ã€ŠGreat Demon Kingã€‹


 prologue

    ¡°You¡¯re incredibly lucky; aside from astronauts, you¡¯re the first person to tour the moon without spending a cent!¡±

    An old man with facial features hooked like an eagle¡¯s wore green robes that gave off sinister vibes. He smiled ominously as he looked at a young man enclosed in a thin, flimsy shell of purple light.

    The youth looked to be in his twenties and wore flowery boxers. His lower body was of average build with a thinly built upper body, and he wore a disdaining expression as he peered around anxiously within the shell.

    ¡°Enough is enough, you old fart. What do you want now that you¡¯ve brought me here?¡±

    Han Shuo was filled with anger. He was just about to enjoy a cold, refreshing shower on this hot summer day when a white light shed before his eyes. A weird, old man appeared in front of him before Han Shuo had fully undressed. The old man merely said, ¡°The date of birth matches,¡± grabbed Han Shuo and jumped out the tenth story window with him, scaring Han Shuo silly.

    When Han Shuo hade to, he suddenly realized it was gloomy, barren and deste around him. The ground was pockmarked like a severe burn victim¡¯s. That was when he was notified that he was on the moon.

    Oddly enough, Han Shuo and that weird man couldmunicate easily, possibly due to that weird purple shell. What was stranger was that Han Shuo had no fear of suffocation, as there was enough oxygen within the shell.

    ¡°I will battle with three people in a moment in search of smashing the rules of heaven and earth. This will allow me to ascend to the apex of evil ¨C the omen realm. Alone, these three fellows present no challenge to me. But I¡¯m not sure what will happen if they join their forces.

    To cover all my bases, I grabbed someone with the same birthdate as me ¨C you. If I am so unlucky as to fall in battle, then I can call upon the most mysterious magic of them all and nt my consciousness within your body. I can thene back to life and use your body to revive myself!¡± Chu Cang Lan said evenly as he stared at Han Shuo, his tone belied by a hint of danger in his bloodshot eyes.

    ¡°Eh... when you were talking about nning your consciousness in my body, then... what will happen to me?¡± Han Shuo was extremely confused and hadn¡¯t caught most of what Chu Cang Lan said, but he still instinctively seized on the critical fact and asked the important question.

    Chu Cang Lan paused and cackled matter of factly, ¡°Your body will be mine and you will be dead of course!¡±

    ¡°@#$#@(....¡±

    Han Shuo was incredibly pissed off and started cussing vigorously, despite the fact that he was at the mercy of someone else. His string of curse words touched upon eighteen generations of Chu Cang Lan¡¯s ancestors and greeted his family in different ways.

    ¡°Use thisst opportunity and get it out of your system, brat! I would have spared your life had I won, but now I¡¯ve decided that even if I win, I¡¯m still going to send you down to hell!¡± Chu Cang Lan had originally kept hisposure in the face of Han Shuo¡¯s non-stop cussing, but his face darkened upon seeing that Han Shuo hadn¡¯t let up after half an hour, and was, in fact, bing even nastier.

    This abruptly stopped Han Shuo in his tracks. He started banging against the side of the thin purple shell with both fists after a moment and started wailing, ¡°Hero¡ª, savior¡ª, I was wrong, spare my life! What you¡¯re doing is illegal, the authorities wille after you. Technology is quite advanced now, and even escaping to the moon won¡¯t do you any good!¡±

    ¡°Demon practitioners are straightforward and are never concerned with thew. I, Chu Cang Lan, have roamed the earth for many years and have killed more people than you have ever met. I am still standing here, perfectly fine!¡±

    Chu Cang Lan said lowly. Something in his face suddenly changed as he looked ahead of him to the left, and he murmured, ¡°Finally!¡±

    Han Shuo and his purple shell rose up and flew far away when Chu Cang Lan pointed his right finger. After bouncing a few times, he finally came to a stop in a shallow depression, upon which Han Shuo realized he could no longer move and his lips made no noise. Apart from being able to hear, blink, and think, he could do nothing else within the confines of the purple shell.

    ¡°The three of you arete. I hope everyone can bring their best game to our battle today, and will not hate me if you die!¡±

    ¡°Praise Buddha.¡± ¡°Almighty Heavenly One.¡±

    .......

    Although Han Shuo could not move, he could still hear a few words from his position, perhaps due to the purple shell. However, he couldn¡¯t make out anything after hearing ¡°Praise Buddha¡± and ¡°Almighty Heavenly One¡±. He came to the conclusion that a monk and a Taoist priest had showed up, because that was what monks and Taoist priests always opened with on TV.

    ording to what Chu Cang Lan had said, Han Shuo was done for whether the former won or lost.

    Han Shuo was born in YZ city, and had managed to get into a bottom tier college after high school. He hadn¡¯t interviewed for jobs after graduation like his peers did, but rather messed around randomly on the inte. He had created websites and opened small online stores, but never earned much money from it. He was an otaku from head to toe, and one with no future potential at that.

    His mind had be filled with evil thoughts the more time he spent online. Because he had spent his days at home, and society was well developed, he had been self-aware enough to not actually act on his thoughts. It¡¯s not like his parents were multimillionaires or high ranking officials either.

    A twenty something year old with no aplishments to date. His parents had attempted to introduce him to someone before, but the other had looked down on Han Shuo for being undependable because he didn¡¯t have a real job. Needless to say, it hadn¡¯t worked out.

    He¡¯d sumbed to parental pressuretely, and had been preparing to submit resumes and find a real job. But who knew this would happen before he had a chance to turn his life around?

    Han Shuo¡¯s brain moved sluggishly as he thought that he was about to die. For the first time in his life, he felt that his life had been a waste. Not only was his career nonexistent, he had never done anything notable and hell, he was still a virgin!

    ¡°Sigh, I¡¯m so damned unlucky. Just when I was about to start over again. Why do I not get a chance? If I don¡¯t die this time, I swear I will act on all my evil thoughts. I will not be looked down upon, and will never be too afraid to act. Never ever...¡±

    The only thing that he could move now were his thoughts, so Han Shuo could do nothing but think wildly. The more he reflected, the more he regretted and despaired...

    An earth-shattering explosion suddenly sounded, apanied by Chu Cang Lan¡¯s egoisticalugh.

    But after a while, he suddenly yelled, ¡°Treacherous!¡± and was engulfed in another series of explosions that rocked the heavens. Therge tremors shook even Han Shuo¡¯s position; it was as if the earth was copsing. The disturbances were apanied by a loud yell, ¡°Chu Cang Lan, you are dead this time!¡±

    ¡°Eh! This is the demonic technique of body stealing! He¡¯s attempting to use a demonic technique, there must be a demon seed nearby!¡±

    ¡°Praise Buddha, for the good of all those beneath heaven, I will not let him seed even if I die. Praise Buddha, Chant of Deste Destruction!¡±

    ¡°Monk, no....¡±

    Another series of violent detonations ensued, and then a ck ray swiftly shot towards Han Shuo. It was as fast as a shooting star, and contained a vague something that was writhing inside, like an unholy liquid.

    ¡°In praise, in praise. Master Yuan Kong sacrificed himself to terminate the demonic technique. We can rest easy. Chu Cang Lan will never again be able to threaten the world of justice!¡±

    The ck light surged into the purple shell after Han Shuo heard thest sentence and something foreign seemed to invade his brain. A loud st caused extreme pain as it felt like all his organs had simultaneously exploded, and then he knew no more.

 Chapter 1: From the depths of the grave

    Chapter 1: From the depths of the grave

    Han Shuo slowly opened his sore eyes after some time. His whole body ached, particrly his head. It felt as if he had a severe migraine and had had random things crammed into his brain.

    Looking around, there were piles of eerily white bones messily scattered around the gloom. There was also strange ck matter further inside the room that wafted a nauseous smell.

    ¡°Ah. So I¡¯m really dead. This must be purgatory.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart turned to cold ashes when he realized he¡¯d died at such a young age. Damn, he was unlucky! His past life had been a waste, better hurry and reincarnate to ensure his next life would turn out differently.

    Han Shuo¡¯s head started aching fiercely at the moment. After he clutched his head and wailed in pain for a while, he felt that he had learned many new things.

    ¡°Bryan... Bryan... Who is Bryan?¡±

    Half an hourter...

    Han Shuo was dumbfounded. He thought that reincarnation into another¡¯s body was the stuff of movies and dramas; how could it have happened to himself? And to take it one step further, he had reincarnated into a foreigner¡¯s body. Had that old fart Chu Cang Lan made a mistake with his magic?

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes had slowly adjusted to the darkness by now. He loosened his limbs and brought his right arm in front of his eyes. The ck mole near his wrist was gone, and in its ce were long, ominous scars crawling like worms up his arms. He shuddered, a cold feeling gripping his insides.

    This body really wasn¡¯t his. A gobsmacked Han Shuo realized he had really taken over someone else¡¯s body...

    Although Bryan was already dead, Han Shuo knew Bryan¡¯s past for some reason. Han Shuo even knew that he had not reincarnated to the US or Ennd, or any of the western countries. He was in a strange world named the Profound Continent, in an unfamiliar country called the Lancelot Empire. This was a strangend with swords and sorcery, one in which alien races ran rampant.

    Bryan¡¯s parents had passed away when he was young, and he was only ten years old when his uncles had sold him to a ve dealer. The ve dealer had sold Bryan in turn to the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, and his life had been dark ever since.

    Bryan had died when he was sixteen. He had been assigned to the weakest department within the Babylon Academy ¨C necromancy.

    In those 6 years, Bryan¡¯s job was to assist the students of the necromancy major, cleaning up the skeletons, corpses and other trash after a failed magical experiment. Aside from that, he was also in charge of random administrative tasks such as making tea, serving water, sweeping the floor and killing bugs.

    And another thing, students majoring in necromancy would often use him as target practice to test the battle abilities of theirtest experimental skeletons or wraiths, or try out necromancy magics directly on him.

    The weak and cowardly Bryan had suffered through a living hell in the past six years. His body was covered with countless scars and bruises. Necromancy students would practice on Bryan whenever they lost a magic battle against the other majors, even if he was eating indigestible food orpleting one of his endless tasks.

    A 16 year old youth, six years of torment. How cruel was this for a child?

    Bryan constantly thought ofmitting suicide. However, in his cowardice, he could not even find the courage to kill himself. And so he silently endured six years of torture.

    Finally, on the previous day, a little witch called Lisa summoned a wraith and invaded his soul ¡ª killing him. Bryan felt no pain upon death, just the sad joy of release.

    After moving corpses and broken skeleton bones for 6 years, another ve threw Bryan onto the same trash heap, the grave that he had constantly dumped trash into.

    Han Shuo had felt his life was dark enough already, but whenpared to Bryan, Han Shuo teared up a little. For the first time, he felt that he had lived a decent life.

    Now that he understood what Bryan had gone through, Han Shuo¡¯s voice choked up as he sighed, ¡°How could such an insane, cowardly youth like you exist in this world? Bryan, what can I do for you now that I¡¯ve upied your body?¡±

    Han Shuo suddenly sensed threads of what seemed like liquid in his body. His head ached at the same time as some memories abruptly surfaced. Threads of liquid slowly circted his body as Han Shuo became lost in his train of thought. Much more knowledge had filled his mind, courtesy of that old fart Chu Cang Lan.

    There were nine different levels in demonic magic, respectively known as the solid realm, the open passages realm, the molded spirit realm, the true demon realm, the bloodsucking realm, the separate demon realm, the carnal realm, the nine changes realm and the omen realm. Demonic practitioners could do as they wish and kill who they wanted,pletely disregarding all morals and ethics in the pursuit of absolute power.

    Once a practitioner became a demon, he would have the abilities to move mountains and see all.

    After sitting a while longer, Han Shuo felt that he had learned many things which were previously unthinkable. Of one thing he was certain, something had gone wrong with Chu Cang Lan¡¯sst piece of magic. His own soul had disappeared, but had left all his knowledge and memories of magic to Han Shuo.

    The thread of liquid moving in his body was the fundamental and incredibly vital magical yuan ¨C the foundation for training one¡¯s magical force. ording to Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories, a demonic practitioner would have to spend at least three to five years to sessfully cultivate magical yuan. Han Shuo had done nothing and knew nothing, yet he had that sliver of magical yuan floating around his body. Although it was pitifully weak, he knew that it truly was magical yuan.

    Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts turned to the crazy old Chu Cang Lan. He¡¯d wanted to use Han Shuo as a scapegoat, but had ended up sending him to a strange time and ce instead. All that random knowledge of how to train one¡¯s magical force must have been left behind by that Chu Cang Lan.

    Although Han Shuo had learned a bit about this strange world thanks to Bryan, his knowledge was greatly limited, as Bryan was just Babylon Academy¡¯s lowly drudge. Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts started racing as he considered the life ahead of him.

    Bryan was dead, and Han Shuo was upying his body. Han Shuo was now Bryan, and Bryan had been sold to a magical force school ¨C this was an eternal identity brand. This strange world had cruel and harsh punishments for runaway ves, so Han Shuo could not run. It was possible that he would not make it out and regardless, he didn¡¯t even have a single copper coin on him.

    After careful consideration, Han Shuo decided to return to the academy. Only there could he change his position as a ve and do something for the pitiful Bryan.

    Han Shuo ached all over (Bryan had had a lot of old injuries before his death). Pain shot through his body as he attempted to stand up, so he hastily sat down after crying out, ¡°Ow!¡±

    Han Shuo felt no goodwill towards the Chu Cang Lan, who had forcibly kidnapped him here. Han Shuo knew nothing of Chu Cang Lan¡¯s life or world, just that through thetter¡¯s memories, one could strengthen his own body by training his magical force. With some advancement, one could travel in a blink of an eye or move mountains and shift oceans.

    Although Han Shuo thought Chu Cang Lan was a bit off his rocker, Han Shuo was convinced of the legitimacy of his memories due to the fact that Chu Chan Lan had flown the two of them directly to the moon.

    Feeling that he had nothing to lose, Han Shuo recalled theplex incantations needed to train his magical force. He concentrated ording to the solid realm¡¯s first principle and sought to control that weak hint of magical yuan.

    When he had built up his concentration and attempted to control the magical yuan ording to solid realm¡¯sws, the magical yuan did exactly as it was told, just like Chu Cang Lan said.

    Secretly delighted, Han Shuo thought that despite Chu Cang Lan¡¯s entricities, the old man¡¯s memories were useful. He started meditating again and began to cycle the magical yuan around his body ording to the solid realm¡¯sw.

    Han Shuo only came to himself when his stomach started rumbling. He had no idea how long he¡¯d meditated, just that his body¡¯s pains had greatly receded and he had gained some new strength. He had seen results after only meditating for a short while. That old fart Chu Cang Lan had trained for who knew how long; no wonder he even dared to go to the moon. Han Shuo could only imagine how domineering the old fart had been when he was alive.

    Han Shuo noticed something odd when he took a break from training ¨C that sliver of magical yuan no longer orbited ording to the solid realm¡¯sw, but was actually circting through the skin, muscles, bones and limbs of his entire body.

    The aim of the solid realm was improvement of the physical body, an enhancement of muscles, skin and bone. Apart from slowly building up magical yuan in the solid realm, some fanatics would harm themselves in order to simultaneously build up their bodies and magical yuan. Simultaneous training yielded the fastest results.

    ¡°This method of training is basically a form of self-muttion! Well, given that Bryan has always done simr things, maybe my progress in the solid realm will be faster when I return to the academy. Maybe it¡¯s not so bad being this Bryan!¡±

    Han Shuo reflected with appreciation and nned to immediately leave this ce. He suddenly thought that it was really stupid of him to have stayed so long in the stink of the tomb; he could bear it no longer.

    A faint light emitted from the top. ording to Bryan¡¯s memories, Han Shuo knew that there was arge cavern above him in which broken skeletons and corpses were thrown in. He ached all over when he stood up, covered with scars. Six years of torment had long since worn down Bryan¡¯s body, not to mention his poor diet. As a result, he was malnourished and thin, and only one meter and sixty some centimeters.

    Han Shuo stood on some moss and struggled to pull his weak body up. After a while and five or six falls, he finally emerged from the tomb. Han Shuo felt a deep joy to be alive again upon seeing the moon¡¯s beams illuminating the earth and cascading across the cemetery.

    Reassured by the magical yuan still circting through his body, Han Shuo thought positively that what hadn¡¯t killed him made him stronger. And it wasn¡¯t like he was without a hidden card. That Chu Cang Lan had left behind secret methods of training that could prove of some use, and help Han Shuo achieve dreams that he had never dared to dream before.

    However, Han Shuo had no idea that the magical yuan Chu Cang Lan had left him would not only help him train, but was also a seed. This seed would change his thoughts as it changed his body. His mind was filled with evil thoughts before, but he hadn¡¯t dared act upon them. The seed could prove to be his undoing, as it would prod Han Shuo into losing control of his own self.

 Chapter 2: The Uncultured are Scary

    Chapter 2: The Uncultured are Scary

    The Babylon Academy of Magic and Force owned the mostnd in Lancelot Empire, and held the highest reputation within the empire. It was also one of the most important training institutions for the empire¡¯s mages and knights.

    The academy was further divided into several departments, which consisted of light, dark, fire, water, wind, earth, thunder, summoning, and space. Each department had its own independent ssroom building, library,boratory, training field, and living district as if they were small cities.

    Bryan was an errand ve for the necromancy major, which was a subcategory of the department of dark magic. Because necromancy majors had to work with skeletons, zombies, and the like, as well as the fact that this major had fallen off the radar for many years, it was not only the most unpopr major, but also the weakest. Even other department of dark magic students scoffed at the necromancy majors and didn¡¯t deign to form teams with necromancy students.

    Bryan had belonged to the weakest and most despised major in his six years of running errands for the academy. Adding onto that, his special tasks of transporting corpses and skeletons... he had been subjected to no end of eye rolls and cold shoulders. Every day was a living hell for him.

    Han Shuo followed Bryan¡¯s memories and arrived at a small path in the mountains located at the back of the academy. He entered through a small gate reserved especially for errand ves returning in the dead of night.

    Other students had long since gone to sleep, because it was midnight. Since Han Shuo was taking a secluded path, he didn¡¯t meet anyone on his way back. He observed his surroundings along the way and noted that the architectural style of Babylon Academy was simr to some of the western European countries back on Earth.

    He finally made his way back to the necromancy major¡¯s designated area with some effort. Bryan lived in a warehouse, a ce befitting his position.

    The warehouse was filled with random items, with the majority being discarded crap or ingredients left over from experiments.

    Most of these items awaited Bryan¡¯s organization and disposal. Necromancy students would often toss their unwanteds in through the warehouse window for Bryan to take care of.

    The warehouse was not very big to begin with. Excluding all the random crap, the only other thing present was a small wooden bed. Even this bed would sometimes covered by a mountain of trash, as the students never paid attention to where they chucked their unwanted items.

    The first thing Bryan did whenever he finished his workte at the night was to clean up the trash that was on his bed. He would have to dispose of them before anyone woke up the next morning and then turned his attention to the others.

    When Han Shuo took in his quarters, which resembled more of a garbage dump than anything, his eyes misted up and he felt deep pangs of sympathy for the unfortunate youth. How could he have survived those six years!

    The air in the warehouse was foul beyond belief, even opening the windows had very little effect, as the smell was exuded by the mountain of trash. There were more items piled up on the small bed. It seemed that some had continued the habit of dumping trash here even after Bryan¡¯s death.

    As Han Shuo shuffled his feet, he felt that even taking a few steps was arduous task (the ground was covered with abandoned litter). He finally reached the bed and was about to clean it off, just like Bryan always did.

    But, Han Shuo was not Bryan. When he was halfway through, Han Shuo felt a burst of rage. At first, this anger was only halfhearted, but the magical yuan within his body reacted to the anger and started moving rapidly, feeding his rage.

    Finally, Han Shuo abruptly stopped his movements and fiercely denounced, ¡°I¡¯m not Bryan! I will not stand for this! Bryan oh Bryan, since I¡¯ve upied your body, let me help you punish that Lisa!¡±

    Han Shuo was unaware that ording to his original personality, he would never have impulsively acted on his thoughts, even if he¡¯d wanted to. The him of yesteryear only had the will to think evil thoughts, butcked the courage to take action.

    He strode out from the warehouse and turned towards the female living quarters. In the silence of the night, he stealthily made his way towards the living district. Bryan had often cleaned here and was thus quite familiar with the area. Of course, he also knew where Lisa lived.

    The necromancy major had much fewer students than the other majors, and thus every female student had her own room. Each room was spacious inside and had all the necessities they needed. This was heavenpared to Bryan¡¯s house of trash.

    Lisa lived on the second floor, and Han Shuo could not gain admittance at night. Good thing there was arge tree next to her window. He ttened his body and scampered up the trunk like a skinny monkey. He could peer into her window if he stood on his tiptoes.

    Han Shuo was secretly delighted when he saw that the window was open. He propped himself up and peeked in. The little witch Lisa had decorated her room in pink and it actually looked quite cute, especially with the furry toys hanging on the wall above the table.

    A faint perfumed scent wafted into Han Shuo¡¯s nose, causing it to wrinkle. He had not anticipated that the cold hearted Lisa could decorate her room so cutely.

    He couldn¡¯t hope to best her in a fight, and he knew that. He took a closer look and noticed pink gauze bed curtains in one corner of the room ¨C that should be Lisa¡¯s bed.

    He withdrew a small bottle from his bag and smeared some blood (typically used in experiments) around the edges of his eyes and mouth. He mussed up his brown hair after checking his face in a broken mirror (that Bryan had picked up). When he looked into the mirror again, a terrifying face covered with bloodstains looked back out.

    ¡°Heh heh, if I can¡¯t beat you, then I¡¯m going to scare the crap out of you!¡±

    Han Shuo was quite satisfied with his current makeup and nodded with a low cackle. When everything was ready, he stepped on a branch and swung himself close to Lisa¡¯s window, swaying back and forth with the branch. He reached out his bone thin hand and knocked on Lisa¡¯s window.

    Don... Don...

    Lisa was fast asleep when she was woken up by the ¡°don don¡± soundsing from the window. She groggily opened the pink gauze curtains and walked out barefoot.

    Little feet as white as jade padded over a carpet that was also pink. Under the peaceful rays of the moon, the five pink toes on each foot were actually quite adorable.

    Lisa was a bit younger than Bryan, and was the youngdy of a noble household. Disregarding what she had done to Bryan, Lisa was quite a beauty with a head full of long, soft, blond hair, a height of 162 cm that made her just a tad taller than Bryan, delicately arched eyebrows, an elegantly long nose, and endearing red lips.

    Dressed in pink pajamas, Lisa didn¡¯t seem fully awake. After she walked out from the pink bed, she instinctively looked over at the source of the sound.

    A familiar face covered in blood, petrifying traces of blood dripping from the eyes and nose, and a thin body swaying back and forth at the window, stared emptily back at her with no sign of life.

    ¡°Wahhhhh....¡±

    A horrorstruck scream filled the hallways of the female living district.

    Han Shuo inwardly grinned evilly and thought, I¡¯m going to scare you unconscious this time, if not scare you to death. His expression grew more and more chilling as his thoughts grew. After a while of staring emptily ahead, he rolled his eyes backwards and swayed even more strongly.

    He could no longer see Lisa because he¡¯d rolled his eyes back. There was a suddenck of sound from Lisa after that initial horrorstruck scream and continued through Han Shuo¡¯s gradual facial progression.

    She probably fainted. Han Shuo thought as sounds of the other necromancy major girls¡¯ cussing floated within hearing. Better to leave while he could, otherwise he¡¯d be in for a world of hurt if he was caught.

    An incredible pain spread from the bridge of his nose just as he was about to reverse his eye roll. Another intense pain appeared from the top of his head, which caused him to fall off the tree. The fall awoke all his aches and pains and made him see stars.

    Attacks fell on him like rain shortly thereafter, with a voice yelling as the hitsnded, ¡°Bryan, looks like you finally grew a backbone! You escaped deathst time, but your brain rotted instead! I major in necromancy and spend my days with skeletons and corpses. You idiot tried to scare me by pretending to be a corpse; I have to really give it to you. Would the future great mage Lisa be unable to determine if a body even has a soul?!¡±

    Although his body hurt, his heart was in even greater pain. That dumb Bryan spent six years as an errand ve for the necromancy major, but hadn¡¯t even picked up this bit ofmon sense. This was hardly the oue he expected for the first time he¡¯d gathered up his courage to do something bad.

    Necromancy? This wondrous necromancy could determine even this? There was definitely some value in it. It looks like I have a lot to learn if I¡¯m to survive in this world, otherwise the unfortunate events from today will most likely happen again.

    As the agony on his body increased, Han Shuo continued to think rapidly while howling in pain. The magic of Chu Cang Lan¡¯s dark path epassed the word ¡°demon¡±, whereas necromancy didn¡¯t sound like a great path either. What if he were to train in both of these, would there be conflict between the two or would they ¨C be stronger together?

 Chapter 3: From Idiot to Crazy

    Chapter 3: From Idiot to Crazy

    Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts spun madly as the little witch, Lisa, beat him hysterically, adding to the aches and pains he already felt all over his body. Poor Han Shuo was already quite weak to begin with. That initial blow to his nose had caused tears to leak out, and the resulting fall from the tree made him dizzy with pain. He could only curl into a tight ball on the ground and present a vulnerable target for Lisa¡¯s attentions ¡ª his butt.

    Han Shuo realized something marvelous after a while. That little bit of magical yuan began to circte past his butt and relieved some of the pain. When Lisa pulverized his butt, it didn¡¯t hurt as much, thanks to the magical yuan.

    In fact, any ce that cried out in pain was greatly relieved after the magical yuan passed through it, and it actually felt a bit...fortable.

    Han Shuo was taken aback and inwardly thought, the solid realm in demonic magic is seriously masochistic! The magic yuan travelled to his right buttcheek as Lisa¡¯s foot came smashing down andnded right where the magical yuan happened to be.

    ¡°Ah!¡± ¡°Wah!¡±

    A high pitched yell and a low grunt sounded from Han Shuo and Lisa respectively. Lisa suddenly felt that Han Shuo¡¯s right buttcheek was harder than iron. Her foot cramped up immediately and she hopped around yelling.

    On the other hand, Han Shuo felt that it had only not hurt when Lisa kicked him, but it felt exceedinglyfortable. This was in stark contrast to the pain that he was feeling all over and had led to his involuntary yell. Truth be old, his yell had sounded slightly obscene ¡ª as if...

    ¡°Bryan, did you put rocks in your pants, you idiot?¡±

    Lisained loudly as she massaged her delicate foot. Several other necromancy major girls suddenly appeared around Han Shuo and Lisa, each staring at him with sleepy, cold eyes.

    His nose had stopped hurting and his tears were finally under control. Han Shuo shook himself and sat up on the grass. When he looked around, he discovered the angry stares from apprentices Amy and Athena, as well as novice mage Be and of course, Lisa.

    The thrum of danger was in the air...

    Amy, Athena, and Be paled inparison when they stood next to Lisa. They were all sixteen or seventeen years old, but were not very pretty. They were also in extremely bad moods as their beauty sleep had been interrupted.

    ¡°Idiot, what are you looking at! Why are there rocks in your pants! You gave my beautiful foot a huge bruise! Ooh ooh.. it hurts.¡±

    Lisa put her hands on her hips and spoke arrogantly while staring coldly at Han Shuo. The effect was somewhat spoiled, as she had to hop around on her left foot.

    ¡°Idiot heh...¡± Han Shuo cackled inside and put on an innocent expression. He gave a dumb sounding ¡°heh, heh¡± after he pulled himself up with some difficulty and said, ¡°Nuh uh, I don¡¯t have any rocks in my pants!¡±

    He turned around so his butt was facing the four necromancy major girls and started undoing his pants as he spoke. Four panicked screams split the air before he¡¯d pulled his pants down, and the frantic sound of running feet followed shortly thereafter.

    ¡°Bryan, you idiot! Pull your pants up immediately or I¡¯m going to kill you!¡± Lisa yelled hurriedly, but one could hear a note of panic in her voice.

    ¡°Oh.¡± Han Shuo answered dumbly, but continued to chuckle sinisterly on the inside. A bunch of naive little daisies, see how I¡¯m going to take care of you.

    After he put his pants back on. Lisa took a close look at Han Shuo. As the four girls now stood in front of him again, she said fiercely, ¡°I can forget the fact that you hid rocks in your pants, but what were you nning to do on the tree outside my window in the dead of night?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh,¡± came two dumb soundingughs in response to her question. Han Shuo pointed at a ragged bag on one of the tree¡¯s branches. ¡°To get that down!¡±

    ¡°Why are you chasing after a trash bag in the middle ¨C of ¨C the ¨C night?!¡± Lisa yelled angrily as she thought, about to pop from anger.

    At the moment, novice mage Be sighed lightly and said to Lisa, ¡°Hey Lisa, can¡¯t you see that Bryan has gone mad? Looks like instead of killing him, your ghoul drove him insane instead. What¡¯s the point of getting mad at a crazy person?¡±

    Athena seemed to be quite sleepy as she covered a yawn, ¡°Oh... there¡¯s still ss tomorrow. I¡¯m going back to bed, senior Lisa you can handle this!¡±

    Amy appeared to pity Han Shuo as she minutely shook her head, sighing softly after staring at him briefly. She didn¡¯t say much and turned to leave like Be.

    If Han Shuo hadn¡¯t acted like the vige idiot, he would¡¯ve faced the wrath of these three girls, in addition to Lisa¡¯s, but since he had ¡°lost his mind¡±, the three girls naturally wouldn¡¯t bother with a madman. Thus, they left him alone and returned to their warm beds.

    When the three female students left, it was only Lisa and Han Shuo again. Lisa red ferociously at Han Shuo and bit off her words, ¡°Go back to your business, I¡¯lle find you in two days. I¡¯m tired today; if you dare disturb my sleep again, I¡¯ll drive you crazy with magic for a second time, not just beat you ck and blue!¡±

    Lisa delivered a final re after she finished and left, walking a bit unnaturally. A soft exmation of ¡°Ouch, this hurts! I can¡¯t believe that idiot put rocks in his pants, he was definitely driven crazy by my ghoul¡± floated out when she walked through the door.

    Silence descended again as Lisa went in. Han Shuo felt a bted shiver of apprehension as he watched her walk in. Good thing this Lisa hadn¡¯t used necromancy magic, otherwise with her rank as a novice mage, another ghoul would have actually driven him crazy.

    The party was over and Han Shuo took his leave as well. He cursed under his breath as he tiredly dragged his frail, battered body back to the warehouse.

    After he returned to his warehouse, he haphazardly swept all the trash off his bed and fell into a deep sleep.

    The next day.

    Han Shuo was sleeping soundly when the warehouse door was suddenly pushed open and a loud ¡°Wah...¡± sounded.

    Han Shuo opened his sleepy eyes and twisted his body to see a short fatty wearing an errand boy¡¯s uniform . He had short blond hair, a dark green left eye, and was pointing at Han Shuo with an aghast expression, ¡°You... You...¡± He couldn¡¯t finish his sentences.

    ¡°Oh, it¡¯s Jack. What are you doing in my room?¡±

    Little fatty Jack was the same age as Bryan. Jack was one of the few people in the necromancy major that treated Bryan nicely, possibly due to a sense of shared misery. Little fatty Jack came from a destitute family and his dad had sent Jack to the Babylon Academy of Magical Force two years ago to earn a few silvers every month.

    Although Jack was an errand boy like Bryan, he had not been sold to Babylon Academy. He was a free person, unlike Bryan, who had been sold to the school by ve dealers.

    Although Jack was also an errand boy and victim of constant bullying, the necromancy students did not treat him like they treated Bryan, simply because Jack was not a ve. They might hit and yell at him, and even conduct some small experiments on him, but they would never torment him to death like they would a ve.

    Bryan had actually always envied little fatty Jack because Jack could eat his fill at every meal and not be subject to inhumane bullying. As for little fatty Jack, it was only with Bryan that Jack was able to find that littlest bit of self confidence, so the two got along fabulously.

    ¡°Hoo... hoo... Scared me to death. Bryan, you¡¯re not dead, that¡¯s wonderful!¡±

    ¡°What bloody wonderful, I¡¯m starving. Jack do you have anything to eat? Give it to me if you do, I¡¯ll return itter!¡±

    Han Shuo realized little fatty Jack did not respond after he¡¯d stopped speaking, and was in fact staring at him dumbfoundedly. Two small, yellow, bean-like eyes stared out curiously from fleshy face. Han Shuo frowned and asked impatiently, ¡°What, am I that good looking?¡±

    Jack started and looked even more strangely at Han Shuo, ¡°You¡¯ve never asked me for food in all these years. You would only eat if I gave you food. You¡¯ve also never talked to me like that. Bryan, you¡¯re a little different!¡±

    A bit startled, Han Shuo reflected that Lisa and co. had been unable to see what was different about him, but Jack, that silly fatty, had sussed it out with Han Shuo¡¯s first sentence.

    Han Shuo rummaged through Bryan¡¯s memories after a while, and discovered that Bryan basically never spoke to the necromancy students. He did whatever people told him to do with no interaction whatsoever, but Bryan and Jack would asionally talk to each other. Granted, most of the time it was Jack talking and Bryan listening. The two had spent a long time together, no wonder Jack had quickly discovered the differences.

    Han Shuo glossed over the moment with a smile and said, ¡°I was hit by Lisa¡¯s ghoul and almost died. After that incident, I felt that the way I was living before was wrong and wanted to make a change.¡±

    Jack breathed a sigh of relief at Han Shuo¡¯s exnation and nodded, ¡°I see. I thought the ghoul hit you and turned you into an idiot!¡±

    Han Shuo, ¡°.....¡±

    ¡°Here, this is some ck bread that I¡¯ve stashed away. Go ahead and eat it. It¡¯s such a good thing that you didn¡¯t die. When everyone thought you were dead, they gave me your tasks because we haven¡¯t found a new errand boy yet. Because of that I¡¯ve had toe here super early this morning. I was in a rush and identally bumped into Bach. He beat me up, I even have a bruise on my left eye!¡±

    Little fatty Jack ryed happily as he passed a piece of gray bread to Han Shuo. It would seem that he was delighted to not have to do Bryan¡¯s work.

    Han Shuo violently bit off a piece of bread as he looked at the green bruise circling Jack¡¯s left eye. He spoke furiously, ¡°Bach hit you again. He¡¯s too full of himself. Come, let¡¯s go get revenge!¡±

    Jack hurriedly jumped up in fright and restrained Han Shuo using his body weight. He eximed, ¡°Bryan, are you crazy? Aren¡¯t we used to this by now? Bach is an apprentice in necromancy! It¡¯s not the first time we¡¯ve been beat up, it¡¯s good enough when he leaves us alone. What revenge can we get?¡±

    Han Shuoughed coldly, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ve got my ways. Yes, I am crazy, by now all of the necromancy students know I¡¯m crazy. Yeah I¡¯m damn crazy, who am I afraid of!¡±

    Han Shuo bellowed as he dragged Jack proudly out of the warehouse. The magical yuan within his body seemed to churn faster!

 Chapter 4: Chest as Flat as Bread

    Chapter 4: Chest as t as Bread

    On a whole, necromancy major students tended to wake up early in the morning and would rush to get ready, hurrying to the department of dark magic¡¯s ssroom building. Jack was about to lose it and waspletely unwilling to participate, but his fears dissipated when he listened to Han Shuo¡¯s n. In the end, Jack finally agreed, as he remembered that Han Shuo was doing this for him. After all, was he less of a man than Bryan?

    Many statues of Babylon Academy valedictorians and notables were erected on the sides of a path made of rocks. These faithfully reproduced statues wererger than life and were the pride of the academy.

    One of Bryan¡¯s tasks was to dust these statues everyday. He had been doing this since he was ten, and had to use a smalldder when he was shorter. Only after thepletion of this arduous task was he allowed to take a break for food.

    As they worked the dust out of the crevices of a bushy-mustached statue of an archmage, Han Shuo turned to Jack and said, ¡°I say Jack, wouldn¡¯t it be nice if our statues could be erected here some day?¡±

    ¡°Bryan, don¡¯t be silly. We¡¯re just errand boys! It¡¯s enough that we get a full meal and not get beaten up everyday. How could we possibly be mages? Oh... Bryan, you are definitely different. You would never have had such crazy thoughts before and wouldn¡¯t share such a bad idea!¡±

    ¡°Why not?¡±

    ¡°We have to have the potential and pay a lot of gold coins for tuition to a magic school in order to be a mage. We have to pass through countless levels of training and tests, even kids from noble families need to have lots of potential if they want to be a mage. This is impossible for usmoners. Oh, I forgot. You¡¯re also a ve without freedom, that¡¯s even worse, there¡¯s no hope for you at all!¡±

    ¡°We¡¯re at a magic school right now and don¡¯t even have to pay tuition. Heh heh, this is a huge stroke of luck! If we don¡¯t learn some magic now, in the future, how would we dare say that we¡¯re from the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, don¡¯t act so confident. We¡¯re not students, we¡¯re only errand boys. Eh.. and at least I can leave the school in the future, but you ¡ª you can never leave!¡±

    Jack was absentmindedly wiping the statue of archmage ire, with none of his usual attention to detail and a face full of ambition. Little fatty Jack thought Bryan was being rather odd and thus spoke candidly.

    ¡°Hah, let¡¯s not talk about that. Look, that witch Lisa is walking this way, let¡¯s get back to work!¡± Han Shuo eyed Lisa limping towards them from afar, and thought that at least Bryan had something to show for his six year of running errands for the academy ¡ª he knew the daily routines of some of the people.

    Lisa usually woke upter, and most of the time, slowly plodded to the ssrooms alone. Today was no exception. She was dressed in a ck wizard¡¯s robe today, with her long, soft, blond hair strewn carelessly across her shoulders. It seemed that she hadn¡¯t gotten much sleep the previous night, as she kept yawning as she walked.

    Lisa was quite pretty, but maybe because she hadn¡¯tpletely finished developing yet. Since she was only 16, her chest area was not as well rounded. Rumor had it that Lisa was also very displeased with her t chest and had recently been searching for solutions.

    Han Shuo and Jack surreptitiously watched Lisa approach as they continued to dust off the statue of archmage ire with all seriousness. They muttered to each other as they worked, seemingly oblivious to her presence.

    ¡°No way, Bryan you must have misheard. How could Bach have said that about Lisa?¡±

    The two had been murmuring quietly when Jack suddenly raised his voice and eximed in surprise.

    Lisa had been walking along absentmindedly when she heard someone mention her name. Her attention immediately zeroed in on that statement as she looked warily in front of her.

    All girls wanted to know what people said about them behind their backs and Lisa was no exception. She even went so far as to hide behind another statue, so that the two wouldn¡¯t see her and be too afraid to talk. Her ears perked up as she sneakily snuck nces at the two.

    It was that half-crazy, half-idiot Bryan! Lisa was still mad and wanted to put him in his ce, but first, she wanted to hear what Bach had said about her.

    Han Shuo smiled vacantly and said, ¡°No I didn¡¯t mishear, on their way to ss, Bach was telling the other students that Lisa¡¯s chest was as t as stomped bread!¡±

    Jack had to hold back hisughter with all his might as soon as he heard this. His face grew red and his body kept shaking.

    On the other side of the statue, Lisa¡¯s face darkened with rage. Her pretty eyes shot out res of wrath as her cute lips convulsed and her pearly teeth ground audibly. She trembled with rage for a few seconds and quickly stomped off in a huff towards the ssroom building. She¡¯dpletely forgotten that she¡¯d wanted to put Bryan in his ce.

    Jack could no longer hold in hisughter as he watched Lisa hurry off in the opposite direction, her face purple with anger and out for blood. ¡°Hahahaha....¡± he expelled all his frustrations with an explosive bout ofughter. Heughed as he said, ¡°Bryan, you¡¯re too evil! Even us errand boys know that Bach likes Lisa and that Lisa hates people making fun of her chest. Looking at how she was just now, Bach is totally screwed!¡±

    Han Shuo gave a sinister cackle as he immediately put his brushes away. ¡°Forget about dusting off ire! Let¡¯s go watch the show!¡±

    Little fatty Jack tucked his brushes, with a grand gesture, into the cloth bag at his waist as he took Han Shuo¡¯s advice. Heughed, ¡°Let¡¯s go, I want to see Lisa beat Bach up. Serves him right for hitting me this morning!¡±

    The two necromancy errand boys followed Lisa in high spirits, running swiftly to the ssroom building. The students they passed along the way were puzzled by their behavior, thinking the two cowardly errand boys had woken up on the wrong side of bed that morning.

    At the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, the necromancy major was a subcategory of the department of dark magic. Necromancy students used the same ssrooms as those majoring in dark magic, and studied everyday under the tutge of the teachers.

    One had to admire Lisa¡¯s efficiency, by the time Han Shuo and Jack had gotten there, she had already vented her spleen and was giving Bach a beating.

    ¡°Lisa, even the major¡¯s errand boys know how I feel about you, how could I have possibly said anything bad about you? Who did you hear this from?¡±

    Bach already had a spectacr bruise around his left eye as he ducked a ¡°bone arrow¡± attack. He took advantage of the respite to quickly protest his innocence and looked quite bedraggled indeed.

    Bach had beaten Jack severely when thetter had bumped into him. Bryan had suffered even more at Bach¡¯s hands.

    Bach was the seventeen year old son of a small noble family, but he held the lowest rank of magic apprentice. He was outssed against a higher ranked novice mage, not to mention that he was pulling his blows because he liked Lisa. No wonder he was quickly hit when facing a wrathful Lisa.

    ¡°Huh, that¡¯s none of your business. They didn¡¯t even mean for me to hear them, so it must be true. Since you are so mean, feel my wrath!¡±

    Indeed, Han Shuo and Jack hadn¡¯t ¡°meant for¡± Lisa to hear them. Han Shuo was also half mad and half vige idiot. There was no way someone like that could make up such a lie. He was also an errand ve, he wouldn¡¯t dare to lie!

    Since it had to do with one of Lisa¡¯s taboos, she would never say what she overheard when other people were around. She brought her best efforts to teaching Bach a lesson so that no one would make fun of her again.

    ¡°Souls of the fallen soldiers, heed the dark herald¡¯s call and reveal your existence!¡±

    Lisa raised her slim, white arm towards the sky and chanted an incantation. When she was finished, two starkly-white, skeletal warriors wielding bone knives appeared in front of her. They creakily rushed at Bach with their knives held high when she pointed at him.

    Han Shuo was gobsmacked as he watched on the sidelines. This was the first time he had seen the mysterious necromancy magic in y with his own eyes. His body about to burst in curiosity, he focused his eyes and attention on the action.

    ¡°Lisa¡¯s focus isn¡¯t that bad to be able to summon two skeletal warriors!¡±

    ¡°Huh, the necromancy major is weak as hell to begin with and its students are not united. No wonder necromancy is one of the weakest majors in the academy. What a stain on the department of dark magic!¡±

    ...

    Students from the department of dark magic started chattering after Lisa had summoned the two skeletal warriors. From their conversations, Han Shuo learned that the same magic could be divided into five different levels based on the level of concentration. If a necromancer archmage with great focus used the chant to summon skeletons, he would be able to summon even more skeletal warriors.

    Bach was extremely depressed and inwardly cursed the rumor starter a couple hundred times. If Bach had practiced dark magic incantations and had enough focus, then Han Shuo and Jack wouldn¡¯t be able to enjoy the show they were currently watching.

    The skeletal warriors chased him frantically all over the ce. Bach finally had to use the same magic to summon a small skeleton. One man and one skeleton started fighting against the two other skeletons.

    Other students from the department of dark magicughed loudly when they saw Bach in such a mess. Bach was affected by the jeers and lost his focus, resulting in one of Lisa¡¯s skeletal warriors stomping him in the gut. His face grew purple with pain and he slowly sank to the ground.

    Lisa hurriedly stopped her skeletons when she saw that Bach had been hit and the skeleton was raising its knife to finish the job. She sent the skeletons back to another dimension.

    After all, it wasn¡¯t a fight to the death, and the academy prohibited such fights anyways. Lisa did not dare to really hurt Bach, and the bulk of her anger had been appeased by Bach¡¯s injury.

    Bach stood up and sent his skeleton back to another dimension. He swept his gaze around and saw that in front of him, Han Shuo and Jack were alsoughing loudly at him. Bach was already feeling quite infuriated and so stomped over angrily, cursing, ¡°You two low level errand servants dare tough at me?¡±

    Bach didn¡¯t dare to vent his anger on Lisa, and even less so on his seniors from the department of dark magic around him. He could only vent some of his wrath on the two errand boys, and the sight of themughing at him only set him off even further.

    Lisa had just about satisfied her anger when she saw Bach ignore her and focus on something else. This roused her rage all over again as she chanted coldly, ¡°Oh eternal darkness, grant me the power of death, inflict the pain of the soul on his body. Agony of the Soul!¡±

    A dark cloud of gas formed as Lisa finished and flew towards Bach. The gas kept shifting as it floated through the air and finally materialized as a pulsing ck me.

    Bach¡¯s expression shifted as he turned to see the magical me from the ¡°Agony of the Soul¡± shooting towards him after he heard Lisa chant the incantation. He then suddenly turned and ran towards Han Shuo and Jack as if he¡¯d thought of something. Just as the ¡°Agony of the Soul¡± was about to hit him, he ducked and rolled on the floor.

    Bach¡¯s n worked. The merrilyughing and utterly defenseless Han Shuo watched as Bach suddenly tucked into a roll in front of him and the ¡°Agony of the Soul¡± crashed onto Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes rolled backwards as his head suddenly hurt, and he fell backwards straight to the ground.

 Chapter 5: How Is That Called Stealing?

    Chapter 5: How Is That Called Stealing?

    When Han Shuo woke up, he found himself lying on the small wooden bed in the warehouse, covered in ice cold water. In front of him, little fatty Jack had a wooden pail in one hand and was climbing onto a stool with great effort. He intended to dump the ice cold water right on top of Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was already freezing his butt off as it was a bit chilly that day. He gave a great yell as he saw Jack about to tip the pail over, ¡°Jack, what are you doing?!¡±

    Little fatty Jack was stepping onto a stool that had been trashed. It wasn¡¯t the sturdiest to begin with, and his legs wobbled in surprise when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s yell. His hand jerked, and all the contents of the pail came crashing down on Han Shuo¡¯s head as the pail flew and smashed into Han Shuo¡¯s chest.

    ¡°Ugh... I say Jack, are you trying to kill me?¡±

    Han Shuo started shuddering uncontrobly after the second pail of ice cold water. Not only that, but it hurt like hell when the pail itself hit him. He immediately starting cursing loudly.

    ¡°Sorry Bryan, I thought the first pail wasn¡¯t enough to wake you up. This stool of yours was wobbly to begin with, and I was surprised when you yelled, that¡¯s why my hand slipped and I dumped the water all over you!¡±

    Little fatty Jack was extremely apologetic and started wiping off Han Shuo¡¯s neck with a random rag that he had found on the ground.

    Who knew that it would provoke a scream from Han Shuo like a pig being ughtered? He hastily scrambled away and said, ¡°Uh Jack, that rag in your hand is covered in bone dust that metamorphosed during necromancy experiments. It feels like little needles are prickling me, are you trying to stab me to death?¡±

    ¡°Ah.... sorry Bryan, I didn¡¯t mean to, I really didn¡¯t mean to!¡±

    Jack was dismayed as he quickly threw the rag far, far away. He was thankful that there was no bone dust on the side that he had been holding.

    ¡°Achoo... Achoo... ah forget it. Jack why am I here? Didn¡¯t I get hit by Lisa¡¯s Agony of the Soul because that dickhead Bach used me as a scapegoat?¡±

    His neck breaking out in red patches, Han Shuo kept sneezing as he rushed to peel off his sopping wet clothes. He quickly groped for the ck towel that Bryan used and dried himself off.

    ¡°Bryan, you have so many scars over your body!¡±

    Han Shuo took a good look at his new body, for the first time, upon hearing Jack¡¯s words. There wasn¡¯t a single inch of unmarked skin on his body as far as his eyes could see. He heaved an inward sigh and once again felt pity for Bryan¡¯s circumstances.

    ¡°Scars are a man¡¯s memories and medals of honor, what the hell do you know about them. Hurry and tell me, what happened after I fainted?¡±

    ¡°sses happened to start after you passed out from the Agony of the Soul. Lisa said a few words and ran off to ss. I yelled for Uncle Saru and the two of us carried you back!¡±

    ¡°So Uncle Saru had been by... Oh yes, what did Lisa say before she left?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded as he continued to wipe himself off. Uncle Saru was the necromancy major¡¯s oldest errand runner, he was fifty some years old and quite kind to Bryan and Jack. When Bryan had arrived at the academy, Saru had already been an errand runner for more than ten years.

    ¡°Lisa said it was too bad for you. If the Agony of the Soul hadnded on Bach, he would have been fine after suffering for three days since he¡¯s a magic apprentice. But you¡¯re not a necromancy student and have no mental strength at all. You¡¯ll probably suffer for a month. She said you bothered her when she was sleepingst night, and hurt her foot because you put rocks in your pants, so she won¡¯t dismiss the Agony of the Soul!¡±

    ¡°Damnit, how dare Lisa treat me this way! I¡¯ll take care of her one day!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s face darkened as he listened to Jack¡¯s words and started cussing. His actions startled Jack as thetter thought, this isn¡¯t the first time Lisa¡¯s been this way to you, I¡¯ve never seen you do anything to get back at her.

    When Han Shuo was done venting his spleen, he thought briefly, ¡°Bach has mental strength because he¡¯s a magic apprentice. He only has to suffer for three days, and I have to endure this for a month? Heh heh, my potential is great. If I learn some necromancy, maybe I can get better in three days.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, you¡¯re an errand ve, how could you learn magic?¡±

    ¡°Then how do the students learn magic?¡±

    ¡°They first have to meditate and learn to sense the magical elements. When they¡¯ve cultivated their mental strength, then they need to study the knowledge contained within the books of magic and practice the magic incantations. They ask the teacher if they have any questions!¡± Jack said matter of factly, after he thought for a short while.

    ¡°There we go, I can meditate. When I¡¯ve cultivated mental strength, can¡¯t I look within the books of magic to learn the incantations written there?¡±

    ¡°But you don¡¯t have a book of magic?¡±

    At this point in the conversation, Han Shuo had sidled around to Jack and suddenly threw a friendly arm around him, smiling winningly at him, ¡°But I have you, don¡¯t you clean the library?¡±

    Jack was shocked and promptly created some space between the two of them. He said with a panicked expression, ¡°Bryan, you want me to steal books for you?¡±

    ¡°How vulgar! How can that be stealing? I¡¯m just asking you to borrow some books for me. You can put them back when I¡¯m done with them. No one reads those foundational books anyways, who would know? Jack, I¡¯m in dire straits today because I was trying to help you. Now shouldn¡¯t you help me too?¡± Han Shuo said earnestly to little fatty Jack.

    Jack wavered upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, but finally agreed to ¡°borrow¡± magic books for Han Shuo after Han Shuo gave him a puppy-eyed look.

    Later that night, Jack stealthily crept up to Han Shuo and took out copies of ¡°The Foundations of Necromancy¡± and ¡°A Magical Dictionary¡± to hand over to Han Shuo. He exhorted Han Shuo to be careful and cautious at all costs before finally surreptitiously sneaking away.

    As an errand ve, Bryan had no right to learn how to read. However, as an errand ve, who had to do anything and everything in the course of his job, he had picked up quite a few words over the past six years. All of this knowledge had been left to Han Shuo, and he was able to read the words in the two books.

    Han Shuo shut the warehouse door after Jack had left, flipped to the first yellowed page of ¡°The Foundations of Magic¡±, and started reading with every bit of interest.

    Magic was a method ofmunicating with the magical elements of the world by using mental strength. There were four ways to use magic, through incantations, magic scrolls (or objects), hand seals, and magic matrixes.

    Necromancy had once been an extremely prosperous branch of magic. At the height of its poprity, all dark magic had been categorized under necromancy. It was a pity that after its fall from grace, necromancy had be a subcategory of dark magic instead.

    Necromancy was a field of magic that had started by simply controlling souls and skeletons. As it progressed and forebearers continuously experimented, its repertoire of spells had continuously grown. It slowly formed into a school of thought and became the representative of dark magic.

    Mental strength was the foundation of all magic. The only way to cultivate mental strength was to sense the magical elements, through meditation, that regr people could not perceive. One was only considered a magic apprentice if they cultivated mental strength through meditation.

    Thus, the first thing Han Shuo did after studying ¡°The Foundations of Necromancy¡± was to meditate and try to get a grasp on mental strength. However, he came up empty handed after meditating for seven days. There wasn¡¯t a trace of mental strength to be found.

    Han Shuo could only meditate at night during those seven days, he had to be the diligent and bumbling Bryan during the day. He had to continue to perform an errand boy¡¯s daily chores of cleaning, sanitizing, bug killing, and trash dumping, otherwise he would have no ce at the academy.

    Thanks to the Agony of the Soul, Han Shuo¡¯s brain would suddenly spasm with pain a few times every day. He fainted dead away the first two times, but possibly limated after that and managed to stay on his feet.

    Han Shuo¡¯s half mad, half vige idiot reputation also spread during this time. However, although he looked like a blundering madman, he still finished his assigned duties everyday. Thus, Babylon Academy did not kick him out upon seeing that his work was stillpleted.

    As for what the necromancy students thought about Han Shuo¡¯s crazy entricities, they were of one mind. Han Shuo had formed a habit of running errands after working for six years. Although he was a bit crazy, some habits were difficult to break and thus he still finished his duties everyday.

    Except for one thing. Han Shuo would always somehow have a ¡°headache¡± whenever the students approached him for experiments these days. He became even more out of control when his head hurt, and sometimespletely wrecked theb. There was nothing the students could do as they knew that he had been hit by Lisa¡¯s Agony of the Soul, and had gone a bit mental.

    Even now, no one knew why Lisa had given Bach such a beating, but Bach was depressed nheless. He often thrashed Han Shuo on the basis of a flimsy excuse. Bach was a magic apprentice and stronger than Han Shuo, so thetter always ended up in much worse shape, even when he pretended to be crazy and hit back.

    Han Shuo would break out into loud curses every night when he returned to the warehouse. ¡°Bach you scum, just you wait. One day I¡¯ll beat you so bad that even your mom and dad won¡¯t recognize you.¡±

    He¡¯d been thrashed by Bach again today, and thetter had a small skeleton as backup. Han Shuo was naturally not a match for the two, and even now was covered in ck and blue bruises. The difference was, Han Shuo felt that his strength was growing stronger these days, along with his appetite. Whenever he was still hungry after his rations, he would ask Jack for some more food.

    Although it hurt like no other every time Bach beat him up, Han Shou would train ording to the principles of the solid realm when he returned to the warehouse. All his aches and pains would disappear during the night, and he would be in fine spirits the morning after. The next time he got into a fight with Bach, he noticed that Bach¡¯s hits hurt less and less.

    Han Shuo would immediately return to the warehouse after each beating and started training. That little bit of magical yuan within his body unknowingly grew bigger during this time as well.

    It seemed that his body was slowly reforging itself after each cycle of beating and training, and the magical yuan slowly changed from the size of a thumbnail to the mass of a thumb.

    This both excited and scared Han Shuo. He was excited that the magical yuan was growing stronger, and that his body and spirit were improving. He was scared that seemingly because of the magical yuan bing stronger, he found it harder and harder to control his temper. Han Shuo would easilymit actions that he wouldter regret.

    He retrieved ¡°The Foundations of Necromancy¡± from underneath the small, wooden bed and started meditating habitually after a short perusal of the book. He circted the magical yuan randomly throughout his body. ces that had aches and pains were greatly relieved after the magical yuan had travelled past them.

    That sliver of magical yuan slowly traveled from his neck to his brain as Han Shuo was meditating. It was at this moment that a familiar pain started emanating from his brain. Han Shuo knew immediately that Lisa¡¯s Agony of the Soul was about to strike again.

    Suddenly, just as Han Shuo¡¯s brain was hurting, the magical yuan slipped into the center of the pain. This was the first time that the magical yuan had moved into his brain when the Agony of the Soul was also ring up. Han Shuo felt as if a cannon had gone off inside his brain, and fainted again after another round of intense pain.

 Chapter 6: Iâ€™ll Get Her One Day

    Chapter 6: I¡¯ll Get Her One Day

    It was already midnight when Han Shuo woke up. The magical yuan was back to circting in an irregr pattern, but there seemed to be something extra in his brain. Everything seemed much clearer now,pared to before, when he looked around.

    A sudden thought struck Han Shuo and he resettled into meditation. He carefully extended his senses ording to the instructions in ¡°The Foundations of Necromancy¡±, and finally confirmed that because the magical yuan had traveled to his brain when the Agony of the Soul had hit, he had bafflingly trained some mental strength into existence.

    ¡°Hahaha... I am definitely a genius. I meditated and gained some mental strength in such a short amount of time. Heh heh, perhaps it¡¯s time to try out the lowest level of necromancy magic. Let¡¯s see if I can summon a skeletal warrior!¡±

    He hastily hauled out ¡°The Foundations of Necromancy¡± and flipped through the pages. He still couldn¡¯t find the incantation to summon a skeletal warrior after searching for a while. It was only then that Han Shuo realized ¡°The Foundations of Necromancy¡± was a reference for only basic necromancy knowledge, and didn¡¯t contain any incantations or spells.

    Han Shuo furrowed his brow in thought and recalled Lisa¡¯s incantation with some effort. He immediately raised his hands up high, concentrated his mental strength, and started chanting, ¡°Souls of the fallen soldiers, heed the dark herald¡¯s call and reveal your existence!¡±

    When he finished chanting, he felt the insubstantial amount of mental strength in his mind rapidly fade away. It seemed that he also perceived something in that moment, but then his head suddenly started to hurt and he sat wearily on the bed, panting heavily andpletely drained.

    When Han Shuo slumped over his bed, a ck shadow shed through his little warehouse, and a starkly-white skeleton, half the height of the one Lisa had summoned, appeared afterwards.

    Han Shuo felt sheer tion when he saw the snow-white skeleton holding a bone dirk and staring back at him with two empty, hollowed out eye sockets. Despite the difference in size, this was still a skeleton and was proof that his necromancy spell had seeded.

    His body feltpletely drained and his mind was woozy. Upon referring to ¡°The Foundations of Necromancy¡±, Han Shuo surmised that his mental strength was too weak, and thus had his mental strengthpletely depleted when he had summoned the small skeleton.

    Han Shuo felt a strange connection with the small skeleton standing in front of him, but his mental strength was so weak, that he couldn¡¯t even issue an order, much less send it back to another dimension.

    Thus, a human and skeleton stared nkly at each other for a while. No one woulde to Han Shuo¡¯s warehouse anyway, and it made no difference if the skeleton was here, since it wouldn¡¯t do anything without his orders.

    It was already well past midnight by the time Han Shuo was done with everything. He was exhausted beyond belief, and once the surprise had worn off, Han Shuo fell into a weary, befuddled sleep.

    The next day, not yet daybreak.

    Han Shuo had already woken up and was nning on clearing out the trash as usual before anyone else had gotten up. He was just about go through the same routine when his eyesnded on the small skeleton standing next to the trash heap.

    His mental strength seemed to have recovered a bit after a night¡¯s sleep, but it was still definitely not enough to send the little skeleton back to another dimension. However, it seemed to be enough to give it a singlemand ¡ª throw away the trash.

    The little skeleton immediately stretched its legs out when the order was given, and slowly extended its five bone fingers to pick up the heap of trash next to it. It pushed the door open and walked outside.

    ¡°Heh heh, no wonder everyone wants to learn magic. Everything is so much easier with magic. In the future, this small skeleton can throw away trash for me early in the morning!¡±

    Han Shuo noted that it was still quite early and flung himself back onto the little bed to resume chasing sheep. Over the past few days, this was the first morning he¡¯d been able to sleep in.

    When Han Shuo opened his eyes again after going back to sleep again, he discovered that the skeleton had returned and appeared to dispose of the trash ording to hismands.

    As Han Shou washed his face after getting up from bed, he noticed that the ck and blue bruising had miraculously disappeared, and even some of the scars on his arms seemed to have faded away. Aside from feeling a bit lightheaded from expending all of his mental strength yesterday, his body seemed to be in fairly good shape.

    The solid realm of demonic magic was a process of reforming the practitioner¡¯s body. Ascension beyond the solid realm was marked by erasure of all the scars on the practitioner¡¯s body and vastly increased bodily strength and resilience. Either Bach or Lisa would suffer a quick loss if they tried to beat up Han Shuo with skeletal warriors then.

    Han Shuo remained deep in thought as he washed up and watched the necromancy students hurry to ss again. He grabbed his tools as well before running to dust off the statues of Babylon Academy notables.

    ¡°Athena, I went to the restroom before the sun rose today and saw a small skeleton carrying two bags of trash. It was walking slowly towards the trash dump, what an odd sight!¡± Magic apprentice Amy chatted with Athena as they walked towards the department of dark magic¡¯s ssroom building.

    ¡°Weirdo, who would be so bored as to summon a skeleton to pick up trash. Doesn¡¯t that half mad, half vige idiot Bryan do all that?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s true, I really saw a very small skeleton carrying two garbage bags. And also, I feel so bad for Bryan. It was bad enough for him already, now he¡¯s suffering from Lisa¡¯s aftereffects and gets beaten up by Bach every day!¡±

    ¡°You must have been half asleep and saw incorrectly. Bryan is an errand boy, and a ve in fact. It¡¯s good enough that he can survive. You¡¯re way too kindhearted, worrying about Bryan!¡±

    The two girls had walked far enough and Han Shuo could no longer hear their conversation. Jack swung back after a while and dusted the same statute with Han Shuo. After Jack had busily wiped for a while, he looked at Han Shuo a bit dazedly, ¡°Han Shuo, I think you¡¯ve gained a bit of weight. And didn¡¯t Bach beat you up yesterday? Your face was still bruised yesterday, why does it look fine now?¡±

    ¡°Bach must have over exercised recently. You can see that dull look in his eyes and how weak he looks. He doesn¡¯t have any strength! At this rate, he won¡¯t be able to beat me up anymore!¡± Han Shuo felt that his stomach was particrly empty after that deration and said to Jack, ¡°My appetite is bigger these days, give me some more of that food that you¡¯re hiding.¡±

    ¡°Eh? How did you know I was hiding bread on me?¡±

    ¡°The entire major¡¯s errand boys know about your habit of hiding food. You¡¯re the only one who thinks it¡¯s still a secret. Quit wasting time and give me some bread. I¡¯ll return it to you in the future!¡±

    Jack reluctantly took out a piece of bread after listening to Han Shuo, took a careful look, and broke off a piece for Han Shuo.

    As Han Shuo sat aside his work and hungrily devoured the bread, Jack suddenly said, ¡°Sh... Bach¡¯sing, eh?! Lisa¡¯s with him!¡±

    Bach held two exquisite, white boxes in his hand and was following behind Lisa with a fawning smile on his face. He kept trying to win her over, ¡°Lisa, these are special snacks from my family and they are fabulously delicious. You haven¡¯t had breakfast yet, right? Please have some.¡±

    When Bach was beating Han Shuo up yesterday, Bach¡¯s face identally connected with thetter¡¯s fist. Even now there was some bruising on his right cheek, with it spasming every time he tried to smile, turning the grin into a grimace.

    ¡°Humph. I¡¯m not hungry. Don¡¯t you try that act with me, I hate people like you ¨C people who tter me to my face and then talk trash about me behind my back!¡±

    Lisa stalked off without even ncing at Bach. When she passed Bryan and Jack, she red coldly at Bryan, ¡°Bryan, I¡¯lle find you for target practice again in a month when the Agony of the Soul ends!¡±

    It wasn¡¯t until Lisa brought this up that Han Shuo remembered that he hadn¡¯t suffered from the Agony of the Soul since this morning. He guessed that the magic from the Agony of the Soul had been cancelled out when he sessfully cultivated mental strengthst night, otherwise he should have suffered an attack by now.

    Lisa was about to walk away, while Bach, on the other hand, eximed in surprise after he saw at Bryan, ¡°Eh? How is that possible? I remember I pounded tons of bruises into your face yesterday, why is that there are none there today?¡±

    Damnit, you remember that well. Han Shuo looked at Bach stupidly and then gave a mad giggle, ¡°Hehe, I have a good skincare routine!¡±

    Lisa gave a small splutter ofughter when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s words and halted her footsteps, not in a hurry to leave anymore. Her beautiful eyes creased into half moons with her smile. It was quite adorable actually. That idiot Bryan had gotten much more interesting after he went mad, Lisa thought. He doesn¡¯t just stand there in silence anymore.

    Jack knew Han Shuo wasn¡¯t crazy, and that he¡¯d said that to make fun of Bach. He tried to hold in hisughter, but just couldn¡¯t and gave a light, ¡°Haha.¡± By the time he realized he did something wrong, it was already toote.

    Bach was already pissed off, thinking the bruise on my right cheek hasn¡¯t healed, but that idiot¡¯s has already faded. He hadn¡¯t dare say anything when Lisaughed, but Jack¡¯sughterpletely triggered Bach. He sprinted towards Jack and cussed loudly, ¡°You pathetic servant, how dare youugh at me! I¡¯ll beat you to death!¡±

    Jack knew things were bad, but he didn¡¯t dare run away. He could only stand there limply as Bach rushed over and waited for a beating. It was then that Han Shuo suddenly clutched his head and yelled, ¡°It hurts!¡± and lumbered over in front of Jack. When Bach saw that the person in front of him had changed to Han Shuo, he mentally shrugged as it didn¡¯t make a difference to him who he beat up, and swung his fist straight towards Han Shuo¡¯s face.

    Don sounded out as Han Shuo took a fist to the face, but Bach¡¯s fist didn¡¯t seem to hurt as much as it had yesterday. Han Shuo even managed to keep his frail little body from swaying back and forth in response.

    But he still continued to howl in pain, ¡°That hurts!¡± and wildly iled his arms in front of him as if he¡¯d gone into a mad fit. Pilip rang out as Bach took three hits in a row, and his left eye immediately ckened into a bruise. He clutched his stomach with both hands and jumped up and down, ¡°Worthless ve, how dare you hit me! I¡¯m going to kill you with necromancy today, even if that¡¯s thest thing I do!¡±

    ¡°Bach, you¡¯re picking on Bryan again. It¡¯s ss time, hurry up and go back to the ssroom.¡±

    Suddenly, a gentle voice admonished sweetly from afar as a tall, lithe beauty with a head full of light purple, wavy hair came sashaying into view.

    She looked to be 24 or 25, had a firm nose, an oval face, and sexy red lips. Her lightly tanned skin looked very healthy, and she wore a slightly form fitting master¡¯s robe trimmed with gold.

    The tight master¡¯s robe perfectly showed off her well rounded chest and long legs. She was talking to Bryan as she held several books of magic in her left hand and a stylish emerald staff in her right.

    ¡°Eh... Master Fanny, you forgot your sses again. You¡¯re pointing at Bryan!¡± Lisa¡¯s lip curled and she spoke with some resignation.

    ¡°sses are the kiss of death for a beautiful woman, I¡¯m not wearing those things everyday,¡± Fanny smiled in return and finally located Bach, using the staff in her right hand to make a motion as if she¡¯d tapped him on the head. She said sternly, ¡°Go back to ss immediately, or you¡¯ll face the consequences!¡±

    After Fanny had spoken to Bach in a bit of a temper, a mellow smile found its way to her face again and she smiled at Lisa, ¡°Lisa, you need to hurry to ss too. Frequent tardiness does not a good student make. I need to prepare for today¡¯s lesson, I¡¯ll see youter!¡±

    Fanny turned her head to re at Bach once more, then glided forward with her lean legs, striding with a grace unmatched by thousands. Her full butt swayed as she walked, creating an alluring silhouette.

    ¡°Eh... Master Fanny, that¡¯s not the ssroom building, you¡¯re walking in the wrong direction. Oh gosh, put your sses on!¡±

    Lisa called out lightly and paused when she was about to leave. She turned back and raked a cold gaze across Bach, sneering contemptuously, ¡°What a worthless guy, you can¡¯t even beat up an errand boy!¡± Lisa nced at Han Shuo again and hurried off in pursuit of Fanny.

    Bach was aze with anger and pointed venomously at Han Shuo and Jack, ¡°Just you wait you pathetic wretches, you¡¯ll get what¡¯sing to you!¡± It would seem that Fanny¡¯s threat had a great effect on him as he ran off to ss in a great hurry.

    Han Shuo gazed lecherously in direction that Fanny had departed in, watching until she was out of sight. He paid no mind to Bach¡¯s threat, and muttered to himself after she hadpletely disappeared, ¡°That Master Fanny is something else alright. No wonder that silly kid Bryan had a crush on her. Bryan¡¯s taste in girls is actually quite simr to mine!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, stop looking. I know you¡¯ve liked Master Fanny for a long time, and she¡¯s also stopped some students from bullying you, but, you¡¯re only an errand boy, and she¡¯s a highly ranked adept mage in the academy. Do you know how powerful adepts are? Although Master Fanny is nearsighted, there are way too many people who have a crush on her in the academy. Wake up already!¡±

    Jack waved two plump hands in front of Han Shuo as he reminded thetter to wake up and face reality.

    ¡°I¡¯m already drunk, I can¡¯t wake up!¡± Han Shuo said with a leer. He paused and added, ¡°I¡¯ll get her one day!¡±

 Chapter 7: Using Methods Used to Refine Demonic Treasures to Refine Skeletons

    Chapter 7: Using Methods Used to Refine Demonic Treasures to Refine Skeletons

    ¡°Bryan, I didn¡¯t believe them when they said you were crazy, but now, even I am a believer. You ¡ª are ¡ª seriously ¡ª crazy!¡± Jack twisted his fat neck, shook his head, and sighed as he saw Han Shuo wearing a zealous expression and dere his desire to get Fanny.

    ¡°Eh? Those are the snacks that Bach was using to fawn on Lisa. Haha, what a stroke of luck! I¡¯ve never tried the delicacies that nobles always snack on!¡± Han Shuo spied the snacks that Bach had forgotten in his hurry to leave and immediately sprinted over. He picked up the intricately designed snack box without saying another word and started munching on the contents without even thinking twice.

    He tutted in surprise as he ate, ¡°Tsk tsk. These are delicious. That fight wasn¡¯t for nothing. Here, I borrowed half a piece of bread earlier, and now I¡¯m returning a box of exquisite snacks. You made out like a bandit!¡±

    ¡°But this is Bach¡¯s? ¡°I beat up that punk, so now it¡¯s mine!¡±

    Jack, ¡°...¡±

    Han Shuo also felt a bit odd about this development as well. He felt that since he¡¯d arrived on the Profound Continent and started training his magical strength, his appetite had grownrger and his personality had also be bolder. He was doing things he hadn¡¯t dared to do before, and his desires were actually growing as well.

    ¡°Bryan and Jack! You guys should be cleaning up thebs right now, but you haven¡¯t even finished cleaning the statues! If you get us in trouble, you¡¯re in for it as well!¡±

    As Han Shuo and Jack were cooing over the wonderful taste of the exquisite snacks, two older errand boys walked up from behind them. The two of them were holding mops in their hands and began badgering Han Shuo and Jack, admonishing them to hurry to thebs and start cleaning.

    These two errands boys were around twenty years old and were over 170 cm in height. They were called Borg and Carey, and had gotten into the habit of bullying Han Shuo and Jack in recent years because the older boys were stronger. They even went so far as to shift some of their own duties onto Bryan and Jack. Case in point? Cleaning up thebs.

    ¡°Not going!¡± Han Shou paid them no heed since he¡¯d wanted to get out of that for the longest time. He felt stronger now and his confidence had skyrocketed since he hadn¡¯t lost any ground in his fight with Bach. He was actually thinking that he felt a bit too full, and another fight was just the thing to aid digestion if the two kept this act up.

    ¡°Hah, not going? Bryan, you¡¯ve really gone crazy, daring to talk back to me, the mighty Borg. Do you want me to beat some sense into you?¡± Borg clenched his right hand into a fist and gave a coldugh while staring at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Ah, my head hurts!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s body shook as he crouched on the ground, clutching his head. Jack had been about to head off to thebs to start cleaning, but paused and stood there unmoving when he saw Han Shuo pull the same trick again. He looked at Han Shuo expectantly.

    ¡°I don¡¯t care if you¡¯re real crazy or fake crazy, I¡¯m going to beat you until you obey!¡± Carey had an even worse temper. He took threerge steps forward and kicked in Han Shuo¡¯s direction.

    It was then that Han Shuo gave a great ¡°Aiya!¡± as he suddenly jumped up, meeting Carey¡¯s right foot with his chest. Han Shuo gave a great cry of pain and wrapped his hands around Carey¡¯s foot, lifting it up and to the side. It was Carey¡¯s turn to yell in pain as he stumbled to the side. His lips parted in a silent howl as he smashed into a statue.

    Borg smiled faintly when he saw Carey rush towards Han Shuo, thinking Han Shuo was in for it now. Who knew that although Han Shuo had taken a foot to the chest, Carey seemed even worse for the wear.

    ¡°Yeah? How dare you fight back Bryan! Borg, let¡¯s get him together, we¡¯ll teach him a lesson today!¡± Carey climbed up, in quite some pain, as he rushed towards Han Shuo again, and called for Borg to join him.

    Han Shuo continued to clutch his head and cry out in pain as he thought, I dared to hit even Bach, much less than you two idiots. He iled his arms and legs around wildly, and even though he took a few hits, Carey and Borg weren¡¯t much better off.

    Han Shuo was already used to being beaten and had been improving his body by circting the magical yuan ording to thews of the solid realm. He had no problem taking on Carey and Borg¡¯s fists at all. On the other hand, Carey and Borg¡¯s faces were already bruising up in some ces. They looked worse off, in part due to Han Shuo¡¯s improved strength.

    The three errand boys were fighting fiercely and wildly on the side of the road. Carey and Borg¡¯s bodies started to hurt more as the fight progressed, and their strength slowly waned, whereas Han Shuo only suffered from a minor bit of pain, and actually felt quite at ease. It was as if he had endless strength and he even started fighting more smoothly. In the end, it was Han Shuo who chased after Carey and Borg, pelting them with blows as they ran away with their tails between their legs.

    ¡°Hah! What a sweet fight! Jack, we¡¯re not doing Carey and Borg¡¯s duties anymore. Come tell me if they pick on you again, I¡¯ll use them as a punching bag!¡±

    Little fatty Jack was looking at Han Shuo in admiration as he tugged on Han Shuo¡¯s arm. Jackughed loudly and said, ¡°Bryan, you¡¯re amazing. You beat Carey and Borg by yourself, how did you do it?¡±

    Han Shuo pointed to himself and said cockily, ¡°I have a brave heart!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s head did not hurt even once in the next few days. For reasons unknown, Bach did not immediately seek revenge on Han Shuo either. Han Shuo and Jack refused to do Carey and Borg¡¯s work, but the two had nothing to say as they couldn¡¯t even win a fight, in which the numbers were in their favor. They silentlypleted the duties that they were supposed to do.

    Now that the little skeleton was taking out the trash in the morning, and theck of a need to pick up Carey and Borg¡¯s duties, Han Shuo suddenly had a lot more free time on his hands. He didn¡¯t ask Jack to ¡°borrow¡± more books of magic during this time, but turned his attention to thoroughly studying ¡°The Foundations of Necromancy¡± in order to build a firm base of knowledge.

    Han Shuo came to understand that his mental power was quite weak after extended studying of ¡°The Foundations of Necromancy¡±. He began to concentrate and meditate every night after he returned to the warehouse. The little skeleton was the weakest, dark creature from the other dimension, and its intelligence was so low, that it could only function ording to the summoner¡¯smands. Han Shuo had given it themand to stay in the warehouse during the day and only dispose of trashte at night.

    Han Shuo was just about to settle into his regr meditation that night when he suddenly recalled the memories that the old fart, Chu Can Lang, had left in his mind. There were some rted to mysterious records of refining demonic treasures. Han Shuo thought that although the demon magic he was training in was from a different world than the necromancy he was learning now, they were both dark magics and seemed to have quite a lot inmon. Would it be possible to fuse the two?

    As Han Shuo furrowed his brow and started to seriously rummage through the memories, he discovered that although Chu Cang Lan had left behind a trove of memories, quite a few of them were misty and vague. It was like viewing things through a thin piece of marbled paper and not everything was clear.

    After a while of recollection, he suddenly remembered a method to refine demonic treasures. Han Shuo could only summon a weak skeleton due to his short period of study in necromancy. Since that was the case, he decided to experiment on the little skeleton.

    Refining materials were first needed for refining demonic treasure. Since he was just experimenting for fun, Han Shuo decided to use the little skeleton as the main ingredient. There was some worthless fresh blood from low level magic creatures in the warehouse, along with other trash, such as bone powder, smander tails, etc. They all became auxiliary materials for the demonic treasure.

    Some unique demonic treasures required veryplex materials that necessitated arduous trials to obtain them. It wasn¡¯t even a certain thing that they existed in this world. Han Shuo ignored all of that and instead grabbed random items to fulfill his sudden impulse. He returned to theb to grab a small bucket that no one was using, as well as various necromancy ingredients that were leftover from student use. He had no idea what they were.

    Han Shuo stealthily crept back to the warehouse under the cover of night and carefully closed the door. He first put the skeleton into the bucket, and then just randomly dumped in all the low level monster blood, bone powder, smander tail, and other materials, following it up with a solid bucket of water. There was now an ugly riot of colors in a bucket filled with an assortment of... things. Only the skeleton¡¯s head showed above the water level, it waspletely unaware of what was happening.

    Han Shuo thought for a moment as he closed his eyes and slowly ran through Chu Cang Lan¡¯s knowledge of refining demonic treasure. Apart from requiring a variety of ingredients, refining demonic treasure required setting up a specialized matrix. The practitioner also needed to train his magical yuan ording to special method for several days or months. Some particrly strong demonic treasures even required training for a few years.

    Of course, the current Han Shuo could aplish none of this. He identified the easiest refinement method and dug out seven starkly-white bone spurs from who-knew-what-kind-of magical creature. He stuck the spurs ording to the instructions denoted by the ¡°Magical Yin Concentration Matrix¡±.

    The ¡°Magical Yin Concentration Matrix¡± was a type of demon refining matrix in Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories. The proper method was to first refine seven natal ¡°yin demons¡±, and to use the seven yin demons in forming the matrix. Once the refiner poured in his own magical yuan, the seven yin demons would concentrate the magical yuan in the matrix ording to the matrix instructions. The refining ingredients would slowly dissolve and seep into the main ingredient. The demonic treasure would finally beplete after 36 days of refining with the magical yuan.

    In order to refine a yin demon, one must first have a ghoul. A ghoul was an innocent who¡¯d died wrongly and was subsequently buried in a forsaken piece ofnd. Only if the soul was unwilling to depart was there a possibility of a ghoul forming. Special methods were needed to refine ghouls into yin demons, and it was naturally something that Han Shuo could not aplish at the moment.

    He stuck the seven bone spurs into the bucket as a substitute for the yin demons, and then squatted beside the bucket to attempt circting magical yuan to his right middle fingertip. He then swiftly stuck his finger in the middle of the seven erected bone spurs. Although the bone spurs were a poor substitute, they were arranged correctly and thus could absorb a bit of magical yuan.

    After who knew how long, seven small swirls abruptly formed on the surface of the water, with the seven bone spurs as the center.

    Han Shuo rxed inwardly when he saw the seven swirls form. He knew that despite randomly mucking around, he had somehow seeded. Although he couldn¡¯t fathom what the little skeleton would ultimately turn into, he was at ease and drifted off into a deep sleep after a bit of meditation.

 Chapter 8: The Infallible Seven-Winged Skeleton

    Chapter 8: The Infallible Seven-Winged Skeleton

    The next day.

    Han Shuo was still quite drowsy and not fully awake when the warehouse door exploded open. Little fatty Jack rushed in and started shaking Han Shuo awake, eximing in excitement, ¡°Bryan get up! You have to see this!¡±

    Han Shuo was bleary eyed. He¡¯d just been dreaming aboutmanding the small skeleton to beat up Lisa. He¡¯d been woken up before he could finish the dream, andined with dissatisfaction, ¡°What¡¯s going on this early in the morning?¡±

    Jack¡¯s eyes were the size of yellow beans and excitement twinkled in them. Heughed heartily, ¡°I¡¯m not sure what Lisa did, but she summoned a weird skeleton that doesn¡¯t obey hermands. No one know¡¯s what going on, but pilip sounds have beening from her room all morning.

    The little skeleton then ran off towards the department of light magic, with Lisa chasing it from behind. Oh! I swear, I¡¯ve never seen a small skeleton run so fast in all my years in the necromancy department. Oh yeah, it also had seven bone spurs as wings!¡±

    Han Shuo had been enjoying Jack¡¯s story until that moment. His expression changed as he suddenly thought of something, and he abruptly jerked his head towards the wooden bucket. The violently colored water had changed to an inky ck at some point, and the seven bone spurs had vanished, along with the skeleton.

    No way. I started refining him only yesterday. He seemed to remember somewhat, through the fog of sleep, giving the skeleton amand to teach Lisa a lesson, but weren¡¯t there still 36 more days before refining a demonic treasure would beplete? What¡¯s going on? Was it because he had randomly used bone spurs instead of yin demons that had caused the magical yuan to prematurely run out?

    Han Shuo felt a foreboding chill at this thought and hastily sat up. He even ignored his morning duties of cleaning the stone statues and dashed towards the department of light magic, pulling Jack along in his wake.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind raced through his worries as he ran. He wasn¡¯t a necromancy student and couldn¡¯t find it within himself to be as indifferent to his summoned creatures as the students were. They didn¡¯t care whether the creature lived or died. The little skeleton had picked up trash for Han Shuo and saved him a lot of effort during this time. He had unknowingly developed feelings for the skeleton, and naturally didn¡¯t want anything to happen to it.

    Apart from Han Shuo and Jack, the necromancy students were also rushing to the department of light magic. They had odd expressions of their faces as they chattered nonstop on the way there.

    ¡°It¡¯s so weird. It was such a small skeleton, ck and with seven bone spurs on its back. I wonder how Lisa summoned it?¡± Amy said as she speed walked.

    ¡°I know, and the weirdest thing is that the small skeleton runs so fast. Oh. Gosh. Is it because Lisa¡¯s mental strength is stronger than ours that she can summon different skeletal warriors than we can?¡± Athena also wore an expression of extreme surprise, and carried a loud conversation with Amy as they hurried to the department of light magic.

    The novice mage Be creased her brow when she heard Athena say so. She snorted, ¡°I¡¯m also a novice mage and I¡¯ve never summoned such a strange skeleton. The weirdest thing is that this skeleton doesn¡¯t obey its summoner¡¯smands. It doesn¡¯t make sense at all.¡±

    .......

    Han Shuo and Jack eavesdropped on conversations as they ran. From what they gleaned from the students, Han Shuo understood that his refined skeleton was quite unique indeed.

    Inwardly fretting with worry, Han Shuo attempted to contact the skeleton with his mental strength. He found out that he could establish contact, but possibly due to the fact that it had been refined as if it was a demonic treasure, the skeleton didn¡¯t seem to receive themands he was giving. It was still running around helter skelter.

    The department of light magic didn¡¯tck students like the necromancy major did. Light magic was a popr major at the academy, and had graduated many distinguished alumni. Light major students had always hated the dark major students, perhaps because light and dark magic directly opposed each other. Light majors hated necromancy majors the most, and light magic was an especially effective restraint against dark magic.

    Many light magics were particrly destructive towards the dark creatures that necromancers summoned. It wouldn¡¯t be an exaggeration to say that light magic was the nemesis of necromancy. Han Shuo had gained quite a bit of knowledge after returning to the necromancy major, and understood the concepts that weremon knowledge to necromancy students. However, knowing all this made his heart grow heavy with worry.

    Han Shuo practically flew down the road as he dragged Jack along. His speed was such that his frail body even passed by a few necromancy students. The ones left in his wake gaped in surprise, thinking when did this idiot get so strong after he went crazy?

    When Han Shuo had dragged Jack all the way to the department of light magic, Jack was utterly exhausted. He nted his butt firmly on the ground and panted heavily,ining continuously, ¡°Bryan, you run so fast. You almost dragged me to death, and you¡¯re not even sweating.¡±

    As Han Shuo¡¯s attention waspletely preupied by the little skeleton scampering up and down all over the department of light magic buildings, hepletely ignored Jack¡¯sints.

    A short skeleton, with a body as ck as ink, seven bone spurs stuck in its spine, and wielding a faintly glowing bone dagger was dashing to and fro in the middle of the courtyard.

    The ck skeleton emanated a faint glow thanks to Han Shuo¡¯s refinement. The bone spurs had stuck on its back, meldingpletely with the spine, as if they had always belonged there. Two leg bones extended like springs when it moved, and the seven bone spurs would p busily, aiding its movement. Although they weren¡¯t enough to help it fly, they raised its speed so that the skeleton was very nimble. Even Lisa following in hot pursuit missed several necromancy spells.

    Numerous light major students and stone pirs decorated with intricate reliefs stood in the courtyard. The little skeleton adroitly weaved in and out between students and pirs with an eerily agile body, leaving Lisa helpless.

    Han Shuo was also dazed upon seeing the little skeleton¡¯s speed, and then quickly gathered his concentration to order the skeleton back to the warehouse. Unfortunately, it seemed that the little skeleton was unable to receive hismands and continued to sh between students and pirs, making the light major students run around in utter disarray.

    It was sheer pandemonium in the courtyard.

    ¡°Lisa, you necromancy students are bing more and more presumptuous. How dare you loose this filthy dark creature into the midst of the department of light magic. Are you still smarting overst time¡¯s loss against me and wanted to show off how good your skeletal warrior is?¡± Novice light mage Irene said coldly, staring at Lisa with provocation.

    Irene was 17 and had a bob of light blue, slightly messy locks. She had beautiful bangs resting against her forehead, and sky blue eyes that were akin to two brilliant sapphires. She wore the hallowed robe of light magic and had set a diamond shaped sapphire in the cor. It sparkled with a misty-blue light that matched and brought out her eyes, making her appear even more beautiful.

    Another young beauty, Han Shuo nced at Irene and started mentallyparing her against Lisa. Irene matched up to Lisa in every way, and showed a burgeoning bosom, that was much fuller than Lisa¡¯s.

    ¡°Irene, keep your nose out of my business. Don¡¯t think I¡¯m scared of you just because youe from the Kamplin family.¡± Lisa paused from chasing the little skeleton and sneered right back at Irene.

    ¡°Hmph! Filthy dark creatures are forbidden from sullying the department of light magic. If you¡¯re unable to take it away and dismiss it, then let me give you a hand!¡± Irene raised her hands with a noble expression and slowly started chanting, ¡°Razors of light, be a sword that purifies evil, cleave this pathetic life ¡ª Radiant sh!¡±

    A longsword, made entirely of blinding light, appeared after Irene had finished her incantation. It swiftly flew towards the skeleton under Irene¡¯smand.

    Han Shuo¡¯s skeleton had been ying hide and seek, and stopped dumbly when Lisa had stopped. It didn¡¯t seem to react when Irene¡¯s light sword rushed towards it, and the sword stabbed solidly into its ribcage.

    The softly glowing ck skeleton suddenly red faintly when the longsword connected, and the longsword disappeared. A bit of smoke rose from its chest as the skeleton swayed a bit from the hit. When it regained its footing, it clutched the dagger and nced around, as if trying to see who had hit him.

    ¡°Hoo, that dark creature didn¡¯t immediately fall to pieces when the holy light of light magic hit it!¡±

    ¡°Yeah! This is so weird! Light magic is the nemesis of dark creatures. Its frame should have turned to dust under the holy light, what is going on!¡±

    ¡°Ah... is it possible that the necromancy major has researched a way to make dark creatures immune to the holy light of light magic? How is that possible? If this is the case, then necromancy¡¯s dark creatures will be ridiculously strong!¡±

    .....

    Han Shuo looked around and saw that the light major students around him all wore expressions of fright. They stared incredulously at the little skeleton that was peering around.

    Necromancy¡¯s dark creatures not only took normal damage from light magic, but additional injury would be inflicted as well. Higher level dark creatures would start to rot, but something as low levelled as a skeletal warrior should have turned into ashes immediately.

    But the little skeleton that Han Shuo had refined, ording to the rules of refining demonic treasures, upended the normalws of magic, and proved an impossibly incredible thing to light and necromancy major students.

    Exmations of shock and bewilderment poured out of the light major students. Even Lisa stood there dumbly, unnerved by this infallible skeleton.

    But just as everyone was reacting in surprise, the little skeleton had finally found out who had hit him after a few moments of looking around. It rushed towards Irene with its five bone fingers clutched firmly around the coldly glowing bone dagger, and the seven bone spurs pped furiously to again give it speed beyond a normal skeletal warrior¡¯s. It arrived in front of Irene, grasped the dagger in its palm, and fiercely stabbed towards the dismayed Irene.

    Irene panicked and frantically threw herself to the left, as she knew she had no time to chant again seeing that the skeleton had already arrived in front of her. A tearing noise sounded as Irene squealed in fright.

    The little skeleton didn¡¯t sessfully stab Irene thanks to her quick dodge. However, it had torn the robe from right shoulder down to her chest, revealing dewy, creamy skin. There was even a small piece of snow white undergarments dangling on the tip of the bone dagger. The skeleton stood there dumbly again and didn¡¯t follow up on the attack.

    Damn, well done! sh you with a light sword huh! sh all her clothes to ribbons in return! Han Shuo exalted inwardly.

    Han Shuo suddenly felt his mental strength sharpen along with those thoughts. He saw the little skeleton snap to attention, grasp the dagger again and spring towards an embarrassed Irene desperately trying to cover herself up. It was obvious to see that it wanted to execute Han Shuo¡¯s order ¡ª sh all her clothes to ribbons.

    Hah, now it receives itsmands, that lecherous skeleton!

 Chapter 9: Heâ€™s really screwed this time

    Chapter 9: He¡¯s really screwed this time

    Irene¡¯s shirt had been sliced open, revealing snow-white skin, and even a hint of the top curve of her right breast. She was embarrassed and panicked, and was squealing in fright. The white expanse drew the rapturous nces of all the surrounding male, light major students.

    Irene was a finely featured girl to begin with. Her beauty was further enhanced by a subtle, regal bearing that projected an awe inspiring and invible feeling. The male, light major students standing closest to her happened to be going through the stage of life in which they were insatiably curious about girls, and thus forgot to put themselves forward to help her.

    When everyone realized that the little skeleton was making a move again, it was toote to prevent it. The little skeleton had already raised the glowing, ck, bone dagger towards Irene. No one dared to make a move for fear of hurting Irene with their light magic.

    A feeling of despair and helplessness arose in Irene¡¯s heart when she looked into the skeleton¡¯s grey, hollow eye sockets. She seemed to be frozen in ce with fright as she sat there, unmoving.

    Irene watched the little skeleton close the distance with an upraised glowing dagger with a sad expression on her face. Who would have thought that her end woulde at the hands of a despised, dark creature, and one of the weakest ones to boot! It was really quite pathetic.

    sh...

    Irene felt a cool draft on her right waist and thought she had been stabbed, but as she looked down, she realized that she hadn¡¯t been hurt. Rather, the magic robe had been shed open from right waist to calf, revealing even more skin.

    A firm and smooth waist, supple and glistening strong legs, were all revealed this time. Even the teensiest bit of light green, silk undergarments could be glimpsed through the cut. Irene could hear some of the surrounding male students swallow loudly, as well as chatter from the female students.

    ¡°Ah...¡±

    Although it would be a terrible thing if the skeleton killed her with one strike, it was worse than death to be stripped of her clothes under the hungry eyes of her peers. A piercing scream rang out from Irene¡¯s mouth as she scrambled away directionless, desperately trying to cover herself up.

    ¡°What¡¯s... what¡¯s wrong with this skeleton? Why is it focused on destroying Irene¡¯s clothes?¡±

    ¡°Stop staring! Hurry up and destroy it!¡±

    The light major students finally regained their senses in the midst of the crowd¡¯s conversations and began to raise their arms, ready to chant spells to attack the little skeleton.

    The skeleton stood there dumbly again after that attack, as if it required continuousmands from Han Shuo to know what to do. Han Shuo started to inwardly stress out as he saw the skeleton just standing there. He didn¡¯t know what to do.

    Lisa, standing to the side, had been about to say something, but said nothing after she hesitated upon seeing such arge portion of Irene¡¯s robe destroyed.

    ¡°Damned dark creature, how dare you attack the beautiful miss Irene! Receive your punishment from me, the sergeant knight ude!¡± It was at this moment that a figure ran in from afar. Because his speed was so fast, ude had already appeared next to the little skeleton immediately after he finished speaking.

    ude shot agilely towards the little skeleton as soon as he had arrived. A beam of pale-green light shot out with his right fist andnded solidly on the unsuspecting skeleton. The skeleton flew up and out,nding with a tter on the ground after taking this blow.

    ¡°Beautiful Miss Irene, you have suffered because I arrivedte!¡± ude spoke humbly and executed an urbane bow to Irene after he sent the skeleton flying.

    ude was 18 and had tied his silver hair into a ponytail, allowing it to drape carelessly on his back. He wore an all white training robe and was extraordinarily handsome. Many of the light major girls blushed upon seeing his appearance and started whispering amongst themselves.

    ¡°Wow! It¡¯s ude! He¡¯s only 18, yet he¡¯s a sergeant level knight already, and the youngest son of the Empire¡¯s Gryphon Legion chief. He¡¯s so amazing!¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re so boycrazy, ude likes Irene. Youe from a small family and you¡¯re not as beautiful as Irene, he¡¯d never be interested in you.¡±

    The light major girls started holding hushed conversations and sneaking sly nces at ude, as if he was the man of their dreams, their prince on a white horse. On the other hand, the male students regarded him with looks that alternated between hate and fear.

    As the surrounding crowd engaged in murmured conversations, the little skeleton that been sent flying stood up shakily, his rib cage trembling along with the rest of his body.

    Irene waspletely bedraggled and frantically protecting her upper and lower body, her face flushed bright with embarrassment. However, she heaved a sigh of relief when ude appeared. She was about to reply to his greeting when she nced beyond ude¡¯s shoulder and saw the skeleton slowly mbering back up. Her haughty face instantly changed into an expression filled with panic and disgust. Irene pointed behind ude and hurriedly said, ¡°ude, I¡¯ll consent to having a meal with you if you destroy that ugly, dark creature.¡±

    ude turned his head upon hearing Irene¡¯s words, and gave a quiet, ¡°eh?¡± of surprise. It would seem that he hadn¡¯t thought the skeleton would still survive. He turned back, shed a small, sunny smile and bowed, ¡°I am honored to serve you.¡±

    ude¡¯s demeanor changed abruptly when he turned away. The urbane grace he¡¯d just disyed faded, reced with a sharp look shooting out from his eyes. He punched out with his right fist again, and the pale-green light once again rapidly shot towards the little skeleton.

    Who knew that a thin, frail body would suddenly rush in from the left just at this moment. It happened to stop right in front of the little skeleton. The pale-green light from ude¡¯s fistnded solidly on the frail body.

    Bam! sounded out and the thin body stumbled a few steps backwards, throwing his head back and fell to the ground.

    ¡°Eh? Who¡¯s this errand boy? Why did he suddenly rush out?¡± Surprised cries came from all directions.

    ¡°Damn it, Bryan are you crazy?¡± Jack was just was mystified and howled with a face full of tragic pain.

    Lisa was also extremely taken aback as she looked at Han Shuo, who had suddenly dashed out and taken the blow for the skeleton.

    What followed was an even more surprising turn of events. The pale-green light connected squarely with Han Shuo, but he didn¡¯t cough up blood and immediately die on the spot. Rather, he too stood up shakily, like the skeleton, and wore a silly, naive expression.

    As for the little skeleton, it suddenly about faced. It had been swaying back and forth, but then abruptly turned, bent its legs and and sprang off towards the necromancy major¡¯s quarters before anyone could react.

    As for ude, the attacker, he tripped over his feet all of a sudden and sat on the ground for no apparent reason. He panted heavily a few times before standing up, as if he had overexerted himself just now, but after he stood up, his chiseled features wore an expression of disbelief and shock. He cast an odd nce towards Han Shuo, who was still out of his mind.

    The person in question, Han Shuo, wasn¡¯tpletely putting on an act with the confusion flitting across his face. When ude¡¯s pale-green light had passed directly through his body into his chest, Han Shuo had felt a heart piercing pain. He almost thought he¡¯d died.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength had been possibly affected by the circumstances in that moment, and he sessfully gave anothermand of ¡®retreat with all haste¡¯ to the little skeleton. To avoid detection, he told the skeleton to take cover in the academy¡¯s garbage dump.

    But what was most incredible to Han Shuo was that he¡¯d felt his magical yuan surround and enclose the pale-green light when thetter had travelled into his body. The magical yuanpletely immobilized the light, and prevented the light from wreaking havoc internally.

    ¡°Bryan, what are you doing here?¡± Lisa finally found her voice and yelled towards Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo had no idea what was going on in his body at the moment. He only felt a bit of heaviness weighing down his chest as magical yuan had enclosed the pale-green light. After the initial pain he had felt earlier, his body hadn¡¯t actually suffered much damage.

    But in other people¡¯s eyes, Han Shuo waspletely crazy. He couldn¡¯t even hear other people¡¯s questions. The nk expression and naive smile on his face further cemented his identity as a crazy person.

    ¡°Oh, it¡¯s the crazy errand ve from the necromancy major. No wonder he was such an idiot!¡±

    ¡°Yes indeed, only an idiot would have rushed out in front of ude¡¯s attack at that moment!¡±

    Little fatty Jack¡¯s legs were shaking like mad, but he eventually made his way towards Han Shuo and started dragging him away by the arm. He said, ¡°Bryan, what are you doing here? It¡¯s not fun here. Come on, let¡¯s go back.¡±

    ¡°Just a second!¡± ude suddenly spoke up at this moment, his eyes fixed on Han Shuo. Setting aside the fact that the little skeleton had run away for a second, he was wondering why he suddenly felt his fighting aura (TL note: mental strength equivalent for knights) disappear. What was going on? Was he mistaken?

    He¡¯d only used his fighting aura in one hit, by all means he shouldn¡¯t have been tired. He¡¯d even fallen, this really was too weird. Did this errand ve have some evil magic? No way, he was just an errand ve. That would be way too crazy beyond belief. He must be wrong.

    ¡°Noble and mighty knight ude, you wouldn¡¯t pick a fight with an errand ve, would you? Not to mention that this errand ve is crazy, this doesn¡¯t seem to reconcile with your distinguished self?¡± Curiously enough, it was Lisa who was speaking up for Han Shuo.

    ude bowed to Lisa from a distance upon hearing her words, then gave Han Shuo a deep look. He nodded, ¡°You may leave!¡±

    ¡°The two errand boys can leave, but Lisa, you summoned this dirty skeletal warrior and ruined my clothes. You owe me an exnation.¡± Irene had found a billowy white robe at some point and had flung it over herself. She¡¯d recovered from her panic and shock by now and leveled a cold nce at Lisa.

    ¡°What does that have to do with me? I didn¡¯t summon that weird ck skeleton, otherwise why would I be unable able to control it? It snuck into my room at night and kicked me two times. I¡¯m also the victim here.¡± Lisa gave a slight snort and also responded coldly.

    ¡°How is that possible? If not you, then who? It must be someone from your necromancy major. Whoever he is, I¡¯ll find him and make him pay!¡± Irene flew into a rage.

    ¡°Hoo... ah... Bach, when.... when throw away trash, saw it run... run out from Bach¡¯s room.¡± Han Shuo smiled vacantly and seemed to have troublemunicating as he stammered out a few words, but it was enough for the others to understand his meaning.

    ¡°Huh. So it was him. He must be trying to get revenge for when I beat him up!¡± Lisa¡¯s face darkened and she bit off her words.

    On the other side, Irene¡¯s face also wore a livid expression as she audibly ground her teeth. Bells signaling the start of ss rang, just as the two were about to track down Bach and make him pay. All of the assembled gave a start when they heard the bells, with light and necromancy majors running off to their respective areas.

    Only Han Shuo and Jack remained, standing there dumbly. Han Shuo smiled ¡°dumbly¡± and said to Jack, ¡°Bach¡¯s screwed.¡±

    Jack nodded his head emphatically inplete agreement, ¡°Yeah, he¡¯s really screwed this time!¡±

 Chapter 10: A demon practitioner does as he wishes

    Chapter 10: A demon practitioner does as he wishes

    The students had gone to ss, but Han Shuo and Jack had yet to begin tackling their duties for the day. After everyone had left, the two also separated toplete their respective work.

    Han Shuo felt the heaviness in his chest dissipate when he¡¯d finished cleaning the statues. He found a deserted corner and undid the top of his rough, linen shirt. He looked down at his chest and saw that there was an undercurrent of pale-green specks of light being expelled from his body. It seemed that ude¡¯s pale-green fighting aura was being handled in this manner under the influence of the magical yuan.

    Breathing a small sigh of relief, Han Shuoid his worries to rest and marvelled at how miraculous the magical yuan was. From the knowledge that he¡¯d recently gained, knights were also divided into various levels. Their fighting auras would be different at each level, such as knight apprentice (pale-blue),panion-at-arms (dark blue), sergeant (pale-green), senior knight (dark green), earth rider (white), sky rider (silver), and divine knight (gold).

    ude¡¯s fighting aura color was pale-green, indicating that he really did have the strength of a sergeant level knight. If a sergeant level knight gathered his fighting aura and attacked a normal person, it would have dealt a fatal blow to the target with no exceptions whatsoever. The fact that he had survived without major injury was a clear testament to the fact that he had been training his magical yuan.

    Han Shuo breathed a sigh of relief upon feeling the magical yuan firmly enclose the pale-green fighting aura, but didn¡¯t dare engage in more training. He was deathly afraid that if the magical yuan circted to other parts of his body ording to his wishes, then the pale-green aura would be free of its restraints and suddenly burst into action and injure his internal organs.

    Thankfully, as time passed, the magical yuan was slowly expelling the aura in the form of specks of light. This helped Han Shuo breathe a bit easier.

    Due to the fact that sses had already started, no one searched the trash heap that the little skeleton had taken refuge in, but this matter wasn¡¯t about to blow over that easily. Seeing as it was broad daylight, Han Shuo didn¡¯t daremand the skeleton to return to the warehouse, for fear of inopportune discovery.

    Late afternoon, within the department of dark magic¡¯s training field.

    The Babylon Academy of Magic and Force had very extensive facilities. Each department had its own independent training field. The training fields were a ce for students to test their magic. All sorts of mental testing rocks to test mental strength, and equipment to measure the strength of a magical st could be found within.

    The necromancy major also had a few spacious rooms reserved specially for students to conduct magic experiments. Han Shuo happened to have a mop in hand and was cleaning the necromancy training room floors when he suddenly saw a few necromancy students walk over.

    One of them was someone who had note looking for Han Shuo in quite some time ¡ª Bach. His face was mottled with bruises and he looked quite miserable. It would seem that Irene and Lisa had already found him and made him pay. Bach swiftly grew livid when he spotted Han Shuo mopping the floor. His already ugly face became even more twisted, until it was almost impossible to make out his original features.

    Han Shuo was gleefully jumping up and down inside, but continued to ster a dumb, silly smile on his face. He was even humming a few lighthearted folk songs as he clutched the mop in his hands, twirling it this way and that.

    ¡°You damned Bryan, when did you see that little ck skeleton run out from my room?!¡± Bach¡¯s face had twisted ferociously as he roared angrily at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo lifted apletely clueless face and nced at Bach, giving him a dumb smile. He didn¡¯t answer and rapidly walked off with the mop.

    ¡°Come back here, you¡¯re not getting away today!¡±

    ¡°Bach, how many times have I told you not to bully Bryan. Do you ignore even my words now?¡± Fanny immediately stuck her hands on her waist and yelled sternly after she¡¯d walked in through the door, and glimpsed Bach about to chase after Han Shuo.

    ¡°Master Fanny, look at my face! It¡¯s all because Bryan started some rumors that Lisa and Irene beat me up. Bryan¡¯s the bully here!¡±

    ¡°Oh, I¡¯ve heard about what happened this morning. Maybe Bryan was confused and saw incorrectly. He¡¯s already like this! Why are you creating more trouble for him? Hmph. With your magical ability, you really don¡¯t have the ability to summon such a strange and strong skeleton.¡± Fanny started talking to herself after this point. ¡°Who on earth summoned it? I am very curious as well. There are rumors flying that our necromancy major has had a major breakthrough, and has discovered a way to make our dark creatures immune to light magic attacks.¡±

    Han Shuo had run to the corner of the room and was gazing upon the morous Fanny from afar. Fanny had tied her light purple hair up into a bun today, leaving only a few purple strands resting on her forehead. This added a striking charm to her looks, causing Han Shuo to silently sigh multiples times in wonder.

    ¡°Bryan, your Agony of the Soul should be over by now and can help me practice my zombies today. Come, go to training room three.¡± Lisa flicked her gaze to the figure in the corner andmanded arrogantly.

    ¡°Lisa, practice is fine and all, but you can¡¯t do what you didst time and directly attack him with a ghoul.¡± Fanny rebuked gently, worried that something might happen to Han Shuo after hearing Lisa¡¯s words.

    ¡°I know, Master Fanny!¡± Lisa tossed out a careless reply and walked towards training room three.

    It was the duty of the errand servants to help students practice their magic. Han Shuo also wanted to take to chance and enact some revenge, so he docilely put down the mop and walked towards the training room.

    Lisa closed the training room door with a loud tter after Han Shuo had entered the area. This indicated that she wished to reserve the room for her own use today. She stood cockily in front of the door and stared Han Shuo down, ¡°You can¡¯t run away today.¡±

    She immediately raised her hands and started chanting when she had finished speaking, ¡°Zombie warriors of the fallen, heed the dark herald¡¯s call and reveal your existence!¡±

    A muscr zombie warrior with a dark green body, wielding a thick wooden club, materialized as soon as the incantation had finished.

    Zombie warriors were a level higher than skeletal warriors. They weren¡¯t necessarily rotting corpses, but rather had muscr and tough bodies.They moved faster than skeletal warriors and their strength was greater. Only novice mages were able to summon them, so therefore a mere apprentice, like Bach, would have beenpletely unable to do so.

    Summoned dark creatures could attack enemies if the summoner gave a mentalmand. However, low level dark creatures usually possessed extremely low intelligence, and could only engage in the most basic attacks. A summoner would have to continuously exercise mental control if they wanted the dark creature to attack up to its full potential. Only then would the dark creature follow the summoner wishes and attack in a variety ofplex ways.

    However, repeated practice was needed in order to be proficient and adeptly control a dark creature¡¯s attacks through mental strength. Therefore, the necromancy errand boys often became practice targets. Up until now, Lisa and co. had used skeletal warriors to practice on the errand boys. This time however, she had summoned a zombie warrior. It was in to see that she was up to no good.

    Han Shuo was dumbfounded when he saw that Lisa hadn¡¯t summoned a skeletal warrior, but a stronger, higher level zombie warrior. He inwardly cursed Lisa¡¯s name a couple dozen times and backed up, on high alert.

    ¡°Hehe, I see you¡¯re running faster Bryan, and that your strength has grown. It seems to be a bit of an insult to practice skeletal warriors on you. So today, you have the honor of helping the future necromancer archmage, Lisa, learn how to better control zombie warriors.¡±

    Lisa¡¯s pretty cheeks were tinged with pink and an unholy glee shone in her eyes. Under hermands, the zombie warrior had already started running towards Han Shuo, while she talked.

    The zombie warrior was wielding a thick wooden club and thundered towards Han Shuo, ording to Lisa¡¯s instructions. Its speed was quite fast, and closed the distance quickly. The club flew directly towards Han Shuo¡¯s head.

    This club was thicker than Han Shuo¡¯s arms, and the zombie warrior possessed great strength. Even if he didn¡¯t die, Han Shuo would be gravely injured if he was hit.

    For reasons unknown, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t afraid at all as he watched the club descend. In fact, he felt a kind of bloodthirsty excitement. It was a very odd feeling, as if his body and soul craved battle.

    His eyes narrowed slightly as the dumb look vanished from his face, reced with a sharp glint in his eyes. He tensed his left leg and sprang off it, shifting his body to the right by a meter.

    Bam went the zombie warrior¡¯s wooden club as it smacked solidly into the floor, where Han Shuo had just been standing.

    ¡°Ee?!¡± Lisa gave a shocked squeal from the sidelines, where she had been controlling the zombie warrior. For the briefest of moments, the feeling she normally received from Han Shuo drastically changed, causing her heart to stutter. She had never seen the expression and the look in his eyes before this moment, and so had emitted a startled sound of bewilderment.

    She forgot to give the zombie warrior furthermands after that moment, and rubbed her eyes nervously. She stared closely at Han Shuo again.

    Strangely, Han Shuo was wearing a silly expression again, and seemed to be instinctively fearing the zombie warrior. He cowered and trembled as he backed up, giving off the very appearance of an idiot.

    I must have seen incorrectly. That damn Bryan, how is it possible... how could he have... that kind of aura, that kind of gaze? Lisa thought silently and gave a cold snort. She started to gather her mental strength again andmanded the zombie warrior to chase Han Shuo.

    Although Han Shuo was chased every which way by the zombie warrior, he did not reveal it second time, the aura and look that had surprised Lisa, but he always managed to avoid the zombie warrior¡¯s club at veryst second. This peaked Lisa¡¯s curiosity andpetitive spirit, and so she fully concentrated on manipting the zombie warrior as she thought, ¡°Bryan¡¯s actually gotten a lot faster and stronger since he¡¯s gone crazy.¡±

    As the widely pursued target, Han Shuo started developing a strong desire for vengeance on Lisa at some point. Even though Han Shuo tried to reason that he couldn¡¯t and shouldn¡¯t pursue vengeance, and tried to stop the thought in its tracks, he just couldn¡¯t turn it off entirely.

    And as the zombie warrior became more and more agile, and chasing after him with greater speed, Han Shuo¡¯s thirst for revenge became stronger as well. ¡°A demon practitioner does as he wishes... A demon practitioner does as he wishes...¡± A memory suddenly resurfaced in Han Shuo¡¯s mind. He seemed to spontaneously understand the true meaning behind demonic magic, and the sentence ¡°a demon practitioner does as he wishes¡± seemed to coalesce into a voice that echoed endlessly in his mind.

    Finally, Han Shuo gave a low roar as he bent his head and arched his body. He changed his body¡¯s trajectory from avoidance and made straight for Lisa¡¯s direction.

 Chapter 11: This time, itâ€™s a club

    Chapter 11: This time, it¡¯s a club

    Lisa was fully concentrating on manipting the zombie warrior at this moment, and was stunned into dumbly standing there when Han Shuo suddenly changed direction and directly charged at her. She shook off her inaction in a panic, and hastily ordered the zombie warrior to follow Han Shuo, while she exhaled lightly and dodged to the side.

    Lisa couldn¡¯t make out Han Shuo¡¯s expression as he had lowered his head and arched his back, but an aura, as sharp as keen as a sword¡¯s edge, emanated from him as he charged. This waspletely unlike anything that Han Shuo had ever disyed before, and thus the source of Lisa¡¯s consternation.

    Because the zombie warrior had been a step behind, its speed could not catch up to Han Shuo and thus could not help Lisa in the short run. It was hard for Lisa to maintain her previous unppable calm and she ran madly to and fro, terror written on her face.

    And so, a strange scene appeared in the training room. The zombie warrior chased after Han Shuo, whilst wielding a wooden club, whereas thetter said not a word and charged towards Lisa with his head lowered, while Lisa ran a wild, avoidance pattern around the room. She even forgot to team up with the zombie warrior and fight Han Shuo together.

    ¡°Bryan, are you crazy? How dare you chase me?¡± Lisa yelled as she ran, rm evident in her voice.

    As the one doing the chasing, Han Shuo¡¯s mind was foggy and not too clear at the moment. Only the voice of ¡°a demon practitioner does as he wishes...¡± reverberated on and off in his mind.

    Han Shuo knew that he had to avoid a confrontation with Lisa at all costs. Otherwise, not only would the academy punish him, but even Lisa¡¯s family would be out for blood. No matter who it was, either one would be enough to make him suffer greatly, as he was only an errand boy.

    However, reason was reason, and logic was logic. Even though he knew he shouldn¡¯t, it was as if Han Shuo had taken the wrong medicine. He pursued Lisa relentlessly, theplete embodiment of ¡°a demon practitioner does as he wishes¡±.

    All at once, Lisa gave a quiet ¡°Ah!¡± as she slipped while running and fell heavily. Han Shuo had already been close behind Lisa, and took advantage of this opportunity to close the distance in one giant step.

    ¡°Ah! Bryan, what are you doing? I¡¯ll definitely kill you if you dare bully me!¡± Lisa saw that Han Shuo was already standing next to her before she was able to pull herself up. She frantically blurted out a threat when she saw that he was raising his left foot readied himself to kick her.

    Han Shuo wore a very odd expression on his face at this time. He frowned fiercely, as if struggling with indecision. Reason wanted to prevent him from kicking Lisa, but after that sentence of ¡°I¡¯ll kill you¡±, a hint of cruelty appeared on his face. The hovering foot descended and made straight for Lisa¡¯s pert, round butt.

    Bam sounded at as the foot connected solidly with its target. Han Shuo felt like his left leg was kicking a smooth, rubber ball due to a feeling of soft buoyancy.

    ¡°Ah....¡±

    Lisa gave an uncontrolled scream, like a pig being ughtered, as she cursed vehemently.

    At the same time, the magical yuan, that had been enclosing ude¡¯s pale-green fighting aura in Han Shuo¡¯s chest, suddenly churned madly like a whirlpool. He could clearly feel that ude¡¯s fighting aura was being dissolved bit by bit into the whirlpool by the magical yuan¡¯s high speed.

    The pale-green fighting aura that had lingered in Han Shuo¡¯s body for the greater part of the day had vanished without a trace in the span of a moment. The magical yuan in Han Shuo¡¯s body felt noticeably stronger. He felt that the pale-green aura had beenpletely digested by the magical yuan.

    And at that moment, the magical yuan in Han Shuo¡¯s chest started circting aimlessly throughout his body again, but he could feel the energy, that he had just expended,e back. Even his mental state was in the best shape, as if he had just taken some highly potent elixir.

    It was then that Han Shuo fully understood the meaning of ¡°a demon practitioner does as he wishes¡±. It appeared that the magical yuan would spin faster if he followed his internal desires, and could even absorb and transmute fighting aura to be nutrition for the magical yuan.

    ¡°A demon practitioner does as he wishes, and benefits himself at the expense of others. So even training should be done this way!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s facial expressions flickered oddly as he thought to himself.

    ¡°Wah... that hurts so much! Damn you Bryan, I¡¯m going to kill you. You hurt me!¡± Lisa clutched the butt, that was still under Han Shuo¡¯s foot, as she loudly gave voice to threats. There were already hints of tears forming in her eyes. It would seem that Han Shuo had delivered quite a strong kick just now.

    His thoughts interrupted, Han Shuo gave a silent cry of dismay inside when he looked at Lisa. He was well acquainted with Lisa¡¯s temper. She was well known for getting revenge. She would not easily let him go after what he¡¯d just done to her.

    Particrly as Lisa had actually cried. It would seem that her butt had suffered more than a small injury. All would be over for Han Shuo if the school found out about this.

    The club wielding zombie had arrived in front of Han Shuo at that moment, and brought its club crashing down on his head, ording to Lisa¡¯s orders.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart gave a great leap as he turned around to see the club descending, but at the same time, he suddenly felt that the club was falling rather slowly. He picked up his feet, and somehow easily avoided the attack.

    Han Shuo gave a light ¡°eh?¡± as he was slightly astonished, and once again dodged easily when he saw the club descending a second time. It was then that he realized that it wasn¡¯t the zombie warrior that had gotten slower, it was that his speed and reflexes that had improved.

    ¡°Hehe, still didn¡¯t get me!¡± He gave a weird cackle as heid his worries to rest. He continued to evade all of the zombie warrior¡¯s attacks. As he moved, he could feel his body be more and more agile, and even had the spare time to verbally ridicule Lisa.

    Lisa had wanted to use the zombie warrior to get revenge for her, but who knew that the damned Bryan would suddenly be as limber as a monkey. He avoided the zombie warrior¡¯s club attacks with a hop here, and a jump there, and even catcalled shamelessly, as if mocking her ipetence.

    ¡°Damned Bryan, you¡¯re not going to get off this easily!¡± Lisa grew a bit distracted thanks to the paining from her butt. Upon seeing that the zombie warrior not able to get a bead on Han Shuo, she made a shrill threat, and dismissed the zombie warrior back to another dimension.

    She tried to get up from the floor at the same time, but her butt was in too much pain after Han Shuo¡¯s kick, and she cried out ¡°aiyo!¡± as her legs gave way and she copsed into a sitting position on the floor again.

    Han Shuo was under no more pressure now that the zombie warrior had disappeared, but rather smiled foolishly and made his way to Lisa¡¯s side. He dumbly extended a malnourished hand and said, ¡°Let me take you to the infirmary.¡±

    ¡°None of your business, you damned idiot.¡± Tear tracks still streaked her face as she replied viciously to Han Shuo. She could still feel the pain radiating from her butt.

    Han Shuo seemed to be bbergasted after hearing her words, and a mischievous, evil glint slowly blossomed in his eyes. He extended his left hand and made as if to touch Lisa¡¯s smooth, pert butt and said dumbly, ¡°Then, let me rub it for you!¡±

    Although Lisa had a vile temper, she was still a beauty. Although her chest wasn¡¯t fully rounded out, her butt was umonly perky. His heart lurched immediately when he touched her butt, it felt exceedingly tender, yet firm, and was a delightful handful.

    ¡°Ah, go to hell Bryan! Don¡¯te near me!¡± Tears still sparkling on Lisa¡¯s face, she immediately lost her head and screamed loudly when she felt her butt being touched by Han Shuo. She found strength from somewhere and pilip beat Han Shuo with both arms and legs.

    One of her feet in particr connected solidly with Han Shuo¡¯s ankle. He lost his bnce and came crashing down on Lisa, with his left hand still on her butt.

    A delicate fragrance from Lisa wafted into his nose, and his heart lurched again. Lisa¡¯s body felt soft beneath him, and his left hand was still cushioned by her butt. He could clearly feel how soft it was.

    It was as if a thunderbolt had struck Lisa in that moment, and she froze there dumbly, staring back at Han Shuo.

    But itsted only a moment, and she didn¡¯t continue to scream, but rather lifted both hands and started chanting with a cold face, ¡°Oh endless darkness, turn into destructive bone arrows, and destroy ording to my will...¡±

    Han Shuo was horrified and agitated as he knew that that was the beginning of the necromancy spell bone arrow chant. He would bepletely unable to dodge if the bone arrows shot at him from such close quarters. Perhaps even some parts of his body would be impaled by the bone arrows. That would not be fun, to say the least. And given that Lisa¡¯s expression was icily cold, it was obvious that she wasn¡¯t kidding. She really did want to kill Han Shuo.

    A thought shed like lightning through his mind as he decided to not wait for Lisa to finish the chant. He abruptly shot out his arms, pinned down Lisa¡¯s slender arms and held her tightly. He followed that up with moving his face closed to her, and frantically smashing his open mouth against her cherry red lips.

    ¡°Destroy the... mmph mmph...¡± Lisa¡¯s incantation was thus halted and wasn¡¯tpleted.

    The two mouths met and a smooth, wet feeling flowed into Han Shuo¡¯s heart. His entire mind felt out of it, as if he had ascended to the clouds in a split second. His entire being was drifting away, and he had no idea what was going on.

    Even before he hadnded in Bryan¡¯s body, Han Shuo had never kissed a girl before. The feeling of kissing a girl had only existed in his theoretical musings before. Now that it had happened, his immediate reaction was to be dazed with astoundment. He only thought, this feeling ¡ª was much more wondrous than he had imagined.

    Lisa¡¯s face blushed hotly red as her breath came out unevenly. Her eyes were a haze of confusion and she was just as dazed as Han Shuo. She had no realization that she was being vited by Han Shuo at that very moment.

    Lisa forcefully pushed Han Shuo away after a while and suddenly pointed at him, her little face ming red, ¡°Stupid Bryan, why do you always carry a bunch of weird things in your pants. Last time it was rocks, this time it¡¯s a club.¡±

    Han Shuo, ¡°....¡±

 Chapter 12: Poking oneâ€™s nose into other peopleâ€™s business

    Chapter 12: Poking one¡¯s nose into other people¡¯s business

    ¡°I...¡± Han Shuo opened his mouth, but didn¡¯t have the time to get a word out before Lisanded a pilip wave of hits with her girly fists. She cursed as she hit him, ¡°Damn you Bryan, how dare you kiss me. My first kiss was taken from me by a crazy person! Oh my gosh, this is too scary. I¡¯m going to kill you!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind was also in a jumble in the heat of the moment, since he¡¯d just kissed Lisa. It was Lisa¡¯s first time, who¡¯s to say it wasn¡¯t also Han Shuo¡¯s first time as well?

    Fear showed on Lisa¡¯s face, and her butt was injured, so there was no strength at all behind her girly fists. Han Shuo did not feel any pain, and wasn¡¯t even tickled by her hits. He didn¡¯t resist, and furiously racked his brain for a way to prevent Lisa from further pursuing this matter.

    Lisa seemed to grow tired from hitting him after a while. Her eyes were a bit red and puffy, and she red viciously at Han Shuo. After she¡¯d stared at him for a moment, Lisa frowned and said coldly, ¡°Bryan, I will let you go if you tell me just one thing.¡±

    Momentarily stunned, Han Shuo asked dumbly, ¡°Tell you what?¡±

    ¡°Why has your strength grown during this period? You couldn¡¯t avoid even skeletal warriors before, but now, even zombie warriors can¡¯t catch up to you. Even that idiot Bach suffered a beating at your handsst time. ude¡¯s fighting aura obviously entered your body this morning, but why didn¡¯t you die immediately? Why is all this?¡± Lisa stared at Han Shuo closely during her interrogation.

    Han Shuo inwardly thought, ¡°uh oh¡± as his heart lurched. His body had indeed be stronger thanks to training his magical yuan, but who would¡¯ve thought that Lisa would pick up on it so quickly.

    He hurriedly considered a few options and then dumbly replied with a silly smile, ¡°I, I don¡¯t know... Just that I¡¯ve eaten a few things recently that have made me feel stronger.¡±

    Lisa¡¯s eyes shed noticeably after Han Shuo had finished speaking, and she put her face next to his with every bit of interest. She focused her eyes on him and said, ¡°What did you eat? I won¡¯t pursue the matters of today as long as you tell me.¡±

    ¡°Use magical reagents to mix lizard tail and aardwolf teeth... submerse it in warm water for a day and then drink both of them down. That will improve your strength.¡± Han Shuo contracted his eyebrows and thought deeply for a moment, then delivered those lines with a naive smile.

    Lisa¡¯s face wore a serious expression and concentrated wholly on Han Shuo¡¯s words. She repeated his words and then murmured to herself. ¡°Eh? These disgusting things have this effect when mixed together?¡±

    Han Shuo did not respond and only looked at Lisa with a dumb smile.

    ¡°Hmph. I¡¯ll let you go today, and wille grab you for magic practice next time.¡± Lisa thought for a moment, and picked herself up from the ground to leave, but then went ¡°aiyo!¡± and cursed angrily, ¡°Damned Bryan, your kick was too strong. Why am I always so unlucky around you?!¡±

    Lisa left the training room madly cursing, with one hand rubbing her butt. Han Shuo swiftly followed as soon as she¡¯d left, quickly making his getaway as well, before anyone noticed.

    Later that evening, Han Shuo stealthily crept over to the trash dump in the middle of the night. He first tried to use mental strength tomand the small skeleton to show itself, but couldn¡¯t reach the skeleton again. He unwillingly bore the stench of trash and rifled through the entire trash dump, finally finding the skeleton at the bottom of all the trash.

    The little skeleton had crumpled underneath the trash as if it was asleep, with no outward sign of life. Several bones were scattered from his rib cage, and he appeared to be heavily injured. Due to his connection with the skeleton, Han Shuo knew that the little skeleton had not been junked. Han Shuo felt a wave of pity and guilt looking at the skeleton¡¯s condition, knowing that it had ended up this way because it had received hismand to get revenge on Lisa.

    ¡°ude, oh ude, just you wait. I¡¯ll get my revenge on you some day!¡±

    He grabbed the skeleton and cradled it, once more sneaking back to the warehouse under the cover of night. The skeleton¡¯s loose rib cage bones ttered against each other as he ran, making his heart wring in pity again.

    Han Shuo carefully closed the door when they were back in the warehouse, and thought for a moment. He ced the little skeleton in the wooden bucket again and found seven pieces of broken bone after some scavenging. He stuck them in the bucket, and channeled his magical yuan into them, reforming the ¡°Magical Yin Concentration Matrix¡±. He was attempting to fix the small skeleton¡¯s body with the method used to repair demonic treasures.

    In contrast tost time¡¯s severe weakness, Han Shuo felt much better off this time after he had injected his magical yuan into the bucket. It would seem that the magical yuan had increased in amount after digesting ude¡¯s fighting aura that morning. This set off another line of reasoning in Han Shuo¡¯s mind.

    He securely put aside the skeleton and brought out ¡°The Foundations of Magic¡± from beneath his bed for further study. He had maintained his nightly studies these days, and not even thunder or lightning could sway him from his reading.

    Even though this was just a foundations book, and had no record of any major necromancy magics within its pages, for aplete magical rookie like Han Shuo, this book was still much tooplex for him.

    Tonight, he cross referenced ¡°The Foundations of Magic¡± alongside the ¡°A Magical Dictionary¡±, and gradually lost himself in the books. However, despite the aid of ¡°A Magical Dictionary¡± in this process, he was still unable to understand some of the technical terms within their covers.

    He gave a long sigh and put down the two books in his hand, thinking to himself that he¡¯d only started building his understanding of magic over the past ten days. If he could fullyprehend all the material in the books, then there was no point in the continued existence of the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. After some thought, he decided to take full advantage of the convenience of his position and eavesdrop on the necromancy ssrooms that were currently in session.

    Han Shuo settled back into meditation after he had calmed and cleared his mind. He wanted to make the best use of any scrap of spare time to meditate and increase his mental strength. Before he knew it, he had meditated well into the night and then went to sleep peacefully.

    Han Shuo was full of vitality when he got up the next day at daybreak, as if his body was full of boundless energy. The little skeleton in the wooden tub next to his bed was still and showed no signs of life. There were seven small swirls next to the seven broken pieces of bone, with subtle hints of ck light flowing in the water.

    Upon closer inspection, he saw that unbeknownst to anyone, the scattered rib cage bones had reordered themselves. The skeleton¡¯s two empty eye hollows also seemed to have ck light sparkling in them and appeared quite eerie.

    Han Shuo contacted the skeleton with his magical yuan and immediately sensed that the skeleton seemed to be delighting in its newfound life. Also feeling the same, Han Shuo gave a slight smile and said to himself, ¡°Oh little skeleton, you¡¯re extremely lucky to be following me. I can keep refining you as long as I have enough magical yuan, and you¡¯ll be stronger as a result. One of these days, that ude will get what¡¯sing to him.¡±

    Because the little skeleton was still being refined in the wooden bucket, Han Shuo had to get up himself and dispose of yesterday¡¯s trash. Once he had washed his face with briskly cold water, Han Shuo vigorously dusted off all the statues. Hepleted his duties afterwards, received a piece of ck bread, and ran off towards the necromancy ssrooms in high spirits, a broom in hand.

    ¡°In order to perfectly release magic, both incantations and hand seals are key. If the chant is incorrect, or the gesture incorrect, then you will be unable to perform magic. Magic is a mysterious power, the art of borrowing strength from the elements found on earth and in the heavens by employing mental strength, along with mysterious incantations. Magic then finds its target through hand seals...¡±

    The necromancy students were either attentively orckadaisically listening to Master Gene. A few windows down, Han Shuo listened with all his concentration and unconsciously waved the broom in his hand.

    Gene was the same as Fanny, a necromancy adept mage, as well as a teacher for the major. Gene mainly instructed the basics and foundations of magic, and was in charge of helping students through the more difficult parts of the material. Fanny on the other hand, taught students how to supplement attacks with necromancy magics and led the students in experimenting with necromancy magic.

    For all the other majors at the academy, not only did they have adept mages for teachers, but they also had even more knowledgeable, more powerful magi (plural of magus) holding down the fort. But due to theck of students in the necromancy major, Gene and Fanny were the only two teachers, and only adept ss at that. On one hand, it was true that there was no need to dedicate too many resources to the tiny necromancy major; but on the other, it was also due to the fact that necromancy had be unpopr, resulting in a corresponding decrease in the number of necromancy magi.

    At the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, students could graduate as long as they passed through a gauntlet of exams. Of course, if students wanted to continue their journey with the academy, they were free to stay and study within the school grounds. Many majors would separate students ording to apprentice, novice, and journeyman sses, but because there were too few necromancy students, all the students were lumped into one ss.

    At this moment, Han Shuo was concentrating with all his might, and a trace of joyous glee could be seen in the smile on his lowered head. It had been just a few moments, but Han Shuo had already thought through some of the theories that had perplexed him endlessly, thanks to Gene¡¯s exnations. His tepid, old-fashioned tone was the soothing music of angels to Han Shuo¡¯s ears, and he lost himself in it.

    Bam sounded out as a student, wearing magician¡¯s robes, suddenly fell down in front of Han Shuo. His butt stuck up in the air as his face became intimately acquainted with the white marble floors. He grimaced in pain as he picked himself up, turned to re at Han Shuo, and said angrily, ¡°Bryan, how dare you trip me with the broom handle.¡±

    ¡°Ah... I was only sweeping!¡± Han Shuo immediately responded with a panicked, upraised voice when he saw that the person was Fitch.

    Fitch was 176 cm tall and had light blue hair. His thin framebined with a billowy magician¡¯s robe, made him look like a wrapped up wooden stick. He was a journeyman mage in the necromancy major, and had long wanted to pass the tests to be promoted to adept mage. Unfortunately, he had failed multiple times, and rumor had it that he¡¯d made another attempt. It would seem that he¡¯d just returned.

    Han Shuo had been enthralled by Gene¡¯s lecture on foundational magic and had paid no heed to the broom in his hand. No wonder Fitch had been tripped.

    ¡°Eh? Fitch hase back. Heh heh, did you fail again? Looks like you need to try much harder if you want to be an adept mage. I wee your return. Bryan must not have done it on purpose just now, don¡¯t mind him!¡± Gene have a lightugh in the ssroom, and spoke with concealed banter.

    Han Shuo was not in the least grateful for Gene speaking up for him, but rather cursed him for poking his nose in other people¡¯s business.

    Fitch had a bad temper to begin with, but wasn¡¯t really a bad sort. Even though he had failed on countless asions to pass the adept mage exams, he still experimented tirelessly due to his great love for necromancy. Fitch was the leader of Bach and a few others, but normally wouldn¡¯t pick on Bryan and other errand boys.

    However, both Fitch and Gene had a crush on Fanny. Fitch tried so hard to advance to adept ss inrge part due to something Fanny had said before,¡°I will only consider you if you be an adept mage.¡±

    Because of this, this teacher and student pair disliked each other intensely. If it wasn¡¯t for Gene¡¯s words, Han Shuo might have escaped further retribution, but now that Gene had spoken, it was bound to have the opposite effect.

 Chapter 13: Mystical Glacial Spellfire

    Chapter 13: Mystical cial Spellfire

    Indeed, Fitch¡¯s face twisted sinisterly as soon as Gene had finished speaking, almost as if someone had stepped on his face with a dirty shoe. He quickly nced at the dumbly smiling Han Shuo, but proceeded to speak to Gene, ¡°Master Gene, this outrageous errand ve dared to trip me. How can I not teach him a lesson?!¡±

    Fitch rolled up his sleeves as he spoke, and hit Han Shuo on the head with his grey magic staff. Han Shuo actually breathed a sigh of relief when he saw that Fitch wasn¡¯t using magic, but merely his staff instead. Although Fitch was tall, he didn¡¯t have much strength. Han Shuo saw that the blow was descending without too much force, and decided to ignore it entirely. He stood there and made no attempt to dodge, just continued to smile in a silly, honest way.

    Pow!

    Han Shuo suddenly experienced acute pain when the magic staff knocked against his forehead. He gave a bloodcurdling ¡°aiyo!¡± and grimaced in pain from the magic staff in Fitch¡¯s hands. Who would¡¯ve thought that although the staff looked like it was made of wood, it had the heft and hardness of metal. Han Shuo could only feel that his brain was buzzing with agony, and that a huge lump had already formed on his forehead.

    ¡°Damnit, why is this magic staff so hard and so heavy? I¡¯ve miscalcted this time!¡± Han Shuo thought as his forehead was bashed again, before his brain had had a chance to recover from the first hit. He felt his head grow heavy, and he stiffly fainted dead away onto the ground.

    When Han Shuo came to, he found himself on arge, soft bed. Faint medicinal scents floated in the air. He noticed that the two big lumps on his head had already faded, and there seemed to be some type of ointment applied to them. It had a cooling effect and felt veryfortable.

    ¡°You¡¯re awake?¡± A face suddenly came near him. Light purple, wavy, long hair, sparkling clear eyes, fresh white teeth, and sexy red lips blew out a breath of slight fragrance onto Han Shuo¡¯s face.

    ¡°Eh, Fan... Master Fanny!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s gave a soft gasp at the sight of the pretty face in front him, and his heart began pounding. He pulled himself up into a sitting position on the bed and nced around, taking in his surroundings.

    The room was 20 square meters, and arge upright drawer was nearby. It contained a variety of medicinal vials, as well as some bones from magical creatures on the side. The walls were filled with magical drawings and text. In the middle was a pedestal made of darkly colored rocks, with a simple magic matrix formed on top of it. One nce was enough to tell Han Shuo that this was Fanny¡¯sboratory.

    As Han Shuo was observing his surroundings, Fanny was also scrutinizing him with a great deal of surprise. It wasn¡¯t until Han Shuo¡¯s sight had made a full circle and looked towards her, that Fanny extended a slender finger and lightly tapped his forehead. A small exmation of bewilderment followed shortly thereafter, ¡°Eh? The bumps went down so quickly? There wasn¡¯t even any bleeding under such a heavy staff thumping... How is this possible?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart lurched when Fanny¡¯s finger touched him, and his nose greedily took in a deep breath. His lips curved up slightly in satisfaction as a whiff of fragrance drifted towards him.

    Fanny, on the other hand, was stunned by Han Shuo¡¯s behavior. His actions just now bore a few obvious hints of wanton seduction, and was a marked difference from Bryan¡¯s typical timid and cowardly behavior. This made her pause in iprehension, but a low sigh of understanding followed thereafter. She murmured lightly, ¡°I didn¡¯t believe them before, but it does seem that Bryan has gone a little crazy. I can¡¯t believe an Agony of the Soul has turned him into this, sigh!¡±

    Although Fanny had murmured in an exceedingly low voice, Han Shuo clearly heard everything. Heughed wryly inside, and thought that here was yet another person who truly believed that he had gone mad.

    Suddenly, an expression of heightened curiosity appeared on Fanny¡¯s face and she said earnestly, ¡°Bryan, the bruises and bumps on your forehead healed so quickly; there¡¯s nothing there now. Is this an aftereffect of the Agony of the Soul? Aiya, this is really too incredible. I have something to research further again. Necromancy magic is truly wondrous indeed!¡±

    Han Shuo could only smile wryly with some resignation, as he watched Fanny ¡®pilip¡¯ rifle wildly through her things with great excitement. Han Shuo was just a crazy person to her right now. He naturally couldn¡¯t exin that training magical yuan was the reason behind his body¡¯s oddities.

    Fanny was not wearing her sses again today, and was exuberantly rummaging through magical items on all sides. After a while, she sashayed towards Han Shuo, holding a light green ball the size of her palm. The light green ball lit up with a soft, green glow, and after she abruptly said an incantation, she ced the ball on top of Han Shuo¡¯s forehead.

    Strong magical undtions rippled out from the ball. It was like a ma, firmly glued to Han Shuo¡¯s forehead as the light green ball sucked out thest bit of mental strength from his mind. The light green ball suddenly flickered like a broken green light bulb.

    ¡°Oh... this is too inconceivable! Bryan, you have mental strength in your mind! Oh my gosh, what¡¯s going on? Can it be that the Agony of the Soul has the ability to bestow ordinary people with mental strength, after they have been baptized by magic? This is too unbelievable!¡± Fanny suddenly hollered, astonishment and fright written all over her face. It seemed that discovering that Han Shuo¡¯s mind had mental strength was more than a small shock to her.

    ¡°I¡¯ve decided, this will be my future research topic. If the Agony of the Soul doesn¡¯t turn someone crazy and can leave traces mental strength within a body, then even an ordinary person can be a mage. Oh... this is too unimaginable!¡±

    Gurgle.

    It was at this moment that Han Shuo¡¯s stomach protested with hunger. The excitement still had not receded from Fanny¡¯s face as she breathlessly to Han Shuo. ¡°It¡¯s gettingte today, go back and rest first. I¡¯lle find you often in the future. I¡¯ll go discuss with the school authorities to lighten your workload appropriately and increase your rations, until I¡¯ve finished studying this topic.¡±

    Joy blossomed in Han Shuo¡¯s heart as he heard Fanny¡¯s words. Evil thoughts kept crossing his mind as he watched the morous Fanny. He thought that good luck was unstoppable when it came; not only did his workload suddenly lighten and food rations increase, but he had an excuse to get closer to Fanny. It looked like Fitch had actually helped him a great deal with this beating.

    When he left Fanny¡¯sb, Han Shuo lifted his head and saw that it was dusk when he noticed the fading light in the sky. He rubbed his forehead and discovered that apart from a bit of light pain, there wasn¡¯t much else wrong with him now.

    Hepleted his afternoon duties with lightning speed, and bumped into Jack at the ce where bread was given out. Jack was extremely surprised to see Han Shuo, and cast weird nces at him. He asked doubtfully, ¡°Bryan, I heard that you had two huge bumps on your head and fainted because of Fitch¡¯s magic staff? Howe there isn¡¯t a trace of that now?¡±

    ¡°Master Fanny smeared magical reagents on me, the bumps naturally faded away quite quickly. Heh heh, Master Fanny is beautiful and gentle!¡± Han Shuoughed happily at Jack.

    ¡°Bryan, this is your food for the day!¡± A voice called out from the dining hall window. Han Shuo swiftly ran over and received a piece of white bread, a small cup of milk and a fried egg.

    ¡°Eh? Brother Gotha did you make a mistake? Bryan should get the same food as us, and even a smaller piece of bread than mine!¡± The boy who Han Shuo had beaten upst time ¡ª Carey, waved a piece of ck bread in his hand and yelled loudly at the fatty who was in charge of dispensing errand boy rations ¡ª Gotha.

    Gotha cast a cold nce at Carey and lightly snorted, ¡°This is correct, it came straight from the school authorities. This will also be Bryan¡¯s rations in the future. Go talk to the school authorities if you have opinions about it. Hmph. But you¡¯re just a small errand boy, you¡¯d be making life difficult for yourself if you said anything.¡±

    Han Shuo gave arge shout ofughter as he saw Carey and Borg¡¯s angry expressions while holding his white bread, milk, and egg. He purposely smacked his lips loudly when eating the bread, and kept up a long litany of praises. ¡°Mm-mm, this white bread definitely tastes different from ck bread. Ah, There¡¯s even milk and eggs. Oh goodness, this is such a happy day.¡±

    ¡°Eh... Bryan, can I drink some milk? That milk looks so delicious!¡± Little fatty Jack licked his lips and looked enviously at Han Shuo.

    ¡°There¡¯s still half a cup left, take it!¡± Han Shuo generously passed it to Jack and pulled him away, smiling merrily as the two walked away, leaving Carey and Borg behind casting disgruntled looks.

    Han Shuo took a look at the small skeletonter that night, back at the warehouse. He noticed that the small skeleton was stillying in the wooden bucket, but that the seven swirls in the bucket had stopped moving. He understood with a nce that this was because the magical yuan had run out, and extended a hand to coalesce more magical yuan into the seven bone fragments. It was only when the seven swirls had reformed around the bone fragments that he stopped and went to bed.

    The ¡°Yin Magical Concentration Matrix¡± was just one method in refining demonic treasures. ording to instructions, one infusion of magical yuan should have been enough to maintain the matrix for a full 36 days. However, this expected result hadn¡¯t been achieved partially due to the weaknesses of Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan, and also because he had randomly scavenged various ingredients together.

    Han Shuo felt that the magical yuan within his body had be much stronger after a bit of meditation and training on the bed. A sudden thought struck him, and he wondered if he could use the magical yuan to practice thebative magics that Chu Cang Lan had left behind in his mind.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyebrows knit together in deep thought as he started down this path of thought. He could vaguely feel that there were numerous training methods in his mind, but that many of these secret demonic techniques were a bit fuzzy, as if a thinyer of opaque paper prevented clear understanding.

    His brows furrowed as he slowly searched through his memories. He realized that the memories in his mind seemed to be in great disarray, and that he could not fully recall all of them. He could only fully remember three topics, one of which was the basics of training magical yuan, and the other was the ¡°Yin Magical Concentration Matrix¡± for refining demonic treasures. Apart from this two, there was another cantrap called the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡±.

    The ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡± was a way of using magical yuan, and its power would increase ording to the practitioner¡¯s level. The practitioner would be able to create red and purple spellfire on his palm if he circted his magical yuan in a particr fashion amongst the meridians. The red me was searingly hot, and the purple cially cold. If the magical yuan and practitioner level was high enough, then he would be able to coalesce his magical yuan into two huge red and purple spellfires on his palms. This attack would be both searingly hot and cially cold.

    It was as if Han Shuo had received a precious treasure after he had fully understood all this. He decided to ignore all the indeterminate, obstructed memories and started circting his magical yuan ording to the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡± method. He slowly concentrated his magical yuan into his right hand, but his right hand meridian felt like it was on fire as the magical yuan flowed through it during this process. His right arm became sore, numb and stiff as that thin, wispy meridian felt like it had been electrocuted.

    The magical yuan would be able to easily and quickly flow to the hand if he hadn¡¯t been circting it ording to the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡± method. But each time he circted the magical yuan ording to the spellfire¡¯s instructions, it was as if the magical yuan had met significant obstacles. Each tiny bit of progress was apanied by almost unbearable pain and difort. It wasn¡¯t until midnight that Han Shuo was able to finally circte some magical yuan from shoulder into wrist, but his entire arm prickled in pain and was useless.

    He understood that only by guiding all the magical yuan into his palm and fingertips would he be able to truly make use of the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡± method. It hurt so much now because he was clearing miniscule meridians, limating them to magical yuan. Short term pain was inevitable, and it would all go away once all the meridians were cleared.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyelids grew heavy, as he was umonly tired, and he decided to flop onto the bed and sleep when he thought about his duties tomorrow. He wouldn¡¯t be able to finish magic training in one night either.

    Han Shou had a strange dream that night, one in which the little skeleton obeyed hismands, and beat up that Fitch who had knocked him on his forehead, getting revenge for Han Shuo.

 Chapter 14: Took care of it in advance

    Chapter 14: Took care of it in advance

    The next day, Han Shuo was rudely awakened by a heavy trash bag being dumped on him.

    He had been sweetly dreaming when he felt a heavy mountain toppling down on him. He alertly scrambled up from the bed, and rubbed his eyes to see that there was an extra heavy bag of trash on the bed. He immediately understood that someone must¡¯ve thrown their trash in through the warehouse window.

    He nagged and cursed randomly, kicking the bag of trash off the bed. The bagnded with a thump and rolled towards the door. Han Shuo was about to go back to sleep, when he realized that the time must¡¯ve beente if someone had thrown a bag of trash in.

    The sun had indeed risen high into the sky when Han Shuo pushed open the windows to take in the view. He sighed in turn, thinking that he had overexerted himself with trainingst night. He had definitely overslept today, and was about to hurry out the door, when he suddenly recalledst night¡¯s dream. He seemed to remember that the little skeleton had gotten revenge on Fitch for him. Han Shuo¡¯s heart leapt in fright when he remembered thatst time he had a simr dream, the events had actually happened. His gaze quickly searched towards the wooden bucket.

    He was greeted with the sight of the skeleton resting two bony, ck hands on the sides of the bucket, and its left leg bone crossed on top of its right leg bone, swingingzily to and fro, as if it was enjoying a sauna. It looked veryfortable and looked every bit a dapper rogue.

    Han Shuo breathed a sigh of relief upon seeing it still in the wooden bucket and mused silently for a moment. He got up and shoved the bucket underneath the bed, and only left the warehouse to tackle his day¡¯s duties after he¡¯d grabbed a trash bag to plug the space underneath the bed.

    ¡°Hi Bryan, what took you so long today?¡± Jack was dusting off the statues as he greeted Han Shuo from afar with a smile.

    Han Shuo nced around him and knew that he waste because no students were passing by on this path. sses must already be in session.

    ¡°Oh, my mind¡¯s groggy after Fitch¡¯s two taps yesterday. That¡¯s why I overslept.¡±

    ¡°Heh heh!¡± Jack suddenly gave a light, gloatingugh and put his head confidentially next to Han Shuo¡¯s. He said lowly, ¡°Bryan, you don¡¯t need to be mad. I heard the students talking on the way to ss today. That the ck, seven-winged skeleton, that appearedst time, beat Fitch upst night. His face is bruised and puffy!¡±

    Han Shuo, ¡°....¡±

    So the dream really had taken ce, with a few marked differences from what he¡¯d imagined. This time, the little skeleton was noticeably much faster and had already finished executing itsmands. No wonder the little skeleton had been lying in the bucket in a different position from the night when he checked the bucket this morning.

    ¡°Eh, Bryan. Why aren¡¯t you saying anything? Are you too happy? Haha, that must be the case. That ck skeleton is really something. When Fitch had been beaten awake, he only saw the pping of the seven wings. The skeleton leapt straight down from the window and escaped that way. Oh! Fitch lives on the fourth floor. It¡¯s amazing that the skeleton didn¡¯tnd in pieces of broken bones!¡±

    Han Shuo gave two dry coughs and was feeling quite gratified. He glossed over the topic and said, ¡°Well done! I wonder who summoned that little skeleton and got revenge for me. I¡¯ve been so luckytely!¡±

    No more unlucky things happened to Han Shuo in the next few days, and no one came looking for him to practice magic. In these days, Han Shuo took advantage of the rare quiet to stand outside the necromancy ssrooms early in the morning, and eavesdrop on Gene¡¯s lectures with a broom in hand.

    Maybe it was due to his beating at the hands of the skeleton, but Fitch didn¡¯t show up to ss in those few days. Han Shuo eavesdropped on Gene¡¯s exnations of magical knowledge everyday, and was enlightened on many theories that he simply did not understand prior.

    At night, Han Shuo practiced the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡±, and bit by bit, circted the magical yuan towards his right palm and fingertips ording to the spellfire¡¯s prescribed method. It burned with pain each time, but over the course of these few days, Han Shuo had almost circted the magical yuan to his wrist.

    He continued to study ¡°The Foundations of Necromancy¡±, and would mentally note the portions he didn¡¯t understand to see if Gene, by chance, mentioned any of those topics when Han Shuo was eavesdropping on his sses.

    Now that Han Shuo¡¯s rations had increased and his body was receiving more nutrition, not to mention him training his magical yuan, Han Shuo¡¯s originally delicate body unconsciously underwent some fundamental changes. He started to form muscles, and even seemed to grow a bit taller, while his temperament changed as well.

    The necromancy students all relegated Han Shuo¡¯s changes as the aftermath of him going crazy. Han Shuo basked in the ease of no one paying him much attention, and continued to work and covertly practice magic. He was happy to witness the changes in his body.

    ¡°Oh endless darkness, turn into destructive bone arrows, and destroy ording to my will, bone arrows!¡± A length of cuttingly sharp bone arrow materialized out of thin air when the incantation waspleted, and flew towards a straw figure in front of Han Shuo with a flick of his finger. However, it suddenly shuddered halfway through.

    Pa!

    The bone arrow suddenly exploded halfway to its target, and from the look of its direction, it had veered greatly off course. It wasn¡¯t aimed towards the straw stuffed figure at all.

    Han Shuo gave a low sigh as he shook his head, thinking that understanding theory was one matter, actually using it was another. Han Shuo had been practicing this lowest level bone arrow magic near the cemetery these days, and he¡¯d never been able to sessfully cast it. Either he wasn¡¯t able to summon the arrow, or its direction was greatly off course and would explode mid-flight.

    Han Shuo understood that repeated practice was necessary in order to sessfully cast necromancy magic. Only through constant practice would he be able to fully grasp the particrs of a spell, and be able to sessfully cast it without any errors or ws.

    These days, Han Shuo would always train his magical yuan for a while whenever night fell, then sneak over to the cemetery, where he had once been dumped as a corpse, to practice necromancy in the dead of night. The little skeleton would stand there unmoving once it had hauled over two bags of trash and thrown them away.

    Just as Han Shuo was reflecting on the incantation and hand seals he had used just now, and was trying to figure out where he had gone wrong with employing his mental strength, he suddenly heard rushed footsteps in the distance. He started and quickly hid in the randomly scattered rock outcroppings next to the cemetery.

    The cemetery was expansive andpletely quiet at night. Few visited apart from Han Shuo stopping by to throw away discarded magical ingredients. He furtively practiced magic here because he didn¡¯t want to be discovered, and naturally hid out of sight when he heard footsteps sound.

    After a while, a tall, solidly built, blue-haired, middle aged man, with his clothes dyed crimson from blood and bloody froth at his mouth, came into Han Shuo¡¯s line of sight. He wielded a broadsword and staggered forward with an anxious look. He stumbled directionless, and kept checking behind his back.

    His body shuddered when he reached the area where Han Shuo had been practicing before, and his footsteps swayed as he fell to the ground. He fished out a grey handbag from an inner chest pocket, randomly pawed at the earth twice and stuck the bag into the dirt. He got up and continued running after he had smoothed over the earth.

    ¡°Dn, where can you run to now!¡± A benevolent voice carried from afar as a ck light shed and materialized into a thin, frail, old man behind the middle aged man. He wore apassionate smile on his face and his master¡¯s robes were rimmed with gold. He carried an obviously precious staff that was embedded with a ruby, sapphire, and topaz.

    A ball of dark green light swiftly flew in from afar after the frail, old kindly mage had appeared. When it reached the clearing, the dark green light abruptly disappeared and a strongly built, muscr looking swordsman equipped with a longsword appeared.

    ¡°Master Duke, how should we handle Dn?¡± The swordsman stood politely next to the mage and asked humbly after he had arrived.

    Thepassionate old mage, Duke, wrinkled his sparse eyebrows and looked at the figure copsed on the ground with blooding out of his mouth. ¡°Poor Dn... he¡¯s probably at the end of his tether. He should not suffer this kind of pain. Erick, send him on his way!¡±

    ¡°The master is too kind!¡± Swordsman Erick praised with an odd expression on his face, and suddenly shed like lightning towards the still running Dn. Han Shuo caught a fleeting nce of a ball of dark green light as blood sttered from Dn¡¯s back, and he finally fell to the ground, unmoving.

    Erick sheathed his longsword and immediately bent down to search Dn¡¯s body. His facial expression became uglier and uglier, he finally stood up and said resignedly, ¡°Master Duke, it isn¡¯t on him!¡±

    ¡°How is that possible!¡± Duke was shocked and his expression shifted. He summoned Dn¡¯s corpse with a wave of his staff, chanted a wind magic incantation, and several sharp des of wind appeared to shred the corpse¡¯s clothing to pieces.

    Han Shou clearly saw it all while hiding behind the outcrop of rock. The dark green light blossoming from Erick¡¯s longsword indicated that he was a senior knight.

    That such a senior knight was so respectful to that Duke meant that the identity, or ability of this person, was even higher. It was the first time that Han Shuo had seen a murdermitted, and his heart pounded as it raced with panic.

    ¡°It really isn¡¯t on him!¡± Duke muttered to himself and tossed Dn¡¯s naked body to the ground like trash with another wave of his staff.

    Duke shook his staff again, and a strong pulse of mental strength gushed towards Han Shuo. Han Shuo¡¯s body flew up against his will andnded in front of Duke.

    ¡°Eh? How did you know I was there?¡± Not only was Han Shuo panicking internally, but his mouth was panicking as well. He iled around with his limbs in mid air and yelled with disbelief.

    ¡°Heh, what a cute, innocent little fellow! Judging from your clothes, you¡¯re from the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force?¡± Duke gazed kindly upon Han Shuo and dumped him on the ground after delivering these lines.

    ¡°Yeah, I¡¯m an errand boy from the Babylon Academy. I was here to throw away magical trash. I didn¡¯t see anything just now. Eh, it¡¯s gettingte. You guys keep chatting, I¡¯m going back now.¡±

    Han Shuo stood up from the ground and responded with a face full of naivete. He took two measured steps towards the academy¡¯s grounds, then increased his speed and ran away with all his might. These two weird guys might do something detrimental to me, best get away as soon as possible.

    ¡°Heh, this fellow is a bit shrewd. Erick, why don¡¯t you send him on his way!¡± Duke spoke benevolently andughed lightly behind Han Shuo¡¯s back.

    Han Shuo felt a strong current of air rapidly approach as soon as Duke had finished speaking.

 Chapter 15: Iâ€™m rich, Iâ€™m rich

    Chapter 15: I¡¯m rich, I¡¯m rich

    Han Shuo understood that Erick must have increased his speed and was rushing towards him to kill him, just like Erick had killed Dn, because he could feel the killing intent gradually approaching from behind.

    At this time, Han Shuo concentrated his focus for the first time in his life. Maybe it was because he had been training, but Han Shuo, now, not only had an extremely agile body, but was also much more bold than before. There would have been nothing but fear left in his heart right now if he was still his old self.

    The magical yuan within Han Shuo¡¯s body was swirling much faster than normal at this very moment. As he was running, he felt that his body had inexhaustible energy. Add to the fact that he was exceedingly familiar with the terrain, he actually widened the gap between him and Erick as he darted left and right while running.

    ¡°Eh!¡± Erick was surprised as he hadn¡¯t counted on Han Shuo being able to run so fast. Not only was he a fast runner, but his direction kept changing without warning. Erick¡¯s face grew hard as Han Shuo was about to disappear from sight, and the longsword in his hand began to glow with a dark green sheen. He forcefully plucked up somerge rocks that were nearby.

    As Han Shuo ran further away, he felt that he was sprinting smoothly and in fine shape. When he realized that he was leaving Erick¡¯s aura behind him, the joy of surviving a cataclysm rose in his heart.

    It was at that moment that two sound waves boomed in the air. Han Shuo only knew that his two legs were heavily hit a few times. He immediately sank to his knees and fell t on his face while he was running away. His face became intimately associated with the dirt, and his entire body fell to the floor.

    ¡°Little fe, sorry about this!¡±

    Erick lightly called apologetically as he flicked the longsword in his hand. A ball of dark green light materialized and swiftly flew towards Han Shuo.

    His mind clearer than ever before, Han Shuo felt the magical yuan within his body churning madly. His legs, that had been sore beyond belief moments ago, no longer ached as badly. As he faced the lethal blow, Han Shuo pushed off from the ground with both hands and feet and rolled to the left.

    ng!

    The ball of dark green light from Erick¡¯s longswordnded where Han Shuo had beenying on the ground. Multiple fractures crisscrossed over the hard ground like a chessboard. Each crack was several meters deep. If Han Shuo had still been there, he would have likely been torn to pieces.

    ¡°I really didn¡¯t see anything, don¡¯t kill me!¡± Han Shuo was scared witless after he dodged that blow and took in the ground¡¯s condition. He spoke with twisted expression as he hurriedly scrambled up, preparing to run for his life again.

    ¡°Little fe, you¡¯re quite nimble for someone so skinny, but you saw something today that you shouldn¡¯t have seen. My apologies, I have to kill you!¡± Erick shrugged his shoulder and smiled with resignation.

    A few rocks, the size of a person¡¯s head, flew up as he flicked his sword, and came hurtling towards Han Shuo. Han Shuo freaked out a bit, and anxiously dodged from side to side. As he was dodging, Erick soundlessly appeared behind Han Shuo, and a ball of dark green light sank into his body with a flick of Erick¡¯s longsword.

    All of a sudden, Han Shuo flew out and once again kissed the ground, with all his limbs flung out. The pain from his spine was intensely bone deep, and the magical yuan within his body furiously congregated in his back, firmly enclosing the dark green aura that hadnded in Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    ¡°Hoo... why do I feel like I¡¯ve lost a bit of fighting aura? This is a bit strange. Have I overexerted myself? Hmm. Yes, that must be it. This kid runs fast, good thing it¡¯s finally taken care of!¡±

    Han Shuo had been ready to run again when he heard Erick mutter to himself. Han Shuo¡¯s current body condition was the same as the time when ude¡¯s fighting aura had attacked his body, but the only difference was, Erick¡¯s dark green aura was even stronger. The magical yuan couldn¡¯t fully enclose it, so Han Shuo¡¯s back was a mess of blood and flesh, and looked quite terrifying.

    Han Shuo held his breath as a thought struck him, andy there, afraid to move a single muscle. But at this time, the little skeleton seemed to sense Han Shuo¡¯s danger and seemed to be on its way to defend its master. Maybe due to the extraordinary amount of pain he was in, Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength seemed to be more concentrated than it had ever been, and so he gave an order in the nick of time for the little skeleton to remain where it was.

    The tomb that the little skeleton was in was a bit far from Duke. But if it crawled out of the tomb to hurry here, Duke would definitely discover it. Although he didn¡¯t know Duke¡¯s rank, Han Shuo could tell from previous events that he was extremely powerful, and didn¡¯t want the little skeleton toe rushing to its death.

    Erick panted a few times, muttered to himself a bit more, then picked Han Shuo up by the cor and brought him to a crumbling tomb nearby. He didn¡¯t bother to check Han Shuo¡¯s condition as he confidently threw his body down into the tomb, behaving as if Han Shuo had naturally died already.

    That was understandable, given that Han Shuo was just an ordinary errand boy. He would naturally be dead after taking a hit from a senior knight, how could there be any exceptions?

    Erick did not tarry after he threw Han Shuo into the tomb, and immediately followed his original route back. There was no more movement in this area after a while.

    Han Shuo¡¯s back hurt like hell and he was busy mentally cursing all of Erick and Duke¡¯s families. He didn¡¯t dare climb out of the tomb until an hourter, when he gritted his teeth against the pain from his back and slowly, arduously crawled out of the tomb.

    He expended some effort in touching his back and felt that it was a bit sticky. When he saw the blood on his hand, he silently noted this incident. If there was a chance in the future, he would pay it all back with interest. Grimacing against the pain, he cautiously walked towards the previous clearing. He crept surreptitiously the whole way, deeply afraid that the two would still be there.

    Han Shuo discovered that even Dn¡¯s corpse had disappeared when he finally made it back. Looks like they¡¯ve randomly thrown it into one of the tombs nearby. He summoned the little skeleton out from its hiding ce and left, cursing loudly as he did. He kept thinking damn I¡¯m unlucky. Looks like I should avoid practicing here for the next few days.

    He suddenly stopped upon reaching a certain ce, and nced at the dirt beneath his feet. Han Shuo remembered that Dn had fallen here when he was running for his life, and buried a grey bag beneath his feet. Duke and Erick seemed to have discussed searching Dn for something, could it be the bag that Dn had just buried?

    He clenched his teeth with pain and bent down, carefully pawing away the soft dirt on the ground and picked up the grey handbag. It weighed heavily in the hand, and clinked when shook. The material and style of this bag was so much better than the one he was using. He yanked at the drawstrings, shoved his hand inside and brought out a few silver coins.

    ¡°I¡¯m rich, I¡¯m rich!¡± Han Shuo knew that silver coins were the currency of this world. Bryan had never even held a single silver coin in his years as an errand ve. Now looking at the coins in his hand, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t hold back hisughter. Even the pain from his back wasn¡¯t as severe as before.

    Swoosh!

    He dumped out the contents of the bag onto the ground, revealing a dark green jade box the size of a palm. It was quite heavy and cool to the touch. There was a depression that seemed to be a keyhole, and actually a green key next to the box as well.

    However, this wasn¡¯t the center of Han Shuo¡¯s attention. His eyes were glued to the coins in front of him and he smiled dumbly and repeated, ¡°I¡¯m rich, rich!¡±

    Three gold coins, 12 silver coins and 56 bronze coins. That was the money contents of the bag. One gold coin could be exchanged for 100 silver coins, and one silver coin for 100 bronze coins. Even with Han Shuo¡¯s improved rations, a day¡¯s worth of bread, milk and fried eggs were less than ten silvers. If this money was exchanged for food, it would be enough for two years of his rations.

    Bryan had originally been sold for five golds to the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. The money here was enough for half of his life.

    After a bout of extreme joy, Han Shuo was all smiles as he put the money back into the bag. His eyes thennded on the dark green jade box and green key. He frowned as he recalled Duke and Erick¡¯s clothing. It was apparent that the two were persons of some stature, Duke¡¯s robes and staff were in particr priceless items.

    Although these coins were a great fortune to him, they would be nothing to Duke. They wouldn¡¯t have hunted Dn for this money, and to kill even Han Shuo over it.

    Were they after the contents of this jade box?

    Han Shuo¡¯s gaze focused on the dark green jade box sitting still on the ground as his thoughts traveled down this path. Under the moonbeams, the jade box sparkled with a faint green glow indiscernible to a careless eye. The hazy green glow was extremely faint, and had an unearthly beauty to it.

    As Han Shuo was silently gazing upon the jade box, concentrating his mental strength with unusual rity, he suddenly felt a sinisterly cold presence emanate from the box. The box flowed up Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength and almost traveled right into his bones. Han Shuo shuddered uncontrobly and closed his eyes tightly.

    This box was a bit strange!

    He took a deep breath in, calmed himself, and then looked around in paranoia. He swiftly stashed the jade box and key back into the grey handbag, and staggered back to the warehouse.

    Back in the warehouse, Han Shuo did not study the jade box further, and even temporarily left the money alone. He hide the handbag underneath the bed with a bit of a fear,manded the little skeleton to wash and dress his back, then sank into a deep sleep.

 Chapter 16: A lot of people are hitting me

    Chapter 16: A lot of people are hitting me

    Noon, the training fields for the necromancy major.

    Han Shuo was absentmindedly cleaning as he ran through Master Gene¡¯s morning lecture in his mind. Han Shuo¡¯s eyebrows were slightly as he was deep in thought.

    A fat figure sprinted in from the door and came to a stop in front of Han Shuo. Jack panted heavily as he said hurriedly, ¡°Bad news Bryan! Carey and Borg areing to get revenge on you!¡±

    Han Shou was a bit unhappy that his thoughts had been interrupted. He frowned upon seeing Jack¡¯s panicked face and asked, ¡°What going on? Didn¡¯t I beat up those two idiotsst time? What do they want with me again?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know, I¡¯m not sure either. I only heard that they¡¯re in pain because they ate something this morning. Their faces are all green! They¡¯re yelling about getting revenge on you, even Lisa¡¯s looking for you!¡±

    Han Shuo still felt a bit of pain when he touched his back, but it felt a lot better than it hadst night. The magical yuan had eventually fully enclosed the dark green fighting aura within his spine, and seemed to be shrinking slowly. This gave Han Shuo a small bit offort.

    ¡°Don¡¯t me me since you¡¯vee looking for death!¡± Han Shuo coldly snorted and tightly grasped the broom in his hand as he looked towards the door.

    Jack still wore an anxious expression on his face as he wringed his hands, ¡°Bryan, it¡¯s different this time. Carey and Borg got a few helpers and they don¡¯t seem to be errand boys from the necromancy major. They¡¯re all really tall and strong! Hurry and run!¡±

    ¡°Damned Bryan, how dare you plot against us! I¡¯ll make you pay today!¡± Carey¡¯s voice had already traveled in from outside as Jack was urgently trying to convince Han Shuo to run. A crowd of people had already blocked the training field doors by the time he¡¯d finished speaking.

    Carey and Borg really did have green faces, and Borg ¡°eurped¡± as soon as they had walked in through the doors. He clutched his stomach and his body spasmed for a while. He vomited a ck and gooey liquid, and his breath immediately smelled of a bitter sourness.

    Carey¡¯s already green face looked even worse after seeing Borg spit something out. His stomach also seemed to be in pain as he coughed into his hand, but couldn¡¯t vomit anything despite wanting to.

    ¡°Bryan, what did you tell Lisa to refine?! She fed it to us and we¡¯re like this now! It¡¯s my death or yours today!¡± He clutched his stomach with one hand and pointed an using finger with the other as he spoke bitterly. Borg¡¯s body felt a bit weak after vomiting , and leaned on the door to keep himself upright.

    He smiled inwardly as Han Shuo felt silly. He had randomly made up some disgusting things to fob off Lisast time she¡¯d asked him why he suddenly became so agile and vigorous, but who knew that she¡¯d take it for real and actually refine the revolting things. It looks like she¡¯d experimented on Borg and Carey, no wonder the two looked worse than death.

    ¡°No, no I didn¡¯t!¡± Han Shuo shook his head and said with an expression of ignorance. He looked dumb and quite innocent.

    ¡°Lisa told us everything. How dare you still say you didn¡¯t! I¡¯m not leaving until I teach you a lesson today!¡± Carey bellowed angrily and made a gesture at those he¡¯d brought with him. There were six errand boys, including Borg. They rolled up their sleeves and walked menacingly towards Han Shuo.

    Apart from Carey and Borg, the other errand boys were from the department of dark magic, but they didn¡¯t quite measure up to Jack¡¯s description of being tall and strong. They were tall alright, but the tall ones were stick thin. There were strong ones alright, but they weren¡¯t as tall as Han Shuo. On a whole, the tall ones weren¡¯t strong, and the strong ones weren¡¯t tall. Their fighting ability probably didn¡¯t amount to much.

    He flexed his hands, but still wore a dull expression on his face. An uncontroble desire to rage and vent grew in his heart, and seemed that it would only be appeased by beating all of these people into the ground.

    This desire came swiftly and unexpectedly, and it filled Han Shuo¡¯s mind within the blink of an eye, like an incantation spurring him to action. Han Shuo¡¯s personality had always been rather passive, and very rarely took the initiative to offend someone. He hadn¡¯t dare get into trouble by being too cocky, but with his strength and speed now, it was very likely that the fallout would be severe if they fought. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t willing for such a development to ur, but he didn¡¯t seem to have rational control over his faculties at the moment.

    This feeling was the same as the situation when he¡¯d faced Lisa in the training fieldsst time. All rational thoughts had been abandoned, and he took action ording to his heart¡¯s inner desires. It was then that ude¡¯s fighting aura had finally been digested by the magical yuan.

    The situation was the same today. The magical yuan had enclosed ude¡¯s fighting aura, and his inner desires were strong beyond belief.

    He turned to see a cowering and shaking Jack. There were no more traces of honest dumbness on Han Shuo¡¯s face, the look from his eyes was as sharp as twin knives, with a streak of a gambler¡¯s fervor. He handed Jack the broom handle and said coldly, ¡°Hold this. Stick anyone who dares hit you!¡±

    He paused, pointed towards the sharp end of the metal broom, and said lightly, ¡°Use the sharp edge!¡±

    Jack was frightened by Han Shuo¡¯s current attitude, and stared at him dully with both legs trembling. The current Han Shuo of now was cool, calm, and collected, without a single trace of Bryan¡¯s cowardice and timidness!

    Han Shuo shoved the broom handle into Jack¡¯s hands and turned with the familiar honest, silly look on his face. He instinctively cowered and wailed, ¡°No, don¡¯t hit me!¡±

    ¡°We¡¯re going to do just that!¡± The six people all rushed in together, punching, and kicking with force, attacking Han Shuo¡¯s entire body.

    He held his head with both hands and backed up fearfully at first. When he had taken three steps backwards and arrived next to Jack, it was as if he¡¯d suddenly lost his mind and he barked out a few howls. He rushed towards the six people, like a bull gone wild.

    Carey was out in front, and his upraised right foot halted in midair as he didn¡¯t dareplete his stomp. His heart skipped a beat as he was reminded of what had happened thest time Han Shuo lost his mind.

    Although, just because Carey didn¡¯t kick him didn¡¯t mean that Han Shuo would let him off that easily. Han Shuo felt the magical yuan churn with increased speed as he ran. It looked like the same thing was happening again, as the magical yuan started to digest the dark green fighting aura that Erick had left behind.

    At that moment, Han Shou only had one uncontained thought, and that was to mercilessly beat everyone in front of him into the ground ¡ª regardless if they were still breathing or not!

    He spread both hands and caught Carey¡¯s upraised foot like lightning. He lifted it up and sent Carey flipping backwards,nding with a huge thump and grimace of pain. His teeth made close contact with the ground and blood was already forming at the edges of his mouth.

    The four who hade to help Carey and Borg were dumbfounded by Han Shuo¡¯s about face. Their leering faces froze, and their expressions became a bit odd.

    ¡°Don¡¯t be afraid, he¡¯s just one person. We¡¯ve got six on our side and can beat him to death, even if we hit him randomly!¡± Borg lifted his chin and said suddenly as he brought a wooden stool out of nowhere. He gave a great yell and came crashing towards Han Shuo.

    The four¡¯s gging confidence was renewed upon hearing Borg¡¯s words, and their expressions shifted back again. They slowly took out short wooden staves from behind them and followed Borg¡¯s lead in rushing towards Han Shuo¡¯s head.

    They¡¯d even prepared weapons! Han Shuo narrowed his eyes, sprang off both legs and dodged to the side as he saw that Borg¡¯s stool was about to hit him.

    Crash!

    The stool hit the stone floor and its legs wobbled from the impact. It didn¡¯t look that sturdy anymore. Borg gave a light ¡°eh?¡± as a shocked expression made its way onto his face. He hadn¡¯t anticipated that Han Shuo would be able to dodge and make his strikend on empty air.

    Pow! A quick fist smashed into the bridge of Borg¡¯s nose and a bloody flower formed. Borg¡¯s head drooped as he staggered backwards, the stool slipping from his limp hands in his pain.

    His head lowered with a lowugh, Han Shuo grabbed the stool that Borg had dropped and turned to be ambushed by a short and stocky red-haired boy. The wooden stave whistled through the air, and the wooden stool was suddenly raised to catch the stave, just as it was about to hit Han Shuo¡¯s head.

    One stool leg in each hand, Han Shuo felt the magical yuan in his spine churn increasingly faster. He could clearly feel the enclosed fighting aura continue to disappear, resulting in limitless strength entering his hands. He grasped the stool legs firmly and all of a sudden tore it apart.

    The entire stool was torn into half, and Han Shuo kicked out with his right foot as he held the two halves in his hands. He connected solidly with the guy¡¯s lower abdomen, with thetter¡¯s face immediately turning white as he stooped on the ground in pain.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t about to let him off that easily ¡ª the former was reveling in his bloodthirsty feelings and only wanted to full vent it out. Both of his hands started working at the same time, crashing the halves of the stool down onto the red-haired guy¡¯s face. Blood splurted out from his forehead at once as it dyed the stool halves red.

    ¡°Hurry and stop him! That damned crazy kid will kill Alva!¡± Borg screamed in terror as blood streamed out from his nose, like two worms, thanks to being ttened by Han Shuo¡¯s fist.

    Even Carey was struggling to pull himself up. Despite being struck with terror, he still shakily raised the pre-concealed wooden stave and rushed towards Han Shuo with the others.

    Pilip.

    A violent series of collisions rang out. Watching from the sidelines with bent legs quivering in fear, Jack watched Han Shuo incredulously. He only saw Han Shuo raise the halves of the stool and bring them down on people¡¯s noses. Blood trickled down their faces and the tops of their heads after only a moment.

    At this moment, Jack was stunned silly,pletely floored by Han Shuo¡¯s coldly cruel methods. He never would have thought that the typically timid and epting Bryan would one day disy such a violent and savage side of himself.

    Just as Jack was stupefied, Erick¡¯s fighting aura had finally been digested by the magical yuan during the fight, in which Han Shuo had indulged his every whim. It was then that Han Shuo came to himself and abruptly realized what he was doing. He couldn¡¯t help but feel a bit afraid.

    ¡°There¡¯s sounds of fighting, what¡¯s going on? Go check out the training fields!¡± Han Shuo suddenly heard Fanny¡¯s voice sound from afar, with rapidly approaching footsteps following her words.

    He turned back to see Carey, Borg and co. look at him with faces full of fear and dismay, each scared out of their minds. They all wielded wooden staves, but not one dared take one step closer.

    Han Shuo knew that things were grave indeed, and madly ran through different scenarios in his mind. A sudden thought struck him, and he unexpectedly ran towards the training field doors. He smeared the blood from the stool onto his face and head as he ran, then threw the two blood stained halves away. He grabbed his back, where Erick¡¯s sword had injured him, and gave a mighty yank along with a great roar of pain. The injury hadn¡¯t fully scabbed over yet and it ripped open immediately, fresh blood staining his back red.

    At the door, Han Shuo abruptly switched from a sprint to a full stop and fell to the ground, ¡°arduously¡± crawling towards the door. He stuck out two bloodstained hands when he saw that Fanny and co. had appeared, and said with a face full of terror and blood, ¡°A, a lot of people are hitting me.

 Chapter 17: An evil, honest grin

    Chapter 17: An evil, honest grin

    Fanny panicked upon seeing Han Shuo¡¯s pathetic condition, and her beautiful, athletic, long legs quickly sprinted towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°Ah....¡±

    Han Shuo gave an anguished cry as the blood drained out of his face. He stared at Fanny and stammered with pain, ¡°Master Fanny, you... you¡¯re stepping on my hand!¡±

    Fanny was nearsighted to begin with, and had run too quickly in her haste, without paying attention to what was underfoot. Add to that, Han Shuo¡¯s outstretched hands were on the ground in his desire to present a convincing front, and it all resulted in this current situation.

    Fanny was wearing knee high boots with skinny, high stiletto heels. She had been sprinting with a certain rush of speed when she stepped firmly on Han Shuo¡¯s left hand. The pain on his face was not feigned in the slightest, it truly was pain that cut deep into the bone marrow.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t suffered any major injuries in his prolonged fight with Carey and co., but now he was suffering from agony deep within his bones.

    ¡°Ooh... sorry Bryan, I didn¡¯t see that your hand was stretched out this far!¡± Fanny was horrified and hastily apologized. The boot, that had been stepping on Han Shuo¡¯s left hand, was swiftly retracted in shock, and rapidly shunted to the left ¡ª but Han Shuo¡¯s outstretched right hand was precisely where her foot wouldnd.

    Han Shuo was scared out of his mind upon seeing that the sharp spike was about to wreak havoc on his right hand. He withdrew his hand with lightning-like speed and wiped at the ¡°blood traces¡± on his face. He pointed at the gobsmacked crew behind him and sent up a wail proiming his grievances, ¡°They, they hit me!¡±

    Fanny¡¯s face darkened as soon as she heard these words. Although there were multiple injuries to Carey and co.¡¯s faces, they had long since wiped off all traces of blood when they heard someone approaching. They were afraid of being questioned, and in the confusion wiped off all the blood on the weapons that they then carelessly discarded.

    They had been nning to keep their mouths shut and just chalk the afternoon¡¯s events up to bad luck. Who knew that Han Shuo would be so evil as to pin the me on them after he¡¯d beaten them up.

    Fanny¡¯s beautiful eyes were astute. She threw a nce towards Carey and co. and realized that although their clothes were in disarray, there were no traces of blood on their face. There were, however, traces of blood on some far flung wooden staves.

    She had merely cast one nce, lowered her head to gaze at the blood on Han Shuo¡¯s back and face, and ¡°wisely deduced¡± what had happened here. Carey and co. had ganged up to beat up Han Shuo, the blood on the wooden staves was proof!

    ¡°I will inform the school authorities of this matter. All of you can await your punishment. I feel disgusted by so many bullying a thin, weak Bryan!¡± Fanny looked at Carey and co. coldly and said with a shrill voice.

    ¡°Master Fanny, that¡¯s not what happened. He beat us! Jack, you saw it all, wasn¡¯t Bryan the one hitting us?¡± Carey was dismayed and yelled in a panic.

    Little fatty Jack¡¯s legs were still trembling on the side, he had beenpletely frightened and was in awe of Han Shuo¡¯s actions. Jack cast a far nce upon hearing Carey¡¯s words and discovered that Han Shuo was winking at him and gesturing with his head as hey on the ground.

    His confidence bolstered, Jack stuck out his stomach and pointed a chubby hand at the group, speaking with an air of self righteousness. ¡°Stop lying Carey, I¡¯m not afraid of you now that Master Fanny is here. You guys hit Bryan and want me to lie for you! Honest Jack won¡¯t do that!¡±

    Carey and his crew still wanted to say something, but was stopped by Fanny¡¯s upraised hand and cold snort. ¡°Stop disseminating and wait to be punished!¡±

    She looked at the ¡°pathetic¡± Han Shuo as she turned, and picked him up by the cor of his shirt. She said tenderly, ¡°Come, let me tend to your wounds. You¡¯re my research topic and I can¡¯t allow you to get injured so often!¡±

    The fresh smell of her breath wafted towards Han Shuo¡¯s nose as Fanny spoke, making him suddenly feel that the part of his hand that had been stepped on wasn¡¯t in so much pain after all. His back to Fanny, Han Shuo signaled with his eyes for Jack to leave, and then smiled an honest, dumb smile at Carey and his group.

    However, these guys had just been badly beaten by Han Shuo and then had all the me pinned on them. The honest smile he was shing them now only appeared to be the most evil, terrifying smile on this earth!

    Ten minutester, Fanny¡¯sb.

    Apart from Fanny, Lisa had alsoe to Fanny¡¯sb under the pretext of having some questions. Along the way, her gaze when looking at Han Shuo was quite strange, making him feel ill at ease.

    Fanny bade Han Shuo to lie down on the bed upon reaching herb, and found a bottle of of medicinal solution. Just as she was about to apply it to Han Shuo, Lisa gave a lightugh and grabbed the bottle from her, smiling merrily, ¡°Master Fanny, you¡¯re not wearing your sses. Let me do it for you.¡±

    Fanny didn¡¯t think too much of Lisa¡¯s words and nodded, ¡°Hmm. Okay, clean his wounds while I find some gauze. I don¡¯t know where I¡¯ve put it.¡±

    Fanny talked to herself as she rummaged throughout theb, whereas Lisa held the bottle in her left hand and applied the solution onto Han Shuo¡¯s back with her right. She peered closely at his body and said lowly, ¡°Eh? This injury doesn¡¯t look like it was just formed. Why has it scabbed over on the top?¡±

    Greatly startled, Han Shuo gave an internal cry of dismay. It looked like he¡¯d underestimated the peculiarities of his own body. His body¡¯s restoration abilities had been enhanced since he¡¯d started training his magical yuan. The injury he¡¯d suffered at dawn had already started to scab over after a short while, to be unfortunately witnessed by Lisa.

    He didn¡¯t make a sound as he knew there was no point in saying anything now. He might as well pretend to be a fool to the end, as if he hadn¡¯t heard Lisa say anything. He kept making noises of pain with his mouth, as if the wound greatly pained him.

    It was at this moment that a surge of pain traveled from him back. He immediately howled in agony and swiftly turned his head to re at Lisa, only to be met with the glee of uncovering a secret in her eyes. He gave a silent uh oh andughed dumbly, facing forward again after saying, ¡°Hurts¡±.

    ¡°Bryan, what¡¯s going on?¡± Fanny inquired after hearing his tormented scream. She was still looking for gauze on the other side.

    ¡°Oh, Master Fanny. I identally touched his wound just now. No big deal, I¡¯ll be more careful this time!¡±

    ¡°Then be more careful!¡± Fanny paid no attention to what was going on after her response.

    An alluring scent made its way to his nostrils followed by hot air puffing by his ear. Lisa kept her voice low, ¡°Damned Bryan, do you think I don¡¯t know that you¡¯re pretending? Huh. You scared me by pretending to be dead, and then gave me the wrong method for refining medicine. If I hadn¡¯t been smart enough to experiment on Carey and Borg, I would have suffered to death because of you.

    I¡¯ll be frank, I got to theb before Carey and heard your conversation with Jack through a ghoul. I even saw the entire process of you beating up Carey. You¡¯re really something now aren¡¯t you. You even know how to scheme against others! Hehe, not bad, not bad!¡±

    Lisa continued to apply the solution as she spoke, but obviously wanted to get some revenge as she frequently pressed down hard on Han Shuo¡¯s wound. Han Shou had been made by Lisa and his heart was feeling topsy turvey. He had no idea what Lisa was nning, so even though the injury hurt like hell, he didn¡¯t darein loudly. He could only grind his teeth in pain as he muffled his cries.

    With her plump lips lowered to his ears and fragrance wafting over Han Shuo¡¯s face, Lisa saw that he refused to make a sound. She said fiercely, ¡°Last time at the training fields, damn, you even kissed me. And... and touched me there. I¡¯m not letting you off that easily. I¡¯ll be waiting for you at the fake mountains behind the ssroom building tonight. You¡¯re a dead man if you don¡¯t show up!¡±

    She pressed down hard onest time on his wound after delivering her lines, smiling in proud vindication when Han Shuo grimaced with a low moan of pain. She then walked to Fanny and handed over the bottle of solution, saying ¡°Master Fanny, I¡¯ve finished applying the solution to him. I¡¯ve suddenly remembered that I have something to do, so I¡¯m going to go now. I¡¯ll ask you that question tomorrow!¡±

    ¡°Oh, sure go ahead.¡± Fanny responded diffidently, then eximed in astonishment. ¡°Eh! I¡¯ve finally found it, so this is where I put it.¡±

    Fanny¡¯s beautiful legs walked her over to Han Shuo after her surprise, and was about to dress his wounds when she took a closer look. She wondered in bemusement, ¡°Eh, howe the outside of the wound has scabbed over!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s head was facing down into the bed and was worrying over Lisa¡¯s actions. He didn¡¯t know how to face her that night. His heart leapt in shock again when he heard Fanny¡¯s words, thinking that not Fanny too!

    Fanny frowned but then quickly smoothed her brow, sighing in knowing wonder, ¡°Ah, the bruise on your head faded quickly when Fitch hit youst time. Is this all because you were hit with the Agony of the Soul? Oh this is simply too amazing!¡±

    Han Shuo, ¡°.....¡±

    Han Shuo was speechless at the sight of Fanny¡¯s self-satisfying thoughts. How can her imagination be so creative as to find a reasonable exnation for something obviously incredibly odd?

    Fanny became absorbed in a round of wonder and thought for a while, then started dressing Han Shuo¡¯s wounds. Her movements were extremely gentle, as if afraid of hurting Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo reflected that Fanny¡¯s movements were so much better than Lisa¡¯s, and was about to turn his head to thank Fanny when he noticed something by the openedb door behind Fanny. He glimpsed a tall, thin figure staring at him enviously. It disappeared upon realizing that his attentions had been noticed ¡ª Fitch.

 Chapter 18: Please let us off the hook

    Chapter 18: Please let us off the hook

    Fanny did not intend to run Han Shuo through a gauntlet, due to his injuries. She let him go back after she¡¯d cleaned, dressed his wounds, and saw that he wasn¡¯t suffering anywhere else.

    Han Shuo¡¯s walk back was filled with silent frustrations and worry. He hadn¡¯t thought that Lisa would cotton on to him ying the fool that quickly.

    He¡¯d yed quite a few nasty tricks on her recently, and she¡¯d originally let it all go because she thought he was crazy, but now that she knew it was all an act, she was bound to be out for his blood.

    He¡¯d unknowingly made it back to his warehouse, while deep in the midst of furrowed, scattered thought. Just as he was about to open the door and step inside, he discovered the two cowering figures of Carey and Borg by his doorway.

    Han Shuo had beaten these two the most at the training fields earlier because they were the ringleaders. Their faces were now bruised and battered, and the sides of their faces were even a bit misshapen.

    Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts churned as he saw the two of them waiting there. He cautiously checked his surroundings, wondering how many more they had hidden on the sides waiting to ambush him, since they were already here to exact revenge.

    He surveyed the vicinity and squinted, staring at the two of them without saying a word. He walked slowly to the side, where he usually washed and scrubbed things, and chose a hard rock. He smiled dumbly and said, ¡°Do you still want to fight?¡±

    Carey and Borg both shuddered when they saw Han Shuoe back with a rock. Carey hastily said, ¡°Bryan, please let us off the hook. It was our fault for offending you before, we¡¯ll never do it again. Please forgive us!¡±

    On the side, Borg was also staring at Han Shuo, with a face full of fear, as he shakily fumbled out two silver coins from his pocket. He cowered in front of Han Shuo and offered them to him, ¡°Bryan, this is a token of our sincerity. Can you please talk to Master Fanny for us? Otherwise the academy will fire both of us. Our families are poor andpletely depend on the silvers we earn from doing errands at the academy. Please let us off the hook!¡±

    So, they¡¯de to beg and plead. Han Shuo threw the rock, that was in his hand, to the side. The honest, dumb look in his eyes faded away as he rested his two hands on his shoulders,zily sizing up the two.

    Han Shuo smiled after a moment. ¡°I don¡¯t want those two silvers!¡±

    Borg and Carey eyed each other, then looked at thepletely unruffled Han Shuo. They both bent down, putting one knee on the ground and implored, ¡°Bryan, please forgive us. We won¡¯t dare do anything again.¡±

    ¡°Stand up and talk, stand up and talk!¡± Han Shuo hurriedly raised the two from the ground while smiling. He then responded, ¡°I don¡¯t want your silver, but I¡¯ll talk to Master Fanny and leave you two alone in the future if you agree on one condition!¡±

    At this point, how could Borg and Carey not know that Han Shuo had always been putting on an act. Han Shuo¡¯s coldly cruel methods in the training fields had stunned and frightened all thoughts of revenge out of their heads. The current Han Shuo hadpletely exceeded all of their expectations!

    ¡°We agree to whatever condition you want!¡± Borg speedily replied, fervently looking at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo looked at the two in a measured, unppable manner and nodded. He said, ¡°In the future, the two of you need to hop to it on all my errand duties, and finish them quickly. I¡¯ll talk to Master Fanny, as long as you two agree to this.¡±

    ¡°No problem, Bryan we¡¯ve got this. We know what to do, we¡¯ll carry out your work in the future.¡± Carey almost tripped over his words in rapid agreement, as if he was afraid that Han Shuo would regret his words.

    There were four errand boys in the necromancy major. If the school authorities really did sweep Carey and Borg out the door, they wouldn¡¯t be able to immediately find recements. This way, the two¡¯s original jobs would undoubtedly fall onto Han Shuo and Jack¡¯s shoulders. Han Shuo would no longer have any free time, and was naturally something he didn¡¯t want to see.

    Now that Carey and Borg had agreed to handle Han Shuo¡¯s business for him, he would have a lot more energy to do other things. What a change in fortunes. It used to be that Bryan was the one receiving a whole heck of extra work from these guys, now the situation was reversed, and he had indirectly gotten revenge for that unlucky Bryan.

    He noted that the sky was darkening, and remembered that the proposed time with Lisa was quickly approaching. He said with some degree of impatience, ¡°Alright, alright. I need to make a trip to behind the ssroom building. You should go back if there¡¯s nothing else. Be careful in the future, keep pretending that I¡¯m that crazy vige idiot. If you dare breathe a word of what happened today, I¡¯ll beat you two so badly that you wouldn¡¯t even recognize each other if you stood face to face!¡±

    Carey and Borg cravenly nodded in quick agreement upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s chilly threat. Han Shuo¡¯s brutally cold-blooded methods in the training fields had branded a deep mark on their hearts. They didn¡¯t dare think of revenge even deep within their hearts.

    Just as Han Shuo was about to leave, Borg suddenly thought of something and called out, ¡°Bryan, don¡¯t walk towards the back of the ssroom building from the direction of the fake mountains. Lisa just directed Carey and I to set up three holes withs and tripwires. She said she wanted to test the intelligence of summoned creatures. Don¡¯t walk into them by ident!¡±

    Han Shuo was taken aback, but quickly marshalled his thoughts in understanding. It looked like Lisa had made her preparations early. What intelligence testing of summoned creatures? It¡¯s just something she¡¯s prepared for me!

    ¡°Where did you set up the traps? Tell me in detail, otherwise I just may fall into them in the dark!¡± Han Shuo frowned as he asked Borg and Carey.

    There was no way those two could have known that Lisa had set those traps in order to deal with Han Shuo. Add to that their current need for a favor from Han Shuo, and their genuine fear of him, the two quickly borated on the locations of the three traps in great detail.

    ¡°Okay. See you tomorrow. Remember to thoroughly wipe and dust off the statues on the path to the ssroom buildings. I¡¯m going to sleep in tomorrow.¡± Han Shuo showily gave an order to the two and walked off without a care in the world, towards the fake mountains behind the ssroom building.

    Department of dark magic ssroom building, around a bend in one of the fake mountains.

    Lisa was hidden behind the fake mountain, a corner of her mouth lifted into a snicker with evil intent. Her two eyes sparkled with life as she eagerly peered at Han Shuo slowly emerging in the distance.

    Damned Bryan, how dare you pretend to be crazy and embarrass me. Not only did you scare me by pretending to be a corpse, but you kicked my butt in the training field and you gave me a disgusting refining recipe. See if I don¡¯t torment you to death. Lisa thought viciously and her fingers tightened on the rope wrapped around her hand.

    The other end of the rope was wrapped in a circr loop,id on the path that Han Shuo would have to take on his way to the fake mountain. Lisa would give a mighty pull as soon as he set both feet into the loop, immediately tripping him to the ground. A big, outstretched had already beenid out on a protruding rock further up ahead, just waiting to entangle Han Shuo as soon as his legs were tied up.

    Lisaughed a silent, cruelugh as she watched the unassuming Han Shuo approach. She observed him looking all around, calling out as he slowly shuffled forward, ¡°Lisa, where are you? Come on out.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m here,e over here. I have something to tell you. You¡¯re dead if you don¡¯te over here!¡±

    Lisa snorted lightly as she stayed behind the fake mountain.

    Han Shuo nced to his left and right again and walked towards the area with the rope lying in wait, as if he waspletely oblivious. Lisa¡¯s heart swelled in joy and she flexed her hands around the rope in her hands, focusing her concentration on the second that both of Han Shuo¡¯s legs stepped into the trap.

    Just as one of his feetnded in the trap, Han Shuo¡¯s body suddenly froze as he called out again, ¡°Lisa, where are you hiding?

    The loop was just a few inches in front of Han Shuo¡¯s foot. Lisa had almost lost control and sprang the trap when she saw that Han Shuo was about to fall right into it. Her heart skipped a beat when she saw that she¡¯d miscalcted.

    Just as Lisa rxed and was about to respond, Han Shuo¡¯s still body quickly strode out, evading the trap in the blink of an eye. He continue walking, murmuring in confusion, ¡°Lisa, what game are you trying to y?¡±

    Thus, Lisa¡¯s carefullyid out rope loop and trap was seemingly carelessly dodged by Han Shuo with his sudden stop and start. A wave of dejection rose in Lisa¡¯s heart and she cursed in a low voice, hating Han Shuo for his good luck, but never once thinking it was because he was keenly aware of what was going on.

    ¡°I¡¯m here, what took you so long!¡± Lisa was gritting her teeth inint, as her lithe body emerged from a crevice in the fake mountain.

    ¡°Oh, nothing much. Just that my back was still hurting so I went back and rested for a bit. Thanks for dressing my wounds today.¡± Han Shuo said without expression and walked towards Lisa.

    A sudden crack rang out, as if fragile wooden raft had been snapped. Han Shuo¡¯s body vanished from where he stood, apanied with his panicked yell. Agony filled moans followed shortly thereafter from a deep hole that had suddenly appeared.

    ¡°Haha, damned Bryan, you finally fell for it. See if I won¡¯t torment you to death today! How dare you y a fool and embarrass the future archmage of necromancy!¡± Lisa¡¯s woebegone expression just a split second ago, was reced a wave of hysterical joy from her heart when she saw Han Shuo fall into the trap. She hollered excitedly and quickly ran out from behind the fake mountain and made straight for the trap that Han Shuo had triggered.

    Lisaughed in proud, high pitchedughter as she walked to the edge of the trap. She brought out a stone as she cussed loudly at Han Shuo, intending to stone him where he¡¯d fallen to take revenge for hertest humiliation at his hands.

    All of a sudden, a hand wrapped around Lisa¡¯s right ankle. Scared witless, she looked down and finally noticed that Han Shuo¡¯s left hand was grasping the edge of the trap, while his right hand wastched onto her ankle. He hadn¡¯t fallen into the hole at all, and was in fact looking at her with an evil grin on his face.

    ¡°Come on down!¡± He guffawed evilly and yanked with his hand, taking advantage of Lisa¡¯s consternation. The carefully scheming Lisa pitched forward, iling her limbs wildly, while screaming in sheer terror, as she shot straight down into the hole.

 Chapter 19: I like you

    Chapter 19: I like you

    Lisa wildly reached out in her panic, and by sheer coincidence, grabbed Han Shuo¡¯s pant leg, while falling through the air. She immediately gave a strong tug, violently swinging Han Shuo¡¯s body, causing him to fall down into the depths of the trap with her.

    Han Shuo had already quickly checked out the bottom of the trap earlier. Thanks to the moonlight, he could see that there weren¡¯t any sharp knives nted at the bottom of the trap, just a few protruding rocks, but those protruding rocks would still cause great difort if one fell onto them.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was curiously calm with the sounds of Lisa¡¯s screams filling his ears. He didn¡¯t know if it was because he¡¯d been training his magical yuan, but recently whenever he¡¯d faced danger, Han Shuo¡¯s first reaction was not to panic. Rather, he swiftly thought about how to resolve the crisis he was in, and this time was no exception.

    The trap had been hastilyid, and thus was only three meters deep, but during the split seconds of the fall, Han Shuo surprisingly still had the mental capacity to think of other things. While listening to Lisa¡¯s screams, Han Shuo circted the magical yuan that had just digested the fighting aura at a speed many times faster than normal.

    Han Shuo made his move just as the two were about to violently crash into the protruding rocks. He snatched Lisa out of thin air, catching the girl who hadpletely lost her head and was screaming every which way, around the waist. He whirled himself around and sacrificed his butt and back, smashing right onto the protruding rocks at the bottom of the pit.

    ¡°Aiyo....¡± Han Shuo grimaced in pain as the wound, that had been dressed not too long ago, split open again. Fresh blood oozed out instantaneously. As the primary point of contact, his buttocks also hurt tremendously.

    Lisa hadn¡¯t suffered too much damage while being cradled in Han Shuo¡¯s arms. Seeing that she was unharmed and listening to Han Shuo¡¯s distressed moans, she started raking a suspicious nce over Han Shuo¡¯s body, asking in extreme surprise, ¡°Why did you save me?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s anguished cries were silenced by Lisa¡¯s question. His face wore a sudden expression of dejection as he shook his head with a low sigh, ¡°Because I like you!¡±

    It was as if lightning had struck Lisa as soon as she heard those words. She stared at Han Shuo dumbly,pleted shellshocked. It took her a long while to react as she pointed at Han Shuo and stammered, ¡°You... you... I... I... what did you say?¡±

    ¡°I said I like you Lisa!¡± Han Shuo gazed upon Lisa with a face full of sincerity, speaking wholeheartedly, ¡°I¡¯ve actually liked you all these years, and so have never begrudged you for experimenting on me. Even when you almost tormented me to death with the Agony of the Soul, I still never hated you.

    Except, I understand that I¡¯m just an errand ve. There¡¯s too much of a gap between my status and yours, so I just bury these thoughts deep in my heart and never dare to express them. I could only act crazy in hopes of soliciting more attention from you. Lisa, was I a fool to do so?¡±

    I am so mean, such an asshole. Han Shuo sprouted off lies with an earnest face on one hand, and with the other inwardly marveled that he could use such low methods after arriving in a strange world. He didn¡¯t know whether it was due to training his magical yuan, or the fact that he had been evil to begin with and it had only begun to show itself after shrugging off all constraints in this strange world.

    Lisa waspletely dumbfounded by Han Shuo, staring at him dumbly and forgetting to speak. She only shook off her stupor and hurriedly stood up when her agitated hands randomly roamed over a strip of naked thigh. When she looked at Han Shuo, an astounding blush actually stole across her face for the first time. She seemed to be a bit embarrassed.

    Han Shuo started and then lowered his head for a look. That was when he noticed that Lisa had ripped his pants when theynded. Apart from his boxers, his entire lower body waspletely exposed. Lisa had actually been sitting on his nakedp just now.

    Frantically whipping her head to the side, Lisa¡¯s voice heaved as she pouted, ¡°I don¡¯t care if you¡¯re speaking the truth or not, there¡¯s no way that I could like you. You¡¯re just an errand ve for the necromancy major. I will never have anything to do with you.¡±

    ¡°I understand Lisa, I just hope to stay in the necromancy major and gaze upon you from afar. I won¡¯t have any other fancies. Now that I¡¯ve said all the words I¡¯ve held in for years, I feel much more at ease.¡± Han Shuo said with a low voice and a face full of genuity.

    ¡°I, I¡¯m leaving. We can forget about what happened before, I won¡¯t pursue it further, but don¡¯t you dare daydream. You¡¯re only an errand ve, the two of us being together is impossible!¡± Lisa turned her back against Han Shuo and hurriedly responded as she listened to his heartfelt confession. She immediately started an incantation and summoned a skeletal warrior,manding it to throw down the rope that she had nned to use on Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo knew that once girls knew that someone had a secret crush on then, they would be unable to do anything to that person, no matter how much they had hated the person before. Lisa was the same.

    Lisa wouldn¡¯t like Han Shuo just because of his words, but would forgive Han Shuo for his past deeds because of them. She would even help him in the future, because she thought that Han Shuo liked her. Even if she never liked Han Shuo, she would be touched and thus her future actions and judgment would be affected.

    Seeing that Lisa was about to leave, Han Shuo turned his back on Lisa and smiled an evil smile of a plot seeding. He then lowered his voice, ¡°Lisa, I can do anything for you. I have done everything possible to learn that if you want your breasts to develop fully, then you must drink lots of papaya milk and do lots of swimming. When showering after swimming, you should massage the sides of your breasts. They say that doing this will ensure that breasts develop fully.¡±

    ¡°Damned Bryan, where did you hear all this?¡± Lisa kept her head averted, throwing down a huffy response as she grasped the rope. After a pause, Lisa spoke again, ¡°What¡¯s papaya milk?¡±

    ¡°Eh, milk will do. Two cups a day!¡± Han Shuo suddenly remembered that this world didn¡¯t seem to have papayas and hurriedly exined.

    Swiftly turning her head, Lisa flung a fierce gaze at Han Shuo, speaking angrily, ¡°Shut up. Don¡¯t tell anyone about what happened today, and don¡¯t tell others that you like me, or I¡¯ll kill you.¡±

    After delivering this line, she issued an order to the skeletal warrior waiting aboveground and it pulled her up. Some scuffling noises traveled down afterwards, and all became peaceful again.

    Han Shuo lightlyughed heartily after exhaling a breath, thinking that he was really be more and more evil to lie so seamlessly and wlessly. Now that Lisa had easily let him off the hook, it testified to how wondrously effective this method had been.

    He snickered as he walked forward, seeing that the rope that Lisa had left behind was still there. He tugged on it and realized that the other end was most likely fastened to the fake mountain. Overjoyed, he understood that Lisa must have given him a hand out of convenience before she left. Han Shuo pulled himself up the rope and swaggered back to his warehouse.

    Han Shuo practiced magic aftermanding the little skeleton to redress the wounds on his back. He felt that not only had the magical yuan grown a tad bit bigger, but it spun at a higher speed than before. The Mystical cial Spellfire that he had been practicing for a while had finally progressed to circting the magical yuan to his wrist. This pleased him greatly.

    Was it because the magical yuan had digested Erick¡¯s fighting aura? Han Shuo creased his brow in silent thought, thinking back to resulting circumstances after ude¡¯s fighting aura had been absorbedst time. Han Shuo was starting to slowly suspect that the magical yuan within his body could strengthen itself through assimting fighting aura.

    Why did training his magical yuan have such a peculiar effect? Han Shuo thought for a while to no avail and did not continue his musings. He started meditating to train his mental strength.

    His mind empty and clear, Han Shuo suddenly felt distracted as he was training his mental strength. He was unable to immediately settle into his meditation as he usually did, as if something was disturbing his meditation by calling out to him. It was a bizarre feeling, and Han Shuo had ignored it at first. It was only after his meditations had been interrupted a few times that he started paying attention to this phenomenon.

    As Han Shuo calmed his mind and started extending his senses, he promptly sensed that the thing interrupting his meditations was underneath the bed. The only thing underneath the bed was the handbag that had belonged to Dn.

    A thought struck him as Han Shuo reached for the bag. He withdrew the uncanny, dark green, jade box, perceiving the sinister, cold air within the box. Han Shuo shuddered involuntarily and began to carefully inspect the green, jade box.

    The culprit that had repeatedly disturbed Han Shuo¡¯s meditations was the dark green, jade box in front of him. To this day, he still didn¡¯t know what was inside. He hadn¡¯t been interested before, but now he had no choice but to appraise the jade box if he wanted to sessfully meditate again.

    He picked up the green key and stuck it into the indentation on the jade box. He felt that it was unable to turn, and an expression of bafflement appeared on his face after jiggling the key back and forth a few times.

    The key can¡¯t open the jade box, Han Shuo was startled and began to grow mystified. He recalledst time¡¯s circumstances in great detail, and thought of something. He concentrated his mental strength, slowly focusing it on the jade box.

    Suddenly, a breath of sinister aura emanated from the box and intruded into Han Shuo¡¯s mind, hurting his mind. Fighting back against the pain, Han Shuo concentrated his mental strength as he never had before. Even the magical yuan within his body spun much faster than usual.

    Bearing up against the invasion of the sinister aura from the jade box, Han Shuo tried a hard twist of the key again. The key turned to the right with an audible click, as the jade box abruptly sprang open, revealing the contents inside.

 Chapter 20: Donâ€™t touch the teacherâ€™s butt

    Chapter 20: Don¡¯t touch the teacher¡¯s butt

    A chilly wave of aura first spilled out when the jade box was opened. The temperature in the warehouse decreased rapidly, causing Han Shuo to shudder involuntarily again. He quickly refocused his concentration on the item within the green jade box.

    It was a verdant ball. Its surface like an emerald, winking with ephemeral green light. There was a red dot inside, like a drop of roiling blood, osciting randomly within the ball.

    His mind suddenly hurting, Han Shuo only felt that his mental strength started draining expeditiously towards the ball. It felt a bit like when he was using necromancy magic. With the injection of Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength, the surface of the ball shone with even more green, and the blood-red dot in the center abruptly let out a small strand of red light.

    Pain! A keenly honed dagger savagely stirred up Han Shuo¡¯s brains. With the loss of his mental strength, Han Shuo¡¯s mind hurt like a living hell. He had never endured such cruel agony in all his years of life.

    In the midst of this extreme pain, Han Shuo should have fainted dead away, but the eerie thing was that Han Shuo¡¯s mind was clearer than it¡¯d ever been. Han Shuo even felt that because his mind was more awake than ever, it was exacerbating and infinitely magnifying the agony.

    Both of his hands clutching his head, Han Shuo was like a wild beast being slowly cut by a thousand, a million knives. He emitted a raspy, low roar that didn¡¯t sound like it coulde from a human. Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength continued to slowly flow towards the round ball, along with the continuation of the inhumane pain.

    At this moment, the tendons stood out on Han Shuo¡¯s forehead, neck, and exposed arms, like multiple worms wriggling in his body. His body had started filling out a bit, and his muscles were now tensed with explosive power.

    As Han Shuo felt that his mental strength was about to bepletely drained, the magical yuan within his body flowed from his neck to his brain. As the magical yuan entered his brain, that was already splitting open from pain, the soul searing agony seemed to increase ten times in intensity.

    The mental strength that had vanished with fleeting speed into the ball, came crashing back like a huge wave rolling onto shore, drowning Han Shuo in an instant. He could finally endure it no more and fainted.

    He felt the weariness of a ten thousand kilometer march after he slowly woke up, but his brain was abnormally awake. When his eyes refocused, he took a look around and discovered that even the grain in the wooden door in front of him seemed quite clear.

    He gave a light ¡°eh?¡± as the changes within him stopped him in his tracks. Thest time he had felt this way was when he gained mental strength after a series of coincidences. He had also felt that his senses were heightened then, and hastened to concentrate his mental strength again upon noting that this feeling had returned in force.

    Exuberant joy immediately blossomed on his face, as he thought, the saying of what doesn¡¯t kill you makes you strong is true! Even that amount of danger hadn¡¯t been enough to end me just now, and now I¡¯ve mysteriously benefited from that disaster. He could feel that his mental strength had increased in spades, and was much more potent than the amount of mental strength he¡¯dbored to increase over the past two months.

    These mystifying things had truly happened, shocking Han Shuo beyond belief as his gaze fell once more onto the dark green ball. The faint green luster on its surface seemed to have dimmed somewhat, but the drop of red within it was even more vibrant.

    He frowned as he backed a few inches away, and made a close observation of the verdant ball. He suddenly felt that this ball was very simr to something. After a few moments of thought, he started in fright and made a sudden inspection of the ball. It was very much like an eyeball, and the more he looked at it, the more it seemed to be one.

    The dot of red within the verdant ball seemed to be an eye sizing Han Shuo up, giving him an exceedingly creeped out feeling. He shuddered rather violently as he closed the jade box with all the hair on his neck raised. A sharp click rang out as the jade box locked itself again, and the key, that had been stuck in the indentation, automatically bounced out.

    Han Shuo shook his head as he banished the association between ball and eyeball from his mind. The more he contemted the matter, the more he thought there was something strange about this ball. If it wasn¡¯t for the magical yuan circting to his brain today, his mental strength would have surely been sucked dry by the ball, and he would have broken underneath the inhumane pain. He would have been truly driven mad and be an idiot.

    But when the magical yuan had made its way to his brain, the depleted mental strength hade rushing back like a river running upstream, and had even been greatly improved and increased. This made Han Shuo feel that the ball was even more uncanny and unpredictable. He could vaguely feel that this ball was no ordinary object, otherwise Duke would have hardly killed Dn for the jade box.

    As for the verdant ball within the jade box, Han Shuo could not fathom what its purpose was, but because the ball had almost turned him into a real idiot, his heart still jumped with fear when thinking about it. He stored the jade box underneath the bed again, nning to experiment with the item inside once he had figured out what it was.

    The next day.

    Han Shuo woke up feeling that his body was in much better condition than it had been the day before. He caught a glimpse of Carey and Borg from afar when washing up, the two were cleaning the statues on the way to ss. They seemed to have woken up a lot earlier than usual, as they kept yawning, even at this time of day.

    Carey and Borg shed eager smiles and greetings from a long ways away when they sighted Han Shuo, also reminding him to speak to Master Fanny as early as possible.

    After downing his breakfast and listening to another lecture from Master Gene on the foundations of magic as he swept the hallway for the necromancy ssrooms, Han Shuo walked directly towards the training fields.

    ¡°Bryan, Fitch is in the training field asking Master Fanny some questions regarding magical knowledge. Please speak to her soon, or the two of us are really screwed!¡± Han Shuo bumped into Carey and Borg at the door, the two had just finished cleaning the training fields, and pleaded with Han Shuo as soon as they saw him.

    Han Shuo nodded as he saidzily, ¡°Alright alright, I¡¯ll go find Master Fanny now.¡±

    Fitch had some bad blood with Gene, not to mention that Fitch was already a journeyman mage. Therefore he naturally had no need to continue to listen to Gene¡¯s foundational knowledge sses.

    Fitch was gazing at Fanny on the side,pletely mesmerized. Love, desire, and the light of greed mixed together and sparkled in his eyes. His eyes kept roaming over Fanny¡¯s beautiful body, and he didn¡¯t even notice Han Shuo¡¯s arrival.

    ¡°Fitch, watch this. Even with my eyes covered, I can stillmand dark creatures to seek out the correct target based on previous memory.¡± Fanny¡¯s eyes were covered as a few zombies bypassed several obstacles, using the clubs in their hands tond hard hits onto wooden targets as she spoke.

    Focused on teaching, Fanny naturally had no idea that Fitch was not paying any attention to her words. Fitch¡¯s attention was purely concentrated on her beautiful curves.

    Upon seeing that Fitchpletely ignoring Fanny¡¯s exnation, and that his gaze was continuouslybing over her body, Han Shuo thought silently that no wonder this kid has failed to advance to adept ss even after multiple tries.

    Judging from the situation, Fitch must have used additional tutoring as an excuse for some alone time with Fanny. Fanny¡¯s covered eyes must have something to do with instructing Fitch on how to use his heart tomand dark creature attacks.

    Han Shuo noted quite a few obstacles in the surroundings as he walked over, carefully avoiding all of them as he moved towards Fitch and Fanny.

    Just as he was about to reach Fanny and Fitch, Fitch suddenly awoke from his idiotic stupor and turned his head slightly. When he saw that it was Han Shuo, a hint of unconcealed disgust appeared in Fitch¡¯s eyes.

    Fitch followed that up with a movement of his staff, and two lines of an incantation in a low voice. Some of the obstacles on the ground suddenly seemed to be alive, as some withered, broken, white bones came hurtling towards Han Shuo¡¯s butt. Some ropes also tightened onto the bones and came flying with them, seeking to entangle Han Shuo like a snake.

    Han Shuo¡¯s body was a bit weaker than normal after the events ofst night. His panicked dance of evasion was a bit messy, was finally tripped by a rope that suddenly appeared and stumbled towards Fitch and Fanny.

    At this moment, Fanny was still concentrating her mental strength on directing the dark creature¡¯s attacks, and her mouth kept summarizing her actions. Although her ears caught a few sounds, she paid them no heed.

    Seeing that he was about to fall onto Fitch and Fanny, Han Shuo¡¯s still reached out wildly for something to stabilize himself even though his heart was calm, but at this moment, a trace of a cold smile tugged at Fitch¡¯s lips. He raised his staff slightly and aimed it towards the falling Han Shuo, obviously up to no good.

    Panicking inside now as well, Han Shuo forcefully twisted his body to the left in mid air, trying to avoid Fitch¡¯s attack. When his body started falling towards Fanny, the results of Han Shuo¡¯s magic training came to bear as his body miraculously stopped after sucking in his waist and pushing out with his stomach.

    But, Han Shuo didn¡¯t manage to retract his randomly iling right arm in time, and itnded on Fanny¡¯s pert, well rounded butt. The ecstasy of supple, tender, well-filled out curve immediately traveled the point of contact between Han Shuo and Fanny, back to his brain.

    In curious coincidence, Han Shuo actually gave a light pinch, before realizing what he was doing and backing up violently. He understood the insanity of his actions just now and was extremely frightened, thinking that there was no way Fanny would forgive him. Why had he pinched her butt cheek ¡ª even though it had felt wondrous!

    As he practically flew in retreat, Han Shuo looked at Fitch, who ring back at Han Shuo with eyes spitting fire and a body trembling in rage. It was as if Han Shuo hadmitted something terrible such as murdering Fitch¡¯s entire family. Fanny also eximed in shock and immediately ripped off the ck cloth covering her eyes.

    Fanny is never going to forgive me now. Shit. Shit. Han Shuo thought.

    Pa pa! Two ps. Fitch had been furiously staring at Han Shuo when two red palm prints appeared on his face. Fanny was enraged, and stared at Fitch with killing intent, her lofty breasts heaving and she raged, ¡°Damned Fitch, how dare you take advantage and vite me!¡±

 Chapter 21: It really wasnâ€™t me

    Chapter 21: It really wasn¡¯t me

    ¡°I, I didn¡¯t! It was Bryan!¡± Fitch was aghast and loudly protested his innocence.

    Pa pa!

    Another two ps, Fitch¡¯s cheeks were now puffed up. Fanny stared at Fitch in a towering rage as she bit off her words, ¡°How dare you make excuses. Bryan is such an honest person, how could he havemitted such a foul act? It must¡¯ve been you.¡±

    Bryan was at a loss for words as he gloated inwardly. He hastily painted a picture of honest, dumb innocence on his face as he looked at Fitch and Fanny. He smiled dully, ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡±

    ¡°Master Fanny, it really wasn¡¯t me!¡± Fitch was suddenly the most wronged man in the world as he clutched his cheeks and protested loudly.

    ¡°Stop lying. Get out. Now!¡± Fanny wore an expression of exasperation that iron wouldn¡¯t improve and be steel (Chinese expression of wishing someone would improve) and replied heatedly.

    Fitch¡¯s face was sore and saw that Fanny was ready to erupt with rage at any moment. He knew that any exnation would be of no use, and was deathly afraid that Fanny would strike out again if he sent her up a wall. He smiled bitterly and nodded, heading outside the training fields with a face full of dejection.

    When he passed by Bryan, Fitch paused and red at Han Shuo viciously for a few moments, gritting his teeth and saying softly, ¡°Bastard.¡±

    Han Shuo pretendedplete innocence of Fitch¡¯s hate and even smiled honestly at him in a friendly, kind gesture. ¡°Eh? Howe you suddenly got fat?¡±

    Fitch was infuriated and he turned his face away in resentment, after ring at Han Shuo one more time. He quickly bypassed the obstacles in his way and disappeared outside the door in a blink of an eye.

    ¡°Bryan, what are you doing here?¡± Master Fanny¡¯s anger abated as soon as Fitch left, and she posed a question to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Cleaning.¡± Han Shuo went to do his own thing in the corner of the training field. He picked up a broom and prepared to clean up the area a bit to get it ready for a subsequent round of necromancy students.

    ¡°Oh I see. Oh right, how¡¯s your back feeling? When your injuries have healed, I want to take a close look at what¡¯s going on with you. It¡¯s incredible that an Agony of the Soul magic could allow you to gain mental strength.¡± Fanny was quite affable when faced with Han Shuo, conversing with him peacefully and helping him clean up the obstacles on the ground with no haughty attitude at all.

    ¡°Much, much better. Oh right, Master Fanny, can you not tell the school authorities what happenedst night?¡± Han Shuo absentmindedly swept up broken bones and dust, and took a sniff of the right hand that had touched Fanny¡¯s butt when he had a moment.

    A faint, delicate fragrance emanated from the fingers of his right hand, making his heart lurch. His eyes immediately gazed strangely at Fanny¡¯s pert butt, which happened to be not too far away. Fanny¡¯s back arched slightly when she bent down to clear the obstacles, further entuating the mesmerizing curve of her butt. It was as if it contained a hypnotizing power of temptation.

    Fanny was a bit startled by Han Shuo¡¯s words and quickly straightened her lithe body. She turned to look at Han Shuo and asked in astonishment. ¡°Why? Hmm, Bryan you¡¯re not concentrating, you¡¯re stepping on the broom.¡±

    He hadn¡¯t expected Fanny to abruptly turn around. Han Shuo had a guilty conscience and hastily moved his foot off the broom, smiling dumbly afterwards. ¡°Carey and Borg are actually good people. If you tell the school authorities what happened, they¡¯ll be fired. Life will be difficult if their families don¡¯t have the silver they earn anymore.¡±

    Fanny gazed at Han Shuo in amazement and slightly crooked a dainty eyebrow. She smiled after a moment and said, ¡°Bryan, you¡¯re always so kind. You speak on their behalf even after they¡¯ve bullied you. Alright, I¡¯ll forget it, since even you, the victim, pleads so. I won¡¯t put them in a difficult ce. You are the key to my experiments, remember to tell me if anyone bullies you in the future!¡±

    Kind! Han Shuo was at a loss of words internally. Sure, what he was doing now was ¡°kind¡±, otherwise he wouldn¡¯t have the opportunity to ckmail Carey and Borg into doing his duties. If the two of them left, then everything would fall on him and Jack¡¯s shoulders. Who would give a crap about what happened to thetter?

    As Han Shuo was thinking his random thoughts, Fanny looked at Han Shuo suspiciously and spoke again. ¡°Bryan, I don¡¯t think you¡¯re that crazy. Otherwise, how could you say what you¡¯ve just said?¡±

    Momentarily dumfounded, Han Shuo¡¯s heart skipped a beat. He hastily scratched his head and replied with some embarrassment, ¡°Eh, I sometimes feel like my mind is dull and foggy. I don¡¯t know what I do after that!¡±

    ¡°I see. Looks like there are some negative aftereffects of the Agony of the Soul on your body. Hmm, don¡¯t worry. I¡¯ll give you a close inspection when your back heals. I¡¯ll definitely cure all your weird ailments. It¡¯s almost time for me to lead students in the next round of experiments. I¡¯m going to get back and get ready. You can clean up the rest!¡± Fanny chanted an incantation after speaking to Han Shuo, sending the zombie warriors in the training field back to the other dimension, and then left in a whirl.

    Soon after Fanny had left, Han Shuo left the ruins in the training field and left to find Carey and Borg as well. He dictated arrogantly to them, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ve already taken care of your business. The two of you can now go clean up the training field!¡±

    Carey and Borg was happily astonished, and ran off willy nilly with mops and brooms, overjoyed to mop up behind Han Shuo after showering a round of gratitude on him.

    Han Shuo had no pressing things to do after leaving the training field. He became curious about the contents of the jade box after recalling the events of yesterday, and truly wanted to learn what the ball was. There was no way that he could ask anyone else about this, and thus decided to head to the dark major library to see if there were any records of the ball.

    Each major had its own individual library within the Babylon Academy of Magic. The range of topics contained within the books of each library were exceedingly diverse, and held all the wisdom and descriptions of the major¡¯s collective knowledge bank. Generally speaking, libraries were not open to the public, and there were strict regtions regarding ess for students from other majors.

    Using Jack¡¯s cleaning duties as an excuse, Han Shuo swaggered into the dark major library with a brush in hand.

    ¡°Bryan, what are you doing here? Aren¡¯t you supposed to be cleaning the training field at this time?¡± Little fatty Jack was putting books away and was startled into a soft question when he saw Han Shuo walk in with a brush.

    ¡°Heh heh, Carey and Borg, those two idiots, will be the ones cleaning up the training field in the future. I¡¯m here on serious business today!¡± Han Shuo smiled and picked up a random book in a rxed manner. He nced at it and put it back after realizing that it was a book on the foundational basics of dark magic.

    ¡°Carey and Borg are cleaning the training field for you. ...how is that possible? Eh, is it because they¡¯re scared of you after the beating in the training field yesterday?¡± Little fatty Jack had an expression of astonishment, but then remembered Han Shuo¡¯s performance yesterday and looked at him with a bit of fear. ¡°Oh right Bryan, what happened to you yesterday? You seemed like a different person. Even though we¡¯re really close, even I was really afraid of you yesterday!¡±

    Han Shuoughed lightly as he put one hand on Jack¡¯s shoulder. ¡°That depends on who. If someone is making life difficult for me, I won¡¯t let him have an easy one either. Heh heh, with our rtionship, there¡¯s no way that I would beat you up. Oh right Jack, where are the books regarding magical items in the dark major library?¡±

    ¡°Mm, second bookcase in the back. Why do you ask?¡± Jack pointed behind Han Shuo and asked in confusion.

    ¡°Nothing much, helping you clean?¡± Han Shuo smiled and walked towards the bookcase of magical item references.

    ¡°But Bryan, I¡¯ve already dusted off that bookcase!¡± ¡°Then I¡¯ll dust it off again for you!¡±

    When he reached the appropriate bookcase, Han Shuo started from thest row and started flipping through a book, carelessly throwing his brush to the side.

    When he had been observing the jade boxst night, Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength flowed curiously to the ball inside. This allowed him to vaguely sense the magical currents within the ball. The Han Shuo of now wasn¡¯t aplete rookie when it came to magical knowledge, and naturally understood that magical currents indicated that the ball was some kind of magical object. This was why he came searching for the ball¡¯s origins within the library.

    Unfortunately, Han Shuo realized after perusing most of the books on magical items that these contained only simple descriptions of ordinary magical staffs, robes and jewelry. It wasn¡¯t what he wanted.

    He cleaned up the bookcase with some dejection and resignation, no longer holding out hope for answers here. He then moved to the bookcases holding books on necromancy.

    Since he had made his way to the library, he couldn¡¯t very well leave empty handed. He should bring at least one book back for further study, Han Shuo mused as he started browsing through the books. The books at the top of the bookcases dealt with higher level magic, he wouldn¡¯t understand them even he took them home. Therefore, he turned his attention to the lower level.

    A book of ¡°The Description of Dark Creatures¡± caught his eye. He flipped through a few pages and discovered that it recorded some of the particrs of summoning dark creatures.

    Happy at heart, Han Shuo immediately went to find Jack and waved ¡°The Description of Dark Creatures¡± at Jack. He chuckled, ¡°Jack, I¡¯m taking this book back for further study. Cover for me, don¡¯t let other people find out.¡±

    He didn¡¯t wait for Jack to respond and happily stuffed the book into his clothes, grabbed the brush he¡¯d discarded earlier, and left the library.

 Chapter 22: Earn Some Spending Money

    Chapter 22: Earn Some Spending Money

    Time flew. Half a month had passed by in a blink of an eye.

    This half of a month was one of the the most rxing periods of time that Han Shuo had ever had. The cleaning duties that had originally belonged to him were taken care of by Borg and Carey. And because Han Shuo¡¯s back was injured, Fanny didn¡¯te looking for him to conduct more research.

    Han Shuo learned from Jeff that even Fitch had gone in again to give the adept mage qualification trials another go. Therefore, this major enemy was temporarily not a threat.

    Ever since Han Shuo¡¯s shameless confession of love at the bottom of the trap, Lisa¡¯s attitude towards Han Shuo had undergone a drastic change. Not only did she not pick on Han Shuo anymore, but she often protected him, forbidding other students to practice necromancy magic on him.

    Given the situation, apart from eating, sleeping, drinking and showering, Han Shuo spent all the rest of his free time on practicing magic and studying ¡°The Foundations of Necromancy¡± and ¡°The Descriptions of Dark Creatures¡±.

    To be honest, the injuries on Han Shuo¡¯s back had long since healed, thanks to him practicing magic. There wasn¡¯t even a scar left anymore.

    The current Han Shuo had grown another two centimeters, and was now 170 cm. Thanks to practicing magic and sufficient nutrition from rations, his previous weak-beyond-belief body had started to slowly firm up and increase in strength. There were even muscles forming on his chest and arms.

    Unbeknownst to anyone else, Han Shuo¡¯s body and strength had slowly changed without anyone knowing. He had also progressed to the crucial point of training for the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡±. When Han Shuo circted his magical yuan, he could proceed ording to the spell¡¯s instructions, and bring his magical yuan to the palms of his hands.

    Whenever Han Shuo started up the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡± and circted his magical yuan to his left and right palm, he could feel that the center of his palms respectively turn cially cold and searingly hot. The surface of his skin would be tinged faint purple and red, causing the center of his hands to look quite odd.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t dare do anything rash with the weird jade box in the meantime. He was deathly afraid thatst time¡¯s situation would happen again. He was temporarily unwilling to take that kind of risk again before he got a handle on what the round ball was and it¡¯s purpose.

    Thanks to studying ¡°The Descriptions of Dark Creatures¡± over the past two weeks, Han Shuo had a much clearer understanding of the particrs of summoning specific dark creatures. He also understood how tomunicate with them, and how to send them back to the other dimension.

    However, even though the incantation for sending a summoned dark creature back to the other dimension was recorded in ¡°The Description of Dark Creatures¡±, and Han Shuo believed that he was absolutely capable of doing so with his current level of mental strength, he didn¡¯t dare take action. This was because he wasn¡¯t sure if he could summon the little skeleton again if he sent it back to the other dimension.

    The ck skeleton with seven bone spurs was the result of Han Shuo¡¯s painstaking refinement ording to the methods of refining a demonic treasure. Not only was it superior in all aspects to ordinary skeletons, but it had a scary immunity to light magic.

    Han Shuo had spent his days and nights with the little skeleton during this time. It had also helped Han Shuo greatly, causing Han Shuo to grow attached to it. He was worried that if he sent it to the other dimension, he would lose it forever if he was unable to summon it next time.

    It was because of this concern that although Han Shuo was confident he would be able to send it back to the other dimension, he still hesitated to do so. He¡¯d rather have the little skeleton live under his bed, resolutely keeping it even when that meant running the risk of discovery by others.

    The little ck skeleton waszily lying in a wooden bucket, its bones as ck as ink and glowing with a faint haze. In the past two weeks, Han Shuo had often injected magical yuan into the bucket, continuing to refine it ording to the Magical Yin Concentration Matrix.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s continual refinement, the little skeleton¡¯s body became more and more agile and strong. Its bone dagger was actually even stronger than ordinary knives and swords. Han Shuo had once experimented with a piece of broken bone, and discovered that the broken bone had been immediately cut in half when the bone dagger had sliced down.

    As the little skeleton underwent changes, so did Han Shuo benefit from training in the solid realm. His body also received a mysterious makeover.

    The only thing was, Han Shuo had still been unable to breakthrough this demonic realm level. He carefully went through old fart Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories, adding some of his reflections on what had happened recently, and came to one conclusion ¡ª if he wanted to quickly reach perfection in the solid realm, ¡°breaking things¡± was the most effective and efficient way.

    Whenever Han Shuo had been severely beaten, or suffered injuries on his body, his body would quickly repair itself through magic training. And everytime after recovery, his body would be more stronger than before. His skin and bones would be more resilient. It was only after damage and injury that his progress in the solid realm would pick up.

    When he thought through this point, Han Shuo gave an involuntary ironic smile. This kind of magic training was death by masochism! But since he had started on this path, he had to find a way to quickly breakthrough the solid realm in order to gain more strength and power.

    On this day, Han Shuo¡¯s figure appeared at the doors of the martial arts school of the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force.

    After a few days of gathering information, Han Shuo understood that a ce for cultivating warriors and knights existed within this school. However, the warriors and knights were trained separately. The ranks of the warrior students were mostly filled withmoners Their training mostly consisted of practicing their fighting aura and being instilled with notions of loyalty to their liege.

    The students within the school of knights mostly came from noble families, and was a training field for the powerful families and military forces, as well as the royal sons of the empire. These students hailed from umon origins and had varying degrees of influence within their families. Not only did they practice their fighting aura, but they were also here to learn the manners and graces of the nobility, strategies of war and art ofmand.

    These students absorbed a variety of knowledge within the school of knights, all for the purpose of obtaining a good opportunity in the future, whether in their family or within the empire. The families of these knight students were all rather wealthy, and on the path of bing a senior knight, did not bat an eye spending money to hire a fewmoners for use in practicing battle and martial arts techniques.

    A fewmoners who felt they possessed tough bodies would take the pummeling in return for money and rich rewards. Even a few warrior students would be willing human targets in return for money.

    However, it wasn¡¯t an easy task to earn this money. Knight students would sometimes miscalcte and even beat a few human targets to death. But because this was a mutually agreed, both sides willing transaction that the knight students had paid for, no one cared if the human targets were beaten to death. They were asking for it, after all.

    Han Shuo hade here to be one of the human targets. But he wasn¡¯t in it for the money, he wanted to temper his body in order to breakthrough the solid realm.

    Numerous human targets stood within a spacious lobby. Each was strong and fit, all wearing the grubby clothing of poormoners. Han Shuo concentrated his attention for a moment and discovered some warrior students mixed into the crowd. Some had been drawn in by the academy¡¯s reputation, and some were students from the warrior school.

    ¡°You¡¯re an errand boy for the academy. But your body isn¡¯t very strong, and you¡¯re not a warrior. You¡¯re asking for deathing here. Little fellow, let me advise you to avoid pursuing this pay, otherwise you could really be beaten to death!¡± A thin old man said to Han Shuo as he looked over from the doors at the front of the lobby.

    Old man Jeff was fifty some years old, and in the same upation as Han Shuo. He wore an errand boy¡¯s clothes and was in charge of registering the human targets. He had some misgivings about the frailty of Han Shuo¡¯s body and so tried to persuade Han Shuo out of kindness.

    ¡°No worries, Mister Jeff please register me. I¡¯d like to try!¡± Han Shuo looked at Jeff and spoke sincerely.

    ¡°Since you insist, I¡¯ll register you. Ai. Do you think this is easy money? If you really are beaten to death, don¡¯t me me for not warning you!¡± Upon seeing Han Shuo was still insistent after a few attempts, and that others behind in the line were impatiently calling out, Jeff gave up trying to convince Han Shuo and agreed, putting down ¡°Bryan¡± in the register.

    A few other human targets looked at him oddly when Han Shuo walked in through the doors. The eyes of most were filled with disdain, and the kindhearted few wore expressions of pity and regret, even trying to convince Han Shuo not to try.

    Although Han Shuo¡¯s body was a bit stronger than before due to practicing magic, he was still quite a ways off from the burly men whose arms were thicker than his thighs. Bryan had been all skin and bones like a skinny monkey, and Han Shuo was only marginally stronger inparison.

    ¡°Listen to me, leave while you still can, otherwise you¡¯ll surely be beaten to death.¡± As Han Shuo took in his surroundings, a thin, twenty some year old youth walked over to Han Shuo and tried to persuade him.

    This youth wore the clothes of a warrior student. Even though his body didn¡¯t look too well built either, he was undoubtedly much stronger than those who looked strong on the outside, but hadn¡¯t practiced any martial arts techniques simply because he was a warrior student.

    ¡°Thank you, I want to try!¡± Han Shuo shed a friendly smile and spoke lightly as he nodded at the youth.

    ¡°I¡¯m called Cal, and Ie here often to earn some extra money. Even though I¡¯m a sergeant knight, I¡¯ve still suffered serious injuries before. I¡¯ve seen too many who were beaten to death because they wanted to earn some money, so I hope you can take my advice. Leave while you still can, otherwise you¡¯ll truly regret it!¡± Cal looked at Han Shuo with sincerity, dissuading Han Shuo with a face of genuity.

    Han Shou smiled and shook his head, ¡°I¡¯m called Bryan. Very nice to meet you Cal. I¡¯m grateful for your good intentions, but I must try.¡±

    Cal gave an involuntary sigh upon seeing Han Shuo¡¯s determination, and shook his head without saying anything. Cal¡¯s gaze however, was full of pity, as if he felt that Han Shuo was surely dead without a doubt.

 Chapter 23: This kidâ€™s a bit strong

    Chapter 23: This kid¡¯s a bit strong

    ¡°Alright, our noble future knights areing this way. Good luck!¡± Jeff suddenly yelled loudly as Han Shuo and Cal were talking.

    More than ten colorfully dressed knight students wearing exquisite swords walked in through the lobby doors following Jeff¡¯s announcement. Most of them were teenage boys, with an exceedingly few amount of young girls.

    They cast arrogant looks in judgment, sizing up the human targets in the lobby. The warriors in the lobby were the first to be noticed. These guys had much more strength than the average person, and would be the most beneficial in terms of realbat experience. They were thus naturally the first to draw attention.

    The group of warriors that Cal headed up were the first to be targeted by the students. As the crowd of students haggled over an eptable price, the group of warriors were led away for practice at the training field. Cal was one of them, and he cast a regretful nce from afar at Han Shuo as he left.

    Warriors were the strongest out of all the human targets, and the most useful for knight students in terms of actualbat practice. If knight students wished to hire them, then the amount they would have to pay would naturally be far above that of ordinary, burlymoner.

    After the warrior human targets, who had been mixed throughout the lobby, had been hired away as first pick, those remaining were allmoners. Of those, the ones who were brawny and stocky became the first to be selected.

    Some flexed their huge muscles, showing off bodybuilding poses that screamed I¡¯m-so-strong-my-muscles-are-awesome. They wore fawning smiles as they looked at the future knights, hoping to be selected and receive richpensation in return.

    Han Shuo¡¯s body was unremarkable to begin with, and beingpletely obscured by a crowd of tall and strong muscle men, he was taken even less seriously. Han Shuo started to be secretly anxious as he saw the knight students pick their targets and leave one by one.

    The three muscle men next to him were standing in three different directions, almostpletely covering him. The knight students probably couldn¡¯t even see him. As Han Shuo fretted, he also tried to find a way to stand out.

    ¡°Hi, big guy, excuse me!¡± Han Shuo patted the two meter mountain of flesh ahead of him and shed a friendly smile.

    The brawny man¡¯s skin was copper-colored, and his back was a sturdy frame. Muscles rippled through his two meter tall height, like a bodybuilder who Han Shuo had seen before.

    When he heard Han Shuo speak, the man turned around and red at Han Shuo with a vicious look. His right bicep muscle abruptly curled and tensed, forming a small mountain of flesh. He thenughed coldly in pride, and turned his head without another word.

    What the, so what if you have big muscles! Han Shuo also gave a coldugh internally and reached out with his left hand. He ced it on the man¡¯s waist, and suddenly pushed forward hard.

    Dondondon. The big muscle man stumbled and staggered forward three steps following the inrush of the force from Han Shuo¡¯s strong push.

    The lobby was already extremely crowded thanks to the presence of many mountains of flesh. People around him were shoved against their will when this person suddenly came crashing in. The area in front of Han Shuo immediately became quite chaotic.

    ¡°Damnit, Daniel, do you want to break the rules?¡± The other mountains of flesh, that had been body mmed by the mountain of flesh called Daniel, roared furiously after steadying himself.

    ¡°It wasn¡¯t me! It was the kid behind me!¡± Daniel protested his innocence to the burly man beside him, and immediately red at Han Shuo ferociously, saying coldly, ¡°Kid, do you want to die early?¡±

    At this moment, Han Shuo had already taken advantage of the situation to slip out and upy one of the better positions on the other side of the lobby. Upon hearing Daniel¡¯s words, Han Shuo gave a coldugh and also stretched out his right hand, making the same bodybuilding pose that Daniel had just made. He flexed his biceps and made an I¡¯m-so-strong gesture, cocking an eyebrow and gazing at Daniel provocatively.

    A few additional knight students walked in suddenly and was about to pick the human targets in the back. They all halted their motions of hiring and looked over in interest, when they realized that there seemed to be something interesting going on.

    Han Shuo had arrogantly struck such an outrageous pose because he had seen these new knight students walk in. Based on Han Shuo¡¯s body condition, it would be a bit difficult to be chosen out of the crowd. Trying to gain attention with his body and self boasting would also most likely not amount to much. The fastest shortcut was to use tyrannical strength to rout a mountain of flesh. Only then would the knight students change their minds about him.

    Except, even though Han Shuo had struck a cocky, provocative pose, he was still an idiot in the eyes of others. If a mountain of flesh like Daniel had made such a gesture, it would have naturally been quite intimidating.

    But, when a 170 cm tall and thin Han Shuo strutted arrogantly amongst so many mountains of flesh, one could only say ¡ª ridiculous, courting death!

    ¡°Ha, kid since you seek death, I¡¯ll send you on your way!¡± Daniel did not immediately erupt into a full blown rage when faced with Han Shuo¡¯s provocation, but was rather delighted. Heughed loudly, raised an arm thicker than Han Shuo¡¯s thigh and grabbed for Han Shuo.

    In the lobby, fights often broke out between human targets seeking to distinguish themselves and attract the attentions of a rich and powerful knight student. This was amon sight. Daniel was naturally happy instead of angry when he saw that Han Shuo¡¯s reckless provocation was ying right into his ns. He would be able to use this kid to prove his aggressiveness and ferocity in front of the knight students.

    Except, muscr and fierce people were usually all brawn and no brains. Daniel had given no thought to how much strength Han Shuo would¡¯ve needed, with his body condition, in order to push Daniel forcefully from the piles of flesh and even cause those he¡¯d crashed into to stagger as well.

    The errand boy in charge of registering names, Jeff, couldn¡¯t bear to see Daniel reach towards Han Shuo and called out involuntarily, ¡°Daniel, he¡¯s an errand boy for the students. You can¡¯t harm him seriously.¡±

    ¡°I will!¡± Daniel smiled in response and didn¡¯t slow his right hand, still going towards Han Shuo.

    A few human targets with good intentions and some of the kinder knight students winced in anticipation. Some of the young female knight students even screamed in fear.

    Just as Daniel¡¯s meaty hand was about to fall upon Han Shuo¡¯s head, Han Shuo¡¯s body suddenly shifted from the position he had been standing in, causing Daniel¡¯s iing hand to grasp at this air.

    Han Shuo alsoughed weirdly at this moment, as if mocking Daniel¡¯s ipetence. He stuck out his left arm again, and curled his left bicep with the same posture. His right finger pointed at the small muscle that had flexed on his bicep and nodded towards Daniel. His meaning was apparently even though he hadn¡¯t said a word. ¡°See, I¡¯m strong!¡±

    ¡°Ah, this kid is really cocky!¡±

    ¡°Provocation, absolute provocation!¡±

    ¡°Hah, interesting fellow!¡±

    ¡°....¡±

    A stream of exmations came out of mouths of the human targets and knight students. When they saw that Han Shuo hadn¡¯t been caught, they took things one step further and struck ridiculous poses themselves, further heightening general interest. Even a few knight students, who had been negotiating prices with some other human targets, temporarily halted their conversations and focused their attention on Han Shuo.

    ¡°Kid, how dare you insult me. I¡¯m gonna get you today!¡± Daniel¡¯s face burned bright red, like a spontaneously enraged bull. The knight students standing around him were his sources of fortune. Daniel¡¯s fury was utterly inmed by such naked humiliation. Judging from the way he looked, he had most likely long forgotten Jeff¡¯s words of caution.

    As Daniel spoke, his eyes spat out fire and his hands formed fists of iron as he red vehemently at Han Shuo. He brought them crashing down towards Han Shuo, wanting to violently damage Han Shuo¡¯s body instead of grabbing him.

    To outsiders, this punch was worlds apart from Daniel¡¯s previous action, whether in terms of speed or strength. This indicated that Daniel was truly furious this time. If Han Shuo was really hit, he would be gravely injured, if not dead outright.

    Those who had previously paid attention to the proceedings out of the kindness of their heart started to worry for Han Shuo again.

    Seeing that the attack was about to reach him, Han Shou pushed off his heels and twisted his body, somehow miraculously dodging Daniel¡¯s iron fists attack. When Daniel struck empty air, his body followed through the action and stumbled forward a good distance. The human targets in his path, who had been watching the show, all scrambled backwards in panic, fearful of being embroiled in the mess.

    Han Shuo on the other hand had created circles in front of his chest with his two arms, pointing his fists upwards and puffing out his chest. With a trace of a disdainful smile at the corner of his lips, he had once again struck a provocative bodybuilder pose.

    A string of astounded noises suddenly emitted from the onlookers. The knight students originally had the attitude of watching a good show started unconsciously treating Han Shuo seriously. The first evasion could perhaps be exined as a fluke, but Han Shuo still sessfully dodged Daniel¡¯s attacks after thetter had increased the speed and strength of his iron fists. This could no longer be exined by luck.

    As everyone was marveling in astonishment, Daniel was like a crazy violent beast. His eyes bloodshot, his body shot forward again, like the wind apanied by a roar of rage, reaching out with both hands and seeking to smash Han Shuo into pulp.

    Miracles kept materializing as Han Shuo kept avoiding Daniel¡¯s attacks. He was as cunning as a fish, and his speed exceedingly swift as well. He even had the breathing space to continuously strike all sorts of bizarre and unique bodybuilding poses.

    Han Shuo¡¯s actions were absolutely a naked provocation, an outrageous unting!

    ¡°Wow, he¡¯s so strong. Those insulting poses never repeat, I¡¯ve never seen anything like it!¡± A female knight eximed in surprise.

    ¡°This kid¡¯s a bit strong!¡± A male knight student eximed in surprise.

    ¡°Daniel¡¯s in a spot of trouble this time!¡± A mountain of flesh eximed in surprise.

    ¡°.....¡±

    The entire lobby was in an uproar!

 Chapter 24: First bucket of gold

    Chapter 24: First bucket of gold

    ¡°Damnit, I¡¯m going to kill you!¡± Daniel roared explosively. He was thoroughly crazed, and began to attack Han Shuo fiercely, as if he was going to drag Han Shuo down to hell with him.

    But Han Shuo was like a sturdy canoe in the middle of a furious ocean. It seemed like it would capsize at any moment, but it somehow resolutely clung on unharmed.

    By now, everyone fully acknowledged Han Shuo¡¯s evasion speed. No one thought that Han Shuo¡¯s previous dodges had been out of luck now. Those who had been worried about him now wore carefree smiles. Even Jeff crossed his arms and wasughing merrily as he looked over.

    Finally, Daniel ran out of energy and stopped automatically, panting heavily. He angrily red at Han Shuo, with sweat dripping down like rain, roaring, ¡°Kid, take one of my hits if you have the guts to. What¡¯s the use in only dodging?¡±

    Daniel had only meant to vent an angryint, even he didn¡¯t think that Han Shuo would take a hit, but surprisingly, Han Shuo stopped his various bodybuilding poses and had the presence of mind to nod at Daniel, smiling, ¡°No problem.¡±

    Everyone revisited their opinions of Han Shuo after this response, with many disying perplexed expressions. Han Shuo¡¯s body was thin and small, so it was understandable that he was nimble and agile, but no one believed that the frail Han Shuo, with no fighting aura, could hold his own in terms of strength against Daniel, an obvious muscle man.

    Even Daniel himself was gobsmacked by Han Shuo¡¯s response. He swiftly recovered andughed wildly, ¡°Good, good. You¡¯re the one who wants to die. You can¡¯t me me!¡±

    Daniel had always been proud of his strong body and ferocious strength. This had formed the basis of his earned power. Although it rankled his pride, Danel could grudgingly ept that his speed and nimbleness didn¡¯t measure up to Han Shuo¡¯s. Now that a chance to disy his awesome strength was in front of him, it was up to him to see if he could wipe away the previous humiliation with one blow. Daniel was naturally going to take full advantage of this opportunity.

    Gathering up his strength, Daniel propelled his right first forward. The veins on his arm popped out as he increased his speed and strength to the limit, bring his fist crashing down on Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo squinted his eyes a bit, a sinister coldness sparkling in their depths. They were like those of a viper, lying in wait for it¡¯s prey, giving the feeling of poised cruelness.

    As Daniel¡¯s fist came flying towards his face, Han Shuo concentrated his magical yuan into his tightly-clenched, right fist and punched outwards in a head-on collision course with Daniel¡¯s iron fist.

    Pa!

    Daniel emitted a devastating scream, like a pig being ughtered, as a crisp sound rang out. His entire right arm drooped, and the right fist, that had being tightly clenched moments earlier, was now curled in the shape of a chicken¡¯s w, shaking madly with his right arm.

    The severeness within Han Shuo¡¯s eyes faded away, and a harmless smile reappeared on his face. He retracted the right fist that he¡¯d just thrust out and shook his right arm slightly, looking at his fist in shock. He muttered to himself, ¡°Eh? I really took the hit?¡±

    Daniel had put all his strength into that hit despite seeing Han Shuo¡¯s weak body. This wasn¡¯t simply teaching Han Shuo a lesson, but wanting to give him a death sentence, but the current Han Shuo was no longer a timid coward who dumbly epted everything that flew his way. Although he sometimes yed dumb, he naturally wouldn¡¯t be kind to someone who wanted to actually kill him.

    The bizarre oue of their two fists meeting hadpletely stunned the lobby full of knight students and human targets. A few of the nearbymoner human targets looked at Han Shuo now with just a trace of fear in their gazes. The people next to him automatically shied away, leaving the prime spot for him.

    All the knight students were extremely excited and put their heads together in discussion. Some even suspected that Han Shuo was one of the rare barbarians on the Continent, or an orc that had taken human form.

    Daniel was still wailing in pain as his right arm trembled continuously. Everyone understood what that crisp crack just now had meant: Daniel¡¯s right arm was most likely destroyed and useless.

    The old errand boy Jeff looked at Daniel regretfully and spoke soft words offort, ¡°Daniel, I¡¯m sorry that this happened, but I¡¯m afraid that your current body condition has disqualified you from staying here.¡±

    Daniel involuntarily looked at Han Shuo in resentment upon hearing Jeff¡¯s words. He then brushed past Han Shuo and walked out of the lobby. Too many previous injuries had resulted from fights, thus a few rules had beenid down. Daniel understood his ce and position. Add to that his clear understanding that he was no match for Han Shuo, his only option was to leave early.

    When Daniel had left, Jeff gave a great yell. ¡°Alright alright, everyone can continue your negotiations!¡±

    Multiple knight students walked towards Han Shuo as soon as Jeff called out. All of them had fixed their gazes on him and were shouting, ¡°One gold coin!¡± ¡°Two gold coins!¡± ¡°Three gold coins!¡±

    Under normal circumstances, ording to their respective strength, amoner human target could be hired for student practice for ten to fifty silvers. Warriors with high potential could be hired for one to five gold coins depending on their level.

    The two or three gold coins that these people were offering were amazingly high amounts. Although Han Shuo had disyed his power just now, he still wasn¡¯t a warrior. A stronger warrior would have been able to use his fighting aura to deal a single, fatal blow to Daniel in the fight just now. Therefore, a price of two or three golds was an incredible price for amoner human target.

    Han Shuo had been ready to ept when the first student had called out one gold coin, but when the subsequent price of two gold coins had appeared, Han Shuo shut his mouth with an audible click and awaited higher offers.

    Although he wasn¡¯t here for money, Han Shuo fully understood that money was just as important in this world as it was on Earth. He would definitely not settle for earning only one gold coin when he could earn two.

    The knight students all walked up to Han Shuo and called out increasingly higher bids. However, Han Shuo was still amoner and not a warrior with surpassing strength. Therefore, these people mostly stopped after two or three gold coins.

    ¡°Five gold coins!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s patience had won arge sum for him. A handsome Sergeant Knight with golden curls, one who looked kind and humble, offered a price higher than the others.

    Most stopped bidding as soon as his offer of five gold coins appeared. They looked at him askance, and one of them said, ¡°Lawrence, a Sergeant Warrior is only worth five gold coins. Although this kid¡¯s a bit strong, he¡¯s definitely not worth five gold. Isn¡¯t your price a bit high?¡±

    Lawrence smiled and said cidly, ¡°It¡¯s a bit high, but we¡¯vee a bitte and all of the good warriors have been hired anyway. There aren¡¯t many left, so we can only choose him.¡±

    The others agreed as they pondered his words. Out of all the human targets left in the lobby, Han Shuo¡¯s strength was most likely the highest. If the warriors who had been here earlier were still here, then perhaps Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t have been worth this much, but now that he was the strongest here, the knight students didn¡¯t have much choice. People were also impatient to find a sparring partner, thus further increasing Han Shuo¡¯s worth.

    ¡°How does five gold coins sound to this amazing friend?¡± Lawrence smiled at Han Shuo and asked peacefully.

    Han Shuo realized that no one would continue to bid higher after looking around, and then proceeded to size up Lawrence as the strongest out of those present. He nodded, ¡°I ept!¡±

    ¡°My name is Lawrence and here¡¯s five gold coins. I hope you can help me in our trainingter!¡± Lawrence walked towards Han Shuo and took five gold coins out of a colorful pouch.

    Han Shuo was a bit emotional as he epted the five gold coins. Bryan had been sold to the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force for five gold coins back in the day. These five gold coins he¡¯d earned for sparring with a knight student were enough to buy back Bryan¡¯s life! Five gold coins was a heavenly price for Han Shuo¡¯s current position; it was enough for his freedom!

    ¡°I¡¯m called Bryan, nice to meet you.¡± Han Shuo smiled urbanely at his fortune god Lawrence after he¡¯d put the gold coins into his own ragged money pouch.

    ¡°Come with me and let me see if you¡¯re worth those five gold coins!¡± Lawrence walked out decisively with Han Shuo following close behind.

    The training fields of the school of martial arts were quite simr to those of the school of magic. However, the corners were filled with obstacles instead of magical items. There was only Han Shuo and Lawrence in the spacious training field. The ground was tiled with rough, hard rock and the surface was extremely hard to the touch.

    Lawrence changed into an athletic, white training uniform after entering the venue. He disarmed his sword, cing it to the side. Only then did he look at Han Shuo with some interest, smiling, ¡°Those five gold coins aren¡¯t earned easily. Are you ready?¡±

    Han Shuo inwardly thought that his body was worlds apart in toughness and strength from the original Bryan, thanks to the forging from the magical yuan. Add to that the magical yuan¡¯s curious negating effect against fighting aura, and he wasn¡¯t that afraid of Lawrence damaging his body with fighting aura. There wasn¡¯t much to prepare, so he nodded at Lawrence.

    ¡°Remember, you¡¯re sparring and thus can only dodge or block, but cannot attack!¡± It seemed that Lawrence could tell that Han Shuo was new at this, and issued some reminders before beginning. He only started slowly walking towards Han Shuo when he was satisfied that Han Shuo understood.

    Just as Lawrence was about to reach Han Shuo¡¯s side, his speed suddenly increased like lightning. His empty left hand was like a sharp sword being unsheathed, and it came rushing towards Han Shuo¡¯s chest. His fingers were arranged together and pointed towards Han Shuo.

    Due to training his fighting aura, a knight¡¯s strength and speed werepletely beyond the realm of an ordinary burlymoner if he activated his fighting aura. Lawrence¡¯s onrushing hand was more than ten times the speed and strength of ude¡¯s from earlier.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes lost focus as he saw that Lawrence¡¯s hand was already near his chest. His heart spasmed in fright as his magical yuan started churning quickly. Han Shuo abruptly twisted his body and dodged to the side.

    Lawrence shed open the front of Han Shuo¡¯s shirt with a clear ripping sound. Han Shuo felt a cold draft on his chest and saw his shirt flying away in the breeze. He felt relieved that he had managed to dodgd in time.

    However, arge amount of force surged into his lower abdomen while Han Shou was still inwardly celebrating. His body involuntarily staggered backwards as he sat down on the hard rock. His intestines and stomach felt like they¡¯d been smashed together and it hurt quite a bit.

    He lifted his head to see that Lawrence¡¯s extended foot was still halted in midair. The student was looking at Han Shuo with a bantering look, ¡°Bryan, I pulled my punches this time, and didn¡¯t keep attacking. I won¡¯t be as kind next time.¡±

    Lawrence¡¯s kick just now had been infused with fighting aura. However, Lawrence had only employed his fighting aura to increase his body and attack speed, and had kept it contained within his body. He hadn¡¯t projected the fighting aura into Han Shuo¡¯s body for further damage.

    And it was because of this that the magical yuan within Han Shuo¡¯s body hadn¡¯t reacted. His physical body had taken the collision that had been filled with a crazy amount of strength. Even his improved body had taken damage.

    He nodded with his brows drawn tightly together. Han Shuo gritted his teeth against the pain from his stomach and stood up from the ground. He looked at Lawrence coldly, ¡°I¡¯ll be more careful from now on. Again!¡±

 Chapter 25: Pain and Happiness

    Chapter 25: Pain and Happiness

    Lawrence looked at Han Shuo with some surprise, then smiled and said, ¡°very good¡±. His body abruptly moved again, and he appeared in front of Han Shuo in the blink of an eye. He violently kicked out with his foot using lightning-like speed, still aiming for Han Shuo¡¯s stomach.

    Han Shuo had already taken a hefty kick to the stomach at this point in time and was in an exceeding amount of pain. He was well aware that sergeant knight Lawrence¡¯s attack speed and strength was not something that he, someone who hadn¡¯t even surpassed the solid realm of demonic practice, could fully defend against.

    But, for some reason, Han Shuo was wholly unafraid, and even felt a bit of eager anticipation. The magical yuan within his body circted through his abdomen a few times, and he felt a quick abatement of pain. He concentrated like he never had before, and faced Lawrence¡¯s subsequent attacks calmly.

    Just as Lawrence¡¯s foot came flying his way, Han Shuo¡¯s feet had already pushed off and he backed up with haste, evading Lawrence¡¯s foot like lightning. However, Lawrence wasn¡¯t surprised in the least and his body didn¡¯t hesitate. He followed his empty kick with a string of punches and kicks, following Han Shuo¡¯s retreat and ferociously continued to attack Han Shuo.

    Lawrence was a sergeant level knight, and could increase his body functions beyond a typical muscle man when he circted his fighting aura to his energy and attack power. Even with Han Shuo¡¯s current agility, he still couldn¡¯t avoid being repeatedly hit. Pilip sounded continuously, as Han Shuo could only fully protect his face. That left his chest, waist, stomach, arms, and legs to suffer constant hits.

    The pain in his body increased as he started being hit multiple times. His evasion speed became more sluggish due to his overall body condition. He was hit with more attacks this way, and towards the end his two legs were as heavy as lead, and each movement required a monumental amount of effort.

    If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that Han Shuo had been constantly practicing magic and strengthening his body during this time, then based off Bryan¡¯s weak and fragile body, he would¡¯ve been dead within a minute of Lawrence¡¯s storm of attacks.

    When he¡¯d faced ude and Erick, both had sent their fighting aura directly into Han Shuo¡¯s body. The wild fighting aura had been enclosed by the magical yuan as soon as it¡¯d entered his body, preventing Han Shuo¡¯s body from suffering from too much damage.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t been seriously injured the two times he¡¯d been hit by fighting aura, causing him to slightly overlook the warriors and knight, but now that he¡¯d been subjected to such a thorough beating by Lawrence, Han Shuo finally understood how he¡¯d beenpletely wrong before.

    He hadn¡¯t been hurt before purely due to the wondrous effects of the magical yuan. If it wasn¡¯t for the magical yuan, then his internal organs would have most likely have beenpleted destroyed as soon as the fighting aura entered his body. No wonder ude was so taken aback when Han Shuo hadn¡¯t immediately died a grisly death when ude sent his fighting aura into Han Shuo¡¯s body. This also exined why Erick confidently thought that Han Shuo was dead without a doubt, and didn¡¯t even bother checking Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    Lawrence used his fighting aura in a different way and didn¡¯t send it directly into Han Shuo¡¯s body to wreak havoc on his internal organs. On the contrary, Lawrence used it to increase the speed and strength of his attacks. This prevented the wondrous effects of the magical yuan and forced Han Shuo to passively take the hits with his physical body.

    Pa!

    The same foot stomped on Han Shuo¡¯s stomach again, and Han Shuo staggered backwards in retreat. He finally couldn¡¯t handle any more and once more fell heavily to the ground.

    The current Han Shuo had two broken ribs and numerous other injuries. Apart from his unharmed face, his entire body had suffered severe hits as it never had before. Han Shuo struggled with his body and kept trying to stand up, but would wobble back to the ground every time he tried.

    Each twist and movement of his body brought him great pain, but Han Shuo actually felt ecstasy at this moment. He could clearly feel that the magical yuan was circting at a speed much faster than normal, and kept flowing through all his aches and pains, creating a strange, fiery sensation where his bones had been broken and wounds had been opened.

    Han Shuo understood that his previous conclusion had been correct. The fastest way to breakthrough the solid realm was to ¡°break things¡±. The magical yuan¡¯s abnormal circtions now continually repaired his broken body, and reforged his tendons, bones, muscles, and skin over and over again, causing his physical body to be tougher.

    Although his body hurt beyond belief, Han Shuo was quite satisfied. He grit his teeth and yelled brokenly whileughing grimly. He finally scrambled to his feet and stared at Lawrence in the eye, ¡°I think our partnership can be continued for a long time.¡±

    Lawrence stopped and stood in front of Han Shuo, frowning as he watched thetter struggle to his feet after falling again and again. As the attacker, Lawrence was well aware of the force of his attacks just now. Even an ordinarypanion-at-arms with the benefit of defending with fighting aura would not be able to take the hits like Han Shuo stubbornly did.

    What surprised Lawrence the most was that even after suffering these fierce attacks, Han Shuo could stillugh loudly in between screams of pain. Lawrence could hear from Han Shuo¡¯sughs that thetter truly seemed to be filled with joy. Lawrence thought this was simply too incredible.

    When Han Shuo had mentioned a long term partnership, Lawrence was dumbfounded at first, but then smiled lightly. ¡°Bryan, you¡¯re quite interesting, but a long term partnership depends on your body and whether it can handle more attacks. To be honest, I haven¡¯t fully exerted myself today, nor have I used my sword. I have coins in abundance. If you still want to earn this money, you cane find me anytime. I will still offer the same price of five golds per session, what do you think?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and responded, ¡°No problem, I¡¯ll be back soon!¡±

    ¡°Good. Bryan you¡¯re a very interesting fellow, I hope you can recover quickly. My attacks next time will be even more vicious! Be prepared!¡± Lawrence said as he changed out of his clothes, rearmed himself with his sword and left the training field.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t leave immediately after Lawrence had departed. He instead sat down Indian style, and repeatedly circted the magical yuan ording to the principles of practicing magic, reforging his severely damaged body.

    After a while, he felt his drained energy slowly revive after repeated circtions of the magical yuan. His legs, that felt like they weighed a ton, also gradually regained some strength. Although he still hurt all over, pain seemed to be better than theplete lifelessness he had felt earlier.

    He grimaced as he moved, sensing the pain he was in. Han Shouughed loudly, holding up underneath the unending agony. He slowly stood up, then swaggered out of the training field.

    ¡°Oh, it¡¯s Bryan, are you alright?¡±

    Han Shuo heard others gasp in amazement as soon as he walked out of the training field. Upon swiveling his body, he realized that it was the kindhearted young warrior, Cal, the one who had tried to talk Han Shuo out of it in the lobby. Cal¡¯s tight robes had some dust on it, and some traces of sweat beaded his forehead, but he seemed otherwise unharmed.

    ¡°No big deal.¡± Han Shuo smiled at Cal and responded faintly while nodding his head.

    Cal was a seasoned warrior and could tell with one nce that Han Shuo was not as unaffected as he said he was. Cal had a great deal of experience as a human target, and naturally understood that even if nothing showed in outward appearances, that didn¡¯t necessarily mean that the body was unharmed. The way that Han Shuo was walking and his expression all indicated that his body condition was quite bad.

    Cal quickly walked towards Han Shuo and reached out a hand to help steady Han Shuo. Cal frowned, ¡°What no big deal. Your body must be in awful shape. Here, let me take you back. Good thing you walked out alive, I thought you¡¯d be beaten to death in there!¡±

    Cal meant well, but Han Shuo was an errand boy for the necromancy major, and a crazy one at that. If he were to return with Cal, it was bound to create unnecessaryplications.

    Besides, Han Shuo didn¡¯t want to owe anyone favors. Even though he felt terrible, he had to hold it in. He would be fine if he walked slowly. Therefore, Han Shuo brushed off Cal¡¯s steadying hand and smiled, ¡°Thank you Cal. I¡¯m fine, really. I can go back by myself.¡±

    Han Shuo turned to leave immediately after his words, but saw a familiar figure approaching from afar ¨C ude.

    A human target followed behind ude, and they both approached the knight student training fields. It looked like he was also here to spar with human targets.

    Han Shuo had been prepared to bump into ude when he came to the school for knights. Thest time at the department of light magic, Han Shuo¡¯s little skeleton had almost been pulverized by ude, and he himself had suffered from ude¡¯s fighting aura as well. If it wasn¡¯t for the magical yuan enclosing the fighting aura, he would most likely be dead by now.

    ude had long since forgotten this matter, and didn¡¯t know that the Han Shuo was the master of the little skeleton, but Han Shuo had already noted this event for future revenge. Even though he was prepared to see ude again, his body condition was at its worst at the moment and Han Shuo had no desire to go head to head with ude right now. If he¡¯d guessed wrong and ude was still harboring a grudge fromst time, death was the only possible oue for Han Shuo if ude took his revenge.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind frantically raced through ways to avoid ude as thetter approached with a sunny smile, turning his head to hold a spirited conversation with other knight students.

 Chapter 26: Entering a demonic mental state

    Chapter 26: Entering a demonic mental state

    As ude neared him, Han Shuo grimaced and gave a low moan. He ducked his body and head and reached for his ankle, as if inspecting the injury to his ankle.

    Next to him, Cal frowned involuntarily as he saw Han Shuo¡¯s actions. He propped Han Shuo up with one hand and said, ¡°Are you alright? Is your ankle injured? Let me take a look.¡±

    ¡°Nothing much, just that I twisted it a bit just now.¡± Han Shuo responded lowly with a drooped head and a bent over body.

    ude and the other knight students had arrived by this time. The others hadeter and did not recognize Han Shuo. There were many present who were wounded or crippled, and so Han Shuo¡¯s performance didn¡¯t attract too much attention.

    ude flicked a nce at Han Shuo and thought nothing of it, passing by Han Shuo as he chatted andughed with his peers.

    Han Shuo¡¯s ankle was indeed twisted, and had swollen up by now. Cal gave a soft gasp upon seeing it, ¡°It¡¯s swollen up so much, let me take you home!¡±

    Seeing that ude¡¯s footsteps were going further away, Han Shuo stood up straight again and wiggled his ankle, spinning off his toes. He smiled at Cal, ¡°I suddenly feel much better. Thank you Cal, no worries about taking me back!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s walking pace picked up after he finished speaking, and he quickly disappeared around the corner without a trace or making another sound.

    Cal shook his head, his face utterly perplexed as he watched Han Shuo suddenly be hale and hearty. ¡°What a weird person!¡±

    Han Shuo dragged his battered body back to the necromancy major of the school of magic when the sky was about to turn dark. Now that his necromancy errand duties had been taken over by Carey and Borg, Han Shuo didn¡¯t need to expend too much effort. He lined up for his dinner after returning and went directly to the warehouse. He immediately started using the magical yuan to continually rebuild and reforge his body after he¡¯d locked the door.

    There wasn¡¯t a single inch of his body that didn¡¯t cry out in pain. His skin, tendons and bones had all suffered severe damage. The magical yuan circted his body again and again ording to the principles of practicing magic. Han Shuo could feel a bit of his strength return from the fiery mass of pain that was his current body each time the magical yuanpleted a cirction.

    The magical yuan churned continuously throughout the process, and it seemed to have grown just a tad bigger, bringing a new surprise to Han Shuo. It looked like the time and effort spent on strengthening his body was also a process of gradual improvement for the magical yuan. He would have to endure this kind of injury in the near future in order to fortify his body.

    The pain in his body eased up after midnight and Han Shuo switched to practicing the Mystical cial Spellfire at this time. He circted the magical yuan to his fingertips and palms of his hands ording to the instructions of the Mystical cial Spellfire.

    Time flew as Han Shuo sank into a strange, oblivious mindset. There were no distractions in his mind, just the perseverance and tenacity to train. He had long since forgotten the pain and injuries of his body, and just kept circting his magical yuan ording to method prescribed by the Mystical cial Spellfire.

    Han Shuo had previously restrained himself when practicing magic. He would awaken at a set time, and had never immersed himself like he had today. Han Shuo had lost himself in it today, forgetting the passage of time, forgetting his sense of self, forgetting all mundane distractions.

    Bam.

    The small door to the warehouse suddenly banged open, startling Han Shuo out of his reverie. He frowned and his eyes shot like cold lightning to Jack¡¯s body.

    Jack shuddered in fright under Han Shuo¡¯s stare, only exhaling softly when he saw the cold lightning in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes fade away. ¡°Bryan, so you really were in the warehouse. I thought something happened to you!¡±

    Han Shuo immediately checked his body¡¯s condition after being startled awake. He suddenly realized that his originally heavily injured body had mostly healed, and that the magical yuan circting within his body was a bit stronger than before. His mental strength also showed more rity than before.

    ¡°What could happen to me. I only slept in one day, that¡¯s all. Borg and Carey are cleaning for me anyway, there¡¯s nothing to do.¡± Han Shuo cracked his stiff neck as creaking noises sounded. When Han Shuo got up from the small wooden bed and stretched his body, all the bones in his body sounded with crisp pa! pa! sounds, leaving Jack dumbfounded where he stood.

    After a while, Jack finally reacted in surprise when the strange sounds had disappeared from Han Shuo¡¯s body. He called out involuntarily, ¡°Uh, Bryan, you didn¡¯t sleep in for just a day. You haven¡¯t appeared in six days! I knocked on your door for a long time without any response from you, I thought something happened to you!¡±

    Han Shuo was also astounded by Jack¡¯s words. Had he trained for six whole days? He creased his brow and then suddenly recalled the mention of ¡®entering a demonic mental state¡¯ within Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories of demonic magic.

    Some practitioners would be able to enter a demonic mental state due to fortuitous coincidence. It varied ordingly, and the demonic mental state was further split into either an aggressive or passive state. Some practitioner¡¯s minds and disposition would drastically change upon entering the demonic mental state, and they would thirst for and feast on blood and murder. Their bodies would feel no pain, and both their magic and physical body would be greatly enhanced upon entering the demonic mental state. They would be unable to pause for even a second, and would only seek to continuously destroy everything and everyone in front of them. This was the aggressive type of a demonic mental state.

    The other kind was what Han Shuo had experienced earlier, suddenly entering a demonic mental state during practice. It was a vague, foggy process undetectable by the practitioner, but his internal processes and magical yuan cirction would be greatly heightenedpared to typical training conditions. He wouldn¡¯t be able to sense his own training status, but would be able to discern a huge change within his body when he awoke.

    The first type of demonic mental state ordinarily urred after the rational mind had lost itself due to severe interference. If the practitioner didn¡¯t die in the course of the endless killings spurred on by the demonic state, his body¡¯s energies would be greatly harmed along with other side effects. Han Shuo¡¯s peaceful demonic state was the much better option. Most entered this bizarre mental realm during training, and could feel the increase in their strength when they awoke.

    ¡°Oh, that¡¯s because I¡¯ve been a bit sleepytely and slept too deeply. Right, what do you need me for?¡± Han Shuo realized that his stomach felt empty as he spoke, and immediately understood that his body greatly needed food and nutrition after going six days without eating.

    Jack withdrew arge piece of bread for Han Shuo as he looked at Han Shuo rub his stomach. ¡°I was worried about you, and Master Fanny told me to tell you to go to herb. Oh yes, Lisa was asking about you too. I don¡¯t know if she wants to make trouble for you again.¡±

    ¡°I see. Hmm. I¡¯ll go to Master Fanny¡¯s first. Let¡¯s go!¡± Han Shuo munched on Jack¡¯s bread as he walked out of the warehouse.

    It was a good thing that Han Shuo had shoved the little skeleton underneath the bed during this time. Jack hadn¡¯t seen anything amiss when he¡¯d barged in. After he relocked the door that Jack hade crashing through, Han Shuo made straight for Fanny¡¯sb.

    Knock knock knock.

    Han Shuo stood at the entrance to Fanny¡¯sb and raised his hand to knock.

    ¡°Come in!¡± Fanny¡¯s gentle and soft voice sounded from theb. Han Shuo opened the door and stepped into theb upon hearing it.

    Several magic scrolls were ced on the pedestal in the middle of theb. Mysterious and exquisite magic words and diagrams were tattooed on the scrolls. Even someone who had just set foot into the halls of magic, a rookie like Han Shuo, could feel the strong magical currents from the scrolls from a far distance away.

    At that moment, Fanny was chanting an incantation as she bent over, tracing beautiful lines on the magic scrolls as she dipped a long, elegant nail into the brown magic solution to the side. Those delicate lines looked random, but also gave a wondrous feeling of extreme harmony.

    Fanny finished outlining the scroll after a while and injected magic into the scroll after reciting an incantation. A deste, lonely and dark aura immediately started emanating from it as a dash of brown light shed over the scroll. It then rolled itself up automatically.

    When she had stored the finished magic scroll, Fanny lifted her head and smiled involuntarily. ¡°Oh it¡¯s Bryan. How¡¯s your back doing?¡±

    ¡°Thank you for your concern Master Fanny. The injuries on my back are all healed.¡± Han Shuo nodded and responded.

    Han Shuo understood he couldn¡¯t continue to y the fool. Although doing so would bring some benefits to him, it would create more trouble sooner orter. Since that was the case, it would be better to slowly change himself, and let everyone unknowingly ept his new self. Therefore, people wouldn¡¯t find it surprising that he had changed, and would actually think that he had suddenly seen reason again after being crazy.

    The previous owner this body, Bryan, had suffered greatly in the necromancy major. Han Shuo had vowed to take revenge for Bryan when he climbed out of that tomb. A lesson had been more or less taught to Carey, Borg, Bach and Lisa, enacting quite a bit of revenge for Bryan. Han Shuo still remained in the necromancy major in order toy the groundwork for future ns.

    After gaining a better understanding of this world, Han Shuo realized that he would have to continuously be stronger if he wanted to thrive in this world. The Babylon Academy of Magic and Force was a ce to continually improve himself. He remained here in order to take advantage of the school¡¯s resources to further raise all aspects of himself, including strength, knowledge, and a full understanding of this world.

    Therefore, Han Shuo knew that he couldn¡¯t continue to be crazy, and needed to change himself bit by bit.

    ¡°Oh that¡¯s wonderful. We¡¯re just about to take a field trip and bring students to the outside world. They will be testing themselves on the development of their magic. Come with us! You can pick up after them, and I can take a good gauge of your body condition on the road. What do you say Bryan?¡± Fanny put down the items she held in her hand and smiled at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo stood motionless, thought for a bit and felt that this was a chance. He nodded involuntarily, ¡°Sure!¡±

 Chapter 27: Hot damn, Iâ€™m awesome!

    Chapter 27: Hot damn, I¡¯m awesome!

    ¡°Alright, then we set off in two days. Use these next few days to prepare. As for your errand duties, I¡¯ll ask the school authorities to temporarily hand them over to the other three, so no worries there.¡± Fanny smiled charmingly upon seeing Han Shuo agree. Her beautiful face was even more tempting and moving because of her smile, making Han Shuo¡¯s heart lurch slightly.

    Before he¡¯d arrived in Bryan¡¯s body, Han Shuo¡¯s life could be categorized as a failure. Not only had he aplished nothing professionally speaking, but his love life had also been in shambles. He still didn¡¯t know anything about being with a woman, to this day.

    Once he came to this world, Han Shuo¡¯s self control had decreased and his various desires had increased due to practicing magic. Han Shuo was someone who¡¯d died once before. The depressing and pointless morass of his past life hadpletely bound his past self. Adding to that was the weight of his family and his shy personality, which had resulted in him never daring to act on the evil thoughts that he dreamed up.

    And now, in thispletely foreign world, with his increasing strength due to practicing magic, many of his previous constraints had disappeared. He naturally wished to live without regrets and fully materialize all the daydreams that had always been buried in his inner heart.

    And women, particrly beautiful women, had been an uncontroble urge in Han Shuo¡¯s heart.

    Fanny was not only beautiful and mesmerizing, she also paid particr attention to Han Shuo¡¯s well-being, and he was at the age that desired the fairer sex most ardently. He would naturally have unavoidable desires. With the principles of demonic magic demanding that a practitioner do as he wished, Han Shuo naturally viewed Fanny as the prey of his affections.

    ¡°Master Fanny, are the dark creatures we summon always different? Is it possible to summon the same creature after sending it back to the other dimension?¡±

    Since Han Shuo had promised Fanny to apany them on their outing, he started making preparations for his own affairs. Han Shuo had no advantages besides his summoned small skeleton that he could rely on.

    Although he could still contact the skeleton within a certain range, it would likely be difficult to remain in contact with the current level of his mental strength once he set out, and they were separated by a vast distance. If the little skeleton got into any trouble because Han Shuo wasn¡¯t here to control it with his mental strength, then things would get sticky.

    Although Han Shuo was confident that he¡¯d be able to send the little skeleton back to the other dimension, he didn¡¯t know if he would be able to summon it again. Therefore, he wanted to solve this problem before setting out. As the teacher for the necromancy major, Fanny would naturally know more about these things. Just because Han Shuo had no way of solving his conundrum did not mean Fanny didn¡¯t, hence his questions.

    Fanny looked at Han Shuo in confusion as soon as his question was asked. Her sexy, full lips moved as she asked, ¡°Eh, Bryan, why are you asking these questions? These are things that necromancy students should pay attention to. You shouldn¡¯t care about these things!¡±

    ¡°Oh, this is Lisa¡¯s question. I was just asking you for her.¡± Han Shuo nodded and spoke with a good Samaritan expression.

    Fanny didn¡¯t suspect a thing after Han Shuo¡¯s response. She understood that Lisa often practiced necromancy magic on Han Shuo and thus, it made sense for Lisa to ask a question through Han Shuo. She thought for a while and then said, ¡°So that¡¯s the case... It¡¯s not that one can¡¯t summon the same creature after sending it to the other dimension, it¡¯s just that there¡¯s no need to do so.

    Every time a dark creature is summoned from the other dimension, it, or a group, is merely chosen at random from a crowd of simr level dark creatures ording to the mental strength powering the incantation, and the chant itself. Because they are the same level of dark creature, their strength is roughly the same, and thus no one cares about these matters.¡±

    ¡°Then what should be done in order to resummon the same dark creature after its been sent back to the other dimension?¡± Han Shou thought quickly and asked a follow-up question.

    Fanny carefully put away the magic scrolls on the pedestal and ran her beautiful, long fingers over the top of the pedestal. She frowned as she exined, ¡°If you really want to resummon a dark creature sent back to the other dimension, then leave a magical brand on its body. Lock onto the original dark creature through the magical brand the next time you summon it. You can find the original creature this way and resummon it out of the other dimension.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was immediately overjoyed upon hearing Fanny¡¯s words, but his forehead creased in a frown as he muttered to himself. ¡°So that¡¯s the case, I wonder if Lisa knows how to leave a magical brand on a summoned dark creature.¡±

    After looking at Han Shuo oddly, Fanny smiled and said softly. ¡°Bryan, you truly are a very kind person. I know that Lisa has not been the friendliest to you, and the problems with your body resulted from her Agony of the Soul. Yet not only do you not carry a grudge, but you constantly think about her. There are few as pure and kind-hearted as you these days.¡±

    Pure! Kind-hearted! Han Shuo was speechless internally, but maintained an honest smile on his face. He scratched his head and said with some embarrassment, ¡°I don¡¯t think a grudge should be carried, no matter the reason. People will understand if you treat them kindly. Heh heh.¡±

    Fannyughed softly and nodded as she heard Han Shuo¡¯s words, and said no more. She took out a thin piece of yellow paper from a nearby cab, and picked up a quill with her slender fingers, dipping it in ink and quickly scratching out something.

    After a short while, Fanny had filled the thin paper with words, and she stuck the quill back into the inkpot. She handed the text-filled, thin paper to Han Shuo and smiled, ¡°This is the incantation and method for leaving a magical brand on a summoned dark creature. Give it to Lisa, I think she will know what to do with her capacity as a novice mage.¡±

    ted, Han Shuo almost shook as he epted the paper from Fanny. He nodded with a dumb smile, saying eagerly, ¡°I¡¯ll go immediately, Lisa will be very happy.¡±

    Han Shuo left Fanny¡¯sb at an eager pace, clutching the thin paper in his hands as soon as he¡¯d finished speaking.

    ¡°What an innocent little fellow. I hope that Lisa makes less trouble for him in the future because of this.¡± Fanny smiled slightly and said with some emotion upon seeing Han Shuo leave so urgently.

    Midnight, the cemetery behind the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force.

    ¡°¡°Oh endless darkness, turn into destructive bone arrows, and destroy ording to my will, bone arrows!¡± A cuttingly sharp bone arrow materialized out of thin air as a lowly chanted incantation finished. Apanied by a strident whooshing sound, it connected violently with the chest of the straw figure in front of it.

    ¡°Haha, I¡¯ve finally sessfully released a bone arrow!¡± Han Shuoughed loudly and called out with pride after seeing that the bone arrow had neither broken in midair nor had been off course.

    A lot of time had passed since the incident that had urred at the cemeteryst time. Han Shuo resumed his practice of the bone arrow magic whenever he was certain that no one would pay attention to the ce.

    During this time, his mental strength had increased at a rapid pace, particrly after the encounter with the strange ball. Since he hadn¡¯t sumbed to that great cmity, Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength had greatly increased. After repeated practice and enhanced magical knowledge, Han Shuo had finally mastered the low level necromancy magic of bone arrow to perfection, without any mistakes.

    The little skeleton stood at attention in the distance, its empty eye sockets vigntly patrolling the four corners as its head swiveled. It grasped the bone dagger with its right hand, and glowed with a cold, dark light under the moonlight.

    He would be temporarily leaving the Academy for the outside world tomorrow with Fanny and co. The fact that Han Shuo had used Lisa¡¯s name to ask Fanny some questions never came to light. After all, this was just a small matter, and Fanny wasn¡¯t someone who would ask about every little detail. She naturally forgot this issue after one or two days.

    Over the past couple of days, Han Shuo studied ¡°The Foundations of Necromancy¡± and ¡°The Descriptions of Dark Creatures¡±, as well as thoroughly reading and contemting the words on Fanny¡¯s thin paper. He was confident that he would be able to leave a magical brand on the little skeleton. He nned to do so before he left on the morrow, and started to nt a magical brand on the little skeleton ording to his understanding.

    The little skeleton patrolling off in the distance came speeding towards Han Shuo with a yank of his mental strength. The seven bone spurs on its back fluttered slightly in the air, seeming to add a bit of power, and causing the little skeleton¡¯s body to actually lift above the ground for a bit as it ran. This surprised Han Shuo, thinking that his efforts in refining the skeleton had not been in vain. It was apparent that just like him, its strength had continued to increase.

    When the little skeleton came to a stop next to Han Shuo, he gathered his concentration in a way he never had before, curling his fingers upwards in the air. He then started to lowly recite the incantation found in Fanny¡¯s notes.

    ¡°My loyal servant, in the name of the summoner, I leave upon you my eternal mark. Dark Seal!¡± Han Shuo suddenly felt his mental strength drain rapidly away upon conclusion of the incantation, and an inky ck aura the size of a fist formed between his hands.

    The mental strength needed by this Dark Seal was more than what he¡¯d anticipated. It was only then that Han Shuo remembered something he¡¯d overlooked ¡ª Lisa was a novice mage, and he was just a magic apprentice. Fanny¡¯s method had most likely been tailored for Lisa¡¯s mental strength, and hadn¡¯t even considered the fact that a magic apprentice would be the one casting it.

    Han Shuo felt his headache fiercely as his mental strength was spontaneously depleted. He was involuntarily shocked by the feeling of something being drained away.

    At this moment, the aura between his two hands abruptly drifted out, sinking into the little skeleton¡¯s body between its two empty eye sockets. At the same time, Han Shuo felt extremely fatigued and sat heavily on the ground, panting heavily as he did so.

    Suddenly, it was as if a corner of a veil had been lifted over the foggy memories left by Chu Cang Lan, and a portion of an incantation and memory became exceedingly clear.

    The newfound memories had to do with harnessing magical treasure and the ¡°Harnessing Magic Incantation¡±. This helped Han Shuo realize that he had gained better understanding of some part of Chu Cang Lan¡¯s indistinct memories under somewhat bizarre circumstances.

    A strange whooshing sound abruptly interrupted his thoughts, and Han Shuo subconsciously raised his head to search for the its source.

    He was bbergasted.

    The little skeleton was waving the sharp bone dagger around in an airy dance. Cold light sparkled around the little skeleton¡¯s body in dizzying waves underneath the moonlight. The bone dagger followed the movements of the little skeleton¡¯s hand and stabbed multiple times at the straw figure, leaving it with the appearance of swiss cheese.

    Han Shuo recollected himself after being dumbfounded, his face full of incredulous joy. He threw his head back to the heavens and roared, ¡°Hot damn, I¡¯m awesome!¡±

 Chapter 28: City of Zajoski

    Chapter 28: City of Zajoski

    A streak of white light shed as Han Shuo and several necromancy students materialized within a circr, magical matrix that was filled with magical symbols.

    Han Shuo had experimented three timesst night and realized that he really could send his small skeleton to the other dimension and sessfully summon it back again. He joyfully took out the moneybag, that had been hidden under his bed, and made his preparations for the field trip.

    He now wore an expression of astonishment as he continuously darted his eyes around in close observation of the magical matrix. Therge matrix was circr in form, and on it was an enormous, six-pointed star on the rock beneath his feet. Exquisite magical forms were carved into the magical columns nearby, and a faint magical current emanated from the entire matrix.

    He had been standing in a simr transportation matrix in the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force a second ago. When the matrix had activated, Han Shuo could only feel the strong magical current that permeated the air. He had appeared here after a sh of white light.

    From the students around him, Han Shuo understood that this was a magical transportation matrix. This kind of magical transportation was extremely rare and required a lot ofplex magic and was costly to set up. Even eminent mages needed numerous quantities of magical ingredients in order to properly arrange the transportation matrix.

    ¡°Stop looking, the magical transportation matrix is amazing alright, but you don¡¯t need to make a big deal over it!¡± Off to the side, Lisa spoke up as she saw Han Shuo looking around, gobsmacked.

    This magic was truly wondrous. Although Han Shuo had heard of magical transportation matrices, this was the first time he¡¯d experienced using one, and naturally felt it was quite incredible. He gave up his observations only after he had carefully contemted the area around the matrix.

    Han Shuo understood that with his currently shallow grasp of magical knowledge, he probably wouldn¡¯t even understand the theories behind the transportation matrix, much less be able to set one up.

    Not to mention that constructing such a transportation matrix would need an inordinate amount of magical ingredients. Even the Empire was unable to set one up in all the cities. Each activation required an awe inspiring amount of energy. Even some ordinary noble families would be unable to bear the burden.

    If it wasn¡¯t for the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force having such a magical transportation matrix, and Han Shuo hitching a ride off the coattails of the students, it would¡¯ve been extremely unlikely for him to ever travel through one in his lifetime.

    This area was the Zajoski city on the outskirts of the Lancelot Empire. Zajoski was the biggest city in the southwestern part of the Empire, with the Ken Valley to the west of it. One would end up in thend of the orcs if they travelled west of the Ken Valley. To the south of Zajoski was the Dark Forest. All sorts of strong magical creatures lived within the expansive Dark Forest, including the elves that worshipped nature.

    Things had never been peaceful for the city of Zajoski. The Empire had situated a lot of troops in Zajoski for defending against invasions by the savage orcs. It was said that the orcs lived in very barrennd, and that the savage race had long wanted to upy the fertilends of the Lancelot Empire. Zajoski was the Empire¡¯s strongest point of defense in the southwest, and naturally enjoyed a lot of attention from the orcs.

    The Dark Forest was also a turbulous area. Although the elves that worshipped nature were on more or less friendly terms with the Empire, many of the magical creatures within the Dark Forest often walked out of the forest to appear within nearby towns and viges. This caused things to be a bit tense in the towns and viges next to it.

    Perhaps the Empire expended so many resources in setting up a magical transportation matrix within the city because of this unease. On one hand, this facilitated a connection between the Empire and Zajoski, but on the other it was unable to supportrge scale military deployments due to the sheer energy requirements needed to send through a limited amount of people.

    Zajoski¡¯s peculiar position turned this region into a heaven for adventurers. Merchants and adventurers of all sorts came here thirsty for gold and treasure.

    Whether it was the crystal cores, bones, skin, or flesh of the magical creatures within the Dark Forest, the priceless magical equipment forged by the elves, some precious jewels from the barren wastes of the ods, or the multitude of other items with heavy profits ¡ª these were the intended targets of all the gold rushers.

    ¡°Noble and respected mages, wee to the city of Zajoski. We hope you enjoy yourselves in Zajoski, and obtain all that you need!¡± The official in charge of the magical transportation matrix stood next to it and humbly bowed to Han Shuo and co.

    ¡°Thank you for your warm words, I¡¯m sure we will receive our just rewards.¡± Fanny smiled and nodded her head at him, and then nced at the necromancy students. She said softly, ¡°This is not a peaceful ce, everyone be careful and don¡¯t let anything happen to you. Let¡¯s go.¡±

    Fanny led the crew outwards along the main street when she finished speaking. Like Han Shuo, the students were gazing around with curiosity, measuring up everything and everyone around them.

    Apart from the two teachers Fanny and Gene, there were nine necromancy students and Han Shuo, bringing the total to twelve people. Fanny and Gene were adept necromancers. Fitch had not traveled with the group because he was still undergoing the test for adept mages.

    The strength of the remaining nine students was unevent. Other than a journeyman mage named Derek, the rest were novice mages and magic apprentices.

    The buildings lining the street were all cut out of hard rock, andcked a touch of artistic beautypared to the other buildings within the Empire, but gained a few traces of dignity and toughness. Due to the frequent orc attacks, not only were the Zajoski city walls built to be impregnable, but even the buildings within the city were built on a principle of durability.

    Along the way, Han Shuo noticed that many, many weapons stores, pharmacies, magical item stores, and provision stores could be found to the sides. There were also some small taverns for entertainment, a ve auction, and a bartering ce for all sorts of materials.

    It seemed that merchants knew what sort of transactions would be most profitable because of the unique characteristics of this location. Those entering and exiting these locations were warriors, knights, mages of different majors, robbers, archers, merchants, poets, and even a few slender, pointy-eared, beautiful elves, who were obviously from the Dark Forest.

    The sounds of the street vendors, the elegant low chants from the poets, the brays from the warriors¡¯ steeds, the shes of sudden conflicts ¡ª these scenes were allpletely beyond Han Shuo¡¯s imagination. He was exceedingly astonished and had a better understanding of this chaotic city.

    ¡°Nothing much to see, we need to leave the city before sundown. This isn¡¯t a ce where we should spend much time. Our next stop is the town of Drol. If we can¡¯t reach it by sundown, we¡¯ll have to camp in the wilderness tonight.¡± Gene called loudly and urged the students to walk faster.

    ¡°Heh heh, they¡¯re all flowers in a greenhouse. For some of them, it¡¯s their first visit to the city of Zojoski. No wonder they¡¯re so curious. They won¡¯t be in the future.¡± Fanny swept her clear eyes across the group and smiled involuntarily when she saw a few students, extremely excited by the sights they were seeing for the first time.

    ¡°Bryan, are you okay with carrying so many things on your back?¡± Next to Han Shuo, Lisa frowned as she looked at Han Shuo and voiced a question.

    ¡°Eh, Lisa, when did you start caring for Bryan. This doesn¡¯t seem like you!¡± Novice mage Be looked askance at Lisa and asked oddly.

    Apart from being in charge of all the random little things, Han Shuo was also in charge of providing manualbor during this field trip apaniment. Although wondrous ¡°space rings¡± that could hold items existed in this world, they were quite expensive. It would be difficult for even ordinary noble families to obtain one, not to mentionmoners.

    None of these necromancy teachers and students were lucky enough to possess a space ring. Everyone had packed heavily for this field trip. As an errand ve, Han Shuo had naturally taken up the role of a pack mule.

    Many items wereshed onto Han Shuo¡¯s back, shoulders, wrists, and even his two legs. No one thought Han Shuo could carry so many items on him in the beginning, but they had piled all their belongings onto him after finding out with surprise that Han Shuo could still walk with ease when loaded down with so much.

    Although Han Shuo could y the fool and carry less, he didn¡¯t do so in order to further train his own body. He happily epted the burden, and now carried all sorts of items on him. A few bags even hung around his neck, with only a happily smiling, dust-covered, face apparent.

    ¡°Oh, I¡¯m not having any problems.¡± Han Shuo smiled slightly at Lisa and said in a carefree manner. After that incident in the trap in which Han Shuo had ¡°passionately¡± dered his love, Lisa¡¯s attitude towards Han Shuo had taken a huge turn. Her words had already started to defend him.

    Seeing that Han Shuo didn¡¯t recognize her good intentions and said such things, Lisa harrumphed lightly and muttered to herself. ¡°Can¡¯t recognize my intentions, what an idiot.¡±

    ¡°And it¡¯s all thanks to you! If it wasn¡¯t for your Agony of the Soul, how could Bryan be this crazy, but it¡¯s a bit strange, Bryan seems to have gotten taller and stronger since then, and even his energy has improved. Lisa you¡¯re quite amazing!¡± Be eximed softly and said enigmatically.

    ¡°Be, none of your business. Shut up!¡± Lisa flicked a nce at Be and responded coldly.

    ¡°Tch. Who wants to mind your business? Just curious!¡± Be snorted and replied.

    ¡°Alright alright, calm down. Let¡¯s walk faster to leave the city. Your delicate bodies are in for it if we don¡¯t reach Drol before nightfall.¡± Fanny creased her brow and admonished lightly, and then looked at Han Shuo. She said softly, ¡°Bryan, are you truly alright?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and smiled slightly, saying decisively, ¡°No problem. Good rations give me strength.¡±

    Fanny smiled and giggled upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, saying, ¡°Looks like me asking the school authorities to improve your rations has actually had some effect!¡±

    The crew engaged in no more idle chatter after that and the students¡¯ gazes did not continue to wander around. They all rushed towards the city gates.

 Chapter 29: The feeling of contempt

    Chapter 29: The feeling of contempt

    The band of twelve, including Han Shuo, were stunned by the magnificence of the city gates when they arrived at the city of Zajoski. The gates were all extraordinarily ptial and made from the strongest of rock. They were the color of dried blood, and no one knew whether or not it was because too much of it had drenched the stones.

    Numerous guards, dressed in full body armor, patrolled the city walls, several meters above the ground. All sorts of defensive measures could be seen on the city walls.

    From afar, the city gates looked like the open, fanged mouth of a bloodthirsty magic creature that devoured everything underneath the sun. Several sharp, cold, hangnails, that looked like the sharp teeth within the creature¡¯s month, peppered the city walls. Their cold light sparkled underneath the sunlight, giving people an incredibly deterring, spectacr feeling.

    The two ink-ck, grand gates, refined from who-knew-what, were open. The city entrance was immensely expansive, enough for ten horses to walk in abreast. It was quite crowded in front of the door and various mammoth and strange magic creatures slowly threaded their way through the entrance into the city, with all sorts of people and items on their backs.

    These magical creatures wererger than any beasts Han Shuo had seen before. They were about five meters tall and ten or so meters long. Their skin was dark brown, with heads shaped like an elephant¡¯s. Their faces were covered in wrinkles, with two curved, white tusks jutting out from their cheeks. The tusks themselves were a meter long.

    ¡°This is an earth dragon, a gentler type of magical creature. They are easily tamed and move slowly, but can carry heavy loads. They¡¯re a popr form of transportation within the Empire. Merchants use earth dragons to transport heavy loads and trade with different areas.¡± Fanny exined with a smile when she saw many students gazing at the earth dragons in astonishment.

    ¡°Master Fanny, look after them while I go register at the officers¡¯ quarters. I¡¯ll also borrow a few battlesteeds, otherwise we¡¯ll never make it to Drol by nightfall on foot..¡± Gene looked at Fanny with sparkling eyes and spoke with a smile. His gaze fell on Fanny¡¯s beautiful face and didn¡¯t stray for a moment.

    The entire necromancy major knew of Gene¡¯s feelings for Fanny. Fanny herself was also well aware, but she never expressed anything. Gene wasn¡¯t in a rush and seemed to want to move Fanny with his sincerity. He often made use of various opportunities to express his feelings, and staring at her soulfully for long periods of time was one of them.

    Han Shuo cursed privately upon seeing Gene¡¯s unfettered gaze. In Han Shuo¡¯s mind, Fanny had long since be his personal property. He would naturally be irritated that other people were peeping at her in front of him, but right now, he was just a mere errand ve and wasn¡¯t strong enough to show his strength. So although it rankled at him, he had to keep himself in check.

    ¡°Mm. Go ahead, I¡¯ll watch them carefully.¡± Fanny gave a tepid response and agreed with a smile, avoiding Gene¡¯s fiery gaze. She turned her head to look at the magnificent city walls and said with emotion, ¡°Although I¡¯ve seen this multiple times, I always feel proud of the Zajoski city gates whenever Ie back to visit. It¡¯s because of these durable city gates that the savage orcs have always retreated with nothing to show for their efforts.¡±

    Han Shuo was weighed down with all sorts of items, and just about drowning in all of it. Everyone had stopped at this moment except for Han Shuo. He bent and then straightened his legs, twisting his wrists, and repeated the same boring movements.

    ¡°Bryan, what are you doing?¡± Amy was standing next to Han Shuo and saw the piles of items move along with Han Shuo¡¯s body. It caught her eye and she asked in astonishment.

    The others noticed his movements after Amy had spoken up and also concentrated their attention on Han Shuo, a perplexed look on each of their faces.

    ¡°Nothing much, I¡¯m feeling a bit sore, and moving around will alleviate it!¡± Han Shuo replied calmly with a dumb expression, truly looking more than a bit dumb.

    ¡°Stupid, be careful. You¡¯re carrying valuable items. If you identally break one, we wouldn¡¯t be able to cover the losses, even if we sold you.¡± Be frowned and said coldly.

    ¡°Be, you¡¯re such an idiot. Those things are quite sturdy. How could they break so easily? No one has allowed him to carry anything truly precious or fragile.¡± Lisa casted a look of disdain at Be and replied sarcastically.

    ¡°Youdies are always arguing... stop it. We always run into some danger, whether big or small, when we travel for training in the outside world. You should unite as a team, or we¡¯re bound to run into problems further down the road.¡± Fanny frowned and tried to separate the two when she saw Lisa and Be were about to bicker again.

    Han Shuopletely ignored Be¡¯s cold jeers and continued to repeat those boring actions. Those motions hadn¡¯t been left behind in Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories, but were muscle building actions that Han Shuo had seen before. In order to keep improving his body and break out of the ¡°solid realm¡±, Han Shuo was taking advantage of every second to train his body.

    After a while, Gene returned with an ugly expression and empty hands. When he walked up to Fanny, he said furiously, ¡°Damnit! They asked me for money!¡±

    Fanny¡¯s elegant brows knotted together and she spoke in surprise upon hearing those words. ¡°Our Babylon Academy of Magic and Force is the cradle for the Empire¡¯s knights, warriors, and mages. We nurture so many talents every year for the Empire. Even many of the guard officers and mages stationed in the city of Zajoski graduated from our Academy. There¡¯s a protocol between the Academy and Zajoski. How dare they not lend us battlesteeds?¡±

    ¡°The guard officer was going to lend me the steeds when I said I was from the Academy. When I offered my identification and he saw that we¡¯re from the necromancy major, he actually mocked me. He demanded fifty gold from me, saying that we would receive no steeds if we didn¡¯t pay up. He further added that our necromancy major has never nurtured any talents for the Empire before, and thus shouldn¡¯t enjoy free benefits.¡± Gene was maddened and bit off his words.

    When the students heard his words, they too found amon enemy and shouted angrily, calling for revenge against the guard officer. It would seem that the the feeling of contempt was a hard one to swallow. These students were already a bit aggrieved at joining an unpopr major, and were hard pressed to contain their anger now that they were so ignored.

    ¡°Forget it, take out fifty gold for him from the funds. These guard officers have lived here for a long time. Add to that the fact that our major truly has declined, and upies a lower standing in the Academy. It¡¯s no wonder than they think less of us. I will report this matter to the dean upon my return. Let¡¯s not get into a fight with them right now.¡± Fanny shook her head, spoke a few conciliatory words with a dejected expression and finally made this reply to Gene.

    Gene at first disagreed with Fanny¡¯s words, saying that they could not allow such arrogant soldiers to strut around, but he sighed slowly and shook his head after a few cating words from Fanny, gloomily epting fifty gold coins from Fanny¡¯s hands and walking to the side of the city gates.

    Han Shuo observed a few people, then looked at the despondent Fanny. He threw a nce at the far off guard officer and internally vowed that one day, the necromancy major would regain its past glories through his hands, and that people would tremble in fear at the sound of a necromancer.

    ¡°Don¡¯t be depressed. No one dared to look down on us when the necromancy major was at its peak. It¡¯s just that the necromancy major suffered from the ostracization of all the majors for a while. Legends speak of a great magic war that caused high casualties amongst the necromancers and the loss of many incredible, powerful spells. This is what¡¯s caused the decline of necromancy.

    Our trip to the Dark Forest this time is in search of a cemetery of death that I¡¯ve heard rumors about. It¡¯s said that a wise mage, who studied necromancy for many years, once stayed within the cemetery of death. If we can find the cemetery and obtain the magical tomes of necromancy inside of it, then perhaps we can alter the current situation that the necromancy major is in.¡± Fanny spoke bracing words offort upon seeing students be mncholy.

    Many cheered up after hearing Fanny¡¯s words, and expressions of joy and astonishment crossed their faces. It would seem that they were all prepared to give their all in this time¡¯s external outing.

    Seeing the ardor on everyone¡¯s faces, Fanny gave a silent, involuntary sigh. Although news had broken of the discovery of the cemetery, the person who discovered it died not long after walking out of it.

    The Dark Forest was vast, and to search for something within it was like looking for a needle in a haystack. Even she didn¡¯t hold much hope. Besides, if such a location was truly discovered, it was bound to draw in a horde of adventurers. It would be a bit unrealistic to think that the power of their band of twelve would be able to retrieve what they needed at that time.

    Fanny merely wished tofort everyone with her words. The main purpose of this time¡¯s outing was to test the student¡¯s grasp of necromancy and help them realize magical knowledge in the real world.

    ¡°Eh? Aren¡¯t these people from the necromancy major? Are you adventuring as well? Hehe, why are you all standing here?¡± A sweet voice sounded from afar as the necromancy students were sunk in their own thoughts.

    It was the light major student fromst time, Irene, and a few other students and teachers from the light major. Her ardent pursuer, ude, was also mounted on a tall battlesteed and came clopping in from the distance.

    ¡°None of your business. Don¡¯t fall from your horse now.¡± Lisa looked at Irene with contempt and sneered back.

    ¡°Hehe I know, you must not have been able to borrow any battlesteeds. Ai, that¡¯s a foregone conclusion. Your necromancy major hasn¡¯t contributed anything to the Empire, so of course it¡¯s a bit inappropriate that you use the Empire¡¯s resources without any payment!¡± Irene chuckled charmingly as sarcasm and mockery filled her holy features.

    Although Lisa andpany were enraged, they couldn¡¯t find the words to retort back as Irene spoke the truth. They could only grit their teeth and fume inwardly.

    ¡°Hello Master Fanny.¡± Light adept mage Beacher was mounted on a battlesteed and greeted Fanny with a smile.

    ¡°Hello Beacher, are you heading towards the Dark Forest for adventure as well?¡± Fanny smiled in return andmented lightly.

    ¡°Yes, we n on traveling to the Dark Forest and hunting down the magic creatures that are often a nuisance to the viges around the Forest. We¡¯ll be testing the students¡¯mand of magic while giving back to the Empire. Heh, we¡¯ll be off, see youter!¡± Beacher replied gentlemanly, but Han Shuo could still discern a trace of disdain in his eyes, as if Beacher looked down on the necromancy crew.

    Gene finally brought six battlesteeds over after Beacher and the light major folk had zipped by on theirrge horses. Gene¡¯s horses were obviously subpar to the ones the light major students¡¯ had, whether in terms of physique or in number. It would seem that the necromancy major still couldn¡¯t obtain equal treatment even after paying fifty gold extra.

    But the necromancy group numbered twelve people, whilst there was only six battlesteeds. Therefore, each horse had to carry double. The students looked at each other and quickly paired up, leaving Han Shuo, Fanny, Gene, and Bach as the odd ones out.

    ¡°Bach, you and Bryan share a horse while I ride one with Master Fanny.¡± Gene¡¯s eyes darted quickly and he became overjoyed when he connected the dots. He smiled happily at Bach.

    ¡°No! I¡¯m definitely not riding a horse with that dirty errand ve!¡± Bach held a grudge against Han Shuo and immediately cried out in dissatisfaction.

    Everyone knew Gene¡¯s thoughts. This was a golden opportunity to get close to Fanny. He was about to respond huffily to Bach¡¯s yell when Fanny suddenly smiled. ¡°Since Bach is unwilling, then I¡¯ll ride with Bryan.¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, thank you Master Fanny. I¡¯ming!¡± Han Shuo was ted and joyously brushed past Gene, striding quickly towards Fanny.

 Chapter 30: A tantalizing moment on the back of a battle steed

    If you¡¯ve reached this page looking for TNC, please hit your back button! This concludes the 2016 April Fool¡¯s coboration between GDK and TNC!

    Chapter 30: A tantalizing moment on the back of a battle steed

    On the way to the town of Drol, the multiple items, previously loaded onto Han Shuo, were divvied up between the battlesteeds.

    Han Shuo was seated behind Fanny, and their bodies touched as the horse maneuvered. A faint, alluring scent wafted towards Han Shuo¡¯s nose and mouth as her hair swung in front of them.

    Fanny sat on the horse with her well-rounded upper body straight and proper. Her alluring curves, beneath her mage robe, werepletelyid out for Han Shuo¡¯s admiring nce. As the horse galloped, the distance between the two started to close slowly.

    Towards the end, Han Shuo¡¯s lower abdomen and Fanny¡¯s full butt slowly touched. The swiftly galloping horse caused the two to be off bnce, and Han Shuo¡¯s lower abdomen and Fanny¡¯s beautiful butt bounced off each other. The thin mage robe did nothing to stop the marvelous sensation, and Han Shuo¡¯s uncontroble desires reared their heads as the bodies collided against each other¡¯s.

    Han Shuo himself didn¡¯t know whether tough or cry when a certain portion of his lower body stiffened, but he was unable to control his body¡¯s reactions. His upright lower body moved with the horse¡¯s ups and downs, constantly moving in the area between Fanny¡¯s wonderous butt cheeks.

    Waves of strong stimulus came from the point of contact between Han Shuo and Fanny, stirring Han Shuo¡¯s heart so much that he almost cried aloud. Han Shuo stared at Fanny from behind, and realized that, at some point, a red flush had crept up Fanny¡¯s pure, white neck, making her look even more tantalizing and mouthwatering.

    The sexy Fanny was already the subject of Han Shuo¡¯s daydreams, and he also happened to be at an age in which boys found it hardest to control their bodies. Add to that, the fact that Han Shuo was a virgin, who had no idea what intimate rtions felt like, all this made the stimulus as earth-shattering as thunder and lightning. Everything became difficult to control after that.

    Unable to control his desires, Han Shuo was boldly wanton as he reached out his hand and slowly crept it towards Fanny¡¯s soft waist. Both of his hands firmly grasped Fanny¡¯s waist in order to more closely connect their lower bodies.

    Two bone-piercing pains instantaneously came from the backs of Han Shuo¡¯s hands. He lifted his head in shock and immediately saw Fanny¡¯s ashamed and angry face. Fanny¡¯s beautiful face was red with anger as she turned her head, and her mesmerizing eyes red viciously at Han Shuo. She said in a low voice, ¡°Damnit, control yourself Bryan, otherwise I¡¯ll throw you off the horse.¡±

    But Fanny could immediately tell that something was wrong with Han Shuo. His face was beet red and his body convulsed spastically. He panted heavily and remained in this position for five seconds, after which his entire body froze and then returned to normal. The only thing left was a mouth panting on and off.

    Fanny could clearly feel that something liquid and sticky had been added to the area between her behind.

    ¡°So... sorry Master Fanny! I... I didn¡¯t mean to!¡± Upon seeing that Fanny was about to spontaneously erupt in rage after Han Shuo had discharged himself, he immediately reacted and whined guiltily, but he actually kept revisiting the tantalizing moment in his mind, and wasn¡¯t as afraid or remorseful as he pretended to be.

    Fanny was stopped up with rage. She also understood the nuances of Han Shuo¡¯s current age and that their bodies had been touching in a rather inappropriate way. Han Shuo¡¯s actions were out of instinct, and most likely not his true intentions.

    But he had actually vited her in doing so. Even though the two hadn¡¯t really done anything, being a woman, Fanny naturally felt resentful and mad that Han Shuo had relieved himself behind her.

    Han Shuo would most likely be unable to handle it if Fanny really lost her temper and took it out on him, since she was an adept mage. Han Shuo also had feelings for Fanny, and was truly afraid that Fanny would throw everything to the winds and beat him. He really didn¡¯t know what to do with her current mental state, and was at a loss for what to do.

    Just as Han Shuo was thinking random thoughts, he suddenly felt a severe pinch on the insides of his two thighs. He immediately ducked his head and cried out in pain, hearing Fanny¡¯s voice at the same time, ¡°Damned Bryan, I¡¯ll settle things with youter.¡±

    ¡°Master Fanny, what¡¯s going on? Bryan, what are you going on about?¡± Lisa had heard Han Shuo¡¯s scream up ahead and looked back in question.

    ¡°No, nothing. He lost his seat for a moment and was scared out of his mind.¡± Fanny cut in to exin before Bryan had a chance to open his mouth.

    Silence resumed as everyone continued to hurry down the path. Half an hourter, Han Shuo was amazed to discover that his lower body was standing up again. When Fanny felt the same thing, she immediately separated a short distance from the pack and reined in the battlesteed, angrily demanding that Han Shuo steer the horse.

    ¡°Master Fanny, I really didn¡¯t mean to, and I don¡¯t know how to ride a horse.¡± Han Shuo mbered onto the horse with resignation under Fanny¡¯s angry motions and spoke with a pinched face.

    ¡°Shut up and listen to me. I¡¯ll teach you how to tame a battlesteed.¡± The two had switched positions, with Han Shuo in the front and Fanny in the back. Fanny, who had always been gentle and nice to Han Shuo, was no longer so kindly disposed to him because of what had happened earlier and spoke angrily.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t get a grasp on things under Fanny¡¯s directions at first, and the battlesteed pranced around directionless. It rushed violently to and fro, braying and screaming loudly. Han Shuo and Fanny¡¯s bodies were off bnce, causing Fanny¡¯s full bosom to crash repeatedly into Han Shuo¡¯s back. Learning how to ride a horse was the furthest thing from Han Shuo¡¯s mind and he waspletely distracted.

    After struggling for a while apanied by Fanny¡¯s rage-filled shouts, Han Shuo finally began to tame the battlesteed. Fanny propped herself up with two hands on Han Shuo¡¯s back, preventing her well rounded chest from intimately touching his back again. She directed the path forward and they rushed towards Drol.

    When Han Shuo and Fanny had arrived at Drol, the sky was dusky and night about to fall. Gene and a bunch of necromancy students were all waiting for them, anxiously staring at the road.

    Gene hastily walked out when Han Shuo and Fanny appeared, looking at her and quickly saying, ¡°Master Fanny, what took you so long? I thought something might have happened to you, I was so worried.¡±

    ¡°Nothing much, just that Bryan wanted to try his hand at steering the battlesteed halfway through. I gave him some pointers, thus the reason for the dy.¡± Fanny had already regained herposure at this time. She smiled as she looked at the group and chuckled faintly, ¡°Very good, everyone is ounted for. Master Gene, have we settled in at the hotel?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s been taken care of. We can rest as soon as soon as we stable our horses. We can head directly to the Dark Forest when dawn breaks tomorrow.¡±

    Fanny alighted gracefully off the horse behind Han Shuo, disying a nimble body. She stretched and frowned, ¡°We¡¯ve been sweating all day. I¡¯m going to take a shower in the hotel. Bryan,e to my room after you¡¯ve stabled the horses. We need to talk.¡±

    ¡°Understood Master Fanny.¡± Han Shuo agreed with a wry face, knowing full well that Fanny must want him with regards to his earlier vition.

    Fanny anxiously rushed off towards the hotel after she¡¯d finished speaking. Han Shuo felt the stickiness of his lower body and understood perfectly why she was so eager to take a shower. A hint of a smirk crossed his face.

    Han Shuo and a few male necromancy students stabled the six horses underneath Gene¡¯s guidance. They then all followed Gene to the hotel.

    ¡°Master Gene, Drol is far away from the Empire and directly faces the Dark Forest. There are many bizarre and unique shops in this town. Since it¡¯s not fully dark yet, can we go take a walk? We know what the hotel looks like anyways, so can we go back a bitter?¡± Bach suddenly spoke up at this moment, and the other students beside him were all chomping at the bit as well. It would seem that they were up to something else, judging from their expressions.

    ¡°No!¡± Gene denied them resolutely, and then looked at them with a weird smile. He said lowly, ¡°Do you really think that I don¡¯t know what you¡¯re up to? This town of Drol is also called town of Depravity because of its unique location. Danger can befall any of the adventurers and merchants whoe here and so they all seek excitement whether in dreams or their waking moments. Thus, their entertainment industry is renowned throughout the Empire. Hmph, you are absolutely barred from opportunistic depravity.¡±

    Indeed, Han Shuo observed the surroundings closely after Gene¡¯s words and realized that although it wasn¡¯t truly night yet, there were so many lights on Drol¡¯s wide streets that they were a neon blur. Several young girls, wearing heavy makeup, stood on a street corner, flinging flirtatious smiles and catcalling the pedestrians on the streets, giving off the impression of total submission to any bystander¡¯s will.

    Gene¡¯s words had obviously hit home as the despondent boys walked into the hotel with their heads trailing. They sighed andined about Gene¡¯s heartlessness.

    The students all found their rooms with help from Gene, after entering the hotel. Gene threw a nce at Han Shuo and smiled faintly, ¡°We had limited funds this time and already took out fifty gold earlier for the battlesteeds, so for simplicity¡¯s sake, I¡¯ve arranged the abandoned storehouse for you. The storehouse is towards the back on the left hand side. There¡¯s no key, just head on back.¡±

    Gene spread his hands apologetically after his words and speedily left with a smile. Han Shuo could hear Gene¡¯s quiet snickering after a few steps and his low mutterings, ¡°You mere errand ve, how dare you share a horse with my beloved Fanny. Huh!¡±

    The Han Shuo of now was hardly the Han Shuo of old. His senses were acutely perceptive within a short range, and he heard every part of Gene¡¯sughter and murmurings. Han Shuo smiled coldly and cursed in a low voice for a bit, then smirked evilly.

    Just you wait until Fanny¡¯s mine... I¡¯ll see you cry tears of blood then. Han Shuo thought viciously as he made for Fanny¡¯s room.

 Chapter 31: Youâ€™re a magical genius!

    Chapter 31: You¡¯re a magical genius!

    Dondondon! Han Shuo stood outside Fanny¡¯s door and knocked with an outreached hand.

    ¡°Bryan, is it you? Come in.¡± Fanny¡¯s faintly lethargic voice sounded from inside the room.

    When Han Shuo pushed the door open, he was greeted with the sight of Fanny¡¯s wet purple hair stered to the white nape of her neck. A few translucent traces of water still clung to her charming face. Fanny had obviously just showered as she was wrapped in a soft white robe. A small patch of milky-white, creamy skin was revealed on her chest as she toweled away the water in her hair with her jade hands.

    It was a simple room with a cloud of mist billowing out from the open doors of the bathroom, which was located in the back. Fanny was sitting next to a round table, a pair of troubled eyes roving over Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    ¡°Master Fanny, what did you want me for?¡± Han Shuo looked around the room and his heart seized upon seeing how tempting Fanny¡¯s beauty was, but he kept a dumb, honest, and even slightly fearful expression on his face.

    ¡°What for? Hmph. You were certainly bold on the back of that horse today. I¡¯ve always thought you were cowardly and timid, but youmit the most outrageous acts when your lewd desires rear their head!¡± Fanny took her measure of Han Shuo and snorted lightly with a frown.

    Here ites. Han Shuo thought as his expression grew even more innocent. He scratched his head and held his breath until his face grew red, then took a deep breath and hung his head. ¡°I¡¯m sorry Master Fanny, you¡¯re so beautiful and pretty, and you were suddenly so close to me. I don¡¯t know what came over me, but I couldn¡¯t control my actions. I was wrong, Master Fanny please punish me?¡±

    Pa!

    Fanny suddenly pped the table in anger and Han Shuo backed up ¡°in shock¡±, watching Fanny fearfully.

    ¡°Damnit, you vited me! Do you understand?¡± Fanny red fiercely at Han Shuo as she shouted hoarsely.

    Han Shuo nodded his head honestly and said with an open face, ¡°I was wrong Master Fanny, I¡¯ll bear responsibility!¡±

    ¡°Hah! You, take responsibility? Are you able to?¡± Fannyughed in the midst of her rage upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words. Although she giggled as she stared at Han Shuo, there wasn¡¯t a single trace of a smile on her face.

    ¡°Eh... then I¡¯ll do whatever you say. It¡¯s all up to you!¡± Han Shuo was certain that Fanny wouldn¡¯t do too much to him, so he sighed with a face of resignation and responded genuinely.

    With that said, Fanny didn¡¯t really know what to do with Han Shuo. From her perspective, it was highly likely that Han Shuo hadn¡¯tmitted that act on purpose, plus she had been the one who told him to get on the horse. Although that had happened, it wasn¡¯t as if Han Shuo hadmitted a heinous crime at the end of the day. He was just a mere errand ve, it felt a bit awkward trying to decide how to punish him.

    Seeing that Fanny¡¯s brows were slightly knitted and that she seemed to be having difficulty in figuring out what to do with him, a thought struck Han Shuo and he said, ¡°Master Fanny, didn¡¯t you say that I¡¯m your experimental subject? I actually have felt something weird with my bodytely and something strange is happening to my mind. When I heard Lisa chant the incantation for the bone arrow spell a few days ago, I tried saying it as well and actually activated it.¡±

    Fanny had been deep in furrowed thought, but started upon hearing these words. She immediately looked at Han Shuo in astonishment, saying excitedly. ¡°Really? Did you really mean that? Can you try out the bone arrow magic for me?¡±

    Han Shuo knew that Fanny was addicted to necromancy magic and was extremely curious about his body¡¯s condition. He was also well aware that he wouldn¡¯t be just an errand ve for the Academy forever, so this was a perfect opportunity to slowly change his image in Fanny¡¯s eyes.

    Indeed, as soon as Fanny had heard his body¡¯s peculiar condition, she immediately forgot about punishing him and temporarily focused all her concentration on this matter.

    ¡°Of course I can!¡± Han Shuo smiled faintly and raised his hands, chanting lowly, ¡°Oh endless darkness, turn into destructive bone arrows, and destroy ording to my will. Bone Arrows!¡±

    A cuttingly-sharp bone arrow appeared out of thin air in front of Han Shuo as soon as hepleted his incantation. The bone arrow flew towards the wooden wall at his gesture, but started to wobble halfway through, and then finally exploded with a sharp crack.

    ¡°No no, the incantation was correct, but your hand seals during casting were incorrect. The right hand should slowly lift up, and the left hand shouldn¡¯t be on the same level as the right hand.¡± Fanny first started to teach in her ustomed manner, then abruptly reacted with a sharp intake of breath. She looked at Han Shuo with a face full of shock and her lithe body trembled eagerly. She cried out breathlessly, ¡°Oh, my gosh. You can, you can really cast necromancy magic!¡±

    ¡°Yes, yes. I don¡¯t know what happened either. Oh right Master Fanny, can you exin to me in detail the proper hand seals to cast the magic?¡± Han Shuo sniggered inwardly and spoke to Fanny with a look of confusion.

    ¡°Of course I can!¡± Fanny was truly excited and threw the towel in her hand to the side. Her limber legs walked rapidly to Han Shuo¡¯s side as she started exining in detail.

    ¡°This, this, like this?¡±

    ¡°Raise your hand higher, concentrate your mental strength, and don¡¯t rx even a bit. Right, that¡¯s the correct hand seal. Mm, slow your left hand down a bit and show me again.¡±

    ¡°Oh endless darkness, turn into destructive bone arrows, and destroy ording to my will, bone arrows!¡±

    When the bone arrow appeared this time, its direction was correct, but it abruptly exploded into pieces again just before it reached the wooden wall.

    ¡°Bryan, mental strength. Keep an eye on your mental strength and don¡¯t rx for even a second. You can only rx after the bone arrow has sessfully struck its target, otherwise the bone arrow will explode halfway. Try again.¡±

    ¡°Oh endless darkness, turn into destructive bone arrows, and destroy ording to my will, bone arrows!¡±

    Uponpletion of the incantation, the bone arrow flew as fast as lightning without changing its position towards the wooden wall. It pierced the wooden wall with a sharp pfft and then vanished without a trace.

    ¡°Oh, gosh. Bryan you¡¯re a genius. You¡¯re absolutely a magical genius. I¡¯ve only given you tips twice and you can sessfully cast the bone arrow magic. Students typically need one to three months before they can master this magic. You¡¯re so incredible.¡± Fanny was utterly stunned by Han Shuo and capered around, eximing loudly. She looked very excited.

    ¡°Damnit, who¡¯s randomly casting magic! It almost hit me. Eh, Bryan, Master Fanny? Bryan, what are you doing in Master Fanny¡¯s room?¡± Lisa¡¯s startled cry suddenly came from next door as one of her eyes peered in from the hole in the wall.

    ¡°Nothing much, I grabbed Bryan for a bit of bone arrow practice. Lisa go to sleep soon, we won¡¯t be disturbing you anymore.¡± Fanny walked hurriedly to the hole in the wall and replied charmingly. She picked up the towel that she had thrown to the ground earlier and filled in the hole before Lisa had a chance to respond.

    She turned and look askance at Han Shuo, walking quickly towards him. ¡°Stand still and don¡¯t move, let me see what¡¯s going on with your body?¡±

    ¡°Alright.¡± Han Shuo smiled responded faintly. I only spent ten days to fully master the bone arrow magic. ording to Fanny¡¯s words, maybe I do have some potential for practicing magic.

    ¡°Hmm? What¡¯s that weird smell?¡± Fanny had walked over and was about to reach out to inspect Han Shuo¡¯s body when her refined nose wrinkled, and she asked in confusion.

    Han Shuo stopped in his tracks, then abruptly understood. He looked down awkwardly, saying wryly. ¡°My room doesn¡¯t have a bathroom, so I didn¡¯t shower. That¡¯s why there¡¯s still a smell left.¡±

    Fanny¡¯s beautiful face flushed red after these words and she red violently at Han Shuo, cursing lowly, ¡°Despicable!¡± She then pointed to the bathroom with its doors ajar, frowning as she hurried him, ¡°The water is still warm, wash that disgusting crap off yourself!¡±

    It truly was ¡°despicable¡±. Han Shuo could still feel a strand of sticky liquid leaking out from a slit in his lower body. Fanny¡¯s words echoed his current inclinations. It was indeed quite ufortable for his lower body to remain in a sticky state, so he walked merrily to the bathroom that Fanny had just upied.

    A simple, crude, round tub was inside the bathroom. The water inside still gave off steam, and several pieces of Fanny¡¯s sexy lingerie wasid out on a nearby rack. It only took one nce of the small silk pieces that were as ephemeral as cicada wings, for a ball of me to violently rise from Han Shuo¡¯s lower body.

    Just as Han Shuo was salivating fixedly over the lingerie that Fanny had changed out of, she abruptly rushed into the bathroom and hurriedly put away all the items of clothing in great embarrassment. When she turned and saw that Han Shuo¡¯s eyes were just about ready to spit fire, she involuntarily made a light spitting sound and spat out, ¡°detestable¡±. She finally left with panicked footsteps after violently pinching Han Shuo¡¯s backside.

    Han Shuo peeled off his clothes andy within the round pool, breathing in the mesmerizing scent that Fanny had left behind in the bathroom with his mouth. Luxuriating in the water that Fanny had previously used, Han Shuo felt that the perfection of moment was indescribable with words. He basically didn¡¯t want to leave.

    Han Shuo took a long time to wash up, and carelessly scrubbed his underwear only after Fanny had checked in a few times, finally walking out of the bathroom clutching his underwear.

    ¡°It¡¯s gettingte, I won¡¯t inspect your body today. Hurry and leave.¡± Fanny acted like nothing had happened after Han Shuo had walked out and spoke dispassionately to him.

    Han Shuo nodded with an honest smile and happily walked towards the door. Fanny called out lightly just as Han Shuo was about to leave, ¡°Bryan!¡±

    Peering back in confusion, Han Shuo scratched his head and asked dumbly, ¡°Yes?¡±

    ¡°Nothing, just that you don¡¯t seem like someone who¡¯s crazy!¡± Fanny sized up Han Shuo and said oddly.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know what happens when my head hurts, but when I¡¯m not being affected by anything. Everything is normal.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s heart skipped a beat. He left in guilty haste after his response.

 Chapter 32: Small accomplishments in magic

    Chapter 32: Small aplishments in magic

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t immediately rest upon returning to the hotel storage room, but rather practiced magic as usual.

    The magical yuan within his body circted ording to the principles of demonic magic. Under Han Shuo¡¯s careful guidance, it flowed through every inch of his meridians, skin, muscles, and bones. Whether it was his physical strength or his five senses, Han Shuo could feel that both had greatly improved.

    Han Shuo resolutely kept attacking the final bottleneck ording to the instructions in the Mystical cial Spellfire. He circted his magical yuan to the centers of his two hands and repeated tried to clear the meridians in his five fingers and bones. Pain continuously emitted from his bones and meridians as his two hands trembled with convulsions. Faint red and purple lights emitted from the backs of his hands, like two feeblenterns.

    The pain continued to increase while Han Shuo grit his teeth and stubbornly hung on. He knew that this was the critical point in training the cial Mystical Spellfire. It was up to his will to see if he could clear all the meridians in his hands and achieve sessful results with the cial Mystical Spellfire.

    The process of the magical yuan attacking the bones in his five fingers seemed to continue interminably. Han Shuo sat Indian style with sweat dripping out of every pore as his veins bulged and pounded in his forehead. His originally peaceful facial expression became a bit sinister and ghastly, giving off a feeling of extreme evil.

    After who-knew-how-long, just as Han Shuo felt that he would faint from the pain, he could no longer bear the bone searing agony in his hands and involuntarily pped his hands with a low roar.

    Papapa...

    Ten crisp sounds rang out from his fingers as Han Shuo immediately felt a bit drained, but the magical yuan flowed smoothly into his fingers with no obstacles.

    Ten purple-red embers, like the me on a candle wick, instantaneously arose from his fingertips. The ten purple-red blossoms of fire sparkled with breathtaking colors in the dark of the storage room. They were like hypnotizing flowers that had suddenly bloomed, giving others a secretive and unpredictable feeling.

    The palms of his two hands were also dyed with purple-red color, along with his fingers. The bones within his hands could clearly be seen, and even his skin shone with a translucent gleam, looking exceedingly bizarre.

    Absolutely ted, Han Shuo roared in a low voice. He then quickly looked around, and slowly withdrew the magical yuan from his hands back into his stomach. Without the continued infusion of magical yuan, Han Shuo¡¯s hands slowly went back to normal and the ten flowering mes disappeared as well.

    Sess. This was the evidence of sessfully practicing the cial Mystical Spellfire. Although its full power could not be demonstrated due to his insufficient magical yuan, Han Shuo was no longer a defenseless, ordinary person, thanks to his current achievements.

    The red me of the cial Mystical Spellfire burned all in its path, whereas the purple me was bone chillingly cold. Anyone struck with this spellfire would either be burned from the inside out, or experience their internal organs being frozen into blocks of ice. The likelihood of survival was exceedingly low. When the caster had sufficient magical yuan, even greater spellfire could be concentrated into the palms and thus unleash even more frightening power.

    Han Shuo was engulfed by a huge wave of exhaustion after seeding with Mystical cial Spellfire, and he fell into a deep sleep.

    The next day, dawn.

    Under Fanny¡¯s leadership, the band of twelve had gathered at the entrance to the town of Drol. They gathered some food and water from the town and piled all these items onto Han Shuo.

    ¡°What were you doing in Master Fanny¡¯s roomst night?¡± Lisa asked Han Shuo in a low voice as she hung a leather water skin on him.

    It seemed like Fanny hadn¡¯t exinedst night¡¯s events to anyone. Han Shuo cast a nce at Fanny off in the distance and realized that she was reminding some students of things to be careful of. He also responded in a low voice, ¡°Nothing much. Master Fanny wanted to test some necromancy magic and used me as a subject.¡±

    ¡°Hmph. Don¡¯t lie to me, even if Master Fanny wanted to test some magic on you, she would test bone arrow. This kind of magic only needs to be practiced by apprentices, would she need to test this kind of magic as an adept mage?¡± Lisa huffed and looked warily at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Master Fanny was testing bone arrow magic, isn¡¯t each magic spell divided into five levels? She just wanted to see what level of bone arrow magic she could cast with her current strength. You can ask Master Fanny if you don¡¯t believe me.¡±

    Ever since Han Shuo had lied to Lisa, her attitude had indeed changed drastically towards him. But, women were just so. Even if she didn¡¯t like him, she would still treat you as her personal property when she knew that you liked her. If you developed an ambiguous rtionship with anyone, she would be the first to feel ufortable.

    Lisa was the same way. Although she didn¡¯t think much of him, but once she ¡°understood¡± Han Shuo¡¯s thought, she naturally thought that Han Shuo would like only her unto his death, and shouldn¡¯t have any goings on with Fanny. Han Shuo had heard of this from others before, and now it seemed that there was some sense to it.

    ¡°Forget it, you wouldn¡¯t dare lie to me anyways!¡± Lisa looked at Fanny, spoke to Han Shuo in a carefree manner and then turned to leave.

    ¡°Bryan, let¡¯s go. The trees and shrubs grow vigorously in the Dark Forest and the paths are winding and uneven. We can no longer ride horses and can only proceed on foot. You have too many resources on you and cannot be pulled down. There are many vicious magical creatures within the Dark Forest. It would be tragic if you were pulled down and killed by them.¡± Fanny looked at Han Shuo from afar and called out.

    Fanny¡¯s attitude towards Han Shuo had subconsciously changed after yesterday¡¯s events. She seemed to ce greater importance on him now, but the gentle attitude she had towards him had ceased to exist, reced with a brusque frustration.

    ¡°Coming,ing!¡± Han Shuo had taken huge advantage of Fanny yesterday and she¡¯d also witnessed his ugliness in her bathroomst night. It was natural that she no longer looked kindly upon him. It was actually a kind of improvement now that Fanny was slowly changing her attitude towards him.

    Drol was abnormally busy in the day as many stores had already set up shop bright and early. A few sleepy-eyed merchants and adventurers walked out of nearby alleys with their clothes in disarray. These people were also preparing to get to work after a night of depravity.

    Merchants and adventurers formed groups and set off for the Dark Forest with their belongings in tow. They either sought to capture magical creatures or trade with the minorities within the Forest.

    Under Fanny¡¯s constant urging, Han Shuo¡¯s group of twelve also put their affairs in order and followed Fanny and Gene¡¯s footsteps into the Dark Forest.

    The Dark Forest was vast and endless with various savage and violent magical creatures within it, as well as a few umon races. Elves, goblins, and savages numbered amongst them and were the main races within the Forest, but even these races normally lived on the outskirts of the Forest.

    The real inner world of the true Dark Forest was full of mysteries and danger. Thergest and most frightening magical creatures lived within this inner world, and that was the most tempting and mysterious part of the Dark Forest. Although legends spoke of great treasures and precious items within the core, few dared venture within. Those who dared to enter and still made it out alive were the cream of the crop.

    ¡°Follow me, we¡¯ll head south.¡± Fanny called out loudly as soon as they entered the Dark Forest and changed the group¡¯s heading, making straight for the southern part of the Forest.

    The roads were indeed rugged within the Dark Forest. All sorts of durable rocks and towering trees with branches tens of meters long could seen everywhere. There were many merchants and adventurers also heading south in the beginning, but they all veered off on their own paths as time went on. The others all disappeared in the blink of an eye, and no one knew where they went.

    Suddenly, several rapid footfalls fell into Han Shuo¡¯s hearing. He paused, concentrated his hearing, and then immediately said, ¡°A sound is approaching, and it doesn¡¯t seem like the steps of humans.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, you¡¯re just an errand ve. What danger can you hear? So ridiculous.¡± Bach was the first tough loudly and mock Han Shuo.

    Ever since Han Shuo had started training his magical yuan, his five senses had be a lot more perceptive than before. Besides, he was confident with his hearing to begin with. It was impossible for humans to emit the fast approaching light taps, and there seemed to be more than one.

    Han Shuo had only spoken up because he understood from Fanny and everyone else the dangers of the Dark Forest, but seeing that no one paid any attention to him after his words, Han Shuo refrained from speaking up further.

    The group continued to slowly walk south, but Fanny first frowned, and then eximed in surprise after two minutes. She said in her sweet voice, ¡°There are indeed magical creatures approaching. Everyone put down your things and prepare to fight. Since we¡¯re still in the outskirts of the Dark Forest, the creatures shouldn¡¯t be terribly strong. No need to worry everyone.¡±

    The students started, then looked at Han Shuo oddly after Fanny spoke. They hurriedly relieved themselves of their packs and formed a circr defensive position.

 Chapter 33: A small magic trial

    Chapter 33: A small magic trial

    Suddenly, five cat-like shapes rushed in from around them, but the shapes had three heads, a spiky tail, and yellow light dancing within its eyes.

    ¡°Not to worry, these are just barbed-tail cats. Everyone hurry and attack. Show me the results of your magic training.¡± Fanny breathed a sigh of relief upon seeing the magical creatures.

    Numerous bone arrows swiftly materialized out of thin air as students finished their incantations after Fanny had finished speaking. The bone arrows shot towards the five barbed-tail cats with whooshing sounds. Although their speed was fast, three of them were hit by the bone arrows and blood immediately blossomed on their brown fur, affecting their speed.

    However, the first two that had rushed up first actually evaded the students¡¯ bone arrow attacks and dashed straight for them. As the students panicked, their bone arrow attacks veered off course or exploded in midair as they repeatedly made mistakes in their frenzy.

    The two barbed tail cats darted left and right. Fanny made her move just as the one of the left was about to charge into the defensive perimeter. The same bone arrow magic in her hands resulted in three bone arrows that flew unerringly onto the three heads of this cat.

    Three shrill wails emitted from the barbed-tail cat¡¯s mouth and it shrank from making another rush. It ran away fearfully instead.

    The other barbed tail cat made for Han Shuo, and in fact it had set its sights on him. In the other students¡¯ panic, their bone arrow magic continued to be riddled with mistakes and didn¡¯t slow down the cat at all.

    Gene was only concerned with Fanny¡¯s side and in the heat of the moment forgot about the threat on the right. He only reacted after Fanny had fought off the barbed tail cat, but it was already a bit toote. The cat had directly charged to in front of Han Shuo, and its three fanged cat heads along with razor sharp ws went directly for him.

    ¡°Bryan, be careful!¡± Fanny and Lisa both screamed in fright.

    Han Shuo¡¯s face stayed calm and didn¡¯t panic as he saw the barbed-tail cat bearing down on him. A cold curve even yed at the corners of his lips.

    Han Shuo suddenly snaked out a hand like lightning when the barbed-tail cat¡¯s ws were in front of his face. His left arm swung violently, and the durable wooden sticks intended to be a tent structure that were tied to his arm caught the barb tailed cat¡¯s sharp ws.

    His right hand immediately thrusted out, and the others seemed to see a bright red line drawn through the air. Han Shuo¡¯s right handnded on the cat¡¯s lower abdomen, paused for a second, and was then retracted.

    Gene¡¯s bone arrow support also arrived at the same time, and two arrows tardily shot towards the barbed-tail cat. Three ghastly wails sounded out from the three heads as it fell listlessly to the ground with an audible thud, where it thenid unmoving.

    The four already injured barbed tail cats were spooked by the fall of this cat and they cried wildly as they hurriedly retreated, vanishing without a trace in the blink of an eye.

    ¡°Eh? Master Gene¡¯s bone arrows are so strong, they killed this barbed-tail cat in a sh! The bone arrows that we and Master Fanny shot towards our cats only injured them and weren¡¯t nearly as powerful!¡± Amy gave a soft exmation and looked at Gene in surprise.

    The others also thought it was odd after Amy¡¯s words, and even Fanny gazed at Gene in astonishment. She said with a perplexed look, ¡°Bone arrow is just a basic attack magic. You were able to immediately kill a barbed tail cat with this magic. This is truly amazing!¡±

    Gene¡¯s expression was a bit strange in the beginning, as if he was also befuddled as well, but after Fanny¡¯s words, he immediately disyed a very confident smile, and nodded faintly at everyone,as if he too was paying respects to the power of his attack magic.

    ¡°Bryan, when you shed at the cat with your right hand just now, why did I seem to see a red line sh through the air? What¡¯s going on? Although Master Gene killed the barbed tail cat, it seemed to have been you who made it off bnce, right?¡± Lisa had been paying attention to Han Shuo and thought briefly, thinking it was a bit odd.

    ¡°Heh heh, don¡¯t think nonsense Lisa. Bryan merely hit the cat once, but his hit didn¡¯t have much effect. What harm could he bring to the barbed -tail cat with his errand ve strength?¡± Bach flicked a disdainful nce at Han Shuo and said in a voice heavy with sarcasm.

    Han Shuo smiled dumbly and didn¡¯t say much, but the other students, having seen the same sight, also looked at Han Shuo with some confusion. They all soon decided that Han Shuo hadn¡¯t had any effect, and it was Gene who had killed the cat.

    After all, to them, Han Shuo was just an errand ve that they could bully at their leisure... how could an errand ve have such strength and ways?

    ¡°Alright alright, let¡¯s get out of here. The barbed-tailed cat is a magical creature that picks on the weak and fears the strong, but this type of creature is a pack animal and would cause some trouble for us if they came back with reinforcements. These low level magical creatures have no magical cores, and their skin isn¡¯t worth much. Ignore them and let¡¯s leave!¡±

    Fanny didn¡¯t pay much attention to Gene after that initial moment of astonishment as she urged everyone to pick up their dropped belongings and hurry on their way. This cause great disappointment for Gene as he thought that Fanny would definitely see him in a different light.

    The group of twelve repacked their belongings under Fanny¡¯s cries and continued southbound.

    Han Shuo trailed the pack and wore a bizarre smile before he left. He¡¯d peeked at the two wounds caused by Gene¡¯s arrows and could smell a burnt smell already emitting from them. Its flesh could be glimpsed from the wounds, and he could see that it was already a charred, burnt mess.

    This barbed tail cat¡¯s death was due to the red spellfire of Han Shuo¡¯s Mystical cial Spellfire and had nothing to do with Gene.

    He looked at his right hand and circted his magical yuan. A bright red spellme abruptly erupted from his middle finger. Han Shuo breathed a sigh of appreciation for the power of the Mystical cial Spellfire as he admired the me, finally chuckling to himself before catching up to the others.

    Night. Bright moonlight filtered through the dense tree branches and leaves to scatter on all corners of the Dark Forest. A few unknown bugs serenaded the night, bringing some joyful sounds to the otherwise peaceful forest.

    A bonfire burned bright red, warming the chilly night air. Han Shuo picked up a few branches with fresh meat draped over them and continuously turned them over the zing me. Delicious meat scents began to waft out into student noses after he applied some spices onto the pieces of meat.

    ¡°It smells so good! Bryan, how do you know how to do this?¡± Lisa eximed in surprise as she wrinkled her cute nose as her gaze locked onto a piece of meat gleaming with oil.

    ¡°Your performance when you met the barbed tail cat today was terribly disappointing. You panicked so much that you couldn¡¯t even cast the most basic bone arrow magic. This won¡¯t do! And Master Gene, although yourst bone arrow magic was quite amazing, you were toox earlier. If it wasn¡¯t for Bryan¡¯s high alertness, he surely would¡¯ve been harmed by the cat.¡±

    The students were gathered around the bonfire as they listened to Fanny¡¯s loud lecture. Her brow was furrowed and she seemed to be very displeased with the students¡¯ and Gene¡¯s performance earlier in the day.

    The students had timid expressions on their faces and seemed to be listening very intently. However, their eyes kept traveling to Han Shuo¡¯s meat rack, and many swallowed audibly.

    Han Shuo had been a full time otaku in his previous life and had taken care of his daily needs. He¡¯d naturally honed his cooking skills. The development of this world¡¯s cuisines were a far cry from the time in which Han Shuo had resided in. People had started salivating when he¡¯d merely deployed the slightest bit of his skills.

    Han Shuo snuck a few nces at Fanny as her lecture sounded in his ears, a bit startled by Fanny¡¯smanding aura. It looked like Fanny was the true organizer of this time¡¯s outing. Gene¡¯s position, who was also a teacher in the necromancy major, seemed to be a bit lower than Fanny. No wonder he was a bit afraid of Fanny. It wasn¡¯t as simple as him having a crush on her.

    ¡°Alright, let¡¯s stop here. We¡¯ll run into more danger along the way. I hope you won¡¯t be as careless next time. Let¡¯s eat.¡±

    After hectoring the students for a while, Fanny was also extremely tempted by the delicious scent of meat. She¡¯d been on the road all day today and had partook only simple bread and clear water. Her stomach was the first to speak up now that such delicious food was in sight.

    ¡°Master Fanny, this is yours. Lisa, this is yours. Be, Bach, Gene, these are yours...¡± Han Shuo had a strange smile on his face as he passed out the meat.

    ¡°Mm... Bryan, nicely done! This meat is delicious!¡± Fanny licked her lips after eating a piece and kept forth a steady stream ofpliments. Han Shuo¡¯s heart lurched at the sight of this arousing scene.

    ¡°Not bad...It¡¯s actually really good! Bryan does have some skill!¡± Lisa was also smiling happily and she devoured half her meat in the blink of an eye.¡±

    ¡°What kind of meat is this? This is disgusting! It¡¯s not fully cooked yet.¡±

    ¡°Ew... this is gross. There¡¯s no vor to this.¡±

    ¡°Damned Bryan, you did this on purpose. This meat is still raw.¡±

    Bach, Gene and Be, as well as some others with grudges against Han Shuo cursed repeatedly after taking a few bites.

    Han Shuo smiled honestly with an innocent face, ¡°Eh... maybe a few pieces really weren¡¯t ready yet. Sorry, bad luck!¡±

 Chapter 34: Subconscious changes

    Chapter 34: Subconscious changes

    Han Shuo and the band of twelve walked south for a full eight days. They met increasingly fiercer magical creatures along the way.

    Unicorned charging bulls, enormous lizards, magical wolves that could release wind des, and flying eagles that could spew out frost. They were handled easily at first and increased in difficulty until the band barely handled them by the skin of their teeth. Everyone felt the increasing pressure.

    Everyone started off eating the food that they had brought and started cooking the meat from the magical creatures when all their rations had been eaten.

    The magical creatures were increasingly violent, but not all of the flesh was edible. The lizard, for instance, had a strange smell that apanied its flesh that made it hard to swallow.

    But the stronger the magical creature was, the more valuable their carcasses, particrly the ones that could cast simple magics. These creatures would have magical cores within their bodies. These cores were very precious and could be sold for varying high prices ording to their level.

    The band¡¯s haul was umon as well. They had obtained four cores from magical creatures over the past couple of days, three from the Windde Wolf and one from the Frost Eagle.

    The cores from magical creatures were divided into six levels. Level 6 cores were the cheapest, while level 1 was the most expensive and basically hard to even catch a glimpse of. These magical cores could be used to create powerful magical weapons and increase a mage¡¯s power. Some special ones could even be used to increase a mage¡¯s mental strength, thus their prices were incredibly high.

    The Windde Wolf¡¯s magical core was ranked at level 5, and could fetch twenty gold at the market, while the Frost Eagle was higher, at level 4, and its market price was 150 gold. Based purely on their haul of magical creature cores, the band had already turned a profit even after subtracting out the fifty golds needed for borrowing the battlesteeds.

    Not to mention that apart from their cores, the bodies of these magical creatures were also worth some money. The fur of the Windde Wolf and the unicorn horn of the charging bull were all valuable items. The value of these items added together had greatly exceeded Fanny and Gene¡¯s original expectations.

    ¡°Everyone has improved after a few days of training, and you no longer panic when faced with magical creatures. This is the most important thing in actual battle. On top of that, our luck has been quite good. We have gained much from this time¡¯s outing. We will allocate the profits out to everyone after we return to the Academy and sell these items.¡± Fanny was in a good mood and she wore a satisfied smile on her face when she spoke softly to the students.

    Han Shuo had been coldly observing everything along the way. The unskilled students had gone from panicking when faced with magical creatures to handling them with indifference. Han Shuo had seen it all clearly.

    Han Shuo¡¯s five senses were much sharper than anyone else¡¯s due to training his magical yuan. His early warnings had aplished much in theter days, but no one could understand why Han Shuo had such perceptive senses. Fanny had even thoroughly checked Han Shuo¡¯s body over the past few days, but had turned up empty handed each time.

    Fanny was perplexed, but could think of no better way. She could only say that she would employ the school¡¯s magical facilities to give Han Shuo a thorough once over after they¡¯d returned to the Academy. After several days of early warnings and cooking mouthwatering meat, Han Shuo¡¯s status had subconsciously risen a few grades in this time¡¯s outing.

    Other than Bach, Be, and others who continued to be extremely unfriendly towards Han Shuo because of their continued ¡°bad luck¡± in always getting a piece of disgusting food, the other students no longer ordered Han Shuo around. Some of the students, who were more particr about their food, had even tried bing more friendly with Han Shuo in hopes of obtaining better food.

    ¡°Master Fanny, when can we reach that cemetery of death?¡± Lisa immediately asked after hearing Fanny¡¯s words.

    Fanny¡¯s brow creased upon hearing this question and she became silent. She sighed gently after a while. ¡°I¡¯ve only heard that the cemetery of death was once discovered in the deep south of the Dark Forest, but I¡¯m not too certain of its exact location. Our main purpose in traveling to the Dark Forest this time was to teach you the correct method of deploying necromancy magic when faced with danger. Based on our current results, you have all reached this standard.

    I don¡¯t know the exact whereabouts of the cemetery of death. You might have noticed by now that the magical creatures we are facing are bing stronger and stronger. If it weren¡¯t for the prewarnings that Bryan had been issuing the past couple of days, I think some people would have already gotten injured, but even so, we only made it through by the skin of our teeth when we met that Frost Eagle yesterday. I¡¯m worried that some amongst us will not only be hurt, but some may even die if we continue further. Therefore, I think it¡¯s time that we head back.¡±

    The students were a bit dumbfounded by Fanny¡¯s words, while Gene nodded and spoke, ¡°Indeed. We¡¯re just out here for training. The location of the cemetery of death is uncertain, and we don¡¯t even know if it truly exists. It¡¯s normal for us not to find it. Everyone had personally experienced the situation yesterday. If we continue south, I feel that everyone¡¯s lives will be in danger. This time¡¯s outing has already reaped rich rewards, so there is no need for taking further risks.¡±

    The two teachers had thus spoken. A few of the more cowardly students thought back to the events of the past two days and all nodded their heads in agreement. ¡°Alright, then let¡¯s go back to the Academy. The dangers are bing worse.¡±

    ¡°Bach, you coward. How else can rewards be gained if not through risk. If it weren¡¯t for yesterday¡¯s danger, how could we have gotten that Frost Eagle¡¯s core? We should continue further south, perhaps we¡¯d obtain even more valuable items. This way, the other majors won¡¯t look down on our necromancy major when we go back to the Academy.¡± Lisa red at Bach with a contemptuous look, and tilted her head back with sarcasm. She then cast a nce at Han Shuo, who was cooking meat on the side with an indifferent expression. ¡°Bryan, wouldn¡¯t you agree?¡±

    Ordinarily, no one paid any attention to Han Shuo, but after his performance over the past couple of days, incredibly enough, the students all stared at Han Shuo after Lisa had spoken. Even Fanny and Gene were the same, as if Han Shuo¡¯s decision was quite important.

    Han Shuo was involuntarily speechless. He paused, and then smiled honestly. ¡°Taking risks is a given. People haven¡¯t been hurt yet. Why don¡¯t we continue? Who knows, maybe we¡¯ll gain even more rewards!

    Fanny gazed at Han Shuo strangely, grew quiet for a moment, and then surprisingly nodded her head. ¡°Alright, since this is the case, then let¡¯s continue until someone is hurt. Once that happens, we¡¯ll return on our original path.¡±

    ¡°Come,e everyone, it¡¯s time to eat.¡± Han Shuoughed lightly and called out. Fanny and Lisa then hurtled forward merrily, dropping their manners as they epted the tworgest pieces of meat that Han Shuo handed over.

    In the deep of the night, the cool moonlight spilled over the Dark Forest. A few students were already fast asleep in a few crude tents, while some others struggled against their sleepiness and took up the grave task of standing guard.

    Han Shuo slipped away soundlessly by himself, slowly moving away from the students¡¯ tents and creeped through the shadows of the towering trees.

    Han Shuo¡¯s not terribly strong body could be seen through the cracks between the shadows of the the trees. He was as fast and agile as a cheetah, abruptly changing direction with ease as he wove through the trees. He had traveled far away from Fanny and co¡¯s tents in the blink of an eye and continued south.

    After a while, Han Shuo¡¯s body suddenly stopped as he spread his two palms upwards and chanted the words to summon a skeletal warrior. ¡°Souls of the fallen soldiers, heed the dark herald¡¯s call and reveal your existence!¡±

    A skinny, inky-ck little skeleton wielding a bone dagger abruptly materialized as soon as the incantation wasplete. The little skeleton¡¯s body was even more dense and darker than before,pletely bing one with the color of the night. It was like an elf of the darkness.

    The little skeleton continuously sprang off its feet to follow Han Shuo¡¯s high speed dash, but its bones no longer creaked with sound. The seven bone spurs pped on its back, allowing the little skeleton to speed through the air, like it was hang gliding, as it wove through the forest side by side with Han Shuo.

    Two Windde Wolves suddenly appeared in front of the man and skeleton duo. The two Windde Wolves were devouring the carcass of a magical creature in the shape of a wild pig. One of them seemed to feel the disturbance in the air as its sharp ears suddenly stood up and its green eyes darted to and fro.

    A bone dagger shimmering with a cold, sharp light materialized out of the night. The bone dagger carved a marvelous curve through the thin air and suddenly stabbed towards the wolf, that had been on high alert.

    At the same time, a nimble figure suddenly rushed out from the trees of the Dark Forest and made for the other Windde Wolf. A faint, purple light suddenly shed in the darkened sky, appearing all the more beautiful and fey.

    Two ghastly wails sounded out from the two Windde Wolves. The bloodthirsty wolves had all been killed before they had a chance to react. One wolf¡¯s skull was cleaved straight through with the bone dagger, and the other fell stiffly to the ground with frosty breathsing out of its mouth.

    ¡°Heh heh, another two level five cores!¡± Han Shuo talked to himself in satisfaction as he withdrew his hand.

    On the other side, the little skeleton had already started dressing the valuable Windde Wolf skin with its bone dagger. Judging from its practiced movement, this wasn¡¯t the first time that it had done so.

 Chapter 35: Prepare to fight

    Chapter 35: Prepare to fight

    Han Shuo worked by himself during the nights, leveraging his perceptive senses to hunt down the magical creatures nearby. The wless cooperation between man and skeleton had no drawbacks. They had gathered four level 5 cores by now, as well as some valuable skin and horns.

    Han Shuo not only tried to cast magic whenever they hunted down magical creatures, but also repeatedly practiced the bone arrow magic, oftenbining missile and melee attacks for uncanny effectiveness.

    Han Shuo never disyed the same panic and disarray that the students had disyed when they first met magical creatures. He always disyed the same calm, even a sort of numb callousness.

    Even Han Shuo himself didn¡¯t know why he didn¡¯t have any negative emotions throughout the entire process. He could vaguely feel that his inner heart was actually brimming with eagerness and anticipation when he hunted magical creatures, as if he really enjoyed the process.

    ¡°I¡¯m definitely not a good person!¡± Han Shuoughed at himself, and epted this time¡¯s haul of cores and Windde Wolf pelts from the little skeleton¡¯s hands. He patted the darkly gleaming head of the little skeleton and smiled, ¡°Let¡¯s go. We can go back now.¡±

    The little skeleton¡¯s hand clutched its bone dagger, with no traces of emotion in its empty eye sockets. It trailed behind Han Shuo and swiftly returned along their original path.

    Han Shuo chanted an incantation when they were halfway there and the little skeleton returned to the other dimension. Seeing that he was about to return to the camping area, Han Shuo slowed his footsteps and walked unhurriedly through the shadows of the trees.

    As it was past midnight, the students standing guard in the camping area had changed to Fanny, Lisa, and Amy. Lisa and Amy had half-drooped eyes and looked incredibly sleepy. Anyone could tell at a nce that they were cking off and not shouldering the responsibility they were assigned.

    It was a good thing that Fanny understood the importance of keeping guard. Her pair of beautiful eyes roamed the four corners alertly, and her wary gaze immediately locked onto the direction that Han Shuo wasing from when his light footsteps grew near.

    Her magic staff in hand, Fanny frowned with an expression of high alert on her alluring features. She slowly advanced in Han Shuo¡¯s direction and said softly, ¡°Who goes there?¡±

    ¡°Master Fanny, it¡¯s me!¡± Han Shuo called out lightly as he walked out slowly from the shadows.

    ¡°I knew it would be you. I went to look for you earlier and discovered that your tent was empty. Where did you go in the middle of the night?¡± Fanny¡¯s eyes locked onto Han Shuo¡¯s body as she asked with confusion.

    ¡°Nothing much, I only went to find a secluded corner to practice magic. After I asked you about the bone arrow magicst time, I¡¯ve been taking advantage of the night to find a secluded area to practice. I think that only with repeated practice can I guarantee that I won¡¯t make a mistake.¡± Han Shuo scratched his head and answered honestly in a light voice.

    ¡°Bryan, it¡¯s great that you¡¯re so hardworking. After a while, when you¡¯ve grasped more magic, I will exin this matter to the school authorities. That way, your status as an errand ve can be waived, and perhaps you will be able to enjoy the same treatment as the students.¡± Fanny looked at Han Shuo and thought for a bit.

    ¡°Oh, I was sold to the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. Will my status as an errand ve be waived purely because I understand magic?¡± Han Shuo asked after he recovered from being dumbfounded.

    Fanny nodded and spoke decisively. ¡°No mage has ever been an errand boy or ve. Being a mage is an esteemed profession throughout the Profound Continent. Even if our necromancy major is unpopr, if you can prove that you truly understand magic, then your status will change, and you¡¯ll never have to be the ve that runs errands.¡±

    ¡°I see, that¡¯s wonderful. I actually have a lot more questions that I hope Master Fanny will be able to answer for me. I will do my best to improve myself and be an adequate mage.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts raced as he suddenly recalled the many unanswered questions he had from the magic books he had read previously, and wanted to make the best use of this opportunity to get them answered.

    ¡°No problem, you can ask me any necromancy questions you have in the future. I will help you. Eh... although you¡¯re a bitscivious right now, I¡¯m certain that you¡¯re a magical genius and will help you escape your current position.¡± Fanny smiled faintly and responded in her gentle voice.

    Han Shuo smiled honestly, as if he hadn¡¯t heard Fanny use him of being too carnal. He contemted briefly and started asking Fanny a few questions regarding magical knowledge.

    After a brief moment, Fanny gave a great start of surprise and gazed at Han Shuo in shock. ¡°Oh, goodness, Bryan, you already have so much magical knowledge. That¡¯s amazing!¡±

    ¡°I gained this magical knowledge from reading the magical books in the libraryst time I helped Jack clean the library. Ever since I discovered that I could cast the bone arrow magic, I started to investigate the reason why.¡± Han Shuo lied smoothly, and in fact spoke with a slightly embarrassed expression.

    ¡°Bryan, I really wasn¡¯t wrong about you. You really are a magical genius!¡± Fanny eximed in astonishment again upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s exnation.

    At this moment, the sound of footsteps fell into Han Shuo¡¯s ears again. His face grew grave as he hastily spoke, ¡°A sound is approaching, but it doesn¡¯t sound like a magical creature. Rather, it sounds more like a human.¡±

    Fanny¡¯s beautiful features changed slightly after Han Shuo¡¯s words, and she pulled on his arms in panic. They ran straight for the tents, ¡°There are many races within the Dark Forest, but not all of them are friendly. Even some who are humans like us will sometimes kill for a high level magical creature core. We should be ready.¡±

    Fanny¡¯s slender fingers clutched Han Shuo¡¯s wrist in her hurry. She had no particr thoughts about it, but Han Shuo¡¯s mind had already been filled with sinister intentions. His mind started falling head over heels when the feeling of the smooth fingers of her jade hand crossed his wrist, and his mind suddenly recalled the tantalizing moment on the back of a battlesteed a few days ago.

    ¡°Everyone up! Lisa and Amy, get everyone up and ready for battle! Possible danger approaches!¡± Fanny words jolted the dozing Lisa and Amy awake. The two could detect the arrival of danger in Fanny¡¯s frantic tone, and they started raising a ruckus to warn those in the tents.

    In the blink of an eye, many students who had been sound asleep in the tents all rushed out with their clothes in disarray and still half asleep. They began urgent preparations for battle.

    Fanny unintentionally nced at Han Shuo at this moment and found that Han Shuo was smiling happily at the hand that was clutching his wrist. An expression of enjoyment could be found on his face. Incensed, Fanny let go only after she gave Han Shuo a sharp pinch with her jade hand. She spoke angrily in a low voice, ¡°Damnit Bryan, I find that you¡¯re as lecherous as Fitch.¡±

    Han Shuo cried out in pain and wore an awkward smile on his face. He thought internally, I wonder what would Fanny think if she knew that I was the one who touched her buttst time?

    Several heavy footfalls gradually approached and fell into everyone¡¯s hearing in the mess of the students getting ready. Han Shuo had started to calm down after Fanny¡¯s pinch, and the previous lustful gleam in his eyes faded without a trace, to be reced by a deep coldness. It was as if he was a bystander coldly observing everything around him.

    Heavy footsteps apanied by weird, airy sounds continued to approach the crew. Gene frowned and asked, perplexed, ¡°Such heavy footsteps shouldn¡¯t belong to humans, but two legged magical creatures are exceedingly rare. What could they be?¡±

    Fanny furrowed her brow in deep thought as her beautiful eyes suddenly brightened with understanding. She suddenly called out, ¡°Everyone hurry and summon skeletal warriors to the front, we seem to have run into the man-eating monsters in the Dark Forest.¡±

    Everyone was gobsmacked when the words ¡°man-eating monsters¡± crossed Fanny¡¯s lips. A few of the female students shuddered as fearful expressions blossomed on their faces. Gene was also startled and hurriedlymanded everyone to form a circr defense pattern. He too brought out a brown magic staff, that looked like a tree branch. His face was full of careful wariness.

    Rounds of incantations flew out from the students¡¯ and teachers¡¯ mouths. Multiple skeletal warriors, ghouls, and zombie warriors appeared out of thin air, as well as Fanny and Gene¡¯s hate warriors.

    Hate warriors were more advanced beings of existence amongst the dark creatures. These hate warriors were enormous in size, wielded metal clubs, and had incredible strength in all the fat on their bodies. Their bodies also possessed extremely durable defensive capabilities, and were amon meat shield used by necromancers.

    Indeed, following their thudding footsteps, eight, grey-colored, 2.5 meter tall man-eating monsters wielding studded clubs and long spears soon appeared in everyone¡¯s vision.

    Man-eating monsters were pack creatures. Ten or so man-eating monsters counted as a tribe. The man-eating monster¡¯s nature waszy and they liked to steal things. They were born robbers. They understood how to use studded clubs and long spears, add to that, the toughness and durability of their bodies meant they had extreme power and damage in closebat.

    However, what frightened people most wasn¡¯t the strength of the man-eating monsters, but their habits. Man-eating monsters werebeled thus because they ate humans. If they met humans in the course of a robbery, not only would they steal everything, but they would carry off the human for food.

    Han Shuo and co. had formed a defensive field, with the skeletal warriors, ghouls, zombie warriors, and hate warriors forming an outer defensive perimeter. A few necromancers readied their offensive missile spells and watched the approaching man-eating monsters gravely.

    ¡°Prepare to fight!¡± Fanny called out. Her staff had already been raised up.

 Chapter 36: The calm of an errand boy

    Chapter 36: The calm of an errand boy

    The man-eating monsters made weird sounds with their mouths as they moved. They abruptly started running towards the band when the strongest and tallest man-eating monster pointed at them with its club.

    Strings of magical incantations sounded out before the monsters had even begun to approach. Bundles of bone arrows flew towards the man-eating monsters out of thin air, and those above the level of magic apprentice even fired out a stronger incantation, bone spears.

    Bone spears was a necromancy magic simr to bone arrows, but one had to be at least at the level of a novice mage in order to master it. The power of the spell was also slightly stronger than bone arrows. Bone arrows and spears flew out simultaneously, through the air, making straight for the eight man-eating monsters.

    These eight monsters knew to dodge the attacks as they ran, but they weren¡¯t a race known for speed. Some were still hit by the bone arrows and spears.

    Except, their bodies were exceedingly durable. The bone arrows only caused them to cry out with pain and temporarily affected their speed, but couldn¡¯t pierce their bodies. Only the bone spears left bloody holes on their bodies, with green blood trickling out of them.

    The eight monsters continued to get hurt as they approached, but none of them fully lost the ability to fight. They crashed into the outer defensive perimeter and started attacking the inner ring.

    Han Shuo stayed within the defensive ring in an orderly, unruffled manner. His face full of calm, he looked coldly upon the fast approaching man-eating monsters and slowly sized up their battle strength.

    ¡°Let the dark creatures attack!¡± Fanny gave a great shout as her beautiful features turned grave as she saw the man-eating monsters drawing near.

    Everyone started directing the outer ring of dark creatures to attack as Fanny¡¯s words rang out. The summoned ghouls, skeletal warriors, zombie warriors, and hate warriors all held their positions firmly, striking out only when the man-eating monsters closed the distance.

    But the man-eating monsters were tall and buff, and their muscles provided them with a tough defense. Apart from the hate warriors, which could actually cause some damage with their metal clubs, the effect of the other dark creatures¡¯ attacks was quite limited.

    The ghouls and skeletal warriors were particrly ineffective. They were immediately pulverized beneath the studded clubs, with the skeletal warriors falling to pieces and the ghouls dying in a mass of flesh and gore. The zombie warriors were more durable and could take multiple hits from the studded clubs, but they too staggered around weakly after being hit a few times.

    ¡°These damned man-eating monsters are a bit tough to deal with!¡± Gene started to worry as he saw the outer perimeter of dark creatures begin to copse, and yet the man-eating monsters remained standing, even when bleeding profusely from various magic attacks.

    ¡°Hold the line! Don¡¯t let them breakthrough, otherwise we¡¯ll surely die if we face them in closebat!¡± Fanny called out loudly, a trace of anxiety appearing on her beautiful face as well.

    Rounds of bone spears continued to appear as she chanted her spells. They honed in on one particr man-eating monster, with the final spear piercing the monster through the eye and prating its head with one stroke. This caused the man-eating monster wobble, and then fall lifelessly to the ground.

    The remaining seven man-eating monsters seemed to lose their minds after theirrade had been killed. It was like the two with spears had been activated as they cried out with weird whooshing sounds and suddenly threw their spears out. The spears drew a curve in the air, and whistled sharply as they pinned down the two hate warriors.

    The two hate warriors were the strongest meat shields in the outer perimeter. Although they didn¡¯t immediately lose the ability to move, their movements became slower now that their bodies had been impaled. They were pretty much ineffectual after two man-eating monsters started marking their every move.

    At this moment, only two hate warriors and six zombie warriors were left in the outer perimeter. The zombie warriors were inferior to the hate warriors in every way, and the pressure on the former had increased with the hate warriors being impaled by spears. Two zombie warriors had fallen in the span of a moment.

    ¡°What to do, what to do? Will these damned man-eating monsters eat us?¡±

    ¡°Oh my gosh, why are their bodies so durable? The bone arrows have no effect when they hit!¡±

    ¡°Screwed, we¡¯re all screwed. We should¡¯ve gone back yesterday, wah... wah...¡±

    Rounds of depressedints and fearful sobs rang out from the students¡¯ mouths, affecting even their spells for a moment.

    ¡°Master Gene, let¡¯s use the corpse explosion spell, quick!¡± Fanny called out suddenly and her beautiful face hardened upon seeing everyone be so forlorn.

    ¡°Oh perished soul, my will be themand, surrender your body to me, explode violently, Corpse Explosion!¡± Fanny and Gene both chanted at the same time, and Fanny pointed at the man-eating monster that she¡¯d previously speared when it was done. Gene pointed at another fallen zombie warrior.

    Two violent explosions suddenly erupted from the man-eating monster and zombie warrior¡¯s bodies. The four injured man-eating monsters next to them, including two zombie warriors, who were fighting against them, were all affected as they flew forcefully through the air.

    The four man-eating monsters were sted apart with loud sounds along with the two zombie warriors. They ally still and unmoving, obviouslypletely done for.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes shone brightly as he fixed them on Fanny. He was quite gobsmacked by the corpse explosion magic. He had seen clearly just now that the exploded man-eating monster¡¯s body had abruptly lit up after Fanny had finished her incantation, to be followed by a frightening force. Of the four man-eating monsters, who had been sted apart, three of them had died underneath Fanny¡¯s magic.

    Han Shuo had previously only heard a bit regarding corpse explosion magic. He understood that only adept mages could cast it, and that explosions would vary ording to the mage¡¯s strength. Fanny¡¯s corpse explosion magic had been noticeably stronger than Gene¡¯s. This may have had something to do with Fanny¡¯s magic and using man-eating monsters as fodder.

    However, it seemed that the corpse explosion spell significantly drained their mental strength. Fanny and Gene¡¯s faces were both pale after casting the spell and they panted heavily.

    Up until now, of the original eight man-eating monsters, Fanny had killed one with a bone spear, and four more had been killed with the corpse explosion spells. Although the two hate warriors had been impaled by the man-eating monsters¡¯ spears, they continued to hold their ground and resolutely tied up two more man-eating monsters.

    Only the strongest and tallest man-eating monster hadn¡¯t been unduly affected. It wielded a studded club and sprinted over like mad, making weird noises and even yelling simple phrases like ¡°I... I will... kill you¡±.

    ¡°We¡¯ve just used the corpse explosion spell and pretty much drained our mental strength. We¡¯ll be unable to use any other high level magic for a while. Everyone run!¡± Gene¡¯s face grew panicked and he yelled quickly.

    Fanny nced around and urged, ¡°Everyone hurry and leave! Don¡¯t get caught by these monsters.¡±

    Everyone panicked even more after these words from Fanny and Gene. The resources on the side were all forgotten as they all frantically tried to distance themselves from the studded club-wielding, quickly-sprinting man-eating monster.

    Except, although the man-eating monster¡¯s speed wasn¡¯t too fast, it was still faster than the students¡¯, particrly as thetter sometimes tripped over the skeletal warrior remains as they panicked. This resulted inpletely iparable speed whenpared to the man-eating monsters.

    Fanny¡¯s thoughts were with the students as she urged them to leave and hung back herself. The tall man-eating monster, who remembered that it was Fanny who had cast the corpse explosion spell and blown three monsters to pieces, chased after her without a second thought upon seeing that she had fallen behind. Its club was raised high and crashed down towards Fanny.

    ¡°Master Fanny, be careful!¡±

    ¡°Watch out! Fanny, behind you!¡±

    Lisa, Gene, and several others all cried out in shock and fright as they saw the club descend towards Fanny from behind.

    Fanny turned upon hearing the others¡¯ cries and discovered that the studded club was falling straight at her. The sharp points of the studs sparkled with cold light, and the apanying whooshing sound gave testament to the strength behind this blow.

    Her enchanting face with starkly-white without a trace of color, and her beautiful legs were suddenly without strength. A feeling of mournful helplessness rose within her eyes as the studded club grewrger in her vision.

    ng. Sparks flew everywhere.

    Fanny¡¯s beautiful eyes widened as she looked in front of her, a bit lost. Two studded clubs had appeared in front of her at some unknown time, and the two had collided together. The sharp studs had already been ttened at the point of contact, which still emitted some metallic sparks.

    She followed her gaze down the opposing studded club and suddenly discovered that Han Shuo had appeared on her left. Both of his hands were tightly grasping the studded club that waspletely disproportionate to his body. Veins had popped out on his forehead and arms, and his face twisted in a grimace as he stared fixedly at the man-eating monster.

 Chapter 37: Ferocious Han Shuo

    Chapter 37: Ferocious Han Shuo

    ¡°Bryan, it¡¯s Bryan!¡±

    The students eximed in shock, even Fanny was a bit dumbfounded as she stared unfamiliarly at Han Shuo. She never would have thought that, with his 170 cm height, Han Shuo would be able to wave such a thick, studded club and block a savage attack to boot.

    While everyone was shellshocked, Han Shuo stared fixedly at the man-eating monster and reached out with his right hand to give Fanny a push. He said with an honest voice, ¡°Hurry and run.¡±

    A shrill, panicked scream rang out from Fanny¡¯s mouth. Han Shuo suddenly felt that his right hand had pressed on two balls of soft, big cotton candy amidst her screams. He understood that he had surely pressed down on the wrong ce when he retracted his hand.

    The students on the side were giving soft exmations as Gene cursed loudly, denouncing Han Shuo¡¯s wanton boldness.

    His heart lurching, Han Shuo turned to look at Fanny and said awkwardly, ¡°Sorry Master Fanny, I pushed in the wrong ce. I really didn¡¯t mean to!¡±

    Fanny was extremely irate and was about to open her mouth to berate Han Shuo, when she suddenly sensed the man-eating monster behind her. Itsrge, studded club was alreadying down on Han Shuo, and she reminded hastily, ¡°Bryan, be careful!¡±

    Traces of dull honesty still on his face, Han Shuo suddenly turned around and raised up the club that was bigger than his body. It whistled as it once more crashed towards the man-eating monster.

    ng. Sparks flew again as Han Shuo didn¡¯t budge an inch, staying firmly put like an erect stone. The picture of his thin frame clutching therge club was imprinted in everyone¡¯s eyes, causing students to look upon him weirdly.

    ¡°Master Fanny, hurry and get out of there!¡±

    Gene¡¯s loud yell suddenly rang out at this moment. Gazing at Han Shuo in astonishment, Fanny finally reacted. Her beautiful eyes still locked on Han Shuo, she retreated backwards towards Gene and co.

    After going head to head twice with the man-eating monster, Han Shuo felt an overwhelming need to vent his feelings at this moment. He wanted to fully let loose with all the power within his body as a faint desire to kill rose in Han Shuo¡¯s heart, giving him the urge to mash the man-eating monster into a meat pie.

    Han Shuo suddenly gave a few chillingughs as soon as Fanny had vacated the area. The dumb honesty on his face vanished without a trace and his expression grimaced scarily. He raised the thick club with a darkened face and rushed headlong towards the confused man-eating monster.

    This fittest and strongest man-eating monster couldn¡¯t seem to understand why Han Shuo could withstand two of his heavy hits with such a frail body, and was standing there dumbly, as if contemting something.

    ¡°Oh my goodness, Bryan must be crazy. He¡¯s rushing towards the man-eating monster!¡± Be eximed softly, a look of incredulity on her face.

    Everyone nodded in agreement as soon as they heard her words, all thinking that Han Shuo had naturally lost his mind. Even Lisa, who knew that Han Shuo was merely ying the vige idiot, had a face of iprehension, utterly shocked by how he was behaving at the moment.

    ¡°Bryan¡¯s suddenly be so strong after he went crazy. This is incredible! Lisa is too amazing. An Agony of the Soul spell turned the cowardly, timid Bryan into such a wild person!¡± Amy called out naively and looked at Lisa with emotion.

    ¡°Shut up!¡± Lisa stared directly at Han Shuo and responded.

    At this moment, Han Shuo was wielding the thick studded club and moved as fast as lightning, dashing straight for the man-eating monster. The studded club whistled strangely through the air as Han Shuo grasped it tightly with both hands, swinging it upwards in a curve and aiming violently for the monster¡¯s waist.

    The look on the monster¡¯s face changed abruptly from confusion to rage and it repeated its previous movement. It sent its club shing towards Han Shuo, as if wanting to thoroughly defeat Han Shuo with strength.

    Loud shing sounds rang out continuously between the two studded clubs. The durable club and sharp studs were all ttened after repeated shes. The fight between the frail Han Shuo and the hulking man-eating monster became heated as the shing sounds continued.

    Fanny and the others had originally wanted to escape as soon as possible, but all remained where they were in shock as they saw how scary Han Shuo¡¯s strength was after he¡¯d gone mad. He was holding his own in a fight against the man-eating monster, and the crew stared gobsmacked at Han Shuo¡¯s strength.

    Dancing around with a clubpletely disproportionate to his body, Han Shuo disyed not even a hint of apprehension as he faced the towering monster. Firm and well defined muscles with popping veins were evident on his neck arms and neck. In this moment, his expression was hideously mad. He had a sort of dauntless valor thatpletely upended Fanny and the students¡¯ understanding of him.

    In this moment, the magical yuan within Han Shuo¡¯s body churned quickly, and he felt a joyous glee in fully deploying his strength. His movements with the studded club became more practiced, and not only did he not be tired by the repeated shes, but his vigor actually grew in strength.

    ¡°Hehehe...¡±

    A few weirdughs emitted from the grimacing Han Shuo. The man-eating monster staggered backwards after another violent sh. Its originally wild attacks and enormous strength had started faltering after a few rounds of shes.

    ¡°Oh.. my gosh. Is this that weak and cowardly Bryan?¡± Be eximed and repeatedly shook her head in disbelief.

    ¡°I swear I¡¯ll never test magic on Bryan again. He¡¯s too scary when he goes crazy!¡± Athena disyed a frightened expression and muttered to herself.

    Lisa¡¯s expression was excited and her small fists clenched tightly. She would randomly scream, ¡°Beat him!¡±

    Bach and others with a grudge against Han Shuo all disyed fearful expressions after exchanging looks. They looked upon Han Shuo with a bit of fear.

    ¡°Hehe... you won¡¯t get away!¡± After another weirdugh, Han Shuo followed closely behind the escaping monster. The thick, studded club suddenly swept forward, and the monster¡¯s two legs were broken with a resounding crack. Han Shuo¡¯s weirdughter followed closely thereafter and the studded club repeatedly crashed down onto the monster. Ghastly wails sounded out from the previously cruel man-eating monster.

    The monster¡¯s hulking body had long since fallen down as fresh blood continued spurting out of his body. The grey, strong body was a bloody mess after Han Shuo¡¯s continued beating. It was a bit difficult to make out what it had originally looked like.

    These violent and savage blows rained down like a furious storm for a minute, with Han Shuo suddenly waking up after the man-eating monster had been mashed into a mess of blood and gore. He was also startled when he stopped as he¡¯d never thought that he would have such a savage side to him.

    This was the first time he¡¯d killed someone, but there was no corresponding wave of fear in Han Shuo¡¯s heart. After the expression on his face had calmed down, Han Shuo turned to look at Fanny and the students, smiling an honest smile, ¡°He seems to be dead?¡±

    Against his expectations, the students, as well as Fanny and Gene, all screamed and took two steps backwards when Han Shuo turned his head. Lisa eximed in fright and then asked, ¡°Bry... Bryan, are you... are you alright?¡±

    Han Shuo started and quickly recollected himself. He scratched his head and smiled dumbly, ¡°What happened to me just now? Even I don¡¯t know what I did. Why did this monster suddenly die?¡±

    ¡°You.. you¡¯ve forgotten everything you¡¯ve just done?¡± Fanny was also dumbfounded and then frowned as she stared at Han Shuo in interrogation.

    Han Shuo nodded truthfully and exined sincerely, ¡°Yes, I felt that my brain started to hurt a lot just now and then forgot everything that happened afterwards. The man-eating monster had already died in front of me when I came to. What¡¯s going on? Eh? Weren¡¯t there two more monsters? Where did they go?¡±

    ¡°You scared them off!¡± Be stared at Han Shuo oddly and replied.

    ¡°Ah, no way. How can this be? Why would they be afraid of me?¡± Han Shuo asked, perplexed and with a face full of innocence.

    ¡°Bryan, you be so scary after you lose your mind, like you¡¯re someone else. Even we were a bit afraid, not to mention the man-eating monsters. Good thing you¡¯re alright now.¡± Gene spoke heartfeltly and voiced everyone¡¯s thoughts.

    ¡°Don¡¯t just stand there. Hurry and pack everything. We can no longer stay here. Two of the monsters got away, they maye back and create more trouble for us.¡± Fanny kept her cool and hurriedly directed everyone to clean up the aftermath upon seeing that the crisis had been temporarily averted.

    Everyone returned to their original ces after Fanny¡¯s orders and picked up the resources strewn all over the ground. The students had be more mature after this life and death experience. No one wasted time in idle chatter, picked up and packed all the items with great speed.

    ¡°I think it¡¯s time to leave and end this time¡¯s outing!¡± Gene proposed gravely after seeing that everyone had appropriately repacked their belongings.

    Everyone had recognized that their strength wasn¡¯t as strong as they thought after meeting the man-eating monsters. There would be more dangers as they travelled south, and thus everyone nodded in embarrassed agreement after Gene made his suggestion.

    Momentarily speechless, the crew started organizing their things. They nned to bring back this time¡¯s pickings back to the Academy and not continue adventuring south.

    But just as everyone was prepared to leave, a deste cry suddenly came from the south. The crew had packed and were about to leave, but were all gobsmacked after hearing this sound. Expressions of greed surfaced shortly afterwards.

 Chapter 38: Another coolie

    Chapter 38: Another coolie

    ¡°It¡¯s the hooting calls of a Frost Eagle. They¡¯re solitary magical creatures... We¡¯ve already hunted one down before, why not leave after killing this one?¡± An expression of joy appeared on Gene¡¯s face as he gazed at everyone and asked.

    The creature core of a Frost Eagle was at level 4, and was worth a lot more than a Windde Wolf¡¯s. Although everyone had expended quite a bit of effort to hunt the first one down, that meant they were now more experienced in dealing with Frost Eagles. Everyone nked after Gene¡¯s words, after which Fanny looked at Han Shuo and asked, ¡°Bryan, what do you think?¡±

    ¡°Arge sum of resources is in front of us. I think we should take it!¡± Han Shuo scratched his head and smiled honestly.

    ¡°Then alright, everyone make your preparations. We will return to the Academy after we¡¯ve taken the Frost Eagle core. If our necromancy major can obtain two level four magical creature cores during this outing, then the other majors will not dare to look down on us.¡± Fanny nodded and instructed everyone to move out.

    When the band heard her words, it was like they¡¯d recalled the outrages they¡¯d suffered before. Each person started moving angrily, following in Han Shuo and Fanny¡¯s footsteps towards the direction of the Frost Eagle¡¯s call.

    Han Shuo walked in front, just like a leader, and everyone else wore a ¡®naturally¡¯ expression. No one had any opinions otherwise, and subconsciously, they themselves had all started to change the way they thought about Han Shuo.

    By now, no one dared to treat Han Shuo as an errand ve that they could bully at their leisure. Their gazes towards Han Shuo subtly held a few more hints of respect and fear.

    The band of people rushed along their way, following the Frost Eagle¡¯s cries. They arrived at the Frost Eagle¡¯s location after a while, but were shocked by the scene that came into view.

    Under the pure and bright moonlight, the band saw a tall, strapping, and handsome youth with tousled silver hair, wielding a longsword to battle the Frost Eagle in the sky.

    He wore a simple pdin¡¯s robe and his shoulders, chest, and stomach were covered with armor that sparkled with silver light. His clothes and appearance made him out to be a knight. As he wove the longsword in his hand, beams of milky-white light shed ringly, causing the Frost Eagle circling overhead to continuously caw out when it was struck.

    ¡°Oh my gosh, a milky-white fighting aura... he¡¯s an earth rider knight! Ooh.. he¡¯s so handsome!¡± Be squealed and locked her eyes firmly on the body of this earth rider knight. A boy crazy look rose to her face.

    Several other female students next to her also revealed mesmerized expressions, their eyes shining as they gazed at the earth rider, who easily handled the Frost Eagle.

    Han Shuo creased his brow, also surprised by the earth rider¡¯s strength. Thest time Han Shuo and the band of 12 had confronted a Frost Eagle, they had found it extremely difficult and had expended monumental effort before finally killing the Frost Eagle. This earth rider not only was not having difficulties, but was handling it with ease. The Frost Eagle emitted continuous low keens after the white fighting aura was projected.

    A beam of white fighting aura shakily rose upwards until it pointed straight at the heavily injured Frost Eagle. The Frost Eagle seemed to have perceived the danger as it pped its wings in preparation to leave.

    The earth rider¡¯s body had been standing on the floor until this moment, where it abruptly flew through the air in an elerated jump. The long sword shed past the Frost Eagle¡¯s belly as a wailing bird call sounded once more. The Frost Eagle wobbled in a listless, downward fall.

    ¡°That was amazing!¡± Be¡¯s eyes gleamed as she giggled with infatuation.

    The earth rider walked up to the body of the Frost Eagle, made a flicking motion with his long sword and removed the Frost Eagle core. He then wore a faint smile as he tookrge strides towards Han Shuo and co. He swept his eyes across the band and then bowed urbanely, ¡°Knight rk greets these noble mages.¡±

    ¡°Hello rk. You¡¯re so strong! You killed a Frost Eagle all by yourself, you¡¯re so amazing!¡± Beughed modestly and spoke gently, as if she was apletely different person.

    Except, that rk¡¯s gaze didn¡¯t rest on Be, but stared at Fanny instead, as if waiting for Fanny¡¯s response. This caused Be to feel a bit awkward.

    ¡°We¡¯re students and teachers at the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. We ventured out to the Dark Forest for training this time, it¡¯s very nice to meet you rk.¡± Fanny¡¯s expression didn¡¯t change as she too slightly inclined her body and smiled in response.

    ¡°I see... I¡¯m also here to train in the Dark Forest. The magical creatures here are very strong and very suitable for increasing strength. I didn¡¯t think I¡¯d run into everyone, heh.¡± rk smiled faintly as he looked at Fanny. There was a strange smell in the look that made Han Shuo slightly ill at ease.

    ¡°Master Fanny, the Frost Eagle has been killed by him, I think we should go back now.¡± Han Shuo looked at rk for a few moments and understood why he would feel ufortable about rk¡¯s gaze. It turns out that rk¡¯s gaze was a bit simr to Gene¡¯s. Although he didn¡¯t take it to the level that Gene took it to, but this already subtly exined a question ¡ª this rk seemed to be interested in Fanny¡¯s good looks.

    ¡°Yes Yes, Master Fanny, it¡¯s getting more dangerous. For the sake of student¡¯s safety, we should head back to the Academy.¡± Gene seemed to have also noticed the threat as his gaze towards rk wasn¡¯t too friendly. He immediately seconded Han Shuo¡¯s suggestion.

    Fanny nodded upon hearing Han Shuo and Gene¡¯s words and was about to agree when rk suddenly said with a smile, ¡°If the noble mages wouldn¡¯t mind, I can join your group and apany you. I think there¡¯s a mutual benefit if we walk together, and a corresponding decrease in danger. I wonder if everyone is amenable to this suggestion?¡±

    ¡°Yes, if a earth rider knight is with us, then our haul this time will surely eclipse the light major¡¯s.¡± Be¡¯s face lit up in joy and she abruptly cut in without waiting for Fanny¡¯s approval.

    Some of the other female students hastened to agree after Be had spoken, only Lisa was unmoved as she stared at Han Shuo in odd consideration. A few of the male students hadn¡¯t spoken. They didn¡¯t seem to care.

    After rk¡¯s words and Be¡¯s unison, Fanny started to waver in her original intention to leave. She had felt particrly tempted when Be had said their haul would eclipse the light major¡¯s haul.

    Don¡¯t agree, don¡¯t agree. He¡¯s smiling, but he¡¯s not a good thing. This kid obviously has bad intentions, don¡¯t agree to travel with him. Han Shuo looked at Fanny and repeated in his mind.

    ¡°Alright, then we¡¯ll have to impose on you. We¡¯re a band of mages, so it will surely be of great help if such a strong earth rider like you were to join us.¡± Fanny hesitated for a while and finally agreed.

    Han Shuo was exceedingly disappointed, but didn¡¯t disy it on his face. He eximed in astonishment instead and say, ¡°Aiya, we came in pursuit of the Frost Eagle, but you had already killed it. Ai, the level 4 core from a magical creature, gone just like that.¡±

    rk¡¯s face wore a bewildered expression after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words and he looked at Han Shuo with some confusion. He asked, ¡°You were the ones originally pursuing this Frost Eagle?¡±

    Nodding his head firmly, Han Shuo said with a wistful expression, ¡°Ah yes, but we hadn¡¯t thought that you¡¯d kill it.¡±

    Fanny was a bit dumbfounded upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words and red ferociously at him. Just as she was about to exin that this wasn¡¯t the case, rk hesitated, and then took out the Frost Eagle core with some heartache. He forced out a smile and offered it to Fanny, saying, ¡°I see. Since this is the case, then I return it to you. Master Fanny, you must ept it.¡±

    ¡°ept, we¡¯ll absolutely ept!¡± Han Shuo smiled as he approached and had already taken the core from rk¡¯s hands before Fanny had responded. He handed it over to Lisa, who was standing beside him, and said merrily, ¡°Heh heh. rk the knight is such a good person. He¡¯s given us a level 4 core so readily. I think he¡¯ll be even more straightforward in the trials toe.¡±

    Lisa¡¯s two eyes shot out light as she also merrily, unapologetically put the core away. She nodded at Han Shuo with praise and surreptitiously stuck up her thumb up in apliment.

    Fanny was going to exin, but found that the core had disappeared into Lisa¡¯s pocket in the blink of an eye. She involuntarily revealed an expression that was neither able tough or cry, rolled her eyes at Han Shuo and Lisa after she shook her head, but didn¡¯t say anything else.

    A level 4 core was equivalent to one hundred gold coins. One hundred gold coins wasn¡¯t a small sum to even an ordinary small noble. No wonder rk was feeling the pain a bit after Han Shuo had so easily taken it from his hands.

    ¡°Master Fanny, now that we¡¯ve been joined by the noble and generous earth rider, I think we can continue south. There are certainly even stronger magical creatures there. If we have obtain a level 3 magical creature core, then we can surely strut with pride in the Academy after this outing.¡± Han Shuo slightly spurred Fanny on, thinking if rk dares look twice at my woman, then he has to provide some freebor at the very least. It would be a pity to not use the earth rider.

    Fanny¡¯s spirits were recollected upon hearing the ability to strut with pride within the Academy. She nodded and smiled charmingly, ¡°Alright, then we continue further on south. Noble knight rk, we¡¯ll have to trouble you to take care of uster on.¡±

    rk bowed humbly and smiled politely, ¡°Not a problem at all, I¡¯m happy to be of service.¡±

    Since you insist on staying, see if I don¡¯t y you to death. Han Shuo was exceedingly unhappy with rk¡¯s actions and his thoughts raced furiously in consideration of several evil schemes.

 Chapter 39: Making fun of the earth rider

    Chapter 39: Making fun of the earth rider

    The next day.

    With the addition of rk, the band continued their journey south in the Dark Forest. Due to rk¡¯s involvement, it became much easier to handle the various magical creatures along the way.

    rk purposefully showed off his skills in front of Fanny, and it was thanks to his great assistance that two Windde Wolves and one Frost Eagle were easily taken care of along the journey.

    Whenever a magical creature was killed, Han Shuo would swiftly appear and immediately remove the creature core. He would then naturally hand it over to Lisa for safekeeping, absolutely treating it as if it was his side¡¯s spoils of war. Even the Windde Wolf pelts weren¡¯t left behind for rk.

    rk wanted to win Fanny¡¯s favor, and thus although his heart bled inside, he still forced a smile, yed along with Han Shuo¡¯s actions, and didn¡¯t fight for the magical creature cores.

    The crew raised a bonfire at dusk and it the duty of grilling meat fell onto Han Shuo again. rk intentionally stayed with Fanny and wittily conversed with her. Off to the side, Gene eyed rk and would repeatedly butt in and use words to ostracize rk.

    The other students all separated to either rest,ugh and chat, or silently organize their belongings. Only Lisa stayed beside Han Shuo, watching him flip the pieces of meat with ease.

    ¡°Bryan, I¡¯ve discovered that you¡¯re bing more of a viin, and that you¡¯re very different from before!¡± Lisa was holding a bright-red, wooden stick in her hands as she stirred the bonfire carelessly. Her bright eyesnded on Han Shuo¡¯s body as she spoke.

    Han Shuo flicked a nce at Lisa before responding faintly, ¡°Is that so? I¡¯m feel fine...I just felt that I was living too hopelessly and stupidly before and wanted to change myself. Is there anything wrong with that?¡±

    Lisa shook her head and said, ¡°No no. I just feel that you¡¯re different from before. I don¡¯t know how to describe what is exactly going on. Maybe it is because I cast the Agony of the soul on you and made things the way they are.¡±

    Laughing involuntarily, Han Shuo thought that he wasn¡¯t Bryan at all and thus it had nothing to do with the Agony of the Soul. Whether it was Lisa, Fanny, or even the other students and teachers, it was quite funny that they all thought the Agony of the Soul was the reason behind his changes.

    ¡°Are my changes not good?¡±

    ¡°Very good, you¡¯re much better than how you were before. I was really angry to see you so cowardly and timid before, so I was mean to you in hopes that you¡¯d shape up, but you always epted whatever life threw your way, and wouldn¡¯t resist no matter who bullied you. I felt that you were quite pitiful then and that living was quite painful for you. It would¡¯ve been better if you died. I actually used the Agony of the Soul on you because I didn¡¯t want to see you living so pitifully anymore.¡± Lisa thought for a moment and and then looked at Han Shuo.

    A frown creasing his brow, Han Shuo looked at Lisa, perplexed. He asked, ¡°Is this to say that you were helping me out of the goodness of your heart when you used the Agony of the Soul on me?¡±

    ¡°Of course!¡± Lisa¡¯s neck raised as she exined, ¡°Although I grabbed you for magic practice before, I treated you a lot better than the other students did, but you were disappointing and lived out your days so hopelessly. I couldn¡¯t bear it anymore and wanted to set you free from this life. Look at you now, you¡¯ve changed so much that I hardly recognize you.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo didn¡¯t say anything more, but somewhat approved of Lisa¡¯s methods within his heart. The pitiful Bryan really did live life so hopelessly and he¡¯d long since wanted to kill himself but justcked the courage to do so. Han Shuo, however, was still unable to forgive Lisa for helping people end their lives.

    ¡°Bry... Bryan. I think we can grill our own meat and don¡¯t have to impose on you.¡± At this moment, Bach, Be, and a few others walked over from afar and looked at Han Shuo with a bit of fright as they spoke.

    In these days, Han Shuo grilled out exceedingly delicious meat for Lisa, Fanny, Amy, and co. and horrendously gross meat for Bach, Be, and a few others. After a few days of torture, Bach, Be, and co. had already suffered from a few days of diarrhea.

    They had been cursing andining at Han Shuo, but after experiencing Han Shuo¡¯s berserk performance yesterday, these people didn¡¯t even dare toin and curse at him. They were afraid that Han Shuo would suddenly lose his mind again.

    Now, they were truly a bit afraid of Han Shuo.

    Smiling dumbly, Han Shuo said with some embarrassment. ¡°How can this be done? I¡¯m an errand ve for the necromancy major and preparing food is one of my jobs. It wouldn¡¯t be that appropriate for your noble and delicate selves to do such tasks, would it?¡±

    ¡°Appropriate, absolutely appropriate! Since we¡¯re out training, we should try everything once. Not to mention you saved our lives yesterday. We shouldn¡¯t let you continue to take on that many missions... Wouldn¡¯t you agree Bach?¡± Be forcefullyughed as she spoke.

    ¡°Indeed, we should grill our own food and not rely on you for everything!¡± Bach¡¯s stomach had suffered for a few days already, and he knew that if he were to eat Han Shuo¡¯s grilled meat again, it would definitely be half raw and half cooked. He hurriedly fawned with a small smile, paused and opened his mouth. ¡°Bryan, I was in the wrong before. Please don¡¯t hold a grudge against me. If you hate me ande find me when you suddenly go cr- er, suddenly lose your rationality, then I would be screwed!¡±

    ¡°Alright, since you all are so kindhearted, then I thank you. Come, you guys grill the meat, I hope you have a great time.¡± Han Shuo felt damn good inside as he stood up with an honest smile. He took a few of the cooked meats, gave a huge piece to Lisa, who¡¯d been eyeing them for a while, and walked the rest of the meat to Fanny.

    The tempting smell of meat slowly spread out. Fanny had been listening to rk and Gene put down each other with an impatient expression on her face when her eyes suddenly lit up and her tongue darted out to moisten her lips. A charming smile appeared on her lips.

    ¡°Master Fanny, Master Gene, um... and Sir rk the knight, these are your grilled meats!¡± Han Shuoughed lightly and handed over the meat to the three people.

    ¡°Ooh ooh... blech! Bryan, howe today¡¯s wasn¡¯t fully cooked, this is too gross!¡± Fanny suddenly squealed and spat out the piece of grilled meat she¡¯d eaten.

    This time, because of Fanny¡¯s poor eyesight and the fact that Han Shuo hadn¡¯t given her the meat individually, plus the fact that she was in a rush to eat, she¡¯d already eaten one of the pieces that Han Shuo had prepared for Gene and rk before he¡¯d had a chance to remind her.

    ¡°Eh... Master Fanny, that one¡¯s not yours, this one is!¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t know whether tough or cry as he thought you were seriously in a bit too much of a hurry.

    He then quickly handed over the piece of meat that he¡¯d painstakingly prepared, seized the half-raw, half-cooked piece from her hand and drew out a dagger to cut off the piece that she¡¯d bit off. He smiled merrily as he handed it over to rk, saying with some embarrassment, ¡°Noble Sir rk, this piece is yours. My cooking skills aren¡¯t quite up to par, and although Master Fanny¡¯s already taken a bite, I hope you don¡¯t mind?¡±

    rk said, ¡°Eh... I¡¯ll just eat bread.¡±

    ¡°Now how can this be allowed, bread won¡¯t increase body strength and you¡¯re a knight who really needs a lot of body strength. You must eat lots of meat. Are you disgusted with Bryan¡¯sck of cooking skills or because Master Fanny has already taken a bite?¡± Gene had long since known that those who weren¡¯t nice to Bryan would suffer greatly when eating something he¡¯d prepared. Gene wasughing gloatingly on the inside while trying to convince rk with a righteous and dignified expression on his face.

    ¡°No, I didn¡¯t mean it that way. Just that, just that...¡± rk had a face of resignation as he spread his hands out awkwardly. He shook his head but didn¡¯t know how to exin himself. He had seen Fanny take one bite and spit it back out, and naturally knew that that piece of meat wasn¡¯t very tasty.

    ¡°As a noble knight, sir rk must not wish to eat something that others have bitten before. I understand. Master Gene, how about you take this piece?¡± Han Shuo had an expression of I-gotchu-man as he first insinuated that rk was disdaining Fanny, and then passed on the hot potato to Gene.

    Gene started to panic after Han Shuo¡¯s words. Heughed shamefacedly and said, ¡°No, absolutely not. How could I take something from sir rk? Besides, this piece is mine, I¡¯ll go off and eat it now.¡±

    Vague traces of sweat apparent on his brow, Gene spoke frantically and hastily took the other piece of meat that was likewise half-cooked and half-raw. He headed towards Bach and Be¡¯s direction as if he was escaping, obviously intending to recook the meat.

    ¡°Mater Gene is such a humble person! Looks like this piece of meat is still yours to dispose of!¡± Han Shuo smiled dumbly and nned to forcefully give that piece of meat to rk.

    rk had a pathetic expression on his face as he smiled with a wry smile, and then suddenly spoke as if he¡¯d abruptly remembered something. ¡°I forgot something, please excuse me.¡±

    rk made like Gene as soon as he¡¯d finished speaking and left like he was escaping something. He had disappeared without a trace in the blink of an eye.

    ¡°Bryan, you¡¯ve be more and more naughty. No wonder Gene and Bach have been gued with diarrhea the past couple of days. You were behind it weren¡¯t you?¡± Fanny found it both maddening and funny as she red at Han Shuo and lectured him.

    ¡°You¡¯ve only realized it now Master Fanny? Bryan truly is different from how he was before, and has be naughtier than all the other students.¡± Lisa chuckled lightly and then looked at Fanny oddly. ¡°Right, Master Fanny you obviously know that Bryan is purposefully pranking them, why don¡¯t you stop him?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s because I also feel that rk and Gene are too irritating. They hover around me and chatter incessantly, keeping up a constant racket and drag me into it. It¡¯s such a bore, but rk has helped us out a lot and is truly a good person!¡± Fanny gave an evilugh as she exined to Lisa.

    Han Shuo gloated inwardly when he heard the first part of Fanny¡¯s words, but that gave way to anger when he heard Fanny say rk was a good person.

    ¡°So that¡¯s the case, hehe. Master Fanny, I know of a spacious pool of water nearby. Its waters are clear, bright and clean. We haven¡¯t bathed or showered in quite a few days, shall we go for a swimter tonight?¡±

    ¡°Lisa, you didn¡¯t like to swim before. Howe you¡¯re suddenly liking swimming these days?¡±

    ¡°Eh... because swimming works out the body!¡± Lisa¡¯s delicate face reddened at Fanny¡¯s question and she responded quickly after turning her head to look at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo¡¯s face wore an odd expression, thinking to himself that although Lisa had seemed indifferent on the surface when he told her about the way to develop her breastsst time, she had taken action secretly. He found it funny, and his understanding of the female mind deepened further.

 Chapter 40: To think that you were this kind of person

    Chapter 40: To think that you were this kind of person

    It was night. The moonlight was cold and clear as it scattered within the vast and boundless Dark Forest. The bright, silver moonlight added a few traces of silence and andfort to the Dark Forest.

    Several crude and simple tents were respectively erected on the soft grass. After experiencing a day¡¯s worth ofbors, the students were tired, holding murmured conversations or meditating. Han Shuo surreptitiously hid behind a towering tree as he chanted an incantation.

    A beam of light shed through thin air as a small skeleton, holding a bone dagger, abruptly materialized. Under Han Shuo¡¯s guidance, it flew soundlessly towards the tent rk was residing in.

    rk¡¯s tent was pitched a bit of a distance away from the students. Although he appeared humble and genteel on the surface, apart from being friendly and genuine with Fanny, his gaze towards the students held a subtle undercurrent of lofty disdain. His tent was alsopletely different from other people¡¯s and was a distance away by himself.

    The little skeleton was agile and its inky-ck form melded with the darkness. It didn¡¯t make a single whisper of a sound as it walked, and had arrived at rk¡¯s tent within roughly ten seconds. The little skeleton slipped inside rk¡¯s tent after Han Shuo¡¯smand.

    A low grunt of pain sounded as rk¡¯s tent spontaneously copsed. The little skeleton figure abruptly dashed out and it fled quickly to the southwest.

    After a cry of pain, rk flew out of his tent in a bedraggled state. He held his longsword in his hand as he gazed around in all four corners, then huffed angrily as it followed in the direction that the little skeleton had taken, muttering strings of low-voiced curses.

    Sess! Han Shuoughed silently.

    Han Shuo cackled evilly as he closely followed in rk¡¯s footsteps. Hidden in the shadows, he wove quickly around the corners of the trees.

    Southwest direction, a spacious pool of water. Strange, curved trees lined the banks. Beneath the light of the bright moon, the clear currents of the pool sparkled with silver color.

    Continuous sshing sounds along with the sounds ofughter came from the surface of the pool, breathing in a few hints of life into the silent pool.

    ¡°Lisa, have you started developing? Your breasts seem to have changedtely?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, Master Fanny, let me tell you something. Swimming can actually erge breasts. I only discovered this secret after trying it.¡±

    ¡°Really?¡± Fanny eximed in astonishment and thenughed involuntary. ¡°No wonder, I was wondering why you suddenly became infatuated with swimmingtely. So this is the reason why. Heh heh, then we should swim longer today.¡±

    ¡°Master Fanny, your breasts are already so well developed... Why would you still care about this matter?¡±

    ¡°Heh, of course. No woman wouldn¡¯t care about this.¡±

    ¡°I see. Hehe, apart from swimming, drinking milk, and massaging during showers can all help breasts be firm and perky. This has been my experience! I¡¯ve been doing thistely and can really feel the changes in my breasts. Master Fanny, you can try too!¡±

    ¡°Ah, Lisa you seem to understand quite a lot now, but your breasts have actually been changing recently, it looks like your methods are effective.¡±

    ¡°But of course. Hehe, you can¡¯t go wrong listening to me.¡± Lisaughed a light, proudugh as she spoke to Fanny.

    At this moment, the sound of footsteps abruptly sounded in the distance. Fanny and Lisa looked at each other and Fanny frowned. ¡°What is that noise?¡±

    Lisa has ducked into the water so that only her head was showing and was equally perplexed. She shook her head and said, ¡°I don¡¯t know, I discovered this area while I was collected firewood earlier today. No one else should know of this ce.¡±

    Fanny and Lisa were a bit surprised and about to leave when the footsteps grew nearer, and a heavily sweating rk burst into view along the pool¡¯s edge. He looked to and fro, surveying the vicinity.

    When rk saw Fanny and Lisa in the pool, all three eximed in shock at the same time. Lisa was utterly difited and hastily hid her body in the pool, pointing a frantic finger at rk and speaking angrily, ¡°Damnit, how could youmit an act like voyeurism as a noble knight!? You¡¯re disgusting.¡±

    ¡°No, this isn¡¯t what you think. I found this ce because I was tracking a monster.¡± rk was extremely upset and rushed to exin.

    ¡°Leave immediately! rk, you have disappointed me greatly. To think that you were this kind of person!¡± Fanny also had a wrathful expression as her facial expression and tone turned frosty.

    ¡°Master Fanny, I really didn¡¯t mean toe here to peep. Please let me exin.¡± rk was sweating profusely as he too hadn¡¯t thought that he would bump into Fanny and Lisa swimming here. He thought it was a bit odd and hastened to exin.

    ¡°Leave, immediately!¡± Fanny and Lisa gasped and screamed in unison as rk was hurriedly exining.

    A resigned and wry smile on his face, rk sighed and slightly bowed at the two from afar. He said apologetically, ¡°My apologies to you both. I will leave immediately. I hope you don¡¯t think that badly of me, I really didn¡¯t mean to.¡±

    rk had a downcast expression and left with a dejected droop to his shoulders when he finished speaking. A round ofints flew out of his mouth as he sighed and moaned that his luck was just too bad.

    Han Shuo¡¯s surreptitious figure materialized from the shadows of the tree after rk had left, and he stuck up his middle finger to the figure walking away into the distance. He cackled as he said in a low voice, ¡°Trying to steal my woman. Go to hell noble knight!¡±

    ¡°It turns out that noble knights also have disgusting hobbies.¡± Lisa was still infuriated and she snorted slightly with a face full of disdain.

    ¡°Men are all the same, noble knights are like this, lowly errand ves are also like this. Only some know how to conceal it and others don¡¯t.¡± Fanny also snorted lightly and said with some emotion.

    ¡°Errand ves? Master Fanny, are you talking about Bryan?¡± Lisa was startled and then seemed to think of something at she stared at Fanny oddly.

    ¡°Eh... no, no. I was just sighing, purely sighing. Heh heh, Lisa don¡¯t imagine things.¡± Fanny was internally startled that she had spilled the beans, and hastilyughed in embarrassment as a cover up after Lisa¡¯s question.

    But Lisa¡¯s face was still full of suspicion after Fanny¡¯s exnation, and her gaze towards Fanny was also a bit strange. She kept murmuring, ¡°Can it really be Bryan?¡±

    Han Shuo had been concealed in the shadow of the trees and watching the two lecherously when he heard their words. His heart jumped, but before he had time to reflect, his eyes suddenly grew wide and his entire being speechless and dumbfounded.

    Fanny had slowly started walking towards the edge of the pool at this time, and the body that had been obscured within the pool started to slowly emerge. The clear, bright moonlight scattered over Fanny¡¯s wless body. Crystalline drops of water on her pure, white skin were like rolling gems beneath the moonlight, lightly traveling past her satin-like body.

    Her upper body, as revealed beneath the moon¡¯s light, was so beautiful that it made Han Shuo dizzy. Her breasts were full and upright, with two mesmerizing spots of blush at the peaks. There wasn¡¯t an ounce of fat on her tightly toned lower body, and her slender arms were as tender as the snow lotus. A head full of beautiful, light-purple locks were scattered messily over her smooth shoulders. She disyed a soul and heart stealing allure.

    The rest of her lower body was immersed in the water starting from her lower abdomen, but under the light of the moon, Han Shuo could still make out sparkling white legs beneath the clear pool waters.

    This was the first time that Han Shuo had seen a naked girl, and such an extraordinary beauty at that. Fanny¡¯s transcendent beauty and perfect figure under the moonlight, with water droplets slowly rolling off of it, caused Han Shuo to be utterly gobsmacked. His entire being immediately sank into a sluggish state.

    A strange sound suddenly traveled into Han Shuo¡¯s ears, and his dumbly staring self suddenly startled awake and started surveying the area.

    A loud, panicked scream emitted from Lisa¡¯s mouth. Lisa was still in the deep waters of the pond and was pointing fearfully behind her. She screamed hoarsely, ¡°Master... Master Fanny, Deepwater Venom Python!¡±

    Fanny nked and turned her head to discover a light-green, spiked back ridge, a five or six meter long enormous python was quickly swimming in from the far reaches of the pool. A savage and merciless light was shing in the python¡¯s dark green eyes, and its heavily fanged mouth spat out dark green smoke as it quickly approached Lisa.

    ¡°Run Lisa! Hurry and run!¡± Fanny¡¯s expression had also changed drastically and she screamed frantically.

    But Lisa had been terror struck. Her originally fast moving figure had slowed down considerably due to the arrival of the Deepwater Venom Python, despite her arms and legs making sshes on the water surface.

    ¡°Master Fanny, wah wah... save me!¡± Lisa¡¯s voice was choked up as she screamed in a panicked frenzy. Her arms and legs moved in unison in a bid to reach the pool banks faster, but the Deepwater Venom Python drew ever closer to her.

    ¡°Damnit, where is that rk now?!¡± Fanny cussed out of character for her, and her perfect body started back, making for Lisa¡¯s direction.

    At this moment, Han Shuo hadpletely recollected himself and gazed at the Deepwater Venom Python that continued to get closer. He hesitated, and then abruptly dashed out of the tree¡¯s shadows. He called loudly, ¡°What¡¯s going on. Eh? Deepwater Venom Python, let me help you.¡±

    The Deepwater Venom Python was a level three magical creature. Not only did its body possess strong attack power, but its mouth could also spit out a poison mist, not to mention its speed and advantages had all been greatly increased because it was still in the water.

    A level four Frost Eagle could only be brought down with herculean effort from everyone. This level three Deepwater Venom Python would be even harder to handle. Even Han Shuo didn¡¯t feelpletely confident, but he couldn¡¯t just stand by and watch Fanny be eaten. He had to rush out even in the face of death.

    ¡°Damnit, screw it!¡± Han Shuo pulled out a dagger and his body shed like lightning through the dark forest as he rushed towards the pool of water.

 Chapter 41: Battling the Deepwater Venom Python

    Chapter 41: Battling the Deepwater Venom Python

    Within the pool, the Deepwater Venom Python caused huge waves and ripples as it swam towards Lisa with a terrifying aura. It became harder for Lisa to escape the more fric she got, and the distance between the two had already shortened to twenty or so meters.

    Fanny had already reached the banks of the pool when she pay no heed to anything as she sshed through the water, rushing quickly towards Lisa like a mermaid. Han Shuo¡¯s speed was even faster. It was like he met no resisting drag in the water as he sped towards Fanny like lightning.

    All of Han Shuo¡¯s bodily functions had far surpassed an ordinary person¡¯s since he started practicing magic. When Han Shuo gave it his all, he immediately demonstrated an incredible energy. He had already arrived when Fanny was approaching Lisa.

    He reached out with both hands without further ado, grabbing Lisa with one and Fanny¡¯s waist with the other as he quickly said, ¡°Let¡¯s go.¡±

    He had no time or spare thought to feel the smooth tenderness of Lisa and Fanny¡¯s bodies at the moment. His only thought under the panicked circumstances was to quickly vacate the area. His two legs quickly moved through the water like swimming fish. Add to that Fanny¡¯s forceful arms and legs, and the three entwined around each other and swam for the banks of the pool, regardless of anything else.

    Except, if it¡¯s only been Han Shuo, he may have really been able to shake off the pursuit from the Deepwater Venom Python. But his speed was greatly affected by the addition of Fanny and Lisa, and it was hard to resume his prior speed. They could only watch as the Deepwater Venom Python grew closer.

    Lisa¡¯s screams and sobs hadn¡¯t stopped for a moment. Even Fanny was powerless in this moment, and her face was filled with shock and desperation.

    In the pool, even summoning dark creatures to do battle wouldn¡¯t be much use. The level three Deepwater Venom Python had umonly thick snake skin. Any ordinary necromancy magic would be unable to stop it. They wouldn¡¯t be able to kill the Deepwater Venom Python with one stroke if they stopped to chant a spell, and they were sure to be tangled up by it and then be eaten without a doubt.

    ¡°Wah wah.... what to do, what to do. Are we going to be eaten by it?¡± Lisa sobbed frantically as her two hands pped the surface of the water with decreasing strength.

    Fanny also didn¡¯t know what to do, and could just watch the Deepwater Venom Python approach ever closer. She couldn¡¯t find a way to hide or escape and could only swim death defyingly.

    A resolute expression appeared on Han Shuo¡¯s face after a moment of hesitation. He grabbed Lisa¡¯s right arm and swung her out with all his strength. Lisa¡¯s naked, charming body shot out from the water and flew three meters through the air, straight for the banks of the pool.

    The left hand that had been wrapped around Fanny¡¯s waist suddenly pressed down on her beautiful buttocks. Han Shuo had already pushed out forcefully before she had a chance to scream, and he gave the fast swimming Fanny a hand. Her speed abruptly picked up as she shot towards to the banks like a spear.

    ¡°Hurry and go!¡± Han Shuo roared explosively and quickly turned his head around, facing down the Deepwater Venom Python alone.

    ¡°Bryan, Master Fanny, you have to save Bryan!¡± Lisa¡¯s deste cry of astonishment sounded out from afar.

    ¡°Hurry and go on shore LIsa. Only then can we help Bryan!¡±

    The look Han Shuo¡¯s face was cold and harsh at this point. He tightly clenched the dagger in his hands and could only watch as the Deepwater Venom Python started tangling around him.

    Surprisingly, Han Shuo didn¡¯t retreat, but moved forward instead. He actually dashed out quickly before the Deepwater Venom Python¡¯s tail had tangled him, and made for the Python¡¯s head.

    Han Shuo knew that as fast as he could swim in the pool, he would still be unable to race against the Deepwater Venom Python. Now that it was tightly against him, wanting to pay attention to nothing else and just seek to escape would be a death sentence. The Python¡¯s skin and flesh were durable and strong, with soft skin and flesh only around its neck. Closebat was the only way to get out of this alive.

    The Deepwater Venom Python most likely didn¡¯t anticipate Han Shuo would attack rather than run, and so when the enormous tail came to tangle him, it only swung around in a ratherrge arc but didn¡¯t touch Han Shuo.

    The dark green eyes shed as the Python seemed to jeer at Han Shuo¡¯s ignorance. A mist of dark green smoke sprayed out directly towards Han Shuo from its heavily fanged, bloodthirsty mouth as it lifted its neck.

    ¡°Bryan, be careful of the smoke it sprays. The smoke has a slow paralysis toxin and will cause your body to stiffen up, and finally be immobile.¡± Fanny called out loudly at this moment to remind Han Shuo to be careful of the dark green poison mist that the Python was spitting out.

    Han Shuo startled in horrified shock as his quickly moving body held a breath and hastily dived into the waters. He used the pool¡¯s clear waters to discern where the Python was and rushed in that direction.

    Avoiding a swing of the Python¡¯s tail again halfway through, Han Shuo directly traveled to the area beneath the Python¡¯s neck. Han Shuo¡¯s body and the dagger in his hand thrust out through the water at the same time, and the dagger shone with a cold light as it traced a silver line through the moonlit sky, stabbing fiercely towards the soft flesh in the Python¡¯s neck.

    The dagger sank up to the hilt with a puncturing sound and blood splurted out afterwards. It was apanied by a ghastly wail from the Deepwater Venom Python as it twisted its neck. Its enormous body started twisting and turning crazily as well.

    Han Shuo was taken aback and quickly yanked out the dagger, pressing down his right palm onto its neck. The red me of the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡± shed once and itnded into the Python¡¯s neck in the blink of an eye.

    The Python became even more berserk after being attacked by the ¡°cial Mystical Spellfire¡±, and it¡¯s deste wails rang continuously. A ball of dark green smoke had started spreading towards Han Shou before he had time to react.

    Strands of strange air substance filtered into Han Shuo¡¯s body through his pores. He felt his entire body suddenly go weak and numb, and even the dagger became as heavy as a thousand tons.

    ¡°Oh my gosh, Bryan¡¯s been hit by the poison mist. What should we do Master Fanny, what should we do?¡± Lisa had already reached the shores of the pool when she saw Han Shuo get sprayed. She called out loudly in great haste.

    The sound of Fanny chanting a spell suddenly rang out at this time. ¡°Oh endless darkness, turn into destructive bone spears, and destroy ording to my will, bone spears!¡± Three cuttingly sharp bone spears materialized out of thin air and sped, with a whooshing sound, towards the Python thrashing madly within the pool.

    Fanny¡¯s bone spears spell was indeed umon. The three bone spears all hit their target, with two of them embedding themselves into the Python¡¯s forehead, causing two flowers of blood to blossom. Thest spearnded in the Python¡¯s mouth, a horrifyingly fanged mouth that had been about to swallow Han Shuo. The spear broke off a few of its sharp teeth, causing the Python¡¯s enormous mouth to rear backwards.

    At this moment, the magical yuan within Han Shuo¡¯s body churned madly, and the sore, numbing feeling vanished immediately without a trace wherever the magical yuan circted to. Previously leaden and lethargic, Han Shuo regained his energy and quickly moved next to the Python after its head was rearing from Fanny¡¯s bone spears. The dagger in his hand stabbed downwards twice like lightning, and then he swam like the devil was behind him and made for the shore.

    The Deepwater Venom Python suddenly gave a miserable, mournful roar as it roiled the waters of the pool so that waves and froth formed. When its head appeared again, Fanny and Lisa could see that its two dark green pupils were all leaking viscous, fresh blood.

    ¡°Oh my gosh! Bryan can still move, and he¡¯s blinded the Deepwater Venom Python! Ahahaha!¡± Lisa was hollering and hopping up on the shore, with the panic and whimpering of the previous second miraculously turning into excited squeals.

    However, due to the Python¡¯s wild frenzy, its enormous tail thrashed chaotically and just so happened to whip Han Shuo. Han Shuo had been moving quickly when his body flew through the air towards the shore after he¡¯d been hit.

    At the same time, Fanny continuously cast necromancy magic, aiming for the weak spots of the Python¡¯s beautiful eyes and neck areas. Having lots its vision, the Python was hard pressed to evade Fanny¡¯s attacks. The vicious wound on its neck and its eyes were repeatedly pierced by the bone spears and it raised an increasingly loud uproar within the pool. But judging from its appearance, it was steadily losing its strength.

    Under its berserk frenzy, the Python didn¡¯t seem to realize that it should escape at this moment, but rather followed the sounds and drew closer to the shore, as if wishing to eat its attackers regardless of all costs. But as its wounds grew bigger, the fric Deepwater Venom Python became drained of its vigor and lost its luster.

    The Python finally fell down listlessly, and Han Shuo¡¯s body slowly floated up to the surface of the water for the first time after he¡¯d fallen in. The clothing around his chest and stomach had ripped apart in many ces, and his right cheek was a fiery red. He¡¯d seemed to have been injured by the Python¡¯s tail whip.

    Lisa had been shouting excitedly and Fanny had been continuously casting magic when they both eximed in shock and abruptly swam towards the center of the pool, paying no heed to the naked state of their bodies.

    The two moved quickly and hastily pulled Han Shuo up onto shore. Han Shuo¡¯s lower abdomen was distended and his cheeks puffed out with water leaking out the sides of his mouth. It¡¯d seemed that he drank quite a bit of the pool.

    Fanny knew a thing or two about rescue measures and immediately ced both of her slender, jade hands onto Han Shuo¡¯s chest. She repeated exerted force andpressed downwards, seeking to expel the pool water that Han Shuo had swallowed. Lisa did the same andrge mouthfuls of pool water were expelled from Han Shuo¡¯s mouth under theirbined efforts.

    ¡°Why isn¡¯t Bryan waking up yet?¡± Lisa¡¯s face was anxious after a while and she looked at Han Shuo with worry.

    ¡°Maybe because he¡¯s drank too much water, and the area around his throat is already blocked. Why don¡¯t you try to breath for him?¡± Fanny looked at Lisa and made this proposal after a bit of thought.

    Lisa blushed and nced at Fanny, ¡°Master Fanny, I don¡¯t really know how, why don¡¯t you do it?¡±

    Fanny halted for a moment and creased her brow with thought. She grit her teeth with resolution and said, ¡°Bryan saved our lives. Forget it, I¡¯ll try for him.¡±

    Fanny bent down as soon as she¡¯d finished talking and, her charming cheeks a path of charming, embarrassed red, moved her delicious, red lips towards Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo had actually woken up a long time ago and patiently held his peace until this moment. His heart thumping loudly and even feeling Fanny¡¯s smooth and tender arms on his chest, Han Shuo¡¯s heart was mad with glee.

    A wisp of light fragrance apanied the creamy sensation, reflecting directly into Han Shuo¡¯s mind. Fanny¡¯s sweet-smelling tongue darted out to separate Han Shuo¡¯s teeth as the two noses touched and lips locked firmly together. Fanny started helping Han Shuo breath.

    A marvelous, soul stealing feeling immediately spread through Han Shuo¡¯s entire nervous system. Han Shuo only felt that this time¡¯s adventure had finally been worth the while and waspletely unwilling to wake up. He carefully savored this moment of incredibly wondrous sensations.

    Fanny sucked in one breath, raised her head to expel it, paused and had been about to continue when her clear eyes absentmindedly took in the strange little tent that had been erected between Han Shuo¡¯s legs.

    Fanny was stunned, nked for a moment and abruptly recollected herself. She gave a high pitched scream and ced her jade hands around Han Shuo¡¯s neck, violently shaking him. She cursed loudly, utterly difited and exasperated, ¡°Damnit Bryan, I¡¯m going to kill you!¡±

 Chapter 42: Erected a small tent

    Chapter 42: Erected a small tent

    ¡°Eh... bleargh, blech...¡± Han Shuo spat out mouthfuls of water as his face turned beet red. He hastily moved Fanny¡¯s clenched hands away from neck, still not sure what was going on. He hurriedly said with a wry face, ¡°Master Fanny, what are you doing? I¡¯m already like this. Can¡¯t you be more gentle?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes suddenly bugged out after saying that and he stared fixedly at Fanny and Lisa in front of him. Their upper bodies were basicallypletely naked. The pure, snow-white expanse were revealed entirely. Fanny¡¯s beautiful twin peaks and Lisa¡¯s initially budding breasts were thus unabashedly utterly exposed to Han Shuo¡¯s eyes at close quarters.

    Dripping-wet, thin lingerie as thin as cicada¡¯s wings covered the two¡¯s most vital area on the lower body. Although he was unable to fully see through, the tantalizing, almost translucent temptation was even more fatal. Han Shuo¡¯s brother had been about to droop down in the shock of being choked, but it now resolutely erected itself again.

    ¡°Aiya, Bryan you¡¯re finally awake. Eh, Master Fanny, why are you treating him like this?¡± Off on the side, Lisa was equally perplexed and she quickly walked over.

    ¡°Look at his lower body. If he¡¯d really fainted, why would his lower body have a reaction?¡± Fanny was irate and spoke to Lisa with a reddened face. She immediately retaliated by randomly pinching and twisting Han Shuo as she cursed in a low voice.

    Han Shuo was immediately dumbfounded by Fanny¡¯s words as his eyes still roved fixedly over the two bodies. Sudden brilliance struck him and he immediately argued, disregarding whether or not his logic was correct. ¡°I was hit by the Python¡¯s venom just now and my entire body went stiff and listless. My lower body was stiff too! How can this be my fault?¡±

    After he¡¯d spoken, Fanny and Lisa looked at each other and suddenly realized that they were still naked. They eximed in surprise and screamed shrilly.

    ¡°Shut up! Stop making excuses. I¡¯ve never heard of anyone with a stiffened lower body after being hit by the Deepwater Venom Python poison mist. Ooh, close your eyes and don¡¯t you dare peek! Lisa, let¡¯s hurry and put our clothes back on before we deal with him.¡± Fanny humphed angrily and hurriedly vacated the scene, screaming along with Lisa.

    Han Shuo immediately shut his mouth and his beady eyes quickly opened when both had turned their backs to rove greedily over Fanny¡¯s well rounded and pert bottom.

    After a moment, a fully-dressed Fanny and Lisa walked furiously over from the distance with both of their cheeks burning red. Fanny sized up Han Shuo with a darkened face, snorting coldly after a while, ¡°Why did you appear here so coincidentally?¡±

    ¡°Eh... I came to collect firewood and happened to hear your screams. That¡¯s why I appeared here to save you without paying attention to anything else. Master Fanny, I¡¯m hurt and I didn¡¯t mean to look at you guys. I¡¯m stiff all over and can¡¯t move. The Python¡¯s tail also whipped me from my chest to my right cheek and it hurts an incredible amount right now. This was all to save you two.¡± Han Shuo said with a pinched face as hey there on his back, his entire body as stiff as a wooden doll with only his mouth and pair of eyes being able to move.

    ¡°Master Fanny, although Bryan is indeed suspicious, but he¡¯s just saved our lives and be like this because of that. Can you let him go?¡± Lisa looked at Han Shuo from afar and flung him a vicious eye roll when she saw that his lower body was still firmly stiff. She spat lightly and only then begged for mercy on his behalf.

    ¡°Lisa, I... I¡¯ve been vited by him!¡± Fanny red at Han Shuo and spoke hurriedly when she saw that Lisa was begging for leniency for him.

    ¡°We¡¯re the only ones that know of this. I won¡¯t say anything, Bryan certainly won¡¯t say anything, so you can just pretend that nothing happened. Eh, he¡¯s also seen my body. Although I hate him too, we can¡¯t very well kill him! He almost lost his life because of us just now.¡± Lisa nked for a moment and finally responded to Fanny wryly after thinking for a moment.

    ¡°I didn¡¯t see anything, I didn¡¯t see anything just now, I promise. Master Fanny please don¡¯t kill me...¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face was full of panic as his eyes moved rapidly, spitting out a string of crazy talk from his mouth.

    ¡°Shut up!¡± Fanny shouted irately. This expression was reced by resignation, and she abruptly stomped her foot after thinking for a while. She gritted her teeth, ¡°This isn¡¯t over yet. You¡¯re injured, so I¡¯ll let you go for now, but I¡¯ll settle this with you sooner orter. We have finished addressingst time¡¯s matter when you¡¯ve... eh. Nothing.¡±

    Fanny suddenly realized that she¡¯d almost let things slip halfway through. Seeing that Lisa was looking at her with a look of suspicion, she hurriedly changed to topic to cover up her slip.

    ¡°Master Fanny, you don¡¯t mean?¡± Lisa looked at Fanny oddly and asked.

    ¡°No!¡± Fanny immediately huffily interrupted Lisa¡¯s words, and thenughed charmingly and said gently, ¡°Bryan kept making mischief inst time¡¯s experiment, that¡¯s why I said I¡¯ll settlest time¡¯s matter with him. Don¡¯t think the wrong thoughts. Isn¡¯t this right, Bryan?¡±

    His eyes moving rapidly, Han Shuo hastened to agree, ¡°Yes, Yes, that¡¯s right.¡±

    ¡°Eh, Lisa you watch Bryan for now. The Deepwater Venom Python is already dead, I¡¯m going to go extract the core from it. Hah, this is a level three magical creature core! We¡¯ll be able to walk and talk proudly when we return.¡± Fanny was a bit afraid to continue to remain here, afraid that she would let something slip again. She hurriedly walked away like she was escaping something. She swam into theke again, but this time she didn¡¯t undress.

    After Fanny had left, Lisa approached Han Shuo and sighed lightly, saying lowly, ¡°Bryan, who would¡¯ve thought that you would be so silly. I know that your death defying battle with the Python this time was all for me. I only half believed your words in the trap, but now after this event, I believe youpletely. Bryan, I¡¯m actually a bad girl and not worth your effort!¡±

    Han Shuo, ¡°....¡±

    Lisa saw Han Shuo stand there dumbfounded and thought that she had correctly guessed Han Shuo¡¯s inner thoughts. She shook her head and clenched her teeth, ¡°Bryan, give up on me while it¡¯s still early. We¡¯re really not suited for each other because the gap between our status and position is simply too great. My family would never approve a rtionship between us. I¡¯m sorry Bryan!¡±

    Han Shuo, ¡°...¡±

    ¡°Bryan, what¡¯s wrong, why aren¡¯t you talking? Are you sad?¡± Lisa maintained a knowing look on her face as she spoke frantically and continued to think that she was being a heartless person.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t know whether tough or cry. As he watched Lisa continue to pay no attention to anything other than herself and carry on speaking those conceited words, he really didn¡¯t how to respond. He finally settled for being in a daze for a while and then shouting in pain, ¡°Stop talking!¡±

    After he paused, Han Shuo that Lisa had been severely frightened. He hastily sighed and spoke with a face of destion, ¡°I understand in my heart. I just wish to look at you from afar and won¡¯t bring you any troubles. Liking someone means that one shouldn¡¯t weigh her down and should wholeheartedly consider all matters for her. Lisa, you don¡¯t have to mind, really. I will take care of myself and silently wish you the best.¡±

    Han Shuo had heard these words from a third rate soap opera before, and he even gave himself goosebumps upon saying them. He thought he was really being a bit too sinister and shameless.

    ¡°I¡¯ve never heard anyone say such nice things, wah wah... I¡¯m sorry Bryan!¡±

    Contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, Lisa actually burst out in low sobs after she heard his words. Her tears flowed down without pause. It¡¯d seemed that she¡¯d been greatly moved to pieces by his words.

    Fanny returned, dripping wet, from the pool at this time. When she heard Lisa crying, Fanny¡¯s face changed as she red viciously at Han Shuo. She said, ¡°Bryan, haven¡¯t you bullied us enough?¡±

    ¡°Wah wah... Master Fanny, it has nothing to do with Bryan. I was just a bit scared after recalling what had happened just now. It had nothing to do with him, really!¡± Lisa hastily wiped away her tears, forced a smile onto her face, and exined when she heard Fanny berate Han Shuo.

    Looking at Lisa in confusion, and then looking at Han Shuo, who hadn¡¯t moved an inch and was still lying therepletely frozen, Fanny snorted lightly and said, ¡°He wouldn¡¯t dare bully you anymore.¡±

    Fanny¡¯s clothes were tightly stered to her perfect body as she¡¯d emerged from theke. Although nothing could be seen, those vivacious curves were still a feast for Han Shuo¡¯s eyes. He tutted in appreciation inwardly. Fanny not only possessed beautiful and striking features, but her body was a crime of utmost temptation.

    ¡°This is a bit odd, the Deepwater Venom Python was burnt to a soggy mess from its neck to its head. I wonder what happened? It looks like this Python died so quickly, not because of my magic, but because of the burnt mess within its head, which is weird because my bone magic doesn¡¯t have the amazing effect of making someone¡¯s body burned up from the inside. What is going on Bryan?¡± Fanny sized up Han Shou and asked oddly.

    Laughing dryly, Han Shuo said hastily, ¡°Who knows? I only stabbed it a few times and don¡¯t have the kind of magic or fighting aura for it to burn up from inside. It¡¯s no use looking at me.¡±

    ¡°Is that really the case? Why do I think you¡¯re very suspicious?¡± Fanny frowned and her beautiful eyes sized up Han Shuo as she spoke with a voice thick with suspicion.

    ¡°Eh, whatever you want to think. I¡¯d love to have such wonderful magic and fighting aura though, but too bad I just don¡¯t have the strength!¡± Han Shuoughed loudly and said with a bit of a self deprecating tone.

    The magic that he was practicing was something that shouldn¡¯t exist in this world. This was a secret that he would never tell anyone else, even under pain of death.

    ¡°Master Fanny, you must be thinking too much or saw incorrectly. Your eyes don¡¯t work too well sometimes. Bryan just saved us, so why would he lie to us. Besides, if he was so strong, he would¡¯ve long since stopped being an errand ve.¡±

    ¡°Perhaps.¡± Fanny smiled slightly, nodded her head and then said gleefully. ¡°I¡¯ve got the magical creature core. Come, we can go back to the tents now. This swim was quite thrilling, but we made out like bandits by getting our hands on a level 3 core!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, can you move now? Do you want me to get some of the male students to carry you back?¡± Lisa looked at Han Shuo and asked with some worry.

    ¡°ording to my knowledge, the poison mist of the Deepwater Venom Python only temporarily paralyzes enemies in order to facilitate eating themter. It¡¯s been so long. Bryan, you should be fine by now?¡± Fanny huffed angrily and rolled her eyes at Han Shuo in a bad temper, speaking with a cold expression.

    Han Shuo eximed in surprise upon hearing her words. ¡°Ah, that¡¯s so true! I can move fully now. Let¡¯s hurry and go back?¡±

    Lisa started, then looked at Han Shuo and also spoke with a bit of anger. ¡°Bryan, you could move a long time ago right?¡±

    Han Shuo spoke seriously without a trace of awkwardness. ¡°No no, I only knew I could move after I heard Master Fanny¡¯s words. Let¡¯s go... let¡¯s go. They¡¯ll be worried if we¡¯re anyter.¡±

    He abruptly stood up after speaking without waiting for Fanny and Lisa¡¯s responses. He walked speedily and headed straight to where the students had pitched their tents.

    ¡°Damnit, he¡¯s definitely been pretending all along. I¡¯ve found out by just testing him. Bryan, stop right there! You haven¡¯t heard the end of this!¡± Fanny was infuriated and she chased after Han Shuo, pulling Lisa along in her wake.

 Chapter 43: Reborn

    Chapter 43: Reborn

    Han Shuo whizzed all the way back and suddenly detected that Gene hadn¡¯t gone to bed yet when he returned to the campground. He was sitting outside his tent instead, bored to death.

    ¡°Eh, Bryan. Have you seen Fanny or Lisa?¡± Gene immediately stood up and asked when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s footsteps.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said faintly, ¡°I did. Master Fanny and Lisa will be back shortly. Master Gene, why haven¡¯t you gone to sleep yet?¡±

    ¡°Oh, because rk suddenly left for some business. He asked me to give Fanny his apologies. Hah, that rk left without giving a reason. How baffling.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts raced after hearing Gene¡¯s words, and he immediately understood that rk must have left abruptly because he knew that he would be unable to exin his actions for bumping into and angering Fanny and Lisa at the pool.

    ¡°I see. Master Gene, I still need to collect a few things from nearby. When Master Fanny and Lisa return, please tell them that I¡¯ll return at daybreak.¡± Han Shuo quickly headed south after he¡¯d spoken, not paying attention to whether Gene had agreed to pass along his message or not. He vanished without a trace in the blink of an eye.

    Although Han Shuo¡¯s body wasn¡¯t stiff and drained of energy, he was still feeling the effects of the Python¡¯s tail whip. His body was truly injured, and he knew that Fanny and Lisa were bound to nag him for a while when they returned. This way, he¡¯d be unable to use his magical yuan to repair his body. He therefore decided to temporarily avoid the situation and wait until morning. Their tempers would mostly be mollified by then, and there shouldn¡¯t be anything major by that time.

    There was a towering tree to the south with a thick branch heavily forested with twigs and leaves about ten meters from the ground. Han Shuo sat down Indian style and was deep in concentration, coalescing the magical yuan to repeatedly strengthen his body.

    Time flew by unknowingly, and the slight aches in Han Shuo¡¯s body faded away beneath the cirction of the magical yuan. Every inch of skin, flesh, tendon, and bone in his body felt like it was filled with surging strength.

    Han Shuo had sank into the passive demonic mental state when a faint sliver of pain started emanating from his mind and gradually spread throughout his entire body. A sudden onught of pain apanied it, as an agony ten times stronger than that pain roared to life and caused Han Shuo to immediately cry out.

    Explosive pilip sounds rang out from within his body apanying his pain-filled roars. Faint, murky strands of air started rising from Han Shuo¡¯s pores along with these sounds, andyers of ripples swam along the surface of his body, as if someone had thrown a rock into water. When his pores had finished emitting the murky air and harmful matter within his body, a misty cloud of ck splendor faintly surrounded his body.

    This situation sustained for who-knew-how-long. Han Shuo only felt the pain all over his body suddenly vanished without a trace, and he dropped down from the ten meter high branch with a sharp crack. His body was scarily agile and nimble.

    Sess! He had finally sessfully broken through the first demonic ¡°solid¡± realm. From now on, his body had been reborn. Whether it was strength, pliability, or toughness, his body now far outstripped that of ordinary people. After surpassing the most basic ¡°solid¡± realm, Han Shuo¡¯s effort in future training would be halved, but would be double in effectiveness.

    A sudden thought struck him and his magical yuan circted freely, meeting no obstructions. Not only could it effortlessly travel throughout his four limbs, chest, and stomach, but the magical yuan could also easily circte to his head. Han Shuo nced at his naked skin and saw that not even a single scar remained from his previously scar covered body. His skin and flesh were clean and supple, and he could clearly feel that his height had increased another one or two centimeters when he moved his body.

    He lifted his head to look at the sky and saw that it was still deep night. Han Shuo was reveling in the joy of new life in the moment as he continuously circted the magical yuan all over his body, excitedly feeling out every inch of change.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo¡¯s mind raced as he remembered the handbag and jade box he carried around with him. Last time he¡¯d used the bizarre object within the jade box to mediate and train his mental strength, he had almost had all his mental strength sucked away instead. It was only when the magical yuan had flowed into his brain that he had found a way out of danger and emerged with great rewards instead.

    Now that he had broken through the ¡°solid¡± realm, Han Shuo could freely deploy the magical yuan at his will andmand it to flow to any part of his body, including the most difficult to reach part, his brain. Recalling the enormous rewards that he¡¯d gained previously, Han Shuo found it hard to repress the desires in his heart. He immediately sat down, crossing his legs, and took out the bag he always kept on him.

    When he opened the box, the ball that appeared like an eyeball was still as strange and sinister as he remembered. When he focused his mental strength and slowly started coalescing it into the round ball, the same thing that uredst time happened again. The ball instantly emitted a hazy light green aura, and the drop of blood inside gave one a heavy, ufortable feeling.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength was sucked away like a whale drinking in water, and it flowed quickly into the round ball within the jade box. The pain in Han Shuo¡¯s mind increased as his mental strength continued to be siphoned away.

    Finally, just when he thought that his mind would explode, his thoughts moved and the magical yuan pooling in his lower abdomen suddenly flew up into his mind. There was a loud roaring sound in his mind as increased pain caused him to roar out loudly in pain. At the same time, his surging mental strength returned with the force of leveling mountains and draining seas, instantly filling Han Shuo¡¯s mind.

    Han Shuo abruptly sank bonelessly to the ground and panted heavily. His entire mind felt groggy and stuffy, and this condition maintained itself for a while. He slowly returned to normal and only felt that his mental strength had indeed increased significantly. Han Shuo stared involuntarily at the round ball with glee.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo saw that strands of green light had started rippling through the ball. These strands of light wove together continuously, as if a pen was tracing out a drawing. A picture formed in the midst after a short while ¡ª a strange, grey castle.

    Briefly revealed by the green lines, it suddenly vanished without a trace leaving only the drop of red in the center shed continuously as it actually formed the shape of a red arrow. It froze momentarily, then pointed south.

    What did this mean? What did it mean when the arrow pointed south?

    Han Shuo was momentarily dumbfounded as he gazed at the spot of red in the center, lost in thought. His thoughts churned madly and finally confirmed one thing. The red arrow within the round ball had delineated a direction, like an objective to travel to.

    He hesitated and gazed at the sky as his curiosity had been thoroughly piqued. He finally grabbed the jade box and quickly ventured south, in the direction that the jade box was pointing at.

    Throughout this entire process, Han Shuo could feel that the further south he traveled, the more he heard sounds fromrge magical creatures. Dangers abounded along his way and he was quite wary. His eyes asionally flicked to the round ball and noticed that the arrow continuously changed direction, as if pointing out the correct path for Han Shuo.

    He proceeded in this way for quite a while when the red arrow in the round ball he grasped finally disappeared. The red blood-like drop reappeared, and the green light emitted from the ball became stronger. Strong magical pulses travelled out from the ball.

    Han Shuo stopped, surveyed his surroundings and realized that this was amon area filled with weeds, shrubbery and towering trees. An unknown, enormous tree with twisted, entwined branches was present not too far off, and its strange shadow, illuminated by moonlight, appeared like that of a monstrous creature¡¯s on the ground.

    Han Shuo concentrated his attention and suddenly noticed something strange. In other parts of the Dark Forest, sounds from bugs would carry on no matter how quiet it was, but upon reaching this ce, Han Shuo realized that this ce was almost destely quiet. There wasn¡¯t a single insect¡¯s call and not a hint of life to be found.

    Bizarre. Han Shuo felt that the entire area was filled with a strange aura, hidden under an ordinary exterior. This aura felt familiar and friendly to Han Shuo, as if he¡¯d long since grown used to some things, but upon thinking carefully, Han Shuo realized that he had no idea what was going on.

    Just as Han Shuo waspletely lost and deep in thought, the round ball within the jade box suddenly levitated into the air as the ball used the green light on the surface to draw beams of magical lines through the air. Han Shuo could feel the strong magical pulses through the air, and that they were growing stronger the more the ball¡¯s green light shone out.

    After Han Shuo had noticed, he suddenly realized that the area bathed in the green light underwent changes that made his eyes bug out and his tongue tied. The weeds and shrubs on the ground would suddenly vanish without a trace whenever the green light touched it, to change into dry, grey, and dusty earth with piles of stark, white bones piled on it.

    The leafy boughed, towering trees on the side also underwent eerie changes under the green light, changing into the skeletons of monstrous, dead creatures. If Han Shuo¡¯s memory served him right, those enormous skeletons were the legendary bone dragons, the most terrifying kind of dark creature.

    Death. An empty, deste wilderness morphed into an eternalnd of death under the rays of the green light.

    There was an enormous grey castle half floating in air, half buried underground. A few odd, sharp spikes encircled the castle as numerous pictures of dark creatures were carved on the castle walls.

    Han Shuo looked on for a while,pletely gobsmacked. He finally muttered to himself in astonishment. ¡°This... is this the legendary cemetery of death?¡±

 Chapter 44: Cemetery of Death

    Chapter 44: Cemetery of Death

    The cemetery of death was a legendary, sacred ground for necromancers, and the lofty hope that the band had held upon traveling to the Dark Forest. Han Shuo fully observed his surroundings, connecting it to Fanny¡¯s previous descriptions. He could be certain that this was the legendary cemetery of death.

    No wonder Han Shuo had vaguely felt something so familiar about this ce earlier. This was because Han Shuo also practiced necromancy magic. The strong pulses of death magic in this area, including the smell given off by the illusioned white bones, were all things that Han Shuo were exceedingly familiar with.

    He gazed all over his surroundings, taking everything in. Han Shuo frowned as he thought, everyone who has ever seen the cemetery of death has ended up dead. Now that I stand here, do I go in or not?

    The cemetery of death was a ce in which mighty necromancers studied necromancy, back when this magic was at its peak. All the necromancers hadter died, and the cemetery of death had vanished without a trace.

    However, since this cemetery of death had been a ce of research for those necromancers, some secrets of necromancy must surely exist here. This was a huge temptation for a rookie like Han Shuo, someone who had just entered the halls of magic. This forced Han Shuo to seriously consider whether or not to take on this adventure.

    After a while, Han Shuo walked towards the direction of the cemetery and set foot into the piles of stark white bones, a firm resolution evident on his face. When he¡¯d taken a few steps forward and set foot into the inner parts of this area, the dark green, round ball hung high in the air suddenlynded back into the jade box, and the green light that bathed the surroundings vanished with a trace.

    Han Shuo started as he looked around him, stunned. The outskirts, that his eyes had just passed over, had changed again. It had been restored to the sight that he had first seen when he had arrived. Only the surroundings areas around the cemetery to the ground underneath Han Shuo¡¯s feet were the same scene of death and gloom.

    Looking at the round ball in his hand, Han Shuo understood that this ball was a pivotal item to enter the cemetery of death. It seemed to be able to open the doors to the cemetery. The entire cemetery was shrouded by a concealing field. No one would be able to detect anything out of the ordinary if they looked in from the outside, nor would this ce elicit anyone¡¯s attention.

    However, one would be able to reveal the true nature of the cemetery of death with this round ball and envelop the entire cemetery under a veil of silence and destion.

    The stark white bones creaked beneath his feet. The sound suddenly broke through the still and lonely air, giving Han Shuo the creeps. It was a good thing that he had just sessfully broken through the ¡°solid¡± realm, giving him some courage from who-knew-where. He actually walked headlong towards the cemetery of death without paying heed to anything else.

    After a while, he finally stood in front of the cemetery. There was a circr moat in front of the door and inky-ck water flowing in it. A bridge made of ck lines and white bones hung in abject loneliness over the moat.

    Without hesitating, Han Shuo¡¯s hands tightened around the jade box, that held the ball and stepped slightly apprehensively onto the bone bridge, slowly walking towards the doors to the cemetery of death. The bridge swayed, throwing his body off bnce. He didn¡¯t know what was in the moat below, but a single nce was enough to raise his hair. He somehow felt that whatever was in the still, inky ck waters of the moat was highly dangerous.

    When Han Shuo walked onto the bridge, the round ball within the jade box started emitting the strange green light again. This seemed to be some miraculous medicine for motion sickness as the wobbly bridge stopped swaying as soon as the green light shed out. The ck lines that had once beenrge gaps in the bridge immediately solidly bridged the space between the bones.

    Han Shuo finally made it to the door. There were skeletons of two enormous evil knights and their steeds in front of the two great, grey doors that were made of unknown material.

    Evil knights were dark creatures that possessed extremely strong battle power. Necromancers who weren¡¯t at archmage level shouldn¡¯t even entertain the idea of of summoning evil knights. From therge skeletons of the two evil knights in front of the doors and the shape of their battle steeds, Han Shuo could vaguely tell that these two evil knights were the cream of the crop.

    There wereplicated and detailed magical patterns on the two grey doors. A round slot was present in the center, where the two doors intersected. The shape of that slot looked like a key that would open the doors.

    At this moment, the dark green ball that Han Shuo clutched in his hands suddenly shot out a beam of green light, aiming straight for the round slot in the middle of the doors. Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts raced as he immediately understood what was going on. He raised the jade box without hesitation and brought the ball closer to the slot, slowly inserting it.

    In the entire process, Han Shuo took pains to ensure that his hand wouldn¡¯t touch the round ball, because he understood that this ball was no simple object. He wasn¡¯t sure if some undesired changes would ur if skin and flesh touched it, so he therefore avoided touching it with his bare hands as much as possible.

    When the ball had been inserted into the slot, a roar sounded out as the doors abruptly opened with a creak. The slot automatically split open with the opening of the doors, and the round ball that had been inserted in it remained in the jade box with no changes.

    Hazy gloom and dust from the inside drifted out, apanying the opening of the doors, causing Han Shuo to cough a few times before calming himself down and observing what was inside.

    There was arge hall within the cemetery of death and six rooms with closed doors around the hall. The entire hall was quite vast and the ceiling was extremely high. It was about the size of a basketball field, and there was a magical matrix in the shape of arge, six-pointed star in the center. It was about 80% to 90% simr to the one that Han Shuo had taken from the Academy to the city of Zajoski, and there were ancient, quaint magical pictures drawn in the center.

    Apart from the six-pointed star matrix, the hall was bereft of anything else. There were only a few magical pirs that were supporting the building, and a few broken pieces of bone in the corner.

    There was a thick scent of decay in the air and Han Shuo waited for a while at the door, only slowly walking in when he felt that the scent had slowly started dispersing through the open doors.

    Apart from the six pointed star matrix, there was only the lofty ceiling within the hall, plus the six room doors that the matrix points were pointing at. He first looked throughout the hall and didn¡¯te up with anything valuable. Han Shuo then turned his attention to the six rooms with the closed doors.

    One, two, three...

    Han Shou was still empty handed after he having gone through all six room. From the shape of the six rooms, they were merely six warehouses with nothing inside them now.

    He returned to the great hall and started recollecting what Fanny had saidst time. Apart from the general outward appearance, Han Shuo gradually remembered that only a small portion of the cemetery of death was revealed above ground. Most of it was buried deep underground, and the true secret would surely lie in the depths of the cemetery.

    Except, Han Shuo hadn¡¯t seen any tunnels or stairs leading down after he¡¯d gone through the great hall and six rooms. This greatly befuddled him and he sank into deep thought again.

    After a while, Han Shuo still felt that the round ball within his hands was the key. He immediately stood up again and circled the hall again, including the six rooms in his inspection.

    Finally, Han Shuo discovered another slot in the corner of one of the rooms. He was overjoyed and another set of rumbling sounded out when he inserted the round ball into the slot. A dark tunnel suddenly split open the walls of the room, and rows of six silver sticks, made from strange material that was neither stone or wood, wereid on the first step of the tunnel. There seemed to be connection points on both ends of each stick, as if the six sticks could be assembled.

    There was only a thin piece of paper apart from the six sticks. On it, ancient magical symbols were used to write a few hastily scribbled words. Han Shuo took the thin sheet of paper.

    When he¡¯d carefully read the magical words, Han Shuo understood that these six sticks could form a diagram with a six-sided star and be used in direct transportation with the magical matrix in the hall. He also clearly understood that if one had insufficient mental strength, one would be unable to venture further into the depths.

    Apart from that, Han Shuo was unable to obtain any other useful information from the thin sheet of paper.

    Thinking briefly, Han Shuo put away the six magical sticks and creased his brow as he started walking down the tunnel. An invisible field suddenly appeared as green light rippled, abruptly bouncing him off. Han Shuo only felt that his mind hurt abnormally throughout the process, and internally reflected that the words on this thin sheet of paper were true. His mental strength must be too weak and was being prevented from descending any further into the depths of the building.

    Cursing lowly, Han Shuo stayed in the room and connected the six magical sticks ording to the instructions recorded on the paper and formed a six pointed star on the floor. He then stood in the center of this mini matrix, activated it with his mental strength, and Han Shuo appeared in therge matrix in the center of the hall with a sh of white light.

    Repeating the same method, Han Shuo infused the transportation matrix in the hall with his mental strength and returned to the same room after activation, appearing within the small, six pointed matrix

    His brow creasing in deep thought, Han Shuo understood that he would be unable to enter the tunnel and explore the cemetery of death for the time being. It was a good thing that he had gained the six magical sticks and the round ball that allowed him to convenientlye here no matter where he was. This filled his heart with glee as he¡¯d already started thinking of this ce as his secret base.

    Since he would be temporarily unable to discover the secrets of this ce, Han Shuo had no desire to continue to stay. After thinking for a while, he rolled up the six magical sticks and ced them on his back, put away the piece of paper into his pocket, and walked out of the cemetery of death in the same manner of holding the jade box.

    When Han Shuo had safely walked out, he looked back and realized that the scene was the same as when he¡¯d walked in. The growth of tall weeds, shrubs, and towering trees remained unchanged. His surroundings were still quietly deste.

    A small, satisfied smile appeared on his face. Han Shuo understood that this time¡¯s outing to the Dark Forest hade to an end here.

    He had stumbled upon the legendary cemetery of death by pure, dumb luck. The secrets of this cemetery also belonged to him and no one else, including the necromancy students and teachers.

 Chapter 45: Making a move when he should make one

    Chapter 45: Making a move when he should make one

    After emerging from the cemetery of death, Han Shuo returned along his original path, but the sky hadpletely brightened halfway on his journey back. When he returned back to the original camping grounds, ording to the way in his memory, he found that the necromancy students had long since moved on.

    Just as Han Shuo was about to curse loudly, he suddenly took in the appearance of his surroundings. He discovered that the ashes in the area with the bonfire didn¡¯t look like they were fromst night, but much more like they had been there for a few days.

    Han Shuo¡¯s tent area had been filled with many resources, but now nothing remained. Only a few rocks were piled up in a triangr formation.

    His interest piqued, Han Shuo quickly walked to the tent area. He took out his dagger and carefully flipped through the center of the stones, retrieving a piece of yellow paper after a while.

    ¡°Bryan, on the second day of your departure, we found traces of the two man-eating monsters nearby. We were worried that the man-eating monsters would seek revenge and decided not to wait for you. When you see this note, return to the academy along the original way. Perhaps we will meet halfway. Hope you are safe and sound, Fanny.¡±

    Fanny had left the note. Han Shuo whapped his head after reading it and silently said, ¡°Oh no!¡±. After reading the note, Han Shuo understood that much time must have unknowingly passed by while he was practicing magic, and not merely just a day.

    It looks like the two man-eating monsters had appeared and caused Fanny and the others to panic. Add to that she was already deep in the southern territory of the Dark Forest and without rk¡¯s protection, they had no choice but to resign themselves to return along their original path.

    Currently, Han Shuo¡¯s ve status still had not been resolved, and the woman he wanted was still within the Babylon Academy of School and Magic, along with some tomes of necromancy magic that he wanted still wanted to learn. He would be unable to leave the Academy in the near future.

    With the six magical sticks, Han Shuo coulde and go from the cemetery of death at his leisure. He could absolutely use the transportation matrix to make the cemetery his personal territory after he returned to the Academy. The entire southern portion of the Dark Forest would be his training fields in the future. Whether it was magical yuan or magic spell training, half the amount would lead to double the effectiveness in a ce like this.

    Musing for a while, Han Shuo followed the instructions left on Fanny¡¯s note and followed the original road, swiftly moving towards the outskirts of the Dark Forest.

    Although he traveled without rest for a day, Han Shuo actually didn¡¯t feel tired at all. Moving through the winding and bumpy paths of the Dark Forest, Han Shuo¡¯s speed was as fast as lightning, like a magical creature hunting down its prey.

    He neared an area of randomly scattered rocks and shrubs around dusk. This was an area where they had camped before. The sounds of metallic shes traveled to him from afar.

    Han Shuo was startled, thinking ¡®Could it be that Fanny and everyone else are under attack by the man-eating monsters?¡¯ When he thought of this, his speed picked up and he abruptly flew towards the area of rocks and shrubs.

    Along the way, many forest trolls with glistening green skin, towering bodies, grimacing faces, and wielded knives or studded clubs repeatedly attacked Han Shuo. He easily evaded all of them.

    Forest trolls were a race within the Dark Forest that were mortal enemies with the elves. The elves treated them as marauders of the forest and continuously attacked them.

    Within the Dark Forest, the forest trolls were even more frightening robbers than the man-eating monsters. Not only did they adhere to a strict code of conduct, but they also divided themselves ording to methods employed by mankind into warriors, hunters, and even priests that could use some simple magics.

    It was said that the forest trolls were evolved from nts and trees. They held high intelligence, simr to humans, and enjoyed some unique advantages within the Dark Forest. They leveraged these advantages to wantonly plunder the resources of other races, including the cargo of some traveling merchants. They were infamous bandits and robbers like the man-eating monsters.

    Han Shuo listened closely to the sounds of fighting and quickly darted in the direction they came from. Along the way, some of the forest troll hunters threw out long spears, and they flew towards Han Shuo¡¯s spine with a whooshing sound. Han Shuo¡¯s fives senses were exceedingly sensitive as he ran. As his ears twitched, he changed the direction of his body a few times and easily evaded the long spears that had been thrown.

    Several forest troll warriors holdingrge, sharp axes yelled loudly as they rushed towards Han Shuo, but before they had reached him, Han Shuo had already agilely dashed past them and continued towards the center of the action.

    After ten or so seconds of extremely fast sprinting, Han Shuo had finally made it to the thick ofbat. He saw ten or so people wielding longswords, defending themselves against the forest troll attacks. Their dress clearly signified them as part of a mercenary band. They all looked like they had suffered some sort of injury.

    There were about ten or so forest trolls surrounding them. Troll warriors handled the closebat up in the front, while about ten troll hunters continuously threw out long spears. The final five troll priests cast simple healing magics and fire of the soul to enhance body durability, healing the warriors¡¯ and hunters¡¯ injuries while increasing their vitality.

    Judging from this scene, the fight had been going on for a while. The battle strength of the band of roughly ten humans was also extraordinary, but it was a pity that the forest trolls held the strength in numbers, and they had missile fighters in the form of the troll hunters, as well as the healing-type troll priests. Thebination of these three matched up against a mercenary band of only warriors. Add to that the forest trolls¡¯ advantage in strength, it was obvious that they held the absolute advantage.

    A short, stocky fatty, with a face full of blubber, was behind the mercenaries. His yellow bean-like little eyes moved swiftly as he cursed loudly. He seemed to be searching for a way out.

    So it wasn¡¯t Fanny and them... looks like this is nothing to do with me. Han Shuo thought as he immediately put the events of this tableau out of his mind. He had no thoughts of joining the fray and helping, and was intent on simply bypassing these people and continue on his path to exit the Dark Forest.

    However, even though Han Shuo had no intention of lending a helping hand, these forest trolls didn¡¯t seem to want to let him go. A couple particrly strong and fierce troll warriors, who were out in the front, had already raised theirrge battleaxes and were rushing towards Han Shuo. A few sharp spears in flight also apanied them.

    ¡°Sorry, I¡¯m just passing by and will leave immediately. Continue robbing them. It¡¯s nothing to do with me!¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t want newplications to arise, so when he saw the troll warriors rush towards him, he yelled loudly and tried to leave and avoid them.

    ¡°Humans are the most devious and evil of all races. Kill him.¡± Standing beside the troll priests on the outside, the forest troll leader of this operation suddenly screamed harshly with themonnguage nguage of humans) of the Continent.

    The troll warriors had paused briefly upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, but lost their hesitation when hearing their leader¡¯s words and came rushing over with axes upraised.

    Damnit! They were looking for death! Han Shuo was also a bit hacked off. He had just evaded the throws of the long spears when the tall, bulky troll warriors rushed over with their battleaxes. They were obviously nning on also taking care of him along with the others.

    Wrapping his hand around a long spear beside him, Han Shuo pulled upwards and grasped the spear in his hand. He didn¡¯t wait for the forest troll warriors to get closer before he jumped upwards. The spear in his hand was so fast that it was like lightning piercing through the air. The spear first pierced through the chest of a troll warrior and also strung up the warrior that was close behind it.

    The two troll warriors only had time to emit two ghastly screams before they died instantly when the spear impaled them. Han Shuo randomly grabbed one of the battleaxes that one of them had wielded and yelled loudly, ¡°Can¡¯t me me if youe looking for your own deaths.¡±

    After the matter with the man-eating monstersst time, Han Shuo was no longer timid nor did he waste time hesitating when it came to killing someone. He also somehow felt vaguely excited.

    Han Shuo knew that mercy or pleas would be absolutely useless with these bandits and robbers. Only cold and cruel methods would be able to shock and awe them. The more timid and cowardly you were, the more they would act without reservation. Therefore, Han Shuo had acted extremely cruelly just now, directly using violent killings to face them.

    Indeed, after Han Shuo had disyed his brutal methods, panicked expressions appeared on the glistening green skin of the other four forest trolls that had followed their brethren¡¯s charge. They retreated quite a few steps backwards in cowardice. Even the leader of the forest trolls looked at him with some horror, and an apprehensive expression appeared on his face.

    ¡°Brave warrior, please rescue me!¡±

    At this moment, the short fatty, that the mercenaries shoved to the back for protection, suddenly cried out with excitement. He looked at Han Shuo with a fervorous expression, as if Han Shuo was his savior.

    ¡°No interest!¡± Han Shuo replied decisively. He picked up the battleaxe with a cold snort and prepared to leave.

    The short fatty immediately lost his calm and cried out wildly upon seeing that Han Shuo was about to leave. ¡°Brave warrior, I am willing to pay you a rich reward if you save me. I promise that you¡¯ll be satisfied!¡±

    Han Shuo had already taken a few steps forward when he heard those words. He suddenly stopped and turned with a faint smile, looking at the fatty. He said, ¡°Noble sir, howrge of a reward are you willing to give?¡±

    The fatty was momentarily stunned, then hesitated. He grit his teeth and stamped his foot, yelling loudly. ¡°Fifty gold!¡±

    ¡°Sorry, please find someone else!¡± Han Shou thought that if it had been before, he probably would have been tempted by the fifty golds. Now that he¡¯d entered the Dark Forest and discovered that his skills were absolutely enough for him to catch Windde Wolves by himself, he no longer felt that fifty gold was enough for him to take the risk.

    Fatty grew anxious seeing that Han Shuo was about to leave. He yelled out again. ¡°Seventy at most!¡±

    Han Shuo continued walking forward without even looking back.

    ¡°80. 100! 120, 150! 200! 200!!¡±

    The moving figure abruptly stopped, Han Shuo suddenly looked back and rushed speedily back. He said, ¡°Alright, 200 it is then. I¡¯ll eat up the loss and count it as making a friend.¡±

    ¡°Oh my word. Two hundred golds! You¡¯re robbing me just like they are. Two hundred gold is enough for more than ten ves. Damnit, get me out of here!¡± Fatty hollered with a look of pain on his face.

 Chapter 46: Little skeleton acts violently

    Chapter 46: Little skeleton acts violently

    When Han Shuo had moved behind the fatty, he discovered that out of the ten or so mercs defending the fatty, the strongest of them were two mid-ranked warriors, followed by six novice warriors and a few other warrior apprentices.

    All of them were covered with wounds, and the two strongest mid-ranked warriors were injured the most heavily to the point where they had almost lost the ability to fight.

    ¡°Master Fabian, we¡¯re the ones who are supposed to protect you!¡± The mid-ranked warrior with blood still bubbling out of a bloody hole in his rib cage grew agitated as he saw Han Shuo quickly draw near.

    ¡°The situation now is quite apparent that you have lost the ability to fight and cannot offer me effective protection. I paid half of the gold to your mercenary band earlier, but because you were unable to escort me back to the Empire, I will not be paying the second half.¡± Fabian said with a face full of resignation and then pasted a warm, slight smile on his face. He bowed slightly and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Mighty warrior, please take me away from here and I will pay you two hundred gold.¡±

    ¡°Alright, give me one hundred gold first and I¡¯ll start immediately!¡± Han Shuo was at ease and also responded with a slight smile.

    At this moment, upon seeing that Han Shuo did not seem to be leaving, the forest troll leader finally screamed with violent rage, ¡°Devious and evil humans, kill them all!¡±

    When the leader¡¯s words sounded, the troll warriors, hunters, and priests that had been standing nkly in their ces called out in the weirdnguage of the forest trolls and rushed over inrge strides.

    ¡°Alright, this is one hundred golds. When you safely take me away from here, I¡¯ll give you the other hundred gold. Damnit, they¡¯reing for us, make your move!¡± Fabian hastily took out a money bag and poured out one hundred gold coins for Han Shuo when he saw that the forest trolls were rushing over with ugly expressions and wielding weapons.

    Having received the one hundred gold coins, Han Shuo suddenly smiled at Fabian. Before Fabian had a chance to react, Han Shuo had swung Fabian onto his back and ripped out a few tattered pieces of gauze from an open pocket. He firmly tied Fabian onto his back without further ado.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, I¡¯ll get you safely away from here. You must hold on tight, if you fall off halfway, you only have only yourself to me!¡± Han Shuo hurriedly instructed as he threw away the battleaxe in his hand, grabbed a new long spear from beside him and abruptly dashed towards the perimeter.

    Seven troll warriors had long since blocked the way, with a few other hunters and priests behind them. They had already thrown out their long spears and javelins with whooshing sounds when they saw that Han Shuo was rushing towards them.

    Even with a fatty on his back, Han Shou still navigated the rough and windy paths with ease. He agilely changed direction and easily evaded several long spears and javelins.

    When Han Shuo had rushed to the side of the seven troll warriors, the long awaiting troll warriors rushed towards him, carrying their battleaxes. He clenched the long spear in his hand tightly as Han Shou rapidly closed the distance, and the spear stabbed towards the chest of the first troll.

    A blood red flower suddenly blossomed on his chest, and the troll warrior fell directly backwards after he shuddered. At this moment, the troll priest towards the back started singing healing and Fire of the Soul magics. A few beams of green light descended onto the troll warriors.

    The troll warrior who had fallen shakily got back to his feet. When the other troll warriors had been enveloped by the magic of the Fire of the Soul, it was as if ayer of metallic skin had been applied to their already tough green skin. Their skin shone with a metallic gleam, followed by simultaneous increases in speed and strength. They rushed at the two with loud wails.

    ¡°Hurry! Hurry and get me out of here!¡± Fabian was frightened out of his wits and started screaming in a panic on Han Shuo¡¯s back.

    His expression unchanged, Han Shuo ignored Fabian¡¯s calls and yells. He abruptly threw out the spear in his hand and impaled the troll warrior, that had just unsteadily mbered to its feet, through the neck and nailed it to the floor. He then pulled out the spears and javelins stuck on the ground and threw them, one by one, towards the priests hiding the back.

    One of the priests didn¡¯t dodge in time and was immediately pierced to death. Another two troll hunters also died due to being impaled from the front. At this moment, Han Shuo randomly pulled out a long spear and started to directly confront the troll warrior in front of him.

    Having had the Fire of the Soul cast on it, all of the troll warrior¡¯s bodily functions had increased significantly. However, Han Shuo¡¯s current condition had had some small achievements in practicing magic, and the toughness and flexibility of his body still far outstripped them. He maneuvered the long spear and flicked out the battleaxes one by one.

    Throughout this process, when the battleaxes had been sent flying from the troll warriors¡¯ hands, they would pull out a javelin or long spear from the ground at the same time, thoroughly blocking the way and entangling Han Shuo. He was up against six with a fatty on his back. Even though he dodged with high speed, he still wasn¡¯t able to fully avoid all the injuries.

    Whenever danger approached him, Han Shuo would very evilly use Fabian on his back as a shield, using thetter¡¯s fat, stocky body to decrease the damage inflicted on his own body.

    ¡°Damnit, you can¡¯t do this, otherwise don¡¯t even expect receive the one hundred gold coins after.¡± Fabian¡¯s butt had been poked by a long spear, and his back had been bloodied by a few javelins. He wailed in continuousints on Han Shuo¡¯s back.

    Unfortunately, Han Shuopletely ignored all of Fabian¡¯sints. He conveniently pulled a long spear embedded in the chest of a troll warrior, and the resulting spray of flesh blood fully sttered all over Han Shuo. Han Shuo¡¯s expression had been cold and vicious to begin with and he looked even more like the reincarnation of a bloodthirsty god with all the blood over him. This momentarily shocked Fabian senseless and he didn¡¯t dare speak further nonsense, merely whimpered and cried on Han Shuo¡¯s back.

    ¡°Kill him, kill him, rush him together!¡± The forest troll leader suddenly exploded into an irate roar upon seeing that Han Shuo had killed quite a few forest trolls. He even pulled out a battleaxe from behind him and rushed over.

    Currently, although Han Shuo wasn¡¯t particrly breaking a sweat facing off against five trolls, it was still exceedingly difficult for him to break through. When the troll leader had finished speaking, even more forest troll warriors rushed over. Han Shuo dodged the crushing blow from a battleaxe and backed up a few steps.

    ¡°Souls of the fallen soldiers, heed the dark herald¡¯s call and reveal your existence!¡± Han Shou spread out his hands and suddenly chanted the spell used for a necromancy summons.

    ¡°Oh, my gosh! You¡¯re also a mage!¡± Fabian had been sobbing in a low voice when he was momentarily shocked by Han Shuo starting an incantation. He looked nkly at Han Shuo with an odd expression and called out weirdly.

    The forest troll leader off in the distance was startled and then increased its speed, screaming loudly, ¡°Kill him, hurry up and kill him.¡±

    A small skeleton that wielded a bone dagger suddenly materialized in front of Han Shuo. Its small, thin body stood there in solitude as its empty eye sockets patrolled the area a bit at a loss.

    ¡°Awe on, just one little skeleton, and such a thin, small one. What use is it?¡± Fabian started wailing with surprise when he saw that Han Shuo had summoned just one skeleton.

    ¡°Wahahaha, so it was just one skeleton. That scared me... kill them all!¡± Upon seeing that it was just one skeleton after being shocked, the forest troll leader immediately jeered loudly and directed the troll warriors to quickly approach.

    Han Shuo¡¯s two eyes were cold as a trace of a mocking smile also made its way to his lips. When the forest troll leader had spoken, he immediately gave the order for the little skeleton to attack.

    When the little skeleton received themand to attack, its small leg bones bent down and then extended, suddenly flying out like a sharp sword. The bone dagger in its hand drew a line of ck light through the empty air as it flew out first. The first troll warrior, that came rushing up, was directly pierced through its forehead like cutting paper, and it fell straight down backwards.

    The little bone dagger didn¡¯t stop after running through the head of the first troll warrior. It whistled through the air ording to the little skeleton¡¯s motions, just like a ghost out for blood. Ear deafening whistling sounds apanied secretive and unpredictable curves as it ran through two more troll warriors with another stroke. When the little skeleton drew close to the troll warriors, the dagger returned automatically back into the little skeleton¡¯s hands.

    The mere loosening of the bone dagger had instantaneously taken the lives of three troll warriors. The previously exceedingly disappointed Fabian and loudly jeering troll leader were both dumbfounded after the little skeleton¡¯s single strike. They stared closely with a face of incredulity at the little skeleton. It was like a tiger that had entered a flock of sheep. The little bone dagger that was grasped tightly in its hand began to nimbly reap the lives of the troll warriors.

    ¡°Oh my goodness! Am I seeing things? Is that really only just one skeletal warrior?¡± Fabian had finally recollected his wits and began to shout excitedly. If it wasn¡¯t for the gauze that hadpletely wrapped around him, he might have even fallen off andnded on the ground in his excitement.

    ¡°Don¡¯t get close to him, everyone stay away from the skeleton and use long spears, javelins, and battleaxes to kill that skeleton.¡± After the troll leader had recovered from its shock, it issued loudmands with a look of fear. Its originally advancing body stopped in its tracks as it began to back up in cowardice.

    The troll warriors, that had been close to the little skeleton, had all retreated. When they had left, long spears, javelins, and even the troll warriors¡¯ battleaxes filled the air and descended upon the little skeleton.

    Han Shuo was startled. As strong as the little skeleton was, it would most likely be hit under such a strong barrage of attacks, b. But he wouldn¡¯t be able to recall it in time even if he started the incantation now. Han Shuo grew anxious and started truly worrying for the little skeleton.

    Except, the little skeleton¡¯s seeding fancy, incredible performancepletely upended Han Shuo¡¯s understanding and knowledge of it.

 Chapter 47: The horror of seven bone spurs

    Chapter 47: The horror of seven bone spurs

    At this moment, the seven bone spurs on the back of the little skeleton suddenly waved in the air with a creaking sound. When the barrage of javelins, long spears, and battle axes were about tond on the little skeleton, the seven bone spurs instantaneously detached themselves from the little skeleton¡¯s spine and whirled into the air, dancing in an interweaving pattern in front of the little skeleton and above its head with great whooshing sounds.

    The little skeleton held its ground, wielding the bone knife, and its little body capered madly, as if it was having an epileptic fit. The seven bone spurs drew mysterious curves through the air, as if manipted into a dance by invisible hands ording to the little skeleton¡¯s will.

    Continuous cracks rang out as the flying javelins, spears, and battle axes were all struck down and broken by the interweaving seven bone spears. Not a single one made it near the little skeleton¡¯s body.

    Han Shuo pinched his own waist and only knew this moment was truly real after he felt pain radiating from his side. Not only could the little skeleton manipte the bone dagger and face off against enemies, but it could even activate the seven bone spurs on its back and make them form such a frightening weapon. This made Han Shuo feel that in this moment, the little skeleton was really quite incredible.

    The ¡°Law of Activating Magic¡± was aw that activated magical treasures to attack. Thest time Han Shuo had bafflingly transmitted those memories to the little skeleton (TL note: chapter 27) , he had seen the little skeleton immediately activate the bone dagger in a flying dance. This was already enough to astonish Han Shuo, but now that the little skeleton could even activate the seven bone spurs on its back, this thoroughly bbergasted Han Shuo.

    In order to activate the ¡°Law of Activating Magic¡±, other than an understanding of thew, a magical treasure, that was tied with the caster¡¯s life and shared one mind with the caster, was also needed in order to call upon thew naturally. It looks like that, unbeknownst to anyone, the seven bone spurs and bone dagger had be the little skeleton¡¯s magical treasures under the constant reforging from the magical yuan.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t have a magical treasure at hand and thus couldn¡¯t activate the ¡°Law of Activating Magic¡±, but who would¡¯ve thought that a dark creature, a little skeleton, was walking ahead of Han Shuo and had been the first to sessfully activate it?

    ¡°Oh my gosh! What, what kind of monster is this little skeleton!¡± Fabian gave an excited and high strung moan, eximing in a low voice while being tongue tied and with eyes bugging out.

    After the flying javelins, long spears, and battleaxes had all been demolished, the forest trolls were alsopletely shocked. Following that, the seven bone spurs, that had been circling the little skeleton¡¯s body, abruptly flew in all directions and pierced through the bodies of the seven forest trolls that were standing there in a stupor.

    ¡°Demon, this is a demon within a skeleton¡¯s body. Run!¡±

    An extremely panicked and horror filled scream rang out from one of the forest troll¡¯s mouth. It was as if this was a signal to retreat, as all the forest trolls started fleeling for their lives in various directions, like lost dogs. Even the forest troll leader had no more crap to say as it ran heedlessly in a sprint for escape.

    A situation¡¯s development was always so out of expectations. Han Shuo had only nned on breaking out and escaping from here and hadn¡¯t reckoned on the fact that the little skeleton¡¯s seven bone spurs would be equipped with such scary power. When Han Shuo had recovered himself, the surroundings were littered with more than ten forest troll corpses and there were no longer any living forest trolls.

    ¡°Hahaha, good boy, good boy!¡± Han Shuo suddenly had an exceedingly proud feeling and couldn¡¯t stop fromughing wildly.

    At the same time, the seven bone spurs whirled in a circle in thin air and then uratelynded back on the little skeleton¡¯s spine. The little skeleton stood up straight afterwards, with bone dagger in hand, and started searching the forest troll corpses with practiced motions. It took everything on the bodies, except for the clothes.

    ¡°Give it to me, the other one hundred gold coins.¡± Han Shuo smiled lightly as he let Fabian down from his body and asked for the remaining payment from a Fabian, that was still shocked silly.

    At this moment, Fabian¡¯s eyes were still patrolling over the little skeleton¡¯s body. He only came back to himself when Han Shuo¡¯s voice sounded. Just as Fabian was about to bring out the gold coins, he suddenly thought of something and red at Han Shuo. ¡°No... you dared to use me as a shield when fighting with the forest trolls just now. Your actions havepletely harmed the position of the employer. How dare you think of the other one hundred gold coins?¡±

    His face suddenly stilling with a cold look, Han Shuo¡¯s frigid gaze roved over Fabian¡¯s body. He randomly plucked a javelin from the ground and asked lightly, ¡°Mr. Fabian, are you trying to cheat me?¡±

    On the other side, the little skeleton, that had been collecting the spoils of war, suddenly stopped as well, its empty sockets looking at Fabian.

    Coldness suddenly emanated throughout Fabian¡¯s body as he heart gave a shudder. He reluctantly squeezed out a smiling face and took a few timid steps backwards, saying, ¡°Joking, it was just a joke. Heh heh, haha, here¡¯s a hundred gold coins and not a single one short. You¡¯ve done great work.¡±

    Han Shuo lightly ¡°hmm¡±ed as he put the one hundred gold coins away without further ther. A feeling of carefree enjoyment rose in his heart as he thought powerful strength is never unfavorable.

    ¡°Noble warrior, the items on the forest trolls...¡±

    ¡°Mine, all mine.¡±

    Han Shuo abruptly cut off his words before Fabian had a chance to finish, matter-of-factly presuming that all those items were his spoils of war.

    Squeezing out a forcedugh, Fabian continued, ¡°Of course, of course they¡¯re all yours. I mean to say that I can purchase the items you¡¯ve gleaned off the forest trolls.¡±

    His brow furrowed, Han Shuo looked suspiciously at Fabian and a smile made its way to his face. Han Shuo mimicked rk and bowed urbanely, ¡°Does Mr. Fabian mean to say that he ns on buying these items from me by means of gold coins?¡±

    That face changes swiftly! Fabian cursed inwardly, pasting the same smile on his face and nodded. ¡°Indeed, I am a merchant and venture in and out of the Dark Forest to purchase items found within, then bringing them back to the Empire for profits. As infamous robbers within the Dark Forest, the forest trolls should have some of what I need. If you don¡¯t mind, I n to buy them off you.¡±

    At this moment, the little skeleton walked silently over to stand beside Han Shuo with eight handbags hanging off his hands. Under Han Shuo¡¯s orders, the little skeleton put the eight bags down and used the bone dagger in hand to flip them open one by one. Han Shuo also took out the treasures he¡¯d gleaned during this trip and put them on the ground, awaiting Fabian¡¯s appraisal.

    ¡°Eight level 5 magical creature cores, six level 4 and one level 3. Threeplete Windde Wolf Pelts, three fangs from the Venom Lizards, one egg from the Deepwater Venom Python, and five des of Mooneating Grass. I can give you one thousand gold for all of this together, what do you say?¡± Fabian appraised the items silently after he had categorized them all and lifted his head to smile at Han Shuo.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo said with an odd air. ¡°That¡¯s nothing. The Deepwater Venom Python is a level 3 magical creature. Its egg alone should be worth a great deal, not to mention the core of a level 3 magical creature. You offer only one thousand gold coins... do you take me for an idiot?¡±

    Han Shuo knew that the price for a level 3 magical creature would naturally not be too low, but he didn¡¯t clearly quantify how many gold coins, because he was unsure of the actual price. However, it was a given that merchants would always offer a price far below market price, so Han Shuo naturally wouldn¡¯t let him have the items so easily.

    ¡°The Deepwater Venom Python is a level 3 magical creature, but the rate of sess for raising a Deepwater Venom Python from an egg is pathetically low, and it¡¯s not a guarantee that it will identify someone as its master. Therefore, the price can¡¯t be too high. How about this, I offer 1,500 gold coins, what do you say?¡±

    Han Shuo said nothing and only looked at Fabian with a slight smile.

    ¡°Two thousand gold coins, this is my final offer. If you¡¯re unwilling to sell then forget it, I¡¯ll leave!¡± Fabian grit his teeth and finally raised his own price up another five hundred gold coins.

    Seeing as this was about the limit, Han Shuo smiled lightly and said faintly, ¡°Two thousand it is. The items are yours, but what about the gold coins.¡±

    These items would surely be worth more than this in the Empire, but Han Shuo was still in the Dark Forest and without a space ring, it would be inconvenient to take these things with him. In addition, Han Shuo¡¯s status was just an errand ve in the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, it would be difficult for him to dispose of the items in the Empire. It would be easier and more convenient to directly hand them over to Fabian.

    ¡°This is a crystal card with two thousand gold coins saved in it. You can take this crystal card to any savings firm and exchange it for gold coins. Oh right, what¡¯s your name? I can print your name into the crystal card for you.¡± Fabian took out a thin card made from golden colored crystals and asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°Bryan.¡±

    ¡°Oh, okay Bryan.¡± Fabian took out another thin, needle-like item after taking out the crystal card and slightly drew it over a thin slot in the corner of the crystal card. A faint, golden light winked and the crystal card went back to normal.

    Han Shuo had arrived at this world for a while and after purposefully getting to know this world, understood that a crystal card functioned like an ATM card in his original world. Gold, silver and bronze coins were all tangible items with heft to them. No one could possibly carry thousands or tens of thousands of gold coins on themselves. These crystal cards were a necessity for nobels. Crystal cards could be used at will in the omnipresent savings firms to save or withdraw gold coins.

    ¡°Here, Bryan, this crystal card is yours from now on.¡± Fabian gave the crystal card to Han Shuo and smiled, looking at him. ¡°I¡¯m called Fabian, a member of the Empire¡¯s Boozt Merchant Guild. You cane find me at the Guild if you ever have anything to sell in the future. This is my address, put it away carefully.¡±

    The Boozt Merchant Guild was one of the biggest merchant guilds in the Empire. Controlled by the Boozt family, even Han Shuo, who didn¡¯t get much in the way of rumors and news, had heard about the wondrous resources of the Boozt Merchant Guild. Listening to Fabian¡¯s words, Han Shuo immediately carefully put away the crystal card and smiled, ¡°Mr. Fabian, nice to meet you. Perhaps I really will have something to bother you with in the future. The forest trolls won¡¯t dare disturb you now, and our matter is concluded. Good bye.¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t say much after those words and he gave the little skeleton an order. One man and one skeleton quickly vanished off into the distance.

    ¡°Hello brave mercenaries. I think our business can continue to be conducted.¡± Fabian called out to the mercenaries who were looking after their wounds and walked towards them upon seeing Han Shuo suddenly leave.

 Chapter 48: The allure of gold coins

    Chapter 48: The allure of gold coins

    After departing from Fabian, Han Shuo¡¯s path took him straight to the outskirts of the Dark Forest. He took paths that their group had all taken before.

    During his journey, Han Shuo continued to practice magic. Having gone through the reforging of the ¡°solid realm¡±, it was as if Han Shuo had been reborn. Now that his magical training had bore fruit, the magical yuan could travel to all parts of his body ording to his will.

    There were nine levels in the world of demonic magic, and Han Shuo had now reached the ¡°open passages realm¡±. The training for the ¡°open passages¡± and ¡°solid¡± realms differed slightly. This was a realm that primarily focused on the expansion of the body¡¯s meridians, greatly increasing the width and durability of the meridians. In every instance of training, the process of ¡°opening passages¡± filled his body with splitting agony, as if there were insects biting and gnawing within the meridians.

    The first three levels of demonic magic of solid, open passages, and molded spirit were the most foundational realms. Training became increasingly difficult as one progressed, but with the experience of training in the ¡°solid realm¡±, Han Shuo already understand that agony and inhumane torture apanied his magical training. The inhumane pain of the ¡°open passages¡± realm was also within his expectations. He used magical yuan to repeatedly expand his meridians without letting up for a second, basing it purely on indomitable will.

    After twelve days of training and traveling, Han Shuo still hadn¡¯t run into Fanny and the others along the way. He finally made it out of the Dark Forest alone and made it to the town of Drol again when dusk fell.

    Compared to a month ago, Han Shuo had weathered through the trials of the Dark Forest, and since then his strength, mindset, and appearance had all undergone drastic changes. Han Shuo was now over 170 cm, and although his body wasn¡¯t too muscr, he was no longer thin and scrawny.

    After baptism by fresh blood, Han Shuo had greatly improved both his pluck and knowledge. His entire aura was also undergoing mysterious changes. He was slowly changing under circumstances that even Han Shuo himself wasn¡¯t even aware of.

    At dusk, the town of Drol was enclosed in a happy, carefree atmosphere. Many adventurers had returned from the Dark Forest. Some wore expressions of sorrow, having lostpanions, while others had satisfied smiles on their faces due to obtaining rich rewards, and they nned on a thorough night of depravity within the town of Drol.

    When it was dusk, Han Shuo first came to the ce where Gene and the others had borrowed and stabled their battlesteeds. He observed the ce from a distance and noticed that the battlesteeds that they had spent money to borrow were still present. He immediately understood that Fanny and everyone else probably hadn¡¯t returned to Drol yet.

    Although they had spent money on the battlesteeds, the necromancy teachers and students only had the rights to use them. When they returned to Zajoski, they would have to return the battlesteeds to the Zajoski guards in precisely the same condition that they had received them. Since the battlesteeds were still here, that meant Fanny and them had definitely yet to leave.

    Han Shuo naturally knew that traveling with such haste by himself, he was sure to return much more quickly than Fanny¡¯s slowly plodding group. Perhaps Fanny and the others had been dyed by magical creatures along the way, so it was within his expectations that Fanny and the others hadn¡¯t returned yet.

    He went to the small hotel that everyone had stayed in previously, walked to the main counter, and said with a smile, ¡°I need a room.¡±

    The owner was eating fruit with his eyes almost shut. He raised his head to flick a nce at Han Shuo and saidzily, ¡°Oh, it¡¯s you. Give me ten bronze coins. That warehouse is always empty... you can go there now.¡±

    Thest time Han Shuo hade with the others, Gene had especially rented out a warehouse for Han Shuo, and Han Shuo had been scorned by the owner because of this. Therefore, when the owner saw that it was Han Shuo, he naturally assumed that with Han Shuo¡¯s status, he could only rent the warehouse.

    He didn¡¯t be angry, but rather smiled and took out the money bag at his waist. He clinked and poured out one gold coin from it, dumping it onto the round wooden table. He looked sideways at the owner and said, ¡°I don¡¯t want to stay in the warehouse.¡±

    The owner had beenzing about when he suddenly sat up, swiping the gold coin off the round table. A professional smile swiftly pasted itself to his face and he raised his voice, ¡°Of course, of course. How would a warehouse be worthy of one gold coin. Cute little fellow, tell me whatever kind of room you want to stay in. A gold coin will be more than enough.¡±

    His treatment was drastically different fromst time¡¯s with the presence of gold coins. Han Shuo smiled faintly and nodded, ¡°I want the room the female teacher was inst time. Arrange it for me.¡±

    ¡°No problem, not a problem at all. This is the key. One gold coin is enough for up to five nights there. Do you have any other desires, young man?¡± The owner asked further with a toadying expression. The owner¡¯s face was wreathed in smiles as he merrily took out a key from a drawer behind him and handed it to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Nothing else, just go about your own business!¡± Han Shuo walked directly towards the room that Fanny had upied before after receiving the key, thinking that money had the same miraculous power no matter what world one was in. It would seem that in order to gain one¡¯s footing in this world, gold coins were a requisite item.

    Han Shuo unloaded his belongings after arriving at the room Fanny had stayed in before, leisurely taking a hot bath in the tub. Recalling the pleasant affair that had taken herest time, Han Shuo felt a burst of mes erupt from him and his lower body bore certain uncontroble, strong signs.

    Cursing in a low tone, Han Shuo stood up naked and grabbed a towel from the side to dry his body off. Just as he was about to leave the bathroom, he caught a glimpse of his athletic, sculptured body in a wide mirror that had been off to the side.

    Han Shuo¡¯s body in the mirror disyed bulging muscles all over his body and a fit figure. The sun had turned his skin copper colored during this time, and he looked exceedingly healthy and full of masculine energy, a marked difference from his previous waif-like, thin self.

    He squeezed his two chest muscles with satisfaction. They were neither too big, nor too small, and he struck some poses in front of the mirror. Han Shuo pointed at his reflection in the mirror with quite some narcissism,ughing as heplimented, ¡°Little fellow, looking good eh!¡±

    Han Shou came to a clothing vendor after he left the hotel and spent one gold coin to purchase a soft, high-quality undergarment, wearing it inside the errand boy uniform that the Academy had handed out.

    He then came to a weapons vendor and spent ten gold coins to purchase a higher quality dagger, four gold coins for fifteen sharp steel needles and hid them in his pant legs, and another six gold coins to purchase a miniature crossbow to hide in his sleeve, fully arming himself.

    Afterwards, Han Shuo went to a pharmacist and took out forty gold coins to buy a few solutions and powders. Apart from a few simple medicinal supplies, tranquilizing and psychedelic aphrodisiacs were also part of the mix, as well as a bottle of poison.

    These items were prohibited within the Empire¡¯s city of Zajoski. Even if Han Shuo had the money, he didn¡¯t have the means to procure them, but in the town of Drol, open trade was allowed because adventurers needed them. Since Han Shuo hade here with money in hand and now that he understood the importance of strength, he naturally bought some in case they would be neededter.

    After he had bought all these items, Han Shuo finally sighed and thought that it was good to have money. He felt that even his spine was more upright than normal after walking out of the pharmacist. Everything became so much easier when there were gold coins in his moneybag.

    On the way to the hotel, Han Shuo¡¯s stomach roiled as he looked at the hotels decked out in colorful lights. He followed his body¡¯s needs and ducked into one of the hotels.

    The din was loud and deafening within the hotel and neon lights shed randomly on the roof. Adventurers and merchants had formed small groups and had congregated on the tables and chairs within the hall, loudly chattering about their adventures.

    These people¡¯s faces were flushed red and they held wine sses in their hands, drunkenly calling out and conversing without any reservations. Delicacies were ced everywhere on the tables and a few young male and female waiters continuously threaded the throng, serving them more fragrant wine and dishes.

    Han Shuo made a beeline for the only empty table in the corner of the hall and sat down. A shy young waiter quickly walked in front of Han Shuo afterwards and asked politely, ¡°Excuse me, what would you like?¡±

    ¡°Good wine, good meats, give me some of both of them.¡± Han Shuo fished out one gold coin and flicked it into the waiter¡¯s serving tter with his thumb,manding loudly as he opened his mouth.

    When the server saw the gold coinnd, his eyes immediately brightened and he immediately bowed even more respectfully. He put away the coin without a change in expression and smiled with a gentle voice, ¡°Yes sir, please wait just a moment, it will be up right away.¡±

    One should enjoy themselves when they had wealth to spend. Han Shuozily lounged against the chair and sized up the various adventurers and merchants in the hall with slitted eyes. Some of these had possibly just returned from the Dark Forest, or were about to enter to Dark Forest. Some of them had just escaped from danger, whereas others were nning on heading into unknown perils. They were all releasing their energy in great waves, enjoying the depravity of the town of Droll to their heart¡¯s content.

    After a while, the shy server ced a bottle of light purple wine, threerge tters of meat, and two bowls of fruit on Han Shuo¡¯s table.¡±

    ¡°This is Purple Len, the most renowned wine in the town of Droll. Adventurers all love drinking this, I hope you will be satisfied with it.¡± The waiter pointed at the bottle of light purple wine and introduced it after cing everything on the table. He then bowed and retreated.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t wait and grabbed a piece of meat and started tearing away at it. Although it didn¡¯t taste as good as the ones he¡¯d prepared, it was still quite good. He twisted the top off the wine bottle and gulped down arge mouthful of Purple Len. The luscious sweetness also embodied a certain fire to it, and a mellow aftertaste was left in the mouth after it had travelled down to the stomach, bringing another kind of enjoyment to Han Shuo.

    Good wine indeed, Han Shuoplimented. When he raised his head to look around, he suddenly saw two familiar figures walk in the door ¡ª ude and Irene.

    ude and Irene scanned the area, searching for an empty seat. Both started when their gazesnded on Han Shuo, after which they actually started walking towards Han Shuo in pure coincidence.

 Chapter 49: A belated revenge

    Chapter 49: A bted revenge

    ¡°Isn¡¯t this the necromancy major¡¯s errand boy?¡± ude asked with a frown as he¡¯d made his way to stand next to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Necromancy errand boy Bryan... who would¡¯ve thought that we¡¯d bump into each other here?¡± Han Shuo nodded, gulped down another mouthful of Purple Len, and smiled in response.

    ¡°There seems to be no seats left. ude, why don¡¯t we switch to another ce for dinner?¡± Irene raked a gaze over Han Shuo with a trace of disdain in her eyes.

    ¡°No need, at this moment, most of the hotels in Drol must be packed with people. There¡¯s only Bryan at this table. Since we¡¯re all from the Academy, I¡¯m sure Bryan wouldn¡¯t mind if we sat down with him, would you Bryan?¡± ude said to Irene with a smile and then stared merrily at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Of course I don¡¯t mind! If you don¡¯t feel that sitting with an errand boy like myself detracts from your dignity, I¡¯ll dly share a table with you two.¡± ude had injured his little skeleton in the past in order to appease Irene. Perhaps ude had long since forgotten about this matter, but Han Shuo had silently remembered it. Now that his strength had increased, Han Shuo had lost more and more reservations when taking action. He¡¯d been fretting that he had lost his chance to enact revenge on ude, but who knew that he¡¯de knocking on Han Shuo¡¯s doorstep. Han Shuo was naturally loathe to let this opportunity pass by.

    ¡°I hate everyone from the necromancy major, even errand ves are without exception!¡± Irene creased her brow, flicked a look at ude and spoke coldly.

    ude started, then threw a meaningful nce at Irene. He smiled and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan, aren¡¯t you with the rest of the necromancy major? Howe we don¡¯t see any sign of them and you¡¯re here by yourself? Oh,e to think of it, you, an errand boy, would be able to enjoy such a rich feast of food and wine. How surprising!¡±

    Irene also looked at Han Shuo with surprise upon hearing ude¡¯s words. She seemed to particrly mind about ude¡¯s questions and was in no hurry to leave at this point. When ude saw that Irene had disyed an expression that indicated her interest, he eagerly wiped off the dust on the seat in front of her. She finally sat down unhurriedly after he had indicated that she should sit.

    Han Shuo ripped apart the grilled meat in his hand and sent it into his stomachpletely as if nothing had happened. He belched in satisfaction after another mouthful of wine, rubbed his stomach in self satisfaction and said with a smile, ¡°Master Fanny and the others should be back soon. They were afraid that I would be a burden and so gave me a few gold coins for me to wait here for them. Are there any problems?¡±

    ¡°No no. So that¡¯s the situation. Right... Bryan, how was your haul this time? Any high level magical creatures?¡± ude winked at Irene and asked Han Shuo with a smile.

    Irene revealed an expression of interest and likewise stared intently at Han Shuo, seeming to suddenly care quite a bit about the necromancy major¡¯s haul.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo said, ¡°I don¡¯t know, I returned halfway. I don¡¯t know if they had any major gains, but I think their haul this time wouldn¡¯t be too small.¡±

    ¡°Huh. Those people? What kind of haul could they get? They could at most hunt down some level five magical creatures, and likely find it hard to kill even a level four.¡± Irene looked at Han Shuo contemptuously and snorted coldly.

    Han Shu only faintly flicked a nce at Irene in the face of her jeering and didn¡¯t say much. At this moment, ude had already hailed the waiter and also used one gold coin to arrange for some wine and meat.

    Han Shuo inwardly took stock of the situation, wondering how to take his revenge on ude. After thinking for a while, an involuntary trace of a wicked smile appeared on his lips. He calmly and subtlely took something simr to a banana peel from the te in front of him and threw it underneath his foot. When a fast walking waiter carrying a te appeared, Han Shuo pushed out with the toes of his right foot and sent the fruit peel abruptly flying out from beneath the table.

    The waiter was setting a fast pace with tes in hand when he set one foot on the fruit pool, stumbled with a exmation of surprise and fell forwards. The te in his hand flew out and hurtled towards ude and Irene from behind.

    ude and Irene reacted upon hearing themotion and suddenly turned around. ude¡¯s right hand abruptly rose and deftly caught the te crashing towards them. At the same time, Han Shuo¡¯s left hand shed out like lightning and with a flick of his pinky finger, the grey-white psychedelic aphrodisided quietly in ude¡¯s wine ss.

    ¡°Be careful when you walk.¡± At this moment, ude¡¯s brow was furrowed as his right hand handed over the te he¡¯d caught to the waiter, who had stood up once again. His voice was displeased.

    ¡°Thank you noble knight. I will be careful in the future!¡± The waiter fearfully took the te from ude and quickly left after a bow.

    Han Shuo wasposed and collected. His head was lowered as he lifted his ss, drinking wine as if nothing had happened, like he hadn¡¯t noticed what had just happened.

    ude and Irene didn¡¯t say much to Han Shuo afterwards. ude fawningly talked with Irene, putting away ss after ss of Purple Len with psychedelic aphrodisiac mixed in. Irene¡¯s expressions were cool, responding to ude on and off. It looked like she had yet to ept ude¡¯s love.

    ¡°You guys take your time. I still have some matters to attend to and will be heading off now!¡± Han Shuo knew with certainty that the psychedelic aphrodisiac powder had been absorbed by ude when he¡¯d drained down several sses of Purple Len. He immediately stood up and dropped this sentence.

    ude and Irene were originally derisive of Han Shuo to begin with. They¡¯d absolutely paid no heed to him and wished devoutly that Han Shuo would leave, as opposed to being an irritating sight in front of them. They waved their hands in unison after Han Shuo¡¯s words, indicating that Han Shuo should have left earlier if possible. After a bit of time, they no longer concealed the scorn on their faces.

    Leaving the hotel with a smile, Han Shuo stood alone in an undetectable street corner beside the hotel. After a while, a hotly-flushed ude and a slightly pink cheeked Irene walked out side by side, heading for the north side of Drol.

    The sky was dark by now and the festivities of the town of Drol had reached their peak of the day. Adventurers formed in groups of three or five staggered drunkenly, loudly down the streets. Han Shuo followed the two noiselessly, and stood by the side of the street, waiting for a good show upon seeing the two of them enter a luxurious hotel.

    ording to Han Shuo¡¯s observations just now, it seemed that ude had yet to move Irene¡¯s heart. If at this moment, under the influence of the psychedelic aphrodisiac, ude did anything that exceed boundaries, he was sure to be severely beaten by Irene.

    Fruit in hand, Han Shuo ate leisurely and thought wickedly. No disturbances hade from the hotel after a while. Just when Han Shuo was beginning to lose his patience, the hotly flushed rk suddenly walked out from the hotel and walked onto the streets with great haste.

    Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts moved. He hadn¡¯t thought that ude¡¯s willpower would be so strong, that he hadn¡¯t fully lost all rational thought by now, but judging from ude¡¯s appearance, Han Shuo knew that he wouldn¡¯t be able to hold out for much longer and he quickly caught up to ude, following him from afar.

    Indeed, he¡¯d only made it about ten or so meters when ude slightly lost control after a wave from a heavily made up, scantily d older woman. He panted heavily as he made for the alley, looking like he would resolve his biological needs at close proximity.

    ¡°Eh? Wasn¡¯t that ude?¡± An exmation sounded from the adjacent street. Han Shuo swiveled his head to sudden joy, inwardly eximing ¡°Even the heavens are helping me!¡±.

    The light major teacher, Beacher, and a few light major students happened to be passing by. One of the female students with particrly sharp eyes just so happened to see ude and the coy, revealing woman dart into the alley and had cried out in astonishment.

    ¡°No way, how could ude be that kind of person? He is a noble knight and wouldn¡¯t demean himself in ces like this. Not to mention that ude is pursuing Irene right now, so there is no way that he¡¯d do so.¡± Beacher frowned and said in unconvinced confusion.

    ¡°It really was him, I¡¯m sure I didn¡¯t see improperly. If you don¡¯t believe me we can go inside and check.¡± The female student, who had spoken first, thought for a moment, and then said decisively.

    ¡°Come Katie, it¡¯s none of your business here. Don¡¯t go poking your nose where it doesn¡¯t belong.¡± Beacher was silent for a moment, and then hurried the students to leave quickly.

    Katie looked angrily at the alley and stomped her foot after a moment¡¯s thought. ¡°How can this be allowed?! I¡¯m going to tell Irene. If ude isn¡¯t in his room, then it must be him. I will absolutely not allow ude to defraud Irene¡¯s feelings.¡±

    Katie left in a fast, huffy pace as soon as she¡¯d finished talking, making a beeline for the hotel that Irene was staying at. The other light major students looked askance at each other when she left, not knowing what to do.

    Han Shuo almost couldn¡¯t hold his raucousughter in. Who would¡¯ve thought that things would work out like this? Han Shuo had been nning on doing things himself and think of a scheme to lure Irene here. Who knew that ude was really so unlucky? Looks like it would be difficult for him to avoid bad luck today even if he tried.

    After a while, an Irene with a frigid expression and a huffy Katie walked swiftly from afar. One look at Irene¡¯s expression was enough to know that she was feeling incredibly wrathful. ude would find it tough to get out of this one.

    ¡°ude was indeed not in the hotel. Looks like I didn¡¯t see incorrectly! That must have been him just now. Irene, I think if we should go in now we¡¯ll be able to catch him in the act. How could hemit such despicable acts as a noble knight! ude is too disgusting.¡± Katie looked angrily at the alley after she¡¯d arrived.

    Irene nodded with an icy face, wasting not a moment more with talk and grabbed Katie in a rush to the alley. Beacher and the others were afraid that a messy situation would develop and followed after a moment¡¯s hesitation.

    When they¡¯d all gone in, Han Shuo unhurriedly made his way into the alleyway with a sinister face dressed in an evil smile.

 Chapter 50: A harsh reality

    Chapter 50: A harsh reality

    A ear-piercing round of screams first sounded, then all sorts of noises followed,ing from a house on the left side of the alley. After a while, Beacher and the others came out dragging a bedraggled ude, who wasn¡¯t quite there.

    Irene¡¯s face was full of rage as she grimly lectured ude while staring at him. She spoke vehemently, ¡°ude, you¡¯re disgusting. I never want to see you again! Katie, let¡¯s go.¡±

    With the way that things had developed, Han Shuo knew that his revenge had been exacted and that there was no further need to stick around. When he saw Irene and Katie walking quickly in his direction, he hastily hid himself and leisurely made his way back to the hotel.

    Back in the hotel, Han Shuo washed up and then sat cross legged on the bed to practice magic. The magical yuan slowly expanded his meridians inch by inch. Han Shuo grit his teeth against the heart wrenching pain and continuously circted his magical yuan ording to the instructions of the ¡°open passages realm¡±.

    Unbearable pain often apanied the process of practicing magic. This caused Han Shuo¡¯s personality to shift from its previouslyckadaisicalness to firmly resolute. Whether it was his willpower or ability to stoically endure pain, Han Shuo had significantly increased both.

    Han Shuo¡¯s entire personality and character had unknowingly continuously changed with the advent of practicing magic. As his strength slowly increased, the previously timid and cowering Han Shuo had already experienced great changes. The way he viewed and understood things were vastly different from the thoughts that he had held prior.

    A solid, dull footstep suddenly sounded in Han Shuo¡¯s heart. Han Shuo abruptly stopped all magic practice, held his breath, and concentrated. All his bodily functions instantaneously sank into a frozen and unmoving status.

    The footsteps that had sounded until now had been from the southern intersection of the town of Drol and the Dark Forest. Based on the dullness and rhythm of the thumps, Han Shuo could draw the conclusion that this came from a magical creature with high speed. This creature¡¯s weight was definitely heavier than a battlesteed, and their numbers consisted of more than a few.

    Creasing his brow, Han Shuo thought for a while and walked out of the hotel, slowly moving towards the direction of the magical creatures, wanting to see what the situation was.

    Just as Han Shuo had emerged from the hotel and arrived at the southern streets of Drol, two figures had also rushed over with a look of haste. It was an elderly, thin wizard and a female elven archer with green-tipped ears. The two disyed expressions of shock seeing Han Shuo upon arrival, as if they hadn¡¯t thought that Han Shuo would be here.

    ¡°Little fellow, what are you doing here?¡± The thin, small wizard gazed at Han Shuo and asked with a smile.

    From their cautious attitudes, Han Shuo understood that they had most likely also detected the disturbanceing from the south. Weighing things up internally, Han Shuo made a slight bow and responded, ¡°Noble wizard, I¡¯ve be separated from mypanions. They said they would return here after a few days, so I¡¯ve been waiting here.¡±

    The wizard nodded and frowned in consideration. He said to the female elven archer next to him, ¡°nche, go scout and see if it¡¯s wolf riders from the orcs. They always send wolf riders every year before winter to raid and loot the viges on the outer edge of the Empire.

    But the town of Drol is in a unique location and is filled withrge quantities of adventurers and mercenaries. The orcs had never sent wolf riders to attack Drol, why would they act so oddly this time? Not to mention that there was still quite a bit of time before winter!¡±

    ¡°Yes, Master Felix.¡± Upon hearing the old wizard Felix¡¯s words, the female elven archer called nche immediately headed south, floating in front of Han Shuo like a gust of wind.

    ¡°Little fellow, the town of Drol isn¡¯t a peaceful ce. It¡¯ste at night, so you should head back early to rest. Yourpanions shoulde looking for you when they return, so there¡¯s no need to continue waiting here.¡± Felix looked at Han Shuo with a smile as he tried to convince Han Shuo.

    ¡°Alright, then I¡¯ll be heading back now.¡± Han Shuo responded calmly and started picking his way back as soon as he¡¯d finished speaking.

    After Han Shuo had left, Felix mused as he stared oddly at Han Shuo¡¯s retreating figure. He finally murmured to himself after a while. ¡°I must be overthinking the situation... there¡¯s no way that this kid is more perceptive me, a wind archmage!¡±

    On his way back to his hotel, Han Shuo noticed that a few others walked out from nearby hotels with the same surprised expression, hastily making their way to the southern street. It looks like they too had detected the disturbance and had gone to the southern street to check things out.

    ¡°Bryan, I have some matters with you! Come here for a second!¡± On the way back, Han Shuo bumped into ude on the street to the hotel. ude¡¯s face was heavily overcast, and it appeared that he was in an exceedingly bad mood.

    His heart skipping a beat, Han Shuo had a vague premonition of unease. He could strongly feel repressed rage emanating from ude. Although ude looked at him with a calm gaze, his teeth were gnashing slightly, still enabling Han Shuo to feel the strong ripples in his emotions.

    Staring at ude dumbly, Han Shuo thought furiously. At this moment, Han Shuo understood that his actions in the hotel just now had still been too heavy handed and impulsive. When ude had sobered up, he would have surely detected his body¡¯s condition and certainly deduced that it was something caused by the Purple Len in the hotel. ude wasn¡¯t a stupid person. Only Irene and Han Shuo had been at the table then, and Irene would never do anything like this. Connecting the dots to when the waiter suddenly tripped, ude must have sussed out the entire situation.

    ¡°Okay.¡± Han Shuo thought carefully and knew that the situation was bad. He was prepared for a brutal beating from ude as he followed behind the knight, walking slowly out of Drol and arriving at a secluded patch of forest to the south of Drol.

    Moonlight filtered through the forest as bugs chirped lightly nearby. However, Han Shuo¡¯s sensitive ears were able to catch the low breathing from ude¡¯s strongly repressed fury.

    Looks like it¡¯ll be quite a beating. Han Shuo thought wryly, but didn¡¯t feel too much fear. He had gotten used to the beatings during this time and knew his body¡¯s situation quite well. He knew that the usual type of blows would be unable to hurt him, so his heart was rtively calm.

    Pa.

    Just when he was thinking wryly, a ringing p sent him staggering towards the left before he was able to react preventatively. It was a good thing that Han Shuo¡¯s body far outstripped normal people¡¯s. He steadied himself in the mess, regained his footing, and scrunched up his face as he smiled wryly at ude.

    ¡°You damned lowly ve. Pig! Who do you think you are to scheme against me!?¡± ude¡¯s firmly repressed anger had finally exploded. An ugly, vehement face stared at Han Shuo as his usual, sunny, gentlemanly demeanor had long since vanished above the clouds.

    Pp. A wave of attacks rained down on Han Shuo¡¯s body. Han Shuo clutched at his head with both hands and didn¡¯t raise them to defend himself, taking the hits from ude¡¯s thundering rage. He finally abruptly curled into a ball and fell to the ground, looking like he couldn¡¯t take any more hits.

    ¡°Well, does that hurt? I won¡¯t let you die so easily. Do you know who I am? I am ude Asche, the son of themander of the Empire¡¯s Gryphon Legion, Commander Bob Asche. You lowly errand boy dares to scheme against me and ruin my rtionship with Irene. I will make you experience agony and pain in full before letting you die slowly. Ahaha.¡± ude stared venomously at Han Shuo as he drew his longsword with a cold smile, walking slowly towards Han Shuo.

    Up until now, Han Shuo had finally understood that he had alwaysmitted a huge error. Whether it was Fitch or Bach, his methods had always embodied arge amount of risk. With his status as an errand ve, no matter who killed him, they wouldn¡¯t have to endure too much bacsh. Even if Bach killed him, the Academy would probably only admonish him for a few words and demand a few gold coins inpensation.

    Han Shuo had originally thought that ude would at most brutally beat him up for a prank like this, but the result now had finally facilitated Han Shuo in understanding the harsh reality. ude not only wanted him to die this time, but also wanted him to fully experience agony and pain before dying. This was the harsh reality.

    At the moment, Han Shuo finally understood what kind of world this was. Status and position were a foundational, integral existence. A yawning difference in status existed between the two, allowing ude to kill him without reservations and without a need to bear any particr responsibility. ude had called him to this deserted forest because he didn¡¯t want to ruin his noble status and self. Even if he¡¯d killed Han Shuo in Drol, it would have been quite matter of fact with no one thinking about it twice.

    Growth always came at a cost. Han Shuo curled up on the ground, still emitting loud wails and pleas for mercy. A heart, that only held vague thoughts of evil, slowly hardened with cold.

    ¡°I will dice you into several pieces, letting you wail as you bleed. You will slowly, fully experience pain before dying. Remember your status in your next life. You¡¯re a mere errand ve, a pig. Never attempt to challenge the temper of your superiors.¡± ude snickered sinisterly as the long sword in his hand pierced towards the chest of a Han Shuo who had seemed too long since losing the ability to defend himself.

    At this moment, the continuous howls suddenly disappeared as Han Shuo¡¯s curled figure abruptly moved, rolling towards ude¡¯s feet. His speed was such that it caught ude off guard.

    When ude was about to dodge, he suddenly emitted a ghastly wail. A few iron needles stuck out from the tops of his feet, firmly nailing his feet to the ground. A wave of bone-cutting pain emanated from his lower abdomen. ude lowered his head to find a dagger sticking out of his stomach. Han Shuo looked at him with a cold and distant gaze, the look in his eyes giving ude a very foreign feeling.

    ¡°I am the son of themander of the Gryphon League. You damned errand ve, how dare you harm me?¡± ude¡¯s body was wracked with pain as he yelled furiously with a weak voice.

    ¡°Thank you for letting me know the harsh truth of reality. It¡¯s because of your vaunted status that not only will I harm you, I¡¯m going to kill you!¡±

    After saying this words in a remote tone, another iron needle appeared in Han Shuo¡¯s right hand and directly pierced through ude¡¯s throat amidst ude¡¯s terror-filled screams.

 Chapter 51: The calm aftermath after killing someone

    Chapter 51: The calm aftermath after killing someone

    This wasn¡¯t the first time that Han Shuo had killed someone, butpared to killing forest trolls, the impact Han Shuo¡¯s heart received from ughtering ude was exceedingly great.

    After all, forest trolls were a different race from him, and were renowned robbers. Han Shuo killing them felt as natural as killing magical creatures, but ude waspletely different from them. Han Shuo had been forced to kill him because he knew within his heart that if ude didn¡¯t die, Han Shuo could put all thoughts of peacefully living his life in the future out of his mind.

    Watching ude weaken and sag into a pool of blood, Han Shuo felt a bit numb in that moment. There was an empty feeling in his heart, he hadn¡¯t hesitated when he made his move, and it was only when he watched ude die in front of him that a feeling of nervousness grew in Han Shuo.

    ude was a noble, and the youngest son of themander of the Empire¡¯s Gryphon Legion. If news of this matter leaked, only death awaited Han Shuo.

    Gazing at ude¡¯s corpse, Han Shuo stared dumbly into space for a while. His originally slightly panicked expression became more and more resolute and harshly cold.

    Finally, Han Shuo rearranged his clothes and stood up, walking up to ude with a calm face and rummaging through his clothes. He poured out a few gold coins from his money bag, a crystal card, and some scattered medicine.

    After thinking for a bit, Han Shuo only put away the gold coins. He set aside the potentially incriminating crystal card and ude¡¯s other belongings.

    A little skeleton, wielding a bone knife, appeared in front of Han Shuo after his incantation had finished. Han Shuo searched out a deste clearing as one man and one skeleton wielded bone knife and dagger spent a few minutes digging a deep hole. After burying ude in the hole, Han Shuo carefully cleaned up the traces of blood that ude had left behind. He even slowly covered up the traces in which he¡¯d fallen down and rolled around.

    Circling around the forest patch and confirming that no clues had been left behind, Han Shuo did not return along the original way. Rather, he made an additional circle and dug a deep hole to the north of Drol, burying all of ude¡¯s belongings. Finally, he returned to Drol using another street.

    He did all this because he was careful and cautious. They hadn¡¯t garnered anyone¡¯s attention on the way to the forest with ude earlier because ude had intentionally done so.

    Now that Han Shuo had killed him and carefully buried his body, logically speaking, no one should discover it. Even if someone unintentionally discovered ude¡¯s body, Han Shuo had taken all the belongings off the body, creating the impression of murder in the course of robbery. These things happened quite often in the town of Drol and should be able to conceal the original reason of death.

    After Han Shuo had dealt with these loose ends, he concealed himself in the surroundings of the hotel of Irene and the others for the next two days, silently observing the movements of the light major students. He discovered that whether it was Irene or Beacher, none of them came looking for ude. It looked like they thought that ude had wronged them first and so left him alone.

    ude was certainly the one who understood his bodily condition the most. No matter how he tried to exin under those circumstances, it was more than likely that not many would believe his words, and judging from the timing in which ude hade for him and his understanding of the psychedelic aphrodisiac, he more or less surmised that ude hade looking for revenge as soon as he¡¯d sobered up, and hadn¡¯t had time to exin anything to Irene or Beacher.

    After two days of observation, Han Shuo finally rxed and let down his guard upon seeing that Irene and Beacher made no moves to look for ude and only focused their attentions on spending money as they visited various weapons and armor vendors as well as pharmacists.

    At dusk on this night, Han Shuo did not venture out again to keep an eye on Irene and Beacher, but instead stayed inside to quietly practice magic. He repeatedly expanded the width of his body¡¯s meridians and improved their pliability.

    Han Shuo was seated primly on the edge of his bed,pletely naked, sweat pouring down his entire body, starting from his forehead. The tendons of his body jumped as they bulged out like endless numbers of worms moving through the surface of his body. It looked even more cringe worthy and scary than even the most evil tattoo.

    During this entire process, a sudden tremor ran through Han Shuo¡¯s mind as he sank into a senseless realm. For the moment, he forgot himself, forgot time, and was like a sculpture, without life. Only a faint hint of ck splendor circted beneath his skin.

    Dondondon.

    A sudden round of fierce knocking abruptly awakened Han Shuo. When Han Shuo came back to himself, he took stock of himself internally and understood that he must have unknowingly sunk into the demonic mental state just now.

    Dondondon.

    The knocking was still continuing and Han Shuo was a bit irritated that his training had been interrupted. He grabbed a random towel and wrapped it around himself, saying with irritation, ¡°Coming. Coming!¡±

    When the door was opened, Han Shuo received the shock of his life. The irritable expression on his face vanished without a trace as it immediately transformed into a smiling face. He said merrily, ¡°Eh, it¡¯s you guys. I¡¯ve been waiting a long time for you. You¡¯ve finallye back.¡±

    Standing outside the door, Fanny and Lisa looked a bit worn out and their hair was a bit messed up. They carried items in the hands and packs on their back, looking quite tired from the road. It appeared that they¡¯d just returned from the Dark Forest.

    ¡°You Bryan, you actually made it back to Drol such a long time ago. We were worried about you for quite a while. Oh, how¡¯d you get money to live in such an expensive room? If it¡¯s wasn¡¯t for the owner¡¯s certainty, I truly wouldn¡¯t have believed that you were the one living in this room.¡± Fanny¡¯s clear eyes swept over Han Shuo and she spoke with a bit of a bite to her words.

    ¡°Bryan, what happened the day you left? You didn¡¯t return for two days and I thought something happened to you?¡± Lisa said.

    ¡°I got lost after I left, and when I found the original camp, I discovered that you¡¯d long since left. I couldn¡¯t find you guys, so I went one step ahead and returned to the town of Drol to wait for you. Good thing that everyone is fine. That¡¯s wonderful.¡± Han Shuo smiled slightly and faintly exined himself.

    Fanny raked a gaze over Han Shuo, thought for a moment and spoke to Lisa beside her. ¡°Lisa, go and finish arranging the rooms with Master Gene and the rest. I have some things to discuss with Bryan.¡±

    Lisa looked at Fanny with some suspicion and said, ¡°Master Fanny, that incident has passed for quite some time now. Bryan even saved our lives... are you still holding a grudge against him?¡±

    Her face reddened when Fanny heard Lisa mentionst time¡¯s incident again. She said furiously, ¡°No, I have other things to discuss with him. Go select a room for me and I¡¯ll be over shortly.¡±

    Lisa still wasn¡¯t fully at ease upon hearing Fanny¡¯s exnation, but didn¡¯t say anything further as she turned to leave, muttering something in her mouth.

    As soon as Lisa had left, Fanny raked her gaze over Han Shuo and looked at the room she¡¯d once lived in, seeming to remember what had happenedst time as her cheeks flushed even redder. She humphed lightly and said, ¡°Aren¡¯t you going to invite me in?¡±

    ¡°Eh, Master Fanny, this way please.¡± Han Shuo was taken aback and hurriedly turned his body to the side. When Fanny had stepped inside, he stuck a head out for a look in the hallway and hastily shut the door tight, like he was acting with a guilty conscience.

    ¡°What are you doing so surreptitiously? I ask you, what happened the day after you left camp? How do you have the gold coins to stay in this room?¡± Fanny nailed Han Shuo with a patrolling look after she sat down.

    Han Shuo still hadn¡¯t fully recovered from killing ude. Upon hearing Fanny¡¯s words, he was a bit surprised. He thought for a bit and then exined with augh, ¡°When I left the camp that day, I stayed nearby practicing necromancy magic. I met an injured Windde Wolf afterwards. I kept chasing the injured Windde Wolf and finally killed it when it wasn¡¯t paying attention. When I returned to the camp, I made my way back here after I realized that you had gone.

    After returning to Drol, I sold the Windde Wolf core and pelt. That¡¯s how I got the gold coins. I thought that you guys would likely be staying here again after returning, which is why I rented the room to wait for you guys. This is what happened.¡±

    Fanny didn¡¯t immediately speak after Han Shuo had finished, but rather gazed upon Han Shuo in apparent thought. She exhaled lightly after a while, ¡°Bryan, you¡¯re trulypletely different from before!¡±

    He started and managed to squeeze out an honest smile. He scratched his head, ¡°Really? Where am I different?¡±

    ¡°In many ways. Your appearance, body, and height, as well as your personality and expressions when you talk are all much too different from how I knew you before. It looks like you were the one who changed the most after experiencing the trials of the Dark Forest. All the students have undergone some changes after constantly facing battles of life and death, but who would¡¯ve thought that your change would¡¯ve been the biggest? How shocking!¡± Fanny stared dumbly at Han Shuo and said with a face of severity.

    Han Shuo understood that during this time¡¯s outing in the Dark Forest, unbeknownst to him, a change had truly urred in the way he viewed things. This change had apanied the increases in his strength and the dangers that he had faced. After killing ude with his own hands the day before yesterday and a serious round of reflection, Han Shuo had gained a clearer understanding of the harsh realities of this world, and with it, his heart had be colder and crueler.

    ¡°Master Fanny, you left a note saying that you guys had met the two man-eating monsters. Did you get into a conflict with them in the end?¡± Han Shuoughed lightly and didn¡¯t exin things in further detail, but rather started asking Fanny what had happened to them afterwards.

    ¡°Of course, the two man-eating monsters kept following us. They even colluded with a few forest trolls to attack us. We finally made it out, but our paths were deviated significantly from our original direction because we were avoiding the man-eating monsters and the forest trolls. That¡¯s why we returned to Drol sote.¡± Fanny responded.

    Nodding, Han Shuo was about to open his mouth, when he suddenly frowned and abruptly stood up. He said with a face full of seriousness, ¡°Looks like we¡¯ve got trouble.¡±

    ¡°Everyone on alert! The orc wolf riders have appeared in the southern part of Drol. They are headed this way, everyone make ready for battle!¡±

    Large yells suddenly sounded from the streets outside the hotel, all having to do with the imminent invasion from the orc wolf riders.

 Chapter 52: Wolf riders invade

    Chapter 52: Wolf riders invade

    Han Shuo had been talking with Fanny when he immediately yelled upon hearing the voices ringing out from outside, ¡°Master Fanny, let¡¯s hurry and meet up with them!¡±

    Fanny didn¡¯t mince words and started for the door to Han Shuo¡¯s room in a rush as soon as his voice had sounded. After Fanny had left, Han Shuo randomly flung off the bathrobe that had been wrapped around his body and quickly put on his clothes. He carefully put away the iron needles, dagger, crossbow, and bottles of medicine he¡¯d bought over the past few days and finally left the room.

    Adventurers¡¯ darting bodies and merchant¡¯s loudly calling voices were apparent all over the main street. These people had been drinking in their hotels or enjoying themselves in ces of temptation, but they had all immediately left their rooms when they heard news of the wolf riders¡¯ invasion and surged onto the main street.

    Adventurers and mercenaries all lived their lives on the edge, living on the edge of a knife¡¯s de, and so were long used to such dangers. When they left their rooms, they all methodically organized their weapons and armor, congregating onto the South street ording to the origin of the voices.

    Han Shuo walked out from the room and realized that even the hotel owner had grabbed a longsword when he¡¯d walked back to the front desk of the hotel. The owner was standing in front of the door with a fierce expression on his face. It seemed that the citizens of Drol were indeed fierce and valorous.

    Fanny and the others were all standing in front of the door. All the students hastily put their belongings down in the room and hurriedly rushed out again. After the adventure to the Dark Forest, these young, sapling mages had learned how to beposed and self possessed, and didn¡¯t cry out randomly in panic.

    ¡°Bryan, hurry ande over here. We must set out for South street immediately. Since orc wolf riders dare to invade the Empire¡¯s town of Drol, we mustn¡¯t let them seed!¡± Lisa immediately raised her hand high and called out as soon as she saw Han Shuo appear, as if deathly afraid that Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t be able to see her.

    Apart from Fanny and the others in front of the hotel doors, a couple other adventurers and mercenaries had also formed into groups of three to five people. The necromancy students continued to walk out of their rooms. Each one was armed to the teeth and bristling with weaponry. Fanny counted heads shortly after Han Shuo had made his way toward Lisa¡¯s side. When she discovered that they were all ounted for, she immediately shouted, ¡°Follow me to South street and don¡¯t get separated.¡±

    Han Shuo followed behind Fanny on a main street crowded with figures, arriving at South street shortly thereafter. When they¡¯d arrived, Han Shuo saw that almost a hundred adventurers and mercenaries were nearby. The old mage, Felix, and female elf, nche, that Han Shuo had seenst time were also there. Judging from the way things looked, they were acting as leaders. Felix was hovering in the air and was loudly shouting something.

    ¡°Eh, this old mage can hover in midair using levitation magic. It looks like he must be at least of the archmage level.¡± Gene eximed in shock after they¡¯d arrived and started exining to the students. ¡°When a mage trains to a certain realm, he/she will be able to use levitation magic to fly. However, only mages who¡¯ve reached the archmage level can cast levitation magic. Therefore, mages ,who can fly, are all without a doubt noble and exceedingly powerful characters.¡±

    ¡°Brave warriors of the Empire, the orcs¡¯ wolf riders are moving towards the town of Drol. ording to my observations, the wolf riders are moving in a formation of five hundred. As an encampment of the Empire, our town of Drol has zero tolerance for being trampled on by these savages. Warriors raise your weapons and give them a taste of the fury of the Empire¡¯s warriors!¡± Felix hovered in midair and clutched an exquisite magic staff, embedded with sapphires, in his right hand, speaking loudly to raise morale.

    ¡°Eh, aren¡¯t these the people from the necromancy major? Heh heh, fancy meeting you here.¡± Beacher¡¯s voice suddenly sounded from the side at this moment. Han Shuo twisted his head to see that the light major students had all cast their eyes this way.

    ¡°Hello Master Beacher, to think we would run into you here. I trust that you have gained rich rewards from this time¡¯s outing?¡± Gene nodded and smiled in greeting, asking his questions afterwards.

    ¡°Nothing much, no big rewards, just that the students have truly improved.¡± Beacher responded faintly with a smile.

    Dull, thudding sounds, that originated from the south, sounded in the distance. Under the instructions of Felix and nche, the warriors had long since armed themselves and bristled with weaponry as they stood in the front. Mages, archers, and priests stood in the back, separated from the warriors by a distance of five to six meters. They had taken our their magic staffs and gazed intently towards the south with grave expressions.

    Seeing that everyone had assumed their positions, Beacher and Gene didn¡¯t waste time in furthering their idle chitchat, instead moving to stand with the mages. Although Han Shuo¡¯s body had greatly improved, he wasn¡¯t so dumb as to stand in the front and draw attention to himself. He too followed Fanny and stood with the mages.

    Just as everyone had taken up their respective positions ording to profession, dull, clopping sounds sounded like dull drums in the hearts of the assembled people. A concentrated, heavy sense of strong aura slowly found its way into everyone¡¯s hearts. The wolf-riding orc wolf riders slowly materialized out of the flying dust cloud and into everyone¡¯s vision.

    A grave, killing aura immediately enveloped the entire town of Drol. The wolf riders immediately started charging forward as soon as they¡¯d appeared, apanied by sharp howls and screams. The longswords in their hands shed with cold light, and the strong re of aura from five hundred wolf riders charging in union immediately gave others a strong sense of oppression.

    ¡°Mages ready, release your magic on my mark!¡± Felix was rtively calm as he hovered in the air, gazing down on the wolf riders. He spoke calmly only when the wolf riders had truly started charging.

    ¡°Everyone be careful! Don¡¯t let anything happen to you.¡± Fanny was also a bit nervous at this moment and she turned to give a few reminders to the students standing next to her. Just as Fanny was about to remind Han Shuo, she suddenly discovered that there was a type of numbing, cold severity in his eyes that were set in a face of calm. There was no panic at all. He gripped a sharp dagger in his hand, and a frigid aura slowly started emanating from the dagger.

    Noticing Fanny¡¯s gaze, Han Shuo¡¯s concentrationpsed and the bone-piercing, frigidly cold aura that he had infused the dagger with as a result of guiding the magical yuan in his left hand into the dagger after activating the Mystical cial Spellfire suddenly faded away, without a trace.

    ¡°Is something the matter Master Fanny?¡± Han Shuo looked at Fanny and asked with an honest smile hanging on his face once again.

    ¡°No, nothing. You be careful!¡± Fanny looked at Han Shuo and responded in a bit of a weird tone.

    At this moment, Fanny had finally realized that the honest, dumb smile that Han Shuo had worn on his face was merely his disguise. The calmness andposure that he had while facing danger was most likely Han Shuo¡¯s true state.

    Damnit, you lied to everyone. I¡¯ll make you pay for that sooner orter. Fanny thought fiercely in her heart on one hand, and on the other surreptitiously appraised Han Shuo, suddenly feeling that a calmly serious Han Shuo had a very different quality to him.

 Chapter 53: The perils of the town of Drol

    Chapter 53: The perils of the town of Drol

    ¡°Loose!¡±

    Felix¡¯s high call drew open the curtains for magic attacks.

    Suddenly, all the mages next to Han Shuo and the others started chanting magical incantations. A column of sharp winddes, multiplerge, zing fireballs, several ice bolts shaped like spikes, lightningnding violently from the skies, and even the longswords from the light major students¡¯ Radiant sh all abruptly appeared, rushing towards the charging wolf riders.

    Fanny and Gene also chanted their incantations and skeletons and zombies staggered out, one after another. They ran out from the side of the foremost warriors and rushed at the wolf riders.

    The orcs on the backs of wolves were engulfed in magic in an instant and suffered brutal blows. Beneath the howling of the winddes, multiple injuries appeared on the wolf riders and therge wolves they rode on. When therge fireballs came crashing down, several wolf riders werepletely swallowed up by the zing fire. Soon after, the ice bolts and lightning also took down ten or so wolf rider lives.

    However, there were five hundred or so wolf riders. When this wave of magic came crashing down, it only killed the thirty or forty wolf riders in the very front. The rest of the wolf riders did not disy the slightest hint of fear or cowardice upon seeing theirpanions die. They continued to thunder forward in excitement, caring not a whit for their deaths.

    Just as the mages were about to sing the second wave of magical incantations, crossbows appeared unbeknownst to anyone in the hands of the charging wolf riders. They raised the crossbows and clouds of sharp arrows flew like the wind, soaring over the first row of heavily armored warriors and making for the mages and archers.

    ¡°Everyone be careful!¡± The elven archer, nche, called out in a melodious voice, also directing the archers to counterattack.

    The mages had been chanting incantations, nning to attack the wolf riders. When they saw the sharp arrows flying towards themselves, they immediately changed the direction of the magical attacks and released waves of magic to crash down onto the arrows in the midair, destroying them before they could strike their targets.

    However, not all the sharp arrows were destroyed by magic. Ten or so sharp missiles still shot down, and the strong force behind them immediately pierced two thunder novice mages to death. Three or so mages more or less suffered some sort of injuries. At this moment, the three priests suddenly started singing healing incantations, taking care of the three injured mages.

    Because this wave of magic had all been used on countering the sharp arrows, the wolf riders hadn¡¯t suffered much damage. They rushed over with an even faster speed. Therge wolves charged over with an extremely fierce aura. The skeletons and zombies, that bore the initial brunt of the attacks, were demolished within seconds.

    Beneath the charge of therge wolves, the lowest level skeletal warriors were abruptly trampled into bits of bone and didn¡¯t have much effect at all. The zombie warriors stood up to the onught for a brief moment, but under the slices of the orcs¡¯ longswords, the heads of ten or so zombie warriors were simultaneously sent flying as they fell to the ground.

    ¡°Humph. The dark creatures of the necromancy major are indeed useless!¡± Upon seeing that the dark creatures from the necromancy major weren¡¯t having much effect, Irene and a few other light major students started jeering at them.

    Han Shuo grasped a dagger in his hand, his entire being still calm andposed. He eyes gazed at the figures of the wolf riders in the distance,pletely ignoring the mockerying from Irene and the light major students.

    The crossbows in the wolf riders¡¯ hands rose again, and another hail of arrows rained down. The mages in the back all used magic to defend themselves. A couple mages with more training destroyed the sharp arrows that flew towards them and were still able to continuously release magic to attack the wolf riders careening towards them.

    Five sharp arrows suddenly shot over with a whooshing sound, heading towards the students of the necromancy major. Fanny and Gene¡¯s facial expressions changed as they both sent out bone arrows, destroying three of them in midair. One of them had veered off course and shot towards a corner in which no one was standing, whereas the other made a beeline for Amy.

    At this moment, Amy became panicked and started chanting magic. Gene and Fanny were also a bit anxious and also started to swiftly chant magic, but the speed in which they all chanted at was obviously slower than the speed of the sharp arrow.

    A dagger suddenly drew a cold line through the air and flew into the sky like a bolt of lightning. A sharp crack sounded out as the arrow that had been flying towards Amy broke into several pieces. At the same moment, Han Shuo¡¯s body suddenly squirmed out, stopping in front of Amy and catching the dagger before itnded on the ground.

    ¡°Thank you Bryan!¡± Amy smiled widely after the crisis had been averted and was full of gratitude towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°You¡¯re wee!¡± Han Shuo nodded with a faint smile, returning once again to Fanny and Lisa¡¯s side with dagger in hand, surveying the surroundings with a face full of calm.

    Finally, after paying the price of seventy injured or dead wolf riders, the wolf riders broke through the constant waves of magic attacks and came into direct conflict with the warriors of Drol. Arge battle suddenlymenced with fifty to sixty warriors armed to the teeth, wielding broadswords and long spears. There were even ten or so knights wieldingnces, fighting with the wolf riders from the back of their battlesteeds.

    The mages chanted their magics as they flew across the air in glorious sparkles,nding on the wolf riders in the back. The entire southern part of the town of Drol had sunken into the heat of battle amidst the sounds of violent explosions.

    Han Shuo, Fanny, and the others were situated behind the warriors and continuously chanted magic. Bolt after bolt of bone spears and arrows flew out towards the orc wolf riders that were charging at the defensive line of warriors.

    Felix, hovering in midair, became the main target of all the orc wolf rider crossbows. More than ten sharp bolts came whistling towards him, but Felix showed no trace of panic. He chanted an advanced wind magic after which a ten meter tornado formed in the air behind the wolf riders. Wolf riders were swallowed up wherever the tornado touched, and ghastly screams and wails sounded endlessly.

    After the tornado had appeared, Felix gave a wave of the magic staff in his hand and more than ten winddes instantaneously flew out from his body, demolishing the sharp bolts that flew to him. At the same time, a magic shield appeared andpletely covered him. The few sharp missiles that finally made it past his magic were blocked by the magic shield. Felix didn¡¯t suffer any harm to his body whatsoever.

    ¡°So strong! That¡¯s the true power of a mage!¡± The light students were watching Felix¡¯s rxed expressions besides Han Shuo and all of them disyed expressions of adoration and worship as they sighed with emotions.

    Just as everyone was reflecting on how amazing Felix was, the previously rxed Felix suddenly gave a great yell. ¡°Oh dear, more wolf riders have appeared in the distance. There also seems to be a few orc shamans with them. Let¡¯s retreat! Everyone split up and make for the city of Zajoski.¡±

    Felix¡¯s words immediately had a huge impact on everyone assembled. Han Shuo was the first to react as he grabbed Fanny¡¯s small hand and said calmly, ¡°Follow me, hurry.¡±

    Fanny was startled and when she saw Han Shuo¡¯s gravely calm expression, the curses that had made their way to her mouth transformed into, ¡°Alright, but where do you want to go?¡±

    ¡°To where the battlesteeds are kept. We must hurry and find the battlesteeds. Only on the backs of horses will we have the chance to escape to Zajoski, otherwise it will be difficult to guarantee our escape from the grasp of the wolf riders.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s mind was thinking very quickly at this moment and he spoke with decisiveness and grim determination.

    Fanny immediately reacted likewise when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s exnations, calling out hurriedly. ¡°All students, follow me.¡±

    Han Shuo knew that Fanny agreed with his n when he heard her call out. He turned his head to see Lisa looking covetously at the hand that he¡¯d used to grab Fanny¡¯s small hand. Han Shuo¡¯s expression turned wry as he also reached out a hand to grasp Lisa¡¯s hand.

    He then paid no attention to either of their expressions and hauled them off to where the battlesteeds were kept.

 Chapter 54: Dog eat dog

    Chapter 54: Dog eat dog

    Because of Felix¡¯s words, the originally smoothly cooperating warriors and mages, that were defending against the orc wolf riders, abruptly sank into panic. People started bing distracted from defense and instead frantically contemted their means of escape.

    In the span of a moment, an impregnable defense copsed. Apart from the warriors in the front, who were fighting as they retreated, the mages and the archers panicked and escaped in all directions.

    Han Shuo had grabbed Fanny and Lisa¡¯s wrists and was forcefully hauling the two with great haste to where the battlesteeds were stabled. Behind Han Shuo, Gene directed the other necromancy major students to follow closely behind him.

    After a few rounds of life and death battles, Han Shuo was no longer naive nor terror stricken when faced with danger. He quietly thought of what actions he should take next as he calmly sped forward.

    Also retreating with Han Shuo and the others, like tidewaters, were a few other mages and archers. If these people blocked Han Shuo¡¯s forward movement, they would¡¯ve been shoved to the side without a moment¡¯s hesitation.

    The archers and mages were hard pressed to increase their speed in the chaos of the crowd. Somehow, with Han Shuo as a meat shield, they managed to rush to the front after a moment¡¯s work.

    After fifteen minutes, Han Shuo had finally hauled Fanny and Lisa to where the battlesteeds were stabled, with Gene and the others following far behind. The master of the ce had also gone to the southern streets to observe the earlier events and had only left a servant inside to watch over the horses. Han Shuo directly broke down the door and pulled Fanny and Lisa in the direction of the stables in the back.

    ¡°What are you doing? Just what are you doing?¡± The elderly servant immediately stood up in a panic when he saw Han Shuo break down the door and rush towards the stables. He yelled angrily at them.

    ¡°The orc wolf riders have already fought their way here. If you continue to stay, you¡¯ll face only death. We¡¯re here to pick up the battlesteeds that we¡¯ve stabled here. If you want to live, then hurry, choose a battlesteed, and flee!¡± Han Shuo exined calmly as he rushed towards the stables.

    The elderly servant had already heard the chaos andmotion from outside at this time. He nked for a second and then also made swiftly for the stables. It looked like he¡¯d epted Han Shuo¡¯s suggestion.

    Han Shuo finally released Fanny and Lisa¡¯s little hands and his eyes made a desperate sweep of the surroundings. His eyesnded on a handsome battlesteed and vaulted onto its back without another word. Hended on the back of the horse in a second, swung the dagger in his hand, and shed through the ropes that restrained the battlesteed.

    He turned his head to find that Gene and some of the light major students had also made it to the stables. All were panting and joined Fanny and Lisa in looking for the horses they¡¯d stabled herest time.

    ¡°Are you all idiots? The orc wolf riders will be here any second, what are you looking around for? Not to mention the battlesteeds we stabledst time were all inferior beasts, there were only six of them... do you want to die?¡± Han Shuo could finally hold in his impatience no longer and suddenly yelled out upon seeing that these people were still looking amongst the crowd of stabled battlesteeds.

    Han Shuo¡¯s violent roar sounded throughout the stables. The necromancy students and teachers, who were looking for their battlesteeds, were all lectured. They all froze in that moment ¡ª Han Shuo had called them idiots! It was a bit tough for them to ept that!

    ¡°Then what do we do?¡± Lisa froze and then asked Han Shuo as she looked at him.

    ¡°Choose the best, strongest battlesteeds. We¡¯ll each take one. The lives of others have nothing to do with us. If you all want to die, then continue looking for the inferior battlesteeds that we had!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face darkened as he resolutely called out.

    This was originally a simple concept, but the pity was that these necromancy students and teachers had always functioned in the necromancy major that epassed a multitude of rules and customs. For them, following the rules was the natural thing to do. They hadn¡¯t thought at all about the fact that all rules could be broken in times of crisis.

    These people¡¯s faces all froze beneath Han Shuo¡¯s curses of ¡°idiots¡±, which then changed to contemtive frowns as Han Shuo continued in the vein of paying no heed to the lives of others. His words caused another round of impact to these students and teachers who were used to following the rules.

    Themotion outside grew bigger and they made swift decisions when faced with a crisis of life or death. They no longer hesitated and ran over to the fiercest and most valiant battlesteeds with looks of resolution.

    When the necromancy students and teachers had all upied the best battlesteeds in the stables under Han Shuo¡¯s urging, they rushed out of the stables. This was when the light major students from the Academy and other clearheaded mages and archers finally made their way to the stables.

    ¡°Damnit, they¡¯re riding our battlesteeds.¡± Irene¡¯s sharp eyesight immediately discovered that the handsome battlesteed, that Han Shuo was currently riding on, was the one that she had ridden just days before. She immediately voiced a loudint.

    However, at this moment Han Shuo and the others were already riding on the fiercest battlesteeds in the stables and had rushed out with due haste. They ignored the curses from Irene and the others and only left behind silhouettes that moved further and further away.

    ¡°Bryan, where should we go now?¡± Fanny immediately asked Han Shou as soon as they¡¯d left the stables and made it onto the chaotic streets.

    The warriors had already retreated into the town of Drol and the orc wolf riders had rushed into town. Whirling their longswords mightily, the defenseless merchants were the first ones to suffer as they often lost their heads when the swords chopped down.

    Because these wolf riders were riding giant wolves, they were in no hurry to immediately pursue the escaping warriors and mages. They only followed the street and starting looting the first stores they found. There wererge bags hanging from the bodies of the giant wolves and the resources of all the surrounding stores made it into the bags of the giant wolves.

    ¡°As long as it¡¯s not in the direction of Zajoski City, it doesn¡¯t matter where we flee to!¡± Han Shuo surveyed the surroundings and swept a nce at the eastern street. He noticed that there were fewer people fleeing on the northern street, and called out after a moment¡¯s thought. ¡°Follow me, we¡¯ll head north.¡±

    Because the town of Drol was about to fall, the most heavily fortified city in the southern part of the Empire, Zajoski City, became the ideal target in the hearts of the frantic escapees. Han Shuo observed for a moment and noticed that seventy percent of the people from the town of Drol were fleeing in the direction of Zajoski.

    However, out of this seventy percent, there were only ten or so on battlesteeds. When the orc wolf riders had finished raiding the town of Drol, their first target was sure to be this crowd of people.

    With giant wolves as steeds, the wolf riders¡¯ speed was sure to be faster than those who were still on foot. Because the flow of people was seventy percent of the town¡¯s inhabitants, the orcs were sure to send the most wolf riders after them. In this way, the ones most likely to die were the seventy percent of people escaping in the direction of Zajoski.

    As soon as he¡¯d started his calm deliberations, Han Shuo immediately realized that his thoughts were very clear. After a brief consideration, he immediately led battlesteeds with Fanny and the others racing to the northern street.

    With the convenience of battlesteeds, Han Shuo and co. moved exceedingly fast. Han Shuo met two swift wolf riders, who¡¯de to the northern street, along the way. The bags on their giant wolves were bulging. They ignored Han Shuo¡¯s crew and were about to rush into another store to loot.

    Snorting coldly, Han Shuo lifted the reins and directed the battlesteed beneath him to change its direction, charging towards the two wolf riders, who were raising their longswords with no abandon.

    The two wolf riders started. It seemed that they hadn¡¯t thought that someone would dare to take the offensive towards them. They withdrew the longswords that they¡¯ve nned on shing down on the shop¡¯s merchant and turned their bodies, abruptly splitting up. They waved the longswords in their hands and chopped towards the quickly approaching Han Shuo.

    ¡°Bryan, are you crazy?! Run!¡± Lisa, off in the distance, saw that Han Shuo¡¯s battlesteed had suddenly changed direction and was rushing towards the two wolf riders. She screamed out in panic and drew the attention of the necromancy students and teachers. They all involuntarily turned their heads and looked in Han Shuo¡¯s direction

    Wielding a dagger in his hand as his horse charged, Han Shuo quietly chanted a magical spell, and a bone arrow abruptly materialized in midair, whistling as it flew towards one of the wolf riders. As the wolf rider waved his longsword to defend himself, the dagger in Han Shuo¡¯s hand was already rushing towards the other wolf rider.

    The dagger drew a cold arc of light as it shed the air and sank into bone with a soft sound. The dagger had passed through the longsword¡¯s defenses and pierced a bloody hole in the wolf rider¡¯s chest. At this moment, Han Shuo¡¯s battlesteed had arrived in due haste. He wed at the reins and the horse abruptly halted in the midst of violent whinnies.

    Han Shuo¡¯s left arm reached out and yanked up, suddenly dislodging the longsword from the orc, who was already dead. Wielding the longsword, Han Shuo¡¯s right hand sank down and a bloody hole suddenly opened in the head of the agitated giant wolf. The rioting giant wolf suddenly ragdolled as it fell to the ground.

    With a flick of the sword, therge pocket hanging on the giant wolf suddenly shot out from the fallen wolf,nding directly on Han Shuo¡¯s battlesteed. Afterwards, Han Shuo¡¯s battlesteed changed direction and he charged with a face of cold cruelty at the other wolf rider, who had just pulverized the bone arrow.

    ¡°Oh my word, did I see incorrectly? Bryan just cast the bone arrow magic. What the hell is going on?¡± Gene pulled tightly on his battlesteed¡¯s reins and called out in with shock. The other students also bore a dumbfounded expression like simr to Gene¡¯s, looking dully at Han Shuo like it was the first time they were meeting him.

    ¡°Damnit, what is Bryan doing?¡± Fanny had known that Han Shuo could cast bone arrow magic and thus wasn¡¯t too surprised. What she was surprised about was that Han Shuo¡¯s current actions were robbing the wolf riders after they had looted the stores.

 Chapter 55: A change in status

    Chapter 55: A change in status

    The other wolf rider, upon seeing Han Shuo rush over wielding a longsword, forcefully widened his eyes that rested beneath his furry forehead. He roared furiously, obviously unpracticed in themonnguage, ¡°Tri... tricky humans, you are... looking for death!¡±

    The giant wolf, beneath his legs, howled and the orc wolf rider whipped out a crossbow from behind him, raised it, and shot it at Han Shuo. It whistled with an ear-piercing sound as it flew towards Han Shuo¡¯s neck.

    His magical yuan churning quickly, Han Shuo focused his concentration. That sharply whistling crossbolt suddenly seemed to slow down in his eyes, as bizarre as the slow motion scenes in the movies that Han Shuo used to watch. In stark contrast to the crossbow bolt¡¯s speed, was Han Shuo¡¯s strong and speedy perception.

    When the crossbolt had flown to about a meter away from Han Shuo, the longsword in his hand abruptly thrust out and itnded an unerringly urate hit on the head of the bolt. A sharp crack resounded and the crossbolt suddenly exploded into pieces.

    Even after destroying the oing crossbow bolt, Han Shuo¡¯s speed, although still on the back of the battlesteed, wasn¡¯t affected at all. Before the wolf rider had the chance to fire off a second bolt, Han Shuo had already raised his longsword and rushed in front of the wolf rider.

    The cold arc of a de red out from Han Shuo¡¯s right hand, wielding the sword. The longsword had been solid and heavy, but it was as light and graceful as a feather in Han Shuo¡¯s grasp.

    The orc wolf rider also raised its sword, but just as the two swords were about to sh together, a smaller, brown crossbow bolt suddenly flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s right sleeve. The crossbolt whooshed as it flew past the orc¡¯s longsword and sank into the orc wolf rider¡¯s neck with a soft sound.

    ¡°Trea... treachery!¡±

    Its mouth frothing with bloody bubbles, the orc wolf rider finally spat out this word with much difficulty as therge hand, which had been holding up the longsword, suddenly lost strength. The heavy longsword brought down its fit and bulky body into falling off the huge wolf¡¯s back. It was obvious from the looks of things that it was dead.

    ¡°A race with low intelligence indeed. Heh!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s previously stern and cold expression vanished as he came to the side of the huge wolf with a face filled of traces of an evil smile. A flick of his longsword sent the bag on the huge wolf¡¯s body flying towards the battlesteed behind him. Afterwards, the sword stabbed downwards and the giant wolf also toppled over in a pool of blood.

    ¡°Kill, kill, kill!¡±

    At this moment, a wave of figures suddenly materialized from the corner of the northern street. More than ten wolf riders were howling loudly as they desperately chased a band of mages and warriors. Amongst the escapees were Beacher and the others from the light major of the Academy, riding on inferior battlesteeds.

    ¡°Hurry and go!¡± Han Shuo immediately reacted after pausing momentarily. He lifted the reins in his hand and the battlesteed trotted out with dull, hasty clops as it changed directions once more to charge towards the north.

    Fanny and the others were tongue tied as they watched Han Shuo¡¯s dog eat dog performance. Seeing Han Shuo suddenly rush out, they too understood that the situation was dire. They also urged their battlesteeds to follow behind Han Shuo, pathing their escape to the north.

    Han Shuo¡¯s crew made their way to arge canyon after half a day¡¯s worth of frantic galloping on the back of their horses. The sides of the canyon were steep, and a vast river was at its end. Han Shuo and the others reined in their battlesteeds at the end of the canyon and gazed at the river¡¯s azure waters, suddenly sinking into a quandary.

    ¡°This should be the Empire¡¯s Nirn River. We can make our way to the city of Balthazar in the southern part of the Empire after crossing the Nirn River. Balthazar City and Zajoski City aren¡¯t too far apart. Although it¡¯s not as heavily fortified as Zajoski City, it¡¯s sure to have a heavily armed guard. I think we¡¯ll be safe as long as we can make it to Balthazar City.¡±

    Gene creased his brow in thought as he looked at the vast Nirn River and then suddenly spoke afterwards.

    ¡°In order to make it to Balthazar, we must cross the Nirn River first, but this Nirn River is so vast. I think we¡¯ll be unable to make it across without a ship ferrying us.¡± Fanny¡¯s face was full of anxiety as she sighed while gazing at the azure river waters from afar.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t said anything after reaching this ce and only self absorbedly rifled through the tworge bags on the battlesteed. The shops of the town of Drol were set up for the adventurers and mercenaries, so the shops mostly sold goods needed for battle.

    Han Shuo took inventory and realized that out of the two bags looted from the two wolf riders, there were four crossbows and more than ten bolts of the highest quality, three daggers of high quality, two longswords and mage staffs of ordinary quality, and three sets of leather armor designed to be worn next to the skin. Apart from this, there were also a few bottles of healing medicine and all sorts of poisons.

    Han Shuo first picked out the sharp dagger with a sapphire embedded in it and naturally concealed it close to his body. He then carefully put away the bottles of various poisons and finally poured out the weapons and armor out of the bags and onto the ground. He raised his head, looked at everyone, and said calmly. ¡°Put these things away and prepare to fight!¡±

    The necromancy students and teachers, who had been sighing and frowning in deep thought of potential strategies, all suddenly started at Han Shuo¡¯s words. Gene paused and suddenly remembered Han Shuo¡¯s performance just now. He eximed in surprise and stared at Han Shuo in question, ¡°Bryan, did you use the bone arrow magic just now?¡±

    Gene¡¯s question caused everyone except for Fanny to stare at Han Shuo with a face full of shock. Lisa even squealed with fright and pointed her right finger at Han Shuo with a face full of incredulity. ¡°That¡¯s right... Bryan, how can you use magic?¡±

    ¡°This isn¡¯t the time to discuss such matters. A portion of the orc wolf riders were headed this way. I think those damned wolf riders will reach here quite soon. We have a canyon in front of us and the vast Nirn River beneath us. What we should do now is consider how to handle the orc wolf riders that are about to arrive.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s expression was calm as he neatly arranged the weapons that had been within the bags, calmly exining as he did so.

    ¡°If it wasn¡¯t for you leading us to this forsaken ce, how would we be in such dire straits?¡± Be nced at Han Shuo disdainfully upon hearing his words and jeered at him with a cold expression.

    His brow furrowing, Han Shuo¡¯s calm face suddenly grew cold as irrepressible sense of disgust and dislike grew involuntarily in his heart. He lifted his head to look at the mocking Be and said, ¡°Do you mean my decision was wrong?¡±

    Be had been about to open her mouth and say ¡°precisely¡± when she suddenly realized that Han Shuo¡¯s gaze was sinisterly cold. Be¡¯s body shuddered involuntarily upon seeing his gaze was like that of jackals and wolves sizing up their prey. She smiled fearfully and stammered, ¡°I, I didn¡¯t mean that.¡±

    Nodding, a smile found its way onto Han Shuo face again as he smiled as though nothing had happened. ¡°Since that¡¯s the case, everyone pick your weapon. Our mental strength is limited and the casting range of magic isn¡¯t as far as crossbows. I think we should first use weapons, and when the weapons are useless, then use magic to attack. Come, let¡¯s make some preparations and wait for those wolf riders toe to their deaths.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s performance now was quite like the style of someone in charge. This would have originally been a veryical scene. After all, he was an errand ve for the necromancy major and had no right to call the shots.

    However, after experiencing the horrors of Han Shuo going berserk in the Dark Forest and his previous cold and cruel killing of the two wolf riders, no one thought it was funny to follow Han Shuo¡¯s orders.

    It was like they were all getting to know Han Shuo all over again. Even Fanny and Gene came docilely over and started to choose crossbows from Han Show¡¯s hands. No one raised any objections in defiance of Han Shuo.

    Unbeknownst to anyone, the original errand ve Han Shuo had established authority amongst them, causing them to willingly listen to Han Shuo¡¯s directives.

 Chapter 56: The pain that accompanies the happy fate of a man

    Chapter 56: The pain that apanies the happy fate of a man

    Steep hills bordered the sides of therge canyon with a passage that was five meters wide, right down the middle. This kind of location was the best forying a trap for the wolf riders.

    Since everyone had agreed with Han Shuo¡¯s ns, they all started busying themselves. Han Shuo didn¡¯t know much about how to set traps up himself. A group of people first used tough and tensile ropes to set up tripwires and snares along the passageway. Fanny and Gene then used advanced necromancy magics to release an acid bog behind the tripwires.

    The acid bog spell was an advanced necromancy spell. It could transform arge area ofnd into a muddy and miry bog. When the acid bog was formed, it would immediately eat away anyone who ventured within, leaving behind only a pile of bones. This was one of the more diabolic advanced magics of the necromancy major.

    However, a great deal of mental strength was needed in order to sessfully cast the acid bog magic. The acid bog¡¯s range would differ ording to each necromancer¡¯s mental strength. Fanny and Gene had teamed up, but only created a bog that measured five meters by five meters. Judging from how the two of them looked, they were already at their limit.

    A fewrge boulders were ced on the top of the hills on both sides, ready to crash down on the arriving orc wolf riders. The bodies of the students and teachers of the necromancy major were all extremely frail and delicate, therefore it was naturally Han Shuo whopleted the mission of moving therge boulders by himself.

    After making these preparations, Gene, Be, Bach, and a few others took cover andid in wait on one side of the passageway. Han Shuo, Fanny, Lisa, and a few others were in charge of the other hill.

    ¡°You¡¯ve changed a great deal now. If we make it back alive to the Academy, your contribution will be the greatest. I¡¯ll be sure to report this to the school authorities and obtain some rewards for you!¡± Fanny¡¯s body was crouched behind arge boulder and patrolled her eyes over Han Shuo¡¯s body, whispering as she did so.

    Han Shuo was in the middle, with Lisa on his left and Fanny on his right. The three were very close together and when Fanny spoke in a low voice, her breath smelled like the fragrance of orchids and directly breathed onto Han Shuo¡¯s right cheek. The faint perfume made Han Shuo¡¯s heart caper like a monkey and mind gallop like a horse. He suddenly felt that this time¡¯s danger was also full of gentle charm.

    He scratched his head out of habit and smiled honestly. Turning his head to boldly stare at Fanny¡¯s charming features. Fanny¡¯s hair was tousled and messy at this moment, and her face was a bit pale after expending quite a bit of mental strength to cast the acid bog. This was in stark contrast to her usual alluring beauty and overbearing air, bringing out another type of beauty for Han Shuo to see.

    ¡°Damnit, I¡¯m talking to you, stop staring at me!¡± Fanny grew angry when she saw that Han Shuo was staring at her, mesmerized and not paying any attention to her. This fellow is bing even more bold... he even dares stare so insolently at me now.

    ¡°Heh heh, Master Fanny, you¡¯re so beautiful. It won¡¯t cost you anything if I stare at you, so why must you be so stingy?¡± Han Shuo flirted with a lightugh.

    A sudden wave of pain travelled from Han Shuo¡¯s left arm. His face turned wry and he turned his head to cast a nce at Lisa. Upon seeing that Lisa was staring at him viciously, he hastily squeezed out a smile and said, ¡°Of course, Lisa you¡¯re also very beautiful, heh heh.¡±

    Holding her head high with a light snort, Lisa red at Han Shuo and said huffily. ¡°Don¡¯t think that I can¡¯t take you down a notch now that you¡¯re stronger. Humph. Since we have some free time now, hurry and tell me how you came to have mental strength and even mastered the bone arrow magic. How many secrets have you not told me?¡±

    ¡°Eh, what secrets? I could master the bone arrow magic thanks to you. If it wasn¡¯t for you using the Agony of the Soul and torturing me half to death, I would definitely still be as useless as before. Thanks to you!¡±

    Her face saddening, Lisa suddenly hung her head and sighed lightly. She said in a low voice, ¡°You still haven¡¯t forgiven me. I know you¡¯ve always hated me for using the Agony of the Soul on you, but I didn¡¯t mean anything by it originally. I didn¡¯t know either that it would almost kill you!¡±

    ¡°No, I really don¡¯t me you. Stop thinking crazy thoughts Lisa. It¡¯s not like you don¡¯t know my feelings towards you. How could I hold a grudge against you?¡± Han Shuo started and suddenly remembered his role and hastened to speak words offort to Lisa.

    Just at this moment, Han Shuo¡¯s right arm also felt the same pain and he turned his head to see Fanny¡¯s slender jade fingers were also forcefully pinching him. A wave of wryness rose from his heart as he sighed silently, thinking that the happy fate of a man was indeed something that couldn¡¯t be enjoyed. He asked wryly, ¡°Master Fanny, what¡¯s wrong now?¡±

    Fanny also started slightly upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words and thought, what¡¯s wrong with me? What do the two of them talking have to do with me? Howe I also couldn¡¯t resist the urge to pinch him? She flung her head slightly and also snorted, then pasted a faint smile on her face and raised her voice slightly. ¡°Lisa, what did he mean by the bit about his feelings towards you just now?¡±

    A panicked expression suddenly appeared on Lisa¡¯s face as she hurriedly waved her hands in concealment. ¡°Nothing, nothing. Master Fanny, you must have misheard. Haha, isn¡¯t that so Bryan?¡± She didn¡¯t forget to throw a threatening nce at Han Shuo in warning after she spoke, indicating that you¡¯re dead meat if you dare speak of it!

    Nodding his head wryly, Han Shou glossed over the matter. He smiled, ¡°Yes, Master Fanny must have expended too much mental strength and something must have developed, causing interference with your hearing?¡±

    ¡°Is that so?¡± Fanny looked suspiciously at Han Shuo and asked with an odd tone.

    ¡°Of course, of course. Oh right Master Fanny, when we return to the Academy, I¡¯d like to remove my status as a ve. I¡¯ve earned enough gold coins in the Dark Forest this time and don¡¯t want to bear the status of a ve forever!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, if we can really safely return to the Academy this time, I will contact the authorities on your behalf. Not only will we remove your status as a ve, but I¡¯m going to remove your status as an errand boy as well. You¡¯ll be a student in the necromancy major in the future and I will personally teach you more advanced necromancy magics. With your potential, I think your future aplishments will definitely surpass that of all the current students in the necromancy major!¡±

    Fanny looked at Han Shuo with gratification and gave him a resolute promise. She thought privately, when he bes a necromancy major student and if his magic increases rapidly, then he¡¯ll be able to truly throw off his current shackles. At that time, maybe... eh. What am I think about? Looks like I¡¯ve truly expended too much mental strength. Otherwise, why would I be thinking such crazy thoughts.

    Han Shuo had had an overjoyed expression on his face, but at this moment his brow suddenly furrowed and he closed his eyes, concentrating silently for a moment. He suddenly called out to the other side, ¡°Master Gene, be careful, I can already hear dull footsteps. I think the orcs¡¯ wolf riders will be arriving soon.¡±

    ¡°Understood, you guys need to be careful as well. Bryan, Master Fanny and I have just expanded a lot of mental strength, so you¡¯ll have to protect Master Fanny well!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, since Master Fanny is by my side, unless I die first, Master Fanny won¡¯t suffer a bit of harm!¡±

    Han Shuo felt more pain on his left arm as soon as he¡¯d finished speaking. He knew immediately that Lisa must have taken action in her anger. He hastily turned his head to the left and exined to Lisa. However, he didn¡¯t notice that on his right, Fanny¡¯s gaze at him at this moment had subtly gained a few hints ofplicated emotions.

    Finally, the dull footfalls slowly traveled in from the distance. Even the ordinary students and teachers of the necromancy major had heard those repressed, dull sounds and all involuntarily concentrated their attention, fully focused on how to spring the sudden attack afterwards.

    ¡°Damnit, why is it Beacher and the others from the light major?!¡±

    Just as everyone was holding their breath in concentration and were about to roll the giant boulders down the hills, Han Shuo¡¯s sharp eyes suddenly realized that the iing people weren¡¯t the orc wolf riders, but rather Beacher, Irene, and the others from the Academy¡¯s light major, who happened to be fleeing in stricken, bedraggled panic. A few unfamiliar mages were mixed in, and then all rode shrilly whinnying battlesteeds that looked like they were about to copse. Expressions of extreme weariness were on all their faces.

    Fanny frowned and suddenly poked her head out from behind the giant boulder. Her slender neck stretched out as she yelled loudly, ¡°Master Beacher, stop immediately. There are traps here that we¡¯veid down to deal specifically with the wolf riders.¡±

    Beacher and the others hurtling towards the tripwires hastened to stop themselves in that crucial moment after hearing Fanny¡¯s words. Beacher lifted his head to look at the necromancy students and teachers on the two sides of the hill and immediately understood the situation. He shouted out, ¡°The orcs¡¯ wolf riders are right behind us. What should we do?¡±

    ¡°Give up the horses and make them continue running. Then walk quickly across, we¡¯ll tell you where the traps are. Otherwise if you stay where you are, only death awaits you!¡± Han Shuo stuck out his head and called back calmly.

    Beacher and the others only hesitated momentarily upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words and then all moved ording to his instructions. They dismounted, used daggers to prick the battlesteeds¡¯ behinds and rushed them onwards after the horses¡¯ had been pricked. Following that, their crew frantically traversed the tripwires and acid bog under Fanny¡¯s voiced reminders and swiftly climbed up the hills on the two sides.

    Another wave of dull footfalls once again traveled into everyone¡¯s ears. This time, everyone knew that it was sure to be the orc wolf riders chasing in hot pursuit.

    ¡°Conceal yourself well and prepare to fight!¡± Han Shuo called out loudly as everyone carefully hid themselves, nning on giving these orc wolf riders, who were used to piging, killing, raiding and looting, a lesson in blood.

 Chapter 57: Killing and robbing

    Chapter 57: Killing and robbing

    A dust cloud formed in the distance as dull footfalls sounded in everyone¡¯s heart like a dull drum. A row of gleaming longswords first came into view, followed one by one by the sight of the strong orcs¡¯ bodies straddled atop their giant wolf mounts.

    These orc wolf riders had obviously already gone through a round of looting. The bags on the giant wolves beneath them were bulging at the seams. It looked like the shops in the town of Drol had surely been raided until not even a single shingle remained.

    Perhaps it was because the wolf riders were carrying too many spoils of war, but the speed of the giant wolves beneath had obviously been affected. This was why Beacher and the others, who were riding spindly battlesteeds, had been able to make it here.

    Behind the giant rock, Han Shuo gripped a tough and powerful crossbow, calmly focusing at the most stalwart orc who was leading the group. On his side, Fanny was also holding a crossbow and constantly changed the direction she was aiming at, resolute light sparkling in her eyes. It looked like when faced with death, Fanny also knew to steel her heart.

    Lisa¡¯s hands were empty, but she, along with all the other students, hadrge boulders next to them. These boulders had been ced appropriately by Han Shuo earlier. All they needed was a strong push to send them rolling, and they were sure to wreak havoc and devastation that was even more frightening than the crossbows.

    Apanied by the howls of the giant wolves, a column of more than ten wolf riders were as swift as the wind and quick as lightning as they finally appeared at the entrance of the passageway. Their speed was ferociously fast and they hadn¡¯t expected that an ambush would be sprung on them. They all swung their longswords and yelled out wildly, spurring on the giant wolves and rushing over.

    ¡°Awoo awoo awoo.¡±

    Some of the leading wolves had their front legs suddenly checked by the tripwires as their front legs buckled and lost bnce. They emitted deste howls as the four wolf riders, carried forward by their momentum, suddenly flew off the backs of their giant wolves.

    Papapapa.

    The four orcs waved their arms wildly as they uncontroblynded directly into the acid bog in front,nding with resounding, dull sounds.

    The four orcs, who hadnded in the acid bog, also emitted ghastly screams simr to their giant wolves. As they wailed like ghosts and howled like wolves, it was as if acid had been poured on their strong bodies. Their flesh, blood, hair, and even their clothes were all turned into bloody water and flowed quickly into the acid bog. The four orc wolf riders had turned into four enormous skeletons within the span of a brief moment.

    These four orc wolf riders were only the first ones to be so unlucky. Three more wolf riders behind them were unable to stop their charge in time and also flew into the acid bog. They too turned into three skeletons in the blink of an eye.

    ¡°This acid bog is worthy of the title of advanced necromancy alright. Master Fanny, you¡¯re amazing! You must teach me this magic when we make it back to the Academy!¡± Han Shuo said in low excitement to Fanny upon seeing that the acid bog was so malicious.

    However, he suddenly realized that Fanny¡¯s face was ghastly white after he¡¯d finished speaking and noticed that her gaze towards the acid bog wasn¡¯t quite right. He used his body to bump into Fanny and asked again, ¡°Master Fanny, is everything alright?¡±

    Fanny abruptly recollected her senses after being bumped by Han Shuo and said frantically, ¡°No, nothing. This is the first time I¡¯ve tried casting this acid bog magic ever since I mastered it and I really hadn¡¯t thought that this magic would be so pernicious.¡±

    Just as Han Shuo and Fanny were talking, the ten or so orc wolf riders had all crashed into each other in chaos and confusion because the front had abruptly hauled on the reins, stopping their giant wolves, whereas the wolf riders in the back couldn¡¯t halt their charge. A few orcs fell off their giant wolves due to the impact.

    But this way, the tripwires and the acid bog lost their purpose. The orcs attempted to regain their footing and formation as they called out in the din of voices and in the midst extremely crowded panic.

    ¡°Kill!¡±

    At this moment, Han Shuo suddenly gathered his strength and roared out loudly.

    Lisa and the others had already busily sharpened their weapons and were itching for action. When they heard Han Shuo¡¯s shout, they too yelled out raucously as they pushed the giant boulders beside them down the hill. More than ten boulders leveraged a momentum that had an imposing manner, which red up at the skies, and alternately rolled or flew down at the orc wolf riders below, apanied by enormous rumbling sounds.

    Suddenly, the orc wolf riders, who had been the hunters, became the prey instead. Those rolling,rge boulders became murder weapons that took lives and swiftly reaped the lives of the orcs. The orcs were already crowded like sardines and hadn¡¯t had the chance to properly reorganize their formation again. Faced with the descent of giant boulders, they immediately paid a heavy price.

    Four giant rocks rained down on them and directly smashed six orcs, and their giant wolf steeds, into a blood mess. The rest of therge boulders followed the downhill slope of the hill with a ferocious momentum. When they crashed into the wolf riders, strings of agonized shouts and wails sounded out.

    When this wave of giant rocks had finished, another fifteen wolf riders had died immediately. Another ten or so had been drawn into the chaos and suffered injuries of varying magnitudes. As these orcs screamed out in panic and fright, they suddenly discovered that the way back was also blocked off byrge rocks. Many figures suddenly revealed themselves on the sides of the hill slopes afterwards and were apanied by curses and volleys of crossbow bolts and magic attacks.

    ¡°Crude and barbaric orcs! Die! All of you!¡± On the other side, Irene, from the light major, had stood up on the side of the hill and cursed in a low voice with a face full of disgust. She began chanting light magic afterwards and started attacking the orcs with Beacher. It looks like they had finally found a target to vent their frustrations on after facing such relentless pursuit from the wolf riders.

    At this moment, there were still thirty of so orc wolf riders who were still alive in the passageway. However, these wolf riders had to face the various magic attacks from the two sides of the hills. Wielding his crossbow, Han Shuo would shoot calmly as soon as he¡¯d focused on an orc. As long as those orcs were hit by Han Shuo¡¯s crossbow bolt, they would still fall down in the short term, even if they hadn¡¯t suffered a hit to a vital organ. They would never stand up again.

    ¡°Eh? Howe the orcs that you¡¯ve hit all never stand up again, even if they¡¯ve only suffered a grazing shot? The ones I¡¯ve hit, as long as I haven¡¯t hit a crucial part, suffer only minor difort?¡± On the side, Fanny creased her brow and asked in confusion after observing the situation for a bit.

    ¡°Heh heh, that¡¯s a given. I took some time earlier to sprinkle some poison dust on my quiver of crossbow bolts. They¡¯re absolutely done for if even a tiny bit gets on them!¡± Han Shuo urately shot and killed another orc and exined faintly, as if nothing was amiss.

    Fanny started when she heard his words, and then angrily pointed at Han Shuo, saying viciously, ¡°You, you¡¯re a bit despicable alright. Where did you learn such evil methods? We can¡¯t use poisoned arrows even if two countries fight... this is an unwritten rule of the Profound Continent.¡±

    Shrugging, Han Shuo said diffidently, ¡°This is a fight between life and death. Being despicable has nothing to do with it. Killing them with the lowest price possible is the correct way, you adhere too stubbornly to outdated rules and ideas!¡±

    ¡°Yes, Bryan is right. These damned orcs burned, killed, looted, and raided in the town of Drol. They take advantage of us every winter to raid along the borders of the Empire. There¡¯s no need to talk about any rules with them.¡± Off on the side, Lisa suddenly interjected at this moment, obviously siding with Han Shuo¡¯s methods.

    ¡°Hmph, you two brats are both lily-livered. No wonder you¡¯ve be close. Bryan, I¡¯ll let it go this time. You can¡¯t tell anyone what you¡¯ve done once you return to the Empire, and you can¡¯t do so in the future. Otherwise, if anyone finds out, they¡¯re sure to send armed forces to suppress you.¡± Fanny rolled her eyes at both of them and suddenly admonished them severely.

    Han Shuo understood Fanny¡¯s good intentions. The poison powder sold in the town of Drol were all for the purpose of being used against the savage and violent magical creatures in the Dark Forest. Ordinarily, no one would dare use it against enemies like this in broad daylight.

    However, Han Shuo only listened to Fanny¡¯s reminders and was still quite disdaining internally. If it came down to the wire and his life was endangered, he would certainly still throw caution to the winds and use even more despicable methods.

    Under the attacks of crossbow bolts and various magics, the remaining orc wolf riders could only use their crossbows to attack the ambushers on the sides of the hills. However, Han Shuo and the others had fully upied the advantage ofnd and numbers. Under the continual onught of attacks, the orc wolf riders fell one by one into puddles of blood, obviously dead as a doornail.

    When there were only five wolf riders left, they finally started to be afraid. The giant wolves were unable to climb past the giant rocks, so the orcs jumped down from the giant wolves, even giving up all the resources in the bags on the wolves¡¯ bodies. They started retreating without a care for anything else.

    ¡°Oh no, they¡¯re getting away. If they escape, there are sure to be more wolf riders thate by. Everyone chase after them!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s facial expression changed drastically upon seeing this situation and hastily yelled loudly, but his body remained where it was standing.

    Everyone panicked after Han Shuo had spoken and rushed down from the slope, frantically chasing the fleeing orcs. The three warriors, that had been hiding, ran the fastest, racing down the rocky slope like they were on t ground. They sped quickly after them, with a group of mages following them. Beacher was at the head as well as Gene, Bach, and some other necromancy students. They all raised their staffs and ran out.

    Just as Fanny poked out tentatively with her body and was about to run out from behind the giant rock, Han Shuo suddenly reached out and abruptly wrapped his arm around Fanny¡¯s waist in a hug. He asked in a low voice, ¡°It¡¯s so dangerous, why are you going?¡±

    Fanny¡¯s slender waist was suddenly wrapped by Han Shuo¡¯s arm, causing her entire body to go numb. She turned her head to see that the other necromancy students, who were also about to walk out, were all looking oddly at her, particrly Lisa, she seemed to be repressing anger.

    Fanny nked and grew agitated when she recollected her wits. A red blush flew onto her face and she began struggling fiercely, saying angrily, ¡°What are you doing, hurry and let go of me. Why are you holding me back?¡±

    ¡°They won¡¯t miss us, and don¡¯t we have more important things to do right now?¡± Han Shuo released his grasp and chuckled.

    ¡°What else could be more important?¡± Fanny and the others all asked, perplexed.

    ¡°Collect the spoils of war! The resources in those bags on the giant wolves are all dazzling gold coins when brought to a city in the Empire!¡± Han Shuoughed heartily as his body had already quickly dashed down from the mountain.

    Fanny, Lisa and the others were dumbfounded. They lost their hesitation when they saw that a couple other smart strangers were likewise rushing downhill. They all cried out happily and ran to the fallen wolf riders to collect the spoils of war, with nary a thought for theirposure or demeanor.

 Chapter 58: The function of skeletal warriors

    Chapter 58: The function of skeletal warriors

    ¡°Souls of the fallen soldiers, heed the dark herald¡¯s call and reveal your existence!¡± Han Shuo suddenly started chanting a magical incantation as he ran towards the passageway.

    An ordinary, skeletal warrior appeared in the passageway after his incantation had finished. Upon seeing the skeletal warrior materialize, Han Shuo immediately concentrated his mental strength and gave amand ¡ª rob them.

    This skeletal warrior wasn¡¯t the one that Han Shuo had refined with magical yuan. Its speed and strength paled far inparison to the little skeleton. Its bones even creaked and rubbed against each other when it moved.

    The ink- ck, little skeleton with seven bone spurs had caused too much of a disturbance in the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. If anyone were to find out that he had been the one to summon the little skeleton, it was bound to cause a string of trouble for him. Therefore, Han Shuo didn¡¯t dare let the little skeleton appear at this moment.

    ¡°Everyone hurry, otherwise all the items will be taken by someone else!¡± The ones who¡¯d stayed behind included Irene from the light major. When she noticed that Han Shuo and the others had raced down, she immediately called out and followed.

    On the necromancy major¡¯s side, Fanny, Lisa, and the others first started when they saw Han Shuo summon a skeletal warrior and then quickly recollected their wits. They bore expressions of glee and also started summoning skeletal warriors.

    More than ten skeletal warriors were abruptly summoned by Fanny, Lisa, and the others. Under themands from their mental strength, the skeletal warriors all reached out their bony hands and began to pick up the giant bags from the ground.

    The resources within the wolf rider¡¯s bags had all been obtained through previous raids. Now that the orc wolf riders were all dead, these bagscked a master and naturally became free game for whoever grabbed it first. On Han Shuo¡¯s side, the skeletal warriorscking in battle strength were finally of some use. Although their speed was slow, a bag still dangled from the hands of every skeletal warrior.

    As their masters, Han Shuo, Fanny, Lisa, and the others naturally didn¡¯t sit idly by. Everyone had a bag in their hands and Han Shuo had even grabbed four bags, looking like the cat who ate the canary.

    Han Shuo and the others had salvaged eighty percent of the loot that the wolf riders had left behind in the passageway. The other strangers had managed to grab the other twenty percent. Weapons, armor, and medicines from the town of Drol were all highly valuable items. If taken to the Empire and sold there, they were sure to fetch high prices and rich rewards.

    Aftermanding the skeletal warriors to line up in neat rows, Han Shuo looked at Fanny with a smile, ¡°Master Fanny, with these items and our gains from the Dark Forest, I think the school authorities will look at our necromancy major with different eyes when we return to the Academy.¡±

    Fanny¡¯s mood was also exceedingly jubnt at this time and she had long since forgotten Han Shuo¡¯s earlier insolence. A gleeful expression was disyed on her face as her eyes flicked a nce at Han Shuo, saying lightly, ¡°Perhaps not. Many of these things are from the shops of the town of Drol. Although the owners of those shops are now either fleeing or dead, if the Empire were to find out about the origins of these goods, they would confiscate them for sure.¡±

    Fanny¡¯s worries were not without reason. Han Shuo thought for a bit and suddenly remembered the merchant, Fabian, whom he had met in the Dark Forest. When the two had parted ways, Fabian had left a card with Han Shuo so that Han Shuo could find him and do business. Fabian was a member of the Boozt Merchant Guild and should have an appropriate way to properly dispose of the items if they found him.

    When his thoughts traveled to this point, Han Shuo smiled confidently at Fanny and said, ¡°Master Fanny, you need not worry. As long as we make it back to the Empire in one piece, I have ways to dispose of these items, which shouldn¡¯t leave any traces behind.¡±

    Fanny looked askance at Han Shuo and shook her head afterwards, saying with emotion, ¡°Bryan, I realize that I can see through you less and less. How many secrets have you hidden from us... how would you have the methods to dispose of these items?¡±

    Chuckling lightly, Han Shuo said, ¡°Let¡¯s speak of these matterster. I think our first course of action should be how to leave this ce and speedily return to the Empire.¡±

    Just as Han Shuo and Fanny were talking, Beacher and the others, including Gene, Bach, and those from the necromancy major on the other side, had returned from the distance they¡¯d travelled. Judging from the relieved expressions on their faces, Han Shuo knew that the orcs had most likely met their impending doom.

    Indeed, when Beacher and the others had walked over, he immediately said proudly, ¡°Everyone rx, none of those orcs made it out. We can finally be at ease for a moment.¡±

    He was halfway through his words when he suddenly looked around in surprise, eximing, ¡°Eh, what¡¯s going on?¡±

    Apart from the corpses of the orc wolf riders and of the giant wolves in the passageway, all the bags had been split up by the remaining people. Particrly on Han Shuo and Fanny¡¯s side, a row of skeletal warriors, each holding a giant bag, was especially conspicuous.

    Fanny was a bit awkward, opened her mouth and didn¡¯t know what to say. Finally, in her agitation, she couldn¡¯t help but re at Han Shuo and indicate that Han Shuo should respond.

    Walking forward as if nothing had happened, there wasn¡¯t a trace of awkwardness on Han Shuo¡¯s face. He put down the two bags on his body and called out to the unfamiliar mercenaries, warriors, and mages who had just returned from afar. He smiled faintly, ¡°These are all spoils of battle, brave fighterse over and take some. Everyone will go their own separate way soon, but we¡¯ve just repelled the orcs together just now, so let these items be a momento of our battle.¡±

    ¡°Sure, alright!¡±

    The ten or so adventurers, who had returned, all cheered simultaneously and ran over excitedly, adeptly picking through the resources in the bags.

    Beacher and some of the other light major students had been about ready to join in their ranks when they saw Irene and the others also held stuffed bags in their hands. They started and began walking over to Irene.

    ¡°Little fellow, you¡¯re a swell friend. If you ever require the services of our Battlewolves Mercenary Company in the future, don¡¯t hesitate to speak up.¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, I¡¯m very happy to be friends with you. If you need any medicines in the future, juste find me.¡±

    These people all chatted andughed in high spirits when they poked through the items as numerous cards with contact information made their way into Han Shuo¡¯s hands.

    ¡°Master Fanny, why are we giving those items over to them? What¡¯s wrong with Bryan?¡± A necromancy student, Athena, was watching Han Shuo¡¯s open bags with a look of pain as she asked huffily.

    ¡°His methods are absolutely correct. If we swallow all these resources ourselves, these people won¡¯t gain anything at all and will be sure to report this matter to the Empire. Perhaps they might even think of robbing us in their anger. We¡¯d be in dire straits then.

    Bryan has taken out only a small portion right now for them to choose what they will. Doing so also drags them down with us and shuts everyone¡¯s mouth. They don¡¯t have space rings and can¡¯t summon skeletal warriors like us for manualbor, so they can¡¯t take much at all. In the end, we still benefit the most and he¡¯s also won the friendship of these adventurers. The Bryan of now is truly bing stronger and stronger!¡± Fanny¡¯s beautiful eyes had continually been focused on Han Shuo¡¯s figure, who was talking andughing with the adventurers as she exined to the perplexed Athena.

    ¡°He¡¯s bing more and more mysterious. I wonder where he¡¯s learned all these random bits of knowledge, and his knowledge actually has some use!¡± Lisa looked at Han Shuo, remembering the secret way he¡¯d taught her to round out her chest and whispered with a hint of emotion.

    ¡°Alright, since everyone¡¯s taken their pick, let¡¯s split up now. I won¡¯t be shy if there are any ways in which I need your help in the future, haha!¡± Han Shuo was chattering happily with an air of familiarity on the other side. The fourrge bags on his body were basically empty.

    These mercenaries and adventurers had all more or less benefited some and gained items they needed. As they looked at Han Shuo, they felt that he looked incredibly pleasing to the eye. Everyone left one by one after finally exchanging a round of pleasantries. Beacher and the others also left carrying their loot aftering by and thanking Fanny.

    Gene finally spoke up in wistful regret when there was only Han Shuo and the others left in the area, ¡°I would¡¯ve stayed had I known earlier. If we hadn¡¯t left, then the bags in the hands of the light majors would be ours for sure.¡±

    Fanny had noment for Gene¡¯s regret and suddenly felt in that moment that even though he had quite a few years on him, his intelligence seemed to not even measure up to Han Shuo¡¯s. An involuntary wave of contempt grew in her heart.

    ¡°Right, what should we do now?¡± Fanny¡¯s eyes looked at Han Shuo and the question came naturally out of her mouth.

    Raising his head to look at the vast Nirn River, Han Shuo thought for a moment and said lowly, ¡°There are a few towering trees in the canyon below. There are various sharp weapons in our bags and a few tensile bundles of rope. We¡¯ll be able to swiftly construct wooden rafts if we fell a few trees. We¡¯ll be able to travel the Nirn River with the rafts and directly make it to Balthazar City.¡±

    ¡°I see, then why didn¡¯t you tell the others just now?¡± Gene suddenly asked upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words.

    ¡°What business is it of mine if they want to leave? Besides, when they leave, they¡¯ll be able to draw the orcs¡¯ attention away from us, decreasing our danger. Isn¡¯t this good?¡± Han Shuo smiled faintly and exined matter of factly.

    Fanny, Gene, and the others were all dumbfounded by his words and privately reflected that Han Shuo was indeed different now. When he had been conversing andughing happily with others, he¡¯d been inwardly plotting against them already.

    Gene, Bach, and Be suddenly all looked at each other, thinking of what they¡¯d done to Han Shuo in the past. A chill simultaneously gripped their hearts.

 Chapter 59: Gifting you a necklace

    Chapter 59: Gifting you a ne

    With the aid of the dark creatures, the operation of felling trees to construct wooden rafts only took half a day under Han Shuo¡¯smand before it was fullyplete.

    Five wooden rafts and ten wooden oars all entered the water with the efforts of the skeletal warriors. Everyone boarded the wooden rafts after all thirteen bags had been ced securely on them, and started rowing down the Nirn River with oars in hand.

    Han Shuo, Fanny, and Lisa were all on one raft, and Fanny had summoned a zombie warrior to row. The three of them lounged leisurely on the sturdy wooden tform, admiring the view of the Nirn River in a satisfied manner.

    It was already dusk, and the glow of sunset painted the sky. The deep, blue waters of the Nirn River were calm, and a few bold fish leapt out to draw silver lines on the water surface. The towering trees in the distance were covered with leafy boughs, and a few unknown insects called out happily, putting everyone into a quiet and calm state of mind.

    As Fanny and Lisa chattered andughed quietly, admiring the view on all sides, Han Shuo sat cross legged on the wooden raft with his eyes closed, silently training his magical yuan, not giving up even a single second that could be used to strengthen and reforge his body, continuously opening up the passages in his body.

    Fanny and Lisa originally had a belly full of questions for Han Shuo, but they didn¡¯t disturb him when they realized that he had closed his eyes and wasn¡¯t speaking. They actually felt moved by how studious Han Shuo was, thinking that it was no wonder he¡¯d improved so quickly in such a short amount of time. Their beautiful eyes asionallynded on Han Shuo¡¯s body, discussing something in low voices. It seemed that their topic of discussion must have certainly involved Han Shuo.

    After a long period of silence, Han Shuo abruptly opened his eyes and looked around when he felt that the wooden raft had shuddered. He discovered that the raft had made it across the Nirn River and arrived in a lush area, thick with shrubbery and trees.

    Fanny and Lisa giddily directed the dark creatures to move the spoils of battle from the wooden raft onto the shore. When Gene andpany were all present and ounted for, everyone cheered and used mental strength tomand the dark creatures, rushing towards Balthazar City after the direction had been set.

    After walking for two days straight, the crew finally arrived at Balthazar city. They first found arge hotel and immediately began to shower and change, feasting on delicacies to their heart¡¯s content, and retiring happily for the night.

    Han Shuo¡¯s treatment was now vastly different from what it had been when they¡¯d first headed into the Dark Forest. He naturally enjoyed the most noble treatment, and shared his room with no one. Everyone had even undertaken the task of moving the resources to the hotel¡¯s specialized vault with their own hands. No one dared to let Han Shuo do it.

    The next day, early in the morning.

    Dondondon. Fanny lived next to Han Shou and he knocked on her door as soon as he¡¯d gotten up.

    ¡°Who is it?¡± Fanny¡¯szy voice sounded from within the room.

    ¡°It¡¯s me.¡± Han Shuo responded.

    ¡°Oh, wait a minute. I¡¯ll open the door for you after I¡¯ve finished washing up.¡±

    Fanny opened her door after a while, wearing a thin, white, silk robe. The long, soft robe thoroughly entuated her slender and well-endowed body. Her hair was messy and shezily flicked a nce at Han Shuo, moving aside to let him in. She asked, ¡°What are you doing here so early in the morning?¡±

    Greedily staring his fill at Fanny, Han Shuo automatically sat at the round table after closing the door. He smiled and said, ¡°Master Fanny, I was thinkingst night that the loot we hold is still too conspicuous in our hands. I wanted toe discuss with you how to dispose of it.¡±

    ¡°Mm. It¡¯d also be a good thing if we disposed of these resources sooner. We¡¯re not merchants and can¡¯t very well bring these items back to the school with us, but these itemse from the town of Drol. If we¡¯re discovered by others, not only will we not receive any gold coins, but we may be in trouble as well. What should we do?¡± Fanny¡¯s beautiful brows were creased faintly as she spoke after thinking for a while.

    ¡°If we had a space ring, we¡¯d be able to resolve this problem. Master Fanny, although space rings are precious, there¡¯s still got to be a price for them. How much would a regr, smaller space ring cost?¡±

    ¡°Typically only space archmages have the ability to refine a space ring. The materials needed to refine a space ring are also quite precious, therefore, the prices for space rings are all quite high. Even a space ring that is of a slightly inferior quality will run for at least one or two thousand gold coins. It isn¡¯t something that just anyone can afford, so you¡¯d best not think these random thoughts.¡±

    ¡°Master Fanny, as an adept mage, most of your necromancy students are from noble families, so howe you don¡¯t have even a space ring?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, although I¡¯m an adept mage, I rarely leave the Academy under normal circumstances. My ie every year is only a few hundred gold coins, so where would I have the spare change to purchase a space ring? The necromancy major is the weakest major. If these students all came fromrge noble families, then they wouldn¡¯t join the necromancy major. Besides, they haven¡¯t graduated yet, why would their families buy a space ring for them!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and basically understood the gist of things after Fanny¡¯s exnation. It looked like the necromancy students and teachers were all paupers. No wonder they were all so excited when faced with this batch of resources.

    ¡°So that¡¯s the case, a space ring costs one or two thousand gold coins. Heh heh, looks like I should get a space ring first.¡± Han Shuo thought about the two thousand gold coins saved in his crystal card, rubbed his chin for a while as he mused, then spoke as if deep in thought.

    Rolling her eyes at Han Shuo, Fanny was out of sorts. ¡°What gold coins would you have as an errand ve? If you had that much money, would you have been sold and be an errand ve for the necromancy major for six years?¡±

    Chuckling, Han Shuo said, ¡°Times have changed, who says I¡¯ll be poor forever? Don¡¯t worry, I have my ways to get a space ring.¡±

    When he had finished saying these words, Han Shuo surreptitiously looked to the left and right under Fanny¡¯s astonished eyes and took out an agate ne studded with a ruby. The ne sparkled with a faint, red hue and the ruby was glittering and translucent, an obviously valuable gemstone.

    ¡°Master Fanny, this is for you!¡± Han Shuo saw that Fanny was staring at the ne in his hands, entranced. Heughed lowly and gave the ne to Fanny.

    At first, she was abruptly joyful, and then blushed hotly. When she¡¯d recovered herself, she hastily shrank back and said, ¡°I, I can¡¯t ept it. Right, where did you get this?¡±

    ¡°From the orc wolf rider¡¯s bags of course. I have sharp eyes and nimble fingers and saw that a bag was sparkling with red light, and thus discovered this agate and ruby ne. I thought that since Master Fanny is such a beautiful person, if you were to wear this ne, it would be sure to disy you in an even more charming and alluring light. So I put it away to give specifically to you.¡± Han Shou¡¯s expression was quite normal as he spoke lightly.

    ¡°This item is too precious, I can¡¯t have it, you keep it for yourself!¡± Fanny¡¯s beautiful face was flushed red as her beautiful eyes stared closely at the ne, but her mouth stammered words of refusal. It looks like that although she greatly liked it, she hadn¡¯t fully lost her reason.

    ¡°Take it, I have no use for it as a man. Besides, you¡¯ve taken care of me all these years, and I¡¯ve been very thankful to you all along. I finally have the chance to repay you, I¡¯d be very sad if you rejected it.¡± Han Shuo was quite serious as his normal, silly, honest look had disappeared. He spoke quite resolutely.

    ¡°I really can¡¯t, you already saved mest time and you¡¯ve helped me a great deal along the way. How could I ept your things. Ooh, althoughst time in the pool, you...¡± Fanny rambled a bit as she seemed to remember Han Shuo¡¯s mischief at the pool. Her face flushed a delicate and charming scarlet as she flung an eyeroll at Han Shuo.

    Her beautiful figure almost lured Han Shuo¡¯s soul away. His thoughts racing, Han Shuo hastily stood up with a strong sense of righteousness. He smiled, ¡°You must ept this or I will always feel ashamed and uneasy. I have other matters to attend to, good day.¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t wait for Fanny to deny him again after he¡¯d spoken, and directly pulled open the door to leave. His footsteps gradually faded away into the distance.

    Fanny was panicking in her heart as her eyesnded on the agate and ruby ne. Her expression was indescribably odd. Her eyes would be resolute one second, and tender the next. Then her face would flush angrily as another,plex emotion continuously yed out on her face.

 Chapter 60: We also have a space ring

    Chapter 60: We also have a space ring

    ¡°This, this space ring... where did you get it?¡± Fanny looked askance at Han Shuo and asked in shock.

    ¡°I bought it.¡± Han Shuo responded faintly and nced at the necromancy students, whose eyes were green, full of jealousy and admiration. He added, ¡°I bought it for 1,800 gold coins in the city¡¯s magical items shop. This space ring can hold up to a small room¡¯s worth of items.

    ¡°Of course I knew that you bought it, but I¡¯m asking how you came about 1,800 gold coins?¡± Fanny¡¯s astounded expression remained as she red fiercely at Han Shuo in question.

    Apart from Fanny, all the other teachers and students of the necromancy major were also present. All of their minds short circuited as they couldn¡¯t quiteprehend why Han Shuo suddenly had so much money.

    ¡°Did, did you sell all the spoils that we looted?¡± Be nked for a moment, suddenly remembered something and eximed softly. She hastily went through the battle loot that they had stored in the room.

    Snorting coldly, Han Shuo flung a disdainful look at Be, mocking her, ¡°Then you need to take a good look to see if I¡¯ve filled my own pocket with public funds. Huh. All 13 bags are still here, untouched. Do you have eyes or not?¡±

    ¡°Then where did your gold coinse from?¡± Gene was also looking oddly at Han Shuo, his eyes roving greedily over the space ring on the index finger of Han Shuo¡¯s left hand, thinking I¡¯m a necromancy teacher and I can¡¯t afford a space ring. Is there any logic left in this world if you, an errand ve, has one before even me?

    ¡°That¡¯s not the point, I have a space ring now, so take inventory of all the items in the bags and I¡¯ll put them away. When we get back to the Academy, I¡¯ll be in charge of selling it and then we¡¯ll distribute the gold coins after we get them.¡± Han Shuo smiled a deep and mysterious smile and said faintly to Gene.

    ¡°Master Fanny? What is your opinion?¡± Gene paused, turned his head to look at Fanny, and asked her opinion.

    ¡°Mm, let¡¯s do it this way then. Bryan¡¯s aplishments have been the greatest in us being able to grab these items. Since he has a way to dispose of them, let¡¯s do it ording to what he¡¯s said. After we receive the gold coins, Bryan gets 40% and we can split the rest evenly.¡± Fanny mused for a moment and proposed with a creased brow.

    ¡°Why is it that he gets 40%? We also put our effort forth too?¡± Bach immediately raised faint dissent upon hearing Fanny¡¯s words.

    ¡°Indeed indeed, he¡¯s just an errand boy, so he shouldn¡¯t receive so many gold coins.¡± Be had finished counting inventory and hastened to assent.

    Scratching his head, Han Shuo wore an honest smile as he raked his gaze over the two. He chuckled, ¡°Then your meaning is...?¡±

    Bach and Be had met many troubles at Han Shuo¡¯s hands during this entire expedition and had long since understood that Han Shuo¡¯s dumb, honest exterior was just a facade. His methods against enemies were brutal and cruel, and Bach and Be had long since witnessed them. Seeing the honest expression appear on his face again, the two of them felt their scalps go numb and stammered, not daring to say much.

    ¡°Alright alright, Bryan don¡¯t scare them. Then it¡¯s decided. If it weren¡¯t for Bryan, you guys wouldn¡¯t even be alive at this point. Besides, we were the ones who gained these resources, you guys all went to chase after the orc wolf riders and didn¡¯t do anything. You¡¯re the ones with the least right to speak.¡± Fanny rolled her eyes at Han Shuo first, then ced her hands on her waist and lectured Bach and Be with an arrogant air.

    ¡°Since this is the case, I¡¯ll store these items into the space ring first. We¡¯ll hire horses to directly head towards Zajoski City. I¡¯ve asked around and the orc wolf riders seemed to have left after ravaging and piging all the nearby viges. I think we shouldn¡¯t run into any further danger.¡± Han Shuo swept his gaze at the assembled and spokezily.

    When Han Shuo saw that Fanny, Gene and the others had all nodded in agreement, he released a tendril of mental strength and activated the space ring. With Han Shuo using his two hands afterwards, the thirteen bags all disappeared one by one into thin air. The blue space ring on his left hand shed with blue light thirteen times.

    Under the admiring and envious gazes of the necromancy students and teachers, Han Shuo stored the battle loot into the space ring. He discovered that after storing thirteen bags, the low-level space ring was already at max capacity and could no longer store anything else.

    The group of people took out more gold coins afterwards, rented a few battlesteeds, and left Balthazar City. They made it back to Zajoski City in the span of two days.

    Using the transportation matrix in Zajoski City, everyone returned to the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force in the city of Ossen. Gazing upon the familiar buildings in the academic surroundings, a joyous feeling of being reborn again arose in the hearts of the necromancy teachers and students as they¡¯d been delivered from great danger.

    ¡°Bryan, you no longer have to deal with the errand duties of the necromancy major anymore. I¡¯m going to have a talk with the school authorities right now to dispel your status as an errand boy and a ve, allowing you to be a true necromancy magic apprentice.¡± Fanny spoke to Han Shuo after she¡¯d gotten over her tion of returning to the Academy.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart also gave an ecstatic lurch upon hearing Fanny¡¯s guarantee and a faint smile made its way onto his face. After the trials of the Dark Forest, Han Shuo¡¯s entire being had undergone a significant change. He had a deep appreciation for the fact that his errand boy and ve status would directly impact his actions in the future. Now that he could not only dispel both of these statuses, but truly be a student, he was naturally ted.

    ¡°Understood Master Fanny, I will dispose of the resources within the space ring. I¡¯lle back here to find you after I resolve all of these matters.¡± He smiled at Fanny and then thought for a moment, fishing out three gold coins from his pocket and giving them to Lisa. ¡°If you see Jack, please give him these gold coins for me.¡±

    Lisa looked oddly at Han Shuo, put away the gold coins and said, ¡°Looks like you¡¯re pretty good to that little fatty. I really wonder how you got so much money all of a sudden. Three gold coins are enough for Jack¡¯s family expenses for a year. You¡¯re quite generous.¡±

    No matter if it was the Bryan from before or the current Han Shuo, they¡¯d always been on good terms with little fatty Jack. Now that Han Shuo had money, the first target of his charity would be Jack. The three gold coins weren¡¯t much to Han Shuo now, but would undoubtedly be a huge sum for Jack. This would also count as repayment for Jack¡¯s help during these days.

    After leaving the Academy, Han Shuo took out the card that Fabian had given to him and hired a carriage to travel to the southern part of Ossen, heading towards the address on the card.

    ¡°Boozt Merchant Guild.¡± The carriage traveled for quite a while before stopping. The groom¡¯s voice sounded from outside.

    Walking down from the carriage, Han Shuo handed over two silver coins and sent the groom on his way. He then took in the Boozt Merchant Guild. Two warriors, wielding long spears, stood on either side of the dark, ck metal doors. A row of houses towered in the distance, and it was apparent from the presentation that wealthy people lived inside.

    ¡°Kid, what are you doing sneaking around here?¡± One of the guards, in front of the doors, called out a bit impatiently when he saw Han Shuo looking around randomly.

    ¡°This is the Boozt Merchant Guild right? I¡¯m here to call upon Mr. Fabian.¡± Han Shuo nked, swept his gaze over the guards, and responded faintly.

    ¡°Fabian? Haven¡¯t heard of him. Does such a person exist within our merchant guild?¡± The guard had a stony face as he asked the other guard.

    ¡°I think so, and he seems to work for the young miss. He¡¯d just returned from the Dark Forest a few days ago and made quite arge haul.¡± The other guard responded. Pausing, the first guard looked suspiciously at Han Shuo and weighed him from head to toe, with a few hints of contempt appearing in his eyes. He asked arrogantly, ¡°And what business do you have with him?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m here to talk business.¡± Because his status as an errand ve had yet to be lifted and the fact that they had hurried without stopping to return to the Academy, the errand boy uniform, that Han Shuo was wearing, was tattered and in pieces. It was obvious that he was being looked down upon.

    ¡°Business, haha. That¡¯s funny. Do the likes of you look like you¡¯re here to do business? Our Boozt Merchant Guild is a famous guild in the Empire. I think you must be in the wrong ce.¡± The guardughed loudly and jeered.

    Just as Han Shuo was about to be angry, an ornate carriage suddenly stopped in front of the guild doors. After two tall, bulky warriors dismounted, a young beauty stepped out from the horse carriage.

    The girl was tall and slender with a head of brown hair, wearing a dress embedded with diamond fragments. She looked ssically elegant and gorgeous, but a faint trace of aloofness was on her stunning face. She had the naturally proud demeanor of someone born to a higher station in life.

    ¡°What is the matter?¡± The girl stared coldly at the guards after she¡¯d gotten out, speaking with a cool voice that was pleasing to the ear.

    ¡°Young miss, he says he wishes to see Master Fabian. I felt that he was suspicious because he was looking around surreptitiously and is also wearing tattered, cheap clothing. I was questioning him.¡± One of the guards bowed politely and exined.

    ¡°You know Fabian?¡± This stunning girl creased her brow and flung a nce at Han Shuo, asking distantly.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes had been boldly roving over the beautiful girl¡¯s body when he abruptly came to himself after he heard the question. He immediately nodded, ¡°Yes, I conducted a deal with Mr. Fabian in the Dark Forest. My name is Bryan and I¡¯m sure Mr. Fabian will remember me.¡±

    ¡°Bryan... Bryan. I think I¡¯ve heard Fabian mention you. Since this is the case, why don¡¯t youe in with me?¡± She didn¡¯t look at Han Shuo again after she finished speaking and just walked inside.

    Han Shuo red fiercely at the two guards at the doors and said in a low voice, ¡°Idiots with no eyes!¡± He thenughed and swiftly walked inside.

 Chapter 61: Embroiling innocent bystanders in trouble

    Chapter 61: Embroiling innocent bystanders in trouble

    There was water flowing through an artificial mountain in the Boozt Merchant Guild and the environment was ssically elegant and luxurious. A hallway, paved with oval stones, ran through the entire building. Guards wielding longswords and javelins would walk by periodically. It would seem that the defense of this merchant guild was quite serious.

    While he had been in Balthazar, Han Shuo had sought information about the Boozt Merchant Guild. He understood that this Guild specialized in trade. To put it simply, the Boozt Merchant Guild leveraged the footholds they had in all the merchant guilds in the Empire to purchase resources and materials from all over the empire and then resold them to ces in need, earning their profits from the price margins.

    This load of weapons and medicines from Drol would definitely be disposed appropriately if handed over to the Boozt Merchant Guild. This was why Han Shuo hade in search of Fabian. Therefore, he was absolutely looking for the right person.

    After traversing three hallways and walking for a few minutes, just as Han Shuo was reflecting that this Boozt Merchant Guild was quiterge, the young miss of the Guild stopped outside a loft.

    ¡°Farmar, go get Fabian. Giles, you stand guard at the door. Mm. You¡¯re called Bryan right? Come with me.¡± The girl looked around a bit when standing before the door to the loft and then issued orders to the two strong warriors behind her.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t chatter idly and followed the girl inside after nodding. Soft carpet met his feet and priceless drawing scrolls lined the walls. The room was decorated in an opulent and grand way with a vast chamber inside. A round table was ced in the center, and several chairs were ced around the table.

    The girl found a chair and sat down, then creased her brow without saying a word, as if contemting something. Several strands of brown hairnded on her translucently white, clean forehead, setting off her fiercely furrowed brow and beautiful cheeks. She had lost a few traces of the aloof arrogance she¡¯d held earlier and gained a few hints of mncholy.

    She didn¡¯t y host to Han Shuo and he wasn¡¯t shy about things either. He spun a chair around and sat down, taking in the room¡¯s decorations, as if nothing was out of the ordinary, sneaking a few nces at her every now and then.

    After a short while, that fatty Fabian came walking in with a fawning smile on his face. When he¡¯d shut the room door, he quickly strode in and bowed in greeting to the girl. ¡°It¡¯s so wonderful that Miss Phoebe has returned safely!¡±

    ¡°Mm. This person hase to find you and says that he wants to do business with you. I also have to discuss a few things with you and so I brought him directly here.¡± Phoebe nodded her head and said to Fabian.

    ¡°Heh heh, so it¡¯s Bryan. It was thanks to you that I was able to escape from the evil hands of those forest trollsst time in the Dark Forest. I thought I would never see you again. Who would¡¯ve thought that you¡¯de find me a few days after I¡¯d returned to the Empire. What kind of business would you like to do this time?¡± Fabian had stered on a professional smile and asked Han Shuo enthusiastically.

    ¡°I have a load of resources with slightly murky origins. I was wondering if you¡¯d be willing to purchase them off me?¡± Han Shuo hadn¡¯t nned to say much with Phoebe sitting there, but then he thought for a moment and noticed that even Fabian seemed to follow Phoebe¡¯s orders. It looked like there was nothing to hide and so he spoke candidly.

    ¡°Heh heh, this is definitely not a problem. Anything dirty that makes its way to our Guild will be clean. Don¡¯t worry!¡± Fabian turned his head to look at Phoebe in the distance and only responded with a sudden smile after he saw Phoebe nod slightly.

    Since that was the case, Han Shuo had no further need to conceal things and released a tendril of mental strength, withdrawing the thirteen bags from the space ring. He spoke after cing them in the room. ¡°These are the items. Come have a look and see how much it¡¯s worth.¡±

    Originally sitting there with cold aloofness, Phoebe¡¯s eyes swept a sharp gaze in their direction as Han Shuo took the items out one by one. She suddenly said, ¡°These itemse from the town of Drol, don¡¯t they? Judging from the bags holding the items, they should be the tools in which the orc wolf riders use in raiding. Have you seized all of these from the hands of the orc wolf riders?¡±

    Looking at Phoebe in surprise, Han Shuo thought privately that this girl¡¯s eyes were sharp indeed. She had guessed the particrs of the situation with just one nce. No wonder she was the young miss of the Boozt Merchant Guild. Nodding his head, Han Shuo didn¡¯t conceal this information either. He smiled lightly and said, ¡°Correct. I¡¯ve seized these items from the hands of the orc wolf riders.¡±

    Phoebe had been wholly uninterested in Han Shuo prior to this, but her eyes lit up as soon as he¡¯d finished speaking and she stared intently at him, sizing him up. She then opened her mouth and asked in astonishment, ¡°You mean to say that you were the one who seized all these items from the hands of the orc wolf riders?¡±

    ¡°Young miss, Bryan is a very strong mage swordsman. He was the one who singlehandedly scared off all the forest trolls who had encircled me and were attacking me.¡± Fabian hastened to exin to Phoebe upon seeing that she seemed to doubt Han Shuo¡¯s strength.

    Phoebe was even more surprised with Fabian¡¯s words, and her sharp eyes patrolled over Han Shuo¡¯s body. Even Han Shuo felt his heart tighten in worry when she looked at him like that, like some of his secrets would be picked up on.

    Coughing lightly, Han Shuoughed dryly. ¡°I wasn¡¯t the only one who seized items from the orc wolf riders, but I¡¯m in charge of them now. I think you guys should know to take inventory and then give me a fair price, so we can quickly conclude this matter.¡±

    ¡°Alright, Fabian take inventory of these items.¡± Phoebe nodded and looked at Han Shuo strangely. She didn¡¯t seem to anticipate that Han Shuo would honestly admit that he hadn¡¯t seized these items himself.

    An exceedingly soft sound suddenly made its way into Han Shuo¡¯s ears at this moment, like that of a longsword slowly being drawn from its sheath. Han Shuo¡¯s heart leapt as his expression changed slightly. He raised his head to look at the dim roof and said with a cold face, ¡°Who¡¯s on the roof?¡±

    Phoebe and Fabian¡¯s face immediately changed drastically with his words, but three crossbow bolts had already flown towards the three of them with an ear-piercing hiss before the former had a chance to react.

    Han Shuo had originally been enraged because he¡¯d thought that Fabian and Phoebe wanted to kill and rob him, but when he saw that the three crossbow bolts were shooting towards each of the three of them, that was when he realized that that couldn¡¯t be the truth.

    The ear-piercing sound at which the three crossbow bolts were slicing through the air with indicated how shockingly high the force and speed behind these bolts were. They were obviously fired by experienced experts. Han Shuo¡¯s facial expression was umonly calm at such a crucial moment like this. He leaned backwards and swiftly dodged the bolt aimed at him. His right hand had already drawn out his dagger as he chopped at the other bolt, which had been aimed at Fabian.

    The bolt, that had been aimed at Fabian, broke apart with a sharp crack as Han Shuo¡¯s right hand became abruptly numb under the extreme force of impact. His entire right arm twinged with pain. This allowed Han Shuo to understand that the force behind this crossbow bolt was iparably fierce and vicious. If an ordinary person had been holding the dagger during the impact, his whole right arm would have probably been shattered to bits.

    Don.

    Phoebe suddenly fled in Han Shuo¡¯s direction with a face full of panic and fright. The chair she had been sitting on had already been pierced through by the crossbow bolt. The bolt had cleaved through the chair and was directly nailed onto the carpet. There was an even more durable floor beneath the carpet, so it was clear to see just how frighteningly strong this bolt¡¯s force was.

    ¡°Assassins! There are assassins!¡± Fabian screamed shrilly in this moment and shoved Han Shuo hard in Phoebe¡¯s direction. He called out urgently. ¡°Bryan, hurry and protect the young miss. As long as you can save our miss, I will pay you an additional five hundred gold coins. Please!¡±

    It looked like Fabian knew that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t the type to y hero and save a damsel in distress. His first thought was to use gold coins to buy off Han Shuo in this critical moment.

    Just as Fabian¡¯s shrill scream rang out, three sharp cracks sounded from the roof as three inky-ck figures suddenly materialized and three longswords, sparking with dark green light, had started cleaving down at Phoebe and Han Shuo. That bone-deep chill made Han Shuo feel awful, like his flesh had been abraded by the des of the swords.

    Dark green fighting aura, this meant that the attackers consisted of three senior knights!

    Han Shuo understood that with his strength, it would be difficult to fight one senior knight face to face. Facing off against three senior knights would likely lead to death. The purpose of the three people were obviously to kill everyone in the room. Even if he threw up his hands and retreated now, he would be hard pressed to escape such a fate. The only way out was to dy things until reinforcements arrived.

    His magical yuan churning speedily, Han Shuo¡¯s body suddenly moved. Phoebe had already moved to front of him at this time. Han Shuo reached out his hand and grabbed her right hand, pulling her into his embrace. He held Phoebe¡¯s body and suddenly fell to the ground, abruptly rolling beneath the round table in the chamber.

    Pilip sounded violently from the top of the round table. The sturdy, round table broke apart into pieces over Han Shuo¡¯s head. Three sharp des shot directly at Han Shuo and Phoebe after demolishing the round table.

    At this moment, Han Shuo¡¯s necromancy incantation was alreadyplete and the bone dagger wielding little skeleton also materialized out of thin air. It rushed directly towards the first assassin. Beneath the table, Han Shuo lifted his left hand and the crossbow bolt hid in his sleeve shot abruptly at another assassin.

 Chapter 62: I like this big trouble

    Chapter 62: I like this big trouble

    Of of the three longswords that had been about to stab into Han Shuo, one of them split off to handle Han Shuo¡¯s small skeleton. Another changed direction midway to ward off Han Shuo¡¯s crossbow bolt, and the remaining one pierced towards Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo pushed out with the hands wrapped around Phoebe and sent Phoebe rolling in Fabian¡¯s direction. His right hand sped tightly around the dagger¡¯s handle, Han Shuo suddenly rushed out from behind the shattered round table. His magical yuan flowed onto the dagger and drew a pale purple arc in thin air, aiming for the longsword that was rushing at him.

    A metallic sound rang out along with a dull grunt from Han Shuo. His dagger-wielding right hand went numb again, and the forward momentum of his body was halted. He fell involuntarily down beneath the table as the assassin¡¯s body also shuddered and fell onto the shattered table.

    He had been wielding a sword with his right hand, but the collision just now seemed to have frozen his hand through usage of the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡± from Han Shuo¡¯s dagger. His longsword suddenly swapped to his left hand and his ice-cold eyes swept over Han Shuo. The longsword stabbed forward again and a wave of wild fighting aura flowed into Han Shuo¡¯s body through his chest taking advantage when he was off bnce.

    The bone-piercing pain immediately spread throughout Han Shuo¡¯s entire body. When the dark green fighting aura surged into Han Shuo¡¯s chest, the magical yuan churned furiously and broke it into thousands, tens of thousand of strands, deathly entangling that cloud of fighting aura, preventing the fighting aura from spreading to other areas.

    Even so, Han Shuo still spurted out a mouthful of fresh blood and he fell down with unsteady steps. The assassin was now full of confidence upon seeing that Han Shuo had been filled with fighting aura from his sword. He didn¡¯t bother with another nce at Han Shuo after seeing he¡¯d been hit, and directly turned his back to deal with Phoebe and Fabian, who were on the other side of the room.

    Except, there was no way that he could have realized how durable and strong Han Shuo¡¯s body was after countless reforging from magic. Add to that the wondrous effects of the magical yuan, what was originally a definitely fatal blow couldn¡¯t take Han Shuo¡¯s life at all.

    In the moment that he¡¯d turned and was about to leave, Han Shuo suddenly sprang up from where he¡¯d fallen on the floor like a ghost. A tendril of frosty light emanated from the dagger in his right hand, abruptly stabbing towards the assassin¡¯s back.

    The assassins were senior knights alright. He hadn¡¯t lost his sense of vignce, even in such a critical moment. He turned his body in that critical, crucial moment and the longsword in his left hand once again sent out dark green fighting aura, blocking Han Shuo¡¯s stabbing dagger with a ng.

    Except, he¡¯d defended against Han Shuo¡¯s dagger, but not Han Shuo¡¯s sniper shot. The crossbow bolt in his left sleeve shot out and fiercely pierced through the assassin¡¯s remote, merciless left eye. As he wailed out in agony and reached out his hand to cover his left eye, the dagger in Han Shuo¡¯s hand moved and a line of blood floated out from the assassin¡¯s neck. He fell listlessly, but solidly to the ground.

    At this moment, Han Shuo¡¯s left hand wiped away the fresh blood that was leaking from the corners of his mouth and tightened his grip on the dagger, calmly taking in his surroundings.

    The little skeleton wielding the bone dagger had actually started fighting one of the assassins. After countless refinements by magical yuan, the little skeleton was so strong that it was almost a bit perverse. The speed of its evasions and dancing bone dagger was extraordinarily high.

    Even when its body had been hit, the inky ck skeleton only wavered slightly. The little skeleton would regain its footing whenever it stumbled backwards and came forward with another attack, making the assassin at his wit¡¯s end.

    On the other side, the assassin, who had broken the crossbow bolt that Han Shuo had shot towards him, had already dashed at Phoebe. Fabian was stricken with panic and fear and hollered frantically, ¡°Be careful young miss, Bryan help!¡±

    Han Shuo started and with one nce, knew that it was toote to save Phoebe. He sighed lowly and was about tomand the little skeleton and find a chance to slip out when something outside his expectations happened.

    Phoebe¡¯s eyes, in her panic stricken face, were calm and aloof. When the dark green light from the assassin¡¯s sword came crashing down on her, when, unbeknownst to anyone, a thin, long dagger suddenly appeared in her hands. A milky white aura suddenly red out from the dagger in Phoebe¡¯s hands like a blossoming lotus flower. A milky-white fighting aura interwove with dazzling sword light, thoroughly swallowing up the assassin.

    ¡°Ah ¡ª¡ª-¡± A deste wail sounded. When the dazzling, milky-white sword light faded away, it was as if the assassin had been pierced by a thousand sharp weapons. His entire body was pockmarked and blood flowed out from a hundred holes.

    Not only was Han Shuo astounded, but even Fabian and thest assassin facing off with the little skeleton was also dumbfounded.

    It was no big deal if Han Shuo and Fabian were shocked, but when a break in the assassin¡¯s concentration appeared, his left arm was directly hacked off by the little skeleton. He cried out in agony, and Phoebe suddenly threw out the dagger in her hand when he was about to escape. The dagger sank into the assassin¡¯s waist and thest screaming assassin abruptly made no sound, falling solidly to the floor.

    ¡°Young... young miss, you... you¡¯re a swordswoman?¡± Fabian¡¯s mouth had fallen open greatly, tongue tied as he pointed at the coldly aloof Phoebe. He stammered out his question.

    Swordsmen were also simrly divided as knights: Swordsman apprentice (pale-blue fighting aura), swordsman-at-arms (dark blue fighting aura), journeyman swordsman (pale-green fighting aura), senior swordsman (dark green fighting aura), swordmaster (white fighting aura), great swordmaster (silver fighting aura), and divine swordmaster (gold fighting aura).

    Han Shuo also hadn¡¯t thought that Phoebe had always been concealing her strength. It looked like Fabian didn¡¯t know either. Phoebe was actually a swordswoman at an even higher level than that of a senior knights. With her strength as a swordswoman at her age, it would shock many if news of this was leaked.

    ¡°Looks like I went to unnecessary effort!¡± Han Shuoughed faintly as he chanted an incantation. The little skeleton, wielding a bone dagger standing there nkly, suddenly vanished without a trace.

    ¡°No, without your help, I wouldn¡¯t have been able to kill all the assassins from ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ by myself. I would have been able to defend against them, but I wouldn¡¯t have been able to prevent their escape. Therefore, your aid was great help to me. I¡¯m very grateful to you!¡± Phoebe nced at Han Shuo and spoke seriously.

    Phoebe¡¯s brow furrowed as she mused deeply after a moment, suddenly looking oddly at Han Shuo. She asked, ¡°Mister Bryan, why didn¡¯t I feel any fighting aura from your body when you made a move just now? And if I didn¡¯t see incorrectly, you¡¯ve also trained in necromancy. Except, I¡¯ve never known that a skeletal warrior could have the same battle capabilities as a senior knight. Mister Bryan is truly an amazing person!¡±

    What a sharp woman. Han Shuo flung a nce at Phoebe and said with an enigmatic tone, ¡°Miss Phoebe has the strength of a swordmaster at such a young age. The truly amazing person here is you. Compared to yourself, I¡¯m just a misfit.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re too humble.¡± Phoebe responded to Han Shuo and didn¡¯t ask further. Turning to look at the still shocked and bewildered Fabian, she said softly. ¡°Fabian, take inventory of the items he¡¯s brought us. Bryan¡¯s saved us this time, so we must give him a good price.¡±

    A serious expression appeared on the previously dumbfounded Fabian¡¯s face after he heard Phoebe¡¯s words. He looked oddly at Phoebe and then at Han Shuo, finally lowering his head to count the items on the ground.

    ¡°Niece Phoebe, my niece Phoebe, are you alright? What¡¯s wrong?¡± A loud exmation came from afar at this moment,ing closer with the sound of hurrying footsteps.

    Phoebe¡¯s usually aloof face suddenly disyed an expression of hate and disgust. It reverted back to normal in a second, with even the faint trace of a smile on her face. She said harmoniously, ¡°Uncle Grover, I¡¯m fine, thank you for your concern.¡±

    A band of five guards broke down the door with a sinister-looking, thin old man in the front. He was wearing luxurious clothes, first swept a look around the room, assessing the situation, before disying an anxious expression. ¡°I¡¯ve just heard your cries for help and saw from afar that the two warriors in front of your door were on the ground. I came as fast as I could. It¡¯s good that nothing has happened to you, it must¡¯ve been your dead father who protected you.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve caused you to be concerned Uncle. However, it wasn¡¯t my dead father who protected me, but that this noble warrior who saved your niece¡¯s life. Otherwise, your niece¡¯s life would have long since been taken by these killers.¡± Phoebe disyed an expression still lingering in fear as she pointed to Han Shuo in her exnation.

    Han Shuo watched Phoebe and Grover¡¯s conversation with a cold eye and closely observed everything. He¡¯d formed a slight understanding in his heart. He¡¯d also clearly seen the hate and disgust on Phoebe¡¯s face earlier.

    He¡¯d discovered that when Grover hade in, his attention had been ced wholly on the three assassins in the chamber first. He¡¯d only expressed his concerns to Phoebe after he¡¯d assessed the situation. This already exined that rtions between the two were not as harmonious as they appeared on the surface.

    ¡°Thank you warrior! I will be sure to reward you well!¡± Grover eximed, looking at Han Shuo upon hearing Phoebe¡¯s words. His eyes continuously raked over Han Shuo¡¯s body, seeming to want topletely size him up.

    ¡°Uncle, thank you for your good intentions, but Phoebe would like to personally thank him for saving my life. I¡¯m fine now, Uncle is always overworked and overtired for the sake of the Merchant Guild everyday. You should go back and rest earlier!¡± Phoebe spoke seriously and bowed as she spoke to Grover.

    ¡°Alright, alright. As long as you¡¯re alright. I¡¯ve been investigating the origins of the killers for youtely. Be at peace good niece. When I find out who¡¯s behind all this, I won¡¯t let him off so easily. Mm, you must be even more careful in the future. I¡¯ll be heading back now.¡± Grover put on a hypocritical show of affection and turned, leading his men out the door. When he reached the door, he suddenly turned and looked at Han Shuo. ¡°Brave fellow, what¡¯s your name?¡±

    ¡°Bryan!¡± Han Shuo bowed slightly and smiled urbanely as he answered.

    Nodding, Grover said, ¡°Bryan, mm. Good name, good name. I¡¯ll remember you!¡±

    Grover finally left the room after saying this.

    ¡°I think I¡¯ve gotten myself into big trouble thanks to your purposeful actions. Miss Phoebe, how do you intend onpensating me?¡± The faint smile on Han Shuo¡¯s face withered away when Grover left, and he stared coldly at Phoebe.

    ¡°Apart from the money for these resources, I will pay you three thousand gold extra. Three thousand gold is enough to buy quite a few lives, what do you say?¡± Phoebeughed faintly, speaking softly as a wise and farsighted light shone in her eyes.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart shuddered as his face became adorned with a smile once more. He spoke in satisfaction, ¡°I like this big trouble!¡±

 Chapter 63: Snobbish base person

    Chapter 63: Snobbish base person

    Han Shuo knew in his heart what three thousand gold coins meant. This was indeed enough to buy a lot of lives. Even when he understood that he had been inexplicably embroiled into a sticky situation, his original anger was instantaneously crushed by gold coins when Phoebe mentioned the astronomical price of three thousand gold coins.

    ¡°Don¡¯t be happy too early. At this point, I think you can probably guess what¡¯s going on without further words from me. The person who¡¯s purchased murder and wants ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ to kill me is my ¡®dear and beloved¡¯ Uncle Grover.

    My uncle has wealth that speaks louder than others. There are many skilled talents by his side who can make you die unknowingly. Besides, after the events of today, my uncle is sure to tell ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ that you were the one who killed the three assassins. ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ is a killer organization that is renowned for seeking revenge for the smallest grievances. I think you¡¯ll have many troubles ahead of you.¡± Upon seeing Han Shuo¡¯s satisfied smile, Phoebe thought for a moment and felt that she had to speak up and warn Han Shuo.

    ¡°Heh heh, this has nothing to do with me. When I leave the Boozt Merchant Guild, I¡¯ll hide myself well. Whether it¡¯s ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ or your uncle, none of them will be able to find me. It won¡¯t be that easy for them to kill me.¡±

    Han Shuo had already thought of these matters when he epted this matter. After he left the Boozt Merchant Guild, he would immediately conceal traces of his movement. After he¡¯d given the gold coins to Fanny, he¡¯d directly asked for some time off and made use of the transportation matrix hidden within the space ring to train at the cemetery of death for some time. He¡¯d be able to avoid Phoebe¡¯s troubles in this way.

    ¡°I see, I¡¯m at ease then since you¡¯ve made ns already. I¡¯ve pushed everything onto you because I didn¡¯t wish to reveal my strength too early. Otherwise when ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ sends even stronger assassins, I would be hard pressed to handle them even with my strength as a swordmaster.¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo smiled, ¡°I understand. Since you¡¯ve already paid gold coins for me to be your scapegoat, then I, naturally, have nothing to say. I have absolutely no interest in the internal affairs of your Boozt Merchant Guild. If there¡¯s nothing else, can you take inventory of my items? I¡¯ll leave after receiving the gold coins.¡±

    ¡°Alright, Fabian, take out the items in his bags and look them over.¡±

    Fabian had calmed down by now and upon hearing Phoebe¡¯s words, immediately walked towards Han Shuo¡¯s thirteen bags and took out the items within the bags one by one, counting them up. He finally said respectfully to Phoebe, ¡°Miss, these items should be worth about four thousand gold.¡±

    ¡°Plus the three thousand gold I promised you, that makes seven thousand gold in total. Are you satisfied?¡± Phoebe looked at Han Shuo remotely and asked.

    ¡°No problem, I think we will still have many opportunities to work together in the future. Except, this Boozt Merchant Guild doesn¡¯t seem to be too safe. Can we switch to a different location next time we do business?¡±

    Phoebe¡¯s ck eyebrows creased in a pleasing manner upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words. She nodded afterwards, saying, ¡°That old thing¡¯s confidantes are arranged all throughout the Guild, I haven¡¯t dared to live here for extended periods of time. The old thing has dared to start something within the Guild this time, this means he¡¯s bing emboldened, secure in the knowledge that he has a strong backing. It looks like he must¡¯ve bribed the others within the Guild.

    Fabian, find me a new ce to live. We move out today. I can no longer live within the Guild. I willmunicate as quickly as possible with the other founding members of the Guild. As long as I prove my abilities to do business and obtain the support of the other founding members, we can then harry that old thing off the stage.¡±

    ¡°No worries miss, I¡¯ve thought of this already. I¡¯ve already found a new ce for you to live before you returned today. The new residence is on the north street, next to the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. Many of the Empire¡¯s nobles and aristocrats live there. I think even if the ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ wanted to run rampant, they would have to think twice beforemitting any atrocities there.¡±

    ¡°Very good, we move out today then. When that old thing is out of the picture, I will be sure to treat you well!¡± Phoebe nodded with satisfaction and smiled at Fabian.

    ¡°It¡¯s my honor to serve you miss!¡± Fabian shed tears of joy and gratitude as he bowed, and took out a card and gave it to Han Shuo afterwards. ¡°This is our new address, you cane find me if you have any further business. You¡¯ve saved my life twice, so I will be sure to give you the fairest prices. Mm, give me the crystal card and I¡¯ll transfer the seven thousand gold into your ount.¡±

    When Fabian had transferred the seven thousand gold into Han Shuo¡¯s crystal card and Han Shuo had verified that all was in order, he finally nodded in satisfaction and with a slight smile. ¡°Since our business is concluded, I¡¯ll be on my way now. I¡¯ll be sure to find you if there¡¯s any more business to be conducted in the future. Farewell, to the both of you!¡±

    ¡°Be careful along the way and make sure you¡¯re not followed by anyone!¡± Phoebe bore her customary remote expression and suddenly passed on a reminder when Han Shuo was about to leave.

    When Han Shuo had left the room, Phoebe finally said huffily in a low voice, ¡°This snobbish base person, where is he from? He grabbed my hand and hugged me, but only thought about his gold. He didn¡¯t even apologize damnit!¡±

    ¡°Eh... Miss. You didn¡¯t mention this incident either and so I thought you didn¡¯t mind at all!¡± Fabian smiled with embarrassment upon seeing Phoebe¡¯s face change drastically with Han Shuo¡¯s departure.

    ¡°Hmph! I am a girl who¡¯s been educated in the courtesies and graces of nobility. How could I bring up this matter first? I feel that this fellow only has money in his sights. Not only did he not feel the least bit guilty, but he seemed to think that I owed him something. What an incredibly wicked person.¡± Phoebeined angrily and then took in a breath, asking Fabian with gritted teeth. ¡°Right, this person is also quite odd, where does hee from?¡±

    Shaking his head with a wry face, Fabian responded, ¡°I don¡¯t know that either, just that I happened to bump into him in the Dark Forest. I paid him two hundred gold coins to save me from the forest trolls. I gave him our Guild¡¯s address after he conducted a business transaction with me for the items from the forest trolls. I really don¡¯t know anything about him.¡±

    ¡°I see. Mm, notify me if hees to find you in the future to conduct more business. I¡¯ll personally transact with him.¡± Phoebe creased her brow and thought for a moment, mping her teeth slightly and leaving these instructions with Fabian.

    ¡°Understood, miss!¡± Fabian agreed trustworthily.

    After walking out from Phoebe¡¯s, Han Shuo made ample preparations to handle Grover¡¯s possible revenge at any time, but perhaps due to the sudden death of the three killers from ¡°Shadow Ghost¡±, Grover hadn¡¯t had time to make other ns and so not only did he not run into any motions of revenge along the way, but even the guards he had seen earlier had all vanished without a trace.

    However, when Han Shuo walked out of the Boozt Merchant Guild¡¯s front door, the two guards he¡¯d cursed at before seemed to have been waiting for Han Shuo. When Han Shuo appeared, the two of them looked at each other and directly blocked the door. One of them looked at Han Shuo wrathfully and asked, ¡°What did you say when you walked in just now?¡±

    ¡°I said the two of you are idiots with no eyes. What about it?¡± Since he knew that these two were on Grover¡¯s side, it wouldn¡¯t harm the rtionship between him, Fabian, and Phoebe if he pummeled them. Han Shuo naturally unceremoniously cursed at them, confident in his knowledge that he had firm backing.

    ¡°Die!¡±

    The two of them shouted angrily and came at Han Shuo directly, waving their fists.

    Laughing coldly, Han Shuo¡¯s body suddenly dashed forward and arrived in front of them before their punches hadnded. His left and right hands pressing down on their chests, the activation of the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡±, and a faint cloud of magical air respectively tinged purple and red sank into their chests.

    Giving way to a longugh, Han Shuo had already taken great strides out before they¡¯d had a chance to react, swiftly leaving the Mystical cial Spellfire. Although the two clouds of purple and red magical air wouldn¡¯t take their lives, it was enough for the two to be in agony for quite a while.

    After leaving the Boozt Merchant Guild, Han Shuo¡¯s extraordinary senses allowed him to sense that there seemed to be someone following him. He raised his attention to the highest and weaved rapidly withinrge streets and small alleyways, constantly changing his directions and barrelling towards areas with a lot of people.

    After quite a while, when Han Shuo felt that no one was following him, he found a random clothes shop and obtained a new set of clothes. He then hired a carriage and started out in the direction of the Academy.

 Chapter 64: A new identity

    Chapter 64: A new identity

    Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, necromancy major.

    After the trials of the Dark Forest, the necromancy major had obtained rich rewards. The ability of the students to handle matters had also simrly increased. When Fanny talked with the school authorities and disyed the magical creature cores that the necromancy major had obtained, she immediately received highpliments from the school headmaster, Emma.

    Emma was a woman who was around seventy years old and majored in space magic. She had long since advanced to the realm of grand magus and had once aplished distinguished achievements for the Empire. Her reputation was quite illustrious within the Empire and she was highly valued by the king.

    Within the training fields of the necromancy major, Emma was wearing a loose-fitting ck magic robe, gazing upon the necromancy students and teachers benevolently. She smiled faintly and said, ¡°The necromancy major has had a very sessful outing in the Dark Forest this time. It¡¯s said that you have greatly helped the Empire by destroying so many of the orc¡¯s wolf riders. Master Fanny, I hope you lead the necromancy major to another level and revive the glory days of yesteryear for necromancy magic. I¡¯ve agreed to all your requests, and the children also need to work hard.¡±

    ¡°Thank you for your kind attention Headmaster Emma. I think after this time¡¯s outing, the students of our necromancy major should have understood the importance of strength. I think they¡¯ll be even more studious and industrious when studying magic in the future and bepetent mages for the Empire, being able to contribute to the Empire earlier.¡± Fanny¡¯s face was serious as she gravely promised Emma.

    ¡°Oh right Master Fanny, why isn¡¯t the fellow that you¡¯ve continuouslyplimented here? I¡¯d love to meet this magical creature!¡± Emma looked at Fanny with a smile as she asked gently.

    ¡°Bryan is traveling on some business, I think the headmaster will surely have the chance to meet him in the near future. He is a mage with very high potential. I can guarantee that it won¡¯t be long before Bryan will be a very strong mage of the necromancy major.¡±

    Emma nodded her head in gratification and smiled, ¡°I look forward to his growth and hope that you will all rally the necromancy major to its past glories.¡±

    After she¡¯d said those words, Emma¡¯s body twisted like that of a reflection in water, giving others an exceedingly unrealistic feeling. White light shed afterwards, upon which Emma vanished without a trace.

    ¡°As an archmage of space magic, Headmaster Emma has already grasped the true meaning of space magic and can directly transfer her body through short distances. Don¡¯t be shocked everyone!¡± Gene hastened to exin after seeing the students emitted astonished gasps after seeing Emma suddenly vanish.

    ¡°Amazing magic indeed!¡± Han Shuo voice came from outside the training fields as he strode in shortly after his voice had sounded out.

    ¡°Eh, it¡¯s Bryan. The headmaster wanted to see you just now... why didn¡¯t youe back earlier?¡± Lisa immediately eximed softly after seeing Han Shuo appear.

    ¡°There will be plenty of chancester. I¡¯ve already disposed of the resources from the orc wolf riders. I¡¯ve sold them for a total of four thousand gold. I took one thousand, you guys can split the rest. Who has a crystal card?¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t waste time with idle chatter after he arrived and immediately opened his mouth to ask.

    ¡°Four thousand gold, oh my gosh. Those resources fetched such a high price! If I¡¯d known they were so valuable, I wouldn¡¯t have gone to chase the orcs that ran away!¡± Bach cried out in astoundment as he berated himself with a face full of regret.

    Even Fanny and Gene had expressions of shock, not to mention Bach. They hadn¡¯t seemed to anticipate that this batch of resources would be so valuable. Smiles crept across all the students¡¯ faces when they heard there were gold coins to be had and they all disyed expressions of joy.

    ¡°I have a crystal card. Here, take it.¡± Fanny directly gave her crystal card to Han Shuo after a moment of surprise.

    Crystal cards could conduct transactions through the mental brand on the cards, in addition to the slot located on the card. It was exceedingly convenient. When Han Shuo received Fanny¡¯s card, he realized that Fanny had already approved the transaction and transferred the three thousand gold coins from his card into Fanny¡¯s card.

    When Han Shuo returned Fanny¡¯s crystal card to her, Fanny also gave a card to Han Shuo. ¡°This is your new student ID. You¡¯re no longer a ve or an errand boy from this day henceforth, but a magic apprentice in the necromancy major of the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. You can borrow books from the library with this ID and practice necromancy magic in the training fields as well as officially attend sses in the necromancy major.

    The tuition for this year is fifty gold coins, but I¡¯ve already paid it for you.You can officially make use of all the resources of the necromancy major now. I¡¯ve also arranged your new quarters. Bryan, I hope you can cherish this opportunity and thoroughly leverage your potential to foster and enhance your necromancy magic!¡±

    Han Shuo felt heartfelt great pleasure after epting the student ID from Fanny¡¯s hands. He said to Fanny, ¡°Many thanks to Master Fanny, I will try very hard in the future. I¡¯d like to go borrow some books from the library now and will take my leave. Please disburse the rest of the gold coins to them.¡±

    After leaving the training field, Han Shuo brought the student ID and travelled to the library. Little fatty Jack was currently organizing the books in the library, and immediately cried out with glee upon seeing Han Shuo appear. ¡°Oh, goodness, Bryan you¡¯re finally back. I almost can¡¯t recognize you anymore. You¡¯re taller and stronger than when you left, and even seem to have gotten more handsome.¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, hello Jack. Has Borg and the others bullied you during the time while I was gone?¡± Han Shuo was also rather happy to see little fatty Jack. He dragged Jack to a corner and started questioning him.

    ¡°No, maybe because you taught them a lessonst time, they¡¯re a lot more well behaved now.¡± Jack chuckled, paused and looked around. He lowered his voice and asked, ¡°Bryan, did you really give Lisa three gold coins to pass on to me?¡±

    Nodded, Han Shuo said with a smile, ¡°Of course, I¡¯m a student of the necromancy major starting from today onward. You didn¡¯t believe me when I said I was going to learn magic before. Heh heh, this is my student ID, do you believe me now?¡±

    ¡°Oh my gosh, how did you do it? This is too incredible!¡± Jack held Han Shuo¡¯s student ID and looked at it, emitting a cry of astonishment again.

    ¡°Alright alright, I¡¯ll give you another fifty gold coins. Don¡¯t stay here as an errand boy any longer, but you must absolutely be careful and don¡¯t let anyone know you have so many gold coins on you. Otherwise, you¡¯ll be in big trouble. These gold coins will help you live an easy life. If you run into any trouble in the future, you cane find me at the necromancy major. I¡¯ll settle things for you.¡± Han Shuo took out another fifty gold coins from his space ring and shoved them into Jack¡¯s pockets, speaking in a low voice.

    ¡°Fifty gold coins, fifty gold coins...¡± Jack sank into a momentary stupor as he listened to the gold coins clink in his pocket. He stood there dumbfounded, continuously muttering to himself, seeming to have forgotten even Han Shuo¡¯s existence.

    Fifty gold coins was such an enormous sum to Jack that he had never thought of it before. Han Shuo could absolutely understand his reaction.

    He didn¡¯t bother responding to him and left Jack with a slight smile. He came alone to the section where necromancy books were kept and selected ¡°Beginner Magics of Necromancy¡±, registered it at the door, and left.

    After leaving the library, Han Shuo returned to the warehouse, leaving after he stored the other two books in his space ring. Han Shuo nned on using the transportation matrix within the space ring and headed directly to the cemetery of death for training. Therefore, whether it was the warehouse or the new dorms that Fanny had arranged for him, someone must know about either of them so it would definitely not be safe to set up the transportation matrix there.

    After creasing his brow and thinking for a bit, Han Shuo directly headed to the mountains behind the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force and walked to the cemetery there. Not only was it quiet there, but people and beasts basically didn¡¯te and go through here. Some of the tombs were even more secluded, and he wouldn¡¯t have to worry at all if he set up the transportation matrix there.

    Arriving at the random tombs on the mountains in the backmostnd of the Academy, Han Shuo searched for the most isted tomb and even moved arge piece of rock to the tomb¡¯s entrance. He moved therge rock after he went instead, sealing off the tomb entrance.

    After finishing these tasks, Han Shuo took out a candle from his space ring and lit it. He discovered that apart from being a bit damp, the tomb was still rtively clean. The various racks of broken bones on the ground was absolutely not sinister to Han Shuo training in necromancy magic, but he rather felt that they were familiar and warm.

    Tidying up the inside slightly, Han Shuo thought carefully and finally summoned out the little skeleton. Using the dagger within the tomb, he cleared a new, small area within the tomb. This new area was in the blind spot of the tomb, and Han Shuo could only enter it when he turned to the side. Although the space inside was a bit bigger, it could only contain Han Shuo alone, simr to the closet of an ordinary room.

    Observing everything carefully, Han Shuo finally took out the six magical sticks when he confirmed that this area was secure enough. He arranged them ording to the diagram of the six pointed star, standing in the middle of the diagram and activating the matrix with his mental strength when all was done.

    White light shed by and Han Shuo opened his eyes to discover that he¡¯d already appeared within the Dark Forest, inside therge magical matrix in the center of the great hall within the mysterious cemetery of death.

    ¡°The mysterious cemetery of death is a country that belongs to me alone in the future!¡± Han Shuo gazed around his surroundings and muttered in satisfaction.

 Chapter 65: A quick way to train

    Chapter 65: A quick way to train

    In the vast expanse of the southern reaches of the Dark Forest, near the cemetery of death.

    There was a raging waterfall that flowed down with grand, magnificent momentum into an expansive deep pool below. There was a bubbling stream that ran off the side of the pool and forked into three directions. The towering trees by the side of the pool were luxuriantly green and all sorts of bizarre and exoticrge stones could be seen everywhere. Fish could be seen swimming in the clear, crystalline pool waters.

    The silvery sheen of flowing water cascaded down like the Milky Way, concentrating in the pool below and emitting loud roars. The water flowing down like a long river spewed violently, crashing down onto the random rocks below and giving cause to impressive traces of water, sshing down on all four sides.

    There was a hard piece of round stone in the corner, slightly off to the side of where the waterfall crashed down. A naked person sat on the round stone and the muscles on his body were evenly fit and full of energy. His legs were crossed as he sat on the round stone, using his body to withstand the violent force of the strong cascade of water.

    The agitated water currents sounded out with loud pilip sounds when theynded on the surface of his body. His body wavered slightly, the expression on his face was cold as the meridians on his body bulged and pulsed. A faint, ck light seemed to sparkle over his flesh and skin.

    This person was naturally Han Shuo. After he¡¯d arrived at the cemetery of death, his first order of business was to thoroughly digest the fighting aura that the ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± killers had left in his body.

    After his magic level ascended from the ¡°solid¡± realm to the ¡°open passages¡± realm, Han Shuo¡¯s body had been reforged again. Even the behavior of the fighting aura within his body had also changed. Previously when he had visited the Boozt Merchant Guild, the fighting aura that had cleaved its way into Han Shuo¡¯s body had always been enclosed by the magical yuan. Han Shuo had originally thought that things would proceed as they¡¯d always had, with the magical yuan slowly being absorbed as Han Shuo went about his business.

    However, the truth proved that Han Shuo¡¯s judgment was wrong. The fighting aura wasn¡¯t digested and absorbed by the magical yuan like he had suspected. On the contrary, the magical yuan seemed to be slowly and purposefully loosening its restraints, letting this cloud of fighting aura continuously run rampant within Han Shuo¡¯s meridians, causing continuous damage to Han Shuo¡¯s meridians and even breaking a few bones beneath the stress.

    Logically speaking, this should have been a very painful matter. However, Han Shuo astonishingly discovered that the meridians and bones, that had been damaged by the fighting aura, once again underwent some sort of change. The reforged meridians had be more tensile and widenedpared to before, and the magical yuan circted at a much higher speed here thanpared to the other areas of his body. The bones were also simrly much more durable.

    After understanding this, Han Shuo discovered to his great joy that if he continued training at this speed, then ording to the rule of magic rebuilding after a breakthrough, the training speed of the ¡°open passages¡± realm would be several times faster than the speed of normal training.

    Whilst he was remarking with emotion that practicing magic was indeed a path of masochism and death, Han Shuo happened upon this waterfall. ording to the importance of building up one¡¯s body while practicing magic, Han Shuo suddenly had the unique thought of utilizing the waterfall¡¯s force to practice magic. The truth proved that Han Shuo¡¯s thought was absolutely correct.

    Just as Han Shuo was using his physical body to withstand the force of the violent waterfall on one hand, while experiencing the pain brought about by the fighting aura wreaking havoc in his meridians on the other, the speed of his magic training progressed at an astonishing pace. The meridians that were ravaged and broken by the fighting aura all became incredibly, pervertedly stronger.

    The force within the center of the waterfall was the greatest, Han Shuo had only tried it for a brief moment before seeing stars from the enormous force. He held on for three seconds before almost fainting dead away. In his resignation, he could only rely on a corner to train in which the waterfall wasn¡¯t too violent, hoping that once his physical body was strengthened, he would be able to stand in the most wildly raging center to withstand thergest amountof the waterfall¡¯s force.

    He caught fish to bake a meal when he was hungry, and used the rest of his time to practice magic. After who knew how long, Han Shuo suddenly realized that the training speed of the ¡°open passages¡± realm had slowed down again after the fighting aura, that the assassin had left in his body, had disappearedpletely.

    ¡°Looks like I need to think of another way to hurry and breakthrough the open passages realm. It doesn¡¯t seem to be the thing to do in order to keep training so slowly.¡± Han Shuo muttered to himself as his body was as agile as arge fish, flying through the pool beneath the waterfall.

    His two hands probed out like lightning in the pool, grabbing two strange looking fish. He swam back to shore, put his clothes back on, and took out his fire starting implements to bake the fish. When Han Shuo had eaten his fill and nned on returning back to the cemetery of death, his ears heard the faint sounds of footsteps.

    Han Shuo¡¯s senses were now more and more perceptive. He focused his concentration and then shot swiftly towards the origin of the sound. There was danger lurking in every corner of the Dark forest.

    Not only were there high level magic creatures, all sorts of exotic races and numerous adventurers on exploration, Han Shuo had even seen a silvery, long dragon one day, flying to an even deeper portion of the southern region of the Dark Forest.

    Dragons were the mightiest existence in this world. Legends said that their bodies were as tough as iron rocks and their mastery of incredibly powerful magic was high. It was an exceedingly strong advanced magical creature that was a level higher than a level one magic creature. Every dragon boasted of unparalleled power, and the appearance of a dragon often meant that treasure existed nearby. Every warrior that could y a dragon received the respect and admiration of all.

    Of course, with Han Shuo¡¯s current strength, he wouldn¡¯t be so foolish as to go be some dragonyer, but the appearance of the silver, long dragon had alerted Han Shuo to the fact that an even more frightening region existed deeper within the Dark Forest.

    After a while, Han Shuo arrived at the scene where the sounds had originated. After he¡¯d taken in his surroundings, Han Shuo smiled involuntarily. Who would¡¯ve thought he¡¯d run into familiar faces here.

    Ten swarthy dwarves with long, braided mustaches standing only a meter tall were wielding iron hammers, pickaxes, and spades used for mining ore and using them to fight against thirty or so forest trolls. Two dwarves had already been hit by long spears andy on the ground, dead. The dwarves were all flushed red. Although they knew they wouldn¡¯t win against their enemies, none of them retreated and fled. They all stayed where they were, doing battle against the forest trolls.

    Han Shuo no longer professedplete ignorance of the wondrous races of the Profound Continent. Dwarves possessed extraordinary beer brewing abilities and were even more adept at forging weapons. Their personalities were conservative and valued beer as much as they valued their lives. Their temper was stubborn and fiery, but once someone gained their friendship, their generosity would know no bounds.

    Looking at the dwarves still raising their hammers and pickaxes, hollering and shouting bravely, wholly unafraid of death, even though they were no match for the forest trolls, Han Shuo actually felt a bit kindly disposed towards these dwarves.

    Han Shuo also thought that the two areas in which dwarves were proficient in may be of some use to him, so he only thought for a brief moment before suddenly rushing out, shing quickly with the dagger in his hand, resulting in the fall of one of the forest trolls.

    When Han Shuo was standing between the forest trolls and the dwarves and had summoned the little skeleton after chanting an incantation, the green face of the forest troll leader turned very ugly indeed, fearfully calling out, ¡°That evil human has brought the demon back. Retreat, retreat!¡±

    These forest trolls were obviously very afraid of the little skeleton with seven bone spurs on its back. As soon as they saw the dagger wielding little skeleton appear, they actually broke up in an uproar under direct orders of the forest troll leader.

    ¡°Mighty warrior, I, Bet, thank you for your help.¡± After the forest trolls had left, one of the strongest dwarves, who wielded a metal hammer, raised it in the manner of the trolls to express his gratitude.

    ¡°Not a problem. I very much admire your staunch fighting spirit. Right, why were these forest trolls attacking you?¡± Han Shuo spread out his hands and spoke with humility and politeness.

    ¡°Huuh. Those greedy scoundrels are robbers. They never put themselves to work and only think of how to rob others. They wanted us to forge weapons for them for free so that their piging would go more smoothly. We refused their request and those dastardly robbers harassed us endlessly and killed our kin.¡± Bet blew out his mustache and said huffily.

    Nodding, Han Shuo added, ¡°So that¡¯s the case. They once wanted to rob my merchant caravan. These dastardly scoundrels are evil indeed!¡±

    ¡°Noble warrior, you¡¯ve saved us. We want to use fine beer to express our gratitude. Please follow us back to our vige!¡± Bet looked at Han Shuo as he expressed an invitation out of friendliness.

 Chapter 66: Operation of the Original Demon Cave

    Chapter 66: Operation of the Original Demon Cave

    Just as Han Shuo was privately celebrating with himself and was about to open his mouth and ept, another dwarf suddenly intervened and said, ¡°Bet, the vige chief said that we can¡¯t bring humans into the vige, have you forgotten?

    ¡°But Benson, he saved us from the hands of those forest troll scoundrels!¡± Be looked at the dwarf and responded.

    ¡°I know, but we must listen to the vige chief or we¡¯ll be punished.¡± Benson said stubbornly.

    ¡°No problem, no problem, I won¡¯t be going. It¡¯s very nice to meet you. I have been adventuring in this areately, perhaps we¡¯ll run into each other again. Farewell.¡± Han Shuo understood that he couldn¡¯t be overly hasty when dealing with dwarves. It wouldn¡¯t be the matter of a second to receive their approval and friendship, so he immediately opened his mouth to speak up.

    ¡°Dear friend, we are truly sorry. This is a wineskin of beer that we brewed. Please treat it as a token of our gratitude. I hope you can forgive us.¡± Bet took out a wineskin and handed it over to Han Shuo, speaking apologetically.

    Han Shuo had hoped that they would forge a decent set of weapons in return, but he naturally wouldn¡¯t express this now. He smiled and epted the wineskin, humbly expressing his understanding and left along with the little skeleton.

    If his magic could be trained to the true demon realm, Han Shuo would naturally be able to refine magical weapons on his own, but if Han Shuo wanted a decent weapon right now, obtaining it through the dwarves was actually a good method.

    There was a magical treasure called Demonyer Edge. It was a bit longer than a dagger, but a bit shorter than a sword. Its two edges were cuttingly sharp without parallel, and its tip a keen triangr spine. After activating it, the Demonyer Edge would reap enemy heads in mid flight. It was an incredibly frightening weapon left behind in Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories.

    With Han Shuo¡¯s current magical training, he definitely couldn¡¯t refine iron items and directly create the magical treasure Demonyer Edge. However, Han Shuo wanted to use the dwarves to forge a prototype, and then slowly improve on it with his magic first. When he found the appropriate materials and his magical training had reached an appropriate stage, he would start over and refine it from scratch a couple of times, forming a perfect Demonyer Edge.

    After returning to the cemetery of death, Han Shuo stopped in the empty plot ofnd in front ck moat. There were bone fragments all over the ground. The cemetery of death never saw the light of the sun because of the enchantment, and the sky was shrouded in a thick cloud of grey clouds. Han Shuo felt quite close to the surroundings, and that the thick gloom inside was very suited to necromancy creatures.

    ¡°Souls of the fallen soldiers, heed the dark herald¡¯s call and reveal your existence!¡± Skeletal warriors slowly appeared in front of Han Shuo one after another as Han Shuo continuously chanted the skeletal warrior incantation.

    Han Shuo finally felt that his mental strength had been slightly depleted when five skeletal warriors had appeared in the open space. He stopped his summoning at this moment.

    Although Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength had greatly improvedpared to before, he was limited by his ability to control them, so including the little skeleton, he could control six skeletal warriors. After releasing his mental strength, Han Shuo gave amand and the six total skeletal warriors started moving, bone daggers in hand, ording to Han Shuo¡¯smands.

    A few oddly shaped deep pits and gullies slowly formed on the ground ording to Han Shuo¡¯s mental maniptions and the dance from the bone daggers of the skeletal warriors.

    The gully in the middle connected these deep pits like a long line, and when looking at it from afar, the gully-connected deep pits looked like the grimacing face of a ghost that was roughly six meters wide. The deep pits formed the nose, eyes, and ears of the grimacing ghost and it looked a bit sinister and evil.

    The ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± was a matrix left behind by Chi Cang Lan for the refinement of ¡°original demons¡±. 18 specters needed to be ced within the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± for them to ughter and swallow each other through the operations of the matrix. Only the three most powerful specters would survive in the end and they would be refined into ¡°original demons¡± after the operation and concentrated refinement of the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡±.

    The ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± needed to operate for at least 36 days, and it would continue to absorb the yin qi from the heavens and earth during this time. The refiner would need to feed it six drops of fresh blood every day and inject magical yuan into it. When the ¡°Original Demon¡± was formed, it would have a direct mental link with the refiner and could soundlessly invade the opponent¡¯s body. When the ¡°original demon¡± made its way into the enemy¡¯s body, it would automatically eat away at the enemy¡¯s vitality and blood.

    In Han Shuo¡¯s memories, demonic practitioners called the ¡°original demon¡± one of the ¡°demon generals¡±. ording to their own level of training, demonic practitioners could refine four ¡°demon generals¡± that were of different levels. They were respectively divided into ¨C original demon, yin demon, mystical demon and spirit demon.

    Of these four, the original demon was actually the lowest level general and its method of refinement was the easiest. It only needed the yin qi between heaven and earth and the fresh blood of the demonic practitioner.

    Of course, because of this, the power of a small demon general such as the ¡°original demon¡± was also the weakest. Many things could harm it. mes and ice could demolish it, even if it entered an enemy¡¯s body, as long as the enemy possessed enough true yuan and magical yuan, they could also kill it from within their body.

    However, with Han Shuo¡¯s level of training, he could only refine such minor demon generals. Not only was his current level not up to the task of refining stronger demon generals like the ¡°mystical demon¡±, but he also temporarily didn¡¯t know the method to.

    Han Shuo refined the ¡°original demon¡± in order to use them as a scouting tool on one hand, and on the other to render some assistance to Han Shuo when they invaded an enemy during battle. The enemy would at least have to split their concentration to deal with the ¡°original demon¡±, and in that way Han Shuo would have the opportunity to act. If the enemy was too weak, then just the invasion of the ¡°original demon¡± would be enough to kill him.

    When the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± wasplete, Han Shuomanded the skeletal warriors to clean up the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡±. Relying on the round green ball and the same method as before, Han Shuo trained his mental strength for a night and on the second day, exhausted all of his mental strength to summon eighteen ¡°wraiths¡±, cing them all within the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡±.

    ¡°wraiths¡± were from another dimension and on the same level of existence as the ¡°specters¡± that Han Shuo already understood. After learning necromancy magic, Han Shuo didn¡¯t need to venture out to collect these ¡°wraiths¡± at all. He merely needed a simple incantation to take care of it all. This was truly exceedingly convenient.

    When the eighteen ¡°wraiths¡± had entered the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡±, a chilly wind suddenly whipped around the surroundings and currents of cool presence aggregated from all over the cemetery of death and into the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡±. The concentration of the yin qi greatly exceeded Han Shuo¡¯s expectations.

    At this moment, Han Shuo suddenly remembered that whether it was necromancy magic or his training of magic ¡ª they all walked the path of evil. These two roads were both different and evil cults in their respective worlds. They had much inmon, and it was half the effort with twice the results when they were used in tandem, saving Han Shuo much effort.

    When the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± had absorbed enough yin qi, the grimacing outline of the ghost face that formed the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± suddenly seemed to be alive, twisting with endless changes. Spheres of ck air rose from the seven orifices of the ghost¡¯s face.

    When he saw this scene appear, Han Shuo immediately understood that all was as his spections. The ¡°wraiths¡± could act as pseudo ¡°specters¡± and be the foundational material of the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡±. As Han Shuo bit his finger and dropped in six drops of fresh blood in the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡±, and after he infused it with his magical yuan, the eighteen ¡°wraiths¡± suddenly sank into a berserk fervor and emitted ghastly screams. Continuously battling and ughtering each other to vie over the six drops of fresh blood.

    ¡°Done. Now I just need to wait 36 days for three yin demons to form!¡± Han Shuo smiled as he looked at the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± and turned his head to look at the skeletal warriors on the side. He suddenly realized that the magically refined little skeleton seemed to be attracted to the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡±. It set one foot into the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± without Han Shuo¡¯s orders andyzily within one of the deep pits. It actually crossed it two calf bones and disyed an odd posture.

    That odd posture looked like ¡ª enjoyment!

    Han Shuo was dumbfounded as he sent out his mental strength and was prepared tomand the little skeleton to leave the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡±. However, he felt the little skeleton¡¯s joy in his heart, greatly startling Han Shuo. He nced with a look of surprise and shock at the little skeleton leisurely rxing in the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡±.

    After a while, Han Shuo was still unable to understand what was going on. He observed the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡±, discovered that it was still operating as usual, and that the ¡°wraiths¡± were still killing each other within it, seemingly unaffected. Han Shuo shook his head, muttering, ¡°The little skeleton is bing odder and odder. Ah forget it, it doesn¡¯t look like it affects the matrix operations. I¡¯ll just leave him be.¡±

    He murmured to himself as Han Shuo walked to the cemetery of death, nning on studying the book of ¡°Beginner Magics of Necromancy¡±. He wanted to proceed on two fronts and breakthrough both simultaneously.

 Chapter 67: Sharing in the secrets of the dwarves

    Chapter 67: Sharing in the secrets of the dwarves

    Han Shuo stayed within the cemetery of death for the next couple of days, studying the book of ¡°Foundational Magics of Necromancy¡± on one hand, while looking after the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡±.

    Utilizing the round green ball, that most likely originated in the cemetery of death, Han Shuo would receive arge increase in mental strength whilst experiencing a high degree of agony and pain in his mind.

    Except, with his increased usage of the round green ball, Han Shuo could clearly feel that his mental strength was no longer growing as speedily as before. It looked like this strange round green ball couldn¡¯t help him continuously. As the number of times he used it increased, the benefit that Han Shuo received continually decreased.

    One day, Han Shuo meditated for a while and left the cemetery of death after infusing the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± with his blood and magical yuan.

    After investigating the vicinity in which he met the dwarvesst time, Han Shuo finally found traces of a dwarf. He followed the dwarf tracks while maintaining hisposure. After walking for a while, he finally discovered that the dwarf tracks had stopped in front of a highly concealed cave entrance.

    There was luxuriant shrubbery near the entrance of the cave, and the surroundings had obviously been fixed up. If it weren¡¯t for a dwarf moving aside therge patch of leaves, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t have been able to discover that there was a cave here.

    After observing the cave entrance for a while, Han Shuo noticed that several dwarves had appeared nearby again. They were holding iron spades and hammers as they filed into the cave. After a short while, the dwarf who¡¯d given Han Shuo the bag of beer, Bet, was helped out of the cave by two dwarves. He seemed to have been injured.

    A soft sound came from afar. Han Shuo¡¯s ears were sharp and could immediately tell that it was likely the sounds of magical creatures approaching. He crouched on the branch of a big tree and waited for a while. Shortly after, he saw two Windde Wolves slowly approach in the distance.

    His thoughts moving, Han Shuo snapped one of the dry branches off the big tree and threw it towards the shrubs next to the cave entrance. The sound of the dry branch falling to the ground obviously attracted the attention of Windde Wolves. The two moved ording to the noise and padded softly, quickly as they changed direction, heading for the cave entrance of the dwarves.

    When Bet and the other two dwarves looked around their surroundings after hearing the movement, the two Windde Wolves had already appeared in their range of vision.

    ¡°Oh, damnit. It¡¯s Windde Wolves. Let¡¯s hurry and and return back to the cave!¡± The injured Bet threw out an involuntarilyint upon seeing the two Windde Wolves appear and decided to head back into the cave.

    ¡°Bet, it¡¯s too crowded inside. If these two Windde wolves follow us into the cave, then the ones inside will be in danger.¡± One of the dwarves shook the hammer in his hand as he heard Bet¡¯s words.

    Bet thought for a moment after hearing his words, ¡°Mm, then we¡¯ll kill these two damned Windde Wolves at the door.¡±

    ¡°No way, it¡¯s impossible for the three of us to do so. I think we should let the dwarves within the cave stop mining for now and join forces to kill the two Windde Wolves.¡± The dwarf said.

    Just at this moment, Han Shuo suddenly jumped down from the big tree and arched his body on the ground, dashing out like lightning. After he revealed himself in the far off shrubbery, he nimbly dashed towards the two Windde Wolves. The dagger in his hand was like a bolt of cold lightning as it shot towards one of the Windde Wolves. Han Shuo followed closely behind with the speed of cheetah, facing down the other Windde Wolf with his bare hands.

    The two Windde Wolves had been staring at the three dwarves as fiercely as a tiger does and had their backs to Han Shuo. The back of one of them had already taken a hit from the fierce strike of Han Shuo¡¯s dagger. The other Windde Wolf turned around and sent a de of wind whistling towards Han Shuo. While performing his high speed dash, Han Shuo suddenly changed direction and magically evaded the wind de¡¯s attack, his body already dashing to the front of the Windde Wolf.

    The Wolf that had released the wind de didn¡¯t give any impression of weakness as it raised its sharp ws, pouncing towards Han Shuo when it saw that the enemy was at hand. A crossbow bolt from the left sleeve first shot towards the ws of this Windde Wolf, with Han Shuo mming down on its head using a fist interspersed with with the cial air from the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡±.

    With a shrill scream, the Windde Wolf fell stiffly to the ground, like a block of frozen meat, cold air emanating from its body.

    On the other side, the dwarves suddenly flung out the sharp axes in their hands, aiming for the other Windde Wolf. However, the strength of the two dwarves was visibly subpar to Han Shuo¡¯s. The thrown axe wasn¡¯t traveling too fast, and the injured Windde Wolf could actually still evade it.

    However, although it could evade the axes from the two dwarves, it couldn¡¯t dodge Han Shuo¡¯s crossbow bolt. The Windde Wolf finally couldn¡¯t escape and fell down listlessly.

    ¡°Oh, Brave friend, you¡¯ve saved Bet again! How could I possibly thank you?¡± The injured Bet cried out involuntarily upon seeing Han Shuo dispatch of the two Windde Wolves, calling out loudly to him.

    After relieving the Windde Wolves of their magical cores and pelts in a practiced manner. Han Shuo waved his hand and smiled, ¡°You shouldn¡¯t thank me, these two Windde Wolves were my prey to begin with! Not only did I not help you, but it was your two friends who helped me with their axes!¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re too polite. Eh, do you not want the bodies?¡± One of the dwarves asked in astonishment upon seeing Han Shuo take only their magical cores and pelts, but disyedplete disinterest in the corpses.

    ¡°Yes, I only need the Windde Wolf cores and pelts. This way, I can sell them for a good price.¡±

    ¡°Then, dear friend, could you give us their bodies?¡±

    ¡°Of course, but, what do you want them for? They¡¯re not worth much.¡±

    ¡°The bodies of Windde Wolves can be used to prepare food.¡± Bet looked strangely at Han Shuo and exined. ¡°To us, the flesh of the Windde Wolves is a very sumptuous delicacy!¡±

    Han Shuo had also eaten Windde Wolf meat before, but he¡¯d found it dry and hard to chew. It didn¡¯t seem to be a delicious type of meat... who would¡¯ve thought the dwarves would be interested. Han Shuo rather thought it was odd upon hearing Bet¡¯s words, but the dwarves weren¡¯t human, perhaps their habits were different from human habits, Han Shuo thought.

    ¡°Right, what are you doing here?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    ¡°This is a mining cave that we¡¯ve discovered. There are some copper and iron ores inside. However, it often copses inside andrge stones will crash down from above. The process of mining has been exceedingly difficult and dangerous, a lot of tribesman have already been injured. A tribesman was smashed to death yesterday. I was also identally hit just now and thus had toe out.¡± Bet seemed to be kindly disposed towards Han Shuo as he blurted out the secret that the dwarves were concealing without hesitation.

    The other two dwarves had wanted to stop Bet, but realized that Bet had already finished before they¡¯d had a chance to speak. They blew on their beards and red at Bet, as if admonishing his undiscerning mouth.

    ¡°So that¡¯s the case. If you don¡¯t mind, I can help you with the mining. I think with my help, a lot of the dangers will decrease for you guys.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts raced as he proposed with a smile.

    ¡°No, it¡¯s too dangerous inside. You¡¯d be smashed by the rocks if you went inside. If you happened to run into a widespread copse, you wouldn¡¯t be able to walk out from there and would be trapped to your death.¡± Bet offered a reminder out of good faith.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I won¡¯t be taking action myself. I¡¯m a necromancer and can summon necromancy creatures. There won¡¯t be any problems if the necromancy creatures go in and mine for you.¡± Han Shuo smiled.

    ¡°I see, then let me go in and discuss with them to see if they agree.¡± Bet thought for a moment, responded, and walked back into the cave with the two dwarves helping him walk.

    After a while, one of the dwarves walked out and said politely to Han Shuo, ¡°Noble friend, we are willing to share the secrets of this cave with you. Pleasee in and mine this cave with us!¡±

    Happiness making it way to his heart, Han Shuo said humbly, ¡°Thank you for your trust, I¡¯m very happy to work together with you.¡±

    After he spoke, the dwarf dragged the bodies of the two Windde Wolves into the cave and, along with Han Shuo, covered up the cave with tree leaves, finally walking into the cave with Han Shuo afterwards.

 Chapter 68: Black iron ore bestowed from the gods

    Chapter 68: ck iron ore bestowed from the gods

    It was narrower inside the mining cave than Han Shuo had thought. The dwarves had shorter statures and could walk around with ease, but Han Shuo found it a bit inconvenient. Even with the light from oilmps along the way, it was still rather gloomy inside the cave.

    After a few minutes of walking, Han Shuo had to start stooping his body. The farther down they walked, the danker and more humid it got. Broken shards of stone could be found all over the ground, and when Han Shuo discovered that it was bing difficult to progress even when stooped over, that was when the three dwarves finally stopped.

    The dwarves ahead held metal spades and hammers in their hands, exerting themselves to the utmost as they mined. The sounds of tapping rang out continuously. When they discovered that Han Shuo hade in, they all involuntarily stopped their motions and measured up Han Shuo with suspicious gazes.

    ¡°The cave will be more and more spacious as we make our way past this narrow juncture. Although there are more iron and copper cores inside, rocks rain down from above when we transport the ores. There was a copse a few days ago, and we spent an enormous amount of effort to reopen the path.¡± Bet leaned back somewhat tiredly on the hard rock wall as he looked at Han Shuo when exining.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°Alright, make some space for me. I¡¯m going to summon the skeletal warriors and have them go inside to mine the ore.¡±

    In ordance with Han Shuo¡¯s instructions, the dwarves cleared out of the area, starting from those furthest inside the cave. When there was no longer any dwarves within the cave, Han Shuo started the necromancy magic incantation. Seven skeletal warriors, in a row, appeared within the passageway,pletely blocking it off.

    Han Shuo had only been able to control six skeletal warriors originally, but now that he had meditated using the round green ball, his mental strength had improved again and was now able to manipte seven skeletal warriors simultaneously.

    ¡°Put your iron spades and hammers on the ground. I¡¯llmand the skeletal warriors to use your tools and mine the ore inside.¡± After the seven skeletons had appeared, Han Shuo looked at and spoke to the dwarves who had retreated.

    The dwarves hesitated upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, and then flung out the mining tools in their hands one by one upon Bet¡¯s persuasion. Han Shuo manipted the skeletal warriors,manded them to cast out the bone daggers from their hands, and pick up the mining tools on the ground instead. Each of them arched their bodies and slowly plodded into the depths of the mining cave.

    A ¡°wraith¡± was released and floated into the depths of the cave along with the skeletal warriors, ording to Han Shuo¡¯s instructions. With the aid of this wraith, Han Shuo could observe the environment surrounding the wraith. With the wraith leading the way, Han Shuo could observe the sights of the depths of the cave as if he were there in person.

    It was as the dwarves had said, the skeletal warriors had to stoop and slowly thread their way through an exceedingly narrow entrance, after which the space became increasinglyrger. Except, there were no light facilities inside. Thus, Han Shuo was unable to clearly see all of his surroundings.

    As the ¡°wraith¡± and the skeletal warriors covered arge distance, to the point where Han Shuo felt that he would no longer be able to manipte these dark creatures, he issued the mission to start mining ore. ording to the ¡°wraith¡± vision intermediary, Han Shuo focused his concentration and manipted the seven skeletal warriors to start tapping and hitting the ores around them.

    Loud rumblings noises sounded out, apanying the skeletal warrior¡¯s movements. After a short while, Han Shuo could clearly feel via the ¡°wraith¡± that because of the skeletal warriors¡¯ digging, the rocks at the top of the mining cave had started to shift. Somerge rocks actually fell down after a while, directly smashing the skeletal warrior in a pile of bone fragments.

    Focusing his concentration, Han Shuo closed his eyes and stood in front of the dwarves, carefully manipting the skeletal warriors. He sent the ¡°wraith¡± floating to the top of the cave and observed the loosened rocks with utmost care. He would hastily send the skeletal warriors dodging to the side whenever the rocks fell.

    After proceeding like this for a while, another skeletal warrior was directly smashed to smithereens by anotherrge rock. Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength was severely depleted and he felt a wave of vertigo in his mind. He immediately understood that he had over exhausted his mental strength and hastilymanded the remaining five skeletal warriors to stop mining ore, pick up the ore fragments that they¡¯d extracted, and start moving them backwards.

    When the five skeletal warriors started moving the ores on the ground one by one to the narrow pass, the dwarves on Bet¡¯s side cheered and started walking to the pass without waiting for Han Shuo¡¯s instructions. They picked up the ores from there and moved them safely to Han Shuo¡¯s side.

    After this went on for a few minutes. Han Shuo felt that his mental strength could no longer sustain the skeletal warriors¡¯ continued actions and so immediately and decisively chanted an incantation again, sending the remaining skeletal warriors and the ¡°wraith¡± back to the other dimension.

    At this moment, the cave opening in front of Han Shuo was already filled with dozens ofrge and small pieces of ore. The dwarves cheered as they fell over each other to free the ore from the surrounding rocks, cing the ore into the packs behind their backs.

    ¡°Oh, dear friend, because of your help, our haul today is greater than the amount of ore we¡¯ve obtained in a week. These adorable iron and copper ores can be used to forge beautiful weapons after they¡¯ve been refined. What a joyful happening.¡± Although Bet was very tired due to his injuries, he was in extraordinarily fine spirits now as he gazed upon hispanions jubntly knocking off the excess rock and picking up the ores. He excitedly expressed his gratitude to Han Shuo.

    The other dwarves picked up the ores with great delight,ughing heartily as they took out the wineskins that they always carried with them, happily pouring beer down their throats, emitting hearty ¡°glugging¡± sounds.

    ¡°Oh, goodness, what¡¯s this, what¡¯s this?¡± A dwarf suddenly screamed shrilly, attracting the attention of all the other dwarves as they all surged up to this dwarf.

    Han Shuo was also simrly surprised and nced involuntarily at this dwarf, but he had already been surrounded by the other dwarves,pletely blocking Han Shuo¡¯s vision. He spected to himself, was something the matter?

    Just as Han Shuo¡¯s mind was rife was suspicion, Bet suddenly lost hisposure andughed wildly, even throwing the wineskin of beer into the air as he cut a caper. Exceedingly ted, charged yells came out of his mouth, ¡°ck iron. Damn, ck iron. I am sure this is ck iron. Oh my gosh, there¡¯s ck iron inside. The chief will go crazy when he finds out about our find!¡±

    The other dwarves also flushed thoroughly red upon hearing Bet¡¯s words as they too danced wildly, raising their hammers to crazily hammer at the walls on all sides. The loud sounds they raised rather gave Han Shuo a fright.

    Han Shuo heaved a private sigh of relief upon hearing Bet¡¯s words, understanding that the dwarves must have obtained a marvelous metal to be so crazy with excitement. He too was happy on the inside.

    After a while, Han Shuo asked after the dwarves, who were finally began to calm down, ¡°Bet, what kind of ore is this ck iron? Is it very precious?¡±

    Bet nodded repeatedly like a little chick pecking at rice, saying excitedly, ¡°Of course, exceedingly precious. Precious to the utmost! The density and hardness of ck iron is the highest amongst all ores, but its weight is the least amongst all metal. It also never rusts, and can change color through adding other materials. It¡¯s the most supreme material in crafting weapons, and a gift bestowed upon us from the gods!¡±

    Han Shuo was about to congratte them when something suddenly shed through his mind and a patch of memories flooded in. He suddenly realized that ording to the properties of this ck iron, the ck iron, ording to Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories, was actually a precious material used to forge magical treasures ¡ª Mystical Metal.

    ¡°What a pity there¡¯s only a small piece. Looks like there¡¯s only enough to forge a small dagger.¡± After expressing his excitement, Bet looked at the ck iron in the dwarf¡¯s hand and said with a bit of regret.

    ¡°Bet, don¡¯t be dejected, there¡¯s bound to be more ck iron inside. Perhaps we¡¯ll be able to mine arger piece next time, that way we can forge the sharpest weapon!¡± The dwarf Benson said.

    ¡°Dear friend, thank you so much for your help. We are willing to share our mining cave with you. Can you continue to help us? We are willing to share the ore that is mined.¡± Bet turned a face full of desire towards Han Shuo and pleaded after hearing Benson¡¯s words.

    ¡°I¡¯m very happy that you trust me so, and am also quite willing to help you, but I¡¯m too weary today and need to rest a night. I¡¯lle back tomorrow and continue helping you mine, alright?¡± Han Shuo chuckled privately to himself and said humbly to Bet.

    ¡°Of course, of course. We¡¯ll be here early tomorrow morning with the vige chief. I hope you can stop by again!¡± Bet hastened to reply.

    Nodding, Han Shuo smiled, ¡°Then I¡¯ll see you tomorrow!¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t leave with a single piece of ore after saying this and walked in a natural and unrestrained manner to the mouth of the mining cave, leaving behind a few widely excited dwarves continuously takingrge gulps of beer.

 Chapter 69: Obtaining the friendship of the dwarves

    Chapter 69: Obtaining the friendship of the dwarves

    When his mental strength was depleted, the replenishment he received from meditating came at a noticeably faster pacepared to his normal training conditions. When Han Shuo returned to the cemetery of death and meditated for a night, his mental strength was once again filled to the brim. Thus, Han Shuo deduced such a conclusion.

    However, for necromancers, they would be unable to release any sort of magic if they had no mental strength. This would undoubtedly ce them in a very precarious position. Therefore, no mage would expend all of their mental strength in one shot under normal circumstances.

    Since the dwarves were willing to share the mining cave, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but form other ns. There seemed to be high amounts of metal and copper ore inside the cave. Therefore, it would take quite a while for the dwarves to excavate the entire cave.

    For Han Shuo, he could absolutely leverage summoning creatures to increase the speed of mining. If these copper and iron ores were shipped to the Empire, they were sure to fetch rich rewards for Han Shuo, particrly the ck iron ore inside. ording to Han Shuo¡¯s understanding and the dwarves¡¯ expressions today, Han Shuo understood that these ck metal ores were very precious resources, and perhaps could be sold for whopping prices.

    There should be quite a few dwarf viges in the Dark Forest, and there weren¡¯t too many dwarves in this group. All of thembined probably didn¡¯t need this much metal and copper ore. Since this was the case, Han Shuo made some other ns in his heart.

    After infusing fresh blood and magical yuan into the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡±, Han Shuo left the cemetery of death early in the morning and rushed in the direction of the mining cave.

    Han Shuo had thought that he had arrived early enough, but he discovered that the dwarves had already arrived by the time he arrived at the entrance of the cave. There was double the usual amount of dwarves today, and it seemed like they had been up all night long due to their excitement. Their eyes were all bloodshot, but their spirits were still highly stimted.

    One of them had a grizzled beard and was leaning on a staff, in the middle of solemnly rying instructions to the other dwarves. All the other dwarves, which included Bet, all listened respectfully to his admonishments.

    Purposefully letting the sound of his steps attract the attention of the dwarves, Bet immediately raised the iron hammer in his hand and called out when he saw Han Shuo appear, ¡°Hi, dear friend, we¡¯ve waited for you for a long time!¡±

    When Han Shuo had walked close, the old dwarf with the grizzled beard bowed in the manner of humans to express his thanks to Han Shuo. He said benevolently, ¡°Brave and strong friend, thank you for your repeated help. I am Chief Calvin of the dwarf vige, and am very pleased to make your acquaintance.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m called Han Shuo and am very honored to obtain your trust!¡± This ce was far from the Academy and no one knew of his identity. Han Shuo therefore used his true name to interact with the dwarves.

    ¡°Brave Han, your name is quite marvelous. I¡¯ve never heard of anyone using such a name. Heh heh, the children say that you¡¯re a man worth trusting. Our vige is willing to share the secrets of this mining cave with you. I just hope that we can coexist in harmony in the future!¡± Calvin first looked at Han Shuo oddly, seemingly befuddled by his name, but his face then became wreathed in smiles and continued to talk.

    ¡°Then, I think we can begin working.¡± Although Calvin was neither in a rush nor too leisurely, the gazes of the other dwarves all flitted towards the cave behind them, obviously exposing their eager thoughts. Han Shuo did not speak further and directly proposed to start working.

    ¡°No rush.¡± Calvin thought and stared at Han Shuo. ¡°Han, why are you helping us like this? We are willing to share the mining cave with you, but why didn¡¯t you take half of the iron and copper cores yesterday?¡±

    The elderly indeed thought more, and it seemed that the dwarves weren¡¯t an exception. Han Shuo looked at Calvin, was silent for a moment and exined. ¡°First, I also had a bone to pick with the forest trolls. Not to mention I was conquered by the death-defying battle spirit disyed by Bet and the others. That¡¯s the reason as to why I helped them the first time.

    In addition to this, they actually helped me fight off the Windde Wolves. Those two Windde Wolves were actually my prey, and helping you mine ore in the cave is just a small matter. I don¡¯t know how to forge weapons, and I don¡¯t think I¡¯ll have any use if I take the iron and copper ores. That¡¯s why I didn¡¯t take any when I left. Elder Calvin, you must believe me, I really don¡¯t have any other dubious motives.¡±

    ¡°Yes chief, Han is a great friend and he¡¯s not like the other humans.¡± Bet suddenly spoke up and said to the old dwarf.

    Nodding, Calvin bowed towards Han Shuo, saying humbly, ¡°My apologies Han, I¡¯m older and have seen too many wily humans. That¡¯s why I questioned you. I hope you don¡¯t mind.¡±

    ¡°Your way is correct, Ipletely understand your concerns!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s difficult for us to mine the ore further inside these caves with our strength alone. Since we¡¯re willing to share our secret with you, we¡¯re willing to share all that is inside with you, including the ck metal bestowed by the gods. We¡¯re willing to share everything equally with you and hope you don¡¯t reject it, otherwise we¡¯ll truly be embarrassed.¡± Calvin thought and made this solemn promise.

    Upon hearing his words, Han Shuo thought that although the dwarves were stubborn and possessed fiery tempers, they were indeed a race worth befriending. Han Shuo became a bit shamefaced about his own intentions after hearing Calvin¡¯s promise. He thought deeply for a moment, ¡°Please be at ease elder, I absolutely agree with your suggestion. In addition, when I have enough ck metal, may I sincerely request that you forge it into a weapon for me?¡±

    ¡°No problem Han, be at ease. If there is enough ck metal, I will personally supervise them and create a weapon worthy of your use.¡± Calvin promised with a smile.

    ¡°Alright, I think we can begin working!¡± Han Shuo finally set aside his ns, thinking that his ns for the Demonyer Edge were finally in motion. He smiled as he headed into the cave with the dwarves.

    After a half day of mining, Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength was depleted once again and he left the cave in utter exhaustion. Today¡¯s haul was even richer than yesterday¡¯s. Apart fromrge amounts of iron and copper ore, they had once again obtained two pieces, onerge and one small, of ck metal. Han Shuo magnanimously handed the bigger piece over to the vige chief and threw the smaller piece into his space ring.

    At the entrance of the cave, the dwarves packed everything away neatly and shouldered the ores with smiles that brightened their faces, nning on carting today¡¯s haul back to the vige.

    ¡°Dear Han, what kind of weapon do you wish to see forged?¡± Calvin asked before he left.

    After thinking for a while, Han Shuo took out his dagger and drew a sketch of the Demonyer Edge on the ground. He pointed at the weapon outline on the ground and exined to Calvin, ¡°This type of weapon would be nice. I would like the best and the sharpest, would you be able toplete it?¡±

    Calvin squinted his eyes and stooped down, observing the Demonyer Edge sketch for a while. He spoke in deep thought, ¡°I¡¯ve never seen a weapon like this, I think this will be interesting. There should be no problem in creating it, but if you would like the best and the sharpest, we would need a few more materials. Our vige likely doesn¡¯t have enough of them in supply.¡±

    His thoughts racing, Han Shuo thought of the Boozt Merchant Guild and privately thought that he really was going all out for this Demonyer Edge. He said, ¡°Please tell me what other materials are needed, elder. I will find ways to collect all the missing or insufficient materials. I need a high grade weapon.¡±

    ¡°Do you have pen and paper?¡±

    ¡°Of course!¡± Han Shuo took out the pen and paper he had prepared before going to the cemetery of death from his space ring and handed it to Calvin. ¡°Don¡¯t worry about the insufficient materials. I will find a way to gather all the materials together as quickly as possible.¡±

    ¡°Then alright.¡± Calvin nodded and started noting down a list of materials on the paper. When he finished, he handed it over to Han Shuo, saying, ¡°Han, as long as these materials are gathered, I can assure you that I will forge a weapon with an unparalleled edge for you.¡±

    ¡°When the amount of my ck metal is enough to forge this weapon, I will think of a way to collect these materials. I will be here earlier tomorrow to help mine the ore,¡± Han Shuo said as he left the mines.

    Just like this, Han Shuo spent his subsequent ten days with the dwarves, mining the caves.

    When Han Shuo had obtained enough ck metal and the dwarves had all obtained a rich haul, Calvin proposed temporarily halting their mining operation and said that they should start forging these ores into weapons. They could mine again in the future when they ran out of weapons.

    Han Shuo had already obtained the dwarves¡¯ trust during this time and epted Calvin¡¯s invitation to visit their vige and drink heavily in celebration. Thus, he knew the correct way to their dwellings.

    After Han Shuo infused fresh blood and magical yuan into the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± earlier than usual. He then made direct use of the transportation matrix to leave the cemetery of death.

 Chapter 70: Help me kill two lackeys

    Chapter 70: Help me kill twockeys

    Han Shuo appeared directly within the secluded tomb, located in the mountains behind the Academy through use of the transportation matrix, in the blind spot that he had dug.

    He put away the six magic sticks and removed the stone b that blocked the entrance of the tomb before walking out of the tomb. The sky was only just brightening hazily, and Han Shuo didn¡¯t walk towards the Academy. Rather, he took his bearings and circled the area, walking directly to the northern street ording to the directions indicated on Fabian¡¯s card.

    The northern part of the city of Ossen contained many tall, ornate buildings. Many of the Empire¡¯s nobles and aristocrats lived here. The city¡¯s defense guard was also found in the highest numbers here, and there were many armored guards, wielding various weapons, patrolling early in the morning. Han Shuo cleaned up his clothes and wiped off the dust he had just acquired, walking towards the northern street, ording to Fabian¡¯s instructions, afterwards.

    Han Shuo stopped in front of a house after a while. There were no guards at the door and it didn¡¯t seem as conspicuous as the ones around it. Han Shuo walked up to the front door, gathered his concentration, and looked around him, finally knocking when he concluded that no one was paying attention to him.

    Last time in the Boozt Merchant Guild, Phoebe had killed the assassins from ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± and shifted the me onto him. When Grover left the chamber, his expression was apparent that he was harboring resentment in his heart. ording to Phoebe¡¯s exnation, whether it was ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± or Grover, both had associates who could kill her at anytime. Therefore, Han Shuo had to be extremely careful when returning to the Empire this time. He was deathly afraid of attracting ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± or Grover¡¯s attention.

    After a while, a butler with warm features opened the door and gazed at Han Shuo, bowing with a smile. ¡°Good morning sir, whom are you looking for?¡±

    ¡°My name is Bryan, and I¡¯m here to discuss some matters of business with Fabian!¡± Han Shuo also responded politely.

    ¡°Mr. Bryan! I¡¯ve heard Fabian speak of you, please follow me!¡± The butler immediately turned his body sideways upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s name and invited him in.

    When Han Shuo had walked in, the butler stuck out his head, carefully observed for a while in front of the door, and finally closing the door tightly afterwards. He was quite cautious and prudent as he led Han Shuo inside.

    The buildings inside were still quite ordinary. It all seemed rather dull whenpared to the luxury of the Boozt Merchant Guild. The surface area of the buildings were far less expansive and spacious than those of the Boozt Merchant Guild.

    The butler led Han Shuo into the main lobby after walking for only a minute. An ordinary looking maid served tea and snacks, after which she said, ¡°Please wait a moment Mr. Bryan, I¡¯ll go get Fabian for you.¡±

    When the butler left, the maid also left the lobby after pouring a full cup of tea for Han Shuo. After a while, the chubby Fabian walked in from outside the lobby,ughing heartily. Bright and clearughter rang from his mouth, but his face looked a bit wan and his spirits didn¡¯t seem too good. He seemed to have been going through a difficult timetely.

    ¡°It¡¯s Bryan! It¡¯s so good to see that you¡¯re safe and sound.¡± Fabian pulled out a stool for himself after entering andughed loudly.

    ¡°I too am very d to see you unharmed. I hid after leaving the Boozt Merchant Guildst time, so whether it¡¯s ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ or Grover¡¯s men, they¡¯ll all be unable to find me. Therefore, you don¡¯t need to worry about me at all, but you on the other hand, you don¡¯t seem to have been living that well!¡± Han Shuo sized up Fabian as he spoke slowly.

    ¡°Don¡¯t mention it, Grover is bing more and more domineeringtely. Our lives have be a bit difficult. Right, what business would you like to discuss this time?¡± Fabian sighed and said with some resignation.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t want to pay attention to the old scores between Grover and them, and Fabian wasn¡¯t willing to truly discuss his feelings in detail. He thought for a bit and said, ¡°I¡¯vee to find you this time not to sell any resources, but to purchase a few rare materials from you.¡±

    ¡°Oh, what rare materials?¡±

    ¡°Take a look at this list, I need all the materials on it. How many gold coins would this cost?¡± Han Shuo handed over the list that Chief Calvin of the dwarf vige had written out to Fabian and asked.

    Fabian took the list from Han Shuo¡¯s hands and looked carefully at it, thinking for a bit before saying to Han Shuo. ¡°Bryan, even I don¡¯t know some of the materials on this list. I¡¯m afraid I can¡¯t make the decision. If you don¡¯t mind, I¡¯d like to ask our Miss Phoebe to discuss with you?¡±

    Han Shuo was startled, thinking did Calvin ask for some very precious items? He mused for a bit and nodded, ¡°Alright, it¡¯s the same if I talk to Miss Phoebe. I have urgent need of these items, when can I see her?¡±

    ¡°Our miss is right here. I¡¯ll go request her instructions, please wait a moment.¡± Fabian rose and left Han Shuo with these words before leaving the lobby.

    Phoebe swept a nonchnt gaze over Han Shuo after she entered, making him feel a bit befuddled. She found a seat and thoroughly perused the list that Han Shuo had brought. She furrowed her brow slightly as she lifted her head to look at Han Shuo, ¡°These materials should be for the use of forging weapons. Some of the items within are very rare indeed. You¡¯vee to the right person to purchase them.¡±

    Joy flooding his heart, Han Shuo kept a calm expression on his face and randomly tapped his right finger on the table. He said lightly, ¡°What¡¯s your price?¡±

    Nodding, Phoebe¡¯s wise eyes sparkled cunningly as a slight trace of a beautiful curve marked her slightly tightened lips. She said, ¡°With the exception of the ck gold ore, we can sell all the other ingredients to you. Particrly because you helped usst time, I¡¯ll even give you a discount. It will only cost you 3,500 gold. This price is absolutely fair.¡±

    3,500 gold! Han Shuo¡¯s heart leapt in shock. He hadn¡¯t thought that the ten or so missing ingredients that Calvin had listed would be so pricey. And judging from the connotations from Phoebe¡¯s words, this price was already quite low, and that the ck Gold ore seemed to be of some difficulty.

    His brow furrowing slightly, Han Shuo thought deeply and said, ¡°3,500 gold is no problem, but is your Guild unable to obtain ck gold ore?¡±

    ¡°ck gold ore is the same as ck iron ore, they¡¯re materials of the utmost quality used for forging weapons. The price of these kinds of ore is beyond your imagination. A piece of ck gold ore the size of a fingernail can fetch the price of 5,000 gold on the marketce. Under normal circumstances, there is no supply for both ck gold and ck iron ore, at any price.

    I have a piece of ck gold ore the size of my thumb in my possession, but I only gained this piece of ck gold ore at extreme effort. I was nning on forging the best sword for my respected teacher when I collected enough material, that¡¯s why I¡¯ve kept it all this time. Therefore, even though this piece of ck gold ore can satisfy your needs, I will not sell it to you no matter how high a price you offer.¡± Phoebe¡¯s face was solemnly grave as she said resolutely to Han Shuo.

    Phoebe was a swordswoman, and Han Shuo could figure out with even his toes what kind of level of character her teacher would be. The kinds of swords used by such a character would naturally be umonly sharp. As Phoebe had reached the level of swordmaster at such a tender age, she must not have been taught at an ordinary academy of magic and force. Phoebe was a mysterious character indeed.

    However, Han Shuo truly needed the ck gold ore. He wanted to create the best possible Demonyer Edge in one go, and naturally needed the exact amount of the rarest materials. If he was short on the valuable ck gold ore, then the quality of the Demonyer Edge would decrease greatly. This was what Han Shuo didn¡¯t wish to see the most.

    His brows locked tightly, Han Shuo pondered hard and finally asked Phoebe, ¡°Apart from you, who else would have ck gold ore in their possession?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t wish for the stars. I think even if someone had some, they would cherish it like treasure and wouldn¡¯t sell it to you.¡± Phoebe looked at Han Shuo¡¯s anxious expression with interest, a hint of a faint smile curving at her lips as she said with some pride.

    Han Shuo felt an involuntary wave of depression when he heard these words, but suddenly detected Phoebe¡¯s unintentional hint of a smile at her lips when he was shaking his head and sighing. His thoughts spun furiously as Han Shuo thought silently. He finally stared straight at Phoebe and asked lowly, ¡°Miss Phoebe, if you¡¯re willing to give the ck gold ore in your possession to me, you can name whatever condition you wish!¡±

    Phoebe started and looked at Han Shuo in some surprise. She then frowned and pretended to turn the matter over in her mind. She finally said with some reluctance, ¡°I can bear the pain of giving up something I value very much because you helped usst time, but you must help me with another task...¡±

    ¡°Help in doing what?¡± Han Shuo privately thought that Phoebe had indeed been scheming early on. Although he felt angry, he didn¡¯t let it show on his face and responded with a grave face.

    ¡°Fight by my side and assist me in killing the twockeys most loyal to Grover ¨C Darnell and Yuna, those two b*tches that should be hacked to death by a thousand cuts!¡± Frost grew on Phoebe¡¯s charming face as she spoke through gritted teeth.

    ¡°What are their strength, respectively?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face was calm as he asked.

    ¡°Darnell is a senior swordsman and his strength is almost at the level of breaking through to swordmaster, while Yuna is a fire adept mage and her strength is extremely frightening. The two are a couple who are beyond depraved and exceedingly shameless. They basically do not spend long amounts of time apart from each other. They currently both live within the Boozt Merchant Guild. If you¡¯re willing to aid me, I have a sixty percent chance of assassinating them without a sound!¡± Phoebe¡¯s body abruptly straightened, highlighting the soaring twin peaks in front of her chest as she spoke excitedly.

    ¡°I promise to help you!¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t hesitate as he spoke in a low voice.

 Chapter 71: A moment of grace before the prelude of assassination

    Chapter 71: A moment of grace before the prelude of assassination

    After spending an entire day preparing, Han Shuo and Phoebe took a carriage at dusk to the Boozt Merchant Guild in the southern part of the city.

    Han Shuo and Phoebe sat shoulder to shoulder within the carriage. Two primitively simplistic crossbows, decorated with intricate carvings, were ced in front of the two. In addition to this, there was a dagger that sparkled with cold light.

    ¡°This crossbow and dagger will be of much better quality than the ones you obtained from the orc wolf ridersst time. I¡¯m giving all of these to you for free.¡± Phoebe held a clean piece of silk in her hands, carefully wiping away at the longsword in her hands as she spoke coldly to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo yed with the crossbow and dagger in his hands, so delighted with them that he could hardly bear to put them down. He was quite satisfied with Phoebe¡¯s generosity and said with a lightugh, ¡°Don¡¯t count on me too much for this operation, I¡¯m not as strong as you think I am. My main purpose is to keep a lookout and act as your supporting assistant. You¡¯re still going to be the one who has to take action.¡±

    ¡°I know, just listen to my orderster. I¡¯ll be telling you what to do then.¡± Phoebe rolled her eyes at Han Shuo and said with some anger.

    Han Shuo took out a small bottle from within his space ring and carefully poured some powder onto his fingertip, very cautiously coating the tips of both the dagger and crossbow bolts. He hastily and repeatedly cleaned the fingertip that had been covered by the powder.

    Phoebe was a bit curious about Han Shuo¡¯s actions and slightly shifted her body closer to where he was sitting, proceeding to stare at and observe his actions for quite a while. She finally asked, seemingly perplexed, ¡°What are you doing?¡±

    A strand of fragrance, simr to the scent of orchids, wafted into Han Shuo¡¯s mouth and nose as Phoebe moved closer to him. He involuntarily flicked a nce at her as his heart suddenly lurched. Phoebe was like Han Shuo today, dressed in tight-fitting, ck, nightwalker clothes. The tight nightwalker clothing caused Phoebe¡¯s marvelous body to be visible without a doubt. She had a pair of exquisitely chiseled cheeks, and stunning beauty which blossomed from the movement of her clear eyes. All of which caused Han Shuo to have a heart like a capering monkey and a mind like a galloping horse.

    I already have Fanny... although this Phoebe is pretty, her personality is too cold and shees with too much dangerous baggage. Han Shuo said silently to himself and turned his head away afterwards, continuing to concentrate on coating the dagger and crossbow bolts. He responded diffidently, ¡°Nothing much, just applying some poison powder to my weapons.¡±

    ¡°Despicable! Shameless! This goes against the regtions of the Empire. If anyone were to know of your actions, you would be in great trouble!¡± Phoebe¡¯s face was full of contempt as she spoke coldly.

    ¡°Doesn¡¯t matter... what we¡¯re about to do today isn¡¯t the most honorable task anyways. Besides, no one will find out about this. Heh heh, you¡¯re my aplice and even I don¡¯t believe that you¡¯re dumb enough to rat yourself out.¡± Han Shuo cackled a low, evilugh as he spoke with a trace of pride.

    Phoebe was a bit suffocated by her anger upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, but since she had looked to him for help, she could only snort coldly and couldn¡¯t say much else.

    When Han Shuo had applied poison powder to all the crossbow bolt and his dagger, he thought for a moment and pulled a few iron needles from his thigh. He spared no trouble and was exceedingly patient as he also applied the same poison powder to the iron needles. Phoebe once again snorted lightly, seeming to hold Han Shuo¡¯s methods in high contempt.

    When he¡¯d settled everything appropriately, Han Shuo put away all his weapons and looked at Phoebe, asking, ¡°Right, why are you not directly attacking Grover and are attempting to kill his two ineffectualckeys instead?¡±

    ¡°Grover has some critical items belonging to the Guild in his possession, he¡¯s put those items in a trusted mistress. If Grover dies, his mistress is sure to publicly reveal those items. This would be of destructive impact to us. So before I kill Grover, I must find his mistress first and regain control of those items.¡± Phoebe nced sideways at Han Shuo, exining with some reluctance.

    Therger a merchant guild was, the more likely shady dealings would ur. Take the resources that Han Shuo had seized from the orc wolf riders for example. These items had originally belonged to the shops of the town of Drol. The Empire had long since had an official regtion that if citizens obtained such resources, they must be turned in.

    Fabian and Han Shuo¡¯s transaction had already vited the Empire¡¯s regtions. If the Empire were to find out about the methods of the Boozt Merchant Guild, the Guild was sure to find it hard to escape their inevitable punishment. For a guild like the Boozt Merchant Guild, there were surely more simrly illegal transactions. It looked like this critical matters was handled by Grover. No wonder Phoebe didn¡¯t dare to act rashly against Grover.

    The two discussed some of the details in low voices until the horse carriage suddenly stopped unbeknownst to anyone. The groom at the front said softly, ¡°Miss, we¡¯ve arrived at the back door of the guild.¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Phoebe nced at Han Shuo and took the lead in alighting. Han Shuo poked his head out to look around and then hopped off as well.

    ¡°Miss, hurry inside. Be careful. Grover has just taken a few strong men and left the guild. I don¡¯t know where they¡¯ve gone. They always return at the end of the night.¡± An old man in the Boozt Merchant Guild was guarding the back door and hastily turned his body to the side to allow Phoebe and Han Shuo to enter when he saw them arrive..

    ¡°We¡¯ve caused you to go to great efforts!¡± Phoebe said to the old man. She nced at Han Shuo as they rushed inside the guild. Han Shuo followed tightly behind Phoebe as he, too, quickly moved forward.

    ¡°Although the Guild is mostly controlled by Grover¡¯s men, I can mobilize a few older men, and this is all because Grover isn¡¯t aware of my rtionship with them. There are many guards inside, so we must be careful and cautious. Otherwise, not only will the assassination fail if we¡¯re discovered, but it would be hard to even escape with our lives.¡± Phoebe was exceedingly familiar with the Boozt Merchant Guild as she evaded quite a few areas with guards when she lead Han Shuo with a fast pace. She didn¡¯t forget to remind Han Shuo during this time.

    It waspletely dark now. There was no moon tonight and thickyers of dark-colored cloudspletely absorbed all light. The few lights along the hallways of the Boozt Merchant Guild were unable to shine out too far.

    Phoebe had the strength of a swordmaster alright. Her agile body greatly surprised Han Shuo. Her body flew soundlessly and her speed was exceedingly fast.

    His magical yuan churning madly, Han Shuo was greatly astounded by the extraordinariness of his senses when he calmed down. The ck night waspletely unable to obstruct his range of vision. Even without the illumination of lights, Han Shuo could clearly see the fish swimming in the pools beneath the artificial mountains in the far distance. He could also clearly hear the footstepsing from quite a distance away and the rustlings of low voices within passing rooms.

    Han Shuo¡¯s calm walk was also agile and fast beyondparison. He was like a hunting cheetah, searching for his prey, following soundlessly behind Phoebe.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo quickly approached and grabbed Phoebe, abruptly hauling her body and stuffing themselves into a crack in the surrounding artificial mountains.

    The crack in the artificial mountains was exceedingly narrow, and their chests were tightly mashed against each other as they squeezed inside. Han Shuo could feel the fully rounded peaks in front of Phoebe¡¯s chest. Her charming face was infuriated as she red fiercely at Han Shuo, her eyes seeming like they could spit out fire.

    ¡°Shh!¡± Extending a finger to make a silencing motion, Han Shuo¡¯s eyes rolled rapidly, indicating to Phoebe that there was an unexpected situation.

    The wrath on Phoebe¡¯s face still didn¡¯t dissipate upon Han Shuo¡¯s actions. A trace of bashful red flooded Phoebe¡¯s slender, white neck and nape. Their two thighs were somewhat enmeshed and rubbing against each other, they could even feel each other¡¯s heartbeat through their connecting chests. A strand of of ambiguous atmosphere started to emanate between the two of them.

    Seemingly too shy to look at Han Shuo, Phoebe¡¯s cheek made its way next to Han Shuo¡¯s ear as she said in an incredibly low voice, her breath like orchids, ¡°I will kill you if there isn¡¯t anything going on.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression was wry as he regted his breathing and concentrated, not saying anything. He felt the exceedingly light footsteps draw near. His breathing became slower and he even slightly shook his head, wanting to warn Phoebe of danger. Who knew that because Phoebe was pursing her jade lips in a low whisper to Han Shuo, Han Shuo¡¯s shake of his head actually caused Phoebe¡¯s tantalizing lips to directly ster themselves onto Han Shuo¡¯s cheeks.

    Just as Phoebe¡¯s breathing was uneasy and about to erupt into rage, Han Shuo turned his head with extreme difficulty and used a very resolute gaze to tell Phoebe to be careful.

    Phoebe had the training of a swordmaster after all, and the strength of her mental state was quite strong. She merely inhaled a deep breath at this critical moment and immediately calmed her rapidly beating heart. However, because of her deep breath, the full peaks in front of her chest involuntarily lifted, rising so that Han Shuo almost lost control and moaned.

    ¡°My wind screen truly felt a disturbance and I came here at the fastest speed possible. Why didn¡¯t I discover anything? Have I been too carefultely?¡± The murmuring sound of a man talking to himself sounded out, not too far away from the two.

    Exceedingly light footsteps only slowly sounded in the vicinity after the voice came into earshot. If Phoebe hadn¡¯t raised her concentration to the utmost, it would have been exceedingly difficult to detect these footsteps unless the man had been quite close by.

    Since he was a wind mage, he could indeed use enhancement magics of the wind major to greatly decrease the weight of his body. His walking speed would be faster than normal mages and warriors, and his footsteps would be even more lithe with no sound. No wonder that even with Phoebe¡¯s strength as a swordmaster, she was able to detect his movement only after he drew near.

    This person surveyed the surroundings, finally departing without a sound while Han Shuo and Phoebe remained on tenterhooks.

    However, Phoebe didn¡¯t dare take reckless actions this time. She was deathly afraid that her judgment would be wed. Her pair of clear eyes bore straight into Han Shuo, as if wishing to gain some clues from Han Shuo¡¯s face.

    After a while, Han Shuo exhaled lightly and said lowly, ¡°He¡¯s gone!¡±

    As soon as his voice sounded, Phoebe used her hands and legs together to firmly squirm out from the crack of the artificial mountains. She lowered her head and said lightly with a fierce tone, ¡°I¡¯ll let it pass this time, but the next time something like this urs, find a more spacious ce, otherwise I won¡¯t let you off.¡±

    Phoebe circled around the area after she¡¯d finished speaking and was about to head in another direction. She walked two steps and realized that Han Shuo was smiling wryly, having yet to catch up. She stuck her hands on her waist and lightly rebuked, ¡°You don¡¯t want the ck gold ore anymore?¡±

    ¡°Coming!¡± Han Shou responded and followed with some resignation, thinking when can I find a spacious hiding ce when things go south!

    They didn¡¯t meet with any more unexpected twists afterwards. Phoebe led Han Shuo on a longer path, avoiding a few waves of guards and finally making it into Darnell and Yuna¡¯s room.

    ¡°Let¡¯s set things up, make our preparations, and wait for this dog couple toe back!¡± Phoebe immediately spoke through gritted teeth upon entering the room, seeming to want to vent her frustrations from earlier on the two of them.

    Therefore, Han Shuo and Phoebe started working busily, preparing to assassinate Grover¡¯s loyalckeys who were about to return.

 Chapter 72: An alarmingly breathtaking completion of an assassination

    Chapter 72: An rmingly breathtakingpletion of an assassination

    Phoebe and Han Shuo had set up the room ordingly after a while.

    ¡°Why were you able to so miraculously discover traces of the wind mage Ellis when he made his way over?¡± Phoebe creased her brow, perplexed, and looked at Han Shuo in inquiry as she was inspecting the inside of the room.

    Han Shuo was stooped close to the ground at this moment and carefully collected some sawdust from scraps of wood. He conscientiously stored it within his space ring and responded without lifting his head. ¡°This is my business and has nothing to do with you!¡±

    Snorting lightly, Phoebe shut her mouth, but couldn¡¯t help but observe Han Shuo¡¯s actions after a while. She gave an involuntary cry of astonishment, ¡°Were you a killer before? Howe you are so steady and cautious right now, and even possess such extraordinary perception?¡±

    If it was Han Shuo¡¯s original personality, he naturally wouldn¡¯t face any matter with such a steady and cautious mentality, but his magical training forced him to continually exist in a state of enduring inhumane pain, unconsciously creating Han Shuo¡¯s firm and indomitable personality.

    After the trials of the Dark Forest and ude¡¯s death, Han Shuo¡¯s careful prudence and steadiness had been unconsciously and soundlessly trained into being. Add to that his extraordinary perception ¨C this truly gave Han Shuo the characteristics of a professional killer. No wonder Phoebe would dare to ask.

    ¡°No, do you think I¡¯m you? Tonight, I¡¯ve been operating under your watchful instructions ever since we entered the Guild up until our preparations just now. I think that you certainly wouldn¡¯t have grasped such methods if it weren¡¯t for certain experiences. Looks like you were the one who was a killer before, otherwise why would you be so well-practiced?¡± Han Shuo finally cleared the sawdust from the bed panels and raised his head to rake Phoebe with his eyes.

    ¡°You¡¯re the one who was a killer before!¡± Phoebe rolled her eyes coldly at Han Shuo. She continued to say, ¡°However, my honored mastered has passed onto me knowledge of these matters. The particrs of assassinating someone was also one of my required subjects of study.¡±

    ¡°Oh. Looks like your master was a very proficient killer!¡± Han Shuo said diffidently.

    ¡°Shut your mouth, don¡¯t you dare nder my honored master. My honored master is a true swordsman. He wouldn¡¯t do such things!¡± Phoebe¡¯s face was even colder as she red ferociously at Han Shuo.

    It was at this moment that faint footsteps could be heard approaching from afar. Han Shuo¡¯s brow knitted as he carefully discerned them. He said to Phoebe, ¡°They should being back, I can hear them!¡±

    Phoebe also focused on her hearing and listened. She only heard the sound of footsteps draw near a few breaths after Han Shuo¡¯s warning had sounded. She looked at him in shock and said in a low voice, ¡°No matter how strong or weak your strength is, you¡¯re already quite frightening just based on your foresight and extraordinary senses.¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t respond and moved ording to Phoebe¡¯s earlier instructions. He crouched down, turned to the side, and rolled underneath the bed. Upon seeing that Han Shuo was in position, Phoebe scanned the four corners of the room with her beautiful eyes and suddenly sprang upwards. Leveraging the chandelier in the room, she hid herself in the shadows of the rafters.

    Holding his breath and concentrating, Han Shuo slowed down the frequency of his breaths and heart rate, until he was appeared to be dead. His mindpletely clear, Han Shuo rifled through his mind, going over the items they had set up in the room once more in his mind, then cing all of his concentration on the people arriving.

    At this moment, footsteps sounded at a volume in which even normal people could hear. The coyughter of a man and woman flirting sounded from far out the room door, apanied by various sounds of them making out.

    The room door creaked open as the two of them slowly walked in, slowly approaching the bed under which Han Shuo was concealed.

    ¡°Darling, were you feeling that itchy today that you had to be so wild at the banquet tonight? Who¡¯s caught your eye now?¡± Darnellughed softly as he teased Yuna.

    ¡°What¡¯s my business is mine, are you a beast that only knows how to think with your lower body? You only have that b*tch Phoebe in your heart now. If it wasn¡¯t for you wanting to do somethingst time, we would¡¯vepleted Grover¡¯s mission and killed that b*tch. Her guards got there in time because of your mistake, we almost didn¡¯t get out in time.¡± Yuna berated Darnell. She¡¯d already sat down on the edge of the bed.

    ¡°Heh heh, her skin is as smooth as silk and her face seems like it was exquisitely sketched by a painter. It¡¯s said that she hasn¡¯t had a man yet. Wouldn¡¯t it be such a pity for her if such a beauty doesn¡¯t experienced the manliness of my strength before she dies?¡± Darnell leered.

    At this moment, Han Shuo¡¯s concentration had been raised to the utmost. Although Darnell and Yuna couldn¡¯t detect Phoebe waiting in ambush, Han Shuo could hear her heartbeat and breathing quicken. It looked like she was exceedingly furious. He gave an internal start of surprise and concealed himself even more carefully, ready to act, in case Phoebe sprang the ambush earlier than nned.

    ¡°Damned lecher, you¡¯ll die beneath the crotch of a woman someday!¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, I¡¯ll let you die beneath my crotch first!¡±

    The shifting sounds of clothes being taken off slowly spread throughout the room, mixed in with Darnell¡¯s depravedughter and Yuna¡¯s light panting sounds.

    Sucking and kissing sounds followed after as Darnell¡¯s depravedughter and Yuna¡¯s moans grew louder and louder. The wooden bed above Han Shuo¡¯s head became a small boat in the midst ofrge waves as it rocked endlessly. A wailing moan, like someone crying, suddenly emerged from Yuna¡¯s mouth, followed by the sounds of repeated smacking sounds and heavy pants fillings the ears, mixed in with Yuna¡¯s uncontroble wails in between.

    Beneath the bed, Han Shuo could hear the sounds from above and could feel the bed swaying. He knew, without needing to see, that the depraved couple above him had started their battle. His blood boiling, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but imagine the scene going on just above him, and he desperately wanted to climb out and take a good look. His body had long since uncontrobly risen in a certain male fashion.

    An exceedingly light breathing sound came within Han Shuo¡¯s earshot. He started, and immediately detected that this sound came from Phoebe, who was still up in the rafters. He wondered if she was furious or also simrly affected.

    Han Shuo could only hear the sounds from beneath the bed, whereas Phoebe had to continuously keep an eye on the two. She probably had caught a huge eyeful of their motions. Because even the slightest break in concentration wouldn¡¯t be allowed during an assassination operation, Phoebe couldn¡¯t even move her gaze away from the two. ording to Darnell¡¯s words, Phoebe was still a maiden. This type of stimulus was probably more effective to her than to Han Shuo, who was stuck underneath the bed and unable to see anything that was going on.

    After a while, just as Han Shuo noticeably heard Phoebe¡¯s breathing hitch higher and was afraid that she would be unable to further conceal herself, but the movements of the depraved couple above him became more and more intense. Enormous panting and moaning sounds grew louder as the movement of the bed frame grew bigger. Things had obviously reached the climax.

    Just at this moment, a light sound pierced the air. Han Shuo¡¯s entire body tensed when it sounded, immediately knowing that Phoebe had already made her move. He focused all the concentration in his body.

    ¡°Ow!¡± Yuna cried out in pain and abruptly yelled out, ¡°Assassin!¡±

    Before Yuna has even finished saying the word ¡°assassin¡±, the dagger in Han Shuo¡¯s hand was already aimed at a hole, that had been previously bored through the bedframe, and he stabbed it ferociously through the hole.

    A ghastly wail ten times more deste than Yuna¡¯s suddenly sounded out from Darnell¡¯s mouth, like a pig being ughtered. The minds of the two quickly cleared up from the original heights that they had almost scaled. They screamed continuously as they jumped from the bed and made for the room outside, the cries of agony never once ceased to flow from their mouths.

    Han Shuo had already rolled out from beneath the bed after his stab. He raised his head to see that Phoebe¡¯s body was enveloped by the ck nightwalker cloak, and that a ball of milky-white aura was ring out from the longsword in her hand. The ball of aura was lustrous and brilliant in the dimness of the room. It dazzled so brightly that one could barely keep their eyes open, and it closed in on Darnell and Yuna, who were attempting to make their escape.

    Han Shuo lifted the crossbow in his hand and realized that both werepletely naked when he aimed and fired at Darnell. There was already a crossbow bolt stuck on Yuna¡¯s snow-white left thigh, and she gritted her teeth with pain as she moved, her body was obviously not as agile as before. Darnell was even worse off, as the lower half of his body was a mess of blood and flesh. He wore a devastated expression of tragedy, wailing continuously like a wolf.

    Who would¡¯ve thought that this dagger would stab directly into Darnell¡¯s private parts. No wonder his cries were a lot more deste than Yuna¡¯s, Han Shuo thought in happy viciousness.

    The crossbow bolt flew out like lightning and shot towards Darnell¡¯s back. Darnell could actually still detect the danger from behind him when he was in the throes of horror and fright. Dark green light red from the longsword he had long since wielded and demolished Han Shuo¡¯s crossbow bolt with an abrupt spin.

    A wall of water suddenly appeared after a hastily muttered incantation. The dark blue wall of water enveloped their two heads and turned Phoebe¡¯s milky-white fighting aura into a sky full of rain, watering their two bodies.

    But the appearance of this wall of water was timely and won a few seconds of time for the two. The two screamed and ran for the outside of the room, but halfway through the room, the hanging chandelier suddenly crashed down, forcing Darnell to halt his steps again and smash the chandelier to the side.

    Phoebe had already descended from the rafters by this time and Han Shuo had just fired his crossbow. They rushed the two at the same time like cheetahs. Phoebe had nned on finishing off Darnell, but disyed a trace of panic and disgust when she saw his naked body. She shifted her sights and longsword to Yuna.

    The crossbow in Han Shuo¡¯s hand fired again and was then flung to the side. Just when Darnell had demolished the crossbow bolt, Han Shuo¡¯s dagger was already rushing to greet him. Darnell had already sunken into a crazed frenzy and due to the pain and heartache of losing his manhood, he increased his fighting aura to the maximum and shed with Han Shuo¡¯s dagger.

    Pffsht.

    A mouthful of fresh blood splurted out as Darnell¡¯s wild fighting aura rushed into Han Shuo¡¯s body. Although he had the restraints of the magical yuan, it still wasn¡¯t enough to fully defend against it. Han Shuo stumbled a few steps backwards after that sh.

    Upon seeing Han Shuo hastily retreat after shing with this sword, Darnell wanted to crazily pursue Han Shuo, but he suddenly discovered that the longsword in his hand was boiling hot, and that the skin of the right hand, that was grasping the sword was suffering from extreme burning pain. He immediately flung out the longsword in his shock.

    ¡°Hurry and run!¡± Yuna called out at this moment.

    A water serpent had appeared at some time and had surrounded Phoebe, attacking fiercly. Except, part of its body would be severed whenever Phoebe waved her sword, turning into watery mist before it even hit the floor.

    Darnell red viciously at Han Shuo, but didn¡¯t pursue him further. He covered his lower body with his left hand and continued rushing out the door.

    At this moment, Han Shuo¡¯s ears caught the sound of faint footstepsing from afar. Agitated internally, he once again rushed towards the two. Phoebe had also destroyed the water serpent by now and chased the two with speed that was on par with Han Shuo¡¯s.

    Han Shuo and Phoebe both understood that if they didn¡¯t kill these two now, they would no longer have the chance to once they left the room. Therefore, they strived with all their might to keep the two in the room.

    At this moment, a prearranged prop was curiously effective. Han Shuo had made some modifications to the table legs of a round table set in front of the door. In their unparalleled haste, the two didn¡¯t circle around the round table, but actually leap towards it, intending to use it as a lever to quickly leave the room.

    The unexpected happened. Their two bodiesnded on the table, and the table legs all broke with a sharp crack as they were unable to hold the weight of the two bodies that had suddenlynded on it.

    The two of them had already used all their strength to begin with, nning on using the table as a stepping stone to push off of, but the table copse caused their bodies to lose bnce. With the suddenck of a support, their bodies followed the table in a wobbly fall.

    Han Shuo and Phoebe had both arrived at this moment. Phoebe¡¯s sword stabbed out, her aura already enclosing the two.

    The two had just regained their bnce when they saw that they had been fully surrounded by Phoebe¡¯s fighting aura. Darnell suddenly pulled Yuna and, under her terrified and panic stricken eyes, thrust her straight into Phoebe¡¯s attack. He didn¡¯t even turn back to look at Yuna as he gave no second thoughts about anything else, rushing out of the room.

    However, the poison powder that Han Shuo had applied to the dagger finally took effect. Darnell¡¯s footsteps suddenly became as heavy as a thousand tons after he took two steps. Han Shuo swiftly closed the distance before he had time to react and waved the dagger again, taking his life.

    After killing Darnell, Han Shuo¡¯s eyes fell on the space ring on Darnell¡¯s fingers. He reached his hand out for it, but felt that it took a bit of effort to do so.

    Time was of the essence and Han Shuo ended up chopping off Darnell¡¯s middle finger with a sh of the dagger. He put away the finger with the space ring and turned his head to see that a bloody hole had opened in Yuna¡¯s chest. Phoebe seemed to have killed her.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Han Shuo called out softly, rushing to Phoebe¡¯s side. A light fragrance suddenly emanated from Yuna and Phoebe¡¯s direction. Han Shuo took in a breath, but paid it no heed. He only saw that the look in Phoebe¡¯s eyes were a bit strange, and rushed at the girl, who was staring off into space.

    He used the same method to break off the ring finger on Yuna¡¯s left hand, taking her space ring as well. He grabbed the crossbows that had been discarded with a smooth motion, and grabbed Phoebe, and with a mighty leap, using a hole that had opened in the roof previously, and made their escape along the roof.

 Chapter 73: Pervert, what have you done to me?

    Chapter 73: Pervert, what have you done to me?

    Around midnight, Han Shuo and Phoebe had just left when Grover brought a pack of Boozt Merchant Guild guards and barged into the room.

    ¡°Who did it, who did it? I¡¯ve spent so many gold coins to keep you guys in vain. Not a single one of you discovered that an assassin had snuck in. If the target was me, then it likely wouldn¡¯t be those two on the ground.¡± Grover immediately started bawling furiously upon entering the room, yelling at the people behind him.

    ¡°Mister Grover, this assassin was very proficient. He managed to avoid my windwall and assassinated both Darnell and Yuna in such a short amount of time. This proves that the killer¡¯s strength is absolutely beyond our imagination.¡± A mage with long hair and a somewhat ugly expression said to Grover after observing for a while.

    Exhaling lightly, Grover looked at the long-haired mage and said in an apologetic tone, ¡°My apologies Ellis, I was a bit out of line.¡±

    The wind mage Ellis was still expressionless, and looked at the dead Darnell¡¯s left hand with some surprise. He went, ¡°Eh?¡± And walked up to the body, noticing that the left hand was missing a finger. Ellis asked, perplexed, ¡°The left middle finger, on which Darnell wears his space ring, has been chopped off. What¡¯s going on?¡±

    ¡°Not only Darnell, but Yuna as well. Could it be that this killer killed them because he wanted to rob them?¡± Grover was also a bit confused and asked after hearing Ellis¡¯ words.

    ¡°Impossible.¡± Ellis denied decisively and looked around the surroundings, exining. ¡°If the assassins wished to kill them for the sole purpose of robbing them, then he never would¡¯ve picked these two, because the two of them together are the most difficult to fight against. Not to mention there are many valuable items within the Guild. If he only wanted valuables, he wouldn¡¯t have needed to do anything to them. With the abilities demonstrated by the killer, he absolutely could have obtained more from the Guild without making a single sound.¡±

    Grover thought for a bit after his words and nodded. He said with a darkened face, ¡°If he wasn¡¯t in it to murder for gain, then it must have been thanks to my dear niece Phoebe. It seems like she finally couldn¡¯t bear it longer after enduring things for so long.¡±

    ¡°Indeed, Phoebe must be behind this. Darnell and Yuna both tried to assassinate Phoebe once. Although they retreated when they didn¡¯t seed, I feel that Phoebe must know that it was the two of them.

    After all, Darnell¡¯s gaze towards Phoebe was simply too lecherous and unique. Even I, an outsider, could tell. As the one involved, Phoebe must have had an even better understanding of things. The fact that we¡¯re fine, and they¡¯re the only ones who have died is enough to exin things. Except, it seems that the killer is a bit greedy. Otherwise he wouldn¡¯t have remembered to take their space rings in such dangerous circumstances. When did such a character appear beside Phoebe?¡± Ellis furrowed his brow and said slowly while turning things over in his mind.

    Grover started and mused deeply for a while. His face suddenly darkened and he said coldly, ¡°I know who. It must be that ¡°Bryan¡± who killed those three assassins from ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ a while back. I heard the guards say that this person came to do some business with Fabian and thus needed some money. Since his strength is enough to kill three of the senior swordsmen sent by ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯, then he would have the strength to kill Darnell and Yuna.

    Damnit, how did Phoebe get her hands on this kid. I don¡¯t know where Phoebe¡¯s hidden him. He hasn¡¯t appeared by Phoebe¡¯s side since he left the Guildst time. I¡¯ve sent people to surveil where he is, but have still been unable to find traces of him. This will be quite difficult.¡±

    Nodding, Ellis concluded. ¡°Looks like it is him. I think we should get rid of this person first at all costs. Otherwise we may be killed by him in due time.¡±

    ¡°Alright, pass my orders on, not to kill Phoebe for now. Put forth all effort into finding this person. He¡¯s ruined my ns twice, and I¡¯m going to make his existence a living hell.¡± Grover¡¯s face was sinister as he spoke coldly.

    At this moment, Han Shuo, deeply hated by Grover, had already brought Phoebe far away from the Boozt Merchant Guild and was rushing towards Phoebe¡¯s quarters in the northern part of the city.

    Something was odd with Phoebe, as she seemed a bit out of it. Her body was sluggish and hot to the touch. Han Shuo was dragging her in his haste to cover distance. The two of them were dressed in nightwalker clothes and chose to thread through small alleyways in the dark of the night, stayingpletely out of sight.

    But as they neared the northern part of the city, the city guards started appearing more frequently, forcing Han Shuo to continuously hide and evade. Phoebe had still known to make good time when dragged behind Han Shuo, but at this moment, her steps started to drag as her body grew hotter and hotter.

    With no alternatives, Han Shuo flung Phoebe onto his back,pletely disregarding whether or not she agreed. In order to avoid the attention of the city guard, Han Shuo temporarily gave up his idea to send Phoebe back to her quarters and took her to the cemetery behind the Babylon Academy of School and Magic instead.

    It was the quietest ce he knew, and no one patrolled there. Add to that, Han Shuo was exceedingly familiar with the area, and that was why this was the first ce he thought of in a time of crisis like this.

    When Han Shuo had circled past the northern part of the city with Phoebe on his back and made it past some narrow roads into a forest patch, he suddenly felt that Phoebe, on his back, was tearing at her own clothes and her two hands were roving unconsciously over Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    Astonished, Han Shuo¡¯s body suddenly stopped. After rxing, Han Shuo could clearly feel the well rounded mounds in front of Phoebe¡¯s chest pressed against his back, the wondrous sensation of them closely mashed against his well defined back. A ze of fire suddenly ignited from his chest, uncontroble like the sparks of a fire. Add to that Phoebe¡¯s restless hands were still unconsciously moving all over Han Shuo¡¯s chest, and it finally grew so stimting, that Han Shuo could no longer control himself.

    He swung Phoebe down from his back and suddenly held her marvelous body in his hands. He thrust Phoebe¡¯s body onto a tree nearby, and Han Shuo¡¯s two hands moved in tandem, kneading the forbidden areas of Phoebe¡¯s body.

    Even with the nightwalker clothes separating them, Han Shuo could see feel the wondrous curves of Phoebe¡¯s bodies. Her well-rounded chest kept changing shape beneath Han Shuo¡¯s ministrations and when his hand roamed over Phoebe¡¯s slender legs and pert bottom, the amazing, strong stimulus attacked Han Shuo¡¯s senses, making him want to experience it even deeper.

    Phoebe had yanked her own face mask off, and at this moment her eyes were ssy, filled with the tempting lure of desire. Her stunningly beautiful face burned to the touch and brought with it a heart leaping beauty. The faint fragrance emitted by the breaths between her open mouth made Han Shuo¡¯s heart caper like a monkey and mind gallop like a horse. He was about to lose himself in it entirely.

    Han Shuo¡¯s right hand tore off a piece of Phoebe¡¯s nightwalker outfit near the chest. The snow white expanse of her breasts immediately blossomed in front of Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, along with a dot of pinkish red.

    Han Shuo finally couldn¡¯t contain himself and he lost control of the strength in his right hand.

    ¡°Oh... ow.¡±

    At this moment, a small, feeble protest came out from Phoebe¡¯s small mouth. Her beautiful brows quirked vaguely because of the paining from her breasts, finally unconsciously mouthing a weak sign of pain.

    Calmness blindsiding his mind, Han Shuo abruptly came to his senses. When he looked at Phoebe, he also recalled that he too had taken in a breath of that odd scent earlier. He immediately understood that Phoebe had fallen victim to an aphrodisiac, and also reflected that his loss of rational thought was likely because he had taken in a breath of the same toxin.

    His thoughts spinning furiously, Han Shuo measured up his potential gains and losses and resolutely gathered Phoebe in his arms again, furiously dashing out to the front.

    Han Shuo was very familiar with this area and came to a winding creek after not too long. The creek was quite narrow, and he wasn¡¯t sure where it led to either, but he knew that this river was very shallow due to often frequenting in the area.

    As soon as he reached the river, Han Shuo walked directly into the waters, still holding Phoebe. Because it was almost winter, the weather was exceedingly frigid. The river waters were even more icy in the middle of the night, and when Han Shuo carried Phoebe into the water and sshed some water onto her head, Phoebe suddenly sneezed a few times.

    Han Shuo also submerged his head into water and when the ice cold water covered his head, it chilled his previous urges. His body¡¯s reactions alsopletely calmed down.

    ¡°Achoo... achoo...¡±

    After Phoebe sneezed a few times, her mind slowly came back to her senses due to the effects of the cold river water. When she spat the cold water out of her mouth, the blush on her cheeks slowly disappeared and her ssy stare slowly disappeared.

    ¡°Where is this, why I am here? Achoo!¡± Phoebe looked around in confusion and sneezed again. When she lowered her head to sneeze, Phoebe abruptly realized that the two well-rounded peaks of her chest were exposed to the night air. The snow-white expanse of her skin and the dots of red at the peak greatly affected Phoebe.

    Pa! Han Shuo¡¯s face had already suffered from a p.

    Phoebe¡¯s face held anger that was almost madness in its ferocity as she screamed shrilly at Han Shuo, ¡°Pervert, what have you done to me?!¡±

    Han Shuo truly did feel a bit apologetic towards Phoebe at this moment, and he stammered, unable to speak clearly as he gazed upon a girl who was about to lose her mind. Phoebe suddenly broke out in loud sobs when she saw Han Shuo¡¯s reaction, instantly losing her usual cold arrogance and demureness. She gave no thought to anything else and began beating at Han Shuo with her fists and feet. Water sshed every which way in the creek and drenched Han Shuo.

    But because Phoebe had suffered from such a great shock at this moment that she seemed to havepletely forgotten that she was a strong swordmaster. She was more like a bad-tempered shrew, beating Han Shuo in a disorganized fashion without any fighting aura whatsoever.

    If Phoebe had used fighting aura, with her strength as a swordmaster, even with Han Shuo¡¯s small aplishments in magic, would cause him to be gravely injured, if not dead after her string of blows, but these types of attacks felt like scratching an itch when theynded on Han Shuo¡¯s strong body, not hurting in the slightest.

    Han Shuo endured Phoebe¡¯s venting with a wry expression. When the strength behind her fists decreased more and more and she herself became tired, Han Shuoughed wryly, ¡°We were both under the influence of an aphrodisiac, but your body is still clean.¡±

    Phoebe came to her senses after Han Shuo spoke and halted the motions of her hands. She stood in front of Han Shuo with a distance spanning two fists, sizing him up with slightly puffy eyes, as if afraid to endure another shock. Her voice trembled as she asked, ¡°Truly? You really didn¡¯t do that to me?¡±

    Nodding his head firmly, Han Shuo held up his right hand in resignation and solemnly promised her, ¡°I swear that I really didn¡¯t do anything inappropriate to you.¡±

    A trace of relieved joy suddenly appeared on Phoebe¡¯s beautiful, tear-streaked face. She was about to open her mouth and say something when she suddenly saw the nudity of her chest and hastily pulled the nightwalker outfit up, covering her naked breasts. She lifted a head full of anger and red at Han Shuo, roaring lowly through gritted teeth, ¡°Then can you exin to me why the front of my clothes were ripped open?¡±

    Shrugging his shoulders, Han Shuo said with a face full of innocence. ¡°What does that have to do with me? You¡¯re the one who lost your mind and started ripping off your clothes. I controlled myself tightly and brought you here, using cold water to revive your senses. I am an honorable gentleman, don¡¯t misunderstand me.¡±

    ¡°Screw your honorable gentlemanliness, you despicable, shameless, profit-seeking knave! You held my handst time and hugged me without even a word of apology. You purposely took advantage of me in the crack of the artificial mountains in the Guild and didn¡¯t apologize. You¡¯ve gone even further now, I¡¯m going to chase you to the depths of hell for this!¡± Phoebe¡¯s face was full of wrath as she made threatening gestures and rushed at Han Shuo. Phoebe had obviously activated her fighting aura aftering to her senses this time.

    Han Shuo was startled and knew that Phoebe had most likely remembered her clothes being torn in front of her was from his hands. He hastily turned and scrambled up the river bank, protesting his innocence along the way. ¡°Miss Phoebe, listen to me. I also took in a breath of the aphrodisiac, causing my emotions to get out of control, but when I came to myself I immediately took you to this river. The heavens and earth are my witness, I really didn¡¯t take advantage of you.

    When you were still under the influence, you also touched me all over and took advantage of me. Apart from you, no other girl has ever touched me before. I¡¯m still a virgin. I¡¯ll have scars deep in my heart after being vited by you. I¡¯ve also suffered losses, let¡¯s say that we¡¯re even for this matter. Don¡¯t pursue it any further...¡±

    As Han Shuo ran away bedraggedly, words shot out of his mouth like bullets. It was as if he¡¯d returned to the time when Chu Cang Lan had brought him to the moon and he¡¯d let the old man have it with his words when Han Shuo lost hisposure. Except, it was insultsst time, and exnations this time.

    ¡°Shut up, you petty viin who should die a thousand, ten thousand times. Stop saying nonsense.¡± Phoebe¡¯s clothes were drenched through at this time and her wet hair exuded another type of allure, but her motions with her sword in her hands were quite violent.

    ¡°Forget it, count me unlucky. I¡¯ll be leaving now and wille find you for the ck gold ore after you¡¯ve calmed down. Farewell.¡± Han Shuo knew that there was no use in talking to Phoebe at this time. A woman who¡¯d lost her senses was the scariest magical creature in the world, not to mention one who was a swordswoman. The danger of this to Han Shuo was on par with that of a super magical creature, like a dragon.

    Sighing inside about how unlucky he was, Han Shuo didn¡¯t dare slow down his footsteps as he quickly rushed out, making for the direction of the cemetery and slowly leaving Phoebe, who was unfamiliar with the terrain, far behind.

 Chapter 74: The little skeleton that wants to soar and fly

    Chapter 74: The little skeleton that wants to soar and fly

    The first glimmers of dawn appeared in the sky after using the transportation matrix to return to the cemetery of death.

    One full day and night had psed since his departure, and he hastened to move to the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± and infuse more fresh blood and magical yuan, finally breathing a sigh of relief after he did so.

    The operation of the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± must not be halted for even a day. If fresh blood and magical yuan weren¡¯t infused everyday, then the work of the previous twenty some odd days would be in vain.

    nting his butt firmly on the ground, the fighting aura that had rushed into his body from Darnell¡¯s blow finally slowly started rampaging through his body. A sudden impact brought an upwelling of blood to Han Shuo¡¯s throat ¨C he almost spat out a mouthful of fresh blood again.

    Happy instead of startled, he abruptly stood up and threw his head back inughter. He quickly strode out of the cemetery of death, towards the waterfall that he used to train his magic. Han Shuo braved the long river rushing down and sat down in his usual ce. His body wobbling strongly in the beginning, Han Shuo quickly sank again into his training mode.

    For the next seven days, apart from infusing the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± with fresh blood and magical yuan at periodic intervals, Han Shuo stayed beneath the waterfall to train his magic.

    Han Shuo¡¯s strength improved in spades in the midst of harsh training. Leveraging the fighting aura that Darnell had left within his body and the violent force of the waterfall, Han Shuo reforged the meridians and bones of his chest, waist, and stomach. When Han Shuo felt that Darnell¡¯s fighting aura no longer remained within him, he could clearly feel that his own body had emerged in an unprecedentedly better state.

    In the next few days, Han Shuo halted all magical training and spent his time looking after the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± and studying the ¡°Beginner Magics of Necromancy¡±. He was now fully able to recite thetter from memory, and had basicallymitted it to memory.

    Han Shuo had noted the parts in which he didn¡¯t understand. As he continued to use the round, green ball to meditate, his mental strength grew with each passing day. Under his continual experimentation, he finally released the ¡°Agony of the Soul¡± magic one day. Han Shuo was overjoyed and ted at that time. He understood that over the umtion of several months and his greatly increased mental strength, he had finally graduated from the ranks of magic apprentice to being a novice mage.

    A novice mage in necromancy could grasp the three magics of ¡°Agony of the Soul¡±, summon zombies, and bone spears. Except after trying for quite a while, Han Shuo had only happened to cast ¡°Agony of the Soul¡± by mistake. He was unable to release the other two magics of summoning zombies and bone spears no matter how he tried.

    He connected that fact to the other of not being able to understand many parts of the ¡°Beginner Magics of Necromancy¡±. Han Shuo understood that only perusing books was not the fastest nor best way to increase his knowledge of magic. It looked like he should look for Fanny and inquire about the areas he didn¡¯t understand, as well as pick up the weapon forging materials that Phoebe had promised him, along with the ck gold ore.

    But before he¡¯d return, Han Shuo still nned to finishing refining the ¡°original demon¡±. The Original Demon Cave had been operating for a full 34 days and would beplete in two more days. Han Shuo was in no rush to leave immediately, and thus went to the dwarves¡¯ vige to socialize with them.

    He came back to the mining cave again and mined for the entire day, obtaining a small piece of ck iron ore and a couple pieces of iron and copper ore.

    Han Shuo understood from Phoebe that ck iron ore was a very rare and very valuable ore. He could often only obtain a very small piece after mining for an entire day. Therefore, he directly stored the ck iron ore within his space ring. When he returned to the cemetery of death afterwards, he threw all the iron and bronze ores into a space storage room within the great hall.

    ¡°Haha, this is interesting indeed. With these three ¡°original demons¡±, I have three extra pairs of eyes. If I let them loose, I will no longer be afraid of being followed and ambushed. If I use the three ¡°original demons¡± to assassinate others, it¡¯ll be an absolute nightmare for my enemies!¡± Han Shuoughed wildly as he repeatedly used his will to release and withdraw the ¡°original demons¡± from and into his body, practicing tirelessly.

    At this moment, the little skeleton, that had been lying in the ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± all along, suddenly stood up, slowly climbing out of the pit. The seven bone spurs on its back actually started pping furiously as its body shot towards the sky with a strong push from its legs.

    The seven bone spurs on its back were divided into two rows, like the wings of an insect, with the remaining one pointing down at its butt like a tail. As it shot towards the air, it capered shakily, with the two rows of bone spurs whirring furiously and its tail wagging continuously. It seemed to be the steering wheel of a bike in helping him move agilely through thin air.

    When the tail-like bone spur moved to the left, the little skeleton¡¯s body would also shift to the left. When the bone spur waved to the right, the little skeleton¡¯s body would fall to the right. It looked quite amazing!

    Han Shuo was gobsmacked as he looked at the little skeleton descend in a wobbling fall, his face full of shock. He didn¡¯t know how to react in the span of that moment.

    After a while, the little skeleton fell from midair with a crack as the bones of its body emitted a long string of creaking sounds. The little skeleton seemed to be dazed from the fall as it staggered around in circles after picking itself and the bone dagger up, as if it was drunk.

    ¡°Damn brat, you¡¯ve only learned how to walk for a few days and now you want to fly?!¡± Han Shuo felt a deep pain in his heart as he looked at the little skeleton¡¯s current state. He hastily walked up to the little skeleton and knocked on the little skeleton¡¯s bright, smooth forehead.

    An interesting thing happened! When Han Shuo knocked down with his finger, the little skeleton immediately stopped its drunken staggering and sat down hard like a child. It even extended a finger to scratch its head, seemingly unable toprehend what it did wrong.

    Han Shuo had protected the little skeleton with great care ever since first being summoned by Han Shuo. Under the continual refinement of his magical yuan, it started to disy human-like behaviors. Han Shuo¡¯s feelings towards the little skeleton was far more than those he felt for anyone else in this world. He was worried to death when he saw it fall from high up in the air.

    Han Shuo breathed a sigh of relief when he verified, with his own eyes, that the little skeleton hadn¡¯t shattered, and that it had only been rattled by the fall with nothing else worse for the wear.

    After looking over it carefully, he suddenly realized that a few specks of dark red could be found within the inky ckness of the little skeleton¡¯s originally dark bones. It was no longer that pure, deep ck. If it wasn¡¯t for his careful gaze, he likely would have been hard pressed to discover it.

    ¡°Eh, this is strange. The ¡®Original Demon Cave¡¯ was original meant to refine a small demon chief. He purposefully squirmed his way in and even had an expression of leisurely enjoyment. His body had undergone some changes as soon as he left the pit, and even wanted to imitate those demon generals in my body and fly. Looks like this brat has changed again. I wonder if these changes are for the better or for the worse. Even I don¡¯t know what this brat is now.¡± Han Shuo carefully stared at the little skeleton in close observation and muttered to himself.

    After a round of deep musings, in which Han Shuo realized that he couldn¡¯t understand the little skeleton¡¯s changes, he shook his head and thought no further. Looking at the now normal ¡°Original Demon Cave¡± since the ¡°original demon¡± general had emerged from it, Han Shuo started an incantation and sent the little skeleton back to the other dimension.

    With his injuries recovered and the three ¡°original demons¡± refined, and even the little skeleton recovering its mobility, Han Shuo traveled back to Ossen City through the transportation matrix when he thought of the iprehensible magical knowledge and the ck gold ore that Phoebe owed him for his services.

 Chapter 75: Close the doors, you get in bed first

    Chapter 75: Close the doors, you get in bed first

    Ossen City, the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force.

    Han Shuo ate breakfast and first bought a set of new clothes, arriving at the academyter in the morning. He went to the library first and surreptitiously put back the two books of ¡°The Foundations of Necromancy¡± and ¡°A Magical Dictionary¡± that he had asked Jack to steal before. He then walked to Fanny¡¯sb.

    The doors to theb were open and Fanny was wearing ck robes trimmed with gold, wearing a set of ck framed sses and holding a magic staff in her left hand. She held a pen in her right and was drawing some magical patterns on the pedestal in the center, exining something with her speech.

    Next to her, Fitch had put on the appearance of conscientious listening, but his eyes often travelled over Fanny¡¯s face. Fanny had lost a few traces of her charming beauty with sses on, but gained solemness and the beauty of intellectuality. In Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, her beauty wasn¡¯t diminished at all, and he rather stared soulfully at her, mesmerized.

    Fanny delivered a string of words then lifted her head to look at Fitch, who was busy staring off into space. She frowned, ¡°Fitch, do you understand?¡±

    Fitch suddenly woke up from his musings and nodded, smiling, ¡°Master Fanny, you were very clear, I understand.¡±

    When Fanny lifted her head to look at Fitch, she happened to see Han Shuo standing in front of the door. Han Shuo was now a bit taller than Fitch, and his body was muscr and well defined due to continuous training and fighting. He stood there with his spine straight, like a javelin, without the slightest bit of the usual, frail external appearance that mages usually possessed.

    Fanny first blinked, a bit astonished by Han Shuo¡¯s unnoticed changes, but when Fanny also saw Han Shuo staring at her, mesmerized, her heart gave a leap and her face blushed red as well. Her right hand tightened on the pen and almost snapped the pen in two.

    What¡¯s wrong with me? Fanny said to herself and involuntarily took a deep breath, seeming to pout as she red at Han Shuo. She lifted her head to call out, ¡°Long time no see Bryan. You¡¯ve disappeared for a month afterst time¡¯s training. Where have you been skulking around for so long that you only remembered to return now?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s mentality immediately returned to normal after hearing Fanny¡¯s words. Heughed lightly, not waiting for her to greet him and strode purposefully into the room. He responded, ¡°Last time¡¯s outing in the Dark Forest made me realize the many deficiencies in my abilities. That¡¯s why I borrowed a magic book and did some remedial studying on the foundational knowledge of magic. I¡¯vee to Master Fanny with some questions because I¡¯ve encountered many difficulties.¡±

    ¡°Huh. Who would believe you?! You¡¯re always so mysterious.¡± Fanny rolled her eyes at Han Shuo, obviously not believing his words. She turned her head to look at Fitch, suddenly feeling that his presence was irritating, for some inexplicable reason. She instructed, ¡°Fitch, I have a few more matters to discuss privately with Bryan. Since you understood my exnation, you can go back and practice well.¡±

    Fitch started. He hadn¡¯t seem to think that Fanny would want him to leave because of Han Shuo¡¯s appearance. He nked for a while, then finally viciously red at Han Shuo, saying lowly, ¡°Errand ves will always be errand ves. It¡¯s not like you¡¯ve be a real student just because you put on the uniform.¡±

    Fitch finally left after saying this. A smile was constantly apparent on Han Shuo¡¯s face,pletely oblivious to Fitch¡¯s low mutterings. Han Shuo knew this was because of Fanny¡¯s attitude towards Fitch that caused Fitch to carry a grudge, but until Fitch took action to express his hatred, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t be bothered to spend an ounce of strength on him.

    ¡°Go and close the door tightly!¡± Fanny put down the pen and raked Han Shuo with her gaze, instructing in an imposing manner as soon as Fitch had left.

    Close the doors? Han Shuo¡¯s heart jumped, gazing upon Fanny with a deep and meaningful look. He disyed a trace of an odd smile, hastily got up, and hastened to say, ¡°Alright alright, I¡¯ll go close the doors.¡±

    When Han Shuo had jubntly and gleefully closed the doors to theb, Fanny raked Han Shuo with another gaze and continued instructing, ¡°Get on the bed first!¡±

    Nodding his head like a chicken pecking corn, Han Shuo didn¡¯t even bother saying much this time and directly shucked off his shoes, falling directly backwards on the white bed. He proudly crossed his legs and smiled, ¡°Master Fanny, youe over as well!¡±

    Fanny watched Han Shuo with an amused expression as her mouth closed with an audible click. ¡°Come, close your eyes first.¡±

    He had never been so docile as Han Shuo obediently closed his eyes, thinking dirty thoughts. A depraved smile blossomed on his face.

    ¡°Ah!¡±

    A painful howl emitted from Han Shuo¡¯s mouth. He suddenly felt that arge surge of mental strength had invaded his mind,pletely startlingly Han Shuo from his beautiful dreams.

    When Han Shuo saw that Fanny was gazing at him with a small smile, he asked with a hint of anger in his voice, ¡°Master Fanny, what are you doing?¡±

    ¡°Examining your body! Didn¡¯t I sayst time that you¡¯re the subject of my experiments, and that I would use the school facilities to conduct a thorough examination on you when we returned to the school, like I¡¯ve just done? What did you think I wanted to do with you after closing the doors and make you lie on the bed?¡± Fanny spoke with a face full of seriousness and red at Han Shuo, but even with sses on, they couldn¡¯t hide the proud smile in her eyes, one that was proud of sessfully executing her scheme.

    The Han Shuo of now was not the Han Shuo of before, he immediately discerned the joy in Fanny¡¯s eye with one nce. He sat up with a wry smile and said, ¡°Forget it, don¡¯t examine me in the future. These things can¡¯t be exined by rational logic. If you truly turn me into an idiot by intruding my mind that way, my life will be over.¡±

    Fanny vaguely creased her brow in thought upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words and sighed involuntarily after a bit of contemtion. She smiled, ¡°Forget it then. I¡¯m willing to lose an experimental subject, but not a talented student.¡±

    Seeing that Fanny was letting him off the hook so easily, Han Shuo heaved a huge sigh of relief and immediately thanked Fanny sincerely. He then took out the book of ¡°Beginner Magics of Necromancy¡± and started asking Fanny all the parts he didn¡¯t understand.

    Upon seeing Han Shuo withdraw the ¡°Beginner Magics of Necromancy¡± from his space ring, and then seeing that many parts of the book had been highlighted and noted by Han Shuo, Fanny immediately looked askance at Han Shuo. She eximed lightly, ¡°You¡¯re already reading this book? Have you grasped all the magics that magic apprentices should know? Um... and you¡¯ve taken a lot of notes. Looks like you really didn¡¯t ck off during this month... I¡¯ve thought wrongly of you.¡±

    ¡°Of course I¡¯ve already grasped the magics that magic apprentices should know!¡± Han Shuo smiled.

    He thought for a moment and released the ¡°Agony of the Soul¡¯ magic in front of Fanny. Fanny immediately said, ¡°Oh my goodness! Bryan, you¡¯re too amazing. You actually have enough mental strength to release the ¡®Agony of the Soul¡¯ magic. This means that your mental strength has truly reached the level of a novice mage. You¡¯re a genius, a true genius!¡±

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t sure if he was a genius or not, but he knew that his mental strength could only improve so rapidly due to that odd, green, round ball. He still hadn¡¯t figured out what this green, round ball was, but he was absolutely sure that it had something to do with the cemetery of death.

    After a string of surprised exmations from Fanny, Han Shuo started seriously asking Fanny all his questions about magical knowledge that he didn¡¯t know. As an adept mage, Fanny¡¯s constant homework had always been to teach students how to understand magic and was very familiar with this foundational knowledge. She went out of her way to resolve all of Han Shuo¡¯s difficult questions.

    During the process, the two were quite close to each other and Han Shou could smell the fragrance wafting off of Fanny¡¯s body. Their gazes would interlock during exnations and have a sense of mutual admiration due to shared enlightenment. Fanny didn¡¯t feel distaste at Han Shuo being so close to her, and would actually p his shoulder as sheplimented him whenever he clearly understood one of her exnations.

    Time passed unknowingly in Fanny¡¯sb. The two of them had conversed for several hours, yet Fanny wasn¡¯t the slightest bit impatient. She seemed rather delighted and would never be bored because she had met a good student.

    It wasn¡¯t until when the bells started ringing that Fanny came to herself with a shock. When she recovered her senses, she said lightly, ¡°Oh no, I almost forgot that I still needed to preside over ss at the training fieldster this afternoon. Bryan, yourprehension abilities are very high. Looks like you¡¯ve chosen the right path in learning necromancy magic, but let¡¯s stop here for today, I¡¯m going to the training fields to teach my ss, do you want toe with me?¡±

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo smiled, ¡°I¡¯d rather not. I¡¯ve already thoroughly grasped some of the lower level magics. I¡¯ve understood from you today many of the things that I didn¡¯t previously understand, and need some time to carefully think about them. I won¡¯t be going to the training fields.¡±

    Nodding, Fanny didn¡¯t press further and hastily cleaned up theb. She picked up a book, adjusted her cor, and said, ¡°That works too. You cane find meet with me in private in the next couple of days and I¡¯ll help you go over the areas that you don¡¯t understand. Oh. right. Lisa seems to have been very worried that you were gone for so long. She asked me where you went?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, I haven¡¯t been up to much. Please tell her not to worry. I¡¯ll be going now, and wille disturb you quite often in the next few days. Thank you in advance, Master Fanny.¡± Han Shuo said carelessly and left before Fanny left herb. He thought for a bit, avoided the crowded areas, and started walking outside the Academy.

    After leaving the Academy, Han Shuo circled past two roads very carefully, finally making his way towards Phoebe¡¯s residence.

    Han Shuo vaguely felt that he was in a bad ce after the assassination at the Boozt Merchant Guild. Not only had he offended Grover, but it was likely that even Phoebe held a grudge against him, but for the ck gold ore, Han Shuo had to grit his teeth ande find Phoebe again. He only hoped that the past ten or so days had been enough to calm her temper.

    The same old butler answered the door again, with Fabianing by shortly after Han Shuo had walked in because he¡¯d heard the news. He still wore a faint smile when he saw Han Shuo, saying, ¡°Bryan, howe you have time to swing by today?¡±

    Smiling wryly, Han Shuo shook his head and sighed, ¡°Don¡¯t mention it. I helped your young miss assassinate Darnell and Yuna in the Boozt Merchant Guildst time, but somehow offended your Miss Phoebe. Not only did I receive nopensation, but she actually beat me up. Terribly unlucky!¡±

    ¡°Oh? Although Miss Phoebees from a wealthy family, she isn¡¯t the type to throw a tantrum without cause. What happened between you and Miss Phoebe? After she came back in the dead of the night that day, she spent the next couple of days being angry. I happened to overhear her curse you as despicable, shameless, and disgusting. I truly don¡¯t understand what could have happened for her to be in such a terrible mood!¡± Fabian looked at Han Shuo with confusion, saying slowly as he seemed deep in thought.

    His face wry, Han Shuo sighed lowly once again. ¡°Forget it, let¡¯s not mention those things again. I have to find her again for my materials. Is Miss Phoebe home right now?¡±

    ¡°Apologies, the miss is out and temporarily not avable, but I think she¡¯ll return shortly, so if you¡¯re not in a hurry, you can wait here a bit.¡±

    ¡°Alright, then I¡¯ll wait for her for a bit.¡±

    Indeed, Han Shuo¡¯s ear caught the sound of someone knocking at the door from far away after waiting for a short while. As his heart started to agitate with unease, he privately weighed up what he should say to Phoebe when he saw herter.

    Just as Han Shuo¡¯s brow was deeply furrowed in thought, a man¡¯s voice sounded lightly. ¡°Eh, you¡¯re Bryan, what are you doing here?¡±

    Han Shuo started and immediately lifted his head, realizing that the warrior Lawrence, who had spent five gold coins to hire him as a human targetst time in the warrior¡¯s academy, was standing at the door with Phoebe.

    ¡°Senior brother Lawrence, you know him?¡± Outside the door, Phoebe looked at Lawrence, astonished, as she asked in surprise.

    ¡°Of course, he¡¯s Bryan, the errand boy from our Academy!¡± Lawrence answered matter-of-factly.

    ¡°Errand boy?¡± Phoebe and Fabian both eximed at the same time. Phoebe measured up Han Shuo with an odd look as she asked Lawrence, ¡°Senior brother, your Babylon Academy of Magic and Force is the most renowned school throughout the Empire. Why would such a despicable, shameless, and disgusting person be present?¡±

    Lawrence started upon hearing these words and shrugged his shoulders at Han Shuo, smiling at Phoebe, ¡°Little junior sister, how did Bryan offend you? I rather admire his tenacious and unyielding personality.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s face was wry as he sat there without a word, drinking tea with a lowered head, one sip after another. He privately reflected that he was in quite the pickle. He hadn¡¯t thought that Lawrence would be Phoebe¡¯s senior brother. Now that his identity had been revealed, if Phoebe wanted to pursue previous events, it would be troublesome for even him to avoid this.

 Chapter 76: Heâ€™s my boyfriend

    Chapter 76: He¡¯s my boyfriend

    ¡°Senior brother Lawrence,e with me, I¡¯ll give you the items you need!¡± Phoebe said to Lawrence, seemingly a bit bored after Han Shuo made no response to the round of sarcasm directed towards him. Han Shuo only drank mouthful after mouthful of water with a wry face.

    Before she left, Phoebe¡¯s clear eyes red viciously at Han Shuo as her body halted, ¡°If you¡¯re not in a hurry, wait for a while.¡±

    Han Shuo lifted his head to look at Phoebe, clearly perceiving her repressed anger. Remember that the materials for his Demonyer Edge were still in her hands, he immediately nodded out of resignation.

    Phoebe led Lawrence off to the side. Fabian looked at Han Shuo with an extremely odd look after they left, asking with surprise, ¡°Bryan, to think that you¡¯re only an errand boy at the Babylon Academy of School of Magic. My gosh, but you¡¯re so strong, what¡¯s going on?¡±

    ¡°Nothing much. Oh right, this Lawrence is part of the warrior academy at our Academy, a very ordinary sergeant knight, but Miss Phoebe has the strength of a swordmaster. How could the two of them have the same master?¡± Han Shuo was quite perplexed as he asked Fabian.

    Although knights and swordsmen could train the same fighting aura, Lawrence was merely a sergeant knight, whereas Phoebe had the strength of a swordmaster while training underneath the same master. The gap between the two was simply too great, particrly when Han Shuo had clearly heard from their mouths that Lawrence was the senior disciple brother and Phoebe was just the junior sister. This made Han Shuo feel that it was even odder.

    ¡°I¡¯m not too clear about the young miss¡¯ situation either. I was just an insignificant character in the Boozt Merchant Guild before. I¡¯d only heard that the young miss was studying abroad before the Guildmaster passed away, and would only return once or twice each year. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that the Guildmaster suddenly passed away, Miss Phoebe likely wouldn¡¯t have suddenly stayed.

    Lawrence only appeared recently. Their rtionship is indeed quite close, but I have no way of answering your questions either.¡± Fabian looked apologetically at Han Shuo as he exined.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t ask further after this exnation, but merely nodded and frowned in contemtion.

    After a while, Phoebe and Lawrence once again stood at the door. Phoebe looked at Fabian and instructed, ¡°Fabian, show senior brother Lawrence out the door for me. I have a few words to speak to Mr. Bryan in private!¡±

    ¡°Yes, miss!¡± Fabian stood up, knowing how to behave in a delicate situation and walked outside.

    ¡°Bryan, I¡¯m very happy to see you here. If you¡¯d like to earn a few more gold coins in the future, you cane find me at any time. However, I think you won¡¯t be needing that anymore. Alright, see youter Bryan, I think we¡¯ll have plenty of opportunities to meet in the future.¡± Lawrence looked meaningfully at Han Shuo,ughed lightly and followed Fabian out.

    When the two had left, Phoebe walked in with a cold face and flicked a nce at Han Shuo after sitting down, snorting lightly, ¡°How dare youe back here again!¡±

    ¡°And why wouldn¡¯t I dare?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s eyebrow flicked, not taking anything lying down as he stared back into Phoebe¡¯s eyes. ¡°I haven¡¯t done anything against my conscience, not to mention you still owe me fromst time. As long as you give me the materials you promised and the ck gold ore, I¡¯ll leave immediately and won¡¯te do business with you ever again!¡±

    Phoebe mmed her hand down on the table and red at Han Shuo furiously, ¡°You, how dare you demand things from me! Damnit, you vited me and I¡¯ve been nice enough not to kill you!¡±

    ¡°Bullshit, both you and I were influenced by the aphrodisiac then. I was the one who dragged you out of the Guild, otherwise you¡¯d be long dead by now. Not to mention I didn¡¯t really do anything to you, otherwise I wouldn¡¯t have brought you to the river.¡± Han Shuo was truly angry now. He had toiled all night long and not only had he gained nothing, but he¡¯d suffered a beating at her hands. This Phoebe wouldn¡¯t let go of this matter, was she truly trying to avoid paying up?

    Phoebe drew out her longsword with a ng and red wrathfully at Han Shuo. Han Shuo also abruptly mmed the table and immediately stood up, ring ferociously at Phoebe, seeming to want to break into a fight as soon as the two disagreed.

    The two of them red at each other and maintained this position for nearly a minute. Phoebe curled her lip and stuck her longsword back into the sheath with another ng. She turned her head, no longer looking at Han Shuo and said coldly. ¡°Just what do you want?¡±

    ¡°Very simple. I¡¯ll purchase the other materials ording to the estimate you gave me and give me the ck gold ore that you owe me. Our debts will be resolved this way and we won¡¯t have anything to do with each other in the future. I won¡¯t conduct any more stupid transactions with you anymore.¡± Han Shuo sat down with a darkened face and drained the water from the ss in front of him with one gulp, saying decisively.

    ¡°You dratted, profit-seeking jerk. Here, take it all and get out of here!¡± Phoebe felt an involuntary surge of rage upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words as uncontroble anger showed in her expression. She withdrew arge bundle of of items rather irritably from her space ring and mmed it down on the table, throwing it in front of Han Shuo, leveling a harsh re at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Eh, you prepared it all, why didn¡¯t you say so? We were harming our amiability for nothing.¡± Han Shuo had nned on taking the items and leaving, but saw that the bundle of items were packaged orderly. There was a piece of odd-looking ore, contained in a clear sk, with the words ¡°ck gold¡± written on it. It looked like Phoebe had been long since prepared for his arrival and hadn¡¯t nned on going back on her word.

    But what Han Shuo couldn¡¯t wrap his mind around was that since Phoebe hadn¡¯t nned on going back on her word, why did shee in with such an explosive temper and say that she hadn¡¯t nned on giving him anything. This was rather baffling, and Han Shuo couldn¡¯t make any sense of it.

    ¡°Give me your crystal card, I¡¯ll transfer the appropriate amount of gold coins into your card. Heh heh, I actually didn¡¯t have any other meaning and just wanted to take back what was owed to me.¡± Han Shuo smiled rather awkwardly, but still put this bundle of items into his space ring, then talked to Phoebe, somewhat abashed.

    Still not properly looking at Han Shuo, Phoebe had a face of cold arrogance and said stiffly, ¡°No need. I¡¯m not as miserly as you. It¡¯s only thirty five hundred gold... treat it as a gift. Don¡¯t let me see you in the future, just get out!¡±

    Seeing that she was so sarcastic and jeering, Han Shuo¡¯s face froze and he nodded, pping down the piece of ck iron ore that he had mined the day before. He too said coldly, ¡°I don¡¯t like owing favors to strangers. Treat this ore aspensation of me purchasing your other ores. Good bye Miss Phoebe, I won¡¯t be doing business with you in the future.¡±

    Just as Han Shuo was about to resolutely leave the room, Phoebe suddenly lost herposure and stood up, looking at Han Shuo with a lost expression. Her wise eyes were full of weakness and weariness. She spoke with a deste voice, ¡°You¡¯re going to treat me as a stranger from now on?¡±

    Shrugging, Han Shuo said naturally and unconstrained, ¡°Since you don¡¯t care to treat me as a friend, I, of course, will not shamelessly impose on you.¡±

    Han Shuo smiled naturally after these words and began to walk outside, but Phoebe suddenly called out lightly before he walked out the door, ¡°Wait!¡±

    Turning his head to look at Phoebe, Han Shuo asked calmly, ¡°Miss Phoebe, what other matters are there?¡±

    Phoebe¡¯s expression was a bit odd. She lowered her head and thought silently for a bit, but when she lifted her head, a good half of the weakness and weariness had actually vanished. Her direct stare at Han Shuo made him feel very odd. She even quirked her lips at the end and revealed a trace of a smile, asking, ¡°Bryan, you mean that you already viewed me as a friend?¡±

    Astounded, Han Shuo nodded and replied matter-of-factly, ¡°Of course, we¡¯ve gone through two life or death experiences in the Boozt Merchant Guild, not to mention you¡¯ve helped me on several asions. I already consider you a friend, but you¡¯re not willing!¡±

    ¡°Who says I¡¯m not willing, huh? Apart from mary transactions, are you so heartless to all your friends?¡± Phoebe¡¯s expressions had returned to normal by now and had a few more traces of human interestpared to her normal, remote aloofness, and she used the same attitude she had used towards Lawrence just now when talking to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Of course not.¡± Han Shuo responded.

    Han Shuo could clearly feel that Phoebe¡¯s words had been permeated with sincerity and worry. He felt a bit touched inside, and his facial expressions became more tender. After thinking carefully, Han Shuo felt that Phoebe¡¯s words should be fine. He frowned and said to Phoebe, ¡°Then, what do you think I should do?¡±

    ¡°Eliminate Grover with me, otherwise we will never have days of peace!¡± Phoebe¡¯s charming face grew cold as she bit off her words.

    Musing for a bit, Han Shuo suddenly felt that perhaps a life ensconced in danger was more suitable for him to break through. His life had been too simple and monotone before, perhaps additional stimulus would make it more interesting. Add to that what Phoebe had said, if the threat of Grover wasn¡¯t eliminated, he may truly be faced with endless troubles.

    After musing for a bit, Han Shuo said resolutely, ¡°Alright, I promise you!¡±

    ¡°Then, apany me to the personal banquet held by the Guild tonight. Several of the founding elders will be present at this banquet.¡± Phoebe¡¯s charming face was ddened upon seeing Han Shuo agree, and she immediately opened her mouth in inquiry.

    ¡°Eh, a banquet held by your Guild? What am I going to do there?¡± Han Shuo started and asked.

    ¡°Gain the goodwill of the other founding elders and take precautions against the schemes of that old thing. Bryan, I need your help, you just said that we¡¯re friends right?¡± Phoebe looked straight at Han Shuo and asked.

    He suddenly had the feeling of the feeling that he¡¯d boarded a pirate ship and was about to be taken advantage of, Han Shuo felt a bit odd. But he had indeed admitted that the two were friends earlier ording to Phoebe¡¯s intentions. He was unable to back down now, and could only grit his teeth and agree.

    Eximing softly, Phoebe said happily, ¡°Wonderful, wait a moment and I¡¯ll have someone tailor a tuxedo that fits you. I also need to teach you some basic noble courtesies. I¡¯ve already learned from Lawrence that you¡¯re from the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. Eh... I think you¡¯re probably not too well versed in such things.¡±

    Throwing an ill-tempered look at her, Han Shuo said, ¡°I was an errand boy, but that was in the past. There¡¯s nothing untowards about it and nothing that can¡¯t be talked about!¡±

    ¡°Sorry Bryan, I really didn¡¯t mean anything by it, truly!¡± Phoebe was a bit agitated and hastened to apologize with genuinity.

    ¡°No worries, tell me, I¡¯ll listen carefully!¡± Han Shuo waved his hand with indifference and indicated for Phoebe to begin.

    ¡°This, this is ck iron ore!¡± It was as if she¡¯d just discovered it as Phoebe looked at the ck iron ore that Han Shuo had set on the table. She looked at Han Shuo with astonishment. ¡°You actually have ck iron ore, it looks like you truly want to forge the best weapon!¡±

    ¡°Absolutely!¡± Han Shuo responded firmly.

    Phoebe gave Han Shuo an overview of the basic courtesies of nobility. Han Shuo understood that in order to climb to a higher level in this world, he must indeed have a grasp of such mannerisms. Therefore, he docilely listened to Phoebe¡¯s descriptions and even tried to make a few of the basic gestures of courtesies ording to Phoebe¡¯s demands.

    When night fell, Han Shuo had already changed into the tuxedo that Phoebe had specially prepared for him and actually cleaned up nicely. He followed behind Phoebe and rode in a carriage to arrive at the Boozt Merchant Guild for the third time.

    Many luxurious and opulent carriages were parked in front of the doors and the guards had been changed out. They were two unfamiliar faces to Han Shuo. When Phoebe and Han Shuo both alighted from the carriage, they walked in with the ease of experience without having to greet the guards. Phoebe led the way past two hallways and appeared at the entrance of the banquet hall.

    ¡°Niece Phoebe, this is a private banquet of our Guild, it doesn¡¯t seem too appropriate that you¡¯ve brought him?¡± Grover¡¯s hand held a wine ss filled with fine wine at the front of the door and happened to be conversing delightfully with a couple obviously well off guild elders. When he saw Phoebe and Han Shuo walk in, he first looked balefully at Han Shuo and then addressed Phoebe.

    ¡°Uncle Grover, Mr. Bryan isn¡¯t an outsider!¡± Phoebe thinned her lips andughed lightly, ncing at Han Shuo with some shyness as she exined.

    ¡°Oh? Then dear niece, can you tell me why he isn¡¯t an outsider?¡± Grover¡¯s eyes squinted as he sized up Han Shuo with venomous, snake-like eyes, speaking sinisterly as he did so.

    ¡°He¡¯s my boyfriend!¡± Phoebe threw her head back, looking at Grover directly in the eyes without fear as she said proudly.

 Chapter 77: The position of Guildmaster

    Wee reader! You¡¯ve found the real chapter for GDK. Happy April Fool¡¯s!

    Chapter 77: The position of Guildmaster

    ¡°Boy, boyfriend?¡± Grover was startled and had an exceedingly odd expression as he looked at Phoebe. His gaze at Han Shuo afterwards was even more odd, and confirmed again as if he didn¡¯t believe what he had just heard. ¡°Is he really your boyfriend?¡±

    ¡°Of course.¡± Phoebe nodded affirmatively, and stretched out her arm with a red face and held Han Shuo¡¯s left hand, like she wanted to prove the rtionship between the two.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mouth was open as if someone had shoved an egg into his mouth, an expression of dumbfoundedness appearing on his face. He didn¡¯t react until he felt Phoebe secretly apply pressure to his arm with her small hand,ughing dryly and nodded without exining anything.

    One of the Guild elders talking jovially with Grover said doubtfully to Grover in a low voice, ¡°What¡¯s this kid¡¯s background?¡±

    Grover didn¡¯t say much, only throwing a look at this person and turned his body to the side. He smiled, ¡°Since he¡¯s your boyfriend Phoebe, then there¡¯s no problem. Hurry ande on in.¡±

    Dragging Han Shuo, Phoebe¡¯s facial expression was as usual as she walked into the hall. She greeted a few founding members with a smile and continued to drag Han Shuo to a ce with fewer people.

    Waiters held tters filled with fruit and fine wine throughout the hall, cing them on square tables located in a spacious area. Arge chandelier overhead sent bright light into every cranny of the room. The decorations, that littered the entire hall, were incredibly luxurious, giving a rustic countryman, such as Han Shuo, quite a shock.

    But, what shocked Han Shuo the most was Phoebe¡¯s words just now. When he saw that there was no one around, he immediately smiled wryly at Phoebe, ¡°Miss Phoebe, what did you mean to do by doing all of this?¡±

    Conveniently snatching a wine ss, Phoebe poured a ss of delicious red wine for herself, gracefully raising it to her lips for a light taste, finally speaking afterwards, ¡°Don¡¯t think too much, I¡¯m just finding a cover for your presence and don¡¯t mean anything else by it. If I didn¡¯t say such things, you probably wouldn¡¯t even be able to make it inside.¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo sighed resignedly and said, ¡°I knew that nothing good would result from me following you here.¡±

    ¡°You have to act more natural, I¡¯ll cover things for you. This is the annual gathering of the Guild and all the founding elders will attend. As bold as Grover is, he wouldn¡¯t dare to make a move at this time, so we don¡¯t have to worry.¡± Phoebe spoke softly to Han Shuo as her eyes continuously scanned his surroundings.

    Also grabbing a wine ss to pour himself half a ss, Han Shuo took a sip and found it tartly delicious. He observed his surroundings once more with keen interest, finding that many of the Guild members had also brought their other halves. There were twenty or thirty people in the entire hall. There were some elderly members and some handsome youths. There were also some beautiful married women with the graceful bearing and demure of nobledies.

    Without an exception, all of these people were dressed richly and their motions urbanely polite. It looked like this was the so-called style of the upper ss. Grover held a wine ss in hand and threaded through all the people, amiably greeting everyone and looking quite friendly.

    ¡°The Boozt Merchant Guild has always been controlled by the Boozt family. My family had always been the Guildmaster before, but because I was always traveling outside, that old thing temporarily took the position of Guildmaster after my father passed away, but don¡¯t think that he has good rtions with many of the elders. No one really knows what goes on in the dark, otherwise there¡¯d be no point in meing back.¡±

    As Han Shuo silently observed the surroundings, Phoebe gave her exnations in a low voice. When Phoebe was finished, a thought struck Han Shuo as he suddenly asked, ¡°How did your father die? Did you know nothing beforehand?¡±

    When he said this, a trace of killing intent instantly blossomed in Phoebe¡¯s eyes. She suppressed her voice and said with a cold expression, ¡°I¡¯m still investigating how my father died. I haven¡¯t found any evidence yet because I¡¯m usually not in the Guild and thus am not too certain of many things. The founding elders probably don¡¯t really trust my abilities and thus their attitudes are all vague and indefinite. My current task at hand is to win over the support of the founding elders, otherwise I¡¯ll be unable to shake that old thing from his position with my power alone.¡±

    Han Shuo understood that Phoebe was also suspecting the reasons behind her father¡¯s death with these words. He didn¡¯t say much more and held his wine ss, observing those in the hall and privately considering a few things.

    A few more people entered after a while. An elder with grizzled sideburns walked inst into the hall with the support of a butler.

    When this person appeared, many people in the hall made their way over to make their greetings. Phoebe immediately pulled Han Shuo in this direction as well when she saw him, quickly exining in a low voice, ¡°He¡¯s Andrew. He founded the Boozt Merchant Guild along with my grandfather and is currently the founding elder with the longest record of service within the Guild. Even Grover doesn¡¯t dare to act too wildly in front of him. We won¡¯t be as passive if he helps us.¡±

    Arriving in front of Andrew, Phoebe made a restrained bow and said with a smile of joy on her face. ¡°Grandpa Andrew, you¡¯vee as well!¡±

    ¡°Eh, it¡¯s our beautiful little Phoebe. Grandpa hasn¡¯t seen you in quite a while heh heh, you¡¯ve grown so tall.¡± Andrew¡¯s left hand grasped his cane, while his right hand was being supported by a butler as he chuckled at Phoebe.

    ¡°Good niece, don¡¯t just stand around talking, hurry and let the elderly sit down. When one is at that age, it must be very tiring to take a carriage the whole way here. He mustn¡¯t be kept standing.¡± Grover said to Phoebe as he walked over in Andrew¡¯s direction, seeming to want to lead Andrew in a seat on his side.

    ¡°Heh heh, no worries. I¡¯m having a delightful conversation with little Phoebe. I haven¡¯t seen our little Phoebe in quite a while.¡± Andrew evaded Grover¡¯s support and actually raised his cane to walk in Han Shuo and Phoebe¡¯s direction.

    Grover¡¯s brows involuntarily knit into a frown as he saw Phoebe lead Andrew to the other side with a look of surprise on her face. His gaze patrolled over Andrew¡¯s body, seeming to be contemting something.

    When Phoebe, Andrew, and Han Shuo had all sat down in a corner on the other end of the hall, Phoebe and Andrew hadn¡¯t even had a chance to speak before Grover had raised a ss and said with a chuckle, ¡°Founding elders of the Boozt Merchant Guild, today is the annual gathering of our Guild. It¡¯s a pleasure to see everyone again this year. It¡¯s a pity that because of health reasons, my dear brother has passed away from an illness. This is quite a tragic event.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry Grover, everything is orderly under your management. I think if the Guildmaster knew, he would be touched and gratified.¡± One of the founding elders suddenly spoke up at this time with two others by his side chiming in.

    Han Shuo watched their performance with a cold eye, having a clear understanding of things in his heart. He knew that these people were sure to have close rtions with Grover, and were merely dering their stance with these words.

    At this moment, Han Shuo, seated next to Phoebe, could clearly hear Andrew snort in a very low tone. Phoebe was even closer to Andrew and naturally heard things clearly. She nced involuntarily with surprise at Andrew, and exchanged a look with Han Shuo.

    ¡°The Guildmaster has already passed away, but our Boozt Merchant Guild cannot be without a Guildmaster forever. I think we should take advantage of this opportunity to thoroughly discuss the particrs of a new Guildmaster. What does everyone think?¡± The same person called out in a carrying voice, and the two founding elders, who had chimed in before, once again assented. Grover¡¯s face was calm, only sitting there and continuously looking around the four corners of the room, with his gaze pausing a bit longer on Phoebe and Andrew.

    ¡°Of course, the position of Guildmaster cannot be empty for too long, but who will be the Guildmaster? This is an important question.¡± A stocky founding elder said in a seat not too far away with a low, muffled voice.

    ¡°What else is there to discuss, Grover should be the new Guildmaster of course. Since the Guildmaster¡¯s passing, Grover has been the one to manage the Guild¡¯s affairs. Everyone has also seen that the Guild has been stable and orderly in his hands. I don¡¯t think anyone else is qualified to sit in this seat other than Grover.¡± The Grover supporter abruptly stood up and called out, winning the other two people¡¯s assent.

    Grover stood up with a smile, his face full of hypocritical humility as he spoke words that his abilities were limited or that he was embarrassed by undeserved praise. The three were resolute in that it must be him, and the merry band demonstrated quite outstanding partnership.

    ¡°Uncle Andrew, who do you think is more suitable to be the new Guildmaster?¡± At this moment, the founding elder, who had previously spoken in a low, muffled voice, looked at Andrew from afar and asked.

    All the looks from the surrounding founding elders focused on Andrew, as if waiting for him to express his decision.

    Andrew looked in Phoebe¡¯s direction, thetter pretending to be calm andposed. He slightly stood up and chuckled lightly, ¡°It¡¯s not me at any case, I don¡¯t have that many days left to live, heh heh.¡±

    Everyone disyed friendly smiles after his words. Grover also smiled andughed softly, like he was heaving a sigh of relief because he was truly afraid that Andrew would step forward and seize the position of Guildmaster from him.

    ¡°However,¡± Andrew¡¯s gaze swept over the assembled and he continued, ¡°I think that little Phoebe has grown up. Since she is the daughter of the Guildmaster and a member of the Boozt family n, logically speaking, she is the most qualified person to be the new Guildmaster. Why has no one mentioned this?¡±

    ¡°No, absolutely not. Miss Phoebe is too young and has always been traveling outside. She doesn¡¯t even know of all the matters within the Guild. If she were to be the Guildmaster, she may ruin the business of the Guild.¡± The founding elder, who¡¯d been upholding Grover, immediately protested violently.

    ¡°Kiro, that may not be the case. Although Miss Phoebe is young, I see that she¡¯s quite knowledgeable and mature, she also knows the proper limits for speech and action when doing something. Perhaps with her at the helm, she¡¯ll even be able to bring further development to the Guild.¡± A founding elder suddenly opened his mouth. All the other elders who had been staying silent without a word suddenly chimed in upon seeing Andrew express his support for Phoebe. Three or four other elders still remained quiet, as if expressing their neutrality.

    ¡°How, how will this do? We can¡¯t take the future of the Guild as an experiment for herpetency.¡± The loyal Grover supporter called Kiro immediatelyined.

    ¡°How can we not? If I recall correctly, when the old Guildmaster first took over the Guild, he was only twenty three himself, but under the guidance of Andrew and a few others, the old Guildmaster quickly grew up and helped the Guild be more prosperous with every passing day. I believe that Miss Phoebe will also be able to do so. Not to mention with us aiding her, no major problems will develop as well.¡± The person continued to say.

    Grover¡¯s face had darkened and he¡¯d stopped speaking after Andrew had spoken out. Finally standing up at this time, he said to Phoebe, ¡°Good niece, your boyfriend was once an errand boy for the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, and had the status of a ve. Don¡¯t think that I¡¯m poking my nose in too many ces, but if people found out that the two of you were together, it would affect the reputation of our Guild.¡±

    Several of the founding elders shifted their focus towards Han Shuo after these words, unable to conceal the contempt and disdain on their faces.

    Han Shuo gave a horrified startled look, finally understanding that Phoebe¡¯s worries weren¡¯t without reason. It looked like he had underestimated the power of Grover and Shadow Ghost. Who would¡¯ve thought that they¡¯d be able to investigate his background with only his first name? It was a good thing that he had spent most of his time in the cemetery of deathtely. Otherwise if he¡¯d stayed at the school, he may have long since been assassinated by highly trained killers.

    ¡°Uncle, what do you mean by this?¡± At this moment, Phoebe suddenly stood up, her charming face cold as she stared at Grover angrily, wanting to throw all decorum to the side.

    ¡°Don¡¯t get angry dear niece. I just wanted to say that your judgment doesn¡¯t seem too good. In order to manage the Guild, a daring, wise, and far sighted judgment is most important. If you choose even your future husband from the ves, then I don¡¯t think I¡¯m content to let you be Guildmaster.¡± A peaceful smile was still on Grover¡¯s face, but the words he said were quite vicious.

    ¡°I think a person who can murder his own brother for profit and continuously send out killers to attempt to harm his own niece is even less worth of the position of Guildmaster.¡± Han Shuo also stood up and watched Grover with a cold smile,pletely fearless and seemingly unaware of how shocking his words were. Pausing in the astonished gaze of the entire hall, Han Shuo said again, ¡°Please remember that I am a student of the Academy now. I no longer have the status of a ve and never will again.¡±

 Chapter 78: A blood battle in the deep alleyways

    Chapter 78: A blood battle in the deep alleyways

    ¡°Shut your mouth! Don¡¯t make unfounded usations! I had such a deep rtionship with my elder brother, how could I possibly kill him? Dear niece, I feel so bad for you since you found a boyfriend that doesn¡¯t understand the principles of propriety!¡± Grover¡¯s face changed drastically as he surged to his feet, mming his hands down on the tabletop and roared angrily.

    His expression as usual, Han Shuo lightlyughed and glossed over the matter, ¡°Everyone already knows this. Phoebe is the Guildmaster¡¯s only daughter and should be the candidate most qualified to inherit the position of Guildmaster. If she were to be assassinated, who stands to profit?¡±

    ¡°When was it an outsider¡¯s turn to talk about the matters of the Boozt Merchant Guild? Phoebe, you should keep this outsider, who doesn¡¯t know what he¡¯s talking about, in line.¡± Grover red viciously at Han Shuo as he turned to talk to Phoebe.

    At this moment, Phoebe had already calmed down from her earlier panic. She¡¯d always maintained a veneer of civility with Grover, but how was she to know that Han Shuo would have no qualms whatsoever and stand in sharp opposition from the beginning, almost having a throwdown with Grover instantaneously, throwing all her ns into disarray? She didn¡¯t know what to do for the span of a moment.

    However, just as Han Shuo and Grover were denouncing each other, Phoebe¡¯s thoughts churned and she felt that Han Shuo¡¯s actions were clear and decisive. Because of his actions, her attitude would clearly be disyed in front of the founding elders. This would also show the founding elders that she wasn¡¯t some weak person who wasn¡¯t willing to fight for her position.

    Except, it was the time to measure her gains and losses. Since Han Shuo had already so sharply announced his stance, there wasn¡¯t a way that Phoebe could salvage the situation even if she wanted to. Immediately after Grover¡¯s words had been cut off, she said confidently, ¡°Indeed, Uncle Grover, I believe that I have the qualifications to be apetent Guildmaster.¡±

    ¡°Although in recent years I have spent my days outside, father has never given up his tutge of me. The knowledge I have learned is also relevant to operating the Guild. Father has long since arranged all this. I hope you can support me uncle, and teach me if I am foundcking in any ces. I am confident that I can take good care of the Guild.¡±

    ¡°Good niece, your courage is worthplimenting. However, a matter such as this is not child¡¯s y. One misstep is enough to doom the Guild beyond redemption. Uncle is cowardly and cannot afford to shoulder such responsibility.¡± Since they wereying everything out, Grover no longer hid and concealed his intentions as he spoke with a darkened face.

    At this moment, Andrew suddenly grasped his cane and tottered to his feet. He spoke in a conciliatory tone, ¡°There¡¯s no point in arguing further. How about this... why don¡¯t we let little Phoebe try first? If the Guild is still expanding smoothly in her hands after three months, then let Phoebe be the Guildmaster. If not, Grover will continue to be. What does everyone think?¡±

    Since Andrew had spoken, apart from the three founding elders who supported Grover, all the other founding elders expressed their consent. Andrew waited until they all had expressed their opinions before smiling at Grover, saying merrily, ¡°Since the majority has agreed, let¡¯s do this for know. What do you think?¡±

    As unwilling as he was, since the majority of the founding elders within the Guild had agreed, Grover had no way of changing the situation. He could only grit his teeth and say with resignation, ¡°Since this is the case, then let¡¯s move ording to your wishes.¡±

    Nodding, Andrew smiled, ¡°Then good. I have a few matters to attend to, so I will be taking my leave. Ah, little Phoebe, I haven¡¯t seen you in so long. If you have nothing else to do,e to my house for a chat!¡±

    ¡°Sure, I happened to want to ask grandpa about your experiences in managing the Guild!¡± Phoebe smiled faintly and stood up. She put down the wine ss, threw a look at Han Shuo, and walked out without even looking at Grover.

    Han Shuo put down his winess and shed a contemptuous, cold smile at Grover, who was staring at him frostily. He followed behind Phoebe and headed outside the hall.

    After leaving the Guild, Phoebe looked around and saw that it was empty. She said softly to Han Shuo, ¡°Go back to my residence first. I¡¯ll rush back after chatting with grandpa Andrew. We¡¯ll talkter!¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, little Phoebe, your boyfriend is quite bold! He dared to argue with Grover in the hall, I think you have quite the eye!¡± Andrew stood on the side of his carriage as he looked benevolently upon Phoebe and Han Shuo.

    Her charming face blushing red, Phoebe looked at Han Shuo and whispered, ¡°Be careful.¡± She then walked to Andrew and said cutely, ¡°No way. You don¡¯t know how frustrating it is because he¡¯s so pudding-headed sometimes!¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t listen further to their conversation any longer and didn¡¯t take the carriage that he had arrived in with Phoebe, but rather set out for the northern part of the city alone.

    Since it waste at night anyways, there were almost no pedestrians on the road. When Han Shuo had just left the Boozt Merchant Guild, he didn¡¯t feel that he was in too much danger, but when he threaded past a street and just walked into an alleyway, he suddenly became alert.

    His thoughts moved as three original demons were soundlessly released from the back of his neck. When the original demons left Han Shuo¡¯s neck, they immediately assumed the form of nothingness andy in wait, in three different directions, without leaving a trace behind in the darkness.

    As if he¡¯d gained additional pairs of eyes, Han Shuo could clearly see not only the direction in front of him, but even the area behind and to the left and right of him. Refined by magical yuan, there wasn¡¯t the slightest bit of fighting aura or magic pulse from the original demons. Under the status of nothingness, it was quite difficult for the human eye to detect any trace of them. Thus, the departure and concealment of the original demons didn¡¯t startle anyone.

    The wind adept mage Ellis, whom Han Shuo had seenst time, was floating like a wispy ghost behind Han Shuo. He hung soundlessly waiting. Four killers, d in ck clothes and head coverings, were also on the roofs of the houses on either side of the alleyway. They walked on soundlessly, quietly following behind him and slowly closing in on him.

    Startled, Han Shuo hadn¡¯t thought that Grover would be so daring. He had just left the Guild when thetter made his move. It looked like Grover¡¯s hatred for him was bone deep.

    Han Shuo suddenly calmed down when it came to the moment of his survival. There were five in total. Apart from the wind adept mage Ellis, the other four weren¡¯t that weak either. ording to the observations of the original demons, Han Shuo discovered that the four of them were divided into two warriors, one mage, and one archer. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that the original demons could monitor their movements at any time, Han Shuo would be hard pressed to escape his death.

    However, with the addition of the original demons, although Han Shuo still didn¡¯t have any advantages, he wasn¡¯t without the hope of escaping. From Phoebe¡¯s descriptions, Han Shuo knew that there was a mansion up ahead that was the residence of the Empire soldiers stationed here. Han Shuo had chosen to walk through this gloomy alleyway precisely because of the manor thaty before him.

    His thoughts churning madly, Han Shuo understood that these people could only make their move within the alleyway. Otherwise once he made it through, they would lose their chance. The space ring lit up faintly as Han Shuo sped the dagger in his right hand. His footsteps moved forward at a measured pace, neither too slow nor too fast, as he continuously paid attention to the movements of the enemy through the observations of the original demons.

    Finally, when Han Shuo made it to the center of the alleyway, the five killers ¨C including Ellis ¨C seemed to believe that this was a good chance as their approach speed suddenly picked up.

    An exceedingly light sound of an arrow whistling through the air suddenly fell into Han Shuo¡¯s hearing range. The arrow was umonly sharp as it made straight for Han Shuo, its momentum exceedingly fierce.

    This arrow hade from a professional archer. The angle and tip were exceedingly brutal. If it hadn¡¯t been for the fact that Han Shuo had clearly observed his actions through the originals demons, then it was very likely that he would¡¯ve fallen to the arrow on the spot.

    His originally measured paces suddenly picked up, but he didn¡¯t rush forward, but rather dodged to the left. The arrow shot past the corners of Han Shuo¡¯s clothes with a whooshing sound, whistling violently towards the front.

    The arrow suddenly fractured into pieces in front of Han Shuo, as Ellis had long since released a few sharp winddes. He seemed to be waiting for Han Shuo to subconsciously move further in, but Han Shuo had already detected this and evaded them.

    At the same time, the air above his head suddenly lit up as a patch of fire wall abruptly formed and came down over his head. Two nimble figures, wielding longswords, came flying down from the roofs. Han Shuo could clearly see the pale-green and dark green fighting auras thanks to the light provided by the fire walls.

    Abruptly increasing his speed, Han Shuo¡¯s speed suddenly raised instantaneously and circled to the left, avoiding the obstruction of Ellis¡¯ winddes and dashing out of the entrance of the alleyway. Han Shuo had just left his position when the fire wall mmed down, and sparks flew up from the ce he had just been standing.

    No matter how they imagined things, they would never know that Han Shuo had already clearly seen their intentionally concealed tracks through the eyes of the original demons. They had thought it was absolutely an unexpected attack, but it had already beenpletely observed by Han Shuo. This is what caused the extraordinarily talented group of five to fail their first wave of attackspletely.

    ¡°Don¡¯t let him leave the alleyway alive!¡± Ellis¡¯ soft voice was purposefully sharp and hard as it sounded at this moment.

    The archer and fire mage stood on either side on the rooftops of the alleyway. When Ellis¡¯ words were spoken, they made their move at almost the same time. The archer grabbed three arrows and notched them to his bow, shooting them all at the same time with a whistling sound. They flew fiercely towards Han Shuo¡¯s forehead, back, and thigh.

    Another wall of mes suddenly formed in the direction that Han Shuo was dashing in, blocking off his escape and forcing him to take the long way around. Otherwise he would be hard pressed to escape the funeral pyre of the ming walls.

    The two swordsmen who had justnded took advantage of the situation to quickly approach with their longswords. They were only ten or so meters away from Han Shuo. Ellis¡¯ feet hovered above the ground as he quickly closed the distance from behind, obviously nning on keeping Han Shuo here.

    Tilting his body, Han Shuo once again changed directions and made for the right. He nned on circling past the fire walls and rush out onto the street. Several winddes came whistling in, but it was all within Han Shuo¡¯s expectations. The dagger in his hand moved swiftly as he cut away at five winddes. However, three of them still drew across his thigh and arms.

    Him suffering three hits was under the circumstances of Han Shuo knowing that Ellis had sent winddes there earlier, otherwise if ten winddes connected with his vitals, it would be likely that he would be unable to take another step forward.

    Han Shuo bore up beneath the injuries to his thigh and arms and rushed out from the windde ambush, simultaneously evading the fire wall and flying arrows, dashing to the alley¡¯s entrance like lightning. He was about to rush out onto the street.

    At this moment, an exceedingly ghastly wail cut through the quiet night sky. In the midst of running, Han Shuo used the original demons to discover that the archer¡¯s bow had been cleaved into two, and was falling listlessly from the rooftop with blood at the corners of his mouth. Phoebe stood where he had just been standing, a longsword in hand and standing with a proud, majestic looking air.

    ¡°Pho... Phoebe, you¡¯re a swordswoman!¡± Beneath the head covering, Ellis was so surprised that he forgot to modte his tone and used his original voice to exim in surprise. He didn¡¯t talk to the others as his quickly dashing body suddenly halted. He abruptly turned back and escaped towards the back with an even higher speed.

    Phoebe snorted coldly and didn¡¯t bother chasing the escaping Ellis. After all, if a wind mage were to attempt a full out escape, it would be difficult indeed to catch up to him. The longsword in her hand waving, the majestic-looking Phoebe alighted gently from the roof towards the two warriors. It looked like she was nning on taking care of those who were still around.

    Han Shuo was about to rush out of the alleyway at this time and was overjoyed when he saw Phoebe suddenly appear. He swiftly did an about face and opened his mouth to summon the little skeleton, running quickly towards the two warriors himself.

    The little skeleton wouldn¡¯t have been that useful when Han Shuo was fleeing for his life previously. With the presence of Phoebe the swordmaster now, Han Shuo had turned from the hunted to hunter. The little skeleton could naturally make an appearnace to kill enemies.

    When the bone dagger-wielding little skeleton appeared, it started running quickly under Han Shuo¡¯smands. The seven bone spurs on its back waved as it shot towards the roof, attempting to finish off the fire mage.

    The fire mage was shocked as he had never thought the little skeleton would be able to make use of its momentum to directly vault onto the roof. In his panic, he immediately muttered an incantation as the wildly zing fire wall made an appearance again, blocking the path that the little skeleton would take.

    However, the little skeleton paid no attention to the obstruction of the fire wall and flung himself into it. It walked out with its body reddened from the fire wall and arrived in front of the fire mage¡¯s dumbfounded expression. The bone dagger in its hand danced as it turned the mage into a beehive.

 Chapter 79: Breaking through the boundary

    Chapter 79: Breaking through the boundary

    There were only two swordsmen left, one senior and one journeyman swordsman. Phoebe herself was enough to make the two of them unable to escape death. Han Shuo turning back merely elerated their deaths.

    With a sh of his space ring, Han Shuo held a crossbow in his hand and fitted a crossbow bolt into the string. He¡¯d already targeted one of them, and shot at the back of the senior swordsman when they abruptly started retreating and wanted to take themselves out of the fight.

    The senior swordsman, who nned on leaving had to turn back in resignation and block the bolt, but in the instant he¡¯d destroyed the bolt, Phoebe was already standing in front of him.

    The little skeleton that had stabbed the fire mage to death held a bag in his left hand, jumping down from the roof with a whoosh. After his skeleton wobbled a bit, he was already standing with dagger in hand in front of the other journeyman swordsman.

    As Han Shuo strode over with a cold smile, one of the swordsmen suddenly drew his longsword across his neck and fell down.

    ¡°These are people from ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯. If they know that there¡¯s no way out for them, they¡¯ll choose to end their own lives!¡± Phoebe shook her head, storing the longsword in her hand back into a space ring and said with a frown.

    The little skeleton had arrived in front of the two corpses at this moment and began to search them with practiced motions. When two more bags hung on its left hand, it walked over happily to Han Shuo with bone dagger in hand, offering the three bags to Han Shuo.

    Caressing the little skeleton¡¯s skull with a faint smile, Han Shuo took the three bags and cursed after one nce. ¡°Damn it, three poor sods. They only had ten or so gold coins!¡±

    Rolling her eyes at him with ill temper, Phoebe didn¡¯t search the corpses and directly said to Han Shuo. ¡°I¡¯ve never seen someone as greedy as you. Don¡¯t bother searching their bodies, you won¡¯t discover anything. The people of ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ never bring anything important with them when they go out on missions, so forget it, they won¡¯t bring any riches to you.¡±

    Han Shuo cursed again when he heard Phoebe¡¯s words and chanted an incantation to send the little skeleton back. He then grinned and asked softly, ¡°Didn¡¯t you leave with Andrew? Why did you suddenly return?¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re hurt?¡± Phoebe was shocked and immediately rushed to Han Shuo. When she saw the blood wounds left by the the winddes on Han Shuo¡¯s body, she immediately revealed a worried expression. The space ring on her finger lit up and some gauze and medicine appeared in her hands. She didn¡¯t shy away as she said softly, ¡°Don¡¯t move!¡±

    It was rare that Han Shuo saw Phoebe disy such an expression, and he felt vaguely touched inside. He stood there dumbly, not moving at all and looked at Phoebe carefully apply medicine to his injury, then using gauze to wrap it all up for him.

    When Phoebe was finished, she tugged at Han Shuo and exhaled lightly. ¡°You sure know how to pick a ce. Two manors are on the two sides of this alleyway and both families are out. No one¡¯se out even after such a violent fight, it looks like the house hasn¡¯t been sold yet. However, we can¡¯t stay here for long. Although the security isn¡¯t too tight here, the guards will still patrol the area after a while. It¡¯d be better if we leave earlier.¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go.¡± Han Shuo agreed and left with Phoebe, rushing to the northern part of the city. He asked along the way, ¡°Oh right, you still haven¡¯t told me, why did you suddenlye back?¡±

    Seeing that there was no one around, Phoebe frowned and said in a low voice, ¡°Grandpa Andrew told me in the carriage that Grover has been conducting transactions with the barbaric orcs, and has actually been selling the Empire¡¯s weapons to them. The implications of this matter are huge, and if the Empire knew, they wouldn¡¯t let him off easily.¡±

    ¡°Grover must know that if I¡¯m in charge of the Guild, he won¡¯t be able to cover this up anyone. So he must kill me before I take control of the Guild. Otherwise once this matter is uncovered, as strong as he is, Grover will be hard pressed to escape from the punishment of the Empire. Once I knew of this matter, I knew that he would try to kill you first. I worried about you so I left Grandpa Andrew halfway through toe find you.¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°So that¡¯s why. No wonder Grover wanted to kill us so quickly. It looks like as soon as you have evidence in hand, Grover will be done for without a doubt.¡±

    ¡°Exactly!¡± Phoebeughed coldly, but then sighed as she thought. ¡°However, Ellis has learned of my strength this time. I think Grover will think of a n and even I will find it difficult to deal with his next assassination attempt.¡±

    Han Shuo knew that his power was limited, if even Phoebe couldn¡¯t handle things, then he wouldn¡¯t have much effect either. The only thing he could do to help Phoebe was with his perceptive senses towards assassins. He thought for a moment and said, ¡°I¡¯ll leave for a bit. I¡¯lle find you when my injuries are healed. Grover is our mutual enemy now, I know what to do.¡±

    ¡°Alright, but don¡¯t go back to the Academy no matter what you do. Since Grover knows your identity, you¡¯ll face tremendous danger if you stay in the Academy the next couple of days!¡±

    Phoebe mused and said to Han Shuo.

    Nodding his head in understanding, Han Shuo told Phoebe to be careful and left alone. The three original demons apanied him, but didn¡¯t discover any other disturbances until Han Shuo came to the cemeteries behind the Academy.

    After returning to the cemetery of death, Han Shuo trained his magic for a bit. A cool feeling wreathed around his injuries as he circted his magical yuan, and the feeling of pain was greatly reduced.

    After sleeping for a while, it was already noon of the next day. Since all the materials had been gathered now, Han Shuo left the cemetery of death eagerly and headed towards the dwarves¡¯ vige. He nned on asking the dwarf chief Calvin to forge the Demonyer Edge for him.

    The dwarf vige was located in a small mountain valley. There were enormous trees concealing the entrance of the vige. If it weren¡¯t for the fact that Han Shuo had once made a trip here with the dwarves, he would have been hard pressed to find their ce of dwelling.

    Han Shuo was now quite familiar with the route and came to the dwarf vige after a while. He threaded past the towering trees, and a dwarf, who stood guard with a sharp axe in hand in front of the vige immediately called out with a friendly voice, ¡°Oh! Good friend, you¡¯vee to visit us again!¡±

    Following behind the dwarf, Han Shuo traveled through a small path with shrubs on both sides and finally made it to the dwarf vige. Calvin, Bet, and the others had heard the news and were all waiting merrily to wee Han Shuo. Fine wine was quickly served.

    The dwarves lived in log cabins that they themselves had constructed, with some also living in emptied-out tree hollows. There were only a hundred or so dwarves in the vige. Women and children were a good half of the numbers, and the warriors, who could truly fight, numbered not that many.

    Han Shuo had won the true friendship of the dwarves over this period of time. They were very generous towards Han Shuo. Whenever he came by, there was always fine wine and meats weing him, making him feel quite touched.

    ¡°Han, howe you have time to stop by?¡± Calvin said merrily to Han Shuo.

    Taking out the materials that Phoebe had prepared from the space ring, Han Shuo handed them over to Calvin, saying, ¡°Elder, these were the materials you requests. There¡¯s also enough ck metal ore. Will you be able to forge a weapon for me?¡±

    Calvin took the materials from Han Shuo and looked at them carefully, saying with surprise, ¡°Of course, absolutely. With enough materials to forge a great weapon, this is a happy matter for us. Don¡¯t worry Han, we¡¯ll start working on it tomorrow. We¡¯ll be able to forge a weapon for you in about a week, and you¡¯re sure to be satisfied for it.¡±

    Han Shuo truly breathed a sigh of relief with his guarantee and immediately expressed his genuine thanks to Calvin. The lowints of some of the female dwarves came from afar. Han Shuo¡¯s ears were sharp, and he involuntarily listened closely to them.

    ¡°Ai, it will be winter soon. We¡¯re never guaranteed of food in the big snow, and the chief has drawn from the stores many times to treat the guest. At this rate, how will we survive through the winter?¡±

    ¡°Yes, I¡¯ve also heard that the damned man-eating monsters have been aroundtely. It looks like they¡¯vee out to plunder and raid in order to make it through winter. If they discover our vige, we¡¯ll have to move again. When will these days end!¡±

    The conversations of the female dwarves were allpletely taken in by Han Shuo. He was a bit touched. It looked like the lives of the dwarves weren¡¯t as good as he thought, but even so, they had still taken out the best food to treat him. This made him feel quite guilty.

    He thought for a moment and sighed lightly, saying to Calvin, ¡°Elder, do you not treat me as a friend?¡±

    ¡°Han, why would you say such things? Have we treated you unkindly in some way?¡± Bet, who was very kindly disposed towards Han Shuo, was the first to exim in surprise and looked at him in consternation before Calvin had a chance to open his mouth.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo sighed, ¡°Why must you worry about food and man-eating monsters, but refuse to tell me, your friend, about such matters?¡±

    ¡°This won¡¯t do, since the elder is willing to bring out the winter rations to treat me, as your friend, I must do something. Don¡¯t worry elder, I¡¯ll head for human society and help you solve the matter of winter rations. What else do you need apart from this? I can bring it all to you.¡±

    ¡°How can we allow this? Although we¡¯re friends, we can¡¯t trouble you. We too wish to purchase these things in the human¡¯s society, but there¡¯s a long stretch of Dark Forest between here and human society. Not only are there attacks from magical creatures on the journey, but we may run into adventurers with ill intentions. This is why we¡¯re forced to stay here.¡±

    ¡°Han, I know that if you¡¯re to purchase those things for us, it will spend quite a bit of your money for sure. We can¡¯t trouble you like this. I think we¡¯ll work a bit harder and still get through this winter.¡± Calvin said.

    ¡°This matter is thus decided. I will help you think of ways to handle the matter of winter rations and the threat of the man-eating monsters. Just concentrate on forging weapons and leave the rest to me.¡±

    Han Shuo made some internal calctions. There were roughly a hundred or so in the entire dwarf vige. He would probably have to make a few trips in order to bring the amount of food they needed to the cemetery of death, based on how much food the space ring could hold. If he purchased the food from Phoebe, he probably wouldn¡¯t need to spend that many gold coins. It was just a convenient favor to do, and Han Shuo was naturally happy to do so for the dwarves.

    ¡°Thank you so much. I thank you on behalf of my child and the mothers within the vige!¡± A female dwarf suddenly heard Han Shuo¡¯s guarantee when she brought over fruit and was so moved that she immediately thanked Han Shuo with the greatest courtesy of the dwarves.

    ¡°You¡¯re dismissed.¡± Calvin admonished, and then also said with gratitude, ¡°Han, we only create fine wines and forge weapons. Because we have exceedingly little contact with humans, we don¡¯t have that many gold coins. We¡¯re willing to make some fine wines and forge some weapons for you in exchange, otherwise I won¡¯t be able to ept your good intentions!¡±

    Although Han Shuo didn¡¯t lust after their wine and weapons, but he understood that with the dwarves¡¯ obstinate tempers, they would be unwilling to ept his assistance for no reason at all. He finally epted after thinking for a while.

    With the promise of winter rations from Han Shuo, all the dwarves were beyond excited. Even Calvin drank heartily with Han Shuo, a rare asion indeed. He had to say that the wine made by the dwarves was truly quite sweet. Even the fine wine that Han Shuo had drankst night at the Boozt Merchant Guild¡¯s banquet couldn¡¯tpare.

    Han Shuo was in an excellent mood after ensuring his Demonyer Edge, and drank the night away with the dwarves. However, due to him practicing magic, he had already thoroughly sobered under the use of magical yuan when he left the dwarf vige. He maintained a state of high alert as he traveled back to the cemetery of death.

    Before meditating, Han Shuo thought for a bit and decided to once more explore the boundary that had stopped Han Shuo from descending down to the lower levels of the cemetery of death. He wanted to see if he could break through that barrier with his current level of mental strength.

    After using the round, green ball to open the passageway, Han Shuo focused his mental strength and abruptly burrowed him. A piercing pain immediately filled his mind, but because he was used to the pain inflicted by the round, green ball during training, Han Shuo held up beneath the onught. He circted his magical yuan to its highest and burrowed downwards.

 Chapter 80: A magical cemetery

    Chapter 80: A magical cemetery

    Han Shuo fell onto solid ground, regained his footing, and took his bearings. He was in argeboratory. All sorts of containers andrge bones were ced everywhere. Several gloomy lights, like green will-o¡¯-wisps, were ced on the walls on the side, lighting up the interior, making it slightly brighter.

    There were also a few rooms in the four corners. Han Shuo went into each of the rooms and discovered that two of them were filled with all sorts of books having to do with necromancy magic, and included a few books on dark magic as well. The books in here were obviously all very old. There was a lot of dust on them, and the number of books greatly exceeded the number of books in the dark studies section of the library in the Academy. Many of them were also books that Han Shuo had never heard of.

    Magical supplies were stored in the other four rooms. Each of the containers were sealed tightly and were filled with colorful liquid, with some holding strange bones and teeth of vicious beasts that sparkled with light.

    Just as Han Shuo was taking measure of his surroundings, the round, green ball in his hand suddenly sent out an eye-dazzling sh of green splendor. The light epassed the entireboratory as a ck, shadow-like a ghost suddenly materialized in one of the circr magical symbols within theboratory.

    ¡°My child, when you arrive here and see this mirror image, I will have already returned to dust. If you seek to understand everything about the cemetery of death, then you must pay attention and listen to all that I have to say.¡±

    The ck shadow was a concentrated mass, whether it was his eyes or the light from the round, green ball, Han Shuo was unable to see its original form. An unpracticed voice slowly formed each word with a bit of difficulty.

    Han Shuo was shocked and then immediately realized that this was a way that mages left messages ¨C mirror images. ording to the meaning of the words, Han Shuo hastily focused his concentration and listened to every sentence he was saying.

    ¡°First, you must know that the cemetery of death was the sacred ground of necromancers during my time. It represents the peak of necromancy magic. The cemetery of death can move. When you finally grasp all that is present here, you will find that you own a frightening city...¡±

    The wispy voice exined ceaselessly. Han Shuo concentrated and listened to the voice¡¯s slow descriptions. When the voice said, ¡°You will still be able to see me on the next level¡±, the ck shadow suddenly disappeared as well.

    Apart from the magic matrix above grounds in the cemetery of death, there were two more levels apart from theboratory and library on this level. In order to fully grasp all the secrets of the cemetery of death, he must travel to the two lower levels as well. Han Shuo had gained this understanding from the ck shadow that the cemetery of death was actually a castle that could move, and it was an incredibly powerful castle. This greatly shocked Han Shuo.

    The round, green ball was equivalent to a key to enter the cemetery of death. The evil mental brand of a necromancer was held within. If an ordinary person obtained this round ball, they would be unable to escape the corruption of the ball and would finally turn into a senseless zombie, apart from necromancers with the feel of necromancy magic about them.

    Although Han Shuo was just a magic apprentice, he still had the presence of necromancy magic about him and thus thankfully hadn¡¯t been assimted by the curse, but because he had brashly explored when his mental strength had been too weak, he would have been hard pressed to escape death that day if it weren¡¯t for the help of the magical yuan.

    The amazing magical yuan was different from all energy of this world. It had actually saved Han Shuo when his mind was being invaded by the mental strength, and had bafflingly helped Han Shuo increase his mental strength. Han Shuo had reaped great rewards in the midst of inhumane pain. This was probably something that the creator of the round, green ball had never imagined.

    From the depictions of the ck shadow, Han Shuo received limited information. It seemed that a more in-depth exnation existed in the lower two levels. Han Shuo mused silently for a bit, and then reentered the rooms that were full of magic books.

    The magic books were the essence of necromancy magic, the product of a time when necromancy magic was at its peak. These were true priceless treasures to Han Shuo. The Academy already had quite a number of books, but books truly dealing with necromancy magic weren¡¯t that many. Most of them only dealt with beginner or journeyman topics, and ones that dealt with more advanced necromancy magic were exceedingly few.

    He flipped through the books covered with thick dust in the two rooms. Han Shuo had to sigh in admiration. The magical books here were much more superiorpared to the ones at the Academy, whether in terms of quality or quantity.

    Three of them were called ¡°Necromancy Magic¡±, divided into upper, middle, and lower scrolls. They were ced in the most eye catching ce and had obviously received special treatment. They were ced in a magical container and still looked quite new. They probably wouldn¡¯t be damaged even in tens of thousands of years.

    The upper scroll of ¡°Necromancy Magic¡± was already quite thick. Han Shuo discovered that it recorded, in detail, everything from the beginning of necromancy magic to the true essence of necromancy magic. The knowledge held within was quite different from what was taught by the Academy, much of the necromancy knowledge and magics recorded were those that Han Shuo had never heard of.

    There were handwritten notes on every page starting from the middle scroll, providing detailed footnotes to the content on the page, but it looked like the three scrolls were of one entity. When Han Shuo read the middle and lower scroll, he still couldn¡¯t understand some of the knowledge within even with the aid of the notes.

    Han Shuo could just barely understand the first half of the upper scroll, but unfortunately, without the presence of handwritten notes, Han Shuo still felt it very difficult to understand. Perhaps the person who had prepared this set of magical books had felt that people wouldn¡¯t need notes to understand the upper scroll, and that¡¯s why he didn¡¯t leave any exnations.

    After thinking for a while, Han Shuo decided to start with the first scroll. He nned on using thisplete set of ¡°Necromancy Magic¡± as his textbooks and slowly study and train from them. After forming his determination, Han Shuo took the round ball and departed from this level, returning to the surface level. He wasn¡¯t affected by the boundary and began to study this scroll, forgoing meals and forgetting to sleep.

    Han Shuo was preupied with this scroll of ¡°Necromancy Magic¡± for many days in a row, understanding all the words inside by studying every word. From this set of ¡°Necromancy Magic¡±, Han Shuo understood that the knowledge and spells currently taught at the Academy were much more shallow than the exnations in the books.

    There were many evil magics that Han Shuo would be unable to learn from Fanny.

    ¡°Corpse Reanimation¡± was a basic kind of necromancy magic. It used necromancy magic to turn those who had died into zombies, and would start fighting ording to the caster¡¯s will. If mental strength was sufficient enough, a terrifying zombie army could be reanimated.

    ¡°Canopy of Necromancy¡± was another evil magic. As long as ¡°Canopy of Necromancy was released¡±, the battle strength and agility of dark creatures would be greatly increased beneath the coverage of the canopy and the enemy would have difficulty adjusting to this area spell, decreasing their battle strength.

    Numerous spells simr to ¡°Corpse Reanimation¡± and ¡°Canopy of Necromancy¡± were listed within the scroll. It was said that these magics had been lost for a long time and none of the necromancers today could grasp them, but there were detailed descriptions within this scroll of ¡°Necromancy Magic¡±.

    Han Shuo understood that he had picked up a precious treasure. If this scroll of ¡°Necromancy Magic¡± was circted, then it could possibly immediately change the current condition of necromancers, noticeably increasing the level of the necromancer¡¯s strength. The terror of necromancers would then once again materialize.

    He studied for nearly ten days, either meditating or studying the scroll of ¡°Necromancy Magic¡±. ¡°Corpse Reanimation¡± was a basic spell, but unfortunately Han Shuo had no corpses to practice on. ¡°Canopy of Necromancy¡± was an advanced spell, Han Shuo was equally unable to practice it because hecked the mental strength to do so.

    But through his practice during this time, Han Shuo mastered the bone spear magic. Even the zombie summoning spell was almost at hand, but he met with some resistance whenmunicating with the other dimension.

    After calcting the time, it was about time that the Demonyer Edge wasplete. Han Shuo thought for a bit and left the cemetery of death with the small skeleton, carefully evading a few level 3 and above magical creatures. He hunted a few low level monsters and took them with him, once again walking to the dwarves¡¯ vige.

    Midway there, just when Han Shuo was about to enter the dwarves¡¯ vige, he heard the sound of weapons shing. Han Shuo was greatly shocked and picked up his speed, threading through the trees and bushes with the little skeleton and rushing towards the source of the sounds.

    A couple dozen man-eating monsters and almost a hundred goblins were wielding weapons and besieging the dwarves. The dwarves held brand new weapons in their hands, and were so much sharperpared to the ones that the man-eating monsters and goblins were using. The goblins in particr were using a few crude des and wooden sticks, breaking into many pieces whenever they shed with the dwarves.

    It was the superiority of their weapons that had enabled the vastly outnumbered dwarves to defend until now. The dwarf vige was behind them not too far away, and women and children with no fighting ability were there. For the safety of the vige, they couldn¡¯t even retreat into the vige in case they exposed the vige and endangered the women and children.

    Han Shuo took in this scene and immediately became enraged. His crossbow had already appeared in his hand as he ran and several crossbow bolts broke through the air with a whistling sound, shooting down a man-eating monster and two goblins. The little skeleton seemed to sense Han Shuo¡¯s anger from the depths of his heart and flew towards the front. The seven bone spurs on its back shot in all directions and lines of blood appeared on the bodies of these man-eating monsters and goblins after ear-piercing sounds rang out.

    ¡°Oh, it¡¯s Han! He¡¯s here!¡± Bet, who was hoisting up an iron club and surrounded by five or six goblins, when he suddenly saw Han Shuo¡¯s figure and eximed in surprise.

    Like a wolf entering a herd of sheep, the arrival of Han Shuo and the little skeleton immediately heralded a ughter. The little skeleton was particrly fierce. Its seven bone spurs danced amongst the crowd of man-eating monsters and goblins, causing injuries and fatalities to them.

    After Han Shuo had arrived, he first summoned a few skeletal warriors and they all wielded bone daggers as they dashed towards these viins. Han Shuo himself rather held his ground and targeted the man-eating monster and goblins who had died, beginning to release the spell of ¡°Corpse Reanimation¡±.

    After failing a few times, Han Shuo still continued to remain where he stood and repeatedly chanted the incantation, under the surprised looks of the dwarves, attempting to make the bodies, who had just lost their lives, rise again.

    Finally, an ugly goblin with a crossbow bolt still sticking out of its chest suddenly stood up after Han Shuo cast his spell. It grabbed a metal club and tottered over, starting to attack the goblin next to him that was still alive. With one sess under his belt, Han Shuo calmly recalled the steps he had just taken when casting and once again cast a ¡°Corpse Reanimation¡± spell.

    He seeded once again, it was a man-eating monster this time. Under the release of Han Shuo¡¯s ¡°Corpse Reanimation¡± spell, another five or six man-eating monsters and goblins stood up, raising their weapons in ordance with Han Shuo¡¯smands and starting to attack the living man-eating monsters and goblins.

    When the man-eating monsters and goblins discovered this phenomenon, this immediately caused a strong wave of terror and panic to spread amongst them. These man-eating monsters and goblins were shocked out of their wits seeing their deadpanions stand up vacantly and attack them. Saying a few sentences in their ownnguage and pointing at Han Shuo in fright, all of them scattered like the four winds as they fled for their lives.

    Even the dwarves on the side felt a bit of fear. They all looked at Han Shuo with exceedingly odd looks, different from those they looked at him usually. Han Shuo nked and then immediately reacted. He dissolved his spell and the dead man-eating monsters and goblins fell down once again.

    ¡°Han, this magic of yours is too evil. Even we are a bit afraid.¡± Bet walked towards Han Shuo and spoke haltingly.

    Han Shuo knew that the spell of ¡°Corpse Reanimation¡± was indeed quite evil, and ordinary people would be unable to ept it. He thought for a moment and nodded, saying, ¡°Bet, I understand what you mean, but I¡¯ve done so in order to save all of you.¡±

    ¡°We understand, thank you Han. However, this kind of magic is truly hard to ept. Even the viinous man-eating monsters and goblins were scared witless by you. Heh heh, let¡¯s go. Your weapon is ready and we¡¯ll give it to you when we arrive at the vige.¡±

    ¡°You guys have finished it!¡± Han Shuo was truly astonished upon hearing that the Demonyer Edge was ready. He brought up the rear and walked towards the dwarf vige.

    The little skeleton¡¯s seven bone spurs reattached to its spine and didn¡¯t head for the dwarf vige along with Han Shuo. Rather, it followed Han Shuo¡¯s orders and looted the bodies of the dead with a practiced air.

    Following Calvin, Han Shuo came to the dwarf vige and arrived at the site where the Demonyer Edge was crafted.

    ¡°Han, this is the weapon that we¡¯ve forged ording to your requirements. Are you satisfied with it?¡± Bet pointed with the hammer in his hand at a weapon on the side as he spoke to Han Shuo.

    The Demonyer Edge was two feet long, and a cold light sparkled along its keen edge. The body was dark brown with three raised thorns at the spiky tip. It was heavy in his hand.

    Han Shuo held the Demonyer Edge and carefully observed it, suddenly stabbing the whetstone beneath it. The Demonyer Edge sank into the whetstone.

    Nodding, Han Shuo looked at the somewhat uneasy Calvin in satisfaction. He smiled, ¡°Elder, thank you for your crafting. I really like this weapon.¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, as long as you like it. This weapon has ck iron and ck gold mixed in as well as more than ten rare metals. I¡¯m also very satisfied with this weapon.¡± Calvin breathed a sigh of relief and looked at the Demonyer Edge as he spoke.

    ¡°Be on the alert, man-eating monster and goblins may appear again during this period of time. I will leave for a while and will bring your winter rations with me next time I visit. Make sure to take care.¡±

    After reminding these dwarves, Han Shuo eagerly returned to the cemetery of death, circting the magic within his body. He used the essence of his blood as a circuit to the Demonyer Edge, refining the weapon for the next three days and three nights ording to the memories left behind by Chu Cang Lan. Han Shuo¡¯s blood was intermixed with magical yuan as it slowly flowed into the Demonyer Edge.

    After three days, Han Shuo was drained and worn out and felt that his magical yuan was a running dry. The originally dark-brown Demonyer Edge had turned dark red. After Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan recovered over the next couple of days, he started practicing the ¡°Law of Activating Magic¡± with the Demonyer Edge, attempting to manipte the weapon with his mind.

    During this process, the meridians of Han Shuo¡¯s body would asionally swell painfully. Han Shuo still gritted his teeth against the enormous impact of the waterfall on this day, continuously using magical yuan to refine the meridians in his body. He suddenly sank into a mental state.

    Under unbeknownst circumstances, Han Shuo slowly woke up. He discovered that at some unknown time, he had already fallen into the deep pool. When he emerged from the frigid waters of the deep pool, he suddenly discovered that the Demonyer Edge had disappeared. Startled, he wanted to quickly find the Demonyer Edge again.

    At this moment, a dark-red light suddenly shot out from the waters and flew towards Han Shuo. Han Shuo had thought danger had found him and was nning on evading it when he realized that a bizarre feeling had risen in his heart. It was as if the dark red light shooting towards him had some sort of connection to him.

    He first nked, and then a thought shed through his mind. Suddenly enlightened, Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts moved. The dark red light shooting towards him suddenly started dancing in mid air. Han Shuo then sensed a fish in the waters of the pool and a thought bubbled up in his mind. The fish was instantaneously pierced through by the Demonyer Edge.

    ¡°It looks like I¡¯ve seeded.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s left hand reached out and the Demonyer Edge shot out from the waters,nding in Han Shuo¡¯s palm.

    Circting his magical yuan, the speed of the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡± was many times faster than usual. Han Shuo was shocked again, and then suddenly discovered that traces of frosty air was leaking out from the Demonyer Edge, held in his left hand with the mystical cial air being infused into it. Because the Demonyer Edge was pointed at the deep pool, ayer of ice had already formed on the surface of the pool as the waters gave off frigid air.

    He knew that these were the signs of having broken through the ¡°open passages¡± and reaching the ¡°molded spirit realm¡±. Han Shuo was gratified to know that after a few life and death struggles and several sleepless nights of magic training, he had finally once again achieved a breakthrough.

    Han Shuo¡¯s magic had once again improved now, and a most excellent Demonyer Edge was now in his hands. Han Shuo felt that it was time to leave the cemetery of death and thoroughly eliminate the threat known as Grover.

    Walking out from the tombs in the mountains behind the Academy, Han Shuo didn¡¯t immediately find Phoebe. Han Shuo harbored feelings of affection towards Fanny. He had nned on asking her a few questions on magical knowledge after theirst meeting, but it was a pity that he had received the ck gold ore from Phoebe and had eagerly returned to the cemetery of death.

    The upper scroll of ¡°Necromancy Magic¡± contained much knowledge that Han Shuo did not fully understand. This scroll didn¡¯t have many notes. As an adept mage, Fanny was bound to have a more in-depth understanding. Therefore, Han Shuo had long since noted the topics he didn¡¯t understand and wanted to find a chance to ask Fanny again.

    The Babylon Academy of Magic and Force had an exalted position within the Empire. Although Grover hated Han Shuo¡¯s guts, he wouldn¡¯t dare brazenly make a move against Han Shuo on school grounds. The teachers of various majors were all quite strong, apart from the necromancy major, the other majors had even more stronger characters acting as overseers. Even if the killers of ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ came looking for him, it was impossible for them to leave alive once they had been discovered.

    It was now dusk and the students were now rxing or eating meals after a day of learning. Han Shuo didn¡¯t directly go look for Fanny at herb, afraid that this would attract the attention of others. He waited a while until the sky hadpletely darkened, before walking to the small building that Fanny lived in without anyone knowing.

    Han Shuo had stayed in the necromancy major for so long and had long since learned of where Fanny lived because of his feelings for her. He skillfully deciphered the appropriate direction under the cover of the night, walking to the teacher dormitory building in which Fanny resided.

 Chapter 81: Caught in the act in bed

    Chapter 81: Caught in the act in bed

    Fanny¡¯s quarters bordered those of some other female dark major teachers. However, there was still a bit of a distance between them. His sensitive perceptions could clearly hear voices in low conversation from within the teacher¡¯s dormitory building. It looked like they had yet to go to sleep at this time.

    All of the teachers at the Babylon Academy were extraordinarily strong. When Han Shuo neared, he purposefully concealed his presence and even slowed down the rate of his heartbeat.

    Just as Han Shuo arrived in front of Fanny¡¯s door and was about to reach out and knock, the door suddenly opened. Fanny was wearing silk pajamas and an expanse of snow white skin showed at her chest. She was wearing the ruby ne that Han Shuo had given her, further disying her beauty.

    ¡°Bryan, what are you doing here so surreptitiously?¡± Fanny was a bit unhappy as she looked at Han Shuo.

    Looking around, Han Shuo asked askance, ¡°Eh, how did you know I was here?¡±

    ¡°I felt that someone was following recently times and so became wary. I¡¯ve cast ¡°Life Reconnaissance¡± in front of the door so I discovered you as soon as you came over!¡± Fanny rolled her eyes at Han Shuo and said in an ill temper upon seeing him cast shifty looks around the area.

    ¡°Eh, Master Fanny can Ie inside?¡± After all, it wasn¡¯t too convenient to stand and talk at the door. Add to this that several teachers had yet to go to sleep, it would be a bad thing if they were seen.

    Who knew that when Han Shuo spoke these words, Fanny¡¯s charming cheeks would flush faintly red. Fanny hesitated, then also stuck out her head to look around, finally dragging Han Shuo in with a red face and hastily closing the door.

    Han Shuo discovered the room was filled with the presence of femininity when he entered Fanny¡¯s room. Pink bed curtains, neat and clean tables and carpet, as well as some elegant decorations that demonstrated the female identity of this room¡¯s owner.

    A thought suddenly striking him, Han Shuo remembered that in his original world, ordinary young girls wouldn¡¯t easily let strangers into their rooms. The room of each girl was the window to her soul. One would be unable to enter without her eptance. When his thoughts travelled here, ripples grew in Han Shuo¡¯s heart as he looked at Fanny with a hot gaze.

    ¡°What are you looking at? Where have you been again the past couple days? There will be a test in half a month and you must participate, otherwise the school authorities have the power to expel you.¡± Fanny red at Han Shuo viciously upon seeing his hot and bothered nce, then seemed to think of something and turned her back to Han Shuo, taking off the ruby ne from her snow white neck.

    ¡°I know. I¡¯vee to find you this time in order to ask you a few questions regarding magical knowledge. Eh? Why did you take the ne off? I feel that you are very beautiful and moving when you wear this ne.¡±

    ¡°None of your business. It¡¯s already night now, I¡¯ve taken the ne off in order to prepare to rest. If you want to ask about magical knowledge, thene find me in theb tomorrow during the day. It¡¯s already night, so it won¡¯t be too good if someone discovers that you¡¯re here.¡± Fanny look at Han Shuo, out of sorts.

    Footsteps sounded outside the door at this moment, and they had already arrived in front of Fanny¡¯s door within the blink of an eye. The door was knocked on twice as a female voice sounded, ¡°Master Fanny, you¡¯re not asleep yet, can Ie in?¡±

    It was truly that whatever one was worried about would happen. Fanny and Han Shuo looked at each other, their faces both stilling at once. Fanny then red viciously at Han Shuo and then reached out with her hand to make a shushing motion. She opened her her mouth to say, ¡°Master Cami, just a moment, I¡¯ll open the door for you shortly!¡±

    After Fanny spoke, she suddenly started walking around in the room, her eyes patrolling over everywhere. It looked like she was trying to find a hiding spot for Han Shuo. Fanny¡¯s room wasn¡¯t too big, there didn¡¯t seem to be a ce able to hide Han Shuo¡¯s entire body. In her anxiety, Fanny suddenly saw her room and pointed at it to Han Shuo, her charming face full of joy.

    Seeing that Fanny was so anxious, Han Shuo shrugged his shoulders and followed her wishes, standing up from the side of the table and walking towards her bed with the pink bed curtains. He hopped onto Fanny¡¯s bed with a whoosh, an expression of great enjoyment showing on his face.

    Having walked to the door, Fanny was about to open the door when she was extremely surprised after turning her head. Her mouth opened with no sound, her right hand pointed frantically at the bottom of the bed. It looked like she¡¯d meant for Han Shuo to hide beneath the bed, but Han Shuo had gotten the wrong impression and actually already gotten on the bed that she¡¯d never allowed strange males to touch before.

    ¡°Master Fanny, hurry and open the door!¡± Cami stood in front of the door and could already see from the light that Fanny was at the door. She opened her mouth and hurried Fanny.

    Lying sideways on the bed, a wonderful fragrance wafted around him, Han Shuo ignored the anxious Fanny giving hints by the door and smiled as he undid the bed curtains, taking Fanny¡¯s nicely scented nkets and covering his body.

    Fanny gritted her teeth angrily with regards to Han Shuo¡¯s actions, but Cami¡¯s continued hurrying in front of the door left Fanny no other choice but to open the room door and pretend to be calm. She smiled and responded, ¡°Master Cami, howe you¡¯vee to find me sote at night!¡±

    Cami was an adept mage of the dark major and was already middle aged. Her looks could only be described as ordinary. When she walked into Fanny¡¯s room, she automatically sat down next to the table and said, ¡°Your necromancy major actually won out over the light major through the trials of the Dark Forestst time. This has given us a lot of face. Our major will be heading out for our trials shortly. I¡¯m here to ask you for tips and tricks!¡±

    ¡°What tips and tricks? Our major only managed to hunt down those magical creaturesst time simply because we were lucky. Master Cami you¡¯ve been in the dark major for many years and have taken the students out on many outings. You should be very experienced, I think you¡¯re asking the wrong person bying to me.¡± Fanny felt ufortable with Cami in the room, deathly afraid that she would discover Han Shuo¡¯s presence.

    The more she worried, the more her gaze flitted to the edge of her bed. She continued to keep an eye on the movements on her bed, afraid that Han Shuo would emit some sounds and arouse Cami¡¯s attentions.

    ¡°Master Fanny¡¯s bed curtains are very pretty, where did you buy them?¡± Cami suddenly stood up and unexpectedly walked towards Fanny¡¯s bed, her eyes staring at Fanny¡¯s bed curtains and an expression of extreme interest appeared on her face.

    Her heart shuddered as Fanny quickly closed the distance, arriving before Cami and sat down to block the former¡¯s line of sight. Her spine ramrod straight, she hastily said,¡± From the Mier Decorations Shop. If Master Cami likes them, then you can go buy them as well. One gold coin should be enough. Um...¡±

    Fanny¡¯s bed was not that big to begin with, Han Shuo was already flush against the wall as hey on his side. In her hasty anxiousness, Fanny abruptly sat down on the bed and actually ced her butt on the back of Han Shuo¡¯s left hand. When Fanny came to the end of her exnations to Cami, her light ¡°um¡± already exined that she also felt things were inappropriate.

    ¡°So you bought it from the the Mier Decorations Shop, no wonder it¡¯s so pretty. Too bad I¡¯m old and not as pretty as Master Fanny. If I bought these curtains, I¡¯ll be sure to be ridiculed behind my back.¡±

    Master Fanny¡¯s well rounded bottom was sitting on the back of Han Shuo¡¯s hand. Han Shuo was feeling the wondrous sensation as his heart was like a capering monkey and his mind like a galloping horse. Just as he was enjoying the sensation, he suddenly felt that the wondrous sensation on the back of his hand was no longer there. Disappointment rose from Han Shuo¡¯s heart as he carefully snuck a peak. He discovered that Fanny¡¯s body still remained in the same position, but had used the muscles of her waist to slightly lift her wonderful behind.

    The ce where Fanny was sitting just happened to block Cami¡¯s line of sight. If Fanny shifted her body, it was very likely that Han Shuo would be discovered. Fanny clearly felt that she had sat in a ce she shouldn¡¯t have sat in, yet couldn¡¯t move her body and could only lift her buttocks to avoid Han Shuo taking advantage of her.

    Watching from the back, Han Shuo could see a red flush creep up Fanny¡¯s neck, slender shoulders, and delectable back. Because she had tightened her body, Fanny¡¯s curves were fully on disy and her well-rounded behind fellpletely into Han Shuo¡¯s view.

    Han Shuo had no idea what Fanny and Cami talked about afterwards. His lustful gaze roved greedily over Fanny¡¯s body. As a mage, it was very difficult for Fanny to maintain her position that was akin to a horse¡¯s stances. Her body started trembling after a while. Perhaps it was because she could no longer hold up, or felt that Han Shuo should have moved his hand from the area, Fanny¡¯s body rxed and her two butt cheeks dropped down as she once again sat down.

    Another light ¡°um¡± emitted from Fanny¡¯s mouth. Han Shuo had flipped his hand from the back to his palm facing up. His fingers curled vaguely from the pressure of Fanny¡¯s buttocks, curling into the space between them, immediately causing Fanny to cry out slightly as she couldn¡¯t bear up beneath it.

    ¡°Master Fanny, are you alright? Your face is so red and your body is trembling so. Are you sick? Let me take a look for you?¡±

    ¡°No, nothing much. If you don¡¯t have any other matters Master Cami, why don¡¯t you leave? I... I¡¯m tired and want to rest early.¡±

    Fanny trembled as she tried to lift her butt as she spoke, wanting to stand up from the edge of the bed. Han Shuo had been enjoying the well rounded, slippery sensation of Fanny¡¯s butt. When he lost that touch, he subconsciously reached out his hand and plunged into the area between Fanny¡¯s butt that she had just lifted up a tiny bit.

    Fanny had been about to stand up straight when her body suddenly spasmed because of the abrupt stimulus to her body. Her body once more sat down uncontrobly, swallowing Han Shuo¡¯s rampaging left hand.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong, what¡¯s wrong Master Fanny? Something¡¯s dreadfully wrong with your body!¡± Cami said frantically and then lifted the bed curtains, wanting to relieve the dazed Fanny from their embrace. She suddenly saw Han Shuo¡¯s burning hot gaze and a startled shriek emitted from Cami¡¯s mouth.

    This scream startled the dazed Fanny awake. She recollected her senses and hastily stood up, not paying any attention to Han Shuo. She frantically exined in a panic, ¡°Master Cami, he¡¯s my student and hase to ask me some questions. I was afraid you¡¯d misunderstand. That¡¯s why I told him to hide.¡±

    ¡°Master Fanny, you don¡¯t have to exin. This is your private matter. Heh heh, no wonder you¡¯ve rejected the advanced of many young men and ignored even Gene. So this is why. Your rtionship is to the stage of sleeping together, this is truly surprising. Master Fanny I apologize, I¡¯ve disturbed you. I¡®ll leave now!¡± Cami eximed in shock and apologized in a bizarre voice, walking directly outside.

    Fanny was in an extreme state of panic and disarray, seeking to hold Cami back and wanting to exin. But no matter how she exined, Cami continued to retain an ambiguous expression and disy an ¡°I understand¡± expression. She chuckled merrily as she walked out of Fanny¡¯s room.

    When Cami had left Fanny¡¯s room, Fanny, standing in front of the door, circled the table in her panic and then seemed to remember something. She made threatening gestures at the Han Shuo still lying in bed, crying out, ¡°Damned Bryan, I¡¯m absolutely not letting you off the hook today.¡±

    Fanny had already jumped onto the bed when she finished speaking andmenced a punishment of fists and feet with a face full of wrathful anger, her little fistsnding on Han Shuo¡¯s chest like rain.

    As a mage, Fanny had no way to use her fists and feet to attack and cause any damage to Han Shuo, but Han Shuo was utterly mesmerized as he watched the highly aggravated Fanny wave her little fists around, tottering and faltering from her movements and even revealing a portion of her snow white, slender thigh because her skirt had be hiked up.

    First reaching out a hand to pretend to stop her, Han Shuo was hard pressed to bear up beneath the agitation of his heart. In his feverish mind, he pushed Fanny down onto the bed and used his strong body topletely press down on Fanny¡¯s well endowed, perfect body. He kept saying, ¡°Master Fanny, calm down, calm down.¡±

    Han Shuo paid lip service to asking Fanny to calm down while covering her with his body. Feeling the firm, pert tips of Fanny¡¯s breasts on his chest, his chest tightly adhered to Fanny¡¯s. The friction between the two bodies under Fanny¡¯s struggles caused Han Shuo to slowly lose himself.

    Fanny was breathless with anger. He was the one more impulsive than any other and yet he dared tell her to calm down. The pain in her hands bing more and more pronounced, she couldn¡¯t move no matter how she struggled. As she watched Han Shuoe closer and closer, her heart was extremely agitated as she said continuously, ¡°Damn it, stop already or I won¡¯t go easy on you!¡±

 Chapter 82: The Eye of Darkness

    Chapter 82: The Eye of Darkness

    A howl of agony rang out as Han Shuo clutched his lower body, moving off of Fanny. He curled up in pain as his mental state returnedpletely to normal.

    Fanny sat up, dusted herself off and got off the bed as if nothing had happened. She flicked a proud nce at Han Shuo and snorted lightly, ¡°Well, do you recognize my strength now?¡±

    ¡°Master Fanny, there was no need to be so vicious, was there?¡± Han Shuo grimaced as he clutched at his abdomen in pain.

    ¡°Damn it, how dare you say anything. I¡¯ve let the matter at the pool go, but you¡¯ve... you¡¯ve vited me again! I¡¯ve already gone easy on you by not killing you!¡± Fanny was filled with rage at the thought of what had just happened as she red at Han Shuo irately.

    Han Shuo scrambled down adroitly from the bed and sat down next to Fanny, his face full of seriousness. He said calmly, ¡°Let bygones be bygones. I¡¯m going to recite a magical incantation for you.¡±

    Fanny saw that Han Shuo was all business and knew that he was purposefully shifting topics from what had just happened. A surge of rage grew in her heart and she was about to open her mouth and furiously berate Han Shuo when she suddenly heard Han Shuo¡¯s incantation. Fanny paid it no heed at first, but was then astounded when Han Shuo came to the end. A bafflingly excited light shone in her clear eyes as they focused on Han Shuo. She asked with a trembling voice, ¡°This is necromancy magic... I can feel it, but howe I¡¯ve never heard this incantation before?¡±

    ¡°This is an incantation for an advanced magic, ¡®Canopy of Necromancy¡¯. It¡¯s necromancy magic that has been lost for many years. I also gained it unwittingly.¡± Han Shuo exined slowly upon seeing Fanny¡¯s overjoyed expression.

    ¡°Just what is going on, exin it to me clearly! And are there any other lost necromancy magics? Hurry up and tell me!¡± Fanny had always been embroiled in the study of necromancy magic and had long since forgotten her earlier rage upon hearing the ancient incantation, that had been lost for ages,e out from Han Shuo¡¯s mouth. Rather, she asked him frantically instead.

    Internally heaving a sigh of relief, Han Shuo first gathered his thoughts calmly and then nodded, saying, ¡°There¡¯s also an evil ¡°Corpse Reanimation¡± magic. I found it unwittingly. Master Fanny, you should know that these are all lost magics of our necromancy major, so I need you to temporarily keep this a secret.¡±

    Master Fanny wasn¡¯t dumb, she immediately understood what Han Shuo intended and nodded her head like a chick pecking at rice, urging him on with her eyes.

    Han Shuo then went over the magical incantation and hand gestures for ¡°Corpse Reanimation¡± and ¡°Canopy of Necromancy¡± in detail for Fanny. He then brought out some knowledge that he had yet to fully grasp and inquired Fanny with them one by one. Fanny was delighted withoutparison and had long since forgotten Han Shuo¡¯s discourteous actions towards her earlier. She patiently exined and detailed the iprehension that Han Shuo had run into.

    Han Shuo understood that he would be casting these spells sooner orter, but, he didn¡¯t intend to let others know that he knew these secrets before his strength was enough.

    As an adept mage of the necromancy major and someone Han Shuo admired, Han Shuo hadn¡¯t nned on continuously hiding the truth from Fanny. Particrly when she was someone whose bark was worse than her bite, and was actually very caring towards him. After all, there was still some knowledge that he¡¯d have to ask Fanny about in order to gain full understanding.

    Han Shuo stayed in Fanny¡¯s room and talked until the middle of the night unbeknownst to both of them. The previously excited Fanny started yawning sessively, then discovered that it waste. Fanny covered her mouth as she yawned and saidzily to Han Shuo, ¡°It¡¯ste, I¡¯m going to rest. I¡¯ve exined these questions to you, so you should return to the dorms and rest too. Oh right, you haven¡¯t ever stayed in the dorms I¡¯ve arranged for you right?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo got up and walked to the door. Just as Han Shuo was about to push the door open and leave, Fanny suddenly said, ¡°Bryan, don¡¯t think I¡¯ve forgotten what you¡¯ve done to me. However, if you can apply yourself to your studies and graduate early from the necromancy major, perhaps I will forgive you!¡±

    Han Shuo started, halting in front of the room door and turned his head to see Fanny looking at him with expectation. Her expression was grave as she said seriously, ¡°Bryan, with your talent this shouldn¡¯t be difficult. As long as you¡¯re willing to work hard, you¡¯re sure to be a very strong necromancer, and then you¡¯ll be able to get everything you want!¡±

    ¡°Does that include you, Master Fanny?¡± Han Shuo asked subconsciously.

    Fanny¡¯s heart trembled as she looked at Han Shuo leering at her. Her cheeks suddenly reddened and she became irate, admonishing, ¡°Get out! Scram, you sex-crazed bad boy!¡±

    His heart full of joy, Han Shuo felt that Fanny seemed to be a bit interested in him. From their recent conversations, he could tell that Fanny had certain expectations for him. He thought carefully and suddenly understood. He realized that if he wished to gain Fanny¡¯s heart, his current strength and status were truly a bit unrealistic.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll work hard. You¡¯ll see soon!¡± Han Shuo whispered as he paused in front of the door, then quickly left in the darkness.

    After he departed from Fanny¡¯s room, Han Shuo didn¡¯t return to the dorm room that Fanny had arranged for him. There were people guarding the doors and some of the rooms were connected to each other. Han Shuo didn¡¯t wish for others to discover his tracks, in case he raised the suspicions of ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± and Grover.

    Particrly as he¡¯d just heard Fanny say that she¡¯d felt someone had been following her recently. This made Han Shuo be even warier, afraid to exposing himself in front of others.

    Turning over these thoughts in his head, he felt that perhaps he should buy a house outside of the school grounds, otherwise he wouldn¡¯t even have a ce to stay in the future when he returned to the Empire. If he had his own personal ce, he wouldn¡¯t need to travel to the cemetery at the back of the Academy every time he wanted to activate the transportation matrix.

    Just as Han Shuo was quietly weighing this matter in his heart and walking to the side of the dark major library, he suddenly heard the sound of pages being turned. This caused his heart to suddenly contract in surprise as he immediately concealed himself noiselessly in the shadows of a corner around the library.

    Moving his neck slightly, three original demons flew out soundlessly, sneaking into the library under the cover of deep night. Two figures held faint light in their hands, and Han Shou saw two familiar faces with the help of the feeble light source ¡ª the old mage Duke and the senior knight Erick.

    Han Shuo had originally received the round, green ball, that opened the cemetery of death, from these people in the cemetery in the mountains behind the Academy. The confident Erick had thought that Han Shuo would be dead without a doubt after his fighting aura imbued sh. Thus, he hadn¡¯t checked Han Shuo¡¯s body. After a few months, Han Shuo hadn¡¯t thought that he¡¯d see these two again in the dark major library.

    ¡°Be careful. Strong people are abound in this Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. Don¡¯t alert others, or we¡¯ll be in big trouble.¡± Duke immediately admonished lightly upon seeing Erick flipping through pages withrge motions.

    ¡°We still haven¡¯t discovered it, the books of the necromancy major have no record of anything to do with ¡®The Eye of Darkness¡¯.¡± Erick flipped pages with a softer hand as heined in a low voice.

    ¡°Huh. ¡®The Eye of Darkness¡¯ is the key to opening the cemetery of death. We finally obtained it after a great deal of effort, to think that it would suddenly disappear. When Dn diedst time, the item was no longer on him. We went back to his ce and searched all of it, but still found nothing. Why would that item suddenly disappear? This is strange indeed. The Babylon Academy of Magic and Force has many books regarding necromancy. Perhaps we can find some clues. Otherwise we can¡¯t afford to be targets when the higher ranks throw the me around.¡± Duke red at Erick and said lowly.

    On the outside, thanks to the original demons¡¯ eavesdropping, Han Shuo could thoroughly eavesdrop on their conversation and expressions. He finally understood that the round ball he held was the ¡°Eye of Darkness¡±. It looked like the two were making a visit to the dark major libraryte at night because they, too, had the same mindset as him, wanting to research the secrets of the ¡°Eye of Darkness¡± in the library.

    After a short while, the two had gained nothing and left the library dejectedly. They left swiftly using a small road leading to the back of the Academy.

    From their conversation, Han Shuo could conclude that the two seemed to be a part of some sort of organization. He had now obtained the ¡°Eye of Darkness¡± and wanted to know more of their secrets, and see if they would be a threat to him. He made use of the three original demons to trail them from a distance, slowly moving to the mountains in the back along with them.

    The two didn¡¯t pass through the cemetery in the mountains, only changing their direction after they¡¯d left the academy grounds. They left quickly, using the streets of the northern district, finally walking into an isted yard in the northern district.

    The three original demons had followed them here and were about to sneak into the yard for a good peek, ording to Han Shuo¡¯s instructions, when he suddenly felt the original demons crash into something. ¡°Who?!¡± Immediately sounded out from the yard.

    Han Shuo was startled and immediately understood that some sort of boundary must have been set up around the yard. Otherwise the original demons, being without shape or form, would have never been discovered. The original demons seemed to sense danger as Han Shuo was recovering from his surprise. They retreated quickly, with Han Shuo hastily manipting them with his mind, bidding them flee with all possible speed in three different directions leading to the northern street.

    After a while, the original demons returned to Han Shuo¡¯s body from three different directions, allowing him to heave a sigh of relief. He remembered the yard, knowing that there was a strong expert inside and temporarily gave up his continual observation.

    He discovered that these were the streets of the northern district just as he was about to leave. This yard was not too far away from Phoebe¡¯s residence. The sky was already growing slightly brighter at the moment. Han Shuo remembered the rations he had promised the dwarves and spent a silver coin for breakfast on the ride, then walked to Phoebe¡¯s residence.

    When Han Shuo arrived at Phoebe¡¯s residence, he immediately noticed that the presence of guards around her residence was much more numerous than before. Exceedingly soft sounds of breathing sounded from both sides of the door. It looked like experts were lying in wait inside. Apart from that, there was also a ce within the building in which Han Shuo couldn¡¯t feel the flow of air. This let him know that a sort of field or barrier had been set up inside.

    Han Shuo knocked lightly when he arrived on Phoebe¡¯s doorstep. Someone swiftly arrived as soon as he¡¯d knocked, but didn¡¯t directly open the door, asking softly behind the door instead, ¡°Who is it?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m called Bryan, here to see Miss Phoebe!¡± Han Shuo stood outside the door and said softly.

    ¡°Please wait a moment!¡± The person inside responded as another set of footsteps quickly faded away. After a while, two sets of footsteps could be heard from the other side of the door.

    ¡°Is it Bryan?¡± Fabian¡¯s voice rang out through the door.

    ¡°It¡¯s me.¡± Han Shuo responded.

    Sighing in relief, Fabian instructed, ¡°Open the door, it is indeed Bryan.¡±

    The doors were opened to reveal Fabian, standing beside two swordsmen, who wore silver armor. Their faces were weathered and coarse, bearing the traces of many years of standing beneath the wind and sun. It looked like they were two experts.

    ¡°Hurry ande on in! I haven¡¯t seen you for ten days now. Phoebe often mentions you around me, saying that we¡¯ll forgo a lot of hassle with you on our side and your extraordinary reflexes.¡± Although a smile appeared on Fabian¡¯s face, he was obviously quite weary.

    ¡°It looks like life hasn¡¯t been that easy for you. Last time I was here, security wasn¡¯t as tight as it is now!¡± Han Shuo swept his gaze over Fabian as he teased him.

    Sighing lightly, Fabian said, ¡°Don¡¯t mention it. Since the banquet, Miss Phoebe has been the victim of assassination attempts three times in the past ten days. Each has been more vicious than thest. These people are from the Battlefire mercenary band, Miss Phoebe has spent a lot of money in order to hire them, but in thest couple of days, they¡¯ve had three of theirs injured and two dead. It looks like Grover is starting to be anxious, but our circumstances have be more and more dangerous!¡±

    They walked towards the main hall as they talked. Han Shuo could sense two more mages and one warrior in the corners of the surroundings, they seemed to be exceedingly strong. With so many experts protecting her and Phoebe¡¯s strength as a swordmaster, Grover and ¡°Shadow Ghost¡¯s¡± people must surely be extremely frightening with such a high number of casualties.

    Three original demons once again flew out soundlessly from the back of Han Shuo¡¯s neck. They avoided the boundary that the Battlefire mercenary band had set and hid in three different parts of the room, silently observing everything around them.

    After a while, Phoebe walked in with a tall beauty with fiery-red hair, pinned up in a ponytail. The girl¡¯s skin was copper-colored and her body was tall, athletic, and buff. Her breasts, butt, and body wererge, and she wore a broadsword on her back. She too looked like a swordsman.

    ¡°Bryan, it¡¯s good to finally see you again. This is great!¡± Phoebe said in surprise as she looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Phoebe, this is the magical Bryan that you¡¯ve talked about?¡± The athletic girl with the fiery-red hair looked at Han Shuo skeptically as she spoke.

    ¡°Yes, Candice!¡±

    ¡°Let me see if he¡¯s as amazing as you say!¡± Candice snorted lightly as she pulled out the broadsword behind her in one movement, suddenly shing downwards at Han Shuo. When the broadsword was unsheathed, red mes immediately crept up onto the surface of the entire de like a red dragon¡¯s breath. It looked like she was also a mage swordsman.

 Chapter 83: Existing and complementing each other

    Chapter 83: Existing andplementing each other

    Han Shuo never would have thought that this woman would make such a move out of the blue. She¡¯d only said one sentence before turning to action. The broadsword made its way towards him, its fiery heat already causing some difort to his skin.

    Snorting coldly, the Demonyer Edge suddenly appeared in Han Shuo¡¯s left hand. He infused it with magical yuan in the manner of the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡±, making the dark red Demonyer Edge suddenly emanate faint amounts of frigid, purple air. The temperature indoors suddenly changed, Candice¡¯s side was fiery hot, while Han Shuo¡¯s was cially cold.

    Their two swords hadn¡¯t even met when the two hot and cold sts met each other. Clouds of white smoke billowed out, but what surprised Phoebe was that Han Shuo¡¯s purple frosty air was different from any other ice magic she had seen before. It rather seemed like something living, and could even proceed in a twisted manner.

    When Han Shuo and Candice¡¯s swords connected, a violent force, interspersed with fighting aura, crashed into Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge like an iron hammer. Han Shuo bedraggedly backed up a few steps, but the fighting aura found it difficult to proceed after surging into the Demonyer Edge. It couldn¡¯t break through the Demonyer Edge¡¯s resistance to hurt Han Shuo.

    It was rather Candice who suddenly cried out in shock. When the white fog dissipated and Han Shuo once more looked upon Candice, the broadsword in her hands already had arge chip in it. It looked like the Demonyer Edge had harmed it.

    Candice looked like she possessed the strength of a senior swordsman, and her strength was even more unfathomable because she also possessed fire magic. The broadsword in her hand should have been a magical sword of exceedingly high quality, one that enhanced the power of the fire magics it was imbued with. Who would¡¯ve thought that such a good quality sword would immediately be marked by Han Shuo¡¯s.

    Just as Candice looked at the broadsword in her hand with a look of shock and anger, seemingly wanting to pursue a fight, Phoebe, standing off on the side, suddenly spoke up. ¡°Alright Candice, Bryan¡¯s forte isn¡¯t his brute strength. I¡¯ve already said his amazingnesses from his extraordinary senses.¡±

    ¡°He, he ruined my magical sword!¡± Candice first red at Han Shuo and thenined to Phoebe.

    ¡°Silly, you were asking for it. If you don¡¯t improve your brash temper, you¡¯ll suffer from a lot of disadvantages in the future!¡± Phoebe flicked a resigned nce at Candice and tried to speak a few words out of goodwill. As her beautiful eyes looked over Han Shuo, Phoebe disyed an exceedingly interested expression. She eximed in astoundment, ¡°Is this the weapon you wanted to forge? Can I have a look at it?¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s nothing to see, it¡¯s just a bit sharper than ordinary weapons!¡± Han Shuo put the Demonyer Edge away without a change in expression, only smiling at Phoebe once he¡¯d put it away.

    ¡°Huh! Grinch!¡± Phoebe eximed softly and then pointed at Candice, introducing her to Han Shuo. ¡°This is the vice captain of the Battlefire mercenary band, Candice. She¡¯s a friend that I¡¯ve known for a while. Although her temper is a bit brash, she¡¯s a nice person. Don¡¯t mind her!¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo flicked a nce at Candice, smiling, ¡°I won¡¯t mind, but I hope she doesn¡¯t hold a grudge, heh heh!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s just a magical sword, and it¡¯s notpletely broken. I¡¯m not that miserly. Phoebe, you chat about your private matters, I¡¯ll go guard the door outside. I hope that damned Grover wille to his senses.¡± Candice red at Han Shuo with disdain, and then walked outside with look of heartache on her face as she looked at the broadsword in her hand.

    As he watched Candice walk out of the room, Han Shuo felt that although this girl was a bit hot tempered, she wasn¡¯t the petty, grudge-holding sort. Otherwise she wouldn¡¯t have left so easily.

    ¡°I¡¯vee to purchase some rations from you, and would like to ask you to find a secluded residence for me. It doesn¡¯t have to be big, as long as it¡¯s guaranteed that no one will find me easily.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t conceal anything as he looked at Phoebe, directly speaking frankly.

    ¡°No problem, how much food do you need?¡± Phoebe was quite decisive and didn¡¯t hesitate at all. She agreed first, and then asked how much food was needed after.

    ¡°Roughly enough for a hundred people to weather the winter.¡± Han Shuo responded.

    Phoebe looked at Han Shuo oddly as soon as he¡¯d spoken. When he started to feelpletely uneasy from her gaze, Phoebe asked, perplexed, ¡°What are you going to do with enough winter rations for a hundred people? Are you nning on leaving the Empire?¡±

    Shaking his head wryly, Han Shuo knew that she would be suspicious. He said, ¡°Don¡¯t think too much, I¡¯m helping friends resolve a difficult matter. I won¡¯t leave the Empire in the short term without getting rid of Grover first.¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s no problem regarding the food, but you¡¯ll have to give me a few days to prepare it. As for a secluded residence, I advise you to not live alone outside for the time being because Grover and the members of ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ have continuously viewed you as a thorn in their side. If I look for a residence for you through my means, that may enable Grover to pick up a few clues.¡±

    ¡°Mm, if you don¡¯t mind, you can stay here at my ce for now. This way we can help each other as well. When the threat of Grover is neutralized, I can leave this house to you and we¡¯ll return to the Guild again, what do you think?¡± Phoebe thought for a moment and looked directly at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo thought carefully about Phoebe¡¯s suggestion and felt that what she said did make some sense. However, he was less enthused about epting the house. After all, even if the threat of Grover was eradicated, there was still a threat if an enormous killer organization like ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± knew of his hiding ce.

    ¡°I know what you¡¯re worried about, so don¡¯t worry. As long as Grover is eliminated, I have ways to ensure that ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ will never make trouble for us again. I¡¯ve formally taken control of the Guildtely and am collecting evidence on Grover¡¯s crime. Grandpa Andrew is also fully supporting me. Grandpa Andrew has even found the tracks of old thing Grover¡¯s mistress. He¡¯s already sent men to take the items back. I think Grover is even more frightened than us right now.¡± Phoebe spoke words offort upon seeing Han Shuo¡¯s brow knit into a frown.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°Then alright, I¡¯ll stay here for the time being. I¡¯ll leave after the threat of Grover has been removed!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s great! With you here, those damned assassins won¡¯t be able to ambush us!¡± Phoebe was overjoyed to see Han Shuo agree.

    Phoebe then let Fabian arrange a room for Han Shuo. Han Shuo¡¯s room was also very spacious, with all of the daily amenities present. It was separated from Phoebe¡¯s room by only one wall.

    Han Shuo sat cross legged on the bed at night and started circting his magical yuan, practicing magic as usual.

    Han Shuo¡¯s magical realm had now reached the molded spirit level. This level was a process that unlocked the potential of the brain. As long as he made it past this level, Han Shuo¡¯s memory,prehension abilities, and observation skills would all increase enormously. His mind would be much smarter than an ordinary person¡¯s.

    Except, because this level was a type of awakening the mind¡¯s potential, it was particrly risky. One misstep could result in the mind sinking into a state of befuddlement, movingpletely ording to instinct. If it was serious, then the practitioner might lose their memories or have a split personality even after recovering from that state.

    Sitting on the edge of the bed, Han Shuo¡¯s head was enveloped by a cloud of ck light. It was like a cloud of ck lightning had encircled Han Shuo¡¯s head and was continuously releasing incredible amounts of lightning.

    This status was maintained for who knew how long. Han Shuo breathed out lightly and stopped training with a sense of trepidation. After learning the horrors of the ¡°molded spirit¡± realm, Han Shuo himself proceeded with all due caution. He always chose the most quiet conditions to train, and didn¡¯t dare let any outside matters disturb him.

    After he stopped training, Han Shuo saw that he was still in a good mental state and began to cautiously meditate again, wanting to increase his mental strength through meditation. Suddenly, his mind trembled with a crash and his mental strength started gathering at a speed many times faster than normal ording to Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts.

    Death energy was present everywhere beneath the heavens and earth. Han Shuo could feel very clearly this time that through the use of mental strength, he could even slowly, bit by bit gather death energy. He could sense that the manner of gathering death energy was something that waspletely unattainable in the normal course of casting magic.

    This time¡¯s meditation brought Han Shuo into a marvelous world. Han Shuo could clearly feel that his mental strength was increasing much faster than before. Although the benefits weren¡¯t asrgepared to when he used the ¡°Eye of Darkness¡±, the mental strength gained from this type of meditation was quite pure and clean and wasn¡¯t apanied by pain.

    When Han Shuo awoke from his meditations, he suddenly remembered that the first two levels of demonic magic emphasized training the meridians and bones of the body, but the level of ¡°molded spirit¡± waspletely made for training the potential of the mind. The meditation of mages werepletely used to gather mental strength in the mind. They would never use it to train other parts of their body.

    Judging from this, if Han Shuo¡¯s brain potential received a high degree of improvement, then the speed in which his mind gathered mental strength would naturally greatly increase. This would then lead to unquantifiable benefits for when Han Shuo practiced his magic in the future.

    ¡°Indeed, it looks like the same evil methods of training from two different worlds canplement each other. It looks like even without the ¡®Eye of Darkness¡¯, the amount of mental strength I receive from meditating is much more than that of ordinary mages.¡± Han Shuo was ddened and murmured to himself.

    ¡°Phoebe, do you like this brat?¡± At this moment, light sounds of conversation floated in from next door.

    This house¡¯s soundproofing was good to begin with. If it were any other person, they absolutely would¡¯ve been unable to clearly hear the conversations from the other rooms through the wall, but Han Shuo wasn¡¯t an ordinary person. The perverseness of the sensitivity of his ears allowed him to clearly hear the murmured conversations of the two girls in the dead of the night.

    ¡°Candice, what nonsense are you talking? Bryan¡¯s helped me a few times, we¡¯re just friends who fight side by side.¡± Phoebe had lowered her voice to the utmost and argued.

    ¡°I don¡¯t think so, if it¡¯s just friends who fight side by side, then howe you keep defending him and give him such high praise? I just think you treat him a bit differently, that¡¯s all. Has something happened between you two? From my high experienced instinct as a mercenary, you absolutely treat him differently from others!¡± Candice¡¯s voice was suffused with thick mistrust and seemed to speak quite professionally.

    ¡°Really, there¡¯s nothing. We¡¯ve been friends for so many years, would I lie to you? Oh, right, what do you think of Bryan?¡±

    ¡°What do you mean?¡±

    ¡°One word ¨C strange! No matter his skills, the weird sword in his hand, or his background, it¡¯s all very strange. I think this person must have a secret he¡¯s concealing, you better be careful!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not asking you that, I knew about that a long time ago... why would I need you to remind me? I¡¯m asking you how is he as a person?¡± Phoebe¡¯s tone was odd as she asked again.

    ¡°Huh. And you say you¡¯re ordinary friends. I don¡¯t see you caring this much about your other friends. His looks are okay, but he isn¡¯t handsome or charming either. I haven¡¯te in contact with anything else, but ording to your descriptions, he doesn¡¯t seem like much. Petty, profit seeking, and sex-craved don¡¯t seem like pros!¡±

    Han Shuo heard everything they were discussing and was cursing Candice inwardly when the three original demons in a further location suddenly sensed the approach of assassins.

    There were ten assassins this time, one of those in front was dressed in all ck and his body was hovering in mid air. It looked like he was at least of the archmage level. Through the vision of the original demons, Han Shuo could see that Grover had also appeared in the distance. His face was gravely cautious, and the experts by his side, such as Ellis and the others, were all part of this time¡¯s operation. It seemed that Grover was betting everything on a single cast of the dice. He was nning on making it difficult for Phoebe to escape this time.

    The three original demons slowly changed their directions ording to Han Shuo¡¯s instructions. They carefully avoided the area covered by the archmage¡¯s mental strength, and carefully felt out the strength and numbers of thoseing. It was the wee hours of the morning at this moment, and the guards were in the heavily fortified northern part of the city. This needed a few minutes and was when security was mostx in the entire northern part of the city. It seemed like these people had already carefully scouted out the conditions here.

    Han Shuo measured the strength on his side and he felt that the odds were stacked against him. He could no longer pay attention to Phoebe and Candice¡¯s conversation. He rushed out of his room with the fastest possible speed, kicking the door to her room open with his foot and rushing inside with no reservations for anything whatsoever.

 Chapter 84: See whoâ€™s a master of concealment

    Chapter 84: See who¡¯s a master of concealment

    ¡°What, what are you doing?¡± Candice squealed in shock and suddenly stood up. Phoebe had been about to undress for bed when she saw Han Shuo rush in. She, too, was startled and hastily pulled her clothes back on, looking at Han Shuo with a face of panic.

    ¡°Grover and the people of ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ areing. Don¡¯t say useless things and think about what we need to do!¡± Han Shuo roared in a low tone at the two frantic women with a darkened face.

    Candice was still vaguely suspicious when he finished speaking and was about to express her opinions with a war face, whereas Phoebe had an extremely grave face and admonished, ¡°Listen to him Candice, Bryan wouldn¡¯t be wrong!¡±

    Candice didn¡¯t believe Han Shuo, but she believed Phoebe. Upon hearing Phoebe¡¯s words, she immediately pulled out the broadsword from her back and nodded to Phoebe, dashing out suddenly like a ball of fiery shadows. Low sounds of warning immediately came from Candice.

    Phoebe didn¡¯t waste any time and grabbed a robe from the edge of the bed, flinging it onto herself. Her space ring suddenly brightened and a longsword sparkling with cold light materialized in her hand.

    Nodding to Phoebe, Han Shuo quickly dashed outside of the house and saw that Candice was standing outside, giving orders in a low voice.

    Using the vision from the original demons, Han Shuo closed his eyes and said, ¡°Three people are approaching from the left, 130 meters away. Two warriors and one mage. The mage is the wind adept mage Ellis. An archmage along with four warriors and an archer is approaching from the front, roughly 130 meters away. There are most likely people from ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ on the roof. Several people are lying in wait in an alleyway 50 meters to the right, and they seem to beying down some sort of trap...¡±

    As if he was watching the action from above, Han Shuo continuously and swiftly detailed the particrs of the people approaching swiftly. Candice hadn¡¯t believed it at first, and would¡¯ve never believed that he could clearly detect the oers¡¯ movements from so far away, but Phoebe had immediately asked Candice to arrange people ording to Han Shuo¡¯s descriptions as soon as she walked out of the room.

    ¡°Miss Phoebe, I hope you make the preparations to retreat this time. ording to my estimations, I think even with you as a swordmaster, we are still possibly not their match. If the situation goes south, I hope you don¡¯t linger here, but no matter how dangerous it is, don¡¯t retreat to the right. It¡¯s a dead end there!¡± Han Shuo suddenly opened his eyes and stared at Phoebe as he said gravely.

    ¡°Thank you, Bryan, I know what to do. You be careful as well!¡± Phoebe trusted Han Shuo a great deal and when she saw him warn her with such a serious face, she immediately understood that it would be a dangerous battle this time. She immediately nodded gravely at Han Shuo, indicating her understanding.

    Breathing in deeply, Han Shuo willed the Demonyer Edge out of the heart of his palm and checked the dagger concealed on his body, and the steel needles strapped to his legs. He then wielded a crossbow in his left hand and bounded up a nearby tree. The shadows of the house happened topletely conceal his body. Han Shuo stared calmly towards the left, not moving an inch.

    ¡°And so they¡¯vee, everyone be careful and spread out!¡± As a swordmaster, Phoebe finally heard the footsteps and inwardly rejoiced for trusting Han Shuo. She cast a gaze at Candice on her side.

    It was only now that Candice looked in shock at the Han Shuo, who was concealed in the shadows. She had never thought that Han Shuo would truly be this amazing. Not only could he detect movement from a distance of a hundred meters, but it was as if he had a pair of eyes in the sky, thoroughly deducing all of the enemy¡¯s movements.

    Candice was a mercenary who had experienced hundreds of battles after all. After a short duration of shock, she looked at Phoebe and the two of them leapt up together. The two of them concealed themselves on either side of Han Shuo and also hid in the shadows.

    ¡°Br... Bryan, can you tell me slowly the movements of the enemy, so I can inform the people below?¡± Candice was about a meter away from Han Shuo when spoke in a soft voice.

    Maintaining his position without even a flicker of change in his expression, Han Shuo¡¯s voice was low as he faintly summarized the details of the enemies¡¯ movement. Candice held a magical item in her hand, utilizing it to give hermands to the mercenaries hidden amongst the yard.

    The three people from Grover¡¯s side, with Ellis in the lead, were the first batch to arrive. They paused on a nearby roof. Han Shuo and the others didn¡¯t move until the floating archmage appeared at the front door with the other experts from ¡°Shadow Ghost¡±. It was only then that they held their breaths, focused their concentration, and prepared to make a move.

    No one saw how the archmage moved, only that his body waspletely enveloped in a ck robe. He muttered a few lines of incantations in an almost inaudible voice, and fierce magical pulses suddenly emanated towards Phoebe¡¯s residence. The rooms all began shaking violently as if arge earthquake was taking ce.

    At the same time, the four warriors behind him swiftly spread out. One archer shifted to a roof on the side, observing the surroundings from a high vantage point. Ellis nodded to the two warriors after seeing the ground tremble and shake like a great beast awakening. The two of them leapt off and descended towards the yard.

    Whoosh whoosh whoosh whoosh whoosh.

    Five arrows suddenly appeared in the darkness, like five violent vipers submerged in deep waters. They sped swiftly to bite the two descending warriors. The two had concealed their movements and had never expected that they would face such a fierce attacks as soon as they¡¯d leapt off. They were quite shocked and frantically waved their swords to block the arrows.

    Three of the arrows were smashed to pieces, one of them was evaded by both of them, with only the one that Phoebe had shot out nailing directly into one of the warrior¡¯s calves. When the twonded, they triggered the field that had beenid out there and three bolts of lightning suddenly appeared in the air. Under the illumination of the lightning, Han Shuo could clearly see multiple strands of metal wire as thin as hair tangled together. When the twonded, their ankles were caught in the metal wires.

    The lightning crept amongst the metal wires, turning the area into a brilliant silver with strong electricity flowing through it. The two people¡¯s bodies spasmed as they emitted ghastly howls. The one who wasn¡¯t injured quickly reacted after being electrocuted and thrust his sword out to cut through the metal wires and escape. The other one, with an arrow in his calf, foamed at the mouth and his hair was a burned mess as he slowly fell down into the metal.

    ¡°This is bad, an ambush!¡± Ellis had been about to descend like the others, but suddenly cried out upon seeing the two warriors had been hit, raising a hue and cry to warn the ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± killers who were attacking from the front.

    The door cracked into four or five pieces with two loud cracks, and four warriors dressed in ck came rushing in. They started searching the two sides of the yard. The archmage floated into the yard, the magic staff in his left hand was wrapped in his long ck sleeves. The rooms on the sides started copsing from the severe earthquake in ordance with his motions.

    Out of those of the Battlefire mercenary band lying in wait in the neighboring rooms, two directly died from the impact of the copsing house. There were also three who had no choice but to rush out as well. They all held their weapons and stood in the yard. Han Shuo took a quick look and noticed that there was only a senior swordsman, a thunder journeyman mage, and an archer left.

    (Hello reader, if you¡¯re not reading this on http://vretrantions, then please be advised that this work has been stolen from the original trantor.)

    The archmage waved the staff in his hand and arge surge of magic once again ripped outwards. Three earth dragons suddenly erupted out of the earth, like pistons of ice, shing towards the three Battlefire members, who had appeared. The senior swordsman and journeyman mage evaded in time, adroitly dodging to the side before disaster struck. The other archer raised his bow, gathered his concentration, and aimed at the archmage, but he didn¡¯t have the chance to release the arrow before the earth dragon, rising beneath his feet, crushed his chest. The strong force of impact immediately caused him to lose his life.

    Calmly controlling his breathing, Han Shuo could clearly sense that Phoebe and Candice on either side of him suddenly started breathing more heavily. It looked like that with the death of this person, the calm stance that the two had always kept vanishedpletely.

    Afterwards, Phoebe and Candice both shot out crossbow bolts at the same time and sent them flying towards the earth archmage who released the earth dragons. The crossbow bolts had fierce momentum, but it was a pity that a wall of earth suddenly rose from the ground with a wave of his left hand. Their crossbow bolts collided with the wall and didn¡¯t cause any damage to the killer.

    ¡°In the shadows of the big tree!¡± Ellis didn¡¯t disguise his voice this time and suddenly spoke with his original voice. The whooshing sound of a windde attack apanied his voice.

    When Phoebe and Candice heard the sounds of an imminent windde attack, they immediately jumped out from Han Shuo¡¯s side. Phoebe held a longsword that dazzled with eye-catching light and dashed at the archmage with the fastest speed possible. Candice¡¯s broadsword red with tongues of fire licking at the skies, turning her into a fiery elf in the darkness as she swiftly charged Ellis.

    Wielding a crossbow, Han Shuo didn¡¯t move as hey covertly in the shadows of the big tree. He didn¡¯t even raise a hand to fend off the iing winddes. Several winddes ripped through the tree branches, and another two connected with Han Shuo¡¯s waist. However, he grit his teeth and bore it all, staying there unmoving, maintaining even his breathing and heartbeat at a very stunningly steady rate.

    Phoebe and Candice flew out from the tree, their mes of battle thoroughly stoked. Because the earth archmage had toppled all the houses with a huge earthquake as soon as he¡¯d arrived, this caused many of the traps, that the Battlefire mercenary band had set up, to be ineffective. Phoebe was well aware of the horrors that an archmage was capable of and thus had her sights set on him, immediately rushing forward, bringing all her strength to bear.

    When Phoebe made her move, the two senior swordsmen from ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± immediately converged on the archmage¡¯s location, presenting abination of two melee and one mage to Phoebe. Off in the distance, the ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± archer also coordinated with the other two swordsmen along with Ellis, starting their attacks on those of the Battlefire mercenary band.

    Wielding her broadsword, Candice sent a tongue of fire licking out with every swing of her weapon. The broadsword sent out dazzling light in the night sky, forcing the wind mage Ellis to continuously back up.

    Ellis¡¯ actions were extremely agile as he leveraged the power of the wind. As he quickly backed up, several columns of windde tornadoes rushed towards Candice. When one of the journeyman swordsmen rushed to Ellis¡¯ side andbined their efforts in battling Candice, even the imposing Candice suddenly seemed to be under a lot of pressure.

    At this moment, whether it was Phoebe¡¯s side or Ellis and those of ¡°Shadow Ghost¡±, everyone had fully revealed themselves in the broken and battered yard. Only Han Shuo still remained hidden within the darkness, still holding on after taking two direct hits from the winddes. He was waiting for the best moment to attack.

    Phoebe and Candice were both in disadvantageous spots, but a few traces of expectation arose in their dejected hearts upon seeing Han Shuo continuously fail to materialize. The two girls were both smartdies, and had already guessed that Han Shuo must be nning something despite his injuries. They all moved in unspoken ordance and slowly brought their opponents towards the big tree.

    After a short while, the struggling Phoebe and Candice had both gathered beneath the tree where Han Shuo was concealed, their movement cut off by the archmage, Ellis, and the other assassins.

    ¡°Beautiful Miss Phoebe, after a few battles, I greatly admire your strength. However, you¡¯ll have no more chances this time. My deepest apologies!¡± Ellisughed gently as the sky in front of him howled and roared after his words, forming a violent tornado. The broken tree branches and rocks around them were all swept into the sky by this tornado as it moved towards Phoebe and Candice.

    The archmage said nothing as he extended his left hand, four high walls of earth rising from the ground, thoroughly enclosing Phoebe and Candice in a cage.

    The longsword in Phoebe¡¯s hand rippled with a blinding milky-white aura, the light forming into the shape of a cross. It sted through one wall of earth as she hopped out with Candice. The swordsmen waiting on the side immediately started attacking Phoebe and Candice. Ellis had a sinister smile on his face as he focused his concentration and slowly manipted the tornado to churn up the two.

    Just at this moment, a crossbow bolt suddenly pierced through the air and shot towards the earth archamge wrapped in ck robes. The archmage leaned to the side and a swordsman next to him waved his hand to ward off the crossbow bolt. A bone spear then materialized out of thin air, also shooting towards the archmage with a sharp whistling sound.

    The archmage seemed to feel a bit irritated as he slightly flexed his left hand. Earth magic once again gathered and a stone b on the ground suddenly flew out, smashing the bone spear flying towards him into two halves.

    The archmage had just breathed a sigh of relief and was about to search for the enemy hidden in the shadows when a ghastly wail suddenly sounded. Ellis, not too far away, clutched his chest and raised a face full of fear to look at the top of the big tree. A sharp weapon burrowed out like a poisonous dragon, leaving his chest with a whistling sound.

    Pfft.

    An arrow of blood sprayed uncontrobly from Ellis¡¯ chest and Ellis raised his head to the sky. His knees suddenly gave way and he sank listlessly to the floor, pausing, and then fell stiffly backwards.

 Chapter 85: Earning a profit without working for it

    Chapter 85: Earning a profit without working for it

    Ellis¡¯ sudden death alsopletely revealed Han Shuo¡¯s existence. As the weapon returned to his hand, Han Shuo also jumped down from the tree as well.

    At this moment, there was also an arrow sticking out of the side of the thunder journeyman mage of the Battlefire mercenary band. It looked like he¡¯d been hit by the archer from ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± on the far roof at some point.

    The other senior swordsman was also spitting out blood. His body seemed to have been injured by the winddes as fresh blood dripped out of his wounds onto the floor.

    ¡°Leave this ce!¡± Han Shuo jumped down adroitly, took in the situation, and understood that even with Ellis dying in the ambush, they were still at a disadvantage. He immediately made the decision to retreat.

    Only a few moments had actually psed since the arrival of these killers until those several rounds of attacks just now. Before the change of the city guard hadpleted, the killers from ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± would have more than enough time to slowly kill hispanions, particrly when the original demons that Han Shuo had set up further away sensed that the others, who had been setting up traps, were also rushing this way. He naturally understood that their arrival would mean their chances of living had further decreased.

    Phoebe and Candice¡¯s beautiful eyes were already sparkling when Han Shuo¡¯smand to retreat sounded out, seemingly already considering how to retreat.

    Before the two had decided, a thought struck Han Shuo as he suddenly remembered a ce and a crafty smile spread across his face. He suddenly said, ¡°Follow me!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s body suddenly dashed towards one of the fallen walls of the house, the Demonyer Edge flying out of his palm like a poisonous dragon. Arge hole suddenly opened, apanied by violent explosions. Han Shuo caught the Demonyer Edge as he arrived, charging out from the hole.

    Phoebe and Candice were close already to Han Shuo and were also the closest to the opened hole. When Han Shuo¡¯s body moved, the two beauties didn¡¯t hesitate and also flew over, escaping through the hole in the blink of an eye.

    The remaining two Battlefire mercenaries looked at each other after seeing Candice and Phoebe leave, and also started escaping in two different directions.

    ¡°Don¡¯t chase after them? After the two girls!¡± The ck robed archmage suddenly opened his mouth at this moment. His voice was exceedingly sharp and unpleasant to the ears.

    Thus, all the killers gave up on the remaining two Battlefire members and quickly squirmed through the hole, under the archmage¡¯s instructions, and started chasing Han Shuo and the others.

    Having trained in magic, Han Shuo was extremely speedy as he furiously dashed. As warriors, the two beauties Phoebe and Candice didn¡¯tg behind either. The two of them paid attention to nothing else, setting their sights on Han Shuo, and chased after him.

    One of the original demons was one step ahead and had concealed itself in Han Shuo¡¯s path. With an additional set of eyes up ahead, Han Shuo would especially pick isted areas to flee to as he threaded through various yards and alleyways. With the existence of the original demons, Han Shuo could map everything into his heart and wouldn¡¯t take a single wrong path.

    Gradually, Han Shuo¡¯s band of three slowly widened the gap between them and their pursuers by leveraging the terrain. A fork in the road suddenly appeared, one led in one direction in a more twisting and turning fashion, whereas the other was wider and didn¡¯t offer that many areas of concealment in the middle of the road.

    Following behind Han Shuo, Phoebe and Candice were incredibly astounded by Han Shuo¡¯s familiarity with this region. They watched as Han Shuo used his knowledge of thend to leave their pursuers far behind them.

    When the fork in the road appeared, the two of them naturally thought that Han Shuo would dash into the more twisty and turning road and use that opportunity topletely shake off their pursuers. They hadn¡¯t thought that Han Shuo would suddenly stop and take out a ck mask and cover his face, throwing another two at Phoebe and Candice, hurriedly urging them, ¡°Wear it!¡±

    While Candice was still hesitating, Phoebe had already pulled the mask on without another word, covering her beautiful face entirely. Seeing that the pursuers had already appeared in the corner of the street, Phoebe rushed Candice, ¡°Hurry!¡±

    Candice no longer hesitated after Phoebe spoke up. She frantically put on the mask and then took out another set of ck nightwalker clothes from her space ring, seemingly nning on wearing them as well.

    ¡°Don¡¯t put on the ck clothes! Let¡¯s move!¡± Han Shuo suddenly said as he looked at their pursuers behind them. Having paused briefly for a few seconds, his body moved again, running past the quiet, windy path and making for the other broad street without any concealment.

    Even Phoebe was startled as she didn¡¯t understand why Han Shuo did so, but this wasn¡¯t the time to ask extraneous questions. Based on her trust in Han Shuo, Phoebe lightly tugged Candice and ran after Han Shuo decisively.

    ¡°Don¡¯t run full out, make sure that those who are following us can follow our tracks!¡± Han Shuo briefly dropped his speed and pulled up side by side with Candice, whispering to the two girls.

    ¡°What the heck are you doing? If we didn¡¯t slow down and went on the other path, I think we would¡¯ve escaped by now. Why are we going to such lengths, like using masks to cover our faces? They know what we¡¯re wearing, there¡¯s no point in doing so and rather makes us appear like idiots!¡± Candiceined.

    ¡°Heh heh, I¡¯m using a mask to cover my face, not to deceive them, but in order not to reveal our faces to another group of people. When I came through here yesterday, I discovered a set of shady, surreptitious people in the house ahead. These people are also very strong and must not be up to anyone good. If the people of ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ met with them, I think some trouble can be caused. Perhaps we can use this to resolve our ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ troubles in one go.¡± Han Shuo exined simply with a sinister tone.

    ¡°You¡¯re so depraved!¡± Candice blurted after a moment of stunned silence.

    ¡°Bryan, we can¡¯t bring danger to innocent people! Are you sure they¡¯re not good people?¡± Phoebe started and asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m sure they¡¯re not good people. I even saw them creeping around the Academy grounds yesterday to steal things. How could they possibly be good people whenmitting such crimes!¡± Han Shuo promised to Phoebe and then suddenly said lowly, ¡°Be careful, it¡¯s that yard up ahead. I¡¯ll attack from the distance in a moment and then we¡¯ll immediately sh behind that yard. Be careful not to reveal yourself at all costs.¡±

    His speed suddenly picking up, Han Shuo, Phoebe, and Candice rushed towards the yard thaty before them. Han Shuo suddenly took out a crossbow when he arrived at the front of the door and fired off a crossbow bolt without aiming. He then took out a metal needle and randomly flung it into the yard as well.

    After doing all this, Han Shuo grabbed Phoebe and Candice once again and found a hiding ce that an original demon had already scouted out ¡ª a square, stone box that was a trash dump behind the house that didn¡¯t have a lid.

    ¡°Ew... it stinks!¡± Candice immediately covered her nose and cried out lowly. Phoebe also covered her nose, a morass of disdain and difort surfacing in her eyes.

    This ce was very narrow and there were also a few trash bags present. Han Shuo crouched down in the middle, with Phoebe and Candice crouching down on either side of him. The three of their bodies all pressed tightly together. Han Shuo naturally couldn¡¯t avoid the stink that Candice and Phoebe were smelling, and could only use the mask on his face to cover his nose.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t say anything and used his hand to make a shushing noise, indicating for the two to talk less and closely observe their surroundings.

    ¡°Enemies!¡± A low call came from inside the yard and slight footsteps sounded from inside, seeming to search for traces of the invaders.

    At this moment, the crouching Han Shuo, Phoebe, and Candice saw that the archmage, that had been floating in midair, had caught up with a few killers from ¡°Shadow Ghost¡±.

    ¡°They went inside this yard!¡± A swordsman immediately reported to the archmage when they arrived.

    The archmage nodded and waved the magic staff covered by his long sleeve. A strong magic pulse once again appeared suddenly, and the earthquake spell that had been used on Phoebe¡¯s house once again showed itself in this yard. All the structures and buildings copsed one by one as the archmage cast his earthquake spell.

    A noisy din of curses and yells suddenly sounded out from inside. Duke and Erick, as well as some of the other people in the yard, red out their fighting aura and magic without a second warning, attacking the ck robed archmage.

    Duke also floated in mid air, he was an archmage as well. An ornate magic staff apanied the conclusion of his wind magic incantation as hundreds of wind des formed a tornado, churning towards the ck robed archmage and the other. The tornado, made of winddes, possessed a frightening force. The sand, little rocks, and small trees in its path were swept up and crushed to dust.

    ¡°Damn it, why is there another archmage present?! Grover didn¡¯t tell us about this!¡± A shrill exmation came from the ck-robed archmage¡¯s mouth as he raised an earthen wall in front of him and hastily retreated.

    The swordsman from Grover¡¯s side and an archer from ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± didn¡¯t react in time and were dragged in by the tornado. Endless rounds of ghastly screams rang out as the two were ripped apart in a mass of blood and flesh. They were transformed into a mist of blood and signs of life ceased to exist.

    ¡°After them!¡± Duke snorted coldly and dashed out of the shambles of the yard with Erick and a few others, chased after the other members of ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± who had already started fleeing in the distance. Magics crashed against each other along the way as endless pilip sounds of explosion were emitted.

    ¡°Eh, where are these people from? They¡¯re so strong!¡± Candice murmured with a face of shock after they¡¯d left.

    ¡°This yard is in ruins and there¡¯s no one inside. We don¡¯t have to stay here anymore.¡± Phoebe hastily jumped out and stayed far away from the stone box that had been used to store trash.

    Candice and Han Shuo walked out from inside as Han Shuoughed lightly, ¡°At this moment, the city guard should have finished changing shifts. I wonder if these two groups of people will alert the guard.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re sinister indeed. What should we do next?¡± At this moment, Candice had started treating Han Shuo as the leader at some unknown time. Now that the danger had been resolved and he had brought ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± and Grover¡¯s people a huge amount of trouble, she opened her mouth and asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°Miss Phoebe, I think I may know where Grover¡¯s mistress is...¡± At this moment, Han Shuo suddenly opened his mouth.

    Her face showed an overjoyed expression, Phoebe looked at Han Shuo with a look of excitement and asked hurriedly, ¡°Where is she?¡±

    ¡°Follow me. It looks like we won¡¯t be resting much tonight.¡± Han Shuo shrugged his shoulders with resignation, took his bearings and led them to traverse the wide road, walking towards a dark and narrow path.

    Grover had revealed himself at the very beginning. When Ellis and those of ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± had rushed into Phoebe¡¯s house, Grover had stayed in a house a short distance away and awaited the news. One of the three original demons had stayed by Grover¡¯s side, monitoring him.

    Grover left alone only when Phoebe¡¯s house had copsed. He didn¡¯t return to the Guild, but boarded a carriage that had been prepared prior, saying to the groom, ¡°Go to Cara¡¯s ce, be careful!¡±

    Han Shuo had heard from Phoebest time that Grover¡¯s mistress was called Cara, this was why he¡¯d notified Phoebe and Candice.

    The three original demons would be harder to control if they were too far from Han Shuo¡¯s side. When Grover had left, Duke and the members of ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± on this side had just made contact. Han Shuo¡¯s control over the original demon became more and more difficult as Grover¡¯s carriage rushed away. When Phoebe and Candice agreed, they immediately traveled at full speed towards Grover¡¯s location.

    The sky was starting to grow hazily bright when Han Shuo appeared on the streets in the west of the city with Phoebe and Candice. Compared to the northern and southern sides of the city, it was dirty and messy here, with trash everywhere on the streets. A few beggars were wearing thin clothes in this frigid weather. They had curled themselves up andy next to the piles of trash, seeming to want to obtain some warmth from the trash bags.

    ¡°To think that Grover, with his status, woulde to the slums . He¡¯d hidden his mistress away here, no wonder we couldn¡¯t find her. Grover is a difficult person to move against alright!¡± Phoebe frowned as she looked around and said lowly to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Alright, this is the ce. Follow me, I don¡¯t think Grover will be able to escape this time!¡± Han Shuo had seen through the eyes of the original demon that Grover had entered a dirty and broken house. He immediately circled past the piles of trash in front after speaking to Phoebe, darting into an alleyway in which flies and bugs danced in flight.

    Although they were disgusted by this ce, Phoebe and Candice still grit their teeth and darted in after Han Shuo. The two continuously pped their hands, trying to shoo away the flies around them.

 Chapter 86: New pursuits

    Chapter 86: New pursuits

    Han Shuo, Phoebe, and Candice walked into the dirty and run down house. It was actually very clean and neat inside, with a few decorations that could even be called luxurious. To think that it was only dirty and broken down on the outside, but quite fancy on the inside.

    After entering the house, Candice abruptly closed the door tightly, emitting a thumping sound that she was unable to conceal. Her broadsword in her hand, she barred the way out.

    ¡°Candice, you don¡¯t need to be that careful. My dear uncle doesn¡¯t know any martial arts or magic, he won¡¯t be able to escape this time.¡± Phoebe¡¯s mask had been taken off and she disyed her stunning features. She sat down leisurely at random, coldly looking at a room with its door open.

    Han Shuo inspected his surroundings and observed by using the original demons. When he ascertained that no suspicious characters were around, he then poured a cup of warm water and took two greedy sips.

    Grover walked out of the room, through the open door, with a face full of dejection. He released a ghastlyugh and looked at Phoebe, ¡°Good niece, dear niece. To think that you¡¯d been hiding your strength all along. Was Cara already taken by you?¡±

    Phoebe started and looked in surprise at Grover. She shook her head, ¡°No, I¡¯ve only just discovered this ce.¡±

    ¡°Let Cara live, I¡¯ll give you everything you want, including my life.¡± Grover knew it would be difficult for him to escape death with the way things were now, and had let everything go.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, Cara isn¡¯t in my hands. If my guess is correct, Grandpa Andrew sent men here already and she¡¯s been taken by them. I don¡¯t have the authority to decide whether she lives or dies.¡± Phoebe shook her head and stared at Grover with a cold look. She asked again, ¡°Did you kill my father?¡±

    ¡°Yes, I poisoned him. Since you already know everything, I have nothing further to hide. What else do you want to know?¡± Grover¡¯s face was wooden as he nodded stiffly.

    Inhaling deeply, Han Shuo could clearly feel the suppressed anger surging from Phoebe. Phoebe slowly stood up and looked at Han Shuo and Candice, ¡°I want to speak privately with my good uncle. Bryan, will you guys go outside and wait for me?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo put the teacup in his hand down and left with Candice, walking towards the alleyway entrance far away.

    ¡°Hey, can I ask you something?¡± Candice kept sizing up Han Shuo when they had left the house and finally couldn¡¯t help but ask after a while.

    Han Shuo had been contemting Duke¡¯s background with a lowered head when he heard Candice¡¯s question. He raised his head and looked at her in confusion.

    As a girl, Candice¡¯s height was a bit taller than ordinary girls. Her skin wasn¡¯t pale, but rather the coppertone of one having spent many years in the sun. Her body was quite fit and muscr, and her breasts looked like they would explode out of her top. Her thighs were supple and full of explosive power. She looked as difficult to handle as a feisty mare.

    ¡°What¡¯s would you like to know?¡± Han Shuo wasn¡¯t kindly disposed towards Candice, but he didn¡¯t hate her either.

    ¡°How were you able to locate the assassins¡¯ movement so clearly, like you saw them all with your own eyes?¡± A heavy sense of curiosity permeated across her face as she looked at Han Shuo with every expression of interest.

    ¡°There¡¯s a magic called ¡®Eye of the Sky¡¯, you must¡¯ve heard of it? My method is simr to that one. Of course there are some differences, but I can¡¯t tell you the exact details!¡± Han Shuo flicked a nce at her and said faintly.

    ¡°Two archmages were unable to detect the disturbances from your method. It¡¯s wondrous indeed. Can you pass this method onto us? If our mercenary band knew of this method, it would greatly increase the sess rate of our missions. We are willing to offer a hefty reward for this.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve heard that you¡¯re a merchant, you can name your price. We can negotiate no matter how high it is. Other forms of payment will work as well as long as our mercenary band can do it.¡± Candice looked at Han Shuo with sparkling eyes and discussed very earnestly with him.

    Shaking his head firmly, Han Shuo rejected her resolutely. ¡°My apologies, there are some thing I won¡¯t sell. My apologies Miss Candice.¡±

    ¡°Then will you join our Battlefire mercenary band? As the vice captain of the band, I can directly approve your application. With your strength, you will surely aplish great deeds if you join us.¡± Candice seemed to know that Han Shuo would reject her and wasn¡¯t discouraged at all. Rather, she invited him to join them and be a member.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I don¡¯t n to for the time being.¡± Han Shuo rejected politely again.

    ¡°Alright, when you n to, please remember toe find us, the Battlefire mercenary band, when you want to. I will greatly wee you with open arms.¡± Candice promised solemnly.

    Phoebe walked out of the house with a cold and remote expression at this moment. Her face only softened when she saw Candice and Han Shuo. She asked, ¡°What are you guys discussing?¡±

    ¡°Nothing much. Oh right Phoebe, what about Grover?¡± Candice pouted a bit awkwardly as she asked Phoebe.

    ¡°He killed himself just now. I¡¯ve already gotten what I wanted from him, we can leave now.¡± Phoebe¡¯s expression was strange as she looked at Candice.

    ¡°Then there shouldn¡¯t be anything to do with me after this. May I leave now?¡± Han Shuo suddenly spoke up when he saw the two conversing.

    Phoebe once again focused her beautiful eyes on Han Shuo and looked dumbly at him, then said to Candice, ¡°Candice, two of your people from the mercenary band made it out. Go contact them first and see if anyone else survived in the wrecked yard.¡±

    Candice looked at Phoebe and Han Shuo with an ambiguous expression and disyed a smile of understanding. She nodded at Phoebe and walked off withrge strides.

    ¡°Bryan, will you take a walk with me?¡± Phoebe blushed after seeing Candice¡¯s meaningful gaze and slowly returned to normal only after she¡¯d left. She looked at Han Shuo with a face of expectation.

    ¡°Sure, where would you like to go?¡± Han Shuo thought and he asked.

    ¡°Let¡¯s walk around the southern district. I think the Boozt Merchant Guild no longer poses a threat to me anymore.¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t say much else as he apanied the beautiful Phoebe on a slow walk down the dirty streets. There were people who had obviously fallen on hard times on the streets and they shot admiring nces at the richly dressed Han Shuo and Phoebe.

    ¡°In this world, our Guild actually doesn¡¯t have much status. Although merchants earn some gold, our status is basically the same as ordinary citizens.¡± Phoebe¡¯s voice was far away as she said introspectively to Han Shuo by her side.

    ¡°Miss Phoebe, you don¡¯t see the gazes of the other people on you. They¡¯re actually full of admiration and envy. To them, your current life is what they dream to have, what else are you unsatisfied with?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, we almost died yesterday. They can¡¯t even imagine a life filled with unknown dangers. Perhaps they worry over living out their daily lives, but we worry about our lives. I wonder who admires who!¡± Phoebe sighed self deprecatingly.

    She suddenly stopped walking and concentrated her gaze on Han Shuo. ¡°Bryan, with your abilities, you are certain to climb quite high as long as you are willing to work hard. I had thought to ask you to manage the Guild with me, but I¡¯ve thought through this clearly. I think the small Boozt Merchant Guild would be insufficient to hold you. You should have more expansive skies. Bryan, have you thought about how you should live in the future?¡±

    Han Shuo started as he remembered his status. Although he had left behind thebel of errand ve, he was still a student of the Academy. With his status, even if he swiftly graduated from the Academy, there was still nothing to his name. Of course, this wasn¡¯t the life he wanted, but just that Han Shuo didn¡¯t have any other ns for the time being.

    ¡°Power and a lofty position is what you should be reaching for. As much money as a merchant has, he is still a small character at the mercy of others. Only those with an illustrious reputation and an extraordinary position have the right to control over and determine the lives of others. You should be one of those types of people!¡± A mesmerizing light shone in Phoebe¡¯s beautiful eyes as she stared directly at Han Shuo, her voice full of persuasion.

    His mind had never been so agitated before. Han Shuo had thought of these things before, but never as clearly as in this moment. Since he had been lucky enough to be reborn, he should enjoy everything there was to life without reservations. Why didn¡¯t he use the strength that was avable to him? Under Phoebe¡¯s persuasion, Han Shuo¡¯s mindset of not wanting to remain ordinary slowly started to catch on fire and he became full of resolution.

    After a while, Han Shuo took in a deep breath and nodded, saying lowly, ¡°I understand your meaning, but my opportunity hasn¡¯t seemed to arrive yet.¡±

    A brilliant smile spreading over her face, Phoebe seemed to have been waiting for these words. When she heard Han Shuo¡¯s words, she immediately stared at Han Shuo and said, ¡°You¡¯re wrong, the chance has always been there. The fastest way to obtain power and status is to achieve meritorious acts in war. The Empire has never been at peace, and our battles with neighboring countries has never stopped. I think arge war will break out in the near future. I think you should get involved. As your good friend, I¡¯m willing to help you and do all that I can to help you.¡±

    ¡°I appreciate your good intentions, but I would like to obtain all that I deserve through my own hands.¡± Han Shuo said resolutely to Phoebe, paused and then said again, ¡°Miss Phoebe, please prepare the rations I need. I¡¯lle by the Guild in a few days to pick them up. I think we¡¯ll have many opportunities to cooperate in the future.¡±

    ¡°Then alright, I¡¯ve said all that needs to be said and won¡¯t need you to apany me further on this random stroll. I trust that with your abilities, you will soon rise to prominence within the kingdom. Don¡¯t forget that I¡¯m your friend then!¡± Phoebe winked at Han Shuo and said cutely.

    ¡°Heh heh, your words today have greatly inspired me, I will remember them! Farewell Miss Phoebe, don¡¯t forget my rations!¡± Han Shuo smiled and suddenly changed direction, heading for the northern part of the city.

    Phoebe pouted angrily after quite a while had passed since Han Shuo had left, she said huffily in a voice that only she could hear. ¡°Damn it, you only care about your rations!¡±

 Chapter 87: Joining the Dark Mantle organization

    Chapter 87: Joining the Dark Mantle organization

    After parting ways with Phoebe, Han Shuo went returned directly to the Academy. However, he once again avoided entering through the front gate and decided to enter through a secluded corner from the mountain in the back.

    Han Shuo suddenly became wary in the woods that he had spent time with Phoebest time, an unexinable feeling of unease rising in his heart. This shock made Han Shuo immediately release his three original demons. They flew out from the back of his neck and patrolled the entire woods, but didn¡¯t find anything.

    The feeling of unease didn¡¯t vanish after the original demons failed to find anything. That exceedingly ufortable feeling grew stronger and stronger, making Han Shuo incredibly wary.

    The Demonyer Edge appearing in his hand, Han Shuo took a deep breath and readjusted his facial expression to be at his best. He tried using his own senses to detect the abnormalities around him and called out, ¡°Who is it? Come on out!¡±

    Han Shuo had only randomly called with this line and hadn¡¯t actually thought that anything would happen, because if it was an enemy, an enemy at this level definitely wouldn¡¯t appear just because Han Shuo had called out.

    But unexpectedly, a low, eerieugh rang out from the thick woods as soon as he¡¯d finished speaking. A human shape slowly took form in front of Han Shuo within the shadows of therge trees.

    ¡°Kid, you have a good level of awareness. How did you discover my existence?¡± When the figure within the shadows of the tree had materialized, a ruthless-looking old man, who was exceedingly tall, skinny, and wearing grey clothing, walked out. The old man¡¯s beard was grey and his eyes were the color of ash. They lookedpletely lifeless.

    ¡°Due to my instincts, who are you?¡± Han Shuo gripped the Demonyer Edge firmly and watched the approaching old man with a hostile gaze, ready to make a move at any moment.

    ¡°I can give you the opportunity of a lifetime. I¡¯m acquaintances with Phoebe¡¯s master and mean you no harm, you don¡¯t need to be so nervous!¡± Han Shuo could feel a strong sense of danger exuding from this person. This was probably the strongest person he¡¯d met sinceing to this world. Han Shuo even felt that if the old man were to make a move, he¡¯d be hard pressed to escape.

    ¡°Phoebe? So Phoebe sent you, what do you mean by all this?¡± Han Shuo reined in his impulse to flee from this person and asked with a darkened face.

    The old man suddenly halted in his tracks and didn¡¯t continue forward. He just stood there, sizing up Han Shuo, like he was observing an item he expected to sell at a high price. He kept nodding his head and a smile blossomed on his face after a while, but when this smile floated out from his ruthless features, it only made one feel that his face became even more sinister.

    ¡°Phoebe doesn¡¯t know of my existence, but I know everything about your recent actions. I heard the conversation between you and Phoebe just now and have an offer to make you, but if you choose this path, you can obtain all that you want, but you may also die very quickly.¡± The old man said slowly as he looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Who are you?¡± Han Shuo was a bit lost and had no idea what the old man wanted. He immediately asked again.

    ¡°Bryan... parents died when he was young and was then sold off to the necromancy major of the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force by his uncle to be a ve. Six years as an errand ve. Started disying extraordinary abilities during an outing to the Dark Forest and seems to possess another wondrous way of training in addition to training necromancy magic...¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart sank slowly as the old man started listing details from his life. Apart from a few secrets having to do with the little skeleton and the Cemetery of Death, most of the doings that he¡¯d experienced in this period of time were all ferreted out. This made Han Shuo feel that a pair of eyes had been fixed on him in the darkness, and a sense of fear rose in his heart.

    ¡°Who are you?¡± This was the third time that he asked about the old man¡¯s origins.

    ¡°I¡¯m called Candide and I belong to the Empire¡¯s ¡®Dark Mantle¡¯ organization that directly answers to His Majesty. Heh heh, there¡¯s a covert organization behind every nation. I think you understand the need for such an organization¡¯s existence. The people of ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ have appeared in the Boozt Merchant Guild several times now. You guys have caused such a great disturbance. Did you really think that we wouldn¡¯t know anything?¡± Old man Candide looked at Han Shuo with a vague smirk as he said slowly.

    Han Shuo was greatly startled after he heard these words and heaved a silent sigh as he finally realized that he really was still too naive. He¡¯d never heard of ¡°Dark Mantle¡±, but immediately understood after Candide¡¯s exnation that this organization must be simr to the Western Depot and the Eastern Depot of the Ming Dynasty, government agencies that directly answered to His Majesty, the Emperor.

    ¡°Alright, what do you want from me?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯d like to absorb you into our Dark Mantle. I¡¯ve carefully investigated your birth and think there shouldn¡¯t be a problem. I¡¯ve also kept my eye on youtely and feel that your working style and special abilities will enable you to handle the jobs of ¡®Dark Mantle¡¯ withpetence. If you join the ¡®Dark Mantle¡¯ and achieve exemry aplishments for the Empire, you can obtain everything you want.¡± Candide looked at Han Shuo and gave this invitation.

    Han Shuo¡¯s brows knit together and considered it carefully. Candide¡¯s invitation wasn¡¯t as simple as it appeared on the surface, but with Han Shuo¡¯s status and strength, if an enormous organization like ¡°Dark Mantle¡± wanted to make a move against him, only death would be in his future.

    There was a path in front of him now, and although it was dangerous, the destination remote, and full of uncertain factors, it was indeed an opportunity. This presented quite a bit of strong temptation to the now hotly ambitious Han Shuo. After weighing his gains and losses, Han Shuo felt that he didn¡¯t seem to have much choice.

    Han Shuo nodded firmly after a while and said lowly, ¡°I ept.¡±

    ¡°Wonderful! Although you might be ced in more dangerous situations in the future, as long as you can climb high enough, you¡¯ll have the chance to see beautiful sights that many will be unable to ever see in their lives.¡± Candideughed lightly and took out an iron badge, handing it to Han Shuo. ¡°This is the badge that symbolizes our status as members of the ¡®Dark Mantle¡¯. Put it away carefully, you¡¯re under mymand from today onwards. Your first mission is to keep an eye out for Duke¡¯s movements. Oh, he¡¯s the wind archmage that came flying out of the house that you guys brought the members of ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ tost night.¡±

    There was a certain heft to the ck iron badge, with the words ¡°Dark Mantle¡± carved on the back. There was also an image of the crown carved in back. The crown was floating above a patch of ck clouds and was also ck colored.

    ¡°Who is Duke, where is he now, and how should I keep an eye on his movements?¡± Han Shuo was greatly startled and wondered how astonished Duke would be if he discovered that Han Shuo was keeping surveince on him. He might even guess that the ¡°Eye of Darkness¡± was with Han Shuo. If Han Shuo were to keep tabs on Duke, then he himself would also bear greater risk.

    Hesitating, Candide exined, ¡°Duke isn¡¯t a person from our Lancelot Empire. He¡¯s from the Kasi Empire and is here as a representative of the Maya School of Magic from the Kasi Empire. He¡¯s here to conduct an exchange of magical knowledge with your Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. Of course, these are all excuses that they¡¯vee up with. Their true goal must not be this, but they¡¯ve hidden it well. We don¡¯t know what they¡¯re up to at the moment. That¡¯s why we need someone to keep an eye on them.¡±

    ¡°Therefore, he¡¯ll visit your Academy often during this time. As a student within, you¡¯re the most convenient person to keep a watch over him. Oh, right. Since you¡¯ve joined ¡®Dark Mantle¡¯, no more killers from ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ will bother you. I will tell them to behave themselves.¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°I see. Alright then, I¡¯ll keep an eye on Duke¡¯s movements. How should I find you if I discover something abnormal?¡±

    ¡°These are our three strongholds within the Empire. Destroy this after you look at it. This badge represents your identity and you can use it to exchange information with others in the strongholds. However, your level is too low thus far and you won¡¯t have the right to ask about many things. If you can advance to a higher status, you¡¯ll be able to use the resources of ¡®Dark Mantle¡¯ and can even deploy the Empire¡¯s army. Heh heh, you must work hard.¡± Candide said to Han Shuo.

    A thin piece of papernded in Han Shuo¡¯s palm. He looked it over once and ripped it to pieces in front of Candide after he¡¯d memorized the contents. He then said, ¡°Alright, my mind¡¯s a mess right now and I need some time to think. I¡¯ll report to you if Duke does anything out of the ordinary.¡±

    ¡°Mm. I¡¯m going to leave now as well. The members of ¡®Dark Mantle¡¯ have a lot of freedom. We won¡¯t intervene in your private affairs, and will onlye for you when there¡¯s a mission that needs to be conducted. We won¡¯t affect your life under normal circumstances.¡± Candide was surrounded by a cloud of ck mist and his figure became fainter and fainter. A thin pulse of magic traveled out of the mist, and he then vanished from Han Shuo¡¯s sight as the breeze blew past, like he¡¯d never appeared.

    Han Shuo had clearly identified what he needed under Phoebe¡¯s persuasion not too long ago. Who would¡¯ve thought that an olive branch would be extended as soon as he¡¯d left Phoebe. He¡¯d joined this ¡°Dark Mantle¡± organization after a round of discussion with Candide. This made Han Shuo subtly feel that something was wrong, and he started to suspect whether or not Phoebe knew of Candide¡¯s existence. This would simply be too much of a coincidence otherwise.

    However, even if Phoebe and Candide were acquainted with each other, then Grover wouldn¡¯t have been anything in the face of Candide¡¯s enormous power. Phoebe wouldn¡¯t have so many troubles either. This made Han Shuo quite confused as well.

    Han Shuo carefully sorted out his thoughts within the woods and went over everything that had happened recently in his mind. He then set off towards the Academy grounds again with a look of resolution.

 Chapter 88: But I have a guilty conscience!

    Chapter 88: But I have a guilty conscience!

    Han Shuo had been worried that he would be found out by Duke, but had thoroughly dispelled these worries a few minutes after arriving at the necromancy major

    The reason was because when Han Shuo arrived, he naturally greeted Borg and Carey when he saw them cleaning off the stone sculptures along the path. However, the two didn¡¯t recognize Han Shuo and were at a loss of what to do with their profound respect and humility.

    When Han Shuo identified himself and Borg and Carey cautiously recognized him, they spoke to him with an even more fearful attitude.

    Han Shuo was no longer an errand ve of the necromancy major now. He¡¯d turned into a student and his status was naturally higher than these two errand boys. Add to that the fact that the necromancy students had purposefully exaggerated Han Shuo¡¯s aid when they returned from the Dark Forest, this made the two previous enemies, Carey and Borg, even more afraid that Han Shuo woulde looking for them.

    However, Han Shuo didn¡¯t pay attention to the two and rather took out a bronze mirror and admired himself in it, full of bliss. He¡¯d suddenly discovered that his features had indeed gone through tumultuous changespared to a few months ago. His originally frail and thin frame had be much stronger and taller. His weak facial features had be much more resolute after a series of life threatening experiences. His features had be much more pronounced, and had changed from those of an old child half a year ago to that of a dashing and charming young man.

    If even Borg and Carey, two errand boys, who were well acquainted with Han Shuo, couldn¡¯t recognize him easily, then Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t need to worry about Duke and Erick, particrly after Candide had promised to take care of the overhanging cloud known as ¡°Shadow Ghost¡±. Han Shuo suddenly feltpletely rxed and didn¡¯t continue to conceal his traces. He returned to the Academy openly in public.

    ¡°Eh, it¡¯s Bryan! You haven¡¯te back to the Academy in so long, I thought something happened to you!¡± Amy, from the necromancy major, had been on her way to the ssroom building when she suddenly eximed upon seeing Han Shuo.

    ¡°Hello Amy.¡± Han Shuo smiled as he greeted her and walked towards the dark major¡¯s ssroom building with her.

    When Han Shuo arrived at the necromancy major¡¯s ssroom, he lost himself in thought for a little while. Just two short months ago, he could only hold his broom and make use of the time that he had while cleaning to stand outside and listen to Gene¡¯s lectures. Who would¡¯ve thought that in just a short period of time, he¡¯d turn into a necromancy major student and had the right to enter the ssroom to sit down and listen to lessons with the other students.

    ¡°Don¡¯t just stand there, the second ss is about to begin,e on in!¡± Amy suddenly spoke up to rush him when she walked up to the door and saw that Han Shuo was standing dumbly outside the window.

    Han Shuo immediately came to his senses and smiled kindly at Amy, nodding as he walked into the ssroom. As soon as Han Shuo walked in, the gazes of several students inside suddenly all focused on Han Shuo, particrly Lisa in the back row. She had beenzily shutting her eyes when her eyes suddenly gleamed as she stood up and waved at Han Shuo, ¡°Here, over here!¡±

    Bach and Be¡¯s gazes l; upon Han Shuo, as well as those from some other majors, were exceedingly odd as they murmured something lowly.

    ¡°Bryan¡¯s back, heh heh. Amy, do you believe the rumors?¡± Athena suddenly asked Amy in a low voice after she greeted Amy.

    ¡°I don¡¯t really believe it. It doesn¡¯t look like anything would ever happen between Master Fanny and Bryan. Cami, that old witch, loves to carry tall tales, you believe stuff that she says?¡± Amy pouted and shook her head.

    It wasn¡¯t just Amy and Athena, when Han Shuo walked towards Lisa, he heard all the students talk about him and Fanny. They talked vividly about Cami finding Han Shuo on Fanny¡¯s bed, as if they¡¯d personally been there. In their mouths, he and Fanny became a couple caught in the act.

    Han Shuo felt quite speechless, he hadn¡¯t thought that Cami would be such a busybody and make it so that all the necromancy students knew of this matter. This probably meant the other teachers, including Fanny herself, had gotten the news even earlier.

    Lisa¡¯s originally excited expression turned into one of interrogation after Han Shuo sat down with a wry smile. Her gaze first made a surprised circuit over Han Shuo, as if marveling over his changes. She then said coldly, ¡°Huh, the things they¡¯re talking about, are they true or not? Is there really something between you and Master Fanny?¡±

    ¡°Lisa, how could even you not believe me when they don¡¯t believe me?! If I were someone like that, Master Fanny would never be someone like that! I can¡¯t believe someone would actually believe such ridiculous things, this is too outrageous!¡± Han Shuo exined softly to Lisa with a wry expression.

    Lisa breathed a small sigh of relief after Han Shuo¡¯s words and her expression also eased off, but she still asked suspiciously, ¡°Rumors don¡¯te from nothing, it should be true that you went to Master Fanny¡¯s room in the middle of the night right? Although that old witch Cami has a fat mouth, she wouldn¡¯t implicate you with no evidence at all?¡±

    Shrugging, Han Shuo said, ¡°I only went over to ask Master Fanny a few questions. The old witch made a mountain out of a molehill and I can¡¯t stop her from speaking. She can say whatever she likes, it doesn¡¯t affect me at all.¡±

    ¡°But, this has arge effect on Master Fanny¡¯s reputation. Everyone will surely think that Master Fanny¡¯s life is a bit unclean, particrly since you¡¯re her student. Perhaps the school authorities will keep an eye on her or something like that.¡± Lisa frowned as she reminded Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was suddenly enlightened after Lisa¡¯s words. He suddenly felt that he really was very selfish in only thinking of himself and never considering Fanny¡¯s position.

    Just as Han Shuo was inwardly berating himself, Gene walked into the ssroom with a thick stack of magic books. He swept his gaze around the room when he entered and saw Han Shuo sitting in the back row. His face suddenly chilled.

    The ss had just begun when Gene suddenly stopped and looked at Han Shuo in the back with an evil smile. ¡°Bryan, you¡¯ve never attended ss since you became a necromancy major student. Is the knowledge I¡¯m going over too advanced for you? Do you understand what I¡¯m talking about?¡±

    After the trials of the Dark Forest, Han Shuo understood that Gene wasn¡¯t a bad person. He just made things a bit difficult for Han Shuo because of Fanny, but Gene was still a refined, cultured person. He didn¡¯t make life too obviously difficult for Han Shuo, and thus Han Shuo didn¡¯t bear a grudge difficult to resolve against Gene.

    This time, because of those ugly rumors about him and Fanny, Gene must have been eaten alive by the green-eyed monster. This was why he was seizing upon this pretext to embarrass him.

    ¡°Master Gene, I¡¯ve learned the knowledge that you¡¯re going over when I read books, and have mostly grasped a proper understanding. Therefore, I think I can understand the ss lessons, please don¡¯t worry about me.¡± Han Shuo leaned back and said with a slight smile to Gene.

    ¡°Oh, if you could grasp magic through self study of books, then why would our Babylon Academy of Magic and Force still exist. Heh heh, since this is the case, I¡¯ll ask you this: how many ways can magic be cast?¡±

    ¡°They can be divided into the four ways...incantations, magical items, hand seals, and magical matrixes. Incantations use words tomunicate with the magical elements in order to reach the purpose of release magic. Magical items include scrolls...¡±

    Han Shuo retained hiszy posture and smoothly reeled off a bunch of definitions, including some of his own reflections. Gene was noticeably surprised by his words. He started slightly at first and then nodded. ¡°Very good, it looks like you already know all the basic knowledge within the books. Then I¡¯ll ask you some more questions.¡±

    Gene frowned and then asked Han Shuo a series of questions. He started with the most foundational magical knowledge, and then started asking points that only novice mages would be able to grasp. Han Shuo spoke fluidly, exining the answers to all of these questions.

    Gene and the other students within the ssroom all looked at Han Shuo with faces full of surprise throughout this process. It seemed that they hadn¡¯t thought that Han Shuo could fully grasp so much knowledge this deeply in such a short amount of time. Traces of sweat shone on Gene¡¯s forehead as he appeared a bit agitated. He then snorted lightly and asked another question.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know how to answer this!¡± Han Shuo nked and answered honestly. This question had surpassed the knowledge that a journeyman mage would know, and he truly didn¡¯t know understand it.

    Gene finally smiled and was about to say a few words to regain face when Lisa said impatiently, ¡°Master Gene, if he knew the answers to everything, then what would be the point ofing to your lectures?¡±

    Lisa¡¯s words stopped him in his tracks when he heard them. Gene obviously felt a bit awkward and pped the table with a dryugh. ¡°Alright then, I won¡¯t keep asking. Let¡¯s continue with ss.¡±

    ¡°Howe you suddenly know so much?¡± Lisa retracted her head as she asked Han Shuo in a low voice.

    ¡°Didn¡¯t I tell you earlier? I asked Master Fanny about all this. Otherwise, how would that old witch Cami have material to spread rumors with?¡± Han Shuo responded and started listening to ss seriously. Some of the material that Gene was currently going over included some of the journeyman mage knowledge, which was something that Han Shuo still needed to grasp. This was why Han Shuo didn¡¯t harbor ill feelings towards Gene¡¯s jealousy.

    Lisa seemed to still want to chat with Han Shuo after ss, but Han Shuo didn¡¯t give her the chance to as he immediately headed over to Fanny¡¯sb after ss.

    ¡°Fitch, I¡¯ve already exined this magic many times. I think with your powers ofprehension you should¡¯ve understood this long ago. Why can you still not sessfully cast it?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s sensitive ears allowed him to clearly hear the conversation inside as he stood outside theboratory doors.

    ¡°Master Fanny, I think you¡¯re well aware of my feelings, but why don¡¯t you give me any chances and would rather be with that lowly errand ve? Why?¡± Fitch¡¯s strongints traveled out from inside. Han Shuo pulled the door open slightly and could clearly see Fitch¡¯s furious face.

    Master Fanny wore ck rimmed sses and a demure, regtion style magic robe. A look of resignation appeared on her face as she sighed, ¡°Fitch, I¡¯ve be more and more disappointed in you. First of all, Bryan is the same as you now, one of my students. You shouldn¡¯t treat him as an errand ve anymore. In addition, I¡¯ve noticed that you¡¯ve never focused your concentration whenever youe to me with a question. You¡¯re always distracted and I have no idea what you¡¯re thinking of. Bryan is much better than you when ites to stuff like this.¡±

    ¡°Bryan again, in what way is that damned errand ve better than me? Why are you willing to be with him, but unwilling to give me any chances? Is the witch Cami really speaking the truth, and you really did sleep with him with no sense of shame?¡± The fury on Fitch¡¯s face grew as he suppressed his voice, almost roaring as he spoke.

    Pa.

    Fanny flung a p at Fitch, she was truly incensed, an umon urrence. She looked at Fitch with cold eyes and said, ¡°I think I have nothing further to say to you. I told you before that we could only talk about matters of the heart once you¡¯d advanced to the level of adept mage in order to encourage you, but now I see that not everything is alright with you. I can tell you clearly that there is no possibility of anything developing between us. I hope you can let go of all illusions. If you still have questions regarding magic in the future, pleasee find me within the training fields or the ssroom. You are no longer wee in myboratory. Please leave immediately!¡±

    ¡°So you¡¯ve been lying to me all along. Haha. Good. Very good. You wanted me to reach the level of adept mage first before discussing matters of the heart, but that errand ve Bryan has already be an exception for you. Hypocritical shameless woman, I¡¯ll never believe you again.¡± Fitch held his face as heughed ghastly, walking outside of theboratory.

    Han Shuo backed up a few steps and hid himself in the corner until Fitch had left. He looked coldly at Fitch¡¯s passing figure, paused for a moment, and then walked into Fanny¡¯sboratory with a natural expression.

    Han Shuo saw that Fanny was a bit lost in thought as he walked towards her. She propped herself up listlessly on the round table with her two hands, sighing lightly with a lowered head. She murmured to herself with an exceedingly weak voice. ¡°Perhaps Fitch is right, I really am a hypocritical, shameless woman. I seem to have truly vited some principles...¡±

    Han Shuo clearly heard all of Fanny¡¯s low murmurs, but he didn¡¯t understand the meaning behind her words and didn¡¯t know who her words were intended for. After thinking for a while, Han Shuo cocked a finger and rapped on the surface of the round table.

    ¡°Get out of here!¡± Fanny suddenly lifted her hand and red at Han Shuo. When she saw that the person in front of her had turned into Han Shuo, her expression became very odd. She first nked and then started in shock, her eyes seemed like they wanted to hide something. Her expression finally went back to normal and she rolled her eyes, obviously in a bad temper, at Han Shuo. ¡°What are you doing here?¡±

    ¡°Nothing much, I just have a few questions to ask you.¡± Han Shuo looked oddly at Fanny and responded.

    ¡°What did you hear? Did you see everything just now?¡± Fanny¡¯s charming features changed as she suddenly red at Han Shuo. ¡°Your ears are so perverse that you must¡¯ve heard everything! Don¡¯t you know that eavesdropping is very rude?¡±

    ¡°Eh... I didn¡¯t want to listen in, but they allnded in my ears. I didn¡¯t have any choice either?¡± Han Shuo spread out his hands like a rascal, indicating that he really hadn¡¯t meant to. His expression then turned grave as he turned to Fanny and said seriously, ¡°That Cami really is very evil. I don¡¯t mind, but she¡¯s ndered you and negatively impacted your reputation. Do you intend to let her off the hook like this?¡±

    ¡°Forgot it, the old witch is just like that. There¡¯s nothing between us anyways, what other people say have nothing to do with us. The more we exin, the more they¡¯ll think we have a guilty conscience. Let¡¯s just ignore them since people of moral integrity do not fear nderous attacks.¡± Fanny sighed lowly as she too seemed a bit worried, but spoke peace making words.

    ¡°But I have a guilty conscience!¡± Han Shuo said with a wry expression.

    ¡°Damn it, what do you feel guilty about?¡± Fanny¡¯s charming face blushed hotly all of a sudden, but her expression was infuriated as she lowered her head and cursed lowly at Han Shuo.

    ¡°It¡¯s because of my mistake that¡¯s caused other people to misunderstand you so. I feel that I have wronged you and so, of course I feel guilty.¡± Han Shuo exined with a poker face.

    Fanny started slightly and then reacted afterwards, saying huffily, ¡°So this is what you meant by guilty conscience. I thought you meant something else!¡±

    ¡°What other meaning is there?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    ¡°No, nothing.¡± Fanny hastily responded like she wanted to cover something up, and then immediately changed the topic and asked Han Shuo. ¡°What questions do you have for me this time?¡±

    Han Shuo had been about to open his mouth to answer when he suddenly felt someone approaching. He didn¡¯t respond and looked to the door instead. After a while, Han Shuo saw the wind archmage Duke walk into Fanny¡¯s room with a benevolent smile.

    ¡°Master Fanny, are you free today? I¡¯d like to ask you a few more questions?¡± Duke smiled and greeted Fanny after entering the room.

    His brow then furrowed as he turned to look at Han Shuo. Han Shuo was startled, but kept a very normal expression on his face, looking at Duke with an expression of surprise and confusion, like it was the first time he¡¯d seen Duke and wanted to know about his origins and background.

 Chapter 89: An odd phenomenon in the molded spirit realm

    Chapter 89: An odd phenomenon in the molded spirit realm

    ¡°Mister Duke, you¡¯re too polite. Go ahead and ask whatever you¡¯d like to know.¡± Fanny passed a chair to Duke and smiled faintly.

    Duke nced over Han Shuo¡¯s body and then naturally looked back at Fanny, as if not minding Han Shuo at all. He didn¡¯t take the chair that Fanny passed over and only said politely, ¡°I won¡¯t be sitting, I¡¯m just here to ask you a small question. I¡¯ll leave after I¡¯ve asked it. Master Fanny, you¡¯ve studied necromancy magic all this time. have you ever heard of the ¡®Eye of Darkness¡¯?¡±

    On the side, Han Shuo silently observed Duke and noticed that after he said these words, his gaze was tightly fixed on Fanny, as if was trying to glean some clues from Fanny¡¯s facial expression.

    Shaking her head, Fanny¡¯s expression was perplexed as she asked Duke instead, ¡°What is this ¡®Eye of Darkness¡¯? Does it have something to do with the necromancy major?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, it¡¯s just a small tool. I¡¯m not too certain of the specifics either, that¡¯s why I wanted to ask you. Since you don¡¯t know as well, forget about it. My apologies for disturbing you.¡± Duke wore a gentle smile having delivered this line after entering through the door. He nodded towards Fanny and walked towards the door again. When he reached the door, he seemed to suddenly thought of something again and asked carelessly, ¡°Oh right... Master Fanny, I¡¯ve heard that the library of your necromancy major is shared with the dark major¡¯s? The necromancy major was once greater than the dark major many years ago. Do you not have your own standalone library?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, Mister Duke you¡¯ve said so yourself that it was many years ago when the necromancy major was at its peak. The magics that necromancers can now grasp are limited and there aren¡¯t that many books on disy.¡± Fannyughed lightly and then paused. She said indifferently, ¡°Oh, right, I¡¯ve heard that there¡¯s a secret library within our school. There are forbidden texts from all the various majors within that library, preserved secretly with authorization from the Empire. I¡¯ve only heard about it from one of the other teachers and have never known where this secret library was hidden.¡±

    ¡°I see, then I¡¯ll be taking my leave. I¡¯ll be taking up residence within your Academy for the immediate future. May I inconvenience you with any other questions I may have?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll be happy to be of service!¡±

    It looked like Duke hadn¡¯t recognized Han Shuo. The former hadn¡¯t paid any attention to Han Shuo after his initial nce when he walked into room. Han Shuo rejoiced inwardly after Duke left.

    ¡°Alright, what questions do you have?¡± Fanny flicked a nce at Han Shuo after Duke left and asked with ill temper.

    His space ring lit up faintly, Han Shuo brought out the questions that he¡¯d previously organized . He sat down naturally in the chair that Duke hadn¡¯t upied just now, and started with his first question.

    As an adept necromancer, Fanny had a veryplete grasp of theoretical knowledge. Questions that had troubled Han Shuo for quite some time were all easily resolved through Fanny¡¯s exnations.

    ¡°Summoning zombies is a bit more troublesome than skeletons because the volume and weight of zombies are greater. You¡¯ll need to expend more mental strength when summoning them. In addition to this, controlling zombies is also moreplicated than skeletons. The bodies of zombies are much more durable than skeletons. If you wish to agilely control them, you must practice repeatedly...¡± Fanny¡¯s voice was gentle as she concentrated on pointing out a few things to take note of when summoning zombies.

    When Fanny finished exining, Han Shuo¡¯s brow knit fiercely together as he sank into a state of contemtion. Fanny didn¡¯t make a sound as to not disturb Han Shuo when she saw that he was deep in thought.

    After a while, Han Shuo exhaled easily and smiled, ¡°So it was an issue of insufficient coordination between the deployment and retrievement of mental strength. I¡¯ve grown ustomed to summoning skeletons and am used to using the same amount of strength tomunicate across the other dimension. It looks like this was the core of the problem. I think I understand now.¡±

    After those words, Han Shuo started reciting the incantation to summon zombies again within Fanny¡¯s vision. When the first incantation finished, the figure of a zombie shed through the air and then immediately disappeared. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a hurry as he tried to control the amount of his mental strength, but still hadn¡¯t seeded after four or five tries.

    Fanny¡¯s face wore a gratified smile as she watched Han Shuo. She understood that Han Shuo had already understood the meaning of her words and was searching for the appropriate amount of mental strength through practice. Once he felt the proper amount of mental strength, he would be able topletely summon a zombie.

    ¡°Never mind it, you don¡¯t need to practice for now. Your direction is definitely correct, and you justck a bit of repeated practice. I think you¡¯ll be able to fully grasp the magic of summoning zombies when you are able to fully control your mental strength. Bryan, it¡¯s only been two or three months, yet you¡¯ve already reached the level of novice mage. I¡¯ve never heard of such speed in all my years of teaching in the necromancy major.¡±

    ¡°Then how do Ipare to Fitch?¡± Han Shuo temporarily gave up further practice beneath Fanny¡¯s encouragement and chuckled honestly as he looked at her.

    ¡°It feels so unnatural to see your honestly smiling face. Don¡¯t act dumb in front of me anymore. Oh, I¡¯d forgotten about Fitch until you mentioned him. He seems very off right now, I¡¯m worried that he¡¯ll hold a grudge and purposely create trouble for you. Be careful.¡± Fanny first rebuked Han Shuo, and then spoke to him with a tone of concern.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, if Fitch is really that gullible, I think the person who would end up worse off will surely be him.¡± Han Shuo shrugged his shoulders and paid Fitch¡¯s grudge no mind. To be honest, he really didn¡¯t think much of the journeyman mage Fitch now.

    ¡°Bryan, I knew that you¡¯d be here,e here. Master Fanny, I have a few matters to discuss with him, hehe.¡± Lisa¡¯s voice traveled in from outside at this moment as she walked towards Han Shuo as soon as she came in. She grabbed Han Shuo¡¯s wrist and dragged him outside.

    As Fanny watched Han Shuo get pulled away by Lisa, a bit of anger seemed to grow out of nowhere in her heart. It was as if someone had seized something precious to her, and she didn¡¯t feel quite happy about it.

    ¡°How do you know my cousin?¡± Lisa asked as she dragged Han Shuo to a little courtyard behind the school library.

    Han Shuo liberated his shoulder from Lisa¡¯s hand and looked at her in confusion. ¡°Your cousin? Who is he?¡±

    ¡°Lawrence! He¡¯s learning martial arts in our martial arts school. He came looking for you previously, but you weren¡¯t here. Who would¡¯ve thought that he¡¯d immediatelye looking for you as soon as you¡¯d returned this time. How do you know him?¡±

    So it was him. This Lawrence was a bit odd. He had the same master as Phoebe, but attended ss at the Academy. Also, he currently possessed the strength of a journeyman swordsman. Han Shuo weighed all of this privately.

    As he lowered his head, Han Shuo happened to see Lisa¡¯s chest next to him. Her chest had originally been quite t, but now blossomed into shapely curves. The well-rounded look noticeably illustrated that she had quite a figure.

    ¡°Eh... Lisa, are you wearing more clothes than usual today? Why do I get the feeling that you¡¯ve filled out quite nicely?¡± Han Shuo snuck a nce at Lisa¡¯s chest and unknowingly let these words slip.

    ¡°What, what do you mean by that?¡± Lisa had been walking when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s words. She was so startled that she almost fell over. Her little face then reddened as she stared at Han Shuo with her question.

    ¡°Your chest was t before, with nothing there, but now it looks bumpy. Did you pad it with something?¡± Han Shuo thought internally, but his words were directly reflected in his speech. He opened his mouth and responded with this incredibly honest internal dialogue.

    Extraordinary rage! Lisa red vehemently at Han Shuo and reached out her small hand and gave Han Shuo a firm pinch. She gritted her teeth and said, ¡°You said such a thing and now suspect that I¡¯ve padded my chest. Do you want to die?¡±

    Han Shuo was horrified as he suddenly realized what he said. He thought those words had only stayed in his heart just now, and ording to his modus operandi, he would¡¯ve only kept them in his heart. He would never have caused so much trouble for himself by voicing thoughts that would only anger the other person.

    But who could have known that reality would be so strange. It was his inner thoughts, but Han Shuo hadn¡¯t given any thought to the consequences and just let it all out. This made Han Shuo feel exceedingly odd.

    At the same time, a strand of cool sensation suddenly suffused with his mind. Han Shuo¡¯s body shuddered slightly, and he then understood why such words slipped out from him before. It must be because the magical yuan had started creating some strange phenomenon after entering the ¡°molded spirit¡± stage.

    He smiled wryly at Lisa with her teeth gritted as he calmed himself down inside. He privately admonished himself to be careful and to not say anything random again. He finallyughed dryly at Lisa,¡± I¡¯m sorry Lisa, i was just joking with you. I hadn¡¯t thought that you really started developing. I¡¯m truly happy for you.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re such a bad person to say such things to someone!¡± Lisa immediately blushed and exined in a low voice, ¡°I should be the one thanking you instead. I followed the methods that you prescribed. Umm... this is so embarrassing. Anyways, that¡¯s what happened!¡±

    Shaking his head in silentughter, Han Shuo hadpletely forgotten the ways he¡¯d imparted onto Lisa before for developing her breasts. Who would¡¯ve thought that they would actually have an effect? This made Han Shuo feel rather awkward and put on the spot.

    ¡°Hi Bryan, how are you?¡± At this moment, Lawrence happened to see Han Shuo and Lisa from across the courtyard and greeted them from afar.

    Lisa¡¯s hastily took in a few breaths to calm her reddened face and snuck a nce at Han Shuo, saying softly, ¡°Lawrence¡¯s father is a great finance minister of the Empire. He is on very friendly terms with His Majesty. It will benefit you greatly if you have increased contact with him, I won¡¯t be disturbing you then.¡±

    Lisa seemed to be greatly afraid of Lawrence seeing her reddened face, and after saying these words she fled towards the training fields with small running steps.

    The son of one of the Empire¡¯s finance ministers! Han Shuo gave a slight start as he thought privately that the Academy was indeed full of hidden dragons and crouching tigers. It would seem that many future nobles would be training in the various majors of the Academy.

    ¡°I¡¯m quite good. I¡¯ve heard that you came looking for me twice? Heh heh, were you nning on spending five gold coins for me to get beaten by you all day?¡± There wasn¡¯t only Han Shuo and Lawrence in the courtyard, there was also a few students from other majors in the distance, reading books in groups of two or three or leisurely tanning themselves in the sunlight.

    ¡°If you¡¯re willing to, I don¡¯t mind spending another five gold coins, heh heh, but I think you would definitely not be willing now!¡± Lawrence leaned against a stone railing and was quite at ease as he spoke to Han Shou.

    ¡°Who says I¡¯m not willing? The only thing is I don¡¯t need five gold coins. As long as you¡¯re willing to let me fight back, I¡¯ll agree to practicing with you. I was beaten up quite severely by youst time and really want to save face!¡± Han Shuo smiled faintly and also leaned leisurely against the railing as he spoke to Lawrence with an interested expression.

    ¡°Oh, that¡¯s not a problem. I can practice with you after we¡¯ve concluded our business here and see if you¡¯re really as strong as Phoebe says.¡± Lawrence also looked quite interested as he stood up straight and smiled.

    ¡° Alright then, I¡¯d like to hear what business you have with me? The two of us shouldn¡¯t have any interaction at all, so what have youe to discuss with me?¡±

    Looking around, Lawrence kept his voice down when he discovered that no one was paying them any attention. He looked at Han Shuo with bright eyes, ¡°My little junior sister said that you seem to be able to get your hands on ck iron ore. If this is truly the case, I¡¯d like to purchase some from you. It doesn¡¯t have to be much, just an amount at the size of a fist will do. I was going to ask little junior sister to buy some for me, but I felt that since we got to know each otherst time and I¡¯m truly curious about you, I¡¯d like to be friends, so I¡¯vee to find you myself!¡±

    Han Shuo looked at the very sincere Lawrence and thought that since he was the son of a great finance minister for the Empire, he must have a lot of money.

 Chapter 90: Three pairs of eyes in the darkness

    Chapter 90: Three pairs of eyes in the darkness

    ¡°I can get the ck iron ore for you, yes, but you also know that it¡¯s not that easy to obtain. How many gold coins do you intend on spending to buy it?¡± Han Shuo weighed things up internally as he spoke slowly with a calm expression.

    His mental state sharpening, Lawrence drew himself upright and said with some excitement, ¡°So you can get it. Heh heh, I only need the size of a fist to forge weapons. The ck market currently has a shortage, so name your price!¡±

    Rubbing his chin, Han Shuo remembered a conversation he had with Phoebest time and hesitated, saying faintly, ¡°How about this? Give me five thousand gold coins and I¡¯ll try to get a piece for you.¡±

    ¡°No problem, although ck gold ore is even more rare, a ck iron ore the size of a fist is indeed worth five thousand gold coins. If you can get a piece of ck iron ore, you cane find me at the knight school. We¡¯ll do an exchange of goods and money.¡± Lawrence said joyfully.

    Nodding, Han Shuo remembered how he¡¯d been beaten up by Lawrence a few months ago at the knights school. His eyebrow flicked upwards as he chuckled. ¡°I¡¯ll get you a piece of ck iron ore within ten days. Why don¡¯t you practice with me again right now? I¡¯ll be very happy to be a human target for you again.¡±

    ¡°Alright, then let¡¯s begin. I can check out just how wonderful you are. Even someone as proud and aloof as Phoebe continuouslyplimented you in front of me. I¡¯m quite curious about your strength.¡± Lawrence struck a pose excitedly and was prepared to immediately fight with Han Shuo.

    It was noon, and most of the students in the courtyard had just put their things away and were getting ready to go to lunch. Only two or three students sunbathing in the far distance seemingly hadn¡¯t left because they¡¯d fallen asleep. Han Shuo swept a nce around the perimeter and smiled, ¡°Let¡¯s go to the left. There aren¡¯t that many people there and we won¡¯t affect anyone.¡±

    Han Shuo lifted his head provocatively at Lawrence after he spoke and walked to an empty clearing behind the railing to the left. Lawrence tightened his fists and chuckled lightly, following behind Han Shuo and also making for the empty lot on the left.

    When he arrived, Han Shuo circted the magical yuan throughout his body and started adjusting his bodily condition. Lawrence was a few steps behind Han Shuo and had just walked down the stone steps when Han Shuo had already doubled back like lightning, bringing a fist crashing down on Lawrence without giving him time to react.

    Lawrence hadn¡¯t anticipated that Han Shuo would make a move so quickly. The punch with frightening momentum had already arrived in front of Lawrence before he¡¯d had time to react. His facial expression changing slightly, Lawrence suddenly backed up a step after putting his feet down, returning to the stone steps again and shunted his body to the side, avoiding the punch that Han Shuo had suddenly flung his way.

    The punch whistled past Lawrence¡¯s face and frigid air emanated from Han Shuo¡¯s left fist, giving Lawrence a bit of a fright.

    Han Shuo retracted his left arm before Lawrence had time to react, then suddenly curved it and mmed his elbow into Lawrence¡¯s chest.

    Lawrence grunted lowly as his body was forced into the railing by Han Shuo¡¯s elbow, his face reddening slightly.

    ¡°Heh heh, Lawrence your sense of alertness isn¡¯t good enough!¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t follow up his elbow blow to Lawrence¡¯s chest with another attack. He backed away with an odd smile instead, teasing Lawrence in a sing-song tone.

    The two of them were only practicing and not fighting to the death, so Han Shuo hadn¡¯t used his full strength in that strike. He¡¯d only released the barest hint of frigid air from the ¡°cial Mystical Spellfire¡±. As a sergeant knight, Lawrence had fighting aura protecting him internally and hadn¡¯t suffered any injuries.

    ¡°You were the one who suddenly ambushed me. This punch doesn¡¯t count, I¡¯ll make you payter.¡± Lawrence wasn¡¯t mad as he borated on the truth with a wry expression. He then walked down the stone steps again and suddenly faced Han Shuo with no hints of levity.

    Pale-green fighting aura suddenly blossomed from Lawrence¡¯s hands as his footsteps sped up. He approached Han Shuo like lightning, the fighting aura from his left hand suddenly formed into the shape of a sword of light and hurtled down towards Han Shuo.

    Lawrence had just experienced Han Shuo¡¯s speed and strength and understood that the current Han Shuo couldn¡¯t bepared with who he had been before. This was why he was using his fighting aura, but his movements were quite cautious as he obviously pulled his punches.

    A trace of a slight smile curved at Han Shuo¡¯s lips as he watched Lawrence¡¯s movements. He measured up the strength of Lawrence¡¯s fighting aura andpletely failed to dodge. He circted the ¡°cial Mystical Spellfire¡± in his right hand as a thin beam of faint, red light materialized in the path of Han Shuo¡¯s waving right fist. It crashed down into the sword of light coalesced from Lawrence¡¯s fighting aura along with Han Shuo¡¯s right fist.

    Bam sounded out dully as Lawrence¡¯s sword of light, made from fighting aura, dispersed in a mass of light spots. Lawrence¡¯s strong forward momentum was halted in its tracks. Han Shuo also felt a wave of soreness and numbness ovee his right hand as his body backed up two steps involuntarily.

    ¡°Lawrence, how much of your fighting aura did you use in coalescing your sword of light just now?¡± Han Shuo looked at Lawrence with burning eyes as he asked

    ¡°Sixty percent!¡± Lawrence responded and then looked askance at Han Shuo. ¡°Your speed and aura is noticeably differentpared to a few months ago. It looks like you were definitely acting on purposest time ¡ª except, why would you be willing to be beaten up for five gold coins?¡±

    Han Shuo had been a rookie who hadn¡¯t been tried inbat a few months ago, and his magical yuan had only been at the first level of the ¡°solid realm¡±. He had done so to earn gold coins, but most importantly to train his body and thus hadn¡¯t held himself back. It looked like Lawrence was misunderstanding Han Shuo.

    Sixty percent of his fighting aura. Han Shuo thought briefly and went over the amount of magical yuan he had infused just now. He finally concluded that his own strength should be slightly stronger than Lawrence¡¯s because he had only infused his punch with about forty percent of his magical yuan. This already had the effect of being at equal strengths with his opponent.

    After testing his strength through the direct collision of one fist, Han Shuo didn¡¯t continue colliding head on with Lawrence. He used the agility and nimbleness of his body instead to battle Lawrence in much more efficient ways.

    The two of them traded blows back and forth for a while on the empty lot and both of them suffered from a few attacks. Han Shuo¡¯s body was obvious much stronger than Lawrence¡¯s, and he emitted low grunts when punches of equal strengthnded on his body.

    Han Shuo¡¯s body was stronger than Lawrence¡¯s to begin with, not to mention that the initial stage of training magical yuan had been self inflicted torture, so he had endured all sorts of pain. He was already used to this kind of pain, so these blows didn¡¯t even register on his body when theynded.

    Spots were dancing in Lawrence¡¯s eyes when he voluntarily stopped after a while. He smiled wryly, ¡°No more, enough. You¡¯re quite a strange person. I can¡¯t feel any fighting aura from you at all, but why is it that your strength is much greater than mine. Is your body made out of steel? Why does it feel like I¡¯m punching a stone wall when I hit you? Don¡¯t you feel pain at all?¡±

    Chuckling evilly, Han Shuo said, ¡°Don¡¯t you worry about this. My body is naturally odd. Can¡¯t my body be strong?¡±

    ¡°Eh, do you have the blood of barbarians running through you, or can you go berserk like the berserk warriors? Phoebe was right, you are a marvelous person!¡± Lawrence first asked in astonishment and then murmured to himself.

    Han Shuo also understood his deficiencies after the two had sparred. His body and magical yuan was indeed wondrous, but Lawrence had obviously been trained in martial arts and there was quite a rhythm in his punches and evasive maneuvers.

    Han Shuo had never learned martial arts, and his attacks were always the simplest methods. Compared to Lawrence, hecked effective attacking methods. He made a mental note of this deficiency. Han Shuo nned on thoroughly pondering this when he had time and see if there were any other attacking styles left behind in Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know. Alright, let¡¯s stop here for today. I¡¯ve finally redeemed myself forst time. I¡¯lle to the knight school when I obtain the ck iron ore.¡± Han Shuo mentally weighed a few things and made his careless farewells to Lawrence as he returned to the necromancy major with furrowed brows.

    Lawrence didn¡¯t get mad aftering off a bit worse for the wear this time. After he bid farewell to Han Shuo with a smile, he walked towards his knight school and muttered, ¡°A strange person indeed. The durability of his body can probably bepared with orc warriors!¡±

    Han Shuo mused privately as his footsteps continued to take him towards the necromancy major. Phoebe needed some time to prepare the rations and he didn¡¯t intend on returning to the cemetery of death in the short terms. Duke was currently residing within the school and Han Shuo still didn¡¯t know his exact ns. Therefore, he decided to remain within the necromancy major after some thought.

    Han Shuo¡¯s dorms had long since been arranged by Fanny, but he¡¯d never lived in them. Now that he¡¯d decided on temporarily staying within the academy, the dorms were finally proving to be of some use to him.

    The Babylon Academy of Magic and Force was thergest institution of learning within the Empire. Its facilities were veryprehensive, and it was no wonder that a high tuition was enacted from every student.

    Han Shuo¡¯s quarters were in the corner of the second floor and were roughly fifty to sixty meters squared. It included a bedroom and a bathroom, with tables, chairs, and mirrors. It was the difference between heaven and earthpared to the warehouse Han Shuo had stayed in before.

    It was already past noon after he¡¯d arrived at his dorms. Han Shuo had missed meal time and could only take out a few chunks of meat jerky from his space ring to pad his stomach.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t leave the dorms after he finished eating. He closed the room door tightly and sat on the bed, taking advantage of a quiet lull to practice his magical yuan. The magical yuan started circting and slowly began to coalesce in his mind from all parts of his body. A sort of clear, slightly-cool feeling permeated through his brain, making Han Shuo feel that his brain was immersed in a refreshing pool of water.

    However, this feeling onlysted for a short while. Thefort of his mind was reced by a soul wrenching pain. The training of the ¡°molded spirit¡± level caused Han Shuo¡¯s brain to continuously switch betweenfort and pain. He would feelzily at ease one second, and so much pain that it felt like someone was digging through his brain with a sharp knife the next.

    What was most agonizing about this for Han Shuo was that every time the pain surged, his mind would be immensely clear headed. This would cause the pain to be suddenly magnified ten times. The rity of his mind was specifically for him to suffer through even greater pain. This made Han Shuo wish to curse whoever created this magical yuan technique was seriously a perverse masochist.

    After a long, long time, Han Shuo breathed out lightly and halted his magical yuan training. Hot air rose from his body like he¡¯d just taken a hot shower and a strong sense of manliness rolled off his body.

    Training his magical yuan had taken Han Shuo from afternoon directly to night. The night scenery outside his window was captivating as the cool night breeze blew in. It was deste and silent all around.

    Sitting up from his cross legged position, Han Shuo turned on the hot water in the bathroom andid back leisurely in the tub, enjoying this rare moment of carefree ease. He even hummed a small tune.

    The dead of the night was the perfect timing for those with ulterior motives toe skulk around. Two small sounds suddenly sounded in Han Shuo¡¯s ears, just as he waszily showering. One of them came from within the dormitory building, the other outside the window.

    Three original demons flew out, without a sound, from the back of Han Shuo¡¯s neck. Two of them went out the window to check what was going on outside. One of them floated towards the origin of the sound, while the other stayed near the window, silently observing any abnormalities. Thest original demon floated out the crack in the door and arrived in the hallway of the dormitory building, moving forward along the hallway and floating to where the sound hade from.

    The one that had gone outside finally discovered Duke surreptitiously floating around the sides of the buildings after traveling for a while. Duke hadn¡¯t used nightwalker clothes this time. He appeared like a ghost in the darkness, floating to the dark major¡¯s ssroom buildings without any weight at all.

    The original demon within the hallway had discovered one of the dormitory room doors had been lightly opened, with Fitch tiptoeing out quietly with a sinister face. He was walking towards Han Shuo and judging from his facial expressions, seemed to bear ill will.

    Han Shuo immediately jumped out from the bath tub and quickly towelled himself off. He put his pants back on andy down on the bed with his back facing the door, even breathing sounds emitting from his mouth.

 Chapter 91: A game of hot potato with lingerie

    Chapter 91: A game of hot potato with lingerie

    Fitch fancied himself clever as he tiptoed like a thief up to Han Shuo¡¯s door. He looked around shiftily and then used an exceedingly low voice to summon a wraith, bidding it to enter Han Shuo¡¯s room through the crack beneath the door.

    Han Shuo¡¯s original demons had been refined from wraiths to begin with, so wraiths could also be another set of eyes for the summoners. However, as a summoned creatures from necromancers, they carried a faint hint of death about them and had a greyish-white outline. Anyone with a slightly higher level of alertness would easily discover traces of them.

    Han Shuo¡¯s original demons had undergone specialized magical yuan refinement and thus didn¡¯t have any magical ripples emanating from them. Their form was also indistinct. As long as they didn¡¯te into contact with a magical boundary, it would be very difficult to discover them. Add to that the fact that original demons were one of the demon generals and had a mental connection to the mage, they could be deployed to far distances and had umon attacking capabilities. Therefore, no matter how one viewed it, an original demon was much more practical than a wraith.

    After Fitch¡¯s wraith entered Han Shuo¡¯s room, it circled around inside and then stopped in front of Han Shuo¡¯s window. It seemed to be silently observing Han Shuo¡¯s movements.

    Breathing evenly, Han Shuo was on his side and appeared to be in a deep sleep. He seemed to bepletely oblivious to everything happening around him. Fitch used the wraith to probe around from the outside before cing his hand on the door handle, exerting a small amount of force. Han Shuo¡¯s room door creaked open with a small squeak.

    A bag of powder suddenly appearing in his hand, Fitch opened the paper wrappings and blew on it in front of the door. The powder dispersed into the air and emitted a light fragrance.

    Soul Temptation Powder!

    Han Shuo had some understanding of poison powder now and had already recognized the fragrance when it dispersed just now. Heughed coldly inside and didn¡¯t hold his breath. He continued to naturally inhale and exhale. With the strength his body acquired after entering the third demonic realm, low level powders that would cause him to sink into a drugged state had absolutely no effect on him at all.

    A sinister and venomous smile on his face, Fitch had a bit of a gleeful expression on his face right now as he walked lightly towards Han Shuo, ring at him fiercely. What he was thinking, no one knew.

    Leveraging the line of vision from the original demons, Han Shuo still fully viewed Fitch¡¯s expression even with his eyes closed. Although he maintained a sleeping posture with his body, Han Shuo had long since readied himself. He was prepared to make a move as soon as things went south. Han Shuo was prepared to kill as soon as Fitchid a hand on him.

    However, Fitch didn¡¯t seem as bold as Han Shuo thought. He stared at Han Shuo and then murmured to himself, ¡°You lowly ve, you¡¯repletely unworthy of Master Fanny. I should¡¯ve run you out of the necromancy major a long time ago, but you weren¡¯t around for a long time. However, let¡¯s see where you¡¯ll run this time. After tomorrow, everyone will be sure that you¡¯re a pervert. Even if Master Fanny helps you, the school authorities will expel you from the necromancy major. I¡¯ve spent quite a lot of effort and time in wanting to make a move against you, heh heh!¡±

    Fitch murmured as he fished out arge package from his being. He bent down and shoved the package under Han Shuo¡¯s bed, then slowly backed out of Han Shuo¡¯s room with a proud air, cackling in a low tone as he did so. He then carefully closed the door to Han Shuo¡¯s room and walked easily to his own room with a face full of satisfaction.

    Han Shuo immediately sat up in his bed after Fitch had left and bent down to look around. He discovered that Fitch had hung this package from the wooden ts beneath the bed. He would¡¯ve been hard pressed to discover it if he hadn¡¯t looked carefully.

    When Han Shuo took down the bundle and opened it, he was bbergasted by what he saw.

    A collection of flimsy, thin female lingerie greeted his eyes. These colorful articles of clothing werece trimmed and all had very small amounts of cloth on them. They were either cute or sexy. Some had just been washed, with two looking like they¡¯d just been taken off and hadn¡¯t had time to be washed. There were still a few traces of the female body on them.

    Han Shuo stared at the female lingerie items within the bundle and looked them all over twice, sighing that Fitch really did possess amazing methods of revenge. He started to grow a healthy appreciation for Fitch. However, what he admired wasn¡¯t Fitch¡¯s schemes, but his methods. Who would¡¯ve thought that he would be able to silently and unwittingly obtain so many articles of female lingerie? He wondered if there were any in this pile that belonged to Master Fanny!

    Shaking his head with involuntaryughter, Han Shuo knew that once the girls of the school realized that their lingerie had gone missing, they were bound to raise a huge furor tomorrow. Fitch was certain to have other tricks up his sleeve. Perhaps there would be a room by room search of all male students tomorrow. If this bundle were to be discovered beneath his bed, Han Shuo was sure to gain the title of ¡°Great Perverted Demon¡±. He wouldn¡¯t have to wait for the school to expel him then, since he himself wouldn¡¯t have the face to face anyone and would never appear within the Academy again.

    ¡°I won¡¯t do anything to you if you don¡¯t do anything to me. Fitch, ah Fitch. You can¡¯t me me for being vicious this time.¡± Han Shuo picked up the package and snickered softly as he got out of the bed and walked towards Fitch¡¯s room with the original demon leading the way.

    He used almost the same exact methods of leveraging the original demon¡¯s vision to copy Fitch¡¯s methods. He travelled soundlessly to Fitch¡¯s room, shoved the bundle beneath Fitch¡¯s bed and then left, with none the wiser.

    Once this matter had beenpleted satisfactorily, Han Shuo returned to his room and didn¡¯t go back to sleep, but rather used the other original demon to observe Duke¡¯s movements.

    Duke had flown directly to a ssroom on the fourth floor of the building after arriving at the dark major building. There was not a soul within the ssroom building at night. Duke didn¡¯t move after setting foot in this room, bing one with the night.

    Han Shuo gazed upon Duke in the darkness, through the eyes of the original demon parked in the shadows of a great tree. Except, he didn¡¯t make another move after arriving and had no further movement. This made Han Shuo feel quite confused. He wasn¡¯t sure what Duke was doing in the ssroom building in the middle of the night.

    After a while, just when Han Shuo started to feel a bit impatient, a fat cloud of ck light suddenly appeared in the distance and slowly moved towards the ssroom building.

    It would¡¯ve been difficult to discover the cloud¡¯s existence if he hadn¡¯t been paying attention in the darkness. Han Shuo gave himself a mental shake and immediately increased his attention. He carefully observed the movements within this ball of light. The dark light was thickly concentrated like a dense patch of clouds, making it difficult for Han Shuo to see what was going on inside.

    The motionless Duke only detected this cloud of light after it entered the dark major ssroom building, and he suddenly coughed lightly.

    The cloud of ck light halted briefly upon hearing Duke¡¯s light cough, then quickly traveled up the steps and made for the room that Duke was in.

    Duke and the cloud of dark light finally met with the room between them. Duke flicked a nce at the cloud of dark light that had halted in front of the door and disyed a trace of a smile, saying softly, ¡°The Empire¡¯s ¡®ck Underworld¡¯ organization is everywhere alright. There are even people from ¡®ck Underworld¡¯ within this organization. It¡¯s very nice to make your acquaintance. I think you can reveal your true appearance now?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve been in this Academy for many years, and expended a lot of the organization¡¯s resources just to gain entrance to this ce from the beginning. My identity must not be revealed at any costs. There are many archmages like you within the Babylon Academy, and the head of the school is even a grand magus. It would be no trifling matter if we rmed her.¡±

    A familiar voice traveled out from the the cloud of ck light. It was then peeled back likeyers of clothing being cast off, revealing the figure of the dark major¡¯s old witch Cami.

    It was her! Han Shuo was startled as he observed everything inside with greater caution, deathly afraid that he would miss any bit of their conversation.

    There was a ¡°Dark Mantle¡± organization within the Lancelot Empire, and hence there would certainly be a simr organization within the Kasi Empire. It seemed that Cami was from the Kasi Empire and was a member of the Kasi Empire¡¯s ¡°ck Underworld¡±. This was quite interesting.

    ¡°So it¡¯s you. Heh heh. I even saw you today... who would¡¯ve thought that you¡¯re one of us. The ¡®ck Underworld¡¯ of the Empire is indeed infinitely resourceful. It looks like my mission this time will be a lot easier than expected.¡± Duke was also quite surprised when Cami revealed herself.

    ¡°It¡¯s very dangerous for the two of us to meet here. The ¡®Dark Mantle¡¯ organization of the Lancelot Empire isn¡¯t that easy to handle either. I¡¯ve had a few run ins with them here. They¡¯re like flies that buzz around you. If my identity is revealed, not only will I immediately die a gruesome death, but I¡¯ll also fail to live up to the Empire¡¯s cultivation of me. Cut the ther. What business did you have in contacting me?¡± Cami rushed Duke impatiently to get down to business.

    Nodding, Duke said gravely, ¡°I have many responsibilities about me on this trip to the Lancelot Empire. If it wasn¡¯t for the inability to resolve them myself, I wouldn¡¯t dare to call upon your ¡®ck Underworld¡¯s¡¯ agents. I¡¯ve asked Master Fanny of the necromancy major today and heard that apart from each major¡¯s library, there¡¯s also a secret library? We need to look up a few materials and would like to ask you where the library is located, and how we get in?¡±

    ¡°There is indeed a secret library with many rare books stored inside. I¡¯ve not only heard of this library, but I¡¯ve been so privileged as to make it inside before. However, there¡¯s a magical boundary personally cast by the headmaster. No one can go inside without the headmaster¡¯s approval.¡±

    ¡°I was going to research curses of the dark majorst time, that was how I made it in, apanied by the headmaster. If you want to break into the secret library, I¡¯m sure you¡¯ll be discovered by the headmaster. You¡¯d best think of another n!¡± Cami gravely warned Duke with a face full of resignation.

    Duke thought with a darkened face for a while after hearing Cami¡¯s words and said to her, ¡°If this is the case, then I¡¯ll have to impose upon you and think of a way inside. The Empire would like to know everything regarding the ¡®Eye of Darkness¡¯. Go inside and see if there¡¯s anything with regards to this. Before I made this trip, those on top in the ¡®ck Underworld¡¯ said that I could make use of you in critical moments. I hope you understand.¡±

    ¡°If the Empire wanted to investigate this matter, they could have directly given me orders through the ¡®ck Underworld¡¯. Why would they trouble you with a personal trip?¡± Cami looked at Duke in confusion and didn¡¯t immediately agree, opening her mouth and asking Duke.

    ¡°You don¡¯t need to know that much about this matter. The Empire has its own arrangements in sending us. You just need to go to the secret library and help me understand everything there is to know about the ¡®Eye of Darkness¡¯.¡± Duke¡¯s forehead creased as he said a bit unhappily.

    ¡°What item is that? It sounds like something from our dark major. Tell me what it looks like and its basic information.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s not something from your dark major. It was created by the necromancers in an era when necromancers were strong. The secrets of opening the cemetery of death are hidden inside. It¡¯s said that the cemetery of death is sacred ground for necromancers. Many years ago, when necromancers rampaged over thends, the cemetery of death was a ce of evil that no one dared to mention on the Continent. The tomes of frightening necromancy secrets may be kept inside. The Empire needs the secrets inside, so you need toprehend the secrets of the ¡®Eye of Darkness¡¯ to the best of your abilities!¡±

    Cami¡¯s face changed slightly as she thought briefly and then said, ¡°Since this is the case, then I¡¯ll think of a way to get inside. However, the headmaster is always present whenever we go inside, so I can only do my best.¡±

    ¡°Alright then, let me know as soon as you go inside, whether or not you make any discoveries. I¡¯ll be staying at the wind major for the foreseeable future, exchanging some knowledge of wind magic. You can make use of other excuses to openlye find me.¡± Duke nodded and said to Cami.

    The two had reached an agreement by this point and didn¡¯t continue further discussions afterwards. The two of them left the ssroom building one by one after dispersing.

    After Han Shuo retrieved his original demons, he went through their conversation in his mind and contemted a bit with a furrowed brow, finally slowly drifting off to sleep.

 Chapter 92: Are you really a mage?

    Chapter 92: Are you really a mage?

    Early the next day, Han Shuo could already hear the topic of the stolen lingerie outside the window before he¡¯d even gotten out of bed. Under the efforts of a conscientious person, this person was quickly found out and the topic immediately spread to every corner of the necromancy major.

    Gene and Fanny were utterly exhausted from overworking early in the morning and were worrying over this matter. The students had quickly gathered within the training fields. Expressions of anger and fright were apparent on the female students¡¯ faces, whereas the male students were also full of astonishment. Some were also delighting in the misfortunes of others.

    Han Shuo had also been gathered in the training fields. He listening to the noisy chatter of the crowd as his eyes constantly flitted towards Fitch. Fitch looked normal, but his eyes kept dancing and also swept towards Han Shuo every now and then.

    ¡°The fallout from this matter is exceedingly devious. Nothing like this has ever happened in our necromancy major before, but now that this matter has cropped up, it must be thoroughly investigated.¡± Gene also had a face full of fury as he expressed his opinion.

    ¡°Lisa, you girls trulyck alertness. How could you have let the thief so easily seed, and not pick up any disturbances whatsoever?¡± Fanny lectured Lisa with a furrowed brow.

    ¡°This is the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, we didn¡¯t think that the thieves would be so bold either. Nothing happened in the necromancy major for such a long period of time, add to that the fact that dirty clothes are nothing valuable. Who would¡¯ve thought that such a perverted lecher would appear?!¡± Lisa said with a pained expression.

    Amy, Athena, Be, and the other girls all wore expressions of rage as they chattered andined ceaselessly. They called out loudly that when they found the thief, they would surely exact a harsh punishment upon him.

    ¡°Such a thing happening in our necromancy major has already caused an extremely negative impact. The school authorities have already taken over the investigation. I wonder who has been so shameless and bold as tomit such an infuriating act.¡± Fanny was a bit irritated, but much more enraged as she said angrily.

    Many animated discussions took ce within the training fields, and those who¡¯d had their lingerie stolen were incredibly angry and couldn¡¯t be calmed. Han Shuo calmly observed everything and waited for further developments.

    ¡°Who do you think did it?¡± Lisa had drifted next to Han Shuo after some time and opened her mouth to ask him.

    Shrugging, Han Shuo smiled. ¡°How would I know? But the person who¡¯s done this should be quite familiar with our territory. Otherwise, how could he have seeded so easily? Although you¡¯re a bit weak, but I think you girls would¡¯ve noticed something if someone ordinary and unfamiliar with the surroundings tried to do something like this. None of you girls noticed a thing, so I quite admire this person¡¯s methods.¡±

    ¡°How can you still be cracking such jokes at a time like this? My, my bra was stolen too! This person is a shameless lecher. If I know who did it, I¡¯m not going to let him off the hook!¡± Lisa clenched her fists and bit off her words.

    ¡°You¡¯ll have to catch him first.¡± Han Shuo conversed carelessly with Lisa, but his eyes roved continuously over Fitch¡¯s face.

    Just as there was a hubbub on the training fields, a middle-aged swordsman walked in. His name was Vida, and he was in charge of all trivial matters within the Academy. Han Shuo had seen him once before. This person was famous for having great strength. If there were any fights that broke out between the students, or any strange circumstances that appeared, it was always him who appeared to handle things.

    ¡°I have already grasped the general gist of the situation. I looked around the girls¡¯ dormitory building just now. Huh. I can already hazard a guess as to whomitted this act.¡± Vida¡¯s eyes immediately swept towards where Han Shuo and the others had gathered when he arrived and spoke coolly.

    ¡°Uncle Vida, who did it!? Hurry and tell us!¡± Amy stood next to Vida and asked anxiously.

    Vida¡¯s expression was stiff as he looked towards Han Shuo, ¡°The person who did this would be most aware of this in his heart. I hope that he will voluntarily admit his mistakes. As long as he steps forward voluntarily, I can at least promise that I won¡¯t send him to the Empire¡¯s Judiciary, but if he stubbornly refuses to plead guilty, then I won¡¯t be kind to him.¡±

    ¡°Mister Vida, what do you mean by that? You¡¯ve been yelling at our students all along, do you think that one of them hasmitted this act? That¡¯s too ridiculous!¡± Fanny said unhappily when she saw Vida¡¯s nce patrol continuously over a few male students¡¯ faces with a cold and stern look on his face.

    ¡°Master Fanny, this isn¡¯t ridiculous at all. It has to be one of your dear students. I looked around the girls¡¯ dormitory and found a pair of exceedingly faint footprints that went from the female student¡¯s dorm windows, avoiding the trees and shrubbery, and making for the boys¡¯ dormitory. Heh heh, I¡¯ve handled many cases like this before and don¡¯t even think of concealing the truth from me. I think Master Fanny should well understand what problem thisys out?¡± Vida thought himself clever as he chuckled and made a judgment on this matter.

    It looked like Fitch had paid quite a bit of attention to detail. He¡¯d even purposefully left footprints behind for Vida to point the way. However, this Vida didn¡¯t seem too intelligent. This caused Han Shuo to somewhat dismiss him and lowered his view of this person in his heart.

    When these words were spoken, they immediately caused an uproar. All the boys immediately called out and denied that they¡¯d been the ones tomit such a dastardly act. The group of girls with Be at their head looked angrily in their direction. Their gaze at all the boys was quite unfriendly, as if every was under suspicion for doing the deed.

    ¡°Lisa, you don¡¯t need to look at me that way. I feel quite ufortable.¡± Lisa also swept an odd gaze over Han Shuo¡¯s face. Although Han Shuo hadn¡¯t done anything, he still felt all the hair on his body stand on end when she stared at him with that look, as if he¡¯d really be that shameless perverted demon.

    ¡°Hehe, I¡¯m just having fun with you. I believe that you would never do something like this.¡± Lisa smiled sweetly at Han Shuo when she saw that his scalp was a bit numb.

    Vida was already a bit impatient at this point and spoke with a cold expression on his face, ¡°I think one amongst you can admit your guilt at this time. We can resolve this matter privately within the Academy if you¡¯re willing to voluntarily admit your wrongdoings. However, if you hold the mentality of getting by on a fluke and have no intention of repenting and mending your ways, then don¡¯t me me for being harsh.¡±

    As the thief, Fitch had already safely stowed the items in Han Shuo¡¯s room. He was quite proud right now and naturally wished ardently for Vida to investigate. All the other students had done nothing and naturally weren¡¯t afraid of anything. Each of their expressions were more serious and with a clear conscience than each other. Fitch even spoke with a noble spirit, ¡°This should be thoroughly investigated. Such a matter should definitely not be treated with leniency.¡±

    Bach and the others murmured noises of assent, expressing the attitude that this thief should be harshly punished. It was as if the firmness of their attitude would be enough to prove their innocence.

    ¡°Bryan, why don¡¯t you say anything?¡± Amy couldn¡¯t help but ask curiously when she saw Han Shuo standing there with a faint smile on his face, saying nothing and presenting a sharp contrast to the other students full of noble wrath.

    ¡°Is he feeling guilty? Heh heh, but it¡¯s rather odd. Nothing happened in the days when he wasn¡¯t in the necromancy major. Something immediately took ce when he happened to be in the dormsst night. This seems like quite a coincidence!¡± Be had some old grudges with Han Shuo. It was as if she¡¯d discovered a new frontier when she suddenly eximed softly.

    Her exmation and her words seemed to make a bit of sense. The gazes of all assembled fell onto Han Shuo. All of them were filled with suspicion, and disdain could be even found on a few people¡¯s faces, as if Han Shuo was that pervert.

    ¡°There¡¯s no point in proiming my stance. I think Mister Vida will be able to sessfully investigate who did it. I await his discovery with great anticipation.¡± Han Shuo shrugged his shoulders and said faintly.

    Seeing that no one was stepping forward, Vida snorted coldly, ¡°Alright, since this is the case, don¡¯t me me for taking drastic measures. Not too much time has passed since the matter urred till now. I think the thief would¡¯ve only hid the items on him or in his room. Master Fanny and Gene, we¡¯ll search their bodies first. Once we¡¯ve concluded the body search, we¡¯ll move onto searching their dorms. I think he wouldn¡¯t have buried the items.¡±

    Under Vida¡¯s requests, the male students all stripped off their clothes until they were standing in their shorts. It was up to Vida and Gene to search through the clothes on their bodies.

    When Han Shuo also took off his clothes, Vida disyed a surprised expression as he looked hotly at Han Shuo¡¯s naked body. He suddenly asked, ¡°Are you really a mage?¡±

    Everyone present couldn¡¯t help but pay attention to Han Shuo when Vida spoke these words. They were greeted with the sight of even and perfect muscles on Han Shuo¡¯s naked body, a body full of masculine energy and strength. His figure looked even stronger and more perfect than ordinary warriors. This was a starkparison to the short, skinny, or fat students. No wonder Vida was so surprised.

    ¡°When did you be so fit? I remember you were skinny and small before?¡± Lisa¡¯s eyes gleamed as she stared intently at Han Shuo¡¯s revealed naked body and sighed in the best of spirits.

    All the other female students were incredibly surprised when they saw Han Shuo¡¯s greatly alluringm masculine body. When theypared it to the room full of fat and bones, they immediately felt that Han Shuo¡¯s extraordinary body was absolutely perfect. The shy Amy blushed faintly and lowered her head to whisper something to Athena. This also made Athena¡¯s face redden as her gaze towards Han Shuo became a bit odd.

    Fanny¡¯s face was also flushed and she didn¡¯t seem to dare to look at Han Shuo¡¯s body directly. She first looked away and then snuck intense nces at Han Shuo¡¯s body when no one else was paying attention.

    ¡°I was malnourished before and wasn¡¯t well developed. Of course I develop well now that I¡¯m eating well.¡± Han Shuo looked ambiguously at Lisa¡¯s chest and said meaningfully.

    ¡°You suck!¡± Lisa became panicked upon seeing Han Shuo stare at her chest and admonished Han Shuo embarrassingly.

    When this interlude had passed and everyone¡¯s clothes had been turned over by Vida, he opened his mouth after failing to discover anything, ¡°It looks like it¡¯s been hidden within the dorms. Let¡¯s begin our investigation of the dorms.¡±

    ¡°Bryan seems to also have a space ring.¡± Be suddenly spoke up just as everyone was about to leave.

    Vida¡¯s departing form halted upon hearing Be¡¯s words. He then looked with astonishment at the space ring on Han Shuo¡¯s hand and eximed, ¡°So that¡¯s a space ring, I almost missed it, but space rings aren¡¯t easily searched. This will be a bit difficult. How about this, give me the space ring first and I¡¯ll go find the headmaster. As a space archmage, she¡¯ll have the ways to open your space ring. I hope you cooperate with the course of my duties.¡±

    Han Shuo first looked coldly at Be in the distance, saying directly to her, ¡°Ugly woman, you are seriously unlikeable.¡±

    Be first disyed an expression of extreme fury, but then remembered Han Shuo¡¯s berserk rage in the Dark Forest when she saw the ruthless chill in his eyes. She involuntarily took one step back in fright and opened her mouth, but couldn¡¯t bring herself to say another word.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart had sank at this moment as he suddenly felt put on the spot. There were some sensitive items within his space ring. It would create a lot of trouble for him if the headmaster discovered them.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong, is there something that shouldn¡¯t see the light of day in your space ring?¡± Vida asked as he saw Han Shuo hesitate to cooperate.

    ¡°I trust that he wouldn¡¯t do anything like this. I think we should investigate the dorms first and then discuss his space ring if nothing is found.¡± Fanny thought for a moment and spoke up when she saw Han Shuo disy a conflicted expression.

    Vida looked in surprise at Fanny and then woodenly nodded his head. ¡°Then you look after him during this time. Don¡¯t let him out of your sight and get up to any tricks. You¡¯re responsible if anything goes wrong.¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, let¡¯s go search the dorms.¡± Gene smoothed over the situation with his suggestion and took the crowd of people towards the male student dorms.

    All the students stayed below Fanny¡¯s watchful eye. Gene and Vida entered the dorm and sounds of things being rifled through and upended rang out. Fitch watched Han Shuo and Fanny stand together with a look of cruel joy. He gleefully went over the punishment that Han Shuo was about to face and he felt a contentment that he¡¯d never felt before.

    ¡°Thank you Master Fanny.¡± Han Shuo thanked her sincerely as he looked at Fanny by his side.

    Rolling her eyes at him, Fanny whispered with her sweet voice, ¡°What awkward items are within your space ring? Even if the headmaster saw them, she wouldn¡¯t have you detained for having them. What are you afraid of?¡±

    ¡°I kept a bit of the weapons and medicines from the town of Drolst time. If the headmaster searched my space ring, she¡¯ll surely discover this bundle of stolen goods. Our major has divvied up the items and the gold coins. If the headmaster saw it, our entire major will be strung up for it. Don¡¯t you think something¡¯s wrong with Be¡¯s brain?¡± Han Shuo said.

    Fanny suddenly felt like a fool after hearing these words. Her brow then knit together as she contemted this matter with a face full of anxiety.

    Suddenly, Gene and Vida walked out from the building towards the arrogantly smirking Fitch. Vida asked coldly, ¡°Did you think I wouldn¡¯t discover them simply because you hung them on a hook beneath the bed?¡±

    All the looks full of disdain and disgust suddenlynded on Fitch¡¯s proud face. Just as Fitch was dumbfounded, he was utterly drowned by a shrill, angry tide of curses from the female students.

 Chapter 93: Great Formation of the Divine Zombies and Five Elements

    Chapter 93: Great Formation of the Divine Zombies and Five Elements

    Fitch was utterly destroyed this time. He was mercilessly hauled away under everyone¡¯s curses and contemptuous gazes as he continuously called out, ¡°This is an evil plot! I was framed!¡± Vida said to Fanny before he left, ¡°This filthy piece of scum will never appear in the Academy ever again!¡±

    Everyone kept discussing Fitch¡¯s despicable acts for a long time after he¡¯d been dragged away. Several of the female students¡¯ fury still hadn¡¯t abated as they chattered busily, cursing Fitch. No one sympathized for him.

    Fanny was a bit bbergasted. She hadn¡¯t expected that Fitch would be that kind of person. She even suspected the truth of the matter a bit, but the truth was right in front of her and she had nothing to say. She could only continuously shake her head and sigh.

    Having caught the thief, Han Shuo naturally didn¡¯t have to worry about the issue of his space ring being searched. Heughed coldly inside as he watched Fitch caught in his own trap. He¡¯d been asking for it and couldn¡¯t fault Han Shuo for being ruthless. If Han Shuo hadn¡¯t discovered this beforehand, he would most likely be the one facing the crowd¡¯s jeers and taunts now.

    This matter made the students buzz with excitement and discussion all day, but Han Shuo didn¡¯t get involved. He didn¡¯t attend ss in the morning, but rather headed to the training grounds alone, practicing how to summon zombie warriors over and over again.

    Since his direction was correct, he only needed time. After a morning of repeated practice, he finally sessfully summoned a zombie warrior. This meant that Han Shuo had added another powerful spell to his arsenal. The maniption of zombies was much more difficult than skeletal warriors. In order to fully deploy the exceptional offensive capabilities of the buff and clumsy zombies, the technique and familiarity of the maniptor was even more critical.

    Han Shuo stayed within the training grounds for the next three days and practiced controlling the zombies with more familiarity. As he stood in the midst of the various obstacles within the training field, Han Shuo summoned a zombie that wielded a heavy iron club. Under the control of Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength, the zombie twisted its body and evaded a few of the obstacles. The iron club in its hand crashed solidly down on a target under Han Shuo¡¯s guidance.

    Han Shuo kept careful surveince on the dark major¡¯s old witch, Cami. During these two days, the old witch visited the headmaster¡¯s office once, but strong magical pulses were present in the headmaster¡¯s office. Han Shuo was certain that a magical boundary existed within the headmaster¡¯s office.

    As a grand magus of space magic, the headmaster possessed extraordinary magic. Han Shuo didn¡¯t dare brashly insert his original demons into her office to eavesdrop. Therefore, he had no way of knowing what Cami discussed with the Headmaster, and he didn¡¯t know whether or not Cami had already visited the secret library.

    However, judging from the amount of time that Cami had spent in the Headmaster¡¯s office, Han Shuo felt that Cami hadn¡¯t paid a visit yet because she walked out a few minutes after entering the office.

    ¡°You¡¯re in the training grounds alright, I knew I¡¯d find you here.¡± Han Shuo had remained within the training grounds this morning while the others were listening to the lecture within the ssroom. Fanny suddenly walked in and spoke to him.

    ¡°What are you doing here? Don¡¯t you only have sses in the afternoon?¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t stop practicing after Fanny had walked in and only responded carelessly, continuing to manipte the zombie to agilely circle past another obstacle.

    ¡°I came looking for you. Eh, you¡¯ve grasped it quite quickly. Heh heh, ording to the speed of your improvement, I think you¡¯ll be able to make it into the next stage before too long.¡± Fanny smiled faintly andplimented him when she saw that Han Shuo could already adeptly control zombies.

    She halted, crinkled her slender brows, and then asked in confusion, ¡°Bryan, although your potential is quite good, the speed in which you¡¯re concentrating mental strength shouldn¡¯t be this quick. The meditation of mental strength doesn¡¯t have much to do with the quality of potential, particrly when one is just starting out. Mental strength is slowly increased through umtion over many months and years. Why are you able to possess the mental strength of a novice mage after just a few months? This is quite queer, just how are you doing it?¡±

    It was natural for Fanny to be perplexed. Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength had increased quicklyrgely due to the effects of the ¡°Eye of Darkness¡±. Han Shuo improved with rapid speed without rhyme or reason whenever his mind was about ready to split open from pain. Now that his magical yuan had entered the ¡°molded spirit¡± stage, the potential of his brain had been unlocked and the speed in which he gathered mental strength increased yet again when he meditated. With the ovepping effects of his training, it would¡¯ve been difficult for his mental strength to not increase in speed of concentration.

    Shrugging, Han Shuo said, ¡°How would I know? My body¡¯s quite strange to begin with. Not only am I much stronger than ordinary mages, but the speed at which I gather mental strength when meditating is also quite fast.¡±

    ¡°Can it be that you possess the legendary body of divine favor?¡± Fanny first nked, with a look of extreme joy appearing on her face as she spoke with excitement.

    Han Shuo was also dumbfounded by her words. He asked nkly, ¡°What¡¯s a body of divine favor?¡±

    ¡°There are an exceedingly few amount of people in this world who are born with bodies different from others. It¡¯s rare for even one of these people to appear out of ten thousand people. Their bodies are different from ordinary people. Some of them have natural aptitudes for training fighting aura, and some are naturally born to be mages.¡±

    ¡°If these people can find the correct realm for them, their aplishments are often incredibly brilliant. Because these people¡¯s bodies are different from ordinary peoples¡¯, the legends say that they¡¯ve attracted the favor of the gods. Some of the preeminent characters on the Continent now possess these bodies of divine favor. Can it be that you¡¯re one of them too?¡± An inexplicable light of excitement danced in Fanny¡¯s eyes as she stared at Han Shuo and eximed in surprise.

    ¡°Perhaps!¡± Han Shuo knew that the peculiarities of his body werepletely attributed to the training of magical yuan. That likely had nothing to do with a body of divine favor. However, Han Shuo naturally couldn¡¯t find any reasonable exnation. If he was tagged with such abel as a body of divine favor, it would be a reasonable excuse.

    After Fanny had finished being excited, her face suddenly became solemn and she said, ¡°If this matter is true, then you can¡¯t tell anyone before you be strong enough. This body of divine favor may bring to you untold riches and glory, but it can also lead to your murder by those who harbor evil designs before you¡¯ve fully matured.¡±

    Han Shuo fully understood Fanny¡¯s words. If it was as she¡¯d said, these kinds of people were a priceless treasure to every country, and would be the targets of seizure between countries. Some would also seek to destroy this kind of potential at all costs. Therefore, people with these kinds of bodies were actually quite dangerous.

    Nodding to indicate his understanding, Han Shuo evaded the subject and asked Fanny, ¡°You said you were looking for me earlier, is something the matter?¡±

    ¡°I mentioned a test to youst time. It¡¯s conducted to understand the true strength of all the students and to record the students¡¯ current level from magic apprentice to adept mage. Our Academy has the authority to confirm the levels and these levels will be recorded within the files of Magic Association and will follow you for the rest of your life. It¡¯s also the symbol of your strength and identity.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯ll be viewed as having graduated from the Academy after surpassing the level of adept mage. When you wish your strength to be confirmed after raising it in the future, you must pass the specialized exams of the Magic Association. To a mage, a verified and defined level is the certificate for your future development, and thus it¡¯s quite useful.¡± Fanny exined with a smile when she saw Han Shuo inquire about it.

    ¡°So this is the case, when will the test start?¡±

    ¡°Tomorrow morning. If students feel that their strength has increased, they will voluntarily participate in this test. You¡¯ve never participated in the test, so I think it won¡¯t be too hard for you to pass the test for novice mage. I¡¯ve already signed you up. The test will be conducted on the dark major training grounds early tomorrow morning. I¡¯ll be there as well, so don¡¯t forget.¡± Fanny reminded Han Shuo.

    ¡°No problem.¡±

    ¡°Oh right Bryan, the magics of ¡®Corpse Reanimation¡¯ and ¡®Canopy of Necromancy¡¯ that you mentioned to mest time, never, ever tell anyone about them no matter how you obtained them, and don¡¯t use them in front of anyone. These magics may bring arge amount of trouble to you before your strength is strong enough, do you understand?¡± Fanny suddenly gravely reminded Han Shuo before she was about to leave.

    Han Shuo understood this even without Fanny¡¯s reminder. He nodded and said, ¡°Master Fanny, be at ease. I haven¡¯t mentioned them to anyone aside from you. I know you¡¯re quite good to me and that¡¯s why I told you without reservation. No one else can even think of obtaining any trust from me!¡±

    ¡°Who¡¯s good to you, you only know how to speak nonsense!¡± Fanny¡¯s face blushed as she looked a bit happy. She walked outside with a small smile after rolling her eyes at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Our beautiful and kind Master Fanny with a perfect body of course!¡± Han Shuo said flirtingly as he watched Fanny¡¯s departing figure, chuckling as he spoke.

    However, Fanny paid no more attention to Han Shuo, finally speaking lowly just before vanishing through the door, ¡°You brat! You¡¯re bing more and more unbridled.¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t continue practicing how to manipte zombies after Fanny left. He thought for a moment and left the training grounds, using the original demons to scout out the four corners and then moved to the concealed corner in the tomb of the mountains at the back of the Academy grounds, returning to the cemetery of death.

    Since he¡¯d promised Lawrence to get a piece of ck iron ore for him, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t go back on his word, even if he was doing it only for the five thousand gold coins. He brought the little skeleton with him into the mine and busied himself with roars and thuds all afternoon before mining a small piece of ck iron ore. It looked like it would satisfy Lawrence¡¯s request.

    The supply of ck iron ore within the mining cave wasn¡¯t inexhaustible. As mining went on, Han Shuo discovered that he had to prate even further into the depths of the mine and needed to excavate for quite some time before digging up a few ck iron ores. ck iron ore was an exceedingly rare metal and this seemed to prove that point. They¡¯d only started digging for a short while and were already exhausting the supply.

    He trained his magical yuan for a bit beneath the raging waterfall, and suddenly recalled something on his way back to the cemetery of death. There was something about zombies left behind in Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories, and Han Shuo had also heard of the previous existence of zombies in his original world.

    When he carefully went through Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories, Han Shuo suddenly felt a bit agitated. ording to Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories, zombies were only a lower form of existence. They were normally created when someone died in a ce with a heavier concentration of yin qi, and formed after absorbing some of the yin qi of the heavens and earth.

    Low level zombies were also a special herd creature. If they happened to be buried in a ce with a thick concentration of yin qi, and that ce also happened to be an extreme ce of the five elements, there was a very small possibility that it would turn into a very strong zombie after absorbing the yin qi and rare resources of the extreme ce of five elements over many months and years.

    ording to the elements of metal, wood, water, fire, and earth, the five extreme ces were divided into ¨C extreme ce of metal, extreme ce of wood, extreme ce of water, extreme ce of fire, and extreme ce of earth. Once sufficient yin qi and power of the five elements were absorbed, there was a small chance that it would be a metal elite zombie, wood elite zombie, water elite zombie, fire elite zombie, and earth elite zombie.

    When the five types of zombies were formed, their bodies were much stronger than ordinary zombies. The most wondrous thing was that these zombies, that had formed after absorbing enough yin qi and five elements, could use the powers of the five elements of metal, wood, water, fire, and earth. If the five types of zombies congregated together, they would form the ¡°Great Formation of the Divine Zombies and Five Elements¡±, and their strength would be incredibly frightening.

    However, these zombies were rare to begin with and they historically couldn¡¯t be controlled by anyone. They even viewed each other with enmity and were hunted down by practitioners. Therefore, it was exceedingly hard for a scene of all five elemental zombies gathering together to appear.

    Detailed descriptions of the five elemental zombies were present in Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories, including his secret methods to encourage the birth of these zombies. He seemed to have researched this topic. When Han Shuo received all this, he felt that he¡¯d received a priceless treasure and immediately wished to refine these five types of elemental zombies.

    With the constraints of necromancy, these zombies would unequivocally obey Han Shuo after creation. Han Shuo had long since discovered that the location of the cemetery of death was an extreme ce of earth. The other four extremes could be searched for slowly, he onlycked a few of the materials needed in Chu Cang Lan¡¯s secret methods to quicken the development of these zombies before he¡¯d be able to refine earth elite zombies.

    Han Shuo immediately made up his mind after this thought appeared, and he nned on trying to see if he could refine these five unique zombies to create the ¡°Great Formation of the Divine Zombies and Five Elements¡±.

 Chapter 94: Wondrous speed in meditation

    Chapter 94: Wondrous speed in meditation

    The next day, within the training grounds of the dark major.

    The dark major was arge major within the Academy and its training ground facilities were moreprehensive than the necromancy major¡¯s. Its surface area was also more vast. When Han Shuo arrived at the dark major training grounds, he discovered that some people had already gathered inside. There were those who were ready to undertake the test and others who were just here for the show. A loud din of noises prevailed inside.

    As the teacher of the necromancy major, Fanny sat with a few other teachers from the dark major and was busily registering the information of students who were going to take the test. The old witch Cami of the dark major was still within the dark major, under the observation of Han Shuo¡¯s original demons and hadn¡¯t made a showing.

    Han Shuo looked around after entering and discovered that Amy and Athena from the necromancy major were the only familiar people there. He began to walk towards the two girls.

    ¡°Eh, are you also here for the test?¡± Amy waved her hand in greeting when she saw Han Shuo approach from afar.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°Yes, I¡¯ve yet to pass the test. What areas should I be looking out for?¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s nothing much to be concerned about with these tests, it¡¯s just a matter of testing your mental strength and then releasing a few magics for them to see. Oh, right. Us necromancy majors also need to demonstrate manipting summoned creatures. There¡¯s nothing terriblyplicated about it, only the more advanced tests, like the one for adept mage, are moreplex. Apart from these basic tests, you¡¯ll needs to know all sorts of techniques and grasp certain magical concepts. Finally, you¡¯ll have toplete a mission. Only after you meet all these requirements will it count as you having officially graduated.¡± Athena flicked a nce at Han Shuo as she exined in detail for him.

    Standing with the two girls on the outside, Han Shuo observed for a bit and discovered that some of the dark major students all demonstrated their magic one by one ording to the rules. Some teachers then quizzed them on theirprehension of certain magical concepts at their current level, finally giving them a grade based on their performance.

    ¡°Bryan, you prepared for the magic apprentice level right?¡± Athena asked when she saw Han Shuo didn¡¯t respond and was only silently monitoring the performance of all the other students within the training grounds.

    ¡°No, I¡¯m here to see if I can make it to novice mage.¡± Han Shuo looked towards Fanny sitting primly in the distance and replied.

    ¡°What? Are you joking? If I recall correctly, you were still an errand ve for the necromancy major a few months ago. How is it possible that you¡¯re advancing to novice mage so quickly?¡± Athena raised her voice and looked at Han Shuo in disbelief.

    ¡°No way?¡± Amy also eximed softly.

    Smiling faintly, Han Shuo nodded his head firmly, exining, ¡°I¡¯m only giving it a shot and may not pass.¡±

    Even though Han Shuo had spoken so, Amy and Athena still couldn¡¯t believe that Han Shuo was here to attempt the novice mage tests. The two girls chattered ceaselessly with their questions, finally stopping only when it was Amy¡¯s turn to be tested.

    ¡°Good luck Amy! I think you¡¯ll be able to sessfully advance to novice mage this time.¡± Athena encouraged Amy when she heard Amy¡¯s name being called. Han Shuo also good naturedly wished her luck.

    Amy walked out and then test her mental strength in front of those assembled. She then released the three magics that a novice mage should have grasped: Agony of the Soul, Bone Spears, and summoning zombies. She then manipted the zombies to attack a target within the training grounds. Finally, Fanny and some of the other dark major teachers asked a few questions regardingprehension of magical theory.

    After a while, Fanny opened her mouth and said, ¡°Congrattions Amy, you will be a novice mage from today onwards. All of your information within the Magic Association will be changed today.¡±

    Athena also walked out for her test as Amy was still celebrating excitedly. She underwent the same tests, but maybe she was nervous during the process as her bone spear magic suddenly exploded halfway through. She also tripped over herself when facing the magical knowledge questions.

    It wasn¡¯t a surprise when Athena was notified that she had failed this test. She walked back to Amy¡¯s side with a depressed look. Han Shuo didn¡¯t have time to speak words offort before his name was called out by Fanny.

    He walked unhurriedly towards the inside of the training grounds and caused a bit of a disturbance. Some of the dark major students standing around were quite surprised to see Han Shuo, originally an errand ve, appear within the great hall. All of them started discussing with each other in low whispers and a great many of them held a mocking attitude as they observed this happening.

    ¡°Heh heh, don¡¯t be nervous. Just follow the previous procedures and go through the tests one by one. I believe in your strength and that you can sessfully advance to the rank of novice mage.¡± Fanny spoke a word of encouragement and had Han Shuo follow the same procedures that had taken ce before him.

    The test of mental strength came first. Han Shuo gathered his mental strength as he faced a testing stone made of special magical material. A dark major teacher then held up the testing stone to measure Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength.

    His mental strength coalesced at an extremely fast pace due to the potential of his brain having been unearthed. The testing stone had slowly brightened when the other students had their mental strength tested by the stone, until it finally stopped at a certain level of brightness.

    However, Han Shuo¡¯s case was a bit different. The darkened testing stone didn¡¯t slowly brighten continuously, but immediately lit up in the two breaths it took for Han Shuo to concentrate his mental strength, and then stopped at a certain level of brightness and didn¡¯t change any further.

    ¡°This, what¡¯s going on?¡± Several of the dark major teachers disyed surprised expressions as they sat on the viewing table, as if they hadn¡¯t anticipated the testing stone to have such an odd reaction.

    Han Shuo dispersed his mental strength and suddenly became a bit nervous inside upon seeing the astonishment of those around him. He¡¯d been worried originally that he didn¡¯t have enough mental strength. This is why he¡¯s used his entire strength. In addition, Han Shuo also didn¡¯t know that his speed in gathering mental strength was truly that speedy. He¡¯d nned on keeping a low profile after listening to Fannyst night. He could only smile wryly and say, ¡°Perhaps there¡¯s something wrong with the testing stone, why don¡¯t you try another?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t voice nonsense, how could something be wrong with the testing stone?!¡± The dark major teacher holding the stone red at Han Shuo and spoke firmly.

    ¡°His mind was hit by the necromancy magic of the Agony of the Soul before, and sank into a period of mental confusion for a while. This may have caused some oddities in his brain. I think we don¡¯t need to pay this much attention to it.¡± Fanny red at Han Shuo ferociously on the stage, seeming to me him for wanting to show off, and then said with a faint smile to those assembled.

    ¡°So this is the case. I think I¡¯ve also heard of this before. To think that the Agony of the Soul magic of your necromancy major has such marvelous effects, it seems a bit interesting!¡± The teacher holding the testing stone said with a frown and an odd tone.

    ¡°Master Alex, if you¡¯re interested, I can cast it on you too. Heh heh, but I can¡¯t guarantee that you won¡¯t lose your mind!¡± Fanny chuckled lightly and teased him.

    ¡°No o, never mind. I don¡¯t have that kind of guts. Alright, this test is over. We canmence to the next stage of this test.¡± The dark major¡¯s Master Alex didn¡¯t tarry much more and nodded at Han Shuo.

    Athena had made mistakes because she was nervous. Han Shuo now had weathered some hardships and the training of his mental state was even more extraordinary. He naturally wouldn¡¯t get cold feet.

    The three magics that a novice mage should have mastered were deployed very smoothly by Han Shuo, with not the slightest bit of unfamiliarity. After the zombies had been summoned, Han Shuo¡¯s maniptions were even more adept than Amy¡¯s. The movement of the zombie in everyone¡¯s eyes wasn¡¯t clumsy, but rather gave people a feeling of nimbleness.

    Han Shuo handled thest section of magical theory questioning even more easily. The main questioner was Fanny. Fanny knew of Han Shuo¡¯s level in grasping magical knowledge and didn¡¯t ask much at all. She carelessly asked a couple of the questions that Han Shuo had asked her two days and ago and let him easily pass.

    Han Shuo smoothly obtained the qualifications for the rank of novice mage without any mishaps. Fanny smiled, ¡°Congrattions Bryan, from this day forth your information will be recorded in the Magic Association. Heh heh, although there are many novice mages, you¡¯ll be able to garner a good upation for yourself in the future. However, I think with your potential, this won¡¯t be the limit of your ability!¡±

    Han Shuo left the training grounds dashingly with Fanny¡¯s blessings, walking directly towards the knight school, intending on exchanging the ck iron ore with Lawrence¡¯s gold coins.

    Chu Cang Lan had left instructions for abination of special ingredients for forming the five elemental zombies. Han Shuo had heard of some of these materials and knew that they were quite expensive in this world. This made Han Shuo realize that he would have to pour inrge amounts of gold coins if he wanted to refine an earth elite zombie. Gold coins became an issue that he had to consider.

    However, when Han Shuo was halfway there, the original demon that had been monitoring Duke, who had stayed put in the wind major area all this time, suddenly notified Han Shuo when he left around noon and also made for the knight school. Having originally intended to find Lawrence, Han Shuo had to temporarily put aside his idea and used the original demon to keep an eye on Duke¡¯s movements.

    After Han Shuo followed Duke to the knight school, Duke met up with Erick, who¡¯d gone missing for a few days. Apart from Duke and Erick, there was another person with them. It was the earth rider knight rk, whom they¡¯d met in the Dark Forest. This greatly surprised Han Shuo.

 Chapter 95: The Dark Mantle stronghold

    Chapter 95: The Dark Mantle stronghold

    rk had expressed his obvious love for Fanny during the trials within the Dark Forest, but had been forced away by Han Shuo¡¯s evil scheme. Who would¡¯ve thought that Han Shuo would soon see him again within Academy grounds a few monthster?

    Duke and rk spoke within a house in the knight school, with the senior swordsman standing guard in front of the door as if deathly afraid of someoneing over and bothering the two.

    Duke personally set up a wall of wind within the house. When Han Shuo¡¯s original demon approached, it could only keep an eye on senior swordsman Erick standing guard outside, because they felt a faint pulse of magic. The original demon didn¡¯t dare to brashly enter, and thus was unable to overhear what the two were talking about.

    When Duke and Cami had metst time in the ssrooms of the dark major, they had chosen to meet in the middle of the night. They must¡¯ve surely thought that no one would discover them, and so hadn¡¯t taken these extra preventative measures, but it was daytime now, not to mention that they were in the middle of the knight school. No wonder Duke took such precautions.

    Duke and rk walked out from the house after a while. Duke retraced his steps and left the knight school alone. The original demon followed behind Duke and Erick and discovered that Duke returned to the wind major buildings, whereas rk remained within a training ground of the knight school to practice his techniques.

    This was precisely the time of day when knight students would practice their techniques, and Han Shuo didn¡¯t stay in the same ce to continue observing. He headed directly towards one of the training grounds to find Lawrence, ording to the directions he had previously left.

    Apart from a variety of weapons in the training grounds, there were also several battlesteeds, fully d in heavy armor, that looked quite fierce. The biggest difference between knights and swordsmen was that knights relied heavily on horses during battles. Ability in controlling horses was an important skill that knights had to master. They could make use of a battlesteed¡¯s force and speed to deploy an even greater amount of strength.

    Lawrence was dressed in bright silver armor and wielded a long spear, dashing to and fro within the training ground. The battlesteed beneath his leads leapt over several high obstacles. As they charged forward, the spear within his hand was like a sh of lightning as glorious fighting aura blossomed from it in midair.

    ¡°Hi Lawrence!¡± Han Shuo stood in front of the door, observed for a while, and suddenly opened his mouth in greeting.

    Lawrence turned his battlesteed around after a shrill whinny, using the long spear in his hand to start a fierce attack towards Han Shuo. Lawrence¡¯s spear stabbed directly towards Han Shuo¡¯s chest, apanied by the clopping sounds of the horse¡¯s iron hooves.

    Although the attack was unparalleled in ferociousness, Han Shuo was unmoved until Lawrence had dashed in front of Han Shuo on his battlesteed. It was only then that he suddenly whipped out the Demonyer Edge, infused it with raging, violent demonic qi and stabbed it towards the long spear.

    Under the impact from the Demonyer Edge, the long spear was broken into two, starting from its point. It was a good thing that Lawrence let go of it in time, otherwise the Demonyer Edge might have injured his hand after decimating the long spear.

    However, thebined force and speed of the battlesteed also made it a bit difficult for Han Shuo to withstand this attack. The irresistible force of the charge also made his arm, that grasped the Demonyer Edge, tremble uncontrobly.

    Hauling back on the reins and stopping the horse, Lawrence leapt off and arrived excitedly in front of Han Shuo after taking off his heavy armor. His two eyes were focused on the Demonyer Edge in Han Shuo¡¯s hand as he eximed in astonishment. ¡°What kind of strange weapon is that, it¡¯s so sharp!¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, ck iron ore, ck gold ore, and many rare metals were mixed in to birth this weapon. It was personally forged by dwarves, it¡¯d be strange if it wasn¡¯t sharp.¡± Han Shuo exined to Lawrence only after putting the Demonyer Edge away.

    Lawrence picked up a towel and wiped away the traces of sweat on his forehead, ¡°So that¡¯s the case, your weapon is indeed quite umon. Oh right, have youe to find me this time because you¡¯ve already acquired some ck iron ore? Heh!¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo brought out the ck iron ore that he had excavated yesterday from his space ring, ¡°That¡¯s right, this piece of ck iron ore should satisfy your wishes. Let¡¯s wrap up our business!¡±

    ¡°No problem, give me your crystal card, I¡¯ll transfer five thousand gold to you.¡± Lawrence looked joyfully at the ck iron ore in Han Shuo¡¯s hand as he said, too impatient to wait.

    After Han Shuo and Lawrence had concluded their transaction, Han Shuo discovered that another five thousand gold had appeared in his crystal card and a trace of a smile broke out across his face.

    Just as both were basking in theirfortable feelings, the earth rider knight rk walked in from outside. rk has just walked in and was about to speak when he suddenly saw Han Shuo. His face immediately changed as he shouted lowly, ¡°You!¡±

    Turning his head to see that rk hade in, Han Shuo also gave a slight start of surprise internally. He nodded towards rk and smiled, ¡°Hello rk, long time no see. Why did you leave without a wordst time in the Dark Forest?¡±

    ¡°Huh. I was framed by a sordid person and had no choice but to leave.¡± So much time had passed that rk must have certainly understood the truth of what had happened. He immediately made innuendos as soon as he saw Han Shuo, cursing a certain someone.

    Pausing for a bit, rk looked at Han Shuo, ¡°How is Master Fanny? I was nning on paying her a visit and also expressing my apologies.¡±

    ¡°Master Fanny is very well and doesn¡¯t need your concern!¡± Han Shuo immediately said with a cold look on his face when he heard that rk had yet to forget Fanny.

    ¡°Hey hey, what¡¯s up with the two of you? Eh, senior rk, didn¡¯t you graduate already? What are you doing here? How do you know Bryan?¡± Lawrence saw that the two were practically spitting fire at each and hastened to speak up.

    ¡°I¡¯vee back to the knight school this time to investigate the matter of my younger brother ude¡¯s disappearance. My brother seems to have had dealings with Bryan in the town of Drol. If I discover that he had anything to do with my brother¡¯s disappearance, I¡¯ll make him pay.¡± rk¡¯s face darkened as he responded to Lawrence and Han Shuo.

    Jumping in horror inside, Han Shuo also looked at rk with some shock. He¡¯d never thought that rk would be ude¡¯s brother. This meant that he was the eldest son of the chief of the Gryphon Legion. Although he¡¯d done away with ude in a clean fashion that time in Drol, ude had indeed met him in a bar. If rk really wanted to investigate this, this matter would be a bit difficult to handle.

    ¡°What does that have to do with me, I don¡¯t know ude that well. Besides, his martial arts techniques are so advanced, what could have happened to him?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face was calm as he said indifferently. He then spoke to Lawrence after thinking for a while, ¡°Alright, I have no further business, so let¡¯s end here today.¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t wait for Lawrence to respond after he¡¯d finished and directly left the training grounds. He left the knight school at an even faster pace, hastening off towards the Academy grounds.

    The three original demons had to be recalled back into Han Shuo¡¯s body due to the issue of distance. When he found out rk¡¯s identity, Han Shuo felt that something was amiss with this matter.

    As the eldest son of the chief of the Empire¡¯s Gryphon Legion, why would he meet with an emissary of the Kasi Empire and stay in that room so surreptitiously? Although he didn¡¯t know what the two had talked about, Han Shuo felt that the earlier he reported something he couldn¡¯t control to the senior executives of the ¡°Dark Mantle¡± for them to fret over, the better.

    There wasrge manor to the northern part of the city that was only three hundred meters away from Phoebe¡¯s copsed residence. Han Shuo took out the ¡°Dark Mantle¡± medallion that was his identity and knocked on the metal door after being unable to detect any abnormalities from the outside. A thin, short youth opened the door after a long while.

    He first looked at Han Shuo up and down, sizing him up, then asked brusquely, ¡°Who are you looking for?¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t say much and only handed the medallion over to the youth. The youth looked at the medallion and turned his body to the side to let Han Shuo pass by. The youth returned the medallion to Han Shuo after thetter had entered. The youth had rxed his facial expression and said faintly, ¡°You¡¯ve just joined us haven¡¯t you? I¡¯ve never seen you before. Your medallion is also one that a neer would carry. Who¡¯s in charge of you?¡±

    As he followed the youth inside, Han Shuo discovered that there wasn¡¯t any particr magical boundaries or mechanisms within the entire manor. This made Han Shuo feel quite astonished and he observed his surroundings even more closely. He responded carelessly, ¡°I just joined a few days ago, an old man called Candide is in charge of me!¡±

    ¡°Wh-what? Are you certain? Sir Candide is in charge of you just after you¡¯ve joined?¡± The youth was noticeably surprised as he asked Han Shuo with a soft exmation.

    Nodding, Han Shuo asked, perplexed, ¡°Yes, is there a problem?¡±

    ¡°Eh, not a problem per se, but Sir Candide is one of the three heavyweights who grasps true power within our ¡®Dark Mantle¡¯ organization. Sir Candide can directly deploy the troops of every city through the Empire without obtaining approval from His Majesty first. He can directly kill ordinary nobles and military officials. You¡¯re a neer, yet you¡¯re directly reporting to Sir Candide?¡±

    Shrugging, Han Shuo said, ¡°How would I know? He¡¯s the one who brought me in anyhow. I¡¯vee looking for him this time. Right, I¡¯ve looked around and discovered that this secret stronghold doesn¡¯t seem to have any defensive capabilities. What¡¯s going on here?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, you¡¯re a newbie alright. Come with me, I¡¯ll show you around!¡± The skinny person adopted a tone of an elder as he led Han Shou in with a smile.

 Chapter 96: The Three Heavyweights of the Dark Mantle organization

    Chapter 96: The Three Heavyweights of the Dark Mantle organization

    After traversing a short distance through the manor, Han Shuo learned that thenky man¡¯s name was Chester, and that he was a bandit. Han Shuo also learned about some of Dark Mantle¡¯s current situation from Chester.

    Dark Mantle members were separated into the three divisions, Dark Star, Dark Moon, and Dark Sun, ording to the amount of contributions they had made to the organization. The scattering of stars over the curtain of night represented that the Dark Star members could be found everywhere, in all corners of the Empire.The Dark Moon level was only higher by one step, but they still couldn¡¯t see the light of day and could only live in the darkened corners. However, the higher level Dark Sun members could appear in the public¡¯s eye like the sun, making a brilliant appearance in the day.

    The three divisions of Sun, Moon, and Star were further divided into five levels ording to their contributions to the Empire. Han Shuo currently held the rank of Dark Star, and the minute star on the back of his iron medallion represented that Han Shuo was the lowest one star member of the Dark Stars.

    As a member¡¯s contributions to the Empire rose, the medallion would slowly umte two stars, three stars, four stars, and eventually five stars. One would be promoted to a Dark Moon member when they surpassed five stars, and then would advance to a Fifth Star Moon member from a One Star Moon member simr to the way he advanced from Dark Star, and so on and so forth until being a Dark Star member at the top levels.

    Once one advanced to a higher level, not only would their monthly stipend greatly increase, but he would also enjoy more of the Dark Mantle organization¡¯s special authority. When one made it to the highest levels, like Candide, he would directly answer to the king. He would be below one person and above tens of thousands. All wealth and prosperity would be within reach.

    ¡°We¡¯ve arrived!¡± Chester finally brought Han Shuo to a house in the center and stopped in front of it after covering a long distance.

    Han Shuo had released the three original demons along the way and discovered that there was no one here in the manor apart from Chester and himself. There were no defensive measures set up around the expansive manor at all. This made Han Shuo quite confused.

    This room wasn¡¯trge, and Han Shuo still didn¡¯t discover anything out of the ordinary after looking around. He asked Chester with a surprised expression, ¡°Is there anything out of the ordinary here?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, of course there¡¯s something different here. The entire manor is just as you saw, with no defensive measures whatsoever. This manor is just a cover. The real ¡®Dark Mantle¡¯ isn¡¯t here at all.¡± Chester exined with a faint smile, and then fumbled with something. Somehow, a crack suddenly appeared on the smooth floor and revealed a bright passageway.

    ¡°So there was another hidden mechanism. Heh heh, where does this lead to?¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but ask when he saw the passageway appear in front of him.

    ¡°Come, I¡¯ll take you to the true ¡®Dark Mantle¡¯ stronghold!¡± Chester smiled and jumped down into the bright passageway, calling for Han Shuo toe down as well.

    Han Shuo felt that hisnding spot was quite soft after he¡¯d also jumped down. There were solid walls around him, with strong pulses of magic suddenlying from the passageway interior.

    The solid walls around them broke apart into arge door, apanied with a soft sound. A very bright passageway revealed itself in front of the two like a maze. There were several passageways intersecting with each other up ahead, and strong magical pulses emanating from the walls on the sides. There were also many namelessly strong crossbows locked and loaded, their cold, sharp gleams pointing at all corners within the passageway.

    ¡°Why do I feel like this ce is simr a cave?¡± Han Shuo asked involuntarily after he looked around.

    Chester walked out from inside and indicated for Han Shuo to follow him, exining as he did so, ¡°Your feeling is correct. This is Mt. Ordas behind the Empire¡¯s pce. This towering mountain is strictly off limits to trespassers. The stronghold of our ¡®Dark Mantle¡¯ is located within the heart of the mountain, that is where security is truly the heaviest. The Empire¡¯s army is also stationed around it. As the king¡¯s secret hand in the shadows, all sorts of the Empire¡¯s talents are gathered inside and many confidential documents are also stored as well. There hasn¡¯t been an incident for many years, and its security level is on par with the Empire¡¯s own pce.¡±

    Han Shuo felt that the security here was extremely high, and some of the surrounding magical pulses noticeably epassed strong danger. He didn¡¯t dare release the lowest level demon general, the original demon, in a ce like this. He could only make use of his perceptive senses to detect the various dangers concealed in his surroundings.

    He followed behind Chester and traversed a few passages. He met a few other Dark Mantle members along the way, and a few stone chambers also appeared along the way. Han Shuo could sense the breathing and heartbeats inside, and knew that there were people within this stone chambers.

    ¡°Master Candide is one of the three heavyweights of our Dark Mantle, so I don¡¯t have the qualifications to personally lead you to see him. However, I can make a report for you. If you were really inducted by Master Candide, I think he¡¯d be willing to see you!¡± Chester¡¯s look at Han Shuo held a bit of envy, as if Han Shuo was truly lucky to be under the care of Candide.

    ¡°I¡¯ve heard you mention the three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle a few times. Who are the other two apart from Candide?¡± Han Shuo asked as he walked along.

    ¡°There¡¯s also Lord Amyes and Lady Cecilia. Lady Cecilia is in charge of all Dark Mantle affairs outside of the Empire. It¡¯s also said that she¡¯s a charmingdy. Heh heh, it¡¯s a pity that a small character like me will never see her in my life. Lord Amyes and Lord Candide deal with all the matters within the Empire, but Lord Amyes is primarily in charge of surveince and investigation of all the nobles and high ranked officials within the Empire, and is a man who absolutely lives in the public eye from our organization.¡±

    ¡°If the results of his investigation show that these officials have done something contrary to the Empire¡¯s gains, he can arrest them directly and report to the king after. He can even directly execute some of the lower ranking nobles without asking His Majesty for approval. Therefore, to most of the Empire¡¯s nobles, Lord Amyes is their nightmare. Lord Candide is in charge of the Empire¡¯s internal affairs, including smoking out all the various hostile kingdom¡¯s spies and putting them to death, obtaining intelligence that is useful to the Empire, and exterminating all hidden threats to the Empire.¡± Chester exined in detail the specifics of the three Dark Mantle heavyweights as they walked.

    The two stopped in front of a metal door as Chester continuously exined. After arriving, Chester indicated for Han Shuo to halt and spoke into a small hole in the metal door. ¡°There¡¯s a Dark Star ranked member who identified himself as Bryan here to see Lord Candide. He says that he¡¯s under Lord Candide¡¯s direct supervision!¡±

    ¡°Wait a moment, I¡¯ll go seek Lord Candide¡¯s opinion.¡± Apletely emotionless, cold voice sounded from the small hole. The metal door opened abruptly after roughly two minutes to reveal several round dials. One of the round dials had magic pulsing from it. The voice sounded again, ¡°Bryan cane in. Stand on the round dial. Chester, you wait outside. When Bryanes back outter, you lead him out along the original path.¡±

    ¡°Yes.¡± Chester responded and exined in a low voice, ¡°When we came in just now, we took a short distance magic transportation matrix. There¡¯s a simr transportation matrix within the heart of the mountain, he will take you to where you should go.¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo indicated that he understood and rose to walk towards the dial carved with wondrous magical images. A short distance transportation matrix wasn¡¯t difficult to set up, any space mage above the adept ss would be able to set one up as long as they had sufficient materials.

    But a long distance transportation matrix, like the one that Han Shuo had taken to the cemetery of death in the Dark Forest, one that spanned thousands of miles, wasn¡¯t one that ordinary mages could set up. This not only needed someone of archmage level or above, it also needed arge quantity of magical ingredients. Without the support of a great power, this level of transportation matrix would be impossible the materialize.

    Once more internally sighing in appreciation of the wonders of the cemetery of death, Han Shuo stood directly on the magical dial and then reappeared in a spacious stone chamber under the operation of the matrix. This stone chamber was furnished in a very bright andfortable manner, and was even more luxurious than the Boozt Merchant Guild. Exquisite magical drawings were carved on the surrounding walls, with a fewndscape paintings hanging on them as well. The chandelier above his head sparkled with a soft and brilliant light, radiantly illuminating the entire stone chamber.

    Candide was sitting at the table near the front of stone chamber, flipping through a scroll with a furrowed brow. As Han Shuo took in his surroundings and once again rested his gaze on Candide, thetter finally put the scroll in his hand down. His hooked face turned towards Han Shuo and opened his mouth to ask darkly, ¡°What¡¯s the matter, have you discovered something?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo summarized the events of the past couple of days for Candide, including Duke meeting with Cami, the conversations about the ¡°Eye of Darkness¡±, and the son of the chief of the Gryphon Legion, rk¡¯s meeting with Duke. He ryed all these matters in their entirety.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s exnation went on, Candide¡¯s originally grim-looking face became even uglier and twisted. Candide remained silent without a word after Han Shuo had finished speaking, his brow tightly knit together as if considering something.

    After a while, just when Han Shuo was growing impatient from waiting, Candide broke out into a smile and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan, you¡¯ve done very well, well to the point where I am astonished. It looks like you were born for this type of profession. With your strength, I¡¯m truly surprised that you¡¯ve managed to obtain so much valuable intelligence in such a short amount of time. Duke is a wind archmage, and even Cami is a dark adept mage. rk is a great earth rider. You¡¯ve obtained so much valuable information under unsuspecting circumstances, I can only use magical as the only qualifier to describe your performance.¡±

    ¡°You praise me too highly.¡± Han Shuo said humbly.

    ¡°You don¡¯t need to be humble. You¡¯ve handled this matter perfectly. Although I¡¯m very curious how you did it, you¡¯re one of mine and I wouldn¡¯t interfere and question you. Heh heh, you don¡¯t have to think about whates after this, I¡¯ll send someone to handle this matter.¡± Candide used the eyes of one looking at a monster as he looked at Han Shuo andplimented him.

    Han Shuo breathed a sigh of relief. The thing he¡¯d been most worried about previously was that Candide would suspect the veracity of his words. After all, to conceal himself from so many people yet obtain so much intelligence with the level of his strength, it should¡¯ve been impossible, logically speaking. What made Han Shuo feel gratified was that Candide didn¡¯t doubt the truthfulness of this matter at all. He didn¡¯t even ask how Han Shuo had obtained this information, this made Han Shuo feel very surprised.

    ¡°You don¡¯t need to find it odd, for our Dark Mantle organization, we only need to know the finals results of the mission. We won¡¯t ask about the process. Every member has their own way, and we don¡¯t care what methods members use when we set a mission, just that it¡¯spleted properly. Therefore, you don¡¯t need to worry about anything. We won¡¯t affect your life when there¡¯s no mission, you can go about your daily routine and enjoy yourself.¡± Candide seemed to see through Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts and exined patiently to him.

    ¡°Alright, then there¡¯s nothing to do with me for the time being?¡± Han Shuo quite approved of the Dark Mantle¡¯s principles and responded with a smile.

    ¡°Give me the medallion that represents your identity. I¡¯ll record this very important intelligence in your medallion and the organization¡¯s files. I have the obligation to add two stars for you. Some members are unable to obtain even one star with ten pieces of information, but the worth of your information is enough to qualify you to gain two stars.¡± Candide looked at Han Shuo and smiled at him.

    Candide then took Han Shuo¡¯s medallion and did something to it so that when itnded in Han Shuo¡¯s hand again, two little stars had magically appeared on its back. This meant that Han Shuo had directly skipped two levels and entered the ranks of Third Dark Star.

    ¡°I¡¯ll be taking my leave now if there¡¯s nothing else.¡± Han Shuo was also a bit delighted to see that one mission was enough to make him a Third Dark Star like Chester and smiled as he spoke.

    Nodding, Candide said, ¡°Alright, you may go now, but you need to report to the organization every month. If you learn of any new intelligence that benefits or harms the Empire during this time, you cane directly and make a report. Your contributions will be calcted ording to the uracy of the intelligence and recorded in your organization files.¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, many Dark Star members advance through the ranks in this fashion. You need to report in every month, even if you have no intelligence. This allows the organization to know your status for one, and the organization will also see if there are any missions suitable for you for another. Of course, you have the right to choose some missions and the right to reject some.¡± Candide added.

    Han Shuo nodded, indicating his understanding without saying much more and prepared to leave. But when he reached the door, Candide seemed to have an awkward subject to disclose and called out, ¡°Wait one moment, Bryan.¡±

    Halting, Han Shuo turned back to look at Candide and asked in bafflement, ¡°Is there anything else, Lord Candide?¡±

    ¡°You must appropriately handle your rtionship with Lawrence, this may have a great impact on you in the future. Lawrence¡¯s identity is much moreplex that you can imagine, and I can only tell you this much. You should keep your wits about you.¡± Candide also seemed to be in a difficult position and stopped after saying these words.

    ¡°I¡¯ve heard that he¡¯s the son of a finance minister, is this what you wanted to tell me?¡± Han Shuo had heard Lisa mention a few things about Lawrence before and thus opened his mouth to ask Candide again.

    Nodding first but then shaking his head after, Candide opened his mouth once again under Han Shuo¡¯s perplexed gaze, ¡°Lawrence is the son of a preeminent finance minister, many are aware of this, but apart from this, Lawrence has another identity. This implications of his identity are too great, and your current level doesn¡¯t have the right to know this information. I¡¯m not at liberty to disclose too much and only wanted to remind you to take care so that you¡¯re not embroiled in something you shouldn¡¯t be in.¡±

    Candide waved his hand and indicated for Han Shuo to leave. Han Shuo felt uncertain, but now that he knew a few of the Dark Mantle rules, he didn¡¯t ask much. He nodded to indicate that he¡¯d pay attention and left Candide¡¯s room.

    ¡°Well, did you gain anything?¡± Chester asked Han Shuo excitedly as the two retraced their steps after thetter had met up with Chester again.

    ¡°Nothing much, just that Candide added two stars for me. I¡¯m a Third Dark Star like you now, heh heh!¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t feel like there was anything that needed to be concealed from Chester¡¯s interest, and smiled as he spoke to Chester.

    Chester was astonished and incredibly envious to hear Han Shuo¡¯s words. He sighed and shook his head at Han Shuo after his surprise, saying, ¡°Your speed of advancement is indeed incredible with Lord Candide. I joined the Dark Mantle three years ago and reported twenty some pieces of information before bing a Third Dark star. You¡¯ve been in the organization for not even a week and have already risen to the rank of a Third Dark Star as well. Ai,parisons are odious, treatment is indeed different when someone is taking care of you from above.¡±

    Han Shuo shrugged and didn¡¯t say much with regards to Chester¡¯s reflection. Although he¡¯d gotten the intelligence by virtue of his own strength, these types of matters were unexinable and he simply decided not to say anything.

    ¡°If there¡¯s any mission that needs to bepleted by two people in the future, can you bring me along? Just treat it as giving me a hand as well?¡± Chester first sighed with emotion and then scratched his head, broaching this awkward subject with a bit of embarrassment.

    ¡°Sure.¡± Han Shuo agreed readily.

    ¡°Thanks so much! I¡¯ll remember you and do my best to follow your instructions.¡± Chester was overjoyed and his attitude became even more enthusiastic than before. He kept describing all sorts of Dark Mantle matters to Han Shuo and sent him back to the quiet manor in the northern district again.

 Chapter 97: Curious and exotic materials

    Chapter 97: Curious and exotic materials

    On the day he returned to the Academy, Han Shuo discovered that Cami had suddenly left one night with a hurried look on her face. He still hadn¡¯t caught sight of her after a day or two, and learned that something had happened at Cami¡¯s home after asking around, and that it was likely that she wouldn¡¯t return to the Academy in the short term.

    This was the exnation on the surface, but ording to Han Shuo¡¯s instincts, they¡¯d probably never see her again. Since she was a spy from an enemy kingdom, she wouldn¡¯t be left to flourish within the Empire, ording to the Dark Mantle¡¯s way of dealing with things.

    When Cami disappeared, Duke and Erick held a secret discussion and didn¡¯t dare continue reside within the Academy. They used the conclusion of the exchange as an excuse to immediately leave the Academy and return to the Kasi Empire. rk, who¡¯d been about to head to the necromancy major to pay his respects to Fanny, left the knight school at almost the same time as them.

    As a member of the Dark Mantle, although Han Shuo didn¡¯t know exactly what had been going on, he could be assured that it must¡¯ve been Dark Mantle making a move and assuming control. Otherwise, the three of them wouldn¡¯t have had such strange reactions and disappear without a trace in such a short period of time.

    Over the next couple of days, Han Shuo lived a leisurely and content lifestyle. He continuously studied magical knowledge and would immediately ask Fanny if he ran into something he didn¡¯t understand. He could always obtain the right answer from Fanny, but maybe because he had trained his magical yuan to the ¡°molded spirit¡± stage, he would often blurt out the outrageousments he¡¯d always hidden within his heart whenever he was with Fanny.

    Whenever this happened, Fanny would pout and berate Han Shuo, and whenever he recollected himself, he¡¯d tried to find a way to salvage the situation. If he couldn¡¯t, he¡¯d just continue ying dumb and try to gloss over the situation.

    When Han Shuo woke up this morning, he discovered that the weather had suddenly turned chilly. Han Shuo thought for a bit and felt that Phoebe should¡¯ve had enough time to prepare enough rations for the dwarves to make it through the winter. Thus, he left the Academy and set out for the Boozt Merchant Guild. He also wanted to purchase from Phoebe the various materials needed to refine an earth elite zombie.

    When he arrived at the Boozt Merchant Guild, Han Shuo discovered that the guards had once again been swapped out. When Han Shuo offered his name this time, the guards immediately let Han Shuo in quite respectfully. Fabian dashed over from a distance after a short while, the very image of health and radiance. He called out from a long ways away, ¡°Hi Bryan! Long time no see, how have you been doing?¡±

    ¡°Oh, Fabian, it¡¯s great to see that you¡¯re alright. I thought you¡¯d be... well. since the house copsed on youst time.¡± Han Shuo was also quite surprised by Fabian¡¯s appearance. He¡¯d thought that Fabian had already died from the copsed building, thanks to the earthquake spell that had been cast when the experts of ¡°Shadow Ghost¡± had visitedst time.

    ¡°I hid beneath the bedst time when the house copsed. Candice came by afterwards and found me, saving me from the wreckage of the demolished house. That¡¯s how I managed to escape.¡± Fabian¡¯s face bore traces of jubtion from having escaped near death as he exined joyfully to Han Shuo.

    Nodding, Han Shuo looked over Fabian. ¡°You look very well now. It looks like your good luck has already arrived!¡±

    ¡°Haha, that isn¡¯t the case, but since Grover died, the men of ¡®Shadow Ghost¡¯ haven¡¯t appeared again. Now that Miss Phoebe has officially taken over the Guild, my life with her is much better.¡± Although Fabian protested against the idea of good luck, the happiness on his face depicted the joy and pride within his heart.

    Many of the decorations and settings within the Guild hadn¡¯t changed, but the guards within had all been reced. Han Shuo suddenly stopped halfway on his way further into the Guild and looked at the artificial mountain on his left. He remembered that Phoebe and him had had no choicest time but to hide within one of the cracks of the artificial mountain in order to evade Ellis¡¯ pursuit.

    When he cast his eyes upon this ce again, it had obviously been spruced up. Many potted nts and flowers had sprung up in the surroundings next to it. A rocking chair and a table had even been ced by the crack in the artificial mountain, as if used to admire the views around the area.

    ¡°Eh, howe changes have been made here? I recall that this area wasn¡¯t like this before?¡± Han Shuo looked around in surprise and turned his head back to ask Fabian.

    ¡°Heh heh, you truly are observant. This ce has been redecorated ording to Miss Phoebe¡¯s wishes. Miss Phoebe has forbidden others to enter this area. Shees here alone to bask in the sun, sip tea, and admire the flowers when she has free time. However, I don¡¯t think the view here is that beautiful, but for some reason Miss Phoebe just likes it here.¡± Fabian exined with a look of confusion on his face.

    ncing at the crack that the two had taken shelter in togetherst time, Han Shuo recalled the two¡¯s embarrassingly ambiguous position. His heart leapt, could it be that Phoebe was keeping this ce as a souvenir of their awkward encounter?

    Han Shuo thought this was unimaginably queer when his thoughts traveled to this point and he repeated that this was, ¡°impossible!¡±. Phoebe was a very proud and high spirited person, and her looks were exquisite, not to mention that she held the Boozt Merchant Guild in her hand at the moment. Rationally speaking, she wouldn¡¯t give heed to a minor student from the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force.

    Fabian had already brought Han Shuo to the lobby when he was thinking this. The former then called over a maid to serve tea and snacks, then left to ask Phoebe toe see Han Shuo.

    Phoebe walked in wearing a simple, white, and practical training outfit. There were faint traces of sweat on her forehead. She seemed to be rather thirsty as she walked in front of Han Shuo, poured an empty cup full of tea, and only focused her beautiful eyes on Han Shuo after taking a few sips. ¡°You¡¯re here for the rations, right?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo smiled, ¡°Of course, why else would Ie to the Guild if not for the rations?¡±

    Phoebe curled her lip in a pretty fashion and rolled her eyes at Han Shuo, saying unhappily, ¡°Can¡¯t you juste to see me, your friend?¡±

    Laughing out involuntarily, Han Shuo teased, ¡°It¡¯s only been a few days since west saw each other, and you¡¯ve just taken over the Guild. You must be very busy. I¡¯d like toe see you, but was worried that you didn¡¯t have the time!¡±

    ¡°Humph. Not having thought of me is not having thought of me. Don¡¯t make excuses.¡± Phoebe¡¯s graceful and long neck lifted. She seemed to be a bit put out at Han Shuo. She thought for a bit and then said, ¡°The amount of rations you need fills two rooms. Your space ring should be of the lowest quality and surely has other items within it. You won¡¯t be able to fill it with that much stuff.¡±

    ¡°Indeed, but I can make several trips. Heh heh, don¡¯t worry, I won¡¯t think badly of you.¡± Han Shuo had long since prepared to make several trips and smiled faintly at Phoebe. Pausing, Han Shuo then took out a piece of paper covered with various ingredients and handed it over to Phoebe, ¡°I also need these materials as well. Take a look, will you be able to collect them for me?¡±

    Looking at Han Shuo with some surprise, Phoebe seemed to be unable to understand why Han Shuo needed to buy all sorts of special itemstely. Phoebe took Han Shuo¡¯s paper and started murmuring, ¡°Ice earth, hot earth, wet earth, blood earth. And something snow, something leaves, something something fruit. What are all these things you¡¯ve written? I don¡¯t understand a lot of them!¡±

    Knowing early on that Phoebe would be suspicious, Han Shuo smiled faintly and exined, ¡°Ice earth can be found in ces of extreme cold, hot earth can be found in burning hot areas. It can usually be found in ces withva. Wet earth is usually found in ces that are wet all year round and never see the light of day. Blood earth is found where the earth has been dyed red from the blood of fallen soldiers after two armies have fought. There¡¯s also the Ice Snow Flower, found in ces that produces ice earth,va from hot earth, a weird ck, green grass from wet earth, and fruit that looks like tumors produced from within blood earth...¡±

    Phoebe¡¯s expression grew more and more confused with Han Shuo¡¯s exnations as he described the items on the list. Although the names of these items would be different from the names in Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories, they should be the same shape and have the same characteristics with names that Phoebe knew. There were also a few items that even Phoebe had never heard of before, and she said that she¡¯d have to inquire with other people after Han Shuo¡¯s detailed exnations.

    When Han Shuo had reeled off the thirteen ingredients needed to form an earth elite zombie, Phoebe feltpletely woozy from Han Shuo¡¯s assorted collection of ingredients. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that this person was Han Shuo, Phoebe likely would¡¯ve not been able to hold herself in until now. She said with a bit of temper, ¡°What do you need all these random ingredients for? If you aren¡¯t willing to tell me, I won¡¯t help you!¡±

    Looking at Phoebe in resignation, Han Shuo saw that she was rather huffy and seemed to be in a bad mood. He spoke an incantation and the bone wielding little skeleton materialized in front of Han Shuo. Under hismand, the little skeleton dashed back and forth the great hall with an extremely nimble body, finally sending the bone dagger in his hand towards Phoebe.

    Phoebe gave a great start of fright as fighting aura red from her long sword, shing with the little skeleton¡¯s bone dagger. The bone dagger spun and returned to the little skeleton¡¯s hand. Han Shuo opened his mouth to ask, ¡°What do you think are the differences between this little skeleton and the skeletons summoned by ordinary necromancers?¡±

    ¡°No difference, but that this one is incredible. I¡¯ve long since seen skeletal warriors summoned by necromancers, there is a difference of heaven and earth between them and your little skeleton. I can feel that your skeletal warrior has only the outward appearance of a skeleton, but that there¡¯s a demon hidden within its body. Even I¡¯m a bit afraid.¡± Phoebe¡¯s expression was grave as she looked at the bone dagger wielding little skeleton with some trepidation.

    ¡°He used to be an ordinary skeletal warrior, even weaker than ordinary ones. He only knew how to throw away trash for me, but you can see that he¡¯s different now. After my secret methods of refinement, he¡¯s still a skeletal warrior, but he¡¯s slowly growing. You¡¯ve tested his strength just now as well. I can only tell you that the materials I need are for refining a zombie, a zombie that will be as amazing as him.¡± Han Shuo looked intently at Phoebe and slowly opened his mouth.

    Apart from him, no one in this world would be able to grasp the way of training magical yuan. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t afraid of letting Phoebe know, not to mention that Phoebe had long since witnessed the miraculousness of the little skeleton¡¯s might. In addition, Han Shuo truly did trust Phoebe, this is why he gave her a simple reminder.

    ¡°Incredible, this is incredible. Your method will surely lead the necromancers in a magical revolution. How did you do it Bryan? You¡¯re amazing!¡± There was a light that could be identified as admiration in Phoebe¡¯s eyes as she softly cried out in excitement.

    Shrugging, Han Shuo said, ¡°I achieved this using my exclusive method. We¡¯re friends Phoebe, so I can tell you this. However, you probably know that if anyone else learned of this matter, it will bring me trouble. Therefore, I hope you can keep this secret for me.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯ve never told anyone apart from me?¡± Phoebe first started in astonishment, and then looked at Han Shuo with a bizarre look.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said firmly, ¡°Absolutely not!¡±

    A streak of faint red magically appeared on her stunning cheeks, Phoebe promised joyfully to Han Shuo, ¡°Alright, I won¡¯t speak of our secret, even if someone threatens my life. You can be certain of that!¡±

    ¡°Thank you Phoebe, I¡¯ll remember this favor. I hope you can purchase these special items for me. I know that onlyrge Guilds like yours can traverse cities and obtain these sort of items from all over the Empire.¡± Han Shuo was a bit touched as he said sincerely to Phoebe.

    ¡°No problem, I¡¯ll try my best. I¡¯m thinking that these items will cost plenty of gold. You¡¯ll need to prepare enough gold coins! Heh heh, I¡¯m not doing this for you for free!¡± Phoebe winked a bit yfully at Han Shuo and teased him with a faint smile.

    In the beginning, Han Shuo had felt that Phoebe was a coldly arrogant person who was difficult to get along with. However, as time went on and the two went through several experiences together, he discovered that this cold haughtiness was just the face that Phoebe put on for outsiders. Once she made a true friend, she was easy to talk to and would no longer disy any hoity toitiness. This also made Han Shuo truly approve of Phoebe from within his heart, no longer viewing her as a simple business partner.

    He spent another hour to exin in detail the formation and location of these particr materials to Phoebe, until Phoebe has used pen and paper to take down all of them. Han Shuo took his leave and returned to the cemetery of death after he had filled a space ring with the amount of rations he needed from the warehouse that Phoebe had set aside for him.

 Chapter 98: The arrogant elf

    Chapter 98: The arrogant elf

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t linger long after arriving at the cemetery of death and headed directly for the dwarves¡¯ vige. He finally reached their vige when it was almost dusk.

    Be and the dwarves were still as friendly as ever. They took out their limited fine food for Han Shuo to taste as soon as he arrived, and filled Han Shuo¡¯s cup full with their specially brewed fruit wine.

    ¡°You haven¡¯te for a few days Han, how have you been?¡± Bet looked at Han Shuo and asked.

    ¡°Thank you for your concern, I¡¯ve been quite well. I¡¯vee to bring you the rations that I promised.¡± Han Shuo took out bags of rations as he spoke. There was some wheat and plenty of milk and bread. There was also some cured meat.

    ¡°Oh, my magical friend. Everyone in our entire vige will thank you for your grace and bounty.¡± Bet cried out softly when saw so much food appear on the ground as Han Shuo¡¯s space ring sparkled. This moved him beyond belief as he¡¯d already felt that the past few days had been quite a struggle to get through.

    The female dwarves and children in the distance also put down whatever they were working on and converged on this area with shouts of joy. They hugged each other with warm tears in their eyes as they celebrated.

    Seeing the dwarves be this agitated over the rations in front of them, Han Shuo understood that their lives must not have been easy. Every winter must be a type of suffering for them, but because of Han Shuo¡¯s appearance, they wouldn¡¯t have to worry about their day to day living this year.

    Chief Calvin was bringing the other youths and strong dwarves of the vige over from the forges, and was a bit surprised to see the excited cheeringing from this direction. When he drew nearer and saw the piles of rations on the ground, he very gravely expressed his thanks to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Elder, this is only the first delivery. My space ring can only hold so much. I think I¡¯ll be able to bring all the food you need with a few more trips. Don¡¯t worry elder, I¡¯ll bring over the next batch of food as soon as possible. I think all of you won¡¯t have to worry about rations this winter.¡± Han Shuo responded humbly and smiled as he exined to Calvin.

    Some noises sounded from outside the vige at this moment as the dwarves standing guard outside the vige brought a few elves in. These elves were wearing clothes with intricate detailing and had flowers and grass woven into a circlet decorating their heads. They held bows or magic staves in their hands, and all the males and females were equally beautiful and handsome.

    ¡°Dearest dwarf friends, we¡¯ve brought beautiful jewels with us that are enough to trade for the weapons you¡¯ve forged. We¡¯ll use those weapons to scare off all the man-eating monsters away from here. Are you willing to sell the weapons to us?¡± The foremost young elf opened his mouth and spoke gracefully. He wore a green bow on his back and faint magical pulses came from the bow. It seemed that this bow was a magical weapon. This made Han Shuo quite curious.

    ¡°Sorry Benedict, I think I¡¯ve been clear enough. The weapons that we¡¯ve forged will absolutely not be sold to you, no matter how much you offer to pay. We¡¯re not interested.¡± Calvin shook his head and rejected the young elf Benedict quite decisively.

    Benedict was visibly upset with these words and he said anxiously, ¡°Why? I know there¡¯s only a hundred or so dwarves in your vige, but the weapons you¡¯ve forged recently number more than a hundred. You won¡¯t be able to use them all yourselves. If ck iron ore weapons forged by you are imbued with our elven magic, then they¡¯ll be even more powerful magical weapons. Why is it that you¡¯re not willing to trade with us even when you have no use for them? Is it that our price isn¡¯t high enough?¡±

    ¡°Because these weapons have been forged for our best friend Han. These fruit wines are also for Han. So I¡¯m very sorry Benedict, I think that we can¡¯t trade these weapons to you just because of some jewels.¡± Calvin resolutely expressed his apologies to Benedict, and then turned his head to call out to Bet. ¡°Bet, take the others to bring the weapons we¡¯ve forged. We¡¯re going to give them all to Han today.¡±

    ¡°Understood, chief!¡± Bet responded brightly and clearly, and then took a few young dwarves on a high spirited trip to the forges. All of the dwarves ignored the temptation of the jewels from these elves.

    ¡°Pardon, is he the Han that you speak of? Humans are the most despicable and evil of all races within the Dark Forest. You actually chose to trust a human instead of the envoys of nature? Elder Calvin, you can¡¯t do this!¡±

    When the elves saw Calvin point at Han Shuo and direct Bet and the others to give the forged weapons to Han Shuo, they immediately startedining with an infinite amount of suffering.

    ¡°Han is different from other humans. We trust him and help each other. So I¡¯m truly sorry Benedict, I don¡¯t think we¡¯ll be able to trade these weapons to you.¡± Calvin was unmoved by Benedict¡¯sints and said stubbornly.

    Thest time he¡¯d left the dwarf vige, Han Shuo hadn¡¯t thought of using rations to trade for the dwarves¡¯ weapons at all. Except, the dwarves would only ept Han Shuo¡¯s rations if they undertook such a transaction. Who would¡¯ve thought that the elves would eye this batch of dwarf-forged weapons interspersed with ck iron ore not too long afterwards. What made Han Shuo surprised was that the dwarves had already repeatedly rejected Benedict¡¯s sincere trading request and had solidly kept the weapons for Han Shuo.

    ¡°Elder, you can absolutely make your own decisions with these weapons. I wasn¡¯t lusting after your weapons in gifting you these rations.¡± Han Shuo thought and exined sincerely to Calvin.

    Nodding, Calvin smiled faintly, ¡°You don¡¯t need to exin Han. We know your good intentions. However, we can¡¯t ept your items without any cause or reason. The teachings from our ancestors have taught us that everything needs to be gained through your own hard work. If we directly ept your gift, that will be a vition of the teachings our ancestors left behind, and will bring a bad atmosphere to the vige, so I think you know what I mean.¡±

    As Han Shuo and Calvin were speaking, Bet and another crowd of dwarves had already brought over more than ten weapons. There were des, swords, long spears, heavy mallets, double-edged axes, and all sorts of weapons. The weapons all gleamed with a shiny sparkle. The heavy mallets and double-edged axes gave one a thick and solid feeling, whereas the sharp edges of some of the des, swords, and long spears appeared quite coldly sharp.

    When Benedict and his entourage saw these weapons, their eyes all glinted with excitement. However, just as they were ovee with emotion, Han Shuo sighed with resignation and said, ¡°Since the elder has spoken, then I¡¯ll have to hesitantly ept these.¡±

    Under the greedy gaze of Benedict and the other elves, these ten or so ck iron ore infused, dwarf-forged weapons all made their way into Han Shuo¡¯s space ring after he¡¯d spoken.

    ¡°This human friend, I wonder if you¡¯re willing to trade the dwarf-forged weapons to us? We¡¯ve been preparing for a great battle recently and are going to suppress the presence of the forest trolls. If we have these weapons and our elven elders imbue it with magic, they will be astonishingly powerful magical weapons. The strength of experts like us will be greatly increased. We¡¯re willing to use jewels to trade with you, what do you think?¡± A sh of disappointment streaked through Benedict¡¯s eyes when he saw the weapons make their way into Han Shuo¡¯s hands. He thought for a bit, and then seemed to suddenly think that it¡¯d be easier to trade with Han Shuo, and so immediately spoke with some excitement to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Humans are the most despicable and evil of all races within the Dark Forest. How do you noble elves deign to transact with us base and lowly races?¡± Han Shuo smiled oddly as he looked at Benedict and flung thetter¡¯s words back at him.

    ¡°In order to make the even more greedy and shameless forest trolls pay the price, us noble elves are willing to make apromise and allow you, human, to trade with us.¡± What shocked Han Shuo was that Benedict didn¡¯t seem to hear Han Shuo¡¯s strong sarcasm at all, and rather self righteously disyed his magnanimity.

    ¡°Sorry, I have no interest in conducting any sort of transaction with you noble elves!¡± Han Shuo felt between tears andughter, and had finally experienced the arrogance of the elves. He couldn¡¯t help but shake his head as he turned them down.

    Han Shuo suddenly heard all sorts of branches and twigs being broken off after he¡¯d spoken, as if many people were approaching this location. Before Benedict had a chance to respond, Han Shuo frowned and asked, ¡°Is there another entourage of elvesing from your side?¡±

    ¡°No, just us. What¡¯s wrong?¡± Benedict asked, askance.

    His thoughts moving, the three original demons suddenly swarmed out and vanished in three different directions outside the vige. After a short while, Han Shuo made use of the original demons¡¯ vision to see a dense crowd of five hundred to six hundred forest trolls, making their way over towards them, in massive columns.

    The forest troll head that Han Shuo had metst time was fawning over another more bulky looking forest troll and describing something. It looked like the status of this forest troll was even higher. This made Han Shuo understand that there would be great trouble this time.

 Chapter 99: A worshipped little skeleton

    Chapter 99: A worshipped little skeleton

    ¡°Elder Calvin, has the vige been discovered by forest trolls?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face turned grave as he turned towards Calvin, asking him in a solemn tone.

    ¡°Han, why are you suddenly asking such questions? There have been quite a few encounters with the forest trolls recently in the past couple of days, but even we don¡¯t know if they¡¯ve discovered something.¡± Calvin first started and then exined.

    ording to the field of vision coverage from the original demons, Han Shuo discovered that the current amount of forest trolls present numbered around five or six hundred this time. There were forest trolls, warriors, hunters, and priests. They all advanced in an orderly fashion, and coordinated with each other in exceedingly reasonable ways. This indicated that this batch of forest trolls must surelye from a strong faction. Five to six hundred forest trolls grouped with the right amount of troll hunters and priests would make for a sizeable force.

    There were only 50 or 60 dwarves who were strong enough to participate in this battle within the vige. Add to that Han Shuo and a few elves, their strength waspletely subpar to that of the forest trolls¡¯. This made Han Shuo understand that it would truly be tough to tide over this time¡¯s danger.

    ¡°Five to six hundred forest trolls are headed in this direction. It looks like your vige has truly been exposed.¡± Han Shuo sighed lowly and slowly revealed the truth.

    Benedict had listened to Han Shuo¡¯s words with some disbelief, but the group of dwarves that Calvin was leading immediately panicked upon hearing that five to six hundred forest trolls were headed their way. They were at a loss of what to do and proposed wild ns.

    ¡°What to do, what should we do?¡± An iron mallet waved in Bet¡¯s hands as he gave a nce at the female and children behind him, appearing very worried and resigned.

    The dwarves weren¡¯t a race that was cowardly and afraid of danger, but they couldn¡¯t be irresponsible towards their females and children. When danger arrived, their first thought would be how to protect the women and children.

    ¡°Chief Calvin, I know that your vige is hidden within a mountain valley. Are there any other ways of leaving the valley? No matter how suitable the valley is as a ce to reside, I think we need to evacuate as quickly as possible. We¡¯ll be hard pressed to fight against five to six hundred forest trolls.¡± Han Shuo tried persuading.

    Calvin¡¯s brow was knit tightly as he appeared quite anxious. After thinking for a while, he spoke to Bet first. ¡°Go assemble all the vigers and have them pack their belongings and prepare to leave from the rear side of the mountain valley. We¡¯ll stay back and see if we can bring some retribution to these viins.¡±

    Bet immediately left with Calvin¡¯s orders, calling out continuously towards the small houses in the back of the vige, exhorting all the vigers to pick up rations and weapons, and to temporarily leave everything else behind.

    At this moment, the two dwarves, who had been standing guard outside, finally rushed in with looks of panic, they started yelling out loudly before arriving where the chief stood, ¡°Bad news! Terrible news! A lot of forest trolls are headed our way. They¡¯re everywhere within the shrubbery!¡±

    Benedict had been a bit hesitant, but no longer doubted Han Shuo¡¯s words now. The group of elves, with Benedict as their leader, all unsheathed their weapons and wiped them down with calm expressions. Benedict held the bow behind his back in his hand, appearing ready forbat at any time.

    ¡°The forest trolls are the natural rival of us elves. I¡¯d like them to taste of our power this time.¡± Benedict didn¡¯t disy any signs of fright and rather spoke with eagerness.

    By this time, Bet had already finished giving the dwarves behind him their orders. Utilizing his original demons. Han Shuo discovered that the forest trolls were indeed headed towards the mouth of the vige. He looked back involuntarily at the dwarves around him and said to them, ¡°I think we should block off the narrow passageway that leads to the vige at this time, and endeavor to buy time for the women and children to leave first.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded at Calvin when he said these words and took a few steps forward to the mouth of the vige. Benedict hesitated and indicated his intentions to the elves, and followed behind Han Shuo, heading for the entrance to the vige.

    Up until now, Han Shuo could basically be certain that these forest trolls were aiming for the dwarves. Otherwise, they wouldn¡¯t have all appeared here by such coincidence. The five hundred or so forest trolls had already started searching through the nearby shrubbery beneath the yells of the particrly stocky forest troll, searching for the entrance to the dwarves¡¯ vige.

    ording to how the situation was developing, the shrubs and leaves covering the vige entrance wouldn¡¯t be able to conceal it for much longer. Han Shuo didn¡¯t be panicked after arriving here and recited a portion of magical incantation. Several skeletal warriors and two bulky zombie warriors appeared in front of him.

    ¡°We should take this time to set up some simple traps. The entrance to the vige will surely be discovered, but it¡¯s not spacious enough here, so we can take advantage of this to create some trouble for them,¡± Han Shuo said calmly when these dark creatures appeared.

    The skeletal warriors and zombies immediately started digging traps under Han Shuo¡¯smand. The zombie warriors possessed strong bodies and were in charge of moving rocks over long the distances to block the path. The dwarves had set up some traps here to begin with, Han Shuo merely added a few more measures. The dwarves also all mobilized themselves to help Han Shuo set up.

    ¡°Necromancy magic is the most disgusting magic, to think that you, human, are an evil necromancer!¡± Benedict seemed to abhor the appearance of the skeletal and zombie warriors as heined.

    Han Shuo waspletely unmoved by Benedict¡¯sints and only concerned himself with setting up the traps. When Han Shuo felt that all was pretty much in readiness, he took out a few crossbows from his space ring and distributed them to the dwarves around him. He then directed them to retreat to the rear and disperse themselves within the strong growth of trees and shrubs.

    The dwarves were masters of forging weapons, but theplex bows didn¡¯t need superb crafting skills, rather required precise designs and thought instead. The firing range and power of a crossbow was exceedingly high, and was one of the most outstanding inventions created by humans in recent years. Their drawbacks were that they were too heavy and that the frequency of firing wasn¡¯t that quick. Every crossbow needed a small amount of time to reload after firing, unlike how a bow and arrow, which could be quickly reloaded.

    Han Shuo¡¯s body was strong, thus he could easily lift such heavy crossbows. Although the dwarves were diminutive in stature, their strength was also equal to Han Shuo¡¯s, and so they too lifted the crossbows easily.

    As Han Shuo and the dwarves stood ready to defend, a loud forest troll shout traveled in from the distance. The forest trolls then immediately cheered and rapidly approached with loud yells. Through the eyes of the original demons, Han Shuo knew that one of the forest trolls had already discovered the concealed entrance.

    Indeed, the new forest troll leader gave orders in the forest trollnguage as more than a hundred forest trolls came charging over with weapons in hand. The troll warriors were in the vanguard, with hunters and priests following close behind, as they carefully and slowly attempted to brush away at the coverings.

    Han Shuo roared lowly and didn¡¯t wait for the forest trolls to walk through the entrance. The crossbow in his hand had already been fired, and the dwarves beside him also sent crossbow bolts whistling through the air.

    Some of the forest trolls, that had just entered this area and hadn¡¯t had the time to peel back the coverings, were sent flying by the enormous momentum behind the crossbow bolts. One of the forest trolls, that Han Shuo had hit, was pierced through by his crossbow bolt and nailed to a tree that was the width of two people.

    ¡°Look at the power of my magical arrow.¡± Benedict nced disdainfully at Han Shuo and suddenly pulled back on his bowstring. Faint magical pulses came from the bow in his hand and the arrow suddenly began burning fiercely in mid air after it was shot out. When itnded amidst the forest trolls, it suddenly exploded ferociously with sparks. Ten or so forest trolls were struck by ssh damage from the sparks and started burning, Three of them didn¡¯t put the mes out in time and were swallowed by the spreading tongues of fire.

    Han Shuo was truly surprised, he hadn¡¯t expected the arrow to have such power and involuntarily looked askance at Benedict.

    ¡°Benedict, you shouldn¡¯t waste such precious magical arrows on these cursed forest trolls. You know that these magical arrows are all very precious!¡± A female elf was a bit angry at seeing Benedict show off and lectured him.

    Benedict stuck out his tongue and made a face when the female elf lectured him and then spoke self righteously to Han Shuo, ¡°Did you see that just now? The magical arrows that have been imbued with magic from our elders have such strong power after being shot out with a magical bow. If those dwarf-forged weapons are modified by us, they will immediately turn into powerful magical weapons and bring lots of trouble to the forest trolls. You should give those weapons to us.¡±

    It looked like the elf still hadn¡¯t forgotten his duty, even now, and was still attempting to use his naive andughable words to persuade Han Shuo. It was a pity that apart from flicking him a nce in the beginning, Han Shuo paid no more attention to him and only calmly gave a few orders to the dwarves around him.

    After the first batch of forest trolls paid a heavy price in casualties, they were much more cautious the second time around. They first had the troll warriors approach, and then the priests added blessings on them, making their bodies more nimble and strong. The enhanced forest trolls immediately shoveled away the weeds at the entrance with great enthusiasm.

    At this moment, the crossbows in Han Shuo¡¯s and the dwarves¡¯ hands continuously shot out across the tall grass, but whenever their crossbolts appeared, the long spears of the troll hunters would rake through the air, also falling on Han Shuo and the dwarves¡¯ hiding ce.

    But because the crossbows had a longer firing range, this caused the forest trolls¡¯ judgement of distance to be off the mark. The long spears fell in rows in front of the group, without causing any damage to them.

    After paying the price of the lives of a few more troll warriors, the forest trolls finally cleared away the obstacles to the vige entrance. With another loud yell, the forest trolls raised their weapons and charged in withrge steps.

    The traps set at the entrance to the vige started disying their lethality. The forest trolls out in front all fell into deep holes with sharp sticks in the bottom, and theyy there moaning in pain. The entrance to the vige was finally ovee, but not without the mounting forest troll death toll and casualties.

    ¡°There are simply too many forest trolls, I think we should retreat.¡± Han Shuo looked at the vige entrance thronging with forest trolls and understood that the difference between the two was simply too great. He shook his head and sighed.

    Benedict also disyed his fright at this time and nodded in agreement with Han Shuo¡¯s words. ¡°Yes, I think we should retreat first and wait for me to go back to the tribe to alert our people. When our people arrive, these cursed viins will pay a painful price.¡±

    When Han Shuo and Benedict said so, the ten or so dwarves around them seemed to be a bit dejected as they allid down their weapons. One of them said, ¡°The chief said that we should listen to Han. If Han wants us to retreat then we¡¯ll retreat.¡±

    Han Shuo smiled faintly upon hearing his words, ¡°Since this is the case, then all of you shoulde back, otherwise we¡¯ll be in big trouble.¡±

    The dwarves, who had been bent on fighting to their deaths, all retreated to the back of the vige in ordance with Han Shuo¡¯s orders. The crossbows within their hands continued to fire. In the face of a densely packed forest troll advance, the crossbow bolts would all hit their targets, without needing to be aimed.

    Upon seeing that the dwarves had already retreated, some of the dwarves also stood tactfully in the back. Han Shuo thought for a moment and summoned the little skeleton. He wanted to use the seven bone spurs on the little skeleton¡¯s back to shed ast wave of blood and create some trouble for the forest trolls.

    However, out of Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, when the bone dagger wielding little skeleton appeared at the vige entrance, he hadn¡¯t even had the time to shoot out his bone spurs when the forest trolls in the very front all disyed very excited expressions. Theyid down their weapons with a thud and bowed down to the little skeleton with highly raised hands, calling out continuously, ¡°Datara, Datara, Datara...¡±

    Han Shuo was bbergasted and stunned where he stood. He didn¡¯t know why the forest trolls were worshipping the little skeleton so faithfully.

 Chapter 100: The demonâ€™s representation?

    Chapter 100: The demon¡¯s representation?

    ¡°Datara, Datara.¡±

    The forest trolls on the outskirts also bowed down reverently in the din of the forest trolls¡¯ shouts and began shouting loudly as well.

    ¡°What, what¡¯s going on?¡± Not only Han Shuo, but the dwarves and elves around them were also astonished by the sudden change. One of the dwarves asked in sudden stupefaction.

    ¡°The skeletal warrior with wings seems to be simr to the demon that the forest trolls worship. This demon is innately evil and loves to seize everything. I¡¯ve heard elders within the tribe mention that the demon the forest trolls worship is called Datara!¡± Benedict seemed to recall something at this point and suddenly cried out.

    Not too far in the distance, a forest troll priest, so old that it seemed like it would close its eyes in final slumber at any moment, crawled swiftly towards the little skeleton on its knees. Han Shuo was rather taken aback that he crawled pretty fast, and had reached the little skeleton in a short while. The old forest troll priest murmured some things in the forest trollnguage at the little skeleton.

    The little skeleton stood there in a stupor with his bone dagger, scratching his bright and clean skullcap, as if not knowing what was going on. He turned back to look at Han Shuo with an empty gaze, as if waiting for Han Shuo to give him orders.

    Upon hearing Benedict¡¯s words, Han Shuo had a pretty good idea that something marvelous had happened. These forest trolls must have thought that the little skeleton was the demon that they worshipped. The old priest seemed to want to take the little skeleton somewhere, judging from its interactions. All the forest trolls in the back were frozen in worship on the ground, and no one mentioned the matter of invading the dwarf vige again.

    ¡°Han, what¡¯s going on, what should we do?¡± A dwarf looked at Han Shuo and asked nkly.

    Han Shuo was thinking furiously when he heard the dwarf¡¯s question. His head also ached with the difficulty of the situation. He waffled for a second, unsure what would happen afterwards and said to them, ¡°I¡¯ll think of a way to dy the forest trolls. You guys leave the valley immediately and find a safe ce with the chief and Bet. I think I will be able to find you guys again.¡±

    ¡°Will it be dangerous for you?¡± The dwarf was a bit uneasy at leaving Han Shuo¡¯s side and spoke a bit reluctantly.

    ¡°No worries, I have my ways to handle them. Benedict I think your party should leave as well. My skeletal warrior is a bit odd, but I don¡¯t think he¡¯s the demon that the forest trolls worship. I can¡¯t predict how well the situation will develop afterwards either, I think you¡¯ll be safer if you left with them.¡± Han Shuo tried to slowly persuade the dwarves and elves that he was looking at.

    ¡°We¡¯ll be leaving, it¡¯s very dangerous here. I think we should notify the elders first.¡± Benedict thought briefly, nodded and retreated with the other elves after speaking.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s urgings, the dwarves also left slowly, unwillingly to the mountain valley. One of the original demons, that had continuously been observing the forest trolls, suddenly split off and followed the dwarves as they retreated. This allowed Han Shuo to clearly view the path that the dwarves were taking to escape.

    After a short while, there was no one else in the entrance to the vige apart from Han Shuo and the little skeleton. Han Shuo¡¯s original demon had been observing the dwarves¡¯ movements and discovered that they were traversing a cold river and leaving from a diagonal crack in the mountain valley.

    ¡°Does anyone here speak themon tongue of the Continent?¡± Han Shuo walked out from the back and stood beside the little skeleton, asking in thenguage of the humans.

    The old priest, that had been kneeling in front of the little skeleton and talking to him in the forest trollnguage, suddenly looked up at Han Shuo, using thenguage of the humans in a slightly unpracticed manner, ¡°You are with the mighty Datara, why are you a tricky human?¡±

    ¡°Are you sure that he¡¯s the same as your Datara?¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t know whether tough or cry as he shook his head and asked oddly.

    The face of the forest troll was a ghastly green and the dry skin that hung all over his body was like old tree bark that had been weathered by the wind and rains for many years. He disyed a look of extreme contempt and said, ¡°Of course I wouldn¡¯t be wrong, this is the representation of the divine Datara on this earth.¡±

    As the old priest spoke, he solemnly took out a treasured ancient scroll from a leather bag. The scroll was slowly unfurled as his wizened hands opened it. Apart from a few squiggly lines in the forest trollnguage that were hard to make out, it was a picture of an enormous skeleton with wings on its back. The skeleton¡¯s bones were a pure white and the wings on its back were bare of feathers. Based on the photo, the wings truly did bear a great deal of resemnce to the bone spurs on the little skeleton¡¯s back.

    There was a barren mountain peak beneath thisrge, white skeleton¡¯s foot with all sorts of gold, silver, and jewelry piled up on the mountain peak, including some jewels that looked quite precious. The white skeleton had an empty socket for one eye and a ck eyepatch covering the other, the outfit of a single eyed pirate who would burn, raid, and loot.

    ¡°This is the appearance of our mighty Datara, we wouldn¡¯t be wrong. He is the representative of Datara in this world and will lead us to even more gold, silver, and jewelry. We¡¯ll have so many jewels and food that we will never starve.The mighty Datara will lead our tribe to seize thends of the tricky humans!¡± The tone of the old forest troll priest had be strangely fervent and he shouted loudly.

    Apart from being slightly smaller and not pure white, the little skeleton was indeed quite simr to the Datara depicted on the scroll. No wonder the greedy forest trolls had thought the little skeleton was the representative of the looting demon Datara.

    Although the unimaginably queer situation made Han Shuo feel quite surprised, a sudden thought struck him as he mused carefully. A trace of a wicked smile appeared on his lips as he gave amand to the little skeleton.

    The little skeleton that had originally been dumbly standing there with bone dagger in hand suddenly waved the bone dagger at this moment, as his empty left hand made a gesture indicating for everyone to rise.

    ¡°Oh! Datara has heard our prayers!¡± The old forest troll priest immediately capered in great excitement as his chicken-like feet, withered hands also waved, speaking very ceremoniously in the low forest trollnguage.

    The forest trolls that had knelt in homage all shouted loudly and stood up from the ground, taking off the pockets tied to themselves and shaking them strongly.

    The little skeleton waited until all the forest trolls had stood up to use its empty left hand to point at Han Shuo, ording to his orders. Under the puzzled gaze of the forest trolls, he used his empty hand to point to himself.

    ¡°He means for me to be his liaison and interact with you.¡± Han Shuo drew himself up proudly and spoke cockily to the old priest. The little skeleton nodded in a very timely fashion after Han Shuo gave the order, as if verifying what Han Shuo had just said.

    ¡°Why, why should this tricky human be your liaison?¡± The old forest troll priest obviously couldn¡¯t ept this and immediately asked in confusion.

    The little skeleton had extended the bone dagger and was already resting it on the old priest¡¯s neck as soon as the old forest troll priest had finished speaking. The little skeleton stood on its tiptoes, trying to appear taller than he was. His two empty eye sockets stared directly at the old priest as bone chilling ttering teeth sounds came from his mouth.

    The old forest troll priest was immediately frightened to the point of losing all strength in his body, crashing to the ground and genuflecting again. He raised his hands high above his head and cried out, ¡°I will never dare question your decisions again, please don¡¯t take all we have!¡±

    None of the forest trolls standing around dared to make a move when they saw the most venerated old priest within their tribe being publicly threatened. The only stood there with their heads hung and spoke something in the forest trollnguage.

    ¡°Get up, get up, your noble Datara has forgiven you. I think you¡¯ll acknowledge my status as liaison now?¡± Han Shuo was cackling inside as he spoke with every appearance of seriousness to the old priest.

    Clutching his head, the old priest spoke with visible reluctance on his face and nodded, ¡°Will great Datara and the liaisone with us to grace our tribe with their presence? We have some things to offer to the great Datara!¡±

    ¡°Didn¡¯t youe to rob the dwarves?¡± Han Shuo started slightly and opened his mouth to ask.

    ¡°No, after I heard members of the tribe describe the great onest time, I immediately told the tribe to search for traces of the great one. Those annoying dwarves are only a small vige of a hundred people and isn¡¯t worth sending out so many elites from our tribes. We¡¯ve heard that the great one had appeared nearby, which is why we sent out so many tribesmen this time, so we could wee the great one back to its sacred ground.¡± The old forest troll priest shook his head and exined to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Sacred ground, what sacred ground?¡± Han Shuo asked in surprise.

    ¡°A pce that our tribe has built especially for the great one. There are even antiques passed down from generation to generation. It¡¯s said that this was the great Datara¡¯s ce to begin with, and so we will offer it all to the great one this time.¡± The old priest looked at Han Shuo with some distaste, but didn¡¯t dare vite the little skeleton¡¯s orders as he exined impatiently.

    ¡°Very good, very good! Let¡¯s set out then!¡± Han Shuo was overjoyed when he heard these words and immediately urged the forest trolls to be on their way.

    The old priest didn¡¯t say much and waved his hand. The most burly looking forest troll in the distance walked humbly towards the old priest. After giving a round of orders in gobbledegook, the leader immediately gave the order for the five, six hundred forest trolls to ignore the matter of the dwarves and set out for the deeper parts of the Dark Forest with great fanfare.

    Four tall and burly troll warriors carried a luxurious carriage made of ck jade with several brightly shining jewels embedded in it. There were soft feathers spread on within it as the little skeleton rode in it on their way into the depths of the Dark Forest. It looked like the forest trolls hade prepared.

    The little skeletony leisurely within, looking to and fro. As a liaison, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t enjoy suchfort and could only proceed on foot with them. They met many magical creatures along the way, but ordinary magical creatures didn¡¯t dare approach such arge group of five to six hundred forest trolls. Even several level three or two wild and ferocious beasts decided not to continue the hunt when they saw therge group proceeding with great fanfare. Instead, they chose to stay far, far away from thisrge group made of a viinous tribe.

    In the outskirts of the Dark Forest, the innately greedy forest trolls, with a love for robbery were renowned and greatly feared. Whether it was some of the more umon tribes living in the outskirts of the Dark Forest or the adventurers and merchants who¡¯d ventured into the Dark Forest , they would always be robbed to a certain degree whenever they were met with forest trolls.

    Apart from a few stronger lifeforms within the depths of the Dark Forest, these infamous viins on the outskirts of the Dark Forest were universally hated and feared. As hated rivals, the elves had fought numerous times with the forest trolls and hadn¡¯t been able to obtain victory. Nobody could stop their innate impulse for robbery.

    As they neared the depths of the Dark Forest, even the formerly blustering forest trolls began to proceed with caution the deeper they entered into the Dark Forest, as if deathly afraid of creating any disturbances.

    ¡°Why is it that you be more timid the farther in you go?¡± Han Shuo had detected the abnormalities of the forest trolls and couldn¡¯t help but ask the old priest beside him.

    Flicking a nce around, the old priest exined, ¡°We¡¯ve now entered the middle area of the Dark Forest. There are many high level beasts here and several special tribes. The humans that appear here are also difficult to deal with. We hope that we won¡¯t run into them, or there¡¯ll be trouble.¡±

    A thundering crash came from not too far away as a six to seven meter tall, frighteninglyrge white stone giant slowly moved away with arge tree thrown over his shoulder. A low caw sounded from the sky as an enormous ck shadow flew over them. When the shadow was cast over the ground, two long, slender necks could easily be made out.

    ¡°The one covered in white stone dust is a mountain ridge giant. Their nature is fairly peaceful and they don¡¯t like to fight. However, if you make him angry, it¡¯ll be a disaster. What just flew overhead was the lowest level twin headed dragon. They¡¯re actually not dragons, just a level two magical creature, but they can spit out venom and are tough to deal with.¡± The old priest spoke up in exnation upon seeing Han Shuo¡¯s astonishment.

    Nodding, Han Shuo sighed with great appreciation. ¡°I finally understand why you dare act wildly only in the outskirts of the Dark Forest!¡±

 Chapter 101: A place of extreme wood

    Chapter 101: A ce of extreme wood

    The group followed carefully behind the old forest troll priest towards recessed terrain, finally stopping beside a river after a half day¡¯s time and passing through a broken section of mountain rock.

    There was a river in the back and primitive houses made of wood all around there. There were also a few simple traps set up and several weird, towering trees. When they arrived, the original demon, that had been keeping an eye on the dwarves had toe back due to the distance between Han Shuo and the dwarves bing toorge. It circled this area and started surveying the various corners.

    Leveraging the increased field of vision with the three original demons, Han Shuo discovered that this was an extremelyrge area. He made a rough calction that there were several hundred huts here. It looked like this was the hideout of the forest trolls. Many green-skinned forest trolls clutched weapons in their hands, whether they were children or females, and were being trained by a strong forest troll warrior.

    From the elves¡¯ description earlier, Han Shuo understood that the forest trolls were born with a natural inclination for raiding and looting. There was no such thing as self providing and self sufficiency in their lives. Whether food, drink, or items of use, they all naturally thought that these items should be earned through stealing. They, who worshipped the demon of raiding Datara, also treated children and women as a training target as this would increase their strength during raids.

    When the old priest arrived, he used thenguage of the forest trolls to call something out loudly. All the forest trolls in the tribe, whether children, the elderly, or females, excitedly ripped off the pockets on their body and waved them in the air, calling out, ¡°Datara, Datara!¡±

    After continuing in this fashion for a while, the old priest finally continued conversing with Han Shuo in thenguage of the humans, ¡°Come, I will take the great Datara and his liaison to the sacred grounds.¡±

    ¡°Mm, hurry up. The great Datara is impatient.¡± Han Shuo said with a darkened face.

    The forest trolls continued carrying the little skeleton and Han Shuo continued on foot. Several troll warriors pushed in several wooden rafts from afar. Han Shuo and the little skeleton walked towards the wooden rafts when indicated by the old priest. Afterwards, some of the forest trolls paddled their wooden oars and set out for the river current.

    The wooden rafts advanced slowly, docking at a patch of swampy earth after roughly half an hour. Han Shuo followed the old priest up the shore and discovered that all the trees here were towering and extremelyrge. The vibrant growth of the grass and shrubbery was enough to drown a person, and even the weeds here grew with great vigor.

    The nts and trees on all sides seemed to be growing quite well, and a bizarre presence seemed to permeate the air. Pushing past the thick shrubbery, several troll warriors led the way. The old priest pointed out the road and Han Shuo followed behind him, heading for an even deeper part of the area.

    As he made his way deeper, a feeling grew within Han Shuo that something was amiss, as if he¡¯d heard of this ce somewhere. He finally stopped in front of a tall house that looked like it was being hauled upwards by a towering, huge tree with this bemused mindset.

    The thickly leafed branches of five to six very tall trees were intertwined, with the entwined branches supporting arge house in midair. The nts were growing exceptionally well around it, and there were also some bizarre flowers bearing some strange and exotic fruit.

    Looking around the surroundings and nking for quite a bit, Han Shuo¡¯s heart shook and he suddenly cried out in astonishment, ¡°A ce of extreme wood. Haha, this is actually a ce of extreme wood! No wonder all the nts have developed so perfectly. So this is the case!¡±

    A naturally formed ce of extreme wood. The presence of the element of wood within it was much more dense than in other ces. All the nts and trees that grew in a ce of extreme wood were naturally much more luxuriant than in other ces. Although the forest trolls worshipped the demon of raiding, Datara, it was said in legends that they were a race evolved from trees, and so they had a natural affinity for wood.

    ¡°The air here is clearer than anywhere else. Our ancestors searched for many years before discovering this ce, and so built the pce of the sacred ground here. The stone statue of Datara was erected for worship inside. There are tributes offered to the great Datara every year in hopes that the great one will ensure our sessful raids.¡± The old priest genuflected piously towards the house hovering in mid air and said all this softly.

    After thinking for a while, the old priest seemed to think that this was inappropriate and immediately started bowing down to the little skeleton. He spoke some gobbledegook to the troll warriors lifting the little skeleton¡¯s carriage. The troll warriors lowered the carriage and indicated for the little skeleton to depart from the carriage.

    At this moment, Han Shuo was thinking of how his wood elite zombie was already at hand and was incredibly excited. He¡¯d actually forgotten to continue giving orders to the little skeleton. The old priest made a number of sincere requests and discovered that the little skeleton was still sitting motionless within the carriage. His brow tightly knit together, he sank to his knees in front of Han Shuo. ¡°Liaison, why doesn¡¯t the great Datara descend from the carriage? Have we done something wrong?¡±

    The old priest¡¯s words immediately startled Han Shuo from his daydream. He turned his head and discovered that the little skeleton was lying therezily, as if he¡¯d fallen asleep. Han Shuo gave an order and the little skeleton¡¯s legs straightened, standing up abruptly and looked around with his shiny skull, the bone dagger in his hand.

    ¡°Datara was contemting just now and didn¡¯t hear your calls. Come, we go up now!¡± Han Shuo snickered inwardly but spoke seriously to the old priest.

    Timidly nodding his head, the old priest didn¡¯t dare to ask anything else. He walked to the back of one of the towering trees and started climbing up after pulling down a softdder, woven from tree branches. Han Shuo followed behind the old priest and climbed up, also making use of the softdder.

    The little skeleton walked out from within the carriage and moved to somewhere in the distance before Han Shuo had a chance to give orders to the little skeleton. What happened next was something out of everyone¡¯s expectation as it made use of the momentum from charging forward, extended both leg bones, and flew into the sky when the seven bone spurs on its back pped around randomly. Itnded in front of the door to the big house in the sky before Han Shuo and the old priest reached it.

    His body wavering in front of the big house, the little skeleton slowly regained his footing and shook his head. He then pulled open the door and entered the house, with pilip sounds of items being rifled through sounding out.

    ¡°Datara, Datara!¡± The old priest wore an expression of excitement as he started calling out in gobbledegook.

    Finally, the old priest and Han Shuo had climbed up to the steps in front of the big house. Some other forest trolls were standing guard outside and no one else had been allowed up.

    Han Shuo followed the excited old priest into the house and immediately saw an enormous sculpture of a skeleton in the middle of the room. It was exactly the same as the one that Han Shuo had seen on the old priest¡¯s ancient scroll earlier, with the only difference being that the enormous skeleton wearing an eyepatch wielded a weapon that looked simr to the scythe that the Grim Reaper carried in its right hand. It grasped arge satchel in its left hand, and it bulged as if holding many spoils from raids.

    It was brightly lit inside, with all sorts of colored jewels embedded in the wooden walls. Gold and jewelry could be seen everywhere on the ground. The Han Shuo of now wasn¡¯t someone who didn¡¯t recognize wealth, and he noticed that all the various jewels in the wooden walls were absolutely priceless as they exuded radiant and sparkling glimmers. The cups and cutlery were ced on a jade table and were all made of beautiful jade and gold, dazzling Han Shuo¡¯s eyes.

    The little skeleton hefted its bone dagger as it ran a hand over its gleaming skullcap, circling continuously around the enormous stone sculpture erected in the center of the house. He would asionally touch the featherless wings behind the giant stone skeleton sculpture, and would run its hand along its back to touch the seven bone spurs, seeming to be quite puzzled as to why the great stone sculpture looked so much like him.

    Except,pared to the stone sculpture, the little skeleton was almost half its size. The scene looked quite odd with a little skeleton standing next to a big skeleton.

    When Han Shuo and the old priest entered, they noticed in confusion that the little skeleton was circling around the statue of Datara. As Han Shuo observed the little skeleton, he suddenly discovered that the little skeleton¡¯s movements were quite human like. This prevented Han Shuo from giving any orders to the little skeleton, causing him to be astonished. He looked intently at the little skeleton with a heated gaze instead, intending to see what he was up to.

    Just as Han Shuo was astonished, he saw the little skeleton suddenly stop right in front of the statue of the demon Datara. His empty sockets stared at the eyepatch over Datara¡¯s left eye, and then extended a hand to feel his own left eye socket, as if wondering why he didn¡¯t have an eye patch.

    The little skeleton suddenly jumped up and extended a hand to rip off Datara¡¯s eye patch. When the little skeletonnded, it was with an eye patch in hand. There was a purple gem concealed in the left eye socket of the now eye patch-less Datara, as if it was an eyeball. The originally lifeless stone sculpture of the demon Datara now appeared to have a few traces of life to it with the addition of a purple eye. It gave Han Shuo the misguided feeling that the sculpture was looking at him.

    At this moment, the purple eyeball seemed to rotate once and glow weakly with soft, purple light, as if the demon Datara had revived suddenly.

    ¡°Oh, the great Datara has opened the ¡®Purple Demon Eye¡¯, the great Datara has manifested!¡± The old priest disyed jubtion as he went crazy with excitement and buried his head in the ground, hollering loudly.

    The little skeleton, previously standing there dumbly, suddenly moved a small table in front of the statue of the demon Datara and leapt onto it. He stood on his tiptoes and reached a hand towards the left eye of the statue of the demon Datara. As Han Shuo¡¯s scalp grew numb, the little skeleton firmly gouged the purple demon eye out and lifted it high for a nce before stuffing it into his own left eye socket.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t know what to do here either, but before he¡¯d thought through what should be done, he suddenly felt a spitting pain in his head. He looked at the little skeleton and realized that the little skeleton had somehow firmly stuffed the purple demon eye into his own eye socket.

    However, when the purple demon eye entered his left eye socket, the little skeleton also appeared to be in pain. His body shuddered and he then clutched his head to roll on the ground in pain. As the host, Han Shuo shared a mental connection with the little skeleton and also felt the same wracking pain. An enormous, foreign energy was emanating from the little skeleton¡¯s purple demon eye. Han Shuo could clearly feel that the purple demon eye was trying to intrude into his and the little demon¡¯s body, as if trying to take control of the two bodies.

    ¡°Great Datara, liaison, what¡¯s happening to you two?¡± The old forest troll priest lifted his head to see that something was amiss with Han Shuo and the little skeleton, and immediately cried out in inquiry.

    ¡°Get out, leave first! The great Datara has some things to do.¡± Han Shuo roared as he held up beneath the searing pain.

    The old forest troll priest was startled as he frantically walked out of the house in confusion. He stayed outside to observe what was happening within the sacred ground.

    Han Shuo immediately clutched his head when the old priest left and curled into a ball with the small skeleton. Han Shuo¡¯s heart was filled with baffled fear. If this purple demon eye really did belong to the demon Datara, then this strange, energy invading his body would naturallye from Datara. A demon was a type of deity and their power wasn¡¯t something that humans could withstand. This made Han Shuo at a loss for what he should do at the moment.

    This enormous power was spreading out from the purple demon eye within the little skeleton¡¯s left eye socket. Han Shuo first gave the order to remove the purple demon eye, but the little skeleton had shoved it into his eye in a way that no matter how the little skeleton grappled with the purple demon eye, he was unable to remove it again.

    As one human and one skeleton rolled around continuously inside and convulsed with pain, another wondrous power emanated from the eye patch that the little skeleton had held onto during all this time. Because his brain was hurting to the extreme, Han Shuo¡¯s perception grew tremendously and he suddenly detected the abnormality. He grasped at every possible solution in his panic and gave the little skeleton the order to put on the eye patch.

    It was magical that the mysterious power attempting to take over their bodies suddenly vanished without a trace after the little skeleton frantically put the eye patch on. The profusely sweating Han Shuo slowly returned to normal.

    The eye patch looked quite appropriate on the statue of the demon Datara, but it was noticeably bigger on the little skeleton. The eye patch almost covered the entire left side of his face, and he looked a bitical and funny.

    ¡°Never remove the eye patch no matter when or what.¡± Han Shuo recovered himself and ignored all these bizarre happenings, giving the little skeleton this order first.

 Chapter 102: Looting the tribute to the demon

    Chapter 102: Looting the tribute to the demon

    There seemed to be an evil power of Datara¡¯s contained within the purple demon eye. The eye patch also seemed to have the ability to seal that power, making Han Shuo feel that it was very strange. His eyes kept looking over at theical eye patch on the little skeletons¡¯ head, attempting to discover something, anything.

    However, Han Shuo quickly realized that his efforts were futile. He could no longer detect anything out of the ordinary from the purple demon eye after it¡¯d been covered by the eye patch. Apart from the jewels and beautiful jade scattered throughout the entire house, there was nothing else worth noticing. When Han Shuo no longer felt endangered, he rose to summon the old forest troll priest.

    When the old priest entered, his gaze instantly converged on the statue of Datara, now missing the purple demon eye. He was incredibly astonished and asked, ¡°What, what¡¯s happened? Why is the purple demon eye that the great Datara left behind gone?¡±

    Pointing at the little skeleton, Han Shuo smiled faintly and exined, ¡°The eye has already been reimed by the great Datara of this world. Do you not see the eye patch on his left eye?¡±

    The old priest finally reacted when Han Shuo gave this reminder and looked at the little skeleton in astonishment. The old priest immediately fell to his knees and cried out, ¡°Congrattions to the great Datara! My tribe has always protected the purple demon eye ording to your final wishes, and now that the purple demon eye has returned into your grasp, my tribe has fulfilled what you have entrusted us with.¡±

    ¡°Apart from the purple demon eye, was there anything else you offered as tribute to the great Datara?¡± Han Shuo thought and stared at the old priest in question.

    The old priest was startled and mused thoughtfully with his brow furrowed. He shook his head and said, ¡°We watched over the purple demon eye in ordance with the great one¡¯sst wishes. Apart from this, all the treasure has also been offered to the great Datara.¡±

    ¡°Very good, very good.¡± Han Shuo nodded his head and said to the old priest. ¡°Leave for now, the great Datara will emerge to guide you in a moment.¡±

    The old priest reverently backed out of the great house, and Han Shuo started unstintingly looting everything within the house. The gold, jewels, and jade scattered across the ground vanished one by one into Han Shuo¡¯s space ring. Han Shuo slightly estimated the wealth within and felt that it was likely worth tens of thousands of gold coins. They were all items that the forest trolls had offered to the demon Datara after stealing from others.

    Han Shuo temporarily ignored the heavier items, and also didn¡¯t immediately attempt to pry the jewels embedded into the wooden walls out. He first put away the jewels, gold, and jade scattered on the floor, and then took inventory of his haul. He felt that it was a good ce to stop for now.

    Apart from a fewrger antiques and the jewels embedded into the house, many of the valuable jewels, gold, and jade had made their way into Han Shuo¡¯s space ring.

    However, the capacity within Han Shuo¡¯s space ring was limited and there were some other items stored within as well. He¡¯d only taken one third of the items within the house, but the value of this one third was likely tens of thousands of gold coins as well. It looked like the forest trolls had reaped rich rewards after many years of raiding.

    Since the little skeleton had be the forest trolls¡¯ great Datara, Han Shuo once again started thinking furiously. He would be able topel the forest trolls to do certain things by taking advantage of the little skeleton¡¯s identity. He wasn¡¯t worried that the items within the house would magically disappear ¡ª they should be quite safe in here. He¡¯d have toe back sooner orter to refine the wood elite zombie, so Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a hurry.

    The forest trolls were a race that was universally hated and disdained within the Dark Forest. With the presence of the little skeleton now, Han Shuo could swagger about in borrowed influence andpel them to action. The only thing he was hesitant about was ¡ª what could he do with these forest trolls?

    Han Shuo suddenly felt a huge headache as he thought. These forest trolls were naturally greedy and loved looting from others. This wouldn¡¯t be changed no matter what. This made Han Shuo not know how to control them. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that they had mistaken the little skeleton for the demon Datara and was worshipping him, Han Shuo didn¡¯t mind killing them all and taking all their belongings.

    However, with the little skeleton now, Han Shuo could make use of them. It seemed too much of a waste to kill them then. He wracked his brains painfully for a bit. Han Shuo felt that their innate raiding nature would be unable to be changed, the only thing he could change was who they raided. If the target they raided could shift to the equally infamous goblins or man-eating monsters, or the troops of some enemy empires, then a bad thing would be something good.

    When he thought this point through, Han Shuo left the house with the little skeleton. He made use of the surveince of the three originals demons to obtain a full grasp of the ce that the forest trolls were guarding. When he descended from the house, Han Shuo opened his mouth to give orders, ¡°The great Datara has just descended here and is unfamiliar with the current state of this world. The great Datara needs to familiarize himself with the Dark Forest and then point out the way for your future. Do not continue to raid the dwarves during this process, the great Datara needs them alive and well.¡±

    Although many questions existed within the heart of the old forest troll priest, he didn¡¯t dare question Han Shuo¡¯s words. He only drooped his head and asked respectfully, ¡°Do you need us to send out warriors to help the great Datara get to know these surroundings?¡±

    ¡°No need, The great Datara and I will remain within your tribe over the next couple of days. You can just stay here and wait.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t take the forest trolls¡¯ wooden raft after these words and left with the little skeleton after giving a few moremands.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t immediately return to the cemetery of death after leaving the area, but took the little skeleton with him on a trip to case the area.

    Since he wanted to collect the five divine zombies, Han Shuo would naturally not let go of a naturally formed ce of extreme wood. Apart from the forest trolls guarding the wooden house and some amazingly exuberant growth of trees and grass nearby, there was nothing else.

    Han Shuo finally felt at ease after releasing the three originals demons and having them scout out the area. He nned on returning to the outskirts of the cemetery of death.

    Han Shuo had closely observed the surroundings through the original demons on his way here and the way back had long since been imprinted in his heart. He didn¡¯t directly head towards the river to return, but walked unhurriedly along the river current. He felt a bit hungry halfway through his trip and looked at the strange fish joyously swimming around in the clear waters. A thought struck him, and the Demonyer Edge flew out with a whoosh. It sank into the water ording to Han Shuo¡¯s intentions and returned to Han Shuo¡¯s hands after piercing through tworge fish.

    The little skeleton left with bone dagger in hand under Han Shuo¡¯s orders and came back with a bunch of wooden materials after a while. He agilely constructed a rack, whereas Han Shuo lit the fire and set the two big fish on the rack. He then took out spices from his space ring and sprinkled it over the baking fish. A tempting smell slowly began to spread out.

    A ck shadow dashed in from the far skies. When a great gust of wind pped Han Shuo¡¯s clothes, a pungent and disgusting stink attacked his nose, making disgust well up within Han Shuo. When he raised his head and looked up angrily, the ck shadow had risen from low to high and returned high up in the sky, forming a ck dot.

    ¡°Damned ugly bird, so disgusting!¡± Han Shuo cursed and turned the almost ready fish onto the other side.

    Just at this moment, the ck shadow swept down from the distance with a whistling sound, rising back up into the air when it was not too far from the top of Han Shuo¡¯s head, but Han Shuo had been prepared and saw the ck shadow clearly this time ¡ª it had the body of an eagle, but the face of an exceedingly ugly woman, a harpy.

    Harpies and Deepwater Venom Pythons were all level three magical creatures. She had the face of a human, but couldn¡¯t make human sounds. A disgusting scent could always be found on her since she liked to scavenge the corpses of humans. When one caught the eye of a harpy, she would continuously test them until she found the right opportunity to suddenly dive at your scalp and use the disgusting scent on her body to disorient you, then use her sharp ws to rip your head apart and start eating.

    Within the Dark Forest, it would be very tricky when one caught the eye of a harpy because of her agile flight speed. When Han Shuo discovered that he had caught the attention of this harpy, he used piercingly cold eyes to look at the harpy circling overhead and snorted lightly, ¡°Looking for death?¡±

    Maintaining his position of baking fish, Han Shuo ignored the continuous feints from the harpy overhead. The little skeleton wielding the bone dagger was a bit restless at his side, seemingly to want to bring this annoying harpy down, but temporarily took no action beneath Han Shuo¡¯s soothing.

    At this moment, several people slowly emerged in the distance. They looked like they belonged to a young adventurer¡¯s crew. They had mages, archers, and warriors, numbering six in total. They looked at the circling harpy and cursed lowly at the irritating harpy.

    Han Shuo had been staring intently at the harpy and nning on taking care of her, when he finally realized that the harpy¡¯s original target seemed to have been them when he heard their curses. She¡¯d suddenly switched targets when she saw him here alone, and attempted to eat him first.

    One of the swordsmen had discovered Han Shuo via the delicious smell of the baking fish. He pointed out Han Shuo to hispanions and the band of six young adventurers with males and females started heading his way.

 Chapter 103: The Fruit of Dagmar

    Chapter 103: The Fruit of Dagmar

    ¡°Hello friend, are you adventuring alone in the Dark Forest?¡± The swordsman called out softly when he was quite a distance away from Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo had long since discovered these six and had desummoned the little skeleton again since he didn¡¯t want to reveal his status as a necromancer. He lifted his head when he heard the other¡¯s voice and nodded at the swordsman. ¡°That¡¯s right.¡±

    The cross legged harpy whooshed past overhead, but didn¡¯t dare to continue testing Han Shuo¡¯s patience when she saw the six adventurers meet up with him. She flew to a higher vantage point to observe the happenings from the sky.

    The six adventurers were a team of three warriors, two mages, and one archer. The archer was a female elf, and the three male warriors consisted of one senior swordswoman and two journeyman swordsmen. In addition to them, there was one male journeyman mage and one female adept mage.

    After Han Shuo had participated in the test given by the Academy, he now knew of some of the level differentiations and symbols used by the Magic Association and the Knight Association.

    Mages would have an exquisite, small magic staff embroidered on the shoulder of their mage robes ording to strength. Novice mages would possess the image of a magic staff, and each sessive level would add another magic staff. Swordsmen and Knights had simr ways of differentiation, with swordsmen using swords as their emblems and knights using battlesteeds.

    The robes of the mages and swordsmen looked like they¡¯d been verified by the Magic Association and the Knight Association, and thus emblems representing their strengths were attached to the clothes they were wearing. Han Shuo could easily determine their strength with just a nce.

    The six of them weren¡¯t weak, but a bit too weak if they were to venture into the depths of the Dark Forest. This was why the harpy dared to follow them when she discovered these six. If any of them were an archmage that could fly, then the harpy would¡¯ve run as far as possible and wouldn¡¯t dare to look for chances to attack them.

    ¡°I¡¯m called Odysseus. These are mypanions. I think you¡¯ve noticed the harpy¡¯s disturbance earlier. I¡¯m very sorry to say that the harpy has been targeting us and shifted her attentions to you when she discovered that you were walking alone.¡±

    ¡°As a level three magical creature, it was truly difficult to fight a harpy since she can fly in the air. If you don¡¯t mind, you can walk with us. The harpy shouldn¡¯t daree down and cause trouble if the seven of us are together.¡± The senior swordsman, Odysseus, spoke sincerely to Han Shuo.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo declined with a smile, ¡°That¡¯s alright. I think you want to head further into the Dark Forest, but I¡¯d like to go back to the outskirts. We¡¯re not taking the same path, so I won¡¯t trouble you.¡±

    ¡°How can this be? If you continue to walk alone, the harpy will never give up on you. I think you should stay with us, or you¡¯ll be in greater trouble or even die!¡± One of the female adept mages Aphrodite said softly.

    The others also protested when they heard Aphrodite¡¯s words, but Han Shuo didn¡¯t agree to leave with them. Although the six weren¡¯t that weak, only the archer¡¯s arrows had any ability to cause trouble for the harpy. Once the flight capable harpy dashed up in the air, the swordsmen would pose no threat to her whatsoever and magic may not be effective because of the distance.

    However, Han Shuo was armed with the Demonyer Edge and the crossbow, add to that the fact that the little skeleton could also fly up into the air using his bone spurs, if the harpy was so oblivious as to dare attack him, then painful wallops from Han Shuo and the little skeleton would be awaiting her. Therefore, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t that afraid of the harpy. This was why he¡¯d turned down the invitation from the six adventurers and chosen to set off alone.

    ¡°Heh heh, thank you for your concern, but I don¡¯t think it¡¯d be that easy for the harpy to catch me.¡± Han Shuo responded with a smile and grabbed his two baked fish. He didn¡¯t respond to the six young adventurers again and walked back in the direction they¡¯de from alone.

    The six young adventurers were startled when they saw Han Shuo leave leisurely. The senior swordsman Odysseus opened his mouth to say, ¡°Let¡¯s observe in the distance. If he truly has a method to deal with the harpy, then we¡¯ll decide to leave. Otherwise we¡¯ll help him, to prevent him from being eaten.¡±

    ¡°Captain, that person¡¯s already turned us down, do we have to do this?¡± Journeyman swordsman Gordon was rather unwilling as he spoke sullenly.

    ¡°The harpy¡¯s original target was us and only troubled others because we started heading in this direction. I think we should own up to this responsibility.¡± Odysseus lectured Gordon and directed the others to follow him, trailing far behind Han Shuo.

    After walking roughly five minutes, the harpy circling over Han Shuo finally made another move. She dived down from high up in the sky and once again soared back up into the clouds with a screeching whistle when she¡¯d almostnded on his head, baiting Han Shuo with extreme patience.

    However, Han Shuo was even more patient than her. Although his two hands looked empty, the Demonyer Edge was ready to erupt into the air at any time, and his crossbow was already prepared to fire within his space ring. As soon as the harpy dared enter within range, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t mind killing this level three magical creature with one shot.

    As for the six adventurers following at a distance, Han Shuo could see everything clearly. He didn¡¯t pay much attention to their kindheartedness and continued walking towards the cemetery of death at a leisurely pace.

    The harpy finally couldn¡¯t contain herself after repeatedly testing him and once again swooped in directly towards Han Shuo with her sharp ws curved, quickly approaching Han Shuo¡¯s skullcap.

    A disgusting stench assaulted his nostrils and immediately wafted around Han Shuo¡¯s being. Most people would be temporarily dizzy and disoriented after catching a whiff of this stench, but Han Shuo¡¯s body had been trained to an unknown level of indomitability and wasn¡¯t affected by this at all. He still fakely swayed in ordance with the harpy¡¯s intentions, as if he would crash to the ground at any given moment.

    ¡°Oh no! He¡¯s been disoriented by the stench of the harpy¡¯s body, he¡¯s in danger! We should go save him!¡± The adept mage Aphrodite suddenly called out as the six adventurers no longer concerned themselves with concealment and walked out from the shrubbery behind him. The archer frantically shot arrows towards the harpy.

    At this moment, the harpy, who¡¯d been afraid tomit herself to a full descent, finally seemed to think that the timing was finally right. She¡¯d maintained a distance of seven or eight meters from the ground when she suddenly shot like lightning down towards Han Shuo, a pair of iron ws locked onto Han Shuo¡¯s head, seeming to want to rip Han Shuo¡¯s bones apart.

    A cold smile blossoming from the corners of his mouth, Han Shu¡¯s body swayed even more and stiffened right before the harpy¡¯s iron wsnded on his head. He quickly fell straight backwards so that the ws, that had been reaching for Han Shuo¡¯s head,nded on empty air.

    Just as the harpy called out strangely and was going to try to make another move, the Demonyer Edge, interspersed with red light, suddenly shed through the air and brought with it a fierce, ming surge of strength that flooded into the harpy¡¯s body.

    A deste, low call sounded as the harpy pped her wings, wobbling in a hurried attempt to leave the ground. The crossbow was already grasped in Han Shuo¡¯s hand at this moment and shot out ruthlessly after locking onto the harpy¡¯s thin neck.

    Red light ring out from her body, the harpy cried out in continuous pain. She was absolutely unable to stabilize her body at this time and naturally didn¡¯t notice an even more lethal attack nearing. The crossbow bolt strongly pierced her neck and sent her body flying backwards. Her neck maintained the position of looking back up at the sky as she suddenly fell onto the ground.

    ¡°Oh, my gosh, he shot down the harpy!¡± Swordsman Andrew arrived swiftly after closing the distance and suddenly discovered that the harpy¡¯s body had fallen to the ground. He eximed in surprise and found it hard to believe the sight.

    The other adventurers, who had nned on reciting incantations or shooting down the harpy, also stilled the movements of their hands and looked at the harpy fluttering weakly in the distance, their faces also filled with astonishment.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts, the Demonyer Edge had used the magical mes of the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡± after plunging into the harpy¡¯s body to incinerate her internal organs. No smoke appeared, but the harpy¡¯s body quickly turned into a charred mess and the thick scent traveled even further.

    Standing up and patting off the dust on his body, Han Shuo walked over to the thoroughly fried harpy, held his breath, and took out the Demonyer Edge. Excavating the core of a level three magical creature from her body, he then chopped off her two iron ws and stored them within his space ring.

    A level three magical creature wasn¡¯t actually that easy to deal with, otherwise the six adventurers wouldn¡¯t have had such a headache. The harpy has always relied on the overwhelming stench within her body and her position from high up in the air to be sessful in every endeavor.

    It was a pity that her two advantages werepletely ineffective against Han Shuo, and she finally became a target for Han Shuo to take advantage of. Add to that the unparalleled sharpness of the Demonyer Edge and the fact that it could strike at will in ordance with Han Shuo¡¯s wishes, that was what caused her to die so quickly and terribly.

    ¡°Hi friend, you¡¯re quite strong indeed. It looks like our concerns were indeed extraneous.¡± Odysseus had finally made it to Han Shuo from the distance and faced thetter merrily.

    Although these people hadn¡¯t been of any help, Han Shuo had gained an understanding of their conversation and methods through the originals demons. He felt that these people were quite decent, and now that their captain Odysseus spoke thus, Han Shuo nodded with a faint smile, ¡°I was only lucky, my real strength isn¡¯t even close to your level.¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, you¡¯re too humble.¡± Odysseus obviously didn¡¯t believe Han Shuo¡¯s words as he responded politely.

    ¡°Captain, since he¡¯s not in danger, I think we should continue deeper into the southern parts of the Dark Forest to continue searching for the ¡°Fruit of Dagmar¡±.¡± Gordon walked over from the distance and rushed towards Odysseus.

    ¡°Ai, I wonder if the ¡®Fruit of Dagmar¡¯ that we¡¯re searching for really exists. A fruit that looks like a human brain, I¡¯ve never heard of something like this!¡± Adept mage Aphrodite sighed.

    Han Shuo had been about to take his leave when he heard Aphrodite¡¯s words and didn¡¯t leave immediately. He rather looked at Aphrodite in confusion and asked, ¡°What kind of item is this ¡®Fruit of Dagmar¡¯? Why is it shaped like a human¡¯s brain? This is really a bit incredible, can you tell me about it?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve heard everything about the ¡®Fruit of Dagmar¡¯ from our captain Odysseus. He knows more about it.¡± Aphrodite smiled in a friendly fashion at Han Shuo and pointed at Odysseus.

    Odysseus smiled faintly, ¡°Are you also interested in the ¡®Fruit of Dagmar¡¯? Heh heh, the legends say that Dagmar was a demon who enjoyed eating human brains. It¡¯s possible for a very strange fruit to be produced in the ce where he¡¯s buried. The fruit is the size of a fist and has dark brown veins running over it. It looks very simr to a human brain.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s said that the ¡®Fruit of Dagmar¡¯ has magical properties. Ordinary people will be confused and turn insane if they eat it, but it¡¯s said that if the ¡®Fruit of Dagmar¡¯ is crushed by a pharmacist, it can be made into very precious medicine. I¡¯ve recently received a request from someone and have decided to try my luck within the Dark Forest to see if I could find the ¡®Fruit of Dagmar.¡±

    Han Shuo was suddenly bizarrely gleeful after he heard Odysseus¡¯ words. In Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories, there was a fruit called ¡°Divine Brain Fruit¡±. It had the effect of forcefully expanding the human brain. It could turn an ordinary person into a madman, but if a demon practitioner in the ¡°molded spirit¡± stage like Han Shuo partook of this ¡°Divine Brain Fruit¡±, then he could leverage the effects to greatly increase his level of training.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t contemted in this direction to begin with because he¡¯d thought that it was impossible for the ¡°Divine Brain Fruit¡± to exist within this world, but Odysseus¡¯ description of the ¡°Fruit of Dagmar¡± were the exact same shape of the ¡°Divine Brain Fruit.¡±

    He was unable to resist the temptation of gaining a fruit that could greatly improve his current level of training. Han Shuo thought no more of it as he asked directly after Odysseus finished exining, ¡°If you don¡¯t mind, I¡¯d like to go search for this ¡®Fruit of Dagmar¡¯ with you?¡±

    Odysseus and the six adventurers suddenly looked at each other after Han Shuo spoke. They all felt extremely surprised as they wouldn¡¯t have thought Han Shuo would have such a proposal.

 Chapter 104: Forming a team for an adventure

    Chapter 104: Forming a team for an adventure

    ¡°We¡¯re actually not holding out too much hope on finding the ¡®Fruit of Dagmar¡¯, and are just trying our luck in the depths of the southern parts of the Dark Forest. We only know that someone has once seen this fruit somewhere, but we¡¯re uncertain if that was the ¡®Fruit of Dagmar¡¯, or if it¡¯s been taken by others already. Have you really decided to join us on this expedition to search for the unknown?¡± Odysseus looked at Han Shuo and exined seriously before asking him.

    Han Shuo knew that this group of people didn¡¯t have much surety after hearing Odysseus¡¯ words, but he thought about it, and felt that he didn¡¯t seem to have much to do temporarily, and would just be returning to the cemetery of death to engage in endless rounds of training to improve himself. If he was lucky enough to obtain the ¡°Divine Brain Fruit¡±, then Han Shuo¡¯s ¡°molded spirit¡± realm would be greatly enhanced.

    Increasing his realm meant that this would also benefit Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength. Therefore, Han Shuo gravely considered and felt that the risk was worth taking with them.

    Nodding, Han Shuo looked at Odysseus and said firmly, ¡°Yes, I would like to go with you into the depths of the southern part of the Dark Forest, but if we are truly able to discover the ¡®Fruit of Dagmar¡¯, I wish to receive one as well.¡±

    ¡°Since you insist, we¡¯re very happy to have you join us. I¡¯m just trying my luck for the ¡®Fruit of Dagmar¡¯, so don¡¯t have high hopes. Our main goal is to venture into the Dark Forest because it¡¯s said that there¡¯s even more tempting items hidden in its depths. Heh heh, if we do discover the ¡®Fruit of Dagmar¡¯, we only need one to fulfill our mission, you can take the rest, no problem.¡± Odysseus smiled.

    The further one delved into the Dark Forest, the greater the danger became. The real danger would only be slowly revealed. There were even stronger magical creatures within, some mystical races, and all sorts of lethal nt species.

    But various alluring riches and fortune could also be found amidst the danger. Some exotic nts would grow only in the deeper parts, and many would fetch high prices. There were also many things that could be sold from the bodies of level one, two, and three magical creatures, but the caveat was that you had to kill them first.

    The two sides reached an agreement and didn¡¯t continue tarrying. Odysseus introduced Han Shuo to his otherpanions and the group of seven set off deeper into the area.

    The sacred ground that the forest trolls were protecting was not too far up ahead. The forest troll warriors were standing guard over the area. Although there was still some riches within the sacred grounds, Han Shuo already viewed it as his personal property. So under Han Shuo¡¯s purposeful guidance, the band of people avoided the area and continued forward after making a small detour.

    They didn¡¯t run into much danger after walking for a day, and everyone made camp on the banks of a river when it was nightfall. They shoveled out some of the luxuriant growth of shrubbery in the surroundings and Aphrodite took out some tents from the space ring that she wore on her hand, simr to Han Shuo¡¯s. Everyone set up their tents, made a bonfire, and started cooking food.

    There were fat fish swimming about in the clear river waters on the side. As a water adept mage, Aphrodite cast a minor water magic and caught roughly ten fish. Everyone used their self made wooden forks to spear the fat fish and start baking them.

    After everyone had eaten the fully cooked fish and talked for a short while around the bonfire, everyone headed into their own tents to sleep. The female elven archer and the water adept mage Aphrodite slept in one tent, while the four males slept two to a tent. Han Shuo eagerly volunteered to take the watch, and found an isted ce to train his magical yuan when everyone had entered the tents and settled down.

    With three originals demons by his side, Han Shuo didn¡¯t need to pay much attention at all, but training his magical yuan was the foundation for Han Shuo¡¯s future development, therefore he couldn¡¯t ck off for a single second. He held up beneath the onught of sudden pain and pleasure in his mind and silently sank into his training.

    It wasn¡¯t until the second half of the night when a sudden strange sound startled Han Shuo out of his training. He raised his hand to wipe the sweat away from his brow as everything his three original demons was observing fell into his vision. One of the original demons left its post and flew out towards the source of the sound, quickly approaching the origin in the night.

    A twin headed dragon was staggering in from the distance. Fresh, green blood was flowing from one of its necks and it seemed to have suffered from heavy injuries. It flew swiftly, heedless of direction, towards their location. Although a twin headed dragon wasn¡¯t really a true dragon, it was still a strong level two magical beast. Han Shuo didn¡¯t know why it was so bedraggled and had fallen to the straits of fleeing for its life.

    One of the original demons kept an eye on the twin headed dragon¡¯s movement, another split off and sped back in the direction that the twin headed dragon hade from, attempting to see what was out there that¡¯d made the twin headed dragon run off, injured. It was a pity that Han Shuo didn¡¯t discover anything after the original demon had flown a certain distance.

    Upon seeing the disoriented twin headed dragon was headed in their direction, Han Shuo immediately stood up and swiftly sped towards the people¡¯s tents, shaking their tent poles and calling out loudly, ¡°Wake up, something¡¯s happening!¡±

    Deeply asleep, the adventurers all groggily heard Han Shuo¡¯s shouts and swiftly put on their clothes, walking out of the tents within ten seconds. It was about to enter wintertime and the temperature at night was exceedingly cold. The six adventurers were solidly wrapped up with only their faces peeking out.

    Because Han Shuo¡¯s surveince had been conducted through the original demons, the six people still couldn¡¯t detect anything out of the ordinary, even though the twin headed dragon was speedily approaching. Odysseus looked in confusion at the surroundings and then back at Han Shuo, ¡°Everything seems very orderly, where¡¯s the situation?¡±

    ¡°A twin headed dragon is five hundred meters north of our position and is quickly approaching. I believe he¡¯ll be of danger to us and we need to prepare immediately.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t have time to exin much to them and immediately voiced the truth.

    Gordon didn¡¯t seem to believe Han Shuo¡¯s words and was about to open his mouth in doubt when Odysseus suddenly said in a low voice, ¡°If this is the case, we¡¯ll make preparations immediately. A twin headed dragon¡¯s temper is violent and is not kindly disposed towards humans. I think it will bring trouble to us if it discovers our presence.¡±

    The female archer took out two arrows and said with some concern, ¡°A twin headed dragon is a level two magical creature. Not only can it spray poison, but the two heads can attack directly with sharp teeth. It will be a difficult fight for us!¡±

    Han Shuo took out his crossbow and climbed onto a nearby big tree, saying rapidly, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, this twin headed dragon has already been injured. It can¡¯t even fly now. If we prepare ordingly, it won¡¯t be able to escape at all.¡±

    The band of people looked at each other in the eye after Han Shuo had spoken and all disyed expressions of surprise. If the twin headed dragon hadn¡¯t been injured, it would¡¯ve been difficult for the team of adventurers to fight against, but if it couldn¡¯t even fly after being injured, this meant that the twin headed dragon was injured quite heavily. This was a heaven sent opportunity that they wouldn¡¯t let slip away.

    Full of overjoyed surprise, some of them climbed up into tall trees like Han Shuo while some others hid in the shadows of the trees. They all took out their weapons or concentrated their mental strength to ready themselves to handle the twin headed dragon with a horrible sense of direction.

    A rustling sound came from the shrubs that it swept past, and the injured twin headed dragon finally appeared in everyone¡¯s vision amidst great expectation.

    Gordon, who had been doubtful of Han Shuo¡¯s judgment earlier, shed him an admiring nce in the distance and gripped his longsword with excitement, intending on hitting the twin headed dragon with a swift attack.

    The twin headed dragon with a bad sense of direction finally mmed headfirst into the wall of water that Aphrodite had set up. The enormous impact caused Aphrodite¡¯s wall of water to turn into numerous droplets in the air.

    At the same time, Han Shuo and Nia (the female elven archer) attacked at almost the same time. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t fire the crossbow in quick session, so the bolt he shot outnded on the back of the twin headed dragon¡¯s neck. Nia sent out three arrows, and apart from it dodging the first arrow, the other two were all nailed to its forehead.

    The thunder journeyman mage within the group shot out a ring of lightning to attack the twin headed dragon¡¯s back. The three warriors who¡¯din in wait for a while took advantage of this opportunity to rush out and dash towards the twin headed dragon, releasing their fighting aura to attack ferociously.

    Up in front, Aphrodite created another two beings of water to attract the twin headed dragon¡¯s attention and create more opportunities for Han Shuo and the archer Nia to attack.

    In this way, the level two magical creature, the twin headed dragon, didn¡¯t even have time to spray out poison under the heavy barrage. He¡¯d already been injured and finally fell down listlessly in its blood.

    The adventurers were incredibly excited when they saw that they¡¯d killed the twin headed dragon and walked out cheering from their ces of concealment, preparing to strip the trophies from twin headed dragon¡¯s body.

    Han Shuo¡¯s face suddenly twisted drastically at this moment and he suddenly yelled fiercely, ¡°Hurry up and leave this ce! The person who had been pursuing the twin headed dragon is heading this way and we have no chance of winning a fight against them!¡±

 Chapter 105: Not listening to advice

    Chapter 105: Not listening to advice

    The six people had been ready to enjoy the fruits of victory when they were immediately startled by Han Shuo¡¯s violent yell. They all immediately reacted and sensibly gave up looting the trophies from the twin headed dragon¡¯s body. Their questioning gazes all swiftly locked onto Han Shuo.

    After Han Shuo had repeatedly demonstrated his superb perception and corresponding strength, all of them now treated Han Shuo as the new leader at some unbeknownst time. Even Odysseus didn¡¯t possess any dissatisfaction and seemed to acknowledge that all this was a matter of course.

    There could only be one leader within a team. Apart from possessing strength thatpelled others to ce their trust in him, he would need to maintain a calm mind and sensitive decision making abilities.

    ¡°Follow me!¡± When Han Shuo discovered that he had be the target of their eptance, he didn¡¯t waste any time with empty ther or humility and opened his mouth to make this statement.

    Han Shuo swiftly passed through the area with a turn of his body and shot to the left. None of the six young adventurers called his decision into question and immediately dropped everything they were holding, ignored the exposed tents and the body of the twin headed dragon on the ground, which was still warm, and darted out after Han Shuo.

    A patch of enormous, towering trees suddenly appeared within everyone¡¯s vision. The towering trees here had thick foliage, covering the bright moonlight. The branches of these enormous trees were like the tentacles of a strange creature in the dark of the night and were a bit frightening.

    When they reached this ce, Han Shuo stared at one of therge trees and used the entangled branches to climb up. His body suddenly disappeared halfway up the tree. Of the six, the three swordsmen were quite agile and were only ten seconds behind Han Shuo. The two mages and the archer also climbed onto the branches with the assistance of the others.

    The group suddenly discovered that there was an opening halfway up therge tree. This big tree, that looked beyond solid and strong, was actually hollowed out. The seven entered through the opening, with four of them shifting to the bottom. Han Shuo, Odysseus, and Aphrodite in the back stuck half their heads out and looked into the distance.

    ¡°What is it?¡± Everyone finally caught their breaths at this time and Odysseus immediately looked at him in confusion.

    ¡°It¡¯s a super level magical creature, the unicorn. This unicorn seems to have been chasing the twin headed dragon from the beginning. No wonder it fled desperately.¡± Han Shuo frowned as he exined to Odysseus.

    The unicorn was as swift as lightning and its body had the marvelous property of being resistant to magic. The horn on its forehead epassed an even more wondrous power. It was the antidote to a hundred poisons, the cure that could bring others back from the dead, as well as purify dirty ces. ording to the legends, the unicorns would onlye near pure young girls and hated human males. Normally, unicorns wouldn¡¯t do anything inappropriate if they weren¡¯t infuriated.

    However, Han Shuo could feel the wrath of this unicorn through his original demons, as if the twin headed dragon had done something to make it lose all reason. The super level magical creature had an extremely durable body and was resistant to magic. Magical and physical attacks wouldn¡¯t have much effect on it, particrly because the strength of Han Shuo¡¯s group wasn¡¯t advanced enough, which makes it extremely difficult for them to harm the unicorn.

    It was said that the unicorns had received the blessings of the gods. If anyone ever harmed or killed a unicorn, then this person would be cursed and have repeated bad luck. Therefore, despite a unicorn possessing a body full of treasures, very few people would throw caution to the wind and pursue a unicorn.

    Odysseus and Aphrodite both inhaled sharply when they realized the creature that had been pursuing the twin headed dragon was a furious, super level unicorn. They all counted themselves lucky to have escaped in time, otherwise they might¡¯ve suffered painful consequences from the unicorn¡¯s anger.

    As Odysseus and Aphrodite were rejoicing, a snow white unicorn with a horn on its head and a pair of beautiful blue eyes trotted out with elegant hoofsteps to the side of the twin headed dragon¡¯s body. Han Shuo and the others, a distance away within the hole in the tree, immediately concealed their presence. Add to that the fact that they were a bit of a distance away, they weren¡¯t afraid that they¡¯d be immediately discovered by the unicorn.

    The unicorn had been a bit agitated to begin with, but suddenly stilled upon seeing the dead body of the twin headed dragon when it arrived. It circled the body with light, graceful steps, and even extended a snow white hoof to kick the body. When it discovered that the twin headed dragon really didn¡¯t exhibit any movement, it stood stockstill and craned its pure white neck around, a very human-like confusion was disyed in its blue eyes.

    The unicorn hadn¡¯t discovered anything after looking around like this. It then shook its head and shook itself all over, returning back to where it came from. The unicorn wasn¡¯t a carnivore, so the body of the twin headed dragon held no attraction for it. No matter what the twin headed dragon had done to infuriate it, it was now dead and thus the unicorn was satisfied.

    One of the original demons closely followed the unicorn until it picked up speed and vanished without a trace. Han Shuo then had the original demon withdraw and said to the others, ¡°The unicorn has left. We can dig out the magical core of the twin headed dragon now.¡±

    The others were full of confidence and eptance towards Han Shuo¡¯s decisions and leadership abilities by now. Even Gordon, who hadn¡¯t fully trusted Han Shuo in the beginning, now looked at Han Shuo with a gaze full of sincere admiration. Everyone cheered happily after Han Shuo spoke these words and slowly crawled out from the hole within the tree, nning to collect the spoils of war from the twin headed dragon.

    A strange sound suddenly arrived in their ears as a manticore bearing a silver haired youth with an inflexible will suddenly appeared next to the twin headed dragon.

    There was a paralyzing venom within every manticore¡¯s tail and its ws were ferocious when tearing into flesh. Add to that its agile movements and powerful jumps, it was a level one beast trickier than the twin headed dragon to handle. The manticore was a very headache inducing existence within the Dark Forest. Who would¡¯ve thought that such a magical beast would be tamed by others?

    The owner of manticore was a twenty seven or eight year old youth. He was dressed carelessly, wore a space ring on his left hand, and carried a broadsword in his right hand. The lines of his face were resolute and angr. Although he wasn¡¯t a stunning man, he had his own allure.

    ¡°Oh. Looks like I¡¯m quite lucky today to meet a twin headed dragon that¡¯d just died.¡± The youth murmured lowly to himself and urged the manticore to stop in front of the twin headed dragon, it seemed like he intended to reap the spoils of Han Shuo and the others.

    At this moment, Han Shuo was a few steps ahead of Odysseus and the others and had jumped down from the hole within the tree. When he saw the youth was matter-of-factly viewing the twin headed dragon as his prey, he was immediately ticked off. Han Shuo chuckled coldly in the distance and said, ¡°Friend, we killed this twin headed dragon with great effort. It¡¯s not the right thing to do, collecting the spoils without asking for the owner¡¯s permission right?¡±

    The youth lifted his head to look at Han Shuo and say contemptuously, ¡°All magical creatures have no owner within the Dark Forest whether they are alive or dead. Since I was the one who had discovered the twin headed dragon, it¡¯s mine.¡±

    The youth ignored Han Shuo after saying this and pulled out a dagger from his calf, tending to his own business and attempting to yank out the poisonous fangs from within the twin headed dragon¡¯s head.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t someone who possessed a good temper and pulled out his crossbow to lock onto the other when he saw that thetter waspletely ignoring his words. Han Shuo smiled coldly, ¡°I¡¯ll shoot and kill you where you are if you dare move!¡±

    ¡°Oh, then I¡¯ll move for you to see!¡± The youth looked amusedly at Han Shuo and said this remotely. He immediately flicked the dagger and plucked out one of the twin headed dragon¡¯s fangs.

    Han Shuo nodded and didn¡¯t say anything else. He nned on immediately shooting out this bolt and kill this stubborn fellow. Just at this moment, Odysseus suddenly called out, ¡°No!¡±

    Odysseus quickly rushed to Han Shuo and exined anxiously, ¡°He should be the legendary Trunks. This is a demon riding a manticore. Anyone who irritates him will face enormous trouble. If he wants the twin headed dragon, then he can have it.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression changed as he looked in surprise at the youth, finally remembering that this person was the magical creature hunter Trunks within the Dark Forest.

    The person¡¯s origin was mysterious. As a swordsman within the Dark Forest, this person¡¯s temper was entric and his personality aloof. It was said that not only did he hunt magical creatures, but he also hunted some of the adventurers within the Dark Forest as well. He was very adept at doing battle within the Dark Forest, and apparently even a great swordsmaster had met their death at his hands. He was a universally feared cold-blooded killer within the Dark Forest.

    ¡°Your friend¡¯s suggestion is good, you should listen to him!¡± The youth reached out a hand towards the twin headed dragon¡¯s other poisonous fang and looked at Han Shou from afar, seeming to have concluded that Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t dare make a move.

    Except, the whistling sound of a crossbow bolt tearing through the air greeted him. Han Shuo¡¯s expression was cold as he didn¡¯t listen to any of Odysseus¡¯ words at all. The aimed crossbow in his hand directly fired at Trunks.

    Trunks was just about to remove the other fang and was quite dumbfounded to see that Han Shuo had actually shot his crossbow. His body was already moving when he revealed his surprised expression, and he¡¯d already taken a step backwards like a ghost.

    Pfft. The force behind a crossbow bolt stuck the bolt deeply into the ground where he¡¯d been standing, leaving behind only half a bolt that continued quivering in the ground.

    If Trunks hadn¡¯t dodged in time, his body would¡¯ve been pierced through when this boltnded!

 Chapter 106: A terrifying enemy

    Chapter 106: A terrifying enemy

    When they heard that this person was Trunks, the other five adventurers, who¡¯d rushed over, didn¡¯t dare act rashly or blindly. They only looked cautiously at Han Shuo. Who would¡¯ve that what they feared would happen as Han Shuo had really made a move?

    Trunks evaded the crossbolt and his face abruptly chilled. His sharp eyes gathered instantly on Han Shuo¡¯s body as he nodded his head and said, ¡°You¡¯ve got guts!¡±

    He didn¡¯t make a move to take the other poisonous fang as Trunks grasped his broadsword in his right hand, walking towards Han Shuo with an even pace and looking at him with an obviously unfriendly expression.

    ¡°Misunderstanding, this must be a misunderstanding! My friend must¡¯ve been too nervous and shot out that bolt!¡± Odysseus suddenly cried out loudly and exined to Trunks with a rueful smile.

    At this moment, the crossbow that had paused was suddenly reloaded with another bolt, and as Odysseus was exining frantically, Han Shuo took aim at the slowly approaching Trunks and shot another bolt out.

    It was as if a p had been flung directly at his face. Odysseus¡¯ expression was gobsmacked as the exnation in his mouth withered to ashes, halting him in his tracks.

    Trunks¡¯ slowly approaching footsteps wavered as he once again wondrously avoided the crossbow ambush. He still walked slowly towards Han Shuo, his eyes staring firmly at him without a hint of rxation.

    Taking a deep breath in, Han Shuo put the crossbow away because it was useless at close range. He then took out the Demonyer Edge and was ready to withstand Trunk¡¯s attack at any time.

    ¡°All of you will pay for this!¡± Trunks¡¯ approaching body suddenly stopped as he said coldly.

    ¡°Eh, all of us... us?!¡± Water adept mage Aphrodite¡¯s face grew frosty as she murmured.

    ¡°It looks like we¡¯ve run into trouble, then we don¡¯t need to be polite then.¡± Odysseus had been avoiding a headlong conflict with Trunks during this time and sighed softly as he saw that they would be hard pressed to extract themselves from the situation.

    When the captain, Odysseus, had spoken, the other five adventurers stopped hesitating and quickly took their positions, readying their weapons and prepared themselves to handle this thorny fellow, who had suddenly emerged from the Dark Forest.

    Just when Trunks was about to reach Han Shuo, he suddenly unsheathed the broadsword in his hand and milky-white aura enclosed the broadsword. A beam of white light drilled through the air, making for Han Shuo.

    The shrubs on the ground suddenly exploded and filled the air with powder wherever the white fighting aura passed over. The ground cracked open as well. There was a heart stopping frightening power epassed within the fighting aura. Having fought with Phoebe, another swordmaster, Han Shuo could clearly feel that the destructive power Trunks¡¯ fighting aura was even more domineering.

    He activated the ¡°cial Mystical Spellfire¡± and the surge of magical yuan flowed entirely into the Demonyer Edge. After taking in abundant magical yuan, the Demonyer Edge glowed with a fiery red light. When the white fighting aura drilled fiercely onto it, Han Shuo tightly grasped the Demonyer Edge and abruptly shed it downwards.

    An explosion rang out as the milky-white fighting aura and the emanation of red light from the Demonyer Edge collided into each other. A round hole, about a meter deep, suddenly appeared out of nowhere and charred smoke rose from the shreds of shrubbery within it.

    Trunks stood where he was without moving, his sharp eyes still looking forward. Han Shuo, wielding the Demonyer Edge, abruptly backed up five or six steps and sat down with a thud. The right arm that was holding the Demonyer Edge was a bloody mess and it looked quite frightening.

    ¡°You¡¯re actually not dead. You do have some basis to be arrogant.¡± Trunks looked at Han Shuo and opened his mouth with some confusion

    Han Shuo shook his right arm, shaking off the droplets of blood that had oozed out. He moved his body numbly, magical yuan circting at a speed throughout his entire body that it never had before. He finally stood up again after pushing off forcefully with both feet.

    Last time he¡¯d faced Lawrence, Han Shuo had tested himself and found his strength to be higher than a journeyman swordsman. He¡¯d brought his full force to bear when facing off against Trunks, who rumors had ced him at having already reached the realm of swordsmaster. He¡¯d imbued ten percent of his magical yuan into the Demonyer Edge and taken one of Trunks¡¯ hits.

    The truth had proven that the strength of a swordsmaster did indeed far exceed Han Shuo¡¯s expectations. Perhaps Trunks hadn¡¯t used his full force in that blow, but he¡¯d already caused significant injury to Han Shuo. If it wasn¡¯t for his wondrous magical yuan and durable body, an ordinary person¡¯s right arm would¡¯ve likely exploded from this blow and would¡¯ve been unable to recover from it for the rest of his life.

    ¡°Protect ourpanion.¡± Odysseus called out calmly as the group of six adventurers immediately surrounded Han Shuo.

    The archer Nia and two mages had already shot out their attacks before Trunks made another move, thetter still staring curiously at Han Shuo. The three warriors didn¡¯t take a step away from Han Shuo as they surrounded him on three sides, protecting him solidly.

    Trunks swiftly evaded the attacks from Nia and the two mages. He didn¡¯t continue fighting as the manticore suddenly popped out for Trunks to mount.

    ¡°Friends, I¡¯m going to get something to eat. You make your preparations, I¡¯ll keep ying with youter.¡± Contrary to everyone¡¯s expectations, Trunks didn¡¯t continue attacking and rather spoke coldly from the back of the manticore. He then patted the manticore and it obediently brought him swiftly away.

    One man and one beast crossed leisurely over the patch of luxuriant shrubs under the wary gaze of Odysseus and the others. Those assembled heaved a sigh of relief when they discovered that Trunks truly had vanished. They sat a bit wearily on the ground after having their nerves stretched taut for a while.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter, why were you so impulsive?¡± Odysseus finally looked oddly at Han Shuo as he inquired.

    Laughing ruefully, Han Shuo shook his head and said, ¡°I¡¯m truly sorry, I¡¯m a bit of an odd person. Sometimes even I can¡¯t control the things that I do.¡±

    ording to Han Shuo¡¯s previous personality, he absolutely wouldn¡¯t have chosen to be enemies with such a strong character, but for some reason, Han Shuo could ept being threatened by others less and less now. Even if the threats were backed up with a strong destructive power, Han Shuo would still throw caution to the winds and defy them.

    To be honest, when Odysseus had offered Trunks¡¯ name, Han Shuo immediately hesitated internally when he understood the strength represented by this name. He¡¯d even nned on putting down the crossbow in his hand and let him take the twin headed dragon away. He was unwilling to make such a strong enemy.

    But he¡¯d still made a move in the end, and he¡¯d made a very resolute move. He hadn¡¯t considered the consequences in the form of a devastating revenge at all. Even Han Shuo found his personality changes a bit baffling, and could only attribute it to the effects of the magical yuan.

    ¡°Perhaps we were too weak. To be honest your methods were quite admirable, but I think we¡¯ll meet great trouble in the future.¡± Odysseus said as he nodded, looking at Han Shuo with a fervent light as sincere admiration surfaced in his eyes.

    ¡°The fact that you could exchange a blow with him and not die already exins that you¡¯re quite powerful. Are your injuries any better?¡± The elven archer Nia walked to Han Shuo side and seemed to inquire after him with some semnce of concern.

    Taking out gauze from his space ring and dressing the wounds of his right arm simply, Han Shuo withdrew his weapon and finally spoke to the others, ¡°I¡¯m sorry for bringing so much trouble to everyone, and am very thankful for all your actions just now. Trunks won¡¯t give up easily, I think we should discuss how to handle him after we remove the rest of the items from the twin headed dragon.¡±

    Although the appearance of a new enemy made everyone a bit depressed, they¡¯d still kept the twin headed dragon in the end. Now that Han Shuo mentioned the trophies from it, everyone¡¯s morale lifted slightly and they happily took out daggers and walked towards the twin headed dragon, removing its remaining poisonous fangs and its magical core.

    The poisonous fangs of the twin headed dragon were an important ingredient that could be used to refine some poison powders. If an alchemist transmuted it, it could even be used in magical arrows and explode with poison halfway through flight, causing lethal injuries to enemies within a short range. As a level two magical creature, the core of the twin headed dragon was also very precious and could be sold for at least one thousand gold coins.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s insistence, the magical core was given to Odysseus as a sort ofpensation for the aid that Odysseus and the others had given just now. Han Shuo ced the poisonous fangs of the twin headed dragons in his storage ring, nning to use them amply in the future if there was the chance.

    After finishing these tasks, the sky was already beginning to brighten. The group packed their luggage and continued south, deeper into the Dark Forest.

    The band discussed as they walked, attempting to find a way to fight against Trunks.

    ¡°Trunks has been viewed as a terrifying existence ever since he appeared in the Dark Forest. The beasts and people that appear within the deeper reaches of the Dark Forest are very strong. The adventurers that win a few battle trophies there would often sink into struggles of life and death. Even thepanions that apany you here are very likely to betray you at crucial moments. Chaotic ughter exists there, and those who can grow ustomed to that environment need a cold heart apart from extraordinary strength.¡±

    ¡°Trunks is amongst the elite of these kinds of people. In addition he is very familiar with the environment inside and is quite adept at leveraging the environment within the Dark Forest to brutally attack his enemies. Since we¡¯ve run afoul with him this time, I think we¡¯ll be attacked for sureter on in the Dark Forest. Therefore, we need to be on our guard and prevent sudden ambushes from him.¡± Odysseus described the chaotic conditions of the deeper reaches of the Dark Forest and the frightening parts of Trunks to ensure that everyone would be cautious.

    ¡°Be at ease, he won¡¯t have a chance to ambush us!¡± Han Shuo smiled confidently after Odysseus had finished.

    Everyone¡¯s expressions were quite bbergasted with these words. However, they didn¡¯t immediately suspect Han Shuo¡¯s words as they¡¯d seen his miraculousness before. Gordon looked at Han Shuo with great interest and asked, ¡°Why?¡±

    Smiling mysteriously and meaningfully, Han Shuo swept a gaze at those assembled, ¡°The twin headed dragon was five hundred meters away from us, but I still discovered its movements. It¡¯s impossible for Trunks to ambush us. Be at ease, there¡¯s absolutely no chance that Trunks can ambush us based on his great familiarity with the Dark Forest.¡±

    With the existence of the three original demons, Han Shuo would be able to clearly discover any man or beast that approached. As familiar as Trunks was with the environment, he¡¯d be unable to sessfully ambush them as long as the original demons were there. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t boasting emptily when he spoke of this.

    ¡°I think he chose to leaver earlier because he didn¡¯t have absolute certainty in capturing all of us, and decided to slowly handle us with the methods that he was most familiar with. If he¡¯s unable to ambush us, then with thebined might of our seven people, Trunks may not have an upper hand, even with his manticore. We really don¡¯t need to be afraid of them.¡± Odysseus spoke happily upon seeing Han Shuo speak so firmly.

    ¡°I promise!¡± Han Shuo spoke affirmatively.

    The group continued further south into the Dark Forest over the next two days. Beneath the astonished gazes of Odysseus and the others, when Han Shuo took off the gauze, his open wound had alreadypletely healed and bore no traces of having been injured.

    ¡°This is amazing, it¡¯s already all healed!¡± Gordon¡¯s mouth was open with shock as he stared dumbfoundedly at Han Shuo¡¯s right arm, observing it for a while and attempting to discover the secret behind Han Shuo¡¯s insanely fast recovery speed.

    The other five adventurers also looked at Han Shuo with eyes as if gazing at a monster. They hadn¡¯t seemed to think that Han Shuo would fully heal within two short days. They were incredibly astonished when such a baffling matter wasid out in front of them.

    After repeated reforging from the magical yuan, the durability and miraculousness of his body was something that they couldn¡¯t even begin to understand. Han Shuo didn¡¯t open his mouth to exin this as he found an excuse of a medicinal powder to gloss things over.

    When night fell and everyone headed back into their tents, Han Shuo suddenly said, ¡°Trunks wants to make a move. I think he¡¯ll attack us tonight. We need to make some simple preparations and then you should attack on my orders. I¡¯ll let Trunks understand howughable his ambush is this time!¡±

 Chapter 107: A hysterical ambush down to the most minute details

    Chapter 107: A hysterical ambush down to the most minute details

    One had to say, Trunks was truly familiar with the terrain of this area. He was like another magical creature when he was on the back of his manticore. He had extraordinary abilities to begin with, add to that the help from the manticore, and his overall knowledge of the entire terrain, he was a top notch expert in every sense of the word.

    If it hadn¡¯t been for surveince from Han Shuo¡¯s original demons, the group would¡¯ve been at a loss on how to deal with Trunks¡¯ attacks. They would¡¯ve surely suffered serious casualties in the dark of the night. After all, none of the seven adventurers present, including Han Shuo, would be able to take many of Trunks¡¯ attacks if they fought him alone.

    However, withplete end to end surveince from the original demons, all this had changed. Originally the hunter, Trunks would possibly be someone else¡¯s prey for the first time.

    ¡°He¡¯sing.¡± Han Shuo, sharing the same tent with Odysseus, suddenly opened his mouth.

    Odysseus didn¡¯t express too much curiosity with regards to Han Shuo¡¯s remarkable perception. He only grasped the longsword in his hand tightly after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words and stared at him, ¡°How should we handle this?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Trunks is currently observing us. Let¡¯s go into action when he makes his move.¡± Han Shuo closed his eyes and crossed his legs, opening his mouth in exnation.

    Trunks was as agile as a monkey on several trees surrounding the area. He leveraged the pliable branches to pile up boulders between several trees and didn¡¯t make any noise. No one could¡¯ve noticed him within the darkness.

    There was still a bit of distance between the manticore and the camp. It was now slowly circling the tents. As an animal exceedingly adept at hunting down prey, he was a hunter with quite a lot of patience, just like Trunks.

    Trunks slowlynded on a tree above the tents of Han Shuo and the others. He looked down coldly at the tents below him, as if debating how to proceed.

    He held a few small stones in his hands, sending two of them flying towards the tents,nding softly into the nearby bushes with a light sound. Several startled shouts rang out from the tents as Han Shuo and Odysseus abruptly walked out of the tents, investigating the area that Trunks had created a disturbance in with the little stones.

    The manticore purposefully made a sound at the same time from the other side. Gordon and another swordsman looked at each other and headed in the direction of the manticore when they exited their tents. The two mages and archer remained where they were, observing the surroundings with alert eyes and guarding the area to provide backup for the others.

    Just as Han Shuo and Odysseus had arrived at where the stones had created the noise and Gordon had also left with the other swordsman, Trunks suddenly made use of a pliable branch to swing over towards Gordon and the two others. It looked like he nned on taking care of Gordon and the two others first.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go.¡± Han Shuo said lowly and circled around with Odysseus, approaching Trunks from another direction.

    Gordon and the two others proceeded with slow footsteps, their gazes full of caution as they continuously patrolled and searched the bushes around them. The manticore was lying in wait in the shrubs ten meters away from them, and would immediately attack without warning as soon as the two drew closer.

    Making use of the branches to swing back and forth, Trunks magically didn¡¯t emit any sound and didn¡¯t reveal any part of himself. He slowly drew closer to Gordon and the other, appearing swiftly above the two people¡¯s heads.

    A crossbow suddenly rang out at this moment. It appeared all the more ear piercing in the dead of the night. As he was swinging between the branches, Trunks suddenly discovered that this crossbolt was aimed at him and was incredibly astonished and shocked.

    He didn¡¯t have any purchase for his feet as he was swinging back and forth, and could only twist his body tond on the ground in resignation. At the same time, the two mages and the archer, who should¡¯ve been standing guard near the tents, abruptly miraculously appeared, with a water dragon, a bolt of lightning, and three arrows suddenly flying in his direction.

    Halfway through the air, Trunks had no way to stop his body from falling. He defended himself with great difficulty as snow white fighting aura red out from his broadsword, but in his haste, it was apparent that Trunks had taken some hits. Although he could chop Nia¡¯s three arrows in half, he was hit by the lightning blow and took the water dragon to the chest. He fell into the thick growth of shrubs after emitting a low grunt.

    ¡°Third tree on the left and five paces in front of you, attack!¡± Han Shuo suddenly called out calmly.

    Several rounds of attacks were fired, their target was the newlynded Trunks. Several rounds of attacks abruptlynded after Han Shuo¡¯s soft exmation. This time, Trunks evaded the attacks from the two mages, but a random shot from thepletely invisible Nia just so happened to stab right into Trunks¡¯ butt.

    A painful wail suddenly sounded as Trunks obviously hadn¡¯t found his bearings yet. He changed directions after crying out and attempted to attack them from another side, but Han Shuo continued to call out his location and the others sent their attacks crashing down, miraculously always where Trunks was.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± Suffering from the barrage of attacks, Trunks had never been more depressed in his life than he was today and finally could help but start cursing.

    Trunks had always been supremely confident in his ability to conceal his movements and ambush others. He¡¯d never felt that anyone could see through his movement within the Dark Forest. However, he wasing off worse for the wear for the first time in facing an adventurer group with mediocre ability. He was always drowned by attacks no matter how he shifted and dodged, and he¡¯d suffered from not so light injuries after a while.

    The manticore, that¡¯d been lying in ambush, finally couldn¡¯t restrain its impatience when it saw that its master¡¯s method didn¡¯t seem to be working. The manticore sent shrubbery and grass flying as it ran, and a tree as thick as a man¡¯s waist fell with a thud when its sharp ws shed downwards. Its presence and momentum was astonishing to the extreme.

    ¡°The manticore ising, attack!¡± Odysseus called out loudly as the three swordsmen suddenly spread out and blocked the manticore¡¯s path forward.

    A portion of the attacks that had been targeting Trunks all along now split up and changed their target to the manticore charging over with utmost speed. Except, the manticore was tough and its speed was as fast as lightning. All of the group¡¯s attacks actuallynded on thin air, with only the arrows shot out from Nia connecting with the manticore, but not causing much damage.

    At this moment, a cold-faced Han Shuo started manipting the Demonyer Edge ording to the Law of Refining Magical Treasure. A beam of purple light suddenly shot out, drawing a beautiful arc through the empty air of the night sky. It suddenly stabbed towards the manticore¡¯s back. As a level one magical creature, the manticore noticeably felt the approach of danger and then very agilely evaded the Demonyer Edge¡¯s first attack.

    At the same time, Trunks revealed himself as he limped and staggered out from the distance. He raised his broadsword with fury and approached the two mages and Nia, attempting tobine efforts with the manticore¡¯s strength and kill everyone present with no reservations whatsoever.

    ¡°Ignore the manticore, concentrate your attacks on Trunks.¡± Han Shuo suddenly called out, causing the two mages and Nia to abruptly change direction and continue attacking the swiftly approaching Trunks.

    Of Odysseus and the two swordsmen, Gordon was sent to Nia¡¯s side as the remaining two rushed towards the manticore and started using fighting aura to attack it. When Odysseus approached the manticore, the fighting aura that he¡¯d gathered to its peak was destroyed with a sh of its ws. Odysseus himself was sent flying far into the distance. The other swordsman took advantage of the opportunity to stab the manticore, but he only left a small cut on the manticore and rather further enraged it instead.

    The furious manticore raised his ws and attempted to smash the swordsman near him to death. At this moment, the purple light that¡¯d disappeared briefly abruptly reappeared to suddenly stabbed at the tail of the manticore.

    The manticore sensed the danger and dashed forward with a leap. The swordsman closest to it barely managed to hold onto his life, but although the manticore had dodged in time, the Demonyer Edge had already sliced down its back and the frigid Mystical Spellfire surged into the manticore¡¯s body.

    Madly furious roars suddenly emitted from the manticore¡¯s mouth. Since Han Shuo was manipting the Demonyer Edge, he could feel its wrath. He immediately focused all his attentions on manipting the Demonyer Edge, attempting to kill it where it stood.

    ¡°Damn it, you dare hurt mypanion!¡± The limping Trunks had an arrow sticking out his butt. He was dripping wet due to the water dragon attack on his chest. Because he¡¯d also been electrocuted, part of his hair was burnt and his original bearings hadpletely vanished. Blood also trickled unendingly out his mouth. He appearedpletely bedraggled.

    ¡°I¡¯m even going to harm you, much less than your pet.¡± Han Shuo said after snickering coldly, the Demonyer Edge still doggedly hanging out the back of the manticore.

    A shrill whistle suddenly sounded from Trunks¡¯ mouth. When the extremely maddened manticore heard the whistle, it immediately retreated and ran off into the distance. Trunks looked hatefully at those assembled after his sharp whistle and also fled swiftly in a direction opposite to the manticore.

    ¡°You stay where you are, I¡¯ll go after him.¡± One had to take someone¡¯s life when they were down. Trunks was obviously heavily injured and Han Shuo naturally knew how to take advantage of an opportunity. When he saw Odysseus, who had been sent flying by the manticore, crawl up from the ground spitting blood with no danger to his life, he immediately chased in the direction that Trunks had fled.

 Chapter 108: Constraining a strong foe

    Chapter 108: Constraining a strong foe

    Despite being injured, Trunks still fled at a quick pace. Some old, broken tree roots and thick overgrowth of shrubbery seemed to have no effect on him.

    Except, the injured Trunks was unable to deploy his maximum speed, whereas Han Shuo was in peak condition and was leveraging the surveince of the original demons, following Trunks like a tight burr on his back. The distance between the two grew continuously closer.

    The arrow in his butt had long since been yanked out as Trunks started running. He¡¯d nned on dressing his wounds first, but when he discovered Han Shuo¡¯s pursuit, he had to give up cleaning his wounds first out of resignation and flee heedlessly, whether or not his injury was still bleeding.

    And so they continued this chase for more than ten minutes. Trunks¡¯ endurance was astonishing as he grit his teeth and continued to run. Every time Han Shuo appeared in his vision, he would tap deep into his potential and bring forth another burst of speed, attempting to shake off Han Shuo.

    It was a pity that having trained his magical yuan, Han Shuo¡¯s originally weak personality had long since been trained to the peak of fortitude after repeated baptism via pain. Apart from the stubbornness of Han Shuo¡¯s will exceeding Trunk¡¯s imagination, his speed never decreased throughout the entire pursuit and in fact he seemed to be growing addicted to the chase and relished the chase more and more.

    Although Trunks was exceedingly familiar with the surrounding terrain, with one of Han Shuo¡¯s original demons hanging around him, it was as if a pair of hawk eyes were circling him, observing everything. No matter what Trunks did, he was still unable to shake off Han Shuo by virtue of him being familiar with the terrain alone.

    Finally, after half a day of pursuing and running, Trunks gradually realized that this couldn¡¯t continue in the face of his continued blood loss. He was unable to shake off Han Shuo, and with the increasing speed of cirction of his bloodbined with the inability of being able to treat his body¡¯s injuries in time, Trunks had a short spell of dizziness.

    He leaned against a tree trunk and stopped, wiping away blood from the corner of his mouth and panted as he watched Han Shuo approach with decreased speed. He huffed as he said, ¡°So it¡¯s only been you who¡¯s been following me. I think you¡¯re looking for death.¡±

    Panting twice, Han Shuo¡¯s fiercely beating heart, due to sprinting during the pursuit, slowly recovered its calm. He was already grasping the Demonyer Edge in his hand and the expression on his face was neither joyful or tragic. He stared coldly at Trunks and was in no hurry to approach Trunks. He slowed down the rate of his footsteps considerably.

    Although Han Shuo knew that Trunks was heavily injured, but as injured as a swordmaster was, he was still an exceedingly dangerous existence. A lethal attack coulde if he let his guard slip. It was precisely because Han Shuo couldn¡¯t be certain how severe Trunks¡¯ injuries were. Therefore, he didn¡¯t actually dare make a move now that his prey had stopped.

    ¡°If you weren¡¯t injured, I¡¯d have no chance of facing you alone, but with the current situation, we¡¯ll have to see if you still have any ability to do anything to me.¡± Han Shuo suddenly stopped roughly fifteen meters from Trunks and roved his eyes over Trunks¡¯ body, opening his mouth to speak faintly.

    Han Shuo once again took out the crossbow after speaking, loaded it with a crossbow bolt, and then took urate aim at Trunks, using this to test Trunks¡¯ current body condition.

    ¡°Do you dare only test me from far away? If you have the same amount of guts that you disyedst time, you would be rushing at me with no hesitation whatsoever.¡± Trunks nted his back against the tree and watch Han Shuo¡¯s movements with cold eyes, speaking disdainfully.

    ¡°Do you take me for a fool or are you the fool? You should know that our identities have been reversed. You¡¯re now the prey and I¡¯m the hunter. I control how the game is yed.¡± Han Shuo waspletely unconcerned by Trunks¡¯ mockery as he decisively shot out the bolt after taking aim with the crossbow.

    The tip of the bolt gleamed with a bit of a cold light in the duskiness of the evening sky. A sharp sound abruptly whistled through the air as the bolt shot towards Trunk¡¯s chest like electricity.

    Trunks¡¯ expression didn¡¯t show anything out of the ordinary as his body flew out at almost the same time that sound whistled through the air. The crossbow bolt nailed firmly onto the big tree that Trunks had been leaning against just now. Having dodged the blow, Trunks¡¯ body soared through the air for a few meters as he adroitly crossed a distance of fifteen meters andnded in front of Han Shuo, his speed greatly outside of Han Shuo¡¯s imagination.

    Milky-white fighting aura filled Han Shuo¡¯s vision in the span of an instant, like he was residing in the center of a tornado. Han Shuo¡¯s body was enclosed in milky-white fighting aura as his muscles instantly became taut. It seemed incredibly difficult to even make the slightest move and he could only watch as he drowned in fighting aura.

    His body was unable to move, but the magical yuan within his body was flowing freely without obstruction. Han Shuo¡¯s mind and heart were of one thought as the Demonyer Edge flew out of his palm, suddenly dancing in the air around Han Shuo¡¯s body. The air around Han Shuo¡¯s body was suffused with the light blossoming from the Demonyer Edge in the blink of an eye.

    A violent sound of metal shing rang out around Han Shuo, apanied with Trunks¡¯ furious yells of incredulity. Just as Han Shuo¡¯s ear drums were about to go deaf, all the ear grating metallic sounds vanished utterly and the previously immobile Han Shuo finally returned to normal.

    ¡°Impossible, this is impossible! How can your weapon still defend against my Restrained Dragon sh? Just who are you?¡± Han Shuo immediately heard Trunks¡¯ shocked yells as soon as his body had returned to normal.

    Concentrating his gaze, Han Shuo suddenly discovered that the broadsword Trunks had been wielding all along had suddenly shattered with many cracks. Trunks¡¯ gaze kept darting back and forth between the broadsword and Han Shuo, a look of disbelief and incredulity on his face as he kept repeating, ¡°This is impossible!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s shirt had been ripped to shreds all over and now hung on him like a rag. Many long superficial cuts had appeared on his muscles, revealing the red blood and flesh inside. The Demonyer Edge seemed to have been flung away as itid motionless in the distance, but there weren¡¯t any dings or marks on it.

    ¡°Nothing is impossible!¡± Han Shuo suddenly bellowed and rushed forward with a sudden punch, taking advantage of Trunks¡¯ abnormal mental state.

    It wasn¡¯t until this punch had made its way to Trunks¡¯ face before he was able to react, lifting the now rigid broadsword to block Han Shuo¡¯s punch.

    Dong rang out crisply as Han Shuo¡¯s right hand went numb, but Trunks¡¯ body staggered backwards. Joy shed through Han Shuo inwardly as he knew that Restrained Dragon sh just now had taken most of Trunks¡¯ fighting aura. Therefore, he immediately drew close to Trunks and started raining down a crazy barrage of kicks and punches.

    Renowned in the Dark Forest for being a character not to get on the bad side of, Trunks had now be the weaker side after being heavily injured. He retreated continuously under Han Shuo¡¯s string of attacks, until he finally fell backwards, as stiff as a board.

    ¡°Wait!¡± Just as Han Shuo had grasped the Demonyer Edge again and was about to end Trunks¡¯ life, he suddenly opened his mouth to stop Han Shuo and looked at him, ¡°No matter what you¡¯vee to the Dark Forest for, I can help you! We don¡¯t actually have any irreconcble differences between us, just the matter of the twin headed dragon. That actually wasn¡¯t that valuable.¡±

    Han Shuo thought carefully after Trunks had spoken and discerned that this was the case. Han Shuo had made his moves earlier because he didn¡¯t want to be threatened by others. Now that he wanted to kill Trunks, that was because he wanted to head off Trunks¡¯ possible revenge. To be honest, he didn¡¯t really have a deep hatred for Trunks.

    He walked in front of Trunks and suddenly stabbed swiftly downwards with the Demonyer Edge four times. He then coolly put the Demonyer Edge away after a round of Trunks screaming like a pig being ughtered.

    The Demonyer Edge stabbed downwards four times, piercing through the vitals in Trunks¡¯ two hands and feet. Although it wasn¡¯t enough to cause fatal damage, it also wouldn¡¯t affect Trunks¡¯ future training and strength, but he would absolutely not pose a threat to Han Shuo in the short run.

    ¡°My apologies, I feel that this is better insurance because you¡¯re a more than dangerous person.¡± Han Shuo shrugged and said naturally, then smiled slightly at the grimacing Trunks after a pause, ¡°I think we can have a good discussion now, will you be able to help me if I don¡¯t kill you?¡±

    ¡°Oh... it seems like another cruel hunter has appeared within the Dark Forest. Haha!¡± He first moaned in pain and then burst out loudly in nervousughter, with absolutely no strength in his body. Except, his current bedraggled condition was offset by his burnt hair, and his expression was an indescribable sort of ugly.

    ¡°Behave if you want to live. Tell me what you can help me with.¡± Han Shuo asked with a slight smile as he looked at Trunks.

    ¡°Then the first thing I need to ask is your purpose ining to the Dark Forest. Why have youe?¡± Trunks¡¯ expression didn¡¯t have any traces of panic. Although he still emitted cries of pain, his expression was quite calm.

    Starting, Han Shuo felt that there was no need to conceal anything and spoke directly, ¡°I¡¯m here for the Fruit of Dagmar. Can you help me obtain it?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve been in the Dark Forest for many years and have heard of all sorts of legends. I know a bit about where the Fruit of Dagmar is and can bring you there, but I¡¯m not certain if I can obtain the Fruit of Dagmar either. If you let me go this time, I can promise to help you with all my strength and won¡¯t pursue this matter in the future. If you¡¯ve heard of my reputation, then you should know that I never go back on my promises!¡± Trunks looked at Han Shuo as he promised solemnly.

    ¡°Deal!¡± Han Shuo nodded and responded quite decisively.

 Chapter 109: Reaching an agreement

    Chapter 109: Reaching an agreement

    Although Trunks was renowned for being a difficult character to shake off, his reputation was indeed quite good. After receiving his promise and having him swear a blood oath, Han Shuo didn¡¯t make further trouble for him.

    Having been seriously injured, Trunks didn¡¯t pay further attention to Han Shuo as he struggled to take out some gauze and medicinal water from his space ring. He shook and trembled as he smeared the medicine over his injuries, and then grimaced with pain as he finished dressing his wounds.

    ¡°Your injuries look quite severe, how long will you need before you can fully recover?¡± Han Shuo frowned and asked when he saw Trunks like this.

    Snorting bad temperedly, Trunks said, ¡°Weren¡¯t you the one who caused my injuries? And you still dare to ask, but don¡¯t you worry, my injuries look severe, but they¡¯ll be easy to recover from as long as my tendons and bones haven¡¯t been hurt. Not to mention that the medicinal water I treated it with just now was developed from magical herbs that I picked in the Dark Forest. It¡¯s especially useful for scabbing over wounds. As long as we wait for my fighting aura to recover, I won¡¯t be a burden to you.¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°Alright then, let¡¯s return now then.¡±

    ¡°Wait!¡± Trunks called out, and then concentrated he looked at Han Shuo¡¯s face, finally asking in confusion, ¡°Can you tell me how you discovered me as soon as I entered your tent area, and why I was located no matter where I hid? Why is it that although I can first use fighting aura to lock onto an enemy before deploying Restrained Dragon sh, so that they¡¯ll be at my mercy as long as their strength isn¡¯t greater than mine, your weapon still automatically flies up to protect you?¡±

    ¡°Sorry, I can¡¯t answer your two questions. The only thing I can say is never try to ambush me in the future. That will only be creating trouble for yourself.¡± Han Shuo shrugged as he said to Trunks.

    Nodding his head in understanding, Trunks said, ¡°If no one can ambush you, then your strength is several times higher within the Dark Forest. It looks like we may actually have a chance of seeding on our trip to search for the Fruit of Dagmar this time.¡±

    The way back expended more than five times the amount of time it¡¯d taken for them to get here. Trunks¡¯ speed was greatly decreased because of his injuries, but he resolutely turned down Han Shuo¡¯s offer to support him, stubbornly insisting on walking by himself.

    In this manner, Han Shuo understood many things about the Dark Forest as the two proceeded, finally making it back to campte in the afternoon.

    The tents of Odysseus and the others were all still here as they hadn¡¯t left. When Han Shuo and Trunks appeared, it was as if the entire group was faced with a great enemy as they all grasped their weapons tightly and leveled them at Trunks.

    ¡°Everyone put down your weapons, he will pose no further threat to us.¡± Han Shuo walked over and tried to convince the others with a grave face that there was no need to brandish their weapons.

    When everyone heard Han Shuo¡¯s words and saw Trunks¡¯ bedraggled condition, they hesitated for a moment and then withdrew the weapons in their hands. Water adept mage Aphrodite asked askance, ¡°Han, what¡¯s going on?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll tell youter, how¡¯s Odysseus¡¯ wounds?¡± Han Shuo asked Aphrodite with a creased brow.

    Casting an unfriendly nce at Trunks, Aphrodite opened her mouth to say, ¡°There¡¯s no threat to his life, but there¡¯s a bloody imprint on his chest after the manticore struck him. His entire body is very stiff now and very odd. I feel that even if he recovers in the future, I¡¯m afraid that the injury to his chest will affect his strength. He¡¯s just gone toy down and rest.¡±

    Everyone¡¯s eyes were filled with hate and bitterness when Aphrodite spoke her piece and swept gazes over Trunks¡¯ body, seeming to want to draw their weapons at any time to give Trunks a thorough, painful beating.

    ¡°Han, can you tell us why you¡¯ve brought this person? Oh, I know, you captured him alive in order to execute him in front of Odysseus?¡± Gordon stared tightly at Han Shuo as he asked with a darkened face.

    Because of captain Odysseus¡¯ injuries, these people now had a hard to conceal hatred towards Trunks. Han Shuo could feel the anger within their hearts from their tones and expressions. If it hadn¡¯t been for Han Shuo restraining them just now, it was likely that Trunks would¡¯ve suffered an immediate, furious revenge as soon as he¡¯d appeared.

    But Han Shuo now needed Trunks to lead him to search for the Fruit of Dagmar, therefore Han Shuo couldn¡¯t let these people hurt Trunks yet. Han Shuo hesitated upon seeing Gordon¡¯s vicious expression, and then exined what had happened.

    When Han Shuo finished, Grodonughed coldly and said loudly, ¡°Screw that Fruit of Dagmar! Odysseus was heavily injured. What we need is no longer the Fruit of Dagmar, but this damned killer¡¯s life!¡±

    ¡°Han, do you want the Fruit of Dagmar, or revenge for Odysseus?¡± Elven archer Nia suddenly looked coldly at Han Shuo at this moment and asked him faintly.

    The other adventurers all focused their gazes on Han Shuo in a moment, as if waiting for his answer. At this moment, Han Shuo suddenly felt a huge headache. He hadn¡¯t anticipated that Odysseus¡¯ injuries would be so severe, and definitely hadn¡¯t reckoned on these people¡¯s concern for Odysseus being far in excess of their care of the Fruit of Dagmar.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t originally viewed these people as trustworthypanions originally. He¡¯de with them purely for the Fruit of Dagmar. He was a bit surprised by what was happening now, and was a bit touched by these people¡¯s friendship with Odysseus, but because he had already promised Trunks his safety, he was at a loss for how to handle the situation in the span of a moment.

    As the person in question, Trunks hadn¡¯t said anything since arriving here. There was no trace of panic in his eyes, but he rather calmly took his measure of everyone¡¯s expressions. He suddenly opened his mouth now and said, ¡°It looks like no one wees me, but I have a way to deal with Odysseus¡¯ injury. Are any of you willing to trust me?¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t wait for the others to speak after Trunks said these words and immediately asked, ¡°You can help Odysseus?¡±

    Nodding, Trunks said affirmatively, ¡°Odysseus¡¯ injuries were a result of being wed by the manticore. The manticore is mypanion, I naturally know how to cure an injury at its hands.¡±

    ¡°Follow me!¡± Having long since sensed Odysseus¡¯ breathing, Han Shuo didn¡¯t waste time in further chitchat and brought Trunks to one of the tents. He lifted open the p to reveal a pale-faced, somewhat weak Odysseus.

    Arge hole had opened in the chest of the soft armor that Odysseus wore. It was now wrapped up in gauze, making it impossible to see the status of the wound inside. When Trunks and Han Shuo entered, so did Aphrodite and Gordon. The others surrounded the tent on the outside, on their guard against Trunks¡¯ lightest moves.

    ¡°Undo the gauze on the wound.¡± Trunks instructed after walking in.

    Ever since Trunks said he had a way to help Odysseus, the group of people hadn¡¯t said anything, as if waiting to see how Trunks would act before deciding their next action.

    Gordon remained silent without a word, but walked towards Odysseus. He first woke Odysseus up, then undid the gauze on his wound beneath Odysseus¡¯ astonished gaze. A frightening injury to the point of seeing bone in his chest was revealed.

    ¡°Han, what¡¯s going on? Odysseus looked at Han Shou weakly and asked in confusion.

    ¡°Don¡¯t move and don¡¯t say a word. I¡¯ll exin to you when your injury stabilizes!¡± Han Shuo said softly as he drew nearer to Odysseus.

    At this moment, Trunks took a sk of medicine from his space ring and poured out some red powder from it, slowly applying it to Odysseus¡¯ wound on his chest. He exined faintly, ¡°The tail of the manticore has an extreme poison that paralyzes the entire body. The ws have it too, but it¡¯s not as strong as the amount on the tail. The powder I¡¯m applying can remove the poisonous effects of the manticore¡¯s ws and increase the rate in which his injuries scab over.¡±

    ¡°If you still want to obtain the Fruit of Dagmar, you¡¯ll meet the Medusa monster within that swamp. The fresh blood of a Medusa monster has miraculous properties for wounds. As long as we can kill the Medusa monster and obtain its blood, I promise that he¡¯ll have no aftereffects once we wipe it down on him. The speed in which the injuries of his chest will heal at will be even faster in the future.¡± Trunks exined faintly as he flicked a nce at Grodon.

    Looking at Gordon and then at Aphrodite, Han Shuo said calmly. ¡°I think we need him to help us find the Medusa monster for us. What do you think?¡±

    Aphrodite and Gordon looked at each other, nodding at the same time.

 Chapter 110: The mysterious druid

    Chapter 110: The mysterious druid

    One of the swordsmen made a simplified stretcher to carry Odysseus, who tried to defuse everyone¡¯s hostility towards Trunks upon understanding the situation. It was a shame that although people didn¡¯t continue to call for Trunks¡¯ death, they kept throwing dark looks at him.

    Trunks himself was rather light hearted about everyone¡¯s enmity. Han Shuo even felt that he didn¡¯t care in the slightest. To his surprise, when Han Shuo asked him, Trunks merely responded coolly, ¡°If it hadn¡¯t been for you miraculously discovering my movement, none of them would¡¯ve left alive. I never pay attention to those who are of no threat to me.¡±

    In the days he spent with Trunks, Han Shuo learned a few things about the Dark Forest through him. Within the depths of the Dark Forest, everything was dependent on personal strength. Everything else was of secondary importance, of that, being indecisive or kind signified the weak. It would often cause one to lose their lives.

    Everyone followed Trunks¡¯ instructions as they continued to venture further into the Dark Forest over the next three days. Odysseus¡¯ injuries came under control over the three days and they slowly started to scab over, but his movement was still restricted.

    Trunks¡¯ injuries also recovered swiftly after having been taken care of, but because of the spikes at the tip of Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge, Trunks¡¯ hands and feet still weren¡¯t quite that agile. However, traces of color slowly began to once again blossom on his originally pale face.

    When it was noon, everyone arrived at the edge of a pond. They found a big tree to ce Odysseus down first, then decided to haul some water from the pond to drink.

    Before the others had moved however, Trunks had been standing with Han Shuo and suddenly frowned, opening his mouth to tell Han Shuo, ¡°Tell them to be careful. Do you see the seaweed within the pond? These seaweeds have sharp thorns in their roots and will pull you into the water as soon as they sense humans or beastse close. They¡¯ll easily lose their lives this way.¡±

    Han Shuo hurriedly cried out when he heard these words. ¡°Gordon, you guys stand there and don¡¯t move.¡±

    ¡°If you hold torches, the heat from the mes will scare off the seaweed so that they won¡¯t easily making a move.¡± Trunks said faintly when he saw Han Shuo stare at him.

    ¡°Thanks!¡± Han Shuo said lightly and walked towards Gordon and the others. He exined the dangers of the seaweed to them and reminded them to light the torches.

    When they started moving ording to Han Shuo¡¯s instructions, one of the original demons standing guard in the distance suddenly discovered traces of the manticore¡¯s movement. Han Shuo was startled and swiftly walked up to Trunks, ¡°Your manticore is nearby.¡±

    Nodding, Trunks looked askance at Han Shuo, saying, ¡°You really can discover the movement in your surroundings. That¡¯s right, I chose to walk down this path because this is where I instructed the manticore to wait. There¡¯s a scent on me that only it can sense. I think it will find me very quickly.¡±

    ¡°So that¡¯s the case, I hope you can tell the manticore to behave.¡± Han Shuo understood that Trunks kept his word as his reputation had always been good. He wasn¡¯t actually afraid of Trunks doing anything, just that the manticore was a level one magical creature with boundless strength and could tell enemy from foe. If it started attacking him, Odysseus, and the others as soon as it appeared, then things would be a bit dicey.

    ¡°I know what to do, I don¡¯t need your reminder.¡± Trunks stretched outzily against a big tree and suddenly whistled violently.

    The manticore, that had been circling in the distance, immediately closed the distance swiftly when it heard Trunks¡¯ whistle. It was standing docilely in front of Trunks after ten seconds. When Gordon and the others, fetching water from the pond in the distance, saw the manticore, it was as if they¡¯d all seen a great enemy. However, Han Shuo was able to calm them down with his voice.

    It was at this moment that the original demon, who had caught sight of the manticore, suddenly saw a strange phenomenon. The branches of a lush, green tree suddenly twisted bizarrely, with the twisty branches turning in a circle a few times and suddenly strangely transforming into human hands and feet.

    Han Shuo had also detected the disturbance there through the original demon, and he immediately focused his concentration on observing it. The twisting branches continued to twine around themselves and finally formed into a strange person covered with tree bark clothing. This strange person had dark green hair and looked slightly simr to the forest trolls, but had sharp ears and thus looked a bit like an elf.

    Just as Han Shuo was perplexed, the strange person got his bearings and walked towards where the manticore had passed through. He muttered, ¡°If the manticore is here, then Trunks must also be nearby.¡±

    Han Shuo was startled as he suddenly stared at Trunks, ¡°A strange person is trailing the manticore. He just transformed from a tree and is now approaching this direction along the path that the manticore took. He seems to know you.¡±

    Trunks¡¯zy expression immediately vanished when Han Shuo¡¯s words sounded and he suddenly stood up, leaping directly onto the manticore¡¯s back afterwards, saying, ¡°If I¡¯m guessing correctly, that person should be the druid Caspian. As a druid, Caspian has the ability to turn his body into a tree and arge bear. He can alsomunicate with trees. I can¡¯t meet him with my current level of strength, we need to leave here immediately.¡±

    ¡°Toote, he¡¯s already here.¡± Han Shuo creased his brow and said suddenly.

    Han Shuo had originally intended on deciding whether to leave or stay after asking Trunks, but who would¡¯ve thought the movement speed of the druid Caspian would be so fast. Caspian had leapt towards a tree when Trunks was talking, and the supple tree branch was as if it had a psychic connection to Caspian, abruptly swinging back and forth and throwing Caspian in this direction.

    Caspian had alreadynded with a thud in front of Trunks when Han Shuo had finished speaking. He looked at Trunks and smiled faintly. ¡°Long time no see good friend. Shouldn¡¯t you return what is mine now?¡±

    Trunks didn¡¯t respond to Caspian from the back of the manticore. The manticore leapt up and attempted to get far away from here.

    The smile on his face remained unchanged, Caspian suddenly recited an old and ancient incantation. All the shrubs, trees, and flowers suddenly seemed toe alive in the direction that the manticore had taken and seemed to turn into countless numbers ofrge and small hands, surging towards the manticore and Trunks to entangle them.

    The branches of arge tree in front of the fleeing Trunks wove into a, blocking off his escape. The shrubs roiled like the waves and surrounded the manticore and Trunks. The manticore tried to destroy everything around it, but Trunks restrained it.

    ¡°Old friend, I can sense that you¡¯re hurt. The fact that you haven¡¯t fought back this time means you don¡¯t haveplete surety of leaving me behind. It looks like your injuries are not light. Give me the divine wood scepter and I can heal your injuries. Isn¡¯t that good?¡± Caspian smiled at Trunks who had stopped in the distance.

    Han Shuo and the others watched the conflict between Trunks and Caspian from afar and didn¡¯t interfere. It looked like Trunks had taken something of Caspian¡¯s and Caspian was merely asking for it back. From the current situation, Trunks was in the wrong and thus Han Shuo didn¡¯t intervene, and merely watched coldly from the sidelines.

    ¡°I¡¯m injured, you wouldn¡¯t take it from me at a time like this, would you?¡± Trunks spread out his hands and spoke to Caspian after he¡¯d been surrounded.

    Caspian went silent for a moment and then stared at Trunks, ¡°If I remember correctly, you stole the divine wood scepter from me when I was injured. I wouldn¡¯t mind learning from you if there¡¯s a need to!¡±

    ¡°Alright, this is your divine wood scepter. I¡¯ve studied it for three months and didn¡¯t discover anything special about it. You can have it back.¡± Thinning his lips and smiling ruefully, Trunks took out an exquisitely crafted scepter that looked like it¡¯d been made from old tree roots from a space ring, throwing it to Caspian from afar.

    The branch from arge tree suddenly extended and magically wrapped itself around the divine wood scepter, bringing it to the hands of the druid Caspian. When Caspian grasped the divine wood scepter, a lively and strong presence of life immediately emanated from the scepter. The shrubs around him rustled, as if celebrating softly.

    Caspian tossed over a small bottle the size of a thumb. When Trunks caught it, Caspian said faintly, ¡°The Hundred Flowers Essence within it will be greatly beneficial to your injuries. Don¡¯t think of doing anything against me in the future.¡±

    Trunks epted the Hundred Flowers Essence and shrugged his shoulders, not promising Caspian anything. Judging from his appearance, he seemed to be greatly interested in something that was on Caspian.

    ¡°Honorable noble druid, may I trouble you to heal my friend?¡± At this moment, the elven archer Nia suddenly walked in front of Caspian and asked very sincerely.

    Caspian smiled faintly as he looked at Nia and nodded, saying benevolently, ¡°Cute child, I am unable to deny your request.¡±

    Druids and elves were both followers of great Mother Nature, with only the most pious of her followers gaining the right to be a druid. This druid¡¯s ears are pointy, making it obvious that he had been an elf that had be a druid. No wonder he¡¯d immediately agreed to Nia¡¯s request without further protest.

    The druid Caspian walked to Odysseus on his stretcher, frowning after he cast a nce at Odysseus¡¯ injuries. Caspian then recited an incantation and dropped three drops of green liquid onto the wounds on Odysseus¡¯ chest, saying apologetically to Nia afterwards, ¡°Your friend is heavily injured. My blessing of nature and three drops of lifewater will help him heal rapidly with no worry of infection. But when his injuries are healed, he¡¯ll be unable to engage in fierce activity. Otherwise, he might experience vertigo or even faint directly. I¡¯m unable to do anything about this, I¡¯m truly sorry!¡±

    ¡°Many thanks to you, kind Caspian.¡± Nia thanked and then said, ¡°Trunks said that the blood of Medusa can help Odysseus recover fully. We¡¯ll find Medusa.¡±

    Throwing a surprised look at Trunks, Caspian said to Nia, ¡°He¡¯s right. There is a magical blue blood in the brain of Medusa where the magical core is held. This blood can indeed help him fully recover. But my old friend isn¡¯t someone who likes helping others, why would he tell you this?¡±

    ¡°You¡¯ve taken the divine wood scepter and healed the person. Isn¡¯t it time for you to return to the Druidic Order after chasing me for several months!¡± Trunks red at Caspian from his side and said a bit irritably.

    Nodding his head and smiling, Caspian exined to Nia, ¡°It looks like my old friend is angry. Heh heh. He¡¯s actually not as bad as you think. If he¡¯s willing to help you, then you have an extremely high chance of obtaining Medusa¡¯s blood. My apologies, I still have things to attend to and can¡¯t keep youpany.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re too kind.¡± Nia was a bit startled and ttered as she hastily responded sincerely.

    Caspian looked at Trunks and left with a slight smile, disappearing from everyone¡¯s view after a while.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, we¡¯ll continue to be on our way and can reach that ce after two days.¡± Trunks snorted slightly with a cold expression after Caspian had left and urged the others to continue on their way.

    Under Trunks¡¯ guidance, the group didn¡¯t run into any danger and arrived at a marsh that had a heavy stench after two days. Several enormous man-eater flowers repeatedly attacked Han Shuo and the others around the marsh. It was a good thing that Trunks had warned them before and the group was able to defend against the man-eater flowers together.

    ¡°The Fruit of Dagmar grows on a patch of sludge in the middle of this enormous marsh, along with a Medusa lying in wait. We¡¯ve reached our destination.¡± Trunks pointed at the vast expanse of marsh in front of him and spoke.

 Chapter 111: The voice of temptation

    Chapter 111: The voice of temptation

    The swamp¡¯s surface was extensive, with bones from humans and creatures subtly poking out of the grey sludge. It looked like quite a number of humans and beasts had died within. There were also various ugly and bizarre nts growing within the sludge. Sharp spikes grew on the nts¡¯ branches as they swayed aimlessly through the air. It all appeared quite eerie and horrifying.

    Therge trees around the perimeter were located on the edges of the sludge. When some leavesnded within the sludge, they would disappear without a trace in the blink of an eye, as if there was a demon hidden at the bottom of the sludge that swallowed everything. Waves of disgusting stench were emitted from the sludge and attacked the senses, causing the water mage Aphrodite and female elf Nia to crease their brows and cover their mouths, appearing quite ill at ease.

    When everyone¡¯s gazesnded into the swamp, Trunks continued exining, ¡°The nts that live within are all exceedingly dangerous. The swamp will swallow all humans and beasts that venture in, and the stench in the deep regions also contain a slow toxin that drains one¡¯s energy. The Medusa that hides within this swamp appears ording to its will and is very difficult to handle.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s gaze focused gravely on therge patch of swamp. His forehead creased after hearing Trunks¡¯ exnation as he privately weighed his options on how to proceed.

    ¡°We don¡¯t have the ability to fly and will sink into the ground as soon as we set foot into the swamp. ording to what you¡¯ve told us, the Medusa lives within the swamp and canpletely conceal itself beneath the swamp. It can attack or retreat and holds all the advantages. The level of difficulty for us to fight it within the swamp is simply too great.¡± Han Shuo said lowly after he¡¯d put some thought into it for a moment.

    Flicking a nce at Han Shuo, Trunks said, ¡°The Medusa¡¯s strength greatly increases within the swamp. Even the manticore, a magical creature also of the first rank would be helpless. We don¡¯t have the ability to fly and won¡¯t be able to injure it much at all, but if the Medusa walks out of the swamp, I think all of usbined will be able to solidly triumph over the Medusa. but ording to my knowledge of the Medusa, it won¡¯t leave the swamp easily.¡±

    ¡°Is there anything that has an increased chance of attracting the Medusa?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    Shaking his head, Trunks said, ¡°I don¡¯t know. The Medusa can emit a marvelous sound, and this sound has the power of attracting humans and beasts. It will suddenly attack as soon as humans or beasts get close to the swamp and pull its prey in. Thus, the Medusa has no fear of not having enough food. I don¡¯t know what else it needs apart from this.¡±

    After remaining silent for a moment, Han Shuo suddenly smiled, ¡°Since this is the case, we can only use the dumbest method. We¡¯ll stand guard here and kill its prey as soon as the Medusa makes sound to lure in its prey. I think it¡¯ll be unable to resist its hunger after a few discoveries that no prey has approached it and will exit the swamp then. We¡¯ll make our move together and kill it then.¡±

    ¡°Yes, although this method is dumb, there¡¯s no other way. My manticore and I aren¡¯t afraid of the Medusa as long as it leaves the swamp. If we add all of you into the mix, I think it¡¯ll be impossible for it to escape death.¡±

    ¡°Alright, then let¡¯s make our preparations.¡±

    Several traps and simple fences were set up around the swamp, with everyone finally realizing how all epassing this task was when they started to undertake it. The swamp was quite vast and it was quite difficult and exhaustive topletely defend it on all sides. The group spent quite arge amount of time before wearily finishing their preparations.

    After resting for a night, everyone¡¯s ears were plugged the next morning as they took up watch around the perimeter in previously discussed positions. The territory of the swamp was too vast. Even with eight people and one manticore split up, they were still spread a bit thin. Han Shuo also released his three original demons and used them to patrol the surroundings of the swamp, continuously paying attention to the situation.

    The group waited with full attention for quite a while on the first day, but didn¡¯t discover the Medusa hunting prey. Just as Trunks had mentioned, the Medusa hunting was enough for it to be fed for more than ten days. The group had no way of estimating when it¡¯dst hunted and so could only continue waiting with this brute force method.

    The Medusa didn¡¯t hunt again on the second day, with Han Shuo¡¯s original demons discovering that a portion of the sludge within the swamp had suddenly surged upwards on dusk of the third day, revealing the Medusa¡¯s form within.

    Just as its name stated, the Medusa¡¯s numerous strands of hair were made of live snakes. These snakes were iparably elongated and extended in all directions of the swamp like tentacles. The Medusa¡¯s features were actually that of a beautiful woman. Her slender eyebrows and cherry lips were quite beautiful, but her mouth opened to reveal rows of sinister fangs. Its slightly revealed lower body was the body of a serpent. An ugly brown suffused its durable and thick skin, forming an indefinable, bizarre contrast with its striking face.

    Although it disyed rows of sinister fangs from its open mouth, the Medusa was emitting an elegant and deste sound of temptation. Han Shuo and the others had long since plugged their ears, but could still faintly hear the sounds. They all felt their hearts tremble, as if they¡¯d experienced a baffling sense of attraction and had the desire to investigate the source.

    It was a good thing that they could only hear a little and had the benefit of Trunks¡¯ repeated reminders earlier that morning. This was how they kept their heads and didn¡¯t walk towards the swamp, firmly standing guard where they were, their gazes continuously roving around in all directions and always paying attention to movements around them.

    Slowly, the sounds of small magical creatures being attracted to the previously quiet swamp traveled to them. They were trotting along happily as they involuntarily traveled in the direction of the swamp. A fewrger magical creatures were also approaching from a distance.

    Han Shuo and Trunks looked at each other, temporarily not activating the traps they had prepared earlier. The magical creatures that were appearing didn¡¯t possess much destructive power, so there was no need to use the traps. Everyone split up and carefully avoided the obstacles of the traps, making their moves mercilessly and started hunting down the smaller magical creatures that were slowly approaching.

    It would appear that Trunks¡¯ injuries had recovered well. His efficiency was the highest amongst them all, and it was as if his body was another dangerous magical creature as he treaded through the trees and shrubbery, bringing with him waves of blood. He¡¯d thoroughly cleaned up the magical creatures, that had been first to approach, in short order.

    With the aid of the Demonyer Edge, although Han Shuo¡¯s speed was slower than Trunks, he was still much faster than the others. The Demonyer Edge was like a magical machine reaping lives as it twirled and easily ughtered level five and six magical creatures.

    After taking care of the low level magical creatures in their areas, Han Shuo and Trunks walked to another area and helped the others handle the swiftly approaching magical creatures. After a short while, the twenty or so small magical creatures that had approached had all been wiped out by the group. The value of these small, low level magical creatures was too low and thus Han Shuo didn¡¯t even make a move to collect the spoils of battle.

    In this short lull, Han Shuo yanked out of the soft cloth plugging his ears and stood where he was with a grave expression. This greatly startled Trunks, who was beside him, as thetter made several hand gestures to Han Shuo.

    The elegant and deste cries seemed to be a lover murmuring lowly by his ears, giving one the uncontroble urge to want to go to her gentle embrace and entwine themselves with her, voicing the agonies of yearning. This strange temptation instantly permeated Han Shuo¡¯s mind, creating illusions for him immediately, as if it was Fanny who was calling out to him again and again in the swamp behind him. This caused him to uncontrobly lift up his feet and stride towards the swamp behind him.

    However, he¡¯d only taken a few steps after raising his feet when the thoughts in Han Shuo¡¯s mind churned slightly. Following that, indomitable will immediately halted Han Shuo where he stood. His body remained unmoving where he was as he defended against the onught of temptation with stubborn will.

    After training his magical yuan for such a long period of time, Han Shuo had full confidence in his willpower. Magic and fighting aura were of no use in fighting the temptation emitted by the Medusa¡¯s voice, the only thing that could counter it was stubborn and tenacious willpower. It was precisely that Han Shuo felt his current self would be able to withstand her that he¡¯d decisively given up the cover of the soft cloth. He was attempting to see if the Medusa¡¯s allure could shake his indomitable will.

    The final result demonstrated that after training his magical yuan for such a long period of time, he had indeed developed an inhumanely strong will. The cries filled with temptation proved to be full of temptation at first, but slowly started losing their effect, until Han Shuo was no longer affected.

    The footsteps he¡¯d started taking backwards once again moved forward with determination, the expression on his face carefree and natural. He was obviously not suffering under the temptation of the mesmerizing voice anymore. Trunks had been watching in astonishment from afar as he saw Han Shuo struggle with some difficulty in the beginning and then easily handle things in the end. He raised his thumb from afar, acknowledging Han Shuo¡¯s stubborn willpower.

    Five to six level three and four magical creatures once again appeared in everyone¡¯s line of sight. There were also two frost eagles circling overhead. Han Shuo, Trunks, and the others cast looks of surprise and wariness at each other, focusing all their concentration on the lowly circling frost eagles.

    The frost eagles were obviously affected by the Medusa and looked like they intended on roosting in the swamp. They wouldn¡¯t be flying so low otherwise. Grasping the crossbow in his hands, Han Shuo took aim at the outstretched throat of one of the frost eagles and an urate bolt broke through the air.

    At the same time, Nia and the other two mages made their moves, aiming for the other frost eagle. The frost eagles were quiterge, and the Medusa wouldn¡¯t need toe out for at least five or six days if they fell into the swamp. This would waste all their previous efforts, and thus the group could absolutely not let the frost eaglend in the swamp.

    The alertness of the entranced frost eagle was obviously not as it usually was. Han Shuo¡¯s bolt pierced through its neck and shot it down from the sky. On the other side, Nia and the other two mages¡¯ attacks were a bit feeble due to the distance. Several of Nia¡¯s arrows were stuck on the frost eagle¡¯s body, but didn¡¯t seemed to do much damage.

    Upon seeing the injured frost eagle fly over their heads and head for the swamp, Han Shuo be a bit anxious. The already fired crossbow needed a bit of time before a bolt could be loaded and the crossbow be operational again. He would never make it in time. Just as he was nning on taking out the Demonyer Edge, Trunks suddenly flung out a short sword that was imbued with Trunks¡¯ fighting aura, sinking into the lower spine of the frost eagle.

    Suffering from the severe damage from the short sword, the speed of the frost eagle¡¯s pping wings deceased noticeably. It started to slowly descend as the manticore shed out like lightning from a distance, suddenly appearing in front of the frost eagle and shed with its iparably strong ws, tearing the frost eagle¡¯s neck apart.

    The magical creatures on the ground were all cleaned out with the efforts of the traps and three swordsmen. Just as everyone had heaved a sigh of relief, an elven maiden suddenly appeared in the distance. The elven maid¡¯s beauty was pure and unadorned. She was dressed in luxurious clothes as she swiftly approached Han Shuo¡¯s direction with a nk look on her face.

    Horror gripping him, Han Shuo immediately shot out and blocked the female elf¡¯s advancing footsteps. He opened his mouth to say, ¡°Stop, hurry up and stop!¡±

    It was a pity that the mesmerized maid let had obviously temporarily lost her senses andpletely ignored Han Shuo¡¯s words as she continued to walk towards the swamp.

    ¡°Not everyone has the same willpower as you. Stop trying to persuade her and just grab her!¡± Trunks couldn¡¯t help but roar out when he saw that the female elf approaching the swamp step by step and Han Shuo was still trying to persuade her.

    Han Shuo nked and finally reached out with the speed of lightning upon seeing the female elf make her way closer to the swamp, wrapping her in his arms and hauling her away from the perimeter, ignoring her struggles.

    ¡°Brother... brother!¡± The female elf cried out continuously and struggled continuously in Han Shuo¡¯s arms. When she discovered that she couldn¡¯t break free, her small fists beat fiercely on Han Shuo¡¯s chest as she destely wailed, ¡°Brother.¡±

    This level of attack was neither painful nor ticklish on Han Shuo¡¯s chest. He held the female elf tightly as he walked further away from the swamp. The Medusa¡¯s elegant voice became more and more hurried, but no more humans or beasts appeared in the surroundings.

    After a short while, the Medusa finally listlessly stopped its calls of temptation and its body, concealed within the swamp, slowly revealed itself.

 Chapter 112: Slaying the snake together

    Chapter 112: ying the snake together

    When the Medusa slowly emerged from the swamp, Han Shuo discovered that it was even bigger than he¡¯d imagined. Its hair full of small snakes was waving wildly as they extended in dance. Its serpentine lower body was as thick as a bucket, and its body was five or six meters long.

    ¡°Everyone be careful, I think the Medusa is ready to leave the swamp to hunt.¡± Han Shuo could clearly see the Medusa¡¯s movements through the observations of his original demons and he immediately warned everyone.

    ¡°Bad guy, bad guy, big bad guy!¡± A scream rang out from his arms after Han Shuo¡¯s rmed words and the beautiful and pure elven maiden in his arms started erupting in violent action, railing her small fists into Han Shuo¡¯s chest, apanied by a look of panic.

    Seeing that the female elf had regained her senses, Han Shuo immediately stopped holding her as the Demonyer Edge abruptly appeared in his hand. His eyes calmly patrolled the four corners as he nned on finding an appropriate location to fight the Medusa.

    ¡°What, what do you want to do?¡± The elven maiden was greatly startled as she thought Han Shuo wanted to kill her. She took two steps back in a panic, a magic staff suddenly appearing in her hand and sent a sharp de of wind hurtling towards Han Shuo¡¯s head with a magical incantation.

    ¡°Damn it, what are you attacking me for?¡± Han Shuo immediately roared furiously at this elf after he dodged it.

    However, it looked like the elven maiden was even more irate than Han Shuo. She was staring at Han Shuo with extreme enmity and also said huffily, ¡°What did you do to me just now?¡±

    The hungry Medusa had obviously lost its patience when it saw that no prey had entered the swamp. Its colossal body moved swiftly within the swamp and drew close to Han Shuo¡¯s group.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t have the time to waste with the female elf at this moment and beckoned quickly with his hand when he saw the female elven archer Nia walk over from the distance. He pointed at the clueless elven maiden and said, ¡°Exin everything to her.¡±

    Han Shuo immediately left quickly after saying these words and arrived where Trunks, Aphrodite, and the others were. He spoke urgently, ¡°It looks like the Medusa couldn¡¯t hold out against its anger and is attempting to leave the swamp to find prey. It¡¯s heading in this direction, everyone be on guard.¡±

    ¡°The two mages hurry and leave, take up positions in the big tree behind the traps. The two swordsman should split up and don¡¯t let the Medusa discover your tracks. Han, you and I leave temporarily. When the Medusa appears in a moment, we¡¯ll block off its path of retreat. It¡¯s extremely difficult to handle a Medusa creature within the swamp, but it may not even be up to the task of fighting my manticore when it leaves the swamps. Therefore, we have a high probability of killing it, but the only thing is to not let it discover our tracks. We¡¯ll find it dreadfully hard to fight it if it returns to the swamp.¡± Trunks suddenly spoke up loudly at this time and quickly instructed everyone to return to their posts.

    At such a pivotal moment, even the other adventurers, who previously bore enmity towards Trunks, didn¡¯t say anything else. They all nodded and started moving ording to their positions in ordance with Trunks¡¯ instructions.

    Han Shuo nodded at Trunks and suddenly left, avoiding the path that the Medusa would definitely take. Han Shuo¡¯s grasp of the greater picture far exceeded everyone else¡¯s, due to the information he received from the original demons. The Medusa looked quite cautious as it warily crawled onto the shore, and wasn¡¯t in a hurry to immediately leave the marsh. It dithered by the side of the marsh, as if contemting something.

    The magical creatures that had appeared just now had been stripped of all their valuables and their corpses abandoned in the enormous trap that¡¯d been previously prepared. The Medusa¡¯s beautiful head turned around a few times, her watery eyes appearing a bit confused as to why not a single human or beast had approached after hearing her alluring voice.

    After a while, the Medusa still hadn¡¯t seemed to think it through and finally left the marsh, walking towards the ce where Aphrodite and the othersy in wait. Through the observations of the original demon, Han Shuo discovered that the previously angry elf had finally calmed down after Nia¡¯s persuading and was looking with interest in his direction. She finally backed up unwillingly towards the back under Nia¡¯s repeated encouragement, but she wasn¡¯t willing to move too far.

    After leaving the marsh, the Medusa cautiously proceeded forward. Han Shuo and Trunks circled around and appeared from another direction the marsh,pletely blocking off the Medusa¡¯s path of retreat. Han Shuo and Trunks traded a meaningful nce and approached the Medusa from behind at the same time, soundlessly, prepared to make a move against it at any time.

    Finally, when the Medusa was ten or so meters away from the marsh, its undting body suddenly drew near to the trap. Its bizarre body was elongated, when its upper body perceived the existence of the trap, it leveraged the strength of its lower body and slowly eased its nted body out of the trap and moved away with the undtions of its body.

    At this moment, a water dragon and lightning suddenly shed through the sky, crashing down onto the Medusa with a thunderous roar. Up ahead, not too far away, Nia also pulled back her bow and fired. Several sharp arrows broke through the air and headed straight for the Medusa.

    On the side, Gordon and the two other swordsmen swung out together and chopped down a branch that had been hoisted up high. A tremendous crack rang out as the sharp end of the thick tree branch came shooting straight down to the Medusa.

    The Medusa immediately realized that it had fallen into an ambush, and its lower body magically curled around a big tree next to it. Its body had been about to fall into the trap, but flew high through the air and crashed back down onto the ground with a thud.

    The branch that had been shooting towards the Medusa shot past where its neck had been before the Medusa dodged, thudding into the bottom of the trap and ringing out loudly.

    Aphrodite¡¯s water dragon crashed into the Medusa¡¯s body, but obviously didn¡¯t reach the amount of destructive power it should have. When the Medusa shook its head, the water dragon dispersed into countless water droplets. It was rather the bolt of thunder and lightning that caused the Medusa to cry out in pain.

    Only one of the Nia¡¯s arrows pierced into the soft, tender nape of the Medusa¡¯s neck, but it didn¡¯t sink in that far and didn¡¯t cause a fatal injury. The Medusa¡¯s frantic, violent writhing proved that it hadn¡¯t suffered grievous wounds.

    After the first wave of attacks hadnded, the Medusa swiftly turned around and retreated. It didn¡¯t attempt to seek revenge on the people who had attacked it and crawled directly towards the marsh. It seemed that it wanted to retreat and fight back after entering the marsh.

    It was a pity at this time that Han Shuo and Trunks had long since been ready. Brutal, milky-white fighting aura and the ear rattling whistle from the Demonyer Edge rang out as they both made for the Medusa, suddenly appearing on the Medusa¡¯ neck and cheek.

    The Medusa had been able to easily handle the previous attacks, but Han Shuo and Trunks¡¯bined attacks finally let it sense the threat of death. These two waves of attacks were swift and fierce. The domineering killing intent epassed within caused the highly ranked Medusa to deploy all of its energy.

    Its enormous body suddenly became incredibly agile as its numerous snakes for hair suddenly danced. The hundreds and thousands of small snakes danced wildly in the air, transforming into a sky of tentacles to obstruct Trunks and Han Shuo¡¯s attacks.

    Trunks¡¯ milky-white fighting aura and Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge attacks hurtled into the midst of the numerous dancing snakes and instantly filled the air with a bloody mist. The small snakes were pulverized into bloody chunks that were sent flying and plopped onto the ground.

    Both of their attacks were greatly weakened at the same time and couldn¡¯t approach the Medusa¡¯s vital parts at all. The small snakes that had been chopped off wriggled on the ground and struggled in Han Shuo¡¯s and Trunks¡¯ direction, attempting to swallow the two.

    ¡°Huh. Go to hell.¡± Trunks snorted coldly as a longsword once again appeared in his hand. However, it wasn¡¯t the broadsword that had been chipped by the Demonyer Edge.

    Trunks¡¯ body was surrounded by milky-white aura and a gust of flying sand and small rocks exploded towards the small snakes approaching him, swiftly making for the Medusa. On the other side, a figure dashed out like lightning. It was the manticore who had long been lying in wait. It maintained the same speed as Trunks and shot towards the Medusa.

    Han Shuo remained unmoving where he stood, closing his eyes instead and manipting the Demonyer Edge with all his concentration. The small snakes that covered the Medusa¡¯s head all screamed as they one by one, turned into a bloody rain that filled the sky. The indestructible Demonyer Edge reaped the life of one small snake after another and chopped off half of the Medusa¡¯s small snakes in the span of an instant.

    The other adventurers in the distance all surged out from the back when they saw that the Medusa had no avenue of retreat and was heavily injured. Even more attacks appeared with theirbined efforts. Trunks and the manticore were even more fierce as they directly challenged the Medusa. Trunks had turned into a cloud of milky-white aura and his every move caused the Medusa¡¯s blood and flesh to fly everywhere.

    Ranked on the same level as the Medusa, the manticore circled the Medusa on the ground and dashed to and fro. Its ws, that were as sharp as des, left injuries on the Medusa so deep that bone could be seen. When all of the small snakes on the Medusa¡¯s head had been executed by Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge, the Medusa¡¯s struggles suddenly became quite listless and its writhing body suddenly became quiet.

 Chapter 113: This is called a hang glider

    Chapter 113: This is called a hang glider

    By the time that everyone had surrounded the Medusa, it had already fallen andy without moving. Trunks leapt onto the body with sword in hand, slicing open its head and taking out the most valuable item from the Medusa with a look of joy.

    Trunks dug out the core of the level one magic beast and the blue blood near its core. When Han Shuo had dashed over from the distance, the matters on this side had beenpleted, and even the corpse of the Medusa had been pushed into the depths of the trap.

    The, elf off in the distance, followed closely behind Nia, poking her head out to gaze at the Medusa within the trap, saying softly, ¡°How does this ugly fellow have such a lovely voice?¡±

    ¡°Angelica, you should hurry and go back. We have other things to do!¡± Nia frowned involuntarily when she saw the young female elf look on with a face full of curiosity.

    ¡°No, sister Nia let me stay with you. This is much more fun than being at grandpa¡¯s.¡± Angelica smiled sweetly at Nia and shook her head, speaking shyly.

    After Han Shuo made his way over, Trunks took out the magical core and the precious blood that he¡¯d retrieved and handed it over to Han Shuo. ¡°I¡¯ll keep ten drops of the Medusa¡¯s blue blood. You can split the rest with the others.¡±

    A small bottle filled with the Medusa¡¯s blue blood was stored within a crystalline, white vase. That and the Medusa¡¯s magical core were all shoved into Han Shuo¡¯s hands. Grasping the items that Trunks had handed over, Han Shuo asked, ¡°How much blood does Odysseus need to fully recover?¡±

    ¡°I think five drops of the Medusa¡¯s essence blood should be enough to help Odysseus fully recover. The essence blood has a miraculous effect. Not only can it increase the recovery speed of injuries, but it can reconnect separated limbs. If one¡¯s arms or legs are broken, the essence blood of the Medusa will allow the limbs to reconnect and grow without affecting movement in the future. Therefore, the Medusa¡¯s essence blood is very precious.¡± Trunks looked at Han Shuo and solemnly exined the preciousness of the Medusa¡¯s essence blood.

    Nodding, Han Shuo also took out a medicine sk and poured out half of the Medusa¡¯s essence blood and gave the rest of the bottle along with the level one magical creature core to Aphrodite. He said, ¡°These items belong to you guys. Split it up with them after this is all over.¡±

    Aphrodite looked askance at Han Shuo and opened her mouth to say, ¡°Isn¡¯t it a bit too much to give us all this? I think we should only receive either the Medusa¡¯s essence blood or the magical core. After all, the two of you put forth the most effort in this n to kill the Medusa, we only served as a sort of distraction and hindrance.¡±

    ¡°Take it for now, we have other things to do. If you¡¯ve further considerations, why not wait until you¡¯ve taken care of Odysseus? Odysseus told you before to temporarily listen to my words, I think you remember that.¡±

    The magical core of the Medusa could be used to create some mysterious instruments that would also have the same mesmerizing effect. If sold, it would absolutely be sold for a premium price. However, the Medusa wasn¡¯t Han Shuo¡¯s goal this time, but rather the Fruit of Dagmar that would be incredibly useful to Han Shuo¡¯s cultivation.

    As useful as the things on the Medusa were, they had no direct usefulness for Han Shuo. Therefore, he was extremely generous in portioning out the spoils of battle from the Medusa. Han Shuo did so also because he hoped that when he obtained the Fruit of Dagmarter, he would have a higher chance of taking more of the Fruits. This was what he needed the most at the moment.

    ¡°Now that the Medusa had been cleared from the swamp, the only things left within the swamp are the man-eating nts and permeating toxins. It was said that the Fruit of Dagmar grew within the man-eating ns. We cane up with a n to find the Fruit.¡± Trunks looked at Han Shuo and opened his mouth to make the suggestion.

    Nodding, Han Shuo didn¡¯t say much and walked towards the swamp, deep in thought. When he came to the edge of the swamp, he randomly picked up one of the small stones on the shore and threw it into the distance. When the stonended, it sank into the swamp within the blink of an eye and vanished without a trace.

    Of those present, no one could fly through the air and only Han Shuo¡¯s three original demons could patrol around the swamp. When he arrived, Han Shuo sat down cross legged with a darkened face and focused hisplete attention on manipting the three original demons. They danced through the vast swamp and attempted to locate the Fruit of Dagmar.

    When Trunks and the others arrived, they saw Han Shuo sitting cross legged without a sound, with even his eyes closed. Everyone was rather baffled.

    ¡°Sister Nia, what¡¯s wrong with that bad man?¡± The pure elven maiden Angelica looked at Han Shuo in surprise and asked Nia in a sweet voice.

    Nia also didn¡¯t know what Han Shuo was doing and shook her head when she heard Angelica ask. She said oddly, ¡°I don¡¯t know either, but Han Shuo is a marvelous person. I think he¡¯s doing some magical things again.¡±

    Trunks understood that some obscure secrets were concealed within Han Shuo¡¯s body. These secrets could cause even him, a fierce and domineering swordsmaster to have extreme misgivings towards Han Shuo. When he saw Han Shuo¡¯s bizarre appearance this time, he immediately thought that Han Shuo was doing something mysterious again. He immediately focused his attentions on observing Han Shuo¡¯s body and any abnormalities around him, attempting to find out the mysteries that shrouded Han Shuo.

    Unfortunately, even with Trunks¡¯ extraordinary abilities and uncanny eye for fighting aura and magical power, the original demons had no fighting aura within them and weren¡¯t supported by magic. This made Trunks¡¯ observatione up empty handed as he had absolutely no idea why Han Shuo did what he did.

    One of the original demons made its way into the midst of the thickest patch of man-eating nts and suddenly discovered nts that looked humanesque within a ret red mound of sludge.

    This nt looked like an ordinary person, replete with hands, feet, waist, and cheeks. It was hidden in the sludge beneath the waist with a thick stalk that was simr to a root, and there were three brains that looked like they had lost their fleshy coverings on the neck that were exposed to the air. The appearance of these three brains were the same as the Fruit of Dagmar that everyone had described.

    Taking a deep breath in, Han Shuo opened his eyes as an excited light sparkled and danced within his eyes. He said, ¡°The Fruit of Dagmar is within that patch of man-eating nts. It has a humanesque stalk, but three fruit shaped like a human brain have blossomed on it.¡±

    ¡°The Fruit of Dagmar is indeed within the swamp, but how should we reach it?¡± Aphrodite was first overjoyed at hearing this news, but then immediately reacted with a woebegone expression.

    ¡°Yes, none amongst us are at the archmage level and have no way of flying above the swamp.¡± Gordon frowned and said equally weakly.

    Trunks looked at Han Shuo who was deep in thought, thought for a moment himself, and said, ¡°Han, all sorts of poisonous insects fill the swamp and there are slow acting toxins within the air. If you fall into the swamp identally, it would be very unrealistic to want to leave alive. I¡¯ve thought for a moment and the only way is to make use of a few of the towering trees on the side of the swamp. If we make use of the trees¡¯ slender branches and swing out fiercely, we¡¯ll be able to briefly fly over the center of the swamp.¡±

    ¡°However, I can¡¯t promise that the oscition force of the branches will be able to send someone directly to the other side. In addition, you¡¯d only swing through the center of the swamp for a brief moment. I think it¡¯s impossible to just so happen to swing by the Fruit of Dagmar and obtain it whilst under attack from the man-eating nts in such a short amount of time.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s brow remained creased in thought after Trunks said his piece, with a smile breaking out on his face all of a sudden. He stared at the female elf Angelica, all smiles, and spoke to her as gently as a big grey wolf talking to a white rabbit, ¡°Beautiful, cute elf, did you cast wind des on me just now, a magic that belongs to the wind family of magic?¡±

    Pulling the slightly panicked Angelica behind her, Nia looked a bit oddly at Han Shuo, like she was a mother hen protecting a small chick. ¡°Han, are you still begrudging what¡¯s just happened and nning on taking revenge against Angelica? Angelica has a noble status amongst us elves so I suggest that you don¡¯t make trouble for her. In addition, I won¡¯t allow you to do anything to her.¡±

    ¡°Anyone with smiles on his face is no one good, that¡¯s what grandpa told me. I feel very perturbed by his smile, he must not be anything good.¡± Angelica, behind Nia, red at Han Shuo and proimed.

    Shaking his head with a rueful smile, Han Shuo said to Nia, ¡°Just what are you thinking about? I need Angelica to help me with a small favor, if she¡¯s a wind mage.¡±

    Nia let out a sigh of relief after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, turned around to look at Angelica peacefully and said with a smile, ¡°He¡¯s not a bad guy. You were casting wind magic just now, what level wind mage are you?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m only a journeyman mage, so I can¡¯t fly. Don¡¯t tell me to get that fruit, I¡¯ll fall!¡± Angelica squealed as her slender calves wobbled, her body floating into the air.

    She was holding her breath and her tender, small face turned red from effort. She seemed to gather all her strength and took two ferocious steps upwards into the air, then fell down to the ground with a tter. She spread her hands at those assembled and disyed a powerless expression. Her performance just now had been to tell everyone that she truly couldn¡¯t, and that she would fall down like this.

    ¡°Eh, I just need you to cast the journeyman magic ¡®Grim Wind¡¯ in a moment. Was there really a need for you to prove your ineptness?¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t know whether tough or cry as he looked at this bizarre little elf.

    Sitting up abruptly from the ground, Angelica dusted off herself and stuck out her small chest, saying proudly, ¡°So it¡¯s just the Grim Wind spell? I, Angelica, promise to help you. What do you need me to do?¡±

    Trunks and everyone else gathered around Han Shuo at this moment with looks of curiosity, waiting for Han Shuo to respond.

    Han Shuo¡¯s face was solemn as he stared deeply at Angelica, saying lowly, ¡°In a moment, as soon as I leap off from a branch, you must cast the Grim Wind spell at me immediately. Remember that you must cast it when I push off, and be sure to grasp the best timing.¡±

    ¡°Han, are you really nning on doing this? The force from the branch¡¯s velocity won¡¯t be enough to support you to the other side of the swamp. Even with the aid of the Grim Wind spell, it¡¯s still quite unrealistic. In addition, the Grim Wind Spell will only increase your speed in flying away, further decreasing your chances of grabbing the Fruit of Dagmar. I highly rmend finding another way!¡± Trunks frowned as he looked at Han Shuo, attempting to convince him.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo¡¯s expression was resolute as he said to Trunks, ¡°No need, I wouldn¡¯t do so if I wasn¡¯t fully assured of sess. All of you be at ease, I have other methods as well.¡±

    After saying these words, Han Shuo took out a tent amidst everyone¡¯s surprise and shed several times with the Demonyer Edge in his hand. The tent ripped apart, Han Shuo then moved steadily and took out some durable rope to wrap around the tent.

    After a while, Han Shuo stopped his movements and said with a smile, ¡°I¡¯ve created a simple tool. With the aid of this tool and the help of the Grim Wind spell, I am confident that I can pass through this patch of swamp, and under the conditions of slow speed!¡±

    ¡°Han, what kind of strange device is this? You say it can help you cross through the swamp? I really don¡¯t believe it!¡± Aphrodite looked in confusion at the item within Han Shuo¡¯s hand and said in disbelief.

    ¡°This is called a hang glider and it can do it.¡± Han Shuo picked up the simplistic hang glider that he¡¯d modified from a tent and slowly crawled up to the tallest and most thickly grown tree on the side of the swamp beneath everyone¡¯s disbelieving eyes

    ¡°Have you really decided?¡± Although Trunks still didn¡¯t quite believe it, he was unable to prate all of the miraculousness of Han Shuo, and thus he didn¡¯t continue to try to convince him. He only asked for onest time after seeing Han Shuo crawl up the highest part of the tree and grasp the tensile, pliable branch.

    ¡°I¡¯m ready, are you ready Angelica?¡± Han Shuo nodded and asked the beautiful elven maiden, Angelica, in the distance.

    Angelica nodded proudly and said with great confidence, ¡°No problem, you can start!¡±

 Chapter 114: Changes in the swamp

    Chapter 114: Changes in the swamp

    Han Shuo pushed off with all his strength and flew out using the pliable branch, his body drawing an arc through the air. When he returned to his starting point, he stomped down on the branch fiercely with both feet and his body once again flew out like lightning.

    After swinging back and forth like this a few times, the degree to which Han Shuo¡¯s body was swinging out becamerger andrger, and his speed increased further and further as well. The group watched him with astonishment as their hearts fluttered up and down in ordance with Han Shuo¡¯s swinging.

    Just as Han Shuo felt that the speed of his swinging had reached its maximum, he called out loudly, ¡°Angelica, prepare the Grim Wind spell!¡±

    Han Shuo suddenly let go and flew out towards the other side of the swamp under the enormous momentum behind his motions. At the same time that he left the branch, the simple hang glider that he¡¯d stored back in his space ring reappeared. It was as if a pair of wings had suddenly appeared beneath Han Shuo as he held them beneath his body.

    At the same time, Angelica confidently chanted the Grim Wind spell, and a violent gust started blowing where Han Shuo was, propelling him forward as he hovered over the swamp.

    If it hadn¡¯t been for the hang glider, Han Shuo would¡¯ve surely flown out like lightning, and possibly fallen into the swamp like lightning as well, but with the aid of the hang glider and the movement afforded by the Grim Wind spell, it allowed Han Shuo to magically, but slowly float towards the center of the swamp with an unhurried, unrushed pace.

    ¡°Oh, my gosh, he¡¯s really doing it!¡± Nia eximed in surprise with a look of incredulity on her face.

    The other observers were equally astonished, with only Trunks maintaining his calm as he said lowly with a look of gravity, ¡°The toxic gas within the center of the swamp is the heaviest, and the man-eating nts there are equally difficult to manage. It won¡¯t be that easy to grab the Fruit within a short period of time. I hope he seeds as he wishes.¡±

    Everyone finally remembered Han Shuo¡¯s goal when they heard Trunks¡¯ words. He wasn¡¯t simply traveling across the swamp, but the most important thing was that he needed to gain the Fruit of Dagmar. After Trunks¡¯ ssh of cold water, everyone¡¯s expression grew heavy once again.

    As he slowly approached the center of the swamp, Han Shuo focused his concentration and tightly gripped the Demonyer Edge within his hand. His eyes however, were tightly closed as he observed all abnormalities within the center through the original demons.

    Finally, the Demonyer flew out Han Shuo¡¯s hand with an ear piercing whistle. The man-eating nts all extended their life reaping branches and twigs as soon as the Demonyer Edge entered the swamp, attempting to entangle it within the swamp. However, the Demonyer Edge¡¯s keenness didn¡¯t let Han Shuo down. Large patches of the branches and leaves were sent falling into the swamp under the Demonyer Edge¡¯s dance.

    A patch of man-eating nts had already been cleared away in the span of an instant. As Han Shuo approached with his hang glider, the Demonyer Edge hewed through everything ording to Han Shuo¡¯s will as expressed through the Demonyer Edge. In this moment, Han Shuo, with his eyes closed, seemed to have reached some ord with the Demonyer Edge, as if he had suddenly be that indestructible de.

    The three original demons appeared in that area at the same time, observing all changes around the Fruit of Dagmar from three different directions. As Han Shuo slowly approached, the patch of man-eating nts broke apart beneath the Demonyer Edge¡¯s shing.

    When Han Shuo was a few meters away from the center, Han Shuo suddenly opened his previously firmly closed eyes. His body nted at the same time as his hand grabbed one of the ropes, fully focusing his eyes on the Fruit of Dagmar. He paid no heed to the man-eating nts around him, including the slowly spreading but faint, poisonous gas, as if none of these dangers existed.

    The people observing around the outside were also quite nervous right now. Angelica¡¯s breathing was increasingly heavy and her face was red with excitement, as if thinking that this situation was quite thrilling.

    Whoosh the rope suddenly flew out, with the Demonyer Edge that had been ripping through the man-eating nts suddenly flying upside down towards Han Shuo. Under Han Shuo¡¯s will, the end of the Demonyer Edge brought the rope with it as it flew to loop around the Fruit of Dagmar.

    A disgusting stench suddenly permeated Han Shuo¡¯s surroundings, making his chest suddenly feel tight in that moment. His mind was briefly disoriented, and the Demonyer Edge, that had been making for the Fruit of Dagmar, suddenly descended, directionless, as Han Shuo lost his bearings.

    ¡°Be careful, hang on!¡± Aphrodite suddenly called out loudly from the shore as she reminded Han Shuo to keep his concentration focused.

    His magical yuan automatically flowing to his chest, slowly removing the heaviness in his chest wherever the miraculous magical yuan passed through. His slightly dizzy mind finally stabilized. As his thoughts moved, the Demonyer Edge, that had been about to sink into the swamp, suddenly emitted a shrill scream, its sharp edge trembled a few times as it flew like lightning towards the Fruit of Dagmar, bringing the rope with it andnding around the neck shaped part of the Fruit of Dagmar.

    Han Shuo took a deep breath in and tugged sharply with his hand, the rope pulled tight on the man-eating nt. Havingpleted its mission, the Demonyer Edge churned as branches and leaves were cut off, with multicolored liquid flowing out of some of the leaves.

    Just as everyone¡¯s hearts were in their throats, the Fruit of Dagmar slowly left the swamp, little by little. Han Shuo increased his strength and then, with the aid of the Demonyer Edge, cut off the Fruit of Dagmar from the waist. Han Shuo then abruptly lifted up and the Fruit of Dagmar came flying out of the swamp, along with the neck and arm-shaped portion of the nt.

    Slowly exerting force and withdrawing the Fruit of Dagmar, the hang glider enabled Han Shuo to fly through the center of the swamp and slowly travel to the other side.

    ¡°Rob them!¡± A shrill yell suddenly rang out at this moment, following shortly thereafter by four arrows, zing with fire, flying directly at Han Shuo¡¯s body. At the same time, the sludge on the ground suddenly formed into an enormous hand and grabbed at Han Shuo¡¯s legs.

    ¡°Oh, damnit, enemies!¡± On the shore, Trunks suddenly cursed and yelled loudly.

    Up in the hang glider, Han Shuo was only ten or so meters from shore. The threat from the sludge formed hand proved to be of greatest threat, forcing Han Shuo to call back the Demonyer Edge to handle the great hand.

    The four burning arrows would obviously not be that easily handled. Han Shuo had no ce to exert force from in the hang glider and thus appeared a bit bedraggled. He blocked two arrows with some difficulty, with one of them still connecting with Han Shuo¡¯s calf, bringing him a fiery pain.

    Han Shuo could only slightly divert the other arrow¡¯s direction, but it stillnded on the bottom part of the hand glider and caused to it start burning.

    ¡°Be careful, he¡¯s making it to shore!¡± More than ten people stood on the other side of the swamp, all of them waiting in readiness for Han Shuo to make it over. Their outfits seemed to indicate that they were mercenaries or some sort of private troops. All sorts of professions were mixed in.

    Boundless fury suffusing his heart, Han Shuo itched to kill every single person standing on the other shore at this moment. These people looked like they had arrived on the other side of shore by coincidence. Because Trunks and the others were separated by the entire swamp, and they¡¯d been too focused on Han Shuo, their alertness had greatly decreased and thus hadn¡¯t discovered this group which resulted in them sessfully ambushing Han Shuo.

    The Fruit of Dagmar was finally stored within Han Shuo¡¯s space ring during this entire process. He was in great pain now that a ming arrow was stuck to his calf. The hang glider was also slowly burning and was crisping the sleeves of Han Shuo¡¯s shirt, forcing Han Shuo to endure the agony of being burned.

    These people were ruthless alright. As the burning Han Shuo and hang glider drifted inexorably towards the ground, some of them fitted another round of crossbow bolts into their crossbows and attempted to shoot Han Shuo dead in mid air.

    The manticore¡¯s roars suddenly rang out at this time. Han Shuo then saw a furious Trunks with killing intent shooting out of him dash towards this group of people with an upraised sword. Not too far away, Aphrodite and the others were also extremely enraged and quickly approached the other shore.

    At this time, thanks to the efforts of the Demonyer Edge, the sludge hand, that was likely to have been formed by an earth mage had returned to a peaceful state. When the whistling sounds from arrows rang out, the Demonyer Edge had returned to Han Shuo¡¯s side and helped pulverize the crossbow bolts.

    Bearing the agonizing pain, vast swathes of his arms being burned, and crisp hair, Han Shuo finallynded onto the other shore with the hotly ming hang glider with soul searing hatred.

    When Han Shuo yanked out the arrow stuck in his calf, he stood up resolutely with a scarily grimacing expression. A pair of proud, cold, and incredibly dangerous eyes shot towards these ambushers.

 Chapter 115: Demon Han Shuo

    Chapter 115: Demon Han Shuo

    ¡°Who are you?¡± Trunks first heaved a sigh of relief when he saw that Han Shuo had arrived safely, then fixed these strangers with a cold eye.

    ¡°Don¡¯t bother with who we are. Leave behind the Medusa¡¯s core and blood as well as the Fruit of Dagmar. You can keep your lives and leave.¡± One of the adept mages held a magic staff in his hands and said with a sinister face.

    ¡°Leon, we can¡¯t let them off that easily. Heh heh, look, three beautiful girls havee running. We haven¡¯t had girls in so long. Those three girls have to stay behind for our enjoyment as well.¡± Another senior swordsman, ferociously built like a gori, shouldered a broadsword asrge as his body on his shoulder, as he leered with ascivious grin.

    ¡°Angelo, your words make some of sense. I didn¡¯t see the three chits just now. Haha, leave the three beautifuldies behind and all your belongings. Strength is above all within the Dark Forest, you can get the hell out now if you want to live.¡± The adept mage Leon also looked at Nia, Aphrodite, and Angelica running in from the distance with great interest and spoke with a merry twinkle.

    There were more than ten people in this group, with not only mages and swordsmen, but also archers, priests, and thieves. They were all well experienced and possessed umon strength.

    ¡°What, to the likes of you?¡± Han Shuo had walked over from the distance by now. He was suffused with a dangerous presence that he wasn¡¯t bothering to suppress. Having been burnt, Han Shuo appeared quite grim and horrifying. Everyone felt a bit shocked and fearful as he drew closer, step by step.

    ¡°Han, are you alright?¡± Trunks couldn¡¯t help but immediately ask when he saw Han Shuo¡¯s outrageous appearance.

    ¡°This ugly thing is an eyesore. He clings rather stubbornly to life and hasn¡¯t died yet. Brothers, take him out first!¡± Angelo called out with a cold face and spoke directly.

    Gordon, Aphrodite, and the others had finally made it over. Han Shuo didn¡¯t say another word as his body flew out quickly and made directly for Angelo.

    A faint, ck demonic mist slowly exuded from Han Shuo¡¯s body. His desire to kill and anger reaching unheralded heights, it caused abnormalities in Han Shuo¡¯s unstable molded spirit realm mentality. The ck demonic qi leaked out due to the effects of the magical yuan as Han Shuo sank into a stupor. There were only the violent emotions of bloodlust and destruction left within his heart as his eyes turned a frightening ghastly white, with no ck pupils left.

    ¡°This, this kid is a bit strange. Everyone be careful.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s current demonic appearance gave Angelo a fright and thetter immediately called out.

    Although Trunks and the others couldn¡¯t see Han Shuo¡¯s expression from where they stood, they could also feel that something wasn¡¯t quite right with Han Shuo at the moment. Tendrils of ck demonic qi interspersed with frightening, evil presence arose from Han Shuo¡¯s body. This kind of presence made one feel terror arise from the depths of their hearts.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go and help Han kill these people who wanted to take advantage of him when he was in trouble!¡± Gordon roared out and took the lead in dashing out. When everyone behind him saw Gordon make his move, they also started mobilizing without a bit of doubt.

    Only Angelica stood there, a bit at a loss of what to do with herself. She spoke to Nia, who was seeking arge tree for cover, ¡°Hey, sister Nia, should I help?¡±

    ¡°Just protect yourself! It¡¯s too dangerous right now.¡± Nia called back impatiently as she¡¯d already notched an arrow into her bowstring and taken aim at a human archer in the distance.

    A forlorn and deste wail permeated the entire surroundings in the span of an instant, as if it was the desperate wail of a demon residing in the depths of hell. Everyone¡¯s hearts trembled and their skin was mmy, utterly shocked by this bizarre, soul-wrenching, shrill scream. They looked around frantically to try to identify the source of the sound.

    ¡°The sound¡¯sing from that kid!¡± Angelo was horrified as the veins on his forehead jumped, shouting as he looked at the swiftly approaching Han Shuo.

    Everyone finally noticed that the source of the sound, as he shouted out this warning, was the Demonyer Edge that was flying close to Han Shuo. A thick, demonic qi was bubbling up from the de of the Demonyer Edge and encircled Han Shuo¡¯s body. The ck demonic qi that circled around it danced like a demon that swallowed everything, causing others to feel an exceedingly evil visual impact.

    ¡°Kill him, kill him first!¡± Angelo was truly panicking internally now. An exceeding sense of difort rose in his heart as he suddenly started hollering.

    Everyone could see Han Shuo¡¯s peculiarities now, even Trunks, baptized by countless battles, felt an internal chill when he saw Han Shuo¡¯s current condition. He couldn¡¯t understand just what had happened to Han Shuo. The enemies were even more frightened and could only think of destroying this unknown danger.

    Suddenly, several violent magical attacks and bolts from crossbows flew through the air, shooting towards Han Shuo. Even Trunks would¡¯ve found it difficult to deal with such ferocious attacks.

    However, the currently berserking Han Shuo emitted a low roar, like that of a wild beast, and pushed off with both feet, his body seeming to actually fly a few feet through the air andpletely sidestepped the attacks, shooting directly towards Angelo. In the area where Han Shuo had just pushed off, several crossbow bolts and magical attacks from the enemynded around a pair of sunken footprints.

    ¡°Damn it!¡± Angelo frowned and suddenly discovered that the frightfully grimacing Han Shuo was heading directly towards him. There was only the adept mage Leon next to him and thetter would be of no use at all. He could only raise his broadsword and strike a good stance, ready to give Han Shuo a painful blow.

    The Demonyer Edge, that had been orbiting Han Shuo, magically flew out with a soul entrancing whistle, making directly for Angelo, like a demon to its food. His heart chilling, Angelo suddenly exerted force as dark green fighting aura surged out of the broadsword in his hand, forming a cross and striking at the Demonyer Edge that was descending through the air.

    A metallic shing sound abruptly spread from where the Demonyer Edge and Angelo¡¯s weapon made contact. After a round of howling, a crack actually appeared in the Demonyer Edge as it swung to the side. Whilst Angelo was stricken in shock, Han Shuo¡¯s body descended from the air and crashed into Angelo with a loud bang.

    A biting scream emitted from Angelo¡¯s mouth as painful keens sounded from a person who had just been arrogantly domineering. Han Shuo descended like a demon had possessed him and straddled Angelo¡¯s body, the Demonyer Edge ripping at Angelo¡¯s body.

    Angelo fought back, his blows interspersed with fighting aura. However, Han Shou had no reaction when the attacks struck his body, and only responded with even more ferocious attacks. His palms seemed to have be sharp weapons as he ripped off Angelo¡¯s ears and sank his nose into his cheeks. The flesh within Angelo¡¯s eyes became a blurry, bloody mess, his eyes having already exploded into sma and were leaking out in a gooey mess. Large swathes of flesh and skin on Angelo¡¯s chest were being ripped out beneath Han Shuo¡¯s crazy tearing. The scene made everyone else¡¯s scalp go numb.

    ¡°Save me, save me!¡± At this moment, Angelo¡¯s features had been obliterated and he looked even more frightening than Han Shuo. Only his mouth was left and able to voice desperate cries for help.

    Having sunk into a demonic stupor, only the urges of bloodlust and destruction remained within his heart. There was no more of the usual cidity and restraint that could be normally found. He was a bit irritated by Angelo¡¯s calls and swung a fist down at Angelo¡¯s mouth. The sound of teeth breaking rang out as Angelo moaned feebly and spat out bits of teeth.

    ¡°Oh, my gosh. How did we enrage such a madman?!¡± Leon, not too far in the distance, was getting an eyeful of Han Shuo¡¯s brutal torture. A cold fear grew in his heart as his body trembled and he gave an involuntary scream.

    Blow after blow from Han Shuo¡¯s fistsnded on Angelo¡¯s cheeks and neck. He¡¯d been moaning continuously before, but his chest now faced upwards and his cheek was against the ground. This posture noticeably indicated that his neck had already been broken and Angelo was long without breath.

    ¡°What¡¯s happened to Han? Why is he being so brutal?¡± Aphrodite and the others had been about ready to attack the other side when they were all scared senseless, even forgetting to raise their hands against the enemies and could only stand there dumbly, watching Han Shuo continue his violence.

    ¡°Angelica, stay there and don¡¯te any nearer!¡± Nia saw that Angelica was curious and wanted toe over to check things out, and so suddenly yelled out loudly to prevent her from drawing close. She wasn¡¯t willing to let Angelica see such a bloody scene.

    ¡°Don¡¯t let them get away! Although Han is a bit out of sorts right now, we should still assist him.¡± Although Trunks had killed his share of people, Han Shuo¡¯s current violence also made his scalp numb. However, Trunks was someone who¡¯d weathered strong winds and big waves as well and understood what should be done at this point.

    Trunks rushed over with his manticore, milky-white aura ring out from his longsword and immediately killed a robber and an archer. His milky-white aura represented his identity as a swordmaster, and the appearance of the manticore indicated Trunks¡¯ identity.

    It was only now that these people finally realized that they had gotten entangled with Trunks of the Dark Forest, and that Leon cursed and said in pain, ¡°Damn it, why were we so unlucky? It¡¯s enough that we met one crazy madman, but now we¡¯ve run into this notable harbinger of bad luck.¡±

    ¡°Damn it, why is it Trunks?! Everyone run!¡± Another swordsman also cried out with some trepidation.

    The group of more than ten, which contained senior swordsmen and adept mages, as well as all sorts of other professions, actually had more than enough strength to defeat them. Even with Trunks on the other side, Han Shuo¡¯s group may not have full confidence in defeating them, but the other side was overwhelmed by Trunks¡¯ reputation and Han Shuo¡¯s outrageous reactions, and thus made the decision to retreat.

    ¡°You stay here, I¡¯ll chase after them.¡± Seeing that Aphrodite and the others were attempting to follow them, Trunks suddenly called out loudly.

    His voice had just sounded and didn¡¯t even have the time to taper off when the berserk Han Shuo suddenly leapt up from Angelo¡¯s corpse and dashed out with the Demonyer Edge, making for Leon, fleeing towards safety, at the speed of lightning.

    ¡°That demon¡¯s catching up to us. Leon, how did you decide on picking on them? You¡¯ve doomed us all!¡± One swordsman turned his head back to see Han Shuo appear andined bitterly to Leon.

    ¡°Everyone split up. Although I can¡¯t tell how strong that demon is, he absolutely wouldn¡¯t be much weaker than Trunks given that he could kill Angelo just like that. You better hope that you don¡¯t run into him, or you¡¯ll be tortured to death.¡± Leon immediately changed direction after calling out these orders.

    Everyone had also witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s brutality just now and didn¡¯t need to be reminded by Leon. All of them suddenly changed direction and formed groups of two or three, splitting off into several directions to escape from the premises. Although they¡¯d heard of Trunks¡¯ might, they also knew that Trunks had never killed someone so brutally. Therefore, they¡¯d rather bump into Trunks and didn¡¯t want to run into the equally unknown, but much more brutal demonic Han Shuo.

    Whoosh sounded out as Han Shuo appeared and rushed ahead without stopping. He finally caught up with two journeyman swordsmen and one thunder adept mage in front of a river.

    When the three of them saw that the person ahead of them was Han Shuo, they all disyed expressions of fear. Their bodies all trembled uncontrobly, and when they saw that Han Shuo was swiftly approaching, the adept mage finally roared, ¡°Damn it, let¡¯s fight him head to head or we¡¯ll all be tortured to death.¡±

    After the thunder mage had spoken, he recited a string of incantations and five bolts of lightning, like traversing dragons, appeared out of thin air, snaking towards Han Shuo. The two journeyman swordsmen gripped their longswords and were a bit nervous due to fear.

    It wasn¡¯t until Han Shuo had rushed in front of the two of them and evaded three lightning bolts, but was rendered greatly charred by two more, that the two swordsmen and mage were overjoyed. The swordsmen intended on killing Han Shuo after the mage had done his bit.

    It was a pity that they had no way of knowing how strong and durable Han Shuo¡¯s body was. Although his body had injuries upon injuries after taking two bolts of lightning, he felt no pain in his enraged mental state. He crashed into the swordsmen and mage, immediately giving rise to a struggle between life and death.

    After taking a few breaths in, he took two bolts of light from the swordsmen¡¯s swords based purely on an indomitable will. He killed the thunder adept mage, who had miscalcting Han Shuo¡¯s bodily strength and used thest bit of his magical yuan to severely injure another swordsman. His body finally thoroughly lost all strength and he sank down listlessly.

    ¡°He¡¯s done for, help me kill him, hurry!¡± The heavily injured journeyman swordsmany in a puddle of blood and called out to the other fellow.

 Chapter 116: Iâ€™m actually a necromancer!

    Chapter 116: I¡¯m actually a necromancer!

    ¡°Hurry, kill that madman!¡± The fallen swordsman screamed out.

    ¡°Shut up!¡± The swordsman, who had been walking towards Han Shuo, suddenly turned his head and stared coldly at the man behind him, saying with a stilted voice, ¡°I¡¯ll kill you too if you keep yelling nonsense.¡±

    The person on the ground suddenly froze and used apletely foreign look to look at hispanion. He asked in confusion, ¡°Fronze, what¡¯s wrong with you?¡±

    Fronze, who¡¯d pulled his sword out and was walking towards Han Shuo, had a look of excitement and greed on his face. His gaze was only focused on Han Shuo as he opened his mouth to say with excitement, ¡°I¡¯m going to be rich. You better not get in my way, or I¡¯ll let you die along with him.¡±

    The person on the ground finally understood what was going on now. Fronze had now been drowned by his greedy heart and had no thoughts for hispanions in his mind now. What was left was just his desire to strike it rich.

    His brain prickling with pain, Han Shuo was slowly awakening from his demonic state, after experiencing a short period of haziness, Han Shuo remembered everything that had happened just now and immediately understood the urgency of the situation.

    ¡°The trophies that were harvested from the Medusa and the Fruit of Dagmar will all belong to me very soon. Go to hell you evil, crazy madman!¡± Fronze¡¯s gaze locked tightly onto the space ring on Han Shuo¡¯s hand as he said with a dark look of excitement.

    Fronze raised the longsword in his hand as soon as he¡¯d said this and stabbed it towards thepletely listless Han Shuo. It looked like Fronze nned on taking Han Shuo¡¯s life first, before taking the space ring to analyze the contents inside.

    Han Shuo swiftly chanted an incantation, and a bone dagger abruptly blocked the sword in Fronze¡¯s hand when it stabbed towards Han Shuo¡¯s chest.

    ¡°Actually, I¡¯m a necromancer!¡± Han Shuo looked bizarrely and muttered coldly at the shocked Fronze.

    The bone dagger pushed forward as Fronze backed up involuntarily, startled. A little skeleton, wearing an enormous eye patch over one eye, swiftly approached Fronze with its bone dagger. The heroic little skeleton killed the previously injuredbatant amidst a wave of metallic ngs.

    The other heavily injured swordsman, who had been calling out for Han Shuo¡¯s death earlier, naturally met the same fate. The little skeleton also killed him when the order was given.

    Starting from the moment that this group of people had appeared, they¡¯d used base and despicable actions to deal with Han Shuo. They hadn¡¯t shown any kindness through it all. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t a naive innocent child and naturally understood that an eye for an eye was the most appropriate downfall for them.

    The appearance of the little skeleton saved Han Shuo from impending death, andpletely upended the original situation. The bone dagger wielding little skeleton adeptly maneuvered the three bodies and collected all the valuables from their corpses, helping Han Shuo store them within his space ring.

    Of the three, only the thunder adept mage had some valuable belongings, which included an expensive magic staff. There was also a few hundred gold coins as well as two or three level three and four magical creature cores. Apart from a subpar quality sword and some broken bits of gold coins, the two swordsmen had nothing else on them.

    Sprawled listlessly on the ground, Han Shuo¡¯s reasoning had immediately sunk into the midst of violent bloodlust when he entered the demonic trance. It was impossible for him to wake up before the magical yuan in his body and energy had been exhausted. This time, not only had Han Shuo fully expended his magical yuan after entering the trance, but his body had also suffered from various sorts of injuries. This was one of the times he¡¯d been most heavily injured. He was even worse off than Odysseus, who¡¯d suffered a blow from the manticore.

    It was a good thing that Han Shuo¡¯s tenacity was something that Odysseus couldn¡¯t hope to measure up to. Therefore, although Han Shuo was as hideous as a ghoul right now, and his body was so weak that it couldn¡¯t support him standing, Han Shuo still understood the condition of his body within his heart and knew that even without the aid of any medicine, he would be able to recover within a short period of time.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t revealed his identity as a necromancer all along because concealing some of his strengths would be able to save his life in critical moments. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that he¡¯d still had some mental strength he could use when facing his attackers this time, he¡¯d be hard pressed to escape death. If these people had known that Han Shuo was also a necromancer beforehand, then the conclusion of the battle would likely not have reached this current level.

    He chanted out another incantation as several zombies and skeletal warriors suddenly appeared around him. They raised their weapons and surrounded Han Shuo, nning on handling any possible changes that might happen.

    After waking up, Han Shuo immediately connected with the original demons and confirmed through them that Trunks, Aphrodite, and the others had already regrouped and were searching for him in this area.

    Now that Han Shuo was incredibly weak, he couldn¡¯t move and couldn¡¯t speak loudly, but hadrge amounts of dark creatures that he could make use of. After giving his order, the little skeleton created arge disturbance and sent shrubbery and grass flying everywhere.

    ¡°There¡¯s movement over there, let¡¯s go check it out!¡± Trunks¡¯ ears were quite sensitive and immediately detected the disturbance. After pointing out its direction to the others, he brought the group to rush towards where Han Shuo was.

    Having just summoned those dark creatures, Han Shuo immediately sent them back to the other dimension with his mental strength again. Trunks and the others arrived in front of Han Shuo after a short while, with Trunks leading the group.

    ¡°What happened to you?¡± Trunks eximed and immediately ran towards Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo looked incredibly bedraggled as he was scorched and charred all over. Many parts of his body had been burnt by huge mes, and his entire face was a ckened mess. It was impressive that Trunks could still recognize Han Shuo.

    ¡°I¡¯m fine, just didn¡¯t think I¡¯d meet this group of people halfway through.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s voice was a bit feeble as he said softly afterughing ruefully.

    ¡°It¡¯s my oversight this time. I was surprised by your unconventional tactics and let down my guard for a moment. That¡¯s why this situation developed, but it¡¯s not a big deal, things like this happen everyday in the Dark Forest. I¡¯ve long since grown used to it all.¡± Trunks breathed a sigh of relief upon seeing that Han Shuo was still alive and shrugged his shoulders.

    Gordon and the others all asked after Han Shuo, with Aphrodite saying afterwards, ¡°Looks like things are as Caspian said, Trunks is a good man. At least Trunks only wanted the spoils of battle from the twin headed dragonst time and didn¡¯t attack us from the start. He also didn¡¯t say he wanted to kill us or have ideas to dirty us. I finally understand Caspian¡¯s words afterparing Trunks to these people, I thought he was joking at first.¡±

    Everyone recalled their encounter with Trunks after Aphrodite¡¯s words and then thought of what these people had done. They suddenly felt that Trunks was rather kind.

    ¡°I¡¯m actually not as you think and I¡¯ve been constantly changing. When I first arrived in the Dark Forest, I was once as simple as all of you and once trusted thepanions by my side, but after continuous operations, I came to the realization that apart from myself, I can trust no one within the Dark Forest. The dangers that exists everywhere mean you must harden your heart to face everything around you. Otherwise, whenever you possess emotions of kindness or weakness, it may very well lead to your death.¡± Trunks shrugged and exined dashingly.

    ¡°What happened to you just now?¡± Nia asked Han Shuo with some trepidation after hesitating for a moment.

    Everyone¡¯s gazes flicked to focus on Han Shuo after Nia¡¯s question, seemingly waiting for a reasonable exnation from Han Shuo. After all, his methods just now had been a tad ruthless. His expression had been greatly different from usual, giving rise to these questions from those assembled.

    ¡°The martial arts technique I¡¯m training causes me to sometimes sink into a frightening stupor when I suffer from a strong shock because it¡¯s not yet fullyplete. I¡¯m very sorry that I¡¯ve caused concern for all of you because I was so enraged earlier. I don¡¯t wish to be like this either, but this isn¡¯t something that I can currently control.¡± Han Shuo was unable to exin anything to them with regards to sinking into a demonic stupor and could only exin it in this fashion.

    ¡°So that¡¯s the case. You were very scary just now. If you can¡¯t control this type of martial arts technique, then you should give it up while you still can. If you continue on this way, then that might give rise to unpredictable consequences.¡± Aphrodite looked sincerely at Han Shuo and spoke a few words of concern.

    Han Shuo naturally paid no heed to her persuasion. If sinking into a demonic trance was something that could be controlled, then it wouldn¡¯t be called a trance. A demonic trance like that wouldn¡¯t happen so easily. It would only ur when a practitioner reached a certain realm, and would be triggered because of a particr mental state as well as other reasons. To Han Shuo, he could only remain vignt against this urrence, but wouldn¡¯t give up training demonic magic just because of this.

    ¡°Alright, we should get Han away from here first and discuss other matters after reconvening with Odysseus.¡± Trunks first stared a bit strangely at Han Shuo and then spoke to Aphrodite.

    Trunks¡¯ suggestion was met with unanimous approval. Gordon and the other two swordsmen made a simple stretcher, raised Han Shuo up, and walked towards where Odysseus was.

    Along the way, Han Shuo learned from Trunks that this group of people seemed to be the personal guards of the McGrady Guild. Trunks had kept chasing them and killed many until he saw that they¡¯d joined up with more guards. He detected that the other side¡¯s strength wasn¡¯t something that he could withstand alone, and doubled back because he was concerned about Han Shuo¡¯s condition.

    Han Shuo had once heard of the McGrady Guild as well. It was a merchant guild that had a simr level of power to the Boozt Merchant Guild. Phoebe had fretted a bit over this guild previously. It was said that this guild specialized in the business of smuggling and sold all sorts of contraband between various countries. It had tight rtions with the nobles of all countries.

    The McGrady Guild didn¡¯t belong to the Lancelot Empire, but rather belonged to the Brut Merchant Alliance that had been founded by mercenaries and merchants. The reputation of the Brut Merchant Alliance wasn¡¯t much and they had only recently started operations within the Lancelot Empire. They¡¯d caused a slight bit of loss to Phoebe¡¯s Boozt Merchant Guild.

    The injuries on Han Shuo¡¯s body were so severe that they could be deemed too ghastly to look at. If such heavy injuries were on any other person and they were subjected to the hardships of making fast time on the road, they would¡¯ve surely cried out, but after half an hour of being jolted on the bumpy road, Han Shuoy on the stretcher with simply dressed wounds and never made a sound. This made everyone greatly admire Han Shuo¡¯s astounding ability to endure pain.

    Not only was this the case, Han Shuo actually had the strength to continuously talk to Trunks and ask him for more information regarding the McGrady Guild. It was as if the grave injuries on his body, which caused the others¡¯ scalp to tingle with numbness whenever they looked at him, weren¡¯t something that he was enduring at all.

    When everyone jointly dug out a cave and moved aside the boulders blocking the entrance, Gordon walked out with a wide, lopsided grin. Gordon finally couldn¡¯t hold it in and looked at Han Shuo with a look of insatiable curiosity and asked the question that was on everyone¡¯s minds, ¡°Han, what kind of monster are you?¡±

    Laughing involuntarily, Han Shuo¡¯s tolerance of pain and agony had already reached monstrous levels. He truly didn¡¯t know how to respond to Gordon¡¯s question. He could onlyugh ruefully and shake his head, saying, ¡°I¡¯m just a bit more thick-skulled than you guys.¡±

    When Odysseus came out and Nia recounted all that had happened, the greatly recovered Odysseus listened with a pounding heart and was incredibly astonished by everyone¡¯s encounters.

    ¡°Nia, I think I should go back now. My grandpa must be getting worried.¡± Angelica realized that no one was paying attention to her here, tilted her head, and thought for a moment, then spoke up in her boredom.

    Nia smacked her forehead in sudden realization when she heard Angelica¡¯s words, ¡°I almost forgot about you. Let¡¯s go, I¡¯ll take you to your grandpa¡¯s. It¡¯s too dangerous in the Dark Forest, so don¡¯t randomly run around next time.¡±

    Nodding, Angelica smiled sweetly and bid everyone farewell. When she got to Han Shuo, she waved her hand and said, ¡°Goodbye bad guy!¡±

    ¡°Nia, will you be alright just by yourself? Gordon, you apany her.¡± Odysseus frowned and said to Nia.

    Shaking her head, Nia smiled, ¡°No need, captain. Her grandpa is just nearby. I¡¯ll yell if there¡¯s a situation.¡±

    She left swiftly with Angelica after speaking and vanished out of sight within a blink of an eye.

    ¡°I think my promise to you has been fulfilled, and that it¡¯s time for me to leave.¡± Trunks looked at Han Shuo and opened his mouth to speak to him.

    After spending a certain amount of time together, Han Shou had discovered that Trunks wasn¡¯t as bad as outside rumors made him out to be. At least, his actions during this struggle didn¡¯t make Han Shuo feel ufortable. Han Shuo had even unconsciously started viewing Trunks as one of hispanions, and was a bit unused to the situation now that he heard that Trunks was going to leave immediately.

    ¡°Be a good Samaritan to the end. Look at how heavily injured I am now! You should stay and take care of me for a little bit at least. It won¡¯t be toote for you to leave once we¡¯re clear of this dangerous territory!¡± Han Shuo looked at Trunks as he joked.

    ¡°This wasn¡¯t what I promised you before. To be honest, our agreement should¡¯ve terminated ever since you had the Fruit in hand. Helping you against enemies afterwards was already extra service. Don¡¯t be too greedy!¡±

    ¡°Look at me being injured now and Odysseus not being able to move. It¡¯ll be quite difficult for the rest of the group to walk safe and sound out of this dangerous area. I don¡¯t think you¡¯d be so cruel hearted as to just leave us, right?¡±

    Trunks was silent for a while after these words and finally opened his mouth to say, ¡°How about this Han, promise me one thing and I¡¯ll protect you guys and help to get you to a rtively safer area.¡±

    ¡°What thing?¡± Han Shuo was startled as he asked Trunks.

    ¡°I won¡¯t say what it is for now, but just remember that you promised me.¡±

    ¡°Aren¡¯t you afraid that I¡¯ll renege on my word? Heh heh, I¡¯m not a person of my word!¡±

    ¡°I believe you!¡± Trunks looks deeply into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes as he carefully pronounced each word.

    Han Shuo suddenly quieted down and exchanged a look with Trunks. Although he was still grinning cheekily, he nodded and responded, ¡°Alright, I promise you!¡±

    Odysseus looked at the two with a look of gratification, suddenly feeling in this moment that these two people were simr in many ways. They both had mysterious origins and were both strong. Their personalities were simr in that they were calm andposed when the unexpected happened, and they showed no hesitation when they should make a move.

    Just as Odysseus was staring at Han Shuo, Han Shuo too was looking at Odysseus. He thought for a moment and said to Odysseus, ¡°You ventured into the Dark Forest this time for the Fruit of Dagmar. I know that you had no high hopes originally and didn¡¯t seem to value the Fruit as much as I did. As friends, I¡¯d like to ask you Odysseus, do you really need the Fruit of Dagmar?¡±

    ¡°Not really. Our main goal in entering the Dark Forest was to increase our strength. Of course, if we were lucky, we would also gain some items of value. I think by now, we¡¯vepletely attained our wishes. The Fruit of Dagmar was just a vague goal, we didn¡¯t think that we¡¯d really be able to acquire it. Normal people go mad if they eat this fruit so we have no use for it. We¡¯ve only lightly promised someone that we woulde and try our luck.¡± Odysseus also exined seriously when he saw Han Shuo¡¯s face full of gravity. He then looked at Han Shuo with befuddlement, ¡°Han, what are you asking this for?¡±

    Breathing out in relief, Han Shuo smiled and nodded his head, saying, ¡°Because I want to im the Fruit of Dagmar for myself. The martial arts technique I¡¯m training in confuses the mind like I mentioned. I can improve this condition with the Fruit of Dagmar, so if you don¡¯t really need them, I¡¯d like to keep all three for myself, but I canpensate you with gold coins!¡±

    ¡°Then take it all for yourself, heh heh. We¡¯ve already received too much. You¡¯ve given us the twin headed dragon and Medusa core. These will be enough to trade for gold coins. If you need the Fruit of Dagmar, then take all of them. There will be less meaning in all of this if you talk any more about reimbursement.¡± Odysseus smiled dashingly and said sincerely to Han Shuo.

    Aphrodite, Gordon, and the others all indicated for Han Shuo not to stand on ceremony and said that they didn¡¯t really need the Fruit of Dagmar.

    ¡°Then alright, I won¡¯t hold back then.¡± Han Shuo really did need the Fruit of Dagmar in the demonic realm of ¡°molded spirit¡± and thus he didn¡¯t make any more hypocritical protestations. He epted decisively and happily.

    In the next couple of days, the group traveled back on their original path, with Han Shuo¡¯s original demons scouting the way and under Trunks¡¯ protection. They nned on leaving the depths of the Dark Forest as soon as possible.

    Han Shuo had originally been so weak, that he had to rely on others carrying him around. He could actually get down from the litter after a few days. A pair of slender arms and pristine as jade cheeks were revealed after the old skin had scabbed over and shed from his originally severely burned arms and cheeks. There wasn¡¯t the slightest traces of burns to be found.

    The burned parts of his body and charred bits of his hair also returned to normal after a few days. The miraculousness of this made Odysseus and the others once again wonder, ¡°What kind of monster are you?¡±

    His magical yuan also recovering swiftly, Han Shuo carefully put away the Fruit of Dagmar during this process. He nned on consuming them when he was quietly alone after returning to the cemetery of death. The injuries within his body also recovered speedily with the cirction of the magical yuan. Han Shuo¡¯s injuries quickly healed with the passage of each day.

    On this day, Han Shuo¡¯s original demons detected the passage of arge group of people in the distance traveling with earth dragons. He discovered the adept mage Leon within this group and suddenly discovered that these people were part of the McGrady Guild.

    Counting the days and the distance they¡¯d traveled, Han Shuo discovered that they were nearing the area where the forest trolls resided. He suddenly remembered those renowned robbers and viins were still waiting for instructions from their great Datara. Connecting the dots to those McGrady Guild guards and the despicable acts they¡¯dmitted against him, a slightly chilly and cruel smile grew involuntarily on Han Shuo¡¯s lips.

 Chapter 117: Rob them all

    Chapter 117: Rob them all

    ¡°Odysseus, we met here, so let¡¯s part here!¡± Han Shuo smiled faintly as he looked at Odysseus in the spot where they¡¯d first met.

    This was close to where the forest trolls lived, and after the healing properties of the Medusa¡¯s essence blood kicked in, Odysseus could be assured of a full recovery from his injuries. After a few days of recovering, Han Shuo¡¯s injuries had also mostly healed. There was no danger to him leaving now, and thus Han Shuo has raised the suggestion of departing.

    All good things muste to an end. Odysseus and the others also knew that this location was rtively safe. After Han Shuo voiced his proposal, Odysseus nodded with resignation and said, ¡°Since this is the case, then let¡¯s part here. I hope we will be able to meet again in the future.¡±

    Everyone bade Han Shuo and Trunks farewell a bit reluctantly and slowly left the area, moving to the outskirts of the Dark Forest as Han Shuo and Trunks waved them onwards.

    It wasn¡¯t until Odysseus and the party of six had vanished from sight that Trunks finally said, ¡°You no longer need my protection with your current body condition, it looks like it¡¯s time for me to leave!¡±

    Han Shuo looked at Trunks and shook his head, smiling, ¡°You can¡¯t leave yet.¡±

    ¡°Why?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m quite furious with the injuries that the McGrady Guild has gifted me. My anger won¡¯t be assuaged before that earth adept mage Leon has died by my hands. Heh heh, I¡¯ve discovered that you and the manticore have been disappearing for certain periods at a time recently. Have you already discovered traces of the McGrady Guild and are nning on slowly making a move against them?¡±

    Trunks said with a dumbfounded look when he heard those words, ¡°It looks like there is indeed something mysterious about you. It¡¯s like there¡¯s nothing I can hide from you. Indeed, I am nning on making a move against the McGrady Guild, but there¡¯s an archmage holding down the fort within it. They also have a lot of helpers, so I can only make moves in the darkness and wouldn¡¯t dare to be an openly dered enemy of theirs. You¡¯re currently injured, so if we were to start fighting, you won¡¯t have much of an effect. That¡¯s why I ruled you out.¡±

    Looking deeply at Trunks, Han Shuo mused silently for a bit and then opened his mouth to say, ¡°I have a way to handle the McGrady Guild, and I also know that they¡¯ll pass through here. It will be tough for me to handle an archmage. As long as you help me handle the archmage, leave the rest to me.¡±

    ¡°Are you crazy? The McGrady Guild is traveling on the back of earth dragons, and all their followers, guards, and others add up to a hundred or so in number.There are sixty to seventy guards of various professions within this powerful group, do you think you can handle so many with your power alone?¡± Trunks stared at Han Shuo and eximed in bafflement.

    Smiling slightly with great meaning, Han Shuo said, ¡°Don¡¯t worry about that. You¡¯ll understand why I can handle them after I appear. From now on, just follow the McGrady Guild. You¡¯ll see how heavy of a price they will pay after a while.¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t stay for further questioning after saying his piece and left with a longugh, walking in another direction and leaving behind Trunks with a face full of confusion.

    After arriving at the forest trolls¡¯ sacred ground, Han Shuo summoned the little skeleton and took out the raft that the forest trolls had hidden here, taking him downstream to the forest trolls¡¯ residence.

    When the little skeleton appeared, the silent forest troll tribe immediately sank into a panic. The forest troll warriors who led the way in immediately ran inside after arriving, and the excited old priest came scrambling out shortly thereafter, falling to his knees in front of the little skeleton and started genuflecting loudly.

    ¡°The great Dataramands you to fully equip and ready yourselves. The great Datara ns on leading you into battle to rob arge human merchant train passing by.¡± Han Shuo threw his head back and issued orders in a proud fashion.

    All of the forest trolls, whether the elderly, women, or children, immediately became excited when they heard news of a robbery. They waved the weapons in their hands and shook the pockets that were always on their bodies, yelling loudly. It looked like this race¡¯s innate nature to steal was something that no one could change.

    ¡°Many thanks to the great Datara, many thanks to the great Datara¡¯s guidance!¡± The old priest was beside himself with excitement as he immediately turned to the strong forest troll chief running in from the distance and started giving instructions in a mumble.

    The head of the forest trolls raised a spear and stood at a high vantage point, mobilizing everyone. All the various young and strong forest trolls within the tribe automatically lined up in long columns, with thebinations of hunters and priests automatically splitting up. Five to six hundred forest trolls were standing at the ready after not too long.

    Seeing that they were all ready, Han Shuo nodded and didn¡¯t say much else, giving an order to the little skeleton. The little skeleton was in vigorous spirits and stood from a high vantage point like the forest troll chief, waving the bone dagger in his hand high above his head.

    The little skeleton, wearing the pirate¡¯s eyepatch, did indeed have a few traces of a robber¡¯s demeanor at the moment. Under the old priest¡¯s calls, the carriage that had been used to carry the little skeleton was once again brought out, and the little skeleton took up residence within. Han Shuo took out a ck magic robe andpletely wrapped his body and head with it, walking towards the road that the McGrady Guild was sure to take.

    Because the forest trolls truly did have such a horrid reputation, it would bring him some trouble if other people discovered that he¡¯d gone raiding with them in the future. Therefore, after considering for a while, Han Shuo decided to conceal himself to the best of his abilities. He¡¯d diverted Odysseus and the others away because he knew that they were too kind and simple. Not only would their existence not prove to be much use, but it might impact him and thus he had them leave halfway through.

    From the observations of the original demons, Han Shuo was quite clear with regards to the McGrady Guild¡¯s location. He brought the five to six hundred forest trolls to a mountain valley. Under Han Shuo¡¯s orders, the forest trolls started adeptly setting traps and rocks that would impede forward movement. When all was ready, the forest trolls stood to the side amongst the trees and shrubbery, bing one with the foliage with their oily green skin. It would be difficult to detect them without taking a close look.

    Trunks rode on the manticore and followed this group of people behind from quite a distance away. Because there was an archmage within thepany. Trunks didn¡¯t dare make any rash moves either. He only followed them ording to Han Shuo¡¯s earlier instructions.

    After half an hour, the group of people, with the earth dragons leading the way, slowly began to appear. The earth dragons plodded in front, the goods on their bodies swaying back and forth. Guards of all sorts of professions walked in front, patrolling the surroundings with wary eyes. Two of them were quite familiar with Han Shuo, they¡¯d been amongst the group that had attacked him in the swamp.

    Apart from the two earth dragons, this group of people from the McGrady Guild also had several enormous lizard pack animals. Several opulently dressed merchants were sitting on top of them, surrounded by highly experienced guards. No wonder Trunks didn¡¯t dare to make a move.

    When they walked into the valley, some of the guards scouting ahead suddenly sank into the traps. Rocks rolled down the small slopes of the surrounding hills,pleting blocking off their paths. Spears and javelins were hurled out from the sides, nailing the ground at these people¡¯s feet.

    Enormous cheering sounds suddenly sounded from all directions. The excited forest trolls flung off the concealing props and charged over to encircle the caravan and surround the people from the McGrady Guild.

    ¡°Datara, Datara!¡±

    At this moment, the forest trolls discovered that this group of prey was indeed veryrge. They all felt that that this was the gracious bestowment from the great Datara and started yelling out involuntarily. The old priest even knelt reverently in front of the little skeleton¡¯s carriage and started offering thanks in an ancientnguage.

    ¡°Damn it, it¡¯s the cursed forest trolls!¡± All sorts ofints sounded from the McGrady Guild train. When they saw that the attackers were forest trolls and in suchrge numbers, the McGrady Guild people also felt that this was an extreme inconvenience. The way forward and backward for the train had been blocked off and a conflict seemed inevitable.

    A beautiful woman with fey features and a fully rounded body slowly walked out from one of the carriages in the back, wearing a luxurious magic robe and holding a magic staff embedded with many gems in her hand. The emblems on her magic robe testified to her status as an archmage. She walked over merrily and used a soft voice to call out, ¡°Hello, is there anyone I can talk to?¡±

    ¡°Liaison, do we talk to her?¡± The old priest, who was still genuflecting to the little skeleton, looked involuntarily at Han Shuo, hidden in the corner of the carriage and wrapped in a ck magic robe, when he heard the woman¡¯s call.

    ¡°Go see what she wants.¡± Han Shuo nodded and opened his mouth.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s orders, the old priest stood quite a distance from the beautiful woman, under the protection of the forest trolls. The old priest opened his mouth to say, ¡°Ugly human female, what do you have to say?¡±

    The woman had been smiling merrily when her face immediately darkened as she heard the old priest¡¯s words. It was only for an instant however, and her facial expressions quickly recovered and a smile made its way onto her face again. She opened her mouth to say, ¡°We¡¯re people of the McGrady Guild and know the strength of you forest trolls. So, we¡¯d like to enter a transaction with you. We¡¯re willing to pay ten thousand gold coins in exchange for our safety in leaving this ce. We have many people on our side as well and you¡¯re sure to suffer injuries if we fight. What do you say?¡±

    ¡°Ugly human female, don¡¯t you know that the appetite of our race has always been big?¡± The old priest looked arrogantly down at the mature, alluring woman as he spoke with a stiff, cold voice.

    To Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, the woman had a curvaceous body and strikingly beautiful features, and was full of a mature feeling. She did possess a high amount of allure for ordinary humans. However, the old priest was a forest troll and hadpletely different standards of beautypared to humans. A beauty in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes had rather turned into another word for ugliness in his.

    Beneath the repeated blows of ¡°ugly human female¡±, the beautiful woman took in another deep breath to control herself, but her gaze was no longer as friendly. She stared at the old priest and opened her mouth to say, ¡°Then what do you want to do?¡±

    The old priest puffed out his chest and was about to open his mouth to respond when he suddenly recalled Han Shuo¡¯s existence. He said, ¡°We need to discuss this.¡±

    The old priest walked quickly towards Han Shuo after this and several forest troll warriors blocked Han Shuo from sight so that those around them didn¡¯t learn of Han Shuo¡¯s existence. The old priest came to Han Shuo¡¯s side and looked at him, ¡°Liaison, what do we do now?¡±

    His brow furrowed as he looked into the distance. Han Shuo saw Leon appear in the back. The McGrady Guild specialized in smuggling and had some conflicts with Phoebe¡¯s Boozt Merchant Guild, not to mention their crimes earlier had offended Han Shuo. He hesitated only for a slight moment before opening his mouth to say coldly, ¡°There¡¯s nothing much to say. Rob them all ording to the rules of our tribe. Kill anyone who resists!¡±

    The old priest immediately eximed excitedly after he heard these words, ¡°The liaison is wise and great! The liaison is wise and great!¡±

    The old priest didn¡¯t say much else as several forest troll warriors walked out from the huddle and nodded to the forest troll chief in the distance.

    The forest troll chief raised the spear in his hand and gave a charged, high cry as forest troll warriors rushed out from all sides, charging the Guild¡¯s guards with a death defying attitude after the priests had cast their magics on them from the back.

    ¡°Damn these greedy forest trolls! We¡¯ll fight them to the death!¡± Various furious mutterings came from the Guild¡¯s party.

    The smiles on the fey, mature woman¡¯s face disappeared at this time as she chanted a magical incantation. A grey cloud of air flew out from her staff as she waved it around, transforming into the head of a demon in mid air and rushing forward to entangle the forest trolls that were rushing over.

    More than ten grey clouds continuously changed shape within the air, sinking into the bodies of the forest troll warriors with no resistance. Their fast dash forward suddenly slowed down as mutations seemed to ur within their bodies. Tumors quickly appeared and looked quite frightening as they expanded and pulsed.

    Pfft, the tumors on the first forest troll¡¯s body burst open and a dark ck liquid oozed out. As the liquid remained on their bodies, it brought with it an iparably strong corrosive effect, causing a round of wild shrieks and howls to sound from the forest trolls as their bodies slowly turned into liquid.

    White smoke also arose from the other forest trolls that were sprayed by by the liquid, and they appeared to be in great pain.

    Standing behind the others, Han Shuo recalled some of Fanny¡¯s magic teachings when he saw the archmage attack. He recognized that this was the advanced dark magic, ¡°Demon Entanglement¡±, and finally understood that this fey, mature woman was a frightening dark archmage.

    The gruesome death of the first ten or so forest trolls caused a certain amount of panic to the forest trolls, but it was a good thing that this race had also lived in the midst of cruel raiding. Although they panicked briefly, but they continued forward due to strength in numbers.

    A shrill piercing sound suddenly sounded from Han Shuo¡¯s mouth. Trunks, hiding in the shadows and observing everything, didn¡¯t quite understand things because Han Shuo¡¯s whistle came from within the forest trolls. No matter how Trunks envisioned things, he hadn¡¯t thought that Han Shuo would be in thepany of the forest trolls.

    But due to his trust in Han Shuo, Trunks still abruptly dashed out of his hiding ce ording to their previous agreement and made for the dark archmage who was torturing the forest trolls.

    Riding on his manticore and longsword in hand, Trunks set his sights on the female archmage. He made use of everyone being in a frantic mess to charge directly at the female archmage. He nned on taking her down first because the power of her dark magic was simply too strong. Any ordinary person simply couldn¡¯t defend against it.

    ¡°It¡¯s that Trunks! Everyone stop him and don¡¯t let hime near me!¡± The female dark archmage had actually discovered Trunks and immediately called out.

    Five or six senior swordsmen, plus archers and other mages, immediately ran over from all directions to block the path to the female dark archmage when they heard her yells. Attacks poured out from from this group of people, making it so that Trunks couldn¡¯t approach easily.

    The female archmage didn¡¯t pay any attention to Trunks as she stood with her back to him and sent out wave after wave of dark magic with enormous destructive power, sweeping across the more than ten forest troll warriors who were dashing over. They fell down one by one, with not a single one being able to approach the female archmage.

    ¡°Liaison liaison, what do we do now?¡± The old priest scrambled to Han Shuo when he saw the forest troll warriors die one by one and asked in extreme panic.

    Staring at the frightening female archmage for quite some time, Han Shuo felt that he would still be hard pressed to escape death if he rushed in. The invasion of the dark magic was simply too horrifying. It looked like only the little skeleton, that made entirely of bone, would be unafraid of the dark magic¡¯s invasion.

    ¡°Look, the great Datara has alreadye out.¡± Han Shuo reassured the old priest as he pointed at the little skeleton that had stepped out of the carriage.

 Chapter 118: The little skeleton immune to dark magic

    Chapter 118: The little skeleton immune to dark magic

    Upon seeing that the little skeleton had walked out from the carriage, the old priest heaved a sigh of relief and called out excitedly, ¡°Datara, Datara!¡±

    Under the old priest¡¯s excited yells, the forest trolls, that had turned somewhat cowardly, all regained their fighting spirit and followed behind the little skeleton, once again charging towards the female dark archmage.

    The bone dagger wielding little skeleton had a eye patch on its smooth and shiny skull te as it dashed nimbly towards that fey, female archmage.

    ¡°Oh, heh heh. It¡¯s only aical skeletal warrior!¡± The female archmage had thought some strong reinforcements wereing her way when she saw the forest trolls regain their courage. When she saw that what was dashing towards her was just a low level dark creature, the skeletal warrior, she immediately started chuckling in mockery.

    When the little skeleton arrived in front of her, she spoke to a journeyman swordsman next to her, ¡°Kill that ridiculous skeletal warrior!¡±

    ¡°Understood, Lady Emily!¡± The swordsman responded respectfully in a low voice and strode forward, grasping his broadsword, towards the little skeleton, smirking coldly.

    It was a pity that before the journeyman swordsman had approached, the little skeleton, that¡¯d been approaching with normal speed before, suddenly sprang off both calf bones and hugged the ground in magical flight. The increase in speed was more than ten times as the little bone dagger in his hand abruptly, aimed directly for the journeyman swordsman who was attempting to block his way.

    The little bone dagger drew a round arc after leaving his hand, and had already made its way to the journeyman swordsman¡¯s neck in the midst of his shock and surprise. Frightened senseless, the journeyman swordsman¡¯s body abruptly came to a halt, drawing his sword in a no holds barred attempt to defend against the bone dagger attack.

    ng rang out softly as the bone dagger crashed into the broadsword held in the journeyman swordsman¡¯s hand, causing his stopped body to involuntarily take a step backwards. Although the journeyman swordsman was surprised that he¡¯d had to take a step backwards in defending against the bone dagger, he still breathed out a sigh of relief as he felt that he¡¯d already gotten past the danger.

    However, a sudden change in fortune urred, one that he would never understand, even in his moment of death. The bone dagger that had fallen to the ground once again shot towards his chest just as he was about to charge forward. Itpletely upended his knowledge of the world as it opened a bloody hole in his chest and caused him to lose his life where he stood.

    The swiftly moving little skeleton didn¡¯t pause for a single moment here as the withered bones of his left hand extended, and the little bone dagger that had just pierced through the journeyman swordsman returned marvelously to its his hand. The remaining empty eye socket in the little skeleton¡¯s head once again fixed its gaze on the astonished female dark magus Emily.

    ¡°Oh my gosh, that little skeleton killed a journeyman swordsman.¡± Although Trunks was busy fending off enemies in the distance, he still paid heed to the little skeleton¡¯s movements. When he noticed that the little skeleton had murdered one of the journeyman swordsman, he immediately gave an involuntary cry of shock.

    ¡°Stop him, stop him!¡± Emily had also witnessed the little skeleton¡¯s miraculous performance. The jeering smile that had been at the corners of her mouth had long since vanished as her heart was in frantic disarray.

    She quickly recited several journeyman and adept dark magics, with themnding directly on the little skeleton¡¯s body. However, the little skeleton was made entirely from bone and had been repeatedly refined by Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan, and had no reaction whatsoever. He stood there and rather looked at Emily in confusion, as if wondering why Emily¡¯s attacks were so feeble.

    ¡°The great Datara has demonstrated his courage and power, what are you standing there dumbly for?¡± Concealed in the distance, Han Shuo suddenly called out coldly at this moment and once again gave the little skeleton the order to attack archmage Emily.

    Yells of gobbledegook suddenly roared out from the old priest and forest troll chief¡¯s mouths. When the forest troll warriors, who were following behind the little skeleton, saw that the previously frightening Emily couldn¡¯t do anything to the little skeleton, they cried out ¡°Datara¡± with excitement and once again charged forward with no fear of death

    The forest troll hunters in the distance shot out a dense wave of javelins and long spears as ranks of attacks shot towards the McGrady Guild¡¯s guards. Add to that the arrows from the archers as well as magic attacks from several priests, numerous guards were pierced full of bloody holes after this wave of javelins and spears had shot past. Bloody froth bubbled from their mouths as theyy on the ground, unmoving.

    ¡°Stop that damned skeletal warrior!¡± Emily saw that the little skeleton was chasing her in hot pursuit and became a bit frantic. When several dark magics had no effect on the little skeleton, Emily finally realized that this bizarre little skeleton had an extremely high defense against dark magics.

    Emily gathered up the folds of her magic robe in one hand and bedraggedly fled towards the back as she hollered. Her well rounded buttocks swayed continuously as she had no further time to cast destructive and harrowing dark magics.

    Because of Emily¡¯s retreat, the pressure on the forest troll warriors decreased greatly. Add to that the little skeleton¡¯s presence strongly boosted morale, this caused these faithful followers topletely ignore their injuries and casualties and charge towards the McGrady Guild guards like the tidewaters.

    At this moment, the forest troll warriors that had been unable to draw near the McGrady Guild train finally crashed into the guards after paying the price of several dozen forest troll warriors.

    The low roars of the earth dragons, the stomping sounds of the lizard beasts, the frantic calls of the merchants, and the sounds ofbat between the forest troll warriors and the guards permeated the scene. The advantage in numbers quickly became apparently. Although their personal strength didn¡¯t measure up to the forest trolls, they were much more disciplined than the randomly scattered guards. They were not in the slightest bit disorganized after rushing over, and each was more unafraid of death than the other.

    In only the span of a moment, the forest troll contingent, made of young warriors and boasting of numbers more than fives times that of the McGrady Guards, had already taken the high ground. Han Shuo stayed in the back,manding the little skeleton to pursue the archmage Emily and directing the forest troll hunters to attack as well.

    The rows of javelins and spearsnded on the earth dragons and lizard beasts afterwards, causing the deaths of all the merchants. When the two main pack animals were injured, they began to run wildly in their madness. When their enormous hooves trampling down, they caused the deaths of many guards.

    Finally, the merchants of the McGrady Guild saw that they would be unable to obtain victory and they decisively decided to make a break for it in their timidness. Some personal guards protecting them, these merchants yelled and hollered, saying that they were giving up the goods and split into several directions to break through.

    The situation was already under control and Han Shuo didn¡¯t continue to further conceal his movements. He walked out from the midst of the forest troll warriors and set his sights on the earth mage Leon who had personally attacked him.

    The dark archmage Emily waspletely frightened with fear beneath the little skeleton¡¯s pursuit. She¡¯d tried to fly through the air, but became the target of many under Han Shuo¡¯s order as she immediately took the brunt of several dozen javelin and long spear attacks.

    Even though she¡¯d erected a dark magic shield in the nick of time, she didn¡¯t have an easy time of it as a walking human target. The magic shield blocked this round of attacks, but also greatly depleted her mental strength, even causing her to spit out a mouthful of blood.

    With the warning of previous experience, Emily didn¡¯t dare fly through the air again in such a short distance. She could only hide amongst the McGrady Guild¡¯s Guards to the best of her abilities and continuously cry for help, asking for someone to help defend her from the little skeleton, but it was a pity that the scene was a chaotic mess at this moment. Under circumstances in which one¡¯s own personal safety was tough to guarantee, no one else would pay heed to someone else¡¯s survival. This caused her to flee haphazardly, in great panic.

    ¡°Eh, how did you know it was me?¡± Han Shuo looked askance at Trunks after he¡¯d revealed himself and asked.

    ¡°I didn¡¯t fully recognize you, but it could!¡± Trunks smiled and shrugged his shoulders, pointing at the manticore beneath him.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°So this was the case!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s you guys! What do you want?¡± Leon immediately recognized the memorable Han Shuo when thetter revealed himself, and he asked timidly.

    ¡°Your life of course! An eye for an eye. Shouldn¡¯t you pay up for the injuries you¡¯ve caused me?¡± Han Shuo looked coldly at Leon and dashed towards him after saying this nomittally.

    ¡°Han, leave this person to me. You haven¡¯t fully recovered from your injuries yet, best not to make a move that easily.¡± Trunks saw that Han Shuo was about to make a move and suddenly spoke up to stop him, then spurring the manticore forward to Leon before Han Shuo had responded.

    The earth adept mage Leon immediately chanted an incantation when he saw that Trunks was spurring the manticore forward to him. The ground before Trunks suddenly roiled and an earth wall quickly formed, forming an obstacle in the direction that Trunks was charging from.

    Having released the earth wall magic, Leon understood that Trunks wanted his life and that there was a Han Shuo of unknown strength hovering around the edges. He didn¡¯t dare linger at all and immediately fled without another thought as soon as the earth wall had appeared.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll kill him!¡± Trunks smiled from the back of the manticore at Han Shuo and charged the wall together after these words. Beneath the manticore¡¯s impetus and the efforts of the longsword in his hand, the wall of earth that had just formed suddenly copsed. Leaping across the wall, Trunks leisurely pursued the escaping Leon and he seemed quite at ease.

    The originals demons were spread out in three directions, and Han Shuo retained aplete picture of the entire situation through their observations. He discovered that the forest trolls, with their strength in numbers, hadpletely grasped the situation with the cowardly merchants leading the way in fleeing. The Guild¡¯s guards were retreating beneath their attacks. No one wasying down their lives to protect the goods and they did everything in their power to break through to the outside.

    The little skeleton pursued the dark archmage relentlessly under Han Shuo¡¯s orders. A group of forest trolls were following tightly behind the great Datara and handling the female archmage along with the little skeleton. The female dark magus couldn¡¯t use her dark magus due to the little skeleton¡¯s continual harassment, and the forest was blocked off on all sides. They finally forced the archmage Emily into a trap, capturing her with arge woven out of branches.

    ¡°I have what you need, you can¡¯t kill me, you can¡¯t!¡± Emily abruptly called out when javelins and spears were aimed at the archmage and about to descend.

    A thought struck Han Shuo as he immediately gave the little skeleton an order. When the little skeleton received the order, he waved his empty left hand, giving the forest trolls next to him a gesture to halt. The little skeleton walked towards Emily with bone dagger in hand, her frightened gaze fixed upon him. The little skeleton tore the shirt off a random corpse of a guard next to him and shoved the rag into Emily¡¯s mouth, using ropes to tie up her arms and legs at the same time.

    When the female dark archmage¡¯s gaudy red lips had been stoppered up, she continuously emitted sounds from her throat, but no one paid attention to her. The little skeleton wielded the bone dagger and took up the responsibility to looking over her. Han Shuo leveraged his observations through the original demons to continuously givemands to the forest trolls and point out where people were escaping, maximizing their spoils of battle to the greatest degree possible.

    After half an hour, the scattered sounds of fighting from all sides had all stopped, and when Trunks approached from the distance on the back of his manticore, the forest trolls also tried to kill, but stayed their hands beneath Han Shuo¡¯s orders.

    When Trunks spurred the manticore on to Han Shuo¡¯s side, he saw the forest trolls on the side look at Han Shuo with respectful and humble expressions. He seemed to understand something in that moment.

    ¡°I¡¯ll exin in detail to youter. Trunks, you must believe me.¡± Han Shuo also noticed the oddities in Trunks¡¯ gaze and opened his mouth to express his apologies.

    Trunks smiled and nodded, saying, ¡°I have time to listen to your exnations.¡±

    Looking at Trunks with gratitude, Han Shuo walked to the side of the dark archmage and roughly tore the cloth out of her mouth. He lowered his body and stared at Emily, saying coldly and cruelly, ¡°Give me a reason not to kill you!¡±

 Chapter 119: Liaison, you canâ€™t be this cruel!

    Chapter 119: Liaison, you can¡¯t be this cruel!

    The trussed up Emily suddenly kissed Han Shuo¡¯s left cheek when he neared her, leaving behind a red mark.

    ¡°Oh heh heh, you¡¯ve fallen to my curse. If I die, you¡¯ll be cursed until your body rots all over and dies.¡± Emily immediately looked at Han Shuo in ease after kissing Han Shuo, delivering these lines merrily.

    A strange pulse of energy flowed through Han Shuo from the ce that Emily had kissed. Just as Han Shuo wanted to investigate the location of this energy, he suddenly discovered that the strange energy had already vanished without a trace.

    This curse was one of the dark major¡¯s most bizarre and mysterious magics. Many legends and stories passed down through the ages all spoke of the frightening and mysterious power of this curse. Han Shuo could clearly feel it when that strange bit of energy had flowed through his body just now, and understood that the dark archmage Emily hadn¡¯t done this randomly.

    Looking at the enormously proud Emily, Han Shuo¡¯s face was sinister as various fleeting expressions made their way across his face. He seemed to be wavering between whether or not to dispose of her. With the protection of the magical yuan, Han Shuo felt that this kind of curse wouldn¡¯t be able to cause any trouble for him, but he didn¡¯t dare to take the risk either.

    ¡°Han, you¡¯d better not leap into the dark. The curses of the dark major are a most mysterious magic. It can often achieve quite frightening things. We can temporarily allow this b*tch to live, and then kill her when we find a way to break the curse.¡± Trunks offered this suggestion when he saw Han Shuo frown in contemtion.

    Nodding, Han Shuo chuckled oddly, his unfriendly gaze patrolled over Emily¡¯s well-rounded and charming, mature body. Emily¡¯s body was quite curvaceous, particrly her pair of heavy, well rounded breasts. They looked like they would explode out of her clothes at any moment. Her sexy lips were a brilliant red and a trace of a wanton smile curved at her lips, full of naked lust for men¡¯s bodies.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s odd gaze, Emily chuckled and swayed forcefully within the. The durable branches tightened around her body, making her curves look even more wondrous, exuding a strong force of attraction.

    ¡°Mm, not bad, not bad. I won¡¯t let you die. There will still be plenty of ways for you to help me slowly lift the curse.¡± Han Shuo started at Emily for a few deep moments and said to the old priest, ¡°I think our strong forest troll warriors would enjoy this beautiful and mature human woman together.¡±

    The arrogantly chuckling Emily¡¯s face immediately drained of color as soon as he¡¯d spoken and she cried out, ¡°You can¡¯t do this!¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, why can¡¯t I? I¡¯ll have the forest troll warriors be careful when they rape you. Don¡¯t worry, they won¡¯t kill you!¡± Chuckling evilly at the panicking Emily, it was Han Shuo¡¯s turn to kick back leisurely.

    Emily was frightened and panic stricken, her horrified eyes looking at the exceedingly ugly, yet fiercely built forest trolls. She didn¡¯t dare say anything else.

    ¡°Liaison, please don¡¯t make us do this. This human is so damned ugly, the children will have nightmares after having her. We¡¯re all followers of the great Datara. Liaison, you can¡¯t be this cruel!¡± At this moment, the old priest suddenly kneeled down before Han Shuo and begged Han Shuo with a look of pain on his face.

    ¡°You blind old dog of a thing, how dare you sully my beauty! I¡¯m going to kill you disgusting old worm!¡± Before Han Shuo had a chance to react, the previously panic stricken Emily immediately struggled furiously within the and red ferociously at the old priest, cursing loudly.

    Han Shu was involuntarily dumbfounded. Who would¡¯ve thought that Emily would be so ugly in the eyes of the forest trolls? It looked like it was actually a cruel torture to gift Emily to them. This made Han Shuo not know whether tough or cry.

    ¡°Han, I think you should get back to more serious matters.¡± Trunks looked at Han Shuo with a slight smile and said.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°Take back the spoils to the tribe. Stopper up the mouth of this woman and also take her back. Guard her well, but don¡¯t touch her for now.¡±

    The old priest immediately called out instructions to the forest trolls when he heard that they didn¡¯t need to undergo such cruel torture. He told them to pick up all the spoils of war in the surroundings ording to Han Shuo¡¯s orders. The little skeleton was on guard duty next to Emily, ready to give Emily a strong blow at any time.

    Throwing a significant look at Trunks, Han Shuo and Trunks left the area, with Han Shuo avoiding the forest trolls and stopping when he found a quiet ce. He began to exin everything to Trunks.

    Of course, Han Shuo withheld everything about the cemetery of death and refining the little skeleton. He only picked the bits that he could tell Trunks.

    Trunks paused for a long while after Han Shuo had exined all of this and looked at Han Shuo in confusion. ¡°This means that you¡¯re also a necromancer?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo smiled, ¡°Of course, I¡¯m a bonafide necromancer. Except, the little skeleton I¡¯ve summoned is a bit odd, leading to the forest trolls mistakenly taking him for their great god Datara. Although these forest trolls are irritating and greedy, since they ept my orders, rather than let themmit evils as they will, why not control them so they raid targets they should raid? That¡¯s why I¡¯ve kept them around.¡±

    ¡°If you can use them appropriately, these forest trolls will be of a great help. I hadn¡¯t thought that you¡¯d be a necromancer as well. Hah, there are quite a bit of magical things about you. How much more are you keeping from me?¡±

    ¡°Eh, not too much else. Everyone has their own secrets. You never mention your own matters either.¡±

    ¡°Alright, then I won¡¯t ask any further. You continue doing your own thing, I need to continue training in the further depths of the Dark Forest. Remember what you¡¯ve promised me. I¡¯ll have you help me when the time¡¯s right.¡±

    ¡°Yes, I think we¡¯ll have plenty of opportunities to meet in the future. When I finish handling all the matters at hand, I¡¯ll also head deeper into the Dark Forest for more training. I think I¡¯ll find a way to locate you then.¡±

    The two were truly treating each other as friends by now, but everyone had their own secrets. Han Shou¡¯s current base was in the cemetery of death, and he also had further necromancy magic to study. In addition, he needed to report to the Empire¡¯s Dark Mantle organization and prepare the dwarves¡¯ rations. He temporarily couldn¡¯t just head further into the depths of the Dark Forest to train.

    There wasn¡¯t too much mncholy and sadness in parting with Trunks. When Han Shuo picked up the location of the original demons and little skeleton, he headed towards the forest trolls, finally reconvening with the forest trolls and heading back to the tribe.

    The forest trolls had sent out five to six hundred trolls this time. All of them had brought pockets especially for raiding. Everyone mobilized themselves and brought back their spoils of war to within the forest troll tribe.

    The McGrady Guild had been couriering resplendent silks and satins, soft andfortable carpets, and a few other luxury items that nobles enjoyed. Apart from those, there were also battle chariots asrge as carriages and a few items for use in attacking cities.

    The luxury items were easy to take care of and sell off, but the battle chariots and other siege weapons would be a source of great trouble if they were being ferried to the Empire, but not to the army.

    Han Shuo had learned from Phoebe that the McGrady Guild conducted a lot of smuggling. In this way, it seemed that these items likely weren¡¯t being supplied to the Empire¡¯s army. It seemed that the McGrady Guild did indeed have unfettered boldness.

    Luxury items were usually stored within the space rings of the dead merchants. The battle chariots and siege weapons couldn¡¯t be stored within space rings, this was why they were being transported by the earth dragons. They took count of inventory back at the forest trolls¡¯ tribe and discovered that the number of luxury items filled two of the forest trolls¡¯ warehouses, and there were another three warehouse worth of battle chariots and siege weapons.

    Looking at the five warehouses full of resources, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t sure how to handle this. The space ring on his hand was already full of gems and gold from the forest trolls. He had no way of storing more items. Han Shuo smiled ruefully as he looked at the mounds and heaps of resources within the forest trolls¡¯ warehouses.

    ¡°Right, how do you usually handle the items that you¡¯ve raided?¡± The forest trolls were a race of high intelligence that understood the pleasures of life. Therefore, Han Shuo inquired after their previous methods as he looked at these items.

    ¡°Someone will make a trip to trade food, weapons, and necessities for these items. Stuff that we have no use for is in high demand from others. This is enough for us to trade for a winter¡¯s worth of food and necessities. Many thanks to the great Datara¡¯s favor. It was the great Datara who led us down the right path.¡± The old priest exined to Han Shuo.

    Nodding, Han Shuo privately thought that this was indeed the case. The merchants who traded with the forest trolls must¡¯ve garnered their trust and brought the food, rations, necessities and weapons necessary toe and trade for these priceless items.

    Items like food, rations, and necessities weren¡¯t that expensive within the Empire. If they were transported here and used to trade for the valuables that the forest trolls had looted, then these merchants would be sure to be able to earn an eye-popping margin. This was no wonder that despite the presence of danger all throughout the Dark Forest, there were still so many merchants who still swarmed into the Dark Forest without heed for their lives.

    The Dark Forest would be exceedingly cold when winter arrived, and many magical creatures wouldn¡¯t venture out then. Because the roads would be sealed off, merchants and adventurers wouldn¡¯t easily venture in as well. Therefore, all tribes had to hurry and prepare the rations and food they needed to weather the winter, otherwise they¡¯d be in bad straits when winter arrived. This was why the dwarves were worrying and why the forest trolls were raiding and looting in all directions.

    The old priest was dumbfounded but nodded his head in understanding, as if thinking that Han Shuo¡¯smand was a bit baffling. However, the old priest was ustomed to following orders and didn¡¯t ask much.

    ¡°All of you temporarily don¡¯t go out raiding during this time. The great Datara and I will look around and notify you when we discover a better target. When Ie back next time, I¡¯ll bring a portion of rations and necessities for your use. Be at ease.¡± Han Shuo said to the old priest after thinking for a while.

    ¡°Liaison, what do we do about the ugly woman?¡± The old priest nodded and brought up the difficult question of Emily.

    Han Shuo also felt a bit of a headache when this question was posed. He mused silently and then said, ¡°I¡¯ll take her with me.¡±

    It wasn¡¯t until they were a few li away from the forest trolls and at a pond that Han Shuo finally loosened the restraints that covered Emily¡¯s eyes. Two zombie warriors had been carrying the ensnared Emily along the way, with Han Shuopletely disregarding her groans and moans. There was no other way they could proceed out of the forest troll tribe territory, thus Han Shuo had to proceed in this fashion.

    When he reached the water¡¯s edge, Emily started cursing at Han Shuo when the coverings over her eyes and restraint on her mouth were released. Han Shuo ignored Emily¡¯s curses and undid his shirt, revealing an evenly fit body.

    Contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, several traces of panic were disyed in Emily¡¯s eyes when she saw that Han Shuo took off his clothes without another word. She hastily spoke, ¡°What, what do you want to do?¡±

    Han Shuo had only wanted to take a shower within the pond, but a plot formed in his mind when he saw the panic in Emily¡¯s eyes. He immediately leered and chuckled oddly as he took steps closer to Emily, wantonly looking up and down her mature, full body. He asked her in return, ¡°What would you like me to do? Ahaha!¡±

 Chapter 120: Forcing himself on a female archmage

    Chapter 120: Forcing himself on a female archmage

    Emily¡¯s body was alluring and curvaceous, presenting a deadly attraction as her mature body was revealed as it was tightly leashed within the. Emily¡¯s eyes were full of obvious panic now, and this only further heightened the temptations of her body.

    Han Shuo had only nned on terrorizing Emily, but as he drew near to her, a surge of an uncontroble desire grew from his heart, uncontroble like an avnche. The speed in which his magical yuan was churning was many times faster than usual, and the heavily panting Han Shuo suddenly felt his mind go dull and heavy and his consciousness slowly be hazy.

    ¡°No, please spare me, I¡¯ll lift the curse for you!¡± Emily was truly panicked and watched Han Shuo prowl over like a wild beast. She could no longer suppress the fear within her heart and started screaming frantically.

    NSFW Part

    Walking towards the pond, Han Shuo suddenly felt alert and full of vigor. The heavy injuries he¡¯d sustained a few days ago seemed to have all taken a turn for the better. When he walked into the pond to wash himself, Han Shuo suddenly discovered that there were traces of red between his legs.

    He was immediately shocked as his gaze swiftlynded on the unconscious Emily. Her body mature and tantalizing, Emily had seemed like a beautiful woman and her actions had been rather wanton. Han Shuo had originally thought that she was greatly experienced, but hadn¡¯t thought at all that this would be her first time. This was simply too baffling.

    No wonder Emily would have such panic in her eyes when she first saw him disy thatscivious expression. No wonder Emily had sobbed with pain in the beginning,ter moaning involuntarily, and finally unconsciously continuously moving with him in the end.

    If Emily¡¯s body had long been defiled, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t have had too much of a burden. A mature woman wouldn¡¯t be too overly concerned with this matter, but now that Emily¡¯s body condition was obviously testifying that Han Shuo was her first man, this made the tenor of this matter a bit different.

    As Han Shuo washed himself, he wracked his brains to decide how to handle this. His brain was a churning mess in that moment, and he couldn¡¯t find an appropriate way to handle this matter. Han Shuo washed himself unconsciously like this within the pond,ing to himself with an abrupt start when a low moan sounded.

    A broken piece of rag was still shoved into Emily¡¯s mouth and her hands were still tied. Standing across from Han Shuo, she seemed to have just woken up and was looking at Han Shuo with a frightening gaze. All sorts of hatred, anger, and hesitation were swimming within her clear eyes as she coldly stared unblinkingly at Han Shuo, who stood within the water.

    Scratching his head awkwardly, Han Shuo also felt his scalp tingle with numbness. He hesitated, then hesitated some more and thought a bit more, finally walking out of the pond and taking out a new set of clothing from the space ring to wear. He smiled with embarrassment as he walked towards Emily, ¡°I didn¡¯t mean that, that was an ident!¡±

    Emily still looked at Han Shuo with that frightened gaze. He suddenly remembered that her lips were still sealed only after he walked up to her, and thus she likely wasn¡¯t able to talk. Taking a deep breath in, he first summoned the little skeleton and then took the rag out from Emily¡¯s mouth.

    Exactly as he¡¯d expected, a string of furious curses exploded out from Emily¡¯s mouth, like bombs, when the rag was taken out of her mouth.

    Her voice choked up, Emily switched various sorts of evil curses, hectoring Han Shuo¡¯s shamelessness and that he was less than an animal. She finally stopped when she herself was tired after half an hour, and then sobbed lowly, saying a few words that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t hear clearly.

    Seeing that Emily¡¯s out of control emotions were finally calming down, Han Shuo finally awkwardly opened his mouth as he scratched his head. ¡°Everyone¡¯s a grown adult here. It was my first time as well. You aren¡¯t any worse off. Let¡¯s just let it go like this!¡±

    ¡°Release me, release me! You damned kid, I¡¯ll have your life for this!¡± Emily had finally gotten herself under control, but her struggles began anew when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s words, as if she wanted toy down her life.

    His scalp numb, Han Shuo took a step back and spread out his hands with a rueful grin. He asked Emily, ¡°How was I supposed to know that that was your first time? Now that the matter¡¯s happened, what do you say we should do?¡±

    ¡°You little brat that¡¯s less than an animal, you shamelessly raped me! What do you say should be done?¡± Fires of anger spurted out from Emily¡¯s eyes as she said furiously.

    ¡°Although you were in a bit of pain originally, I saw that you also looked quitefortable afterwards. It was my first time as well, you weren¡¯t that taken advantage of. How about I let you go, and then we go our separate ways? It can be as if we don¡¯t know each other. Han Shuo furrowed his brow and thought carefully, proposing this to Emily.

    ¡°Shut up!¡± Emily yelled out, making Han Shuo jump with fright. Emily then quieted down and first disyed a weak expression of resignation, then stared directly at Han Shuo, saying lowly, ¡°If you don¡¯t have an exnation for me, I¡¯ll kill myself immediately. You¡¯ll be hard pressed to escape death as well when the curse takes effect upon my death.¡±

    Scratching his head out of habit, Han Shuo walked ruefully towards Emily. He took out the Demonyer Edge and removed the restraints from Emily¡¯s hands and legs. He opened his mouth and said softly, ¡°Why don¡¯t you wash your body first, we can talk after!¡±

    After saying these words, Han Shuo raised his level of alertness and was privately on guard against Emily suddenly attacking him in a rage. However, when the restraints on Emily¡¯s body had been released, she didn¡¯t make any moves out of the ordinary. She only continuously patrolled her eyes over Han Shuo¡¯s body, as if wanting to see him clearly.

    After staring at him for a while, Emily nodded her head nkly and wrapped the robe around her body tightly, walking towards the pond. She tripped halfway through and almost fell to the ground. Her face reddened as she cursed lowly, slowing down her pace afterwards.

    When she walked into the pond, she took off robe and flung it far away from her, revealing the charms of a mature woman and started washing up without any reservations.

    Taking in his fill of Emily¡¯s mature body, having had his first taste of the pleasures between man and woman, Han Shuo¡¯s heart started itching again, but he spoke with all seriousness, ¡°Hey, I¡¯m still here. You¡¯ve taken off the robe and started washing up just like this, that isn¡¯t the best option, is it?¡±

    Suddenly turning around, Emily fully disyed her taut abdomen and a patch of ck between her legs to Han Shuo. She red ferociously at Han Shuo, saying, ¡°You¡¯ve seen all there is to see and touched all there is to touch! How dare you act serious in front of me, you¡¯re truly not just typically shameless! Humph. If I were to move too far away, who knows if you would take advantage of the opportunity to run away. I¡¯m going to keep you close at hand.¡±

    Han Shuo had really been about to run away when given the chance. When he heard her say so, he smiled awkwardly with some embarrassment, ¡°I¡¯m not the type to avoid responsibility. Heh heh, go ahead and wash up, I¡¯ll keep a look out for you.¡±

    After a while, a freshly washed up Emily with a new set of luxurious magic robes once again reappeared in Han Shuo¡¯s vision. Radiating with beauty, she walked to Han Shuo and first looked askance at the little skeleton wielding a bone dagger, then stared at Han Shuo and asked, ¡°After contemting for so long, have you decided what exnation to give me?¡±

    Having looked his fill for a while, Han Shuo pulled Emily into his embrace with one hand and suddenly kissed down on Emily¡¯s red, luscious lips. His hands started unceremoniously roving all over Emily¡¯s well rounded body. An intoxicating, wondrous sense started to spread out from Han Shuo¡¯s heart as their mouths and tongues entangled and he entwined himself with her body.

    Emily started struggling fiercely at first, but even with the restraints on her hands and feet having been released, she still had no way to break free from Han Shuo¡¯s embrace. As Han Shuo drew her into a long kiss, her body also started bing pliable as her struggles became weaker and weaker, finally voluntarily moving within Han Shuo¡¯s mouth like a little snake.

    After a while, when both their breathing was starting to be difficult, they finally panted heavily and broke apart. Han Shuo then drew close to Emily¡¯s bright red ears, nipping her bright red ear tips, and said softly, ¡°Well then, you¡¯re my woman then!¡±

    Emily¡¯s body first stiffened, and then encircled Han Shuo¡¯s body like a snake after he¡¯d spoken and also bit his ear tip, ¡°Humph, shameless brat, at least you know what¡¯s the right thing to do!¡±

    Laughing wildly in pride, Han Shuo swept up Emily by the waist and started a ravaging campaign on her amidst her protestations. He only stopped when Emily was about to faint.

    Over the next three days, Han Shuo and Emily appeared on the path leading to the cemetery of death. The two had been at odds with each other, but suddenly became inseparable after three days of intimacy.

    During this process, Han Shuo¡¯s strong body had caused Emily to sway and waver whenever she walked. Emily had gone from her initial lust to subsequent panic, and finally begged Han Shuo to let her off the hook before she could finally recovered.

    Having tasted sweetness, Han Shuo finally knew that the taste of the pleasures between man and woman were beyond words. The conquests of the past two days made Han Shuo feel that he¡¯d lived in vain before, and had thoroughly let himself go in depravity.

    The closer they drew to the cemetery of death, Han Shuo finally thought of something as he looked at the brilliant and mesmerizing Emily next to him. The two of them hadn¡¯t volunteered information about their own identities, and neither had they asked each other. Therefore, Han Shuo still didn¡¯t know Emily¡¯s identity, even until now.

    At this moment, the only thing that Han Shuo felt was a bit inappropriate was that he wasn¡¯t sure how to face Fanny in the future. He had true feelings for Fanny, and was only with Emily due to ridiculous circumstances. He wasn¡¯t sure how to handle the future, and could only take each step as they came.

    But as they neared the cemetery of death, Han Shuo involuntarily started worrying. The cemetery of death was Han Shuo¡¯s greatest secret, and the fastest way to the Empire was through the transportation matrix within the cemetery of death, but Emily had already expressed that she was going to cling onto him no matter what. He knew nothing of Emily¡¯s status right now and didn¡¯t dare take the risk of telling her this secret. Therefore, he was in a bit of a hard spot.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I was lying to you about the curse I¡¯d cast on you. You don¡¯t need to be worried at all. Such a strong curse would need something from your body as a medium, it wouldn¡¯t be as simple as a kiss if I really wanted to cast it. I would have to pay a heavy price as well.¡± Emily saw that Han Shuo had a long face and thought that he was worrying about this. She smiled involuntarily and spoke up infort.

    Han Shuo started, and although he wasn¡¯t fretting over this, he still felt a bit relieved to hear her say that the curse was fake. He then recalled the strange feeling that had entered his body when Emily had kissed him. He furrowed his brow and looked at Emily in confusion, asking, ¡°But I clearly felt a strange energy enter my body then. What was that?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, that was a low level disease magic that I¡¯d released, purposefully to create an illusion for you.¡± Emily looked at Han Shuo with pride as she exined with a smile.

    Pausing, Emily seemed to suddenly remember something and stared oddly at Han Shuo. ¡°Speaking of this disease magic, I rather forgot that you should¡¯ve long since been sick by now. You¡¯re just a small necromancer. Why is it that there¡¯s nothing wrong with you at all, and you¡¯re full of boundless energy when youmit that bad act? What¡¯s going on?¡±

    An ordinary magic of disease would, of course, not have any effect on his perverted body. The magic yuan¡¯s repeated reforging had crafted an enormously strong body for Han Shuo. Add to that Emily had always thought Han Shuo was just a necromancer, it was no wonder that she would find it odd. However, Han Shuo didn¡¯t exin and only chuckled evilly, not saying a word.

    ¡°Mysterious evil little brat!¡± Emily paid no attention and also rolled her eyes at Han Shuo.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo¡¯s brows knit together as an original demon patrolling nearby suddenly detected the appearance of people who shouldn¡¯t be here ¡ª the wind archmage Duke and the senior swordsman Erick!

    Last time in the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, because Han Shuo had made a report to the Dark Mantle, the old witch Cami disappeared without a trace. Duke and Erick had also hastily returned to the Kasi Empire. Who would¡¯ve thought that these two would appear again after only twenty or so days.

    ¡°Someone¡¯s seen the cemetery of death nearby, but that person died suddenly of unexined circumstances.¡± Erick waved the longsword in his hand and hacked away at the strong growth of shrubbery and grass around him, speaking as he opened a path.

    ¡°Mm. It looks like the cemetery of death is nearby. The Dark Mantle of the Lancelot Empire is very frightening indeed. I wonder how Cami¡¯s identity was exposed ¡ª she was actually killed that night. It was a good thing that we read the situation correctly, otherwise we would¡¯ve been hard pressed to escape death as well if we¡¯d stayed.¡± The old mage Duke frowned and revealed some information in his low murmurings. It looked like Cami had been done away with by the Dark Mantle organization.

    ¡°Hey hey hey!¡± A shout that became louder and louder suddenly rang out from Emily¡¯s mouth. When Han Shuo abruptly came to himself, Emily was tenderly stroking his face. She asked merrily, ¡°My cute little devil, just what evil thoughts are you thinking of that you¡¯re so entranced?¡±

    ¡°Eh, there¡¯s sounds to the south, let¡¯s go take a look!¡± Duke had been walking along unhurriedly and unrushed when he suddenly made a shushing motion towards Erick, saying this softly afterwards. He immediately floated up using a floatation spell and swiftly neared where Han Shuo and Emily were.

    ¡°Someone¡¯sing, we need to hurry and hide!¡± Han Shuo had been about to respond when he detected Duke¡¯s movement and hastily called out to Emily. He used another original demon to continue observation and grabbed Emily by the waist, dashing towards a big tree on the left.

    When he arrived, Han Shuo said lowly, ¡°Use a floatation spell to go up the tree, we should stay together.¡±

    Han Shuo climbed adroitly up the tree when his words had finished,nding into a thick patch of branches and leaves in the blink of an eye, waving down towards Emily who was floating in the middle of the tree.

    ¡°Howe I haven¡¯t heard anything? Are you overreacting?¡± Emily said softly with some suspicion, but still meekly squirmed into the thick of the leaves and even leanedfortably on Han Shuo¡¯s body, squirming her snake-like body around.

    ¡°¡±Shh!¡± Han Shuo made a shushing motion and then took a deep breath in, immediately calming down his heartbeat and breathing.

    She¡¯d originally thought he was overreacting and was about to speak again to make fun of Han Shuo, Emily¡¯s brow suddenly furrowed as she too felt the same disturbance. She chanted out an incantation in a low voice as a cloud of grey air appeared and obscured the two¡¯s location.

    As an archmage, Emily also naturally had sensitive hearing, but because a wind archmage majored in wind magic, their ears would be a bit more sensitive than ordinary archmages, otherwise Duke would¡¯ve been hard pressed to hear Emily¡¯s cry.

    ¡°It¡¯s Duke from the Kasi Empire!¡± Killing intent suddenly red in Emily¡¯s eyes when Duke appeared.

    Han Shuo was surprised when these words were spoken and looked quite in surprise with Emily, didn¡¯t think for a moment that Emily would also know Duke.

 Chapter 121: It turns out it was our own people

    Chapter 121: It turns out it was our own people

    Duke used a floatation spell to arrive where the two had been hiding and inspected the four surroundings for a sign of anything out of the ordinary, with a lofty air and above everything. The senior swordsman Erick also rushed in from a distance and carefully poked his head through the shrubbery. He raised his head towards Duke up in the sky, ¡°Mister Duke, nothing out of the ordinary here!¡±

    The wind archmage Duke closed his eyes and didn¡¯t say a word, concentrating and listening to the wind, as if trying to obtain some clues.

    Situated within the thick growth of branches and leaves, Han Shuo and Emily werepletely concealed. Their surroundings were also covered by a grey magic wall from the dark major arts. The dark major magics were veiled in mystery and adept at hiding traces of movement. As a fellow archmage, it would be difficult for Duke to detect the dark magic wall that she had set up.

    After a low exmation, Emily looked at Han Shuo, extremely astonished. ¡°How did you do that?¡±

    His expression grave, Han Shuo looked at Duke, who hovered in the distance, and made a careful gesture, indicating for Emily not to speak and alert Duke and Erick.

    Extending a finger to tap Han Shuo¡¯s forehead, Emily smiled. ¡°What are you being furtive and scared about? There are thick branches and leaves concealing our whereabouts. The wall I just set up has sound insting properties. Even if Duke is a wind major archmage, he won¡¯t be able to hear a bit of our conversation. What are you worried about?¡±

    Emily had spoken several times, but Duke, standing in the distance, was still listening with his eyes closed. It looked like he truly hadn¡¯t discovered anything. Heaving a sigh in relief, Han Shuo grabbed the finger that Emily had extended and bit it, making her roll her eyes at him with a brightly flushed face.

    ¡°Speak, how did you do it?¡± Emily, her face brilliantly red, stared at Han Shou as she asked.

    At this moment, Emily was leaning on Han Shuo¡¯s left side, and half her body was pressing against him. Her full chest was resting on Han Shuo¡¯s left arm and her long and smooth thigh tightly mashed against his waist. Emily, with an extremely amorous expression, was an uncontroble temptation for Han Shuo, who had just gotten an initial taste of the pleasures between man and woman.

    Chuckling lowly, Han Shuo said, ¡°So there¡¯s a soundproofing effect. Heh heh, we haven¡¯t done it on a tree yet!

    Han Shuo grabbed Emily as soon as he¡¯d finished speaking and moved to position her behind at his waist. He immediately started ravaging with his hands as Emily¡¯s face and necks immediately flushed red from Han Shuo¡¯s actions and the finger that he¡¯d just bit. She said, ¡°Duke is below and Erick is also observing from below as well. We can¡¯t do this! It¡¯s too embarrassing!¡±

    ¡°No worries, that¡¯s what makes this exciting. Heh heh!¡± When Han Shuo had ripped Emily¡¯s shirt apart, his mouth neared her earlobes and he kissed her tenderly as he chuckled evilly in a low voice.

    After this string of teasing, Emily finally couldn¡¯t hold it any longer and emitted a tempting moan from her sweet lips. She forgot everything that¡¯d they been talking about before and no longer cared that they were in arge tree, with two enemies making observations around them. She voluntarily reached out a hand into Han Shuo¡¯s shirt as her well rounded bottom searched for the right position.

    ¡°Ah... ¡° Both of them gave out afortable cry when he entered.

    After a while, when Emily¡¯s body had gonepletely soft and she¡¯d screamed herself hoarse, everything began to slowly calm down. Maintaining their position, Emily sprawled on Han Shuo¡¯s chest and used her index finger to trace small circles. She asked again, ¡°How did you do that?¡±

    At this moment, the wind archmage Duke and Erick had long since left. An original demon trailed far behind the two and ryed everything it reacted to into Han Shuo¡¯s mind. Because the two of them hade with the intention of finding the cemetery of death, their speed in walking away wasn¡¯t that fast. They would find it difficult to escape the surveince of the original demon within a short amount of time, thus Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a hurry.

    Hisrge hand unconsciously roved over Emily¡¯s naked back, Han Shuo asked, ¡°How did I do what?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m a dark major archmage and I didn¡¯t discover when Duke was approaching us. You¡¯re just a minor necromancer, how could you detect this disturbance? In addition, you¡¯re a mage, but your adroitness and deftness in climbing this tree was more ridiculous than an ordinary swordsman. I¡¯ve also seen how you¡¯ve adjusted your breathing and heartbeat. What¡¯s going on?¡± Emily breathed out lightly in enjoyment after they¡¯d calmed down from Han Shuo¡¯s motions and asked him on the side.

    Remaining silent for a while, Han Shuo said, ¡°Apart from training in necromancy magic, I¡¯m also training in a wondrous martial arts technique. This wondrous technique is different from ordinary fighting aura. Therefore, I can count as a mage swordsman. All of the particr points you saw just now are because of this martial arts technique.¡±

    Her body straightening slightly, Emily looked in astonishment at Han Shuo, ¡°Such a wondrous martial arts technique exists? Then can you fight like a swordsman?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo said affirmatively, ¡°Of course.¡± His forehead then creased as he looked at Emily with confusion. ¡°How do you know those two?¡±

    It was Emily¡¯s turn to be silent after his question. She hesitated, and then said slowly, ¡°I haven¡¯t told you everything about me because I was afraid of bringing you trouble. I¡¯m actually someone from the Lancelot Empire and was escorting the McGrady Guild¡¯s smuggled goods from the Brut Merchant alliance this time because I was investigating something. I wanted to get to the bottom of who was receiving this batch of resources that would be used for war.¡±

    ¡°Honestly speaking, I belong to a secret organization. Duke and Erick havee with an unspeakable secret to the Empire this time, and their actions threaten the livelihood of the Empire. Therefore, our organization is making a move against the two. Although I wasn¡¯t in the Empire, I have the clearance level to know everything that happens.¡±

    ¡°I also saw Duke and Erick¡¯s head shots within the organization¡¯s files. The organization is sending people to shadow their movements. The organization said that they might appear on the borders of the Empire and thus wanted me to return to the Empire through the border. I paid quite a bit of attention, that¡¯s why I know so much. Although our organization allows everyone their space and usually won¡¯t interfere in members¡¯ lives, there¡¯s still no benefit if you know too much.¡±

    The soft and tender voice emitted from Emily¡¯s mouth as she calmly ryed the entire matter and her identity. After all of this, Han Shuo suddenly disyed a strange smile, scaring Emily. She wondered if something was up with him.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong? Are you frightened? Don¡¯t worry, our organization answers to His Majesty the king and existspletely and only for the security of the Empire. We don¡¯t interfere in members¡¯ lives and I don¡¯t think they will be of any threat to you. Oh, are you afraid of me? Are you prepared to throw me away?¡± Emily first exined, but then felt a bit afraid when she saw Han Shuo¡¯s weird smile. This man had gotten everything of hers and was quite cute when he was acting bad. He had helped her heart enjoy the past few days in peace, and so she wouldn¡¯t let him go, no matter what. Emily¡¯s heart raced frantically.

    Beneath Emily¡¯s worry and fear, her previously reddened and flushed face appeared full of fear and trepidation. When she got to the end, her voice was choking up. No matter how strong or a mature a woman was, when she gave her body and heart to a man, she would disy weakness and timidness in front of the man who had received her all. Emily was naturally no exception.

    After a while, Han Shuo said with a shadow of a smile, ¡°Your organization is called the Dark Mantle, right?¡±

    Her heart leaping in fear, Emily¡¯s body stiffened as she looked at Han Shuo in astonishment and shock. She asked, ¡°How do you know that?¡±

    His space ring lighting up, the iron medallion that represented his identity as a Dark Mantle member suddenly appeared in Han Shuo¡¯s hand. Han Shuo said to Emily, ¡°Because I¡¯m also a member of the Dark Mantle!¡±

    Emily, ¡°...¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, who would¡¯ve thought that we¡¯d be colleagues? Hurry and let me see your medallion and let me know what rank you are?¡± Han Shuo chuckled oddly as he grasped Emily¡¯s small hand and caressed her space ring with his finger.

    ¡°You wicked little brat!¡± Emily nked for a moment and suddenly started chuckling delightfully, sying herself on Han Shuo¡¯s chest with tears of joy. She reached out her hand and ran it acorss Han Shuo¡¯s chest. When Han Shuo was breathing outfortably, her teeth suddenly bit down fiercely and started squeals from Han Shuo.

    ¡°See if you dare bully me again, humph!¡± Emily chuckled with pride when she saw Han Shuo scream out of startlement. She put on an air of ring ferociously at Han Shuo before subsiding.

    Feeling that the distance between them and the original demon trailing Duke was increasing further, Han Shuo suddenly pulled down his shirt and also looked over Emily before saying, ¡°Let¡¯s follow Duke and see what he¡¯s up to?¡±

    When Han Shuo finished speaking, Emily recited an incantation in a low voice and the grey air that had been surrounding them suddenly disappeared without a trace. As Han Shuo poked his head out of the leaves and grabbed Emily, he directly jumped down from the tree amidst her screams. Hended solidly within the shrubs in the back and didn¡¯t cause any harm to Emily¡¯s body.

    Leveraging the original demon tailing Duke, Han Shuo and Emily exchanged some information. Han Shuo also told Emily about his recent experiences within the Dark Forest. However, he picked which ones he could say, and still concealed what he had to conceal.

    ¡°A minion of the Third Dark Star, you need to listen to me in the future or I can directly punish you!¡± When she knew that Han Shuo was just a lowly Third Dark Star, Emily continued to lightly tease Han Shuo along the way. Candide, one of the three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle, was at the highest level of Fifth Dark Sun. Emily was already a Third Dark Sun and thus her status within the Dark Mantle would surely be very high. No wonder she had the authority to know so much.

    ¡°Who would¡¯ve thought you would be a Third Dark Sun! Heh heh, so what if you are? You¡¯re still conquered by my prowess! You live if I want you to live, you die if I want you to die.¡± Han Shuo smacked his palm on Emily¡¯s butt andughed delightedly.

    ¡°You crude, despicable little brat! I¡¯m going to make youpletely tame and make you answerable to me sooner orter!¡± Emily¡¯s hand that was curled around Han Shuo¡¯s arm suddenly pinched him fiercely, and wasn¡¯t in the slightest bit angry about Han Shuo¡¯s crudeness.

    His body suddenly froze as Han Shuo discovered, through the original demon, that Duke and Erick had actually discovered traces of the cemetery of death. Duke kept circling the area around the cemetery of death with a frown on his face, as if he¡¯d discovered something.

    Emily stopped when Han Shuo halted and looked askance at him, opening her mouth to ask, ¡°What now? Are you annoyed at me because I said I would tame you? You know I¡¯m joking!¡±

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo said lowly, ¡°Should we kill Duke and the other?¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s not for now. If I¡¯m guessing correctly, the old fox Candide must be nning on thoroughly understanding Duke¡¯s intentions. That¡¯s why he¡¯s still alive. Otherwise, there¡¯s no way that the two of them would be able to leave the Lancelot Empire alive. You¡¯ve just entered the Dark Mantle so you don¡¯t know how strong the organization is. It¡¯s impossible for a wind archmage and a senior swordsman to escape from that sly fox Candide¡¯s hand.¡± Emily mused deeply and then opened her mouth to exin to Han Shuo.

    ¡°I actually understand, because I answer directly to Candide!¡± Han Shuo said in a low.

    Covering her surprise and looking at Han Shuo, Emily said lightly, ¡°You¡¯re joking! You¡¯re just a Third Dark Star! You don¡¯t have the right to be managed by him at all?¡±

    Shrugging, Han Shuo said, ¡°If you don¡¯t believe me, you can look into the internal information of the Dark Mantle. I was directly inducted by Candide, and he said that I would be under his deployment in the future. That¡¯s how things are.¡±

    Emily rather believed Han Shuo after his words. She stroked his cheek as she said, ¡°You¡¯re quite something alright. How did the old fox take a fancy to you?¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s not talk about this, we should hurry and follow them. I think Duke and them are nning on doing something.¡± Han Shuo suddenly said and tugged Emily towards Duke and Erick¡¯s direction.

    Leveraging the original demon¡¯s vision, Han Shuo discovered that Duke and Erick were circling the outside of the cemetery of death. It looked like Duke had indeed discovered something. He changed magical incantations and released several Grim Wind spells. They howled around the edges of the cemetery of death, attempting to discover something.

    Just as this moment, the concealed original demon discovered someone crouched within the shrubbery. This man wore a body of dark brown clothing, with the color of the clothing melding into the trees. Hey there unmoving, and it would be difficult to discover him if one didn¡¯t look carefully.

    His clothes and actions clearly indicated that he was after Duke and Erick. From the information that he¡¯d just received from Emily, Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts raced and he immediately understood that this man was likely someone that the Dark Mantle had sent to keep an eye on Duke and Erick.

    The Grim Wind spells blew randomly and tore through everything around them. When one of the Grim Wind spells blew over, it happened to crash directly into him. Although the many crouching on the ground and didn¡¯t move, a bloody furrow was gouged out of his body and he involuntarily cried out from the pain.

    ¡°Who is it?¡± The sensitivity of Duke¡¯s ears were beyond belief as he heard a cry of pain from such a distance away. He¡¯d been standing within the bushes, but suddenly once again, used the levitation spell to drift through the air and make straight for where the person was.

    Seeing that he¡¯d been made, the person immediately stood up and nned on hastily leaving the area. However, as a wind archmage, Duke¡¯s speed was obviously faster than this person. He¡¯d arrived behind the person with a whoosh as soon as he¡¯d activated the levitation spell.

    ¡°You Dark Mantle people again, you really linger and refuse to leave. You¡¯ve discovered me even in the Dark Forest! I have to say that you Dark Mantle people are truly infinitely resourceful!¡± Duke said this with a light smile and chanted an incantation.

    Great winds suddenly appeared in front of the Dark Mantle member, who was attempting to leave, obstructing his path forward. The howling wind formed des of wind and criss-crossed as they shot towards the Dark Mantle member.

    When his body met the obstruction, a dagger appeared in his hand as he dodged nimbly within the shrubbery, evading most of the attacks from the wind des. He then waved the dagger to defend against the other wind des. Explosions rang out, and although his dagger defended against a few of the wind des, two deep gouges of blood appeared on his legs.

    ¡°Oh no, the observer from our organization keeping an eye on their movements seems to have been caught. We should hurry on over. You take care of Duke and I¡¯ll handle senior swordsman Erick.¡± Han Shuo was deathly afraid that the cemetery of death would be revealed and thus nned on using Emily¡¯s power to kill Duke and Erick once and for all. He immediately cried out when he saw this situation developing.

    Emily¡¯s facial expression immediately changed when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s words. A grey robe suddenly appeared as it covered her entire body. She also casted the levitation spell and flew out after murmuring ¡°be careful¡± to Han Shuo.

    Apart from serving within the Dark Mantle, many within the organization had other identities. Therefore, unless there was no other option avable, they wouldn¡¯t easily show their true faces to others. This was the basic modus operandus of all Dark Mantle members.

    When Emily left, Han Shuo also took out a grey robe to cover his entire body as two of the original demons flew towards Duke, with the other closely tailing Erick. Han Shuo was quite familiar with this area as he dashed over from another path and nned on intercepting and getting rid of Erick halfway.

    Han Shuo¡¯s injuries were mostly healed by now, and his magical yuan had greatly increased afterst time¡¯s experience of entering a demonic trance. As his magical yuan circted now, it gave Han Shuo a feeling of being free from inhibitions.

    When Erick heard Duke¡¯s voice, he grasped his longsword and quickly, but cautiously approached the same spot. When he reached an uneven hill, Han Shuo, who¡¯d been lying in wait, suddenly chanted a magical incantation. A bone spear suddenly shot towards Erick, and a crossbow also twanged when the bone spear materialized.

    When the crossbow bolt shot out, Han Shuo¡¯s body also shot out like lightning. When Erick saw these two attacks charging towards him, Erickpletely lost hisposure as he panicked and used a most practical, yet exceedingly ugly roll to move out of the way towards the front, not giving a thought to how he looked.

    The ugly method was quite useful as he evaded Han Shuo¡¯s two waves of attacks. Erick then appeared right in front of Han Shuo and stabbed forward with a sword imbued with dark green fighting aura. Han Shuo hastily took out the Demonyer Edge, but his hand trembled slightly from the impact.

    Erick also grunted, but didn¡¯t actually make use of the opportunity to follow up. He stood up and chased in Duke¡¯s direction.

    Snorting lightly, Han Shuo grasped his Demonyer Edge and quickly followed. Another original demon, who was observing Duke, discovered that Emily had already exchanged blows with Duke, and it seemed that she had the upper hand. It was a pity that she seemed to be a few steps toote as the Dark Mantle member already had multiplecerations crossing his body. He seemed to be dead.

    ¡°Master Duke, I¡¯m going!¡± Erick cried out loudly and charged over with upraised sword. Duke, in the midst of his fight with Emily, had his facial expression flicker rapidly, but when he saw Han Shuo chasing behind Erick, the staff in his hand suddenly shook as he released a hurricane spell, lifting up Han Shuo¡¯s charging body and flinging it into the distance.

    At this moment, the Eye of Darkness that had been stored within Han Shuo¡¯s space ring actually flew out of the ring automatically, ring out with sparkling green light, opening the boundary that protected the cemetery of death. Han Shuo¡¯s body alsonded within the cemetery with a thud.

    ¡°Oh, my gosh, it really is the cemetery of death!¡± Duke had been about to turn back and handle Emily when he saw the green light explode in the air, revealing the bizarre view of the cemetery of death. He immediately cried out with joy and suddenly dashed over, paying no heed to anything else.

    Erick and Emily were both incredibly astonished. They first stared, dumbfounded, and then sprinted forward with all their might before the boundary to the cemetery closed again.

 Chapter 122: Thinking for you

    Chapter 122: Thinking for you

    Tall and angr buildings were erected within the cemetery of death that was strewn with bones. All of them drew Duke¡¯s attention. In that instant, he concerned himself with looking around wildly and didn¡¯t continue making a move against Han Shuo.

    However, when Emily rushed into the cemetery, her first task wasn¡¯t to take in the surroundings. Rather, she flew to Han Shuo instead and asked anxiously, ¡°Are you alright?¡±

    If it¡¯d been an ordinary person falling from such a height, they might have actually been injured. but Han Shuo, of course, wasn¡¯t injured at all. He shook his head at Emily and stood up with a darkened face, fixing his gaze tightly onto the wind archmage Duke in the distance.

    Looking around with excitement, Duke said joyfully when senior swordsman Erick arrived next to him, ¡°This is the cemetery of death, there¡¯s no doubt about it. Who would¡¯ve thought that we¡¯d actually make it inside?¡±

    ¡°Master Duke, we didn¡¯t discover anything after a such a long period of studying, but the boundary to the cemetery of death opened when green light was emitted from that person. It¡¯s very strange!¡± Erick looked at Han Shuo from afar and said lowly to Duke.

    Nodding, Duke said, ¡°That¡¯s right. It looks like there¡¯s something odd about this person. That green light just now also gave me a familiar feeling, it seems to havee from the Eye of Darkness!¡±

    Erick was greatly astonished when these words were voiced. ¡°How is that possible?¡±

    Grasping the Demonyer Edge in his hands, Han Shuo recited an incantation and the little skeleton, wielding a bone dagger and sporting seven wings, appeared. Three zombie warriors also appeared. They all held wooden clubs and barred the path to Han Shuo and Emily along with the little skeleton.

    ¡°You were the one who opened the boundary to the cemetery of death?¡± Emily breathed a sigh of relief when she saw that Han Shuo was unharmed. She then recalled what had just happened and asked Han Shuo with great confusion.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said with a darkened face, ¡°That¡¯s right. The cemetery of death was opened by something on my body. Duke and Erick must die now. You help me take care of Duke, and I¡¯ll exin to you after we kill them!¡±

    Emily didn¡¯t ask anything else after hearing Han Shuo speak thus, and docilely picked up her magic staff, setting her sights on the approaching Duke with a look full of killing intent.

    ¡°He¡¯s also a necromancer to boot, it looks like this will be a slightly difficult fight!¡± Erick had traded blows with Han Shuo and could feel that Han Shuo¡¯s strength was not in the slightest bit weaker than his own. When he saw that Han Shuo had even summoned zombie warriors, his brow creased as he spoke.

    ¡°Kill them first. We¡¯re excavating the secrets of the cemetery of death!¡± Duke snorted lightly and floated over. Erick didn¡¯t say much else after pausing for a moment and following Duke in a charge over.

    A string of incantations leisurely surged out of Emily¡¯s mouth. The magic staff in her hand suddenly shot out a few strands of ck air and like snakes twisted and twined towards the approaching Duke. When Duke saw the ck air attacking him, his face became iparably grave. A tornado formed suddenly in front of him and churned up all the white bones on the ground. It made for the ck air and twisted all of them into the tornado.

    Snorting coldly, Emily said, ¡°Be careful¡±, to Han Shuo and also flew towards the ck air. She waved the magic staff in her hand and started fighting fiercely with Duke within the air.

    ¡°We shouldn¡¯t just idly stand around either.¡± Han Shuo grinned and gave a longugh. The little skeleton led the three zombie warriors in heading towards Erick. At the same time, Han Shuo kept an eye behind Erick and Duke, via the original demons, observing their every gesture and move.

    ¡°Do you think three zombies and a skeleton are enough to stop me?¡± Erick snorted lowly with disdain as dark green fighting aura red out of the longsword in his hand. His body was like a bulldozer as he sent dirt and dust flying as he charged directly towards Han Shuo.

    Continuouslyughing coldly within his heart, Han Shuo made use of his mental strength to manipte the zombie warriors and little skeleton, blocking the way in front of him. The little skeleton¡¯s usual speed was as fast as lightning, but was now being purposefully curtailed by Han Shuo so that he was as slow as the zombie warriors. Dashing over, Erick¡¯s dark green fighting aura formed a ball of light as it enclosed a zombie warrior within it.

    The sound of bones exploding suddenly emitted from the zombie warrior¡¯s body. Beneath the effects of the dark green fighting aura, the first zombie warrior had its body shattered. Its wooden club also broke into several segments. Turning his body sideways with a disdainful smirk, Erick¡¯s nimble body evaded the crashes from the other two zombie warriors¡¯ wooden clubs and stabbed forward with his longsword, shing open the neck of another zombie warrior. The zombie warrior swayed and looked like it was about to fall down.

    The little skeleton raised the bone dagger and pressed itself against the other zombie warrior, jerkily raising the bone dagger in its hand and stabbing it towards Erick. Erick could easily handle even the zombie warriors, so he paid absolutely no attention to the little skeleton¡¯s upraised dagger, raising his sword rather impatiently to block the strike.

    At this moment, the originally abnormally slow bone dagger suddenly increased more than tenfold in its striking speed. The previously stiff and slow little skeleton became so agile that it caused Erick¡¯s eyes to bug out. Erick¡¯s longsword had just started rising and he hadn¡¯t had time to make his move before the bone dagger was alreadynding on its target.

    Erick retreated in horrified fright, but he was still a beat too slow. A puncturing sound rang out as arge piece of flesh and blood flew out from his chest. As Erick cried out in pain, he also called out with incredulity, ¡°How is this possible?! What kind of skeletal warrior is this?¡±

    It was a pity that the little skeleton had no reaction to Erick¡¯s astonished yells. When he¡¯d seeded with one of his blows, he didn¡¯t rx and immediately followed up afterwards. He didn¡¯t wait for Erick to stabilize his footing before appearing in front of him. As Erick¡¯s fighting aura gathered anew on his longsword, the seven bone spurs on the back of the little skeleton¡¯s spine red out at the same time and they flew in a semi-circle,nded urately on Erick¡¯s body.

    The seven bone spurs pierced through Erick¡¯s neck, forehead, and heart. He didn¡¯t even have time to release the fighting aura that he¡¯d gathered before his body fell backwards. The frightened and terrified expression on his face didn¡¯t even vanish in death.

    Duke and Emily had been fighting when they both noticed the disturbance on this side. When they saw that Erick had died a gruesome death, both were surprised. However, Duke¡¯s worry and Emily¡¯s joy followed closely after that surprise.

    Emily had already witnessed the little skeleton¡¯s miraculousnessst time, and even she, a dark archmage, had been powerless in the face of the little skeleton¡¯s pursuit. The little skeleton¡¯s nimbleness and speed had left a powerful impression on Emily. Upon seeing that the seven bone spurs on the back of the little skeleton could even harm someone, she had a deeper understanding of Han Shuo¡¯s mysteriousness.

    Duke was already having trouble fending off attacks from Emily alone, he¡¯d actually been hoping that Erick would help him after taking care of Han Shuo. He hadn¡¯t thought that the seasoned and well experienced Erick would die so quickly. Han Shuo was still standing there, having made not a move. This made Duke panic momentarily.

    ¡°What, you want to run? Do you think you can get away today?¡± After killing Erick, the original demon noticed that Duke¡¯s eyes were darting around. Han Shuo drew near to him with a shadow of a smile as he opened his mouth in mockery.

    Duke¡¯s face suddenly grew frosty as his usually benevolent features twisted as he stared at Han Shuo, ¡°You¡¯re seeking death!¡±

    Many sharp shards of bone fragments on the ground suddenly shot towards Han Shuo as Duke waved his magic staff. The sound they made while shooting through the air was extremely ear piercing, and their momentum was quite frightening. When Emily saw that Han Shuo was under attack, she was even more nervous than Han Shuo as she hastily chanted a dark magic spell.

    An inky ck opening appeared out of thin air before these sharp bone fragments reached Han Shuo. When the bone fragments arrived, they were all attracted to the ck opening andpletely sucked in.

    After releasing his attack, Duke didn¡¯t continue to attack, but rather hurtled his body towards the outside in an attempt to escape. It looked like he¡¯d counted on Emily being concerned for Han Shuo. That¡¯s why he¡¯d attacked Han Shuo so that Emily would save him, and then take advantage of the opportunity to run off.

    However, it was easy to enter the cemetery of death, but quite difficult to leave. After the Eye of Darkness had revealed itself, it¡¯d once again sank back into Han Shuo¡¯s space ring. Without the Eye of Darkness, even him, a wind archmage, would be unable to open the boundary.

    He crashed headfirst into the boundary, and arge bang sounded out. A ball of green light red out from the boundary as Duke was affected by its power. He was unable to maintain his levitation spell and fell from midair. Some broken pieces of bone happened to pierce his calves, stomach, and waist, causing immediate injury to his body.

    ¡°My condolences!¡± Han Shuo approached Duke with a cold smile as Emily and the little skeleton surrounded Duke. Han Shuo ripped the mask off his face and said, ¡°Long time no see, benevolent Mister Duke!¡±

    Duke, crying out painfully, immediately spoke with fear when he saw Han Shuo reveal his true face. ¡°Why is it you? I remember that I once saw you in the Babylon Academy. Aren¡¯t you that necromancy student?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo smiled sinisterly and said, ¡°That¡¯s right, it¡¯s me.¡± He then took out the Eye of Darkness and ced it on his palm, lighting it up. ¡°The small errand boy, whose tracks you guys discoveredst time, in the cemetery in the mountains at the back of the Academy, was also me. Heh heh, I was the one who gained the Eye of Darkness that Dn buried in the ground. You guys didn¡¯t think that I wouldn¡¯t die, did you? It¡¯se full circle not too long afterwards!¡±

    ¡°So you were the one who obtained the Eye of Darkness! No wonder the boundary to the cemetery of death was opened after that light came from your body!¡± Duke spoke in sudden enlightenment.

    Three more zombie warriors appeared, making it a total of four zombie warriors and one little skeleton. They walked slowly towards archmage Duke. Han Shuo raised his crossbow and took aim at Duke, Emily chanted a dark major spell, officially sealing Duke¡¯s fate as the little skeleton¡¯s seven bone spurs flew around in a dance.

    When the seven bone spurs flew out, Duke used wind des to rapidly defend against them all, but the approaching four zombie warriors and little skeleton made him feel quite troubled.

    When Han Shuo¡¯s crossbow had shot it, the bolt pierced through the hastily dodging Duke¡¯s thigh and nailed him to the ground. Emily¡¯s dark magic had already enclosed Duke before Han Shuo had taken out the Demonyer Edge. Thick smoke rose up from Duke¡¯s body in that instant as he became another set of stark white bones within the cemetery of death.

    The little skeleton drew close to Duke and took off the space ring from the white bones of his hand. He handed it over to Han Shuo along with the pouch of the senior swordsman Erick.

    Emily stared at the little skeleton with clear eyes and was dumbfounded for quite a while by the little skeleton¡¯s motions. She finally couldn¡¯t hold it in any longer and asked Han Shuo with an exceedingly high amount of curiosity, ¡°Can you tell me what was up with that wondrous little skeleton?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, nothing much. I refined it with a secret art. That¡¯s why its performance is so wondrous!¡± Rubbing the little skeleton¡¯s clean and smooth skullcap, Han Shuo smiled as he picked up the spoils of battle being offered up to him.

    Emily red fiercely at Han Shuo and said huffily, ¡°Just how many more things are you hiding from me? Why do you have the Eye of Darkness and howe you¡¯re able to refine such an amazing skeletal warrior? You¡¯re just a small necromancer, yet you also have umon fighting techniques. Just what is going on here?¡±

    Some things had to be exined at this moment. Han Shuo exined everything that had happened in the necromancy major, including the discovery of the cemetery of death, to Emily. However, he still didn¡¯t mention anything with regards to refining the little skeleton and the magical yuan.

    This conversation caused exceedingly great shock to Emily. As she contemted silently, Han Shuo started searching through Duke¡¯s and Erick¡¯s things.

    But after rifling for a while, Han Shuo discovered that Erick was one heck of a poor guy. There wasn¡¯t anything valuable in his pouch. Duke should¡¯ve had some interesting items on him, but he¡¯d set up a magical boundary within his space ring and Han Shuo waspletely unable to break it to obtain anything from inside.

    After a while, Emily looked at Han Shuo with a grave face. ¡°Does anyone else know that you¡¯ve obtained the Eye of Darkness and that you cane and go from the cemetery of death, apart from you and me?¡±

    ¡°No one else knows.¡± Han Shuo looked at Emily and hesitated before asking, ¡°What do you n to do?¡±

    ¡°In that case, then we¡¯ll continue to keep this secret. Duke and Erick are dead anyways, and the agent that the organization had sent to chase them is gone. No one else knows about this matter. Then, in the future, the cemetery of death is still your secret alone, the foundations for you to train your body to slowly control the Dark Forest.¡± Emily gazed deeply at Han Shuo as she spoke lowly.

    Staring in stupefaction for a bit, Han Shuo smiled slightly and suddenly yanked Emily into his arms. He smiled, ¡°You¡¯re my woman alright, I thought you¡¯d want me to offer the secret of the cemetery of death to the organization!¡±

    Rolling her eyes in a disy of ill temper at Han Shuo, Emily said, ¡°Do you think I don¡¯t know what you¡¯re thinking? If you wanted to tell the organization about this secret, you would¡¯ve done so a long time ago, why would you wait until now? I understand what the cemetery of death means to you, and it seems very important for your future development. We¡¯re already like this now, I would naturally think for you.¡±

    Han Shuo was really a bit touched upon hearing Emily¡¯s words. He privately thought to himself that women were iprehensible creatures alright. Once their bodies and hearts were captured, then all their previous resolutions wouldpletely copse. When she spoke these words, it meant that Emily had chosen to lean towards Han Shuo between the Dark Mantle and himself. If Han Shuo had any conflicts with the Dark Mantle in the future, it looked like Emily would be willing to make a stand against the Dark Mantle for Han Shuo.

    ¡°Right, you said that your goal this time was to investigate where those weapons had gone. I used the forest trolls to rob that batch of resources this time, will it affect your mission?¡± Seeing that Emily was thinking on his behalf, Han Shuo thought for a bit and suddenly recalled what Emily had mentionedst time, and so opened his mouth to ask her.

    Smiling merrily for a bit, Emily looked soulfully at Han Shuo in the midst of his surprise. ¡°You bad boy, you¡¯re finally willing to think of my situation. How nice!¡±

    Han Shuo was speechless as he thought back to prior events and discovered that he really had never thought on Emily¡¯s behalf. He¡¯d thought for himself from start to finish, and he now felt a bit embarrassed by her words. Heughed a bit awkwardly.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry too much about this matter, I actually had a fair guess of where these resources were going. I just wanted to catch him in the act so that he¡¯d have nothing to say. Although these resources have been intercepted, many of the McGrady Guild¡¯s men have made it out. They¡¯ll surely think of a way to ransom back the siege weapons from the forest trolls.¡±

    ¡°If anyone wants to purchase the siege weapons from the forest trolls, just let them handle the matters they usually would. You¡¯d be doing me a great favor that way. When they obtain all their items, they¡¯ll still deliver it to my target. I¡¯ll arrest him then, and it won¡¯t affect the greater picture.¡± Emily looked at Han Shuo and said with a smile.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°No problem, I¡¯ll go back to the Empire and get my hands on some rations. I¡¯ll return to the Dark Forest after that. I¡¯ll go speak to the forest trolls so it won¡¯t impact your mission at all.¡±

    ¡°Oh right, you can¡¯t open Duke¡¯s space ring either. So why not give it to me? I¡¯ll think of a way to break through the barrier and see just what¡¯s inside.¡±

    ¡°Okay, you take it then.¡± Han Shuo straightforwardly handed Duke¡¯s space ring over to Emily, and then suddenly remembered Yuna¡¯s pretty space ring from his previous encounter when that thought struck him. Yuna was only an adept mage. Theoretically, the boundary that she¡¯d set up should be easily broken by Emily.

    Therefore, he took out Yuna¡¯s space ring and gave it to Emily. ¡°There¡¯s also a boundary ced within this space ring, but that person was only an adept mage. I think you should be able to break the barrier inside and see what¡¯s in it?¡±

    Emily took the space ring without asking how Han Shuo obtained it, took a deep breath, and focused her concentration.

    The jade green space ring suddenly lit up, and abruptly dimmed when a strong pulse of magic was felt. Breathing out slightly, a few items suddenly appeared in Emily¡¯s hand. There were some female personal effects, a crystal card, a book on water magic, and some medicine to treat injuries.

    Staring at Han Shuo oddly, Emily asked, ¡°To think you would be such a brutal person as to destroy a feminine flower. How did this woman die in your hands?¡±

    Turning the items over after taking them from Emily, Han Shuo put away the jade green space ring when he discovered there wasn¡¯t anything valuable. He smiled, ¡°A wanton woman betrayed me. I was so angry that I killed her. This is quite normal.¡±

    ¡°Pah! I don¡¯t believe you!¡± Emily said.

    ¡°Alright, I have two more days before I need to report to the organization. I must hurry and leave the cemetery of death. You already know my identity and origins, so we can temporarily leave this ce. Go about your business first, whether you are going to report to the Dark Mantle or the Academy first, I think it¡¯ll be easy for me to find you. We should part ways here.¡± Han Shuo remembered that he had a ton of things to do and spoke to Emily.

    ¡°Alright, although you¡¯re a dishonest brat, it is indeed easy for me to find you. I¡¯ll ask you a final question, between Bryan and that weird name Han Shuo, which one should I call you by?¡± Emily asked.

    ¡°How about Han Shuo? This is the new name that the person who passed on the martial arts technique created for me. Call me that in the future!¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment and responded.

    Nodding and saying nothing else, Han Shuo took Emily on a quick tour around the cemetery, and the two left via the transportation matrix amidst Emily¡¯s repeated exmations of surprise.

 Chapter 123: You didnâ€™t rob the giant dragon, did you?

    Chapter 123: You didn¡¯t rob the giant dragon, did you?

    After leaving the cemetery of death, Han Shuo and Emily went separate ways. Emily still had to aplish her mission from her superiors and couldn¡¯t stay by Han Shuo¡¯s side.

    He hadn¡¯t returned to the Babylon Academy in a while and he was rather missing Fanny. Except, the whole incident with Emily had happened, and this made Han Shuo a bit uncertain of how to face Fanny. He hesitated and didn¡¯t directly return to the Academy, rather walking to the Boozt Merchant Guild first.

    Han Shuo had asked Phoebe to help look for items to refine an earth elite zombie. So much time had passed, it was time to ask if she was ready. There were also treasures that hade from the forest trolls¡¯ sacrednd within his space ring that needed to be disposed of via Phoebe. Add to that the fact that he needed to prepare rations for the forest trolls and the dwarves, so he rather needed to make a trip to the Boozt Merchant Guild.

    After experiencing the Grover incident, Phoebe had already grasped the reins of power at the Guild. After making a couple visits, those within the Guild were all familiar with Han Shuo.

    When Han Shuo presented himself at the door this time, the guards sent him in directly. When he walked towards the living room, Han Shuo suddenly heard the sounds of Fabian lecturing someone in a room, ¡°Your father spent gold coins to help you enter the Guild, so you must work hard! Otherwise, with my position in the Guild, I won¡¯t be able to protect you.¡±

    ¡°Understood, uncle.¡± Another voice that Han Shuo was familiar with responded honestly.

    When this voice sounded, Han Shuo¡¯s body sped up in surprise. When he arrived at the door to the room, he pushed the door open without knocking because he was so agitated, giving Fabian a shock. He immediately cried out, ¡°Who dares to trepass in my territory!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s me, Mister Fabian.¡± Han Shuoughed lightly and walked in with great strides.

    When he heard Han Shuo¡¯s voice, Fabian heaved a sigh of relief and walked out chuckling from the room. He said, ¡°So you¡¯vee, heh heh, are you here toe see our Miss Phoebe again?¡±

    Another fat and chubby body quickly dashed out of the house. When he saw Han Shuo, he cried out with unexpected surprise. ¡°Bryan, howe it¡¯s you! Howe you¡¯re in the Boozt Merchant Guild as well? Heh heh, are you a member of the Guild as well? We can be colleagues again?¡±

    Little fatty Jack¡¯s body had grown a bit taller, but his weight seemed to have increased even faster. When he rushed out of the house withrge strides, the ground sounded with thumps.

    ¡°Long time no see Jack! Howe you¡¯re with the Guild?¡± Han Shuo was also quite happy to see Jack again. Little fatty Jack was the closest friend that Han Shuo had met after arriving at the Academy. When Han Shuo gave him a sum of moneyst time, he thought he¡¯d never see Jack again. Who would¡¯ve thought that the two would see each other again after not too long had past.

    ¡°You two know each other?¡± Fabian was a bit taken aback as he looked at Jack and then at Han Shuo.

    Nodding, Han Shuo smiled as he exined, ¡°When I was in the Academy, I was an errand boy with Jack. Heh heh, not only do we know each other, but our rtionship is quite good.¡±

    ¡°Yes uncle, Bryan is quite amazing. Who would¡¯ve thought that I¡¯d run into him here?¡± Jack said, delighted.

    ¡°Mister Fabian, I¡¯d like to catch up with your nephew. I¡¯ll go meet Miss Phoebeter! Please pass that along for me!¡± Han Shuo said to Fabian with a smile.

    Han Shuo had saved Fabian and Phoebe¡¯s lives, and had brought a great deal of business with him thest couple of times. This made Fabian long since view Han Shuo as a person of great fortune. When he heard Han Shuo speak thus, he immediately agreed and winked at Jack, as if hinting something to Jack.

    It was a pity that the excited Jack didn¡¯t discover his uncle¡¯s hints, but rather, the more mature and experienced Han Shuo saw it all clearly andughed ceaselessly in his heart.

    When Fabian left, Han Shuo immediately asked, ¡°Jack, how did youe to the Boozt Merchant Guild?¡±

    ¡°When you gave me the gold coins. I left the Academy. When I returned home, I didn¡¯t know what to do and helped my father butcher cows and sheep. I saw that things were difficult at home, so I secretly exchanged the gold coins you gave me into bits and pieces and gave them to my father, but he discovered my secret in the end, so I told him I found a bag of gold coins on the streets.¡±

    ¡°My father felt that I couldn¡¯t always be a butcher, and so he took half of the gold coins to find my uncle Fabian to ask him to let me help in the Guild. I¡¯m learning bookkeeping from someone, and that¡¯s how things are. Right, why are you in the Guild? I see that my uncle seems to have a lot of respect for you, what¡¯s going on here?¡± Jack looked at Han Shuo with surprise and asked in confusion.

    Han Shuo said something random and fobbed Jack off with them. Han Shuo and Jack chatted for a while. From Jack¡¯s expression and words, Han Shuo felt that he was actually quite happy to work for the Guild. So he decided to help Jack a bit and was prepared to say something to Phoebe. He felt that Phoebe would at least give him this face.

    No wonder he was happy to stay here. When he was an errand boy in the Academy before, not only did Jack have to work day and night, but he was often bullied by other students and errand boys. His days weren¡¯t toofortable. Now that he was in the Guild, he had the protection of someone like Fabian, who worked at Phoebe¡¯s side. At least no one dared do anything to him. Compared to the backbreaking work of an errand boy, the material he was now learning was much more interesting. No wonder Jack liked it here.

    They talked for quite a while until Fabian came to rush Han Shuo, telling him that Miss Phoebe was waiting for him. Han Shuo then patted Jack¡¯s shoulder, saying with a smile, ¡°Then I¡¯ll be going. Since you¡¯re within the Guild, we¡¯ll have plenty of chances to meet in the future.¡±

    ¡°Alright, you go about your business. Come see me whenever you have the chance! Although I¡¯m doing well here, I don¡¯t have that many friends.¡±

    ¡°Mm, I know.¡±

    After leaving Fabian¡¯s room, Han Shuo¡¯s sensitive ears immediately heard Fabian and Jack¡¯s conversation. Fabian was telling Jack to build a good rtionship with Han Shuo, saying that Han Shuo was a person of great fortune, etc.

    Phoebe was still stunning as usual. A well-tailored, form fitting green robe even more fully offset her tall, slender, and umon demeanor. Faint blush powdered onto her cheeks disyed their clean smoothness, with a hint of red blush hidden within them. Her bright eyes were embedded into a face that seemed a work of art, appearingpletely perfect and wless.

    ¡°You¡¯ve disappeared for almost a month, what do you n on talking about this time?¡± The surrounding maids had long since left as Phoebe sat within the hall, holding a cup of tea within her hands and leisurely sipping it. She flicked a nomittal nce at Han Shuo and delivered her words faintly.

    ¡°I¡¯ve only been gone for a month, but why does Miss Phoebe look even more beautiful?¡± Han Shuo spoke truly. When he¡¯d seen Phoebe before, she¡¯d never purposefully dressed up, but this, time, she¡¯d noticeably put on some makeup, and her beauty truly had been enhanced a bit in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes.

    When these words were spoken, Phoebe¡¯s eyes lit up as the faint red on her cheeks slowly spread out. A happy curve traced her lips as she said in a soft, gentle voice, ¡°You¡¯ve grown more glib in the month that I haven¡¯t seen you.¡±

    Laughing heartily, Han Shuo walked in front of Phoebe and took the teapot and cup from in front of Phoebe, pouring himself a cup and taking a sip before saying, ¡°Before we chat about serious matters, I hope you can do me a favor. Help my friend advance a bit.¡±

    Phoebe wasn¡¯t surprised to hear that, and her translucent chin nodded lightly twice. She said in a quiet and beautiful voice,¡± I heard from Fabian just now. Who would¡¯ve thought that you¡¯d be friends with the fatty? Heh heh, he¡¯s such an honest person and has you as a friend?¡±

    Breaking out intoughter, Han Shuo scratched his head, ¡°With your words, am I not honest enough?¡±

    ¡°Humph! If you counted as honest, then there¡¯d be no people who don¡¯t abide by the rules in this world. I remember all the bad things you¡¯ve done to me, how dare you say that you¡¯re honest?¡± Phoebe rolled her eyes in a pretty way as she bit off her words while ring at Han Shuo.

    Abruptly taking in a sip of tea to hide his awkwardness, Han Shuo said awkwardly, ¡°Don¡¯t mention what¡¯s in the past! You still haven¡¯t agreed to help me take care of Jack!¡±

    ¡°No problem, I¡¯ll take good care of him for you. It¡¯s easy to help you with a small matter like this, but the other matter is a bit trickier.¡± Phoebe said a bit thoughtfully.

    Starting, Han Shuo looked askance at Phoebe, asking, ¡°What¡¯s tricky?¡±

    ¡°About the materials you asked me to buy for you,¡± Phoebe thought for a moment and opened her mouth to speak.

    The refinement of the earth elite zombie was something that Han Shuo felt imperative he wanted toplete. When he heard Phoebe said that she¡¯d run into some trouble, Han Shuo immediately felt a bit worried. He hastily asked, ¡°What trouble? Is it that your Guild can¡¯t find those materials?¡±

    Shaking her head, Phoebe¡¯s painted eyebrow creased slightly as she sighed lowly, ¡°With our Guild¡¯s abilities, if these items exist in the world, then we¡¯ll be able to get our hands on it as long as someone can afford the price. I had thought that the items wouldn¡¯t be that expensive, but who would¡¯ve thought that after careful inquiry, I¡¯d discover that all those unknown items would all be at an exorbitant price.¡±

    ¡°ording to my calctions, all these materials added together would need at least thirty thousand gold coins. Although I hold the power within the Guild, but I¡¯ve just be the head and don¡¯t have the authority topletely mask such arge transaction for you, because each transaction will leave behind a record.¡±

    Han Shuo had been a bit worried when he heard her say she¡¯d run into troubles, but now that he saw that it was due to the price, he rather breathed a sigh of relief. The current Han Shuo could be short on other things, but he had so many gold coins that he couldn¡¯t take them all with him at any given time. When he heard Phoebe say that the problems resulted from pricing, he immediately smiled.

    ¡°What are you smiling about? I know you¡¯ve got some savings in your hands, but thirty thousand gold coins isn¡¯t a small amount. I can privately put together ten thousand for you, but I can¡¯t ess my father¡¯s savings before I¡¯m 25, so I can only take out so much. Why are you stillughing? I¡¯m talking about serious matters!¡± Phoebe was frowning and trying to think of a n for Han Shuo, but he was smiling andughing as if nothing was the matter. This made Phoebe feel a bit irate.

    ¡°Right, how old are you now?¡± Han Shuo halted and asked Phoebe.

    Her face reddening, Phoebe appeared a bit shy. She hesitated, and then snuck a nce at Han Shuo with a bashful expression, ¡°23, you?¡±

    ¡°17!¡± Han Shuo said.

    Phoebe¡¯s face whitened and she appeared a bit panicked. She hastily cried out, ¡°Who are you kidding? Do you talk and look like a seventeen year old?¡±

    Han Shuo only remembered that he¡¯d already been 24 when he¡¯d possessed Bryan¡¯s body. Bryan had originally been thin and small, but now lookedpletely like an adult after the reforging from the magical yuan. Add to that his original way of speech and experiences, he didn¡¯t look like a seventeen year old no matter how one cut it.

    Thinking for a while, Han Shuo finally chuckled, ¡°I¡¯m kidding, I¡¯m 24.¡±

    Phoebe noticeably heaved a sigh of relief when she heard these words and thenughed wryly at Han Shuo, ¡°Don¡¯t think of using me to make a n. There¡¯s still two more years until I¡¯m 25. I don¡¯t think you can wait two more years. Let¡¯s think of another n.¡±

    A smile still hanging on his lips, Han Shuo blew a breath of air at the space ring and rubbed it with his fingers. Blocks of gold and all sorts of jewels, jade, and precious gems appeared one after another within the hall. In that instant, the hall was filled with the luster from the jewels as all sorts of dazzling, opulent splendor made the hall extremely luxurious and extravagant.

    ¡°Is this enough?¡± Han Shuo looked at Phoebe, who¡¯d sunk into a dumbfounded state, and asked merrily.

    The riches within the hall hade from many years of forest troll looting. When he took them all from the space ring and piled them in front of Phoebe, it did indeed cause a huge shock to her.

    ¡°Heart of the Blue Ocean, Sierra Leone Jade, the Mudanee Ne, King Finley¡¯s Crown...¡± Phoebe¡¯s stunning face was full of shock as her slender fingers rifled through the jewels that had appeared. She murmured these amazing names in a low voice.

    After a while, Phoebe took in a few breaths in a row, finally looking deeply at Han Shuo and asking, ¡°A lot of missing treasures are here. You didn¡¯t rob a giant dragon, did you?¡±

    Shaking his head with a lowugh, Han Shuo said, ¡°Don¡¯t ask how I obtained these items, just tell me if they¡¯re enough for me to exchange for the materials I requested?¡±

    ¡°Eh... I temporarily can¡¯t estimate the value of these goods, but I think their value will definitely exceed thirty thousand gold coins.¡± Phoebe¡¯s clear eyes still stared firmly at Han Shuo as she slowly responded.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said straightforwardly, ¡°Good, these items are showy but not substantial, they don¡¯t have much value for me. Collect them all and dispose of them for me at a reasonable price. I need the materials that I mentioned earlier. In addition, please purchase another space ring for me, I¡¯d like to take the rations fromst time with me.¡±

    ¡°With so many treasures, aren¡¯t you afraid that I¡¯ll list some random price that disadvantages you?¡± Phoebe looked at Han Shuo and stared for a bit, a trace of a faint smile blossoming on her lips as she asked him.

    ¡°I believe that you won¡¯t!¡± Han Shuo smiled. ¡°I¡¯ll visit again in a few days, I hope the items I need will be ready then.¡±

    ¡°Stay for lunch.¡± Phoebe nodded and hesitated, suddenly saying lightly when she saw that Han Shuo was about to leave after leaving the treasures behind.

    Han Shuo felt a bit strange when he heard these words, but Phoebe truly could help him with a great deal of things right now. Although he had a lot of things to handle at the moment, the time it took to eat a meal wasn¡¯t that long either. Therefore, he decisively nodded and agreed to it.

    The location of lunch was near the artificial mountains where Phoebe and Han Shuo had once crushed themselves into. This ce had been redecorated now and all sorts of expensive flowers and grass had been nted in the surroundings. The branches and leaves of some green and luxuriant, soft nts were entwined around the stone pirs of the little pavilion. It looked quite charming.

    Han Shuo continuously felt a bit ufortable as he sat at the table within the little pavilion, after the maids had filled it with food and wine. His eyes kept drifting to the crack in the artificial mountain that he¡¯d squeezed into with Phoebe as he kept recalling what had happened here.

    Phoebe rather looked quitefortable, and she didn¡¯t seem to pay any attention to that area at all. She waved her hand and dismissed all the maids and guards, hospitably encouraging Han Shuo to drink wine and tea. This change in attitude made Han Shuo feel ufortable.

    After eating and drinking, although Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t get drunk thanks to the magical yuan, now that he¡¯d tasted the wonders of women, he kept recalling the time that he¡¯d taken advantage of Phoebe, for some reason. His serious and professional nces at Phoebe were suffused with another meaning at some unknown point.

    Phoebe observed Han Shuo¡¯s changes, and whether it was because of the sweet wine, her cheeks became even more reddened and beautiful. As her chilly facade retreated, Phoebe¡¯s charms continued to increase rapidly, making Han Shuo across the table from her panic inwardly and think random thoughts.

 Chapter 124: We havenâ€™t even slept together!

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    Chapter 124: We haven¡¯t even slept together!

    ¡°Why are you looking at me like that?¡± Phoebe drank another cup of translucent and clear red wine that sparkled with a wondrous light. She flicked a nce at Han Shuo as she said lowly.

    ¡°No... nothing much.¡± Han Shuo panicked and he stammered a bit.

    ¡°Then why are you drooling?¡± Phoebe pointed at the corner of Han Shuo¡¯s mouth as she lightlyughed yfully.

    He touched his chin and discovered that there really was some trace of water on his chin. Han Shuo said awkwardly, ¡°Eh, that isn¡¯t drool. It¡¯s wine, it¡¯s really wine.¡±

    ¡°Oh.¡± Phoebe smiled delightedly, ¡°So it¡¯s wine. How is it possible that you¡¯d miss some even when drinking wine? How interesting.¡±

    He kept feeling that the atmosphere was a bit odd. Han Shuo felt veryfortable at heart as he listened to Phoebe¡¯s soft and gentle words. His mind kept making connections as his eyes once again involuntarily drifted to the crack in the artificial mountain.

    ¡°It¡¯s only been a short time since we started eating, and you¡¯ve already nced to the left at the crack in the artificial mountain nine times. Just what is there that deserves your attention?¡± Phoebe¡¯s beautiful eyes darted around andnded on Han Shuo¡¯s body as she said lightly.

    Panicking inwardly, Han Shuo blurted out, ¡°How do you know that I kept ncing at that area, and that I¡¯ve done so nine times?¡±

    These words made Phoebe¡¯s face even redder. She tsk¡¯ed lightly and said lowly, ¡°You¡¯ve been looking around shiftily. Sitting in front of you, of course I saw everything. I know what bad thoughts you were harboring when you looked there.¡±

    ¡°Then what bad thoughts would you say I¡¯ve been thinking?¡± After what he¡¯d just gone through, Han Shuo suddenly felt that he was a bit too passive. A demonic practitioner was unafraid of all conventions and was most at ease when he did what was on his mind, no matter what others would think or say. When he suddenly understood this, Han Shuo no longer wildly casted around surreptitious nces, but rather stared directly at Phoebe and asked her with a smile.

    Phoebe started as the red blush on her cheeks slowly spread down her slender, white neck. She stuttered and stammered, but didn¡¯t say anything with her reddened face. Her affectedly bashful face was even more ill at ease than Han Shuo had been earlier.

    Seeing Phoebe like this, Han Shuo gave a happyugh, feeling that the depressing passivity from earlier waspletely swept away. He said merrily, ¡°Who would¡¯ve thought that Miss Phoebe would care so much about me? You¡¯ve even noted how many times I nced over. I¡¯m truly overwhelmed by your favor.¡±

    ¡°Oh shut up Bryan, I¡¯ve discovered that you¡¯re full of bad thoughts. Looks like I¡¯ll receive the short end of the stick whenever I do business with you in the future.¡± Phoebe flew into a rage and red fiercely at Han Shuo,ining as she did so.

    When Phoebe said this, Han Shuo suddenly remembered the matter having to do with the McGrady Guild. The humor on his face was immediately reced with seriousness as he asked Phoebe, ¡°Talking of business suddenly reminds me of something. You mentioned the McGrady Guildst time and said that they were yourpetition, right?¡±

    Phoebe was a bit surprised that Han Shuo had suddenly mentioned this, and she looked at him, taken aback. Phoebe nodded and responded, ¡°That¡¯s right, the McGrady Guild belongs to the Brut Merchant alliance and have been doing a lot of business in our Lancelot Empiretely. The items they transport do not travel through the towns of the Empire and thus they don¡¯t need to pay customs taxes to the Empire. When their goods arrive, they can keep their prices low and thus impact our Guild¡¯s business a bit as well.¡±

    Smiling faintly, Han Shuo said, ¡°Not going through the proper channels can indeed result inrge profits, there are particrly huge, even frightening profits to be made in the industries forbidden by the Empire. The McGrady Guild is quite daring to act and risk a lot.¡±

    ¡°Why are you suddenly mentioning the McGrady Guild?¡± Phoebe looked at Han Shuo with confusion as she asked him.

    ¡°I have a friend in the Dark Forest with a rather particr profession. He robbed the McGrady Guild entouragetely and came by many luxury items. He wants me to get rid of them. I wonder if I can do that through you?¡±

    ¡°Being a robber is a robber, what particr profession? There are all sorts of robbers within the Dark Forest, there¡¯s nothing strange about that. Heh heh, the McGrady Guild wouldn¡¯t dare pass through the Empire¡¯s cities because they want to avoid the high customs taxes. However, this naturally increases their risk of danger, but their McGrady Guild has private guards, and therefore, very few robbers are blind enough to make a move against them. Your friend is quite something to be able to rob them.¡±

    ¡°Of course. So, do you dare ept goods from the McGrady Guild?¡±

    ¡°Our Guild will ept everything as long as it¡¯s not siege weapons. I¡¯ve heard that the Empire is investigating this area rather closely recently. Forget it if it¡¯s siege weapons.¡±

    Han Shuo remembered the matter that Emily had mentioned when Phoebe spoke, and he seemed to catch a vague hint of something. However, Han Shuo had long since promised Emily the batch of war resources. He¡¯d only nned on selling to Phoebe the goods used by nobles, and so he had no particr concerns.

    ¡°Be at peace, I wouldn¡¯t make life difficult for you. I¡¯ve eaten well today and wille by in a few days toe find you again. Help me take care of my matters as soon as possible if you can.¡± Han Shuoforted Phoebe and stood up, preparing to take his leave.

    Seeing that Han Shuo was about to leave, Phoebe hesitated and then said with a bit of difficulty, ¡°I actually have a favor to ask as well.¡±

    Looking at Phoebe in baffled surprise, Han Shuo asked, ¡°What is it?¡±

    ¡°I need to attend a banquet in five days time. If I appear alone, some annoying people may bother me. I¡¯d like for you toe with me and act as my boyfriend likest time.¡± Phoebe looked a bit shyly at Han Shuo and said lightly.

    A rueful smile on his face, Han Shuo shook his head, ¡°Forget it, I don¡¯t want to be your shield again. If I trigger someone else¡¯s jealousy and theye at me from the darkness, I¡¯ll be in some danger. Why don¡¯t you find someone else?¡±

    ¡°No!¡± Phoebe shouted, and then exined with a wry expression, ¡°I¡¯ve previously introduced you to the founding elders in the Guild. If I suddenly change to someone else within a month, they¡¯ll say I have loose morals! This absolutely won¡¯t do.¡±

    Han Shuo was still hesitant and appeared a bit ill at ease. Phoebe stared at Han Shuo, and then pouted. ¡°If someone doesn¡¯t agree, then I won¡¯t be serious about my business either. It will be very normal if the thing that I promised him is dyed by ten days or half a month.¡±

    This was what Han Shuo didn¡¯t want to see. He had no choice but to nod after Phoebe¡¯s words and say, ¡°Then alright, as long as you don¡¯t think I¡¯m embarrassing you then.¡±

    ¡°There we go, how could you allow someone else to take me to the banquet? What if they take advantage of me, wouldn¡¯t you be worried?¡± A faint smile reapppeared on Phoebe¡¯s face when she saw Han Shuo agree.

    ¡°Then aren¡¯t you afraid that I¡¯ll take advantage of you?¡± Han Shuo rolled his eyes at Phoebe and said bad temperedly.

    When he said these words, Phoebe¡¯s beautiful face flushed again, and she turned her head away, too shy to look at Han Shuo. She said lowly, ¡°No, you¡¯ve already taken all the advantage you can.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart lurched as he looked at the redness of Phoebe¡¯s neck and ears, and in a curious coincidence, blurted out, ¡°Not all. We haven¡¯t even slept together!¡±

    Han Shuo immediately reacted and swiftly walked towards the outside before Phoebe had a chance to speak. He hastily said, ¡°I¡¯ll be going now that I¡¯m full. I¡¯lle by five dayster.¡±

    ¡°You rubbish talking viin!¡± Phoebe hadn¡¯t thought that Han Shuo would say such things and immediately flew into a rage. She cursed at Han Shuo¡¯s fleeing back and only broke out into a lowugh when his body sped up and vanished. ¡°Damnit, how dare he say that to me. Huh, he¡¯s getting bolder and bolder.¡±

    It was just past noon after leaving the Boozt Merchant Guild. Since thest time he¡¯d reported into the Dark Mantle, it was almost a month. Thus, after seeing the time, Han Shuo hired a carriage and set off for the Dark Mantle¡¯s stronghold.

    When he was a street away, Han Shuo disembarked and released the three original demons to survey the surroundings, walking to the manor on foot.

    ¡°Boss, you¡¯re finally here! I¡¯ve been counting the days and knew that you woulde and report soon. Therefore, I purposefully swapped shifts with others and have been waiting here to bring you into the organization¡¯s interior.¡± The bandit Chester squirmed out from inside when Han Shuo arrived and said lowly with excitement.

    ¡°Eh, why are you calling me boss?¡± Han Shuo looked oddly at Chester and asked him with confusion.

    ¡°I¡¯ll follow you in the future, and I hope that you¡¯ll give me tips and pointers. Of course I need to express my respect towards you.¡± Chester said matter-of-factly towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°This title doesn¡¯t sound very nice, let¡¯s just go by our given names. Heh heh, but don¡¯t you worry. If there are any good missions, I¡¯ll ask to bring you along as well.¡± Han Shuo said.

    After receiving Han Shuo¡¯s promise, Chester appeared overjoyed and brought Han Shuo inside with passion and excitement. He chattered away non stop, asking where Han Shuo had been during this time, and if he¡¯d gone out on any missions.

    Han Shuo carelessly responded to Chester¡¯s questions and walked slowly into the internals of the Dark Mantle organization. There was no surprise for him this time, and he walked with an air of familiarity directly towards Candide¡¯s room.

    ¡°Ooh, you really are here. I thought Emily was lying to me.¡± Candide sat in a shadowy corner and was examining something in a magical sk. He didn¡¯t raise his head when Han Shuo came in.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t anticipated that Emily would mention him, and was a bit surprised. He didn¡¯t know what Emily had said to Candide, and thus stood there silently.

    After a while, Candide put away the sk in his hands, finally speaking with his never-changing sinister face, ¡°Emily said she happened to bump into you in the Dark Forest and rather admired your style andpetency. I was quite surprised. I hadn¡¯t thought that Emily, with her high standards, would speak so highly of you. It looks like there truly are some unique things about you.¡±

    No shit, Emily¡¯s my woman, of course she¡¯d say good things about me. Han Shuo thought with pride, but maintained his usual expression on his face. He opened his mouth to say, ¡°It¡¯s been one month since myst mission. I¡¯vee to report in as per the rules and see if there are any other missions.¡±

    The Dark Mantle usually didn¡¯t interfere in personal matters, thus Han Shuo didn¡¯t go into detail about how he and Emily had met. Since Emily had already spoken of it, she surely would¡¯ve concealed all that had to be concealed. As long as Han Shuo didn¡¯t give anything away, nothing would happen at all.

    Nodding, Candide said, ¡°Emily gave you a round ofpliments and said that she wanted you toplete the mission in her hands with her. You¡¯ll share the rewards and honor together then. What do you think? You¡¯re one of mine. Emily won¡¯t be able to make use of you without your agreement, but if you agree, then it¡¯s another matter entirely.¡±

    With Han Shuo and Emily¡¯s rtionship now, there was naturally no reason not to agree. Not to mention Emily needed to get the resources out of the forest trolls through Han Shuo for her mission. He had already be unwittingly embroiled in all this. If this became a mission that he could benefit from, then it¡¯d be even better.

    ¡°No problem, I¡¯m willing toplete the mission with her.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t hesitate and nodded in agreement. He paused and said, ¡°The bandit who brought me in, Chester, is quite smart. Can he join as well?¡±

    ¡°The mission is Emily¡¯s, it¡¯s up to her if she needs another person. You can ask her directly.¡± Candide said faintly, paused and then said, ¡°Emily is Amyes¡¯ sister by blood. Her status within the Dark Mantle isn¡¯t low. It will be good for you to interact more with her. However, Emily¡¯s identity within reality is a bit mysterious. Keep an eye out, don¡¯t give others any gossip to talk about.¡±

    Amyes was one of the three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle and was in charge of surveince and investigation of all nobles and officials. He was a character within the Dark Mantle who was hugely active in the political scene, and one who held great power in his hands. To think that Emily was his sister by blood.

    In addition, Candide seemed to be alluding to something else about Emily¡¯s other identity. This made Han Shuo a bit surprised, unsure of the meaning within his words.

    ¡°Looks like you didn¡¯t know all this, let this be a reminder to be careful. Mm. This will be all. She¡¯s already pulled your information to peruse and will be able to find you easily. Come find me after youplete the mission with her.¡± Candide said as he looked at Han Shuo.

 Chapter 125: Iâ€™m damn good arenâ€™t I?

    Chapter 125: I¡¯m damn good aren¡¯t I?

    When he left the Dark Mantle, Han Shuo left some instructions with Chester, telling him to wait here for news.

    When he walked out of the Dark Mantle headquarters, Han Shuo didn¡¯t linger and returned to the Academy. When he was about to arrive, he disembarked from his carriage and went to the graveyard in the mountains behind the Academy, entering the tomb that went to the cemetery of death.

    He didn¡¯t return to the cemetery of death, but rather rubbed his space ring and took out the Fruit of Dagmar that was shaped like a human brain. Han Shuo had sealed the three fruits in special containers. When he took it out, he took a good look and discovered that this Fruit of Dagmar didn¡¯t have a remarkable appearance, and it looked rather ugly.

    Taking a deep breath in, Han Shuo sat down cross legged, hesitated, and swallowed the Fruit of Dagmar that was a bitrger than the size of a fist. It tasted a bit bitter and was tough to chew. It tasted really badpared to normal, ordinary fruit.

    When Han Shuo hadpletely swallowed the Fruit of Dagmar, he immediately circted his magical yuan and slowly started concentrating it towards the back of his brain.

    Nothing abnormal happened as first, but Han Shuo slowly felt something was different after some time had passed. Swirls of strange energy emanated from his stomach and bubbled up from his lower abdomen, spinning as they moved to the brain.

    The strange energy within these swirls was apanied by a pain that pierced into his bone marrow. Even Han Shuo, with his resolute tenacity and willpower, felt it was a bit tough to endure. When these bubbles of strange energy made it to Han Shuo¡¯s brain, his mind shuddered greatly, as if a hundred bombs were exploding at the same time. The sounds of explosions rocketed through his brain.

    Bone piercing pain apanied the violent explosions in his head. When his brain had been opened up by the magical yuan, the perceptiveness of his five senses greatly increased. Han Shuo could feel that the folds on the left and right sides of his brain was suffused with the power within this swirls.

    It was a bit simr to when Han Shuo had expanded his meridians. Because of the effects of the Fruit of Dagmar, Han Shuo¡¯s brain was being developed bit by bit. This process was mysterious and strange. Even Han Shuo didn¡¯t know what had happened as he sumbed under the painful process.

    If it¡¯d been anyone else going through such strong stimtion of their brain. They would basically immediately turn into an idiot or a madman. This was because the brain was the mostplex thing in the world. Any abnormalities within it could immediately trigger changes that upended the heavens and earth.

    This kind of bone achingly deep pain that seeped into a person¡¯s heart would be enough to immediately make a normal person lose their mind and never recover from it. Even Han Shuo, someone with extreme mental strength and the protection of the magical yuan, suffered greatly throughout this process, under the effects of the Fruit of Dagmar. Any other bystander would¡¯ve only faced death in front of them.

    His entire body trembling, Han Shuo was raining sweat as he sat there cross legged. He hadn¡¯t screamed himself hoarse in a long time, but these screams once again erupted uncontrobly from his mouth. Finally in the end, the ce that Han Shuo was sitting on was soaked with sweat, and his hoarse screams slowly became weaker and his lips trembled like the rest of his body.

    He remained in this position for a long time as Han Shuoy there stiffly within the drenched soil, sinking into aa in that instant.

    After who knew how long, Han Shuo slowly woke up. When he came to himself, he felt that his head hurt so much that it was about to split open, and that his body ached all over. He raised his head and shifted his body. When he looked upwards, Han Shuo¡¯s heart was immediately filled with delight.

    Within the gloom of the tomb, Han Shuo could clearly see even the smallest of the patterns within the stone bs a few meters over his head. Although Han Shuo¡¯s original vision had been quite clear, the feeling was even more marvelous now, and he barely believed his own eyes in that moment.

    When he¡¯d carefully observed the four corners and discovered that he could see anything within the dusk of the tomb as long as he concentrated, Han Shuo¡¯s astonishment grew even greater. It was as if his eyes had transformed into a magnifying ss. If he slowly concentrated on something a few meters away, the distance would seem to slowly decrease. The originally small dot would be slowly enhanced, with him finally catching an eyeful of unparalleled rity in the end.

    This kind of feeling was quite marvelous and Han Shuo knew that this was absolutely due to the effects of the Fruit of Dagmar. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that one couldn¡¯t eat the fruit repeatedly, Han Shuo really wanted to swallow the other two whole as well. In a frenzy of joy, Han Shuo sat down and meditated for a bit. He found that the concentration and cirction speed of his mental strength had indeed greatly increased.

    In this regard, when Han Shuo meditated, he would obtain mental strength at an increased rate. When he used magic to fight against others, the recovery rate of his mental strength from meditation after it¡¯d been exhausted would be vastly greater than the ordinary person¡¯s. This meant that whether in terms of training or battle, Han Shuo would be able to operate at a much faster tempo than ordinary mages.

    In his great joy, Han Shuo didn¡¯t linger in this ce. Now that he felt his mental strength had increased, Han Shuo decided to advance to the next step of necromancy magic. Han Shuo had only been able to fully grasp and skillfully employ several novice necromancy magics until now.

    With the increase of his mental strength, Han Shuo was confident that he could achieve another breakthrough. It looked like it wouldn¡¯t be a difficult thing to graduate from the necromancy major as an adept mage in a short period of time.

    Han Shuo had studied some of the intermediate necromancy magics for a while in the days when he was injured. There were still a few theories that he wasn¡¯t fully clear on. Now that he¡¯d returned to the Academy, it looked like it was time to find Fanny for some answers.

    When he crawled out of the tomb, the sky was brightening over a silvery world. There¡¯d actually been a huge snowfall, and the snow covered everything. It was a snow white world as far the eyes could see.

    As the harsh, chilly wind blew, Han Shuo¡¯s already sweaty and wet body felt a bit cold. Han Shuo took off his damp clothes in this cold, snowy ce and faced this silvery world with a naked body.

    The range of his vision had greatly increased as he looked out across the world. If it was said that Han Shuo¡¯s eyes had the function of a magnifying ss within the tomb, then his eyes seemed to have the function of a pair of binocrs as he walked out of the tomb and looked out. His vision expanded endlessly, taking in even the sights in the distance.

    His eyes alighted on several nearby trees. They all appeared incredibly clear, and it was so amazing that Han Shuo almost wanted to whistle loudly in appreciation.

    Although Han Shuo¡¯s current body wasn¡¯t afraid of changing seasons, in order not to appear too out of the ordinary, he still took out some new, thicker clothes from within his space ring and wrapped up his naked body, proceeding towards the necromancy major.

    All thendmarks had their own vor to them beneath the cover of the thick snow. His various memories with Fanny kept resurfacing in his mind as Han Shuo walked over, but every time he thought of his current rtionship with Emily, Han Shuo felt a bit shy about facing Fanny.

    When he arrived at the dark major, earth shattering yells immediately traveled into Han Shuo¡¯s ears. They were filled with excitement and fervor, as if some grand party was being held.

    Han Shuo was astonished as he didn¡¯t know what was going on. There were a lot of buildings in the way on his way to the dark major, so he couldn¡¯t use his amazing vision to see anything. The distance of several hundred meters would be covered quickly, so he felt no need to release the original demons. Therefore, he picked up the pace and walked over quickly.

    There were many students and teachers upying the enormous square. There were dark and necromancy major students within, as well as the students and teachers from other majors. There were even a few knights and swordsmen mixed in, and it was all very exciting.

    The enormous square appeared a bit crowded after taking in a hundred people. Many students on the outside were trying to push their way inside with all their strength. There were also a few dirty and depraved fellows staring at some female students and putting the weight of their bodies on the female students, eliciting a round of light screams and yells.

    When he arrived here, Han Shuo had nned on releasing the original demons for surveince, but felt strong magical pulses in the area. It looked like a magical boundary had been set up inside. If he identally had the original demons crash into the magical boundary and gave rise to attention from other people, that would be a bit unfavorable.

    Therefore, he hesitated only a little bit and didn¡¯t release the original demons. He used his strong body to shove his way inside.

    Several thunder mages red at Han Shuo angrily beneath his shoving and pushing, and Han Shuo paid them no heed and ignored them, ramming them aside. Their fragile and thin bodies were a far cry from Han Shuo¡¯s, and they were shoved aside as Han Shuo¡¯s actions zed a path for him.

    His extraordinary senses were of use now. Han Shuo spied Lisa up ahead and immediately shoved aside those next to him, squirming his way towards Lisa. He was subjected to frowns and low curses along the way.

    When he came near to Lisa, Han Shuo saw an exceedingly shifty swordsman look hungrily at Lisa¡¯s now well rounded chest. He was attempting to get closer to Lisa and take advantage of her. Now that Han Shuo was inside, he finally discovered that the magical boundary that had been set up was for the magical battle that was taking ce inside. No wonder it had drawn a lot of attention.

    Lisa was giving the fascinating battle inside her full attention, and would cry out excitedly every now and then. Amy and Athena, at her side, were just as excited, and weren¡¯t paying any attention to the looks of those around her.

    The swordsman had finally made it next to Lisa. He was taking in his fill of Lisa¡¯s chest and licking his lips as he approached, wanting to take advantage of her in the crush.

    Bam! Han Shuo suddenly appeared midway and body mmed the approaching swordsman, pushing him into a group of male thunder mages. He was subject to a round of abuse and curses.

    Han Shuo, smiling merrily, shed a proud grin at the swordsman who¡¯d finally regained his footing. He then leisurely stood next to Lisa and purposefully pushed his way forward a bit, cing himself at Lisa¡¯s back.

    The swordsman had been about to get what he wanted when Han Shuo had thrown him for this loop. He disyed an angry and depressed expression, flipping Han Shuo off from the distance and mouthing the words, ¡°You cut in line!¡±

    Shrugging, Han Shuo had a proud look on his face and also slowly mouthed the words back, ¡°So what?¡±

    Rolling his eyes, the swordsman was a bit resigned. His shifty eyes spun in a circle as he nned on finding another target. At this moment, Lisa¡¯s elbow suddenly shot back swiftly and suddenly attacked Han Shuo¡¯s chest, catching him unawares.

    However, this level of attack had absolutely no effect when itnded on Han Shuo. The swordsman on the other side however, immediately revealed an expression that delighted in the misfortune of others, and he looked at Han Shuo with an eager expression, hoping to see him get in trouble.

    ¡°Huh! Another blind idioting over to take advantage, how irritating!¡± Lisa¡¯s impatient low growl sounded out, and she then twisted her head to angrily look over, but when she saw that it was Han Shuo, she immediately revealed a surprised and happy expression and hastily asked, ¡°Eh, you¡¯vee back? Um... I didn¡¯t know it was you, did I hurt you just now?¡±

    Seeing the fellow across from him wanting to delight in his misfortunes, Han Shuo immediately pretended to rub his chest and and disyed a pained expression. Lisa was greatly shocked and frantically reached out with her small hand, rubbing Han Shuo¡¯s chest, because this ce was already crowded, Lisa¡¯s movement basically made her flush against Han Shuo¡¯s chest.

    The swordsman, who¡¯d been ready to watch Han Shuo go down, was bbergasted when he saw the situation develop. Han Shuo had a proud smile on his face and he mouthed to the swordsman, ¡°Aren¡¯t I awesome?¡±

    The swordsman didn¡¯t say anything else and stuck up his thumb at Han Shuo, indicating that, damn you¡¯re good. I¡¯m in awe. He then turned his head and set his sights on another girl, pushing through once again. It looked like he was trying to see if he had the same luck as Han Shuo.

    By now, Han Shuo could fully see the fight within the square. He kept one eye on the battle between the dark major students and the light major students, and searched for traces of Fanny within the crowd.

 Chapter 126: I want to battle

    Chapter 126: I want to battle

    The Academy would hold apetition every winter between all the majors ording to tradition. The victor would gain rich rewards, and this was used to spur the students to study even harder.

    This was when the Academy was bustling the most as the majorspeted not only for rewards, but also for the face of their major and teachers. Even the future of their teachers were closely tied to these battles.

    Therefore, all the majors would send out their strongest students at this time every year to take part in the fighting. This was both for the students¡¯ own benefit, and for the face and future status of the teachers within the Academy.

    Chapter originally published on vretrantions. If you¡¯re not reading this chapter on vreTL, then it has been stolen without the trantor¡¯s permission.

    The dark major and light major had always been hated rivals. Open conflict and veiled struggles between the two majors had waged on for many years. The battle between the dark and light major was to determine who would win the title of the strongest major. This was why it¡¯d attracted so many observers.

    An enormous magic shield had enclosed the entire square, allowingbatants to battle to their hearts contents without causing injury to anyone. There were five participants from both the dark and light majors, and a fine show was being put on the stage.

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    Han Shuo¡¯s gaze wandered around, finally resting on Fanny, who was sitting in the back corner of the row of teachers sitting at the front stage. Their section was raised, and the teachers from all majors were sitting there. The dean was also sitting there quite primly. It looked like everyone was cing great importance on this time¡¯s demonstration.

    ¡°Is anyone from our necromancy major part of the team?¡± Han Shuo started after Lisa had exined the situation for him, and opened his mouth to ask her.

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    Shaking her head, Lisa said, ¡°Our necromancy major is an offshoot of the dark major. The dark major teachers and students were awfully afraid that we¡¯d be a burden to them, so they didn¡¯t count us in for this time¡¯s demonstration at all. Therefore, it¡¯s only students from the dark major being involved from beginning to end, and there¡¯s nothing to do with our necromancy major.¡±

    ¡°So that¡¯s the case. Who do you think will win between the light and dark major this time?¡± Han Shuo stared at the two groups within the square and asked carelessly.

    ¡°Not sure. The dark and light major have always been the two strongest majors within the Academy. After all these years, the two majors have been trading the title of strongest major back and forth. No major has been able to win consecutively. The dark major wonst year, but the captain that led the teamst year has already graduated, whereas the light major¡¯s is still here. I think the dark major is in some trouble this time.¡± Lisa fixed her gaze on the situation within the square and exined for Han Shuo.

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    ¡°Ai, too bad there¡¯s nothing to do with our necromancy major. After all these years, the dark major has always directly counted us out. Although Master Fanny and Gene try quite hard, because of this, their standing within the Academy keeps decreasing. See, Master Fanny can only sit in thest row, and Master Gene doesn¡¯t even dare show his face because he¡¯s afraid that people willugh at him. Our necromancy major is truly a failure.¡± Amy shook her head and spoke dejectedly with a woebegone expression.

    ¡°This can¡¯t be helped either. The creatures that our necromancy major students can summon are innately weak to light magic. Without the help from our summoned creatures, it¡¯s very difficult for necromancy magics to obtain the upper hand against light magic attacks. This is why Master Fanny can only resign herself to epting the arrangements from the dark major and not have us join in the battle. If we did so, we¡¯d only be making life more difficult for ourselves.¡± Athena was also simrly dejected as she followed up on Amy¡¯s words.

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    It wasn¡¯t smooth and without obstacles within the square, but all sorts of artificial mountains and fake trees had been ced, as well as numerous moats that were jagged and uneven. The school authorities wanted the students to be used to real environmental situations, and thus had made the battleground quiteplicated.

    At this moment, the five students from their respective majors were making use of the fake trees and grotesque rocks to conceal their bodies within the square. They would pop out and attack each other every now and then, then make use of the terrain to back off or regroup with their teammates. The enormous magical shield protecting the square also made the light hazy and dim. It looked like this had been a conscious decision to create this effect, to make it easier for teams to cooperate.

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    The two sides were probing each other when one of the members from the dark major suddenly clutched his stomach and fell down. Cold sweat beaded his forehead as his face was drained of all color.

    Dark major archmage Deo¡¯s facial expression changed drastically when he saw the situation develop and he immediately spoke to Dean Emma, ¡°Dean, Phillide seems to be feeling unwell. I¡¯d like to halt the battle and see what¡¯s going on.¡±

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    Space grand magus Emma was also looking at the fallen Phillide with some surprise. She seemed to be puzzled as to why he¡¯d suddenly fallen down when the real fight had yet to take ce. When she heard Deo¡¯s words, she nodded and said, ¡°Halt, let¡¯s see what¡¯s wrong with Phillide?¡±

    Emma then waved her hand and the enormous magic shield suddenly lit up. The other dark major students helped the anguished Phillide to Deo. Dark major archmage Deo and several other dark major teachers examined Phillide, with Deo finally speaking to Emma with a darkened face, ¡°Dean, Phillide¡¯s eaten some food that he shouldn¡¯t have eaten. I don¡¯t think he can participate this time.¡±

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    ¡°Oh, my gosh! What¡¯s going on? Phillide is almost graduating and is someone who¡¯s about to be an adept mage within the dark major. He¡¯s also the current team leader and the strongest. If he suddenly can¡¯t participate, then the dark major has even less chance this time.¡± Athena spoke with some worry as she looked at the pale Phillide.

    Sara nodded and spoke, ¡°Indeed. Keelung from the light major on the other side was captain of the light major teamst year. It¡¯s said that he already has the strength of an adept mage, but purposefully dyed the timing of his advancement due to this year¡¯spetition. With Phillide present, they would¡¯ve been evenly matched, but now that this has happened, it looks like the dark major ispletely without hope.¡±

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    Han Shuo, with his sensitive hearing, could clearly hear Emma and Deo¡¯s conversation. Because of Phllide¡¯s health issues, Deo was attempting to convince Emma to dy this year¡¯s battle for a few days, but Emma rejected Deo¡¯s request on the basis of Academy¡¯s rules. She only agreed to allow Deo to swap out for another dark major student on Phillide¡¯s behalf.

    Deo had a face full of fury as he argued shrilly with Emma, saying that this was a conspiracy and he demanded for Emma to change the day of the demonstration.

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    It was pity that archmage Deo was just a dark major teacher in the end, and naturally wasn¡¯t more important than the Academy¡¯s rules.

    Unable to convince Emma, Deo said furiously, ¡°Since this is the case, then we¡¯re notpeting. Allow others to say what they will this time!¡±

    If you¡¯re not reading this at vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    ¡°Master Deo, please remember your status. Although an ident has urred, I hope you don¡¯t think of changing the Academy¡¯s traditions. Please find a substitute for this year¡¯s demonstration and let¡¯s see it through.¡± Emma, usually benevolent and kind, was obviously a bit annoyed as she spoke gravely to Deo.

    Apart from being a space grand magus, Emma also had a sense of unquestionable authority since she¡¯d established her position as dean of the Academy. When such a severe warning was issued from her mouth, Deo was immediately dumbfounded.

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    Thinking for a bit with a darkened face, Deo turned to look at Fanny, who sat in the corner and spoke, ¡°Master Fanny, the necromancy major has never been a part of thebat after so many years. I think it¡¯s high time that the necromancy major sent out someone. Please find someone to fill in Phillide¡¯s position so that thebat may continue.¡±

    Originally sitting in the back row expressionlessly watching everything, Fanny suddenly started when she heard Deo¡¯s words. She immediately recollected herself as rage filled her face, ¡°Master Deo, what do you mean by this?¡±

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    Anyone could see that Deo had purposefully spoken to Fanny when he knew that he had no way to win after Phillide bowed out.

    Even if they lost, those in the know could tell that Deo¡¯s actions werepletely as a result of his bad temper. After all, the necromancy major was known for being weak. Deo could¡¯ve asked anyone other than the necromancy major to fill in the spot. His actions were a noticeable jab at the necromancy major, and could even be construed as humiliation for the major.

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    ¡°Master Fanny, as a member of the dark major, you still need to make an effort sometimes, wouldn¡¯t you say?¡± Another dark major teacher, off to the side, naturally understood Deo¡¯s intentions and spoke up after thinking for a moment.

    The teachers next to Fanny were watching her with an expression of delighting in her miseries, with some also disying expressions of pity. However, the necromancy major was well known for being weak, and no one expressed anything. Expressions of watching a good show prevailed more than not.

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    ¡°When do you usually ever think of our necromancy major? You think of us when you need someone to act as a scapegoat, I think not!¡± Fanny had alreadycked face with no necromancy students participating, and she¡¯d only hoped for the battle to be over as soon as possible, so as to not suffer through the mockery and sympathetic gazes of others. Who would¡¯ve known that she¡¯d be so humiliated by Deo at the very end? This immediately roused her ire.

    Fanny was someone who was soft on the outside and tough on the inside, of this Han Shou was well aware of. Under normal circumstances, Fanny always greeted others with a smiling face and wouldn¡¯t cause conflict with others, but once someone stepped over her bottom line, Fanny would also fight back with all her strength. It was obvious that Deo had stepped over Fanny¡¯s bottom line this time.

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    The conversations of the teachers on stage couldn¡¯t make it over here, so Lisa and the others were standing there with looks of bafflement, not knowing why Fanny had suddenly stood up. When Han Shuo ryed what was happening with a darkened face, they were all incredibly angry as they cursed at Deo¡¯s despicableness.

    A strong body was useful in moments like this. He pushed everyone blocking the way aside, and walked towards the main stage amidst a flurry of student curses. He suddenly raised his voice, ¡°Master Fanny, I would like to battle on behalf of Phillide. I hope you approve.¡±

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    Han Shuo could no longer contain the anger within him when he saw Fanny being humiliated. He cried out loudly with a look of seriousness, his voice ringing out clear as a bell and traveled a great distance to the stage.

    The square was immediately silent without a sound asrge hubbub immediately exploded after. Everyone¡¯s gaze was focused on Han Shuo and they were all full of excitement and curiosity, all wanting to know what was going on.

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    ¡°Who is that kid? He¡¯s got some guts!¡±

    ¡°Huh, such overconfidence. Even Phillide knew that he was no match for our major and pretended to be ill and backed out. To think there are those who invite humiliation!¡±

    ¡°Eh, isn¡¯t that our major¡¯s Bryan? When did he return?¡±

    An uproar instantly suffused the scene as all the students and teachers patrolled curious gazes over Han Shuo¡¯s body. They even started asking those around them what Han Shuo¡¯s background was.

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    Fanny was dumbfounded to see Han Shuo appear. Her clear eyes sparkled as a hint of a sweet smile blossomed on her angry face. She spoke tenderly to Han Shuo, ¡°Forget it... can¡¯t you see that someone¡¯s purposefully using us as a scapegoat?¡±

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo looked at Deo, who was busily pretending that nothing was out of the ordinary. He spoke to Fanny, ¡°I know, but I still want to try. Our necromancy major has been quiet for so long that it¡¯s time we took our spot in the limelight again.¡±

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    This demonstration would affect the standing of all the teachers in the future. As a necromancy teacher, Fanny was being set up by someone like Deo. Han Shuo would naturally not allow something like this to continue to happen.

    Some sort of message seem to be conveyed from Han Shuo¡¯s resolute gaze. Fanny stared dumbly at him for quite a few seconds before finally nodding. She spoke to Deo, ¡°Alright, I agree to your request. He will act as a substitute for Phillide.¡±

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    Han Shuo¡¯s identity was quickly revealed from the mouths of the necromancy students. His life as an errand ve to his experiences within the Dark Forest quickly made their ways to the ears of all the teachers and students present.

    When the tidbit of the old witch Cami seeing Fanny and Han Shuo spending the night together and Han Shuo on Fanny¡¯s bed came out, this filled the minds of everyone present with endless imagination. This caused the voices of discussion to be louder and louder as people¡¯s gazes sharpened and grew with enthusiasm.

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this is a pirated copy of the chapter.

    ¡°Then it¡¯s settled, he¡¯ll substitute for Phillide and immediately join the battle against the light major. Mm, he¡¯s just taking the stage for show. It¡¯ll be over quickly and won¡¯t waste much time.¡± Deo nodded and said to Fanny.

 Chapter 127: Cutting a smart figure

    Chapter 127: Cutting a smart figure

    Under Deo¡¯s remote gaze, Han Shuo nodded his head woodenly and didn¡¯t say much. He flicked a nce at Fanny and walked inside of the magic barrier.

    Arriving at Emma¡¯s side, Emma looked at Han Shuo with benevolence and kindly said, ¡°You¡¯re called Bryan, right?¡±

    Han Shuo was startled and looked at Dean Emma in confusion, and said, ¡°That¡¯s right, how do you know?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, of course I know of you. You made a great contribution to the necromancy major during the Dark Forest excursion. Mm, go in and have a good fight. You¡¯re not a good kid.¡± Emma smiled merrily at Han Shuo and spoke slowly.

    Han Shuo seemed to think there were some hidden connotations in Emma¡¯s words from the way she looked at him, but he didn¡¯t quite understand what she meant. He didn¡¯t pursue it and nodded politely at Emma, then walked into the square.

    After Emma opened the shield, Han Shuo and the rest of the dark major, as well as the light major, all reentered the square. When they walked inside, Han Shuo suddenly noticed that what people saw inside and outside of the shield was different. When they looked in from the audience¡¯s perspective on the outside, they were able see everything clearly although the lighting was dim.

    But when Han Shuo walked in himself, he discovered that it was much darker inside than outside. There were even a few wisps of fog floating around the interior. All sorts of trees, artificial mountains, and moats existed, making the entire battlefield a ce strewn with obstacles.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t dare to release the originals demons within the magic shield. After all, there were so many audience members outside. Not only were there teachers from all majors, but the space archmage Dean Emma was there as well. With so many seasoned experts watching along with the existence of the shield, Han Shuo didn¡¯t dare take the risk of releasing the original demons.

    Even without the original demons, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t affected by the fog or duskiness due to the way his brain was developed. The sensitivity of his ears and eyes were far greater than any of the other students present within the square.

    Leveraging his eyes and ears, Han Shuo discovered that the five from the light major seemed to be setting something up under the guidance of Keelung. On the contrary, the four from the dark major were all trailing their heads in dejection. They looked like they¡¯d all been forced into fighting.

    That made sense. Ever since losing Phillide, they could tell from Deo¡¯s conversation that even Deo had given up on this year¡¯s battle. Having them battle was just for show.

    It was a given that they weren¡¯t willing to go on stage for a fight they knew they¡¯d lose, but they couldn¡¯t disobey Deo¡¯s orders either. It was no wonder they were drooping their heads and had no morale whatsoever. Since they¡¯d entered the fighting grounds, the four of them had had no inclination to discuss any details with Han Shuo. It looked like they were nning on acting ording to what Deo had said, and just make a random showing.

    From where Han Shuo stood, he could see all of their expressions. Yet he didn¡¯t say much, he just chanted a section of magical incantation and summoned a few small skeletons and zombie warriors to battle.

    The small skeletons and zombie warriors appeared faster than normal beneath Han Shuo¡¯s incantation. The six skeletal warriors and three zombie warriors appeared in almost the blink of an eye within the square. There was no pause in between each one, and their speed was astonishing.

    ¡°Yo, that fellow¡¯s incantation speed is rather abnormally fast. He¡¯s summoned so many creatures in the blink of an eye.¡±

    Those observing in the crowd were students and teachers from all majors. They naturally understood that the chanting of a magical incantation needed to be in concert with the speed in concentrating mental strength. If the two magics had a short interval in between them, that meant that the speed in concentrating mental strength was also very fast. They all disyed expressions of astonishment when they saw Han Shuo summon so many dark creatures in such a small time frame.

    Even Dean Emma¡¯s eyes gleamed as she looked at Han Shuo in interest, as if she was very curious as to what Han Shuo was prepared to do.

    ¡°Humph. Light magic is the antithesis of dark creatures. He might as well save his mental strength for a few more necromancy magics, as opposed to wasting his mental strength in summoning dark creatures.¡± One of the dark major teachers jeered as he looked at Han Shuo.

    Fanny sat beside him, so these words were obviously meant for Fanny. Anger appeared on Fanny¡¯s face, but she didn¡¯t say a thing.

    After summoning the skeletal warriors and zombies, Han Shuo was secretly delighted. When he¡¯d summoned so many dark creatures previously, he¡¯d felt a significant decrease in his mental strength. However, this time, afterpleting the summoning of so many dark creatures, the amount of mental strength depleted was negligible to Han Shuo. This was a practical demonstration that Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength had also increased by quite a lot.

    Joy filling his heart, Han Shuo once again chanted an incantation and a few more skeletal warriors, zombie warriors, and ghouls appeared.

    As he was summoning these dark creatures, Han Shuo had already left the clump of dark major students and arrived on the left most corner of the square. There was cover from artificial mountains and fake trees, as well as fog wreathing the area. Therefore, the light and dark major students wouldn¡¯t be able to see his motions.

    When the dark creatures came out, they waved the weapons in their hands ording to Han Shuo¡¯smands and quickly began to set up traps within the area.

    Ropes and snares, as well as further deepened moats became hidden dangers in the area. The skeletal warriors raised their bone daggers to work quickly, the ghouls speedily moved the dirt to pile up in the front and formed a wall that would impede others from entering the side. The zombie warriors then used the wooden clubs in their hands to made the mud walls a bit thicker and firmer.

    The three dark creatures started working orderly and without confusion under Han Shuo mental maniption. Under the gaze of the students and teachers outsiders, they began to calmly and gravely set up the damaging traps, as if Han Shuo was a calm hunter.

    They¡¯d all originally held the mindset of watching a joke, but when they saw so many dark creatures appear and quickly work to set up the traps, their expressions turned fromical to gravely serious.

    ¡°As long as a necromancer¡¯s mental strength is strong enough, he can summon an endless numbers of dark creatures. Only necromancers can use their dark creatures toplete work that requires manualbor. This is the kind of advantage that all other majors aren¡¯t able to emte.¡±

    ¡°This little fellow¡¯s methods have thoroughly utilized the advantage of necromancers being able to utilize dark creatures. His mind is rather nimble. I think there will be a spot of interest with the fight this time.¡± Dean Emma flicked a slight smile at Deo and said faintly.

    Snorting lightly, Deo¡¯s expression was still cold and remote. ¡°He still has to lure the people into his traps in order for them to be effective. I think the necromancy fellow will be hard pressed to do that. When he appears in front of the light major students, a wave of magical attacks will be enough toy him t. By then, his traps will bepletely useless.¡±

    Deo couldn¡¯t help but be a bit regretful when his words finished. If he¡¯d instructed the other four to work together with Han Shuo, then perhaps he could¡¯ve lured the light major students into the traps and maybe truly caused some misfortunes to happen.

    But battle had officially begun by now, and no matter how much Deo regretted things, there was nothing for it now.

    Coldly surveying everything within the square, Fanny¡¯s bright eyesnded on Han Shuo. She didn¡¯t rx for a single second, and didn¡¯t pay any attention to the mockery and jeering from those around her.

    They say that a man seriously going about his business held the most allure. At this moment, Han Shuo was going about his business with not a trace of panic or frantess. There was even a hint of rxed confidence ying about his lips. Add to that the fact that Han Shuo¡¯s current actions were on Fanny¡¯s behalf, he truly did have a mysterious allure to Fanny at the moment.

    Because of the magic shield¡¯s effect after entering the square, the noise and scenes from outside the square werepletely obstructed by the shield. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t see anything outside the shield after he¡¯d entered it.

    The dark creatures were still were busily. Han Shuo, having given his orders, began to walk amongst the shadows of the trees and artificial mountains like a ghost, approaching the center between the light and dark majors soundlessly.

    Han Shuo¡¯s movements weren¡¯t particrly surreptitious, nor did he purposefully disy a fast pace, but with Han Shuo¡¯s current vision, his control over his movements had already reached the level of astonishing and magical. Ordinarily speaking, anyone passing through the shadows of the trees and artificial mountains would need to pass through an area of light. Any of the others students would be able to see someone pass through if they just concentrated a bit.

    As these students walked, they would inevitably unconsciously turn their heads to observe their surroundings. Han Shuo would only suddenly move through two shadows in the instant that they moved their eyes or when they happened to blink. It was as difficult as trying to scale the heavens for an ordinary person to grasp that instant of open space. It could even be said that it was a wonderful art, but the current Han Shuo had well and truly aplished it.

    Therefore, no one discovered traces of Han Shuo¡¯s footsteps as he snuck through the shadows and arrived at the artificial mountains at the center between the light and dark majors. The students and teachers observing on the outside also found it odd why the students inside hadn¡¯t seemed to notice Han Shuo. This bizarre phenomenon made them feel that something was afoot.

    However, Emma and several other archmages with unparalleled vision happened to observe some peculiarities at the same time. Emma didn¡¯t say much after her eyes lit up, but two wind and water archmages exchanged shocked nces. Their originally disinterested expressions instantly refocused on Han Shuo.

    Deo¡¯s face darkened even further. He hadn¡¯t thought either that Han Shuo would have such ridiculous powers of judgement and vision. As he was reeling in shock, he couldn¡¯t help but look at Fanny behind him, wondering if Han Shuo¡¯s wondrous abilities came from Fanny.

    Han Shuo stopped in the shadows of an artificial mountain, and stood there without moving. The light major students had spread out and were cautiously probing in all directions on light footsteps, moving slowly towards the dark major¡¯s territory and using the surrounding trees and artificial mountains to conceal their movement. It looked like they hadn¡¯t lowered their guard even though Phillide had been taken out of the picture.

    On the contrary, the four from the dark major side werezily approaching the center area. Their expressions were dour and dejected as theyined ceaselessly. They seemed to be venting the anguish within their hearts. In their condition, they were likely to be demolished by the light major¡¯s first round of attacks.

    A light major student suddenly approached where Han Shuo was and looked at the artificial mountains in which Han Shuo was concealing himself. He was paying attention to the direction where the dark major students were going to appear, drifting closer to the artificial mountain Han Shuo was residing in without any guard up at all.

    This light major student was about ten paces away from the closest person. He¡¯d initially looked over the artificial mountains as he walked closer, and didn¡¯t pay much attention to things when he didn¡¯t discover anything out of the ordinary. He started walking over with his guard down.

    Within the shadows, Han Shuo¡¯s body was almost one with them. His body was like a boulder as he stood there unmoving. The audience outside looked on as the light major student approached Han Shuo in the shadows, sucking in a breath as the entire scene became deathly quiet.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo, hidden within the shadows, became a demon concealed by the darkness. His demonic arms suddenly opened as one hand covered the mouth of the light major student, the other hand abruptly closed on his body and the light major student was dragged into the darkness.

    Just as the light major student was reacting with astonishment, Han Shuo brought a fist crashing down onto the back of his head. The light major¡¯s student went limp and he fell directly unconscious. Within the darkness, Han Shuo dragged this light major student into the shadows and quickly swapped clothes. He then strode out openly from the shadows and slowly approached the center.

    The five light major students were more than ten paces apart from each other. They could see those beside them, but could only determine that they were on the same side via the same clothes, due to the fog and duskiness. They couldn¡¯t see faces or features clearly. Add to that the fact that winter clothes tended to be thicker and made all their bodies bulkier. Therefore, Han Shuo¡¯s appearance didn¡¯t draw anyone else¡¯s attention.

    However, the students and teachers within the square got a full view of what was about to happen. The outside was going crazy with noisy chatter and discussion. The necromancy major had suddenly be the center of attention. Lisa and the other¡¯s yells stood out even in the midst of the boisterous square.

    ¡°Oh my gosh, that¡¯s incredible, he took out a person just like that.¡±

    ¡°The five from the light major have been observing their surroundings with their eyes for half the day. How could they have not discovered that he¡¯s approaching them, how is that possible?¡±

    ¡°He¡¯s be part of the light major team now. I think the light major fellows are in big trouble this time. Theirpanion has suddenly be a ticking time bomb, but no one realizes it. This is quite interesting!¡±

    Voices raised in incredible conversation rose and fell in waves. The students still found everything hard to believe, but given that the truth was right in front of them, they had no choice but to believe.

    ¡°Master Fanny, your student is quite interesting!¡± Deo¡¯s usually cold and remote face had be much more tender, as he looked at theposed Fanny. However, her subtly dancing eyebrows gave away her repressed excitement.

    A feeling offort flowing through her heart, Fanny flicked a chilly nce at Deo and mocked, ¡°Now how would that be? He¡¯s just there to make up the numbers, Master Deo is tooplimentary.¡±

    Deo didn¡¯t say much after getting shut down, and his expression also appeared a bit nervous. His gaze patrolled the demonstration area within the square as he paid attention to further developments.

    At this moment, Fanny¡¯s heart was filled with contentment. She¡¯d been continuously mocked and belittled by others because of the her major¡¯s uselessness. Now, because of Han Shuo¡¯s rise to prominence, the gazes of those looking at her were filled with astonishment and incredulity. Even Deo, who¡¯d jeered at her before, had nothing much to say now. This almost made the joy within Fanny¡¯s heart overflow.

    Everyone had a vain heart, and Fanny had often been suppressed by others. Now that the situation was suddenly reversed, Fanny¡¯s joy andfort was felt even more strongly. When she looked at Han Shuo now, she found him extremely pleasing in her eyes and a trace of a sweet smile unconsciously curved on her lips.

    Within the square, Han Shuo naturally didn¡¯t know that there was an uproar outside the field because of his performance. He strode out calmly and steadily, slowly moving towards the center with the other four light major students.

    The four dark major students slowly appeared from the other direction. They had spread out their formation and kept an appropriate distance from each other. When they saw the light major students, the four dark major students abruptly halted their footsteps.

    Two Deep Slumber spells and another two Hand of Darkness magics were chanted from the mouths of the four dark major students. The two Deep Slumber spells came floating towards Han Shuo and another light major student. Two enormous hands also suddenly formed in the dim sky and started swooping down towards the other two light major students.

    Light major captain Keelung was standing in the center and watched all of this with a cold gaze,pletely unmoved. This was because not a single dark major attacknded on him, or perhaps this was because the dark major students knew that they would be useless on Keelung.

    Han Shuo had also been attacked with a Deep Slumber spell. He shifted his body at this moment and walked swiftly, dodging the spell.

    The light major student standing beside Han Shuo remained coollyposed when the Hand of Darkness appeared overhead. A Radiant sh suddenly appeared and shot towards the Hand of Darkness high overhead.

    A bone spear suddenly appeared out of thin air at this time, with another one appearing shortly thereafter. It pierced the Radiant sh attack and both bone spears and the Radiant sh broke apart as white dots of light. At the same time, an Agony of the Soul appeared in front of this light major student, along with the Hand of Darkness.

    The sudden changepletely derailed the light major student¡¯s train of thought. The Agony of the Soul had alreadynded on him before he had time to react. The Hand of Darkness followed quickly after and grabbed his body.

    ¡°Deron, are you alright?¡± Off in the distance, Keelung immediately cried out and started walking over when he saw what had happened.

    Deron immediately reacted. Although Han Shuo¡¯s chant had been made in an exceedingly low voice just now, he still heard it because the two were so close.

    Deron was anxiously trying to tell Keelung to watch out for Han Shuo, but unfortunately he was finding it difficult to breathe, given that the Hand of Darkness was wrapped tightly around him. The dark major student who¡¯d casted it was watching with a face full of excitement off in the distance. The student reached out forcefully, causing Deron to pass out.

    Apart from Deron fainting, the other light major students easily handled the dark major attacks that had targeted them. Keelung, having not been attacked, swiftly approached Deron, wanting to check on him.

    There was one unconscious Deron between Han Shuo and Keelung. Han Shuo also approached the unconscious Deron as Keelung approached, appearing to want to see how Deron was doing.

    The light major captain reached Deron first. He¡¯d just stooped down and was about to examine Deron¡¯s condition when three bone spears materialized, followed by two bone arrows and an Agony of the Soul.

    Keelung gave an abrupt start and suddenly stood up, finally catching a glimpse of Han Shuo¡¯s face. He shouted involuntarily, ¡°This is bad!¡±

    A light magic attack was suddenly released as an incantation was rapidly recited. It formed a semicircle in front of his chest and started rushing over. The bone spears, arrows, and Agony of the Soul were destroyed in an instant.

    However, when the magical fallout had begun to settle down, several bone arrows flew out again. This gave Keelung a great shock as he hastily backed up.

    The release of magic was dependent on the amount of mental strength and the speed of focusing it. Although the time psed between two magics could be decreased, theoretically speaking, the more destructive a spell was, the longer amount of time there must be between each cast. A spell, such as bone arrows, expended very little mental strength, and so it could be quickly cast in session.

    Seeing the situation, Keelung had sent out an answering wave of magic and needed a bit of time to recover. It was a pity that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t giving him any opportunity to. Three bone arrows flew out from behind, causing him some panic and taking one to the rear when he couldn¡¯t dodge in time.

    ¡°The necromancy major fellow is masquerading as Billy. This person¡¯s too sinister! Take him down first!¡± Keelung rubbed his butt and immediately called out.

    Off in the distance, the other two light major students evading the dark major attacks hesitated only briefly and immediately met up with Keelung to attack Han Shuo after hearing his shouts.

    Han Shuoughed loudly at this moment, raising his voice, ¡°Fainting already counts as being out. It¡¯s three of you now against us five, I think it¡¯ll be difficult for you to win!¡±

    Han Shou didn¡¯t stay where he was as soon as he¡¯d finished speaking. He dashed off to where the traps had already been set up with the speed of a normal mage. Keelung and the others were stunned for a second as Keelung then said resolutely, ¡°Take down this fellow first. The other four from the dark major have no fighting spirit left, we¡¯ll take care of them after.

    The other two from the light major nodded and rushed towards Han Shuo after hearing Keelung¡¯s words, leaving the four from the dark major looking at each other with some embarrassment. One of them yelled out, ¡°We¡¯re five now, why should we be afraid of the three of them? Let¡¯s take them out!¡±

    In this way, the odd scene of Han Shuo running in front, the three from the light major in hot pursuit, and the four from the dark major chasing madly after was formed.

    It was a hubbub of noise outside. If it was said that Han Shuo had been lucky when he took down a person within the shadows just now, then hister interactions with Keelung and the fast speed of his magic being released and injuring Keelung¡¯s butt proved that Han Shuo¡¯s strength was definitely umon.

    Add to that the fact that they had seen Han Shuo setting up traps and saw him running there now, the audience immediately knew what sinister intentions Han Shuo had in mind.

    ¡°Oh damn it, why are things happening like this?¡± Light major archmage Voignder had been smiling smugly, assured of victory. He couldn¡¯t help but cry out at this moment. The development of the situation waspletely out of his expectations.

    ¡°Master Fanny, your student is very strong. To think that the necromancy major had a talent such as him. This is truly incredibly!¡± Suddenly, several teachers, who often mocked Fanny, had aplete change in attitudes, and they all spoke with great praise to Fanny.

    This was Fanny¡¯s proudest moment in all her years in the necromancy major. Han Shuo¡¯s actions had won the respect of all those present for Fanny. She was crazy with joy inside, but still smiled demurely and said calmly, ¡°This is nothing. Our necromancy major has great talent, we just tend to keep a low profile. Now do you understand how shallow your understanding was before?¡±

    The other teachers looked askance at each other after Fanny had spoken. They hadn¡¯t thought that thanks to Han Shuo¡¯s bizarre rise to prominence, Fanny¡¯s presence would also be bolstered as well.

 Chapter 128: Stomping all of them together

    Chapter 128: Stomping all of them together

    Amidst the mor from outside the arena, Han Shuo¡¯s body leapt as he threaded through a wall that he had constructed earlier,nding onto the t ground behind it. The traps, that the skeletal warriors had dug up, were a few paces behind Han Shuo, with branches and twigs concealing the entrance of the traps. The ghouls had covered the exterior with dirt, and it all looked quite normal.

    Havingpleted their mission, the dark creatures spread out ording to Han Shuo¡¯s orders, hiding behind the big trees and artificial mountains in the back. Han Shuo then stood behind the earthen wall, firing out bone spears and bone arrows again, attacking the three quickly approaching light major students.

    ¡°Huh. You¡¯re asking for trouble by openly attacking us.¡± Keelung drew near as two Radiant shes flew out, destroying the attacks that Han Shuo had sent their way, rapidly approaching Han Shuo with the other two students.

    The other two students also recited incantations just before reaching Han Shuo, demolishing the earthen walls that Han Shuo had just erected. One of them walked over the dirt, setting foot into a snare on the ground. Han Shuo immediately gave an order to the zombie controlling the trap when he saw that.

    The zombie warrior, standing in the distance, suddenly yanked hard on the rope in his hand. The loose rope suddenly tightened beneath the light major student¡¯s foot and abruptly entwined around his ankle, sending him soaring into the sky.

    ¡°Damn it!¡± Keelung roared and was about to make a y to save the light major student when Han Shuo, standing quite a distance away, sent bone spear attacks at him from another direction, forcing him to temporarily retreat.

    The other student however, had sharp eyes and nimble fingers and released a Radiant sh, shing through the rope. This caused the captured student to freefall from a great distance and cry out in pain.

    Arge stone, bound by a rope, suddenly started rolling down from the artificial mountain from the left and came crashing towards Keelung and the others. They gave a great start of fright and also released magic at the same time to defend against therge rock, hurrying in the direction of the other traps afterwards.

    Light magic had a marvelous effect in restraining dark creatures, but the ones that Han Shuo had summoned never engaged them in directbat. Rather, they leveraged other tools and elements to attack the three light major students. This caused the restraining effect that the light major had on dark creatures to bepletely nullified.

    Finally, the four dark major students, who were chasing them, also arrived. When they saw the three from the light major busily fending off the attacks from the traps, they immediately joined in the fray with great gusto. They started chanting dark major magic from not too far away, preparing to add fuel to the me and offer Han Shuo their assistance.

    A string of magical incantation suddenly sang out of Keelung¡¯s mouth. Eye searing light abruptly shot out of the darkened sky. Everyone¡¯s eyes temporarily lost vision wherever the extreme lightnded. Even the other two light major students didn¡¯t have enough time to react as they temporarily lost sight of everything happening around them.

    Keelung had closed his eyes beforehand and calcted when the Strong Light spell would arrive. He suddenly opened his eyes and was ready to deal out a devastating blow that would turn the tide against all those who¡¯d lost their sight.

    However, in the second that he opened his eyes, he didn¡¯t even have time to chant any magic incantation before he saw more than ten skeletal and zombie warriors surrounding him. Under the strength of two zombie warriors pushing him, his body backed up against its will as he fell into a trap when his foot stepped out into empty air.

    The other light major and dark major students, who¡¯d lost their sight, were all standing there, extremely anxious. The dark creatures advanced upon them one by one and picked them up or pushed them, throwing all of them into the traps, making an exception for no one.

    The Strong Light spell was an extreme shock to the eyes of ordinary people. Han Shuo had also fallen victim due to its swiftness, but his body was different than that of ordinary people and his eyes recovered extremely swiftly. Most would need at least ten seconds to recover from such a bright sh, but Han Shuo was out for only two seconds.

    Before the effects from the Strong Light spell had fully faded away, and before Keelung had even opened his eyes, Han Shuo had already recovered and directed the dark creatures into action that would change the course of the battle. He wrenched around the oue of the battle and settled it with one move.

    Not only the students from the light major, Han Shuo had also thrown the four from the dark major into the pit as well. The trap had been dug quite, quite deeply and could more than hold these small mages, who didn¡¯t know the levitation spell yet. There were also dark creatures holdingrge stones standing over them, ready to fling them down at any time. This heralded the conclusion of thepetition.

    Deo had been watching with a more rxed face and excitement when Han Shuo had been performing particrly well earlier, but when Han Shuo had targeted even the dark major students and thrown them into the trap in the end, he¡¯d snorted coldly and once again tightened his facial expression, speaking to Fanny, ¡°Your student has no sense of team spirit, look at what he¡¯s done!¡±

    ¡°I think it¡¯s your four students who had no morale from beginning to end. They weren¡¯t that useful at all. Bryan must¡¯ve thought that they were useless and wanted to give them this reminder. It¡¯s just a joke, no big deal.¡± Fanny was in grand spirits as she chuckled and reposited Deo¡¯s words.

    On the other side, Light major archmage Voignder stood up with a face full of depressed dejection. He flourished his sleeves and spoke to Emma, leaving the square afterwards, leaving behind only Master Beacher to clean up the aftermath of thepetition.

    ording to logic, because the necromancy magic was tied into the dark major, and that Han Shuo had taken the field in lieu of Phillide, this should have been a dark major victory.

    But Han Shuo¡¯s motions were a direct p to Deo¡¯s face. This made it difficult for Deo to be happy. When he saw Voignder give a random word of instruction to a teacher behind him, he also took his leave from Dean Emma and left gloomily.

    As for Lisa and the other necromancy major students, they erupted into enthusiastic cheers. This was the proudest moment that the necromancy had had in many years. They¡¯d always been suppressed and mocked, but because of Han Shuo¡¯s sudden appearance, not only had they salvaged Fanny¡¯s face, but all the students of the necromancy major had basked in glory as well.

    When Han Shuo walked out after the magic shield was taken down, he immediately saw the light of fired-up glee in Fanny¡¯s eyes and the sounds of cheering from the other necromancy students.

    ¡°Eh... although the circumstances are a bit odd, I still must announce that the dark major has won this year¡¯s demonstration. Those who have participated in the fight will receive a space ring personally refined by me. Everyone will also receive a magic staff. I hope you will continue to learn and improve yourselves.¡± Emma¡¯s voice sounded out smoothly after Han Shuo had walked out and carried throughout the entire square.

    As onlookers watched in admiration, Han Shuo was the first to walk to Emma¡¯s side and receive the rewards from this time¡¯s battle. Those from the dark major side had finally crawled out of the trap with help from others. They were just about to get their revenge on Han Shuo when they heard Emma¡¯s announcement, and smiles made their way to their faces again. They ambled over to Emma.

    Han Shuo swept the space ring with his mental strength after receiving it and was quite satisfied. The capacity of the space ring personally refined by archmage Emma was at least five times greater than the one worn by Han Shuo right now. The materials needed to refine such arge space ring would be even more umon. It also looked like only a character on the level of a space archmage would be able to refine it.

    Part 2

    Up until now, Han Shuo had never used a magical staff when casting magics. When he grasped it in his hand and imbued it with his mental strength, he suddenly discovered that there was another small space within the staff. The space had the ability to store mental strength. As he released a random spell and felt it circte throughout the staff, the speed of the spell was increased slightly.

    Judging from the looks of things, this magic staff had the effect of storing small amounts of mental strength and even increasing the casting speed of spells. No wonder mages were even willing to put their lives on the line in order to get a decent staff. A wondrous staff would more or less have a great effect of enhancing the mage¡¯s strength.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t hang around the square after receiving his space ring and magic staff. He nodded to Fanny from afar with a smile and left alone, leaving Fanny and the others to take care of any other remaining details.

    ¡°Wait a second, Bryan!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s departure wasn¡¯t unnoticed by the many students within the square. However, everyone only watched him leave with surprise, and didn¡¯t do anything after whispering to each other in hushed voices. When Lisa saw Han Shuo leaving however, she called out from a far distance and ran straight towards Han Shuo.

    After leaving the square and arriving at the necromancy major¡¯s training fields, there was a look of astounded excitement on Lisa¡¯s face. She stared at Han Shuo and kept up a running litany of questions, ¡°You were too amazing today! You handled them all by yourself! You did it all with a natural and smooth style, how did you do it?¡±

    Shrugging, Han Shuo said nomittally, ¡°It wasn¡¯t that I was strong, but just that they were too weak.¡±

    Han Shuo had met many people during his trip to the Dark Forest that were all adept mages or senior swordsman. He¡¯d even met swordmaster Trunks and archmage Emily.

    Those McGrady Guild guards, including Duke and Erick who¡¯d shown upter, were experts who had experienced many battles and had astonishing strength.

    Having fought against these people, Han Shuo had basically experienced all sorts of situations. He¡¯d just faced off against mages who had yet to reach the adept stage, and whose battle experience was even morecking. He naturally held every advantage, and it would¡¯ve been odd had he not won instead.

    If Han Shuo had mobilized the little skeleton, his own martial techniques, and the Demonyer Edge, he wouldn¡¯t have needed to use any schemes or traps. He¡¯d be able topletely annihte the five light major students with his own strength, denying them the slightest change of resistance.

    ¡°When did you get this strong?¡± Lisa watched Han Shuo with every expression of interest as she asked curiously.

    Grasping the magic staff in his hands, Han Shuo poured in his mental strength and began to practice the Bone Prison spell that a journeyman mage should be able to master. He imbued the staff with his mental strength and used it as the conduit to try to activate the Bone Prison spell.

    The Bone Prison spell was a spell that imprisoned enemies. It would form a prison madepletely out of white bones once it was cast and would confine enemies, making them unable to move a muscle.

    If one had enough mental strength, one would be able to control every single bone within the Bone Prison. Not only would it be able to confine someone, but the caster would be able to use the bones within the prison to once again lock down the prisoner. The bones could be transformed into soft and supple vines. It was all very amazing.

    It was his first time manipting the Bone Prison spell. After more than ten bones had appeared in the air, they couldn¡¯t quite form a prison. When Han Shuo rxed his concentration, the bones didn¡¯t form any kind of structure before falling to the ground with a tter.

    ¡°My strength is simr to yours and I¡¯m not that great. If you practice diligently, I think your aplishments will be even higher. You may even be able to represent our major in next year¡¯s battle.¡± Han Shuo responded to Lisa carelessly as he continued to practice the Bone Prison spell.

    Lisa made a silly face at Han Shuo at these words, then said lightly, ¡°I¡¯m too stupid. I¡¯ve studied necromancy for so long, but you¡¯ve only learned it for a few months and you¡¯re already much stronger than me.¡±

    ¡°No, your strength is quite goodpared to the other necromancy students. Heh heh, I meant that if you work even harder, you should be able to increase the rate of your progress. I feel that the magics of our necromancy major aren¡¯t worse off than any of the other majors. It¡¯s just that there are fewer people studying necromancy magic now, resulting in fewer experts emerging.¡± Han Shuo chatted at ease with Lisa and practiced the Bone Prison spell over and over again.

    After a while, some other students, who seemed to recognize the strength of necromancy magic for the first time thanks to Han Shuo¡¯s heroics, all skipped their meals and arrived enthusiastically at the training fields. They too began to practice magic one by one.

    When the other students appeared, Han Shuo halted his magic practice and evaded the other students¡¯ excited babble. He walked out from the training fields and, after leaving them, headed in the direction of Fanny¡¯sb.

    When Han Shuo arrived at Fanny¡¯sb, the door to theb was locked. It looked like Fanny had yet to return. Typically speaking, Fanny would usually be at herb right now. It looked like she¡¯d been dyed by the necromancy major¡¯s newfound glory that she hadn¡¯t returned yet.

    He wasn¡¯t in a hurry either as Han Shuo took a seat on the grass and took out the book of necromancy magic that he¡¯d taken from the cemetery of death. He studied it as the three original demons patrolled three different directions. With no fear of someone suddenly approaching, he began slowly studying the Bone Prison magic that he wanted to master.

    After a while, the space in front of Han Shuo suddenly twisted as light shed by and Dean Emma materialized in front of Han Shuo.

    Giving a start of fright, Han Shuo immediately quickly put the book of necromancy magic away in the space ring and wore a smile on his face. He said to Dean Emma, ¡°Hello Dean, what are you doing here?¡±

    Dean Emma looked kindly at Han Shuo, and an admiring smile appeared on her wrinkled face. She opened her mouth to say, ¡°You¡¯re a hardworking child alright. You aren¡¯t willing to waste the slightest bit of time and still study while you¡¯re waiting for Fanny. No wonder you¡¯ve had such aplishments in such a short amount of time.¡±

    Han Shuo felt a bit baffled by Emma¡¯s words. He didn¡¯t know why Emma had soundlessly appeared here and spoken such odd words to him.

    He thought for a bit and look at Emma with a frown. He opened his mouth to ask, ¡°Have youe in search of me?¡±

    Nodding, Emma said straightforwardly, ¡°Of course, heh heh. I didn¡¯t appear here because I failed a space magic spell.¡±

    ¡°Then, do you need something from me?¡± Han Shuo hesitated and then asked again.

    Emma smiled kindly after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s question, ¡°I actually want to thank you. If it weren¡¯t for youst time, I wouldn¡¯t have known that Cami was a member of the ck Underworld organization from the Kasi Empire.¡±

    Han Shuo gave another start of fright upon hearing these words. Han Shuo hadn¡¯t breathed a word of this to anyone other than Candide, and now that Emma suddenly spoke of this, it really did frighten Han Shuo. His thoughts raced as he looked at Emma, ¡°Did Master Candide tell you this?¡±

    Nodding, Emma smiled, ¡°Smart kid. Our house¡¯s old man says you¡¯re a good talent and Fanny¡¯s mentioned it to me as well. After today¡¯spetition, I¡¯ve discovered that there are indeed some mysterious things about of you. However, I won¡¯t ask you why. I only wanted to try to convince you of something with my visit this time.¡±

    Shock written all over his face, Han Shuo would¡¯ve never expected that Emma and Candide from the Dark Mantle would be husband and wife. No wonder Emma looked at him with that strange look before the battle.

    ¡°What would you like to tell me?¡± Han Shuo stared at Emma aftering back to himself.

    ¡°I can tell from your gaze that you have feelings for Fanny, but I hope that you don¡¯t develop anything with her before you¡¯re strong enough. If you¡¯re still just a student who has yet to graduate, and your rtionship crosses over that bottom line, it won¡¯t be good for either you or Fanny, particrly Fanny. This could give rise to unnecessary troubles.¡± Emma stared at Han Shuo and spoke sincerely.

    Hesitating and then opening her mouth once again, ¡°This is for your own good and Fanny¡¯s, I hope you take heed of my words of wisdom. When you graduate from the necromancy major and you¡¯re stronger than Fanny, I can even help you then if you run into issues in your rtionship with Fanny. Eh, Fanny¡¯sing, I¡¯ll take my leave now.¡±

    Emma¡¯s figure once again vanished after she¡¯d finished speaking. When Emma had just disappeared, Han Shuo also heard the sounds of Fanny approaching.

 Chapter 129: Flirting with Master Fanny

    Chapter 129: Flirting with Master Fanny

    This trantions has been stolen from the original trantor etvre at vretrantions.

    ¡°Eh? What are you doing here?¡± Fanny called out in surprise when she caught a glimpse of Han Shuo from far away ¡ª there was a delighted smile all over her face.

    Han Shuo left the patch of grass behind theb and strode towards Fanny. ¡°I came to find you and saw that you hadn¡¯t returned yet, so I decided to wait for a while.¡±

    Han Shuo had to seriously consider Dean Emma¡¯s words. From her words, Han Shuo understood that if they truly had a rtionship within the Academy, it might actually affect each other. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t scared of anything happening to him, but he really didn¡¯t want to see anything negative affect Fanny.

    Original and most up to date trantions are posted at vretrantions.

    ¡°Come in! Let¡¯s chat.¡± Fanny was smiling a lot more than usual because she was in a happy mood. She opened to the door to theb and gestured for Han Shuo to hurry ande in.

    When Han Shuo entered theb, Fanny¡¯s beautiful eyes stared a bit fervently at Han Shuo. ¡°I must really thank you this time. The teachers of the other majors were truly too ridiculous to treat our major thus. Heh heh, do you know howical their faces were after you won? I haven¡¯t been this happy in the longest time!¡±

    ¡°Then how would you like to thank me?¡± Han Shuo found a stool for himself after he came in, and then looked at Fanny with an intense look and smiled. Fanny¡¯s face blushed as she seemed to think of something, this caused her to be unable to look at Han Shuo in the eyes. She lowered her head and said, ¡°Then how would you like me to thank you?¡±

    ¡°Give me a kiss!¡± This blurted out of Han Shuo¡¯s mouth with no forethought at all. He felt that he was in for a beating as soon as he said this and decided to turn it into a joke, ¡°I¡¯m joking, joking!¡±

    Contrary to expectations, a ming red faced Fanny didn¡¯t immediately erupt in anger. She stood there silently for a moment with a flushed face and shyly walked over to Han Shuo. Before he could react, her cherry red lips darted out and gave him a lightning fast peck on the left cheek.

    ¡°Cheeky little bugger, did you finally get what you wanted?¡± Having kissed Han Shuo, Fanny didn¡¯t dare to look at him as she abruptly turned her back, and pretended to sort the things in the messyb with a nonchnt attitude. However, her flushed and trembling shoulders betrayed the agitation in her heart.

    Han Shuo stood there in dumb shock, reaching out a hand, he subconsciously ran it over the cheek that Fanny had kissed. He could feel the faint fragrance lingering on his cheek and used a finger to tap that wet patch. He then stuck his finger into his mouth to suck on it.

    When she saw that Han Shuo was remaining silent, Fanny finally couldn¡¯t resist looking back. She happened to see his ambiguous and somewhat horny move. She immediately stomped her foot in anger and cried out, ¡°Damn it, you¡¯re really lecherous!¡±

    Han Shuo had long since forgotten Emma¡¯s words of advice by now and spoke in an utterly leering tone, ¡°How am I lecherous? You¡¯re just too mesmerizing. I actually wanted you to kiss my lips just now, but you seemed to have kissed the wrong ce. That didn¡¯t count, let¡¯s do that again.¡± Han Shuo actually closed his eyes when he was finished speaking and pushed his lips forward. He looked lecherous no matter how one looked at him.

    Fanny felt breathless from the anger as she saw Han Shuo¡¯s appearance. Her slender right arm suddenly reached out to pinch Han Shuo¡¯s cheek. She hectored, ¡°You bad little kid, reaching out for a yard after taking an inch!¡±

    When Fanny¡¯s words of censure passed her lips, Han Shuo immediately knew that he couldn¡¯t get what he wanted. He hastily opened his eyes and suddenly saw Fanny¡¯s white, tender right hand reaching out to pinch him when he was about to retreat. His heart lurching, Han Shuo didn¡¯t think at all and and turned with lightning speed, leaving a kiss in the heart of Fanny¡¯s beautiful palm, then retreating with lightning speed again.

    A soft ¡°eh¡± was emitted. It was as if electricity made its way through Fanny¡¯s body as she involuntarily emitted a low sound. She then recollected herself and huffily said, ¡°You bad little kid are behaving more and more outrageously. You¡¯re dead meat!¡±

    An irate Fanny immediately dashed towards Han Shuo after her words sounded as she seemed to want to get her revenge on Han Shuo. Having justmitted a frivolous action on Fanny, Han Shuo felt his heart lurch as it became harder and harder to control himself. He¡¯d also discovered that perhaps due to being happier than usual today, Fanny¡¯s attitude towards him was markedly different from the usual.

    Under normal conditions, Fanny would¡¯ve flown into a passion and denounced him had Han Shuo raised an outrageous request such as to kiss him. Who would¡¯ve anticipated that not only would she not lecture him this time, she¡¯d actually agreed to such a ridiculous request. When Han Shuo had kissed the heart of her palm just now, her embarrassment was noticeably greater than her anger. Han Shuo could clearly feel that the current Fanny was quite different from normal.

    When he saw that Fanny was about to rush towards him, Han Shuo didn¡¯t dodge or evade, but suddenly snaked out a hand and grabbed Fanny¡¯s outstretched hand when she¡¯d rushed to in front of him, pulling her into his embrace.

    A waft of tantalizing scent suddenly surged towards Han Shuo¡¯s nose and mouth. When the fascinating, shapely body crashed into Han Shuo¡¯s embrace, the wondrous curves that stuck tightly onto Han Shuo¡¯s body immediately caused a great disturbance within his body, especially now that he was no longer a virgin.

    At this moment, he¡¯d long since thrown his conversation with Emma and the awkwardness having to do with his rtionship with Emily to the four winds. Hisrge hand wrapped around Fanny¡¯s waist as he descended upon Fanny¡¯s cherry lips and began to greedily taste his fill.

    ¡°Eurgh... ¡° With her body confined by Han Shuo, Fanny couldn¡¯t budge. Even though she wanted to resist, she was powerless against him. Her small hands beat down furiously onto Han Shuo as protesting noises came from her mouth. But as Han Shuo continued his rapacious devourment. His big tongue churned behind her winsome lips, and an iparably wondrous sensation slowly began to spread in Fanny¡¯s heart.

    She¡¯d been pounding furiously on his chest originally, but the strength of her blows began to falter. Fanny¡¯s hands had not only stopped their struggle in the end, but they¡¯d even mysteriously entwined themselves behind Han Shuo¡¯s broad back and neck. Her neck was tilted as she went along with Han Shuo¡¯s avaricious intrusion as her almond-shaped eyes grew hazy. Her body temperature began to rise, and it was as if she¡¯d sunk into a sweet dream that she was happy to stay within.

    This wondrous sensation filled Han Shuo¡¯s entire body. The person that he¡¯d dreamed about day and night was lying in his embrace. This type of psychological satisfaction was enough to drive him wild.

    Fanny¡¯s shy response near the end brought a sense of glee that filled Han Shuo like an erupting volcano. He slowly found it difficult to control his originally innocent objective as hisrge hands unconsciously moved towards Fanny¡¯s wonderful butt, and his highly erect lower body slowly began to look for an appropriate angle.

    Suddenly, Fanny felt a hot passion that was as stiff as a metal rod around her waist, deep in the throes of her sensations. She immediately understood the current situation, and began to struggle without care for anything. Because Fanny had gone along with his motions earlier, his body had also rxed. He hadn¡¯t thought that Fanny would suddenly react so violently and was pushed away by her.

    ¡°You... you... I... I...¡± Having pushed Han Shuo away, Fanny stood there with her face ming red and was panting loudly, trying to say something. But she couldn¡¯t get a word out for a while because of her agitated emotions.

    Han Shuo¡¯s gaze was locked onto Fanny as he resolutely said, ¡°Master Fanny, I think you know that I like you.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression was solemn and firm, and his low voice seemed to have a maic attraction to it. Fanny¡¯s heart trembled as she was in obvious disarray. Currently she didn¡¯t dare meet Han Shuo¡¯s eyes. She averted her head and said, ¡°Say no more. I don¡¯t want to talk about this right now. If you can advance to the adept mage stage and graduate from the Academy, I¡¯ll consider giving you a chance.¡±

    Don¡¯t support theft. Read the original trantion at vretrantions.

    Standing with her back facing Han Shuo, Fanny was still panting as her neck was a patch of red. Han Shuo stared at Fanny for a bit whilst behind her, and then took resolute steps towards her. He suddenly reached out and hugged Fanny from behind, saying tenderly, ¡°You were the goddess that I thought of day and night from a long time ago. Your kindness and passion have touched my heart, your amazing body makes it even harder for me to restrain myself. I think my entire life has perished in your hands...¡±

    When Han Shuo had hugged Fanny at first, she¡¯d trembled and wanted to break free. But when Han Shuo started his passionate deration of love, her body had gone limp and it was as if she¡¯d melted as she leaned softly into Han Shuo¡¯s chest, her cherry lips opening and closing.

    ¡°Really, I think I¡¯m unable to escape your spell. The honor of the necromancy major, personal glory, and rich rewards have no value in my eye. I didn¡¯t want to see anyone insult you and so I stepped out to do battle. All I did was for you. I think you¡¯ve known of my feelings a long time ago...¡± Han Shuo put a spin on a passionate topic and spoke of it with sincerity that overflowed with emotions. This caused Fanny¡¯s body to burn up, and she breathed even more loudly due to the agitation of her feelings.

    After a while, Fanny used an almost inaudible voice to say shyly, ¡°I... I actually know all this. However, our current statuses aren¡¯t that appropriate. This will be disadvantageous to both of us. If you graduate from the necromancy major, then we can, eh... you know.¡±

    These words revealed Fanny¡¯s internal thoughts, and Han Shuo¡¯s heart was immediately drowning in gleeful joy. He then wrapped his arm around Fanny¡¯s waist, one that had not an ounce of fat on it and brought his mouth close to Fanny¡¯s exquisite ear. He blew hot air into it and said wickedly, ¡°I don¡¯t know, can you tell me what?¡±

    Han Shuo was holding Fanny and thus could clearly feel her shudder when he blew into her ear. That marvelous, subtle sensation had a different kind of allure to itpared to the excitement of previous. Han Shuo quite relished the situation.

    ¡°You bad little kid! What did I do wrong in this life to take you in as a student. Alright alright. If you graduate from the Academy, I¡¯ll be your girlfriend. Does this answer satisfy you?¡± Fanny turned around, rolled her eyes with a hotly flushing face and spoke softly.

    With extreme joy and pride fully upying all of his heart, Han Shuo only felt that this moment was the one most worth celebrating in his life. He stood there and smiled dumbly, not saying anything.

    ¡°Get out. I don¡¯t want to see you today. Hold whatever matters you want to mention. I want to be alone for now.¡± As Han Shuo stood there and had a silly smile on his face, Fanny shoved him away in her shyness and pushed him out the door.

    Just as Han Shuo had been pushed to theboratory door, Han Shuo suddenly chuckled and reached out a hand, blocking the door that Fanny was about to close. He then said to Fanny, ¡°Wait one more second.¡±

    Fanny couldn¡¯t close the door with Han Shuo¡¯s hand blocking it. She red at Han Shuo with a red face and said huffily, ¡°What else do you want, haven¡¯t you bullied me enough today?¡±

    ¡°No no,¡± Han Shuo argued and said, ¡°I agree with everything you said. But when I won today¡¯s battle, I received a space ring that Dean Emma had crafted herself. This space ring is of a much higher quality than the one I have, so I temporarily have no use for my space ring. I¡¯d like to give mine to you.¡± Han Shuo said tenderly with a smile to Fanny.

    ¡°I can¡¯t ept anything more from you. If I wear your space ring, then people will absolutely misunderstand our rtionship. That won¡¯t do.¡± Fanny declined Han Shuo¡¯s gift with a reddened face.

    Han Shuo abruptly halted and then understood after Fanny¡¯s exnations. Han Shuo had nned on giving Yuna¡¯s space ring to Fanny, but he¡¯d suddenly received Emma¡¯s space ring and thus changed his mind to gifting his to Fanny. He hadn¡¯t thought that Fanny would have this level of consideration.

    ¡°Then, you can have this one. I don¡¯t think anyone will be able to read anything from this space ring.¡± Han Shuo took out Yuna¡¯s space ring and handed it to Fanny.

    ¡°I said that I can¡¯t ept it.¡± Fanny still didn¡¯t agree.

    ¡°I won¡¯t leave unless you ept it. Take it!¡± Han Shuo shoved it into her hands without caring whether or not she wanted it, and immediately left afterwards without waiting for her to say anything. He disappeared without a trace after a few steps.

 Chapter 130: Full speed improvement

    Chapter 130: Full speed improvement

    The Bone Prison spell was a magic spell that journeyman necromancers had to master. When this magic was deployed deftly, it would create certain conditions for dark creatures that makes it easier for them to defeat their enemies.

    Han Shuo practiced the Bone Prison spell by himself in the cemetery behind the mountains to the back of the Academy for the next three days. His resolute determination and the intelligence afforded to him after opening up his brain allowed Han Shuo to grasp a clearer understanding of the innate character of necromancy magic.

    Some magical theory that had been obscure and difficult to understand, or needing prolonged contemtion from Han Shuo forprehension, had be easy to understand due to Han Shuo¡¯s mind bing iparably clear. He could quickly understand many concepts when he put his mind to it.

    In a short three days, the use of the Bone Prison spell progressed from continual failure to asional release. He also started officially practicing another spell of Bone Shield during this time. His fast training speed astonished even himself.

    ppp.

    The sound of apuse rang out in the distance, as the well rounded and alluring Emily appeared in the distance with a slight smile, approaching Han Shuo slowly.

    Halting his magic practice session, Han Shuo looked at Emily and said, ¡°I¡¯ve already met up with Candide. Who could¡¯ve thought that your identity in the Dark Mantle is this high? Looks like your mission will include me in it.¡±

    ¡°Hehe, my mission will require yourmunication with the forest trolls anyways. Although I don¡¯t have a high status like that old fox Candide, he still had to do me this favor when I brought up this matter with him. Now that you¡¯ve joined this mission, I¡¯ll give you most of the credit after the matter¡¯s done. Perhaps your status within the Dark Mantle will increase another two stars this way.¡± Emily reached out naturally to wrap her hands around Han Shuo¡¯s shoulder when she arrived in front of him, speaking to him in a seemingly fawning manner.

    He was about topliment Emily when Han Shuo suddenly remembered what Candide said, and was on his guard about Emily¡¯s other identity. He suddenly looked at her with a not so pleasant expression, ¡°When I went to see Candide this time, he told me a bit about your true identity and told me to be careful, lest I incur unnecessary trouble. That was when I knew you were Master Aymes¡¯ blood sister. But I still don¡¯t know much about your other identity. Can you tell me now?¡±

    Emily¡¯s face changed slightly when Han Shuo spoke. She looked at Han Shuo deeply and then sighed lowly, speaking, ¡°Looks like Candide does value you highly, and he¡¯s deathly afraid that I¡¯ll lie to you. Alright then, since this is the case, I won¡¯t have to conceal some things from you then. I¡¯ve actually been married for many years already, except my husband went out to war right after we were married and then died in the battlefield. I¡¯ve been a widow until now.¡±

    Han Shuo became silent after Emily¡¯s words, finally speaking after a while, ¡°It looks like that person¡¯s status must be high to warrant such a reminder from Candide.¡±

    Nodding, Emily said, ¡°Yes, but that person¡¯s already dead and there¡¯s nothing much worth discussing. Because of my involvement with the Dark Mantle, I had a few missions to execute after he died and my actions were a bit odd because of the missions. This has caused my reputation to be a bit damaged amongst the upper echelons of society in the Empire.¡±

    ¡°Why do you say that?¡± Han Shuo looked at Emily and asked faintly.

    Emily shook her head self deprecatingly as she spoke with a dejected look, ¡°Just like when you saw me just now and took me for a wanton woman, because of my status as a widow, it was inevitable that some gossip would start up because I had toe in contact with people when executing Dark Mantle missions.¡±

    Han Shuo had taken Emily¡¯s virginity from her. Therefore, while others may not believe her, but Han Shuo had no choice but to believe her. She was in such a dejected mood right now that Han Shuo unconsciously reached out a hand and wrapped her in his embrace, saying tenderly, ¡°I don¡¯t care what other people think, but I took your innocence from you and naturally know that you¡¯re not like what they say you are. Be at ease, I won¡¯t be affected by those kinds of words.¡±

    Shaking her head with some gratitude, Emily said forlornly, ¡°Candide¡¯s words reminded me, it looks like I must face reality. With your strength and rate of improvement, your future is bright without parallel. But because of the particrs of my status, it looks like I can only maintain an underground rtionship with you. To do otherwise would bring no benefits to either of us.¡±

    Han Shuo was well aware of the meaning behind Emily¡¯s words. It was like when Emma had reminded him to be careful of the rtionship between him and Fanny. There were some unavoidable taboos having to do with status in this world. If the rules were challenged, one would meet heavy oppression.

    He kissed Emily as sheid in his arms ¡ª

    Han Shuo spoke coolly with a darkened face, ¡°Don¡¯t you worry, I won¡¯t force you to hide for the rest of your life! We¡¯ll be able to interact out in the open one day. I don¡¯t dare do so yet because I haven¡¯t yet climbed high enough. If my status is enough to decide everyone¡¯s life or death one day, I think everyone will shut up or give us well wishes if they ever open their mouths.¡±

    Emily¡¯s face showed delighted joy when she heard these words, as she turned Han Shuo¡¯s embrace around to hug him fiercely. She said with emotion, ¡°You can do it, I believe you!¡±

    After a round of entwinement, Emily spoke to Han Shuo with a hotly flushed body, ¡°Hurry and handle the matter with the forest trolls. The McGrady Guild people have already contacted the merchants that deal with the forest trolls and they¡¯re heading for the Dark Forest. They¡¯re nning on buying the batch of siege weapons. You have to make the forest trolls sell the weapons to them.¡±

    Nodding to indicate his understanding, Han Shuo thought for a bit and said, ¡°I have good rtions with a robber. He wants to do this mission with us, can we possibly add him?¡±

    ¡°No problem. I¡¯m in charge of this mission and plenty of my people are on it already. It makes no difference if another one joins. If he¡¯s trustworthy, I¡¯ll deploy him immediately when I get back. This way, I can contact you through him whilst you¡¯re at the Academy. After all, it¡¯s not entirely appropriate for me toe into contact with you directly at school with my identity.¡± Emily was quite forthright as she immediately agreed to Han Shuo¡¯s suggestion.

    ¡°Alright, he¡¯s called Chester and should be the guard in charge of the northern stronghold as of this moment. If you have any instructions and are not at liberty to venture outside to take action yourself, let him do it. I¡¯ll make a trip to the Dark Forest as soon as possible. Go about your business at ease.¡± Han Shuo opened his mouth to speak with Emily.

    ¡°Okay, I¡¯ll be in touch if anything crops up. Don¡¯t worry, I have confidence in being able to quicklyplete this time¡¯s mission.¡± Emily left after saying these words.

    When Emily had left, Han Shuo thought for a bit and walked towards the Boozt Merchant Guild. There were two days until Han Shuo¡¯s predetermined time with Phoebe. But the days seemed to be getting colder and Han Shuo was a bit worried that the dwarves would run out of rations and life necessities. He nned on making a trip to the cemetery of death and taking care of the rations that the dwarves need to make it through winter first.

    Now that he had a space ring with greater capacity, he would only need to make one trip to settle everything. Add to that the fact that he had to visit the forest trolls in a few days and prepare the same rations and necessities, he probably should take care of the dwarves first. There were more forest trolls and so it was likely the space ring wouldn¡¯t be able to hold enough rations to take care of things in one trip.

    He made his way proficiently to the Booz Merchant Guild, but didn¡¯t get to see Phoebe today. Fabian was instead the one who came out to wee him. He learned from Fabian that Phoebe was out today, and because of Han Shuo¡¯s rtionship with Fabian, they could take care of the matter regarding the rations even if Phoebe wasn¡¯t present.

    Because Phoebe held the reigns of power now, Fabian¡¯s status within the Guild had also risen ordingly. He took Han Shuo to the warehouse where the rations were stored and the warehouse was opened under hismand. They filled Han Shuo¡¯s space ring with the rations that Phoebe had previously prepared for Han Shuo.

    ¡°Mm, tell Phoebe for me that I still need more. Please have her prepare them for me and we¡¯ll settle the ounts at once when I swing by two dayster.¡± Han Shuo said with a smile as he looked at Fabian.

    ¡°Heh heh, no problem. With our rtionship, I can take care of a small matter like this. Don¡¯t worry.¡± Fabian spoke merrily to Han Shuo as he promised.

    ¡°It looks like Mister Fabian¡¯s role within the Guild is bing higher and higher.¡± Han Shuo was surprised to see Fabian agree so easily.

    ¡°Not at all, not at all, this is all thanks to you. If it wasn¡¯t for you, I don¡¯t think I would¡¯ve made my way up so easily. The reason Miss Phoebe values me so is also because I introduced you to her, I think. To be honest, I really need to thank you. Heh heh, even my nephew Jack has benefited from acquainting you. You truly bring great fortune to us.¡± Fabian looked at Han Shuo as he spoke earnestly.

    ¡°You¡¯re too polite, please say hi to Jack for me and tell him I came by. However, I¡¯m a bit busy today and don¡¯t have idle time to chat.¡± Han Shuo exchanged some pleasantries with Fabian and left with a smile.

 Chapter 131: Some rejoice and some worry

    Chapter 131: Some rejoice and some worry

    The Dark Forest was now covered by a thickyer of snow. Han Shuo sloshed his way through it as he made his way towards the dwarf vige.

    The dwarves had been forced to leave their vige because of the forest trolls. Although Han Shuo vaguely knew where they¡¯d relocated to with the help of the original demons, but he wasn¡¯t quite sure where exactly they¡¯d gone either such a long period of time.

    The forest trolls had left long ago and hadn¡¯t reappeared. Han Shuo felt that the dwarves wouldn¡¯t necessarily be willing to give up their old vige, so he still decided to head in that direction first.

    When Han Shuo arrived at the passageway into the vige and looked around, a smile blossomed from the corner of his mouth. From the various concealments and setup of things around the passageway, Han Shuo could ascertain that the dwarves hadn¡¯t left.

    Han Shuo whistled long and loudly, shaking the umted snow off the tree branches. His sensitive ears heard the sound of approaching footsteps as several dwarf warriors, holding battle axes, appeared after a short while, approaching from afar with looks of caution on their faces.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, it¡¯s just me, I¡¯ve returned as promised.¡± Han Shuo immediately called out before the dwarf warriors had gotten close to him.

    The dwarf warriors in the distance all heaved involuntary sighs of relief when they heard Han Shuo¡¯s voice. When they walked to Han Shuo, one of them said, ¡°Many things have been difficult now that winter has arrived. Although the vige has been exposed, we¡¯re unable to build suitable houses in such a short amount of time, so although we knew of the potential for danger here, we still didn¡¯t want to suffer in the cold and returned to the vige.¡±

    ¡°Winter is here, so I¡¯vee this time to bring some winter rations and thick clothing for you. In addition, you can be at ease about the forest trolls. They won¡¯t ever bother you again.¡± Han Shuo smiled slightly andforted the dwarves.

    The dwarves immediately cheered when they heard this. Their expressions were bafflingly overjoyed and filled with sincere delight and celebration.

    ¡°This is wonderful! We¡¯ve gone through most of the rations you broughtst time in recent days. The chief thought something had happened to you because you hadn¡¯t appeared in a long time, but we also didn¡¯t know how to help you so we could only worry about you. It¡¯s wonderful that you came. Let¡¯s hurry and enter to vige to tell the good news to everyone.¡± The dwarf that had spoken before spoke joyfully as his short, stout legs moved forward rapidly, moving towards the depths of the vige.

    When they heard that Han Shuo hade, all the dwarves that had been warming themselves up indoors, out of the frosty winter weather, squirmed out one by one to give Han Shuo friendly greetings.

    ¡°Oh, it¡¯s fantastic that you¡¯re alright Han. We were very worried about you.¡± The dwarf warrior Bet spoke with a look of surprise.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t say much and proceeded to an area with t ground that had been cleared of snow. He then took out the rations and daily necessities from his space ring with a smile. Heid them all out and gathered them into piles, covering arge area.

    ¡°These are the rations and necessities that I¡¯ve brought with me this time, along with some thick clothes to help you guys keep warm this winter. In addition, you won¡¯t have to worry about the forest trolls making trouble for you in the future. You can live here in peace and without worry, the forest trolls won¡¯t be making any trouble for you in the future.¡± Han Shuo exined as he observed the dwarves¡¯ delight. He felt that his actions had resulted in a proper reaction.

    All the dwarves were beyond themselves with glee when they saw the ground covered with rations and daily necessities. Even the female dwarves, children, and elderly hiding in the houses came out when they heard the news and started cheering in the distance.

    ¡°Thank you so much Han, if it wasn¡¯t for your rations and necessities, I think many of us would starve and freeze to death this winter. These rations and clothes are enough for us to make it through the winter. How can we thank you?¡± Chief Darwin genuflected to Han Shuo in the great gesture of the dwarves and spoke with great gratitude.

    ¡°We¡¯re friends, so say nothing of gratitude.¡± Han Shuo responded.

    To be honest, these rations and clothes weren¡¯t worth much money at all, but it was a bit difficult for merchants to transport them over. Therefore, after entering the Dark Forest, whether it was the forest trolls, dwarves, or other species, all would be willing to pay a high price in exchange for rations and daily necessities.

    However, with the transportation matrix in the cemetery of death and therge capacity of the space ring, this task that would have taken a lot of people and resources to achieve was easily aplished by Han Shuo with no difficulty at all.

    ¡°Han, you said that the forest trolls would no longer bother us, is it because the elves have already waged war against them andpletely destroyed them?¡± The dwarf warrior Bet thought of another matter and asked Han Shuo with great excitement.

    When he asked this question, Han Shuo suddenly started and asked Bet, ¡°Can it be that the elves are already nning on waging a huge battle against the forest trolls?¡±

    Nodding, Bet spoke angrily, ¡°Indeed, they¡¯ve even invited us and said that they want to give those wicked robbers a harsh lesson. But the defensive capabilities of our vige are too weak and the chief isn¡¯t nning on having us participate. Isn¡¯t it the elves that created this situation where the forest trolls won¡¯t invade us again?¡±

    ¡°Of course not, the scourge of the forest trolls will slowly be restrained in the future. Be at peace. Mm. Alright, alright. I still have some things to do and I¡¯lle find you again in the future.¡± Han Shuo spoke.

    He then spoke a few random words and hurriedly left the vige, despite the dwarves¡¯ efforts to keep him. Bet said that the elves were going to wage war on the forest trolls. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t sit still after he heard that. If it was before, he would¡¯ve wanted the elves to wipe the floor with the forest trolls.

    But now, the forest trolls were absolutely under his control and could even bebeled as his private army. In addition, he needed the forest trolls to cooperate with Emily¡¯s mission. If the elves stirred up trouble now, that would be quite an inconvenient timing to choose.

    Except, many days were necessary to travel from here to the forest trolls¡¯ stronghold. Han Shuo had many things he still had to take care of in the Empire and he really couldn¡¯t spare the time. This gave him a bit of a headache.

    After thinking carefully, Han Shuo felt that there was no particr rush for things either. He¡¯d only be dying things by a day or two if he settled Phoebe¡¯s matters first and apanied her to a banquet, then head for the forest trolls afterwards.

    The elves making a move against the forest trolls may not take ce in these couple of days. Besides, although the elves were strong, the forest trolls were no pushover either. After so many years of conflict, the fact that the elves had not wrung any major concessions out of the forest trolls had already illustrated how things stood.

    When the sky was dark, Han Shuo made use of the darkness/silence to hurry back to the cemetery of death. He was in no hurry to leave immediately, so he took out a Fruit of Dagmar again and endured exceedingly painful torture within the cemetery of death, digesting the Fruit of Dagmar likest time and once again opening up parts of his brain.

    When Han Shuo felt that his body had recovered and was reborn once again, the rity of his five senses had taken another leap forward, while the concentration speed of his mental strength and the cirction speed of his magical yuan had also all improved. Han Shuo could vaguely feel that there were signs of him breaking through the molded spirit realm. It looked like he¡¯d be able to progress to the next level of demonic magic before long.

    The next stage would be the ¡°true demon¡± realm. Once he entered this realm, Han Shuo would be an infant demon, truly bing a demon in definition. The previous three stages of solid realm, open passages, and molded spirit were just to reinforce one¡¯s foundations for demonic magic. Before one became an infant demon, a practitioner didn¡¯t really count as a demonic practitioner.

    Only after he entered the ¡°true demon¡± realm will Han Shuo truly be considered as someone who has entered the halls of demonic magic. As an infant demon, he¡¯d be able to fly through the air and use magical yuan to refine magical treasures. He¡¯d be able to reforge the Demonyer Edge all over again, and could train in various other amazingly powerful magics. He¡¯d even be able to refine the yin demons that were a step above the original demons.

    In other words, the true demon realm was a boundary. Han Shuo would have many ways to improve his strength after reaching this realm. His strength would once again take great leaps forward, so Han Shuo was filled with indescribable joy when he vaguely felt that he was exhibiting signs of breaking through.

    By now, it was morning the next day, and Han Shuo didn¡¯t remain here. He used the transportation matrix in the cemetery of death to return to the Empire and walked directly back to the Academy.

    After the ambiguous conversation with Fanny, Han Shuo¡¯s heart was filled with boundless expectations. Although Fanny hadn¡¯t immediately agreed to his pursuit, he basically understood Fanny¡¯s heart. He understood that if he advanced one step further, attained the level of adept mage and graduated from the Academy, he¡¯d be able to capture the teacher¡¯s heart.

    He was still a bit unclear on some parts of the new magics and more technical terms, so he had to inquire Fanny. Therefore, Han Shuo still needed Fanny¡¯s guidance in this stage.

    Once he returned to the Academy and made his way to the necromancy major, he suddenly realized that he¡¯d be a celebrity when he bumped into students from other majors along the way. The gazes that other people used to use when looking at him were filled with surprise and admiration, with some pretty female students even revealing the light of romantic interest in their eyes.

    This kind of attention hugely satisfied Han Shuo¡¯s vanity. He was in quite a good mood all along the way. When he saw the attention and feelings from the pretty girls, Han Shuo even gave them friendly greetings, disying a brilliant smile. These female students immediately ran away with short strides and reddened faces.

    However, once Han Shuo passed by the training fields, his good mood was immediately shattered. The smile on his face was reced with a darkened look. Earth rider knight rk was standing in front of the doors of one of the necromancy major¡¯s training fields, wearing a form fitting shirt and holding arge bouquet of fresh flowers in his hand. He was looking inside with a faint smile.

    Passing through the open door, Han Shuo saw that Fanny was exining some magical theory to some necromancy students with a smile on her face. Judging from her demeanor, she wasn¡¯t affected by rk, nor did she look at rk at all. She was practically ignoring rk¡¯s existence.

    Even so, Han Shuo still felt ticked off by seeing rk stand there looking soulfully at Fanny. As he tookrge strides to the doors of the training grounds, he suddenly darted forward and purposely exerted pressure with his right shoulder after tilting his body, scattering the bouquet of fresh flowers all over the floor.

    Han Shuo had purposely lightened his footfalls in his movements just now, elerating only when he¡¯d walked up to rk. Engrossed in watching Fanny, rk had been caught off guard and reacted toote. It was a bitical how broken and scattered his bouquet was now.

    ¡°Oh, I¡¯m sorry, so sorry. It¡¯s just that these are the training fields for the necromancy major, and I bumped into you by ident because you were blocking the door.¡± Han Shuo immediately appeared apologetic when he saw rk spitting fire with his eyes and staring at him.

    ¡°Oh, Bryan, what are you doing here in the training fields today?¡± When Fanny saw that Han Shuo hade, her beautiful eyes immediately brightened and her whole face glowed with health. She indicated for Han Shuo to hurry up ande inside.

    Han Shuo was somewhat mollified by Fanny¡¯s reaction, but rk¡¯s existence still irked Han Shuo, and so his facial expression was a bit ugly. He looked at Fanny and then looked at the fresh flowers in rk¡¯s hands. He spoke with a voice dripping with acid, ¡°Just who is the noble knight rk waiting here for with flowers in his hand?¡±

    Fanny started and rolled her eyes bad-temperedly at Han Shuo. She then walked over as if expressing her stance, speaking a bit coldly to rk, ¡°Mister rk, I think I¡¯ve been clear enough. I only want to teach in peace, and hope that you¡¯ll stop bothering me. In addition, your status is noble and lofty. I don¡¯t want to be embroiled in any unnecessary trouble with you, I think you probably understand what I mean?¡±

    Fanny¡¯s words were for rk, but also for Han Shuo. They were an obvious refusal of rk¡¯s pursuit and a subtle indication to Han Shuo of her own attitude, also telling him to rx and not to think too much.

    Thus, when these words came from Fanny¡¯s mouth, rk¡¯s face immediately dulled and became dejected, whereas Han Shuo felt damn good and had smiles reappear on his face again.

    rk nodded his head, hugely depressed, and sighed lowly. He took the destitute flowers and departed from the training fields with a downcast face, not saying a single word further.

    ¡°Are you satisfied now?¡± Reaching out a hand to pinch Han Shuo, Fanny said viciously, ¡°How dare you not believe me!¡±

    ¡°Ouch, that hurts, I believe you, I believe you!¡± Han Shuo felt like he was on cloud nine as he pretended to be in pain.

 Chapter 132: Abnormalities in the night

    Chapter 132: Abnormalities in the night

    ¡°Master Fanny and Bryan, what are the two of you doing?¡± Lisa called out from behind them, looking at both of them suspiciously.

    ¡°No, nothing.¡± Fanny red at Han Shuo and pointed her finger in the direction of herb, turning and walking inside afterwards.

    When she reached out her hand, the space ring that Han Shuo had given her was disyed very prominently on her hand. Han Shuo was filled with joy after taking only one nce at it. He knew that Fanny had already epted the ring. She was pointing in the direction to theb, obviously telling him to wait for her there.

    He hadn¡¯t nned on lingering anyways, and he smiled foolishly as he nodded at Fanny. He then left on his own ord and walked to herb.

    After waiting there for a while, Fanny returned to theb after ending her ss in the training field. She opened the door to let Han Shuo in and asked him with her usual expression, ¡°Alright, what do you want?¡±

    Although Fanny was acting normally, both of them knew that their rtionship had undergone a subtle shift. It was basically impossible for Fanny to maintain the dignity of a teacher in front of Han Shuo now.

    Grinning cheekily at Fanny, Han Shuo smirked, ¡°Don¡¯t be so serious!¡±

    Rolling her eyes bad temperedly at Han Shuo, Fanny said, ¡°I need to be serious towards you; otherwise you shine so radiantly if I give you the slightest bit of warmth and your hands and feet be naughty.¡±

    How were these ambiguous tones those of a teacher to a student? It was practically a flirtatious byy between lovers. Han Shuo still felt content at heart even when Fanny was ring at him.

    Although he was delighted, Han Shuo¡¯s willpower had gone through much tempering and he wasn¡¯t someone who didn¡¯t know what was truly important. He stilled for a moment, then started asking Fanny about all the difficulties in magical theory he¡¯d run intotely.

    When she saw that Han Shuo was raising questions, Fanny also turned solemn as she regained her attitude as a teacher. She carefully exined all the theories in detail out all the theories for Han Shuo. When she saw how hardworking Han Shuo was, and that he could even use the journeyman magic of Bone Prison now, Fanny was happier than even Han Shuo.

    She sighed after a while, ¡°With your abilities, it looks like you¡¯ll be able to progress to adept mage before too long. I have to think for a moment before answering the questions you¡¯re asking now, and can¡¯t just answer off the cuff like I did before. It looks like I¡¯ll be unable to teach you before long.¡±

    A good student would impart onto the teacher an iparable sense of achievement. But because Han Shuo had truly progressed too quickly, this gave Fanny some pressure. She was only an adept mage after all, and was only one level higher than Han Shuo now ording to the divisions of power and levels.

    Han Shuo¡¯s rate of improvement was beyond her imagination. If things progressed at the current is rate, Fanny would make a weaker and weaker impact on Han Shuo. This made it difficult for Fanny to bear when this feeling permeated her heart, but she was still rather resigned to it.

    ¡°Heh heh, no matter what, you¡¯re always going to be the Master Fanny who brought me in and set me on the right path. Hehe, even if our rtionship changes in the future, your identity as my teacher will never change.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s brain was working quite fast at the moment, and he could more or less guess her current thoughts based on the changes in her expression. He immediately spoke to her with a smile.

    Shaking her head with a slight sigh, Fanny¡¯s beautiful brows immediately creased and she spoke in a worried tone. ¡°Our Babylon Academy only has Gene and I as the two teachers in the necromancy major. We¡¯re only adept mages. When you learn all of our knowledge and have no one to teach you then, your rate of improvement will surely face obstacles. I¡¯m most worried about this!¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re thinking too much. When that day truly arrives, there may even be an even better way to resolve things. You don¡¯t need to worry that much at this time.¡± Han Shuo could clearly feel Fanny¡¯s concern for him. However, with the existence of the cemetery of death, Han Shuo believed that as his strength improved, he¡¯d be able to make it into the further depths of the cemetery of death. He could vaguely feel that the inner depths of the cemetery of death would have ways to help him be even stronger.

    Fanny seemed to think things through with Han Shuo¡¯s speech and she nodded with a smile. ¡°Perhaps you¡¯re right, I am indeed thinking too much. Alright, it¡¯s gettingte. Go practice magic if you have nothing else. I¡¯m going to go get dinner as well.¡±

    ¡°How about if we go to dinner together?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s heart lurched as he offered this naughty suggestion.

    ¡°Humph. Dream on. I will have nothing to do with you before you be an adept mage. Mm, hurry and leave now. You¡¯re never up to any good if you stay here.¡± Fanny smiled and waved a magic staff in her hand, trying to get Han Shuo to leave.

    Han Shuo was in no rush either as he yelped ordingly and backed up towards the door. Just as he was about to be swept out of theb, he suddenly moved like a sh of lightning and kissed Fanny,ughing merrily as he made his escape amidst Fanny¡¯s embarrassment.

    ¡°Darned kid, I¡¯ll get you one day!¡± Fanny said huffily as she mmed theb door closed with an audible ng.

    At this moment, something registered in Han Shuo¡¯s mind as he suddenly heard a low panting sound. Three original demons suddenly flew out without a sound and floated towards the origin of the sound.

    Earth rider rk was hiding by a fence post in the distance, his originally handsome features distorted by anger. He was staring at Han Shuo with a look of hatred, and Han Shuo was quite familiar with that kind of look. That was how Fitch had been looking at him before he¡¯d taken his revenge.

    His heart chilled, Han Shuo suddenly felt that this was a bit tricky. rk was an earth rider, and Han Shuo had witnessed the might of his strength before. Although Han Shuo¡¯s strength had taken great leaps forward, he was well aware of his limits and knew that he absolutely couldn¡¯t take rk on alone. It was a bit difficult to be hated by such a character.

    Privately weighing up solutions to take care of him, Han Shuo walked slowly towards the dorm. The earth rider rk was following close behind him, leaving silently only after Han Shuo walked into the dorm. Through his observation via the original demons, Han Shuo could clearly see the expression on rk¡¯s face and knew that rk wouldn¡¯t take things lying down.

    With his strength as an earth rider and the methods he disyed in the Dark Forest, Han Shuo believed that if rk were to make a move against Han Shuo, he wouldn¡¯t try hidden subterfuge like that kid Fitch. It was likely that rk would bring about an attack as indomitable as a thunderbolt once hemenced, and would absolutely give him no chance toe back. With rk¡¯s strength and confidence, he would never leave anyone alive.

    rk and ude were brothers, so their personalities were exceedingly simr. They were both people who appeared forthright and full of sunshine on the surface, but were characters that were filled with darkness inside. Han Shuo had long since discerned this point and thus been privately on guard against them.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t linger in the dorm that night, but rather hid himself in the old warehouse, cing one original demon in the dorm. He wanted to see if rk would take advantage of this opportunity to bring about a devastating blow to himself.

    The warehouse was as messy and dirty as usual as all sorts of useless items were shoved within, only to be cleaned in the morning by Borg and Carey. Now that Han Shuo was tall, muscr, and more than double his original size, the warehouse was a bit of a tight fit for him, but for security concerns, he still had to do so.

    When all was quiet in the dead of night, Han Shuo meditated silently to concentrate his mental strength. As he remained alert mentally, his entire body seemed to meld with the color of the night. His breathing and heart beat decreased at an astonishing pace. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that heat remained within his body, bystanders would¡¯ve thought he was a dead man.

    The speed of his meditations was much faster than it had previously been. Although Han Shuo had been mentally prepared for this phenomenon, when he felt the concentration speed of his mental strength was much faster than before and that his mental strength was replenishing at a bbergasting pace, he finally understood that the level of his mental strength training had surely outstripped ordinary mages.

    After who knew how long, when the frosty night was about to pass, the original demons finally discovered rk¡¯s body, just when Han Shuo felt that he¡¯d overreacted and rk wouldn¡¯te by. In stark contrast to the Dark Mantle or any other nightwalker, rk didn¡¯t conceal himself at all. He still wore the clothes that he had worn during the day, but his face appeared a bit overcast. He strode in from afar and didn¡¯t arouse anyone¡¯s attentions.

    When he arrived at the window of the room Han Shuo lived in, rk dashed forward and leapt upwards, flying through the air andnded adroitly in Han Shuo¡¯s room.

    ¡°Although I don¡¯t have concrete proof, the disappearance of my younger brother ude must surely have something to do with you. Don¡¯t think that I¡¯m too harsh, it¡¯s that you¡¯re simply too irritating. You¡¯ll vanish after today, and Fanny will never find traces of you, even if she searches.¡± rk muttered to himself afternding through the window and surged forward like lightning, stabbing downwards with his sword.

    Han Shuo had used some of the pillows in the closet to set up his bed and made it it seemed like someone was sleeping there. Therefore, when rk stabbed downwards and even made a faint sound ring out with his sword, it gave him a feeling that something was amiss. rk pulled back the nket to see that there were only pillows inside. His face changed slightly.

    He stared off into space for only a moment and immediately put things back as they were. He retreated from the room like lightning and seemed to n to return along the way he came.

    Just as this moment, the original demons patrolling the area suddenly felt another person¡¯s presence approaching. This person was like a shadow in the night, his body almost glued to the wall of the ssroom building and observing rk¡¯s actions from afar.

    Han Shuo had thought that this person was in cahoots with rk, but when the person followed surreptitiously behind rk after he left, Han Shuo immediately understood that this fellow¡¯s target should be rk. He was greatly startled as he hadn¡¯t thought so many random, bizarre matters would take ce in the Academy.

    As he saw rk and that person run in the direction of the knight school, Han Shuo was deathly afraid that the original demons wouldn¡¯t be able to see everything clearly because they needed to keep a distance. He immediately dashed out of the warehouse and kept an exceedinglyrge distance between the two, observing them through the original demons.

    When the original demon followed them back to the knight school, Han Shuo discovered that rk entered one of the rooms and sat there without speaking. This room was where rk had once spoken to Duke. It seemed like this was where rk lived now.

    The shadow that had been following rk made its way here and stood for a while in the distance after seeing rk enter a room. He then made his way soundlessly in another direction in the knight school.

    He sent an original demon to remain within rk¡¯s room and had another keep watch on the surroundings. The third original demon followed that shadow, trying to glean more information about it.

    After a short while, the shadow made its way to an isted room in the knight school, lifted up a few tiles on the roof, and bounded into the room from above.

    ¡°You¡¯vee back.¡± Lawrence was sitting in the dim room and holding a cup of hot tea in his hand, speaking faintly to the shadow that hadnded from the roof.

    Han Shuo was greatly astonished. He hadn¡¯t thought that the shadow¡¯s final destination would be Lawrence¡¯s room. As the son of a great finance minister in the Empire, Lawrence had actually bought ck iron ore from him a while back. Han Shuo had even sparred with Lawrence, and had some goodwill towards this person. To think that he¡¯d sent someone to follow rk!

    Han Shuo suddenly thought of Candide¡¯s words to him the first time he¡¯d arrived in the Dark Mantle. Candide had said that Lawrence¡¯s identity was umon, and had reminded him that if Han Shuo walked too closely with Lawrence, it could result in attracting an enormous amount of trouble. Candide had wanted to speak further about Lawrence¡¯s identity, but didn¡¯t say more.

    When Han Shuo saw this scene, he immediately understood that Lawrence¡¯s identity wasn¡¯t as simple as merely the son of a great finance minister. The son of a finance minister wouldn¡¯t warrant such a reminder from one of the three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle.

    ¡°Yes, rk went to the necromancy dorms after leaving his room and darted into one of the rooms. He seemed to want to kill one of the students. However, I saw him walk out with a dejected look on his face and didn¡¯t hear any sounds of fighting. He likely didn¡¯t find who he was looking for.¡± The shadowy figure responded.

    Lawrence was suddenly interested as he looked at the shadowy figure. ¡°Oh, that¡¯s a bit odd. Right, tell me which room did rk enter?¡±

    When the shadow described the location of Han Shuo¡¯s room, Lawrence was taken aback and then smiled mysteriously, ¡°So he¡¯d wanted to make a move against Bryan. Heh heh, this is interesting. Quite interesting, indeed. It looks like I need to sit Bryan down for a good conversation.¡±

 Chapter 133: I want to kill him too

    Chapter 133: I want to kill him too

    ¡°He¡¯s just a necromancy major student, is he really worth that much attention from you?¡± The shadow spoke in surprise.

    ¡°Heh heh, he¡¯s not ordinary! There¡¯s many mysteries surrounding him and even I can¡¯t figure out what secrets he holds now. This person is quite interesting.¡± Lawrence spoke slowly with a smile.

    ¡°The goal of rk¡¯s visit to the knight school should be you this time. Most likely, he and that Duke from the Kasi Empire wanted to make a move against you, but for some reason, their mission was aborted halfway through and Duke suddenly left our country. This entire matter is very bizarre.¡± The man continued his report.

    Nodding his head and remaining silent for a while, Lawrence opened his mouth to say, ¡°Alright, you are dismissed for now. It¡¯s not that easy for rk to make a move against me in the knight school anyway. Hmm. It looks like I need to move first and eliminate rk.¡±

    The shadow didn¡¯t say much when he heard those words and jumped up onto the roof, squirming out from a hole beneath the roof. He vanished into the distance as Lawrence sat inside, silently sipping his tea and contemting something.

    The sky had already brightened at this point as the figure left and flew towards the mountains behind the Academy, walking even further out. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t tantly continue his pursuit either because of the lightened sky. Add to that, the matters of today, Han Shuo decided to momentarily give up on investigating that fellow.

    Making use of the time before the students of the knight school had awoken, Han Shuo returned to the necromancy major early in the morning. He spent the morning alone in the dorm, practicing necromancy magic as usual and silently contemting Lawrence¡¯s identity, and his rtionship with rk.

    Han Shuo moved to the Academy¡¯s cafeteria for the first time at noon, resulting in a small riot.

    Each major of the Academy had their own independent cafeteria, the dark major was no exception either. The cafeteria was divided into two, with the lower level beingpletely free. Students were free to partake after turning in their tuition fees, but of course, what was free naturally didn¡¯t taste that good.

    There was another level upstairs that many chefs were in charge of. Its level was much higher than the one beneath it. Of course, the food on this level could only be enjoyed by spending additional gold coins. It was usually for students who were more well off.

    Han Shuo was no longer a poverty stricken schr. There were enough gold coins stored in the crystal cards that were in his space ring for him to enjoy life as he would. Therefore, he didn¡¯t linger on the first level, went directly to the second. He swiped his crystal card to order a few expensive and exquisite dishes. He took a table for himself and started pigging out.

    Afterst time¡¯s battle, Han Shuo had be a celebrity in the school. Those enjoying their meals were now all dark major students. Although Han Shuo had gained glory for the dark majorst time, his actions hadn¡¯t won respect for the dark major. Rather, he had thrown dirt in their faces. So when he appeared on the second level of the cafeteria, he had attracted everyone¡¯s attentions.

    Han Shuo paid no attention to any of this. As his strength and breadth of experience grew, he slowly paid less and less attention to these Babylon Academy students. In his heart, these students were only kids who¡¯d never seen the outside world, so they posed no threat to him.

    ¡°Eh, so there you are!¡± Lisa eximed softly as she and Lawrence walked through the door. She smiled and walked over to Han Shuo with Lawrence.

    Lawrence smiled at nodded at Han Shuo from afar, then he went off to order his own food. Lisa sat down peremptorily in front of Han Shuo and she looked at the looks full of hostility around her. Her charming face chilled as she stuck her hands on her waist, ¡°And just what are you looking at? What is there to look at here?¡±

    Although the little witch Lisa was in the weak necromancy major, her bad temper was renowned throughout the entire dark major. Therefore, when she yelled, those ring at Han Shuo had their expressions turn ugly and they ducked their heads, muttering a few curses and then turned their heads again.

    ¡°Pay no attention to them, they¡¯re just jealous of you.¡± Looking around her and cursing angrily, Lisa sat down merrily and stared at Han Shuo.

    At a loss for words internally, Han Shuo said, ¡°Then just let them be jealous. I won¡¯t lose any hair over their jealousy, but, if anyone dares materialize their jealousy into action, then I can promise that they won¡¯t only be short of hairs!¡±

    Han Shuo had spoken softly in the beginning, but when he noticed that there were still people staring at him in hatred, he raised his voice with a cold face, filling it with a warning tone.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t dealt killing blows inst time¡¯sbat disy, but the cold remoteness and resolution had already told everyone that he was absolutely not someone who was kindhearted and would show mercy. The bystanders then had even had the strange impression that if it weren¡¯t for school rules, Han Shuo might very well have truly coldly killed those people.

    Therefore, when Han Shuo issued those warnings with a angry face, those who hadn¡¯t lowered their hostile gazes after Lisa¡¯s hectoring slowly ducked their heads in the end.

    ¡°Heh heh, it looks like you¡¯re quite unpopr!¡± Lawrence walked over from afar as he carried a tray of exquisite food. He said down across from Han Shuo with a smile, next to Lisa, after giving a te to her.

    Shrugging, Han Shuo said diffidently, ¡°The key thing is that some people are truly too bored. They¡¯re ipetent, but have a strong sense of jealousy. Not only will they not be grateful if you show them a friendly face, but they¡¯ll think you fear them instead.¡±

    ¡°Indeed, I deeply empathize with your perspective.¡± Lawrence chucked in agreement and nodded his head to say so.

    Amy and Athena, the two girls from the necromancy major, suddenly appeared at this time. When Lisa saw the two take another seat, she hesitated and then picked up her te. ¡°You guys chat, I¡¯ll go sit with Amy and the others.¡±

    Lisa stood up after she spoke and made her way down two walkways, greeting Amy and the others in the distance and sat down with them.

    Han Shuo and Lawrence were the only ones left after Lisa¡¯s departure. Because of Lisa and Han Shuo¡¯s repeated warnings just now, there was arge area of free space around Han Shuo. Therefore, no one should be able to listen in on their conversation.

    ¡°I¡¯ve heard that rk likes Fanny, but he left with a face full of dejected failure today because of your appearance. Did such a thing happen?¡± Lawrence seemed to ask randomly with a slight smile.

    Han Shuo was frantically going over things at this moment in his heart. He lifted his head to rake a nce over Lawrence and responded with seeming indifference. ¡°How could such a thing have happened? Master Fanny turned down rk because she wasn¡¯t interested in him. This had nothing to do with me, don¡¯t you go sprouting random nonsense.¡±

    Lawrence¡¯s expression abruptly turned normal after Han Shuo¡¯s words, and he then spoke merrily, ¡°Bryan, ah Bryan. We¡¯re friends, do you want to lie to me? Rumors of the matter between you and Master Fanny is all over the dark major. They say that nothinges from nothing. I, for one, don¡¯t believe that there¡¯s nothing between the two of you.¡±

    ¡°Say whatever you want to say.¡± Han Shuo declined toment. He lowered his head and continued eating, seeming to not mind Lawrence¡¯s words at all.

    ¡°I happen to know a bit about rk¡¯s personality, he¡¯s not as just and kind as he appears on the surface. It looks like you¡¯ve offended him. I¡¯ve also heard that he suspects that you killed his little brother. It looks like you¡¯re in a spot of trouble!¡± Lawrence continued to speak and used his eyes to silently observe Han Shuo¡¯s expression. When he saw that Han Shuo waspletely unmoved, Lawrence remained silent for a bit and continued to speak, ¡°Bryan, we¡¯re friends, right?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo put down his cup and looked at Lawrence with a smile, ¡°I¡¯d say so!¡±

    ¡°Then alright. Since this is the case, I¡¯m willing to bet that rk will definitely make a move against you. I hope you believe me.¡± Lawrence spoke seriously.

    ¡°Of course, when I returned to the dorms today, I saw that the nket on my bed had traces of it being sliced open. It was a good thing that I wasn¡¯t in the dorms yesterday, otherwise you likely wouldn¡¯t have seen me today. I thought for a bit and felt that only rk would want to act like this towards me.¡± Lawrence had beat around the bush and said so much. His aims were slowly revealing themselves. Thus, Han Shuo knew what Lawrence was trying to do and stopped talking in circles, directly admitting to things.

    When these words were spoken, Lawrence¡¯s eyes lit up and he stared at Han Shuo in astonishment. He then shed a brilliant smile and nodded, ¡°You¡¯re not a simple character at all. So you¡¯d been prepared in advance! And to think that I¡¯d been worried for you. Mm. Since you treat me as a friend, I can actually help you take rk down.¡±

    These words were the main point. A glimpse of astonishment shed through Han Shuo¡¯s eyes as he took a deep look at Lawrence. He lowered his head and spoke lowly, ¡°You mean to say, you¡¯ll team up with me to kill rk?¡±

    A prickle of fright rippled through Lawrence as he was shocked. He looked around and said lowly, ¡°Bryan, what makes you think that?¡±

    Han Shuo stared at Lawrence, pausing for a bit. When he¡¯d stared at Lawrence so that he caused the hairs on the back of thetter¡¯s neck to stand up, he spoke lowly, ¡°Lawrence, when you spoke of handling rk just now, I could feel your killing intent. I can be certain that you also have these sort of thoughts too, right?¡±

    It was Lawrence¡¯s turn to be silent after these words were spoken. It was like he was meeting Han Shuo for the first time. Lawrence looked at Han Shuo with an odd look on his face and was silent for a long while before nodding. He sighed, ¡°Bryan, I bow to your knowledge. That¡¯s right, I want to kill him too!¡±

    ¡°This isn¡¯t a ce to talk. I have some things to do today. Come find me tomorrow afternoon. Perhaps we cane up with a good n.¡± When Lawrence also spoke of his desire to kill rk, Han Shuo suddenly didn¡¯t look at Lawrence anymore. He lowered his head and ate nonchntly, speaking lowly as he did so.

    Also simrly silent, Lawrence and Han Shuo sat across from each other and ate with lowered heads. They didn¡¯t speak anymore, and didn¡¯t raise their heads to look at each other again.

    Maintaining this bizarre situation for a while, Han Shuo stood up after, walking outside with leisurely and unhurried strides. When Han Shuo was about to walk out of the cafeteria, that was when Lawrence suddenly raised his head and looked intently at Han Shuo¡¯s back, speaking in a voice audible only to him, ¡°What a frightening fellow!¡±

    When he left the cafeteria, Han Shuo dwelled no more on what had happened. He left through the mountains to the back of the Academy and hired a carriage when no one was looking, heading for the Boozt Merchant Guild.

    This was the day that Han Shuo had set an appointment with Phoebe. The materials needed to refine the earth elite zombies and the forest trolls¡¯ rations still needed to be done through Phoebe.

    Han Shuo was also starting to make preparations to refine the yin demons that were a step higher than the original demons after advancing to the true demon stage. Han Shuo had also discovered a ce of extreme wood in the sacred ground of the forest trolls. This way, he could also refine the wood elite zombies and would have to trouble Phoebe for more materials.

    When he arrived at the Guild, Han Shuo learned from Fabian that Phoebe had yet to return. Phoebe had left instructions with Fabian that if Han Shuo swung by, to have him wait for a bit. She would returnter in the evening.

    Seeing that the night was still young, Han Shuo had Fabian lead the way to catch up with Jack. When Jack heard that Han Shuo had arrived, he was also delighted. He found an empty ce for the two of them and they began chatting happily.

    Han Shuo learned from Jack that Phoebe quite valued him due to Han Shuo¡¯s rmendation. Jack was apprenticing beneath the best teacher in the Guild, learning how to keep the books and knowledge of how to operate a business. It looked like Phoebe was nning on cultivating Jack into someone of Fabian¡¯s status.

    Phoebe finally returned when it was night and spoke immediately when she saw Han Shuo, ¡°I¡¯ve been busy all afternoon and made evening wear for you. Come with me to my room and change into it. Let me see if you fits you well.¡±

    When Phoebe said that she had spent all afternoon to make evening wear for him, Han Shuo felt something odd stir in his heart. His heart lurched as he ambled confusedly after Phoebe, following her to her room.

 Chapter 134: An awkward encounter

    Chapter 134: An awkward encounter

    They entered Phoebe¡¯s room and stopped in front of an enormous mirror. Phoebe then stopped by a pile of ck evening wear hemmed with exquisite, rolled gold edges that included a full set of boots and undergarments.

    ¡°Change out of your clothes first and I¡¯ll help you with the exterior wear in a moment.¡± Phoebe left after handing the pile of clothes to Han Shuo and went to wait outside.

    Han Shuo looked at the dress shirt, boots, and bow tie with an aggrieved look. He hesitated, then followed Phoebe¡¯s request anyway and put them on. He looked at himself in the mirror and felt that he¡¯d noticeably be more vigorous and handsome.

    ¡°Are you done yet?¡± Phoebe asked outside.

    ¡°Yes, I¡¯m done.¡± Han Shuo responded.

    When she heard Han Shuo¡¯s response, Phoebe walked in from outside and looked Han Shuo up and down with her clear eyes. She nodded, ¡°It fits you very well. You look quite dashing in these clothes!¡±

    ¡°Oh, is that so? I feel quite good as well.¡± Han Shuo smiled faintly with a careless response.

    ¡°I¡¯ll help you with the outer jacket.¡± Phoebe walked next to Han Shuo and picked up the jacket in Han Shuo¡¯s hands with ease. She didn¡¯t wait for Han Shuo to speak and took the initiative to help Han Shuo into the jacket, her expression quite happy.

    The two of them were close to each other as the faint fragrance wreathed around Phoebe wafted into Han Shuo¡¯s mouth and nose. Add to that Phoebe¡¯s indescribably tender movements, this all made Han Shuo¡¯s face flush and heart race.

    After Phoebe had helped Han Shuo into all pieces of his evening wear and helped him tie his tie, Phoebe took a small step backwards and focused her sparkling, beautiful eyes on Han Shuo, taking a deep look.

    ¡°I hadn¡¯t thought that you were so fit. This set of formal wear appears to be quite form fitting on you.¡± Phoebe breathed softly with some surprise as she looked attentively at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Then, did you finish what I asked you to do?¡± Han Shuo finally couldn¡¯t help but ask what he cared most about after holding in his words until now.

    She rolled her eyes ill temperedly at Han Shuo, saying unhappily, ¡°Can we not talk about your business for now, and talk about them after the banquet ends?¡±

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t thought that his careless question would incur Phoebe¡¯s unhappiness. He thought privately that a woman¡¯s heart is difficult to guess alright. He was asking someone else for a favor and so could only nod his head with a rueful smile.

    ¡°Alright, alright. Don¡¯t give me that unwilling and reluctant look. I promise you that as long as you apany me to the banquet and back, you¡¯ll leave the Guild satisfied.¡± Phoebe said when she saw that Han Shuo was sporting a wry grin.

    She then told him to wait for her for a bit and turned to walk into her room. After the sounds of rifling through clothing, a stunning Phoebe dressed in a simple, elegant pale-blue dress with faint powder on appeared in front of Han Shuo.

    The unadorned, elegant pale-blue dress tapered into a thin waist from the torso, fully offsetting the perfect curves of her chest and thin waist. The skirt that began around her lower body rippled like petals of beautiful flowers. It was as if waves werepping when she walked. Her gorgeous cheeks were even more mesmerizing due to the presence of light makeup. Han Shuo was bbergasted in the moment he saw her.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong, why are you looking at me in such a silly fashion?¡± Phoebe appeared a bit proud as she threw back her head a little arrogantly and asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°No, nothing.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s lips were a bit dry and responded after swallowing some saliva.

    Laughing lightly, Phoebe lifted her head and walked outside. A faint fragrance drifted around Han Shuo when she passed him. She opened her mouth after arriving in front of the door, ¡°Let¡¯s go and attend the banquet now.¡±

    Following behind Phoebe, Han Shuo got into a carriage that had long since been prepared. Two journeyman swordsman were acting as groomsmen and spurring the horses on into the distance.

    ¡°Where are we going?¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but open his mouth with a question when he saw that Phoebe was sitting in the carriage, seemingly thinking of something.

    ¡°The finance minister of the Empire is holding a banquet and has invited several notable businesspeople in the Empire. It¡¯s a meeting of the businesspeople and a good timing to discuss business.¡± Phoebe looked at Han Shuo and opened her mouth to exin.

    Starting, Han Shuo said, ¡°Then isn¡¯t that Lawrence¡¯s father¡¯s banquet?¡±

    ¡°Eh? How do you know that Lawrence is the son of the finance minister of the Empire?¡± Phoebe was a bit surprised and asked Han Shuo with confusion.

    ¡°Lawrence and I have a good friendship, we¡¯re both from the Academy. We¡¯ve also had a few transactions before, so of course I know a few things about him.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t tell Phoebe that Lisa had been the one to tell him about Lawrence. He spoke matter-of-factly, making it seem that the two of them had close rtions.

    Phoebe didn¡¯t suspect a thing as she nodded, ¡°So this is the case. I hadn¡¯t known that you were close to my senior brother. This rather surprises me.¡±

    The two of them chatted about about Lawrence afterwards. It was mostly Han Shuo taking the chance to ask questions and Phoebe responding. Contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, Phoebe didn¡¯t know much about Lawrence. She only knew that he was the son of the Empire¡¯s finance minister, and although they had the same master, the two of them didn¡¯t meet much.

    ording to Phoebe¡¯s words, Lawrence didn¡¯t seem to be one who focused on training martial techniques. He spent more time studying random things with their teacher than martial techniques, so it was no wonder that Lawrence¡¯s martial skill wasn¡¯t that extraordinary.

    Phoebe was unsure about more of Lawrence¡¯s matters. She only knew that he dealt with people well and had a good rtionship with their teacher. Lawrence was also a bit resourceful and seemed to have many secrets about him, but Phoebe was uncertain of that as well.

    The two of them had unknowingly arrived at their destination as they chatted. It wasn¡¯t until when Han Shuo got off from the carriage that he discovered they weren¡¯t too far away from the pce.

    Alighting from the carriage with Phoebe and walking to the door of a luxurious, opulent manor, there was a well mannered butler long since awaiting to wee Han Shuo and Phoebe inside. They made their way through a corridor and arrived in a courtyard surrounded by artificial mountains and rivers. They discovered that all sorts of soft andfortable chairs had been ced in the surroundings, with many exquisite sweet delicacies and fine wine set up in the ins around the artificial mountains.

    People dressed in extravagant clothing were scattered in all areas, grasping wine sses in their hands and conversing with a smile on their faces. When Han Shuo and Phoebe walked in, the stunning Phoebe immediately drew hot eyed stares from many gentlemen within the area as well as some envious nces from some nobledies.

    ¡°Hello Phoebe, I¡¯m very happy that you coulde and participate in this time¡¯s banquet.¡± An ordinary looking middle aged man with normal features called out softly from the grass next to the flowing waters, walking over with a smile.

    ¡°Uncle Eevee, how would Phoebe not dare attend an event that you¡¯ve issued an invitation for?¡± Phoebe tugged on Han Shuo and walked in the direction of finance minister Eevee of the Lancelot Empire.

    Eevee Egadi was the father of Lawrence Egadi. Han Shuo stared at Eevee, observing him closely and marveling at how Eevee could sire such a handsome son as Lawrence, given his own ordinary features. He felt it truly incredible.

    ¡°Is this handsome young fellow your boyfriend?¡± Eevee looked at Han Shuo with a smile and asked in surprise when he saw Han Shuo standing by her side.

    ¡°Yes, Uncle Eevee, he¡¯s called Bryan and he¡¯s also quite close with senior brother Lawrence.¡± Phoebe nodded and responded with a smile. She purposefully drew close to Han Shuo as they talked and reached out a hand to take his wrist, speaking with a look of happy contentment.

    Although he knew that Phoebe was doing so to purposefully prove their rtionship to Eevee, Han Shuo still felt something odd in his heart when Phoebe held onto him so intimately.

    ¡°Oh, so this is the case. Heh heh, Lawrence has returned from school today as well and is changing into his evening wear. I think he¡¯ll be out in a bit. You can have a nice chatter.¡± Eevee spoke with surprise and then smiled at Han Shuo and Phoebe. ¡°I¡¯m a bit busy today and need to attend to other guests, I¡¯m afraid I¡¯ll have to leave you for now.¡±

    ¡°No worries Uncle Eevee, go attend to what you need to do!¡± Phoebe said graciously with politeness.

    Eevee had just left when a middle aged man with a protruding belly walked towards Phoebe with a ss of wine in his hand. The man suddenly saw Han Shuo standing next to Phoebe before he¡¯d reached her and his face immediately darkened, but he covered it quite well.

    ¡°It¡¯s been a few days, but Miss Phoebe is as beautiful and enchanting as ever. I don¡¯t know if you¡¯ve considered the matter that I brought up to youst time?¡± When the person reached Phoebe, his ardent gaze stared at Phoebe without abandon as he spoke in question.

    ¡°Apologies Mister Cameron, our Boozt Merchant Guild is not willing to join your merchant guild.¡± Phoebe¡¯s face resumed its cold expression as she flicked a nce at Cameron, speaking diffidently.

    Cameron¡¯s face changed as he stared deeply at Phoebe, saying, ¡°Our merchant guild exists to oppose the Brut Merchant Alliance. As members of the Brut Merchant Alliance, the McGrady Guild seems to pose quite a threat to your Boozt Merchant Guild. I hope you can seriously consider my proposal.¡±

    ¡°Hello Mister Cameron! Who are you talking to?¡± A familiar voice suddenly sounded from behind as a curvacious and alluring Emily, all dressed up, suddenly appeared behind Han Shuo.

    Her facial expression had been rxed and carefree when it suddenly changed after she caught sight of Han Shuo when her body was turned. When her gazended on Phoebe holding onto Han Shuo¡¯s arm, her eyes danced even more as a weird look focused fixedly on Han Shuo.

 Chapter 135: Giving tit for tat

    Chapter 135: Giving tit for tat

    Han Shuo received even more of a fright. He never thought that he¡¯d run into Emily here. There was no way he could exin the fact that Phoebe¡¯s hand was wrapped around his arm.

    ¡°This beautifuldy is the master of the Boozt Merchant Guild.¡± Cameron¡¯s expression grew a bit reserved when he saw Emily appear and he spoke up politely.

    Emily¡¯s gaze was still focused on Han Shuo at this moment, and she only recollected herself after Cameron started speaking. She flicked a nce at Phoebe who stood to the side, saying faintly, ¡°So you¡¯re Miss Phoebe.¡±

    ¡°This is Madame Emily, she¡¯s of the Empire¡¯s Betteridge family. Her husband is the second son of the head of the Betteridge family, Mister Hahn.¡± Cameron looked at Phoebe and cast some light on Emily¡¯s identity for her.

    The Betteridge family was arge family in the Empire, renowned for producing famous generals for the Empire. The Betteridge family had achieved many distinguished aplishments for the Empire over the years, with Master Hahn now retired at home due to his advanced age. However, no one dared question his influence in the military.

    When she heard that Emily was of the Betteridge family, Phoebe¡¯s eyes lit up and she gave a friendly bow, ¡°Greetings to Madame Emily.¡±

    ¡°Hehe, you¡¯re too polite. Eh, this young fellow is quite handsome, is he your boyfriend?¡± Emily had lost herposure earlier, but had fully recovered by now. She chuckled and stared at Han Shuo in inquiry.

    Phoebe had felt that Emily seemed to keep flicking nces at Han Shuo, but she didn¡¯t think much of it when she heard that Emily was already married. Now that she heard Emily¡¯s question, she immediately tightened her grasp on Han Shuo¡¯s arm and smiled, ¡°That¡¯s right, his name is Bryan.¡±

    ¡°Hello, beautiful Madame Emily, pleased to meet you.¡± Han Shuo reached out a hand politely and wanted to shake hands with Emily.

    ¡°It¡¯s very nice to meet you, you¡¯re very much like one of my friends!¡± An odd smile clung to the corners of Emily¡¯s mouth. She stretched out her hand and sped Han Shuo¡¯s, but suddenly exerted pressure when their hands met as her fingers dug fiercely into the back of Han Shuo¡¯s hand that was facing the ground.

    A wry smile suddenly appearing on his face, Han Shuo knew that Emily was definitely doing this on purpose. He grimaced and revealed a pained expression. Emily¡¯s expression didn¡¯t change, but was obviously in a better mood after getting her revenge. She rxed her hand and flicked a nce at Han Shuo and Phoebe, saying diffidently, ¡°I need to go somewhere else for now, can I chat with youter?¡±

    ¡°Of course!¡± Phoebe agreed happily.

    Nodding, Emily sashayed away. She suddenly turned her head back halfway and viciously threw a look at Han Shuo when Phoebe and the others weren¡¯t paying attention. She made a subtle e hither¡¯ motion behind her back.

    ¡°Mm. I¡¯m going to the restroom.¡± Han Shuo understood Emily¡¯s meaning and leaned against Phoebe, whispering in her ear. He then extracted his arm from Phoebe¡¯s and left.

    He made a circle first and then walked past a corridor, sneaking towards a pavilion. Han Shuo¡¯s vision could clearly pick up traces of Emily¡¯s path, even without use of the original demons. He avoided some people along the way and made for an artificial mountain that was a bit out of the way.

    He¡¯d just entered the artificial mountain when a shadow suddenly walked out from the gloom, giving Han Shuo¡¯s waist a firm pinch. The person spoke angrily next to Han Shuo¡¯s ear in a low voice, ¡°Howe you never told me that you actually have a girlfriend?¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t even need to think to know that it was Emily. He turned the hand back on her and held her tightly, pushing her flush against the artificial mountain and running his hand over her pert bottom. His other hand sped around her waist and kissed down on her brilliantly red lips.

    ¡°Eh... ooh...¡± Emily struggled twice and pounded furiously on Han Shuo¡¯s chest. She couldn¡¯t stop his invasion however, and her own body slowly began to grow hot and go limp.

    Emily was wearing a brown evening dress today. The long, tapering dress clung tightly to her mesmerizing body figure. The curvaceous evening dress was tight on the bottom as it enclosed around Emily¡¯s long, slender legs. It looked like the bottom half of a mermaid, further enhancing the body¡¯s slenderness.

    Breasts that looked like they were about to burst out of their fabric and a well rounded, pert bottom were firm and toned. They were alsopletely essible beneath the dress and left nothing to one¡¯s imagination, sending out a strong allure. When she sashayed, Emily sent alluring beams of beauty all over, appearing to be an iparably beautiful woman. Han Shuo had noticed that many men present were looking at Emily with apletely distracted look, staring so hard that it seemed their eyes were about to fall out.

    ¡°Speak, what¡¯s with that Phoebe?¡± After they were done, Emily bit off her words while she helped Han Shuo clean up.

    Basking in his freedom from inhibitions and lying backfortably with closed eyes, Han Shuo leaned on the artificial mountain and exined about the matters between him and Phoebe. Emily¡¯s face warmed a little afterwards, but didn¡¯t let Han Shuo entirely off the hook. She suddenly naughtily grabbed Han Shuo lower body and said huffily, ¡°Phoebe that little chit looked so natural with her hand around your arm just now, she didn¡¯t look like she was pretending at all. I think things aren¡¯t that simple between the two of you.¡±

    His little brother having been caught, Han Shuo eximed in surprise. He hastily straightened his pants and breathed a sigh of relief, exining mischievously, ¡°Alright, alright, don¡¯t be jealous. We really don¡¯t have that kind of rtionship.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, are you here? I¡¯m looking for you!¡± The original demons detected Lawrence calling out loudly and approaching this area at this time.

    ¡°Damn it, what¡¯s he doing here?¡± Han Shuo felt a shiver of horror as he and Emily hastily adjusted their clothing, anxiety written over their faces.

    Lawrence seemed to know that Han Shuo was here as he yelled and walked in this direction. When Lawrence was almost where they were, Han Shuo pointed in another direction and said to Emily, ¡°Leave in that direction, now!¡±

    Emily was also inplete disarray right now as she hiked up her dress and stumbled into a run out of there. When Lawrence finally showed himself, heughed merrily, ¡°I was asking people where you were and the butler said he saw you walk in this direction. You were indeed here. Eh, who¡¯s that?¡±

    Lawrence spoke with a smile when he saw Han Shuo and then suddenly caught a glimpse of Emily¡¯s back disappearing in another direction. He immediately eximed softly in surprise and looked at Han Shuo with a look of confusion.

    ¡°No, nothing. Eh, no, I don¡¯t know.¡± Han Shuo had finally gotten everything in order and was privately cursing Lawrence as a bastard. He stammered a bit incoherently when he opened his mouth.

    Lawrence¡¯s facial expression was a bit odd as he took a few nces at Han Shuo, suddenly saying, ¡°I just heard Phoebe say that you¡¯re her boyfriend and was about toe find you for a good chatting. I happened to see a women leave, are you going behind my junior sister¡¯s back anding here to rendezvous with another woman?¡±

    ¡°Haha, how is that possible, you must¡¯ve seen incorrectly, or someone happened to walk by.¡± Han Shuo glossed things over and then changed the topic with a solemn face, saying to Lawrence, ¡°How do you n on proceeding with regards to rk?¡±

    Seeming to see through Han Shuo¡¯s purposeful attempt to change the subject, Lawrence looked oddly at Han Shuo and didn¡¯t continue asking him. He said with a smile, ¡°My father is holding the banquet today and you¡¯re attending as a guest. You should thoroughly enjoy yourself. Let¡¯s not talk about such dirty tasks.¡±

    Lawrence¡¯s words happened to fall in line with Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts. He walked out with a faint smile, ¡°Alright, then let¡¯s go back to the banquet hall.¡±

    Nodding, Lawrence didn¡¯t say much else as he left the area with Han Shuo, walking back to the banquet hall.

    A melodious song had started sounding at some point as many of the guests outside had entered arge lobby. Some of these people started dancing gracefully in the rises and falls of the music. Those without partners or without interest stood around the outskirts by themselves.

    Off in the distance, Phoebe¡¯s expression appeared quite irritated as she impatiently dealt with Cameron¡¯s conversation. There was another madame standing next to Cameron wearing a disdainful cold smile on her face. She seemed to be saying something to Phoebe that made her facial expression be uglier and uglier.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± Han Shuo asked Phoebe with a frown when he and Lawrence walked over.

    ¡°Oh, this little thing is your boyfriend? Heh heh, he¡¯s just an ordinary student at the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. How would he measure up to Mister Cameron¡¯s wealth? Oh, are you paying for this little thing¡¯s tuition? It¡¯d be very interesting that way!¡± This olderdy was wearing luxurious clothing and adorned in brilliant jewels, seemingly deathly afraid that people wouldn¡¯t know that she had money. Her features were middling, but her body was curvy to the point of being over the top. She rather appeared a bit bloated.

    ¡°Eh? Who¡¯s this old granny?¡± Han Shuo flicked a surprise nce at this olderdy when he walked over and eximed to Phoebe.

    ¡°Pfft.¡± Phoebe covered her mouth and couldn¡¯t help butugh. Her face then regained itsposure as she said, ¡°She¡¯s Madame Valerie of Lin Garments.¡±

    ¡°Impudent thing, with which eye did you see an old granny?¡± Valerie was beyond incensed as she ced her hands on her hips and red at Han Shuo.

    Pointing at his left eye, Han Shuo said, ¡°This left eye.¡± He then pointed at his other eye and continued, ¡°This right eye.¡±

    A trace of a delighted smile curved Phoebe¡¯s eyes as she came over to tenderly hug Han Shuo¡¯s arm, saying to Valerie, ¡°He¡¯s just this blunt, I¡¯m truly sorry!¡±

    As a swordmaster, Phoebe¡¯s own strength was unquestionable. However, she wasn¡¯t adept at verbally sparring with others and couldn¡¯t bear to let go of her face to do so. With Han Shuo at her side kicking things off however, she didn¡¯t mind going with the flow and adding fuel to the fire.

    ¡°Old granny, you¡¯re already at an advanced age. You should be staying at home and enjoying the little bit of time you have left. What are you doing in the outside world putting your face out there? In addition, the difference in our ages is simply too great to the point of being unable tomunicate. If you¡¯re truly that lonely, you should find someone simr to your age tomunicate with!¡± Han Shuo ignored Valerie¡¯s anger and mocked viciously. He then pointed at someone in front and said, ¡°There, you shouldmunicate with that old gentlemen over thing. You can flirt with him and maybe experience some old love!¡±

    There was an elder man with white hair, holding a cane, in the direction that Han Shuo was pointing in. He was sitting on a chair not too far away and slowly drinking wine.

    Valerie took a look at the old man and was so angry that her cheeks were red. The two meatballs in front of her chest swayed back and forth as she turned to stare at Han Shuo angrily, unsure of what to say.

    Following Han Shuo¡¯s gaze, Cameron, Phoebe, and Lawrence looked at the old man at the same time. Phoebeughed lightly and pinched Han Shuo covertly, seeming to admonish him for making fun of the elderly. Cameron looked at the old man and turned his head, telling Valerie in a low voice to not be angry.

    However, when Lawrence looked at the old man, his facial expression suddenly changed as he was a bit shocked and take aback. He finally revealed an odd, wry smile.

    ¡°Little fellow, I heard you were talking crap about me from afar.¡± The old man suddenly turned at this moment and looked at Han Shuo with bright, piercing eyes, speaking with a resonant, carrying voice.

 Chapter 136: Difference in position

    Chapter 136: Difference in position

    Han Shuo was bbergasted when he saw the old man get to his feet and walk over. He hadn¡¯t discovered it when the old man was sitting, but when the old man drew himself up straight, he immediately appeared extraordinarily awe inspiring. His body was tall and fit, and didn¡¯t appear old and clumsy in the slightest.

    Phoebe pinched Han Shuo covertly, wanting him to hurry and apologize. Lawrence, on the other side, kept throwing nces at Han Shuo, seeming to urge him into an apology to the old man.

    When he saw the old man walk over, Han Shuo said with a rueful smile, ¡°Your ears are truly sensitive, but I didn¡¯t say anything bad about you, just wanted to introduce a goodpanion to you in your old age.¡±

    ¡°Oh? Now this is a bit interesting. I didn¡¯t think you¡¯d be so kindhearted.¡± The old man walked over and flicked a nce at Han Shuo, one that sent chills running through his heart. He then pointed at Phoebe and smiled, ¡°Do you mean this beautifuldy? If it¡¯s her, I¡¯d be very happy to, heh heh!¡±

    Han Shuo was immediately gobsmacked by these words as Phoebe¡¯s face turned bright red. She flung a vicious nce at Han Shuo, seeming to me him for ying with fire.

    ¡°No, thisdy is noticeably unsuitable for your age. I was thinking that this old granny is more suitable for you.¡± Han Shuo felt that his aura was a bit blocked when he faced this old man. He opened his mouth and continued spouting off random nonsense in an effort to shake off that oppressing feeling.

    On the other side, Lawrence appeared a bit anxious and continued sending certain looks at Han Shuo. However, he was still a bit toote as Han Shuo spoke his mind.

    ¡°Such a rude thingcking breeding and vision. In what way am I a good match for this old thing? Are you seeking death?!¡± Valerie was exceedingly angry as she bawled out at Han Shuo with a violent look. She also red at the elder as well for good measure.

    ¡°Little fellow, you must be joking. Although I¡¯m not young, I¡¯m noticeably younger than this madame. I think she¡¯d be more suited for myte grandfather.¡± When the elder heard Valerie also curse at him, he actually merrily riposted in the same manner.

    Although his age was advanced, his words made Valerie out to bepletely worthless. Valerie was so incensed, that smoke was almost rising from her seven orifices. She immediately stared at the old man angrily and shouted, ¡°Damned decrepit thing, how dare you say that about me.¡±

    A p rang out as Lawrence suddenly made his move and flung a p at the rich madame. He said with a cold face to Cameron off on the side, ¡°Uncle Cameron, your friend is simply too rude. We don¡¯t wee people like her. Please have her leave immediately.¡±

    Cameron¡¯s face changed slightly as he couldn¡¯t quite understand why Lawrence would do so. The madame almost wanted to go on a rampage. She covered her mouth as a few traces of blood could be seen. It looked like Lawrence hadn¡¯t held back with this p.

    Cameron began to subtly feel that something was amiss and was about to ask what Lawrence meant when Finance Minister Eevee walked over from the distance. He immediately cried out with surprise when he came over and gave a bow, ¡°Master Hahn, what brings you here?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart jumped with surprise as he suddenly remembered Mister Cameron¡¯s talk of Emily¡¯s identity earlier. The current head of the Betteridge family was called Hahn. As he thought of this and once again looked at the elder, he vaguely guessed at his identity.

    Cameron¡¯s face also changed as he shouted coldly at Valerie in a low voice. ¡°Shut up!¡± He restrained Valerie, who¡¯d been about to continue making a fuss. He then spoke fearfully to the elder, ¡°My apologies Master Hahn, we¡¯ve been most impolite. I will take her away now and personally visit in a few days to offer my apologies.¡±

    Valerie had finally recovered herself in this moment and her expression was filled with awe and fear as well. She stood there in a dumb haze, not sure of what to say. It was obvious that she was stunned by Hahn¡¯s identity.

    ¡°No need, our Betteridge n cannot amodate such characters like you.¡± Hahn on the other hand, maintained his usual expression and cast a cold look at the two of them as he spoke faintly.

    Cameron¡¯s expression was still humble as he continued to express his apologies and kept tugging the dazed Valerie, quickly walking outside. He kept bowing and offering his apologies before he left, until his figure vanished into the distance.

    In this world, even with all the many gold coins that merchants could earn, their status in society would never be on par with nobles such as Hahn, particrly when Hahn¡¯s nsmen were senior officials in the military. They wouldn¡¯t dare offend Hahn no matter what.

    ¡°Little fellow, you¡¯ve got some guts.¡± Seeing that Han Shuo still had the same expression on his face after Cameron had left with clear exnations from Lawrence and Eevee, Hahn was a bit surprised to see that Han Shuo didn¡¯t offer an apology or appear that frightened. He snorted softly at Han Shuo.

    Actually, when he found out Hahn¡¯s identity, Han Shuo was also a bit shocked. However, he hadn¡¯t said anything that was too offensive just now so he wasn¡¯t that afraid of Hahn. When he heard Hahn¡¯s words, Han Shuo said with a conciliatory smile, ¡°I was just joking with you earlier, I think you surely wouldn¡¯t mind with your magnanimity.¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, I¡¯m a very narrow minded person. Everyone knows that.¡± Hahnughed oddly and responded with something outside of Han Shuo¡¯s expectations.

    This made Han Shuo feel a bit taken aback as he stood there, at a loss for appropriate words.

    ¡°Eh, honored father, what are you guys standing here chatting about?¡± Emily had changed into a new set of clothes at this time and first flicked a nce at Han Shuo, then looking at Hahn in surprise.

    Emily had married Hahn¡¯s second son, but that unlucky fellow hadn¡¯t had time to consummate the marriage before Hahn had sent him onto the battlefield. He hadn¡¯t returned in the end and had left Emily a widow. Therefore, after Emily had be a Betteridge daughter-inw, old Hahn kept reprimanding himself and felt that he owed something to his son and daughter-inw. It was said that he dearly loved Emily and was even closer to her than his own son.

    ¡°Nothing much, just that I¡¯ve met an interesting little fellow. Mm, let¡¯s go, let¡¯s go. I¡¯ll go dance with you. I don¡¯t understand you at all. You used to never bring a date to these banquets, but wanted to drag me along this time. You¡¯ll be the death of me sooner orter.¡± Old Hahn first responded carelessly and thenined merrily as he walked towards the dance hall.

    Emily had wanted to speak more, but she could only quickly follow after old Hahn. When she left however, Emily still raked Han Shuo with a subtle nce.

    Old Hahn¡¯s words seemed to subtly indicate something. He thought about it briefly and understood that it might have been because of him to make Emily change. He was quite touched internally.

    ¡°Eh, so she¡¯s Madame Emily. It should be my first time meeting her today, but why does her back look a bit familiar?¡± Lawrence looked in the direction that Emily had disappeared in and flicked a nce at Han Shuo, questioning in a low voice.

    Lawrence¡¯s words seemed to point at something, particrly thatst nce at Han Shuo. This made Han Shuo feel that Lawrence seemed to have discovered something, but to Han Shuo, his rtionship with Phoebe was the fake one, and thus he wasn¡¯t afraid of Lawrence telling Phoebe about his rtionship with Emily. He felt that he was on firm ground at heart and wasn¡¯t panicked.

    ¡°Little Phoebe, you didn¡¯t offend old Hahn, did you?¡± Finance Minister Eevee looked at Phoebe and spoke with a bit of worry after Hahn and Emily had left.

    ¡°Never mind Phoebe¡¯s matters, heh heh. Go back to whatever you were busy with and don¡¯t worry. I¡¯ll take care of things here.¡± Lawrence stood by the side and suddenly spoke up.

    Eevee seemed to listen very much to Lawrence as he nodded and didn¡¯t say much else after Lawrence had opened his mouth. He left with a slight smile.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Master Hahn isn¡¯t someone who confuses right from wrong. He won¡¯t make trouble for you, I can promise that. The ball has already started, the two of you can go enjoy yourselves.¡± Lawrence spoke with a small smile at Han Shuo and Phoebe after Eevee had left.

    ¡°Mm, understood senior brother.¡± Phoebe smiled and pulled on Han Shuo¡¯s arm, seeming to say randomly, ¡°Come, dance with me.¡±

    Han Shuo started and said a bit frantically, ¡°Forget it, I don¡¯t know how to dance, not at all!¡±

    Phoebe started and hesitated. Just as she was about to give up, her eyebrow suddenly lifted and she said a bit mischievously, ¡°No problem, I can teach you. It¡¯s really simple.¡±

    ¡°Forget it, I¡¯m really stupid. It won¡¯t be good for me to embarrass you in front of everyone.¡± Han Shuo shook his head and declined with a wry smile.

    Her slender, white neck rising up, Phoebe said with a bit of a pout, ¡°What did you promise me before? Don¡¯t try to change the subject.¡±

    Phoebe wrapped her hands firmly around Han Shuo¡¯s arm after she¡¯d spoken, with no thought of whether or not Han Shuo had agreed. She tugged him in the direction of dance floor, not giving him the chance to decline.

 Chapter 137: Strange happenings at the ball

    Chapter 137: Strange happenings at the ball

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t know whether tough or cry. He was resigned as he allowed Phoebe to drag him over to the dance floor.

    Original and most up to date trantions are posted at vretrantions.

    When he reached the dance floor, he noticed that a few merchants and other nobles were holding onto the waists of theirdies and dancing gracefully in the center of the floor. Han Shuo stood dumbly in a corner after being led there by Phoebe, watching the others dance with narrowed eyes and praying that he wouldn¡¯t be too embarrassingter.

    ¡°Here, ce your arm around my waist.¡± Phoebe¡¯s body twisted as she stood across from Han Shuo. Her slender jade hands rose as she ced one into Han Shuo¡¯s right hand, guiding Han Shuo¡¯s left hand to her waist with her right hand.

    All other reproductions of this chapter are theft.

    When Phoebe¡¯s small handnded in Han Shuo¡¯srge hand, Han Shuo¡¯s heart lurched slightly as it never had before. A smooth, warm, and boneless small hand felt quitefortable to the touch. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but squeeze her hand, which caused Phoebe¡¯s body to tremble all over, her cheeks reddening unknowingly.

    She red at Han Shuo and said softly, ¡°No monkey business allowed!¡±

    When Han Shuo¡¯srge handnded on Phoebe¡¯s waist and the two of their bodies were flush against each other. They could smell the scent on each other, and their breaths would even waft into each other¡¯s mouths and nose when they spoke.

    Original and most up to date trantions are posted at vretrantions.

    ¡°Come, I¡¯ll lead you in dancing, just follow my rhythm.¡± Phoebe was a bit scared to look directly at Han Shuo as she lowered her head and said that. She took a deep breath in, cing her empty hand on his shoulder and slowly walked towards the dance floor.

    Phoebe appeared to let go of her reservations with the elegant and wonderful music. She didn¡¯t continue looking down at the floor, but stared soulfully at Han Shuo with her beautiful eyes. She exined the main ts of dancing to Han Shuo in a low voice.

    Trantor etvre has not given permission for her works to be reproduced elsewhere.

    With Han Shuo¡¯s current intelligence and observation skills, he¡¯d already grasped the main principles of dancing after a round of observation. When he listened to Phoebe¡¯s detailed exnations and was lead forward by her, he immediately grasped the knack of dancing and slowly became familiar with dancing after his initial unfamiliarity.

    Phoebe was a swordmaster, and thus her strength, flexibility, and agility was naturally extraordinary. After enduring the reforging from the magical yuan, all the various functions of Han Shuo¡¯s body were even more outstanding than an ordinary person¡¯s. When their two bodies leaned close to each other and settled into the same rhythm, their dancing style was very much in sync and quite mesmerizing.

    Their bodies leveraged the fact that their hands were sped together to move in incredibly harmony. Han Shuo would understand what Phoebe meant when she sent a nce over, and his footsteps would move with Phoebe¡¯s, in moving slowly, quickly, or turning. This kind of wondrous sensation caused ripples of odd emotion in both Phoebe and Han Shuo¡¯s heart.

    When the song was over, both of them felt that they hadn¡¯t given full expression to their thoughts, so when the next song sounded, Phoebe pulled Han Shuo into a dancing form again. Their strong ordance perfectly demonstrated another dance to perfection, and their handsome and beautiful forms attracted much attention from the many eyes within the dance floor.

    Reproduction of any GDK chapter is theft, even if credit is given.

    Just as he was feeling greatly content, Han Shuo¡¯s eyes swept the area and suddenly noticed Emily dancing with old Hahn not too far away. A pair of eyes full of the light of jealousy were fixed intently on him. This made Han Shuo¡¯s heart jump and sh a rueful smile at Emily from afar.

    When she saw that Han Shuo had only just now noticed her gaze, Emily was a bit angry as she viciously rolled her eyes at Han Shuo, telling him that she was truly jealous.

    There was really no way that Han Shuo could exin anything at this moment, and could only smile wryly at Emily in the distance. Several waiters appeared from three directions at this time. Their gazes were flitting back and forth and their steps light and slow, as if trying to hide something.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t paid them much attention at first, but his sensitive ears seemed to filter out the wondrous music and heard a very, very faint tinkling sound. This seemed to be the sound that jade and jewels would make after hitting metal.

    Do the right thing, don¡¯t support theft.

    His thoughts racing slightly, Han Shuo¡¯s expression tightened as he began to involuntarily closely observe the waiters who had just appeared. As everyone was mesmerized in romantic dance steps, the appearance of several waiters holding trays with wine sses on them was a bit jarring. In addition, although the waiters¡¯ gazes were calm, they would involuntarily travel to old Hahn in the middle of the dance floor, with a cold light subtly appearing when their eyesnded on him.

    As Han Shuo continued his observations, he noticed that the waiters were slowly converging on one area. He also judged that Emily¡¯s and old Hahn¡¯s footsteps would travel to where the waiters were in another few breaths. Han Shuo vaguely felt uneasy as he noted the waiters¡¯ gazes.

    His mind racing now, Han Shuo tilted his forehead forward and brought his lips up to Phoebe¡¯s ears. Lost in the dance, Phoebe suddenly sensed Han Shuo¡¯s movements and her heart was thrown into disarray. The redness of her cheeks spread out to her nape.

    She moved her neck slightly to the left, seeming to want to put some distance between Han Shuo¡¯s lips and her neck. She then quickly lifted her head and snuck a nce at Han Shuo after moving her head like that, noticing that Han Shuo had furrowed his brow. This made her heart panic even more.

    She hesitated a bit and seemed to decide on something, rolling her eyes at Han Shuo inwardly. Her neck didn¡¯t continue to dodge and stayed there as she seemed to be waiting for something with reddened cheeks.

    ¡°Those waiters seem to want to take action against old Hahn and Madame Emily. I made a joke out of old Hahn just now earlier. Move there with me now and I¡¯ll go and repay him for his favor.¡± Han Shuo finally ced his lips next to Phoebe¡¯s ears and said softly.

    Her body had first trembled in anticipation, Phoebe¡¯s body had then changed from soft and pliable to quite stiff after Han Shuo had spoken his words. A trace of disappointment shed through her heart, after which she widened the distance between her and Han Shuo to use her eyes to indicate that she understood.

    Looking at Phoebe¡¯s gaze, Han Shuo knew that Phoebe had fully understood his intentions, given how in sync he was with her. He nodded and didn¡¯t say much else, covertly changing their dance moves together. The two of them exchanged positions with another couple at an unknown moment and swiftly danced towards old Hahn and Emily.

    To Han Shuo, he wasn¡¯t doing so in order to pay back old Hahn any sort of favor. He was doing so because Emily was there. Emily was dancing with old Hahn and when she saw Han Shuo winking incessantly at her, she thought that Han Shuo was feeling guilty and wanted to exin something. She red huffily at Han Shuo and turned her head to no longer look at him again, seeming to still be greatly angry.

    Seeing danger approach, Han Shuo¡¯s heart became more and more calm. His gaze focused on the bodies of the waiters and mentally charted out their n of action and timing. He measured it all up clearly and urately calcted when they would make their move.

    When Emily and old Hahn finally started moving towards a corner, Han Shuo¡¯srge hand on Phoebe¡¯s waist suddenly abruptly exerted force and they took two quick steps towards Emily.

    At the same time, the gazes and demeanors of the waiters, who¡¯d waited for quite a while suddenly made a drastic change from their peaceful looks. A cold and severe presence emanated from their bodies. The waiter, with the tray of wine sses in his hand, suddenly flung it forward, sending the tray and its contents flying towards Emily and old Hahn. Their bodies moved at the same time as a dagger, sparkling with cold light stabbed towards old Hahn and Emily like lightning.

    Emily and old Hahn had been dancing to the graceful music when their faces suddenly changed drastically, but when they reacted, the fatal attack was already close at hand. One dagger stabbed towards Emily as another four stabbed towards old Hahn. The five assassins moved quickly and cleanly. It was obvious to see that they were old hats with lots of tough training under their belts.

    A sharp and severe whistling suddenly sounded, appearing all the more ear-piercing in the midst of the melodious music. The Demonyer Edge shot out of Han Shuo¡¯s sleeve like lightning in ordance to his thoughts, aiming for the dagger making straight for Emily.

    Han Shuo and Phoebe had swiftly whirled to old Hahn¡¯s side at this time and surged into the other four assassins attacking old Hahn before they¡¯d had a chance to react.

    Original and most up to date trantions are posted at vretrantions.

    Having long since made their preparations, Han Shuo and Phoebe acted to defend at the same time. Han Shuo used a dwarf-forged dagger to block a hit, Phoebe¡¯s longsword twirled fiercely and strongly deflected two daggers into the sky. Making use of this opening, Han Shuo shoved fiercely with his back and tried to push old Hahn away from the danger zone.

    To his surprise, old Hahn wasn¡¯t pushed out of the way after his strong shove. Old Hahn¡¯s upper body swayed slightly as he reached through the air to snatch out a flying tray. Old Hahn hauled it behind him and blocked thest dagger with a loud ng.

    The suddenly appearing Han Shuo and Phoebe had blocked three of the daggers that¡¯d been for old Hahn,pletely throwing the assassins ns into disarray. The five waiters looked at each other and didn¡¯t make another move. They retreated quickly towards the outside as screams and panic ensued on the dance floor, with everyone trying to flee and hide.

    Old Hahn and Phoebe both set their sights on different assassins and immediately ran off in pursuit. As the two of them were taking action, Han Shuo quickly ran to Emily¡¯s side and grabbed her hand, saying lowly, ¡°Are you alright?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m fine, go after the assassins!¡± Emily was a senior executive of the Dark Mantle alright, she didn¡¯t disy any panic and immediately admonished Han Shuo lightly.

    ¡°It¡¯s none of my business. it¡¯s good as long as you¡¯re alright. Everything else has nothing to do with me!¡± Han Shuo shook his head and picked up a wine ss from beside him at random, staying where he was and slowly sipped at wine as he looked at Emily, having not the slightest intention to rise.

    ¡°You, you darned brat!¡± The meaning behind Han Shuo¡¯s words was obviously cing Emily¡¯s safety first and being toozy to care about anything else. When Emily heard his words, she was both angry at Han Shuo not listening to her and touched by his concern. She pouted and rebuked him.

    The dance floor was inplete chaos at this moment as the merchants reacted to the sudden developments. They were all fleeing in mass panic to the courtyard beyond the dance floor. No one was paying any attention to the conversation between Han Shuo and Emily.

    Seeing that there were fewer and fewer people on the dance floor, Han Shuo and Emily finally walked outside. A grave, sharp sound sounded when they reached the door as the Demonyer Edge threaded through the frantically fleeing crowd and suddenlynded in Han Shuo¡¯s palm, vanishing without a trace in the blink of an eye.

    ¡°The person who attacked you is dead!¡± Han Shuo said faintly to Emily when he put the Demonyer Edge away.

    When the Demonyer Edge had flown back just now, it had been flying close to the ground. The people panicking around it naturally hadn¡¯t noticed, but Emily had been walking with Han Shuo and had seen the Demonyer¡¯s miraculous, automatic flight with her own eyes. It¡¯d then concealed itself within Han Shuo¡¯s sleeve, making Emily bbergasted.

    ¡°What¡¯s the weapon that you¡¯re using?¡± Emily¡¯s voice trembled as she looked in disbelief at Han Shuo.

    The Demonyer Edge that could fly ording to his own will naturally appeared mysterious and unpredictable in this world. It was understandable that Emily was so shocked.

    Smiling mysteriously, Han Shuo exined with a dashing air, ¡°This has to do with the martial arts technique that I¡¯m training, I¡¯m not at liberty to exin. All you have to know is that my weapon is indeed a bit different.¡±

    ¡°You wicked brat, just how many secrets are hidden amongst yourself?¡± Strange lights danced in Emily¡¯s eyes as they focused on Han Shuo, asking with extreme curiosity.

    Shrugging, Han Shuo smiled without responding and gave off the air of unfathomable mysteriousness. This made Emily¡¯s teeth itch to throw all decorum to the winds and bite him where they stood.

    Just as Han Shuo and Emily were conversing quietly, the chaotic scene slowly came under control as Phoebe, old Hahn, a slightly frantic Finance Minister Eevee, and Lawrence, with a darkened expression, returned from all directions.

    ¡°One made it out and the othersmitted suicide. There was nothing to be gleaned from their bodies.¡± Phoebe first looked in surprise at Han Shuo and Emily and spoke lowly to Han Shuo when she returned.

    Han Shuo and Emily had already put some distance between themselves before Phoebe and the others had returned, and their expressions had gone back to normal and didn¡¯t express anything special in particr. Therefore, although Phoebe was curious why Han Shuo hadn¡¯t gone after the killers and stayed with Emily, she didn¡¯t ask anything.

    ¡°Little fellow, thank you for your aid in saving me and Emily.¡± Old Hahn said approvingly to Han Shuo with a smile after he walked over.

    ¡°Not at all, treat it as me returning the favor after making a joke out of you earlier. Heh heh, this way even if you really were narrow minded, you likely wouldn¡¯t be able to find it within yourself to make trouble for me.¡± Han Shuo winded at old Hahn and said teasingly.

    Old Hahnughed heartily when these words were uttered, ¡°Fascinating, what a fascinating little fellow!¡±

 Chapter 138: We can be together

    Chapter 138: We can be together

    ¡°I¡¯m so sorry, it was because our defensive precautions weren¡¯t good enough that it caused you to be frightened!¡± Finance Minister Eevee spoke with a look of worry to Hahn.

    Waving his hands, Hahn¡¯s face was grave as he said seriously, ¡°Don¡¯t apologize Eevee, I won¡¯t hold you responsible. Don¡¯t investigate this matter further, I¡¯ll handle it myself.¡±

    Eevee first heaved a sigh of relief when Hahn said so and then asked askance, ¡°Why?¡±

    ¡°Honored father, since grandpa Hahn has already spoken, don¡¯t think too much about it.¡± Lawrence¡¯s face was a bit dark as he spoke to Eevee.

    ¡°Mm. Lawrence, don¡¯t you worry either. I know who did this.¡± Hahn flicked a nce at Lawrence and seemed to know something as he spoke.

    Lawrence nodded his head remotely and looked towards Han Shuo and Phoebe. He hesitated for a moment, then asked Phoebe, ¡°Did Cameron try to force you to join his organization¡¯s merchant alliance?¡±

    ¡°Yes, but I¡¯ve already turned him down.¡± Phoebe responded.

    ¡°Very good, don¡¯t give in at any cost, otherwise your Boozt Merchant Guild will face incredible danger.¡± Lawrence who contemted silently gave this piece of advice to Phoebe.

    Taking in their conversation, Han Shuo made his observations. He seemed to notice something from Lawrence and Hahn¡¯s discussion, but since the two of them didn¡¯t talk about anything tangible and so he didn¡¯t inquire further.

    As for the other matters, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t that curious about them. Since this assassination attempt had taken ce, it was difficult for the banquet to continue. Han Shuozily stretched his waist and said to Phoebe, ¡°I believe the banquet is already over. Can we leave now?¡±

    Rolling her eyes at Han Shuo, Phoebe bowed slightly to Eevee and old Hahn. Then, with a slight smile, she said, ¡°We still have matters to attend to, so we¡¯ll be taking our leave now.

    Eevee couldn¡¯t very well keep them now that such a matter had urred. He sighed and said lowly, ¡°Alright, be careful on your way back.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, remember what we said, I¡¯llee find you tomorrow. Don¡¯t disappear for another few days now!¡± When he saw that Phoebe and Han Shuo were about to leave, Lawrence suddenly reminded Han Shuo not to forget their arranged appointment.

    Han Shuo nodded in understanding. Just as he was about to leave, Hahn opened his mouth again, ¡°So you¡¯re Bryan, heh heh. I¡¯ll remember you.¡±

    Smiling and not responding, Han Shuo and Phoebe left the banquet along with some other merchants who were leaving in a hurry. Everyone boarded their carriages and traveled back along their original routes.

    ¡°Just who wants to kill that old Hahn? Even I know of Master Hahn¡¯s aplishments for the Empire. Many of the current officers in the military are Master Hahn¡¯s former men. With his status, there shouldn¡¯t be that many within the Empire who dare make a move against him.¡± Phoebe¡¯s beautiful eyebrows creased slightly after they entered the carriage and she spoke with a distant voice.

    To remain vignt, the three original demons had been deposited nearby and were continuously keeping an eye on the surroundings. When Phoebe had voiced her thoughts, Han Shuo thought briefly and said, ¡°We helped old Hahn today, but that may bring great trouble to us. But for your merchant guild, the advantages of having a good rtionship with old Hahn definitely outweigh its disadvantages. Mm, however, this matter doesn¡¯t have much to do with me as I¡¯m not afraid of anything. But you, you should be careful.¡±

    Phoebe shed her teeth in a smile, ¡°Don¡¯t you worry, I know my limits.¡±

    ¡°Then I won¡¯t speak further. Can you now fully detail the items you promised me?¡± Han Shuo nodded and then drew himself up slightly, staring straight at Phoebe as he asked this question.

    ¡°Alright alright, just look at you. I found someone to professionally assess the wealth that you obtained from that unknown source. It¡¯s worth roughly forty thousand gold and can fully cover those random items you purchased. In addition, I¡¯ve thoroughly preparedrge amounts of rations for you. However, the space ring with arger capacity that you want will take some time. There¡¯s temporarily no supply of that in the market.¡± Phoebe¡¯s spirits hadn¡¯t been dampened with running into an attack on the banquet, as she spoke quite lightheartedly at this moment.

    When Phoebe spoke thus, Han Shuo finally breathed a sigh of relief in his heart and revealed a very gratified expression. He spoke with augh, ¡°I¡¯m at ease with you at the helm. Forget about the space ring, I¡¯ve just gotten one with an even bigger storage space.¡±

    ¡°When we arrive at the Guild, you can take what you need. I¡¯ve already taken the risk of gathering all of it earlier when I didn¡¯t know if you¡¯d have enough gold coins to pay for it all. Be at ease, there won¡¯t be any troubles.¡± Phoebe threw her head back proudly and said softly.

    Han Shuo was a bit touched by Phoebe¡¯s words. He knew that Phoebe had taken the risk to do so purely based on their friendship. Phoebe had even thought of paying for some of it herself. From this point alone, he could conclude that Phoebe was a friend worth having.

    Just as Han Shuo was feeling gratitude, Phoebe reached out and pinched Han Shuo¡¯s cheek while ring at Han Shuo. ¡°Also, you lied to me that you didn¡¯t know how to dance. You were so well practiced! You¡¯re the worst.¡±

    In all honesty, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t have known how to dance if it wasn¡¯t for this time¡¯s banquet. He¡¯d learned on the spot and muddled his way through. It was only because his brain had been developed so much that his ability to pick things up was incredible. This was why Phoebe had the misconception that Han Shuo was pretending that he didn¡¯t know how to dance.

    ¡°I¡¯m innocent! I really didn¡¯t know how to dance before, you were a good teacher!¡± Han Shuoined with an aggrieved air.

    ¡°Do, do you like dancing with me?¡± Phoebe suddenly lowered her head to ask softly, and she looked a bit bashful.

    Nodding, Han Shuo responded carelessly, ¡°Yes, it feels rather nice.¡±

    ¡°Then, I want you to promise me that you will dance with me again next time, or I won¡¯t help you with your matters in the future.¡± Phoebe¡¯s face lit up as she spoke happily.

    ¡°Alright alright, I promise you. As long as you help me seriously, I¡¯ll promise you anything you want. I have no problem killing or setting fires for you, not to mention dancing.¡± As there were plenty of annoying matters that he¡¯d have to bother Phoebe with in the future, Han Shuo agreed without any hesitation.

    The two of them didn¡¯t run into any troubles along the way as they returned amidst happy chatter. When they arrived at the Boozt Merchant Guild, Phoebe took out the materials that Han Shuo needed, including a few warehouses full of rations and daily necessities, almost filling up Han Shuo¡¯s current space ring.

    ¡°Keep the other gold coins for me for now. In addition, these are the other materials that I need you to purchase, please continue collecting them for me.¡± The wood elite zombies and yin demons all needed to be refined. Han Shuo had therefore prepared another list and gave it to Phoebe after taking care of everything that needed his attention.

    Looking over the list that Han Shuo handed over, Phoebe looked at Han Shuo with surprise, saying, ¡°Rations for hundreds of people and all sorts of bizarre materials, just what are you nning on doing?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, nothing much nothing much. Just take care of it for me and I¡¯ll make up for the insufficient gold to you next time I visit.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t exin much as he uttered this sentence and left the Boozt Merchant Guild, returning to the Academy alone.

    When Han Shuo returned to the necromancy major, it was already pitch ck outside. The chilly wind of winter howled through the night and it was so bone achingly cold that no one wanted to venture outside.

    However, there was a figure standing not too far outside the entrance to the dorms. It was so cold that the figure¡¯s small face was beet red as it continued to circle around a stone statue not too far away.

    ¡°What are you doing here?¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but ask when he saw that the figure was Lisa.

    ¡°I¡¯m waiting for you!¡± Lisa¡¯s eyes disyed happiness when she saw Han Shuo appear and she quickly walked towards Han Shuo, speaking urgently.

    His brow furrowing, Han Shuo took off the coat on his body and covered Lisa with it. He asked in bewilderment, ¡°Why are you waiting here for me on such a cold night?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s movements made Lisa overjoyed, but she then spoke with a worried face, ¡°My mother is sick and so I need to make a trip home. I may note back for a while, so I wanted to say goodbye to you.¡±

    ¡°If it¡¯s just a goodbye, you can tell me tomorrow. Why must you wait for me in the middle of the night?¡± Han Shuo hesitated when he saw that Lisa was still shaking, then activated the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡±, his right hand swayed slowly as waves of warmth came forth, warming Lisa¡¯s trembling body.

    ¡°You often disappear mysteriously. I was afraid that I wouldn¡¯t be able to see you because I¡¯m leaving tomorrow, which is why I waited for you here. I didn¡¯t know if you¡¯de back, but in the end you did.¡± Lisa breathed out softly infort when her body warmed up and then spoke softly to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Eh, you don¡¯t have to go out of your way toe say goodbye to me.¡± Han Shuo felt that the atmosphere was a bit odd and was silent for a while before responding.

    Lisa remained silent for a while, her gaze was fixed onto Han Shuo. She suddenly said, ¡°Bryan, you said that you like me. You¡¯re no longer a ve or an errand boy now. Come home with me, let¡¯s be together.¡±

    Han Shuo was greatly astonished by her words as he faced her, and he stood there, dumbfounded. He didn¡¯t know what to say when he saw Lisa rigidly standing there with a solemn expression.

 Chapter 139: The fate of the original demons

    Chapter 139: The fate of the original demons

    ¡°Eh, I have a buttload of things to do right now. I¡¯m afraid I don¡¯t have time to spend with you.¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment and then responded to Lisa.

    With regards to Lisa, Han Shuo had rather disliked her in the beginning, but with hister interactions with her, he realized that Lisa wasn¡¯t a vile person. She was just a bit too naive. Particrly towards the end of their interactions, Lisa had protected him in many ways. This made it difficult for Han Shuo to maintain his heart of revenge towards her like he had before.

    However, as much as he didn¡¯t dislike Lisa, he still didn¡¯t have any feelings from her. Therefore, when Lisa made her suggestion, Han Shuo could only fob her off with a careless excuse.

    When Han Shuo spoke thus, Lisa remained silent for a bit and then nodded. ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll return home tomorrow. I hope you¡¯ll be stronger the next time we meet.¡±

    Lisa was noticeably distracted when she said this, and she smiled after her words concluded. She walked back to the girls¡¯ dormitory alone, her back shaking slightly as she did so.

    Shaking his head and sighing lightly, Han Shuo only returned to his room when he saw Lisa disappear into the distance.

    When he arrived in front of the dorm, Han Shuo had just pushed open the door when a longsword came stabbing towards his chest. His face changed drastically, and he tried to back out of the doorway without even thinking about it.

    However, the sword¡¯s movement was like lightning, as it¡¯d already arrived at Han Shuo¡¯s chest after the cold light had shed. Han Shuo¡¯s rapidly retreating body tilted sideways as he quickly fell to the side.

    Pfft, the longsword stabbed deeply into Han Shuo¡¯s body through the ribs, injuring him in that instant. The ambusher then quickly retracted the longsword with ease.

    Although pain wracked his body, Han Shuo didn¡¯t make a sound as the Demonyer Edge flew out from his right sleeve. It pierced through the door and stabbed directly towards his attacker.

    Dark green fighting aura suddenly exploded as the door turned into splinters. A figure, with its face covered, suddenly appeared in front of Han Shuo with the apaniment of metallic shes.

    With Han Shuo¡¯s current powers of vision, all concealment would basically be useless as long as he¡¯d gotten a glimpse of a certain person once. Han Shuo hadn¡¯t thought that rk would be so scarily dogged. He¡¯d retreated with all due haste when he hadn¡¯t discovered anythingst night, but he¡¯did in wait tonight to make a move against Han Shuo.

    Because he¡¯d felt a bit apologetic towards Lisa, Han Shuo hadn¡¯t been on guard thiste at night and thus he¡¯d been less cautious. He hadn¡¯t thought that rk would actually ambush him and so had been injured when the ambush started.

    As an earth rider, rk¡¯s fighting aura should¡¯ve been milky white. However, it looked like he finally understood that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t an easy target afterst night¡¯s failure and was being much more careful this time.

    These thoughts shed through Han Shuo¡¯s mind like lightning. Before the only partially hidden rk sent another stroke his way, Han Shuo looked at rk as his legs suddenly exerted power and he madly retreated outside, crying out loudly, ¡°Assassin!¡±

    Bam! Han Shuo¡¯s back suddenly ran into a sturdy and chilly wall. When he turned back for a look, he discovered that there was only air behind him. His heart immediately tightened as he understood that rk hade prepared this time.

    Han Shuo had concentrated all his attention after rk had appeared and could sense that there was no one else around. As an earth rider, for rk to have set up the water magic in the surroundings that was this sturdy ice wall meant that he must¡¯ve used a costly magic scroll that didn¡¯t need magic as a catalyst. This was why he could release the sturdy ice wall in the surroundings,pletely blocking off Han Shuo¡¯s escape path and all sound from traveling.

    Indeed, the sturdy ice wall didn¡¯t break when his back hit it. Han Shuo patently saw a jeering look sh through rk¡¯s eyes, his entire face so muffled that only his eyes showed. Another ball of dark green fighting aura then red out, forming the appearance of rolling waves and churned towards Han Shuo.

    His mind racing, the Demonyer Edge, that¡¯d just returned to his hand, suddenly howled as magical yuan infused it. It danced with exceedingly hot mes to counter rk¡¯s wave of fighting aura attack.

    It was a pity that rk felt a strange power suddenly appear when he sensed the magical yuan infused Demonyer Edge, halfway through his attack. His eyes shed and Han Shuo discovered that the roiling fighting aura attack was dark green in the front, yet milky white in the back.

    He didn¡¯t even need to think that rke was afraid of failing when he sensed the unknown power. He finally exposed his hidden strength and fully disyed the ferocity of an earth rider.

    Although his magical yuan was limitless in power, Han Shuo had only been training it for a few months. He knew that it would be difficult for him to defend against this all out attack. He weighed his options with extreme speed in his mind, and the three original demons circling rk instantly melded into rk¡¯s body and ate away at his essence with reckless abandon.

    ¡°Agh!¡± The silent rk immediately screamed hoarsely in agony when the original demons started eating away at him. The milky white fighting aura, that he¡¯d just released, was partially pulled back into his body in an attempt to destroy the three rampaging original demons.

    Bam! sounded out as Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan and rk¡¯s fighting aura finally shed. Han Shuo staggered backwards, his mind a bit woozy.

    Suddenly, three pricks of pain reflected in Han Shuo¡¯s nerves, and his somewhat foggy mind instantly cleared. He understood that this meant that the three original demons had already been destroyed in rk¡¯s body. He focused his concentration and looked at rk, noticing that rk was looking at his body with panic as a strand of blood slowly seeped out from the corners of his mouth.

    Because of the three original demons eating away at his essence, rk¡¯s body was surely injured as well now. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t be looking at himself with such horrified eyes. After all, to the people of this world, having an unknown entity enter their body and devour their essence would be something that they would remember for the rest of their lives.

    The Demonyer Edge, newly infused with magical yuan, carried with it a burning, ming momentum as it struck into the back of the sturdy ice wall with a howl. A sharp ping sounded as Han Shuo charged towards the hallway with a look of joy.

    Just as Han Shuo threw back his head and was about to cry for help, rk suddenly jumped out Han Shuo¡¯s window and quickly made his escape, as he¡¯d felt the boundary copse. He looked a bit bedraggled. It looked like he knew that with the copse of the boundary, the n to kill Han Shuo this time had failed and thus he immediately decided to retreat.

    Opening his mouth, Han Shuo didn¡¯t call out. Given that rk had left, there was no point in him calling for help.

    Because of the sound istion effect, although there¡¯d been an extremely harrowing fight in Han Shuo¡¯s dorm and the hallway, it hadn¡¯t wakened any of the other students. Han Shuo¡¯s heart still pounded in fright as he looked at the shattered door and walked in silently.

    The three painstakingly refined original demons had been destroyed by the fighting aura within rk¡¯s body due to the need to contain him. However, it¡¯d been because of the effect of the three original demons that saved Han Shuo¡¯s life. Although the three had been destroyed, rk¡¯s body had also been injured because his essence had been eaten away by the original demons. He¡¯d have to rest for the immediate future and it¡¯d be tough to prepare a second attack.

    ¡°It¡¯s alright, the new will rece the old. It looks like I can begin refining an even higher level of the yin demons. When I make it to the true demon stage and bring forth the elite wood zombie and yin demons, it¡¯ll be your death sentence then rk.¡± Han Shuo murmured to himself.

    The next day, morning.

    Lawrence came looking for Han Shuo ording to their agreement, and the two sat down in Han Shuo¡¯s room.

    ¡°rk came byst night, I was almost unable to see you again.¡± The door was still shattered and there were noticeable traces of a fight around it. Han Shuo didn¡¯t hide anything and spoke frankly to Lawrence.

    Giving a start of shock, Lawrence was astonished, ¡°So soon?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo said again. ¡°Yes, I didn¡¯t think that would happen either. However, rk¡¯s body has also been injured and I don¡¯t think he¡¯ll make another attempt any time soon. You don¡¯t need to worry about anything.¡±

    ¡°You, you harmed rk?¡± Lawrence looked at Han Shuo with disbelief as he asked in shock.

    ¡°Yes, but if you think that means my strength is greater than rk¡¯s, you¡¯d be dead wrong. I harmed him through a fluke, and if it wasn¡¯t for me evading in time, I would¡¯ve definitely been killed by him. This person is really difficult to shake off.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face was grave as he spoke lowly.

    Even without Han Shuo¡¯s reminder, Lawrence knew of how thorny rk was, given his greater familiarity with thetter. Although Han Shuo didn¡¯t speak of how the battle unfoldedst night, Lawrence could tell from his expressions that it must¡¯ve been very heated indeed. No matter what methods he¡¯d used, that Han Shuo could injure rk meant that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t a simple man either. Thus, when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s words, Lawrence¡¯s opinion of Han Shuo raised another few notches.

    ¡°With my understanding of rk, it will be difficult for us to find him now that he¡¯s injured. He must¡¯ve returned to a safe ce to rest and recover. Our n to kill him can only be dyed.¡± Lawrence thought briefly and spoke slowly.

    ¡°Alright, I happen to have to take care of some matters as well. Let¡¯s end matters here for today and I¡¯lle find you after another ten days. We¡¯ll chat then.¡±

    Lawrence also nodded in agreement after Han Shuo spoke, then looked at him deeply before taking his leave. Han Shuo also proceeded cautiously to the mountains in the back, nning on starting the earth elite zombie first in the cemetery of death and then finishing the matter with the forest trolls.

 Chapter 140: Advancing to true demon

    Chapter 140: Advancing to true demon

    After arriving at the cemetery of death, Han Shuo immediately ced all the materials needed to refine the earth elite zombie in the ce of extreme earth.

    He was in no hurry to immediately take action as he first refreshed the refining method for the earth elite zombie in his mind. He only started after he thoroughly considered the various steps in the procedures and ces that he¡¯d need to keep an eye out for.

    He first found the ce in which the earth qi was thickest in the ce of extreme earth. Han Shuo took out the Demonyer Edge and dug a hole, turning it into the ce where he¡¯d be putting the zombies. All sorts of materialsnded exactly where they should be ced ording to the setup of the formation. He coalesced all of his mental strength in his mind and went over everything clearly and cleanly. Han Shuo acted without hesitation andpleted all preparations with extremely high efficiency.

    When a ball of oozing, ck dirt was embedded in a natural dip in the ce of extreme earth, a small, weak wind seemed to start blowing in this location of extreme earth. However, upon taking a close look, one would discover that it wasn¡¯t a weak breeze blowing, but that some grey colored matter was slowly converging in the center of the pit from all sorts of directions in the ce of extreme earth.

    The concentration of the essence of earth qi was a indicator that the formation wasplete. Han Shuo broke out in a grin when he saw this situation take ce, and then immediately used necromancy magic to summon zombie warriors.

    Three zombie warriors suddenly appeared in front of Han Shuo. Theoretically speaking, any zombie warrior would have the chance to be an immensely powerful earth elite zombie with the particr preparation in the ce of extreme earth. However, if the conditions of the main ingredient, the zombie warriors, was better all around, it would naturally have a greater chance of bing an earth elite zombie.

    Taking in a deep breath, Han Shuo once again summoned three zombie warriors. When six zombie warriors appeared, Han Shuo gave them the order to attack each other. He wasn¡¯t sure which zombie warrior was better, thus the order for them to attack each other was the simplest and most effective method.

    His brow furrowed in concentration, Han Shuo watched the struggle between the six zombie warriors with with glittering eyes. He immediately ordered them to stop after a few minutes because his eyes had lit upon one of the zombie warriors with the bulkiest build. His battle strength seemed to be a bit stronger. If he allowed them to continue fighting, this zombie would undoubtedly be in tattered pieces afterwards. This would obviously impact the refinement of the earth zombie afterwards.

    All was in readiness now as Han Shuo once again ran over everything that he needed to pay particr attention to in his mind. He cast his eye over everything in the ce of extreme earth with his astounding powers of observation. He gave the order to the zombie warrior after he was certain that he hadn¡¯t missed any details. The zombie warrior slowly shuffled into the pit in the ce of extreme earth.

    When the zombie entered the pit, its body was covered by the coalesced essence of earth qi. That grey essence of earth qi slowly seeped into every drop of the zombie warrior¡¯s bone marrow ording to a profound way of cirction. The zombie warrior was a bit ufortable in the beginning as his body shivered slightly. A while after all the earth qi essence had been absorbed, the zombie warrior appeared to enjoy things quite a bit.

    Smiling slightly, Han Shuo suddenly waved his hand and all sorts of strange, colored dirt suddenlynded within the pit, covering it in the span of an instant. The pit was also filled in by the strange dirt, but the essence of earth qi continued its slow collection and percted through the dirt and continued drilling into the zombie warrior¡¯s body.

    Having done all that he needed to do, what Han Shuo needed to do now was wait. He knew that the zombie warrior would only turn into a earth elite zombie after all the earth essence qi in this ce of extreme earth had been fully absorbed by the zombie warrior. He wasn¡¯t sure how long the entire process would take either, but now that everything was proceeding ording to n, Han Shuo felt that he had no reason to remain.

    Walking out of the cemetery of death, Han Shuo continuously trained and practiced his magical yuan and magic along the way as he headed further south in the Dark Forest. It was indeed a bit inconvenient without the surveince of the original demons along the way. It was a good thing that Han Shuo¡¯s senses were extraordinary. He didn¡¯t run into any particr danger along the way.

    In the dead of the night, the snow covered, chilly Dark Forest seemed to be shrouded with a silver veil. Beneath the rays of the quiet moon, the entire Dark Forest was surrounded in a still and peaceful atmosphere.

    Han Shuo sat cross legged on top of a single, towering tree with thick branches. His entire body trembled as thick, viscous clouds of demonic power wreathed around Han Shuo¡¯s body. The bright moonlight couldn¡¯t pierce through thisyer of darkness at all.

    When thest of the Divine Brain Fruit had been consumed by Han Shuo, and he¡¯d suffered through the painful effects of the fruit, he was finally breaking through the molded spirit stage. As essence blood slowly gathered in his mind and abdomen, a baby demon slowly started forming, interspersed with magical power and Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts.

    Clouds of demonic power traveled out from Han Shuo¡¯s pores. The baby demon was a symbol of the true demon stage, indicating that Han Shuo had broken through the molded spirit stage. This stage was a line of demarcation in demonic magic. Only when the baby demon was truly formed would a practitioner really counted as having be a demon. Therefore, this was the most dangerous and risky moment.

    He kept this position as the magical yuan within Han Shuo¡¯s body furiously flowed into the baby demon. The baby demon had originally only been the size of a thumb as it continued to absorb Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan and blood essence. It slowly grew bigger and even sparkled with a faint halo.

    He experienced this for seven straight days as the baby demon grew to the size of a fist. As Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan ran dry and he grew a bit dizzy, his body trembled as he suddenly fell from therge tree in a moment of weakness.

    Crying out with pain, just as Han Shuo was panicking, he suddenly sensed that the baby demon that had been continually absorbing blood essence and magical yuan seemed to suddenly form a mysterious connection with him. The magical yuan, that had been continuously taken in by the baby demon, suddenly surged back into his limbs and bones with the force of an exploding volcano. The magical yuan seemed to have fundamentally changed due to its association with the baby demon, and Han Shuo himself seemed to feel that he¡¯d been reborn.

    A thought striking him, he activated the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡± and a red and purple me roared to life after magical yuan was infused. It felt like he was holding twomps in his hands, appearing all the more wondrous and magical.

    Waving his left and right hand around, the red and purple balls of me suddenly flew out,nding on two different small trees. One of them was charred to cinders and gave off thick smoke, while the other instantly froze and multiple branches fell down with sharp cracks.

    Now in the true demon realm, Han Shuo could adeptly control the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡±. He could form the purple and red spellfire in the palms of his hands and cast them from his hands as an attack. This was the wondrous effect after his magical yuan had transformed.

    The Demonyer Edge flew out from thin air, howling in a way that would possess souls and steal spirits. The surrounding trees and hills all broke apart or exploded as the Demonyer Edge pierced through them. When the Demonyer Edge had circled the premises in its flight and returned to his hand, the surroundings were devastated, as if a great battle had taken ce.

    Now, he could finally refine the yin demons that were a level even higher than the original demons. With the effect from the baby demon, Han Shuo would be able to truly fly through the air after he practiced the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡± as listed in the magical tome. Traveling thousands of li in a day would be a piece of cake.

    When he had previously faced off against rk, Han Shuo had been extremely passive throughout the entire encounter. However, now that he¡¯d reached the true demon stage, Han Shuo was confident that he could fight with rk on equal footing were he to encounter rk again. He wouldn¡¯t just duck and weave like he hadst time.

    As Han Shuo practiced the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡± and made his way further into the southern part of the Dark Forest, he finally appeared outside the forest troll residence after two days.

    Casting a nce in the distance, Han Shuo saw traces of battle outside the forest trolls¡¯ vige. Somerge trees had been toppled as fired arrows and some broken weapons indicated that the forest trolls must have experienced a battle.

    It went without thinking that the battle between the forest trolls and elves had already started. Han Shuo surveilled the surroundings but didn¡¯t find traces of the elves. He didn¡¯t know whether or not the two sides had finished their battle.

    Summoning the little skeleton, Han Shuo made his way slowly towards the vige where the forest trolls lived. Several forest trolls walked out in full battle gear when they reached the outskirts. When the forest trolls saw Han Shuo and the little skeleton, they all cheered in unison and cried out, ¡°Datara!¡±, weing Han Shuo and the little skeleton into the vige with great fanfare.

    When he walked over, Han Shuo saw that the forest trolls around them were all holding weapons, ready to fight at a moment¡¯s notice. Even the forest troll women and elders in the distance were holding weapons as they prepared food.

    When he paid attention, he noticed that the numbers of forest trolls within the vige were more than the amount that had been present when he leftst time. He made a rough estimation and determined that there were at least eight hundred adult forest trolls that could wage war. That was three hundred more than the amount that had been present when Han Shuo hadest time.

    However, it was obvious that the forest troll didn¡¯t have enough weapons and equipment to use. Some of the forest trolls in the back were holding only crude clubs or even rocks, with some metallic weapons spotted with rust dotting the crowd. Some were even starting to munch on tree bark and weeds. It looks like they were also short on rations.

 Chapter 141: Worshipping the oracle

    Chapter 141: Worshipping the oracle

    Han Shuo¡¯s arrival resulted in a round of cheering from the forest trolls. The old priest trembled and knelt on the ground, crying out with hot tears in his eyes, ¡°The mighty Datara and liaison, you¡¯ve finally returned!¡±

    Taking in the sights around him, the Han Shuo felt odd emotions in his heart. Logically speaking, these forest trolls were the greediest of robbers. Han Shuo should¡¯ve had a distaste for them, but when he saw the forest trolls treat him like an oracle from the gods and listen to all hismands, Han Shuo suddenly felt that they weren¡¯t that evil.

    Raiding and looting was this race¡¯s innate nature. Their actions were eptable ording to the rules of survival in the Dark Forest. Just like how some of therger magical creatures would naturally hunt some of the lower level magical creatures, this was what the forest trolls did as well.

    As he looked out over them, all the forest trolls, whether elderly or young, were all looking him with great expectation and yearning. It was the most pious and reverent sort of faith a religious follower would have that was present in their eyes. It was as if one of hismands would cause them to rush headlong into death without a second thought. This kind of feeling made Han Shuo feel a bit odd.

    ¡°Don¡¯t¡¯ worry, your mighty Datara would never abandon you.¡± After surveying the surroundings, Han Shuo opened his mouth gravely after remaining silent for a moment.

    The old priest tranted this sentence in a shout of celebration as hot tears filled his eyes. All the forest trolls raised up empty pockets and cheered loudly, as if a guarantee from Han Shuo was enough for them to forget their current difficult straits.

    Han Shuo took out hemp sack after hemp sack of rations from the space ring, piling them on the stone floor that had been cleared of snow. All sorts of thick nkets and daily necessities filled the space in front of the forest trolls, dazzling their eyes. This caused the forest trolls suffering through the harshness of winter to all caper with joy.

    ¡°These items were prepared for you to make it through this winter. The several warehouses full of rations are enough for you to smoothly make it through this winter without having to go out and raid. The mighty Datara made this trip in order to ready these items for his people.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s low voice carried out smoothly over the forest trolls¡¯ vige.

    As the old priest led the way with tears of gratitude bursting from him, all the forest trolls knelt in homage. The old priest then gave orders and the chief of the forest trolls led the way in lifting up the rations and daily necessities, storing them in a cave towards the back of the vige.

    Han Shuo followed behind the old priest and arrived at the newly redecorated temple within the vige. Not only had a small sculpture of the little skeleton been erected, but there was even one of Han Shuo. This made Han Shuo feel even more odd, as if he¡¯d unknowingly truly be their protector.

    ¡°When I arrived just now, I saw the traces of battle outside the vige. Did those annoying elves start a war again?¡± After he walked in with the small skeleton, he gave an order and the little skeleton flopped down into the head seat. Han Shuo sat down next to the little skeleton and looked at the old priest with inquiry.

    ¡°In response to the oracle, it was indeed those pesky elves who have once againe to start a war, but be at peace oracle, your brave people will never allow the elves to win. Beneath the splendor of the mighty Datara, the elves will surely retreat in great defeat again.¡± Light shone from the old priest¡¯s face as he spoke with great confidence.

    Waving his hand, Han Shuo halted the old priest¡¯s continued boasting and thought for a bit before instructing, ¡°The rations and daily necessities that I¡¯ve brought should be enough tost all of you the entire winter. If any more merchants want to trade for the weird items in your possession, you can trade with them.¡±

    ¡°In addition, don¡¯t go out raiding this winter without my instructions. If we¡¯re going to rob anyone, we¡¯ll do a big heist and none of those small jobs. The mighty Datara will inform you when he¡¯s found a suitable target. You don¡¯t need to worry that you¡¯ll have nothing to do. How many did the elves bring this time and when did you start fighting? Tell me all the details.¡±

    The old priest didn¡¯t ask why after receiving Han Shuo¡¯s instructions and agreed to his request. He immediately told the forest troll warrior beside him to convey Han Shuo¡¯s two points to the chief.

    The old priest then thoroughly detailed the entire battle with the elves to Han Shuo. From the old priest¡¯s exnation, Han Shuo understood that the elves would always have a big battle with the forest trolls every winter. This was because it was only then that the forest trolls were likely to be short on rations, daily necessities, and weapons, and this was when the forest trolls¡¯ fighting strength was at their weakest.

    The elves had followed the same actions asst year and taken advantage of the fact that the forest trolls couldn¡¯t raid in winter to make an attack. However, their numbers weren¡¯t as great as the forest trolls¡¯ and thus they couldn¡¯t upy at absolute advantage. They¡¯d only just made a feint when they retreated to discuss next steps again.

    From the old priest, Han Shuo knew that the forest trolls had manyrge and small tribes within the Dark Forest. Because this tribe had the duty of protecting the mighty Datara¡¯s sacred ground and the fact that it had around five hundred forest troll warriors, the old priest¡¯s tribe had a certain authority over the other forest troll tribes in the Dark Forest.

    Because of the little skeleton and Han Shuo¡¯s appearance, the old priest had used their name to issue an order andmand all the forest trolls, scattered throughout the forest, to gather, intent on giving the elves a painful lesson.

    Because the mighty Datara was the god of the forest trolls, the impact of the little skeleton¡¯s appearance was immeasurable. More than three hundred forest troll warriors from four small tribes had rushed over in ten days, wanting to bask in the little skeleton¡¯s presence.

    ording to the old priest, the forest trolls from various tribes within the Dark Forest would gather together within a short period of time. By that time, not only would the elves¡¯ attack not have the anticipated effect, but rather they would even suffer heavy losses.

    Han Shuo had been worried that the elves would kill a great number of forest trolls, but hadn¡¯t thought that because of the little skeleton¡¯s charisma, forest trolls that had been scattered throughout the Dark Forest, who normally had no rtion with each other, were all rushing here as if for a pilgrimage. From the old priest¡¯s words, Han Shuo understood that when all the forest trolls gathered, they would number more than two thousand.

    As for the elves within the Dark Forest, there seemed to be only a few hundred of them. Although they had a few divine archers and mages, it was very possible that they would suffer such a thorough setback that they¡¯d lose the shirt off their own backs.

    Rubbing his head, Han Shuo had a bit of a headache. He thought for a moment and then opened his mouth, ¡°It looks like it should be the elves who should be worried this time. Mm. It¡¯s said that the elves are very rich, I think we should rob them all.¡±

    ¡°The liaison¡¯s meaning is...?¡± The old priest started and asked, perplexed.

    ¡°Do you know where the elves live within the Dark Forest?¡± Han Shuo thought for a bit and then asked.

    The old priest was stunned and then thought with a furrowed brow before finally saying, ¡°We¡¯re aware of the general location, but have never been inside.¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo smiled, ¡°Alright, then when the forest trolls from the other tribes arrive, have them stay and keep the elves in check. Our tribe can travel to where the elves live and make use of this time to rob their homes.¡±

    ¡°But liaison, why don¡¯t we stay and meet up with the brothers from other tribes and kill all of the elves¡¯ warriors? These elves are truly wicked. They always make mischief and sabotage our operations. They also fight with us every winter and have killed many of our tribe over the years.¡± The old priest nked momentarily and asked in confusion, not blindly following Han Shuo¡¯s suggestions for the first time.

    ¡°The nature of us forest trolls is raiding and not killing. In addition, the elves within the Dark Forest aren¡¯t the whole of their tribe. If we kill all the elves here, it will bring further trouble for us. There¡¯s no need for that.¡± To Han Shuo, there really was no point in having the forest trolls and elves fight each other to the death. In addition, he didn¡¯t actually want all the elves to be killed. What he needed now was wealth. He neededrge amounts of gold coins to support his demonic magic and practice of magic. This was why he made this suggestion.

    Although he still didn¡¯t fully understand, the old priest didn¡¯t continue his questioning. After a few more days in which more forest trolls gathered from all areas, Han Shou and the little skeleton received a tsunami of cheers and pious worship before leaving a portion of the forest trolls behind to contend with the elves. Han Shuo, the little skeleton, and the five hundred forest troll warriors from the old priest¡¯s tribe left to visit the elves¡¯ vige.

    On this chilly winter day, the five hundred forest troll warriors brought with them sufficient rations, thick nkets, and sharp weapons as they made for the deeper reaches of the Dark Forest.

 Chapter 142: The suggestion to slaughter the dragon

    Chapter 142: The suggestion to ughter the dragon

    Winter had arrived. The chilly wind howled ferociously asrge snowkes floated through the air like goose down, causing even the long term residents of the Dark Forest, the forest trolls, to shiver with cold and feel frostbitten. It was a good thing that Han Shuo had brought enough rations and thick clothes upon visiting this time, otherwise this cruel winter would¡¯ve been a disaster for the forest trolls.

    Han Shuo and the forest trolls ventured deeper into the Dark Forest over the next couple of days. Their progression this time didn¡¯t take them directly into the depths towards the south. They veered towards the west from the very beginning.

    Over the past couple of days, Han Shuo also had the forest trolls craft a crude carriage for himself and he silently practiced the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡±. This Art needed to infuse the meridians of the hands and legs with magical yuan, and then circte magical yuan ording to a particr cirction route before being able to fly through the air.

    After experiencing the foundational training of the solid realm, open passages, and molded spirit realms, now that he¡¯d reached the true demon realm, Han Shuo¡¯s speed in practicing the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡± was much faster than when he¡¯d initially trained in the ¡°cial Mystical Spellfire¡±. Because the meridians had already been opened and reinforced, Han Shuo didn¡¯t feel the slightest bit of obstruction as he circted his magical yuan ording to the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡±.

    Over thest few days, Han Shuo didn¡¯t continue to remain within the carriage. He came up with random excuses and secretly tried to fly through the air with the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡±. Once he understood how to deploy it, a bit of practice and mastering its knacks was still needed in order to truly fly. Han Shuo tried many times and could only hover. Because he still wasn¡¯t adept at controlling direction, he fell from high heights multiple times.

    On this particr day, the blizzard stopped its ravaging of thend. The forest trolls also stopped in front of a mountain valley. Han Shuo was in the back, still attempting to quickly master the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡±. When he discovered that the forest trolls suddenly stopped, he immediately stopped practicing and quickly rushed to the front from the back.

    ¡°Liaison, the mountain valley ahead should be where the elves live. Two of our children saw arge amount of elves appear near this area a long time ago.¡± When Han Shuo walked to the old priest, he pointed at the snow covered mountain valley and exined respectfully to Han Shuo.

    He took a deep breath in and narrowed his eyes, looking into the distance. It was a pity that due to the cover of the umted snow, the trees and ground were all covered and thus Han Shuo couldn¡¯t actually make out anything in the distance.

    A string of mysterious incantation chanted out lowly from Han Shuo¡¯s mouth as an oily green ring of light flew out in front of him, making for the snow covered mountain valley.

    ¡°Life Reconnaissance¡± was a journeyman magic of the necromancy major, and something that Han Shuo had just started to grasp recently. ¡°Life Reconnaissance¡± had no use in attacking, it was as its name indicated, a spell that probed for life. It was useful in unfamiliar environments and unknown surroundings.

    Han Shuo narrowed his eyes to sense things as soon as this magic had been deployed. He didn¡¯t sense any traces of life wherever the ¡°Life Reconnaissance¡± spell flew over. When the magic had circled the mountain valley, it vanished without a trace due to ack of mental strength.

    ¡°There are no signs of life within the mountain valley. However, we can still take a look. If the elves do live here, they must¡¯ve left signs on the trees. It¡¯d be best if we can discover the elves¡¯ homes here.¡± Han Shou thought for a bit and instructed the old priest.

    Han Shuo then took the lead with the forest troll warriors, with the hunters and priests bringing up the rear. They slowly moved alertly towards the depths of the mountain valley. As their feet creaked through the packed down snow, the forest troll warriors waved the weapons in their hands and knocked the snow off the top of the trees, kicking vigorously at the snow that had umted on the ground, trying to see if there were any clues.

    A shout of astonishment came from a young forest troll. Han Shuo¡¯s ears captured this exmation as his body shed like lightning towards that location, but when he stood at the source of the sound, he discovered that the forest troll who¡¯d cried out had already vanished without a trace.

    His brow furrowing, Han Shuo paid attention to the sounds of disturbance all around and then circled the umted snow a few times. He finally stood on top of the messy, snowy ground and suddenly stomped down hard.

    Han Shou¡¯s body suddenly freefell with a plonk and hended in a pitch ck cave within the span of a breath. The startled cries of the young forest troll were still sounding from a corner not too far in the distance. It was quite ear piercing in the pitch ck darkness of the hole.

    Han Shuo¡¯s body had now adjusted to the darkness as his eyes rolled around, discovering that the cave he was in continued on through to somece beneath the ground. He looked carefully and discovered that the entrance to this cave was quite spacious. The ground leading downwards from the entrance was a bit messy as there were many traces of footprints.

    Could it be that the elves who worshipped the goodness of nature and loved the forest all lived underground? Han Shuo was a bit confused. He activated the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡± after looking around dumfounded for a bit. His body slowly floated upwards and he punched upwards where he¡¯dnded through the ground, destroying the snow covering overhead.

    The forest troll, who had identally fallen down just now, had only slowly grown ustomed to the darkness after iling around in surprise for a bit. He felt his way around and slowly climbed out as well.

    A weird whistling sound suddenly traveled from the depths of the ground. Han Shuo gave a start of surprise as he once again released the ¡°Life Reconnaissance¡± magic and aimed it towards the source of the sounds from the depths.

    When the ¡°Life Reconnaissance¡± magic was released, Han Shuo discovered immense traces of life and gave a great start of fright. He abruptly rushed out from the cave, threw his head back and whistled sharply.

    When the old priest heard Han Shuo¡¯s cry, he came searching for Han Shuo from a far distance away. The forest troll, who¡¯d fallen down, had also crawled out at this point. The forest troll warriors who were observing the situation in the surroundings all rushed over with their weapons, shoveling the snow away from the cave and revealing a deep cave that could contain three or four people walking abreast.

    Several arrows whistled fiercely as they were shot from the mouth of the cave, scaring the forest trolls who had stuck their heads out to take a look. The old priest¡¯s face grew angry and was about to give the order to attack the creatures within the cave, but Han Shuo reached out a hand and stopped him.

    The elves greatly loved nature and naturally wouldn¡¯t live in such a dark and gloomy ce. Han Shuo understood this and thus he hadn¡¯t had the forest trolls immediately make a move.

    Several figures shot out from the mouth of the cave with a whoosh. Their sharp ears, handsome and beauty features were the unique trademarks of the elves, but these elves had ck or darkly purpled colored skin and white hair, appearing all the more different.

    ¡°It¡¯s the dark elves!¡± The old priest immediately eximed when he saw these strange elves appear.

    Han Shuo finally reacted after the old priest¡¯s cry. This tribe was also made up of elves, but they¡¯d forsaken peace, nature, and worship of the goddess of nature. They worshipped the queen of the night, Rose, instead. Living in the gloomy underground world for a long period of time had caused their skin to turn ck and dark purple.

    Their natures were evil as they burned and looted everywhere. Their society was a matriarchal one as females were mainly in positions of power. Within the underground world, they were like the forest trolls, an evil race full of viiny.

    After the first couple of dark elves dashed out, even more of them slowly poured out. When they appeared, they first guarded the entrance to the cave as they stared in an unfriendly fashion at Han Shuo and the forest trolls, grasping weapons in their hands.

    Han Shuo waved his hands and indicated for the old priest to not make any moves at the moment, and for everyone to slowly back up and spread out behind them. However, he also had everyone brandish their weapons against the dark elves, in case they suddenly made a move.

    The beautiful female dark elves wore revealing outfits, disying tantalizing bodies from all of them. Although it was the winter season, they still didn¡¯t seem to be willing to cover the skin on their bodies. Although the dark purple skin was bizarre, it had another sort of enthralling allure.

    After a while, a beautiful, dark elf noblewoman, who looked quite stately and opulent, walked out from the cave. She was wearing a soft, leather jacket and was subtly revealing her beautiful legs with a fey air about her.

    When the beautiful dark elf madame walked out from within the cave, she looked askance at the forest trolls in the surroundings and gave a coyugh. She asked in themon tongue, ¡°So it¡¯s our brave forest troll friends. What are you doing here?¡±

    The old priest also knew that they¡¯de looking for the wrong people at this time. As the sage of the forest trolls, the old priest¡¯s experience was also quite broad. He naturally understood that the dark elves also weren¡¯t those of the light. He snorted lightly and responded, ¡°Our children recently discovered the traces of arge group of elves. Because us forest trolls hold deep hatred for the elves, we¡¯vee to destroy them.¡±

    The fey, beautiful madame had a much friendlier attitude after his words had been spoken. She nodded, ¡°We also have a deep grudge with those who live on the ground. They enter the underground world every now and then to attack us. Therge numbers of elves you discovered must havee to do battle with us. Hehe, we¡¯ve long since heard the brave ferocity of your forest troll tribe on the ground. It looks like we have amon enemy.¡±

    The old priest was silent for a bit after she¡¯d spoke and turned to ask Han Shuo respectfully, ¡°Liaison, what should we do now?¡±

    Han Shuo actually wanted to rob the dark elves, but he didn¡¯t know just how many they had in numbers or how strong their fighting capabilities were. Thus, he weighed things up privately.

    The fey dark elf madame was very surprised by the old priest¡¯s inquiry towards Han Shuo. Although he wore a dark robe and had covered his entire body, his body was noticeably smaller than the forest trolls and it was obvious that he was of a different race. It naturally made the beautiful woman quite surprised to see the old priest¡¯s respectful attitude.

    ¡°Brave friend, our family is facing the attacks from a dark dragon at the moment. If you¡¯re willing to help us, we can offer you a cartload of gold and a cartload of jewels in thanks. If you can kill the dark dragon, everything on it will belong to you.¡± The dark elf madame suddenly spoke up when she saw Han Shuo stand there without a word.

    Han Shuo started. He hadn¡¯t expected that these dark elves would be facing the attacks of a dark dragon right now. Dark dragons were evil dragons and also liked to live beneath the surface. The dark elves were truly unlucky to run into a dark dragon.

    Frowning, Han Shuo thought for a bit and felt that this dark elf¡¯s suggestion was a bit tempting. Although the dark dragon was likely incredibly strong, but thebination of this group of dark elves and five hundred forest trolls, there should be a chance to kill him.

    There was extraordinary treasure on each dragon that would cause anyone to tremble. Therefore, the rewards in killing a dragon was a temptation that many couldn¡¯t resist.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go see the underground world first. If the addition of us means we can handle that dark dragon, we¡¯ll agree to your proposal.¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment and opened his mouth to say.

    ¡°I can promise that with the aid of your five hundred brave forest troll friends, that dark dragon is dead without a doubt. My name is Dana, you¡¯re wee to join us in the underground world.¡± The dark elf madame said happily and then gave a word of instruction to the dark elves.

    The dark elves who had just rushed out of the ave once again re-entered the cave under Dana¡¯s orders. Dana lifted her buttocks and walked in in the very end, waving a hand at Han Shuo and the old priest.

    Following behind them meant that they could back out if anything went south. Therefore, when he saw that the dark elves went down first and Dana had stayed behind to look after them, Han Shuo felt that there should be no danger and he nodded at the old priest.

    Han Shuo and the old priest was in front, the carriage holding the little skeleton was in the center. Five hundred forest trolls filtered in through the cave and started walking down into the underground world that the dark elves lived in.

    The further they walked, the more spacious the cave became. There were even some red-brown rocks growing down in the depths, sending out a faint light and making so that it wasn¡¯t so dark inside.

 Chapter 143: Everyone with their own plans

    Chapter 143: Everyone with their own ns

    The group walked downwards for quite a long period of time, with Han Shuo discovered that the cave was bing wider and wider. All sorts ofplex paths led in all directions.

    At this time, Han Shuo concentrated and his eyes took in the surroundings, remembering the way they¡¯de in from in order to prevent them from being unable to find their way back.

    When their footsteps downwards slowed down and Dana led Han Shuo and the others to walk on t ground, Han Shuo lifted his head to look up and discovered that those red-brown glowing rocks were hung high overhead, appearing like the sunset that would appear on the ground.

    As he looked out, he noticed that apart from the red-brown rocks covering the skies overhead, the sights all around weren¡¯t that much different from the world above. It just wasn¡¯t as cold as the outside world, and seemed to even be a bit warmer.

    ¡°Those who live below the ground also include gnomes and lizardmen, as well as super creatures like the dark dragon, apart from us dark elves. Although the world below and the world above are a bit different, it¡¯s not that much so.¡± When Dana saw Han Shuo and the old priest look in all directions with great interest, she beamed and exined. Her mesmerizing eyes seemed to look at Han Shuo with great expression.

    The dark elves were naturallyscivious, and their female elves even more so. As the matriarch of the dark elves, Dana was naturally no exception. Han Shuo only needed to take one look at her nce to understand the meaning within it.

    ¡°Why is the dark dragon attacking your tribe? Where does he live?¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t pay any attention to Dana¡¯s attention as he frowned and asked her about important matters.

    ¡°We originally didn¡¯t have much conflict with this dark dragon, just that the lizardmen seemed to use some methods to bribe it into attacking us. This is because our tribe has been fighting the lizardmen for a fertile piece ofnd recently. We¡¯ve engaged in several battles, and the lizardmen turned up with this dark dragon after they were defeated.¡± Dana was a bit glum and anxious when Han Shuo brought up this matter and spoke with a sigh.

    ¡°How many people did you send out to battle the dark dragon? What kind of attacks does it use, will we be of any effect if we join you?¡± Han Shuo continued to ask.

    ¡°Our tribe has more than three hundred dark elf warriors who have already engaged this dark dragon inbat. Its body is incredibly durable, with only its head and neck being slightly weaker. It can spit out a dragonbreath attack that will eat away at flesh. It can also spew out a hot me that hasva mixed in.¡±

    ¡°We used magic and arrows to attack it from afar and lost more than twenty dark elves during this time, but we also sessfully harmed it. It¡¯s now hiding in the swamp, licking his wounds. If we add your five hundred forest troll warriors, I am certain that we can kill it.¡± Dana answered confidently.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t open his mouth again. Many dark elves continuously gathered along the way. When they finally arrived at swamp with deeply dark sludge, the original ten dark elves had turned into more than three hundred.

    ¡°Give us our payment first. We¡¯ve decided to help you.¡± Han Shuo thought for a bit and suddenly said with a low voice.

    Dana was quite forthright as she nodded with a smile. A few male dark elves in the distance pushed two carts to Han Shuo. They lifted the grey cloth covering the cart to reveal the gleaming cart of gold and a sparkling cart of jewels. Han Shuo¡¯s eyes lit up as he looked silently at the payment, appraising it privately. He was sure that this cart of gold and jewels was worth at least tens of thousands of gold coins.

    To think that these dark elves were actually quite rich. Han Shuo weighed things up privately and walked to the cart of gold and jewels, using the space ring to unceremoniously put the contents of the two carts away. As he did this, Han Shuo covertly observed Dana¡¯s reaction. From her eyes, Han Shuo suddenly detected a hint of coldness and disdain.

    After ascending to the true demon realm, not only Han Shuo¡¯s five senses, but even his perceptions felt all the more mystical. He could miraculously detect many fine details, just like the expression that had just shed through Dana¡¯s eyes. Han Shuo hadn¡¯t even purposefully paid attention to it, but still magically grasped this detail unconsciously.

    A thought striking him, Han Shuo maintained his bent over posture and put away the items in the two carts. He silently debated the meaning of the coldness and disdain in Dana¡¯s eyes. A few more traces of wariness appeared in his heart as he began to secretly plot some things.

    ¡°Alright, I¡¯ve epted the items, what now?¡± Han Shuo lifted his head and kept an eye on the swamp as he spoke to Dana.

    ¡°Our tribe doesn¡¯t have any strong warriors and only has archers and mages to engage in long distance attacks. I think we should have your forest troll warriors lead the chargeter, with our dark elves using arrows and magic to attack from behind.¡± Dana spoke matter-of-factly.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo turned her down decisively. ¡°No, the dark dragon also has a strong body. Our people will be going to our deaths if we take the lead. If you insist on doing this, then we can¡¯t continue this business deal.¡±

    If the forest trolls led the charge, they would face a dark dragon of unknown strength in front and the coldly scheming dark elves behind. Facing danger in this way would subject the forest trolls to danger from both sides, cing them in an exceedingly disadvantageous situation.

    Even if Han Shuo hadn¡¯t discovered Dana¡¯s plotting, he would¡¯ve never agreed to this suggestion. Not to mention that Han Shuo now felt that Dana had other ns, he naturally wouldn¡¯t allow such conditions to form.

    Dana¡¯s smiling face darkened when Han Shuo turned her down, and she then looked at Han Shuo with some anger. ¡°Someone has to be in front at least, do you want my weak tribeswomen to go to their deaths? We¡¯ve paid you two carts of gold and jewels.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, we just want cannon fodder don¡¯t we? Leave it to me. As long as you can lure the dark dragon out, I can take care of the cannon fodder. Will this do?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s voice had also descended as he responded.

    When Han Shuo¡¯s words finishing ringing out, he chanted a magical incantation and a zombie warrior appeared out of thin air. Han Shuo continued chanting as more zombie warriors and skeletal warriors appeared, including a few ghouls as well. They formed a meat shield in front of Dana.

    ¡°So you¡¯re a necromancer.¡± Dana nodded, but her gaze at Han Shuo had turned slightly contemptuous because he had only summoned zombie and skeletal warriors.

    He paid no heed to her look and said, ¡°Well, can you make your moves now?¡±

    ¡°Yes. I¡¯ll go make arrangements and lure that dark dragon so it leaves the swamp immediately. You¡¯ll have to immediately send your summoned creatures forward and have your forest trolls attack with us from the distance. We can¡¯t give the dark dragon any breathing space or chance to talk, otherwise we¡¯ll be in grave trouble.¡± Dana nodded and then backed up to where the dark elves were. They chatted quietly in an exceedingly low voice as they looked in Han Shou¡¯s direction.

    It was at this moment that Han Shuo¡¯s extraordinary ears proved their use. He could clearly hear Dana¡¯s conversation after he concentrated. When he discovered that Dana¡¯s words were discussing on how to handle the forest trolls, he couldn¡¯t help but continuouslyugh coldly.

    He waved the old priest over and bent his head to the old priest, giving a few instructions in a low voice. The old priest was first greatly startled and then recollected his wits. He listened carefully to Han Shuo¡¯ words and then walked off to give some order to the forest troll chief, having him act in ordance to Han Shuo¡¯s words.

    A young, female dark elf walked naked to to the swamp, singing out with a clear voice as she walked. Her naked curves was tantalizing as her dark purple skin glistened and gleamed. Her buttocks from the back were full and pert, her spine smooth and alluring. She was full of a fey beauty.

    The pure, deste song emitted from her mouth, making even Han Shuo¡¯s heart caper and his mind race. When she walked to the end of the swamp, her cute feet sank into the soft, pitch ck sludge as she cutely kicked at it, created not a small bit of sound.

    The peaceful swamp suddenly sank in on itself, forming a huge whirlpool. The whirlpool sucked in all the sludge around it as the naked dark elf girl gave a start of surprise, evading it a bit frantically and dodging the pull of the whirlpool.

    The whirlpool had been in the center when it slowly changed position, quickly moving to the little girl. Just as it was about to reach the end of the swamp, a huge wave of sound erupted from the the whirlpool as an inky ck dark dragon stuck its head out. Its red eyes were like twonterns. When its spine and sharp ws were also revealed, its body extended to tens of meters beyond into the swamp. Its body shape was huge, making Han Shuo bbergasted as it was his first time seeing a dragon this close.

    ¡°Little wench,e y with me, don¡¯t run away.¡± The dark dragon was full ofscivious teasing after it¡¯d emerged. It shook its enormous body as it chased after the dark elf girl.

 Chapter 144: A step ahead

    Chapter 144: A step ahead

    It was a depraved dragon alright. Han Shuo cursed under his breath and gave an order. The dark creatures he¡¯d just summoned walked out from the cover on either side and looked at the dark elves, ready to make a move against the dark elves along with the dark dragon.

    ¡°Come on,e on!¡± The dark dragon leered as its over ten meter long body took flight with a thunderous rumble, sending sludge flying every which way in the swamp.

    The naked dark elf girl had panic written all over her face as she desperately ran towards where Han Shuo and Dana were hiding. Her lofty melons swayed in tantalizing ripples as her slender legs furiously churned. Her allure only increased as mud adorned her lithe body..

    When the dark elf girl finally made it to the zone that Han Shuo and the others had erected, Han Shuo gave an order to the dark creatures. More than ten zombie and skeletal warriors, as well as a few ghouls, broke out from concealment and brazenly charged towards that lustful dark dragon.

    Han Shuo called out at the same time and the forest trolls readied their weapons. Aiming for the dark dragon trying to rise into the sky, the forest troll hunters threw out sharp spears and javelins. In the same breath, the dark elves covered the sky with a shower of arrows and dark elf magic.

    ¡°Damnit, it¡¯s you lowly races again.¡± The dark dragon bellowed as he opened his mouth and shot out an awe inspiring jet of me with bits ofva mixed in.

    ¡°Stand back and evade.¡± Han Shuo roared out, as the forest trolls quickly hid towards the back when the old priest shouted out as well. The jet of me seared where they¡¯d just stood, setting fire to the dry weeds and grass that littered their surroundings.

    Attacks from all sorts of spears and javelins, as well as arrows and magic from the dark elves,nded on the dark dragon¡¯s durable body. They had no effect at all. The ones aimed at the dark dragon¡¯s neck, eyes, and head were all sent flying in another direction with a wave of the dark dragon¡¯s ws.

    The dark dragon¡¯s enormous body soared through the air as it arrived above Han Shuo¡¯s summoned zombie and skeletal warriors. Its metal ws suddenly swiped downwards, crushing the skeletal warriors into bone fragments. The zombie warriors fared no better, their bodies falling to pieces with another swipe. They were indeed only good as cannon fodder.

    The strength of the dark dragon was within Han Shuo¡¯s expectations. He didn¡¯t feel pained when he saw the dark creatures disappear into shards and fragments beneath the dark dragon¡¯s attacks. He sent a significant look at the old priest from afar.

    The dark elves continued attacking as their archers, with magic bows in the back, started shooting icicle-like arrows. In addition, they also started using explosive arrows, which caused a huge disturbance and enraged the dragon even more.

    ¡°You lowly, pathetic lives will all die before the anger of I, the wondrous Gilbert!¡± The dark dragon Gilbert roared furiously and continued flying forward in the face of icicle and exploding arrows. As he flew close to the ground and churned the ground with his ws, it finished off the rest of the dark creatures that Han Shuo had summoned.

    The dark elves, ording to orders received from matriarch Dana, all swiftly dodged to the back after firing their attacks, attempting to continue handling the dark dragon from behind the forest trolls. It was a pity that Han Shuo had long since given his instructions that whenever the dark elves started moving, all the forest trolls should even forget attacking the dark dragons and race backwards in retreat with all due haste. They were even faster than the dark elves in escaping to the back.

    ¡°Bring down the stone wall!¡± Han Shuo roared furiously in the midst of the forest trolls after they¡¯d arrived at a small mountain valley, not too far off in the distance.

    The old priest gave his instructions and the forest trolls roared out his order. More than ten forest trolls stood at a high vantage point and threw down boulders, instantly blockading off the mountain valley and blocking off the dark elves.

    When Han Shuo eavesdropped on the dark elf matriarch Dana¡¯s words earlier, he knew that Dana had long since made preparations in the surrounding valley. She¡¯d preparedrge amounts of boulders and had intended on evacuating the dark elves to the area after enraging the dark dragon, leaving the forest trolls to face the dark dragon. They¡¯d then emerge after the battle and eradicate the surviving side. In this way, whether it was the dark dragon or the forest trolls, neither of them would escape the dark elves¡¯ grasp.

    If Dana¡¯s marvelous n had been deployed ording to her ideas, then Han Shuo and the forest trolls would likely not have left this ce alive. It was a good thing that Han Shuo¡¯s hearing was extraordinary and caught every detail of Dana¡¯s vicious n. This allowed the forest trolls to be one step ahead and hurry to the mountain valley before Dana and the others could react. They then used the stones that the dark elves had prepared to seal off the valley.

    ¡°What do you mean by this?¡± Dana finally revealed panic as she shrieked at Han Shuo and the old priest from the other side of the stone wall.

    ¡°Nothing much, just that I¡¯ve discovered this dark dragon is simply too hard to handle. I¡¯m canceling our deal earlier, we don¡¯t intend on continuing this battle. I¡¯ll be sure to return the two carts of gold and jewels after you take out the dark dragon, and I¡¯llpensate you for your losses as well. My deepest apologies!¡± Han Shuo shrugged and spoke quite sincerely to Dana.

    Dana had never thought that Han Shuo would deceive her at the most crucial moment. Although Han Shuo was apologizing with a sincere face, his eyes were sinister and cold, obviously bearing ill will towards her. How could Dana be blind to it? When she thought about what she¡¯d nned earlier, she felt her hands and feet grow cold and a huge headache throb at her temples. She was so anxious that she didn¡¯t know what to do.

    ¡°Lowly, cowardly lives, receive the rage of the mighty Gilbert!¡± Dark dragon Gilbert roared and sprayed acidic poison from his mouth. More than ten dark elves couldn¡¯t dodge in time and emitted hideous screams after being covered by the acidic liquid.

    ¡°To hell with him!¡± A handsome elf roared angrily as the exquisitely carved longbow in his hands suddenly expanded, as if sucking in something. His originally slender body seemed to be sucked in by the bow as he started shrinking rapidly.

    ¡°No!¡± Dana cried out loudly, her expression a bit frantic.

    ¡°Hurry and give the order, otherwise my sacrifice will have been in vain!¡± The male dark elf howled as his body became stick thin. His life surged into the strange bow as the bow red out a faint, dark light, looking quite evil and strange.

    Han Shuo looked at the bow with astonishment, revealing a very curious look. After the bow sucked in the dark elf¡¯s life, an arrow, with inky ck light circling around it, formed magically on the bow. As the dark elf¡¯s body dried out, the arrow started emanating a dangerous aura.

    Even the cocky dark dragon felt danger at this moment. He started his charge, sending out streams of zing me. The back of the mountain valley had been blocked off by Han Shuo¡¯s orders, so the dark elves could only face the dark dragon¡¯s attacks and had no avenue of retreat at all.

    Since things had progressed to this point, Dana had no choice left avable to her. She grit her teeth and gave the order. A few dark elves threw themselves in front of the elf with the bow without hesitation, rapidly deploying all sorts of elven magic to help him defend against Gilbert¡¯s attacks. In the span of a moment, more than ten dark elves were engulfed by the dark dragon¡¯s mes that hadva mixed in and turned into a crisp in the blink of an eye.

    A ghastly wail sounded at this moment as the arrow finally swallowed all of the dark elf¡¯s life and shot out towards the dark dragon. Unfathomably swift, Gilbert had no chance to evade the mysterious arrow.

    The strange arrow formed by the ck light abruptly metamorphosed into a ck cloud as it drew closer to Gilbert, eventuallypletely enveloping him. A string of crackles exploded from the cloud of ck light, intermixed with Gilbert¡¯s pained screams. It looked like the dark dragon was enduring an inhumane amount of pain.

    But as a super rank magical creature, the dark dragon still spewed out mes and poisonous liquid when assaulted by such pain. His body evennded amidst the dark elves from the air, as the ck cloud enveloped him, his ws tearing all the nearby dark elves to pieces.

    Even more dark elves died in a sickening fashion beneath the attacks of the mes and the poisonous liquid. Another hundred dark elves perished after a few breaths. There were less than a hundred out of the original three hundred dark elves.

    When the cloud of dark light dispersed and the dark dragon¡¯s body once again revealed itself, Han Shuo discovered blood running down the dark dragon in multiple ces. Even Gilbert¡¯s flesh and skin were charred and burnt. His movements weren¡¯t as agile as before and both his eyes were injured. He moved around blindly like he couldn¡¯t see anything.

    ¡°Prepare yourselves, we¡¯re going to be dragonyers very soon.¡± Han Shuo smiled sinisterly at the old priest behind him as he gave the order.

 Chapter 145: Capturing the lewd dragon

    Chapter 145: Capturing the lewd dragon

    ¡°Kill that damned dark dragon!¡± The dark elf matriarch Dana no longer possessed her previous beauty and demeanor as she screamed with her hair wildly strewn all over the ce.

    Due to the dark dragon¡¯s random rampaging, the dark elves scattered and dodged in all directions, asionally running into the dark dragon¡¯s poisonous bouts of me. Even though Dana had the protection of the dark elves, she still appeared quite bedraggled.

    Under Dana¡¯s instructions, the remaining dark elves started attacking the almost blind dark dragon. All sorts of arrows and magic struck the dark dragon¡¯s body, further worsening his injuries.

    As an advanced rank magical creature, the strength of the dark dragon was beyond all doubt. Even with three hundred dark elves, if it hadn¡¯t been for the male dark elf sacrificing his life to activate that strange bow, it was likely that they would have been unable to harm the dark dragon.

    But up to now, because the dark dragon had already been gravely injured to the point where his eyes could no longer see, hisrge body had be a living target. As injuries racked his body, his speed became slower and his attacks weren¡¯t as powerful as before.

    The dark elves in the back were pushed up against the rock wall that Han Shuo and the others were standing behind. When Han Shuo saw that the dark dragon was about to die as he observed everything, he immediately nodded at the old priest.

    ¡°Obliterate the stone wall, we¡¯ll go in and cleanup.¡± Han Shuoughed sinisterly and gave instructions to the old priest.

    The forest troll warriors were ready after the old priest conveyed Han Shuo¡¯s instructions and immediately started moving the boulders away. The dark elves had long since made their preparations to clean up afterwards and dug a sloping pit not too far in the distance. The forest troll warriors only needed to exert a little bit of strength to turn the thick logs that the dark elves had prepared. The boulders rolled at a slope and surged into the deep pit in the back.

    When all the boulders in the mountain valley had rolled into the deep pit, the passageway was finally opened again. Han Shuo swept the scene with a cold gaze and waved his hand, telling the forest troll to charge.

    The forest trolls hunters in the back row hurled out spears and javelins with their thin arms, and the weapons whistled as theynded amongst the dark elves. Although the dark elves had been prepared for an attack, they still cried out with multiple howls of agony as the multitude of spears and javelins rained down.

    Scores of dark elves were nailed dead beneath this wave of attack. The matriarch of the dark elves was so incensed that she wanted to leap over and fight Han Shuo to the death.

    ¡°Matriarch, let¡¯s retreat!¡± A female dark elf elder cried out loudly.

    ¡°Shameless forest trolls, I¡¯ll settle this with you sooner orter!¡± Dana¡¯s shrill voice bawled out loudly. She then turned destely and gave the order, ¡°Retreat, everyone retreat!¡±

    The dark elves, who hadn¡¯t died yet, all ran for their lives under Dana¡¯s orders. Even Dana swiftly left under the cover of some experts.

    If roots weren¡¯t fully removed, they¡¯d reappear again when the spring wind blew. Since they¡¯d erupted in full blown hostility, Han Shuo naturally hardened his heart and spoke coldly to the priest, ¡°After them, exterminate them all.¡±

    The forest troll chief gave the order to attack and the forest troll warriors came howling out of the mountain valley, giving chase to the remaining dark elves.

    Han Shuo targeted one of the dark elves and gave the little skeleton the order to kill. Wielding the bone dagger, the little skeleton was as fast as lightning as it swept past the hordes of forest trolls, speeding towards the dark elf with the strange bow.

    The male elf had expended his life earlier to activate the strange bow into shooting a frighteningly powerful arrow, riddling the dark dragon¡¯s body full of injuries. Han Shuo was exceedingly curious about that strange bow, so he¡¯d kept his eye on it all along.

    When the dark elf, who¡¯d used up his life had died, the bow was grasped by another dark elf. Han Shuo had the little skeleton chase him because he wanted to obtain the bow in the elf¡¯s hands.

    Gilbert roared out raspily as its enormous body rolled, creating thundering sounds as he thrashed around on the ground. The forest trolls around him hastily avoided the dragon when they saw that he was moving around again.

    Even when heavily injured, the strength of an advanced realm magical creature was still very frightening. The forest trolls had already seen him terrorize the dark elves, so they were deathly afraid of the dark dragon¡¯s enormous strength to the point of being unwilling to let up their guard even now.

    The dark dragon¡¯s body thrashed as it slowly moved towards the swamp. It looked like it would attempt to flee back to its old nest at all cost now.

    Seeing that the dark dragon wanted to flee and casting a look at the dark elves escaping in all directions, Han Shuo immediately roared at the old priest, ¡°Split half of our force to handle the dark dragon and have the rest chase after the dark elves. Those chasing the dark elves shouldn¡¯t go too far. Even if they can¡¯t kill all the dark elves, they should return in a short amount of time.

    The old priest made a simple hand gesture and half of the forest trolls, who¡¯d all been ready to chase after the dark elves, automatically split off, with the remaining half attacking the dark dragon.

    The forest trolls had more than twice the amount of numberspared to the dark elves. Once two hundred trolls joined forces in attacking the dark dragon, it was unable to escape after a mere second.

    ¡°Wah wah... that hurts, don¡¯t hit me! Don¡¯t hit me! I surrender!¡± The dark dragon Gilbert cried out loudly as hisrge body slowly began to shrink beneath the circling ck lights.

    Han Shuo started, he hadn¡¯t expected that the dark dragon would actually beg for mercy. Heughed uproariously as he lifted a hand indicating for the forest trolls to cease their attacks, intent on seeing what the dark dragon wanted.

    When the forest trolls had surrounded the dark dragon in the center, the dark dragon¡¯s body continued to shrink beneath the circting ck lights, slowly transforming into a humanoid form.

    A tall, slender young man with burnt skin, smokeing out of his head, and traces of blood around his eyes appeared. He grimaced and cried out with pain, continuously begging for mercy. ¡°I surrender, I surrender!¡±

    Casting a nce at the old priest and all weapons leveled at this young man, Han Shuo grasped the Demonyer Edge and slowly walked in front of the young man. ¡°There¡¯s no use in surrendering. There are many valuable things on you, your dragon crystal, dragon meridians, and dragon horns are all priceless treasures. I can obtain them all if I kill you, do you think your surrender is of any use?¡±

    Dark dragon Gilbert immediately raised both hands and called out, ¡°No, no! My most valuable things aren¡¯t on me. I can belong to you and form a master and ve contract with you, as long you give me beauties and treasure and keep me by your side.¡±

    Han Shuo immediately paused when this suggestion was raised, and thoughts spun madly through his mind, weighing up the possibilities of this suggestion.

    ¡°Don¡¯t hesitate, think about it. If I be your servant, I can help you kill people, burn things, and fly everywhere and take out your enemies. As my master, you only need to give me treasure and beauties to enjoy. What a good business deal this is.¡± The young dark dragon called out loudly, as if deathly afraid that Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t agree. He then added on, ¡°I canpromise if you don¡¯t have treasure, but I must have beauties to sleep with, or I won¡¯t do it!¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t know whether tough or cry as he looked at the shameless and cowardly dark dragon. He stood there, not knowing what to do. The old priest suddenly walked over to Han Shuo and hurried him, ¡°Liaison, hurry and agree. He¡¯ll be an absolutely loyal servant if he forms a contract with you.¡±

    ¡°Lewd dragon, why must you have beauties?¡± Han Shuo stared at Gilbert and asked, amused. Thetter was covered in burns and blood and looked like he would die at any time, but still roared loudly for beauties.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know, I really don¡¯t know. That¡¯s what my daddy told me when I was born. Us noble dark dragons must have plenty of treasure and beauties to win respect from other dark dragons. Beauties are our goal.¡± Gilbert¡¯s ck hands kept rubbing his eyes as he answered loudly.

    ¡°Eh, is this your first time away from home?¡± Han Shuo stared at him and asked once again.

    ¡°You, how did you know that it¡¯s my first time away from home?¡± Gilbert started as turned towards Han Shuo¡¯s voice.

    This lewd dragon was actually quite silly. Han Shuo contemted silently and then opened his mouth, ¡°Alright, I ept your request. You and I will immediately form a master and servant contract, otherwise I¡¯ll immediately kill you.¡±

    ¡°Master, I¡¯m your servant now, will you find beauties for me?¡± The lewd dragon Gilbert cried out and pleaded Han Shuo.

    ¡°I haven¡¯t found any for myself yet, you wait there on the sidelines!¡± Han Shuo said nonchntly.

 Chapter 146: Iâ€™ll safeguard it for you

    Chapter 146: I¡¯ll safeguard it for you

    ¡°How can you do this, you can¡¯t do this!¡± Gilbert¡¯s loudints traveled far.

    ¡°Alright, alright. Let¡¯s talk about thister. Rest up first.¡± Han Shuo randomly fobbed Gilbert off with some excuses and silently mused over the mental pulse he¡¯d felt earlier.

    When he¡¯d sealed the contract with Gilbert earlier, a marvelous connection formed between the two. ording to the power of the contract, Han Shuo was able to locate Gilbert¡¯s position even with his eyes closed. In addition, Han Shuo knew that with the power of master and servant, he could absolutely dictate the life and death of the lewd dragon.

    As Gilbertined and whined, the little skeleton returned to Han Shuo with the bizarre bow in hand. When the small lewd dragon Gilbert saw the little skeleton appear with the bow, it recognized the presence and instinctively dashed behind Han Shuo in a panic.

    Since the bow had appeared, that meant the dark elf who¡¯d wielded it was done for. Han Shuo took the bow from the little skeleton and held it in his hand, sensing it. He didn¡¯t discover anything umon about it at all. He observed it closely and discovered that the entire bow gave off a dark brown color like ancient tree bark, full ofplex, strange, and mysterious patterns.

    ¡°Liaison, the matriarch of the dark elves Dana and one third of the dark elves sessfully escaped.¡± The old priest reported what the forest troll chief had to say and stood next to Han Shuo to speak respectfully.

    Nodding, Han Shuo first stored the strange bow within his storage ring and said, ¡°The dark elves are very familiar with the underground world. They¡¯re the masters of this ce and it¡¯s not strange that they¡¯d be able to use the terrain to escape. In order to prevent the dark elves froming back and seeking revenge, we should leave the underground world as quickly as possible. Otherwise, we¡¯ll have great trouble once Dana gathers the other dark elf ns to attack us.¡±

    ¡°Master, are you returning to the world above? Oh, that¡¯s wonderful. I¡¯ve never left the underground world. I can finally see what the outside world looks like now.¡± Gilbert appeared very excited to hear that Han Shuo and the others were returning to the world above and cheered loudly.

    Looking at Gilbert strangely, Han Shuo asked with a frown, ¡°Have you always lived underground? Then how did you be enemies with the dark elves?¡±

    ¡°Eh, there¡¯s nothing much to it. I ran away from the Dark Dragon City underground and then got lost. I wanted to go aboveground and ran into the lizard men. They treated me as an honored guest and agreed to take me out of the underground world, and promised to help me find beauties and treasure. So I then helped them destroy the homes of the dark elves in return.¡±

    ¡°But when I came to destroy their vige, I discovered that the dark elf girls were very pretty. It was a pity that these girls came running to me actually attacked me instead. I escaped to the swamp when I was hurt and you know the story from there.¡± Gilbert looked innocently at Han Shuo as he detailed what had happened to him.

    Although these words were confusing, out of order, and didn¡¯t exin many vital details, Han Shuo more or less understood what Gilbert meant. He was toozy to inquire further and so nodded and asked, ¡°Are your injuries serious?¡±

    ¡°Very serious!¡± The little lewd dragon scratched his head and said dispiritedly. He paused and then said, ¡°But I¡¯ll be able to slowly recover after some time. It was mostly that weird arrow that made me feel pain. I really don¡¯t know why such a weak and fragile lifeform could shoot such a powerful arrow!¡±

    Han Shuo pped Gilbert¡¯s ck head and said, ¡°Idiot, didn¡¯t you see the dark elf immediately die after shooting that arrow? That was an evil arrow that consumed life in its wake. Of course it¡¯d be strong. Don¡¯t think you¡¯re really something just because you have arge body.¡±

    Gilbert cried out in pain and rubbed the head that Han Shuo had just pped, muttering, ¡°I¡¯m already injured. Even though you¡¯re my master, you still can¡¯t bully me!¡±

    Thinking for a bit, Han Shuo took out the Medusa¡¯s essence blood and gave it to the little lewd dragon. ¡°This is the essence blood of the Medusa, it has a miraculous effect on injuries and will definitely be good for your injuries. Take it and use it sparingly, don¡¯t waste it.¡±

    ¡°Oh, wondrous master, I salute you.¡± Gilbert temporarily couldn¡¯t see anything because his eyes had been injured, but when he heard that there was Medusa¡¯s essence blood that could heal his injuries, he waved his hands as he kissed up to Han Shuo, finallyying his ws on the small sk with the Medusa blood.¡±

    ¡°Bring my litter over and carry this blind dark dragon. We need to leave the underground world as soon as possible. Otherwise, we¡¯ll have incredible trouble when Dana gathers the other ns of dark elves.¡±

    The old priest also understood the danger they were in with their current situation. He gave instructions to the forest troll chief in the distance and two litters were carried over. Thefortable, spacious one held the little skeleton and the somewhat crude one held the little lewd dragon Gilbert. Han Shuo walked in front, leading the way.

    It was a good thing that Han Shuo had silently taken note of the path on the way here. With Han Shuo¡¯s current memory and brain, he was able to fully recall theplicated and winding roads in his mind. They didn¡¯t run into any difficulties on the way back out under Han Shuo¡¯s guidance. When they reached the entrance passage once again and started walking into the spacious and interwoven caverns, the old priest was incredibly surprised.

    ¡°Liaison, we¡¯ve only walked through this area once, yet you¡¯ve remembered the entire path already?¡± The old priest couldn¡¯t help but ask with curiosity after holding his questions in for a while.

    ¡°Oh, this is all conducted under the guidance of the mighty Datara and has nothing to do with me.¡± Han Shuo responded carelessly.

    He gave an order and the little skeleton poked a head out of the litter, waving his little hand at the old priest and saluting Han Shuo. The old priest was baffled as he didn¡¯t know the significance of the little skeleton¡¯s saluting motion, and so gave the little skeleton a round ofpliments again.

    Halfway through, many scattered and random footsteps rang out in Han Shuo¡¯s ears. His heart seized as he urged the forest trolls onwards, wanting them to leave the underground world as quickly as possible.

    His sharp eyes saw some strange creatures with the body of a man and head of a lizard at the end of the cavern. He remembered the conversation between Gilbert and the dark elves, immediately understood that these creatures were likely the lizardmen below ground. However, what he didn¡¯t understand was why the lizardmen were here.

    ¡°Some lizardmen are here, do you know what¡¯s going on?¡± Han Shuo snapped his fingers and some forest troll warriors brought the litter holding Gilbert over to Han Shuo, allowing him to ask his question.

    ¡°Oh, it really is the lizardmen. I hadn¡¯t thought that they¡¯d keep their word. They promised me that they¡¯d take me out of the underground world, but I ran into the dark elf trapter and retreated back into the swamp. To think that they were still waiting for me!¡± Gilbert cheered and surged out of the litter.

    Perhaps it was because of the effects of the Medusa¡¯s blood, but Gilbert¡¯s eyes, the ones that previously had blood gushing out of them, were now back to normal. Although he was still covered in injuries, the blood had stopped flowing from his wounds.

    The little lewd dragon suddenly roared out lowly with a resonant voice, ¡°Lowly lifeforms, are you here to offer tribute to me?¡±

    The lizardmen at the end of the cavern suddenly cheered when they heard Gilbert¡¯s voice. Dozens of lizard men appeared from either side of the cavern, with a few of them lifting a chest, respectfully cing it beneath Gilbert¡¯s feet. An elderly lizardmen hobbled forward on a cane, ¡°Mighty, noble dark dragon, we¡¯ve heard of you punishing the evil dark elves for us. This chest of treasure is what we¡¯ve promised you, please ept it.¡±

    Gilbert walked over and lifted the lid to see that it was filled with all sorts of radiant and sparkling crystals. He was immediately very excited as he then asked, ¡°What about the beauties you promised me?¡±

    The old lizardman snapped his fingers and three curvaceous female lizards walked in front of Gilbert. One of them used unpracticedmon tongue to say shyly, ¡°Honored noble dark dragon, us three sisters will serve you well, please take us with you.¡±

    ¡°Ah hahaha.¡± Han Shuoughed loudly as he watched the little lewd dragon¡¯s smile freeze on his face. He couldn¡¯t help butugh a bit mockingly.

    ¡°Forget it, I¡¯ll ept the crystals, but you take the threedy lizards away. I don¡¯t need them.¡± Gilbert picked up the chest of crystals and avoided the three lizard beauties¡¯ attentions. He immediately spoke to Han Shou and wanted to leave immediately.

    When Gilbert drew near, Han Shuo snaked out a hand like lightning and grabbed Gilbert¡¯s box of beautiful crystals and threw it into his space ring, ignoring Gilbert¡¯sints. ¡°Yours is mine, I¡¯ll safeguard it for you. Heh heh.¡±

    The forest troll entourage then walked towards the world aboveground thanks to Han Shuo¡¯s amazing memory.

 Chapter 147: The mission is a go

    Chapter 147: The mission is a go

    Not running into any further danger along the way, Han Shuo and the others made it safely out of the underground world, exiting from the mountain valley they¡¯de in through.

    Although this time¡¯s outing had been a bit different from the original n, he was still satisfied with the overall result. Not only had he received two cartloads of gold and jewelry from the dark elves, he¡¯d also received a chest of beautiful crystals, a mysterious bow and a dark dragon subordinate. Han Shuo felt that this trip had been quite worth it.

    As they walked towards the forest trolls¡¯ vige, dark dragon Gilbert keptining, switching tracks between wanting Han Shuo to return his chest of crystals to him, and Han Shuo finding beauties for him. Indifferent to his whining, Han Shuo turned him down tly.

    The dark dragon knew a lost cause when he saw one, and didn¡¯t continue wasting his breath, preferring instead to sulk in a corner and tend to his wounds. Meanwhile, Han Shuo didn¡¯t remain idle either. He mastered another journeyman level necromancy magic, ¡°Dark Fog¡±. Not only could this magic create fog within a certain perimeter, but it was cast in such a way that the caster would be unaffected, allowing only enemies¡¯ vision to be obscured. It was a very practical magic to use in attacking and running away.

    Han Shuo had mostly grasped the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens by now. After some testing, he discovered that apart from some issues in grasping direction, all his other problems were being resolved through continuous practice. It would appear that he really would be able to soar through the air before too long.

    When they passed by the forest trolls¡¯ sacred ground, Han Shuo had the forest trolls wait outside. He and the little skeleton went inside and stored all the remaining treasures within his space ring. The ce of extreme wood still had great use for Han Shuo, so he left specific instructions for the forest trolls guarding the sacred ground to keep an eye on this ce.

    After returning to the vige, Han Shuo discovered traces of a violent fight outside the vige. As he entered the vige and listened to the old priest¡¯s summary, he learned that the forest trolls that had gathered from all areas had engaged the elves after they¡¯d left. The forest trolls¡¯ superior numbers forced the elves to retreat after losing a few of their number.

    As the god that the forest trolls worshipped, the little skeleton received adoration from all the forest trolls. Han Shuo then gave instructions to the old priest and took all the luxury items that they¡¯d robbed from the McGrady Guild. Using the excuse of observing potential targets, he left the forest trolls along with the little skeleton and lewd dragon Gilbert.

    Han Shuo arrived at the cemetery of death after a few days of walking. Because of the contract, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t afraid of Gilbert spilling his secrets and led him directly into the cemetery of death. When Gilbert discovered that Han Shuo possessed the cemetery of death, a string of fawning words poured out from his mouth anduded Han Shuo up to the heavens.

    ¡°Alright, you stay here temporarily and rest up. I¡¯lle find you if I have any instructions.¡± Han Shuo paid no attention to Gilbert¡¯s rambunctiousness and left through the transportation matrix. He returned to the Empire¡¯s capital of Ossen.

    Han Shuo discovered Emily¡¯s marks right after walking out of the cemetery of death. This cave was where Han Shuo had ced the transportation matrix for transporting in and out of the cemetery of death. Only Emily knew about it apart from Han Shuo.

    From Emily¡¯s message, Han Shuo knew that Emily hade looking for him and wanted him to contact Chester at the Dark Mantle as soon as he¡¯d returned from the cemetery of death.

    He picked up the transportation sticks from the ground and didn¡¯t return to the Academy, but made for the Dark Mantle stronghold instead.

    ¡°Oh, you¡¯ve finally appeared! Mistress Emily has looked for you many times already. I¡¯ve also been to your Academy to look for you but couldn¡¯t find traces of you. In the end, Mistress Emily told me to stay here and said you¡¯d contact me. To think that you¡¯d actually appear!¡± Coincidentally, the bandit guard Chester walked out as Han Shuo arrived at the Dark Mantle¡¯s stronghold and started yelling excitedly.

    ¡°Has something gone wrong that Emily is looking for me so urgently?¡± Han Shuo asked askance when he saw Chester¡¯s look of anxiety.

    Chester nodded and shook his head, speaking with a wry face, ¡°Something must¡¯ve happened, but Mistress Emily didn¡¯t tell me specifically what had happened.¡±

    ¡°Then, what did Emily tell you?¡± Han Shuo knew that Emily would not tell Chester information he had no right to know, and thus asked about Emily¡¯s instructions for Chester.

    ¡°Leave the capital with me immediately. We need to head for Valen City. Mistress Emily should be there already.¡± Chester responded and then added, ¡°Mistress Emily told me to take you to Valen City and contact her through the organization. She¡¯ll exin in detail to you then.¡±

    ¡°Then let¡¯s go!¡± Han Shuo nodded in agreement.

    Valen City was on the western frontier of the Empire and was separated from the Kasi Empire by the Ken Grand Canyon. The Empire¡¯s Gryphon Legion was stationed there to defend against the Kasi Empire.

    Han Shuo only realized the Dark Mantle¡¯s true strength when they were on the move. Han Shuo and Chester used the Dark Mantle transportation matrix to directly travel to Valen City from within the Dark Mantle headquarters.

    When the two arrived at Valen City and contacted the local Dark Mantle members, the local members immediately prepared a carriage for them when they heard the two were on business for Emily. The carriage drove directly to the hotel where Emily was staying.

    The soil of Valen City was poor, so the entire city would only bustle with activity when the Lancelot Empire went to war with the Kasi Empire. But after so many years of war, the originally poor Valen City became even more impoverished. Many locals had already moved to other ces and the ones who remained conducted their trade with the army.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t seen Emily in quite a while. Emily had taken up residence in an elegant room within the spacious hotel and was furiously writing away at something. She was quite overjoyed when she saw Han Shuo, but grew serious as she saw Chester following behind him, ¡°Chester, you wait outside first, I have some words for Han Shuo.¡±

    Chester wasn¡¯t unhappy at all and retreated quite respectfully. He stood guard outside for Han Shuo and Emily, preventing others from disturbing their conversation.

    ¡°I¡¯ve already left instructions with the forest trolls. Whoeveres to purchase the siege weapons will be able to do so.¡± Han Shuo walked directly towards Emily and arrived at the side of a burning brazier.

    ¡°Our target this time is the Gryphon Legion. ording to our spections, the chief of the Gryphon Legion ns to rebel. What I need to do is gather evidence.¡± Emily didn¡¯t conceal anything and directly gave voice to their ns.

    Han Shuo gave a start of fright but then felt joy slowly forming inside. As the sons of the chief of the Gryphon Legion, ude and rk had long since formed deep grudges with Han Shuo. ude had died at his hands and rk had tried to assassinate him earlier. It looked like he¡¯d be able to kill off rk during this time¡¯s mission as well.

    ¡°Why does the chief of a legion want to rebel?¡± Although he was happy, Han Shuo didn¡¯t forget the task at hand and asked in confusion.

    ¡°His Majesty¡¯s health has continued to decline, bing poorer and poorer. The two princes aren¡¯t worth much and neither of them are able to truly obtain his trust. Curiously enough, the chief of the Gryphon Legion petitioned His Majesty to have the princess marry his son rk. Even though His Majesty declined him in the end, the chief still holds great military power in his hands, and his motives for his petition remain unclear.¡±

    ¡°The Dark Mantle then discovered that his movements were bing a bit suspicious. They seem to indicate that he has some contact with the Kasi Empire. Our goal is to collect as much evidence as possible. As long as we have enough evidence, my brother will personally make a move and arrest the chief of the Gryphon Legion.¡± Emily looked at Han Shuo and exined.

    ¡°Then, what should we do next?¡± Since Emily knew the detailed particrs of this mission far better than Han Shuo, he didn¡¯t dare express any opinions and directly asked Emily.

    ¡°ording to our Dark Mantle¡¯s observations, a storm seems to be brewing within the Empire. The Kasi Empire is watching us with greedy eyes, and seems to be prepared tounch fierce attacks as soon as His Majesty dies. The chief of the Gryphon Legion won¡¯t make his move immediately, but since you¡¯ve already given your orders to the forest trolls, I think the siege weapons stolen from the McGrady Guild will appear in Valen City before too long.¡±

    ¡°This batch of siege weapons could be what Gryphon Legion chief Bob Ascher is nning to use when attacking the pce. As long as we can discover this batch of siege weapons in their house, we can arrest them before they start their rebellion.¡± Emily exined as she looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°His son rk isn¡¯t in Valen City right now. I want to kill him first!¡± Han Shuo suddenly spoke with a low voice when he finished listening to Emily¡¯s words.

    Emily started when she heard these words. She couldn¡¯t fathom how Han Shuo would know rk and moreover, hold such hatred towards him.

 Chapter 148: A familiar female slave

    Chapter 148: A familiar female ve

    ¡°No matter how your grudge against rk was formed, he is still an earth rider. You shouldn¡¯t moves lightly.¡± Emily couldn¡¯t help but remind Han Shuo anxiously when she saw his desire to kill.

    Nodding with a faint smile, Han Shuoforted Emily, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m not that kind of brash person. I wouldn¡¯t do anything to him without absolute guarantee.¡±

    Emily¡¯s mind was put at ease only after Han Shuo said thus. ¡°I¡¯m not sure whether or not rk is in Valen City right now. I heard that he had returned, but I¡¯ve yet to receive word. If rk really has returned to Valen City, I¡¯ll tell you that Valen City is the Gryphon Legion¡¯s territory. You must be very, very careful.¡±

    ¡°Understood, what should we do next?¡± Han Shuo asked Emily.

    Emily took a fur cape from the seat to the side and wrapped it around herself. She stood up and patted herself down, saying to Han Shuo, ¡°I¡¯ll take you to a ce and see if you can collect any intelligence.¡±

    Emily stood up and was checking herself out in the mirror when Han Shuo suddenly remember the jewels he obtained from the forest trolls. He took out a ne made fromrge red agate and walked tenderly behind Emily,ying the ne over her head and onto her white neck.

    The pure and elegant nape of her neck was like white snow. The strand of faintly sparkling red agate further heightened her beauty, adding a few traces of luxurious opulence to her demeanor.

    Although Emily¡¯s status was noble and she¡¯d seen all sorts of jewelry, the meaning was greatly different when Han Shuo gently ced the red agate ne on her neck. When he put it on her, beautiful lights danced within her eyes. It looked like she liked it very much.

    ¡°You bad little brat, you rather know how to make someone happy!¡± Emily¡¯sughter rang out as she turned back to hug Han Shuo fiercely, giving him a kiss. She then wiped away traces of the kiss from Han Shuo¡¯s lips before walking outside.

    Her expression returned to normal after walking outside and gave orders to Chester, ¡°Go prepare a carriage, we¡¯re going somece.¡±

    ¡°Very happy to be of service.¡± Chester responded respectfully and walked off.

    When Emily and Han Shuo walked out of the hotel, Chester had already readied a carriage. The two of them sat inside while Chester sat outside with the groom. Their journey started out heading for the southern side of Valen City.

    The carriage stopped in front of a spacious mansion after half an hour. There were many sumptuous carriages parked in front of the mansion. Several fierce looking warriors were standing guard with broadswords in hand. Numerous armored guards patrolled the mansion. It looked like security was very tight.

    Emily didn¡¯t say anything and Han Shuo didn¡¯t ask anything either. Emily took out a card when they arrived at the door. The two guards at the door immediately let them through when they saw it and Emily brought the other two into the mansion.

    They passed through a hallway paved with oval stones and arrived in arge hall. The hall was particrly bright as more than ten burning braziers lined the walls. This made the entire hall quite warm, and there were many iron cages scattered throughout the hall. All sorts of male and female ves were inside. Some of the male ves looked tall and muscr, likely for hardbor. Some of the female ves had prettier features and wore very revealing clothing. Their exposed skin was full of temptation.

    Many men and women wearing extravagant clothing were pointing their fingers at and sizing up the ves within the cages. They would asionally pull over a smiling ve trader standing on the side to negotiate prices. There were many wearing military uniforms as well. Judging by the Gryphon patches on their shoulders, it was apparent that they were a part of the Empire¡¯s Gryphon Legion.

    ¡°This is Valen City¡¯srgest ve trading house. The person behind the scenes is the chief of the Gryphon Legion, Bob Ascher. Make note of the guards in this ce. You¡¯ll discover that these guards have strict discipline and it¡¯s obvious that they¡¯re military men. Although they¡¯ve taken off their uniforms, it¡¯s difficult to change the military air about them.¡± Emily pretended to peruse as she exined things to Han Shuo in a low voice.

    Han Shuo started when he heard Emily¡¯s words and asked, shocked, ¡°The Empire has a writtenw that all titled nobles and officers cannot participate in the buying and selling of ves. This Bob Ascher dares act so brazenly?¡±

    ¡°Bob Ascher is the emperor of Valen City. Many know that he¡¯s the person in charge behind the scenes of thergest ve trading house. Even His Majesty knows this, but because Bob Ascher has done so much for the Empire, His Majesty had nned on just letting it slide before Bob Ascher wanted to rebel.¡±

    ¡°But some of his actions are now threatening the Empire¡¯s profit, so we can no longer sit idly by. As long as we can gather evidence from thergest ve trading house of Valen City, we can also use this a means to prosecute Bob Ascher.¡± Emily¡¯s eyes roved around the surroundings as she leisurely exined to Han Shuo.

    Chester was a bit surprised to see Emily¡¯s intimate attitude towards Han Shuo.

    But as a member of the Dark Mantle, Chester naturally understood that sometimes, he¡¯d have to pretend that he hadn¡¯t seen some things. Thus when Emily noticed his attentions, Chester hurriedly looked away. His expression had already gone back to normal by the time he lifted his head, just that there would be hints of surprise and admiration in his eyes when he looked at Han Shuo, even a slight trace of envy.

    ¡°The quality of these ves aren¡¯t much, I¡¯ll show you some better ones. Maybe you¡¯ll be able to select one that you would like as a maid or serving girl.¡± Emily¡¯s voice suddenly raised higher when two guards walked towards them as she tugged Han Shuo in the direction of a small house.

    Emily once again disyed the card when they reached the door, and the guards respectfully let them through after they examined it. ¡°Beautiful madame, I hope you find a ve that satisfies you.¡±

    She chuckled and turned to nod at Han Shuo, saying with a slight smile, ¡°Come in.¡±

    There was a dim hallway inside that was carpeted with a soft, red carpet and ss chandeliers hung high above. Paintings were hung on the walls of the hallway with a guard stationed every ten steps.

    The three of them entered a round auction room after walking for a minute. The auction floor was decorated very opulently. There were regr seats like a movie theater and small rooms for VIP seating. Emily walked to one of the small rooms on the left and conversed a bit with those inside. One of the guards respectfully led her upstairs after a swipe of her crystal card.

    Han Shuo heard riotous calls of prices as soon as he entered. A savage with an exceedingly fierce body was restrained in a cage and emitting roars like a wild animal. The people beneath the stage were raising their signs one after another to bid on the fierce-looking savage.

    ¡°Some nobles like to fight. They send their diators in for private fights, stopping only when one side is dead. Hence they¡¯lle to pick some ves with astonishing capabilities because there are lessplications with ves.¡± Emily exined faintly when she led the two upstairs to the VIP room.

    Han Shuo nodded to express his understanding and saw that there was a sign for bidding when he walked into the small room. He also saw a simple magical apparatus that would disy the desired bid when activated. It was quite convenient.

    Some people have a lofty status or have certain reservations so they don¡¯t wish for people to discover that they¡¯ve appeared in such a ce. This is why these small rooms, that can conceal oneself, and can look out but not in, exist.¡± Emily¡¯s gaze swept alertly across the stage and the people beneath it after they entered.

    ¡°The next character to be auctioned will be familiar to the Valen City guests tonight. She¡¯s the young miss of the Addison family of Valen City. The Addison family has colluded with the Kasi Empire and was found out by the noble chief of the Gryphon Legion. The Addison family was thoroughly exterminated a few days ago and all traitors were executed. The young miss of the Addison family has been branded as a ve status.¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, this feisty miss once had a widely known reputation throughout Valen City. Her breasts have now fully developed and she¡¯s still a virgin. I believe that everyone will be quite interested in this feisty miss of Valen City.¡± A host, wearing a tuxedo, described all this with a smile on stage, perking the interest of those below. He then raised his arm and called out, ¡°Miss Lisa of the Addison family! Oh, little Lisa isn¡¯t a miss anymore, but a female ve that you can enjoy at your leisure about to go home with you. Starting price of three hundred gold coins, the bidding begins!¡±

    A cage descended slowly from the ceiling when his words concluded as Lisa, wearing a ghastly expression and brimming with tears, appeared within Han Shuo¡¯s vision with her very full breasts covered by sexy veils.

 Chapter 149: Sheâ€™s yours

    Chapter 149: She¡¯s yours

    Han Shuo was greatly startled to see Lisa appear inside a cage. His originally wandering gaze became a bit harsh.

    Han Shuo had once borne hatred towards Lisa, but as the two spent more time together, he discovered that she wasn¡¯t as bad as he had originally thought. She¡¯d then protected him whenever she could. All of this had slowly changed Han Shuo¡¯s impression of Lisa.

    Lisa¡¯s eyes were brimming with tears as she was held captive within the cage. Her bright, clear eyes were now dim andckluster, suffused with a sense of helpless despair. This made Han Shuo¡¯s heart ache with pain.

    ¡°Is there some feud between the Addison family and Bob Ascher? Why was the Addison family suddenly destroyed and branded with the tag of traitors?¡± Han Shuo looked coolly around his surroundings and asked Emily.

    Emily had felt that Han Shuo had be a bit on edge when Lisa had appeared, and she couldn¡¯t help but ask when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s words, ¡°You seem to care a lot about this Lisa?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo turned to exin, ¡°Lisa is one of my ssmates in the necromancy major back at the Academy. We¡¯re good friends and she¡¯s helped me quite a few times. I definitely won¡¯t sit idly by now that she¡¯s in dire straits.¡±

    Emily was startled when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s words and then responded, ¡°The Addisons were already on bad terms with Bob Ascher before he wanted to rebel. However, because the Addison family had a certain status within Valen City, Bob Ascher didn¡¯t dare to do anything.¡±

    ¡°But now that Bob Ascher is obviously intent on thoroughly grasping Valen City in his hands, any family that doesn¡¯t answer to him must be wiped out. It looks like the Addison family was one of those unlucky families. From the intelligence gathered by the Dark Mantle has been able to obtain in recent times, Bob Ascher hasmenced his actions using a variety of excuses.

    ¡°Little Lisa¡¯s body is now eye popping, but I must warn you all that she¡¯s also a necromancer. The magic dampening cuffs on her wrists must not be taken off.¡± The organizer on the stage was still describing Lisa.

    The bidders beneath the stage were exceedingly interested in Lisa, and her price increased rapidly. It¡¯d been raised from the original 300 gold coins to over six hundred gold coins, double the original.

    When Bryan had been sold originally to the Academy, he¡¯d only been worth five gold coins. To think that Lisa wouldmand such a high price, more than a hundred times more than Bryan¡¯s price. It looked like people were greatly interested in this renowned Lisa.

    Those beneath the stage were originally participating in the auction, but bids kept sounding out from the boxed seats above towards the end. Lisa¡¯s price kept climbing up from six hundred to seven hundred gold coins.

    Han Shuo watched the proceedings with a cold eye as he suddenly made a move and activated the magical box and keyed in a price of a thousand gold coins. The bid of a thousand gold coins was disyed after the space in front of Han Shuo whirred, causing the noisy hall to immediately quiet down. Everyone¡¯s gazes turned towards Han Shuo¡¯s box in astonishment.

    ¡°She¡¯s just a female ve and isn¡¯t worth a thousand gold coins. Your actions will cause others to take notice of us.¡± It was apparent that Emily didn¡¯t quite understand as she looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°I must save this girl. There¡¯s no point in hemming and hawing and slowly adding on to the price. One high price can cause others to stop in their tracks.¡± Han Shuo said as he looked at Lisa in the cage, lying there as if she were dead.

    Indeed, the bidders, who¡¯d been greatly eager to bid, all stayed their hands with displeasure.

    A female ve for the purposes of pleasure wasn¡¯t worth a thousand gold no matter how they looked at it. Although Lisa¡¯s status within Valen City had once been lofty and thus was of some temptation, a thousand gold coins wasn¡¯t a small sum. Setting aside her status, any other ve of equivalent looks would only be worth fifty gold coins.

    Therefore, when Han Shuo¡¯s high price of a thousand gold coins was ced, the organizer happily mmed down the gavel after calling out three times. ¡°Congrattions to bidder number 83, you only need to swipe your crystal card within the box and transfer a thousand gold into our trading house¡¯s ounts. Little Lisa is all yours.¡±

    To the current Han Shuo, a thousand gold coins wasn¡¯t a big deal at all. His trophies from the Dark Forest in recent times had all been worth tens of thousands of gold coins. Therefore, he didn¡¯t even frown at the thought of a thousand gold coins and took out his crystal card, prepared to swipe it through the slot within the box.

    Emily suddenly reached out her hand and stopped him. She swept the crystal card in his hand to the side and said, ¡°Let me. If we use your card, the name on your ount will be registered in the trading house. Although they will keep your information confidential, it will be easy for Bob Ascher to know your identity if he wanted to investigate you.¡±

    Han Shuo felt that her words made sense and said, ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll transfer a thousand gold coins to your crystal card and you can use a secure card to make the payment.¡±

    Emily actually hadn¡¯t nned on letting Han Shuo do so originally, since a thousand gold coins wasn¡¯t much to her either. However, when Emily was about to pay for Han Shuo, she noticed Chester eyeing them from the side. She finally nodded and epted Han Shuo¡¯s suggestion, transferring a thousand gold coins from his card to hers and then paying for Lisa.

    Some female elf ves and two fox women were auctioned off next, including a very fierce berserker. Han Shuo¡¯s group didn¡¯t make any further moves and watched everything happening around them with cold eyes.

    ¡°We shoulde and canvass this cete at night next time. We shouldn¡¯t walk around since you participated in today¡¯s auction.¡± Emily fully exined everything about the trading house, including things to watch out for, as the auction progressed.

    He nodded and agreed, walking out of the room with Emily and Chester. He was nning on leaving with Lisa when his sharp eyes noticed that someone had entered through the door.

    His body suddenly halted and Han Shuo made a gesture towards Emily, then spoke in a low voice, ¡°You and Chester go take charge of Lisa first, I have something else to attend to.¡±

    Han Shuo quickly left after saying these words and threaded through the crowd withrge strides, abruptly appearing in front of the door and heading towards Lawrence, who¡¯d just appeared. However, two people appeared beside Lawrence before Han Shuo had even drawn close and they took one step forward, staring at Han Shuo alertly.

    Lawrence finally noticed Han Shuo at this moment and looked at him with surprise. He then turned his head and spoke sharply at the two men, finally waving at Han Shuo afterwards.

    Lawrence asked him with great astonishment when Han Shuo drew close to him, ¡°Bryan, what are you doing in Valen City?¡±

    ¡°I had a few things to take care of in this area. What are you doing here?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    His face growing frosty, Lawrence spoke in a cold voice, ¡°Something¡¯s happened to my cousin¡¯s Addison family and now even Lisa¡¯s fallen victim to a plot to make her a ve. I heard that she was being auctioned off here and havee to rescue her.¡±

    Lisa and Lawrence¡¯s family were rted, and it seemed that he was well aware of what had happened to her family. This was why he¡¯d purposefully made the trip from the capital. This also raised Han Shuo¡¯s opinion of him. It would appear that Lawrence was one who valued family.

    Logically speaking, there was a limit to how close cousins would be, not to mention that Bob Ascher gavebeled the Addison family as traitors. Such a crime was enough to cause all rtives to pause, as it would be easy for them to be embroiled as well. For Lawrence to make his way here from such a far distance was enough for Han Shuo to view him with new eyes.

    ¡°You¡¯re toote, Lisa¡¯s already been purchased for a thousand gold coins!¡± Han Shuo looked at Lawrence and said with a slight smile.

    ¡°It must be that old dog Calvert. Lisa¡¯s family and his family have never gotten along. He must¡¯ve been one of the instigators for what happened to Lisa¡¯s family this time. He would certainly be willing to spendrge sums to buy Lisa and take her home to torture.¡± Lawrence¡¯s face darkened and he spoke to the two behind him. ¡°It looks like we¡¯ll have to be the burning and looting sort of robbers today.¡±

    The two behind Lawrence had no expressions on their faces and wore very ordinary, loose clothing. There wasn¡¯t much that could be gleaned from their outfits, but Han Shuo discovered that one was a swordsman and the other a mage after he concentrated a little. However, he couldn¡¯t determine how strong they were.

    ¡°How would I let Lisa be taken by others since I¡¯m here? Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ve got Lisa.¡± Han Shuo could be certain that Lawrence was truly worried about Lisa and spoke with a small smile.

    Lawrence noticeably heaved a sigh of relief when he heard these words and spoke heartfeltly towards Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan, I owe you one!¡±

 Chapter 150: I can help him

    Chapter 150: I can help him

    ¡°You don¡¯t owe me anything. Lisa and I are good friends at school, so I simply did what I should have done.¡± Han Shuo saw that Emily and Chester had walked out with Lisa¡¯s figure, draped in a ck cloth, as they spoke.

    ¡°Let¡¯s leave this area first.¡± Lawrence noticed Emily and Chester¡¯s movements as he followed Han Shuo¡¯s gaze. His eyes lit up as he spoke softly and turned to walk outside.

    A lot procedures needed to be passed before entering the trading house, but it wasn¡¯t so strict when leaving. Han Shuo and Lawrence didn¡¯t meet any resistance as they followed behind Emily and Chester. Emily was escorted by two guards from the trading house and they stayed respectfully when Emily dismissed them at the door.

    She was slightly surprised to see Lawrence appear by the carriage. Han Shuo maintained a calm expression on his face and said to Lawrence, ¡°I made Madame Emily¡¯s acquaintance at your cest time. I¡¯ve been hired by her to take care of some things in Valen City.¡±

    Lawrence seemed to understand some things, but didn¡¯t say much. He shed a friendly smile at Han Shuo and said, ¡°This is between the two of you, so you don¡¯t need to tell me anything. I think we should see how my cousin is doing first.¡±

    He lifted the carriage curtains and the two boys entered. They¡¯d just entered when a weeping Lisa threw herself into Han Shuo¡¯s arms, sobbing her heart out, ¡°Bryan, they killed my entire family. My father, mother, and grandfather are all dead!¡±

    Lisa was heartbreakingly weak at this moment. Han Shuo patted her shoulder lightly and said in a soft voice, ¡°You¡¯re safe now. These people will get what¡¯sing to them.¡±

    She hugged him fiercely, using all the strength in her body, as if wanting to prove that this moment was real. She stuck her pinky in her mouth and bit down on it, finally crying out in pain, ¡°I¡¯m not dreaming! I¡¯m still alive. I want to get my revenge! I¡¯m going to kill those brutal people!¡±

    Lisa had always been a small terror at the Academy, but her entire being seemed to have undergone a change after such a drastic event in her life. The innocence on her face had been reced by hatred, and it seemed like it was the only thing giving her the will to live in this moment.

    ¡°Lisa, just what happened? You must tell me in detail. I¡¯ll obtain revenge for you.¡± Frosty, cold light shot from Lawrence¡¯s eyes as he asked the wailing Lisa in a low voice.

    Lisa finally seemed to realize that there was someone else in this carriage other than Han Shuo. She wiped away the tears on her face and looked at Lawrence, immediately choking up again, ¡°Brother Lawrence, I don¡¯t know what happened either, only that my father said my mother was sick and wanted me to return home to look after her.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯d only just returned when I learned that there might be trouble at home. Mother wasn¡¯t sick and father didn¡¯t let me go home either. The next day, Calvert, that dog of the Gryphon Legion, brought men and rushed into our home. He killed and captured people everywhere. They¡¯re all dead except for me. All dead!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll get revenge for you.¡± Lawrence promised Lisa with a darkened face.

    ¡°Help me kill Calvert! You have to kill him for me!¡± Lisa murmured helplessly, looking at Lawrence first and then fixing her stricken gaze on Han Shuo.

    Her entire family and all her kin had been extinguished in the span of a second. The impact from this stimulus was too much for Lisa. This also made the usually bullying Lisa reveal a helpless side of her that caused others to want to protect her.

    ¡°I¡¯ll help you.¡± Han Shuo was silent for a moment beneath Lisa¡¯s stare, but he finally nodded his head solemnly and promised her.

    ¡°We should thoroughly discuss things first if you want to kill Calvert.¡± Emily suddenly said lowly outside the carriage and then stuck her head in to look at Han Shuo and Lawrence. She said, ¡°We should leave this ce at the very least.¡±

    ¡°Lisa,e with me.¡± Lawrence ducked out of the carriage and then nodded at the two men standing coolly off to the side. The swordsman departed and came back leading a carriage. Lawrence dragged Lisa in with him and the carriage began to move slowly after the groom cracked his whip.

    ¡°Follow him.¡± Han Shuo told Chester outside and then turned to look back at Emily with some apology. ¡°This may conflict with your n some, but I have to do so.¡±

    ¡°I understand. Besides, killing Calvert was our original n anyways. This causes no tangent from our original n, and we¡¯ve gained some additional assistance, no?¡± Emily first smiled slightly and then spoke a bit gravely. ¡°However, although Lawrence is the son of the finance minister, his two followers seem quite strong. In addition, Lawrence seems to be acting a bit weirdly. How did you get to know him? Do you know of his background?¡±

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo hesitated before responding, ¡°Master Candide once told me that Lawrence¡¯s identity wasplex. He said that I maynd in trouble if I grow too close with him. However, I¡¯ve been in contact with Lawrence for a while and feel that this fellow is quite alright.¡±

    ¡°Candide that old fox! If he knows of Lawrence¡¯s identity and didn¡¯t tell you, that means that Lawrence¡¯s identity is really not that simple. It looks like I have some new questions to ask my brother.¡± Emily spoke with a furrowed brow and was a bit perplexed.

    The carriage that Lawrence was in suddenly stopped and he stuck his head out. He opened his mouth when the carriage that Han Shuo and Emily were level with his own, ¡°Bryan, I think this matter has no direct rtion with Madame Emily. If you¡¯re thinking of her behalf, you should try to make sure she¡¯s not embroiled in this.¡±

    Han Shuo nked momentarily and exchanged nces with Emily within the carriage. Emily frowned and mused, before speaking with Han Shuo, ¡°Go with them and see what the preparations are. Come find me at the rally point afterwards. It¡¯ll be a good time for me to go back and investigate Lawrence.¡±

    Nodding to Emily, Han Shuo alighted from Emily¡¯s carriage and walked towards Lawrence, saying with a smile, ¡°Your considerations are quite thorough, it¡¯s true that there¡¯s no need to involve Madame Emily.¡±

    ¡°My apologies Madame Emily, but you know I¡¯m doing this for your own good. The Aschers don¡¯t fear anyone in Valen City, so there are some things that you won¡¯t be able to be involved with, even with your status.¡± Lawrence called out softly to Emily¡¯s carriage and then ordered those in front of him, ¡°Let¡¯s go.¡±

    When Han Shuo entered the carriage, he noted that Lisa seemed to have calmed down after Lawrence¡¯s consolement. Lawrence didn¡¯t say much and mused on certain things with a darkened face. Han Shuo didn¡¯t know how tofort Lisa, so he remained silent along the way.

    The carriage stopped in front of a house and Lawrence said gently to Lisa, ¡°You go and rest in that house, Bryan and I will be going out to take care of a few things and will return soon. Don¡¯t worry, you¡¯ll be very safe inside the house.¡±

    Having suffered through such a painful disaster, Lisa was much more malleable than usual. She nodded docilely and was helped down by Lawrence. Lawrence knocked on the door, causing a person to walk out. This person was hidden in the shadows, and Han Shuo immediately discovered that he was the expert that had once spied on rk.

    ¡°Escort her in and tell those inside to protect her. You¡¯ll being with me.¡± Lawrence returned back to the carriage after giving his orders, with the man walking back outside after Lisa went in. He sat down in front of Han Shuo and Lawrence without saying a word.

    Han Shuo took a good look at him as they sat face to face. He discovered that this man looked ordinary, and there was nothing overly special about his face at all. However, it was enough to prove that his strength wasn¡¯t ordinary given that he could tail earth rider rk without being discovered.

    ¡°His name is Lucky. He¡¯s an assassin. The two with the groom outside are senior swordsman Divac and earth major adept mage Ad. We¡¯re going to go kill Calvert now.¡± Lawrence first introduce his men to Han Shuo and then suddenly announced that they were going to go kill Calvert.

    ¡°What sort of n do you have?¡± Han Shuo was silent at first and then spoke up in inquiry.

    ¡°Calvert is the loyal dog of Chief Ascher of the Gryphon Legion and is in charge of distribution of rations within Valen City. He¡¯s also an officer in the Gryphon Legion and is thirty or forty years old. He only had one son called Caernand who once tried to rape Lisa, but Lisa chopped off his manhood instead. Thus, the two families formed an irresolvable feud. As a senior knight, Calvert has scores of servants at home. Many of them are part of the Gryphon Legion and aren¡¯t too hard to take care of.¡± Lawrence slowly exined all of this, which proved that he must have thoroughly investigated him prior to all this.

    ¡°I happened to receive news that rk has already returned to Valen City and seems to have arrived at Calvert¡¯s home, seeming to bring some sort of instructions from his father.¡± Lucky, who¡¯d remained silent until now, suddenly spoke up at this time.

    Shock appearing on Lawrence¡¯s face, his brow furrowed tight. Han Shuo¡¯s heart also leapt as a thick killing intent appeared on his face.

    Lawrence¡¯s hesitant expression exined that he¡¯d be uncertain with rk¡¯s appearance. However, having entered the true demon realm, plus the aid of the little skeleton and necromancy magic, Han Shuo was willing to go head to head with rk. However, he too wasn¡¯t certain if he could beat an earth rider, so he remained silent.

    ¡°Uncle Lucky, how confident would you be in killing rk if you made a move?¡± Lawrence opened his mouth to ask the assassin Lucky after remaining silent, waiting for an answer.

    ¡°I¡¯ve roughly fifty percent certainty.¡± Lucky replied indifferently.

    Nodding, Lawrence said, ¡°Alright, then you make the first move. I trust that with your strength, you¡¯ll be able to retreat safely even if you don¡¯t seed. We can then judge based off rk¡¯s condition to see if we need to make a move as well.¡±

    ¡°Mm, I think there¡¯s no way that rk will be able to find me if I want to leave!¡± Lucky responded.

    ¡°I think if I coordinate with Mr. Lucky, I¡¯ll be able to increase the odds by thirty percent.¡± Han Shuo looked at Lucky and suddenly spoke.

    ¡°Bryan, are you certain you won¡¯t be discovered and won¡¯t affect Uncle Lucky?¡± Lawrence¡¯s face was grave as he looked solemnly at Han Shuo.

    ¡°I feel that my inclusion will bring him aid. If you believe in me, I¡¯d like to make a move with him.¡± Han Shuo said seriously as he looked back at Lawrence.

    ¡°Alright, Uncle Lucky, take him with you. Give up halfway through if things won¡¯t do. We can always find another opportunity.¡± Lawrence thought for a moment and spoke to the assassin.

    ¡°Alright!¡± Lucky responded and looked at Han Shuo. ¡°We¡¯ll leave immediately. If Calvert¡¯s house catches on fireter, that means the mission¡¯s a go and you cane charging in. Otherwise, don¡¯te near us.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I know what to do. Be careful.¡± Lawrence nodded.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go.¡± Lucky looked at Han Shuo and jumped down softly from the carriage. He jumped up andnded on a roof that was three meters up without making a sound.

    Han Shuo took a deep breath in and concentrated, focusing his magical yuan to employ the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡± to take a great leap as well. His body flew out in midair as he jumped even higher than Lucky, alsonding silently beside the assassin.

    ¡°Eh!¡± Lucky looked back at Han Shuo in surprise as the corners of his indifferent face tugged upwards. He said faintly, ¡°Not bad, perhaps you really can assist me.¡±

    The old assassin didn¡¯t look at Han Shuo afterwards as his body started threading through the roofs agilely, seeming to glide through them like a wild ghost, making Han Shuo greatly admire his agility.

    However, having already reached the true demon realm, Han Shuo¡¯s agility and pliability were just as extraordinary. Making use of his supernatural five senses, he followed closely behind Lucky and didn¡¯t fall behind at all.

 Chapter 151: One thing after another

    Chapter 151: One thing after another

    Han Shuo only got to experience the old assassin Lucky¡¯s skill after the two flew to Calvert¡¯s house. A decent assassin would maintain his position before he made a move on his target. He would only allow his target to feel his presence in the moment that he made his move.

    Lucky was quite professional in this regard. He first crouched on the roof after entering Calvert¡¯s home, looking out over the entire building, then pointing out the use of each room to Han Shuo. He clearly exined which was the living room, which was the master bedroom, as well as the bathrooms.

    It looked like Lucky was very well versed in all architectural styles, and must have given quite a bit of thought to this. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have been able to obtain so much information after just ncing at theyout shortly after arriving here.

    Lucky changed into a grey robe that matched the color of the walls. When he slowly walked along the wall, no one detected any disturbance, even as the bright rays of the moon rained down.

    Han Shuo took out a simr robe beneath Lucky¡¯s gaze and followed behind Lucky, moving towards the roof of the brightly lit living room.

    Han Shuo¡¯s breathing became measured and steady as they neared the living room, and the rate of his heartbeat also suddenly became quite slow, matching the pace of his breaths. Even the heat emanating from his body began to decrease as they drew near the living room. When they got close enough, he could, at the stage, be mistaken for a shingle on the roof when he wasn¡¯t moving.

    Lucky was unable to conceal his body as well as Han Shuo had done even after taking a pill. When he finally reached the top of the roof, Lucky looked at Han Shuo with disbelief as he was incredibly surprised by Han Shuo¡¯s control over his body.

    Since reaching the true demon stage, Han Shuo could feel that his body was indeed more agile and deft than before. He could adjust his body condition to all sorts of situations by making his own adjustments, making it very easy for him to do something like concealing his presence.

    Because rk would possibly be in the living room, the two didn¡¯t dare lift the tiles of the roof to look inside. They ced their cheeks on top of the roof and attempted to listen in on the conversation inside.

    ¡°Alright, let¡¯s do it like this. Keep your wits about youtely, Lawrence seems to have been spotted in Valen City, so he may try to make trouble or you.¡± rk¡¯s voice rang out as he reminded Calvert to be careful.

    ¡°Lawrence is just the son of the finance minister. Isn¡¯t he courting death if hees to find me in Valen City?¡± Calvert didn¡¯t mind at all as his heartyughter rang out like a bell.

    ¡°Uncle Calvert, Lawrence¡¯s identity isn¡¯t that simple. Anyways, you must always be on guard. My father will send people over to protect you in two days.¡± rk reminded Calvert.

    ¡°I¡¯ve caused the chief to worry. Heh, it¡¯s gettingte, why don¡¯t you rest here tonight? I¡¯ve prepared special entertainment for you.¡± Calvert chuckled.

    ¡°That¡¯s alright, thank you uncle. However, some strangers have appeared in Valen Citytely and I have a lot of things to take care of. I won¡¯t be staying here tonight.¡± rk made his excuses and seemed ready to leave.

    His ear lifting away from the roof tiles, Han Shuo stood up and threw a nce at Lucky. The two left with a sound and quickly moved away from the manor.

    Lucky had decided to change the n since rk was going to leave and wanted to get rid of him while he was traveling. He would have to pass through a certain street after leaving Calvert¡¯s house. There were all sorts of buildings and several leafy trees on that street, making for a good ce to make a move no matter what direction they came from.

    ¡°You hide and wait in a tree, pick the best timing after I make my move to attack rk.¡± Lucky instructed and then crouched on top of a nearby wall, as if he was a gecko, melding into the night.

    Lucky had no way of being able to cue when was good time to make a move. Lucky could only let Han Shuo attempt to grasp that critical moment himself.

    A horse carriage left Calvert¡¯s house after a while, the clopping sound of the horse¡¯s hooves appeared quite ear piercing. The groom was a muscr guard and he waved the whip in his hand to spur on the horse. When the carriage passed by where Lucky was concealed, a figure shed out of the corner of concealment so quickly, that it was as if it had no weight, and stuck itself to the bottom of the carriage.

    Han Shuo clearly saw all of this from his vantage point in the distance. He took in a deep breath when he saw the carriage approaching the big tree he was hidden in. Holding it in and watching things closely, he tightening his grasp on the Demonyer Edge.

    A cracking sound erupted from the bottom of the carriage at that moment as the carriage exploded into pieces. Wood shards, sand, and dust flew everywhere as milky-white sword aura shot up two meters into the air, ring out over the now destroyed carriage. The exploding sword aura was like a bristling porcupine, and Lucky had the body of the porcupine within the spikes of the sword aura.

    At this time, Han Shuo discovered that Lucky was an assassin who also happened to be a sword master. The milky-white sword aura shed by and vanished like it had never appeared. The pieces of the carriage were shattered andy all over the ground. One person within the carriage was full of bloody holes and had died instantly, whereas the groom at the front of the carriage was running for his life.

    Han Shuo had felt extraordinarily surprised in the beginning, thinking that Lucky had seeded so quickly. However, he realized that the person in the carriage waspletely foreign to him when he looked at the corpse. It wasn¡¯t rk at all. The scattered footsteps swiftly approaching from all directions immediately made Han Shuo realize the severity of the situation.

    ¡°We got yed, retreat!¡± Han Shuo immediately called out from the treetop and leapt down from the thick growth.

    Lucky¡¯s expression remained calm as he scanned the surroundings, calling back softly, ¡°We¡¯ll split up and go through the surrounding houses.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and didn¡¯t say much, leaping into the air andnding on a roof. When he looked back, he saw that Lucky had already disappeared miraculously.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart became even calmer at this time as he coolly looked around and noticed that several soldiers had appeared on the streets to the front and back. These men were charging down on the back of horses, and several had drawn back on their bows to send arrows shooting towards him.

    rk, with an easy expression on his face, walked out from the direction of Calvert¡¯s house with another middle-aged knight that was well built. Their gazesnded on Han Shuo as they spurred on the battlesteeds beneath them toe charging over.

    There were many houses in the surroundings, but when Han Shuo concentrated and listened, he noticed that there didn¡¯t seem to be anyone living in them. He didn¡¯t know if they¡¯d been moved beforehand. It was only now that he was a bit regretful that he hadn¡¯t used his extremely sensitive senses to investigate his surroundings. He¡¯d been too focused on killing rk and hadn¡¯t thoroughly probed the details.

    Han Shuo dodged nimbly when the arrows came shooting over, he noticed many more soldiers were approaching. He weighed things up and cast the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heaven¡±, sending himself shooting into the air and away like a hawk.

    The numerous arrows whistled over and were batted away by the Demonyer Edge. He¡¯d flown out of the encirclement in the blink of an eye and alighted on arge tree in the distance.

    Although Han Shuo wasn¡¯t that well versed in the Art yet, he had no problem simply flying through the air. It was because of this Art that he could break free from the soldiers.

    In addition, Han Shuo discovered thatpared to the levitation spells that archmages could cast in this world, the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡± was much more advanced. None of the levitation spells that the archmages could cast even came close to his Art¡¯s speed and maneuverability.

    He took a deep breath in and took stock of his surroundings, discovering that rk had almost a hundred soldiers with him. These people were conducting a carpet style search, going through each room looking for Lucky. They gave up hunting down Han Shuo after he left and was focused on finding Lucky.

    Just as Han Shuo started worrying for Lucky, a figure, using a levitation spell, quickly approached from the distance. The moon was covered by a cloud of dark mist in a second and the already dim sky immediately darkened. When the figure drew close, it took out a mage staff, made of white bone from its spacious sleeves and chanted out a spell in a low voice.

    Suddenly, numerous skeletal, zombie, and ghoul warriors, as well as gargoyles and hate warriors appeared, charging towards the soldiers.

    Another low chant rang out as bone arrows flew wildly through the air and crashed into the soldiers, making them cry out in agony.

    ¡°Oh my gosh, it¡¯s an archmage level necromancer!¡± Calvert suddenly cried out with shock.

    Han Shuo was also greatly surprised as he fixed an ardent gaze on the necromancer that had appeared in the air, absolutely taken aback by the destructiveness of the necromancy magic.

 Chapter 152: I only need one chance to kill you!

    Chapter 152: I only need one chance to kill you!

    Necromancers were few to begin with, as it was apparent from the numbers of archmages specializing in necromancy magic. This was why the necromancy magic elicited so much attention when it actually appeared.

    Han Shuo had only escaped from that area when he activated the Art. He hesitated when this development urred and decided to move across the roofs of the nearby houses, going back to where he¡¯d started.

    The dark creatures that the necromancer had summoned from the other dimension greatly impacted the soldiers who were attempting to chase after Lucky. The enormous hate warriors and gargoyles flying in formation were particrly destructive.

    The enormous and incredibly powerful hate warriors were able to pound a soldier into meat paste with a swing of its iron club, whereas the agile gargoyles were equally lethal when they came swooping down with their iron ws.

    ¡°Damn it, I¡¯ll kill him myself!¡± rk roared out angrily and whipped his battlesteed into action. A spear appeared in his hand as he charged towards the necromancer.

    Thanks to the coordination of the galloping battlesteed and the sweeping spear, none of the skeletal and zombie warriors were obstacles in his path. Knights made use of the charging force of their battlesteeds to enhance their own battle strength. Thus, when rk and the battlesteed charged as one, the scattered dark creatures couldn¡¯t stop him at all.

    Because of the appearance of an archmage level necromancer at this time, the soldiers on the side were busily fending off the summoned creatures and couldn¡¯t assist rk. Senior knight Calvert stayed where he was and was busily directed his troops. When these highly trained soldiers finally calmed down to coolly battle the summoned creatures, rows and rows of skeletal and zombie warriors began to fall down.

    Although the mental strength of the archmage necromancer was colossal, the numbers of his summoned creatures couldn¡¯tpete with the number of soldiers here. The ghouls and skeletal warriors in particr were of limited use in this type of battle situation, and were often destroyed by a single stab from a Gryphon Legion soldier.

    However, the enormous hate warriors and gargoyles howling through the darkness were still quite fierce, and had killed quite a few soldiers in the blink of an eye. It was a pity that there were only five hate warriors, and six or seven gargoyles. More than ten Gryphon Legion soldiers also surrounded each hate warrior.

    Another low chant emitted from the necromancer¡¯s mouth as two fallen hate warriors suddenly exploded violently. The two ¡°Corpse Explosion¡± spells immediately caused scores of Gryphon Legion soldiers to die with agonized howls.

    When the necromancer opened his mouth to chant the next spell, rk, on the back of a battlesteed, had already charged in front of him. The spear in his hand suddenly red with a milky-white aura, and rk flew into the air using the momentum from the battlesteed. He shot towards the necromancer, floating in midair, like lightning.

    An enormous white skeleton abruptly materialized in mid air, forming a shield of white bone with mind boggling speed. The white bone shield was three meters tall and two meters wide,pletely blocking the way in front of the necromancer. The clean, eerily sparkling white bones didn¡¯t leave any gaps between them as they came together. Some sharp bone shards were even in front of the shield as reverse spikes. The shape looked very odd.

    rk¡¯s concentrated blow smashed against the white bone shield. Even such a highly advanced shield like this one started splintering from rk¡¯s violent thrust, with bone shards flying randomly where it had been struck by rk¡¯s spear.

    The necromancer grunted quietly and floated away in retreat like a ghost. It looked like he had also realized that rk would be a tough opponent to face and nned on putting some distance between them. rk¡¯s body moved forward with the momentum from his charge as hended on a roof, putting his spear away and swapping it out for a sword. He moved quickly over the roofs and purused the necromancer fixedly.

    Another dark mist was released as the retreating necromancer¡¯s body shed through the dark mist, vanishing without a trace. Three bone spears came hurtling through the empty air, aiming straight for rk. rk also finally pinned down the necromancer¡¯s location after the three bone spears appeared.

    At the same time, Han Shuo¡¯s sharp eyes caught slight movement from a piece of protruding rock on one of the roofs that rk was moving towards. This made Han Shuo¡¯s heart jump and his body abruptly half-crouching to conceal himself on another roof.

    The Demonyer Edge had soundlessly approached rk ording to Han Shuo¡¯s wishes.

    Snorting coldly, rk didn¡¯t halt his momentum as he suddenly changed direction halfway, the longsword in his hand suddenly flicked upwards and shed through the bone spear that he hadn¡¯t avoided. At this time, rk¡¯s body finally approached the protruding boulder as a strand of cold light suddenly shot out of of the rock-like structure and Lucky appeared, wrapped in a gray robe.

    rk hadn¡¯t expected an ambush after just batting away the necromancer¡¯s bone spear. His fighting aura was halfway through pulling together when he raised his sword to block the hit. A metallic ng rang through the night as rk¡¯s body was flung downwards from the roof.

    As rk descended, a severe whistling sounded out as a thin strand of purple me appeared in mid air, ramming into the rk¡¯s back and sinking into his waist, vanishing within rk¡¯s body.

    A ghastly scream emitted from rk¡¯s mouth. As his body mmed into the ground, his entire body became consumed in purple mes. Han Shuo¡¯s eerie figure flew in front of rk, he looked coldly at rk suffering as the purple mes consumed him. He sent out a mental summons and the Demonyer Edge exploded out of rk¡¯s chest and vanished into Han Shuo¡¯s palm without a drop of blood.

    ¡°It¡¯s, it¡¯s you?¡± The spirit of extreme extreme cold was invading rk¡¯s organs, and his body had been heavily damaged by the Demonyer Edge. When he saw Han Shuo reveal himself and tug off his mask, rk spat out these words with difficulty as his teeth chattered with disbelief.

    ¡°That¡¯s right, it¡¯s me. You tried and failed to kill me twice, but I only needed one chance to kill you.¡± Han Shuo said coolly and waved his right hand around fiercely, slowly circting the ¡°cial Mystical Spellfire¡±. A flower of red me entered rk¡¯s body. His internal organs had been frozen solid and rk had been about to die when he was thawed out by the me and turned into a bloody puddle. The speed of change was unbelievably fast.

    Three bone spears appeared out of nowhere again and targeted Han Shuo. Their whistling noises startled Han Shuo as he leapt upwards, shing down with his Demonyer Edge and destroyed one of the bone spears. Han Shuo shouted out to Lucky in the distance, ¡°Damn it, why is he attacking me as well?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know him.¡± Lucky responded and evaded like lightning, because the necromancer had attacked Lucky as well.

    So it wasn¡¯t one of their people. Han Shuo was surprised and hastily escaped outside. When the necromancer saw Han Shuo escape, he actually came after Han Shuo and pursued him doggedly. The appearance of this necromancer was a bit odd. He wasn¡¯t on Lawrence¡¯s side and this greatly confused Han Shuo, making him uncertain as to which side he belonged to.

    Now that rk was dead, Han Shuo saw that Lucky had made himself invisible again and was sneaking towards Calvert. It looked like he was nning on taking care of Calvert as well. As for his colleague, Han Shuo didn¡¯t know anything about him at all, just that he had his sights set on Han Shuo. Han Shuo didn¡¯t know whether tough or cry, but he knew that he didn¡¯t want to be further entangled by him as he fled for his life at his top speed.

    When Han Shuo was a few hundred meters away from the Calvert house, his amazing vision picked up Lawrence¡¯s carriage in the distance. Overjoyed, he made quickly in that direction as the necromancer following Han Shuo summoned a few gargoyles to tail him. It was only when Han Shuo appeared next to the carriage that the necromancer abruptly retreated with his gargoyles.

    ¡°Bryan, what¡¯s going on? There was no signal from you guys, but everything¡¯s a chaotic mess over there.¡± Lawrence immediately poked his head out of the carriage when he saw Han Shuo and anxiously asked for a status update.

    ¡°Don¡¯t mention it. Things have been really odd tonight. Lucky and I don¡¯t know what happened as our movement was mysteriously revealed to rk and we were almost captured. An archmage level necromancer suddenly appeared and attacked rk and them, and then attacked us as well. I have no idea what¡¯s going on.¡± Han Shuoined.

    ¡°Then what of Uncle Lucky, and is rk dead?¡± Lawrence asked again.

    ¡°Mister Lucky is making his way towards Calvert and seemed to want to take him out as well. Mm, rk is done for, you don¡¯t need to worry about him.¡± Han Shuo responded.

    Lawrence couldn¡¯t hide the glee in his expression as heughed with satisfaction, ¡°Dead, he¡¯s dead! Valen City will be in chaos now!¡±

 Chapter 153: An identity to be cautious of

    Chapter 153: An identity to be cautious of

    When Lawrence spoke thus, the expression on his face was very bizarre. It was a slightly manic one that seemed anxious to see the world plunged into disorder.

    ¡°Bryan, I¡¯m going to stay in Valen City for now. You cane find me in the house we dropped Lisa off in. Where can I find you if I need?¡± Lawrence was in a great mood as he turned his head to look at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was silent for a moment and then told Lawrence the address of Emily¡¯s hotel, leaving quickly afterwards and not paying attention to anything that happened after.

    The hotel that Emily was staying in wasn¡¯t one of the Dark Mantle strongholds, thus Han Shuo wasn¡¯t afraid of Lawrence finding his way there. When Han Shuo made his way back to the Dark Mantle stronghold, metallic horse hooves clopped endlessly on the path to Calvert¡¯s house. It looked like rk¡¯s death had indeed had a great impact on the entirety of Valen City.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t linger here at this moment and didn¡¯t care to find out whether or not Lucky had seeded in eliminating Calvert. He masked his traces as he swiftly made his way to the Dark Mantle stronghold.

    He easily found Emily after reaching the stronghold. When she saw him, she waved her hand and dismissed Chester. Her beautiful face was grave as she said to Han Shuo, ¡°I know of Lawrence¡¯s identity.¡±

    She was a senior executive of the Dark Mantle alright. Han Shuo looked happily at Emily and said enthusiastically, ¡°Wonderful, just who is that guy? His status seems quite high!¡±

    ¡°You! You better mind your tone andnguage when you interact with him in the future. This person could have a drastic impact on you.¡± Emily red huffily at Han Shuo and then whispered an incantation. A boundary formed within the room and enclosed Han Shuo and Emily within it.

    ¡°The members outside won¡¯t hear my words when this boundary is in effect.¡± Emily said gravely.

    Han Shou was quite surprised to see Emily take such precautions. He asked a bit anxiously, ¡°Alright, stop ying it up, just who is Lawrence?¡±

    Taking a deep breath in, Emily sighed lightly and said, ¡°He should be the third prince.¡±

    Starting in fright, Han Shuo looked at Emily with some incredulity. ¡°You¡¯re joking! The king only has two sons. Every citizen of the Lancelot Empire knows of this. How could there be a third prince? Besides, everyone knows that Lawrence is obviously the son of the finance minister, how could he possibly be the third prince?!¡±

    ¡°I mean it.¡± Emily reached out a hand to pinch Han Shuo when she saw that he didn¡¯t believe her. She exined, ¡°This is actually one of the royal family¡¯s scandals. The finance minister, Eevee, has some problems in that area, and can only look at his beautiful wife, Alice. Eevee¡¯s rtionship with the king is quite good, and the king met Alice at one of Eevee¡¯s private banquets. The king was conquered by Alice¡¯s beautiful looks, and the two finally walked together because Eevee was functioning inadequately in addition to the king making purposeful moves.¡±

    ¡°Eevee detected this because Alice became pregnant. The king himself then put in an appearance and exined the matter to Eevee. Since the deed had been done, and the king was still the king in the end, and Eevee knew that he couldn¡¯t say anything to Alice and thus silently epted this.¡±

    ¡°Because the fallout from this matter would have been too severe, both sides have concealed it until now. Those who truly hold power within the capital have some sort of understanding towards this matter, but no one dares to talk about it openly that Lawrence is the son of the king and Alice. Lawrence has been raised in the care of his ambitious mother since birth, teaching him the ts of ruling and the knowledge he should know when controlling a kingdom.¡±

    ¡°Lawrence knew of his status since young, but his potential is extraordinary and he has umon social graces, so he has a good rtionship with even his adoptive father. It¡¯s a pity that due to his illegitimate status, he can¡¯t enter the royal family. The king also feels quite guilty about this and thus treats Lawrence very well. He often meets with Lawrence privately to express his affection, and it¡¯s rumored that the king is very satisfied with Lawrence as well.¡±

    ¡°Of the other two princes, one of them is fierce and general material, the other is extremely crafty, but is wishy washy about making decisions. It looks like neither of them are ruler material. Because the king¡¯s health is starting to decline, he too may feel that he doesn¡¯t have much time left and thus has been walking closer to Lawrencetely. It¡¯s been said that the king has the desire to reveal Lawrence¡¯s identity and have him inherit the throne.¡±

    ¡°However, the mothers of the other two princes hold great power within the Empire. If the king acts rashly, he¡¯ll lose control of the situation and thus hasn¡¯t made a move yet. As the king bes weaker and weaker, a storm is starting to brew within the Empire. That old fox Candide doesn¡¯t want you too close to Lawrence, likely because he¡¯s also worried that Lawrence¡¯s identity will affect your future path.¡±

    These words had an extreme impact on Han Shuo. He¡¯d never thought that Lawrence would have such a lofty identity. If all went smoothly, then he could absolutely be the next king of the Empire and hold all of Lancelot in his hand, deciding the fate of anyone within the Empire.

    Emily understood that her words had had a huge impact on Han Shuo when she saw him take a breath in, his eyes continuously dancing. When she saw that he had sunk into deep thought, she didn¡¯t disturb him and only stood there, looking at him, waiting for Han Shuo to sort out his thoughts.

    After a while, Han Shuo nodded and said with a smile to Emily, ¡°Alright, I understand the particrs of this matter now. Don¡¯t worry, I know how to handle my rtionship with Lawrence.¡±

    ¡°Our Dark Mantle has never intervened in theplex situation of the power struggle within the royal family, and simply takes orders from the king. We normally don¡¯t get involved before the situation has cleared up and the king has given definitive orders. The fact that that old fox would give you a subtle hint after your first mission means that he values you greatly.¡±

    ¡°He also means the best for you. The more you know about this matter, the more disadvantageous it is for you. I understand you too well and know your strength and ambitions. This is why I¡¯ve told you such a highly ssified matter. As for how to grasp the situation, I leave that to you.¡± Emily stared at Han Shuo as she continued exining.

    ¡°I know you mean well. Heh heh, I know what to do. Oh, I forgot to tell you. I killed rk. Valen City should be engulfed in chaos by now.¡± Han Shuo smiled faintly at Emily.

    It was Emily¡¯s turn to have shock written on her face after she heard these words. She looked at Han Shuo with incredulity, asking with extreme shock, ¡°What, what did you say? You said you killed rk?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo said firmly, ¡°Yes, I killed rk, but someone helped me with it and I only did it through an ambush. Don¡¯t be too surprised.¡±

    Breathing out slightly, Emily was still quite surprised. She shook her head and said, ¡°We¡¯ve investigated rk¡¯s strength and he¡¯s a solid earth rider. He reached this level at such a young age. His potential is extraordinary, and to think that he would die so easily after being ambushed by you. It looks like you¡¯re keeping quite a few things from me.¡±

    ¡°No, I¡¯m really not hiding anything from you. Just that an archmage necromancer appeared halfway through, and my colleague helped us with rk. We¡¯ve received great help from his strength, otherwise we would¡¯ve never seeded.¡± Han Shuo smiled wryly and quickly summarized what had happened.

    Emily¡¯s expression grew even graver after she finished listening to Han Shuo. She murmured, ¡°Necromancers are rare enough already, an archmage necromancer is like the feather of a phoenix or the scale of a dragon. I wonder which faction this necromancer belongs to?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll need you to investigate that.¡± Han Shuo smiled.

    ¡°Come and make a trip with me, we need to find something.¡± Emily pondered for a bit and then wrapped herself with a nearby fur.

    ¡°What are we doing?¡± Han Shuo walked up to Emily and tenderly adjusted a corner of her clothing.

    Smiling coyly at Han Shuo, Emily cackled like a little girl nning on ying a prank. ¡°rk¡¯s just died, so the entire Valen City must be in an uproar right now. The Gryphon Legion must be in a busy panic right now and searching through the entire city for you two. What we need to do is stir the muddy the waters and make things even more confusing.¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, that¡¯s wonderful. I find that I like doing bad things. Perhaps I was a killer or an arsonist in my past life.¡± Han Shuo smiled faintly.

    ¡°You¡¯re also quite a viin in this life.¡± Emily rolled her eyes at Han Shuo, taking down the boundary and walking outside together.

 Chapter 154: Why bother so much?

    Chapter 154: Why bother so much?

    Within the span of a few short months, of Bob Ascher¡¯s two sons one had mysteriously gone missing and the other was killed oin the streets. This was simply too great of a shock to him, particrly because rk had been the son that he¡¯d valued more and ced the most hope in. To have him be killed by others in Valen City made him go utterly crazy.

    This night in Valen City was destined to be a chaotic time. All of the Gryphon Legion had been summoned and were conducting a carpet style search for all suspicious personnels. Because of their chief¡¯s explosive rage, all the ordinary soldiers within the Legion all held equally poor tempers. Any unfamiliar faces or merchants would be beaten viciously if they gave the slightest hint of not cooperating.

    Metal hooves galloped over the streets as citizens, sleeping soundly in the middle of the night, were rudely awakened. Even the symbol of the Gryphon Legion, a troop of gryphons, soared through the night skies of Valen City on patrol. Everyone was as if they were confronting a great enemy, and all thought that the Kasi Empire had invaded in the night.

    The gryphons in the sky were ck dots as their strange cries reverberated through people¡¯s eardrums. They flew from the west side of the city to the south. Then flew from the south to the north. They wouldnd and search with the soldiers on the ground whenever they saw something out of the ordinary.

    ¡°So these are gryphons. They¡¯re truly big alright.¡± Han Shuo stood behind arge tree near Bob Ascher¡¯s ve trading house and murmured to himself as he inspected the gryphons.

    ¡°That¡¯s right, the gryphons are a very fierce flying species. A single gryphon by itself can rip apart ordinary magical creatures. The king values old Bob so much and doesn¡¯t dare make a move even though he knows that he wants to rebel inrge part because of this Gryphon Legion.¡± Emily huffed lightly and shivered a bit as she spoke.

    The water that had umted on the streets had already frozen into thick sheets of ice in this harsh winter night. Icicles from the edge of the roofs, glinting with cold as the severe cold wind came howling over. As a mage, it made sense that Emily would find herself cold.

    Sucking a breath in, Han Shuo¡¯s right hand sped Emily¡¯s smooth, small hand as he circted his magical yuan. Han Shuo¡¯s right hand was like a small furnace as he brought warmth to Emily.

    ¡°You¡¯re a necromancer and also have an umon martial arts technique, but why can you also use fire magic, and deploy it so adeptly? It¡¯s like you can adjust the temperature ording to your wishes. How are you doing it?¡± Emily¡¯s charming eyes sparkled as she fixed them on Han Shuo, pouting as she admonished him.

    ¡°This is actually one of the techniques I¡¯m training in, you don¡¯t need to be that surprised.¡± Han Shuo shrugged his shoulders and responded honestly to Emily.

    It was a pity that Emily was obviously not having any of Han Shuo¡¯s exnations. She didn¡¯t keep asking however, but just spoke with a smile, ¡°Alright, alright. I¡¯ll discover all your secrets one day. Um, your mysteriousness is like a poison to me. The more I want to know about you, the more mysterious that I find you are.¡±

    ¡°Heh, don¡¯t be boy crazy. Let¡¯s go, let¡¯s go.¡± Han Shuo stretched out his hand with a smile and patted Emily¡¯s round butt, urging her to move along.

    The two hadn¡¯t brought Chester along with them this time. When they approached the ve trading house where Lisa had been auctioned offst time, Han Shuo released a dark mist magic and surrounded the structure, enveloping it with darkness.

    ¡°Heh heh, your grasp of necromancy magic isn¡¯t bad at all now.¡± Emily chuckled lowly. She deployed the archmage levitation spell and her body slowly flew through the air,nding on top of the five meter tall wall. She opened her mouth again, ¡°I entangled the rope inside, you can climb over using it.¡±

    ¡°Why go to so much trouble!¡± Han Shuo smiled and suddenly leapt upwards, his speed much faster than Emily¡¯s levitation spell as he suddenly found his footing next to Emily.

    Emily¡¯s body stiffened as she looked at Han Shuo like she¡¯d seen a ghost in broad daylight. A strange light danced in her beautiful eyes as she threw herself into Han Shuo¡¯s arms, using all the strength in her body to pummel Han Shuo¡¯s chest. She yelled at him, seemingly angry and happy. ¡°You viin! You reached the archmage realm a long time ago, but still kept lying to me. I¡¯m going to beat you to death! You jerk, jerk!¡±

    Han Shuo heard some noises traveling from the distance and didn¡¯t dare remain at a high vantage point for fear of attracting attention. He suddenly grabbed Emily and flew down, hiding in a corner of the ve trading house, sping her small hand afterwards, exining with a wry smile, ¡°I didn¡¯t lie to you, this is a method that¡¯s simr to the levitation spell and is one of the techniques that I¡¯m training in. It has nothing to do with magic. Think carefully, did you sense any magic pulses from me earlier?¡±

    Emily started after listening to Han Shuo¡¯s words and her long eyebrows fluttered in confusion. She looked at Han Shuo in shock afterwards and asked with incredulity, ¡°Just what kind of martial art technique are you training in? ording to my knowledge, even the strongest swordsman or pdin can only fly for short periods of time using fighting aura. That technique wasn¡¯t flying at all, so how could you do it?¡±

    ¡°I told you before that the technique I¡¯m training in is rather incredible and I¡¯m not at liberty to discuss so much to you.¡± Han Shuo truly couldn¡¯t exin much regarding demonic magic, so he could only say so much to Emily.

    ¡°Alright, alright. I knew that I wouldn¡¯t get much out of you anyways. Let¡¯s go. Let¡¯s see if we can get anything useful from the ve trading house while it¡¯s still a chaotic mess within Valen City.¡± Emily pouted and rolled her eyes at Han Shuo, tugging him towards the trading house proper that she was now familiar with.

    Emily must have thoroughly investigated the trading house beforehand. She was very familiar with the buildings and floating through the air along the way, not making a single sound. A thin, dark magic shroud surrounded her,pletely concealing her movements.

    Han Shuo was quite familiar with covert operations like these. Not only did he not make a single sound, but he used his extraordinary senses to continuously point out the way to Emily, helping the two evade many patrolling guards along the way.

    The two had made their way past tworge auction buildings after a short while and was headed for the three houses located towards the back.

    ¡°This trading house usually has part of the Gryphon Legion stationed here. It will be very difficult for us to escape once they discover traces of us. Today however, the soldiers inside would¡¯ve been deployed due to rk¡¯s death and will be searching the entire Valen City. This is perfect timing for us.¡± Emily exined to Han Shuo as they walked.

    Han Shuo became quite serious once they started talking business. He listened to Emily as he silently observed the surroundings. A very strange smell suddenly wafted into his nostrils. The smell of blood was mixed in with the smell. Han Shuo felt that it was slightly pungent as he slowly took in the smell.

    He wrinkled his nose, reached out a hand and grabbed Emily, saying lowly, ¡°There¡¯s the smell of blood here, something¡¯s wrong.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t smell it.¡± Emily took in a deep sniff and said in surprise. She then thought for a bit and seemed to recall Han Shuo¡¯s miraculousness, ¡°See if you can find the source of the smell of blood.¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo said quietly, ¡°Follow me.¡±

    Grabbing Emily¡¯s small hand, Han Shuo followed his nose in search of the origin of the blood smell. He passed by two houses and came by the side of a pond. There was an artificial mountain next to it, with several deep and slightly creepy caves within it. Han Shuo¡¯s ears proved their worth as he walked inside one of the caves with Emily.

    A creak suddenly sounded as the originally solid stone wall suddenly split apart as a guard dashed out from inside, covered in blood and wearing a frightened expression. A bone spear appeared out of thin air after he took only a few steps, running the guard through from behind. Two zombie warriors then walked out and dragged the guard¡¯s body inside.

    Han Shuo and Emily received a good eyeful of the scene that had just taken ce. Han Shuo was taken aback, and then spoke, ¡°Perhaps the necromancer I saw earlier today is inside that cave.¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s a high possibility for that, but the owner of the ve trading house is Bob Ascher, and the necromancer is one of rk¡¯s killers, so what would he be doing here?¡± Emily was still a bit perplexed as she conversed lowly with Han Shuo.

    ¡°The most dangerous ce is also the safest. There¡¯s an enemy behind every bush and tree now. The trading house is Bob Ascher¡¯s ce of business and actually sent out the most number of soldiers. Who would¡¯ve thought the necromancer would appear here? The fact that a soldier was killed just now is enough to prove that this necromancer isn¡¯t a guest either. This means it¡¯s highly likely that he has the desire to hide here.¡± Han Shuo contemted and then spoke slowly.

    ¡°Mm, you make a lot of sense. Shall we go see what¡¯s going on?¡± Emilyplimented and then asked Han Shuo¡¯s opinions.

    ¡°Of course, I¡¯m rather curious about this necromancer as well. I would likely only be able to run the other way if I faced against him alone, but with you by my side, we have nothing to fear.¡± Han Shuo said and then paused, paying attention to the disturbances inside. He spoke again after a while, ¡°Alright, the zombie warrior¡¯s footsteps have gone into the distance. We can go inside and take a look.¡±

 Chapter 155: The three eyed demon god Ansidesi

    Chapter 155: The three eyed demon god Ansidesi

    The two were greeted with a scene of corpses strewn everywhere as soon as they entered the cave. Roughly estimating, there were at least a couple dozen. Judging from their clothing, there were guards, some nobles who¡¯de shopping, and even some ves who¡¯d been imprisoned in the cages.

    Many torches burned along the walls, casting bright light all over the surroundings. It looked like a ce to hold ves. There were many cages made from iron bars lying around, as well as some torture equipment. It looked like this was the ce they used to teach a lesson to unruly ves.

    There was a ck stone erected in the center that had been shaped into a plinth. A corpse was tied to some iron bars on top of the plinth. There was also an indentation about three meters wide and long in the middle of the stone, with a thick scent of blood emanated from it.

    More than ten zombie warriors had been summoned and they picked up the corpses on the ground, throwing them into the bloody pool in the middle of the plinth. These whole corpses sank into the blood with a ssh. The surface began bubbling shortly thereafter and then quieted down, with the liquid level rising slightly afterwards.

    The amount of fresh blood within the blood pool increased as the corpses were tossed in. It was actually about to overflow. The necromancer, whom Han Shuo had previously seen was standing off to the side of the plinth. He was holding the bone staff and had revealed his face. His body was wizened and he was staring into the blood pool with no expression. There were no signs of life in his grey pupils.

    Han Shuo and Emily immediately backed up into a corner and made use of a crack to observe all that was going on. Emily set up a sound istion boundary around the two and spoke in a low voice, ¡°It looks like the necromancer is setting up some ritual altar. I wonder what he¡¯s about to do?¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head and responded with a grave expression, ¡°Maybe it¡¯s because I know too little about necromancy magic, but I don¡¯t know anything about the altar that the necromancer has set up. It looks like archmage level necromancers have indeed grasped many more strong magics.¡±

    Just as Han Shuo and Emily were conversing lowly, the necromancer suddenly waved the bone staff in his hand and mumbled out an incantation. The blood pool on the altar suddenly started churning, and the corpse that was tied on top of the altar suddenly had its flesh and skin whipped off, bing a stark white skeleton.

    Another necromancy magic was chanted as the not yet dispersed souls from the newly dead on the ground seemed to materialize and condense into grey smoke, surging into the blood pool that surrounded the altar. The blood pool transformed into a whirlpool as the bones from the corpses that had just sunk to the bottom all revealed themselves again, slowly reforming themselves into a three eyed demon god with eight spikes on its head and a spiked tail attached to its waist.

    The three eyed demon god was formed from the white bones and its three eyes were red, yellow, and blue, embedded into its head in the shape of a triangle. An enormous buffet of evil presence started emanating from it as it started forming, suffusing the entire area with its evil presence. It was a kind of evil that was wildly violent and bloodthirsty.

    Even though they were quite a distance away, Han Shuo felt a chill grip his heart as he fixed his eyes on the three eyed demon god, not shifting from it for a second and focusing all his attention on the movement by the altar.

    ¡°Oh, my gosh! He¡¯s connected with the three eyed demon god Ansidesi through the altar!¡± Emily gave a low exmation as her eyes were filled with surprise.

    A god was a being of utmost strength at a legendary level of existence. They had divine arts that stretched to the heavens, but were constrained by thews of their ne of existence and couldn¡¯t reveal their actual body in this world, but through some rituals and mediums, some people in this world could use mystical arts to contact the gods.

    Han Shuo had always felt that this unsubstantiated saying was quite ridiculous, and felt that this was something that was impossible to actually exist, but now that the truth appeared in front of his face, Han Shuo had no choice but to believe. The three eyed demon god Ansidesi had appeared from who knew how many nes of existence through this necromancer¡¯s ritual, descending his consciousness on these skeletons. Han Shuo stood nkly there for a moment, his thoughts churning in a mess.

    A string of profound and ancient sounds emitted from Ansidesi¡¯s mouth. Han Shuo and Emily werepletely befuddled as they had no idea what this string of sounds meant. However, the wizened necromancer seemed to be able tomunicate with it.

    However, the necromancer had been crouching on the floor and had buried his head in his chest in worship when he suddenly lifted his head with a look of fright, then quickly sung out an incantation, releasing the ¡°Life Reconnaissance¡± spell and sent it through the surroundings.

    ¡°This is bad!¡± Han Shuo knew things would get bad as soon as he saw this spell appear. He suddenly exhaled and nned on pulling Emily out of here.

    It was a pity that he was still a bit too slow. The ¡°Life Reconnaisance¡± spell suddenly lit up when it neared Han Shuo and Emily¡¯s position. The necromancer worshipping on the floor immediately had his face sink and his bone staff suddenly waved, sending the dozens of zombie warriors walking towards the two.

    ¡°We¡¯ve been made. We need to get out of here!¡± Emily cried out and suddenly backed up, nning on taking Han Shuo away from here.

    At this moment, Han Shuo¡¯s sharp eyes saw that Ansidesi¡¯s body, formed from white bones, crashed back into the pool of blood with a thud when the necromancer lost his concentration.

    It would seem that a necromancer couldn¡¯t lose his concentration for even a second when using the mystical arts and the blood and bones within the pool tomunicate with the three eyed demon god. When the necromancer shifted his attention to Han Shuo and Emily, the divine consciousness that had crossed who knew how many nes of existence would be unable to use the bone and blood to manifest itself.

    ¡°The three eyed demon god can¡¯t help him, we don¡¯t need to be afraid of him.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s body halted in front of the cave entrance as he pulled Emily¡¯s retreating body to a stop as well.

    When Emily¡¯s movement was arrested by Han Shuo, her beautiful eyes focused on the altar when she heard his words. She also discovered that Ansidesi had disappeared within the bloody pool and coolposure wrote itself over her face. ¡°Who are you and how dare you use such an evil ceremony to summon Ansidesi within Valen City?!¡±

    ¡°The two of you shouldn¡¯t havee in. I wouldn¡¯t have killed you otherwise.¡± The shriveled necromancer spoke in an extremely dry and cracked voice, using a levitation spell to float towards Han Shuo and Emily from the altar.

    He waved the bone staff in his hand as he let loose an adept level necromancy spell, ¡°Chain of Wraiths¡±. More than dozens of wraiths were entwined into one long, metal chain, snaking towards Han Shuo and Emily. Dozens of zombie warriors also raised their wooden clubs and rushed to attack Han Shuo and Emily.

    Snorting delicately, Emily took out her staff and lowly sang out a dark magic spell, forming a inky ck Grim Reaper¡¯s de out of midair. It churned towards the zombie warriors with a wave of her staff, and the zombie warriors were all sliced cleanly like paper beneath the reaping of the de. Not a single one was able toe near Han Shuo and Emily.

    As the ¡°Chain of Wraiths¡± came hurtling over, Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge suddenly whistled out of his hand as he activated the ¡°cial Mystical Spellfire¡±. The Demonyer Edge sent out eye piercing red light, enveloped in red spellfire as the temperature of the surrounding air suddenly skyrocketed. The Demonyer Edge burned with the red spellfire as itnded swiftly on the Chain.

    The dozens of wraiths making up the Chain all opened their mouths to scream in frightened horror beneath the searing heat of the red spellfire Demonyer Edge. When the Demonyer Edge sank into the Chain, the Chain emitted sharp, squeaky sounds and gave off grey smoke. The dozens of wraiths flew into pieces as they screeched and wailed.

    Three bone spears suddenly formed and shot towards Han Shuo and Emily. Han Shuo used his mind to control the Demonyer Edge to block the two aiming for Emily. He also chanted lowly and sent a bone spear hurtling through the air, crashing urately into the other bone spear that had been about to hit him.

    ¡°Eh, kid you¡¯re also a necromancer!¡± The wizened necromancer suddenly eximed in astonishment and looked at Han Shuo with great surprise.

    ¡°Heh heh, indeed, indeed. We even teamed up to take out rk at Calvert¡¯s earlier. This is our second time meeting tonight.¡± Han Shuo looked leisurely at this necromancer and said with a slight smile.

    Han Shuo had kept his features covered up at Calvert¡¯s and only taken off his mask after killing rk. The two had been quite a ways apart when the necromancer attacked Han Shuo, and so he hadn¡¯t clearly seen Han Shuo in the deep of the night. It was obvious that he hadn¡¯t recognized Han Shuo this time either.

    ¡°So it was you!¡± The necromancer called out lowly and then quickly floated out towards Han Shuo. He said sinisterly, ¡°As a fellow necromancer, I¡¯d like to see if you truly understand the mysteries of necromancy at all.¡±

    The necromancer made a move after he finished speaking, looking like he would take out Han Shuo first!

 Chapter 156: Soul Erosion

    Chapter 156: Soul Erosion

    ¡°I¡¯ve only just set a foot inside the door and have many questions to ask you!¡± Han Shuo himself possessed many tricks and had a dark archmage by his side. They wouldn¡¯te off worse at all with two against one. Therefore, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t nervous at all when he saw the necromancer float over.

    His figure was shapeless and unpredictable, like a ghost¡¯s, and the necromancer continuously changed direction. Just when he was ten or so meters away from the two, the archmage necromancer suddenly waved his bone staff and chanted an incantation.

    An evil knight, covered in ck armor and dark colored skin that measured over three meters tall appeared, riding a howling beast that was stronger than a rhino and covered with brown scales. It raised a spiked club, that was a thick as a human body, as it spurred on the howling beast beneath it, charging viciously towards Han Shuo and Emily.

    The evil knight was a dark creature that was one level higher than a hate warrior. Only archmage level necromancers could summon them. They came from the dark abyss of the other dimension. Their ck armor held an absolute advantage in deflecting physical attacks. Combined with the charging force of the howling beast beneath them, they were everyone¡¯s worst nightmare.

    The evil knight immediately charged towards Han Shuo and Emily when it appeared, raising its club high and bringing it down like a metal pir.

    Emily immediately backed up when she saw the evil knight and murmured a dark spell. The Grim Reaper¡¯s de from earlier had yet to vanish, and it swung towards the evil knight with Emily¡¯s maniptions.

    After summoning the evil knight, the necromancer didn¡¯t take another step forward, but rather quickly dodged to the side, summoning a team of gargoyles to attack Han Shuo and shooting bone spears every which way.

    Compared to fighting students in the Academy, the necromancer was obviously much more experienced and had a very fine grasp on the timing of battling. He¡¯d approached the two in an unpredictable manner just now in order to summon the evil knight, and took advantage of the short distance to charge and deny the two any chance to defend.

    The Demonyer Edge followed Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts and whirled out in flight again, infused with the ming red spellfire, shooting towards the gargoyles making their way over. Han Shuo himself chanted a ¡°Bone Shield¡± spell and blocked towards the front, defending against the bone spears.

    After blocking two rounds of bone spears, the magically summoned ¡°Bone Shield¡± broke apart. Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength swiftly circted and he abruptly summoned the little skeleton, giving the mental order to fight the evil knight.

    The evil knight on top of the howling beast was an extremely high level dark creature. It very agilely used the metal club in its hand to block the attacks from Emily¡¯s Grim Reaper de. The spiked club that had appeared with it was quite durable, as it didn¡¯t break at all when it collided with Emily¡¯s magic de.

    ¡°Eh, you only know how to summon skeletal warriors?¡± The necromancer was quite perplexed when he saw that Han Shuo had only summoned a bizarre skeleton after swiftly chanting a spell.

    A leisurely smile yed about his lips as Han Shuo didn¡¯t respond, only mentally giving the order for the little skeleton to attack the evil knight.

    His two leg bones springing up, the little skeleton¡¯s seven bone spurs shook as he flew through the air. He sped the bone dagger tightly in his hands as he made the first move, moving swiftly behind the evil knight like a streak of lightning.

    The evil knight facing off against the Grim Reaper de, seemed rather disdainful of the little skeleton. It only slightly shook its shoulders and shifted his ck armor to cover his back. The necromancer had a mocking smile on his face as he watched as the little skeleton attacked, not worried in the slightest for the evil knight that he¡¯d summoned.

    Just as the little skeleton¡¯s bone dagger was about tond into the evil knight¡¯s back, the bone dagger suddenly froze for a second and suddenly changed direction, stabbing into the evil knight¡¯s exposed neck. The evil knight facing off against the de¡¯s attack suddenly emitted a string of ghastly screams as the giant spiked club in its hand waved around wildly.

    Emily¡¯s summoned de slipped past the spiked club¡¯s defence and smashed into the howling beast¡¯s body, cutting its head off, giving rise to a spray of light like aet.

    The little skeleton flew over at the same time andnded on the evil knight.

    It blurred into motion, seeming to stab randomly into the now unarmored evil knight.

    The little skeleton also yanked out bone dagger that had been stabbed into the evil knight¡¯s neck, grasping it in his hand and continuously plunging it into the evil knight¡¯s body. The evil knight, that had been covered with gleaming armor and riding the howling beast, suddenly changed greatly.

    The ck armor suddenly rusted over, the evil knight¡¯s originally strong and gleaming body dissipated into dust, vanishing in an instant. Even the howling beast that it was riding also scattered into ashes. It was the manifestation of life being thoroughly wiped away.

    Emily breathed a sigh of relief when the evil knight vanished, her highly tensed heart was finally able to calm down and the Grim Reaper¡¯s de also vanished without a trace. The little skeleton was the only thing remaining as it spun its bone dagger, recalling the seven bone spurs on the ground and cing them back on its back.

    The jeering look on the necromancer¡¯s face had long since vanished utterly as he looked at the little skeleton with a look of incredulity. He cried out in shock, ¡°Impossible, this ispletely impossible. A hundred skeletal warriors wouldn¡¯t be able to harm an evil knight. This goes against the basic ts of necromancy theory!¡±

    A faint smile still on his face, Han Shuo said very easily, ¡°Nothing is impossible. Although I don¡¯t have as much necromancy knowledge as you, I don¡¯t think anything is illogical here.¡±

    He gave an order and the little skeleton¡¯s legs shook as it took off towards the necromancer.

    The necromancer was greatly surprised, but then immediately chuckled oddly, ¡°Good, very good! Then let me see what secrets you have!¡±

    A necromancy incantation sang out lowly from his mouth as the necromancer swiftly approached Han Shuo. Just as the little skeleton was about to bump into him, the necromancer suddenly leapt high into the air and flung out the bone staff in his hand,ing on top of Han Shuo¡¯s head.

    An enormous evil mental strength suddenly surged into Han Shuo through the bone staff like a ma, attempting to subvert Han Shuo¡¯s memories. The necromancer disyed a proud smile as he said viciously to the panicking Emily, ¡°Don¡¯t make any moves. I¡¯ve already established a connection with his soul. If I suddenly die, he¡¯ll lose his soul and be an idiot.¡±

    Emily was immediately stunned motionless when she heard those words as she looked anxiously at Han Shuo. She discovered that Han Shuo was standing there frozen,pletely out of it with his eyes unfocused like he was a sculpture or stone.

    Even the little skeleton, that had just received Han Shuo¡¯s order to attack the necromancer, suddenly stood there nkly, looking around as he wielded his bone dagger, as if waiting for Han Shuo to give him an order.

    ¡°Haha, this is a necromancy magic called ¡®Soul Erosion¡¯ that I¡¯ve recently grasped. I can take over a person¡¯s soul through necromancy magic and gain all his secrets after I erode his soul. I¡¯m connected to the target throughout this process, and my target will be unable to escape even if I suddenly die. Haha!¡± The necromancer started exining proudly to Emily when he saw that his power through the bone staff had invaded Han Shuo¡¯s brain.

    Emily was quite frantic right now as she looked at Han Shuo, not knowing whether to fight this necromancer or not.

    As an archmage, Emily could clearly sense the enormous even mental strength surging into Han Shuo¡¯s body through the white bone staff over his head. She didn¡¯t dare not believe the necromancer¡¯s words.

    Just as Emily was utterly frantic and didn¡¯t know what to do, the originally ck jawed Han Shuo suddenly cried out harshly as red and purple spellfire surged up his arms. His entire being seemed to be enveloped in purple, red me as his face appeared quite contorted, his entire body full of a frightening aura.

    At the same time, the previously cocky necromancer suddenly had all color drained from his face as he cried out with extreme fear, ¡°No, don¡¯t!¡±

 Chapter 157: Taking all the memories of the soul

    Chapter 157: Taking all the memories of the soul

    The white bone staff, that had originally been hovering above Han Shuo¡¯s, head had reversed directions at sometime and left his head to hover over the necromancer¡¯s instead. The frightened necromancer kept chanting spells and attempted to regain control of the staff, but nothing he did would having any effect.

    The Demonyer Edge abruptly flew out at this time and stabbed into the necromancer¡¯s chest. Red spellfire suddenly red up over his head, whereas Han Shuo sat down cross legged. It was his turn to chant in a low voice.

    The necromancer was burnt to a crisp in very short amount of time as his head was encircled by red spellfire. His head was like a ck cinder, and it was no longer possible to make out his features.

    A profound incantation rang out from Han Shuo¡¯s mouth. He waved his hand and the white bone staff suddenly shot out a green light that weaved together to create a. The of green light epassed the necromancer¡¯s head like a whirlpool sucking something in.

    A cloud of grey aura suddenly floated out of the necromancer¡¯s body and was slowly detained by the green, just as the souls of the other dead within the surroundings had been. The and the white staff floated in front of Han Shuo.

    The white staff suddenly flew into Han Shuo¡¯s hand when it reached him, while the green got absorbed into Han Shuo¡¯s brain through his facial orifices, along with the soul within it.

    Emily waspletely gobsmacked by this sequence of events. She had no idea what was going on. She didn¡¯t understand why the previously cocky necromancer had suddenly lost his soul to Han Shuo instead.

    After the green and necromancer¡¯s soul were absorbed by Han Shuo¡¯s brain through his orifices, Han Shuo sat down cross legged and didn¡¯t move a muscle. However, his expression continuously changed, at times joyful, enraged, and at times pained.

    As Han Shuo sat there without moving, the little skeleton that had been standing in a daze seemed to still be perplexed. It walked around the surroundings with bone dagger in hand. When the little skeleton reached the center where the altar was, his eyes suddenlynded on the pool of blood that had been used to summon Ansidesi.

    ¡°Leave that ce!¡± Emily knew that the little skeleton had an unexinable connection with Han Shuo. When she saw the little skeleton run to that dangerous ce, she immediately spoke up to stop him.

    That evil pool of blood in the center of the altar had been formed from the corpses of countless numbers of trading house guards. The necromancer had likely added in a number of devious items. Emily was quite afraid that the evil within the pool would invade the little skeleton¡¯s body if he went in.

    It was a pity that Emily wasn¡¯t Han Shuo. Her words had no effect on the little skeleton. Her words actually had the opposite effect, as the little skeleton touched its smooth head and looked at Emily with some confusion, turning back to leap forward into the pool.

    ¡°Oh, my gosh. Not only is the master crazy, but so are the summoned creatures!¡± Emily was going mad in her anxiety and started cursing.

    Emily still walked towards the altar, even though she was cursing, nning on seeing how she could help the small skeleton. When she reached the altar however, and saw that the little skeleton was sshing around happily within the pool of blood, she actually felt the emotion of joy from the little skeleton, submerged up to his neck as he yed like an innocent child.

    ¡°Eh, what¡¯s with this little skeleton?¡± Emily didn¡¯t know what to say when she saw that all was well with the little skeleton and that he seemed to be having a great time.

    All the corpses that hadnded in the pool of blood earlier had seen their flesh and blood immediately dissolve, with their bodies sinking into the pool without a trace, but the little skeleton hadn¡¯t seemed to be affected at all after entering the pool. This took Emily aback greatly. When she thought back to the first time she met Han Shuo and how the little skeleton had seemed to be immune to many dark magics, chasing her up and down the battlefield, Emily had to shake her head with a rueful smile. There were indeed some things that she couldn¡¯t exin.

    Suddenly, Emily¡¯sshes fluttered quickly as she looked at the pool of blood, perplexed. When looked at closely, it seemed that the blood within the pool was slowly decreasing.

    When Emily refocused her attention on the little skeleton, she noticed that the seven bone spurs on the back of the little skeleton¡¯s back were absorbing the blood from the pool. This strange phenomenon made Emily cry out in shock and murmur, ¡°My gosh, what kind of demon did he summon?!¡±

    The blood within the pool was slowly absorbed into the seven bone spurs on the little skeleton¡¯s back. When the blood began to run dry, the multitude of white bones within seemed to be affected by some power and liquified with the remaining blood, also to be absorbed by the seven spurs.

    This process had taken roughly half an hour and everything within the pool had been absorbed by the little skeleton¡¯s spinal area. Emily discovered that the seven bone spurs on its back had turned a fey, bright red and subtly emitted a bloodthirsty light. They looked even more sharp and frightening than before.

    The pool was in a square shape and was three meters deep after everything had vanished. The little skeleton was only a meter tall. He looked up at Emily, seeming to be considering how to climb up.

    ¡°Out of ideas now, aren¡¯t you.¡± Emily huffed and nned on unfurling a rope to pull the little skeleton up.

    Who would know that the little skeleton would suddenly activate the seven bone spurs on his back as soon as she¡¯s spoken, shakily flying out of the bottom of the pool of blood,nding next to the shellshocked Emily. The little skeleton didn¡¯t even look at Emily once as he activated the seven bone spurs again to fly next to the still meditating Han Shuo.

    ¡°Damn it, you¡¯re just as much of a jerk as your master!¡± Although the little skeleton was expressionless, Emily could feel that he was smugly showing off at the moment and she couldn¡¯t help but curse at him.

    She then saw the little skeleton continue to fan the seven bone spurs and start flying around the enormous room. He started off shakily, but then started leveling out. As he flew more steadily, his speed increased as well. Emily¡¯s eyes couldn¡¯t even keep up with him towards the end.

    Han Shuo breathed out lightly at this moment and suddenly said, ¡°It¡¯s finally done!¡±

    Emily was greatly surprised and turned her head to look at Han Shuo. She was suddenly mesmerized and looked at his eyes with great astonishment, forgetting to ask Han Shuo what was going on.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes were suddenly incredibly clear, like the brightest star in the vast heavens. They were alluring and deep, giving others a feeling of imprable mysteriousness.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but stand up when he saw Emily¡¯s lovesick expression and walked over to pinch her face, asking with some confusion.

    ¡°No, nothing much. Just that your eyes seem brighter than before, and even your presence seems to have undergone some changes.¡± Emily brushed away Han Shuo¡¯s yful hand a bit bashfully.

    ¡°Heh heh, so it turns out there¡¯s a really nice side benefit to taking over the necromancer¡¯s soul.¡± Han Shuoughed gleefully.

    ¡°Hurry up and tell me, just what is going on?¡± Emily¡¯s curiosity was killing her at the moment as her hand snaked out and clutched Han Shuo¡¯s throat, asking viciously.

    ¡°Cough, alright, alright!¡± Han Shuo smiled in exnation after he wrenched Emily¡¯s hands off his neck. ¡°I told you that the martial techniques I¡¯m training in are quite miraculous. Not only have they strengthened my body, but they¡¯ve even erged my brain. He wanted to use the soul erosion spell just now to take over my soul and memories, but because my brain had been erged, I could also sense all the memories of his soul throughout this process.¡±

    ¡°Logically speaking, a necromancer at my level, mental strength, and brain processes would definitely be far inferior to the speed at which he would erode my soul. Ordinary people wouldn¡¯t even have the time to repeat his name before their memories were co-opted.¡±

    ¡°But it was a pity that the tenaciousness of my erged brain was something that he didn¡¯t imagine. I took over his memories before he could take mine and upied his soul, obtaining all of his. It¡¯s that simple.¡±

    Emily was gobsmacked by the exnation that came from Han Shuo¡¯s mouth. She looked at Han Shuo with an incredible look and kept shaking her head, ¡°Unbelievable, seriously unbelievable. What kind of monster are you?¡±

    Hugging her fiercely, Han Shuo held Emily and said cheekily, ¡°Alright, alright. Don¡¯t be so surprised. We can go now.¡±

    The Demonyer Edge suddenly flew up and out of the necromancer¡¯s chest after he finished speaking,nding into Han Shuo¡¯s palm. There was a chopped off finger at the tip of the Demonyer Edge with a space ring on it. Han Shuo took that as well.

    ¡°You brat, stop flying around ande down.¡± Han Shuo yelled up with a smile at the little skeleton still circling in the air. The little skeleton capered down in front of Han Shuo and suddenly screeched to a halt in front of him, standing on the ground, waving his bone dagger.

    ¡°He, he entered the pool of blood and absorbed all of the blood and all the fragments of bone into those seven bone spurs.¡± Emily hastened to exin to Han Shuo what the little skeleton had done while he was meditating.

    Nodding, Han Shuo smiled, ¡°I know. It isn¡¯t the first time that he¡¯s done something so daring. This is no big deal. See, he can fly now, isn¡¯t that great?¡±

    ¡°I have no idea what kind of demon you¡¯ve created here. I notice that he seems to have his own emotions now. I don¡¯t know if it was my misimpression, but when I wasughing at him being unable to get out of the pool of blood, he immediately flew out proudly from it. Truly, I could feel that he was showing off towards me, I promise!¡± Emily looked at the little skeleton and seemed to suddenly remember what had just happened.

    ¡°Heh heh, don¡¯t be surprised. There are too many mind boggling things in this world. I believe that what you saw wasn¡¯t an illusion because I¡¯ve had the same impression before as well. I can¡¯t really say for sure what¡¯s going on now, but I think that he¡¯ll give me an exnation as he continues to evolve in the future.¡± Han Shuo wasn¡¯t surprised at all as he pointed to the little skeleton and smiled faintly.

    Emily started when she heard these words and looked at the little skeleton with a wry smile after a while, then shifting her gaze to Han Shuo. ¡°You two weirdos!¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s nothing weird about this. You must get used to everything about me, because I believe that there will only be more amazing things that will happen in the future.¡± Han Shuoughed heartily and looked to be in quite a good mood.

    ¡°Bryan, you¡¯re growing at such a fast speed that your future aplishments will be hard to imagine. Perhaps I won¡¯t be able to help you with anything soon. I¡¯m just a widow, will you cast me aside then?¡± Emily suddenly seemed to think of the matters of the future as she looked at Han Shuo. Her beautiful eyes looked at him and asked with a bit of forlornment.

    ¡°Don¡¯t be silly. I¡¯m with you, not because of what you can help me with. Even if our identities change in the future, that won¡¯t affect anything between us.¡± Han Shuo looked deeply at Emily and saw her disy a happy expression. He then pulled on Emily. ¡°Let¡¯s go, let¡¯s go. Let¡¯s leave, we don¡¯t need to go anywhere else. I think I¡¯ve gotten what you need.¡±

    The two didn¡¯t linger as they left, hand in hand. The sky had just started to brighten, as the two left stealthily, simr to how they had arrived.

 Chapter 158: Reaching the sky in a single bound

    Chapter 158: Reaching the sky in a single bound

    The Dark Mantle had strongholds in any of the Lancelot Empire¡¯s cities. Naturally, Valen City was no exception.

    If you are not reading this at vretrantions, this trantion is stolen and is not thetest/mostplete update.

    Han Shuo sat cross legged within a secret room carved out of dense rock, slowly digesting the memories from the necromancer¡¯s souls.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t set foot out of the secret room once within the four days, going through decades of the necromancer¡¯s memories. This necromancer named rendon had been 52 years old, and his experiences of all those years were all analyzed by Han Shuo.

    Dozens of battles and a lifetime of studying necromancy, as well as a few secrets of his identity, werepletely absorbed and memorized by Han Shuo in those four days. There were many minor details of course, but Han Shuo was toozy to remember those.

    After he¡¯d assimted all of the necromancer¡¯s experiences, Han Shuo realized that rendon had been in service to an organization called the Church of Natural Disasters. As such, all his actions, including the operation against rk, had been on the orders from the Church¡¯s senior executives. He had no idea why he had to assassinate rk.

    Apart from a few matters having to do with rendon¡¯s identity, Han Shuo¡¯s greatest acquisition was the necromancer¡¯sprehension of his path from apprentice to archmage, including the experience of every single battle and subsequent reflections.

    If there really was a way to reach the sky in one bound in this world, then Han Shuo was doing so right now. With the theoretical knowledge and battle experience from this necromancer, Han Shuo¡¯s path to archmage was crystal clear. He would be able to quickly learn many advanced magics as long as he had enough mental strength.

    rendon¡¯s experience from dozens of battles greatly broadened Han Shuo¡¯s worldview, and would prove to be of incalcble benefit to his future battles. The untested Han Shuo took note of some matters to avoid. In this way, the practical experience gains were likely on par with that of those of necromancy knowledge.

    Han Shuo had obtained all of the valuable aspects from rendon¡¯s memories after four days, but he didn¡¯t immediately leave this secluded secret room. He spent another two days to fully grasp the other necromancy magics that a journeyman mage should know.

    When Han Shuo walked out of the secret room, he felt refreshed and in great spirits. He was greatly at ease and felt quite confident about their mission this time.

    ¡°You¡¯re finally out. Mistress Emily has left orders that I must take you to her as soon as you emerge.¡± Chester was standing guard at the door and spoke respectfully to Han Shuo when thetter emerged.

    ¡°Chester! Why are you so serious now. I remember that you weren¡¯t like this when I first met you!¡± Chester had spoken with a very casual tone and been quite at ease when he¡¯d interacted with Han Shuo before. Chester was now noticeably more reserved when facing Han Shuo and spoke like he was speaking to his supervisor. This made Han Shuo rather confused.

    ¡°Bryan, you¡¯ll be a great person in the future, I¡¯m just getting used to things beforehand.¡± Chester briefly rxed and smiled.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo said leisurely, ¡°Even if I be a great person, our rtionship shouldn¡¯t be that estranged.¡± He pped Chester¡¯s shoulder andughed easily, ¡°True partners should rx. I feel rather ill at ease seeing you this solemn.¡±

    ¡°Alright, alright, I know what to do. Bryan, hurry up and go see Mistress Emily. She said that I had to bring you immediately to her when you emerged.¡± Chester chuckled lightly, rxing after Han Shuo had pped his shoulder, and leading Han Shuo swiftly down a brightly lit hallway.

    They emerged from the secret room after a few minutes, finally arriving in front of the room Emily was in. Chester winked at Han Shuo, backing away with a chuckle, and only resumed his guard when he had ced some distance between them.

    Although Han Shuo and Emily had purposefully concealed their rtionship, a hint of their true status still seeped out from the tone of their conversation and gestures. As a bandit, Chester was naturally very perceptive. He had naturally discovered a few hints after spending a few days together. However, Chester was a smart man, knowing his only chance to exceed his current station in life would lie in friendly rtions with Han Shuo. So, although he knew full well some of what was going on, he pretended he didn¡¯t.

    Han Shuo understood this and so wasn¡¯t even slightly worried that Chester would tattle. He maintained the easy smile on his face as Chester winked, pushing open the door to Emily¡¯s room without a care in the world, not having the slightest reservations at all.

    ¡°Who is it?!¡± Emily was greatly shocked as she cried out from within the bathroom. Han Shuo¡¯s sharp ears even picked up a few hints of water dripping.

    His eyes flickering, Han Shuo realized that Emily was actually taking a shower at the moment. After six straight days of closed door cultivation, he¡¯d been keeping things in for quite a while. He chuckled deviously and closed the room door, shooting straight for Emily¡¯s bathroom.

    Emily was a bit panicked at first, but immediately knew who hade when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s evil chuckle. She blushed and fell back into the tub.

    ¡°The beauty stealer is here!¡± A cocky smirk on his face, Han Shuo circted his magical yuan, shredding his shirt from his upper body and revealing his sturdy, domineering figure. He leaped into the bath, causing the water to spray everywhere.

    ¡°You evil viin! Such a rascal!¡± Emily pouted teasingly and sshed around, seeming to protest against Han Shuo¡¯s invasions, but her curses had turned into soul lurching panting within the span of a few breaths.

    Emily¡¯s thrashing and twitching body rxed into a long moan after a long while, and the ripples in the water finally calmed.

    ¡°That was beautiful!¡± Emily sighed softly, draped over Han Shuo¡¯s broad and firm chest. She said contently, ¡°You evil little thing, I hate and love you!¡±

    Han Shuo was sprawled outzily by the side of the tub and said leisurely, ¡°It¡¯s one of the happiest things in life to be able to take such a warm soak on this cold winter day. Oh right, what were you in a hurry to find me for?¡±

    ¡°To ask you what you¡¯ve gained through the past couple of days, of course!¡± Emily¡¯s slender hands subconsciously kneaded Han Shuo¡¯s back as she asked him.

    Han Shuo took a deep breath in and thoroughly described the gains of the past couple days for Emily. Emily was incredibly shocked and looked at Han Shuo with great delight, ¡°You¡¯ve gained his necromancy magicprehension and his real life battle experience!? Doesn¡¯t this mean that as long as you have enough mental strength, you¡¯ll be able to quickly grasp all of the archmage level magics that he already knows?¡±

    ¡°I think that¡¯s the logic. I¡¯ve already tried to practice another journeyman level magic and discovered that I could master it quickly with the prior understanding of the necromancer. I didn¡¯t have to go through too much trial and error in the middle.¡± Han Shuo nodded.

    ¡°My gosh, incredible, this is too incredible!¡± Emily¡¯s incredulous joy doubled when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s words. She kept repeating those sentences and appeared even more excited than Han Shuo.

    ¡°The necromancer obtained those documents from a secret room within the ve trading house. They chronicle Bob Ascher¡¯s business dealings and can prove that he was involved in its operations.¡± Han Shuo handed the documents that the necromancer had taken from the secret room over to Emily after describing the situation.

    Although the necromancer named rendon had set up a magical boundary within his space ring, Han Shuo broke it open very easily. He had obtained several books regarding necromancy, a few medicines for replenishing mental strength, and a few magic robes that had the effect of increasing magic power.

    Of course, what Han Shuo was most satisfied with was still rendon¡¯s white bone staff. This white bone staff was specially refined for necromancers, using this staff to cast necromancy spells would enhance Han Shuo¡¯s power.

    Han Shuo could originally only summon one bone spear when he cast the bone spear spell, but with the white bone staff, he could release two at once. Even the number of summoned dark creatures would increase as well.

    The delighted Emily was about to say something as she held the documents that Han Shuo had given to her when she suddenly thought of something. She stared fixedly at Han Shuo and spoke urgently, ¡°What organization did you say that this necromancer is from?¡±

    ¡°The Church of Natural Disasters!¡± Han Shuo started and replied.

    Her expression changing drastically, all the color drained from Emily¡¯s face as she spoke to Han Shuo, ¡°Don¡¯t tell anyone you killed rendon. I must report this to my brother immediately, especially since it involves the Church of Natural Disasters. Oh, Lawrence came looking for you and wanted you to drop by when you had the time. If you¡¯re careful, you can make your way to him. ¡±

    Emily hastily gave Han Shuo a few more reminders and told him not to tell anyone of his involvement with the Church of Natural Disasters. She then hurriedly left for the secret room with the magic mirror that would enable her to speak with the senior executives of the Dark Mantle.

 Chapter 159: Leaving with the beauty

    Chapter 159: Leaving with the beauty

    Ever since learning of Lawrence¡¯s identity, Han Shuo had been pondering how to interact with him. From the current situation, Lawrence was obviously nning on involving himself in the struggle of the princes. It was because of the mysteriousness that shrouded his identity that made his situation not that optimistic.

    If Lawrence really could inherit the throne, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t mind growing closer with him and would even be willing to go to bat for him, but if Lawrence didn¡¯t have this kind of strength in him, it would ce Han Shuo in a disadvantageous position if he were to brashly associate himself with Lawrence.

    Therefore, even though he was well aware of Lawrence¡¯s identity, Han Shuo pretended that he didn¡¯t know and arrived at Lawrence¡¯s residence with his usual expression.

    The assassin, Lucky, was the one who showed Han Shuo in. After their experience assassinating rk, the old assassin hadpletely epted Han Shuo and his expression was no longer that remote. When he brought Han Shuo in, Lucky said, ¡°He¡¯s not here right now, but will return at any moment. You can wait here if you¡¯re not in a hurry.¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo looked at Lucky with a faint smile, ¡°No worries, I¡¯ll wait for a while. Oh, right. You went off after Calvert afterwards, but did you get him?¡±

    ¡°Of course, not only him, but I killed his son as well.¡± The old assassin disyed a trace of pride in his eyes. It looked like he was quite proud of his skills.

    Han Shou chit chatted randomly when he suddenly remembered about Lisa and asked, ¡°Oh right, Lisa isn¡¯t present at the moment. I¡¯d like to check in on her.¡±

    ¡°Miss Lisa is elsewhere. Pleasee with me, I¡¯ll take you to her.¡± Lucky responded and took Han Shuo through a garden, arriving at a building in the quiet rear of the property. He then spoke quietly to Han Shuo, ¡°Miss Lisa¡¯s emotions have calmed down because Calvert and his son have been killed, but you¡¯d best not bring up her family.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded in understanding and didn¡¯t say much.

    He approached the building and knocked lightly.

    ¡°Is it cousin Lawrence?¡± Lisa asked through the door as her voice still seemed a bit mncholic.

    ¡°It¡¯s me!¡± Han Shuo responded.

    ¡°Oh, Bryan, you¡¯vee to see me.¡± Han Shuo could hear long awaited happiness in Lisa¡¯s voice as her footsteps rapidly drew near. Lisa opened the door and appeared in cotton pajamas in front of Han Shuo.

    Although Lisa¡¯s features hadn¡¯t changed since her life changing event and her naive and cute demeanor remained just as youthful as ever, a constant sorrow clouded her clear eyes. Her demeanor was such that it evoked protective feelings, a marked difference from her previous obstinate, headstrong ways.

    However, this weak Lisa looked quite pleasing to Han Shuo¡¯s eyes. He closed the door after walking in and huffed out lightly, pretending to be cold, ¡°The weather outside is quite cold!¡±

    ¡°Thank you for killing that old dog Calvert!¡± Lisa tugged on Han Shuo¡¯s sleeve, leading him inside with her as she thanked him.

    A brazier was burning inside as it spread warmth throughout the house. Lisa added a few sticks of dry firewood to the brazier and then took her seat on a soft, leather chair.

    ¡°It was one of your cousin¡¯s men who killed Calvert, so you should thank him instead. I only caused a mess of some things.¡± Han Shuo found a seat and poured a cup of hot water for himself.

    ¡°If it wasn¡¯t for your distraction, my cousin¡¯s man wouldn¡¯t have seeded that easily.¡± Lisa had indeed changed a bit from before. She was silent for a bit after speaking, then looked a bit fearfully at Han Shuo. ¡°You spent so many gold coins to buy me from the trading house. ording to the rules of very, I belong to you.¡±

    Starting in fright, Han Shuo immediately said seriously, ¡°Lisa, you should know that I bought you purely to save you and had no other thoughts whatsoever. In addition, it wasn¡¯t that many gold coins. We¡¯re friends after all, don¡¯t misunderstand!¡±

    Lisa shook her head destely, appearing a bit frantic as she looked at Han Shuo, ¡°Do you not want me because you disdain me now?¡±

    ¡°No, not at all. We¡¯re friends and this is what I should do. You have your own personal freedom. I don¡¯t want you to feel guilty about those thousand gold coins.¡± Han Shuo hastened to say.

    Lisa was silent once again after speaking. ¡°Because of Bob Ascher, my family n ispletely annihted. My status as a ve is also confirmed. You bougt me in front of so many people in the trading house, this is also an irrefutable truth.¡±

    ¡°Then I can return your freedom to you and lift the status of a ve from you.¡± Han Shuo thought and said to Lisa.

    Han Shuo heard footsteps sound outside of the door, and Lawrence walked in with a slight smile after a short while. He asked when he saw Han Shuo and Lisa in conversation, ¡°What are you two chatting about?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m saying that I¡¯m going to dissolve Lisa¡¯s status as a ve.¡± Han Shuo responded as he looked at Lawrence.

    ¡°Give me your crystal card, I¡¯ll transfer a thousand gold coins to you. Then you¡¯ll have sold Lisa to me through legal proceedings. Leave the rest to me.¡± Lawrence seemed to have given the matter some thought already and responded immediately when Han Shuo spoke up.

    ¡°No need, Lisa is my friend, I can give her to you now. I can¡¯t take the thousand gold coins.¡± A thousand gold coins was nothing in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, and he really had held the mentality of saving Lisa at the time.

    Lawrence didn¡¯t insist on refusing after Han Shuo, but nodded at Han Shuo with a smile. Lawrence said forthrightly, ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll take care of her status. However, this is Valen City and Bob Ascher¡¯s territory. I¡¯ll get Lisa back to the Empire in the next two days. Bob Ascher will be powerless even if he wants to do anything.¡±

    As the third prince, Lawrence¡¯s rtionship with the king was very close. There naturally wouldn¡¯t be any difficulty for him to handle such matters. Valen City was in an uproar at the moment, and there was indeed some danger to Lisa¡¯s life if she stayed here. It would be a good thing to get her as far away as possible.

    ¡°Lisa, I have some things to discuss with Han Shuo separately. We¡¯ll be leaving first!¡± Lawrence cast a nce at Han Shuo and walked outside. Han Shuo then rose to his feet and followed.

    The two of them walked to an artificial mountain by the side of the front yard and Lawrence looked deeply at Han Shuo, asking, ¡°Bryan, why have youe with Mistress Emily to Valen City this time?¡±

    This had to do with secrets of the Dark Mantle, and so Han Shuo naturally couldn¡¯t say much. He shook his head in apology, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I promised Mistress Emily that word of this wouldn¡¯t travel.¡±

    Sighing lowly, Lawrence said genuinely, ¡°You have a clean birth and although you once had a status of a ve, it¡¯s of no matter. However, Emily is different, and her current status is old Hahn¡¯s daughter-inw. Walking too close with her will affect you in the future.¡±

    ¡°I think I understand your meaning, but I know what I¡¯m doing. You don¡¯t need to worry about me. Right, if you¡¯vee to Valen City to save Lisa and kill rk, then you¡¯re finished here. Are you leaving soon?¡± Lawrence meant well, but Han Shuo and Emily¡¯s rtionship had been cemented already. Han Shuo had his own thoughts and ns and naturally wouldn¡¯t change anything because of Lawrence¡¯s words of advice.

    ¡°Apart from this, I also promised someone to take out Bob Ascher. Perhaps you can assist me?¡± Lawrence suddenly spoke as he looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Haha, you must be joking. You¡¯re inviting me to fight against the chief of the Gryphon Legion. This is tooughable. I know how much I weigh and I¡¯ll have no effect whatsoever against someone at the level of old Bob.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s eyes gleamed, but he still yed dumb.

    Lawrence stared at Han Shuo and was about to say something when Lucky¡¯s low call suddenly traveled in, ¡°We¡¯ve beenpromised! I think we need to retreat immediately, Bob Ascher¡¯s men are on their way.¡±

    Lawrence was startled and his face changed slightly. ¡°Bryan, please take Lisa around the path in the yard to the back. We need to make some preparations.¡±

    Time was of the essence and so Han Shuo didn¡¯t say much else. He immediately nodded decisively and suddenly moved, breaking through the door into Lisa¡¯s room like lightning.

    He didn¡¯t wait for Lisa to say anything as he took down a leather coat from the wall and wrapped her in it. He wrapped Lisa in it and leapt out the window, rushing for the path in the back yard.

    Rapid hoofbeats sounded in the distance and approached quickly. Han Shuo knew that the Gryphon Legion must have sent a lot of men this time. He didn¡¯t know if Lawrence and the others could make it out. Bob Ascher¡¯s Gryphon Legion blotted out the sky in Valen City. Even a prince would only face death if he went head to head with Bob Ascher.

 Chapter 160: You shouldnâ€™t have chased after me

    Chapter 160: You shouldn¡¯t have chased after me

    After leaving the back yard, Han Shuo immediately focused his concentrations. Although he held Lisa within his arms, his speed was still as fast as lightning as he sped along the path.

    It was noon, but there were no pedestrians on the road during such a frosty winter. Add to that, the fact that the soldiers had been turning Valen City inside out over the past two days, the civilians were all hiding in their homes and didn¡¯t dare to walk about. Thus, Han Shuo¡¯s dashing figure rather stood out along the road.

    Two airborne patrolling Gryphon Knights spurred their gryphons on and detected Han Shuo¡¯s figure. The gryphons screamed as the knights hefted their three meter long spears and flew towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°There are gryphons in the air!¡± Lisa¡¯s face was frozen red from the cold bite of the wintry air. She raised her head from her position in Han Shuo¡¯s grasp and noticed the pursuit from the two Gryphon Knights, hastily voicing a reminder to Han Shuo.

    ¡®I know, don¡¯t worry!¡± Han Shuo had long since noted the pursuit and he responded in a low voice to Lisa without a change in expression. His body continued to dash quickly through the scattered streets as his mind spun, searching for ways to react.

    Han Shuo had thoroughly remembered all the ces they¡¯d passed on the way to Lawrence¡¯s. Now that they had been spotted by the Gryphon Knights, Han Shuo was quickly thinking of ways out.

    He couldn¡¯t expose the Dark Mantle stronghold, so he couldn¡¯t return there at the moment. Now that there were Gryphon Legion members patrolling Valen City and two Knights in the air had set their sights onto them, he had to quickly shake them off or find a ce to kill them. Otherwise, more trouble would quickly descend upon them.

    As his thoughts raced, Han Shuo suddenly changed direction and didn¡¯t dash in and out of alleyways. He ran towards the direction of a patch of trees, circting his magical yuan, making it so that he seemed to have a boundless source of energy. The speed of his dash was faster than the two knights¡¯ expectations.

    The two knights had nned onnding as soon as Han Shuo had left the cover of the houses and killing him. Who would¡¯ve thought that Han Shuo would speed forward like he was riding a fierce and swarthy horse as soon as he left the area, catching them off guard.

    However, the knights naturally held an advantage being in the air. When they regained theirposure, they spurred their gryphons onwards to catch up to Han Shuo and circled above the trees, locking their sights onto Han Shuo.

    They were already a few li away from where Lawrence lived. Han Shuo had observed for a little bit just now and noticed that only these two knights were pursuing him, so he hadn¡¯t been unduly worried. His body halted as soon as he entered the cover of the trees and suddenly came to aplete stop, swinging Lisa up and around him so that she was on his back.

    ¡°Hold on tight and don¡¯t let go no matter what!¡± Han Shuo ordered lowly.

    She nodded her head docilely and said resolutely, ¡°I understand. I won¡¯t let go even if I die.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, we won¡¯t be the ones to die.¡± Han Shuoforted Lisa confidently and took out a firm, supple rope from his space ring. He firmly tied Lisa onto his back to prevent her from sliding off halfway through. Han Shuo gripped the Demonyer Edge in his right hand after doing all this and looked coldly at the two Gryphon Knights hovering overhead, preparing himself to kill two men and two beasts.

    ¡°Let¡¯s see where you¡¯ll run to now!¡± A Gryphon Knightughed disdainfully overhead, shaking the sharp spear in his hand and digging his heels into the gryphon beneath him in an odd way.

    The gryphon circling in the air suddenly screamed out bizarrely and dived down towards Han Shuo. The metal ws of the gryphon could rip apart a buffalo. As it dived down towards Han Shuo like this, the aura formed by its enormous body and the knight¡¯s coldly gleaming spear was enough to stun an enemy senseless.

    The other Gryphon Knight moved his steed closer to Han Shuo, but didn¡¯t immediately make a move. The arrogance and disdain on his face seemed to indicate that having one out of the two of them was more than enough to take care of Han Shuo, and that his attentions weren¡¯t needed at all.

    Han Shuo¡¯s demeanor was aloof and remote as he held his ground without moving, staring intently at the diving knight and gryphon. A white bone staff suddenly appeared in his other hand when the Gryphon¡¯s metal ws was skimming the tops of the trees and Han Shuo quickly released a ¡°Dark Mist¡± spell.

    With the enhancing effects of this bone staff, the area of coverage by Han Shuo¡¯s ¡°Dark Mist¡± spell had increased by one third,pletely enshrouding an area that measured ten meters in diameter.

    ¡°Ugh, damn it, I can¡¯t see anything!¡± The Gryphon Knight bellowed furiously, some panic evident in his tone of voice.

    He¡¯d been chasing after Han Shuo all along and had witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s speed with his own eyes. That agility was something that a strong swordsman should possess, and a sword shaped Demonyer Edge had appeared in his hand when he¡¯d reached the treetops. His posturepletely resembling that of a swordsman.

    However, when it really came down to the actual fight, a white bone staff had suddenly appeared in Han Shuo¡¯s hands and he¡¯d released a ¡°Dark Mist¡± spell in the nick of time. This greatly astonished the Gryphon Knight, who¡¯d also fallen into Han Shuo¡¯s trap.

    The diving Gryphon Knight eximed in astonishment, alerting hispanion that something was wrong. Hispanion moved quickly, intent oning over to rescue hisrade.

    It was toote.

    A streak of bizarre, incandescent red fire red strikingly through the dense, ck mist. It was like it wasn¡¯t affected by the ¡°Dark Mist¡± spell at all, disying a heart stirring arc and tracing a long, bloody path.

    The gryphon screamed bizarrely in pain as the knight yelled hoarsely, the cries rising at almost the same time as that fey, red fire. Screams that would strike fear into people¡¯s hearts as the long, bloody line painted itself through the patch of dark fog.

    It was only when that bizarre, red fire extinguished itself did the despairing cries of agony finally fall silent.

    The other Gryphon Knight that had arrived in the area listened to the screams with his scalp tingling with numbness. He couldn¡¯t see what was urring and could only frantically repeat his questions, ¡°Camper, what¡¯s wrong? What¡¯s going on?¡±

    He kept calling out, but didn¡¯t dare to approach the ck mist. He only observed from a distance.

    The ¡°Dark Mist¡± was a spell that took effect swiftly and also dispersed quickly. As the chilly wind blew, the ck mist, that had coalesced quickly, vanished in a short period of time.

    Han Shuo still stood where he was and had a cruel, cold leer on his face. Lisa on his back had her eyes tightly shut, burying her head into Han Shuo¡¯s neck as she couldn¡¯t bear to look upon the scene.

    A bloody mess of severed limbs and hacked off flesh was scattered around Han Shuo. Some belonged to the Gryphon Knight, and some to the gryphon. A thick scent of blood attacked the nose as Han Shuo was stepping on a head that was slowly leaking brain fluid. It was as if he¡¯d just been baptized by blood as he was covered in the gore, making his leer appear even more horrifying.

    Dry retching suddenly sounded from the Gryphon Knight. He turned his gryphon immediately, fearfully trying to make his escape.

    ¡°Do you think that you¡¯re the only one who can fly?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s leer split in augh. He activated the ¡°Demonic Art of the Ninth Heavens¡± and took to the air, shooting towards the Gryphon Knight like lightning with Lisa on his back. He arrived behind the Gryphon Knight before thetter had travelled too far.

    Two bone spears shot out and stabbed into the gryphon¡¯s rump, making it scream shrilly. It actually turned and shot towards Han Shuo with the knight on its back. After the experience of his initial panic and the fact that his steed was now charging towards Han Shuo of its own volition, he quickly understood that Han Shuo could also fly through the air and that there was no opportunity for him to escape. He therefore hefted his spear and took aim at Han Shuo.

    Every Gryphon Knight was at least a senior knight. Therefore, when he hefted his spear, it red out with dark green fighting aura, as if silver lightning were traveling through the air after making use of the gryphon¡¯s momentum to hurtle towards Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo had just used the sharp Demonyer Edge to ughter a Gryphon Knight, along with his gryphon. There was an uncontroble bloodthirst rising in his heart. It was as if there was a voice spurring him on in his heart that told him to keep killing in such a gory manner. It happened to provide the perfect outlet for his emotions as he saw the Gryphon Knight charge towards him.

    Han Shuo threw his head back in a long howl and flew over with a leer. The Demonyer Edge hadn¡¯t appeared to be particrly long before, but with the cirction of the ¡°cial Mystical Spellfire¡± , a two meter long purple and red light spat from the tip. The purple light was out in front, and the red light connected to the Demonyer Edge in the back. The weapon looked quite magical.

    Even with Lisa on his back, Han Shuo¡¯s speed wasn¡¯t much slower than the Gryphon Knight¡¯s as he flew using the Art. His magical yuan circting at top speed. Han Shuo emitted a dense killing intent that seemed to materialize as a ck aura around his body. When viewed from afar, Han Shuo¡¯s figure with Demonyer Edge in hand was like a shooting star falling towards the ground.

    A ball of dazzling splendor exploded from where the two intersected, a deafening metallic ng reverberated in the surroundings. The Spellfire infused Demonyer Edge shot out a meter of cold, purple light, crashing into the fighting aura emitted by the long spear. The spear was immediately churned into dust as it was ravaged by the violent magical yuan.

    A bone piercing cold immediately crept over the knight¡¯s body. He reacted, but didn¡¯t have time to make a move before Han Shuo coalesced a red spellfire a meter tall. The blood veins in the knight¡¯s right arm gripping the silver spear suddenly exploded beneath the piercing cold and burning heat. His muscles started sliding off his bone, like they¡¯d been doused in acid, as droplets of blood escaped from his arm.

    ¡°You shouldn¡¯t have chased after me!¡± Han Shuo leered at the horrified Gryphon Knight. The Demonyer Edge started flying ording to his will afterwards and hacked off the gryphon¡¯s metal ws. The Demonyer Edge then hewed downwards and spliced the knight and gryphon¡¯s body into two, like he was cleaving apart a mountain. Fresh blood sttered like rain down towards the trees.

    The two Gryphon Knights had now died grisly deaths at Han Shuo¡¯s hands, but Han Shuo actually had an unsated feeling. His heart trembled as he suddenly came to his senses, finally understanding why he had such a fervent desire to y and ughter.

    Since his demonic magic had reached the true demon realm, Han Shuo had thoroughly be a demon. It was the first time that he¡¯d had overwhelming power and would find it difficult to control the urges deep within his heart, particrly as the next realm was the most dangerous ¡°bloodlust¡± realm. As one began to enter the bloodlust realm, the practitioner would start to have the desire to erupt in full blown ughter in every battle.

    It was a good thing that since he hadn¡¯t yet entered the bloodlust realm, Han Shuo could still control his thoughts and desires. It would be harder to control his bloodthirsty desires once he reached the next realm. He wouldn¡¯t be able to stop once he started fighting unless he saw blood, bing an extreme, gore-seeking violent demon.

    He exhaled lightly and privately reflected that practicing demonic magic was truly a perverse way. However, the exhration of fighting and killing today made him feel damn good, and his entire being seemed to strut around like a new person.

    ¡°Over there, after him!¡± The battle screams of horses came in from the distance. Han Shuo hovered in the air and swiveled his head, seeing that a troop of Gryphon Legion cavalry was quickly approaching him. This troop was formed only by earth bound knights. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t afraid that he¡¯d be unable to shake them off.

    Snorting coldly, Han Shuo flew downwards and picked up speed to leave when he was level with the trees.

    ¡°You know how to fly!¡± Lisa suddenly put her lips next to Han Shuo¡¯s ears at this time and eximed with astonishment at this time.

 Chapter 161: Bumping into a familiar face

    Chapter 161: Bumping into a familiar face

    Outside of Valen City, Han Shuo set Lisa down when they arrived at an outcropping of randomly scattered rock in the wilderness.

    Suddenly, having been set down, Lisa hugged Han Shuo tightly from behind. Her burgeoning breasts were pressed tightly against his back and he could clearly feel their soft, smooth firmness.

    Han Shuo had been carrying Lisa back all along, but because he¡¯d been fighting in a dangerous situation and had been busy avoiding hits, he hadn¡¯t focused his attentions on anywhere else. Now that the two were out of danger, Lisa suddenly embraced him tightly from behind, giving rise to strange feelings in his heart.

    ¡°Do you like that?¡± Lisa perched her lips next to Han Shuo¡¯s earlobes as she stered her chest against his back, huffing out a breath of hot air and asking shyly in a low voice.

    Taking a deep breath in, Han Shuo turned around and looked at Lisa, prying her from his body with a small bit of effort. He smiled, ¡°Alright, we¡¯re safe now. Now that we¡¯ve left Valen City, it will be harder for the Gryphon Legion to capture us than it would be for them to ascend to the heavens. You can be at ease.¡±

    Pouting, Lisa once again approached Han Shuo and hugged him tightly, her two arms squeezing him tightly around the waist. She said softly, ¡°I¡¯m nothing now, all my kin is gone. What should I do in the future?¡±

    pping Lisa¡¯s shoulder, Han Shuoforted her, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Lawrence will take care of you. He rushed here from the capital when he heard that something had happened to you. He truly dotes on you.¡±

    ¡°I often yed with cousin Lawrence when we were young. He already doted on me back then. Heh heh, he¡¯s been like my own brother all these years. I¡¯m very grateful to him!¡± Lisa said proudly when she heard Han Shuo mention Lawrence, and then cried out in surprise, saying with worry, ¡°Oh no, he didn¡¯t leave with us, could he possibly be in danger?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, your brother Lawrence isn¡¯t an ordinary person. If he can¡¯t handle even this little bit of danger, then all his years of living will have been wasted.¡± As the third prince, Lawrence had always been educated by his ambitious mother. He was also heavily valued by the king and had experts by his side. It wouldn¡¯t be a problem for him to leave peacefully at all.

    ¡°Right, you haven¡¯t answered me, why can you fly?¡± Han Shuo¡¯sfort had great effect on Lisa. She heaved a sigh of relief and suddenly thought of this matter, fixing her beautiful eyes onto Han Shuo.

    ¡°Eh, this is difficult to exin. I can only say that I¡¯m using a levitation spell that¡¯s not limited to archmages. As for how I can fly, I can only say that it¡¯s a marvelous technique.¡± It was difficult to exin anything regarding the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heaven¡± to either Emily or Lisa, and it was impossible to put things inly. Therefore, he could only gloss over the matter.

    More than ten people suddenly appeared in the distance and slowly walked towards Valen City. Han Shuo looked at them from afar and paid them no attention when he saw that they weren¡¯t wearing the uniform of the Gryphon Legion. He stood there and continued to talk to Lisa.

    The slope of random rocks that Han Shuo and Lisa were standing on happened to be where the group of people would soon pass by. When they drew near, a soft exmation suddenly rang out, ¡°Eh? Bryan, what are you doing here?¡±

    Han Shuo started and then paid close attention to the group of people. He suddenly discovered a familiar face among them ¡ª Candice. Boasting a fit body and wearing a broadsword on her back, Candice was wearing the thin, tight uniform of a swordsman and seemed to be unafraid of the assault of cold air.

    When she saw Han Shuo, she made a gesture to the mercenaries behind her and then walked over dashingly to Han Shuo. She swept her eyes up and down Han Shuo when she walked over and frowned, ¡°You¡¯re bringing a small girl to feel her up behind this random outcropping of rock on such a cold day?¡±

    ¡°None of your business!¡± Lisa flicked a nce at Candice, seeming to not like her tone and hectored in an unfriendly manner.

    Han Shuo struggled a little bit and broke free from Lisa¡¯s grasp. He looked at the Battlefire mercenary band members behind her and noticed that they numbered six in total. Five of them were spread out and surrounded a girl with a better figure wearing a thin veil, seeming to be protecting her.

    Looking at Candice, Han Shuo understood that Candice should have epted a mission and was protecting the thin veiled girl behind her. He then looked at Candice and said with a slightugh, ¡°Long time no see Candice. You must¡¯ve epted a mission and are in the middle of carrying it out?¡±

    Nodding, Candice admitted to it readily. Sheughed heartily, ¡°Indeed, I have a tough life! Not everyone can be as carefree as you, able to make out with a girl in a ce like this on such a cold day!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t you think random thoughts! We¡¯re only here because of some matters.¡± Han Shuo smiled at Candice ruefully.

    ¡°We¡¯re on a date, and what business is it to you!¡± Lisa¡¯s lip curled as she seemed to resume the usual spitfire she had at school, ring at Candice like she was a little hen itching for battle.

    ¡°Alright, alright, what are you posturing for?¡± Han Shuo felt things were a bit bizarre as he smiled and patted Lisa, indicating for her to say a few less words.

    ¡°This little girl is rather interesting, heh. Right, Bryan, how are things between you and Phoebe now?¡± Candice looked in amusement at Lisa and then stared at Han Shuo in inquiry.

    ¡°Same old, I¡¯m business partners with her. She¡¯s taken over the guild now and has been incredibly busytely.¡± Han Shuo responded carelessly and then asked Candice, ¡°Are you going into Valen City?¡±

    Nodding, Candice said, ¡°That¡¯s right, we¡¯ve epted a mission to escort Miss Belinda to Valen City. We¡¯ll take her safely back when Miss Belinda concludes her business in the city.¡±

    Because Candice and Han Shuo had gone through a life and death situation with each other before, Candice had epted Han Shuo in the depths of her heart. Therefore, she fully revealed the details of her mission this time.

    Thinking rapidly, Han Shuo weighed things up before warning Candice, ¡°Valen City has been a bit uneasy during these past few days. The chief of the Gryphon Legion, Bob Ascher, has seen one son gone missing for a few months and his eldest, rk, was just killed two days ago. The chief is enraged to the extreme and is turning Valen City upside down. I rmend that your employer not venture into Valen City at this time if there¡¯s nothing too urgent.¡±

    ¡°Thank you, I¡¯ll mention your suggestion to my employer, but I can¡¯t decide whether or not she¡¯ll listen to me.¡± Candice was very surprised by this news, and it was apparent from her furrowed brows that she too was cing high emphasis on this matter.

    But she was a mercenary, and since she¡¯d epted an employer¡¯s mission, she had to proceed ording to the original contract. She had no power to modify the contract even if some abnormalities cropped up along the way, or else she¡¯d have to pay additionalpensation. Therefore, she could only speak thus.

    Nodding, Han Shuo was about to say something when his brow suddenly furrowed as he suddenly turned in the direction that they hade from. He hesitated and asked Candice, ¡°Did you run into any danger along the way here?¡±

    Candice first started in surprise, and then remembered Han Shuo¡¯s miraculous abilities. Her pretty features immediately stilled as she quickly responded, ¡°We did run into some danger along the way, but we quickly handled it. Why do you say this? Did you discover something?¡±

    ¡°There was another group of people behind you since you¡¯ve appeared. I thought they had nothing to do with you and was just another group of people wanting to enter Valen City, but a huge gust of wind blew by just now and I happened to hear the word ¡®Belinda¡¯. If I¡¯m not mistaken, this group of people that¡¯s continuously kept their distance from you must have something to do with your employer ¡®Belinda¡¯.¡± Han Shuo responded with a frown.

    If it¡¯d been anyone else to say these words, Candice would¡¯ve never believed him because even she hadn¡¯t detected anything out of the ordinary at such a far distance. Not only had Han Shuo picked up the traces of another group of people, he could even make use of the wind to hear what they were saying. This was apletely unimaginably queer urrence.

    Only a wind archmage would have such miraculous hearing to be able to pick up on what others were saying so far away. Han Shuo was obviously not at this level.

    However, after going through life and death with Han Shuost time, Candice understood that he did happen to have such miraculous abilities. She had long since seen his capabilities and thus believed him without hesitation. Her long eyshes fluttered rapidly as she contemted with a furrowed brow, then spoke to Han Shuo, ¡°What direction are they in, how many and what¡¯s their strength like?¡±

 Chapter 162: The abnormalities of the white bone staff

    Chapter 162: The abnormalities of the white bone staff

    ¡°There are three people five hundred meters behind you. Because they¡¯re further away and wearing ordinary gear, I can¡¯t figure out their strength.¡± Han Shuo observed for a moment as he stood on the outcrop with narrowed eyes, responding to Candice¡¯s question in a low voice after a while.

    ¡°Thank you Bryan, I¡¯ll remember your help.¡± Candice said lowly and didn¡¯t say much else to Han Shuo, turning to return to the Battlefire mercenary band, discussing something with the mercenaries.

    ¡°What is she to you that you¡¯re willing to help her?¡± Lisa tugged on Han Shuo¡¯s sleeve after Candice had left.

    ¡°A friend of mine from awhile back. Let¡¯s go. We¡¯ll leave in another direction. We still need to return to Valen City in a bit.¡± Han Shuo looked at Candice and saw that she was still discussing things with her employer. He knew that his words had had an effect then.

    Candice was a mercenary and had her missions and way of living. Han Shuo gave her a reminder out of the kindness of his heart when he ran into her and saw that her mission held sometent danger. He was being a good friend, but wouldn¡¯t interfere in her matters.

    When she heard that Han Shuo wanted to leave, Lisa didn¡¯t say much as she ducked her head shyly and walked behind Han Shuo, reaching out her hands to entwine around his neck and jumping firmly onto his back. She said merrily next to his ear, ¡°I still want you to give me a piggyback me.¡±

    Han Shuo was speechless, and then smiled ruefully. He said to Lisa on his back, ¡°I had no choice just now because there was an emergency. That¡¯s why I put you on my back. Now that we¡¯re out of danger, you no longer need to be piggy backed. We can slowly walk back.¡±

    ¡°Hehe, I¡¯m not getting down no matter what you say.¡± Lisa¡¯s small hands entwined themselves around Han Shuo¡¯s neck as her fleshy thighs criss crossed themselves around his waist, appearing quite at ease.

    Lisa was at an exuberantly youthful age, and because of Han Shuo¡¯s random teachings, her originally t chest was now a bit ridiculously well rounded. Han Shuo could even feel that her chest on his back wasn¡¯t much smaller than that of Emily¡¯s. That soft, wondrous feeling made Han Shuo¡¯s heart itch a bit.

    Off in the distance, Candice spoke a bit with herrades and seemed to be set on continuing to make their way to Valen City, ignoring the three following behind them. Their minds made up, the group began moving out again. Candice flicked a nce over at Han Shuo and happened to see Lisa on Han Shuo¡¯s back. She was rather taken aback.

    Han Shuo felt Candice¡¯s slightly bizarre gaze and turned to lift his head proudly, as if showing off something to Candice. She couldn¡¯t help but break into softughter.

    ¡°Hang on, we¡¯re leaving too.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t force her toe down from his back when he saw that Lisa¡¯s mind was set. She¡¯d just lost her parents and was in the most painful moments of her life. He didn¡¯t want to make her unhappy at a time like this. He gave instructions in a low voice and walked off on another path, avoiding the direction that Candice¡¯s crew was taking to Valen City.

    It was already evening at this time. Han Shuo took note of the direction and made a circle around the city walls. He used the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡± to fly over the city walls when night had fallen,nding in Valen City¡¯s territory.

    They arrived at the hotel that Emily had stayed atst time and Han Shuo made his way directly to Emily¡¯s room. Chester called out lowly from within the room before they entered, ¡°Who is it?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s me!¡± Han Shuo responded and pushed open the door. He looked at the surprised Chester and asked, ¡°What are you doing here?¡±

    Chester hesitated when he saw Lisa on Han Shuo¡¯s back, responding, ¡°Madame Emily thought that this might be where you¡¯re meeting Lawrence and had me stay here in hopes of receiving word from anyone of you.¡±

    ¡°Then, did you receive any messages from Lawrence?¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t head directly to the Dark Mantle from here because Emily had arranged for men to be here, and because Lisa was present. This was also where he¡¯d told Lawrence he was staying, so Lawrence was likely toe here after he escaped.

    Nodding, Chester answered, ¡°Lawrence hasn¡¯te by yet, but he¡¯s sent a messenger. The man told me that if you and Lisa came back, please take Lisa to this ce!¡± Chester handed over a card as he spoke. The address that was not too far from here was written on it.

    ¡°What did the man who Lawrence sent look like?¡± Han Shuo had to take all precautions.

    After Chester had described the person, Han Shuo immediately understood that the person who¡¯de was the old assassin Lucky and therefore there was nothing to worry about in this matter.

    Letting Lisa down from his back, Han Shuo looked at her and said seriously, ¡°Lisa, we¡¯re about to do something very dangerous. You should go with Chester and immediately go to where your cousin is. Lawrence will take you back to the Empire in a short period of time. Do as I say, alright? We¡¯ll stay and get revenge for you.¡±

    After experiencing an extreme hardship in life, Lisa was much more mature than Han Shuo had remembered. Although an expression of longing remained in her eyes after he said his words, she nodded her head docilely, agreeing to Han Shuo¡¯s arrangements.

    ¡°Hire a carriage. Take Miss Lisa to the ce on Lawrence¡¯s card yourself. ce her safely in Lawrence¡¯s hands.¡± Han Shuo said with a smile to Chester.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll handle all of this perfectly.¡± Chester promised Han Shuo with great confidence and then bowed towards Lisa, gesturing for her to walk ahead of him.

    Lisa looked deeply at Han Shuo, saying to him with some worry afterwards, ¡°Be careful, don¡¯t let anything happen to you.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, nothing will happen to me. Make use of the cover of the night to make haste. Go with him.¡± Han Shuo nodded and urged Lisa on with a slight smile.

    Lisa turned and followed Chester after these words, and the two quickly moved outside. The Dark Mantle¡¯s influence was naturally significant in such a city asrge as this. It wouldn¡¯t have been a difficult thing to aplish if Han Shuo had wanted to send Lisa back.

    However, he¡¯d only joined the Dark Mantle only a short while ago, so it wasn¡¯t a good thing to use the organization¡¯s resources for his own personal affairs. In addition, as the third prince, it would be a more than appropriate thing for him to handle this matter and take care of Lisa¡¯s affairs after she¡¯d returned back to the Empire.

    Han Shuo turned after Lisa had left and walked into the inner chamber, saying with a slight smile, ¡°Come on out.¡±

    Emily walked out with a smile from the inner chamber wearing a soft leather coat and rolled her eyes when she walked next to Han Shuo. She reached out a hand and pinched him, saying with some jealousy, ¡°You made off with Lawrence¡¯s sister after visiting him and made him send men here to ask for her. You¡¯re something alright!¡±

    Grasping her pinching hand and pulling it forward, Han Shuo held Emily in his arms and started roving his hands all over her well rounded chest. He smiled in exnation, ¡°I¡¯m not as bad as you think I am! I only took her with me because Lawrence¡¯s location had beenpromised.¡±

    He exined the entire matter to Emily, who then responded with a furrowed brow, ¡°ording to Lawrence¡¯s words, he may be here to act against Bob Ascher on the king¡¯s silent approval. This may be one of the methods that His Majesty is using to test Lawrence. He¡¯ll be using Lawrence¡¯s performance in this matter to determine Lawrence¡¯s future path.¡±

    Han Shuo started slightly after hearing Emily¡¯s words. He hadn¡¯t thought that much at first, but it all made sense after Emily had exined things. He mused silently for a moment and then said, ¡°If this is the case, then we might actually have the inclination to cooperate with Lawrence.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right, the Dark Mantle is under no restrictions when we conduct missions. I don¡¯t mind cooperating with Lawrence if the timing is right, but as for how to actually act, we must have a defined n.¡± Emily¡¯s slender brows were knit tightly as she spoke with some concern.

    Emily¡¯s worries stemmed from Lawrence¡¯s identity as prince. She was afraid that if others misunderstood their rtionship before the greater picture had been set. If Lawrence wasn¡¯t king in the end and another prince inherited the throne, then Emily, Han Shuo, and those others who had been too close to Lawrence might attract fatal disasters. Thus, Emily was quite cautious.

    ¡°I understand your meaning. Don¡¯t worry, I know my ce when interacting with Lawrence.¡± Han Shuo said quietly. He thought for a moment and then asked, ¡°Right, you left in a hurry to notify your brother about the Cmity Church and told me not to mention this to anyone else. Why is that?¡±

    Emily¡¯s charming features became incredibly grave when these words were voiced. She took a deep breath in and responded, ¡°The Cmity Church is an evil church. They worship all sorts of evil gods, and numerous evil experts are gathered within their ranks. I only know of a few rumors about this church and don¡¯t know the details, but my brother told me that this Cmity Church is thergest evil cult on the entire continent. Theymit acts hated by both man and god in the shadows. It¡¯s always a great threat to any country whenever they embark on arge scale mission.¡±

    ¡°Ten years or so ago, several empires cooperated to exterminate the Cmity Church and swept away all of their exposed strongholds. There was no news of the Cmity Church for a long while after that, but everyone knows that they hadn¡¯t been destroyed at all. They are only in hiding. The fact that you confirmed this fact from the memories of the necromancer from the Cmity Church means that this matter is receiving significant attention.¡±

    Starting in shock, Han Shou looked askance at Emily, ¡°Did you report the fact that I took the necromancer¡¯s memories?¡±

    ¡°Of course not.¡± Emily pouted and rolled her eyes at Han Shuo, seeming to fault him for not believing her. She only continued to speak after he apologized. ¡°I only said that we killed the necromancer together and gained this information from his space ring.¡±

    ¡°I see. It looks like this necromancer was a big fish.¡± Han Shuo smiled and fished out the white bone staff as they chatted, toying with it as they continued talking.

    A strange buzzing sound suddenly emitted from the white bone staff, like the drone of an unknown bug. This made Han Shuo¡¯s hair stand on end with astonishment.

    ¡°Is there anyone here in this hotel?¡± A familiar voice traveled in from outside at this moment. It was Candice calling out loudly.

    The white bone staff still continued to sound out oddly and kept vibrating, seeming to want to fly out of Han Shuo¡¯s grasp. This greatly surprised both Han Shuo and Emily.

    ¡°Eh? Miss Belinda, what are you doing? You can¡¯t leave by yourself.¡± Candice¡¯s shouting suddenly became frantic calls. It seemed that her employer had walked out of the Battlefire mercenary band¡¯s protection.

    Firmly grasping onto the shaking white bone staff, Han Shuo also felt rather perplexed and shook his head quickly. ¡°I don¡¯t know what¡¯s going on either. This has never happened before whenever I used it.¡±

    Frantic footsteps quickly approached their room, apanied by Candice¡¯s frantic yells. Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts raced as he seemed to understand something and put the white bone staff back into his space ring. He made a motion towards Emily as he tip toed over to the window.

 Chapter 163: Convening in a small hotel

    Chapter 163: Convening in a small hotel

    Han Shuo lifted the window slightly upwards, revealing a long, narrow crack and made use of this opening to look outside.

    Candice¡¯s employer, Belinda, was wearing a face veil and revealed only a pair of sapphire colored eyes. A strange expression was in them as she seemed to be looking for something. She looked to and fro upon arriving in front of Han Shuo and Emily¡¯s room.

    Candice and the others of the mercenary crew ran over frantically behind Belinda. Candice was on high alert as she kept a hand on the magic sword strapped to her back, looking carefully around the premises, deathly afraid that something would happen to Belinda.

    Candice only breathed a sigh of relief when the other members surrounded Belinda in the center. She spoke to the still peering around Belinda in admonishment, ¡°Miss Belinda, please tell us before you walk around next time. We¡¯ve been hired to ensure your safety, but we won¡¯t restrict your freedom of movement. You have no need to suddenly run away like this!¡±

    Belinda¡¯s features were hidden behind her face veil, as her half moon, slender eyebrows were tightly knit together. Her beautiful eyes darted around as she appeared quite confused. Belinda only came to herself after Candice had spoken with displeasure, speaking apologetically in a gentle voice, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I just thought I saw an acquaintance and so I hastened over. It turns out that I was mistaken.¡±

    Candice was also quite perplexed upon hearing these words and she said with a strange tone. ¡°There was no one here. Why would you say that there was a figure here? This is too strange.¡±

    ¡°Ah, it could be that I¡¯m short on sleep and my eyes are seeing things. I¡¯m truly very sorry.¡± Belinda¡¯s bright eyes swept around the room that Han Shuo and Emily were in as she responded carelessly to Candice.

    More frantic footsteps sounded from behind as a slightly chubby, middle aged woman walked into view smiling merrily. She held a book in her hand and curtseyed politely when she walked in front of the people, then saying apologetically, ¡°Honored guests, you must be here to look for lodging. I was preupied just now and am truly apologetic. Pleasee register at the front counter with me.¡±

    ¡°To think that no one¡¯s standing at the front of this hotel. This is truly a bit worrying. In addition, the external surroundings don¡¯t seem that good. Should we switch to another hotel, Miss

    Belinda?¡± Candice didn¡¯t seem to like this hotel and raised this suggestion with a sour expression.

    Wrapped in a veil, Belinda¡¯s clear eyes surveyed the surroundings and said, ¡°No need, let¡¯s stay here. I think this ce is fine.¡±

    ¡°Then alright.¡± Candice had to follow to her employer¡¯s wishes and responded with some disappointment.

    ¡°Excuse me, what kind of people live in the rooms along this hallway?¡± Belinda seemed to ask a careless question to the chubby hotel owner.

    ¡°Apologies, we¡¯re not at liberty to say. This is for the privacy of our guests, I¡¯m sorry!¡± The hotel owner stuck to her principles. Although she inly wanted Candice and them to stay here, she wasn¡¯t willing to budge on a matter of integrity.

    Nodding, Belinda didn¡¯t continue her line of questioning. She said softly, ¡°That is fine too. Are there any free rooms around the hallway? If so, I¡¯ll stay here.¡±

    The middle aged woman¡¯s eyes lit up as she quickly flipped through the book in her hand, then pointed at a room not to far away from Han Shuo and Emily¡¯s, saying hastily, ¡°This room is empty, but it¡¯s not the best in the hotel. If the honoreddy doesn¡¯t mind, you can immediately take up residence in it.¡±

    ¡°No problem, then this room it is. Candice, you handle the rest.¡± Belinda said gently as her clear eyes flicked a surreptitious nce at Han Shuo and Emily¡¯s room, striding out in front to her room.

    The owner of the hotel knew that Belinda was the master of this group, so she very quickly fished out a set of keys when Belinda started moving. The owner opened the door and let Belinda in when she got to the door.

    ¡°You guys go in first and protect thedy. I¡¯ll take care of the paperwork and arrange rooms for us around Miss Belinda.¡± Candice gave orders to the rest of the Battlefire mercenary band after she saw Belinda head inside before following the overjoyed, chubby owner back to the front desk.

    Han Shuo only closed the gap in the window when those of the Battlefire mercenary band followed Belinda into the room. He said lowly to Emily, ¡°The abnormalities of the white bone staff must have something to do with Belinda. This person¡¯s identity is very suspicious.¡±

    Emily had seen some of what had just happened as well and immediately nodded when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s words. She said gravely, ¡°It looks like Belinda has something to do with the necromancer you killed. Since you¡¯ve taken all the memories from his soul, do you have any impression of this Belinda?¡±

    Furrowing his brow and thinking deeply, Han Shuo shook his head firmly in the end, ¡°No. Belinda has never appeared in any of rendon¡¯s memories. I really don¡¯t understand why she could sense the white bone staff.¡±

    ¡°How did rendon obtain the white bone staff?¡± Emily started and approached the question from another perspective.

    ¡°It was awarded to him by the senior leadership of the Cmity Church after rendonpleted a certain number of mission. He only knows how to use the white bone staff, but not where ites from.¡± Han Shuo responded after musing with his eyes shut for a while.

    ¡°It looks like Belinda is from the Cmity Church. She could be here because of rendon¡¯s disappearance. We need to be careful.¡± Emily thought for a bit and concluded gravely.

    Belinda was currently Candice¡¯s employer. If she was from the Cmity Church, then it was an unknown why she had asked Candice to protect her on this trip to Valen City. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t quite understand this point, but given that Belinda could sense the white bone staff, this meant that her background wasn¡¯t simple. He considered the situation silently as he thought of the evils of the Cmity Church.

    ¡°Belinda must be suspicious of the rooms in this hallway. I think we should temporarily leave this ce and switch to another room to observe her.¡± Han Shuo suggested to Emily after thinking for a bit.

    Nodding, Emily said with confidence, ¡°No problem, the owner of the hotel is one of ours. We can switch to any room we want.¡±

    No wonder Emily had chosen to stay at this hotel in Valen City. It turns out the owner was part of the Dark Mantle! It looked like the Dark Mantle¡¯s intelligencework was quite vast indeed.

    Making use of the time before Candice returned and the fact that Belinda had gone into that room with the members of the Battlefire mercenary band, Han Shuo and Emily quietly snuck out of their room from another exit. They entered a great lobby on the floor above and leaned against the window, able to see the front yard from their vantage point.

    Emily must have triggered some mechanism as the hotel owner merrily appeared in the lobby after a short while. She still wore a professional smile and bowed slightly in front of Emily, ¡°Madame Emily, what orders do you have?¡±

    ¡°Sister Helene, arrange a new room for us, ideally a bit of a distance away from Belinda, but able to observe them as well.¡± Emily also responded amiably with a bit of a smile.

    The middle aged woman called Helene was a bit surprised by Emily¡¯s words. She thought for a moment, ¡°Three people also came in and asked for a room that could be used to observe Miss Belinda.¡±

    His mind connecting the dots, Han Shuo thought of the three that had been following Candice. He asked involuntarily, ¡°Where are they now, and did you give them the proper rooms?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ve purposefully kept the rooms that can observe Belinda¡¯s room. I knew something was wrong with that woman when her gaze at your room was a bit off.¡± Helene flicked a nce at Han Shuo and disyed a ¡®don¡¯t you worry, I¡¯ve got it under control¡¯ look on her face as she exined with a smile.

    ¡°Sister Helene has aplished many achievements for our organization over the years. Although she doesn¡¯t know offensive magics, she¡¯s very adept at observing people. This is why I stay here when I¡¯m in Valen City.¡± Emily also rolled her eyes at Han Shuo and smiled slightly.

    ¡°Enough, Madame Emily, don¡¯tpliment me like that. I¡¯ll go arrange new rooms for you right away. I¡¯ll also keep an eye on those who¡¯ve just arrived and will immediately report any developments to you.¡± Helene sashayed out after replying merrily.

    ¡°Alright, we should make our preparations as well. We must keep a close eye on that girl. Investigating her background may lead to enormous profits for us.¡± Emily said.

 Chapter 164: The female alchemist

    Chapter 164: The female alchemist

    They changed rooms and switched into one of the rooms on the other side of the artificial mountain in the yard. From this room, they could look directly into Belinda¡¯s room through the window.

    Candice seemed to be discussing something with Belinda upon returning as she stayed within the room and didn¡¯te out. The other mercenaries were arranged in the rooms on either side of Belinda¡¯s.

    The three people who had followed Belinda were given rooms neighboring Han Shuo and Emily¡¯s room. Thanks to a magical mirror, they could directly observe the three¡¯s movements.

    The trio looked like nondescript, ordinary featured men. They actually looked quite simr and could have been three brothers. One of them leaned against the window and kept an eye on Belinda after moving into the room, whereas the other two fell into a deep sleep on the bed, likely because they were too fatigued.

    It was still daylight, so the two groups of people made no moves, maintaining a calm, peaceful situation. Han Shuo observed them for a while and noticed that both sides were doing nothing out of the ordinary. He returned to Emily¡¯s side and thought for a moment, ¡°Keep an eye on the situation for me. I¡¯m going to make a trip to the cemetery of death to check on things.¡±

    ¡°Hmm? Why do you suddenly want to go back to the cemetery of death?¡± Emily was a bit surprised by Han Shuo¡¯s decision and stared at him with a questioning gaze.

    Smiling mysteriously, Han Shuo said, ¡°I recently took in a follower and want to see if his injuries have healed yet.¡±

    Han Shuo had already moved further into the room and ripped up the wooden panels of the closet, setting up the transportation matrix inside. Emily was long since used to Han Shuo¡¯s mysteriousness by now and didn¡¯t ask much when she saw that he was about to leave. She said, ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll stay here and observe them. I¡¯ll go over and pull you back if anything happens, so you¡¯d best not stray too far from the cemetery of death.¡±

    ¡°Mm, don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll stay within the cemetery. You cane find me anytime if there¡¯s anything out of the ordinary.¡± Han Shuo responded and stood within the matrix, closing the doors to activate it.

    ¡°Gilbert, where the hell are you?¡± Han Shuo immediately yelled loudly when he reappeared in the cemetery of death.

    The little lewd dragon appeared in front of Han Shuo with a pop and fell to his knees immediately, saying pitifully, ¡°Noble master, you¡¯ve finally remembered your faithful servant. There¡¯s nothing interesting in this boring ce and I can¡¯t go out either! I¡¯m bored to death!¡±

    ¡°I told you to keep a good eye on that ce, you didn¡¯t ck off, did you?¡± Han Shuo had once told Gilbert to pay attention to the piece ofnd that was refining the earth elite zombie, just in case something untoward happened there.

    ¡°Of course I didn¡¯t ck off, but there¡¯s really nothing worth keeping an eye on there. Nothing¡¯s happened since you left. Oh, honored master, when will you take me out to go look for beautiful women?¡± Gilbertined to Han Shuo.

    Compared to his charred lookst time, Gilbert was now dressed in a gleaming ck robe and had his hair perfectlybed. Apart from his skin being the color of coal, the young Gilbert looked rather handsome.

    ¡°How are you injuries?¡± It remained to be seen whether or not he¡¯d take Gilbert out with him, based on his injuries. Although this little lewd dragon was a shot mess, his strength as a dragon was extraordinary, so he would make a good helper regardless.

    Gilbert puffed his chest out after hearing this question and said very cockily, ¡°Not a problem. As one of the strongest predators on this, this kind of injury was not a problem for me at all.¡±

    ¡°Stop bullshitting me, how are your injuries?¡± Han Shuo red as he spoke harshly.

    As his master, Han Shuo could more or less sense a bit of Gilbert¡¯s condition through the ties of the contract. Although he was much better than before, Han Shuo could still feel that he hadn¡¯t fully recovered, and so couldn¡¯t help but take a severe tone when he heard Gilbert speak this way.

    Gilbert shrank into himself and said with a bit of trepidation, ¡°I¡¯m not fully recovered yet, but I¡¯m pretty much all healed, I won¡¯t drag you down.¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll consider taking you with me. Maybe in the next two days. Rest well. If you be a burden when I need you in the future, I won¡¯t let you off the hook that easily!¡± Han Shuo walked towards the spot where the earth elite zombie was being refined. The center of the area where the earth zombie was being refined had sunk in, and the concentrated earth essence was still slowly flowing in.

    He took a look around and focused his concentration, establishing a connection with the zombie in the ground. Han Shuo instantly sensed a roaring sense of life when he did so. This sense of life was brimming with the rich qi of earth. Han Shuo immediately understood that the refinement of the zombie was already on the right path.

    This was because when ordinary zombies were summoned, only a dead silence could be felt when a mental connection was established. Only incredibly strong dark creatures such as the knights would send forth a bit of the feeling of life when connected to the caster. There was a vibrant sense of life and the rich feeling of earth qi exuded from this zombie warrior. This meant that it had truly grown after absorbing the essence of the ce of extreme earth.

    ¡°Alright, you stay here and rest up. I¡¯ll let you out in a few days.¡± Han Shuo was at peace when he saw that nothing was out of the ordinary within the cemetery, and that the dark dragon and earth elite zombie were all regaining their full strength. He walked towards the structure within the cemetery.

    Gilbert was quite excited upon receiving Han Shuo¡¯s promise and he kept bouncing around Han Shuo,plimenting his mighty prowess. Gilbert¡¯s fawning smile made Han Shuo burst outughing.

    Han Shuo nned on leaving through the transportation matrix, but suddenly remembered that he hadn¡¯t gone into the basement for a very long time. Now that his mental strength had increased, Han Shuo nned on seeing if he could make it another level farther.

    He had Gilbert stay where he was and walked down into the secret chamber by himself. He easily broke through the boundary at the first level and walked in matter-of-factly.

    When he arrived at where he¡¯d been stuck before, Han Shuo focused his concentration and charged forward, hoping tond on the next level of the cemetery of death.

    Bam! Han Shuo was immediately bounced back when he hit the boundary and his mind ached with pain.

    He fell to a sitting position and staggered to his feet, immediately understanding that his current mental strength wasn¡¯t enough to make it to the next level. A thought struck him as he held the Eye of Darkness in one hand and took out the white bone staff from his space ring with the other.

    The cemetery of death was once hallowed ground for necromancers, and the green Eye of Darkness was the key to opening the cemetery of death. The white bone staff could enhance necromancy magics and although its function was different from the Eye, they were both items of necromancy. Han Shuo held the two in his hand and weighed them up, trying to see if there were anymonalities between the two.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but focus his attention on the two items in his hand. The Eye of Darkness suddenly lit up and shot out green light, resulting in a surge of strength entering the white bone staff. A trace of ck light suddenly shot out of the white bone staff and instantly sank into the Eye of Darkness.

    Shocked, Han Shuo originally paid no attention to the Eye of Darkness and set his concentration on the white bone staff. He originally hadn¡¯t sensed anything out of the ordinary from the white bone staff, but suddenly discovered that there was a small magical formation within it.

    ¡°Ah, it¡¯s a boundary formation that acts as a magical brand, no wonder Belinda could sense the white bone staff.¡± Han Shuo suddenly realized what had happened when his concentration made a round through the staff.

    There was a type of boundary that acted as a magical brand in rendon¡¯s memories and could be ced on weapons and clothes. It usually existed in the formation of a magical formation. The owner of the magical brand would be able to sense the existence of his brand within a certain existence.

    So it turned out that such a magical brand existed within the white bone staff. There were traces of magic left within the staff that had not only blocked Han Shuo¡¯s mental exploration and alerted Belinda of its existence.

    Perhaps it was the Eye of Darkness absorbing the residual magic within the white bone staff, causing the magical brand formation to copse fromck of energy, but this allowed Han Shuo to take a peek at the situation inside.

    Han Shuo¡¯s concentration sank thoroughly inside and discovered a small line of text within the formation ¡ª Work 17 from Alchemist Belinda of the Cmity Church. ¡°The Cmity Church alright.¡± Han Shuo said lowly and didn¡¯t n on remaining within the cemetery of death. He reemerged on the ground and went back to the hotel, nning oning up with a good strategy to take care of Belinda.

 Chapter 165: An abnormal situation within the hotel

    Chapter 165: An abnormal situation within the hotel

    A faint fragrance drifted into Han Shuo¡¯s nose and mouth. A strong woozy feeling suddenly assaulted him and he almost fainted.

    It was a good thing that the tenacity of his body was much stronger than an ordinary person¡¯s after the demonic magic had reforged his body. The magical yuan had an even more wondrous effect. His body started automatically circting it the moment he became dazed after taking in a breath of the faint scent.

    The demon infant in his abdomen instantly expelled the fragrance from his body. The dizzy feeling in his head also disappeared as well.

    At this moment, Han Shuo held his breath and started circting magical yuan first before taking in another breath of the fragrance. When he took the breath in, his immensely strong nerves were fully mentally prepared and in the instant the dizzying feeling appeared, the feeling of wanting to faint turned from strong to faint until he was no longer affected by it.

    Now that he was in the true demon realm, his physical body had been reforged to a depth beyond normal imagination and even this strong, cloying fragrance wasn¡¯t enough to affect him.

    Oh no! I wonder what¡¯s happened to Emily! After his perverted body grew used to the fragrance, Han Shuo suddenly recalled that Emily had been in the room and hastily pushed open the closet door.

    Emily had been within the room, but was now nowhere to be found. He didn¡¯t know where she¡¯d gone. There were traces that the room had been turned over, and judging from the level of mess that had been made, someone had been by.

    Han Shuo¡¯s transportation matrix was set up inside closet and clothes were covering the magic sticks. Therefore, even if someone opened the closet doors, they wouldn¡¯t be able to discern anything out of the ordinary if they didn¡¯t inspect closely.

    When he saw that someone had gone through the room and that Emily had vanished without a trace, Han Shuo immediately started worrying. Now that he nned on walking out of the room in search of his Dark Mantle colleague, he suddenly discovered that everything about the hotel was a bit out of sorts.

    He lifted a corner of the window to discover that it was already night. However, as he gazed into the distance, he could see that the rooms in the distance were lit up. This meant that it wasn¡¯t toote at night yet, but all the rooms within this hotel were shrouded in darkness. There was faint light emitting from only Belinda¡¯s room as very low voices engaged in discussion came from it.

    As Han Shuo held his breath and concentrated, he discovered that there were small fly-like bugs swarming the hotel courtyard. There were dozens of them, and they spread out to fly into all of the various rooms of the hotel. A gray mist emitted from their tails, emitting the fragrance that had almost caused Han Shuo to faint.

    Creasing his brow, Han Shuo was almost certain that the abnormal events within the room had to do with Belinda. He soundlessly opened the door and took out the ck robe that Dark Mantle members wore during missions. He made it to the top of the roof in the darkness and slowly slunk towards Belinda¡¯s room.

    As he did so, Han Shuo deftly used the magical yuan topletely cover traces of his presence, adjusting his heartbeat and breathing to a very hard to detect frequency.

    ¡°Master Belinda, all of the guests within this hotel have been gathered into the living room of the suite.¡± Han Shuo heard a low voice speak as soon as heid his ear to the roof of Belinda¡¯s room.

    ¡°Mm.¡± Belinda responded faintly and seemed to walk towards the lobby.

    Han Shuo carefully moved his body towards the lobby. When he arrived, he lightly reached out a finger and circted the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡±. A small me appeared on his fingertip, burrowing through dense wood material on top and allowed him look below.

    There were more than ten people in a dead faint ced in a lobby that was very simr to the room that Han Shuo was staying in. Emily was amongst them, as well as Chester, having returned from his mission of taking Lisa to Lawrence. Hotel owner Helene was amongst these people, and even Candice and the other members of the Battlefire mercenary band as well.

    Apart from the people whom Han Shuo was well acquainted with, there was also the great druid Caspian and female elf Angelica. Han Shuo had bumped into both of them in the Dark Forest, but had met them separately. He only knew that the two of them were traveling together when he saw both of them here now.

    There was no one of particr interest within the rest of the hotel guests. They were likely here to conduct business in Valen City and didn¡¯t raise Han Shuo¡¯s interest.

    The three people who had been following Belinda were all standing there respectfully, as if subordinates waiting for Belinda¡¯s orders. This rather surprised Han Shuo as he hadn¡¯t thought the three following her would be her men.

    Belinda¡¯s slender brows knit together tightly when she arrived in the lobby and she swept a gaze over those below her. She said softly, ¡°I felt vibrations from white bone staff number 17 when I arrived at the hotel. I personally refined that white bone staff and awarded it to rendon.¡±

    ¡°However, the presence from the staff suddenly vanished without a trace when I arrived at the end of the hallway. It looks like someone suddenly returned it to their space ring. No one¡¯s left the hotel since I¡¯ve arrived, so the white bone staff must be within one of their space rings.¡±

    ¡°Master, then how should we do this?¡± The one who looked to be the oldest out of the three brothers asked in inquiry.

    Belinda¡¯s blue eyes looked shrewdly at the people on the ground and pointed at Emily. ¡°The white bone staff should be on her. She¡¯s the only one with a space ring.¡± Out of Emily, Candice, Caspian, and Angelica, Candice had always been with them, so was naturally ruled out. It looked like Caspian and Angelica had arrivedter, therefore, in Belinda¡¯s eyes, Emily was the one with the staff.

    The person who¡¯d asked the question walked over to Emily after Belinda¡¯s words and took off her space ring, handing it respectfully to Belinda.

    When Belinda took Emily¡¯s space ring, she touched it with closed eyes for a while and said, ¡°She set up a magical boundary inside. Tie her up and then wake her.¡±

    ¡°Master, what about the others?¡± It was still the oldest of the three asking the questions.

    Waving her hand, Belinda said carelessly, ¡°Same old, kill those who have no value.¡±

    Han Shuo immediately became nervous when he heard these words. Apart from Emily, Candice, Angelica, and Caspian were also in the lobby below. Although Caspian had no rtionship with Han Shuo, he was friends with Candice and Angelica to varying degrees. He couldn¡¯t watch them be killed in front of him.

    ¡°Don¡¯t you think that you¡¯re going overboard with your actions?¡± Caspian, supposedly in a dead faint, suddenly spoke up before Han Shuo took action.

    Caspian stood up as he spoke and protected the little elf Angelica behind him.

    When Han Shuo noticed this abnormality, he immediately stopped and continued crouching on the roof, observing what was happening below.

    ¡°Eh? You can still remain conscious beneath the strong effects of my fragrance. It seems that the great druid Caspian does indeed have some magical abilities.¡± Belinda eximed softly but spoke calmly.

    ¡°I don¡¯t care who you are, but your methods are greatly distasteful to me. I will ignore the fact that you harmed us earlier if you let all those here go, and I will allow you to leave as well.¡± Caspian looked at Belinda with disfavor and snorted.

    ¡°Fereeca, you three brothers can take advantage of this to see what kind of magical abilities a great druid of the nature divinity possess. Kill him!¡± Belinda didn¡¯t waste any ther and immediately waved her hand, indicating for the three brothers to kill Caspian.

    Fereeca and his brothers suddenly disyed a ruthless look of killing intent after Belinda¡¯s instructions and unsheathed three longswords, surrounding the druid.

    ¡°Don¡¯t me me for what happens next since you won¡¯t listen to me!¡± Caspian red at the three of them and took out an odd staff shaped like an old root from his space ring, nning on fighting the three.

    At this moment, all of the scattered flying bugs in the small hotel seemed to be summoned by some power and converged on Belinda¡¯s room.

    At the same time, the thick branches of arge tree by the side of the room suddenly seemed to be summoned as well, sending its gnarled branches into the room like pliable snakes.

 Chapter 166: The armored golem

    Chapter 166: The armored golem

    Han Shuo could clearly see the changes in the room through a long and narrow crack in the roof above.

    The flying bugs converged from all over the hotel and gathered in the room, next to Belinda.

    The pliable branches of the nearby tree began to spread throughout the room crazily. The branch-like staff in Caspian¡¯s hands emitted a vibrant feeling of life.

    ¡°Why aren¡¯t you acting yet?!¡± Belinda snorted softly at this point.

    Fereeca and his brothers attacked Caspian, almost in unison, after receiving Belinda¡¯s words. The three of them moved in concert. The tip of Fereeca¡¯s longsword suddenly crackled with lightning, and the other two had one of their longswords howl with the sound of the wind, cutting through the air extraordinarily quickly. Another red with burning fire and roiled towards Caspian.

    Han Shuo was greatly astonished when the three of them attacked together. He could tell from the changes in their longswords that Fereeca and his brothers were mage swordsman. Fereeca looked like a thunder magic major, while the other two specialized in wind and fire magic respectively.

    The three longswords also looked like they¡¯d been tempered with special methods. They could directly imbue their elemental magic attacks into the longswords when they attacked to enhance their power and speed. It was very intimidating.

    ¡°Three mage swordsmen huh! No wonder you¡¯re so cocky!¡± Caspian snorted coldly when they struck out and waved the magic staff in his hand as he spoke.

    The branches wove madly like snakes within the room, dancing in their movements. The scores of branches were like a long whip as they hurtled towards the brothers. Caspian took a step forward at the same time and grabbed the fainted Angelica, jumping out of the window andnding on a nearby tree.

    The entangling branches were astonishingly agile beneath Caspian¡¯s maniptions. It was like they knew martial arts as they avoided the attacks of the three magical swords. High up in the tree, Caspian had a benevolent smile on his face as he raised his branch-like magic staff and lowly sang out a spell.

    The tree he was standing on suddenly came alive like an enormous octopus. The leafy branches were like countless tentacles of the octopus as they spread through the house with extreme speed, churning towards everyone inside.

    ¡°Up!¡± Caspian roared.

    A huge rumble sounded as the house Belinda and everyone was in suddenly lifted itself, with the roof caving in shortly thereafter.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes were fixed tightly on Emily within the house, and he rushed down to save her when he realized that something wasn¡¯t quite right. It touched his heart to see that the pliable branches that had snaked into the house from all directions were protecting all the people apart from Belinda and her men.

    As the house copsed on itself, the flexible branches had already brought the people, who Belinda had sent to sleep, out.

    ¡°The friend on the roof, it¡¯s about time for you toe down, isn¡¯t it?¡± When Han Shuo was about to leave when he discovered that Emily had been pulled out of the room by the branches, Caspian¡¯s bright eyesnded on Han Shuo as he asked with a smile.

    Seeing that his movements had been exposed, Han Shuo didn¡¯t continue to hide and he jumped down from the tree,nding in the hotel¡¯s spacious inner courtyard. He then very casually walked up to the tree that Caspian was on and stood next to Candice and Emily.

    ¡°You go about your business, I¡¯ll help you look after these people. I won¡¯t let them harm those beneath this tree.¡± Han Shuo lifted his head to smile at Caspian as he spoke.

    Caspian started when Han Shuo opened his mouth, and then looked at Han Shuo oddly. ¡°Have we met before? Why does your voice sound familiar?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, let¡¯s do away with these people first.¡± Belinda and the others rushed out from the copsed house at this moment and red angrily at Caspian, immediately attacking in this direction.

    ¡°Alright, I think I must know you.¡± Caspian responded and waved his staff, looking at Fereeca and his brothers gravely.

    The branches of the leafy boughed tree above him kept entangling amongst themselves and looked grotesquely strong. The other trees within the courtyard were affected by the power of nature and started waving their branches as well, joining Caspian¡¯s side. Han Shuo was greatly surprised by this development.

    After he took a look and realized that Caspian seemed to be able to deal with these people, he then focused his attentions on the fainted Emily.

    He took a deep breath in and ced a hand on her back. His magical yuan circted into a small whirlpool in his left hand.

    Using his knowledge of the human body, Han Shuo concentrated and used the effects of the magical yuan to quickly clear out the fragrance¡¯s effects from her body.

    Her longshes suddenly fluttered, making Han Shuo delighted as he knew that meant she would wake soon.

    Arge rumble suddenly traveled to Han Shuo¡¯s ears. He abruptly lifted his head in surprise and saw that a four to five meter tall three eyed monster with eight horns on its head and a spiked tail had suddenly appeared within the courtyard.

    Han Shuo recognized this monster with one nce. It was the image of the three eyed demon god Ansidesi that the necromancer rendon had tried to raise. This three eyed demon monster was now formed of shining, grey armor and its enormous body was filled with power, giving others an intensely intimidating feeling.

    ¡°A golem formed in the image of the demon god? You¡¯re from the Cmity Church?¡± Caspian¡¯s face changed drastically when the golem appeared and he eximed in shock.

    ¡°You guessed right!¡± Belinda said softly and then gave instructions to the golem, ¡°Kill him.¡±

    The four or five meter tall golem shaped from grey armor charged towards Caspian after receiving Belinda¡¯s order. A towering tree next to it furiously sent branches churning towards it.

    Before the branches had thoroughly entangled the golem¡¯s ankles, the fierce looking golem suddenly exerted force and broke free of the soft branches around its ankles. Every heavy step the golem set down on the ground shook the ground with a thunderous crash, as if an earthquake were happening.

    A nearby tree twisted many branches together and formed a branch thicker than two people¡¯s waists put together, mming towards the golem. When the golem discovered that an attack was about to hit it, it raised its spiked tail and swept it in an arc, crashing into the thick branch.

    The thick branch, that had been roiling towards the golem, was halted in its tracks by the golem¡¯s armored tail. Its tail was deeply embedded into the branch and it actually ripped out the branch with a vigorous shake of its tail. The branch splintered into a pile of twigs and branches.

    A string of profound magical incantations suddenly rang out of Emily¡¯s mouth as a few dark magic spellsnded on the golem. However, these spells, that had an incredibly destructive effect on men and animals, had absolutely no effect on the golem.

    ¡°The alchemists of the Cmity Church have developed golems in the shape of the evil demon god with incredible magical immunity. Don¡¯t waste your efforts.¡± Caspian lowered his head to give Emily this reminder.

    ¡°Then what should we do?¡± Emily lifted her head to ask anxiously.

    ¡°Take these innocent people away from here. I¡¯ll think of a way to dy them.¡± Caspian was also equally anxious as he swept a nce below.

    ¡°The golem is being manipted, this matter will be over if we can control her.¡± Han Shuo suddenly spoke coldly at this moment.

    ¡°This is indeed the case, but she has three mage swordsmen protecting her and a golem attacking us. It¡¯s a bit unrealistic to think that we can put her under our control.¡± The three eyed demon god golem had already arrived at their location as they were talking. Caspian waved his staff to spur on the great tree beneath them to intercept the golem.

    ¡°Emily, you protect those beneath the tree. Caspian, you slow the golem down. Leave the rest to me!¡± Han Shuo roared coldly as he dashed forward like lightning, setting his sights on Belinda in the midst of the three mage swordsmen.

 Chapter 167: Capturing the female alchemist

    Chapter 167: Capturing the female alchemist

    ¡°Be careful!¡± Emily cried out in warning when she saw Han Shuo rush forward.

    The courtyard was the size of a basketball court. With Han Shuo¡¯s speed, he arrived in front of Belinda and the others almost as soon as Emily had finished talking.

    But just as Han Shuo moved, Fereeca and his brothers understood what he was after and surrounded Belinda in their midst. They protected her on three sides and kept all three pairs of eyes on him, grasping their magic swords in their hands tightly.

    Han Shuo chanted the spell for the ¡°Dark Mist¡± lowly as he charged forward. He immediately released the spell when he appeared next to the four, enclosing everyone within it.

    ¡°Damn it, he¡¯s a necromancer!¡± Fereeca cursed as the magic sword in his hand suddenly sent out brilliant crackles of lightning, lighting up the darkness around them.

    Two zombie warriors and the dagger wielding little skeleton appeared within the dark mist. The three of them started attacking the three brothers at the same time under Han Shuo¡¯smands.

    Even with the light from the lightning, absolute visibility still couldn¡¯t be gained in the area covered by the dark mist, particrly due to the fact that it was also nighttime. As the caster, Han Shuo circled the three brothers like a ghost hidden in the darkness and was in no hurry to make his move.

    The two zombie warriors were immediately hit with devastating attacks when they neared the three brothers. The one wielding the fire sword sent one of the zombie warrior¡¯s clubs flying with one fiery stroke, engulfing the zombie warrior with mes in an instant. The other was remarkably agile with hismanded of wind magic and the speed of his flurrying strokes were too fast to be witnessed.

    More than ten strokesnded on the other zombie warrior in the blink of an eye, making it lose the ability to battle in a short amount of time.

    Two bone spears broke through the air at the same time aiming for Fereeca. The little skeleton brandished the bone dagger and also sped towards Fereeca.

    To Fereeca, he felt that the bone spears were more of a threat than the little skeleton. When he heard the bone spears whistle towards him, he concentrated his attention on the source of the sound, shing through the darkness like a streak of lightning and bringing them both down.

    The little skeleton, who¡¯d been moving as slowly as a regr skeletal warrior until now, suddenly picked up speed and stabbed swiftly at Fereeca¡¯s chest.

    ¡°Be careful!¡± Belinda, manipting the golem off on the side, noticed this abnormality and shrieked a warning.

    Fereeca startled in a fright and didn¡¯t defend himself in time. He immediately dodged, but arge bit of flesh was carved out of his chest and he grimaced in pain.

    The Demonyer Edge¡¯s harsh howling suddenly sounded piercingly at this moment, disying a heart stopping red splendor in the darkness and quickly moved between Fereeca and his brothers.

    Two soft sounds broke through the air, like a wooden stick breaking through paper.

    The two who had just finished off the zombie warriors hadn¡¯t even had time to clearly see what had happened when they felt a gusty draft in their chests. They lowered their heads to see a great, bloody hole in their chests and that their blood was spurting out like arrows.

    The two fell down with a thud shortly after looking down at their chests.

    On the other side, Caspian discovered that the golem¡¯s movements had suddenly be a bit stiff due to Belinda¡¯s distraction. He immediately waved his staff and once againmanded the branches to entangle the golem.

    Beneath the tree, Emily took out her staff and swiveled her gaze between the golem and Han Shuo, seeming to monitor the danger within the terrain.

    ¡°Don¡¯t kill her, just capture her!¡± Emily saw that the Demonyer Edge was howling louder and louder after having feasted on the blood of the two mage swordsman. She spoke up in reminder when she saw that moving streak of red drift closer and closer to Belinda.

    If it hadn¡¯t been for Emily¡¯s reminder, the Demonyer Edge would¡¯ve reaped Belinda¡¯s life in the next second. Han Shuo immediately understood Emily¡¯s thoughts and summoned the Demonyer Edge back to him, having it sink back into the palm of his hand.

    Having evaded one of the little skeleton¡¯s bone dagger attacks already, Fereeca¡¯s chest was on fire, but this pain was only temporary, as the little skeleton¡¯s seven blood red bone spurs spun out and suddenly nailed him to the floor.

    The seven blood red bone spurs were all sparkling with an evil, red splendor as the blood within Fereeca¡¯s body all quickly flowed into the seven bone spurs. They had sucked Fereeca¡¯s body dry in an exceedingly quick manner. His body was like a piece of dried, aged meat.

    As the seven bone spurs drained Fereeca of his blood, the little skeleton seemed to enjoy this greatly as it capered happily with bone dagger in hand, giving Belinda, who stood in the distance, a feeling of uncontroble fear.

    ¡°Don¡¯t move.¡± Belinda suddenly heard a harshly cold voice behind her in the darkness, and then saw the bizarre weapon, that had reaped the lives of two of her men, resting on her shoulder.

    ¡°Who are you to interfere in the matters of the Cmity Church?¡± Belinda wasn¡¯t panicked as her sapphire eyes looked ahead to the front, maintaining a gentle tone and speaking faintly.

    ¡°Cut the bullshit and make the golem stop, or you¡¯ll die immediately.¡± He¡¯d already killed rendon, so his grudge with the Cmity Church was certain. Han Shuo was nowpletely unfettered in his actions and wouldn¡¯t care about the threats of the Cmity Church at all.

    The harsh tone and the killing intent ring out from the Demonyer Edge made Belinda realize that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t joking. She grunted lowly and said, ¡°You¡¯ll regret provoking us.¡±

    As she spoke, Belinda manipted the golem somehow and the fierce, stocky armored golem that was four, five meters tall suddenly disappeared within a strange magic scroll in her hands.

    Pa rang out as Han Shuo exerted a bit of force and hit the back of her head, making Belinda¡¯s body copse and faint.

    The little skeleton had retrieved the seven bone spurs after sucking Fereeca dry. The dark mist was slowly starting to dissipate. Han Shuo saw that everything was in control and dismissed the little skeleton.

    Taking a deep breath in, Han Shuo picked up Belinda and carried her under his arms, walking out of the area and arrived next to Emily.

    ¡°Let¡¯s leave the rest to Elder Caspian.¡±

    Han Shuo lifted his head and looked at Caspian with a slight smile.

    Since the golem had disappeared, Caspian naturally had no reservations and looked at Han Shuo with great surprise, ¡°Who are you? How do you know that my name is Caspian, have we met before?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, we did indeed meet before, but we¡¯re not well acquainted with each other. Mm, these people here are innocents and have only been caught by the fragrance. They¡¯ll wake up slowly even without your help. We need to take this person of the Cmity Church to interrogate her, so we¡¯ll be on our way.¡± Han Shuo smiled as he looked up to Caspian.

    ¡°No, this woman is from the Cmity Church. If the matters of today aren¡¯t handled well, great trouble could befall you. It¡¯s better if you give her over to me, I¡¯ll handle this matter appropriately.¡± Caspian seemed a bit unwilling to let Han Shuo take Belinda away. He alighted from the tree and spoke to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Our Dark Mantle has already taken charge of the matter of the Cmity Church. It¡¯s not your ce to say what we can or cannot do.¡¯ Emily suddenly flicked a displeased nce at Caspian and spoke with a darkened face.

    Caspian started when he heard these words and then spoke with the air of enlightenment, ¡°So you¡¯re of the Dark Mantle. There¡¯s no problem in that case then. Take the woman, I¡¯ll guarantee the safety of all of those here.¡±

    ¡°Then you have our thanks.¡± Han Shuo picked up the three magical swords as he spoke and searched the bodies of Fereeca and his brothers.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, stop searching, there¡¯s nothing there.¡± Emily rolled her eyes at Han Shuo ill temperedly, seeming tough at Han Shuo¡¯s greed.

    ¡°Exin things to her if she wakes up to prevent her suspecting anything.¡± Han Shuo pointed at Candice as he spoke and left with Emily, returning to the Dark Mantle stronghold.

 Chapter 168: Ripping off the veil

    Chapter 168: Ripping off the veil

    As Han Shuo and Emily brought Belinda to the Dark Mantle stronghold, they noticed that the flying bugs that had been circling the hotel were trailing them from a short distance.

    The Demonyer Edge suddenly shed as its sharp point sank into one of the flying bugs and brought it to Han Shuo¡¯s palm. He took a closer look and discovered that this bug was the same material as the golem that Belinda had released. They were all made of metal armor, with just one of them being extremely big and the other being very small.

    Magical yuan circting in his palm, Han Shuo pinched his thumb and forefinger together tightly and a sharp crack rang out as he pulverized the bug. Han Shuo¡¯s eyes narrowed into slits as he noticed an exceedingly small magical formation within the stomach of the crushed bug, with traces of magical elements flickering within it.

    ¡°This Cmity Church is indeed formidable to set up a formation within such a small flying golem!¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but sigh with amazement as he put the flying golem away.

    Emily nodded,in full agreement with Han Shuo¡¯s words, and spoke with a tinge of fear in her voice, ¡°The Cmity Church is the most evil of all churches, with all sorts of evil magics and secret arts. Take the golem in the shape of the three eyed demon god for example. If the force and strength it disyed could be mass produced, then the knights of our Empire will have no way to contend against the attacks of these golems.¡±

    She was definitely part of Dark Mantle; Emily¡¯s first thought was for the country¡¯s security and not how much personal gain these golems could bring her.

    ¡°I¡¯m going to dispose of those flying bug golems to prevent them from following us to Dark Mantle. It won¡¯t do for someone to discover our traces.¡± Han Shuo brought out the Demonyer Edge and willed it to charge into the crowd of flying bugs, destroying all of them in short order.

    When all the flying bugs had been destroyed, Han Shuo and Emily didn¡¯t linger as they made use of the night to sneak back to the Dark Mantle stronghold.

    Han Shuo ced Belinda on a chair in the secret room he¡¯d stayed in two days ago and had Emily take out ropes to secure Belinda to the chair.

    Completely unconscious, Belinda had no feeling that she was being tied to the chair. After Emily tied her down, she looked at Belinda¡¯s veiled face curiously and said, ¡°Why is this girl veiled? Is there something that she can¡¯t show the world?¡±

    Shrugging, Han Shuo smiled, ¡°There are only three possibilities for a face veil. She¡¯s either too beautiful and afraid that her features will bring danger to herself, she has a need to wear it out of certain cultural considerations, or that she doesn¡¯t want people to see the ws of her face.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m quite curious myself which of these possibilities she falls under. But since she¡¯s our prisoner now, I think you can just directly take off her face veil.¡±

    Emily red at him involuntarily when Han Shuo waxed eloquent, and an odd tone colored her voice, ¡°Hmm. I didn¡¯t know that you knew so much about facial veils!¡±

    Han Shuo smiled awkwardly and hastened to exin, ¡°This has nothing to do with me. I only know about all this because I¡¯ve gotten rendon¡¯s memories.¡±

    Snorting softly, Emily didn¡¯t say anything else as she reached out a hand to slowly pull off the light veil on her face.

    The features of the senseless Belinda were slowly uncovered. Thin, arched brows appeared below a smooth, gleaming forehead. A pair of tightly shut, longshes then came into view as Belinda¡¯s charming nose was slowly revealed. Her skin was white and translucent, she was a wondrous beauty no wonder how one looked at her.

    However, when her veil was fully pulled off, Han Shuo and Emily suddenly saw a ck birthmarke into view on Belinda¡¯s left cheek. This birthmark made her originally beautiful face appear a bit frightening.

    ¡°You guessed right, she has a natural defect. If it wasn¡¯t for this ck birthmark, she¡¯d definitely be an unabashed beauty. What a pity!¡± Emily looked carefully at Belinda¡¯s exposed face and spoke with some regret.

    An oval shaped face, pert nose, juicy red lips, sapphire blue eyes, and translucent pale skin allbined with a lovely figure to form the body that a beauty should have. It was a pity that the birthmark on the left side of her face was simply too eye catching. It caught the attention of anyone looking at her and formed a severe contrast, thoroughly casting her looks in the shade.

    ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll wake her now.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s expression was the same as usual as he didn¡¯t particrly care about this girl¡¯s appearance. He walked to the back of the chair and ced a hand on the back of her neck, lightly pinched the meridians on the back of her neck and then patted her right cheek gently. ¡°It¡¯s time to wake up.¡±

    Belinda¡¯s skin was smooth and soft. Han Shuo felt that the sensations were veryfortable when he ced his hand on her skin to wake her. It was like touching an expensive piece of satin.

    Belinda¡¯s longshes fluttered as her clear eyes opened. She first scanned her surroundings in confusion, then alighted on Emily and Han Shuo with surprise.

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, this chapter has been stolen and is iplete.

    The confusion in her eyes immediately faded away as Belinda rapidly recognized where she was. Her clear eyes sparkled with ice as her voice turned soft, but threatening, ¡°Who are you to dare capture me? My Cmity Church won¡¯t let you get away with this. You¡¯ll regret what you did today!¡±

    ¡°No need for you to worry about that. What business do you have in Valen City? Apart from assassinating rk, what other evil plots are you up to?¡± Emily looked coldly at Belinda and started her interrogation.

    ¡°Do you think I¡¯d tell you? You¡¯re wasting your effort.¡± Belinda looked disdainfully at Emily.

    Belinda suddenly noticed the veil in Emily¡¯s hand and thought of something. Her previously tender voice became shrill for the first time. Panicked, she red at Emily and said loudly, ¡°You¡¯ll pay the price for taking off my veil!¡±

    After watching for a while, Han Shuo walked impatiently in front of Belinda, his voice chilling, ¡°Tell us what you came here for, or I¡¯ll give you another birthmark on your right cheek.¡±

    Belinda¡¯s facial expression changed when she heard these words and she gave a high pitched giggle, ¡°You¡¯ll be sorry for this!¡±

    Her previously red flushed face abruptly drained of all color as her body stiffened instantly. Her breathing slowing to a shallow pace and her eyes shutting once more, she seemed to have fallen into aa as all her bodily functions went into hibernation.

    Han Shuo was dumbfounded by the sudden turn of events. He looked at Emily ruefully, ¡°She seems to have taken some medicine and fainted again. This is a bit tricky, what do you think we should do?¡±

    Emily came over and released a dark magic into Belinda¡¯s body. She then closed her eyes and thought for a bit, but could only lower her head to sigh, ¡°The Cmity Church is certainly difficult to deal with. There¡¯s no point in interrogating or torturing her if we can¡¯t wake her up.¡±

    ¡°So what do you say?¡± Han Shuo spread out his hands and backed away in resignation.

    Thinking for a moment, Emily replied, ¡°I¡¯ll report what¡¯s happened here and see what the senior executives say. In addition, notify the forest trolls that the siege weapons they¡¯ve sold to the merchants seem to have been secretly transported to Valen City. I need to go gather some intelligence to see if I can obtain tangible evidence.¡±

    ¡°Then what should I do?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    ¡°Heh heh, there¡¯s nothing for you to do at the moment. Do whatever you¡¯d like. I¡¯lle notify you immediately if anything happens.¡± Emily looked at Han Shuo with a smile.

    Nodding, Han Shuo responded, ¡°That sounds good. I¡¯ll stay in the secret chamber and start practicing high level necromancy magic. I¡¯ll also see if I can find a way to wake Belinda and get something out of her.¡±

    ¡°Whatever you¡¯d like, but behave! Don¡¯t you take Belinda to bed whilst I¡¯m not here!¡± Emily was about to leave when she suddenly thought of something and suddenly turned back to re ferociously.

    ¡°Eh, I¡¯m not the type to take advantage of others. Don¡¯t worry!¡± Han Shuo smiled ruefully.

    ¡°Humph, and you say you¡¯re not. That¡¯s exactly how you got me!¡± Emily red fiercely and then seemed to remember something. ¡°However, Belinda¡¯s ck birthmark probably has affected your feelings towards her. I don¡¯t think I have anything to worry about.¡±

    Emily was obviously proud of herself after saying these words and left happily.

 Chapter 169: Premeditated partnership

    Chapter 169: Premeditated partnership

    Han Shuo¡¯s magical prowess had increased in recent times due to his advancement to the true demon realm, and his mental strength had also advanced by leaps and bounds due to the strengthening of his brain. He¡¯d already fully grasped all the magics that a journeyman necromancer should know.

    Having received all of rendon¡¯s memories, Han Shuo¡¯s understanding of necromancy magics had taken a giant leap forward. He¡¯d received knowledge of many difficult to grasp concepts thanks to rendon¡¯s decades of experience, so his magic was brought to new heights.

    Han Shuo now felt that his mental strength was much greater than before, and since he¡¯d fully grasped all of the journeyman magics, he nned on taking the next step forward. He¡¯d made a promise to Fanny to officially be in a rtionship with her when he reached adept status. This proved to be a great impetus for Han Shuo.

    Since he had some free time now, Han Shuo remained within the secret room and made use of the time to meditate and to sort through rendon¡¯s reflections.

    As Han Shuo continued to practice the advanced magic, ¡°Acid Bog¡±, Han Shuo felt that he was expending too much mental strength and temporarily halted his practice.

    His eyes flicked around at this moment and rested on Belinda, who sat in a drug induceda. A thought struck him as he walked over to Belinda¡¯s side, cing a hand on her back and slowly circted his magical yuan, extending one tendril into her body.

    It was precisely because of the harsh reforging his body had undergone that Han Shuo was incredibly familiar with the construction of the human body. As the magical yuan flowed into Belinda¡¯s body, Han Shuo concentrated and could feel the trail of the magical yuan as it traveled through her body.

    As Han Shuo focused his attention in this matter, he quickly discovered that there was a numbing medicine within Belinda¡¯s body. It was like an anaesthetic that could stimte the nerves to make one spontaneously faint, making it difficult for them to be awoken.

    When Han Shuo detected the effects of this medicine, he smoothed out his breathing and used a bit of magical yuan to slowly circte through Belinda¡¯s body. He used the power of the magical yuan to absorb this medicine and collect it into the palm of his hand.

    As he did so, Han Shuo unintentionally looked at the ck birthmark on Belinda¡¯s left cheek. A thought struck him as he directed the magical yuan into that birthmark.

    When the magical yuan entered it, Han Shuo could clearly feel that another strange element was present within the birthmark, but it had thoroughly melded with Belinda¡¯s face and so there would be some difficulty if he wanted to remove the mark.

    After all, this ck birthmark would¡¯ve been present at her birth and not been present in her body for only a short amount of time like this medicine.

    Although he still had methods to deal with it, Belinda¡¯s beauty had nothing to do with him. It would also expend a lot of his magical yuan to do so for her, so Han Shuo naturally wouldn¡¯t help beautify Belinda.

    When he¡¯d absorbed the entirety of the medicine agent from Belinda¡¯s body, Han Shuo knew she would wake soon. His mind thought furiously as to how he would interrogate the awakened Belinda. A notion suddenly floated to the top of his mind as he chuckled coldly. A purple me jumped into existence from his left finger tip, and he used the Demonyer Edge to slightly cut open his index finger, forcing a drop of blood into the me.

    When this little bit of Han Shuo¡¯s essencended on the purple me, the me suddenly brightened painful and then copsed into the size of a pinky fingernail.

    Under Han Shuo maniptions, the little ball of purple me suddenly sank into the back of Belinda¡¯s neck and formed into a small, ck mole.

    Since reaching the true demon realm, Han Shuo could use his magical yuan to form a wondrous connection with the blood in his body. Using a secret art, he could seal a bud of frosty air into that drop of essence, and use the infant demon within him to control the level of cold within that essence.

    Whenever he wanted to, the infant demon could activate that drop of essence and invade Belinda¡¯s body with frosty air, immediately deciding her life or death. In addition, he¡¯d also be able to sense her proximity through that drop of essence as well.

    Because of the loss of a drop of essence, Han Shuo made use of this time to sit down and meditate not too far from the soon to awaken Belinda, silently circting his magical yuan to recover himself.

    His blood essence resided near the infant demon and was nutrition for the demon infant. Each drop of essence contained arduously trained magical yuan.

    Certain special arts would require this blood essence as a catalyst. Each drop was just as important as the demon infant. Using too much of it could make his magical yuan decrease in training at the least, or move him into cultivation deviation at the worst.

    However, using only one drop wouldn¡¯t lead to any serious problems. He¡¯d be able to fully recover after a day or so if he meditated carefully.

    A soft sound suddenly sounded from beside him after a while. Deep in meditation, Han Shuo could feel that Belinda was about to awaken, even with his eyes closed.

    Her longshes fluttered as Belinda¡¯s bright eyes began to look around her surroundings. Several torches burned in this secret room, so she could clearly see everything as she looked around.

    Apart from being spacious, there was nothing particrly noteworthy in this secret chamber. Han Shuo sat coolly in one corner, immediately drawing all of Belinda¡¯s attention. He presented a stern and grave face at the moment, the angles on his handsome face quite apparent. He looked quite masculine as he sat there aloofly, cross legged and back straight.

    Curling her lip, Belinda breathed out softly and tugged at the ropes on her body. She discovered that it was indeed tough to struggle free from them. Her lively eyes darted to and fro, seeming to be weighing up something.

    ¡°You better not make any careless moves. Otherwise, if I discover something¡¯s wrong, I¡¯ll immediately kill you.¡± Han Shuo spoke coldly when he heard the friction of the ropes.

    His sudden remarks startled Belinda and she stared angrily at Han Shuo. Belinda said, ¡°Just who are you and what grudges do our Cmity Church have with you for you to capture me and not let me go?¡±

    Taking a deep breath in, Han Shuo opened his deep eyes and flicked a nce at Belinda, taking out rendon¡¯s white bone staff and saying faintly, ¡°The seventh work of the Cmity Church¡¯s alchemist Belinda. You personally refined this staff. I obtained it when I killed rendon. It¡¯s very useful, so I should rather thank you!¡±

    ¡°So you¡¯re the one who killed rendon. You must be one of Bob Ascher¡¯s men!¡± Belinda¡¯s gaze focused on the white bone staff before shifting to Han Shuo a whileter.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo responded. ¡°I¡¯m not of the Gryphon Legion. On the contrary, I actually have a bone to settle with them. If it hadn¡¯t been for my help when rendon came to assassinate rk, rk might not have died, but rendon was killing whoever he saw. I happened to see him summon the three eyed demon god Ansidesi, and was forced to defend myself when he wanted to kill me.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re really not one of Bob Ascher¡¯s men?¡± Belinda was very surprised when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s words and urgently asked for confirmation.

    ¡°Of course, you¡¯re now my prisoner and I have no reason to lie to you.¡± Han Shuo nodded his head in confirmation.

    ¡°You said just now that you also tried to kill rk. This means you¡¯re enemies with Bob Ascher?¡± Appearing a bit excited, Belinda¡¯s soft voice charged with emotion as she asked urgently.

    Nodding his head again, Han Shuo responded with a smile. ¡°That¡¯s right, to be more urate, rk died by my hands and not rendon¡¯s. My goal ining to Valen City this time is also to move against Bob Ascher.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s wonderful! Since our goals are the same, I don¡¯t think we should be enemies with each other. The Gryphon Legion has enormous influence in Valen City. I think it¡¯ll be easier for us to reach our goals if we work together.¡± Surprise appeared on Belinda¡¯s face as she looked at Han Shuo with great interest.

    ¡°However, I killed rendon and your three mage swordsmen as well. What should we do about that?¡± Although Han Shuo had long since nned to do so, he was still rather surprised to hear Belinda voice these words so straightforwardly.

    ¡°Sacrifice is unavoidable in order to attain any goal. There¡¯s no big deal in a couple people dying. I promise we can let everything be history as long as we cooperate against the Gryphon Legion!¡± Belinda spoke carelessly, not caring about the life and death of her men.

    Han Shuo was a bit surprised by this cavalier attitude, but still chuckled when he saw that his goal had been met, ¡°Since this is the case, that¡¯s wonderful!¡±

 Chapter 170: Violation during sleep

    Chapter 170: Vition during sleep

    When Emily saw that Han Shuo and Belinda were actually having a conversation when she returned to the secret room, she was bbergasted and looked suspiciously between Han Shuo and Belinda. She pulled Han Shuo aside and asked with a disbelieving voice, ¡°You didn¡¯t really sleep with her, did you?¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t know whether tough or cry as he quickly shook his head. ¡°Of course not. Miss Belinda¡¯s goal is also to kill the chief of the Gryphon Legion and can fully forgive all our past transgressions. She¡¯s willing to cooperate with us against Bob Ascher. I felt that there was a benefit in cooperation between our two sides, so I agreed to her proposal.¡±

    ¡°You agreed just like that and even released her from her bonds?¡± Emily was startled and stared fixedly at Han Shuo as she interrogated him.

    Throwing a significant look at Emily, Han Shuo smiled openly and said to Belinda, ¡°We have a special rtionship. Although we are cooperating with each other, there are still secrets between us. If you don¡¯t mind, I¡¯d like to blindfold you before we let you go.¡±

    ¡°Of course, I understand.¡± Belinda epted readily and forthrightly.

    Han Shuo blindfolded her again and had also ced the veil back over her face. He led her out of the Dark Mantle stronghold beneath Emily¡¯s taken aback gaze and only let her off a carriage when they were a far ways away. He said, ¡°You cane find us at the agreed ce after you make contact with your people. We can talk about the details of our cooperation then.¡±

    ¡°Okay, it was very nice to meet you.¡± Belinda responded softly and left after alighting from the carriage.

    Emily hastened to ask after her figure had vanished, ¡°Just what is going on? Why did you let her go just like that?¡±

    Han Shuo quickly summarized what had happened. ¡°There wouldn¡¯t be much of an effect if we tried to force the truth out of her, but we can get a lot more information out of her if we let her go like this. I can take her life immediately if she tries to do anything disadvantageous towards us, so there¡¯s no need to worry about anything. ¡°

    ¡°She¡¯ll reach out to the Cmity Church after she leaves and we¡¯ll obtain more information from her if we work together. We can also team up against Bob Ascher together. Isn¡¯t this killing multiple birds with one stone?¡±

    ¡°Do you know that you¡¯re engaging in very dangerous acts? The Cmity Church isn¡¯t an ordinary faction. If we aren¡¯t careful, not only will we lose everything we¡¯ve worked for up until now, we¡¯ll lose even our lives as well! You¡¯re ying with fire!¡± Emily still found it hard to ept his actions even after listening to his exnations and sighed with emotion.

    ¡°Alright alright, I know my limits in this matter. Taking risks is necessary sometimes. Only with great riskes great reward. We can handle it.¡± Han Shuo paused here and asked Emily, ¡°Right, you went out just now... did you get any useful information?¡±

    ¡°The Phoebe that you apanied to the finance minister¡¯s banquetst time just arrived in Valen City. You¡¯ll never guess what she¡¯s here for.¡± Emily frowned when she saw Han Shuo ask about business.

    Starting, Han Shuo asked, taken aback, ¡°What¡¯s she doing in Valen City?¡±

    ¡°Because the McGrady Guild failed their mission halfway throughst time, Bob Ascher no longer trusted them, but approached Phoebe instead. As the owner, she was tempted by the high price that Bob Ascher offered to transport the siege weapons and used the channels of her guild to bypass some cities and bring them to Valen City. I didn¡¯t think that she¡¯d actually do it, and now that she¡¯s arrived in Valen City with them. If nothing goes wrong, she¡¯ll hand them over to the Gryphon Legion tomorrow.¡± Emily smiled ruefully as she exined.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind spun rapidly after he heard these words and suddenly ask, ¡°Will this matter bring Phoebe down as well?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s difficult to say. If she helped Bob Ascher even after knowing what this equipment was, then I¡¯d be hard pressed to cover up this matter, but if she had no idea and was kept in the dark, we may have some wiggle room then.¡± Emily thought for a moment and responded.

    ¡°Where is Phoebe staying now? I¡¯m going to find her immediately.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s forehead creased as he looked at Emily.

    Pouting, Emily red at Han Shuo and said huffily, ¡°And you say you have nothing to do with her! Look at you, all worried when you hear that she¡¯s in danger!¡±

    ¡°I have a lot of materials that depend on her procuring them for me. Nothing can happen to her, please tell me her address?¡± Holding Emily in his arms, he kissed her strongly and begged with a cheeky grin.

    Emily snorted lightly and pinched Han Shuo harshly before finally giving him Phoebe¡¯s address. She reminded him as he left, ¡°There are Gryphon Legion members guarding the premises around her hotel. You must be careful!¡±

    ¡°Thank you for your concern, I¡¯ll take care of myself, just for you.¡± Han Shuo chuckled and shot out from the carriage like a cheetah, moving swiftly to where Phoebe was staying.

    The hotel that Phoebe was staying at was on a street close to the entrance of the city. When Han Shuo reached it, he discovered that there were indeed a lot of soldiers stationed around it. It was obvious that they cared greatly about what Phoebe was transporting.

    Making use of the cover of night, Han Shuo activated the Art to fly into the air and slowly descend onto the roof of one of the nearby buildings.

    One had to say that the Dark Mantle did indeed possess incredible intelligenceworks. Emily had known which hotel Phoebe had checked into as soon as she entered the city. She even knew which room Phoebe was in.

    Thest room on the west side was the quietest and most expensive room in the hotel. There were three Gryphon Legion soldiers guarding it as well. Han Shuo observed the surroundings from the roof and made use of someone dozing off to crack open a window and sneak in soundlessly.

    The room was quite spacious as it had a separate living room, bathroom, and bedroom. Phoebe was fast asleep, so she was naturally in the bedroom. Han Shuo held his breath and quietly tiptoed to the bedroom, not making any sound.

    A soft, big bed was located beneath purple bed curtains. A brazier, by the side of the bed, burned softly, warming the entire room. A body on her side was on the soft bed, wrapped in satin sheets and a head full of long hair spilled over the pillow. A pale, translucent shoulder was exposed to the air and she moaned deeply as if dreaming.

    Waking soundlessly to Phoebe, Han Shuo¡¯s body twisted as he lifted a corner of the purple curtains, nning to wake her up. He suddenly heard a deep moan and a shy proteste from Phoebe¡¯s lips, ¡°Oh... no, you viin. Bryan, you viin!¡±

    Han Shuo started, thinking that she had discovered him. He couldn¡¯t help but raise himself a bit higher to look at Phoebe, but noticed that her eyes were tightly shut and her cheeks flushed red. Low moans sounded from her mouth as her arms seemed to move over her body and rub herself beneath the sheets.

    She was having a wet dream! And he seemed to be the male lead!

    Han Shuo was bbergasted as he looked at Phoebe in shock. Phoebe¡¯s face and nape were a patch of red as her luscious, red lips parted slightly. A hand kept traveling between her chest and lower body beneath the sheets as she emitted low moans, calling out his name every now and then.

    Han Shuo felt his mouth and tongue dry out when such a shocking, incredible scene was presented in front of him. His lower body immediately stood at attention. He¡¯d nned on waking Phoebe, but forgot everything at this moment. His body slowly lowered itself into Phoebe¡¯s bed and he even lifted a corner of the sheets to slip in.

    He spooned Phoebe from behind as his stiffly alert lower body inserted itself into the rounded arc of Phoebe¡¯s bottom. He could even feel the slippery wetness of her body down there through the thin fabric.

    No man was able to resist such strong stimulus. Han Shuo panted lowly once and slowly crept his hands up to Phoebe¡¯s pert and full breasts from behind, rubbing them through the silk pajamas. His mouth moved to Phoebe¡¯s neck and his passion filled mouth and lips licked at Phoebe¡¯s flushed neck.

    ¡°Oh... you pervert!¡± Phoebe obviously felt the same level of strong impetus in her sleep as she couldn¡¯t help but moan as well. One of her hands unconsciously covered the hand that was ravaging her breasts as her other hand guided Han Shuo¡¯s other hand along her breasts.

    Phoebe¡¯s bottom also seemed to feel Han Shuo¡¯s intrusion as well as she clenched her slender legs together, seeming to want to feel Han Shuo¡¯s invasion even more clearly. This kind of soul wrenching stimulus made Han Shuo start to pant and lick Phoebe even more fiercely.

    Just as this feeling became more and more acute, Phoebe¡¯s neck suddenly turned as she opened her sleepy eyes to look at Han Shuo, the expression of enjoyment stered all over his face.

 Chapter 171: Youâ€™re my woman from now on!

    Chapter 171: You¡¯re my woman from now on!

    Han Shuo was immediately gobsmacked as his heart pounded rapidly, his mouth opening and closing, not knowing what to do.

    No matter how one looked at it, he had barged into someone¡¯s room in the middle of the night, climbed into her bed andmitted such ridiculous acts. These were all unexinable and unforgivable. The drowsy Phoebe was looking at him with such hazy eyes that Han Shuo had already made his preparations to wee the advent of the storm.

    Contrary to his expectations, just as he was stunned and didn¡¯t know what to do, Phoebe actually turned her body to face Han Shuo. She then snaked her arms around his neck and moved her luscious lips towards Han Shuo¡¯s wide open mouth. Her small, lithe tongue reached voluntarily into his mouth.

    As shey there face to face with Han Shuo, Phoebe¡¯s long, slender legs also entangled themselves with his legs. One of them crept around his waist she started squirming against his body like a snake.

    Phoebe wore thin, satin pajamas to sleep. When the two of them were so tightly meshed together, this kind of satin material was almost nonexistent against skin. Such a perfect body was enmeshed against his body and this fragrant tongue was voluntarily offering itself for his sampling. Han Shuo immediately forgot his panic from just now and responded enthusiastically.

    His two hands rested on Phoebe¡¯s chest and butt as he unceremoniously started ying with them, feeling their smooth roundness. As they changed shapes beneath the ministrations of his hands, Han Shuo¡¯s panting became rougher and rougher as he finally couldn¡¯t take it anymore and pinned Phoebe beneath his body. He roughly ripped apart her thin pajamas and started kneading her breasts roughly with his bare hands.

    ¡°Eh... that hurts!¡± Phoebe cried out with pain as her ardent tongue retreated. A pair of hazy, almond shaped eyes slowly became to gain a bit of rity.

    Han Shuo nked and panted, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I¡¯ll be more gentleter on!¡±

    Phoebe had been a bit perplexed until he spoke, and her flushed cheeks immediately changed greatly. She pushed Han Shuo off her with extreme fear and quickly pulled up the thin sheets, wrapping them tightly around herself. She screamed, ¡°You speak, this isn¡¯t a dream!¡±

    Han Shuo finally reacted after hearing Phoebe¡¯s words. It looked like Phoebe had kissed him back just now because she hadn¡¯t been fully awake and thought that she was still in her dream. As their bodies entangled in that hazy and indistinct circumstances, as well as Han Shuo¡¯s slightly rough movements and his response, Phoebe finally woke up and realized the truth of the situation.

    ¡°Miss Phoebe, is something the matter?¡± Phoebe¡¯s scream had attracted the attentions of the three Gryphon Legion guards standing guard outside her door. One of them stood in front of it and called out to her.

    ¡°No, nothing. I just had a nightmare. Don¡¯t worry about me. Just keep guard outside.¡± Although Phoebe was currently in a state of panic, she didn¡¯t even give a moment¡¯s thought to concealing Han Shuo¡¯s presence when she heard the guards call out to her.

    ¡°Alright, it will be daybreak soon. Miss Phoebe can rest for a little while longer!¡± The guard outside the door returned to his station after saying a word.

    Her face flushed red because of her shock, Phoebe¡¯s eyes stared directly at Han Shuo as she looked at him silently, a bizarre expression apparent on her face.

    Han Shuo really wanted to find a hole to bury himself into in his current state of awkwardness. Even though he had a thick face, he still couldn¡¯t help but burn in embarrassment. He stammered out nonsense as he tried to exin, ¡°Um... eh... I had some business with you and you were having this weird dream. And then you hugged me. Hah, I¡¯m a normal guy, so we... that... that¡¯s how things happened...¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s exnation was feeble and even he himself felt a bit ashamed as he spoke. His presence weakened greatly with these words, and he looked like a prisoner on death row in his final struggles.

    He looked deeply at Phoebe as her face became redder and redder. Han Shuo¡¯s frantic motions to find an excuse seemed to irritate her even more as she huffed out lowly, ¡°Shut up!¡±

    Han Shuo immediately shut up upon hearing these words and sat with a wry smile on the corner of the bed. He hung his head quietly, looking like a kid who had done something wrong and was waiting for the teacher to punish him.

    ¡°You dared vite me in such a shameless way while I was asleep. Bryan, oh Bryan, you¡¯re even more despicable than I had originally thought!¡± Phoebe looked like she wanted to kill him as she bit off her words.

    ¡°I didn¡¯t, you hugged me first! To be honest, I was the passive one here.¡± Han Shuo hung his head and snuck a peek at Phoebe out of the corner of his eye as he spoke with some aggrievement.

    ¡°Wah!¡± sounded out as Phoebe sobbed lowly, a hand tugging on the thin sheets to cover herself and using the other to fiercely hammer Han Shuo¡¯s chest. She cursed lowly like she was crying, ¡°How dare you, you despicable, shameless rogue! You¡¯ve always treated me like this and never take responsibility. I hate you, I hate you!¡±

    Although Phoebe¡¯s fists sounded out dully as she beat Han Shuo, he didn¡¯t feel any pain at all because she hadn¡¯t used any fighting aura.

    Thinking rapidly, Han Shuo remembered that Phoebe had first called out his name in her sleep and connected it to the sometimes strange actions she would make towards him sometimes. Add to that what he¡¯d just said, a moment of brilliance shed through his mind and he suddenly understood something ¡ª Phoebe liked him!

    Once he sorted this out, Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts spun even more rapidly, but even with the nimbleness of his mind, it wasn¡¯t that easy to find a rational exnation for what he wanted to do. He thought for a moment and then made up his mind viciously, deciding to just take her then and there.

    He had been passively epting the blows from Phoebe when he suddenly gripped her hands with one hand, the other striking out and lifting the thin sheets covering him and pressed her down on the bed beneath him. Wild kisses rained down on her as he started kissing and licking her neck, cheeks, shoulders, and breasts.

    As he did so, he used the weight of his body to keep her pressed down and strong arms to restrain her, keeping her immobile and leaving her only able to cry out through her mouth.

    ¡°Damn it, let go of me you jerk. Um... not there, don¡¯t lick there. Stop, you evil jerk! Oh... no...¡± Curses and sounds of struggle continued to spill out from her mouth, but because there were guards outside, Phoebe didn¡¯t dare rm them, so she kept her voice down, having no effect on Han Shuo at all.

    Phoebe soft calls became more and more urgent beneath Han Shuo¡¯s strong kisses and her face flushed redder and redder. Her struggles became more and more weak until they finally turned into low moans. Han Shuo suddenly felt the refreshing feeling of victory and began licking and kissing even more strongly.

    ¡°Oh... why did you bite me?!¡± An enormous cry of pain suddenly emitted from Han Shuo¡¯s mouth. Phoebe could only move her mouth and so decided to bite Han Shuo¡¯s ear when she realized she couldn¡¯t move her body.

    ¡°You bite me and so I bite you as well!¡± Phoebe¡¯s face was filled with a strange light after biting Han Shuo. Her eyes sparkled and she seemed to be repressing a certain sweetness.

    ¡°Then, let¡¯s bite each other together!¡± Han Shuo chuckled devilishly and his mouth that had been kissing Phoebe¡¯s shoulder suddenly moved to her mouth.

    Contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, Phoebe didn¡¯t struggle this time, but panted as he met her mouth.

    A slippery tongue moved voluntarily into Han Shuo¡¯s mouth, entangling with Han Shuo¡¯s fiercely.

    When he sensed Phoebe¡¯s response, Han Shuo¡¯s heart lurched as his hands and feet started acting up again. Hisrge hands caressed Phoebe¡¯s full and firm peaks, squeezing them unceremoniously. His strictly at attention lower body rubbed restlessly against Phoebe¡¯s.

    ......

    Giving off a soft ¡°oh¡±, Phoebe panted roughly as she exerted force to push Han Shuo off her. A bit afraid to look at Han Shuo in her shyness, ¡°That¡¯s enough now, the sky¡¯s about to brighten.¡±

    Seeing that it was indeed light outside and that sounds of conversation wereing in, Han Shuo tampered down his desires when he thought of the danger Phoebe was in and moved off her body. He tenderly picked up the thin sheets, wrapped Phoebe in them and held her close.

    A strange light shed through Phoebe¡¯s strong eyes as Han Shuo did so, appearing quite content and gentle. When Han Shuo finished doing all this, she lowered her head and said softly, ¡°You vited me again today, what are you going to do about it?¡±

    Chuckling devilishly, Han Shuo tightened his grasp and said in a dominating fashion, ¡°You¡¯re my woman from now on!¡±

    Phoebe¡¯s reddened face gleamed with an umon light when she heard these words, as if she¡¯d waited a long time for this day and these words. She became shy when the truth arrived in front of her, but the sweetness on her face depicted the joy in her heart.

    Her face trailing to her neck, Phoebe was quite bashful as she docilely said in a mosquito level voice, ¡°Alright.¡±

 Chapter 172: Refining the yin demons

    Chapter 172: Refining the yin demons

    Perhaps because they¡¯d touched each other intimately, but the cold and arrogant Phoebe now blushed often, and her attitude towards Han Shuo had changed drastically.

    Women were like this. Before they gave you their heart, they would have many reservations and hesitations. However, once they gave their heart to you, they would involuntarily let the man take charge. Even a swordmaster like Phoebe was no different.

    ¡°Speak. How did you know I was staying here? What did you sneak in here for?¡± Phoebe lifted her head to look at Han Shuo with a slight smile as shey on Han Shuo¡¯s broad chest.

    Taking a deep breath in, Han Shuo¡¯s naughty hands and feet all stopped. He frowned as he gave Phoebe a basic overview of what was going on. However, he didn¡¯t speak of some of the more sensitive topics, including his identity in the Dark Mantle and the interference from the Cmity Church.

    ¡°Do you know what you were transporting when you were handling this batch of goods?¡± Han Shuo looked at Phoebe and gravely asked.

    Shaking her head, Phoebe¡¯s slender brows creased as she responded, ¡°I don¡¯t know. Those in my line of trade sometimes need to take on unknown risks. However, I hadn¡¯t thought that this time¡¯s matter would epass so much.¡±

    Han Shuo did indeed breathe a sigh of relief when he learned that Phoebe had no idea what she was moving. He thought deeply for a moment and said, ¡°The chief of the Gryphon Legion had the heart to rebel, so you must cooperate with us for the safety of the Boozt Merchant guild. Otherwise, once the senior levels of the Empire learn of this operation and of your guild¡¯s involvement, I¡¯m afraid your guild will be subjected to unmeasurable danger, even as strong as it is.¡±

    Nodding her head in understanding, Phoebe hugged Han Shuo andughed softly, ¡°I¡¯ll do as you say. I think you¡¯ll be quite earnest in helping me.¡±

    Phoebe waspletely trusting of Han Shuo as she spoke, making him quite ttered by her trust. He quickly weighed some things up and once again coalesced a drop of essence blood, cing it in a small sk. He gave it to Phoebe, ¡°Try to drip a drop of this blood onto those siege weapons as you transport them.¡±

    ¡°If you¡¯re unable to open the containers, then drip it on the containers themselves. Then, try to apany the shipment as far as you can tomorrow. Don¡¯t be in a hurry to leave after you¡¯re done, I¡¯lle find you again. Oh, right, Candice is in Valen City too and she¡¯s staying at a hotel owned by ine. You can go find her.¡±

    ¡°No problem, I¡¯ll do as you say.¡± Phoebe agreed and then lightlyughed, taking out a bunch of items from her storage ring. Her clear eyes looked at Han Shuo like she was showing off a treasure. ¡°This batch has the all items that you wanted. I collected all of them in the course of helping Bob Ascher transport his items over.¡±

    She handed the list over; looking over it, Han Shuo realized that all these items were what he¡¯d needed to refine the yin demons. It looked like Phoebe had paid a lot of attention to his matters and had collected all the necessary materials for him in a short period of time.

    He pulled Phoebe over andnded a kiss on her blushing, beautiful cheek, delighted. ¡°Heh heh, thank you so much!¡±

    The guard¡¯s voice sounded again from outside at this time, ¡°Miss Phoebe, the sun haspletely risen. You should get ready to leave.¡±

    ¡°Mm. I¡¯m awake. I¡¯ll be out in a moment.¡± Phoebe responded, pushing Han Shuo away, bashfully changing her clothes within the thin nkets and pouting, ¡°It¡¯s all your fault. You ripped my undergarments, you savage brute.¡±

    Han Shuo chuckled evilly and and left Phoebe¡¯s bed. ¡°Alright, alright, I¡¯ll make it up to you. Remember what I said. I¡¯m leaving here for now, but I¡¯lle find you again soon.¡±

    Han Shuo slowly made his way to the window. Just as he reached it, Phoebe suddenly called out softly. He looked back at her in surprise as she reminded softly, ¡°Be careful.¡±

    ¡°I will!¡± Han Shuo responded dashingly. Taking a quick peek out the window, he took advantage of a guard blinking to shoot out from the window like a wraith.

    Han Shuo concealed his body in the light of the early morning and flew to the Dark Mantle stronghold. He discovered that Chester was already waiting when he arrived. It looked like he¡¯de from ine¡¯s hotel.

    ¡°What¡¯s the situation?¡± Han Shuo asked when he saw Chester.

    ¡°I was unconscious in the hotel. A druid told me that we¡¯d fallen victim to a drug when I woke up and didn¡¯t say anything else.¡± Chester looked a bit confused as he looked to Han Shuo for an exnation.

    Han Shuo briefly went over what had happened while Chester had been unconscious. ¡°Did that druid chat about anything with the female leader of the mercenary band? In addition, is Lisa back safely? How are things within the hotel?¡±

    ¡°It looks like that the druid spoke with the female swordsman Candice for a bit, but he evaded our hearing so I don¡¯t know what they spoke of. I personally took Lisa to Lawrence, he said that he¡¯ll be in touch shortly. The hotel is rearranging Belinda¡¯s room with ine¡¯s guidance and should be back to normal operations soon. The druid and everyone from the mercenary band are still there. They haven¡¯t left!¡± Chester replied.

    ¡°So I see. Right, have you seen Emily since returning?¡±

    ¡°No, I just came over and saw the two that work for Madame Emily, but she¡¯s not here at the moment.¡± Chester responded.

    ¡°Ah, I see. I don¡¯t have anything going on at the moment. If you¡¯re free, why don¡¯t you head out and see what¡¯s going on around town.¡± Han Shuo smiled and walked past Chester to head for the secret room.

    When he set up the magic formation, Han Shuo once again entered the cemetery of death. The little lewd dragon Gilbert immediately bounded over with enthusiasm when he saw Han Shuo appear, thinking that Han Shuo was taking him out.

    ¡°Now isn¡¯t the time, but I¡¯ll take you away from the cemetery of death in a few days; don¡¯t be in a hurry.¡± When he saw Gilbert rush over, Han Shuo immediately proceeded to throw cold water over him and ignored the rest of Gilbert¡¯s mutterings, heading to where the yin demons were being refined.

    Refining the yin demons was simr to refining the original demons. Apart from making a few adjustments to the formation and substituting in more precious ingredients, as well as three drops of essence blood, there were no other differences.

    Han Shuo took a deep breath and quickly went over the details he needed to pay attention to in his mind. He then took out the Demonyer Edge and started to change the cave in which the original demons had been refined in, changing it to the formation that could be used for the yin demons.

    When the yin demon cave formed, Han Shuo ced all the ingredients that Phoebe had collected in the proper order in the yin demon cave. He had needed eighteen wraiths to be the catalyst to refine original demons, but the yin demon refinement required double. While 36 wraiths were needed, the time for refinement was decreased to 18 days.

    Since Han Shuo had reached the true demon realm, he now possessed essence blood. Add that to the improved quality of his magical yuan, he¡¯d be able to have the 36 wraiths finish battling each other in a short 18 days. The strongest wraiths that seized the three drops of essence blood would have the right to absorb the power within the yin demon cave and be refined to yin demons even more powerful than the original demons.

    When the three yin demons finish forming, not only would they have all the power of the original demons, they would have even stronger life forces than the original demons. They would be able toy in wait once they invaded a body until they rose tond a fatal blow at a critical moment.

    If someone bes possessed by a yin demon, then Han Shuo would be able to see everything they saw and felt through the yin demon within them. The yin demon lying in wait within their body could suddenly explode to action when the victim was deeply asleep or fighting others, and make its attack when the victim was otherwise distracted.

    It¡¯d be best if it could kill his enemy, but if the opponent was particrly strong, the yin demon could continue toy low within his victim¡¯s body, or leave it and flee back to Han Shuo.

    When the three yin demons werepletely formed, they could even briefly transform into Han Shuo and create illusions of him for a short period. If Han Shuo suddenly created three copies of himself during battle, he¡¯d be able to turn the situation around by befuddling his enemies.

    When Han Shuo dripped in his essence blood and saw that the 36 wraiths had started furiously attacking each other within the cave to fight over Han Shuo¡¯s three drops of essence blood, he understood that the yin demon cave had started operating sessfully and didn¡¯t continue to watch. He left without listening to Gilbert¡¯sints.

 Chapter 173: Not enough right to

    Chapter 173: Not enough right to

    After returning from the cemetery of death, Han Shuo discovered that Emily was standing next to him as soon as he reappeared from the secret chamber.

    ¡°So you¡¯ve seen your little lover?¡± Emily immediately asked when she saw Han Shuo.

    ¡°Regarding those siege weapons that Bob Ascher asked for, Phoebe ispletely out of the loop. Moreover, I told her everything and she will cooperatepletely with our work. I think, we can conceal the fact that Phoebe is implicated in this.¡± As he walked out of the transportation matrix, Han Shuo retrieved the six magical sticks one by one while exining to Emily.

    ¡°If Phoebe is truly ignorant of the situation, then she won¡¯t be implicated in this matter. We of the Dark Mantle will definitely not treat a good person with injustice. In the future, you will know of this,¡± Emily resolutely replied. Then she smiled tenderly and said, ¡°You entered her room in the middle of the night, did she not mistake you as a rapist and beat you up?¡±

    ¡°Of course not,¡± Han Shuo replied with a straight face.

    Emily stared intently at Han Shuo, trying to decipher something, but she realized that Han Shuo¡¯s expression was nd with absolutely no particr changes.

    ¡°Alright alright, let¡¯s leave this matter as it is. I just received a message. That Belinda that you released contacted me using your method. I don¡¯t know what happened.¡± After Emily realized that she could not read anything from Han Shuo¡¯s expression, she dropped the matter and continued to talk about proper business.

    Before he released Belinda, Han Shuo had left her a means to contact him and told Emily about it so that she could keep an eye on it for him. Now, when he heard her say this, he immediately replied, ¡°That¡¯s good. Then let¡¯s go meet Belinda right now to see what she wants.¡±

    Han Shuo traveled with Emily to the Dark Forest where he had previously killed the two Gryphon knights. Although he had already left some insurance on Belinda¡¯s body, Han Shuo continued to be very cautious. He had been utmost vignt on the way here, afraid that he would fall into one of Belinda¡¯s schemes.

    When Han Shuo entered the forest, he suddenly felt an enormous presence concealed inside.

    This energy clearly did not originate from Belinda. Han Shuo immediately focused his attention and spoke softly to Emily who was right beside him, ¡°Be careful. There¡¯s something unnatural inside.¡±

    Emily nodded her head and replied, ¡°Indeed. It seems that Belinda isn¡¯t in the forest alone. It¡¯ll be better if we take precautions to avoid being lured into one of her traps.¡±

    ¡°Rx. If Belinda dares to raise a finger against us, I will make her suffer the consequences,¡± Han Shuo¡¯s expression was calm. He retrieved the Demonyer Edge from his space ring and walked towards the depths of the forest.

    Suddenly, a streak of blinding lightning, as thick as a man¡¯s arm, violentlyunched towards his body like a soaring dragon, zig-zagging in midair as it exploded with brilliant radiance. As it moved, somerge trees around its path began to smoke with a chaotic creaking noise.

    Han Shuo¡¯s brows furrowed as the Demonyer Edge shot out at will. With a whoosh, it leapt past the trees that blocked his path and instantly stabbed towards the top of the streak of lightning.

    Amidst a string of thunderous explosions, Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge could sense a storm of vengeful sword aura infused with the power of lightning. Not even the Demonyer Edge infused with Han Shuo¡¯s demonic power could continuously withstand this kind of incredibly violent and chaotic energy. In the blink of an eye after making contact, Han Shuo was visibly unsettled as he hurried topel the Demonyer Edge back to his palm.

    ¡°Who¡¯s there?¡± Emily, who was also very cautious at this point, called out delicately. She gripped her magic staff, her bright eyes affixed to the soaring lightning overhead.

    ¡°Cmity Church Thunder Magic Knight Johnny! I only wanted to see if the two of you have the qualifications to work with me!¡± From the mysterious depths of the forest, a deep voice suddenly shouted.

    After this shout, a middle-aged man in ck armour with with ash-silver hair emerged from deep within the forest alongside Belinda. An ugly scar ran from his forehead to his nose, adding even more harshness to his already ugly visage.

    The moment he stepped out from the Dark Forest after speaking, his body had alreadyunched rapidly towards the soaring lightning. With a luxurious flourish of his right hand, a milky white fighting aura shed into existence. The suspended lightning seemed to be steered by a titanic force into the palm of his hand.

    After the lightning had receded, Han Shuo realized that it was actually a long silver sword. Only, even now the sword was still covered by electricity that had yet to disperse, sparking asionally with light.

    The milky white fighting aura of this man spoke of the strength that he had as either a swordmaster or an Earth Rider. Combining this kind of potential with the lightning demonic arts that this person had cultivated, it was no wonder that this person was so powerful to the extent that even Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge couldn¡¯t handle it.

    From behind thunder mage swordsman Johnny¡¯s figure, the veil-adorned Belinda walked out slowly. When she reached Han Shuo, she first apologized briefly before turning around to Johnny. ¡°Uncle Johnny, I already told you. Their potential qualifies them to work with us. Otherwise how could I have miscalcted?¡±

    This man, Johnny, of the Cmity Church looked to be an extremely egotistical person, but he was still somewhat respectful towards Belinda. When he heard her say that, he could not help but nod and say, ¡°Their potential can be considered passable, but cooperating with them will not benefit us much. Bob Ascher of the Gryphon Knights is a sky rider. These two people are no match for someone of his potential. Our only opportunity is if you can only use your golem to obstruct the surrounding people while I execute him.¡±

    Emily couldn¡¯t help but speak up when she heard this person¡¯s arrogance, ¡°Apparently, apart from the Gryphon Legion Chief being a sky rider, there are five earth riders by his side. Add to that rk¡¯s master, great swordmaster Gabriel, and two other water and earth archmages.¡±

    ¡°Just based off of this alone, it has to be a divine swordmaster and a magister, or a divine knight acting in concert, or it¡¯ll be an empty dream to try to kill him alone. Heh heh, I see that although Mister Johnny is a thunder mage swordsman at the level of swordmaster, it won¡¯t be that easy for you once you truly start fighting Bob Ascher, not to mention the followers on his side.¡±

    Most people would know that Bob Ascher had a few followers by his side, but wouldn¡¯t know to the level of detail that the Dark Mantle was aware of. When Emily started describing all of Bob Ascher¡¯s followers in detail, even the arrogant Johnny¡¯s face changed drastically.

    ¡°Then, what aid can you bring us?¡± Johnny stood there silently with a stone-cold face and looked at Emily.

    ¡°No matter your goals in fighting Bob Ascher, I just want to tell you not to make moves lightly. Otherwise not only you, but even we will be dragged in as well. If we work together, we can provide you the intelligence on the people by Bob Ascher¡¯s side and can help you distract them for a short period of time, creating the appropriate moment for your assassination attempt.¡± Emily revealed a confident smile and softly described what the Dark Mantle could do for Johnny.

    ¡°Uncle Johnny, this is precisely what we need!¡± Belinda suddenly spoke up beside Johnny.

    ¡°You¡¯re likely members of the Lancelot Empire?¡± Johnny wasn¡¯t an idiot and naturally made out Han Shuo and Emily¡¯s identity at this point.

    Nodding, Emily admitted, ¡°That¡¯s right. I hope you can keep this secret for us if we work together.¡±

    ¡®Humph. You people are so fake. You¡¯ll cooperate with us when you need us, but will pretend you don¡¯t even know we exist when the matter passes. You¡¯lle at us with everything you have.¡± Johnny sneered with utmost sarcasm.

    ¡°Then the matter¡¯s settled then. We¡¯ll tell you if we find a suitable time to kill him in the next couple days. We¡¯ll let you know when the arrangements are made. You can make use of the time to find more helpers, otherwise it won¡¯t be that realistic in wanting to kill Bob Ascher.¡± When Han Shuo saw Johnny¡¯s experience, he knew that although thetter didn¡¯t care for those who worked for the country, he seemed to be used to using others. He looked like he¡¯d agreed to work together.

    With the Cmity Church¡¯s current level of strength, it wasn¡¯t feasible to assassinate Bob Ascher alone. Han Shuo and Emily had agreed to work with them not because they hoped they could kill Bob Ascher, but they wanted to make use of the chaos to slip into his manor and obtain the information they needed, and then use the Dark Mantle¡¯s power to take him down.

    ¡°Alright, then this matter is settled. I hope you two don¡¯t get up to some tricks, or you¡¯ll regret it.¡± Johnny finally agreed with a darkened face.

 Chapter 174: Cover is blown

    Chapter 174: Cover is blown

    After leaving the Dark Forest, Han Shuo and Emily split up, making his way towards Lawrence¡¯s new ce of residence.

    When Han Shuo saw Lawrence, thetter immediately thanked Han Shuo, ¡°Thank you so much forst time, otherwise Lisa might have been put in danger.¡±

    ¡°No problem, considering my rtionship with Lisa, this was something I should¡¯ve done. Right, how is Lisa now?¡± Han Shuo sat down and asked Lawrence with a smile.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ve already sent her back to Ossen City. As strong as the Gryphon Legion is, they wouldn¡¯t dare to do anything in the capital.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s wonderful. Oh right, your junior sister Phoebe is also in Valen City. She has some dealings with the Gryphon Legion.¡± Han Shuo started talking about Phoebe with Lawrence.

    Surprise on his face, Lawrence was quite shocked and looked at Han Shuo in confusion, ¡°What is she doing in Valen City? What¡¯s going on?¡±

    Due to his previous understanding, Han Shuo discovered that Lawrence and Phoebe had a tight rtionship. As the third prince, it¡¯d be better if he knew everything that Phoebe had done. Therefore, after Lawrence started asking, Han Shuo sketched out what had happened.

    After Han Shuo finished, Lawrence thought deeply with a furrowed brow for a bit and then looked deeply at Han Shuo. ¡°It looks like I have you to thank for helping Phoebe in this matter. Your Dark Mantle is truly all powerful!¡±

    Han Shuo started in fright after hearing these words. His eyes focused on Lawrence and he looked deeply at Lawrence for a bit. Han Shuo sighed softly, ¡°When did you discover my identity?¡±

    ¡°When we left the ve trading house.¡± Lawrence smiled in response and hesitated before speaking again, ¡°More urately speaking, I¡¯ve just found out of your identity now. Ever since we left the trading housest time, I began to suspect Madame Emily¡¯s identity. I found someone to confirm it for me and then started investigating you.¡±

    It wasn¡¯t something ignoble to work for the Dark Mantle. Within the senior ranks of the Empire, the existence of the Dark Mantle wasn¡¯t a secret. Its mission and operations wouldn¡¯t harm ordinary people unless this person did something that harmed the Empire. He didn¡¯t think there was anything wrong with what the Dark Mantle was doing.

    Musing silently for a moment, Han Shuo¡¯s expression returned to normal as he smiled, ¡°That¡¯s right, I¡¯ve just joined the Dark Mantle, but I¡¯ve truly recognized its strength!¡±

    ¡°Then, you must know a great deal about me?¡± Lawrence suddenly asked Han Shuo with a faint smile.

    Starting, Han Shuoughed heartily, ¡°Of course, you¡¯re Lawrence, the son of the finance minister. Everyone knows this!¡±

    Even though Han Shuo knew full well of Lawrence¡¯s identity, he couldn¡¯t voice it, otherwise the rtionship between him and Lawrence would change. At the very least, Lawrence would probe Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts or invite thetter to exert effort on Lawrence¡¯s behalf. This was a conundrum that Han Shuo currently didn¡¯t wish to face, so he felt that ying dumb was the smartest move.

    Lawrence had a strange smile on his face after Han Shuo¡¯s deration and he looked deeply at Han Shuo for a bit before responding, ¡°Alright, let¡¯s not talk about this for now. With your visit to Valen City this time, you have surelye to understand that Bob Ascher has the desire to rebel and are here to collect evidence. I¡¯vee here for simr purposes in taking down this Gryphon Legion Chief. Can you tell me your current progress?¡±

    Han Shuo hesitated a bit and quickly weighed the gains and losses in his mind before mentioning that he hadid hands on evidence regarding the siege weapons and had given it to his superior in the Dark Mantle to officially arrest Bob Ascher. But Han Shuo remained silent on anything regarding the Cmity Church, he didn¡¯t want Lawrence to know of what was happening in this regard.

    ¡°It looks like our goals are the same, I think we can work together. What ns do you have? How can I help?¡± Lawrence asked Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo eyed Lawrence and asked, ¡°Then, what can you help us with?¡±

    Smiling mysteriously, Lawrence looked deeply at Han Shuo and said, ¡°I have someone inside the Gryphon Legion, second to only Bob Ascher. He can directly deploy some of the Legion for us at certain times and do much for us.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind worked furiously, there was much to mine from these words. It looked like Lawrence was here not only to take down Bob Ascher, but likely to raise his own person as a recement and thoroughly take control of the Gryphon Legion, paving the way for his future attempt on the throne.

    ¡°That would be for the best. Let me consolidate things a few things. We¡¯ll make a move in the next two days and I¡¯ll be in touch to discuss how to coordinate!¡± Han Shuo responded after thinking for a moment.

    ¡°No problem, I¡¯ll wait for your good news. Heh heh, we¡¯re friends now, and I have utmost confidence in your style. I know you¡¯re prudent enough and trust that you won¡¯t make anyrge mistakes in your ns. Let me know when you¡¯ve settled everything and I¡¯ll do my best to coordinate with you. It¡¯s a win-win situation for us.¡± Lawrenceughed heartily and spoke forthrightly to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Alright, then I¡¯ll be going now.¡± Han Shuo took his leave after Lawrence finished speaking and walked over to ine¡¯s hotel, not too far off in the distance.

    When Han Shuo arrived at the hotel, he discovered that Belinda¡¯s wrecked room had been mostly repaired, and looked like it would be open for business again soon. Han Shuo hadn¡¯t checked out of Emily¡¯s room yet, so he returned to it after arriving in the hotel.

    The chubby, middle ageddy ine walked out not too long afterwards and closed the door with a smile, ¡°Thank you so much for your aid, otherwise my hotel would¡¯ve been destroyed in the hands of that woman from the Cmity Church!¡±

    ¡°It looks like Emily¡¯s already told you everything that¡¯s happened.¡± Han Shuo said.

    Nodding, ine said, ¡°Yes, Madame Emily came by once to tell me everything, and told me to keep an eye on the guests. Do you have any instructions for me?¡±

    ¡°Of those within the hotel, who has yet to leave? In addition, has the female mage swordsman of the mercenary band been in touch with anyone else?¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but ask when he thought of his agreement with Phoebe.

    ¡°There¡¯s been no changes in the guests here. The great druid and little female elf still temporarily upy their rooms. The two of them went out earlier today and returned not too shortly after. Apart from the girl called Candice, those of the mercenary band have all gone out once, seemingly to look for new missions and haven¡¯t returned yet.¡±

    ¡°I observed for a bit and no one suspicious seems to have walked into Candice¡¯s room, and I haven¡¯t seen her leave either. Apart from this, there has been nothing out of the ordinary within the hotel. The Gryphon Legion has sent men once to patrol and asked about the copsed room. I covered it up.¡± The frightening events that had just taken ce in the hotel hadn¡¯t seemed to affect her as ine spoke calmly of what had taken ce, describing everything in great detail.

    ¡°Those of the Gryphon Legion don¡¯t suspect this ce, do they?¡± Han Shuo asked with a frown after remaining silent for a while.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I don¡¯t think there¡¯s any trouble. I¡¯ve been in Valen City for many years and have known long ago how to handle the Gryphon Legion.¡± ine guaranteed with confidence.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t able to say much else after her words, otherwise it would appear that he didn¡¯t trust her. He nodded, said ¡°You¡¯ve done well¡±, and indicated for her to go about her business.

    He thought for a moment after she left; he should still tell Candice that Phoebe mighte looking for her, just in case she suddenly left.

    Walking out of his room, Han Shuo contemted how to broach the subject with Candice. As he walked towards her room, he suddenly heard, ¡°Bad guy!¡±, and saw the little elf Angelica point and yell at him from Caspian¡¯s room window.

    He smiled wryly and made a face at Angelica, ignoring her and continuing towards Candice¡¯s room. However, he soon heard running footsteps from Angelica¡¯s direction. It was obviously Angelica in hot pursuit.

    ¡°Bad guy, what are you doing here?¡± Angelica had already rushed up and spoke with some happiness.

    ¡°Why, here to kidnap someone like you, of course!¡± Han Shuo winked and chuckled devilishly.

 Chapter 175: Conversation between three girls

    Chapter 175: Conversation between three girls

    ¡°Pssht, I don¡¯t believe you!¡± Angelica wrinkled her exquisite little nose in disdain.

    ¡°It¡¯s up to you whether you believe me or not. Alright, I still have some other things to do, so you can go back to whatever you were previously doing.¡± Saying these words with a smile, Han Shuo didn¡¯t entertain Angelica any longer, and was about to continue his way to Candice¡¯s room.

    Right at this moment, a ¡°creak¡± sounded from the door Angelica had ran out from, with the great druid Caspian walked out. He nced at Han Shuo and cried out in surprise, ¡°Why is it you? Why are you here?¡±

    Han Shuo smiled at Caspian and nodded amicably, then bowed and said, ¡°Hello great druid elder Caspian; Trunks and I previously met you in the Dark Forest previously.¡±

    ¡°Huh, you¡¯re acquainted with grandpa?¡± Angelica watched Han Shuo greet Caspian and appeared to be surprised. She looked towards her grandpa Caspian, then turned back to stare at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuoughed and was about to reply, when Caspian¡¯s eyes lit up, and inspected Han Shuo¡¯s body. With a smile of having figured something out, Caspian said, ¡°So it¡¯s you, but we should have met very recently as well, haha!¡±

    Not long ago, Han Shuo wore a ck hood, but despite that, his physique and voice hadn¡¯t been altered. In addition, when the matter ended Han Shuo even called out Caspian¡¯s name. Just based on these three ws, it was not at all strange for Caspian to be able to quickly recognize Han Shuo.

    With regards to Caspian¡¯s vague tone, Han Shuo didn¡¯t try to justify or exin anything, he just gave Caspian a profound smile and said, ¡°I¡¯m busy right now, so I will see youter.¡±

    ¡°Little Angelica, you shouldn¡¯t disturb others when they¡¯re busy. Come back into the room with me.¡± Caspian nodded understandingly, then went up to grab hold of the little elf, about to carry Angelica away.

    Right at this moment, Candice, who¡¯d heard Han Shuo speaking, opened her door to look at Han Shuo, then looked at Caspian, who was chatting with Han Shuo, in astonishment. She gave an amicable nod towards the other two, then said to Han Shuo, ¡°Are you here to look for me?¡±

    ¡°Sister Candice, I¡¯m also looking for you. Let mee in as well!¡± Angelica on the other side sweetly called out towards Candice.

    ¡°If our cute little elf really needs me for something, then I¡¯lle over and look for you in awhile, older sister is busy right now.¡± Candice said with a smile. She opened the door, leaned back and said, ¡°Come on in!¡±

    ¡°Alright, no more ying around,e back to the room to study magic!¡± Great druid Caspian rebuked Angelica, then dragged her back to the room.

    Han Shuo entered Candice¡¯s room, with her closing the door afterwards. She thought of something and asked Han Shuo, ¡°The person who previously saved us was you, right?¡±

    There was no need for Han Shuo to deny this matter. He nodded and replied, ¡°This matter is ratherplicated, has your employer Belinda paid yourmission yet?¡±

    Candice forced a smile, then shook her head and said, ¡°She¡¯s someone from the Cmity Church. This church has always done things in a sinister manner. I¡¯m already very lucky that nothing happened to me, how could I possibly get anymission out of it?¡±

    After some consideration, Han Shuo gazed at Candice and replied, ¡°Promise me one thing, do not try to create trouble for Belinda. You guys definitely won¡¯t gain a thing from doing that. As for themission you¡¯re promised, I will help you get it back.¡±

    Once these words were spoken, Candice was evidently surprised. She looked at Han Shuo in bewilderment and said, ¡°I heard from Caspian that you and a woman brought Belinda away. Just what is your identity? Since you¡¯ve captured Belinda, why do you say this?¡±

    ¡°This matter is a littleplicated right now, I¡¯ll exin it to you both once Phoebe arrives. However, don¡¯t think about dealing with Belinda. I understand how strong she is, and she¡¯s not at a level that your mercenary band can handle.¡± Although Han Shuo hadn¡¯t known Candice for a long time, he knew that she wasn¡¯t someone who would give up so easily, He also understood that despite her knowing the risks involved, once she set her mind upon something, it would never sway, so he had to cate her.

    ¡°Huh, why is Phoebeing over too?¡± Candice was first surprised, then staunchly replied to Han Shuo, ¡°You¡¯ve said this a little toote, I¡¯ve already dispatched the others to search for Belinda¡¯s tracks. This time there was a problem with the employer, so the Mercenary Union should bear our losses, I will deal with Belinda my own way.¡±

    ¡°Consider this as me begging you. Older sister, let Belinda go. That woman is in my hands, I need her for some matters, please give me face.¡± For a woman like Candice, who wouldn¡¯t listen to reason, the more one tells her of the dangers, the more obstinate she would be. Out of options, Han Shuo could only use this method to cate her.

    Once Han Shuo said this, Candice no longer remained so persistent. Her resolute eyes stared at Han Shuo for a while, but unwillingly nodded, and said: ¡°Since you¡¯re begging me, then fine. I promise I won¡¯t persist on this matter, but Belinda must pay themission she owes, otherwise I have no way of answering to the chief.

    ¡°No problem, that¡¯s no problem at all. She said she¡¯d send themission in the next two days after I questioned her.¡± Seeing that Candice had loosened up, Han Shuo quickly agreed.

    While Han Shuo and Candice were chatting, the sounds of two people¡¯s footsteps could be heard, Han Shuo then heard the hotel owner, ine¡¯s voice: ¡°This is Miss Candice¡¯s room.¡±

    ¡°Thank you very much.¡± Phoebe¡¯s cold and arrogant voice sounded from the outside.

    Candice was pleasantly surprised. She quickly stood up and walked to the door. When the door was opened, Phoebe, in an elegant dress and a coldly noble expression, could be seen. However, once she saw Candice, the coldness instantly receded and a brilliant smile took over, she cried out, ¡°Candice, you¡¯re really here!¡±

    ¡°Not just me, there¡¯s also someone who you definitely want to see here!¡± Candiceughed cheerfully, then leaned back to let Phoebe walk in.

    ine had taken this chance to skillfully shift her head to peek inside, when she realized that the one inside was actually Han Shuo, she was incredibly astonished. Phoebe had already walked in by this time, and the room¡¯s door was quickly closed by Candice.

    Having experiencedst night¡¯s twisting of sheets, when Phoebe saw Han Shuo, her beautiful cheeks blushed. Perhaps it was because Candice was right by her side, Phoebe¡¯s body became a bit stiff and she didn¡¯t even dare to look at Han Shuo too much. She only took a side peek at him before she started chatting with Phoebe herself, her clear eyes surreptitiously looking at Han Shuo.

    When Han Shuo saw Phoebe, he also felt a little awkward because there was someone else present, but his skin had always been thick, so he wasn¡¯t really affected by this. He remained properly sitting there while drinking his tea, and looked rather at ease.

    The twodies chatted, briefly narrating what they had gone through since they hadst met, and focused on Valen City. As both of them had bumped into Han Shuo, Han Shuo naturally became a topic of discussion.

    ¡°Go on, why are you here in Valen City, and why do you know where I stay? Also, Candice said that you¡¯ve been together with another woman, exin yourself!¡± After Phoebe and Candice had chatted for a while, Phoebe finally set her sights on Han Shuo, and she inquired him.

    Candice was evidently astounded as well, so she supplemented, ¡°Belinda is from the Cmity Church, and should have no rtion to you. Why did you have her captured, and what use do you have for her? Just who on earth are you?¡±

    The twodies were filled with doubt, and they stared at Han Shuo hard, attempting to get a reasonable answer out of him.

    Han Shuo had a prepared story, but when it was time for him to exin it, he had a headache trying to go about saying it. However, such a matter was not something that he could easily trick them with, because there were indeed manyplicated matters involved.

    Right at this time, Han Shuo¡¯s brows creased, he heard another personing from the outside. He lightly coughed, then made a hand gesture telling the two to keep quiet.

    The footsteps got closer, and the room was lightly knocked on a few times, Emily¡¯s soft voice was heard from the outside, ¡°I know you guys are in there, can Ie in?¡±

    Phoebe and Candice both had an expression of suspicion. They turned towards Han Shuo at the same time and asked, ¡°Who is she?¡±

    ¡°She¡¯s the woman you guys have been asking about!¡± Han Shuo revealed a bitter smile. He could never have expected that Emily woulde and stir the pot at this time as well.

    If it was yesterday, when Han Shuo hadn¡¯t done something so intimate to Phoebe, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t be afraid of the two of them meeting each other, but now, Han Shuo was really caught between a rock and a hard ce. He thought at a rapid pace as to how he could handle the rtionship between the two.

 Chapter 176: Itâ€™s enough to know that Iâ€™m in your heart!

    Chapter 176: It¡¯s enough to know that I¡¯m in your heart!

    ¡°What are you doing here?¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t make out Emily¡¯s intentions. Although his expression was the same as usual, his heart was in a panicked mess as he smiled apologetically at Emily.

    ¡°I¡¯m just here to discuss things with you on how we should handle the chief of the Gryphon Legion.¡± It was unknown whether Emily was doing this on purpose, as she didn¡¯t even nce at Han Shuo after entering, but rather gave an expectant look at Phoebe while talking to the other two.

    ¡°Eh, are you not Madame Emily? How do you know Bryan? What exactly is going on here?¡± Phoebe found the rtionship between Emily and Han Shuo to be quite interesting, and she was much more intrigued about this than dealing with the Gryphon Legion. Since the person in question was here, she couldn¡¯t resist the urge to bring it up.

    Phoebe sneakily nced at Han Shuo after uttering these words. Her good looking face blushed all the way, and she even extended her hand towards Han Shuo¡¯s arm as a way of trying to look good in front of Emily.

    If this were yesterday, Han Shuo would still be able to give Phoebe no face and exin that the rtionship between the two of them was fake. However, due tost night¡¯s flirtations and her charm, he wasn¡¯t sure how to exin this now. He could only look at Emily with an awkward face, wearing a wry expression and not saying a word.

    A pair of clear eyes glittering withplicated emotions, Emily watched Han Shuo carefully. However, this look only made Han Shuo feel even more guilty as he resolutely made up his mind, took in a deep breath, and said to Phoebe, ¡°Actually, the rtionship between me and Emily is...¡±

    ¡°We are that of a subordinate and superior in the same assassination organization. We happened to be assigned to the same target this time, so please do not think too much about it Miss Phoebe!¡± Just as Han Shuo was about to make a thorough exnation, Emily, who¡¯d been staring at Han Shuo, suddenly interrupted Han Shuo¡¯s words, obscuring the original words he had been going to say.

    Han Shuo was bbergasted. He had no idea why Emily was saying all of this, but when he looked at Emily in surprise, he saw Emily give him an understanding smile. It was as if Emily had only wanted to be recognized by Han Shuo, and his actions to reveal the truth had been what she wanted, instead ofpeting for a title with Phoebe and gaining a momentary victory.

    Since Emily had put it this way, Phoebe felt a bit awkward. It rather appeared that she had been petty. It was a good thing that Phoebe was a superwoman in charge of a guild, so she only spent a moment in awkwardness. Phoebe immediately let go of Han Shuo¡¯s arm, making her way towards Emily¡¯s side. ¡°I apologize, sister Emily. It was just me thinking too much. When taking into ount your position and identity, it¡¯s hard to imagine you looking upon this viin with any sort of favor!¡±

    Phoebe¡¯s censure of Han Shuo as a viin met with Emily¡¯s approval. However, Emily¡¯s heart gave a slight sigh, saying that unfortunately she¡¯d already hopped onto this viin¡¯s pirate ship and was so deeply entrenched that there was no way to get off now.

    ¡°Indeed. I would never like such an uneducated and ill mannered fellow like him. Besides, I¡¯m already married, and so that would be even more impossible. Please don¡¯t think any wild thoughts¡± Emily sighed in her heart, a smile still on her face as she reassured Phoebe.

    ¡°I should have known after seeing how that jerk is so secretive. To think that he is actually part of the Dark Mantle! We should have guessed that earlier.¡± Candice looked at Han Shuo with interest, speaking with a gentleugh.

    Contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, both Phoebe and Candice didn¡¯t seem particrly surprised after his identity had been revealed by Emily. It seemed that they had long since suspected that his actions were the result of a secret organization, and Emily¡¯s revtion only served to confirm their internal suspicions.

    ¡°I already told you didn¡¯t I? He really is very secretive. As part of the necromancy major at the Academy, he¡¯s always doing weird things on the side. It turns out that he has another identity within the Dark Mantle, so thispletely exins all of his previous odd gestures.¡± Phoebe alsoughed. She flung Han Shuo an eyeroll from Emily¡¯s side, apparently faulting him for keeping everything a secret.

    Han Shuo shrugged his shoulders and spoke, ¡°Alright, now is not the time for this. We should be checking how we can help Phoebe shake off the implications of this matter and take down Gryphon Legion chief Bob Ascher. This should be the final matter in the end?¡±

    The two girls decided to drop the topic about Han Shuo¡¯s identity after he spoke. Since Emily did not know how much Han Shuo had told the two girls previously, he was still the one exining matters this time and also exining a few things about his identity to the two girls.

    ¡°My senior brother Lawrence is also in Valen City?¡± Once Han Shuo mentioned Lawrence¡¯s existence, Phoebe seemed to be surprised as she eximed softly.

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo said, ¡°Indeed. He will help us with this time¡¯s matter as well. He came to Valen City because of his cousin Lisa and their family matters. The downfall of her family was causedpletely by the Gryphon Legion. Lawrence wants to avenge them and will be helping us wholeheartedly.¡±

    In their previous discussion, Han Shuo understood that Lawrence hade with a primary motive not just to avenge Lisa, but to kill the chief of the Gryphon Legion and prop up his own man as well. However, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t reveal Lawrence¡¯s identity to the two girls and thus he could only just say that Lawrence was willing to help only for Lisa¡¯s sake.

    ¡°With regards to the siege weapons, I¡¯ve already surreptitiously dropped a bit of your essence blood onto one of the siege weapons. We will keep escorting the shipment until it reaches the western part of the city and before handing it over to the Gryphon Legion. I think the Gryphon Legion¡¯s weapons warehouse is definitely there. We can look around for it there.¡± Phoebe spoke after Han Shuo, recounting what she had done after Han Shuo had left.

    ¡°Very good. That location is definitely where all the weapons of the Gryphon Legion are being stored. I will visit the ce myself so that we will have a grasp on what direction it is in. As long as we obtain records that the Gryphon Legion has bought these siege weapons, as well as the shipment itself, we¡¯ll be able to pin the crime of rebellion onto Bob Ascher if we report it to the leaders.¡± Han Shuo immediately said excitedly after hearing Phoebe¡¯s words.

    After saying this, Han Shuo and the three women discussed things a bit further, then left with Emily using carrying out the mission as an excuse.

    ¡°I feel that his rtionship with Madame Emily is a bit off. The way they interact and speak with each other is a bit too intimate.¡± Candice immediately said with a furrowed brow after Han Shuo and Emily exited the room.

    ¡°Heh, don¡¯t think too much about it. Madame Emily is a widow. Besides, she is a member of the Betteridge family, nothing is going to happen.¡± Phoebe spoke with a content smile and soothed Candice.

    ¡°Um, have you two gone from putting on an act to doing this for real? Why do you have this expression on your face otherwise?¡± Candice suddenly spoke with astonishment when she saw Phoebe¡¯s face change to that of a young woman in love.

    Upon hearing this, Phoebe blushed even harder, stammering in embarrassment. ¡°Last night...st night we already...¡±

    ¡°My goodness, Phoebe, you are too easy! How could you end up sleeping with him so fast?¡± Candice eximed in surprise with an open mouth without even waiting for Phoebe to finish her words.

    ¡°Peh! What are you saying? We only... only confirmed our rtionshipst night!¡± Phoebe¡¯s face was now a deep shade of red as she scolded Candice in a low voice.

    ¡°Oh really, I don¡¯t think it¡¯s was just confirming your rtionship. Your expression is obviously trying to hide something else. Out with it now!¡± Candice watched Phoebe attentively, having waited for Phoebe to say those words before effectively checkmating her with a ruthless demand for an exnation.

    After Han Shuo and Emily left the room, they didn¡¯t immediately go to carry out their mission. Rather, the two of them went to the hotel room that Emily stayed in.

    The two of them entered the room, and Han Shuo immediately hugged Emily, tenderly asking, ¡°Why?¡±

    ¡°I know you have me in your heart. That is enough for me. The age gap between us is toorge, and I have the identity of a daughter-inw to the Betteridge family as well. If you attempt to expose our rtionship, this would have drastic consequences for both me and you.¡± Emily buried her face within Han Shuo¡¯s chest, speaking in a soft voice and recounting with great sorrow.

    Before Han Shuo reached the full peak of his strength, exposing their rtionship would have drastic consequences. Particrly for Emily, not only could this affect her brother¡¯s career, but also stain the family¡¯s reputation. There was no other way, so Emily could onlyin and stay quiet about this matter.

    ¡°Phoebe is a good girl. Though her birth is not very high, she is pretty and clean and doesn¡¯t have many strings attached. You should be together with her. Her merchant guild would benefit you so much more. I would understand!¡± Emily burrowed deeper, murmuring softly.

    ¡°I promised you that we won¡¯t have to sneak around for very long. Some day, when there is no one else left in the empire who can dictate what I can or cannot do, I will give you what you deserve!¡± Han Shuo had a firm expression as he dered this in a low voice, fiercely kissing Emily¡¯s body and carrying her towards the bedroom. Emily responded to him with a degree of warmth she never had before, perhaps wishing to extinguish the bitterness that she had been feeling with happiness.

 Chapter 177: Devising strategies

    Chapter 177: Devising strategies

    After a tumble in the sheets with Emily, Han Shuo left alone, heading for the Gryphon Legion¡¯s warehouse on the western side of the city. Thanks to the Dark Mantle¡¯s intelligencework, Han Shuo had a pretty good idea as to where the exact location of the warehouse was.

    Under the cover of night, Han Shuo left no traces behind as he moved. He made use of the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heaven¡± to sneak into the warehouse from above, hiding himself in an isted corner and silently circted the magical yuan topel the demon infant to sense where the drop of essence blood was located.

    When Han Shuo did so, he felt the demon infant jump as it sensed the drop of essence blood¡¯s exact position. He evaded the thick infestation of Gryphon Legion patrols and stopped not too far from a low house. He made use of his sharp vision to see that apart from being under heavy guard, it waspletely sealed with no windows.

    After observing for a while, Han Shuo silently sensed and clearly felt that the drop of essence blood was beneath the house. This meant that there was definitely a secret room used to store things underneath this house.

    It was a pity that the earth elite zombie had yet to be fully formed. Otherwise, with its power of earth, the earth elite zombie could tunnel into the ground and scout ahead. Without the earth elite zombie, Han Shuo could only take out all the guards at the front door if he wanted to enter and look inside.

    Although the guards weren¡¯t that weak, Han Shuo was still confident that he could take care of them with no one being the wiser. However, he¡¯d rm his enemies in this way and the siege weapons may get moved again. Therefore, he didn¡¯t take any action after thinking for a while and returned back the way he¡¯de.

    Within the Dark Mantle stronghold, Emily and Han Shuo met up to weigh all the powers within Valen City as well as the Cmity Church and Lawrence. They then carefully estimated Bob Ascher¡¯s strength, and the two of them began to brainstorm strategies to take care of Bob Ascher with furrowed brows.

    Through the Dark Mantle¡¯s intelligence, Han Shuo learned that there was a secret chamber hidden within Bob Ascher¡¯s manor. The two of them discussed for a bit and became generally certain that Bob Ascher¡¯s siege weapons were likely within the secret chamber. There might even be other evidence.

    After the two had discussed, they decided to sneak into the Ascher manor when the guard wasx during rk¡¯s funeral tomorrow night. They were going to make use of Lawrence¡¯s key man to make the guard even more loose that night and divert some of the men away from Bob Ascher¡¯s side. The Cmity Church would also attempt to assassinate Bob Ascher, whereas Han Shuo and Emily would make use of the opportunity to sneak into the secret room and see if there was any useful intelligence.

    When the operation had been more or less settled, Han Shuo and Emily thought carefully about what problems might crop up and brainstormed corresponding strategies again and again.

    Han Shuo only started moving when the two of them felt that it was more or less settled. He went off to visit Belinda and Lawrence, thoroughly discussing the operation with them.

    This matter had to do with Phoebe as well, but she didn¡¯t have to help him with this. However, once Emily learned that Phoebe was a swordmaster, she went ahead and counted Phoebe as part of their team. Her excuse was that Phoebe was now involved anyways, so it was the best way to resolve this matter.

    As Han Shuo went to find Belinda to discuss things, Emily also sought Phoebe and Candice¡¯s assistance. No one was sure what she said, but Phoebe and Candice both agreed readily to join this mission.

    When Han Shuo returned to ine¡¯s hotel from Lawrence¡¯s ce, he was nning on going to find Phoebe when he ran into the druid Caspian along the way. Han Shuo didn¡¯t think much of it and just nodded at Caspian, nning on passing him by.

    ¡°A moment of your time please.¡± Caspian suddenly said at this time.

    Han Shuo was taken aback and turned to look at Caspian with confusion. He smiled, ¡°Does the elder need me for something?¡±

    Nodding with a smile, Caspian said, ¡°If you don¡¯t mind, can youe to my room? I have a favor to ask.¡±

    It had been thanks to Caspian that everyone had been savedst time, otherwise Han Shuo would¡¯ve been hard pressed to rescue everyone with his own strength. Things wouldn¡¯t have been that easy, not to mention capturing Belinda in the end.

    He nodded straightforwardly and smiled, ¡°Of course.¡±

    Han Shuo walked with Caspian as they arrived at his room. There was nothing out of the ordinary in his room, but Han Shuo could feel the extraordinary life exuded from the nts within the room as he walked in.

    ¡°Eh? The big bad guy, what are you doing here?¡± The little elf Angelica seemed to be meditating on the bed and was quite surprised to open her eyes and see Han Shuo walking through.

    ¡°Don¡¯t be so rude Angelica. You need to understand to respect others, or no one will respect you.¡± Caspian red severely at Angelica and admonished.

    ¡°Understood, grandpa!¡± Angelica stuck her tongue out after these words and spoke a bit fearfully as she made a face.

    Han Shuo randomly picked a seat within the living room ording to Caspian¡¯s instructions. Angelica didn¡¯t continue her meditations at this time and jumped off the bed, walking to the living room, staring at Han Shuo with eyes bright with interest.

    ¡°Elder, do you have any instructions?¡± Han Shuo looked at Caspian with a faint smile after he sat down.

    ¡°You¡¯re too polite. It¡¯s not instructions, but rather a favor I¡¯d like to ask. I wonder if it¡¯ll be too much of a bother.¡± Caspian looked at Han Shuo with a benevolent smile.

    Han Shuo was nning onmencing the operation tomorrow night with Emily, so if Caspian wanted anything that would affect his nster, there was no way he could possibly agree. Therefore, Han Shuo spoke honestly, ¡°Please go ahead and speak first. I will certainly help you if I can, but I also have some matters to attend to. Please understand if I don¡¯t have the time to this time.¡±

    Caspian nodded with an understanding smile and mused silently for a moment, pointing at Angelica, ¡°I need to run an errand and will be back tomorrow at thetest. However, I can¡¯t bring Angelica with me. I hope you can take care of Angelica during this time and promise that she won¡¯t be in harm¡¯s way.¡±

    Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t undertake his mission until tomorrow night, and he had made all his preparations already. He actually didn¡¯t have much to do between today and tomorrow. Even if something urgent came up, Emily, Phoebe, and the others could handle things. Thus, Han Shuo only thought briefly after Caspian spoke and agreed readily, saying, ¡°No problem, I don¡¯t have anything pressing during this time. Valen City is quite chaotic, so be careful when you venture out.¡±

    With Caspian¡¯s strength and his need to leave the hotel immediately without bringing Angelica, it must be an exceedingly dangerous matter. He must have been afraid that he would endanger Angelica¡¯s life, and that¡¯s why he didn¡¯t take Angelica with him. This was why Han Shuo had spoken up in reminder.

    ¡°Grandpa, you must be going to fight that enemy. Take me with you! I¡¯ve practiced magic for a very long time and can help you!¡± Angelica obviously knew some of Caspian¡¯s matters as her little face changed immediately when she heard these words. She stretched her hands out to wrap them around Caspian¡¯s arm and started pleading anxiously.

    ¡°No, you can¡¯t go. A duel is between two people. I would be breaking the rules if I brought you.¡± Caspian truly doted on Angelica and would patiently not give way on this matter. He resolutely turned her down.

    In actuality, Han Shuo could understand why Caspian didn¡¯t want to take Angelica with him from his tone and words. He didn¡¯t want Angelica to take the risk with him, and so breaking the rules was just an excuse he was using to distract Angelica.

    ¡°But, the enemy doesn¡¯t necessarily follow the rules!¡± Angelica cried out anxiously and then looked at Han Shuo. ¡°Although this person is bad, he¡¯s strong. Why doesn¡¯t he help you? I can protect myself.¡±

    ¡°No matter what the other does, grandpa will not break the rules. Do you not listen to grandpa¡¯s words anymore?¡± The druid Caspian frowned ferociously as he stared at Angelica.

    Angelica and Caspian stared stubbornly at each other for a while before the former backed down. Her face scrunched up with worry, she said, ¡°Then, you must be careful!¡±

    ¡°I will.¡± Casian agreed and then turned to Han Shuo, ¡°Then I leave her in your hands.¡±

    Caspian nodded gratefully towards Han Shuo after these words and walked towards the door, leaving through it.

 Chapter 178: Iâ€™m happy to be captured by him, what can you do about it?

    Chapter 178: I¡¯m happy to be captured by him, what can you do about it?

    ¡°Big bad guy, will my grandpa be alright?¡± The little elf Angelica looked at Han Shuo with great worry when the Caspian left.

    Caspian obviously possessed no allies in Valen City, otherwise he wouldn¡¯t have given Angelica over to the care of a rtive stranger. If his enemies were in Valen City and decided not to follow the rules and fight him, then the danger to him would be greater. However, in order to relieve Angelica¡¯s worries, Han Shuo could only smile and say, ¡°Rx, your grandpa¡¯s strength is great, so there definitely won¡¯t be any dangers.¡±

    Angelina, who¡¯d originally been carefree and without worry, suddenly became worry stricken because of her grandpa¡¯s matters. The eyebrows on her charming face were knit together as she suddenly became taciturn.

    Tomorrow night, Han Shuo would have to face the Gryphon Legion with the others, but for Belinda from the Cmity Church and Lawrence, today was a special day, so they had to use the resources at hand to prepare in advance.

    After staying here for a short while, Han Shuo decided that just waiting in Angelica¡¯s room wasn¡¯t the thing to do, so after thinking for a bit, he turned to the sulky little elf and said: ¡°Let¡¯s go find big sister Candice and y.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t want to go anywhere! I want to wait here for my grandpa!¡± Unexpectedly, Angelica, who always wanted to y, did not acknowledge Han Shuo and even firmly refused his suggestion.

    Momentarily stunned, Han Shuo stared nkly before opening his mouth, ¡°You waiting here is not a good option either. I think your grandpa will be fine, so why don¡¯t you talk to big sister Candice? Maybe you will feel less worried?¡±

    ¡°I know that you want to find sister Candice yourself, you big evil person, so if you want to go then go by yourself! I¡¯m not going!¡± Angelica resentfully red at Han Shuo, snorted, and then proceeded to ignore him.

    Han Shuo did not know whether tough or cry at her words, but he¡¯d already given Caspian his promise, and Valen City was indeed not safe at this time, so he couldn¡¯t possibly leave her alone. Otherwise, if Caspian¡¯s enemy took this opportunity to seize Angelica and used her to threaten Caspian?

    Looking at Angelica¡¯s stubborn expression, Han Shuo muttered to himself before fiercely ring at her and said: ¡°Who cares if you are willing to or not? I already promised your grandpa, so I won¡¯t let you leave my side.¡±

    After speaking these words, he didn¡¯t wait for Angelica¡¯s reply before his body shed like lightning, arriving next to Angelica. His left hand extended and hooked Angelica¡¯s body before lifting her up into the air with hands that were like steel ws.

    ¡°Let go! You big scoundrel, you big pervert. Hurry up and let me go!¡± When Angelica reacted, she found that she was unable to move her body even a little bit. Her two little feet kicked in the air while her mouth spewed out curses.

    Han Shuo paid no attention towards Angelica¡¯s shouting. Han Shuo didn¡¯t care at all as he kept his hand hooked around her body while he pushed open the door and made his way towards Candice¡¯s room.

    Once he was outside the door, Han Shuo discovered that Angelica was still screaming. In order to prevent her from attracting too much attention, he reached out with his right hand and covered her small mouth. Angelica¡¯s loud screaming was suddenly diminished to low grunting, and she looked as if she was being coerced by Han Shuo.

    ¡°Put her down!¡± Just when Han Shuo was close to Candice¡¯s room, several members of the Battlefire mercenary band suddenly stepped out from two doors down as they stared at Han Shuo. One of whom had a fierce body shook a head full of hair like it was like iron needles, and shouted with a sword strapped to his back.

    ¡°Eh, isn¡¯t he the man who was talking to the vice chief outside the city?¡± One of the journeyman mages said in shock as he recognized Han Shuo with a nce.

    ¡°I don¡¯t care what his rtionship to the vice chief is. This kind of public coercion of a little girl infuriates me. I cannot possibly stand by and watch with wide eyes as he takes this poor little elf away.¡± The fierce-looking senior swordsman spoke with extreme righteousness. His bronze eyes stared at Han Shuo while he slowly reached behind him to draw his longsword to point it at Han Shuo.

    Not knowing what was going on, a pair of eyes concentrated on Han Shuo¡¯s body, and Candice asked with astonishment, ¡°What happened Bryan? Why are you grabbing ahold of little Angelica?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s nothing, something happened to her grandpa, so he asked me to protect her. I am keeping her by my side so I can ensure her safety.¡± Han Shuo shrugged his shoulder and replied easily.

    ¡°Davis, this is just a misunderstanding, there is no need to be so nervous!¡± Candice gently smiled and said towards the fierce senior swordsman.

    ¡°His words are useless. Only that beautiful little elf¡¯s words can prove his innocence.¡± For some reason, Davis was still quite obstinate upon hearing Candice¡¯s words, as he stared straight at the little elf Angelica, who had her mouth covered by Han Shuo¡¯s hand.

    With those words, Han Shuo immediately loosened his hand from Angelica¡¯s mouth and said, ¡°Okay, stop ying around now and tell him that I am only protecting you.¡±

    When Han Shuo loosened his hand, Angelica loudly cursed and continued once again to make a ruckus before staring angrily at Han Shuo and saying fiercely: ¡°You big evil person, you¡¯re kidnapping me! You¡¯re kidnapping me!¡±

    As soon as Angelica¡¯s words left her mouth, Davis, standing off to the side, immediately flew into a rage. He was pointed his longsword at Han Shuo, and proimed righteously, ¡°Let her go immediately, otherwise you will definitely regret it!¡±

    ¡°Enough, Davis can you really not see that the little girl is just messing around? If you really have nothing to do, then it would be better for you to return back to your room and recover your strength, and not to poke your nose into other people¡¯s business!¡± Candice said with an imposing aura, her eyes bright and expression cold as she glowered at Davis.

    Maybe he was used to Candice¡¯s berating, as Davis was timid at first, but regained some courage after he looked at Angelica. He straightened up, puffed out his chest and said, ¡°Master Candice, if your suggestion is wrong then I will not listen to you.¡±

    By now, it was Han Shuo¡¯s turn to be amused as he could tell from Davis¡¯ gaze when he looked at Angelica that there was a different kind of fire within them. Han Shuo¡¯s heart moved as he already had a grasp of the situation.

    With a weird chuckle, Han Shuo remarked, ¡°So this is the case hmm? It seem like this valiant mercenary wants to appear to be a hero in front of a little beauty, or maybe there¡¯s yet another reason for him to be acting like this.¡±

    With these words, Candice and Phoebe, along with the other mercenaries off on the side, all of them turned to look oddly at Davis. Even the little elf Angelica measured up Davis with an astonished look. At this time, Davis¡¯s face turned red as he awkwardly tried to exin, ¡°No, no. It¡¯s not like that!¡±

    Han Shuo loosened his grip on Angelica and put her down, as he spread out his hands and said, ¡°Alright, I won¡¯t hold onto you any longer since this hero wants to save the beauty so badly. Angelica, you are now saved and the hero can take you away. I won¡¯t care about you.¡±

    After speaking, Han Shuo calmly walked towards Candice and Phoebe, not sparing a single nce at Angelica, as if he¡¯dpletely forgotten about the promise he made to her grandpa.

    ¡°You, you, you are safe now!¡± Davis said as he walked towards Angelica. The righteous aura he¡¯d boasted before was gone as he stammered.

    ¡°What does this have to do with you, you stupid dumb dumb! I¡¯m happy to be held by him, big deal!¡± When Angelica saw that Han Shuo didn¡¯t even acknowledge her, her heart suddenly shook. When she saw the approaching Davis lick his lips, she became even angrier and replied angrily.

    Davis¡¯ expression suddenly became peculiar, as if someone had just stepped on him with a dirty shoe. His face was unspeakably embarrassed and bitter.

    ¡°Big bad guy, you promised my grandfather that you would take care of me, so you¡¯re not allowed to leave!¡± The little elf Angelica hollered at Davis before picking up her small flower skirt and quickly charging toward Han Shuo. She reproached loudly while running, fearful that Han Shuo would ignore her while she didn¡¯t even deign to give Davis a nce.

    Davis stood to the side with a bitter face as Candice red at him, saying without any good feelings: ¡°Scram back to your room. Stop making a fool out of yourself. If you want to be a hero who swoops in to save the beauty, then first look carefully whether or not the beauty is willing to let the fiend kidnap her. You deserved to make a fool out of yourself by acting so ignorantly!¡±

    With Candice¡¯s words, the heart-broken and inconsble Davis let out a long sigh and gloomily returned to his room. This kind of situation was indeedplicated to his brain and he didn¡¯t quite understand it even until now. Howe Angelica, who¡¯d had on a face full of mistreatment and injustice, start to implore Han Shuo when he¡¯d let go of her hand and turned to leave?

 Chapter 179: Officially starting the mission

    Chapter 179: Officially starting the mission

    In the end, Angelica went into Candice¡¯s room with Han Shuo. They chatted with Phoebe as well and learned that Emily had gone out on business.

    With Emily and Phoebe here, Han Shuo didn¡¯t need to worry about Angelica¡¯s safety as much, and left with the excuse that he had something to do. He returned to his own room to quietly practice another high level necromancy magic ¡ª summoning hate warriors.

    rendon¡¯s years of knowledge,bined with Han Shuo¡¯s own spirited fortitude, meant that he struggled for a few hours¡¯ worth of time before he became well versed in the art of summoning hate warriors. Eventually, he managed to summon before him from the other dimension, a hate warrior holding a metal club.

    This summoning consumed most of Han Shuo¡¯s mental energy. As he meditated, he felt his mental strength quickly recovering after using the transportation matrix to return to the cemetery of death.

    ¡°Evil master, are you finally going to take me away now that you¡¯vee?¡± As soon as Han Shuo appeared, dark dragon Gilbert began to make a ruckus in a loud voice.

    ¡°That¡¯s right, this time I¡¯m really going to take you away from here,¡± Han Shuo smiled as he spoke, seeing Gilbert looking especially crestfallen.

    As soon as he heard that he could finally leave the cemetery of death, Gilbert¡¯s dejection was reced by ecstasy in a sh, as he started a continuous stream of fawningpliments.

    ¡°Enough, you should get ready. We¡¯re going to leave soon!¡± Han Shuo said impatiently as he quickly walked to the ce where he was refining the earth elite zombies. He discovered that the qi of earth streaming towards the center seemed to flow slower and slower from when he had first started. It seemed that the elite earth zombie had absorbed nearly all of the earth qi from the cemetery of death.

    The yin demon cave was on the other side and its resentful spirits were still struggling over who would swallow the three drops of essence blood that Han Shuo had dropped in before. Because his actual strength wasparable to the true demon realm, Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan had changed fundamentally. Not to mention the fact that it had three drops of Han Shuo¡¯s essence blood to sustain it, the yin demon cave could actually operate for quite a long time. It wasn¡¯t like the time when he was only refining the original demons and had to infuse it with magical yuan everyday.

    Seeing that everything in the cemetery of death looked normal, Han Shuo didn¡¯t linger, but instead attended to the entreaties of the dragon Gilbert and brought him out of the cemetery of death.

    After returning to ine¡¯s hotel, Han Shuo told Gilbert to stay in his room while he practiced magic the entire night to ensure his best performance.

    The afternoon of the second day, Han Shuo stayed in his room. He also forbid Gilbert to take a single step outside while he spent the entire day mastering the adept level necromancy magic corpse explosion.

    Towards evening time, Gilbert finally couldn¡¯t take it any longer. He made an uproar towards Han Shuo from inside the room. ¡°What kind ofme ce is this? After we left the other ce, we¡¯ve stayed here the entire time! I¡¯m about to get ill from being so stifled.¡±

    The meditating Han Shuo suddenly exhaled, opening his thoughtful eyes to look at Gilbert. ¡°All right. We¡¯ll leave this ce immediately. When we do, you have to keep your mouth shut the entire way and do as I say. If you dare to try anything without my permission then I¡¯ll leave you in the cemetery of death forever.¡±

    ¡°What is it? What kind of things are we doing at night? Haha, esteemed master, don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll definitely pull my own weight!¡± Gilbert immediately became incredibly excited when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s words.

    Footsteps sounded from outside at this moment as Emily¡¯s voice rang out, ¡°Are you inside?¡±

    Han Shuo immediately stood up when he heard it was Emily and opened the door to ask, ¡°How are things? Did you manage to take care of everything?¡±

    The open door revealed Emily¡¯s voluptuous body, making Gilbert¡¯s eyes widen in appreciation. He suddenly whistled and said excitedly, ¡°A beauty, it¡¯s a great beauty!¡±

    ¡°Shut up!¡± Han Shuo turned back to re ferociously at Gilbert. Gilbert didn¡¯t dare say anything after this, but he kept looking at Emily up and down and looked at Han Shuo with a face full of envy.

    ¡°Who is he?¡± Emily wasn¡¯t aware of Gilbert¡¯s existence and looked at Han Shuo in surprise when she suddenly saw him appear.

    ¡°One of us. There won¡¯t be any problem with him at all. He¡¯ll take action with us and he¡¯ll be able to help us quite a bit.¡± Han Shuo exined.

    Although Gilbert was still a young dark dragon, he possessed great destructive abilities when he transformed into his dragon form. If a dark dragon added to the chaos in a critical moment, this would greatly increase the sess of Han Shuo and the others missions.

    Emily had never doubted anything Han Shuo said, so Gilbert¡¯s appearance only made her get to know him that much better. She didn¡¯t question Han Shuo¡¯s methods.

    ¡°The great druid Caspian has yet to return and even Angelica is quite worried. Forget the Battlefire mercenary band this time. Candice and the others don¡¯t know our identity and nned a mission. I just saw that Candice asked the other members of her band to temporarily take care of Angelica, and that senior swordsman Davis was quite happy about that. You don¡¯t need to worry about Angelica¡¯s safety for the time being.¡± It looked like Emily had learnt of the conflict between the two from Phoebe, which was why she was saying this to Han Shuo now.

    ¡°Alright, since this is the case, let¡¯s leave it to them.¡± Han Shuo thought for a bit and opened his mouth to say.

    Since Caspian had yet to return, that meant something must have happened. However, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t great friends with Caspian, so he wouldn¡¯t alter his longid out ns for Caspian.

    The middle aged Bob Ascher had lost two of his sons in the span of a few months. This matter had been a matter of great shock to him. As the true master of Valen City, rk¡¯s funeral had to be conducted with all due pomp and ceremony.

    All sorts of luxurious carriages were parked in front of the Ascher manor, with no one of any importance in Valen City daring to miss such an important asion. No matter how busy things were at home, they would always manage to squeeze out the time toefort old Ascher¡¯s injured soul.

    ¡°So we¡¯re here to participate in a funeral!¡± Gilbert stood in a quiet corner next to Han Shuo and Emily as he spoke with disinterest.

    ¡°No, we¡¯re here to make a mess.¡± Han Shuo chuckled lowly and said, ¡°If the mission is sessful, I¡¯ll award you, so work hard.¡±

    When he heard that they were here to cause a mess and that there might be rewardster that night, Gilbert¡¯s interest was hugely sparked once again as heughed heartily. He was about to walk inside when Han Shuo grabbed him back with a hand again.

    ¡°We can¡¯t go in through the front door since we¡¯re here to make a mess, stupid!¡± Han Shuo hectored Gibert with ill temper and nodded towards Emily. The three of them circled around the manor and arrived at a high wall where no one else was present.

    ¡°Ascher¡¯s even set up some magical protection at some key parts of his manor, but there shouldn¡¯t be a problem if we enter through here. Be careful though, I¡¯ll go up first to take a look.¡± Emily spoke softly and used a levitation spell to slowly rise into the air, taking a look around when she got to the top before making a gesture towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°Can you still fly?¡± Han Shuo looked at Gilbert by his side as he prepared to make a move.

    Shaking his head, Gilbert answered honestly, ¡°Only if I transform back to my original form. Otherwise I won¡¯t be able to fly.¡±

    ¡°Being a burden from the very beginning!¡± Han Shuo looked disdainfully at Gilbert and grabbed his nape, using the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡± to fly into the air andnd beside Emily, the three of them descending together.

    Han Shuo and Gilbert followed behind Emily after descending as they passed through two corridors and an artificial mountain, appearing in the crowded manor with nd expressions.

    The three of them had changed clothes earlier, and Emily had applied some magical solution to her face,pletely altering her appearance. Even Han Shuo barely recognized her. The three of them was dressed like the rest of the guests at the manor, so no one gave them any trouble when they appeared within the crowd.

    ¡°Wow, so many women! So many beautiful women!¡± Gilbert was a bit excited as his eyes spun lustfully in all directions, speaking to Han Shuo lowly.¡±

    ¡°Mind your image Gilbert!¡± Han Shuo cursed lowly as his eyes also darted to and fro. He finally located Belinda and Johnny from the Cmity Church, noting that they had also arrived.

    In a distance not too far away, Lawrence had also used a magical solution to alter his appearance and waved at Han Shuo when he saw their group arrive.

    Emily had arranged for Phoebe and Candice to be elsewhere. They would set things on fire as soon as the Cmity Church made their move, utterly throwing the manor into chaos.

    Add to that a schedule adjustment from Lawrence¡¯s man, the defensive capabilities of the manor at that time would certainly be at its weakest. Han Shuo and Emily would then take advantage of the confusion to sneak into the Ascher secret room.

 Chapter 180: Complete chaos

    Chapter 180: Complete chaos

    Everything was proceeding ording to n. Lawrence had first made arrangements to alter the protective detail from the Gryphon Legion. Emily then used the power of the Dark Mantle to restrain three out of five great earth riders by Bob Ascher¡¯s side.

    Belinda and Johnny from the Cmity Church walked in and out of the crowd for a bit before disappearing without a trace. Belinda nodded at Han Shuo and Emily from afar, indicating that she had made her preparations.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go. Be careful and let¡¯s head for the secret room.¡± Seeing that they had done all that needed to be done, Han Shuo didn¡¯t continue to linger, but avoided the guests and made his way to Bob Ascher¡¯s bedroom.

    There would¡¯ve been a heavy guard along the way, but Lawrence¡¯s man had made arrangements beforehand, so the three of them had an easy stroll down.

    When the three of them paused behind an artificial mountain and peered at Bob Ascher¡¯s room, they discovered many Gryphon Legion soldiers standing in front of the door.

    Each had solemn expressions, and the faint scent of those who had weathered multiple battlefields emanated from their tall, well built bodies. It was easy to tell from a nce that they wouldn¡¯t be easy to handle.

    ¡°Lawrence said that the soldiers around Bob Ascher were all his most trusted men and have ovee many battles and skirmishes with him. All of them are unafraid of death and won¡¯t listen to anyone else¡¯smands apart from Bob Ascher himself. Therefore, Lawrence¡¯s man had no way to do anything about them either.¡± Han Shuo nced at those men and exined lowly to Emily.

    Emily nodded, ¡°Mm, the Dark Mantle knows of this as well. We must personally take out this group of people ourselves, or we¡¯ll be unable to enter at all.¡±

    Soldiers were standing on top of the roof and at every window. Unless they could fly through the dirt, even with Han Shuo and Emily¡¯s extreme abilities, they would find it impossible to avoid these people¡¯s eyes.

    ¡°Alright, we¡¯ll wait for a bit. The entire manor will be engulfed in chaos as soon as the Cmity Church makes their move, regardless of their sess.¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment and then responded to Emily.

    ¡°Honored master, what should I do in a moment?¡± Gilbert¡¯s face was filled with excitement as he looked towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°Master?¡± Emily asked in astonishment and looked at Han Shuo with considerable confusion. She then looked at Gilbert, ¡°How can he be your master? Did he buy you as a ve?¡±

    Looking at Emily with immense disdain, Gilbert said proudly, ¡°A brainless bimbo alright. As a legendary dark dragon of the mighty Dark Dragon City, I, Gilbert, would never be a ve!¡±

    ¡°Dark... Dark Dragon City? You say you¡¯re from the Dark Dragon City beneath the ground?¡± Emily was greatly taken aback.

    ¡°Haha, you¡¯ve heard of our great name as well?¡± Gilbert was quite happy to see that Emily seemed to know of the Dark Dragon City. He puffed his chest out and said solemnly, ¡°Indeed, I am the future legend of the Dark Dragon City.¡±

    ¡°Mm, he¡¯s not my ve, but more like my magical pet.¡± Han Shuo smiled faintly at the bbergasted Emily.

    Gilbert immediately deted when those words were said. As a dark dragon, it wasn¡¯t an honorable thing to be someone¡¯s pet. But that was the truth, and there wasn¡¯t much he could refute. He could only hang his head and sigh, ¡°So darned unlucky that I was besieged by so many people the first time I left home. How would I have been afraid of you otherwise?!¡±

    Emily had been a bit disbelieving, and the shock on her face only deepened when she heard Han Shuo and Gilbert speak thus. Her bright eyes fixed upon Han Shuo as she asked shakily, ¡°He, he really is a dark dragon?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo confirmed very firmly for her, ¡°Absolutely. This stupid dragon was being attacked on all sides from a dark elf n, and they paid a heavy price to wound him deeply. I was going to take advantage of it and harvest his core or something, but he was the one without the slightest bit of dark dragon dignity and shamelessly wanted to sign a master and servant contract with me, bing my magical pet!¡±

    ¡°Hehe, dark dragons are the most shameless and evil of all dragons, what kind of dignity do they have?¡± Emily was delighted by Han Shuo¡¯s exnation and looked at the dejected Gilbert, chuckling with sarcasm.

    ¡°Beautiful women can sometimes be so hateful!¡± Gilbert was thoroughly incensed as he red at Emily and spoke with gritted teeth.

    A shrill scream sounded out at this moment as all sorts of panicked footsteps suddenly exploded into hearing. The sounds of horses screaming were mixed in, as well as all sorts of weapons nging against each other.

    ¡°The Cmity Church has made their move, but we still don¡¯t know anything as of now. Why does the Cmity Church want Bob Ascher dead? Just what kind of grudge exists between them?¡± Joy blossomed over Emily¡¯s face as she said excitedly.

    Han Shuo chuckled coldly with a sinister face, ¡°ording to my thinking, it doesn¡¯t matter whether or not the Cmity Church seeds this time. Johnny and Belinda will be grievously hurt, if not dead. We¡¯ll capture them as well and slowly interrogate them.¡±

    ¡°Master, you¡¯re too ruthless and despicable!¡± Gilbert couldn¡¯t help but cry out with excitement when he saw that Han Shuo was ready to move against his allies

    ¡°Gilbert, are you mocking me?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s brow creased as he flicked a frosty nce at Gilbert.

    Shaking his head ferociously, Gilbert hastened to protest, ¡°No, no! I¡¯mplimenting you! Your methods are the same as the teachings of my wise and courageous grandpa, thoroughly embodied with the essence of the superior heritage of us dark dragons!¡±

    Emily had just said that the dark dragons were evil and despicable dragons, but Han Shuo finally understood her words after he¡¯d heard Gilbert¡¯s praise. It sounded like he¡¯s both praised and cursed Han Shuo.

    Several ces within the manor suddenly lit up in me before Han Shuo had a chance to lecture Gilbert. The manor had already been engulfed in chaos beforehand, and now it was suffused with all sorts of panicked screams. The guards from the Gryphon Legion appeared as well, frantically trying to deal with the situation.

    ¡°Phoebe and Candice have also made their move, it¡¯s our turn now.¡± Han Shuo stopped bickering with Gilbert and set his sights on Bob Ascher¡¯s room with a serious expression.

    Emily¡¯s charming face was equally grave as she took out a magic staff and lowly sang out a dark magic spell. Several shadows that looked like demons started soundlessly approaching the guards.

    The Demonyer Edge danced through the air ording to Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts, swiftly approaching a man at the door. Just as it reached the point where the person might discover the weapon, Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan suddenly exploded and greatly increased the Demonyer Edge¡¯s speed. A howling sound rose as it punched through the neck of the now rmed guard.

    ¡°Assassins!¡± Someone screamed shrilly. The eight Gryphon Legion guards hastily raised the longswords and spears in their hands, nning on handling the danger that would appear at any time.

    Emily¡¯s dark magic spellnded into the two guards it first encountered, causing them to bleed continuously and then fall down bonelessly after a while. The five guards behind them released their fighting auras in time, destroying the effects of this spell and weren¡¯t injured.

    Because of Lawrence¡¯s man, the immediate surroundings had been cleared. No matter how the guards called out, no one answered them. Han Shuo and the three others didn¡¯t continue hiding after this blow and directly rushed out from the darkness.

    Contrary to Emily¡¯s expectations, Gilbert¡¯s speed was the fastest. Even though he was in human form, the ferociousness of a dark dragon wasn¡¯t something that an ordinary person could imagine. Gilbert rushed out excitedly and acted like a bulldozer, grabbing the spear of the first guard Han Shuo had killed and charging the other people.

    Although his target was a journeyman swordsman and was releasing an umon fighting aura. Gilbert stabbed through him with a single thrust, sending him flying to one side, dead before he hit the floor. When his fighting aura crashed onto Gilbert, Gilbert only grunted softly and wasn¡¯t injured at all.

    Emily was sorely surprised by this blow, and finally truly epted Gilbert¡¯s identity as a dark dragon. Han Shuo knew of this already and so wasn¡¯t surprised, walking over leisurely and directing the Demonyer Edge to dance wildly, using a bewildering pattern to kill another two Gryphon Legion soldiers.

    These soldiers were mostly journeyman or senior swordsmen and knights, and were actually not terrible. Their job was to thoroughly defend this ce, and to summon greater experts when enemies came knocking.

    If it hadn¡¯t been for Lawrence¡¯s man within the Gryphon Legion, the first cry of ¡°assassin!¡± would¡¯ve been enough to summon vast troops of the Gryphon Legion. If this had been the case, Han Shuo and the others would only be able to flee for their lives.

    As Emily attacked once again with dark magic, the remaining two guards finally fell down. Seeing that the obstacles had been cleared, Han Shuo spoke to Gilbert, ¡°Stay here on guard, notify us if anything happens.¡±

    Han Shuo flung a look at Emily after speaking and the two of them carefully pushed open the door, walking into Bob Ascher¡¯s room.

    Bob Ascher¡¯s room was exceedingly opulent and luxurious. Expensive furniture dotted the room, the carpet was made from the fur of a rare magical creature, and the paintings on the walls were all worth cities.

    ¡°This Bob Ascher knows how to enjoy life alright. The decorations of this house are already enough to prove that his sources of ie aren¡¯t clean.¡± Han Shuo immediately said after walking in and looking around at the surroundings.

    ¡°Of course, otherwise with his identity as the chief of the Gryphon Legion, he never would¡¯ve been able to afford such a ce.¡± Emily nodded and headed towards the inner chamber as she responded.

    There was a secret doorway to another room within his bedroom. This was a bit of intelligence that the Dark Mantle had spent a lot of effort before finally obtaining. Han Shuo and Emily immediately made for the inner chamber as soon as they entered the bedroom.

    Emily immediately lifted the covers on the bed in the room and ran her hand along the edge for a bit, looking for something when the boards of the bed suddenly split open to reveal a cave with stairs.

    ¡°Within the Lancelot Empire, the Dark Mantle can manage if we absolutely must learn of some intelligence. Although the secret chamber is hidden quite well, we still learned of this ce¡¯s existence and how to enter because Bob Ascher would bring his mistress in to exult in his glory.¡± Emily smiled at Han Shuo in exnation before they went down.

    Nodding, Han Shuo expressed his understanding. ¡°Indeed, someone like Bob Ascher would find it hard to control his desire to show off. If someone wants to keep a secret hidden, they¡¯ll have to pass through their own hurdle first.¡±

    ¡°Come, let¡¯s go and see what lies in Bob Ascher¡¯s room?¡± Emily said.

    Han Shuo followed behind her and suddenly heard soft, breathing sounds from someone before they¡¯d reached the bottom.

    ¡°Someone¡¯s there, be careful!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s heart tightened as he grasped Emily, proceeding forward with even more caution.

    When the two got to the bottom, Han Shuo looked towards the source of the breathing and suddenly discovered that Caspian was being held tightly within a cage enclosed by a magical boundary. Caspian was likewise looking at the two with a face full of surprise.

 Chapter 181: Found it

    Chapter 181: Found it

    Metal chains entangled all four of the great druid Caspian¡¯s limbs in a cube-shaped cage, around which lightning was crackling and sparking off of. An icy mist was hovering about the chains, freezing the man stiff to the bone and making even his breathing obviouslybored.

    When Han Shuo and Emily found Caspian in this room, they rushed towards the druid, shocked. Emily only took one nce before diagnosing quietly. ¡°There are both electric and water element magical boundaries at work here. In addition to this, the cage is restricting his power. I need some time to disassemble the spells.¡±

    ncing quickly at the ice beginning to form on tips of the druid¡¯s hair, Han Shuo said, ¡°I¡¯m confident that my weapon is sharp enough to prate the cage directly.¡±

    Emily reached out a hand to stop Han Shuo, shaking her head sternly and exining, ¡°This is a magic boundary made of both electric and water elements that has been set up quite intricately. If you don¡¯t know the proper technique and attempt to break through the cage with brute force alone, you might kill him through electrocution or hypothermia.¡±

    Han Shuo was far from being Emily¡¯s equal in the knowledge of magic in general since necromancy magic differed from the other paths of magic. After hearing her exnation, he didn¡¯t continue pressing his own thoughts, ¡°All right. You work on releasing him from the boundary, and I¡¯ll look for evidence against Bob Ascher.¡±

    With that said, he left Emily and began to investigate their surroundings. Crowded with numerous shelves of various sizes holding many strange, fascinating items, the room did not seem very spacious.

    There were many glistening badges marked with certain symbols describing its meaning on one of the shelves. These were the awards which Bob Ascher had received through his many years of service, which helped him rise to the position of chief of the Gryphon Legion, bing the items that he could unt for the rest of his life.

    There was another shelf that housed a few cavalry helmets and weapons. Some were shiny, while others were patently damaged. There was a small slip of paper under every piece that detailed which battle the helmet or weapon had been used in.

    The rest of the shelves of assorted sizes held either old books or obviously exorbitant swords and spears, not the pearls, jewels, and jade that Han Shuo expected.

    Emily had been working on dismantling the druid¡¯s confinement in the distance when she happened to see Han Shuo bored by the items on the shelves, his mind even wandering a little. She couldn¡¯t help but chide, ¡°A man such as Bob Ascher wouldn¡¯t ce run-of-the-mill jewels in his secret chamber, so rid yourself thieving thoughts. Wealth hasn¡¯t been his goal for a long time. The things here represent his glory and memories, nothing that gold canpare to.¡±

    With that reminder, Han Shuo sighed dejectedly. ¡°Here I thought I would find a ton of gold and wealth in his secret chamber. I was even nning to reward Gilbert after this mission, but I suppose I was ignorant and ill informed.¡±

    ¡°Go look through the other things.¡± Emily rolled her eyes and urged Han Shuo. ¡°We need enough evidence to pin him for good!¡±

    Taking a deep breath to help himself focus, Han Shuo quickly walked around the shelves searching for any hidden items, but after going around once and looking through every single shelf, he still didn¡¯t find anything of value.

    ¡°Seems like we¡¯re out of luck!¡± Han Shuo walked back to Emily with his palms open and said with some resignation.

    ¡°Just a second.¡± Emily was at a crucial part of her work. A shadowy cloud of magic pulsed between her hands, and she pressed it firmly against the cage.

    Snap! Crackle! The cage began to sizzle and fizz once Emily¡¯s magic cloud came into contact with it and vanished in an instant. Caspian¡¯s trembling eased, as well.

    ¡°All right. Now that the magic boundary has been broken, you can rescue him with your weapon.¡± Emily breathed out a light sigh and turned around with a graceful smile before sashaying towards the shelves. ¡°Leave finding evidence against Bob Ascher to me. My experience in the Dark Mantle has made me an expert at this kind of work.¡±

    ¡°Thank you!¡± The druid shakingly expressed his gratitude towards Han Shuo as he slowly regained his body heat after the magic boundary was dissolved.

    ¡°Heh heh, you¡¯re just lucky that we came across you!¡± Chuckling, Han Shuo took Demonyer Edge into his hand into which he directed his magical yuan and swung it in the air.

    With a loud crack, a few obsidian metal bars snapped under the Demonyer Edge¡¯s swing. Han Shuo reached out and forcefully bent the bars to the side, allowing the druid to step out.

    Upon leaving his confinement, Caspian stretched his body and took in a few deep breaths before asking Han Shuo, ¡°Where¡¯s Angelica? Is she in danger?¡±

    ¡°Rest assured. We left her in the care of the Battlefire mercenery band before we left. I don¡¯t think she will run into any trouble, but she¡¯s very worried about you.¡± After answering, Han Shuo looked at Emily, not asking why Caspian was imprisoned there in the first ce.

    Meanwhile, Emily took out a particr magic item and yed with it in her hands until she forced open a hiddenpartment in the corner. After rummaging through it, she fished out a small book.

    ¡°Ah hah, I found it.¡±

    ¡°Hiddenpartments aremon in secret chambers, but are concealed with space magic that an average person can almost never discover. Only a space grand magus is able to sense these magical ripples and disable the disguise, but the Dark Mantle does this kind of stuff so often that we¡¯vee up with a specialized magical tool. With it I could detect even the slightest magical activity in this room and obtain everything we need.¡± Emily proudly exined with the book now in hand.

    ¡°So, does that mean our mission isplete?¡± Han Shuo asked with a grin after a pause.

    Nodding rather happily, Emily replied, ¡°That¡¯s right. As long as we can leave Valen City, Bob Ascher is a dead man!¡±

    It was then that they heard a series of hurried knocksing from above.

    Expressions tensing, Han Shuo and Emily shared a quick look before the former finally spoke, ¡°That was Gilbert¡¯s signal. It means that somebody has noticed our existence and is heading here. Let¡¯s go back up and depart from this ce.¡±

    With that said, Emily ascended the way they hade. The great druid had yet to recover from his recent escape from the cage. He was still pale in the face and his steps were stiff and awkward.

    Nimbly maneuvering himself to nk Caspian, Han Shuo threw the druid onto his back and dashed out behind Emily, returning to Bob Ascher¡¯s bedroom.

    Just as they arrived, they heard the sounds of battle from outside the door. Emily shared a quick, worried look with Han Shuo before she reached out for the bed. Reverting the bed to its original form, the two of them raced out the door.

    On the other side, Gilbert was holding off an attack from several soldiers of the Gryphon Legion with a spear in hand. Another squad of Gryphon Legion troops was drawing near. Some were equipped with bows and arrows and had positioned themselves appropriately to shoot down Gilbert.

    ¡°You¡¯re finally out, honored master. I¡¯m afraid I can¡¯t hold them off for much longer.¡± Spotting Han Shuo, Gilbert jumped back after fending off a strike with his spear and shouted to his master.¡±

    All three of them, Han Shuo, Emily, and Gilbert, had their faces and identities concealed, unmistakably the appearance of no-good-doers. Even the great druid had been disguised with ck mask before Han Shuo carried him out. The party appeared more like a group of sneaky bandits.

    ¡°Let¡¯s get out of here!¡± Han Shuo eximed as the flow of Gryphon Legion soldiers converged on them. He sprinted out through an opening before the enemies could seal them in.

    The bowmen and crossbowmen had finished loading their weapons by then. If Han Shuo and Emily were to take flight, they would be clear targets without any cover, and thus they were forced to take shelter behind the artificial mountain and nts in the vi.

    Without wasting words or even a nod, Gilbert charged behind Han Shuo. mes hadpletelye swamped the manor and screams now filled the air. Belinda and Johnny had stormed through a wall using the three-eyed golem and were running as if their lives depended on it. Johnny even appeared to be wounded, as an arrow stuck out from his butt and his chest was dripping with blood.

    ¡°This way!¡± Spotting Han Shuo¡¯s party, Belinda rather loyally waved and signalled for them to join up with her. However, Han Shuo ignored her and dashed for the opposite wall. He yelled back, ¡°Are you kidding? I don¡¯t want to die fighting all those soldiers on your tail, thank you very much!¡±

 Chapter 182: A fierce battle

    Chapter 182: A fierce battle

    Everything was incredibly chaotic within the manor as fires licked at all the houses. Groups of ck robed people scurried hither and thither amidst waves of panic as Gryphon Legion soldiers chased them everywhere,pletely throwing the manor into wild disarray.

    ¡°Wait for us!¡± Two shapely ck figures suddenly rushed out as Han Shuo, Emily, and Gilbert were running in another direction.

    Han Shuo knew this should be Phoebe as soon as he heard the voice. It went without saying that the other person was Candice. The two of them had set fire to everything when the mission had just begin. As a fire mage swordsman, such matters came naturally to Candice. She had engulfed the entire ce in a sea of mes after a short while.

    There were a few Gryphon Legion soldiers behind them, and another awe inspiring elder wielding a longsword that red with silver fighting aura.

    The man quickly dashed over, and his imposing presence made it hard for one to look directly at him. He lightly waved the great sword in his hand and thoroughly pulverized all trees, shrubbery, and rocks in the silver fighting aura¡¯s path. Even the ground split open with various cracks, demonstrating the frightening ferocity of the fighting aura.

    ¡°He¡¯s rk¡¯s master, great swordmaster Gabriel! We need to get out of here!¡± Candice grew extremely worried as she called out and fled towards Han Shuo with an even faster speed.

    Gabriel was extremely swift as he¡¯d flung the Gryphon Legion soldiers with him far behind. As a great swordmaster, Gabriel possessed extreme strength. Han Shuo needed to take one nce at him to know that there was no one beside him who could fight Gabriel alone.

    As they witnessed Gabriel picking up speed, about to overtake Phoebe and Candice, Han Shuo¡¯s heart clenched as he looked at Gabriel, suddenly remembering the might of Gilbert¡¯s transformation and immediately shouted, ¡°Damn it, hurry up and transform!¡±

    Han Shuo concentrated like he never had before and, at the same time,pelled the Demonyer Edge to fly wildly at great swordmaster Gabriel. Infusing the Demonyer Edge with magical yuan, a thick magical aura red out from it, with a bizarre sense of fire and frost interspersed within it.

    The Demonyer Edge howled and shed through the air, appearing directly in front of great swordmaster Gabriel, stabbing directly towards him. That odd sense of heat brought an exceedingly dangerous presence and rather surprised Gabriel.

    Snorting coldly, Gabriel waved the longsword in his hand and suddenly gave birth to a silver firework in the distance, as resplendent as the shattered stars. Han Shuo suddenly felt an enormous force explode out of the glorious silver sparkles and attempt to firmly hold the Demonyer Edge in ce.

    A burst of tremendous energy surged violently into the Demonyer Edge. Gabriel¡¯s silver fighting aura was incredibly overbearing, rumbling on the surface of the Demonyer Edge as though it wished to ravage everything. The enveloping silver light caused the Demonyer Light to emit humming noises.

    This tyrannical power wound its way around the Demonyer Edge in an instant, chaotically mixing with the fire and frost energy that Han Shuo had created inside the de with his magic. The magical energy from the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡± that had coalesced in the de rapidly disappeared.

    Muttering a quick curse, Han Shuo knew that his magical training had been too brief. No matter how fantastical his magic was, with such a short amount of time spent on training, he was still unable to measure up to Gabriel¡¯s decades spent coalescing his fighting aura. In the moment they¡¯d connected, the magical yuan within the Demonyer Edgepletely dissipated, and the result a foregone conclusion.

    However, because of the Demonyer Edge¡¯s obstruction, it slowed down Gabriel¡¯s pursuit of Phoebe and Candice. Han Shuo felt that things weren¡¯t right when he couldn¡¯t resummon the Demonyer Edge back to his hand.

    He thought quickly as his heart clenched. Han Shuo swiftly sang out a magic spell as two bone spears suddenly flew towards Gabriel. In the instant that Han Shuo made his move, Emily also released a dark magic spell.

    At the same time, Han Shuo used his entire strength to quickly circte the magical yuan within the Demonyer Edge and used Gabriel¡¯s distraction in fending off their magical attacks to wrest the Demonyer Edge away from the ball of silver light. Because he¡¯d spent too much energy and the speed of the circting magical yuan was beyond Han Shuo¡¯s limits, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but spit out a mouthful of blood, having already been injured.

    ¡°You¡¯re injured, let me down, I think I¡¯ve recovered!¡± Caspian, on Han Shuo¡¯s back, could clearly feel Han Shuo¡¯s body tremble violently and immediately spoke when he saw Han Shuo spit out a mouthful of blood.

    Gabriel had already destroyed Han Shuo and Emily¡¯s magics in this short amount of time and his cold, grey eyes once again swept towards Han Shuo and Emily. His gaze on Han Shuo in particr was infused with some surprise, as he seemed to be incredibly curious about Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan and the Demonyer Edge.

    Bam! sounded out as Han Shuo turned his head to see that Gilbert had finally transformed back into an enormous ck dragon. His body was covered with ck scales and he¡¯d already crushed the wall in front of Han Shuo and the others.

    ¡°Everyone, on his back!¡± Han Shuo was delighted to see Gilbert reveal the body of a ck dragon and roared out loudly, throwing Caspian over to Gilbert as well.

    He used a certain amount of force when he did so, so that when Caspian arrived where Gilbert was, the momentum around his body would lessen and it wouldn¡¯t cause too much harm to the druid.

    Apart from Emily knowing Gilbert¡¯s identity in advance, Gilbert¡¯s sudden transformation shocked everyone senseless. They stared, open mouthed, at the enormous Gilbert and couldn¡¯t really react for a while.

    ¡°All Gryphon Legion soldiers gather here! Archers and spear throwers, prepare your arrows, spears, and crossbows! You can be dragonyers today!¡± Gabriel¡¯s loud call suddenly rang out and spread throughout the manor.

    ¡°Why aren¡¯t you getting on yet?!¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but roar furiously when he saw that Candice and Phoebe were still dithering about on the ground in shock.

    Dark dragons were alsobeled as the most evil and greedy amongst the dragons. They liked to live in the gloomy underworld, and were lustful, shameless, and greedy. They were practically the materialization of evil on the earth. That such a dark dragon had suddenly appeared in front of them, it was no wonder that Phoebe and Candice didn¡¯t know how to react.

    But when Han Shuo urged them on a second time, the two girls finally recognized the dark dragon¡¯s rtionship with Han Shuo and looked askance at him, leaping up tond on Gilbert¡¯s back.

    When he saw that Emily, Phoebe, and Caspian had all leapt until Gilbert¡¯s back, Han Shuo rxed and activated the Art to also fly towards Gilbert. ¡°Leave immediately, but don¡¯t take to the skies, or you¡¯ll be a flying target.¡±

    ¡°Honored master, you must block the spears and arrows that fly my way.¡± Gilbert had a mouth full of sharp teeth now and his dragon¡¯s breath was filled with a piercing odd smell. His voice also appeared to have an additionalyer of dignity in it.

    ¡°I know, all is a mess here anyways. Just destroy anything that gets in your way. Don¡¯t pay heed to anything else as long as we can get out of here.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t put any restrictions on Gilbert now as long as they could make it out of this sticky situation alive.

    When Caspian heard Han Shuo¡¯s orders, he seemed to want to protest, but when he thought of how Han Shuo had helped him numerous times already and that he was trying to get everyone out alive, he said nothing in the end after moving his lips a few times.

    ¡°Wahahaha, then alright, I¡¯ll do as I see fit!¡± Gilbert spoke excitedly with his dignified voice.

    That heavily fanged mouth suddenly yawned open and sprayed a gout of acidic poison into the distance. Dragonbreath apanied this spray, and the archers, who had just set up their formation, hastily retreated. Those who didn¡¯t back up in time were reduced to melting flesh after their bodies had came into contact with the acid. Death was the only way out for them.

    After this breath went out, scores of Gryphon Legion soldiers appeared suddenly. They wielded silver spears and gleaming silver armor as they flew in on the backs of gryphons. The person in front was fierce and stocky. He looked middle aged as the silver fighting aura from the spear in his hand shot out two to three meters tall, making that silver spear, carved with mystical patterns, appearing even longer.

    ¡°Hurry and go, Bob Ascher has arrived! It looks like the Cmity Church has failed indeed!¡± When he saw that the dark dragon still wanted to rampage around, Han Shuo quickly kicked him in the side and hastily gave this order.

 Chapter 183: The swift and fierce silver spear

    Chapter 183: The swift and fierce silver spear

    Ten Gryphon Legion soldiers and Bob Ascher, as well as the swordmaster Gabriel, ¡ª little dark dragon Gilbert would be courting death if he attempted to face this enormous amount of strength head on.

    Beneath Han Shuo¡¯s urging, Gilbert realized the magnitude of the situation they were in and didn¡¯t waste time with cheeky remarks. He charged over from the now obliterated wall, while the archers and spear throwers on Gabriel¡¯s side found their footing once more in a newly formed formation. They suddenly shot out in unison and filled the blotted out the skies with arrows and spears, targeting Gilbert.

    Han Shuo and the others had long since made preparations. Emily shot out a dark magical spell and formed a grey, semi-circle protective barrier in the air. Han Shuo also chanted the incantation for Dark Mist, covering the entire area in darkness. Candice, Phoebe, and Caspian also used a variety of methods to smash the arrows and spears that came their way.

    Han Shuo had already been injured when he had crossed des with Gabriel earlier. It was a good thing that he could call upon his necromancy magic without his magical yuan. When Han Shuo chanted out a magical spell, several zombie and hate warriors suddenly appeared on the ground, in addition to dozens of skeletal warriors, forming a blockade in the gap in the wall that had been made by Gilbert.

    The summoned dark creatures yed the roles of meat shields, filling up the gap so that the attacks fell only on them.

    Add to this Emily¡¯s magic shield and Han Shuo¡¯s Dark Mist, as well as Phoebe and Candice¡¯s efforts, Gilbert didn¡¯t suffer any injuries in the end.

    The dark creatures that Han Shuo had summoned were shot full of arrows and spears, and he once again began chanting, but this time it was the ¡°Corpse Explosion¡± spell that he¡¯d just mastered when the soldiers of the Gryphon Legion drew near, making two hate warriors explode, sending flesh and blood flying through the sky. The ten soldiers were caught off guard and were all sent crashing backwards.

    ¡°Take to the sky and get us out of here!¡± Han Shuo yelled out as he made use of this chance in which the dark creatures were blocking all the arrows and spears.

    Gilbert didn¡¯t hesitate when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s order and swung his enormous body around, crushing two houses by his side. Boulders hurtled through the air as trees snapped. Gilbert roared as his body, previously hovering close to the ground, suddenly shot towards the dark sky.

    ¡°Halt right there!¡± Bob Ascher suddenly shot over magically at this moment, the silver spear in his hand suddenly shooting out like a silveret. A splendid tail followed behind it as it aimed for Gilbert.

    As a sky rider, Bob Ascher had weathered many battles over the years and had seen all sorts of situations. Not only was he himself quite fierce, but his breadth of battle experience was even more rich. He understood that it would be difficult to catch up to Gilbert with the gryphon¡¯s speed, so the only way was to injure Gilbert first. Otherwise, even though he had arge amount of troops following close behind him, it would be impossible to keep Han Shuo¡¯s group behind.

    Bob Ascher¡¯s abundant fighting aura was concentrated into the spear as it drew a magnificent, almost piercing, arc in the dark night sky. It embodied a severe presence within it, giving Han Shuo and the others immense pressure. The spear flew towards them, as if hunting prey, whistling through the night and seeming to be making use of the wind as well.

    Han Shuo hastily chanted another bone spear spell, and two bone spears suddenly materialized in front of the silver spear ording to Han Shuo¡¯s will. They broke apart as soon as they touched the spear, and the spear continued, unabated, on its path.

    As Han Shuo was reeling in shock, Emily chanted out a dark magic spell as a Grim Reaper¡¯s de once again formed in the night sky. As the magic staff in Emily¡¯s hands drew an arc downwards, the Grim Reaper¡¯s de shot swiftly towards the oing silver spear.

    Another exploding sound rang out as Emily suddenly stumbled on Gilbert¡¯s back. She couldn¡¯t help but take a few steps backwards as the de formed out of her mental strength dissipated in the blink of an eye.

    However, because of her attack, the fighting aura coalesced on the tip of the silver spear had decreased noticeably. Whether it was the re of its silver light, or its speed, both had been suddenly decreased.

    Although Han Shuo¡¯s heart went out to Emily at this time, he didn¡¯t have the time tofort her. He stared unblinkingly at the spear, prepared to summon the Demonyer Edge and meet it inbat.

    Two crossbow bolts suddenly flew out from Phoebe and Candice¡¯s hands. Candice¡¯s bolt missed, but Phoebe¡¯s bolt solidly smashed into the slowing silver spar.

    Because of this bolt, the spear¡¯s speed decreased once more. Gilbert had increased his speed at this time and was making for the horizon. He increased the gap between the group and Bob Ascher¡¯s gryphon, and continued to pull ahead.

    ¡°Convey my orders! The entire city is under martialw. Only entrance is allowed, exit is not. All transportation matrixes traveling to other cities are to be closed! No one can activate them without my order. All trespassers will be killed without exception!¡± Bob Ascher¡¯s fierce yell could be heard in the distance, with even Han Shuo and the others hearing him clearly.

    ¡°Are you alright?¡± Han Shuo rxed when he saw that they were temporarily out of danger, but his expression tightened as he hurriedly rushed to Emily¡¯s side and held her up.

    Emily took off her mask and disyed a face drained of color, but when she saw that Han Shuo was asking after her so urgently, sweetness flooded her heart as she gave a weakugh, ¡°No worries, this is what happens after I exhaust my magic. Don¡¯t worry about me, how are you?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll be fine after a few days of rest as well!¡± Han Shuo alsoforted Emily with a smile.

    Phoebe was now wearing a stiff expression when she saw how intimate Han Shuo and Emily were, but Emily was wounded and had gotten her injuries just now from protecting them all. She wasn¡¯t in a position to say anything about Han Shuo¡¯s concern for her.

    Coughing lightly, she braved the chilly wind to walk up to Han Shuo, worry also appearing on her stunning face. She reached out a slender, jade hand to wipe the blood from Emily¡¯s lips, admonishing her, ¡°You spit out blood, so how can you say that you¡¯re alright?!¡±

    Phoebe¡¯s light cough and her motions immediately made Emily realize something. She pushed away Han Shuo¡¯s support with a nonchnt smile and maintained a distance of two arm lengths from him, only saying then, ¡°What do we do now?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m beginning to worry about the safety of the others now that Valen City is on lockdown.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face darkened as she looked at Emily.

    Nodding, Emily said, ¡°That¡¯s right, he was incredibly enraged just now and won¡¯t be easily pacified. Valen City has never closed its transportation matrixes to other cities before. In doing so, he¡¯s cut off all chances of ofmunication with the outside world. Whether it was the Empire or news from any other ces, Valen City will be unable to receive any of it. Bob Ascher must have hardened his heart and won¡¯t give up that easily since he¡¯s taken this step.¡±

    ¡°The target I¡¯de to fight this time was water magus Howard by Bob Ascher¡¯s side. I had originally been confident of handling him, but he found someone to help him who doesn¡¯t y by the rules to capture me. He wanted something from our druid order after he captured me, but I didn¡¯t give it to him even when threatened with death. Before you came tonight, he said he was going to capture little Angelica to threaten me with, so I¡¯m concerned for her safety.¡± Caspian finally came clean with everything at this time.

    ¡°Honored master, where are we flying to? If you don¡¯t make a decision soon, we¡¯ll be leaving Valen City!¡± Gilbert¡¯s voice suddenly rang out in the frosty winter air.

    Valen City was a mess at the moment and so the best and wisest course of action was to leave. However, if they left now, those still in Valen City would likely be in great danger. Hesitation showed on Han Shuo¡¯s face as he looked uncertainly at those assembled in front of him.

    ¡°My cousin is very good to me and I cannot leave him in danger!¡± Phoebe resolutely expressed her stance when she saw Han Shuo look at her.

    ¡°I can¡¯t give up on my battlerades!¡± Candice also spoke up.

    When Han Shuo looked at Emily, Emily smiled charmingly, ¡°I¡¯ll go with whatever you decide!¡±

    ¡°Gilbert, return to the hotel!¡± Han Shuo stomped down on the back of the dark dragon after thinking for a while.

 Chapter 184: An incredible memory

    Chapter 184: An incredible memory

    Having finally increased the distance between himself and Bob Ascher and seeing that he was about to clear the danger zone, Gilbertined when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s instructions telling him to turn back. ¡°Honored master, even the mighty Gilbert cannot take on an entire Gryphon Legion! We¡¯ll surely be discovered if we go back to the city like this!¡±

    ¡°Shut up and fly back to the hotel. We need to pick up whoever we need to pick up.¡± Han Shuo snorted lightly as he spoke to Gilbert.

    In his dark dragon form, there wasn¡¯t much space on his back for people to stand on. Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t be able to take everyone away in one go, so he started to contemte what to do.

    Thoughts racing furiously, Han Shuo¡¯s sharp eyes saw Gryphon Legion soldiers patrolling the skies as Gilbert was returning from the outskirts of Valen City.

    Gilbert was such arge target that it was impossible to surreptitiously sneak back into the hotel. Han Shuo thought silently for a moment before suddenly saying, ¡°Gilbert,nd immediately since the Gryphon Legion has yet to spot us. We¡¯ll be returning to the hotel by foot.¡±

    Under Han Shuo¡¯smands, Gilbert didn¡¯t say anything pointless and traveled stealthily at a low altitude, with everyone getting off his back in session shortly after. When everyone had gotten off, Gilbert¡¯s huge body gradually shrunk, entombed in a dark radiance before once again transforming back into that tan-skinned, handsome, young man.

    ¡°When we were within Asher¡¯s manor just now, we had masks on. Now that we have returned under our true appearances, it¡¯s likely that they won¡¯t be able to recognize us.¡± Han Shuo nced over at Emily as he spoke to her.

    ¡°Right, however, if a group of strangers suddenly appears at the same time and are somehow discovered by the Gryphon Legion¡¯s people, we will definitely raise suspicions. I think we should split up, and by doing that, other people won¡¯t think that we acted together!¡± Emily looked at their group as she spoke.

    ¡°Alright, then let¡¯s do this. Everyone should be familiar with the way back. We¡¯ll split into two groups, and if there¡¯s danger within the hotel, we¡¯ll meet up at the block behind it.¡± Han Shuo nodded, agreeing with Emily¡¯s n.

    Once Han Shuo had spoken, Phoebe immediately moved matter-of-factly to Han Shuo¡¯s side. As a magical pet, Gilbert naturally couldn¡¯t be separated from his master either. With the situation developing like this, Emily quickly looked at everyone and spoke again. ¡°Since things are like this, I¡¯ll be with Miss Candice and Elder Caspian.¡±

    ¡°Elder Caspian has entered the city before, so we need you to use magic to adjust his features. Otherwise, it will be extremely easy to recognize him.¡± Han Shuo warned. He then turned towards Phoebe and Gilbert, saying, ¡°Let¡¯s go.¡±

    Currently, Valen City was even more chaotic than during the day that rk had been assassinated. The chief of the Gryphon Legion used the invasion and assassinations of the Kasi Empire as an excuse to seal off the entire city. The Griffon Legion¡¯s men whistled through the skies. and immediately carried out a severe interrogation as soon as any stranger appeared.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s sensitive eyes and ears, his group of three focused on taking small, winding paths. They scuttled under the shadow of the eaves, avoiding many troops from the Griffon Legion along the way.

    Regardless of whether it was Gilbert or Pheobe, they were both extraordinary characters. Since Han Shuo¡¯s brain had developed, his powerful ability to recall things was fully deployed during this return trip. There were all types ofplicated small passages that existed in Valen City, and it seemed as if there was a map imprinted into Han Shuo¡¯s heart. As Han Shuo made his way back, he moved erratically in all directions.

    In the end, even Phoebe began to feel as if they were getting farther and farther away from the hotel. If it wasn¡¯t for her knowing how mysterious Han Shuo was, she definitely would have questioned whether or not Han Shuo knew where he was going. After going through many small roads and traveling through a few curved routes, the back door of the hotel suddenly appeared before their eyes.

    Han Shuo¡¯s had actually managed topletely avoid the airborne Griffon Legion and soldiers on the ground. By using a few smaller, moreplicated roads, the three people actually didn¡¯t encounter any danger as they appeared at the the hotel doors.

    ¡°This is too amazing!¡± Phoebe couldn¡¯t help but exim when she saw ine¡¯s hotel, lights dancing in her eyes as sheplimented Han Shuo.

    ¡°Honored master, I¡¯m super dizzy. How were you able to memorize suchplicated roads?¡± Gilbert was also looking at Han Shuo with incredulity.

    Pointing at his head, Han Shuo chuckled. ¡°I¡¯m just that good!¡±

    It was like he¡¯d said nothing with that statement, but even if he¡¯d exined the bit about his brain being developed, the two of them most likely wouldn¡¯t have understood regardless, so he didn¡¯t bother.

    Han Shuo took a deep breath after speaking and concentrated his gaze on the hotel. His eyes sparkled with dark gleams and his sensitive ears also turned towards the hotel.

    Contrary to his expectations, there wasn¡¯t anything out of the ordinary in the hotel. Han Shuo heard that everything was normal inside. There were no panicked sounds of fighting, nor was there any sounds of interrogation from the soldiers of the Gryphon Legion.

    ¡°You and Gilbert head over first, I¡¯ll go find Lawrence and tell him to leave the city immediately!¡± Han Shuo spoke to Phoebe beside him.

    Phoebe¡¯s stunning face turned to look at him as she reached for his hand. She grasped his broad, coarse hands tightly and said softly, ¡®Be careful!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry! Nothing¡¯s going to happen to me!¡± Han Shuo said with a smile and turned to Gilbert, ¡°Protect her well if anything happens!¡±

    Han Shuo was like a shadow in the dark night after he spoke. He melted into the darkness and vanished without a trace.

    On his way to Lawrence¡¯s ce, Han Shuo heard a bizarre sound. He quickened his steps andnded on a tree branch. Han Shuo saw a disguised Lawrence, Lucky, and the two swordsmen he¡¯d seen before making for the direction of the hotel with Belinda and Johnny from the Cmity Church.

    Coughing lightly, Han Shuo called out softly from the tree, ¡°Lawrence!¡±

    The group below was greatly frightened by Han Shuo¡¯s cough. They all grasped their weapons tightly and swivelled to look up into the tree, almost sending out attacks as they turned.

    ¡°Bryan, what are you doing here? Shouldn¡¯t you have left the city long ago? We saw you take the dark dragon out of the manor and leave Ascher behind!¡± Lawrence spoke with confusion.

    ¡°We came back again. Cut the ther and gather at the hotel. We are going to be leaving immediately. You can¡¯t stay in Valen City for a second longer.¡± Han Shuo had no time to exin anything and responded carelessly,nding on the ground and convening with Lawrence and the others.

    When he drew near, Han Shuo discovered that Johnny had not only taken a hit to his buttocks, but there was arge patch of blood on his chest and it looked like he was injured quite severely. Although Belinda still had her veil on, her gaze wasn¡¯t as sharp as before. She looked a bit weak and had also likely been wounded.

    Lawrence and the others had only been involved in logistics and cleanup in this operation. They hadn¡¯t taken part in the actual battle, and so they were in rtively good spirits, with no one being injured. What Han Shuo didn¡¯t understand was why he was with Belinda. Han Shuo hadn¡¯t introduced the two to each other and so they shouldn¡¯t know each other.

    Hesitating, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t keep back the questions in his heart. He looked at Lawrence and then at Belinda, ¡°How do the two of you know each other?¡±

    ¡°Oh, we discovered that our two groups were going the same way when we were retreating earlier and ended up walking together!¡± Lawrence nced nomittally at Han Shuo and exined faintly.

    Belinda also nodded, ¡°It¡¯s because of Mister Lawrence¡¯s aid and that such arge number of his men went after you that we were able to make it out.¡±

    ¡°So that¡¯s the case!¡± Han Shuo still felt that things weren¡¯t this simple, but since Belinda and Lawrence had the same story, he wasn¡¯t able to get anything else out of them either.

    Just as Han Shuo and Lawrence were almost at the hotel, Han Shuo could hear a group of Gryphon Legion soldiers interrogating ine inside. He could hear her heartyughter from a distance away, seemingly to not have a care in the world.

    However, his superior vision saw that as this troop was talking to ine, another soldier seemed to have received some instructions and surreptitiously left the hotel, walking swiftly towards the street and waving his hand up at the two Gryphon Legion soldiers hovering in the sky.

    ¡°Damn it, we must¡¯ve been made!¡± Although he didn¡¯t know why, Han Shuo knew that ine¡¯s hotel was no longer safe. He called out softly and didn¡¯t bother concealing his tracks anymore, making for the hotel like a streak of lightning.

 Chapter 185: The great escape

    Chapter 185: The great escape

    ¡°Has there really not been any suspicious characters nearbytely?¡± A Gryphon Legion officer asked ine.

    ¡°Honored sir, our hotel has always had good ratings in Valen City and have always cooperated with the Aschers. We would¡¯ve immediately reported to you had we discovered anyone suspicious.¡± The chubby ine was still merry and promised with a smile that nothing was wrong with the hotel.

    ¡°Mm, I feel that nothing would be wrong with your hotel anyways!¡± The officer¡¯s expression was calm as he spoke gravely.

    A severe whistle sounded at this moment as a streak of faint red cut through the dark sky, making straight for the officer.

    The officer, who¡¯d been putting on a show in talking to ine, had long since been on his guard. He wouldn¡¯t have sent his men out for help otherwise. He pulled out the sword by his side with an audible ng as soon as the whistle had sounded. Dark green fighting aura suddenly red across it as it immediately flew out towards the descending red light.

    Ding! The sounds of weapons shing into each other rang out. The Demonyer Edge bit viciously into the officer¡¯s de and extinguished his fighting aura, causing a nick in the officer¡¯s de.

    A figure shed at the same time as a hard fist pummeled towards the officer. The officer started in shock and he lifted his left hand, blocking his chest and attempting to stop Han Shuo¡¯s punch.

    It had seemed to be an ordinary punch, but suddenly red up with purple spellfire when it reached the officer¡¯s chest. A bitingly cold presence suddenly rushed to the front, and it surged into his body when Han Shuo¡¯s fistnded on his chest.

    The officer felt like he¡¯d fallen into an icy cavern in a single instant. Frost immediately formed on his hair and eyebrows, and ice pierced through his body as well. He didn¡¯t even have the strength to lift his hands.

    Han Shuo retraced his tightly clenched fist and snatched the Demonyer Edge out of the air. He turned his head to yell at ine, ¡°This ce has beenpromised. Tell everyone to leave the hotel immediately!¡±

    ine quickly sized up the situation after recovering from her shock. The cries of the gryphons were sounding out from the air at this time. This meant that Han Shuo¡¯s judgment had been without error, and that the soldiers circling in the sky were already closing in.

    ¡°However, Madame Emily has yet to return!¡± ine was about to leave when she suddenly recalled that Emily was the true leader of this mission, and couldn¡¯t help but speak up at this moment.

    ¡°You don¡¯t need to worry about this, she will return soon.¡± Han Shuo grasped the Demonyer Edge and charged into the soldiers, quickly responding to ine.

    ine had no other reservations after Han Shuo¡¯s words and she nodded as she turned. She yelled out as Angelica, members of the Battlefire mercenary band, as well as Phoebe and Gilbert all emerged from the hotel.

    When they came outside, they joined in the fray without another word from Han Shuo, killing all the Gryphon Legion soldiers.

    ¡°Go! Leave through the back!¡± Although these soldiers were dead, this location had already beenpromised. Along with the soldier¡¯s previous report, this ce would quickly be a prime target. The two hovering soldiers high up in the air had also discovered the abnormalities over here.

    The group of people didn¡¯t pack anything under Han Shuo¡¯s orders and had just fled the hotel, running towards the back. Although ine didn¡¯t possess any fighting aura, she was quite quick on her feet and didn¡¯t be a burden.

    A loud outcry of yells suddenly sounded from the distance. Han Shuo ran and jumped up,nding on a nearby roof. He looked into the distance and noticed that Emily, Candice, and Caspian were fighting their way over here.

    A dozen cavalry members were behind them, riding armored battlesteeds and wielding sharp spears. They pursued Emily fiercely, seeming to have discovered their identities.

    ¡°Hurry,e this way!¡± Han Shuo suddenly called out loudly, his voice making it over to Emily¡¯s location like a sharp weapon.

    Lawrence¡¯s group also bumped into Phoebe and Candice at this time, making all those who had participated in the Bob Ascher operation gather in one ce.

    ¡°Form up! Let¡¯s make it out of here before the entire Gryphon Legion arrives!¡± Standing on top of the roof, Han Shuo had be the leader of this mission as he called out sternly.

    ¡°Steal the horses!¡± Emily suddenly hovered in midair on her way over as she lowly chanted a dark magic spell.

    The dozen fiercely charging knights suddenly floundered into a dark vortex along the way. The battlesteeds¡¯ lightning fast speed suddenly became incredibly slow, and their hooves made no sounds on the ground.

    The trees in the surroundings suddenly became alive as their branches danced liked snakes, entangling the slowing horses, forcing them to stop where they stood.

    Caspian¡¯s old tree branch of a magic staff rested on a nearby tree. He concentrated and released the magic of the druidic order, restraining all twelve horses and confining even the legs of the knights on the horses.

    ¡°Hurry up!¡± Caspian also suddenly roared out.

    ¡°Grandpa! Are you alright?¡± Angelica broke down into tears of joy when she saw her grandfather appear from the vantage point of being protected by the Battlefire mercenary band members.

    ¡°Take the horses,e on!¡± Han Shuo had already charged out in the air and turned his head to yell back.

    Lawrence waved his hand and didn¡¯t bother speaking to Phoebe. Those beside him, including Belinda and Johnny of the Cmity Church and even Phoebe and Candice, dashed out and made for the dozen trussed up horses and knights.

    Han Shuo had Caspian, swordmaster Phoebe, magus level Emily, thunder mage swordsman Johnny, as well as fire mage swordsman Candice, and finally Lawrence by his side. With such a group of expertsing together to take care of the ordinary knights tied up on the backs of their horses, it was easily a ughter.

    Everyone disyed their abilities in the span of a few breaths and killed the twelve ordinary knights in a few seconds. They threw the bodies down and imed the horses.

    ¡°Hurry and get out of here. We escaped this way because there¡¯s more than a hundred simr cavalry behind us.¡± Emily tugged on the reins and shouted.

    Just as her words sounded, the cries from the gryphons in the air became more and more numerous. Han Shuo lifted his head and suddenly discovered a few ck dots converging on their location. His sensitive ears could hear random hoofbeats. It seemed that they would be surrounded before long.

    ¡°Come with me, we¡¯ll make it out soon!¡± Han Shuo yanked on the reins and turned the horse around, charging in the direction that Emily and the others had juste from.

    ¡°You¡¯re crazy! There¡¯s more than a hundred knights back there!¡± Emily was immediately shocked by Han Shuo¡¯s about face and called out in surprise.

    He turned back and looked at Emily with a wry smile. ¡°I think that¡¯s the only path avable to us that will get us to the city walls as soon as possible! If we don¡¯t leave immediately, there will be countless troubles that follow behind us, so we must take that risk!¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t hesitate after speaking and charged off on the back of his steed, shooting for the location where the hoofbeats were converging. Emily was stunned for only a second before she immediately followed Han Shuo¡¯s battlesteed.

    Phoebe and Candice had worked with Han Shuo before and trusted his judgment greatly. Gilbert had no objection of course, and charged out after Emily. Caspian and Angelica, on the same horse, also followed quickly after a moment of hesitation.

    Thest group was more hesitant, but they too followed Han Shuo¡¯s direction one by one after a short while.

    None of them knew whether or not this path would lead to life or death. They could only hope that Han Shuo¡¯s judgement had been correct.

 Chapter 186: The â€œDemonic Art of Assimilationâ€

    Chapter 186: The ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡±

    It was the dead of winter, and some ice had already formed on the surface of the streets. The frosty wind cut through the air like a knife, as if a demon was walking the streets, giving pedestrians an awe inspiring feeling, which sank into the depths of their soul.

    The hooves of Han Shuo¡¯s horse pounded against the ground of the streets as everyone followed closely behind. Everyone had severely grave expressions pasted on their faces, having already made their preparations that they would be charging head on into great trouble.

    A dense concentration of hooves sounded in front of Han Shuo. The presence of ten thousand fiercely charging horses assaulted him before he even seen anyone.

    The Demonyer Edge was gripped loosely in his hand right now as a coollyposed Han Shuo discarded all the stray thoughts in his mind. He focused his concentration like he never had before, adjusting his breathing and heart rate to his most ideal condition. Even the pain originally emanating from some of his wounds began to fade away.

    When he focused his attentions and nned on carving out a path of blood, he suddenly felt a bit lightheaded, as if he¡¯d suddenly sunk into some strange state of mind. His mind shook at the same time as a profound incantation slowly crystallized in his heart.

    The ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡± was a demonic art that could be grasped only after one reached the true demon realm. Its effects were evident from the word ¡°assimtion¡±. A demonic practitioner in the true demon realm would have formed a demon infant at that time, and once injured, the practitioner could use the ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡± to swallow the enemy¡¯s blood, flesh, and soul to heal their own injuries.

    If the demon infant wanted to grow quickly at this time, it could use the ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡± to swallow the enemy¡¯s soul or demon infant. However, because there was no one else in the same school of study as Han Shuo in this world, there were no other demonic infants for him to swallow.

    Before a person died, the energy in their soul wouldn¡¯t fade away. If one used the ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡± to absorb a living person¡¯s soul and fortify the demon infant, that would be the fastest way for Han Shuo¡¯s training to advance to the next level.

    The power of one¡¯s soul would quickly fade upon death, and the remnants of energy wouldpletely dissipate in an exceedingly short while. It was also impossible to summon the vengeful spirits known as wraiths to fill the void, because those were creatures from another dimension and had been dead for an indeterminate amount of time. The energy of their souls had long since vanished, leaving behind only the simplest traces of life.

    In actuality, Han Shuo¡¯s use of the original demon and yin demon cave to refine the original and yin demons was actually using his blood essence and magical yuan to imbue these wraiths with the energy of a soul again. These original and yin demons would regain their powers, in addition to incredible abilities after they managed to absorb Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence andrge amounts of magical yuan.

    A mystical incantation magically imprinted itself into Han Shuo¡¯s brain as he sped forward on the back of the battlesteed. He quickly reviewed the incantation in his state of concentration and continued to gallop forward.

    The sound of hooves were even more densely packed ahead, pounding into Han Shuo¡¯s heart like a war drum. When his sharp eyes looking straight ahead, he calmly circted his magical yuan ording to how to deploy the ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡±, trying to see if it would have any effect.

    To his surprise, Han Shuo discovered that he could circte the magical yuan smoothly ording to the requirements of the ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡¯, not meeting any obstacles at all.

    Han Shuo finally realized that since he¡¯d reached the true demon realm, many of his meridians had been carved out by his magical yuan, and the meridians that the ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡± was circting through happened to be simr to the ones needed for the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire. Although they weren¡¯t the exact same set of meridians, the current set was clear and without obstacle at all. Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts raced as he immediately sensed the changes in his body.

    As he circted the ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡± and focused his concentration on his empty left hand, a thick, ck cloud of magical mist materialized as a spinning ck hole, full of an eerie and hard to define presence. There were many ck flecks sparkling inside, giving off a frightening feeling.

    The vortex hovering over the palm of his hand wasn¡¯t thatrge, but Han Shuo understood that this meant he¡¯d fully grasped the ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡±, and he would only know its effects when he actually tried using it on someone.

    ¡°You in the front! Halt for questioning or be killed without exception!¡± A fierce roar sounded out from in front of Han Shuo at this time.

    A dense collection of knights whipped forward with battle rage. The silver spears in their hands red with dark green fighting aura, appearing quite piercing in the darkness.

    ¡°Heh heh, I just so happened to want to see who¡¯s going to kill who!¡± Han Shuoughed wildly as he clenched with his legs. His horse shot forward even faster as it made for the knight.

    In the moment that they were about to crash into each other, Han Shuo chanted a necromancy spell and the knights who were about to attack Han Shuo suddenly found bone spears materializing out of nowhere and hurtling towards them instead. They hastily raised their weapons to defend themselves as one of their silver spears was blocked by a white bone shield that had formed on Han Shuo¡¯s left shoulder.

    Beneath the cover of necromancy magic, Han Shuo pointed at the lofty knight who had shouted. When the sharp Demonyer Edge connected with the knight¡¯s spear, thetter immediately broke apart in ordance with Han Shuo¡¯s expectations. Making use of the knight¡¯s momentary shock, Han Shuo suddenly reached out a hand when he was passing by the knight and grabbed thetter.

    Han Shuo¡¯s physical body was perversely strong now. When his left hand grabbed the knight and squeeze severely, the knight¡¯s shoulder de immediately fractured. The Demonyer Edge then nicked the knight¡¯s head, causing an immediate fountain of fresh blood.

    The knight had been howling in pain when his cries of agony intensified after the Demonyer Edge¡¯s blow. Strength drained from his struggling body and he was knocked senseless.

    Han Shuo¡¯s left hand once again activated the ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡± at this time. The knight¡¯s flesh and blood, as well as lifeforce, swiftly flew from the knight¡¯s neck into Han Shuo¡¯s left hand.

    A vigorous, strange power suddenly surged into Han Shuo¡¯s body thanks to the demon infant consuming it. His previously injured body recovered miraculously from this injection of strength, as if he¡¯d obtained some sort of magical elixir or pill. Han Shuo could even clearly feel that some of his broken blood vessels had bizarrely reconnected themselves beneath the nurturing effects of this force.

    At the same time, the knight in Han Shuo¡¯s hands was slowly deting and turning grey because his flesh, blood, and lifeforce was being absorbed. When Han Shuo was finished with that, his remaining strand of soul was also sucked away like a drop of water.

    When Han Shuo let go, a cold wind blew up and the corpse, now an empty husk, disintegrated in a cloud of dust. A life had been demolished in the span of a second, leaving not a single trace behind, thanks to the ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡±.

    As the caster, Han Shuo had received the nourishment from this knight in a short amount of time. Not only were his injuries healed, but he felt greatly alert and energetic at this moment as well.

    The effects of the ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡± scared even Han Shuo himself. He¡¯d never thought that it would be able to suck away all of the knight¡¯s life force in such short amount of time.

    This was a typical case of harming others to benefit oneself, and it rather fulfilled the true principles of a demonic practitioner. Helping one recover and advance through ughter and careless abandon of other lives, making use of other¡¯s soul and life force. These were the methods that demonic practitioners had long since grown ustomed to in the past hundred, thousand years.

    ¡°Demon, he¡¯s a demon!¡± The knights in front of Han Shuo stopped in their tracks with shock after seeing their leader die in such a horrifying fashion. One of them yelled in panic.

    Han Shuo¡¯s methods had obviously surpassed the limits of their understanding, particrly when Han Shuo¡¯s left hand devoured their leader. The blood and bone fragments flying everywhere made his left hand appear like a man-eating demon. It made all this very difficult for the knights to ept.

    Han Shuo had now charged deep into this group of knights. Due to the narrowness of the streets, the way forward waspletely blocked.

    He was forced to lower his speed due to the crush of people around him. Han Shuo had been ready for a cruel round of attacks when he realized those around him had all fallen into a stupor. They were all looking at him in horrified fright, and no one dared make the first move.

 Chapter 187: Flying

    Chapter 187: Flying

    Emily and the others took advantage of these people¡¯s stupor to unceremoniously rain attacks down upon the knights.

    Dazzling spells and fierce fighting aura exploded at the same time, smashing into the knights like bombs and causing great injuries and casualties.

    Faced with extreme threat to their lives, the previously shell-shocked Gryphon Legion knights started fighting for their lives. Javelins, arrows, and sharp spears all shot towards Han Shuo¡¯s groups.

    The knights hadpletely blocked off the street, and so Han Shuo¡¯s group would have to meet them in head on battle if they charged over. When the Gryphon Legion knights shrugged off their fear and fought desperately, they immediately became a great hindrance.

    However, Han Shuo¡¯s group was created of all experts with strong martial arts techniques and magic. They fought on the narrow streets since it wouldn¡¯t allow the Gryphon Legion soldiers to spread out. Only ten or so soldiers could face Han Shuo and the others at any given time.

    These soldiers were naturally no match for Han Shuo and the others in this regard. The soldiers were all struck down from their horses in an exceedingly short period of time. It was a pity that there were roughly a hundred or so soldiers with the Gryphon Legion crew, and they were all experienced soldiers who had weathered many battles. They charged forward without heed for their own lives, greatly obstructing the group¡¯s speed.

    The cry of gryphons came from the direction they hade from. Han Shuo took one listen and immediately understood that arger portion of the Gryphon Legion were on their way. Perhaps even Bill Ascher was amongst them.

    ¡°Charge through this group or we¡¯ll be in trouble!¡± Han Shuo roared furiously. He turned and looked at Gilbert, ¡°Transform back into your dragon form and destroy everything you see.¡±

    Gilbert immediately jumped up upon hearing these words and transformed into the enormous body of a dark dragon in the air. Gilbert¡¯s body hurtled through the sky over the crowded streets, opening his maw to send out a jet of me on dozens of soldiers.

    A dull thud sounded at the same time as Belinda¡¯s irond golem of the three eyed demon god, Ansidesi, charged into the crowd under her orders. It caused mass destruction, along with Gilbert, dealing disastrous blows to the soldiers.

    Han Shuo took stock of the surroundings and noticed that there were several noticeable marks on Belinda¡¯s irond golem. Although it was as powerful as ever, it seemed a bit more bedraggled and was even a tad bit slower thanst time.

    Han Shuo knew without much thought that the golem must¡¯ve been damaged in the operation to assassinate Bill Ascher, or it wouldn¡¯t be appearing in such bad shape. Han Shuo turned his head and was about to shift his gaze elsewhere, when he suddenly saw the light of excitement shine in Lawrence¡¯s eyes. Lawrence looked at the irond golem in fascination, seeming to continuously emit sighs of amazement as he looked at it.

    Perhaps Lawrence had wanted to save Belinda because he was targeting the value of the golem. This was an enormous entity of mass destruction. If it could be used as a weapon in war, then he would have a great advantage in besieging cities and ravagingnds. No wonder Lawrence was so excited.

    Due to Gilbert and the irond golem leading the way, those following behind immediately felt a lot more at ease. Their charge was apanied by howls of pain and agony from their enemies as Han Shuo and the others treaded through the devastated streets, continuing forward.

    Severalrge earth spikes suddenly appeared towards the front at this moment. They were all several meters long and shot fiercely towards the low flying Gilbert. Two water dragons also materialized into existence also churning ferociously towards Gilbert.

    Gilbert had been squalling in his excitement when he was hit on all sides in his stupor. Hisrge bodypleted a forward roll and fell down again. The knights, who were still alive after all his attacks immediately shot all their weapons at Gilbert, injuring him as well.

    ¡°Damn it, you guys actually injured me. I¡¯m going to kill you!¡± Gilbert shrieked after a howl of agony and spewed mes towards the water and earth archmages in front of him. His enormous body thrashed and crushed some houses around him as he once again took to the air.

    ¡°We go.¡± One of the archmages said coolly as both of them used the levitation spells to float into the air and leave in another direction.

    ¡°Don¡¯t chase them, we need to get out of here!¡± Han Shuo immediately yelled out when he saw that Gilbert seemed to want to chase after the two magi in his rage.

    Gilbert had just set foot into this world andcked sufficient battle experience. He was also full of himself and quite arrogant, so no wonder he¡¯d been injured by the two magi. If they didn¡¯t have Gilbert with them, the group may not be able to destroy a section of the city wallter with only the slow moving golem by itself. Therefore, there was no way that Han Shuo would allow Gilbert to leave at this moment.

    Due to the contract between Han Shuo and Gilbert, although thetterined a bit after receiving Han Shuo¡¯s order, he continued charging forward in the end. However, his speed wasn¡¯t as fast as it had been. It seemed that his injuries were indeed affecting him.

    The calls of the gryphons drew closer and closer as Han Shuo¡¯s group finally made it to the closest section of city wall in their desperate flight to escape. All of the scattered soldiers they met along the way immediately vanished beneath everyone¡¯s attacks.

    ¡°Break through that section of the wall!¡± Han Shuo ordered when they arrived.

    Gilbert and the irond golem charged a section of the wall at the same time. However, this study wall only creaked and trembled beneath the tremendous force and wasn¡¯t instantly destroyed.

    ¡°Valen City used the most durable of rocks to build its walls in order to defend against invasions from the Kasi Empire. As opposed to having the dark dragon break through the wall, it¡¯d be easier to fly over it.¡± Emily immediately suggested when she saw that Gilbert¡¯s first charge hadn¡¯t resulted in immediate effect.

    Han Shuo swept everyone a nce and immediately said decisively, ¡°Those who can¡¯t fly over the wall, take a ce on top of the dark dragon using the levitation spell and leave the horses behind.¡±

    As a dragon, Gilbert would rather die than let a lifeform many times inferior to him crawl on top of him. To force him to carry them would make this be the dragon¡¯s lifelong shame and disgrace. Han Shuo naturally understood this taboo and so had given up the notion of having the dark dragon ferry the battlesteeds across.

    Angelica, Candice, Caspian, and members of the Battlefire mercenary band, who weren¡¯t able to fly, immediately discarded their horses and leapt on top of Gilbert. Emily grabbed the chubby hotel owner ine and slowly flew up as well.

    Lawrence used an expensive flying scroll and also flew up leisurely with the assassin, Lucky. His speed wasn¡¯t that slow, so it looked like the scroll must have been the work of, at least, a wind grand magus.

    To Han Shuo¡¯s surprise, Belinda from the Cmity Church released another golem, shaped like a kite. It was made out of bizarre wood and actually brought Belinda and Johnny into the air. They weren¡¯t as helpless as Han Shuo thought they would be.

    Everyone started showing their hidden aces in this time of need, and this was also when Han Shuo suddenly realized that apart from the mercenary band and Caspian, everyone else was rich and all had objects that could allow them to fly and take them away from here.

    Seeing that everyone had taken their ces, Han Shuo moved to Phoebe¡¯s side. She too was preparing to leap up to the dark dragon¡¯s spine, but Han Shuo suddenly grabbed her by the waist and activated the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡± to soar into the sky, amidst Phoebe¡¯s panicked expression.

    A faint fragrance flowed into Han Shuo¡¯s nose due to their proximity. Phoebe¡¯s breathing was a bitbored in her panic and her eyes sparkled with an odd light. Her red lips drew close to Han Shuo¡¯s ear in her incredulity, ¡°How can you fly?¡±

    Not only Phoebe, but even Lawrence, Candice, and the others were all looking at Han Shuo dumbfounded. Exmations of disbelief sounded from the back of the dragon, as they too couldn¡¯t seem to understand why Han Shuo could fly.

    What surprised them even more was that, despite bringing Phoebe along, Han Shuo¡¯s speed was actually the fastest. He¡¯d soared over the city wall like lightning in the span of a second and continued his flight to the other side.

    He hadn¡¯t flown as they¡¯d run for their lives because for one, it was an enormous drain on his resources. Flying drained Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan quickly, whereas it drained Emily¡¯s mental strength. For an archmage such as Emily, using the levitation spell was an enormous depletion of her mental strength. Prolonged flight would quickly exhaust an archmage.

    In addition, for an archmage of Emily¡¯s level, her speed wasn¡¯t that much faster than a horse¡¯s, even if she flew. Long stints of flying was also quite tiring for great dragons. Gilbert had flown with everyone on his back for a while, and he¡¯d also suffered injuries from the soldiers earlier. This was why Han Shuo onlymanded him to give everyone a ride now.

    Now that they had left behind the battlesteeds and the Gryphon Legion soldiers were hot on their tails, flying wasn¡¯t an easy thing for any of those in the group, but they all had to grit their teeth and bear it, hoping to get as far away from Valen City as possible.

    Their pursuit didn¡¯t let up. As the group cleared the city wall and continued flying forward, Han Shuo turned back to see a thousand cavalry and a dense collection of ck dots in the air in hot pursuit. It looked like Bob Ascher was truly enraged this time and wouldn¡¯t stop until he had killed them all.

    The Ken Grand Canyon, the geographic marker that separated the Kasi and Lancelot Empire, was just ahead. There were many great and small mountain ranges around the grand canyon, with thick growths of trees and not that many people. They¡¯d be able to shake off their pursuers if they set foot into that area.

    Thus, once their path had been plot, Han Shuo once again became the leader. He exined the situation at hand and then dashed forward with Phoebe in his arms, the dark dragon following close behind.

    In these moments of danger, everyone was flying full speed ahead. Lawrence and Belinda however, were looking at Han Shuo in the front with odd expressions of excitement. Their speed kept increasing, seeming to want to pull ahead of him.

    ¡°You¡¯ve concealed this operations from both of them and was the person in charge from beginning to end. Those two proud people must be a bit irritated. Now that you¡¯re flying faster than them with me in hand, they must be even angrier.¡± Phoebe looked behind her and then said softly to Han Shuo.

    ¡°That seems to be the case, but there doesn¡¯t seem to be a need for this at all!¡± Han Shuo abruptly understood why.

    ¡°If you weren¡¯t the person I liked, then I¡¯d want to triumph over you as well, since you best me in all areas. Heh, such is human nature!¡± Phoebe exined lowly and then mischievously said next to Han Shuo¡¯s ears. ¡°Will you beat them?¡±

    Laughing loudly, Han Shuo felt a surge of heroism in his heart that he forgot all about the danger at hand. Looking down at the beauty in his arms, he said lowly, ¡°Hang on tight, I¡¯m going to make them despair soon!¡±

 Chapter 188: Inner conflict

    Chapter 188: Inner conflict

    Han Shuo¡¯s ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡± was more than a bit faster than the levitation spells that the archmages could cast. Therefore, when he circted his magical yuan during his flight, his speed was faster than anyone could possibly imagine.

    Because he had previously used the ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡± to absorb the flesh, blood, and souls of one of the knights, his injuries from when he¡¯d shed with Bob Ascher had beenpletely healed. When he flew now, his speed was like a loosed arrow. He shed through the dark sky and disappeared from view.

    Lawrence and Belinda were inwardly rejoicing as they drew close to Han Shuo, only to see his speed suddenly double and disappear from their line of sight.

    Shaking his head with a wry smile, Lawrence was full of agitation as he became even more aware of Han Shuo¡¯s amazing abilities.

    He also made up his mind at this moment that he would recruit Han Shuo under his banner.

    ¡°Well?¡± Han Shuo slowed down after increasing the distance between him and the other two.

    ¡°How did you do it?¡± Phoebe¡¯s voice was full of surprise.

    ¡°Heh heh, don¡¯t pay attention to that. The reason I can fly through the air is not because of necromancy.¡± Han Shuo smiled with exnation.

    Dawn was about to break after a night of chase. The Ken Grand Canyon was bathed in morning light as the sun slowly began to rise.

    As he looked back, Han Shuo discovered that Gilbert, Emily, Lawrence, and Belinda¡¯s figures were slowly approaching. When they caught up to Han Shuo, Han Shuo could also see a dense gathering of ck dots in the distance.

    Judging them their distance, Han Shuo discovered that his group had maintained an ideal distance from the Gryphon Legion¡¯s soldiers. When he looked at the Ken Grand Canyon beneath them, Han Shuo encouraged everyone, ¡°We¡¯ll be able to make use of theplicated terrain within the grand canyon and use umted snow on the trees to conceal ourselves. The Gryphon Legion soldiers won¡¯t be able to find us then.

    Everyone knew what to do without further instructions from Han Shuo. Everyone became even more enthusiastic as they charged forward. They indeed reached the grand canyon before the soldiers made caught up to them.

    The Ken Grand Canyon was vast. The mountain ranges,kes, and forests within were located between the Lancelot Empire, the Kasi Empire, and the orcs. The orcs lived in the territory to the west of the Ken Grand Canyon, and the border of the Kais Empire was to the north. If one traveled a few days south of the canyon, one would find themselves in Zajoski City in the Lancelot Empire.

    The orcs of the Lancelot Empire lived in a triangr region surrounded by the Ken Grand Canyon. This area didn¡¯t belong to either empire, and the Ken Grand Canyon was always the focal point of conflict whenever war broke out. However, a few cities and towns still existed in such a special geographic region, with members from both the Lancelot and Kasi Empires, as well as orcs living amongst them.

    They used this special geographic region to conduct mutually beneficial transactions. The merchants and adventurers from all three nations coexisted peacefully within these cities and towns before war broke out.

    Of course, as runaways, Han Shuo¡¯s group didn¡¯t n on hiding in these ces. All of themnded as soon as they entered the Ken Grand Canyon. As someone who¡¯d long since run a merchant guild, Phoebe and the highlypetent Emily immediately took control of operations. The two of them discussed briefly and walked forward after settling on a direction.

    Much snow was umted on the densely packed trees, almostpletely blotting out the sky. To Han Shou¡¯s group, this was an area perfect for concealment, and the Gryphon Legion soldiers in the sky would be hard pressed to pick up their tracks once they took the cover under the trees.

    Therefore, when everyonended, they purposefully moved towards where the trees and grass grew the thickest. It wasn¡¯t the most convenient for Phoebe to be in Han Shuo¡¯s arms now, so he indicated for her to leave his grasp.

    As a swordmaster, Phoebe first moved her body back and forth in his grasp, seeming to be greedily taking in the warmth of his body, but when she noticed that everyone was walking on foot and Candice even seemed to be looking back at her with a trace of a smile, she finally tore herself away from Han Shuo¡¯s grasp with a reddened face.

    The frost winter wind pierced her bones. As mages, Emily, Angelica, and the others were all wrapped in thick furs. They¡¯d been subjected to the cold wind for so long under the night sky and were now all shivering with cold. Thus, they were all moving a bit more slowly.

    When he saw Emily half frozen and trembling, Han Shuo felt pained and looked around. He suddenly suggested, ¡°We¡¯ve made it into the Ken Grand Canyon already. There¡¯s a covering of big trees here and it¡¯ll be difficult for the soldiers to find us. I think everyone¡¯s tired after today. It¡¯s not a wise decision to keep going on. Why don¡¯t we find a hiding ce to rest?¡±

    Everyone agreed after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words and Phoebe suddenly remembered something with a roll of her bright eyes. ¡°I¡¯ve walked these woods many times and remember there¡¯s a concealed cave nearby. I¡¯ve stored items there before, so we can rest there.¡±

    ¡°Alright, we¡¯ll take a look around. It¡¯s best if we¡¯re able to find this ce.¡± Han Shuo was delighted to hear this.

    Phoebe thought for a bit with a furrowed brow and pointed in a direction, saying, ¡°If I remember correctly, it should be in that direction. Let¡¯s go take a look!¡±

    When the group arrived, they didn¡¯t see any signs of a cave other than a thick covering of snow. Phoebe blinked, and then said resolutely, ¡°It should be here. It looks like the cavern¡¯s been sealed off. We¡¯ll know if we dig a bit.¡±

    ¡°Then what are we waiting for!¡± Lawrence roared our heartily. It looked like he quite trusted this junior sister. He took out a longsword and stabbed fiercely at the ce that Phoebe was pointing at.

    When they saw Lawrence go to work, Belinda and the other mages seemed to want toe help. Han Shuo called out at this moment, ¡°Wait, don¡¯t use any magic. We should exercise caution while moving the snow away. That way, we won¡¯t leave any traces behind when we move the snow away and the soldiers will find it difficult to pick up our traces, even if theynd to search of us.¡±

    Everyone agreed with Han Shuo, and it was up to Han Shuo, Phoebe, and Lawrence to carefully dig away at the snow and move it away.

    ¡°This was the ce alright! Heh heh!¡± Phoebe called out with joy when the snow was moved away and she stabbed her sword forward.¡±

    Han Shuo and Lawrence looked at each other and moved a particrly thick chunk of snow away from the entrance, revealing a dark and looming cave entrance.

    Han Shuo took a peak and discovered that this entrance was actually asrge as a basketball court. It was enough for everyone on their side to enter.

    ¡°Go on in one after another. Don¡¯t erge the hole, or it¡¯ll be too difficult to cover up!¡± Han Shuo said and moved away from the entrance.

    Angelica was the first to walk in, replete with teeth chattering from the cold. Emily, Candice, and the others all followed in one after another. Phoebe and Lawrence were thests ones in, with Han Shuo bringing up the rear. He set up a few branches at the entrance and shifted some of the excavated snow to cover them.

    When Han Shuo felt that all wasplete, he walked into the depths of the cave after taking a look around. A bonfire had already been lit at this time and the warm wave spread throughout the cave. The originally chilly cave had be a warm zone.

    Thanks to the space rings, all mages carried some firewood on them during the winter time, in case they needed warmth. All sorts of tents and soft carpets were also brought out at this time and ced next to the fire. Everyone settledfortably into their equipment to rest.

    Emily and Caspian felt their limbs slowly thawing thanks to the fire. They sighed with relief as Emily slowly got to her feet. She made for the entrance, saying, ¡°I¡¯m going to set up a concealing boundary to prevent us from being discovered here.¡±

    Caspian also got up at the same time and walked with her, saying, ¡°I¡¯m going to go help her.¡±

    As Emily and Caspian got up to set up the magical boundary, Belinda and Johnny¡¯s expressions grew a bit unnatural. Their eyes danced uneasily and they looked defensively at the mouth of the cave, seemingly afraid that Emily and Caspian would do something to the cave entrance.

    This was indeed the case. Han Shuo had been walking back when he saw Emily and Caspian walk towards the mouth of the cave. He turned back absentmindedly and saw that Emily and Caspian had indeed set something up at the entrance of the cave out of wariness.

    ¡°Miss Belinda, you should pay us the fees that you still owe us!¡± Just as Han Shuo was looking on in astonishment, Candice was already looking at Belinda unhappily and spoke with an irritated tone.

    Everyone had worked together before because they had amon enemy, and the relentless pursuit from the Gryphon Legion had made it so that they couldn¡¯t rx even for a moment. This was why they hadn¡¯t taken each other to task for debts. Now that the threat from the Gryphon Legion was temporarily abated, the already existing conflict between people began toe into y.

    ¡°You¡¯re already quite lucky to be alive! Sorry, the Cmity Church has never had the habit of paying our mercenaries!¡± Belinda¡¯s voice was quite soft as she flicked a nce at Candice, replying nomittally.

    ng rang out as Candice¡¯s broadsword was unsheathed. She red ferociously at Belinda, ¡°I escorted you to Valen City! Not only did I not receive a single gold coin of my payment, you even tried to kill me! Looks like it¡¯s time to settle our debts.¡±

    ¡°I think you¡¯ll regret trying to do anything!¡± Belinda was obviously not afraid of Candice. She turned to look at Johnny and took out a scroll with the image of Ansidesi on it.

    ¡°The cave is only three meters tall. Your golem won¡¯t be able to do much if it¡¯s released!¡± Candice snorted and walked towards Belinda. It looked like she was nning on making a move.

    Phoebe had been standing by Han Shuo¡¯s side and was basically a sister to Candice. When she saw that Candice was about to make a move, she unsheathed her longsword without hesitation and was already ring milky white aura from its tip.

    Belinda had had a disdainful expression in her eyes when they lit up upon seeing Phoebe¡¯s milky white aura, seemingly surprised.

    ¡°Humph, you¡¯re looking to die!¡± Johnny¡¯s chest wound had been dressed as was now covered by gauze. The sword in his hand right now was sparkling with thunder and lightning, and he didn¡¯t seem any weaker than Phoebe.

    ¡°Give them their payment. You should¡¯ve paid this, otherwise you¡¯ll die!¡± Han Shuo quickly sized up the situation and walked over with a cold face to Phoebe¡¯s side, looking at Belinda and snorting coldly.

    Gilbert also cackled as he cracked his knuckles. Caspian and the Battlefire mercenary band also stood on Candice¡¯s side. It looked like a fight would break out as soon as Belinda refused to back down.

    Although Belinda¡¯s voice was soft, her temper was quite stubborn and she didn¡¯t disy any fear at this time. She seemed to be prepared for a hard fight.

    ¡°This doesn¡¯t seem to the be the time for inner conflict. Heh heh. Miss Candice, how much do they owe you? I¡¯ll pay it for them, so let¡¯s not fight over this right now, shall we?¡± Lawrence suddenly stood up, to everyone¡¯s great surprise and smiled to smooth things over.

 Chapter 189: You have no chance

    Chapter 189: You have no chance

    Shaking her head, Candice rejected Lawrence¡¯s suggestion. She looked resolutely and admonished, ¡°This isn¡¯t just about the money!¡±

    Candice noticeably held the upper hand in this situation. With the aid of Han Shuo and the authors, Belinda and Johnny couldn¡¯t do anything at all. It was apparent from Belinda and Johnny¡¯s equipment and weapons that the Cmity Church wasn¡¯t short on money. Belinda could easily settle this matter with a bit of money, so she was being surprisingly stubborn this time.

    ¡°The Cmity Church isn¡¯t someone you can threaten!¡± The scar on the injured Johnny¡¯s face became even more apparent because of his rage. The longsword in his hand shone with blinding electrical light thanks to the power of thunder and lightening.

    Just as Han Shuo was about to open his mouth, Johnny¡¯s body suddenly moved forward and charged at Han Shuo. He had a look of killing intent on his face and the longsword in his hand was as if an electrical dragon, exploding with the frightening power of thunder and lightning and lighting up the somewhat dark cave.

    ¡°Be careful!¡± Phoebe and Emily were both shocked by Johnny¡¯s sudden motions and couldn¡¯t help but cry out in reminder.

    A pile of white bones suddenly gathered in the air and formed a white bone shield, blocking the longsword that was striking like an electrical dragon. Two bone spears flew out viciously afterwards, crashing into Johnny¡¯s longsword, which was wreathed in lightning before it had a chance to strike the white bone shield.

    Some light cracks rang out as the bone spears exploded. The longsword angrily gave off sparks as it smashed into the bone shield beneath Johnny¡¯s thrust.

    The white bone shield immediately fractured into many bone fragments as Johnny¡¯s thrust still made viciously for Han Shuo despite being thwarted twice.

    The Demonyer Edge finally howled as it made its appearance. A metallic ng exploded through the air as a cold light shed in Han Shuo¡¯s hands. Han Shuo grunted as he was driven back for a few steps. The lightning red once on Johnny¡¯s longsword as it abruptly extinguished.

    Johnny¡¯s imposing momentum finally slowed down at this point, and when he nned on regrouping for another attack, Caspian, Emily, and Phoebe were already standing by Han Shuo¡¯s side and ring at Johnny angrily.

    ¡°I don¡¯t think I¡¯m your enemy, hmm?¡± Han Shuo steadied himself and circted the magical yuan around his body, confirming that he¡¯d suffered no harm before directing a cold look at Johnny and asking faintly.

    ¡°You lied to us during the Bob Ascher operation and made us cannon fodder. Apart from distracting a few people for us, you didn¡¯t go to any other efforts. Now that everything¡¯s over, don¡¯t think I don¡¯t know what ns you¡¯re making in your heart. You¡¯re the one who deserves to die the most!¡± Johnny grimaced as he looked frostily at Han Shuo.

    Since Bob Ascher was the chief of the Gryphon Legion, whether or not Han Shuo and Emily had concrete evidence, they had no right to condemn Bob Ascher to death, not to mention engaging in an assassination attempt like this.

    If Han Shuo and Emily had colluded with the Cmity Church to kill Bob Ascher, then there would¡¯ve been severe consequences from the Dark Mantle¡¯s side afterwards. Not to mention that Han Shuo knew full well the exact strength of his intended victim, and that it was impossible to kill Bob Ascher in Valen City. Only fervent religious followers would do something that held such a high risk.

    Nodding, Han Shuo smiled faintly. ¡°Since things are out in the open, don¡¯t me me for cutting our rtionship here then. You¡¯ve already made a move against me, don¡¯t me me for doing the same.¡±

    Han Shuo turned to look at the wryly smiling Lawrence after speaking, ¡°You still want to help them now?¡±

    Spreading his hands, Lawrence took a few steps back. He smiled ruefully, ¡°I¡¯d been quite interested in the Cmity Church¡¯s golem and wanted to obtain the method to make one through peaceful means. It looks like that¡¯s not too likely now.¡±

    Lawrence¡¯s words also confirmed Han Shuo¡¯s earlier spection. For someone concerned with only his matters, he must have had something else on his mind to suddenly give Belinda and Johnny a helping hand. Lawrence¡¯s words were an obvious indication that he was standing on Han Shuo and Phoebe¡¯s side.

    Nodding, Han Shuo smiled slightly at Lawrence. ¡°Many thanks!¡±

    ¡°Do you think you¡¯ve got us?¡± Standing behind Johnny all this time, Belinda finally spoke up and took out the item she¡¯d used to seal the golem. It looked like she was finally going to make a move.

    ¡°Heh heh, you won¡¯t have the chance to use that!¡± Han Shuoughed for a long while and used the demon infant to manipte the drop of blood essence hidden within Belinda. A mere thought was enough for the frosty air within the blood essence to invade Belinda¡¯s body. She felt her neck grow numb and fell backwards in a dead faint.

    ¡°What, what did you do to her?¡± Belinda¡¯s sudden faint shocked Johnny as he looked at Han Shuo in great panic.

    ¡°She¡¯ll live, but there¡¯s no need for you to continue living. It¡¯s too dangerous to allow you to live.¡± Han Shuo smiled coldly and suddenly opened his mouth to chant a necromancy spell. A hate warrior appeared out of thin air along with three other zombie warriors standing in front of Han Shuo.

    Johnny knew that Belinda wouldn¡¯t be able to help him now that things had developed to such a . He hesitated only slightly and immediately turned to run, trying to leave from the only entrance. Both Emily and Caspian suddenly started chanting and several thick branches snaked over adroitly, as well as a cloud of ck mist.

    ¡°You can¡¯t escape!¡± Emily chuckled and chanted another spell. The cloud of ck mist seemed to be some kind of restraint as Johnny¡¯s body suddenly stiffened as soon as it neared him. The flexible tree branches then entangled his body.

    Johnny was a thunder swordsmage alright. He could still barely manage to move even when restrained like this. He lifted the longsword in his hand with difficulty and nned on chopping away at the tree branches that held him down. However, the three zombie warriors and hate warrior had already closed in on him.

    A bolt of lightning shed as the longsword sliced through the air, hitting the two zombie warriors that arrived first and sending electricity through the zombie warriors¡¯ bodies. The sh of the longsword made the two halt abruptly and never move again.

    As he deployed the longsword with difficulty and nned on making a move on one of the other zombie warriors, the hate warrior¡¯s club crashed downwards and connected with Johnny¡¯s sword wielding right hand. The sharp sound of a bone breaking rang out and the sword slid to the ground after a wail of pain from Johnny.

    Han Shuo had been standing beside Phoebe and the others when he suddenly shed behind Johnny, deploying the ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡± with his back to the others. He absorbed Johnny¡¯s wailing soul into the demon infant. When the demon infant had ovee Johnny¡¯s soul, it was as if Han Shuo had been greatly fortified and only then did he bring a punch down on Johnny¡¯s back.

    A thud sounded as life drained from Johnny¡¯s eyes. He fell down listlessly, a caved in handprint apparent on his back.

    After wiping out Johnny, Han Shuo¡¯s demon infant grew noticeably and began to use the magical yuan to purify Johnny¡¯s soul, turning it into nourishment for the demon infant. As a thunder swordsmage, the strength of Johnny¡¯s soul was noticeably more abundant than that of the Gryphon Legion soldier¡¯s. Han Shuo could clearly feel the demon infant grow and develop as it did so.

    ¡°He¡¯s dead.¡± Emily slowly walked over when she saw that Johnny had died. When she saw Han Shuo stand there without moving and not searching Johnny¡¯s body for valuables as usual, she spoke up to alert him of the fact.

    Han Shuo abruptly came to himself as he was thoroughly reflecting over the changes to the demon infant. He continued to operate the ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡± without change in expression and nodded towards Emily. He pointed at Johnny, ¡°Can you handle this? I need to rest for a bit.¡±

    Han Shuo sat down cross legged after speaking and focused his attention on the changes in the demon infant after it had absorbed Johnny¡¯s soul. The stronger one was, the stronger his soul. The strength from Johnny¡¯s soul seemed to be elerating the demon infant¡¯s growth.

    The demon infant was the foundation of the ¡°true demon¡± realm. Han Shuo would be able to break through to the next level, the bloodlust realm, only after the demon infant reached a certain level. He would only need the power from souls in this realm. Once the demon infant was strong enough to reach the ¡°bloodlust realm¡±, it wouldn¡¯t require the energy from the souls anymore and it would be able to be deployed to greater uses.

    Just as Han Shuo was quietly training, everyone else huddled together and chattered away. After Belinda had been captured and Johnny was killed, there were no other suspicious characters in the cave. Candice had seen Belinda mysteriously taken out by Han Shuo and didn¡¯t mention anything aboutpensation. Sheughed as she chatted with Phoebe and Emily.

    Lawrence and Phoebe finally had time to converse with each other. Caspian was also reunited with Angelica after his long absence and could breathe a sigh of relief. Angelica was pouting that he wouldn¡¯t describe the events of the past two days.

    Han Shuo had been meditating with his eyes closed when he suddenly opened them and raised his finger to make a ¡°shushing¡± noise.

    Han Shuo walked cautiously towards the entrance of the cave without saying anything. Everyone watched him ce his ear against the entrance of the cave as their rxed emotions once again grew nervous.

    Footsteps slowly grew louder and approached from the distance. The sounds of several people talking traveled into everyone¡¯s ears at this moment.

    ¡°The Ken Grand Canyon is so vast that there¡¯s no way we can find them after they¡¯ve escaped in here. What¡¯s the point in searching aimlessly like this!¡± A voice said.

    ¡°I know right, but the chief is crazy with anger this time. His two sons have been murdered and someone has been so bold as to attempt to assassinate him within Valen City. They¡¯ve even gotten away with it. The chief has been fighting on the north and south all these years and have seen all sorts of situations, but has never been humiliated like this before. I don¡¯t think he¡¯ll rest before he¡¯s caught these people and killed them!¡± Another person responded with emotion.

    ¡°I¡¯ve heard that so much has happened in Valen City because the chief offended those in the capital. If this really is the case, then the chief is in for a world of trouble and I wonder if we¡¯ll be affected as well.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, we were just following orders. Nothing should happen to us as long as we take note of the greater picture. We¡¯re also not the chief¡¯s confidantes, and we should listen to the orders from the king. We¡¯ll just follow orders before any further developments.¡±

    ¡°Come, there¡¯s no ce to hide here anyways, let¡¯s try somece else!¡±

    The group of people passed by the cave in which everyone was hidden in. They didn¡¯t discover anything out of the ordinary, and the sounds of them conversing grew fainter and fainter before vanishing entirely.

    Another two groups of people passed by afterwards. Thanks to Emily and Caspian¡¯s actions, the entrance to the cave was well concealed. No one discovered anything out of the ordinary and didn¡¯t spend more time there.

    ¡°Alright, it¡¯s been a tiring night, everyone take a rest!¡± Han Shuo waited for a while and noticed that there were no further movements outside, so he turned and smiled to those inside.

    Everyone sighed in relief and nodded, before starting to meditate, or went to sleep by the warm bonfire.

    Everyone rested for a day within the cave and spent a full day recovering their strength. Han Shuo mediated for the entire day and fully absorbed Johnny¡¯s soul, recovering his mental strength and magical yuan.

    ¡°It¡¯s nighttime now, I think they¡¯ve forgotten after a day of searching. We can leave now!¡± Han Shuo got up.

    Everyone else got to their feet as well and packed their belongings. Emily and Caspian took down the boundary at the door and the group walked out of the cave.

 Chapter 190: Beauties in both arms

    Chapter 190: Beauties in both arms

    The waning moon hung high in the sky as cold moonlight spilled down, casting a silvery whiteyer across the world and brightening up the night.

    All was very quiet without the slightest bit of sound. Even bugs weren¡¯t willing to venture out on this cold winter night, not to mention humans or beasts.

    When they walked out of the cave, they could immediately feel that the outside temperature was much colder than it had been within the cave. Even though they¡¯d been prepared, they couldn¡¯t help but wrap themselves more snugly in their clothing and huff out a breath.

    ¡°Things shouldn¡¯t be dyed. We should leave here as soon as possible and return to the Empire.¡± Han Shuo looked at everyone and spoke solemnly.

    After such a huge disturbance, they didn¡¯t know if Bob Ascher had discovered that the important items within his secret chamber had been stolen. When his search came up empty handed, he would discover this sooner orter when he returned to Valen City, he¡¯d be beside himself with panic then.

    Therefore, Han Shuo and Emily had to use the shortest amount of time possible to deliver the intelligence to the upper levels of the Dark Mantle and take care of Bob Ascher as soon as possible, in case he got up to any trouble before they could make their report.

    ¡°Some towns in the Ken Grand Canyon belong to no jurisdiction. The Dark Mantle has some strongholds there and a magical apparatus tomunicate with the senior executives is in thergest one. Bryan and I need to head there as soon as possible. We¡¯re in very little danger now, it looks like it¡¯s time to go our own separate ways!¡± Emily thought for a moment and then raised this suggestion with a smile.

    ¡°Those who were apanying the shipment with me all left Valen City before we entered ine¡¯s hotel. I¡¯m moving alone now and also left instructions previously, so the guild won¡¯t need me for a while. I¡¯ll return to the Empire with Bryan.¡± Phoebe expressed her stance whilst standing next to Bryan.

    Caspian and Lawrence both thought for moment and expressed their intentions to leave. Caspian thanked Han Shuo solemnly, and Lawrence¡¯s gaze patrolled the captured Belinda before saying, ¡°Bryan, if you can get the secrets behind refining that golem, I¡¯d be willing to buy it from you for a high price!¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo indicated his understanding and smiled, ¡°I¡¯ll ask her, but I¡¯d say don¡¯t get your hopes up. I feel that even if we obtained the method, you wouldn¡¯t be able to mass produce them. Otherwise, with the Cmity Church¡¯s deep pockets, they would¡¯ve produced a golem army a long time ago!¡±

    Lawrence started and once again opened his mouth to say, ¡°It would be of great help if I can even refine one or two of them.¡±

    ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll try my best!¡± Han Shuo said with resignation when he saw that Lawrence wasn¡¯t giving up.

    ¡°Big bad guy, will we meet again?¡± Angelica suddenly turned to speak to Han Shuo when Caspian was about to leave.

    Shrugging, Han Shuo said dashingly, ¡°I think we will, we¡¯ve already met up twice in not too long of a period. We seem to have quite a bit of shared destiny!¡±

    ¡°Alright, many thanks to you this time. If you have a chance to,e be a guest at the elf tribes within the Dark Forest in the future. Angelica will host you well!¡± Caspian bowed towards Han Shuo and smiled.

    Lawrence and the others didn¡¯t linger after Caspian and Angelica had left. The former left in the opposite direction of Caspian and Angelica. Han Shuo started worrying what might happen if Caspian and Angelica learned of his identity as the leader of the forest trolls. What if the two of them hated him? It was probably best not to pay the elves a visit then.

    The Battlefire mercenary band¡¯s senior swordsman Davis was saddened after Angelica had left. The fierce warrior¡¯s gazed still stared dumbly in Angelica¡¯s direction.

    ¡°Candice, how much does that Belinda owe you? How about I pay for her? We have use for her and can¡¯t give her to you!¡± Emily looked at Candice at this moment and took out her crystal card, seeming to want to pay Candice¡¯s fees.

    ¡°Forget it sister Emily, we¡¯re not short on money anyways. We¡¯ll treat this mission as a failure, no worries!¡± Candice immediately responded hastily when she saw that Emily wanted to pay and looked at the mercenaries behind her. ¡°Alright, alright, we¡¯re going to leave as well. We have more missions to execute!¡±

    Candice didn¡¯t wait for Emily to transfer the gold coins after she¡¯d finished speaking and hastily left with the mercenaries. Only Han Shuo, Phoebe, and Emily were left in front of the cave, as well as a bizarrely quiet Gilbert.

    ¡°Eh, why are you so quiet?¡± Han Shuo finally remembered that Gilbert hadn¡¯t spoken up in quite a long time when he saw this and couldn¡¯t help but ask in surprise.

    Gilbert had been standing there with closed eyes and immediately spoke with a long face after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s question. ¡°Disloyal master, I was injured on the way and have been recovering whenever I had time. Why have you only thought of me now?¡±

    Han Shuo finally recalled that when they¡¯d rushed out of Valen City, Gilbert had been hit by attacks from two archmages and a horde of knights. He¡¯d then dragged along a group of people and flown for so long, no wonder he¡¯d been so quiet.

    ¡°No worries, you¡¯ve got thick skin anyways!¡± Han Shuo chuckled and thought for a moment. ¡°How about this, go home first and rest up, I¡¯ll bring you out again once you¡¯ve recovered.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve onlye out for a few days and you¡¯re sending me back already?!¡± Gilbert immediatelyined loudly when he heard that Han Shuo was sending him back to the cemetery of death.

    ¡°Go on, be a good boy or you¡¯ll be in for it. I have twopanions now and it will be quite an inconvenience to travel with you, not to mention that you¡¯re injured!¡± Han Shuo cackled as he set up the magic sticks and kicked Gilbert in whether he wanted to or not.

    Han Shuo mobilized his mental strength and activated the transportation matrix. Gilbert vanished without a trace afterwards. Gilbert wouldn¡¯t be able to emerge from the cemetery of death without the Eye of Darkness, so Han Shuo¡¯s wasn¡¯t worried that he¡¯d get into any trouble.

    Phoebe, on the other side, eximed softly in surprise when she saw Han Shuo set up a small transportation matrix and send Gilbert away. Her clear eyes looked at Han Shuo with even greater surprise.

    ¡°Heh heh, just a transportation matrix, nothing to be surprised about. Let¡¯s go, we can leave now!¡± Han Shuo chuckled softly and stored the sticks in his space ring, rushing Phoebe and Emily onwards.

    Having twopanions on his trip wasn¡¯t necessarily a good thing. The usually coldly aloof Phoebe seemed to have adopted a very intimate attitude with Han Shuo on this trip. Whether she was doing this on purpose or not, this made Emily cast some aggrieved looks at Han Shuo.

    As a mage, Emily was wrapped warmly in thick furs but still shivered regardless. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but feel a bit pained. However, Emily was purposefully keeping some distance between Han Shuo, as if deathly afraid that Phoebe would discover their rtionship.

    Han Shuo had been flying through the air with Phoebe in his arms along the way, and Emily had been expending her mental strength by using the levitation spell to hover above the ground. However, as an archmage, Emily could only sustain this type of flight for a limited duration of time. Han Shuo noticed that her lips were turning white towards the end of the night.

    He suddenly decreased his speed and moved next to Emily, saying, ¡°I¡¯ll be fine even if I¡¯m flying carrying with two people!¡±

    Han Shuo reached out a hand and wrapped it around Emily¡¯s soft waist, disregarding whether or not Phoebe would agree. He had Phoebe under his right arm and Emily under his left arm as he flew through the air. He also silently started circting magical yuan and warmed up Emily¡¯s chilled body.

    Emily struggled briefly under Han Shuo¡¯s arm and attempted to extract herself from his embrace, but discovered that she was firmly pinned beneath his arm. When Emily turned her head to look at him, she noticed the pain and resolution in his eyes. Sweetness flooded her heart.

    Whether it was because the warmth was flooding into her body or not, Emily¡¯s body suddenly started heating up and all of her previous chills were instantly dissipated. She seemed to be epassed in warmth.

    ¡°I feel like your actions in holding her around the waist seem to be quite well practiced!¡± Phoebe brought her lips close to Han Shuo¡¯s ears and spoke lowly with a hint of jealously, seemingly unafraid that Emily would hear these words.

    ¡°We need to hurry and make it to the Dark Mantle stronghold. We¡¯ll be in a lot of trouble if we¡¯rete, so me flying with the two of you is the fastest way!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s expression was remote and he didn¡¯t express anything because of Phoebe¡¯s words.

    He deployed his ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡± to it¡¯s maximum effect along the way and also split out a portion of magical yuan to warm up Emily¡¯s body. He shot towards one of the mountain ranges in the Ken Grand Canyon ording to Emily¡¯s instructions.

    Even with Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan, having to fly for so long and help Emily warm up meant that he suffered greatly beneath the energy drain. He was already sweating and panting profusely towards the end of the night.

    ¡°Let¡¯s take a break, you look so tired!¡± Although Phoebe had been a bit jealous, her feelings for Han Shuo were real and her heart went out to him when she saw him sweating.

    Emily also felt quite bad for Han Shuo. She¡¯d nned on opening her mouth to tell him to rest, but since Phoebe had already spoken up, there was no need for her to say anything.

    He was indeed a bit tired now. Han Shuo had been going non stop sincest night, running after the battle, using all the time within the cave to digest the strength of Johnny¡¯s soul afterwards.

    A pair of sharp eyes patrolled the area as Han Shuo discovered a hole in a tree. Hended in front of it with Emily and Phoebe, brushing aside some umted snow and discovering that there was some space within the tree.

    ¡°Let¡¯s rest inside!¡± Han Shuo suggested.

    The trunk itself was quite solid, with only a tall, narrow hole in the roots. The three of them discovered that the cold wind couldn¡¯t make its way all the way inside. Han Shuo plugged the hole with his body whereas Phoebe and Emily upied the two sides.

    Although there was some space inside, it was a bit cramped with the three of them. The three of them were pressed tightly against each other. Their arms and legs were pressed against the others and it was a bit difficult to move around.

    Han Shuo took a deep breath in after rxing and circted the magical yuan in his body, recovering swiftly from his depletion just now.

    Emily and Phoebe were pressed against Han Shuo¡¯s front, and Emily¡¯s chest and stomach were resting against Phoebe¡¯s back and butt. Han Shuo¡¯s chest was at their shoulders, and his hands were resting on his thighs. There was a small sliver of space between his legs and the two girls.

    It was night, and the only source of light was blocked by Han Shuo¡¯s back, making the cave ink ck.

    Apart from Han Shuo, the two females basically had no vision of their surroundings.

    Han Shuo¡¯s chest was pressed against their delicate shoulders as he started circting his magical yuan to transport some warmth to Emily. His left hand on his thigh twitched a little as he started cing it on Emily¡¯s.

 Chapter 191: The cry of help from the little skeleton

    Chapter 191: The cry of help from the little skeleton

    A warm sensation drew closer as Emily and Phoebe felt it at the same time. Emily felt it on her thighs, and Phoebe felt it on her pert butt. When Han Shuo¡¯s handnded on Emily¡¯s thigh, her body stiffened as she thought that Han Shuo was trying to do something funny at this time. She moved her thigh away in a bit of an admonishment.

    In regards to this, Han Shuo¡¯s hand suddenly moved backward thanks to her movements andnded on Phoebe¡¯s pert, well rounded butt.

    ¡°Umph!¡± A soft cry emitted from Phoebe¡¯s mouth. Han Shuo could see her cheeks blushing furiously red in the darkness.

    As a mage, Emily had extremely thick clothing on, but as a swordmaster, Phoebe was much more resistant to the cold, so her clothes weren¡¯t that thick. In addition, a swordmaster needed to be able to jump over rocks and be agile in battle. She was wearing a normal outfit on the lower part of her body, and so Han Shuo could clearly feel the fullness of her buttocks when his handnded on them.

    Phoebe¡¯s face was a ming red in the darkness as her heart thumped rapidly. How dare this daring pervert treat me like this in such a ce! How wicked!

    Her heart racing, Phoebe craned her neck in Han Shuo¡¯s direction to give him a firm re. Han Shuo was quite enjoying himself and couldn¡¯t help but turn his head to look at her as well. When their eyes met, he made a funny face at her.

    There was no light within the cave, but because the three were very close to each other, Phoebe could still see Han Shuo¡¯s face. She couldn¡¯t do anything else but continue to curse at his daringness inwardly.

    Han Shuo had been nning on sending warmth to Emily, but had ended up touching Phoebe instead due to Emily¡¯s shyness. Because he¡¯d already been intimate with Phoebe in Valen City, and the two of them had basically confirmed their rtionship, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t going to be any sort of gentleman now. He decided to go with the flow and ced his hand firmly on Phoebe¡¯s butt, greedily kneading it.

    It felt damn good doing so as the soft roundness of her butt still gave him a marvelous sensation through the clothing. Phoebe however, had never been so treated. Her body temperature continued to rise and her originally calm breathing began to be a bit heavier.

    Emily and Phoebe¡¯s vision were both affected in such a dark ce, but Han Shuo could clearly see everything around him. Not only was Phoebe¡¯s face blushing red and her eyes misty, she was breathing hot air out from her cheery red lips. Han Shuo saw it very clearly, and saw how alluring her expression was right now. He got a lot more into in and became even more bold with his movements.

    His hand suddenly felt that the thinyer of clothing was an unbearable obstruction. He tugged her shirt upwards and then ced his hand on her smooth and warm waist. As Phoebe¡¯s breathing grew heavier, he moved his hand down towards her well rounded butt.

    In this regard, Phoebe¡¯s neck and face were red as she found it more difficult than ever to control her panting. She couldn¡¯t help but moan softly.

    Just as Han Shuo was thoroughly enjoying himself and wanted to continue, he suddenly heard Emily cough softly and a sharp pain travel from his waist, as if she¡¯d pinched him.

    If it¡¯d been anyone else, Han Shuo likely would¡¯ve felt a bit awkward, but Emily and Han Shuo had long since slept together countless times, so he had no reservations around her at all. He turned his head to look at her and moved his right leg, shifting his knee behind Emily¡¯s butt and bumping her with his knee.

    Emily waspletely irritated by his actions, thinking that he was simply too bold. Not only was he viting Phoebe right in front of her, but he was doing the same thing to her as well. Her slender hands had been resting on his waist after her pinch, but now she made up her mind and slowly moved it downwards. She gave it a firm pinch when she¡¯d reached her destination.

    ¡°Ow!!!¡± A weird cry suddenly burst from Han Shuo¡¯s mouth. His proud lower body had been given a firm pinch and he couldn¡¯t help but yell out in pain. He¡¯d been nning on viting both girls, but abruptly retracted his hands and feet.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong? What happened to you?¡± Phoebe had been losing herposure in her aroused state when she immediately snapped back to herself after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s cries, turning around to ask Han Shuo with some panic.

    ¡°There was a squirrel inside that probably bit him. It¡¯s probably flown out of the hole by now!¡± Emily¡¯s odd voice sounded nomittally in the darkness. Han Shuo could hear the glee in her voice.

    Little hussy, you dared pinch me even there! See how I take care of you next time! Han Shuo grit his teeth and started plotting on how he would punish Emily.

    ¡°Is that right, Bryan?¡± Emily asked happily and on purpose when she saw that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t agreeing with her.

    ¡°Eh... yes. A wicked squirrel bit me. I¡¯m going to make it suffer if I catch it!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s mouth was bitter from his inability to speak the truth. Not only did he have to swallow what had happened, but he had y along with Emily as well.

    ¡°We invaded its territory, it¡¯s only right that it treats us thus. Don¡¯t think of killing people and setting things on fire everyday!¡± Phoebe¡¯s voice only regained its customary coolness now.

    ¡°Miss Phoebe, your body temperature is a bit high and you were panting a bit loudly just now. Did you catch a chill from traveling in the cold wind these the past two days?¡± Emily was quite happy to see Han Shuo¡¯s diforted state. It was as if her repressed emotions had been vented all at once, and she gave no thought to the threat in his voice.

    However, she didn¡¯t feel satisfied doing this only to Han Shuo. An evil thought struck Emily as she pretended to ask Phoebe.

    ¡°Eh... I guess so!¡± Phoebe¡¯s cheeks reddened again with Emily¡¯s question as she responded with some awkwardness.

    ¡°Bryan, look at how you¡¯ve made Miss Phoebe catch a cold. Why aren¡¯t you holding her tighter to warm her up? However, don¡¯t take advantage of her! Heh heh!¡± Emily chuckled.

    Both Han Shuo and Phoebe were a bit awkward after hearing these words. There was an obvious intent in them, and Phoebe could naturally deduce that their embarrassing moments had been discovered by Emily just now. She couldn¡¯t help but re ferociously at Han Shuo.

    With the way things were, Han Shuo naturally understood that it wasn¡¯t very possible to take advantage of Phoebe or Emily again. To someone as perverted as Han Shuo, he wouldn¡¯t feel a thing even if he stood naked on a winter night like this. In order to prevent Emily from speaking further, Han Shuo said, ¡°I need to go relieve myself, youdies rest here!¡±

    He didn¡¯t wait for them to speak before struggling out of the hole. When he was a few steps away, he sat down cross legged in a snowdrift and began to circte his magical yuan.

    When Han Shuo felt himself enter an ideal state with circting his magical yuan, a sudden strong impulse suddenly tugged on his soul. It was a bizarre summons that was reflected in his heart, like a voice carrying a message from the depths of his soul and immediately wanted to return to his side.

    Han Shuo was greatly startled and didn¡¯t know what was going on. However, when he cleared his mind of stray thoughts and focused his concentration, he suddenly discovered a marvelous connection that had been unaffected by distance. Or perhaps it had always existed, but he¡¯d only discovered it now.

    It was a summons from the little skeleton in the other dimension!

    When Han Shuo felt this cry carry with it a plea for help, he immediately used the most basic of skeleton summoning spells and followed this weak but unbreakable connection to summon the little skeleton.

    The little skeleton creaked as he stood in front of Han Shuo, still waving his bone dagger around like he¡¯d weathered a great battle. The bones of his body were cracked and the seven boys spurs on his back seemed a bit dull, perhaps because they had been cutting through things for a long time.

    Judging from the little skeleton¡¯s body condition and current motions, Han Shuo could be certain that the little skeleton had fought with creatures in the other dimension, and he knew clearly that it had been the little skeleton crying out for help earlier.

    This all seemed rather fantastical!

 Chapter 192: Valley of Sunshine

    Chapter 192: Valley of Sunshine

    Some of his bones had been broken, and the little skeleton suddenly seemed at a loss as he slowly stopped waving the bone dagger about. Han Shuo hadn¡¯t treated the little skeleton as an ordinary dark creature since the very beginning.

    From the moment that he began practicing necromancy magic and summoned this little skeleton, he had be Han Shuo¡¯s indispensablepanion. Before he¡¯d learned how to fight, the little skeleton had released Han Shuo from the drudgery of daily chores and had helped him take out the trash and clean.

    When Han Shuo had used magical yuan to refine him, the little skeleton was even less of an ordinary summoned creature to him. The former had assumed an essential role whenever Han Shuo met danger in the future, always assisting him in his escape.

    But now, Han Shuo discovered that the little skeleton had a marvelous connection with him, simr to how he had one with it. Han Shuo had never thought of nor attempted to discover the little skeleton¡¯s matters or methods in the other dimension. If he hadn¡¯t concentrated his attention this time, he might¡¯ve missed the little skeleton¡¯s cry for help and the little skeleton might no longer exist now.

    A few traces of guilt grew in Han Shuo¡¯s heart when his thoughts traveled down this path. His necromancy magic would have to reach new heights before he would be able to understand what had happened to the little skeleton in the other dimension, and if there were any other existences in that world apart from regrly summoned dark creatures.

    It was even more impossible for him tomunicate with the other beings in the other dimension for the time being.

    As Han Shuo closed his eyes and attempted tomunicate with the little skeleton, he discovered that the little skeleton seemed to have realized that it was in different surroundings. His wildly iling arms and legs slowed down as his empty eye sockets looked around in confusion, abruptly quieting down when he looked in Han Shuo¡¯s direction.

    Han Shuo could clearly feel the little skeleton¡¯s chaotic presence calm down.

    It was as if the little skeleton realized that the danger was gone with Han Shuo¡¯s appearance, that he was truly safe!

    It was a speechless kind of trust, an innate dependence that was simr to how a naughty child would sob endlessly in front of a fierce beast, but would think his parents would protect him, no matter if his parents actually could or not.

    A baffling sensation suddenly surged into Han Shuo¡¯s heart, making his emotionsplex. An exceedingly intricate emotion wrapped around his heart, giving him the illusion for a second that this little skeleton made of bones was like his child. It was a feeling that he never wanted to be apart from the little skeleton.

    ¡°Alright, it¡¯s alright now!¡± Han Shuo walked over to the little skeleton very naturally and reached out a hand to stroke the little skeleton¡¯s skull, speaking softly infort.

    Han Shuo could clearly feel that this simple word offort brought immediatefort to the little skeleton.

    ¡°Who are you talking to?¡± Emily and Phoebe walked out from the tree hole at the same time, with Phoebe out in front. She was a bit jealous when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s tender voice, thinking that Han Shuo was speaking to another woman, so she asked before she could even see who it was.

    But when she saw Han Shuo pat the little skeleton¡¯s head benevolently and his tone of soft tenderness, that she¡¯d never heard before, she immediately lost her jealousy and looked a bit oddly at Han Shuo.

    Since history began, the necromancers of the Profound Continent only viewed their summoned dark creatures as tools. Phoebe had never heard of a necromancer treating a dark creature as kindly and as friendly as Han Shuo was doing.

    Therefore, when she saw his actions, her heart was immediately filled with shock. Her thoughts raced as she mused that this little skeleton was likely this amazing because his master also treated him differently. It looked like Han Shuo¡¯s mysteries didn¡¯t stem from his wondrous martial arts techniques, but rather his methods were indeed a bit different from others.

    He turned his head to look at Phoebe and Emily with a smile, sweeping his gaze across a stunningly beautiful face and another quietly pretty face. He noted that they seemed to be in good spirits and asked with a smile, ¡°Did you guys get a good rest?¡±

    ¡°Yes, we can keep going if that¡¯s alright with you?¡± Emily felt that she could levitate again for a while after some meditation and so she raised this suggestion.

    The senior executives of the Dark Mantle had to learn of the information she held in her hand as soon as possible. They needed to execute their n against Bob Ascher as soon as possible. As a Dark Mantle member, Emily knew that the timing of action was paramount and that time could have a heaven and earth difference on the results. This was why she was in such a hurry.

    ¡°Alright, then let¡¯s go.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t say any incessant chatter, as he grabbed the little skeleton¡¯s waist and shed to where Phoebe was. He reached out another hand and grabbed her soft waist, that was devoid of any fat, flying through the air.

    The sun was rising again and its rays dyed everything a faint red, adding some color to the silver world beneath it. It was akin to a fair skinned girl suddenly blushing from shyness.

    A towering mountain and valley sprawled out beneath them. Some magical creatures, unafraid of the cold, emerged from cover and probed with their sharp ws. Life began to appear in the mountain valley beneath the warmth of the winter sun.

    Last night¡¯s chill was chased out of Emily¡¯s body thanks to the effects of the sun. Her beautiful face was upturned towards the warm light as she revealed a sweet smile. She looked with interest at the scene below her, seeming to want to imprint the view into her heart.

    ¡°It¡¯s so beautiful!¡± Phoebe said softly in Han Shuo¡¯s grasp as her eyes sparkled.

    Han Shuo also took a quick nce at their surroundings upon hearing her words, grunting with agreement and then flying forward in silence. Waxing eloquently in front of a beautiful scene was something women liked to do. He only wanted to get to the stronghold as quickly as possible andplete his mission.

    After several more hours and traveling over two small mountain valleys, Han Shuo cast his eyes ahead again. The sun was high in the sky at this point and the mountain valley was no longer covered in snow. The ground was clean and neat, with short buildings of all sorts of architectural styles scattered in rows in the small mountain valley.

    Different looking humans, orcs, and elves were walking out of their homes onto the clean and neat streets, thoroughly bundled up in an assortment of interesting styles of dress.

    ¡°We¡¯re almost there, let¡¯s travel the rest of the way on foot!¡± Emily could easily see this from afar thanks to the bright sunlight. She called out softy in obvious joy.

    This ce was simr to the town of Drol, just a bit moreplex. Although there were hotels and ces where one could enjoy themselves, the adventurers and merchants within Drol were all basically from the Lancelot Empire and governed by the Empire¡¯s soldiers.

    The adventurers and merchants here, however, were from the Lancelot and Kasi Empires as well as the orc tribes. There were also those from further away, or minorities that called the Ken Grand Canyon their home. Of course, such a diverse ce was naturally not under the jurisdiction of any single country.

    ¡°The one maintaining order is the greatest power within the Valley of Sunshine. They¡¯re in charge of protecting everyone¡¯s interests in transactions and preventing the incursion from thieves. In this regard, all three countries have their own spheres of influence here. When one side is strong enough to the point where the other two have no objections, that sphere will take over in maintaining order and exact heavy tolls from the merchants and adventurers to run this town.¡±

    ¡°However, this status quo isn¡¯t set in stone. If another side can prove that they are stronger than the other two, then the one upholding order will change. Currently, the ones upholding order is the Cairo mercenary band from the Kasi Empire!¡± Emily exined to the other two as theynded and proceeded on foot to the Valley of Sunshine.

    ¡°If the ones upholding order act on behalf of their country, then won¡¯t that infringe on the rights and profits of adventurers and merchants from other countries?¡± Han Shuo asked after thinking over this briefly.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, no matter which country they were originally from, they would never act on behalf of their own country when they be the power upholding order. Otherwise, they will be ostracized by all the adventurers and merchants and will never have the right to regain power again. There are no nationalities within the Valley of Sunshine. Not participating in conflicts between countries is the first rule that they must follow!¡± Emily smiled faintly as she exined this to Han Shuo.

    He nodded to express his understanding, privately thinking that this was quite an interesting ce. All sorts of people were here for their own interests. The fees gained from the transactions conducted between the three countries must be quite a sum indeed.

    Han Shuo naturally wasn¡¯t too familiar with thesemon sense rules, so Emily and Phoebe took turns in exining them to him along the way. Han Shuo listened carefully until they reached the border control office of the Valley of Sunshine. High fences of metal were erected here as knights in gray armor patrolled behind them with distant expressions.

    Han Shuo gleaned from Emily and Phoebe¡¯s conversation that these were the members of the Kasi Empire¡¯s Cairo mercenary band. It was rather astonishing that there were two to three thousand people in this mercenary band!

    There were experts of all professions who practiced diligently day and night. Their battle strength was even stronger than the standing army of other countries. They had a strict code of conduct and proper division of duties. In the year that they¡¯d been assigned to the security of the Valley of sunshine, they¡¯d beaten back raids from robbers several times, disying apetency that the merchants and adventurers within the valley were rather satisfied with.

    ¡°Where are you threeing from? Do you have passage tokens, or do you need to apply for them now?¡± A tall, somewhat handsome knight walked over from the metal fences and was quite polite when he saw Phoebe and Emily walk over. A trace of a mesmerizing smile yed about his lips as he asked gently.

    ¡°I¡¯m from the Boozt Merchant Guild and they¡¯re with me. This is my token!¡± Phoebe¡¯s expression was coldly aloof as she took out a token from her space ring, handing it over coolly.

    The mature knight reached out respectfully to take Phoebe¡¯s token and took a close look at it. He handed it back with a smile and said urbanely, ¡°No problem, the Valley of Sunshine wees your arrival. Our Cairo mercenary band will ensure your safety and the security of your belongings.¡±

    Phoebe took out a bag of gold coins and threw it onto a table near the fence with a thunk. She had her usual distant and reserved manner when dealing with outsiders. ¡°Our fees!¡±

    Phoebe turned to look at Han Shuo afterwards and reached out with her slender, jade hands to wrap them around Han Shuo¡¯s arm. The proud haughtiness faded from her face as she smiled, ¡°Let¡¯s go, we can go in now!¡±

    Seeing such a stunning beauty such as Phoebe paid no heed to the men around her and even gave off an aura that rebuffed all attempts to approach her, then suddenly underwent such drastic change in attitude to wait upon Han Shuo immediately drew looks of admiration and envy from the mercenaries.

    However, those looks changed to ones of odd puzzlement when they saw Han Shuo tug along the little skeleton in his wake. They didn¡¯t say anything however, seeming to be used to seeing a lot of weird characters. It didn¡¯t seem too out of the ordinary that an adventurer had a dark creature in his wake.

    Everyone was a bit vain at heart. When he saw the others look at him with such admiration, Han Shuo also felt quite proud. Phoebe is really showing me some face here!

    ¡°Come on, let¡¯s go you!¡± When Emily saw Han Shuo stop where he stood, wreathed in smiles, she knew exactly what he was thinking about and couldn¡¯t help but roll her eyes at him. She snorted inughter and pushed him from behind.

    Han Shuoughed heartily as he crossed through the fence while being subjected to endless looks of envy, walking into the Valley of Sunshine.

 Chapter 193: Place of extreme water

    Chapter 193: ce of extreme water

    Han Shuo took a stroll around the entire valley and discovered that the Valley of Sunshine was formed by interestingly shaped buildings. These buildings were built from different materials such as durable, gray rocks or wood from hundred year old trees. Some were round and others pointy with a chimney.

    It was because so many merchants and adventurers from various countries co-existed here that caused the architectural style to also be heavily influenced in a multitude of different ways.

    Early in the morning, inhabitants walked out of their homes to shovel away snowfall that had umted from the previous night, clearing the space in front of their door. This was also simr to a small city, as there were all sorts of vendors and stalls here, disying their wares from a variety of countries.

    ¡°These stalls all belong to small merchants. Therger merchants only spend a few days here because they have long since been in contact with their business partners, and are just here to conclude the transactions.¡± It wasn¡¯t Phoebe¡¯s first visit to the valley. She held onto Han Shuo¡¯s arm with her slender fingers and exined in a soft voice.

    ¡°Alright, you guys have fun shopping, I¡¯m going to take care of business first. When you tireter, you can rest in thest store on this street, I¡¯ll arrange for someone to meet you there!¡± Emily¡¯s thoughts werepletely preupied by the mission.

    Nodding, Han Shuo understood that she was quite anxious and said, ¡°Go and take care of business, we¡¯lle find youter!¡±

    A thought struck Phoebe after Emily left as she suddenly recalled, ¡°Oh right, I haven¡¯t had time to collect the materials on the list that you gave me. There are many rarities here from other countries. Why don¡¯t we take a look around? Maybe we can find some of the materials you need.¡±

    Han Shuo finally recalled that he¡¯d once asked Phoebe to help him collect the materials he would need to refine a wood elite zombie. The yin demon cave and earth elite zombie were operating without a hitch back in the cemetery of death, but he had yet to obtain all the materials required for the wood elite zombie. Han Shuo readily agreed to Phoebe¡¯s suggestion.

    Thus, Han Shuo followed behind her and started making his way through shops, starting with the first stall.

    Phoebe was patently very happy to have Han Shuo¡¯spanionship. As the leader of a guild, once she started conducting a transaction, she would transform into a very shrewd person. She was able to identify the true price of ingredients that Han Shuo needed amongst the stalls they passed without a flicker in expression.

    She paid seven thousand gold coins without hesitation just to get Han Shuo a vital ingredient that he had beencking. When Han Shuo took out his crystal card to pay, Phoebe served him with a fierce re, saying, ¡°You still have some gold coins stored with me, what are you taking your crystal card out for?!

    Han Shuo was speechless and decided to stay out of this matter. He continued to stand by Phoebe¡¯s side and watched her barter with several merchants with a distant expression.

    There were indeed many rare materials within the Valley of Sunshine. Two vendors had stock of ck iron ore and ck gold ore that couldn¡¯t even be found within the Empire. There were even a few items, that had been banned by the country¡¯s governments, that were openly ced on stalls to attract customers.

    There were a few strong aphrodisiacs, as well as powder that could melt corpses with a pinch. There were even strong weapons that had just been developed, along with the cores and bones of some strong magical creatures. Everything that one would want could be found here.

    Some of the owners of the stalls were humans, while others were orcs or elves. There was even an interesting mermanying half submerged within the water. Because they all used the humannguage tomunicate, there were no barriers ofmunication. When the two had made a full circuit of the premises, they both felt that this trip had been worth it as some rare materials had gotten added to their space rings.

    ¡°Alright, that¡¯s good, let¡¯s go meet up with Emily first the day. We can¡¯t possibly finish perusing all the stalls in the valley in a single day. As long as we pay particr attention, I think we should be able to collect all the ingredients you need!¡± Phoebe was a bit fatigued after entering more than a dozen stalls and bargaining heatedly with all their owners. She raised this suggestion to Han Shuo after they walked out of thetest stall.

    The skies over the valley had darkened due to the setting sun, unbeknownst to either of them. The entire valley was cloaked in a red light as dusk began. Han Shuo felt that Emily was most likely done reporting her matters after so much time had past and he too was eager to find out how they¡¯d gone. He directed Phoebe to the ce that Emily had mentioned when she raised her suggestion.

    Because he didn¡¯t know what danger the little skeleton had met in the other dimension, Han Shuo didn¡¯t send the little skeleton back and kept thetter by his side. There were all sorts of unconventional characters within the valley, so Han Shuo didn¡¯t stand out that much with a little skeletal warrior by his side.

    On their way to Emily¡¯s predefined ce however, the little skeleton suddenly stopped in front of a stall without moving, its empty eye sockets staring at the door, seemingly attracted by something at that very moment.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡± Phoebe also stopped when she saw that Han Shuo and the little skeleton had stopped. She paused and looked back in surprise.

    ¡°Something inside is calling out to him!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s expression was quite bizarre as he looked at Phoebe and then shifted his gaze back at the little skeleton.

    Phoebe had only been a bit confused when her perplexed expression immediately turned into one of shock. She looked around and walked over to Han Shuo when she confirmed that no one was paying attention to them. She looked at the little skeleton with incredulity, ¡°You mean, he has his own thoughts?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo said firmly, ¡°Yes, I¡¯m sure this is the case. I don¡¯t know what¡¯s going on either, so don¡¯t ask me anything, because I don¡¯t know when this happened either!¡±

    Phoebe was even more befuddled with Han Shuo¡¯s words as bewilderment suffused her expression. When she raised her head to look at the store, she eximed in surprise. Han Shuo looked back at her for an exnation. ¡°Why is it this store? It¡¯s not my first time in the Valley of Sunshine, but I¡¯ve never seen this store open for business. I think that those inside aren¡¯t willing to sell anything, otherwise they wouldn¡¯t be concealing their front door.¡±

    This was indeed the case. All the stores and stalls on this broad street strived mightily to invite and attract customers to visit. Only this one covered its front door, like no one was home, and appeared quite at odds with everything else on this street.

    The little skeleton suddenly walked towards the store without Han Shuo¡¯s order. He raised his hand to push open the door. Contrary to his expectations, the door lightly creaked open and revealed a stone paved hallway.

    Phoebe blinked and said with some hesitation, ¡°It¡¯s against the rules to enter someone¡¯s store against their volition!¡±

    ¡°Is there someone inside? Is there someone inside??¡± Han Shuo nodded and followed behind the little skeleton. He suddenly started talking loudly, as if to ascertain if someone was inside or not.

    Sadly, he received no response after calling out a few times, and the little skeleton naturally didn¡¯t understand what rules were. He hurtled deep into the structure.

    Spreading out his hands, Han Shuo said, ¡°There¡¯s no one in here anyways, it shouldn¡¯t matter if we go in and take a look.¡± He turned and shut the door that the little skeleton had opened, casting a nce Phoebe and taking her by the hand to walk inside.

    The little skeleton made straight for a round well in the back garden. He stood by the well and looked inside, seeming to be looking at something. When Han Shuo and Phoebe drew close, Han Shuo suddenly felt a frosty, evil presence exuding from the well, as if an enormous demon was inside.

    ¡°Something¡¯s wrong.! The temperature is too low here, even I feel a bit cold!¡± Phoebe¡¯s body suddenly trembled as she looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°That¡¯s right, this is a ce of extreme water, a ce that I need to refine water elite zombies. The thick water qi within has been absorbed by wraiths and transformed them to water demons!¡± Han Shuo was overjoyed.

    He sensed closely and could clearly feel the thick water qi within and two currents of frosty, sinister water qi. Han Shuo immediately understood that the water elements within were being absorbed by the two water demons.

 Chapter 194: Battling the blood water demons

    Chapter 194: Battling the blood water demons

    The round well was so deep that it could hide a person¡¯s body. The green colored stones that formed it were cold to the touch, the biting chill travelled deep into his bones.

    Han Shuo could feel the abundant water qi within the well as he stood next to it. The two sinister presences within also stirred to action, possibly because they sensed the presence of living beings.

    Han Shuo was absolutely overjoyed to discover that a ce of extreme water was located at the bottom of a deep well in such a ce. If he was able to refine all of the zombies of the five elements, then the ¡°Great Formation of the Divine Zombies and Five Elements¡± could be formed and devastating power could be brought forth. Han Shuo had already located ces of extreme earth and wood. If he added this ce of extreme water, then he¡¯d be one step closer to sessfully reaching his goal.

    As Han Shuo was rejoicing, Phoebe suddenly frowned, ¡°It seems to have gotten colder. You said this is a ce of extreme water, what did you mean by that?¡±

    Two bone piercing waves of cold suddenly crept out from the deep well. The well had been calm before the water became agitated and sshed out all over. Clouds of white mist rose from the well and covered the yard.

    ¡°They¡¯reing!¡± Han Shuo snorted coldly and grabbed Phoebe. He said seriously, ¡°The water demons areing out to make trouble, be careful!¡±

    The qi within the ce of extreme water was extremely concentrated. If anyone drowned here, their soul wouldn¡¯t disperse immediately. With the water qi sustaining it, it would have to absorb only a small amount before forming a water demon.

    When water demons absorbed water qi, the strength of the soul would greatly increase and it could then use specialized powers to manipte the water qi and attack living creatures that approached.

    Han Shuo understood all of this when he researched the ways to refine the elite zombies. Therefore, when he sensed the two sinister presences within the well, he immediately understood that two water demons had been somehow created.

    However, what he didn¡¯t understand was why the little skeleton could sense this. What was it that existed here that could¡¯ve attracted him?

    The little skeleton wielded its bone dagger and stood next to the deep well, his eyes staring into it. Han Shuo didn¡¯t know what he was waiting for and what he¡¯d nned on buying.

    The water qi crept throughout the yard in the form of a thick, dense mist. The scenery in the surroundings were also affected and grew increasingly blurry and indistinct. The water qi was epassed in the same sinister presence. It¡¯d been cold to begin with, and now temperature decreased even more rapidly.

    ¡°I can¡¯t see anything!¡± Phoebe cried out in surprise.

    ¡°This is the water demons manipting the water qi to form a water curtain. They¡¯ll attack us through the cover of the curtain!¡± Han Shuo said calmly from the side, calming Phoebe¡¯s madly thumping heart.

    Phoebe¡¯s vision was only on the level of an ordinary person. Even though she¡¯d trained her fighting aura, her eyes were barely sharper than that of an ordinary person. There was a world of difference between herself and a demon practitioner such as Han Shuo.

    Therefore, although her vision was obscured, Han Shuo¡¯s eyes weren¡¯t affected at all. There seemed to be silver lightning shing through his eyes as he looked calmly through the white mist.

    Suddenly, the bubbling water within the well shot out like a fountain. The clear water droplets seemed to have a life of their own as they formed columns that churned towards Han Shuo and Phoebe.

    A sinister and chilly presence emanated from the well. Even with Han Shuo¡¯s durable body, he too began to feel a hint of coldness. The water-formed columns were in a state between liquid and solid, reaching for Han Shuo and Phoebe¡¯s body like a pliable eel.

    ¡°Looking for death!¡± Han Shuo grinned a rather ruthless grin.

    Red spellfire suddenly red to life in his hands like evil fire looking to incinerate everything in its path, standing at attention in front of Han Shuo and Phoebe¡¯s bodies. The surrounding frosty presence immediately started cracking and popping as soon as the red spell fire appeared, and its fiery heat spread throughout the vicinity, immediately warming Phoebe¡¯s body.

    The several hundred eel-like columns evaporated as they neared Han Shuo¡¯s red spellfire.

    Two ugly, low roars sounded from within the well, like the final cries for help of a drowning person. Two red figures shot out from within, seemingly formed of red blood and continuously distorting in the air. They finally settled into the figure of a man and a woman, but a shade was still a shade in the end, and they possessed no visible features.

    ¡°Water blood demons!¡± Han Shuo started and looked askance at the two shadows.

    Water demons resided in ces of extreme water. If they harmed too many lifeforms, they would absorb the blood as well.

    Blood was also a liquid and had the same characteristics as water. The boiling blood of a lifeform near death held another sort of wondrous power. The water demons would absorb this blood, and when enough blood was absorbed, they would be able to evolve into the more powerful and cruel blood water demon.

    When the water demons formed blood water demons, not only would they be able to manipte the water qi within ces of extreme water, but they would even be able to manipte the blood of living beings. They were very difficult to face off against, and Han Shuo was quite surprised to see two blood water demons appear in front of him.

    Contrary to other bloodthirsty creatures, the blood water demon could cover the scent of blood on their bodies with the power of water. This was why Han Shou hadn¡¯t smelled the blood even with his sensitive nose.

    The two blood water demons emerged from the well and wavered in the air, pouncing towards Han Shuo and Phoebe like two bloody clouds. The evil power suddenly suffused the area around Han Shuo and Phoebe. Han Shuo immediately felt the blood in his body boil and it seemed to want to break free of his control.

    He turned to see that Phoebe was in even more dire straits. Two streams of blood were already flowing out of her nose and her charming face was quite bedraggled.

    Cursing under his breath, Han Shuo grabbed Phoebe and threw her outside with all his strength, roaring, ¡°Leave now!¡±

    Phoebe had been flung out whether or not she¡¯d consented. As a swordmaster, Phoebe had incredible strength and Han Shuo wasn¡¯t worried that she¡¯d be injured uponnding. He was more worried that she wouldn¡¯t even have the chance to make a move against the two blood water demons before dying of blood loss first.

    The blood within his body raged out of his control and surged towards his orifices. Han Shuo brought out the Demonyer Edge, but as it howled and stabbed into their bodies, it caused them no injury.

    The blood water demons were formed of liquid, and no matter how sharp the Demonyer Edge was, they would easily reform after he hacked them into various segments.

    The two water demons continued to advance towards Han Shuo after coalescing again. With the blood water demon¡¯s abilities, they would be able to suck him dry of his blood in an instant once they covered his body, turning him into a dry husk.

    As a demon cultivator, the power within Han Shuo¡¯s blood wasn¡¯t something any ordinary person or expert in this world could measure up to.

    The blood water demons also seemed to have sensed this and had set their sights on Han Shuo as their greatest source of nourishment,pletely ignoring Phoebe. Not a single iota of their attention was split out for her as they all focusedpletely on Han Shuo, proving the emphasis they ced on him.

    His blood churning madly, the magical yuan preventing blood from flowing out of his body with all its might. The two forces restrained Han Shuo¡¯s body as his blood frothed, preventing Han Shuo from moving that much.

    However, the strength of the magical yuan was also demonstrated in this moment. As a swordmaster, Phoebe had no defense whatsoever and her blood was already flowing freely out of her. However, Han Shuo could use his magical cultivation to firmly prevent his blood from flowing outwards. Although the defense was a bit difficult, he¡¯d been able to aplish the fact that none of his blood had flowed out of his body up until now.

    The greedy blood water demons were finally about to cover Han Shuo. Being confined and unable to bring his magical cultivation to bear, he could only rely on his necromancy magic. The bone spear, arrows, and corpse explosion spell were released one by one, but had no effect on the demons.

    Han Shuo suddenly understood that the two blood water demons could only be harmed by high temperature mes. However, his magical yuan waspletely preupied in prevent his blood from geysering out and none could be spared for the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡±.

    Freaking hell! Am I going to die by the hand of two blood water demons? I really don¡¯t want that! Forget it, I should be able to deploy the ¡°Mystical cial Spellfire¡± even if my blood is streaming out of me. Since I¡¯ve formed the demon infant, even if all my blood and body is lost, I can still be reborn using it. I¡¯ll just be gravely injured, but it¡¯ll be a lot better than dying.

    These thoughts ran through Han Shuo¡¯s mind as he made up his mind and decided that he would kill the two blood water demons even if he would be left gravely injured.

    A mysterious message was suddenly transmitted from the little skeleton at this time, as if he understood Han Shuo¡¯s intentions. The little skeleton sent a conscious feeling over that anxiously asked Han Shuo to stop.

    There were no concrete words ornguage, just a message for Han Shuo to stop that he could clearly feel. He¡¯d nned on immediately making a move, but actually froze, thinking furiously.

    There were only five or six meters separating him and the blood water demons. He couldn¡¯t move and could only stare ahead, unable to see a trace of the little skeleton.

    If he didn¡¯t act now, he might be covered at any moment by his two enemies and have his blood sucked dry in an instant. His body would lose life instantly and the demon infant would likely be unable to escape as well. His entire being would vanish without a trace.

    The little skeleton anxiously asked Han Shuo to stop, making him uncertain if he should proceed with his n or not. As he watched the two blood water demons close in on him, he sighed lightly and made a decision that he didn¡¯t know was right or not ¡ª he would trust in the little skeleton!

    His eyes suddenly grew resolute as he threw his previous ns away. Han Shuo stood where he was and didn¡¯t make any move, just waiting for the little skeleton and taking a gamble on his life.

    The two blood water demons finally enveloped him and Han Shuo could no longer control his blood from splurging out of his orifices like tidewaters.

    A deep wave of despair suddenly grew in Han Shuo¡¯s heart, but he didn¡¯t hate the little skeleton, but rather trusted thetter instead. He didn¡¯t have any regrets even if he truly died here.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo¡¯s rapid loss of blood halted like someone had stepped on the brakes. The mysterious power controlling his blood suddenly vanished without a trace, and Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan once again flowed smoothly throughout his body. All returned to normal as his blood settled down again.

    The two blood water demons started thrashing violently in front of him. Han Shuo could read from their violent twists and struggles the expression they wanted to express ¡ª fear!

    Han Shuo¡¯s body could move about freely now after his blood had returned to normal. He looked up and saw some bone spurs sticking into the two blood water demons. The little skeleton was looking at him with empty eye sockets as his body was slightly crouched, two leg bones stamped firmly on the blood water demons as all seven bone spurs were stuck firmly within them.

    Streaks of bloody splendor flowed swiftly into the little skeleton¡¯s body through the seven bone spurs. The seven bone spurs, that had seemed to dull, red with bewitching red light as the broken ribs in front of the little skeleton rearranged themselves with a speed that Han Shuo could see, also gleaming with a bloody light.

    In contrast, the two blood water demons, that had been a vivid, blood red, suddenly dimmed as their color surged rapidly towards where the bone spurs were stuck in their bodies. The two blood water demons slowly turned ghastly white and Han Shuo could feel all the qi that they¡¯d collected over who knew how long flow swiftly into the little skeleton¡¯s body, along with their life force and blood.

    This situation wasn¡¯t maintained for long. When the blood water demons had thoroughly turned a ghastly white, their bodies transformed into two puddles of water with a sshing sound and fell to the ground.

    The mist that had suffused the yard was swept away by the wind, and the waning moon shed a red light over the yard, giving it a few hints of a deste beauty.

    Clunk. The little skeleton fell down from midair because he¡¯d lost his support after the two blood water demons disappeared.

    Reaching out a hand to rub his head, the little skeleton¡¯s empty eye sockets met Han Shuo¡¯s. A surge of joy traveled into Han Shuo¡¯s heart from the little skeleton, and his originally vividly red body started changing once again. Each bone had had blood red splendor sparkling over it, but it¡¯d now turned back into its originally pure white color.

    Since the little skeleton had been summoned and refined as a magical treasure, his skeleton had gone from inky ck to blood red. Now, he¡¯d changed back, but the stark white of the little skeleton¡¯s bones were obviously greatly different from that of a normal skeletal warrior.

    His bones were translucent and as pure as beautiful jade. It even seemed to be sparkling with eye catching light, making various thoughts rise in Han Shuo¡¯s mind.

    Han Shuo finally understood now why the little skeleton had stopped in front of the shop and hadn¡¯t moved. He must¡¯ve been attracted by the blood water demon¡¯s energy!

    Han Shuo recalled thatst time, in Bob Ascher¡¯s ve trading house, the Cmity Church necromancer rendon had used fresh blood to summon the three eyed demon god. The blood had been absorbed by the little skeleton in the end. Perhaps it was because of this that, although the blood water demons could conceal the scent of blood from Han Shuo, they couldn¡¯t do the same to the little skeleton and this was why he¡¯d stopped in front of the shop.

    As Han Shuo thought silently, another wisp of consciousness came from the little skeleton once more. He was actually strongly requesting to return to the other dimension, and Han Shuo could clearly feel his ardent desire to exact revenge.

    Having absorbed the strength of the two blood water demons, the little skeleton had undergone a significant transformation. Not only had his injuries from the previous battle been recovered, he seemed to have heightened his abilities as well. This was why he was so confident now.

    The little skeleton¡¯s fighting spirit and requests were quite strong. Han Shuo hesitated for a moment, and felt that no particr problems would arise if he kept part of his mind on the situation. He then used the necromancy spell to once again send the little skeleton back to the mysterious ne.

 Chapter 195: Promotion to the Dark Moon division

    Chapter 195: Promotion to the Dark Moon division

    Apart from the moonlight spilling into the yard and the two puddles of water around the well, there were no other traces of anything else within the vicinity.

    Scattered footsteps suddenly sounded from outside. They rapidly approached as Phoebe and a band of ten others appeared in front of Han Shuo.

    Worry filling her face, Phoebe¡¯s clear eyesnded on Han Shuo¡¯s body and visibly rxed when she saw that he was unharmed. However, she didn¡¯t rx her grasp on her longsword as her pale neck swiveled, surveying the surroundings, seeming to want to detect if there was any danger hidden elsewhere.

    There were a dozen armored Cairo mercenary band guards apart from Phoebe. It would seem that she had led them here. Their eyes were alert as they cautiously patrolled the surroundings.

    ¡°Are you alright?¡± Phoebe breathed out a sigh of relief when she took a look around and saw nothing out of the ordinary, nor any danger.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo cast a nce at Phoebe and smiled infort, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m fine.¡±

    ¡°My apologies Mr. Harris, I think we must¡¯ve seen an illusion just now. The danger I spoke of earlier doesn¡¯t seem to have appeared.¡± Phoebe understood that Han Shuo must¡¯ve taken care of matters and wore an embarrassed expression on her face, speaking to the stern, aloof guard captain.

    This person was in the prime of his life. Swarthy, with a head full of short, brown hair that was messily askew, he carried a double headed battle-axe in his right hand and naturally emanated the violent aura of someone who¡¯d weathered multiple battles. It was obvious that it had been formed through ughter.

    ¡°This shop is a ce that¡¯s been cursed by a demon. All the owners who have taken charge of this shop have died of unnatural causes over the years. No matter who enters, whether man or beast, they will all die from this curse. There has never been any exceptions, so no matter how you entered, I rmend you leave immediately.¡± Harris¡¯ eyes roved over Han Shuo and Phoebe¡¯s bodies as he spoke coldly.

    He waved his hand and didn¡¯t wait for Han Shuo and Phoebe to say anything before he apanied his band of a dozen soldiers out of the yard, seemingly unwilling to linger even another second in this area.

    ¡°Harris is a battle fiend who¡¯s weathered hundreds of battles and the vice chief of the Cairo mercenary band. When I said there was danger here just now, he still paid a visit even though he was a bit unwilling. It looks like there is indeed something here that people are wary of. I didn¡¯t have any strength to fight back earlier even with my level as a swordmaster!¡± Phoebe went over Harris¡¯ identity in a perfunctory manner after he¡¯d left. She then changed the subject and stared at Han Shuo, ¡°What happened just now?¡±

    Smiling dashingly, Han Shuo reached out a hand to stroke the well and said happily, ¡°The two blood water demons have been taken care of, so no more odd things will happen here in the future. In addition, I¡¯m going to buy this shop no matter how this ce costs!¡±

    Phoebe¡¯s beautiful, clear eyes looked at Han Shuo with a look of surprise on her face as she said confidently, ¡°You must have a great deal of assurance since you¡¯re saying this. Don¡¯t worry about the shop, I¡¯ll take care of the negotiation with the Cairo mercenary band. I think such a cursed ce won¡¯t be worth much money.¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo walked over to Phoebe and wrapped his arm lightly around her, putting his mouth close to her ears and saying softly, ¡°Thank you so much, Phoebe!¡±

    Her face suddenly flushing red, Phoebe turned back and hugged Han Shuo fiercely, pursing her lips to lightly kiss Han Shuo¡¯s. She then pulled back and stared deeply at Han Shuo, saying passionately, ¡°I¡¯m the one who should be thanking you! You threw me out first when danger was in front of us!¡±

    The danger with the blood water demon earlier had made Phoebe go through a life and death experience. Even Han Shuo¡¯s soul had been almost scattered to the four winds. Having survived these two disasters, the two felt a unique sense of the joy of life as they looked at each other now.

    As the moon shone down on them, it added a few traces of beauty to Phoebe¡¯s stunning features. Her eyes shone with light and Han Shuo fell deep into them.

    He tightened his grasp and held her tightly, feeling her shake slightly in his intimate grasp. A sense of happiness and contentment filled his heart.

    Before he¡¯d arrived in his world, Han Shuo had been just an ordinary person who had only dared to think evil thoughts. He didn¡¯t dare act upon them. His personality was one that was a bit timid. He¡¯d lived twenty years and hadn¡¯t paid much attention to anything. He¡¯d never had any women and had lived routinely through twenty years.

    But thanks to Chu Cang Lan¡¯s maneuverings, he¡¯d sessfully arrived in this foreign world with the heritage of magical cultivation. He¡¯d amassed great strength within a short amount of time, gotten quite a bit of riches, and won the hearts of two beauties.

    The affairs of the world changed thus greatly and unexpectedly. What had been farfetched daydreams twenty some years ago had all be part of his grasp in such a short amount of time. An unbelievable feeling rose in Han Shuo¡¯s heart as he sometimes felt that all of this was still an unrealistic dream. However, his encounters with danger and pain again and again reminded him that this wasn¡¯t an illusion.

    ¡°Alright, I think Emily must be waiting for us. We should hurry up and make our way there!¡± Han Shuo looked at the fading light in the sky after a bout of reflection and spoke tenderly to Phoebe.

    Seemingly enjoying this moment of peace and romance that belonged to the two of them, Phoebe assented softly and allowed Han Shuo to hold her smooth, soft hand. The two of them walked side by side to the location Emily had previously mentioned.

    Before long, the two of them had appeared in front of the shop. There were no longer any customers because night had fallen. A hale and hearty elderly man walked up merrily after Han Shuo had walked inside, ¡°Are you Sir Bryan?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not a sir, please just call me Bryan!¡± Han Shuo bowed humbly to the elderly man and took out his identity token, handing it over with both hands.

    The elder took Han Shuo¡¯s iron token and nced at it, then returned it with a smile. He then said a bit apologetically to Phoebe, ¡°My apologies Miss Phoebe, please wait here a moment. These are the Dark Mantle¡¯s rules that no one may enter if they are not of the Dark Mantle.¡±

    As the shadowy organization beneath the king¡¯s hands, the Dark Mantle naturally had its rules that everyone must follow. The fact that Phoebe, an outsider, could¡¯ve apanied Han Shuo to this ce was already an exception. She naturally couldn¡¯t proceed further.

    When faced with such a polite and benevolent old man, Phoebe didn¡¯t maintain her usual aloofness and nodded with a smile, sitting down willingly.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, I¡¯ll lead you inside!¡± The elderly man stooped slightly and led Han Shuo in. They walked through a hallway and stopped in front of the living room. The old man pointed inside, ¡°Mistress Emily is inside!¡±

    The old man returned along the original route when Han Shuo walked in, seemingly back to his post at the head of the shop.

    ¡°Is it Bryan?¡± Emily¡¯s voice sounded from somewhere as soon as he set foot inside. A piece of the living room flooring then opened up into a hole, a mechanism simr to what Han Shuo and Emily had seen in Bob Ascher¡¯s roomst time.

    Emily walked out in casual clothing from the hole. There was a firece in this living room and the temperature was quitefortable. This was why Emily hadn¡¯t continued to bundle herself up warmly.

    ¡°How are things? Was everything taken care of?¡± Han Shuo walked towards Emily with a smile when the hole closed up.

    ¡°No problems at all. My brother is taking over and our mission is done. We seeded! Heh heh, do you want to know how much of this was thanks to you?¡± Emily¡¯s alluring cheeks held a trace of mischievousness as she looked at Han Shuo.

    The mix of a youthful yfulness and an adult¡¯s maturity in Emily gave her an unusual allure at this moment. Han Shuo¡¯s heart lurched as his hands reached out and grabbed Emily while he sat down in a chair. His hands roved naughtily around her breasts as he chuckled, ¡°Little hussy, I haven¡¯t even punished you for what you did in the tree hole earlier!¡±

    ¡°Humph!¡± Emily threw back her head and red at Han Shuo, saying huffily, ¡°How dare you mention that! You started doing that with Phoebe right in front of me, were you thinking of me at all? Don¡¯t think I couldn¡¯t see anything because it was dark. Humph, Phoebe was panting so loudly and the both of you were trying to put on a normal act!¡±

    He suddenly lifted Emily¡¯s legs up and shifted her around so that she was kneeling on his thighs. Her well rounded butt was thrust high into the air and, much to her surprise, he started to spank them harshly. Emily began to beg for mercy amidst the pain.

    ¡°Alright alright! I won¡¯t say anything about what you do in the future, you big viin!¡± Emily yed along and suddenly switched to a serious tack, ¡°After this time¡¯s mission, you¡¯ve advanced from a Third Dark Star to a First Dark Moon. You¡¯ve skipped a few levels again.¡±

    Han Shuo started, stopping his motions and looking at Emily with confusion. ¡°Sometimespleting several missions wouldn¡¯t be enough for one to advance one level. Why did I advance several afterpleting only one mission? You didn¡¯t do anything for me behind the scenes, did you?¡±

    Rolling her eyes at Han Shuo, Emily didn¡¯t know whether tough or be angry. ¡°Remember, you went up against Bob Ascher of the Gryphon Legion. The difficulty of this mission,pared to the usual scouting for information or arresting some fugitive nobles, ispletely different. ording to your contributions this time, it wouldn¡¯t have been out of the ordinary to directly promote you to Second Dark Moon. However, you¡¯ve only been in the Dark Mantle for half a year and promoting you to First Dark Moon was already astonishing enough. That¡¯s why we didn¡¯t go further.¡±

    Han Shuo understood after he thought briefly about Emily¡¯s words and then remembered Chester. ¡°Oh right, Chester should still be in the Valen City Dark Mantle branch, what treatment is he receiving?¡±

    ¡°Thanks to you, he¡¯s already a Fourth Dark Star. This kid is smart enough to be able to be promoted to it just by delivering messages. I never ran into anything that easy when I was running missions!¡± Emily responded with a smile.

    ¡°Oh right, when will ine and Belinda arrive?¡± Han Shuo was happy for Chester when he heard of his circumstances and then thought of ine and Belinda again.

    ¡°I almost forgot! Belinda was an unexpected gain. If we deliver her to the headquarters and she undergoes interrogation at the hands of the experts there, we¡¯ll be sure to obtain a lot of information about the Cmity Church. We¡¯ll be rewarded ording to the level of intelligence we gain from her!¡± Emily chuckled lightly and spoke happily.

    ¡°Oh right, what kind of different treatment can I enjoy after advancing to First Dark Star?¡± Han Shuo thought for a bit and immediately asked. This was what he was most concerned about at this moment.

    ¡°First of all, you¡¯ll receive an increase in your monthly stipend from 70 gold coins to 150 gold coins. Of course, I think you don¡¯t care about this at all. Apart from that, you can use your current level to obtain all information that corresponds to your level from all Dark Mantle strongholds within the Empire. You can use the transportation matrixes in all the cities of the Lancelot empire, and don¡¯t need to pay any fees. You canmand a troop of soldiers in any of the military organizations, not to exceed 100 people. In addition...¡±

    Han Shuo finally discovered that there was a significant increase in all areas of his benefits after advancing from Dark Star to Dark Moon. He was already enjoying so many privileges at the Dark Star division, then being part of the Dark Moon level or even one of the three heavyweights would surelye with much higher benefits.

    No wonder so many people wanted power! It looked like it really was a nice thing!

 Chapter 196: Sharing one room

    Chapter 196: Sharing one room

    Phoebe obviously couldn¡¯t take up residence within the Dark Mantle, and now that her rtionship with Han Shuo was out in the open, he naturally needed to stay with her.

    Han Shuo finally left with Phoebe after dining with Emily and sweet talking her quite a bit, intent on finding a hotel for the two of them.

    Hotels of various sizes could be found in great number in the Valley of Sunshine. Because there was a high number of traveling merchants and adventurersing and going, the amount of entertainment facilities were no less than that in Drol.

    Brightly colored, hazy lights shone out from each hotel onto the streets, alternating withdies clothed in sexy or innocent attire, castinge-hither eyes at passersby on the streets, trying to lure customers in.

    Han Shuo walked next to Phoebe and didn¡¯t look anywhere else. She was quite satisfied with that, but it was actually because Han Shuo had already vented his energy on Emily¡¯s voluptuous body earlier, so he didn¡¯t have any evil thoughts in his mind right now.

    After a while, Phoebe stopped in front of a luxurious looking hotel. She tugged on Han Shuo with her little hand and walked inside with him. The small, skinny owner was already smiling fawningly at them in front of Phoebe before she¡¯d even opened her mouth, saying ingratiatingly, ¡°Noble Miss Phoebe, will it be the same room asst time?¡±

    Nodding, Phoebe had an aloof expression on her face as she handed her crystal card over without saying a word.

    Judging from the owner¡¯s expression, it was obvious that this wasn¡¯t Phoebe¡¯s first visit here. It looked like she¡¯d traveled to many ces in her travels to and fro for the Boozt Merchant Guild.

    Retrieving her crystal card and key, Phoebe turned her head to smile at Han Shuo and tugged on his arm, leading him inside.

    It was nicely warm inside the hotel andpletely different from the brutal cold outside. Bright lights hung in the hallways and shed ample light throughout the entire hotel.

    The solid wood floors gleamed like a mirror, and shoes sounded out clearly when they tapped against the floor. The sounds were actually quite pleasing to the ear, so it was apparent that these floors weren¡¯t ordinary.

    Han Shuo realized that Phoebe hadn¡¯t arranged another room for him, and some ambiguous motions grew in his heart as they continued walking down the hallway. Phoebe¡¯s not nning on sharing a bed with me, is she?!

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but cast a look full of passion at Phoebe as they walked.

    Phoebe¡¯s long brown hair naturally fell down towards the floor like a waterfall, swaying around her translucent cheeks and long neck as she sashayed. Her brows were like the waxing moon and her skin gleamed richly with the splendor of the stars. Her lips were as red as cherries, making one want to give them a fierce bite.

    ¡°You big pervert, what are you looking at?¡± Phoebe suddenly stopped and red at Han Shuo with slightly flushed cheeks.

    Han Shuo¡¯s gaze had been fiery, with a strong sense of possessiveness within. Phoebe was stupid. She could naturally see all of it clearly and couldn¡¯t help but speak up as her heart beat in panic.

    ¡°No, nothing!¡± Han Shuo returned to himself and immediately concealed the lecherous look in his eyes. ¡°Why aren¡¯t we walking anymore?¡±

    ¡°We¡¯re here, what nonsense are you thinking of? Don¡¯t you see that the door is right in front of you?¡± Phoebe¡¯s clear eyes were bashful as she red at Han Shuo again, pointing at the door.

    Indeed, Han Shuo noticed a tightly shut door when his gaze followed her jade arms. This was also the end of the hallway, and it seemed like it was the most quiet room in the hotel.

    ¡°Nothing much, just thinking of you!¡± Han Shuo chuckled evilly and looked straight at Phoebe.

    ¡°You bad jerk, you only know how to fob me off with sweet words!¡± Sweetness rose in Phoebe¡¯s heart as she spoke softly.

    ¡°Nuh uh, I really was thinking of you just now!¡± Han Shuo said, aggrieved.

    ¡°Then you weren¡¯t thinking nice thoughts. Judging from the way you were leering earlier, you must¡¯ve been thinking something dirty!¡± Phoebe naturally wouldn¡¯t believe anything at this point and snorted softly as she flicked a nce at Han Shuo.

    He had indeed been thinking of nothing nice just now. Han Shuo could only chuckle dryly after Phoebe had hit the nail on the head and then hurried Phoebe, ¡°Hurry and open the door. I¡¯m really tired after such a long day, let¡¯s go in and shower and sleep.¡±

    Phoebe didn¡¯t continue questioning as she took out the key to open the door. She moved aside to let Han Shuo in and then closed the door behind him.

    A spacious living room greeted them with several fur couches ced on top of a soft carpet. Out of the four rooms, there were two bedrooms, one bathroom, and one storage room for clothes and random knickknacks.

    ¡°Do you think I didn¡¯t know what you¡¯re thinking of? Humph! There are two rooms here and each of us will have one. I will run through whoever barges into my room again!¡± Phoebe threw back her head and threatened Han Shuo as she lit the firece, making the internal temperature slowly rise.

    ¡°Heh heh, what if whoever barges in runs into a beauty having a wet dream and then throws herself into his arms!¡± Han Shuo chuckled evilly.

    ¡°You dratted, damned bastard! How dare you mention that!¡± Phoebe¡¯s face turned bright red as she ran angrily up to Han Shuo and reached out her slender hands to give him a fierce pinch around the waist.

    He first yed along and cried out painfully, then yanked her arm around her back and kissed her unceremoniously. Han Shuo explored and ravaged her mouth like a dragon in the ocean as she grunted in protest.

    Phoebe struggled symbolically for a bit before slowly weakening, and her hands, that¡¯d formed fists that pounded Han Shuo¡¯s chest, suddenly twined towards his neck like snakes, her tongue entangling with Han Shuo¡¯s.

    Han Shuoid her down on the soft carpet and tasted her sweetness while rubbing his hand over her pert bottom.

    When Han Shuo¡¯s hands finally started fondling her chest, Phoebe suddenly started struggling and pushed him away fiercely. She then red at him with embarrassment as she said with great allure, ¡°It looks like I need to be careful or you¡¯ll take advantage of me whenever I let my guard down. Ugh, after running for so long, my body stinks. I need to take a shower, you stay out here!¡±

    Phoebe escaped to the bathroom after saying these words and shut the door with a great bang. The sounds of water flowing came from inside afterwards. It looked like she was indeed in a great hurry to wash away the dirt from her body.

    Bam bam bam... bam bam bam...

    Knocking sounds suddenly sounded at this moment. Han Shuo blinked and wondered if it was Emily looking for them. He walked over in confusion and opened the door. A bouquet of brilliant fresh flowers was shoved in his face. It looked like there were at least a hundred of them as they emanated a wonderful fragrance.

    The bouquet was abruptly pulled back and a handsome face revealed itself in front of Han Shuo. His eyebrows were dashing and his eyes clear. A broad forehead, firm nose, and apart from somewhat skinny cheeks, this face could bebelled umonly handsome.

    The charming face had been wearing a disarming smile when it suddenly drew together into a frown and the face became covered in clouds. He looked at Han Shuo in an unfriendly manner. ¡°Who are you? Where¡¯s Phoebe?¡±

    ¡°She¡¯s showering. And who are you?¡± Han Shuo nked and then reacted. This must be one of Phoebe¡¯s admirers. He too showed the fellow a rather unfriendly face.

    ¡°Showering! Then what are you doing here?!¡± When he heard that Phoebe was showering inside and Han Shuo was inside the room, his expression grew even uglier.

    ¡°I¡¯m Florida, chief of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band. I¡¯m Phoebe¡¯s good friend! I naturally have something to discuss with her, so don¡¯t block the way!¡± He stared at Han Shuo angrily and roared lowly, magical pulses emanating from his body.

    When Han Shuo heard that he was Florida, chief of the Rainbow Sickle, Han Shuo was immediately startled and looked at this person with more than a hint of wariness.

    The Rainbow Sickle mercenary band was just as famous as the Cairo mercenary band. However, the Rainbow Sickle was made up mostly of those from the Lancelot Empire. The Rainbow Sickle had been the strongest within the Valley of Sunshine a few years ago and had been in charge of order. However, the original chief unfortunately fell when defending the valley against robbers once. This was why their fortune had suddenly fallen.

    It was rumored that this person was a light archmage and seemed to have something to do with the Church of Light. His strength was unfathomable, and although he was an upright person, he was decisive and vicious. He never had any mercy for his enemies and had a great reputation within the mercenary band.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t thought that such a person would be one of Phoebe¡¯s admirers. Although Han Shuo felt a bit of a headache knowing the other¡¯s identity, he wasn¡¯t afraid. Han Shuo said coldly, ¡°Sorry, I¡¯m Phoebe¡¯s boyfriend. She can¡¯t see you at the moment, so you cane back next time!¡±

    Han Shuo snorted coldly after speaking and mmed the door shut!

 Chapter 197: Making a decisive move

    Chapter 197: Making a decisive move

    Florida was far more domineering than Han Shuo would¡¯ve thought. He could feel a dangerous pulse of magic the instant he shut the door. Han Shuo immediately sprang backwards.

    The door exploded with a tumultuous bang as the room wreathed itself in white light. Large pieces of wooden ts flew across the room as Florida¡¯s handsome face once again appeared in front of Han Shuo.

    He still clutched the bouquet of fresh flowers tightly, with a strongly pulsating magic staff embedded with a red, blue, and yellow crystal in his right hand.

    ¡°I said, I want to see Phoebe. Didn¡¯t you hear me?!¡± Florida looked harshly at Han Shuo as he bit off his words.

    At roughly 25 or 26, Florida¡¯s age was simr to the deceased rk. The two of them had many simrities, both having the same high level of strength and charming exteriors.

    However, although rk was devious, he wouldn¡¯t unt it so boldly. He at least understood that his identity as a noble; conscious he had to conceal his emotions, he made his moves in the dark. On the other hand, Florida looked like apletelywless person, with an even more brash style, seemingly having no reservations at all.

    ¡°And I said, don¡¯t disturb our rest!¡± Han Shuo snorted coldly and shed to Florida¡¯s side like lightning. He raised a fist with magical yuan circting within it and smashed it towards Florida¡¯s face.

    Han Shuo¡¯s sudden move was outside of the other¡¯s expectations as panic suddenly appeared on his face. He threw out the bouquet in his hands and swiftly backpedaled.

    Han Shuo¡¯s punch whistled through the air as it smashed the bouquet to pieces. Petals flew everywhere as a floral fragrance wafted through the air.

    When this punch had obliterated the bouquet and seemed like it wouldnd on Florida¡¯s face, a strong magic pulse suddenly burst from his body. A rainbow colored, ss-like magic shield suddenly enveloped him like an enormous light bubble.

    Bam. Han Shuo¡¯s fist connected with the shield. He felt like he was punching cotton candy as the shield distorted at the point of contact. The impression left by the fist deepened until Han Shuo¡¯s blow stopped right above Florida¡¯s well defined nose, unable to proceed any further.

    Completely flustered, Florida was forced back a few steps, bringing the force field with him and widening the gap between him and Han Shuo. Disarrayed, he looked at Han Shuo with an even more unfriendly glint, as if Han Shuo had be his mortal enemy.

    ¡°You dared to attack first!¡± Florida¡¯s voice was as distorted as his expression as he roared furiously at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo shook his hand and retracted his fist, pointing at the shattered room door. He said coldly, ¡°You trespassed the moment you broke through the door. I¡¯m just defending myself!¡±

    Nodding his head with a frosty smile, Florida cast a dark nce at Han Shuo. ¡°Very good, you¡¯ve got some guts. However, you won¡¯t get a chance toe near me again now that our distance has been increased. Let me see what you¡¯re made of now!¡±

    Florida once again stepped back after he spoke and raised the staff in his right hand, nning on facing off with Han Shuo. In response to Florida¡¯s move, Han Shuo solemnly brought out the Demonyer Edge from his space ring and prepared to take Florida¡¯s attack.

    As a light archmage, his strength was certainly umon. Han Shuo had tested him just now and had noticed that his reaction was swift and movements agile. It was obvious that he¡¯d weathered hundreds of battles. Han Shuo hadn¡¯t even been able to harm him just now with that punch, despite their proximity. Now that they were separated, Florida would be able to deploy his advantage as a mage and would be difficult to deal with.

    Hasty footsteps sounded at this moment and seemed to approach the room. Just as Han Shuo and Florida were about to really get into it, vice chief Harris from the Cairo mercenary band suddenly appeared with a few soldiers.

    ¡°Isn¡¯t this chief Florida? What are you doing here, creating a mess in territory that¡¯s under the Cairo mercenary band¡¯s protection instead of staying in yours?¡± Harris¡¯ voice was filled with obvious sarcasm as he maintained the same remote expression from earlier in the day.

    The sshing sounds from the bathroom suddenly stopped. It seemed that after these disturbances, Phoebe had finally discovered something was happening outside after having her hearing affected by her shower.

    The wildly posturing Florida looked back at Harris when he heard thetter¡¯s voice. He put away the staff in his hand and said with an aloof expression, ¡°I came to visit Miss Phoebe and hadn¡¯t expected to be blocked by some blind kid.¡±

    ¡°If you¡¯re here to be a guest, then I wee you on behalf of the owner. However, I hope you don¡¯t try to start a fight here, or else our Cairo mercenary band will definitely get involved. You surely know the rules after being in the Valley of Sunshine for so long!¡± Harris snorted coldly when he saw Florida retract the staff in his hands.

    ¡°Humph! Today was your lucky day!¡± Florida said coldly to Han Shuo and turned to leave. He halted when he passed by Harris, saying with his back turned to Han Shuo, ¡°In the near future, I will definitely retake control of the valley. Then, I won¡¯t be as polite to you as I am now!¡±

    Floridaughed heartily after throwing down these words and walked out withrge strides, not waiting for Phoebe toe out.

    Harris had an ugly expression on his face and a vein began to throb on his forehead. He looked like he would go berserk at any time. In fact, Han Shuo knew that he was a berserker, It was said that a berserker¡¯s strength was quite astonishing. They were able to use a mysterious method to provoke themselves into a mad state, increasing their strength exponentially and giving them incredible destructive power.

    Han Shuo rather wished Harris would go berserk as he looked at thetter. If Harris couldn¡¯t control the fury in his heart, he would immediately attack Florida until one of them died.

    It was a pity that Harris quickly regained normalcy and Han Shuo¡¯s daydreams didn¡¯t y out. Harris cast a detached nce at Han Shuo and said, ¡°You still need to pay for the door. Florida¡¯s group has great power in the Valley of Sunshine, so you need to be careful after offending him. You cane find us if there¡¯s anything you need from the Cairo mercenary band.¡±

    Although his expression was still aloof, Harris seemed to have undergone a change in attitude towards Han Shuo because of their newly acquiredmon enemy. There were even traces of concern in his words.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t nned on paying for the door because it¡¯d been Florida that had broken it, but his thoughtspletely changed after seeing Harris¡¯ attitude shift. He did still have need of the Cairo mercenary band to obtain the shop with the ce of extreme water, so heughed decisively and said, ¡°No problem!¡±

    Nodding, Harris didn¡¯t say anything else and waved his hand, departing with his guards.

    The room to the bathroom creaked open after Harris left and Phoebe came out wearing a bathrobe, like a flower emerging from the water. Her wet hair was stered all over and a small expanse of reddened, fair skin was revealed at her chest. Her red lips were full and wet as she flicked her eyes towards the door. ¡°They¡¯re all gone?¡±

    ¡°All gone. What¡¯s going on with that Florida?¡± Han Shuo looked at Phoebe and asked unhappily.

    Chuckling lowly, Phoebe hiked up the bathrobe a bit and wrapped her legs tightly. She walked up to Han Shuo and batted her wet eyshes, looking at him with interest. She teased, ¡°What, are you jealous?¡±

    ¡°Yeah I¡¯m jealous! That kid doesn¡¯t look too bad and came looking for you with a huge bouquet! He even told me, the boyfriend, to get out of the way. I¡¯m very pissed off right now!¡± Han Shuo was quite direct as he looked irritatedly at Phoebe.

    Her body softening, Phoebe sat on Han Shuo¡¯s legs and chuckled softly. ¡°I used toe to the valley a lot and had business dealings with the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band. But it¡¯s always been him pursuing me, I¡¯ve never had anything to deal with him.¡±

    ¡°Alright, alright, don¡¯t be mad. I¡¯ll exin things to him next time so that he doesn¡¯t bother me in the future. How¡¯s that?¡±

    ¡°No point in exnations, I don¡¯t think that brat is the kind to ept such things. I didn¡¯t like him from my first impression of him, but I think he thinks the same of me. I think our grudge has been well and truly formed!¡± Han Shuo shook his head.

    ¡°Then what do we do? The Rainbow Sickle mercenary band has great power in the valley and is second only to the Cairo mercenary band. It¡¯s said that they¡¯ve been recruiting in recent times and have even hired a group of experts from the Church of Light. They seem to want to rece the Cairo mercenary band. It will be very troublesome to stay in the valley if we¡¯ve offended them!¡± Phoebe was startled and spoke with some worry.

    ¡°We¡¯ll deal with matters as they arise. He¡¯s not the sole ruler of the valley, he won¡¯t be able to do anything to me!¡± Han Shuo snorted coldly and spoke without fear.

 Chapter 198: Conduct oneself well

    Chapter 198: Conduct oneself well

    Florida had broken the door with his appearance, and so, Han Shuo and Phoebe had no choice but to upy another room. They paid twenty gold coins aspensation for the door, and Phoebe asked for two rooms so that Han Shuo would have no opportunity to get up to any shenanigans. He didn¡¯t remain idle when Phoebe returned to her room to rest.

    He located the room¡¯s closet and set up the transportation matrix, then adjusted his mental strength to release a dark mist spell within the closet before stepping into the matrix.

    The cemetery of death was as deste as ever. Han Shuo immediately saw Gilbert¡¯s enormous true form as soon as he stepped out. He was fast asleep amidst piles of bones and hadn¡¯t noticed Han Shuo¡¯s arrival at all.

    Gilbert had taken on a great responsibility in the past two days and was likely truly tired after being injured again. Han Shuo didn¡¯t disturb him and went to where the earth elite zombie and yin demons were being refined.

    He first went to the yin demon cave to infuse it with more magical yuan. He noticed that there were only nine wraiths left in the cave now. After fighting every day and every night, the day at which he could collect the yin demons drew closer and closer.

    The earth elite zombie exuded an immense presence of life. The earth qi that circted around the entire cemetery of death was thinning out. Balls of grey qi spread out from the center of the ce of extreme earth, and slowly coalesced into one ce as if arge hand was tightening its grasp on them.

    A marvelous connection emanated from the earth. Han Shuo started as an exuberant feeling flowed into his heart. He sensed carefully and discovered that this joy wasing from the earth elite zombie that was buried deep in the ground.

    It looked like Han Shuo¡¯s arrival had caused the earth elite zombie below to be quite joyous. After the long duration of time in which it¡¯d absorbed earth qi and nourishment from the resources that Han Shuo had spent an enormous sum to acquire, the earth zombie was no longer just a simple zombie, but had simple, instinctual feelings.

    Now that Han Shuo had located the ces of extreme earth, wood, and water, he was also confidence in gaining all the materials that he needed through Phoebe¡¯s merchant guild. He¡¯d be able to refine the earth, wood, and water elite zombies. When these three elite zombies were formed, Han Shuo¡¯s personal strength would greatly increase as well.

    As long as he could find ces of extreme metal and fire as well, he¡¯d be able to put a frightful formation with all five elemental zombies together. He would have even more of a right to speak in this world after that.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t wake Gilbert when he saw all was functioning normally here. He returned soundlessly to the hotel in the Valley of Sunshine and sat cross legged on the bed, meditating. He rxed his entire body and slowly sank into meditation, not letting up on the slightest bit of time to increase his mental strength.

    Phoebe came over early in the morning with her hair tied up. Her long blue skirt made her appear even more elegant and graceful.

    She naturally tucked her hand into the crook of Han Shuo¡¯s arm as she walked over and tugged him outside, saying, ¡°Come on, let¡¯s keep shopping in the valley today and collect all the materials you need!¡±

    Han Shuo readily agreed. He¡¯d nned on collecting materials only for the wood elite zombie before, but now that he¡¯d discovered a ce of extreme water, he needed to start collecting the materials required for refining the water elite zombie as well. As it bordered three countries, the Valley of Sunshine saw an endless parade of merchants through its borders and all sorts of strange materials could be obtained here. Han Shuo and Phoebe did indeed locate many of the needed items through some patient searching.

    The noon sunlight filtered down from the sky into the Valley of Sunshine, basking the entire valley in its light. Its warmth was quitefortable, and Phoebe¡¯s hand started rubbing her stomach after they finished perusing the most recent shop. She turned to smile at Han Shuo, ¡°I¡¯m a bit hungry, let¡¯s go get some food.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re familiar with this ce and know where all the good food is. Just lead me to it!¡± Han Shuo responded with a smile.

    It was said that at certain levels of magical cultivation, cultivators could go without eating or drinking and just make use of the energy within their body to maintain their lives for a hundred years. They had no need for food to nourish their bodies. However, Han Shuo had yet to reach that stage and apart from nourishment, food was also an enjoyment to him.

    Phoebe led the way in the front as the two walked into a small storefront. A few one meter tall dwarves walked out from within and enthusiastically led them to their table.

    The shop wasn¡¯t too big and the decorations weren¡¯t that luxurious. There were only a few few simple chairs, but it was incredibly crowded. Some merchants wearing rich furs, with diamond rings sparkling on their fingers, sprawledzily over narrow chairs and tables, shoveling food into their mouths without a thought of their images.

    The two sat down in a quiet corner near the window. Phoebe didn¡¯t ask Han Shuo for his opinion before she said to a dwarf waiting on the side, ¡°The best food in the store!¡±

    The dwarf smiled faintly and bowed urbanely, then quickly left to busy himself.

    ¡°Dwarves are quite an odd race. Some of them are adept at forging weapons, others crafting beer. There are those who like cooking as well. Whenever they fall in love with a craft, they always bring about some surprises in their work.¡±

    ¡°The dwarves in this shop were from a remote mountain valley of the Kasi Empire. Their joy in life was to cook all sorts of delicious food. The dishes made by their hands are so tasty that it¡¯s hard to forget about them.¡± Phoebe smiled faintly and exined to Han Shuo.

    Havinge from another world, Han Shuo had grown up with the delicacies of Chinese cuisine. He¡¯d tasted the food of that world and had always felt that there was a world of difference between the food here and the illustrious history of food culture in China.

    To be honest, Han Shuo didn¡¯t truly believe that the food here would be that much more exquisite or tastypared to what he¡¯d had in hotels before, so he didn¡¯t hold too much hope and only went along with Phoebe¡¯s words with a smile.

    Business here was good. One could see from the numbers of customers and their identities that these high ss customers didn¡¯t disdain this ce because of its scale. From the way some noblewomen were eating, Han Shuo could see that they were greatly enjoying the food on their tes.

    As Han Shuo smiled and chatted with Phoebe, the little dwarf brought over two tes of odd looking food and ced it lightly in front of the two.

    It looked like a strange sort of meat that had been cooked to a bright gleam. An interesting smell wafted into Han Shuo¡¯s mouth and nose and rather surprised Han Shuo.

    Phoebe, in front of him, had already started digging in with a knife and fork in hand. It was apparent that she also greatly enjoyed the food. When Han Shuo cut into a piece of meat and ced it in his mouth. His brow suddenly uncreased as a delicious taste suffused his mouth. It was like a wondrous magic spell as the deliciousness of food continuously circted in Han Shuo¡¯s mouth and nose.

    His appetitepletely expanded, Han Shuo immediately dug in with a vengeance after tasting that small bite. He devoured the food like tigers or wolves swallowing their prey. Han Shuo belched when his stomach bulged. Heplimented, ¡°This really is something alright. No wonder there¡¯s so many people trying to squeeze into this small restaurant.¡±

    ¡°Friend, we meet again!¡± Florida walked in through the door at this time. He stood there in his white magic robes and looked coldly at Han Shuo.

    Phoebe was in the midst of enjoying her food when she lifted her head to look at Florida. She then hailed the dwarf and threw down a bag of gold coins on the table. She rose and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression was remote as he waved a hand, ¡°I have nothing good to say to him. You can exin things to him directly. If he keeps bothering you, I¡¯ll be happy to have a go or two at him then.¡±

    Having exchanged a few blows with him yesterday, Han Shuo understood that Florida¡¯s strength was mysterious and unfathomable. However, Han Shuo had both magical cultivation and necromancy magic, as well as the mysterious little skeleton and the almost formed earth elite zombie and three yin demons. All of thisbined made it so that he had no fear of Florida. As his magical cultivation improved each and every day, he had no need to lower his head in front of anyone.

    Phoebe started when Han Shuo spoke thus and then shed a smile, ¡°I understand.¡±

    She moved and walked over to Florida, cold arrogance recing her smile from a moment ago. When she reached the door, she pointed at Han Shuo and said to Florida, ¡°He¡¯s my boyfriend, I think we have nothing to talk about. Business is business, but you have no right to interfere in my life. I hope you won¡¯t disturb me in the future!¡±

    Although he was mentally prepared, Florida was still momentarily dazed when he heard these unkind words from Phoebe¡¯s mouth. The stiffness on his face faded away when he faced Phoebe, and he even spoke very gently. He stared tightly at Phoebe, ¡°Where does this kide from, what can he give you? Why choose him?!¡±

    ¡°Sorry, this has nothing to do with you. I hope you conduct yourself well!¡± Phoebe expression was remote and she also spoke frostily.

    Nodding, Florida barked out a ghastlyugh. He looked at Phoebe and then at Han Shuo in the distance, saying, ¡°Alright!¡± three times in a row. He then turned and left.

    ¡°Give me another te!¡± Han Shuo snorted coldly and then turned to the dwarf by his side with a smile.

 Chapter 199: A marvelous sensation

    Chapter 199: A marvelous sensation

    After filling their stomachs and walking out of the shop, Phoebe and Han Shuo shopped for a bit longer amidst all the various stores in the Valley of Sunshine. Phoebe then went to find the proper members of the Cairo mercenary band to negotiate for the shop that contained the ce of extreme water for Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo walked alone towards the shop in which Emily was located in, nning on asking Emily to investigate Florida¡¯s background.

    The same elderly man was still watching the door. This shop sold the armor in the style of Lancelot Empire knights, and because night had yet to fall, there were indeed a few wearing the armor of knights flipping through the wares located towards the front of the store.

    The elderly man indicated to Han Shuo with a slight smile when he saw Han Shuo walk in. He pointed to the backyard. Han Shuo understood and made a show of picking up a set of clothing, walking over to the door that led to the backyard and walked through it.

    ¡°How did you run afoul of Florida?!¡± Emily was noticeably taken aback when Han Shuo started asking her about Florida with a ruthless expression on his face.

    ¡°Apart from the information everyone knows about him, do you have anything else? I know the Dark Mantle must have some other information on him!¡± Han Shuo nced at Emily.

    Emily¡¯s brow creased faintly as she looked at Han Shuo. ¡°Just what is going on here?¡±

    Han Shuo recounted what had happenedst night, going over events simply. Emily then said angrily, ¡°I¡¯ve long since heard that Florida is arrogant and cocky. I hadn¡¯t thought that he would really be so domineering. The Valley of Sunshine isn¡¯t in the hands of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band anymore. How dare he act this way!¡±

    When he saw Emily also grow angry with him, Han Shuo¡¯s originally ticked off feelings were suddenly smoothed over. He then asked tenderly, ¡°So what is this Florida¡¯s background?¡±

    ¡°The Dark Mantle stronghold located here, within the valley, is to collect local information. Florida is neither of the Lancelot Empire nor the Kasi Empire. Hees from a vassal state to the Lancelot Empire, and his grandfather is grand magus Ferguson of the Church of Light. He has a lofty status in the Church and it¡¯s said that he has an extremely high chance of advancing to magister.¡±

    ¡°Florida grew up in the Church of Light and was personally taught by his grandfather. Apart from light major magics, he¡¯s also practiced many thunder magics. These are secrets that most don¡¯t know. Since his grandfather taught him personally and his potential is umon indeed, he became an archmage at a young age just three years ago. The Dark Mantle once kept an eye on him and felt that he would be one of the preeminent experts on the Continent.¡±

    ¡°However, he didn¡¯t join the Church of Light and suddenly left a few years ago toe to the Valley of Sunshine, joining the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band shortly afterwards. Because he had such great power, he quickly won chief Jason¡¯s trust in an exceedingly short amount of time. Jason even entrusted his only daughter to him. However, old Jason fell in battle against robbers once, and his daughter also went missing as well.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s said that this had something to do with Florida.¡±

    ¡°However, no one has solid evidence of this. Florida naturally took control of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band after Jason¡¯s death. There was a group that suspected Florida had something to do with this and left the band and the valley out of resentment and anger. This was how the Cairo mercenary band grew to strength.¡±

    ¡°At the same time, the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band has indeed developed well in Florida¡¯s hands these years, and it¡¯s gradually recovered all the strength that it¡¯d previously lost. It¡¯s now be Cairo mercenary band¡¯s greatest opponent, and they really might regain control of the valley under Florida¡¯s hands!¡± Emily contemted with a furrowed brow for a bit and conveyed all she knew.

    After Emily had finished sharing her knowledge, Han Shuo said lowly. ¡°A strong enemy indeed. This person¡¯s thoughts are vicious and devious to make a move even against his benefactor. These methods arepletely against the mission of the Church of Light. It looks like I¡¯ll need to be careful.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, the Valley of Sunshine is different from other ces and is under the jurisdiction of no country. Whoever has the most strength here is king. I know your strength is certainly not inferior to Florida¡¯s, but Florida has the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band in his hands and you will be hard pressed to fight against multiple enemies with your fists alone. I don¡¯t think he¡¯d make any moves in the valley thanks to the restraining pressure from the Cairo mercenary band, but you better not venture out easily so that you don¡¯t give him any chances to make a move!¡± Emily was obviously very cautious of Florida as she spoke bracingly to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I know!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s expression was calm as he responded gravely. He paused and said to Emily, ¡°Oh right, why hasn¡¯t ine brought Belinda after such a long period of time. I left a drop of blood essence in Belinda, so she won¡¯t be able to do anything at all. Has something happened along the way?¡±

    Emily shook her head with a wry smile after Han Shuo¡¯s words as she responded, ¡°I was worrying as well. ine should¡¯ve arrived in the valley by now. Has something really happened to her?¡±

    ¡°Forget it, I¡¯ll take a trip and search the roads around the valley for a bit.¡± Han Shuo thought for a bit and answered.

    ¡°No, you offended Florida so you probably shouldn¡¯t leave the valley for a while. He has great power in this area and if he knew that you left the valley, he would definitely try to make trouble for you.¡± A look of panic grew on Emily¡¯s face as she tried to stop Han Shuo.

    ¡°It¡¯s going to be fine. You know how perceptive I am. I¡¯ll leave immediately if I discover any signs of danger. In addition, I ced a drop of blood essence on Belinda and only I can sense her within a certain distance. I must take this trip in order to conclude this mission perfectly!¡± Han Shuo smiled dashingly and paid no heed to the threat of Florida at all as he spoke quite at ease.

    ¡°Since you insist, then let me go with you!¡± Emily spoke resolutely to Han Shuo when she saw that she couldn¡¯t sway him.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo rejected Emily¡¯s suggestion and turned to step outside. He spoke with his back to Emily, ¡°Emily, you should trust me and not try to take care of everything for me like I¡¯m a child. That isn¡¯t the kind of life I want. If Florida actually does act, then I¡¯ll actually be quite excited.¡±

    Emily had already started moving, but sighed when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s words. ¡°Alright, but you have to be careful. ine and Belinda¡¯s well being is nothingpared to your own. You must remember to protect yourself first.¡±

    ¡°I will!¡± Han Shuo responded.

    The sky was already darkening by the time he walked out of the store. The various shops on the streets were already closed at this time, and the bright, multi-colored lights of many ces of entertainment reced the setting sun.

    Han Shuo ignored all the calls and pleas for attention from the thickly made up faces around him, striding towards the valley border. Some procedures were needed in order to enter the valley, but none were needed to leave. No one asked Han Shuo anything, but the two Cairo mercenary band knights look at him with some surprise, seemingly perplexed why the two beauties weren¡¯t leaving with him.

    Han Shuo¡¯s sharp perceptions noticed that someone was surveilling him as soon as he had stepped out of the valley, but he paid them no heed. There was no need for further thought. It was either members of the Cairo or Rainbow Sickle mercenary band who were keeping an eye on him. It wasn¡¯t difficult for Han Shuo to shake them, of that he was extremely confident about.

    He¡¯d been walking slowly since leaving the valley, but abruptly picked up his speed. Han Shuo¡¯s body was like a shooting star as he streaked through the dusk sky. He¡¯d covered several hundred meters in a few breaths and pulled ahead of those keeping an eye on him.

    When that feeling of being watched disappeared, he suddenly took to the skies and flew close to the lush, silver trees, making for Valen City.

    He sent out a mentalmand as the demon infant¡¯s mystical power mysteriously circted. Waves of mystical power rippled out from the demon infant and covered the distance in front of him. There was a connection between the demon infant and the drop of blood essence. Han Shuo would immediately feel it if the drop of blood essence appeared.

    As he concentrated his attention on the demon infant and cast his senses out in an attempt to search for the blood essence, a marvelous feeling suddenly grew in his heart. He could suddenly feel the presence of any small orrge life forms. As Han Shuo inwardly started with shock, that sensation suddenly disappeared.

    He once again concentrated his attention and bent his mind to finely sense the feeling that had surged into his heart just now. He discovered that he could feel the lifeforms of the various bugs and small mammals that were hibernating around him. Although this sensation faded in and out and was rather blurry, he was still quite shocked by this.

    The demon infant suddenly shifted slightly at this point and the location of the blood essence was transmitted to Han Shuo in the next second. Overjoyed, he abruptly picked up his flight speed and sped to where that drop of blood essence was.

    When he reached his destination however, he saw ine fallen on the ground beneath arge tree, her body covered in blood. Her neck was bent at an unnatural angle, as if she¡¯d been forcefully choked to death by a strap. Her body seemed to have been hit by wind de spells as multiple bone deepcerations had sliced through her shirt. The blood was mixed into the umted snow and had melted into bloody water. It looked like she¡¯d died not too long ago.

    Suddenly, a strong sense of danger suddenly exploded in Han Shuo¡¯s heart. He started and immediately tried to back up rapidly from ine¡¯s body.

 Chapter 200: Dog eat dog

    Chapter 200: Dog eat dog

    An explosion rang out from ine¡¯s body as her profusely bleeding body suddenly exploded into bloody chunks as a momentous force vented in all four directions.

    Two finger bones and three arrows of blood made directly for Han Shuo with ferocious and frightening power. In that critical moment, the quickly retreating Han Shuo immediately chanted out the spell for the bone shield and a pile of stark white bones immediately formed a white bone shield a meter wide and 1.5 meters tall that floated in the air in front of Han Shuo.

    Cracking sounds rang out crisply as the white bone shield couldn¡¯t hold up beneath the tremendous impact it had just received. It exploded into numerous bone fragments that flew every which way, as splendid as fireworks.

    If it¡¯d been anyone else, they may not have sensed the danger lurking in ine¡¯s body and would¡¯ve been caught unaware by this attack. They likely would¡¯ve scrambled to face it. However, Han Shuo was perceptive and his thoughts moved quickly. A bolt of enlightenment had suddenly struck his heart and he¡¯d felt thetent danger in ine¡¯s corpse just now. This was why he¡¯d barely been able to react and retreat in time.

    Being in the true demon realm, Han Shuo¡¯s brain had undergone a savage bout of training and the speed at which he could concentrate and release his mental strength at a speed far faster than ordinary mages. This was why he could chant out the white bone shield spell with such miraculous speed in such a crucial moment.

    After retreating more than ten meters and the white bone shield now lying in broken fragments, Han Shuo had sessfully evaded this obviously premeditated attack.

    When he cast another nce at ine, there was nothing remaining apart from some fresh blood and chunks of flesh. A strong sense of bloodshed suddenly permeated through the air.

    Han Shuo suddenly sensed a stifling feeling, and he immediately knew that this was bad. He¡¯d been catching his breath but started circting the magical yuan in his limbs without another moment¡¯s thought.

    The trickles of magical yuan made a circuit of his limbs as it wiped away the scent of blood that Han Shuo had just sniffed into his lungs. Han Shuo had been feeling a bit woozy and tired, but now felt strength surge back into his limbs.

    A vicious n, a devious enemy!

    He went over what had just happened and was certain that the blood essence he¡¯d ced in Belinda¡¯s neck had been tampered with and transferred into ine¡¯s body.

    The enemy had then killed ine and used her body as bait, setting two traps to ensnare him. They¡¯d first used a spell simr to corpse explosion. ine¡¯s body had been filled with chemicals so that the moment her body exploded, her fresh blood, that wasced with chemicals, would be a second round of attack.

    Such cruel methods that made use of a corpse could only be the brainchild of those fervent cultists of the Cmity Church!

    Belinda must have been saved by others, or she would¡¯ve never awoken from the shackles of the blood essence through her power alone. Han Shuo immediately nned on leaving this ce when his thoughts traveled here, but two sets of footsteps started drawing close to where he was. One of them was heavy and the other soft. Han Shuo could judge from their weights that the oers were a male and a female.

    A thought struck him as his mind raced furiously. He was weighing up what was the most appropriate method and best timing to handle the two.

    However, he needed an opportunity to create the best timing! Han Shuo looked around and noticed that there was no good terrain to take advantage of, nor was there any good timing present. He couldn¡¯t help but sigh in his heart!

    Han Shuo¡¯s originally upright body then suddenly softened to the ground. When his eyelids covered the sharp look in his eyes, his heartbeat and breathing became umonly calm. It was as if he were in a deepa with no awareness whatsoever.

    Two people gradually drew close. Belinda¡¯s face was covered by her ck veil as usual. Her bright eyes stared tightly at Han Shuo without blinking.

    The other person was rather elderly as the tips of his hair was a gray brown color. Fine lines wizened his face like moats as he wore a thick, gray cotton jacket. He held onto a knobbed cane in his left hand as his gray white eyes seemed without energy. He walked slowly over, keeping an eye on the surroundings as well and paying attention not only to just Han Shuo.

    ¡°Wait, Belinda!¡± Just as Belinda was about ten meters from Han Shuo, the old man immediately called out with a low, raspy voice.

    Belinda had been staring intently at Han Shuo when she immediately stopped upon hearing this call. She turned in confusion and looked at the old man, ¡°What is it Master Edwin?¡±

    The man called Edwin was from the Cmity Church. His gray white eyes circled the surroundings again and again before finally settling on Han Shuo. He rasped out, ¡°There¡¯s no blood on his body and there are no obvious signs of injury. He likely wasn¡¯t injured by that exploding corpse. Judging from the distance, he may have fainted from the chemicals, but we need to be more cautious.¡±

    ¡°Then ording to your opinion, what should we do?¡± Belinda not only stopped approaching Han Shuo after these words but actually started backing up until she was side by side with Edwin.

    ¡°Shoot an arrow into him. If he¡¯s truly in aa, he won¡¯t have the slightest sensation of it!¡± Edwin responded.

    Han Shuo cursed inwardly. This old fart was devious and vicious alright! He coulde up with such a savage n. This man gave Han Shuo a strong sense of danger, but from his body¡¯s condition, Han Shuo was well aware that this person wasn¡¯t a swordsman or a knight. He must be a marvelous mage despite his decrepit body, otherwise he wouldn¡¯t be afraid to approach Han Shuo!

    Belindaughed softly and agreed when she heard Edwin¡¯s instructions. She took out a bow and arrow and shakily notched an arrow to the string.

    Belinda was noticeably not a marksman. Her two arms were shaking as her notched arrow shook in Han Shuo¡¯s direction as well.

    Because they were so close, Han Shuo could sense Belinda holding the bow and arrow even with his eyes closed. Her shaking hands made soft sounds when her arms brushed past her thick clothing. This made Han Shuo panic a bit as he weighed whether or not he should take the gamble.

    If he suddenly exploded into action, he wasn¡¯t confident in his ability to kill both of them given their distance from him and the fact that they were both on guard. Han Shuo didn¡¯t know anything about what methods this Edwin possibly had either, so it was very unwise to take this risk in attacking.

    Han Shuo hardened his heart in the moment that Belinda notched her arrow and decided to just take the hit no matter what. Han Shuo understood that they didn¡¯t seem to want to kill him from their conversation. This was what caused him to make up his mind.

    ¡°Do it!¡± Edwin¡¯s voice was low as he pressed Belinda.

    ¡°Alright!¡± Belinda agreed and released the arrow with a ¡°whoosh¡±.

    The arrownded in the snow by his left arm as Han Shuoy there nervously. It hadn¡¯t touched him at all! It looked like Belinda¡¯s shooting skills were beyond crap, which cause her to miss even at such a close range. ¡°No worries, we have plenty of time, you¡¯ll get the hang of it after shooting a few more arrows.¡± No emotion could be heard in Edwin¡¯s voice as he spoke slowly.

    His eyes lit up as he spoke and he focused on Han Shuo¡¯s body, wanting to glean some clues from it.

    ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll try a few more times!¡± Belinda responded and shot out another three arrows. All three of them missed yet again.

    Belinda was obviously a bit irritated as she huffed out lightly and took out another arrow. She didn¡¯t aim at all this time and shot it directly towards Han Shuo.

    However, the one arrow which she hadn¡¯t aimed at all actually turned out to be miraculously urate. It flew straight towards Han Shuo¡¯s calf and sank in with a small pfft. Bright red blood oozed out slowly from his pant leg.

    This kind of pain had long since be nothing to Han Shuo. His heart rate and breathing stayed the same as did the dull expression on his face, as if he¡¯d truly sunk into the depths of a druggeda.

    ¡°Things should be fine!¡± Edwin nodded and said lowly after observing for a while.

    Belinda and Edwin then rxed their guard against Han Shuo and approached his position. Han Shuo focused his concentration and prepared himself to kill at any second. He would make a move to immediately kill Edwin as soon as the old man approached. As frightening as Belinda was, she was only a threat in group fights thanks to the destructive powers of her golem. Han Shuo didn¡¯t fear her at all if they were to fight in a ce like this.

    Just as Han Shuo made his preparation, more sounds came from the distance. They quickly approached this area, surprising Han Shuo as he feigned death on the ground. He wondered who was arriving now.

    ¡°Chief, that person¡¯s here!¡± A loud yell suddenly sounded as a band of a dozen travelled swiftly through the frosty winter wind.

    ¡°To think he left the Valley of Sunshine of his own ord, he doesn¡¯t want to live anymore!¡± Florida¡¯s voice suddenly rang out in Han Shuo¡¯s ears,pletely contrary to his expectations.

    ¡°Chief Florida of the Red Sickle mercenary band!¡± Belinda suddenly eximed in shock.

    ¡°No matter who you two are, give me that kid immediately!¡± Florida announced peremptorily as usual when he arrived.

    Calm restored itself in the eyes of the man called Edwin. He flicked a nce at Florida and the others approaching, first cackling oddly and then rasping out in a voice full of hate. ¡°So you¡¯re Florida, it looks like I was right toe to the Valley of Sunshine this time!¡±

    As Edwin spoke, an immense pulse of magic suddenly emanated from his body. The presence of dark magic suddenly permeated the air towards Florida. Three enormous ck hands materialized in the air, mming down upon them with a ferocious force that could cleaving the heavens and ground open.

    All the trees and boulders exploded into dust within that area in the span of a second. Towering trees first creaked audibly and then fell beneath the onught of that force.

    The enormous dark magic spell, ¡°The Hand of Death¡±, had been released, and three ten meter wide hands had appeared. As the terrifying force covered the ground, four of the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries couldn¡¯t dodge in time and were pounded into bloody mincemeat.

    ¡°Did your grandfather Ferguson not teach you how to treat your elders?¡± Edwin¡¯s voice was suffused with a cruel smile as he spoke to Florida.

    Edwin and Belinda were already by Han Shuo¡¯s side now, and if he wanted to, he could make a sudden move and harm Edwin. However, judging from these enormous disturbances, Han Shuo understood that Edwin seemed to hate Florida even more. He was trying to kill him after just meeting the man, and his strength was much stronger than Emily, who was also a user of dark magic.

    On one side was a killer from the Cmity Church, on the other was enemies from the Rainbow Sickle. These two groups were both people that he would have to make moves against in the future, and it was all to Han Shuo¡¯s advantage that they had suddenly started fighting. As opposed to him making a move now, he might as well continue to y dead and have them dog eat dog.

    ¡°Just who are you?¡± Florida and the rest of the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries had swiftly taken refuge on higher ground and was looking back at Florida in shock.

    ¡°Heh heh, you may not know me, but your grandfather has known me for many years. Perhaps you¡¯ve heard of the name Edwin!¡± Edwin¡¯s voice still sounded rather nomittal.

    ¡°Grand magus Edwin of the Cmity Church, it¡¯s you old monster!¡± Florida cried out with shock as he swept his gaze over Han Shuo¡¯s body. He waved his hand, ¡°Retreat!¡±

    The Rainbow Sickle mercenary band memberspletely obeyed Florida¡¯s orders and retreated swiftly, obviously greatly afraid of Edwin.

    ¡°Want to run? It won¡¯t be that easy!¡± Edwin¡¯s voice sounded again.

    He quickly chanted a profound magical spell. Two enormous Grim Reaper des materialized in his left and right hands. They were evenrger than the previous hands of death. The sharp des flew quickly through the air and cut through towering trees like they were slicing through tofu. They broke apart into various chunks of wood after the de had passed through.

    The presence of death emanated towards Florida and the others. Two brawny and tall senior swordsmen nking Florida had no defense against this at all as they were carved into various pieces of meat by the des and scattered down onto the ground in a bloody mess.

    Such frightening effects made Florida and the others move even faster.

    The appearance of such an unlucky omen had obviously disturbed Florida¡¯s previouslyid ns. Even Han Shuo was quite surprised as the ghastly wails continued tomentate a y by y of the casualties.

    ¡°Tie him up first, I¡¯ll take care of these people!¡± Edwin turned to speak to Belinda when he saw Florida and the others fleeing towards the Valley of Sunshine for their lives. He took out a vial of powder and gave it to Belinda, ¡°Smear this on his throat, he¡¯ll answer all your questions as soon as he wakes up!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll make him pay!¡± Belinda responded resolutely.

    Nodding, Edwin turned to leave and nned to pursue Florida and the others. Han Shuo suddenly made his move as the Demonyer Edge howled through the air, shooting straight for Edwin¡¯s back.

    Han Shuo had nned on staying quiet for a while longer, but now that he¡¯d witnessed Edwin¡¯s strength and realized that he was departing his attack range, he didn¡¯t n on observing any longer. Han Shuo decided to use this opportunity to take him out first.

    Edwin was stronger than Han Shuo had assumed, as an instinctual response kicked in even when the Demonyer Edge pierced towards him at such high speed in this short distance. A magic shield-like ck metal red up, protecting the area that the Demonyer Edge was piercing towards.

    Pfft. Blood sprayed everywhere.

    The Demonyer Edge sank a few inches in after piercing through the thick magic shield and was then halted by an enormous force, unable to move a single bit forward.

    At the same time, Han Shuo leapt up like a panther from his original position on the ground, flying past Belinda to shoot towards Edwin with the speed of lightning, purple shellfire sparkling from his left hand as his hand formed a de, drawing it across Edwin¡¯s neck mercilessly.

 Chapter 201: Hurry up old dog!

    Chapter 201: Hurry up old dog!

    Grunting beneath his breath, the dark grand magus Edwin soared into the sky like the branch of a willow tree whipping into the air. As he did so, Han Shuo¡¯s sharp knife-like palm cut through the air.

    Stuck in Edwin¡¯s heart, the Demonyer Edge seemed to be under the draw of an immense force and forcefully flew out of his body, flying through the air.

    Fresh blood dripping from his back, Edwin¡¯s expression was an ugly grimace as he chanted a magic spell. Another hand of death appeared in the air and started hurtling down upon Han Shuo like a mountain. An enormous aura covered Han Shuo¡¯s body, making it very difficult for him to breathe.

    A thought grew in his mind as the Demonyer Edge flew towards Han Shuo like a rainbow. He suddenly activated the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡± and shot through the enormous aura surrounding him as the hand of death reached his head. He shot towards Florida¡¯s escaping group.

    When the second blow missed, Edwin distanced himself from Han Shuo. The speed at which he flew towards the horizon was clearly much nimbler than Archmage Emily.

    Perhaps Han Shuo would have be able to meet him head on if the opponent had been Florida. But Edwin was a dark grand magus. Such potential was most definitely sufficient to overwhelm Han Shuo. So once the situation turned ugly, he needed to withdraw immediately.

    ¡°Treacherous little brat. Your death is certain!¡± Edwin bellowed hoarsely from above. Unexpectedly, he ignored Belinda entirely as he shot straight towards Han Shuo.

    Defeating him was out of the question, but as for escaping... The flexibility and speed of the ¡°Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡± instantly disyed its power, gradually increasing the distance between Han Shuo and Edwin.

    Suddenly, a group of ten or so people appeared before him. Florida hovered midair, his long hair billowing. Below him, a few elite members of the Rainbow Sickle Mercenary Band sprinted through the thick shrubbery at lightning speed.

    This time, Rainbow Sickle¡¯s target had only been Han Shuo in their trip from the Valley of Sunshine. Therefore, they had only mobilized some experts. But who would have thought they would be so unlucky as to run into Edwin, someone with a grudge against Florida¡¯s grandfather, and fall into such a miserable state.

    Even though they were escaping in the same direction, Han Shuo¡¯s speed had clearly surpassed Florida¡¯s group. The fact that he would be able to catch up to these people had also been part of Han Shuo¡¯s ns.

    Laughing coldly, Han Shuo approached them from behind, using the flexibility granted by the Art to leisurely suspend himself on the bodies of Florida¡¯s group. With Han Shuo¡¯s chant,nce afternce of bone spears pierced towards Florida like arcs of electricity shing in midair.

    ¡°Damn it!¡± Florida, in the midst of running for his life, suddenly heard the whistling sounds of bone spears breaking through the air. He turned his head back and discovered a sinisterly smiling Han Shuo looking down at him with a cold smile. In that moment, Florida couldn¡¯t help but swear.

    A ball of eye blinding light shot out from Florida¡¯s staff. A ¡°Radiant sh¡± spell was flung out and pulverized the three bone spears. At the same time however, the difference between the levitation spell and Han Shuo¡¯s Art was made apparent. They had both chanted spells, but Han Shuo¡¯s speed hadn¡¯t been affected at all, whereas Florida¡¯s originally swiftly moving speed had decreased by a third.

    A strange wind sound quickly approached from the distance and Han Shuo understood that Edwin was swiftly catching up. A mocking smile hanging from his lips, Han Shuo once again slowed down and clung to Florida¡¯s trail like a ghoul. He chanted the bone spear spell again as another three bone spears flew out.

    Florida wasn¡¯t afraid of Han Shuo, but he was inordinately afraid of Edwin. If it hadn¡¯t been for Edwin¡¯s pursuit, Florida would¡¯ve absolutely stopped and brought his significant prowess to battle Han Shuo. However, he also obviously didn¡¯t want Edwin to catch up to him because of Han Shuo. Therefore, he could only continue his defense and reduce his speed again and again.

    ¡°Chief, we¡¯ll hold him off for you, you get out of here!¡± At this moment, some of the Rainbow Sickle experts out in front of Florida suddenly halted as one of them yelled loudly.

    They¡¯d all witnessed Edwin¡¯s strength just now. If they stayed, they might be able to hold back Han Shuo, but they¡¯d never be able to defend against Edwin. Speaking these words at this moment meant that they¡¯d already made their ns to die.

    ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll get revenge for you!¡± Florida was a ruthless person alright. Although he was a bit pained, he still decisively epted their suggestion and red ferociously at Han Shuo, then turning and dashing forward.

    Two crossbows suddenly locked onto Han Shuo as two mercenaries¡¯ sharp eyes gave Han Shuo a prickling feeling of danger. Two sounds pierced through the air as two bolts brought a terrifying air current with them. They shot towards him with a speed and uracy beyond Han Shuo¡¯s imagination.

    The quickly advancing Han Shuo had to rapidly back up. He didn¡¯t dare rush another step forward. In this process, some of the archers notched their bows and took aim at Han Shuo. Their skill was in stark contrast to Belinda¡¯s methods just now. Since Han Shuo had already taken to the sky, he was hard pressed to evade the danger from below and had to back up once again.

    Han Shuo hesitated and nned on immediately changing direction. At this moment, the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries beneath him suddenly started panicking. A milky white, respondent server aura suddenly shot out from their midst as Trunks appeared on the back of his manticore. He was waving his sword around with a cold expression and forced the mercenaries back so that they had no energy to spare for Han Shuo.

    ¡°Trunks!¡± Up in the air, Han Shuo was bbergasted by the disturbance below and he couldn¡¯t help but dive down to exim in joy.

    ¡°Fly through the air to keep harassing Florida. I¡¯ll handle these traitors on the ground who should¡¯ve died a thousand, ten thousand times! We¡¯ll chat when we get back to the Valley of Sunshine!¡± Trunks threw back his head and shed a brilliant smile. The charming, handsome Trunks was attacking the experts of Rainbow Sickle from the back of his manticore.

    ¡°Trunks, don¡¯t you bully others to the extreme!¡± The expert who had spoken before suddenly red ferociously at Trunks.

    ¡°Bully others to the extreme?! Haha! The old chief was so good to you and none of you guys said anything after that animal Florida took control. You just blindly followed behind him. How dare you say these words to me now!¡± Trunksughed as if he¡¯d heard something hrious, but his smile was even colder than the frosty night wind and his tone spoke of a hatred etched bone deep.

    Edwin¡¯s figure was drawing closer, drawing a coldugh from Trunks. Trunks lifted his head once again and urged Han Shuo on, ¡°Bryan, hurry and go. Take advantage of this opportunity to kill Florida!¡±

    ¡°Alright, that old monster behind us is a tough bird. Run away immediately if he draws near and don¡¯t meet him head on!¡± Although Han Shuo didn¡¯t understand why Trunks hated Florida that much, he guessed it must have something to do with the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band. The experts present here seemed to be acquainted with Trunks, and so this meant that there was some type of rtionship between them.

    Han Shuo realized that he wouldn¡¯t be able to measure up to Trunks¡¯ strong belief in him if he didn¡¯t immediately give chase. He darted through the air like lightning and shot for Florida. Edwin arrived shortly after Han Shuo¡¯s departure as well.

    He cast a nce down and didn¡¯t linger when he noticed that both Florida and Han Shuo were absent. He followed Han Shuo¡¯s trail and seemed to bepletely unconcerned with Trunks and those of the Red Sickle mercenary band below.

    Han Shuo had already gotten a taste of Florida¡¯s abilities earlier, he definitely wouldn¡¯t be able to live in peace if thetter didn¡¯t die. The ce of extreme water was located within the valley, so he needed to stay here for a while longer. If Florida didn¡¯t die, he¡¯d have no end of trouble in the future. So even if Phoebe hated him for it, Han Shuo needed to kill him!

    The flying art of a demonic cultivator enabled Han Shuo to slowly catch up to Florida when he circted his magical yuan to the utmost, even after lingering halfway.

    When the bone spears once again whistled through the air, Florida almost wanted to spit blood in his anger. He now knew that Han Shuo wanted to go down with him and have them both die to Edwin. In his irritation, he truly wanted to stop and fight Han Shuo to death.

    ¡°Just what do you want? When that old monster Edwin catches up to us, neither one of us will be able to escape!¡± Florida roared out furiously at Han Shuo, as the scene from earlier repeated again; Florida used the Radiant sh to hack Han Shuo¡¯s bone spears into pieces.

    ¡°Heh heh, it strikes my fancy today that I¡¯ll die with you!¡± Han Shuo had an incredibly refreshing and relieving feeling after venting the dejected feeling he¡¯d felt from being suppressed by Florida in thest two days.

    Even with Edwin catching up to them, Han Shuo was confident that he could make use of his magic to get away. With Han Shuo¡¯s understanding of mages, he could also be certain that Florida wouldn¡¯t be able to maintain flight for too long, and thus this was why he¡¯d done this.

    ¡°Crazy, a f*cking madman!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s words finally caused Florida to start cussing.

    Because Florida and Han Shuo¡¯s speed had decreased, Edwin¡¯s figure appeared from behind them at this moment and his odd cackling traveled to them first.¡±

    ¡°Hurry up old dog! I¡¯m waiting for you!¡± Han Shuo even had the time tough wildly and look back at Edwin, egging him on with his words.

    ¡°You better pray that I don¡¯t catch you, or I¡¯ll make you regret that you¡¯ve ever lived!¡± Edwin was absolutely incensed by the mention of ¡°old dog¡±. Even the injury on his back seemed to throb with more pain after hearing that.

    Han Shuo had long since pulled out the arrow that Belinda had shot into his calf, and this was when his durable body showed off its capabilities. His blood had stopped flowing out of the wound, and apart from some minor pain, there was no impact to Han Shuo¡¯s movements.

    When the three bone spears once again shot out, Florida had to reach out a hand and defend himself. Han Shuo made use of this time to release a dark mist spell. It was night to begin with, and there was no other light in the sky apart from a crescent moon. When the dark mist spell appeared again, it shrouded Han Shuo and Florida in a patch of darkness in which even one¡¯s own hand couldn¡¯t be seen.

    ¡°Damn it!¡± Florida emitted blinding light from his magic staff, but could only illuminate a small patch around him. He scrambled to defend himself against the bone spears and thereby decreased his flight speed even more.

    ¡°Kid, I¡¯ll take your life first to pay back some of your grandfather¡¯s debt to me!¡± Edwin had finally caught up to them, but Han Shuo slipped away like a bit of smoke and vanished in the direction of the Valley of Sunshine, leaving behind only Florida who¡¯d been obstructed by the three bone spears.

    Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t be so stupid as to conceal his traces in front of a dark grand magus. When the mental strength of a freak like this covered everything, even someone truly dead would be revealed to him. Therefore, Han Shuo could only use the advantage of his speed to leave this ce of danger as soon as possible and leave Florida behind to bring up the rear.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s figure slowly faded into the distance, the dark mist magic also started to dissipate. When Florida once again saw the clean moonlight reappear in the deste night sky, he was also greeted with the sight of Edwin, enraged to the point where steam was spewing from his face.

    ¡°In the name of the God of Light, bind all darkness, Shackles of Light!¡± Florida panicked when he saw Edwin and didn¡¯t think at all before he released the light magic spell, Shackles of Light.

    H hoops of light sparkled with clean, pure light and rolled beneath the bright moonlight, surrounding Edwin. The bands of light were filled with the purest of light elements and had an enormous restraining power.

    ¡°This little fellow has such a high grasp ofprehension in light magic at such a young age. He will surely be a thorn in the side of our Cmity Church in the future. It looks like I can¡¯t allow you to leave alive today!¡± When faced with the shackles of light, the dark grand magus Edwin neither panicked nor grew frantic, and his angrily scowling face from earlier regained its peace.

    He chanted out a dark magic spell and waved his staff at the approaching Shackles of Light. A boundless surge of energy seemed to want to rip into everything as it churned the two bands of light closest to him into pieces.

    Suddenly, the remaining bands of light all formed into one string as lightning started sparking and crackling all over the bands of light. The Shackles of Light had originally only be able to restrain enemies, but it had suddenly turned into an enormously strong killing machine in the span of a second and tried to churn Edwin into pieces.

    ¡°Heh, you¡¯ve got some skills alright to be able tobine thunder magic with the Shackles of Light.¡± Edwin eximed softly as he waspletely enveloped in the radiant shes of lightning and bright light.

    An inky ck magic shield covered Edwin, and three Hands of Death appeared in the air, grabbing the Shackles of Light. They pulled apart the bands of light with brute force and the violently sparking lightning found itpletely impossible to injure the Hands of Death.

    ¡°Pfft.¡± Florida spat out a mouthful of fresh blood and then ran blindly away, seemingly unwilling to spend another moment there.

    Melding together the light and thunder magic was obviously out of his control, and he¡¯d been hit with the bacsh of expending too much magic. That had resulted in immediate, significant injury. However, Edwin had easily broken through such a strong blow, disying that the differences in their strengths were indeed too hard to cross. Florida knew that he would be hard pressed to escape death if he stayed for another moment.

    Although Edwin had broken through Florida¡¯s spell, it had taken him some time to do so. When Edwin then cleared away the remnants of the magic, he discovered that Florida had once again disappeared.

    Florida was wavering through the sky in flight at this moment due to expending too much mental strength. However, the valley had finally appeared in front of him, and he¡¯d be able to make it to safety before long.

    No matter how much the Cairo and Rainbow Sickle mercenary bands were at odds with each other, the Cairo mercenary band still had to follow the rules of the valley. So once Florida entered the valley, whoever tried to kill him would face the attacks of all the assembled powers.

    Add to that the fact that most of the Rainbow Sickle band was stationed within the valley, Edwin would be able to do nothing to Florida once he made it inside.

    However, when he saw the border of the valley, Han Shuo¡¯s coldly smirking figure appeared at the same time and blocked the way that he needed to take, obviously not nning on letting him make it inside alive!

 Chapter 202: Iâ€™ll remember you

    Chapter 202: I¡¯ll remember you

    If a person expressed the attitude of wanting to kill you at all costs, then the only way for you to live was to kill him before he killed you!

    Han Shuo and Florida hadn¡¯t seen eye to eye from the very beginning, and the matter with Phoebe had magnified this enmity even more so. Not only had Florida expressed his desire to kill Han Shuo from the very beginning, he¡¯d also taken actual action. Han Shuo would naturally not sit there and patiently await his death.

    A day¡¯s worth of pursuit had now extended into the depths of the night. The bright moon hung high in the sky like a giant, a cold eye looking down on everything beneath it. Strong gusts of chilly wind shook the towering trees and blew away the thick snow cover on the ancient branches, the falling snow whispering in people¡¯s ears.

    Han Shuo was standing in the air, carrying the Demonyer Edge in his right hand with a cold expression on his face. His gaze stern and emotionless, he seemed to be a lofty mountain range obstructing Florida¡¯s path of hope.

    Florida only had the chance to live if he made it past Han Shuo!

    ¡°If you step aside now, I promise to never go up against you in the future!¡± Caught in the throes of a magical bacsh, Florida had greatly expended his energy in his desperate flight for life. His injuries were now severe and his strength far depleted. A tinge of resignation colored his words as he looked at Han Shuo.

    A charming smile was stered across his face, yet Han Shuo¡¯sugh was as cold as an icy cavern. He looked meaningfully at Florida and shook his head, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I think your corpse is much more reassuring than your promise!¡±

    When he heard those words, Florida knew that there was no way out for him. His face darkened as he said, ¡°My grandfather is the grand magus Ferguson of the Church of Light! There¡¯s nothing in it for you if you be enemies with me! Even if you can kill me today, my grandfather will never let you off the hook!¡±

    Even if Florida was injured, he still tried to create the illusion of strength with these words. But for Han Shuo, with his current strength, not only was he unafraid of Florida bringing out his grandfather to threaten him, he was now even more certain that Florida had nothing left in his tank Otherwise, Florida wouldn¡¯t have wasted all this time talking to him.

    ¡°If I don¡¯t kill you today, I¡¯ll face danger from both you and your grandfather. But if you¡¯re dead, I only need to face your grandfather. Therefore, go die!¡± His words icy, Han Shuo readied himself to kill.

    A pile of stark white bones appeared beneath the pristine moonlight as Han Shuo chanted. Gleaming coldly, the bones quickly assembled into a bone prison that was three meters wide and four meters tall, contracting rapidly around Florida.

    Han Shuo suddenly shot towards Florida with a merciless expression when the bone prison hadpletely formed, moving through the night sky like lightning.

    Even if his strength was greatly spent, Florida was still a light major archmage, particrly as he¡¯d also dual majored in thunder magic. Han Shuo had seen everything quite clearly in the distance when Florida had faced off against Edwin, and knew that his strength was quite frightening.

    Therefore, with Han Shuo¡¯s advantage in magical cultivation, the smartest thing for him to do was to close the distance between him and Florida. No matter how strong Florida was, Han Shuo was confident that he¡¯d be able to kill him if he was within closebat range.

    A light major spell suddenly exploded out with Florida as the epicenter. The eye piercingly strong light brought with it the pure, divine strength of light. The spell formed sharp ripples as it crashed onto the bone prison in front of him.

    Light major had always been a natural counter to necromancy magic. When the pure and divine strength of light collided with the bone prison, the originally gleaming white bones seemed to undergo a hundred years of corrosion as they started to crumble. The strong defenses had be so brittle that they wouldn¡¯t even be able to withstand the slightest blow, and so exploded into pieces when Florida struck fiercely with his magic staff.

    Although he¡¯d broken out of the cage, Florida¡¯s face was even more drained of blood than before. It was obvious that he¡¯d expended too much mental strength and had taxed his body beyond its limits. At that moment, Han Shuo suddenly appeared next to him, the Demonyer Edge sparkling with a murderous light. He shed at Florida¡¯s neck, utterly determined to end his life with one deadly strike.

    The magic staff in Florida¡¯s hand suddenly exploded with white light as an enormous power within suddenly erupted. Florida hurled his staff at the Demonyer Edge.

    A metallic ng rang out as the two connected, and the magical yuan infused Demonyer Edge ripped arge hole through Florida¡¯s staff of unknown materials. However, the power within the staff obstructed Han Shuo for a slight moment, making him falter involuntarily in the air for a moment.

    On the other side, frothy blood was now running down from Florida¡¯s mouth, trailing down his neck to dye his chest a vivid red. His handsome face was now as pale as paper and the blood by his mouth made him appear even more frightening. At this point, he wasn¡¯t so much flying to the Valley of Sunshine, but swaying his way to it instead.

    High quality magic staffs could store a portion of the caster¡¯s magic within it and release it at critical moments. Florida¡¯s actions just now had obviously been that. The magical elements within the staff had acted as a catalyst to cause an explosion and make Han Shuo pause for a second.

    By the valley¡¯s fence, the Cairo mercenary band¡¯s vice chief Harris seemed to have received some sort of message and was looking in that direction with some of his experts at his side. They had long since seen the battle going on outside, but was casting a dispassionate eye upon things and hadn¡¯t intervened.

    Everyone in the valley knew of the enmity between the Cairo and Rainbow Sickle mercenary bands. The Cairo mercenaries had an obligation to interfere as long as Florida set foot within the valley. However, Han Shuo and Florida¡¯s fight was taking ce outside the valley at the moment. Additionally, with Harris¡¯ hatred of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band, he likely was passionately wishing for Han Shuo to kill Florida.

    Pausing for a moment, Han Shuo saw that Florida was about to enter the valley. Behind him, Edwin had once again reappeared as well. Han Shuo immediately circted his magical yuan to its utmost and shot across the sky, leaving a smoke trail as he made for Florida.

    Suddenly, a fire dragon rose into the air and shot out from the valley¡¯s fence, churning towards Han Shuo. Han Shuo had wanted to kill Florida, but was forced from his path in order to evade. He first used the dark mist spell to create cover and then summoned a zombie to substitute for himself in the face of the fire dragon¡¯s wrath.

    Han Shuo looked down at the dark mist and noticed that a fire mage had appeared by the valley border. There was a rapidly approaching cavalry troop in the distance wearing the uniform of the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries as well.

    ¡°Damn it, why are they here?¡± Harris growled in anger.

    ¡°Chief, chief, are you alright?!¡± The Rainbow Sickle mercenaries immediately surrounded Florida when they drew nearer and asked anxiously.

    Florida was still suffering from immense shock and fright, and finally breathed a huge sigh of relief at the sight of his own people. He turned his head to point viciously at Han Shuo, ¡°Kill him!¡±

    Florida¡¯s body fell into a dead faint as soon as he¡¯d finished speaking. It looked like the trials he¡¯d suffered along the way had caused him great trauma.

    The appearance of the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries made Han Shuo understand that he no longer had any opportunities to kill Florida. However, since Florida had fainted, Han Shuo understood that even though he hadn¡¯t died, he was half dead anyways. It would take him a long time to recover from this.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t wait for the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries to make their move, but shot into the valley from above andnded a few meters in front of Harris.

    ording to the valley¡¯s rules, even if one had the ability to fly, one couldn¡¯t enter the valley using flight.

    However, Han Shuo¡¯s earlier fight with Florida had beenpletely witnessed by those in the Cairo mercenary band. The enemy of one¡¯s enemy was a friend, and so not only did Harris very magnanimously forgive Han Shuo¡¯s actions, but immediately gestured for his men to form a wall in front of Han Shuo.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, now that he¡¯s entered the valley, fights cannot ur in the Valley of Sunshine, or our Cairo mercenary band would intervene!¡± Harris¡¯ expression was calm as he grasped his double headed battle-axe tightly, radiating a willingness to explode into battle at any moment.

    Chief Florida¡¯s grave injuries were arge blow to the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries, not only in terms of strength, but also reputation. The eyes of the mercenaries all spat fire as they looked in Han Shuo¡¯s direction, but Harris had expressed his intention to abide by the rules, and so they were caught in a dilemma.

    ¡°Let¡¯s stabilize the chief¡¯s injuries first. They¡¯ll pay as soon as the chief is alright!¡± The fire mage who had attacked Han Shuo earlier cast a nce at Florida¡¯s face and suddenly opened his mouth to speak.

    This person likely had a very high position within the mercenary band as no one else said anything after his suggestion. They all red furiously at Han Shuo, leaving quickly with Florida in their care.

    ¡°Friend, you must be more careful. Florida will not let you off easily after he wakes up. Although our men patrol all over the Valley of Sunshine, we still can¡¯t fully prevent people from making some mischief. I think you know what I mean?¡± Harris¡¯ attitude was much warmerpared to the first time he¡¯d seen Han Shuo. The cold lines of his face had softened as he spoke a word of warning to Han Shuo.

    Florida¡¯s grave injuries greatly benefited the Cairo mercenary band, and as Florida¡¯s rival, Han Shuo was the Cairo mercenary band¡¯s friend. No wonder Harris¡¯ attitude was so friendly towards Han Shuo.

    The Cairo mercenaries were on patrol all throughout the valley, but their energy was limited;. It was impossible for them to keep an eye out all the time. When the fuming Florida woke up, he would absolutely pursue revenge at all costs. Even if he was in the Valley of Sunshine, he would likely pick the perfect time to make his move, so Han SHuo wasn¡¯t truly safe within the valley as well.

    Nodding, Han Shuo spoke with a slight smile, ¡°Thank you, it¡¯s not that easy to kill me either!¡±

    Edwin had also made it over at this time andnded on the ground near the border. His gaze fixed itself tightly on Han Shuo as he said, ¡°I want to enter the valley, what procedures do I need to take care of?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s head began to throb at these words. The arrival of such an old freak was an even greater threat to him than Florida. However, the Valley of Sunshine had its rules as well, and they wouldn¡¯t turn away such a god of wealth.

    ¡°Kid, you¡¯re called Bryan aren¡¯t you? There are fewer and fewer people who can inflict injuries on my body as the years go on. I¡¯ll remember you!¡± Edwin rubbed his aching back as hepleted went through the appropriate procedures. He threw a ghastly smile at Han Shuo, the various crevices and moats on his face scrunching together to appear quite stern.

    ¡°You should forget me instead, I don¡¯t want to see you again!¡± Han Shuo smiled ruefully in response, walking into the valley nursing a headache and thinking of how to prepare appropriate measures.

    Edwin came from the Cmity Church and had the strength of a dark grand magus. He was a significant force to be reckoned with across the entire Profound Continent. That such a character hadn¡¯t been immediately killed meant that he would have an almost unimaginable amount of trouble in the future. Han Shuo was now besieged with an enormous headache and wanted to leave the valley immediately. Everything could wait until he returned to the cemetery of death through the transportation matrix.

    The end of the night had arrived unknowingly and Emily was rather sleepy when Han Shuo returned to the Dark Mantle.

    When she saw Han Shuo reappear in front of her, the slightly confused look in her eyes slowly cleared up. She said gleefully, ¡°You¡¯re alright! Did you see Trunks?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo said with surprise, ¡°How did you know Trunks is here?¡±

    ¡°The Dark Mantle has a small intelligencework within the valley. Trunks entered the valley by himself shortly after you left. I know that the two of you are close, so I had a chat with him when he entered the valley. When he learned that Florida was making a move against you, he immediately left again and rushed in the direction of Valen City. I didn¡¯t go with him because I had to stay here and wait for news from my superiors.¡± Emily exined.

    ¡°ine¡¯s dead. I fell victim to a trap and almost got killed!¡± Han Shuo sighed and sat down.

    When she heard of ine¡¯s death, a sad expression appeared on Emily¡¯s beautiful face and she grew very quietquiet. After a while, she sighed heavily and softly said, ¡°Although big sister ine didn¡¯t know how to fight, she was very capable. She¡¯d operated her small hotel in Valen City for many years and supplied us with valuable advice many a time. She¡¯s helped us so much, but died because of us!¡±

    If Han Shuo and Emily hadn¡¯t appeared, and if they hadn¡¯t given Belinda over to ine¡¯s care in their rush, ine wouldn¡¯t have died either. It was because Han Shuo didn¡¯t have a deep rtionship with ine that he wasn¡¯t hit with any particrly tragic feelings. When he saw Emily¡¯s grief stricken expression, he patted her shoulder lightly and spoke a few words offort.

    Emily¡¯s mood improved as Han Shuoforted her in a low voice. It was then that she remembered the true task at hand, ¡°Just what happened?¡±

    Han Shuo recounted the events in great detail, making Emily shudder in fright when she heard of the dangerous happenings on this trip. She cheered for Han Shuo¡¯s escape and prayed for him during his dangerous encounters.

    Emily was still caught up in the shock from what had happened after Han Shuo had finished, and lifted his pant leg to see the now clotted wound. ¡°Don¡¯t take such risks in the future, if Belinda¡¯s arrow hadn¡¯tnded here, then you would¡¯ve been in a lot of danger.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, if the direction of her arrow was more dangerous, I naturally wouldn¡¯t have sat there just to be hit by it. I would¡¯ve immediately evaded and escaped as far as possible.¡± His actions had brought certain results in the end. Although Edwin¡¯s back injury wasn¡¯t as severe as Florida¡¯s, it would be enough to cause him grief for some time.

    ¡°We¡¯re in trouble now. Florida is already a tough person to shake off, and now we have Edwin to deal with as well. He has a high position in the Cmity Church and is quite vicious and brutal. You¡¯ve even hurt him, I don¡¯t know whether to be proud or worried for you!¡± Emily sighed with a look of worry on her face.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, if ites down to it, we can return to the cemetery of death. As long as we stay in a ce where no one can find us, we¡¯ll be able to defend ourselves or attack after we set up the transportation matrix!¡± Han Shuo held a rather optimistic view as he smiled tofort Emily.

    At this time, the old man looking after the Dark Mantle stronghold walked over and knocked on the door, ¡°Mistress Emily, chief Laureton of the Cairo mercenary band requests that you and master Bryan pay a visit.¡±

    ¡°Understood, Grandpa Camby!¡± Emily responded lightly and looked at Han Shuo. ¡°It looks like we may have allies!¡±

 Chapter 203: Forcing a fight

    Chapter 203: Forcing a fight

    The sky hadpletely brightened and the air had grown cooler. The sun, the size of a disc, was slowly rising in the sky. A resplendent sunrise stood tall and upright over the inky blue clouds and sparkled with a soft red light, ripping apart the clouds covering the heavens.

    Small groups of people traveled on the morning streets in the Valley of Sunshine as they wandered out of the dens of temptation from the various alleys off the streets, yawning with sleepy expressions. It was apparent that they¡¯d expended great effort on the bodies of womenst night.

    ¡°There are truly so many disgusting fellows with no taste!¡± Emily wasn¡¯t in the best of moods as she flicked a cold nce at those walking out of the alleys with untidy clothing, speaking with a look of distaste on her face.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t overly tired by the chase that hadsted all night. He looked around interestedly and didn¡¯t respond.

    ¡°Oh, right, Phoebe came to find youst night, I said you were out of business!¡± Emily drew her coat together tightly by the neck and turned her head to speak to Han Shuo.

    ¡°She didn¡¯t say anything?¡± Han Shuo started slightly and thought of what Phoebe had gone to do.

    ¡°No, she likely doesn¡¯t have anything to say to me!¡± Emily responded, paused, and suddenly drew close to Han Shuo in a gossipy fashion. She lowered her voice, ¡°Did you do... that to her?¡±

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo was all business as he said righteously. ¡°How could I do that? We¡¯ve only met for a few months. Am I someone in that much of a rush?¡±

    ¡°Pfft, you vited me the day you met me through raping me, you shameless viin!¡± Emily was quite disdainful of Han Shuo¡¯s response and snorted with contempt.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help butugh at her words. He didn¡¯t feel awkward, but rather retorted, ¡°Our circumstances were rather special. Besides, you were so alluring, how could my hot bloodedness withstand your temptations?¡±

    ¡°Viin! All you know is how to talk nonsense!¡± Emily¡¯s breath was caught in her anger, but was rather satisfied by his answer and she didn¡¯t continue the conversation.

    When he saw that some happiness was marking Emily¡¯s brows, Han Shuo knew that she wasn¡¯t actually angry. He suddenly thought of a problem and asked, ¡°Oh right, how did the Cairo mercenary band know of that ce? Is it that they know the Dark Mantle controls the shop?¡±

    Contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, Emily actually nodded her head. She exined when she saw his look of befuddlement. ¡°The Valley of Sunshine is different to a town or city of the Empire. The Cairo mercenary band holds control here. Since there is limitednd here, they¡¯ll thoroughly investigate anyings and goings. It¡¯s apletely unrealistic thing to want to stay here and remain a secret.¡±

    ¡°However, although they know that we¡¯re the Dark Mantle, they don¡¯t interfere with our operations at all, because we target those with designs against the Lancelot Empire and won¡¯t purposefully make trouble for them.¡±

    ¡°Bryan!¡± Han Shuo and Emily were walking towards to the Cairo mercenary band when they heard Trunks¡¯ voice at this moment.

    Han Shuo turned his head to see the manticore riding Trunks appear from the direction of the entrance to the valley. There were some indistinct traces of blood on him and the manticore. Behind them, the Rainbow Sickle experts had on looks of anger. It seemed like they¡¯de off worse in a fight.

    Han Shuo patrolled sharp eyed over Trunks¡¯ bodies, but didn¡¯t discover any traces of ripped clothing on him. It looked like the fresh blood on him and the manticore were from those of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band.

    ¡°Are you alright?¡± Han Shuo asked with a slight smile when Trunks had made it over on his manticore.

    ¡°Just a few cowardly traitors, how could they possible harm me? Oh right, how did it go on your side? Did you kill that pathetic Florida?¡± Trunks responded confidently and looked closely at Han Shuo.

    Spreading his hands out with resigned expression on his face, Han Shuo sighed, ¡°His men saved him at the entrance to the valley. However, I think he¡¯ll have to spend at least a month or two to fully recover from his injuries!¡±

    ¡°Haha, that¡¯s good enough. I came to the Valley of Sunshine for his life this time, and it looks like you¡¯ve already done half the job for me, I thank you!¡± Trunksughed heartily and then looked back at the Rainbow Sickle members behind him with a coldly imposing expression. ¡°Traitors, go back and tell Florida that I, Trunks, have returned again. I must take revenge for Annie this time, he¡¯ll die in my hands!¡±

    The Rainbow Sickle mercenaries all had looks of hatred and anger when they heard these words, but they seemed to know that Trunks wasn¡¯t someone to be trifled with. They only snorted coldly a few times and circled past Han Shuo and the others, moving towards another direction.

    ¡°Trunks, why are you here, and what enmity do you have with Florida?¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but ask at this point.

    The merchants had already awakened on the streets of the valley and the streets began to bustle a bit. Trunks looked around with a slightly dismal expression, saying, ¡°This isn¡¯t a ce to speak, let¡¯s find a ce where we can chat and I¡¯ll tell you in greater detail!¡±

    ¡°Alright!¡± Han Shuo nodded.

    ¡°Wait, Laureton of the Cairo mercenary band has reached out to us. Why don¡¯t you have a good chat after we return?¡± Emily couldn¡¯t help but speak up in reminder when she saw that Han Shuo and Trunks seemed to want to immediately find a quiet ce to chat.

    Han Shuo only reacted after Emily had spoken and said to Trunks apologetically, ¡°Laureton of the Cairo mercenary band sent people to find us early this morning, asking us to pay a visit. Why don¡¯t we chatter?¡±

    Nodding understandingly, Trunks walked side by side with Han Shuo and said dashingly, ¡°Let¡¯s go, I happen to know Laureton as well, let¡¯s go together.¡±

    ¡°You know him?¡± Han Shuo started and asked Trunks with surprise.

    ¡°Of course, I spent some time in the valley back in the day and I know many people here!¡± Trunks responded matter-of-factly. Emily revealed a surprised expression and looking thoughtfully at Trunks.

    There were no established streets of shops within the valley, just a few soaring cliff faces and some towering trees that blocked the sky a bit. Trunks seemed very familiar with this area as he led Han Shuo and Emily inside.

    ¡°The terrain is quite precarious within the depths of the valley, but there¡¯s a vast expanse of ins after making it through a narrow tunnel in the cliffs. The strongest power within the valley has always lived there. It used to be the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band living there a few years ago, if it wasn¡¯t for Florida¡¯s evil scheme in killing the old chief, the Cairo mercenary band can only live else where at this moment!¡± Trunks started introducing the area around them as they walked.

    There were members of the Cairo mercenary band standing guard at certain intervals along the path. However, the distance between the guards were a bit far away and they weren¡¯t afraid of others hearing their words.

    ¡°Right, Trunks, just what kind of enmity is there between you and Florida?¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but ask when he saw that the surroundings were quiet enough.

    ¡°I was actually part of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band to begin with, and I was a senior swordsman then. The old chief had always taken care of me and the chief¡¯s daughter Annie treated me like a brother. I was veryfortable in those days until Florida appeared. The young Florida brought with him a dazzling aura and enjoyed special treatment as soon as he joined. Not only did the old chief value him highly, but even Annie quite admired him. I myself had good rtions with him as well.¡±

    If you¡¯re not reading this on vretrantions, then this chapter has been stolen.

    It costs nothing to support the original trantor.

    So why support theft? It¡¯s incredibly demoralizing to the trantor.

    ¡°However, Florida¡¯s goal ining to the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band was to fully control it. Even though the old chief had already given Annie over to his care, but he still felt that the old chief had too many days in front of him. He colluded with robbers and revealed our movements to them, causing great losses to the band. The old chief died when surrounded by the robbers, and Annie vanished as well. It¡¯s likely that she met with a bad downfall as well.¡±

    ¡°I was lucky enough to escape and personally witnessed the conversation between Florida and the head of the robbers. That was when I understood everything. From that moment forth, I made up my mind to get rid of Florida sooner orter. Sadly, when Florida took control of the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries, he also invited a source of power from the Church of Light and consolidated his influence over the situation in an exceedingly short amount of time, thoroughly grasping the mercenary band.¡±

    ¡°I was only a senior swordsman then and attempted to assassinate Florida with some injured mercenaries loyal to the old chief. We ended up be thoroughly defeated and fleeing for our lives. Many of my closest friends died in that battle. I entered the Dark Forest to train myself, nursing the determination to take revenge. I waited for three years, and when I heard that the fight over who is the strongest in the valley was about to take ce, I knew that Florida is one who is unwilling to be left out. He will certainly contend with the Cairo mercenary band. I think this is a chance, and so I¡¯vee back!¡± Trunks distantly regaled the tales of times gone by as they walked.

    His expression was very remote from beginning to end, as if describing something that had nothing to do with him. However, as the audience, Han Shuo and Emily could discern from the events themselves the endless hate deep within Trunks¡¯ heart.

    When Trunks had finished, Han Shuo looked deeply at Trunks and shed a brilliant smile, ¡°It looks like we can team up again, I think Florida is dead without a doubt this time!¡±

    ¡°Of course! He¡¯s definitely going to die.¡± Trunks said confidently, and then looked at Emily interestedly, switching his gaze to Han Shuo afterwards. He asked a bit oddly, ¡°And what¡¯s the deal with the two of you? If I recall correctly, thisdy was captured by you, but why are the two of you walking together now?¡±

    Chuckling heartily, Han Shuo winked at Trunks and said, ¡°Sometimes, it¡¯s an easy thing for enemies to be friends, particrly between men and women!¡±

    ¡°I understand, haha!¡± Trunks burst outughing and nodded in understanding.

    ¡°Two silly fellows!¡± Emily was a bit angered and embarrassed by their words. She rolled her eyes at them and huffed.

    They¡¯d passed through a narrow tunnel as they chatted, arriving in an open in. ck boulders were in abundance here, and many tall buildings had been erected. These buildings were neither exquisite or beautiful, they were just all extremely practical. They seemed durable, sturdy, and would hold up well beneath ramming.

    There was arge parade ground on the way to the buildings and several muscr mercenaries were practicing with various weapons. Some mages were releasing spells in a dense forest not too far away, and there were others meditating in the distance.

    ¡°This ce isrge enough and the buildings sturdy enough. Because there¡¯s only one path leading here, it¡¯s very safe, and has always been the valley¡¯sst line of defense throughout the years.¡± Trunks kept exining on the way over here.

    ¡°Eh, Trunks, what are you doing back here?¡± Harris of the Cairo mercenary band was standing on the parade ground in great spirits, seemingly waiting for Han Shuo and the others. He was quite surprised to see Trunks and couldn¡¯t help but call out.

    ¡°Harris, long time no see! You look even more fierce now! But Florida is still thriving throughout these years, it looks like you didn¡¯t get your revenge!¡± Trunks spoke to Harris from afar with some mockery on his face.

    ¡°Humph, you also fled with severe injuries, what right do you have to talk about me?¡± Harris¡¯ expression was stiff as he said irritably.

    ¡°Forget it, I have nothing to say to you. Let¡¯s go, take me to Laurenton!¡± Trunks frowned as he twitched his lips, urging Harris to lead the way. Harris led the three of them through the parade ground to a tall building. Rumbling crashes traveled form the inside of the building, and the three of them were greatly surprised by the scene in front of them when they walked in.

    A bald, fierce man about two meters tall was wearing only a pair of shorts. The muscles of his naked upper body were raised upwards, each as tough as iron ore. The blood vessels over his body throbbed as they were filled with frightening explosive power.

    There was a ck boulder the size of a small mountain on his back. It was three times the size of him as he stood shouldering the boulder. He backed up rapidly so that his body sent the boulder crashing against a stone pir that was as thick as three people wrapping their arms around it.

    Sweat flowed like rivulets down the lines of his muscles as his dark skin sparkled with healthy vigor. His gleaming head didn¡¯t have a single strand of hair on it. His body trembled continuously amidst the thunderous collision sides, and the entire building shook from the violent impacts, making one worry that it would copse at any time.

    After Han Shuo and the others had arrived, he collided five more times before finally throwing away the boulder on his back away to the side. The ground trembled like an earthquake had struck it, and the thunderous roaring sounds suffused the building.

    He raised his head and focused his eyes in their direction. A strong bout of forceful presence charged towards Han Shuo. Han Shuo¡¯s heart couldn¡¯t help but seize a bit, seeing how strong this person¡¯s body was. He had used only external training methods to train his body to the point where it naturally produced such a thick, forceful presence. This fully exined the frightening aspects of this person.

    ¡°Trunks, what are you doing back here?¡± A strange light shone in the big man¡¯s eyes as he looked askance at Trunks.

    ¡°Long time no see Laurenton, it looks like your physical body has almost been trained to the utmost. You could be berserk twice over previously. It looks like you¡¯ve improved even more. I wonder if you can be berserk thrice over to reach the legendary third realm of the berserks?¡± Trunks revealed an interested expression as he stared at Laurenton.

    Grinning oddly, Laurenton didn¡¯t respond to Trunks¡¯ question and switched his attention to Han Shuo. ¡°You¡¯re the fellow who almost killed Florida?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo smiled faintly. ¡°That¡¯s right, what might Chief Laurenton be summoning me for?¡±

    ¡°I want to discuss a spot of business with you, but you need to eat one of my punches first so I can measure up your strength and see if you¡¯re worth me handing over that shop to you!¡± Laurentonughed loudly as a fist the size of a fan came crashing down on Han Shuo with a fierce, dominating aura.

    Han Shuo was slightly startled and realized that this punch epassed a berserk force when it arrived in front of him. This greatly shocked him, and what was even more surprising was that when this strength surged forward, it blocked off all his avenues of retreat, making it so that he couldn¡¯t dodge at all.

    Han Shuo was struck dumb with amazement as he immediately focused his concentration and deployed his magical cultivation to the maximum, nning on directly taking this punch.

 Chapter 204: My own power

    Chapter 204: My own power

    An iron fist swung over with the momentum of wanting to cleave through mountains and split open rocks. The strong force rippled audibly through the air as an unbounded dominance spilled forth like the tides, making Han Shuo¡¯s hairs stand on end.

    Han Shuo took a deep breath in and circted his magical yuan to his right hand, deploying his magical cultivation to its extreme and turning his hand into the color of ck jade. His very bones seemed to be made of ck jade as his hand sparkled with a faint light. A cloud of purple magic circted in the palm of his right hand, appearing as spellfire.

    Trunks and Emily had been shocked by the sudden development and was about to intervene when they saw Han Shuo¡¯s right hand suddenly change. They all stood there, bbergasted, and didn¡¯t say a word.

    After his hand had changed, Han Shuo suddenly shot out from his defensive position at an unparalleled speed. He then pulled his right hand back and materialized a purple-ck streak of lightning, smashing it into Laureton¡¯s oing punch.

    A thunderous crash that was even louder than when Laureton had crashed into the pir with the boulder sounded, the collision reverberating throughout the entire hall.

    An overwhelming force traveled up Han Shuo¡¯s right hand into his body. The strength was beyond his imagining. If it wasn¡¯t for the perverse level of durability his body was at, his right hand would¡¯ve absolutely shattered and exploded from this touch.

    Even so, his body couldn¡¯t help but fly backwards and crash into a ck boulder in front of the hall doors with an audible crack. His body sagged to the ground, as chief Laureton stood firmly rooted like a boulder. However, an icy cold presence spread from his fist throughout his body and froze the small trickles of sweat running down his body into gleaming, translucent pearls. White smoke rose from his body as the frosty air covered him.

    ¡°Are you alright?¡± Emily shed over to Han Shuo in the blink of an eye, reaching to help him up.

    His arm was numb from his fist up to his shoulder, and it was still trembling lightly even now. Han Shuo panted heavily as his heart filled with shock, full of astonishment at Laureton¡¯s strength.

    ¡°Laureton, it looks like your strength has improved once again. Don¡¯t think I can¡¯t tell even though you¡¯ve held back some of your strength. You may have already materialized the level of being berserk thrice over!¡± Light danced in Trunks¡¯ eyes as he stared at Laureton¡¯s body.

    Han Shuo had been about tofort Emily when he heard Trunks¡¯ words. The shock in his heart grew even greater. From Trunks¡¯ words, Han Shuo knew that perhaps that blow just now may have been fierce, but it still hadn¡¯t been Laureton¡¯s true strength. Based on the domineering strength from that blow, Han Shuo was certain that Laureton wasn¡¯t any less inferior to earth rider rk or swordmaster Phoebe.

    This wasn¡¯t even his true strength! If Laureton truly brought his full strength to bear, then it¡¯d be even more astonishing. No wonder he was the chief of the Cairo mercenary band and controlled the order of the Valley of Sunshine. Ice had covered Laureton¡¯s body when cracking sounds suddenly sounded over his body. The frozen beads of sweat scattered down from his body down to the floor like gleaming pearls, shattering into shards of ice when they came in contact with the stone ground.

    Shivering involuntarily, Laureton sneezed and wrapped a fur cape around himself tightly, then looking at Han Shuo with surprise. ¡°What kind of technique was that? I couldn¡¯t sense any fighting aura or magic, but why did it have the power of the twobined?¡±

    ¡°I couldn¡¯t feel any ripples of fighting aura or magic from you either, but your strength isn¡¯t any less than a swordmaster and his fighting aura. This is nothing to be shocked about!¡± Han Shuo shrugged and responded with a smile.

    ¡°Us berserkers have a special way of training, and a very specialized method at that. You¡¯re not a berserker, how can you do this? This is truly very strange!¡± Laureton looked askance and shook his head.

    ¡°Alright, I think this wasn¡¯t your point in inviting us here?¡± Han Shuo walked leisurely to the front and sat down on a stone seat not too far from Laureton, also calling out to Trunks and Emily as well.

    After the blows they¡¯d just exchanged, Han Shuo understood that Laureton was likely stronger than himself. The Cairo mercenary band¡¯s greatest enemy currently was the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries, so Laureton definitely hadn¡¯t invited them toe so he could act against them. Therefore, Han Shuo was quite at ease.

    Emily and Trunks also walked over carelessly when they saw Han Shuo so rxed, pulling over a stone stool each for a seat.

    ¡°Harris, what¡¯s Florida¡¯s condition now after returning to the Rainbow Sickles?¡± Laureton revealed an approving look at Han Shuo and the others¡¯ nonchnce and lifted his head to look at Harris.

    ¡°Florida suddenly fell into aa at the door in front of the valley and was brought back to the Rainbow Sickles. ording to our reports, he should still beatose, so we don¡¯t know his condition right now either.¡± Harris disyed an appropriate amount of respect in front of Laureton and responded quickly.

    Nodding, Laureton rubbed his gleaming, bald head and seemed to contemte something. He looked at Han Shuo after a while and said loudly, ¡°Your strength isn¡¯t bad, I¡¯d hoped that you would consider joining our Cairo mercenary band, but since you know Trunks, you likely won¡¯t be willing to.¡±

    ¡°I know Florida¡¯s strength, and I tested you just now. I think it¡¯d be impossible for you yourself to harm him to that degree, not to mention that he had some experts by his side. Can you tell me what happened?¡±

    ¡°An enemy helped me. Edwin, who entered the valley today, happened to be enemies with Florida¡¯s grandfather. Florida bumped into Edwin along the way and the two fought first, I just happened to take advantage of the situation.¡± Han Shuo responded honestly since the truth was easy enough to decipher, and there was nothing worth concealing about it.

    ¡°Edwin... Dark archmage Edwin of the Cmity Church¡ªthat old monster has entered the valley?¡± Laureton was startled and he turned his head to look at Harris.

    ¡°That would be him. Another masked woman entered the valley after a while and is staying with him for now.¡± Harris nodded and responded to Laureton.

    ¡°This person is very difficult to handle, he¡¯s your enemy?¡± Laureton smoothed over his gleaming head again and appeared a bit troubled.

    ¡°Laureton, I haven¡¯t heard that you were afraid of anyone all these years. Can it be that an old man is frightening you? It looks like the stronger you are, the more cowardly you¡¯ve be!¡± Trunks seemed to know the meaning behind Laureton¡¯s head rubbing and couldn¡¯t help but mock him.

    ¡°I¡¯m not afraid of him, I¡¯m afraid of the Cmity Church behind him. This is the most evil cult in all of the Profound Continent, and they never adhere to any rules or logic. Their power is incredibly vast as well. They won¡¯t rest if you provoke them, and all the kingdoms on the continent are quite scared of them, not just our Valley of Sunshine.¡± Laureton rubbed his head and spoke with some worry.

    The Cmity Church was the disaster and nightmare of the entire continent. They nursed some unreasonable, fervent ideals and tried to use their power to destroy all those who didn¡¯t agree with them. Even the Lancelot Empire would react as if facing an oing enemy when they heard of the Cmity Church, not to mention a mid sized mercenary band. From this point alone, it was apparent to see that the Church was very terrifying indeed.

    ¡°Edwin is my enemy and Florida¡¯s as well. Now that he¡¯s within the valley, I think he¡¯ll be making a move!¡± Not much expression could be seen on Han Shuo¡¯s face as he opened his mouth to speak dispassionately.

    ¡°I¡¯ve heard that Miss Phoebe of the Boozt Merchant Guild is buying a shop for you. That shop is in a forbidden zone within the Valley of Sunshine. It¡¯s rumored that it¡¯s been cursed by an evil god. Any who¡¯ve bought that shop in recent years have all died from having their blood drained. Do you really n on buying it?¡± Laureton didn¡¯t keep asking about Edwin as he raised the next topic of interest.

    ¡°Indeed, I¡¯ve never believed in any curse from an evil god. I hope chief Laureton will sell that shop to me?¡± Han Shuo admitted and responded.

    ¡°Bryan, why do you want that shop? I¡¯ve heard of that ce as well. Many died there when the Rainbow Sickles were in charge. We even made an investigation once, but found nothing. That¡¯s an unlucky ce, don¡¯t take that risk!¡± Trunks was quite startled when he heard this and immediately turned back to frown at Han Shuo.

    Emily was also startled. She turned to fix her stare on Han Shuo. ¡°No, don¡¯t take the risk! I¡¯ve heard of that ce too, there¡¯s an incredible curse there. You can¡¯t take that!¡±

    This chapter has been stolen if it¡¯s not on vrenovels. Don¡¯t support theft.

    ¡°There are still some unimed shops within the valley. I just want to know, why that one?¡± Laureton obviously didn¡¯t care about Han Shuo¡¯s wellbeing. He only wanted to know Han Shuo¡¯s motivations, which was why he was questioning Han Shuo.

    ¡°I have noment about this, why I hope you can give the shop to me. I¡¯ll pay you a reasonable price!¡± Han Shuo could understand from Laureton¡¯s words that Phoebe hadn¡¯t seeded yesterday. Laureton looked all brawn and no brains, but Han Shuo knew that he certainly wasn¡¯t as simple as he appeared from the surface. If he was, he would¡¯ve sold that cursednd to Phoebe a long time ago.

    ¡°Of course, I have no right to interfere in your personal matters, but I have power over the shop in the valley. I have the authority not to sell it to you.¡± Laureton put on a dashing air andughed heartily.

    Taking a deep breath in, Han Shuo said, ¡°Alright, I won¡¯t push it if you don¡¯t want to sell it to me. I think we can leave if there¡¯s nothing else. It looks like there¡¯s not much left for us in the Valley of Sunshine, we should be leaving now!¡±

    ¡°Perhaps you do need to leave, but Trunks will likely stay. Heh heh, is that right, Trunks?¡± Laureton looked at Trunks with a look of confidence on his face.

    Snorting coldly, Laureton had indeed touched up on a matter important to Trunks as thetter threw out a ferocious re.

    Han Shuo was absolutely confident in obtaining the ce of extreme water. He¡¯d pretended he was going to leave only because he wanted to haggle with Laureton. However, it¡¯d seemed like Laureton had seemed to understand something and had seized on Trunks¡¯ weak point.

    Laureton had been observing Han Shuo and Trunks¡¯ expression since they¡¯d walked in and was certain that they had a deep friendship. When he¡¯d tested Han Shuo, Laureton had mentioned the matter of the shop. Han Shuo had then taken out his full strength in response. This made Laureton understand that Han Shuo cared a great deal about this shop.

    ¡°I said in the very beginning that I wanted to talk about a spot of business with you. I tested your strength just now, you do indeed have the right to sit down and talk with me. Now with Florida in the mix, this matter will be a bit easier to handle. This is a win win situation, I wonder if you¡¯re interested?¡± Laureton waspletely unafraid that Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t ept as he chuckled.

    ¡°Speak, what kind of business?¡± Han Shuo sat downzily on the chair and flicked a nce at Laureton.

    ¡°Very simple. You continue about your business, which is to kill Florida. Our Cairo mercenary band will supply intelligence and can also guarantee that the Rainbow Sickles won¡¯t send forth their troops against you. After the deed is done, you can get that shop for free and Trunks will have gotten his revenge. There will also be one less threat to us. Isn¡¯t this great joy all around?¡± Laureton raised a very alluring proposal. It seemed like a win ¨C win ¨C win no matter how one looked at it, with no one being the worse off.

    However, Han Shuo still didn¡¯t immediately agree to it. Rather, he remained silent for a while and suddenly said, ¡°You need to provide men as well to help us handle Edwin. Otherwise, our safety isn¡¯t guaranteed with this person around.¡±

    ¡°Friend, don¡¯t ask for too much. Actually, if we go find Edwin, we may have a better partnership effect with him.¡± Laureton shook his head and declined with a darkened expression.

    ¡°Alright, then go cooperate with Edwin!¡± Han Shuo spread out his hands and couldn¡¯t seem to care less.

    The Cmity Church wasn¡¯t made of kind people. Anyone who cooperated with them had to worry about going up in mes, particrly as Edwin was a dark archmage. If Laureton cooperated with him, it wasn¡¯tpletely assured that Laureton could maintain control over the situation.

    In addition, the Cmity Church had always been an organization on the continent that was hated by men and gods alike. If the Cairo mercenary band cooperated with Edwin, this would be a lethal blow to their reputation if this matter was leaked. All of the merchants within the valley would surely be incensed then and the Cairo mercenary band¡¯s position within the valley would be subject to great challenge. Han Shuo had said this because he¡¯d deduced this point.

    ¡°We can¡¯t help you fight Edwin as it¡¯s not a wise move to offend them for Florida¡¯s matter, but we can use our advantage in the valley to supply you with intelligence of Edwin¡¯s movements. We¡¯ll tell you in advance no matter where he wishes to go. This way, your safety will increase as well. This is the best we can do, otherwise we really have no deal!¡± Laureton said slowly.

    ¡°Alright, then it¡¯s settled!¡± Han Shuo understood that this was the most that Laureton could do. The threat from the Cmity Church was so great that the Cairo mercenary band wasn¡¯twilling to make enemies of them.

    ¡°Very happy to be working with you. If you¡¯re willing, please stay for lunch first!¡± Laureton seemed to be in a great mood having settled the matter and he made this suggestion with a heartyugh.

    ¡°No thanks, we have other matters to discuss.¡± Han Shuo demurred and then walked out with Emily and Trunks.

    ¡°Bryan, are you familiar with Miss Phoebe of the Boozt Merchant Guild?¡± Trunks¡¯ expression was a bit strange on the way back and he suddenly stopped in a quiet corner to ask Han Shuo.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°That¡¯s right, our rtionship is very good. She¡¯s my girlfriend, what of it?¡±

    Trunks¡¯ handsome face revealed a strange light to it beneath the rays of the sun. He looked deeply at Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan, look. The Valley of Sunshine is a marvelous ce. You can start your own power if you have enough ability and if we develop using the Valley of Sunshine as our center of operations, we can have our own faction as well.¡±

    ¡°You have Miss Phoebe as your friend, and so you¡¯ll definitely have enough gold. I have some seasoned mercenaries on my hand. We can absolutely use these resources to form our own mercenary band and form our own power. If we hold greater power in our hands, we¡¯ll be able to obtain more and won¡¯t have to be restrained by others anymore.¡¯

    ¡°Honestly, with Lauren¡¯s strength, he doesn¡¯t need to fear that old monster Edwin. Add to that his Cairo mercenary band, it¡¯s not difficult if he wants to kill Edwin. He fears the Cmity Church behind Edwin. He¡¯s also on his guard against Florida not because of his own strength alone, but the Rainbow Sickles that follow him as well.¡±

    ¡°After all, one person¡¯s strength is insufficient to content with a faction¡¯s. As long as we work hard, with thebination of our advantages and the peculiarities of the Valley of Sunshine, we can absolutely form an independent power. This way, no matter where we are in the future, the volume that we speak with will be different if we have this power in hand!¡±

    This suggestion was filled with a fervor that filled Han Shuo¡¯s mind like the finest cream. He suddenly understood something, as a heart that had never been willing to be ordinary suddenly started beating even more fiercely.

    ¡°You mean that the two of us should build a power that belongs to us along?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s voice sounded a bit emotional, atplete odds with his usual indifference.

    Nodding his head firmly, Trunks continued. ¡°Indeed, some of the original Rainbow Sickle brothers are stabled in the mountain ranges around the valley after receiving my news. However, although their talents are extraordinary, life has been a bit difficult for them because they¡¯ve lost the halo of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band. However, the strength and quality are without a doubt the best.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve been hunting all sorts of magical creature cores in the Dark Forest these years and have created a small stash of wealth with my greed. However, it¡¯s still a bit difficult to satisfy the needs of the operations of a mercenary band. But you have a deep rtionship with Miss Phoebe, and if we obtain the support of sufficient gold, we can absolutely form a mercenary band with my currentwork. When our operations arerge enough and we have our own reputation, not only will we not need additional gold, but we¡¯ll be able to amass our own wealth through various missions and methods to slowly strength our power.¡±

    ¡°If our mercenary band can take control of the valley like the Cairo mercenary band to protect the profits of the merchants, we¡¯ll have several hundred thousand gold coins in fees every year. With such a power in our hands, our identity will be different in front of any person or country!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, Trunks¡¯ suggestion is sound. The organization won¡¯t mind another identity. In fact, the stronger your other identity is, the more use you are for the organization. The speed of your promotion will be faster within, it¡¯s a goodplement. If you reach a certain scale, then maybe the upper levels will send someone to help you so you have even more power!¡± Emily was also an ambitious woman and her voice had be charged with emotion the more the conversation progressed.

    ¡°Come, let¡¯s go back and thoroughly discuss this!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s decision had already been made. He spoke lowly with a strange smile on his face.

 Chapter 205: Then call it Soul Destroyer!

    Chapter 205: Then call it Soul Destroyer!

    After a short conversation, Han Shuo understood that Trunks had already gathered several dozen original Rainbow Sickle mercenaries to take on Florida. These people hadn¡¯t entered the valley yet, but were staying in a mountain cave on the outskirts of the valley and waiting for Trunks¡¯ orders.

    Trunks was part of the Rainbow Sickles before and had a treasure trove of experiences being a mercenary. He was well versed in the operations of a mercenary band, and onlycked the funds to register a mercenary band and to maintain its daily operations. Phoebe controlled the Boozt Merchant Guild, and there were many opportunities to earn money from the that guild alone. In addition, the Boozt Merchant Guild was quite well off and it could certainly temporarily fill in the gap of capital.

    Emily had an enormous intelligencework within the Dark Mantle. With her position and role, she could absolutely supply much valuable information to Han Shuo and Trunks.

    Not only was Emily quite excited about their conversation, but so was Phoebe highly interested as well. Han Shuo was well acquainted with Trunks¡¯ abilities and strength. Han Shuo knew that once the mercenary band was created and running, their business wouldn¡¯t be too poor.

    ¡°Trunks, give me an estimate of how much gold you¡¯re still short on?¡± Han Shuo looked at Trunks and asked.

    Han Shuo and Phoebe had both expressed strong interest up to the point. As the owner of the Boozt Merchant Guild, it wasn¡¯t difficult for Phoebe to resolve the issues withck of funding. Now that Trunks heard Han Shuo ask the critical question, he responded with some excitement, ¡°Registration depends on the number of members, and each member¡¯s sry, equipment, weapons, and horses, as well as the band¡¯s facilities will need gold coins.¡±

    ¡°Only fifty to sixty people have currentlye forth to the Valley of Sunshine. They were all the key members of the Rainbow Sickles before. Using them as a base to form a new mercenary band, we¡¯ll need to put forth only twenty thousand gold coins in the beginning. We may need to add to that in the future ording to member strength and numbers, but once our mercenary band¡¯s reputation is set and we have stable partners we work with, not only will we not need to further invest in more gold, we¡¯ll be able to save money and slowly increase our strength!¡±

    Han Shuo looked at Phoebe and then at Trunks, smiling faintly, ¡°I had great gains during ourst trip in the Dark Forest. I think I can set up the mercenary band with the wealth I amassedst time.¡±

    Han Shuo had obtainedrge amounts of gems and crystals from the dark elves and lizard men during his trip to the underground world. Not to mention hisst haul of jewels from the Forest Trolls¡¯ sacred ground, which had been even greater than thest batch he¡¯d handed over to Phoebe. When Han Shuo took out all the wealth he¡¯d collected during this time, Phoebe, Emily, and Trunks were all stunned and bbergasted!

    The many splendid colors sparkled from the gems and beautiful jade beneath the light of themps. There was a small mountain¡¯s worth of wealth, and even wealthy folk such as Emily and Phoebe were momentarily stunned by the sight.

    ¡°Oh, my gosh, where did you get all this? Emily cried out in astonishment as shock was written all over her face.

    ¡°You already offered a pile of treasurest time, and this time¡¯s has been even greater. Exchanging this amount of treasure into gold coins would you fifty thousand gold coins at a minimum, where did you get this from?¡± Phoebe was simrly surprised.

    After being momentarily stunned, Trunks shook his head with a wry smile, ¡°I spent three years in the Dark Forest and hunted hundreds of magical creatures, but only made less than ten thousand gold coins. You kid are certainly impressive!¡±

    ¡°Change all of this into gold coins for me, then take thirty thousand as the initial investment into Trunks¡¯ mercenary band. Keep the rest with you so that you can collect the items I need!¡± Han Shuo smiled faintly and spoke to Phoebe.

    Han Shuo had already quite trust Phoebe before they¡¯d confirmed their rtionship, and now that they¡¯d had touched each other intimately, he naturally had even fewer reservations. Phoebe also felt that Han Shuo¡¯s trust was quite par for the course, and nodded in eptance. Sheughed softly, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll handle everything for you. The Valley of Sunshine is the best ce to conduct transactions, I¡¯ll turn all these items into gold coins for you over the next two days!¡±

    When Emily saw that Han Shuo had handed over such an enormous amount of wealth without reservation to Phoebe, she became noticeably jealous. But she knew that as the owner of the Boozt Merchant Guild, It was most reasonable for Phoebe to undertake this matter, so there was not much else she could do.

    ¡°Eh? Where did you get this bow?¡± Trunks suddenly walked over with an odd expression on his face as Phoebe was putting all the items away into her space ring. He picked up a bow with bizarre patterns and turned to ask Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo suddenly remembered that this bow was from the dark elves when Trunks posed this question to him. The original holder had expended all his life force to shoot one arrow and cause great injury to Gilbert. After Han Shuo had obtained this bow, he didn¡¯te to any conclusion after some research. Add tot that hisck of desire to expend his life force in shooting the bow, he¡¯d thrown it into his space ring without further question.

    ¡°I got it from the hands of a dark elf family in the underground world. This bow is quite odd, it seems to be able to absorb one¡¯s life force to shoot a frightening arrow!¡± Han Shuo exined.

    ¡°Oh my gosh, legends speak of a bow cursed by Rose, that should be it! The legends say that the evil goddess Rose of the dark elves once cursed this bow so that it would absorb the life force of the wilder to shoot out an arrow of terrifying force. Usually, only perverse folks who wish to seek revenge at the cost of their own life would use it!¡± Emily eximed as she¡¯d heard of the legends of this bow.

    ¡°Indeed, this is the bow. However, I heard that this bow was a marvelous treasure that could increase thunder magic before it was cursed. If thunder mages held the bow, they could use it to shoot out astounding electricity with great power.¡± Trunks exined to Han Shuo as he held onto the bow.

    ¡°Keep it, maybe someone will be able to cleanse it of its curse in the future. If the curse is removed, then this bow will be a treasure that thunder mages fight over!¡± Emily thought for a moment an said to Han Shuo.

    It wasn¡¯t likely that many would dare buy a bow that absorbs the wielder¡¯s life force anyways. As a magical cultivator, Han Shuo would be able to use his own magical yuan to create formations and forge magical weapons as his strength increased. Perhaps he¡¯d be able to cleanse the curse on it in the future.

    Therefore, Han Shuo nodded to Emily¡¯s words and put the bow away, ¡°Alright, perhaps we can possibly use an altar in the future tomunicate with the evil goddess so that she¡¯ll remove it. Let¡¯s try int he future!¡±

    After obtaining rendon¡¯s memories, Han Shuo understood a bit aboutmunicating with evil gods. The basic principle was that as long as you could supply something that the evil god wanted, you¡¯d be able to receive a corresponding boon from the evil deity. This was actually just a sort of business transaction.

    The sparkling and gleaming jewels had been stored into Phoebe¡¯s space ring in a short span of time. Han Shuo thought for a moment and took out another set of dwarf forged weapons, handing over a heavy battle axe to Trunks. Han Shuo smiled, ¡°What do you think about this quality?¡±

    Trunks¡¯ eyes had already started gleaming when Han Shuo had taken out the weapons. He picked up the battle axe without another word. As he waved it around once, a howling sound emitted from the battle axe¡¯s shining surface. There was a natural wave of cold killing intent emanating from the battle axe as Trunks held it in his hands.

    ¡°This is great! Where did you get it?¡± Trunks was delighted as he looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°The dwarves forged all of these weapons. Perhaps there will be something within this pile that¡¯s suitable for ourrades!¡± Han SHuo smiled faintly.

    ¡°Haha, I think they¡¯ll like it. Dwarf forged weapons are renowned in thends. I knew these were no ordinary items when you took them out just now!¡± Trunks happily epted these weapons and ced them into his space ring.

    He was quiet for a bit and then looked seemingly carelessly at Han Shuo, smiling, ¡°Chief, everything is ready now, and we just await a striking name from you!¡±

    Han Shuo started after hearing these words, then smiled and waved his hands, ¡°I just need to be vice chief, that¡¯s enough for me. The real chief should be you, you decide the band¡¯s name!¡±

    Trunks had been wreathed in smiles just now when he suddenly grew serious and declined gravely, ¡°You must be the chief of the mercenary band. This matter isn¡¯t open for discussion. I¡¯d rather decline your good intention if you refuse and nothing we¡¯ve talked about before will count for anything.¡±

    Emily and Phoebe had actually wanted to ask a long time ago who was the owner of the mercenary band. However, it wasn¡¯t the thing to do to actually open one¡¯s mouth and discuss this, so they¡¯d kept things in and had nned on taking some time out to discuss with Han Shuo.

    To the two girls, they would only help the mercenary band if the band was Han Shuo¡¯s. They were unfamiliar with Trunks, and naturally didn¡¯t have any rtionship with him. Although Han Shuo and Trunks seemed close, they were naturally unwilling to put their lives on the line for Trunks.

    The two girls paid a great deal of attention after Trunks brought up what was troubling them. Their beautiful eyes looked between Han Shuo and Trunks continuously, anxiously waiting for their decision.

    ¡°Trunks, I know nothing about the formation and management of a mercenary band. It¡¯s a bit inappropriate if I¡¯m the chief!¡± Han Shuo truly didn¡¯t know what a mercenary band needed.

    ¡°No worries, you just need to give general guidelines orders. I can take care of everything else for you as vice chief. Bryan, Miss Phoebe and Madame Emily will help me only if you¡¯re the chief. I don¡¯t have the charisma to obtain their support!¡± Trunks self deprecated and winked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Eh, since this is the case, don¡¯t continue to decline!¡± Emily wasn¡¯t awkward at all, as if Trunks¡¯ words had been quite ordinary.

    Phoebe also nodded with a remote expression and turned to Han Shuo, ¡°That¡¯s right, I¡¯ll only help this mercenary band unconditionally if you¡¯re the chief.¡±

    ¡°Alright, men should be more decisive. Hurry and decide on the mercenary band¡¯s name so I can go register it and officially give my brothers a new home!¡± Trunks looked at Han Shuo and urged him onwards.

    Han Shuo was actually more aware than anyone of the circumstances at hand. When he saw that all that needed to be taken care of had been decided, he no longer hesitated and nodded his head in agreement. ¡°Alright, then call it the Soul Destroyer mercenary band!¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re so fake! You even thought of the name already and said you didn¡¯t want the position. You had to make a show of declining, so shameless!¡± Trunks couldn¡¯t help butugh and yell at Han Shuo when he heard Han Shuo immediately give out a name.

    Emily and Phoebe both looked askance at Han Shuo. They too hadn¡¯t expected that Han Shuo would think of a name so quickly. They then understood that Han Shuo had long since had intentions of taking control of the mercenary band, and he¡¯d put on a show of declining just now.

    ¡°He¡¯s always been this shameless!¡± Emily and Phoebe both deeply agreed with Trunks¡¯ words and actually opened their mouths to say the same thing.

    When they finished speaking, they discovered that they¡¯d actually voiced the exact same words. This made them quite amused as they started giggling softly.

    ¡°Alright, let¡¯s call it the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. I¡¯m going to go about my business now, you guys can too!¡± Trunks said.

 Chapter 206: Transformation

    Chapter 206: Transformation

    Once things were settled, the hotly fired up young folk with money started to move very rapidly.

    Florida¡¯s injuries were quite severe, and news from the Cairo mercenary band indicated that he was still in aa. Edwin¡¯s every move and gesture was under close surveince after entering the valley. He stayed within the hotel, seeming to want to take care of the wound in his back first.

    Trunks left the Valley of Sunshine after he¡¯d had settled matters with Han Shuo, saying that he wanted to discuss future ns and the good news of Florida¡¯s injuries with his brothers.

    Phoebe moved about the Valley of Sunshine the next couple of days after receiving Han Shuo¡¯s enormous wealth. She called upon her connections to talk to several merchants and also helped Han Shuo collect materials to refine the wood and water elite zombies.

    Emily stayed within Dark Mantle and seemed to bemunicating with the executives. The senior levels of the Dark Mantle seemed to want arge operation this time to take down Bob Ascher.

    As someone in the know, Trunks was the one busying about forming a mercenary band. There wasn¡¯t much for Han Shuo to do after the issue of funding had been taken care of. He used the two days of downtime to return to the cemetery of death.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t actually too worried about Edwin¡¯s threats. After all, he had a dark dragon in the cemetery of death as backup. Through somemunication, Han Shuo understood that if Gilbert wanted to recover quickly, he¡¯d need to absorb some creature cores.

    It was because he understood this, and that he did indeed need Gilbert¡¯s strength, that he¡¯d brought Gilbert along with him over the past two days into the Dark Forest to hunt down some high level magical creatures.

    The two killed seven wind de wolves, four frost eagles, and one medusa in two short days. With Han Shuo¡¯s current strength and Gilbert¡¯s help, the high level creature medusa was defeated after the two joined forces.

    Gilbert mostly recovered from his injuries after absorbing these creature cores as well as the medusa¡¯s valuable blood, and his strength was no longer affected by his injuries.

    Gilbert had absorbed all the cores but had left behind the teeth, skin, and flesh. Han Shuo took all those and threw them into one of the warehouses in the cemetery of death.

    On the eve of the second night, Gilbert stayed within the cemetery of death to digest the cores. As for Han Shuo, he left to visit the broad and swift moving waterfall near the cemetery.

    The waterfall dived down like the universe emptying itself, bringing with it a ferocious strength that swept away all obstacles in its path. It seemed to be falling directly from the heavens. Han Shuo sat down cross legged underneath the falls, positioning himself close to an enormous boulder near the center and enduring the crushing force of the waterfall.

    The parts of his body exposed to the waterfall had all turned a bright red. Han Shuo had seemed to be part of the boulder as he sat there without moving an inch. He seemed to be a lifeless sculpture.

    However, the magical yuan was circting with the speed of ten thousand horses galloping ahead. All muscles, tendons, and bones in which the magical yuan circted past were refined over and over again. The demon infant started bouncing slightly in his abdomen as a small figure exactly the same as Han Shuo emanated vigorous life force.

    Han Shuo had continuously achieved new heights during this time. He¡¯d finallypletely absorbed all of Johnny¡¯s soul. Bits of information floated randomly through Han Shuo¡¯s mind. All sorts of disordered memories were in the mix as well, appearing as clouds of mist that no one could see clearly.

    Han Shuo understood that these scattered bits of information were the memories that Chu Cang Lan had left in his mind. Han Shuo had been only able to obtain small parts of this information before reaching the true demon realm and having his brain fully developed. The majority of the information had been locked in his mind.

    Now that he had reached the true demon realm and his mind developed, Han Shuo had seen great increases in his memory,prehension, and thinking abilities. Those previously hazy, indistinct, and scattered memories were swiftly casting off their veil and bing clearer beneath Han Shuo¡¯s full examination.

    All sorts of bizarre secret magical arts, parts of profound incantations, refinement methods to create magical treasure, demon generals, and formations were running through Han Shuo¡¯s mind at high speed. They were bing part of Han Shuo¡¯s memories that would never be destroyed.

    He suddenly awoke after who knew how long. There was hard to conceal excitement, pride, and confidence in that pair of eyes beneath the rush of the waterfall. It was as if he¡¯d been reborn as he was filled with a heretofore unseen confidence.

    The solid realm, open passages realm, molded spirit realm, true demon realm, bloodlust realm, separate demon realm, carnal realm, nine changes realm, and omen realm were the nine levels of cultivation that would enable a mortal to ascend to a level of existence that was as omnipresent as the gods. A frightening strength that could cleave open the heavens and earth, would grow to being able to move mountains and oceans, as well as grant the holder immortality in the end drew a magnificent and mysterious blueprint in front of Han Shuo.

    The blueprint had been unfurled now and Han Shuo was the brush, able to trace his unbounded future ording to his desires. This power that could reforge, fly through the heavens and earth, be indestructible, and surpass the wheel of rebirth truly did exist!

    A thought struck him as all the pores of his body expelled gouts of dark grey, murky air out of his body. This murky air had been the dredges from Johnny¡¯s soul, and had remained in Han Shuo body after the demon infant had absorbed the strength from the former¡¯s soul.

    Han Shuo¡¯s body wavered as he took off, shooting across the sky. Hended solidly atop an enormous tree, put on a warrior¡¯s dark green outfit and flew towards the cemetery of death.

    ¡°Eh? Master, you seem a bit different from normal!¡± Gilbert looked askance at Han Shuo as soon as thetter had returned to the cemetery of death and couldn¡¯t help but speak out.

    ¡°Oh? What¡¯s different about me?¡± Han Shuo looked at Gilbert and smiled faintly.

    Shaking his head, Gilbert said, ¡°I can¡¯t express it. Your eyes seem a bit more mysterious and your aura as well. Mm, you seem more confident, the confidence of having grasped the situation and being assured of victory!¡±

    Han Shuo understood. After obtaining all of Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories, he now knew many magical arts like the back of his hand. He¡¯d be able to take on Edwin even without Gilbert¡¯s help now. But because hecked sufficient strength, it¡¯d be a bit troublesome for him to do so.

    ¡°Since your injuries have healed, leave with me!¡±

    ¡°Wonderful! Are you taking me to do some sneaky and underhanded things again this time?¡±

    ¡°Shut up, do what I tell you!¡±

    ¡°Master, I seemed to have see that patch of dirt shift slightly after you left today!¡± Gilbert first pouted and then suddenly remembered something as he pointed at the area where the earth elite zombie was being refined.

    Han Shuo started and turned back to look at the ce of extreme earth. He suddenly discovered that the center had indeed sunk in. The earth qi that had been circting the area had all vanished without a trace. Overjoyed, Han Shuoughed heartily, ¡°Very good, it looks like he¡¯s thoroughly absorbed all of the earth qi. He¡¯ll be able to emerge from the dirt after a few more days!¡±

    ¡°Humph, just a zombie, what¡¯s so good about it!¡± Gilbert flicked a dismissive nce over and grumbled.

    Just as Gilbert finished speaking, the ce he was standing on suddenly copsed as an enormous crack appeared out of nowhere after a series of earth shattering rumbles. It caught Gilbert unawares and closed on him. The crack seemed to be alive as it kept closing, squeezing Gilbert¡¯s body and making him curse loudly.

    Original and most updated trantions are on vre. If you¡¯re reading this anywhere else, you¡¯re supporting a thief. ??

    ¡°Alright alright, let him go!¡± Han Shuo could feel the earth elite zombie¡¯s dissatisfaction from deep within the ground and knew that he must be behind all this.

    The originally retracting crack suddenly sprang open like a spring. When the immobile Gilbert discovered that the earthquakes and shifting of the ground was due to the earth elite zombie below the ground, he couldn¡¯t help but wear an expression of extreme shock on his face. He hastily climbed out when the crack loosened.

    ¡°He was formed here and has been absorbing the earth qi here. This ce is his territory. He¡¯s able deploy strength several times his own as long as he¡¯s here. He can move the earth and mountains, crack the ground, form the earth into a cage to trap you, or coalesce an earth dragon to attack you. This is all incredibly easy for him.¡±

    ¡°Remember, don¡¯t fight him in his territory. He¡¯s basically invincible deep in the ground. He may not be able to manipte everything ording to his will when he leaves, but any bit ofnd here can be transformed into his weapon!¡± Han Shuo looked at the scrambling Gilbert with a supercilious smile as he exined faintly.

    The elite zombies would be able to greatly increase their strength in the area that they were formed. Whoever irritated them in their own territory wasmitting a foolish action.

    Gilbert had offended him with a word and the earth elite zombie had immediately struck back tit for tat, allowing Han Shuo to understand that the earth elite zombie wasn¡¯t a low level zombie that could only listen to hismands. It looked like it was the same as the little skeleton, having gained his own sentience.

    When he saw that Gilbert was behaving himself after mbering out of the crack, Han Shuo spoke in the earth elite zombie¡¯s general direction, ¡°Refine the earth qi well and emerge sooner rather thanter!¡±

    A beam of thought was sent into Han Shuo¡¯s mind. The earth elite zombie had obviously heard his words and sent over ¡°understood!¡±.

    ¡°Come, let¡¯s leave!¡± Han Shuo walked towards the center of the cemetery of death as he looked as Gilbert. When he passed by the yin demon cave, he noticed that there were only five wraiths left. It seemed like the three yin demons would be formed soon as well.

    ¡°Just what¡¯s with that zombie, why is he so strong?¡± Gilbert couldn¡¯t hold back the questions in his heart when they¡¯d left the earth elite zombie and arrived at the transportation matrix.

    ¡°You wouldn¡¯t understand even if I exined to you. He¡¯s just different from any other zombie warrior you know. His existence began to change the moment he started absorbing the earth qi. Remember, you should try to avoid provoking him in the cemetery of death. He¡¯s much stronger than you can imagine in here!¡± Han Shuo smiled faintly and instructed Gilbert.

    Han Shuo pushed Gilbert into the middle of the transportation matrix as he spoke and then activated it, returning to the Dark Mantle¡¯s stronghold in the Valley of Sunshine.

    Han Shuo put the six magical sticks away when he walked out of the secret room and lifted a piece of wooden floor above him. A hallway leading upstairs appeared and the two walked up.

    ¡°Bryan, you¡¯re back!¡± Emily suddenly called out when she saw them emerge.

    ¡°Hi, beautiful woman, we meet again!¡± Gilbert smiled at Emily in greeting when he walked up and was greeted with an enormous eyeroll from Emily.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡± After receiving all of Chu Yang Lan¡¯s memories, Han Shuo was now full of confidence about the future. He believed that if he worked hard enough and advanced his magical cultivation, he¡¯d be able to obtain strength that would make everyone respect him. It was because of this that he hadn¡¯t terribly minded some of the difficulties and setbacks that he was encountering and asked Emily rather carelessly.

    ¡°The Cairo mercenary band just sent word that Florida has awoken, and that he called for a meeting as soon as he woke up. He ns on moving against us with no thought of anything whatsoever, and wants us to be on our guard. In addition, Edwin and Belinda seems to have made a trip to the Cairo mercenary band these days. This is information we gained ourselves. No one from the Cairo mercenary band told us about this.¡± Emily responded quickly.

    Nodding his head in understanding, Han Shuo thought with a furrowed brow and then smiled slightly, ¡°We¡¯ll deal with things as theye up. If Florida darees to his death, then I¡¯ll make sure he doesn¡¯t get off easily. Don¡¯t worry about Edwin for now. I think Laureton won¡¯t be so silly as to create trouble for us now. We¡¯re something he can leverage now. He¡¯ll wait until Florida is dead before creating trouble for us.¡±

    ¡°In my estimations, Edwin went to meet with the Cairo mercenary band possibly to obtain some information about Florida, but Laureton may not have necessarily agreed to help him against us. He also won¡¯t choose to cooperate with Edwin against us. Don¡¯t be too bothered by it. What we need to do now is to defend our current stronghold.¡±

    Emily was stunned momentarily by Han Shuo¡¯s words, and then looked at him oddly. This was when she discovered that Han Shuo had worn a remote expression on his face all along, as if no danger would shake his confidence. His eyes were even more profound and mysterious, and his entire demeanor had changed. He was full of an unexinable feeling, making Emily feel a bit surprised.

    ¡°What, why are you looking at me so oddly?¡± Han Shuo rubbed his nose andughed when he saw Emily stare at him unblinkingly with her beautiful eyes.

    ¡°Bryan, has something happened to you these past two days? Why do I feel like you¡¯re different from before?¡± Emily didn¡¯t conceal the thoughts on her mind and asked directly.

    ¡°Indeed, master is a bit different from usual. I¡¯ve discovered it as well!¡± Gilbert also couldn¡¯t help but murmur loudly at this point. His eyes kept looking over Han Shuo, trying to figure out what was different about him from usual.

    ¡°Heh heh, nothing much, just that I¡¯ve received arge amount of memories over these past couple of days. They¡¯ve helped me understand a lot of things.¡± Han Shuo wore a mysterious expression on his face as he exined to Emily.

    Emily still felt Han Shuo was mysterious beyond belief, and that the things that happened to him were marvelous and illogical. He had a little skeleton that wasn¡¯t afraid of dark magic, could fly without making use of magic and fighting aura, and had an amazing weapon that moved ording to his thoughts. These were all out of Emily¡¯s range ofprehension.

    ¡°Forget it, I wouldn¡¯t understand if you exined either. I just need to know that you¡¯re alright!¡± Emily shook her head and gave up further questioning. She suddenly remembered what Han SHuo had saidst and asked, ¡°Oh right, you said you wanted to defend our current location. How are you going to?¡±

    Han Shuo paused silently with a bit with a mysterious expression, then voiced a word that Emily waspletely unfamiliar with, ¡°Formation!¡±

 Chapter 207: A hundred ghosts in a frenzied dance

    Chapter 207: A hundred ghosts in a frenzied dance

    The ability to set up a formation that could seize the wonders of the heaven and earth using the mystical rules of nature and a few special ingredients, was a secret skill that all magical cultivators could grasp.

    Han Shuo was no longer content staying passive after digesting all of Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories. Even if his current cultivation level wasn¡¯t up to par, he¡¯d be able to take a more active role by using some magical formations.

    Using a strategy of acting first and reportingter, Han Shuo took over the shop with the ce of extreme water. He used Florida as an excuse to fob off Harris when he came byter.

    The Cairo mercenary band was in charge of everything in the Valley of Sunshine, so they weren¡¯t afraid of Han Shuo getting up to any tricks. The shop would unconditionally be returned over to Han Shuo anyways, once Florida was dead. Han Shuo was just taking possession of his property earlier.

    A storefront wasn¡¯t the same as other items, capable of being taken away and easily stored. If that had been the case, Harris probably wouldn¡¯t have been willing to hand over the store that early, since he would¡¯ve been concerned that Han Shuo would¡¯ve taken the items away. But since the store was immobile, this concern didn¡¯t exist for Harris. Not to mention, the deed was still in his hands. Thus, Harris didn¡¯t say anything after listening to Han Shuo¡¯s exnations, tacitly approving of what Han Shuo had done.

    The storefront rumored to be cursed wasrger than Han Shuo had imagined. It was roughly four hundred square meters and had an eighty square meters courtyard. There were many small andrge rooms, including various tables, chairs, beds,mps, and assorted furniture. It was because this was an ill omened ce that all of the items inside had be unlucky after the owner had died. No one would take anything from this store and potentially bring trouble down on their heads. Apart fromcking nkets and other daily necessities, as well as a thickyer of dust due tock of upants for a long time, there wasn¡¯t much that the storefront was missing.

    Han Shuo had already exined the peculiarities of this storefront earlier when talking about forming the mercenary band. Although Emily and Phoebe didn¡¯t quite understand his exnation, they understood that Han Shuo had already cleaned out the unclean thing within this store. Out of their trust for Han Shuo, although the two girls were a bit ufortable with this ce, they didn¡¯t protest and allowed Han Shuo to take up residence within.

    Since he¡¯d decided to set up a formation, he had to make the necessary preparations. Han Shuo made a list and put Emily and Phoebe in charge of collecting some necessary items of cold to form the foundational materials.

    Due to consideration of their safety. Han Shuo had Gilbert follow behind them. With such a strong and extraordinary dark dragon following behind, and the two girls being an archmage and a swordmaster respectively, they likely wouldn¡¯te off worse for the wear if they ran into Edwin.

    Once everyone had been sent on their way, Han Shuo chanted a necromancy magic spell and summoned ten skeletal warriors. He gave an order, and they all picked up brooms and dustbins and started sweeping from room to room.

    The ¡°Shura Soul Formation¡± was a formation that trapped victims in a realm of illusions. This formation needed the death auras from a hundred ghosts to support it, as well as the bones fromnds of cold to form six Shura pirs, and the blood of virgins as ink. Once magical glyphs were written onto the pirs, a piece of floating rock infused with five drops of blood essence from the caster would form the eye of the formation andplete it.

    Once the formation was formed, any enemies who didn¡¯t understand formations would be attacked by the death auras of a hundred ghosts as soon as they walked in. They would be disoriented and see illusions, discovering a spectral clone of themselves that wanted to kill them at all costs. Fear would cause him to sink into madness in an instant. Furthermore, no matter how strong their heart was, it was a very difficult thing to triumph over one¡¯s heart.

    The well in the middle of the ce of extreme water had been slightly modified by Han Shuo so that he could make full use of it. He was using the well as the eye of the formation and had added some of the materials he¡¯d picked up these days to form a small scale ¡°Kelpie Possession Formation¡±. Each wraith had been nted with a jellyfish and had been transformed into a kelpie in the well through use of secret arts. Anyone who neared it would be possessed by the kelpies and dragged into the well.

    After setting up the two formations, Han Shuo suddenly reflected that he¡¯d been wise alright, tobine the use of Chu Cang Lan¡¯s magical cultivation and the necromancy magic of this world. It seemed that they did indeed give rise to unforeseen effects whenbined.

    The ¡°Shura Soul Formation¡± ghosts could be reced by wraiths, and the bones of cold could be reced by ordinary skeletal warriors. The ¡°Kelpie Possession Formation¡± also made use of wraiths. If Han Shuo hadn¡¯t known necromancy magic, he¡¯d have to collect all the materials himself from cemeteries.

    However, with the identity of a necromancer, he merely needed a few chants to collect all the materials. It¡¯d saved him no end of effort.

    After busying about for a day, Emily, Phoebe, and Gilbert were quite surprised by what they saw in front of them when they returned to the shopte at night.

    Six stark white bone pirs were stuck in six different corners of the courtyard. Cold aura wafted from the center of the courtyard. There were clouds of foggy wraiths in the air, posturing and making faces as they danced through the air. A sinister feeling filled the surroundings.

    Several white, foggy clouds were floating intangibly around the well in the center, forming leering and grimacing faces. A blood red stone was ced within an indentation next to the well. Some of the wraiths floating through the air were circling around the stone, with their bodies dyed red as a result.

    Han Shuo was sitting down cross legged in front of the stone, with beams of ck splendor emitting from the palms of his hands. His hands had turned into an inky ck as hazy light circted around his body, making his entire being appear quite evil.

    The doors to all the rooms around the courtyard had been opened, and all the dusty rooms had been thoroughly cleaned. The light within them was cozy and inviting, with none of the cold air in the courtyard drifting into the rooms. ¡°Oh, my gosh, what did you do?!¡± Emily eximed in surprise as she turned on the spot. Curiosity filled her eyes and she reached out a hand to touch one of the Shura pirs.

    ¡°Don¡¯t move!¡± Han Shuo suddenly opened his eyes and called out softly to Emily.

    Emily¡¯s jade hand had been about to touch the pir when she hastily yanked it back, as if she¡¯d been frightened. Phoebe and Gilbert were still a bit bbergasted at the moment. They¡¯d never have thought that this ce would¡¯ve been transformed so utterly within the span of a day.

    A strange presence suffused the courtyard, making them instinctively ufortable. They¡¯d never seen this setup of straight things, and had no idea what they were for. Their minds were full of questions at the moment.

    Smiling faintly, Han Shuo stood up from his cross legged position and dripped a drop of bright red blood into the stone. The breezy courtyard whipped up even stronger winds as the wraiths danced and howled with the addition of the blood. Bouts of cold air of death made everyone feel incredibly frightened.

    ¡°Did you get everything I wanted you to purchase?¡± Han Shuo smiled faintly.

    ¡°Ask him, he was the one who collected the most important thing!¡± Phoebe pointed at Gilbert with a reddened face.

    ¡°Gracious master, why are you collecting the blood of virgins? You are too shameless and dirty!¡± Gilbert griped and looked at Han Shuo with a disdainful expression, yet he appeared quite excited.

    ¡°Oh shut up, did you get it?¡± Han Shuo red angrily at Gilbert.

    ¡°Heh heh, I did I did. There¡¯s nothing that can¡¯t be settled without gold coins! I spent only fifty gold coins and took a spin around the small alleyways of the valley to get what you needed.¡± Gilbert took out a bottle the size of a palm as he spoke.

    Emily and Phoebe both snorted coldly when he took out that bottle, splitting off into two directions and heading for the rooms.

    Original and most updated trantions are on vre. If this is being found anywhere else, it has been stolen. Don¡¯t support theft. ??

    ¡°Why are you two snorting at me? I wasn¡¯t the one who wanted to do so, it was all master¡¯s orders! Did you think I wanted to? All those stupid women inside looked at me like they were looking at a huge pervert! If I hadn¡¯t taken out the gold coins, I probably would¡¯ve drowned from them spitting at me!¡± Gilbert appeared quite aggrieved when he saw that both Emily and Phoebe were looking down on him, and couldn¡¯t help butin loudly.

    There were some crudely wealthy customers within the red light district who liked to be waited upon by virgins. In order to lure these customers, those in charge would spend a great deal of money to purchase virgin ves. Han Shuo had sent Gilbert there precisely because he knew this.

    Although Han Shuo had a thick enough skin, he still couldn¡¯t set aside his face enough to purchase these things. After all, if someone with no idea of what was going on saw his actions, they would think his actions were dirty enough indeed.

    ¡°Alright alright, go about your business, don¡¯t bother me!¡± Han Shuo rather understood Gilbert¡¯sints, but didn¡¯t botherforting him.

    Han Shuo had used the Demonyer Edge to carve variousplicated drawings on the six Shura pirs. He now hauled a bucket of spirit water from the ce of extreme water and diluted the bottle of virgin blood within it.

    He used a spoon made from the wood of a peach tree to stir it, then picked up the bucket and flew upwards,nding on top of the first Shura pir, and poured the liquid on top of the pir.

    Emily and Phoebe exited their warm rooms when they saw Han Shuo start his work. Their clear eyes were full of curiosity about Han Shuo¡¯s actions.

    The reddish liquid flowed down the pictures that Han Shuo had carved earlier. Amazingly, none of the liquid dripped to the ground. They filled the cracks within the pictures as if being tightly attracted by a surge of power.

    Han Shuo threw the empty bucket away to the side after he poured the liquid over the six pirs. He then flew to the blood red stone next to the well and sent ck sparkles soaring up from his palm, forming a magical formation and branding it into the center of the blood red stone. The six pirs suddenly glowed with a red light as the faces of all sorts of howling and wailing ghostly faces appeared in the pictures carved onto the Shura pirs. The hundred wraiths that had been flying around the courtyard sped towards these pictures as if sparrows returning to a nest.

    The originally intangible wraiths melded with the twisting shapes of the ghosts as they sank into the Shura pirs. The ghosts seemed toe alive as they started thrashing and dancing on the Shura pirs, revealing fanged and bloodthirsty mouths. Sessive bloodcurdling wails of desperation rang in the night sky, terrifying the nearby people.

    This is bad! Han Shuo was greatly startled. He hadn¡¯t thought that such frightening screams like the cries of ghosts and hows of wolves would sound after the formation wasplete. He immediately formed another spell and threw it into the floating rock that had absorbed five drops of his blood essence.

    In that instant, all the wraiths were sucked into the Shura pirs, and the pirs that had hundreds of ghosts dancing madly over them became lifeless, as the wraiths within seemed to be frozen in the drawings of the ghosts.

    ¡°Give me the rest of the materials. The formation should bepleted first. Even if that old monster Edwin pays a visit, I¡¯ll make sure he doesn¡¯t get off easily!¡± Han Shuoughed madly as he spoke to Emily and Phoebe.

    Their two faces were full of shock at the moment. When they heard Han Shuo¡¯s words, they handed over the items of cold that they¡¯d purchased in a morass of confusion. When all the materials had been collected, Han Shuo started flying rapidly around the courtyard amidst the three people¡¯s befuddled gazes. It was then that the three discovered that manyrge and small ditches that could perfectly hold all of the items in Han Shuo¡¯s hands.

    Han Shuo retreated from the courtyard when all was ready and summoned Gilbert to his side, where he was standing next to Phoebe and Emily.

    He gave a mental order and a beam of red light soared to the sky from within the courtyard. Wind howled in the courtyard for a moment as an extreme feeling of cold from the hundred dancing ghosts on the pirs suffused the other three¡¯s hearts.

    The three understood that a simple courtyard had turned into a ce of lethal danger after Han Shuo¡¯s preparations!

    ¡°Everything will be wlessly perfect as soon as we erect a soundproof forcefield around the area!¡± Han Shuo turned to look at Emily with a mysterious smile.

    ¡°Leave that to me!¡± Emily understood his meaning and released a dark magic. Magic ripples suddenly appeared over the courtyard,ing down like a formless dome.

    ¡°What happened, did the curse of the evil god re up?¡± Harris¡¯ call suddenly sounded from outside as hoofsteps echoed. Harris and others of the Cairo mercenary band appeared in front of the store on horseback, with Harris knocking on the door and calling out.

    As the eye of the formation, the floating rock also had five drops of Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence on it. Therefore, Han Shuo could easily control the entire formation through the floating stone with a simple thought.

    When he heard Harris¡¯ shout from the outside, Han Shuo slightly changed the formation and made it revert back to normal. There were no other changes apart from the six Shura pirs.

    ¡°Nothing much, has Mister Harrise by to tell us of some news?¡± Harris opened the door to let Harris in as he responded easily, beaming widely.

    Harris looked around with his sharp eyes after entering, sweeping them through every corner of the shop. He asked Han Shuo with a bit of confusion, ¡°Why have six strange pirs suddenly appeared?¡±

    ¡°Oh, we n on making this a long term residence, and created this six pirs for support because there¡¯s no ce to hang anything out to dry. What brings Mister Harris by?¡±

    ¡°A bloody light red just now, and others in neighboring shops heard frightening wailse out from here. They said that they were terrified and wanted us toe over to look at the situation. I was also worried that something had happened to you, so I came by to take a look!¡±

    Laughing easily, Han Shuo joked, ¡°These people are quite cowardly. We were just practicing magic just now. We¡¯ve several people here and wouldn¡¯t be afraid even if the curse kicked in. Don¡¯t worry!¡±

    ¡°Eh, the fellow collecting virgin blood is also your friend?¡± Harris nodded and was about to leave when he suddenly discovered Gilbert. He couldn¡¯t help but ask Han Shuo.

    ¡°Eh... you could say that!¡± Han Shuo felt a bit awkward as he turned back to re at Gilbert. Thetter was about ready to erupt in anger, when Han Shuo indicated for him to be quiet and then turned back to exin to Harris.

    ¡°Why do you have this kind of friend? He¡¯s so disgusting!¡± Harris looked at Gilbert with extreme disdain and seemed unwilling to stay longer as he hastily took his men and left.

    ¡°The hell! It¡¯s all master¡¯s orders, what the hell does it have to do with me!?¡± Gilbert finally couldn¡¯t keep it in after Harris left and roared, smokeing out of his orifices.

 Chapter 208: The Purple Demon Eye

    Chapter 208: The Purple Demon Eye

    After Han Shuo¡¯s actions, the storefront had indeed turned into an incredibly dangerous ce. Anyone who tried to enter without Han Shuo¡¯s guidance would be attacked by the formation. Those whocked a sufficiently strong will would try to kill themselves as their minds grew confused.

    After thoroughly remaking the store, Phoebe, Emily, and Gilbert all stayed there that night. Having seen the oddities of the yard, the three were on edge all night long, deathly afraid that something bad would happen to them as they slept.

    Fortunately, all was fine that night and Trunks returned at noon the next day. He had learned from the Cairo mercenary band as soon as he set foot into the Valley of Sunshine that Han Shuo had actually moved into the cursed storefront.

    When he swung by, he noticed the six starkly white pirs that had appeared in the courtyard. He was quite surprised, and had no idea what was going on.

    ¡°I heard Harris say that something out of the ordinary had happened here yesterday. Did you guys run into something?¡± Trunks asked after sitting down in the living room of the storefront.

    Smiling faintly, Han Shuo exined, ¡°We did run into a few things, but it was something I cooked up rather than the evil god¡¯s curse. There¡¯s no need to worry about anything. There¡¯s lots of rooms here, I left you one!¡±

    ¡°Forget it, I think I¡¯ll be safer elsewhere. When I was in the Valley of Sunshine a few years ago, I saw many owners of this store suddenly die spontaneously. Although you¡¯ve already defused the danger, this ce still makes me uneasy!¡± Trunks noticeably had some psychological trauma from this location and waved his hands with a wry smile.

    ¡°Who is this kid, how dare he not trust the master?!¡± Gilbert was already ticked off from beingbeled a pervert. When he heard Trunks hem and haw and refuse to take up residence within, he couldn¡¯t help but speak up.

    ¡°And who are you?¡± Trunks started and suddenly looked at Gilbert.

    Trunks had been acting a bit oddly since he¡¯de in on the back of his manticore. The manticore had been unafraid of anything beneath the heavens and on the earth, but was instinctively on his guard against Gilbert and tried to keep his distance from Gilbert.

    The manticore was a sentient being and could naturally sense the enormous presence of the super rank dark dragon. Even though Gilbert was currently in human form, the manticore still didn¡¯t want to draw close to Gilbert. It was the fear brought about from the difference in levels.

    As the owner of the manticore, Trunks had spent many years with the manticore and was well acquainted with its temper. When he saw the manticore¡¯s abnormal behavior, he started keeping an eye on Gilbert and couldn¡¯t help but question now.

    ¡°I am of the mighty dragon race, their future king, Gilbert!¡± Gilbert had an arrogant look on his face as he proudly proimed this with the tones of a ringing bell.

    ¡°Just like your manticore, he¡¯s my magical pet, a perverted little ck dragon!¡± Han Shuo quelled Gilbert with a warning look and exined to Trunks.

    Trunks was incredibly shocked when he heard that Gilbert was a dark dragon. He couldn¡¯t help but sigh, ¡°You¡¯ve got some skill alright. I¡¯d thought taming a manticore was something to be proud of. To think you could tame a dark dragon! It looks like you¡¯re stronger than me!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s nothing to do with me, I just so happened to get lucky. It¡¯s this dark dragon who shamelessly begged me!¡± Han Shuo shrugged and said humbly. He then paused and changed his tone, asking Trunks, ¡°Right, you didn¡¯t run into any trouble on your trip out of the valley this time, did you? How did everything go?

    Trunks¡¯ expression also became serious when he saw that Han Shuo was chatting about serious matters. He responded lowly, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m more familiar with the terrain of the valley than even Laureton or Florida. It won¡¯t be easy for most people to hurt me within the valley. I met some of my old friends and they were highly interested in forming a mercenary band. I¡¯ve already sent someone to register the name of Soul Destroyer. We¡¯ll be able to have our own official name before long.¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°That¡¯s for the best. This will be our stronghold in the future. I¡¯m sure that with Florida¡¯s ability, he¡¯ll be able find out where we are soon. We don¡¯t need to be a rush, we just need to wait for him to attack us!¡±

    Since the formation had been set up, Han Shuo just wanted to test it out using Florida¡¯s men, and see if it was as magical as he saw in Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories!

    Surprisingly, whether it was Florida or Edwin¡¯s men, no one came to bother them over the next two days. Han Shuo and his crew stayed here both days and only shopped a bit on the busy streets during the day.

    All the materials to refine the wood elite zombie had finally been collected. Phoebe used these couple of days to discuss some transactions with some of the merchants. She turned two thirds of the jewels and crystals that Han Shuo had given her into forty thousand gold coins. He very trustfully gave all forty thousand gold coins to Trunks and allowed him free rein over this sum to form the Soul Destroyer mercenary band.

    Han Shuo trained silently in his room. He hadn¡¯t left the store at all over the past two days. After a low incantation broke the silence, the bright sun was suddenly covered by ck clouds, and the entire courtyard was plunged instantly into darkness.

    The sinister ck cloudspletely blocked off the sun¡¯s rays, and a strong sense of death spread rapidly throughout the courtyard. The wraiths sealed within the pirs seemed to sense this marvelous presence and wanted to stir to action.

    This particrly dark magic spell could cause the presence of death to permeate the surroundings. Dark creatures that were located within it would have their attacks greatly strengthened, and enemies caught in the range of the ¡°Canopy of Necromancy¡± would be weakened thanks to the effects of this spell.

    At this point, not only had Han Shuo fully grasped all the spells that an adept mage should know, he could also use them skillfully. If he returned to the Academy and made use of this strength, Han Shuo was confident that he could easily advance to adept mage.

    When he thought of Fanny¡¯s promise with him and the right he¡¯d have to go out with her once he advanced to adept mage, Han Shuo felt quite excited by the thought of a steamy night with Fanny. Although he already had Emily and Phoebe now, his feelings for Fanny were something that the two would be unable to rece.

    Han Shuo had never bex about his magical cultivation, but the stage that demon infant was at meant that it needed the strength from souls to be stronger. Hard training alone wouldn¡¯t be enough to obtain improvement within the short term. Therefore, Han Shuo had also been waiting for an opportunity to obtain some stronger souls to nourish his demon infant.

    The sun was setting, and Han Shuo suddenly heard the little skeleton¡¯s call in the midst of his cultivation. An anxious, panicked feeling suddenly traveled from a ne far away as the little skeleton¡¯s urgent cry for help brought with it overtones of a hasty flight for life.

    Afterst time¡¯s experience, Han Shuo immediately knew that the little skeleton must¡¯ve met with some danger again. He didn¡¯t give it much thought as he immediately chanted the incantation, attempting to summon the little skeleton from the far away ne with the connection they shared.

    When the incantation wasplete, the air in front of him tore open as if a knife had sliced through it, and a little gleaming skeleton with seven pping bone spurs shot out of the crack like lightning.

    The figure of an enormous six meter tall knight, mounted on a ming horse and wielding a two meter long broadsword, was suddenly illuminated in the crack behind the little skeleton. An enormous rotting air spread from the enormous figure, as an overwhelming presence of death suffused the area, making one¡¯s heart palpitate.

    The dark creatures of the other dimension were bound by thews of space. They could only disy an enormous shadow. When the little skeleton was standing in front of Han Shuo, the crack in the air went back to normal and the enormous presence vanished without a trace.

    The little skeleton had yet to recover as he clutched his bone dagger in his left hand and the eyepatch in his right. After losing the eyepatch, the purple demon eye from the statue of Datara sparkled with purple light as the little skeleton looked dumbly at Han Shuo.

    An enormous strength suddenly exploded out of the little skeleton¡¯s purple demon eye. This power suddenly surged out with the purple demon eye as the center. It entered the little skeleton and Han Shuo¡¯s body, attempting to take over their bodies.

    Just like in the forest troll¡¯s sacred ce, the power from the purple demon eye was full of a violence that wanted to ravage everything. This power would always awaken after the eyepatch was removed, like Datara had truly left a bit of his consciousness behind in the eye.

    ¡°Put the eyepatch on, hurry!¡± Han Shuo roared out violently as his body trembled in the throes of pain as several sharp knives seemed to stab his brain.

    The little skeleton was likewise rolling on the ground in pain. After receiving Han Shuo¡¯s order, his hand bone shook as he slowly lifted the eyepatch.

    Miraculously, the enormous power that had invaded the two vanished without a trace when the eyepatch was ced back on.

    However, just as Han Shuo was breathing a sigh of relief and was looking at the little skeleton, he saw purple light shoot out of the little skeleton¡¯s left eye as the eyepatch that had been covering it ignited, going up in mes!

 Chapter 209: The Purifying Strength of Soul

    Chapter 209: The Purifying Strength of Soul

    When the eyepatch that sealed the Purple Demon Eye had burnt to ashes, the eye embedded within the little skeleton¡¯s eye socket once again discharged an eye piercing purple light.

    In that instant, that soul wrenching pain once again invaded Han Shuo and the little skeleton¡¯s body. The bone deep pain made both Han Shuo and the little skeleton tremble all over.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but let a growl under his breath, and the little skeleton¡¯s stark white jaw bone also ttered together as the two were invaded by a mysterious power.

    Suddenly, the demon infant residing in his abdomen surprisingly generated an enormous suction power. Han Shuo had the sudden impression that the demon infant had turned into a ck hole in that instant. His entire body seemed to turn into a great spider web, with the demon infant at the center, and all his meridians had turned into the durable fibers of the spider web.

    Thanks to the absorption force, the force that had invaded Han Shuo¡¯s body streamed towards the demon infant along the meridians of the spider web, like streams returning to the ocean.

    The heart wrenching pain decreased by quite a bit when his body morphed into this state. The invading power in Han Shuo¡¯s body was sent to the demon infant. Just like how Johnny¡¯s soul had once been digested and absorbed, this power was being turned into nutrients to aid a crazy rate of development for the demon infant.

    As the pain in his body slowly came under control, Han Shuo saw that the little skeleton was still rolling continuously on the ground. He struggled to make it to the little skeleton¡¯s side, and aimed the palm of his left hand at the skeleton¡¯s left eye socket, releasing the ¡°Demonic Art of Assimtion¡±.

    Magical light suddenly sparkled from his left hand as beams of faint purple light flowed into his body through Han Shuo¡¯s arm. They were sent via the meridians to the demon infant, just like the surge of power in his body had been treated.

    This was when Han Shuo was certain that the power from the Purple Demon Eye was one of the soul. Judging from the close rtion between the forest trolls and their protector Datara, this might very well be the vestiges of soul power left by the demon Datara on this ne.

    Compared to Johnny¡¯s soul, the soul from the Purple Demon Eye was even stronger. The violent, rampaging presence held within was met with no resistance from the demon infant. Instead, the demon infant circted the power from that soul madly, slowly purifying it.

    Looking in on the demon infant, Han Shuo could see that the demon infant now looked like a sun burning with ck spellfire, sending out piercing magic light in all directions. At the moment, Han Shuo¡¯s body was also glowing with light, as beams of a violent, chaotic, and evil magical aura wreathed his body. From the distance, it looked like Han Shuo had suddenly gained countless ck arms that were dancing wildly around him.

    After who knew how long, Han Shuo suddenly rxed as a crisp cracking sound rang out. Something seemed to have broken in the Purple Demon Eye as it suddenly lost its light. A cloud of purple smoke leaked out from the little skeleton¡¯s left eye as the demon infant kept furiously circting the power from the soul. The power that he¡¯d gained from the Purple Demon Eye was heads and shoulders above the amount that they¡¯d obtained from Johnny a few days ago. When Han Shuo felt that all the power had been absorbed into the demon infant, he gave the little skeleton an order to protect him. After that, Han Shuo sat down crosslegged to enter a meditative state to digest everything.

    The power within the Purple Demon Eye had beenpletely absorbed by the demon infant. The little skeleton sat dumbly on the floor for a while when he was released from his agony. After the mysterious power had vanished, the Purple Demon Eye embedded within the little skeleton¡¯s left eye socket rolled around adroitly, giving the little skeleton a trace of life.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± Emily and Gilbert detected that ck magical aura had exploded out of Han Shuo¡¯s room, and they couldn¡¯t help bute forth to investigate.

    The little skeleton had been sitting on the floor when he heard the knocks from outside. He straightened his calf bones and stood up, walking to open the door as his eye rolled a bit.

    When Emily and Gilbert saw that a short, white skeleton had appeared in front of them when the door was open, and that there was a purple eyeball in his left eye socket whirring busily, both of them hastily took a few steps back in their fright.

    Reaching out to point his left finger at Han Shuo, the little skeleton¡¯s eye rolled in a circle as his hand reached for his mouth and made a shushing gesture. His meaning for Emily and Gilbert was that, ¡°He needs quiet, don¡¯t disturb him!¡±

    Emily and Gilbert stared dumbly back at this little skeleton that was telling them to be quiet. They instinctively felt that the scene in front of them was too much of a challenge for their minds. A dark creature had made such a human gesture in front of them, and there was even an life-like eyeball rolling around in his left eye socket. All of this seemed unimaginably fantastic.

    It was a good thing that it wasn¡¯t Emily¡¯s first day knowing Han Shuo. When she¡¯d fought Han Shuo, she¡¯de up short against this little skeleton. Thus, when she looked carefully at the little skeleton and noticed the seven bone spurs on his back, she immediately understood that while the bone spurs color had changed, this little skeleton was still the same marvelous skeleton that¡¯d been immune to most dark magic and had relentlessly chased her.

    ¡°I think your master must be having some sort of marvelous advancement this time again. We won¡¯t disturb him then!¡± Taking a deep breath, Emily shook her head at Gilbert and indicated for him to leave with her.

    After the earth elite zombie¡¯s sudden rage in the cemetery of death, Gilbert understood that his master¡¯s dark creatures were different than the ones that he knew. If there was a zombie could form arge crack in the ground to attack him just for one sentence, then it wasn¡¯t too difficult to understand a small skeleton that made such human gestures.

    ¡°I think it¡¯ll be very interesting to follow such a master!¡± Gilbert looked at the little skeleton curiously and waved his hand goodbye, turning to speak to Emily after closing the door.

    ¡°I think so too, but you must continuously improve yourself, or you might find one day that you can¡¯t even defeat one of your master¡¯s dark creatures!¡± Emily had learned from Han Shuo that the dark creatures he refined had the unlimited potential to evolve by themselves. She¡¯d been a bit skeptical at first, but was a firm believer now that she¡¯d seen the little skeleton¡¯s performance.

    Han Shuo had been wholly unaware of Emily and Gilbert¡¯s visit. The enormous power from the purple eye was making him focus his concentration to the utmost, and he was impervious to all distractions from the outside world.

    Some magical cultivators needed to find an exceedingly quiet area to to mediate behind closed doors when training some sort of secret art or refining some treasure. They would also set up multipleyers of heavy defenses, in order to prevent disturbances. So much caution was taken because this was when a cultivator was most defenseless. Not a single bit of distraction could happen during this process, or one would run the risk of a cultivation deviation or waste of previous effort.

    Two days and nights passed. Han Shuo stayed within his room during this time, and Phoebe, Emily, and Trunks all busied themselves with setting up the mercenary band, or continuing to talk business into selling more of Han Shuo¡¯s jewels.

    On that night, the crew was staying within the store and discussing how best to use the gold as well as the most efficient way to handle the mercenary band¡¯s affairs when a member of the Cairo mercenary band suddenly knocked to say that a group of people were on their way over.

    The mercenary left immediately after delivering this message, saying that they needed to report this to the chief or vice chief of the Cairo mercenary band. He warned them to be careful, and informed them that their men would arrive in half an hour.

    ¡°It looks like the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries are on their way over. Bryan can¡¯t be disturbed at the moment, and we don¡¯t know when he¡¯ll wake up either. We¡¯re in a bit of trouble now!¡± Emily said with a small frown when the mercenary left.

    ¡°We¡¯ll give whoever darese a thorough beating if they dare trespass!¡± Gilbert was obviously not thinking much of this matter as he blustered offhandedly.

    ¡°They¡¯re not that easy to take care of. Florida¡¯s experts are as numerous as the clouds, and the Church of Light has sent some reinforcements as well. You may not be able to win even if you turn back into a dragon.¡± Trunks also said with a deep frown.

    ¡°Bryan can¡¯t be disturbed right now. The dark creature is protecting him right now, so he probably can¡¯t leave. We must protect him if he¡¯s here. As long as we can stall things for a bit so that the Cairo mercenariese, then all should be fine!¡± Phoebe thought silently for a bit and then responded.

    Dull hoofbeats sounded in the quiet night air. One could judge from the sound that the hooves of these battlesteeds had been wrapped by cotton cloth or something soft.

    ¡°Be careful, let¡¯s protect Bryan¡¯s room first!¡± Emily called out softly and said to the others.

 Chapter 210: A whirling bone dagger

    Chapter 210: A whirling bone dagger

    The enemies hade swifter than they¡¯d thought. No sooner had hoofbeats sounded in the distance, did strange noises starting from the roof.

    ¡°Go, leave the rooms, go to the courtyard!¡± Trunks maintained a calm expression as he hefted a longsword and walked towards the courtyard with the manticore.

    There was a wide courtyard in the middle of the storefront, with variousrge and small rooms around its perimeter. If the enemy attacked and pierced through the walls, and then used fire magic to set the rooms on fire, it would force Trunks and the others to be on the defensive.

    In addition, Han Shuo had once told them after he¡¯d painstakingly made his preparations that enormous danger lurked within the six pirs. But if they stood in certain positions next to the pirs, they wouldn¡¯t be affected by the formation. The formation wasn¡¯t active now, but once the six pirs were violently attacked, the formation would have a natural reaction even without Han Shuo¡¯s orders.

    ¡°We¡¯re not familiar with the things inside the courtyard, so let¡¯s not make a thoughtless move unless we have to. If we really can¡¯t defend ourselves, we¡¯ll hit the pirs and then quickly hide into the six safe areas and gamble!¡± Emily said to the other three while she took out her staff and walked into the courtyard.

    It¡¯d been two days since Han Shuo had cast the ¡°Canopy of Necromancy¡±, so there wasn¡¯t much of an effect left from it now. The starry sparkles were like diamonds embedded in the night sky, and the light from the myriad actual stars in the sky added a few traces of scattered light in the night. The light was just enough for those in the courtyard to roughly make out their surroundings.

    A sound suddenly howled through the air as a little bone dagger with a coldly shing handle started traveling over the roof like a lost soul.

    The howling from the little bone dagger ripped through the quiet of the night sky. Its gleam was particrly eye catching as it brought a cold, harsh presence of death. It flew over the tops of the roofs in a marvelous trail with no discernible pattern to it.

    Several soft sounds echoed from the dark corners that the little bone knife flew past. Suddenly, agonized screams rang out from those hard to view corners. Three dark shadows then fell off from the roof into the courtyard in an exceedingly bedraggled manner.

    Trunks and the others immediately knew what had happened when they saw this. When they saw three people lying on the ground not far from them, bleeding profusely, they didn¡¯t even think before rushing up to finish them off.

    The three on the ground had been struggling to their feet when they wereid back down in eternal slumber beneath Trunks and Phoebe¡¯s two shing swords.

    The group looked in surprise towards Han Shuo¡¯s room when the three were dead. They saw a corner lifted from the window blinds, and the whirling purple eye in the little skeleton¡¯s left socket, sparkling with a sinister purple light. There seemed to be a purple ball of ghostly me dancing around behind the window.

    His sparkling clean hand bone waved continuously. The weaving bone dagger seemed to be manipted by his hands as it danced around with no pattern whatsoever.

    ¡°Frightening little skeleton!¡± Trunks looked and couldn¡¯t help but shake his head.

    ¡°Look over there!¡± Gilbert suddenly shouted out. The other three looked over ordingly and saw that three clouds of gray mist were floating out of the three would-be ambushers¡¯ heads. The gray clouds seemed to be attracted by some sort of power as soon as they left their bodies and were soon absorbed by the two closest pirs.

    ¡°If I saw correctly, those three grey clouds were the souls of the three who¡¯d just died. Ordinarily speaking, people¡¯s souls return to the earth after they¡¯ve died, and most people won¡¯t be able to see them without the effects of magic!¡± As a dark archmage, Emily¡¯s knowledge in this area was a bit more broad than others, and she exined to the rest with a furrowed brow.

    ¡°Then why can we see it, and why did the three pirs absorb the grey clouds?¡± Phoebe asked in bafflement.

    Shaking her head with a wry smile, Emily turned to look at Han Shuo¡¯s room. ¡°How would I know the reason behind all this? If you want to understand everything, wait for him to wake up first. This courtyard is full of oddities, and it¡¯s all his doing!¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t think I¡¯d understand if he exined it either!¡± Phoebe was just as hard pressed to understand Han Shuo¡¯s mysteriousness as Emily was. She shook her head ruefully after Emily¡¯s words.

    The little bone dagger was still twirling without rest as the four were chatting. The three who¡¯d wanted to ambush them hadn¡¯t even clearly taken in their surroundings before they were counter-ambushed, and died ignobly. This had been so unjust!

    However, those three were just a scouting party. Although they had died, it didn¡¯t affect the enemies in the rear.

    When the dull hoofbeats suddenly quieted, Trunks and the others knew that the true battle was about to begin.

    The little bone dagger¡¯s howl suddenly grew more fierce. When the four looked over, the little bone dagger had already left the vicinity of the roof and was flying towards the sky in the distance. Two faint figures slowly became clear in the direction that the bone dagger was flying in. They seemed to be two masses of floating clouds in the starry night sky, being sent on their way by the wind.

    ¡°It¡¯s two archmages, we need to be careful!¡± Emily started and issued a grave reminder.

    A fiercely burning me suddenly sprang up in front of the little bone dagger as soon as Emily had spoken. The dagger shone with even more of a cold light beneath the light of the fire, and it sent an eye piercing ray in all directions.

    Several crossbow bolts suddenly came shooting from the front. Five had been shot out, but only one urately connected with the little bone dagger. The whirling dagger was knocked off its path and dropped down,nding with a nk on the streets not too far away.

    At that moment, the sound of the doors being broken down echoed as a fast patter of footsteps quickly approached. Roughly a dozen armored people immediately filled the courtyard, wielding all sorts of swords, spears, axes, and bows.

    Two archmages floated down to the roofs. Now that the dagger was no longer a threat, they cast a cold eye down on the proceedings.

    ¡°Trunks, you¡¯re here alright!¡± The cold voice of the fire archmage who¡¯d saved Florida at the gates to the Valley of Sunshinest time sounded, one of the two standing on one of the rooftops.

    ¡°Andy you traitor, how dare youe see me. The old chief treated you well, and that staff in your hands was something that the old chief spent a great deal of money to get someone to refine for you. To think that you¡¯d still be with that swine Florida after the old chief died!¡± Trunks pointed the longsword in his hand at Andy and hectored coldly.

    ¡°The old chief¡¯s death was an ident. He died at the hands of robbers in the surrounding mountain ranges, and had nothing to do with Florida. You envied Florida sitting in the seat of the chief of the Rainbow Sickles, that¡¯s why you¡¯re framing him.¡± Andy looked disdainfully at Trunks and mocked him.

    ¡°I think that with your intelligence, you¡¯ll be able to see what¡¯s really going on here. I¡¯vee back this time to make sure all you traitors pay the price!¡±

    Andy firstughed jeeringly and then looked at Trunks with a gaze full of pity. ¡°Today is when you¡¯ll die, you won¡¯t have the chance to in the future!¡±

    ¡°Stop wasting time with him, Laureton¡¯s men may show up at any time. We need to kill them immediately!¡± The other archmage who¡¯de with him said expressionlessly.

    There was the emblem of lightning on this person¡¯s magic robes. It looked like he was a thunder archmage. He seemed about 30 years old and had grey-brown locks. He was as thin as a bamboo pole as he paced back and forth on the roof.

    ¡°I know!¡± Andy said impatiently. He didn¡¯t seem to have cordial rtions with this thunder mage. He then cast a slightly odd look downwards and said with an equally odd tone, ¡°Do it?!¡±

    The enemies in the courtyard wereprised of swordsmen, knights, and archers. The weakest amongst them were sergeant knights or journeymen swordsmen. There was also onepletely covered in a green robe, wearing a pointy hat. His features couldn¡¯t be made out in the darkness, but there was an enormous presence from him.

    Andy had been looking and not really looking at this person when he spoke earlier. His tone didn¡¯t sound like he was giving an order, but more like he was asking his elder¡¯s opinion.

    When Andy¡¯s question concluded, this person suddenly moved as an enormous, harsh silver sword aura suddenly emanated from his body.

    As he moved and the harsh sword aura cut through the air, the pointy hat on his head flew backwards, revealing a face that Emily and Phoebe were very familiar with.

    ¡°Gabriel, it¡¯s you!¡± Emily couldn¡¯t help but cry out in surprise.

    Gabriel was rk¡¯s master and possessed the extraordinary strength of a great swordmaster. He was Bob Ascher¡¯s right hand man, but had popped up here instead!

 Chapter 211: The formation activates

    Chapter 211: The formation activates

    Gabriel flicked the longsword in his hand and sent silver fighting aura splitting through the air, apanied by a vicious, icy killing intent that pierced one down to the bones.

    As Emily gasped in shock, Trunks and Gilbert had already charged to intercept Gabriel. Trunks had an inscrutable expression as he brandished his sword on the back of his manticore, forming a round, milky white fighting aura circle in front of him.

    Gilbert held a dark long spear in his hand. He had no martial arts foundation, and so flung his spear forward with the inborn strength of a dark dragon tribe descendent.

    There was a string of metallic ngs and explosions. Trunks grunted and evaded swiftly with the manticore. Gilbert¡¯s spear was broken into two as his chest was marked by the fighting aura, revealing arge patch of dark skin.

    Great swordmaster Gabriel refocused his attention, his impassive face like it was carved out of stone. He was in no hurry to attack, but turned his gaze to where Han Shuo and the little skeleton were.

    The howl of the bone dagger dagger suddenly grew in intensity, and a gleaming bone dagger shot out from the direction Gabriel was looking in. The little skeleton behind the curtain had focused his purple eye on Gabriel and was waving the five finger bones of his left hand.

    Trunks was heavily panting, and Gilbert had been shocked into a cold sweat as they both reacted to Gabriel¡¯s strength. A simple swing had forced Trunks to dodge and evade like he¡¯d faced an avnche of attacks. The immensely strong Gilbert had simply thrown out a spear because he hadn¡¯t understood any martial techniques, only to have it hacked into two by the silver aura. If he hadn¡¯t shifted in time, his chest would¡¯ve been cut open by the fighting aura as well.

    Just as the two were fretting over how to handle Gabriel, support from the little skeleton arrived. Gabriel couldn¡¯t help but treat this gleaming dagger carefully.

    The ability to deploy a magical treasure was an incantation unique to magical cultivators. Gabriel had obviously been shocked by this incredible attack, which was why he¡¯d given up the chance to further beat down on Trunks and Gilbert and had turned his attention to fully sensing how the little skeleton was manipting the bone dagger.

    The silver fighting aura was radiant and stunning, and it seemed like glorious clusters of fireworks beneath the starry sky, erecting an impregnable defense around Gabriel. The little bone dagger circled around him, emitting ear piercing howls as it tried to give Gabriel a lethal blow.

    Small collision sounds continued to sound around Gabriel along with sparks, and the little bone dagger¡¯s path became more and more unpredictable.

    ¡°What are you standing you there? Attack!¡± Andy suddenly roared from above.

    The mercenaries had been staring, bbergasted, at the little bone danger¡¯s unbelievable attacks. They were finally awakened to their senses by this yell and either raised their bows to find their targets, or wield their swords, circling past Gabriel to charge at Trunks and the others.

    Andy and the other thunder mage on top of the roof also got to work when they saw the swordsmen and knights start charging below. They too used magic to attack Emily and the others.

    In the span of a moment, three fiercely burning fireballs as big as records started descending down to where Emily and the others were, rolling violently with the heat of their mes. Several bolts of lightning also ripped through the sky and crashed down, sparks flying everywhere.

    ¡°Oh dear!¡± Emily eximed and released a dark magic spell she¡¯d prepared in advance.

    An enormous, oily green appeared over people¡¯s heads as she chanted. When the formed, it dyed the three enormous fireballs, but the thunder attack went through the holes in the and still came crashing down.

    Emily and the others kept continuously ducking and weaving, evading the lightning strikes. The ground within the courtyard kept crackling and popping as two of the Shura pirs were also hit by lightning, piercing the darkness with light.

    A ng sounded from Gabriel¡¯s direction. He¡¯d gotten a grasp on the bone dagger¡¯s pattern of attack and used his sword to connect solidly with the bone dagger, sending it ttering to the ground.

    ¡°The friend within the house, your marvelous techniques are quite amazing, but your preferred style of hiding yourself and ambushing others is a bit shameful! Since you have such a marvelous technique, you should walk out forthrightly from the house and meet with me in battle!¡±

    Great swordmaster Gabriel naturally thought it was the reclusive Han Shuo manipting the bone dagger. Although he too had seen the little skeleton and his somewhat bizarre hand motions, he wasn¡¯t willing to believe that such a wondrous method of attack originated from a lowly dark creature.

    However, the little skeleton¡¯s next movespletely wrecked his understanding of the world!

    The little skeleton¡¯s purple eye red with light as he jumped out of the window with a twist of his body,nding to face Gabriel¡¯s provocation.

    He curled the five fingers of his right hand and the bone dagger lying on the ground suddenly flew upwards,nding in his hand like lightning.

    Gabriel couldn¡¯t react for a moment as he stared incredulously at the little skeleton, his mind short circuiting for a bit. An even more stunning thing happened as this moment as the little skeleton bent over slightly, making the seven bone spurs on his back suddenly fly out and shoot towards Gabriel like seven bolts of lightning.

    ¡°Oh my gosh!¡± A cry of astonishment that only Gabriel could hear flew out of his mouth.

    He was once again forced to be passive, defending himself by concentrating his silver fighting aura onto his longsword and expending all his focus on parrying the seven bone spurs¡¯ aerial attacks.

    The little skeleton raised the bone dagger and crashed into the attacking mercenaries in a mass of iling limbs. He revealed his cruel side as he bent and flexed his leg bones,nding into the group of mercenaries like a sh of lightning.

    He shot out his empty left hand and connected with a soft splurting sound, ripping out five bloody gorges in the chest of a journeyman swordsman and creating a bloody fountain.

    His right hand brandished the bone dagger and flourished it wildly, sending a nearby mercenary¡¯s head flying off his neck at high velocity. Bloody sprayed everywhere from the severed neck, dying the little skeleton¡¯s clean skeleton in an eerie red.

    Two crossbow bolts whistled and dinged into the little skeleton¡¯s back and chest with metallic sounds. The two bolts ttered to the ground as two white traces appeared on his bones.

    The two bolts hadn¡¯t harmed the little skeleton, but he had indeed been affected as his originally swiftly moving body couldn¡¯t help but waver a bit from the crossbow bolt attacks.

    Some of the mercenaries nearby took advantage of this opportunity to send their spears and swords at the little skeleton. Multiple dings rang out from his skeleton as these strings of attacks seemed to daze the little skeleton, and his control over the seven bone spurs also suddenly ceased.

    The bone spurs had been flying around Gabriel and attacking him whirled uncontrobly and crashed into a nearby Shura pir.

    It was as if a powerful inhibition had been triggered. Winds gusted through the courtyard and a thick sense of death suddenly spread to all four corners. The night sky was covered by this deathly aura, and not even the slightest hint of starlight made it through this shroud. Only a beam of evil red light rose to the sky from the center.

    The stark white pirs had been deathly quiet until now, when horrifying wails and screams suddenly rang out. The cries of ghosts and howls of wolves drilled into one¡¯s brain, making the scalps tingle with numbness. It was like a vicious ghost was crouched next to one¡¯s ear, sticking a tongue out of its blood red maw to lick at one¡¯s earlobe.

    The ghostly drawings on the pirs abruptly came back to life as they all capered and caterwauled. The pirs seemed to turn into demons with hundreds, no, thousands tentacles that continuously waved around, attacking all life around them.

    ¡°Hurry and take cover!¡± Emily shouted when she saw that the formation had been triggered.

    The others had actually already started moving before Emily¡¯s shout. They hastened to stand in the safe spots that Han Shuo had told them about before.

    Footsteps once again sounded outside, as the couple dozen Cairo mercenaries, originally surrounding the shop on the outskirts, couldn¡¯t help but charge into the courtyard when they saw that Han Shuo¡¯s group hadn¡¯t taken care of the attackers after so long.

    On arge tree three shops away, the dark grand magus Edwin and female alchemist Belinda of the Church of Cmity stood atop arge tree. They looked at the blood red light in the distance, and the center of the location where a hundred ghosts were wailing and screaming while strange winds were blowing.

    ¡°Can it be that the legendary evil god¡¯s curse has truly taken effect?¡± Belinda¡¯s eyes were filled with shock as she spoke to Edwin.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know, the presence within is quite odd, even I don¡¯t know what¡¯s going on. Let¡¯s not draw near for now and see what¡¯s going on first!¡± Edwin shook his head with some confusion.

 Chapter 212: Slaughter

    Chapter 212: ughter

    ¡°What¡¯s going on, what¡¯s going on here? I can¡¯t see anything!¡±

    ¡°Someone¡¯s attacking me, what¡¯s going on in this courtyard?!¡±

    ¡°Everyone be careful, this is the most sinister ce in the Valley of Sunshine. It must be the evil god¡¯s curse taking ce!¡±

    ¡°Retreat, everyone leave the courtyard! No one can leave this ce alive when the evil god¡¯s curse takes effect!¡±

    Panicked screams rang out from the mouths of the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries who¡¯d entered the yard. These people had all heard of the legend of the store, and when they saw abnormalities happen, they all tried to immediately leave in great haste.

    However, when the formation had been activated, the first formation of illusions had already taken effect. Apart from Emily and the others standing in safe zones, all the other mercenaries who¡¯d brashly intruded could see nothing of their surroundings as the thick sense of death permeated the air.

    Several foggy shadows suddenly shot out of the well in the center of the courtyard. When the kelpies sensed the presence of living humans nearby, they began to attack the mercenaries without hesitation.

    In an instant, the mercenaries suddenly felt their bodies grow cold, and it seemed like something liquid had entered their bodies. Their minds were hazy and befuddled as a voice seemed to take control of them, forcing them to wander involuntarily to the well and jump in.

    Three sshes echoed, as the mercenaries plummeted into the well amidst disorientation. The ice cold well water immediately restored their mind¡¯s rity, but their efforts to crawl out of the well at any cost were stymied. Their bodies were no longer under their control as they began to sink slowly into the depths.

    Three despairing screams suddenly rang out from the well. As their voices filled with terror and despair, the scalps of all the other mercenaries in the courtyard grew ever more numb!

    It was then that they finally realized there were many unknown dangers in this courtyard. This sh of enlightenment caused them give up any further thoughts of aggression, as they frantically tried to navigate the courtyard ording to their memories, attempting to leave this evil and dangerous ce with the fastest speed possible.

    However, the modestly sized courtyard seemed to stretch on for an eternity in every direction. They retreated ording to their memories, and their speed should¡¯ve taken them out of this area a long time ago, but they never seemed to be able to find its end, and cries of agony rang out in session next to their ears.

    The illusion suddenly changed as another them suddenly appeared in front of them. These apparitions were wielding sharp weapons and leering at them, attacking the real one mercilessly.The fear brought about from this phenomenon destroyed their willpower in an instant, thoroughly defusing their fighting spirit.

    Screams of fear and helpless sobbing echoed as all the mercenaries sank into a state of frenzied violence, randomly iling their weapons about. Even the most stout hearted mercenary found it hard to ept a double attacking them ruthlessly, and they were all equally scared,shing out at everything and anything.

    And like this, all the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries who had entered the courtyard went insane in a matter of moments. They fought against each other enthusiastically as cries of mental breakdowns, anguish, pain, and the ng of weapons rang out from all corners of the courtyard.

    Emily and the others in the safe zones had their lines of vision affected by where they were, so they couldn¡¯t see what was going on in the courtyard. However, the various sounds and shouts from those trapped within allowed them to understand that the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries were caught in a situation that they would find hard to forget for the rest of their lives.

    Whenever a wail cut off suddenly, it meant that another life had been lost. They would then see another wisp of grey sucked into the Shura pirs next to them. As each soul vanished, the souls inhabiting the Shura pirs would provide more evil power to the pirs, making the wind howl even more fiercely within the courtyard and spreading the presence of death even more quickly.

    Andy and the thunder mage could do nothing but watch the changes in the courtyard. The thick presence of death obscured the sky, and apart from a blood red beam rising into the sky from the center, there was nothing else that entered their eyes.

    Like Emily and the others, the cries of helplessness and despair rang continuously in their ears. Contrary to the feelings of Emily and the others, Andy and the other mage felt their scalp grow numb as their hearts palpitated in fright. They didn¡¯t dare randomly cast fire and thunder spells because they couldn¡¯t see the situation clearly. They could only stand anxiously on top of the roof and scratch their heads, attempting to find a more appropriate way to help.

    Although everyone¡¯s vision had been affected, the little skeleton was standing in the center of the courtyard, with his purple eye sparkling fiercely like an elegant gentleman. He walked leisurely, as if taking a stroll through the ballroom and walked with light steps with the bone dagger in his hand. He ambled at ease through the courtyard of madness, walking at the side of the mercenaries randomly waving their des.

    He made a grasping motion with his left hand bones and created bloody gauges in the mercenaries or just directly twisted their necks. The bone dagger sparkled with cold light as it drew beautiful arcs, cutting off agonized wails and reaping yet another life.

    When the attacking mercenaries had all fallen one by one, the great swordmaster Gabriel had be the little skeleton¡¯s final target. Gabriel was much more difficult to handle than he¡¯d imagined. Silver fighting aura filled the area around him as his brows jumped up and down on his face. It was obvious that he too was feeling the effects of the formation, but he was in no hurry to attack his surroundings and had focused on defending his area instead.

    It was because of these conservative actions that only the weakest attacks had drawn near him. Those mercenaries that were closest to him were all blocked by the fighting aura, but these mercenaries were all busy killing each other or had been easily ughtered by the little skeleton. Apart from the enormous drain of his fighting aura, Gabriel hadn¡¯t suffered at all from the formation.

    The little skeleton drew near to Gabriel and wanted to keep using the same easy method to reap his life, but it wasn¡¯t that easy. Since Gabriel was holding onto the mindset of being willing to forgo achievements as long as he could protect himself adequately, he¡¯d used his silver fighting aura to form curtains around him, thoroughly defending himself.

    The little skeleton couldn¡¯t prate the great swordmaster¡¯s method either when he arrived. The little skeleton rubbed his head in frustration as he stood by Gabriel¡¯s side, his purple eye rolling around busily as he tried to figure out the best way to handle the situation.

    ¡°Who dares ignore the presence of the Cairo mercenary band and attempts tomit murder in the Valley of Sunshine!¡± Laureton¡¯s explosive roar crashed in from the distance like a great wave from the sea. Heavy hoofbeats sounded from afar with his shout.

    ¡°This is bad, that Laurmonster ising. We need to retreat!¡± The thunder mage on the rooftop suddenly said lowly.

    ¡°But, Gabriel is still down there!¡± Andy also had a panicked look on his face as he looked anxiously downwards.

    ¡°No time for all of that. If we don¡¯t leave now, we won¡¯t be able to when Laurmonster makes his way here. But if you want to die that badly, I won¡¯t make you leave either!¡± The thunder mage said coldly, without a nce at Andy. He used a levitation spell to lift himself up and flew off into the distance.

    Andy looked nk for a bit and finally shook his head with resignation. He stomped his foot and also used a levitation spell to float upwards, vanishing into the night behind the thunder mage.

    When Andy and the thunder mage had left, Edwin and Belinda also left their post from a great tree not too far away and followed them soundlessly.

    At this moment, the six Shura pirs quickly sucked in the presence of death and ill winds within the courtyard. In a couple of moments, starlight once again shone down onto the courtyard. As the formation¡¯s effects withdrew, it left behind only a ground littered with bodies and Gabriel, still waving his sword around.

    ¡°Kill him!¡± Gilbert yelled and grabbed a battle axe from the body nearby, charging towards Gabriel.

    Phoebe and Trunks also knew that this opportunity was umon as they too brandished their weapons, charging towards Gabriel with the fastest speed possible. Theybined their efforts with the little skeleton to issue a strong attack towards Gabriel.

    Gabriel reacted very swiftly as soon as the formation¡¯s effects wore off. He took a quick look around and understood that his operations this time had failedpletely. He moved without hesitation and leapt for the rooftop.

    Gilbert and the other¡¯s attacks arrived at this time, only to be met with a rock from the roof as Gabriel¡¯s longsword flicked with a silver sh of fighting aura, batting it into the path of the attacksing at him from behind.

    An explosion sounded as the flying battle axe was halted by therge rock. The bone dagger howled as it broke apart the rock, directly threatening Gabriel. Gabriel swept his longsword in an arc and finally sent the little bone dagger flying to the side.

    However, Trunks and Phoebe¡¯s fighting auras also arrived in front of Gabriel at this time. A ghastly scream spilled from his lips as his swiftly flying body suddenly paused, with a criss crossing pattern of des appearing on his back. It was obvious that he¡¯d suffered great injury. As he fled in a panic, he spat out great mouthfuls of fresh blood.

    Emily used the levitation spell to fly upwards and was about to chant a dark magic to give him the final blow when a fierce arrow flew out of nowhere like cold lightning. It brought with its speed a frosty chill, something that she felt before it even drew near her.

    Emily choked off her incantation halfway through and suddenly dropped out of the sky. However, that cold arrow still doggedly clung to her path and shot towards her neck like a lethal sh of lightning, embodied with a fearful chill and ruthlessness.

    There wasn¡¯t even enough time to chant a spell at this moment. Gilbert and the others were all within the courtyard and had just sent forth an enormously vicious blow. Whether in terms of personal speed or fighting aura, there was nothing that anyone could do for Emily at this time.

    The person who had sent out this arrow had an exquisite grasp of timing, understanding the right moment to strike. They¡¯d melded ice magic into this arrow, and the swiftness and cruelty of this shot was one that greatly frightened onlookers.

    Despair filling her face, Emily¡¯s hopes vanished at this moment. There was only one thought in her mind. ...was she going to die like this?

    However, nothing is ever absolute in life! In that moment of certain death, a red light ripped through the dark sky and appeared next to Emily, crashing into that lethal arrow with irrefutable uracy.

    The missile broke apart on contact, and the frosty air scattered as it was unable to concentrate into one ce.

    Emily had snatched her life back from the jaws of death, and the glee of living after a disaster filled her heart. When she focused her eyes to the front again, she saw the Demonyer Edge flying in front of her!

    In that moment, an indescribable feeling of bliss filled her heart like an enormous wave. In that instant, the love that she had for Han Shuo was as deep as the boundless ocean.

    ¡°You won¡¯t be that lucky next time!¡± A clear shout traveled from exceedingly far away. A thin figure danced on top of some rooftops like a swan elegantly dancing on ake.

    Trunks and the others were enraged as they all leapt up tond on the roofs, nning on taking down this extremely dangerous female archer.

    ¡°Don¡¯t chase her!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s low shout traveled from within the house at this time.

    Original and most updated trantions are on vre. If you¡¯re reading this anywhere else, it has been stolen from the trantor. Don¡¯t support theft. ??

    The room door was open as a sinister looking Han Shuo stepped out. Blood red light emanated from his body as a thick killing aura condensed around him. His eyes were blood red, and his expression sinister and filled with the utmost cruelty. It was as if he was a demon from hell, having endured millennia to break through his shackles and arrive in the world of humans!

    Emily and the others were absolutely shocked by Han Shuo¡¯s current appearance and aura. They subconsciously halted their footsteps and looked at the somewhat unfamiliar Han Shuo.

    The current Han Shuo¡¯s presence and expression were all much too malevolent. He was simply too different from usual!

 Chapter 213: A bloodthirsty urge

    Chapter 213: A bloodthirsty urge

    Han Shuo took a deep breath in and slowly repressed his aroused desire for blood. A slowly stirring urge to engage in ughter was slowly calmed after a few deep breaths.

    Under the gaze of Trunks and the others, Han Shuo¡¯s original distant and bloodthirsty appearance started to slowly revert to normal after he took in a few deep breaths. The blood red light and that cruel aura all slowly disappeared until he returned to the form they were familiar with.

    ¡°What happened to you?¡± Emily finally breathed a sigh of relief when she saw Han Shuo return to normal. Her beautiful eyes looked anxiously at Han Shuo.

    ¡°My techniques were elevated to a new stage just now, and this new stage is incredibly difficult to control. I¡¯m not that familiar with this new stage yet and lost myposure!¡± Han Shuo revealed a faint smile when his mindset returned to normal and exined to the others.

    ¡°I was so frightened. Your expression and aura earlier were really evil and scary. Even I felt terrified!¡± Trunks looked deeply at Han Shuo. His heart was pounding even now.

    Of those present, only the little skeleton wasn¡¯t reacting out of the ordinary. He started capering happily when he saw Han Shuo appear, and pointed at the corpses on the ground every now and then, seeming to be rying his battle score to Han Shuo.

    Chuckling lightly in gratification, Han Shuo could feel the little skeleton¡¯s desire to show off, excitedly awaiting for Han Shuo¡¯spliments.

    ¡°Hey you brat, c¡¯mere. Well done!¡± Beckoning his hand, Han Shuo stroked the little skeleton¡¯s gleaming skull when thetter walked over docilely with his bone dagger. The little skeleton¡¯s purple eye rolled around as his jaw bone ttered together, appearing quite at ease.

    ¡°Honored master, you¡¯re truly prejudiced. You¡¯ve never treated me this kindly!¡± Gilbertined when he saw Han Shuo drown the little skeleton with love.

    The little skeleton had been by Han Shuo¡¯s side when thetter was still an errand ve. He¡¯d started off throwing trash away for Han Shuo, and took care of a lot of random, irritating matters. When the little skeleton had grown stronger, it had protected Han Shuo a few times. This were deeds which Gilbert couldn¡¯t measure up to.

    Flicking a nce at Gilbert, Han Shuo was about to say something when he suddenly frowned and turned his eyes to the entrance.

    Laureton of the Cairo mercenary band walked in through the doorway like a metal tower. Harris and a group of experts followed close behind him. Laureton¡¯s body was built very robustly, and he was likely even a bit heavier than a battlesteed. His footsteps echoed dully on the ground as he walked.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on, where are the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries?¡± A voice that rang like a bell sounded from Laureton¡¯s mouth.

    Pointing at the corpses littered over the ground, Han Shuo smiled faintly, ¡°Aren¡¯t these them?¡±

    Laureton¡¯s brow drew together as he looked at the ground, listing out names as though he were counting up his family¡¯s treasures. ¡°Angero, Tulije, Jelina...¡± Shock blossomed on his face as he spoke. When he finally lifted his head to look at Han Shuo, shock was all that was left on his face. ¡°You guys killed all of them?¡±

    ¡°Possibly. Or maybe it was the curse of the evil god that helped us!¡± Han Shuo smiled mysteriously and shrugged his shoulders as he answered carelessly.

    ¡°These people are indeed of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band, and some of them are their core members. To think you¡¯ve managed to killed so many of them, this is a big help to us!¡± Harris was hard pressed to conceal his joy after he walked in, and his voice seemed more emotional than usual.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on here?¡± Laureton was thoroughly confused by Han Shuo¡¯s response and could not help but ask.¡±

    ¡°Laureton, you came toote! You only arrived after the fighting had finished. Looks like the efficiency of the Cairo mercenary band isn¡¯t as good as we thought!¡± Trunks flicked a nce at Han Shuo and spoke before thetter could speak.

    ¡°Trunks, you also know that there are many areas in the valley that need to be protected. Our mercenary band can¡¯t possibly station that many of our men here.¡± Laureton said and then snorted coldly with an irritated expression. ¡°To ignore our existence like this, Florida has be way too cocky! The ones whounched a sneak attack on you didn¡¯t even conceal their features. This is an obvious dismissal of us!¡±

    ¡°Chief Laureton, I hope you guys can be more timely next time. The matters here have already ended and there¡¯s probably nothing here that¡¯s worthy of your attention left.¡± Han Shuo said and then suddenly remembered something. ¡°Amongst those who attacked us this time was a great swordmaster called Gabriel. This person works for Bob Ascher, chief of the Gryphon Legion in nearby Valley City. I don¡¯t know if the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band is in leagues with Bob Ascher. I hope you¡¯ll keep an eye out for this!¡±

    ¡°Great swordmaster Gabriel!¡± Laureton eximed in shock as he obviously didn¡¯t know of this matter. His expression grew grave.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°That¡¯s right. This person is the master of Bob Ascher¡¯s eldest son, rk and has always been by Bob Ascher¡¯s side. I hadn¡¯t thought that he¡¯d leave Ascher¡¯s side this time and be with the Rainbow Sickles.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll investigate things thoroughly. Alright, we¡¯ll be leaving now, if there¡¯s nothing else.¡± Laureton seemed to be contemting something with a darkened face as he spoke rather anxiously.

    ¡°Wait, I¡¯ve been away from the valley for too long and don¡¯t know enough about Florida¡¯s strength. You should give us detailed information about all the experts of the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries and their strength. A thunder mage appeared today, as well as a female archer with amazing shooting skills. One of ourpanions was almost injured this time. We need detailed information on the Rainbow Sickles!¡± Trunks hurriedly said when he saw Laureton about to leave.

    ¡°Female archer!¡± Laureton cried out once again and said gravely, ¡°That would be the female elf Maxine. She¡¯s a sharpshooter versed in the water, thunder, and wind magics. She canbine all three magics into her shooting and send out incredibly frightening shots.¡±

    ¡°This woman is very difficult to deal with, it¡¯s said that she¡¯s the fiancee that Florida¡¯s grandfather located for him. She¡¯s very mysterious, and doesn¡¯t seem to have good rtions with Florida. She¡¯s rarely in the valley these days, but will always help whenever the Rainbow Sickles meet with danger. It looks like she¡¯se back!¡±

    ¡°Who was the thunder archmage?¡± It was Emily¡¯s turn to ask this time.

    ¡°His name is Asa. He only joined half a year ago and I¡¯m not too sure of his background. Vicious and cruel, he gets along well with Florida. He¡¯s taken care of most of the band¡¯s underhanded dealings this past year, and is deeply trusted by Florida!¡± Laureton was quite familiar with the experts of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band and began to exin in great detail without hesitation when Trunks and Emily asked him.

    ¡°Apart from these two, have any other experts joined the Rainbow Sickles these past few years?¡± Trunks continued to ask.

    Laureton¡¯s brow creased as he thought silently for a moment, then turned his head to look at Harris. ¡°Give him a copy of our intelligence.¡±

    Harris started and then nodded, taking out a scroll from his space ring and handing it over to Trunks. ¡°The information regarding the Rainbow Sickles in here is likely going to be more detailed than what Miss Emily has.¡±

    It looked like Harris and the others already knew of Emily¡¯s identity. They were the ones who held true power within the valley, and the identities of those they watched over would naturally not escape their eyes.

    Trunks nodded after scanning this scroll, then smiled at Laureton. ¡°Very detailed. We¡¯ll take care of Florida for you before the struggle for power begins!¡±

    ¡°If this is the case, I will thank you all greatly. Not only will this shop be unconditionally yours, Miss Phoebe¡¯s guild shall be exempt from all taxes in the valley in the future.¡± Lauretonughed heartily and strode outside with great steps.

    Harris, who followed closely behind Laureton looked at Trunks and reminded, ¡°The terrain of the Rainbow Sickle quarters is drawn behind the scroll. There are detailed descriptions of their open and hidden outposts. Destroy this scroll after reading it, don¡¯t let it fall into the hands of others and give rise to unnecessary trouble!¡±

    Trunks nodded understandingly andughed coldly, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I know what to do!¡±

    Harris and Trunks were old acquaintances and naturally knew that Trunks and Florida had a death feud. Harris left with the parting words, ¡°Good luck!¡±

    When Laureton and the others had left, Han Shuo said lowly, ¡°Laureton is trying to take advantage of us! But we want to find our footing in the valley as well, so we won¡¯t move ording to his ns! The Cairo mercenary band and Rainbow Sickles aren¡¯t the only powers within the valley. There are some others that aren¡¯t weak either, and I¡¯m sure they would love to rece the Cairo mercenary band and hold power in their hands as well!¡±

    Trunks blinked and asked Han Shuo, ¡°What would you like to do?¡±

    Chuckling sinisterly, Han Shuo looked at the sky and murmured to himself, ¡°The winds are strong and the night dark today. The Valley of Sunshine has been chaotic for a while now. Let¡¯s make use of this opportunity to make things even more messy!¡±

 Chapter 214: The four great powers

    Chapter 214: The four great powers

    Apart from the strongest Cairo mercenary band in the Valley of Sunshine, there were two other slightly weaker factions of the House of Menlo and the Katar orc tribe.

    The House of Menlo had originally been a minor noble family in a small kingdom. They had their own private army and had attempted a coup, but had failed when their ns were revealed.

    They¡¯d fought with the royal army of the small kingdom and fled, discarding their armor along the way. They¡¯d finally arrived in the Valley of Sunshine with vastly decreased strength.

    They only possessed three hundred soldiers then, but the House of Menlo had made off with quite a sum of riches from the small kingdom during the chaos of civil war. They used this fortune when they arrived in the valley to attract a thousand experts of various professions, and their strength was now second only to the Rainbow Sickles.

    The House of Menlo was now the richest power within the valley, and the head of the house Sawyer Menlo always dreamed about bing the most powerful within the valley, recruiting more soldiers and going back to their home, obtaining the authority over that kingdom.

    The Katar orc tribe was a small tribe that had originally lived in frosty destion. They¡¯d ovee countless hardships to immigrate to the Valley of Sunshine and take up residence within one of its mountain ranges. There were only five, six hundred orcs within this tribe, but all of them were highly capable warriors that were tough to take on.

    The orcs of the Katar tribe mainly functioned to protect the merchants and put their earnings towards taking care of their family and elderly.

    This faction wasn¡¯t weak, but the chief of the tribe was also constantly thinking about controlling the valley in order to gain more benefits and gold.

    The Cairo mercenary band, the Rainbow sickle mercenary bound, the House of Menlo, and the Katar orc tribe were the four strongest forces in the Valley of Sunshine at the moment.

    This information wasn¡¯t hard to obtain. Han Shuo had just arrived in the valley not too long ago before learning all of this from Emily. Everyone was aware that the four powers had uneasy rtions, and that each of them wanted to take over the Valley of Sunshine to leverage its resources and quickly increase their own strength.

    The Cairo mercenary band had only had a thousand people to begin with. After they¡¯d taken control of the Valley of Sunshine, their numbers had doubled in just a few years. This was all because they¡¯d obtained enormous amounts of gold after controlling the Valley of Sunshine and attracted even more numbers of experts to join.

    To the Cairo mercenary band, it was a wonderful trade if they could immensely decrease the Rainbow Sickles without harming their own strength. A mere storefrontpared to the entire valley, it was a worthwhile trade no matter how one looked at it.

    It was because Han Shuo understood the situation within the valley that he was full of ambition and began to think for himself, trying to plot a profitable path for the mercenary band he¡¯d just formed.

    ¡°Trunks, take your oldrades and go for a walk around the House of Menlo tonight. Conceal your faces and cause some trouble. Kill some people and set some fires!¡± Han Shuo looked at Trunks and smiled slightly.

    ¡°You mean, make the House of Menlo think that another faction did it?¡± Trunks¡¯ expression changed as he asked.

    ¡°They won¡¯t suspect us anyways when they¡¯re attacked, because we don¡¯t have the strength and have no reason to be enemies with them. They¡¯ll suspect the other three factions in the end.¡± Han Shuo exined.

    Trunks nodded and a sinister smile appeared on his face. ¡°I think I can do this well. I was used to the covert and open struggles between the factions when I was still in the Rainbow Sickles!¡±

    ¡°Then good, be careful and don¡¯t expose yourselves. Cause as much destruction as you can!¡±

    Trunks made use of the night and said nothing else, leaving hurriedly. It looked like he was nning on making some moves tonight.

    After Trunks had left, Han Shuo said darkly to Emily and the two others. ¡°Since the Rainbow Sickles have already made a move against else, we can¡¯t take that long down, can we? Come, let¡¯s go take a walk ourselves and see if we can kill some people at the Rainbow Sickles!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s group now enjoyed exceedingly good rtions with the Cairo mercenary band. It was very convenient for them to enter and leave the valley. However, they didn¡¯t exit from the main entrance this time, but made use of Gilbert¡¯s flight ability to fly out of a quiet corner in the valley.

    There were rules in the valley as well. Under ordinary conditions, even archmages who could fly couldn¡¯t levitate themselves in and out of the valley. If they were discovered by the Cairo mercenary band, they would be immediately detained for questioning.

    The moonlight shimmered like water as it cascaded down over the white ground. The umted snow had yet to melt, and the snow covered mountains and towering trees were inordinately beautiful beneath the rays of the moon.

    The Rainbow Sickles were located within a small mountain valley to the north of the Valley of Sunshine. When Han Shuo¡¯s group arrived, they could see row of low houses made of red tiles when they peered into the mountain valley. There was a sizable hot spring cluster within the valley, and hot mist was arising from the waters, shrouding the mountain valley in white mist.

    There were many fresh flowers and grass nted around the hot springs, and because of the heat from the springs, the flowers and grass in the surroundings weren¡¯t afraid of the bite of winter. Many vibrant flowers were blooming all over the area.

    Stout looking mercenaries were stationed at outposts all over the mountain valley. They were looking around alertly, always on their guard against the intrusion of enemies.

    Han Shuo had Gilbert stop on a cliff over the valley and looked downwards. Han Shuo smiled coldly, ¡°Someone else may be making a move before us this time!¡±

    Phoebe and Emily revealed confused expressions after his words. They looked in bafflement at Han Shuo, with Phoebe asking, ¡°What makes you say that?¡±

    ¡°When we were at the storefront earlier, dark grand magus Edwin and the female alchemist Belinda of the Cmity Church were observing not too far in the distance. I sensed their position before I stopped, and the two of them followed after Andy when he left.¡±

    ¡°Edwin and Belinda were the first to break off from the pursuit, and then it was Gabriel and the female archer Maxine who left. Edwin and Belinda should in the mountain valley below now. If they¡¯re here to kill Florida, that will be a huge help for us!¡± Han Shuo said slowly as he looked down into the mountain valley below.

    ¡°Then what should we do?¡± Starting at some unknown time, Emily had already grown ustomed to Han Shuo deciding everything when he was present.

    Lifting his head to look at the sky, Han Shuo said, ¡°Only half of this long night has passed. We still have plenty of time, let¡¯s wait for a while!¡±

    Time passed quickly as roughly half an hourter, violent magic pulses suddenly emanated form one of the most magnificent red tile buildings. A metal golem in the shape of the three eyed demon god abruptly appeared out of thin air beneath the cool moonlight.

    The golem began body mming the magnificent building as soon as it appeared. Its thick metal tail swept across the scene and sent red tiles flying everywhere, shaking all the buildings as well.

    At the same time, strong magic pulses apanied the rumbling sounds of the earth shaking and mountains moving. Three hands of death appeared out of thin air and floated into the magnificent building through the windows, destroying its insides with abandon.

    ¡°Edwin and the others have made their move, we can¡¯t sit idly by!¡± Han Shuo chuckled coldly as the air of bloodlust gathered around him again. The evil and ruthless expression from earlier once again floated onto his cheeks.

    ¡°What should we do, honored master?¡± Gilbert was once again excited as he rumbled in his deep dragon voice.

    ¡°Bear them on your back and fly over the mountain valley. Destroy al the buildings in this valley to the best of your abilities, and spray out poisonous me. If you run into any attacks that may injure you, fly away immediately and don¡¯t wait for me. No one will be able to stop me if I want to leave!¡± Han Shuoughed loudly with a grimace and a coldly stern expression. He rushed down like a diving hawk, a blood red light emerging from his body as his eyes were turned a deep blood red.

    ¡°Will he be alright?¡± Phoebe had already discovered Han Shuo¡¯s peculiarities before he¡¯d flown down, and couldn¡¯t help but voice her concerns to Emily.

    ¡°Do as he says!¡± Emily responded and kicked Gilbert in the sides. ¡°Dark dragon, move out!¡±

    A thin figure followed behind Han Shuo in this moment, floating downwards through the air.

    The little skeleton capered wildly as he flew like a kite with a broken string. When he reached halfway, the seven bone spurs on his back shook consecutively and his body regained bnced. He followed closely behind Han Shuo with a strange trail and dived down towards the mountain valley.

 Chapter 215: A frenzied slaughter

    Chapter 215: A frenzied ughter

    Cultivators easily became violent and angry in the bloodlust realm. One could onlyprehend the wonders of this realm in the midst of bloodthirsty battle, and only through such ughter could a cultivator understand himself better. Continued ughter was the fastest shortcut to breaking through this realm.

    However, it was exceedingly easy for one to veer into a cultivation deviation during the ughter. It was incredibly hard for a cultivator to regain their reason once they identally lost it, and they would be a crazed monster that only knew how to wreak mass ughter. Therefore, this realm was quite difficult to exercise self control in. ughter was the fastest way to ascend from it, but it was also a one way path.

    As Han Shuo flew down from the cliff, his hatred towards Florida was infinitely magnified, including his anger towards the female archer Maxine who¡¯d almost caused a fatal blow to Emily. His originally calm heart began to pound at a much faster rate than usual, and the magical yuan filled the demon infant with a thriving life force.

    When the demon infant had absorbed the pure power of the soul held within the purple demon eye, it¡¯d help Han Shuo break through his stalemate in the true demon realm. When he¡¯d reached the bloodlust realm, although he would asionally have the thought of rampaging around killing everything in sight, his strength had indeed taken leaps and bounds forward.

    An inky ck shadownded from the sky amidstrge rumbling noises. An thick sense of killing intent arose, one that couldn¡¯t be ignored by anyone. When the panicking Rainbow sickle mercenaries, in the throes of gathering their men and horses to respond to Edwin and Belinda¡¯s threat, discovered the abnormalities in the sky, they sent arrows, spears, and javelins howling with lightning into the sky.

    However, none of the dozen or so attacks could approach the dark shadow. The descending figure swiftly recited a necromancy magic incantation, and a ck light shed through the skies. A troop of gargoyles appeared out of nowhere. They were wielding bone spears and lined up in a neat formation in front of the dark shadow, blocking all the arrows, spears, and javelins.

    Suddenly, an enormous ck canopy expanded quickly from the dark figure. It covered the bright moonlight and enclosed a third of the valley in the canopy.

    A thick presence of death abruptly spread out. All those who moved around in its vicinity felt that their body was moving around much more stiffly than normal. The dark shadownded in the valley beneath the cover of the canopy and dark creatures started popping into existence shortly thereafter.

    The moonlight was blocked by the ck clouds, making one unable to tell time and not knowing how much time there was until daybreak.

    The Canopy of Necromancy was a spell that had been lost long ago, and it adversely affected the battle strength of all enemies caught within it. All dark creatures would be strengthened in the range of this canopy, and their strength and speed would be increased after absorbing the thick presence of death around them.

    This was an evil magic that wore away at the opponent¡¯s strength and increased the strength of one¡¯s own dark creatures. It¡¯d been forgotten by humans on the continent since the cemetery of death had vanished.

    When Han Shuo¡¯s magic materialized, the dark creatures all began excitedly attacking their surroundings. Not only did the Rainbow Sickles feel the limberness of their bodies affected, their eyes also felt abnormally dry and their vision was likewise affected.

    ¡°Belinda, apart from rendon, has another necromancere by this time?¡± Edwin had been releasing dark magic when he saw the moonlight be obscured by the ck clouds. He asked a gleeful question to Belinda, who happened to be manipting her golems off on the side, when he saw the dark creatures enthusiastically attack the mercenaries.

    Shaking her head, Belinda¡¯s expression was perplexed as she responded, ¡°rendon¡¯s already been killed. There should be no other necromancers other than him!¡±

    Edwin started when he heard those words and smiled faintly, ¡°Then perhaps our superiors sent more people over. Even I have never seen such mysterious necromancy magic. I don¡¯t think that there¡¯s any other necromancers apart from our Cmity Church who would grasp such magic!¡±

    ¡°Of course, only our Cmity Church would have such mysterious magic. He must be one of our.¡± Belinda had full faith in Edwin¡¯s words. It would seem that they had an unswervable confidence in the strength of the Cmity Church.

    ¡°I¡¯m Edwin, which friend hase by?¡± When Edwin saw that the dark creatures were helping them after Han Shuo had appeared, he couldn¡¯t help but call out in a friendly manner when he saw the dark creatures head off some of the mercenaries.

    His enormous amount of mental strength had been mostly depleted after releasing the canopy of necromancy and summoning fifty to sixty dark creatures of different levels. When the dark creatures began to attack with wild abandon under the cover of the canopy, Han Shuo became a cruel shadow locked in the depths of bloodlust and began to vent his violence every which way.

    A craving for fresh blood cascaded down like the endless river waters, pushing Han Shuo into a boundless frontier of ughter. Wherever the dark shadow passed, the mercenaries with insufficient strength were all hacked to pieces by the sharp Demonyer Edge, and fresh blood splurted everywhere.

    His eyes dyed blood red, Han Shuo¡¯s hard to control desire to kill everything led him to kill all those in his path. He was as if a machine reaping lives, and all the mercenaries in his vicinity kept being subjected to frightful attacks.

    His body halted slightly after hearing Edwin¡¯s words, but he ignored them. When he looked around again, he discovered that apart from the little skeleton hot on his heels, there was no one else there.

    Now in the bloodlust realm, the durability of Han Shuo¡¯s body had reached its peak. He could instinctively sense the danger around him as he fought, and could even clearly perceive the fear and trembling of those far away. Whenever he killed someone, the fear of his victim upon imminent death and his resentment after death would form a cloud of air hard to be seen by the human eye, to be absorbed by the aura of killing intent around Han Shuo.

    As more and more mercenaries were ughtered, the killing aura around Han Shuo became more and more thick. A strong scent of blood even began to emanate from his pores. Han Shuo¡¯s body and magical yuan kept being continuously refined in this process, and he could feel his strength increasing bit by bit in this process.

    In contrast, Han Shuo¡¯s mind became more and more torpid the more his body and magical yuan improved. When the fear and resentment cause from killing others was attracted to his vicinity, this enormous amount of information seemed to affect Han Shuo¡¯s mind, making the blood vessels on his brain pulse and giving him the feeling that he was entering a cultivation deviation.

    He realized that this was bad and scanned Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories, immediately realizing that in the bloodlust realm, once the brain had this kind of torpid sign and wanted to kill and destroy everyone and everything in sight, this was a sign of one about to enter a cultivation deviation.

    His tried and tested willpower proved to be useful now. Han Shuo recalled the Demonyer Edge back into his storage ring and attempted to calm his rampaging heart whilst he still had some semnce of reason left. He ignored the chaos around him and sat down crosslegged.

    The little skeleton had been at Han Shuo¡¯s side and helping him reap lives when he suddenly saw his master sit down. His purple eye shed as the little skeleton waved a hand at some of the dark creatures nearby.

    The purple eye shed on and off with an evil, purple light like a broken light bulb. There seemed to be a mysterious powerpelling the dark creatures. Several zombies and hate warriors walked over fearfully as the little skeleton beckoned to them, giving the little skeleton the respect that subordinates would give to their superiors.

    When they faced Han Shuo, they could only move stiffly ording to instinct, due to being summoned by a spell. But when Han Shuo had sat down cross legged and was summoned by the little skeleton, they disyed fear and respect when they carefully surrounded Han Shuo. They seemed deeply afraid that the little skeleton would be unsatisfied and be angry at them. They behaved like the most humble servants and ves.

    This kind of performance seemed to indicate that they¡¯d long since known the little skeleton, or heard of the little skeleton¡¯s dominance and wondrous achievements. Otherwise, in the vast and boundless other dimension, how would an ordinary skeletal warrior incite so much fear and respect from them?

    Perhaps, in the other dimension, the little skeleton with the seven bone spurs, wielding a bone dagger and boasting of a purple eye, had already grown into his own and be a famous and illustrious character!

 Chapter 216: Shock

    Chapter 216: Shock

    A third of the mountain valley had been enclosed by the canopy of necromancy. ck clouds obstructed all light, and a thick sense of death floated everywhere, making the mercenaries within feel extremely ufortable.

    In the center of the canopy of necromancy, having undergone a ughter, Han Shuo was finding his desires hard to control. The aura of killing intent around him created a scene in which his mind was starting to run out of control. Thankfully, his long honed willpower hauled back on the reins at the most critical moment, forcefully halting his further descent into madness.

    He sat down cross legged and ignored the chaos around him. Han Shuo calmed himself and concentrated, slowly cating his deep desires. Three zombie warriors, two hate warriors, and seven to eight skeletal warriors stood around him. The little skeleton wielded a bone dagger as his purple eye sparkled. He was as if a general leading thousands. He stood with a puffed up chest te and looked towards the front, silently protecting Han Shuo.

    The most magnificent building in the valley finally copsed with a roar beneath Edwin and Belinda¡¯s concerted efforts. The earthshaking explosion shook the entire mountain valley. All of a sudden, whether it was mercenaries living further away in the valley, those meditating or practicing, or yet others sparring with each other, all members of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band realized that their old nest was under attack and surged towards the valley.

    In a ce exceedingly far away, a knight wearing gleaming silver armor charged over on the back of a warhorse d with silver armor whilst wielding a three meter long javelin.

    A thin, ck figure moved adroitly amongst the branches of trees with thick umtion of snow, swiftly making up for her tardiness in arriving. A loose, ck dress and several colorful ribbons concealed her face as she moved. Only two long, tipped ears indicated her identity as an elf.

    Andy and the thunder mage made use of the moonlight to fly through the air from another direction. They too were rushing over to render aid, panic and shock written all over their faces.

    ¡°Who darese wreak havoc in the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band!¡± A furious roar shook the earth from the knight d in silver armor. Even though his head was covered by a silver helmet, this roar still echoed throughout the entire valley.

    ¡°The Knights of Light are here! It looks like we should retreat!¡± Belinda cast a look into the distance and turned to speak to Edwin.

    Edwin nodded and suddenly pointed at the horizon in shock, ¡°Eh? Who¡¯s that?¡±

    Belinda followed the direction of Edwin¡¯s finger and looked at the sky. Although there was the cover from the canopy of necromancy, gouts of me still enable the two to identify an enormous ck figure through the light of the mes.

    ¡°It¡¯s that person¡¯s magical pet, a young dark dragon. To think that they followed us here as well!¡± Belinda seemed to remember her earlier embarrassment and responded with a heavy tone.

    ¡°Heh heh, then that¡¯s perfect ,we don¡¯t need to be in a hurry to leave!¡± If it wasn¡¯t for Gilbert and the others, then all of the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries¡¯ attacks would¡¯ve been targeted at Edwin and Belinda. Now that Gilbert and the others were here to divert attention away from them, they naturally wouldn¡¯t have to bear the brunt of the pressure.

    Gilbert made use of his fast flight speed over the valley to haul Emily and Phoebe around, spewing out red hot mes at the buildings below and drowning them in a sea of fire.

    Gilbert would send a stream of green poison down to wherever a concentrated group of people were. The mercenaries all screamed in agony and dodged away to all sides. If any were sshed with even a hint of the green poison, they would loose their lives in the span of a moment.

    ¡°Lowly lives, you shouldn¡¯t have angered us. This is the punishment that I, dark dragon Gilbert, am visiting on you for your lowly actions!¡± Gilbert¡¯s resonant voice sounded out as he passed over the mountain valley. He was dancing in his excitement and proud of the destruction that he had wrought.

    ¡°Oh noble God of Light, hear my calls. Disperse all darkness¡ªRadiant Glory!¡± A wizened voice suddenly rang out in the chaotic mountain valley. All sorts of cries, shouts, and collision sounds were unable to bury this chant.

    An exceedingly strong beam of light ripped through the sky, and the pure, divine elements of light suffused the valley. The ck clouds formed by the canopy of necromancy was diffused in an instant and vanished without a trace.

    The resplendent and stunning light scattered down over the valley, intermixing with the soft light from the stars. When the divine power of light shone down, the presence of death was swiftly banished and all the mercenaries in the valley were no longer affected by the darkness.

    Apart from the little skeleton being unafraid of the light, all the dark creatures that Han Shuo had summoned began to rot in an exceedingly short amount of time. They disyed expressions of great pain and hurriedly began to find cover.

    The dark creatures that had been protecting Han Shuo under the little skeleton¡¯s orders were also all in great pain, but they seemed to fear the little skeleton greatly. Although their bodies were fast dposing, they didn¡¯t leave. They all looked pleadingly at the little skeleton, waiting for the little skeleton¡¯s forgiveness.

    The little skeleton finally waved his hand, allowing the dark creatures to disperse. They all hid beneath roofs or found a random hole in the ground to burrow into, attempting to evade the rays from the Radiant Glory.

    The injured mercenaries saw their wounds miraculouslye under control beneath the radiant beams of light. They all recovered some of their energy like they¡¯d been quickly healed.

    When the element of light filled the valley, it immediately turned the situation around. Shortly thereafter, an old man wearing the outrements of a priest of the Church of Light with greying hair but in good spirits, started patrolling the valley with a benevolent gaze in his eyes.

    ¡°He¡¯s here alright. When Florida was injured so heavily, I thought he might go back. Let¡¯s go, Florida must¡¯ve been transferred elsewhere. Otherwise, the building that he lives in wouldn¡¯t have had only that little bit of defense!¡± Edwin looked viciously at the light archmage Ferguson as he stood in the shadows of a house and spoke lowly to Belinda.

    ¡°Yes, we¡¯ll find it hard to leave soon if we linger any longer!¡± Belinda understood just how strong Ferguson was. She didn¡¯t hesitate. The golem had already transformed back into a beam of white light as soon as she¡¯d finished speaking, disappearing into her scroll.

    On the other side, the bellowing Gilbert fled swiftly into the skies without another sound when he saw that this old man had used a single light magic to change the situation as soon as he¡¯d appeared.

    Ferguson frowned as he saw Gilbert about to leave and chained a basic Radiant sh spell. The light element surrounding the mountain valley suddenly coalesced into three swords of light, swiftly shooting towards Gilbert.

    Gilbert turned his head back and spewed out a gout of me, hauling two of the swords. Emily hastily released a hand of death and blocked the other sword of light. It was only after that that the dragon and two girls finally made it out of the mountain valley.

    After Ferguson had release the Radiant sh, a strong purse of light magic formed, resulting in ripples of magic spreading out from the epicenter. The ripples screeched through the air as cracks grew swiftly in the ground. A building roughly fifty square meters was in the path of these ripples. It was instantly crushed to rubble and stone shards flew through the sky.

    ¡°Edwin old friend, I could feel that hateful presence from you from a far distance away! Come on out!¡± Ferguson called out in the direction of his attack after releasing the light magic.

    It looked like Gilbert wasn¡¯t Ferguson primary target. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have left so easily. As someone on his level and an opponent he was quite familiar with, Edwin was Ferguson¡¯s true target.

    ¡°Heh heh, it¡¯s so good to see you. However, this ce isn¡¯t suitable for me. Good bye!¡± Edwin¡¯s sinisterugh traveled from the pile of rubble as a dark figure slowly faded after these words were delivered, disappearing from the wreck.

    ¡°I¡¯ll find you!¡± Ferguson¡¯s face was calm. He didn¡¯t look happy or sad, and there were no ripples of anger in his voice either.

    ¡°There¡¯s another one down there, and he actually looks unafraid of death!¡± Thunder mage Asa looked askance below and called out with surprise.

    There was a figure shimmering with a blood red light in the center of the ruined mountain valley. He sat there like a boulder, as unmoving as a mountain, ignoring all that was going on around him. A figure that was slightly shorter, wielding a bone dagger with seven bone spurs on his back and a purple left eye stood by his side, unswerving in his loyalty and looking like he was protecting the other.

    ¡°It¡¯s him, the person ho almost killed Florida at the border of the valley!¡± The fire mage Andy immediately cried out after flicking a nce down.

    Everyone was shocked after these words! They all looked at Han Shuo, perplexed, not understanding why he hadn¡¯t left at this time.

    Could it be that he wanted to use his own power alone to fight against the entire Rainbow Sickles mercenary band? Didn¡¯t he know that there was a light grand magus in the mercenary band?

    ¡°Surround him, I want him alive!¡± A trace of anger finally colored Ferguson¡¯s voice. It was unknown whether or not he was angry that Han Shuo had injured Florida, or that Han Shuo was ignoring all of them.

    ¡°Understood!¡± The Knights of Light immediately surged forward from all directions after hearing Ferguson¡¯s order, surrounding Han Shuo with threeyers.

    Up in the sky, archangels Andy and Asa as well as grand magus Ferguson and sharpshooter Maxine also surrounded Han Shuo as well. By this point, it was likely that only a magister or a divine knight or swordmaster would be able to leave at will.

    Han Shuo was obviously not at that level of existence!

    As everyone focused on Han Shuo, a stunning light suddenly lit up light archmage Ferguson¡¯s eyes. His calm face was suddenly filled with a bizarre expression. His brows were knit together, the furrows in his forehead twitching as his mouth opened and closed. Incredible shock filled his expression, as well as a few traces of worry and fear.

    ¡°Grandpa Ferguson, what¡¯s wrong?¡± Maxine looked at Ferguson with an odd expression not too far away.

    Maxine¡¯s features wereprised of an exquisite, wless face like she was a perfect work of art. She had all the advantages that a beauty of the elves should possess. A long and limber body, an ethereal bearing, gleaming green tresses that were like a waterfall, and a heart stopping face. All of this hade together in a marvelousbination to form an elfin beauty that would cause cities to go to war for her.

    On a cliff on the other side of the valley, where Han Shuo and Gilbert had stood, Edwin and Belinda were now standing side by side.

    The expression on Edwin¡¯s face was incredibly simr to Ferguson and the others below. A stern light flowed out from his eyes, focusing on the little skeleton wielding his bone dagger. His expression epassed a few gleeful traces of obtaining a heavenly treasure amidst unparalleled shock, and his lips trembled uncontrobly.

    ¡°Master Edwin, what¡¯s wrong?¡± Belinda looked oddly at Edwin, asking the exact same question as Maxine.

    ¡°That little skeleton isn¡¯t afraid of the Radiant Glory!¡± Ferguson and Edwin said at almost the same time with exceedingly different emotions.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know how that person has done it, but he must die now. He can¡¯t live for another second!¡± In all these years, it was the first time that Ferguson had made up his mind to kill someone. An unquestionable resolution filled these words.

    On the other side, Edwin took a deep breath in and said gleefully, ¡°He must stay alive no matter what! In thest thousand, hundred years, light magic has always been the bane of dark magic. If the dark creatures no longer need to fear the rays of light magic, then the Cmity Church willpletely change the situation and the Church of Light will no longer be able to halt our footsteps forward!¡±

    Belinda immediately woke to her senses after hearing these words as her eyes were also filled with shock and delight. She then looked at Edwin, ¡°What should we do?¡±

    ¡°We need to save him no matter what. He absolutely can¡¯t die!¡± Edwin said firmly. He¡¯d never wanted to protect someone as bad as he did now!

 Chapter 217: A bloody explosion

    Chapter 217: A bloody explosion

    ¡°Knights of Light, kill them immediately! This person and dark creature cannot be permitted to stay in this world!¡± Ferguson¡¯s expression was grim as he called out lowly.

    The group of knights who¡¯d just surrounded Han Shuo and were about to take him alive were rather surprised by this sudden change of heart. However, they only paused for a second, still intending on executing Ferguson¡¯s orders.

    Up on the cliff, Edwin didn¡¯t waste time hesitating, and shot down towards Han Shuo with Belinda. He nned on saving Han Shuo, whatever the cost, and get to the bottom of why that dark creature was unafraid of light magic.

    At the same time, Han Shuo suddenly opened his eyes and swept a cold nce around his surroundings, revealing a bizarre smile.

    He chanted out a simple necromancy magic, and the little skeleton who¡¯d stayed by his side all this time, vanished without a trace as a beam of ck light broke through the skies.

    ¡°Farewell, everyone!¡± Han Shuo smiled after the little skeleton had disappeared.

    The blood red light that had been circling around Han Shuo suddenly shot to the heavens after his words, and an enormous explosion rang out.

    Increasingly loud explosions, with Han Shuo¡¯s location as the epicenter, began to shake the ground and skies. The entire valley trembled, and the knights closest to the center were sted to shreds, blood and flesh flying out like shrapnel.

    Edwin and Belinda had been descending rapidly when they saw the sudden explosion from below, apanied by the ear numbing explosions. Waves of evil, blood red light sted towards their location in the sky, shocking the two of them.

    Edwin mmed on the brakes, skidding as he used the levitation spell to grab Belinda. They floundered around in the sky in order to evade the light, and then cast urgent looks to the enormous change down below. Stunned stupefaction filled their face as they looked down incredulously.

    When the dust had settled, an enormous hole six meters deep and ten meters wide had appeared where Han Shuo had been sitting down cross legged. A thick sense of blood slowly floated out, along with dark red clouds of air. The only things left were a pockmarked surface and the mangled bodies of some knights by the hole.

    Han Shuo had vanished without a trace, and no matter how grimly those remaining searched, they couldn¡¯t discover a single trace of him.

    Taking a deep breath in, Ferguson restrained his anger and said, ¡°Stop searching. Although I don¡¯t know how he did it, that person¡¯s left already!¡±

    ¡®Then what should we do now?¡± Thunder mage Asa asked respectfully when facing Ferguson.

    ¡°I need to know everything about this person as soon as possible. As detailed as possible!¡± A trace of rare anxiety colored Ferguson¡¯s tone as he looked back at Asa.

    ¡°Understood! We¡¯ll do this immediately! Asa responded.

    Female archer Maxine roughly understood why Ferguson had lost hisposure thus at this time. That someone who could turn the situation around like this had appeared on the Continent meant that this might bring nightmarish effects to the Church of Light.

    Therefore, as an important person in the Church of Light, Ferguson would be sure to use all resources avable to kill this possibility before it even formed.

    ¡°Nice going kid, he¡¯s got some moves alright to be able to escape so miraculously!¡± It was a good thing that Edwin had stopped his descent. Otherwise, he might¡¯ve been embroiled within it as well. He was delighted to see Han Shuo¡¯s miraculous escape and couldn¡¯t help butpliment him.

    ¡°Master Edwin, this person is enemies with our Cmity Church. rendon died at his hands, and he even killed Johnny!¡± Belinda couldn¡¯t help but speak up when she saw Edwin¡¯s attitude undergo a 180 degree change.

    ¡°What do these grudges matter as long as he¡¯s willing to work with us! All humans have weaknesses, and we can give him whatever he needs. Not to mention that Ferguson¡¯s discovered his peculiarities today, the Church of Light will try to kill him at all costs. Ferguson himself will be helping us in making this person work with us!¡± Edwinughed heartily and took Belinda higher up in the skies, slowly leaving the mountain.

    There was ake with a thickyer of ice roughly ten li away from the Rainbow Sickle mountain valley. On this frosty winter day, theke had been frozen into ice cubes, and the smooth mirror surface glistened beneath the moonlight.

    However, a bolt of red light streaked through the sky and descended from the heavens like a falling star crashing down to the earth, mming violently onto the sturdy ice.

    Theke exploded outwards as a huge crater appeared on the mirror smoothke surface. The waters of theke began to spurt through the cracks of the ice as the ice began to crumble under the impact.

    A slender figure shot out of the crater in the next breath. Han Shuo was sopping wet as hended on a piece of ice that hadn¡¯t cracked. He immediately sat down and began to adjust his breathing.

    Han Shuo opened his eyes after roughly fifteen minutes and huffed out lightly. Dark red, muddy air floated out of his pores like string, and vanished with the gusts of the chilly winter wind.

    Han Shuo stood up from his cross-legged position and changed into a dry shirt. He once again took to the air and gathered his bearings, before flying swiftly towards the Valley of Sunshine.

    After fully grasping all of Chu Yang Lan¡¯s memories and having reached the bloodlust realm, Han Shuo could now deftly utilize some secret arts.

    The ¡°Blood Explosion Shield¡± was an art that helped one escape. It was usually triggered with blood essence to form a series of explosions, enabling the cultivator to move their body and escape the ce of danger in the ensuing sound and chaos.

    However, most cultivators wouldn¡¯t use this method that would consume a lot of blood essence if they didn¡¯t have to. That was because once this was cast, the cultivator would exhaust a great deal of energy due to consuming blood essence and would find themselves in a disadvantageous situation.

    However, this hadn¡¯t been the case with his casting this time. Having reached the bloodlust realm, Han Shuo¡¯s body had naturally produced a violent killing aura after engaging in the massacre in the mountain valley. The aura had naturally attracted the fear and resentment from the mercenaries he¡¯d killed and concentrated it in his body.

    The stronger this power became, the harder it became to control. This impendingck of control was what had caused Han Shuo to immediately prioritize his mind¡¯s recovery, even in the middle of the battlefield. After suddenly awaking in the middle of recovery, he¡¯d immediately understood that he was surrounded by a group of experts.

    At the moment, the violent aura around him was still disorderly and hard to control. He suddenly recalled the ¡°Blood Explosion Shield¡± in this moment of danger and a thought struck him. He turned this aura into energy and used the energy he¡¯d absorbed as a foundation to cast this art.

    In this way, not only had he created amotion that had shaken the heavens and earth, brutally killing some knights who hadn¡¯t had time to react, Han Shuo had also left unhurriedly from the encirclement of the various knights. At the same time, he¡¯d been able to release a power out of his control, and he hadn¡¯t harmed himself at all.

    When he had again returned to the Valley of Sunshine, Han Shuo felt that his body had once again been miraculously tempered in the ughter of the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries. Perhaps it was because he¡¯d cast the ¡°Blood Explosion Shield¡± and consumed the random, disorderly power, but there was a tiny bit of pure power left at the very end that had miraculously been absorbed by the magical yuan.

    ¡°It looks like adventuring is needed in order to pick up the pace of improvement!¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but murmur to himself when he felt the changes in his body thanks to the fight against the knights earlier.

    The metallic sound of battle caused Han Shuo to pay close attention to his surroundings. Coming to a halt in midair, he began to carefully investigate the situation around him.

    Having fully developed his brain due to magical cultivation, Han Shuo was quite familiar with theyout of the nearby terrain as he¡¯dmitted the entire map to memory. When he listened carefully, he quickly realized where the sounds wereing from, and where he currently was as well.

    The shes wereing from the House of Menlo. This matter might even have something to do with Trunks and the others.

    ¡°I should go take a look at the strength of my unknown troops.¡± Han Shuo murmured to himself and changed his flight path, making for the House of Menlo¡¯s territory.

 Chapter 218: A cry from the heart

    Chapter 218: A cry from the heart

    The House of Menlo was located within a small mountain in the Valley of Sunshine. The center of the mountain had been hollowed out into caves, all interconnected to form a matrix of astonishing defense.

    Han Shuo came in from the air and stood on a towering tree tens of meters tall, looking towards the source of the noises.

    He saw the caves where the House of Menlo stored their weapons on fire, with thick smoke rising into the air. Tongues of me flicked out from some of the entrances. It looked like everything was on fire.

    These caves each had many stone chambers hewn into them. Each was a room, with all the necessities of life inside. Many of them were even more luxurious than some of the shops within the Valley of Sunshine, so it was very normal for the whole thing to go up in mes once a fire dragon spell was lobbed inside.

    A group of masked people were moving swiftly around the entrance to the small mountain. There were some fire mages amongst them who asionally chanted fire spells, sending gouts of me towards the mountain entrance.

    Their movements were swift and highly coordinated. The fire mages would release fire, the wind mages call up winds to push the fire along, and several archers would force those of the House of Menlo who dared poke their heads out back inside again.

    Nevertheless, the small mountain was actually quiterge after it had been hollowed out. With so many caves and stone chambers, this band of marauders could only target a section of the mountain. Once Menlo reinforcements arrived, they would immediately split up and conceal their movements, hiding into the surrounding shrubbery for cover. They were obviously very familiar with the surrounding terrain and well versed in these guerri tactics. They would quickly retreat whenever someone discovered them and then circle around,ing in from another side to continue wreaking havoc.

    Under normal circumstances, this group of people would¡¯ve been dead without a doubt if they hadn¡¯t retreated after the first wave of attacks.

    However, the House of Menlo waspletely preupied at the moment. This group of troublemakers wasn¡¯t the main target. Their main focus was on a group of heavily equipped robbers around 500 strong. The robbers¡¯ motives were unknown, but they were besieging the mountain and attacking anyone who walked out of it. These two sides were locked in heated battle.

    Han Shuo stood in the distance and looked out for a bit, doubled over inughter as he saw Trunks¡¯ men taking advantage of the chaos and adding further confusion. He hadn¡¯t thought Trunks would be talented in this regard. The House of Menlo mission this time had only been to make this power suspect the other factions. Han Shuo was a bit surprised at how things had developed.

    Even more cavalry with gleaming armor, wielding sharp weapons, came galloping from a path in the distance. Their adornments clearly identified them as those of the House of Menlo. There were roughly six hundred of them, each with an umon air to them. They were likely the elites of this house.

    The direction that this group was charging in happened to be where Trunks and the others were. Yet to detect the danger they were about to encounter, they were currently nning on causing another round of mischief. Han Shuo finally couldn¡¯t sit still any longer and flew to where they were.

    The sky was already lightening, and the stars had hidden behind the depths of the night at some point. It seemed like daybreak woulde soon. Just as Trunks was about to start on his final round of mischief, a ck shadownded with a ¡°whoosh¡± in front of him.

    He started badly, but breathed a sigh of relief when he discovered that it was Han Shuo. ¡°What are you doing here?¡±

    ¡°I happened to be passing by and saw that the elites of Menlo are about to return. They¡¯re going to pass through here. Let¡¯s hurry and leave?¡± Han Shuo smiled slightly and exined the situation to Trunks without further ado.

    When he heard that the elites of Menlo were returning, Trunks shouted lowly and gestured at the mercenaries off in the distance.

    These fellows were covered from head to toe and immediately understood Trunks¡¯ hand gesture. They didn¡¯t gather together to leave en masse, but actually spread out even further and made use of the terrain to conceal themselves, slowly vanishing without a trace.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Trunks didn¡¯t remain idle as he turned his head to smile at Han Shuo, darting into the thick undergrowth.

    Snowy heavily on the branches of the towering trees, blocking the sky¡¯s light. The densely packed branches made it hard to trave, but Trunks wasn¡¯t the least bit bothered. He took Han Shuo down several twisted paths, emerging far away from the House of Menlo¡¯s mountain roughly half an hourter on the path to the Valley of Sunshine.

    ¡°Those were all old Rainbow Sickle mercenaries. Everything within the valley was under our control when the old chief was still here, and we¡¯re so familiar with the terrain that we can navigate it with our eyes closed, so don¡¯t worry about their safety.¡± Trunks said to Han Shuo when they¡¯d left the mountain.

    Han Shuo had observed the group¡¯s operations when he was on high ground earlier. They showed a high degree of coboration and were all quite strong. Most of them were journeyman swordsmen or sergeant knights, with a few adept mages and swordsmen mixed in. There were many of them with umon bow and arrow skills. It looked like things were as Trunks had said, they were the old mercenaries of the Rainbow Sickle band.

    With such a group of people and Trunks¡¯ ns, the Soul Destroyer mercenary band would have an easy path forward in the future.

    ¡°Right, what happened with you, why did robberse knocking on the doors of the House of Menlo?¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but ask.

    Trunks couldn¡¯t hold hisughter in when he heard this question. ¡°We happened to see this band of robbers on our way to the House of Menlo. They were about to rob a caravan. We pointed out the proper path after fighting with them, and they attacked the House of Menlo with our guidance.¡±

    ¡°When they finally disturbed those guys inside, the robbers started fighting them. We took advantage of the chaos to create more havoc everywhere else. We¡¯d thought that the robbers would be immediately defeated and had made ns to retreat early, but who would¡¯ve thought that the elites of the House of Menlo were deployed elsewhere on some unknown business?¡±

    ¡°When the robbers saw that the elites weren¡¯t surging out to attack them, they grew more bold and continued to attack. We stuck around a bit longer, and you saw the rest!¡±

    ¡°So that was the case. Are there many groups of robbers like those in the mountain ranges around the valley?¡± Han Shuo nodded and asked with a faint smile.

    ¡°Of course. Since the valley sits where three nations¡¯ borders meet,, many merchants seek to do business in the Valley of Sunshine. Therefore, there are many bands of robbers in the vicinity as well. Two of them even number in the thousands, and they¡¯re made of wanted fugitives from the three nations.¡±

    ¡°The leaders of the two bands of robbers are a man and a woman. The man is called Gustav, nicknamed the Butcher, an infamous criminal in the Kasi Empire. He kills without blinking and is exceedingly brutal. If a merchant caravan runs into his crew, then they¡¯re truly unlucky. If his mood is fair, all the goods and beauties will be taken away, but if his mood is ill, no one is left alive.¡±

    ¡°Florida cooperated with Gustav that year to scheme against our old chief, killing him and causing my little sister Annie to disappear. I¡¯m going to kill him sooner orter!¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s another woman called J. Eh, she¡¯s basically inherited her father¡¯s business. Her father was a robber, her grandfather was a robber, and her great grandfather was also a robber. They¡¯re a notable family of robbers in these mountain ranges. She¡¯s been raised as a robber as soon as she was born, and although she¡¯s not a kind sort, she still has certain principles. As long as the merchants who run afoul of her don¡¯t resist, they¡¯re usually able to retain their lives!¡±

    ¡°Apart from these two, there are about a dozen small to mid-sized robber groups in the mountains. Their scales of operation are smaller and they¡¯re not as famous as these two.¡± Trunks exined.

    Han Shuo listened for a bit and then asked further about the strength of the robbers before nodding, ¡°It looks like the robbers and mercenaries in the Valley of Sunshine mutually depend on each other. Whether it¡¯s the robbers or the mercenaries, both of these are vital for the ecosystem of the valley!¡±

    ¡°What do you mean?¡± Trunks asked.

    ¡°Merchants won¡¯t need protection if there are no robbers. Therefore, the mercenaries won¡¯t be able to make any money. Without mercenaries, the merchants wouldn¡¯t daree here, and thus the robbers won¡¯t have anything to take. Therefore, it¡¯spletely logical that both mercenaries and robbers can be found within the valley.¡±

    ¡°With the strength of the four factions in the Valley of Sunshine, they should have the ability to destroy the robbers. However, perhaps it¡¯s because they understand this that they haven¡¯t done so and have allowed the robbers to exist.¡± Han Shuo smiled and exined.

    Trunks chuckled after his words, ¡°That¡¯s right, the old chief understood this back in the day, to think you¡¯d understand that so quickly as well!¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo looked at the sky, ¡°Let¡¯s go, it¡¯ste. We should hurry back to the valley, I want to take a look at some things as well.¡±

    Ever since the Rainbow Sickles had left, Han Shuo had felt a voice calling him from afar. He¡¯d thought that it was the little skeleton running into trouble again at first, but after some careful probing, realized that this wasn¡¯t the case.

    When he focused his attention, Han Shuo discovered that the voice wasing from the Dark Forest. They weren¡¯t too far away from the Dark Forest, and the cemetery of death was within it as well.

    When he realized that this call wasing from the Dark Forest, Han Shuo immediately understood that the earth elite zombie had sessfully broken out of the earth. However, it was confined by the boundary of the cemetery of death and couldn¡¯t exit find Han Shuo. It could only passively send out this message to its master.

 Chapter 219: Donâ€™t worry, Iâ€™ll take care of him!

    Chapter 219: Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll take care of him!

    Han Shuo and Trunks returned to the Valley of Sunshine.

    Gilbert, Emily and Phoebe had already returned to the store that contained the ce of extreme water. They were currently anxiously waiting for Han Shuo, afraid that some mishap may have befallen him.

    ¡°Are you alright? I didn¡¯t think that old guy, Ferguson, would also be part of the Rainbow Sickles mercenary band. Luckily, his main target wasn¡¯t us or we might not have returned so easily with Gilbert,¡± Emily eximed upon seeing Han Shuo¡¯s safe return, a trace of fear lingering in her heart.

    ¡°Mm, contrary to what you think, Ferguson minded the events of tonight very much. There is no way the Rainbow Sickles mercenary band will quietly endure the losses they suffered tonight. We must be more careful!¡± Han Shuo understood that the Rainbow Sickles mercenary band were not weak; the reason the chaos in the valley had happened then was because none of their high-level experts had been present. Otherwise, it would have been impossible for them to stir up such a massive disturbance.

    ¡°What happened afterwards?¡± Phoebe and the two others had left early so they were unaware of what had transpiredter. She couldn¡¯t help but inquire after seeing Han Shuoe back safe and sound.

    ¡°Nothing of significance. After you left, I also escaped under the cover of the chaos,¡± Han Shuo replied.

    Continuous pleas tugged at Han Shuo¡¯s mind and heart, emanating from the distant Dark Forest. Since there was nothing else to address, Han Shuo could no longer resist his curiosity so he said shortly, ¡°There shouldn¡¯t be any problems during daytime. Everyone has worked hard throughout the night. While the skies haven¡¯tpletely brightened, take a short break!¡±

    The moment these words left his mouth, Han Shuo hastily returned to his room. He recited a spell and the small skeleton that had been faithfully guarding him appeared before him, bone dagger in hand.

    Han Shuo gave amand and brought out the magic sticks that led towards the cemetery of death. He set up the formation and hastily set a foot inside, activating the formation with his mental strength.

    A brilliant sh of white light blinded him as the scenery around him shifted radically in the blink of an eye. Han Shuo stepped out into the hall of the cemetery of death, his eyes greeted by mounds of dirt protruding from the ground. Under the murky darkness of the sky, the dense earth element kept congregating in this bastion of extreme earth.

    Like the tumultuous ocean currents, the ground trembled softly as though it were made of waves. One by one, the mounds of dirt bulged and dissipated as the firm dirt turned as soft as sand. There was a deep hole in the center as the dirt seethed, as though an enormous mudfish was twisting and tossing.

    The cemetery of death was protected by a special boundary. Without the Eye of Darkness that Han Shuo grasped in his hand, there was no way for any person to enter or exit this ce. The moment the earth elite zombie was born, it followed its instincts to search for Han Shuo.

    As it turned out, Han Shuo¡¯s current location, the Valley of Sunshine, was not too far from the Dark Forest. Hence, the moment the earth elite zombie sensed Han Shuo¡¯s presence, it immediately strove to get closer, but was unfortunately blocked by the barrier. Irritated at not being able to leave, the zombie had been churning the ground as though it wanted to use its special abilities to exit the cemetery through the ground.

    However, it was obvious that the cemetery of death was indeed a marvelous ce with wondrous powers. Despite being a favored son of the earth and having the ability to travel through the earth as it desired, the earth elite zombie could not ovee the restriction. This sufficiently proved that the status of the cemetery of death as a sacred ground for necromancers was definitely not a name given in vain

    ¡°Come out!¡± Han Shuo immediately called out after he stepped into the cemetery.

    Immediately after he spoke, a slightly yellow shadow abruptly emerged from the ground in the center and stood stiffly at attention in front of Han Shuo.

    It was still an ordinary zombie warrior, but its appearance had undergone quite a change after being refined by the secret arts of demonic cultivation. The original dark green of its face had faded to a yellow pallor, and its entire body was covered by armor slicked with yellow oil. A faint light flickered its way through it, and a thick sense of earth spirit emanated from the armor.

    The yellowish armor had slowly formed after the earth elite zombie had absorbed the earth qi of thend and mixed the qi with several umon materials that Han Shuo had provided. The earth elite zombie had refined the mixture along with his body, and so the amor covered all of its skin. The durability of the body was vastly greater than before, and he could use the earth qi to form all sorts of attacks. He could also fly through the earth to conceal his movements or suddenly attack enemies.

    The earth elite zombie stood at 180cm with an ordinary, unremarkable face. Its face was split into a wide open grin at this time, revealing an odd smile that was a bit simple. It was looking delightedly at Han Shuo. Like the little skeleton, although the earth elite zombie had a soul, it wasn¡¯t able to directlymunicate with Han Shuo. He could only make use of the mysterious connection between the two tomunicate. The earth elite zombie grinned widely at Han Shuo and waved his enormous hands around, calming the furrows in the earth and restoring calm to the area.

    ¡°Alright, I know your abilities, stop showing off!¡± It was like a mischievous kid, eager to show off its abilities. Han Shuo understood that the earth elite zombie had just formed and that its intelligence was quite low. He¡¯d need to keep infusing it with knowledge so that it would understand more.

    The earth elite zombie moved its lips after Han Shuo had spoken and jumped into the center of his hiding ce with a flip of his body. The ground shook slightly as the earth elite zombie reappeared, clutching three vaguely shifting shadows.

    ¡°Oh, the three yin demons have formed as well!¡± Han Shuo was surprised and immediately activated the magical yuan in his delight. He sent a beam of ck light towards the vague shadows and shouted, ¡°Yin demons, take your ces ording to my order!¡±

    When the ck light hit the three indistinct shadows, strands of ck aura appeared around them, making their forms clearer and more distinct.

    They had long tails, sharp fangs, and was asrge as vicious, wild monkeys. All three had two sharp horns and a pair of bat-like meaty wings. Their faces had evil, deep green eyes that sparkled with a frightening ruthless light. This was the true form of the yin demons.

    When their forms grew clear, they flew out from the earth elite zombie¡¯s hands and through the air like lightning. Their forms shimmered between tangible and ghostly, changing their shapes at will in the air and emitting soul wrenching howls as they moved.

    The three yin demons circled around Han Shuo once and entered his body through the back of his neck with a thought, vanishing without a trace in the blink of an eye.

    Han Shuo then smiled and gave his body a shake. Four Han Shuo¡¯s appeared in thin air. Apart from his own body, the three were formed by the yin demons. They were truly marvelously incredible.

    The earth elite zombie hadn¡¯t the slightest clue of what had transpired and was obviously confused. He stood there unmoving, looking dumbly at Han Shuo.

    After a while, the earth elite zombie grinned bashfully and moved his stocky figure, instantly standing next to the leftmost Han Shuo. It reached out a left index finger to point at Han Shuo, meaning ¡°I found you!¡±

    There was a marvelous connection between the two, so Han SHuo didn¡¯t find it odd that the earth elite zombie could identify him. As he watched the earth elite zombie look at him with an honest smile, Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts moved again as the three yin demons transformed back into three beams of ck light and returned to Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    Han Shuo continued to practice quickly transforming the three yin demons into replicas of himself. He repeated this a dozen times until he had a solid grasp on this technique.

    The earth elite zombie needed quite a bit of time to identify Han Shuo, but when Han Shuo kept practicing, the earth elite zombie used the connection between the two to identify the real Han Shuo with lightening speed as soon as replicas appeared.

    The earth elite zombie thought that Han Shuo was ying a fun game with him and ceaselessly identified the real Han Shuo, not feeling tired or bored at all. It kept grinning with a silly, honest grin and didn¡¯t possess the cold ruthlessness that a zombie should have at all. This made Han Shuo some worry about whether or not the zombie could develop quickly.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t Chu Cang Lan, so he couldn¡¯t bring this zombie warrior around with him wherever he went and attend all sorts of events. Therefore, Han Shuo thought for a moment and decided to send the earth elite zombie to the dimension that he¡¯de from.

    He wasn¡¯t worried about the earth elite zombie¡¯s strength. After refinement from his secret arts, the earth elite zombie was certain to be a very useful helper to him. However, it¡¯d just been born from the earth right now and seemed a bit naive and simple. It would need to grow quickly.

    The little skeleton seemed to have grown into a strong, omnipotent presence in the other dimension; even Han Shuo wasn¡¯t sure of how strong the little skeleton was now. Eventually, one would run into some enemies that one would have to hide from, so it might actually be a very good idea to send the earth elite zombie back home.

    ¡°I¡¯m going to introduce a friend to you. He has my presence on him, you¡¯ll definitely like him.¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment and smiled at the earth elite zombie.

    Han Shuo then used his connection with the little skeleton to chant an incantation, summoning the little skeleton. Once he arrived, the little skeleton and the earth elite zombie stared silently at each other.

    The purple eye in the little skeleton was glimmering with vitality, and he seemed quite interested in the earth elite zombie. He walked up to it and reached out a stark white hand bone to pat the honest zombie¡¯s shoulder, and used the other hand to pound his own chest, making a hand gesture to Han Shuo.

    He seemed to mean that, I¡¯ll take care of him, don¡¯t you worry!

    Please support GDK on NU if you like the novel!

 Chapter 220: Saving up for a rainy day

    Chapter 220: Saving up for a rainy day

    Both dark creatures had Han Shuo¡¯s life essence, so they naturally felt a sense of affinity towards each other. He could see threads of empathy slowly begin to flourish between them.

    The little skeleton and the earth elite zombie were staring at each other, seemingly in the midst of a broken conversation. After a short moment, they both turned to stare at Han Shuo anxiously.

    ¡°Alright, I will send you guys back!¡± Han Shuo smiled slightly and replied when the two guys simultaneously expressed their desire to leave. With a spell, the small skeleton and the earth elite zombie vanished without a trace.

    After the two of them departed, the cemetery of death fell back into silence. The ground settled into stillness, and with the birth of the yin demons, the yin demon cave stopped operating.

    Han Shuo looked around and realized there was nothing of further significance in this ce. He ruminated briefly before walking towards a valley where the dwarves resided.

    ¡°Han! What brings you here?¡± As soon as he entered the dwarf¡¯s valley, these guileless little dwarves disyed their passion and showered him with a continuous stream of friendly greetings.

    Thest time Han Shuo hade here, the dwarves had obtained arge amount of food and daily necessities from him. Now, all their elderly and young were adorned in thick, cold-resistant cotton-padded clothes, had cozy stoves to warm themselves and enjoyed an abundant food supply to relieve their hunger. Not even the freezing ice storms of midwinter were scary anymore.

    Along the way, Han Shuo could detect the satisfaction and contentment brimming in dwarves¡¯ faces. When these dwarves saw Han Shuo, their faces exuded thankfulness and weing as they bellowed to one another, spreading the news of Han Shuo¡¯s arrival.

    ¡°Uncle Han, this is for you!¡± When he made his way to the center of the valley, a six-year old, snot-nosed dwarf kid ran up with a sugar hawthorn stick in hand. The kid presented a piece of barbequed meat, roasted to glistening perfection, in his delicate voice.

    ¡°Thank you, dear child!¡± Han Shuo smiled as he bent down and patted the head of the dwarf child, who was only a few dozen centimeters tall, while taking the piece of meat with his other hand.

    The adult dwarves surrounding them all smiled kindly. The atmosphere was extremely harmonious, attesting to the deep sense of goodwill they bore towards Han Shuo.

    When Han Shuo entered the center of the vige, he saw the familiar faces of the dwarf warrior Bet as well as the vige chief Calvin. He smiled and asked, ¡°Elders. How has everything been recently?¡±

    ¡°Dearest Han, you¡¯ve taken the cold away from this winter! Everyone has warm clothes and enough food. No one will starve to death this winter!¡± Chief Calvin¡¯s face was filled with gratitude. He faced Han Shuo and expressed his debt using dwarven etiquette.

    In the beginning, Han Shuo hadn¡¯t helped these honest dwarves out of the goodness of his heart. But the more he got to know them, the more he understood that these stubborn dwarves were actually very easy to get along with, and their generosity towards friends was unbelievable.

    He had won their friendship at an unknown time, but the way they went about their business had also won them his goodwill. He¡¯d nned on just using them in the beginning, but now treated them as good friends that he could depend on.

    ¡°That¡¯s good, good! Let me know if there¡¯s anything you need. I¡¯m going to go back to the world of humans soon, and I¡¯ll be able to bring you whatever you need!¡± Han Shuo had a kind smile on his face as he spoke leisurely with Calvin.

    Calvin waved his hands, touched. ¡°No need, we can easily make it through this winter already. We¡¯ll use our own efforts to repay you when springes. You know that we¡¯re a hardworking species. Children need to be raised thus since young and we need to avoid instillingzy habits in them.¡±

    Nodding understandingly, Han Shuo said. ¡°I see. Ah, yes. I¡¯d nned on asking you to refine some weapons and armor for me this time. Would that be inconvenient for you, elder?¡±

    ¡°Han, you¡¯re speaking like an outsider. We¡¯re friends, why would anything be inconvenient! Prey is scarce in winter, and there are very few ces in the Dark Forest that we can freely move around in. Forging weapons is our hobby, it would be very fun to make use of our idle time to forge more weapons. This is no problem at all.¡± Calvin didn¡¯t hesitate at all when he agreed, and he looked rather happy as well.

    ¡°Truly, Han. We¡¯ve been wondering how to repay you during this time. Asking us to forge weapons for you now means that we no longer have to rack our brains anymore.¡± Betughed heartily, expressing the dwarves¡¯ sincerity to Han Shuo.

    When he saw that the dwarves were still filled with gratitude at Han Shuo bringing them provisions, as well as their desire to not take advantage of their friends, Han Shuo felt a bit shamefaced at the dwarves¡¯ kindness and honesty.

    He¡¯d approached them with ulterior motives at first, and was now rather embarrassed by their outpouring of genuine emotion.

    ¡°Mm, you don¡¯t need to do anything for now because I haven¡¯t thought of what kind of weapons I need. I¡¯ll bring the raw materials over next time when I think of what weapons I need!¡± Han Shuo said.

    After departing from the dwarves¡¯ valley, Han Shuo didn¡¯t linger in the Dark Forest but returned to the Valley of Sunshine through the cemetery of death.

    When he retrieved the magic sticks and walked out of the room, he discovered that it waspletely empty. He was a bit taken aback, and unsure of when everyone had left.

    Han Shuo hadpletely handed over the matters of the Soul Destroyer mercenary band to Trunks, and matters of money to Phoebe. Emily was in charge of all the random Dark Mantle affairs, and Gilbert was Phoebe and Emily¡¯s bodyguard.

    The setting sun on the horizon left the clouds in the sky afire as dusk loomed. The Cairo mercenaries were everywhere in the valley, taking care of security in shifts, so Han Shuo wasn¡¯t too worried about everyone¡¯s safety.

    Seeing he was the only one left in the storefront and he had nothing else to do, Han Shuo took out the thick tome of necromancy from the cemetery of death and slowly started studying it.

    He¡¯d deployed the lost art of the Canopy of Necromancy to great effect on their trip to the Rainbow Sickle hideoutst night. If it hadn¡¯t been for light grand magus Ferguson¡¯s timely arrival, the dark creatures in the vicinity of the spell would¡¯ve been able to continue wreaking havoc and destruction, disying umon battle strength.

    Even after absorbing the memories of necromancer rendon from the Cmity Church, there had been no knowledge of the Canopy of Necromancy. He didn¡¯t have any knowledge of reviving corpses either.

    This meant that the tome of necromancy in the cemetery was the pinnacle of necromancy magic. There was a vast amount of knowledge and spells contained within, including ones that had been lost.

    These items were exceedingly useful to Han Shuo. After receiving rendon¡¯s memories, Han Shuo¡¯s understanding of necromancy magic had already reached the level of archmage. He could understand many of the obscure and profession-specific sentences within, and had no need to consult Fanny about anything anymore.

    Time always passed by so swiftly when he was studying magic. The sky had grownpletely dark in the blink of an eye, and soft footsteps from outside jerked Han Shuo from his reverie.

    His thoughts raced as he sent the three yin demons flying outwards. His hasty surveince revealed that it was Trunks and Gilbert returning together.

    ¡°Bryan, good news. I think you¡¯ll be very happy!¡± Trunks said happily when he walked in.

    Starting, Han Shuo was surprised. ¡°What good news?¡±

    ¡°Remember Odysseus and the six others who adventured with you in the Dark Forest?¡±

    ¡°What about them?¡±

    ¡°I saw them enter the valley when I was returning today. Their strength is exceptional, and they have a deep rtionship with you. Our mercenary band has only just formed and needs people like them. I think they¡¯d want to join us if you invite them!¡±

    Han Shuo was delighted when he heard Trunks¡¯ words, ¡°Good news indeed. Odysseus and Gordon are two senior swordsman, with Aphrodite being a water archmage. The thunder journeyman mage, and the elven female archer Nia as well make up an altogether strong team.¡±

    ¡°If they join us, I think our band¡¯s strength will be rounded out immediately. It looks like we are indeed quite lucky, heh heh!¡±

    ¡°They seem to be protecting someone this time. I spoke with them and they said they¡¯lle by tomorrow and catch up with you. It looks like there will be no problems!¡± Trunks smiled.

    Han Shuo¡¯s brow suddenly furrowed as he listened to Trunks. He looked at a tree not too far off in the distance and said lowly, ¡°Mister Edwin, since you¡¯re already here,e inside for a chat !¡±

 Chapter 221: Refusal to the face

    Chapter 221: Refusal to the face

    The yin demons had been released into the surroundings, so no movements around the storefront would escape Han Shuo¡¯s notice. Even if the other was a dark grand magus, it would be impossible for him to move about within Han Shuo¡¯s territory with no one the wiser.

    When Edwin and Belinda hadnded on the tree in the distance, Han Shuo had already used the yin demons to mark their movement, which had led to him calling them out without hesitation.

    Even if Han Shuo had been alone in the shop, the formation in the courtyard would allow him to bepletely fearless in front of Edwin, let alone the presence of Gilbert and Trunks by his side.

    Edwin and Belinda were obviously stunned by Han Shuo¡¯s frightening perception. Dumbfoundness filled Edwin¡¯s face as he revealed himself through the thick cropping of branches, looking at Han Shuo in the yard. He called out, ¡°How did you discover me?¡±

    ¡°Nothing is impossible!¡± Han Shuo shouted back coldly. He then shot a look to the two by his side, revealing a calm smile. He pointed elegantly at a few of the empty seats in the yard and threw his head back to say, ¡°Since you two have the mind to, why don¡¯t youe over for a chat? I don¡¯t feel any killing intent from you, so it doesn¡¯t appear that you¡¯re here to kill me this time!¡±

    Having reached the bloodlust realm, Han Shuo now had a keen sensitivity to the natural killing intent that would emanate from experts, perhaps also a function of his own increased desire for blood. Up in the tree, Edwin and Belinda were casting curious and cautious looks into the yard. Their expressions were calm with no hint of killing intent.

    Edwin was even more astonished after Han Shuo¡¯s words. His look at Han Shuo was full of surprise and shock. He kept trying to read something from his face.

    Edwin revealed a wry smile after a while and shook his head, ¡°I¡¯m here with sincerity this time, but I can¡¯t see if you harbor an intention to kill me or not. Your yard is too dangerous, so I won¡¯te down for now. Otherwise, I may die thanks to this group of young but frightening children!¡±

    He brought Belinda with him whennding softly on the shop roof, seemingly very concerned about the strangeness within the yard. The two of them didn¡¯t dare draw near the courtyard and seemed to be on their guard against any kind of sudden ambush.

    To be honest, Han Shuo did indeed wish that the two of them wouldnd in the courtyard. He could then use the formation as well as Gilbert and Trunks¡¯ strength to kill them, and save himself the effort of always being on his guard against an ambush from Edwin.

    It was a pity that Edwin was a sly old fox and wouldn¡¯t easily fall into his trip. Edwin had already investigated the happenings in the shop of the previous night and deeply understood that this shop was fully capable of swallowing people. This was why he didn¡¯t darend inside.

    Since his ns had failed, Han Shuo didn¡¯t continue his good attitude towards them. His face dark, he said impatiently, ¡°If you¡¯re not here to kill me, are you here to cooperate against Ferguson? He¡¯s a heavyweight in the church of Light and is now diametrically opposed to you. You¡¯re his true target.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re wrong! Perhaps you don¡¯t even know yourself, but you¡¯ve be the hated enemy of the Church of Light! They¡¯ll spare no cost to make you disappear from this world now!¡± Edwin looked deeply at Han Shuo and said lowly.

    ¡°Oh? Is that so? Ferguson doesn¡¯t represent the entire Church of Light. I think my grudge with Florida isn¡¯t so deep as to make the entire Church of Light move against me. You¡¯re just saying frightening things to raise an rm!¡± Han Shuo mocked.

    Looking at Han Shuo with a pitying expression, Edwin said slowly, ¡°Your miraculous performancest night made the Church of Light realize your terrifying aspects. Your little skeleton being unafraid of the radiance of light created even more trouble for you. Ferguson will make a move against you even if not for his grandson Florida now, because your existence strongly threatens the Church of Light.¡±

    Han Shuo fell silent after these words. He wasn¡¯t stupid, but had simply never thought about this matter seriously before. When Edwin reminded him of this, Han Shuo recalled that thest couple of times necromancy magic had fallen, the Church of Light had seemed to y an important role every time.

    Light magic had a fatal effect on the dark creatures of necromancy magic. When necromancy magic was at its peak, hordes and packs of dark creatures had ravaged thends. The Church of Light had then sent outrge numbers of believers to use the simplest of light magic to deliver a devastating blow by bathing the dark creatures in light magic.

    Han Shuo thought carefully and quickly realized the truth in Edwin¡¯s words. He¡¯d refined the little skeleton and zombies from his secret arts, making them impervious to light magic attacks. This was an intolerable truth to the Church of Light. It looked like he¡¯d unwittingly be embroiled in enormous trouble.

    When Edwin saw Han Shuo remain silent, his brows deeply knitted together, and his face bing darker and darker, Edwin understood that Han Shuo had realized how serious things were. He smiled faintly and reached out a finger to point at Han Shuo. He spoke with an extremely bewitching voice, ¡°I¡¯m sure you know how influential the Church of Light is in the Profound Continent. Apart from the Cmity Church continuously fighting against them, there are very few powers that can withstand them.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t hesitate. As long as you join our Cmity Church, we can forget all our previous grudges. Our necromancers¡¯ study of dark creatures will reach unparalleled levels as soon as you join. Large armies of dark creatures will then raze and loot all the Church of Light strongholds, making everyone and everything fall under our rule.¡±

    ¡°And you, you will be the most respected person in the Cmity Church. You can have anything you want. Wealth, women, and power will all be within your grasp. What a wondrous thing! I¡¯m sure that with your intelligence, you¡¯ll be able to imagine the glorious future ahead!¡±

    ¡°Honored master, he makes a lot of sense. Agree!¡± Gilbert became incredibly excited when he heard about wealth and women.

    ¡°Shut up!¡± Han Shuo red fiercely at Gilbert and then looked back at Edwin. ¡°My apologies, although your suggestion is tantalizing, I don¡¯t think I can agree. The Cmity Church has an awful reputation. I don¡¯t want to be a public enemy.¡±

    The Cmity Church was a power that everyone hated on the continent. This church hid in the shadows and was a force that no country could ignore.

    They possessed a fervent faith to destroy, and a stubborn desire that was hard to understand. They were at odds with all kingdoms and religions on the Continent. If he did join such a church. Han Shuo would be the enemy of all the nations. This was something he was absolutely unwilling to see.

    Not to mention that it was very difficult to use magic cultivation methods to refine dark creatures. He would need to expend an enormous amount of resources and manpower. He wasn¡¯t sure if he could mass produce light magic resistant dark creatures either. Even if he could, ording to the Cmity Church¡¯s teachings and canon of destroying all, the Continent would then be enveloped in a shroud of blood and fire and ultimately be a wastnd. This was also something that Han Shuo didn¡¯t wish to see.

    Han Shuo¡¯s unhesitating and resolute refusal perplexed Edwin. He¡¯d nned on trying to further convince Han Shuo, but a beam of ck light shed through the air from afar and shot towards Edwin on the roof.

    ¡°You should all die! I¡¯m going to get revenge for big sister ine today!¡± Like a furious tigress, an enraged Emily shattered the air as she sped towards Edwin, staff in hand and hair dancing wildly.

    Casting a disdainful look at her, Edwin raised his hand and blocked all attacks with a wall of darkness. He then looked at Han Shuo and smiled slightly, ¡°Don¡¯t be in such a hurry to decline. I think you might change your decision when the Church of Light makes their move.¡±

    Edwin didn¡¯t continue to tarry after he finished speaking, vanishing without a trace with Belinda in the blink of an eye.

    Edwin was a grand magus. If he wanted to leave through the air, no one there was capable of hindering him. Emily and Phoebe both refrained from foolish pursuit as theynded in the courtyard.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± Emily looked at Han Shuo and asked.

    He sighed softly with a wry smile. ¡°I¡¯m in big trouble!¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong? What kind of trouble could¡¯ve given you a headache?¡± Emily had been with Han Shuo for so long but she¡¯d never truly seen him at a loss.

    When Han Shuo had described all that had happened, the two girls were also greatly shocked. They immediately understood the importance of the matter and frowned, looks of anxiety on their faces as no solutions seemed to present themselves.

    The Church of Light was different from the Cmity Church. They were the most influential religious organization on the Profound Continent, and had argework amongst the popce. There were arge number of believers worshipping the Church of Light in any country, and theirbined influence was stronger than any small kingdom.

    ¡°If all of the Church of Light believers are like Ferguson, then I don¡¯t think much of this church either!¡± Han Shuo sneered dismissively in the end.

    ¡°No, there are many who are kind and just in the Church of Light. At least, those I know have characters worthy of admiration. Ferguson isn¡¯t a bad sort either, he just spoils his grandson Florida too much. He often ends up wiping Florida¡¯s butt after some willful action or another. This is the reason for the slow shift in his character.¡±

    ¡°There are many necromancers in the entire Continent apart from the Cmity Church. I think the Church of Light won¡¯t try to kill you as long as you don¡¯t join the Cmity Church. Not all believers of light are that unreasonable!¡± Emily thought for a moment andforted Han Shuo.

    ¡°It¡¯s difficult to say. This matter is indeed a bit thorny. But if the Church of Light wants to make a move against me for no reason, I won¡¯t be merciful either. No matter what excuse they have, I¡¯ll kill someone first if they try to kill me!¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment and said resolutely.

    ¡°Master, no matter what you do, your loyal servant Gilbert will serve you faithfully!¡± Gilbert didn¡¯t miss an opportunity to fawn on Han Shuo.

    ¡°Trunks, the Soul Destroyer mercenary band will make all actions in your name in the future. Don¡¯t tell anyone the rtionship between the mercenary band and me. Otherwise, I¡¯m afraid that with my identity, it would bring unnecessary trouble to the band!¡± Han SHuo thought for a moment and suddenly said to Trunks.

    ¡°Bryan, do you think I¡¯m afraid of some trouble?¡± Trunks was a bit unhappy and said coldly.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo responded, ¡°Don¡¯t think random thoughts. The mercenary band is mine, but don¡¯t publicize that for now. You can announce that after I take care of this Church of Light matter. You have to know that our mercenary band has just started at this moment, and I want to expand more quickly as well, so I can¡¯t let this matter affect it at this time!¡±

    Trunks¡¯ expression returned to normal after Han Shuo¡¯s exnation. He smiled faintly and nodded, ¡°You¡¯re the chief, I¡¯ll do what you say. That¡¯s the rule of the mercenary band!¡±

    ¡°What were you two doing today? Why weren¡¯t you in the shop during the day?¡± Han Shuo looked askance at Emily and Phoebe, having settled Trunks.

    ¡°I brokered an enormous deal and disposed of everything you gave me. We now have seventy thousand gold coins. Apart from those needed to form the mercenary band, I¡¯m temporarily holding onto the rest for you!¡± Phoebe said.

    ¡°Younger sister Cecilia, one of the three heavyweights in charge of all Dark Mantle matters outside of the Empire, suddenly arrived in the valley today. I immediately went to meet her, and was dyed because we decided to catch up for a while.¡± Emily looked at Han Shuo and exined. She paused, and smiled faintly, ¡°Because I talked about my cooperation with you, she was very curious about you!¡±

 Chapter 222: Making a move myself hurts the body!

    Chapter 222: Making a move myself hurts the body!

    Cecilia was one of the three heavyweights in the Dark Mantle, ascending to her position at a young age. She was legendary within the Dark Mantle, and was greatly admired by all members.

    She¡¯d had been traveling to various kingdoms all this time, in charge of foreign policy matters. She rarely made a trip back to the capital if there was nothing urgent.

    As a central location between three countries, the Valley of Sunshine was a very special existence. That Cecilia was here meant that she must have an important mission, otherwise she wouldn¡¯t have dithered here.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t have many designs on this legendary woman, even if she was rumored to be very tempting. He was only a bit surprised when he heard Emily say that she was interested in him and didn¡¯t say much else.

    ¡°Bryan, I need to talk to you alone. Come find meter.¡± Phoebe stretched and walked towards her own room, murmuring, ¡°What a long day, let¡¯s take a bubble bath and rx first.¡±

    When Trunks and Gilbert saw Phoebe leave, they immediately started making faces at Han Shuo. Emily curled her lip and gave a very soft, low snort. She was likely a bit angry.

    ¡°Trunks, make a list of what weapons our mercenaries will use. I¡¯ll ask the dwarves to forge them soon.¡± Han Shuo said to Trunks as he suddenly remembered.

    ¡°The dwarves live in a very mysterious ce. How did you find them?¡± Trunks was quite shocked as he looked at Han Shuo with surprise.

    ¡°Thanks to some fortuitous urrences I have a good rtionship with a dwarf vige, and can ask them to forge some weapons for me. Mm, I can bring this with Phoebeter. She can purchase some rare metals for me so that the dwarves can forge even sharper weapons.¡±

    ¡°I see. Alright, I¡¯ll think about it tonight and then give you a list tomorrow.¡±

    Looking up at the sky, Han Shuo said, ¡°Mm, it¡¯s gettingte. Everyone should get some rest.¡±

    ¡°Honored master, Miss Phoebe has just returned to her room and hasn¡¯t even started filling the tub with water yet. Aren¡¯t you a little anxious?¡± Gilbert sniggered lewdly, his voiceced with a double meaning.

    ¡°Gilbert, if you really are getting blue balls, I can give you some gold coins so you can go to those alleyways and take care of your issues!¡± Han Shuo looked sideways at Gilbert and suggested.

    Trunks guffawed and clutched his stomach, gasping betweenughs, ¡°He already tried today, but even though he was willing to spend arge amount of money, all of the girls in the valley think that he¡¯s an incredible pervert due to his previous actions, so no one dares serve him.¡±

    When he heard that Gilbert really had attempted to go whoring, but hadn¡¯t been able to find anyone willing to serve him, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help butugh heartily, ¡°A little lewd dragon is a little lewd dragon alright. It¡¯s too bad he can¡¯t be lewd even when he spends money! You¡¯re truly sad!¡±

    Gilbert¡¯s look of dejection turned to a look of anger,ining loudly, ¡° It¡¯s all because that you wanted me to collect virgin¡¯s blood that I can¡¯t get any girls. Now you evenugh at me! I feel so shunned!¡±

    ¡°How low, so disgusting!¡± Emily rolled her eyes at Gilbert with extreme disdain. She snorted coldly and walked off to her own room.

    ¡°Hey hey, are you getting something wrong here? Master told me to collect it, why aren¡¯t you yelling at him?¡± Gilbert cried out loudly, aggrieved when he saw Emily scorn him so much.

    ¡°Alright, if you really can¡¯t hold it in, you can fly to a farther city to take care of your needs. I know it¡¯s the personality of you dark dragons. Master is willing to give you gold for whoring, don¡¯t worry!¡± Han Shuoughed oddly and ignored Gilbert, heading for Emily¡¯s room.

    Although Han Shuo and Phoebe were in a rtionship in name, the two of them had yet to develop to that point. Han Shuo could only look for Emily when he had to take care of some bodily needs.

    ¡°Eh? Didn¡¯t Miss Phoebe tell him to go visit her? Why did he go visit Madame Emily instead? Eh, is he walking to the wrong ce?¡± Gilbert looked at Trunks and spoke in iprehension.

    Rubbing his chin, Trunks looked as Han Shuo entered Phoebe¡¯s room, a thoughtful expression on his face. He smiled, ¡°Stop poking your nose into your master¡¯s affairs. You should uphold the principle of ¡®Talk less, do more¡¯.¡±

    After Han Shuo had entered Emily¡¯s room, he directed one of the three yin demons surveilling the shop to take up guard outside her room. He smiled cheekily and walked further in,ughing softly, ¡°Alright alright, don¡¯t be mad.¡±

    ¡°Go, go find your little Phoebe!¡± Emily said huffily as she red at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Heh heh, I¡¯d need to find my little Emily first. Phoebe can wait.¡±

    Han Shuo walked to Emily, smiling as he didn¡¯t wait for her to resist. He held her in his arms and his hands roved over her body, invading her luscious curves. When Emily was panting heavily, her emotions took over as she began voluntarily coordinate with Han Shuo¡¯s actions. The two quickly shed their clothes and entangled themselves with each other with an air of familiarity.

    When Emily¡¯s body had softened into a ball of cotton candy, exhausted after Han Shuo¡¯s multiple vigorous charges, the bit of ire left in her heart from earlier quickly vanished without a trace. Her skin was flushed red as she curledzily in Han Shuo¡¯s embrace. Her slender fingers tapped lightly on Han Shuo¡¯s chest as she murmured lowly. ¡°I know I shouldn¡¯t be mad, but sometimes I can¡¯t help myself.¡±

    Running hisrge hand over Emily¡¯s smooth back, Han Shuo said softly, ¡°It only means that you care about me. You don¡¯t need to exin. It¡¯d be even more odd if you weren¡¯t mad.¡±

    Han Shuo was spooning Emily and murmuring sweet nothings to her,pletely forgetting about the passage of time. He¡¯d forgotten what Phoebe had said before. But in the other room, Phoebe had waited a long time after she¡¯d showered and changed. She began to grow impatient when Han Shuo took his sweet timeing.

    She put on her clothes and adjusted them, leaving her room and crossing the yard to walk towards Han Shuo¡¯s room. She knocked, ¡°Bryan, can Ie in?¡±

    Han Shuo had discovered her movements when Phoebe had pushed open her own door. When he saw Phoebe make a beeline for his room, he hastily started putting his clothes on. ¡°Damn it, I forgot what Phoebe said just now.¡±

    Deathly afraid of being caught in bed, Emily also had a panic stricken expression on her face as she hastily put her clothes back on and carelessly pulled her hair up into a bun. She urged Han Shuo on, ¡°You should hurry on back. Things¡¯ll be bad if she discovers this.¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo walked to a window in the back and jumped out, approaching his own room from the back wall. He then used his cultivation skills to open his window and flipped inside, casting a look over his appearance in the window and opening the door with an awkward expression.

    ¡°Why did it take you so long to open the door? I told you toe find me just now; why didn¡¯t youe?¡± Phoebe pouted at Han Shuo and asked suspiciously when she saw that his pants were loose. ¡°What were you doing just now; howe you haven¡¯t zipped up your pants?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression was a bit panicked because he felt guilty. Inspiration struck and he hurriedly responded, ¡°No, nothing. I was going to the bathroom.¡±

    ¡°I see!¡± Phoebe giggled and replied understandingly. Smiling, she walked towards Han Shuo and looked coquettishly at him. ¡°You should still pull up your pants properly before opening the door. Look at you now, gosh!¡±

    Contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, Phoebe stooped down with a faint smile as she spoke and reached out to pull up his pants.

    However, a strong, odd smell hit her nose from his pants when she did so, assaulting her nose and mouth.

    This strange smell made her immediately cover her nose and cry out, ¡°What is this; why does it smell so weird?¡±

    She looked closely at his pants as she spoke and noticed some white spots on the fabric of his thighs. It looked like some liquid had just dried.

    Her stunning cheeks suddenly burned hot as she abruptly realized what those spots were. She was so embarrassed that she wanted to find a hole to hide in, standing there dumbfounded as she froze.

    ;Shit! Damn! I¡¯m dead now! I forgot to clean myself just now. The only other woman in the store is Emily. It looks like the gig¡¯s up, Phoebe¡¯s definitely going to throw a tantrum.¡¯ Han Shuo was apprehensive when his thoughts spun wildly. ¡°Eh... uh.... um... things aren¡¯t as you think!¡± Han Shuo frantically exined as he hurriedly pulled his pants up, unable to conceal the panic in his expression.

    Phoebe stood up with a lowered head, as her cheeks and neck burned, not daring to look at Han Shuo. She turned and headed back outside, but suddenly found her voice and her sense of humor as she reached the doorway and murmured in an exceedingly low voice, ¡°Bryan, it¡¯s been tough on you. I¡¯m your girlfriend, but you still have to take care of such things yourself. Um... I¡¯m just not ready yet. Give me some more time. Don¡¯t do this in the future. I¡¯ve heard people say that it really harms the body to do this to yourself!¡±

    Phoebe delivered these words with a reddened expression as Han Shuo watched, dumbfounded. She then left like she was fleeing, and rather seemed more ill at ease than Han Shuo.

    ¡°Hey hey, things aren¡¯t as you imagined!¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t know whether orugh or cry as he watched Phoebe¡¯s retreating back.

    The next day. Morning

    Phoebe, Emily, and Han Shuo all had on very awkward expressions in the morning. No one knew what to say.

    Particrly Han Shuo. He¡¯d been misunderstood by Phoebe but had no way of exining himself. Exining wouldnd him in more trouble instead.

    Trunks and Gilbert looked ambiguously at all of them, especially Gilbert. He kept chuckling under his breath and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Honored master, did you have a wonderful night? Aha, I think it must¡¯ve been one worthy of dreaming about again and again.¡±

    ¡°Shut up!¡± Han Shuo flew into a rage and red fiercely at Gilbert.

    ¡°Bryan, here¡¯s a list of weapons. If the dwarves can forge these, it¡¯ll definitely greatly increase our men¡¯s fighting abilities and passion!¡± Trunks handed over a scrawled list of weapons.

    ¡°Eh, I still have some matters to take care of. I¡¯ll be going now.¡± Emily was alright, but she still felt a bit shy after the previous night¡¯s events, and so was the first to leave.

    ¡°I¡¯m also going to leave too.¡± Phoebe also expressed her intentions when she saw Emily leave.

    ¡°Phoebe, wait!¡± Han Shuo opened his mouth.

    Phoebe¡¯s face suddenly flushed hotly as she didn¡¯t quite dare meet Han Shuo¡¯s eyes. She only flicked a shy nce at Han Shuo, ¡°What is it?¡±

    ¡°Eh? The frosty Miss Phoebe can be so shy as well? It looks like what happenedst night altered even Miss Phoebe¡¯s personality!¡± Gilbert finally ¡®confirmed¡¯ that something had happened between Han Shuo and Phoebest night.

    ¡°Lewd dragon, don¡¯t think everyone is as shameless and perverted as you! I¡¯ll stab you with my sword if you keep spewing nonsense!¡± Phoebe was also enraged as she rolled her eyes fiercely at Gilbert, threatening him with a icy look on her face.

    ¡°I need all of these things, buy them for me.¡± Han Shuo took out a list and handed it over to Phoebe, asking her to obtain the written items.

    Taking Han Shuo¡¯s list, Phoebe assented softly and didn¡¯t say anything else before quickly leaving the shop.

    Not long after she¡¯d left, Han Shuo was discussing matters of the valley with Gilbert and Trunks when he noticed through the yin demons that Odysseus and his crew was looking around a bit cautiously at the surroundings. They were standing in front of the door, not having daring to enter.

    It seemed like everyone in the Valley of Sunshine had heard of this storefront¡¯s infamous reputation. Odysseus and them were no exception as they adopted an exceedingly cautious attitude due to its reputation of a curse.

    ¡°They¡¯re here!¡± Han Shuo smiled faintly and stood up to open the door.

 Chapter 223: Invitation

    Chapter 223: Invitation

    ¡°Long time no see!¡± Han Shuo stood outside the door and greeted Odysseus¡¯ group with a half smile.

    All six of them cheered when they saw Han Shuo appear, their faces brimming with genuine joy. Odysseus and Gordon even barrelled towards Han Shuo to hug him.

    ¡°It really is you! What are you doing here?¡± The touchy feely Gordon looked at Han Shuo with surprise after he let go.

    ¡°Heh heh,e on in. It¡¯s not as frightening as you think, it¡¯s very safe here!¡± Han Shuo moved aside and gestured for them toe inside.

    The six had been rather apprehensive about this ce before they¡¯d confirmed that Han Shuo was inside. After hearing his words, they stopped dithering and strode in, making for the center of the yard.

    Odysseus¡¯ crew was made of three warriors, two mages, and one archer. Odysseus was a senior swordsman; Gordon and Angelo, journeyman swordsmen; Aphrodite, a water adept mage; Bard, a thunder journeyman mage; and Nia, a female elven archer.

    After theirst foray into the Dark Forest, not only had they gained incredible treasures, but their strength had reached new heights. From their badges, Han Shuo could tell that Gordon had advanced to senior swordsman, and Bard to adept mage.

    ¡°Bryan, this ce is Valley of Sunshine¡¯s famous cursed shop. I¡¯ve heard people mention the legends of this ce thest time we were here. There¡¯s a warning that no one should enter this shop. Howe you¡¯re living here?¡± Gordon was a straight shooter,pletely unable to hide his thoughts. He looked around the yard when he entered the shop and asked Han Shuo as soon as he¡¯d sat down.

    ¡°Legends aren¡¯t necessarily real, and those curses could be manmade as well. We¡¯ve been here for so long and haven¡¯t run into any danger.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t exin the blood water demons to them.

    ¡°How¡¯ve you been?¡± As the captain, Odysseus was dependable and upright. He looked at Han Shuo and smiled in greeting.

    ¡°Not too bad. What have you encountered since leaving the Dark Forest? Gordon and Bard¡¯s strength have greatly increased, not bad at all!¡± Han Shuo said.

    ¡°We went to Zajoski City after parting ways with you and sold what we¡¯d gained in the Dark Forest. We obtained a sum of money and upgraded our equipment, as well as getting Bard a staff that enhanced his strengtht, After that, Gordon and Bard reported to their promotion exams since they felt they were ready. After passing the exams, we took some protection missions and arrived near the Valley of Sunshine. We entered the valley this time because we were protecting a merchant caravan.¡± Odysseus smiled slightly and slowly went over all that had happened since they¡¯d parted ways.

    Flicking a nce at Trunks, Han Shuo thought for a moment and looked at Odysseus. ¡°We¡¯re friends here, so I¡¯ll speak candidly. Trunks and I have formed a mercenary band, and there¡¯s only a few members right now. I would love it if you joined so we can increase the size of the band.¡±

    Odysseus and the others were all taken by surprise by these words. They looked at each other, at a loss of how to respond.

    Snapping his attention back after being dazed, Odysseus looked at Han Shuo and said, ¡°Bryan, you¡¯re not kidding are you? Why did you think of forming a mercenary band? You¡¯ve always been a lone ranger, and you don¡¯t seem the sort who¡¯d want to form a mercenary band?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s very true. But we¡¯ve already registered the name. I think if the band is run well, the future will be quite bright. Would you guys be interested in joining?¡± Han Shuo smiled at Odysseus and asked him with great sincerity.

    ¡°Just what¡¯s going on, can you tell me about things?¡± Odysseus seemed interested, but knew that he couldn¡¯t be hasty and questioned Han Shuo closely.

    Han Shuo went over the origin and details of the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. He didn¡¯t purposefully conceal the points about Trunks¡¯ hatred or Han Shuo¡¯s recent run-ins with Florida.

    The other five¡¯s expression noticeably shifted after Han Shuo had finished, having obviously not anticipated that so much would happen with Han Shuo and Trunks in the Valley of Sunshine in such a short amount of time. They were all very excited and itching to sign up. ¡°I think I need to discuss this in great detail with them before giving you an answer.¡± As the captain, Odysseus naturally needed to ask the other five for their opinions and thus couldn¡¯t give a response on the spot.

    Nodding, Han Shuo smiled, ¡°I understand, please take a few days to think about it!¡±

    The six and Han Shuo fell into talking about the fun things in the Dark Forest. The six didn¡¯t leave until it was almost noon.

    Trunks would asionally toss in a word or two, but Gilbert felt a bit bored sitting there. His shifty eyes kept checking out Aphrodite and Nia. He only stopped, pouting, when Han Shuo red at him a few times.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go out for a walk!¡± Han Shuo said to Trunks and Gilbert after the six had left.

    ¡°Where are we going?¡± Trunks was a bit confused and asked.

    ¡°The situation in the Valley of Sunshine is ratherplex right now. Our original target was Florida, but now that Ferguson¡¯s joined the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band, I think we need to discuss his arrival with Laureton. We can also obtain more information from Laureton to decide our next course of action.¡± Han Shuo said calmly.

    This time, the group made their way easily to the Cairo mercenary band without meeting any obstacles. However, before they¡¯d made it past the enormous square, they heard an earth shattering explosion from the depths of the Cairo mercenary band.

    When Han Shuo and the others rushed over, they found that a building had toppled over, ck smoke spilling out of it. Several charred, bloody corpses were scattered around the building. Standing in the center, the bald Laureton was simr to an infuriated beast, seemingly a step away from going berserk and emanating an exceedingly dangerous aura as he roared at his men.

    Harris was standing not too far far from the chaos with an equally darkened expression. He seemed to be in a awful mood and wasn¡¯t as polite as usual when he saw Han Shuo and the others walk over. He looked angrily and guiltily at the corpses on the ground and seemed to be ming himself.

    ¡°Eh... it looks like we haven¡¯te at the right time.¡± Han Shuo pursed his lips after walking up.

    Restraining the anger in his heart, Laureton sucked in a few deep breaths and turned his head to Harris, ¡°Bury these brothers well. I¡¯m going to find out who did this and rip him apart!¡±

    Harris didn¡¯t say much as he nodded his head painfully, then started directing the mercenaries who were converging on all sides. They lifted the bodies carefully and started cleaning up the premises.

    ¡°Come with me.¡± Laureton had a ck face and snorted softly, walking towards thergest building.

    It was obvious that the three had chanced upon the aftermath of an ambush on the Cairo mercenary band. They took a close look around but discovered no traces of any enemies, and so had no idea what was going on.

    When Laureton entered his own house, he waved his hands randomly around to indicate for them to find a stone stool. He spoke with a darkened face, ¡°The enemy wants to kill me. The room that exploded was where I usually take care of the daily matters of the Cairo mercenary band. I usually go there at noon.¡±

    ¡°However, I was dyed by some matters today. When I was ten meters from the building entrance, I felt a strong magical pulse radiate outwards, with the explosion happening immediately. It looks like a magical device was set up beforehand, otherwise, it wouldn¡¯t have exploded so timely. I almost died inside.¡±

    ¡°There are certainly those who belong to other factions in your mercenary band. This wouldn¡¯t have happened otherwise. In addition, when I was fighting Florida in front of the gates to the Valley of Sunshinest time, the Rainbow Sickles shouldn¡¯t have gotten there so quickly to save Florida. I started suspecting something then, and today, it seems like my suspicions were warranted.¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment and responded.

    ¡°That¡¯s for certain. If I can arrange my men to infiltrate other factions, then the others can certainly do so as well. It was just too dangerous this time, I almost died. I wonder which faction did this.¡± Laureton growled with a darkened face.

    Seeing that Laureton had his own thoughts, Han Shuo said no more. Although Laureton seemed all brawns and no brain, his mind was actually quite calctive. No wonder he could rece the previous Rainbow Sickle mercenary band to be the most powerful in the valley.

    ¡°Florida¡¯s grandfather, Ferguson, the light grand magus of the Church of Light has arrived. Florida has also been transferred to another ce and I can¡¯t find an appropriate time to make a move against him. I¡¯vee to find you this time to figure out where Florida has been moved to.¡±

    ¡°Since you have men in the Rainbow Sickles, I think you might know this info. If I don¡¯t know where Florida is, then I have no way to find the most appropriate timing to strike. I¡¯ll need you to tell me where he is.¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment and told Laureton.

    ¡°I already know what happenedst night, but since that sly old fox Ferguson has arrived, I think it¡¯d be rather unrealistic to assassinate him now. After your attacksst night, Florida is certainly even more well protected now. Even if you know where Florida currently is, you won¡¯t have the chance to make a move!¡± Laureton¡¯s expression hadpletely returned to normal now.

    Han Shuo understood Laureton¡¯s words, but now that his three yin demons had formed and he had an earth elite zombie at his beck and call, Han Shuo had full reason to believe that he would still have a chance to seed after he knew where Florida was, no matter how heavily guarded he was.

    ¡°I understand everything you¡¯ve said, but I still hope you can tell me where Florida is.¡± Han Shuoughed confidently.

    It was obvious that Laureton felt that Han Shuo was overreaching himself. Although he understood Han Shuo¡¯s strength was umon, he felt that even if Han Shuo leveraged the power of the Cairo mercenary band, he still wouldn¡¯t have much of a chance to kill Florida.

    ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll keep an eye out and send someone to notify you if I have news of Florida.¡± Laureton¡¯s voice had grown cold as an impatient expression began to appear on his face.

    Han Shuo knew there wasn¡¯t much to discuss beyond that and nodded, leaving with Trunks and Gilbert.

    ¡°What the hell! We¡¯re doing him a favor and his attitude is so vicious!¡± Gilbert startedining loudly as soon as they¡¯d left Cairo mercenary band¡¯s territory.

    ¡°If you were almost blown to pieces, I think your attitude would be worse than his. It looks like Laureton was truly frightened today.¡± Trunks looked at Gilbert and smiled.

    ¡°Mm, Laureton was indeed in a bad mood today. I wonder if he¡¯ll be unable to control himself and make a move shortly.¡± Han Shuo chuckled and paused. ¡°It looks like chaos is growing in the Valley of Sunshine. I think we should change our ns. I¡¯ve got a better idea now.¡±

 Chapter 224: Counter assassination

    Chapter 224: Counter assassination

    ¡°What should we do?¡± Trunks asked.

    ¡°The depths of the Valley of Sunshine are too murky, and our power is too weak. We don¡¯t have the ability to fight against any side. No matter what the final result is, control of the valley won¡¯t fall to us. In the end, our mercenary band is too weak.¡±

    ¡°As such, it¡¯s not a wise move for us to be involved at this time. For now, we can set aside our feud with Florida. When they¡¯re injured and bleeding from fighting each other, we can take advantage of that to recruit men to expand our power. The most important thing is to grow our strength and not be involved with them.¡±

    ¡°The shopfront that I need is rumored to be an unlucky ce. No matter who¡¯s in control of the valley, they won¡¯t know how to use it, so it¡¯ll remain empty with no one taking up residence. I¡¯ll be able to obtain it sooner orter. There¡¯s no need for us to be confined to one ce because of it.¡±

    ¡°Not to mention that Laureton isn¡¯t a kind sort. Our security is far from guaranteed during our stay in the valley. If Laureton loses his temper one day, then we might turn into enemies. At that time, it would be difficult for us to leave the valley.¡± Han Shuo continued calmly after careful consideration.

    ¡°You mean that we should temporarily leave the Valley of Sunshine?¡± Han Shuo¡¯sments had been long, but to distill it down in a simple manner, he was advocating that they take a seat on the mountain and watch the tigers fight. After some thought, Trunks was able to grasp his intention.

    ¡°We¡¯ll leave the Valley of Sunshine, but not necessarily its sphere of influence. We can imitate the three other factions and expand our influence to the outskirts of the valley. With the gold and your connections, you can make use of this time to recruit more mercenaries. We can slowly increase our strength when they¡¯re busy fighting each other.¡±

    ¡°In addition, I need to leave for a while as well. If I remain here and the Church of Light discovers me, I¡¯ll bring unnecessary trouble to the mercenary band. I can make use of this opportunity to ask the dwarves in the Dark Forest to forge the weapons you need. I¡¯ll pay the forest trolls a visit as well to see if I can get anything out of them.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s mind was quite nimble as he quickly and calmly made ns.

    When Han Shuo had finished, Trunks smiled and nodded. ¡°There are a few more months until the fight for control of the Valley of Sunshine ends. Now that we have enough gold for our base, I can make use of this time to attract more experts to join. Perhaps they¡¯ll be of some use in critical moments.¡±

    ¡°Yepp. Let¡¯s go and discuss things with Emily. We should leave earlier rather thanter.¡± Han Shuo looked at the sky and started thinking about what to do when they leave the valley.

    As they made their way back, the streets were bustling. All sorts of bizarre and exotic wares were on disy by merchants from various kingdoms, catching the eyes of passersby.

    From stockily built orcs wearing thick furs, to beautiful elves with pointed ears, all sorts of races were looking at the items on the streets, trying to identify where their profits woulde from.

    Han Shuo was moving through the crowd when a sudden sense of danger rose in his heart. It was as if enemies from the shadows had locked onto him with killing intent, nning on giving him a lethal blow.

    Having reached the bloodlust realm, Han Shuo had a frightening sensitivity towards other people¡¯s killing intent towards him. Even though he was on the crowded and bustling streets, he could still clearly feel that concealed burst of killing intent. It was really quite incredible.

    His thoughts moved as he sent the three yin demons flying out soundlessly, gusts of air drifting through the void, slowly dispersing and moving into the blind spots around Han Shuo, probing for the origin of that killing intent.

    Thanks to the yin demons, Han Shuo could clearly see all around him within several meters. He quickly sifted through the people around him, trying to identify the source of the danger.

    On the blind spots to the left of a shopfront, a wless, exquisite face came into view. Like the edge of a de, the female elven archer Maxine¡¯s eyes held a cold gleam. She was looking sharply at him and holding a strangely designed bow in her left hand. She seemed to be waiting for the prime opportunity to deliver a fatal blow.

    Next to her stood thunder mage Asa. His face was equally ruthless as he gripped a magic staff in his right hand. He seemed to be ready to make a move at any time.

    However, in this crowded and busy street, Han Shuo¡¯s group was surrounded by merchants of all nationalities. Conducting an assassination in such an area needed an exquisite, near perfect grasp of timing, or it would be impossible to seed.

    A cold smile suddenly appearing on his face, Han Shuo continued walking forward without a hitch. The three yin demons kept an eye on Maxine and Asa¡¯s movements as he considered how to handle their ns.

    He suddenly dashed around a corner on the streets. Trunks and Gilbert also vanished without a trace.

    Maxine and Asa had seen the three walk forward, but suddenly disappear around a corner. Slightly surprised, they looked at each other. Their hidden bodies couldn¡¯t help but join the crowds as they tried to take a look at what had happened around the corner.

    ¡°Where are they?¡± Asa scanned the corner when they arrived and asked with a slight frown when he didn¡¯t find them.

    At that moment, the streets reverberated with a low howl. A jet ck beam of light screamed through the air as it twisted through the crowd. A pair of glistening fangs, at the head of what looked like a gigantic snake winding through the air, came to bite down on the two.

    The sudden changepletely wrecked their ns. Maxine¡¯s thin eyes narrowed into a slit as the Demonyer Edge shot towards her chest; she dashed upwards towards the roof and fled into the distance without a second thought.

    Behind Maxine, a ghastly wail tore its way out of Asa¡¯s mouth. The cry galvanized the crowd, engulfing the street in chaos as everyone ducked and sprinted for safety, wanting to flee before the unknown danger arrived.

    The mercenaries who were following the merchants and in charge of their safety immediately surrounded their employers before identifying what had gone on in the surroundings.

    Thunder mage Asa¡¯s right hand, the one clutching the magic staff, had been chopped off because of Maxine¡¯s departure. The severed stump spewed blood everywhere.

    The Demonyer Edge sprang back into the air, circling back ruthlessly as it attempted to reap Asa¡¯s life as well. However, Asa was still an experienced mercenary. After that first shriek, he kept his mouth shut even in the midst of such horrifying circumstances.

    He didn¡¯t hesitate. In a situation where he might lose his life in the next second, his empty left hand swiftly picked up his severed right hand as he deployed the levitation spell without pause. He took to the skies and a circle of lightning formed around him, turning him into a electric man.

    The Demonyer Edge once again flew towards Asa as the electric currents sparked madly. When the Demonyer Edge closed in on his back, the electric currents invaded it, interrupting its charge and stopping it a hair¡¯s breadth away from Asa¡¯s body, At that moment, a series of crackles and pops resounded from his body.

    The electric that surrounded Asa poured into the Demonyer Edge with fierce electric power. This threw the magical yuan that Han Shuo had infused into the Demonyer Edge into disarray. With that, it didn¡¯t take Asa¡¯s life.

    Although Asa hadn¡¯t been stabbed to death, the wildly rampant magical yuan within the Demonyer Edge crashed into him like an enormous boulder. His body trembled like a kite with a broken string, almost plummeting from the sky with his violent swaying. He finally caught himself with a stumble and shakily flew into a room, crying for help.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go. Asa¡¯s injured even worse than Florida now. I think it¡¯s bing more and more unrealistic that the Rainbow Sickles will be able to win out over the Cairo mercenary band in this time¡¯s struggle.¡± Han Shuoughed coldly and walked out of an alleyway with Gilbert and Trunks.

    ¡°Devious master, why not take this advantage to kill him? We just need to stick him again and Asa will be dead without a doubt?¡± Uprehending, Gilbert looked at Han Shuo in confusion.

    ¡°Asa fell into a rest stop of the Cairo mercenary band. Even though the Cairo mercenary band and the Rainbow Sickles are covertly fighting each other, everyone within the valley is under the protection of the Cairo mercenary band. No matter whether the mercenaries want to or not, they¡¯ll have to raise a hand to help Asa. We can¡¯t kill Asa there or we¡¯ll offend Laureton.¡± Trunks exined to Gilbert.

    ¡°Yep. When I ambushed Asa, the Cairo mercenaries didn¡¯t say a word and no one came out of their rest stop to help him. This is already helping us out. You, stupid dragon, should use your brain more and not just think of dirty things from day to night.¡± Han Shuo lectured Gilbert in an exasperated tone.

    ¡°It¡¯s a pity that Maxine escaped. That woman has a very finely honed sense of danger!¡± Trunks spoke with some regret.

    Nodding, Han Shuo agreed. ¡°Mm. It was indeed a bit of a pity that Maxine escaped. Perhaps it¡¯s because she¡¯s adept as she is in assassination that her senses are so keen. The woman hiding in the shadows is much more dangerous than Asa. You must be careful and not give her any openings.¡±

    The three of them chatted as they made their way back to the shop. With the three yin demons around him, no one and nothing could escape Han Shuo¡¯s observation, so they didn¡¯t run into any further trouble.

    There were some exotic flowers and grass ced in front of an orc¡¯s shop, as well as some exquisitely knotted small trees. One of them had three golden, glittering leaves and milky-white stalks. They were as durable as stctites and shone with a faint, white luster, immediately catching Han Shuo¡¯s attention.

    He¡¯d observed this shop through the yin demons. He spoke to the other two, ¡°Come, let¡¯s take a look at this shop.¡±

    Having long since grown used to Han Shuo¡¯s peculiarities, the two of them didn¡¯t say anything and followed behind Han Shuo, walking towards the orc¡¯s shop.

    Several umon flora and fauna attracted Han Shuo¡¯s attentions. Some of them had refreshing scents, and others had bizarre shapes with vivid colors. Many of the small trees had translucent roots like a beautiful jade. It was a wonder how they¡¯d grown.

    Han Shuo drew nearer to the three golden leaves and leaned over to sniff them. A clean scent drifted into his nose and mouth, refreshing his mind. Han Shuo stared at those three leaves, examining them closely for a bit. He reached out and rubbed the rock-like roots, thinking of something with a furrowed brow.

    Gilbert and Trunks were staring at Han Shuo with a peculiar expression. They didn¡¯t understand his actions at all, and didn¡¯t know why he was suddenly interested in such bizarre flora and fauna.

    After a while, Han Shuo¡¯s eyebrows suddenly twitched as a crazed delight filled his eyes. He observed all of the strange nts even more closely afterwards, his whole being filled with an unspeakable excitement like he¡¯d suddenly picked up some treasures.

    Gilbert and Trunks looked at each other, unsure of what Han Shuo had discovered. They stood there and watched his strange performance,pletely befuddled.

    Sweeping his eyes over the wares in front of the door, Han Shuo took in a deep breath and said to Gilbert and Trunks, ¡°I need these special nts. Come, let¡¯s see if there are other gains inside.¡±

    His excited expression slowly returned to normal after his words as he walked inside.

 Chapter 225: A heavenly treasure

    Chapter 225: A heavenly treasure

    The shopkeeper was an old, yet tall and strong orc. Even in the heart of cruel winter, he just had on a thin shirt. Thick hair covered his coarse skin as hezily rested in his shop.

    There were many exotic nts everywhere in the shop. These strange flowers and grasses came in vivid colors, and the shop was filled with a refreshing scent.

    Han Shuo only flicked a slight nce at the old orc as he walked in and started looking amongst the nt life himself, identifying them, and looking for what he needed.

    In Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories, he¡¯d spent a lot of time researching the methods of pill refinement. He¡¯d also refined some pills himself.

    However, apart from a pill cauldron and a recipe being of the utmost importance in pill refining, the next most important thing were the ingredients. The more precious the pill, the rarer the ingredients. Most of them were heavenly treasures, and one needed them in sufficient quantity to refine the pills.

    This time, the leaves glittering with a golden color in front of the old orc¡¯s shop with roots like rock had attracted Han Shuo¡¯s attention.

    Using the methods in his memories, he began to closely examine the fauna in order to identify them. After careful scrutiny, he was able to confirm that these strange nts were the ones that only grew in caves with stctites. These were Goldmarrow Grass that had formed after absorbing the rock essence within the caves for a hundred years as well as the yin qi of the heavens.

    Goldmarrow Grass was a heavenly treasure of great yin. Ifbined with a couple of other ingredients, one would be able to refine the transformative Reform Pill¡ªa pill that would thoroughly excavate all of a mortal¡¯s bones and meridians,pletely transforming their body to make it suitable for demonic and magical cultivation.

    There was also a small ruby-colored tree with several red fruits on its branches. The ming fruits were round and translucent, sparkling with a faint crimson light beneath the sunlight. They each seemed to be like a miniature sun.

    When Han Shuo looked at them closely, he grew even more certain that these were the fire attribute treasures, Sunze Fruits. If someone cultivating the fire attribute ate this fruit, then their strength would increase immensely for a short amount of time thanks to the power of the sun filtering down to them.

    However, if someone not inclined towards the fire attribute ate the fruit, they wouldn¡¯t be able to hold up under the fiery power within and would be burned to a crisp by the fruit. When he turned to cinders, the spirit power of the fruit would slowly dissipate into the skies.

    Apart from the Goldmarrow Grass and the Sunze Fruit, Han Shuo also discovered other treasures such as the Dragonfly Fruit, Hundred Year Vine Heart, and Extreme Frost Grass in this shop. These were all precious materials that pill refiners needed. Han Shuo naturally wouldn¡¯t let them easily out of his sight now that he¡¯d discovered them.

    After a while, Han Shuoid out all the exotic spirit nts he knew on the counter in front of the old orc. He smiled, ¡°Elder, how much do these go for?¡±

    The old orc had been long since keeping an eye on Han Shuo¡¯s movements as hezily sat there. He finally stood up when Han Shuo ced these items in front of him.

    Contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectation, the stocky old orc didn¡¯t immediately name a price. He looked at Han Shuo with interest instead and asked, ¡°Do you recognize these items and know what they¡¯re used for?¡±

    The old orc¡¯s voice was raspy and resonant, seemingly a bit awkward when he formed the sybles of human speech. His two nostrils huffed with air as he spoke, looking a bit odd.

    ¡°No, I just think they¡¯re a bit strange and wanted to take them home for some further study.¡± Han Shuo smiled. The old orc was a bit disappointed when he heard that Han Shuo didn¡¯t recognize them. He muttered self deprecatingly to himself, ¡°Of course. So many pharmacists had no idea what this is, how would you know what they are?¡±

    Pointing at the Sunze Fruit, the old orc said to Han Shuo, ¡°Curious human youngster, these things aren¡¯t fun at all. They grew out of an area of poor dirt in our home and no one dares y with them. For instance, this red fruit? Even if some fierce beasts eat these fruits, they¡¯d be burned to death by poisonous me.¡±

    ¡°And, these strange flowering grasses. You¡¯ll be able to feel a bone deep chill if you ce your hand on their leaves. Whoever eats them freezes into ice cubes. You¡¯re not a pharmacist, so you should probably not try to mix them up. ording to what I know, some pharmacists suffered great harm when they tried mixing these.¡±

    It was obvious that the old orc didn¡¯t know the marvelous effects of these heavenly treasures and treated them as scary poisonous grass. The Sunze Fruit and Extreme Frost Grass were treasures of utmost heat and cold. Ordinary people would indeed be injured if they ate them since they couldn¡¯t digest the spirit power within. It was normal for him to have this kind of misconception.

    Laughing lightly, Han Shuo smiled, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m not using these myself. It¡¯s just that I know a good pharmacist who¡¯s good with exotic nts. I just want to give these to him. Of course, I¡¯ll remember your reminders and tell him the peculiarities of these nts.¡±

    ¡°Then alright. It was very difficult for my children to bring them over from the far barren wastnds. Give me a hundred gold coins for all of these. This is a fair price. Some pharmacists would be greatly interested in them and be willing to spend a great deal of money to buy them.¡± It was obvious that the old orc didn¡¯t know what these items could be used for in the hands of someone like Han Shuo. A hundred gold coins wasn¡¯t even enough to buy one of their leaves.

    In consideration of the orc¡¯s kind reminders, as well as the possibility of obtaining more of these nts in the future, Han Shuo generously threw down five hundred gold coins. ¡°Thank you for your reminder, elder. Your kindness was worth four hundred gold coins. Otherwise, my friend might¡¯ve ended up in trouble. Mm, if you have more of these nts, please bring them from the barrennds. I¡¯lle over when I¡¯m free and purchase them for high prices.¡±

    ¡°Oh, honored guest, your generosity will be rewarded. Thank you!¡± The old orc emotionally epted a bag of five hundred gold coins. His gaze at Han Shuo was quite different as he spoke happily.

    ¡°Wait a second.¡± A clear shout suddenly came from outside the door as a beautiful girl, one that made all three guys sigh, sashayed in.

    She had a tall and slender body that was covered by a light purple dress. Her brown hair flowed like a waterfall as a pair of limpid eyesy gently beneath her delicately arched brows. She had a charming nose, and small red lips that dotted her face. Her wless, tender skin and oval shaped face rounded out all the elements that a beauty should have.

    She looked only in her early twenties, but had the air of one used to holding power and having weathered many a disaster. Although she wasn¡¯t purposefully revealing it, she had a natural gravitas to her bearing, as if she could easily decide someone¡¯s life or death.

    ¡°Hi, beauty, talking to me?¡± Gilbert blew a sharp whistle and looked at thedy with excitement as he flirted with her.

    ¡°Not you!¡± She flicked a nce at Gilbert and responded calmly without looking at him again. She walked towards Han Shuo and raised a slender finger finger to point at the Extreme Frost Grass. Her limpid eyes looked at Han Shuo as she said, ¡°Can you sell that poison grass to me?¡±

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo smiled, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, no!¡±

    The beauty looked askance at Han Shuo after hearing his rejection. She hadn¡¯t thought that Han Shuo would reject her so decisively. Her pretty brows knit together as she asked again, ¡°I can pay a hundred gold coins just for this de of grass!¡±

    He shook his head again and confirmed, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, not selling!¡±

    Having met with rejection twice, she knew that there was no chance she would be able to obtain the grass. She looked meaningfully at Han Shuo and said with disdain, ¡°A man with no chivalry. It looks like Emily¡¯s words weren¡¯t that true.¡± It was Han Shuo¡¯s turn to be surprised after hearing those words, ¡°Are you Mistress Cecilia?¡±

    Nodding her head coldly, Cecilia threw her head back and looked at Han Shuo, speaking proudly, ¡°That¡¯s me. Mister Bryan, what will it take for you to give me the grass?¡±

    ¡°Nothing!¡± Han Shuo responded and smiled, ¡°It¡¯s very nice to meet you, Mistress Cecilia. Good day!¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t even look at Cecilia after he finished speaking, circling past her to unhurriedly walk outside the shop.

 Chapter 226: Violence

    Chapter 226: Violence

    ¡°Honored master, this doesn¡¯t seem like your style. Howe you¡¯re suddenly so indifferent to a beauty?¡± Gilbert spoke, a look of utter confusion on his face.

    ¡°First of all, I have a use for the grass, so I won¡¯t be giving it to her. In addition, Cecilia throwing her weight around in front of me just because her rank is higher than mine is the kind of attitude that really leaves a bad taste in my mouth, so she won¡¯t get anything from me.¡±

    He¡¯d heard from Emily that Cecilia was a priest and had also focused on pharmacy. Her talent in the area of medicine was quite high. Although she didn¡¯t take the front line inbat, an expert priest and pharmacist like her would be of the utmost importance in critical times.

    A person like her could enable the warriors and mages to recover their energy swiftly in battle, and could use some priest magics and medicines to quickly stabilize wounds, allowing allies to return to the battlefield in short order.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t tarry outside after leaving the old orc¡¯s shop, returning to his base of operations. Phoebe and Emily were bathed in the setting splendor of the sun and sittingzily on tworge chairs in the courtyard, chatting happily about something.

    When he walked in, all eyes shot to him. After a day¡¯s passage of time, the two girls had natural expressions on their face and didn¡¯t have the awkwardness from the morning. Beneath the rays of the evening sun, their charming faces were tinged with red. With eyes full of tenderness, and a blush on their cheeks, they looked like two stunningly cute wives waiting for their husband¡¯s return.

    In that instant, Han Shuo¡¯s heart was suffused with warm contentment. He felt that both women were so beautiful, and if they could still interact so harmoniously after the truth was revealed, that would be wonderful for any man.

    ¡°What are you thinking about, standing there with a silly smile?¡± Phoebe would only appear friendly and down to earth when interacting with Han Shuo, that gentle tone only for him.

    ¡°No, nothing!¡± His beautiful wish could only be thought about at the moment. From Phoebe¡¯s personality, she wasn¡¯t the sort who would easilypromise. Therefore, Han Shuo maintained a natural expression on his face in case he made her unhappy.

    ¡°Bryan, I¡¯m afraid I¡¯ll have to leave first this time. I¡¯ve just received a mission that I need to coordinate with younger sister Cecilia. I can¡¯t stay in the Valley of Sunshine any longer!¡± Emily looked at Han Shuo longingly as she spoke apologetically.

    He first nked, and then thought deeply. Han Shuo understood that as a senior executive of the Dark Mantle, she did indeed have many things she needed to do and couldn¡¯t stay in one ce forever. Nodding, Han Shuo revealed an understanding smile. ¡°I understand. It¡¯s unsuitable for us to stay in the valley in the short term as well, so I¡¯m preparing to leave too.¡±

    As Phoebe and Emily stared in surprise, Han Shuo quickly repeated the reasoning he told Trunks and the others,ying out their gains and losses. Since his decision was correct, he quickly gained Phoebe and Emily¡¯s agreement.

    ¡°Then, what should we do next?¡± Phoebe focused her beautiful eyes on Han Shuo¡¯s body as she asked softly.

    ¡°Being in charge of the Boozt Merchant Guild, I don¡¯t think you can keep staying in the valley either. Why don¡¯t you go do your own thing? I¡¯ll take care of a few matters and then go find you in the capital. Trunks has enough gold for now. I think with his abilities and connections, he¡¯ll be able to build up his strength better staying in the outskirts of the Valley of Sunshine.¡±

    ¡°Alright. It looks like we¡¯ll need to temporarily separate for now. Here, these are the items you needed. The Valley of Sunshine is a remarkable ce. It looks like you can find whatever you want as long as you¡¯re patient!¡± Phoebe took out a pile of exotic ores and some rare metals from her space ring and ced them in the center of the yard, smiling at Han Shuo.

    These were the items that Han Shuo wanted to pass onto the dwarves to forge weapons, and some he wanted to keep for personal use as well. He was nning on refining some small treasures in his spare time. Phoebe had already given him the materials to refine the wood elite and water elite zombie earlier.

    Now that all the materials for the wood elite zombie had been collected, it was a perfect time for Han Shuo to head towards the forest trolls¡¯ sacred ground and start the wood elite zombie in the ce of extreme wood, aiming to form it as soon as possible.

    ¡°Oh right, Trunks. Keep an eye on Odysseus and the others. I don¡¯t know how long they¡¯ll need to consider. I think with your familiarity of the valley, you¡¯ll be able to contact them at any time. I¡¯ve already exined the situation to them. It¡¯s up to them if they want to join the Soul Destroyers or not.¡± Han Shuo said to Trunks after thinking for a bit.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I know what to do. The Valley of Sunshine and the Dark Forest aren¡¯t too far away. I think it won¡¯t be too difficult for the two of us to remain in touch.¡± Trunks smiled faintly.

    Han Shuo and Trunks had already decided on a point of contact between the two locations on their way back. Han Shuo didn¡¯t tell him about the cemetery of death, but gave him a marker for the waterfall where he often trained.

    The group of five thoroughly discussed the details again. Han Shuo and a few would slip out under the cover of night. Thanks to Gilbert, they wouldn¡¯t need to leave through the entrance and could slip away soundlessly. Only Emily would stay behind for another day as she needed to leave with Cecilia. She could also give Laureton a heads up as well.

    The four immediately split up after leaving the Valley of Sunshine. ording to Han Shuo¡¯s instructions, Gilbert flew Phoebe to the City of Zajoski, helping her use the transportation matrix there to safely return to the Empire¡¯s capital and then reconvene with Han Shuo at the cemetery of death.

    Trunks bid farewell to Han Shuo and moved into the depths of the forest, vanishing without a trace in the blink of an eye.

    Han Shuo strolled leisurely in the direction of the Dark Forest after parting ways with his group, not even employing the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heaven.

    He was nning on purposefully revealing his movement this time so he could attract Ferguson¡¯s attention, so that thetter wouldn¡¯t keep pursuing Trunks because he didn¡¯t know that Han Shuo had left.

    His expression was easy and carefree on the path out of the Valley of Sunshine. He traveled on foot, without any steeds, and seemed wholly unaware that he¡¯d be a target beneath the pure moonlight gently falling from the night sky.

    The four great powers in the Valley of Sunshine patrol everywhere at critical moments to prevent any idents from happening. When Han Shuo took the initiative in exposing himself, everything seemed to fall into ce. By using the three yin demons¡¯ surveince, he easily found several groups of people trailing him.

    When one of the pursuers seemed anxious and left swiftly with hispanions, running towards the location of the Rainbow Sickles, Han Shuo understood that the Rainbow Sickles would arrive very quickly. Furthermore, Ferguson from the Church of Light was also guaranteed to drop everything on hand to deal with Han Shuo. He was the most dangerous tent threat¡± after all. With the three yin demons at his side for surveince, the little skeleton and earth elite zombie as backup, and being at the bloodlust realm, Han Shuo was confident that he could leisurely escape any encirclement with the extremely fast Art of the Demonic Ninth Heaven.

    Therefore, Han Shuo acted very casually the entire time. He walked serenely towards the direction of the Dark Forest, waiting for Ferguson¡¯s group to hurry over. He would then move away from the Valley of Sunshine during their pursuit so that they would understand he was leaving the valley.

    In the depths of icy winter, the umted snow on top of the mountains revealed a freezing world, wrapped in silver beneath the bright moonlight. It didn¡¯t seem overly dark even at night, as the reflection of the moon and snow caused the silvery white world to appear so silent and beautiful.

    Under the moonlight, Han Shuo¡¯s lone figure cast a long shadow on the ground covered in the silvery white snow. Even some of greediest of merchants weren¡¯t willing to go out on such a cold night. Thus, even on the busiest roads, he didn¡¯t meet a single merchant caravan.

    After leaving the main path, Han Shuo continued into the vast Ken Mountains. After he had walked for more than an hour and had arrived at a rather dense forest that was even more remote, Han Shuo discovered, through a yin demon, a small merchant caravan that was being furiously destroyed by cruel bandits. There weren¡¯t that many bandits, just a dozen or so, but each one of them was beyond vicious. They were shouting savagely,pletely ignoring the merchants¡¯ pleading and ughtering the men with sneers while they robbed the carriages. Several young women were strippedpletely naked, and helpless screams wailed out as they were all forcefully pressed onto the trees beside the carriages as they were raped. To hear their cries was to feel one¡¯s heart bleed.

    There were several muscr men that looked like mercenaries on the ground around the merchant group¡¯s carriages. They¡¯d been decapitated and their blood had already dried, dying the ground in a dark red color. It looked like they were the guards killed in the first wave.

    It was clear that the small merchant group had taken the risk to travel through the night, thinking they wouldn¡¯t be noticed by bandits in the dead of winter¡¯s night whilst taking such a silent and small path. Who were they to know that they¡¯d made a mistake, and met with a small group of bandits. This was why such a cruel situation had arisen.

    Han Shuo was not a very kind person. He had watched calmly as he once directed forest trolls to pige ces, but he¡¯d never killed the innocent, and would never do anything atrocious like raping women. They say that bandits have their own morals, and Han Shuo did feel like he did as well.

    However, the merchants had already given up all their merchandise, and were kneeling on the ground, begging while continuously kowtowing. Despite that, they were still decapitated by theughing, sneering bandits. Han Shuo could not hold himself back after seeing this sort of situation, these wretched actions by the bandits that disregarded rules. Thispletely infuriated him.

    Without any greeting or bullshit, Han Shuo, who had seen all the atrocious deeds through the yin demons, burst onto the scene. Due to his anger and intent to kill, a thick, demonic aura smashed onto the scene in a dominating manner alongside Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo had a hideous expression on his face, his eyes crimson. His cold and ferocious expression was extremely terrifying, as his aura couldn¡¯t help but surge outwards. He used his hand to slice towards the neck of one of the bandits who was raping a woman.

    The left hand that he¡¯d chopped out with shone like dark jade, a shining sharp knife. With a ¡°pfft¡± sound, the bandit¡¯s head flew upwards as his neck spurted blood everywhere.

    ¡°Ahhh...¡± A terrified scream rang out from the mouth of the woman underneath the bandit. The woman who¡¯d been suffering through all this suddenly saw the person on her body lose his head, as blood sshed all over her. She couldn¡¯t help but scream in abject horror.

    ¡°Who is it that dares poke their nose into our business?! Don¡¯t you know that our boss is the Butcher?¡± A bandit with a mustache, that was just about to kill a merchant, suddenly turned his head back and roared.

    As expected, it was Gustav the Butcher¡¯s people. Of all the bandit powers around the Valley of Sunlight, only Gustav the Butcher¡¯s bandits would be so savage and ignore the rules!

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t wasting time thering, letting his actions speak for themselves. His darkened face and flood of killing intent was frightening as he revealed the ruthless side of a demonic cultivator in front of these brutal robbers.

    He charged the man and sent a fierce punch crashing down on him before he could reacted. The punch closed in like a sharp mallet, punching a hole through the mustached robber. When Han Shuo pulled out a fist dripping with blood, even the robber¡¯s crushed organs could be seen through the enormous hole.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was filled with fury as he panted heavily, like a demon king who only had ughter in his eyes. He used a violent, perverse ruthlessness to rip the robbers to shreds. He tore one robber apart with his bare hands, and crushed another¡¯s bones with one blow from his fists, hot blood spraying all over him.

    A bloody whirlwind blew as the dozen or so robbers were turned into stray pieces of flesh. Compared to the innocents they¡¯d killed, their downfall was so much more frightening. Not a single corpse remained whole.

    Han Shuo made use of the yin demons to discover where Ferguson and Maxine had gone. He suppressed the bloodlust in his heart and walked heavily towards the Dark Forest, not spending another second in the carnage strewn scene.

 Chapter 227: Leaving with ease

    Chapter 227: Leaving with ease

    A broad river blocked the way to the front. The river¡¯s waters surged and frothed, rushing to a ne of lower elevation.

    Han Shuo stood in front of a towering tree, panting heavily, barely managing to suppress the wild craziness in his heart. His eyes were blood red as he looked back at the two slowly approaching him.

    Their figures gradually became clearer beneath the bright night sky. Ferguson was using magic to bring Maxine along with him. They appeared in Han Shuo¡¯s vision like two floating clouds.

    ¡°You¡¯re finally here, I¡¯ve waited a very long time!¡± Killing intent billowed and weaved around him as a blood red light encircled Han Shuo¡¯s body. This crimson light was the strange energy of fear and resentment that had been naturally absorbed by his body when he killed the robbers just now.

    ¡°Although your methods are cruel, you did save those people just now, meaning you¡¯re not an immoral person. I¡¯ve already investigated you and know you¡¯re not from the Cmity Church. But the matters that you hold in your hands are too dangerous for this world, so I must capture you and imprison you forever in the Church of Light. Rest assured, I won¡¯t take your life!¡± Ferguson¡¯s body flew to a nearby branch as he looked calmly at Han Shuo.

    The female elven archer Maxine¡¯s charming body alighted gracefully, notching an arrow as she did so. As she took aim at Han Shuo, a feeling of danger suddenly surged in his heart and he couldn¡¯t help but cast a few more nces at Maxine.

    ¡°The Cmity Church has nothing to do with me, and I have no way of using my knowledge to reformrge amounts of dark creatures. I can tell you clearly that I won¡¯t be joining the Cmity Church. In fact, we¡¯re actually enemies. However, if you keep pursuing me, I won¡¯t care if your reputation is good or bad, I¡¯ll kill whoever threatens me without a moment¡¯s hesitation.¡± Han Shuo repressed the mad thoughts in his heart as he spoke viciously with a scowl.

    ¡°Sorry, not killing you is already my biggest concession. I can¡¯t allow you to leave, because what you hold is too dangerous for us.¡± Ferguson shook his head and responded resolutely. It looked like there was no room for negotiation.

    Laughing wildly, Han Shuo nodded. ¡°Since this is the case, there¡¯s nothing for us to talk about then. I won¡¯t go easy on you if you dare make a move!¡±

    Han Shuo rose into the air before he lost his reason and transformed into a beam of red light, flying towards the Dark Forest.

    Whoosh!

    Maxine shot out the arrow that she¡¯d long since notched, and it fractured the air like a bolt of lightning. An ear piercing howl followed it as it closed in on Han Shuo like a shadow. It didn¡¯t seem like it would stop until it tasted blood.

    Grand magus Ferguson also didn¡¯t remain idle. As Han Shuo¡¯s body catapulted itself through the air, Ferguson waved his staff, sending a blinding light shooting towards Han Shuo. The current of energy gave Han Shuo a dangerous feeling.

    He¡¯d been shooting through the air when he felt the attack near. His charging body suddenly screeched to a halt as he activated the Demonyer Edge with a thought, sending it careening out of his sleeve to intercept Maxine¡¯s arrow. Han Shuo circted his magical yuan and focused the violent aura around him onto his right arm.

    A bloody glow radiated from his right arm as that enormous strength hurtled towards the beam of bright light with a force akin to the raging river beneath him.

    A resounding explosion apanied the resplendent sh of white and blood red light, blooming in the air like a wondrous firework. There was a strange and fey beauty to it.

    Han Shuo¡¯s body tumbled from the sky like a rock in the aftermath of this magnificent sight. He fell audibly into the river and was instantly swallowed by the raging waters.

    Ferguson and Maxine hovered above the spot Han Shuo had impacted the water, waiting. They looked at the water, not quite sure what to do.

    They waited for quite a while as the river churned and frothed. Han Shuo had seemingly vanished without a trace, with nary a hint of surfacing from the river waters. Ferguson and Maxine were both incredibly astonished.

    ¡°With the strength that he disyed, he can¡¯t possibly have died that easily. Why hasn¡¯t he floated up onto the river¡¯s surface? There¡¯s no way he can go so long without breathing!¡± Ferguson looked around his surroundings with astonishment as he faltered, uncertain.

    ¡°Perhaps he¡¯s already dead. He would¡¯ve surfaced a long time ago otherwise. No one can go that long without breathing!¡± Maxine was also greatly confused as she guessed hesitantly.

    ¡°He must¡¯ve been swept downstream if he hadn¡¯t died. Come, let¡¯s go downstream!¡± Ferguson was certain that Han Shuo was no longer there after a while and flew in the direction of the river¡¯s flow with Maxine.

    After the two had vanished, dark grand magus Edwin and the female alchemist Belinda walked out of the shadows of a towering tree.

    ¡°It was a good thing that we were a ways away. Otherwise, we would¡¯ve been discovered by that old fox Ferguson. It looks like Bryan¡¯s met with a lot of trouble!¡± Edwin¡¯s heart was still pounding.

    ¡°With Ferguson and Maxine both attacking him, he must¡¯ve been knocked into the river. He hasn¡¯t emerged for such a long time, perhaps he¡¯s already dead!¡± Belinda guessed the same as Maxine as she looked down at the frothing waters.

    Shaking his head with a smile, Edwin said resolutely, ¡°No, he¡¯s definitely not dead! Bystanders have the clearest sight, and I noticed a couple of details that were off while they fought. Although Bryan¡¯s weapon also fell towards the river along with Maxine¡¯s arrow after they shed together, its path was steady. ording to what you saw before, his weapon must still be within his grasp. This means Bryan hadn¡¯t fallen into the river unconscious, nor is he dead, otherwise he wouldn¡¯t have been able to control his weapon!¡±

    Belinda thought back with surprise after hearing Edwin¡¯s words, and agreed, ¡°That¡¯s right, he must still be alive!¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, the stronger he is and the more he can protect himself, the more advantageous it is for us. We¡¯ll have the chance to grab him as long as he¡¯s not dead. He¡¯s certain to appear again. Before that, we¡¯ll need to understand all that we can about him. We must have him!¡± Edwin left with Belinda after a low cackle.

    In a ce far away from the spot where Han Shuo had fallen into the broad, surging river, a figure shot into the air like a sharp arrow, decorating the air with a spray of water. After getting its bearings, it shot towards the Dark Forest.

    Edwin¡¯s judgement had been entirely correct. Han Shuo¡¯s concentrated aura on his right hand hadpletely defended against Edwin¡¯s strong light attack. He hadn¡¯t been injured at all. He¡¯d recalled the Demonyer Edge into his hand before he¡¯d fallen into the river and flown along the depths of the river, avoiding Ferguson and taking to the sky again after.

    Han Shuo had been nning on fighting Ferguson, but thanks to Edwin¡¯s haste and desire to see everything, he¡¯d revealed himself to one of the three yin demons. This changed Han Shuo¡¯s mind as he then decided to hide in the river and hasten away from that ce of trouble.

    With Han Shuo¡¯s strength, as well as the little skeleton and earth elite zombie, plus his magical cultivation and necromancy magic, even though he might not have been able to triumph over Ferguson and Maxine, he was confident that he¡¯d be able to leave at will. The two of them would never be able to stop him.

    However, Edwin and Belinda¡¯s appearance made Han Shuo have to give up the idea of a pitched battle. To Han Shuo, those two from the Cmity Church were just as irritating. If they ambushed him while he was fighting Ferguson and Maxine, he¡¯d be in a world of trouble.

    Therefore, after weighing the gains and losses, Han Shuo felt that there was nothing to be gained in staying. So he decided to avoid them and use magical cultivation to make his escape using the bottom of the river.

    Thest time Fanny and the others had gone to the cemetery of death, they¡¯d spent about ten days to reach the ce. Thanks to the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heaven, Han Shuo saved a lot of time and only took a day and a night to fly there. He arrived in the cemetery of death on the evening of the second day.

    Although he¡¯d rested three times along the way, Han Shuo had still exhausted quite a bit of magical yuan reaching the cemetery of death. He was forced to rest and recover again.

    He ced the three yin demons outside the cemetery of death to wait for Gilbert¡¯s arrival, meditating for the night. By the next day, he waspletely recovered.

    The cemetery of death was enshrouded by a powerful boundary, and those within never felt the rays of moonlight. It was enclosed within a dark and sinister atmosphere all year long, and stark white bones were piled all over the ground, making this a sacred ground for death.

    When he saw that Gilbert had yet to return, Han Shuo had no choice but to take out the materials that Phoebe had given him and look over them one by one.

    Han Shuo had asked her to collect materials that would be used in the dwarves¡¯ forging, but also items that he¡¯d be able to use in refining some magical treasures of his own.

    The demon infant had fully taken shape and he was now in the bloodlust realm. He could absolutely refine some treasures now. Not only did he want to temper the Demonyer Edge all over again, he also wanted to craft some useful little baubles for himself.

 Chapter 228: Murder weapon

    Chapter 228: Murder weapon

    Han Shuo stayed in the cemetery of death for two days in a row. He sat cross legged among the stark white bones. The Demonyer Edge floated in front of his chest while bolts of zing lightning surrounded it.

    Han Shuo held his breath as he gazed calmly at the Demonyer Edge, asionally using his hands to release beams of the spellfire, or biting his finger to drip out a few droplets of blood essence. He slowly used the demon infant in his abdomen to wash the Demonyer Eye over and over again with his magical yuan.

    Han Shuo held some ores of rare metals in his hands as two balls of red, zing mes slowly covered his palms. The scorching magical fire had a terrifyingly high temperature that slowly melted the durable metal ores, causing them to turn into colorful liquids that fell onto the hovering Demonyer Edge.

    Before Han Shuo had formed the demon infant, he didn¡¯t have the ability to refine magical treasures, that was why the basic shape of the Demonyer Edge had been crafted by the famous dwarven smiths. After the dwarves had understood Han Shuo¡¯s intention, they¡¯d worked on it for several days and nights as they mixed the sharpest metals into the Demonyer Edge.

    Experiences afterwards had shown that the Demonyer Edge was beyond sharp. After all, Han Shuo had spent a huge amount of money for it and it¡¯d been lovingly crafted by the dwarves. Normal metal weapons were always sliced in half without a doubt by the Demonyer Edge.

    However, it wasn¡¯t enough for a true magical treasure to merely be sharp. It would only count as a type of magical treasure if it had some special effects.

    As a powerful weapon in Chu Cann¡¯s memories, the Demonyer Edge would only be able to disy spectacr effects when used by a demonic cultivator of the bloodlust realm after it is sessfully refined. The ¡°y¡± in Demonyer Edge clearly described its effects, it was inseparable from massacre.

    The truth was such as well. When the Demonyer Edge was sessfully refined, a demonic cultivator who¡¯s reached the bloodlust realm could absorb the terror and hatred of his victims when using the Demonyer Edge to kill, forming a natural, demonic aura around him. If the Demonyer Edge was deployed to its truest abilities, then the weapon absorb the terror and hatred of the deceased into the hilt of the de.

    When the Demonyer Edge had absorbed enough of this strange power, the terror and hatred can naturally form a Demonic Soul within the Demonyer Edge. This would cause the Demonyer Edge to be a peerless, sentient weapon.

    As the bearer kills more and more, the Demonyer Edge would more absorb increasing amounts of negative energy. When the Demonic Soul finally forms, just as the enormous amount of terror and hatred stored within the Demonyer Edge could cause opponents to lose their minds, so could the Demonic Soul within the de could shatter all confidence.

    Apart from this, when the Demonyer Edge bes a powerful weapon and has its own consciousness, it will also have other unbelievable effects. Han Shuo could even turn the Demonyer Edge to turn into another double for him, one that possessed the ability to continuously evolve and gain more frightening energy just like the main body.

    However, quite a few exotic materials were needed in order to form such a powerful weapon. The amount of these materials were outside of Han Shuo¡¯s expectations. Aside from the rare metals mixed in when the dwarves were crafting it, Han Shuo now needed to continuously fuse even more rare materials into it. He had to ensure its formation by adding in magical yuan, blood essence, and using the demon infant to refine it bit by bit.

    The process of refining the Demonyer Edge was not fast. It was a slow one that slowly fused the materials into the Demonyer Edge, a gradual process that required magical yuan, the demon infant, and blood essence. It would not be aplished within a day.

    During these two days, Han Shuo merely slowly absorbed the materials that the Demonyer Edge required into himself, and used the magical yuan, demon infant, and blood essence to build a closer link with the Demonyer Edge in order to construct a good foundation for it.

    In this way, when the Demonyer Edge was not used, it could turn into a small ball the size of a grain of rice, and hide in the blood essence that Han Shuo used to nourish the demon infant, continuously providing the de the energy it needed to be refined. When Han Shuo attacked and ughtered others, the Demonyer Edge coulde out instantly and absorb the energy of the deceased from Han Shuo¡¯s victims.

    Only when the Demonyer Edge absorbed enough energy of the deceased and formed the Demonic Soul within its hilt, was it truly formed and a peerless weapon, a terrifying magical treasure.

    Two days passed swiftly. On this day, Han Shuo was nurturing the Demonyer Edge within himself and slowly recovering through meditation. He noticed through the yin demons that Gilbert was returning.

    He came back to himself and stood up, taking out the ¡°Eye of Darkness¡± and letting Gilbert in through the boundary. When he entered, Han Shuo discovered that Gilbert¡¯s eyes were darting too and fro, an exceedinglyscivious smile on his face.

    ¡°What happened? Look at the way you¡¯re smiling. With your speed, two nights and a day would¡¯ve been enough for you to return to the cemetery of death. What too you so long?¡± Han Shuo looked askance at Gilbert and interrogated the other.

    ¡°Heh heh, I¡¯m just a bitte, aren¡¯t I? What¡¯s the harm? I¡¯ve already dropped off Miss Phoebe safely at Zajoksi City, don¡¯t worry!¡± There was an unexinable element of lewdness to Gilbert¡¯s smile, making Han Shuo feel quite out of sorts.

    Looking at the dark dragon suspiciously, a thought formed in Han Shuo¡¯s head when he saw that the dark dragon had a trace of weariness on his lewdly smiling face. He couldn¡¯t help but cry out, ¡°Did you take advantage of this time to go whoring in Zajoski City?¡±

    Gilbert didn¡¯t feel awkward when this question was asked as he nodded with a lusty chuckle. ¡°Honored master, you¡¯re very smart. My grandfather was right. The taste of women is so marvelous! The two wenches were so thirsty, we rolled in the sheets all night long! That¡¯s why I waste.¡±

    Indeed, the dark dragon race was known for their depravity. Just like looting and stealing were in the forest trolls¡¯s innate nature, so was lewdness in the dark dragons¡¯. This was a characteristic specific down to their core that no one was able to change. Han Shuo understood Gilbert¡¯s actions, but was surprised to see his weariness. ¡°It¡¯s rumored that you dark dragons are renowned for your dominating prowess in this area. Can it be that two women in one night was enough to tire you out so fully?¡±

    ¡°Honored master, this was my first time. I had a long time with both of them and then flew back. Is this kind of aplishment not enough? I¡¯ve heard that human males are really weak in this area, there¡¯s no one they could¡¯ve been as amazing as me.¡± Gilbert puffed out his chest and said with great pride.

    Shaking his head disdainfully, Han Shuo said, ¡°If it was me, I could spend as long as I wanted with them and not only would I not be tired, I would be even stronger!¡±

    ¡°Psht! Keep boasting! Although you¡¯re very strong master, you¡¯re still a human. Human abilities in this area isn¡¯t as strong as us dark dragons!¡± Gilbert said scoffed dismissively and then proudly reaffirmed himself. It looked like this mindset was deep rooted in his brain, and wouldn¡¯t be something easily changed.

    There was truth in Han Shuo¡¯s words. With his abilities in the bloodlust realm and some evil magic arts, he could make it so that he never gged, and could even use evil ways to harvest yin to replenish yang and recover his energy. Not only would this not harm himself, but the act of intercourse would increase his strength. It was magical.

    Some magical arts either harvested yin to replenish yang or vice versa. The ¡°Chant of Thrills¡± was a happy way of dual cultivation that brought gains to both sides.

    Han Shuo only understood these secret arts after he¡¯d fully gained Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories. He hadn¡¯t paid much attention to it, but suddenly thought that perhaps he could use the ¡°Chant of Thrills¡± to bring gains for both him and Emily when they spent time together.

    Therefore, when he thought about the secret arts, Han Shuo sank into temporary quietness. He thought back to those secret arts and slowly contemted their possibilities. There were some that didn¡¯t require the internal essence or magical yuan from either party, and only made use of certain techniques to refine one¡¯s body.

    There were also a few strong methods that needed a cooperation between internal essence and magical yuan. But only a little bit of each was needed. If they were deployed sessfully, the the results of that time¡¯s lovemaking would be incredible.

    ¡°Lewd dragon, tell me honestly, if your tribe conducts these acts repeatedly, will your dark dragon bodies suffer harm in anyway?¡± Han SHuo thought for a moment and suddenly asked Gilbert.

    ¡°Of course, regardless of tribe, the body will be injured if too much of this is done. Us dark dragons are no exception. We particrly need to abstain from this when we need to evolve, or the damage to our bodies will be even greater. However, this is our innate nature to us, and there are many dark dragons who can¡¯t control themselves, still giving free reign to their desires when evolving. Not only do they not evolve, but their rank is decreased as well. This is nothing out of the ordinary.¡± Gilbert answered truthfully when faced with Han Shuo¡¯s questions.

    Dragons were the strongest, super rank magical creatures. However, there were also divisions amongst the super rank. There were five levels overall, with their rankingpletely opposite of other magical beasts. The strongest was level five, and the newly born were level one.

    For one such as Gilbert, having evolved not even once, he was a level one creature. The lowest amongst the super rank, he only had a few of the characteristics of the dragons and heightened attack power.

    ¡°Heh heh, little lewd dragon, you¡¯ve followed me for so long and I haven¡¯t given you anything at all. This time, master will make it up to you in one go. I¡¯ll teach you a wondrous technique that lets you not exhaust yourself when you go whoring. It¡¯ll make you stronger instead, and you can still do it when you¡¯re evolving!¡± Han Shuo looked at Gilbert and cackled oddly.

    ¡°I don¡¯t believe you, how could such wondrous techniques exist in this world? This isn¡¯t true! Don¡¯t lie to me!¡± Gilbert obviously didn¡¯t believe Han Shuo and shook his head uncaringly.

    ¡°You¡¯ll believe me alright!¡± Han Shuo walked towards Gilbert and ced a hand on his shoulder. A bit of magical yuan flowed into his body and slowly traveled to his abdomen.

    ¡°What, what is that!¡± Gilbert was shocked and cried out in surprise, ¡°Why does it feel like a small snake has climbed into my body!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t move! This is master investigating the makeup of your body!¡± Han Shuo shouted softly and prevented Gilbert from moving.

    The magical yuan traveled in Gilbert¡¯s body in a circle ording to Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts. He discovered that Gilbert¡¯s anatomy was indeed a bit different from his. Han Shuo thought for a moment, and moved his magical yuan in Gilbert¡¯s body ording to a specific method.

    Half an hour passed like this. Han Shuo flipped up Gilbert¡¯s clothes and dripped a drop of blood essence onto his belly button. After which, Han Shuo said lowly, ¡°Follow the trace of the snake¡¯s movement, and try to control it. Slowly direct it into your belly button. If you can do this, you will be able to possess this sort of miraculous martial technique in the future.¡±

    Han Shuo released the hand that he¡¯d rested on Gilbert¡¯s shoulders after saying this and looked at the dark dragon. Gilbert¡¯s head was covered in sweat as he followed Han Shuo¡¯s instructions with a face full of terror and nervousness. However, he was still unable to find the proper way.

    Han Shuo could not guide him in this critical moment. Gilbert had to learn the trick of this himself in order to use it with familiarity. The drop of blood essence thatnded on his belly button was like a seed that could use to turn the tides, it can provide a hiding ce for the magical yuan that Han Shuo injected into him, allowing him to sessfully use the secret arts of harvesting yin to replenish yang.

    Han Shuo had done all he could, since Gilbert¡¯s body structure was different from a human¡¯s, his sess was up to himself. Although it would theoretically work, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t sure, and so he measured up Gilbert in a perturbed manner.

    Gilbert hurriedly gazed towards Han Shuo after a moment and shouted anxiously, ¡°Alright, it¡¯s in, I did it! The little snake returned to my belly button.¡± Han Shuo was quite d to hear this, and asked quickly, ¡°Then how do you feel?¡±

    ¡°Hard. I¡¯m hard, very very hard!¡± There was a small tent on the lower part of the ck Dragon Gilbert¡¯s body as he responded frantically while looking at it, unsure of what to do.

    ¡°Hard is good, hard is good. Haha!¡± Han Shuoughed, then said proudly. ¡°Very good, lewd dragon, you did it!¡±

 Chapter 229: Favored son of earth

    Chapter 229: Favored son of earth

    With Han Shuo¡¯s tutge, Gilbert had finally grasped the evil method of harvesting yin to replenish his yang after half a day.

    Gilbert had been highly skeptical at first, but slowly started believing it was true when his body began to change. He still wasn¡¯t fully convinced of the magical effects until he really confirmed some things though.

    ¡°Remember, you can only steal a little bit of yin energy each time. You¡¯ll kill someone if you take too much though.¡± Han Shuo reminded him gravely after Gilbert had fully grasped this new technique.

    If the sinister methods of harvesting yin to replenish yang was used adequately and only on one woman at once, not much harm woulde to the woman, but if this technique was used too often or an excess of yin energy was absorbed, it would harm the woman. In severe cases, her life might even be lost.

    Gilbert seemed to understand after Han Shuo¡¯s repeated reminders, murmuring, ¡°I know. Who knows if this is even useful? I¡¯ll let you know after I¡¯ve tried it!¡±

    Han Shuo and Gilbert then traveled together to the dwarves¡¯ valley. Gilbert stayed outside as Han Shuo entered by himself to chat with Calvin. He handed the list of weapons and all the materials needed to Calvin, and left the valley after concluding their discussions.

    With Gilbert present, Han Shuo saved a lot of spare effort and rode on Gilbert¡¯s back. The two of them flew towards the forest trolls¡¯ sacred ground in the depths of the Dark Forest.

    After flying for half a day, Han Shuo and Gilbert arrived at the ce where they worshipped Datara.

    The forest trolls guarding the ce recognized Han Shuo and didn¡¯t stop him, letting him enter freely and took up the duty of protecting him.

    Even though it was the dead of winter, the ce of extreme wood generated the thriving air of spring in the forest trolls¡¯ sacred ground. Lush undergrowth, towering trees, and high shrubs all grew exceptionally well. Flowers bloomed in charming shades of red and purple, filling the air of the valley with a fresh fragrance of greenery.

    Only a vibrant green color, as far as one could see, met the eye. All the nts were growing so perfectly and incredibly strong. A thick earth qi suffused the surroundings. The towering trees covered the skies and the old roots of the tree tangled together with utmost force. This was why the forest trolls had built their sacred ground atop these trees.

    When he arrived, Han Shuo told all the forest trolls to clear out of this area. He then took to the skies and observed theyout of thend and elements. He identified some crucialndmarks ording to Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories beforending on the roots of an ancient tree.

    This tree was the most ancient andrgest of all the trees in this ce of extreme wood. It was several dozen meters tall. Its richly interlocking branches were filled with light green, life blossoming in abundance from its twigs. It looked quite old.

    Han Shuo stared at this tree for a long and finally said apologetically, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, you¡¯ve upied the best spot. You must hand over the earth qi that you¡¯ve been absorbing. I can only sacrifice you!¡±

    He sent out a beam of light from his body, concentrating it in his hand and acted without hesitation, starting to dig at the roots of the ancient tree.

    ¡°Honored master, do you need my help? Gilbert asked enthusiastically as he saw Han Shuo start to dig at the roots of the old trees.

    Han Shuo thought for a moment and nodded, halting the movements of his hands. ¡°No need, but thanks for reminding me. With the earth elite zombie, I don¡¯t need to do any of this myself at all!¡±

    He sang out an incantation as soon as he¡¯d finished speaking, summoning the little skeleton and two other dark creatures.

    The little skeleton¡¯s bones were translucent, as if they were made of jade. A faint light of the soul circted through his purple eye. As he stood there with his bone dagger in hand, a natural sense of danger emanated from him. The seven bone spurs on his back gave others an exceedingly evil feeling, like they were seven weapons waiting to reap their lives.

    The earth elite zombie¡¯s eyes were sparkling with the same yellow-brown light that emitted from its body. The light covered the armor of his body like a thickyer of dirt. It was blinking its eyes right now and seemed to be looking at Han Shuo with confusion. It seemed to be saying, ¡°Why did you summon me?¡±

    From the appearance of the little skeleton and earth elite zombie, Han Shuo discovered that the two seemed to be continuously evolving¡ªparticrly the little skeleton. He gave Han Shuo an odd feeling. Ever since the little skeleton had gained his own sentience, he had started acting with more and more purpose, forming an odd sort of demeanor with his bearing.

    ¡°I¡¯ve a mission for you. Create 49 holes of the same size in the area and then connect them with moats!¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment and then spoke at the blinking earth elite zombie.

    The honest zombie nodded shyly and before continuing to blink at Han Shuo, not making a move. He seemed to be waiting for further instruction.

    Pausing, Han Shuo immediately reacted. He sat down cross legged and began rifling through his memories. His brain seemed to be a marvelous machine as theyout of the entire ce of extreme wood immediately appeared in his mind, pointed out the location of all 49 holes ording to Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories, and ovey them onto the scene in front of him.

    When Han Shuo hadpleted this process, there was aplete schematic in his mind. The earth elite zombie dived into the ground upon receiving Han Shuo¡¯s next order.

    The entire ce of extreme wood suddenly started churning violently, like a sinuous earth dragon was traveling underground. Earth shook and mountains trembled as hills were formed. The earth elite zombie was like a small dragon ying leisurely amongst the rippling waves of the enormous sea. Arge or small hole would appear whenever he revealed himself from the ground.

    The earth elite zombie was the most efficient and wondrous construction worker as he worked, apanied by rumbling sounds. It perfectly recreated the scene in Han Shuo¡¯s mind using its own strength and its naturalmand over the earth.

    Enormous changes had urred in the entire ce of extreme wood in a very short amount of time. 49 holes had appeared, and hundreds, thousand of ravines connected thework of holes.

    It was an exact replica of the scene in Han Shuo¡¯s mind! To have done it so this perfectly in such a short amount of time, and with the power of one alone, the earth elite zombie was likely the only character to be able to do so.

    ¡°Amazing, too amazing. This fellow is too wonderful!¡± Gilbert looked at the earth elite zombie inplete shock. This fellow had caused such a thorough change in such a short amount of time!

    ¡°Now you know his strength, hmm? The earth elite zombie is the favored son of heaven. He can hide under the earth as an assassin, and can leave immediately through the ground if his attack fails. Even if someone evades his attacks, they¡¯ll be unable to capture him.¡± Han Shuoughed heartily with pride and nced sideways at Gilbert.

    Having done all this, the earth elite zombie surfaced from thergest hole. The thick clods of earth were as if pure air to him, unable to form the slightest obstruction to him. He seemed to be emerging from water, giving others an extreme visual impact.

    He took out arge amount of material from his space ring and filled the empty ground in front of him. They were so many items that they eventually formed a small mountain. He then used his mental connections with the little skeleton and the earth elite zombie to ce the numerous material into the holes, following a particr order.

    After doing everything, Han Shuo sighedfortably, ¡°All of the ingredients have been ced inside, there¡¯s just one thing missing now.¡±

    ¡°Why is that hole empty and nothing¡¯s been ced in it?¡± Gilbert looked at everything happening around him with interest. He took a look around after Han Shuo had finished speaking and noticed that there was a hole, the size of a human, right next to Han Shuo. It happened to be next to the oldest andrgest tree root.

    ¡°Duh, that hole is the center of the formation and only the master can enter it!¡± Han Shuo rolled his eyes at Gilbert and exined haphazardly.

    He started chanting as soon as he¡¯d spoken, summoning a few zombies and decided to use the same method of having them fight each other to select a suitable candidate.

    Just when Han Shuo was about to do so however, the earth elite zombie hastily shook his hand and walked in front of Han Shuo, blinking frantically as he tried to convey something to Han Shuo.

    He also waved at the little zombie as he did so, miming and gesturing as he conversed with the little skeleton, seemingly wanting the little skeleton to persuade Han Shuo as well.

    Han Shuo was surprised and held his breath in concentration, looking carefully at the earth elite zombie and the little skeleton, slowly trying to understand the message that the two were sending over.

    The earth elite zombie seemed to understand what Han Shuo was about to do and kept waving his hands around. Aftermunicating with the little skeleton, the little skeleton also reacted and joined the earth elite zombie in exnation. Short, muddled bursts of messages kept being delivered to Han Shuo¡¯s mind.

    After a while, Han Shuo looked at the two in surprise. ¡°You mean, you guys have a suitable candidate?¡±

    The earth elite zombie and the little skeleton both nodded forcefully upon hearing these words. The little skeleton even walked next to the zombie warriors that Han Shuo had summoned and beat them up a bit, knocking them all into the ground.

    The little skeleton then stood proudly in front of them and gestured nobly with a puffed out chest. He seemed to be saying these fellows are junk. They¡¯re not worthy of receiving such amazing treatment.

    Han Shuo finally understood after watching for a while. He nodded and smiled, ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll send the two of you back and give you some time to catch the zombie warrior of your choice. I¡¯ll try to summon you three together afterwards!¡±

    The little skeleton and earth elite zombie all nodded their heads firmly after Han Shuo had spoken. He could feel the joy and excitement in their hearts.

    Smiling, Han Shuo gave them a few reminders and chanted again, sending the two back to their old homes. His heart was full of surprise. He hadn¡¯t thought that the little skeleton and the earth elite zombie would behave so interestingly.

    ¡°These low level dark creatures have their own intelligence now?¡± Gilbert was mystified as he sighed with astonishment at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Don¡¯t voice those words in front of them, or they will definitely be mad. They might even beat you up. They¡¯re outside the range of dark creatures now. I think even high level dark creatures won¡¯t have the amazing powers that they have!¡± Han Shuo flicked a nce at Gilbert to warn him from voicing foolish words around them.

    Han Shuo felt the little skeleton¡¯s summons from the other ne after a short while, and chanted the incantation again to resummon the two.

    A light shed by as the little skeleton and earth elite zombie carried a thin, frail, yet exceedingly tall zombie in their arms. He was as thin as a bamboo shoot and had a green countenance to his face. There was no light in its pupils. It was obvious that it could only obeymands.

    The little skeleton and the earth elite zombie shouldered the thin zombie warrior over, despite the discrepancies in their heights. One was tall and the other short, they presented aical sight.

    The little skeleton pointed to the new zombie warrior amidst Han Shuo¡¯s surprise and gestured, seeming to say, ¡°He¡¯s one of ours!¡±

 Chapter 230: The little skeletonâ€™s faction!

    Chapter 230: The little skeleton¡¯s faction!

    Taken aback, Han Shuo stared dumbly at the tall, thin zombie warrior. His eyes roved over the little skeleton and earth elite zombie, finally asking with surprise. ¡°One of ours? One of yours?¡±

    Nodding, the little skeleton and the earth elite zombie seemed a bit proud. Their empty hands gestured at Han Shuo as a flood of messages bombarded Han Shuo like electromaic waves.

    After he¡¯d taken a while to sort through the information, his heart was filled with astonishment as he looked incredulously at the two fellows. ¡°You mean, you have your own minions and domain in the other dimension?¡±

    The two of them puffed out their chests at the same time with supremely proud expressions. They looked like they were guffawing withughter as they nodded. Han Shuo had obviously hit the spot.

    On the other side, Gilbert looked at Han Shuomunicating slowly with the dark creatures and also felt it to be incredible when he understood what was going on. He couldn¡¯t help but go ¡°Eh?¡± to express his astonishment.

    After he recovered from his surprise, Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts spun as he couldn¡¯t help butugh heartily, ¡°Not bad, not bad, both of you¡¯ve done well!¡±

    With Han Shuo¡¯s current knowledge of necromancy, he knew that as he continuously improved, he would eventually be able to directly surpass the limits of space one day and descend upon that miraculous dimension alongside the little skeleton and the earth elite zombie. Furthermore, if Han Shuo reached the level of a Magister necromancer, he could even userge-scale teleportation formations to directly connect the two dimensions and teleport personnel. In that case, if the little skeleton and the earth elite zombie developed a powerful faction in the other dimension, they would be able topletely share resources when Han Shuo¡¯s necromancy reached a certain level. The possibilities caused Han Shuo to be very excited.

    The little skeleton and the earth elite zombie were both beyond happy at hearing Han Shuo¡¯s praise. The little skeleton pointed at the zombie warrior that he¡¯d been supporting, and then pointed at the hole beside him, gesticting Han Shuo to use this zombie warrior to refine into a wood elite zombie.

    Han Shuo nodded and gave a faint smile to show that he understood. He waved towards the little skeleton and signaled him to drop the tall and thin zombie warrior into the hole.

    When the little skeleton and the earth elite zombie carried the zombie warrior to the hole, the little skeleton ced it down, then looked up at it. Purple light continuously shone out from the purple eye, as if he was giving some sort of orders to the zombie warrior.

    After a while, the little skeleton went on its tiptoes andically tapped on the zombie warrior¡¯s shoulders, seemingly telling it to ¡°work hard¡±, just like a general encouraging its subordinates. It was as if the tall and thin zombie only had the intelligence to obey. After receiving the orders of the purple eye, the zombie warrior nodded stiffly, understanding the little skeleton¡¯s meaning and jumped down into the hole. Itid down in the hole in a docile manner and looked at Han Shuo, waiting for his next action.

    Seeing that everything was set, Han Shuo took a deep breath, and familiarly dropped two droplets of blood essence onto the zombie warrior, then cast a Dark Seal spell, gaining a deeper connection with the zombie warrior.

    After that, Han Shuo crossed his legs and sat down. He gave an order to the earth elite zombie, then sent out rays of ck light from his hand into the prone zombie warrior.

    After receiving Han Shuo¡¯s orders, the earth elite zombie dove into the soil, disappearing instantly like an eel. With the efficiency and speed of an earth dragon swimming around, it quickly filled in the forty nine holes, returning the area back to its former even ne.

    When Han Shuo¡¯s final sealsnded on the body of that thin and tall zombie warrior, the surrounding soil of the hole quickly flowed over his body, covering it as if guided by some sort of power. Then, the earth elite zombie rose up back up and dusted off its hands with a rxed expression.

    ¡°Spirit power of wood, listen to mymands and immediately take your ce!¡± Han Shuo formed two hand seals as he thundered, sending a cloud of ck light into the tall, thin zombie.

    Suddenly, the forty-nine holes that have been filled and ttened rose up. Natural, green strings gradually linked up together into a dense, as if woven by spiders. The thin and tall zombie warrior¡¯s hiding ce was at the center of this.

    In the blink of an eye, thick earth energy all gathered towards the center, as if linked by the green bonds. From afar, it looked like little streams flowing towards the river in the middle, resulting in a strong visual impact for spectators.

    While this happened, some of the thick weeds further way were gradually wilting. Even thergest of the ancient trees, filled with powerful branches, slowly changed at a rate visible to the human eye due to the loss of earth energy. Everything was being absorbed by the thin and tall zombie warrior at the center. In order to create him, all the vegetation in the surroundings had to wilt.

    ¡°This, this is amazing! Master, how did you do it? Gilbert couldn¡¯t help but exim as he stared at the enormous changes around him.

    ¡°All of the nts around the ce of extreme wood need to spit back out all the wood qi they absorbed over the years. The day that the wood elite zombie forms is the day they fully wilt and die. Survival of the fittest. Only the most superior survive in this kind of environment, that¡¯s their fate!¡± Han Shuo said cruelly.

    Gilbert looked around and then stared at the earth elite zombie and the little skeleton, ¡°What do we do now?¡±

    ¡°Nothing much, we¡¯ll leave and take a walk around the forest trolls¡¯ residence. With the protection of the forest troll warriors, there shouldn¡¯t be anything untoward. The changes in this area will be more obvious with the advent of time. I¡¯ll instruct the forest trolls not to bother about this.¡±

    ¡°When the zombie absorbs all of the wood qi here and transforms into an wood elite zombie, he will naturally contact me and I¡¯lle to wake him!¡± Han Shuo said faintly.

    He left with the little skeleton and Gilbert, heading for the forest trolls¡¯ vige, arriving after half a day¡¯s travel.

    When Han Shuo arrived with the little skeleton, they were greeted by the atmosphere of a holiday. As their protector, the little skeleton was viewed as the materialization of the great god Datara in this world. The sessful raidst time and Han Shuo¡¯srge supply of living necessities had made the forest trolls trust Han Shuo more and more.

    The old forest troll priest presented himself in front of Han Shuo after a short while, kneeling down and kowtowing in front of Han Shuo and the little skeleton.

    ¡°Hello, how have things beentely?¡± Han Shuo asked with a faint smile after telling the priest to rise.

    ¡°Thanks to your noble and wonderful guidance, we have enough rations to weather the winter. No merchants are willing to pass through the Dark Forest in the cold of winter, so we¡¯re all resting in the vige and haven¡¯t gone out to hunt!¡± The old priest responded respectfully and appeared quite at ease.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said warmly, ¡°Good. Train some more warriors and priest for the tribe this winter. Train them well, they¡¯ll be put to good use when springes again!¡±

    ¡°We promise to listen to the liaison¡¯s orders and train the children well! The old priest nodded and promised.

    ¡°Mm, send some more warriors to protect the sacred ground. The great god Datara will be resting within for a while. No one is to enter the sacred ground without my orders. All abnormal urrences within the sacred ground are because of the great Datara. Don¡¯t be surprised.¡±

    Han Shuo knew that the formation of the wood elite zombie would cause the area to change. He notified the forest trolls beforehand just in case, so that they wouldn¡¯t disrupt Han Shuo¡¯s ns.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, we¡¯ll do as the liaison says and guard the area well!¡± The old priest didn¡¯t ask why before promising confidently. He appeared quite at ease when he didn¡¯t have to worry about daily life.

    ¡°Alright, if I have further orders, I maye myself or send this fellow. Heh heh, I think you must know who he is?¡± Han Shuo smiled and pointed to Gilbert behind him.

    ¡°Of course, this is the strong Mister Dark Dragon, the humble servant of the liaison!¡± The old priest had been with Han Shuo on his trip to the underground cavest time, and knew everything about how the dark dragon had formed a contract with Han Shuo. He naturally understood where Gilbert hade from.

    When he¡¯d thoroughly gone over all that was to be done, Han Shuo didn¡¯t tarry and left the forest troll vige. After he sent the little skeleton back to his old home, Han Shuo rode on Gilbert and headed further into the depths of the Dark Forest.

    There was a mysterious tribe in the furthest depths of the Dark Forest, full of very powerful and terrifying existences. Of course, in such a ce, there would naturally be more ferocious magical beasts, mystical nts, as well as some natural treasures that only appeared in legends.

    Han Shuo had wanted to refine some pills, so he wanted to try his luck in the depths of the Dark Forest, in hopes of finding some mystical grass in order to replenish some of his basic materials.

    After flying for a while, Gilbert took the initiative to let Han Shuo down. He actually muttered with a hint of fear, ¡°This Dark Forest really isn¡¯t right, just now, I felt like my back grow cold, as if something treated me as prey. It¡¯s too unbelievable!¡±

    ¡°Your feeling should be right, I too felt a very powerful aura that locked onto the two of us just now. However, I wasn¡¯t able to find out what sort of powerful aura it was, or where it came from. It looks like the Dark Forest is truly beyond mysterious. Let¡¯s not fly in the sky anymore, so that we don¡¯t attract the attention of some powerful beings!¡±

    When Han Shuo felt that powerful aura, he immediately sent out the three yin demons to scout. However, he was unable to determine where the aura came from. After the three yin demons hadpleted one scouting run, they weren¡¯t able to find any irregrities. However, that didn¡¯t leave Han Shuo at ease, but rather made him even more cautious.

    What was surprising was that the depths of the Dark Forest didn¡¯t seem to be affected by the cold winter. The freezing air gradually disappeared as the two of them ventured deeper, while the surrounding temperature gradually rose. Indeed, it bore simrities to the ce of extreme wood. Here, the thick and dense trees reached for the sky. There were springs along the way as they walked in, several of them decorated with white mist rising out of them.

    Thanks to the vision from the yin demons, Han Shuo saw all sorts of fierce, high level creatures along the way. Harpies, deepwater pythons, frost eagles, medusas, manticores... all of these rare creatures continued to appear in the yin demon¡¯s vision. Sometimes, he even spotted more than one together.

    These high level creatures were hard to see on the outskirts of the Dark Forest. There was often only one of these high level creatures in arge area. Most adventurers would evade them if they bumped into them, deathly afraid of being attacked by them.

    However, they¡¯d turned into the mostmon of existences within the depths of the Dark Forest. There were even many exotic nts growing in specific ces, ones that Han Shuo had never heard of or seen. There were enormous flowers growing on these strange fauna.

    Han Shuo saw through the yin demons that a giant flower bend when a windde wolf passed by, ensnaring the wolf with its stamens. The thick stem moved like a neck, as it chewed and swallowed the wolf. The wolf was quickly digested amidst a thick pool of blood, and not even the bones were spat out.

    There were some strange looking nts with leaves like human hands. They also had the same frightening destructive power. As soon as magical creatures approached them, they would be entangled by their thick branches and be strangled to death.

    ¡°Follow me closely. Danger lurks everywhere within the Dark Forest. No wonder Trunks kept reminding me that although the gains were great in the forest, one might lose their life at any time!¡± Han Shuo spoke calmly to Gilbert, and cautiously moved forward.

    However, even though he spoke those warning words, he was actually the one who lost his cool right after, sprinting towards something with a face full of glee.

 Chapter 231: Blood essence grass

    Chapter 231: Blood essence grass

    A nt with a big, fan-like leaf was protruding from fiery red rock crevice. Sparkling red lights flowed through its entire body.

    Drops of bright red liquid dripped down from the hanging leaf of this odd nt. Crystal clear, the liquid drops looked like red diamonds as they fell onto the rock, emitting a sizzling sound as well as a plume of red smoke. The smoke then disappeared near the roots, as if absorbed by thetter.

    Han Shuo¡¯s body moved with a speed much faster than Gilbert anticipated. In just a moment, he was already below the leaf, his mouth wide open to catch the dripping red liquid.

    Drip... drip...

    The blood-like red liquid fell onto the tip of Han Shuo¡¯s tongue with a soft plop. When the red smoke rose up with a sizzle, he took a deep breath and inhaled it all. Under the watchful eyes of Gilbert, Han Shuo¡¯s cheeks gradually glowed red.

    Not knowing what was going on, Gilbert looked at Han Shuo¡¯s weird actions in perplexion, thinking that his master was bing increasingly mysterious.

    The nt had been originally hale and hearty. However, with every drop of crystal red liquid trickling down the leaf, crimson patches appeared on its body, which then slowly became one with the red rock.

    By the time the liquid stopped trickling from the leaf, the strange nt became rock-hard, sticking firmly to the red rock below.

    Han Shuo¡¯s whole body had turned blood red by this point. He immediately sat down on the spot, his whole being seemingly made of blood, a faintly bright, redyer of smoke surrounding his body.

    Han Shuo slowly opened his eyes. He let out a long, low whistle and said with high spirits, ¡°The depths of the Dark Forest are indeed unfathomable. To be able to encounter this Blood Essence Grass that strengthens my blood essence, it appears my luck isn¡¯t bad at all.¡±

    ¡°What is it?¡± Gilbert asked with surprise as he stared at the rock-like nt.

    ¡°The Blood Essence Grass is a vile nt. It continuously absorbs the energy of the surrounding nts after formation. If it¡¯s surrounded by evil nts that feast on the flesh and blood of humans and beasts, then the blood of their victims will also be devoured and refined by the roots of the Blood Essence Grass.¡±

    ¡°The process has to operate for a hundred years before the Blood Essence Grass can produce a fan-sized leaf. Once this leaf forms, it will then proceed to spit out the condensed blood refined during the past hundred years to be reabsorbed into its roots. It can then absorb the surrounding vitality even faster, and the radius it can absorb will also expand.¡±

    ¡°After another hundred years, the Blood Essence Grass will give birth to another leaf after absorbing enough vitality from the surrounding carnivorous nts. This cycle repeats for a total of nine hundred years. If the Blood Essence Grass can sessfully evolve each time, it will eventually be a blood essence that can move freely, possessing sentience just like humans. Every nt within a ten mile radius would be under its control. This is an incredible art!¡± Han Shuo smiled as he exined the origin of the Blood Essence Grass to Gilbert.

    ¡°So amazing. Then, what effect did the blood red liquid have on you? How old is this Blood Essence Grass?¡± Gilbert asked, surprised at Han Shuo¡¯s exnation.

    Han Shuo gave a proudugh and said, ¡°When I absorb and refine the essence of the grass, I can transmute it into my essence blood. In the future, it¡¯ll prevent me from expending too much magical yuan. What a pity this Blood Essence Grass seemed to only be around three hundred years old. If it¡¯d been nine hundred years old, after being transformed by my essence blood, it would possess the miraculous effect of bringing the dead back to life. If I suffer a cut, the healing speed of the wound will be visible to the naked eye!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s that magical? Perhaps there are other Blood Essence Grasses inside the Dark Forest. We can search for them!¡± Gilbert eximed in excitement after being dumbfounded for a while.

    Paying no heed to the excited Gilbert, Han Shuo took out the Demonyer Edge, and carefully dug up the red rock on which the Blood Essence Grass had grown. He shook off the soil around it, and finally ced the clump of red rock into the space ring.

    ¡°What does the stone do?¡± Gilbert curiously asked.

    ¡°This is a Blood Essence stone. This is a valuable material, very useful!¡± Han Shuo knew that Gilbert wouldn¡¯t understand even if he exined everything, so he responded half-heartedly.

    Taking a look around, Han Shuo saw nothing else worthy of attention. Only then did he proceed to the deeper depths with Gilbert, his heart growing increasingly curious about the Dark Forest.

    However, the strong presence appeared again not long after they set off. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but frown, his body halting in ce.

    ¡°Who or what are you ying at? Are you done yet?¡± Han Shuo shouted impolitely after he coldly took a look around.

    Possessing such a strong presence and being able to avoid the three yin demons¡¯ eyes, it would at least possess intelligence, if it wasn¡¯t human. Such a powerful creature lurking around and eyeing him and Gilbert as if they were prey made Han Shuo extremely ufortable, and he couldn¡¯t help butsh out violently.

    His shout echoed through the ancient forest with no response. After listening for a while, there was still no additional sound. Evidently the powerful presence hadn¡¯t responded to Han Shuo¡¯s words.

    ¡°There really is something stalking us!¡± Gilbert could apparently sense the danger with his instincts and couldn¡¯t help but cry out.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said softly, ¡°Indeed, and we have no idea what it is. Even I have no way to trace it. It looks quite powerful too. We¡¯ll have to be careful; don¡¯t give it any advantage!¡±

    No matter what this creature was, if it was confident in dealing with Han Shuo and Gilbert, it wouldn¡¯t be lurking around in the dark and would have gone on the offensive already. Yet, it chose to hide, which meant this creature didn¡¯t have confidence in defeating them both. As such, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t too worried.

    With the three yin demons around, it was impossible for this creature to ambush them. Although Han Shuo was on the alert, he felt no fear at all. On the contrary, he was even curious, and more determined to lure this creature out and take a look at what it really was.

    The clear moonlight shone down in the depths of the night. Under the rays of the moon, the shadows of the towering ancient trees were etched on the ground, looking like the capering limbs of demonic figures.

    Han Shuo and Gilbert were resting in the branches of a ten meter high tree. Gilbert leanedzily on the tree trunk as he napped, deeply asleep.

    Han Shuo¡¯s posture was straight, his breathing even, his heartbeat slow. He sat cross-legged like an erect javelin with his eyes closed, silently refining the essence of the Blood Essence Grass that he¡¯d taken in earlier in the day.

    After who knew how long, Han Shuo¡¯s closed eyes suddenly snapped open from his meditation. His bright eyes shone in the night, pupils sparkling as they swept the area.

    The three yin demons had taken positions around Han Shuo, to his back, left. and right. They were closely examining the surroundings for any anomalies. Suddenly, the yin demon at the back found ripples appearing on the surface of a nearbyke. It was followed by an enormous, transparent shadow that slowly rose from the surface of theke.

    The watery being was colossal, on par with Gilbert in his dragon form. Nine heads on slender necks slowly appeared out of its bulk. After emerging from the pool, the originally transparent watery body gradually turned more and more immaterial, until itpletely disappeared.

    However, a strong presence subtly radiated from that direction, giving off the exact same feeling from the past two days. Han Shuo watched attentively for a while and discovered the wind flowing a bit oddly from that direction, as if encountering an obstacle in the void.

    Tapping the soundly sleeping Gilbert, Han Shuo abruptly woke up the dark dragon. Gilbert turned his head to look around, and asked in a low voice, ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡±

    ¡°The super rank magical creature, the Hydra!¡± Han Shuo responded lightly.

    Hearing his words, Gilbert¡¯s face paled as he said in a stunned voice, ¡°No wonder, my grandfather said that the Hydra has a skill that allows it to use the power of water to conceal its body, falling into a wondrous invisible state. In addition to its powerful presence, its whole body is also venomous. I can¡¯t believe that it¡¯s set its sights on us!¡±

    ¡°This Hydra has likely evolved only once, so no wonder it was following us but didn¡¯t dare to act! Make your preparations, we¡¯ll teach it a lesson!¡± Han Shuo whispered, his whole body remaining unmoving. He continued to sit there, waiting for the Hydra to arrive.

    Gilbert understood and but still pretended to continue sleeping, snoring lightly.

 Chapter 232: Lewd Dragon, Lewd Snake

    Chapter 232 ¨C Lewd Dragon, Lewd Snake

    A terrible stench along with a powerful presence came crashing down even before the hydra arrived.

    Han Shuo was unable to capture the hydra¡¯s figure even through the three yin demons. However, he was still able to specte its approximate location due to the odd changes in the wind.

    As the hydra flew over, the clear ponds in the surrounding area were instantly polluted, turning them into gutters that spat out foul odors. The wet ground also slowly became unusually dry, revealing a dark brown color. It seemed like the surroundings were affected by the hydra¡¯s abilities.

    Han Shuo summoned the Demonyer Edge, and made his preparations with Gilbert as the hydra approached. He nned on unleashing an unforgettable strike the moment the hydra closed in.

    The stench in the air gradually grew worse and worse. Han Shuo had been resting with his eyes closed but became briefly disoriented when he inhaled the revolting aroma. Upon filtering the air with his magical yuan however, his body swiftly returned to normal.

    As a member of the dark dragon tribe, Gilbert¡¯s physical body was powerful, and he was capable of spitting poison. Furthermore, the natural resistance of a dragon¡¯s body was strong enough that the fetid poisonous gas could not affect him.

    Suddenly, the hydra¡¯s moving figure seemed to stop beside a tree that reached towards the skies. The wind currents also stabilized and stopped changing. The hydra seemed to havended there.

    Han Shuo was shocked. Just as he was wondering why the hydra didn¡¯t approach, four waves of dark brown liquid spurted out like a fountain towards the tree that Han Shuo and Gilbert were sitting in.

    A noxious stink instantly filled the air. Unusually rancid, when the magical beasts in the area inhaled this putrid stench, their bodies straightened and abruptly froze.

    Higher leveled magical beasts like the harpy and two windde wolves all ran away in a panic after scenting the stinking air. None of them dared to stick around. They clearly knew of the terrifying danger present in their surroundings.

    After cursing under their breath, Han Shuo and Gilbert instantly shifted. Gilbert leaped andnded on a tree even further away, while Han Shuo rose into a high vantage point in the sky.

    While he rapidly flew up, Han Shuo took the opportunity to chant necromancy spells, summoning the little skeleton and earth elite zombie at the same time, who organized themselves with great teamwork. The little skeleton took up a position beside Han Shuo, while the earth elite zombie hid into the ground.

    The branches of the tree that Han Shuo and Gilbert stayed on shuddered when the four waves of dark brown liquid sshed onto it. All the blooming leaves wilted almost instantly, and only a dessicated trunk was left of the once towering tree, It was as if it had experienced a long period of drought.

    ¡°Hydra, you¡¯ve finally appeared!¡± Han Shuoughed coldly in the sky andunched an attack with the little skeleton. The bone knife and Demonyer Edge flew directly towards the concealed hydra.

    Gilbert¡¯s roar also sounded out from the side at the same time. In human form, he gradually grew in a ball of ck light, finally turning into his dark dragon form. He rushed towards the hydra with his ws and fangs and shouted in a resounding voice, ¡°Despicable hydra, you will pay!¡±

    The concealed hydra inly didn¡¯t think that Han Shuo and Gilbert could find its tracks. Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge and the bone knife had already connected with its body before it was able to react.

    A sharp scream tore through the silent sky. After getting injured, the hydra¡¯s enormous body was no longer concealed. Coiled atop a sky-reaching tree, it waspletely exposed to Han Shuo and Gilbert.

    At that moment, two of its long necks were dripping blood, and the remaining seven heads shuddered. It seemed like the tree the hydra was on was unable to withstand its pained writhing as it snapped with arge creak, bringing the hydra¡¯s body down with it as it fell.

    At this moment, a huge crack suddenly appeared on the brown ground. Intense rumbles sounded from deep within the earth, as if a terrifying danger awaited the hydra¡¯s impact.

    As a super rank magical beast, the hydra naturally had the ability to fly, but it was just writhing in pain as it fell.

    However, when one of the snake heads caught sight of the ground underneath it fracture into arge ravine, the hydra was scared mindless. It struggled frantically, finally halting its descent and rising upwards again.

    Faced with the threat of death, it seemed that the hydra¡¯s no holds barred struggle bore fruit. However, the attack from the ground clearly did not end there. Just as the hydra rose a bit in the air, it noticed several sharp mounds suddenly rise up from the ground and charge towards its body.

    The hydra was extremely troubled in that moment, it hadn¡¯t thought that its ambush would result in all this happening. ording to its n, it would silently draw close to Han Shuo and Gilbert, use the noxious poison¡¯s fumes to take down the ¡°Dragon Knight¡± Han Shuo, and then casually deal with the little dark dragon that was a rank lower.

    But, Han Shuo, having trained extensively in demonic cultivation, didn¡¯t fall to the attack of its noxious fumes like it had nned at all. Furthermore, the appearance of the little skeleton and earth elite zombie also empowered Han Shuo,pletely shattering the hydra¡¯s n.

    The nine snake heads suddenly started to tremble as its long necks wobbled continuously. The momentum of the mounds that the earth zombie had created waspletely counteracted by the fierce streams of poison that the snake heads spat out. While it did so, the hydra¡¯s body gradually rose as it frantically flew towards the pool it had first emerged from, dodging the remaining mound attacks from the earth elite zombie.

    A stream of magma suddenly hit one of the snake heads, unusually dazzling within the pitch-dark night. With a terrible scream, the hydra¡¯s gigantic fleeing body stumbled. The remaining magical beasts in the area fled in fear as the colossal body snapped trees into twigs as it crashed and fell.

    ¡°Wahaha, a second ranked fellow has to flee as well!¡± Gilbert¡¯s voice rang out through the night sky as he carried Han Shuo and the little skeleton to swiftly chase the hydra.

    The hydra destroyed all of the towering trees blocking its way as it fled. It suddenly leapt into the pool it had surfaced from just as Gilbert was about to catch up.

    The originally clear pool water was instantly polluted and very quickly became mired in filth. When the hydra hade out of the pool previously, the pool had remained clear. Yet the moment it entered now, the pool had changed. This meant that the hydra was unable to control its power anymore, most likely due to it being wounded.

    The hydra caused a huge wave of activity the moment it entered the newly formed bog. The mud sshed up around it and a foul odor began to spread.

    ¡°Honored master, just leave this to me. Just watch from above. I¡¯m very familiar with this sort of ce as well!¡± Gilbertughed loudly.

    Gilbert had been hiding in a swamp the first time he¡¯d met Han Shuo, using its natural advantages to fight against the dark elves. He was entirely used to fighting and hiding in this sort of ce. Now that the hydra was hurt, and Han Shuo was on watch above, he didn¡¯t really worry about Gilbert¡¯s safety, particrly given his astounding resistance to poison.

    ¡°Alright, go on down. Come out or yell if you can¡¯t handle things!¡± Han Shuo nodded and agreed to Gilbert¡¯s n of action.

    With a wild guffaw ofughter, Gilbert¡¯s enormous body dove into the marsh with a huge ssh. Like an enormous eel, he swiftly began to make his way deeper into the depths .

    All of a sudden, a hugemotion rose out in the mire. Gilbert had obviously found the hydra and had engaged inbat. With the swamp as the epicenter, tremors shook the ground, and the soaring trees as well. With this cacophony, regardless of size, all the magical beasts vacated the premises in a hurry.

    It was as though someone had tossed in a chained set of bombs, as huge pirs of mud, apanied by tremendous bangs, erupted from the huge pool. The constant explosions forced the swamp into a terrifying spiral that could not settle.

    asionally, the hydra heads or Gilbert¡¯s huge tail would show itself above the surface of the bog. Looking down from his vantage point in the sky, Han Shuo noticed that Gilbert and the hydra¡¯s bodies were entwined together, continuously rolling around in the mire.

    ¡°OOOOOH....¡±

    Suddenly, Gilbert¡¯s extremely lecherous yell rang out from within the mire.

    Then, Han Shuo caught sight of something that shocked him beyond measure. The hydra and Gilbert slowly floated out of the swamp, their bodies knotted tightly together. But the more Han Shuo looked, the less it looked like they were fighting. Rather, it actually seemed like they were getting intimate.

    Gilbert¡¯s thick tail and sharp ws continuously stroked the hydra¡¯s body like human hands. Meanwhile, the nine long necks of the hydra, that were once struggling fiercely to escape from the dark dragon, began to wrap closer and closer around the dark dragon.

    Rays of dark light had begun to surrounding the two entangled super rank magical beasts at some unknown time. The two enormous bodies slowly condensed, and gradually became two muddy people¡ªa man and a woman who were entwined together.

    Furthermore, they were two naked humanoids that were tightly embracing each other!

 Chapter 233: Conquer

    Chapter 233: Conquer

    Han Shuo stood in the sky as he watched the development taking ce below,pletely astonished. He waspletely dumbfounded as he stood there frozen.

    Gilbert and the hydra had be two naked mud people entwined around each other. The originally intense battle became an ¡°intense battle¡± of another kind. Passionate cries and roars rang out, giving Han Shuo aplete eye opener!

    The dark dragon race was lewd. All hydras were female and were hardly anything proper as they¡¯d always been a synonym for the word ¡®pervert¡¯. The fact that these two beings could turn such an intense battle into another kind of ¡°intense battle¡± meant that they were truly lusty. It really shocked Han Shuo.

    The two mud people were rolling around together intensely and churning through the mire. Since their bodies were covered in mud, their original appearances could not be seen. Han Shuo could only discern that the hydra was female from her voluptuous body.

    The busty lewd hydra entwined with the dark dragon and copted fiercely. Heavy breathing kept on ringing out and echoing through the quiet night sky, causing people¡¯s lust to rise!

    Han Shuo had been watching intensely, while finding it all slightly baffling. Suddenly he felt someone tug on the corner of his shirt. He turned his head, and saw the purple eye of the little skeleton sparkle as he reached out with his bony w to point at the dark dragon and the hydra that were in the heat of the moment. He sent Han Shuo a question, ¡°What are they doing?¡±

    Han Shuo replied, ¡°Uh...¡±

    The little skeleton tugged on the corner of his shirt again as the light in his purple eye swirled around quickly, showing that he was clearly very confused. It was as if he couldn¡¯t understand what was going on no matter what, so he questioned Han Shuo again.

    ¡°The dark dragon is conquering it. Little kid, don¡¯t ask so much!¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t evade the question, so he justughed weirdly and tried to skirt around the question.

    Only half of the earth elite zombie was in the ground starting from an unknown period of time. It waved its hands around wildly, also looking at the two people in the mire with confusion, wondering if it should get closer to attack.

    The mire was very wide and filled with extremely poisonous liquid. If the earth elite zombie rushed inside, it would be unable to make full use of its powers. Not to mention that the current situation was very odd, Han Shuo hastily issued a mentalmand for the earth elite zombie¡¯s movements to halt.

    The two people on the surface of the mire gradually sank back in and disappeared from Han Shuo¡¯s line of sight. However, the hugemotion inside the mire did not vanish ordingly.

    Han Shuo knew that the grand battle between a lewd dragon and a lewd snake had not stopped even after they had disappeared. The battle location had merely shifted to underneath the surface.

    Seeing that he couldn¡¯t see anything with his eyes anymore, Han Shuo descended from the sky tond beside the earth elite zombie. He patted the earth elite zombie¡¯s shoulder and praised, ¡°You did very well!¡±

    The earth elite zombie had hidden in the ground earlier and used his powers over the earth to pose an immense threat towards the hydra. Power that could tear the earth apart and form a fissure excited Han Shuo quite a bit. This meant that it had already developed a very good battle awareness after staying with the little skeleton for a while.

    Now that it would be rather difficult for the hydra to threaten Han Shuo anymore, hended and praised the earth elite zombie, chanted the spell once more and sent the little skeleton and the earth elite zombie back home.

    He then leapt onto a towering tree beside the mire, sat down with his legs crossed, and started to adjust his breathing while watching themotion within the mire.

    As he did so, a loud sound rang out from afar, as if a huge being was passing nearby.

    Han Shuo had been adjusting his breathing, but immediately sent out a yin demon to travel towards the source of the sound and discern what was going on.

    An azure cyclops, roughly eight or nine meters in height, its muscles as firm as boulders, was moving its stone-pir like legs as it hurried along its way. The mountains shook with each step, seeming as terrifying as andslide.

    All of the trees were ttened in his path, like a bulldozer had been driven over the ground, ttening it thoroughly. Even some hard boulders were crushed into dust. This clearly indicated that the azure cyclops had an enormous strength that rivaled that of a god¡¯s.

    The cyclops seemed slightly anxious as it was walking at a very fast pace. The shuddering of the ground caused all of the magical beasts in the area to flee their nests in order to make way for it.

    Han Shuo was shocked as therge sound traveled further south. It was likely that even the hydra and Gilbert would feel quite troubled if they met with that enormous fellow with a body as strong as boulders, embodying a terrifying strength.

    Just as Han Shuo thought that, a hugemotion rang out from the mire. A whirlpool was spiraling at the center of the mire as streams of brown mud were shot out. It seemed that the lewd dragon and the lewd snake had reached the climax.

    As he expected a howl sounded out from within the mire after a while. The mire and its foul stench miraculously regained its purity in an extremely short amount of time. The contaminated muddy water gradually sank down, while clear pool water slowly appeared along the surface with bubbles.

    Gilbert¡¯s naked body leapt out from within. His muscles dazzled as the mud on his body was washed clean.

    Gilbertughed maniacally with indescribable excitement and pride in his voice after breaking through the surface of the pool. He looked down at the watery pool as he couldn¡¯t restrain lewdughter from bursting out of his mouth. He was clearly very cocky.

    ¡°Honored master, you are a living god of this world. You hold miracles that surpass thews of the natural world. You have allowed your humble disciple to have a technique that can rule the entire Dark Dragon City. I must continuously praise you. Oh, you¡¯re truly too great!¡± Gilbert blurted out a bunch of ttering words continuously after leaping out of the water.

    The sincere tone, the passionate emotions, the goosebumps-inducing words surpassed any ttering that he¡¯d done before. Gilbert was truly excited and joyful in this moment, he wasn¡¯t purely being fawning towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°What, you used that technique?¡± Han Shuo chuckled oddly as he gazed at Gilbert in a smiling, yet not smiling manner.

    Gilbert nodded continuously and loudly in a truly excited manner, ¡°Of course, it¡¯s too amazing. That female snake waspletely dealt with. She can¡¯t even more now.¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s the situation now?¡± Han Shuo momentarily nked, then asked Gilbert quietly in a sneaky manner, as if he was afraid of the hydra in the deep pool overhearing him.

    Gilbert quietly gave a lecherousugh and said, ¡°Honored master, I already stole some of the essence from her body during the process. I can already feel my body reaping enormous benefits.¡±

    ¡°Will this hydra be a threat to us anymore?¡± Han Shuo nodded, then frowned before he asked calmly.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, she definitely won¡¯t. Furthermore, I have a way to rope her in, so that master can gain another powerful helper!¡± Gilbert promised confidently with a smile of unmeasurablesciviousness.

    ¡°That¡¯s good. I¡¯ll believe you this time since you¡¯re so confident. I hope you don¡¯t disappoint me!¡± Han Shuo chose to believe Gilbert after witnessing his feat with the hydra and nodded in agreement with his suggestion.

    ¡°Then, let¡¯s depart for now. She needs a very long period of time to rest. We¡¯lle back and find her after she recovers!¡± Gilbert gazed towards the clear pool reluctantly.

    ¡°That¡¯s alright. I saw a cyclops hurriedly running towards a direction just now. Let¡¯s go over there to see what¡¯s going on!¡± Remembering the actions of the cyclops, Han Shuo became interested and spoke thoughtfully to Gilbert.

    It was said that the cyclops were the servants of the gods. Legends spoke of their miraculous ability to forge weapons and find special ores. They liked to eat humans and had strong bodies and stubborn personalities. Their living habits were very simr to the dwarves. Another legend said that cyclops were actually a type of dwarf, but they had unbelievablyrge bodies, as well as terrifying destructive abilities. It was said that they lived in huge buildings.

    Their bodies were as hard as boulders. It was unknown whether they had the ability to find strange ores and rare mining fields due to this sort of body. This was an innate ability that made all alchemists green eyed with envy.

    When the cyclops had hurried on so anxiously just now, Han Shuo naturally thought of its instinctive abilities and wondered if the cyclops had discovered some special metal ore and was rushing to dig it out.

    ¡°Perhaps this cyclops found a good location, or is nning to mine some sort of special ore!¡± Gilbert clearly knew about the instinctive characteristic of the cyclops, so he couldn¡¯t help but cry out.

    Han Shuo nodded and smiled, ¡°Come, let¡¯s go and see. Incidentally, I need some materials to refine a new weapon. Let¡¯s see if this cyclops can help me find some good stuff!¡±

    With that, Han Shuo and Gilbert swiftly followed the path that the cyclops had been taking.

 Chapter 234: A strong crowd

    Chapter 234: A strong crowd

    The gigantic cyclops¡¯ powerful body fully depicted its strong soul as it shook the ground and mountains in its path, snapping ancient trees, and causing many beasts to flee.

    Even in the Dark Forest, where super rank magical beasts lurked everywhere, very few beings were actually willing to provoke a being as powerful as a cyclops. Having bad rtions with such a big fellow was not an easy thing.

    Han Shuo and Gilbert followed the tracks that the cyclops left behind and caught up without too much effort. In order to prevent it from noticing them, Han Shuo rode on Gilbert¡¯s body and intentionally created arge distance between them and the cyclops.

    As they hurried behind the cyclops, Han Shuo carefully surveyed their surroundings and actually discovered several powerful auras that seemed to be interested in the cyclops¡¯ actions.

    However, the owners of these auras also intentionally avoided the cyclops. They hid far away, unwilling to approach it, and only followed the tracks that the cyclops left behind, seeming to have the same idea as Han Shuo.

    When Han Shuo sensed these powerful auras, he immediately told Gilbert to revert back into his human form. He then dragged Gilbert along using the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heaven to prevent Gilbert¡¯srge body from catching the attention of these powerful beings and bing their prey.

    The three yin demons kept watch on the side and continuously paid attention to any approaching danger that might befall them. Danger lurked around every corner in the Dark Forest, so Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but remain vignt.

    Each step of the towering cyclops covered five or six meters. He finally entered a small valley after a long period of rumbling, hasty travel.

    A waterfall crashed within the valley, the vegetation green, theke clear, and strange flowers bloomed. Odd rocks of various colors sat at the bottom of the clear river. They dazzled beneath the sunlight, making the river ripple and shine and the fishes¡¯ color even brighter in contrast.

    What was surprising was that after the cyclops suddenly became very cautious after arriving at the valley. He set each step down very carefully, as if afraid of breaking the silence of the valley, or disturbing some powerful being.

    Following the cyclops from a distance away, Han Shuo hid at a cliff above the valley. He looked down from above, observing the cyclops¡¯ movements.

    The cyclops advanced forward carefully after arriving at the valley. As it walked, it reached back to undo the huge shovel, heading for the smallke underneath the waterfall.

    Contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, the smallke was extremely deep. The cyclops was nearly ten meters tall, and yet theke water reached his shoulders when he entered theke.

    As careful as the cyclops had been, he caused numerous violent ripples to spread when he entered theke. Fish of various colors scattered in fear, and the clear waters around his body gradually became muddier, clearly affected by his movements.

    When the cyclops moved its hands and started using shovel, theke water surged even more and the clear surface of theke became even murkier, as pieces of gigantic rock were flung onto the bank by the moving shovel.

    The cyclops was able to determine with just one nce which rocks were useful, and which were useless. He would put away the useful rocks the moment he excavated them and then continued working.

    All of the rocks that the cyclops dug out had some sort of muddy silt stuck to them. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t determine what they were. However, since the cyclops had be interested in them, and had snuck over to dig them out from such a far distance, they were unlikely to be something that could be easily found.

    Suddenly, several powerful auras descended on the valley. All of them locked their attention onto the cyclops, as if waiting for something.

    Han Shuo instantly slowed his breathing and heart rate, and began intentionally concealing his presence. He wanted to prevent anyone from discovering a single trace of him and bringing him unnecessary trouble.

    As a super rank magic beast, Gilbert also had a miraculous way of concealing himself. He slowly snuck into the current in theke after a nce from Han Shuo, continuing to sink downwards until he reached the muddyyers at the bottom of theke.

    As one of the evil races of the underground world, the dark dragons had a natural talent for hiding in mire. When Gilbert sank into the mud and was blocked by the flowing water and mud, even Han Shuo needed to sense very carefully before being able to find a trace of the dark dragon.

    After concealing himself, Han Shuomanded the three yin demons to slowly move around the valley and slowly scout out the direction where he had sensed the powerful auras.

    Firstly, there was an old woman, whose face was full of wrinkles, wearing a ming red magician robe, who stood on top of a branch of a seven-meter-tall tree. From the magical insignia on her robe, Han Shuo recognized that this old woman was actually a fire grand magus. Her vision did not rest on the cyclops. Instead, she kept casting her gaze around, as if more interested in the valley itself.

    The second person was a middle-aged hulk. He looked rather handsome, with short golden hair sticking up, appearing very energized. He¡¯d stopped behind a boulder and was focusing his attention on the cyclops itself.

    There was a strange aura around the middle-aged hulk. It was actually rather simr to Gilbert¡¯s aura. Han Shuo carefully observed the middle-aged man and suddenly understood that he was an adult, golden dragon.

    The third powerful being hadnded within the bushes. It was a savage, huge ape around five meters tall with long silver fur and a pair of blood-red eyes. Its long arms ended with sharp fingernails that were akin to knives. There were traces of blood on one of them, as if it had just ripped open a magical beast.

    Thest person was a beautiful young girl, who was hovering in the air on the back of a pegasus. She had clear eyes, white skin, and a wless face. A holy aura emanated from her features. She rode atop the pegasus with a straight back and breasts held high, appearing quite full. Her attention was also on the cyclops.

    Thanks to the surveince of the three yin demons, Han Shuo examined the four powerful beings from all directions. He couldn¡¯t help but be shocked. The Dark Forest was truly a terrifying ce. A single cyclops had attracted the attention of so many powerhouses.

    There were four powerful beings, two beasts and two people. The middle-aged hulk was naturally a golden dragon in its human form. As the race with the most powerful bodies amongst dragons, they were publicly acknowledged to be strong. The aura of this middle-aged hulk was as steady as a mountain. He was definitely a powerful being who had evolved at least three times. He wasn¡¯t something that a rookie dark dragon couldpare up to.

    The silver-eyed giant ape had an enormous body that was four meters tall. From the cold sharpness of its nails, Han Shuo could tell that they were drenched in the blood of various powerful men and beasts from within the Dark Forest. The aura of bloodlust surrounded it. Although he didn¡¯t know what sort of mutated monster it was, its powerful aura was definitely not weak.

    The old woman with a face full of wrinkles was a fire grand magus. Her control over fire magic already reached its peak, so her strength was definitely terrifying.

    Han Shuo was unable to determine the strength of the beautiful young girl on the pegasus from her appearance, but since she¡¯d dared to appear here, Han Shuo believed that she wouldn¡¯t be an opponent that would be easy to handle. She definitely would¡¯ve never appeared if she didn¡¯t have extreme confidence in her own abilities.

    When Han Shuo had fully appraised the four powerful beings that were hidden, he immediately contacted Gilbert, telling him to stop moving to prevent an unfortunate disaster.

    ¡°Roar...¡±

    An enormous roar suddenly rang out from underground. The entire valley shook as the boulders on the cliffs trembled and tumbled towards the smallke.

    This roar came from deep within the earth. It was filled with endless fury. The four powerful and hidden existences all disyed varied expressions upon hearing this loud howl.

    The golden dragon and the beautiful girl on the pegasus were shocked and didn¡¯t know what to do or what was happening. Their gazes shifted from the cyclops towards theke and stream. However, the fire grand magus and the gigantic silver ape seemed to understand what had happened, and their expressions revealed a hint of eager anticipation.

    After that loud roar, the temperature of the originally temperate valley shot up quickly. Theke and the clear river suddenly transformed into a hot spring as steam rose up from them and gradually diffused through the valley.

    The cyclops clearly knew what was going on as well. Its originally light-footed actions immediately sped up, as if it was avoiding something and wanted to maximize the most strange ores possible from theke in a shortest period of time. It frantically sped up its work.

    The ground in the valley trembled in apaniment to therge sound. The ground beneath theke and river split open. The temperature in the valley rose, causing some of the fragile flowers that couldn¡¯t withstand it to wilt. Following that, some branches and bushes cracked as they dried up and started smoking.

    Even Gilbert, hidden within the mud, was unable to withstand the rapid rise in water temperature. It nearly turned him into a roasted dragon, making him want to break out from the mire.

    However, Han Shuo noticed that the four hidden powerful beings had raised their vignce to the utmost. There was an ominous killing intent that filled the valley, as if arge-scale war would unfold at any second. He was extremely shocked and hastily stopped Gilbert. Han Shuo told him to banish the thought of leaving the river bottom so that he wouldn¡¯t be the first target to be attacked.

    Han Shuo was fiercely stopping the dark dragon¡¯s action and telling him to leverage the convenience of the mud to leave the valley. This was to prevent him from unfortunately bing the target of everyone¡¯s attacks and dying a terrible death.

    Gilbert withstood the pain of his body being burnt and used the dark dragon¡¯s natural talents to move to a ce of lower temperature, gradually leaving the valley and disappearing in the direction of the river¡¯s current.

    A terrifying roar sounded out from underneath the ground not long after the dark dragon left. The river andke seemed to be torn open as magma gushed through to them. The scorching hot temperature made everyone feel extremely ufortable.

    Ten or so ming red rock giants, that seemed to be constructed from magma, slowly stood up where the magma was gathering within the river.

    The body of these giants were red like iron brands; there seemed to be magma continuously circting throughout their bodies. Each of them were as huge as the gigantic silver ape, and appeared very savage as magma flowed in their eyes. As the magma spread through the water, they rushed towards the cyclops.

    ¡°The Scorching Demon Generals, they really are here!¡± The old woman, who happened to be the fire grand magus, couldn¡¯t help but exim with a face full of excitement.

    The huge silver ape appeared extremely ferocious. There was a savage light sparkling within its blood red eyes. It was anxiously waving its thick arms around at this moment, as if it was prepared to rush in and fight, but hesitated like it was waiting for something.

    The golden dragon and the pegasus girl seemed to be targeting only the cyclops. They clearly hadn¡¯t through that this situation would develop and froze, trying to quickly think of something.

    While the four hidden powers were slowly gathering ideas, the magma constructed Scorching Demon Generals charged towards the cyclops.

    The cyclops no longer dared to stay now. It picked up its shovel and once again stepped out heavily, hoping to quickly leave the valley behind and avoid the attacks of these demon generals.

    The temperature within the valley rose up swiftly, immediately cracking the surrounding ground and wilting all vegetation in an extremely short period of time. The scorching temperature emanating from underneath the ground caused Han Shuo to feel very ufortable.

    Yet, just at this moment, Han Shuo closed his eyes and rxed his body, as if wanting to perceive his surroundings more clearly.

    After a while, Han Shuo opened his eyes and light sparkled in them. He gazed down into the valley that had been turned into a sea of fire and muttered, ¡°Yes, yes, it should be a ce of extreme fire down there!¡±

 Chapter 235: Sea of Fire

    Chapter 235: Sea of Fire

    ¡°ROAR!¡±

    Another terrifying roar rang out from beneath the ground, the valley trembling vehemently throughout. Large boulders on the cliff tumbled down, while the gigantic boulders that formed the waterfall creaked madly, as if they were about to crumble at any moment.

    An extremely powerful aura subtly seeped out of the cracked ground. The roar¡¯s powerful sound wave caused the wilted trees to suddenly crash to the ground and the earth to rupture very quickly, forming a huge ravine.

    Han Shuo no longer sent his three yin demons in separate directions for surveince. Instead, he immediately called them back to his side to verify the disturbances in his surroundings. Han Shuo also couldn¡¯t help but vault away from the rocks and take to the air because the scorching heat had already transformed the boulders into bright red heated irons.

    The scorching demon generals that¡¯d stalked out of the magma attacked the cyclops without any hesitation. In concert with the terrifying sound st, the demon generals sent streams of magma from the river shooting towards the cyclops¡¯ enormous body.

    Three four-meter tall demon generals strode out from the ground¡¯s depths and blocked the cyclops¡¯ path of retreat as their ming bodies charged towards the cyclops.

    The cyclops¡¯s enormous body was twice as tall as the demon generals¡¯. Its azure muscles sturdy as granite, the huge shovel it was holding with both hands became its weapon to block the attacks. Every single swing embodied monumental strength and caused gusts of hot air to spin wildly within the valley.

    Loud crackling explosions continuously echoed near the cyclops¡¯ body as every swing of the shovel deflected a stream of magma, causing a spray of sparks to fly everywhere. Rocks hidden within the magma exploded on contact, shrapnel flying off in all directions.

    When some wilted small vegetation off to the side was brushed by the burning rocks, they immediately went up in mes. Instantly, a raging fire started to rapidly spread, enveloping the entire valley in a burning ocean.

    A ming rock the size of a skull was batted to the side with contemptuous ease. Yet the furious force with which it flew towards Han Shuo forced him to flee in a sorry fashion.

    With a loud crack, the ming rock smashed into the hard rock where Han Shuo had previously been standing. A splendid shower of sparks decorated the air as the searing hot me burned a hole clear through the boulder, causing the people around to gasp at its miraculousness.

    Firespark Stone, the ultimate material for refining weapons! Han Shuo gazed intently at that fiery piece of rock, and immediately knew from those mes what this miraculous rock was. This was the material that cultivators required most of all to refine their weapons ¨C the Firespark Stone.

    Han Shuo reached out with his left hand, and a wisp of purple spellfire rose up like a sliver of a soul. It carried a sinister aura and slowly enfolded the Firespark Stone.

    The moment the scorching heat made contact with the cold aura, dense white smoke immediately billowed out alongside a squeaking sound. When Han Shuo felt the Mystical cial Spellfire take effect, he immediately activated his magical yuan. When his magical yuan covered the purple me of the Firespark Stone, it flickered up even more beautifully.

    Wisps of white mist began to rise from the Firespark Stone. Under the impact of the sinister aura, the fire burning on the Firespark Stone was slowly extinguished as it slowly calmed to a normal appearance, finally bing a normal fire-red colored boulder, red light sparkling from within like a ruby.

    Seeing the mes on the Firespark Stone extinguish, Han Shuo immediately revealed a joyous expression and ced this rock, that was the size of a skull, into his space ring. It would be of great use in the future when he refined weapons.

    Whether they were magical cultivators or demonic cultivators, cultivators couldn¡¯t avoid needing some special mes for refining weapons. Some particr materials would only be melted with special mes. The Firespark Stone was very special. If it wasn¡¯t exposed to mes, it acted the same as any other rock, not even the least bit warm.

    But once the Firespark Stone was touched by the tiniest spark, it would immediately start burning intensely. Only once the energy contained within the Firespark Stone waspletely consumed would it be the most ordinary of rocks. During this process, the enormous fire energy of the Firespark Stone was able to melt any material, which made it convenient for cultivators to refine their weapons.

    Han Shuo felt extremely happy afterying his hands on a piece of Firespark Stone, and started searching around with a bright gaze in order to find more stones from the sparks in the sky.

    At that moment, a fiery streak of a dragon tore through the sky andnded close to the beautiful girl riding a pegasus. There was an evenrger piece of Firespark Stone burning where the dragon hadnded, shrouding the entire area around it in a sea of me.

    The four experts who¡¯d been hiding in the valley had already raised their vignce to the limit. Due to the chaos in the valley, traces of some of them had been revealed. They¡¯d all discovered each other, but none of them took action.

    For someone to appear in this valley and not be afraid in the face of such a terrifying scene, they either had mental issues, or were powerhouses who had no need to be afraid. All of the experts knew that they couldn¡¯t make a careless move without fully understanding the situation. That¡¯s why, even after knowing that there were others in hiding, they didn¡¯t dare easily blow their cover.

    As therger piece of Firespark Stone burned intensely, it heated up the surroundings, causing the pegasus girl to sweat profusely, releasing a sweet fragrance. Due to the sweat, the curves of her tall breasts became even more alluring.

    There was no way to extinguish the Firespark Stone without special means once it started burning. As Han Shuo looked at the Firespark Stone endlessly consume its energy, he hesitated and finally flew out, moving towards that area.

    ¡°Who is it?¡± The pegasus beauty called out softly. She¡¯d clearly noticed Han Shuo¡¯s actions, since her long eyshes fluttered quickly as she watched the approaching Han Shuo cautiously.

    ¡°I bear no ill will, I just want to pick something up!¡± Han Shuo called out softly and slowly revealed himself. He was afraid that if he acted too quickly, it would cause this girl to suddenly attack.

    Han Shuo was also cautiously on guard during this entire process. He had already called out the Demonyer Edge, and a yin demon watched her every move and expression. If this girl made the slightest expression of hostility, Han Shuo would mercilessly make the first move.

    Through the yin demon¡¯s surveince, Han Shuo noticed that the arched eyebrows of the girl was furrowing slightly. Two rows of sweat rolled down her fair cheeks, along her neck, and made it into her the depths of her clothing. The girl anxiously urged the pegasus to fly into the sky as she carefully looked at Han Shuo, perplexed. He was approaching her via flight, but wasn¡¯t making any unusual moves.

    The piece of Firespark Stone was to the left of the beautiful girl. Since Han Shuo was afraid that she would misunderstand, he deliberately avoided her body, and circled around tond at the center of the intense mes¡ªwhere the Firespark Stone was located.

    ¡°I mean no harm!¡± Han Shuo raised his head and looked deeply into the eyes of this beautiful girl as he slowly descended from midair. He pped his palms together and activated the magical yuan, causing a sphere of purple me to explode into being between his palms. A wave of freezing aura instantly radiated from Han Shuo¡¯s palms.

    Someone that could fly was certainly a top expert. This wasmon knowledge in the entire Profound Continent. When Han Shuo flew over steadily with a rxed expression, the girl immediately thought that he was an expert on the same level. Since she saw that Han Shuo hadn¡¯t made any actions that disyed ill intentions towards her, she didn¡¯t dare carelessly offend Han Shuo either. She only examined him with a pair of beautiful and curious eyes.

    When Han Shuo deployed the Mystical cial Spellfire, giving form to the freezing purple spellfire, the temperature with Han Shuo at the center also decreased. Using the same method as before, Han Shuo brought over the purple magical spellfire with both of his hands and gradually approached the Firespark Stone.

    Intense rumbling smoke suddenly rose up. As the scorching heat aura and the freezing cold aura met, the collision caused once again caused a dense white mist to billow. The Firespark Stone that had been burning intensely started to gradually extinguish amidst squeaks.

    The majestic pegasus underneath the beautiful girl was very unused to the inhospitably high temperatures currently in the valley, and had been extremely agitated. It was only due to the girl¡¯s continuous control that it did not immediately leave the valley.

    However, once Han Shuo¡¯s purple spellfire appeared, the temperature around Han Shuo rapidly dropped. It was as if he was a piece ofnd that the blistering summer was evading. For the majestic pegasus underneath the girl, this was an extremely strong temptation.

    The pegasus decided to draw near Han Shuo despite not having received any such orders from its rider. It flew around Han Shuo greedily, as if wanting to stay where the temperature was just right.

    Han Shuo, who was focusing on obtaining the Firespark Stone, saw the pegasus¡¯ approach and the girl¡¯s actions clearly through the surveince of the yin demons. The beautiful girl was attempting to stop the pegasus from approaching, but was clearly failing.

    Han Shuo raised his head and looked at the beautiful girl, revealing a smile of good intentions, signaling that he understood she hadn¡¯t approached intentionally, and that she bore no ill will either.

    ¡°Thank you!¡± When the girl smiled, it was as if flowers had bloomed. Her voice was soft and sincere.

    ¡°You¡¯re wee!¡± Han Shuo lowered his head and continued to use his magical yuan to extinguish this piece of Firespark Stone at the quickest pace possible. He didn¡¯t nce at the beautiful girl anymore.

    With the three yin demons, Han Shuo could still keep an eye on the situation of the entire valley even though he was working hard. The scorching demon guards that¡¯d blocked off the cyclops¡¯ way was savagely battling, trying to make the cyclops permanently stay in the valley.

    However, the cyclops was twice asrge as the scorching demon generals, and possessed an extremely hard body. It was furiously iling about with the giant shovel in its hand. In a shocking turn of events, he had already hacked two zing demon generals into severalrge pieces of rocks that ended up fusing together in the river.

    At that instant, a bit of scorching magma sshed onto the cyclops¡¯ azure body, causing arge scalded area. The cyclops wailed in pain, its single eye asionally ncing at the depths of the magma river, as if scared that a certain powerful being would suddenly break out of the ground.

    The fire grand magus was covered in a crimson magic shield. The old woman within had a really excited expression on. Her eyes sparkled as she directed all her attention to the depths of the magma, as if she was waiting for something as well.

    The buff golden dragon hulk waspletely soaked with sweat in the hot valley. He was slowly moving towards the outside of the valley, as if biding his time to make a move on the cyclops.

    The silver fur of the giant silver ape was standing up like needles. When some sparksnded on its silver fur, they actually didn¡¯t leave any burn marks. His tough ws continuously clenched and unclenched as its blood red eyes stayedser focused on the depths of the magma river, not daring to approach.

    ¡°ROAR!¡±

    Another ear shattering roar rang out, and the valley truly started to crumble. Thend was ripped apart. The being underneath the ground seemed to be truly furious, as if it was ming the scorching demon generals for their ipetence. More and more fissures tore open as more magma exploded outwards, spurting in all directions like a fountain.

    In what seemed to be an instant, the beautiful scenery in the valley no longer existed. A gigantic ten-odd meters tall thing stood up from thergest crack on the ground, rising along with the boiling magma.

    The head of this enormous thing was sharp, its lower body rotund, and it was as ming red as the scorching demon generals. It seemed to be a huge moving volcano as a powerful aura spread out from its body, seemingly burning the very sky. Swathes of clouds, seemingly set aze, covered the sky above the valley, causing the valley to utterly transform into a kingdom of pure congration.

    As the sky crumbled and the ground shattered, the boulders of the valley imploded, careening downwards. When the gigantic being walked out from the depths of the earth, its enormous body swayed backwards and caused more magma to explode. A volcano had truly erupted!

    ¡°It¡¯s actually... actually the Lord of the mes! No wonder scorching demon generals would appear!¡± The beautiful girl eximed, immediately spurred the pegasus underneath it, yelling. ¡°Leave, now!¡±

    The pegasus, though infatuated with the temperature around Han Shuo, was clearly very happy to hear the girl¡¯s orders. It flew up beautifully and nned to leave this ce of trouble.

    However, the terrifying Lord of the mes was furiously burning everything. The burning clouds in the sky were not illusions, they had actually enveloped the valley. When the girl and pegasus flew up, the ming clouds lit up with intense mes, turning the sky into a sea of fire as well. No one could even think about escaping through the air.

    Furious killing intent spread out from the body of the Lord of the mes. All of the experts realized that this fire maniptor was of a mind to savagely ughter the intruders that had dared to break into its kingdom!

 Chapter 236: The strong work together

    Chapter 236: The strong work together

    By the time Han Shuo finally secured the Firespark Stone, the entire valley had already been sealed off by fire. Six powerful beings, including Han Shuo, were all trapped within the valley.

    Those six powerful beings, who all had different goals, were about to face the wrath of the Lord of the mes¡¯ surrounded by volcanic eruptions. No one had been fortunate enough to escape.

    After the Firespark Stone was stored safely into the space ring, Han Shuo extinguished the purple spellfire between his palms. The surrounding temperature began to rise rapidly once again. Sweat gathered on Han Shuo¡¯s body and flowed down like small rivers.

    As they were facing a sky filled with fiery clouds, the beautiful girl and the pegasus were forced tond on the ground. They looked up at the ming clouds with resignation. It looked like they didn¡¯t dare to directly break through the ocean of mes that upied the sky above the valley.

    The fire grand magus with the crimson shield floated like the wind, upying the ce between Han Shuo and the girl. She smiled and said, ¡°The three of us are human. I think it¡¯ll be easier tomunicate between us. Taking a united stand against the enemy at this moment might make it easier for us to survive. What do you guys think?¡±

    When faced with horrifying danger, alliances between the powerful wasn¡¯t a bad idea. Besides from the Lord of the mes, there was also the gigantic silver ape, the cyclops, and the golden dragon. Those three beings were also exceptionally powerful, but it was a pity that they weren¡¯t human, making them less than ideal targets to partner with.

    ¡°Of course, only by cooperating can we live to walk out of this kingdom of mes!¡± Han Shuo naturally knew that with his ability alone, he didn¡¯t haveplete confidence in dealing with any of the experts within the valley. This fire grand magus seemed to at least know what was going to happen. Although he didn¡¯t know what she was nning, he could at least wait and see.

    ¡°This idea isn¡¯t bad, granny!¡± The beautiful girl revealed a dazzling smile and responded with a sweet and clear voice.

    The fire grand magus seemed to know that Han Shuo and the beautiful girl would agree, she slightly shook the magic staff in her left hand and chanted a mystical spell. A boundary the size of a house instantly appeared around the three of them. The boundary was invisible and formless, but it isted them from the high temperature. The scorching temperatures from the magma outside waspletely blocked off.

    The magic shield on the old woman disappeared after she¡¯d formed the boundary. She smiled and looked towards Han Shuo and the girl. She introduced herself, ¡°I¡¯m called Marceau, Ie from the Brut Merchant Alliance. I major in fire magic.¡±

    ¡°Bryan Han from the Lancelot Empire. I¡¯m a necromancer,¡± Han Shuo replied.

    ¡°Sophie from the Kasi Empire. I¡¯m a knight. Ugh, and an amateur summoner,¡± The beautiful pegasus girl answered simply. The moment she said this, she softly chanted a spell and made the pegasus she had been riding the entire time miraculously disappear.

    The old woman Marceau and the girl called Sophie seemed to have heard of each other¡¯s name. When the two introduced themselves, the other person revealed a shocked expression. Only Han Shuo was an unknown, and the two were unfamiliar with him. They looked at him in confusion. As an expert who focused on necromancy and could fly, they definitely would¡¯ve heard of him if the Lancelot Empire had such a person. Thus, Marceau and Sophie both assumed that Han Shuo had given a fake name after realizing that they¡¯d never heard of Han Shuo¡¯s name.

    In response to the two people¡¯s confusion, Han Shuo shook his head and smiled wryly as he exined, ¡°I¡¯m telling the truth, I only made my debut recently, it¡¯s normal for my name not to be known. There¡¯s nothing to feel odd about.¡±

    ¡°ROAR!...¡±

    The Lord of the mes¡¯ loud roar rang through the valley. Along with the terrifying sound wave, its massive body began to chase the cyclops with surprising speed.

    Rays of scorching mes danced like iling ribbons, while the insanely high temperature caused the air itself to crackle and pop. mes mixed with magma surged towards the cyclops under the Lord of the mes¡¯ maniption, causing the cyclops to scurry around in an unsightly manner, clearly showing that it wasn¡¯t able to stand up to its opponent.

    The golden dragon seemed to be targeting the cyclops, but after realizing now that it also faced an enormous threat, it seemed to have given up the n of immediately dealing with the cyclops. Instead, it paced around the exit of the ming valley, wondering how to leave.

    At that moment, the enormous silver ape beat its chest with a roar, and turned into a bolt of silver lightning as it tore through space, shooting directly at the Lord of the mes, who was still chasing the cyclops. While in the air, its two razor sharp ws danced in front of its chest, sending out several rays of cold light simr to a sword¡¯s fighting aura.

    When several ming demonic generals in the vicinity were hit by the rays of cold light, their bodies crumbled with a huge crack, the pieces swiftly fusing into the magma flow.

    Watching through the yin demons, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but be shocked. He didn¡¯t know what sort of mutated magical beast this gigantic silver ape was, but it had such terrifying destructive abilities.

    Its two ws could shoot out attacks akin to sword shes, which seemed to hold tremendous power, like it could tear through anything. The ming demonic generals, who were just as huge as it was, and had bodies like heated metal to boot, were torn into pieces from afar before they¡¯d even neared the gigantic silver ape¡¯s body.

    ¡°The power of the gigantic silver ape is very terrifying. I have once saw it tear apart three twin head dragons before. It should be a mutated super rank magical beast! Its target is the Lord of the mes. I have watched for a while, and found that it hade to the valley three times, but it had never dared to provoke the Lord of the mes. This time, they might actually fight!¡± Granny Marceau had also had been paying attention to the distantmotion as well.

    Han Shuo momentarily nked, then understood that Marceau truly hadn¡¯te here by chance like himself. She must¡¯ve surveyed the area for a long time, and then chosen toe here during the chaos. However, he didn¡¯t know what she nned on doing.

    ¡°AOOO...¡±

    A loud roar exploded from where the golden dragon was. A gigantic golden dragon, fifteen or sixteen meters long, suddenly revealed its form within dazzling golden light.

    After the golden dragon had transformed back to its original form, its long and slender body shook, releasing a terrifying surge of dragon breath that exploded outwards, disintegrating the red boulder that sealed the valley. The sudden explosion caused a path five or six meters wide to suddenly appear in the valley that the Lord of the mes had sealed off.

    As the dragon race with the most incredible fighting abilities, the golden dragons boasted the strongest attacks and defense. They¡¯d always been synonyms for strength and power, and taking on its dragon form had made it even more ferocious. Even the valley that has been sealed shut by the Lord of the mes was sted clear by the golden dragon¡¯s dragon breath.

    ¡°This Lord of the mes is a super rank magical beast that has evolved four times, but this golden dragon has only evolved three times. Its decision to give up on taking revenge on the cyclops, and choosing to leave the valley instead is the wiser decision!¡± The fire grand magus, Marceau, gazed at thergemotion in the distance and calmly exined the situation to Han Shuo and Sophie.

    ¡°ROAR!¡±

    The Lord of the mes let out an earth-shattering howl. When faced with the golden dragon¡¯s dragon breath, it naturally considered it provocation, so it howled loudly to vent the rage in its heart.

    All of a sudden, the flowing magma on the ground and the ming clouds covering the sky all rushed towards the opening which the golden dragon had created, following the will of the Lord of the mes. The path that was created by the dragon¡¯s breath attack was once again sealed shut by the searing mes, magma, and the ming clouds before the golden dragon had time to leave. This time, it was sealed even tighter. At this, the golden dragon waspletely enraged!

    As the proudest species amongst the super rank magical beasts, the method that the golden dragon had tried to take in leaving the valley had given quite a bit of face to the Lord of the mes. However, this rank four Lord of the mes seemed to truly want to burn everything with its mes, causing the golden dragon topletely lose its temper.

    A dominating dragon roar came out from the golden dragon¡¯s huge mouth. The golden dragon decided to give up on its original ns. Ignoring the cyclops, it charged directly towards the Lord of the mes. Along the way, the golden dragon swung its tail, making it so that the scorchingly hot ming rocks were unable to leave even the tiniest of scratches on its shimmering body.

    At the same time, Marceau suddenly eximed in joy and said excitedly, ¡°Chance, a chance for us has finally arrived!¡±

    Han Shuo turned around to gaze at Marceau, then said calmly. ¡°I think that you should tell us your n now. Otherwise, it¡¯s impossible for the two of us to blindly follow you!¡±

    ¡°There is a very miraculous existence in the underground domain of the Lord of the mes. It was only due to this miraculous existence that it was able to evolve four times. I have researched fire magic for many years, and have noticed that that ce has a strange kind of fire attribute energy. This energy is different from the usual fire element, it is much more mysterious and mystical.¡±

    ¡°Not only did this miraculous location shape a rank four Lord of the mes, it¡¯s also nurtured a mysterious Fire Lotus and many strange rocks. I only discovered this by coincidence. Using the opportunity while the Lord of the mes battles outside, I can use my fire maniption magic and take you guys into that underground world together, and bring out some interesting things. What do you think about that?¡± Fire grand magus Marceau, looked very anxious as she looked at the other two people and exined quickly.

    ¡°Sure!¡± Han Shuo answered decisively without any sort of hesitation.

    Fire grand magus Marceau was definitely a powerful figure. From her to be able to discover this ce of extreme fire, and even understand that the fire element energy within waspletely different from the energy of the fire elements, it seemed as though she had definitely put a lot of work into studying the ce of extreme fire underneath.

    Although fire element energy and the fire element were both fire attribute existences, they were twopletely types of power. In this world, as long as a mage had mental strength, they can use it tomunicate with the fire element and cast fire magic anywhere.

    The fire element existed everywhere in this world. ording to a mage¡¯s mental strength, a fire mage couldmunicate with the fire element and release fire magic that was either powerful or weak.

    However, fire element energy did not exist everywhere. It only existed in some mystical ces in the world. Only when a ce that coincided with heaven and earth and formed and of natural treasure, would it be possible for fire element energy to form in some blisteringly hot ces after hundreds and thousands of years. Out of these ces, the ce of extreme fire was without a double the best spot to nurture fire element energy. Compared to the fire element that was everywhere, fire element energy was far rarer. If it was then refined by some cultivators who knew how to use it, it could disy even more mystical and incredible power.

    The Lord of the mes had always been a magical beast that found it extremely difficult to evolve. However, this one had evolved four times and be an extremely savage fire magical beast thanks to this ce of absolute fire. If this Ruler of me could evolve once again, it would be an Emperor of the mes that possessed power and divinity simr to that of a demigod.

    If the Emperor of the mes could break through the fifth evolution, it would surpass the boundaries of magical beasts and be a fire god with a divine fate, possessing true divine powers as well as powerful fire maniption abilities.

    Han Shuo understood that this was a chance. He had to take a look at the ce of extreme fire no matter what in order to see if he had a chance to refine a fire elite zombie. The elite zombies of the five elements was Han Shuo¡¯s goal. If he counted this ce of extreme fire, he only had a ce of extreme metal left to locate. Only when the elite zombies of the five elements were gathered could they use the earth-shattering effects of the formation.

    Beautiful girl Sophie was likely targeting the cyclops. She was clearly a bit hesitant to ede to Marceau¡¯s suggestion. She contemted for a while, finally nodding her head lightly, agreeing to Marceau¡¯s suggestion.

    ¡°Alright, then let¡¯s take the opportunity when they¡¯re fighting to hurry to the underground kingdom of the Lord of the mes!¡± Seeing that Sophie agreed, fire grand magus Marceau disyed a joyous expression, and hurriedly activated a spell. Sparks suddenly arose from the invisible magic boundary covering the three of them, seeming to have the ability to absorb the fire element. As the sparks flew, the surrounding fire element was swiftly absorbed into the boundary.

    After absorbing the enormous amount of energy, the boundary contracted bit by bit and emitted a dazzling red light as the temperature inside also gradually rose. Only when the temperature inside the boundary was about forty degrees Celsius and it¡¯d be three or four meters in size, did the temperature stop rising and the space stop shrinking.

    ¡°Go!¡± Marceau, called out softly, causing the boundary to carry the three people and circle around the great battle of the enormous beings. It then descended into the ming fissure on the ground that was shooting out magma.

 Chapter 237: Fire Attribute Treasure

    Chapter 237: Fire Attribute Treasure

    The temperature within the boundary stopped at around forty degrees, while the magma that spewed out of the crack in the ground was halted outside the boundary, not affecting the three people within its confines at all.

    Fire grand magus Marceau clearly found the process very difficult. Since there was arge amount of magical element within the boundary, it meant that she had spent a lot of mental strength in order to shift this boundary.

    After the boundary had shrunk to a size of three to four meters, it became rather close quarters. Adding onto the fact that it was a hot and muggy temperature of forty degrees within, it caused the people to feel wet and ufortable, even though it wasn¡¯t as scorching as it was outside.

    However, Han Shuo¡¯s body was able to easily handle a temperature of this degree. His body wasn¡¯t covered in sweat even though he didn¡¯t use his demonic arts to defend himself. Instead, he used this rare spare time to sit down cross legged, calmly adjusting his breathing to recover the magical yuan that he¡¯d expended earlier.

    Beautiful knight Sophie wore tight clothes that clung to her great figure. Her sweat soaked through her clothes, making it seem like she¡¯d just taken a bath in her clothes, emphasizing the curves on her body. Due to the high temperature, the sweat on her body flowed continuously as she wheezed erratically, continuously fanning herself with her hands to create a little bit of wind to cool herself.

    The fire grand magus was just as focused as Han Shuo as she paid careful attention to controlling the boundary. The wrinkles on her face were like gullies that were currently filled with sweat. They were unable to stop the sweat from slowly dripping down her body due to gravity.

    The two yin demons, that had been left in the valley, were surveying everything that was going on outside, so that Han Shuo could find out everything going on above in order to make the most precise decisions.

    After descending into the magma crack on the ground, the boundary continued to sink. As the surrounding mes burned fiercely, bits of magma and loud rumbling sounds shot everywhere. When they collided with the boundary, radiant sparks appeared and created a beautiful scene of an ocean of fire.

    Unfortunately, for the three people in the boundary, Han Shuo and Marceau had no spare effort to pay attention to the surrounding scene; while female knight Sophie was ufortably covered in sweat creating a burning fire of anxiety in her heart. She naturally wasn¡¯t of the mind to pay attention to the beautiful scenery around her.

    The three of them and the boundary slowly sank downwards amidst the scorching and brilliant sparks. During this process, fire grand magus Marceau manipted the direction of the boundary, slowly guiding it to fall towards the earth¡¯s center. She seemed to be rather familiar with the situation here.

    Finally, the moving boundary stopped. Han Shuo opened his eyes instantly and carefully surveyed the scene around him. He wanted to imprint everything into his mind with the shortest amount of time.

    What he saw first was a vastke of fire. It was like the burning sun as it released scorching light and heat. Turbulent magma emerged in the form of pirs of fire dragon. They shot up up pir by pir. They were likely so fierce due to the influence from the Lord of the mes¡¯ powers.

    zing walls of boulders were around the vastke of fire. These walls of boulders were red like heated metal as they radiated an intense temperature. They filled up the surroundings with piercing red light, causing the entire area to be a huge space of mes.

    There was a strange fire lotus at the center of the fireke that bloomed miraculously in the turbulentke filled with magma. It simmered with an unusual red light and seemed to have a sort of tempting beauty as it swayed on the fiery waters.

    The three of them were still enclosed by the boundary and floated inside an opening within the wall of boulders. This moved them safely away from the spurting magma.

    ¡°Firespark Stone, Firesun Crystal, Red Onyx...¡±

    Han Shuo eximed softly with surprise when he noticed that there were several pieces of magical rocks scattered not far from the cave entrance. They were all weapon-refining treasures of the fire attribute. Their quality was top tier and could be used to refine high quality fire flying swords or be directly absorbed by fire cultivators in order to improve their arts.

    ¡°This area is very mysterious. It¡¯s filled with strange energy, and the stones that is nurtured around it are very valuable. If they were embedded into a magic staff, it would definitely give a great improvement to fire mages!¡± Grand magus Marceau said as she wiped away her sweat.

    However, Han Shuo, as a demonic cultivator, could recognize many of the strange stones based on Chu Cann¡¯s memories even without her exnations. He understood that these special stones all had different types of great effects, and each one of them were highly useful.

    ¡°Open the boundary, I have to go and collect some!¡± Han Shuo felt really excited, but he still spoke with a calm expression.

    Marceau blinked, then hesitated for a moment before reminding with goodwill, ¡°The temperature outside the boundary is several times higher than within. I think that the moment you leave the boundary, you will be baked by the high temperature. I would advise you not to take the risk!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s okay, I think I can withstand it!¡± Han Shuo used his magical yuan to create a jumping sphere of purple me to appear in his left palm. A wave of cold breeze air instantly blew up in the forty degrees interior of the boundary, causing Sophie and Marceau to shudder with cold, despite perspiring heavily. Their flowing sweat suddenly stopped, bringing to them a cold feeling.

    ¡°What kind of magic is this?¡± Fire grand magus Marceau couldn¡¯t help but exim after seeing the high temperature within the boundary instantly drop, nearly turning into an extremely hot spot into an ice cavern the moment the purple mes appeared in Han Shuo¡¯s palm.

    ¡°Hehe, it¡¯s just a special type of martial arts, so don¡¯t worry, I think I can withstand the high temperatures outside!¡± Han Shuo gave a faint smile as he looked confidently towards Marceau while holding the ball of jumping purple mes.

    ¡°I think you¡¯re right!¡± Marceau nodded and then said. ¡°Pay attention, the moment I count to three, I will send you out of the boundary, so prepare yourself.¡±

    Han Shuo took in a deep breath and circted his magical yuan, moving his fingers on his hands agilely as waves of purple mes appeared from his fingertips.

    When Marceau counted to three, the section of the boundary in front of Han Shuo was sheared off, as if by a knife. The high temperature attacked his face as scorching waves of fire broke through the boundary, instantly covering Han Shuo¡¯s entire body. Without Marceau¡¯s control, the boundary cracked like an egg shell. Not only did it lose the ability to block off the heat wave, it also lost the ability to remain in the air.

    The boulders were boiling heat where Han Shuo hadnded. If he stepped down, his feet would instantly burnt to cinders. When he activated his magical yuan to cast the Mystical cial Spellfire, he naturally didn¡¯t forget about the Arts of the Demonic Ninth Heaven. In the moment his feet were about tond on the faming stone, he suddenly stopped moving in midair.

    The yin demon that Han Shuo had left behind in the boundary was paying attention to the two women¡¯s actions. Han Shuo himself didn¡¯t waste a split second as he used the extreme coldness of the Mystical cial Spellfire, covering his entire body in white smoke as he nned to act covertly.

    When Han Shuo started flying, Marceau and Sophie looked at his actions in shock. They were clearly very surprised. At the same time, when the extreme cold on Han Shuo¡¯s body was met with the high temperature, his body was instantly covered with white smoke, obscuring his figure from their eyes.

    ¡°The most magical thing in this area should be that fire lotus at the center of theke. He¡¯s gone to collect stones to forge weapons, then let¡¯s go and pick that fire lotus!¡± Fire grand magus Marceau did not seem to care about the unknown rocks around her. Perhaps, it was because she didn¡¯t know what kind of miraculous effects those rocks had and had ced all her attention onto that fire lotus.

    The fire lotus had roughly ten bright red leaves that were the size of palm leaves. It was as translucent as a crystal. Strange red light flowed in the texture of every leaf, as if they were nurturing life through mes. The fire lotus was extremely eye catching in the ming fireke, giving people a feeling of awe-inspiring beauty.

    Fire grand magus Marceau and Sophie werepletely captivated by this strange lotus. Both of them gazed at the fire lotus like they were mesmerized. Marceau started moving the magical boundary and slowly approached the fire lotus together with Sophie.

    Han Shuo did not activate his arts within the dense white smoke to collect fire rocks. Instead, he quickly dug arge hole and dripped his blood essence into it. His sparkling eyes asionally nced over to the fire lotus. while the expression on his face was extremely calm, as if he was quickly thinking about setting something up.

    After hearing Marceau¡¯s description before they¡¯de down, Han Shuo understood that the ce of extreme fire had nurtured a fire lotus, and thus formed his own ns. No matter what, the fire lotus could not be obtained by Marceau nor Sophie. As a fire attribute treasure and a spiritual treasure that was nurtured by the ce of extreme fire, the fire lotus had the miraculous effect of directly enclosing a zombie in order to help a zombie directly be a fire elite zombie.

    The ces of the five extreme elements had a chance to nurture treasures of the five elements based on time and special circumstances. The ce of extreme earth, ce of extreme wood, and the Valley of Sunshine¡¯s ce of extreme water may have needed too much time, or perhaps were not suitable locations, and so no treasures had appeared.

    However, this ce of extreme fire may have existed for over several hundred thousand years, and had been storing energy during this long period of time. Thanks to the Lord of the mes as well, it had actually sessfully nurtured the treasure of the fire lotus. As the spiritual treasure of the ce of extreme fire, the fire lotus had absorbed all sorts of fire attribute power during the thousands of years it had to grow.

    Thanks to the existence of the fire lotus, Han Shuo did not need to spend arge amount of time to gather all sorts of materials. He could use secret techniques to build a formation at the ce of extreme fire, and start the formation with his blood essence. If he then ced the zombie into the fire lotus, it could help evolve the normal zombie into a fire elite zombie through the nutrients the fire lotus had absorbed over the years, and the dense concentration of fire element energy within the ce of extreme fire.

    This was an extremely rare chance. Han Shuo would definitely not allow Marceau to take the fire lotus. Therefore, he¡¯d started to organize everything after he exited the boundary.

    As Marceau manipted the boundary and slowly approached the fire lotus, Han Shuo¡¯s wave of dense white smoke passed through the caves made from the reddened boulder walls. When the two women saw this, they thought that Han Shuo was taking the chance to collect some unique ores in the surroundings. They didn¡¯t know that by using the cover of the dense smoke, Han Shuo had already finished digging the eyes of the formation that was needed to refine the fire elite zombie. Although there was the fire lotus, because there weren¡¯t any other materials to refine the fire elite zombie, the connection between eyes of the formation was done using Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence. It was fortunate that Han Shuo had swallowed a three hundred years old Blood Essence Grass earlier and possessed enough blood essence. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t be able to sessfully use the formation at this time.

    After Han Shuo walked around the walls, dug all of the eyes of the formation, and dripped his blood essence into them, he immediately chanted an incantation and summoned the little skeleton from the other dimension.

    ¡°Quick, bring a zombie you approve of. He will have the same treatment as the earth elite zombie!¡± After issuing the order, he sent little skeleton back to the other dimension before the little skeleton could nod in understanding.

    Purple mes then leapt up from Han Shuo¡¯s hand as he activated his magical yuan in the direction that the little skeleton had stood at in order to create a temperate location.

    The little skeleton¡¯s body was made out of crystal-like white bones. After multiple refining and training, Han Shuo had enough confidence in the strength of the little skeleton¡¯s body that he knew that this sort of temperature wouldn¡¯t affect the little skeleton at all.

    However, if a normal zombie suddenly appeared at such a ce like this, it would definitely be in terrible pain due to the scorching high temperature. It might even be directly burned to death. Thus, in order to sessfully refine the fire elite zombie, Han Shuo had to make some preparations first, so that the zombie wouldn¡¯t die from the heat once it was ced within.

    An urgent call passed over from the other dimension from the little skeleton. When Han Shuo received this call, he immediately cast the spell, resulting in the little skeleton appearing in front of Han Shuo within the temperate area he¡¯d created. When the little skeleton appeared, he was holding a zombie warrior that had an extremelyrge head.

    Perhaps the little skeleton had felt Han Shuo¡¯s anxiousness, and so did not take too long in his search before randomly grabbing a zombie warrior with an extremelyrge head.

    ¡°Alright, it¡¯s you!¡± Time was tight. Han Shuo saw that everything had been prepared. When he saw the two women approaching the fire lotus, he didn¡¯t have the time to dither as he grabbed the huge zombie and dashed towards the center of the fireke.

 Chapter 238: Disguise

    Chapter 238 ¨C Disguise

    The closer Han Shuo traveled to the fireke, the hotter the temperature was. But since the big-headed zombie couldn¡¯t withstand the heat, Han Shuo had no choice but to use more magical yuan to activate the Mystical cial Spellfire in order to lower the temperature around the two of them.

    Zombie warriors was used to the dark and instinctively wanted to avoid to the scorching heat and sunlight. This big-headed zombie was no exception as it kept on shaking in Han Shuo¡¯s hands, like it was afraid of that searing fireke.

    However, he couldn¡¯t move at all within Han Shuo¡¯s vice-like grip. Meanwhile, two waves of dense white smoke quickly neared the fire lotus from the boulder walls and arrived beside Marceau in the blink of an eye.

    At this moment, the two women were only a bit more than three meters away from the fire lotus below. Since they were afraid of the temperature being higher than what the boundary could entire, the two of them didn¡¯t dare to approach the fire lotus that quickly, for fear of the boundary being cracked open by the high temperature.

    ¡°Eh, why are you here?¡± Marceau was surprised to see the two waves of white smoke near. Although she couldn¡¯t see Han Shuo¡¯s appearance due to the dense mist, she was able to recognize him from his actions.

    ¡°I can¡¯t stand the baking of the heat anymore, please let me enter the boundary to rest a bit!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s anxious pleading rang out from the thick must. When the sound had reached them, Han Shuo already stopped next to the boundary.

    Fire grand magus Marceau was clearly a bit troubled after he said this. It seemed like it was very difficult for her to bring Han Shuo into the boundary, so she hesitated and debated.

    Han Shuo suddenly screamed loudly in one of the waves of smoke next to Marceau. The wave of smoke suddenly sank directly towards the beautiful fire lotus.

    Screams rang out from continuously the smoke underneath them, shocking them to the core. This caused the two confused women unable to react.

    Although Han Shuo was emitting terrible screams whilst covered by the smoke, he had a calm expression on as he grabbed the struggling big-headed zombie warrior and stuffed him into the bud of the flower.

    Han Shuo shot out an arrow of blood from his left index finger, causing it tond directly in the big-headed zombie¡¯s mouth. At the same time, Han Shuo also imprinted a dark seal into the zombie¡¯s body. A jumping purple me followed Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts and covered the zombie, while Han Shuo sent out rays of dark magical light that surrounded the big-headed soldier.

    Han Shuo formed his blood essence into a lotus shape and smacked it down onto the big-headed zombie¡¯s head. It was as if he¡¯d triggered some sort of prohibition. All of a sudden, twenty-four rays of scorching blood red lights shot out towards the fire lotus from the holes in the boulder walls.

    The rays of fire element energy seemed to be couriers for the dense fire element energy, bringing it to the fire lotus in the center. The beautiful fire lotus let out a blinding, splendid red light that leapt around. It slowly began to retract with a miraculous speed and path. During this, the big-headed zombie that Han Shuo had firmly ordered to remain in the bud became wrapped up bit by bit.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on, what is this!¡± Marceau, three meters above Han Shuo, couldn¡¯t help but exim as she observed the mysterious change in the surroundings and felt fire element energy gather furiously.

    However, Han Shuo¡¯s pitiful wailspletely covered Marceau¡¯s exmations. Marceau had no idea what was going on and had no idea just what what Han Shuo had met with below. She didn¡¯t dare descend herself thest three three meters to see what was going on underneath.

    Due to the influence of the formation, the thick fire element energy in the surroundings was all sent gathered at the fire lotus at the center to provide nutrients for the fire elite zombie. When the fire elite zombie formed, the fire lotus that nurtured it may very well be a treasure that the fire elite zombie could employ.

    Twenty-four rays of blood red light had gathered at the fire lotus in the center of the cave. The fire element energy that has circled the entire ce of extreme fire for ten thousand years was gradually nourishing the big-headed zombie¡¯s body through the fire lotus. As long as it continued to absorb the pure energy and trained ording to the seal that Han Shuo had left in his mind, the zombie would be able to continuously change itself and be a strong fire elite zombie.

    ¡°ROAR...¡±

    A terrifying roar of anger sounded out from above the fireke. It was as if the Lord of the mes sensed the change in the kingdom of fire, howled as a result.

    Through the yin demon¡¯s surveince, Han Shuo saw that despite holding a slight upper hand even against three enemies, the Lord of the mes had given up on the fight with the golden dragon, the cyclops, and the gigantic silver ape. Instead, it moved its enormous volcanic body and slowly walked towards thergest crack in the valley.

    The fire lotus nurtured by the fireke was a treasure of the fire attribute. There was special energy inside, and the Lord of the mes must have some sort of connection with the fire lotus since it was the ruler of this kingdom of mes. Perhaps, the fire lotus had already been branded with its mark, and it treated the lotus as its own forbidden treasure.

    Using the formation and touching this forbidden item, even left a living lifeform within that absorbed the fire element energy around it, this must have startled the Lord of the mes, and it was rushing over to find out what was happening.

    At this moment, the petals of the fire lotus have already closed into a flower bud, and started to sink into the fireke. Han Shuo immediately knew that his job wasplete, and continued to scream as he moved upwards slowly.

    Han Shuo¡¯s n has been sessful up until now, but he was still unable to know the final results. ording to Chu Cann¡¯s memories, Han Shuo knew that after the fire lotus petals had shut tight, it was very hard to open it once again without a special method and particr timing. However, he didn¡¯t know whether the Lord of the mes had a way to open the fire lotus since it was the owner of this fireke.

    Han Shuo knew that there was no guarantee of sess, but he had been forced to do this. Otherwise, if he lost this chance, it was unknown when the Lord of the mes would next leave the ce of extreme fire, and there definitely wouldn¡¯t be a fire grand magus who would bring him to this strange space.

    Therefore, despite not being guaranteed sess, Han Shuo needed to make use of this rare opportunity and nt the big-headed zombie into the fire lotus. As for the final result, whether the Lord of the mes could open the fire lotus or not, would it kill the big-headed zombie or not, none of it was something that Han Shuo could control. It was up to heaven¡¯s will!

    When Han Shuo¡¯s body floated upwards slowly, he intentionally dispelled the purple mes protecting his two legs, and allowed the high temperature of the fireke to burn his legs. The ends of Han Shuo¡¯s trunks were burnt ck in an instant, his legs were exposed to the scorching temperature, and they looked like they would be charred to cinders in an instant.

    ¡°Save me!¡± A terrible cry filled with despair rang out from Han Shuo¡¯s mouth.

    However, Han Shuo¡¯s face in the dense smoke had no expression of pain on it. Instead, it was terrifyingly calm. It was like the burning pain on his legs was happening to someone else as he looked at the two people within the boundary with interest.

    Fire grand magus Marceau watched the fire lotus slowly sink into the fireke with a clear expression of regret. She didn¡¯t pay attention to Han Shuo¡¯s call underneath, and just kept muttering, ¡°My fire lotus, my fire lotus...¡± It was female knight Sophie who showed pity for Han Shuo. She wheezed heavily as she pulled on the corner of Marceau¡¯s clothes and said anxiously, ¡°Go and save him first!¡±

    Marceau suddenly recovered her senses thanks to Sophie¡¯s actions. She looked down in dejection, sighed, then nodded unwillingly and started to chant a spell.

    A powerful magic suddenly covered Han Shuo¡¯s body. Under the guidance of the fire elemental energy, Han Shuo¡¯s body was suddenly pulled into the boundary where Sophie and Marceau was staying through the fire sparks.

    When Han Shuo had first left, the three to four meter magic boundary had had a section chopped off. Now that Han Shuo¡¯s body squished in once again, the chopped off section did not return, and so the magic boundary that Sophie and Marceau were upying became very crowded due to Han Shuo¡¯s sudden appearance.

    Han Shuo had a weak expression on his pale face at the moment. He had been burnt on arge scale from his knees down to his feet. Not only was it terrifying, there was also a terrible smell.

    Possibly due to her age, identity, or some other reason, the fire grand magus didn¡¯t seem to want to touch Han Shuo within the crowded confines. She squeezed herself into a corner, making the copsed Han Shuo lean on Sophier.

    Han Shuo moved his body difficulty, then called out with fake pain, as if wanting to sit up from the copsed posture. With his arms pressed against the invisible boundary, he couldn¡¯t help but touch Sophie¡¯s leg.

    After Han Shuo had left, the temperature within the boundary had remained around forty degrees. Sophie was still covered in sweat, causing her entire body to feel ufortable from the dampness of the clothes stuck to her body. The stered clothes fully emphasized her curves and well toned body. Through Han Shuo¡¯s unintentional touch, he could feel the firmness of Sophie¡¯s thigh, as well as the tremendous power within the flexible thighs.

    The burning of his two legs had been intentional. This level of injury wouldn¡¯t affect the function of his legs. Although it looked terrifying and caused some pain to Han Shuo, there was no other impact to him.

    Therefore, although Han Shuo cried out softly as he tried to sit up whilst pretending to be in pain, he wasn¡¯t in as bad of a state as he appeared. Thus, when his arm unavoidably touched Sophie¡¯s straight, slender thighs, he actually had the effort to spare to rate the flexibility and suppleness of her thigh.

    Perhaps due to the boundary being very crowded, Sophie treated this sort of frivolous touching as idental, and wasn¡¯t annoyed. Her arched eyebrows furrowed slightly and instead looked at Han Shuo with a bit of pity. She said kindly, ¡°Let me help you!¡±

    Sophie¡¯s soft voice rang out beside Han Shuo¡¯s ear. As Han Shuo clenched his teeth in pain, she squatted down slightly and use her jade hands to support Han Shuo¡¯s shoulders in order to help him up. She then aided him in sitting down cross legged in the boundary.

    Due to how crowded the boundary was, it was unavoidable that the two would have body contact. When she hauled upwards on Han Shuo¡¯s arms, their arms pressed tightly , and Han Shuo even ¡°identally¡± touched Sophie¡¯s full and well curved breasts with his shoulder.

    ¡°Thank you so much!¡± When Sophie helped Han Shuo sit up from his copsed position, Han Shuo looked at Sophie sincerely and thanked her wholeheartedly.

    ¡°You¡¯re wee, it¡¯s what I should do!¡± Sophie¡¯s delicate cheeks were bright red due to the high temperature, but the keen eyed Han Shuo noticed that Sophie¡¯s cheeks were even redder than before. She even seemed slightly embarrassed. It seemed that the close contact between the two had caused this kind girl to feel a bit awkward.

    Han Shuo and Sophie still remained very close together up until now. Although Sophie had intentionally tried to distance herself, due to the crowded quarters of the boundary, the maximum distance of the two¡¯s limbs was not more than twenty centimeters, causing them to smell the scent on each other clearly.

    Han Shuo¡¯s intense male body odor mixed together with the sweet smell of sweat on Sophie¡¯s body. Both of them breathed it in. This special scent was like a miraculous medicine that nourished Han Shuo¡¯s eager heart, causing it to palpitate for some reason.

    Han Shuo looked deeply at Sophie. His gaze was extremely intense, possibly due to the high temperatures. When Sophie turned her head ufortably, Han Shuo greedily took a deep breath, then resumed his normal expression as he shed a bright smile towards Sophie. He then slowly closed his eyes and started to rest, not wasting any time to restore his magical yuan.

    Through the surveince of the yin demon, Han Shuo saw that Sophie¡¯s cheeks had reddened, and her expression seemed rather unnatural. Her long eyshes fluttered, and she looked oddly at Han Shuo when he started to rest. He was unable to know what she was thinking.

    On the other side, Marceau hadn¡¯t noticed Han Shuo and Sophie¡¯s actions. Since the Lord of the mes¡¯ roar was getting closer, Marceau didn¡¯t have any effort to spare to observe what was going on around her. She waspletely focused on controlling the boundary and making it gradually rise towards the top where the magma was shooting out.

 Chapter 239: Couldnâ€™t help it

    Chapter 239: Couldn¡¯t help it

    The Lord of the mes¡¯ terrifying wave of sound carried within it savage and earth-shattering power. It caused all of the spurting magma to stop, and then fall downwards to the fireke with an even more ferocious speed.

    At that moment, not only was the magic boundary unable to rise anymore, but it fell speedily towards the fireke below due to the reversed flow of the magma.

    ¡°This is bad!¡± Marceau eximed anxiously with a face full of shock. ¡°The Lord of the mes is controlling the magma and making it fall. I used too much mental strength just now and have no way to control the boundary and fly out.¡±

    Han Shuo had been resting with his eyes closed and suddenly opened his eyes. He looked at Marceau, ¡°So we¡¯re stuck in the fireke?¡±

    Kind hearted female knight Sophie was equally helpless in this situation and looked anxiously at the scorching magma roiling towards them,pletely unsure of what to do.

    Suddenly, Marceau revealed a resigned expression and said to Han Shuo and Sophie, ¡°I¡¯m very sorry, I don¡¯t think I can leave the fireke if I bring you two. I¡¯m sorry!¡±

    An strong pulse of magic suddenly traveled out from the position where Han Shuo and Sophie was at. It felt the same asst time when Han Shuo had left the boundary. As fiery sparks flew, the section of the boundary where Han Shuo and Sophie was located was directly cut off from Marceau¡¯s boundary as if it had been chopped off by a sharp weapon.

    Without the support of Marceau¡¯s magic, Han Shuo and Sophie were immediately drowned by the flowing magma as they fell into the fireke.

    ¡°Instead of the three of us dying together, I might as well escape by myself. This couldn¡¯t be helped. Please don¡¯t me me!¡± Marceau murmured to herself remotely as she watched the two people fall and be quickly covered by the magma.

    ¡°ROAR...¡±

    The earth-shattering roar was growing closer and closer. Marceau¡¯s expression turned to shock when she heard that and she no longer dared remain. She controlled the boundary that was clinging rightly to her and inched upwards against the magma that was falling like a waterfall.

    ¡°Ahhh...¡±

    Sophie¡¯s yell as she fell towards the fireke waspletely covered by the roar from the Lord of the mes. Aside from Han Shuo, who happened to be right next to her, no one else heard her scream of despair.

    Even a female knight with extraordinary abilities,would instinctively reveal her weak side when facing a life or death situation, so this yell of despair was not a shameful act.

    However, no one was able to withstand it when this sort of sharp scream was continuously ringing out right next to your ear. Han Shuo was naturally no exception.

    ¡°Miss Sophie, can you stop yelling!¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but say to Sophie with a look of annoyance as he held Sophie¡¯s slender waist with one arm.

    To his surprise, the remaining magic boundary that was left on the two of them did not suddenly burst due to Marceau¡¯s departure. It was instead covered with a dark light. The dense magma in the surroundings continuously crashed against this dark boundary, but thetter didn¡¯t move or crack. Only rays of ghostly light slowly seeped out from Han Shuo¡¯s body to stick to the dark boundary.

    Sophie very quickly realized the situation they were in after Han Shuo¡¯s scolding. Her clear eyes swiftly surveyed her surroundings and she eximed in joy, ¡°We¡¯re actually not dead!¡±

    ¡°Of course, I just recovered some strength. I think we can hold on for a bit more until we leave this mysterious ce!¡± Han Shuo smiled faintly andforted Sophie.

    Sophie suddenly realized that Han Shuo still had an arm wrapped around her waist. She immediately straightened herself ufortably, and struggled out of Han Shuo¡¯s arm to maintain a safe distance from him.

    Seeing that Sophie had recovered from the shock, Han Shuo no longer intentionally took advantage of her. He smiled apologetically and said, ¡°It couldn¡¯t be helped just now, I hope you don¡¯t mind. The Lord of the mes wille back very quickly, we have to leave immediately!¡±

    ¡°That Marceau is actually a famous person from the Brut Merchant Alliance, I didn¡¯t think that she could actually do something like this. What a petty character!¡± The kind Sophie swore furiously as she was still very hung up over Marceau¡¯s actions.

    Han Shuo however, felt that it was natural. He didn¡¯t think that there was anything wrong with Marceau¡¯s. After all, the three of them had just met and there was no true friendship between them. When danger befell them, everyone naturally had to think for themselves. Marceau had been forced to do what she¡¯d done, so Han Shuo didn¡¯t fear any grudge towards her.

    That was because he would¡¯ve done the same if he were in her position!

    However, Han Shuo didn¡¯t say much, he merely shrugged and smiled, concentrating on circting his magical yuan as they slowly flew up through the falling magma.

    At Han Shuo¡¯s level of magical cultivation, he could naturally form a protective barrier around him via manipting the magical yuan. As long as his magical yuan didn¡¯t run out, he could continue to maintain the barrier so that it didn¡¯t break, and use it to stop the invasion of the magma and mes.

    Compared to Marceau¡¯s barrier from earlier, the insides of Han Shuo¡¯s shield had a more moderate temperature. None of the various threats in the surroundings could prate the barrier. After the barrier enclosed Han Shuo and Sophie¡¯s body, their flight speed actually increased greatly as they broke through the obstacles ofyers of magma. They swiftly identified a narrow crack and rushed upwards against the scorching sparks.

    Sophie focused on observing Han Shuo¡¯s protective barrier during this process and disyed a confused expression. She even reached out carefully her hands and touched the protective shield with ck light flowing through it, then mused nkly as she felt the weird texture.

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression was carefree and confident without pain and suffering he¡¯d shown before as they rushed upwards. This caused the observing Sophie to be very confused. In the end, she couldn¡¯t resist as she asked with suspicion, ¡°Are you actually hurt or not?¡±

    Han Shuo understood her meaning the moment she said this and turned to look at Sophie. He smiled wryly and said, ¡°Don¡¯t think that I¡¯m fine just because my expression is carefree. I¡¯ve actually been enduring agonizing pain. It¡¯s just that I have to show my strong side in front of a beauty, only then will I leave the image of a powerful man in your mind!¡±

    Sophie obviously hadn¡¯t expected Han Shuo to say that. These words were full of ambiguities which Sophie naturally heard as well. She first nked, then rolled her eyes at Han Shuo with annoyance andughed, ¡°You¡¯re so interesting, who says things like that!¡±

    Han Shuo shrugged and pretended to in pain. He even used his magical cultivation to force himself to break out into a sweat and turned his face ghastly pale. He said with difficulty while panting, ¡°Look, this is my real situation. I might fail at any moment, then we¡¯ll both fall into the fireke together to see that beautiful lotus!¡±

    Sophie was extremely unused to Han Shuo¡¯s sudden change in appearance. She said anxiously with great shock, ¡°Don¡¯t scare me, I don¡¯t care if it¡¯s real or not, but I want to see your carefree look of just now!¡±

    ¡°No problem!¡± Han Shuoughed heartily as the painful expression disappeared from his face in the blink of an eye. The sweat on his forehead also miraculously disappeared, and he winked at Sophie with an evil smile. He teased casually, ¡°Is this better?¡±

    ¡°Pfft!¡±

    Sophie was unable to hold in herughter, and she waved her firsts to punch towards Han Shuo¡¯s chest. She huffed as she waved her fist angrily in front of Han Shuo, ¡°You evil person, you were tricking me the entire time!¡±

    ¡°Haha!¡± Han Shuoughed proudly. He then broke through theyers of magma with Sophie in tow and rushed directly towards the crack above.

    ¡°You guys are actually fine?!¡± Marceau, from the Brut Merchant alliance, suddenly eximed from a boundary wrapped in magma located beneath Han Shuo and Sophie¡¯s body.

    Right now, Marceau looked like she was drenched by rain. Her body was soaked in sweat and her face was pale as she huffed and puffed weakly. She moved the magical boundary with difficulty and slowly inched upwards.

    Her current appearance was simr to the appearance that Han Shuo had faked. It was obvious that she¡¯d used up a lot of mental strength, and was finding it harder and harder to hold on. When she noticed Han Shuo and Sophie had passed her by like an arrow as they flew straight towards the surface, she was even more shocked.

    ¡°Hi, let¡¯s meet up there!¡± Han Shuo casually looked down at Marceau beneath his feet as he responded with a smile. He then activated his magical yuan and ignored Marceau¡¯s concentrated gaze as he rushed towards the crack in the ground that was revealing the sky.

    One of his yin demons had been left near the underground fireke, while the other two had remained in the valley all this time. This had enabled Han Shuo to see everything clearly through the three yin demons¡¯ surveince.

    When the Lord of the mes left behind its three enemies without hesitation and wanted to return to the Kingdom of mes, the enormous silver ape was the only one that went to stop it, but was easily beaten back by the fury of the Lord of the mes.

    Without the cooperation of the golden dragon and the cyclops, the enormous silver ape was unable to defeat Lord of the mes, it could only watch as the Lord of the mes entered thergest crack on the ground and hitched a ride underground with the flowing magma.

    As the traces of the Lord of the mes disappeared, the proud golden dragon seemed to remember the purpose foring to the valley, and immediately started to attack its previous ally ¨C the cyclops. The cyclops seemed to know well beforehand that this would happen as well as it started fighting with the golden dragon. It carved a passage through the valley, as it fought with the golden dragon, making for the exit.

    When the Lord of the mesnded in his kingdom of mes, the enormous silver ape knew that it didn¡¯t have any more chances and left from the path that the golden dragon had torn open after beating on its chest. It disappeared with a few hops.

    Han Shuo saw all of this through the two yin demons he¡¯d left in the valley. The yin demon left around the fireke also noticed the enormous body of the Lord of the mes at this moment. It was mixed with the mes and magma, and was slowly sinking towards the bottom of theke.

    ¡°Phwee...¡±

    A long whistle rang out from a crack in the ground as a ck arrow shot out from within, hovering in the sky above the valley.

    Having managed to escape from danger, Han Shuo let out a long whistle as the barrier of ck light flowing around him cracked like an egg shell. Rays of ck light seemed to wrap around Han Shuo like lightning before it slowly sinking into his skin.

    These ck lightning wiggled beneath his exposed skin. They seemed to be like moving tattoos and disyed a shocking beauty. With Han Shuo¡¯s long whistle, the ck light slowly faded away as his skin color returned to normal.

    ¡°How long are you going to hold onto me for?¡± Sophie gazed at the series of changes to Han Shuo¡¯s body and couldn¡¯t help but re when she saw that he refused to let go of her slender waist.

    Due to the crack in the protective barrier, Han Shuo had been afraid of Sophie falling down from the sky and had held onto her slender waist in hurry just now. When he felt the soft sticity of Sophie¡¯s slender waist, the long whistle earlier had also been indescribablyfortable.

    ¡°Eh... I couldn¡¯t help it, hehe, couldn¡¯t help it!¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t feel awkward at all as he chuckled. ¡°I don¡¯t know that if I let go, would you directly crash to your death?¡±

    Sophie looked at Han Shuo in an unfriendly manner and then pointed below. ¡°I¡¯m only a few meters up from the ground. The surrounding area has not been covered byva yet. Do you think a knight who has darede to the Dark Forest by herself would fall to her death from a few meters in the sky?¡±

    ¡°ßÀ......ÎÒÏë²»»á£¬Äã¸Ã³ÃÔçÌáÐÑÎÒµÄ£¡¡±º«Ë¶ÃþÁËÃþÍ·£¬æÒÆ¤Ð¦Á³µÄËµÁËÒ»¾ä£¬Íì×ÅËÕ·ÆÏ¸ÑüµÄÓÒÊÖ½ôÁË½ô£¬ÁôÄîµÄ¸ÐÊÜÁËÒ»ÏÂËýÏ¸ÑüµÄÈáÈíÃÀÃî£¬Õâ²Å·ÅÊÖÈÎÓÉËýÍùµØÃæÂäÈ¥¡£

    ¡°Ugh... I think not, you should have reminded me earlier!¡± Han Shuo touched his head and said with aughing expression. He tightened his right hand on Sophie¡¯s thin waist, then gave ast feel for the miraculous softness of her waist, before letting her go and fall towards the ground.

    ¡°Awroo...¡± The Lord of the mes¡¯ strange roar suddenly rang out from deep within the ground.

    By using the yin demon underneath to investigate, Han Shuo noticed that the Lord of the mes¡¯ enormous body had beenpletely fused into the fireke. The fire lotus that had sunk into the fireke was raised in its giant palm. A powerful feeling emanated from the Lord of the mes towards the fire lotus through some sort of mystical power.

    Just as Han Shuo was growing worried, the Lord of the mes suddenly looked up and called out continuously, then carefully caressed the shut fire lotus as if it was a treasure. The murderous air around it was nowhere to be felt. Instead, it was more like a mother as it brought the fire lotus to its chest as a strange motherly love filled the entire fireke.

    ¡°No way, it¡¯s not treating the fire elite zombie as its child, right?¡± Han Shuo guessed in confusion as he waspletely dumbfounded.

 Chapter 240: A strange place

    Chapter 240: A strange ce

    A ray of red light flew out, showing that Marceau had finally escaped with incredible difficulty. Her wrinkled face was full of dejection as her shining eyes looked around, wanting to understand to fully grasp the current situation within the valley.

    The beautiful scenery and the valley full of flowers had beenpletely destroyed after the four enormous beings¡¯ battle. The ravines in the ground were flowing withva, while raging mes burned in huge holes, filling the air with a burnt smell.

    Marceau looked around for a bit and clearly let out a sigh of relief after noting the absence of the golden dragon, cyclops and gigantic silver ape. When she noticed Han Shuo and Sophie staring coldly at her at a distance, she forced an ugly smile on her face. She exined apologetically, ¡°Congrattions to the two of you for gaining a new life. I hope you can understand the special circumstances just now, I had no other choice!¡±

    Sophie¡¯s face was full of despise and contempt. She raised her head and snorted. Without looking at Marceau for even a moment longer, she said to Han Shuo still up in the air, ¡°Let¡¯s go. There¡¯s nothing to be said to this kind of person!¡±

    ¡°Yeah, I think so too!¡± Han Shuo supported Sophie¡¯s suggestion, then looked at Marceau coldly from afar. When he did that, he naturally emitted a wave of savage aura, but he didn¡¯t make a moved, and instead flew towards the exit of the valley.

    Sophie chanted out a mysterious summoning spell from her cherry lips. The pure, white, and beautiful pegasus appeared in the burning valley once again, helping Sophie mount.

    The enormous burning clouds slowly dispersed from the skies above the valley after the Lord of the mes ceased to control them. The wind in the sky blew lightly downwards and slowly extinguished the surging mes.

    It would definitely take more than a single day for the fire elite zombie to form. It would be a slow and gradual process. From the yin demon¡¯s surveince, not only did the Lord of the mes bear no ill will towards the life within the fire lotus, it even treated and protected him as its child. There definitely wouldn¡¯t be an issue with the fire elite zombie¡¯s safety.

    When the fire elite zombie had absorbed enough power, it would emerge from the fire lotus. When that happened, this ce of extreme fire will also be the fire zombie¡¯s kingdom of fire. Han Shuo would be able to use its connection with the fire elite zombie to sweep away all of the various fire spiritual stones, so he wasn¡¯t in a hurry to collect them.

    As Han Shuo exited the valley, Sophie rode the beautiful pegasus and followed behind him at a moderate space, eventually disappearing from the valley as well.

    Marceau watched both Han Shuo and Sophie leave with a sullen expression, but didn¡¯t take any action. Only a while after the two had disappeared did she gaze at the now clear sky and used a levitation skill to quietly rise into the sky.

    Han Shuo mentally contacted dark dragon Gilbert when they¡¯d left the valley. The little skeleton has already been sent back to the other dimension, and the yin demon left in the fireke also flew out of the ground¡¯s crack and met up with Han Shuo.

    When the yin demon returned to Han Shuo¡¯s side, he also sensed Gilbert¡¯s location. Sophie was following Han Shuo at a moderate pace on the pegasus. She gazed at Han Shuo with her beautiful and sparkling eyes, thinking some unknown thoughts.

    Han Shuo had a good impression of Sophie. When Han Shuo had pretended to be injured as he flew up from the fire lotus, it had been Sophie who had convinced the indecisive Marceau to let him into the boundary. After Han Shuo had entered the boundary, Sophie hadn¡¯t minded the terrible smell and the terrifying appearance of his legs to help Han Shuo sit up.

    Sophie¡¯s kindness had won Han Shuo¡¯s kindly disposition, causing Han Shuo to immediately enclose Sophie in his protective barrier after Marceau had cut them out, and use more magical yuan to protect Sophie.

    ¡°I think it¡¯s time for us to go separate ways!¡± Sophie had been silently following Han Shuo for a while when she finally spoke.

    Han Shuo turned around and looked at her deeply. He shed a dazzling smile and said, ¡°You are a kind and just knight. It was a pleasure to meet you!¡±

    They were about to go on their ways when Sophie also looked at Han Shuo with deep interest, as if she wanted tomit him to memory. After a while, she smiled and said, ¡°Bryan, if you have the time toe and tour the Kasi Empire, I can be your guide!¡±

    ¡°Oh!¡± Han Shuo was happy to hear that. He then asked curiously. ¡°How should I find you?¡±

    Sophie pouted and red at Han Shuo. She said strangely, ¡°Did you really just make your debut that you actually don¡¯t know me?¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head and spoke with augh, ¡°Are you very famous?¡±

    ¡°The Kasi Empire¡¯s sacred knight, Zoro, is my father. I am the only earth rider who rides a pegasus. If you want to find me when youe to the Kasi Empire, you¡¯ll definitely be able to find me. Goodbye, interesting scoundrel!¡± Sophie left behind a round of bell-like giggles as she flew in another direction on the pegasus, entering the skies like a little fairy. Shepletely disappeared in the blink of an eye.

    She was the daughter of a sacred knight! Han Shuo was shocked. Only then did he truly pay attention to Sophie¡¯s identity. He never would¡¯ve thought that she was from such a famous family and have such a terrifyingly powerful father.

    Currently on the Profound Continent, only the strongest of the strong would have the word ¡°sacred¡± added on their ss. Whether they were a sacred magus, a sacred swordmaster or sacred knight, they were the people that were publicly recognized to be the strongest. Regardless of what country they were in, they would hold an extraordinary position and gain the adoration of all of the people.

    People like them held terrifying strength. They could even instantly change the oue of a battle. They were existences that served as a nation¡¯s patron god, and had the strength that caused even kings to treat them carefully. Sophie¡¯s father was a sacred knight! No wonder she had such confidence, and rolled her eyes at Han Shuo furiously when he told her that he had never heard of her.

    However, there was another type of existence that exceeded the boundaries of ¡°sacred¡± and gained the title of ¡°divine¡±. They were the closest existence to the gods, and weremonly called demigods!

    They were the extreme of every ss. They were as rare of the scales of dragons and feathers of phoenixes, and only a few appeared during hundreds and thousands of years. They were called the divine magus, divine swordmaster, and the divine knights. These demigods had the destructive abilities to destroy the earth. Their power were on par with deities. If they could breakthrough even more, they would break through the barriers and be true gods.

    It was a pity that no such people had appeared on the Profound Continent yet. Those who held the title of ¡°sacred¡± were already the peak level of existence.

    As Sophie rode away on her pegasus, Han Shuo merely gawked at Sophie¡¯s identity for a bit and then flew towards where Gilbert was.

    He saw the huge footprints of the cyclops and signs of an intense battle along the way. The two meter long footprints were clearly from the cyclops. All of the towering ancient trees had been knocked down in rows, whereas some smaller hills also had been impacted.

    With just a few nces, Han Shuo was sure that it the cyclops and golden dragon had been fighting as they left the valley. Gilbert must¡¯ve followed the two enormous beings here stealthily.

    Gilbert was still following the two powerful creatures. Han Shuo could feel that he was constantly on the move without paying attention to his surroundings. As he followed his contact with Gilbert, Han Shuo fully activated the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heaven and rushed towards Gilbert like a ray of light.

    The valley had been in an ocean of mes before. Han Shuo only noticed that it was already night after he¡¯d left. The stars shimmered in the sky while moonlight flowed down like water, it was a pity that the passing scenery was no longer beautiful due to the fighting of the two powerful beings.

    After Han Shuo flew with all his might for a long distance, he heard a loud sound from afar. It was as shocking as the ground breaking apart. The ground seemed to be trembling due to this voice. In this moment, Han Shuo¡¯s distance with Gilbert also seemed to be gradually decreasing.

    Just as Han Shuo flew quickly and thought that he would be able to see Gilbert soon, the loud sound disappeared, and Han Shuo¡¯s contact with Gilbert was also cut off at the same time. No matter how hard Han Shuo tried, he couldn¡¯t sense Gilbert¡¯s existence.

    Han Shuo was shocked. He had no idea what had suddenly happened. He waspletely confused by this sudden change, so once again raised his speed and flew towards the location where he had sensed the dark dragon just now.

    Han Shuo was able to reach the scene with a speed of a falling star a few minutester. Traces of the two enormous beings¡¯ fight were still in front of him, but there was a vast area covered in ck mist as well.

    The area was extremelyrge. As Han Shuo gazed down from above, he noticed that the ck mist covered a 2.5 kilometer radius. The moonlight waspletely blocked off by the ck mist, preventing it from entering. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t able to see anything with his naked eyes either.

    Waves of intense evil filled the entire area. There seemed to be some sort of terrifying danger within the ck mist. Han Shuo was unable to feel the existence of any living things. It was as if the ck mist hadpletely blocked everything off.

    He hovered in the sky for a moment, then released a yin demon towards the area underneath. The formless yin demon descended slowly, then shot into the area of ck mist.

    Han Shuo¡¯s connection with the yin demon was instantly cut off. The yin demon that had slipped into the ck mist had instantly vanished in the blink of an eye. Han Shuo was unable to sense its position at all.

    Han Shuo was truly shocked now. His connection with Gilbert was due to the power of the contract, so it was possible for the area to block it off. However, the three yin demons were refined by feeding them his own blood essence. Having it disappear after entering that area was truly a bit frightening.

    The five kilometer radius below him waspletely blocked off by the ck smoke, he was unable to see what was going on inside at all. Han Shuo could only feel that it was full of an evil aura, meaning that the existence inside was definitely not a simple one.

    ¡°The Dark Forest is truly filled with mystery. This is such a bizarre ce! It seems that if I want to understand the situation, I have to go in and figure it out!¡± Han Shuo muttered to himself as he gazed at the area below. He activated the magical yun in his body to form a barrier that would protect his body and slowly descended into the area below. As Han Shuo slowly approached the ck mist, fear, depression, rage, insanity, and all sorts of negative emotions suddenly surged into Han Shuo¡¯s mind. It was like a power had tried to invade Han Shuo, trying to cause him to lose his sense of self.

    However, the murderous aura that¡¯d formed Han Shuo¡¯s body had absorbed various negative emotions in thest two ughters he¡¯dmitted. Being in the bloodlust realm, Han Shuo was also used to the invasion of negative emotions. He waspletely unaffected as his expression remained calm and controlled.

    ¡°This is rather interesting!¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but mutter with surprise after feeling that sort of negative emotion rush into his mind. His body suddenly sank and fell directly into the area.

    His lost connections with Gilbert and the yin demon was instantly reconstructed. It seemed like the ck mist only prevented contact with the outside, but couldn¡¯t stop the beings inside from connecting with each other.

    He didn¡¯t hurry to find Gilbert. Instead, Han Shuo looked around with fascinated eyes. He nned to fully memorize his bearings first so that he could make the correct decision when facing something dangerous.

    Han Shuo¡¯s vision was affected by the dense ck mist. He was only able to see ten meters around him. This part of the Dark Forest seemed entirely different as it was covered with ck mist. He looked around, but didn¡¯t find any vegetation within ten meters of him. There were only weird and dark-colored rocks around him.

    There was a small green stream beneath Han Shuo¡¯s feet. It flowed quietly without any fish in it. When Han Shuo looked up to the sky, the ck mist blocked off even the tiniest bit of light. The entire space was dim and filled with the smell of the destion.

    ¡°Mhmm!¡± Han Shuo eximed when he saw a strange stone monument through the yin demon¡¯s vision. It was the fact that there were some writing on the stone monument that caused Han Shuo to decide to go and see it for himself.

 Chapter 241: Demigod existence?

    Chapter 241: Demigod existence?

    AS Han Shuo approached the monument, he saw a row of words engraved in it from far away ¨C Ayermika Cotton!

    It was actually Ayermike Cotton¡¯s name! This simple row of text shocked Han Shuo greatly. As a citizen of the Lancelot Empire, he had heard a great deal about this person. Every citizen would speak of his deeds in great detail. As the peak existence of dark magic in the Lancelot Empire¡¯s history, Ayermika was a divine dark magus that was said to have a demigod¡¯s strength in the legends!

    Five hundred years ago, Ayermika Cotton had helped the first king of the Lancelot Empire to establish the Empire. It was only with this person¡¯s help that the founding emperor of the Lancelot Empire was able to conquer all of the foreign tribes, exile the barbaric beastmen, drive off the greedy and despicable goblins, and stand above the various factions to establish control of thend. Even now, the Lancelot Empire stood firmly upon thisnd.

    In the legends, Ayermika Cotton was a divine dark magus with the abilities to destroy the world. In that era, not only did such a powerful being bring about the existence of the Lancelot Empire, it had also deified his being, resulting in adoration from all citizens of the Lancelot Empire for five hundred years!

    Even now, there hadn¡¯t been any descendants who could surpass his glory and game!

    Ayermika¡¯s entire life had been glorified with the legends of greatness. He¡¯d defeated countless powerful people, expanded the borders of the Lancelot Empire, and shattered the fighting spirit and confidence of the foreign tribes. His power had caused the all the tribes to submit to the Empire¡¯s reign as soon as the Empire¡¯s iron hoovesnded on it.

    However, such a terrifying demigod existence had suddenly disappeared at the peak of his life. The Lancelot Empire had been in its grandest era, having already conquered several countries around it. It was at that time that Ayermika should¡¯ve been enjoying glories and honor.

    However, he¡¯d disappeared mysteriously, just like that. The first king of the Lancelot Empire had been unable to ept the departure of his true friend, and used all sorts of ways to search for him. They were still unable to discover anything in the end.

    There were quite a few versions of the rumors surrounding his mysterious disappearance. Some said that he grew sick of conquest and went into hiding by himself. Others said that he surpassed everything and ascended to be a true god. There were those that said although he¡¯d defeated countless powerful foes in his life of conquest, he had been injured several hundred times. The frail body of a mage was unable to withstand the wounds in his old age, so he¡¯d died in a depressing way.

    However, the legends were still just legends in the end! All words were mere illusions before any tangible evidence was produced. Ayermika Cotton¡¯s mysterious departure five hundred years ago remained an unresolved mystery!

    However, there was a monument with Ayermika Cotton¡¯s name engraved on it in such a strange ce enclosed by ck mist. From the shape and engraving of the monument, Han Shuo was certain that it was a tombstone to memorialize the deceased buried here. Seeing this filled Han Shuo¡¯s heart with shock. He wanted to draw close to the tombstone and carefully inspect it.

    Just at this moment, Gilbert started moving towards Han Shuo, using their mutual connection. Han Shuo could even feel Gilbert¡¯s anxiety.

    Han Shuo had already nned to examine the tombstone closely, but due to Gilbert¡¯s anxious and swift approach, he set the idea aside. He then increased his awareness so that he was ready before leaping up andnding behind a huge boulder. At the same time, he also sent out a yin demon to fly in Gilbert¡¯s direction.

    Gilbert, who¡¯d changed into his dragon form, approached swiftly with an enormous roar. He actually wasn¡¯t flying, but was using his body to slither forward like a huge python. The gigantic cyclops was chasing him relentlessly, while the golden dragon that had originally been fighting with the cyclops was slithering on the ground like Gilbert, forgoing a dragon¡¯s natural talent to fly.

    ¡°Great master,e quickly and save your pitiful servant!¡± As Gilbert approached swiftly, his eyes shone with frantic light as he continuously bawled out in his deep voice.

    Hearing that Gilbert was shouting for Han Shuo to save him, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but curse quietly behind the boulder, ¡°Dumb dragon, with you shouting like this, anyone would know that there¡¯s someone waiting ahead. How can I ambush them then!¡±

    Seeing that he couldn¡¯t set up an ambush, Han Shuo cursed lowly as he leapt up into the sky and flew in Gilbert¡¯s direction. Then, he let out a dominating whistle in order to notify Gilbert of his presence.

    Through the yin demon¡¯s surveince, Han Shuo saw that the cyclops and golden dragon seemed to be chasing Gilbert. Who knew what sort of shitty thing Gilbert had done in order to piss off two enemies enough for them to work together to kill him?

    The terrified Gilbert calmed down slightly when he heard the piercing whistle. He then furiously ¡°crawled¡± over and startedining before he reached Han Shuo, ¡°Two on one, this is too shameless, too wicked!¡±

    ¡°Damn stinky bug, you nearly ambushed and killed both of us when we were tired from the fight! But whatever, you actually brought us to this forbiddennd, making us have no way out. You¡¯re the most shameless and wicked!¡± To Han Shuo¡¯s surprise, the cyclops actually let out a thundering curse after a furious roar.

    ¡°A shameless person that ran over to someone else¡¯s ce to steal stuff doesn¡¯t have the right to scold others!¡± Gilbert was clearly more confident with Han Shuo around, so he turned around and mocked the cyclops. He then swiftly moved his huge body and stood in line with Han Shuo.

    ¡°You¡¯re pissing me off, you damn reptile, I¡¯m going to kill you!¡± The cyclops was enraged. He roared at the sky and his single eye began to shimmer with a terrifying light as he leaped towards Gilbert.

    The majority of the cyclops¡¯ body had been scorched by the Lord of the mes. Its tworge azure palms were a mess of blood and muscle. It seemed that the fight with the golden dragon afterwards had caused it quite a lot of harm.

    ¡°Shut up! You can beat him and curse him, but you aren¡¯t allowed to use the words ¡®reptile¡¯ and ¡®stinky bug¡¯ in front of me! Otherwise, I¡¯ll kill you first, you damn one-eyed thief!¡± The golden dragon roared furiously and howled loudly behind the cyclops.

    The golden dragon¡¯s body condition was equally as bad. Not only wererge patches of its golden scales ck, there were also some scales that were sttered with blood. Even itsrge head had a trail of blood dripping from it. It seemed that the fight earlier had caused it to be severely injured.

    ¡°You crazy dragon, do you think I¡¯m afraid of you!¡± The cyclops and golden dragon had fought their entire way out of the valley, and had be quite angry with each other. Although the cyclops was extremely furious with Gilbert¡¯s shameless actions, he had no good feelings towards the golden dragon either. He immediately turned around to argue with the golden dragon, as if they were ready resume their halted fight at any time.

    The truth was this as well. The proud golden dragon just couldn¡¯t take any provocation. Right after the cyclops¡¯ initial thunderous shout, he¡¯d already rushed up with a howl and started fighting with the cyclops. They¡¯d already forgotten about Gilbert andpletely disregarded him.

    ¡°Eh... What¡¯s going on?¡± Han Shuo was confused by the two enormous beings fighting in front of him. He couldn¡¯t help but look at Gilbert, asking him with a wry smile.

    ¡°Haha, I saw that they fought along the entire way, so I followed them, and took the chance of moving arge rock that was the size of a small mountain when they were both tired in hopes of smashing them both to death. What I didn¡¯t know was that they were rather nimble and managed to dodge it. Afterwards, they chased me all the way here.

    I started running frantically without caring where I went, and ended up rushing into this strange ce. The two of them had already lost their sense of reason, and also followed without thinking. Then, I noticed that my power was restrained. Not only did I lose the power of my tribe to spurt poison, I couldn¡¯t fly anymore.

    ¡°Of course, that dumb golden dragon couldn¡¯t fly anymore either. He could only crawl like me. It seemed that like even the cyclops has his power restrained. After a brief moment of shock, they treated me as their main focus of attacks. They started attacking me together with great shouts. I had no other way, so I could onlye find you!¡± Gilbert didn¡¯t mind in the slightest, andughed evilly when he exined his shameless actions to Han Shuo. Looking at his prideful look, he was clearly honored instead of ashamed!

    ¡°You truly are despicable!¡± Han Shuomented upon hearing Gilbert¡¯s description.

    ¡°I learned all of this from you!¡± Gilbert yelled, ming it all on Han Shuo, as if he¡¯d been that pure when he left the underground world!

    Rumble...

    Loud collision sounds rang out from where the cyclops and the golden dragon were fighting. Dark colored boulders around them exploded outwards, whilst the cyclops and golden dragon copsed limply on one side, arge pit between the two of them.

    Just as the two enormous beings struggled to stand up and continue their fight, the cyclops shouted in a thunderous voice, ¡°Wait, why isn¡¯t the human affected by the environment and is still able to fly in the sky?!¡±

    Upon hearing that, the golden dragon and Gilbert also looked confusedly at Han Shuo, seeming to be filled with surprise and confusion. They suddenly seemed to regard Han Shuo, still able to fly in the sky, as a really special sort of existence.

    ¡°Human, there is no magical essence in this forbidden ce, so how are you still in the sky?¡± The golden dragon coiled up from his limp posture with difficulty and raised his head up high. Even now, he still did not forget about the innate pride of his tribe, and seemed to want to suppress Han Shuo in his atmosphere. He gazed at Han Shuo from above and asked with a tone that was used to interrogate criminals

    ¡°None of your damn business!¡± Han Shuo replied very sharply with a very disparaging tone towards the golden dragon.

    Just as the golden dragon was about to roar with anger, the cyclops couldn¡¯t help but jeer, ¡°Dumb dragon, do you think someone who can stay in the sky in this forbiddennd would be scared of you? Have you not heard about the legend about this forbidden ce? Do you really want to die?¡±

    The golden dragon surprisingly shut his mouth the moment the cyclops voiced this thought. His two eyes, that were asrge as a human head, quickly shone with a strange brightness. They focused on Han Shuo as he shook his head with disbelief. He rumbled, ¡°Impossible, how is it possible!¡±

    ¡°Great demigod existence, you must have exceeded the barriers of mankind. Please, you must shine your merciful light and take us away from this forbidden ce!¡± Sincere pleading filled the cyclops¡¯ eye. Furthermore, his humongous body bent in a weird manner to disy respect for Han Shuo.

    Even the golden dragon stopped his muttering and gazed at Han Shuo silently. The pride within him made him unable to immediately bow before Han Shuo, but he also conveyed urgent pleading with his eyes.

    ¡°What do you mean?¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t know what to say and looked at the two enormous beings in confusion. He scratched his head in silence for a moment and couldn¡¯t resist asking with confusion.

    ¡°All the super rank beings in the Dark Forest know of the legend of this forbiddennd. There was a shocking battle here five hundred years ago. The legends say that even true gods participated. That battle caused all of the beings in the Dark Forest to tremble. The enormousmotionsted for three days and two nights. Nobody knows what happened.¡±

    The cyclops showed an expression of lingering fear and continued in his thunderous tones, ¡°None of the powerful beings that tried toe in to observe the situation were able to walk out of the forbidden zone. Furthermore, none of the beings that identally entered the forbidden zone made it out alive either.

    Legends says that all magic and fighting aura is restrained in the forbidden area. All beings can only use pure physical abilities, and they cannot leave the forbidden ce. Only demigods that have surpassed the divine stage will be unaffected by the limitations of the forbidden ce. Great human demigod, please take us away from here!¡±

    Although the golden dragon hadn¡¯t said anything, his gaze towards Han Shuo waspletely different from before. His gaze clearly contained a bit of pleading, and he couldn¡¯t help but dip his proud head.

    ¡°I think that you¡¯re mistaken!¡± Han Shuo looked helplessly at the two enormous beings, then exined with a shrug. ¡°I¡¯m very sorry, but I¡¯m not some kind of demigod existence!¡±

 Chapter 242: Murderous Soul

    Chapter 242: Murderous Soul

    ¡°How is this possible? If you¡¯re not a demigod existence, how are you not affected by the restraints of the forbidden ce and continue to fly?¡± The cyclops found this hard to believe. He had an incredulous expression on his face, perhaps afraid of the hope that he¡¯d ced on Han Shuo vanishing.

    Han Shuo chanted out a most basic necromancy spell, the skeleton summoning spell that he never failed in casting. There was no effect this time. No abnormalities formed out of the dark space ¨C the necromancy spell had failed!

    This was indeed the case! Han Shuo was shocked and understood that the cyclops wasn¡¯t lying. It seemed that no magic abilities could be used in this forbidden ce.

    ¡°Wait a moment!¡± Han Shuo called softly towards the cyclops and the golden dragon, and flew directly up into the swirling ck mist.

    However, just as Han Shuo felt that he was about to leave the space of the swirling ck mist, a nearly infinite wave of strange energy blocked off the sky like a trillion ton rock. Han Shuo charged furiously into it, causing his entire body to ache with pain, but no matter what he did, he couldn¡¯t break through the cover of the ck mist and leave this strange space.

    There was no need to try anymore. Han Shuo understood that this area with a 2.5 kilometer radius had beenpletely restrained by this strange power, just like the cemetery of death. It was impossible to leave without opening the boundary.

    Han Shuonded dejectedly, rubbing his buzzing head. When he looked at the surprised cyclops and golden dragon in front of him, Han Shuo spread out his hands and apologized, ¡°The entire forbidden ce is truly enclosed within a boundary, the same going for the sky covered by ck mist. I think that if there is no special way, we don¡¯t need to bother thinking about leaving the forbidden ce!¡±

    The cyclops and golden dragon were starting to believe that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t the demigod existence they¡¯d thought him to be. When facing the threat of death, and their hopes extinguished, the two powerful beings lost interest even in why Han Shuo was able to fly. They started sighing continuously in despair.

    Seeing that the two powerful beings had not only lost interest in his ability to fly, but was also the desire to attack Gilbert, Han Shuo was able to understand the depths of their utter despair.

    ¡°Great master, what should we do? I don¡¯t want to stay in this damned ce. Let¡¯s go to the colorful outside world to continue my iplete legend!¡± Gilbert was very anxious as he started to fretfully wail.

    No beings have left the forbidden ce in five hundred years, not even super rank magical beasts with extremely long lives. Yet, after Han Shuo had entered this area, he¡¯d only felt the coldness of death without a hint of life. This meant that those super rank magical beasts with extremely long lives must¡¯ve died there.

    As he looked up to the sky, Han Shuo noticed that the ck mist swirling around the entire region had gradually be denser, possibly due to his forceful impact. There was an extremely dangerous, murderous aura that floated around in the damp air.

    ¡°I don¡¯t think we could die of old age here, even if we want to!¡± Han Shuo muttered as he felt the surroundings change. He then suddenly call out. ¡°Careful, danger!¡±

    Just when he¡¯d beenining about everything, Gilbert suddenly sensed the terrifying change in their surroundings as well, along with the cyclops and the golden dragon. This caused their survival instincts to kick in immediately as they nervously scanned their surroundings, ready to react at any time.

    Swirls of inseparable ck mist roiled in the sky, the asional green shes of light mixed in with them revealing an evil and terrible power. As it swept over and crashed down on those assembled, they found it difficult to even breathe. The colossal power seemed as weighty as a billion ton mountain, bearing down on everyone¡¯s backs.

    Even enormous beings like the cyclops and golden dragon could only scream and howl in the face of such terrifying pressure. Their figures, they hadpletely lost their minds! Gilbert, at only rank one, had already fallen t on the ground like a limp snake, unable to even stand up.

    The magical yuan within Han Shuo cycled furiously, creating a sparkling ck protective shield thatpletely covered Han Shuo¡¯s body. Meanwhile, rays of ck lightning swirled around inside the shield as the pure magical yuan refined the shield over and over again, raising the defensive power of the shield even further.

    In the end, the protective shield around Han Shuo was as beautiful as a piece of clear ink jade, and Han Shuo seemed like a living fossil entombed within the ck jade, full of a demonic charm.

    The forbidden ce had sealed all of the mystical powers within this world, but the magical yuan from another dimension was not something the forbidden ce could simply snuff out!

    Thus, as Han Shuo furiously cycled his magical yuan to protect himself, he actually managed to withstand the tremendous pressure and remain standing.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s profound gaze examined at the change in the entire area, none of the traces of evil aura were able to escape his detection. His originally anxious heart was thumping violently, and his once calm breathing slowly sped up.

    Han Shuo actually felt a sliver of familiarity from the strange power enclosing the forbidden ce. More, it seemed as though this power was filled with a drug-like allure to him, someone in the bloodlust realm!

    A miraculous feeling was suddenly transmitted from the demon infant within his body. The demon infant was like a bloodthirsty little monster that had finally caught the scent of fresh blood. It was no longer able to resist as it rampaged within Han Shuo¡¯s body and urged him onwards, as if it was trying to reach something.

    Terrible green light shed within the inky mist that covered the entire area, as swirls of the mist started to converge around Han Shuo and the others. Waves of the terrifying evil aura seeped out from the swirls of smoke. Under the continuous shes of the green light, the mist gradually changed shape, transforming into a savage and horrifying face that bore downwards.

    ¡°No!¡± The cyclops let out an angry roar and waved his giant shovel towards the terrifying face. The golden dragon also let out a roar and furiously swung his huge tail towards the sky, towards the savage, demonic face.

    However, their attacks had not the barest of effects on the savage phantasm. It fearlessly reformed after it was scattered, and lunged down with shocking fierceness.

    Still inside his protective barrier, Han Shuo suddenly eximed,¡°Specters, they¡¯re specters!¡±

    Instantly, he dispelled the protective barrier that covered his entire body as rays of bloody light shot out from his body, causing a dense, murderous aura to suddenly surround his body.

    At the same time, a sh of indigo light shot out from his body. The Demonyer Edge was shining with a purplish red light as it danced around endlessly above Han Shuo¡¯s head.

    Han Shuo had a calm expression before, but now his face had twisted into a savage and frightening visage. His stark white teeth were bared in a devil¡¯s grin, as his eyes glowed blood red. The murderous aura around his body spread out and entwined with the Demonyer Edge above his head. A piercing bloody light exploded forth from man and the weapon in that moment.

    The terrifying demonic face was screeching without any sound. All of the evil faces that was rushing down towards the cyclops and the golden dragon all panicked, and started to escape without the slightest hesitation.

    But it was far toote. With Han Shuo and the Demonyer Edge as the center, an enormous whirlpool had unknowingly formed above them. It was hovering in the air, around ten meters wide, a murderous aura swirling within. Blood red light shed inside as evil energy swirled within it.

    All of the ¡°specters¡± that had gathered seemed to be caught within a strong suction force generated by the enormous whirlpool. All of them frantically tried to escape, but none were able to. Under the attraction of the enormous whirlpool above Han Shuo¡¯s head, no matter how far away the ¡°specters¡± escaped, they were slowly reeled back towards the whirlpool.

    The intense and overwhelming pressure instantly disappeared. Gilbert straightened his back from his limp snake position as he looked at Han Shuo, watching the hugemotion in the air. He muttered to himself, ¡®Great master, what the hell are you doing?¡±

    ¡°Little dark dragon, what exactly is your master? What is he doing? Why is there no trace of a fighting or magical aura that a human should have?¡± The proud golden dragon couldn¡¯t help but yell after hearing Gilbert¡¯s muttering.

    ¡°No matter what, our dangerous situation just now was ayed due to his unusual actions. Otherwise, we would¡¯ve already been killed by those evil ghost faces!¡± The cyclops looked meaningfully at Han Shuo with his single eye. He still couldn¡¯t find any trace of a fighting or magical aura from the human after a while. ording to his understanding of the world, he understood that Han Shuo truly might not be some sort of demigod existence. However, Han Shuo¡¯s current actions had illogically removed the enormous pressure that had covered the entire area, causing the cyclops to not dare underestimate Han Shuo.

    Since his master had shown off his might, Gilbert also took the chance to strut around with borrowed influence. He raised his neck high and loudly proimed, ¡°Damn, how do I know what¡¯s going on? However, my master is very powerful! Otherwise, as a mighty dark dragon, how could I have submitted at his feet!¡±

    The two powerful beings were convinced of the dark dragon¡¯s words; Han Shuo¡¯s current actions and Gilbert¡¯s existence were proof enough of Han Shuo being an extremely powerful existence. Due to this, even though the dark dragon had been talking so disrespectfully, the golden dragon and the cyclops epted it, as if they had already forgotten about the dark dragon¡¯s previous wicked actions, and didn¡¯t attack him.

    Since Gilbert had such a powerful master who was able to dispel the tremendous pressure that covered the entire area in his own unique way, they weren¡¯t willing to attack the dark dragon at this moment and bring about unnecessary trouble for themselves. If the human stopped all his actions and that strong pressure appeared once more, only death awaited the cyclops and golden dragon.

    Therefore, the two enormous beings only snorted coldly in response to Gilbert¡¯s uncourteous thering without saying anything else. Since they saw that the dark dragon didn¡¯t know anything, the two of them didn¡¯t continue questioning him. They merely recovered their stamina on the side as they quietly watched the changes in Han Shuo.

    The savage demonic face that floated in the air earlier had already be a pitiful refugee ¨C a pitiful fugitive that could not escape! Ever the ¡°specters¡± that had left this area at the beginning were pulled in by the whirlpool above Han Shuo¡¯s head, no matter how terrified any of them were.

    It was as if the murderous aura around Han Shuo and the whirlpool of bloody light created by the Demonyer Edge had some sort of restraining effect towards the weird strange specters. There was not a single one that could escape in the end. Under the powerful suction of the giant whirlpool, the savage green faces silently roared in terror as they became rays of dark green light and fused into the whirlpool.

    The immense whirlpool was like a huge strange tree, the swirls within like flourishing leaves, and a thin path towards the roots. When the specters were sucked in one by one, the huge whirlpool was filled with harrowing, rampaging energy.

    Lights of blood red, ck, and terrifying green slowly gathered within the Demonyer Edge and Han Shuo through the roots, as well as a dense, baleful aura. The whirlpool churned more and more quickly as the Demonyer Edge absorbed arge amount of specters. It began to shine brightly, slowly disying the splendor of a peerless weapon. Violent screeches continuously rang out from the Demonyer Edge, causing the three enormous beings to shake and tremble.

    On the other hand, Han Shuo was surrounded in a mist formed from the baleful aura, sitting cross-legged in the sky. Behind him, the dense aura had faintly formed a giant gazing down towards the earth. The giant was ten-odd meters tall in the sky, and had a horrifying deathly me. It looked exactly the same as the Han Shuo with bloodshot eyes.

    This astonishing scenested for a day and a night before the giant whirlpool above Han Shuo¡¯s head slowly dissipated. All of the specters in the area also disappeared along with it. Even the floating image of the giant behind Han Shuo, slowly flew into hi¡¯s body. Only the Demonyer Edge was left floating and shining above Han Shuo¡¯s head.

    ¡°ROAR....¡±

    A terrifying howl suddenly tore out of Han Shuo¡¯s mouth. He¡¯d been sitting down cross legged when he suddenly stood up with bloodshot eyes. His figure seemed to embody the soul of a peerless killer that had just awakened from his slumber underground. He stared savagely at the cyclops, the golden dragon, and even Gilbert, making them tremble from within the depths of their hearts!

 Chapter 243: Destruction

    Chapter 243: Destruction

    ¡°What, what does he want to do?¡± The proud golden dragon couldn¡¯t help but exim with a shudder of his heart when he saw Han Shuo, evil incarnate, re sternly at him with blood red eyes.

    ¡°How do I know?! Oh my gawd, honored master, just what do you want to do? I¡¯m your most humble servant Gilbert!¡± Gilbert had just drawn himself upright when he saw the violent looking Han Shuo stride over, a wave of murderous intent churning towards him like a wave of blood. Gilbert immediately started screaming in a panic.

    It was a pity that Han Shuo¡¯s expression was a frightful leer at the moment. His pupils had all turned a blood red as he threw his head back, screaming to the heavens, and charged over like a bloodthirsty beast.

    The aura circling around him had solicited into a red mist, and started turning over with an incontrovertible momentum as Han Shuo leapt and flew.

    ¡°This is bad, he¡¯s lost his reason!¡± The cyclops¡¯ thunderous tones suddenly cried out as he prepared for the worst.

    The golden dragon was standing the closest to Han Shuo at this time, and he¡¯d already curled himself into a ball, bing Han Shuo¡¯s first target of attack. Han Shuo had alreadynded on the golden dragon¡¯s head amidst the mass of aura and punched downwards with one fist.

    If it¡¯d been only Han Shuo¡¯s fist, the golden dragon might not have minded that much. After all, Han Shuo¡¯s body size was on a different level from the golden dragon. There was a limit to the power behind his punch and the area he could cover. He would be unable to cause too much damage to this enormous being.

    However, when the punch came crashing down, the murderous aura around Han Shuo suddenly coalesced into the forms of red fists the size of small mountains. The fistspletely encircled the golden dragon¡¯s coiled up form, the pressure such that he could barely catch his breath. A destructive ferocity descended upon his head.

    The proud golden dragon cried out in pain as he cussed viciously. He was forced to uncurl himself and stab out viciously with his tail that was as long as the Great Wall of China.

    Rumble...

    An earth shattering explosion traveled from the impact of the violent punch and the golden dragon¡¯s tail. The boulders around the golden dragon crumbled from the impact as he howled with pain. His dragon tail couldn¡¯t seem to take the pressure as it curled together with a shake. The more than ten meter long body wasid low from its previously proud position with this blow.

    ¡°Wahaha, mighty master, your humble servant is proud of you! You used your power to beat the strongest of the dragon race, the golden dragon, into the ground! I, Gilbert of the dark dragons, have witnessed this historical moment. You are the master I chose alright...¡±

    The terrifying blow had pounded the golden dragon into the ground. Disbelief shone out of the cyclops¡¯ single eye as Gilbert continued to yell, ¡°Eh... my mighty, handsome, amazing, and noble master, what... what do you want to do? Are you nning on hitting your cutest, most loyal, most honest, and most humble Gilbert? Um...¡±

    However, the fist with blood red lighting out of it vanished before Gilbert¡¯s fawning had ended. When Han Shuo kicked towards Gilbert, a blood red foot appeared out of midair and aimed straight at the chattering dark dragon.

    Before Gilbert had even finished yammering, this foot had already stepped down on Gilbert¡¯s head. If it continued, Gilbert would never again be able to be this noisy!

    ¡°ROAR...¡±

    As the dark dragon roared in despair, a towering figure suddenly shot out. An enormous green hand dragged back this foot for Gilbert, and the green cyclops crashed to a sitting position on the ground after a series of rumblings and shaking. He looked in fear at the grimacing Han Shuo who was slowly descending.

    ¡°Stupid dumb dragon, he¡¯s already lost his mind and isn¡¯t your master anymore. Do you want to die?¡± The golden dragon had finally struggled up from his copsed position on the ground. He couldn¡¯t help but shake his head and tail and roar, wanting Gilbert to recognize reality.

    Gilbert found it a bit difficult to react. In the depths of his heart, he was unwilling to believe that Han Shuo would want to kill him. He murmured to himself in a daze, ¡°How is that possible? How would my master want to kill me?¡±

    ¡°Dumb dragon, although I don¡¯t know what¡¯s happened, your master really has lost his mind at the moment. He is now very, very strong. I and that unlucky golden dragon don¡¯t have much energy left now. Only the three of us together will be possibly able to fight against your master!¡±

    As the cyclops watched Han Shuo slowly descend form the sky, a boundless, thick murderous sense locking firmly onto them, he couldn¡¯t help but cry all anxiously at Gilbert.

    Gilbert shook his head dazedly. Although his heart ached, and he felt despair at Han Shuo¡¯s vicious blow just now, he still said stubbornly, ¡°No! Absolutely not! I can¡¯t fight my master with you guys! Not even if I die!¡±

    ¡°Idiot, we wouldn¡¯t be able to kill him with even the three of us! We just need to defend or control him! We¡¯re saving him, you stupid, damned dark dragon! Do you understand this or not?¡± The golden dragon started roaring on the other side when he was faced with threat of death.

    ¡°Indeed, dumb dragon, we¡¯re saving him, saving him! Stupid!¡± The cyclops immediately understood when he heard the golden dragon¡¯s word and started yelling as well.

    The dragons were a proud race, and if it wasn¡¯t for special circumstances, it was very difficult for them to submit to humans, a race they disdained. However, once a dragon formed a contract with a human, their loyalty was unquestionable before their master died.

    Gilbert had spent a bit of time with Han Shuo, and his master¡¯s actions were right up his alley. Even though Han Shuo had lost his mind and had struck out viciously at him, he¡¯d never had any thoughts of resistance. This was like a dark dragon¡¯s naturally lewd nature, a innate brand on the dragons that no one was able to change!

    The golden dragon understood this racial characteristic well and thus immediately changed his tune, spinning this as a way of liberating Han Shuo and dispelling the conflict that this formed against Gilbert¡¯s nature.

    Indeed, it was as if cold water had been dumped over Gilbert¡¯s head. The golden dragon and the cyclops¡¯ roaring shocked Gilbert awake. Having thought through things, he muttered anxiously, ¡°That¡¯s right, I must help you. Nothing can happen to you, your humble servant still needs your guidance!¡±

    ¡°ROAR...¡±

    Han Shuo was slowly descending upon the three enormous beings when he suddenly leered and roared out again, charging forward with a frightening sound wave. Ripples of the murderous aura rolled over in the dark space. Evil was contained with the sound wave, and it seemed like clouds of fire were pouring down form the skies.

    Blood started leaking out of the mouths, nose, and eyes of the three beings beneath the attack of this horrifying sound wave. Their bodies rolled violently, seemingly to be unable to hold up beneath this terrifying sound wave.

    ¡°Damn it, just what kind of attack has your master used? As opposed to him yelling, I¡¯d rather face his enormous fists and kicks. At least we can block the tangible attacks, what can we do against this sound wave!¡± Streams of blood as thick as a baby¡¯s arms were leaking out of the golden dragon¡¯sntern-like eyes as heined whilst blood dripped out of his mouth.

    ¡°Oh my gosh, what is going on? My master shouldn¡¯t be this strong!¡± Gilbert had spent a long time with Han Shuo. Although he was uncertain of Han Shuo¡¯s true strength, his master had never demonstrated such frightening strength.

    ¡°Nothing for it, the three of us need tobine our strength to attack him! Otherwise, we¡¯ll be dead without a doubt. He probably won¡¯t be able to escape the bacsh of this power! The frightening power around him now is from the specters that were present earlier. This must have happened because he¡¯s trying to absorb them all!¡± The cyclops was the calmest out of them all. He hastily raised this suggestion when he saw that all of them were about to die from the impact.

    The cyclops and the golden dragon suddenly looked at each other before Gilbert reacted and stood up together. They endured the agonizing pain of their bodies to charge towards Han Shuo, wrapped inyers of murderous aura and bloody sound waves, in mid air.

    Han Shuo had been roaring furiously when he felt the movements of the two enormous creatures. He cackled oddly as his bloodshot eyes suddenly lit up. Bloody light emanated from his pupils and concentrated on the two enormous beings like it was something tangible.

    The two had just struggled to their feet when they were swept by his bloody eyes. A terrifying power immediately invaded their bodies as they began to seize and spasm. Terrifying cries traveled out from their mouths.

    ¡°Damned dark dragon, you¡¯re right behind him. Make your move or we¡¯ll all die!¡± The golden dragon¡¯s scales were exploding one after another after Han Shuo had swept his blood gaze over them. Fresh blood was gushing forth, and the golden dragon kept trying to evade the gaze as he screamed for his life.

    ¡°Hurry up, you¡¯re saving him, damned stupid dragon!¡± The cyclops¡¯ skin suddenly split open after been swept by Han Shuo¡¯s gaze, and his injuries were increasing in scale. His heart was filled with an unknown fear as he too began screaming in earnest, cussing for the first time.

    Gilbert murmured as the two enormous beings howled in pain, ¡°I¡¯m going to save you, save you...¡±

    A resolute emotion appeared in Gilbert¡¯s eyes as he reached out suddenly with his dragon ws, pping them forward cautiously and gingerly towards thepletely unsuspecting Han Shuo in front of him.

    He nned on knocking Han Shuo unconscious first and then finding a way to restore Han Shuo¡¯s reason, saving his master from this berserk state. Gilbert¡¯s loyalty was without a doubt.

    Bam!

    An enormous dull thud sounded as a patch of red mist appeared over Han Shuo¡¯s head, blocking Gilbert¡¯s swipe. Wrapped in the red mist, Han Shuo hadn¡¯t been injured at all, but he¡¯d seemed to feel Gilbert¡¯s malicious intent. He couldn¡¯t help but turn around and re at Gilbert with bloodshot eyes, roaring furiously.

    All of the murderous aura floating around Han Shuo was affected by his anger and congregated from all corners, feeding into the Demonyer Edge floating in front of Han Shuo¡¯s chest. The enormous murderous aura seemed to be bloody waves as they quickly gathered within the Demonyer Edge.

    The savagely howling Demonyer Edge suddenly emanated a destructive aura. When all of the aura surrounding Han Shuo had been absorbed, a beam of blood red light a hundred meters tall shone out of the weapon. It¡¯d be a peerless weapon that could cleave the heavens and earth, and Han Shuo seemed like a demon god that could destroy all when he wielded it.

    The hundred meter light slowly pivoted and locked onto Gilbert as Han Shuo¡¯s right arm adjusted its direction. During this process, anywhere the frightening light passed by directly reduced the weathered boulders into rock dust.

    When faced with this boundless aura, Gilbert¡¯s enormous body seemed so small and helpless. His dragon eyes were filled with despair, fear, bitterness, and sadness. As his eyes locked dumbly onto the raging Han Shuo, he couldn¡¯t help but murmur lowly, ¡°No, you won¡¯t, you¡¯re my master and won¡¯t really want to kill me!¡±

    ¡°Dumb dragon, run, run!!¡± The cyclops and golden dragon screamed in reminder. For some reason, their hearts were filled with bitterness as well.

    However, for some reason, the usually loud and active Gilbert seemed to be stuck dumbly in ce like a fool. Blood red tears slowly formed in hisntern-like eyes, but his body stayed firmly put as if it¡¯d been rooted!

    Earth shattering roars continuously emitted from the grimacing Han Shuo¡¯s mouth. The destructive Demonyer Edge and hundred meter tall sword slowly lifted to aim at Gilbert. Both the cyclops and the golden dragon had no doubt that when this light descended, Gilbert would be carved into many little pieces of meat. He wouldn¡¯t have the slightest chance of survival and his vital signs would be utterly erased.

    ¡°No!¡± A howl came from Han Shuo¡¯s mouth. It was the first human sound he¡¯d made up until now. His face contorted with pain, the ck lightning surrounding him as he roared furiously started crackling and popping. The blood vessels in his neck and arm starting exploding, and fresh blood sttered him all over.

    Han Shuo ignored the frightening wounds on his body. He couldn¡¯t seemed to control his limbs as he looked at his right arm with a twisted expression. He kept yelling, ¡°No, no!!¡±

    Suddenly, his expression hardened as his bloody left arm suddenly mmed into his weapon wielding right arm. Itnded like a bolt of lightning, apanied by a crisp breaking sound. arrows of blood shot out from his arms and sped toward the surroundings.

    This self-mutting blow had an amazing effect. It saved Gilbert¡¯s life, and a change happened in the hundred meter tall sword light!

    The light had been aimed at Gilbert when it suddenly changed direction, circling past Gilbert¡¯s enormous body and carrying with it a violent, evil sword aura to shoot into the endless ck mists surroundings the forbidden area.

    Suddenly, the skies were filled with bloody light as the earth shook. A frightening explosion sound filled the area, seeming to rip the very sky asunder. The ck mists that had covered this area for five hundreds years slowly dispersed after the blow from the blood red light.

    Beams of warm sunlight finally shone on this destend after hundred of years of absence. Sunlight radiated on the heavily injured cyclops and golden dragon, on the panting but clear eyed Han Shuo lying in a pool of his own blood, and entered the teary, delighted eyes of Gilbert...

 Chapter 244: Awe

    Chapter 244: Awe

    The violent explosions continued for a while before the forbidden zone slowly returned to normal. The radiant sun finally shone on the forbidden area that had been confined for 500 years.

    ¡°Ah, light, this is the sun¡¯s light!¡± The injury ridden golden dragon looked up at the bright sun in the sky and felt the warmth of the sun dappling over his body, sighing with great emotion.

    Just as he was reflecting with some emotion, the power that he¡¯d lost upon entering the forbidden area slowly began to fill his body once again. His body had been stered to the ground when it slowly began to rise again. The natural ability of the dragons to fly had been restored.

    ¡°The strength that¡¯s been confining the entire area has disappeared. We¡¯ve been saved!¡± The cyclops¡¯ single eye looked straight at the sun as he copsed on the ground from his injuries. Although he appeared a bitzy, his green face was filled with delight from the thought of being alive.

    On the other side, Gilbert shook his enormous head, sending his tears from earlier flying through the air like the spring rain. His enormous body floated in the air and flew towards Han Shuo, murmuring, ¡°I knew it, I knew you wouldn¡¯t kill your most loyal servant!¡±

    Han Shuo had broken his right arm, an arm as strong as iron, with his left hand. The meridians in his neck and arms had exploded, and he was lying in an ever-growing pool of his own blood, panting heavily.

    ¡°Idiot, if I hadn¡¯t recovered quickly, you would¡¯ve been dead without a doubt by now!¡± Han Shuo hectored Gilbert loudly from his listless position. Bloody froth spewed out of his mouth whenever he opened it, but he felt none of the associated pain. His now clear eyes had a few traces of warmth and touched emotions to it.

    With the strange power that restrained the entire area vanished, Gilbert felt a familiar power in his body and slowly began to transform as he approached Han Shuo. When he once again stood in front of Han Shuo, he¡¯d already changed into a haggard and worn person, reflecting what he¡¯d just gone through.

    ¡°Heh heh, recover your body first!¡± Gilbert stood with his back to Han Shuo and wiped the moisture from his face, walking over easily and helping Han Shuo up from copsed position. Gilbert silently stood behind him in support.

    Han Shuo chanted out an incantation and a little skeleton with sparkling white bones and a honest and silly earth elite zombie suddenly appeared in front of Han Shuo.

    The two of them focused their attention on Han Shuo when they stood in front of him. When they discovered his woeful state and that he was dripping with blood, they rushed to his two sides and reached out urgently with their hands, seeming to want to take his blood and shove it back into his body through his wounds.

    Panic and anxiety filled the little skeleton¡¯s purple eye and the earth elite zombie¡¯s yellow eyes. They waved their arms around madly as they busied themselves, seeming to express, ¡°Alright, alright. We¡¯re here now, he¡¯ll be fine now!¡± The two of them capered around frantically to express themselves to Han Shuo. Although their actions of trying to shove his blood back into his body through his wounds were childish andical, this warmed Han Shuo¡¯s heart greatly.

    Suddenly, the little skeleton took to the sky and sent his bone dagger and bone spurs whirling through the air. An evil, frosty, andpletely inhumane killing intent emanated from his body as the seven bone spurs pierced towards the cyclops and golden dragon like seven bloody streams of light.

    At the same time, the earth elite zombie next to Han Shuo sank into the ground like he stepping into water. Shaking and rumbling then traveled from the depths of where the cyclops and golden dragon were. Sharp earth mounds then began shooting out of the ground. The cyclops standing on the ground was the first to be affected, and he began to frantically evade the attacks.

    When the little skeleton and earth elite zombie had appeared out of nowhere, the cyclops and golden dragon had only flicked a nce at them, not paying too much attention to these low level dark creatures. However, when the two finally made their moves, the destruction they brought forth shocked the two creatures senseless. They were unable to believe the truth before their eyes.

    The little skeleton and the earth elite zombie¡¯s actions were as fast as a strike of lightning. By the time that Han Shuo had time to react, their attacks had almostnded on the heavily injured cyclops and golden dragon.

    ¡°Hey, damned idiot dragon, are you going to just watch the show? We helped you just now!¡± The golden dragon was terrified as he dodged the attacks and roared loudly.

    Although the cyclops and golden dragon could now use their recovered abilities, their bodies had long since lost all their strength after the previous round of events. Add to that although the little skeleton and earth elite zombie were small, the destruction they wreaked was indeed terrifying, making the two enormous beings cry out with fear.

    ¡°Eh... my honored master, these two fellows did indeed help us just now. I think they mean us no harm now!¡± Gilbert thought of when the three of them defended against Han Shuo just now and couldn¡¯t help but say to Han SHuo.

    ¡°I see. Come back then, the two of you!¡± Han Shuo nodded distantly and called out to the little skeleton and earth elite zombie.

    The two brash dark creatures immediately withdrew their attacks when they heard Han Shuo¡¯s order. The seven blood red bone spurs spun in a circle and reattached to the little skeleton¡¯s spine in an exceedingly short amount of time. The various hills all sank down astonishingly, and the earth regained its smoothness again. The earth elite zombie that had disappeared from sight floated up again, slowly rising from the earth and stood on Han Shuo¡¯s left, as if he¡¯d never moved.

    When the little skeleton and earth elite zombie discovered that Han Shuo was gravely injured, they naturally ruled Gilbert out of the running of entities that could¡¯ve hurt their master. Therefore, the two enormous beings that had obviously weathered through an immense fight became the natural culprits. It was understandable that they hadn¡¯t waited for Han Shuo¡¯s orders before attacking.

    To be honest, Han Shuo had a vague notion of what had happened after he¡¯d lost his ability to reason. However, his presence had still been useful in allowing the two beings to escape the forbidden area when he¡¯d attacked. Now that the restraints around the forbidden area had been dispelled, he didn¡¯t know if the two of them would act maliciously towards him. He¡¯d summoned the two fellows purely as a precaution.

    The little skeleton and earth elite zombie¡¯s sudden attack had been out of his expectations, but he then thought that the two fellows could awe the two enormous beings after a show of strength, thereby preventing them from making any moves against him. Therefore, he only stopped the little skeleton and the earth elite zombie after Gilbert had exined what had happened. This also served as a warning to the two enormous beings that they weren¡¯t the ruler of this ce just because the restraining power in the forbidden area had been dispelled.

    When he faced the little skeleton¡¯s bone spurs just now, the golden dragon had frantically tried to decrease his size in order to evade the attacks. He wiped cold sweat from his brow now and smiled at Han Shuo from afar, ¡°Very nice to meet you, strong human! I think you¡¯ve nothing to do with me now, so goodbye!¡±

    The golden dragon had already transformed back into his human form after speaking and dashed outwards as if fleeing the scene. Hended in a patch of boulders after a few leaps and vanishedpletely from sight.

    The cyclops also rumbled anxiously after the golden dragon had left, ¡°Ahaha, I¡¯m also very pleased to make your acquaintance. However, I still have some things at home and won¡¯t keep chatting with you. I hope we can meet again!¡±

    The rumbling from his voice was still hanging in the sky as the cyclops twisted his injuryden body into motion. He stumbled as he made for the far distance, praying to never bump into this crazy human again. He was simply too scary when he lost his mind!

    In the span of an instant, the two heavily wounded enormous beings had fled with panic stricken expressions from their location. Han Shuo and Gilbert looked at each other, finding this extremely ludicrous.

    Whether it was the cyclops or the golden dragon¡ªboth were incredibly frightening levels of existence when they were at their full peak of power. If they hadn¡¯t met something like the Lord of the mes, a level four creature, they would absolutely be the lords of the Dark Forest. Something like the manticore, a level one magical creature, would dash out of the way like it¡¯d seen a ghost if it ever met a cyclops or golden dragon.

    However, such a strong level of existence had left in front of them like they were fleeing from some horror. This filled Han Shuo and Gilbert¡¯s heart with strange emotions!

    Cleaning his mind of stray thoughts, Han Shuo sat down cross legged and said to Gilbert, the little skeleton, and the earth elite zombie. ¡°I¡¯m going to recover from my wounds now, you guys keep watch!¡±

    The murderous aura around him formed a cocoon of ck and red light, fully enclosing his body. Streaks of ck and red lightning swirled around the cocoon andpletely sealed Han Shuo¡¯s presence away, not allowing even a single bit of it leak out.

    The specters that¡¯d been present in the forbidden area were strange existences formed from the souls of the strong who¡¯d died, but had been unable to disperse into the world, and had absorbed all sorts of random powers instead.

    No one knew what had happened five hundred years ago, but there were quite a few souls that had been affected by the strange power of the forbidden area, and were unable to disperse for five hundred years.

    All of the lifeforms that had mistakenly barged into this forbidden area had had their powers restricted by the area. They were unable to use fighting aura or magic to hurt the specters, and the specters were unaffected by physical attacks. Therefore, death was the only way out for anything that stumbled upon this area and faced the specters.

    Before these entities died, all their fear, despair, fury, unwillingness, and associated negative emotions were absorbed by the specters, making them umte even more energy over the years, causing the spectres to be more and more powerful.

    Intruders who could only make use of their physical bodies to attack naturally couldn¡¯t handle the specters, but Han Shuo, already in the bloodlust realm, had a natural aura and the Demonyer Edge that was the antithesis of the specters. Therefore, when he knew the beings present were specters, he immediately used the demon infant and Demonyer Edge to form a whirlpool, constructing a crazily devouring machine. All of the specters that had existed for five hundred years were sucked into the demon infant and the Demonyer Edge.

    In this process, the image of the giant that had floated behind Han Shuo in the air was a result of the demon infant consuming too many specters. This naturally formed image was also absorbed by Han Shuo¡¯s body in the end.

    However, although the specters had great strength, there were too many impure and random thoughts amongst them. All of the negative emotions mixed together, and their characteristics were all different. Han Shuo¡¯s mentality in the bloodlust realm was already unstable to begin with, which caused him to almostpletely lost his mind and be a bloodthirsty demon.

    He¡¯d made use of his fight with the three enormous beings to vent the random emotions guing him. The purest portion of the specter¡¯s energy had been absorbed by the demon infant, and the majority of it had been too filled with negative, violent emotions and so it had been absorbed by the Demonyer Edge inside.

    The majority of the energy that he had been unable to absorb caused Han Shuo to lose reason. He¡¯d made use of his attacks on the three enormous beings to wear away at it, and then used the final blow from the Demonyer Edge to attack the void of ck mists. The tremendous and fatal energy had actually destroyed the restraining power around the forbidden area, enabling sunlight to stream in once again.

    Han Shuo had possessed the power to fight against the three strong beings previously because the Demonyer Edge had consumed the violent and scattered energy from the specters. This kind of energy was pure destruction and not something he could control at all. This was why he¡¯d made it all disappear through venting like how he¡¯d done.

    Therefore, this was why Han Shuo and the Demonyer Edge had disyed power that didn¡¯t belong to them earlier. When the Demonyer Edge pierced through the restraints of the forbidden area, all of the destructive power had vanished, and Han Shuo and the Demonyer Edge quickly returned to normal shortly after.

    However, the two gained great benefits this time. Even though Han Shuo was still in the bloodlust realm, the pure energy within the demon infant had once again greatly increased in strength.

    After absorbing some power, the Demonyer Edge would be able to truly emit a murderous aura after a bit more refining and some fortuitous urrences. It would really be a peerless weapon then.

    Wrapped in his red and ck cocoon, Han Shuo didn¡¯t emerge for eight days. His ravaged right arm had returned to normal, and the blood vessels on his neck and arms had reformed, more durable than before. His height had also increased by a few centimeters, and his naked body was even more stocky than before. His shoulders were broad, his waist narrow, and his muscles were more evenly distributed over his body like finely chiseled granite. His eyes were clear and sinister looking, brimming with the confidence of being able to control everything.

    ¡°Honored master, you¡¯ve finally emerged. Your poor servant has waited for such a long time!¡± Gilbert had a look of dejection on his face as he stood pitifully next to Han Shuo, loudly praising his glory.

    Looking at Gilbert in shock, Han Shuo asked in bafflement, ¡°What? What happened to you?¡±

    Gilbert looked around pitifully and cast a look in his surroundings, then finally speaking to Han Shuo like he was tattling on someone. ¡°Those two fellows not only bullied me, but also dug up someone¡¯s grave. This is too evil!¡±

    Han Shuo was shocked upon hearing these words, ¡°What¡¯s going on here?¡±

    ¡°You take a look at what they¡¯ve done! They had me, the great dark dragon Gilbert, help them in digging up someone else¡¯s grave, and actually threatened me with a knife when I wouldn¡¯t do so. This is so evil, so shameless, and that little skeleton is too evil!¡± Gilbert was incredibly pitiful as he brought Han Shuo up into the air and had him take a look for himself.

    When Han Shuo floated in the air and looked at Ayermika Cotton¡¯s grave, he was stunned senseless by what he saw. He didn¡¯t know whether tough or cry as he said, ¡°Eh... those two are indeed a bit out of line!¡±

 Chapter 245: Grave digging

    Chapter 245: Grave digging

    The formerly leveled ground stood witness to many ravines. The tombstone of Ayermika, the demigod existence of the Lancelot Empire, stood grandly at the center. Surrounding it was a ten meter circr area of messily dug trenches and holes. Dirt had been tossed every which way, as if some archaeology team had conducted an excavation searching for antiquities. The whole area had been overturned.

    Taking a closer look, Han Shuo noticed a few more hills formed from mounds of brown soil. The little skeleton and the earth elite zombie were busy demolishing an enormous skeleton at the bottom of a huge trench. This skeleton was a dozen meters long, and each bone was as tall as a person. The skeleton was translucent as crystal, its surface reflecting bright light. It was obviously the corpse of some super rank creature.

    The two fellows sensed Han Shuo¡¯s presence in the midst of their demolition. They excitedly waved their hands, which were holding bones even bigger than their own bodies, greeting their master.

    After that, the little skeleton picked up several bones with his hand and flew, fast as lightning, to the middle of the trench, dropping the bones in a deeply excavated pit. He ced them carefully in the middle of the deep pit, as if the bones were valuable treasures.

    ¡°Eh... What have they been doing these past days?¡± Han Shuo stood in the air and watched raptly, asking Gilbert in surprise.

    Gilbertined loudly, his face as gloomy as one at a funeral, ¡°Not long after you wrapped yourself up in the cocoon, these two fellows got up to these antics. First, the small zombie went underground and took out a bone. He proudly bragged about it to the little skeleton, then the little skeleton also got excited. These two together were simply the most superb grave diggers, they turned the whole ce upside down. They seem to be collecting those bones, I don¡¯t know what they¡¯re doing that for!¡±

    Han Shuo listened to Gilbert¡¯sining narrative, his eyes glimmering as he looked into the deep pit that held the white bones. His body slowly moved and approached the pit. Hended straight within it, randomly picking up a bone of who knew what super rank creature and carefully examined it.

    The bone was heavy in his hand, seeming to actually weigh around a hundred kilograms. The stark white bone seemed to contain a strange presence. The skin touching this bone felt a biting cold, and a sharp and chilly killing air flowed from the bone into Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    The earth elite zombie silently emerged from the earth beneath Han Shuo like a ghost, his hand clutching a white bone as if it was something iparably precious. As he handed this bone to Han Shuo, his golden earth-colored eyes danced with pride.

    This surprised Han Shuo. He took the bone from the earth elite zombie and immediately felt an eternal dragon breath within. He could tell that this bone was heavier than the one earlier. This pristinely white bone caused the air around it to emit a faint whistling sound. He sensed it carefully again and felt some wind magic elements within.

    Han Shuo could say with certainty at this point that this bone hade from a wind dragon. He was sure because as a necromancy mage, he had some understanding about the bones of magic creatures. Every mageing from the necromancy department had to use bones in their experiments.

    The bones of some super rank magic creatures still contained some energy from when they were still alive. They could be used to make powerful weapons. For example, the white bone staff that Belinda from the Cmity Church had refined was also forged from the bone of a super rank magic creature. This bone would also be helpful for Han Shuo to improve his necromancy magic.

    While Han Shuo was deep in thought, the little skeleton also seemed to be trying to prove something. He brought several bones in front of Han Shuo, then pulled on his sleeve to gain attention.

    Han Shuo was stunned when he looked at the little skeleton. He discovered two odd lights gleaming in thetter¡¯s eyes. The little skeleton¡¯s left hand was holding a white bone when a wave of silver light suddenly started circting within the bone. The originally translucent bone rapidly corroded, as if time had elerated over a thousand times. In just a moment, the bone containing a strange presence had turned into ashes and scattered into the wind.

    After that, the little skeleton threw back his head proudly. He took another bone and made a munching motion towards Han Shuo. The little skeleton then threw the bone back into the pile of bones.

    Han Shuo could understand without needing the little skeleton to say anything else. The little skeleton and the earth elite zombie could absorb the energy from the enormous skeletons littered throughout thisnd. Due to the unknown force of imprisonment here, the souls of the dead creatures couldn¡¯t dissipate into the heavens and earth after death, and instead, a portion of energy still remained in the bodies. Even when the flesh rotted away, the bones still contained some magical energy. To these two fellows, this energy was a great tonic. No wonder they were so interested in roleying as grave robbers and had turned this ce upside down.

    Han Shuo smiled as he rubbed the little skeleton¡¯s smooth skull, then patted the earth elite zombie¡¯s shoulder and said gently, ¡°Hehe, you did well! How about this, you guys collect all the usable bones here!¡±

    After being encouraged by Han Shuo, the earth elite zombie rubbed his head in honest joy as he quickly sank into the ground again. He appeared next to the ten meter long skeleton in the blink of an eye and started to dismantle the bones. As for the little skeleton, he waved his bony hands and danced around, happily sending Han Shuo a message to express his thoughts.

    After focusing his attention for a moment, Han Shuo nodded and said understandingly, ¡°So you think there¡¯s no problem for you and the earth elite to take away these bones. Wait until you guys collect them all in a pile, I¡¯ll give you a hand!¡±

    The little skeleton had transmitted a message saying he wanted to bring all of these bones into the other dimension for the benefit of the necromancy creatures in his camp. Han Shuo had first been surprised for a moment after he¡¯d understood, then expressed his assent.

    As he received Han Shuo¡¯s approval, the little skeleton became extremely excited. His seven bone spurs shook, sending him whizzing through the air towards the earth elite zombie. The two continued to dismantle the huge magic creature¡¯s skeleton.

    As Han Shuo observed carefully, he discovered that the two didn¡¯t take just anything from the ten meter long skeleton. Relying on their sensitivity towards energy, they only took bones with energy and promptly threw away the ordinary ones.

    The useless bones thrown away by these two fellows were scattered throughout the trench filled area. They obviously hadn¡¯t sat idly by either dying the past couple of days when Han Shuo was cultivating. This ten meter long skeleton seemed to be theirst prey.

    While the little skeleton and earth elite zombie remained hard at work, Han Shuo¡¯s eyes were caught by the tombstone with the name Ayermika Cotton engraved onto it.

    Only now did Han Shuo discover that this tombstone of the Lancelot Empire¡¯s legendary figure had originally only revealed a small part of its splendor. Thanks to the trenches that the earth elite zombie had carved, he¡¯d yanked out that one meter tall tombstone up three meters. From the top of the tombstone down, it seemed to keep getting wider the deeper it was buried. It was shaped like a miniature hill, which puzzled Han Shuo.

    Seeing Han Shuo focus his attention on the tombstone of Ayermika, Gilbert seemed to remember something and suddenly shouted out loud, ¡°Master, this engraved stone b is really weird. The little skeleton and earth elite zombie asked me to try moving it, but we found that it¡¯s extremely heavy. I didn¡¯t expect that even my strength couldn¡¯t move it one bit.¡±

    ¡°Oh, this is a bit interesting!¡± This surprised Han Shuo greatly. As part of the dragon race, Gilbert was still immensely powerful even in human form. Even if the stone b had been double in size, it should¡¯ve been impossible for Gilbert to not be able to move it.

    Therefore, Han Shuo had flown to the tombstone as soon as he¡¯d heard Gilbert¡¯s words. He reached out and touched this tombstone with a surprised face.

    The tombstone was cold to the touch. Apart from the deeply engraved,rge Ayermika letters, the entire tombstone was as smooth as a mirror. Running his hand over it again, Han Shuo didn¡¯t feel any difort or anything strange. This tombstone wasn¡¯t much different from an ordinary stone b.

    Taking in a deep breath, Han Shuo tried shaking it and didn¡¯t even feel a shudder from the tombstone. It was just as Gilbert said, this stone was simply not easily moved.

    ¡°Come, dig up this piece ofnd for me!¡± His thoughts raced and Han Shuo waved his hand at the distant earth elite zombie.

    The little skeleton and earth elite zombie were too interested in their skeleton, this tombstone seemed to have no appeal to them. Otherwise, with the earth elite zombie¡¯s nature, it would have given this tombstone a try.

    As per Han Shuo¡¯s instructions, the earth elite zombie in the distant underground immediately disappeared. Afterwards, a tremor arose under Han Shuo¡¯s feet. The soil and sand that the tombstone was buried in was roiling and churning. The soft ground shook for a while, when two cracks appeared beneath the tombstone.

    The originally firmly standing tombstone crashed down on a high hill that had formed. The tombstone, seven meters in length, was nowpletely revealed. Even its base, as broad as a tree root, could be seen.

    ¡°Hateful zombie, it obviously has the ability, yet deliberately makes this great dark dragon do all the carrying. What azy brat!¡± Gilbert watched the earth elite zombie follow Han Shuo¡¯s order to uproot the tombstone without much effort. At that point, he could not help but recall his previous experiences andin loudly.

    It was a pity that the earth elite zombie simply didn¡¯t care for the noisy Gilbert. When he finished what Han Shuo had ordered him to do, he immediately went back to the little skeleton¡¯s side and continued dismantling that huge skeleton.

    ¡°Honored master, what do you want to do?¡± Gilbert looked at thepletely revealed tombstone and asked, puzzled.

    ¡°Let¡¯s have a look first!¡± Han Shuo casually answered. Then he approached the tombstone and carefully observed it, gently tracing the tombstone with his finger as he looked a little pensive.

    An ordinary tombstone wouldn¡¯t be seven meters long. In addition, the material of this tombstone were unknown. Even with Han Shuo¡¯s current knowledge of all kinds of ores, he couldn¡¯t identify the tombstone¡¯s material. Combined with its unexpected weight, the tombstone left him suspicious.

    As his finger gently swiped across the tombstone, a piece of magical yuan appeared like static electricity on his fingertip. It was pressed into the tombstone with a push from Han Shuo¡¯s finger. Suddenly, arge wave of dark magic element reflected back to Han Shuo¡¯s mind through the magical yuan. This energy was astonishingly simr to the imprisonment force all over in the forbiddennd.

    Han Shuo paled and hastily retracted his finger. He looked at the brown tombstone in astonishment and murmured, ¡°How strange, this force should¡¯ve disappeared already, could it be... the strange imprisonment force that covered the whole forbiddennd came from the deceased demigod Ayermika...?¡±

    ¡°What is it, master?¡± Little dark dragon Gilbert couldn¡¯t hear Han Shuo¡¯s mumble, but couldn¡¯t help but ask when he saw Han Shuo¡¯s surprised face.

    Han Shuo backed up a few steps and instructed, ¡°Gilbert, back away a bit, I need to blow up this tombstone and see what¡¯s inside.¡±

    Waiting until Gilbert had moved ording to his orders, Han Shuo also backed up about ten meters or so. He took out the Demonyer Edge and infused magical yuan into it. After absorbing such arge mass of evil intent, even though the Demonyer Edge hadn¡¯t truly be a peerless masterpiece, it already contained a formidable power.

    A fierce sword light directly sted out from the Demonyer Edge after Han Shuo had infused his magical yuan, and headed straight for the tombstone with a terrifying force.

    Rumbles resounded nonstop. The grand, seemingly indestructible tombstone was shattered into pieces under the impact of the Demonyer Edge amidst a spray of splendid light.

    Stone debris flew all around. After all had calmed down, the brown tombstone had broken into many pieces. A magic staff embedded with three amethysts wrapped in dense dark magic elements appeared on the ground. Next to the staff was an ancient, handwritten notebook.

 Chapter 246: Just you? Are you worthy?

    Chapter 246: Just you? Are you worthy?

    This magic staff was made of an unknown material. It was greyish-brown in color and felt rough to the touch. The staff was about one meter long, and its upper part was diamond shaped. The three amethysts were palm-sized. They emitted a beautiful bright light and sparkled as if containing water ripples. The three amethysts looked like three miniaturekes at a nce, and were ced in a triangr formation.

    Ancients script were as dense as a bunch of tadpoles in the ancient, handwritten notebook. These two things had been unexpectedly embedded within the tombstone! One could tell that they were very valuable with just a single nce. They could even be the relics of Ayermike Cotton himself.

    Han Shuo held the two items in hand, taking a deep look, and then unceremoniously put them into the space ring. He flicked a nce around and saw the fragmented rocks of the tombstone sparkling with different colors. He couldn¡¯t help but feel surprised and carefully assessed each one.

    ¡°Mhm, scarletheart iron and whitelight silver ores. I hadn¡¯t thought that the tombstone was refined from these strange ores. No wonder I couldn¡¯t see through the material!¡± Han Shuo softly eximed. He picked up some of the broken stones and identified them.

    The surface of the tombstone had actually been refined from several strange ores smelted together. However, after the Demonyer Edge had broken it apart, the interior revealed ores that hadn¡¯tpletely melted, many of which were still raw ores. Looking at the magic staff and notebook, one would understand that it wasn¡¯t because the refiner of this tombstone wascking in ability. They definitely did this on purpose, for fear of ruining the items inside if theypletely refined all the ores.

    What happened in this forbiddennd five hundred years ago? Why was Ayermike Cotton here? Why was his tombstone here? Han Shuo didn¡¯t know and didn¡¯t care. What he wanted was to collect anything of value here before leisurely leaving this area.

    After cing the magic staff and ancient notebook into the space ring, Han Shuo also unceremoniously did the same with the raw ores. He then walked to the pit where little skeleton and the earth elite zombie were, closing his eyes and ced his hand on each of the bones containing the strange energy.

    In a blink of an eye, roughly ten white jade-like bones were also shoved into the space ring by Han Shuo. Seeing their hard earned bones taken away by him, the little skeleton and earth elite zombie weren¡¯t at all angry. They even expressed joy, as if the more he took, the more honored they became.

    When he took a look around the whole area, there were no longer anyplete skeletons. In the pit, the little skeleton and earth elite zombie were excitedly picking things up here and there. Like two small porters, they held the bunch of bones under their arms, on their backs, and in their hands.

    When these two fellows were almostpletely hidden by the white bones, the little skeleton¡¯s purple sockets shone brightly and he looked at Han Shuo to transmit a message. Han Shuo began to chant a spell. The little skeleton, elite earth zombie, along with the bones that they had to made four trips back and forth to collect, were sent back to the other dimension.

    After the two fellows left, Han Shuo stood in the sky and swept the entire area. Seeing there weren¡¯t any more abnormalities in this forbiddennd, he had Gilbert transform and returned to the cemetery of death.

    This time, the human and dragon didn¡¯t encounter any danger during their return trip. Han Shuo released three yin demons along the way, and had Gilbert slow down. He searched carefully for materials to refine pills and weapons. This actually took them a total of ten days before they finally returned to the cemetery of death.

    Han Shuo had managed to collect a good amount of refining materials in those ten days. Upon returning to the cemetery of death, the materials would be enough for Han Shuo to refine several things that he wanted, as well as a cauldron full of rebirth pills.

    Han Shuo had actually reaped a lucrative harvest during this excursion into the Dark Forest. Although there had been some crises halfway, he resolved them by relying on the virtue of his luck and wits. The feeling that he received when he returned to the cemetery of death was quite good.

    As he collected enough pill and weapon refining materials, Han Shuo carefully weighed his options. He decided to do a closed door session in the cemetery of death, ready to refine a pill cauldron in addition to some small magic treasures, before continuing to refine rebirth pills.

    Determined, Han Shuo decided to research the refinement of pills and magical treasures. He stayed in the cemetery of death for three months.

    When he emerged after the three months were up, the cold winter had passed and all beings had awoken from their hibernation. It was a season in which the spring flowers were blooming vibrantly. At the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, it was the time where students took an exam to test their individual power.

    At the dark major¡¯s biggest testing field, the teachers and students of the necromancy major were grouped. They had to wait for the dark major students to finish before they could use the equipment in the testing field for their exams.

    After the tragic experience that had happened to her family, little witch Lisa suddenly became much more sensible. Although her nature was still unruly and stubborn, she was no longer unreasonable to the point where people hated her.

    ¡°Master Fanny, has Bryan really not returned to the academy in the past six months?¡± Lisa looked helplessly at Fanny and asked in a sweet voice.

    ¡°Lisa, you have been asking this for two, three months already. He really hasn¡¯te back!¡± Fanny replied with a gloomy face. She thought in her heart, That damnable naughty devil, where has he been for the past six months? He hasn¡¯te back to see me in so long.

    ¡°He said he would return to the Empire shortly after leaving Valen City, but it¡¯s been so long and he still hasn¡¯t returned, can it be that something¡¯s happened to him?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t speak nonsense, how could something happen to Bryan?!¡±

    Fanny was also worried that Bryan had disappeared for half a year. However, she didn¡¯t dare to think any bad thoughts. That was how humans were. Just one bad thought would be enough to derail their entire train of thought, and everything would go downhill from there. One thought could cause them to fall into inextricable sadness.

    ¡°Master Fanny, your students canmence their exams.¡± A dark major teacher shouted from a raised tform.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, let¡¯s go watch a bit!¡± Necromancy major teacher Gene was still indulgent to Fanny as ever. He disyed a gentle smile, urging Fanny onwards.

    Nodding her head politely, Fanny maintained a distance from Gene and went with him to the raised tform. The dark major students happened to be descending. A few of them had on arrogant expressions and didn¡¯t immediately leave. Instead, theyughed and lowered their voice to murmur about something.

    The dark major students that been humiliated by Han Shuo at thestpetition were made aughingstock for the longest time. The longer Han Shuo had vanished for, the more their embarrassing experience would be forgotten. However, their hatred for him couldn¡¯t be erased. From time to time, they would find opportunities to poke, bully, and make fun of the necromancy major students.

    After Han Shuo left, the necromancy major returned to its previous state of decay. The exuberant heroic spirit was short lived for only a few days. The students continuously waxed eloquence on how good things had been when Han Shuo was still there.

    ¡°It makes no difference if the necromancy major takes the test or not! What can their students aplish?!¡± Phillide, the strongest student in the dark major, sneered disdainfully at the approaching necromancy major students.

    All of the dark major students, who were standing nearby, joined in andughed loudly, each one louder than the one before, as if they feared the necromancy students wouldn¡¯t be able to hear.

    ¡°Phillide, don¡¯t use such a loud voice within the testing field!¡± The dean of the dark major, archmage Deo, had a nd smile on his face, as he softly chided the mor Phillide and the bunch of brats had created. He didn¡¯t look the least bit serious.

    Be it the necromancy major students or teachers like Fanny and Gene, all could see that Deo¡¯s smile held a trace of delight and indulgence. Han Shuo had stomped on both the light major and the dark majorst time at thepetition. As the head of the dark major, Deo had lost a great deal of face and naturally didn¡¯t hold any bit of goodwill towards the necromancy major.

    ¡°I know, dean!¡± Phillide chuckled off to the side as he answered. He then ridiculed, ¡°Looking at the necromancy department taking test, isn¡¯t that interesting?¡±

    ¡°True. We¡¯ve nothing to do anyways. Let¡¯s stay and watch!¡± All of the students, who¡¯d been stomped by Han Shuost time, chimed in to agree with Phillide, rapt interest on their faces. They looked at the first personing up to take the test, Athena, as if they were watching clowns walk up stage.

    ¡°I heard that it¡¯s this stupid woman¡¯s fourth attempt to take the test. If she still can¡¯t advance to novice mage, she might as well go die already. What an embarrassment!¡± Phillide smiled, ridiculing viciously.

    ¡°Phillide, and who the hell do you think you are?! If Bryan were here, he definitely will rip your mouth off!¡± Lisa couldn¡¯t listen to those words and couldn¡¯t help but snap at Phillide.

    ¡°Humph! How could that brat have run around so arrogantly! If I hadn¡¯t had a stomachachest time? Heh heh, now that my body has recovered, it¡¯s time to settle the debt, but he¡¯s disappeared for half a year. Doesn¡¯t this exin it all?¡± In thestpetition, Han Shuo indeed participated in Phillide¡¯s stead. The former had done so with a bang, making Phillide lose all face. He¡¯d even been scolded by Deo. He still felt indignant about it even now, not wanting to be the least bit inferior than others.

    ¡°Oh, so you say I¡¯m hiding from you? Just you? Are you worthy?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s shadow appeared like a ghost. A blue magic robe adorned his tall body, an odd smile hung on his face. He walked measuringly into the testing field, raising his voice as he said, ¡°I¡¯ve return this time to graduate ahead of schedule. Today, I will take my final test at the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force.¡±

 Chapter 247: Graduation

    Chapter 247: Graduation

    With his current strength, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t even be afraid of the dark major¡¯s dean, Deo, let alone the likes of Phillide. Han Shuo looked rxed and unrestrained as he stepped onto the testing field. An easy smile hung on his face. However, he still exuded an awe-inspiring temperament.

    ¡°Bryan, you¡¯ve finally returned?¡± Lisa¡¯s voice was full of joy and surprise. She couldn¡¯t help but jump in excitement as she let out a ¡°Yeah!¡±.

    Fanny was sitting demurely on the high tform. After seeing Han Shuo, the traces of sadness that had lingered on her brows for the past few months werepletely wiped away by an invisible hand. She radiated brightly in a way that dazzled the eyes. Her lips curved in an odd way that seemed both happy and angry.

    Han Shuo had been through a series of life and death battles in that half year¡¯s worth of time. His power had skyrocketed and emitted a natural aura now. No one dared to look down on him now, even when he didn¡¯t deliberately show off his strength.

    ¡°Athena, focus on the test! I know you can definitely pass!¡± After arriving, Han Shuo spoke to Athena, who seemed nervous because of the jeers and sarcastic remarks from Phillide¡¯s group.

    ¡°Thank you, Bryan!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s arrival seemed to put Athena at ease, and her uneasy heart slowly returned to its original calm state.

    Phillide, on the other side, had been set off by Han Shuo¡¯s earlier words. His facial expression was quite ugly as he gave Han Shuo a sinister look, ¡°You disappeared for half a year after I recovered. What was it for if not to hide from me?¡±

    Honestly speaking, the likes of Phillide bored Han Shuo. After fighting so many powerful beings, Phillide was no longer qualified to shout and yell in front of him. The disparity in power was too great, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t be bothered to even deal with him.

    ¡°Aha!¡± Han Shuo gave an oddugh, squinting his eyes at Phillide. He shook his head sympathetically, before shrugging and sighing softly, ¡°You think too highly of yourself, but what can I say to this kind of fool who has a few screws loose in his head?¡±

    As he finished saying this, Han Shuo no longer paid any more attention to Phillide, who happened to trembling in anger. He turned in the direction of Fanny on the tform and shed a bright smile. Inhaling deeply, he gazed at Fanny and said, ¡°I¡¯m back!¡±

    Fanny¡¯s pretty face reddened for some reason. She seemed to want to hide her true feelings as she red fiercely at Han Shuo, huffing, ¡°You unruly brat! You still know toe back to the academy?¡±

    Han Shuo shed an awkward smile and wanted to exin something when the dark major dean disyed an unpleasant expression. ¡°Wait until after the exams to catch up. You¡¯ll have plenty of time then. Now, I think we need to quickly settle your major¡¯s business, we¡¯re very busy people after all!¡±

    The other dark major teachers also loudly rushed Fanny and Gene after their dean had spoken, expressing that they had a lot of things to do and couldn¡¯t keep waiting.

    Han Shuo had been about to exin, but looked apologetically towards Fanny on the tform and flipped out his hands. He shrugged and took a few steps back without another word to where Lisa, Amy, and several other necromancy major students were standing.

    ¡°Bryan, where did you go for the past half year? Didn¡¯t you say that you would quickly return to Ossen City? Why did you drag it out until now?¡± Lisa chattered nonstop after Han Shuo had arrived. Han Shuo waited for her to finish her questioning before smiling and telling her that he spent a period of time cultivating in the Dark Forest.

    ¡°What the hell? He really thinks he¡¯s something huh!¡± The dark major students, who¡¯d been stomped by Han Shuo, felt indignant and snorted when they saw his dashing manner.

    ¡°Humph, I¡¯d like to see how he intends on graduating early. I remember he was only a novice mage half a year ago!¡± Phillide, who¡¯d been repeatedly humiliated by Han Shuo, said coldly when he saw Han Shuo in his element.

    Athena was calm this time and was not as nervous as she¡¯d been before. She skillfully casted several necromancy magic spells, smoothly answered some questions, and easily passed the novice mage test.

    Afterwards, the necromancy students started their tests one by one as well. For most of the students, their power hadn¡¯t improved much. Only Lisa unexpectedly became a journeyman mage, the magical pulses from her body were obviously stronger than that of the other students.

    Lisa was a lot more sensible after her harrowing experience and had alsoe to understand the importance of strength. She was much more hard working when it came to practicing magic now, unlike when she¡¯d mostly yed around and rarely meditated.

    Waiting until all the necromancy students had finished their testing, Han Shuo leisurely stepped forward and said, ¡°I intended to directly graduate upon my return. May I take the test now?¡±

    At the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, one could graduate as long as they advanced to the rank of adept mage. Since Han Shuo received the memories from the soul of archmage rendon, he¡¯d mastered all the high ranked necromancy magic after a short amount of practice, not to mention that he also possessed some lost necromancy spells.

    The magic test was divided into three stages. The first was an oral examination about magical knowledge, the second was to release a magic spell of that corresponding rank, and the third was to be assigned to a mission. The test was over once all three stages werepleted.

    However, in the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, the adept mage test didn¡¯t include the mission portion. Students could advance as long as they passed the first two stages.

    With his current necromancy knowledge and power, the adept mage test was as simple as child¡¯s y for Han Shuo. He arrogantly skipped the journeyman mage test and set his eyes on the adept mage level test, intending to escape the shackles of the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force as soon as possible.

    ¡°Are you sure you want to skip to the adept mage test?¡± Standing on the tform, Deo glowered at Han Shuo and asked for confirmation.

    Nodding his head impatiently, Han Shuo confirmed, ¡°Master Deo, didn¡¯t I just say it very clearly? I want to skip the journeyman mage test and directly advance to adept mage.¡±

    ¡°Fine then, let¡¯s start!¡± Deo snorted coldly, obviously a little displeased at Han Shuo¡¯s discourtesy. He then turned to nod at Fanny and Gene, giving his agreement.

    To the surprise of the other necromancy students, Han Shuo stepped onto the round tform. He leisurely dealt with Fanny and Gene¡¯s questions, then he answered some questions about the rtionship between several magical theories. Some of the dark major teachers on Deo¡¯s side deliberately tried to embarrass Han Shuo, asking him about obscure, difficult magic knowledge.

    However, Han Shuo possessed rendon¡¯s memories of magic. Forget his mental strength, with his own strength alone, he could already be considered an archmage who had been thoroughly tempered. The seeminglyplex problems couldn¡¯t stump him as he fluently answered them all with merrily twinkling eyes.

    At this point, the necromancy students below were starting to feel proud, especially Lisa. She chattered andughed at Phillide, jeering at him. She was making use of Han Shuo¡¯s performance to mock Phillide and the group of students who¡¯d jeered at her earlier.

    Even though Deo didn¡¯t want to admit it, Han Shuo¡¯s answers were wless. Han Shuo smoothly and urately answered all of the difficult questions that they presented him with. There was nothing for them to even find fault with. In the end, they had to announce with stiff faces that Han Shuo had passed the first round.

    The second round about necromancy magic performance was even easier. Han Shuo cast and skillfully deployed about a dozen spells along with adequate mental strength. With the decades of experience from rendonbined with his own, Han Shuo didn¡¯t have any difficulty releasing high rank necromancy magic.

    As Han Shuo released one high rank necromancy spell after another, the necromancy students below began cheering nonstop, while the dark major teachers and students had ugly expressions on their faces. Evidently, they hadn¡¯t expected Han Shuo to be able to skip one rank and advance directly to the rank of adept mage in just the a short span of six months.

    ¡°Bryan, my assessment wasn¡¯t wrong! You really are a magic genius!¡± Fanny was watching from the tform how Han Shuo easily dealt with the test from beginning to end. The power he demonstrated wasn¡¯t at all inferior to Fanny herself. For some difficult spells, he released them even more urately and skillfully than her, the teacher. This made Fanny marvel.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong with the world¡¯s order? He¡¯s actually gained so much strength so quickly!¡± Gene muttered with a look of disbelief, but then his thinking changed. Although Han Shuo had never attended his sses, he could still be considered one of Gene¡¯s students. With such a miraculous student, Gene could still more or less take some credit, enough for him to boast from now on. Gene felt delighted when his thoughts reached this point.

    ¡°Pass!¡± Deo gave a cold snort. His expression was increasingly ugly.

    ¡°Hehe, many thanks, Master Deo!¡± Han Shuo was all smiles from beginning to end. Be it oral knowledge or practical magic deployment, he passed it all leisurely without a single bit of effort.

    Deo and some dark major teachers gathered for a discussion with glowering faces. Deo then gave a cold, deviousugh as he looked at Han Shuo. ¡°You¡¯ve managed to pass the first two rounds. Your performance has impressed everyone, so I¡¯ll just tell you about the third test. You need to hunt a rank three harpy by yourself and hand us its core in a month. Your exam can only be considered passed then!¡±

    ¡°Oh my gosh, how is that possible?!¡± The necromancy students immediately startedining.

    On theirst trip to the Dark Forest, Odysseus and his team of six had been carefully on their guard when dealing with a harpy. The six person team had included mages, and swordsmen, plus a journeyman swordsman, and archer Nia, but they¡¯d still had to be careful. This showed how fearsome a harpy was.

    Deo had actually demanded Han Shuo hunt a harpy as a stepping stone to advancing to adept mage. He was obviously trying to make Han Shuo¡¯s life difficult.

    Phillide¡¯s cadre all shut up when they witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s performance on the second round. Even Phillide, who¡¯d been full of confidence, was disturbed and didn¡¯t dare to say anything else after he saw Han Shuo easily release all sorts of advanced level magic.Just when the dark major students felt their spirits had been dampened, they heard Deo suddenly announce that Han Shuo had to hunt a rank three creature¡ªa harpy. They were excited again andughed loudly while they threw gloating looks at Han Shuo¡¯s group.

    ¡°Master Deo, aren¡¯t you going too far? I¡¯ve never heard of any dark major student having to hunt a harpy for the mage advancement exams. This is simply a mission to death, I definitely won¡¯t agree!¡± Fanny¡¯s delicate cheeks were red with fury, and she red fiercely at Deo as she shouted.

    Snorting coldly, Deo said with a darkened face, ¡°Master Fanny, I¡¯m the head of the dark major, not you. Your necromancy major is part of our dark major, and l have the right to do so. You can give up if Bryan doesn¡¯t want to ept this task, but then the first two rounds will be wasted!¡±

    By now, Deo had made it abundantly clear that he wanted to make things difficult for Han Shuo. This conversation left Fanny trembling in rage. She pointed at Deo and shouted, ¡°You... you are actually that despicable of a person! I¡¯m going to look for academy dean to judge this, I won¡¯t allow you blot out the sky with one hand like this!¡±

    ¡°Wait!¡± Han Shuo still had a smile smile on his face. He responded in a neither fast nor slow manner. When he had everyone¡¯s eyes on him, he looked at Deo and chuckled merrily, ¡°Master Deo, are you sure you want me to kill a harpy?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, I am sure! As long as you can prove that you have this power, I will definitely let you pass without another word!¡± Finally feeling the thrill of victory, Deo was smiling as he looked at Han Shuo.

    Nodding, Han Shuo shrugged and said smilingly, ¡°If so, it seems I don¡¯t have to make a trip back to the Dark Forest again. Please determine my rank now!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s space ring shed when he finished saying these words and two harpy cores appeared in his hand. His right hand also held a pair of ck iron ws, obviously also belonging to the harpies.

    ¡°I hunted down these two harpies in the Dark Forest before I returned to the Academy. These ws still retain traces of my magic. I think Master Deo won¡¯t deny these things?¡± Han Shuoughed and said, throwing a mocking look at the shocked Deo.

    Suddenly, the space before Han Shuo trembled. A light shed by and the Dean of the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, Emma, appeared out of thin air. A pulse of magic shot out and circled the pair of iron ws in Han Shuo¡¯s hand. Emma then smiled benevolently, ¡°Indeed, I have confirmed that these two harpies were definitely killed by Bryan.¡±

    Halting, Emma gave Han Shuo an odd nce, then turned to look at Deo with a smile. She said warmly, ¡°There shouldn¡¯t be any problems. I think he can truly graduate now!¡±

 Chapter 248: The promise

    Chapter 248: The promise

    Deo¡¯s face was as ugly as it can be. No matter how much he had overestimated Han Shuo¡¯s abilities, he absolutely couldn¡¯t imagine that thetter¡¯s strength had been this terrifying. Even Deo himself might not have the power to kill two harpies by himself.

    Deo simply had no words to say after Dean Emma had given her confirmation. He couldn¡¯t deny it with so many people watching. Ultimately, he could only nod in anger and say to Emma, ¡°Since master Dean has personally confirmed it, Bryan can be considered to have officially graduated.¡±

    Saying those words, Deo snorted with a scowl as he spoke. He turned to a dark major teacher next to him and left some instructions before directly leaving the testing area, seeming to be in a foul mood.

    The necromancy students snapped out of their shock after Deo left. When Lisa started cheering, the rest couldn¡¯t help but join in as they shouted happily. As for Phillide and his gang, they didn¡¯t bark another word and ran off with their tails between two legs.

    ¡°How could this be? How could this be?!¡± Fanny murmured, looking at Han Shuo in disbelief. No matter what, she couldn¡¯t figure out how Han Shuo managed to kill two harpies by himself. Fanny felt that even she couldn¡¯t estimate Han Shuo¡¯s current strength.

    Afterwards, Fanny suddenly remembered her promise with him. She once said that as long as Han Shuo advanced to adept mage, she would consider being his girlfriend. Now, just after six months, Han Shuo had suddenly returned to the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, and had done this grand deed in such a rxed manner. With Fanny¡¯s understanding of Han Shuo¡¯s character, he¡¯d definitely bring up the matter.

    Therefore, the unprepared Fanny panicked. Her face was red with embarrassment as she snuck a fleeting nce at Han Shuo, just to discover that he was also looking at her with shining eyes. She grew even more frantic. She hastily left Gene with an exnation and quickly fled the scene.

    When Han Shuo saw Fanny leave, he knew full well as to why and proudly chuckled in a low tone. Paying no heed to thepliments from Lisa and the other students, he turned to chase after Fanny.

    ¡°Bryan, I have some things to discuss alone with you, soe with me for a bit. There¡¯s no need to pursue the matters regarding your graduation qualifications. There shouldn¡¯t be any more problems!¡± Dean Emma immediately stopped Han Shuo with a smile when she saw that he was about to leave.

    Han Shuo was slightly taken aback. He wanted to decline as he didn¡¯t know what she wanted. However, he then told himself the matter with Fanny wasn¡¯t as urgent, so he nodded in agreement. Han Shuo spoke a word to Lisa¡¯s group before following Emma to her office.

    They reached Emma¡¯s office after walking for a bit. Han Shuo found a seat and sat down without any reservations, then said smilingly, ¡°Master Dean, what can I do for you?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, if I remember correctly, you aren¡¯t older than eighteen years old, and yet, you¡¯re already a necromancy adept mage and even have the power to kill harpies. You went from being a child without any magic to having such aplishments in just a short year. This is quite incredible!¡± Emma spoke at a good pace as she smiled at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo frowned involuntarily upon hearing her words. Remaining silent for a bit, he smiled and opened his mouth to speak, ¡°Indeed, even I myself find this incredible. I wonder what Master Dean means by saying such words?¡±

    Emma shook her head and chuckled, speaking kindly, ¡°Child, you shouldn¡¯t misunderstand, I hold no harsh feelings towards you. You¡¯re a student of my Babylon Academy of Magic and Force and even studied necromancy. Now that you have such great achievements, it can be considered as a credit to our Academy.¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, you¡¯ve gone from being a clueless child to having the power to kill two Harpies in two years. I must say that this is quite the miracle. I¡¯m sure you have encountered many strange things in these past two years, otherwise you wouldn¡¯t have progressed this fast.¡±

    ¡°You also haven¡¯t reported to the Dark Mantle for quite some time. Candide told me to pay attention that if you returned to the Academy, that I must have you visit to the Dark Mantle as soon as possible. He seems to have a mission for you. In addition, I hope you will properly handle your rtionship with Fanny. While there are things that I can¡¯t say, I just want to remind you that Fanny¡¯s father isn¡¯t someone that you will easily get along with, so you need to pay special attention!¡±

    Han Shuo heaved a sigh of relief after Emma finished speaking. He hadn¡¯t expected Emma to be simr to Candide. Like husband like wife, they didn¡¯t seem interested in plumbing his secrets, and even sounded rather protective of him.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said with a smile, ¡°Rest assured Dean Emma, I¡¯ll definitely heed your advice. I¡¯ll also report to the Dark Mantle as soon as possible.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s all well and good, so I¡¯ll say no more. Your diploma and identity certificates should be ready by tomorrow if there¡¯s no problem. Deo won¡¯t dare to try any more monkey business under my watch. Hehe, Deo isn¡¯t a bad person in fact. It¡¯s just that you humiliated himst time, which is why he targeted you like this. I hope that you won¡¯t take it to heart.¡±

    ¡°Mhm, I know!¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t say anything else and left Emma¡¯s office. He actually didn¡¯t mind the matter with Deo. Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t have many chances toe back after graduation if there were no further idents. He naturally wouldn¡¯t have any contact with Deo in the future. Of course, if Deo himself wanted to seek death, Han Shuo didn¡¯t mind sending him on his way with the strength that he held.

    Han Shuo went straight to Fanny¡¯sb after leaving Emma¡¯s office. His mind was churning nonstop when he thought about how he would be seeing her soon. He was a little excited and couldn¡¯t quite control himself. He was nervous like a young boy about to confess his love.

    Han Shuo inhaled deeply at Fanny¡¯s door and gradually calmed his nerves. He knocked on the door with a smile, ¡°Master Fanny, can Ie in?¡±

    ¡°No you cannot!¡± Contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, Fanny neatly rejected him as soon as she heard his voice. This had never happened before.

    Dumbfounded, Han Shuo smiled wryly, ¡°Why?¡±

    ¡°Humph! I know you are up to no good this time, so just stand outside the door, or you can just disappear for half a year likest time.¡± Fanny¡¯s voice inside theb contained obvious resentment that anyone could tell from her tone. She was stillining about thest time that Han Shuo had departed without a farewell.

    ¡°Master Fanny, please let me exin. I really didn¡¯t do it on purpose. I was dyed in Valen City this time. I really had no choice but to stay there. I didn¡¯t deliberately try to deceive you!¡± With his current breadth of experience, how could Han Shuo not understand the underlying meaning of Fanny¡¯s words? He could only stand outside the door with a wry smile and exin slowly.

    ¡°Little lecher, I¡¯ll allow you toe in, but don¡¯t try anything funny.¡± Fanny hesitated for a bit. She understood that leaving Han Shuo standing at the door was somewhat inappropriate.

    Hastily nodding his head, Han Shuopromised to assure her, ¡°Of course, of course. There might be bad rumors if someone sees me standing outside. That¡¯d be even more improper.¡±

    Fanny seemed to think that Han Shuo¡¯s words made sense. Theb door made a creaking sound as she cautiously stuck out her head out and looked around. Her hand grabbed at the silent Han Shuo and yanked him inside, shutting the door. She returned to sit at the table in the middle of the room, and said in a serious manner, ¡°Alright, what do you want?¡±

    Laughing devilishly, Han Shuo walked to sit right in front of Fanny without any reservations, saying, ¡°Master Fanny, could it be that you want to deny your promise?¡±

    Stilling her expression, Fanny pretended to be calm and flicked a nce Han Shuo, asking suspiciously, ¡°Deny what?¡±

    ¡°You once said that you¡¯d be my girlfriend when I advanced to adept mage. Now that I¡¯ve passed the adept mage test, I can be regarded to have officially graduated from the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. There is no longer a barrier between us, and so, you¡¯ll honor your promise, won¡¯t you?¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t beat around the bush. He asked with a smile, his eyes shining as he looked at Fanny.

    Fanny couldn¡¯t pretend to be serious anymore after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words. Her cheeks red as red as the sun. She fiercely rolled her eyes at Han Shuo, then giggled in a charming manner and said the words she prepared beforehand, ¡°I didn¡¯t say I¡¯d agree for sure, just that I¡¯d give it some thought and consider it. Hehe, I¡¯m done thinking, so what are you so anxious about?¡±

    Fanny¡¯s expression was delicate and charming at this time. The two crimson patches on her cheeks adorned her shy beauty even more. Having known her for so long, Han Shuo had long since been aware that she wasn¡¯t without affection for him. Her half-hearted attitude right now only made Han Shuo unable to suppress a heart that was itching with naughty thoughts.

    With a wickedugh, Han Shuo instantly forgot thepromise earlier. He abruptly moved behind Fanny, hisrge hands hugging her shoulders from behind. He puckered his mouth to steal a kiss from her red cheek, then said with a grin, ¡°Can it be that you really want to go back on your words? That isn¡¯t the morals of a good teacher, no?¡±

    Fanny only saw a blur when Han Shuo disappeared right before her eyes. He appeared like a ghost behind her without giving her time to react. His arms embraced her, firmly holding her to the chair as he took the chance to attack her with a kiss.

    ¡°You brazen daredevil of a little lecher, what did you promise me when you came in?¡± Fanny was extremely embarrassed. Her resentment from the past half year still hadn¡¯t dissipated yet, so she couldn¡¯t help but struggle and yell loudly.

    When dealing with a woman, one couldn¡¯t follow her pace, but had to take the initiative, using body and soul as a doubleyered attack to destroy the defenses of her heart. Han Shuo had learned many things from Emily¡¯s body. He had long stopped being a greenhorn. Moreover, with the memory and experience from rendon, plus his own feelings, he was no longer passive whening into contact with women.

    While Fanny was struggling and yelling, Han Shuo held her firmly with his hands and leaned down, his hot tongue gently caressing her white, slender neck. He tenderly whispered into her ear, ¡°I¡¯ve thought of you, everyday and everynight for this past half year. I¡¯ve wanted to see you at every moment. I think you already know this, don¡¯t you? Honestly, the past days were nd when I wasn¡¯t by your side. Only your promise encouraged me to work hard and practice. The thought of being with together with you was like a spell, haunting me to train day and night without a single moment to rx. I could advance to an adept mage today, everything was because I wanted to be with you. Could it be you wish to heartlessly hurt me?...¡±

    The unbroken string of whispers was full of sincerity and deep affection. The tender voice was like a gentle rain that moistened Fanny¡¯s dry soul. The hot tip of Han Shuo¡¯s tongue wantonly probed about, like a catalyst that started to destroy her soul¡¯s defense. Fanny, whose very heart was still struggling, slowly fell into the of love woven by Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oh... Bryan...¡± Fanny softly moaned, tears had unknowingly filled her eyes. Her struggling body suddenly melted and her mouth curved into a sweet smile as she listened to Han Shuo¡¯s whisperings of passionate love.

    ¡°Do you know? I truly can¡¯t do without you!¡± Han Shuo finally pulled Fanny up from the chair and embraced her tightly. His look was fiery and directed right at her as he tenderly professed his affection.

    The line of defense in her soulpletely copsed. Fanny softly whimpered and threw herself into Han Shuo¡¯s chest. Her hands clutched his strong back, and she stood on the tips of her toes as her fragrant lips reached for Han Shuo¡¯s.

    A beautiful woman was offering her cherry lips, so Han Shuo naturally wouldn¡¯t be politely aloof. He immediately held her and gave a zing hot kiss.

    Beautiful Fanny was the one that Han Shuo truly loved. From the moment he¡¯d stepped into this world, perhaps it was the lingering emotions from Bryan¡¯s thoughts, or her kindness that¡¯d moved Han Shuo¡¯s heart. He was deeply infatuated with her, a fact that had never changed.

    Even after all the earth-shattering changes, even after Han Shuo¡¯s power soared nonstop, even with Emily and Phoebe, who were no less beautiful than Fanny, his initial and most sincere affection for Fanny had never been affected.

    Han Shuo was now ustomed to the ways of this world. He understood that as long as he had enough strength, it wouldn¡¯t be difficult to obtain whatever he wanted. Money, power, and beauty were his trifecta of favorite things, and were precisely the three things that he didn¡¯t have in his past life.

    Why would one mind the petty things in life if one could simply have everything they wanted? Why mind how others look at you? Han Shuo had decided to indulge himself, and no longer concealed his desires!

 Chapter 249: Rebirth pill

    Chapter 249: Rebirth pill

    Han Shuo and Fanny embraced each other affectionately. However, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t anxious to take her. He only continued to use tender words to dere the feelings that he felt deep in his heart.

    When Han Shuo realized that Fanny hadpletely let down her guard, he took out a pill from his space ring and smiled, ¡°Eat it!¡±

    ¡°What is this?¡± Fanny smiled happily, her eyes sparkling. She looked curiously at Han Shuo and asked.

    The rebirth pill was round and crystal clear, like a beautiful bright green jewel, and emitted a refreshing fragrance. Han Shuo had refined it back when he had been in the cemetery of death. It had the effect ofpletely transforming an ordinary person¡¯s body. A batch had only seven pills. Han Shuo had already eaten one. He had confirmed its effects and intended to use the rebirth pill to reform her body, giving her a surprise.

    ¡°A great pill!¡± Han Shuo smilingly said.

    ¡°Being all mysterious again, you bad thing!¡± Fanny rolled her eyes at Han Shuo, as she casually picked up the rebirth pill. She popped it into her mouth without another word.

    Seeing her swallow it so quickly, Han Shuo was shocked for a moment before hastily urging, ¡°Quick, sit down and don¡¯t think of anything else.¡±

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t exin in time, so he used his hands to press her back into her seat. He then ced both of his hands on the middle of her back and began to transmit magical yuan into her body.

    ¡°Mm, what on earth did you give me to eat? It feels like a fire is burning in my stomach!¡± Fanny felt like a fire had been lit in her body after swallowing the rebirth pill. Her body temperature rose quickly, making her yell out in panicked voice.

    She then seemed to misunderstand as she couldn¡¯t help but struggle and roar in fury, ¡°Damnable brat! You gave me that kind of medicine didn¡¯t you!? How could you be so despicable?¡±

    Fanny had misunderstood and her heart was in a mess. She was both disappointed and furious at Han Shuo, wanting to escape his grip as her body madly struggled.

    Han Shuo panicked, his face paled. He immediately used his left hand to firmly press down on Fanny¡¯s shoulder and hastily shouted, ¡°This isn¡¯t an aphrodisiac. I swear. You trust me so little?¡±

    Fanny became a little calmer upon hearing his words. She could feel that although there was a fire in her body, it wasn¡¯t a lustful me. Therefore she stopped struggling and said quickly, ¡°Eh, you¡¯re always up to nothing good, so I just misunderstood your intentions. I won¡¯t move anymore now!¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t know whether tough or cry upon hearing her words. When he thought about it, his rtionship with Fanny was indeed a little out of order. It was understandable for her to assume his intentions were bad.

    ¡°Alright, don¡¯t speak. Just calm your soul and empty your mind, like you¡¯re meditating!¡± Han Shuo released Fanny¡¯s shoulder and moved his hand to the middle of her back. He quickly poured magical yuan into her body and helped her diffuse the medicinal energy.

    Dense mists wrapped around the two, ck electric sparks shot out from Han Shuo¡¯s palm into Fanny¡¯s body. Fanny sat still and proper, her whole body rxed as she allowed Han Shuo tp act as he wished,pletely trusting him.

    Han Shuo released his hand with a smile roughly an hourter, heaving a long sigh before he leaned in and asked, ¡°How are you feeling?¡±

    ¡°Eh, I need to go to the toilet!¡± Fanny was somewhat embarrassed. She whispered with a reddened face.

    Han Shuo let loose with a loud string ofughter and said, ¡°That sounds about right. You¡¯ll want to go to the toilet over the next three days. The waste and filth in your body will be excreted during this time, after which your body will be reformed in ways beyond your imagination. I¡¯lle back to see you again then.¡±

    A series of pitter-patter sounds burst out from Fanny¡¯s body. Fanny couldn¡¯t hold it in anymore. She sprang up with a flushed face, huffing and yelling, ¡°How is this different from axative? You hateful brat!¡±

    Fanny leapt to open the door and ran out before Han Shuo could respond, not daring to stay for a moment. She obviously couldn¡¯t hold it back anymore.

    Han Shuo gave a long, devious, oddugh after Fanny left. He then promptly left as well. He followed a narrow, twisting trail to the back mountain to avoid bumping into the other necromancy students and exited the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force.

    Han Shuo¡¯s actions would definitely have caused a sensation upon return. He would stop being associated with the Academy after procedures were wrapped up in three days. Thus, it was more appropriate to leave through the back door to avoid the chatter of Lisa and the other students.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t immediately go and report to the Dark Mantle after walking out of the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. He hadn¡¯t been back for a long time, so it wouldn¡¯t matter if he visited a day or twoter.

    It currently seemed quite lively in front of the Boozt Merchant Guild as many carriages stood there. Han Shuo went straight inside after arriving.

    ¡°Eh, if this isn¡¯t Mr. Bryan? What brings you here?¡± The two guards at the door both recognized Han Shuo. They greeted him with surprise as he hadn¡¯te to visit in a long time.

    ¡°Mhm, it has indeed been a long time since Ist came by. Has thedy of the house returned?¡± Han Shuo nodded with a smile and asked in a friendly manner.

    ¡°Thedy came back a long time ago. If Mr. Bryan hase to discuss business with thedy this time, why don¡¯t you drop by a littleter?¡± This guard had a difficult expression, he hesitated momentarily before opening his mouth to speak.

    ¡°Oh, why is that? Can it be that yourdy isn¡¯t home?¡± Han Shuo inquired with confusion, thenughed lightly, ¡°No problem, I can just meet with Fabian. If Fabian is absent, I can still chat with Jack!¡±

    Suddenly, Phoebe¡¯s angry shout echoed from inside. Han Shuo was stunned before his face turned grave. He curiously asked, ¡°What¡¯s going on here?¡±

    The guard smiled wryly as he looked at Han Shuo, saying in all honesty, ¡°There¡¯s some chaos going on inside at the moment. Some big businessman called Cameron seems to want Miss Phoebe to assent to something, but she didn¡¯t. Things aren¡¯t look very good.¡±

    ¡°Many thanks for the reminder. You don¡¯t seem to know much about my rtionship with your merchant guild.¡± Han Shuo replied before rushing in to see what was happening.

    That Cameron fellow had wanted Phoebe to join his alliancest time at Lawrence¡¯s residence, but she¡¯d turned him down. Apparently he still hadn¡¯t given up on the idea after so long. Judging from Phoebe¡¯s furious shout, the scene inside was likely not very amiable.

    No matter how he looked at it, Phoebe could already be considered Han Shuo¡¯s woman. He naturally wouldn¡¯t stand for it if someone bullied her. Therefore, he dashed forward at an extremely fast speed and appeared at the source of Phoebe¡¯s angry shouts in the span of just a few breaths.

    A group of ten surrounded Phoebe in a pavilion at the crack of the artificial mountain that Han Shuo and Phoebe had once hid themselves in. The familiar ce was now full of tension, with some strange faces readying their weapons for a fight.

    Apart from Cameron, who Han Shuo had met at the residence of Finance Minister Eevee, everyone else was unfamiliar. These people were either flowery dressed merchants, or highly skilled mages or swordsmen. The gang looked at Phoebe and Fabian¡¯s group with ugly faces, as if just one more unwanted word would cause them to spring into action.

    Several guards of the Boozt Merchant Guild stood in the surroundings with rage burning in their bellies, their weapons already unsheathed as if they just needed one order from Phoebe for them to engage in a pitched battle.

    ¡°Bryan, when did you return?¡± Her pretty eyes suddenly brightened with delight at Han Shuo¡¯s sudden appearance. Phoebe was ecstatic as she eximed in surprise.

    ¡°Humph! Just a little boy toy, what can he do?¡± A sturdy man, whose logo on his chest clearly indicated him as a senior swordsman, cast a disdainful nce at Han Shuo. He seemed to know about Han Shuo and Phoebe¡¯s rtionship.

    ¡°Oh, is that so?¡± Han Shuo gave an oddugh before jeering, ¡°Then try taking a blow from this little boy toy, shall we?¡±

    When his words fell, the already annoyed Han Shuo punched out. There wasn¡¯t any energy pulse nor powerful momentum to it, even the speed of it was neither fast nor slow. The punch seemed soft and without strength.

    ordingly, the senior swordsman still retained his mocking expression and said coldly, ¡°Just a little boy toy indeed, even his punch is weak with no bite.¡±

    The swordsman then raised his hand. Smiling viciously, he aimed a blow right at Han Shuo¡¯s iing punch. Obviously, he intended to seriously injure Han Shuo with this blow and intimidate the Boozt Merchant Guild¡¯s guards.

    The merchants with Cameron all had leisurely smiles on their faces. They looked at Han Shuo like he was a fool, sure that he would be severely injured.

    On the other hand, Fabian, who stood by Phoebe¡¯s side, showed an excited expression. Having seen Han Shuo in action, he believed that the punch was more than met the eyes. As for Phoebe, her face was cold as ice and her lips curved with a touch of cruelty.

    Cracking sounds rang out. The yet savagely smiling senior swordsman suddenly emitted shrill, mad screams like the howling of wolves and weeping of ghosts after his blow collided with Han Shuo¡¯s.

    The sturdy body was sted backwards by an astounding force, making heavy bouncing sounds. When his butt finally touched the ground, the swordsman uncontrobly sprayed out one mouthful of blood after another. Even his shrill screams were muffled by the blood. He looked at Han Shuo, horrified, as his mouth wouldn¡¯t stop whimpering tragically.

 Chapter 250: Poison of Fire and Ice

    Chapter 250: Poison of Fire and Ice

    Han Shuo¡¯s punch had contained magical yuan, along with the punch¡¯s own astounding destructive ability. The senior swordsman, who¡¯d been jeering earlier, not only had the blood vessels and meridians of his right armpletely shattered, but his bones broken as well. This arm would be useless from now on.

    Han Shuo curved his lips and grinned nonstop as he said coldly, ¡°If you still dare to be boorish, then leave your life here today!¡±

    The senior swordsman bled uncontrobly from his mouth. He looked at Han Shuo, horrified. He couldn¡¯t even finish uttering a whimper and had beenpletely owned by thetter.

    A space archmage with a vicious appearance was standing next to Cameron. He wore a brown magic robe, his face riddled with pockmarks. His eyes shed as he looked at Cameron. Backed up by this man, Cameron nodded slightly, as if agreeing to some idea proposed by him.

    The space archmage with the pockmarked face was the most powerful person in Cameron¡¯s gang. When he saw Cameron nod his head, the archmage slightly moved his lips and quickly chanted out a magic spell.

    It was as if waves of water had suddenly risen up in the surrounding areas. Magical elements violently permeated through the air, bringing with them a wondrous binding force. The whole space seemed to be restrained, and no one could move their hands or feet.

    The vicious looking space archmage once again chanted another magic spell. The still space seemed to be sliced by a ss-like de with Cameron at its center. The space slices also included Cameron¡¯s people. The invaders escaped the space imprisonment after a few sparkling white lights.

    ¡°Refusing a toast only to be forced to drink to a forfeit. It is you who seek your own death!¡± The archmage looked sinisterly at Han Shuo¡¯s group and screeched in a voice that sounded like a tool scratching against the ss, making one¡¯s scalp tingle.

    ¡°Mr. Aubrey, your skills are really quite amazing!¡± Cameronughed loudly. Due to the space around Cameron being cut, his group could resume their movement.

    ¡°No need to be polite, I¡¯m only following Duke Ashburn¡¯s orders.¡± The space archmage replied to Cameron¡¯s ttering with an arrogant, strict face.

    ¡°This brat is called Bryan. He made the acquaintance of Hahn of the Betteridge family at the banquet hosted by the Empire¡¯s Finance Minister. Wouldn¡¯t it be bad if we also detain him?¡± Cameron hesitantly asked Aubrey, pointing at Han Shuo.

    Aubrey coldly smiled and threw back his head. He threw a disdainful nce at Han Shuo and said, ¡°What can this brat do? You think our Duke Ashburn is afraid of that old dude Hahn?¡±

    Putting on a smiling face, Cameron ttered, ¡°Of course not, of course not. Since that¡¯s the case, let¡¯s capture them all. We can release them after I¡¯ve taken over the Boozt Merchant Guild.¡±

    ¡°Mhm, this must be done quickly. The duke has already be a bit impatient. You must hold all of the Empire¡¯s major merchant guilds in your hand in a short amount of time. As for the small ones without foundations, kill them all if there dare to disobey. We don¡¯t want to wait any longer.¡± Aubrey turned his nose up in the sky with a cold face, as if he found it annoying to have to deal with this merchant.

    ¡°Understood. How would I dare not put forth my all for His Grace the Duke!¡± Cameron¡¯s face was painted with an expression of loyalty as he vowed solemnly.

    Nodding, Aubrey said, ¡°Good. No more nonsense. I¡¯ll tie up these people, making it easy for you to bring them out of the Boozt Merchant Guild. Just lock up this woman called Phoebe. Don¡¯t get any other ideas. You¡¯ll bring bad luck upon your own heads if you anger her master!¡±

    Cameron didn¡¯t dare to disagree. He repeatedly nodded his head in understanding while looking at Phoebe with a hint of shock. He appeared unable toprehend the origin of Phoebe¡¯s master, who even Duke Ashburn would unexpectedly have scruples about.

    Aubrey took a deep breath and shook the left hand hidden in his sleeve. His space ring emitted a faint light and a blue jade magic staff appeared in his hand. He opened his mouth, about to chant another magic incantation.

    Exactly at that moment, the space suddenly shattered with Han Shuo as the epicenter . A faint, cold light shot out like lightning and swam around like lightning, releasing Phoebe and the others from their rigid states.

    The faint, cold light circled around once and returned back to Han Shuo¡¯s palm. Then a cold, savage killing intent emitted from his body. He calmly looked at the shocked space archmage Aubrey and asked Phoebe, ¡°Phoebe, how should we deal with these people?¡±

    ¡°How could it be? Who are you? How are you able to break out of my space binding?¡± Aubrey looked horrified. He couldn¡¯t believe his eyes and shouted loudly. His left hand clutched the magic staff, about to release his next spell.

    Cameron and his group were also shocked, shouting at the guards to protect them. They looked at Han Shuo with some fear as they retreated into the middle of the guards. Han Shuo, who had the power to destroy the binding space of a space archmage, wasn¡¯t someone their guards could deal with. The merchant bunch understood this clearly so they nervously prepared to defend against his attack.

    Phoebe had a somewhat ugly look on her face. Looking at Cameron¡¯s group with resentment for a while, she sighed in resignation and said, ¡°Let them go!¡±

    Han Shuo was appalled. They enemies had knocking on their door, yet Phoebe actually swallowed and endured it. It didn¡¯t seem like her personality. Then Han Shuo thought about the name of Duke Ashburn and seemed to understood something. His heart was overflowing with anger, as he coldly shouted, ¡°Isn¡¯t that too easy for them?¡±

    ¡°Let them go!¡± Phoebe sighed and said somewhat helplessly.

    ¡°Haha, what can you people do? In the Empire, Duke Ashburn¡¯s power is as high as the sky. With just your little merchant band, how can you go against His Grace?!¡± Aubrey was very proud. He wildlyughed and headed straight for the door.

    To be able to destroy a space archmage¡¯s space binding, Han Shuo¡¯s power was definitely not lower than the caster¡¯s. With Han Shuo, who was on par or even a level higher than him, and Phoebe as well, Aubrey knew he couldn¡¯tplete the task. Naturally he wouldn¡¯t want to stay here any longer.

    Seeing Aubrey flee, Cameron and his men obviously didn¡¯t dare to stay. ncing with fear at the murderous Han Shuo, Cameron nervously followed Aubrey.

    ¡°Halt!¡± Han Shuo suddenly roared. Han Shuo¡¯s body was shrouded with murderous intent, a frosty, violent air bursting out like a river destroying the dam.

    This air was vicious to the extreme. It was like a substance heading straight towards the thong of people who were attempting to leave. Under that terrifying pressure, even Aubrey broke out into a cold sweat. He couldn¡¯t move as his body was rigidly stuck in ce.

    As for the merchants, their bodies were trembling like mad, backs overflowing with sweat. Han Shuo was like a furious beast that would go berserk at any time, staring at them with a bloodthirsty red glow in his eyes. They felt as though they would be torn to pieces if they made even the slightest careless move.

    ¡°Bryan, this is the Boozt Merchant Guild, I¡¯m begging you!¡± Phoebe was shocked, Han Shuo¡¯s strength had skyrocketed in just four months. She was both happy and frightened that he was emitting such a terrifying aura.

    She was happy because, with Han Shuo¡¯s rapid progress, their safety would be guaranteed from now on. She was frightened because she couldn¡¯t see through his temper. He now had the power to severely injure these merchants. If he recklessly used all of his power on them, it would likely bring disaster upon the guild, so she begged with mixed feelings.

    Han Shuo took in a deep breath. He¡¯d understood when he heard Phoebe deliberately stressed on the three words ¡°Boozt Merchant Guild¡±. Whatever the situation was, he couldn¡¯t take action and brought her trouble. This was also the capital of the Empire. Many things couldn¡¯t be resolved by just blindly killing people.

    His body shing, Han Shuo appeared behind Aubrey. He patted thetter¡¯s shoulder, coldly stressing each word, ¡°Aubrey is it? I¡¯ve memorized your face, and you should also remember mine. Remember, those who dare to harm my people will pay the price sooner orter.¡±

    While Han Shuo spoke, the hand on Aubrey¡¯s shoulder flicked out two faint lights of red and purple between the index and middle finger. The lights were covered by his palm as they fell into Aubrey¡¯s body.

    At this point, Aubrey had just about lost his wits. When he heard Han Shuo shout ¡°halt¡±, he¡¯d been prepared to fight at anytime. However, Han Shuo¡¯s speed was devilish and hadpletely destroyed his defenses. He didn¡¯t even had time to react when he saw Han Shuo appear out of thin air and felt arge hand mp down on his shoulder.

    Even as an archmage, he had no chance of winning when he was in such close quarters with this horrifyingly powerful fellow. Aubrey¡¯s aura died down as he stood still and docile without another sound, listening to Han Shuo¡¯s threats. He could obviously feel the murderous intent when Han Shuo patted his shoulder.

    Due to this nervous, tense state, he wasn¡¯t calm enough to sense any abnormalities. He also didn¡¯t notice the two hot and cold entities entering his body.

    ¡°Good. You bloody bunch of bastards can get the hell out of here!¡± Seeing that the poison of ice and fire was nted in Aubrey¡¯s body, Han Shuo walked back towards Phoebe with a cold face. Passing by the terrified Cameron, he randomly patted Cameron¡¯s body, and a red purple light fleetingly shed. Han Shuo smiled ndly, ¡°You also be careful.¡±

    After he arrived at Phoebe¡¯s side, the murderous intent was withdrawn. Aubrey and the others didn¡¯t dare to utter nonsense and hurriedly fled. One trip to hell was enough for these people to fear Han Shuo from the depths of their hearts.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry. These people are under themand of Duke Ashburn. If something happened to them within the guild, it will be very difficult to handle!¡± After those people left, Phoebe looked apologetically at Han Shuo and said somewhat timidly.

    Smiling as he nodded his head, Han Shuo no longer emitted the murderous aura. He was back to his calm and indifferent self as he said, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, nothing will happen to them at Boozt Merchant Guild. However, I guarantee they won¡¯t be safe for long.¡±

    Taken aback, Phoebe eximed, ¡°You want to assassinate them? After what happened today, if you assassinate them not long after their return, everyone will know it¡¯s us. This is not a good idea!¡±

    Smiling mysteriously, Han Shuo assured, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, am I someone who doesn¡¯t know how to look at the big picture?¡±

    ¡°All of you leave first. I have something to discuss privately with Bryan.¡± Phoebe looked at the guards, plus Fabian and several trusted confidantes of the guild, frowning somewhat worriedly as she ordered.

    After this incident, the guards and trusted confidants of the guild once again were aware of their rtionship. As Phoebe ordered, they silently dismissed themselves, and all disappeared from the pavilion after a while.

    ¡°Just what¡¯s going on?¡± Han Shuo gently asked after those people left.

    Seeing no one else around, Phoebe threw herself into Han Shuo¡¯s embrace. She used some strength and hugged him tightly then softly murmured, ¡°It feels really good to have you beside me again.¡±

    The two embraced each other tightly. Phoebe told Han Shuo about what happened to her after they separated at the Valley of Sunshine. From her words, Han Shuo roughly understood that because he and Phoebe had stayed in the Valley of Sunshine for a while, Boozt had no one at the helm. Cameron had taken advantage of this and led a bunch of merchants to upy the guild.

    ¡°Okay, I understood!¡± Han Shuo patted Phoebe¡¯s shoulder to sooth her, then took out a rebirth pill and said softly, ¡°Eat it.¡±

    Han Shuo told her about the side effects of the pill first to prevent Phoebe from misunderstanding that it was an aphrodisiac orxative like Fanny hadst time.

    Phoebe rolled her eyes at Han Shuo then swallowed the rebirth pill. Han Shuo helped her diffuse the pill. When Phoebe quickly ran for the toilet, he left to report to the Dark Mantle.

 Chapter 251: Becoming a famous person

    Chapter 251: Bing a famous person

    Mt. Ordas was at an altitude high above sea level and was covered in clouds all year round. The Dark Mantle headquarters were situated right in the middle of the mountain¡¯s belly, guarded by all sorts of experts. The security here was even more strict than the Empire¡¯s pce.

    Han Shuo passed through the entrance using the magical transportation matrix. Identity badge in hand, he moved without impediment deep into the mountain belly. After a few turns, he arrived at the transportation matrix leading to Candide¡¯s ce.

    ¡°Wait a bit, Lord Candide is currently not in the headquarters. I¡¯ll go to notify him, the Lord shoulde back in a short while.¡± Only at this point did the Dark Star guide, who¡¯d led Han Shuo to Candide¡¯s ce from the transportation matrix, exined at a neither fast nor slow pace.

    ¡°Is that so? Alright.¡± Han Shuo nodded in understanding.

    ¡°Mhm, then I¡¯ll take you to the waiting area and notify you immediately when Lord Candide returns!¡± The Dark Star envoy also nodded, then spun on the transportation matrix.

    A white light shed and Han Shuo appeared in a wide, square stone chamber that was as big as four basketball courtsbined. There were many soft chairs and tables set up, with dazzling disys of various fruit desserts, plus some books on the table. Many people of different appearances surrounded these ces, patiently either eating or flipping through the books on the tables, seemingly also waiting.

    Except for the transportation matrix where Han Shuo was standing, soft carpet covered the surrounding ground. A dozen or so ssnterns hung above, lighting up the entire stone chamber.

    ¡°Hey! Hello there, you look unfamiliar! Is this your first time here?¡± A short haired, young and pretty girl stood in front of Han Shuo, cheerfully greeting him.

    ¡°Mm, it¡¯s my first time here. How do you do?¡± Han Shuo walked towards this lively young girl with a smile on his face, intent on learning about news within the Dark Mantle headquarters.

    ¡°I¡¯m Chrissie, a fire journeyman mage. Currently, I¡¯m a rank three Dark Star, nice to meet you.¡± This girl named Chrissie was quite talkative. She smiled at Han Shuo and warmly greeted him in a familiar manner.

    ¡°Hehe, I¡¯m Bryan, also a rank three Dark Star like you. I¡¯m a necromancer.¡± Han Shuo smiled as he walked towards Chrissie and introduced himself.

    However,st time he¡¯d left Valen City for the Valley of Sunshine, Han Shuo had already known from Emily that his rank was already Dark Moon.

    However, since Candide was in charge of Han Shuo, only he could upgrade Han Shuo¡¯s badge to officially confirm his rank as a Dark Moon. Han Shuo hadn¡¯t reported for a half year already, so although he¡¯d advanced to the rank of Dark Moon, it had yet to be made official.

    ¡°Hah! So you¡¯re also a rank three Dark Star! Which Lord are you following?¡± Chrissie giggled, and pulled up a chair for Han Shuo.

    ¡°Chrissie, you¡¯re on the bench with no missions. Why must you keep chatting up random people? Are you trying to harm them?¡± A robust journeyman swordsman next to Chrissie rolled his eyes.

    ¡°Allis, what nonsense are you spouting? Who wants to harm people?¡± Chrissie abruptly turned around, huffing and ring at that journeyman swordsman.

    ¡°Yet you still deny it! You fire mages make a mess of everything. On ourst mission, you burned half the vige, throwing my mission down the drain. The boss furiously lectured me. I¡¯m already miserable thanks to you, so don¡¯t go around harming others.¡± Allis wryly smiled, shaking his head. He turned to Han Shuo and winked, as if telling him to be careful.

    Han Shuo lifted his head and grinned with goodwill, then wrinkled his brow to read the book in his hand. As it turned out, the books on the tables were actually thetest secret intelligence reports circting internally in the Dark Mantle. They included everything in the most recent period, such as news on every aspect of the Empire. The topics ranged fromrge ones, such as frontier battles, to the small petty gossip about some aristocrat¡¯s odd quirks.

    With Han Shuo¡¯s current brain capacity, he only needed to flip through a book once to memorize its contents. He didn¡¯t care about the small petty gossip, but those regarding Valen City and the Valley of Sunshine caught his attention.

    One highlight was the Gryphon Legion¡¯s chief, Bob Ascher, betraying the Empire. ording to the intelligencework of the Dark Mantle, Bob Ascher had long since colluded with the Kasi Empire. After betraying the Empire, Bob Ascher had led a group of trusted confidants to join the Kasi Empire and became one of its senior military officers.

    Han Shuo¡¯s name once again appeared in the Dark Mantle¡¯s intelligencework. ording to the books, it was due to Han Shuo and Emily¡¯s efforts that Bob Ascher¡¯s misdeeds were exposed. After receiving the two¡¯s report, the Dark Mantle arrived at Valen City at the fastest speed possible. They took advantage of Bob not yet erupting in rebellion to put the situation back under control.

    Otherwise, if Bob Ascher had been allowed to abuse his power and creates holes in the defenses of Valen City for the Kasi Empire, who was eyeing the city like a hungry tiger, to invade, the city would have fallen quickly. Unknowingly, Han Shuo as a rank three Dark Star had be a rising star within the Dark Mantle. Han Shuo¡¯s description was attached within, and it even included his first mission where he¡¯d uncovered the plot of wind archmage Duke from the Kasi Empire.

    In addition, this intel also included news regarding the chaos in the Valley of Sunshine. The four strongest forces endlessly fighting covertly and openly, leading to daily bloodshed. This time even the Butcher and J¡¯s strong forces seemed to have entered the fray, joining the struggle for power in the Valley of Sunshine.

    Amongst them, the Soul Destroyer mercenary band founded by Han Shuo and Trunks was gradually emerging from the fray. Under Trunks¡¯ charisma, along with plentiful resources, they had taken advantage of the disarray to attract experts to join their mercenary band. Since the Soul Destroyer mercenary band was appearing in the internal intelligence of the Dark Mantle, it showed the band already had some standing.

    As Han Shuo concentrated on the book in his hands, Chrissie stood in front of him and asked again, ¡°Right, Bryan, which Lord do you follow?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, I follow Lord Candide.¡± Han Shuo put the book down and lifted his head smilingly to answer Chrissie.

    ¡°Lord Candide, but you¡¯re only a rank three Dark Star, how could you possibly be following Lord Candide? Mm, your name is Bryan... can it be that you¡¯re that Bryan? Oh my gosh!¡± Chrissie shook her head in confusion at first, then suddenly remembered something. She looked at Han Shuo and shouted with surprise.

    When the patiently waiting members around them heard Chrissie¡¯s shout, they all put down their fruits or books and looked at Han Shuo in astonishment.

    ¡°He¡¯s Bryan? So young!¡±

    ¡°What a lucky young fellow for Lord Candide to fancy him. It would be hard for him not to be promoted quickly even if he doesn¡¯t want to be!¡±

    ¡°Hee hee, his looks really don¡¯t disappoint. If I can go on a mission with him, it would be such a sweet thing!¡±

    Chatter erupted from the surrounding members who happened to be idle at the moment. All sorts of astonishment, admiration, and odd looks were projected at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oh my gosh, my luck is really not bad. Bryan, if you have any mission that requires more people, can you please take me? Don¡¯t listen to that brat Allis¡¯ nonsense, I¡¯m a fine fire journeyman mage! I promise I won¡¯t be a burden to you!¡± Chrissie immediately recovered after eximing in surprise. She grabbed at the corner of Han Shuo¡¯s clothes and begged pitifully.

    ¡°Bryan, Lord Candide has returned. Please go to the transportation matrix!¡± A transportation member next to the matrix suddenly announced in a loud voice.

    ¡°If I need more people, I will consider you. See you!¡± The clothes that Chrissie had grabbed onto slipped out of her fingers like oil as Han Shuo twisted his body. After shing her a friendly smile, he stood in the transportation matrix in front of the crowd¡¯s surprised looks.

    A white light shed and Han Shuo appeared in Candide¡¯s personal room. The old man had a gloomy expression on his face as always. Looking at Han Shuo without showing any particr expression, he only said in a low voice, ¡°I remember telling you long ago, that even if you don¡¯t have a mission, you still have to report back in the Dark Mantle headquarters once a month. You brat disappeared for a half year, no discipline at all!¡±

    ¡°I was honestly dyed by some things. I came into the possession of something in the past half year that I think Lord Candide will be very interested in!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s expression didn¡¯t change. He smiled faintly and responded.

    Whether it was Han Shuo¡¯s strength or experience, both were greatly different from the past. After half a year, the growth of his strength and experience had all greatly elerated, and all aspects were significantly developed. Han Shuo didn¡¯t feel any fear even in front of such a powerful figure like Candide and instead spoke to him as if speaking to a friend of the same status.

    ¡°You really are differentpared to before!¡± Old fox Candide apparently saw through his changes. He gave Han Shuo a stunned look for a while then shed a weird smile, ¡°What things? Will I be interested?¡±

    Han Shuo took out the handwritten notebook he had obtained from the forbiddennd. It didn¡¯t have any substantial knowledge on magic, only some experiences along with some obscure understanding of dark magic from Ayermike Cotton. Han Shuo had already copied a portion of the magic texts written in it. He had intended to give it to Emily along with the magic staff, since she practiced dark magic.

    After careful consideration, Han Shuo had decided it would be best to hand over the notebook to dark grand magus Candide. Since Han Shuo couldn¡¯t fully understand the magic texts, the reflections on dark magic from Ayermike¡¯s notebook were useless to him.

    In addition, from his multiple points of contact with Candide, Han Shuo felt that this old, suspiciously crafty looking fellow was actually truly protective of him. Giving this notebook to Candide would definitely bring about great benefits and a good future in the Dark Mantle.

    ¡°You take a look.¡± Han Shuo smiled mysteriously, before handing the ancient handwritten notebook to dark grand magus Candide in a ceremonious manner.

    ¡°What is this? It does seem to have some history!¡± Candide took the handwritten notebook and said with uncertainty. After his eyes caught a small row of letters, he was immediately dumbfounded. His eyes and mouth were wide opened as if he were struck by lightning.

    That small row of letters read, Ayermike Cotton!

    Candide was one of the three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle and had the power of a grand magus, but his two hands couldn¡¯t stop trembling when he held the notebook. His eyes almost popped out of their sockets, his face revealed an extremely shocked expression.

    This statested for a few seconds, until Candide suddenly turned his eyes to stare at Han Shuo and asked with a trembling voice, ¡°Is, is this?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded his head and confirmed, ¡°That¡¯s right! This is the notebook of the legendary dark mage of the Lancelot Empire, the demigod Ayermike Cotton!¡±

    Candide was ecstatic upon hearing these words. He wouldn¡¯t stop trembling like crazy. His mouth muttered something that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t make sense of. As for Candide¡¯s two eyes, they wouldn¡¯t leave the notebook. His trembling hands flipped the pages one by one, his whole body falling into a sluggish state.

    This continued for a long time until Candide sighed out, ¡°Too unfathomable, too wondrous! The value of this notebook is simply immeasurable!¡±

    After he uttered these words, Candide took a few more deep breaths. Waiting until he calmed down from his excitement, he looked at Han Shuo with shining eyes and asked with some hesitation, ¡°What do you mean in bringing this notebook to me?¡±

    Shrugging, Han Shuo chuckled, ¡°I¡¯m giving it to you, obviously!¡±

    ¡°Bribery! Damn brat, this is despicable bribery!¡± Candide eximed, but then he suddenly shook his head and then quickly nodded, ¡°Forget it, I want to ept this even if it¡¯s bribery.¡±

    Using some force to smooth down his hair, Candide spoke somewhat nkly, ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll take it, what¡¯s your condition?¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head and said smilingly, ¡°No conditions. This thing originally belonged to the Empire. You are my boss, and me handing it over to you can¡¯t be considered bribery, you shouldn¡¯t worry about it!¡±

    ¡°Haha, right, this is the notebook of Ayermike Cotton, so of course it belongs to the Empire. I, Candide, am one of the few dark grand magi of the Empire. As long as I exin a bit of this to His Majesty the King, he will definitely allow me to read it, so how can this be bribery!¡±

    Candide muttered to himself andughed loudly, then he swiftly flew in front of Han Shuo and pped thetter¡¯s shoulder with appreciation, ¡°Good going brat, really not bad. You did a meritorious deed again! I remember that you¡¯re already a one star Dark Moon? Give me your badge, I¡¯ll immediately promote you to a four star Dark Moon. To have found the relics of Ayermike Cotton, no one would dare to say anything against you jumping up two ranks. Lucky little brat, you are bing legendary at climbing ranks in the Dark Mantle!¡±

 Chapter 252: A high rank

    Chapter 252: A high rank

    Han Shuo was overjoyed upon hearing that his rank had jumped up by two ranks. He quickly handed his iron identity badge over to Candide.

    The Dark Mantle organization existed on an enormous scale, holding various resources of the Empire. Candide and the other two heavyweights held power that ced them under one person and above ten thousands. No one could afford to overlook them. As one was promoted here, they could enjoy even greater benefits, and could use their power to acquire thetest information that was not yet been known to others.

    Holding Han Shuo¡¯s badge, Candide couldn¡¯t conceal his excitement as he went back to his seat. He changed the rank indicated on the badge before handing it back to Han Shuo. The stars on the back of the iron badge had disappeared, reced by four crescent moons.

    ¡°Many thanks Lord Candide!¡± Han Shuo nced at the badge and ced it back into his space ring. He smiled and thanked Candide.

    Candide spread his hands, the odd smile still hanging on his face. His mood was great as heughed joyfully, ¡°No need to thank me. This is the reward you deserved. You brat, are very good. It hasn¡¯t even been a year since you joined and you¡¯re already a rank four Dark Moon. What a miracle.¡±

    ¡°This was just thanks to my good luck and also master¡¯s promotion!¡± Han Shuo wasn¡¯t arrogant or cocky as he replied humbly.

    ¡°Alright, alright, you little bootlicker of a brat!¡± Candideughed loudly as he hectored a bit. Then he raised his brows and looked raptly, ¡°I want to know all the details of how you came across this handwritten notebook.¡±

    Han Shuo knew early on that Candide would carefully question this matter, so he¡¯d already prepared a story. He briefly described the situation at the forbiddennd, hiding what needed to be hidden and said what he could say. Han Shuo gave the credit of lifting the confining forcepletely to the Cyclops and Gold Dragon, saying only that he was extremely lucky. He said only after the two big creatures left did he enter the forbiddennd and obtain the handwritten notebook.

    Candide was amazed after Han Shuo had finished. He murmured, ¡°I didn¡¯t expect the legendary forbiddennd to be so strange that no one would be able to leave. Now that it¡¯s lost that power of imprisonment, it¡¯s still simply unbelievable. Could it be that demigod Ayermike died there? There is something weird about this.¡±

    ¡°I carefully swept over that area once. After the two super rank creatures left, there was nothing left except for the tombstone. Even if you have someone go to investigate, I¡¯m afraid there is nothing left to discover.¡± When leaving the forbiddennd, Han Shuo had erased all traces that had been left behind in it. Even if Candide really sent someone there, they wouldn¡¯t find anything.

    ¡°Is that so?¡± Candide said softly and continued, ¡°However I should still send someone to investigate. This is rted to the deity Ayermike, so it shouldn¡¯t be dealt with carelessly. I think his Majesty would do the same.¡±

    ¡°Up to you! I¡¯m not going to go back there. I¡¯ve just returned from that ce and didn¡¯t find anything after searching every nook and cranny!¡± Han Shuo appeared uninterested in this mission, as he shrugged his arms in seemingziness.

    ¡°Up to you, if you don¡¯t want to, then I¡¯ll just find someone else!¡± Candide nced at Han Shuo and didn¡¯t nag him. He gave Han Shuo a puzzled look then said, ¡°Right, if you don¡¯t have anything there, why keep running into that Dark Forest? That area isn¡¯t for ordinary folk to enter!¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, not answering this question is also my right, isn¡¯t it?¡± Han Shuoughed shamelessly because he knew that the Dark Mantle couldn¡¯t pry into the members¡¯ private matters.

    ring at Han Shuo, Candide helplessly waved his hand and said, ¡°Forget it forget it. You already brought back this item, so I don¡¯t care for your private matters. In giving me this handwritten notebook, you¡¯ve already done a deed of great merit publicly speaking, and so I owe you a big favor privately speaking.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s great!¡± Han Shuoughed joyfully then inquired, ¡°Mhm, good. I¡¯ve already reported in, so if there is nothing else, then I¡¯ll be leaving first, I still have some other things to deal with!¡±

    ¡°Wait wait!¡± Candide stopped him, them murmured, ¡°I¡¯ve actually prepared a mission for you, but you brat could evene back alive from the depths of the Dark Forest, and you¡¯re a necromancy adept mage now. This simple mission seems unsuitable for you now.¡±

    ¡°Well, I have three that are a little more difficult. The first is to go to Balthazar City and assassinate a traitor called Angel. This traitor has an official role in Balthazar City, so all of his acts appear to be legitimate, so we can only assassinate him in order to avoid troubles.¡±

    The second is to go to the Bimson City in the north of the Empire. It¡¯s said that someone stored arge amount of weapons within the barren hills around the city. We need to send someone to investigate this. The third mission is to guard someone you know, Prince Lawrence.

    Eh, even though his identity hasn¡¯t officially been recognized, I think you already know of it. This third mission was personally issued by His Majesty the King. Although he¡¯s already arranged some of his own men, the King is still worried that it¡¯s not enough. You can participate if you¡¯re interested.¡±

    Assessing the matter a bit, Han Shuo believed that there was still some danger on Phoebe¡¯s side. He¡¯d just returned to the Empire and still had a lot of things that he needed to handle, so he couldn¡¯t leave immediately. Han Shuo said, ¡°Alright, I choose the third mission. I¡¯m already familiar with Lawrence anyway, so protecting him is killing two birds with one stone!¡±

    ¡°Then it¡¯s up to you. However, Lawrence¡¯s identity is special, so you have to tread carefully to avoid bringing trouble upon yourself!¡± Candide had long reminded Han Shuo to deal with Lawrence properly. He once again advised this when Han Shuo epted the mission, exining that it would even be more intense once the princes began their fight for power.

    ¡°Rest assured, I understand!¡± Han Shuo nodded in understanding. Then he hesitated for a moment and asked, ¡°Master Candide, what kind of person is this Duke Ashburn?¡±

    Candide was surprised for a moment and stared at Han Shuo, suspiciously. ¡°Why? Does he want to recruit you?¡±

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo said in a low voice, ¡°That¡¯s not it. I think I may have offended him, so I reckon that he won¡¯t let me off easily.¡±

    Shocked, Candide said with a darkened expression, ¡°Politically speaking, Grand Duke Ashburn is the Empire¡¯s minister of operations. His younger sister is the Queen, so he is the uncle of the eldest son, Prince Charles. This person is vile and always seeks revenge for his grievances. He reigns over arge amount of death sworn warriors, relying on his position and the covert support of the Queen to murder many of his political enemies. You must be careful after offending him.¡±

    ¡°Are you afraid of him?¡± Han Shuo was silent for a while before he suddenly asked.

    Rolling his eyes at Han Shuo, Candide said, ¡°It¡¯s not that I¡¯m afraid of him, but more that I don¡¯t wish to recklessly provoke him either. You already know that our Dark Mantle is the King¡¯s hand in the shadows. Everything we do represents the king. Particrly us three rank five Dark Suns are directly under his charge.¡±

    When the King is still healthy, no one can do anything to us. Even Ashburn has to tread carefully, preventing us from grasping his weak points. However, once his Majesty the King abdicates and the power shifts, if the new king nullifies our authority, Ashburn won¡¯t have any more scruples about moving against us, do you understand?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo said in a low voice, ¡°I understand. Alright, I¡¯m going to find Lawrence then!¡±

    Han Shuo immediately set off after speaking. Candide suddenly spoke up just when he was about to leave, ¡°You are one of mine, and as you are now a rank four Dark Moon, even if Ashburn wants to deal with you, he¡¯ll have to be cautious. Heh heh, since I¡¯ve received the handwritten notebook of Ayermike this time, I¡¯ll help you in moment of need!¡±

    ¡°Thank you!¡± Han Shuo turned his head and sincerely thanked Candide, then left the room.

    Leaving Mt. Ordas through transportation matrices, Han Shuo headed for the house of Finance Minister Eevee. He intended to ask about how Lawrence was getting along and how things were on his side.

    ¡°I¡¯m Bryan. I¡¯vee to call upon Lawrence. Please notify those within for me.¡± Han Shuo smiled at the guard after arriving at Lawrence¡¯s house.

    Han Shuo had long been aware that the clothes made the man. He was adorned in a perfectly tailored blue warrior outfit, the cor trimmed with several precious stone fragments. While Han Shuo looked capable and alert, the confident smile on his face made him appear even more umon.

    The guard, who normally looked down on folks, realized that this was an exceptional person. He didn¡¯t dare to make things difficult for Han Shuo and respectfully said, ¡°Please wait a moment¡± and quickly went inside.

    Lawrence personally came out not long afterwards. He already startedughing heartily before reaching Han Shuo, ¡°You¡¯ve finally returned! I came to look for you at the necromancy department several times already.¡±

    Several unfamiliar faces walked behind Lawrence. Each possessed extraordinarily calm bearings. They were evidently experts with great skills. What Candide had said wasn¡¯t wrong indeed. Lawrence was exceedingly cautious about his safety.

    ¡°Alright, nothing should happen in broad daylight. You guys can stop following me.¡± Lawrence turned his head to say this after walking out. He then strode quickly towards Han Shuo and gave thetter a warm hug, saying, ¡°Why have you suddenly remembered toe looking for me?¡±

    ¡°Eh, I actually didn¡¯t remember to look for you, just that I was tasked with a mission and so that¡¯s why I came!¡± Han Shuo exined honestly as he smiled wryly at Lawrence.

    Lawrence was stunned and thenughed out loud, ¡°So that¡¯s why! It doesn¡¯t matter, it¡¯s good that you¡¯vee.¡±

    ¡°Comeee,e with me. We can find afortable ce to chat.¡± Lawrence dragged Han Shuo along, making straight for the carriage at the entrance.

    Seeing that Lawrence wasing, the normallyzy coachman immediately became extremely spirited. He hastily ran to the side and lifted the curtains for Lawrence to enter. The unfamiliar experts spread out, either tantly or covertly following behind, carefully ensuring the prince¡¯s safety.

    ¡°Go to the Rose Garden at the north workshop!¡± Lawrence ordered the coachman as soon as they had settled down.

    ¡°What¡¯s that?¡± Han Shuo was practically dragged into the carriage by Lawrence. He couldn¡¯t help but ask after the carriage started to move.

    ¡°Heh heh, you¡¯ll know when we get there. Don¡¯t concern yourself so much. Tell me, where did you go to mess around after we parted ways?¡± Lawrence smiled mysteriously, asking Han Shuo.

    ¡°Nothing much, I just stayed idle in the Valley of Sunshine for a while, then went to the Dark Forest to kill some magical beasts.¡± Han Shuo smiled slightly. He responded effortlessly and concealed everything.

    ¡°It can¡¯t be that simple. I heard from junior sister Phoebe that you did some stunning things in the Valley of Sunshine! Heh heh, you guys made such a mess at the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band. Did you really think I¡¯m that ignorant?¡± Lawrence made a you-don¡¯t-consider-me-your-brother face. He squinted his eyes and curled his lip at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Hehe, it was really nothing. Speaking of your junior sister Phoebe, you¡¯re her senior brother and yet you don¡¯t know anything. Her merchant guild was insulted and bullied, and you actually didn¡¯t help her?¡± Han Shuo wrinkled his brows, reflecting the me back onto Lawrence.

    Lawrence paused and was surprised by these these words. He then furrowed his brow and asked with puzzlement, ¡°What happened?¡±

    Han Shuo looked carefully at Lawrence and hesitated. He asked in surprise, ¡°You don¡¯t know?¡±

    ¡°This junior sister of mine doesn¡¯t like owing anyone favors. Whenever something happens, she never wants to bother others. I know her temper, so I just didn¡¯t know what exactly happened.¡± Lawrence replied frankly.

    ¡°It¡¯s like this, Cameron¡¯s merchant alliance wanted to acquire the Boozt Merchant Guild. Cameron seems to be backed by Duke Ashburn and almost captured Phoebe in the guild.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face was cold and grave as he responded.

    Suddenly furious, Lawrence mmed his hand on the carriage. He coldly snorted, ¡°Ashburn seems to spare no effort for Charles huh? Such despicable means.¡±

    Stopping for a moment, Lawrence heaved a long sigh, ¡°Oh Phoebe, really. I could¡¯ve helped her with this, but she still won¡¯t confide in me. If it wasn¡¯t for you, I wouldn¡¯t have even known known had she been taken over by Cameron¡¯s merchant alliance.¡±

    Thanks to the Dark Mantle¡¯s intelligencework, Han Shuo had a general understanding of Lawrence¡¯s abilities. He also knew that Lawrence¡¯s men in the Gryphon Legion had takenplete control of Valen City and had now be the new chief of the Gryphon Legion.

    Moreover, if Lawrence won the favor of the king, then his identity as the prince could be officially recognized. As such, he would have hopes in bing king.

    ¡°Bryan, you offended Ashburn this time. It looks like even if we didn¡¯t want to be good friends, it¡¯d be hard not to.¡± Lawrence looked deeply at Han Shuo and said, ¡°I currently have a good position for you. If you wish, I can help you quickly obtain a high rank in the army. This also wouldn¡¯t conflict with your identity in the Dark Mantle. What do you think?¡±

 Chapter 253: Paving the way

    Chapter 253 ¨C Paving the way

    This was a very tempting suggestion, so Han Shuo was immediately interested. However, he didn¡¯t instantly agree either. Instead, he said, ¡°As you know, I¡¯m a member of the Dark Mantle. Furthermore, I have a lot of things that I, myself, need to do as well, so I don¡¯t have that much time that I can spend on the military.¡±

    ¡°I think that won¡¯t be a problem. You¡¯re a mage, so you naturally should have plenty of your own time. As long as you gain the title of duke and your ownnd, then you are free to do with your time as you see fit, as long as there are no issues within the territory you rule,¡± Lawrence immediately responded as if he had been prepared for his answer.

    ¡°Then, what do you want me to do?¡± Han Shuo was momentarily confused, then asked as he looked towards Lawrence in confusion.

    ¡°I¡¯ll help you gain a ce in the military first. As long as you¡¯ve made enough contributions, I can use my rtionships to help you gain the identity of a noble. Once you receive the title of a duke, then I¡¯ll help youy your hands on some territory. Everything will be good as long as your territory develops well,¡± Lawrence seemed to be very familiar with this sort of thing as he started exining everything to Han Shuo with a smile.

    When he¡¯d left Valen City, Han Shuo knew that his fortunes would be tied with Lawrence sooner orter. With his current strength and the existence of the cemetery of death, Han Shuo believed that he would be able to leave unscathed, even if Lawrence lost the struggle for power.

    If he wanted to climb higher, he would have to depend on a person that could help him. Lawrence was definitely a suitable candidate. He was someone who¡¯d gained the king¡¯s affection and also held some power. Additionally, with the aid of Candide, Han Shuo believed that it wouldn¡¯t be too long before he gained power.

    ¡°It looks like we truly are going to be tied together,¡± Han Shuo smiled and said to Lawrence.

    Lawrenceughed happily, then said with pride, ¡°We were on the same side since ages ago. Ever since I went back to the Empire, I started helping you pave your path. Now that you¡¯ve graduated from the necromancy department, and so swiftly at that, things have be even more convenient for me.¡±

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but be shocked after hearing him say that. He hadn¡¯t thought that even Lawrence would receive news so quickly that he¡¯d graduated, apart from Candide. It seemed like the two really did pay a lot of attention to him.

    ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll let you in on some of the details, then we¡¯ll go over the n. With your strength and intelligence, I think that you reaching new heights in the Empire won¡¯t be a difficult thing as long as we cooperate with each other,¡± Lawrence was clearly very happy as he said excitedly to Han Shuo.

    Afterwards, Han Shuo and Lawrence discussed within the carriage for a long time, forming a bright path for the two of them between their schemes.

    The carriage stopped after a long while. The carriage driver said with a low voice, ¡°Young Master Lawrence, we¡¯ve arrived at the Rose Garden in the northern workshops!¡±

    ¡°Alright, I need to wee you properly upon your rare return. Come, let¡¯s go in and enjoy ourselves!¡± Lawrence said to Han Shuo after lifting the curtains and jumping down the carriage.

    Han Shuo raised his head and looked around when he alighted. He saw a grand building in front of him with roses engraved on the walls made from white marble. At the same time, he also saw numerous beautiful carriages parked all around.

    Meanwhile, the experts, that had been following Lawrence, walked over from a corner of the streets and stood behind him like guards.

    ¡°You guys stay out here. There won¡¯t be any problems inside the Rose Garden, so don¡¯t worry,¡± Lawrence turned his head back to look at the people, then ordered faintly.

    ¡°Sorry, young master Lawrence, we¡¯re just following orders. We have to protect you wherever you go,¡± A rather loyal knight, wearing heavy armor, responded with a muffled voice.

    Han Shuo was able to feel an intense killing aura from this knight. The symbol on his chestte showed that he was an earth rider. From the calluses on hisrge hands, it was clear that he was someone who shouldn¡¯t be messed with.

    ¡°Jino, we¡¯re only going in to rx. Nothing usually happens in the Rose Garden normally. How can we go in together since you¡¯re all wearing armor. Why don¡¯t you stay outside?¡± Lawrence continued to smile without getting angry at the earth rider for being determined.

    ¡°No, orders are orders. We cannot defy our orders!¡± The earth rider named Jino was a stubborn person, and once again rejected Lawrence with a stern face.

    ¡°Hehe, then alright. I have no issues with it if you guys can go in!¡± Lawrence chuckled lightly, then pulled Han Shuo inside. When he reached the entrance, he cast a look at the guard with his eyes, then rushed in while tugging on Han Shuo.

    Jino and the others followed, but they were forcefully stopped when they reached the entrance. The guards refused to let them in no matter how much they tried to exin.

    Han Shuo knew through the yin demon¡¯s surveince that the protectors out in the open had been left outside by Lawrence. However, the hidden guards being led by Lucky were trying their best to sneak into the Rose Garden through various other methods.

    However, the defenses of this Rose Garden were astonishingly good. It was protected by experts openly and covertly. These included powerful swordsman and mages specializing in different elements. These people were rather powerful, and protected the surroundings with great responsibility. Aside from the old assassin, Lucky, who¡¯d managed to sneak in, all of the other experts had been stopped outside.

    Han Shuo noticed that this Rose Garden upied a great deal ofnd through usage of his yin demon¡¯s surveince. There were numerous artificial mountains, flowing water, hot springs with pavilions with in, and every single room was decorated in an extremely opulent manner. There was a beautiful woman in revealing clothing who was stripping as she twisted her hips and danced a mesmerizing dance within one of therge halls.

    Suppressed moans rang out from several slightly smaller rooms as many noble lords and young masters spent enormous amounts of money here to enjoy all sorts of services.

    Lawrence seemed to be extremely familiar with this sort of ce as he walked straight in familiarly. All of the openly stationed and hidden guards recognized Lawrence. Not only did noone stop him, they often greeted him.

    ¡°Ugh, I know what this ce is now!¡± Since the three yin demons had swiftly circled the extremelyrge Rose Garden, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but blurt out after he understood what sort of ce this was.

    ¡°Haha, all men should know what kind of ce this is. All of the expenditures here today are on me, so just treat it as me weing you back.¡± Lawrenceughed frankly as he walked straight in and arrived within a wide all. There were young and beautiful women dancing at the center of the hall, with some people that were either rich or noble watching from the sidelines. When they saw Lawrencee in, they also greeted him with smiles.

    There were many soft animal-skinned chairs around the hall alongside fresh vegetables, exquisite snacks, and sses of expensive alcohol costing a gold coin each. Arge circr chandelier, with a five meter diameter, shone down upon the scene with ambiguous light, causing the women dancing to the light hearted music underneath it to appear extremely sexy.

    ¡°Hey, Lawrence, you haven¡¯te in a long time,¡± A guy, who was clearly a fop of a rich family, greeted Lawrence as the former led in a thinly covered woman exuding sexiness.

    ¡°Bruno, why do I see you every time Ie here?¡± Lawrence casually picked up a wine ss filled with amber wine from a tableden with numerous other drinks. He responded to this weakling dandy after taking a sip of wine.

    ¡°Life is just that boring. There are only some ces in the northern workshops that spark my interest. That¡¯s why Ie over here. Isn¡¯t it the same for you?¡± Bruno winked towards Lawrence and said meaningfully.

    ¡°Alright, I came here purely to entertain my friend. I won¡¯t chat too much with you this time, so let¡¯s have a good discussion next time,¡± Lawrence apologized, then dragged Han Shuo across the hall into another quiet ce.

    Lawrence had brought Han Shuo through a corridor, around a few corners, and into another quiet hall after a few moments. There wasn¡¯t anyone in this hall, but there was a magic barrier around it.

    Lawrence took out a magic scroll and chanted a spell. The magic scroll emitted out a hazy azure light, and the surrounding walls cracked open under the light. Lawrence turned around and indicated for Han Shuo to enter with him.

    Han Shuo was shocked as he looked at the pathway under the light. He asked since he was clearly befuddled, ¡°It¡¯s very normal for a ce like this to have a secret passageway, but why do you know about it?¡±

    ¡°Of course I would know about it, because I am the true owner of the Rose Garden. Bryan, since we are being honest with each other, I won¡¯t hide this secret from you!¡± Lawrenceughed, then pulled Han Shuo inside. There were quite a few magical seals along the corridor that extended towards the very bottom.

    There were a lot of things that made Han Shuo surprised about this hidden ce. However, what shocked Han Shuo the most was that the true owner of this gold mine was Lawrence. No wonder Candide had said that Lawrence wasn¡¯t simple during their first meeting. It seemed that he did know quite a lot of things about Lawrence.

    ¡°Come, I¡¯ll take you to meet Phoebe and my master. I think that he must be very interested in you!¡± Lawrence was very satisfied with Han Shuo¡¯s surprise as heughed and pulled Han Shuo inside.

 Chapter 254: The use of killing aura

    Chapter 254: The use of killing aura

    When he heard that Phoebe¡¯s master was here, Han Shuo was even more shocked. Phoebe had already reached the realm of a swordmaster at such a young age. In addition, when Aubrey had thought that he¡¯d captured Phoebe at the Boozt Merchant Guild, he¡¯d still said that he needed to treat Phoebe well in order to prevent her master from getting angry.

    As Duke Ashbern¡¯s subordinate, what Aubrey did represented Duke Ashbern. It wasn¡¯t hard to figure out that Phoebe¡¯s master wasn¡¯t a simple person, since even Duke Ashbern, who held tremendous power in his hands, was so wary of him.

    When Han Shuo walked beside Lawrence, he had sent his three yin demons through the path in front of them, hoping that he could obtain a picture of the ce underneath.

    However, as the yin demons wandered about, Han Shuo noticed that there were numerous boundaries everywhere. Some invisible boundaries even stopped the yin demons¡¯ surveince; it seemed like the defense of the ce underneath the path was extraordinarily tight.

    ¡°Hehe, the space underneath the Rose Garden is more than twice asrge as it appears on the surface. I¡¯ll take you on a detailed tourter, we¡¯ll meet my master first for now!¡± Lawrence looked at Han Shuo proudly as he revealed his prowess little by little, like he was trying to show Han Shuo that cooperating with him was the correct decision.

    Han Shuo felt that they were already ten-odd meters underground after traversing a narrow path. The dim area suddenly lit up and revealed four intersecting paths that came together where Han Shuo and Lawrence stood. There were also bright lights that were ced on the side that illuminated the four paths as clear as day.

    ¡°Follow me!¡± Lawrence walked to the left and he led the way for Han Shuo. When they arrived in front of a white jade door, Lawrence used the scroll once again to open the boundary that was sealing the door. The door automatically opened after a sh of white light, and Lawrence led Han Shuo in.

    ¡°Young master Lawrence,¡± All of a sudden, an extremely ugly old man with a face full of scars appeared and bowed towards Lawrence.

    The old man was covered in a bloody aura. No one knew how many people he had killed, but he was able to sense Han Shuo and Lawrence the moment they appeared. Furthermore, the closer that they approached the old man, the thicker the stomach-wrenching smell that was emanating from him became.

    Lawrence was clearly ufortable, since the smile from his face disappeared. He said dryly, ¡°Grandpa Bonds, is my master inside?¡±

    The weird old man called Bonds stood straight with a hunchback, then raised his head to gaze at Lawrence with his grey eyes, and said remotely, ¡°He¡¯s inside, but master is cultivating.¡±

    ¡°Then I¡¯ll wait outside for a bit!¡± Lawrence had already pushed past Bonds with his response and he quickly walked forwards, like he was unwilling to be too close to the old man.

    The stone room in front of them was asrge as a basketball court, with a lot of indentations where a lot of daily necessities were ced. However, the majority of them held numerous fine alcohols, as if the room was a storage room for exquisite wine.

    Han Shuo first surveyed his surroundings after entering the room, then moved his attention onto the old man Bonds. The old man¡¯s face was covered in scars, like if each one had been scratched on by something sharp. He looked as terrifying as a ghost from hell. Alongside the thick bloody aura that surrounded him, it was enough to give people an extremely powerful shock just by standing there.

    Not only was there blood on this person¡¯s hands, his strength was top tier. He was mostly likely an expert who was stronger than Phoebe by one rank; his aura wouldn¡¯t have been so powerful otherwise. A person who was at the great swordmaster realm was not going to be a nobody no matter which country he lived in. The fact that he stayed in this secret room that doesn¡¯t see daylight, in order to serve Lawrence¡¯s master, really did surprise Han Shuo somewhat.

    ¡°Bryan, let¡¯s wait here for a bit!¡± Lawrence had already scooted far away from Bonds and he was calling out to Han Shuo while sitting on a stone chair.

    ¡°You¡¯re not afraid of me?¡± Just as Han Shuo was about to leave, the old man named Bonds suddenly looked at Han Shuo and asked.

    Han Shuo nodded and replied with a smile, ¡°Of course, what is there to be afraid of?!¡±

    ¡°An interestingd,¡± Bonds smirked as he carefully examined Han Shuo. Then he frowned as if he sensed something, which caused him to nod, ¡°No wonder, you have a malicious aura around you that can only be felt if you carefully feel for it. From the looks of it, you shouldn¡¯t be even twenty-five, yet your hands are dyed thick with blood at such a young age. You truly are a character!¡±

    Even before Han Shuo had broken into the bloodlust realm, the murderous aura had always apanied him. He hadn¡¯t killed a lot of people before, it was just that his body absorbed a lot of specters at the forbidden ce, so they continued to surround Han Shuo, making it seem like his hands were also dyed in blood.

    Han Shuo smiled, but he didn¡¯t say much. He merely nodded at Bonds and walked past him, moving towards Lawrence.

    ¡°Young man, did you know that after killing a lot of people, the killing aura can be used to increase your strength?¡± Bonds was silent for a slight moment after Han Shuo had left, then he suddenly shot a weird look at Han Shuo.

    When he spoke, an intense wave of killing aura exploded out like a river that had been just undammed. All of a sudden, the stomach-churning smell of blood spread out and it approached Han Shuo with cold intent, like it was something physical.

    ¡°Oh god!¡± Lawrence wailed, then he backed off in terror until his back was against the wall. Even then, his forehead was still covered with cold sweat as he looked at Bonds with a pale expression.

    However, Han Shuo, who was closer to Bonds, was not afraid. He casually cycled the magical yuan in his body quickly, causing the evil aura hidden in his body to rush out furiously, shing with the physical killing aura from Bonds. When the auras collided, sounds of collision could actually be heard in the air.

    Even some of the table and chairs in the room continuously trembled. What was more terrifying was that after the evil aura rushed out of Han Shuo¡¯s body, it formed itself into spirals that were difficult to see with the eye, and actually started to consume Bonds¡¯ killing aura.

    ¡°When you said using killing aura, does it mean like this?¡± Han Shuo had a smile on his face when he inly said this. While he spoke, he also stopped his magical yuan and the room returned to normal.

    Right now, Han Shuo had already undergone three months of closed door cultivation in the cemetery of death. Adding onto the fact that he had absorbed the specters from the forbidden ce, he had a much deeper understanding of the demonic arts than what Chu Cann had left behind. His maniption of the evil aura in the bloodlust realm had also reached a level where he could do as he wished. If Han Shuo wanted, he could absorb the killing aura in Bonds¡¯ body like he had absorbed the specters from the forbidden ce.

    Bonds had had an indifferent expression until this point when he looked at Han Shuo with a piercing gaze, then he said with a trembling voice, ¡°How is this possible? How could you use it even more familiarly than me? You also know how to use this sort of power?¡±

    Han Shuo only understood it the moment Bonds spoke. All swordsmen and knights cultivated fighting aura, but none of them could use evil aura and killing intent. However Han Shuo, who cultivated the demonic arts, was very well versed with using this type of strange power. That why Bonds had been surprised when Han Shuo had showed off his abilities.

    ¡°No, you didn¡¯t use fighting aura at all. How is that possible?¡± Shock, loss, and confusion instantly filled Bonds¡¯ heart. He stepped in front of Han Shuo and red at him with scorching eyes, like he was fighting for Han Shuo to give an answer.

    Han Shuo knew that this was a bad situation to be caught in by now. He took a deep breath and exined with a smile, ¡°I cultivate a special type of martial technique, it¡¯s different to the cultivating of fighting aura that most people do.¡±

    ¡°Okay, Bonds, stay outside for now. Lawrence, you two cane in now!¡± A benevolent voice seemed to ring out from the walls at that moment.

    Lawrence immediately pulled Han Shuo towards him, then apologized to Bonds, ¡°Grandpa Bonds, my master has told us to go in. Let¡¯s chatter.¡±

    The wall behind Han Shuo split open at that moment, and Lawrence pulled Han Shuo in. After the two of them entered, the crack in the wall healed miraculously.

    There was an extremely wide training field past the wall. Apart from a few strangely shaped boulders, there were no other decorations. An old man sat on top of one of the boulders at the center off the field, and even though he had white hair and beard, he still looked very energized.

    The old man had a square face, and seemed rather benevolent. He sat ramrod straight in a pure white warrior uniform. Even though he was sitting down, he looked extraordinary and seemed like he would be rather tall if he stood up.

    ¡°Teacher!¡± Lawrence bowed and greeted the old man respectfully the moment he entered.

    The old man nodded, then he looked at Lawrence and said softly, ¡°Rise.¡±

    Lawrence straightened himself, then he pulled Han Shuo to sit down on a piece of boulder. After the two of them took their ces, Lawrence began, ¡°This is Bryan, Phoebe¡¯s boyfriend. I mentioned him to you before!¡±

    The old man¡¯s gaze immediately fell onto Han Shuo after he heard Lawrence¡¯s words, and he carefully examined Han Shuo carefully without speaking. After quite a while, he finally nodded and said, ¡°Although Phoebe is my youngest disciple, she has the most talent. Her future is unmeasurable. I hope she will inherit my martial techniques. You won¡¯t hold her back, right?¡±

    ¡°Of course not!¡± Han Shuo replied with a smile that was neither reserved nor fearful. Instead, he appeared ratherid back.

 Chapter 255: A powerful figure

    Chapter 255: A powerful figure

    ¡°How is little Phoebe recently? I heard she stayed with you at the Valley of Sunshine for a while and did some interesting things?¡± The old man squinted, asking slowly and softly.

    ¡°Eh, she returned safely to the Empire from the Valley of Sunshine, but her current situation doesn¡¯t seem very good.¡± From the way the old man said it, he must¡¯ve been unclear about Phoebe¡¯s situation so Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but exin.

    ¡°What happened?¡± The old man frowned, worried.

    ¡°Master, it¡¯s like this.¡± Lawrence quickly opened his mouth to describe what happened, then smiled wryly, ¡°You already know little senior sister doesn¡¯t like to trouble others. She didn¡¯t even tell me about something like this.¡±

    ¡°This old fellow Ashburn is getting more and more unbridled. He knows Phoebe is my disciple, yet he dared to act so presumptuously. It seems he and I are due for a conversation.¡± The old man coldly snorted, his face angry.

    Seeing the old man be angry, Lawrence wasn¡¯t the least bit anxious and instead revealed a slight chuckle as he said hastily, ¡°Master, you know already how my father¡¯s health is getting worse. Right now, my brothers are all prepared. The Duke spares no effort for Charles, and he dared to not give you face by doing such things.¡±

    Han Shuo kept silent, his eyes carefully examining the two¡¯s faces. When he suddenly understood something, he drew in his presence.

    The old man chuckled and gazed thoughtfully at Lawrence, nodding, ¡°I have my own ns. Alright, let¡¯s temporarily not talk about these things today. Since you came to visit me, did you bring any good wine?¡±

    ¡°Of course, I couldn¡¯t let you down no matter what!¡± Lawrenceughed heartily as he took out a crystal, jade-like bottle that contained blood red wine. He respectfully handed it over and said, ¡°This is a specialty from a small town in the Kasi Empire, named Redbud Blood. Master, please try it.¡±

    Having seen many kinds of wine while waiting in the hall, Han Shuo understood that Lawrence¡¯s master must be a wine lover. Now it looked indeed so.

    When his thoughts reached that point, Han Shuo suddenly remembered the good wine produced by the dwarves in the Dark Forest. He thought for a bit and took out a bottle of wine from his space ring, respectfully giving it to the old man as he spoke with a smile, ¡°This bottle of wine was brewed by the dwarves of the Dark Forest. Perhaps it isn¡¯t that precious, but it¡¯s much stronger than some of the good wines in the Empire.¡±

    When Han Shuo said so, the old man looked at him with interest before taking the wine bottle. He tried shaking it, listened to the sound, thenughed happily, ¡°What a thoughtful child. The dwarves brew naturally good wine that isn¡¯t any inferior. I¡¯ve had a taste before.¡±

    Waving his hand, the old man took the two bottles of good wine from Han Shuo and Lawrence and said, ¡°Alright, I¡¯ve remembered Lawrence¡¯s matter. You all leave, I¡¯ll drink first.¡±

    Han Shuo was surprised, not knowing what was happening. However Lawrence winked at him, indicating that Han Shuo shouldn¡¯t ask so much and just leave with him.

    Afterwards, Lawrence took Han Shuo out to the hall where Bonds stood. When Bonds saw Han Shuo appear, his eyes gleamed as he stared at thetter, saying, ¡°Can you tell me how you understood to use murderous aura?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s a part of the martial arts I cultivate, I have no way of exining it to you, sorry!¡± Han Shuo honestly replied, of course he couldn¡¯t speak of his demonic magic method.

    ¡°Grandpa Bonds, we¡¯re leaving first, I¡¯ll trouble grandpa to take care of the Rose Garden.¡± Lawrence¡¯s steps suddenly became much quicker as he passed by Bonds. He evidently couldn¡¯t adapt to the pungent smell of blood on thetter¡¯s body.

    ¡°Alright, you are Bryan?¡± Bonds suddenly asked while Han Shuo and Lawrence headed back the way they came.

    Pausing, Han Shuo turned his head and nced at Bonds as he politely answered, ¡°That¡¯s right!¡±

    Bonds nodded his head and curved his lips, saying, ¡°We¡¯ll meet again. I like the smell on your body. Heh heh, that evil killing intent!¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned. He was about to say something when Lawrence dragged him away. They quickly left that area with a few steps.

    Under Lawrence¡¯s guidance, the two followed the same way back to the quiet hall above. Letting out a breath, Lawrence exined, ¡°My master is Karel Ascot. He has the strength of a sacred swordmaster. His outstanding contributions have given him a high reputation in the Empire. Master can go in and out of the pce directly, and my father has great trust in him. Even though I¡¯m his disciple, he doesn¡¯t clearly support me, which puzzles me greatly.¡±

    ¡°Eh, but I know he really dotes on my junior sister Phoebe. Even this Rose Garden used to belong to the Boozt Merchant Guild. Master shares a past with Phoebe¡¯s father. For some reason, after Phoebe¡¯s father passed away, my master managed this Rose Garden, then handed it over to me.¡±

    Grandpa Bonds used to be a very famous killer, and old Lucky is actually his direct disciple. I don¡¯t know why he follows my master. The smell of blood on him is so heavy, you can imagine how many people he¡¯d killed. I can¡¯t control the urge to vomit every time I get near him, so I always try to stay away. Otherwise if I really vomit, I think he¡¯d be very displeased.¡±

    Even though Lawrence was Karel¡¯s disciple, he hadn¡¯t focused on learning martial arts, but instead concentrated various strategies and military abilities, possibly due to his identity as the prince. Therefore his strength wasn¡¯t very powerful, it was normal for him to feel difort in front of people like Bonds.

    Although he had known early on that Lawrence¡¯s master must be extraordinary, Han Shuo was extremely shocked after Lawrence confirmed his identity. As a member of the Dark Mantle, plus his own deliberate research, Han Shuo had a decent understanding of the dark side of the Empire. Naturally, he had heard of the thunderous name Karel Ascot.

    Karel Ascot was born amoner but was a heaven-defying genius. He¡¯d set a record with his graduation speed from the Babylon Academy of Swordsmanship. He had roamed the maind with the strength of a senior swordsman and fought hundreds of fights in various countries, increasing his fame quickly. He¡¯d already had the strength of a great swordmaster by the time he¡¯d returned to the Lancelot Empire.

    After epting the invitation of the king, he¡¯d taught at the Babylon Academy of Swordsmanship as the dean. When war broke out in the Lancelot Empire, not only did Karel cultivate numerous talents for the Empire, he¡¯d also personally defeated several provocative figures from enemy countries. At that point, where his heroic fame was like the sun at its peak, he retired from being the dean of the Academy of Swordsmanship and went to train in the deepest part of the Dark Forest for a decade. When the Empire faced the threat of invasion and was on the brink of defeat facing the Kasi Empire, Karel appeared with the strength of a divine swordmaster and killed three great swordmasters of the Kasi Empire. This inspired the morale of the Lancelot Empire and helped it win the battle.

    Many yearster, all of the citizens and even the king regarded Karel Ascot as the Protector of the Empire. Even though he didn¡¯t have an official position, he could influence the king¡¯s decisions. Several of his direct disciples held great power in the government or the military.

    ¡°So it¡¯s him, no wonder!¡± Han Shuo eximed after going over this information in his head.

    ¡°I took you to see him this time so he¡¯d know of you. As long as you leave a good impression, he¡¯ll speak a few words in front of my father. You aren¡¯t far from a prosperous future then.¡± Lawrence spoke sincerely, in a prudent manner.

    ¡°I understand what you mean.¡± Han Shuo smiled, nodding.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, the main thing is done. Now I¡¯ll take you to y to your heart¡¯s content.¡± Once Lawrence saw that Han Shuo had understood, he no longer said anything else. He dragged thetter out of this quiet deserted ce to the most crowded and lively area of the Rose Garden.

    ¡°Young master Lawrence, do you need a separate room?¡± A man dressed in a butler¡¯s attire, who looked to be the middle aged steward of the Rose Garden, asked smilingly after he saw Lawrence.

    ¡°Of course, I¡¯ll use the room I usually take. You help me arrange the best service for my good friend to enjoy.¡± Lawrence instructed in a straightforward manner.

    Suddenly Lawrence paled, he looked back behind Han Shuo as murderous intent shed in his previously smiling face.

    ¡°Hey Lawrence, what a pleasant surprise.¡± A seemingly cheerful sound of greeting resounded from behind Han Shuo.

    Turning around, Han Shuo saw a luxuriously dressed youth of roughly twenty-five or twenty-six years old. He came over with several flower seekers, who was obviously noble at a single nce. This young man was a little taller than Lawrence and had a handsome and tough look. As he walked, he exuded the awe-inspiring momentum of someone in a high position.

    He was obviously the leader of this flower seeking group. Those flower seekers looked at him with ttering smiles and even lowered their postures, which set off his noble position even more.

    ¡°Hmph, I certainly don¡¯t want to see you.¡± Lawrence¡¯splexion didn¡¯t look too good as he coldly looked at this man.

    ¡°Heh heh, Lawrence, you are getting more and more impolite nowadays. ording to the Empire¡¯s rules, mustn¡¯t you at least offer your greetings when you see me?¡± The tall healthy man looked mockingly at Lawrence, with a smile that wasn¡¯t a smile.

    His face twitching, Lawrence red resentfully at this person, then grimaced helplessly, ¡°Greetings to his Royal Highness the first Prince.¡±

 Chapter 256: The female bandit

    Chapter 256: The female bandit

    This was the first prince Charles!

    As Han Shuo squinted at him, he suddenly had an odd thought, ¡°Lawrence is the owner of the Rose Garden, so the mage guards around should be under the order of that murderous Bonds. For the first prince Charles toe here to seek pleasure, he¡¯s basically unknowingly gone deep into the tiger¡¯s den. If Lawrence receives the support of Karel, wouldn¡¯t he be able to soundlessly kill that Charles?¡±

    ¡°Haha, good, good.¡± Charles firstughed loudly with satisfaction, then he curved his mouth and coldly provoked, ¡°You should dispel any thoughts as soon as you can, or you may even die without knowing how.¡±

    Finishing this sentence, Charles conveniently dropped a vicious line in a low voice, ¡°Little bastard mutt!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go. Shall we have some fun?¡± Charles turned his body with a loudugh and left with the bootlickers following closely behind him. He paid no more attention to Lawrence.

    Lawrence¡¯s face twisted with anger. His two hands clenched tightly into fists, blue veins popping out from their backs. Lawrence couldn¡¯t suppress the light trembling of his entire body. His furious eyes emitted thick murderous intent as he viciously stared at the departing back of Charles. Even his breathing had be much heavier.

    Looking at Lawrence¡¯s posture, that might blow at any moment, Han Shuo was truly afraid the guy wouldn¡¯t be able to control himself, and would throw everything to the wind to risk his life for a fight with Charles.

    To an illegitimate child, the most humiliating thing was to be cursed as a ¡°bastard¡±. When this vicious curse came from the person they hated the most, it increased the humiliation by tens of times. No wonder even an introvert like Lawrence almost raged out of control.

    Patting Lawrence¡¯s shoulder, Han Shuo consoled, ¡°Let it go. We will soon return this hatred. Don¡¯t be so hasty.¡±

    ¡°I want to kill him with my own hands. I¡¯ll definitely kill him with my own hands...¡± Lawrence gnashed his teeth as he whispered, his face ferocious.

    ¡°Oh, if it isn¡¯t Mister Aubrey? And Mister Cameron too!¡± The Rose Garden was a lively ce for spending gold indeed. First prince Charles had just left, and Han Shuo had already bumped into the iing fellows whom he¡¯d previously met at Boozt Merchant Guild ¨C Cameron and Aubrey plus several other merchants.

    ¡°Damn it, what the hell did you, petty, despicable viin do to our bodies?¡± As soon as he saw Han Shuo, Aubrey couldn¡¯t help but fume and immediately curse.

    It was spring time with flowers blooming everywhere. The weather was great. However Aubrey and Cameron looked somewhat weird. Aubrey¡¯s whole body was wrapped from head to toe in a thick fur coat. He stood there and shivered, his face frozen purple.

    On the other hand, Cameron was the exact opposite. In this gentle,fortable weather, he looked like he was at a sauna. His thin clothes were damp with sweat, his mouth breathed out hot air currents whenever he opened it to speak. His face flushed beet red. Evidently he was unbearably hot.

    Perhaps to bnce out each other, these two weirdly dressed fellows walked hand in hand. As two great manly men, for them to appear in such a ce like the Rose Garden while holding hands, it was even weirder.

    These two had been injected with the poison of ice and fire. Fire and ice poisons were taking turns to attack their bodies right now, making them extremely cold for a moment and then extremely hot the next. This pain would repeatedly torture them until the poison injected by Han Shuo waned.

    Throwing the two a contemptuous nce, Han Shuo viciously said, ¡°Two great masters walking hand in hand in broad daylight. This is really sickening.¡±

    ¡°Damnable! What poison did you actually give us? You lowly despicable viin!¡± Aubrey¡¯s two rows of teeth made cking sounds as they chattered. He trembled as he shouted.

    Lawrence was originally furious, seeing these two appear here, but now he felt a little better. Heughed heartily and shook his head in ridicule, ¡°With this special hobby, you should have been more surreptitious. Boldlying here like this, your morality has really degraded!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, I won¡¯t let you off easily.¡± Aubrey furiously red at Han Shuo and threatened with a wide mouth.

    As soon as he finished those words, the poison of ice and fire swapped. His ice cold body suddenly spiked up in temperature. He hastily threw off his fur coat in a practiced manner and started cursing nonstop.

    ¡°That¡¯s enough for today, let us leave this ce.¡± Han Shuo persuaded. He understood that meeting Aubrey here meant that he would constantly be entangled by thetter. Since he knew the misery caused by the poison of ice and fire was unbearable indeed. Furthermore, Lawrence had certainly lost interest in having fun after the vicious remarks he had received from Charles earlier.

    Lawrence seemed to have lost his mood as he nodded, ¡°Alright. I brought you here this time mainly for the matter earlier. We¡¯ll have plenty of time for funter. These hated charactered really disgust me. Let¡¯s leave. Don¡¯t allow them totch onto us.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t leave. Give me the antidote first, or I won¡¯t leave you alone.¡± Aubrey breathed heavily and stared at Han Shuo, shouting nonstop.

    After knowing Han Shuo¡¯s strength, the big businessman Cameron appeared to be afraid that Han Shuo would abruptly kill him. He didn¡¯t dare to speak and just followed behind Aubrey.

    Han Shuo quickly left with Lawrence without stopping. After they exited the Rose Garden, the earth rider Jino gave a loud shout. Several guards of Lawrence swiftly surrounded him.

    Aubrey had yet toe close when Jino crudely pushed him aside. Lawrence and Han Shuo stepped into the carriage just like that and left the Rose Garden.

    ¡°Alright, I¡¯m going first. Wait for me toe look for you after I pick up my graduation diploma.¡± Leaving the Rose Garden for a little while, Han Shuo spoke a farewell to Lawrence. He then jumped off the carriage and left by himself.

    The number of people guarding Lawrence in both the light and dark weren¡¯t few, so Han Shuo wasn¡¯t concerned much for his safety. He didn¡¯t need to stay and protect thetter, so he jumped out of the carriage to go handle his own personal matters.

    After separating from Lawrence, Han Shuo went straight to the graveyard in the mountain back of the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, entering the ce hiding the transportation matrix.

    Fanny and Phoebe needed at least three days to adapt after taking the rebirth pill. In these three days, they wouldn¡¯t stop having stomachaches until their bodies expelled all the impurities inside. Han Shuo believed they definitely wouldn¡¯t want to see him during this time period. For beautiful women to have to squat on the toilet nonstop, no matter how elegant their bearings were, it¡¯d still be greatly reduced.

    Lawrence had paved the way for Han Shuo¡¯s future, but Han Shuo needed to prove himself to be an adept necromancer. He intended to obtain the diploma of the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force when he came to see Fanny, so he had at least three more days of free time.

    Many things could be done in three days¡¯ time. Han Shuo intended to go check the Valley of Sunshine first. He appeared in the cemetery of death through the transportation matrix, then used the art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens to fly towards the Valley of Sunshine.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s instructions, Gilbert left the cemetery of death and brought the weapons from the dwarves to Trunks. They must¡¯ve met already.

    Han Shuo used all his strength and flew at the speed of a shooting star. There was only a faint light shing through, heading towards the direction of the Valley of Sunshine.

    The Valley of Sunshine wasn¡¯t too far from the Dark Forest. Han Shuo only took about half a day to arrive at the Valley of Sunshine with his current speed.

    There were many forces here, so when Han Shuo reached the area, he didn¡¯t keep flying and instead walked on the ground to avoid raising attention. He moved forward, following the address that Trunks had given him.

    Whoosh!

    Suddenly, several arrows pierced the air and nailed the tree in front of Han Shuo.

    As sounds of disturbance rang out, nearly a hundred bandits stepped out from the bushes. They were obviously well trained, and most of them held a good weapon. A small portion of them even wore aplete set of armor, the quality of which looked even better than that of the Lancelot Empire¡¯s official army.

    Nearly a hundred bandits, eyes cold and momentum awe-inspiring, suddenly surrounded Han Shuo. Bows, crossbows, and spears locked onto him one after another.

    There was a long red haired, unruly looking girl amongst them. She has bright eyes and white teeth, wearing a set of leather clothes. She looked quite arrogant as she walked forward withrge strides and said haughtily, ¡°We¡¯ve watched you for quite a while now. You dare to fly around in ournd. If you¡¯re so good, then fly here for me to see?¡±

    Han Shuo had been flying in the air just now, so he hadn¡¯t released the yin demons to scout around. Moreover he didn¡¯t pay too much attention of the going abouts in the forest below, and naturally didn¡¯t expect to be surrounded byyers of bandits.

    ¡°You must bedy J. Hehe, I¡¯m just an ordinary mage, I didn¡¯t know this area was your turf, sorry.¡± Han Shuo gave an once over nce at the group, especially paying attention to that unruly girl, then he said with augh.

    ¡°It seems that you have some knowledge. Who are you? What the hell do you n to do by infiltrating our territory?¡± The female bandit J red at Han Shuo, interrogating.

    ¡°I just happen to pass by, I don¡¯t have any bad intentions. Well then, I still have things to do, will you allow me leave?¡± Han Shuo had heard a bit about this female bandit J¡¯s deeds from Trunks. He knew this girl followed the bandit job as inheritance to her ancestry. Even though her character was a little unruly and stubborn, she wasn¡¯t a bad person. She could be considered a merciful bandit with a strict set of principles among the bandit forces around the Valley of Sunshine, so Han Shuo didn¡¯t want to butt heads with her.

    ¡°You look so shifty. You mustn¡¯t be any good person. The Valley of Sunshine has been chaotic recently, so who knows if you aren¡¯t a spy sent by our enemies? Men,e and capture this fellow first, then carefully interrogate him.¡± J stared fixedly at Han Shuo. Seeing him exposing not even a bit of fear and grinning instead, she started to feel somewhat annoyed and angrily turned around to order the gang.

 Chapter 257: Robbing the robbers

    Chapter 257: Robbing the robbers

    Several rough, bulky bandits abruptly sprang out from behind J. They grinned and shot towards Han Shuo.

    These fellows all seemed to have cultivated fighting aura. Each bandit was about two meters tall, and emitted a pressure as fierce as a bear. Their momentum alone was enough to shock people.

    ¡°Eh, sorry, I still have something to do, so I can¡¯t stay here long.¡± Of course Han Shuo wasn¡¯t scared. When he saw these big guys closing in, he quickly shot up and slipped out of the besiegement of the surrounding men like an eel.

    His speed suddenly elerated like that of a leopard. Han Shuo leapt onto a huge tree with just a tap of his foot, then leapt backwards more than ten meters. It seemed like he¡¯d soon be able to escape the encirclement of bandits.

    ¡°Damn it! Capture him alive for me! There must be something up with this brat!¡± J was furious. She suddenly and fiercely shot towards Han Shuo, and was actually able to move elegantly among the shrubs, her eyes fixed on Han Shuo without letting go.

    Several bandits had already fired a series of arrows and spears at Han Shuo as per J¡¯s order. However, they¡¯d all heard her say ¡°alive¡±, so they didn¡¯t dare to aim these attacks at him, but instead, shot at the path that he was aiming for.

    Han Shuo grinned. His body shed left and right, up and down in an odd fashion. He only stuck to the middle of the forest and changed directions with an extremely quick speed. Not only did he avoid all of the attacks, he even leisurely exined, ¡°Hey, miss bandit, you shouldn¡¯t chase me like this, I¡¯m really no spy.¡±

    ¡°You say you¡¯re not a spy, but why are you running as if you are a spy?¡± J was still in hot pursuit as she furiously roared, ¡°Brothers, who cares if he¡¯s a spy or not? Get him!¡±

    This bandit group wasn¡¯t weak. The big guys that were chasing Han Shuo under J¡¯s order all had the strength of senior swordsmen. There were several shabbily dressed mages, whose power were also simr. Han Shuo would be in big trouble if they all worked together to stop him.

    However, Han Shuo¡¯s current strength was unfathomable. The three yin demons he had released could cover the entire terrain, as well as monitor the surrounding situation. Several obstacles were discovered ahead of time by the three yin demons, and so the distance between Han Shuo and the bandits gradually widened. His high speed, coupled with the extensive observation of the three yin demons, simply rendered the encirclement of J¡¯s gang useless.

    This group of bandit seemed to have a good reputation. In addition, Han Shuo also had some ns for them, but not in the same way that he¡¯d ruthlessly treated the Butcher¡¯s gang. He didn¡¯t immediately leave after escaping their encirclement, but instead dragged them around to observe their quality andbat effectiveness through the surveince of the yin demons.

    Out of the more than a hundred bandits, a majority of them had trained fighting aura, while a dozen or so were mages. In the process of pursuing Han Shuo, their formations were constantly stable without any particr frantess. Without J having to issue manymands, they all spread out in tacit understanding. If one side heard any movement from Han Shuo, they¡¯d immediately alert the others. After which they would all rush in, swordsmen, archers, and mages would be arranged orderly in the encirclement.

    ¡°They have some strength indeed. No wonder they could be one of the most powerful forces in the Valley of Sunshine. Compared to the Butcher¡¯s bandit group, this one is much more smoothly ordered. However, the Butcher¡¯s bandits are more cruel and bloodthirsty.¡± Han Shuo muttered to himself. He was hiding in the thick lush foliage of a huge tree while clearly observing their movements through the three yin demons.

    ¡°Where is he? You guys lost him?!¡± J was chasing aggressively when she realized that they had lost all traces of Han Shuo. She furiously shouted at the bandits around her.

    Be it her speech or actions, J didn¡¯t have the gentle and tender demeanor of a girl at all. Perhaps because she grew up in a banditir, her manner had beenpletely affected by the bandits. Her temper was ferocious and her behavior crude. Although she looked gentle and pretty, the feeling that she gave people was that of a great, prideful man.

    ¡°Young miss, this person is even faster than a leopard and more cunning than a fox. Is he really a mage?¡± An old mage with one crippled leg said with a wry smile as he used the levitation skills to float to J¡¯s side.

    ¡°Old Billy, if he were a swordsman or a knight, would he fly to this ce from afar? Damn it, are you so old that even your head is old too?¡± J was still raging, her almond eyes rolling at the crippled old man as she huffed and cursed angrily.

    Old Billy wasn¡¯t angry being scolded at by her like that. He only hung his head with a wry smile, ¡°Maybe I¡¯m really old now, or the times have changed. How could a mage run faster than a leopard? I dare say that he was running, and not using levitation skills. Heavens, is he special like you?!¡±

    ¡°Search this area! This guy must be a spy, or he could be from the House of Menlo.¡± Paying no heed to old Billy, J shouted to some bandits nearby.

    ¡°Not here, young miss!¡±

    ¡°Can¡¯t find him, he¡¯s gone!¡±

    ¡°He may have escaped!¡±

    All kinds of helpless messages resounded around J. Obviously the bandits had no way of discovering Han Shuo¡¯s existence.

    It was already nighttime. Only J and Billy were standing under the tree where Han Shuo was hiding. As for the other seven or eight bear-like bandits, they were in the middle of an area with tall weeds that reached the waist, around ten meters away from J.

    Han Shuo, who was hiding in the foliage above, suddenly raised his voice to let out a longugh then flew straight down. He reached her in the blink of an eye, smashing a blow that contained magical yuan and surging evil aura at her head.

    ¡°Damn it!¡± J cursed as she pushed away the old Billy, who was about to chant a spell. She curled her hand into a fist that emitted a dark green fighting aura, aiming it at Han Shuo¡¯s punch above.

    Seeing the dark green fighting aura, Han Shuo immediately understood that she should only have the strength of a senior swordsman. He quickly reduced the magical yuan in his punch from eighty percent to thirty percent.

    Bang! The dark green fighting aura and Han Shuo¡¯s punch fiercely collided, then their fists hit each other. A force that could row the mountains and topple the sea suddenly shot out from J¡¯s small fist. This force flipped the flying down Han Shuo up again in the same trajectory that he fell.

    ¡°How could this be?!¡± His right hand became numb. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but eximed, his face horrified.

    The green fighting aura was the signature of a senior swordsmen. From Han Shuo¡¯s experience, J could, at most, withstand about thirty percent of the power from his magical yuan. However, even though J¡¯s fighting aura scattered when their punches collided, her small fist still emitted a terrifying force.

    If it wasn¡¯t for Han Shuo¡¯s unusually tough body, her punch could have crippled his right hand. To his understanding, the green fighting aura of a senior swordsman absolutely couldn¡¯t cause such a great force.

    This female bandit was a little strange!

    ¡°Keke!¡± J revealed a satisfyingugh at Han Shuo¡¯s horrified face. Then her space ring shed and a studded club, bigger than her body appeared. She easily held the studded club in her left hand and giggled as she leapt up towards Han Shuo using the high trees around. Han Shuo had yet to fall down when the studded club viciously aimed at his waist and smashed downwards.

    Han Shuo snorted coldly. He had just showed some goodwill and didn¡¯t expect to eat a loss in return. Seeing J pound her studded club right at his lower body, he became somewhat angry. His body that was hit dizzy by the strong force earlier suddenly halted mid-air, as he aimed a simr punch right at J¡¯s studded club.

    Rumble. A huge sound rang out, followed by J¡¯s surprised yelp. She was using the tree trunks to leap up, but now, both her body and studded club were fiercely smashed back down. As her butt mmed on the ground, J looked at the proud Han Shuo standing mid-air, aghast.

    ¡°Motherfecker son of a b*tch! Pretending to be a pig to eat a tiger!¡± J couldn¡¯t help but let out a vulgar curse. Her breathing was heavy for a while before she took hold of the studded club, wanting to fight again.

    Han Shuo was shocked. He didn¡¯t expect J to be able to stand up so quickly. Not letting him make a move again, the big mercenaries around them rushed up together. The old crippled mage Billy was also finished chanting his spell. Chilling winds whistled as they churned into piercing sharp wind des, whizzing forwards.

    He was actually a wind archmage! Han Shuo was stunned for a moment. Now that he knew of J¡¯s power, he didn¡¯t continue to stay here.

    He flew to hide himself in the foliage of the tree behind them, then made a few leaps and dropped down to a carriage that belonged to the bandits. As soon as hended, he used the Demonyer Edge to slice open the carriage¡¯s top. While everyone wasn¡¯t paying attention, he grabbed a blithely unaware young woman, suppressed her strength, and flew out.

    ¡°You rogue, let me go! Hurry and let me go, or J definitely won¡¯t let you off!¡± This young woman was utterly beautiful, arching crescent eyebrows, a pair of clear and bright eyes. Her voice was soft even though she was yelling angrily.

    ¡°J, I¡¯m taking this girl away. If you want to rescue her,e to the Soul Destroyer mercenary band.¡± Han Shuo seized the young woman without any care for her shouting. Heughed loudly and left grandly.

    ¡°Scoundrel! Let go of my wife, or else I¡¯ll never be finished with you!¡± J was raging as she roared to the heavens, then she constantly and vulgarly cursed. She hadn¡¯t a bit of the manner that a gentle girl should have had.

 Chapter 258: Headquarters

    Chapter 258: Headquarters

    The dangerously steep cliff, that was tapering into a bottomless abyss, was covered in floating clouds. The crimson sunset was outstanding in the sky, shining on the towering cliff, which now looked like an enormous red branding iron.

    This cliff was a long distance away from the Valley of Sunshine. This kind of cliff wasn¡¯t umon in the Ken mountain range. Rugged, oddly shaped rocks were scattered all over the bare cliff and no nts grew anywhere.

    Standing atop the cliff, Han Shuo leapt straight downwards. In just a breath of time, he fell through the clouds andnded safely on a huge, protruding rock.

    This big rock was situated in the middle of the cliff, and there was thick white mist above and below it. Part of this protruding cliff was t, and although a little steep, it wasn¡¯t that dangerous as long as he was careful.

    ¡°Who are you?¡± A fellow with a bare upper body eximed. His face was messily beardy, his hand holding an axe forged by the dwarves as he stared at Han Shuo in a hostile manner.

    ¡°I¡¯m looking for Trunks.¡± Han Shuo answered with a smile.

    The Soul Destroyer mercenary band was situated on a vast, t in on the protruding rock in the middle of the cliff. The rock was floating on this cloudy mist, and for some reasons unknown, this thick mist didn¡¯t spread to the center. Above and below this t in was a vast expanse of misty white, giving it a somewhat strange appearance.

    A row of bamboo huts were spread out along the t in. Many mercenaries, with bare upper bodies, were practicing martial arts on a fighting tform asrge as a football field. Behind it were severalrge caves which could also be used for housing.

    This t in was truly miraculous. It was covered in thick mist above and below, leaving only the center, which was isted by a simple enchantment. This thickyer of white mist was a natural barrier, ensuring that no one would discover the t in within it. There was no mist in the center of the in and the air was fresh. It was quiet and concealed, a good hiding ce.

    Han Shuo was holding that gentle girl in his arms. Her eyes couldn¡¯t see and her ears couldn¡¯t hear as he had already restricted her senses. The moment hended, Han Shuo immediately felt Gilbert¡¯s presence.

    ¡°Honored master! You¡¯ve finally returned!¡± The pitch ck Gilbert was in the middle of the fighting tform. His body was naked from the waist up, showing his glossy ck muscles. He threw two entangled mercenaries aside and yelled loudly as he ran towards Han Shuo.

    The brawny guy holding the axe, who¡¯d been eyeing Han Shuo with hostility, immediately curved his mouth into a smile as he heard Gilbert call Han Shuo his master. He said in a friendly manner, ¡°Your weapon is very good. Thank you.¡±

    Since Han Shuo offended the Church of Light and the Cmity Church at the same time, he didn¡¯t tell Trunks his other identity in order to guard against these two churches. These mercenaries only knew Han Shuo as a good friend of Trunks, but they didn¡¯t know about the other matter.

    ¡°No need to stand on ceremony. Where is Trunks?¡± Nodding, Han Shuo asked this brawny guy.

    ¡°He¡¯s gone out for something, but he should be back by evening. Honored master, you¡¯ve returned.¡± The naked Gilbert yelled as he walked forward. Many mercenaries on the t in could hear his voice. A great deal of them exited their bamboo huts and rock caves, looking at Han Shuo with surprise.

    Gilbert hadzed around this ce for quite some time. Even in his human form, none of these mercenaries could deal with his tyrannical dark dragon body. Evidently, he had established a powerful image during that time.

    This powerful being actually humbly called Han Shuo master, shocking the mercenaries who resided on this t in. They couldn¡¯t help but want to take a look and see how powerful this figure was that he could make Gilbert submit.

    ¡°Many thanks to your weapons! They are really useful!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. This broadsword is amazing. Worthy of being a weapon forged by the dwarves!¡±

    ¡°Thank you, thank you. The weight of this double-edged hatchet really suits me, thank you!¡±

    The mercenaries shouted one after another, their eyes looking at Han Shuo with gratitude and goodwill. Evidently they were extremely satisfied with the weapons that had Gilbert brought with him.

    ¡°No need to be polite. Trunks and I are the best of friends, hehe!¡± Han Shuo nodded andughed in a friendly manner, his eyes shining as they assessed these mercenaries.

    Han Shuo saw more than a hundred mercenaries on this t piece ofnd. Each of them possessed a calm and experienced bearing. The majority were swordsmen, plus a dozen or so mages and more than thirty archers. Judging from the presence exuded from their bodies, they must be great men with extraordinary power and tough mindsets.

    Compared to the bandit group led by J, the Soul Destroyer mercenary band also had over a hundred members. Its power was a bit stronger. Amongst them, several mercenaries were still young, yet had a cold and calm bearing. Han Shuo knew these people used to be a part of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band that he¡¯d met at the House of Menlo. Their calm and cold manner, forged from weathering many battles, made Han Shuo look at them a few more times.

    ¡°Hey, you¡¯re called Bryan? Hehe, you must be very powerful to be Gilbert¡¯s master. Are you interested in exchanging blows?¡± A seasoned mercenary offered. He was about a meter and ny centimeters tall, naked from the waist up, revealing his bulging muscles. He held a broadsword of one and half a meter in length as his eyes squinted at Han Shuo, measuring him with his invitation.

    When he spoke, his right hand, which held the sword easily waved around as if demonstrating his strength. A dark green fighting aura suddenly red up as a sharp de light flickered in and out of existence.

    ¡°Alright!¡± Trunks wasn¡¯t back yet anyway. In order to remove future obstacles when he revealed his identity, Han Shuo intended to leave a powerful impression and deeply engrave it into the depths of their hearts. That would be the most effective method.

    Han Shuo walked towards the fighting tform, rxed and unrestrained. As he walked, he took of his shirt, so that his body was also naked from the waist up. His body was over one meter eighty centimeters tall, each chunk of muscle was as if carved by a knife. His force was vigorous and explosive. The rows of muscles were perfectly coordinated as they were naturally formed through the tempering of his demonic magic.

    As he flung off his shirts, the mercenaries around saw his body and immediately issued surprisedments. A bunch of them excitedly jumped as they yelled, ¡°Grant, you¡¯re in trouble!¡±

    They were all knowledgeable people. Seeing the strong muscles and perfectly coordinated lines on Han Shuo¡¯s body, they immediately knew that this sturdy and bnced body was most suited for fighting. Grant held a broadsword and his body wasrge. However, some of his muscles weren¡¯t that visible. His muscles could achieve explosive power thanks to his fighting aura, but his speed would obviously be affected.

    On the contrary, each chunk of Han Shuo¡¯s muscles was clear and harmonious. Even in the most difficult ce to grow muscles ¨C his v-lines appeared as if they were carved. This type of body with perfect muscle coordination was the most suitable forbat.

    Grant also showed a surprised expression. Seeing that Han Shuo hade empty handed, he was stunned for a moment then threw aside his broadsword, shouting defiantly, ¡°Then we won¡¯t use weapons, only relying on pure physical strength topare.¡±

    ¡°As you wish!¡± Han Shuoughed loudly. He walked towards Grant, not using magical yuan at all.

    Grant was delighted. He increased his speed and charged forward without waiting for Han Shuo to close in. His body rushed violently towards Han Shuo, curving his lips and clenching his fist, aiming it straight down at thetter.

    Unexpectedly, Han Shuo moved step by step without any other actions. He just watched the iing iron fist, the corner of his mouth curving into an odd smile.

    Boom!

    The momentum of Grant¡¯s punch was like a rainbow as it pounded into Han Shuo¡¯s chest. A muffled drum-like sound came out of thetter¡¯s body. Han Shuo¡¯s figure stood still, even the smile on his face remained unchanged.

    ¡°Oh my god, is your body made of steel?¡± On the contrary, it was Grant who grimaced. His fist in pain, his face miserable.

    ¡°Heh heh!¡± Han Shuo made a move like lightning. He took hold of Grant¡¯s shoulder and suddenly threw it over his shoulder. The big man¡¯s one meter ny centimeter body fluttered like a feather, flying a few meters into the air and falling just right onto arge, soft cushion.

    Leisurely sweeping his eyes to nce at the nearby mercenaries, Han Shuo called out dashingly, ¡°Does any other brother want to try? Whether it¡¯s physical attacks, fighting aura, or magic, I can do them all!¡±

    When his words fell, every single one of the Soul Destroyer mercenary band waspletely silent. They dazedly looked at Han Shuo, dumbfounded. No one dared to step up.

    ¡°Wakaka, you guys are idiots! Daring topete with my master in bodily strength. In the forbiddennd of the Dark Forest, even the golden dragon, proimed to have the most powerful body, couldn¡¯t fight against my great master. You brats are truly crazy!¡± Gilbert shouted triumphantly, scaring the already stunned mercenaries into shock.

    ¡°Mighty master, you¡¯ve even brought me a woman this time? You are bing more and more considerate!¡± Gilbert squealed as he suddenly discovered the restrained woman that¡¯d been put aside by Han Shuo. He excitedly walked over.

    ¡°Stop. This woman is not to be touched. I still have great uses for her. She belongs to that female bandit J, and so I need to use her to schedule an appointment with J!¡± Han Shuo red at Gilbert as he snapped.

    Gilbert immediately became honest upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s shout. At this time, the sound of rustling wind echoed down the steep cliff. In just a while, Trunks, along with Odysseus and a bunch of others,nded down from above.

    ¡°Eh, you¡¯vee!¡± Trunks immediately said with a smile when he saw Han Shuo. As he walked to thetter, his eyes unintentionally nced around. He was suddenly stunned as he looked at the girl that Han Shuo had brought, his expression extremely odd.

    After a while, Trunks loudly cried out ¡°Annie¡± then furiously rushed over to her side. The people next to him were originally from the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band. They were first ecstatic before looking at her with some suspicion as they muttered, ¡°Something¡¯s not right!¡±

 Chapter 259: Assembly

    Chapter 259: Assembly

    Trunks¡¯ expression was exceedingly off as he dashed in front of the girl like lightning. He reached out a hand to touch the ne of crystal shards on her neck. He said with a choked up voice, ¡°Annie, it¡¯s definitely you!¡±

    The original Rainbow Sickle mercenary band members all clustered around Trunks and looked on with confused stares. Grant, who¡¯d been tossed into the air by Han Shuo, couldn¡¯t help but say, ¡°Chief, Miss Annie doesn¡¯t look like that!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s definitely Annie. I gifted her that crystal ne, and the ck mole behind her left ear are all proof that she¡¯s Annie!¡± Trunks¡¯ voice was thick was tears as he held onto the girl and sobbed with joy.

    The mercenaries, who¡¯d been doubtful before, all cheered when they heard that Trunks had confirmed her identity. The used their mallets to bash each other¡¯s chest as they seemed to want to use pain to express how excited and happy they were.

    ¡°Annie, Annie, what¡¯s wrong? Why can¡¯t you speak?¡± Trunks asked frantically when he realized the girl in his grasp wasn¡¯t moving, and was as quiet as a puppet.

    ¡°Allow me!¡± Han Shuo dashed in front of Trunks and ced his right hand on Annie¡¯s back. A beam of ck light entered her body and cleaned away the restraints ced on her.

    The girl, with her head lolling to the side, suddenly had color suffuse her cheeks again. She seemed to feel Trunks¡¯ shaking as her long eyshes fluttered, suddenly snapping open into bright eyes as she looked at Trunks, perplexed.

    Thatsted for only a moment. A shrill scream immediately broke from the girl¡¯s mouth. She struggled fiercely and threw punches and kicks at Trunks. She resisted ferociously and cursed loudly, ¡°Damn it, who are you? If J knew, she¡¯d kill you for sure. Let go of me, let go of me!¡±

    However, the girl didn¡¯t seem to have practiced martial techniques. Her punches and kicks didn¡¯t cause Trunks much damage when theynded on him. Trunks let go of the girl in bafflement, ¡°Annie, do you not remember me?¡±

    ¡°Who¡¯s Annie? I¡¯m Betty. You must have the wrong person. You¡¯re crazy!¡± The girl dodged Trunks and looked huffily at Han Shuo. ¡°You evil robber, what do you want with me here?¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t respond as he looked at Annie with deeply furrowed brows. Linley looked at the deeply emotional and dejected Trunks, ¡°Trunks you¡¯re not recognizing the wrong person, are you?¡±

    Shaking his head firmly, Trunks said, ¡°I gave her that crystal ne, and the ck mole on her ear is still there. This is definitely Annie, but I don¡¯t know why her looks have changed and why she doesn¡¯t remember me.¡±

    ¡°Then there¡¯s nothing wrong about it. These marks mean that it must be her. Memories are sometimes forgotten after enormous stimulus, and some magical potions can be used to change one¡¯s appearance.¡± Han Shuo said calmly.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. That must be the case. Where did you find her?¡± Trunks immediately agreed when he heard Han Shuo respond.

    ¡°You jerks, what do you want to do with me? Hurry up and let me go or J will never let you off the hook!¡± The originally gentle girl became a bit frantic because of her dangerous circumstances, and she kicked up quite a fuss.

    ¡°I grabbed her from J¡¯s hands. It looks like we¡¯ll understand what¡¯s going on only after we find J. I have things to discuss with her anyways.¡±

    ¡°Annie, where did you get this crystal ne?¡± Trunks asked in a shaky voice as he walked towards the girl and pointed at the ne on her neck.

    ¡°How would I know? It¡¯s mine. You must have the wrong person. Please, let me go. I can have J let you guys go too.¡± The young girl seemed to feel Trunks¡¯ affection for her and begged pitiably.

    ¡°Do you remember your childhood, the matters of you youth?¡± Trunks eyes glimmered with light as he looked closely at the girl, asking anxiously.

    Shaking her head like a rattle-drum, the girl bawled, ¡°I don¡¯t remember, I don¡¯t remember anything and I don¡¯t want to. Let me go!¡±

    By now, even the original Rainbow Sickle mercenary band members could see that she had indeed lost her memory, and was sure that this had to be Annie, who¡¯d been missing for three years.

    ¡°I¡¯m going to find J and get to the bottom of this. Uncle Grant, take two small teams and make the trip with me.¡± Trunks had a resolute expression on his face and gave an order to Grant, then spoke softly to Annie, ¡°Annie, stay here for now. They¡¯ll take care of you like before.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not Annie, let me go!¡± Annie wanted to cry when she saw that Trunks was about to leave.

    ¡°Come, let¡¯s do it all tonight.¡± Swiping with his eyes, Trunks couldn¡¯t bear to look at the sobbing Annie and cast a nce at Han Shuo, walking down withrge strides.

    There were 20 people on each small team, as well as Odysseus¡¯ crew, Han Shuo and Gilbert walking along the t ground. They climbed up the previously shaped stone stairs and climbed up out of the cliff.

    ¡°Why did you leave in such a hurryst time?¡± Odysseus asked Han Shuo with a smile as Gordon and Aphrodite also chattered away.

    ¡°It couldn¡¯t be helped. I had a ton of stuff to dost time, plus that Ferguson was hot on my tail, so I had to leave.¡± Han Shuo smiled apologetically at Odysseus and exined. He looked to the right and left and saw that no one was paying any attention to him. Odysseus couldn¡¯t help but ask a question in a low tone at this point.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said softly, ¡°Yes.¡±

    Gordon was delighted and chuckled, ¡°You¡¯re amazing to have created such arge mercenary band. We were only willing to join after Trunks said that the boss in the shadows was you.¡±

    pping Gordon¡¯s shoulder, Han Shuo smiled faintly and nodded, not saying much. The friendship of life and death that Han Shuo had formed with them in the Dark Forest was indeed bing of use.

    ¡°A merchant happened to discover a silver mine in the mountain valley. It¡¯s said that there¡¯s even mithril inside. All of the powers in the Valley of Sunshine have fought several times for possession of this silver mine. I¡¯ve received news that Laureton of the Cairo mercenary band will be going over tonight as well. The Cairo mercenary band has upied all high ground in the valley, and it¡¯ll be difficult for the other powers to fight against him.¡±

    ¡°Laureton has left the valley this time for mithril. The other power won¡¯t let him off the hook either, so there¡¯s certainly going to be a vicious battle tonight at the silver mine. I¡¯vee back to take some men and watch the show, and see if there are any benefits to be had.¡± Trunks exined as he arrived aboveground from the misty t grounds.

    Startled, Han Shuo said, ¡°Silver mines are rare enough to begin with. Mithril is the ultimate material used in forging weapons and armor. No wonder everyone¡¯s gone crazy over it. If such a mine were discovered, its value is truly unsurpassable. Therefore, all of the factions in the valley will want a share of the profits. The merchant who discovered it was killed in the first moment, but sadly the news had already travelled.¡± Trunks nodded in agreement.

    ¡°Come, let¡¯s go take a look as well. If there are no idents, J will appear there as well.¡± Han Shuo thought for a bit and suggested to Trunks.

    ¡°Mm, my thoughts precisely!¡± Trunks responded.

    The group of thirty some people left the cliff silently, heading for their destination with Trunks¡¯ instructions.

    The mercenaries that Trunks had brought along were mostly the experienced, extraordinary members of the Soul Destroyers. They kept checking their equipment along the way and looked around alertly, carefully avoiding the other groups of people along the way.

    As the sky darkened, before the crescent moon rose into the night sky, Trunks stopped in front of a boulder and pointed at a valley in the distance that was filled with ivy vegetation. ¡°There it is, I think all the powers in the valley have arrived. The smaller forces like us who want to take advantage of the situation will also be greatly numerous. It¡¯s going to be a bit impossible to hide without anyone discovering us.¡±

    ¡°The others remain here. You, me, and Gilbert will go inside first. Just follow me and be careful. No one will discover us then.¡± Han Shuo turned his head and calmly gave Trunks his orders.

    Trunks had witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s miracles before. He immediately turned back to the others and said, ¡°Uncle Grant, you guys remain here and hide yourselves for now. We¡¯ll scout ahead. I¡¯ll use signals to notify you if anything happens.¡±

    As experienced mercenaries, they wouldn¡¯t have any objections about their chief¡¯s orders once they started their operations. Grant nodded, saying lowly, ¡°Understood.¡±

    ¡°Follow me!¡± Han Shuo called out softly and lowered his body to be level with the shrubbery. He took a step out and sent the three yin demons out around him, keeping an eye on all movement around him.

 Chapter 260: Adding fuel to the flames

    Chapter 260: Adding fuel to the mes

    ¡°This mithril mine is within the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band¡¯s area of influence. It now belongs to our Church of Light. All of you please leave!¡± The light grand magus Ferguson floated in the air. He wore a pure white magic robe that shone with splendor. His left hand held a magic staff that emitted a dazzling light. He gave off an invible, sacred bearing.

    All of the light magical elements in the valley converged towards his magic staff from all directions. Ferguson¡¯s presence was bing stronger and stronger. A brilliant curtain of light burst out of the magic staff in his hand, illuminating the moonless valley.

    A small river was quietly flowing in the center of this valley, a few li wide. Big rocks of strange forms surrounded the whole river. The mountain wall was covered in a green, thick carpet of ivy-like vines.

    The four great powers in the Valley of Sunshine, the Cairo mercenary band, the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band, the House of Menlo, and the Katar orc tribe, had all gathered here. They had divided the valley into four sections in order to upy it. In addition, a dozen or so smaller forces were scattered in groups here and there. All of them hade here driven by greed.

    Han Shuo had originally wanted to hide his traces. As soon as he heard the loud rumbling, he released the three yin demons to circle and scout the valley. After obtaining a clear understanding of the situation through the yin demons, he knew that this was a key moment in the valley, since all the forces were no longer hiding in secret.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go. No one will notice us as long as we¡¯re a bit careful.¡± Han Shuo shouted lightly, leading Gilbert and Trunks. The three cautiously slipped through several forces to a remote corner in the valley before hiding behind arge boulder.

    ¡°Mr. Ferguson, the person who discovered the silver mine was a merchant from our House of Menlo. Therefore, the mine naturally belongs to us.¡± Adam Menlo, head of the House of Menlo, said ndly, his face heavy as he red at Ferguson.

    Adam Menlo was a skinny old man rumored to be a sky rider. He was riding on the super rank magic creature Golden-Winged Roc, holding a golden spear in hand. He looked very heroic.

    Dozens of experts from the House of Menlo were behind him. The entire group was riding on exotic, odd magic creatures, their hands grasping superior weapons or magic staffs. They all stared at Ferguson in an unfriendly manner.

    ¡°Ferguson, it¡¯s not your Church of Light¡¯s turn to be arrogant in this Valley of Sunshine. Our Cairo mercenary band is the true master of this ce, everything here belongs to us.¡± The bald, robust Laureton shouted in a bell-like voice. His right hand wielded a huge battle axe in demonstration.

    This battle axe showed no reflection under the light magic, as if it contained a mysterious force within. At a nce, the handle seemed rusted all over, as if it had been through many years of life.

    Simrly, the elite mercenaries of the Cairo mercenary band were standing behind Laureton. He was evidently also determined to take control of this mithril mine. The chief of the Katar orc tribe stood on another side. He was roughly two and a half meters tall and carried a huge totem pole on his shoulder. The warriors of the tribe behind him were simr from their bodies to weapons.

    ¡°Looks like this battle is inevitable!¡± Han Shuo curved his lips into a devious smile as he said to Trunks, looking at the four great powers having their tit for tat in the central part of the valley.

    ¡°Mm, but why are J and the Butcher¡¯s bandit gangs not here?¡± Trunk first nodded then asked somewhat suspiciously, ¡°Logically speaking, they should have gotten the message. I didn¡¯t expect that they wouldn¡¯t evene for a piece of the pie.¡±

    ¡°They¡¯ve actuallye already. They are just hiding like us. Heh heh, these bandits didn¡¯t dare to expose themselves, so they¡¯ve just been hiding.¡± Han Shuo pointed in the direction of the Katar orc tribe chief and said, ¡°There¡¯s a huge rock in the mountain valley behind them, the Butcher¡¯s bandits are over there.¡±

    ¡°Over there, within the ivy bush about a li behind the House of Menlo is J¡¯s gang. However we shouldn¡¯t go hunting for her for the time being. Let¡¯s look at the situation first before deciding.¡±

    ¡°Understood.¡± Trunks replied.

    Since the valley was limited in size, the parties here had only brought a portion of their elite forces. The number of people from each faction wasn¡¯t toorge. All of the powers in the light and dark had gathered here with the intention of taking the mine. The situation was an imminent stalemate in every corner and direction of the valley. At this moment, no one dared to make a move. Even Laureton didn¡¯t dare to act first, avoiding the inevitability of bing a target for the other forces.

    After quarreling with each other for a while, the four great powers were still stuck in a battle of res and curses. Even theckeys only waved their weapons around like props. They hadn¡¯t officially started the fight. Obviously, they were still having some apprehension about each other.

    ¡°These people are so troublesome. Why can¡¯t they just make a move? I¡¯m already so tired from looking at them.¡± Gilbert observed for a while, but the bunch was still quarreling nonstop. He couldn¡¯t help butin.

    ¡°Where is the mine? I¡¯ll give them some impetus.¡± Han Shuo thought for a bit then looked to Trunks and asked.

    ¡°There¡¯s a hidden underground cave over there at that overgrowth. Rumor has it there is silver inside, and even a very small amount of mithril.¡± Trunks answered as he pointed at the ce where the four great factions were standing.

    His heart jumped as Han Shuo suddenly had an idea. Heughed devilishly, ¡°I have a way. This time, I must make Florida suffer continuously!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s group saw Florida upon moving forward. His injuries had beenpletely healed after half a year¡¯s worth of recovery. He was currently in high spirits as he stood behind his grandfather Ferguson, and whispered something to Asa.

    Asa and Maxine had tried to assassinate Han Shuo during hisst trip to the Valley of Sunshine. Marco¡¯s right arm had been cut off in the end, and he barely escaped with great embarrassment. He seemed to yet to recover, as his face was pale without the color of blood. Even though the severed arm had been reconnected, the spasming of his fingers indicated that some aftereffects were present. His arm might never recover its original flexibility.

    The little skeleton and earth elite zombie appeared after a necromancy chant. After being refined by demonic magic, the earth elite zombie no longer had the original appearance of a zombie warrior. He didn¡¯t look much different from a human.

    Upon receiving an order, the earth elite zombie slowly sank into the ground and disappeared before the incredulous eyes of Trunks. There was no change in thend where he disappeared, as if he were a drop of water absorbed by the soil.

    ¡°This, what is this? He, what thing is he?!¡± Trunks cried out in disbelief, he seemed to be unable to ept the scene that he had just witnessed.

    Pointing at the little skeleton, Han Shuo smiled and exined, ¡°The same as him.¡±

    Upon hearing Han Shuo mention him, the little skeleton¡¯s purple eye immediately lit up and focused on Trunks. He arrogantly waved his right hand,which grasped the bone knife, seemingly disdainful of Trunks¡¯ ignorance.

    ¡°I see, wondrous Bryan! You truly know how to shock people!¡± Trunks eximed, then smiled wryly as he said, ¡°No wonder both Ferguson and Edwin are looking for you!¡±

    ¡°This is the territory of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band. You dared to break into this ce and covet the silver mine. You really think too little of us!¡± Florida shouted on the other side with murderous intent as he looked coldly at Laureton.

    Amongst the troops invading the valley this time, the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band had brought the most amount of people. Moreover, with the presence of his grandfather Ferguson and the Church of Light, Florida felt that his side was the most powerful. His manner naturally became more overbearing.

    ¡°Florida, do you think the Valley of Sunshine is your home just because you have your grandfather backing you?¡± Laureton coldly snorted as he mocked Florida.

    Suddenly, the earth elite zombie appeared beneath the thick bush of ivy vines. His hands held a huge silver rock and enthusiastically ran towards Florida, giving the big rock to thetter under the crowd¡¯s watching eyes.

    ¡°Very good, damn you! Florida, your people are tantly exploiting the mine and simply ignoring our presence!¡± Seeing the situation, the head of the House of Menlo, Adam Menlo, immediately cursed out loud. He rode the super rank Golden-Winged Roc and rushed straight at Florida.

    The Golden-Winged Roc was a dozen meters long. Its pair of golden wings unfurled and covered the moon that had just risen in the night sky. A sharp cry resounded as the huge wings were like sharp des that were pping rapidly, creating enormous gusts through the valley. The frenzied winds fiercely buffeted the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries on Florida¡¯s side, making their sleeves flutter madly. Their bodies swayed as they couldn¡¯t stand straight.

    As the golden spear was raised, it emitted a thick murderous intent. Adam Menlo was at the forefront as he charged towards the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band. The men from the House of Menlo were riding all kinds of exotic magic creatures as they shouted and followed from behind.

    ¡°Your Church of Light will never have the chance to be arrogantly dominant in the Valley of Sunshine! Brothers, let him know who¡¯s the strongest in the Valley of Sunshine!¡± Laureton suddenly roared to the sky, bursting out of his clothes. A terrifying aura exploded out of his body and his bald head shone brilliantly.

    As his body sank into a berserk state, Laureton became extremely violent and impulsive. He carried the huge battle axe and was the first to rush out, leading the charge. The battle axe swept out fiercely. The boulders that he passed exploded with rumbling sounds as he charged forward with terrifying momentum.

    Behind him, a group of Cairo mercenaries also went berserk. They roared and howled loudly as they rushed towards the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries like a group of mad bulls.

    At the same time, the chief of the Katar orc tribe howled a few sentences in the oguage, fiercely mming his huge totem against the ground. The ground immediately shook violently before the totem pole caused a great pit.

    Several orc shamans also capered madly. Colorful lights fell one by one onto the bodies of dozens of orcs behind Katar. After being blessed by the chant, their muscles turned as hard as granite. Together, they raised their shining totem poles and advanced in a strange rhythm, howling as they rushed towards Florida.

    ¡°Who are you? Do you want to kill us all?!¡± Florida roared furiously at the earth elite zombie, his rage reaching its peak. He quickly chanted a spell, wanting to kill the earth elite zombie first before anything else.

    It was a pity that the earth elite zombie quickly sank into the ground and had already disappeared without a trace before he evenplete the spell. Florida eventually gathered a light sword to deal with Laureton, who was madly charging towards him.

    Once the berserkers and orcs went berserk, Florida knew too well how difficult it would be to stop them. He understood that this battle was unavoidable. On the other hand, he had the intention of killing Laureton to begin with. He¡¯d be killed heartlessly if he didn¡¯t find a way to stop thetter.

    The light sword shot forward as heughed wildly. The attack had yet to reach Laureton before it shattered into tiny pieces of light. The bald berserker sprinted towards Florida with awe inspiring momentum. Boulders were sent flying in many pieces wherever he passed. The battle axe in his hand emitted a presence that could disintegrate mountains and upend the seas.

    ¡°Formidable, they truly are experts! This battle is really interesting!¡± Han Shuoughed loudly and said leisurely as he looked at the other three great powers attacking the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band.

    ¡°Honored master, what do we do now?¡± Gilbert couldn¡¯t help but ask with excitement when he saw the chaotic scenes.

    ¡°Trunks, send out the signal and have our brotherse over. These people who want to fight, let them fight. You guys go harvest the mine, I will keep watch out here.¡± Han Shuo hastily told Trunks when he saw the scene of extreme chaos in the valley.

    ¡°But the mine entrance is right where they are fighting! Since they¡¯ve blocked the ce, whoever tries to go inside will meet with a bad downfall. This isn¡¯t a good idea!¡± Trunks smiled wryly and didn¡¯t immediately release the signal.

    ¡°Heh heh, the secret tunnel is prepared! With the earth elite zombie here, we won¡¯t have to go that way.¡± Han Shuoughed softly. As soon as he finished those words, a tunnel appeared underneath the rock where they were hiding. The earth elite zombie stood in the middle of that tunnel and waved his hand, beckoning with a broad smile.

 Chapter 261: Night of madness

    Chapter 261: Night of madness

    Ordinary earth mages could use the power of the earth to form all sorts of attacks. The earth element¡¯s forbidden magic ¡°Falling Meteor¡± and ¡°Rage of the Earth¡± even had the terrifying power to destroy a city. Yet, despite the earth mages being able to use the earth element to conduct all sorts of attacks, they were still unable to use the earth¡¯s power as flexibly as the earth elite zombie.

    As the favored child of the earth, once the earth elite zombie stepped on the ground, he could use the earth elemental energy tomit a lot of magical and wondrous things. It wasn¡¯t hard for him to use the power of the earth to form tunnels underneath the ground.

    When a tunnel appeared out of nowhere, Trunks knew that it must lead towards the mine.

    The four powers of the Valley of Sunshine were currently locked in intense battle in order to im the silver mine. Yet, the appearance of such a tunnel allowed Trunks and the others to directly enter the innermost location without any trouble at all.

    ¡°Understood!¡± Trunks chuckled, then let out an eagle-like shriek. Due to the mor from the heaven shaking fighting within the valley, Trunk¡¯s shriek didn¡¯t seem out of the ordinary.

    Through the yin demon¡¯s surveince, Han Shuo was able to see Grant and the others snap to attention after hearing Trunk¡¯s shriek, then immediately move vigntly towards the inside of the valley.

    ¡°Roar!!¡±

    The berserk Laureton howled towards the sky and hurled the battleaxe from his hands, causing a piercing, radiant light to enclose seven people from the Rainbow Sickle Mercenary Band. All of the people that were covered in his light had their body torn savagely into pieces, blood spraying all over Laureton.

    ¡°Be careful of Laureton. If I¡¯m seeing correctly, what he¡¯s holding should be the divine weapon of the Berserkers ¨C Berserker¡¯s Battle Axe. Laureton is already a powerhouse who can be berserk twice over. Legends says that a berserker with the berserker¡¯s Battle Axe can use its power to enter the berserk mode once again.¡±

    ¡°A berserker who can be berserk three times is definitely stronger than a great swordmaster. I think he is going to be the hardest to handle in the valley, even Ferguson might not be his opponent, so you definitely have to be careful of him,¡± Trunks couldn¡¯t help but remind Han Shuo the moment Trunks saw the enraged, muscle-bulging Laureton release a terrifying aura.

    Han Shuo actually became rather interested in trying after hearing Trunks¡¯ words and said softly, ¡°A berserker who can be berserk three times, hehe, that¡¯s rather interesting!¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s also those Katar orcs, be careful not to be surrounded by them. Otherwise, when their totems hit the earth, they will form a very terrifying shockwave. Once you are swept by the impact, it would be very difficult to live,¡± As an old hand in the valley, Trunks was quite clear about the different faction and couldn¡¯t help but remind Han Shuo after seeing that the battle in the valley had officially started.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll keep it in mind. Be careful when you go inside. I¡¯ll have the earth elite zombie follow you guys so that if your movement is exposed, you can leave from the tunnel immediately. With the earth elite zombie underground, your safety should be fine,¡± Han Shuo gazed at the group of people excitedly as bloodlust gradually rose from the depths of his heart. After saying that to Trunk, he immediately walked towards the insides of the valley in a ghostlike manner.

    Seeing that Han Shuo had left, the little skeleton walked over to the earth elite zombie¡¯s side and patted his shoulders, then followed Han Shuo as usual.

    In Gilbert¡¯s eyes, this wasn¡¯t anything special, since this wasn¡¯t the first time he saw the two beingsmunicate. However, Trunks faced with this obvious jarring ofmon sense, he eximed once again when he saw the little skeleton¡¯s strange actions.

    ¡°Chief, what is it?¡± Grant couldn¡¯t help but ask after rushing over when he saw Trunk¡¯s weird expression. Trunks remained dumbly looking at the little skeleton¡¯s departing back.

    ¡°No-Nothing, all of you follow me,¡± Trunks smiled wryly and shook his head, then he waved at Grant before walking down into the tunnel.

    The earth elite zombie was very intelligent. The moment he saw Trunks jump down, he went further into the darkness and led the way in front.

    ¡°What-What is going on, why is there a tunnel?¡± Grant couldn¡¯t help but exim with a face full of shock when he came down and saw an endless tunnel.

    ¡°Don¡¯t ask so much, just hurry!¡± Gilbert yelled, then immediately followed Trunks into the tunnel.

    All of the mercenaries who¡¯de down were extremely confused, but once they got over their surprise, they all filed into the tunnel. After everyone had entered, the tunnel closed miraculously without a trace.

    Meanwhile, the valley was in chaos. The hundred something elites from the four significant powers of the Valley of Sunshine were crashing together. When Han Shuo neared that area in interest, he found that the situation had changed in an odd way,pletely out of his predictions.

    Originally, due to the earth elite zombie¡¯s actions, the other three forces had rushed towards the Rainbow Sickles. Out of them, the Cairo mercenaries with ferocious war god Laureton as ferocious as a war god and ughtered the Rainbow Sickles, who had no corresponding expert. Even though the Rainbow Sickle Mercenary Band had the advantage in numbers, if the House of Menlo and the Katar orc tribe had also attacked together, the Rainbow Sickles would have been in dire straits.

    However, the situation wasn¡¯t like that. The House of Menlo and the Katar orc tribe that had rushed forward with Laureton¡¯s mercenaries all defected once they neared the Rainbow Sickles. With an explosive roar from Adam Menlo and Katar, the experts from the two forces all started attacking the Cairo mercenaries.

    ¡°Wahaha, Laureton, Laureton, you never would have imagined this, right?! The real target is your Cairo mercenary band in today¡¯s fight. You finally left the Valley of Sunshine, so don¡¯t think about going back, haha...¡± Florida of the Rainbow Sickles suddenlyughed maniacally. As he floated in the air, his loud voice passed to every single corner of the valley.

    ¡°Times have changed, the Cairo mercenaries has controlled the Valley of Sunshine for too long. No matter what, you have to move a little,¡± Adam Menlo¡¯s, the master of the House of Menlo, sinister voice also rang out as he flew towards Laureton on a great golden-winged roc.

    The circumstances had changed shockingly. It seemed like the Rainbow Sickles, Adam Melo and the orc tribe had alle to an agreement. The intense argument beforehand was only a way of covering the fact that these three forces had already set their target on Laureton¡¯s Cairo mercenary band in secret.

    Those apanying Laureton were the most elite berserkers of the Cairo mercenary band. Out of the fifty-something people, there were twenty berserkers who had the ability to be berserk once, and four of them, including Harris, had the ability to be berserk twice. Add to that the presence of the four archmages and three swordmasters they¡¯d recruited over the years, it meant that the majority of the strongest people from the Cairo mercenaries were all there.

    Yet, when faced with the sudden defection of the House of Menlo and the orc tribe, six berserkers on the outer ring were immediately ughtered by the experts from the two forces in the blink of an eye.

    On Florida¡¯s side, his grandfather Ferguson, had already descended from the sky and was watching the changes in the valley with a cold gaze. He didn¡¯t join in the attack on Laureton.

    ¡°Roar!¡±

    Laureton howled as the Berserker¡¯s War Axe in his hand attacked without a pattern. Meanwhile, a powerful aura spread as the Berserker¡¯s Battle Axe caused curtains of light to appear, and all those who were swept into the light were smashed into smithereens.

    ¡°Follow me to break out!¡± Laureton¡¯s yelled echoed through the entire valley. All of the people from the Cairo mercenary band suddenly changed directions and rushed towards the House of Menlo that were charging at towards them.

    Adam Menlo, waved the golden spear in his hands atop his roc, making the air sound out with his sword aura. As golden-winged roc pped its wings, tornadoes formed in the air and swept towards the people of the Cairo mercenary band.

    A fire mage of the House of Menlo released three snakes of fire that were five meters long. They spread out as if they were alive, one towards Laureton, while the other two slithered to nk the Cairo Mercenary Group in a cone-like formation. The tender green nts that they¡¯d slithered over in their path quickly melted.

    ¡°Adam, you ancient piece of crap, if you want to die, then I¡¯ll send you on your way!¡± Laureton roared in anger and leapt into the air. The Berserker¡¯s Battle Axe red out a curtain of light, causing the five meter long fire snake to rain down from the sky in sparks before it even managed to draw near his body.

    Silver light exploded from the Berserker¡¯s Battle Axe like satin sashes. It surged out like a waterfall as it shot directly towards Adam Menlo on the great golden-winged roc.

    Ding!

    Adam Menlo¡¯s golden spear connected directly with the berserker¡¯s Battle Axe, making Laureton¡¯s leaping figure tremble and then fall from the sky into the middle of the House of Menlo. Adam Menlo grunted, then quickly urged the roc to fly higher, as if he was afraid of the rampaging Laureton.

    As Laureton howled in anger, he made his move once again. The fact that he¡¯dnded right in the middle of the House of Menlo also made things more convenient. Before the archmage who¡¯d casted ¡°Dancing Fire Snakes¡± could react, he was split in half by a hack from the battle axe, spilling his blood and guts onto the ground.

    Laureton¡¯s savage power seemed to have found an outlet afternding in the middle of Adam Menlo¡¯s troops. He instantly caused the brutal death of several people, but the experts of the House of Menlo had managed to react by now, and they all aimed the broadswords, spears and bows at Laureton. All sorts of attacks swarmed him before Laureton was able to cause more tremendous damage.

    Ding ng dong.

    The Berserker¡¯s Battle Axe hand danced furiously in Laureton¡¯s as it blocked most of the attacks. However, several arrows still prated his defenses, and pinned his shoulders and back. A spear also appeared from a strange angle and carved a thin and long wound underneath his arm, where blood spurt forth madly.

    However, the berserk Laureton did not know pain at all. Furthermore, the defenses of his body were also terrifying. Although all of the arrows and long bows had packed such power and momentum that they would pierce through a normal person¡¯s body, they only managed to scratch Laureton¡¯s skin. Regardless of arrow or spear, the missiles only entered about a nail¡¯s depth into Laureton¡¯s muscles.

    ¡°As long as we kill Laureton, I, Florida, swear to back off from the fight over the silver mine. Don¡¯t let him leave here alive!¡± Florida rose in the air as the exquisite staff in his hand continuously shimmered, sending out exquisite Radiant Sword shes and pulses towards the people from the Cairo Mercenary Band.

    ¡°Aooooo!¡±

    The orc chieftain, Katar, howled, and led a group of orcs empowered by various shamanic spells in a charge towards the Cairo mercenaries. Although these orcs were least in number, they seemed to be immune to most of the magic attacks. Aside from causing their skin to turn redder, the water and fire spells casted by the Cairo archmages were not of any use.

    A savage power impacted the ground, causing one of the archmages to be assaulted by a huge tremor. Even his rank three magical beast, the Deepwater Venom Python, was hit as well. His steed died instantly, while the archmage bled from all of his orifices. He frantically used a levitation spell to fly into the sky.

    Since this fight had included all of the true experts in the four great powers of the Valley of Sunshine, the dense murderous aura due to their hatred and bitterness were all attracted by a power when they died, causing them to gather behind a huge boulder.

    Han Shuo, who had been watching excitedly behind the boulder, had bloodshot eyes at the moment as waves of blood-red evil aura wreathed around him. As more and more experts died, the terrifying aura around Han Shuo¡¯s body became denser and denser.

    ¡°Roar!!¡±

    A crazy long howl sounded out from afar, causing an enormous boulder the size of a house to suddenly break apart, its pieces flying everywhere.

    The evil aura around Han Shuo had condensed into a strange wave of blood as his crimson eyes red savagely ahead. The terrifying aura from his body spread out quickly, and everyone¡¯s gazes became fixated on Han Shuo when all of the powerhouses in the valley felt this evil, raging aura.

    Han Shuo turned swiftly into a ray of blood light and shot into the midst of the Rainbow Sickle Mercenary Band like a bloodthirsty demon. He was able to pound away at three great swordmasters of the Rainbow Sickle Mercenary Band with a single punch, while the blood that spurting out from his punch condensed into sma.

    ¡°It¡¯s him, it¡¯s him, kill him!¡± Florida¡¯s hatred for Han Shuo was deeply entrenched into his bones. Even though Han Shuo¡¯s appearance was very different from usual at this moment, he was still able to recognize him with a nce, causing him to yell out furiously.

    However, for an unknown reason, Florida, who should have been the first one to make a move, suddenly felt deep terror in his heart. Although he yelled loudly about killing Han Shuo, he subconsciously moved back.

    It was obvious that he was afraid!

 Chapter 262: Resurrection of the dead

    Chapter 262: Resurrection of the dead

    ¡°Hehe, Florida, we meet again!¡± Han Shuo sneered with crimson eyes. He was terrifying, like someone possessed by a demon.

    Normally speaking, once someone of the Bloodlust Realm went berserk, they would lose their mind and enter a mentality of endless ughter,pletely unable wake up. However, during the journey to the forbidden cest time, Han Shuo and the Demonyer Edge had taken in a lot of ¡°specters¡±. When the pure power had been absorbed by the demon infant, it seemed to have a miraculous effect on him.

    This time, Han Shuo felt that most of the evil aurae of hatred, terror, and savagery swirled around was actually absorbed by the Demonyer Edge within his body, causing most of the things swirling around his body to only be pure evil power.

    The negative emotions were the main reason why once Han Shuo would lose control over himself once he entered the bloodlust mode. Although the infinite bloodlust within Han Shuo¡¯s heart did not decrease when those negative emotions were absorbed by the Demonyer Edge, his firm will allowed his mind to remain clear. This differed from when he was in the forbidden area, where he¡¯d nearly killed Gilbert since he was unable to distinguish friend from foe.

    ¡°You won¡¯t be able to run away! You¡¯ll die today! Kill him!¡± Florida fled until he was in a ce that he was safe before calling out hatefully.

    ¡°You¡¯re actually not dead!¡± Grand magus Ferguson of the Church of Light eximed as he gazed at Han Shuo.

    ¡°How could I die so quickly when you haven¡¯t died yet, kaka!¡± Han Shuoughed oddly and made as if an eagle preparing to soar into the sky. Dense bloodlust spread out with Han Shuo as the center and formed an area suffused with blood-red mist.

    A terrifying and savage aura exploded out from within this area. The remaining power, that had yet to dissipate from the experts who¡¯d just died, all coalesced with the blood mist. As Han Shuo¡¯s aura became stronger and stronger, the area became a burning cloud that moved to cover Ferguson.

    ¡°What¡ª What kind of magic is this?!¡± Even with Ferguson¡¯s insight, he was unable to understand Han Shuo¡¯s methods of attack. However, he instinctively sensed danger. The magic staff in his hand shone brilliantly as he cast an ¡°Illuminate¡±, quickly backing away to hide like Florida.

    Once the spell ¡°Illuminate¡± had been cast, it was as if another sun had appeared in the sky. A ball of piercing light, carrying pure and holy power, surged towards Han Shuo.

    Unfortunately, while ¡°Illuminate¡± had the power to exorcise evil, it waspletely ineffective towards Han Shuo¡¯s demonic techniques. As the people underneath him died gruesomely, the aura from Han Shuo became stronger and stronger. A mist of blood, covering arge patch of area, spread out, causing the eight Rainbow Sickles to feel as if an evil power had surged into their bodies. They cried out in anguish until their bodies bulged and exploded.

    ¡°Who¡ª just who exactly are you? You¡¯re more evil than the Cmity Church! I won¡¯t allow you to get away with this!¡± Ferguson grew furious and roared while pointing at Han Shuo, as the Rainbow Sickles instantly exploded without any hope of resistance.

    ¡°Old fart, I reminded youst time and you didn¡¯t listen,¡± Although Han Shuo still retained control over his mind in the bloodlust realm, his desire for ughter was unable to be suppressed. Thus, he spoke coldly as he controlled the demonic cloud towards the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band.

    A blood-red fan ÊÈÑªá¦ flew out from the bloody mist. The intense murderous aura around Han Shuo surged crazily into the blood fan, causing the pictures of hundreds of demons on the fan to release an intense blood mist.

    The Bloodlust Fan was a demonic treasure that Han Shuo had refined during his three months of closed door cultivation. It was specifically used by those within the bloodlust realm. Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence was in the Bloodlust Fan, and it was able to transmute the murderous aura wreathing Han Shuo¡¯s body into a bloody mist that would cause blood to boil and bodies to explode.

    Now that it¡¯d been released by Han Shuo, it immediately showed a spectacr effect by converting the murderous aura. As the number of deceased in the surroundings increased, the terrifying aura of blood around Han Shuo also became more and more powerful. Wherever the blood fan passed, those ensconced by the mist were unable to control the blood in their bodies from boiling, and they all imploded with gruesome deaths.

    ¡°Use wind magic to blow away the bloody mist, quickly!¡± Seeing that the bloody mist was traveling over, Florida immediately lost his calm as he gave this quick order.

    The wind mages on the side immediately cast tornado and gale wind spells as soon he had shouted. The dozen or so small tornadoes churned over and destroyed everything like a knife. The bloody mist that had been gathered by the blood fan was blown apart, no longer able to coalesce as Han Shuo wished.

    No treasure was perfect. Thus, Han Shuo was neither surprised nor discouraged when the bloody mist of the Bloodlust Fan was torn apart by wind magic. As Florida yelled loudly and the remaining Rainbow Sickles attacked, Han Shuo¡¯s body flew backwards, and swiftly stopped in the air over Laureton¡¯s head.

    ¡°Laureton, I¡¯ll help you break through the encirclement, but that cursed shop belongs to me. Furthermore, the Soul Destroyers will have the right to publicly recruit mercenaries in the Valley of Sunshine. How¡¯s that sound?¡± Han Shuo stood straight in the air surrounded by his murderous aura and threw out these suggestions whilst looking down at the wound riddled Laureton.

    It was obvious that three of the great factions in the Valley of Sunshine had plotted together against Laureton in this battle. If Laureton died here, then the Valley of Sunshine would immediately be plunged into chaos. The Rainbow Sickles would then be most likely to take charge. This was something that Han Shuo didn¡¯t wish to see, and it was also detrimental to the Soul Destroyer mercenary band¡¯s development.

    Due to this, even if it wasn¡¯t for Laureton and purely for Trunks and himself, Han Shuo would¡¯ve helped Laureton break free as well Of course, it would be all the more perfect if Han Shuo could secure some benefits before helping him. Han Shuo also believed that Laureton would not refuse in this situation.

    As he expected, Laureton did not hesitate. He looked up and yelled back at almost the same moment Han Shuo had finished speaking. ¡°Agreed. If our people can leave the valley alive, I¡¯ll also give you an extra ten thousand gold!¡±

    ¡°Deal!¡± Han Shuo replied calmly.

    As spell after spell was chanted and the Canopy of Necromancy was released, the sky became covered by dark green clouds that were dense and unable to be broken apart. Meanwhile, several acidic swamps suddenly formed in the middle of the Katar orc tribe and House of Menlo troops. As Han Shuo chanted out various mystic spells whilst waving his hands, rays of strange light shot out beneath the Canopy of Necromancy,nding onto the bodies of the experts who had died not too long ago

    A terrifying scene urred. The people, that had been killed not long ago, began to struggle to their feet without a hint of humanity left in their eyes. The wounds on their bodies still bled, even the intestines of some of them could be seen. What was more horrifying was that some of them had their guts dangling from their waist, as if they hadn¡¯t properly put their belts on.

    When the deceased stood up one by one, it was enormously shocking and absolutely horrifying to those who were still alive. Every single live person who noticed this scene let out terrifying screams, causing the entire valley to sink further into chaotic uproar..

    Resurrection of corpses was one of the most horrifying and memorable magics of necromancy. It was something that had be an ancient legend, having disappeared from the continent for several thousand years. There was no record of this spell in the now forlorn branch of necromancy magic.

    However, on such a night and in such a ce, the four great factions of the Valley of Sunshine had the fortune of witnessing this long lost evil magic. Legends were legends after all. When corpses stood up one by one and attacked their formerrades while waving their weapons, the shockpletely destroyed theirpanions¡¯ minds.

    ¡°Oh, gods! How is this possible!¡± Ferguson let out an anguished wail as he looked at everything that was happening in disbelief.

    ¡°Laureton, don¡¯t say that I didn¡¯t help you. Quickly use this chance to break free!¡± Han Shuo grinned coldly as zombies and skeletons appeared out of nowhere and rushed towards the four shocked great factions, alongside the resurrected corpses. Under the cover of the Canopy of Necromancy, these beings of darkness became like fish in water, having their power and speed greatly increased.

    After being reminded by Han Shuo, the immensely shocked Laureton quickly came back to himself and immediately yelled, ¡°What are you guys spacing out for?! Charge!!¡±

    The immense roar made the dumbly staring Cairo mercenaries return to themselves. As they looked at their intimatepanions, who¡¯d already passed away, stand up in terrifying form, the mercenaries were absolutely shocked senseless. If it weren¡¯t for Laureton¡¯s shout waking them from their stupor, they might have needed quite a while to return to their senses.

    However, since they were Han Shuo¡¯s protective targets, they were still fine even when they were staring off into space. As for the other three forces, the dead suddenlytched onto some of their ankles, the subsequent terror from which might be engraved on their hearts for the rest of their lives. Some who reacted a bit slower were stabbed to death by their formerrades.

    Han Shuo stood in the air and gazed coldly at the savage changes underneath. The murderous aura from his body surged and red, releasing an evil atmosphere. When coupled with his savage look and red eyes, it caused him to look the epitome of terror.

 Chapter 263: Domineering

    Chapter 263: Domineering

    ¡°Grandpa, hurry and cast Radiant Glory! Expel this evil magic!¡± Florida shouted in a panic as he looked at the dumbfounded Ferguson.

    The shocked Ferguson only reacted when he was reminded by his grandson. The magic staff in his hand burst forth again with the holy force of light as his aged voice resonated throughout the valley, ¡°Oh noble God of Light, hear my calls. Disperse all darkness¡ªRadiant Glory!¡±

    A powerful light tore through the sky. Holy light elements permeated the air above the entire valley. The ck-greenyer of clouds created by Han Shuo¡¯s Canopy of Necromancy immediately began to disperse under the radiance of the holy light, and disappeared without a trace in a short time.

    Brilliant light scattered throughout the valley and intermixed with the numerous stars that dotted the sky to emit a soft light. As the holy force of light descended, the deathly air was quickly dispelled. The dark creatures summoned by Han Shuo started smoking under the rays of the holy light, and their speed and power were hindered.

    However, the resurrected dead bodies weren¡¯t much affected by the strong light from the Radiant Glory. Even though their skin also began emitting white smoke, they could still move freely, so they rushed straight at the troops of the three great powers.

    The experts who died thanks to Han Shuo¡¯s necromancy magic also had the presence of dark creatures on them. However, they¡¯d only just died after all, so this dark presence was very weak. This enabled them to barely manage to resist the rays of light magic.

    The Cairo mercenary band still had around twenty people left thanks to Han Shuo¡¯s assistance earlier. They took advantage of the House of Menlo being stunned senseless to escape the encirclement of the three great powers and flee to the entrance of the valley.

    Han Shuo knew the Canopy of Necromancy would certainly be dispelled wherever the Radiant Glory shone upon, and that the summoned dark creatures simrly wouldn¡¯t be spared. However, a bit of acid from the Acid Bog had been already released earlier, so the men chasing Laureton¡¯s group were more or less affected by this acid.

    The House of Menlo was the one most affected. Their magical creature mounts panicked when they stepped into the acid, their feet and legs quickly consumed by the acid. This looked simr to the effects that Radiant Glory had when hitting dark creatures.

    ¡°Be careful! I¡¯m going to kill him this damnable evil of a necromancer!¡± The House of Menlo had spent years of effort to finally gather this group of high rank magical creatures. Now that six of their rank two or three creatures had died in the blink of an eye, Adam Menlo was furious. He roared loudly in anger as he red at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Keke. Wanna kill me? Come on!¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t suppress his thirst for blood and had been worrying about where he could vent. As soon as he heard the furious Adam Menlo¡¯s furious shout, his blood red pupils immediately snapped to him.

    Using the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens to float in the air, Han Shuo¡¯s entire body was filled with ferocious killing intent that was horrifying. Even Florida, who had a bone deep hatred towards him, didn¡¯t dare to issue an order to attack. On one hand, it was because Han Shuo¡¯s momentum was too terrifying, and on the other, it was because it was difficult to handle him when he was so high up in the air.

    ¡°Kill Laureton first! The Cairo mercenary is finished as soon as he¡¯s dead. Leave this guy alone for now.¡± Florida couldn¡¯t help but shout anxiously when he saw Asa and Andy floating up and raising their magic staffs to deal with Han Shuo.

    Laureton was leading a group of survivors and rushing towards the entrance of the valley. Florida had gone through a great deal of effort and was even willing to let go of the mithril mine this time to kill Laureton. He wanted to take control of the Valley of Sunshine for the Rainbow Sickles, so he naturally couldn¡¯t let the former leave alive.

    Upon hearing Florida¡¯s shout, more than thirty Rainbow Sickle experts pursued Laureton together. Andy, who¡¯d floated up and was about to deal with Han Shuo with Asa, turned and flew towards Florida after looking at Han Shuo standing arrogantly in the air.

    However Asa, whose arm had been sliced off by Han Shuo by the Demonyer Edge, didn¡¯t listen to Florida¡¯s order. He red viciously at Han Shuo and rushed at him along with the Adam Menlo.

    Ferguson released the Radiant Glory behind Asa, then softly heaved a few breaths and floated over like a fluttering willow leaf in the air.

    ¡°Shoot him!¡± Adam Menlomanded from the back of the roc, his hand holding the dazzling golden spear as he lunged at Han Shuo.

    The House of Menlo only had less than thirty experts left after being swept through by the berserkers and Han Shuo¡¯s necromancy magic. Under Adam Menlo¡¯smand, they each aimed their crossbow bolts and spinning axes at Han Shuo, who was standing grandly in the sky.

    Three yin demons were observing the entire battlefield. Therefore, Han Shuo could clearly see any abnormal actions that urred. When the attacks from the Menlo¡¯s troops hurtled through the air towards him, he only curved his lips into a disdainful sneer without taking any other action.

    The attacks from below were just about to connect with Han Shuo when his proudly aloof body suddenly wavered, then split into four clones. These four clones looked exactly the same as the original. They flew in four different directions towards Ferguson, Adam Menlo, Asa, and the members of the House of Menlo respectively.

    The bolts and spinning axes from the Menlo people below suddenly connected with empty air. They didn¡¯t even touch a corner of Han Shuo¡¯s clothes.

    ¡°This, what is this?!¡±

    ¡°How did he be four people? Damn it! Am I seeing things?¡±

    Shocked exmations poured out from the mouths of those of the House of Menlo nonstop.

    Seeing one of the Han Shuos speedily closing in on them, Ferguson¡¯s side had no idea what was going on. Ferguson and Asa dodged instinctively. Only Adam Menlo on the back of the roc still met Han Shuo¡¯s attack head on with his golden spear, despite his surprise.

    Sessive sounds ripped through the air at this time as seven bone spurs shimmering with cold light came at Adam Menlo from all directions. The little skeleton stood proudly on a huge rock, a light dancing within his purple eye as his gaze locked onto Adam Menlo, who rode the golden-winged roc.

    The seven bone spurs flew in a bizarre orbit as they attacked the golden-winged roc. The bone spurs sparkled with a brilliant jade-like light like seven eerily sharp snow des.

    The bone spurs churned into the roc¡¯s wings, causing metallic dings and sharp, low whines to emit from the roc. Blood sttered from its wounds and dyed the golden feathers. It was obviously injured.

    Adam Menlo had originally rushed at Han Shuo with a ferocious momentum, he was now waving the golden spear around to block the seven bone spurs. He kept cursing nonstop, evidently angered to death.

    ¡°You old thing, you want to kill me? Keke!¡± The three clones suddenly vanished, revealing the original Han Shuo now standing ten meters above Adam Menlo. His pupils were deep red as he cawed madly, the killing aura around his body condensing onto his arm. As Han Shuo¡¯s hand smashed downwards, the focused killing aura rushed violently down likeyers of blood.

    ¡°Damn it!¡± Adam Menlo cursed loudly. The spear had been defending him against the seven bone spurs was forced to change directions and head upwards instead. He pushed the fighting aura of a sky rider to its limit, forming a silver curtain of light to block the invasion of the bloody waves.

    However, this force had been distilled from Han Shuo¡¯s murderous aura, a terrifying power embodied within him. A thick killing intent that could cover the heavens and earth dropped down like a cage, its forceparable to a mountain. The curtain of light formed by the fighting aura could only resist for a span of two breaths of time before it was obliterated by the bloody waves.

    Rumble! A loud explosion resounded. The bloody waves were like a river from the gxy, surging over both Adam Menlo and the golden-winged roc. They drove the super rank magical creature straight down into the ground, creating an earthquake that shook the mountain wall.

    Seeing that Han Shuo had shot down both their head of house and the golden-winged roc, the experts of the family suddenly panicked. They gave up chasing Laureton and swarmed to where their leader had fallen. As soon as they arrived, they saw both Adam Menlo and the golden-winged rock struggling to their feet. The men immediately surrounded the two.

    When Han Shuo saw that the House of Menlo had already surrounded their head of house and the golden-winged roc, Han Shuo stood still in the sky and didn¡¯t continue to attack. The golden-winged roc was obscuring his vision, so he couldn¡¯t see if Adam Menlo was dead or alive. His terrifying presence and blood red eyes returned to normal after a while.

    Han Shuo¡¯s current strength could easily deal with a sky rider or a great swordmaster, with the little skeleton, victory was even more assured. However, the reason why he¡¯d been able to thoroughly trounce Adam Menlo and the super rank roc just now was mostly likely due to the abundant killing aura that had filled the valley.

    His one attack earlier had released all the killing aura he¡¯d absorbed from the valley. Han Shuo had regained his calm. He once again summoned the three yin demons to surveil every moment within the valley.

 Chapter 264: Stomping on a grand magus

    Chapter 264: Stomping on a grand magus

    ¡°Who on earth is this person?¡±

    ¡°Too formidable! Even head Adam Menlo and his super rank magical creature were taken down. Too horrifying!¡±

    ¡°Just what kind of skill did he use? Why couldn¡¯t I identify it at all? He definitely has the power of a sacred swordmaster, otherwise he wouldn¡¯t be that powerful!¡±

    The small powers in the Valley of Sunshine were all hiding in the valley¡¯s periphery. They were trembling and cowering as they watched the chaotic battle unfold, and whispered exmations.

    ¡°Aowuuuu...¡±

    In the end, chief Laureton of the Cairo mercenary band remained behind by himself after escaping the encirclement. He emitted wailing battle cries as the battle axe in his hand emittedyers of silver light under the moonlight.

    The muscles on Laureton¡¯s bare upper body were now sparkling with silver light. His eyebrows and thick chest hair had changed from ck to silver. Cracking sounds ringing out from his two meter tall body, his frame seemed to be stretched by some force as he grew another half meter taller.

    He now clenched the battle axe with both hands instead of one. There was an enormous presence exuding from the weapon that now madly sparkled with silver light. Laureton was roaring as he ferociously chopped the battle axe down towards the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries who were pursuing him.

    Piercing silver light shot straight forward and crackled as it swept the ground. The several Rainbow Sickle mercenaries simply had no way to defend against the invasion as their bodies were it sliced neatly through. The speed of the silver light was extremely fast, cutting through several mercenaries without impediment. It then continued to close in on the horrified Florida with incredible momentum. He fled frantically into the air, his forehead now covered in cold sweat.

    ¡°A thrice berserk berserker? Oh my gawd! Laureton is crazy!¡±

    ¡°That must be the divine weapon of the berserker tribe, the Berserker Battle Axe. No wonder his power has be one notch stronger. What a terrifying fellow!¡±

    ¡°No shit. How could he hold sway in the Valley of Sunshine if he¡¯s not strong enough!?¡±

    The people watching the fight in the dark couldn¡¯t help but exim as they saw Laureton go berserk once again and reach a legendary status that almost no one could attain.

    ¡°Shoot him!¡±

    Arrows, axes, and spears shot straight at Laureton in ordance with Florida¡¯s shout.

    In addition, lightning bolts, as thick as an arm, cleaved violently down at him from the sky, dancing like fire snakes. A dense mass of whizzing arrows and erupting earth spikes sted towards Laureton.

    An intense series of attacks descended. Arge patch was charred, the earth cracked, and every nt was disintegrated to ashes. Arrows and spears were scattered all over the ground, dust filled the air that the wind was slowly dispersing. Laureton remained in the center of it all with his battle axe in hand, proud and tall.

    Laureton seemed to fear no pain after bing thrice berserk. Even though the skin of his singed body was cracked in many ces, they were all minor skin injuries. For Laureton to stand firmly after facing such an enormous number of physical and magical attacks from experts, his power was truly, extremely terrifying.

    ¡°Aowuuuu...¡± Laureton howled at the moon. He unexpectedly still had some spare energy left as he charged at the Katar orcs and Rainbow Sickle mercenaries.

    ¡°What a powerful man. A thrice berserk berserker is truly, exceptionally powerful. His body was unexpectedly immune to a majority of both physical and magical attacks!¡± Han Shuo stood in the air, stunned. He involuntarily praised Laureton as he watched his actions.

    Laureton once again threw out the battle axe that was ring with radiance in all directions. The weapon emitted dazzling silver light as it flew in an arc. Several archers in hiding immediately had their flesh and blood rended, the gore spewing around messily.

    The battle axe returned to Laureton¡¯s hand after flying a full circle. In fact, it seemed to have a bit of the essence of the Law of Activating Magic. However the battle axe returned to Laureton only after a short flight. It wasn¡¯t able to float in the air and follow his wishes like the Demonyer Edge.

    Han Shuo let out a sinisterugh. Taking advantage of the fact that everyone was still focused on Laureton, he suddenly released the Demonyer Edge. A purple light de shot out and made its way towards the thunder archmage Asa with a howling sound.

    Asa resented Han Shuo the most. It was only because Han Shuo had exploded into four clones earlier that he was unable to easily kill Han Shuo. Asa¡¯s head snapped to Laureton¡¯s howl for only a second when he saw Han Shuo¡¯s attack unexpectedly close. He was immediately frightened out of his wits.

    ¡°Last time I only managed to sliced off your right arm, but this time, I¡¯ll cut off your head!¡± Han Shuo leered ferociously and rushed towards Asa.

    At the moment, both the Rainbow Sickles and the Katar orcs were giving their all to deal with the thrice berserk Laureton. The experts from the House of Menlo were carefully protecting Adam Menlo. Only the light grand magus Ferguson was near Asa.

    As Asa dodged in fright, Ferguson suddenly turned around and chanted the spell ¡°Radiant Protection¡±. A translucentyer of light appeared and firmly wrapped around Asa.

    Asa heaved a sigh of relief upon seeing his body wrapped in the ¡°Radiant Protection¡±. As he was about to cast a lightning protection spell, he suddenly cried out in rm, ¡°Mister Ferguson, be careful!¡±

    As it turned out, the Demonyer Edge, that was originally aiming for Asa, suddenly changed its direction as it drew closer, whizzing towards Ferguson who¡¯d just cast ¡°Radiant Protection¡±. At the same time, Han Shuo also turned around and followed closely. He didn¡¯t even spare a nce at Asa as his eyes stared coldly at Ferguson.

    Ferguson suddenly realized that Han Shuo¡¯s attack at Asa had only been a feint. Han Shuo¡¯s real goal had been Ferguson from the start.

    When he understood this, a strong dread shrouded his heart. He hastily chanted the incantation for ¡°Radiant Protection¡± to thoroughly cover his body.

    ng! nk! Sweet metallic sounds of the Demonyer Edge colliding with Ferguson rang out. Crack after crack appeared in theyers of ¡°Radiant Protection¡±. From within, Ferguson quickly focused his mental strength to mobilize the light element and desperately repair the cracks.

    ¡°Heh heh, old fart, I had warned already you thest time you pursued me. Yet you still stubbornly took action and almost killed me in the river. You didn¡¯t think this day woulde, did you?! You just cast Radiant Glory, so your mental strength is already exhausted. Now after two Radiant Protection spells, let¡¯s see how long you can hold on for!¡±

    Han Shuo closed in like a ghost. He didn¡¯t withdraw the Demonyer Edge into his body. Instead, his magical yuan furiously circted and coalesced itself into two attacks. Han Shuo gave an odd chuckle as he unceremoniously mobilized his fists to violently assault the surface of the ¡°Radiant Protection¡±.

    The sound of the violent bombardment was like a loud drum. Cracks in the ¡°Radiant Protection¡± spread rapidly beneath the relentless brutal attacks. Ferguson almost had an impulse to vomit blood inside the protection. He¡¯d never felt socking in light elemental energy as he did now. He was giving it his utmost efforts to exhaust his mental strength.

    Extreme dread branded Ferguson¡¯s heart with Han Shuo¡¯s continued pummeling. Only now did he realize how unfathomable Han Shuo¡¯s heart was. He finally understood why thetter released the Canopy of Necromancy and so many dark creatures in his presence.

    He had been Han Shuo¡¯s original target from the start! Everything had been to take revenge for thest time Ferguson and Maxine had chased him down at the small river! This time, Han Shuo expended quite a bit of effort on this n. He¡¯d first forced Ferguson to cast ¡°Radiant Glory¡± in order to expend arge amount of his mental strength. He then pretended to attack Asa and made Ferguson exhaust his mental strength in casting ¡°Radiant Protection¡±, before finally closing in for close quarterbat.

    Han Shuo had also expended a great deal of mental strength to cast the Canopy of Necromancy and summon therge amount of dark creatures. However, he was also a powerful melee attacker with a strange weapon, in addition to being a mage. Although both sides wasted a simr amount of mental strength, Han Shuo could stillunch an offensive with his weapon.

    If all of this had been within Han Shuo¡¯s calctions, then his unfathomable heart and his deep, sophisticated scheming were all beyond imagination. Now that Ferguson understood, he¡¯d never feared anyone as much as he did now.

    ¡°Chase me now why don¡¯t you?! You motherfecking S.O.B.! Who do you think you are to decide my life and death? You old fart, you only know to protect your own. I¡¯ll make it so that you can¡¯t chase me in the future!¡± Han Shuo cursed loudly as he assaulted the ¡°Radiant Protection¡±.

    Being smashed in both spirit and body, Ferguson finally couldn¡¯t help vomiting blood. An immense arrow of blood sprayed out onto the ¡°Radiant Protection, dyeing its pure white color crimson. The cracks became increasingly wider.

    ¡°Florida, what the hell are you still chasing for? Your grandfather is going to get beaten to death!¡± Asa was casting lightning magic nonstop to attack Han Shuo. However, thetter was constantly changing his position to evade while each of his blows still ruthlessly smashed into the ¡°Radiant Protection¡±. Asa finally couldn¡¯t help but yell out upon seeing Ferguson vomit blood.

    The thrice berserk state couldn¡¯tst for too long. Laureton had already turned to escape. Florida was chasing him in high spirits when he heard Asa curse loudly. He suddenly panicked and involuntarily looked back.

    ¡°Old fart, buh bye!¡± As Florida looked on in deep shock, Han Shuo grinned as he dealt a blow aimed at a crack in the ¡°Radiant Protection¡±. This spell had long since been overwhelmed by the brutal attacks and finally shattered, copsing in a burst of purple light.

    The body covered in blood of Ferguson suddenly emerged, then fell listlessly on the ground. He was deader than dead!

    ¡°Keke...¡±

    Han Shuo flew higher and higher with his round of creepy cackling. He left arrogantly under the gaze shot out from Florida¡¯s eyes that ached to rip him in half.

 Chapter 265: Raw ores

    Chapter 265: Raw ores

    Han Shuo immediately ducked behind a lush bush upon leaving the valley. He used his mental strength to contact the earth elite zombie and the little skeleton.

    Whoosh! A thin white light gleamed under the moonlight, whizzing from within the valley to settle beside Han Shuo. This was obviously the little skeleton holding his bone knife.

    The seven bone spurs had returned to the little skeleton¡¯s back. He held the bone knife very leisurely, like a child touring a flower garden, not caring at all about the chaotic happenings in the valley. What a veteran!

    After establishing contact with his mind, Han Shuo could sense the earth elite zombie swimming towards him from the depths of the valley. Ten secondster, the ground beneath his feet loosened and the honest earth elite zombie mbered out.

    ¡°Where are they?¡± Han Shuo hastily asked upon seeing the earth elite zombie return.

    The earth elite zombie was taken aback. He scratched his head dumbly in a moment of thought, then sank again down to the ground, going back to the valley using the same way. However, his speed was a little slower this time. Han Shuo focused his eyes and discovered that the earth elite zombie had drilled a tunnel that one person could fit in.

    It seemed that the earth elite zombie had thrown everything to the wind and returned to Han Shuo when his master had called him just now, so he¡¯dpletely forgotten Trunks and the others. Only after Han Shuo¡¯s inquiry did the earth elite zombie remember that he¡¯d been in charge, so he used his natural talent to dig a tunnel again.

    The earth elite zombie could swim freely within the earth, but Trunks and the others didn¡¯t have this miraculous talent. Thus the tunnel was essential. The earth elite zombie was using his talents to create a passage in the valley, and thus his current speed couldn¡¯tpare to his usual flying through the earth.

    The three yin demons were quite a distance away. One was following the Cairo mercenary band¡¯s chief Laureton. Laureton had returned to his twice berserk state now and was escaping towards the Valley of Sunshine along with the rest of the remaining Cairo experts.

    The Cairo mercenary band had taken severe damage after the intense battle in the valley. A dozen experts had been killed, incensing Laureton. However, he understood that it was simply impossible for the Cairo mercenary band to win against the three other forces outside the Valley of Sunshine. He intended to return with full effort to the Valley of Sunshine and take revenge at ater time.

    Another yin demon remained in the valley. Since Han Shuo had beaten Ferguson to death, Florida had suffered a major blow. He was currently holding Ferguson¡¯s corpse and letting out earth-shattering wails. He¡¯d simply forgotten about leading the pursuit of Laureton.

    Ferguson had dearly spoiled his grandson, paving a great and easy path for his growth. It was due to Ferguson¡¯s identity, as well as support from the Church of Light, that allowed Florida to have the confidence in contesting Laureton for the position of leading power in the Valley of Sunshine. However, since the grandfather who¡¯d nurtured him had been beaten to death by Han Shuo, it¡¯d be hard to say if he could borrow the force of the Church of Light from now on.

    To Florida, his grandfather¡¯s death was emotionally unbearable and also threw a great wrench into his practical benefits. Even the sinister leader of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band couldn¡¯t help but burst into tears under this double blow.

    The House of Menlo¡¯s group wasn¡¯t very far from Florida. Adam Menlo¡¯s was covered in injuries. When taking that sky-shattering blow from Han Shuo, Adam Menlo had first circted his fighting aura for a full body defense before wrapping himself firmly in the great roc. That was how he¡¯d barely escaped the grasp of death.

    Although he¡¯d avoided heavy injury, his partner for decades, the golden-winged roc hadn¡¯t shared the same luck. It had almost been scraped bald by the little skeleton¡¯s bone knife, and more than half the feathers on its golden wings had been snapped. When it¡¯d faced Han Shuo¡¯s heaven-shattering blow, the roc had protected Adam Menlo out of instinct, using its enormous body to withstand the attack. Its injuries were extremely serious.

    In this moment, even though Adam Menlo¡¯s heart was dejected, he was also extremely furious. He shakily caressed the roc¡¯s bald, bloody wings and screamed with rage, ¡°I want to kill him! I must kill him!!¡±

    Several small powers lurking in the valley had witnessed all of the heaven-shaking changes that had taken ce thus far. Han Shuo¡¯s crazy atrocities were engraved in their minds and made the name of Soul Destroyer famous. Since Han Shuo¡¯s performance tonight demonstrated his close rtionship with the Soul Destroyer mercenary band, no one would dare to look down on the group¡¯s strength again.

    Han Shuo used the three yin demons to observe their surroundings. After a while, the earth elite zombie leapt out from the ground again. He pulled on Han Shuo¡¯s sleeve and pointed his finger to the underground tunnel, as if waiting for praise.

    Patting the earth elite zombie¡¯s shoulder, Han Shuo said with a smile, ¡°Not bad, you did it right this time!¡±

    ¡°Did what right!?¡± Trunks followed up as he jumped out of the tunnel with a loudugh.

    Gilbert also climbed out with arge hemp sack. Grant and the others followed behind, each also carried arge sack, their faces shining with excitement.

    ¡°How were things?¡± Han Shuo asked with a smile, knowing from their expressions that they must have had some generous gains.

    ¡°It was hard to advance inside. There were rocks as sharp as knives. I¡¯m afraid it¡¯d have been simply impossible if it wasn¡¯t for your friend¡¯s help. There were several Rainbow Sickle mercenaries, we casually killed them all and took the raw ores that they harvested. We also mined some more and brought them here.¡± Trunks seemed especially happy as he narrated with a carefreeugh.

    ¡°Looks like the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries used the advantage of geography to gain a head start. Florida had actually dared announce that after killing Laureton, they would give up the mithril mine. How shameless! Oh right, how big was the mine? How much did we harvest?¡± Han Shuo scorned at Florida¡¯s pledge then continued questioning.

    Shaking his head, Trunks said helplessly, ¡°I¡¯m not sure. We only came in contact with a limited area. What we brought back are a few raw ores with small amounts of mithril within. We need someone in the know to confirm what we¡¯ve harvested today.¡±

    If the metal elite zombie was refined, its natural talent could be used to scope out the size of the mine. With his ability to control metal and metal ores, the metal elite zombie could easily gather all of the resources in the entire silver mine within a short amount of time, leaving not even a piece of mithril behind.

    Unfortunately, the ce of extreme metal was the most difficult to find out of the five extreme areas. He was unable to refine the metal elite zombie before locating it. With the metal elite zombie, Han Shuo simply wouldn¡¯t have to worry aboutcking any ores. When the ability of the dwarves and the metal elite zombie¡¯s natural talent to sense metal wasbined, a steady supply of weapons would be a simple matter.

    Sighing for a bit, Han Shuo suddenly noticed some movement from J¡¯s bandit group. He immediately cursed, ¡°Alright, let¡¯s leave first. The valley is engulfed in chaos, so we shouldn¡¯t stay here for the time being.¡±

    ¡°You guys put down the ores, I¡¯ll put them into my space ring.¡± Han Shuo urged Gilbert and the rest.

    Only Trunks wore a space ring amongst this bunch, even Grant and the mercenaries used bags tied around their waists. Space rings were famously expensive. These mercenaries naturally didn¡¯t have enough gold coins to buy one.

    However, Grant and the mercenaries didn¡¯t act immediately upon Han Shuo¡¯s instructions. They looked to Trunks, as if waiting for him to express his opinions.

    ¡°Listen to him. From now on, hismands are mymands. You guys should remember this well!¡± Trunks had a strict face as he carefully instructed.

    ¡°Understood!¡± Grant¡¯s folks were relieved of a great burden after putting their sacks down. They hastily took therge sacks off their backs and ced them in front of Han Shuo.

    The weight of theserge sacks loaded withrge and small broken rocks were such that an ordinary person wouldn¡¯t be able to tolerate them. Even for these mercenaries, the way back to the Soul Destroyer mercenary base would be an unlucky, painful errand.

    One white light shed after another. All of therge and small sacks disappeared into Han Shuo¡¯s space ring. After all was done, Han Shuo waved his hand saying, ¡°Follow me, we¡¯ll block J¡¯s escape route. This time, we shall be the bandits and capture J.¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s do it like that then. I must get some clear answers!¡± Trunks immediately remembered Annie¡¯s matter when Han Shuo mentioned J. His happy mood turned sorrowful as he shouted with a darkened face.

    Two of the three yin demons had returned while thest was closely following J¡¯s bandit group, paying close attention to their every move. The Soul Destroyers took a shortcut to block J¡¯s way under Han Shuo¡¯s directions, suddenly discovering some suspicious behavior from these people. Unexpectedly, J¡¯s gang wasying an ambush where the House of Menlo would pass.

    It seemed that J intended on taking advantage of the House of Menlo¡¯s heavy losses, and make out like bandits!

 Chapter 266: Captives

    Chapter 266: Captives

    As J and her bandit gang snuck up on the House of Menlo with the intention of adding insult to injury, she didn¡¯t realize that she herself had be someone else¡¯s prey.

    Adam Menlo was injured, and the roc had transformed into a blonde, middle aged man with de wounds all over his skin. Both were under protection of the family¡¯s elites as they slowly retreated in the direction of their headquarters.

    As they passed by a thick shrub surrounded by several towering trees, J¡¯s people immediately jumped out screaming and shouting. The old man next to J release several wind supporting ¡°eleration¡± spells, enabling their people to quickly close the distance between them and the House of Menlo and begin their ambush.

    Han Shuo had thought that J was lurking around here for the chance to pige and loot. Contrary to his expectations however, J had passed down the order to kill as soon as she saw the Menlo family. Evidently, she hadn¡¯t wanted to rob them.

    ¡°Unlucky old fart Adam. Serves you right! You even dared to scheme against me. You¡¯re really tired of living aren¡¯t you!¡± J didn¡¯t make a move, only shouting loudly in high spirits. Her delicate cheeks were painted with glee.

    ¡°The House of Menlo is done for if we kill these people. See if they still dare to make trouble for us then!¡± The bandits screamed and shouted, furiously waving their weapons and attacking fiercely. They were hot on the heels of the heavily wounded Menlo experts, who were now escaping bedraggedly in all directions.

    The major forces seemed to havee to a tacit understanding before tonight as they hadn¡¯t sent too many people on this trip to the valley. The House of Menlo had brought roughly two dozen experts total. After the berserk Laureton had killed some and more had fallen to Han Shuo¡¯s resurrected corpses, they only had a dozen members left.

    Now that they faced J¡¯s bandit group, who was thrice their number, taking a loss was just a matter of time.

    ¡°Protect my father well. Our people are near! As long as we return to the headquarters, these damned bandits won¡¯t be able to leave alive!¡± A skinny, seemingly weak mage with brown hair waved his staff and shouted loudly.

    Many sharp spikes suddenly shot up on the path that J and her bandits were using. Their momentum was quick and fierce thanks to the supporting ¡°eleration¡± spell. They simply didn¡¯t pay attention to the changes beneath their feet. When theynded one by one, their bare feet were immediately prated by the spikes.

    ¡°Damn it! Shoot them dead!¡± J roared, ordering the several archers behind her.

    Whoosh whoosh whoosh.

    The sound of arrows piercing the air resonated as a series of shining silver arrows whizzed towards the House of Menlo, abruptly throwing them into confusion. Even the earth mage, who¡¯d casted ¡°Earth Spikes¡± earlier, was affected by the rain of arrows. He was forced to release an earth wall in defense.

    Han Shuo clearly saw the happenings of the fight between J and the House of Menlo through the three yin demons. Currently, his group was hiding in the dark about dozens of meters away, paying rapt attention to the intense fight, awaiting Han Shuo¡¯s orders.

    ¡°Leave them to harm each other. I¡¯ll have the earth elite zombie sneak attack them in a moment and grab our person!¡± Han Shuo said leisurely, not the least bit anxious.

    ¡°Tonight is destined to be a sleepless night. The Valley of Sunshine will be even more chaotic starting tomorrow, and our Soul Destroyer mercenary band will take this chance to rise up!¡± Trunks¡¯ ambition red as he spoke with excitement.

    ¡°You should be careful for the time being. After my brutal acts tonight, I think the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band and the House of Menlo may just cast aside everything to deal with us first. The current strength of our mercenary band isn¡¯t enough topete with them yet. Our base absolutely must not bepromised.¡± Looking at the zing ambition on Trunks¡¯ face, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but speak out as a reminder.

    ¡°Heh heh, that¡¯s fine too. With your madness tonight, our Soul Destroyer mercenary band is definitely going to be renowned. As long as we have fame, we won¡¯t have to worry about gaining new recruits. As long as we have both money and manpower, we will grow rapidly. When we¡¯re strong enough, that¡¯s when the traitor Florida dies!¡± Trunks coldly said, his face solemn.

    Nodding in agreement, Han Shuo said, ¡°Indeed, the moment of the Soul Destroyer mercenary band hase!¡±

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo softly cried out and said, ¡°I didn¡¯t think that the experts from the House of Menlo were really waiting outside to help their own. It seems that J¡¯s efforts are going down the drain!¡±

    Patting the earth elite zombie, Han Shuo ordered it to quickly sneak into the ground. Then he turned to nce at Trunks and said, ¡°I suddenly remember that since I have him, I won¡¯t need your help. You guys return to the base first. I¡¯ll bring J and catch up with youter.¡±

    ¡°You really don¡¯t need backup? Since J can be the leader of such arge bandit group, her strength must be strong. Plus, her men are surrounding her. Are you certain you can seed?¡± Trunks asked in surprise.

    ¡°Rest assured. This definitely won¡¯t be a problem!¡± Han Shuo smiled confidently and turned to Gilbert and the little skeleton, ordering them both to go back. He then headed towards J with the earth elite zombie and silentlyy in wait to ambush them.

    This evening was bound to be chaotic, so when the elites from the four great powers of the Valley of Sunshine had advanced into the mountain valley, the majority of their troops were waiting outside, ready to offer support.

    The small powers in the valley before, deeply resentful of being intensely suppressed by the four great powers, hadn¡¯t dared to act rashly. Now that the four great powers had been seriously injured in the struggle, in addition to the deathly temptation of the mithril mine, no one would guess if they took some crazy action.

    Even though Trunks and his group were familiar with the terrain of the Valley of Sunshine, Han Shuo was worried they¡¯d meet with dangers along the way. He sent Gilbert and the little skeleton along with them. At least they could help each other along the way.

    Han Shuo¡¯s brain spun furiously as he schemed on how exactly he would capture J. Relying on the detailed observations of J¡¯s every move from the three yin demons, he quickly brainstormed and considered the most appropriate method.

    ¡°Hurry and chase after them. Kill them! There won¡¯t be another chance if we miss this one!¡± J grasped the huge studded club, her delicate body dashing forward lightning fast as she chased the escaping members of the House of Menlo. Several bandits were originally by her side, but gradually got further from her as they hastily pursued the Menlo experts.

    Han Shuo calmly determined J¡¯s route through the yin demons. He moved surreptitiously to hide behind a huge tree, slowly adjusting his breathing and heartbeat. A whileter, his whole being seemed to melt into the tree. No one could detect him in the shadows.

    The earth elite zombie speedily travelled through the ground and followed J closely as per Han Shuo¡¯s orders. He only needed but amand from his master to immediately coordinate with Han Shuo from underground.

    The Menlo experts rode various different magical creatures and fled past the huge tree trunk where Han Shuo was hiding. Several bandits on J¡¯s side waved their weapons, yelling noisily as they gave chase. Everyone was passing right by Han Shuo.

    The heavily panting J gradually approached at the trajectory that Han Shuo had previously predicted. She wielded the huge studded club while loudly shouting and cursing vulgarities nonstop. She didn¡¯t have the slightest bit of reservation and subtlety that a young girl should have.

    Suddenly, the lurking Han Shuo jumped out like a ghost and instantly appeared in front of J like a dark shadow.

    J had been swearing continuously when she suddenly saw a shadow slip out from the darkness. Startled, she raised the studded club and rushed forward. The club moved at a high speed, making a strange whistling sound. The momentum appeared quite astonishing.

    ng ng!

    A metallic sound echoed as an enormous force transmitted through the studded club into J¡¯s body. The force was like a terrifying volcano outbreak, sting J backwards.

    ¡°It¡¯s you!¡± J realized the neer was much stronger than her after a single blow. When Han Shuo¡¯s figure was revealed, her face immediately paled in shock as she cried out.

    When she saw that her ambusher was Han Shuo, she knew her strength wasn¡¯t up to the task. She quickly retreated without a thought and yelled, ¡°Men, capture him!¡±

    As J was fiercely retreating, she waspletely unaware of the earth elite zombie lying in wait. A pair of arms abruptly emerged from the ground and urately seized her ankles, halting her escape.

    J was scared out of her wits by this sudden turn of events. She shrilly screamed in fear, ¡°Help! Something¡¯stched on me!¡±

    ¡°Toote!¡± A light shout rang out. Han Shuo was already face to face with J. She felt her entire body stiffen up as if it wasn¡¯t her own anymore, and slowly lost strength in her limbs.

    ¡°Let her go, or you will bear the costs of our retaliation no matter the cost!¡± The crippled wind archmage Billy rapidly flew over as he red furiously at Han Shuo, shouting loudly.

    ¡°I need to ask her about some matters. I will not take her life, so rest assured!¡± Han Shuo said, carrying the fainted J as he responded to the quickly iing Billy.

    ¡°You promise not to hurt her?¡± On the other side, Billy was afraid that Han Shuo would make a vicious move. He held back the raging bandits around him from rushing forward as he stared urgently at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Of course, I¡¯m not taking her life. Otherwise she¡¯d already be dead!¡± Han Shuo nodded and replied, then he brought J and flew away, leaving some words, ¡°At most three days. She will definitely return safely, rest assured!¡±

    Having finished speaking, Han Shuo ordered the earth elite zombie to retreat. Together, the man and zombie left by sky and ground. They quickly drifted in the direction of Trunks and his group.

 Chapter 267: Divine body

    Chapter 267: Divine body

    Han Shuo joined Trunks and the group on the way back. They didn¡¯t encounter any unexpected incidents, and went back to the Soul Destroyer mercenary band base in secret.

    The group seemed somewhat worn out after experiencing a grueling night. However, Trunks had already waited for too many years, he obviously didn¡¯t want to waste even a second. Those around who¡¯d been an original member of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band were now gazing at Han Shuo with shining eyes.

    ¡°You people, you people really captured J?¡± When the sleeping Annie was woken up, she yelled noisily. However she immediately paled and stuttered when she saw the unconscious J.

    Patting J on the cheek, Han Shuo intended to pour magical yuan into her body to wake her up from thea. But his brows suddenly raised when he was surprised.

    Eximing ¡°oh¡± in a light voice, Han Shuo ced his big hand on the back of J¡¯s head. Five strands of magical yuan as thin as silk swam inside her body, suddenly discovering that her body structure had some ces different from an ordinary person. Her meridians were a bit more fragile, but she had a dozen more bones.

    ¡°Bastard! How dare you take advantage of J?!¡± Annie furiously cursed upon seeing Han Shuo press his big hand on J¡¯s back.

    ¡°How is it?¡± Trunks was waiting for Han Shuo to wake J up. However, Trunks couldn¡¯t help but inquire upon seeing Han Shuo¡¯s face turn puzzled while J had yet toe to.

    ¡°This J is very strange, her body structure has many differences from a normal person¡¯s!¡± Han Shuo was astonished. He was even more careful after that, letting the magical yuan run a few more rounds. He finally determined that J¡¯s body was indeed the same as human being, but theposition of bones and meridians was different from normal human¡¯s.

    ¡°There¡¯s really such a strange thing as this?¡± Trunks was surprised. He stared fixedly at J a few times over then nodded, ¡°It is indeed her. I¡¯ve known her for several years now, this is definitely J. How can her body be different from normal human?¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s no mistake about it. Her body is absolutely different from ours. I¡¯m sure this J has some oddities!¡± Han Shuo said with certainty. He then suddenly recalled thest time he fought J. Her deep green fighting aura had already scattered, but still had the ability to make his arm tremble, this had sown some doubts in his heart.

    After Han Shuo listed out the peculiarities about J, Trunks was stunned for a moment and then opened his mouth to say, ¡°I actually know something about this. When J had yet to cultivate fighting aura, she actually already possessed a very powerful strength. I heard it showed when she was a child.¡±

    ¡°I see, I know what it is now. J must have a legendary divine body blessed by the gods. Her body structure has been different from ordinary people from birth!¡± Han Shuo eximed, suddenly remembering Fanny¡¯s remark about his body before.

    Han Shuo could have such a rapid progress was entirely due to the practice of demonic magic, but Fanny had mistakenly believed that he had a divine body. At that time Han Shuo thought the divine body talk was just gibberish. Now that he¡¯d sussed out J¡¯s body structure, he understood there were truly some magical things on this continent.

    ¡°Oh my god! This female bandit actually has a divine body. ording to the legend, those with a divine body will be an extremely powerful figure. I didn¡¯t think we could actually encounter one here.¡± Trunks too was quite shocked as he looked at the unconscious J.

    ¡°Scared already? Quickly let us go or J definitely won¡¯t let you go easily!¡± Annie clenched her tiny hand, shaking her fist at Trunks in threat.

    Shaking his head slightly, Han Shuo mocked with a smile, ¡°So what of a divine body? She was still captured by me!¡±

    ¡°Wake up!¡± Han Shuo lifted the restriction on J¡¯s body and patted her face, smiling cutely as he spoke.

    J didn¡¯t say a thing as soon as she woke up and instead turned to Han Shuo and cursed nonstop. Han Shuo felt really weird for such a pretty girl to spit out vulgar curses one after another.

    ¡°I¡¯ll leave her to you. She can move her mouth now!¡± Han Shuo stood up with a wry smile, patted Trunks¡¯ shoulder, and walked out.

    When Han Shuo left the mountain cave, Odysseus and the other fellows were quite self aware and followed him out. Only Trunks and some oldrades remained inside to interrogate J about Annie¡¯s past.

    ¡°Bryan, it¡¯s been quite a while since we met, let¡¯s have a drink tonight!¡± Odysseus walked out and immediately smiled at Han Shuo as he offered. This ce was still covered in thick mist in the evening, but for some reason the mist up in the sky had gradually dispersed, allowing the bright and clear moonlight to directly sprinkle down.

    Almost all of the other mercenaries were sleeping as it waste into the night. The Odysseus gang were quite tired after a busy evening, so they all just sat down at the practice area.

    ¡°Good!¡± Han Shuo had nothing to do and picked a random seat, sitting down cross legged with Gilbert, Odysseus, and the others. He took out the wine crafted by the dwarves and handed it to Gordon¡¯s group.

    Even the water adept mage Aphrodite and the female elven archer Nia didn¡¯t refuse Han Shuo¡¯s goodwill. After a few sips of good wine, they all looked up at the moon and shared the desires and aspirations in their hearts.

    ¡°I want to be a great swordmaster. Sooner orter, I¡¯ll have everybody know of the name Gordon!¡± Gordon, who¡¯d advanced to senior swordsman, said proudly after a few mouthfuls of wine.

    ¡°I too need to practice my magic and be an archmage. As long as I advance to archmage, I can be bestowed a title in any country and be a superior noble!¡± The water adept mage Aphrodite softly expressed her desire, a smile hanging on her lips.

    ¡°Ah right, Bryan what do you desire?¡± Odysseus turned to nce at Han Shuo.

    ¡°More powerful strength, money, privilege, and beautiful women!¡± Han Shuozed around as hey on the sparring stage, his hands resting behind the back of his head. He looked at the sky and responded clearly.

    ¡°Eh, Bryan, you¡¯re really straightforward!¡± said Odysseus.

    ¡°Haha, don¡¯t people live to strive for these things? Although different people have different desires, frankly speaking, don¡¯t they all revolve around these things?¡± Han Shuo said with a smile as he nced humorously at Odysseus.

    ¡°Hehe, that¡¯s quite true!¡± Odysseus pondered for a moment and nodded.

    After Han Shuo and the group had drunk wine and chatted freely for quite a long time, Trunks walked out alone from the mountain cave. He plopped down next to Han Shuo, picked up the wineskin on the ground near Odysseus, and threw back his head for a long gulp.

    Trunks poured more than half of the good wine left into his mouth with a gurgling sound, then abruptly threw the empty wineskin to the sky. His eyes were deep red as he said in a low, choked tone, ¡°I must kill Florida and the Butcher Gustav, and also Bradley Pillon from the Kasi Empire!!¡±

    Bradley Pillon was the younger brother by blood to the king of the Kasi Empire, Brady Pillon, and a grand duke of the Kasi Empire. His territory epassed only Cesar City, a location separated from Valen City by the Ken mountain range. He was a grand aristocrat below one person but above ten thousand in the Kasi Empire, holding enormous power in his hands.

    When Gryphon Legion chief Bob Ascher had betrayed the Lancelot Empire, he¡¯d sought refuge under someone else. That someone else had been the lord of Cesar city. It was easy to imagine how much power the younger brother of the Kasi king possessed. It was simply impossible to deal with such a an immense figure with Trunks¡¯ current power.

    Patting Trunks¡¯ shoulders, Han Shuo consoled, ¡°Rest assured, I¡¯ll help you, nothing is impossible!¡±

    Trunks violently smashed his fist down. The blow didn¡¯t contain any fighting aura. It hit a hard rock and caused the back of his hand to crack, bleeding. Trunks roared like a caged beast, ¡°Damnable bastards! I¡¯ll definitely make them pay the price!¡±

    J suddenly walked out with a cold face, looking at Trunks with veins throbbing in his forehead as she said, ¡°For Annie, I too shall kill them!¡±

    ¡°Grant, cover her eyes, take her out of here.¡± Trunks turned to sweep a nce at J and abruptly shouted.

    The bulky Grant held Annie as he walked out of the mountain cave, his eyes red and swollen. Looking pitifully at the sleeping Annie, he sobbed, ¡°Chief, what do we do about Annie?¡±

    ¡°Annie is a close person of mine. Believe me, I will protect her from any harm. If she stays with you guys, sooner orter she¡¯ll remember about the past, then I¡¯m afraid she¡¯ll...¡±

    ¡°No need to say anymore, take her away, help me take good care of her!¡± Trunks abruptly cut off J¡¯s remaining words and said in a resolute manner.

    J nodded without another word and willingly let Grant blindfold her. She slowly climbed up under Grant¡¯s guidance and escort.

    ¡°Good. I assure you this vengeance shall be taken!¡± Han Shuo once again patted Trunks¡¯ shoulders and cautiously said with a grave expression.

    Even though Trunks and J hadn¡¯t clearly said anything, Han Shuo could generally guess from their attitudes about what happened to Annie¡¯s body.

    Trunks treated Annie like his own sister, this hatred obviously had to be returned!

 Chapter 268: A pleasant surprise

    Chapter 268: A pleasant surprise

    Trunks drank all night, holding his face and crying loudly nonstop with bloodshot eyes. Han Shuo wanted to console him, but nothing he did worked. Trunks seemed to forget everything else as he wallowed in his inextricable agony.

    That night, Han Shuo took out three of the remaining five Rebirth Pills and handed them to Odysseus, Gordon, and Aphrodite to reform their bodies. The other two pills were for Trunks and Emily.

    At noon the next day, Han Shuo left the Soul Destroyer mercenary band and traveled to the Valley of Sunshine by himself.

    The merchants inside the Valley of Sunshine weren¡¯t affected afterst night¡¯s battle outside. They woke up early, busy as usual and simply not knowing about the happenings ofst night.

    When Han Shuo reached the fence, the soldiers from the Cairo mercenary band immediately recognized him and respectfully weed him. Looking around carefully, Han Shuo discovered that there wasn¡¯t much change to the merchants in the Valley of Sunshine. However the number of Cairo mercenary band soldiers was much higher than usual. They frequency at which they appeared on the street was very high.

    Everyone from the Cairo mercenary band nodded respectfully towards Han Shuo along the way upon seeing him. Evidently, they all knew of the aid he had given themst night.

    Han Shuo bought a great deal of precious herbs from the old orc¡¯s family shopst time in the Valley of Sunshine. This time, he made straight for the orc¡¯s shop.

    The shop owner immediately recognized Han Shuo upon his appearance. He¡¯d been lying down sluggishly inside when he stood up abruptly and enthusiastically weed Han Shuo, chattering away, ¡°Long time no see, haha! Do you see anything good this time?¡±

    Sweeping a few nces around, a hint of delighted surprise shed across Han Shuo¡¯s eyes. He hastily picked a dozen herbs and ced them in front of the orc,ughing heartily, ¡°I want all of these. You can calcte the price.¡±

    In addition to the Dragonfly Fruit, Extreme Frost Grass, and Goldmarrow Grass that Han Shuo had seenst time, he also discovered the Ninejade Flower during this visit. This was truly a delight beyond imagination. Han Shuo had affirmed his belief that this shop could always give him a pleasant surprise.

    The Ninejade Flower had nine petals that were as shiny and translucent as jade, emitting a fragrance that permeated the heart and soul. The Ninejade Flower could be used with several magic herbs to refine the Yuan Repair Pill, in which the Ninejade Flower was the main ingredient. This herb was normally very difficult to find.

    ¡°You decide the price!¡± Having experienced Han Shuo¡¯s generosityst time, the old orc seemed to have realized something and casually said with a smile.

    Han Shuo¡¯s joy could easily be imagined after collecting so many precious herbs. He immediately took out two heavy bags of gold coins from the space ring and plopped them in front of the old orc. He asked smilingly, ¡°A thousand gold coins. Would that suffice?¡±

    ¡°Haha, such a generous young man, many thanks!¡± The old orc quickly grabbed the two bags of gold coins andughed loudly in a great mood. His mouth was open so widely that it seemed like he wanted to eat a person.

    ¡°You again!¡± An exmation suddenly rang out from the door. Cecilia, one of the three Dark Mantle heavyweights, approached leisurely. She called out immediately when her vivid eyes caught sight of Han Shuo. She wore a ckish purple dress today, with soft long hair casually let loose down to the shoulders. Two small, middle-aged men followed behind, their eyes gazing around full of vignce.

    Seeing Cecilia as soon as he turned around, Han Shuo was a little surprised. He nodded indifferently at her, his hands starting to collect the herbs on the table as he intended to leave the shop.

    ¡°Hey prettydy, you¡¯vee again! What would you like to buy this time?¡± Cecilia seemed to be a regr here. The old orc also weed her with warm hospitality and a big smile.

    ¡°He already bought whatever I wanted. Damn it, he was one step ahead again!¡± Cecilia frowned at Han Shuo and lightly shouted somewhat in anguish.

    ¡°This...¡± The old orc didn¡¯t know what to say. He wrung his hands, expressing that he was out of ideas.

    Han Shuo was about to leave the shop when he suddenly remembered something. He stopped at the door, turned to look at Cecilia, and said, ¡°If you tell me where Emily is, I¡¯ll give you an herb from my purchase just now.¡±

    The disappointed Cecilia immediately rejoiced at his words. She looked at Han Shuo and asked, ¡°Is that so? You¡¯ll let me choose from the herbs you just bought?!¡±

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo took out the herbs that he¡¯d just bought with a thousand gold coins. Heid them out and pointed at them saying, ¡°I¡¯ll let you choose one!¡±

    ¡°I want this one!¡± Cecilia pointed at the Ninejade Flower and said softly.

    The corner of his mouth spasmed slightly. Han Shuo considered for a moment, then suddenly said coldly, ¡°This one won¡¯t do, transaction canceled!¡±

    The Dark Mantle higher-ups should know of Emily¡¯s whereabouts. If Han Shuo couldn¡¯t get the answer from Cecilia, he could still ask Candide for help. Moreover, he needed this information just because he wanted to give Emily the Rebirth Pill and help her remake her body. This wasn¡¯t a critical matter, so Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a rush at the moment.

    The Ninejade Flower, however, could only be met by chance and not found, so it was a very important to Han Shuo. He could refine a cauldron of Yuan Repair Pills using this flower as the main ingredient. Han Shuo immediately went back on his word when forced to choose between the two options.

    Cecilia had been reaching out for the Ninejade Flower when halted upon Han Shuo saying ¡°transaction canceled¡±. She was dumbfounded for a while, then frowned as she looked at him, ¡°You renege on your word!¡±

    ¡°I didn¡¯t promise you anything. It doesn¡¯t count as going back on my word. I can let you take two others except for this flower if you¡¯re still willing to tell me!¡± Han Shuo first ced the Ninejade Flower into the space ring and then shrugged his shoulders, speaking to Cecilia as if nothing happened.

    Sparks flew out from Cecilia¡¯s eyes as she looked at Han Shuo. She remained frozen for quite a while before nodding bitterly, saying, ¡°Stingy brat!¡±

    She took two des of Extreme Frost Grass, then red at Han Shuo and answered, ¡°After Emilypleted her mission with me, she should have return to the Empire¡¯s Ossen City. To think that the person that Emily greatly respects is actually this petty. I really don¡¯t understand why she values you so much!¡±

    ¡°This has nothing to do with you!¡± Han Shuo chuckled. He felt quite secure after knowing about Emily¡¯s location and that he was going to return to Ossen City soon. Emily would take the initiative to find him once she knew. He could then use the Rebirth Pill to help her.

    ¡°You there! Don¡¯t move, or don¡¯t me us for being rude!¡± Suddenly, ten mercenaries from the Cairo band surrounded the old orc¡¯s shop, pointing their crossbows at the three in Cecilia¡¯s group.

    ¡°What is this? Is this how the Cairo mercenary band treats us merchants?¡± Cecilia asked, her expression angry as she coldly looked at the leader.

    ¡°We always treat merchants nicely, but you people didn¡¯t enter normally. Otherwise we would have your records. Come with us!¡± At this point, a mercenary stared unceremoniously at Cecilia and said coldly.

    It seemed Cecilia¡¯s group of three hadn¡¯te in through the fence, but had used another way instead. The Cairo mercenary band might not have found out if this had been normal times. However, after the fiascost night, the Cairo mercenaries were on high alert. They were all extremely cautious, so no wonder they had discovered the abnormal happenings.

    ¡°Mister Bryan, please be careful with these people!¡± The leading mercenary¡¯s attitude towards Han Shuopared to his attitude towards Cecilia, was as different as the heavens and earth. His tone was sincere, his manner respectful, and even a touch ingratiating.

    ¡°Mister Bryan, when our chief knew you¡¯d arrived at the Valley of Sunshine, he immediately wanted to meet you. If you wait for just a moment, the chief himself wille to see you regardingst night¡¯s agreement after he handles the matters within the valley. We will fulfill the promised amount of gold, so please wait just a bit!¡± Another mercenary bowed respectfully to Han Shuo and said in a humble tone.

    What is this? Cecilia looked at Han Shuo suspiciously. She secretly thought, Han Shuo is only a Dark Mantle envoy, while the other person is the violent lunatic Laureton. Why is he treating Han Shuo so kindly? This is truly confusing! Laureton is notoriously arrogant and hard to please, but is so unexpectedly respectful towards this fellow? Weird, really too weird!

    ¡°Hey, we¡¯re together, you must¡¯ve been mistaken!¡± Cecilia suddenly came up with an idea. She abruptly walked up to Han Shuo with a charming smile, patting his shoulder as if their rtionship was very intimate!

    Han Shuo was dumbfounded. He nced at her with a cold face and was about to open his mouth to say something when he heard Cecilia whisper, ¡°We are carrying out a mission. As a fellow member of the Dark Mantle, if you have the guts to not help me, I¡¯ll definitely report to that old fellow Candide when I return!¡±

    ¡°Hehe, we are together indeed!¡± Cecilia and Han Shuo stood side by side as he suddenly rxed.

    ¡°Mhm, they are my friends, so I guarantee that they won¡¯t do anything detrimental to your mercenary band¡¯s interest. I¡¯ll wait for your people to meet me at the shop. If your chiefes, I¡¯ll let him know about this!¡± Han Shuo smiled and nodded at the mercenaries, then put his arm around Cecilia¡¯s waist with naughty intentions. His actions screamed of an ambiguous rtionship due to this act.

    Cecilia¡¯s small waist was plump and firm. The thin dress couldn¡¯t hide its amazing sticity. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but secretly praise as he held it. This young woman didn¡¯t only have a beautiful face, even her body was truly tempting.

    ¡°So it¡¯s like that!¡± The mercenaries suddenly realized and spoke apologetically to Cecilia, ¡°Our apologies, we didn¡¯t know of your rtionship with Mister Bryan, we¡¯ve been rude!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, there is no problem in this area. Let¡¯s go inspect the other areas. Do not let any suspicious characters slip through our fingers!¡± After bowing respectfully to Han Shuo, the leader loudly shouted amand and led the group of mercenaries to leave in a blink of an eye.

 Chapter 269: The arrogant Dark Moon envoy

    Chapter 269: The arrogant Dark Moon envoy

    Cecilia turned, her eyes huge as she red furiously at Han Shuo, yelling with her voice as cold as ice, ¡°Let go already!¡±

    With an awkward, dryugh, Han Shuo withdrew his hand and pretended as if nothing happened. He spoke casually, ¡°I only meant well. Heh heh, the Valley of Sunshine has been chaotic recently, so you¡¯d best be a little careful!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t you worry, you despicable brat!¡± Cecilia bluntly replied in rage. She secretly wondered why Laureton would value such a despicable character. How very odd!

    Paying no heed to Cecilia, Han Shuo strode away towards the shop with the extreme ce of water. He arrived in about ten minutes.

    Except for the dust covered rooms, the shop wasn¡¯t much different since thest time he¡¯d left. The formation outside hadn¡¯t changed either. The elements of the ce of extreme water was still as rich as before. It seemed like no one had lived here after they¡¯d left.The materials for refining the water elite zombie were still a bitcking. That was being taken care of by Phoebe, so Han Shuo knew not to be anxious for now. He made a few circles around the yard before randomly sitting down in a chair in the middle of the courtyard, waiting for Laureton to arrive.

    In the afternoon, Han Shuo was studying a book on magic when he suddenly put it away and stood up. He squinted, looking towards the front door. The brawny, rough, bald Laureton entered by himself a bitter with heavy footsteps. His face didn¡¯t look very good. He was a bit pale, both eyes bloodshot and swollen. He must¡¯ve had a sleepless night.

    ¡°Many thanks for your assistancest night!¡± Laureton drew upon his energy reserves after seeing Han Shuo and spoke with a forced smile.

    Last night, the Cairo mercenary band had suffered heavy losses, even severely injuring vice chief Harris. To prevent the other three great powers from taking advantage of these chaotic times, Laureton had been hard at work all night making arrangements. He¡¯d mobilized all of the Cairo mercenary band experts in the Valley of Sunshine. This could only be described as cautious to the extreme.

    ¡°Hehe, we could be considered friends. The Church of Light and Florida also had a grudge with me, so of course I wouldn¡¯t mind lending you a helping hand!¡± Han Shuozed around in his chair and smiled leisurely. He didn¡¯t mention thatst time he¡¯d left without saying farewell.

    Laureton didn¡¯t ask either. He took out a deed and a crystal card from within his space ring, cing them on the stone table before Han Shuo, saying with a proper expression, ¡°This is the deed for this shop, along with a ten thousand gold coin crystal card with no owner. In addition, I will personally allow the Soul Destroyer mercenary band to openly recruit in the parts of the Valley of Sunshine that are overseen by the Cairo mercenary band.¡±

    These were the three conditions agreed to by Laureton that Han Shuo had proposedst night in exchange for his help. During the brutal battlest night, Laureton¡¯s group would¡¯ve been hard pressed to escape the mountain valley if it weren¡¯t for Han Shuo¡¯s sudden interference. Laureton was a straightforward person, so he handed over the promised items as soon as he¡¯d arrived.

    Han Shuo nodded with a smile. He ced the deed and crystal card into his space ring, then looked at Laureton and said, ¡°Last night, I killed Ferguson and heavily injured Adam Menlo. My grudge with them cannot be resolved now. Since we now have amon enemy, we¡¯ll have many chances to cooperate in the future.¡±

    ¡°Of course. I admit that I underestimated you. Someone who could kill Ferguson and heavily injure Adam Menlo is a person worthy of my true cooperation. In the current power struggle in the Valley of Sunshine, as long as the Soul Destroyer mercenary band cooperates with me, I guarantee it will develop greatly.¡± Laureton¡¯s eyes twinkled as he looked at Han Shuo, seemingly aware of thetter¡¯s rtionship with the Soul Destroyer mercenary band.

    ¡°Trunks will discuss with youter. I¡¯m only his friend, so I have no right to decide the future of the Soul Destroyer mercenary band!¡± Han Shuo was stunned for a moment, but still responded indifferently.

    ¡°Heh heh, from what I know, your rtionship with the Soul Destroyer isn¡¯t that simple!¡± Laureton grinned and continued, ¡°How about this? I¡¯ll offer some gold coins and hire the Soul Destroyers to help me deal with the other forces. What do you think?¡±

    ¡°For this matter, you¡¯d have to go find Trunks and talk to him about it. Hehe!¡± Han Shuoughedzily, then exhaled softly and said, ¡°Right, I have a friend who might have not entered the Valley of Sunshine through the main entrance. I hope you can give me some face and not trouble her.¡±

    ¡°No problem!¡± Laureton agreed without saying anything extra. He then thought for a bit and stared mysteriously at Han Shuo, saying in a low voice, ¡°You killed Ferguson and even used the terrifying Corpse Reanimation spell of necromancy. No matter how magnanimous the Church of Light is, they won¡¯t let you off. You¡¯d best take good care of yourself.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not afraid of their revenge since I dared to kill him. You shouldn¡¯t worry about such trivial things. Also, we will have a chance to cooperate in dealing with Florida. I¡¯m afraid we¡¯ll have to add the House of Menlo to the list of enemies as well. When I want to take action, I maye looking for you.¡±

    ¡°Then you¡¯d best be quick, or I¡¯m afraid you will miss your chance to do so!¡±

    Laureton¡¯s eyes were bloodshot and overflowed with murderous intent. It seemed that he intended on exacting revenge for the grievances that he¡¯d sufferedst night. With the power of the Cairo mercenary band, it would be an extremely brutal scene if Laureton started a bloody vengeance despite all consequences.

    ¡°Then I wish you good luck!¡± Han Shuo said no more after this sentence. He closed his eyes, seemingly bathing in the sun with leisure.

    Laureton knew Han Shuo had no interest in further conversation upon seeing this posture. He nodded in understanding, ¡°Alright. I still have other things to attend to, goodbye!¡±

    ¡°Sure, I won¡¯t send you off now!¡± Han Shuo answered with his eyes closed.

    Not long after Laureton left, Han Shuo suddenly rolled his eyes towards the roof and said with a tone of indifference, ¡°Since you¡¯vee, why note down and join me?¡±

    There were no other sign of life around. It was as if Han Shuo was just speaking to himself.

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression sank as he said with displeasure, ¡°Master Cecilia, do you need me to personally invite you toe down?¡±

    A reaction finally appeared in the area where he was looking when he finished speaking. Cecilia abruptly appeared on the empty, sunlit roof. She looked at Han Shuo in surprise and said lightly, ¡°Even Laureton couldn¡¯t discover me, so how did you do that?¡±

    ¡°Alright, tell me what you came here for. Could it be that your current mission is rted to Laureton?¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t answer Cecilia¡¯s question and cut straight to the chase. Since he¡¯d stopped talking to Laureton as soon as he¡¯d noticed her arrival, Cecilia simply didn¡¯t know what they¡¯d been talking about.

    ¡°Tell me, how did you realize I was up there?¡± Cecilia looked down at Han Shuo from above, asking with the tone of a superior talking to their subordinate.

    ¡°Sorry, you have no right to know. Even Master Candide has no right to ask about my secrets, let alone you, someone who is not in charge of me. Moreover, my ce doesn¡¯t wee you, so please leave!¡± This kind of attitude from Cecilia displeased Han Shuo. He immediately and bluntly drove her away upon seeing her arrogant manner.

    ¡°You, you actually dare to talk to me like that?¡± Cecilia pointed at Han Shuo, appalled. Her body trembled slightly. She was angry as nobody seemed to have ever treated her so rudely like that. She looked extremely furious and stomped her feet violently as she huffed, ¡°I¡¯m not leaving, I¡¯ll see what you can do to me!¡±

    Precisely at this moment, a distant call from the Dark Forest echoed in Han Shuo¡¯s mind. This call, that came from the depths of the soul, was like a joyous call from the most intimate of family.

    Han Shuo was stunned for a split second, then overjoyed. He understood that the wood elite zombie in the forest trolls¡¯ holynd had formed. He was making the call based on the virtue of the blood essence in his body.

    ¡°If you won¡¯t leave, then I¡¯ll leave!¡± Han Shuo was toozy to pay attention to Cecilia anymore. He immediately stood up, hurriedly left the shop and promptly shut the front door. He rushed straight out of the Valley of Sunshine.

    ¡°You look down on people too much, really look down on people too much! That lowly Dark Moon envoy actually dares to be so arrogant?!¡± Seeing Han Shuo unhesitatingly leave as if avoiding a gue, Cecilia abruptly shouted in rage. It seemed she¡¯d taken a major blow.

    None of the guards at the entrance to the Valley of Sunshine blocked Han Shuo from exiting. Everyone from the Cairo mercenary band nodded at him in a friendly manner, showing their deep respect.

    Being able to kill a light grand magus and heavily injure the chief of the Menlo family at the same time, while lending his aid to the Cairo mercenary band, this character had immediately gained their goodwill. They all expressed their respect and extreme gratitude towards Han Shuo.

    Upon leaving the Valley of Sunshine, Han Shuo flew rapidly forward by fully leveraging the art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens. He only took fifteen minutes to reach the Soul Destroyer mercenary band.

    Trunks had yet to wake up after getting drunk the night before. Yesterday, when nothing was on his te, Han Shuo had intended to wait for a while before helping Trunks reform his body. Now that the wood elite zombie had awakened, things had to happen now.

    Not caring about the sleeptalking Trunks, Han Shuo rushed directly into his cave. He promptly picked up a wineskin on the ground, mixed the Rebirth Pill into it and forced it into Trunks¡¯ belly.

    Firmly pressing down on Trunks in order to ensure he couldn¡¯t struggle, Han Shuo used his magical cultivation to force Trunks to refine the Rebirth Pill in his stomach. Afterwards, he left and said to Grant, ¡°Take him to the toilet. He will be like Odysseus and the others. You guys look after him well.¡±

    ¡°Understood!¡± Grant didn¡¯t understand this at all, but he knew Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t harm Trunks, so he immediately nodded in agreement.

    ¡°Gilbert, you stay inside the mountain valley to help Trunks for the time being. I¡¯ll look for you when I need you. Absolutely do not create any trouble for him!¡± Han Shuo left only onemand for the dark dragon. He couldn¡¯t wait to leave the mountain valley as he rushed towards the Dark Forest.

 Chapter 270: The religion of the Evil God

    Chapter 270: The religion of the Evil God

    In the Dark Forest, the sacred ce of the forest trolls.

    Under the zing sun, a rainbow spectrum cut through the sky. Like an arrow going against the flow of time, the light swiftlynded in the center of the Dark Forest without a sound.

    After four months, the lush and thick nts in the ce of extreme wood had once again gone through an earth-shattering change. All of the towering old trees had withered, the weeds on the ground were without a trace of their original lively green. The originally lush ce of extreme wood didn¡¯t have a single green leaf now.

    nts no longer grew, and the dry, cracked, and hard ground was revealed. At a nce, the entire scene was that of desertification. Due to the existence of the formation, the wood elements, that had originally filled the ce, were now gathered in the body of the wood elite zombie in the center of the formation. This had caused all the ns to wilt as they lost the wood elemental energy they¡¯d originally possessed.

    Han Shuo relied on the yin demons¡¯ reconnaissance uponnding. He discovered from afar that several forest trolls were stationed here, evidently protecting the holynd.

    Intimate calls resounded one after another from roots of the oldest,rgest dried tree. The wood elite zombie had Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence flowing in his veins. He had sensed thetter¡¯s arrival based on their connection.

    ¡°Come out!¡± A series of ck lights converged towards the ce where the wood elite zombie was concealed as Han Shuo used the secret arts.

    Rumble...

    Tremors spread out on the ground as the old, dried tree suddenly exploded. Pieces of bark and wood flew in all directions as a dark cave was revealed at the base. Deep underground old roots were buried there.

    Whoosh! A green shadow jumped out from the dark cave.

    A green armor covered the wood elite zombie. This armor looked as if it were made from tree trunks as it shimmered with a green light. The wood elite zombie was tall and thin. He really did look like a tree branch at a nce. His shiny green eyes were full of joy at this moment, rolling around as they stared at Han Shuo.

    A dense mist of wood elemental energy drifted out along with the emergence of the wood elite zombie. The wood elements, that had been tightly bound and absorbed by the wood elite zombie, now gradually escaped bit by bit, blowing a fresh breath of air into this almost desertifiednd.

    Han Shuo understood that this area would gradually return to normal after the wood elite zombie left. The dead nts would burst forth with vitality again, and the entire ce should be able to restore itself to its original lush state in less than eighteen months.

    The little skeleton and earth elite zombie appeared together after an incantation. The little skeleton arrogantly walked over immediately upon seeing the wood elite zombie. He jumped and patted the wood elite zombie¡¯s shoulders like a general inspecting one of his soldiers.

    This wood elite zombie seemed surprisingly afraid of the little skeleton. His sparkling green eyes shone brightly as he took the initiative to lower his shoulders in order to allow the little skeleton¡¯s patting.

    The earth elite zombie lumbered over to the side of the wood elite zombie and dumbly touched thetter¡¯s shoulder, seeming to want to wee thetter like the little skeleton. However, the green eyes red at him. The earth elite zombie was dumbfounded, withdrawing his right hand that¡¯d been about to pat the wood elite zombie¡¯s shoulder. In the end, he patted his own shoulder, his posture quiteical.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, let me see what you have mastered.¡± Han Shuo nced at the wood elite zombie and started walking out.

    They left the ce of extreme wood and arrived at a river bank in the forest after walking for a while. As soon as they arrived, the green eyes of the wood elite zombie shone brightly without stopping, and the trees around them started dancing in the wind. The towering old trees, that needed several people to fully embrace them, twisted their soft, ribbon-like tree branches like snakes, moving in ordance with the green light emitted from the eyes of the wood elite zombie.

    The nts around Han Shuo all seemed to be affected. They were all either whipping around or growing rapidly. The wood elite zombie was showing off, and his figure disappeared out of sight when he leaned on a nearby tree.

    Han Shuo knew early on that the wood elite zombie could manipte nts. His thoughts spun as he recalled the strange ability of the druid Caspian. Feeling that there were some simrities between the two, his heart couldn¡¯t help but feel somewhat peculiar.

    With the wood elite zombie, Han Shuo¡¯s strength would once again be increased when he entered the Dark Forest again. The Dark Forest was dense and brimming with life, while the wood elite zombie was like a ghost that could control the nts in it ordance to his will. He could randomly merge with a big tree, or mount a surprise attack. No one would be able to catch him when he retreated.

    ¡°Not bad, not bad, very good. You three brats can all go back!¡± Han Shuo watched for a bit before nodding his head. As usual, he left a Dark Seal in the wood elite zombie, then sent the three fellows back to the other dimension.

    It¡¯s been three months. I wonder why the fire elite zombie hasn¡¯t beenpleted yet. Forget it, let¡¯s leave this ce for the time being. He will call me when he¡¯s ready. Han Shuo thought for a bit then returned to the cemetery of death. He didn¡¯t intend on going to the ce of extreme fire to inspect the situation. Who knew if the Lord of the mes would go nuts again? Best not to go if he didn¡¯t have extreme confidence.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a hurry to leave after returning to the cemetery of death. He went to the depths of the building inside instead.

    He¡¯d been halted at the first level before due tock of sufficient mental strength. Now that his strength had progressed greatly, Han Shuo intended to try again.

    He passed through the first passage easily. In the second level, Han Shuo rammed straight into the invisible forcefield. A strange force suddenly pierced through his brain and a heart wrenching pain abruptly spread through his mind. It was as if Han Shuo was being torn apart by a tornado of sharp des¡ªtwisted, stabbed, and dragged into an endless abyss.

    Fortunately Han Shuo¡¯s current state of mind was durable to the utmost now. Despite the extreme pain of a thousand cuts being inflicted on his body, he grit his teeth and coalesced his mental strength, pushing the magical yuan through. A crisp cracking sound echoed as he fell downwards.

    Suddenly, the Eye of Darkness in Han Shuo¡¯s hand sent out a dazzling green light. Under that shining light, he found himself in the center of an oval altar. The whole altar was suddenly cloaked in a green halo as the green light touched it. An enormous, strange force converged on Han Shuo from the corners of the altar.

    These ribbons of green light all poured into the Eye of Darkness in Han Shuo¡¯s hand. A mysterious force abruptly entered through his palm and flooded his brain like water released from a dam.

    ¡°My child, you¡¯ve proved to at least have the mental strength of an archmage by being able to enter the secondyer. Now, let go of everything and ept this mental strength. It will help you reach the power of a grand magus!¡± The shadowy figure from the firstyer slowly formed and spoke calmly.

    Han Shuo was ecstatic. He immediately sat down and rxed his soul to wee the mysterious force in. As soon as this force entered, it merged directly with his mental strength in a mysterious manner, giving Han Shuo a veryfortable, wonderful feeling. The extreme pain from before had long since vanished without a trace. Right now, Han Shuo seemed to be bathed in sun dappled, warm water. He enjoyed it withplete leisure andfort.

    The greenyers of light shrouded the entire altar and slowly united with the Eye of Darkness at the epicenter. The enormous, pure force integrated with Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength. His brain, that had been reinforced by the demonic magic, rapidly underwent changes.

    This processsted for an unknown period of time. Han Shuo forgot everything and indulged himself in the wondrous feeling of having full control over his mental strength. He even forgot his own existence.

    ¡°Child, necromancy magic is the most powerful, most marvelous magic on earth, yet some people don¡¯t allow it to exist. You, as the legitimate heir to the ancient necromancy magic, hold the responsibility of promoting its profound meaning and the glory it used to have to the world.¡±

    ¡°To have the Canopy of Necromancy cover the earth, to enable necromancy magic to cause tremors in every corner of the world, to shower every ce in the evil light of necromancy magic¡ªthis is your responsibility to bear. You cannot escape, nor can you refuse...¡±

    The voice of that shadowy figure slowly, yet alluringly infiltrated Han Shuo¡¯s mind with the strange force. As Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength was continuously reinforced, another current of force suddenly erupted. This force attempted to invade his soul, forever drowning him in evil.

    This force had the ability to change the soul. When it finished merging with the soul, it would turn Han Shuo into a most loyal follower, forever subjected to the dominion of some evil god.

    ¡°Aowuuuu...¡±

    Han Shuo threw back his head and released a long howl to the heavens, circting his magical yuan like mad. Another intense force surged out from the demon infant, reaching the brain in just a second. Ittched onto the force trying to invade his soul.

    ¡°No, no!¡± Han Shuo roared, his eyes a deep red as he panted. His firm strength of mind kicked into gear as he utilized the magical yuan to its utmost, formingyer afteryer of obstruction in his brain to fight against the magical brand of the evil god.

    There was as if a violent torrential outbreak in Han Shuo¡¯s mind. It desperately resisted the force invading his soul with the demon infant as the main power. During this process, Han Shuo experienced excruciating agony, rolling and screaming about on the altar. However, the green light around the Eye of Darkness became more and more brilliant.

 Chapter 271: The tri-colored bone staff

    Chapter 271: The tri-colored bone staff

    ¡°Aowuuuu...¡±

    Han Shuo was roaring in extreme agony on the oval altar in the secondyer of the cemetery of death. Thick green light wreathed his body. His head in particr was showing a jasper-like luster. The ethereal light seemed to be the most lustrous green jade.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength still grew at a crazy rate during this process. However, the brand from the evil god from an unknown source actually wanted to prate deep into his soul, ordering him to be a loyal follower of the religion of the evil god until death. This was a kind of soul brand simr to the one that Han Shuo imprinted on the little skeleton and earth elite zombie. Once his soul was stamped by this brand, he would never be himself again.

    This was absolutely something that Han Shuo didn¡¯t want!!

    Although his brain felt like it was being cut by ten thousand des, Han Shuo still held on, his eyes bulging in agony. He roared madly in rage, trying to alleviate the pain in some way.

    However, the power of the soul brand was bing ever greater as the growing green halo above the altar grew brighter. In his panic, an enormous, pitch ck figure appeared in Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. The massive body seemed to blot out the sky. Its green pupils were like two huge full moons. The eyes nced over all beings as if looking down upon weak, tiny ants.

    The enormous pressure filled the heavens and earth, making it difficult for Han Shuo to even breathe. This kind of endless presence tasted of immortality, like a star existing for billions of years in the gxy.

    ¡°Submit. There will be no pain, only eternal life!¡±

    A spirit imprint suddenly broke into Han Shuo¡¯s mind, repeatedly tempting him. It seemed that if he just rxed and epted this brand, the suffering would be gone in the next moment, and his life would be endless.

    ¡°No!!¡±

    Han Shuo screamed tragically, his hands clutching his head as he rolled around on the ground. The Demonyer Edge stored in his body abruptly shot out terrifying amounts of killing intent. The negative feelings of fear, resentment, and thirst for destruction coalesced into a force that instantly flowed into the demon infant to form a resistance.

    The Demonyer Edge shrank into a beam of light, bringing every fiber of power within Han Shuo to bombard the shadowy figure that¡¯d been born from the panic within his mind.

    Crack...

    A crisp sound like the breaking of fragile ss resounded clearly in Han Shuo¡¯s mind. The colossal figure shattered into spots of starlight. The lights suddenly gathered into the Demonyer Edge.

    In a blink an eye, the agony that had ripped apart his heart and pierced his lungs retreated like the tides. Within his consciousness, the frenzied rate of growth of his mental strength suddenly stopped. The green light curtain above the altar also disappeared without a trace.

    The Eye of Darkness in Han Shuo¡¯s hand vanished, reced with a green bone staff. The upper part of the staff was formed by three skulls.

    The bone staff was one meter and thirty centimeters in length, and was made out of a green, jade-like material. The three skulls weren¡¯t human, and were respectively yellow, blue, and purple. The yellow skull had three big eye sockets, the blue one had a horn, while the purple one was riddled with finger-sized holes.

    Although their shapes were strange, the skulls were as small as a fist, each one looking more sinister than the one before. These three skulls integrated perfectly with the staff, with the three skulls looking in different directions crowning the top.

    Han Shuo slowly calmed his breathing. In the end, he fainted and fell listlessly to the ground in aatose state.

    However, whilst unconscious, the bone staff in his hand emitted yellow, blue, and purple rays of light from the three differently shaped skulls. The three lights were like silk ribbons that glided into his nose and mouth at the same time.

    Blood was still flowing from Han Shuo¡¯s mouth and nostrils due to the piercing agony he had just experienced. Each plume of hot blood slowly drifted into the three skulls under the guidance of the tricolored lights. The three skulls gleamed with increasing light.

    The three skulls finished absorbing the fresh blood from Han Shuo¡¯s mouth and nostrils. The staff shone with brilliant light that slowly dispersed. The bone staff then returned to normal.

    After who knew how long, Han Shuo gradually came to. His whole body ached to the extreme, as if his meridians and bones had shattered. There wasn¡¯t a ce that didn¡¯t scream out with pain.

    On the other hand, after experiencing explosive agony, his mind was now clear andfortable. When Han Shuo looked down at the bone staff, he was startled. His eyes were full of confusion as he simply didn¡¯t know where this bone staff hade from.

    ¡°Ah, where is the Eye of Darkness?!¡± Han Shuo was greatly shocked in the next moment as he discovered that the Eye of Darkness, that had been in his hand during the whole ordeal, had vanished.

    The Eye of Darkness was the key in and out of the cemetery of death. Once it disappeared, he could only use the transportation matrix to leave the cemetery of death, which would be a tremendous setback.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo looked closely at the bone staff and noticed that its jade-green color was the same as the color of the Eye of Darkness. The staff felt extremely familiar in his hand.

    A thought struck him. Han Shuo tried to use the bone staff in the same way he¡¯d used the Eye of Darkness. When the bone staff immediately shot out a familiar green halo, Han Shuo understood what had happened.

    Staring fixedly at the bone staff for a while, Han Shuo became more and more surprised. However, when he recalled the matter of the evil god invading his soul, he fearfully put the staff into his space ring. He didn¡¯t dare to try out its power when his magical yuan was exhausted and body extremely fragile.

    Closing his eyes to recall the events that urred before he fell unconscious, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but feel fortunate. He secretly thought that this cemetery of death was really not that simple. When that evil god infiltrated his mind, the horrifying pressure from that shadowy figure on him had been truly unthinkable for Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was certain that the colossal figure was definitely the true appearance of the evil god. Han Shuopletely understood what the evil god¡¯s brand wanted to do to him. This made him even more grateful to have escaped, and he became more cautious of the cemetery of death.

    In the next moment, Han Shuo remembered what the shadowy figure said, ¡°Let go of everything and ept this spirit force. It will help you reach the power of a grand magus!¡±

    Ecstatic, Han Shuo chanted a spell to summon one ordinary skeleton. Eight skeletal warriors immediately appeared on the altar. Feeling the smooth cirction of his vast mental strength, Han Shuo was overjoyed upon discovering that his mental strength had made a shocking advancement.

    The same necromancy spell meant that the results would be different based on the strength of one¡¯s mental strength. Generally speaking, a magic spell could be divided into five levels based on one¡¯s mental strength.

    Take summoning a skeletal warrior for example. A novice magic apprentice with weak mental strength could only summon one skeletal warrior. However, for journeyman mages, they could release the second level of the spell due to their stronger spirit force, allowing them to call upon two skeletal warriors.

    Han Shuo summoning eight skeletal warriors meant that he had reached the fourth level of the spell. This was more than enough proof for his terrific improvement in mental strength. ording to the exnation in necromancy magic books, Han Shuo understood that one would reach the fourth level for the skeletal warrior summon only when their mental strength advanced to grand magus.

    ¡°Truly unexpected! This was all true! To advance to grand magus all of the sudden! This cemetery of death is strange, but truly miraculous!¡± Han Shuo was ecstatic. He couldn¡¯t help butugh heartily despite his fragile current state.

    Struggling to sit up, Han Shuo¡¯s eyes shone brightly as he look around. He saw that this second level was half the size of the first one. The surrounding area was empty, except for the oval altar in the center. No items were stored in this secret room.

    The second level centered around the altar beneath Han Shuo, a mysterious magical formation was set up to upy the entire room. There was nothing else except for it, seemingly a ce to cleanse the soul and improve mental strength.

    Han Shuo rested for a while before leaving the second level of the cemetery of death. He sat in the center of the magical formation, slowly gathering his exhausted magical yuan and restoring it bit by it.

    After about five days, Han Shuo heaved a sigh of relief and murmured in good spirits, ¡°Although the evil god invaded my soul this time, it was actually rather useful. Not only did my mental strength advance to grand magus level in one fell swoop, even my magic cultivation showed signs of great improvement!¡±

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a hurry to leave. He stayed in the cemetery of death, spending the entire day and night to indulge in the study of necromancy magic. Although he had the power of a grand magus, he still needed to brush up on some necromancy spells. Thanks to the absorbed memories from rendon, Han Shuo could officially begin his preparation for the archmage level. The memories yed an important role.

    Han Shuo practiced necromancy magic in the cemetery of death without rest or food, as if he was possessed. He repeatedly cast all archmage level spells. He practiced every day until his mental strength waspletely exhausted. Afterwards, his mental strength improved slightly with meditation.

    Over ten days, Han Shuo could skillfully release the several archmage level necromancy spells that he¡¯d gained from rendon. As for the two new spells written in the book of ¡°Necromancy Magic¡± that he¡¯d picked up in the cemetery of death. However, it was difficult to grasp them in a short amount of time. Han Shuo decided to not waste any more time and left the cemetery of death via the transportation matrix.

 Chapter 272: The effect of the Rebirth Pill

    Chapter 272: The effect of the Rebirth Pill

    Lancelot Empire, Ossen City, the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force.

    ¡°Master Fanny, you¡¯ve be more and more beautiful!¡± Gene looked at Fanny and praised sincerely in the testing fields of the necromancy department.

    ¡°That¡¯s right, master Fanny. How did you do it? Can you please tell us how?¡± Lisa looked at Fanny with admiration and asked sweetly.

    ¡°Master Fanny, what herbs did you use? Please tell us!¡±

    ¡°Yes yes, please!¡±

    Several female students of the necromancy major surrounded Fanny, chattering nonstop. For women, beauty could be said to be the matter that they were most concerned about. Like the forest trolls¡¯ love for piging, a woman¡¯s love for beauty was innate. No woman was an exception to this.

    ¡°I¡¯ve told all of you many times already. There is no secret method. I only rxed my mood and the change urred naturally. You shouldn¡¯t be so surprised.¡± Fanny exined with resignation. Although she knew her students wouldn¡¯t believe her, this was the only answer she could give them.

    Fanny was as if reborn after consuming the Rebirth Pill. Her mental strength had undergone a huge improvement and increased by twice as much when she meditated. Her mind was suddenly clearer. The magic theories she used to have problems with were now easily understood.

    Fanny¡¯s skin was also creamy, simr a newborn baby¡¯s. Her face was a glowing white with a touch of rosiness on the cheeks, like a delicately crafted porcin doll, giving people the feeling of surreal beauty. This miraculous transformation had urred over ten days. The female students and teachers had all witnessed it. Even Fanny herself was unable to say that this was a natural transformation. Many female teachers hade to consult Fanny about this matter, even Dean Emma herself asked.

    Only Fanny herself knew that this was thanks to Han Shuo¡¯s Rebirth Pill. She had taken a three day leave and spent almost all of it on the toilet. She¡¯d been mad at his prank. However, when she looked in the mirror three dayster, she was dumbfounded. She froze for dozens of seconds before eximing nonstop in ecstasy, ¡°Bryan oh Bryan, you cute little fellow!¡±

    ¡°Master Fanny, Master Fanny!¡± Gene shout loudly a few times.

    Startled, Fanny looked at Gene and said, ¡°Master Gene, what is it?¡±

    ¡°ss is over. Master Fanny, I noticed that you¡¯ve been staring off into space more often recently!¡± Gene had recently discovered that when he talked to Fanny, she often didn¡¯t pay much attention to him. The times he saw her fall into a daydream, her eyes flickered with yearning.

    ¡°Oh, ss is over? Hehe, thank you for reminding me.¡± Fanny responded apologetically. She turned to the students to advise them about something before walking back to herboratory alone.

    Hateful fellow, he said he woulde see me in three days time, and yet he hasn¡¯t appeared for twenty days already, making me distracted all the time. You really anger me to death! Fanny gnashed her teeth in rage, walking to herb with her head down.

    Thud! Not paying attention to the path, Fanny suddenly bumped into a person.

    ¡°Sorry, sorry!¡± Fanny apologized nonstop before lifting her head. However, when she looked up, she was stunned for a second before exploding with anger. Her fists hammered as she cursed, ¡°Damn you, you only know to return now? It¡¯s been twenty days, don¡¯t you know that you¡¯ll make people worry? Where did you get off to before onlying back now...¡±

    She screamed, cursed, and hit the evilly smiling Han Shuo on the chest. Fanny seemed to vent all of her feelings as she listed all of his wrongdoings. Her voice gradually grew strange before turning into sobs at the end.

    Han Shuo originally wanted to tease Fanny just a little. However, upon hearing the strange tone in her voice and the footsteps closing in, he embraced her and jumped behind the big tree. His mouth rushed towards Fanny¡¯s fragrant lips for a kiss.

    ¡°Mmmm...¡±

    Fanny¡¯s scolding turned into long moaning. Her hands desperately pounded against Han Shuo¡¯s chest, but her fragrant lips responded with enthusiasm.

    This was a separate road to Fanny¡¯sb surrounded by rows of ancient trees. When Han Shuo heard the iing footsteps, he hastily embraced Fanny and jumped behind therge tree out of fear of being discovered. As Fanny responded intensely to his kiss, Han Shuo felt as if he was sinking into a beautiful dream. This charming, wondrous feeling instantly ignited upon the contact of their lips and ran deep into his soul. Han Shuo rxed his vignce and loosened his body,pletely indulging himself in this feeling.

    It was a whileter that Fanny finally stopped beating his chest. Her slender, jade hands snaked euphorically around his neck. She was on the tips of her toes, kissing him fervently. Shepletely forgot everything else, forgetting that they were out in the open.

    After who knew how long, Fanny panted and struggled, pushing Han Shuo away. She nced alluringly at him as she protested coquettishly, ¡°You thousand times damnable brat, why don¡¯t you ever keep your promises?¡±

    ¡°Mmm...¡± As she¡¯d just finished speaking, Fanny covered her mouth and inhaled softly. Her cheeks instantly flushed as she looked behind Han Shuo with an exmation.

    Turning around, they saw Lisa holding a magic book, standing alongside Gene. Their eyes was filled with heartbreak as they stared at this side, dumbfounded.

    ¡°Master Gene, it¡¯s very immoral to peep on others¡¯ intimate actions!¡± Han Shuo waspletely calm. He turned around and spoke unhappily to Gene without letting Fanny out of his embrace.

    ¡°I, I didn¡¯t mean to. Just that Lisa was unclear about some magic knowledge that I couldn¡¯t exin it, so we came to look for Master Fanny to resolve our doubts. It was really an ident!¡± Gene¡¯s facial expression was ugly, but he still stammered an exnation upon seeing Han Shuo¡¯s displeasure.

    Fanny had surpassed Gene on someplex magic knowledge thanks to the effect of the Rebirth Pill. After the great changes to Lisa¡¯s family, she¡¯d suddenly became hard-working and seized every chance to improve her magic. Lisa and Gene had some questions to ask Fanny. They came for a look when hearing the panting, and hadn¡¯t expected to see something that they shouldn¡¯t have seen.

    ¡°I didn¡¯t think, didn¡¯t think that you were actually this intimate with Master Fanny. Master Fanny, Bryan, I hate you!¡± Lisa said these words out of rage, then turned around and ran off in tears.

    ¡°Master Fanny, I give you my blessing!¡± Gene was an adult after all. He suppressed the pain in his heart and whispered this sentence. He too then turned around to leave, his departing back seeming a little bleak.

    ¡°Bryan, you go console Lisa. I know how much she likes you, I¡¯m afraid she can¡¯t take this blow!¡± Fanny softly sigh at the events and told Han Shuo.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo said in a low voice, ¡°Forget it, this isn¡¯t the appropriate time to see her. Give her some time, Lisa is much stronger than you think.¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, I¡¯ll give you your certificate proving your achievement as an adept mage in the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. You can graduate!¡± Fanny pondered for a bit and said no more. She let Han Shuo put his arm around her as they walked back to theb, where she gave him a book with a magical brand on it.

    ¡°You should pay some attention to Lisa in the next two days. I think she¡¯ll think it through.¡± Han Shuo said as he took the book. After such a thing happened, he was temporarily in no mood to act intimately with Fanny.

    ¡°Bryan, you¡¯re leaving again?¡± Fanny was stunned. She suddenly hugged Han Shuo tightly and looked up at him, speaking very unwillingly.

    ¡°I¡¯ve officially graduated from the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. Now that something like this has happened, I don¡¯t want Lisa to feel sad, so I can¡¯t stay here for the time being!¡± Han Shuo had wanted to stay with Fanny a little longer, but could only let go after giving it some thought.

    ¡°Then, where should I go if I want to see you? I don¡¯t want you to disappear for months at a time without receiving any messages from you!¡± Fanny frowned and hugged Han Shuo tightly, not letting him move. She seemed like she wouldn¡¯t let go until she received a reply.

    Han Shuo had a headache as he thought about it. He said, ¡°It seems I need to find a mansion within the Empire. Mhm, so be it, I¡¯ll tell you my address after seven days at most. I promise to not suddenly disappear for a long time!¡±

    ¡°Okay. Oh right, my father maye to the Ossen City soon. I want you to meet him then!¡± Fanny nodded, her cheeks turning crimson. She said softly as she buried her face in his chest.

    Han Shuo was dumbfounded. He secretly thought about his rtionships with Phoebe and Emily. If this was discovered by Fanny or her father by chance, something serious might just happen. However he couldn¡¯t refuse now, so he bit the bullet and said, ¡°Alright, I¡¯lle see him at that time!¡±

    Forget it, I¡¯ll worry about it when it happens. I can only take one step at a time. Han Shuo secretly thought and said, ¡°Alright, I¡¯m going!¡±

    ¡°Mmm, right, thank you for the herbal pill. It was really miraculous. Do you have any more? I want to eat a few more!¡± As Han Shuo was about to leave, Fanny asked excitedly with shining eyes.

    ¡°Eh... This pill is extremely expensive, I only had that one pill. One pill is enough, any more would useless!¡± Han Shuo sweated. Afraid that Fanny wouldn¡¯t listen, he hastily left.

 Chapter 273: Climbing up step by step

    Chapter 273: Climbing up step by step

    After leaving the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, Han Shuo went straight to Lawrence¡¯s house. Together, they left for the barracks of the northern city guards.

    Ossen City was divided into four sections, South, East, North and West. Each section had a big city gate and an independent army of guards responsible for maintainingw and order.

    As they arrived at the city¡¯s northern campgrounds, Lawrence opened his mouth to speak, ¡°Although we¡¯re ten dayste, I think there¡¯s no problem!¡±

    What greeted the eyes was a grand castle wholly made of solid rocks. Several armored guards stood in front of the city gate, looking over the recruitment of ordinary civilians with strong physique. They were being examined before they could join the rookies.

    Lawrence walked over to them with Han Shuo and said with authority, ¡°He is an adept mage who¡¯s just graduated from the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. He¡¯ll join your magic corps from now on.¡±

    An officer was lyingzily on a chair, his mouth munching on the fruits on the te. As soon as he heard Lawrence¡¯s voice, he scrambled to his feet and put on a ttering smile, ¡°Greetings to the young master Lawrence!¡±

    Lawrence nodded and pointed at Han Shuo saying, ¡°He¡¯s my friend. He intends to join the magic corps of the city¡¯s northern guard. We¡¯ll proceed based on the formal procedures.¡±

    ¡°An adept mage!¡± The officer was shocked. His expression was much more respectful as he looked at Han Shuo, ¡°May I see your certificate?¡±

    There were three jobs in the Profound Continent: swordsman, knight, and mage. Swordsmen held the lowest status, knights were a little higher, and the rarest and highest were the mages.

    To a country, a mage of the same level brought more benefits to the army. For instance, a senior swordsman or senior knight could only kill several soldiers in one attack no matter how powerful they were.

    However, if an adept mage released a magic spell of great lethality, they could kill dozens or more than a hundred of soldiers in an instant. The higher the mage¡¯s level, the more powerful their spell was. For example, if a sacred magus released a forbidden spell, he could even destroy a city and kill tens of thousand soldiers in a second.

    Because mages possessed magic spells with arge area of destruction, they were very useful in the military. Their status was obviously higher than swordsmen or knights. Generally, in any country, if a mage reached the level of archmage, they would be bestowed with a noble title and their own territory.

    As for those of the grand magus or sacred magus level, they were the talent that every countrypeted over. The king of that country would agree to any of their conditions from wealth, position to beautiful women. Everything could be theirs.

    That was why the officer¡¯s attitude had taken aplete turn for the opposite upon hearing that he was an adept mage who¡¯d graduated from the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. Over the years, the Academy had produced many of the most outstanding figures in the Empire. Currently, several notable figures who were the best in their fields of expertise had all graduated from this academy.

    ¡°Of course you can!¡± Han Shuo took out his graduation certificate from his space ring and handed it to the officer.

    Only now did the officer realize that Han Shuo wore a space ring. He was a slightly surprised, an adept mage who could possess a space ring was definitely not ordinary. The officer became even more respectful. He held the certificate and skimmed it before handing it back to Han Shuo with both hands, saying in all honesty, ¡°There¡¯s no problem at all. We of the city¡¯s Northern Guard wee you to join us. You will be a member of the Northern Guard¡¯s magic corps. Please follow me, I¡¯ll help you with the documents.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m going with you!¡± Lawrence smiled at Han Shuo and followed thetter into the castle. The officer seemed to know Lawrence as he didn¡¯t stopped him from following.

    The three yin demons had been released earlier to circle around the castle. Han Shuo discovered that the castle was divided into several areas. The bottom floor was the rooms of ordinary soldiers, it could amodate nearly a thousand people. The second floor was for ordinary officers, the third floor for senior generals and the members of the magic corps. Han Shuo paid some attention and realized that there was a basement was storing weapons and food.

    Even though this castle was inside Ossen City, its defenses weren¡¯t weak. The castle walls were ten meters tall with several guards in each direction. There were several heavy defensive weaponries and even three magic towers set up.

    This was the base camp of the Northern Guard. Many more soldiers were stationed outside. The scattered Northern Guard was divided into three portions. One portion trained in the jungle, another stood defense at the northern gate, and the remaining was in charge of patrolling to prevent brawling inside the city.

    Before he¡¯d came here, Han Shuo knew Lawrence was acquainted with the highestmander of the city¡¯s Northern Guard, Count Boris Carlin, so he hadn¡¯t been worried at all.

    In the Lancelot Empire, the majority of military power was in the hands of the nobility. Lawrence¡¯s uncle, Boris Carlin, for example, was a count of the Empire. The Carlin family in the Empire was regarded as a grand family. Lawrence¡¯s father in name and Boris¡¯s older brother, Eevee Carlin, was one rank higher as a Marquis of the Empire.

    Eevee Carlin had an intimate rtionship with the King due to his connection with Lawrence. With Eevee¡¯s support, plus his own extraordinary military talent, Boris Carlin was able to sit on the position of the Northern Guard¡¯s highestmander.

    Obviously Lawrence arranged for Han Shuo to be here because his uncle was in charge of this organization. The soldiers in the castle all knew of the rtionship between Lawrence and Boris, that was why they treated the former so respectfully. Even Han Shuo, following Lawrence, also received the same treatment.

    ¡°Oh, my lovely Lawrence, you haven¡¯te to see me in such a long time!¡± The group was heading to the third floor of the castle, when an army man of one meter eighty centimeters in height with a rough, beardy face, called out loudly from a distant staircase.

    ¡°Hi dear uncle, aren¡¯t I visiting you right now? Hehe, I¡¯ve brought an outstanding person here. Isn¡¯t your nephew good to you?¡± Lawrenceughed all the way as he pulled Han Shuo to Boris.

    Borisughed heartily with a resounding voice. He swept a nce over Han Shuo and said, ¡°Is this the Bryan that you¡¯ve mentioned to me many times? Haha, his body is unexpectedly strong, and he¡¯s an incredible mage to boot. Truly unimaginable!¡±

    Due to his practice of magical cultivation, Han Shuo was now one meter ny centimeters tall. His back was as straight as a javelin, naturally emitting an extraordinary presence. Although he was wearing an ordinary magic robe, this presence emitting from his body simply couldn¡¯t be concealed.

    ¡°Greetings honored Count Boris. Please take care of me from now on!¡± Han Shuo had a firm grasp on the situation. He smiled and bowed respectfully.

    ¡°Well said, well said!¡± Borisughed loudly again and spoke to the guiding officer, ¡°Gilok, you help Bryanplete the procedures.¡±

    ¡°Lawrence, Bryan,ee,e to my room for a bit!¡± Boris waited for the two to step up the stairs before enthusiastically grabbing onto them, leading them straight to the biggest room on the third floor. All the guards respectfully saluted Boris along the way.

    Boris¡¯ hand was rough like an old tree bark¡¯s. Han Shuo immediately understood from the sensation that he used heavy weaponry. Han Shuo had heard Lawrence mention that Boris was an earth rider.

    Boris¡¯ room was built in with big boulders, bright and spacious. There wasn¡¯t any luxurious items, only some simple furniture. It seemed Boris wasn¡¯t an extravagant person.

    ¡°All of you are dismissed. Don¡¯t let anyone in for now!¡± Boris ordered upon reaching the doorstep. The two senior swordsmen withdrew themselves without a word and stood guard at a distance from the door.

    When the three had settled down in the room, Boris went straight to the point, ¡°Bryan, I¡¯ll be frank on ount of your rtionship with Lawrence. Since you¡¯vee here, I¡¯ll help you obtain the title of duke in the fastest way possible. Lawrence told me that you have endless potential and will definitely be a great assistant of his. I believe in his vision.¡±

    ¡°Thank you, Sir Count!¡± Han Shuo nodded slightly and smiled with gratitude.

    ¡°No need to be polite. Hehe, helping you is helping Lawrence, which is also helping myself. We¡¯ll have you stay in the magic corps for now with no particr status. However, when you make a military achievement to the Northern Guard, plus your identity as a mage, I can help you apply for a noble title. From then on, your rank will gradually increased based on your contributions.¡± Boris looked at Han Shuo and slowly exined.

    ¡°Uncle Boris, for this period when Bryan is in the Northern Guard, the Viscount title will do just fine. The higher titles aren¡¯t as easily acquired through the Northern Guard, I have my own ns!¡± Lawrence had long since made his ns about Han Shuo¡¯s position. Considering the achievements and power of the Northern Guard, it might only be enough for Han Shuo to be a viscount here. Even Boris was only a count after all, it would be difficult to promote Han Shuo once more in the Northern Guard.

    ¡°Hehe, you little boy. Good, I just have something here, if you can do well Bryan, your credit will definitely be recognized. I can help you obtain a title faster then!¡± Boris rolled his eyes at Lawrence before telling Han Shuo with a smile.

    His thoughts moved, Han Shuo was immediately interested, ¡°What matter?¡±

 Chapter 274: Who dares to act wildly?

    Chapter 274: Who dares to act wildly?

    ¡°The Imperial weapons factory has developed a new type of chariot that can consecutively shoot bolts thousands of miles away. This secret arsenal was located in the wilderness to the north of the city and was originally under the responsibility of our Northern Guard. However, one night about half a month ago, a group of assassins suddenly snuck in and killed the guards, in addition to a dozen inventors there. They also took the blueprints of the chariot.¡±

    ¡°His Majesty the King was furious when he heard this news and gave me a month to arrest this gang and retrieve the blueprints at all costs. This matter is really stressing me out. If you can help me resolve it, I guarantee that you¡¯ll easily receive the title of baron!¡± Boris turned gloomy upon talking about this matter, his heartyugh from earlier had long since disappeared.

    ¡°Mhm, I too am thinking of a way to resolve this. If we don¡¯t capture those people and take back the blueprint within a month, it could affect my uncle¡¯s career!¡± Lawrence sighed softly and turned to Han Shuo as he spoke, somewhat worried. Boris was his backer. In his struggle for the throne, whether or not Lawrence could stand out mainly relied on the power of his supporters.

    First prince Charles currently had the biggest influence and also the most supporters. Lawrence had the weakest force due to him being an illegitimate child. His status would certainly be affected if the people closest to him lost their standing.

    Han Shuo wrinkled his brows, thinking for a bit before opening his mouth to say, ¡°If it¡¯s been half a month, wouldn¡¯t they have left the capital already? If they really did, it¡¯d be like finding a needle in a haystack if we want to catch them!¡±

    ¡°They shouldn¡¯t have. I immediately reported this to His Majesty before anything else when this happened. Master Candide, one of the three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle, took notice of this and ordered the guards to strengthen the defense of the four gates, not letting any suspicious character leave. I¡¯m positive that they haven¡¯t been able to leave Ossen City!¡± Boris said in a low voice, his face solemn.

    ¡°I see. Then did Master Candide tell you who was taking charge of this mission?¡± Han Shuo asked. Everyone with a high position all knew of the Dark Mantle¡¯s existence. Candide was the most mysterious, most difficult to reach figure. Han Shuo understood the protocol of the Dark Mantle. An enemy country must be pulling the strings behind such a major matter, so the Dark Mantle couldn¡¯t afford to not send anyone to handle it. Boris smiled wryly and shook his head as he replied, ¡°I only know of his name, but didn¡¯t have the honor of meeting him. I got this information from a higher-up. Although I tried to check afterwards, I wasn¡¯t able to find out who¡¯s in charge of this.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded with a faint smile and said, ¡°This I understand. I will try my best. When I see Master Candide, I will ask him about what¡¯s going on.¡±

    Boris was shocked, he urgently asked, ¡°You, you know Master Candide?¡±

    ¡°I forgot to tell you uncle, but Bryan has another identity as a Dark Mantle member!¡± Lawrence turned to exin to Boris, then asked with the same shocked expression, ¡°Bryan, I only know you¡¯re a member of the Dark Mantle, but can you really meet that old monster Candide directly?¡±

    ¡°He¡¯s directly in charge for me!¡± Han Shuo nodded with a smile.

    Lawrence was immediately ecstatic upon hearing this. He looked at Han Shuo with eyes full of excitement, ¡°I really didn¡¯t think that you had such a special position in the Dark Mantle to directly answer to that old monster. It seems like I¡¯ve truly made the right choice!¡±

    ¡°Very good!¡± Boris was also overjoyed. He gave Lawrence a grateful look and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Then I¡¯ll leave this matter in your carepletely. As long as you can handle it, I¡¯ll take care of obtaining a baron title for you!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll do my best!¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t dare to guarantee anything. After all, he didn¡¯t know the specifics of the situation. The Dark Mantle might have a widework, but it wasn¡¯t omnipotent.

    ¡°Alright. Uncle Boris, Bryan belongs to your magic corps only in name, so you needn¡¯t assign him to any jobs. He won¡¯te to the Northern Guard if there¡¯s nothing else. We¡¯ll be going for now.¡± Lawrence stood up and said straightforwardly. He didn¡¯t mouth empty pleasantries in front of his uncle.

    ¡°Rest assured, I know what to do. Helping him is helping you, and also helping myself. I understand this clearly!¡± Boris obviously wouldn¡¯t keep Han Shuo in the camp to do petty chores after knowing thetter¡¯s identity as a member of the Dark Mantle. He understood Han Shuo had joined purely to umte military credit and rely on the Northern Guard for a quick promotion. Han Shuo absolutely wouldn¡¯t stay for long.

    Lawrence and Han Shuo left the Northern Guard together. As they exited through the city gates, Lawrence asked Han Shuo, ¡°Are you certain you can handle this? This matter is rted to my uncle¡¯s career, I¡¯ll leave it in your hands!¡±

    ¡°I can only try my best. After all, I don¡¯t know the specific details yet.¡± Han Shuo replied. At this moment, when he was getting onto Lawrence¡¯s carriage, Han Shuo suddenly frowned and whispered, ¡°Lawrence, be careful on the way!¡±

    Lawrence was stunned and asked in a low voice without a flicker in his expression, ¡°Is someone attempting to kill me?¡±

    ¡°You get in the carriage first, I won¡¯t leave together with you, but will protect you from the shadows!¡± Han Shuo nodded, indicating that Lawrence shouldn¡¯t act rashly and alert the enemy.

    ¡°Alright, then I¡¯ll be going first!¡± Lawrence said loudly, his face shing a smile like nothing had happened as he got into the carriage and left.

    As soon as Lawrence had left in the carriage, Han Shuo turned down another street. He walked dozens of meters before seeing a carriage in a corner. He shouted lowly, ¡°Chester, why are you here?¡±

    Chester, wearing a coachman outfit turned his head upon hearing the familiar voice and eximed in delighted surprise, ¡°Bryan, why are you here?¡±

    Two small hands suddenly lifted the curtain. The touchingly charming Emily appeared, covering her mouth as she lightly shouted in joy, ¡°Rascal, what are you doing here?¡±

    After a long time, Emily was ever heartbreakingly beautiful. Her long hair was done up high, and she wore a long purple dress, along with her figure elegant and solemn eyebrows revealed an invible holiness. Her presence waspletely different from the flirtatious manner the first time Han Shuo had met her.

    ¡°I went to the Northern Guard for a job. I discovered Chester looking around so I came to see. What are you guys doing here?¡± Han Shuo wrinkled his brows, asking urgently.

    ¡°The Northern Guard lost a chariot blueprint. I¡¯m in charge of this mission and have sent people to inquire about the details of the situation.¡± Because of their rtionship, Emily told Han Shuo about the secret mission without hesitation.

    Delight flooded his heart, Han Shuo said, ¡°So that¡¯s why. Haha, we are really destined to be together! Okay, I¡¯ll talk to you when Ie to the Dark Mantle¡¯s base in the city¡¯s northern castle tonight. Now I have some matters to deal with, see you tonight.¡±

    As he finished speaking, Han Shuo nodded towards Chester and quickly vanished into the night, not paying attention to Emily, who was full of confusion.

    ¡°Master Bryan is bing more and more mysterious these days. I heard he made a great achievement again, the Dark Mantlework is spreading legends of his power!¡± Chester couldn¡¯t help but say in admiration upon seeing Han Shuo disappear in the blink of an eye.

    ¡°He only pretends to be mysterious. Why hasn¡¯t that brat returned yet? We need to quickly handle this matter and return to the base in the northern stronghold as soon as possible!¡± Emily was impatient when she saw Han Shuo appear. She began to begrudge her man who¡¯d gone over to the Northern Guard.

    ¡°Be careful!¡± Sitting in the carriage, Lawrence lifted the curtain to speak softly to earth rider Jino, who was riding a horse beside him.

    ¡°Rest assured, we will protect the young master well!¡± Jino rode a war horse. He wore shiny silver armor, his hand grasping a silver spear.

    ¡°Mm, just be very careful!¡± Lawrence waspletely calm, but still repeatedly advised.

    After his partnership with Han Shuo in Valen City, Lawrence knew very well about thetter¡¯s miraculous ability, so he had no doubt about Han Shuo¡¯s words. With Jino leading the experts out in the open and old assassin Lucky near him for personal protection, Lawrence wasn¡¯t too worried.

    Moreover, Han Shuo had told him he¡¯d secretly protect him before leaving, so Lawrence was even more assured, given his understanding of Han Shuo¡¯s strength. After all, Lawrence had personally seen his terrifying power.

    When the group reached a long alley, a long, shrill whistle suddenly resounded. The ground violently shook before a three meter long earth spikes shot towards Lawrence¡¯s carriage. The spikes also ambushed Jino¡¯s group on war horses at the same time. The horses were pierced and killed in the blink of an eye.

    Fortunately, Lawrence¡¯s group had been on alert. As soon as the ground had trembled, they¡¯d immediately jumped out of the carriage and off their horses to an area free of the earth spikes.

    Several archers shot a series of sharp arrows from the rooftops around the alley. The arrows howled through the air as they whizzed straight towards Lawrence¡¯s group. Jino and the knights quickly spread out to surround Lawrence and raised their shields in defense.

    ¡°Pok, continue to release the earth spikes!¡± A ck robed mage shouted towards another rooftop.

    ¡°I¡¯m Bryan from the Northern Guard¡¯s magic corps. Who dares to act wildly in my jurisdiction? Are you tired of living?¡± Bryan came out from another direction,ughing coldly, his hand holding a head dripping with blood.

    ¡°Pok!¡± The ck robed mage immediately screamed in shock upon seeing the head in Han Shuo¡¯s hand.

 Chapter 275: Killing two birds with one stone

    Chapter 275: Killing two birds with one stone

    There were a total of ten people in the group that had ambushed Lawrence¡ª

    three mages, four archers, and three swordsmen.

    Amongst the three swordsmen, only one was a swordmaster, while the other two were senior swordsmen. Except for the earth adept mage that Han Shuo had already killed, there was one space adept mage and the ck robed dark archmage.

    The ck robed mage felt a chill down his spine when he saw Han Shuo appear with Pok¡¯s head in hand. The two mages had been back to back, yet he hadn¡¯t even noticed when Pok was killed. This indicated the absolutely extraordinary strength of the neer.

    ¡°Kill this person first!¡± The ck robed mage shouted, about to chant a magic incantation.

    Suddenly, the big tree next to him swayed in an odd manner. Like a peacock disying its tail, the tree branches turned into sharp arrows and shot towards the mage in a hail of sharp missiles that covered the sky. He simply had no time to react as dozen of branches transformed his body into a pincushion. He turned into a hedgehog, his blood flowing profusely.

    The mage¡¯s eyes were still wide open as he died. He couldn¡¯t ept the fact that the tree had suddenly turned into a murder weapon. Why did the ordinary tree suddenly turn into an unblinking murder weapon?

    The two senior swordsmen were dressed in ck nightwalker outfits as they jumped down from the rooftop, intending to kill Han Shuo firsthand. Ludicrously, three cracks somehow appeared on the ground where theynded. They¡¯d wanted to borrow the force of their movement to spring towards Han Shuo, but let out a tragic scream as they were swallowed by the cracks like flies casting themselves into a spider¡¯s web. The remaining people looked on, dumbfounded at the weird happenings with perturbed hearts. The swordmaster assassin then ordered in a grave tone, ¡°Retreat!¡±

    The four archers and the space adept mage were as if granted amnesty by this word. They quickly turned around, about to flee.

    ¡°Want to escape? Heh heh, it¡¯s my first day of work today! I¡¯ll gain some standing for catching all of you!¡± Han Shuo leisurely gave chase while smiling cutely.

    The swordmaster leapt, his feet about to tap the small tree next to him when the tree unexpectedly came to life, the snake-like branches tightly wrapping around his ankle. More and more of branches twisted like octopus tentacles and tightly bound the lower half of his body.

    The swordmaster¡¯s face was dreadful as he waved his sword, attempting to hack off the soft branches. However at this precise moment, old assassin Lucky emerged from the shadows and approached like a ghost to finishe the struggling swordmaster.

    Han Shuo was about to act, but halted upon seeing Lucky approach. He understood this swordmaster would be hard pressed to escape death, so he turned his sights to the four archers and the space adept mage.

    ¡°Bryan, capture one alive!¡± Lawrence was both surprised and overjoyed. He didn¡¯t expect Han Shuo to be so stunning and calm in the face of so many experts. He¡¯d used some unexpected method to casually y with them in his hand.

    ¡°Ah! Murder murder! Shut the door, quickly shut the door!¡± Even though this alley was remote, there were still people in the broad daylight. Several civilians opened the windows to take a peek upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s shouts, then hastily shut both their windows and doors in horror of the fear of being implicated.

    Han Shuo¡¯s sensitive hearing soon caught the sound of a cavalry team quickly approaching from afar. He looked in the direction where the four archers had escaped andughed sinisterly.

    His body shing with a whooshing sound like a stone thrown from a catapult, hended in the midst of the four archers in the blink of an eye. The Demonyer Edge instantly took three lives like a demon summoned from hell.

    Han Shuo restrained thest archer by grabbing the back of his neck, lifting him up using one hand. The archer was only one meter and seventy centimeters tall, so his legs iled around upon being lifted up. He grunted gutterly and couldn¡¯t utter aplete word as he looked down in horror at Han Shuo.

    The quiver on the back of this poor archer had long since been thrown away. Although he struggled with all that he had, he couldn¡¯t reach Han Shuo since his two arms were shorter than thetter¡¯s. It looked quiteical.

    ¡°Kid, be good and your crime will be lessened!¡± Han Shuo grinned. He walked back towards Lawrence while easily holding the archer.

    The other space adept mage didn¡¯t get to take a few steps before he was coldly shot down by a dark arrow in the middle of his back. The dead mage fell from the rooftop to the ground.

    The person who shot the arrow was the old assassin Lucky. Han Shuo had seen the happenings clearly, so he wasn¡¯t surprised about the space adept mage¡¯s death.

    ¡°Who, who dares to fight on the street!?¡± The cavalry rushed from a distance only when everything was over. The leading officer was fully armored as he shouted loudly.

    ¡°You city guards are truly unreliable!¡± Lawrence on the other side shook his head and let out a long sigh. He didn¡¯t spare a nce towards the officer and looked towards Han Shuo with appreciation, ¡°Many thanks, Bryan!¡±

    ¡°Alright. I choked this person unconscious, so you look after him yourself. Remember that I protected you this time, so the Dark Mantle higher-ups will take note of this aplishment. In addition, I protected the order of the northern castle and prevented a malicious assassination, so the Northern Guard should record this credit for me!¡± Aplishing two deeds in one go, what a great harvest! Han Shuo was secretly smug.

    ¡°Got it!¡± Lawrence understood what he meant and answered with a smile.

    ¡°Mm, there¡¯s no more danger on the road, I¡¯ll be leaving then!¡± Han Shuo only flung out these words before leaving in style.

    The officer had originally wanted to stop him, but he simply didn¡¯t have to courage to say anything and let Han Shuo leave leisurely when he recognized Lawrence and saw how the two were chatting warmly.

    Han Shuo reached the Dark Mantle¡¯s northern stronghold at night as he¡¯d promised. Emily had been waiting for quite some time. When she saw Han Shuo appear, she immediately waved her hand to signal Chester to withdraw so that she could be intimate with Han Shuo.

    The two discussed what had happened after they¡¯d parted at the Valley of Sunshine. They also talked about the Northern Guard¡¯s stolen blueprint.

    ¡°Are there any clues?¡± Han Shuo asked Emily after listening.

    ¡°I¡¯m inspecting this closely, but I can be certain that the people haven¡¯t left Ossen City since the Dark Mantle immediately started investigations. Our people are stationed at all four gates. The foreigners are being detained by the Empire, so they have no chance to slip out.¡±

    ¡°We actually discovered a few suspicious groups recently. However, we can¡¯t be sure if they were the ones behind this. I¡¯m investigating this with full force. As long as I can determine which group did this, none of them will be able to escape Ossen City. You just wait for my news. Although this problem is tricky, the Dark Mantle will definitely handle it properly since it urred inside the city.¡± Emily had a cautious expression as she whispered in a low voice.

    ¡°Store these two things well. They will definitely help increase your power!¡± Han Shuo took out the magic staff embedded with three amethysts, and a notebook in which he recorded everything he remembered from Ayermike Cotton¡¯s ancient notebook. He handed them over to Emily.

    ¡°For, for me?¡± Emily was stunned upon seeing these two things, her mind temporarily dizzy. She understood clearly how valuable these things were.

    Ayermike Cotton¡¯s handwritten notebook had recorded his experiences, understandings, and feelings about dark magic. It was a sacred object that every dark mage would give an arm and a leg for. As for the magic staff, its value was even more difficult to calcte, given the terrifyingly rich dark elements on the surface.

    Emily had already had a faint premonition when she heard Han Shuo say he had taken down a copy of the notebook. However, her heart still pounded wildly in disbelief when he actually handed these two treasures to her.

    ¡°Of course, they belonged to you the moment I got them. However you need to prepare a reason for this magic staff so it won¡¯t rouse Candide¡¯s suspicion!¡± Han Shuo had turned in the original handwritten notebook to Candide, but concealed the matter about t Ayermike Cotton¡¯s magic staff. To dark mages, this magic staff certainly wouldn¡¯t have the ordinary effect of magnifying magic spells. Han Shuo reminded Emily in advance so that she could evade Candide¡¯s scrutiny.

    Emily inhaled deeply and murmured, ¡°The Dark Star staff belonged to magic god Ayermike Cotton. It¡¯s thick covering of dark element can help dark mages gather their mental strength faster. Be it training or casting magic, the speed should be five times faster when using the Dark Star staff. This staff is considered a divine artifact for dark mages¡±

    ¡°Then there¡¯s also theprehension of dark magic from magic god Ayermike. If I canpletely understand everything, my power will increase by leaps and bounds and reach new heights. These, these two things are simply priceless artifacts for dark mages!¡±

    ¡°No need to be so moved. I know full well of their value. They belong to you now!¡± When Han Shuo saw Emily so happy to the point of forgetting everything else, he hugged her by the waist and continued, ¡°Eat this pill. It can give you eternal youth and is very beneficial to the study of dark magic.¡±

    Emily¡¯s heart almost stopped beating from excitement when she heard the two words ¡°eternal youth¡±. One good thing after another was falling on her head today, all of which was brought about by Han Shuo. This was the first time she¡¯d ever experienced such a thing in her life, and it also proved her position in Han Shuo¡¯s heart.

    ¡°Eternal youth, eternal youth...¡± Emily was most concerned about her age. Her being older than Han Shuo had been a knot in her heart. Now that there was a medicine that could maintain eternal youth, she was willing to pay any price no matter what. Her whole being became distracted as she muttered nonstop.

    ¡°Eat it, I¡¯ll help you dissolve the pill!¡± Han Shuo whispered. He pulled her over by the hand and brought the Rebirth Pill to her lips.

    Emily¡¯s eyes shone brightly, she swallowed the Rebirth Pill without hesitation. Afterwards her bones emitted cracking sounds as the Rebirth Pill reformed her body bit by bit Han Shuo¡¯s help.

    Like Fanny and Phoebe, Emily also had a need for the toilet. She only felt assured after Han Shuo told her the pill¡¯s side effect.

    Han Shuo left the stronghold and went straight to the Boozt Merchant Guild.

    In the deserted training field inside the guild, Phoebe was wearing a pure white warrior outfit, her hair braided and tied into a ponytail. The sword in her hand whistled as it danced around. He body moved like a lightning bolt within the field, shadow images appeared one after another from the high speed. Extremely sharp silver crosses blossomed from the sword as they hacked a huge rock into fragments with rumbling sounds.

    Suddenly, Phoebe seemed to discover something. She raised the sword in her hand and shot spinning cross-des towards a small tree. Cracking sounds echoed as the tree exploded into hundreds of pieces.

    A ck light shed, a shadow behind the tree rushed forward at a very high speed and slipped through the spinning cross-des. A huge killing aura enveloped Phoebe and restrained her. Dread spread from the depths of her soul and filled her mind. In the blink of an eye, everything around her seemed to be confined by the killing intent. Phoebe suddenly felt her body stiffen up, she simply couldn¡¯t move. A deep fear surged in her heart.

    However, the violently churning killing intent suddenly stopped when it almost touched Phoebe¡¯s delicate body. It spread to the sides, not hurting her in the least bit. When the killing intent disappeared and she rxed her whole body, Han Shuo appeared right in front of her eyes with a slight smile.

    ¡°Congrattions! I didn¡¯t expect you would reach the rank of great swordmaster at such a young age. Truly incredible!¡± Han Shuo looked at Phoebe with a smile and congratted her.

    Phoebe rushed into Han Shuo¡¯s chest with happy surprise, like a young swallow returning to its nest. A faint fragrance, mixed with a dash taste of sweat, instantly assaulted his nostrils. She tightly embraced Han Shuo and said in a sweet, excited voice, ¡°All thanks to that medicinal pill or I wouldn¡¯t be able to breakthrough so quickly. Take a look, how am I different from before?¡±

    Like Fanny, Phoebe¡¯s skin was soft and delicate like silk. Her already beautiful smile was now even more soul-shaking after the Rebirth Pill¡¯s reformation.

    ¡°You¡¯ve be much more beautiful!¡± Han Shuo replied honestly.

    ¡°Mm, I¡¯m all sweaty, let me take a bath first!¡± Phoebe softly pushed Han Shuo away and walked to her bathroom, somewhat embarrassed. Suddenly, she stopped halfway and said in a light voice that couldn¡¯t be lighter, ¡°Come with me!¡±

 Chapter 276: The lovebirds shared a bath

    Chapter 276: The lovebirds shared a bath

    Ossen city pce, to the west in a luxurious residence...

    NSFW

    ¡°Rest assured, the whole Empire is mine in the future, this small matter is nothing much!¡± Charles let out a pervertedugh. He took out an aphrodisiac pill, about to swallow it for another round of ¡°battle¡±.

    However, at that moment, a strange sound echoed in the room. Charles¡¯ expression changed. He immediately put the pill away and quickly put on his pants, saying in a hurry, ¡°I have an important matter to attend to, you must leave. Now!¡±

    The beautiful woman hurriedly pulled up the dress pooling around her knees upon hearing this. She left through the side door without another word and disappeared in a blink of an eye.

    The thin and tall duke Ashburn rushed in directly following the strange sound. He gave Charles a nce and said with displeasure, ¡°I can¡¯t believe you still have the heart to be licentious at this moment.¡±

    ¡°Sorry uncle, what happened?¡± Charles looked very humble in front of Ashburn. He bowed and honestly admitted his wrongdoings.

    ¡°Failure. Of the killers sent by Shadow Ghost, one was captured alive, the rest were ughtered.¡± Ashburn said in a low tone, his face gloomy.

    ¡°How could that be? We investigated clearly earlier, even if those killers couldn¡¯t kill him, they shouldn¡¯t have ended up like that?¡± Charles was shocked, he couldn¡¯t understand how Lawrence had done it.

    Ashburn was in a bad mood. The Shadow Ghost had suffered a heavy loss and one killer had even been captured alive, which made him very worried. He said again in a gloomy manner, ¡°Something unexpected happened. That meddling Bryan seems to yed a major role, otherwise the situation wouldn¡¯t have been so bad!¡±

    ¡°The boyfriend of the Boozt Merchant Guild master Phoebe? How could it be?! He¡¯s but an adept mage, what could he do with that kind of power?¡± Charles could hardly believe it. He had met Han Shuost time in the Rose Garden and felt that Han Shuo¡¯s power wasn¡¯t enough to be feared.

    ¡°This person isn¡¯t simple. After Aubrey came back from the Boozt Merchant Guild, his body was hot one moment and cold the other, and it turned into a serious illness a few dayster. Even Aubrey, with his power, fell victim to this person¡¯s trap. Bryan definitely isn¡¯t easy to deal with. It seemed we first have to get rid of this hindrance now that he¡¯s appeared again.¡± Ashburn paced back and forth as he thought for a while before saying coldly.

    ¡°All will be as uncle says!¡± To Charles, this uncle was his important backing. Ashburn held a great deal of power and yed a crucial role in Charles¡¯ fight for the throne. Moreover, Charles didn¡¯t dare not listen to Ashburn given their familial rtionship.

    Nodding his head, Ashburn said, ¡°Phoebe¡¯s master is the sacred swordmaster Karel Ascot. He came to visit me earlier. The old fellow hasn¡¯t expressed if he supports Lawrence or not, so we temporarily shouldn¡¯t make an enemy out of him. This old fellow knows very well that I also have some experts, so I can¡¯t allow them to act because of Bryan¡¯s intimate rtionship with Phoebe. The Shadow Ghost is now severely damaged and may not be able to mobilize their men again in a short time. Only you can kill Bryan!¡±

    ¡°No problem. A while ago at the Brut Merchant Alliance, the great swordmaster Leah Cain offended the lightning sacred magus Reynold D. He took advantage of the chaos in the Brut Merchant Alliance to escape to the Empire and flocked to my banner. He¡¯ll arrive in two days. No one knows about this yet, so he¡¯s the perfect one to send out.¡±

    ¡°That maniac?¡± Ashburn was started, then nodded as he said with a sinisterugh, ¡°Then I can be at ease!¡±

    ......

    Phoebe¡¯s room.

    The sound of running water echoed from within. Phoebe¡¯s clear, cheerful voice sweetly resounded, ¡°Heh, are youfortable?¡±

    Gentle mist covered the whole room from a spacious bathtub, the water inside decorated with countless petals emitting a fresh fragrance. Han Shuo was wearing shorts as hey on the edge of the bathtub. Phoebe had a thin veil draped over her body. She sat next to Han Shuo and leaned over to massage him, helping his muscles rx.

    Han Shuo squinted his eyes as hezilyy still. He said, somewhat disappointed, ¡°Comfortable yes, just not in the way I imagined it. I thought you wanted me to join you in the tub and do something else!¡±

    ¡°Humph, I knew you¡¯d have naughty thoughts. Giving you a massage is good enough! I haven¡¯t ever given anyone a massage up until now, but you still aren¡¯t content!¡± Phoebe had her hair up in a high bun, with a few strands naughtily falling on her shoulder. The thin veil couldn¡¯t cover up her youthful air as her white jade skin revealed a natural rosiness.

    Han Shuo had done it with Emily beforeing here, but still found it hard to contain himself. It was a pity that he promised to not force Phoebe, so no matter how difficult it was, he could only grit his teeth and bitterly endure for fear that she¡¯d be truly angered.

    ¡°Bryan, what was that pill you gave me? How could it be so miraculous? If you can refine a lot of it, our guild will definitely earn a lot of money. I¡¯m afraid no woman can resist the temptation of this medicinal pill even if they have to pay a sky high cost!¡± Phoebe softly asked Han Shuo like a little wife. However, her mind was still thinking business as she massaged Han Shuo¡¯s shoulders.

    ¡°Forget it. That pill cost too much in precious resources. Besides, the Rebirth Pill can not only give you eternal youth, it can also help you revitalize yourself. Be it body or spirit, both will be reinforced immensely. I had to spent a lot of time collecting the treasures of heaven and earth in the depths of the Dark Forest to finally refine a few. You think it¡¯s easy to make?!¡± Han Shuo exined with a wry smile. Both Fanny and Phoebe were obsessed with the Rebirth Pill. Han Shuo gave them the Rebirth Pill as he was mostly worried about their power. Unfortunately, they only cared about maintaining their beauty and didn¡¯t focus much on raising their strength.

    ¡°Is that so? Then there¡¯s really no way!¡± Phoebe eximed in disappointment, then softly giggled, ¡°That¡¯s also fine. From now on, no one can have such beautiful skin like me, hehe!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart immediately jumped upon hearing her say so. He secretly wondered if Phoebe, Emily, and Fanny would detect anything from each other¡¯s delicate skin when they met each other. If so, then wouldn¡¯t he be hoisting himself high on an execution stage of his own making?

    Slightly shaking his head, Han Shuo didn¡¯t want to think about it anymore. He turned his body to embrace Phoebe tightly. Her soaked, smooth, white skin seemed to merge with the thin veil, causing him to have naughty thoughts.

    ¡°Just kissing okay?!¡± Phoebe said softly with a chuckle and turned her fragrant lips to Han Shuo.

    When their lips touched, Han Shuo finally couldn¡¯t suppress himself. However, he was in a bind as he remembered his promise to Phoebe earlier.

    Suddenly, an idea popped in his head. Han Shuo recalled several secret demonic magic methods from Chu Cang Lan and formed a secret n. While he intensely kissed Phoebe¡¯s cherry lips, his hands caressed some of her sensitive areas. He tried using a few provocation methods to see if they were really that miraculous.

    ¡°Oh...¡±

    Phoebe moaned out sobbing-like sounds. Her soft body¡¯s temperature kept soaring as her smooth skin flushed red. Her breathing grew more and more urgent. She finally couldn¡¯t suppress it any longer and hugged Han Shuo tightly like an octopus.

    Phoebe was already this aroused after Han Shuo had surreptitiously used two moves. This truly made him happy inside. He secretly thought that the demonic magic from that old monster Chu Cang Lan was truly useful. He moved his hands up and down then rested them around her small waist while kissing Phoebe.

    It wasn¡¯t long before Phoebe lost control of herself first. Her eyes zed as if she¡¯d fallen into an erotic dreand. She took the initiative to take the thin veil off her body. She panted and glided over to Han Shuo, softly calling, ¡°Bryan... Bryan...¡±

    Secretly rejoicing, Han Shuo put on an evil smile and said, ¡°If we continue like this, I¡¯m afraid I won¡¯t be able to hold myself back. Let¡¯s stop here today?¡±

    ¡°You scoundrel, I knew I couldn¡¯t escape the palm of your hand. Forget it, forget it!¡± Phoebe softly eximed and slowly removed everything on her body, revealing a perfect figure. Highly protruding peaks, t belly and a pair of long, extremely beautiful legs appeared just like that in front of Han Shuo without cover.

    Letting out a light cry, Phoebe took the initiative to move over to Han Shuo and reached out with her jade hands to help fling off his shorts. She used her strength to hug Han Shuo tightly and buried herself into his broad chest, whispering, ¡°After seeing you relieve yourselfst time in the Valley of Sunshine, I had already intended to give it to you then. From now on, you don¡¯t need to hold back anymore!¡±

    Han Shuo was betweenughter and tears, but had no way to exin. He hadn¡¯t thought that a misunderstanding would lead to this. It seemed this was also thanks to Emily¡¯s assistance.

    NSFW

    ¡°Did it hurt?¡± Phoebe¡¯s earlier performance could only be described as insane. This was her first time, so Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but ask in concern.

    ¡°I, I don¡¯t know. I think I went crazy. There was basically no pain. When I snapped out of it I was already like this!¡± Phoebe was embarrassed, her voice small as a mosquito¡¯s.

    Han Shuo was shocked upon hearing these words. He secretly thought that the demonic sexual provocation method was truly overbearing indeed. Even a girl with a resolute mind like Phoebe couldn¡¯t help but fall into madness. It it had been an ordinary woman, they might have lost all reason and be a harlot begging for punishment.

    ¡°I¡¯m dead tired, let¡¯s rest for a while!¡± Phoebe was truly tired. She¡¯d initiated the earlier lovemaking and had demanded madly from Han Shuo. Moreover it was her first time, so her whole body was sluggish.

    ¡°Mm, you rest!¡± Han Shuo gently picked Phoebe up and ced her on a warm ce next to the bathtub. He himself sat cross-legged in the bathtub and circted the magical yuan.

 Chapter 277: Advancing to Archmage Necromancer

    Chapter 277: Advancing to Archmage Necromancer

    The eastern section of Ossen city was where the business organizations gathered and associations were established. Aside from all sorts of shops, the Magic Association, Swordsman Association, Archer Association, Thief Association, and Mercenary Association were all located in the eastern part of the city.

    Theserge and small guilds were extremely influential and spanned the entire Profound Continent. They were in every single country and were redited organizations for all professions. As long as any mage or swordsman was redited by the association, they would be able to receive an appropriate rank that was recognized by any country on the Profound Continent.

    The Magic Association¡¯s building was like a tall tower. It looked like a magic tower from afar. Unlike the Swordsman Association and Mercenary Association buildings, it¡¯s entrance was not filled with endless people. Instead, very few people entered, causing the Magic Association¡¯s entrance to appear rather deserted.

    Mages were the most mysterious group of people on the Profound Continent. In terms of numbers, they were naturally unable topare to the vast number of swordsmen and knights. That was why there appeared to be so few mages that came to the Magic Association to be tested.

    Since Phoebe was too tired right now and had yet to wake up. Han Shuo arrived at the Magic Association by himself after daylight broke, after putting her on the bed properly. Right now, Han Shuo had the mental strength of a grand magus, but was still an archmage in name. Furthermore, Han Shuo had fully assimted rendon¡¯s soul and could now proficiently use all the necromancy spells that thetter had known after several days of endless practice in the cemetery of death.

    However, aside from the magic abilities that rendon possessed, he¡¯d also gained the knowledge of two new spells, ¡°gue¡± and ¡°Soul Shock¡±, from the book entitled ¡°Necromancy Magic¡± that he had found in the Cemetery of Death. ¡°gue¡± was simr to ¡°Corpse Reanimation¡±. It was a most notorious, as well as the most feared,rge-scale killing magic. The spell ¡°gue¡± had made a great contribution as to why necromancers were so feared.

    ¡°gue¡± was a pure destructive magic. The scale of this magic was notrge, but what was terrifying was that it had the ability to spread quickly. As long as one person was affected by ¡°gue¡± within a town or city, unless they were immediately burnt to death and buried, the spell would follow the person wherever they went, infecting more and more people and cause them to die as their bodies rotted.

    As long as a vige, city, or even an empire did not quickly deal with it, the ce might be a hellhole. If coupled with the spell ¡°Corpse Reanimation¡±, an archmage necromancer, who was at the archmage level, would be able to reanimate all of those people who had sumbed to ¡°gue¡±, creating a terrifying zombie army out of nowhere.

    Han Shuo did not n to practice ¡°gue¡± yet, since this spell was truly too terrifying. Once ¡°gue¡± was casted, even Han Shuo himself would find it hard to control. This sort of pure destructive magic was a nightmare for any country. There was no question about him being the public enemy of the entire continent if he were to cast such a spell, so he decided not to practice it after careful consideration.

    ¡°Soul Shock¡± was a spell that directly affected the soul. Archmage necromancers had a higher understanding of the soul, and could use their own mental strength to attack the opponent¡¯s soul as a kind of surprise attack.

    Normally, a mage¡¯s mental strength was far stronger than that of a swordsman or a knight. In face of this sort of direct attack on the soul, they were still able to defend a bit with their mental strength, but swordsmen and knights had much weaker mental strengthpared to mages, so they would be at a huge disadvantage in face of this sort of attack on the soul.

    Han Shuo was currently practicing ¡°Soul Shock¡±, but since rendon¡¯s memories did not have any experience in using this spell, it was impossible for him to quickly grasp it. Spells of the archmagus level were far deeper and difficult to understand than spells of the previous levels. Even if one knew the incantation, it was still very difficult to cast it correctly. Only when their recognition and understanding of the soul reached a very high level would they be able to cat it. Although Han Shuo had yet to reach this realm, it would not be able to stop him from advancing to the archmage level.

    ¡°Excuse me, did youe to advance your level?¡± A young woman, wearing a sky blue one-piece, asked with a smile after Han Shuo walked into the Magic Association.

    Han Shuo nodded, then said with a smile, ¡°That¡¯s right, I n on advancing to a necromancer archmage, so where should I start?¡±

    ¡°First, you need to provide proof that you are indeed an adept mage. Then you have to pay a thousand gold coins as a testing fee. Regardless of whether you seeding or not, this fee will belong to the Magic Association. Do you ept?¡± This girl replied politely with a kind smile, while looking at Han Shuo with a bit of shock. There were not many mages that practiced necromancy. It surprised her that such a young man had the confidence to advance to the rank of archmage.

    A thousand gold coins. It seems that this Magic Association is very profitable! Han Shuo momentarily nked, then asked directly, ¡°No problem, when can we start?¡±

    ¡°Give me your certificate and the gold coins, I can only tell you after going upstairs and asking about it!¡± The young woman replied with a smile.

    Han Shuo handed over his graduation certificate from the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, as well as two bags of gold coins to the girl. After a nce at Han Shuo¡¯s proof, her expression became very odd, and looked at Han Shuo as if she saw a monster, before quickly saying, ¡°Wait a moment, I¡¯ll be right back!¡±

    The moment she finished speaking, the girl hiked her skirt a little, then ran up the magic tower. Her expression was extremely strange, causing Han Shuo to be a bit surprised.

    There were five floors in the Magic Association in total, withrge-scales boundaries on every floor. There was dense magical essence within the boundaries. Although Han Shuo felt a bit confused by the girl¡¯s actions, he didn¡¯t release a yin demon to go and pry due to the existence of the magical boundaries.

    After a while, a kind-looking old man with white hair hurried down the stairs. From the magical symbol on his chest, Han Shuo could tell that he was an earth grand magus. There were also a few mages behind the old man, two water archmages, two thunder archmages, and four adept mages.

    ¡°I am Ares Hosein, the person in charge of the Magic Association in the Lancelot Empire. I am in charge of the advancement exams for mages in the Lancelot Empire. Are you nning to advance to the rank of necromancy archmage?¡± The old man walked over with Han Shuo¡¯s certificate and looked at him with glittering eyes, as if he was a bit surprised.

    Han Shuo nodded and said with certainty, ¡°That¡¯s right, are there any problems?¡±

    ¡°No-no problems at all!¡± Ares quickly said and looked at Han Shuo¡¯s certificate. ¡°You advanced from a mage apprentice into an adept mage in less than two years. This-This is a miracle! Especially since you practice necromancy. If it weren¡¯t for that fact that I am familiar with your dean, Emma, and recognize that she created this certificate, I would definitely think that you had faked it.¡±

    So this was this was the case! Han Shuo thought with surprise. Then he smiled, ¡°Then, can I start?¡±

    ¡°Of course, of course. Our test is different from your academy¡¯s. We only need to test your precise mental strength. You just need to release the strongest magic you are capable of releasing in order for us to determine if you passed or not,¡± Ares¡¯s attitude was surprisingly good. He said amiably, ¡°Come with me to the second floor, we¡¯ll conduct the test there.¡±

    There was a blue boundary in the middle of the second floor, while the hard wall was engraved with all sorts of magic symbols. After arriving on the second floor, Ares took out a magic stone used to test mental strength and handed it to Han Shuo, ¡°Pour your mental powers into it. We can use the data from it to confirm whether your mental strength fits the criteria.¡±

    As Han Shuo slowly infused mental strength into the magic stone, it slowly began to glow. When Han Shuo noticed that Ares was revealing a satisfied expression, he stopped infusing mental strength in order to not pass the archmage mental strength test in a surprising manner.

    ¡°Not bad, your mental strength has indeed reached the level of an archmage. Next, you can stand inside the boundary and cast one of the strongest spells you know. We can determine through the spell whether you have truly reached the level of an archmage!¡¯ Ares¡¯s attitude towards Han Shuo was extremely good as he pointed towards the boundary kindly and said.

    With the level of development of Han Shuo¡¯s brain, his speed in gathering and releasing mental strength was ten times that of normal mages. Last time in the Babylon Academy of Magic and Forces testing, Han Shuo had understood that when other people tested their mental strength, the magic stone would glow slowly, but because Han Shuo¡¯s brain was different from normal people¡¯s, the speed at which he gathered mental strength was extremely quick. Thus, he pretty much instantly caused the magic stone to glow at the brightest luminosity.

    During the test with the magic stone today, Han Shuo intentionally released his mental strength slowly, and didn¡¯tpletely release his mental strength of a grand magus in order to avoid unnecessary trouble. Therefore, he didn¡¯t pass with any surprise.

    ¡°No need to stand in the boundary. Us necromancers don¡¯t need to be that troublesome!¡± Han Shuo smiled lightly, then properly chanted out a necromancy spell. An evil knight, in pitch ck armor, riding a warhorse with both eyes spurting fire and carrying a huge bone stick appeared on the ground out of nowhere.

    It was a publicly acknowledged fact that evil knights could only be summoned by archmage necromancers. When Han Shuo¡¯s evil knight appeared, it basically proved his level as an archmage. This was even more convincing than other powerful spells.

    ¡°God, you actually became an archmage from a magic apprentice in less than two years. This is too unbelievable! Oh yes, why did Dean Emma allow you to leave the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force? Her necromancy major shouldn¡¯t have an archmage necromancer yet. She should¡¯ve tried to keep you,¡± The moment Ares saw the evil knight appear, he knew that there was no need to say anything more. Han Shuo truly did possess the power of a necromancy archmage.

 Chapter 278: A crazy proposal

    Chapter 278: A crazy proposal

    ¡°So, can you confirm my qualifications now?¡± Han Shuo understood full well that his magical cultivation yed a huge role in his achievement today. Another reason was that his luck was quite good.

    ¡°No problem. Please wait for a moment and I¡¯llplete everything the rest for you!¡± Ares replied readily and turned to nod at the archmage next to him. The baggy-robed archmage took Han Shuo¡¯s documents to the third floor.

    ¡°Mister Ares, that person hase by again.¡± The young girl, who¡¯d been waiting downstairs, tapped her way up and informed Ares.

    Ares was stunned. He waved his hand and said, ¡°Let hime up!¡±

    Not long after, Candide came up with a remote expression. He was immediately a bit dazed upon seeing Han Shuo standing there.

    Han Shuo was also stunned, as he hadn¡¯t expected to meet Candide in a ce like this. A glint shed through his eyes, which quickly returned to normal. He stood still while still maintaining his smile.

    ¡°You old thing. Only now did you find time to spare toe visit me!¡± Aresughed heartily. He seemed to have known Candide for a long time.

    ¡°I wouldn¡¯t bothering if I didn¡¯t have something to ask. What, are you busy with something right now?¡± Candide swept a nce at Ares, then over at Han Shuo. He asked with a frown, pretending to not know who Han Shuo was at all.

    ¡°Hehe, nothing! The Babylon Academy of Magic and Force just produced a magic genius. It took him less than two years to go from a mage apprentice to archmage. This is truly a great thing! His records will be an important note in the Magic Association.¡± Ares pointed excitedly at Han Shuo and introduced him to Candide.

    Candide too was clearly shocked. He truly hadn¡¯t expected Han Shuo to have reached the rank of archmage necromancer. His eyes glinted as he stared at Han Shuo a few times over before opening his mouth to speak, ¡°Ares, if you don¡¯t mind, I would like to have a private chat with this young magic genius.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t mind, but I don¡¯t know if he minds or not!¡± Ares nced at Han Shuo, leaving it up to him.

    Ares obviously didn¡¯t know of the rtionship between Han Shuo and Candide. Han Shuo understood what Candide was saying, so he turned to nod at Ares, ¡°I have to wait for my documents anyway. Since I have nothing to do, I don¡¯t mind chatting with him for a bit!¡±

    ¡°Alright, then I¡¯ll go upstairs first. The rest of you guys can go downstairs. I won¡¯t allow anyone else toe up!¡± Ares ordered the people on the second floor before turning to Candide with a smile, ¡°His archmage certificate will bepleted by the time you two are done chatting. Juste up and let me know then.¡±

    ¡°No need to nag, I already know what to do!¡± Candide likely had a very close rtionship with Ares, as he impatiently urged thetter.

    Waiting until Ares and his group left, Candide looked at Han Shuo in an odd manner and said, ¡°I¡¯ve just got news from the Valley of Sunshine that you killed Ferguson from the Church of Light. I was going to find you to get a better understanding of the situation. I didn¡¯t expect you to be here, with the identity of a archmage necromancer to boot. You¡¯ve truly given me a surprise!¡±

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t able to suppress his heart¡¯s desire during the chaos in the Valley of Sunshine. He had acted out madly, killing grand magus Ferguson of the Church of Light and heavily injured chief Adam of the House of Menlo. This news had spread all over the Valley of Sunshine. Candide had no reason to remain in the dark towards this matter as one of the Dark Mantle¡¯s three heavyweights.

    Han Shuo silently looked at Candide, knowing that he didn¡¯t need to say anything about this matter since Candide already knew about it. On the other hand, he knew Candide would mention this, so he¡¯d prepared something to say beforehand.

    Seeing Han Shuo sink into silence and not say anything, Candide looked raptly at him, saying in a low tone, ¡°I don¡¯t know how you managed to kill Ferguson. I likely wouldn¡¯t be able to kill him myself. Ferguson is dead now, but with the great influence of the Church of Light, you¡¯ll meet an endless amount of trouble.

    ¡°Moreover, I heard that you cast the lost spell Corpse Resurrection? I think the Cmity Church will certainly try to recruit you. These two churches have a massive amount of believers all over the Profound Continent. They have dozens of methods to deal with you, so how are you going to deal with it?¡±

    ¡°Different situations call for different measures. If they dare to act against me, I¡¯ll kill all of them without leaving a single one behind!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face was ruthless. His body naturally emitted a killing intent as he said in a voice as cold as ice.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t need to conceal anything since Candide already knew about this matter. When he released the killing aura from his body, a figure at Candide¡¯s level immediately reacted.

    Nodding his head, Candide replied with a grave expression, ¡°I believe that your power is by no means weak. However, the Church of Light doesn¡¯t only have Ferguson. They don¡¯t even need to deal with you directly. They only need to pressure the king. I think His Majesty won¡¯t run the risk of offending the church for a minor character like you.¡±

    Han Shuo was even more silent upon hearing these words. With his current intelligence and Candide¡¯s reminder, Han Shuo could naturally understand what he was trying to say.

    Taking a deep breath, Candide said, ¡°You¡¯re someone that I brought into the Dark Mantle myself. I¡¯m very happy that you have such a great amount of power. Now that you have the identity of an archmage, I will give you an idea!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts raced, he asked in surprise, ¡°An idea?¡±

    Han Shuo had already been mentally prepared on how to live his life afterwards before he had killed Ferguson, so he wasn¡¯t too worried. If the Lancelot Empire sold him out under the pressure from the Church of Light, Han Shuo was confident that he could use the cemetery of death to escape. However, it¡¯d be more difficult to move around from then on.

    Now that Candide had an idea, Han Shuo naturally wanted to know if there was a way to deal with this two pronged attack against him.

    ¡°Be it the Church of Light or the Cmity Church, both are religious institutions. Their power can¡¯t dictate the movement of the Lancelot Empire, despite their widespread influences. The Church of Light is a little more difficult to deal with since they act in the light. However, if you can somehow prove your strength to be powerful enough to make His Majesty value you more than the Church of Light, given my understanding of him, the king won¡¯t care one whit about the church¡¯s pressure.¡±

    ¡°As long as his Majesty is willing to protect you, even the Church of Light wouldn¡¯t dare to do anything to you within the Lancelot Empire. After all, they aren¡¯t powerful enough to destroy the Lancelot Empire.¡± Candide looked at Han Shuo and voiced his advice.

    Han Shuo was enlightened by Candide¡¯s words. What a country needed most was indeed talented people. Those with potential were especially important to the future of the country. The Lancelot Empire had been able to maintain its strong standing for so many years due to the efforts of deity Ayermike Cotton.

    A sacred magus could release a terrifyingly strong magic that could directly destroy a city. A deity at the demigod level was even more powerful and could create unimaginable destruction. It was precisely due to the existence and assistance of Ayermike Cotton that the Lancelot Empire became so prosperous.

    After many years passed, a supernaturally powerful figure was still the most important resource to a country, particrly holy existences, such as sacred swordmasters, sacred magi, and sacred knights. The number of powerful figures was the best basis on which to determine the strength of a country. If Han Shuo could prove to the king that he could reach such a level, the king wouldn¡¯t be concerned about the threats from the Church of Light and would even wholeheartedly ensure his safety.

    ¡°Candide, do you mean...?¡± Han Shuo understood his advice, but hadn¡¯t thought of a specific way to actually do it. After all, words alone weren¡¯t enough to prove to others that one was very powerful, were they?

    ¡°The simplest way is to challenge others and prove your strength through challenging powerful people. I¡¯ve heard that you¡¯ve been hanging out with Lawrence in the city¡¯s Northern Guard. What can Lawrence hide from me? It would actually be faster for you to obtain a noble title through challenging others. When your strength arouses interest from His Majesty, you¡¯ll be able to be a noble without any aplishments to your name. Why bother with trying to achieve military feats?¡± Candide mocked, seemingly dismissive of Han Shuo and Lawrence¡¯s ns.

    ¡°Challenge, challenge powerful people. Good idea...¡± Han Shuo muttered to himself. He then took a deep breath and sincerely thanked Candide, ¡°Many thanks lord Candide. I know what to do now!¡±

    Nodding his head, Candide said casually, ¡°If it weren¡¯t for the fact that you are under my charge, and you brought back Ayermike Cotton¡¯s notebook, I wouldn¡¯t go to such lengths for you. I already came up with this n to help you once I heard that you¡¯d killed Ferguson. Challenge the people listed on this scroll one by one. You can kill them all, as they¡¯vemitted crimes worthy of death, but have managed to escape the punishment of the Empire¡¯sws. Even the Dark Mantle can¡¯t find any evidence to catch them, so we want to borrow your ability to execute them.¡±

    ¡°Since you have the power to kill Ferguson, it won¡¯t be hard to execute these people openly and fairly. I will help record your credit. You can quickly gain fame by killing these people. As for the king, I¡¯ll be responsible formunicating with him and obtaining the title of viscount for you if all goes well. Not only will His Majesty not exert pressure on you due to the Church of Light, but he can even warn them against you. As your position and fame rise, that kid Lawrence will be very excited. This is really killing many birds with one stone!¡±

    Candideughed craftily with a sinister face after finishing his speech. It seemed like he had considered this for a long time, and was very smug about this idea.

    ¡°Master Candide, why do I feel like I¡¯m being used?!¡± Han Shuo was bbergasted. He understood that this method was good. However, upon seeing Candideugh so sinisterly, he still felt that the old man helping him was only one aspect, and the main purpose was to use him to eradicate opposing elements.

    Rolling his eyes at Han Shuo, Candide said, ¡°Consider this a mission. I¡¯ll record the credit under your name. These damn dogs thought they could escape from my palm? Heh heh, this time, you¡¯ll all die together!¡±

    ¡°Understood!¡± Han Shuo nodded in agreement. He knew from Candide¡¯s insidious sneer that the old man already had some sort of n.

    ¡°Good. I still have some magic knowledge to consult Ares about. Ayermike¡¯s notebook is truly too profound. even I couldn¡¯t fully understand and have to ask that old thing!¡± Candideined and started walking upstairs. At the door, Han Shuo saw him release some magic to dispel the previous enchantment formed before their conversation had begun. Then Candide called out, urging, ¡°Come, quickly give this brat his certificate! He¡¯s very impatient!¡±

    ¡°Coming!¡± Ares replied as he came down with a slight smile. He walked over to Han Shuo and handed him the certificate before saying with a smile, ¡°Congrattions Bryan, with this certified proof from the Magic Association, you are now officially an archmage.¡±

    ¡°Thank you.¡± Han Shuo replied with a smile. He nced at Candide, who was looking on with a sinister face, secretly cursing in his heart before walking downstairs.

    ¡°Congrattions, you¡¯re something alright! Already an archmage necromancer at such a young age!¡± As Han Shuo reached the first floor, the receptionist offered her congrattions with admiration.

    Han Shuo nodded and shed a bright, radiant smile at the girl before taking a direct path away from the Magic Association.

    The girl blushed at his brilliant smile, her heart beating many times faster than normal. She secretly thought that he was so tall, young, and handsome!

    Han Shuo was one meter ny centimeters tall and possessed a natural evil temperament due to his practice of demonic magic. Him attracting the attention of the opposite sex was simply a matter of course.

    ¡°First target ¨C Colbert, a swordmaster who¡¯s raped and murdered seven girls. Currently residing in the outskirts of the Empire¡¯s Bimson City, mayor of Billow, title of baron!¡± Han Shuo raked his gaze over the list that Candide had given him after leaving the Magic Association. He smiled coldly as he walked towards the Empire¡¯s transportation matrix.

 Chapter 279: The arrogant challenger

    Chapter 279: The arrogant challenger

    Lancelot Empire, in a small town named Billow on the outskirts of Bimson City.

    ¡ª

    Mayor Colbert had just finished eating a snack under the sunlight and was humming a little song as hezilyy on the highest, most luxurious balcony in town. He squinted at the town girls walking around, trying to decide whose house he would visit to rx for the evening.

    This small town wasn¡¯t big, but it could still produce a few thousands gold coins in tax revenue every year. Colbert could live somewhatfortably off of this money. From time to time, when his interest was roused, he could randomly use brute force or abuse his privilege on the women in town. No one dared say anything.

    That was because he had the title of a baron and the power of mayor, and he himself was a powerful swordmaster. All of these conditions were more than enough to make him an emperor of this small town.

    ¡°Ai, when will this kind of life end?!¡± A civilian had just returned from the mountains and wasining in a low voice.

    ¡°I heard that Roots¡¯ wife was raped by Colbert again. This is the ninth time this year. How about we leave Billow? This is no way to live!¡± Another civilian let out a long sigh and said helplessly.

    ¡°Mhm, we need to be a careful if we want to leave. We will die very miserably if he finds out. Truly evil!¡±

    ¡°Excuse me, is this Billow?¡± Someone suddenly asked while the two were whispering to each other. The speaker was a very tall youth with a bright smile on his handsome face.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Young man, what did youe here for?¡± One of them asked, puzzled.

    ¡°Does your mayor go by the name Colbert?¡± Han Shuo smiled and asked again.

    The person nodded, his expression changing slightly as he added with disgust, ¡°You know our mayor? And what do you do?¡±

    ¡°I have some small matters, where does he live?¡± Seeing this civilian reveal an expression of disgust upon hearing Colbert¡¯s name, Han Shuo immediately understood the situation in his heart.

    ¡°Go straight ahead. The biggest, most luxurious house you see is where he lives!¡± The other person answered then pulled his friend away from Han Shuo, whispering, ¡°Don¡¯t you want to live anymore? You see how tall and strong he is? He¡¯s definitely a friend of that bastard Colbert. Don¡¯t bring trouble upon yourself!¡±

    The two whispered back and forth as they quickly left after throwing Han Shuo a disdainful look. Han Shuo¡¯s sensitive hearing caught it all. He secretly thought that this Colbert was truly devoid of conscience. Even as a mayor of this small town, there wasn¡¯t a bad thing that he hadn¡¯t done.

    Han Shuo quickly walked to the biggest house and said to the guard at the gate, ¡°I want to meet mayor Colbert.¡±

    ¡°Who are you?¡± The guard frowned and threw Han Shuo a nce as he replied.

    The three yin demons surveyed the rooms in the house and took note of every detail for Han Shuo. He smiled and said, ¡°I heard that mayor Colbert was a powerful swordmaster. This time I¡¯vee especially to challenge him to a fight. Please report this for me!¡±

    ¡°The mayor has no interest in you. You¡¯d better leave while you can!¡± The guard rudely replied, seeming to have no intentions of making a report.

    Taking a step forward, Han Shuo broke apart the door. He raised his voice and shouted, ¡°Colbert, you coward! As a swordmaster, you still don¡¯t dare to ept my challenge?¡±

    ¡°Boy, are you purposely trying to make trouble?¡± The two guards were instantly shocked. They drew their swords, about to make a move.

    Han Shuo fanned out two ps, pushing back the two guards before they could see anything. Smiling as he look at the two clutching their faces, Han Shuo said leisurely, ¡°It would be best if you two were not to seek your own deaths!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s loud shout echoed so far that half of Billow heard it. The townspeople immediately stopped what they were doing toe watch when they heard that someone hade to challenge Colbert.

    Colbert had been squinting, leering randomly, when he obviously heard Han Shuo¡¯s voice. He shouted furiously from the high balcony, ¡°Where do youe from, brat? You daree to Billow to cause trouble!¡±

    A dozen soldiers rushed out from inside the house to apany Colbert¡¯s shout. Afterwards, Colbert walked out from the broken door with a cold face and shiny set of silver armor.

    ¡°What the hell are you looking at?! You damnable bunch of lowly people, scram!¡± The first thing Colbert did after walking out was roll his eyes and re, cursing the civilians. Then he angrily looked at Han Shuo and said, ¡°Little brat, you deliberately came to cause trouble, didn¡¯t you?¡±

    ¡°I have heard of Baron Colbert¡¯s great name as a swordmaster. I also train in the ways of the sword and was passing through Billow, so I hoped to ask your Lordship for some guidance. But I don¡¯t know whether your Lordship... has the guts to ept?¡± Han Shuo smiled ndly, waiting for Colbert¡¯s answer.

    Colbert red at Han Shuo and said in rage, ¡°You, a little brat who doesn¡¯t know the height of the sky, dares to challenge me?! You really must be tired of living. Good! I ept your challenge. However, don¡¯t me me if you die!¡±

    ¡°Of course!¡± Han Shuo replied straightforwardly.

    ¡°You guys back off. See how I kill him!¡± Colbert waved his subordinates away. He drew his sword, taking a deep breath. He suddenly calmed down.

    ¡°Young man, I¡¯ll let you attack first!¡± Colbert put on a generous face and said calmly to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Alright!¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t drag his feet. As soon as he finished speaking, he walked calmly to Colbert and deployed a punch.

    ¡°Oh?!¡± Colbert was a little stunned seeing Han Shuo not take out his sword. However, he was even more surprised upon seeing no fighting aura radiating from that punch. Feeling strange, Colbert sneered and raised his sword to stab right back at the punch.

    ¡°Heh heh, courting death!¡± Han Shuo also spared a moment to jeer. His magical yuan condensed, dazzling red light bursting out from the punch.

    The red light instantly surged and destroyed the milky white aura surrounding Colbert¡¯s sword. The punch smashed into the sword, making a metallic ng. A current of hot air burst out, apanied by Colbert¡¯s tragic scream. He was blown away along with his sword and couldn¡¯t stop vomiting blood.

    ¡°Oh my god, the demon is heavily wounded!¡±

    ¡°Great! I hope he just dies this time! We¡¯ll be free then!¡±

    ¡°He¡¯d best die, or Billow Town won¡¯t have a day of peace!¡±

    After seeing Colbert be heavily injured after just one hit, the townspeople, who were watching from a distance away, became as joyous as if it were a holiday and murmured in low voices.

    ¡°I, I have no hatred nor injustice with you, so why did youe for me?¡± His mouth overflowing with blood, Colbert immediately understood that Han Shuo¡¯s strength was far above his after being heavily injured by a single punch. However, he didn¡¯t know how or when he¡¯d offended Han Shuo.

    ¡°Heh heh, because you deserve to die!¡± Han Shuo smiled coldly. He slowly approached Colbert and said, ¡°I am Bryan, and you are the first!¡±

    Bang! echoed a blow. Colbert had no strength to resist when the punch smashed down on his head. He immediately bled from all seven orifices and died on the spot.

    ¡°I fairly and openly killed him in a challenge, and all of you are witness to this.¡± Han Shuo turned to theckeys, expressing that he didn¡¯t do it on purpose. After saying this, he left Billow Town in style under the shocked, puzzled, and fearful gazes of the people.

    The Empire wouldn¡¯t pursue the matter if one killed the opponent after a challenge was epted. Candide had exined clearly to Han Shuo earlier. The old man would take care of the aftermath, so Han Shuo wasn¡¯t worried at all.

    ¡°Second target ¨C water archmage Deborah in Bimson City. Killed a family of eighteen people three years ago in a magic shop over a magic staff. The aftermath was handled cleanly, leaving no clues. Sessfully escaped the punishment of the Empire. Mm, she¡¯s the one!¡± Han Shuo took out the paper Candide gave him and skimmed it.

    Candide had put his heart into it indeed. Each target was in close proximity to the previous one, making it convenient for Han Shuo to act.

    Two hourster, In Bimson City, at the residence of Count Chapman Dean.

    Han Shuo wore a mage outfit, his hand grasping the white bone staff. He gracefully appeared at the residence of Count Chapman Dean and spoke to the guard with a smile, ¡°I¡¯m looking for the honored water archmage Deborah.¡±

    ¡°Follow me.¡± This guard saw Han Shuo in a mage outfit with the white bone staff in his hand to boot. Therefore, he didn¡¯t dare be discourteous and led Han Shuo in respectfully.

    When they arrived inside a big courtyard, the guard spoke, ¡°Please wait a moment, I¡¯ll go inform Master Deborah!¡±

    A whileter, a short, slightly fat woman of around forty years of age walked out. She wore a luxurious magic robe and a blue space ring on her finger. She frowned suspiciously at Han Shuo and asked, ¡°Who are you? I don¡¯t think I know you?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo answered with a smile, ¡°Of course, this is our first time meeting. However, I have admired your great name for a long time. This time, I came here to ask for your guidance on some magic knowledge, I hope you agree!¡±

    Upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, Deborah impatiently waved her hand, ¡°And I wondered who you were. Don¡¯t care. Scram now. Don¡¯t make me angry, damn brat!¡±

    Sweeping a look at the guard, Deborah reprimanded, ¡°Next time clearly ask who the visitor is. Don¡¯t think that all mages are acquainted with me. I have no time to deal with this immature brat!¡±

    Finishing her speech, Deborah treated Han Shuo as though he were nonexistent and walked back inside, intending to continue fiddling around with some new magic potions.

    ¡°Ugly old granny, you don¡¯t dare to ept my challenge? Or do you think that you¡¯re so ugly that you wouldn¡¯t want to let others look at you for too long?¡± Still with a smile on his face, Han Shuo deliberately yed the old trick, using vicious words to anger his opponent.

    Sure enough, Deborah immediately fumed over Han Shuo¡¯s malice. She abruptly turned around, staring sinisterly at Han Shuo and said with a cold smile, ¡°Fine. I ept your challenge. I¡¯ll send you on your way to the underworld.¡±

    A light shed as a blue magic staff appeared in her hand. Deborah chanted an incantation and three men, five meters tall and each made of water, suddenly appeared out of nowhere on the rooftops and shot towards Han Shuo. The water men wielded sharp ice awls that emitted a brilliant cold light as they stabbed towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°Interesting!¡± Han Shuo let out an oddugh. The white bone staff in his hand trembled as he quickly chanted an incantation. A white bone shield suddenly appeared in front of his body.

    The five ice awls were faster than the water men and rammed straight at the shield¡¯s surface with a huge amount of force. The ice awls shattered as cracks also appeared in the shield.

    Han Shuo unhurriedly shrank the white bone shield¡¯s size. The white bone staff once again shone. Two hate warriors, one evil knight, a dozen zombies, and twenty-odd skeletal warriors in addition to a team of flying gargoyles appeared in the air, filling the yard.

    The evil knight rode a warhorse spitting fire, his hand holding an enormous bonence. He stabbed out at the five meter tall ice man, piercing a big hole through thetter. The evil knight ordered his skeletal warhorse to spew out a breath of fire, and the rest of the ice men evaporated into mist with a sizzling sound.

    ¡°You, you¡®re actually an archmage necromancer!¡± Deborah was terrified, her voice trembling as she shouted.

    Necromancy mages were at a disadvantage against light mages of the same level. However, they held a major advantage against other magic majors due to their ability to summon powerful creatures. If it hadn¡¯t been for the disappearance of the realms of grand magi and sacred magi as chronicled in the Necromancy Codex, the number of necromancy mages wouldn¡¯t be as few as they were now.

    When the Canopy of Necromancy spread out across the sky, the speed and strength of the dark creatures inside suddenly increased immensely. Caught within the Canopy of Necromancy, two water men were surrounded by a huge number of dark creatures.

    The evil knight in particr now charged forward with terrifying force directly towards water archmage Deborah. The hovering gargoyles shed out as deadly shadows, one after the other in, a manner that appeared very fast and strange, thanks to the aid of the Canopy of Necromancy.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t need to rely on the little skeleton, earth elite zombie, and wood elite zombie nor his magical cultivation in this fight. He had gained an absolute advantage using purely necromancy magic alone. Except for light archmages, no other mage at the same level as him could be his match. Even if the opponent was a light archmage, Han Shuo could still easily kill them as the little skeleton, earth elite zombie, and wood elite zombie were all immune to light magic.

    Therefore, Han Shuo was invincible when fighting mages of the same rank, even without using demonic magic!

 Chapter 280: Infamy

    Chapter 280: Infamy

    ¡°Damn it!¡± Deborah cursed in a low voice. She had clearly felt that something was wrong and immediately retreated to her room. She was actually very quick, despite her short and fat stature. She intended on hiding in her room to hinder the attacks from the dark creatures.

    She released a high level water magic ice spell, creating a white fog that covered a vast area. A crystal clear ice wall sealed the door and emitted white mist beneath the sunlight.

    The evil knight spurred his warhorse forward, holding a bonence bigger than his body, as he charged. He raised the bone spear and stabbed fiercely at the ice wall.

    ng!

    Miraculously, the ice wall condensed by the ice spell actually had great defensive ability. The huge bonence had created such a huge impact upon colliding with the ice wall, but could only drill a small hole. It couldn¡¯t break through the defenses of the ice wall.

    ¡°Ice de sh!¡± Deborah¡¯s shout echoed from inside the room.

    Cold wind howled as snow scattered across the sky. des of ice spun as they shot towards the dark creatures that upied the yard. The low level skeletal warriors couldn¡¯t withstand the ice des, causing their bones to scatter across the ground. Even the flying gargoyles fell down in session under the attack of the ice des.

    However, higher ranked creatures, such as zombie warriors and hate warriors, still stood firmly after being struck by the ice des. The group slowly advanced towards the room that Deborah was in, joining forces with the evil knight and assaulting the ice wall.

    Han Shuo smiled coldly as he stood proudly in the yard under the Canopy of Necromancy. He leisurely watched the fight between the dark creatures and Deborah, and secretly exulted in the most appropriate way to use necromancy magic.

    ng!

    The ice wall finally crumbled into pieces beneath the ferocious stabbing of the bonence in the evil knight¡¯s hand. He rushed into Deborah¡¯s room with his warhorse. Two hate warriors and several zombie warriors followed behind and instantly surrounded the room.

    ¡°I surrender, I surrender!¡± Deborah paled in horror and involuntarily screamed.

    When the evil knight destroyed the ice wall and charged into the room with its necromancy troops, Deborah knew that defeat was nigh. She was instinctively scared by the ferocious, heartless eyes of the evil knight and immediately shouted out in a desperate attempt to preserve her poor life.

    Whoosh whoosh whoosh!

    A dozen bone spears hurtled through the windows, two of which ambushed Deborah behind. Deborah had yet to react when they pierced through her chubby body and pushed her towards the evil knight.

    The evil knight raised his huge bonence up high. When thence fell, Deborah¡¯s head also went flying. A stream of blood spewed out and fell upon a smoking green potion, causing it to blow up.

    ¡°Murder, murder!¡± The guard, who¡¯d led Han Shuo in earlier, was instantly horrified when he realized from Deborah¡¯s tragic scream that she must¡¯ve been killed. He shouted loudly while running to the courtyard in the back. Through the yin demons¡¯ surveince, Han Shuo noticed troops quickly approaching in the distance. Since his target Deborah had been handled, Han Shuo wasted no time. He immediately sent the necromancy creatures back and cut off the mental strength that¡¯d been used to maintain the Canopy of Necromancy, before leaving the yard using the levitation skills.

    Over the next five days, Han Shuo used the transportation matrices to visit various cities and towns in the Empire to challenge powerful people. Not only did he win every fight, he even killed his opponents on the spot. His infamy speedily spread through the Empire.

    Han Shuo¡¯s identity was slowly acknowledged amongst the ranks of the powerful in the Empire thanks to Candide deliberately spreading the news. Many nobles heard of this powerful young man¡¯s story and expressed their strong interest in him.

    In a strictly guarded, luxurious hall in the Lancelot Imperial Pce, His Majesty the King, Uhtred Lancelot wore a loose robe, sitting on his throne as if waiting for something.

    Uhtred was almost sixty years old and his body had be increasingly weaker due to his licentious youth. He looked thin despite his big bones and his hair was still ck and glossy thanks to the treatment of special magic potions. It was a pity that hisplexion didn¡¯t look too good.

    ¡°Your Majesty, Lord Candide has arrived!¡± A guard suddenly came in and softly informed.

    This guard was d in a shiny armor, his bearing cold and calm. His entire body emitted the air of a top expert. It could be seen from the insignia on his armor that he was a powerful sky rider.

    ¡°Let him in!¡± Uhtred instructed in an even tone upon hearing of Candide¡¯s arrival.

    After a while, Candide respectfully came in with his darkened face and said in a low tone, ¡°Candide greets Your Majesty!¡±

    ¡°Sit. I heard that one of your subordinates is a kid who has be very famous in these two days. What¡¯s going on?¡± Uhtred nced at Candide and asked casually.

    ¡°He is called Bryan and was indeed recruited by me. This kid¡¯s strength is extraordinary, and his mindset is mature. He hasn¡¯t been part of the Dark Mantle for long, but has already helped with several major events. Oh, the notebook of Ayermike Cotton was also brought back from the Dark Forest by him. He¡¯s truly a rare genius.¡± Candide exined in a respectful manner after sitting down.

    ¡°So he¡¯s Bryan, hehe, interesting, interesting. I remember that just yesterday, the Red Archbishop Kosse from the Church of Light sent people to ask for Bryan. I didn¡¯t expect to hear about him today. Candide ah Candide, isn¡¯t this a littl too coincidental?¡± Uhtred spoke in a pleasant voice, as if he was recalling the past with an old friend.

    Candide was secretly shocked, and he hastened to exin, ¡°Your Majesty, please pardon this offense. This was arranged by me with the purpose of tying up some loose ends that are unfavorable to the Empire¡¯s peace. Bryan¡¯s strength is extraordinary. He not only passed the archmage test of the Magic Association, but has also mastered a special cultivation technique. The Empire needs such a young rare genius like him.¡±

    Uhtred looked at Candide and coldly snorted, ¡°Candide, you think this kid is worthy enough for me to worsen our rtions with the Church of Light?¡±

    ¡°I do think he is! Bryan is only eighteen this year. He entered the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force and became a archmage necromancer from a mage apprentice in less than two years. His skills are excellent. The future of such a person is limitless.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s just that he practices necromancy magic and has mastered some knowledge that is disadvantageous to the Church of Light, so they have deliberately acted against him. There was a light grand magus called Ferguson in the Valley of Sunshine. Bryan ultimately killed him and earned their rage.¡±

    ¡°Being able to kill a light grand magus already proves his power. On the other hand, the most important point is that Bryan is still very young, so his future development is limitless. I think such a talented person shouldn¡¯t be let go. It¡¯s worth it even if we have to offend the Church of Light!¡± Candide answered respectfully.

    Uhtred¡¯s eyes shed upon listening to Candide¡¯s rant. He slightly straightened his body and looked at Candide, saying, ¡°From an apprentice to an archmage necromancer in less than two years, and able to kill a light grand magus? Candide, are you sure that all this is true?¡±

    ¡°Your Majesty, you also know that my wife is the Dean of the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, so I¡¯m absolutely sure this is true. I gave him the order to challenge some notorious powerful people because I was originally doubtful of his strength. Now given the information that I¡¯ve gathered, he indeed has the power.¡±

    ¡°The rarest thing is that, such a genius like him actually has a very clean background. He has a strong sense of belonging to the Empire and is willing to serve the Empire. I believe he will grow bigger and might even be another figure like Karel Ascot as long as we give him the proper amount of time. Oh right, he¡¯s also the boyfriend of Phoebe, the most beloved female disciple of Karel Ascot!¡± Candide continued to exin.

    ¡°Oh, you say he has some sort of rtionship with Karel Ascot?¡± Uhtred¡¯s face finally changed, surprised as he asked Candide.

    ¡°Yes. Not only so, he¡¯s even a good friend of His Royal Highness Lawrence. You know that His Highness studied military strategy at the Knight Academy, and is a disciple of Karel Ascot as well. The rtionship between Phoebe and Han Shuo is very good. Last time in Valen City, Han Shuo contributed the most in exposing Bob Ascher¡¯s conspiracy.¡± Candide was striking while the iron was hot upon seeing Uhtred reveal his surprise.

    Uhtred fell silent as he listened to Candide. He thought for a moment before opening his mouth to speak, ¡°Is that so? Then this Bryan is very interesting from what you¡¯ve said. Oh, I heard that great swordmaster Leah Cain of the Brut Merchant Alliance hase to Ossen City. He¡¯s been quite arrogant these past couple of days. I lost three experts of his level to that guy. If that Bryan is as powerful as you say he is, let him challenge Leah Cain. If he can defeat that guy as proof for his talent, not only will I be willing to offend the Church of Light for him, but I can even bestow him with a title of nobility.¡±

    ¡°Humph! This crazy swordsman Leah Cain has been too notorious. He fled to our Lancelot Empire after having offended sacred magus Reynold D in Brut. Such a despicable cowardly absconder actually dares to act so wildly? He¡¯s seeking death!¡±

    ¡°Understood!¡± Candide was slightly horrified upon hearing that Uhtred wanted Bryan to challenge Leah Cain. He was silent for a while, then secretly let out a long sigh as he agreed with resignation.

 Chapter 281: Getting famous

    Chapter 281: Getting famous

    Han Shuo was very busy over the next couple of days. He traveled through the majority of the Lancelot Empire through the teleportation matrixes. Within these few days, Han Shuo had killed three archmages, four swordmasters, and a great swordmaster all through challenges.

    At the start, the challenges were rather smooth because Han Shuo¡¯s age was extremely deceiving. His enemies would think that he was of no threat, and would furiously ept the challenge after being provoked by Han Shuo. Later on, after continuous sessful challenges made Han Shuo¡¯s name infamous, and when many powerful people linked together the identity of the people who had been killed, they silently started to have their own ideas.

    Towards the end, thest three powerhouses on the list suddenly disappeared. Even after the Dark Mantle conducted thorough searches, they were unable to obtain any intelligence. Whenever Han Shuo reached a city, all of the experts within city would be worried, regardless of whether they¡¯d done anything that they should feel guilty about. All of them were afraid that Han Shuo would look for them, and so they all disappeared under the guise of travelling.

    These people couldn¡¯t help it as the people that died in Han Shuo¡¯s hands in recent days were all heavyweights. If they did not ept Han Shuo¡¯s challenge, then it would have a huge impact on their reputation. But once they epted it, they might lose their lives. That¡¯s why they had no other choice but to find an excuse and hide.

    When a great swordmaster died in Han Shuo¡¯s hands, the caused the notorious name of the young expert Bryan to reach its climax, causing the rest of the names on the list to disappear. That was why Han Shuo could only return to Ossen city for further instructions from Candide.

    ¡°Lord Candide, it¡¯s not that I didn¡¯t try my best. The three people in the end disappearedpletely. It seems that I can only wait until you find them,¡± Han Shuo and Candide were in a room in a small room at the north of the city.

    ¡°You did very well. His Majesty has already heard about your work, there is temporarily no need to take care of those three guys. We have another troublesome matter on our hands. If you canplete this task, His Majesty will definitely help you and grant you a noble

    title,¡± Candide said with a low voice. He frowned and taking a sip from the cup of tea in his hands.

    ¡°Oh? What is it?¡± Han Shuo momentarily nked then asked.

    ¡°Leah Cain of the Brut Merchant Alliance also has the power of a great swordmaster. This person is titled the Crazy Swordsman. He is extremely vicious and savage, but have great power. He¡¯s currently in our Ossen city. In the recent few days, he¡¯s challenged three great swordmaster in Ossen City and was extremely disrespectful after winning. This has caused His Majesty to greatly dislike him.¡±

    ¡°His Majesty means to have you challenge Leah Cain. If you can defeat Leah Cain, then His Majesty will ignore the Church of Light¡¯s pressure and fully protect you and bestow upon you a noble title. It¡¯s just that Leah Cain¡¯s strength is extraordinary, and possessed the strength of a great swordmaster more than ten years ago. ording to the Dark Mantle¡¯s news, this Leah Cain is very close with His Highness the first prince, Prince Charles. Due to your rtionship with Lawrence, I¡¯m afraid that you might lose your life if you are unable to beat him!¡± Candide looked truly worried about Han Shuo.

    ¡°Where is this Leah Cain right now?¡± Han Shuo was not afraid at all as he asked Candide with a smile.

    ¡°In the Garden House at the northern part of the city. The Garden House is the property of the first prince, Prince Charles. Other people doesn¡¯t know this, but the Dark Mantle naturally does. It is also through him staying at this ce that we guessed that he is rted to the first prince. What, are you nning on challenging Leah Cain? Although they¡¯re both in the great swordmaster realm, the difference in strength between one just entering it and one that has been in it for ten odd years is reallyrge. Furthermore, Leah Cain is called the Crazy Swordsman, he will be extremely difficult to deal with!¡± Candide eximed.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I will deal with him!¡± Han Shuo finished the entire cup of tea in one gulp and directly stood up. Then he smiled, ¡°To be honest, I kind of got addicted to the continuous challenges recently!¡±

    In the recent few days, Han Shuo had continuously fought against several powerhouses, causing him to subtly feel like his strength was about to break through to the next level. The only way to quickly improve in the bloodlust realm was through battle and ughter. When he did so against master, his strength improved even more quickly.

    In eight continuous battles, Han Shuo challenged archmages and swordmasters, all of them powerhouses who were rather famous. He challenged a great swordmaster at the very end. That person was very dangerous. It was only though that fight had Han Shuo felt like that he showed signs of a breakthrough.

    By now, Han Shuo definitely wouldn¡¯t use the little skeleton, earth elite zombie, or wood elite zombie. With his magical cultivation in the bloodlust realm, he was able to face a great swordmaster head on. If he didn¡¯t use the magical advantages he had, Han Shuo still had strength equivalent to a great swordmaster.

    Leah Cain was possibly a bit stronger than a great swordmaster. Perhaps Han Shuo might run into some trouble, but if he used the little skeleton, the earth elite zombie, and the wood elite zombie, Han Shuo believed that he would absolutely seed in killing Leah Cain, and so didn¡¯t pay heed to Candide¡¯s worries at all.

    ¡°Be careful, this guy is just very dangerous. He is famous for being hard to deal with in the Brut Merchant Alliance. Don¡¯t rx your guard!¡± Seeing that Han Shuo was walking outside, Candide issued a reminder as he was still worried.

    ¡°Understood, I¡¯ll be going then!¡± Han Shuo replied, then walked outside.

    ¡°Bryan!¡± Just after leaving the inn, he heard Emily¡¯s voice ring out from a carriage at the corner of the street. Chester, dressed like a carriage driver, waved his hand towards Han Shuo.

    The Dark Mantle¡¯s informationwork was everywhere, adding onto the rtionship between Emily and Candide, it was not hard if she wanted to find Han Shuo. Han Shuo also knew that Emily woulde and find him. That why he hadn¡¯t been surprised at all when he heard Emily¡¯s voice.

    Han Shuo looked around and suddenly saw a carriage parked afar. The knights at the entrance of the carriage were all familiar faces. The curtains of the carriage were lifted to reveal Lawrence¡¯s face. Lawrence was looking at him with a face of excitement as if he had a lot to say.

    Han Shuo first stepped towards Emily and said, ¡°Wait a moment for me.¡±

    With that, Han Shuo then quickly walked in front of Lawrence¡¯s carriage and called out softly, ¡°What are you doing here?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, I identally found Madam Emily¡¯s carriage hurrying over here. I thought about it then followed, I didn¡¯t think that I would actually find you,¡± Lawrence gave a soft, oddugh as he said to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo understood that Lawrence might know about the rtionship between him and Emily, so he merely rolled his eyes at Lawrence without saying anything. ¡°Alright, what did youe to find me for?¡±

    ¡°Haha, I heard that you beat several experts in a row, and that you now have an enormous reputation. I didn¡¯t think that you were no longer hiding yourself and had started to truly reveal your prowess. This is for the best! In thest few days, I went to the royal pce twice, His Majesty asked me some things about you, seeming to be very interested at you. This is a good sign!¡± Lawrence was clearly very happy as he spoke with a smile.

    ¡°Of course he is paying attention to me. His Majesty told me to challenge Leah Cain, so I¡¯m thinking about killing him now.¡± Han Shuo said inly.

    The moment he said that, Lawrence felt shocked, then insanely happy as he said, ¡°Leah Cain is on the side of the first prince, Prince Charles. I am certain about this through my own means. Bryan, are you confident in killing him?¡±

    ¡°What do you think?¡± Han Shuo looked towards Lawrence with a smile that was not quite like a smile, and replied with a question.

    ¡°Of course you do. You are very miraculous, I believe you! How about this, I¡¯ll help you since you are going to challenge Leah Cain and spread this far and wide. As long as you can beat Leah Cain, your notorious name can be bleached. Hehe, since Leah Cain is someone of the Brut Alliance, there is probably no one in our nation who likes him!¡± Lawrenceughed evilly.

    ¡°Do as you¡¯d like. If there¡¯s nothing else, then I¡¯ll find you after killing Leah Cain!¡± Han Shuo said.

    ¡°Nothing else, nothing else. Go and busy yourself with your own business!¡± Lawrence smiled strangely as he looked towards Emily¡¯s direction.

    From Lawrence¡¯s expression and speech, Han Shuo understood that the former already knew about the rtionship between himself and Emily. This was likely because he¡¯d noticed Han Shuo and Emily hiding behind a fake mountain and getting intimate during his family¡¯s banquet. He be even more certain about this after the events of Valen City.

    However, with Han Shuo and Lawrence¡¯s rtionship right now, Han Shuo naturally believed that Lawrence would seal his mouth shut.There was nothing good about this for Lawrence at all if it came to light.

    ¡°Mhmm, I¡¯ll be off then!¡± Han Shuo replied, then turned and walked towards Emily¡¯s direction.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± said Han Shuo after arriving at Chester¡¯s location and entered Emily¡¯s carriage.

    ¡°Mmm... Bryan, too miraculous. That pill was too miraculous!¡± Emily leapt into his embrace the moment Han Shuo entered the carriage, grabbing him tightly and voluntarily presenting her lips, in obvious emotional agitation.

    Chester acted like normal, pretending that he hadn¡¯t heard anything as he slowly drove the carriage down the street.

    After Chester¡¯s carriage left, Candide gazed at the direction the carriage left in out of the shadow of a corner. He muttered, ¡°I was wondering why Emily would help him so much. So this is why. This brat¡¯s courage for lust is truly huge, he¡¯s with Emily alright. God, what a yboy!¡±

 Chapter 282: The repute of a genius

    Chapter 282: The repute of a genius

    At the Garden House in the northern part of the city, lush palm trees filled the structure that was suffused with the fresh feeling of spring. The garden had been arranged in an exquisite fashion, with all sorts of flowers emitting pleasant fragrances, and had been nted in the surroundings. Several maids moved carefully amongst the flowers, watering and pruning them.

    First prince Charles was squinting as he conversed with a crude-looking man on a soft patch of grass. Thetter had two criss cross scars on his neck, was a meter and seventy five centimeters tall, and looked very sturdy with his brawny arms and legs. His eyes glinted with a brutal, beastly light.

    ¡°Mister Leah, olou shouldn¡¯t have challenged those three great swordmasters as soon as you arrived. You¡¯ve just arrived here from the Brut Merchant Alliance after all, and our nation is prejudiced against foreigners. If my father finds out that you¡¯re one of my people, this could affect his impression of me.¡± Charles frowned with displeasure, clearly irritated by Leah Cain¡¯s unauthorized acts.

    Leah Cain leered and chuckled, saying brazenly, ¡°Your Highness first prince, although I¡¯ve joined your banner upon arriving in the Lancelot Empire, I don¡¯t have to listen to you for all matters. I am a swordsman first and foremost. Since I¡¯vee all the way to the Lancelot Empire, I will challenge the local experts as ording to my habits. How else will I be able to improve my skills?¡±

    Damn it, what a brute! Why don¡¯t you go challenge Karel Ascot if you¡¯ve the balls to! Let¡¯s see how horribly you die then! Charles cursed inwardly, his expression darkening even further. He turned to Leah Cain, ¡°Let¡¯s just drop this matter. I hope you tell me before you do anything like this next time. Do you remember the Bryan whom I mentioned to you? The one I wanted you to help me kill?¡±

    Leah Cain nked momentarily, then nodded. ¡°Oh, the kid with the strange techniques that you mentionedst time? What? Has he appeared in Ossen City? Do you want me to kill him today?¡±

    Shaking his head ruefully, Charles said, ¡°The situation is different now. Bryan¡¯s reputations has greatly increased over the past couple of days during his leave of absence from Ossen City. His reputation has grown greatly after challenging these experts, and now, word on the street is that he¡¯s returned to challenge you.¡±

    ¡°After this news was released, all of the nobles and experts within Ossen City began paying close attention to this. You¡¯ve been training in the Garden House, so you may not have been aware of this, but even my father is interested in this matter now. It¡¯s no longer appropriate for you to kill him secretly. What I mean for you to do is why not go and challenge him directly then kill him in that way? No one will be able to say anything about this then. What do you think?¡±

    ¡°No! Absolutely not! Who am I? I¡¯m Leah Cain! How can I lower myself to challenge this unweaned brat? Hmph, I¡¯d wee it if he challenged me, but I¡¯d never go to the door of an infamous kid just to challenge him!¡± Leah Cain rejected this suggestion soundly, with no room for discussion.

    Sitting in his chair, Charles viciously swiped at the arm rests and cursed inwardly again. If it wasn¡¯t for you really having some skill to your name, I¡¯d already have someone kill you where you stand, damn it! You¡¯re just a brute! How dare you repeatedly talk back to me??

    ¡°Alright then. There are many people paying attention to this matter now. There have been some people circling the Garden House for the past two days. They¡¯re likely waiting for Bryan toe and challenge you. I¡¯m not at liberty toe find you. You just need to mind yourself. If Bryanes, you must kill him immediately to prevent further troubles from developing!¡± Charles was a bit irritated as he stood up after speaking to Leah.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. He¡¯ll be dead without a doubt if he dares to challenge me! Hmph, all young men are asking to die these days by acting so cockily! I¡¯ll have him learn just how much stronger his seniors are than he is!¡± Leah Cain snorted coldly. After traveling to many ears, the news quickly spread to every corner of Ossen City. Only a few experts and nobles of Ossen City heard of it in the beginning, but once someone upgraded this to a matter of national pride, evenmoners learned of it as well.

    In this way, Han Shuo¡¯s birth and origins were slowly revealed in utmost rity!

    A ve when young, the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force made an exception and enrolled him when he demonstrated surprising potential. He ascended from a lowly rank of mage apprentice to a rare archmage necromancer in less than two years. He even had a mysterious technique about him. All of this added together made Han Shuo out to be genius.

    As citizens of Ossen City discussed this matter fervently, a fewrge guilds were already cing bets on this. Gamblers expressed high concerns towards this matter, and no one knew of the Boozt Merchant Guild betting enormous sums against Cameron¡¯s Merchant Guild.

    On the west side of Ossen City, in the middle of the night.

    Out of the north, south, east, and west parts of the city, the west side was the dirtiest and poorest part. This ce could be considered the congregation zone of all the poor. There was trash everywhere on the streets, with flies and bedbugs everywhere. Some beggars, with rags on their bodies, were dozing off in the corner. A stench permanently permeated the surrounding air.

    However, the moon still shone, even on the poorest areas. As the pure, white moonlight shone down, it cast long shadows for Han Shuo and the others. Some stifled sobs traveled out slightly from one of the ugly and crude houses.

    ¡°I really didn¡¯t want toe here!¡± Chester¡¯s expression was long as he sighed.

    Although Emily stayed within the carriage, her brows were knit tightly together as well. Her tender and white skin was as clear as white jade, and the precious jewels on her head and closely tailored silks andces marked her as being quite at odds with the surroundings.

    Emily had seen Chester¡¯s information and knew that he was born amoner. Before he had entered the Dark Mantle, he¡¯d spent some time in the western part of Ossen city. However, he didn¡¯t miss those days. That was easy enough to see. No one would think too fondly of a ce like this.

    ¡°Alright, we¡¯ll leave as soon as we¡¯re done. There are the poor and rich in every country. This is a truth that will never change, and we don¡¯t have the power to change all this!¡± Han Shuo called out softly as he sat within the carriage.

    A troop of about a hundred knights were following behind the carriage at a leisurely pace. The troop was in a long formation in the narrow streets.

    ¡°Come on. We don¡¯t have much time, so stopining!¡± Emily also rushed Chester onwards.

    Chester didn¡¯t say much else as he skillfully drove the carriage down the quiet streets. He headed for the dirtiest and poorest part of the west side after making it down this street.

    Chester slowed down the carriage after a moment in a ce filled with sewage and a disgusting stench. ¡°Master Emily, the broken down buildings ahead are where the intelligence seems to point to.¡±

    Emily changed into a ck robe in the carriage and hid her identity as a senior executive of the Dark Mantle. She slowly stepped down from the carriage and spoke to Han Shuo, ¡°ording to the intelligence, it¡¯s the buildings in front of us. The enemy is a leader from the Angel Empire called Ynd. He seems to be a sky rider.¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo released three yin demons and bade them slowly slip inside. He himself walked towards the troop of knights who were trailing them, telling an officer, ¡°Don¡¯t prematurely alert our enemies. Spread out through the buildings and create a perimeter. Try to approach slowly. Capture anyone alive if you can. Otherwise, execute them on the spot. We can¡¯t let a single one escape.¡±

    ¡°Understood!¡± The officer responded and made a gesture towards the knights behind him. The knights slowly spread out and encircled the buildings from a distance away.

    There had been several mages in the center of the knights, who were now revealed due to the knights spreading out. The mages in the Magic Corps of the Northern Guard were all journeyman or adept mages. There was only one thunder archmage. Boris had told him before the mission had started that he was to listen to Han Shuo¡¯smands.

    Some of them had been unruly and rebellious at first, but when Boris told them of Han Shuo¡¯s identity, all of became docile and didn¡¯t dare to not listen to Han Shuo¡¯smands.

    Han Shuo had traversed half of the Lancelot Empire in the past few days, challenging viins with infamous reputation. They¡¯d all been killed on the spot, and that kind of violent, ruthless method made Han Shuo¡¯s evil prestigee to life. The group of mages in front of him had all quieted down afterwards.

    Someone who could kill numerous experts was someone that they couldn¡¯t afford to antagonize, not to mention that he had full control over the team from themander of the Northern Guards. They would be foolish as to provoke Han Shuo.

    ¡°Alright, all of you find your positions. It¡¯s best to stay in between the knights. Listen to my orders afterwards and attack with the strongest spells you¡¯ve got!¡± Han Shuo flicked a nce over the thunder archmage and gave his orders.

    ¡°Understood, Sir Bryan!¡± The thunder archmage said respectfully with a nod. He wasn¡¯t angry at all about Han Shuo taking his position as themander of the Magic Corps.

 Chapter 283: Coolly composed

    Chapter 283: Coollyposed

    Before Han Shuo¡¯s arrival at the Northern Guards, thunder archmage Killua had been the leader of the Northern Guards magic corps. However, due to Han Shuo¡¯s appearance, he could only take Han Shuo¡¯s orders now.

    Killua had originally been a bit reluctant, but after Boris spoke a few words to him, he immediately understood that Han Shuo onlye to the Northern Guards to gain some military achievements, and that the magic corps of Northern Guards would be just a jumping board for Han Shuo. After that, not only did that remove anyint he might have had, he would even intentionally curry Han Shuo¡¯s favor in hope of a little bit of help when Han Shuo became sessful.

    ¡°Be careful, they have twenty something people and they¡¯re all pretty strong!¡± Han Shuo said quietly when he returned to Emily¡¯s side after giving his orders.

    ¡°I understand, what do you think we should do?¡± Emily nodded in reply, then asked for Han Shuo¡¯s opinion.

    ¡°When the hundred knights surround this area, immediately use magic to destroy all obstacles. Capture the experts if you can, otherwise, it¡¯s fine if you kill all of them. As long as we can find the blueprints, we¡¯ve essentially finished this mission!¡± Han Shuo thought about it and said quietly.

    ¡°We¡¯ll do as you say. Those Northern Guards seem to trust you very much. You have tomand them well, so that they don¡¯t mess up!¡± Emily said docilely in front of Han Shuo, she had already be used to having him in charge.

    ¡°Then alright, pay attention to Ynd, don¡¯t let him escape!¡± Han Shuo replied before slowly floating into the air.

    Han Shuo quickly passed through the knights and mages like a ghost. Using the three hundred and sixty degree surveince of the three yin demons, Han Shuo continuously gave orders to the surrounding knights. He had them discard their horses and hide in the surroundings. The contingent of knights slowly surrounded the other party, keeping a hundred and fifty meter buffer.

    Han Shuo stood proudly in the sky and calmlymanded the knights and mages of the Northern Guards. He made sure to put suitable men in every location. In the meantime, everyone lowered their voices and quietly approached the dirty and broken down building.

    The distance slowly decreased as the encirclement tightened. When the two parties were only fifty meters apart, Han Shuo waved at Killua and the others. Upon seeing his action, they immediately started to chant magic spells quietly, their expressions solemn.

    ¡°My lord, we¡¯ve been surrounded. I can hear unusual sounds from the wind!¡± A wind mage said anxiously to Ynd, who had a dark and muscr body and was riding a tattooed beast.

    ¡°How is that possible!¡± Ynd suddenly sat up from a pile of straw he¡¯d been resting on. He quickly looked out the window, his expression immediately darkening as he shouted softly, ¡°Everyone, assemble. Find a chance to break through the encirclement!¡±

    The twenty something people within the room all stood up silently after hearing that. All of them unsheathed their swords and knives and prepared to charge out.

    As the leader, Ynd remained calm in the face of such a terrible situation. His space ring brightened slightly as he took out the blueprints that he¡¯d spent much effort in obtaining. He carefully dug a hole in the wall and said quietly, ¡°The brothers that havee on this operation are all not afraid of death. I will put the blueprints in the widened gap in the wall. If any of you can leave this ce alive, you can wait until Ossan City is no longer so heavily under guard before returning to take back the blueprints to the Empire. Do you hear me?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry my lord. We know what to do!¡± That wind mage replied seriously. The other people in the room also had on determined expressions, prepared to make the sacrifice.

    Suddenly, five rays of lightning struck down from the sky. The zigzagging lightning illuminated the pitch dark sky. At the same time, several walls of mes appeared around the building, causing the surrounding temperature to spike up to dangerous levels. Meanwhile, the ground started to tremble as spires started to project from the ground.

    Ynd and the others who were within the house understood that the attack had already begun. All of them leaped out from the door and windows, and started to charge separately from all directions through the attacks of lightning, fire snakes, and rock spikes.

    ¡°Kill!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s cold voice rang out through the entire night.

    Killua¡¯s lightning suddenly mmed down. When the houses were struck, every single one of them exploded with a deep rumble. Two men rushed out from those houses. They instantly fell limp onto the ground when they were struck by a bolt of lightning.

    The hundred knights of the Northern Guards were all elites of the military, every single one holding the strength of apanion-at-arms or a sergeant. Under Han Shuo¡¯s orders, each one methodically blockaded the roads. Once they noticed someone dashing towards them, they would immediately move to block the target mercilessly.

    ¡°Send three knights to the north to stop them. Killua, have the Magic Corps attack the four experts rushing in from the south. Ynd is in the west, he is a sky rider, so those in the west have to be careful...¡±

    Using the vision of the three yin demons, Han Shuo sent hismands forth leisurely. He would urately mention the other party¡¯s strength and numbers every single time, then send out suitable number of troops to stop the charge of the assassins.

    Emily and Chester slowly approached the direction that Ynd was charging towards under Han Shuo¡¯s directions. As a thief, attacking straight on wasn¡¯t Chester¡¯s forte, so he remained among the group of the knights that was setting up the blockade and left it up to Emily, who was ready to attack any time with dark magic.

    ¡°Damn it, why is the enemy so clear about our movements!¡± Ynd had told everyone to separate and attack using the strongest force they could muster. He¡¯d noticed a few weaker areas in the beginning that could have been broken though. Sadly, before they¡¯d even drawn near, those ces had suddenly be heavily guarded, causing those trying to break through to suffer enormous losses.

    The mages all cast spells in directions that they couldn¡¯t see under Han Shuo¡¯s orders. Yet, the spells would always leave Ynd¡¯s people in dire straits, and heavily wound or even kill those people waiting in the dark.

    ¡°I didn¡¯t notice anyone casting Sky¡¯s Eye. I don¡¯t know why the enemy is able to see our movements so clearly!¡± The wind magician¡¯s voice was frantic as his anxiety broke through.

    ¡°Everyone, if you think that you can escape easily after breaking thew in the capital city of the Lancelot Empire, then think again! Hehe, everyone here is clear on your identities. As long as youy down your weapons, surrender, and identity yourselves, we can allow you to live and wait for the mediators from your country to negotiate,¡± Han Shuo fired off a string of orders before hollering at them with a smile.

    Their actions werepletely revealed to Han Shuo through the yin demons¡¯ surveince. Then, he would organize experts of appropriate skill to stop the would-be escapees. He had sessfully killed enough of the assassins, leaving only thirteen. On the other hand, the Northern Guard only had four lightly wounded and one heavily wounded when the other party fought back until the brink of death. Aside from that, there was no one who had died.

    Yet, only fearless attacks were the answer to Han Shuo¡¯s announcement. None of the assassins from the Angel Empire showed the slightest bit of hesitation. After Han Shuo had finished speaking, they viciously tried to break through the encirclement again.

    Han Shuo could determine that these people were all death sworn from their reactions and strength. They probably hadn¡¯t had any thoughts of surviving after entering the Lancelot Empire. It was an unrealistic notion to capture these people alive. Thus, after a bit of hesitation, Han Shuo suddenlymanded, ¡°Everyone, don¡¯t hold back any longer, just kill them all!¡±

    ¡°Brothers, rush out with all your might. Even if you can¡¯t, you have to bring several of them down with you!¡± shouted Ynd after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s merciless orders,

    ¡°You have no more chances!¡± Emily¡¯s cold voice sounded as she red at Ynd from her ck robes, ¡°The technicians in the military factory were all helpless civilians. All of them were killed savagely. You guys truly do deserve to die today!¡±

    ¡°Haha, since they were not people from my empire, so what if they died!¡± Yndughed maniacally as he raised a huge broadsword and rode atop of his tattooed beast. He dashed directly towards Emily. ¡°Woman, are you stop me by yourself?¡±

    ¡°Foolish!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s thick murderous aura spread out with lightning speed before Emily could chant a spell. The Demonyer Edge shone with crimson light as the blood red sword aura cleaved down towards Ynd from the sky with unparalleled ferociousness.

    Ynd had been dashing towards Emily and hadn¡¯t thought that Han Shuo would suddenly attack like this, not to mention from above. Although he had the strength of a sky rider, he still found it a bit difficult to face this sort of sudden attack. The broadsword that he was holding horizontally had to quickly rise to meet the Demonyer Edge attacking down from above his head.

    ng!

    Sparks exploded everywhere and a clear crack appeared in Ynd¡¯s broadsword. He snorted as his shoulder trembled, while the four short legs of the tattooed beast underneath him snapped, unable to withstand the force. The tattooed beast fell onto the floor as its wolf-like head continuously spat out blood.

    ¡°Haha, don¡¯t think of obtaining the blueprints even if you kill me. All of the technicians were killed, you won¡¯t be able to create the war chariots without the blueprints!¡± Ynd looked tragically at the tattooed beast underneath him first beforeughing savagely with a grimace. Since he had no way of attacking Han Shuo in the sky, he could only sprint quickly towards Emily.

    ¡°Isn¡¯t it just hidden in the gap in the walls? What¡¯s so hard to find about that!¡± Han Shuo said with contempt. Han Shuo ignored Ynd as thetter¡¯s expression drastically changed and dashed towards the room the targets had originally been hiding in with lightning speed.

 Chapter 284: A big gamble

    Chapter 284: A big gamble

    Though Ynd had been about to attack Emily, his heart suddenly spasmed when he heard Han Shuo reveal his most closely guarded secret. Just as he intended to turn around and run back into the room to destroy the blueprint, several bolts whizzed at him with whooshing sounds. Emily waved the magic staff in her hand and a sharp Grim Reaper¡¯s de sliced across Ynd¡¯s body with a deathly glint.

    ¡°Stop him! Don¡¯t let him take the blueprint!¡± Ynd¡¯s voice was shrill. He hastily raised his broadsword to block the Grim Reaper¡¯s de.

    The assassins of the Angel Empire were originally about to break through the encirclement, but abandoned the idea upon hearing Ynd¡¯s shout. They swiftly turned back, one by one, and rushed straight at Han Shuo.

    Unfortunately, their power was a far cry from Han Shuo¡¯s. The difference in speed was like heaven and earth. Han Shuo utilized the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens and flew into the room like lightning. The assassins only caught up with him after he¡¯d pulled the blueprint from a hollow corner on the wall.

    ¡°Die!¡± Han Shuo coldly shouted beforending with the Demonyer Edge. He walked towards the furiously sprinting assassins of the Angel Empire.

    When Han Shuo released the Mystical cial Spellfire, the Demonyer Edge exploded with brilliant purple-red light. The light sparked like a rainbow on the tip of the de, and rapidly formed one willowy me after another. The beautiful light from the shing purple red mes danced on the de of the Demonyer Edge. They gathered into twisting threads of fire that entangled each other, creating two magics of me¡ªone purple, one red.

    The madly charging Angel Empire assassins only had one obsession in their heart, to destroy Han Shuo. Faced with the two zing hot and icy cold magicals, they all released their strongest level of fighting aura, trying to tear thes apart.

    However, Han Shuo had firmly grasped a whole new level of the Mystical cial Spellfire at his current strength. The twos of magic twisted and swayed about in the air as if two fishings thrown into the sea. The lights from the swords simplynded on empty holes and wasn¡¯t able to prate the beautiful mes.

    ¡°Not good! Fall back!¡± The distant Ynd, who¡¯d desperately dodged the Grim Reaper¡¯s de, also rushed towards Han Shuo. Upon seeing his subordinates¡¯ swords unable to rip apart the magics, he immediately understood that theses of unknown material couldn¡¯t be torn by just the sword. That was why he couldn¡¯t help but shout a reminder to his subordinates.

    However, the two strangely swaying magics in the air actually possessed an extremely fast speed. Thes didn¡¯t wait for the assassins to react before they spread out and shrouded the whole group.

    When the red fell down, the me threads touched three assassins like scorching hot iron. A thick smoke erupted as their skin and flesh was burned to a crisp. Every one of them was paralyzed and fell to the ground amidst their own tragic screams. The purple nketed the remaining four assassins. Their limbs instantly stiffened, and their bodies shivered as if they had been trapped in an ice block. The cold air maintained their previous dodging or attacking postures.

    ¡°I¡¯ll end my life with yours!¡± Ynd had finally reached Han Shuo. Upon seeing his brothers shrouded in thes, each either burned to ashes or frozen solid like ice, he roared and raised his sword, rushing at Han Shuo without a care for his life.

    ¡°Heh heh! I¡¯m afraid you won¡¯t have that chance!¡± Han Shuo released the Demonyer Edge with an indifferent smile on his face, and charged towards Ynd.

    Ynd¡¯s expression turned hideous as he raised his broadsword to receive Han Shuo¡¯s attack. Ynd keptughing maniacally when he saw Han Shuo quickly close in. He was about to disregard everything to risk his life to fight Han Shuo, when a pair of arms suddenly emerged from the ground where he stood and tightly grabbed his ankles.

    ¡°Shoot him dead!¡± Han Shuo had been rushing towards Ynd when he suddenly screeched to a halt in body mid-air. He shouted to the dozen Northern Guard soldiers who were holding bows and approaching in the distance.

    Ynd couldn¡¯t budge his feet. He stared dumbly at Han Shuo, floating in the air. Thetter was only about five meters away, right in front of him, but Ynd had no way to move. When Ynd shed downwards on the pair of big arms with his sword, the arms holding his legs retreated back into the underground. His two feet suddenly felt a soul-shaking pain as two bone spikes shot out from the ground and pierced deeply from his feet to his knees.

    While he was wailing like a pig being butchered, several arrows quickly shot towards Ynd, whistling through the air until they prated his body. Before he died, his killing intent, filled with resentment, transformed into an air barely visible to the naked eye and was absorbed by Han Shuo.

    The lineup of the twenty-odd assassins from the Angel Empire had no survivors left, including Ynd. None of their resentful killing intent had escaped Han Shuo¡¯s absorption, enabling his demonic magic to grow increasingly perfect. The feeling of breaking through was bing increasingly stronger.

    Han Shuo walked to the four frozen assassins and shot out four pitch ck lights into their bodies. Four cracking sounds echoed as the originally frozen stiff assassins fell limply down. Han Shuo turned to speak to the leader of the Northern Guard army, ¡°These four aren¡¯t dead yet. Guard them strictly, and don¡¯t let themmit suicide. This will be our answer to His Majesty as well.¡±

    ¡°Rest assured, Master Bryan, we know what to do!¡± The leader readily agreed and ordered the soldiers behind him, ¡°Men, tied up these four assassins and gag them. Don¡¯t give them the chance to bite their tongues and kill themselves!¡±

    Following the orders of their leader, the dozen soldiers quickly walked forward and took out special binding tools from the bags that they always carried. From their practiced actions and plentiful equipment, Han Shuo could instantly confirm that it would even harder for these four assassins to seek death.

    When they were brought to the Northern Guard¡¯s prison, they would be anesthetized, and their spirits drained of strength. They would be too weak to even bite their tongues. It might actually be possible to torture something out of them.

    Han Shuo stopped paying attention to these four. He walked to Emily¡¯s side, took out the blueprint and gave it to her, saying, ¡°Take this. This mission can now be consideredpleted. I will give you the blueprint so you can hand them in to the Northern Guard. As you have the blueprint that the Northern Guard¡¯s been desperately seeking, you can report in to His Majesty now!¡±

    Emily naturally wouldn¡¯t stand on ceremony with Han Shuo. As she couldn¡¯t reveal her identity, she didn¡¯t say anything to him and only nodded before turning around. She swiftly walked to Chester¡¯s carriage and got in. They left together and quickly disappeared out of sight.

    ¡°Master Bryan, we could sessfully capture the assassins of the Angel Empire and recover the blueprint they¡¯d hidden this time only thanks to you. If Count Boris can say a few good words in front of His Majesty, this deed is enough to grant you a title.¡± Lightning archmage Killua walked over to Han Shuo and offered his sincere congrattions. He seemed even more excited than Han Shuo.

    ¡°Hehe, it¡¯s everyone¡¯s credit. I wouldn¡¯t have been able to catch them all by myself, without everyone¡¯sbined efforts. Mm, you all get back to work. I still have something to deal with, I¡¯ll need to leave for a moment!¡± Han Shuo looked at Killua and said with a smile.

    ¡°Alright then master Bryan, please leave first. We can take care of the aftermath!¡± Killua respectfully replied.

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo didn¡¯t linger. He chose another direction and quickly disappeared from sight in a dirty, chaotically slum of the city¡¯s west end.

    When night fell and everyone was resting, Han Shuo soundlessly appeared at the Boozt Merchant Guild. He followed the familiar path to Phoebe¡¯s room.

    ¡°No need to consider anymore. I believe that Bryan will definitely win. Our crisis may even bepletely over with this gamble. Let¡¯s take out all of our active funds and fight it out with Cameron and his group!¡± Phoebe stood in the middle of the living room, voicing her resolution in apetent and astute manner.

    ¡°Little Phoebe, this needs reconsideration. I know of the rtionship between you and Bryan. His strength is good, but Leah Cain has been famous for too long and is also very powerful. Everyone agrees that he has a better winning chance. This bet is no trivial matter. If we lose, I¡¯m afraid that our Boozt Merchant Guild will also go down with it!¡± Boozt Guild veteran elder Andrew leaned on his walking stick and spoke, somewhat worried.

    Andrew was an original elder of the Boozt Merchant Guild. Before Phoebe had taken over, he had wholeheartedly cared for her, so she was very much concerned about his viewpoints. However, Phoebe had gained majority control of the guild after bing the owner. During this period, the Guild had actually made great progress under her hand. Andrew was satisfied, understanding that Phoebe wasn¡¯t one to work based on her emotions. He might not have been so worried if it wasn¡¯t for Leah Cain¡¯s widespread fame.

    ¡°Rest assured grandpa Andrew, Bryan¡¯s strength is much more formidable than you can imagine. Moreover, Cameron has forced us to this state already. The merchant alliance he has lead is intensely suppressing us, and it¡¯s difficult for us to do anything now. Even without this gamble, they will still pressure us bit by bit until we¡¯re exhausted. If we can win this time, we can reverse the situation. Those merchant guilds cooperating with Cameron won¡¯t give him face if he faces a heavy loss. Only when we hold a huge amount of gold coins, can we truly control the situation.¡± Phoebe calmly exined her analysis to Andrew.

    ¡°Aii, since you¡¯ve said so, let¡¯s do it like that. I hope Bryan won¡¯t disappoint us, otherwise our Boozt Merchant Guild can be considered finished!¡± Andrew thought for a while before finally nodding in agreement to Phoebe¡¯s proposal. This showed the immense crisis the guild was facing. Otherwise, they wouldn¡¯t have chosen such a gamble to save the situation.

 Chapter 285: Dazzling

    Chapter 285: Dazzling

    Phoebe sat alone after Andrew left, frowning in contemtion. It seemed that the crisis the Boozt Merchant Guild was facing was indeed very serious. Otherwise Phoebe wouldn¡¯t choose to strike using a gambling method, given her cautious nature.

    Han Shuo slowly came in without a sound, his eyes bright as he looked at Phoebe as soon as he entered the door. After a moment of silence, Phoebe was suddenly surprised. Looking up to see Han Shuo, she revealed a smile and said with delight, ¡°You¡¯vee back?¡±

    ¡°Rest assured, Leah Cain will die to my sword tomorrow, without a doubt!¡± Han Shuo smiled and walked towards Phoebe. He reached out his hand and smoothened the spot between her wrinkled eyebrows before speaking softly.

    ¡°I believe you. Our Boozt Merchant Alliance took out seven hundred thousand gold coins this time. Cameron will have topensate us five times that amount based on the current odds as long as you kill Leah Cain. Cameron won¡¯t be able to bear the costs no matter how much money he has. After this victory, our Boozt Alliance will have an enormous amount of gold coins and the danger from Cameron¡¯s group will naturally disappear!¡± Phoebe very much enjoyed Han Shuo¡¯s tenderness. She rxed her body and leaned on his chest, saying softly.

    ¡°Alright, go rest early. I¡¯ll meditate here for tonight. I¡¯ll go to the Garden House tomorrow to issue a challenge to Leah Cain and settle this problem as soon as possible!¡± Han Shuo patted Phoebe¡¯s shoulder and urged.

    Phoebe nodded meekly upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words. Her expression rxed into a smile as she said, ¡°Rest assured, I¡¯lle with you tomorrow and watch you kill Leah Cain for myself. I know you¡¯ll definitely win!¡±

    Phoebe didn¡¯t stay after finishing speaking. She walked into the back room with a chuckle and softly said, ¡°After you win, keep mepany for a nice chat!¡±

    Han Shuo sat cross-legged in the hall after Phoebe left. He silently circted his magical yuan and recovered his mental strength bit by bit, gradually adjusting the state of his body.

    In Han Shuo¡¯s body, the demon infant was as if surrounded by a bloody whirlpool. Each drop of blood essence was like a precious ruby, sparkling translucently as each drop formed a red, lustrous crystal shape. The drops of blood essence swirled into a whirlpool and nourished the demon infant in its center. Theyers of blood red mist, which was the killing intent gathered in the bloodlust realm, surrounded this whirlpool, also nourishing the demon infant.

    The demon infant was a copy of Han Shuo, except about the size of a fist. A ck spot appeared between its eyebrows where the Demonyer Edge was stored. The enormous amount of killing intent absorbed during this time had been stored in his body and condensed into a ck spot in the demon infant¡¯s be.

    In this way, the connection between Han Shuo and the Demonyer Edge constantly matured. The demon infant and the Demonyer Edge could also support each other to absorb even more energy. Once the Demonyer Edge sessfully developed its own soul, its connection with Han Shuo would be another step closer. Slicing off a human head from a thousand miles away with only a thought wouldn¡¯t be an impossible feat.

    In the past several days, Han Shuo had been going to war everywhere and killing many experts. Han Shuo had swallowed and absorbed their killing intent and resentment in order to improve himself bit by bit. He¡¯d already absorbed an enormous amount in particr from his trip to the forbiddennd, which had helped both him and the Demonyer Edge improve immensely.

    Han Shuo had slowly gained control over his nature in the bloodlust realm. Once the killing intent umted to a certain extent, it would gradually transform from quantitative to qualitative. Only then would he be able to break through to the separate demon realm and his strength would take another step forward. Not only would Han Shuo be able to practice higher level secret demonic skills, but he could also separate his consciousness from his body. He would possess some unimaginable miraculous abilities.

    After a night of meditation, Han Shuo was in high spirits the next day as he left the Boozt Merchant Guild with Phoebe and went to the Garden House where Leah Cain resided.

    The past several days, news of Han Shuo challenging the Crazy Leah Cain had spread throughout Ossen City, thanks to the deliberate work of Candide and Lawrence. Many aristocratic spies were lurking in the neighborhood of the Garden House. In addition to them, experts from all walks of life were full of enthusiasm as they waited for Han Shuo¡¯s arrival.

    Han Shuo stepped down from Phoebe¡¯s carriage and was walking alone to the Garden House when someone recognized him. Amidst the whispering and discussion, the spies of every house quickly sent in reports of this news. The whispering turned into a hubbub in the blink of an eye. More and more people gathered at the Garden House upon hearing the news.

    Leah Cain was famous among the aristocrats and powerhouses as the Crazy Great Swordmaster of the Brut Merchant Alliance. Such a character had raised a storm when he had appeared in Ossen City and defeated three of the city¡¯s great swordmasters. It was a pity that Leah Cain was a foreigner, otherwise the Lancelot Empire¡¯s civilians wouldn¡¯t be so upset about this.

    Han Shuo¡¯s fame had bloomed just the same during this time period. Of course, his reputation wasn¡¯t that good either. Because he had continuously killed his opponents, his infamy had spread far and wide. Even though Han Shuo¡¯s reputation was bad, he was still a citizen of the Lancelot Empire after all, so everybody hoped for his victory.

    The nobles and civilians cheered as they sent him in on the way to the House Garden. These people had known toe here early because Lawrence had revealed to them that Han Shuo would walk down this path within the next two days. They tried their luck whenever they were idle and waited in this ce. Everyone danced in happiness, as they didn¡¯t expect Han Shuo would reallye today.

    Han Shuo was one meter ny centimeters tall. He wore a simple and capable-looking ck warrior¡¯s outfit, his figure handsome and masculine. After a long time of cultivating demonic magic, cultivators would possess a striking evil temperament. When the nobledies saw Han Shuo for the first time, they already harbored goodwill for him regardless of right and wrong. People were first whispering in discussion, butter, they all screamed nonstop upon throwing a nce at Han Shuo¡¯s zing eyes.

    ¡°Humph! I¡¯ll die from anger! He disappeared for so many days in one go and made me wait again this time. If it weren¡¯t for the uproar this time, I¡¯m afraid I wouldn¡¯t have known when I¡¯d be able to see him again!¡± On a path to the Garden House, Fanny was leading a group of people from the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. She looked towards Han Shuo from afar and bitterly whispered herints.

    ¡°Master Fanny, what did you say just now? Look, it¡¯s really Bryan. When I first heard of this news, I thought it was fake! I didn¡¯t think that it really was Bryan. He¡¯s unexpectedly challenged that wicked Leah Cain, everyone is so excited about this!¡± Amy from the necromancy major animatedly waved her fists as she watched Han Shuo walking towards the Garden House. She turned to Fanny and noisily screamed.

    ¡°I, I didn¡¯t say anything!¡± Fanny covered up with a smile and said, ¡°I didn¡¯t expect this brat to be so calm in front of so many people. It seems that he has really matured!¡±

    ¡°Bryan is really very powerful. His deeds have spread everywhere in Ossen City. Even our necromancy major has gained some new students. These new students actually chose our weak necromancy major as soon as they entered the Babylon Academy. The tables have turned!¡± Athena was excited all the same. She looked at the proudly walking Han Shuo and eximed.

    Lisa tagged along this time, but she was silentpared to the past. She was no longer constantly twittering and only quietly followed the distant, dashing Han Shuo with her gaze. Seeing him acting so leisurely, even in the presence of so many people, Lisa suddenly felt that he should have been this dazzling from the start.

    ¡°I am Bryan, I havee here to see Mister Leah Cain!¡± Upon reaching the gate of the Garden House, Han Shuo spoke smilingly to the guard.

    A great number of nobles and civilians had crowded the alleys and gazing pavilions around the Garden House. The news of Han Shuo¡¯s challenge had soon spread. Leah Cain had also left an order earlier, so the guard naturally knew what to do.

    ¡°Mister Leah Cain is currently training. He has been expecting your arrival and has made arrangements. You can enter as soon as you arrive.¡± The guard said respectfully.

    ¡°Great then, please lead the way!¡± Han Shuo said with a smile.

    Han Shuo came in following the guidance of the guard. All of the onlookers were blocked outside. After all, this ce was private property, so no one could enter without the owner¡¯s permission.

    ¡°Let us in, let us in!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right, we have waited a long time for this! Please let us in!¡±

    ¡°I am Count Asi of the Lancelot Empire, I want to see Mister Leah Cain!¡±

    After Han Shuo entered, the nobles and civilians outside tried various methods to ess the Garden House. Not far from the ce, several carriages slowly lined up. The decorations of these carriage were extremely luxurious. It only took a look to know they belonged to the nobility.

    First Prince Charles led a group of aristocrats in a slow approach. The group included Mister Hahn and Emily of the Betteridge family, finance minister Eevee, along with Lawrence, Boris of the Northern Guard, and many other nobles.

    Candide, along with tall, handsome Amyes, who had a refined presence and was one of the three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle, also appeared in a gazing pavilion opposite of the Garden House. Everyone was raptly watching the inner area of the Garden House.

 Chapter 286: The challenger

    Chapter 286: The challenger

    ¡°Is this kid the Bryan you¡¯ve been telling me about?¡± One of the three Dark Mantle heavyweights, Amyes, asked elegantly as he observed Han Shuo in the Garden House with amusement.

    ¡°That¡¯s him. He¡¯s truly done a lot of big things during this short span of time. His strength also seems to be unfathomable. However, I haven¡¯t really seen it for myself. Let us use this opportunity to see his real strength?¡± The remote looking Candide said to Amyes.

    Amyes only looked to be around thirty some years old. He wore a fitting white robe without any other ornaments, which gave him a clean and pure look. This elevated his extraordinary handsomeness even more. In addition, there was an attractive, graceful charm about him.

    However, to the nobles of the Lancelot Empire, Amyes¡¯ ever elegant smile and graceful handsomeness was shrouded by a shadow of death. A noble was simply out of luck if they were targeted by him. At the bare minimum, they would be thrown in jail after their property was seized, and at worse, instant execution.

    Of the three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle, Cecilia usually carried out activities in foreignnds, Candide was responsible for gathering domestic intel and investigating other Empires¡¯ assassins. As for Amyes, he was in charge of monitoring and intimidating the dignitaries. The three of them coordinated with each other very well. Candide and Cecilia rarely showed their faces and never posed any threat to the Empire¡¯s nobles, so Amyes was the one that most of them were familiar with and also feared the most. There wasn¡¯t an aristocrat that wasn¡¯t afraid of him.

    ¡°You should know very well of Leah Cain¡¯s strength. Besides, he has a rtionship with the First Prince Charles. If this boy can¡¯t win against Leah Cain, I¡¯m afraid he won¡¯t be able to leave this ce alive.¡± Amyes squinted to look at the proudly standing Han Shuo in the Garden House, and said to Candide.

    ¡°Heh heh. That¡¯s hard to say. Ferguson was a light grand magus like you, and yet he still died by Bryan¡¯s hand. From what I know, Ferguson¡¯s reputation isn¡¯t any less than Leah Cain¡¯s. If he could kill a light grand magus, he should be able to kill Leah Cain all the same!¡± Although Candide wasn¡¯t so optimistic about Han Shuo privately, he still had to put up a front before Amyes. After all, Han Shuo had been promoted by him.

    Amyes smiled elegantly and nodded slightly before sitting down leisurely on a stone bench above a high tform. He took out a set of fine tea outrements and began to enjoy it.

    Han Shuo was currently quite worried in the Garden House. Through the three yin demons¡¯ observation, he found Emily, Phoebe, and Fanny outside. Even though they weren¡¯t in the same spot, he knew they¡¯d definitely rush to him once he left the Garden House.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t too worried about Emily. After all, she was much more open in the matter of romance. She might feel a bit unhappy, but the possibility of her causing a scene was the lowest. However, that couldn¡¯t be said for Phoebe and Fanny. They both knew nothing about his current situation. Once these two met, they¡¯d raise a storm without a doubt.

    As Han Shuo wallowed in anxiety from this situation, the great swordmaster Leah Cain walked out to the center of the Garden House. He carried a broadsword, his face cold, and the look in his eyes brutal as he swept a nce at Han Shuo. Leah Cain sneered, ¡°Little guy, are you that Bryan?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s me, you must know everything already, so there¡¯s no need for nonsense. The two of us will fight it out on this spaciouswn and settle everything in one go. Does that sound alright?¡± Han Shuo immediately threw all of his worries to the wind upon seeing Leah Cain appear. He looked raptly at thetter and replied casually.

    ¡°That works. I will teach you a good lesson!¡± Leah Cainughed coldly. He swept a nce around the crowd outside of the Garden House and suddenly proposed an idea, ¡°If you don¡¯t mind, can we allow the outside people toe in and watch the fight?¡±

    Han Shuo wrinkled his brows in thought for a bit before saying, ¡°I don¡¯t mind myself, but there are too many people outside. I¡¯m afraid it isn¡¯t very appropriate to allow all of them in here!¡±

    ¡°Then just let the nobles in. That shouldn¡¯t be a problem!¡± This proposal was due to Charles¡¯ prior reminder, otherwise, Leah himself didn¡¯t care about any of this.

    Han Shuo was afraid of some unexpected stormy situations if the three women were to meet, so that¡¯s why he¡¯d been hesitant. Now that he heard Leah Cain¡¯s words, he remembered that both Fanny and Phoebe didn¡¯t have noble titles. He instantly nodded and said, ¡°Then so be it!¡±

    Upon hearing the approval, Leah Cain waved his arm towards the guard standing in the distance. The guard seemed to have known beforehand as he shouted, ¡°Those with a noble title in the Empire cane inside to watch. Civilians will not be allowed entry.¡±

    The nobles wandering outside one by one elegantly walked in with their noses up. The civilians in the surroundings had no opposition to this. The nobility held certain privileges on the Profound continent. The people here all understood and were used to this, so they didn¡¯t feel surprised

    The nobles walked in with their followers. Phoebe and Lawrence also took this opportunity toe in as a couple. Phoebe suddenly felt that someone was watching her the moment she walked inside. She lifted her head to notice Emily¡¯s surprised look.

    Emily was wearing a purple dress, her skin delicate like white jade as she stood with old Mister Hahn¡¯s group. She looked beautiful with an invible, noble air and had none of the mncholy that could usually be seen from a widow. She was too dazzling for words.

    ¡°Damn that Bryan! This Emily must¡¯ve used that magical pill too. Does he have some rtionship with Emily?¡± Phoebe immediately recognized that it was the effect of the Rebirth Pill with just one nce at Emily¡¯s delicate, pure white cheeks. On the other hand, Phoebe¡¯s eyes were filled with surprise as she looked at Emily. The two women only needed a single nce at each other to understand the matter.

    ¡°Hey! Bryan, you¡¯ll definitely win!¡± Lawrence was very optimistic as he cheered for Han Shuo from afar.

    ¡°Humph, want to win with his strength? Dream on!¡± Not far from Lawrence, first Prince Charles said disdainfully. The bunch of nobles behind him immediately chimed in to lick his boots, taking turns to analyze the reasons Han Shuo would lose. Their goal was to gain some goodwill from Charles.

    There was a grassywn as big as a football field in the middle of the Garden House. Han Shuo and Leah Cain were currently standing in the center of thiswn. The Lancelot Empire¡¯s nobles sat in the surroundings. They brought their own highly skilled guards and kept their distance so they didn¡¯t need to worry about their safety.

    Leah Cain¡¯s facial expression was sternly cold and he didn¡¯t care much for Han Shuo. When he saw the nobles came in, his eyes moved to Charles. The chattering First Prince slightly nodded in response to Leah Cain¡¯s gaze, indicating that he could start making a move.

    Only now did Leah Cain look at Han Shuo again as he gripped his broadsword. His voice resounded coldly, ¡°Little guy, ready to die?¡±

    Taking in a deep breath, Han Shuo cleared all distractions from his mind. His face instantly became cold and ruthless, the arrogance in his voice wasn¡¯t any less, ¡°Mister Leah Cain, before this fight, let me remind you that I¡¯m also an archmage necromancer in addition to being a martial artist. I hope you¡¯ll be careful!¡±

    ¡°Humph, nothing but a useless archmage necromancer, wasting your power to train that kind of useless magic. I can already imagine how much skill you have. I really don¡¯t understand what kind of garbage that great swordmaster that you killed was. He couldn¡¯t even win against a brat like you who doesn¡¯t focus on training martial arts. It seems like your Lancelot Empire doesn¡¯t have a single truly strong expert!¡±

    Leah Cain was truly too cocky. He had offended every noble around him with just a few sentences. Even the nobles betting on his victory revealed angry expressions.

    Fool! Even if you win, don¡¯t even dream of a gaining a foothold in this Lancelot Empire anymore. No wonder you had to flee from the Brut Alliance. With your hot temper alone, you should¡¯ve long since been killed if it weren¡¯t for your power! First prince Charles cursed nonstop in his heart as he looked at the arrogant Leah Cain. He secretly made up his mind to absolutely not reveal his rtionship with Leah Cain, even if thetter managed to kill Han Shuo. He needed to prevent this from impacting the nobles¡¯ opinions of him.

    ¡°Mister Leah Cain, I hope you won¡¯t let me down!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s mind moved with a thought and the Demonyer Edge appeared in his right hand. The two-meter long edge didn¡¯t look very sharp, the body of the weapon was an unusual dark brown. Basically, the Demonyer Edge didn¡¯t look at all prominent without being injected with magical yuan.

    ¡°Little guy, since you dared to find me, I¡¯m sure you must be well prepared. Today, I¡¯ll let you know the true power of your seniors. Don¡¯t think that you¡¯re invincible just because you won against some garbage!¡± Leah Cain let out a cold harrumph. He pointed his sword at Han Shuo and said haughtily.

    Han Shuo no longer responded to Leah Cain, his face ice cold. He slightly raised the Demonyer Edge and shot forward. His extremely fast speed created several shadow images on his path, so fast that it was difficult to tell which one was real and which one was false with naked eye.

 Chapter 287: Standing proudly in the sky

    Chapter 287: Standing proudly in the sky

    Even though Leah Cain waspletely contemptuous, he immediately focused all of his attention when Han Shuo truly made his move. He raised the broadsword in his hand with a cold snort. A silver sword light suddenly spread out in front of him.

    Leah Cain had stepped into the rank of great swordmaster many years ago. He had indulged in this realm for a long time, challenging and defeating many experts back in the Brut Merchant Alliance, and gaining the title of Crazy Great Swordmaster at the same time. If he hadn¡¯t offended the lightning sacred magus Reynold D of the alliance, he might have never had to flee to the Lancelot Empire.

    The silver sword light instantly enveloped the area in front of him. Han Shuo could feel an enormous sword aura hidden within the light as he flew over to Leah Cain. He immediately infused the Demonyer Edge with magical yuan. This indestructible weapon then burst out with ck light and stabbed directly towards the silver sword light.

    The Demonyer Edge shot forward explosively with a ck light and heavy killing intent. It abruptly bombarded Leah Cain¡¯s sword light. The silver sword light intertwined with the ck light as several metallic pops sounded. Spots of light scattered out like stars before fading away in the air.

    ¡°Nngnn.¡± Leah Cain let out a light cry and quickly retreated a step back. He looked at Han Shuo with shock, ¡°Not bad little guy, your weapon is quite strange. It actually isn¡¯t fighting aura!¡±

    The ck light from the Demonyer Edge snuffed the silver sword light into thin air. However when the silver sword light collided with the Demonyer Edge, a huge force flooded into Han Shuo¡¯s arm through the weapon, numbing his arm a little.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t rush to make a next move. His face cold as he stared fixedly at Leah Cain, he focused his mind to the peak. After this exchange, he knew that Leah Cain was indeed much more powerful than the great swordmaster he killedst time. They were both swordmasters, but Leah Cain had swelled in this rank for many years. His strength was truly extraordinary.

    ¡°This Bryan has some power indeed!¡± Amyes looked at Candide in surprise and eximed softly on the tform opposite of the Garden House.

    Candide¡¯s eyes shone brightly, his face full of interest as he replied while looking at Han Shuo, ¡°This is my first time seeing him fight as well. Although he has no fighting aura, he could unexpectedly break through the sword light that Leah Cain had gathered from his fighting aura. It looks like his body is hiding a lot of secrets!¡±

    The nobles around eximed incredulously nonstop upon seeing Han Shuo shatter Leah Cain¡¯s sword light with his stroke. Amongst them, Lawrence and Phoebe were visibly joyous.

    ¡°This boy really isn¡¯t bad. He saved us oncest time at Eevee¡¯s house, it can be considered that we owe him a favor. I hope that he won¡¯t be harmed by Leah Cain!¡± Old mister Hahnughed and said to Emily next to him as he looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°It seems this Bryan may just win!¡± Emily replied with a chuckle. She knew in her heart that Han Shuo¡¯s strength wasn¡¯t just that simple. Based on the fact that he could fly through the air, that alone was a huge advantage as it wasn¡¯t something Leah Cain could do.

    ¡°Haha, hopefully so!¡± Old Hahnughed heartily.

    As everyone discussed noisily, Leah Cain snorted coldly, ¡°You do have some strength, but it¡¯s a pity that you shouldn¡¯t have challenged me!¡±

    Leah Cain raised his broadsword after his words and stepped towards Han Shuo. His speed wasn¡¯t fast and each step was heavy. The two scars on his neck looked ferocious as they crossed each other, his pupils filled with a mad fighting desire.

    Leah Cain¡¯s momentum was stronger with each step, the broadsword in his hand emitting a dazzling silver halo beneath the sunlight. The silver fighting aura finally converged with the broadsword into a brilliantly beautiful rainbow that shot towards Han Shuo from a dozen meters away.

    The speed of this silver rainbow was lightning fast. It whizzed right to Han Shuo¡¯s face as if having leapt over the distance of a dozen meters. This attack contained such an enormous force that several watching nobles around could also felt it clearly.

    Han Shuo just stood there, like he been stunned by the extremely fast attack of the silver rainbow. He seemed to have not reacted yet. Everyone stared dumbly as the silver rainbow cut down on his body. It looked like he didn¡¯t know how to dodge.

    ¡°Quickly, run!¡± Many onlookers were worried for Han Shuo, they all screamed out to warn him. Unfortunately the speed of their voice couldn¡¯t match the attacking speed of that silver rainbow sword aura from Leah Cain.

    A frightening sound boomed right out at the ground where Han Shuo was just standing dumbly right after the onlookers¡¯ warnings rang out. A gully fifteen meters long instantly appeared in that area. The deep gully was as if one had just sliced into a piece of tofu.

    The silver fighting aura wreathed around the gully and didn¡¯t disperse. The enormous destructive force of this strength assaulted the two walls of the deep gully, creating loud rumbling sounds. When the terrifying sounds had stopped, the already enormous gully was now even bigger. All of the weeds within the fighting aura¡¯s area of effect had all turned into green dust.

    ¡°What a terrifying attack. The poor challenger must be done for!¡±

    ¡°Aii, he was still too young after all. It¡¯s inevitable he¡¯d be vulnerable against an attack from an expert who¡¯s been famous for a long time!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go. That young man must¡¯ve died and fallen into that crack. The fun¡¯s over!¡±

    ¡°Mm, such a handsome man had actually died to that ugly monster. That damned foreigner!¡±

    All sorts of pessimisticments about Han Shuo resounded from the audience. They had dumbly watched on as Han Shuo hadn¡¯t make any move to evade Leah Cain¡¯s sword attack. Everyone was certain that Han Shuo had died and lost his life in that gully.

    Suddenly, a loud shout resounded, ¡°Oh my god, look to the sky!¡±

    Throwing their heads back to look at the sky, everyone saw Han Shuo standing tall in the sky with the Demonyer Edge in hand. He looked remotely down at Leah Cain. He wasn¡¯t injured a least bit.

    ¡°How can this be?!¡± Even Leah Cain couldn¡¯t help but exim in shock. He looked up, unable to believe his eyes.

    If a swordsman wanted to float in the air, they had to reach the rank of the legendary divine swordmaster in order to fly using fighting aura. While mages could fly by using the levitation skill upon reaching the rank of archmage, the casting speed of the levitation skill wasn¡¯t as fast or as smooth as Han Shuo¡¯s skills.

    Even though Han Shuo was a necromancy archmage, he couldn¡¯t have been able to dodge that rapid attack using that slow levitation skill. That was why even Leah Cain was shocked beyond belief upon seeing Han Shuo stand safe and sound in the sky.

    ¡°Amyes, can you sense any magic elements on his body? Why can¡¯t I sense any at all?¡± On the high tform, Candide eximed with surprise as he looked directly at Han Shuo standing proudly in the sky.

    Even an usually rxed and calm person like Amyes was startled. He shook his head, saying, ¡°Strange, too strange. He doesn¡¯t use any magic or fighting aura, but can actually stand in the sky so miraculously. Just what is this?¡±

    ¡°It seems this has something to do with his unique cultivation art. Amyes, this art he practices is very wondrous. If the Lancelot Empire¡¯s army also knows how to fly that quickly, then the power of our army would be multiplied!¡± Candide eximed with excitement as he thought of this.

    ¡°Pay close attention. We have to stop Leah Cain if he deals a killing blow even if it vites the rules. This Bryan is truly magical. He is too useful to our Lancelot Empire, we absolutely cannot let him die!¡± Amyes said with determination, having determined to set everything aside in order to ensure Han Shuo¡¯s safety.

    ¡°Let¡¯s do it like that then. After this, I think is Majesty also knows what to do now!¡± Candide agreed immediately. His gloomy eyes focused on Leah Cain. The dark elements on his body suddenly became dense as he prepared to make a move at anytime without regard to his identity.

    A person was watching Han Shuo on a lush, towering old tree. He was the one whom Han Shuo and Lawrence had met in the Rose Garden, super rank assassin Bonds. He was crouching within the foliage, his eyes were wide open as he observed Han Shuo and muttering, ¡°Truly amazing. He can actually use a skill directly to stand proudly in the sky. It seems this Bryan is hiding other secrets besides his extraordinary attainment with murderous aura. Master was right to send me here this time!¡±

    ¡°Little guy, don¡¯t think you are formidable just because you are an archmage who can fly in the sky. Get down here if you¡¯re so good!¡± Leah Cain shouted furiously down below as he looked up at Han Shuo in the sky.

    Even though he was a great swordmaster, he couldn¡¯t fly in the air. He had no choice but stare dumbly, helpless, whilst looking up at Han Shuo in the sky.

    ¡°As you wish!¡± Han Shuo let out a longugh in the sky before diving down like a meteor. The Demonyer Edge emitted a purple-red spellfire that two meters long . A thick murderous aura emanated in every direction with Han Shuo as the epicenter. The surrounding onlookers all felt a wave of palpitations and involuntarily stepped a bit further away, shocked as they looked up at him shooting down from the sky.

 Chapter 288: Ripped asunder

    Chapter 288: Ripped asunder

    ¡°Not bad, little guy!¡± Leah Cain could clearly sense the enormous murderous intent from his opponent. His eyes shone with excitement for the fight. Fighting aura continuously gathered on his broadsword. He didn¡¯t wait for Han Shuo tond on the ground as the silver fighting aura shot directly at thetter¡¯s head like a silver rainbow.

    A murderous aura condensed nonstop around Han Shuo¡¯s body. His pupils had be a deep red, his expression ferocious. The sinister, evil aura in the form of a bloody mist rushed to swallow Leah Cain. The purple-red spellfire that was two meters long floated down eerily in a strange trajectory, like arge, beautiful feather floating with the wind.

    An explosive rumbling echoed, the spellfire smashing into the silver fighting aura. Bursts of brilliant fireworks bloomed in the air as the two lights intertwined with each other. Deep red light, silver aura and purple lights shimmered endlessly. Metallic collisions resounded nonstop from the mystically beautiful fireworks.

    Leah Cain was standing on the ground, his two legs forced knee-deep into the ground due to the powerful pressure from the explosion above. The violent reactions kept ringing in his ears. An alternating force of two pr opposite powers, hot and cold, shrouded his brain. The strange force was like a ghost slipping through his pores before violently flooding his internal organs.

    Leah Cain first shivered all over from the cold, then suddenly felt as if his body was frozen solid. A zing hot current then burst through his body like a volcano. The two hot and cold airs intermingled within, giving Leah Cain an extremely surreal and painful feeling.

    ¡°Aowuuuu...¡±

    Leah Cain looked like a madman as he wailed crazily to the sky. He ripped apart the clothes on his upper body with one hand, revealing his strong muscles. Streams of silver light could be seen clearly as they wiggled around the his bare upper body. Purple and red glints reflected from within. It looked extremely odd.

    ¡°I¡¯m going to tear you apart!¡± Leah Cain roared. The broadsword in his hand had gathered every fiber of silver light. He looked to Han Shuo, who happened to be standing indifferently in the air.

    The silver halo on the broadsword in Leah Cain¡¯s hand suddenly shrank. The silver light faded away, and the glossy broadsword didn¡¯t reflect a single gleam beneath the sunlight. This appeared extremely weird.

    Han Shuo understood that Leah Cain¡¯s strength was indeed extraordinary after exchanging blows with him. He hadn¡¯t gained any advantage even after utilizing his full force of the bloodlust realm. If it weren¡¯t for the Mystical cial Spellfire with the property of both fire and ice invading his body, Leah Cain wouldn¡¯t have ended up so miserable after the attack either.

    Han Shuo dived downwards while fiercely pouring magical yuan into the Demonyer Edge despite his numb hands. Precisely at moment when he¡¯d focused his power and was waiting for a chance to deal a fatal blow, Han Shuo suddenly discovered that the light from Leah Cain¡¯s broadsword had suddenly vanished. Han Shuo¡¯s instincts detected a grave danger. His extraordinary senses once again were at y. Han Shuo immediately contacted the three yin demons. Just as the broadsword in Leah Cain¡¯s hand trembled, Han Shuo abruptly split into four clones andnded in four directions.

    The previously dull broadsword suddenly burst out with ring lights at the same moment. Icy awls as sharp as needles shot towards the sky in a drizzle, covering an area of about five meters. This attack had a terrifying pration ability in addition to its intensity. It pierced through the sky before disappearing in the blink of an eye.

    A yin demon had transformed into a clone to rece Han Shuo in the ce he¡¯d just been standing. As the icy awls pierced through that area, the invisible yin demon was also prated by a strange force. The violent fighting aura had coalesced into tiny shapes, unexpectedly possessing a particrly destructive force on the yin demon. The yin demon was pierced through like a beehive, its presence fading to the extreme.

    ¡°What a terrifying attack!¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t stop feeling horrified afternding.

    Leah Cain was indeed terrifying. He could gather his fighting aura into such a small and intense form. When the fighting aura was condensed into thousands of icy awls, the destructive force hidden in those awls actually increased by a hundred times. Even an intangible existence like the yin demon had suffered injuries from this attack. Han Shuo believed that if he hadn¡¯t reacted fast enough and swapped his body out, he definitely would¡¯ve be a mangled mess.

    While Han Shuo was shocked at Leah Cain¡¯s attack, Leah Cain the attacker himself felt even more incredulous. He could never expected Han Shuo to evade his strike.

    Han Shuo¡¯s four clones andnded on the t ground. The three figures transformed from the yin demons slowly faded like a reflection on ake being hit with a stone. The shadows twisted and swayed for a bit before disappearing, leaving only one Han Shuo behind Leah Cain.

    ¡°Too powerful!¡±

    ¡°Woah! What was that just now? A rain of swords? So stunning! I didn¡¯t think this ugly fellow could have produced such a beautiful attack!¡±

    ¡°Bryan was the formidable one here. If I didn¡¯t see wrong, there was four Bryans just now. My gosh, truly miraculous!¡±

    ¡°You didn¡¯t see wrong. I also saw four Bryans. What skill is this? It¡¯s really too powerful!¡±

    The whole audience burst into a hubbub after a moment of silence. All of the watching nobles, along with their followers, were discussing with surprise. Their faces was full of shock and excitement after seeing the astounding performance earlier.

    ¡°What, what¡¯s going on?¡± Candide¡¯s expression was that of disbelief as well on the high tform. He eximed with incredulity while looking at the distant Leah Cain and Han Shuo.

    ¡°That Leah Cain is truly terrifying. ording to the intelligence of Dark Mantle, he¡¯d always used that rainbow of a silver sword aura to gain the advantage before defeating his opponents in his fights during recent years. It seems his trademark move is the attack he¡¯d just deployed, the dense drizzle of ice needles. I could feel the destructive force within. I really didn¡¯t expect this crude, brainless looking Leah Cain to hide such a sinister and meticulous skill. Truly a terrifying person!¡±

    Sighing in astonishment, Amyes stopped for a bit and continued to exim in excitement, ¡°Candide, your Bryan is even more magical. There¡¯s almost no way to avoid that attack, yet he used such a miraculous skill to instantly split into four and escape the area of attack. What an incredible boy!¡±

    ¡°Of course, otherwise why would I spend so much effort on him?!¡± Candide was secretly taken aback, but still answered smugly after hearing Amyes¡¯ words.

    The surrounding was filled with the mix of endless discussion and loud noises. Given this level of excitement from the audience, it was likely that the discussion would only stop when the two fighters resumed their battle.

    Leah Cain and Han Shuo now had some certain understanding of their opponent¡¯s strength after such an intense exchange. The originally confident Han Shuo had to tread with more caution, and the dismissive Leah Cain had to put aside his arrogance and treat Han Shuo as his most powerful opponent thus far.

    The two were standing around fifteen meters away from each other at the moment. Leah Cain once again stood on the ground, panting lightly as he red at Han Shuo.

    The two men just stood there, staring at each other without a word. After a span of ten breaths, Han Shuo¡¯s lips curled into a grin,

    ¡°Leah Cain, you¡¯re going to be dead today without a doubt. Your attack just now was truly very powerful. Unfortunately, it needs a long time to gather and moreover, exhausts a great deal of fighting aura, doesn¡¯t it?¡±

    Leah Cain instantly paled in shock as Han Shuo¡¯s words sounded. It seemed Han Shuo had hit upon the weak point of this skill!

    Han Shuo shot towards Leah Cain like a lightning bolt at this precise moment. The Demonyer Edge was flying one step ahead like a snake baring its fangs and biting down on its prey. As Leah Cain used his broadsword to block, the Demonyer Edge would circle around to attack from another side.

    Han Shuo also rushed towards Leah Cain but didn¡¯t attack in the manner of the Demonyer Edge. Instead, he flew up in the air and leisurely took out the white bone staff, his mouth starting to chant some incantation. When the Canopy of Necromancy blotted out the sunlight, two evil knights leading a troop of dark creatures appeared one by one on thewn and tightly surrounded Leah Cain.

    Two evil knights, five hate warriors, twenty zombies, seventy skeletal warriors and two teams of thirty gargoyles each had appeared. Leah Cain was entangled by the Demonyer Edge and could only stare dumbly at the materializing dark creatures that were encircling him.

    ¡°Leah Cain is done for!¡± Amyes said gracefully before looking at Candide with a smile, and added, ¡°Let¡¯s go, we will go together to meet His Majesty. His Majesty will definitely make the right decision with Bryan¡¯s value. Hehe, that boy Lawrence¡¯s luck isn¡¯t bad alright, we should grow closer to him!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right!¡± Candide nodded before drifting away with Amyes towards the direction of the Imperial Pce.

    The two had yet topletely clear the area when Leah Cain¡¯s tragic roars echoed nonstop throughout the entire Garden House area.

    Lurking underground, the earth elite zombie had grabbed on Leah Cain¡¯s ankles. The humble little skeleton had then caused great injuries to Leah Cain with a surreptitious ambush. The two evil knights trampled him to death afterwards. In the end, over a hundred dark creatures rushed in and ripped him apart. There wasn¡¯t a single piece of bone left behind.

 Chapter 289: A medal of merit

    Chapter 289: A medal of merit

    Leah Cain¡¯s fate had been sealed when more than a hundred dark creatures appeared. After all, a great deal of his fighting aura had been exhausted after exchanging blows with Han Shuo. Particrly in thatst attack, Leah Cain had consumed a massive amount of fighting aura to produce the ice needles.

    Han Shuo had the mental strength of a grand magus despite not being able to release the necromancy spells of this level. Such a huge mental force was enough for him to summon arge number of dark creatures. Amongst these creatures were the remarkably powerful little skeleton, the earth elite zombie and the wood elite zombie.

    The three bizarre dark creatures lurked within the necromancy grand army and would randomly release attacks that caught an average person off guard, rendering them unable to defend themselves. Leah Cain had to deal with the Demonyer Edge¡¯s all-pervasive attacks while facing two evil knights, creatures famous for their tyrannical strength. That obviously took most of his attention.

    The three bizarre creatures took the opportunity to utilize their unique attacks to their hearts¡¯ content. This strategy was naturally effective as Leah Cain was instantly heavily injured by the little skeleton¡¯s sneak attacks. It was a matter of course for him to be trampled to death by the evil knights.

    The hundred strong dark creatures instantly drowned Leah Cain and blocked the vision of the surrounding nobles as well as that of their entourages¡¯. These people couldn¡¯t see what was happening at all. They could only hear the shrill, tragic roars from Leah Cain.

    Han Shuo was standing grandly in the sky as Leah Cain¡¯s tragic screaming started to subside. He unhurriedly chanted an incantation, sending his summoned dark creatures back to the other dimension. Apart from the traces of blood scattered on the grass, there was nothing, not even a piece of bone left on thewn to indicate these creatures had been present.

    Everyone understood that Leah Cain was finished! He must have been ripped apart and eaten cleanly by those dark creatures. The big, still wet patches of blood on thewn were proof of this truth.

    ¡°Done, done just like that!¡±

    ¡°Leah Cain is dead! I mean, he should be dead!¡±

    ¡°Uhh, how can this be? He was finished so quickly?!¡±

    The onlookers around all sent horrified looks at Han Shuo standing proudly in mid-air. They then looked back down at the bloodstains on thewn and understood that the battle was over. Han Shuo had sessfully killed the Crazy Great Swordmaster Leah Cain of the Brut Merchant Alliance. He¡¯d won fair and square, and had shown his unique skills from beginning to end of the battle.

    He¡¯d used the necromancers¡¯ most brilliant,mon, and effective tactic of numbers in the end to directly stomp on the great swordmaster. No matter from what perspective one approached this battle, this match could be regarded as a ssic one for the books. Leah Cain¡¯s dense rain of ice awls and Han Shuo¡¯s unique skill in splitting up into four copies were all deeply engraved into everyone¡¯s memory.

    A hubbub of discussions rose and fell. Han Shuo had been standing proudly in the sky when he suddenly let out a resounding shout and left a blinding speed. His elegant, dashing figure gradually turned into a ck spot until the crowd could no longer see a trace of him.

    It weren¡¯t just the audience inside the Garden House who knew of Han Shuo¡¯s grand victory, the civilians on the streets outside all deduced the result when they saw Han Shuo fly away in the air. Everyone cheered and yelled, the atmosphere as joyous as a holiday.

    First Prince Charles¡¯ face was terrifyingly gloomy. He never expected Leah Cain to lose, no matter how much he spected about the match. To him, this was simply unreal.

    A face that looked even more embarrassed than Charles¡¯ belonged to merchant Cameron. He stood right behind Charles with a bleak expression on an ashenplexion, his eyes zed over as he stared into space. He simply didn¡¯t know what to do now. As the operator behind the scenes, Cameron had to draw out all of his capital for this bet like everyone else. He already had to pay an arm and leg for just Phoebe¡¯s Boozt Merchant Guild alone.

    Phoebe was theplete opposite of him. Her usually cold face was currently full of uncontroble excitement, her cherry lips muttering nonstop, ¡°I¡¯m rich, I¡¯m rich!¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, heh heh, Bryan ah Bryan, you really didn¡¯t let me down!¡± Lawrence had never felt happier than he was today as he looked at Charles¡¯ gloomy face. Heughed loudly and left with Phoebe, walking arrogantly past Charles and Cameron.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, father-inw!¡± Although Emily soon knew of this result, she still felt an infinite glory as Han Shuo¡¯s secret woman when she saw his godly strength on disy. The corner of her lips slightly turned up in a delightful smile as she turned to speak to old mister Hahn.

    ¡°Incredible, incredible little guy, heh!¡± Old mister Hahn showered nonstop praises, then left the Garden House with Emily.

    When the nobles exited the Garden House, the details of Han Shuo¡¯s grand victory over Leah Cain quickly spread. At this moment, the entire Ossen City was discussing Han Shuo. Many noble youngdies secretly regarded him as the target of their admiration and adoration. Countless aristocrats wanted to recruit Han Shuo.

    Ossen City, the Imperial Pce.

    The two who¡¯d left early ¨C Amyes and Candide ¨C were in a chamber with the king of the Lancelot Empire. They were softly narrating the details of the battle.

    King Uhtred suddenly spoke loudly in joy after a while, ¡°Good, very well done! I heard just yesterday that he¡¯d found the blueprint, and today he¡¯s already killed Leah Cain of the Brut Merchant Alliance. This boy is truly worthy of enormous investment!¡±

    ¡°Not only that, your Majesty. Bryan also possesses an unique art. Not only can he be a top notch expert, his martial art can create an immeasurable impact to our Empire if widely promoted!¡± Amyes waited until Uhtred happily finished his speech before adding cautiously.

    As these words fell, Uhtred asked in surprise, ¡°What is this about?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s like this...¡± Gloomy Candide, one of the three heavyweights, carefully exined to Uhtred as he went over the details of how Han Shuo defeated Leah Cain. Then he added, ¡°Your Majesty, Bryan has a clean background and is wholeheartedly loyal to the Empire. He¡¯s worth it no matter the cost!¡±

    Uhtred naturally had extraordinary insight since he¡¯d been able to be king of Lancelot. His eyes sparkled when he heard Candide talk about the miracles about Han Shuo. He was silent for a while before issuing an order, ¡°Candide, I intend to bestow him the title of count, award him with a mansion in the city¡¯s north end, along with ten thousand gold coins. Promote him directly from Dark Moon to Dark Sun envoy with the right to ess all Dark Mantle intelligence. In addition, you will personally lead Bryan and let him have his pick of territory. Don¡¯t ask him about his martial arts for the time being. We first need to show him our sincerity.¡±

    ¡°Your Majesty is wise, I think Bryan will be very grateful!¡± Candide ttered.

    ¡°Mm, Candide, this Bryan was personally mentored by you, your credit is great. I now bestow you with a Medal of Bravery, consider this your reward!¡± Uhtred said to Candide with a smile.

    ¡°Many thanks to Your Majesty, your subject is very grateful!¡± Candide was overjoyed as he knelt down to receive the honor.

    The Empire¡¯s Medal of Bravery carried a special meaning. Only those with outstanding contributions to the Empire could be awarded this medal. Having this Medal of Bravery meant that Candide could enjoy the special privileges of the Empire in his lifetime. Even if the current king passed away, the next inheritor of the throne could never use brute force against the Imperial heroes who possessed a Medal of Bravery. Moreover, this medal was hereditary. Even when Candide died, his direct descendents could still enjoy the special privilege.

    Although the Medal of Bravery carried no tangible benefits, this little medal was like a card of privilege that gave an identity even much superior than an average noble title. Therefore, Candide was overjoyed upon hearing Uhtred bestow him a Medal of Bravery. He secretly thought that this Bryan was indeed his lucky star!

    ¡°Candide, congrattions!¡± Amyes elegantly turned to offer Candide his congrattions.

    ¡°Many thanks!¡± Candide smiled in response, his face couldn¡¯t conceal his joy.

    ¡°Alright, this is a reward you deserve because you¡¯ve discovered a person who can be a sacred swordmaster and sacred magus for the Empire. I hope you will provide Bryan with more guidance and make even more contributions for the Empire!¡± Uhtred smiled as he looked at Candide and spoke slowly.

    ¡°Rest assure your Majesty, I will help Bryan adapt to aristocratic life as soon as possible. This boy is highly intelligent, he will be a pir of the Empire sooner orter !¡± Candide was so pleased after he received the Medal of Bravery that he immediately made these promises.

    Nodding his head, Uhtred said smilingly, ¡°Good. You can all leave now. I will warn the Church of Light and won¡¯t allow them to act wildly in our Lancelot Empire. Hehe, I believe the title of count is just the beginning for this boy. I hope he won¡¯t disappoint me!¡±

    Candide and Amyes nced at each other. They didn¡¯t say anything else and bowed respectfully. They then left through the secret tunnel and returned to the Dark Mantle headquarters within Mt. Ordas behind the Imperial Pce. After arriving, Candide started to prepare for Han Shuo¡¯s ennoblement matters.

 Chapter 290: First function of the bone staff

    Chapter 290: First function of the bone staff

    Han Shuo¡¯s name spread all throughout Ossen City in just a short few days. Thanks to his identity as an archmage necromancer and his deed of killing Leah Cain, this proved his strength. Uhtred used the fact that Han Shuo had recovered the blueprint to bestow upon him the title of count.

    Uhtred also awarded him a gorgeous mansion in the northern part of the city, which included guards, maids, servants, and all that one could possibly want. The mansion had more than a hundred rooms of various sizes.

    Even though Han Shuo had yet to officially receive the title of count, this didn¡¯t stop others from admiring and wanting to make friends with him. The gorgeous mansion already belonged to him from the moment he had left the Garden House.

    Over the next couple of days, dignitaries from various noble houses came by to pay their respects to him. Unfortunately, the steward kept saying that the owner had yet to move in. Those who hade to visit could only leave their gifts behind.

    Although he was currently the center of attention, Han Shuo himself actually didn¡¯t know about the situation going on outside. He flew alone to the mountain behind the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force after leaving the Garden House. There, he opened up the transportation matrix and returned to the cemetery of death.

    Han Shuo had reaped many benefits from his battle with Leah Cain. He slowly digested the experience from this battle as he gradually recovered his magical yuan and mental strength. Han Shuo¡¯s body reached its peak condition by the time evening came. He immersed himself in the bloodlust realm, his deep red pupils furiously circting with magical yuan.

    After a few days passed like this, Han Shuo¡¯s deep red eyes gradually returned to normal. He heaved a soft sigh, ¡°Just one more step. It¡¯s a pity that this step seems to be an unbreakable bottleneck. I really don¡¯t know what¡¯s going on.¡±

    Han Shuo could faintly sense that he¡¯d soon break out of the bloodlust realm. However, he couldn¡¯t bridge the gap no matter how much effort he put in. Breakthroughs in magical cultivation required opportunities andprehension. Perhaps the day that Han Shuo became spontaneously enlightened, he would directly break through into the next realm. He could instantly seed once he firmly grasped this step.

    Blind, stubborn practice wasn¡¯t a good idea. When Han Shuo felt that he could no longer advance by relying on arduous training, he immediately stopped practicing demonic magic. He took out the tri-colored bone staff after some thought.

    At this point, Han Shuo was certain that this bone staff was the result of the Eye of Darkness transforming, as the top of the staff and the Eye of Darkness gave off the same feeling. When Han Shuo focused his mental force into the bone staff, he could use it to sessfully open the cemetery of death.

    This bone staff was much more intricate and ancientpared to the white bone staff that Han Shuo had taken from the Cmity Church. The three different skulls seemed to contain three different kinds of power. Han Shuo could subtly feel this every time he grasped the bone staff.

    The bone staff was, without a doubt, a treasure that belonged to the cemetery of death. Shaking the staff a little, Han Shuo muttered, ¡°Let¡¯s try out this bone staff.¡±

    ¡°Souls of the fallen soldiers, heed the dark herald¡¯s call and reveal your existence!¡± Han Shuo waved the bone staff and chanted an elementary skeleton summoning incantation. The tri-colored skulls on the bone staff suddenly shone brightly upon being infused with his mental force. A row of sixteen skeletal warriors appeared out of thin air afterwards.

    Han Shuo was momentarily dazed, shocked even, as he looked at the sixteen skeletal warriors. Mental strength at the grand magus level would only result in eight skeletal warriors being summons when using the white bone staff. But when he cast the spell using this bone staff, he¡¯d unexpectedly reached the highest level of the skeleton summoning spell ¨C level five. The number of summoned dark creatures had straight up doubled.

    ¡°This is too amazing!¡± Han Shuo eximed involuntarily. He started chanting the incantation to summon evil knights. When he had finished chanting, two evil knights appeared on the ground.

    ¡°Twice the results!¡± Han Shuo was utterly delighted. He then tried summoning the hate warriors and zombie warriors and achieved the same results. The number of summoned creatures had doubled when he used this bone staff whilst chanting the incantations.

    After a sessful experiment, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but continue and try incantations for Canopy of Necromancy and Acid Bog. He discovered that the area of effect for both spells were now twice as wide.

    ¡°Good stuff! This is really good stuff!¡± Han Shuo caressed the bone staff, never wanting to let go of it. He hadn¡¯t expected this bone staff to be so magical. It¡¯d doubled the potential of the spells and increased his power by another level.

    The bone staff was designed in an odd fashion and seemed quite ancient. In addition to doubling the power of necromancy magic, Han Shuo subtly felt that this staff hid several other secrets within it as well. It was a pity that he had no other methods to test it besides using it to release necromancy magic.

    A white light shed in the transportation matrix in the cemetery of death. Emily¡¯s figure appeared within the light. She opened her mouth to speak as soon as she saw Han Shuo, ¡°I knew you¡¯d be here!¡±

    The transportation matrix leading to this ce was stationed in a corner of the graveyard. Han Shuo was ustomed to arriving at the cemetery of death by using the hidden location in the mountains behind the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. Only Emily knew this habit of his. When she went there and saw the magic sticks in the corner of the grave, she immediately knew that Han Shuo must¡¯ve headed to the cemetery of death.

    ¡°Oh, what brings you here?¡± Han Shuo smiled upon seeing Emily appear and pulled her into his embrace.

    ¡°Hurry and return to Ossen City. His Majesty the King has prepared to bestow upon you the title of count. Everything is ready and waiting for you to return to Ossen City. Who knew that you¡¯d disappear for a few days? Even the Dark Mantle couldn¡¯t find a single trace of you. Master Candide is very anxious, so he asked me to help him find a way to contact you. I guessed that you were at the cemetery of death, and it seems that I wasn¡¯t wrong!¡± Emily rolled her eyes at Han Shuo in exnation.

    ¡°So that¡¯s the case!¡± Han Shuo replied, then asked with a strange chuckle, ¡°So His Majesty intends to grant me the title of count?¡±

    ¡°Yes. In addition to the title, he¡¯s also bequeathing upon you a mansion in the northern part of the city and ten thousand gold coins. Candide seems to have prepared everything for you already, and it only awaits you to take it!¡± Emily said.

    ¡°Fantastic. I didn¡¯t think that giving Leah Cain a beating could bring such great benefits. Heh heh, it seems that noble titles really aren¡¯t so hard to get!¡± Han Shuo said with a smile before activating the transportation matrix and returning to the Ossen City with Emily.

    Mt. Ordas, the Dark Mantle headquarters.

    ¡°Stinking brat, why don¡¯t you disappear for ten more days huh?¡± Candide scolded with a dark face upon seeing Han Shuo appear.

    ¡°I was slightly injured after my fight with Leah Cain, so I had no choice but to recover first, so I returned a bitter.¡± Han Shuo lied, and smiled at Candide and congratted his mentor. ¡°Congrattions Master Candide, I heard that His Majesty the King bequeathed upon you the Medal of Bravery two days ago. Congrats congrats!¡±

    Candide¡¯s gloomy face finally revealed a hint of a smile when Han Shuo mentioned this, but he quickly recovered and said with a stern expression, ¡°Alright alright, let¡¯s not talk about this anymore. Give me your badge. His Majesty has ordered me to promote you to a rank one Dark Sun envoy. Little brat, your luck is truly too good!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go,e with me to meet His Majesty. His Majesty will bestow upon you a noble title and grant you a territory!¡± Candide said before leading Han Shuo through the secret transportation matrix in the Dark Mantle headquarters that led directly to the Imperial Pce.

    Not long after, King Uhtred summoned the various nobles of Ossen City to gather in the middle of the spacious Lancelot Imperial Pce. He granted Han Shuo an audience and read the promation to begin the ceremony, ¡°Bryan aided the Lancelot Empire many times in defending against foreign enemies... I bestow upon you the title of count, a mansion in the north of the city, and ten thousand gold coins. I hope you will continue to make great contributions to the Empire!¡±

    ¡°My thanks to your Your Majesty!¡± Candide had reminded Han Shuo of what to do and say earlier, so Han Shuo sincerely voiced his gratitude at this moment.

    ¡°Mhm, Brettel City in the furthest east shall be your territory. Brettel City is vast but extremely chaotic. I hope it will soon be restored to order under your leadership!¡± Uhtred raised his voice to speak loudly.

    Several nobles revealed surprised expressions when they heard the territory would be Brettel City. It seemed that this city was very famous.

    ¡°Thank you, Your Majesty. I will definitely take good care of Brettel City and help restore the city to the order that it should possess in the Empire!¡± Han Shuo respectfully replied.

    ¡°Good. This shall be it for today. You are all dismissed!¡± Uhtred nced at Han Shuo several times over before waving his arm to signify the end of the meeting. Everybody left one by one.

 Chapter 291: Mansion and territory

    Chapter 291: Mansion and territory

    Brettel City was located to the east in the Lancelot Empire and bordered seven constantly warring duchies. These duchies weren¡¯t as powerful as the Lancelot Empire and were gued with conflict almost all year round.

    However, whenever the Lancelot Empire would try to invade these seven duchies, they would stop their internal conflict and tightly join hands to resist the invasion of the Lancelot Empire.

    One duchy by itself couldn¡¯tpete with the Lancelot Empire, but seven of them together had the power beyond that of the Lancelot Empire. Fortunately, these seven duchies would never be united forever, otherwise the Lancelot Empire would truly be hard pressed to face their attack.

    Brettel City was precisely a Lancelot Empire city that bordered the seven duchies. The size of the city was vast, but unfortunately its location was awkward. The city suffered from the impact of the chaotic warring between the seven duchies, so it was the ce where crooks mixed with honest folk.

    ¡°Bryan, normally a count such as you has no way to control such arge territory. Brettel City is almost the size of the Valen City, only someone with the title of marquis is qualified to oversee such a city. Hehe, Brettel is chaotic indeed, but it¡¯s just right for a spirited young man like you.¡±

    ¡°It would greatly benefit your future career if you manage Brettel City well. It will be up to you to grasp opportunities well if you wish to obtain the title of marquis or duke.¡± In the secret chamber of the Dark Mantle, Candide looked at Han Shuo and exined in a low tone.

    Sitting directly opposite of Candide, Han Shuo was perusing the information about Brettel City. He nodded at Candide¡¯s words and ced the documents to the side, lifting his head to say, ¡°Brettel is a barrennd, the soil cannot nurture any type of crops. It can only produce some specialized iron and silver ores. The city has been caught in the midst of warring between the seven duchies for a long time while bandits and thieves have run rampant. Even several official armies of the duchies have disguised themselves as bandits to invade and pige the city. This is a chaotic ce where the city folks are tough. It¡¯s actually a very interesting area!¡±

    ¡°How so? Do you have any ideas yet?¡± Han Shuo was a count not, and he¡¯d also proved his powerst time in the Garden House by killing Leah Cain. Even Candide no longer had the attitude of a boss talking to a subordinate when he spoke with Han Shuo. He was viewing Han Shuo as he equal on the same level.

    ¡°No ideas yet for now. I want to go to Brettel City and see the situation for myself first!¡± Han Shuo replied indifferently.

    ¡°Then alright. Take these documents, they are proof of your identity as the Brettel city lord. The former city lord was removed due to his ipetence. The Brettel City¡¯s castle now belongs to you, you can show these documents to officially take ownership of it.¡±

    ¡°Mm, in addition, Brettel City currently has three thousand guards all under yourmand. Perhaps you aren¡¯t well versed in leading the army to war. However, I think Lawrence can help you with this aspect. You only need to protect Brettel City from the invasion of the duchies and bandits, as well as maintain its order. That should be enough.¡± Candide said.

    ¡°Alright then, I¡¯ll be leaving now. I¡¯ll contact you through the magic mirror in Brettel City¡¯s Dark Mantle stronghold if anythinges up!¡± Han Shuo nodded and said to Candide before exiting the Dark Mantle headquarters.

    Han Shuo walked into a mansion in the city¡¯s northern end. A steward was already waiting in front of the gate. He immediately said respectfully upon seeing Han Shuo, ¡°Respected Sir Count, you¡¯ve finallye. My name is Kas, I am your steward.¡±

    ¡°Hello Kas, what can you tell me about this mansion?¡± Han Shuo asked with a faint smile.

    Kas was a gray-haired old man wearing clean and simple clothes. His speech was refined and his behavior courteous. He must have been in his position for quite a few years. Kas immediately responded respectfully to Han Shuo¡¯s question, ¡°Your Lordship, this mansion has belonged to you since the moment you defeated Leah Cain. Everything is operating normally. In the past few days, a total of thirty nobles from Ossen City havee to pay you a visit. We have received seventy-three types of gifts in total, all of them are being properly stored...¡±

    Han Shuo remembered every detail as Kas softly summarized the situation within the mansion. From Kas, Han Shuo knew that many nobles didn¡¯t have territory in the Ossen City. Instead, they had a mansion here which they stayed in when they came to meet His Majesty the King.

    Of course, there were also aristocrats whose territories weren¡¯t bustling enough for their tastes. As they didn¡¯t enjoy the life in their own territory, many nobles always resided inside the Ossen City. It was fine as long as they returned to their territory regrly, handled some matters, and made sure that no trouble cropped up in it.

    There were maids, servants, stewards and all necessary resources inside the mansion. Han Shuo had the right to remove them, or needed to pay them a certain sry each month so they could maintain the normal operations of the mansion. Kas described some of the misceneous things very carefully.

    ¡°Alright, Mister Kas, I¡¯ve understood everything. Mm, take me to the living room. Invite Lawrence and young Miss Phoebe here, I want to see the two of them. If other people ask for me, tell them I¡¯m not here.¡± Han Shuo discovered through the three yin demons¡¯ surveince that many people hade to visit him. These people had been ced in different rooms so they didn¡¯t know of each other¡¯s movements.

    One yin demon had been injuredst time in the battle with Leah Cain. It had recovered after being nourished by the blood essence in the cemetery of death. Even though Han Shuo had spent a few drops of his essence blood, it was good that the yin demon was fine.

    ¡°Yes, Your Lordship!¡± Kas replied. He brought Han Shuo to a big living room before withdrawing respectfully.

    This living room was as big as a basketball court. Sevenrge, vibrantmps were hanging above. A soft carpet covered the floor. Manyfortable chairs was ced around the surroundings. The room looked bright and spacious.

    Lawrence and Phoebe walked in together after a while. Lawrenceughed heartily and said to Han Shuo as soon as he arrived, ¡°Congrattions Bryan, I heard that the king bestowed a title upon you today. I thought you woulde back to your mansion, so I brought Phoebe with me.¡±

    Phoebe¡¯s face was glowing, a beautiful, bright smile blooming on her lips after she¡¯d won an enormous amount of gold coins. Her eyes zed as she looked at Han Shuo and said, ¡°Bryan, Cameron is finished this time. His merchant alliance has suffered a heavy loss thanks to him, so his allies no longer trust him. The crisis of our Boozt Guild has been resolved.¡±

    Looking at the two happy people, Han Shuo nodded smilingly and said, ¡°I intend to go to Brettel City. This city is full of mayhem, it¡¯s very interesting. If this Brettel City can develop well in my hands, it can be very beneficial to you, Lawrence.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve knew about you taking charge of Brettel City. This city is chaotic indeed, the civilians there are much tougher than in the Ossen City. The bandit armies of several grand duchies constantly pige the viges in the surroundings. In recent years, the city lords of Brettel City have all been ipetent. This has caused all the businessmen to leave, and the nobles and civilians to lose their confidence in Brettel City due to this. It may not be easy if you want to quickly grasp control of the situation!¡± Lawrence said with a frown. He was quite worried upon hearing Han Shuo mention Brettel City.

    The Lancelot Empire had sent out its armies repeatedly and tried to invade the seven grand duchies through Brettel City. However, the Empire had to withdraw every single time and eventually banished this idea. Whenever the main troops retreated, the few tens of thousands remaining Brettel City guards were insufficient to defend against the invasion from any duchy. The duchies took advantage of that opportunity to loot and raid, as was their habit.

    However, even though the seven grand duchies had the power to take over Brettel City, they didn¡¯t dare to because they still had suspicions about each other, while also being afraid that they¡¯d really infuriate the Lancelot Empire. This was why they only piged from time to time and never truly upied the city.

    Therefore, the former city lords of Brettel City had been much aggrieved and frustrated. The city was much weaker than any of the grand duchies. In addition, thend was barren, so there wasn¡¯t much benefit from it despite the vastness of the area. The King also wasn¡¯t willing to waste an enormous amount of manpower and resources in stationing an army inside the city to defend against the seven grand duchies.

    Brettel City had be a kind of useless and meaningless existence ever since then. It would be a pity to give up, but not giving up wouldn¡¯t bring any benefits either. The situation was very awkward.

    ¡°Rest assured, I understand what kind of ce Brettel City is. I already have a n. After all, His Majesty has spoken. Brettel City is fully under my responsibility, I¡¯ll take good care of it!¡± Han Shuo let out a strange cackled and responded in a mysterious manner.

    ¡°What do you intend to do?¡± Lawrence asked, dumbfounded.

    ¡°You¡¯ll know when the timees. I will make Brettel City even more chaotic!¡± Han Shuo spoke with an evilugh.

 Chapter 292: Three hundred thousand gold coins

    Chapter 292: Three hundred thousand gold coins

    ¡°Senior brother Lawrence, there¡¯s something I want to speak to Bryan about alone.¡± Phoebe nced at Lawrence and said softly.

    Lawrence was startled but soon reacted. He smiled meaningfully and said, ¡°Alright. Rest assured Bryan, I¡¯ll arrange some fine military leaders to arrive at Brettel City before you travel there.¡±

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo said with a slight smile, ¡°Many thanks, I¡¯m really not very good at military strategy. Your people will surely be a great help to me!¡±

    ¡°Alright then, you guys talk, I¡¯ll go back first. I¡¯ll personallye to Brettel City after a while to pay you a visit.¡± Lawrence shed a wink at the two before exiting the room with a smile.

    Han Shuo stepped forward and gathered Phoebe into his arms as soon as Lawrence had left, following up with a long, lingering kiss. Han Shuo picked her up and walked straight into the bedroom. He dropped her right on the spacious, soft bed and pressed himself on her.

    Clothes flung out, the two naked bodies intertwined. Phoebe let out one sultry whimper after another, trying desperately to match Han Shuo¡¯s pounding movements. She kept going until she had exhausted of every bit of strength.

    After stormy turbulence, Phoebezily leaned onto Han Shuo¡¯s strong chest. Her delicate fingers gently glided across his body as she murmured in satisfaction, ¡°I can¡¯t leave with you for now. Cameron¡¯s merchant alliance is facing a crisis of disbandment due to their loss in his huge gamble. This has opened up an opportunity.¡±

    There was normally a secret chamber in the mansion of every noble for storing precious goods or engaging in secret endeavours. This mansion the King had bestowed upon Han Shuo was no exception. Candide had told Han Shuo everything about this mansion when he met with Han Shuo in the Dark Mantle headquarters, including the underground secret chamber.

    Han Shuo saw a big, empty room after walking down the tunnel. There was nothing inside except for a few empty closets.

    Setting up the magic sticks into a closet, Han Shuo arrived at the cemetery of death through the transportation matrix. The cemetery of death was gloomy all year round. Except for the stark white bones scattered everywhere, there was no vitality nor any changes. Han Shuo heaved a soft sigh of relief upon exiting the cemetery of death. He looked to the depths of the Dark Forest and spread out his senses.

    ¡°Why hasn¡¯t the fire elite zombie beenpleted after so long!¡± Han Shuo frowned and muttered to himself, unable toprehend things.

    The earth elite zombie and wood elite zombie certainly hadn¡¯t taken as long to emerge as the fire elite zombie. If it weren¡¯t for Han Shuo being able to sense its presence, he would really have thought that it¡¯d met with some troubles.

    ¡°Could it be because of the fire attribute treasure ¨C the fire lotus, or the Lord of the mes?¡± Han Shuo pondered for a bit and made this guess.

    In contrast to the earth elite zombie and wood elite zombie, the ce of extreme fire had given birth to a fire attribute treasure ¨C the fire lotus. What would result from it hadn¡¯t been mentioned in Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memory. There had been a terrifying Lord of the mes inside as well that had taken the fire elite zombie to be its child, which put an even odder spin on things. So many strange happenings together might have impacted the formation of the fire elite zombie. Otherwise, it shouldn¡¯t have taken that long to emerge.

    ¡°Forget it. Let¡¯s start the water elite zombie for now!¡± Han Shuo decided to stop thinking about it. He understood that there was no issue since he could still sense the presence of the fire elite zombie. He decided to go to the Valley of Sunshine and ce the water elite zombie into the ce of extreme water.

    After flying through the air for a while, Han Shuo traveled from the Dark Forest to the territory of the Valley of Sunshine. He jumped down the strange cliff to look for the Soul Destroyer base.

    Surprisingly, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t sense Gilbert¡¯s presence at all. He only saw Grant when he walked in. Thetter immediately paid his respects upon seeing Han Shuo and exined, ¡°The chief and Gilbert have taken epted a mission, they aren¡¯t here for now.¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s the current situation?¡± Han Shuo ordered the three yin demons to circle around. He discovered that there were over two hundred mercenaries still present. As these two hundred people lookedpletely unfamiliar, he immediately understood that the Soul Destroyer mercenary band had expanded.

    ¡°What else could have happened? The great powers have switched from covert to direct fighting. During this chaotic period, Laureton¡¯s Cairo mercenary band has been the strongest. The other three powers was forced to join hands in order to take a stand against the Cairo mercenaries. A few strong bandit forces also participate from time to time. The current Valley of Sunshine has be a chaotic mess.¡± Grant exined to Han Shuo with a smile.

    ¡°Oh right, after what happenedst time, did the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band and the House of Menlo make trouble for you guys?¡± Recalling the events in which he¡¯d killed Ferguson and heavily injured Adam Menlo, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but ask with surprise about what had happened after.

    ¡°Heh heh, those two do indeed hate us Soul Destroyers very much. It¡¯s a pity that they don¡¯t know where we are. They can¡¯t proceed even if they want revenge!¡± Grant looked smug as heughed loudly.

    ¡°I see many new faces in our band. There aren¡¯t any problems with these people right?¡± Concern struck him as Han Shuo asked.

    ¡°Rest assured. We only picked these mercenaries after a strict inspection. Those who cane in here are all trustworthy. Hehe, Laureton has allowed us to recruit people in the Valley of Sunshine thanks to you. This has saved is a lot of effort. ¡° Grant looked gratefully at Han Shuo and said smilingly.

    ¡°Good. I¡¯ll be leaving now since Trunks isn¡¯t here.¡± Han Shuo said goodbye to Grant after obtaining the information he wanted and flew straight to the Valley of Sunshine.

    The members of the Cairo mercenary band in the Valley of Sunshine all knew of Han Shuo now. They dismissed all procedures necessary from him to enter the valley. Everyone greeted Han Shuo with a smile, their attitude towards him quite amiable.

    Han Shuo went straight to his shop as soon as he entered the Valley of Sunshine. He started to operate the formation without another word before jumping into the well. He took out the materials from his space ring one by one and sank down to the depths of the waters. The waters were cold to the bones. Han Shuo summoned the little skeleton upon reaching the bottom.

    The little skeleton located an ordinary looking zombie as per Han Shuo¡¯s order and disappeared after bringing theter out. Han Shuo ced this zombie warrior in the center of the ce of extreme water. He threw in the strange materials one by one afterwards and directed all of the avable water elements in this ce to gather at the zombie warrior.

 Chapter 293: The Temple Knights

    Chapter 293: The Temple Knights

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t expend too much effort in refining the water elite zombie. Thanks to the earth, wood and fire elite zombies, he was well versed in the process. After everything was finished,

    Han Shuo jumped out of the well and suddenly felt two unfamiliar presences.

    The deathly air of the Shura Soul Formation was quietly circting in the shop¡¯s courtyard. Dark grand magus Edwin of the Cmity Church and the female alchemist Belinda was wandering around outside. They didn¡¯t dare toe in, and could only looked down in shock at this gloomy yard from the rooftop.

    A concentrated sense of death could be found within the Shura Soul Formation. The two people absolutely couldn¡¯t see what Han Shuo was doing inside. But for Han Shuo, he only needed to lift his head after jumping out of the well to see the two experts of the Cmity Church clearly.

    Edwin and Belinda obviously knew there was a great danger hidden below. They looked down in shock at the changes, not daring to risk entering the formation. They appeared very wary and cautious.

    Thanks to the Rainbow Sickle ambushst time, the two already knew that this ce was extremely dangerous. Han Shuo knew they knew, so it was understandable that these two didn¡¯t dare to draw close.

    After circling around the courtyard to inspect it, Han Shuo walked towards the eye of the formation and shot a ck light onto it. The violent, gloomy deathly air in the formation instantly dispersed and the formation returned to its inert state.

    Han Shuo sat down on a chair in the courtyard,zily looking up at Edwin on the rooftop. He asked indifferently, ¡°Mister Edwin, it seems that you¡¯re always this surreptitious when you pay a visit. Can it be that this is how your Cmity Church operates?¡±

    Edwin still didn¡¯t dare toe down even though the changes in the courtyard had disappeared. Having heard Han Shuo¡¯s words, he chuckled and said, ¡°My apologies. We¡¯ll stay up here for our little chat. Congrattions on killing Ferguson. However, you¡¯ve alsopletely offended the Church of Light. They¡¯ll spare no costs in dealing with you now. So, heh heh, our Cmity Church sincerely invites you to join us. We¡¯re willing to pay any price as long as you¡¯re willing to join us.¡±

    ¡°Sorry, not interested!¡± Han Shuo had declined before, and he was still determined to turn them down all the same. He left no room for further negotiation.

    ¡°Alright then. Since you don¡¯t want to join us, let¡¯s discuss a bit about cooperation instead. Hehe, the Church of Light has dispatched a small troop of Temple Knights, whose goal is to deal with you. The Temple Knights don¡¯t number many, but each one is a true expert. This troop is the sword that the Church of Light uses to eradicate heretics. They are currently marching towards Brettel City, just waiting for you to arrive.¡±

    ¡°Even if you hadn¡¯te to the Valley of Sunshine today, my people would have still gone to inform you when you arrived at Brettel City. But I didn¡¯t expect to be able to meet you here, and that¡¯s why I¡¯m telling you in advance to see if we can possibly cooperate!¡± Edwin was truly sincere, he¡¯d informed Han Shuo of this important information at first opportunity.

    Han Shuo involuntarily frowned at Edwin¡¯s words. The main headquarters of the Church of Light headquarters was positioned in the most powerful nation of the Profound Continent ¨C the Oden Empire. This Empire was separated from the Lancelot Empire by the Angel Empire. The Temple Knights had always protected the Temple of Light loyally. It seemed the Church if Light was truly determined this time if they¡¯d dispatched a small troop of Temple Knight just for Han Shuo.

    ¡°I won¡¯t cooperate with you for now. However if I need something, I just might contact you!¡± Han Shuo thought for a while before telling Edwin.

    Edwin immediately grinned upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words and said, ¡°The Cmity Church and the Church of Light are death sworn enemies in the Profound Continent! Alright then, if you encounter any trouble, our Cmity Church may just appear at your side. Let¡¯s meet again then!¡±

    Edwin and Belinda didn¡¯t linger after speaking these words. They swept a casual nce around the surroundings before cautiously leaving Han Shuo¡¯s rooftop and disappearing out of sight.

    Han Shuo immediately stood up after Edwin and Belinda left. He released all three yin demons and had them follow after Edwin and Belinda. He intended to see why these two hade to the Valley of Sunshine.

    Edwin and Belinda were very careful, they made a lot of turns along the way, guarding against the tracking of any possible enemy. However, they couldn¡¯t hide their presence from the three yin demons¡¯ surveince.

    In the end, the two people unexpectedly entered the Cairo mercenary band¡¯s headquarters. Han Shuo was secretly tracking them this time so he didn¡¯t enter the headquarters openly. Instead, he hid in a corner of the valley that wasn¡¯t very far away and used the three yin demons to spy on Edwin¡¯s actions.

    To be honest, when he saw the two walk up to the door, Han Shuo could somewhat deduce that Edwin had reached an agreement with Laureton. Otherwise, Edwin and Belinda couldn¡¯t havee to Han Shuo¡¯s door so quickly after he¡¯d just returned to the Valley of Sunshine less than a couple hours ago. The Valley of Sunshine was within the Cairo mercenary band¡¯s sphere of influence. The Cmity Church¡¯s spywork had spread far and wide.

    ¡°Mister Edwin, did you go see Bryan?¡± Laureton asked first when Edwin arrived.

    Nodding, Edwin thanked him with a smile, ¡°Many thanks for letting me know. I¡¯ve just seen Bryan. Right, how¡¯s the preparation going? Three hundred Death Guards from our Cmity Church will arrive at the Valley of Sunshine in two days. After all, anyone but the Church of Light can have the mithril mine. If they craft mithril armor for the Temple Knights, it will bring us great trouble in the future!¡±

    Laureton¡¯s expression was cold as he said ferociously, ¡°Rest assured. I will immediately mobilize the Cairo mercenary band as soon as your Death Guards arrive to tten those powers around the mithril mine. Humph! I almost lost my life therest time, I won¡¯t be so careless this time. Those three great powers will definitely pay back this debt in blood!¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, that¡¯d be best. Since the Church of Light wants the mithril mine, we¡¯ll fill the mine with their lives!¡± Edwinughed in a sinister fashion as he discussed the details of the n with Laureton. Han Shuo listened for a while and carefully memorized their conversation. When Edwin and Laureton were about to leave, Han Shuo moved one step faster than them and soundlessly exited the area.

    Han Shuo immediately departed the Valley of Sunshine after leaving the Cairo mercenary band. He returned to the Soul Destroyers to ask about the movement of Trunks¡¯ group. From Grant, Han Shuo knew that it would be some time before those two returned.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t linger in the Soul Destroyer base. Instead, he rushed back to the cemetery of death and returned to the secret chamber in his mansion. Kas stepped into the secret chamber not long after his return and said respectfully to Han Shuo, ¡°Your Lordship, a youngdy called Fanny wants to see you. She said that you¡¯d definitely see her if I informed you of her name!¡±

    Han Shuo was dumbfounded. He suddenly remembered his promise to Fanny. He¡¯d said that he would find her in a few days when he¡¯d leftst time. He hadn¡¯t expected to be so busy and had forgotten about this. Now it was Fanny who¡¯de looking for him.

    ¡°Where is she? Take me to see her!¡± Now that Han Shuo had his own mansion, if Fanny and Phoebe came to find him too often, his rtionships with them would be exposed sooner orter . Just thinking about it gave him a headache.

    Seeing him so anxious, Kas was quite surprised. He immediately said in a respectful manner, ¡°Your Lordship, please follow me!¡±

    After winding through a couple of hallways, Kas led Han Shuo to the room where Fanny was. He pointed inside and said, ¡°Miss Fanny is in there.¡±

    ¡°Mhm, you are dismissed, don¡¯t let other peoplee here!¡± Han Shuo instructed.

    Han Shuo waited for Kas to leave before he bit the bullet and walked inside. He immediately saw Fanny sitting in the middle of the room. She was wearing a navy blue dress instead of her usual magic robe. She instantly humphed upon seeing Han Shuo walk in, coldly looking at him as she said, ¡°Your Lordship finally has some time to spare for usmon civilians?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m so sorry. There was something that happened so I was dyed a little. This won¡¯t happen again. Fanny, you must forgive me.¡± Han Shuo smiled wryly and apologized as soon as he came in. He was indeed in the wrong, it was natural for Fanny to be so angry.

    ¡°This isn¡¯t the first time either. You never honor your promises!¡± Fanny still maintained her iron face as she fixed him with a cold stare.

    Han Shuo smiled wryly as he looked at Fanny, putting up his hands in surrender, ¡°I was wrong. You can punish me however you want!¡±

    ¡°Then good, just promise me that you¡®ll be an honorary professor for our necromancy major and I¡¯ll forgive you.¡± Fanny thought for a bit before ring ferociously at Han Shuo.

    Honorary professor was just a title for show in the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. A person with this title basically wasn¡¯t bound by the Academy¡¯s rules. They only need to asionally give a speech in ordance with the Academy¡¯s request. There was strongpetition amongst the different majors in the Academy. The ability to invite famous, powerful figures to be honorary professors was the standard with which to measure a department¡¯s influence.

    ¡°No problem!¡± Han Shuo readily agreed.

    ¡°You scoundrel, how do you have the ability to kill someone so evil as Leah Cain? How did you be an archmage necromancer? How many things are you actually still lying to me about?¡± Fanny was happy when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s ready acquiescence, but then her many doubts flooded her heart and just burst out.

 Chapter 294: A massive amount of explosives

    Chapter 294: A massive amount of explosives

    Han Shuo only needed half an hour of honeyed words and gentle caressing, to make Fanny, who¡¯de to incriminate him, beam with joy. Smiles blooming on her lips, Fanny left Han Shuo¡¯s mansion in contentment after listening to his sweet talking.

    Han Shuo then traveled at the fastest speed possible to the Boozt Merchant Guild to find Phoebe. He immediately requested upon finding her, ¡°I need a ton of explosives, ones with the maximum fatality. The amount should be enough to destroy a small mountain!¡±

    ¡°Gosh! What do you need it for?¡± As a normal girl, Phoebe was shocked upon hearing that Han Shuo was in urgent need for a huge amount of lethal explosives, the stronger the better. She only needed to use her toes to figure out what he was going to do.

    ¡°Don¡¯t ask so much. Hurry and help me get my hands on them. Also, don¡¯t let anyone know about this matter.¡± Han Shuo had made up his mind regardless of anything. Time waited for no one, so the faster the better.

    Once a woman entered a physical rtionship with a man, she would change because of him, even if that woman was the cold and arrogant Phoebe. Moreover, she knew that Han Shuo was very clear-headed, so he wouldn¡¯t do anything stupid. Therefore, she didn¡¯t ask anymore questions despite her doubts. When Han Shuo urged again, she nodded and said, ¡°Give me some time, I¡¯ll collect them using all means possible.¡±

    ¡°Good! I¡¯lle for the explosives the day after tomorrow. You should temporarily avoid going out for the next two days.¡± Han Shuo instructed before leaving the Boozt Merchant Guild in a hurry.

    After quietly returning to the secret chamber in his mansion, Han Shuo used the transportation matrix to arrive at the cemetery of death once more. He then utilized the art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens and flew towards the mountain valley with the mithril mine. There, he summoned the earth elite zombie.

    Three yin demons slowly drifted towards the center of the mountain valley, rapidly transmitting images and scenes into Han Shuo¡¯s mind. The alliance, of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band, the House of Menlo, and the Katar orc tribe, was here. More than a thousand of their members were stationed near the valley, surrounding it withinyers andyers of encirclement.

    That mithril mine was still operating as usual. However, harvesting this mine was no easy matter due to its steep and narrow terrain, especially as the mithril was mixed in with the silver ores and located in the deepest ce. The three powers were still unsatisfied with their progress, even after increasing the amount of overtime the past several days.

    The three yin demons scoured every corner of the valley. The earth elite zombie lurked underground, shooting to and fro as the child of the earth. Under Han Shuo¡¯smands, he dug out an undiscoverable hole deep under the mountain valley. This hole would be the container for the explosives he would receive from Phoebe.

    Han Shuo knew there¡¯d be a bloody battle in this mountain valley from Laureton and Edwin¡¯s conversation. The majority of fighting force from the four great powers were going to participate in this war, including Laureton¡¯s Cairo mercenary band. Laureton had recently used various incentives to lure over ten minor forces to his side.

    The other three great powers had also poured in a great deal of troops into the valley due to the existence of the mithril mine. Once the fighting broke out, this mountain valley would be the biggest battlefield in all of the Valley of Sunshine¡¯s history. All Han Shuo needed to do was put enough explosives under this battlefield to destroy all of the enemy forces, subduing them all in one fell swoop.

    This had to be done with caution. Only the earth elite zombie¡¯s miraculous ability to drill soundlessly underground enabled him to aplish this task. The three yin demons hadn¡¯t registered any powerful earth mages at this time, so he boldly allowed the earth elite zombie to dic ording to his arrangements.

    Even with his miraculous ability, the earth elite zombie still took quite a long time toy out the preparations for the explosives in the mountain valley. Han Shuo constantly kept watch on the experts present through his three yin demons. He was afraid that they would sense the movements underground and discover his n.

    Fortunately, everything went fairly smoothly. Han Shuo immediately left the mountain valley once the earth elite zombie had finished his preparations. He returned to and stayed in the cemetery of death, carefully studying the archmage rank spell, Soul Tremor. This spell was extremely obscure and was quite difficult to grasp.

    ¡°Soul Tremor¡± directly attacked the opponent¡¯s soul using one¡¯s own mental strength. One first had to grasp a certain amount of knowledge concerning the soul before they could master this spell. On the other hand, they also needed to master the method of using their mental force to attack. Just this step alone, of shaping the mental force into an attack was already very difficult to execute.

    Han Shuo continuously practiced in the cemetery of death, frowning as he pondered the way to utilize his mental strength as an attack.

    He could clearly sense this invisible mental force when he concentrated his mind. However, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t materialize it into an attack no matter what method he tried.

    ¡°This is indeed somewhat difficult!¡± Han Shuo muttered. He was unable to gather the requisite mental force and turn it into a tangible attack.

    ¡°The consciousness is formless, but its power limitless. The heart is the foundation of the attack. When the heart moves, the soul too, will move...¡±

    Han Shuo suddenly recalled an incantation about the consciousness that was described in demonic magic. Upon reaching the separate demon realm, cultivators could distinctly sense their consciousness. The consciousness was actually reinforcement for the soul. Cultivators in the separate demon realm could transform their soul into their consciousness. They could live forever as long as this consciousness wasn¡¯tpletely destroyed.

    Since the consciousness was a formless existence, the cultivator would gain many miraculous abilities once their soul transformed. The most basic benefit would be the ability to use their consciousness to sense movements in the surroundings. The sensitivity and scope depended on the strength of the cultivator¡¯s consciousness. In a fight, the consciousness could form all kinds of exotic attacks, as long as it was strong enough. For instance, a mirage or a tangible attacks could manipte the opponent¡¯s mind, turning them into a puppet or have other amazing effects.

    The consciousness could also attack the opponent¡¯s soul like mental force, with much more varied and mysteriousness ways than a simple mental strength to attack. ording to the demonic magic¡¯s teachings about using consciousness to attack, Han Shuo vaguely felt that consciousness and mental force were simr in their uses.

    The main difference was that the consciousness was the transformed soul of demonic cultivators, and was an important part of the foundation, like the demon infant. In fact, consciousness was even a bit more important. The demon infant was the source of his magical yuan. Once it was destroyed, a demonic practitioner would lose all of their power. They¡¯d be an ordinary person once their body was void of magical yuan.

    The consciousness was the soul of a demonic cultivator. They could still make use of their past experiences and expend time to build another demon infant if theirs was destroyed, as long as the consciousness was preserved. However once the consciousness was destroyed, cultivators would have their souls disperse into nothingness, leaving behind no traces in this world. Mental force was simr to the concept of demon infant. Oncepletely lost, a mage would, at most, lose their ability to gather magic elements and cast magic spells. They would just be an ordinary person instead of losing their life.

    In the cemetery of death, Han Shuo was constantly contemted, particrly with regards to attacking with his consciousness. He carefully sifted through his understanding and seemed to gradually grasp a clue. When hepletely focused all of his mental strength in a calm state of mind, a thought shed through his head. The mental force churned fiercely, giving birth to a wondrous resonance.

    Han Shuo quickly chanted an incantation at this moment. A strange force appeared from who knew where and swiftly merged with his mental force. A kind of wave spread out like water ripples.

    ¡°Mm, that¡¯s some improvement. Just a little bit more!¡± Han Shuo breathed out a whisper. Just now, he¡¯d felt his mental force form a tangible attack. However, since there was no soul in front of him, his attack had no target, so he was unable to truly test its effectiveness.

    ¡°It seems I need to find a live test subject!¡± Han Shuo muttered to himself as he thought for a moment. He left the cemetery of death when he found that it was already somewhatte.

    Han Shuo went straight to the Boozt Merchant Guild without prior notice. He found Phoebe in her room and asked, ¡°How goes it?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve managed to collect a few. However, due to the short timing and explosives being dangerous, prohibited goods in the Empire, the amount I collected wasn¡¯t enough to destroy a small mountain. Mm, if you can give me a little bit more time, I can go look in some cities farther away.¡± Phoebe looked helplessly at Han Shuo, speaking somewhat apologetically.

    ¡°There¡¯s not enough time. Just gather as many as possible then. Mm, this matter would best be kept secret, otherwise trouble may arise.¡± Han Shuo said with a frown.

    ¡°Rest assured, I used some small businesses and acquired them in great secrecy through batches. I think there should be no problems.¡± Phoebe replied.

    Phoebe¡¯s space ring then shone nonstop. A carefully wrapped bundle of explosives appeared in Phoebe¡¯s hand and was ced into Han Shuo¡¯s space ring. When Phoebe finished handing over all of them, she finally asked, ¡°Bryan, what do you intend to do? You don¡¯t want to destroy Brettel City, do you?¡±

    ¡°This has nothing to do with Brettel City. I haven¡¯t even gone there yet.¡± Han Shuo casually answered. He hugged Phoebe and gave her a kiss before saying with a smile, ¡°Alright, don¡¯t worry about me, I know what my limits are.¡±

    Han Shuo hurriedly left the Boozt Merchant Guild beneath Phoebe¡¯s surprised gaze. He returned to the cemetery of death through the transportation matrix and quickly flew to the mountain valley with the mithril mine.

 Chapter 295: Undercurrents

    Chapter 295: Undercurrents

    The inky veil of night shrouded the entire mountain valley. Spring had arrived and the fragrance of flowers was still intoxicating, even at night.

    In the quiet night, the low buzzing sound of insects apanied thetent danger. Teams of mercenaries were stationed in every corner of the mithril mine in the mountain valley. The seemingly calm space was filled with prudence and alertness.

    A group of ck-armored people slowly crept through the thick bushes like shadows in the night, bringing with them a creepy, sinister atmosphere. Dark grand magus Edwin drifted above them in the air, guiding the way. Three hundred Death Guards followed closely behind without making a sound, simr to wraiths.

    Two thousand mercenaries of the Cairo mercenary band followed behind the three hundred Death Guards under Laureton¡¯s leadership. They slowly approached the mithril mine in the mountain valley. A mix of a dozen or so small forces were behind the Cairo mercenary band. There were probably more than a thousand experts wearing mercenary outfits of various colors.

    Even though the three great powers had gathered to guard the the mithril mine, they still needed to leave members behind to guard their base. That was why they had only dispatched roughly a thousand mercenaries total. This number was only a third of Laureton¡¯s two thousand elite mercenaries, the Cmity Church¡¯s three hundred Death Guards, and the thousand plus experts from a dozen small forces.

    A ck mass of gas slowly suffused through the air as dark grand magus Edwin released a dark spell. A faintyer of mist suddenly shrouded the moonlit area in front of the mountain valley, as if all the moisture in the night had condensed together.

    The originally buzzing sounds of the insects gradually died down for an unknown reason. The House of Menlo¡¯s wind archmage Arthur had been resting with his eyes closed and seemed to sense the abnormal movement. Opening his eyes to scan the mountain valley, he muttered to himself, ¡°What¡¯s going on? Why did the sounds of the insects stop?!¡±

    The voice of the orc warrior Caloric echoed from the tent to Arthur¡¯s left, ¡°Hey, Arthur, it¡¯ste already. Hurry up and get some rest.¡±

    ¡°I feel like something¡¯s not right. I¡¯m going out to take a look.¡± Arthur mumbled before exiting his tent. He slowly floated up using the levitation skill and looked out towards the area beyond the valley. ¡°Hmm! Why is it all fogged up?¡± Arthur asked himself and drifted out of the mountain valley.

    There were all sorts of tents scattered around the mountain valley, and some energetic mercenaries patrolling between them. These people immediately weed Arthur when they saw him drifting in the sky. Several mercenaries from the Rainbow Sickle joked in a light tone, ¡°This fellow can¡¯t sleep at night, could it be he¡¯s gone out to find some fun? Heh heh, this makes sense. It sucks being assigned to this kind of ce.¡±

    ¡°Leave him be. We only need to worry about our shift.¡± Another mercenary promptly responded.

    ¡°Shush!¡± Edwin, approaching from this side, suddenly let out a light cry. He made a gesture to the Death Guards behind him. The shadowy advancing Death Guards quickly crouched down, hiding in the bushes without revealing a single sign of life.

    Laureton¡¯s eyes were sharp as he caught Edwin¡¯s action. He immediately waved his hand towards the back. A lineup, as long and twisted as a dragon, instantly quieted down to slight breathing. These people were quite far from Arthur, so their slight breathing wasn¡¯t heard.

    Arthur flew out of the mountain valley, frowning as he looked out into the distance. However, he couldn¡¯t find anything unusual. He stayed for a while, muttering a few words before returning to the mountain valley.

    At this moment, the positions, ording to the distance from far to near, rtive to Laureton¡¯s group were: the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band, the House of Menlo, and the Katar orc tribe. An orc warrior guarding outside the Katar orc tribe¡¯s area was abruptly jolted by an ear-piercing whistle. After he reacted, he discovered an arrow nailed into therge tree next to him. A letter was tied to the still trembling tail of the arrow.

    Adam¡¯s House of Menlo was next. The two guards here were simrly snapped awake by an arrow with a letter tied to it. Lastly, it was the Rainbow Sickles¡¯ turn. They were right in front of the mithril mine and also received a letter tied to a still shaking arrow.

    At that moment, the leaders of the three great powers were jolted awake from their various states. Holding the letters in hand, they urgently summoned their troops and woke up all of the soundly sleeping mercenaries. Everyone rushed at top speed to the mithril mine in the mountain valley.

    After sending out three warning letters using his speedy hang gliding techniques, Han Shuo once again soundlessly returned to his hiding ce near the mithril mine in the mountain valley. All of the explosives had been nted beforehand. Han Shuo quietly and coldly observed every change within the valley through his three yin demons, waiting for a tragic battle to break out.

    There were more than a thousand mercenaries in the alliance stationed at the mithril mine. Once Laureton destroyed this army, the three powers would be hard pressed to save the day even if they joined hands together. Last time in the mountain valley, the three great powers had plotted against Laureton and earned his undying hatred. He would show them no mercy this time. It¡¯d be their turn to bear brutal revenge once Laureton ughtered the experts guarding the mithril mine.

    As the three other leaders had a firm standing in the Valley of Sunshine, none of them were stupid. They naturally understood this truth and would rather believe the letters in their hands than not. The three sent out experts to contact each other, mobilizing most of their remaining forces at the bases to rush towards the mithril mine at top speed.

    Time passed quietly at the mithril mine. The original alertness of the mercenary guards slowly drifted away. They began to yawn one by one, their mental state reaching its lowest point.

    Edwin was currently hiding outside the mountain valley with Laureton next to him. He observed the mountain valley with a sinister expression on his face. He suddenly threw a nce at Laureton and said, ¡°We can make our move now.¡±

    His eyes shed with killing intent and his bald head seemed to be emitting a cold light, Laureton nodded and said in a low tone, ¡°Our brothers died in this mountain valleyst time. This time, I intend to make them pay that back a dozen, a hundred times over. Chief Hagen, are your men ready?¡±

    ¡°Rest assured Chief Laureton. We have long since been ready for a split of this mithril mine.¡± Knowing their power wasn¡¯t a match for any of the four great powers, the ten small forces had quickly gathered into an alliance. Hagen of the Raging me mercenary band was this alliance¡¯s spokesperson.

    ¡°Very good! Not just this mithril mine, even the territories of these three powers are yours to split among yourselves as long as you help me take them down. The Cairo mercenary band will still only upy the Valley of Sunshine. I hope you guys won¡¯t disappoint me!¡± Laureton spoke out so readily whileughing coldly in his heart.

    ¡°Rest assured. We know what to do!¡± Hagen let out a cunning chuckle, expressing that hepletely understood what Laureton meant.

    ¡°Alright, no need for nonsense. Just be careful. I will take advantage of the fog around the mountain valley to get in. Don¡¯t make any noise once you¡¯re inside. It¡¯s best to let them die in their sleep!¡± Edwin impatiently blurted out, not concealing the arrogance on his face.

    The Cmity Church was a notoriously tough character to chew in the Profound Continent. Except for the Church of Light, very few powers couldpete on even ground with them. Even Laureton wasn¡¯t anything much in Edwin¡¯s eyes. Of course, a chief of some small mercenary band wouldn¡¯t enter his eyes. That was why Edwin didn¡¯t show them sincerity and politeness like he had with Han Shuo.

    The small forces naturally didn¡¯t dare to provoke Edwin upon learning of his identity. Just the sinister atmosphere from the three hundred Death Guards alone was enough to terrify them and send their hearts palpitating. They had long since heard that the Cmity Church was brutal and ruthless, treating lives like weeds. They all turned into yes-men in response to Edwin¡¯s words upon seeing his impatient expression.

    Edwin was feeling a little bit smug upon seeing these peoples¡¯ fear. Extremelyfortable as he bathed in the feeling of superiority, Edwin softly humphed with arrogance before swinging his arm to order a tall, slim Death Guard at the front, ¡°Forward, kill them all!¡±

    The Death Guard was a group of people who worshipped the Evil God. They were the most extreme of fanatics who offered all of their beliefs and spirits to the Evil God. They carried with them the will of the Evil God and terrifying power as they ughtered the enemies of the Cmity Church all over the Profound Continent. They were a group of inhuman executioners. Having been granted certain powers after their sacrifices to the Evil God, the Death Guards easily possessed the ability to dominate the life and death of others.

    The gray pupils of this Death Guard filled with a fanatical excitement like Laureton going berserk thrice over after hearing Edwin¡¯smands. His teeth tightly gritted, the Death Guard issued a horrifying sound like he was chewing on beast bones. His action was agile as he led the three hundred Death Guards rushing into the mountain valley under the cloak of mist.

    Florida, Adam Menlo, and Katar were also leading the three great powers and hurrying to the mountain valley. A fire burning in their hearts, the three constantly issued orders to urge their men forward, afraid that they wouldn¡¯t arrive in time.

 Chapter 296: A tragic battle

    Chapter 296: A tragic battle

    In the mountain valley, members of the alliance were either lightly snoring, nodding off, or dead asleep. Very few were able to stay awake. The few solitary, cautious folk also gradually closed their heavy eyelids beneath the sleeping effect of the fog.

    Everything seemed perfect. The oue seemed predestined the moment the Death Guards started to advance into the mountain valley. This sneak attack could simply be considered a ssic one for the books, if it hadn¡¯t been for a frightening, loud rumbling sound.

    Rumble...

    A surge of wind blew from who knew where, just as the Death Guards crossed the channel into the mountain valley. The power of it was violent. The wind first uproot a small tree on the mountain, creating a strange butterfly effect. One tree after another fell in bizarre session. This finally caused the unbelievable copse of the rocks on the mountain.

    Moss-covered rocks, asrge as a millstones, smashed straight down on the mountain valley. This kind of movement created earth-shattering sounds, waking up all of the mercenaries that were sound asleep. They abruptly jumped up, as if faced with the greatest enemy of their lives, grabbing their weapons before looking at the situation.

    Edwin was also an aplished alchemist on the side. He understood that only sleeping drugs with minor effects would be the kind not as easily discovered by experts. Edwin had been gloating over the victory within his grasp when the rumbling soundpletely destroyed his wishful thinking. He looked at the mercenaries stationed in the valley all looking around with weapons in hand and then at the Death Guards entering the mountain valley. Edwin had to swallow back his curses and issued an order to attack, ¡°Forward, kill!¡±

    Both Edwin and Laureton understood that their ambush would no longer be perfect thanks to the rumbling avnche. The two secretly cursed as they hastily issued orders to attack, while their eyes looked up and down at the epicenter of that tumultuous incident. A strange suspicion filled their hearts.

    Why had that avnche happened? How could its force have been sorge? How could it have generated such an astonishing effect? If it were man made, then who¡¯d done it?

    Doubt after doubt instantly piled up in their hearts, but only for a moment. The two couldn¡¯t think much as all of their attention was pulled back to the ughter that was about to take ce in the mountain valley.

    ¡°Enemy attack, enemy attack!¡±

    The thousand mercenaries in the mountain valley were jolted awake by the rock avnche. A small portion of the mercenaries near the edge of the valley constantly dodged the falling rocks. The mercenaries at the outermost region, who were responsible for night patrol, had now discovered the Death Guards by now. They immediately started yelling loudly.

    The mercenaries of the alliance immediately reacted. They took out weapons, started to chant magic incantations, and notched their arrows. They all aimed at the entrance of the mountain valley.

    The Cmity Church¡¯s three hundred Death Guards spread out like wraiths in the night, whizzing about like faint shadows under the moonlight. Evil, sinister air permeated their bodies, their eyes filled with frenzy and excitement. Exotic spiked weapons were grasped in their hands, they speedily glided across the ground into the mountain valley.

    The ground trembled as a series of sharp earth spears pierced out of the ground. A zing fire quickly gathered into a defensive firewall. Lightning bolts twisted and shed across the sky above the mountain valley then smashed downward. Mermen and water dragons gradually materialized and rushed away from the zone of the firewall.

    Whistling sounds apanied arrows that fell endlessly upon the Death Guards. Mages and archers formedyer afteryer of obstacles within the mountain valley. They instantly hindered the momentum of the rushing Death Guards, itching to kill the entire bunch of tant invaders.

    However, as the religious scourge, whose notoriety had spread all over the Profound Continent for so many years, the Cmity Church¡¯s Death Guard naturally weren¡¯t that easy to deal with.

    The speed of the three hundred Death Guards didn¡¯t decrease, but instead spiked at an rming rate. The ckish gray robes that they wore had a strong resistance to magic, theing mes were snuffed with just a wave of their sleeves. Even the violent thunderbolts only made them pause a little without causing any fatal damage.

    ¡°Hmph! The Death Guard¡¯s armory is one of the secrets of our Cmity Church. How could normal magic attacks have any effect!¡± Dark grand magus Edwinnded behind and looked forward with a sinister face, speaking contemptuously. He could have soundlessly exterminated the majority of the force in the mountain valley. He naturally felt irritated now that this unexpected incident had thrown a wrench in his ns.

    Laureton stood next to Edwin, clutching the divine artifact Berserker¡¯s War Axe. He let out a loud, maliciousugh and said, ¡°It¡¯s also fine this way. We¡¯ll only waste a bit more time. It¡¯s more interesting to let them struggle in their death.¡±

    The Cairo mercenary band had expended all of their elite forces for this battle. Add to that the Cmity Church¡¯s three hundred Death Guards and the alliance of a dozen small forces, this was a proper amount of strength to annihte the powers inside the mountain valley. Laureton was someone who thirsted for battle to begin with. This was why he¡¯d been even more excited when the mercenaries of the alliance woke up, as the ambush had turned into openbat.

    Curling his lip, Edwin didn¡¯t say a thing. He looked at the waves of mercenaries rushing into the mountain valley and secretly calcted how much more he should extort from Laureton. After all, the cost of dispatching three hundred Death Guards wasn¡¯t small. Even though their purpose had been to block the Church of Light, he¡¯d also helped Laureton, hadn¡¯t he? Therefore, thetter should also pay up a little.

    The Death Guards were definitely worthy of their reputation as forces of the Evil God. They rushed forward with an unstoppable momentum, even when attacked by violent magic spells. The three hundred Death Guards scattered into groups of ghostly shadows, using sharp, spiked weapons to poke bloody holes into the mercenaries¡¯ bodies.

    These Death Guards cultivated a strange type of fighting aura. They seemed able to borrow the Evil God¡¯s power in a fight. An evil presence naturally appeared on their bodies, and their eyes could attack the souls of their opponents. The strange fighting aura possessed an intense corrosion with it that could destroy the defense of the opponents, causing injuries to the body.

    Han Shuo was sitting cross-legged on a cliff of the mountain valley. After secretly lending a hand to help kick start the dreadful battle, he silently circted his magical yuan to absorb the power from the dead that had not yet dissipated. He also paid attention to the battle in the mountain valley at the same time.

    The astonishing performance of the Death Guards shocked Han Shuo. He could even sense a bit of the Evil God¡¯s presence from their bodies.

    rendon, who¡¯d ultimately died a tragic death in Han Shuo¡¯s hand in Valen City, had used an altar to call upon the three-eyed demon god Ansidesi. The figure of an evil god, that was three hundred meters tall, once again appeared in Han Shuo¡¯s mind in the loweryers of the cemetery of death. Han Shuo could sense a bit of the presences of Ansidesi and the evil god from the Death Guards.

    The Death Guards could obtain a bit of the strange force from the Evil God due to their fanatical belief. Perhaps they could only borrow one out of a hundred thousandth of the Evil God¡¯s power. However, that power released still couldn¡¯t be looked down upon, as evident in the tragic death of the mercenaries who faced them.

    Three hundred Death Guards wasn¡¯t a big number, but the damage they caused was terrifying. Since the Temple Knights of the Church of Light possessed were at a simr level of strength as these Death Guards, Han Shuo could imagine that the former¡¯s power was certainly just as impressive.

    ¡°Heh heh, it¡¯s getting more and more interesting!¡± Han Shuo muttered to himself with a cold smile. He abruptly heaved a breath of relief, ¡°What wille wille. Otherwise it would no longer be interesting!¡±

    Dark grand magus Edwin also frowned when Han Shuo finished saying these words. He abruptly used the levitation skill to float up and out of the mountain valley. He carefully took note of his bearings before quickly returning to the mountain valley. Hended swiftly near the now twice berserk Laureton, ¡°Arge number of mercenaries are gathering here. How could this happen?¡±

    ¡°The Rainbow Sickle mercenary band isn¡¯t far from here. They must have discovered something because we¡¯ve caused such a big movement in this ce. Heh heh, four to five hundred out of the one thousand mercenaries in the mountain valley have already died. Florida will only being to his death if we make good use of time and kill them all. Just his Rainbow Sickles alone simply can¡¯t stop our momentum!¡±

    Laureton randomly threw out an answer as he chopped a two meter tall orc warrior in half with a wave of his Berserker¡¯s War Axe. He then rammed into the crowd in front, seemingly insane with happiness as he was able to indulge in battle.

    ¡°That¡¯s not it. It isn¡¯t just the Rainbow Sickles. There¡¯s also arge group of orcs!¡± Edwin shouted to Laureton as if there was a fire was raging in his heart.

    ¡°Damn it! How can that be?¡± Laureton was startled. He abruptly jumped to Edwin and asked with horror.

    ¡°Kill them!¡± Adam Menlo was riding a ten meter long ming bird in the air. He rushed forward with his family members, who were behind him, also riding various magic creatures.

    The dull sounds of iron hooves pounding against the ground outside of the mountain valley were heavy, like a beating drum. The experts of the three great powers were gathering in the valley, tightly blocking Laureton¡¯s group¡¯s retreat.

    ¡°Shove it all and bring forth all your efforts to bear, or none of us will be able to escape!¡± Since the situation had be like this, Laureton naturally understood what was to follow. He let out a long howl to the heavens. His ferocity burst as he rushed straight forward to kill the remaining mercenaries in the mountain valley.

 Chapter 297: Explosion

    Chapter 297: Explosion

    It was a scene of three thousand, including three hundred notorious Death Guards from the Cmity Church, against six hundred people. The difference in power waspletely disproportionate. The fate of the remaining six hundred people was destined to be death, just that the exact moment of their demise was dragged out for a few more minutes.

    Life became cheap with every ear-piercing, miserable scream of the mercenaries that were from various races and of different skin colors. They slowly and listlessly fell in a pool of blood. Streams of air, barely visible to the human eye, drifted upwards from the dead bodies before gathering in a corner of the mountain valley.

    Han Shuo was the hand in the shadows that¡¯d pulled the strings of this battle. With the three yin demons observing the overall battle, he sat on the sidelines in a surreptitious corner, extremelyfortable as he absorbed each burst of scattered energy. The desires of the bloodlust realm were churning, wanting to explode out. However, his rational mind tightly forced the urge down.

    Lives perished as time passed. The original group of six hundred mercenaries guarding the mine were now down to two hundred. The mages in this group were ceaselessly releasing various spells. Their targets were naturally the mercenaries with the vivid colored outfits. No one would waste their magic on the Death Guards.

    Adam Menlo and the experts from his family were the first few to arrive. However, they could only used magic and arrows to attack Laureton¡¯s group in the mountain valley from a distance. They stood still as they watched their remaining family members in the valley get ughtered.

    It wasn¡¯t that they didn¡¯t want to, but rather that they just didn¡¯t dare!

    Those elite members of the House of Menlo, who could fly in the air, were all magic creature riders. This elite army was the foundation of the family. It was a pity that their numbers were few, far fewer than the number of experts in Laureton¡¯s Cairo mercenary band. Adam Menlo¡¯s heart bled as he watched his family members die one by one. However, he didn¡¯t dare toe in close to rescue them. He knew full well that once hended, what awaited his group would be destructive blows.

    He was waiting, waiting for Florida and Katar¡¯s groups to arrive. The new arrivals would be able to surround Laureton¡¯s group from outside the mountain valley. He was waiting for more members of the three forces to assemble and then vent their umted rage towards Laureton.

    ¡°Honorable father, save me!¡± A middle-aged man, with a face simr to Adam Menlo¡¯s, was riding an armored ck Buffalo in the middle of the valley. His eyes flooded with helplessness as he called out miserably to Adam Menlo, who hovered in the air on his fiery bird.

    Laureton stood in front of this middle-aged man, holding his Berserker¡¯s War Axe, leering widely. Several berserkers were next to Laureton, also grinning maliciously as they coordinated to keep watch on the middle-aged man. Laureton wasn¡¯t in a hurry to kill him.

    Instead, he lifted his head to look at to the sky, as if waiting for Adam Menlo to draw nearer.

    However, he only saw Adam Menlo turn around with his shoulders trembling slightly after waiting for a while. It seemed that Adam had made the right decision despite the agony he felt in his heart.

    ¡°No!¡± The middle-aged man bitterly growled. Laureton approached and cleaved him in two. The echoing sound of his dying cry made the distant Adam Menlo falter on the back of his ming bird.

    The heavy sounds of dull hooves were finally heard. Florida and Katar were leading arge number of mercenaries to advance upon the mountain valley. Adam Menlo¡¯s eyes were bloodshot as he held up beneath the heart wrenching agony of the scenes disyed in front of him. He was the first to rush into the center of the valley. Fighting aura burst out from the spear in his hand and intersected with the zing mes from the ming bird¡¯s beak, instantly taking several lives.

    The battle had be even more devastating, taking ce in the mountain valley like a raging fire. Han Shuo absorbed the killing intent quietly and indifferently. He coldly watched the battle that had turned the mountain valley into a level of hell and desperately suppressed his intense desire to join the fray.

    The evenly matched forces fought each other until they became crazed with bloodlust as time went on. Ny percent of the Valley of Sunshine¡¯s forces had be involved in this, either for the mithril mine, or to gain privilege in the Valley, or to vent their deep hatred umted over the many years.

    The life force of the unyielding powerhouses was happily absorbed by an opportunist. Soon, the bodies piled up all over the whole mountain valley and began to hinder the battle itself. The races ughtered each other to their heart¡¯s content out of interest and hatred.

    Blood red mist began to materialize around Han Shuo from therge amount of energy he¡¯d absorbed. The sky above the mountain valley was suddenly blotted out by a bloody red mist. This terrifying evil murderous intent brought along with it a nauseating, bloody smell as it enveloped the entire mountain valley.

    However, the forces were all obsessed by battle and didn¡¯t notice this strange happening. All of their attention was focused on the enemy in front of them. Each and every individual had gonepletely insane, using their weapons, bare hands and feet, or even their teeth to attack.

    Han Shuo almost lost control of himself as he fought against his own bloodthirsty urges. He finally issued an order to the earth elite zombie lurking underground. Han Shuo understood that this wasn¡¯t the right time, since one side hadn¡¯t obtained victory yet. He could still wait a bit longer. Unfortunately, Han Shuo knew that he was in an extremely bad state. He¡¯d absorbed far more killing intent than he could bear. He was afraid that he¡¯d lose his rationality and miss his chance.

    Ny percent of the forces in the Valley of Sunshine was here, locked in battle. Of that, a fourth of this number had already perished. This battle was absolutely the most intense one that had ever urred in the history of the Valley of Sunshine, with the greatest amount of participants as well. Suddenly, the forces that had been fighting to the death, felt a violent tremor from the ground. Every corner of the entire mountain valley seemed to explode before they could react, the strong smell of explosives instantly spreading.

    As every corner in the mountain valley had opponents fighting each other, the explosion caused massive damage. The mercenaries instantly exploded into clouds of blood mist. The earth was shaking and mountains cracked with the endlessly echoing series of explosions. More than half of the forces that had been lucky enough to survive until now died to the violent explosions.

    The huge rocks above ground shattered into pieces due to the underground explosion. Each piece was bigger than a person, and tumbled down like a shower of rain. The impact from the momentum of rocks that were falling from an altitude of several hundred meters was extremely terrifying. Careless experts were smashed into meat paste by them.

    The parties in the mountain valley were dumbfounded by this violent explosion. Ny percent of the Valley of Sunshine¡¯s forces were located here, but this earth-shattering bombardment hadn¡¯t distinguished between friend nor enemy. The damage it caused was amplified even more. No matter how dimwitted Laureton¡¯s group was, they too could smell a conspiracy going on here.

    Countless rocks were still falling, the entire mountain valley was sealed off. The startled experts were snapped out of their bloodlust by the sound of explosion and reacted abruptly. They looked up and cursed loudly before madly fleeing for their lives. The voices of Laureton¡¯s people were extremely resounding among the scene, each screaming and roaring before quickly evacuating.

    Perhaps these people would have discovered Han Shuo existence if it weren¡¯t for the avnche obscuring the bloody mist surrounding him. After all, the fiendish image that he¡¯d established in people¡¯s hearts after using the blood mist to attackst time had left an unforgettable impact in their hearts.

    However, the big rolling boulders had dispersed the barely noticeable mist. In addition, the downpour of rocks was so terrifying that no one had the heart to carefully watch the sky. Everyone put all their effort into fleeing, so Han Shuo¡¯s existence wasn¡¯t exposed.

    The leader of the great powers could smell conspiracy, and so their resentment and hatred overflowed like rivers and seas. However, they knew full well this wasn¡¯t the time to pursue the matter. Like Laureton, all of the leaders ordered their subordinates to retreat from this ce as quickly as possible.

    Florida¡¯s group had already felt an ominous premonition when they received the arrows. The bloody battle had already started by the time that they had arrived at the mountain valley. The series of explosions constantly bombarded them before they could finish distinguishing between friend and foe. Florida immediately understood that the people in the mountain valley had been plotted against.

    Florida¡¯s group was terrified. They even thought that this was an act from the three great empires surrounding the Valley of Sunshine, the purpose to eradicate all forces and takeplete control of the Valley. Due to this, Florida naturally believed that this attack using explosives was just the beginning. Perhaps a great number of soldiers from some empire was baring their fangs at them already.

    Therefore, when Laureton fled, they also chosen to flee in panic. No matter how they thought about it, they hadn¡¯t expected this to be orchestrated by a single person, and that an attack with such a massive impact was created by just the earth elite zombie alone. This sent all of the forces intoplete disarray.

    The leader of a force was naturally much more meticulous in his calctions. However, not all of his followers were as smart. The majority of these mercenaries, who lived by their des, were simple-minded fellows. The disastrous battle in the mountain valley had taken the lives of theirrades, and their enemies were now running madly around them. They didn¡¯t think much and attacked immediately.

    And just like that, the great powers still fought each other tooth and nail even as they tried to escape, due to the irreconcble hatred between each other. The sounds of metal colliding with metal echoed outside the mountain valley, tragic dying screams resounding endlessly for a long time.

    At this moment however, the culprit was shrouded in a thick, blood red mist

    and was on the verge of breaking through. The Demonyer Edge hovered in the sky above the mountain valley, absorbing the various energies in Han Shuo¡¯s stead.

 Chapter 298: Breakthrough

    Chapter 298: Breakthrough

    Corpses were scattered everywhere in the mountain valley after the tragedy. What was even more horrifying was that most of the corpses weren¡¯tplete. Broken off heads seemed to be leaking rubber balls as they had their own trail of blood. Fresh bloodstains stood out on the big and small rocks on the valley¡¯s bottom. Bodies with their limbs cut offy quietly in the narrow gullies of the mountain valley like hacked off tree trunks.

    The moon shone down serenely on this scene from hell. The souls that had yet to disperse upon death were pulled along the cliff of the mountain valley, gathering into a spiral that shimmered in and out of existence. This spiral was slowly and carefully absorbed by a sharp weapon sparkling with brown light.

    The Demonyer Edge currentlycked its dazzling luster as it hovered quietly over Han Shuo¡¯s head, like a loyal follower guarding its master. Its brown edge didn¡¯t shine beneath the moonlight. However, it emitted a strangebination of lights and killing intent around Han Shuo when the plumes of souls drifted over.

    Spots of light shone like the stars within the blood red killing intent. The brilliant stars swayed and danced like little elves, slowly blossoming into a charmingly beautiful light for a moment before finally gathering in the dark brown Demonyer Edge.

    The strength of two thousand dead souls wasn¡¯t weak at all, theirbined power was immense. Han Shuo was able to absorb sixty percent of this soul energy, and the Demonyer Edge took in the remaining forty percent. As the main instigator behind the scenes, Han Shuo¡¯s random eavesdropping had caused the leaders of the various powers in the Valley of Sunshine to specte widely in fright. It had also created a chance for Han Shuo to break through the bloodlust realm, and make the mes of battle dance along the length of the Demonyer Edge.

    There were clouds of red mist that were so dense they could not disperse. They wrapped tightly Han Shuo, twisting into bizarre knotted strands. His skin glinted with a deep red light from within the mist, the bones all over his body constantly emitting crisp crackling sounds. A terrifying deathly air and killing aura alternated nonstop between a weak and strong state. Han Shuo¡¯s tough, handsome face trembled in an aberrant manner.

    He maintained this state from night till sunrise. As the sun rose, it discovered a valley gradually nketed in a crimson fog. Dense as only fog could be, it actually covered more than half of the skies above the mountain valley. Impervious to sunlight, the sun only made its crimson hue even more brilliant. The entire mountain valley looked as though it was relocated amidst a bloody hell. With the dead bodies scattered across the valley, this halo of blood mist made the scene even more deste, evil, and terrifying.

    The powers in the Valley of Sunshine were confused and fearful day and night for the next three days. Clouds of blood were still constantly shifting into different forms within the mountain valley. Faint shadows started drifting out from the back of Han Shuo¡¯s neck, gradually merging with the bloody clouds. Devil heads then slowly took on clearer form, their appearance abnormal, frightening, and ferocious.

    Fog and clouds of blood all melded with the shadows. Twelve uniquely shaped, but equally creepy and ferocious monsters finally took shape after five days. Some came with a spiky head and sharp ws, others had thick row of fangs like a shark, and some even had thorny barbs all over their backs. These twelve grim demons were each different in appearance but possessed a simr presence, Han Shuo¡¯s unique presence.

    They all possessed Han Shuo¡¯s unique presence as they were created from his body. The little skeleton, earth elite zombie, and wood elite zombie hiding in a valley gully didn¡¯t make any unfriendly moves towards the grim demons thanks to this familiar presence.

    Seven more days passed. The shapes of these twelve capering monsters constantly changed, there were times when they even took Han Shuo¡¯s appearance. The strangest thing was that, on the fifth day, Han Shuo was surrounded by twelve exact copies of himself. On thest day, the twelve ever changing ¡°things¡± returned to their original grim demon appearance before turning into red rays and hiding in Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    Exhaling a soft breath, Han Shuo finally opened his fey-like eyes after all of the grim demons had concealed themselves in his body. Sweeping a nce around the mountain valley that exuded a dank stench rising to the skies, he murmured, ¡°Finally, the separate demon realm!¡±

    The mountain valley had violently shook and copsed under the massive explosion. All of the paths into the mountain valley were blocked. The only thing able to enter was the warm sunlight pouring down from the sky. During this period, the three dark creatures¡ªthe little skeleton, earth elite zombie, and wood elite zombie, had dedicated their all to guarding Han Shuo.

    The forces in the Valley of Sunshine had sent out people to spy shortly after the tragedy, but unfortunately, no one could leave the ce alive after being ambushed by the three dark creatures. The spies all turned into mournful souls just like the mercenaries in the mountain valley. In the end, even their corpses quickly rotted away.

    The stench in the mountain valley really was unpleasant. Han Shuo frowned as his mind spun. He reached out his hand to grab the hovering Demonyer Edge next to him. The Demonyer Edge instantly turned into brown spots of light and disappeared in a strange manner upon touching Han Shuo¡¯s hand. Utilizing the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens, Han Shuo tore through the air, leaving the mountain valley in a blink of an eye.

    On a low mountain top five miles to the north of the Valley of Sunshine.

    Laureton of the Cairo mercenary band, Florida of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band, chief Adam of the House of Menlo, Katar of the orc tribe, and leaders of various forces, including even Trunks who¡¯d just returned from his mission, had been invited.

    All of the major power holders in the Valley of Sunshine had gathered at this location today. Everyone had ugly expressions on their face, especially those who¡¯d fallen victim to the mithril mine¡¯s tragedy. They were all investigating the matter with the intent of visiting furious revenge on whoever was responsible. They were here today to brainstorm a strategy for the future of the Valley of Sunshine.

    ¡°Who did it?¡± Everyone shared the same question in their hearts.

    With the exception of the great powers who¡¯d suffered heavy damages, all those who hadn¡¯t participated in the battle were a suspect. Even those small forces who¡¯d onlye to watch and fled the quickest, thus suffering only small losses, were targets of suspicion.

    ¡°Trunks, your Soul Destroyers didn¡¯t participate in this battle. Your mercenary band is the strongest amongst those who didn¡¯t join. Currently, only your Soul Destroyer band ispletely unharmed while we are all heavily damaged. Your strength isn¡¯t far off from ours now either. It seems like your group benefitted the most this time! I¡¯m thinking, was it you who did this good deed?¡± Florida of the Rainbow Sickles stared at Trunks as he spoke in a sinister tone, his handsome face full of menace.

    Trunks was secretly delighted and had no idea how to repay the person behind the scenes. However, he maintained an expression dripping with sorrow. Trunks had been faking long, heavy sighs when he heard Florida¡¯s words. Trunks abruptly stood up and violently mmed his hand on the stone table, breaking it into pieces.

    Trunks didn¡¯t even spare a nce at the experts around him who were defending themselves against the stone fragments. He red furiously at Florida and said, ¡°If you want to nder us with unfounded usations, then let¡¯s fight to the death! Our Soul Destroyer band epted a mission half a month ago. All of the elite members, including me, had left the Valley of Sunshine to handle it. Chief Laureton is the one most clear about this. Florida, everyone is here today. If you want to kill me then do it fair and square, no need for plots and schemes!¡±

    When Trunks shattered the stone table with one blow, the ray of silver aura emitting from his palm hadn¡¯t escape the eyes of those assembled. Everyone here was sharply intelligent, who didn¡¯t know what silver fighting aura meant for a swordsman? Thanks to his own efforts and the Rebirth Pill, Trunks had advanced to the rank of great swordmaster. In addition to being a demonstration of his strength, the blow was warning the leaders here to think carefully.

    The Soul Destroyer mercenary band had been able to openly recruit experts in recent times. Add that to the abundant funding it received, Trunks¡¯ fame, and the mercenaries¡¯ previous foundations as Rainbow Sickle members, the mercenary band had developed at an astonishing rate in just a short amount of time.

    Perhaps the Soul Destroyers wouldn¡¯t have been noticed by Laureton and Florida if it weren¡¯t for the tragedy in the mountain valley. It was a pity that these forces had suffered a major blow in the valley, their umtion of strength over many years destroyed in just the blink of an eye. Their power had dropped so drastically that they had no confidence that they could easily swallow Trunks. Moreover, the Soul Destroyers existed in the shadows. The various powers still didn¡¯t even know where the Soul Destroyer base was. This made them into a force that was truly on par with the four great powers.

    By disying his powerful strength at the great swordmaster rank in such a tough manner, Trunks was directly provoking Florida. This altitude was obviously far different from how he¡¯d kept a low profile in the past.

    Even though he practiced thunder magic along with light magic, light archmage Florida still hadn¡¯t fully recovered from thest time in which Han Shuo had wounded him. If he fought Trunks, whose strength had rapidly advanced to great swordmaster, with his current power, plus their previous bone deep hatred, Florida had no doubt that Trunk would take this chance to rip him to shreds.

    Therefore, Florida¡¯s cheeks twitched in anger as he red darkly at Trunks before he opened his mouth to speak in a stiff voice, ¡°The most important thing now is to find out who was behind this. I have no time to fight you!¡±

    When these words sounded, the leaders in the Valley of Sunshine all understood one thing. Florida was afraid!

 Chapter 299: Ceasefire

    Chapter 299: Ceasefire

    Trunks didn¡¯t pursue things either. He said with a sigh, ¡°As a member of the Valley of Sunshine, it saddens me greatly that such a tragedy has urred, but the first and most important thing is to determine the truth of the matter. Otherwise, we¡¯d suffer a series of assaults if our enemy attacks us again after this. It will be unbearable for any of us!¡±

    None of the leaders present believed one iota of Trunks¡¯mentations. The huge happenings in the mountain valley hadn¡¯t affected the Soul Destroyers in the slightest. They didn¡¯t believe that Trunks wasn¡¯tughing at their disaster. Of course, they wouldn¡¯t be so stupid as to provoke Trunks at the moment, especially when thetter had just shown that he had the strength of a great swordmaster.

    After an awkward moment of silence, Laureton finally opened his mouth, ¡°I think the goal of the perpetrator was all of the forces in the Valley of Sunshine. The Soul Destroyers were lucky enough to avoid disaster. None of the people I sent to the mountain valley returned. Perhaps our Valley of Sunshine is facing a great deal of trouble this time.¡±

    The forces had been locked in bloody battle just a few days before. They wouldn¡¯t be having such a friendly discussion if it hadn¡¯t been for mutual devastating damage. Florida stared discourteously at Laureton, his face clouded over with resentment, his voice cold and sinister, ¡°What do you think we should do then?¡±

    Taking a deep breath, Laureton seemed to have chosen his words carefully. His eyes, asrge as bronze bells, swept in a circle across everyone¡¯s faces. He finally said in a low voice, ¡°Let¡¯s temporarily set aside the grudges between us and find out who the hand in the darkness belong to. The power to control the Valley of Sunshine will be handed over to whoever figures out the truth first. What do you all think?¡±

    As the person who¡¯d always grasped the major power in the Valley of Sunshine, Laureton was absolutely not someone this generous. In fact, he was famous for being as stingy as he was berserk. Truthfully speaking, these words shouldn¡¯t havee from his mouth at all.

    However, the strength of the Cairo mercenary band was now far weaker than it had been due to the huge change of scenery in the mountain valley. On the other hand, although the other three great powers had also suffered heavy losses, the Cairo mercenaries still wouldn¡¯t be able to resist theirbined might, even if they held the advantage of superior terrain in the Valley of Sunshine.

    In that case, he¡¯d rather happily and openly let go of the privilege that he would no longer be able to hold onto. The power over the Valley of Sunshine could be the bait to seduce the three great powers, causing the alliance to fracture because of this hard to grasp benefit. Laureton wasn¡¯t simple-minded, despite being brawny. This fellow was definitely a great schemer as he was able to sit on the highest position in the Cairo mercenary band.

    The moment Laureton¡¯s words fell, the eyes of Adam Menlo and Katar, who¡¯d been following Florida¡¯s lead, shed with wild ambition. The two silently nced at each other for a few seconds before agreeing readily, seemingly unaware of Florida¡¯s desperate eye signals.

    The small forces, who¡¯d cooperated with Laureton, hesitated for a moment before nodding their heads in consent. Trunks also readily agreed upon seeing the majority of the forces nod with agreement. Everyone¡¯s eyes then fell on Florida. Originally, Florida would likely have grasped this power as long as Adam Menlo and Katar supported him. He secretly cursed these two former allies and their families in his heart. Although Florida was extremely bitter inside, he could only nod and give his approval.

    The big decision had been made. Even Florida couldn¡¯t go against it!

    ¡°Very good. Then we can discuss the details for a bit and even draft an agreement. All of the forces in the Valley of Sunshine will be the supervisors in case someone refuses to admit to thister!¡± Laureton grinned ndly as he made a serious proposal.

    This agreement was as ridiculous as a prostitute iming to be a virgin, however, sometimes this was necessary. Although everyone knew full well that the agreement would be instantly torn apart if one side became powerful enough, there was still a need for rituals. This could offer a bit of psychologicalfort, especially when everyone felt that a ¡°secret enemy¡± existed in the shadows.

    Therefore, even the great powers, with nefarious intentions, had to agree to these terms. The forces were temporarily agreeing to a truce as they put forth all of their effort to track down the the hand in the shadows!

    When Han Shuo learned all of this from Trunks, he only chuckled ndly without offering anyments. He didn¡¯t exin anything to Trunks either and quietly left the Valley of Sunshine, a ce where everyone was sucked into a huge whirlpool of conspiracies and suspicions.

    Trunks¡¯ hairs stood on end as he was creeped out by Han Shuo¡¯s smile. He saw in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes a trace of pride that was deliberately revealed, yet hard to see. Trunks suddenly realized something.

    However, Trunks didn¡¯t ask any questions. Upon Han Shuo¡¯s leave, he immediately led the Soul Destroyers to raise a great hue and cry in the form of arge manhunt for the perpetrator. They looked even more hardworking than Laureton¡¯s mercenary band.

    In the process of this open and righteous search for the perpetrator, Trunks took the opportunity to conveniently carry out recruitment activities. The fame of the Soul Destroyer mercenary band gradually began to spread, attracting many fine experts to join them.

    Han Shuo returned to the Ossen City seven days after he¡¯d left the Valley of Sunshine. He gave some instructions to the steward in the mansion before secretly leaving through the transportation matrix in the Dark Mantle.

    Brettel City wasn¡¯t a firm, stable city. As the former city lords had been habitually weak against the invasions of the seven grand duchies, the guards here had be a motley array of individuals. Whether it was the city lord or the soldiers, they¡¯d save their strength to run and flee even faster than the civilians when faced with a real attack.

    Since Brettel City was often assaulted, the Lancelot Empire hadn¡¯t wasted a great amount of money to build a transportation matrix here. After all, if a transportation matrix leading everywhere just so conveniently existed when the other grand duchies upied Brettel City, no one could guarantee that the tant invaders wouldn¡¯t just invade other cities of the Empire through the transportation matrices. While Brettel City was barren, the Lancelot Empire had many flourishing and rich cities. Theoretically, if the invaders really entered the Empire¡¯s other cities by using the transportation matrices, it¡¯d bring about a danger no one would dare to imagine.

    Therefore, building a transportation matrix in a ce like this, that seemed to be an abandoned city, was a double-edged sword. This resulted in a never-ending situation of suspension.

    ¡°Spring is truly here. It¡¯s a pity that the scenery isn¡¯t very pleasing!¡± Sitting inside a carriage, Han Shuo lifted the curtain to look at the scenery along the way and muttered to himself.

    Ever since arriving at the transportation matrix in Seamist City, neighbor to Brettel City, Han Shuo had been sitting in the carriage in a slow approach towards his destination. On the way, beggars wrapped in coarse clothes wandered all around. Flies flew back and forth over dead bodies on the two sides of the road. A thick stinking smell was always drifting about the ce.

    Seamist City was a rich city with strict defenses in the eastern part of the Lancelot Empire. However, when traveling to Brettel City from there, these deste scenes were like heaven and earthpared to Seamist City. Han Shuo already discovered a dozen groups of bandits running rampant through the yin demons just three days into the trip.

    These bandits were just regr robbers from the Lancelot Empire, and not the official armies of the seven grand duchies that disguised themselves as bandits. Even the steel-nerved Han Shuo was a little stunned at such a miserable situation. He personally killed no less than fifty of these beasts in human skin along the way.

    ¡°Bryan, I didn¡¯t think your territory would be this kind of ce. The tragic sights along the way are challenging enough for people¡¯s nerves already. I think Brettel City will be almost unbearable for you.¡± Chester had disregarded life and death when he had begged to follow Han Shuo. He¡¯d given up a good mission led by Emily and was even willing to be the coachman, so Han Shuo didn¡¯t have to go to such a notoriously dirty, chaotic city by himself.

    Han Shuo chuckled heartily as he thought about Chester¡¯s somewhat insane courage, asking, ¡°Chester, why did you follow me, even after I rejected you?¡±

    Having focused wholeheartedly on being a coachman, Chester¡¯s nerves had been toughened along the way. He suddenly whipped the handsome, umon warhorse to to prevent its curiosity from being drawn towards a corpse in the bushes. He answered Han Shuo like a philosopher, ¡°If you wish to gain more, not only does the will need perseverance, but the vision has to be far and wide.¡±

    ¡°Interesting thought.¡± Han Shuo smiled slightly at Chester¡¯s answer. His elegant voice resounded softly and indifferently as he calmly watched the civilians struggle intensely for a loaf of bread.

    The situation in Brettel City was incredibly bad. Except for a few who were reluctant to leave their ancestral homes, plus the nobles and soldiers who couldn¡¯t leave due to their duties, the rest of the civilians tried to use every method to shake off the evil shackles here, desperately wanting to enter the rich and peaceful Seamist City.

    However, the road to Seamist City wasn¡¯t peaceful at all . Even if one risked their life to reach the gate, they¡¯d be heartlessly refused without a huge entry fee. They would be left to fend for themselves even though they were also civilians of the Lancelot Empire. After all, the poor civiliansing to Seamist City could only be the lowest of unstable, petty beggars. Seamist City couldn¡¯t amodate too many of these beggars to prevent an adverse impact on the image of the city.

    Therefore, noble merchants, who could enter the city, were those who could prove their worth to live in Seamist City. Civilians from Brettel City were also allowed entry if they paid quite a hefty sum. Otherwise, the city guards would watch with cold eyes if anyone even died outside the city gates.

    ¡°My territory, I¡¯ve finally arrived!¡± Han Shuo looked at the wide open Brettel City and murmured emotionally in front of the broken gates.

 Chapter 300: Broken city, broken soldiers

    Chapter 300: Broken city, broken soldiers

    A humble looking carriage passed through the broken city gate that was riddled with holes. The streets were deserted, with an asional sighting of one or two people. The eyes of those on the streets were filled with despair and resentment, a silent protest against their current tragic life.

    Brettel City was as dirty as Han Shuo had expected, looking only a tad bit better than the sights he¡¯d seen on the road. A fewzy soldiers indifferently watched the carriage enter the city without asking about his background or for an entry fee. It seemed that Brettel City was on the verge of death.

    ¡°Hey, can you please tell me where the city lord¡¯s mansion is?¡± Chester pulled on the reins and smiled at a civilian who looked like a beggar.

    This person was lyingzily in the sunlight, focused on picking out the fleas from his body. He seemed not to have heard Chester¡¯s question. He didn¡¯t even lift his head.

    ¡°I¡¯ll give you one silver coin, where is the city lord¡¯s mansion?¡± Chester had been born poor so he knew quite well about the poor¡¯s temper. A smile on his face, he patiently asked again.

    The mention of silver coin immediately showed its effectiveness. Sniffing the seductive aroma of money, the seemingly deaf beggar suddenly stared at Chester. He pointed in the direction of the street to the east, ¡°Go straight for three hundred meters. The tallest, most broken down mansion is the city lord¡¯s mansion.¡±

    A silver coin shining in the sunlight spun through the air, rolling to a stop on the ground in front of the beggar. Chester whipped the horse and left without saying thanks, following the directions to the city lord¡¯s mansion.

    The beggar hastily picked up the silver coin, clutching it tightly in his hand. He then looked towards the direction where the two left and murmured, ¡°Some more people havee to Brettel City again. If it isn¡¯t some risk-taking merchant who¡¯de for profit, then it must be that legendary unlucky count. Poor fellow.¡±

    Whenever Brettel City was invaded, the city lord would be the loving focus of their attention. As such, the walls of the big tall building weren¡¯t too sturdy, and there were still several holes decorating the ground nearby, remnants of a previous bombing, that hadn¡¯t yet been repaired. When Han Shuo¡¯s carriage arrived, only a smattering of five maids and less than a dozen soldiers were present.

    These maids and soldiers¡¯ attitude towards Han Shuo¡¯s arrival was quite indifferent. They weren¡¯t enthusiastic nor weing in the manner of a subordinate. Of course, a wee banquet that would be normal in other areas was even more impossible.

    The city lord¡¯s mansion was at least five times bigger than Han Shuo¡¯s mansion in Ossen City. However, it really had no other uses aside from being big. As the city lord was the first to flee upon every invasion, no soldiers had been stationed here. Therefore, the city lord¡¯s mansion was always the first ce to be piged.

    Even some things that were hard to take away were all gone after sessive attacks. What was incredibly ludicrous was that Han Shuo actually saw arge, rectangr hole in the ground ¨C the remnants of a white jade table that had been peeled away. This was enough for Han Shuo to imagine the real situation in Brettel City.

    ¡°Describe the current situation of Brettel City to me.¡± Han Shuo asked Dick whilst sitting in the tattered lobby of the city lord¡¯s mansion hall. Dick was the Dark Mantle liaison in this city, and had arrived after hearing of Han Shuo¡¯s posting.

    Dick was a man who was roughly forty years old. He looked ordinary, with his nose ced high on his face. It was a feature unique to the mountain people of Brettel City. Dick paid his respects to Han Shuo and answered in a somewhat awkward version of imperial tongue, ¡°The former city lord of Brettel took a total of five hundred family members with him upon his leave. The entire city currently only has over three thousand soldiers. The poption in the city is less than fifty thousand. The three thousand soldiers aren¡¯t enough to guard the city gates, not to mention they usually flee even faster than the civilians. The city¡¯s defenses have never been fixed after every attack due to theck of funds, and now it¡¯s almost lost all defensive ability.¡±

    ¡°The mountain folk are native to Brettel City, and the majority of them reside on several steep mountains in the area. These mountains produce valuable ores. The natives are very familiar with the terrain of the big mountains, and it¡¯s difficult tounch an attack at the mountains. This is why the mountain people can resist the invasions of the seven grand duchies.¡±

    ¡°In fact, Brettel City has actually been rtively safe up until now. After dozens ofrge and small invasions, the seven grand duchies all know that there¡¯s nothing left to loot in this city anymore. Even if they spent the time and resources towards a raid, there¡¯s not enough to raid in the city to ensure a profit. That¡¯s why no further aggression has urred in the past few months.¡±

    ¡°It was rather the mines in the big mountains surrounding us that the natives protect and harvest from that have be the target for bandits and private armies. However, the mountain people there aren¡¯t as ipetent as the imperial soldiers. So far they¡¯ve been able to barely resist the onught of attacks...¡±

    Han Shuo gradually grew to understand the situation in Brettel City thanks to Dick¡¯s overview. When Dick finished speaking, Han Shuo looked at a soldier in the city lord¡¯s mansion and ordered, ¡°Assemble all of the city¡¯s soldiers in front of the city lord¡¯s mansion. I want to see what they currently look like.¡±

    ¡°Yes, Sir Count!¡± This soldier respondedzily and climbed unhurriedly onto a skinny horse before slowly moving out of the castle.

    ¡°My Lord, you will be disappointed.¡± Dick shook his head with a long sigh as he spoke to Han Shuo.

    ¡°I know. But I think I won¡¯t be disappointed again in the future!¡± Han Shuo smiled ndly before sinking into silence with a frown.

    The city¡¯s scattered soldiers finally assembled unhurriedly after almost two hours. They gathered at the front of the castle with no order or discipline. Their bodies didn¡¯t look very strong, and theirplexions were sickly, probably due to issues with food. No one had any trace of the kind of attitude and spirit that a soldier should have. It was clear that they wouldn¡¯t be able to withstand even one blow with their currentbat strength.

    The swords, bows and spears in their hands were of inferior quality, with rust stains all over them. Han Shuo felt that just about any weapon forged by the dwarves could break apart all of their weapons. Only one-third of the soldiers were middle-aged men and strong youngsters. The rest were much older old men who moved much more slowly. Who could expect to rely on these folks¡¯ fighting capabilities?

    Han Shuo stood on the high tform in front of the mansion, observing these soldiers for a while. He silently pondered before saying with a grin, ¡°From today on, your happy days are over. Soldiers over fifty years old will be removed. For these people, I will guarantee you a normal life.¡±

    ¡°As for the rest, not only will you have enough food to fill your stomachs, you¡¯ll also get new weapons and armor, plus strong warhorses. Of course, you¡¯ll also be trained in a cruel, torturous manner to wait for the next chance to wash away our previous shame with the blood of the invaders. With me here, Brettel City has to change,pletely.¡±

    The elderly soldiers below broke out into an uproar. They were indifferent to Han Shuo¡¯s retirement order, but were doubtful of his guarantee for a life with enough food and clothing. The young people turned to look at each other as they processed his words, not knowing what he actually wanted to do.

    ¡°Sir Count, do you mean that?¡± Dick was standing next to Han Shuo and asked Han Shuo with shock.

    ¡°Your Lordship, even if the thousand of us gets new weapons and warhorses, do you think we¡¯d be able to stand firmly against ten or twenty thousand bandits or tens of thousands of soldiers from the official armies of the seven grand duchies with this broken city wall?¡± A crude looking, bearded soldier lifted his head and shouted towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°You don¡¯t need to worry about this. As a soldier, if you have no way to stop the enemy from invading, you should offer up your own head to wash off your failure and shame. I will personally cut off the heads of those who dares to escape in order to prolong their lives.¡± Han Shuo looked coldly at this brawny guy and snapped.

    ¡°Your Lordship, I think you¡¯d better leave while it¡¯s early. This ce has been abandoned by the Empire. Do you think you alone can change the situation of Brettel City? Without a hundred thousand imperial elite soldiers to guard this city, it¡¯ll forever be unable to escape its fate of being invaded. If you want to seek death, can you please not drag us with you?¡± This stubborn soldier was extremely arrogant as he ignored Han Shuo¡¯s cold eyes and rebutted in a rebellious manner.

    Whoosh!

    A dark brown ray of light shed. No one knew what had beenunched as something shot towards that rebellious soldier. The next second, a head rolled off a pair of shoulders, fresh blood spraying out from the neck like a brush sketching a beautiful painting.

    ¡°From now on, what you need to do was listen and executemands. You have no need for doubts, and even if you do, you must keep them to yourself!¡± Han Shuo looked murderous as he shouted, his face cruel and ruthless like a butcher. The soldiers below mped their mouths shut one by one.

    At this moment, a shining troop of over a hundred warhorses, their riders holding shiny weapons in their hands, slowly entered the castle. A man in a full-body, silver armor with a silver spear in his hand bent his body slightly on the warhorse to pay respects to Han Shuo, ¡°Sir Count, earth rider Faulke will dedicate my all to serve you and heed your everymand.¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t need to think much at all to know that Faulke had been sent by Lawrence. Han Shuo felt an atmosphere of ughter from this man that only existed on true warriors who¡¯d been through hundreds of battles. He immediately swept a nce filled with ill intent at Brettel City¡¯s soldiers and said with a sinisterugh, ¡°Faulke, from today on, these ones are under your care. Use the most cruel method you have to train them. I won¡¯t me you if someone dies during training.¡±

 Chapter 301: Army of Undead

    Chapter 301 ¨C Army of Undead

    Brettel City had undergone a slight change. The civilians that dressed like beggars within the city often saw a different scene from what they usually saw. The soldiers of Brettel City that lived like cowardly borers had recently be energized. It was like they had been possessed by something. They would actually form a tidy troop and run while carrying weights; or practice their swordsmanship within the city lord¡¯s mansion that was undergoing steady repair.

    The originally cowardly and useless soldiers who¡¯d worn fearful expressions on their faces gradually toughened up beneath the harsh training from the knights in silver armor. Their previously wax colored, thin looks also hardened and had unknowingly be more defined.

    It wasn¡¯t just the soldiers in Brettel City, but some other areas also underwent significant changes. An example would include the pitted city wall that was now repaired by some old and retired soldiers. The changes were especially apparent at the city lord¡¯s mansion. It had suddenly be filled with life. Therge numbers of people visiting and leaving it had even caused it to be a bit disorderly.

    For the civilians of Brettel City, who¡¯d already given up hope, they weren¡¯t too affected by these changes. They were used to the city lord being the first to escape and didn¡¯t think that these changes would have any effect. Instead, some of them even maliciously spected about the harm these actions might bring to them.

    They didn¡¯t know if the changes in the city would cause the bandits and soldiers of the seven duchies, who hadn¡¯t visited in several months, to think that there was loot worth piging in the city once again. It would be another terrible experience if they became interested and came back to rob the city once again.

    Han Shuo slowly walked out of the secret chamber within the city lord¡¯s mansion very early in the morning, to find Faulke and Dick Chester already waiting in the living room. When he saw the three of them, the three people saw Han Shuo move his storage ring, dumping weapons as well of bags full of provisions onto the floor. Han Shuo looked towards Faulke and said, ¡°Use these weapons and chariots properly. You also have to control the provisions properly. Furthermore, start recruiting today. Civilians can enter the troops as long as they are young and strong. For now, promise them one gold coin aside from their meals.¡±

    As an earth knight sent over by Lawrence, Faulke naturally possessed umon strength. Several soldiers had already died from the intense training under Faulke. However, the death of these soldiers had actually served as examples, causing all of the soldiers to truly realize the harshness of their training, meaning that none of them dared to be there just to make up the numbers.

    Faulke would maniacally train these soldiers in the morning and then discuss military tactics with the high-ranking soldiers at night in the city lord¡¯s mansion. Han Shuo also felt that he learnt a lot after listening in on the side for a few days, and felt that Faulke was indeed an officer that he could ce his trust in.

    ¡°Understood,¡± Faulke wasn¡¯t a man of many words. He normally had on a stern face and exuded the righteousness and bloodlust of a soldier.

    ¡°Dick, have there been any unusual events in the surroundings recently?¡± Han Shuo smiled at at Dick, who was in charge of the Dark Mantle operations in the area, ¡°Sir Count, apart from some of the civilians not understanding your actions, nothing special has urred recently around Brettel City. However, ording to Dark Mantle reports, I believe a wave of bandits will pay a visit in a few days. Of course, their targets should only be the mountain people in Mount Tali near Brettel City,¡± Dick replied respectfully. Although the soldiers in Brettel City were cowardly and useless, the local Dark Mantle branch still operated normally with Dark Star spies concealed in the surrounding mountains.

    Han Shuo nodded and then said with interest, ¡°Very good. Keep your eye on this, figure out when the bandits will strike, along with their numbers and path. Faulke, perhaps it¡¯s time we test these soldiers. If we don¡¯t stir them up a bit, I think it would be hard for them to truly grow.¡±

    ¡°My Lord, you are very right about this. I will make them look more lively,¡± Faulke replied.

    Three dayster, a battle that often urred happened intensely yet again on Mount Tali, the mountain southwest of Brettel City. Redbeard Troda led four thousand savage bandits and rushed up Mount Tali, disregarding his losses. On the other side, the mountain people hid inrge bushes and behindrge boulders beside the meandering paths of the mountain, using bows to stop the bandits from climbing the mountain.

    The mountain people had already be used to these sort of attacks. They naturally had their own way of handling it. Large rolling boulders and arrows caused quite a bit of damage to the bandit horde. The mountain people that hid behind the boulders on the mountain were much braver than the soldiers within Brettel City. They were not afraid of the bandits¡¯ attack at all, using a variety of tactics to harass and repel the invaders.

    ¡°Faulke, do you think those bandits can emerge victorious?¡± Han Shuo, a bit of distance away from the bandits, turned his head towards Faulke at the foot of the mountain.

    Faulke shook his head and answered bluntly, ¡°It¡¯s impossible, although Redbeard Troda¡¯s bandits number plenty, the mountain people of Mount Tali have the geographical advantage. Furthermore, they are already used to the mountain battles. It¡¯s impossible for war horses to walk the meandering mountain paths, yet Troda does not have the determination to fight to the death, so he¡¯s destined to not gain any loot from these attacks.¡±

    ¡°Only a hundred something bandits are dead from four thousand savage bandits. Hehe, Faulke, do you think that we have a chance of doing them in?¡± Han Shuo asked once again.

    ¡°That¡¯s also impossible. The road at the foot of Mount Tali is t, so we have no geographical advantage to make use of. What¡¯s more, these soldiers haven¡¯t been trained for that long, I don¡¯t think that their courage can immediately face the savagery of the Redbeard bandits. What¡¯s more, we merely have a thousand three hundred people. Sire, this is not a good idea,¡± Faulke was shocked after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, causing him to immediately advise otherwise to Han Shuo.

    Sadly, Han Shuo didn¡¯t listen to Faulke¡¯s suggestion. He chuckled and said, ¡°Faulke, you forget that I¡¯m a necromancer. Necromancers specialize in this sort ofrge-scale battles. What¡¯s more, these bandits don¡¯t have any outstanding light archmages. I think we can give it a try.¡±

    Before Faulke could speak again, Han Shuo had already walked towards the Redbeard bandits with a smile, while saying, ¡°Attack with me. I think you should know what to do.¡±

    Han Shuo took out the skeletal wand from his spatial ring. With a low chant, dark beings began to appear one by one. Due to the existence of the skeletal wand, the power of the summoning magic was doubled. Fifty warriors, two hundred something zombies, seven hundred something skeletal warriors and three hundred gargoyles led by ten evil knights were summoned by Han Shuo as he used the skeletal wand and poured in a huge amount of mental power.

    A thousand two hundred something dark beings, including powerful evil knights and hatred warriors, along with soaring gargoyles, stood in an organized fashion and marched towards the bandits under the direction of Han Shuo¡¯s skeletal wand.

    After seeing so many dark creatures appear with Han Shuo¡¯s chant, Faulke felt his life suddenly turn bit surreal. Only when Han Shuo¡¯s figure had nearly disappeared from sight did he finally react and quickly roar towards the soldiers behind him, those ones that were terrified of him, ¡°Today is the day to test your training! You have already seen the city lord¡¯s prowess. I don¡¯t doubt that he has the strength to kill all of you just by himself. The results of being a coward will definitely be quite pitiful, that¡¯s why your only choice is to listen to my orders and attack!¡±

    The soldiers who were already frightened felt a chill grip their hearts after hearing Faulke¡¯s roar. They nced at Han Shuo waving the skeletal wand with a sinister expression. As courage and cowardliness warred against each other, all of them surprisingly found the courage to fight. They grasped their weapons with a determined gaze, and made the preparation to die in an effort to avoid falling at the city lord¡¯s hands.

    The little skeleton with glittering white bones rode a special undead creature full of spikes that was five meters long and three meters tall. This creature seemed to be a hedgehog that had been magnified a thousand times. It carried a tail full of spikes and had only a single grey eye that was suffused with the aura of death.

    The earth elite zombie and the wood elite zombie each rode on a fire-breathing ck armored warhorse. These were usually only owned by an evil knight. They stayed at the little skeleton¡¯s sides. These three little things were actually more cocky than the ten evil knights and showed up at the very front of the troops. What was weird was that the ten evil knights wasn¡¯t dissatisfied by this apparent assertion of the pecking order and followed docilely behind them.

    ¡°What-What was that?¡± A cowardly bandit at the rear screamed shrilly after turning around to see what the dull roar behind him was. He waspletely bbergasted at the sight that greeted him.

    Focused on the battle in front of him, Redbeard Troda was annoyed and had a sullen expression on his face as he roared on top of a boulder. When he heard the mor from his subordinates, he immediately cursed, ¡°Stupid pigs, charge!¡±

    ¡°Boss, behind. Look behind!¡± The bandit was terrified as he anxiously pointed behind him and continued to shriek.

    When Troda raised his head, he was met with a dark aura of death. He found that a horde of undead creatures emanating an icy air not of this world was marching inexorably towards them.

 Chapter 302: Charge

    Chapter 302 ¨C Charge

    ¡°Why are there dark creatures here?¡± Redbeard Troda was shocked. He couldn¡¯t help but stop barking orders to his subordinates to charge up Mount Tali as he gazed, baffled, at the dense army of undead creatures that were advancing on him.

    ¡°Boss, I think-I think that the target of those damned dark creatures is us!¡± When the shimmering purple eye of the little skeleton focused into a re at the cowardly bandit, the bandit suddenly felt that the warm spring air had plummeted into the depths of mid-winter. A bone-deep chill crept into his body.

    ¡°Light mages, kill those filthy dark creatures!¡± Troda noticed the disadvantageous situation by now as well, so he hurriedly roared at the mages ahead on Mount Tali.

    There weren¡¯t as many mages as there were swordsmen and knights in the Profound Continent. The fact that this bandit group could field a few mages was a clear demonstration of their strength. The journeyman mage as well as the light adept mage clearly realized that it would be up to them handle these dark creatures, so the two of them had already started their incantations the moment Troda finished speaking.

    Rays of light-shaped swords and balls of light shimmered in the air as they slowly barrelled towards the undead creatures. Seeing the light magic descend, the earth elite zombie, who had been standing on the front lines, scratched his head ingenuously and suddenly sank into the earth from the body of the fire-breathing warhorse. Right after that, a barrier formed from dust suddenly appeared, blocking most of the light swords and balls of light.

    Although several light swords and balls of light managed tond on the dark creatures and purify a few skeletal warriors, they barely made a dent in the horde of dark creatures.

    These two light mages were not light archmages like Ferguson, who was able to cast a damaging area of effect spell such as ¡°Radiant Glory¡±. Mere sparkles of light were snuffed out like candles in the wake of the inexorable advance of more than a thousand undead creatures, especially since the undead army also boasted the little skeleton and elite zombie warriors who were not afraid of light magic in their ranks.

    Of course, the ck armor of the high ranked evil knights also gave them very good resistance to light magic. Thus, the armyposed of dark creatures did not waver at all under the attacks from light swords and balls of light. They continued to rush vigorously towards the bandits led by Redbeard Troda.

    ¡°Foolish pigs, feeding you guys was truly useless!¡± Troda swore loudly and pulled out a bright dual edged broadsword from his storage ring. He then roared towards the subordinate behind him, ¡°Come, smash these dirty bones!¡±

    Troda immediately charged out in the lead, three thousand bandits by his side. The bandits, who didn¡¯t understand things like battle formations at all, only followed behind Troda like a crowd and charged towards the dark creatures with savage expressions.

    Faulke led the group of terrified soldiers in another direction, different from the dark creatures¡¯ path. The soldiers from Brettel City looked fearfully at their city lord, not daring to retreat in the face of Han Shuo¡¯s ruthlessness. ¡°Prepare the crossbows and bows, shoot until you see them fall. You gutless idiots, focus!¡± Faulke couldn¡¯t help but swear when he saw the soldiers actually daring to crane their necks around on the battlefield.

    The soldiers who were used to being scolded all raised the bows and crossbows in their hands and shot wildly at the Redbeard bandits running down the hill. Although these soldiers were far from urate, the bandits were too densely packed together. Every arrow drew blood in the crowd as long as enough strength had been applied behind the shot.

    On one side stood soldiers that hadn¡¯t been trained for long and had worked up their courage for the first time to resist the bandits. On the other side were fiery bandits who didn¡¯t understand battle techniques and used brute force. As defenders, the bows and crossbows in the soldiers¡¯ hands were quite vicious. Three hundred something bandits were killed and five to six hundred others were injured in the blink of an eye as a dense rain of arrows hurtled down.

    After the bandits had paid the price in three hundred lives, they finally reached the foot of the mountain. They had two options now. They could either charge towards the Brettel City soldiers on their nk, or charge forward to meet the slowly advancing undead army.

    Troda was furious. He¡¯d finally recognized the ones who¡¯d dared to attack him were the cowardly soldiers of Brettel City. The same soldiers who would run away like cowardly dogs every single battle, and were aughingstock for the seven dukedoms and the bandits.

    Yet at this moment, these soldiers had actually dared to pick up their weapons and attack his men, inflicting quite a bit of damage. This was an unforgivable insult for Redbeard Troda. Thus, Troda roared maniacally when he¡¯d reached the foot of the mountains, ¡°Brothers, destroy these pieces of crap!¡±

    Troda once again lead the charge as he rushed the soldiers led by Faulke with a roar. He didn¡¯t bother attacking the undead creatures in front as per his previous n. However, even though he didn¡¯t attack the undead creatures, these creatures of darkness controlled by Han Shuo and the little skeleton would not let them go peacefully.

    When the dark green from the Canopy of Necromancy crept over the ruby hue of dusk, a dense aura of death slowly spread out under the cover of the Canopy. All of the bones of the undead creatures shimmered with evil light as they bathed in the undead atmosphere. Their slow marching immediately suddenly tripled in speed, and even the hate warriors that moved slowly became as fast as flying gargoyles.

    With a series of deep and archaic chants, rays of rippling grey liquid poured down from the sky. As the grey liquid poured down, patches of acidic swamps with azure smoke appeared in the middle of the path that bandits were taking towards Faulke and the soldiers.

    The bandits that carelessly set foot in the acidic swamps all suddenly howled in pain. Due the corrosion of the acidic swamp, their skin and muscles quickly separated from their bones. Fifty to sixty living skeletons suddenly appeared in the acidic swamps in the blink of an eye.

    ¡°Damnit, avoid those pools emitting azure smoke!¡± Troda yelled then furiously red at Han Shuo, who was elegantly releasing necromantic spells. Troda roared. ¡°Evil necromancer, why are you opposing us? I shouldn¡¯t have wronged you before!¡±

    Han Shuo temporarily stopped chanting and looked at Troda with interest. He said softly with a charming smile, ¡°Brettel City is my territory, wouldn¡¯t killing and robbing in my territory count as offending me?¡±

    ¡°Haha, so you are that unlucky new city lord. Do you think that Brettel City is Seamist City? Do you think that you, a necromancer, can change the situation of such an abandoned ce?¡± Troda mocked Han Shuo after thetter revealed his identity.

    ¡°How would I know if I don¡¯t try!¡± Han Shuo chuckled lightly in response. He then pointed the skeleton staff towards Troda¡¯s direction and ordered, ¡°Children, tear them apart!¡±

    The purple eye of the little skeleton riding on top of a giant undead creature shone with a ferocious light. He looked towards the undead creatures that were rushing towards Troda, and suddenly patted the undead creature underneath him. This undead creature, that looked like a supersized hedgehog, extended three pairs of five meter long wings that seemed to be made of azure colored rotted meat. With a p of its azure wings, the giant undead creature brought the little skeleton into the sky towards Troda.

    This seemed to the signal for a charge. The moment the little skeleton and the undead creature took off, the gargoyles that had been circling above quickly pped their bat-like wings and followed closely behind the enormous undead creature and attacked Redbeard Troda¡¯s bandits.

    Han Shuo floated in the air and observed the spiky undead creature through a yin demon. He didn¡¯t know why, but the dense white bones sticking out of its body actually seemed rather familiar. After a period of detailed observation through the yin demon, Han Shuo suddenly remembered that the little skeleton and earth elite zombie had collected a lot of super ranked magical beasts¡¯ bones spikes. Those bone spikes had shimmered with a strange energy that was actually surprisingly simr to the energy coursing through the spikes on the undead creature.

    ¡°Can it be that this undead creature that I¡¯ve never been seen before was actually refined by the little skeleton?¡± This thought randomly popped up in Han Shuo¡¯s mind, but he quickly dismissed it as too fanciful. A little skeleton that he¡¯d personally refined shouldn¡¯t have this kind of special ability.

    ¡°Don¡¯t kill him, I want that leader alive!¡± Han Shuo suddenly yelled when he saw the little skeleton and the undead creature dive down at Troda.

    Han Shuo had found out from Dick that the bandit named Troda often robbed Brettel City in recent years. He was a bandit leader who¡¯d amassed an unknown amount of wealth. Han Shuo was going to make him spit out all of the riches that his group had looted. Brettel City currently needed arge amount of gold coins and the two hundred thousand gold coins Han Shuo had brought with him was not enough to continue supporting everything.

 Chapter 303: Must confess even unto death

    Chapter 303: Must confess even unto death

    The undead creature that had been rushing at Troda suddenly changed direction to attack the bandits in Troda¡¯s group in ordance with Han Shuo¡¯s shout and the little skeleton follow up pat.

    Troda roared as he shot out a series of arrows at the undead creature. A random few connected, but unfortunately didn¡¯t hinder it at all. This hedgehog-shaped undead creature rammed right into the middle of the dense group of bandits under the little skeleton¡¯s guidance.

    Pfft pfft...

    The enormous body of this undead creature barged into the center of the bandits. Its sharp spikes pierced through five bandits, three of which were torn apart while two of them flew through the air, impaled on the spikes.

    Three hundred gargoyles roared as they flew over, pping their bat-like wings as they shot forward. Roughly a dozen bandits didn¡¯t even have time to resist before iron hook-like ws mangled their flesh and blood. The dark creatures that couldn¡¯t fly united with the ten evil knights charging down Troda¡¯s bandits under the leadership of the earth and wood elite zombie.

    Over a thousand undead creatures of various kinds crashed directly into the middle of the bandits. These creatures didn¡¯t fear death or felt any pain. They used either sharp weapons or ws to crazily assault the bandits.

    The skeletal warriors were the weakest among the troop. Their bones often shattered upon impact of a strong collision, except for those whose bodies were at a higher level of defense. The power from the iron bars in their hands was very ferocious, able to create great trouble for the bandits.

    The huge hate warriors were even more difficult to deal with. It would take four or five bandits to barely handle one hate warrior. Only fire and lightning magic, in addition to light magic, could deal major damage to these powerful undead creatures. Even though normal physical attacks could cut off the hate warriors¡¯ limbs, they still couldn¡¯t stop thetter from attacking.

    The ten evil knights were the fiercest as together they raised huge, sharp white bone spikes with great lethality. A swing of a huge bone spike would sweep five or six bandits to death. The ck armor formed from the exotic ore native to the abyss of death was even more resistant to magic,pared to normal armor, while the undead creatures themselves weren¡¯t easily injured by physical attacks. Therefore, the ten evil knights were a nightmare for the bandits. The bandits seemed unable to find a suitable, timely method to deal with them.

    Han Shuo stood in the air, activating the bone staff and chanting some obscure magic incantation. Under the thick veil of the Canopy of Necromancy¡¯s green-ck fog, water ripples descended from the sky to create puddles of acid bog. The acid bog was harmless towards the undead creatures. But when living people without the the aura of death around them entered, they would be dissolved to the bone.

    ¡°Damned stupid pigs you, do you only know to stand there and watch?¡± Faulke let out a loud curse. He clutched his silver spear and turned to the bandits, shouting, ¡°Aim at them!¡±

    The brutal bandit group of four thousand members really couldn¡¯t be underestimated. Han Shuo had only summoned over a thousand undead creatures, the majority of which were the lowest level of zombie warriors. The power of these zombie warriors was too weak to pose a true threat to the bandits.

    Therefore, the amount of undead creatures were too fewpared to the bandits. It was simply impossible to exterminate arge amount of these four thousand bandits by relying on few hate warriors and evil knights. Amidst Faulke¡¯s screams and shouts, series of arrowsnded amongst the bandits and even the undead creatures. The arrows were basically harmless to the high level hate warriors and evil knights, so most of these arrow attacks didn¡¯t even cause any damage to them.

    Seeing the hate warriors have no problem attacking the bandits even when stuck with arrows, the greenhorn archers heaved a visible sigh of relief and unleashed their skills even more fiercely. Now that they had nothing to worry about, the archers became better at deploying the shooting skills learned from their training. The attacks were bing increasingly urate. More and more bandits were hit and died from the arrows.

    Observing the situation with cold eyes, Han Shuo was startled and suddenly paused the Acid Bog magic. A narrow, twisting path that led to Faulke¡¯s group had appeared next to Troda. The narrow path was enough for only three or four people to enter, but it gave rise to an opportunity to attack Faulke¡¯s group.

    ¡°Attack! Kill those damned cowardly soldiers of Brettel City!¡± Troda pointed towards Faulkee. Theyers bandits around him rushed straight at Faulke with Troda beneath the rain of arrows.

    The soldiers were bing used to the fight. They mercilessly shot even more arrows at Troda¡¯s group as they faced thetter¡¯s iing attack. The charging bandits fell one by one and rolled onto the ground like porcupines with arrows, spears andnces extending out of their bodies, their dying poses varied and exotic.

    Halfway up Mount Tali, the leader of the mountain people, tall Fulkin with a high nose bridge was wearing not quite precious armor and at a loss as he watched the chaotic battle at the mountain foot, saying, ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡±

    Fulkin was the leader of the mountain people on Mount Tali. They lived on Mount Tali by mining to trade for living necessities. The group of roughly a thousand mountain people had dropped continuously to less than six hundred throughout endless conflicts. They would have already long been destroyed by the bandits if it hadn¡¯t been for the terrain of Mount Tali.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know who that necromancer is, but those soldiers should belong to Brettel City. Hmm, those Brettel bugs actually dare to wield weapons in their hands, I must be seeing things!¡± Veteran miner Turiaf was tiptoeing on a tall stone, speaking with suspicion as he looked down below.

    ¡°I heard that Brettel City got a new city lord. Could it be this is the new city lord really wants to change the whole city?¡± Fulkin eximed involuntarily, a hint of shock appearing in his eyes.

    ¡°It¡¯s said that the new city lord is Bryan. He seems to be a necromancer who killed the great swordmaster of the Brut Merchant Alliance. He¡¯s an evil man who¡¯s challenged many powerhouses of the Empire. No one could escape his palm of his hands. He¡¯s never spared a single life in any fight.¡± Turiaf had recently heard some information from Brettel City thanks to the fairweather merchants. He couldn¡¯t help but speak up now.

    Fulkin, the chief of the mountain people on Mount Tali, pondered silently for a bit before opening his mouth to say, ¡°That damnable bandit Troda has killed many of our people. Even my little brother died to his hands. Whatever it might be, Troda¡¯s situation doesn¡¯t look very good now. It seems we won¡¯t have to stay and defend ourselves on the mountain anymore.¡±

    ¡°Fulkin, do you mean to descend down the mountain and fight to the death with Troda?¡± Turiaf asked, startled.

    Nodding his head, Fulkin harrumphed coldly and shouted loudly, ¡°Perhaps today is the time for our revenge. These damnable Troda bandits have killed too many of our people. We must not let him leave Mount Tali alive!¡±

    As his words sounded, Fulkin stepped out from a mountain rock and sprinted downwards at the battle at the mountain foot. The mountain people who¡¯d been hiding behinds rocks and shrubs, all followed Fulkin to charge the area where Faulke¡¯s group was stationed, all of their long umted hatred abruptly exploding.

    For the Fulkin¡¯s people, the undead creatures were strange existences from another world. It was best not toe in contact with them. These creatures didn¡¯t belong to this world after all, so it¡¯d be a shame if the creatures turned to attack them.

    Moreover, there were acid puddles of various sizes on the ground beneath those undead creatures. There were dozens of stark white skeletons freshly denuded of their flesh that were still lying in the acid puddles. The creepy scene was too shocking for them. They naturally wouldn¡¯t be willing to enter such a dangerous ce.

    Whoosh whoosh!

    Two bone spears shot out from an unknown position. Troda suddenly felt pain on his two legs. Dozens of gargoyles abruptly swamped over him. Without waiting for him to react, they grabbed him with their ws, spiraling up with him into the sky.

    ¡°My name is Bryan, I¡¯m the new city lord of Brettel City. Very pleased to meet you, Troda!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s voice rang out elegantly. When Troda finally reacted, he saw Han Shuo¡¯s smiling face looking down at him, while the ws from four gargoyles pierced through his back. These four creatures pped their wings, not letting him fall to his death.

    ¡°What do you want?¡± Troda was indeed a leader in the bandit world. His face was still vicious and furious as he roared at Han Shuo despite the agony on his bloody back.

    ¡°I don¡¯t want anything, only all of your wealth. Spit back everything you¡¯ve piged from Brettel City in the past several years!¡± Han Shuo was in a good mood as he spoke with a soft, happyugh.

    ¡°Kill me! I won¡¯t give you anything even if I die! Haha, you won¡¯t get your hands on this weath!¡± Troda let out a crazyugh, seemingly not knowing how to spell the word ¡°death¡±.

    Pfft! Three bone spears nailed Troda¡¯s chest and lower abdomen. Han Shuo said smilingly,

    ¡°You seem to have forgotten that I¡¯m a necromancer. In addition to the power ability to control dark creatures, necromancers are very familiar with the soul. Even if you die, I can still extract everything from your soul.¡±

 Chapter 304: Memory search

    Chapter 304: Memory search

    ¡°The boss, the boss is dead!¡± A bandit screamed when he saw the three bone spears prate through Troda.

    When they saw Troda killed in addition from the undead creatures and Brettel soldiers, the bandits lost their fighting spirit. They were no longer fearless of death, and instead, suddenly felt an ardent desire to live. No one thought of getting revenge for Troda, they all fled in panic.

    Using the bone staff to cast a necromancy magic spell that wrapped around the hazy green of the souls, Han Shuo solemnly chanted obscure incantations to collect the memories of these souls. He flourished the bone staff awhileter. The souls turned into green smoke and drifted away.

    The gargoyles dragged Troda¡¯s body over to Han Shuo. He relieved Troda¡¯s corpse of his space ring before promptly throwing the corpse away. Han Shuo let out a light breath of satisfaction after collecting Troda¡¯s wealth and memory. He looked to the distance to see that the chaotic battle still going on.

    A portion of the heavily injured Redbeard bandits rushed towards Faulke. The soldiers who¡¯d been shooting arrows from a safe distance were shocked and frightened as they switched gingerly from bows to broadswords and spears under Faulke¡¯s orders. Faulke arranged for the hundred plus experienced knights to be out in front and started attacking the iing bandits along with the soldiers.

    Fulkin and the mountain people of Mount Tali had also sprinted down from the mountain. They cooperated with Brettel soldiers to surround and exterminate the Red Beard bandits, who¡¯d were all dejected due to the death of their leader.

    Han Shuo firmly grasped the situation through the three yin demons. He knew for sure that the bandits were doomed for defeat this time. The undead creatures were still ughtering the bandits as per his orders. Having reached the separate demon realm, Han Shuo no longer needed the power from these souls. However, the Demonyer Edge on his chest still silently absorbed this energy that was difficult to observe by the naked eyes.

    Standing on a high altitude, Han Shuo discovered the little skeleton riding a huge, bizarre roaring porcupine and running all the escaped bandits down. The earth elite zombie, wood elite zombie, and ten evil knights were fighting together as they scurried around, hunting down bandits.

    Han Shuo issued an order, and the little skeleton and zombie warriors in this area squatted down to collect the spoils of war from the bandits¡¯ bodies. The undead creatures diligently searched out every weapon, leather jacket, and even some fine clothes before piling them up ording to Han Shuo¡¯s instructions.

    Han Shuo stopped supplying mental strength for the Canopy of Necromancy after the bandits had fled, letting it gradually scatter to the wind. The earth gradually absorbed the Acid Bog puddles under the sunlight. The skeletons in various weird postures suddenly let out cracking sounds and copsed.

    There were no surprises now that the big picture had been set in stone. In this battle, more than twenty seven hundred out of four thousand bandits had died, the rest had fled in a bedraggled fashion. All spoils of war had been collected from the corpses, which Han Shuo ultimately handed over to Faulke¡¯s management.

    Nearly two hundred of Brettel City¡¯s new soldiers died from the bandits¡¯ savage attacks in this battle, while Fulkin had only lost only fifty of his people who¡¯d rushed down from the mountain. This showed the weak power and ipetent abilities of the soldiers in the battlefield.

    ¡°Noble Sir Count, thank you for your help.¡± When the battle was settled, Fulkin went over to Han Shuo and bowed to pay his respects and gratitude.

    ¡°No need to stand on ceremony. Mount Tali is part of Brettle City territory. It¡¯s my responsibility as the city lord to ensure the safety of your lives.¡± Han Shuo responded with a smile before adding, ¡°I hope this is a good start. Brettel City is also your hometown, I don¡¯t think you must continue staying on Mount Tali if you don¡¯t want to.¡±

    ¡°Perhaps one day we¡¯ll return to Brettel City, but it¡¯s not yet the best time. Sir Count should understand our concerns.¡± One battle wasn¡¯t enough to assure Fulkin. He wouldn¡¯t dare to take the risk before Brettel City could disy powerful military strength.

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo said smilingly, ¡°You will see Brettel City change. Alright, we can stop here today. I still have other things to handle.¡±

    Paying no more attention to Fulkin, Han Shuo went over to Faulke and told him to clean up the battlefield. He then left for direction of the Helon Duchy by himself. Han Shuo had received the information about Redbeard Troda¡¯s hidden location from thetter¡¯s mouth. In addition to some misceneous crystal cards inside the space ring, the jewelry and ores that Troda had piged over years hadn¡¯t been sold, but hidden within a mountain with a bald top instead.

    Troda had originally been a criminal in the Helon duchy. He was released thanks to general amnesty when Helen Tina seeded the position. Troda left the prison and returned to his long lost freedom, bing a bandit. Even though he¡¯d been making a mess everywhere over the past several years, he was still obsessed with his hometown. He¡¯d hidden the wealth at a mountain not far from his hometown.

    The current grand duke of Helon Duchy was Helen Tina, rumored to be an extremely charming woman. This woman had obtained with finesse the grand duke position that her uncles had coveted, bing the true power holder of Helon Duchy. None of the uncles who fought for the throne had escaped from her hands. She¡¯d killed them all when she¡¯d seeded the seat.

    ¡°Helon Duchy, humph!¡± Han Shuo snorted coldly. He traversed the dim sky while secretly thinking about when to make a move on this duchy.

    Even though Helen Tina was a woman, the army there had no hearts for mercy in her hands. Her Helon Duchy was the most frequent invader out of the seven grand duchies that invaded Brettel City.

    Helon Duchy was seven hundred li to the northeast of Brettel City. It¡¯d take a day to travel by a fast galloping horse, but Han Shuo only needed an hour using the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens.

    Upon his arrival at that bald-headed mountain, Han Shuo saw arge scale battle campaign that involved four grand duchies in full swing on that precise mountain. The person who Han Shuo had been secretly cursing, Helen Tina, was valiantly sitting on a fiery red phoenix, calm and at ease as shemanded the troops in an attack.

 Chapter 305: Hiding

    Chapter 305: Hiding

    The seven grand duchies included the Helon Duchy of Helen Tina, Bavenden Duchy of Alec Ambridge, Boulet Duchy of Burt Zili, Bonton Duchy of Randy Ard, Narsen Duchy of Benedict Sackville, Etman Duchy of Argi Gilles, and Bisli Duchy of Nehem Beige.

    Thebined size of the seven grand duchies wasn¡¯t much smaller than the Lancelot Empire, but the seven grand duchies fought all year round and never seemed to stop. This battle was being conducted right outside of the Helon Duchy, the current participants being the Helon, the Narsen, the Etman and the Bonton duchies.

    Grand duke Benedict of Narsen Duchy was in the prime of his life. He coveted Helen Tina¡¯s beauty, hence his cooperation with Helon Duchy against the invasion of Etman and Bonton duchies to win the beauty¡¯s heart.

    Benedict desired Helen for her beauty as well as her duchy. However, Helen had always maintained a tepid attitude towards his aggressive pursuit. This tickled his heart, making him even more eager to please her. Benedict often epted Helen¡¯s invitation to personally led the army of Narsen Duchy in skirmishes.

    Helen wore a bright red magic robe, a mysterious magic pattern on her high, protruding chest, and her long red hair elegantly flying in the wind above the mountain. Helen looked like a dazzling goddess of fire as she rode the red-feathered fire phoenix.

    On the cliff beneath her was grand duke Benedict of Narsen Duchy in clean, exquisite formal attire. He stood next to a luxurious carriage, a calm and confident smile on his face. His eyes were watching the soldiers of Etman and Bonton duchies advance deep into the mountain.

    Han Shuo arrived in the sky above the mountain valley. ncing down on the raging battle, he recalled Troda¡¯s wealth being buried hidden here and momentarily zoned out.

    This ce waspletely different from the mountain valley with the mithril mine. The mountain was formed purely from the deposits of type of very durable rock. The darling of the earth¨Cthe earth elite zombie, could move unimpeded within the soft soil, but he couldn¡¯t do so at will with this rock solid mountain.

    If the metal elite zombie could be refined in the ce of extreme metal, its ability to destroy stones and drill through mountains would enable it to enter easily. Unfortunately, the metal elite zombie was currently unobtainable, since the location of the ce of extreme metal was still unknown. Han Shuo could only helplessly watch the grand battle ur on the mountain while thinking of another way.

    Han Shuo stood on the sky, his vision scanning the entire mountain valley. He frowned, wondering if he should make use of this chance to enter. Troda¡¯s wealth was hidden at the spot beneath the carriage where Benedict was standing next to. Troda hadn¡¯t ced all of his wealth into the space ring, likely because he was scared that someone would assassinate him to seize his ring.

    Troda had also been quite a yer. He¡¯d had three lovers and two sons in the Helon Duchy. He¡¯d already made the appropriate arrangements for his most trusted mistress. Once she learned of his death, the wealth in his mountain would be the pir of support for this mistress and his sons.

    Therefore, Han Shuo needed to quickly clean out the four hundred thousand gold coins worth of treasures when the news had yet to reach her ears.

    As Han Shuo raptly watched the scene below and tried to think of a way, Helen Tina below suddenly discovered his gaze. She frowned, a magic staff embedded with an enormous me stone abruptly appearing in her hand.

    This magic staff had the ability to increase the effectiveness of fire magic. Helen raised it and pointed at Han Shuo. A zing fire coalesced into five human-sized fireballs, flying straight towards him on the sky.

    ¡°Hateful woman!¡± Han Shuo softly cursed. The fingers on his left hand danced adroitly, shooting out rays of faint purple me. The rays wove into a cial, tightly enveloping the five huge fireballs.

    Sizzling sounds and faint smoke instantly appeared when the magic, woven from the purple spellfire of the Mystical cial Spellfire, wrapped around the five fireballs. The cold air instantly snuffed out the fire elements within the fireballs. The fire remnants shimmered as they slowly scattered down, forcing Helen to pull on the hood of her magic robe.

    ¡°Who is it?¡± Helen Tina looked up only to see a small ck spot under the sunlight. She withdrew her contemptuous attitude and asked cautiously upon seeing her fireballs easily destroyed.

    Han Shuo paid no heed to Helen Tina and snorted before flying off towards the back of the mountain. He intended to temporarily depart this troublesome area and think of other methodster. At the back of the mountain, he saw Helon soldiers hauling enormous war equipment to the top. Han Shuo intended to kill a soldier and changed outfits in order to enter the main battlefield.

    Helen Tina started panicking upon seeing Han Shuo fly to the back without any words but a snort. She looked down and shouted to Benedict, ¡°You take care of matters here. The magic cannons are being delivered to the back of the mountain, but a dangerous character has appeared. I need to immediately go and take a look.¡±

    Helen Tina patted the fire phoenix without waiting for Benedict Sackville to reply. The super rank magic creature had brilliant, fiery red feathers that swayed and sashayed as the phoenix pped its wings and flew up, bringing the bright red robed woman to the back like a gout of zing me.

    The magic cannons contained a strange kind of magic element. This element seemed to repulse the space rings. The cannons couldn¡¯t be ced directly into space rings and could only be pushed up slowly via human power.

    Helen Tina had crafted the strategy for this grand battle for a long time, the killing blow being precisely the bombardment of magic cannons from the high attitude of this mountain. She had been nning this for far too long, using enormous effort to lure two grand duchies to the same ce. She absolutely would not let anyone destroy her n. Therefore, she expended full force in stopping Han Shuo when she saw him fly to the back.

    Han Shuo had yet to apply his n when a red silhouette quickly flew over. In the sky, five huge but slender, vivid fire snakes twisted their roughly seven meter long bodies before shooting at Han Shuo from five different directions.

    The fire magic ¡°Mad Dance of Fire Snakes¡± could only be casted when a fire mage advanced to the rank of archmage. The ring that Helen Tina wore on her left hand enhanced mental strength. Add to that the magic staff embedded with the me stone, she was able to release five fire snakes instead of three that an ordinary archmage could summon.

    The five fire snakes meandered in the sky, the extremely high temperature creating sizzling sounds in the air. The fire was so violent that it seemed that it would only need a short while to burn Han Shuo to ashes.

    Han Shuo was stunned. He had originally looked down on Helen Tina, thinking she was only a woman with wild ambitions who only knew to use schemes and beauty to gain power. He hadn¡¯t expected her to have real strength. This terrifying strength coupled with her extraordinary beauty surprised Han Shuo greatly.

    Snow white bones shot out like flowers in full bloom, bing as soft as silk threads. They were woven into a massive white bone shield under Han Shuo¡¯s maniptions. Endless darkness blotted out the dazzling sunlight. The dark fogpletely shrouded this space while the white bone shield materialized in front of Helen Tina.

    The fiery red halo of the five fire snakes wasn¡¯t enough to light up the surroundings. As the sunlight was blotted out, the snakes lost their targets and turned to entangle the white bone shield instead, burning it to crisp. Helen Tina suddenly couldn¡¯t feel a hint of Han Shuo¡¯s presence anymore.

    The dark fog disappeared as quickly as it came, dispersing upon just a breeze. When the sunlight returned to scatter upon the hill, Han Shuo had already vanished from the air without a trace, leaving behind only the burned bone shield that was cut off from it supply of magical energy. The shield shattered into small, inky ck pieces and scattered down.

    Taking out a pair of snow white gloves with silver embroidery, Helen Tina promptly caught a falling piece of bone. She was shocked upon looking at the pitch ck piece in her hand, her eyes vignt as she swept a nce around and murmured, ¡°Turns out he¡¯s a damnable necromancer. Just who is this person?¡±

    Mumbling to herself for a bit, Helen Tina still had no clues. She naturally thought that Han Shuo had taken advantage of the dark fog to escape. Turning to look at the soldiers busily pushing the cannons, she ordered, ¡°Hurry up, move all of these cannons to the top of the mountain.¡±

    The bare chested soldiers were hard at work and all shouted ¡°Yes!¡± upon hearing the order. Everyone snuck a nce at the goddess of their heart and felt themselves full of an inexplicable energy, their strength suddenly spiking up.

    On a huge rock, a soldier lightly rested his hands on the carriage containing the cannons. A trace of ridicule shing in his eyes, he nced at Helen Tina in the sky like a vicious beast lurking in the dark looking at its prey. He whispered with a chuckle, ¡°Helon Duchy, Helen Tina. You piged Brettel City to fatten yourselves, now it¡¯s time for you people to spill some blood.¡±

 Chapter 306: Magic crystal cannons

    Chapter 306: Magic crystal cannons

    As soon as the grand duchess of Helon Duchy had departed, the previously dispersing fog slowly gathered once again. The sunny sky was shrouded by an inky cloak so ck that one couldn¡¯t see their own fingers. The Helon soldiers who¡¯d been rigorously pushing the cannons, were so scared that they couldn¡¯t help but shriek.

    A shadow dashed erratically back and forth within the pitch ck darkness. Terrifying, deste screams echoed from the ces where the shadow had glided past. These shrill screams would start up briefly before being abruptly cut off. The soldiers had been fought on the edge of death many times in their lives, so they quickly understood what it meant for the sounds toe to an abrupt end.

    The screams of those not reconciled to their fate were isted by the darkness. The thick dark fog hid the brutal ughter that was happening. When itpletely dispersed, more than forty bodiesy on the ground. Each had died with their neck pierced through by a sharp weapon.

    Six crystal cannons, each five meters tall and six meters long, disyed vivid colors after the fog had cleared. The crystal cannons were refined from magic silver and a variety of other exotic metals. Their barrels were engraved with obscure, microscopic magical arrays. The silver-gray crystal cannons were so heavy that they couldn¡¯t be moved easily.

    ck glossy spots sparkled like stars that were appearing together with the sunlight. Along with the glossy ephemeral sheen, stiff and heavy bodies appeared one by one out of thin air next to the crystal cannons. Sixty some zombie warriors took careful control of the crystal cannons. Divided into six teams, they began to push the cannons down the bald mountain.

    The magic crystal cannons had been created in an ancient style, making them sturdy and heavy. Hauling them up the mountain was quite difficult, so it naturally didn¡¯t take much effort to push them down. The six magic crystal cannons were now pushed back down to the mountain¡¯s foot using less than a tenth of the time through thebined efforts of sixty zombie warriors.

    Of course, these extremelyrge and expensive magic crystal cannons weren¡¯t protected only by those dozens of toiling soldiers. The guards who protected them from a further distance were still trapped within the dark fog. When the thousand plus Helon soldiers at the mountain¡¯s foot saw the magic crystal cannons that they¡¯d just pushed up with much effort quickly roll downwards with the help of their adversaries, they immediately knew that there was a problem.

    Not waiting for the thousand plus soldiers to react, the ground at the mountain¡¯s foot suddenly split open, forming a gully with arge rumbling sound. The six expensive magic crystal cannons rolled downwards one by one. The gully was very deep and narrow. Even after waiting some time, no sounds of the heavy cannons hitting the bottom could be heard from the gully.

    Mission aplished, the sixty zombie warriors vanished one by one amidst a ck shimmer under the dumbfounded gazes of the soldiers at the mountain¡¯s foot. Only the deep tracks left by the rolling of the magic crystal cannons proved that they had indeed existed.

    ¡°Sir lieutenant, what... what do we do?¡± A captain looked helplessly at his lieutenant, asking helplessly as he nced at the gully that was quickly closing up.

    ¡°Inform Her Lordship the Duke! The six magic crystal cannons are worth six hundred thousand gold coins. Our lives are finished if we can¡¯t find it!¡± The lieutenant looked terrified. He had initially nned on ignoring everything to run away. However, thinking of the cruelty that the grand duke was capable of as well as his parents in Helon City, he secretly prepared for his death instead.

    As the two talked, the gully on the ground miraculously closed up after swallowing the six hundred thousand gold coins worth of magic crystal cannon. This incredible scene happening right before their eyes, as if everything was returning to normal, was both shocking and slightly calming, actually dissolving some of their inner fear.

    In the sky above the mountain, Helen Tina returned to Benedict Sackville¡¯s side with empty hands. The feathers of the Fire Phoenix danced, offsetting Helen¡¯s dazzling beauty even more as she rode in on the phoenix.

    ¡°What happened? Nothing out of your expectations, right?¡± Benedict asked indulgently as he gazed at perhaps the most difficult prey he¡¯d encountered in his life. Even though Benedict was already middle aged, his elegant and noble intellectual temperament, coupled with the charisma of a mature man, were a fatal attraction for countless normal women.

    ¡°He ran away. It was an evil necromancer.¡± Helen Tina rxed her face into a subtle smile. She didn¡¯t hold back her smiling countenance, her tone slow and gentle.

    ¡°So it was just a cowardly necromancer. Hehe, a minor character unrted to the big picture, he shouldn¡¯t have any impact to our n.¡± Benedict secretly weighed the information and didn¡¯tment much on the matter. He casually asked, ¡°When will the magic crystal cannons arrive? I really want to see these despicable invaders blown to bits under their bombardment.¡±

    ¡°They are halfway up the mountain and will soon appear. I¡¯ve spent a lot of money to buy these six magic crystal cannons from the Brut Merchant Alliance thousands of miles away. Their power has been tested, you¡¯ll definitely see blood blooming like roses.¡± Having destroyed an entire small forest in one test shot, Helen Tina could imagine the scene of her enemies¡¯ flesh and blood spewing messily in her head. She was so full of expectations after having gone through all this fire and blood to reach this point.

    ¡°Lord, Lord Duke, it¡¯s bad, things are very bad!¡± The captain from the mountain¡¯s foot hurriedly scrambled over and shouted his report loudly with a terrified face.

    ¡°What happened?¡± Helen Tina frowned, extremely displeased in her heart. She shouted at the lesser captain who¡¯d disturbed her good mood.

    ¡°The six magic crystal cannons have all disappeared!¡± The captain was extremely horrified but had resigned himself to articting the truth in fear.

    ¡°Wha... what?¡± Helen Tina was momentarily stunned as her spirits tumbled from the peak of satisfaction to the bottom of a deep abyss. She couldn¡¯t adapt to this kind of sudden reversal in fortune. As a result, she didn¡¯t realize that her usual graceful voice had be shrill.

    ¡°Some zombies pushed the six cannons down from the hillside, then a crack appeared on the ground and swallowed them all. The crack then closed up and the ground returned to normal. This is the truth!¡± The captain hung his head as he quickly described the sequence of events. He didn¡¯t even dare lift his head to look at Helen Tina¡¯s eyes right now.

    An enormous fireball shot out, violently consuming the captain. Helen Tina¡¯s face was covered in ayer of frost as she screamed tragically. She rode the fire phoenix to the back of the mountain, her fury billowing to the skies. The phoenix flew quickly, surrounded by dancing embers. Benedict was certain that the soldiers responsible for transportation would face great suffering.

    ¡°Lord Duke, what should we do now? Do we still need to defend this small mountain?¡± After Helen Tina left the bald mountain, a soldier standing tall next to Benedict with a straight posture and darkened face asked in a low voice.

    Shaking his head, the elegant and rxed expression on Benedict Sackville¡¯s face vanished. His face turned stern as he barked, ¡°This battle is purely a waste of troops without the magic crystal cannons. With no rewards to speak of, we naturally won¡¯t be engaging in this confrontation anymore. Let¡¯s go, we will immediately withdraw from this mountain. You only need to inform Kabbah of Helon Duchy, I think he¡¯ll know what to do.¡±

    Nodding, the soldier took his leave without another word and issued orders to retreat to high ranked officers.

    While Benedict Sackville was certainly pursuing Helen Tina, he was also scheming to swallow the Helon Duchy at the same time. By nature, Benedict Sackville was a duke interested in nothing but profit. He wouldn¡¯t expend his own power solely in the pursuit of romance.

    With the withdrawal of Narsen Duchyl in addition to Helen Tina¡¯s departure, the Helon soldiers also seemed to realize that the situation wasn¡¯t looking good. After some paying, themander of the Helon army decisively issued a retreat order. The soldiers from the two duchies defending the mountain valley withdrew as quickly as they could under a rain of arrows.

    The zing fight had fizzled out as quickly as it¡¯d been ignited. Three thousand corpses had remained behind on the bald mountain after the battle stopped. The two enemy duchies who had painstakingly waited for the Helon army to emerge from their city, now saw their chance as the soldiers cleanly withdrew. Their leaders instantlymanded the troops to go around the mountain and chase down the armies of the Narsen and Helon duchies.

    There were only three hundred soldiers from the Edmond and Bonton duchies left to clean up and scavenge the remnants of the battlefield on the mountain.

    The majority of troops had withdrawn after half an hour. The three hundred soldiers cleaning the battlefield suddenly felt day turn into night as the sky was gradually covered by a thickyer of ck clouds. As they gathered items off the corpses, the soldiers looked up at the green-ck cloudyer in the sky with a head full of befuddlement.

    The three hundred soldiers had only justpleted the cleanup and collected all of the weapons and armor into five big piles when, much to their terror, the previously dead soldiers started to slowly writhe and stand up in grotesque postures.

    Three thousand corpses all over the ce stood up and immediately surrounded the three hundred soldiers cleaning up the battlefield. Under the Canopy of Necromancy, the three thousand corpses didn¡¯t spend too much time to turn the three hundred soldiers into more of their own.

    With now over three thousand stiff, resurrected corpses properly lined up in formation under Han Shuo¡¯s evil maniptions, the undead army advanced towards Helon Duchy. Han Shuo arrived at the exact ce where Benedict Sackville had been standing. ording to Troda¡¯s memories, Han Shuo sessfully dug his way underground and found the wealth that Troda had prepared for his children and mistress.

 Chapter 307: Divine power

    Chapter 307: Divine power

    Han Shuo conveniently shoved all five piles of collected items from the mountain into his space ring. Suddenly, he saw an enormous halo of holy light shining upon the earth in a distance. He instinctively felt a disgust towards that sacred, pure light. Strand of faint smoke drifted up in the light and dispersed into heaven and earth.

    Having collected all of the valuables in the bald mountain, Han Shuo looked up to see the three thousand plus zombies that had been walking towards the Helon Duchy turned to ashes upon being bathed in the holy light. None was left after a short span of a few minutes.

    Through the yin demons, Han Shuo saw a group of four gracefully drifting over on the back of warhorses. Three of them wore silver-gray armor with the Church of Light¡¯s cross engraved on the chest. The fourth was a light mage in white robe, a thick book of scriptures in his hand. A vast holy force overflowed with each page of the book being flipped.

    Helen Tina was advancing by their side on the back of the fire phoenix. Her beautiful face full of fury and cold killing intent, she quickly approached the bald-peaked mountain.

    A yin demon was surveilling and about to close in on these people for close detail when the white robed mage with the scriptures in hand seemed to discover it. His bright and wise eyes staring right at in the yin demon¡¯s direction, he paged through the scriptures in his hand. A bundle of white light abruptly shot out from a page and hit the invisible yin demon in a second.

    The yin demon that Han Shuo had spent a great deal of resources to refine was enveloped in a strange force upon being hit by the white beam. It turned instantly to ashes. Even Han Shuo¡¯s soul brand on it had vanished.

    A pair of thin eyes opened in the skies above Han Shuo. The white robed light mage abruptly closed the scriptures, his eyes as if piercing throughyers andyers of obstacles to nail down Han Shuo¡¯s body. The mage¡¯s peaceful voice resounded quietly, ¡°He¡¯s on the bald mountain.¡±

    The three silver armored Temple Knights urged their warhorses forward at the same time. The warhorses moved like whirlwinds, galloping swiftly towards the mountain. The white d mage leisurely abandoned his warhorse and floated up, his speed even faster than that of the three Temple Knights riding warhorses.

    Helen Tina, gliding on the fire phoenix at a low altitude, cried out softly in anger after hearing the mage¡¯s words. The fire phoenix instantly shot in the air, tearing a zing red across the sky and reaching the mountain in the span of a few breaths.

    Han Shuo¡¯s anger had been ignited when the yin demon was turned to ashes. He also became aware of the Church of Light¡¯s terrifying power at the same time. That light mage holding the scriptures in particr could easily kill a yin demon with a simple gesture. Han Shuo was instantly on his guard against this mysterious person and his scriptures.

    With the high speed of Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens in addition to the earth elite zombie bing invisible within the earth, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t worried about escaping. Therefore, he didn¡¯t choose to retreat upon seeing the Sky¡¯s Eyes above his head. He¡¯d wanted to at least face the light mage who¡¯d destroyed his yin demon and suss out the situation before deciding whether or not to temporarily retreat.

    The Sky¡¯s Eye formed over his head needed a constant supply of mental strength from the caster. When the light mage realized that Han Shuo was remaining in the same ce, he no longer provided supplied the Sky¡¯s Eye with mental strength and immediately withdrew it.

    Helen Tinanded in front of Han Shuo like a me under the brilliant sunlight in her fiery-red magic robes. She was approximately twenty-eight years old. Her soft expression covered in ayer of frost, she stared coldly at him from the super rank magic creature and shouted, ¡°The six magic crystal cannons, hand them back over to me now!¡±

    Han Shuo looked up at her with a calm and natural expression. He pouted before saying with a nd smile, ¡°This is but some interest from your Helon Duchy. Remember this well, these six magic crystal cannons is only the beginning. I will make you spit back out everything you people have robbed of us these past several years.¡±

    ¡°Who are you?¡± Helen Tina burned with rage upon hearing his words. However, she seemed to remember something and inquired him about his identity.

    ¡°Heh heh, you will know.¡± Han Shuo replied casually. He then stopped caring about her and focused all of his attention on the light mage who¡¯d arrived by now.

    ¡°Pleasee with us to the Church of Light for a visit. As long as you confess your sins, the God of Light will forgive your reckless arrogance.¡± The Red Archbishop Kosse looked peaceful, as if he was the host inviting his guest.

    Kosse and Ferguson were both grand magi. However Kosse was also a wind mage in addition to being a light mage. Moreover, he held the divine artifact ¡°Revtion¡± of the Church of Light. He could borrow divine power from it, so his strength was much higher than the light grand magus Ferguson.

    Kosse was only forty-five years old, but had the honor of serving as the acimed Red Archbishop. This indicated that he was no simple character. The only person above the rank of Red Archbishop was the God of Light¡¯s messenger, the Pope. As the youngest Red Archbishop ever, he was the most promising candidate for the seat of the next Pope.

    ¡°Sorry, I have no time.¡± Han Shuo looked remotely at Kosse, refusing outright.

    The three galloping Temple Knights had finally caught up. They¡¯de on the back of their warhorses since the road on the bald mountain wasn¡¯t too windy. Standing on the mountain, Han Shuo looked into the far distance and discovered that a team of a dozen silver armored knights was gradually materializing. They seemed to be left behind by the four in Kosse¡¯s group.

    ¡°My Lord, we don¡¯t have to waste words on this heretic. He brutally killed Lord Ferguson. He should be burned for this sin.¡± A Temple Knight nced coldly at Han Shuo and suggested to Kosse.

    The Temple Knights were a group of dedicated fanaticspletely faithful to the God of Light. They themselves possessed extraordinary strength. Only when the God of Light recognized their existence and bestowed a blessing upon them, could they be qualified as Temple Knights. The favor each Temple Knight earned was different in ordance to their strength of their faith as well as their own efforts.

    The strength of the Temple Knights could be distinguished based on the amount of the God¡¯s favor bestowed upon them. The Temple Knights who only received a hint of favor would have the insignia of the Holy Grail on the armor¡¯s chest. Those who received a lesser amount would have the olive branch insignia, those with a lot of favor had the cross insignia.

    The Temple Knights who earned the blessing of a miracle could disy their power to the highest possible extent. This type of Temple Knights was extremely rare and few, their insignia on the armor¡¯s chest being an angel statue, their strengthparable to a sacred knight. If a Temple Knight of this kind was a sacred knight himself, then his strength would be even more terrifying.

    However, these Temple Knights were simply too rare in the Church of Light. They wouldn¡¯t randomly leave the Temple of Light under normal circumstances, so those with the cross insignia on their chests were already the most powerful outside. Currently, three of these Temple Knights with the cross insignia was staring raptly at Han Shuo with fervent, frenzied eyes. Han Shuo became cautious upon seeing this kind of stubborn madness that belonged only to stubborn religious followers.

    ¡°Bryan, pleasee to the Church of Light with us to give a clear exnation. I guarantee that the God of Light will forgive your recklessness no matter how grave your sins are. At most you¡¯ll only be imprisoned within the Church, we won¡¯t take your life.¡± The Red Archbishop secretly recalled the warning of the Lancelot Empire and tried his best to sound polite.

    ¡°Bryan? So you are indeed that unlucky new city lord of Brettel City. I finally know the meaning in your words just now. Hmph, daring to grab my magic crystal cannons, you simply don¡¯t care about the lives of your people!¡± Helen Tina hadpletely understood by nail. Her pretty eyes drilled into Han Shuo¡¯s body as she snorted.

    ¡°You can try. Any duchy that dares try to pige Brettel City will have to pay the price.¡± Han Shuo remained unmoved, only throwing Helen Tina a nce along with a cold warning. He then slowly took out the Demonyer Edge and nodded towards the Temple Knight who¡¯d first spoken, ¡°Come on, brave Temple Knight. As long as you win against me, I¡¯ll consider following you guys to the Church of Light. I think your Church of Light won¡¯t gang up on me, will you?¡±

    ¡°But a despicable necromancer, it simply won¡¯t need a second person from us to make a move.¡± The Temple Knight swung his silver spear to point at Han Shuo and spoke in a righteous, awe-inspiring manner.

    The silver spear shone with a brilliant silver light. Han Shuo was long since been familiar with this kind of silver fighting aura. However, the silver spear also contained a pure divine power in addition to the energy of the silver fighting aura. When the strange divine power merged with the fighting aura, thebination was much more powerful than the simple silver fighting aura.

    The Temple Knights had exchanged their faithful, steadfast beliefs for blessings from the God of Light, earning a strange power in addition to the fighting aura they bitterly cultivated. Not only did strange power protect them from the erosion of evil force, it also gave them the ability to purify the evil in this world.

    Normally, the damage caused by dark and necromancy spells to Temple Knights was extremely limited. The Temple Knights possessed a very strong defense even against high rank dark and necromancy spells with terrifying lethality. On the other hand, the Temple Knights¡¯ weapons,bined with the power bestowed by their God, was terribly fatal to mages of the two aforementioned majors. Any undead creature touched by the silver spear would be unable to withstand it and be immediately turned to ashes.

 Chapter 308: Divine weapon versus divine weapon

    Chapter 308: Divine weapon versus divine weapon

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind was calm, his expression ruthless as he watched the high ranked Temple Knight of the Church of Light slowly approaching on the warhorse. He held the Demonyer Edge in his right hand. As the space ring shed, a tri-colored bone staff appeared in his previously empty left hand.

    Han Shuo was about to chant a high level undead summoning spell when he saw ¡°Revtion¡± on the hand of Red Archbishop Kosse burst out with a vast, brilliant holy light. This divine artifact flipped through its pages quickly without any wind, shocking even its owner.

    The tri-colored bone staff of unknown material suddenly shone out brilliant yellow, blue and purple lights at the same time, the dark, evil power crazily circting. The lights of the three colors converged before shooting towards ¡°Revtion¡± on Kosse¡¯s hand.

    Continuous pping sounds traveled out as ¡°Revtion¡± flipped rapidly. A beam of light drifted out with every page flipped, each light forming a miraculous word and joining a river of words flowing in front of Kosse. As soon as the marvelous words came into contact with the light from the tri-colored bone staff, holy power along with evil power exploded at the same time. Violent air surged and rushed in all directions between Han Shuo and Kosse.

    The iing Temple Knight who was challenging Han Shuo was pushed back by that terrifying power, along with the other two Knights. Helen Tina was also overwhelmed by the pressure on the back of the phoenix. She immediately struggled up to higher skies, horrified as she looked down at the happenings below.

    The previously refined andmanding posture of Red Archbishop Kosse had disappeared without a trace. He stood there trembling slightly, cold sweat flowing down his body as he looked at Han Shuo, dumbfounded. He could feel the power all over his body pour crazily into the ¡°Revtion¡± in his hand. This situation had never happened before.

    ¡°Revtion¡± was a book of scriptures in the Church of Light that had been left behind after Kosse¡¯s master had passed away. His luck had been excellent, he¡¯d received this divine artifact after receiving the God of Light¡¯s recognition in a baptism in the Temple of Light. The artifact had been in his hands for merely three years, but everything had gone smoothly for Kosse with his identity as a light and wind grand magus. The situation had always gone favorably every time he¡¯d used ¡°Revtion¡± against evil powers. He had never encountered this situation at hand.

    Han Shuo held the bone staff, the mental strength in his entire being also madly attracted to it. The bone staff was rapidly absorbing his mental strength like a big sponge. When the mental strength poured into the staff, it seemed to resonate with the magic force of the bone staff itself, ultimately forming a strange tri-colored light that all converged towards the ¡°Revtion¡±.

    Although he was at the rank of grand magus, Han Shuo still felt slightly woozy when his mental strength was crazily sucked by the bone staff. However, his mind was much more resolute than ordinary people¡¯s, in addition to his astoundingly strong body. This was why he wasn¡¯t trembling like Kosse with cold sweat flowing down his body.

    As the evil and holy powers intertwined, the terrifying impact swept away all of the obstacles between Han Shuo and Kosse. Rocks shattered wherever this force passed through, the bald mountain shuddering violently exploding where this impact spread through. Huge rumbling sounds echoed nonstop in the area between the two people.

    ¡°This evil force is so enormous that I¡¯m sure that only the artifact of the Cmity Church¡¯s Evil God can possess such power. Kill this ignorant heretic!¡± The Temple Knight had been swept head over heels by the forces ricocheting between Han Shuo and Kosse. After standing up with much effort, he was inwardly terrified of Han Shuo¡¯s power upon seeing Kosse¡¯s body trembling. He immediately suggested taking advantage of this opportunity to kill Han Shuo.

    How would the Temple Knights not know how powerful Red Archbishop Kosse was? The divine artifact of ¡°Revtion¡± in his hands had always been a nightmare for evil forces for many years. He hadn¡¯t expected that today, a weak petty heretic such as the one they were facing would be able measure up to the Red Archbishop Kosse. He was afraid of Han Shuo¡¯s immense power, so he proposed the idea of killing thetter.

    The remaining two Temple Knights were watching the scene develop in front of them as they stood on the sides. As soon as they heard their brethren¡¯s proposal, they immediately turned their warhorses towards Han Shuo without another word.

    The three Temple Knights carefully avoided the center part of the still rumbling explosion, approaching Han Shuo from the rear and two sides. In the holy light shing out from ¡°Revtion¡±, they started singing praises about the glory of the God of Light. Streams of fighting aura filled with divine power red out from their spears and attacked Han Shuo.

    Seeing the Church of Light¡¯s despicable act, Helen Tina, overhead, curled up her lips with a trace of contempt. However, Han Shuo was her enemy, while the Church of Light wasn¡¯t an entity a small duchess could offend. She just there silently and observed happily.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength infused the bone staff at a high speed. Coldly facing Kosse in a difficult struggle, he also had to guard against the three Temple Knights quickly drawing close. He could neither move his body nor make use of his mental strength. However, his demonic magic was still avable. A stream of magical yuan flowed into the Demonyer Edge in his right hand under the control of his mind.

    After having absorbed a massive amount of the souls recently, the Demonyer Edge now had a faint trace of terrifying killing intent that belonged to an unparalleled weapon. Upon being infused with magical yuan, it was akin to a murderous magic beast who¡¯d caught the delicious smell of blood after being trapped for tens of thousand years. The Demonyer Edge suddenly moved of its own ord and left Han Shuo¡¯s hand with a loud howl.

    A dense mass of star-like spots gathered into blood clouds. An endless resentment from the Demonyer Edge, along with tyrannical murderous intent, had formed a massiveyer of blood red clouds. The blood clouds blotted out over half of the sky above the bald mountain.

    The thick blood smell seemed to contain an attack on the soul. The three Temple Knights weren¡¯t the only ones to feel that the situation had taken a bad turn. Even Helen Tina, who¡¯d soon flown up high, was also surrounded by the vicious, terrifying air of endless fear. Her head dizzy and her chest heavy with the urge to vomit, a crazy obsession gradually surged within her heart.

    Helen Tina knew that things were very bad. She hurriedly chanted an incantation to form a fiery red magic cage, enveloping both herself and the phoenix. The phoenix¡¯s wings were like a colorful ribbon, fire sparkles shing each time they pped. Fiery light shot out in all directions from the fire magic cage.

    She finally managed to suppress the nauseous feeling of wanting to vomit. She urged the phoenix away from Han Shuo, angry and somewhat scared as she watched the battle of the two weapons above the mountain valley.

    The murderous intent reaching the sky from the Demonyer Edge had even formed an attack on the soul. Its target wasn¡¯t Helen Tina in the sky, which was why she could defend herself, albeit with some difficulties by resorting to the fire magic cage and the purifying fire of the phoenix. On the other hand, the Church of Light¡¯s three Temple Knights weren¡¯t sofortable like her.

    The Demonyer Edge danced wildly above Han Shuo¡¯s head. The murderous intent of this peerless weapon wasn¡¯t weak at all against the other divine artifact. With the Demonyer Edge as the center,yers andyers of thick clouds dyed the entire sky a blood red above the mountain. The three Temple Knights, who¡¯d tried to take the opportunity to attack Han Shuo, was violently shaken by the soul attack. Their warhorses let out a scream and fell down down. The three Knights jumped down with stumbling steps, their bodies shaking. Blood flowed from their nostrils, streaming down their necks and chests like two wiggling worms.

    The three Temple Knights temporarily didn¡¯t know what to do in the face of this unfamiliar evil force. This evil force wasn¡¯t like the quiet, mysterious darkness of the Cmity Church. It was a mad, furious bloodlust with the cruelty and arrogant desire for the destruction of everything.

    The three Temple Knights had to raise their spears and sing loud praises in order to obtain even more holy force whilst suffering through soul piercing agony. Brilliant halos shed on their bodies, constantly resisting against the force that was invading their flesh.

    The Demonyer Edge had mobilized every ounce of its stored deathly soul force after having absorbed ny percent of Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan. If formed an evil maic field that also possessed the ability of attacking the soul and started eroding the essence of every living being that were enveloped within.

    ¡°Revtion¡± was already struggling against the invasion of the tri-colored bone staff. Kosse couldn¡¯t help but almost groan audibly when he saw Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge disy an unfamiliar terrifying force.

    The Demonyer Edge spun in a circle around Han Shuo¡¯s head and slowly gathered a beam of bloody light to shoot at Kosse. Kosse desperately controlled his mental force to chant an incantation after biting the tip of his tongue. A flower of blood bloomed on one of the pages on ¡°Revtion¡±. The divine artifact immediately stopped turning its pages and was quickly put away by Kosse.

    The bone staff that seemed to struggling with its rival also immediately dulled and stop absorbing Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength when Kosse speedily withdrew ¡°Revtion¡±. Only the Demonyer Edge¡¯s beam of bloody light still shot insistently towards Kosse.

 Chapter 309: The mighty

    Chapter 309: The mighty

    Kosse himself had suffered internal injuries, he instantly panicked upon facing this murderous intent from the Demonyer Edge¡¯s attack. He hastily took out a magic scroll from the space ring and released the magic within. A silver halo wrapped around his entire body, as he also hurriedly chanted a magic incantation at the same time.

    Cold winds whistled as sharply as knives, forming an enormous tornado that roiled up to block the Demonyer Edge¡¯s swift attack. The descending Demonyer Edge fell into the big tornado, its speed slowed by the cold winds. In addition, the raging murderous intent was also somewhat scattered.

    The Demonyer Edge destroyed the obstacles posed by the whirlwind and immediately shot towards the silver halo released from Kosse¡¯s magic scroll. It was once again blocked by the strange energy in this silver halo. The Demonyer Edge was now at the end of its strength. It could only make Kosse spit out a mouthful of blood, but couldn¡¯t threaten his life.

    ¡°Protect the lord!¡± The three Temple Knights couldn¡¯t help but cry out in panic upon seeing Kosse¡¯s misery as well as Han Shuo¡¯s ferocity. Blood dripping out of their mouths, they staggered in a charge towards Han Shuo and Kosse.

    Han Shuo¡¯s body was also currently in a very bad state. The bone staff had suddenly gone out of control and absorbed nine out of ten parts of his mental force. The three Temple Knights had thene attack him. Then, the Demonyer Edge had absorbed more than half of his magical yuan. His current strength was now far less than normal.

    Han Shuo was now unable to release another equally powerful attack after the Demonyer Edge returned after injuring Kosse. He immediately chanted an incantation upon seeing the three Temple Knights approach. The little skeleton, earth elite zombie, and wood elite zombie suddenly appeared afterwards.

    The little skeleton was still riding the undead creature that looked like a giant, undead porcupine. The earth elite zombie and wood elite zombie each rode a fire-spitting warhorse. The three fellows immediately caught the smell of something disgusting as soon as they appeared in this dimension. They were instinctively irritated at the smell of the three Temple Knights who were loudly singing praises for the God of Light.

    The three strange dark creatures charged out without needing for Han Shuo¡¯s instructions. They flew straight at the three Temple Knights, seemingly wanting to destroy these hateful Knights immediately.

    ¡°Humph! Lowly dark creatures, suffer the anger of the God of Light!¡± The Temple Knights raised their voice, waving their silver spears with the intention to send off these reckless dark creatures back to the dust.

    Unfortunately, these three undead creatures had been refined using the secret method of demonic magic. They were fearless towards the purification ability of the God of Light. The silver spears didn¡¯t disperse their souls, turning them to ashes upon contact like the Temple Knights had expected. Among these three undead creatures, the little skeleton was first to attack. The bone knife in his hand swayed unhesitatingly to block the silver spear.

    During this process, the bone knife that the little skeleton was holding abruptly went through a some weird changes. The solid bone knife suddenly wriggled madly like a living creature. The bone knife that originally possessed the length of only a dagger, grew at a very fast pace and turned into a three meters long de in just a second.

    The long knife had yet to stop its peristalsis, a million of insects now seemed to be wiggling on its de. It gave one a scalp tingling feeling just by looking at it. Sharp little spikes slowly appeared on the knife¡¯s de, covering it in sharp little spikes and making it look eerily ferocious.

    This process had taken a long time to describe, but had actually happened in just the blink of an eye. It¡¯d finished transforming to a three meter long sword in the instant that the little skeleton swung it up at the silver spear. The little skeleton himself was only one meter thirty centimeters tall, lookingical as he held the long de.

    However, deathly aura filled the sky with a swing of the long sword in the little skeleton¡¯s hand. The dense sinister air epassed tens of thousand years umtion of destion. This despairing atmosphere revealed a taste of endless death in which the godly power within the Temple Knights¡¯ silver spears was simply unable to purify.

    Riding the massive porcupine-like undead creature, the little skeleton dove down from high above with an enormous rumbling sound. The long sword brought with it a deathly air that filled the skies, hammering straight down on a Temple Knight and forcing him to his knees.

    This Temple Knight had previously suffered serious internal injuries from the corrosion of the Demonyer Edge. Now that he took a violent blow from the little skeleton, his knees couldn¡¯t withstand the pressure and shattered with cracking sounds. Not waiting for the Knight to react, the little skeleton¡¯s long sword pierced through his silver armor. The little skeleton lifted up the Temple Knight on the tip of the de and flew over to Han Shuo in a triumphant manner.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t need to take a look to know that this Temple Knight was already done for. Otherwise, thetter wouldn¡¯t be lying still without any resistance. When the little skeleton neared, the hideous three meter long sword flicked. The Temple Knight spun and flew with the wind before crashing down right at Han Shuo¡¯s feet, his bodypletely devoid of life.

    Temple Knights who could release silver fighting aura were naturally sky riders. It was a pity that Temple Knight had already been heavy injured and had somewhat underestimated the little skeleton. Therefore, the terrifying powerful little skeleton had easily in him. As for the remaining two knights, they had stood quite a distance from Han Shuo, so they wasn¡¯t much affected by the Demonyer Edge¡¯s corrosion. Moreover, the earth elite zombie and wood elite zombie weren¡¯t as horrifying as the little skeleton. The two Temple Knights didn¡¯t fall in defeat as fast even though they had difficulties defending against the two zombie¡¯s endless skillsets.

    Helen Tina was still hovering on the phoenix, shocked as she looked at the happenings below. She originally intended to take advantage of the situation whilst the two sides battled, but now could only stared dumbly at the situation of the Red Archbishop Kosse and the three Temple Knights. Not only were they unable to kill Han Shuo, one of them was dead while the other three suffered serious injuries. Her heart fell into disarray with panic.

    Han Shuo stood arrogantly below, his eyes coldly watching the surroundings. Helen Tina constantly weighed up the gains and losses. On one hand, she was scared of Han Shuo¡¯s astonishing strength. On the other, she was heartbroken over the six magic crystal cannons.

    After a while of hesitation, the magic crystal cannons worth six hundred thousand gold coins washed away some of her fear for Han Shuo. Helen Tina saw Kosse fleeing in a panic towards the foot of the mountain, the little skeleton astride the skeletal undead creature in hot pursuit with a three meter long de in his hand. Helen Tina had no time to debate any longer.

    She released a mass of mes that burned the clouds along with the phoenix. Her staff embedded with a fire stone and her ring that enhanced mental strength further spread out the mes to cover half the sky. The sea of fire churned and spread to envelop Red Archbishop Kosse.

    Kosse, who was escaping in panic, soon sensed the strangeness over his head. He didn¡¯t forget to release a wind magic despite his trepidation. The wind magic blew the zing mes towards the little skeleton and earth elite zombie, forcing them to suspend their chase.

    Undead creatures were born and lived in a gloomy and humid strange world ¨C an endless realm of destion that was forever unable to witness the sunlight. Therefore, they felt an instinctive disgust towards the light and high temperatures. When the raging mes shrouded over Kosse, the three undead creatures little skeleton, earth elite zombie, and wood elite zombie didn¡¯t immediately charge at him.

    ¡°Lord Kosse, Lord Kosse!¡± The distant group of Temple Knights had finally caught up with a great deal of road dust. These Temple Knights mostly had olive branches or holy grail insignias on their chests, which corresponded with the power of senior knight and earth rider. They were obviously weaker than the previous three experts, whose insignia was the cross.

    However, their numbers were numerous. Moreover, they all had the ability of purification towards undead creatures thanks to the God of Light¡¯s blessing. It was indeed unrealistic for Han Shuo to attempt to drown them in a grand army of undead creatures, particrly when considering the presence of the light grand magus Kosse.

    Kosse was now seriously injured and had expended a great deal of spirit power. He immediately shouted upon seeing the Temple Knights finally arrive, ¡°Kill this heretic, his dark heart should not exist in this world of light!¡±

    Kosse previously had wanted to persuade Han Shuo with kind words, but he¡¯d had experienced thetter¡¯s power and even taken serious damage. Therefore, Kosse no longer had benevolence or mercy heart. Absolutely frightened of Han Shuo¡¯s evil power, Kosse immediately ordered everyone to kill him.

    The Temple Knights who¡¯d just arrived saw Kosse¡¯s group in their miserable state. They instantly followed Kosse¡¯s order to charge at Han Shuo, standing on the mountain in a terrain full of holes and pockmarks. The two Temple Knights, who were out of breath in a struggle under the attacks of the earth elite zombie and wood elite zombie, tried to shout a warning=, ¡°Be careful of his dark creatures! They don¡¯t fear the holy power, they even have mysterious skills. Be very careful!¡±

    As the Temple Knights chatted, a team of the Cmity Church¡¯s Death Guards in pitch ck armor appeared in another corner of the mountain. A necromancer in ck magic robes was amongst the Death Guards troop. All them ran desperately in the mountain. The necromancer spoke in a lowered, worried voice, ¡°Hurry! Bryan cannot die no matter what! Ehh, even though he identally hurt some of our people, you absolutely shouldn¡¯t harbor any dissatisfaction.¡±

    Many people among the Death Guards had bleeding noses and mouths. It seemed the Demonyer Edge¡¯s murderous intent had also hurt them.

    The eyes of the ck robed necromancer shone with excitement. He murmured, ¡°Why is the divine artifact of the bone staff blessed by the Evil God in his hands?¡±

 Chapter 310: Captured alive

    Chapter 310: Captured alive

    Han Shuo stood tall on the bald mountain, looking without fear or anxiety at the iing Temple Knights. His mental force and magical yuan had been restored somewhat. Although he¡¯d be hard pressed to win against the Temple Knights, it wouldn¡¯t be difficult if he wanted to leave leisurely.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t released the other two yin demons since ¡°Revtion¡± had destroyed one of them. Thus, he didn¡¯t know that aid from the Cmity Church had appeared near bald mountain. He was about to leave when his consciousness sensed another presence.

    When Han Shuo¡¯s soul had formed a consciousness at the separate demon realm, his senses had be much more sensitive. When he¡¯d sensed that sinister presence, a thought struck him. Last time in the Valley of Sunshine, Edwin had once said that the Cmity Church would appear when Han Shuo needed them the most. It seemed Edwin hadn¡¯t lied.

    Han Shuo had been standing on the mountain but immediately soared high with a thought. He saw a necromancer leading a group of Death Guards and Death Knights rushing over. The mountain had be riddled with potholes under the bombardment of the divine artifacts. However, these Death Guards and Death Knights were sprinting over as if they were on t ground.

    Within the Temple Knights¡¯ thickyer of protection, Red Archbishop Kosse was thinking to himself on a warhorse. He looked up at Han Shuo, not knowing what to do.

    These Temple Knights had extraordinary power and were high in number, but it was a pity that they didn¡¯t have flying magic beasts. They had no other way but to look helplessly at facing Han Shuo high in the sky. Red Archbishop Kosse could use magic to fly, but didn¡¯t dare to pursue due to his grave injuries.

    Helen Tina looked indecisively at Han Shuo from the back of her phoenix, her pretty face darkened calctingly. She hesitated, not knowing if she should take this opportunity to chase after Han Shuo.

    If Helen Tina hadn¡¯t seen the great battle between Han Shuo and the Church of Light, she certainly wouldn¡¯t have hesitated to charge at him right now and wrest back the six magic crystal cannons that he¡¯d taken. Unfortunately, the battle right before her eyes just now had given her a clear understanding about Han Shuo¡¯s terrifying power.

    Pointing at Helen Tina, Han Shuo said with a jeering smile, ¡°You still want the magic crystal cannons?¡±

    Upon Han Shuo¡¯s disdainful nce, the originally hesitant Helen Tina couldn¡¯t suppress the anger that instantly ignited throughout her body. It pushed aside the fear of Han Shuo from her heart. She patted the phoenix and dived towards him.

    The Temple Knights were standing on one side of the mountain valley, and Han Shuo could clearly see the reinforcements from the Cmity Church also arrive in the mountain valley. A malicious idea suddenly struck Han Shuo. He immediately chanted an incantation to send the little skeleton, the earth elite zombie, and the wood elite zombie back to the strange dimension, before flying out of the mountain valley with a long string ofughter.

    ¡°Damn it. He¡¯s leaving just like that!¡± The leading necromancer of the Cmity Church started to pause when he saw Han Shuo fly away from the mountain.

    ¡°It¡¯s the Cmity Church, they must be with that heretic!¡± The Temple Knights had discovered the Cmity Church¡¯s people climbing up from the foot of the mountain at this moment. The feud between the two hadsted for hundreds of years. The umted hatred between the two sides was definitely bigger than the one building for Han Shuo.

    Therefore, the Church of Light¡¯s Temple Knights had almost no hesitation at all when they heard this shout. They started attacking the Cmity Church¡¯s forces as soon as they appeared. The moment the battle broke out, both sides ughtered each other until their eyes were shot with blood. Everyone prayed to their respective god as the battle grew into full swing.

    The necromancer leading the Cmity Church¡¯s group intended to rescue Han Shuo from the Church of Light and grow closer to him that way. Unfortunately, his calctions had gone down the drain. Han Shuo had quickly left this chaotd with the fast speed of the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens, leaving a bunch of sworn enemies to fight each other.

    ¡°This despicable fellow is even more despicable than us!¡± The necromancer grumbled. It was unknown whether he was praising Han Shuo or cursing him. Either way, after he finished voicing those words, he immediately focused on directing the Death Guards to battle the Temple Knights.

    ¡°Shameless necromancer, return my magic crystal cannons!¡± Helen Tina rode the wind on the back of her phoenix and chased after Han Shuo, her soft lips crying out nonstop.

    Han Shuo used the speedy Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens to quickly leave the area andnded on a lush mountain valley. Now that he was out of the reach of Kosse¡¯s ¡°Revtion¡± artifact, Han Shuo immediately released the remaining two yin demons. Although the yin demons seemed to be flying disorderly, they could actually observe Helen Tina¡¯s every movement.

    Upon arriving at the mountain valley, Helen Tina finally saw Han Shuo slow to a stop, with the little skeleton on the strange undead creature appearing next to him. Rage having overwhelmed her rational thought, Helen Tina urged the phoenix to shoot straight towards Han Shuo. The phoenix emitted a melodic sound before spraying out a zing hot me.

    Helen Tina waved her fire stone embedded magic staff. Bowl-sized fireballs one by one appeared, sting towards Han Shuo and the little skeleton in a dense rain.

    The little skeleton grasped the three meters long knife and tapped on the undead creature he was riding with the handle. The undead creature opened a huge mouth full of sharp fangs and howled at the sky. Green glowing wraiths floated out from its mouth, their green sheen glimmering as they brought with them the thick presence of death from the other dimension. The wraiths started to madly absorb the deathly air floating around mountain valley as soon as they appeared in this world.

    The wraiths¡¯ bodies had originally appeared with barely a glimmer of light. Their bodies slowly expanded and condensed into the appearance of green liquid under the pressure blowing from the undead creature¡¯s mouth. They rammed violently towards the densely packed fireballs.

    The wraiths had absorbed energy from dead souls and rapidly swelled up to the point they couldn¡¯t hold their shapes anymore. They exploded in mid-air, deathly air covered the sky in gray-green mist. Ice cold breaths beat at the pack of fireballs, slowly dissipating the brilliant light of the fireballs.

    Upon seeing the light from the fireballs dissipate, the little skeleton urged his huge undead mount to dash towards Helen Tina.

    Undead creatures bore a natural hatred for the light of fire. However, the glossy bones of the little skeleton were highly resistant to fire magic despite his hatred. He wasn¡¯t truly afraid of fire. As soon as the deathly air destroyed the dense fireballs, the little skeleton held his long de and charged ferociously to face Helen Tina as per Han Shuo¡¯smand.

    When the little skeleton neared, the Helen Tina¡¯s phoenix emitted a massive me, the high temperature causing every green nt around the mountain valley to wilt and die. Only several towering big old trees held up thanks to their firm roots.

    At this time, the Demonyer Edge howled as it drew across the sky with the speed of a meteor crossing the horizon, dragging a long purple tail behind it. It instantly arrived by the side of Helen Tina and the Fire Phoenix before circling upwards. Purple, dancing spellfire suddenly appeared like a star and sprinkled down on the ming body of the Fire Phoenix.

    The Fire Phoenix suddenly issued a sharp cry. The super rank magic creature then opened its beak to speak in humannguage, its girly, sweet voice resounding, ¡°What is this? It¡¯s so cold.¡±

    A bone-chilling cold spread as the purple spellfire descended. Sizzling sounds crackled all over the fire phoenix¡¯s body, it suddenly felt its steely bones stiffen up, the pping of its wings bing increasingly heavy. The phoenix lost altitude and began to slowly fall down to the depths of the mountain valley with Helen Tina on it.

    ¡°Big sister Fire Phoenix, what¡¯s wrong?¡± Helen Tina hastily called out in panic.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know, my body feels really ufortable!¡± The phoenix also cried out, not knowing what to do or how to stop the descent. She was also very afraid of this unknown cold invading her body.

    The two female creatures fell down, about to hit the ground when the branches of the nearby towering old trees suddenly twisted tightly like an octopus¡¯ tentacles around them, not letting them move one bit.

    ¡°Damnable necromancer, how are you able to use the natural ability of the druids!?¡± The phoenix¡¯s crisp and clear voice constantlyined after she was tied up by the branches.

    Helen Tina struggled with the fire stone embedded magic staff in her hand. She tried to chanted a fire magic incantation. At this moment, a vicious, long, and sharp knife kissed her white, slender neck at this moment.

    Helen Tina lifted her head to see the odd little skeleton. The seven wing bones behind his back were fluttering gently. The lengths of his body and the long knife in his hand werepletely at disproportionate odds with each other. An eyeball sparkling with a purple light was staring straight at Helen Tina, making all the hairs on her body stand on end.

    ¡°What do you want?¡± Helen Tina looked coldly down at Han Shuo below and asked vengefully. Someone like her who¡¯d been through the baptism of blood and fire to reach her current position actually restored her calm bearing at a time like this.

 Chapter 311: Rejuvenation

    Chapter 311 Rejuvenation

    ¡°What do you think, hehe!¡± Han Shuo intentionallyughed lewdly, his face sporting a lecherous look. When he looked at Helen Tina, he deliberately stared at her busty curves.

    Branches had entwined tightly around Helen Tina, who was wearing a fiery red robe, alongside the phoenix. The wood elite zombie hadmanded the huge branches to be as soft as snakes, but no matter how soft the branches were, there would be some sharp edges. Helen Tona¡¯s magic robe had been sliced through in several ces the branches wrapped around her, revealing her snow white skin at several ces.

    When Helen Tina was restrained hand and foot, she immediately had the wrong idea. The moment she saw Han Shuo reveal such a lecherous gaze, her heart was immediately plunged into chaos. She red angrily and anxiously at Han Shuo before attempting tomit suicide.

    ¡°Helen, no!¡± The phoenix was able to sense Helen Tina¡¯s thoughts, so she quickly called out to stop the woman. Unfortunately, the phoenix was wrapped so tight that it couldn¡¯t move at all, so she was unable to reach Helen Tina.

    Helen Tina, who was trying tomit suicide by biting her own tongue, suddenly felt her entire body drain of strength. She didn¡¯t even have the strength to hurt herself. Right after that, she saw Han Shuo walk over, reaching out with hisrge hands and touching her white and long neck. When that happened, a wave of strange power flowed into her body from Han Shuo¡¯s coarse hands, causing her to gradually lose strengthpletely.

    ¡°Hmph, I have no interest in your body for now, you don¡¯t need to be so anxious tomit suicide!¡± Han Shuo snorted coldly, then pped Helen Tina unconscious with one hand before grabbing her and flying into the sky.

    Han Shuo¡¯s voice rang out from afar when the branches restraining the phoenix slowly fell onto the ground, ¡°Tell the Helon Dukedom to prepare a million gold coins. I¡¯ll return her only after that. Otherwise, prepare to receive her corpse.¡±

    The phoenix felt the branches around her slowly loosen. She watched Han Shuo as he flew further and further away while carrying Helen Tina. She spoke in a wry, crisp tone. ¡°A million gold coins? If her people knew that she was captured, they would only think about how to revolt! What should I do!?¡±

    Han Shuo was already far in the distance and didn¡¯t hear the phoenix¡¯s words. After capturing Helen Tina alive, he rested a bit at the depths of the valley in order to replenish his mental energy and magical yuan.

    When Han Shuo returned to the mountain with the bald top once again after half a day, he could tell from the shattered rocks on the mountain that another intense battle had urred after he¡¯d left. Han Shuo naturally was unaware of the final result of the battle between the Cmity Church and the Church of Light. When he arrived at the foot of the mountain, Han Shuo used the earth elite zombie to use the strength of the earth to summon the six magic crystal cannons once again.

    Han Shuo summoned several zombie warriors to push the six magic crystal cannons forward, then used two yin demons to survey the surroundings before slowly started walking in the direction of Brettel City.

    If Han Shuo flew, he naturally could return to Brettel City in a matter of minutes. However, he was transporting six magic crystal cannons right now, so he had to avoid the soldiers of other dukedoms during the journey as well and couldn¡¯t fly at full speed.

    On the night of the second day, Han Shuomanded the zombie warriors to take the magical crystal cannons to a hidden forest. As he slowly advanced with the zombie warriors, Han Shuo ced the two yin demons at his side to cover his nks.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo summoned the earth elite zombie and hid the six magical crystal cannons into the earth. He then gazed at the depths of the darkness of the hidden woods with a cold expression, and said with a sinister voice, ¡°Come out.¡±

    The strand of a silhouette slowly appeared from the depths of the darkness. It was the necromancer that Han Shuo had met the previous day. As his figure slowly materialized, the necromancer gradually revealed his originally appearance like a lich that had crawled out of a tomb. This necromancer exuded a dense aura of rotten corpses. His grey and white pupils were like a zombie and had no focus, causing people to instinctively fear him under the creepy darkness of the light.

    Han Shuo was a necromancer himself and naturally wouldn¡¯t fear the neer¡¯s terrifying image. Han Shuo had his left arm around Helen Tina and frowned as he looked at the necromancer who¡¯d appeared. Han Shuo remarked, ¡°It seems like your physical body is no longer here. You¡¯re held together from souls and undead creatures now. Just how many years have you existed for?¡±

    Others called necromancers the observers of the soul. Aside from the gods that were rumored to exist, necromancers were the people who understood the soul the most in this dimension. Powerful necromancers were able to cause their soul to live permanently through their understanding of the basic fundamentals of the soul.

    Of course, necromancers with an immortal soul could not likewise make their physical bodies immortal. Normal necromancers that had survived for a long time in the form of a soul would have to use the physical bodies of various powerful undead creatures and mix it with their own body. This was how their physical bodies would be filled with the chilly aura of death and not rot.

    The body of this necromancer who had appeared before Han Shuo was clearlybined with a lich, a dark creature ranked even higher than evil knights. His pale face was filled with the sickly aura of death, while the hard to conceal smell of rotten flesh proved that his body was no longer pure.

    ¡°I¡¯m called Wolf. I¡¯m a hundred and seventy years old this year, and am a grand magus necromancer in the Cmity Church. Hehe, since we both practice necromancy, of course you would know that it isn¡¯t a very difficult thing to prolong our life using our knowledge of souls, as long as we aren¡¯t killed,¡± Wolf looked at Han Shuo with a smile and calmly talked about immortality.

    Han Shuo nodded and said with a smile, ¡°Of course. You only want to talk about immortality with me after following me for so long?¡±

    ¡°Bryan, you¡¯re a special talent. Your existence is a rare miracle for the Cmity Church. Previously, we thought of lots of ways to recruit you for the Cmity Church, but it seems like we were all wrong. You were always one of ours. Hehe!¡± Grand magus Wolf said to Han Shuo with a sinister smile.

    The moment he said this, Han Shuo was shocked, and gazed towards Wolf with a gaze full of confusion. He frowned and said, ¡°I never joined the Cmity Church, when did I be of your Cmity Church?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, it seems that you don¡¯t even realize what you own,¡± Wolf shook his head and eximed, then spoke with a smile. ¡°You will know sooner orter. My reason foring over here is to tell you that although the Church of Light lost quite a lot of Temrs, Red Archbishop Kosse was still able to bring a group of Temrs and walk out of the mountain alive.¡±

    ¡°From now on, I think that the Church of Light is already viewing you as someone part of our Church. It will be hard to avoid the endless threats of deathing from the Church of Light since you reside so openly in Brettel City. Regardless of whether you are willing or not, we will protect you from the shadows, but I hope that you will also be more vignt.¡±

    Han Shuo was initially still very confused when he heard Wolf¡¯s words, but he was suddenly struck with brilliance after thinking for a moment. He took the tri-colored bone staff out and looked meaningfully at the hundred and seventy years old Wolf, asking,, ¡°Is this bone staff a divine artifact belonging to your Cmity Church?¡±

    The dark smile on Wolf¡¯s face vanished as he immediately knelt before the staff, trembling as he chanted a series of names. His unfocused eyes suddenly released a pale green light as he bowed deeply. Meanwhile, he also raised his hands high to form some odd gestures, as if he was prostrating himself before an evil god.

    The tri-colored skeletal staff suddenly shot out three rays of faint yellow, blue and purple light. The three rays of light instantlynded on this ancient necromancer, causing Wolf to continuously kowtow shakingly as he writhed like a worm, bathed in the three faint rays of light.

    When the light of the tri-colored skeletal staff shone down on Wolf, Han Shuo¡¯spletely drained mental energy actually miraculously recovered. On the other hand, the necromancer that was writhing on the ground had slowly begun to weaken. Han Shuo could clearly feel the bone staff soak up the mental energy of the necromancer like a sponge.

    This process continued for a short while until the bone staff stopped shimmering. When the shimmer died, Han Shuo¡¯s mental energy had actually been fully replenished. However, the body of the necromancer continued to writhe underneath the ck robe at Han Shuo¡¯s feet, like a huge living tumor that kept on moving.

    Wolf¡¯s body shook uncontrobly as he continued the ancient chant. After draining quite a bit of his mental energy, the writhing of his body actually be more and more intense. After a final terrible howl, Wolf suddenly stood up from his prostrate position.

    The formerly ancient and pale appearance of Wolf had suddenly transformed to be an elegant young man full of a soft noble aura with sword-like brows and star-like eyes. The dense aura of rotten corpses that surrounded him hadpletely disappeared, his skin filled with a soft light simr to white jade. Wolf¡¯s originally sinister voice also became soft and tender as he eximed, ¡°The feeling of youth is so wonderful!¡±

    As Han Shuo watched this transformation of Wolf in front of him, his surprise only grew. He looked at the rejuvenated Wolf in disbelief, then at the bone staff in his hands with bright eyes and murmured, ¡°Miraculous, too miraculous!¡±

 Chapter 312: Conditions

    Chapter 312: Conditions

    ¡°Isn¡¯t it unbelievable? Only the bone staff¡¯s divinity can allow us to obtain immortality while enjoying the wonders of youth!¡± Grand magus Wolf, alive for a hundred and seventy years now, said proudly to Han Shuo after taking a deep breath of fresh air.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes sparkled with light as he looked greedily at the bonestaff in his hands. His heart was filled with surprise and joy as he muttered, ¡°No wonder, no wonder I kept on feeling that the bone staff would have other fantastic uses, I never would have thought that it would actually have such a miraculous effect!¡±

    Wolf seemed to be very satisfied with Han Shuo¡¯s surprise. Wolf looked only twenty something years old now and was filled with the elegance of a noble. He started carefully trimming his knife-like nails with a sharp knife that had suddenly appeared in his right hand.

    As Han Shuo was still caught in the depths of his shock, Wolf had already finished trimming his nails and was joyously examining his white hands beneath the moonlight. He eximed, ¡°How many years has it been? Even since I merged with the lich, my long and beautiful hands had disappeared. What reced it were a pair of de-like ws. Mhmm, my wonderful hands have finally appeared once again! I no longer need to hide in endless darkness and use a ck robe to cover a body that can¡¯t be seen!¡±

    After his body had merged with the old lich, not only had it became full of the smell of rotten corpses, it also caused his body to resemble a cross between a human and a monster. Although Wolf had gained eternal life, he no longer dared to openly walk under public gaze. Otherwise, even if the Church of Light doesn¡¯t do anything, some adventurers who didn¡¯t know the truth would attack him after thinking him an undead creature.

    Han Shuo was just as happy as Wolf. He studied the bone staff in his hands with interest, but was unable to find the source of the mysterious power of rejuvenation. He didn¡¯t know how to cast it either. After hesitating for a while, Han Shuo looked at Wolf with a smile, ¡°Perhaps you can tell me the secret of rejuvenation from this staff?¡±

    Wolf smirked with his youthful face, shaking his head at Han Shuo, ¡°If you admit that you belong to our Cmity Church, ande back to the sacred grounds with me. I will help you obtain the true secrets of the divine bone staff.¡±

    Han Shuo snorted derisively, then ced the bone staff back into his space ring and said coldly, ¡°I¡¯m so young, so I don¡¯t need this sort of mysterious power for now. If you have nothing else, then don¡¯t continue to disturb my journey.¡±

    ¡°Then alright, please take care of yourself. I need to immediately return to the sacred grounds and report about what has happened over these few days,¡± Wolf smiled with a nod, then looked at Han Shuo a final time. He made a slight bow that was befitting standard ancient nobility etiquette and expressed his thanks, ¡°Thank you, Bryan. You are an unbelievable person, I think that you must have received the favor of our god. We will have a lots of chance to meet in the future.¡±

    Wolf tarried no longer after saying that. He slowly walked into the darkness with a joyous mood. After a while, when Han Shuo couldn¡¯t even detect a sliver of Wolf¡¯s aura, did he summon the earth elite zombie, and had it spit out the six magic crystal cannons. Han Shuo continued to travel towards Brettel City while using the yin demons to survey his surroundings.

    On midday of the second day, Han Shuo and a group of zombie warriors was walking on a shady and meandering path under the scorching sun. When he passed by a clear river, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but temporarily stop as he gazed at the small river that blocked his way.

    There wasn¡¯t this sort of clean and clear river in the wet and dark other dimensions. Although undead creatures like the zombie warriors were not afraid of the corrosion of running water, this river didn¡¯t seem shallow. It wouldn¡¯t be an easy task for the zombie warriors to cross the river while pushing six magic crystal cannons.

    Magic crystal cannons were built using many valuable magical materials, and there were a few that would react very easily with water. Although Han Shuo did not know the theory behind the magic crystal cannon operations, he did have somemon sense. He couldn¡¯t be sure that whether some bad reactions would happen when these six magic crystal cannons were ced into water.

    The sunlight over his head was a bit bright, and since the shade was blocking some of it, long weird shadows were drawn on the ground. Han Shuo hesitated as he gazed at the river that had appeared in front of him, then finally woke the Helen Tina who¡¯d been sleeping for quite some while.

    It had been nearly two days from the time when Han Shuo had knocked Helen Tina unconscious. In order to avoid the trouble that would arise after Helen Tina woke up, Han Shuo had just ignored her. Her stomach reacted before she was even conscious, after the restrictive magical yuan had been withdrawn from her body.

    Gurgle...

    Helen Tina¡¯s t stomach suddenly let out a hungry moan. At the start, the sound was still very small, but as Helen Tina¡¯s bodily functions gradually recovered, the objection from her stomach became louder and louder.

    It was at that moment that Helen Tina slowly awoke. When she raised her head and saw Han Shuo smiling terribly, Helen Tina instinctively protected her body. She calmed herself a bit and stared at Han Shuo coldly, ¡°What else do you want to do?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m already done everything that can be done, what¡¯s the use of guarding yourself right now? I already tasted the miraculousness of your body when you were unconscious. My my, it really made me mesmerized!¡± Han Shuo smiled lecherously with an evil intent as he thought about Helen Tina¡¯s neverending fierceness earlier, then about the harm the Helon Dukedom had caused for the people of Brettel City.

    As he expected, the moment Han Shuo¡¯s lecherousughter sounded out, Helen Tina reacted like she¡¯d been struck by lightning. Shepletely nked out there with a pitiful look. However, her pitiful and despairing look onlysted for a moment before she focused her hateful gaze onto Han Shuo.

    After being stared at by Helen Tina¡¯s cold eyes full of endless hatred, even someone with as strong of a will as Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but feel a chill down his spine. It was as if a poisonous snake had silently neared the back of his neck, and was nning to give him the fatal strike at any moment.

    After that, Helen Tina remained silent no matter what Han Shuo said. She ignored the objections of her stomach and continued to gaze at Han Shuo using such a cold, vengeful stare that made Han Shuo feel extremely ufortable.

    Han Shuo was finally defeated after a while. He waved his head while feeling his scalp prickle with numbness, ¡°Damn it, I have no interest in a woman like you. I need you to exchange for a ransom of million gold coins, I won¡¯t easily do anything to you. Okay now, I admit that I was just lying to you just now. Look, your six magic crystal cannons are right there. Now, tell me, are the magic crystal cannons afraid of water?¡±

    Helen Tina¡¯s expression of endless hatred softened slightly when Han Shuo finished speaking, but she still red at him with suspicion. She finally let out a sigh and asked, ¡°You really did nothing to me?¡±

    ¡°No shit, you have hands and feet now, I¡¯m not tying you up, don¡¯t you know how to check yourself!¡± Han Shuo swore, then said quietly, ¡°However, with your slutty name out there, you probably aren¡¯t a virgin anymore. You really might not be able to find anything.¡±

    Whap!

    Helen Tina casually grabbed a handful of shattered rocks and threw it on Han Shuo. She red at Han Shuo in anger and roared, ¡°All you shitty men are the same!¡±

    The moment she said that, Helen Tina squeezed her legs with a bit of embarrassment. After checking with an unknown method, she actually disyed a bit of happiness. When she saw Han Shuo turn around remotely, a thought struck her and she quickly took out her magical staff to chant a high ranked fire spell ¡°me Catastrophe¡±.

    Unfortunately for Helen Tina, she didn¡¯t find any mental energy that she could use when she chanted the incantation and waved the magical staff. She immediately looked at Han Shuo in shock, while her inner self was filled with terror. She yelled in frantic panic, ¡°Evil filthy necromancer, what did you do to me?! Why don¡¯t I have a hint of mental strength left?!

    Han Shuo saw all of Helen Tina¡¯s actions behind his back through a yin demon. He turned around as if nothing happened and smiled brilliantly], ¡°Don¡¯t waste your strength. Don¡¯t think about chanting a single spell before I release you. Hehe, but you don¡¯t need to worry. As long as your phoenix sister brings a million gold coins over, I will let you gopletely unharmed, and you will also be able to use your mental strength again.¡±

    Helen Tina was shocked the moment he said that. She was surprised about Han Shuo¡¯s all-epassing ability. Helen Tina was a fire mage who wasn¡¯t weak at all. ording to what she knew, restraining mental strength wasn¡¯t something that normal people could do. Even mages at the level of grand magus would need the aid of some magical scrolls or formations in order to constrain a archmage¡¯s mental strength.

    She found it unbelievable that Han Shuo could have the amazing power to constrain mental strength at such a young age.

    However, after her surprise, Helen Tina very quickly thought of some of the people who had ulterior motives in her Helon Empire. She understood that once those people find out that she was captured alive, they would just take the chance to control the Helon Duchy. They absolutely would not take out a million gold coins to get her back. Even Duke Benedict from the Benson Dukedom, that seemed to be madly pursuing her, would probably only consider sending his army out to the Helon Empire and use this chance to make it his own.

    ¡°Just kill me, no one wille for me. Not a single person!¡± Helen Tina shook her head pitifully and replied while looking at Han Shuo with despair.

 Chapter 313: Returning to the city

    Chapter 313: Returning to the city

    ¡°Humph, don¡¯t try that on me. I won¡¯t let you go unless I receive a million gold coins!¡± Helen Tina was notorious throughout the seven grand duchies for her insidious schemes. Han Shuo¡¯s naturally wouldn¡¯t believe the words randomly spewing from her mouth. He looked coldly at Helen Tina and said, ¡°The magic crystal cannons are made of many rare magic materials. I want to know if they are afraid of water.¡±

    The first thing Helen Tina did upon waking up was look around, her eyes had taking notes of the group of zombie warriors surrounding the six magic crystal cannons at the river¡¯s bank. She was only distracted because Han Shuo had postured he¡¯d tainted her body. It angered her now that Han Shuo mentioned the magic crystal cannons again. She looked at him and shouted in fury, ¡°Don¡¯t expect to get any useful information from my mouth, you damnable bandit!¡±

    ¡°Bandit? Haha, your Helon Duchy is the true bandit. You¡¯ve piged the Brettel City day and night for years. From a big city with hundreds of thousand people, it¡¯s now a deserted city with dozens of thousand people. The people in the city have long since lost their hopes and dreams in life. It¡¯s all thanks to you people. Yet you still have the face to say that I¡¯m the bandit, haha!¡± Han Shuo recalled the miserable sight of people whocked the clothes to cover their bodies and the food to fill their stomachs on his way to the Brettel City. His heart ached with grievances.

    Helen Tinaughed heartily upon hearing his words. She coldly said, ¡°Such is war. When your Lancelot Empire invaded us seven grand duchies in the past, didn¡¯t you also burn and pige us? If we hadn¡¯t allied to resist and drive you back, I¡¯m afraid that all of our people would have be ves already.¡±

    Helen Tina¡¯s words also made sense. Han Shuo pondered for a bit and figured that he shouldn¡¯t sink in further in this matter. Seeing Helen Tina unwilling to say anymore, he said in a cold voice, ¡°It¡¯s not like I can¡¯t do anything just because you don¡¯t say anything, just that I will waste a little more time. To a necromancer, costly manpower is never a problem.¡±

    Han Shuo no longer cared about Helen Tina after speaking. He started to chant the incantation to summon the wood elite zombie.

    Han Shuo issued amand when the wood elite zombie appeared. Thetter uprooted the big trees one by one like he was the lord of this forest. The Demonyer Edge then cut them into sections, with the wood elite zombie tying them together by soft branches. Han Shuo and the wood elite zombie had built six huge rafts after half an hour.

    During this process, Helen Tina watched Han Shuo and the wood elite zombie closely while sneaking bread from her space ring. Perhaps she¡¯d been hungry for too long as she swallowed the bread very quickly.

    Uponpletion, the zombie warriors pushed the rafts towards the river. Helen Tina finally couldn¡¯t help butmented, ¡°No wonder the Church of Light wants to kill you. You can actually summon such miraculous undead creatures!¡±

    Helen Tina didn¡¯t know that the wood elite zombie had in fact been refined from the most ordinary of zombie warrior. As the zombie warrior pushed the six rafts onto the river and ced the six magic crystal cannons on the rafts, Han Shuo breathed a soft sigh of relief. He sent the wood elite zombie and the zombie warriors return to the strange dimension.

    Four zombie warriors paddled one raft. When the zombie warriors mobilized their force, the six loaded rafts began to slowly move to the other side of the banks.

    Han Shuo once again went over behind Helen Tina at this moment and gently tapped the back of her neck. He said softly and lowly, ¡°You should rest.¡±

    Han Shuo easily lifted Helen Tina up after knocking her unconscious. He then slowly flew over onto a raft andmanded the zombie warriors to cross the river.

    Han Shuo avoided some scattered bandit groups along the way, as well as some mercenary bands who¡¯d made a living in the near vicinity. After a trip without any surprise, he finally arrived at Brettel City.

    In the spring night, the temperature was just right. The bright moonlight shone gently upon the earth. This could have been a truly warm, peaceful night if it weren¡¯t for the zombie warriors pushing the magic crystal cannons, exuding the sense of death.

    When they approached the Brettel City¡¯s gates, the soldiers on the city wall were startled by the moonlight reflecting from the magic crystal cannons. Seeing six huge cannons pointing towards the city¡¯s fortress with some stiff moving figures behind, the soldiers immediately paled in horror.

    ¡°Who is it?¡± The soldiers manning the cannons at the city¡¯s gates shouted to the distance before Han Shuo drew near.

    Compared to previously, the various potholes and pockmarks that had dotted Brettel City had all been perfectly patched up, the gates changed to enormous ones of dark steel. Having experienced thest crusade against the bandits, the initially cowardly soldiers now possessed somewhat strong and calm bearings.

    The armor of the soldiers reflected the moon¡¯s radiance in a strange manner on the city walls. The soldiers were stirring to action, hurriedly applying the arrows and raising their bows to aim at the zombie warriors. Warning calls echoed and more soldiers gathered on the fortress, all of them aiming their bows below.

    After hisst experience when he¡¯d entered the city without meeting any defenses, Han Shuo understood that the Brettel City was no longer the same in the face of these soldiers¡¯ vignce. The soldiers couldn¡¯t see Han Shuo¡¯s face clearly because of the long distance, but he could clearly see their figures above the fortress.

    ¡°Open the gates for me, you bastards! You don¡¯t recognize even me!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s voice suddenly rang out and spread throughout the city.

    The city lord, it¡¯s the city lord! The city lord has returned!¡± The soldiers on the fortress couldn¡¯t see Han Shuo clearly but could still recognize his voice. Everyone cheered with pleasant surprise, opening the city¡¯s gates slowly.

    After the gates opened wide, the zombie warriors finally transported the heavy magic crystal cannons into the Brettel City. Even though it was evening, Faulke immediately rushed to meet Han Shuo upon receiving the news.

    ¡°Ahh, this is, this is...¡± Faulke bowed to pay respects to Han Shuo upon arriving. When he swept a nce to see the zombie warriors pushing the six magic crystal cannons, Faulke couldn¡¯t help exim with surprise and excitement.

    ¡°These are magic crystal cannons, also called the powerful Lightning God. The cheapest one costs at least a hundred thousand gold coins for this type of magic crystal cannons. They can release terrifying offensive power through magic crystal ores. These magic crystal cannons are simply great, invincible weapons in the battlefield. Your Lordship, where did you get these from?¡± Faulke was indeed worthy of being a veteran who¡¯d been through the baptism of years in the battlefield. He actually recognized the six magic crystal cannons and even knew of their name, ¡°Lightning God¡±.

    Han Shuo only knew that they were magic crystal cannons. As for what type and what size, he was clueless. Hearing Faulke so knowledgeable about magic crystal cannons, Han Shuo responded delightedly, ¡°Is that so? Then you must know how to use these magic crystal cannons?¡±

    ¡°Of course. This type of magic crystal cannon is extremely easy to use as long as we have enough magic crystal ores. Each shot of this ¡°Lightning God¡± is equivalent to an extremely powerful attack of an archmage if there is enough power. These magic crystal cannons can maintain continuous discharges without running out if given enough power.¡± Faulke said with a confident smile, as he walked towards a magic crystal cannon. It was unclear what he did when the cannon suddenly shook a little and a small box cracked out from its bottom.

    ¡°Mm, the magic crystal ores avable here are enough for five, six shots. Heh heh, a bandit group has been wandering around the vicinity of Brettel City recently. It seems they intended to make a move again. I was worried about how to deal with them. Now with the six magic crystal cannons here, I¡¯ll make them regret their foolish thoughts.¡± Faulke had a cold smile on his face as he looked at the six magic crystal cannons and gritted his teeth. It looked like he intended to use these six magic crystal cannons to carry out a grand deed.

    ¡°Alright then, these six magic crystal cannons are under your care.¡± Han Shuo instantly issued this order before walking straight towards the city lord¡¯s mansion.

    Faulke and the soldiers had noticed the stunning, unconscious Helen Tina under Han Shuo¡¯s arm from the start. Of course, they wouldn¡¯t ask about the city lord¡¯s private affairs. When they saw Han Shuo walked to the direction of the city lord¡¯s mansion, these people¡¯s thieving eyes ran over Helen Tina¡¯s charming body several times over while chuckling wickedly in their hearts.

    Therefore, after Han Shui had returned with Helen Tina back to the Brettel City that night, some rumors and gossip spread throughout the city. The people didn¡¯t know of Helen Tina¡¯s identity, but her beauty had made a deep impression on the soldiers. They were either admiring or jealous of Han Shuo, and so various rumors and evil spections appeared.

    Upon bringing Helen Tina to the city lord¡¯s mansion, Han Shuo impatiently went straight to the secret chamber. He had sensed a distant call just a short while after he¡¯d returned to the Brettel City. This call was weak and fragile as if it was a thousand mountains and seas away. However, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness at the separate demon realm could naturally perceive it.

    It seemed that the fire elite zombie had finally emerged!

 Chapter 314: A strong emergence

    Chapter 314: A strong emergence

    The call from the depths of his soul grew five times more urgent once Han Shuo entered the cemetery of death. It seemed that the fire elite zombie had also felt his presence because of the shortened distance.

    Without dying for a second, Han Shuo utilized the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens to fly straight to the depths of the Dark Forest. Since he was familiar with the way, it didn¡¯t take long to reach the ce of extreme fire.

    Han Shuo¡¯s currently strength had far exceeded the time he¡¯dst been here. He immediately felt the enormous presence of the Lord of the mes once he arrived at the area. The fire elite zombie was currently within its zing kingdom. Han Shuo would face a headache of a problem if he wanted to enter the ce of extreme fire and sneakily lift the magic matrix binding the fire elite zombie.

    The elite zombies of five elements could only be formed through the interconnecting matrices through a secret method, using the matrices to gather the elements of heavens and earth in an entire region. However, when an elite zombie took shape, it could only officially emerge when the matrix shackling it was lifted. Otherwise, the fire elite zombie wouldn¡¯t have had to call out to Han Shuo so urgently.

    The rocks in this mountain valley had been scarred a brown-red after the great battlest time. There were even some bubbling hot springs in the vast, warm mountain valley now.

    Han Shuo stood nkly in the mountain valley, frowning as he thought of a way to enter the ce of extreme fire and lift the matrix binding the fire elite zombie. It was simply impossible to advance safely and soundly with the Lord of the mes in the area.

    Therefore, Han Shuo just remained there frowning and thinking, but couldn¡¯t think of a good way. The call from the fire elite zombie was bing increasingly stronger since he¡¯d felt Han Shuo¡¯s presence. The zombie was anxiously conveying his urgent desire to break free of his restraints.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was on fire with anxiety as well. He finally decided to take a risk and ventured into the ce of extreme fire after some hesitation. Han Shuo slowly dove down into one of the numerous hot springs. The warm water enveloped his body, dispelling all of the exhaustion from his trip. However, the pressure from the Lord of the mes wasn¡¯t something so easily dissolved.

    Han Shuo tapped around with the Demonyer Edge at the bottom of the spring, trying to find a crack to enter the ce of extreme fire. It took some time before Han Shuo finally pried open two huge rocks and found a way in.

    A green-ck veil shrouded his body as soon as he entered the crack. He slowly made his way down the crack into the ce of extreme fire. The deeper he went, the higher the temperature spiked. Firelight danced around him as brilliant as beautiful me flowers.

    Han Shuo had wrapped himself in a protective shield and could clearly observe all of the events around him. The two cliffs on either side were burning red as he passed by them. Some flexible creatures that looked like fire snakes hid themselves in the cracks of the cliff, surrounded by several scorching demons lying dormant. It seemed that they didn¡¯t notice Han Shuo¡¯s existence and let him proceed all the way into the underground.

    A scorching demon general within another crack discovered him when he was almost at his destination. The scorching demon general rose and waved his arm once, sending a me shooting straight at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo raised his hand slightly and sent out a cloud of purple light. The me shot by the scorching demon general had yet to draw close when it disappeared into faint smoke in mid-air. As the cold breath from the light touched the me, the two turned into a bright array of me stars that slowly scattered down onto the ce of extreme fire.

    The inside of the ce of extreme fire was an enormous area of magma. The me stars which had fallen caused the calmly bubblingva to boil, as if it¡¯d felt the presence of the scorching demon general. The air bubbles floated up and became as big as a cup, the already zing temperature getting even hotter.

    A huge skull slowly emerged from the middle of the melting hotva. The more than ten meter long body of the Lord of the mes was next to arrive, spraying the mes in the ce of extreme fire in all directions. He was instantly furious upon sensing the presence of a human.

    ¡°Haowuu!!¡±

    A terrifying howl pierced the sky, the entire ce of extreme fire seemingly trembling in terror. The burning redva rocks on two sides shuddered as they broke loose. Amidst the falling rocks, the enormous head of the Lord of the mes scanned its surroundings.

    The ear-splitting sounds of the crumbling cliffs rang out, apanied by the billowing mes that instantly spread throughout the ce of extreme fire. Within the mes, Han Shuo¡¯s azure shield became a particrly conspicuous existence. His misery couldn¡¯t be described by words in the face of the anger from this super rank magic creature ¨C the Lord of the mes. Han Shuo continuously increased his output of magical yuan to firmly protect the area where he was standing.

    Han Shuo¡¯s power had indeed soared after reaching the separate demon realm. Otherwise, his shield would have long since shattered from the violent attacks of the mes from all sides.

    Han Shuo¡¯s face flushed blood red, his shield crackling and popping. However, he could still resist the surging temperature, albeit with a few drops of sweat slowly dripping from his forehead.

    The Lord of the mes¡¯ body emerged from the middle of the melting hot magma with his terrifying roar, surrounded by raging, churning mes. Some of the mes were more than ten meters in length, like soaring fire dragons. The power of Helen Tina¡¯s ¡°Dance of the Fire Snakes¡± couldn¡¯t evenpare to this awe-inspiring spectacle.

    Seeing that his omnidirectional attack wasn¡¯t working, the Lord of the mes screamed his fury to the sky. Three fire dragons of over ten meters in length drew a twisted path towards Han Shuo. They greedily absorbed the sky high mes along their way, leaving the ce of extreme fire almost barren by the time they¡¯d reached Han Shuo.

    The length of the three fire dragons had remained unchanged, but their width had quintupled. They¡¯d turned into three enormous dragons, their bodies emitting raging, fiery mes destructive enough to burn the entire mountain valley to ashes.

    Han Shuo could keep his cool in the face of the omnidirectional attack from the Lord of the mes. But when the attacks were concentrated on him, the pressure of the mes seemed to increase ten times over. Han Shuo was constantlymunicating with the fire elite zombie deep in the magma while trying to craft a defense with all of his energy.

    The Demonyer Edge had swallowed a great deal of souls. Now that it was filled with a massive reservoir of magical yuan, the weapon instantly releasing a terrifyingly evil air upon being activated. The purple me of the Mystical cial Spellfire had ultimately transformed into Purple Spellfire of Extreme Cold. Purple flowers of spellfire blossomed from the Demonyer Edge. They floated elegantly around Han Shuo and the de, as if the two were delicate flower stamens.

    Extreme Cold Purple me was the culmination of the Mystical cial Spellfire. Catalyzed from an enormous amount of magical yuan, it was so terrifyingly cold that it could freeze everything in the world. When the kes of purple spellfire drifted gracefully out of the de, the surroundings actually started to snow. Each petal of the snow flowers blended with the purple mes, forming arge block of solid purple ice that tightly enveloped Han Shuo and the Demonyer Edge.

    Han Shuo seemed to have turned into a translucent crystal block of ice. The mes in the ce of extreme fire now shone with a brilliant purple-red luster. The beautiful solid block of ice became increasinglyrger as Han Shuo poured more magical yuan into it, until it finally covered a width of more than ten meters. Han Shuo continued to circte magical yuan from within, making even more cold smoke rise from the ice.

    The three massive fire dragons had yet to reach the solid block of ice when thick mist blew up from the high temperatureing in contact with the icy cold. The entire ce of extreme fire was shrouded quickly in mist. The three fire dragons assaulted the square, ten meters wide solid ice block in ordance with the roar from the Lord of the mes.

    Crack... Rumble...

    As the terrifying sounds of battle echoed, radiant purple and red lights constantly shing in the smoke, a testament to the ferocity of the fire dragons¡¯ assault. Large chunks of ice fell into the ce of extreme fire, sending gigantic spouts ofva sshing upwards.The Lord of the mes growled as it imposed its will over the ce of extreme fire, causing more burningva to spew out towards the center of the smoke.

    Han Shuo pushed his magical yuan to the extreme, but was still unable to stop the mes¡¯ encroachment. Under the multiyered assault, the ten meters wide solid ice block melted rapidly, and was reduced to a quarter of its size after just a moment.

    mes covered the sky as fiery magma surged and boiled. Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan wasn¡¯t endless, and he was slowly exhausted.

    Han Shuo urgently contacted the fire elite zombie while starting to chant a long magic incantation. Suddenly, a thickyer of ck clouds appeared on the ice block that was three meters long. Amidst the thick clouds, glossy white bones entangled with each other to form a huge bone cage, enclosing the solid ice block.

    ¡°Pth! Break!¡±

    Han Shuo abruptly shouted out two words that echoed in the ce of extreme fire. The bone cage suddenly transformed from translucent to pitch ck, emitting dark smoke.

    Suddenly, the walls around the matrix Han Shuo had arranged several months ago burst open with a series of cracks. At this moment, the fire element that¡¯d been pouring towards the center of the ce of extreme fire suddenly halted.

    As the walls crumbled into pieces, a gorgeous lotus slowly rose up from the bubbling magma!

 Chapter 315: Imprint

    Chapter 315: Imprint

    The fire lotus rotated as it sprouted, apanied by bright red, scathing bubbles. When the rhizomes emerged from the magma. The petals quickly unfolded, revealing the fire elite zombie at the center.

    The fire elite zombie had a big head and ruddy skin that was the color of blood. Everything below its waist was still wrapped in the flower. The armor on its body seemed to have been formed from deep red flowers, covering its entire body except for its face.

    The exposed body of the fire elite zombie twisted quickly within the flower. The petals on its waist slowly peeled backwards. The pretty, dazzling, red petals of the fire lotus contracted, condensing into an armor on the lower body and legs of the fire elite zombie.

    The enormous amount of fire element force in the surroundings gathered agitatedly towards the fire elite zombie during this process after the crazy explosion around the formation. The fire element force condensed into fire stars that filled the sky and flowed towards the fire elite zombie like a ming Milky Way.

    The zing temperature emitted from the fire elite zombie¡¯s body and slowly formed a lotus pattern in the spot between its eyebrows. The pattern was blurred at first, gradually bing clearer and clearer. Ultimately, it shrank into a small fire lotus that was a hundred times smaller than the one that had nurtured it and engraved itself on the fire elite zombie¡¯s be.

    The huge fire lotus, that enveloped the fire elite zombie, slowly shrank and disappeared. When the lotus imprint on his be appeared, the fire lotus beneath its feet had also vanished without a trace.

    The body of the fire elite zombie was thoroughly red. When its deep red eyes turned to look at Han Shuo¡¯s body, its big head shook slightly. It opened his mouth wide to take in a deep breath.

    The mes were still surging around Han Shuo¡¯s body and frantically eroding his shield. As the fire elite zombie inhaled deeply, beams of red light flew into his mouth, entering his belly through his throat.

    The surging mes vanished, but the ice block wrapped around Han Shuo was still standing strong. When he saw the fire elite zombie emerge, Han Shuo stopped circting his magical yuan and slowly walked towards the crack.

    The Lord of the mes, who¡¯d been constantly howling, immediately stopped his ruckus upon seeing the fire elite zombie appear from within the lotus. It focused all of his attention on thetter.

    When the lotus imprint formed between its eyebrows, the fire elite zombie directed its gaze at the Lord of the mes, as if exchanging some conversation with him. The furious Lord of the mes gradually calmed down.

    As Han Shuo slowly floated up towards the crack, he felt a deep maternal love permeating throughout the extreme ce of fire. The Lord of the mes hadpletely rxed. Its huge palm lifted the fire elite zombie up as they used a mysterious method tomunicate.

    Since the fire elite zombie had emerged, Han Shuo knew that the former would find him through the connection established by his blood essence due to the constraints of the demonic magic. Not to mention that the little skeleton had been the one to bring the fire elite zombie over from the other dimension. Even though the fire elite zombie possessed consciousness and high intelligence after being refined by the demonic method, the soul brand in the depths of his soul hadn¡¯t changed much. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t worried that he wouldn¡¯t be able to recognize his master.

    Han Shuo departed easily as the Lord of the mes had stopped trying to kill him. Shooting back up to the surface, he didn¡¯t encounter any obstacles before finally arriving at the center of the mountain valley.

    When he returned to the mountain valley, Han Shuo immediately ordered the fire elite zombie to collect various strange ores from the extreme ce of fire. Then, he stayed in the mountain valley to wait for the fire elite zombie¡¯s task to bepleted.

    The fire elite zombie and the Lord of the mes had spent several months together in the extreme ce of fire for months. During this time, thetter had considered the fire elite zombie to be his own child. Since both of them had absorbed the fire element force in the surroundings, they naturally had the same presence that made them feel even more intimate towards each other. Therefore, Han Shuo understood that these two, originally different beings, had certainly developed deep feelings towards each other.

    When the fire elite zombie left the fire lotus, it meant that he¡¯d no longer continue to stay in the extreme ce of fire. Since he had to leave, the two different beings would obviously have to part ways, so Han Shuo didn¡¯t disturb them.

    As Han Shuo wasfortably lying around and enjoying a hot spring in the mountain valley, a string of raging mes appeared from an unknown position and instantly drowned Han Shuo in heat. The hot spring boiled and bubbled. Han Shuo immediately jumped out, hot mist emitting from his body.

    ¡°Who dares?!¡± Han Shuo leapt into the air and let out a loud shout. He released purple spellfire from his two hands and extinguished all the mes on his body, then coldly observed his surroundings.

    The two yin demons drifted around the mountain valley after being released, paying attention to every change. Han Shuo also sent out his consciousness to survey the area. He harbored a strong killing intent towards the ambushers.

    Seven or eight red magic bullets shot towards Han Shuo from the fiery red cliffs around the outskirts of the mountain valley. He wasn¡¯t an easy target now that his guard was up. A purple light quickly and cleanly knocked the magic bullets out of the air.

    As soon as the magic bullets were flung back, fireballs, fire walls, and fire snakes continuously appeared from all directions and hurtled towards Han Shuo. The two yin demons couldn¡¯t find any traces of the attackers after searching for a short time period. Only when Han Shuo destroyed two fire snakes did his consciousness felt a faint magic fluctuation. The two yin demons immediately drew close to see a fiery globe high on a rock wall.

    That fiery globe was a magic shield cast by fire mages. A blurry shadow inside was waving a magic staff to fire out attack after attack. The incantations were blocked out since the mage was within the cover of magic, so Han Shuo couldn¡¯t hear any sounds.

    ¡°Humph! No need to hide, fire grand magus Marceau!¡± Han Shuo snorted derisively and quickly drifted over, a series of popping and banging sounds ringing on his way there. He deflected all of the fire magic attacks fired at him.

    The original still fire shield suddenly shot into the sky, the blurry shadow slowly bing clearer amidst the random sparks. It was indeed fire grand magus Marceau of the Brut Merchant Alliance who¡¯d appearedst time at the battle in the mountain valley. Han Shuo and her had been allies. However, they had parted ways on not so pleasant terms after the unhappy predicament in the ce of extreme fire.

    It was unexpected that Marceau was still probing the ce of extreme fire and had run into Han Shuo by coincidence. Marceau had been inwardly suspicious of Han Shuo about the sudden disappearance of the fire lotus. Now that she saw Han Shuo appear here again, she was certain in her heart that he¡¯d tricked herst time.

    Moreover, she had already harbored resentment towards Han Shuo in her heart, but couldn¡¯t make a move as her mental strength had been exhausted. Meeting him here this time, in addition to the temptation of the fire attribute treasure, had given her the courage to take a risk and attack Han Shuo.

    Seeing that she¡¯d been identified and that Han Shuo could calmly deal with her various fire magic attacks, Marceau immediately realized that Han Shuo¡¯s strength had made terrifying progress. Therefore, she needed to leave as quickly as possible.

    ¡°Heh heh. Running so soon? Where do you think you¡¯re going?¡± Han Shuo coldly mocked as he rapidly shot towards Marceau. The Demonyer Edge had appeared in his hand at an unknown time.

    The scenery of the mountain valley quickly fell behind in their speed. Marceau still had the spare power to release fire walls to obstruct Han Shuo as she ran. However, thetter just simply ignored the blockades and rampaged forward. Han Shuo¡¯s body became charred inrge patches as he did so, the burned skin scattering with the wind, and new skin appeared underneath, still as clean and glossy as before.

    Even though his eyebrows had been burned to a crisp, they regrew after just a moment. Han Shuo had gone from looking extremely bedraggled to restoring his carefree and dashing manner during the pursuit.

    Not far behind Han Shuo, a fiery red shadow bolted madly like a raging me. Dried nts immediately erupted into mes in every ce it passed through in the mountain valley. All things that could burn went up in intense mes.

    Fire grand magus Marceau used the levitation skill to flee in a hurry, her heart filled with horror. She hadn¡¯t expected Han Shuo¡¯s strength to be so terrifying that her deliberate ambush couldn¡¯t even injure him. Han Shuo¡¯s flight speed was too fast too, as the distance between them became increasingly smaller. Marceau was greatly anxious upon seeing that Han Shuo would catch up with her very soon.

    ¡°Ah! If it isn¡¯t grand magus Marceau?¡± A surprised cry suddenly rang out from the depths of the forest as Marceau was flying by. A beautifully dressed group of adventurers looked up at Marceau inside the fire globe.

    The escaping Marceau looked down to see the team of adventurers and heaved a sigh of relief. Shended beside them and hastily said to them, ¡°There¡¯s a killer from an enemy empire chasing me. Everyone get ready for a fight.¡±

    Marceau and this team of adventurers must have been acquaintances. They immediately looked furious upon hearing her words, each readying their weapons and arrows. They aimed directly at Han Shuo in the air, only waiting for him to draw nearer to instantly make a move.

 Chapter 316: Teamwork

    Chapter 316: Teamwork

    Aside from fire grand magus Marceau, the group included one thief, one priest, two mages and three swordsmen. The strength of these adventurers weren¡¯t weak. Their average age was around forty and they were all experienced fighters.

    Marceau seemed to be the leader among these adventurers. Therefore, they immediately readied their weapons to attack Han Shuo as soon as her words sounded.

    The two mages below were a lightning adept mage and a water archmage. They were the first to make a move. The opening salvo was several sizzling lightning and thunder balls, their electric sparks bursting out to smash into Han Shuo. The water archmage waved his magic staff around to release some sharp, cold shiny icicles that hurtled fiercely at Han Shuo from below.

    The priest chanted a magic restoration spell, after which a silver halo enveloped Marceau¡¯s body. Her mental strength had previously been overspent, but the effect of the silver halo restored it from depletion. Shimmering light circles sparkled on her old, wrinkled face.

    One of the two senior swordsmen instantly stepped over to protect Marceau. Two huge iron shields were erected at the front. The shifty eyed thief slipped through the thick forest like a racoon, setting up traps and readying them.

    Han Shuo was still advancing straight towards Marceau. He had already taken note of this group¡¯s appearances and various strength thanks to the two yin demons. As he flew, he took out the bone staff, spreading out a thick mass of ck fog around himself. Han Shuo vanished in the midst of the thick smoke.

    The lightning balls and icicles all collided into the thick ck fog. However, as Han Shuo¡¯s body had suddenly disappeared, these attacks could no longer find their target. They turned to crash into each other instead, creating huge explosions.

    When the lightning balls and icicles dissipated into nothingness, the thick ck fog also gradually spread out as well. The team of adventurers led by Marceau had also finished their preparations and were staring at the center of the fog. The three swordsmen had temporarily switched to being three archers as they raised their bows, waiting only for Han Shuo to show himself.

    However, there was no trace of Han Shuo in the clear blue sky when the thick ck fog dissipated. He had vanished without a sound or a shadow. The adventurers who were ready to attack him head-on could only look at the sky in puzzlement.

    Rumble...

    Dirt mounds suddenly emerged from the ground without a warning. The adventurers had been paying attention to the sky were caught off guards by the movements underneath. Grand magus Marceau and the water archmage were the first to fly up.

    The three swordsmen reacted swiftly. They grabbed the iron shields to block the earth from attacking the lightning mage and the priest. The attacks threw the swordsmen up into the air, but most of the impact was lessened by the shields. The swordsmen were meant to be meat shields in battles, so they weren¡¯t injured much.

    The thief had extraordinary sensitivities. Leaping with the tips of his feet like a monkey swinging on the trees, he used prearranged silver silk threads to swing to a towering tree and avoided all of the attacks from the mounds.

    Hended on a big tree before using a dagger to cut off some rope. A tree trunk whittle sharp suddenly flew out straight towards Han Shuo, who was hiding behind a tree.

    Upon seeing the thief¡¯s action, the rest of the adventurers immediately aimed their attacks at that tree. In a blink of an eye, dozens of attacks rained down in all directions. Han Shuo, who¡¯d originally thought that they wouldn¡¯t be able to find him, could only awkwardly jump out from behind the tree.

    As he defended against the various attacks, an ice arrow nailed his thigh, a lightning ball exploded and hit him with its flying sparks. Han Shuo¡¯s whole body became numb, his hair that¡¯d just grown out all stood erectly upright.

    ¡°Kill him, he¡¯s been hit!¡± The thief shouted loudly.

    The priest chanted a long incantation, and three dizzying beams of radiance shone upon the three swordsmen. Now that the spells of ¡°Strengthen Armor, ¡°God¡¯s Blessing,¡± and ¡°Brute Strength¡± had been cast, the light churned in gorgeous fashions in their chest as they ferociously rushed Han Shuo.

    What a horrifyingbination of adventurers! Han Shuo¡¯s heart jumped with fright for a moment before he rapidly retreated into the woods. His speed was very fast as he quickly left the three reinforced swordsmen in the dust and waited for an opportunity to make a move.

    This adventurer team obviously had practical battle experience. Otherwise, it couldn¡¯t have been possible for them to coordinate so tacitly. They had great trust for each other, and when the priest, the mages, the swordsmen and the thief united, they created enormous offensive power. Han Shuo had initially thought he could easily deal with them, but his head now ached with the conundrum of dealing with them.

    The power of the three swordsmen had been increased a level thanks to the priest¡¯s magic, but Han Shuo was confident he could neatly kill them in a few minutes even if he faced all three of them at the same time. However, the mages who were staring at him as if looking at prey certainly wouldn¡¯t let him seed. The priest was hard at work casting magic at the three swordsmen, constantly supplying them with energy. This wasn¡¯t something Han Shuo could hold up against.

    Han Shuo pondered as he remained concealed before finally realizing that this team didn¡¯t have a light mage. He immediately took this opportunity to summon a great deal of dark creatures in secret, while casting the Canopy of Necromancy at the same time. When the wood elite zombie appeared, he hid at a big tree the thief was standing on on, and utilized his control over nts to order the tree to wrap around the thief as per Han Shuo¡¯smand. The soft tree branches turned into deadly weapons, instantly drilling through the thief¡¯s body.

    ¡°Cadi!¡±

    The adventurer team was forming a firm, defensive formation. When the tree branches prated the thief, the priest let out a big, shrill scream in agony. The thirty-odd years old woman seemed to be the wife of the thief. His death dealt her a great blow.

    ¡°There¡¯s a druid here, be careful everyone!¡± Marceau hastily shouted out a reminder.

    The three swordsmen on the ground immediately waved their broadswords to clear away all of the nts around them. As for the priest, she still looked around in caution despite the fury in her heart. Not finding her target, she stepped into Marceau¡¯s shield. She started cursing crazily with grief, releasing spell after spell to probe where the enemy was.

    ¡°So, so many people!¡± Probing with her magic, the priest sensed the sudden presence of many people in all directions. This awoke her from the blindness of her fury, she mumbled as she looked around.

    ¡°How many? How many people?¡± Marceau asked urgently with great anxiety.

    ¡°A lot, too many!¡± The priest answered. She nced at the thief¡¯s body and pleaded to Marceau, ¡°Get his body first, hurry!¡±

    ¡°Take Cadi¡¯s body, leave this ce! Damn it, now that I think about it, he¡¯s also a necromancer!¡± Marceau shouted out loudly. The three swordsmen risked their lives to rush towards the thief¡¯s body.

    It was toote. Apanied by rustling sounds from the thick forest, a great horde of undead creatures slowly appeared. There were amongst them an evil knight on a fire-spitting skeletal warhorse with his two meter long bonence raised high, his ice cold, emotionless eyes nailing the three swordsmen.

    Ten enormous hate warriors with rotting bodies were behind the hate knights, each holding either a big mace or a long spiked pole. Under the deathly aura¡¯s maniption, they slowly flocked towards the adventurer team standing in the middle of the scene.

    The hearts of Marceau¡¯s group became increasingly heavier upon the appearance of the undead creatures. When a swordsman brought back the thief¡¯s body, Marceau immediately ordered, ¡°I¡¯ll open up a path. You guys leave this ce now.¡±

    Six fire snakes flew up, their raging mes bringing about a burning high temperature. This was something extremely horrifying that also upset the undead creatures. The high temperature would burn their cold bodies uncontrobly, with the fiery red mes sweeping away the thick smell of death. Their souls would then fell into an endless abyss.

    Therefore, the undead creatures instinctively retreated when the five fire snakes flew out to hinder the two hate warriors, not wanting to suffer any agony from the mes. The two hate warriors only drew near after Han Shuo gave them orders again. As for the evil knight of a higher rank, he moved firmly towards the mes to attack the adventurers.

    Undead creatures were born afraid of fire. However, the higher their level, the less their fear of mes. The hate warriors could just manage to hold on, while the evil knight wasn¡¯t afraid at all. He charged forward in ordance to Han Shuo¡¯smands.

    A gout of me came crashing in from not too far away. The few low rank creatures such as skeletal and zombie warriors were immediately charred to cinders. Even the hate warriors constantly retreated backward, not daring to be near to those mes.

    The big headed fire elite zombie was within the light of the mes. He¡¯d yet to be able to exercise control over the mes on his body, so he¡¯d actually identally burned his own kind. Still, he heeded Han Shuo¡¯s order like it was an imperial edict and opened his mouth wide to swallow the fire snakes released by Marceau, not letting her take advantage of the mes to flee from the undead creatures.

 Chapter 317: Complete Annihilation

    Chapter 317: Complete Annihtion

    ¡°What-What is it?!¡± Fire grand magus Marceau eximed when she was shocked by the sudden appearance of the fire elite zombie.

    After the big-headed fire elite zombie swallowed the mes, he grinned at Marceau, then opened his mouth and spat them all back out. The fire snakes were now no longer under Marceau¡¯s control, and actually churned back over to attack the adventurers.

    The low level undead creatures in the surroundings all instinctively retreated in the face of the intense heat. Jumping mes in the shape of lotus flower petals seem to burn continuously on the fire elite zombie¡¯s frame. His deep red armor shot out red light everywhere. When skeletal warriors were hit by even a little spark from it, they were immediately destroyed and turned into dust.

    The fire snakes that the fire elite zombie spat out was even more powerful. Not only did it force the adventurers to continuously duck and weave, even the undead creatures needed to retreat. Out of them, the evil knights and hatred knights also sensed a threat, causing them to quickly leave retreat from the incineration of the mes.

    ¡°Idiot, you can¡¯t even tell our people apart from enemies!¡± Han Shuo scolded quietly, then gave another order to the earth elite zombie and wood elite zombie.

    The earth trembled and rumbled beneath three swordsmen, with sharp earthen spikes shooting out again. Therge tree branches danced crazily in the distance, while the branches became life-reaping arrows that shot towards the team of adventurers.

    The fire elite zombie charged towards the three swordsmen like an enormous fire brand, creating waves of intense mes in front of them. The swordsmen¡¯s bodies quickly started burning when even a spark stuck to their bodies.

    The evil knight held arge bone spike in its hand and flung it towards the sky. The priest and mages were busy with dealing with the attacks from the branches and thus were unable to avoid the path of the evil knight¡¯s huge bone spike. Han Shuo also released the Demonyer Edge as arrows filled the sky.

    Pitiful howls suddenly sounded through the sky, then instantly stopped. The lives of all of the adventurers, except Marceau¡¯s, had been ended in a few breaths.

    Marceau red at Han Shuo with hatred as she panted. When she noticed that all of herpanions had died, she took out a magic scroll and started to chant a long spell.

    Intense magical pulses traveled out from the scroll. The space in front of Marceau started to distort until a long and sharp de formed in the sky. The terrifying spatial movement gathered up a dense amount of magical element, causing rays of blinding light to shoot everywhere.

    ¡°Not good, this is the ¡®Spatial Edge!¡¯!¡± A thought shed across Han Shuo¡¯s mind, causing him to suddenly remember the terrifying and forbidden spatial spell ¡°Spatial Edge¡±. He was astounded, and immediately chanted out spells in order to send the undead creatures back to the other dimension as he tried to escape the area of effect of the spell.

    ¡°Spatial Edge¡± was a forbidden spell within the area of space. Legend said that it could cut through anything, no matter how durable. Han Shuo never would have thought that Marceau would own a valuable scroll of such a forbidden spell. The moment he felt a long giant de twist out of space, he immediately retreated at all costs.

    A sh of white light around twenty meters long chopped down from the sky. All hard boulders that it passed through, including the ck armor of the evil knights that wereparable to metal ores, were cut neatly into two like a piece of tofu. Even towering trees over ten meters tall were snapped after the white light zed past. A bottomless abyss also opened up in the ground.

    Almost a hundred undead creatures were sliced and diced by the light, andpletely shattered whenever the light passed over them.

    Marceau still held the magic scroll in her hands and was continuing to chant the long incantation. She once again released three rays of white light that were more than ten meters long using the extremely valuable forbidden scroll. More undead creatures were destroyed wherever the white light passed through.

    Out of them, one of the shes of white light instantly sliced towards Han Shuo when it locked onto him from the air. This spatial edge was as fast as lightning, and was on top of Han Shuo in an instant. Marceau was determined to eliminate Han Shuo, so she focused all her attention onto that spatial edge. Due to this, this spatial edge was not only fast, but also urate, as if it wasn¡¯t going to give Han Shuo a chance to escape.

    Using the speed of the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heaven, Han Shuo retreated towards the dense forest behind. During so, he continuously changed directions in an attempt to avoid the spatial edge. However, this spatial edge was actually following him like a shadow beneath Marceau¡¯smands, and chased Han Shuo no matter how he moved. It seemed like she wouldn¡¯t stop if she didn¡¯t slice Han Shuo apart.

    Han Shuo swore silently in his heart, then headed into a swamp. He flew back out as a muddy man with a waver of his body, venturing even further into the depths.

    Pfft!

    The spatial edge sliced downwards, slicing the muddy Han Shuo in half, then entered deeper into the ground without any decrease in power. It once again create an enormous, bottomless trench.

    ¡°Mhmm, he finally died!¡± Marceau let out a sigh as she panted heavily, then looked at the magic scroll that had expended all of its magic. She murmured with heartbreak, ¡°Ai, he truly is someone hard to deal with, making me waste such a valuable magic scroll!¡±

    Just as Marceau moved her attention to the magic scroll in her hands, a figure covered in mud in the deep trench of sludge and water, moved.

    A cold light suddenly shed past and pierced through Marceau¡¯s body. The huge pain caused Marceau to be a bit confused, but she then saw a figure within the mud move in front of her, revealing Han Shuo as the mud was shook off.

    ¡°I wasted another yin demon. This spatial edge is so powerful. It even ripped apart the invisible and formless yin demon!¡± Han Shuo also said heartbrokenly, then flew towards Marceau. He looted her and the adventurers of all equipment and rings, cing them in his own space ring.

    When he arrived in front of Marceau, Han Shuo put away her staff and took away her space ring without hesitation. The fact that Marceau had a forbidden magic scroll meant that she must have been a filthy rich person. A fire grand magus could easily gain prestige and wealth, alongside a noble rank in any country. Marceau was naturally not an exception in the Brut Merchant Alliance.

    The entire ground was filled with shattered bones and flesh. Arge majority of the undead creatures that Han Shuo summoned had been sliced apart by the spatial edges. On the other hand, the fire, earth, and wood elite zombie had been the first sent to the other dimension, protecting them all timing from the spatial edge¡¯s attacks.

    The undead creatures knew no fear. Those that were still alive still stood there, awaiting Han Shuo¡¯s next order. Han Shuo gazed at the scene beneath him as he held Marceau¡¯s space ting. He then took out his skeletal staff to send the undead creatures back to the other dimension.

    After doing all that, Han Shuo raised his head and gazed around. He discovered that thanks to the forbidden spell spatial edge, there were enormous trenches in a radius of one thousand and five hundred meters. Towering trees and boulders had all been hacked to pieces. It really was aplete mess.

    It was unknown whether it was due to theck of Marceau¡¯s mental power or theck of stored magic within the magic scroll, that spatial edge spell had only released thirty percent of its true power. If theplete power had been released, there would have been at least more than twenty shes of light, and the number might even increase ording to the caster¡¯s mental power strength.

    If it was casted by a powerful sacred space magus, pretty much all of the living creatures and nts in a small city would be torn to shreds by the spell, as it had a terrifyingly wide area of effect.

    As Han Shuo held the space ring that Marceau left behind after her death, he wondered about the method of opening it as he flew casually towards the Cemetery of Death.

    During this process, Han Shuo used his remaining yin demon to find that a team of roughly five thousand was stationed outside the Dark Forest. Han Shuo surveyed this team of five thousand and realized out that they were actually a proper troop of knights that hade from the Brut Merchant Alliance. Some of the tents were blocked by magical boundaries as they faintly radiated a powerful aura.

    Han Shuo frowned slightly. After surveying them for a while, he thought of Marceau and those adventurers that died in his hand, and suddenly felt that they were with these people.

    Marceau was someone of the Brut Merchant Alliance. The three swordsman within the adventures had the same sword and shield pattern on their left shoulder as these knights who were resting. It meant that they must havee from this troop.

    The Brut Merchant Alliance was a distance from the Dark Forest. After passing through the Dark Forest, they would arrive directly at Zajoski City on the southwest of the Lancelot Empire. The knights had good equipment, fine warhorses, and some even more powerful experts. It was an unknown why they appeared in the Dark Forest.

    After looking around for a bit, Han Shuo was silently shocked by this troop. He noticed that their power was even a bit stronger than how they¡¯d first appeared. The magical pulses from the central tent were intense, with some strange sounds ringing out faintly from it. After Han Shuo released his consciousness, he kept on feeling that there was something amiss inside. After thinking about it, he decided to have a look at what these people nned to do.

 Chapter 318: Saving the beauty

    Chapter 318: Saving the beauty

    Cough...

    A shrill, miserable scream rang out from the tent. This extremely tragic scream, which wasn¡¯tpletely suppressed by the boundary on the tent, came to an abrupt end. Han Shuo caught a faint reverberation with his great sensitivities.

    The only remaining yin demon slowly drifted over to that direction in a probe. However, Han Shuo had already felt magic fluctuation ripple out in all directions before the yin demon even came close. With his extraordinary knowledge, he immediately knew that this was a soul inspection magic. Han Shui hurriedly withdrew the yin demon.

    After the soul inspection magic was released, a dazzling rift suddenly cracked open in the sky. It patrolled the surrounding area like a bright eye.

    Han Shuo immediately held his breath and entered the realm in which nothing affected him, his body hidden in the lush foliage of a big tree.

    The fluctuation of the soul inspection magic drifted out gently like water ripples. When it passed through Han Shuo, he felt a bit of surprise. However, he easily avoided the inspection with a tight lock down on his consciousness.

    ¡°There¡¯s someone there!¡± A soft cry suddenly rang out from the tent.

    A figure shot out from the tent like a streak of lightning. A team of knights followed closely behind that silhouette, quickly chasing towards the east.

    Rustling sounds travelled quickly in from that area, Han Shuo clearly heard that a person was swiftly running away from where the knights stationed. It seemed that there were also others who were paying attention to this troop of the Brut Merchant Alliance. However, they must¡¯ve not concealed themselves very well since their tracks were discovered.

    Han Shuo remained where he was without moving. His eyes swept again through the tents in the distance, stopping at the few in the center of the group. The withdrawn yin demon was once again released. It flew towards the direction of where the sound had travelled.

    What had the knights of the Brut Merchant Alliancee to the Dark Forest for? Han Shuo was full of doubts, his bright eyes looking at the tent in the center as he silently pondered.

    Rumble...

    A huge explosion echoed from the direction in which that figure had rushed toward. Afterwards, a strange cooingughter resounded sinisterly, ¡°Heh heh, I didn¡¯t expect two beautiful women. Don¡¯t think of getting away.¡±

    ¡°Cecilia, you go first. I¡¯ll stop him!¡± A familiar female voice rang out from the distance.

    Han Shuo had been calmly watching the tent, and suddenly paled upon hearing this voice. His heart had been as still as clear water, yet was instantly disrupted. He shot out like a sharp arrow, flying across the sky, drawing a silver arc through the air.

    It was Emily¡¯s voice. It it had been someone who Han Shuo didn¡¯t know, he naturally wouldn¡¯t have poked his nose in their business. However, since it was Emily in that area, he definitely wouldn¡¯t let anything happen to her.

    ¡°Want to run? Keke, you can¡¯t escape!¡± The nasty cooing of an owl rang out again, apanied by the sounds of spells and weapons colliding.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was on fire with anxiety as he utilized the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens to its extreme. He reached that area in the span of three breaths, much faster than the yin demon.

    Broken, uprooted trees filled the area. Emily and Cecilia wore pure green magic robes, their delicate faces painted with green nt sap. Their entire bodies seemed to blend into one with the Dark Forest as they leaned on a big tree trunk and ceaselessly casted magic spells.

    Several members of the Dark Mantle with their strength, agility, and endurance enhanced by Cecilia¡¯s magic were fiercely throwing themselves in front of the attacks from the Brut knights.

    There was a thin middle-aged man with short, red hair and a cruel smile hanging on his face. He stood behind the knights with his hands behind his back, watching Emily and Cecilia struggle while cackling nonstop.

    ¡°Who is it?!¡± The thin, middle-aged man suddenly discovered Han Shuo dashing over. Surprise shing through his eyes, he raised his left hand to form aplicated magic formation. An enormous force then surged out from his palm and quickly assaulted Han Shuo.

    Bang!

    It was as if being hit by an iron mountain. Han Shuo immediately felt dizzy. He red furiously at the middle-aged man, unable to move forward.

    ¡°Eh!¡± The middle-aged man eximed, his eyes switched from Emily and Cecilia to Han Shuo. The lines in the center of his palm twisted up like a snake, faintly revealing a trace of blood.

    Whistle...

    Han Shuo finally mobilized the Demonyer Edge, its murderous intent billowing to the skies and filling the area. The middle-aged man suddenly roared to the heavens. His originally one meter seventy-five centimeters body began to grow with unimaginable changes.

    The man¡¯s smooth glossy skin was instantly covered in a thick, hairy coat. His slender, long arms became very strong and sturdy. His body expanded to ten meters before transforming into a huge ck bear. The bear growled and mmed down his paw, ferociously smashing down Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo had intended to fly up but suddenly staggered. He¡¯d discovered that the gravity in the surrounding had increased tenfold. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t react in time in his surprise, and the feeling was extremely unsettling.

    ¡°Bryan!¡± Emily had been about to cast a dark magic when she finally discovered Han Shuo¡¯s appearance. She didn¡¯t had the time to feel happy when the palm of the ck bear pped down like a small mountain. Emily screamed in panic.

    As his movement had been affected, Han Shuo¡¯s mind churned rapidly in the face of this crisis. Seeing the huge paw m down, he immediately infused magical yuan into the Demonyer Edge. Blood red light exploded and shot to the skies from the weapon that had absorbed an enormous amount of killing intent from resentful souls. Clouds of blood drifted out continuously, transforming into thin, blood-red threads that wrapped around the Demonyer Edge.

    A ring red light abruptly beamed out from the tip of the Demonyer Edge. The endless, vicious, resentful intent shot straight at the bear¡¯s paw.

    The bear¡¯s gray pupils wavered slightly, the thick fur on his arm standing erect like needles. This paw emitted light waves that ripped forth like the surface of a water disturbed by a thrown rock.

    Rumble rumble...

    Loud rumbling sounds echoed from the collision of the Demonyer Edge and the ck bear¡¯s palm. Blood red light radiated in all directions, apanied by the agonized cry of the ck bear.

    A force that could topple the mountains and overturn the seas surged violently into Han Shuo¡¯s arm. The force was purely brute power without any skill, even Han Shuo¡¯s rock solid body couldn¡¯t withstand it. The vessels of his right hand holding the Demonyer Edge burst open.

    ¡°The hell! What kind of person is this!¡± Han Shuo could help but curse. After his strength had spiked up a great margin after entering the separate demon realm, he¡¯d thought that there wouldn¡¯t be many people that could exceed him in strength. He had unexpectedly been injured by Kossest time, and now he was even wounded after one strike.

    ¡°Who are you!?¡± After one blow, the big ck bear shrank back into the thin, middle-aged man. However, his palm was now dripping with blood. He looked at Han Shuo, terrified disbelief on his face.

    Not paying attention to his opponent, Han Shuo rushed over to Emily as soon as the terrifying gravity was lifted, shouting, ¡°Hurry and get away from here! There are more expertsing.¡±

    Cecilia, one of the three Dark Mantle heavyweights, had observed the fight from beginning to end. A strange look filled her eyes as she looked at Han Shuo. Upon hearing his shout, she suddenly turned to the front and softly yelled, ¡°Retreat!¡±

    As her words fell, Cecilia took out a magic scroll. Her long, slender arm held the scroll and shook it fiercely, a space door appeared amidst a dazzling white light in front of her. The Dark Mantle members struggling with the knights seemed to know beforehand that Cecilia would do that, as they immediately disengaged from their opponents and entered the space door.

    Not waiting for Han Shuo to react, Emily grabbed his hand and dragged him through the space door without any reservations. Cecilia then also leapt into it.

    It was as if they had taken a transportation matrix. A white light shed as everyone appeared in the middle of a river. Heads poked up from the water¡¯s surface, the entire group resembling drowned rats, gulping in fresh air in big mouthfuls.

    ¡°Bryan, shouldn¡¯t you be at Brettel City? How are you here?¡± Emily had let go of Han Shuo¡¯s hand and asked after sticking her head out of the river¡¯s surface.

    ¡°Eh, it¡¯s very easy for me toe here. You know.¡± Han Shuo winked several times at Emily, his voice quiet.

    Emily was stumped for a bit before recalling the Cemetery of Death within the Dark Forest. With the transportation matrix there, Han Shuo could easily run back and forth no matter where he was.

    ¡°Damn it! Why did we end up here? Hurry up, they are chasing us!¡± Cecilia¡¯s voice rang out in the distance. Her body was dripping wet as she shouted suddenly.

    Emily sent a signal to Han Shuo with a nce upon Cecilia¡¯s shout. The two immediately followed the Dark Mantle members in leaving the river, moving along a path leading to the Dark Forest.

 Chapter 319: The art of shapeshifting

    Chapter 319: The art of shapeshifting

    ¡°Who was that just now?¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t forget to ask Emily about the identity of the middle-aged man as they hastily fled.

    Emily arrowed out of the small river, her dripping wet body enveloped in a deep ck mist. She revealed only her wless face as she quickly caught up to the group behind Cecilia. Cecilia was walking quickly in the front, Emily and Han Shuo were side by side in the back, and low rank Dark Mantle members brought up the rear.

    Emily turned to nce at Han Shuo and exined, ¡°That was Kassel, a great druid who betrayed the Druidic Order and a terrifying powerhouse in his own right. Even though he¡¯s betrayed the Druidic Order and can no longer utilize the force of nature, he can still skillfully use the shapeshifting art of the great druids. That transformation back then was him turning into an earth bear that can utilize the art of gravity. Taking him head on like that, your strength is bing more and more impressive.¡±

    Upon hearing that his counterpart was a great druid, Han Shuo suddenly remembered great druid Caspian. He subconsciouslypared them and felt that Caspian was much weaker in strength.

    ¡°Caspian is also a great druid. Why isn¡¯t he as powerful as Kassel?¡± Han Shuo frowned and inquired, inwardly doubtful.

    Emily casually arranged her messy hair. She nced at Cecilia in the front before continuing to exin, ¡°The great druids can train in the various magical arts of the Druidic Order. The majority of them master the method to manipte nts. ording to the legends, this is the ability that the Goddess of Nature has bestowed upon them.¡±

    ¡°However, the art of shapeshifting isn¡¯t as easily mastered. Only a few great druids with extraordinary talent can sessfully grasp it. It looks like Caspian hasn¡¯t fully mastered it yet. Otherwise, he couldn¡¯t have been so easily capturedst time in Valen City.¡±

    Han Shuo had to muse on Emily¡¯s words for a moment before he could understand them. He thought it to be quite an irony that Caspian, who¡¯d always served the Goddess of Nature, couldn¡¯t learn the art of shapeshifting, while the traitor of the Druidic Order could learn it.

    ¡°Right, what mission brought you guys to the Dark Forest this time?¡± Han Shuo leisurely followed Emily along the way into the lush forest. He continued to ask her about their purpose.

    Cecilia was leading the way at the front. She suddenly tossed her long, beautiful hair and sent pearls of crystal clear water rolling down. She turned her head to direct her bright eyes at Emily and let out a faint snort, ¡°We still could have left safely even without your help. This mission is under my charge, and even big sis Emily has to listen to me. Your name isn¡¯t listed in this mission, so you don¡¯t need to know.¡±

    Emily had been about to answer, and couldn¡¯t help but feel apologetic towards Han Shuo for Cecilia¡¯s words. She said to him with a wry smile, ¡°Since Mistress Cecilia has spoken, I¡¯d better not say anything.¡±

    ¡°Big sis Emily!¡± Cecilia stared at Emily with rebuke in her eyes, saying softly, ¡°We have to be clear about work and personal matters.¡±

    ¡°I know, I know!¡± Emily cried out before smiling at Han Shuo , ¡°Alright, you shouldn¡¯t ask too much. We¡¯re fine. If you have matters to handle, go quickly. No need to worry about us.¡±

    Cecilia had obviously created the space door through the magic scroll. However, since she possessed the scroll, it meant that even without Han Shuo¡¯s appearance, Cecilia could still have brought Emily and the group to safety with the scroll. Therefore, it didn¡¯t quite count as Han Shuo having saved Cecilia.

    Even though Han Shuo was still worried about Emily, it was obvious that Cecilia didn¡¯t want him to be involved, so he didn¡¯t say anymore after hearing her words.

    Han Shuo was nning to say a few words to Emily when he suddenly realized that he¡¯d arrived at the forest trolls¡¯ territory while following Cecilia¡¯s group. At first sight, a dozen blue-green troll warriors hurled their axes straight at Cecilia without a word.

    ¡°Hateful forest trolls, why are their weapons getting more and more sophisticatedtely?!¡± An arc drew across Cecilia¡¯s chest and triggered a magic formation, spilling liquid into the air before coalescing into a magnificent, blue ice crystal shield.

    The axes thrown by the troll warriors created nking sounds upon hitting the ice shield. They only left some faint marks on the surface and simply couldn¡¯t prate the defense of the ice shield.

    ¡°This is the territory of the forest trolls. Let¡¯s first hide in here. Once the Redbud Knights enter this area, these greedy, idiotic forest trolls will definitely risk their lives to attack them. Even though the Redbud Knights are one of the top ten knights of the continent, their power will be greatly restricted in this forest. The forest trolls¡¯ tribe isn¡¯t small either, so they will definitely cause some trouble for those knights. Even if the Redbud Knights do destroy all of the trolls, it can be considered eliminating a harmful element of the Dark Forest.¡±

    Cecilia coldly narrated as she watched the forest trolls run away after throwing their weapons. She then turned to the masked Dark Mantle members and ordered, ¡°Destroy the forest troll scouts in front. Once they¡¯re provoked, they¡¯ll definitely attack with all they have when the Redbud Knights arrive. Not only can we take this opportunity to escape, we might evene out on top.¡±

    Several Dark Mantle members had already rushed out as soon as Cecilia¡¯s words sounded. These folks had at least the strength of senior swordsmen. A few mere forest troll scouts absolutely had no way to resist them.

    At this moment, Han Shuo suddenly blocked their way with a darkened face andmanded in a low tone, ¡°Find another way. You guys cannot touch these forest trolls.¡±

    The forest troll race could be considered a force in Han Shuo¡¯s hand. They treated the little skeleton as their god Datara. This force waspletely under Han Shuo¡¯s control and heeded his orders without hesitation. He¡¯d be using them a great deal from now on, so he certainly couldn¡¯t let Cecilia borrow the Redbud Knights¡¯ power to exterminate the tribe.

    Any of the top ten knights in the continent would be veterans who¡¯d been through numerous battles. Since the Redbud Knights were on this list, they would only need a hundred of their fellows to ughter over five hundred forest trolls.

    Han Shuo had precisely heard of their reputation, which was why he was absolutely against Cecilia doing so. Otherwise, the only thing awaited the forest trolls would be genocide. This was somethingpletely uneptable to Han Shuo.

    ¡°They¡¯re only some greedy forest trolls. Why are you protecting them? You¡¯re crazy aren¡¯t you!?¡± Cecilia wrinkled her delicate brows, looking unhappy as she coldly rebukedHan Shuo.

    ¡°Hurry up and take a detour. I can feel the Redbud Knights close behind. These forest trolls are of use to me, and no one can touch them. Otherwise, don¡¯t me me for offending you as your subordinate!¡± Han Shuo said frostily, looking at Cecilia in a manner that brooked no room for discussion.

    ¡°You are obstructing our mission. As a member of the Dark Mantle, do you realize that I have the right to punish you?!¡± Cecilia was also angered by Han Shuo. She red at him, her voice rising in anger.

    ¡°Detour! Otherwise, don¡¯t me me for not being polite!¡± Han Shuo wasn¡¯t scared at all, instead stressing his words.

    ¡°Little sis Cecilia, how about taking a detour? Consider giving me some face!¡± Seeing the two locked in an argument, Emily hastily tugged on Cecilia¡¯s clothes and asked in a pleading tone.

    Cecilia had just witnessed Han Shuo fight fearlessly against the transformed big earth bear, so she knew full well that his power was absolutely unfathomable. The knights chasing after them could arrive any moment now. It was pointless to be locked in an impasse with Han Shuo now.

    Cecilia was caught between a rock and a hard ce. Upon hearing Emily¡¯s pleas, she swept a cold nce nce at Han Shuo, ¡°I will demand an exnation from that old fox Candide about this. We go, let¡¯s take a detour!¡±

    After her words finished, Cecilia turned around and led the way. Emily threw a nce at Han Shuo before hurriedly chasing after the angry Cecilia. The Dark Mantle members participating in Cecilia¡¯s mission also red at Han Shuo in an ill manner as they left one by one.

    ¡°Datara, Datara!¡± After Cecilia¡¯s group had left, the forest trolls suddenly surrounded Han Shuo when they saw him.

    Han Shuo was taken aback until he heard the sounds of footsteps fast approaching. He hurriedly led the forest trolls away from this ce.

    The traitor of the Druidic Order, great druid Kassel, burst onto the scene with roughly sixty Redbud Knights shortly after Han Shuo had left. Even though he¡¯d betrayed the Druidic Order, his experience in forests yet remained.

    Looking at the two paths of footprints in front while sniffing the scents in the air, Kassel pointed at the direction where Cecilia¡¯s group had left, ¡°Chase after them for me, they have indeed run in this direction. Humph! No one can evade the pursuit of me, Kassel, in the forest.¡±

 Chapter 320: Treasure trove

    Chapter 320: Treasure trove

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t stop to chat with the forest trolls after dragging them far away, nor did he enter the forest troll vige to meet the old priest who could understand themon tongue. He backtracked on his original path and snuck into the camp of the Redbud Knights.

    With the space door scroll, Cecilia¡¯s group should have no trouble escaping, even though their power couldn¡¯t measure up to Kassel¡¯s group. However, Han Shuo felt that something wasn¡¯t quite right for the Redbud Knights of the Brut Merchant Alliance to appear in the Dark Forest. Since Emily couldn¡¯t tell him the truth because of Cecilia, Han Shuo decided to check things out for himself.

    Using his only remaining yin demon to scout ahead, Han Shuo sent out his consciousness at the same to sense any presence within a certain range. Noon¡¯s sunlight pierced throughyers of foliage, stubbornly shining down on the ground of the Dark Forest. At a nce, these rays of sunlight looked like a bunch of sharp arrows.

    Han Shuo¡¯s sensitivities were razor sharp, moving between the trees as swiftly as a veteran hunter. His figure dashed swiftly through and over several growths and rocks without making a sound. Relying on his pervertedly strong sensitivity and the yin demon¡¯s vision, Han Shuo arrived at the staging area of the Redbud Knights after a few minutes.

    The knights were scattered in the area as they restedzily. They squinted beneath the sunlight, chatting about stuff that shouldn¡¯t be heard by children. From time to time, pervertedughs rang out from within the clusters of knights. Sitting apart from them, there were also several knights who were persevering in training their fighting aura alone.

    The magic enchantment on the tent in the center had yet to be lifted. One to two miserable screams faintly echoed out, seemingly the sounds of criminals being tortured.

    Han Shuo hid patiently within the foliage of a big old tree to observe the Redbud Knights. He spread his powerful consciousness to enclose a small area, preventing anyone from getting close. A yin demon soundlessly drifted around to spy and constantly eavesdropped on the knights¡¯ conversations.

    The majority of the knights talked about boring, trivial matters. However, there were some stern faced knights who were in the middle of a serious meeting. The yin demon cautiously eavesdropped on their meeting. Picking up on their brief descriptionsHan Shuo gradually gleaned the purpose of their trip to the Dark Forest this time.

    A faint wave of magical fluctuation emitted from the tents among the knights, followed by three soul searching magic spells. Han Shuo had been on guard, so he hurriedly withdrew the yin demon back into his body before using magical cultivation to hide his presence.

    When the fluctuation of the three soul searching spells passed through, a huge eye appeared above Han Shuo¡¯s head. It was the Sky¡¯s Eye again. The eye in the sky looked down below for a moment before gradually dispersing.

    Wuuu...

    The battle signal sound of a buffalo horn trumpet suddenly resounded. A shout echoed from the tent in the middle, ¡°Assemble. Prepare to march!¡±

    Thezily resting soldiers instantly sprang up, organizing their armor and weapons at the horn¡¯s call. They walked energetically towards the fierce warhorses grazing and drinking at the river¡¯s bank. A surge of domineering air suddenly spread out.

    They were indeed worthy of belonging to one of the top ten knight troops in the continent. It didn¡¯t show when they rested, but when they organized themselves, they naturally emitted this fierce atmosphere. Han Shuo was secretly surprised as he watched the Redbud Knights gather from his hiding ce within the lush foliage. He began to worry for the races in the underground world of the Dark Forest.

    The Redbud Knights had traveled the lengthy distance of a thousand miles to the Dark Forest this time to deal with the underground world beneath the Dark Forest. The underground world produced various types of exotic ores, as well as crystals and beautiful jade used to refine magic weapons and protective gear. However, the path connecting the underground world and the world above was extremely secretive. People above ground were generally hard pressed to find it.

    As a great druid of the Druidic Order in the Dark Forest, Kassel had naturally known of the entrance to the underground world beneath the Dark Forest. One time when he¡¯d ventured into the underground world to explore, he¡¯d stumbled upon the sight of the lizardmen mining a small magic crystal mine. Since magic crystal ores were extremely valuable, Kassel had been taken over by greed and vited the order¡¯s doctrine, wanting to monopolize the magic crystal mine. However, an unknown, powerful super rank creature had appeared to expel him when he was killing the lizardmen in the underground world.

    Furiously returning to the Druidic Order, Kassel had tried to use the Order¡¯s power to destroy the lizardmen along with that powerful super rank creature. It was a pity that the elder druid, who worshipped the Goddess of Nature, had rejected Kassel¡¯s proposal out of his love for peace. He¡¯d even angrily reprimanded Kassel. Kassel, blinded by greed, injured the elder druid out of rage, which put him on the wanted list by the Druidic Order. He had to flee the Dark Forest, and now, for reasons unknown, he¡¯d somehow partnered up with the Brut Merchant Alliance.

    The wealth of the underground world as well as the small magic crystal mine had sessfully tempted Celt, themander of the Redbud Knights of the Brut Merchant Alliance. He¡¯d led the elite of the Redbud Knights to cross a long distance, spending a month to travel into the Dark Forest with the intention ofing back with an enormous haul from the underground world.

    Celt¡¯s hair was graying at the temples, his weathered face engraved with the traces of time. His figure was tall, and his eyes exuded a calm, peaceful atmosphere. If Han Shuo hadn¡¯t known about the purpose of his trip here, he wouldn¡¯t have thought of Celt as a greedy bandit from his appearance.

    After emerging from the tent, Celt took out a clean white handkerchief and carefully wiped off the blood on his hands. When he was cleaning himself, he looked at the assembled Redbud Knights and casually asked the young mage beside him, ¡°Howe Teacher Marceau hasn¡¯t returned yet?¡±

    ¡°My apologies, I don¡¯t know why teacher hasn¡¯te back even when it¡¯s already sote.¡± The young mage answered hurriedly and was obviously quite polite when facing Celt.

    Promptly throwing away the bloodstained handkerchief, Celt looked at his two clean slender hands with satisfaction. He said in a calm voice, ¡°Forget it. Teacher Marceau knows what we need to do this time anyway. She can fly, so she can catch up with us once she finishes her matter. Let us leave first.¡±

    Celt then suddenly let out a loud, clear whistle, so shrill that it seemed to tear through the sky. A huge shadow flew over shortly afterwards. As it drew near, Han Shuo saw that it was a green dragon over twenty meters long.

    This green dragon was much bigger than Gilbert. The strength of every dragon race wasn¡¯t necessarily measured based on volume. However, for the green dragon race, it was indeed that the bigger the volume, the higher their power. This twenty meter green dragon must be a super rank magic creature at its second evolution. Otherwise, it couldn¡¯t have achieved such a length.

    Celt leapt up seven or eight meters into the air andnded nimbly on the green dragon. His one meter eighty centimeters tall figure only upied a small space on the green dragon¡¯s back, but the faint presence that emanated from his body couldn¡¯t be covered up by the dragon¡¯s huge body.

    Celt sat firmly on the back of the green dragon and let out another long, high whistle. The green dragon flew rapidly through the sky like a huge dark cloud blotting arge patch of the air. Their direction seemed to be where Kassel was chasing Cecilia¡¯s group.

    The Redbud Knights on the ground below packed up their tents and slowly headed towards another direction under the leadership of several majors. Their chosen direction seemed to be towards the entrance to the underground world that Han Shuo had once entered.

    With such a powerful lineup, no one dared provoke them even in the extremely chaotic Dark Forest. The magic creatures in this region were all intelligent, they certainly wouldn¡¯te to seek their own death. Therefore, the Redbud Knights advanced leisurely and unhurriedly to their target destinations without encountering any obstructions.

    Some tragic screams echoed from the tent after they left. Marceau¡¯s students had suddenly cast fire magic. Waiting until these peoplepletely left, Han Shuo flew over to examine the burned bodies. They seemed to be all lizardmen. It seemed the knights were looking from some information from these lizardmen.

    Celt had likely gone off in pursuit of Kassel. With Celt¡¯s strength, Han Shuo would be very worried if he joined the group chasing after Emily. Cecilia would be hard pressed to escape even with the space door. After some hesitation, Han Shuo decided to follow Celt and see what would happen.

    At this moment however, a huge, dazzling golden figure shot in Celt¡¯s direction like a strip of golden lightning. Han Shuo even heard a familiar voice from its furious roaring.

    ¡°It¡¯s the golden dragon who was trapped in the forbiddenndst time. Oh! He seems to be attacking Celt. This is getting more and more interesting!¡± Eximing in surprise, Han Shuo snooped through the yin demon to observe the situation on that side. He decided to get closer and took flight, keeping himself hidden.

    ¡°Damnable bandit, you dared take advantage and rob my treasure while I wasn¡¯t present. Quickly hand it back over!¡± The golden dragon roared at Celt on the green dragon, its huge body thrashing in the sky. Lightning sparks crackled towards the green dragon.

 Chapter 321: Dragonlance and Dragon Net

    Chapter 321: Dragonce and Dragon Net

    The golden dragon, that lived deep within the Dark Forest, was a super rank magical creature that had evolved three times. Han Shuo had clearly understood his strength from the previous time. The golden dragons were hailed the race with the strongest physical bodies out of the dragons. The aura of a rank three golden dragon was steady, and as it moved its enormous body, rays of lightning struck the green dragon and Celt.

    Themander of the Redbud Knights, Celt, showed a hint of surprise on the back of the green dragon when he saw the golden dragon rush over fiercely.

    As bolts of lightning struck, the green dragon beneath him raised its head and breathed out, redirecting the scorching lightning to one side, not actually taking any sort of actual damage.

    The golden dragons were hailed the dragon race with the strongest physical bodies. Perhaps it was due to the strength of their physical bodies that resulted in magic not being an area that they specialized in. Even the thunder attacks shot out by this thrice evolved golden dragon was merely equivalent to the attack of a thunder adept mage.

    It wasn¡¯t hard for the green dragon, also a super rank magical creature, to defend against this level of attack. A mere exhale was able to stop the bouncing thunder attack. The green dragon had arge physique and was a twice evolved super rank magical creature. In contrast to the golden dragon, the green dragon specialized more in magic. Although it didn¡¯t have a dragon body that was as hard as iron like the golden dragon, its magic was able to supplement some of its physical disadvantages.

    Celt slowly took out a thin, silver dragonnce from the back of the green dragon. He smiled and pointed at the golden dragon from afar, ¡°Honored golden dragon, I have already taken your treasures. If you want to take them back, then you¡¯ll have to see if you have the ability to.¡±

    ¡°Pitiful human, you have offended me! I will make you regret having those greedy thoughts!¡± The golden dragon was closing in on them and roared loudly, directly pressing down its huge body on Celt.

    The golden dragon clearly recognized that with the existence of the green dragon, he couldn¡¯t think about killing Celt with only magic attacks. Thus, he decided to use the golden dragons¡¯ powerful body to teach them a painful lesson.

    ¡°Hehe, foolish golden dragon, you are just asking to suffer!¡± Celt raised his dragonce with augh as silver fighting aura condensed at the tip of the gun. Then, Celt charged towards the golden dragon using the momentum of the green dragon.

    Halfway through, Celt suddenly put down the dragonce and flung something towards the sky. All of a sudden, a ck dragon of sharp des suddenly came down over the golden dragon.

    The golden dragon who¡¯d charged over had his attentionpletely focused on the dragonce in Celt¡¯s hands. He didn¡¯t think that Celt would suddenly throw out a dragon. Due to theck of appropriate defense, he was unable to avoid it and was immediately firmly entangled. Sharp little des hung all over the ck dragon and quick tightened the moment the golden dragon was caught. The more the golden dragon moved, the tighter the ck dragon became. Meanwhile, little des stabbed merrily into the muscles of the golden dragon in between the golden dragon¡¯s scales with ringing sounds.

    Suddenly, a powerful magic pulse passed through the ck dragon and rays of silver light exploded from the ck strings. This proved to be of marvelous effect against the dragon shapeshifting in order to escape. The moment the golden dragon was hit by the magic pulses, he immediately felt that his entire body grow numb, causing him to be unable to use his natural talents.

    ¡°I already told you not to make things hard on yourself. This dragon was refined for me by three alchemists. Don¡¯t think about escaping from it, even if you are a golden dragon!¡± Celt slowly approached the golden dragon with a peaceful smile. He aimed the dragonce in his hand at therge eye of the golden dragon within the ck.

    Although the golden dragon had a powerful physical body, their eyes were as fragile as any others¡¯. The golden dragon roared tragically, ¡°Despicable human, fight me fair and square if you have guts to!¡±

    ¡°Hehe, us humans rely on our brain,¡± Celt said with a smile. He sized up the golden dragon with interest and teased in a manner as if he was talking to himself. ¡°Hmm, the entire body of a rank three golden dragon is a treasure. How should I deal with you? Should I kill you and take your dragon tendons, bones, eyes, and core? Or should I make you one of my magical pets? Hehe. I already have a green dragon, this is really troubling!¡±

    ¡°Despicable human, if you cannot defeat me justly, then even if you kill me, the proud golden dragon will not bow in defeat!¡± Even at this moment, the golden dragon still spoke loudly without any fear of death.

    Celt had been smiling but his expression immediately turned cold upon hearing this. He waved the dragonce in his hand in front of the dragon¡¯s eye, an eye asrge as a fist, and said, ¡°I don¡¯t have too much patience, and don¡¯t want trouble. I¡¯ll give you a final chance, form a ve contract with me immediately. Otherwise, die.¡±

    ¡°I will not form a contract with a human as despicable and sinister as you. Just give up!¡± The golden dragon struggled fiercely in the giant ck, causing the small des hanging off the threads to cut deeply into his flesh through the gaps between his scales, resulting in a small drizzle of blood.

    Han Shuo had already seen that the golden dragon was very powerfulst time in the territory of the Lord of the mes. However, the ck dragon was something created by three alchemists specifically to use against dragons. Something that had been brought out by themander of one of the tenrgest knight troops on the continent was naturally not going to be something ordinary. Even through the golden dragon struggled with his life on the line, it wasn¡¯t enough to improve his situation and merely worsened the wounds on his body.

    ¡°Alright, then die!¡± Celt yelled softly, then thrusted the dragonce into the gap between the golden dragon¡¯s scales.

    Since the golden dragon continuously moved its body, the ck dragon tightened around him even more, worsening his injuries. Even so, Celt was unable to easily pierce his eyes. That¡¯s why, he chose to attack the dragon¡¯s body instead, and stabbed into the golden dragon¡¯s body over and over again.

    No matter how strong the golden dragon¡¯s physical body was, it was unable to endue attacks like this without the ability to fight back. A mist of blood seeped out from his body as howls of pain rang out.

    ¡°Despicable and cowardly human, you will definitely pay the price!¡± The golden dragon continued to curse even as he howled in pain.

    ¡°I can¡¯t see how you¡¯re going to make me pay the price. Pitiful lizard, your long life has finally reached its end today!¡± Celt chuckled softly without stopping the dragonce in his hand. After pulling it out of the dragon¡¯s body with spray of blood, he stabbed down once more. As he watched the bloodied golden dragon, his eyes were filled with an excitement that he found difficult to hide. He subconsciously licked his lips, as if he was enjoying this sort of moment very much.

    Suddenly, a light pierced through the sky and slipped into the ck dragon agilely like a fish. The huge dragon was slowly ripped to shreds with whooshing sounds by the movement of the light.

    ¡°Who is it, actually daring to stick your nose in my business!¡± Celt frowned. The excitement disappeared from his body like the receding tide as he snorted coldly while ncing around with sparkling eyes.

    ¡°ROAR...¡±

    Under the help of the ck ray of light, the ck dragon was ripped apart, no longer able to entrap the golden dragon. With a ghastly roar that was furious to the extreme, the golden dragon lumbered towards the green dragon, while bits of ripped dragonting hung off of him. The golden dragon used his sharp ws and fangs to rip and bite at the green dragon as well as Celt, without any fear of death.

    Due to needing use the dragonce to pierce the golden dragon, Celt was actually very close to the golden dragon. The freed golden dragon immediately entangled with the green dragon. His immensely wounded body actually invoked the golden dragon¡¯s savageness. The golden dragon howled destely during its maniacal attacks.

    Celt was the enemy that the golden dragon nursed a bone deep hatred against. Unfortunately, Celt was also extremely agile. He kept on changing positions on the green dragon¡¯srge body so the golden dragon¡¯s swipes with his ws were unable to find their mark at all. He merely caused the green dragon to continuously scream out with pain.

    Han Shuo had been hiding on the top of an ancient tree. He gazed at the intense battle of dragons above with a cold gaze. Surging dragon auras caused unending, rumbling explosions to sound in the surrounding ancient trees and hill. A ray of ck light circled around the golden dragon before swiftly entering Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    The yin demon slowly drifted out again and focused on another ambusher ¨C the giant silver ape that had appeared at the territory of the Ruler of the mes.

    The giant silver ape had appeared when the golden dragon had been trapped by the dragon. The four meter tall giant silver ape was iparable in size to the enormous dragons in the sky. As itid in the bushes, it hid its presence most excellently. At this moment, the giant silver ape was drooling with the liquid of greed as it fixed its blood red eyes on the battle in the skies, as if it was preparing to join in at any moment.

    Super rank magical creatures were able to consume each other¡¯s bodies in order to digest the other¡¯s magical core to strengthen the devourer directly or even evolve. Super rank magical creatures of the same level normally wouldn¡¯t fight to the death, but if they had the chance to kill each other, these savage magical creatures definitely would not hesitate.

    To the giant silver ape, the two dragons in an intense battle in the sky represented a potential chance for it to quickly evolve, particrly since both of the dragons that were fighting to the death were a bit crazed. He knew that sooner orter, one of them would be unable to stand the assault from the other anymore and fall from the sky. That was when his chance would arrive.

 Chapter 322: The green dragonâ€™s crystal core

    Chapter 322: The green dragon¡¯s crystal core

    ¡°ROAR...¡±

    The green dragon madly twisted its body, a long mournful cry resounding from its mouth. The golden dragon had desperately wrapped his body around the green dragon. Well known for their bodily strength, thetter was obviously not an opponent for a golden dragon. Not to mention that the golden dragon had already evolved three times. He wasn¡¯t afraid of death at all as his ferocity burst out upon being wounded.

    The golden dragon and green dragon were locked in close quarterbat. The former took advantage of his steely body, hook-like ws, and enormous maw full of stark white teeth to leave grievous wounds on the green dragon that reached the bone. The scales on the green dragon¡¯s body were effective against human arrows, but could not withstand the force of the madly wing and tearing of the golden dragon that was a rank above it.

    Due to the distance between the two super rank creatures, the green dragon was unable to find an opening to retreat and utilize its powerful magic attacks. Because the two dragons were tearing each other so intensely, Celt couldn¡¯t even stand firmly on the green dragon¡¯s back, let alone release any attacks.

    ¡°Despicable human! I¡¯ve warned you already. You will pay the price!¡± The golden dragon let out a roar of insanity. With a swing of his shining golden tail, the miserable green dragon was thrown back.

    The green dragon was already woozy and flew straight downwards onto a distant hill. The huge body looked like a green ribbon, rapidly falling amidst its howling.

    The giant silver ape remained in his hiding ce, its blood red pupils stared fixedly at the descending green dragon. Waiting until the green dragon had almost hit the ground, the fur on its body suddenly stood erect as it made a beeline towards the hill like a bolt of silver lightning.

    Rumble...

    The green dragon¡¯s massive body smashed into the hill, ttening the ten meter tall hill and making a rumbling sound that shook the ground.

    The golden dragon was dripping with blood and created a rain of red liquid. He stretched out a bit in the skies, bringing his iron hook-like ws down upon the caterwauling green dragon below.

    The injured green dragon spat out several green puffs of dragon¡¯s breath with a strange sour stench. The golden dragon hadn¡¯tpletely dived down and suddenly staggered like a drunkard, changing directions uponing into contact with the dragon¡¯s breath. He nownded on a small hill ten meters away from the green dragon.

    A silver bolt of lightning abruptly shot out from the shrubbery. The giant silver ape used his sharp, knife-like ws to assault the green dragon in the golden dragon¡¯s steed. His two ws proved to be incredibly sharp as nearly half of his arms prated the green dragon¡¯s body.

    ¡°Aowuuu... Aowuuu...¡±

    This strike was obviously very painful for the green dragon to deal with. Its huge body thrashed violently, destroying all the trees in the surrounding radius of dozens meters. The giant silver ape also rolled together with the green dragon, since his two ws were still within thetter¡¯s body.

    However, the toughness of the giant silver ape¡¯s body was astonishing. He immediately pulled out his ws when he reacted. His entire body transforming into a silver bolt, he aimed right at the green dragon¡¯s eyes, trying to blind it before slowly torturing it to death.

    Whoosh!

    A silver dragonce suddenly stabbed forwards, nailing the giant silver ape in the chest with an audible sound. The madly charging ape was hindered by the dragonce¡¯s blow. He let out a shrill, raging howl, and swung his ws fiercely, slicing thence into two pieces. Only the tip of the spear was still stuck in his chest.

    ¡°Damnable beast! Even you want to seek undue advantages!¡± Celt casually threw away the broken pieces of thence and slowly pulled out a strange looking sword.

    A cold presence suddenly started spreading along the de as soon as the sword was drawn. Ripples of starlight orbited the sword before spreading outwards. Celt pointed the sword point at the silver ape. His silver fighting aura instantly fused with the starlight, shooting straight towards the giant silver ape with raging momentum.

    Han Shuo was still hiding surreptitiously nearby. Upon seeing Celt raise the sword, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness immediately sensed an infinite, starry presence that shook his very being. He instantly knew that the sword was absolutely extraordinary. Otherwise, it wouldn¡¯t have possessed such an enormous, exotic hidden atmosphere.

    The naturally ferocious giant silver ape also felt the same boundless presence, especially when the starlight merged with the silver fighting aura. A mysterious, horrifyingly dangerous feeling of the unknown descended, along with a small gxy that had been created from the fusion of the two forces.

    However, the giant silver ape was so close to getting the magical core of the green dragon, as thetter was slowly dying after being heavily injured. The green dragon only needed a single strike to finish it off. Upon seeing the silver fighting aura twinkling with countless starlights drawing near, the giant silver ape blinked his blood red eyes, as if hesitating whether or not he should take the risk.

    Suddenly, the giant silver ape¡¯s savage eyes shone brightly. The giant silver ape moved as quick as lightning, attempting to dodge the starry silver fighting aura, while killing Celt and excavating the green dragon¡¯s magic beast core in one swift move.

    ¡°It won¡¯t be that easy to escape!¡± Celt sneered. He twisted the sword in his hand slightly, suddenly changing the direction of the starry fighting aura in mid-air. It continued to shoot at the giant silver ape¡¯s back at an extremely fast pace.

    A tragic roar emitted from the giant silver ape¡¯s mouth. The starry fighting aura bore more than a dozen bloody holes into his back, each hole overflowing with blood.

    ¡°Greedy beast, how does the divine weapon ¡®Starry Sky¡¯ taste? You want some more?¡± Celt stood upright on the back of the green dragon as heughed heartily at the giant silver ape.

    Divine weapon ¡°Starry Sky¡±! Han Shuo was shocked. He¡¯d initially intended to take this opportunity to make his move, but once again had to restrain himself. Han Shuo looked at the ¡°Starry Sky¡± in the sky rider¡¯s grasp. He understood that Celt being able to injure that tyrannical giant silver ape was all thanks to the strength of the divine weapon.

    The giant silver ape¡¯s bloodshot eyes stared fixedly at the divine artifact in Celt¡¯s hand. He could feel waves of vast cosmic power pulsing from the weapon.

    Fear gradually crept into the giant silver ape. He let out two low growls and slowly retreated. His speed had been extremely fast just now, yet the divine weapon ¡°Starry Sky¡± had still been able to hit him. The giant silver ape possessed extremely high intelligence. He didn¡¯t dare to run with his injured back facing Celt, even if his heart was now filled with the desire to avoid thetter.

    ¡°Despicable human, I shall tear you to pieces!¡±

    At this moment, the golden dragon approached with a roar. He¡¯d transformed into a middle-aged man with a twisted expression as he rushed towards Celt.

    Evidently, the golden dragon knew that having toorge of a body would hold no advantage over Celt and would instead make him an easier target for thetter. Therefore, he switched over to his human form to continue his attacks. As his roar rang out, a golden light shot towards Celt. The giant silver ape, who¡¯d been about to dodge, quickly darted towards the green dragon like a sh of lightning upon seeing the golden dragon furiously engage in battle with Celt.

    However, he¡¯d yet to reach the green dragon when thetter suddenly let out a tragic scream. The giant silver apended in front of the green dragon, only to find that a big hole had been drilled out of thetter¡¯s head.

    A person shrouded in a ck magic shield had harvested the green dragon¡¯s core, eyes, and horn.

    ¡°Heh heh, my bad. Everything from the green dragon will belong to me. I advise you to best mind your own business.¡± Han Shuoughed heartily as he collected the trophies while wielding the Demonyer Edge wreathed in a dense blood light.

    The giant silver ape was about to disregard everything and draw closer, when he suddenly felt the endless murderous intent emitting from the Demonyer Edge. There seemed to be tens of thousands of innocent souls crying and screaming from it, instantly ready to drown anyone who dared toe close.

    Since the divine artifact ¡°Starry Sky¡± had left a dozen bloody holes in the giant silver ape¡¯s back, thetter had developed an instinctive fear for strange weapons. Not to mention that the surge of murderous intent that exuded from the Demonyer Edge wasn¡¯t as natural and peaceful like the ¡°Starry Sky¡±, but an infinite, brutal atmosphere of death and killing.

    To the giant silver ape, the threat from this kind of atmosphere was even greater than that of ¡°Starry Sky¡±.

    Therefore, the giant silver ape could only watched dumbly as Han Shuo harvested all of the treasures one by one, not daring to take a step forward in his hesitation.

    ¡°Uraka!¡±

    Celt was still entangled with the golden dragon when he heard the shrill, ghastly screams full of grievances. It seemed that he had very deep feelings for the green dragon. Thetter¡¯s tragic death was a huge blow to him.

    Distraction was an enormous taboo in a fight. Celt¡¯s distraction gave the golden dragon an opening as thetter ttened Celt¡¯s sturdy armor. Celt retreated hurriedly as he had been injured, two streaks of blood flowing from the corners of his mouth. He coldly looked at Han Shuo, who stood above the green dragon¡¯s head, and let out a low shout, ¡°Whoever you are, I will make your life worse than death!¡±

    As his words sounded out, Celt screamed out with all of his resentment and grief before turning to escape. He knew that he couldn¡¯t hold any advantage against three enemies from all sides, even with the ¡°Starry Sky¡± in his hand. Particrly for Han Shuo, whose appearance was hidden, Celt couldn¡¯t predict this new enemy¡¯s strength at all. Therefore, he had to flee despite the unwillingness that filled his heart.

    ¡°If the weeds aren¡¯t pulled out from their roots, they¡¯ll grow back at spring¡¯s breeze. Since it¡¯s like that, don¡¯t me me for being ruthless!¡± Having finished excavating all of the treasures from the green dragon¡¯s body, Han Shuo spontaneously mumbled before turning to the salivating giant silver ape, ¡°The rest is for you!¡±

    A beam of ck light abruptly shot up into the sky. The beam chased Celt together with the golden dragon, intending to take advantage of Celt¡¯s injuries to finish him off, as to not leave behind endless trouble.

    After Han Shuo left, the giant silver ape let out a low growl and instantly jumped on the green dragon¡¯s corpse. He started eating the dragon¡¯s meat and brain. Even though these things weren¡¯t as nutritious as the core, they would still increase the giant silver ape¡¯s strength by a little bit.

    Celt fled in Kassel¡¯s direction. He would never have expected that so many experts were lurking deep within the Dark Forest. He and the green dragon should have been unimpeded. In the end, the green dragon was miserably dead, whilst Celt was heavily wounded.

    To him, the loftymander of the Redbud Knights, this was simply an uneptable fact. He¡¯d dominated the Continent for many years and had rarely experienced the taste of failure. He was truly angered right now. Etching the figure enveloped in that ck halo into his mind as he escaped, Celt was already nning about how to use the power of the Redbud Knights to catch the person who killed Uraka and slice him into a million pieces.

    ¡°Despicable human, let¡¯s fight to the death!¡± The golden dragon¡¯s loud roar carried along the path. He was determined to kill Celt, but it was a pity that his body was no longer able to bear the injuries that he had taken. Not only were his roars bing much weaker, but his speed gradually slowed and his mind grew dizzy due to the profound loss of blood.

    If he hadn¡¯t been the strongest member of the golden dragon tribe, he would¡¯ve copsed long ago. For him to be able to hold on until now made him truly worthy of the title of strongest amongst the dragon race.

    ¡°Since you wish to die reptile, then I shall fulfill your wish!¡± Celt had run a distance. Upon seeing that the golden dragon was bing increasingly weaker but still chased him, Celt couldn¡¯t help but screech to a stop due to his extremely bad mood.

    ¡°Starry Sky¡± burst out again with its orbiting brilliant constetions. The starry light spots created a beautiful luster amidst the silver fighting aura. The vast celestial presence once again spread out slowly to epass the iing golden dragon.

    Last time, the golden dragon had assaulted Celt so suddenly that he simply hadn¡¯t given thetter any time to use his divine weapon. The golden dragon had taken advantage of Celt¡¯s distraction to strike him. Now that the divine artifact had disyed its full power, the golden dragon suddenly became somber upon seeing the gxy spread out.

    However, it was toote to dodge. The golden dragon was flying forward at a speed so fast that it was difficult to stop. He could only utilize all of his power to barely change direction, attempting to clear the area that was shrouded in the starry fighting aura.

    A sharp, shrill whistle suddenly rang out at this moment. A streak of ck light zigzagged like a snake to suddenly appear a dozen meters away in front of Celt.

    Celt had been looking coldly at the heavily injured golden dragon when he suddenly saw the sharp tip of the ck light rapidly closing in on him. Frightened out of his wits, Celt hastily withdrew the starry fighting aura. The fighting aura that¡¯d been shooting at the golden dragon once again made a miraculous 180 degree turn to shoot straight at the ck light instead.

 Chapter 323: Leaving behind an ear

    Chapter 323: Leaving behind an ear

    Crackle... pop...

    The starry nebe, which dotted the fighting aura, transformed into a dark ray, fusing with the Demonyer Edge. The formerly ck and matte Demonyer Edge suddenly exploded with a pir of bloody light, the fearsome killing intent condensing into clouds of bloody mist, with thin, red lightning crackling within.

    The divine weapon in Celt¡¯s hand, ¡°Starry Sky¡±, suddenly flew out from his hand, abruptlynding in the glow of clustered nebe within the blood cloud. With little spots of cold light ring from its body, it continuously shed with the bloodthirsty Demonyer Edge.

    The two battling weapons gave off an aura of violence. Within the multicolored light, increasingly loud explosions echoed, causing nearby nts and animals to be knocked over by the sounds before the undtions spreading towards other areas.

    Han Shuo remained hidden in the dark, feeling all of his magical yuan surging towards the wild Demonyer Edge. The greatly worried Han Shuo immediately sat down cross-legged, circting his magical yuan as he tried to provide more power for the Demonyer Edge to utilize.

    Celt moaned painfully, his veins popping out of his forehead. The fighting aura in his body ravaged his wounds as it continually circted, causing Celt to spit out another mouthful of blood.

    The golden dragon had originally thought that it would be impossible to escape. He was unable to react for a moment when he saw the starry fighting aura engage inbat with a blood-red weapon. The dragon sat, staring distractedly at the light strewn skies, slowly starting to feel that the blood-red weapon looked a bit familiar.

    ¡°It¡¯s that man, that lunatic!¡± After staring for a while, the golden dragon finally remembered and cried out in surprise.

    ¡°Rumble...¡±

    The sky rumbled as if there were thunder, with the sound of arge explosion ripping past.Rays of light crisscrossed through the magnificent sky, and the divine weapon ¡°Starry Sky¡± turned tail and retreated back towards Celt.

    Celt was actually kneeling on the ground at this very moment. It looked like he¡¯d expended too much fighting aura in too short an amount of time. He was quivering like a leaf seeming to be suffering from an epileptic fit. The blood flowing from the corners of his mouth became white foam; he looked like he could copse at any moment.

    ¡°I will kill you!¡± The golden dragon finally found his opportunity. Not thinking carefully about why Han Shuo had appeared, he madly charged towards Celt.

    Celt could barely stand. He had been weakened to a critical point. Seeing the blood-covered golden dragon charging towards him, Celt used his trembling hands to throw out a magical scroll. The lifesaving scroll transformed into a mass of silver light, wrapping around Celt, and releasing strong magical pulses.

    ¡°Crap. It¡¯s another priceless spatial magic scroll!¡± Han Shuo cursed under his breath, his attention calmly focused as he manipted the Demonyer Edge that was flying straight towards Celt¡¯s neck.

    Consumed by the sh of dazzling light, Celt let out a mournful screech. Large undtions rippled through the area, as if it had been ripped in half. By the time it calmed down, Celt¡¯s body had vanished without a trace, only leaving left ear on the ground.

    When the golden dragon arrived, the only thing he found was Celt¡¯s left ear. He didn¡¯t find anything else apart from this. Even Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge had been recalled into his body after that single strike.

    ¡°Kill me! I just hope that after you kill me, you¡¯ll also kill off that despicable human!¡± Standing at the ce where Celt once stood, the golden dragon reached out and picked up Celt¡¯s ear, shouting at his surroundings while stuffing it into his mouth.

    In the Dark Forest, strength determined everything. In the cruel Dark Forest, the strongest gained everything, while the weakest didn¡¯t even have the right to live. Such were the rules tacitly agreed upon between the super-ranked magical beasts and the humans.

    The golden dragon had reached its weakest point now. Without a space magic scroll to save its life, and having already witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s unfeeling ferocity, it correctly predicted that Han Shuo would treat him as another animal of prey and kill him. This was why he had said these words.

    ¡°Celt¡¯s loss of an ear won¡¯t affect his strength at all. This time, he only exhausted his fighting aura and sustained a few injuries. When I was fighting with him, not only did he recognize my weapon, but he also managed to perceive my presence. I¡¯ve already detected that Celt¡¯s has met up with the Redbud Knights. We now have amon enemy, so I think killing you wouldn¡¯t be the wisest idea.¡±

    Han Shuo slowly walked out of the shade and spoke calmly to the golden dragon. Seeing that the golden dragon had be quiet, Han Shuo continued to speak: ¡°Besides, I feel like you¡¯re a dragon whom I should befriend. I highly admire your bravery and dedication. As such. I feel that making a friend like you is far more valuable than your magical beast core.¡±

    ¡°Thank you. You have won the respect and friendship of me, the golden dragon Sidrick!¡± As per the etiquette of the dragon race, golden dragon Sidrick expressed the highest level of respect towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°Sidrick, I feel that your best course of action right now is to properly tend to your wounds. That despicable knight called Celt will definitely not let us off after regrouping with the Redbud Knights. However, the Dark Forest is veryrge, so it shouldn¡¯t be a problem for the two of us to disappear. On the contrary, their group isrge and easy to discover. When your wounds have healed, we can work together to deal with them.¡±

    This golden dragon trembled every time he tried to speak. Han Shuo could see that he would copse at a moment¡¯s notice. Since that was the case, Han Shuo had offered this thought to Sidrick after mulling the situation over.

    ¡°I shall return to my race. After I recover a bit, I¡¯ll bring my fellow dragon warriors and kill every one of those despicable ambushers who dared to offend me.¡± The golden dragon vowed solemnly. He then respectfully spoke to Han Shuo once more, ¡°There is a Dragon Valley located in the deepest parts of the Dark Forest. In the future, be it you or your sons and descendants, if you ever need me, Sidrick, you can alwayse to the Dragon Valley to find me.¡±

    ¡°I apologize, I really can¡¯t endure it any longer. I¡¯ll be taking my leave now.¡±

    As if he were afraid of Han Shuo reneging on his promise, Sidrick managed to force out a friendly smile after saying these words. He transformed back into his draconic form, flying towards the deepest recesses of the Dark Forest. It seemed like his injuries really weren¡¯t light; he probably wouldn¡¯t be able to recover any time soon.

    Mature dragons of the dragon race would usually leave the Dragon Valley and upy a mountain or a river, gradually building their wealth over the long course of their evolution. Some dragons prefered to live alone, while others preferred to live in groups. Han Shuo had learned a little about the Dragon Valley from some of the Dark Mantle¡¯s intelligence reports, but had never gone there to explore himself.

    The golden dragon Sidrick had actuallye from the Dragon Valley! It seems like his influence wasn¡¯t something to sneeze at. The reason why Han Shuo had let Sidrick go was because he wanted to use the dragon¡¯s power against Celt, though he would never have thought that he hade from the Dragon Valley. Han Shuo thought that since Sidrick had been able to leave alive, if Celt didn¡¯t quickly leave the Dark Forest and a group of dragons from the Dragon Valley found him, then one of the continent¡¯s ten great troop of knights, the Redbud Knights, would vanish forever.

    With themander of the Redbud Knights lying injured, along with the disappearance of fire grand magus Marceau, this time¡¯s n of looting of the underground world would likely be seriously dyed.

    After following the trail of and discovering the Redbud Knights, Han Shuo discovered that the Redbud Knights had been prevented from making good time. Everyone was frantically converging on the central tent, tending to Celt¡¯s injuries. The central tent was surrounded by rows of knights, with a few powerful mages setting up magic boundaries in the vicinity. Han Shuo hid in the shadows, observing them, realizing that it was impossible to assassinate Celt at this time.

    Even the ground beneath Celt had be as hard as steel due to the effects of the boundaries. When the earth elite zombie returned after failing to prate the enchantment, Han Shuo immediately gave up on this idea. Seeing the Redbud Knights set up camp, seemingly wanting to bring Celt¡¯s injuries under control first, Han Shuo understood that their nned raid on the underworld would be suspended until further notice.

    After observing for a bit longer, Han Shuo spotted the traitor druid Kassel returning without any aplishments, both his hands were empty and his face held an expression full of ire. It was obvious that he had failed to catch Cecilia and Emily. Only after seeing this did Han Shuo truly rx. He didn¡¯t stick around, flying straight towards the Cemetery of Death.

    Han Shuo spent a night resting at the Cemetery of Death, then used the transportation matrix the next day to return to the city lord¡¯s residence in Brettel City.

    Walking out from the secret chamber in the city lord¡¯s residence, Han Shuo was deeply moved by the profoundness of magic. Yesterday, he¡¯d been thousands of kilometers away in the Dark Forest, struggling for his life. He¡¯d appeared here after using the transportation matrix, skipping a long journey and arriving with a thought. Even the technologically unparalleled Earth couldn¡¯t aplish this, but this magic and martial skill wielding Profound Continent could.

    After leaving Brettel City for a couple of days, Han Shuo suddenly remembered his prisoner, Helen Tina. He happened to recall that Helen Tina hadn¡¯t eaten anything for two days. The secret prison in the city lord¡¯s residence had never really been used to lock people up. After Han Shuo tied up Helen Tina and threw her in there, he hadn¡¯t even told anyone about her. As such, he believed that nobody had brought her any food.

    Han Shuo rushed towards the prison to take a look when he remembered. He found Helen Tina, with a paleplexion and sallow cheeks, belly deting and rumbling continuously, as if there was a bird constantly calling. Sure enough, Helen Tina had been starved pretty badly over these two days. Had Han Shuo returned anyter, it was likely that this enchanting beauty would have starved to death.

 Chapter 324: Blackmail

    Chapter 324: ckmail

    ¡°De...demon, just kill me! No need to humiliate me like this!¡± The weakly starving beauty spoke in a weak voice upon seeing Han Shuo approach. She wanted to put on a fierce front, but didn¡¯t have the slightest bit of energy to do so, even just talking alone had exhausted all of her strength.

    ¡°Eh... I¡¯m very sorry. These past two days I had to go out for something, but forgot to instruct my people to bring you food.¡± This time Han Shuo was genuinely embarrassed this time. He exined with all sincerity as he looked at Helen Tina.

    Helen Tina had been barely able to mouth a few words. When she heard Han Shuo exin, she pointed her finger at him, her pale lips trembling as if wanting to say something. However, whether she was too hungry or angry, she actually fainted without another word.

    ¡°Aii, mages are truly fragile, unable to hold up after two days of hunger.¡± Seeing Helen Tina fall unconscious, Han Shuo spoke with a sigh and involuntarily shook his head.

    He¡¯d forgotten thatst time along the way he¡¯d brought Helen Tina back, he¡¯d only let her eat one meal during those two days. She¡¯d been locked up in Brettel City for two more days, meaning it¡¯d been four days in total since Han Shuo had captured her. For Helen Tina, who¡¯d eaten only one meal on the way here, for her to still be alive, her body was already much better than that of an ordinary mage¡¯s.

    Han Shuo hauled Helen Tina up and carried her out of the cell. He handed her over to the two maids in the city lord¡¯s mansion with the following instructions, ¡°Prepare some food for her. Wait until she recovers before putting her back into the cell.¡±

    The two maids looked at Helen Tina¡¯s pale face in shock, then turned to Han Shuo with a strange gaze before withdrawing with the unconscious Helen Tina in trepidation.

    When they¡¯dpletely cleared the room, the two foolish maids started chattering in a low voice as they thought that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t hear them talk.

    ¡°Two days! The city lord disappeared for two days! I can¡¯t believe that he ravaged a beautiful woman until she¡¯s this weak. The city lord is really a brutal, perverted evil demon!!

    ¡°Mm... two days in a row! How could the city lord hold up? No wonder he could kill all of those hateful bandits. His endurance is terrifying!¡±

    ¡°Aii. Poor woman, she must have been so devastated, being ravaged for two days!¡±

    ¡°Yeah, you see how she haggard she is. I can¡¯t believe she¡¯s be like this in just two days!¡±

    The two maids whispered as they went. Han Shuo¡¯s sensitive hearing having involuntarily caught all of their conversation. He was torn betweenughter and tears, his eyshes constantly trembling. Han Shuo wanted to exin but didn¡¯t know where to start.

    After roughly half an hour, Faulke arrived along with Dick and Chester after hearing the news. The three stood before Han Shuo, looking at him somewhat strangely. Faulke was a true knight so he didn¡¯t say anything. The one in charge of the Dark Mantle here, Dick, was a subordinate so he kept silent all the same.

    However, Chester had long been familiar with Han Shuo, so he had no reservations between the two. Heplimented with a slight smile upon arriving, ¡°My lord is really intense alright! I only knew about your powerful martial skills before. Only now do I know that not only your martial art is superb, your other aspect is even more terrifying. Two days, my gosh, two days in a row. This little one has no words to describe my admiration for you!¡±

    Faulke and Dick seemed to share the same thought as they nodded solemnly at Chester¡¯s words. The good-for-nothing Dick even eximed with a deep sigh, ¡°Comparisons really will be the death of people, ai! I utterly concede!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s brows jumped constantly at their words. He suppressed his anger, before opening his mouth to exin to his so-called three subordinates, ¡°The truth isn¡¯t like what you¡¯ve imagined. Don¡¯t listen to the drivel of those servants. I only left that prisoner hungry for two days. You guys shouldn¡¯t think nonsense.¡±

    The three dirty minded fellows didn¡¯t believe a word. However, as subordinates, they naturally understood the need to maintain some dignity in the surface. Therefore, they earnestly nodded, admitting that they had misunderstood, saying that the lord wasn¡¯t that kind of person. But their eyes was filled with envy and admiration. They obviously didn¡¯t believe Han Shuo¡¯s exnation.

    ¡°This woman is Grand Duke Helen Tina of the Helon Duchy. Has anyonee to negotiate with you guys for her release over the past two days?¡± Seeing the three refused to believe him, Han Shuo had to reveal Helen Tina¡¯s identity, inwardly wondering if they would believe him now.

    ¡°What? My lord, you actually dared to eat even Grand Duke Helen of the Helon Duchy!¡± Chester blurted out without thought.

    Faulke and Dick¡¯s expression abruptly changed. Dick was especially solemn as he said loudly, ¡°My lord, we¡¯re in big trouble this time! I think Brettel City will face crazy retaliation from two other grand duchies. Once people know that this poisonous beauty is in your hands, many from the seven grand duchies will be interested in Brettel City again.¡±

    ¡°There¡¯ll naturally be a solution for any troubles thate. What are you afraid of? If the seven grand duchies dare toe, they will be just in time to taste our magic crystal cannons. All six magic crystal cannons have been installed at the city¡¯s wall. Any duchy that wants to invade the Brettel City will have to pay with their blood.¡± Faulke was indeed obsessed with battle. He coldly snorted with an air of arrogance.

    Stopping for a bit, Faulke suddenly thought of something as his expression somewhat changed. He turned to speak to Han Shuo, ¡°But if the seven grand duchies attack repeatedly, our supply of magic crystal ores will be far from enough. Once it¡¯s not enough for our operations, it¡¯s simply impossible to resist the attacks from the seven grand duchies with the Brettel City¡¯s current defenses.¡±

    Magic crystal ores were formed by nature. They could be used for refining various magic equipment, and were needed in some transportation matrices as well as magic weapons. Magic crystal ores were different from creatures cores. The energy within the former couldn¡¯t be directly absorbed by human or beasts, and could only be used via tools. As for the creatures cores, the majority of them could be directly absorbed by magic creatures, while a few could be absorbed by human who had the same kind of element. Therefore, creatures cores were more valuable than magic crystal ores.

    Even though creature cores were more precious, most of them couldn¡¯t be used as a source to operate transportation matrices or magic crystal cannons. Magic crystal ores were needed to run magic crystal cannons.

    ¡°It looks like we need to pay attention to the harvest of magic crystal ores in the underground world!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s mind spun quickly with the information about the different uses of creature cores and magic crystal ores as he whispered to himself.

    ¡°My lord is truly a man of courage. You knew full well that she was Helen Tina yet still dared to lock and ravage her for two whole days! I¡¯m in awe of your spirit that is fearless of any pressure or threat!¡± Dick eximed sincerely.

    It looked like these three perverts had determined that Han Shuo had nailed Helen Tina no matter what he said. Han Shuo was toozy to say anything else in the end. He turned to give orders to Faulke, ¡°Use all of the gold coins I brought back defending of Brettel City. I will make the people of Helon Duchy ransom a million gold coins for Helen Tina. If theye, report to me.¡±

    Han Shuo no longer pay any heed to the ttery of these three perverts after he gave his orders. He returned to his room in the mansion, waiting for the two maids to bring Helen Tina back. The two maids slowly brought the weak looking Helen Tina to Han Shuo¡¯s room after half an hour.

    Helen Tina¡¯s mental strength had been confined, while she herself had been left hungry for quite a long time. She probably wouldn¡¯t even be able to beat a maid in her current state. it was simply impossible for her to escape from the city lord¡¯s mansion. Helen Tina put all thoughts of escape to rest and meekly let the two maids lead her.

    Helen Tina¡¯s face now had some color to it after eating some food and drinking some water. She didn¡¯t need to lean on the two maids anymore. Her bright eyes full of hatred as she red at Han Shuo, her gentle voice instantly ringing out curses, ¡°You crude, despicable necromancer, I can¡¯t believe you dared to treat me like that! Even if you are an insidious, evil necromancer, you should know that abusing prisoners deserves everyone¡¯s spittle!¡±

    ¡°My lord, if you have no other orders, we will be taking our leave now.¡± The two maids turned their eyes away and lifted their heads to look at Han Shuo with fear. One of them pleaded in a low voice.

    The two maids was already regarding Han Shuo as an abusive pervert in their hearts. Their voices trembled, eyes looking at him full of fear, likembs facing a wolf.

    ¡°Go. Speak no more nonsense from now on!¡± Han Shuo swept a cold nce at the two maids as he spoke frostily.

    The two maids were so scared that they went soft at the knees, trembling as they nodded in agreement. Neither of them dared to lift their heads. After a while, seeing as Han Shuo had no intention to punish them, the two maids left the room in shock and fear.

    This time they left without daring to say a word. It seems Han Shuo¡¯s deterrence had begun to take effect.

    Waiting until the two maids left, Han Shuo opened his mouth to speak to the furious Helen Tina, ¡°My apologies that you were starved for two days because of my negligence. But I really didn¡¯t do it on purpose, I truly only forgot.¡±

    Han Shuo took out her space ring and handed it back before carrying on, ¡°Alright, I¡¯ve returned your space ring to you. I think this kind of situation won¡¯t happen again next time.¡±

    Helen Tina¡¯s pretty eyes red bitterly at Han Shuo, uncontroble hatred still remaining on her face after she recovered her space ring. However, she obviously understood that she had no capital to make a fuss since she was a prisoner. After rolling her eyes ar Han Shuo for a while, Helen Tina finally let out a light sigh and said in a soft tone, ¡°If you think you can use me to threaten the Helon Duchy, I think your wish won¡¯t be fulfilled. Four days have passed already. The Helon Duchy likely hasn¡¯t sent anyone with a million gold coins for my release. How about this, my space ring still has four hundred thousand gold coins. If you release me, I¡¯ll give you these gold coins, alright?¡±

    Han Shuo sat there on the chair, stroking his chin as he stared fixedly at Helen Tina. He opened his mouth after a bit of pondering. ¡°Don¡¯t worry. I¡¯ll wait for some more time and see how it goes. If it¡¯s really as you¡¯ve said, I can discuss conditions with you again.¡±

    ¡°No. If I don¡¯t return to the Helon Duchy in a short period of time, it will definitely fall into civil strife. As time drags on, it¡¯ll be useless for me to return to the Helon Duchy anymore.¡± Helen Tina¡¯s tone became urgent as she immediately responded.

    ¡°That has nothing to do with me. You are the grand duke of Helon Duchy, you¡¯re absolutely worth a million gold coins. Heh heh, four hundred thousand gold coins is really a bit too little. I¡¯ll be taking a huge loss if I just simply let you go like that! I don¡¯t care if your duchy has civil unrest. Will corpses pile up everywhere just because of civil strife? Don¡¯t expect to leave my ce without handing over a million gold coins.¡± Crossing his legs and leisurely looking at Helen Tina¡¯s urgent posture, Han Shuo slowly replied with a smile.

    ¡°You, you demon from hell! The six magic crystal cannons is worth a million gold coins! Is your greed truly that bottomless?¡± Helen Tina¡¯s face flushed red in fury. Her body staggered as if she wanted to fall down in a faint.

    ¡°The longer the time is dragged out, the more it¡¯ll be detrimental for you. I see you obviously don¡¯t have enough gold coins on you. I¡¯m not an unreasonable person either. Mm, how about this, write me a note. Bring the remaining six hundred thousand gold coins to me within three months after you return to your duchy.¡± Han Shuo squinted at Helen Tina, waiting until she vented all of her rage before opening his mouth to speak one more.

    ¡°You greedy pig, you¡¯ll get what¡¯sing to you!!¡± Helen Tina screamed in fury.

    ¡°Alright then, you can just keep screaming here and wait for your Helon Duchy fall into chaos. Heh heh, I have something to attend to and won¡¯t keep youpany!¡± Han Shuo stood up calmly, seemingly not taking Helen Tina¡¯s screaming in his eyes as he leisurely walked to the door.

    ¡°You evil demon, greedy evil demon. I¡¯ll agree, I¡¯ll agree!¡± The noisy Helen Tina finally yielded and screamed hysterically when Han Shuo had almost walked out the door.

    ¡°Isn¡¯t it good to agree early? Your body is so weak, screaming loudly is not good for your health!¡± Han Shuoughed heartily. He promptly took out a contract, making Helen Tina finger print and sign it, finally cing down a magical brand.

 Chapter 325: Lack of manpower

    Chapter 325: Lack of manpower

    The clouds were a fiery red in the sunset, refreshing gentle breezes blowing happily through people¡¯s hearts. All of the potholes and scars in Brettel City had been fixed during this period of reparation.

    The main city gates had two huge magic crystal cannons stationed at them. They shone a faint red halo under the sunset. seemingly ready to spit out enormous mes at any moment.

    Helen Tina was currently standing in front of the city gates after having been forced to sign the contract. She looked up at the two magic crystal cannons that¡¯d originally belonged to her, unsure what to feel. Han Shuo stood on the city¡¯s walls, smiling merrily as he held the contract aloft and waved goodbye, ¡°Dear honorable Duke Helen Tina, we won¡¯t be seeing you off.¡±

    Helen Tina inwardly gave eighteen generations of Han Shuo¡¯s ancestors a good cursing. However, she was worried that rebellion that could break out any time in her Helon Duchy. Having recovered her mental strength, she slowly floated up using levitation skills. Her shining eyes red fiercely at Han Shuo as she gritted her teeth and lowered her voice, ¡°Greedy evil demon, I¡¯ll definitely be back for revenge!¡±

    ¡°Have a safe journey. Remember that you have to pay back the gold coins you owe me in three months!¡± Han Shuo beamed radiantly, waving the contract in his hand as if telling Helen Tina not to try to weasel her way out of her debt.

    ¡°Hmph!¡± Helen Tina turned her head angrily. She transformed into a fiery shadow, slowly flying towards the direction of Helon Duchy. The fiery shadow looked like a rainbow across the horizon beneath the sunset.

    ¡°My Lord is truly too evil. Not only did he take this poisonous beauty, he even exhorted a huge amount of gold coins. Truly eating people down to the bones!¡± Chester shook his head emotionally, his eyes looking at Han Shuo full of worship.

    ¡°I didn¡¯t think Helen Tina was this beautiful, no wonder Benedict of the Narsen Duchy is so obsessed with her. A pity, ah, a pity. He definitely wouldn¡¯t expect that our lord was one step ahead to pluck this flower!¡± Dick chuckled at the pain of others, making malicious spections about how ugly the situation would be after Benedict learned of this.

    ¡°Your Lordship, I think that with her malevolence, Helen Tina definitely won¡¯t be willing to let this go after she leaves. Hmph, if she spreads the news about our Brettel City extorting four hundred thousand gold coins from her, I think it will give rise the greed of the seven grand duchies.¡± Faulke approached Han Shuo, saying worriedly as he watched Helen Tina depart.

    Han Shuo looked at the red clouds spread throughout the sky, silently frowning for a bit. He then casted his eyes at the blurry outlines of the mountain ranges around Brettel City. He told Dick, ¡°Dick, send people to the surrounding mountains, ask the leaders of the mountain people to pay a visit to Brettel City. Just tell them that I invite them for a meal.¡±

    ¡°My lord, because the former city lords were all ipetent and mediocre leaders, they couldn¡¯t help the mountain people resist the bandits. So the mountain people have never harbored any good impression, let alone respect, for the city lord. I can pass the news to them, but I¡¯m afraid that they won¡¯te out of contempt.¡± Dick revealed a difficult expression and exined to Han Shuo after some hesitation.

    ¡°Now is different from the past. Fulkin of Mount Tali wille for certain. If he informs the others beforehand, the other leaders will know of our strength. I think they¡¯ll be willing toe, heh heh. The past is the past, the present is the present. The entire Brettel City is my territory, they are all my people. If these people really can¡¯t tell good from bad, then I will make them know how to respect a city lord.¡± Han Shuo said to Dick in a neither fast nor slow manner.

    Nodding his head, Dick promised, ¡°Alright then, I will definitely notify them.¡±

    Dick was also a mountain man. He had already had contact and even secretly maintained a good rtionship with the people in the surrounding mountains before Han Shuo had arrived in Brettel City. He¡¯d had no hope in Han Shuo originally. Now that he¡¯d witnessed the knowledge, power, as well as the schemes of thetter, Dick understood that his stubborn people would definitely eat a bitter loss if they provoked Han Shuo.

    Therefore, Dick was determined to persuade those stubborn fellows toe as soon as he heard Han Shuo¡¯s words. He didn¡¯t want any of those people to die at the hands of Han Shuo¡¯s undead army.

    After Dick left, Han Shuo said to Faulke, ¡°Use the gold coins we have to arm and power up the entire city with everything we¡¯ve got. War chariots, catapults, oil, goblin missiles, etc. As for equipment, I have entrusted some merchant guilds to transport them here. What you have to do is tell the masons to reinforce any fragile areas of the city¡¯s walls. Make it taller in areas where it isn¡¯t tall enough.¡±

    ¡°Your lordship, the craftsmen have already increased their overtime to do these things. What weck the most now are soldiers with sufficientbat effectiveness. Brettel City has suffered through many battles with devastating effects from fire. The total poption in our city is only fifty thousand or so, this is really miserably fewpared to some big cities of millions. The number of young people is even fewer. We have been conscripting men through providing enormous temptation in recent periods, but have only recruited two hundred or so. The number of our people is far from enough!¡±

    ¡°Brettel City is so big that it¡¯s simply impossible to protect all four gates with only roughly three thousand soldiers in the city. Even if we have strong firepower, we still need people to operate it! If the problem of the poption can¡¯t be resolved, I think Brettel City will still remain in this half dead atmosphere.¡± Faulke was indeed a knight who¡¯d been tempered by the fires of war. He only took one nce to point out what the citycked the most, which was also it¡¯s current biggest weakness.

    This was truly a difficult problem. Han Shuo also knew that what Brettel Citycked the most was people, but he didn¡¯t have a proper method to solve it. Brettel City had always been in the midst of war and had be a hell on earth due to the number of departing citizens throughout so many years. Even ordinary citizens of other cities might not be willing to migrate to the Brettel City, not to mention the natives who had left

    The first thing Han Shuo could do now was secure the safety of the city before gradually turning to expansion of other aspects. He then could slowly attract people from other cities to inhabit Brettel City through good security conditions that are beneficial to their development.

    However, this wouldn¡¯t be an overnight process, it required quite a long transition period. At least, the piging and threats from the seven grand duchies had to be halted before the Brettel City could slowly prove to outsiders that it was safe. Only then would fear and panic be dispelled.

    ¡°Mhm, I know this is indeed our biggest problem. We temporarily have no way to attract new residents. However, as long as we can stop the piging of the seven grand duchies and spread the news that the Brettel City is safe, some original inhabitants missing their hometown might be willing toe back. We will tackle this problem from multiple angles. I think Brettel City will be much more bustling sooner orter.¡±

    ¡°First, about theck of staff and soldiers, we can start from the mountain people in the surrounding mountains. This is why I¡¯ve invited them to the city. I heard from Dick that there are thirty, forty thousand of them, of which around ten thousand have the ability to fight. If we can firmly grasp and use this force, in addition to being equipped with six advanced magic crystal cannons and a sturdy city wall, our odds of sessfully blocking the invasions of the seven grand duchies will be much higher.¡± Han Shuo had considered this issue early on. He exined himself leisurely regarding why he¡¯d invited the mountain people.

    ¡°If my lord has made careful considerations already, then I will say no more. On the other hand, young master Lawrence will soon send over several talents who are knowledgeable in city and financial management. The military of Brettel City is also getting on track.¡± Faulke said respectfully.

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo said nomittally, ¡°Mm, for the time being these things are under your arrangements.¡±

    At the present, there were hundreds of things are waiting to be done in Brettel City. All kinds of talents were greatlycking. Lawrence¡¯s arrangements of talented military and political personnel would indeed y an important role. However, since they were arranged by Lawrence, it would be difficult to remove them once these military and political talents officially took control.

    If this situation was left to develop as it would, if Han Shuo still continued to use Lawrence¡¯s people, then this subconscious infiltration would slowly turn Brettel City into Lawrence¡¯s territory. Han Shuo was now much more mature than in the past and understood clearly this drawback clearly. Unfortunately, he didn¡¯t have any of his own people to use at the moment. He also temporarily couldn¡¯t identify if Lawrence¡¯s help was out of good intentions or other purposes. What Han Shuo currentlycked the most was manpower, so he could only leave things as they were.

    However, Han Shuo had started thinking for the future and was seriously considering using his own trusted people. Be it developing or discovering these people, neither were simple matter. He slowly walked to his room with this idea in mind.

    Staying in the city lord¡¯s mansion for two days, Han Shuo monitored the progress of enhancing the city¡¯s defense facilities during the day, and tirelessly practicing demonic cultivation and necromancy magic at night. However, breakthroughs in cultivation became harder the more he progressed, and there weren¡¯t many gains to be had in his boring regr day to day practices. On the other hand, since his mental strength was at the grand magus rank, his grasp over necromancy magic actually made rapid progress.

    Therefore, Han Shuo put more effort into studying necromancy magic. Using the secret chamber in the city lord¡¯s mansion, he could easily transport to the Cemetery of Death ¨C the most perfect training grounds for necromancers. Not only the scent of death here dense, this ce even had plenty of magic tools andboratory. Han Shuo stayed here alone every night and captured some live magic beasts to practice the spell ¡°Soul Tremor¡±.

    For a demonic practitioner at the separate demon realm like Han Shuo, their soul had be the even more mysterious consciousness which possessed some truly wondrous uses. Based on his study of the soul, in addition to his memory of demonic magic, Han Shuo gradually felt that there was a link between the understanding of the soul in necromancy and the changes in the consciousness in his demonic cultivation.

    Especially at this realm, the consciousness had miraculous abilities to sense the presence of all creatures in the surroundings, to create illusions and imnt magical brands on the soul, and seemed to be able tomunicate with the magic elements that existed everywhere in this world. Han Shuo suddenly had a whim to consider if it was also possible to integrate demonic cultivation and magical training so they couldplement each other.

    However, this wonderful idea was still extremely difficult to implement with Han Shuo¡¯s current situation because his knowledge had yet to reach true proficiency in any field. There would be a long process of exploration if he wanted to master the two aspects. It seemed this wouldn¡¯t be able to be applied for a short while.

    This spell ¡°Soul Tremor¡± used the consciousness to attack the opponent¡¯s soul. Han Shuo had experimented it on living magic creatures over the past two days. Moreover, he had certain reflections in some areas of using the mind to attack, gradually grasping some key parts of this spell in two days.

    Han Shuo walked out from the Cemetery of Death on the third day. Bathing under the warm sunshine, he felt a very leisurely pleasure. While he was checking on the progress of the city, Dick ran out from an unknown location to Han Shuo¡¯s side and said respectfully, ¡°My Lord, I have sent out the invitations ording to your orders. The five mountain leaders on the surrounding mountains all agreed toe to Brettel City seven dayster.¡±

    Smiling lightly, Han Shuo looked at Dick deeply before finally saying, ¡°Dick, you are also a mountain man. I know that you wouldn¡¯t let me down if I ced this in your charge.¡±

    ¡°But of course. Otherwise, with your methods, all the leaders who didn¡¯te with definitely meet with some idents. I didn¡¯t want to be the viin of my people.¡± Dick thought inwardly, his expression still respectful as he said smilingly, ¡°My Lord has gained the mountain people¡¯s trust after you exterminated the Red Beard bandits. I think they¡¯ll being here with hearts full of hope.¡±

    ¡°Perhaps with more fear than not, haha!¡± Han Shuoughed heartily with Dick. How could he not know what these people wanted to do? Dick had said all that needed to be said, and so they naturally knew what to do.

    ¡°Eh... They actually are a bit afraid. Heh heh!¡± Dick answered with augh. He looked into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes and felt as if thetter knew the thoughts in his mind. Dick involuntarily felt scared in his heart.

 Chapter 326: Somewhat tricky

    Chapter 326: Somewhat tricky

    Frantic hoofsteps resounded, approaching swiftly from the distance. Han Shuo was atop the city wall to oversee the construction progress when he saw Commander Knight Faulke anxiously charge over on the back of a warhorse.

    Flying off of his horse, Faulke ran all the way to the foot of the city wall where Han Shuo was standing. Panting heavily, he looked up at thetter, ¡°Your Lordship, the caravan transporting the war chariots and other equipment from Seamist City has been robbed by several bandit groups. They say they will only release the merchants and goods if we pay them fifty thousand gold coins.¡±

    The bandit groups along the road from Seamist City to Brettel City weren¡¯trge in scale. Han Shuo had ordered this equipment from some of Phebe¡¯s merchant guild contacts. Not only had he reminded them to be careful of the bandits on the way, he even had Faulke send people along to escort the convoy. These small bandit groups certainly shouldn¡¯t have had the guts to make a move. Han Shuo¡¯s face darkened when he heard the news from Faulke, ¡°You say that several bandit groups allied up to make a move?¡±

    Faulke¡¯s expression was quite ugly as he answered with a nod, ¡°That¡¯s right. One bandit group alone definitely wouldn¡¯t dare to do something like this. However, five bandit groups banded together this time. The guards of the caravan simply couldn¡¯t hold up against them. Your Lordship, these damnable bandits are seeking death. I¡¯ll immediately lead the knights in the city to exterminate them all!¡±

    ¡°Wait!¡± Han Shuo shouted to stop Faulke¡¯s impulsive action. He thought for a bit before asking, ¡°Our purchase of war chariots and equipment this time, how many people knew about this?¡±

    ¡°The soldiers who were to escort the goods all knew. Why, My Lord?¡± Faulke was confused, not knowing why Han Shuo had suddenly mentioned this.

    Han Shuo asked with a cold snort, ¡°How could it be a coincidence that these bandits knew which day the caravan would arrive? Howe they suddenly banded together and even dared demand a ransom after robbing the caravan? Can¡¯t you see how abnormal this is?¡±

    Faulke was in shock after these words rang out. He shouted, ¡°My Lord, you are saying that there may be spies among our people?!¡±

    ¡°Not maybe, but for certain!¡± Han Shuo suddenly shouted loudly, ¡°I will not pursue your negligence of duty for now. You have half a day to find the spies and execute them! On the other hand, don¡¯t just ept anyone in the next recruitment drive. Kick out all of those whose backgrounds aren¡¯t clean!¡±

    ¡°Yes, My Lord!¡± Faulke replied loudly. His face was icy as he leapt on a horse and quickly rode off.

    Since this matter had been his duty, he wouldn¡¯t absolve himself of responsibility from such a big incident no matter what. Lawrence had made it clear that his life and death would be up to Han Shuo when he stepped foot in Brettel City. Having witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s powerful strength, Faulke knew full well that this city lord was definitely not the benevolent, lenient sort. Faulke cursed that traitor while quickly thinking of a way to catch him.

    An hourter, three hundred bulky knights in shining armor were neatly lined up in a wide marble square in front of the city lord¡¯s mansion, in ordance with Faulke¡¯smands. If one overlooked his negligence of duty at the moment, judging from their posture and presence, Faulker¡¯s training had indeed produced knights with the demeanor of a knight regiment. This indeed showed the capabilities of Faulke as a superior knight officer.

    Han Shuo sat in the city lord¡¯s mansion, not caring what methods Faulke would use to find the spies. He was pondering how to eradicate these bandits and clear the path from Seamist City to Brettel City as soon as possible.

    Han Shuo had ced all of his attention on the possibility that the seven grand duchies would muster up a raiding force at any moment. However, he¡¯d forgotten about therge and small bandit groups along this trip. There were more than a dozen forces, either small-scaled bandit groups with over a hundred members, or bands with only a dozen members who didn¡¯t even warrant a mention. These groups scurried messily around Brettel City and the seven grand duchies all the time. They weren¡¯t on the same level as therge groups with thousands of bandits.

    After killing Trodast time, Han Shuo had thought that these petty bandits wouldn¡¯t dare act rashly, so he hadn¡¯t paid them any heed. He hadn¡¯t expected them to stab a knife into his back at such a crucial moment, robbing a hundred thousand gold coins worth of battle equipment. This birthed a killing intent so fierce in Han Shuo, he wanted to exterminate them from the world.

    The road between Brettel City and Seamist City was the most important channel that connected Brettel City to the Lancelot Empire. If Brettel City wanted to develop, then there were no words that could describe the importance of this road. If immigrants were robbed before they could even reach Brettel City, no one would dare to settle down there no matter how eloquent Han Shuo was.

    ¡°They¡¯re asking for it. It¡¯s not that I didn¡¯t want to give them a chance to live!¡± Han Shuo had cleared up his thinking, and his fingers subconsciously tapped on the chair armrest as he spoke resolutely.

    Faulke didn¡¯t failed to live up to Han Shuo¡¯s trust. He only took two hours to find the spies. Han Shuo didn¡¯t actually see who they were, but he could hear mournful, hair-raising wail after wail echoing from outside the city lord¡¯s mansion.

    The scalp-tingling, tragic screams onlysted for a bit before petering out. Five minutester, Faulke walked in, filled with trepidation. He humbly paid his respects to Han Shuo and said in a low voice, ¡°Sir Count, I have neglected my duties.¡±

    Straightening his somewhatzy posture, Han Shuo indifferently swept a sharp nce at Faulke and asked, ¡°Got something out of the interrogation?¡±

    Nodding his head, Faulke answered, ¡°A total of three new recruits. All of them are infiltrators from the surrounding bandit groups Because their bodies were strong and we werecking people, I didn¡¯t investigate them carefully and let them join our knight regiment. It was all my negligence! I ask Your Lordship for your punishment!¡±

    It was as Faulke said, Brettel City was utilizing every person to the extreme. Talents like Faulke who could train soldiers were truly too scarce. Faulke¡¯s temporary carelessness could be considered negligence of duty, but Han Shuo had no candidate for his recement.

    Han Shuo was silent for a bit before saying with a cold harrumph, ¡°I will take note of this for now. If you can contribute achievements to redeem your mistake when we exterminate the bandits, I will overlook your negligence this time.¡±

    Faulke nodded heavily. He solemnly struck a ceremonial posture and said in a loud voice, ¡°Rest assured Sir Count! This kind of thing shall never happen again. None of the bandits involved in this robbery will escape! I give you my word as a knight.¡±

    ¡°Very well. Assemble a hundred knights. We are going visit theirir and see if they have the qualifications to take fifty thousand gold coins from my hands.¡± Han Shuo narrowed his eyes and stood up. Faulke could clearly sense the thick killing intent radiating from his body. He understood that the bandits who had acted in such a wanton manner would be paying a painful price soon enough.

    Night fell. A moonless night, the pitch ck sky was like a canvas smeared with a dense, thickyer of ink, reducing line of sight to a bare minimum. Torches burned brightly as they headed in a direction where the air was humid and wild weeds grew.

    A dozen huge rafts were lining up on a long river shaped like a willow leaf. Many strong sturdy men stood on these rafts, their hands also holding torches. The noisy sound of an argument echoed out from these people.

    Faulke rode a warhorse, a torch in his hand. He frowned at the bandits on the rafts on the distant small river and scolded in a low voice, ¡°Cunning bandits, they unexpectedly chose this ce for the transaction. This makes things a bit difficult.¡±

    This ce was very far from Brettel City and simply wasn¡¯t anywhere between Seamist City and Brettel City. Instead, it was in the area connecting Brettel City to the seven grand duchies.

    Last time Han Shuo had caught Helen Tina, it had been precisely at this river where he¡¯d transported the six magic crystal cannons back to Brettel City. However, because the six cannons were so heavy, it had taken him two days to return from this ce. This time, Han Shuo¡¯s group that solely consisted of knights, took only half a day to arrive here at night to meet the deadline.

    It was undeniable that these bandits had picked a good ce this time. Once they took the fifty thousand gold coins, they would be able to quickly get away using the rafts. Han Shuo¡¯s group were all knights, simply unable to pursue them on this small river. When they notified Han Shuo of the ce the transaction was to take ce, it was already toote for thetter to make preparations. They had involuntarily fallen into a passive state.

    ¡°This group of bandits really isn¡¯t simple. They¡¯ve arranged everything properly and even took the advantage from us. They can easily escape on the rafts after taking the gold coins. The knights can¡¯t pursue them. It seems we have encountered some difficult to handle bandits.¡± Han Shuo looked at the shing lights of the bandits before him and spoke to Faulke.

    ¡°Sir Count, how should we handle this? Even if you¡¯re a necromancer, the dark creatures can¡¯t make a move in the water.¡± Faulke spoke worriedly to Han Shuo. He was ready to redeem his mistake with all of his enthusiasm, intending to make a big move this time.

    ¡°There are some light mages on their side. It seems these bandits have been nning this for a long time. These light mages must have been arranged specially for me. Could it be that this matter isn¡¯t so simple? That there are people secretly plotting against us?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s voice was soft, but surprised. The yin demon he¡¯d secretly released had caught sight of two low ranked light mages.

    There was a light journeyman mage and a light adept mage. These ranks of light mages had limited influence against high rank creatures like evil knights. However, even a middle level holy light spell could cause considerable damage to the gargoyles.

    Therefore, Han Shuo immediately became cautious upon seeing the two light mages. He waved his arm at Faulke, ¡°Halt for now. Let¡¯s me ascertain the situation first. If this is a trap, we¡¯ll immediately retreat.¡±

    Han Shuo was left with only one yin demon now. His observation was no longer as speedy as before, and he had no way of covering everything at the scene. He¡¯d started to consider whether he should spend a while in closed door training to refine the higher rank mystical demon.

    Circling around the rafts on the river, the yin demon indeed discovered the war equipment that Han Shuo had procured, and even Fabian and Jack of Boozt Merchant Guild among them. The bandits had tied them up tightly and ced two glinting steel knives against their necks. Their faces looked wan and forlorn, obviously having been immensely frightened.

    There were a dozen merchants as well as thirty or so guards from other merchant guilds tightly tied up beside Fabian and Jack. The bandits surrounded and watched them closely.

    After winning the gamble against Cameron, the Boozt Merchant Guild had naturally be the richest merchant guild in the empire. Cameron had fallen into a slump and lost the trust of his merchant guild. The Boozt Merchant Guild had taken advantage of the situation to develop, gradually bing the most active amongst the major merchant guilds.

    The war equipment Han Shuo had purchased was being transported by Boozt along with several other merchant guilds. If they didn¡¯t have a good first experience, it would negatively affect their impressions of Brettel City. Cooperation would be difficult to continue from then on.

    Therefore, it was not just Fabian and Jack, the safety of these merchants and guards were equally important. If their safety wasn¡¯t guaranteed, the subsequent fall out would be hard to make up for, even if the bandits were all killed. Han Shuo had a major headache just looking at the strict security of the bandits.

    ¡°Dorcus, what should we do next?¡± A crude looking burly man over two meters tall, obviously the leader of these bandits, was currently asking a young man sitting on the raft. This young man had a resolute face, his eyes burning with wild ambition.

    This young man was dressed in the clothes of a minor banditckey, with a height of nearly one meter ny centimeters. He stood tall, like a straight pole that never bend nor break, and the vividly colored bandit outfit couldn¡¯t hide the wild light of ambition in his eyes. This young man was named Dorcus. He nced at the bandit leader and said confidently, ¡°Rest assured. I¡¯ve made careful preparations beforehand. That I didn¡¯t let you kill these captives will make them apprehensive, not to mention we also hold the advantage with the rafts on this small river. We even used arge amount of money to recruit two light mages who can stop the assault of gargoyles. This n is absolutely safe, they have no other choice but to bring the money.¡±

    ¡°Dorcus, the civilian genius of the Imperial Academy of Strategy. So it¡¯s him. No wonder!¡± Han Shuo murmured upon hearing the two¡¯s conversation through the yin demon, who was circling around the young man.

 Chapter 327: A talented person

    Chapter 327: A talented person

    The nature of the Lancelot Imperial Academy was different from that of the Babylon Academy. Lancelot Imperial Academy was an academy that groomed talented strategists, with magicians, swordsmen, and knights not within its scope. Simr to all other schools on the Profound Continent, it was always nobles who held the important positions within the Imperial Academy.

    There were several reasons for why so many talented nobles came to be. The first reason being that the astronomical costs associated with attending such an Academy caused ordinary civilians to back down. The other reason was that, even if a civilian managed to enroll in the Imperial Academy, they would find it extremely difficult to find a good teacher who could teach them systemically about military affairs

    However, nothing was ever set in stone. The Imperial Academy would still asionally see one or two civilian students. These civilians would still manage to reveal their talents, even under such unfavorable conditions; they were so brilliant that they managed to steal the limelight from the other students of noble descent.

    In such an academy, unparalleled geniuses would receive a multitude of offers from the greatest of teachers, guaranteeing their sess As long as these talented civilian teenagers appeared docile and clever, there would always be talent-seeking nobles and generals who would attempt to recruit them.

    Of course, there were also a few wild and unruly civilian teenagers who didn¡¯t know to conceal their brilliance, which angered their fellow noble students. In the worst case scenario, they would be killed by their fellow students out of jealousy, or if their luck permitted, their careers would be obstructed, losing their chance to join the military.

    Dorcas was exactly this kind of unlucky genius. The young Dorcas had once been unsurpassed in the Imperial Academy, but he¡¯d became too haughty and didn¡¯t conceal his talent, falling in love with an earl¡¯s daughter. This made the girl¡¯s father and her fiance¡¯s family very angry indeed.

    The end result was that Dorcas had been groundlessly used of crimes. Not only was he expelled from the Imperial Academy, but he was also hunted down by the two families, and almost lost his life. He had been forced to be a fugitive.

    This had happened about a year ago. The Dark Mantle¡¯s records had details of this incident, and Han Shuo had also read through this intelligence when he¡¯d exercised his rights in the Dark Mantle headquarters. It had left a deep impression on him, and he hadn¡¯t thought that he¡¯d be able to meet this civilian military genius here.

    Dorcas was standing on a wooden raft. His once haughty face was now a bit more mncholy due to the bitter experiences he had faced. He stood straight and looked off into the distance. He turned his head and said to that bandit leader, ¡°Captain, the people holding torches should be those from Brettel City. After we acquire the 50,000 gold coins, we should refrain from appearing in the vicinity of that city. The city lord named Bryan isn¡¯t an easy person to deal with! If we don¡¯t leave quickly enough, not only will we have to give up the gold coins, but even our lives will be forfeit!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. I¡¯m not stupid enough to stay behind and let the people who killed Redbeard Troda surround me. Heh heh, let Laxi and the rest experience the rage of these people. Ten thousand gold coins is enough for us to livefortably for quite a while.¡± This bandit leader wasn¡¯t a fool. He cackled, and expressed his satisfaction that, after a lifetime of small jobs, he was able to split ten thousand gold coins for their efforts.

    Han Shuo had seen everything through the eyes of the yin demon. He took a careful look at the raft that Jack and the others were on, before turning to Faulke and saying, ¡°Hand the carts with the gold coins over to them, we cannot lose a single merchant.¡±

    ¡°Sir count, are we really just going to submit to them just like this? We¡¯ve already prepared many ways to counter them!¡± Faulke said anxiously upon hearing that Han Shuo intended to hand over the money without a fight, trying and failing to suppress his doubts.

    ¡°The Imperial Academy genius, Dorcas, is out there. If we are to go through with original n we created, then we would be at aplete disadvantage. Water lies in the distance, we won¡¯t have an opportunity to act without them harming the merchants. We should give them the gold coins first as ransom for the merchants and war equipment. We can discuss the matter of annihting the bandits after they arrive safely back in our hands.¡±

    Before they¡¯d arrived, Han Shuo had nned to have the earth elite zombie strike out in an ambush. Had they been in the forest, then the wood elite zombie would be able to quickly ensure the safety of the merchants. Unfortunately, the cunning Dorcas had chosen the middle of a river as their ce of transaction. Han Shuo had no other option since the water elite zombie had yet to finish developing.

    ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll go now!¡± Faulk nodded his head. He didn¡¯t have a better idea either. He mounted his horse and rode forward, opening his mouth and shouting, ¡°Carry the boxes with the gold coins next to the river, we¡¯re going to make the trade with the bandits.¡±

    Han Shuo had purposely filled one box with gold coins and not crystal cards. The original n had been to dump the box filled with gold coins amongst the bandits. The suspicions of the allied bandits would surely explode and result in a fight over the gold coins. As such, the earth elite zombie and wood elite zombie would be able to ambush them.

    Now that Han Shuo and the others were in a passive position, they naturally could not force this scenario. When the clinking of gold coins sounded out, the bandits drew near on their wooden rafts, with those behind them raising their bows, taking aim at the knights on the shore. The bandits in the front slowly pushed the merchants and equipment to a more shallow location along the riverbanks.

    Dorcas was indeed cautious enough, never allowing the rafts to wash ashore. The merchants and the battle wagons all waded to the banks a close distance away, not providing Han Shuo¡¯s side with a single chance to act.

    After a case of gold coins were hauled aboard a raft by two bandits, a loud cheer arose from amongst the ranks of the bandits. The arrogant banditsughed excitedly, with many leaders praising that the Imperial Academy¡¯s Dorcas, saying that he was very able indeed.

    Ducas, responsible for the scheme, did not smile. His expression from start to finish was one of gloomy remoteness. Under the cheering of the bandits, his eyes held a hint of hesitation, as if this arguably perfect n was a disgrace.

    Amongst the excited mor, the bandits were taking advantage of the fact that the raft was slowly floating away to suddenly extinguish all the torches in their hands when they were 50 meters away from Han Shuo and the others. The bandits ceased their madughter under the berating of their leaders. The moonless night was pitch ck. Having lost their light and sound, no one could clearly see what path they were taking when they were 50 meters out, the only exception being Han Shuo.

    These bandits didn¡¯t cross the river and disembark, but instead paddled along with the river, making use of the current. Dorcas shook his head at the bandits, who were silent but were squirming around with all sorts of weird postures to convey their excitement. He sighed inwardly, not knowing if it was right to use these bandits to exact his revenge, but now that he was considered a fugitive, unless he carried out the disgraceful actions of bing a traitor to the Empire and seeking asylum in another country, who else could help him sate his desire for revenge?

    Ai. He was someone who¡¯d been born and raised in the Lancelot Empire in the end. No matter what, he couldn¡¯t be a lifelong traitor with unforgivable crimes. Being a bandit was vastly preferable to being a traitor hated by everyone in the Lancelot Empire, right?

    ¡°Faulke, escort them back. We¡¯re still some distance away from the city, so don¡¯t have any mishaps.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s vision was likewise affected in the inky night. He¡¯d had nearly lost sight of the wooden rafts that were slowly floating away. When the merchants and war weapons had all mbered ashore, Han Shuo hurriedly turned to Faulke and gave his orders.

    ¡°Sir Count, are we not going to hunt and ughter those rotten bandits?¡± Faulke asked, looking at him confusedly.

    ¡°If you safely escort this equipment and the merchants back to the city, I¡¯ll forget about your previous negligence. Remember, the area outside of Brettel City still isn¡¯t safe. Make sure you don¡¯t overlook anything again!¡± Han Shuo was thinking of the constant threat from the seven grand duchies, as well as therger bandit groups wandering between the duchies and Brettel City. He gravely warned Faulke to be careful.

    Faulke¡¯s goal this time was to redeem himself through meritorious acts. It was because he was constantly thinking about this that he¡¯d lost his usual cool-headedness during this extraction mission. He immediately came to his senses after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s warnings and realized that he had be too obsessed. He calmly said, ¡°Rest assured Sir Count, I will definitely ensure their safety and bring them back to the city.¡±

    Seeing that Faulke¡¯s eyes had regained their calm, Han Shuo rxed. He knew that Faulke had recovered from his urgent desire of redeeming himself. He patted Faulke on the shoulder, and said in a gratified manner, ¡°Be careful!¡±

    He left nimbly like a light wind after speaking. Han Shuo¡¯s figure quickly shed out of sight in the pitch ck night. Faulke and the others didn¡¯t know what Han Shuo was nning to do.

    ¡°You lot, use your warhorses to pull the carts. You over there, dismount and give the merchants your horses. Hurry up, we need to take advantage of this darkness to return to the city. Stay sharp. We¡¯re all going to be in for it if something happens...¡± Faulke began loudly giving orders after Han Shuo disappeared. The knights that Faulke brought quickly executed his orders, organizing the merchants and tying up the battle wagons and other materials, slowly making their way back to Brettel City.

    Dorcas was standing on a wooden raft, his gloomy face flickering between red and white with the lights of the torches. He looked at some of the bandits busily splitting a chest full of gold coins in the next raft over. He asked with awful timing, ¡°That matter that you promised me... when are you going to do it?¡±

    ¡°Rx, Dorcas! As long as you help us with a few more of these ¡®business transactions¡¯, and we earn enough gold coins to grow strong from recruits, even hiring soldiers and wiping the dukedom off the map won¡¯t even be a problem then!¡±

    A bandit leader amongst them casually fobbed off Dorcas¡¯s inquiry. He turned to another leader beside him, smiling lecherously, ¡°Tuca, we¡¯ll soon bring our brothers to the Full Spring Garden brothel to y. These gold coins are enough for us to y for a while! Heh heh, our brothers have always wanted to go and try it out. Unfortunately, those refugees from Brettel City didn¡¯t have much on them... we didn¡¯t really earn much in all these years. Now that we finally have money, we should thoroughly enjoy it!¡±

    ¡°I like your suggestion, Laxi. Haha, let¡¯s go together!¡± Bandit leader Tucaughed and rubbed his chin. He chatted knowingly about the smaller bandit groups with them, the smaller onesprised of 70-80 bandits, and therger ones around 200. They specialized in robbing refuges between Brettel City and Seamist City. They had no ambition or great aplishments to their name at all. Otherwise they would have gone and raided Brettel City long ago. These people didn¡¯t n on upgrading their subordinates¡¯ weapons and armor after earning these gold coins, but instead harbored thoughts of enjoying their lives to the fullest. They didn¡¯t appear to give a damn about the promise they¡¯d made to Dorcas.

    Dorcas, a student of the Imperial Academy, wasn¡¯t an outstanding swordsman or knight. He¡¯d spent all his time studying military strategy and tactical skills. Even though he was 1.9 meters tall, his strength wasn¡¯t strong at all. To these crude and uncivilized bandits, this kind of weak strategist, who didn¡¯t pose a threat to them and was able to scheme and create ns for them, was very handy indeed. They weren¡¯t in a hurry to help him exact revenge at all.

    ¡°You guys promised me that you would help me take revenge after we got the gold coins!¡± Dorcas stared at the bandit leaders, who were unrestrainedly talking about which girl¡¯s breasts were thergest, and which girl¡¯s asses were the plumpest. Dorcas¡¯ muffled voice carrying over the water.

    ¡°The most important thing is to let the brothers rest and have a hell of a time after working so hard for so long. Dorcas, let¡¯s talk about this matterter. I¡¯ll help you find a girl to thoroughly enjoy. She¡¯ll definitely be a lot more worth it than that little noble girl you like, haha!¡± Even the leader that Dorcas was following was alsoughing heartily without any cares,pletely setting aside his promises to Dorcas.

    ¡°Aha, we¡¯re here!¡± Once we get ashore and walk for a bit, we¡¯ll arrive at the Narsen Duchy¡¯s Tulian Town! The girls in the Full Spring Garden are awaiting us!¡± Laxi excitedlyughed, instructing his subordinates, ¡°Hurry up! Stop the rafts, your boss will take you to have some fun!¡±

    Dorcas wore an unsightly expression. He resented these untrustworthy bandits, but he knew that his own strength was limited. He was angry to the point of erupting, but he didn¡¯t have any other choice. He could only stare at the bandits who were disembarking the rafts one by one, walking happily towards the Full Spring Garden in Tulian Town.

    ¡°My friends who have so graciously taken my fifty thousand gold coins, I¡¯ve been waiting a long time for you!¡± Suddenly, the silence of the night was broken by the sound of a young manughing. The silhouette of an extremelyrge person gradually appeared beneath the flickering light of the bandits¡¯ torches, blocking their way.

 Chapter 328: I will be your hunting hound!

    Chapter 328: I will be your hunting hound!

    The extremely tall figure was gradually revealed beneath the illumination of the torches as the mockingughter rang out. It was a handsome, young man with a strange and evil smile. The young man was around a meter and ny something centimeters tall. When he stood there, he was like an unsheathed sword, giving people an intense visual impact.

    An azure warrior uniform emphasized his refined physique. His mouth showed a faint smile that gave off an aura of yfulness, like an eagle in the sky nning to toy with a rabbit that was frantically running away on the ground. He seemed both confident and at ease.

    The frightened bandits hurriedly looked around when the young man revealed himself, as if they thought that there were more people behind the young man, which caused their nervousness and wariness to peak.

    ¡°Stop looking around. There¡¯s only me!¡± Han Shuo exined with a faint smile, then stopped looking at the bandit leader that clearly let out a sigh of relief. He merely set his gaze on Dorcas, who was standing stiffly amongst the crowd, and asked, ¡°Do you think these bandits, who only know how to enjoy themselves and are unable to achieve anything, will be able to help you to exact revenge?¡±

    Dorcas revealed an indifferent expression. Then after a moment of silence, he looked at Han Shuo, ¡°That is none of your business. You came for the fifty thousand gold coins, right?¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head with a smile, then continued to fix his gaze on Dorcas, while saying dashingly, ¡°No, fifty thousand gold coins might be a huge amount of money in the eyes of these bandits, but not in mine. The reason I followed you guys was not for the fifty thousand gold coins, but for you, Dorcas!¡±

    Dorcas had a sudden change in expression and stared hatefully at Han Shuo, as if wishing to firmlymit Han Shuo¡¯s appearance to memory. Then he smiled sadly, ¡°I hadn¡¯t that the two families would still have the desire toe after me after so much time had passed. I never would have thought that I would be worth so much. Ha!¡±

    ¡°Stop the bullshit. You¡¯re just a single man and you dare to block our path. You¡¯re just seeking death!¡± Laxie, the bandit leader, wanted to hurry along to the Full Spring Garden. He suddenly roared loudly after confirming that Han Shuo was indeed alone, unable to suppress the urgency in his heart.

    The other bandit leaders all agreed after hearing Laxie¡¯s roar. It seems like their lust had caused them to be unable to withstand the situation any longer. Under the orders of the bandit leaders, their underlings, equally urgent, quickly surrounded Han Shuo while wielding worthless weapons.

    Han Shuo had a smile on his face from the start. He waspletely indifferent towards the actions of these bandits, who only thirsted for the smooth skin of women. He continued to gaze at Dorcas and shook his head slightly. He finally decided to exin upon seeing Dorcas¡¯ confused expression, ¡°You might be both worthless and a hot potato to others, but you are worth far more than fifty thousand gold coins to me. I will exin to you in detailter, after I clean up these bandits. Then, I¡¯ll take my time to discuss with you your true value.

    ¡°Prideful fellow, you are asking for death!¡± Laxie gazed at Han Shuo with rage. He waved his hands and shouted, ¡°Kill him! He¡¯s definitely that evil necromancer. Close in on him and don¡¯t give him the chance to chant any spells.¡±

    ¡°Aha, he is the new city lord of Brettel City! Just look at that space ring on his hand. He¡¯s definitely a fat target!. Brothers, take the space ring for me, I can already imagine the wealth within the space ring!¡± Bandit leader Tuca cawed weirdly in excitement. He raised the broad, double-edged battle axe in his hands and stared greedily at the space ring on Han Shuo¡¯s finger.

    ¡°Dong... Dong dong...¡±

    Just as the bandit underlings were about to tear Han Shuo to shreds, the sound of dull footsteps suddenly rang out.

    ¡°What¡¯s that?!¡± Laxie¡¯s messy eyebrows tensed, bing two irregr triangles as he looked around and asked loudly.

    The underlings had been about to make a move, but looked around in confusion when they heard Laxie¡¯s shout.

    ¡°Dong... Dong dong... Dong dong dong...¡±

    As the dull footsteps neared, several branches with sparse leaves began to shake, notifying these third rate bandits that even the ground was slightly shaking. However, even if they had a torch, the distance that the torch could illuminate was still very limited on this pitch dark night. This was why the bandits could only hear increasingly loud footsteps drawing closer to them, but they were unable to see what it was no matter how hard they looked around.

    ¡°That, my friends, is the sound that the metal hooves of the fire-spurting steeds of the evil knights make. Everyone, no need to look around, you¡¯re all doomed!¡± Han Shuo suddenly exined with a smile in the midst of being surrounded by the bandits.

    ¡°Damn it, he already summoned his undead creatures! Kill him immediately! As long as he dies, the undead creatures won¡¯t be too much if a threat without his orders!¡± The light adept mage, who had been hired by the bandits with a lot of gold, quickly eximed as he lost his calm.

    The bandit leaders were frightened and unsure of what to do. They all yelled at their underling loudly when they heard the light adept mage¡¯s shout, ¡°You idiots, kill him quickly!¡±

    The underlings swung back into action when they heard their leaders give them the same order to kill. They brandished the weapons in their hands and charged Han Shuo, trying to kill him before the undead creatures arrived.

    Whoosh whoosh whoosh!

    Under the flickering red light of the torches, long, thin, ck bone spears shot of from Han Shuo. These bone spears flew out with extreme speed and were like rays of life-reaping ck light. The unending bone spears actually seemed to be connected to each together, causing Han Shuo to look like a strange, ck peacock with its tail fully opened.

    ¡°Ah.. Ahhhh....¡±

    The bandits, who¡¯d charged over, let out a dense series of terrible howls, sounding like firecrackers. When Han Shuo opened his ¡°tail¡±, the bone spears either easily pierced their armor, which was only worth several silver coins anyways, or prated deep into the gaps between their bones or guts, sending blood flying everywhere.

    The bone spears didn¡¯t diminish in power as they pierced the bandits¡¯ bodies. They had enough momentum to even string up the bandit behind the first one, making this sort of tremendous impact truly terrifying.

    In the blink of an eye, the roughly thirty bandits that had charged forward had all been fatally pierced by the bone spears amidst their terrible wails. The blood covering the ground became strangely beautiful under the illumination of the torches that had fallen to the ground. The dense smell of blood instantly spread into the noses and mouths of the bandit leaders.

    ¡°Not-Not good!¡± Laxie¡¯s lust was gradually extinguished by the bone-piercing cold as he saw Han Shuo slowly rise from the mounds of corpses and blood. An intense me of fear incinerated everything in his mind.

    ¡°Dong dong...¡±

    The dull footsteps pounded on the hearts of every single bandit like beating drums. The ¡°things¡± that they had only heard but couldn¡¯t see, now appeared behind them one by one. These ¡°things¡± did not have eyes. Instead, their sockets were filled with flickering mes. Under the illumination of their burning eyes, enormous figures gradually appeared from the darkness.

    Tuca¡¯s lips suddenly became strangely dry. He couldn¡¯t even speak smoothly as he muttered softly, ¡°Everyone. T-those are Evil Knights, run!¡±

    The hands of the two light mages trembled as they held their staffs. They had been hired with a lot of gold. However, purifying light magic at their current level of strength was truly limited. What¡¯s more, there were actually more than ten evil knights in front of them. Thanks to the blurry light, their sharp eyesight could see many more shadows behind the evil knights.

    These bandits had indeed heard of the rumors that Han Shuo had obliterated the bandit Troda and others at the foot of Mount Tali. However, they¡¯d thought that it had been done by the many soldiers of Brettel City, as well as Fulkin¡¯s mountain people.

    There was no way that they would have factored the appearance of an archmage necromancer with mental strength on par with a grand magus, as well as a bone staff that doubled the number of summoned undead creatures. Just how many could Han Shuo summon?

    ¡°Sorry, we don¡¯t want the wages anymore!¡± The light adept mage turned around and looked towards Dorcas, then said to the other light journeyman mage, ¡°Give them back the gold coins!¡±

    The two light mages poured out roughly a thousand gold coins from their money bags. The adept mage bowed slightly towards Han Shuo in the distance and said in fearful yet respectful tone, ¡°This doesn¡¯t have much to do with us. Please allow us to leave.¡±

    ¡°You two despicable mages! How dare you actually run away first! I¡¯ll kill you myself!¡± Dorcas¡¯ bandit leader roared and then charged at the two light mages who wanted to retreat.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know why, but I¡¯m starting to dislike light mages more and more. Also, I really hate your actions of defecting at thest minute, I think it¡¯s better if you stayed,¡± Han Shuo gazed coldly at the two mages, who only knew how to save their own skin very well, and responded inly.

    Due to the wave of dense bone spears, none of the bandits dared to draw near to Han Shuo. All of them stayed as far away from Han Shuo as they could. However, there was still arge number of undead creatures behind them, so they were still dead no matter how they looked at it.

    ¡°Pierce!¡±

    A bandit right next to an evil knight was pierced through by the evil knight¡¯s enormous bone spear and hoisted up high. The ughter began the moment this bandit¡¯s corpse hit the floor. The ten evil knights slowly drowned the bandits with endless death along with the roughly thousand different undead creatures.

    The night was as dark as ink. The torches began to extinguish as the bandits were killed one by one, and the darkness of the night gradually affected the bandits¡¯ vision. However, the undead creatures were like fish in water during the night. They silently ughtered everything in front of them, not knowing what mercy was.

    Dorcas had also revealed a terrified expression when all sorts of terrible howls started ringing out, standing out for his peculiarities as he held the torch amongst the crowd of people. Evil knights and zombies walked past him, as if they didn¡¯t know that there was a delicious human body standing beside them. He didn¡¯t seem to exist to them as they only ughtered the living around him.

    When the stark straight Dorcas noticed that none of the undead creatures attacked him, the fear in his heart gradually resided. Due to the treachery of the bandit leaders earlier, even though Dorcas had originally been theirrade, he felt a hint of joy as he watched them die.

    ¡°Good riddance, good riddance, that scum should have been dealt with ages ago.¡± Dorcas muttered to himself as he looked at the bloody ughter with indifference.

    The two light mages were the first to receive the brunt of the bandits¡¯ attack after Han Shuo¡¯s merciless refusal. The two light mages, who¡¯d originally been able to threaten the undead creatures a bit, nearly drowned in the furious attacks of the bandits. After the bandits had done away with the light mages, they were then consumed by a wave of undead creatures. As time passed in the pitch dark night, the terrible, unending screams gradually came to a halt.

    After a while, only Dorcas, holding a torch with an indifferent expression, was left. There was also a ground covered in corpses apart from him, as well as a few ghouls munching on the corpses.

    ¡°That was a bit gory, but I hope you don¡¯t mind.¡± Han Shuo floated towards Dorcas with a smile. He didn¡¯t seem gentle at all as he smiled amidst a ground full of corpses. Instead, there was another sort of terror and sinister atmosphere about him. The fact that the ghouls feeding on the ground all left Dorcas¡¯ side when Han Shuo neared only emphasized that all of this horror had resulted from this young man with a strange and evil smile.

    Dorcas took in a deep breath and forcefully stopped himself from vomiting. He ced his focus on Han Shuo in an attempt to soften the hideous scene painted around him. ¡°What do you want?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, I know some things about you, and I can also understanding the endless anger in your heart. I want to give you a chance. A chance to release your vengeance,¡± Han Shuo offered this extremely alluring suggestion with a smile.

    This wasn¡¯t something that anyone could bestow on him!

    Before Han Shuo disyed the savageness of ughtering all of the bandits, Dorcas wouldn¡¯t have thought that the lord of Brettel City, someone who¡¯d found it hard to keep himself safe, could give him any sort of chance.

    However, Dorcas now had reason to believe that, as long as Han Shuo was willing, the revenge that had seemed impossible to take was nothing difficult in front of this man as savage as a demon.

    Due to this, Dorcas only hesitated for a moment before nodding, ¡°As long as you can take revenge for me, I can do anything for you.¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head and said slowly with a smile, ¡°It¡¯s not that I will take revenge for you, it¡¯s you who will take revenge for yourself!¡±

    When Dorcas frowned, Han Shuo exined with a smile, ¡°I will give you the chance to take revenge with your own hands. With your talent, the two families will be dancing in the palm of your hand sooner orter. Hehe, isn¡¯t torturing them to death bit by bit with your own hands much better than letting someone else kill them?¡±

    The girl that had fallen in love with Dorcas had now be his enemy¡¯s ything. Due to the girl¡¯s rtionship with Dorcas, her fiance treated her savagely. The pitiful girl waspletely helpless as she washed her face with tears everyday.

    Although the girl¡¯s family was unhappy about this, there was nothing nothing they could do about it as their daughter was already married. What¡¯s more, her husband¡¯s family was of a higher position, so her father could only me all of it on Dorcas. He did not hold back in his pursuit of Dorcas. It could only be said that Dorcas possessed great luck to be able to survive the chase for so long.

    The Dark Mantle knew about all this, but in the world where nobles ruled, even though themoner born Dorcas was shockingly talented in militaristic affairs, it was not enough to change these unwritten rules that had existed for several thousand years.

    The Dark Mantle would only kill the nobles that had betrayed the empire. However, nobles asionally bullying a few peasants wasn¡¯t a huge matter. It was even more negligible if the bullied peasant didn¡¯t have any backing. The Dark Mantle had countless other things to do. They naturally would not waste their effort on minute matters like these. The fact that they had a note of this in their records was already due to Dorcas¡¯ strategic talent. Otherwise, there probably wouldn¡¯t even be a record of his name.

    ¡°I am a fugitive, how could I possibly use my power to kill my own enemies!¡± Dorcas was clearly moved by Han Shuo¡¯s suggestion. However, since Dorcas had shone with brilliance in the Imperial Academy, he was naturally not a fool. He looked at Han Shuo and asked after pondering for a while.

    ¡°Whether you are a fugitive in Brettel City or not is decided by me, the city lord! I know about your identity and hatred. The fact that I dare to ept you means that I am not afraid of your identity as a fugitive,¡± After saying this with a slight smile, Han Shuo raised a finger and pointed in the direction of the seven duchies, then said enticingly, ¡°Aside from intense hatred, I can also see arrogant ambition that cannot be concealed in your eyes. Brettel City is a hunting ground for the seven duchies. However, they are also a hunting ground for me. Are you willing to be a hunter like me?¡±

    Dorcas gazed deeply at Han Shuo. After a while, he prostrated himself towards Han Shuo without any regards to the blood on the ground and said solemnly, ¡°Sir Count, I am not a hunter, but I will be your hunting hound!¡±

 Chapter 329: Friends

    Chapter 329: Friends

    The day had yet to brightenpletely. In the soft purple and grey glow of dawn, the morning light slowly chased away the darkness in the sky as cool winds gently blew over. The golden sun slowly burst out with a thousand rays of splendor after a while.

    Upon their return to Brettel City, Han Shuo and Dorcas were surprised to find that Faulke and the knights had also just arrived. Han Shuo could see traces of battle from their bodies and even see that some had disappeared eternally.

    Dorcas rode on a thin, weak horse that had been taken from the bandits as he slowly followed Han Shuo back to Brettel City. Upon entering the city, the first things to greet his eyes were two mighty magic crystal cannons mounted on the city walls. Not only were the previously old broken down walls now shining brightly, their height had also increased. Looking at the city from a distance, Dorcas even felt that Brettel City had recovered a bit of its former prestige and magnificence.

    Nodding to himself, Dorcas turned back to look at Han Shuo, who was quickly entering the city with a slightly darkened expression on his face. Dorcas understood that for Brettel City to have changed like this, the credit entirely belonged to this new city lord.

    ¡°What happened? Did something happen again? Where are the merchants and the battle equipment?¡± Han Shuo was like a ghost drifting by. His cold shout, along with the cool winds of early morning, made the still fearful Faulke jump out of his skin.

    Hurriedly turning around to see that it was Han Shuo, Faulke heaved a sigh of relief. He hastily straightened his body and exined, ¡°Your Lordship, some small incidents urred on our way back. Our torches attracted the attention of many bandit groups, but luckily that area was near Mount Tali. Before the bandits could rush over, the mountain leader Fulkin came down to assist us. The merchants and battle equipment are still safe and sound, and only three knights died.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart slowly returned to its proper ce upon hearing that the merchants and equipment were all safe. He looked at Faulke with a faint nod and said in a softened tone, ¡°Arrange proper funerals for the knights who¡¯ve died. Our top mission is to exterminate all of the bandits in the surroundings before the seven grand duchies arrive.¡±

    ¡°Rest assured, Your Lordship. I, Faulke, swear to take revenge for our brothers!¡± Faulke¡¯s tone was determined as he took out his sword to point it towards the sky and solemnly make a vow.

    Dorcas rode the weak horse over to this side with clopping sounds. He¡¯d taken meticulous looks at the city¡¯s defensive measures, contemtion filled his eyes. When he arrived in front of Han Shuo, Dorcas looked at thetter with a measuring look before opening his mouth to propose, ¡°There were seventeen bandit groups between Brettel City and Seamist City. Taking away the five that you annihtedst night, there are still twelve left. The scales of these bandit groups aren¡¯t much, but they are as annoying as hateful flies. I think you should exterminate them first. Otherwise the safety of the merchants won¡¯t be guaranteedter.¡±

    ¡°Your Lordship, are all of those greedy bandits dead?¡± Faulke queried upon hearing Dorcas¡¯ words.

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo answered, ¡°That¡¯s right. All five bandit groups are finished. Mhm, let me introduce someone to you. This is Dorcas from the Imperial Academy of Strategy. Perhaps you¡¯ve heard about some of his past deeds. He will be yourrade from now on. No one is allowed to mention his identity as a fugitive in the future.¡±

    ¡°Yes, Your Lordship!¡± Faulke immediately replied, his eyes looking at Dorcas with a hint of admiration. He also didn¡¯t ask Han Shuo why Dorcas was joining Brettel City. It had been this person who¡¯d single-handedly nned the robbery and transaction. Dorcas had held the advantage from beginning to end and yed with their group in the palm of his hand. Even Han Shuo ultimately had to surrender the fifty thousand gold coins. The intellect of this person was indeed the real deal.

    ¡°Take out a thousand knights for Dorcas from the three thousand you¡¯re training. Dorcas will be the captain of that team!¡± Han Shuo gave Faulke an order before looking over to Dorcas, ¡°Dorcas, wipe out the remaining twelve bandit groups between Brettel City and Seamist City for me!¡±

    Dorcas dismounted from the weak warhorse and saluted Han Shuo with a standard military posture. He said crisply and neatly, ¡°Yes, Your Lordship!¡±

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo once again turned towards Faulke and said, ¡°The equipment for the city¡¯s defenses that have just arrived are for you to assemble in the appropriate positions.

    Do this well for me during this time, as well as keep an eye on other matters within the city. Prepare to deal with the attacks of the bandits and seven grand duchies at any moment.¡±

    ¡°Rest assured, Your Lordship. With this defensive equipment, I will make sure that anyone who dares toe and pige Brettel City pay with their blood.¡± Faulke promise.

    ¡°Mm. Right, what arrangements did you make for the merchants?¡± Han Shuo asked Faulke, suddenly remembering that he hadn¡¯t seen little fatty Jack in a long time, and also Fabian as well.

    ¡°I¡¯ve arranged ces for them in the city lord¡¯s mansion. Your Lordship¡¯s mansion is quiterge and is currently the safest ce in Brettel City, so I have arranged for the honored merchants to be located there.¡± Faulke answered.

    ¡°Well done. I won¡¯t pursue your negligence any longer. Dorcas is a new addition to Brettel City, so help him familiarize himself with the city. Also, ce a thousand soldiers under hismand.¡± Han Shuo gave his orders. He nodded towards Dorcas before leaving the city gates.

    Han Shuo appeared in the city lord¡¯s mansion after a short while. More than ten merchants had been settled in. These merchants had fallen into a deep sleep, like dead pigs after the big fright. One or two of them asionally whimpered in their nightmares, their bodies drenching in cold sweat.

    Little Jack of the Boozt Merchant Guild was tightly hugging a pillow, the corner of his mouth dripping with saliva in his sleep. Han Shuo soundlessly walked in front of him. He revealed a knowing smile upon seeing Jack¡¯s ugly sleeping posture.

    Back in the necromancy department at the Babylon Academy, Han Shuo recalled how he and little fatty Jack had swept the ground quickly with brooms. He also remembered when his body had still been weak and his magical cultivation still hadn¡¯t taken shape, this little fatty had stolen ck bread to feed him. Han Shuo even recalled the time that he fought with other necromancy students...

    Separated for more than two years, little fatty Jack actually hadn¡¯t changed too much, he was still ever so simple and honest. However, his body was bing increasingly fatter. It was Han Shuo himself who¡¯d changed the most. During these past two years, Han Shuo had grown from an errand boy to the point where no one dared to look down on him, be it his intelligence or his strength.

    Having experienced one dangerous battle after another, Han Shuo¡¯s body, mental strength, and magical yuan had developed rapidly. He¡¯d made breakthroughs again and again, many times with his life on the line. And now, he held the titles of count and city lord. As for this little fatty who lusted after food and wealth all day, he was still an ountant for the Boozt Merchant Guild.

    ¡°This brat will keep eating and drinking well in the Boozt Merchant Guild and won¡¯t have to meet with any danger. Phoebe gives me face and takes special care of him. Although his days aren¡¯t as interesting, they¡¯re very peaceful!¡± Han Shuo smiled and murmured as he looked at the drooling, sleeping fatty.

    Not waking up little fatty Jack from his deep sleep, Han Shuo stood outside the window to look at him for a while. He then turned to leave, intending to chatter after he woke up.

    Han Shuo had just taken a few steps when he heard a sudden, loud cry from inside Fabian¡¯s room. He hastily walked into Fabian¡¯s room and found thetter sitting up on the bed, drenched with sweat and a look of fear still lingering on his face. It turned out that he¡¯d had a terrifying nightmare.

    Seeing Han Shuo suddenlye in, the newly jolted awake Fabian cried out once again. Only when he discovered that the person who¡¯de was Han Shuo, did Fabian shut his mouth. He turned to give Han Shuo an ugly smile before saying with a somewhat embarrassed expression, ¡°These past several years with the young miss have been all too peaceful. After encountering such a dangerous incident once again, I¡¯ve discovered that I¡¯m bing more and more afraid of death. Maybe I¡¯ve gotten too old now. I can no longer tolerate dangerous adventures like I used to. I just want to continue my life with quiet, peaceful days!¡±

    Hearing Fabian say so, Han Shuo recalled the first time they met and revealed a rxed smile. He found himself a chair and sat down, before saying to Fabian, ¡°Such is life. If you want more wealth and a more prominent position, you have to put in more effort and handle greater danger. Heh, it was my carelessness that caused you guys to encounter this kind of incident this time. Fortunately everyone came out unscathed, otherwise I really wouldn¡¯t be able to forgive myself!¡±

    Among these people, the merchants had alle here because of the benefits that Han Shuo promised them, apart from Fabian and Jack. If these people died, Han Shuo would only feel pity and immediately find a way to make it up for their guilds, lest their guilds lose their confidence in him.

    But for Fabian and Jack, Han Shuo truly cared for them, especially Jack. Jack had been Han Shuo¡¯s best friend since when he was still a nobody with nothing. If Jack died because of his carelessness, Han Shuo would never forgive himself. He¡¯d might even me himself to the point of breaking down in the short run.

    Fabian looked at the young man who was over one meter ny centimeters tall standing before him. He inwardly tried to ovep this person with that thin, weak figure that he¡¯d met for the first time in the Dark Forest. Fabian discovered that he couldn¡¯t do so no matter how hard he tried just based on the change in body size alone.

    Time could change everything, so Fabian couldn¡¯t help but feel emotional. The older he became, the more timid he grew. However, Han Shuo was the opposite. He¡¯d developed from a youngster to a young man whom no one dared to underestimate.

    Han Shuo¡¯s power had be increasingly stronger as he slowly revealed himself to be a striking figure in the upper echelons of society. For His Majesty the King to allow Han Shuo to take up the mess that was Brettel City, it absolutely wasn¡¯t a poor posting that those unaware were gossiping about. It was actually the tempering for an invincible sword. Fabian looked at the young man in front of him, the look in his eyes deepening as he was unable to understand thetter¡¯s inner thoughts. A sh of inspiration suddenly struck him.

    ¡°This is the letter that young Miss Phoebe asked me to personally hand to you.¡± Fabian took out an envelope emitting a faint fragrance with a rose printed on it. He respectfully ced it in Han Shuo¡¯s hand.

    ¡°Alright, old Fabian. You continue to rest. I still need to console the frightened merchants after they wake up! Many industries in Brettle City are awaiting investment. Cooperation with other major merchant guilds will certainly be more intimate from now on. Apart from the current, urgent shortage of weapons and equipment, I also need a steady stream of food and pharmaceuticals. I will be depending on you for all of this.¡± Han Shuo put away the fragrant letter before saying to Fabian with a smile.

    ¡°Hehe, with the rtionship between you and young Miss Phoebe, the Boozt Merchant Guild will definitely give you our full support.¡± Fabian also understood the two¡¯s rtionship. He winked at Han Shuo and spoke humorously with a meaningful smile.

    ¡°Of course, I won¡¯t treat the Boozt Merchant Guild badly either. Eh, your leader Phoebe included!¡± Han Shuo said smilingly, his face delighted as he left Fabian¡¯s room. The open door closed slowly by a wave of force after he left.

    ¡°He is getting more and more powerful. Young Miss Phoebe is indeed a true businesswoman. She knew to invest in him before he even aplished his great deeds. It seems the Boozt Merchant Guild will definitely bloom and usher in a new era of glory in the hands of young miss!¡± Fabian whispered thoughtfully to himself as he watched the door close automatically without wind.

    ¡°Phoebe, ah Phoebe, I¡¯ve received your love!¡± In his room, Han Shuo murmured to himself with a cute smile after reading the fragrant letter.

    Brettle City had been bathing in a happy, joyous atmosphere three dayster. The center of the city lord¡¯s mansion was filled with the sounds of chatter andughter.

    The Food Festival wasn¡¯t considered a big festival in the Lancelot Empire. However, Han Shuo was cing great importance on this festival because the merchants had arrived safely. Moreover, he wanted to use them to send some messages.

    Rows of tables, that were over ten meters long, were set up in front of the city lord¡¯s mansion. Various fine snacks and deliciously aromatic, steaming hot meals came out in turns from the wide open gates of the city lord¡¯s mansion. Any civilian in Brettel City was free to enjoy this food to their heart¡¯s content.

    The civiliansing because of the news took only ten seconds to get past their initial doubts, bing deliriously happy instead. Knights in shining armor maintained order with a polite, refined manner and smiles on their faces.

    Exquisite food had been arranged on a luxurious, round sandalwood table inside the city lord¡¯s mansion. Dick had prepared for the merchants who¡¯d escaped death. Fabian, on the other hand, seemed to be a co-host as he helped Han Shuo entertain the guests who came from distant areas. He ced gold coins directly in their hands for the war chariots and equipment that they¡¯d transported.

    The merchants¡¯ grins grew even wider after they¡¯d received their payment, ceaselessly showering praises upon Han Shuo, who was sporting a refined smile. They dered that this business was just the beginning of a great partnership, and that whatever Han Shuo needed would be delivered in an endless stream.

    ¡°Ladies and gentlemen, everyone...¡± Han Shuo picked up his ss of fine red wine, his voice resounding loudly throughout the entire audience. The profit seeking merchants were currently overjoyed as they received their payment. Everyone immediately stopped their noisy chattering and smiled as they looked up to see Han Shuo¡¯s dashing figure, waiting for him to continue his speech.

    When the hubbub had quieted down, Han Shuo said with a slight smile, ¡°Ladies and gentlemen, this transaction is just the beginning. Brettel City needs a steady stream of goods and resources. The harvest from the mines of the surrounding mountains is also priceless. From now on you will definitely be able to obtain more wealth in this city.¡±

    Pausing for a bit, Han Shuo¡¯s smile disappeared as he raised his voice to speak gravely, ¡°As a city that had been trampled on by bandits and foreign countries for too many years, Brettel City has been through too much hardship and pain. No other city has been through so much agony and humiliation like this city in the Lancelot Empire.¡±

    ¡°His Majesty bestowed upon me Brettel City. I epted it with a heavy heart and the mission to bring back its prosperity. However, my power alone is limited, but I will create good conditions that are favorable for you, so that you can obtain what you need in Brettel City.¡±

    The merchants weren¡¯t stingy with apuse that didn¡¯t cost the anything. After the rain of apuse, the not-too-luxurious banquet continued.

    Little fatty Jack and Fabian walked over to Han Shuo. Jack looked up at the tall, imposing Han Shuo and said, ¡°Bryan, I don¡¯t want to stay at Ossen City anymore. It¡¯s so boring. Let me stay in Brettel City, I can help you.¡±

    Han Shuo was surprised. He subconsciously raised his ss to clink with Jack¡¯s for a toast. After finishing the ss of fine wine, he spoke unhurriedly after some hesitation, ¡°Jack, only the two of us know how deep our rtionship goes. It¡¯s not that I don¡¯t want you to stay here, but this is a very dangerous ce. You will be in constant, life threatening danger. As a friend, I advise you to remain at the Boozt Merchant Guild. That way, at least you will always be safe.¡±

    Jack shook his head, theyers of fat on his face also shaking. He turned to look at the shocked Fabian by his side and said, ¡°The Boozt Merchant Guild is too peaceful. I¡¯m still too young. I¡¯m very grateful to young Miss Phoebe and you for always taking care of me, but Jessica has said that the one she likes must be an experienced knight or a noble. I feel that no matter how much I try, young Miss Phoebe can¡¯t make me a knight or a noble, but maybe you can, Bryan.¡±

    Han Shuo was speechless. He hadn¡¯t expected that because of ady, the always timid, cowardly little fatty Jack could also grow to possess this dangerous item called ¡°ambition¡±.

 Chapter 330: Preparing for war

    Chapter 330: Preparing for war

    ¡°Jack, are you truly prepared to face the dangers that are toe?¡± Fabian asked Jack after he let out a long sigh. He could see the same prideful and fearless spirit that he used to have emanating from Jack

    Nodding heavily, Jack said stubbornly, ¡°Yes, I¡¯ve made up my mind.¡±

    Seeing that Jack was insistent, Fabian shook his head and didn¡¯t say anything more. He understood in his heart that Jack had finally grown up. Maybe some tempering at Jack¡¯s age wasn¡¯t a bad thing. Not to mention that Fabian knew that Han Shuo would definitely take good care of Jack and never allow his friend to get hurt.

    Fabian¡¯s silence meant that he was no longer opposed to the idea. Jack then turned towards Han Shuo, eyes full of expectation. Han Shuo, half a head taller than Jack, stood in front of him and patted him on the shoulder. He said sincerely, ¡°Don¡¯t rush such a decision for now. Stay in Brettel City for a few days. Let me know after you¡¯ve thought things through clearly.¡±

    Brettel City wouldn¡¯t be quite so peaceful over the next few days. Maybe when Jack saw the cruel realities of war for himself, he¡¯d automatically drop this idea, Han Shuo thought to himself.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t continue to talk with Jack about this topic anymore. However, he was rather interested in Jack¡¯s favored girl, Jessica, and he asked all sorts of things about her.

    ording to Jack¡¯s stammering answers, Han Shuo gained an understanding that the girl named Jessica was the daughter of a small noble. Her father had done some business with the Boozt Merchant Guild and had gotten to know Jack as he¡¯d often visited Boozt. At the moment, Jack¡¯s love was one-sided. He was a mere ountant of the merchant guild, so he naturally couldn¡¯t attract the attention of the noble¡¯s daughter. Not to mention Jack¡¯s chubby body garnered no advantages in his favor.

    Jack had also found out about Jessica¡¯s ideal man by use of sly methods to extract this information. In the Profound Continent, where aristocracy dominated, even Phoebe, the owner of the Boozt Merchant Guild, wasn¡¯t epted by the upper ss. How could Jack, a small ountant, be epted then?

    Therefore, Jack now hoped that Han Shuo would help him due to his fanatical love for Jessica and possibly his truly motivated mindset.

    The joyous atmospherested throughout the banquet, the guests feeling very much at home. Outside of the city lord¡¯s mansion, the civilians, who¡¯d heard the news, were reluctant to disperse and kept oning. The temptation of free food had exceeded Han Shuo¡¯s imagination. The hired servants were busy all day, but still couldn¡¯t manage to keep up. This situation dragged on until the sun set behind the mountains and the veil of night was about to shroud the earth. Only upon the knights¡¯ friendly persuasion did the crowd of civilians finally disperse.

    The previous night had been without a moon. It was conspicuously bright tonight, as if the moon were making up for yesterday¡¯s day off. Standing in the highest bell tower of the city lord¡¯s mansion, Han Shuo looked over Brettel City, bathed in moonlight. Brettel City was vast as it covered an enormous area. Houses upied every stretch ofnd all the way to the city gates in four directions, absolutely able to amodate millions of inhabitants.

    Brettel City had originally been built as a military base from which to attack the seven great duchies. Brettel City was still standing proud even after much vicissitudes and humiliation. Had it not suffered the severe retaliation of the seven great duchies after many failed attempts at conquering them, Brettel City would likely be one of the strongest cities in the Lancelot Empire

    A great deal of gold coins had been poured into the renovation of Brettel City. Han Shuo hadn¡¯t held back on the heightening and enhancement of the city walls. In addition to the six terrifyingly powerful magic crystal cannons, many war chariots and stone-throwing catapults now filled the originally empty posts along the wall. Various equipment of great firepower had been assembled.

    Brettel City had just begun to reveal its fangs starting at an unknown time, like the ferocious, giant war machine it was. After investing millions of gold coins, it was ready to crush all of those arrogant, ambitious invaders that dared toe at a moment¡¯s notice.

    A brigade of a thousand people gradually made their way back from the direction of Seamist City. This soldier brigade belonged to Dorcas. Their shining weapons and sturdy armor werepletely on a different levelpared to those ofst night. Each sword was worth at least three gold coins, and each set of armor and helmet was worth at least five gold coins as they were forged from the finest of steel.

    Moreover, each soldier was equipped with other sharp, dexterous weapons, such as daggers, worth over ten gold coins in value. However, there were soldiers who should have been knights but had temporarily been assigned to the infantry units due to ack of warhorses. Warhorses were a scarce resource even in the Lancelot Empire. In fact, the seven great duchies were experts in rearing horses. It was a pity that Han Shuo hadn¡¯t found a way to purchase from them.

    A thousand soldiers riding warhorses advanced orderly towards Brettel City under Dorcas¡¯ leadership. These people must have been through many battles, each looked remote with a subtle glint of madness in their eyes. Their armor and weapons had been polished clean, but the bloodstains on their clothes underneath were very obvious.

    From the highest point of the city lord¡¯s mansion, Han Shuo looked down from above at Dorcas for a while before whispering to himself in satisfaction, ¡°Three days, twelve bandit groups. Out of the thousand soldiers who¡¯d departed, nine hundred and sixty have returned safely. Only forty deaths. Quite a talent indeed!¡±

    Half an hourter, Dorcas had changed into a clean outfit and walked under the moonlight towards the city lord¡¯s mansion. Han Shuo received him in the living room.

    ¡°Dorcas, very well done. Have all twelve bandit groups beenpletely destroyed?¡± Han Shuo looked at the kneeling Dorcas and asked smilingly.

    Shaking his head, Dorcas looked up at Han Shuo and said, ¡°Sir Count, there are still over seven hundred that are still alive.¡±

    Han Shuo frowned, not yet allowing Dorcas to rise. His finger subconsciously tapped the armrest of his chair. He squinted at Dorcas, asking, ¡°Dorcas. You led a thousand soldiers out. With your methods, you wouldn¡¯t have allowed seven hundred bandits to escape, would you?¡±

    Dorcas looked up at Han Shuo, his expression unchanged as he replied, ¡°Sir Count, twelve bandit groups werepletely destroyed, all of the obstacles between Seamist and Brettel City have been cleared. Only, your humble servant doesn¡¯t think that blind killing is a good way. The crimes of those seven hundred bandits aren¡¯t enough to condemn them to death. They were only helpless and forced tomit crimes to survive.¡±

    ¡°This servant feels that if your Lordship wants Brettel City to develop as fast as possible, appropriately soft policies are needed, apart from the weapon of wholesale ughter. The bandits are easy to tame. Once they experience some tempering, they will sincerely submit to you, my Lord. They will also be your fierce and loyal warriors.¡±

    Han Shuo was silent for a while after hearing Dorcas¡¯ words. He then looked at Dorcas, slowly nodding as he said, ¡°Dorcas, your words aren¡¯t wrong. I indeed hadn¡¯t considered it carefully. Mhm. If so, then you must have recruited all seven hundred of those bandits, but why don¡¯t I see them?¡±

    Nodding his head, Dorcas was still kneeling on one knee as he hadn¡¯t received an order to rise. He said respectfully, ¡°That is right. Seven hundred forty two bandits have all submitted and are cleaning up the battlefield as per my order. My Lord, the rotting corpses of refugees are everywhere along the road from Seamist City to Brettel City. This kind of situation is very detrimental to the development of Brettel City, so I¡¯ve ordered the bandits to clean all of the eyesores from the roadside.¡±

    ¡°Very good, Dorcas, that¡¯s very thoughtful of you. Mm, right, all of your people havee back. Aren¡¯t you afraid that those bandits will run away?¡± Han Shuo first praised the other before asking skeptically.

    ¡°My Lord, you may not know that the life of those bandits isn¡¯t any better than that of the refugees¡¯. I only promised to give them the same treatment as ordinary soldiers in Brettel City, and they agreed without hesitation.¡± Dorcas replied before pausing for a moment. He took out a big bundle, handing it over to Han Shuo with both hands as he said, ¡°A total of thirty-seven thousand gold coins were found after raiding the twelve bandit groups. There were also, silver, jade, and ores of about several thousands gold coins worth, which the soldiers are now transporting to the warehouse. As for some worthless weapons, I left them in their of a bandit group for now as they were too heavy while their value wasn¡¯t very high. I felt that there was no need to bring them back, so left them.¡±

    ¡°Good. Well done. You¡¯ve thought it out very well. Rise. I will record your aplishment of great merit. As long as you keep this up, you¡¯ll get what you want sooner orter !¡± Han Shuo looked deeply at Dorcas, saying, ¡°Brettel City is your stage. It seems that you are slowly adapting to your new position. Our Empire has sent the great armies to the seven duchies in the east, but couldn¡¯t dominate them. However, since we¡¯re already standing here, we must seize this chance at all costs to soar to new heights. We shall show those mediocre talents of the Empire, who couldn¡¯t do it, how we do it.¡±

    ¡°Your servant swears to follow you to the end, my Lord!¡± Dorcas let out a loud shout. He stood up straight before Han Shuo, like another invincible Demonyer Edge.

    ¡°Alright then, you are dismissed. The gold coins are temporarily in your care, consider them the capital for the armor and weapons of the seven hundred new recruits.¡± Han Shuo signaled Dorcas¡¯ dismissal. After thetter left, Han Shuo fell into silence, musing over Dorcas¡¯ words about tempting the bandits. He felt that there was indeed some truth to his words.

    Two dayster, early in the morning.

    Dick hurriedly came to see Han Shuo with a report, ¡°My Lord, severalrge bandit groups of the same size as Troda¡¯s group are gathering in a forest over six miles away from Brettel City. I have received this information from a Dark Mantle member conducting a mission in one of the duchies. I heard that these bandit groups have a total of fifteen thousand people, all are prepared to rush over and furiously pige our city.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s about time they came!¡± Han Shuo coldly snorted then said, ¡°Send some people to keep tabs on their whereabouts. Fifteen thousand bandits? This will be the first real challenge for Brettel City to face!¡±

    ¡°My Lord, do you want to notify the chiefs of the mountain people? It¡¯s too dangerous this time with just the three thousand soldiers guarding Brettel City. The mountain people might be able to help us!¡± Dick proposed.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo said, ¡°Not for now. This is a test for us. The results of this battle will determine if I can make them dance to my tune in the future. Humph! Even though we only have a little over three thousand soldiers, the walls of Brettel City are no longer tattered like they were before. I¡¯ve spent so many gold coins on Brettel City! Do they think it¡¯s that easy to break?¡±

    Han Shuo dared to say so because he was quite confident. The soldiers could hide on the high city walls and wait at ease for the enemies to exhaust themselves, while using their new equipment such as the great war chariots, fire and stone-throwing catapults to attack downwards. The six magic crystal cannons were no decorations either. In the worst case, Han Shuo could also summon the great undead army to join the fray. He believed that it absolutely wouldn¡¯t be that easy for fifteen thousand bandits to break into the current Brettel City.

    The entire Brettel City had unknowingly gone on high alert. Groups of soldiers dragged massive rocks through the streets. However, the war chariots and huge magic crystal cannons that the citizens had grown used to seeing everyday became tightly covered under gray cloth for an unknown reason, as if afraid of being discovered.

    The originally indifferent civilians gradually became more interested in this new city lord. In addition to the bandits being annihted at Mount Tali, there was also news of the obliteration of a dozen bandit groups between Seamist City and Brettel City that¡¯d been deliberately spread throughout the city.

    Moreover, an endless stream food had been distributed to them from the city lord¡¯s mansion on the Food Festival yesterday. For once, the civilians had been treated to a fine filling meal. Their confidence towards the city gradually increased.

    However, they were used to the city lords betraying them at critical moments. As the real crisis had yet to arrive, it was still unknown whether this new city lord was worthy of their trust. Therefore, the civilians had yet to sympathize with the new city lord. They only quietly observed the changes in Brettel City with eyes withholding.

    After one more day, the four gates of Brettel City were all shut tightly. Merchants or civilians, all were forbidden from leaving. From time to time, soldiers would appear at the four gates to swept their vignt eyes across the scene outside. Several small teams of knights on warhorses rode tirelessly around the city.

    Even though the knights didn¡¯t say anything, the citizens of Brettel City had been through too many painful wars. They smelled a familiar scent in the air.

    War wasing!

 Chapter 331: So what if I tricked you!

    Chapter 331: So what if I tricked you!

    Bandits from the fourrge bandit groups had gathered on the ins six miles away from Brettel City, and were slowly making their way towards the city.

    These bandit groups were vastly different from the small bandit groups that hid between Brettel City and Seamist City. Among these groups, the smallest, the Bloodtooth Bandits, had more than two thousand people. Thergest Greenfire Bandits had more than six thousand people, and was double the size of the city guard of Brettel City by itself.

    Theserge bandit groups were the same as the Redbeard Bandits, a harbinger of disaster that frequently visited and looted the seven duchies, spelling doom for every city they descended upon. Wherever they went within the seven duchies, the cities that were robbed were swept clean. As the seven duchies were constantly warring with each other and there were many mountains and hills to hide in around the seven duchies, these bandits were like fish in water, bing parasites that were thoroughly hated by the seven duchies.

    In contrast to the typical bandit groups, these bandits were well-equipped. Some former military officers from the seven duchies were actually amongst them. They decided to bring their men out to the ins when they¡¯d run afoul of the nobility in their own duchy or hadmitted some dire crime.

    These people had military backgrounds. Although they had be bandits, their discipline andbat knowledge had not decreased one bit. After bing bandits, they used the wealth and equipment that they plundered for soldiers and warhorses. This resulted in their equipment andbat strength being on par with the official armies of the seven duchies.

    This time around, the four bandit groups heading towards Brettel City were the Greenfire Bandits, the Battleaxe Bandits, the Flying Dragon Bandits, and the Bloodtooth Bandits. The Battleaxe Bandits and the Flying Dragon Bandits had four thousand and three thousand men respectively. They had excellent equipment and were experienced and bloodthirsty people.

    Currently, the leaders of the four bandit groups was walking in the center of his troops, still discussing the ns for their attack on Brettel City.

    ¡°Does Brettel City really have the wealth that you mentioned? I visited the city just half a year ago. Apart from stones, there weren¡¯t any other valuables. The brothers who made the trip with me didn¡¯t gain anything!¡± Bloodtooth¡¯s leader Lance asked skeptically.

    Lance had only joined this time because the other three had personally invited him. He had nned on piging a small town in the Helon Duchy. If he hadn¡¯t understood that the other three were even greedier than him, Lance definitely wouldn¡¯t have agreed to join them on this raid of Brettel City.

    ¡°Brettel City is different from before. The new city lord is said to be extremely wealthy. The magic cannons owned by the Helon Duchy sissies were seized. There are rumors that Helen Tina was even raped by the city lord. Damn it, that wench Helen Tina is one of the well known beauties in the seven duchies and is also grand duke. Who would have thought that she would actually be sullied by the new city lord!¡± Leader Bynam of the Battleaxe Bandits was a brute that stood over two meters tall. He had an enormous battle axe strapped on his back that was a meter and fifty centimeters long. What exposed skin could be seen showed that he was as hairy as an orc.

    ¡°Lance, I¡¯ve received definitive information that Brettel City is definitely different from before. Just the six magic cannons alone are already worth six hundred thousand gold. There¡¯s also the wealth of the governor and merchants. Brettel City currently has at least one million gold.¡± Greenfire¡¯s leader Faust exined to Lance.

    Faust had once been a high ranking officer of the Narsen Duchy, and had a decent reputation in the ever raging conflict between the seven duchies. However, he had been dismissed for wantonly ughtering captives in battle. When Faust received this news, he led his men and transitioned to being bandit mercenaries. By transitioning from a high ranking officer to a bandit, Faust was even more in his element, expanding the Greenfire Bandits to their current size of six thousand men, no longer restricted by anyone.

    Of the four bandit groups, Faust¡¯s Greenfire Bandits were not only thergest in number, but they were also the strongest inbat. After all, Faust had a military background and was extremely skilled in leading and training his men.

    Hearing Faust¡¯s exnation, the eyes of other bandit leaders, including the silent, malicious looking Flying Dragon Bandits¡¯ leader Afie, shone with greed. One million gold was arge amount in anyone¡¯s eyes. If even the dukes of the seven duchies knew of this, they would¡¯ve possiblye on the raid as well, not to mention these bandits!

    ¡°Faust is indeed formidable, haha! One million gold! They want to defend that only relying on Brettel City¡¯s defensive measures? We¡¯ve really struck it rich this time.¡± Battleaxe¡¯s Bynumughed loudly, as if imagining limitless gold coins raining down on him.

    Flying Dragon Bandit¡¯s Afie looked at Bynum in disdain. What an idiot. If Brettel City was so easy to conquer, why hasn¡¯t the equally brutal and greedy Faust already taken all the gold for himself? He¡¯d even kindly invited them to share the spoils.

    Of the four bandit leaders, although Faust was brutal, greedy, and had outstanding military strategy, he wasn¡¯t a ruthless or scheming person. On the other hand, Flying Dragon¡¯s Afie had the nickname of ¡°Vicious Dragon¡±, referring to his vicious personality and his tendency to use despicable, insidious tricks.

    When Faust mentioned the one million gold, Graves thought for a moment and secretly decided that he definitely shouldn¡¯t be the main offense after reaching Brettel City, at least not until after analyzing the situation. If not, he could easily lose all of his hard earned capital.

    With the temptation and desire for gold, the four bandit groups marched slowly towards Brettel City¡¯s city walls dressed in their respective colors.

    Tall and broad city walls stood before them, not a single hole could be seen on the repaired city walls. From the outside, Brettel City seemed to have a tight, sturdy defense.

    ¡°Wow. Brettel City has changed a lot, I remember when i was here previously, the city gate was riddled with holes. The walls weren¡¯t as high as they are now either. We could easily break into the city at that time. We definitely didn¡¯t encounter such a strong resistance. Looks like Brettel City is definitely different now.¡± Lance couldn¡¯t help but exim as he raised his head and gazed at Brettel City.

    ¡°Eh? Faust, where are the magic cannons you mentioned?¡± Battleaxe¡¯s leader Bynum firmly remembered the cannons were worth six hundred thousand gold. He wasn¡¯t fazed by the destructive power of the cannons. Instead, he was pondering how to exchange the magic cannons for glittering gold coins after obtaining them. Bynum felt a delightful sense of satisfaction every time he imagined being drowned in gold.

    Faus was riding on a tall warhorse and didn¡¯t immediately respond to Bynum¡¯s question. Instead, he started ordering the Greenfire bandits to line up in formation, preparing to engage in battle at any moment. Only when the Greenfire bandits were in formation did Faust gaze at the city walls, realizing that there really seemed to be no magic cannons on top of the city walls.

    Frowning as he thought for a moment, Faust replied, ¡°The magic cannons are definitely in Brettel City. Just keep focusing on that. Brettel City has four city walls, our four groups will each take one city gate. Follow our previous arrangement. Once you see my signal, we will all attack Brettel City together.¡±

    ¡°Brettel City¡¯s city guard only has three thousand soldiers. A city gate will at most have a thousand soldiers defending it. You have all heard of theirbat strength. As long as you spread your troops out when attacking, the magic cannons would not be able to deal a heavy blow. Also, the magic cannons need to be reloaded with magic ores. There is also a dy after every cannon st. They could possibly becking in magic ores as well, therefore, there is no need to fear them.¡±

    ¡°Our four sides only need to break through one of the walls. Brettel City will be ours based on our strength. There might be a few casualties this time around. However, think about the one million gold, the glittering gold that is piled up in the governor¡¯s mansion. It¡¯s impossible to obtain that without any sacrifice.¡±

    Bynum rubbed his hands and said excitedly, ¡°I¡¯m itching to begin!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s good. Leave the main gate to us. The three of you decide amongst yourselves who to attack which gate. ¡¯ll send the signal to begin the attack in two hours. Whoever first breaks into the city will get 40% of the gold.¡± Faust said with a low voice.

    This was the n that was previously agreed on, everyone had no objections. Hence, the other three bandit groups left in their respective directions after a short discussion. On the way to their selected city gate, ¡°Vicious Dragon¡± Afie ordered his men, ¡°Take note of the other three city gates. You are to immediately send a signal to me when any of them has broken through.¡±

    ¡°Rx boss, we all know what needs to be done.¡± One of the bandits nodded, leaving stealthily with the rest of them. They had already known of their leader¡¯s sinister personality and were already used to such situations.

    Afie didn¡¯t want his Flying Dragon Bandits to actually test out how strong the Brettel City defenses were. Furthermore, Afie was afraid Faust had deliberately invited them to be cannon fodder. He was taking careful precautions against Faust in case Brettel City had any powerful artillery. In this way, Graves would still consider whether or not he needed to follow Faust¡¯s ns.

    The temptation of a million gold was indeed huge. However, Graves naturally would retreat without hesitation if he wouldn¡¯t be able to survive to enjoy it. He didn¡¯t care about Faust¡¯s arrangements. Only by preserving his own strength would there be more opportunities to gain wealth. If he recklessly squandered his capital, it definitely wouldn¡¯t be worth it.

    Han Shuo, Dorcas, Faulke, Dick, and the rest had just exited the city lord¡¯s mansion after a discussion in Brettel City. Han Shuo, Dorcas, and Faulke headed towards one of the city gates, while Dick, Chester and Fabian headed towards another city gate.

    The remaining yin demon floated around, eavesdropping on every conversation that the four bandit groups had. The weapons with heavy firepower on the high city walls were all temporarily hidden. The sparse soldiers on top of the city wall were only equipped with bows and crossbows, attentively watching the bandit groups that were a distance away.

    Of the four city gates, the main gate that Han Shuo went to had the fewest soldiers and weapons. There were only three hundred soldiers and not a single magic cannon located here. However, he had to face the Greenfire Bandits¡¯ six thousand members. The Greenfire Bandits were the strongest and were also the main force behind this attack.

    ¡°Bryan, do you feel confident?¡± Little Fatty Jack¡¯s voice trembled, a bit hesitantpared to normal as he looked at the dense mass of bandits in the distance.

    End of Part 1 of the chapter

    Jack hade over at Han Shuo¡¯s request. He had already told Jack before that, ¡°Join me in seeing this battle through. If you are willing to stay after the battle ends, I¡¯ll agree to appoint you as Brettel City¡¯s finance minister.¡±

    When Jack heard Han Shuo¡¯s words, he agreed without hesitation. However, as he currently stood on the tall, broad city walls, seeing the well-equipped, vicious-looking bandits, his heart quailed.

    ¡°Why, are you afraid?¡± Han Shuo chuckled as he poked fun at Jack.

    Valiantly puffing out his chest, Jack shouted as if reassuring himself more rather than answering the question, ¡°What¡¯s there to be afraid of?! I¡¯m just a little nervous since this is my first time. Not to mention, even if I stay in Brettel City, I will only be a finance minister. It¡¯s not like I need to go to battle. What should I be afraid of?¡±

    ¡°Very good, if you are able to continue watching to the end of the battle, still have just as strong a resolve then, I guarantee you will be able to win over that noble girl Jessica.¡± Han Shuoughed as he spoke.

    Once he heard Han Shuo mention Jessica, Little Fatty Jack¡¯s eyes became a little downcast, but was immediately reced by a look of determination. Nodding his head gravely, Jack clenched his fist while looking at Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan, although I can¡¯t be a knight, I can definitely still be a noble!¡±

    Smiling slightly without reply, Han Shuo observed the Greenfire Bandits in the distance. They were currently using simple wooden frames to form a tall wooden tower, ten mages of various aptitudes were slowly climbing up the tower with the aid of the other bandits.

    The strongest of the mages was a lightning archmage. The rest were all minor mages from other majors. The rarity of mages made them highly valued in any country throughout the continent. Their value differed ordingly based on the difference in strength. It was said that the Greenfire Bandits kidnapped the lightning archmage¡¯s family and was threatening him with his family¡¯s lives. If not, no archmage would be willing to be a lowly bandit¡¯s aplice.

    The equipment of the mages on the wooden tower were rather umon though. Not only were their magic robes exceptionally beautiful, they each held a valuable magic staffs. It looked like Faust had really invested quite a bit into them. That made sense, considering the impact mages had on a battle. If a bandit group boasted of a mage, their strength would naturally greatly increase. Furthermore, it was also a sign of status to a bandit leader for his troop to have a mage.

    The wooden tower was six hundred meters from Han Shuo, with some wheels at the bottom of the tower that could be pushed. A few bandits equipped with shields also climbed onto the tower, protecting the valuable mages from all directions so that they could unleash their magic without distraction. Once the battle truly started, the tower could be pushed nearer to the city wall by using the wheels. This would allow the mages to better rain their spells down onto Brettel City.

    Six hundred meters wasn¡¯t an unsurpassable distance to the Demonyer Edge wielding Han Shuo. Once the Demonyer Edge flew out, the mages that were six hundred meters away would definitely be caught off guard, either dying or suffering severe injuries. However, the battle had yet to begin. It wasn¡¯t wise for Han Shuo to unleash the Demonyer Edge at this moment. Hence, he only watched as theypleted the construction of the wooden tower, not acting rashly.

    Once the wooden tower was finished, the bandits also pushed out four repeater ballistae. These ballistae had a shooting range of around five hundred meters and could amazingly shoot six prative crossbow bolts in a single load. Han Shuo had also purchased twenty of these from the Boozt Merchant Guild this time, with six of them hidden on the city walls right at this very moment. Han Shuo was naturally familiar with the piercing abilities of these carts.

    ¡°Jack, when the battle begins, don¡¯t leave my side no matter what happens, and always stay within ten meters of me. I can guarantee your safety, but if you happen to be ten meters away, immediately lie down and climb within the city walls.¡± Han Shuo immediately turned towards little Fatty Jack when he realized that the bandits actually had crossbow carts, giving prudent instructions.

    Jack became nervous again when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s words and drew even closer. He was almost glued to Han Shuo¡¯s side, saying with a cracked voice, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll follow you wherever you go.¡±

    When the wooden tower and chariots were disyed, Faust haughtily steered his enormous warhorse forward, shouting loudly towards Han Shuo, ¡°Brettel City Lord Bryan, you know the reason why us brothers havee. My brothers have survived under poor living conditions and have recently run out of food. We will leave you and your Brettel City alone if you give us a million gold coins.¡±

    ¡°Pitiful Mr. Faust, I deeply sympathise with your group¡¯s misfortune. However, Brettel City¡¯s poverty is also well known. The people in my city arecking in food as well. I am really unable to bring out a million gold.¡± Han Shuo miserablymented with a twisted expression.

    His voice was neither loud nor soft, but both the faraway bandits, as well as the soldiers on the city wall, heard him clearly. Even the citizens within the city, who were closer to this location could hear him. Some of the braver citizens even exited their homes to see what was going on. There were even those who wanted to head to the city gate to investigate the happenings outside.

    ¡°How much can you cough up then?¡± Discerning from Han Shuo¡¯s reply that there was still room to negotiate, Faust paused for a moment before replying loudly.

    The current Brettel City walls didn¡¯t have any holes. Although there were only a few soldiers on the imposing city walls, they were equipped with shiny new equipment. There were also rumours that Brettel City¡¯s city lord, Bryan was a necromancer archmage himself. If they insisted on attacking, the Greenfire Bandits would definitely suffer losses. If they could gain a generous amount of gold without losing a single soldier, only a fool would choose thetter. Therefore, when Faust heard Han Shuo¡¯s tone, he pondered for a moment before inquiring about Han Shuo¡¯s bottom line.

    ¡°Uh, Mr Faust. How does one gold coin sound?¡± Han Shuo seriously thought for a moment before responding earnestly.

    ¡°Wahaha......¡±

    The city guards had been a bit nervous. They couldn¡¯t resistughing out loud after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s reply. Even the citizens who heard the reply had an interesting look on their faces, thinking that this new city lord certainly had a nice sense of humor.

    ¡°You conniving bastard!¡± Faust exploded, he hadn¡¯t been this angry in a long time. His subordinates also had unsightly expressions, wishing that they could rush over and tear Han Shuo and his men into pieces.

    ¡°Haha, so what if I tricked you! You won¡¯t be getting a single gold coin today. Hehe. Who knows? You might even be leaving behind gold for my personal use! How dare you pathetic scum dare to steal from me? You obviously want to die. I¡¯ll tell honestly you that I seized all of Redbeard Troda¡¯s wealth. Along with the four hundred thousand gold coins from Helen Tina and the gold I own, Brettel City currently has more than one million gold coins. However, let¡¯s see if you have the ability to obtain even a single coin. Stupid swine. Come at me!¡± Han Shuoughed savagely, ridiculing Faust as if he was an idiot.

    Faust was truly indignant. He had never been this dismissed by others in all the years since he had left Narsen Duchy. Staring at the extremely arrogant young governor on the city wall, Faust had the urge to eat him alive. His men had simr feelings, their expressions steely as they started charging towards the city gates.

    ¡°Attack! Massacre everyone in the city!¡± Faust furiously gave the order as he charged towards Brettel City.

    ¡°Mass.... Massacre everyone?!¡± Jack became weak in the knees, almost paralyzed on the cold, marble floor.

    The citizens had previously rxed due to Han Shuo¡¯s humor, but now sank into a bottomless abyss when they heard the words ¡°Massacre everyone!¡±. Everyone¡¯s eyes dimmed, at a loss of how to respond.

    All along, although Brettel City had experienced the cruelty of war, they had never faced a bloody massacre. Otherwise, Brettel City would have long since be a ghost city. Although their valuables would be snatched, the citizens were still able to retain their lives.

    Unless the attacker was a bloodthirsty devil or possesses endless hatred, the order to massacre everyone in the city was not easily given regardless of bandits looting or war between two countries. This was because it would mean effectively destroying everything in a city. That was the true meaning of creating rivers of blood and leaving nothing alive.

    A person like this would usually be condemned by every country. One who dared to massacre a city would even be denounced and despised by even their own country, while the side who had a city massacred would spare no expense in getting their revenge. Although the seven duchies were entrenched in war, the act of razing a city was also extremely rare. It wasn¡¯t something a normal person would dare to do.

    The unaffiliated Faust could no longer stopper the anger raging in his heart in the face of Han Shuo¡¯s arrogant provocation and utterly humiliating insults. This was why he¡¯d given such a crazed order. He felt that only by sending everyone in Brettel City to their graves would he be able to cleanse the shame brought about by Han Shuo.

    ¡°Humph. Do you think you¡¯ll be able to do so?¡± Han Shuo snorted. Turning towards the soldiers by his side, he said, ¡°Bring out the catapults, let¡¯s see how they die!¡±

    Once the order to massacre the city was given, the green me on the gs of the Greenfire Bandits were painted in blood red, forming blood red mes. The mages on the wooden tower were also slowly taxied towards Brettel City. The four crossbow carts were also loaded with bolts and pushed forward. Two thousand furious bandits, carrying thedder hooks of climbingdders started charging towards Han Shuo.

    Chariots, crossbow carts, catapults, as well as fire oil, giant stones, and other city defense tools were rapidly hauled out from their hiding ces by the hundreds of soldiers, and distributed to various locations along the vast city walls. However, the number of soldiers, as well as the number of chariots and crossbow cars were still limited. The wall, which could hold seven to eight thousand men, was only being defended by several hundred soldiers. It indeed seemed shamefully few.

    ¡°Kill!¡± The bandits had already charged over. The bandits who had been insulted hardened their hearts to kill everyone they saw in Brettel City. Faust was green in the face and hysterically bellowed, ¡°The first brother who scales the city wall will be rewarded with a thousand gold!¡±

    Arge cloud of magical mes shot from Faust¡¯s hand towards the sky. This was the prearranged signal between the four bandit groups. When the signal shone magnificently in the sky, that marked the official beginning of the battle.

    The bandits had been deluded by gold and blinded by anger. They charged forward with reckless abandon. Han Shuo didn¡¯t say a word as he calmly observed the situation, waiting for the bandits to enter their range. Only then did he give the order to the soldiers, who were so afraid that their palms were already sweaty, ¡°Attack!¡±

    Rumble...

    The rumbling of chariots resounded through the entire city, spraying a tongue of mes towards the skies. The crossbow carts rapidly fired crossbow bolts, crashing into a crowd of bandits along with giant rocks from the catapults, instantly creating a grisly scene. The areas that were sprayed by the chariots experienced huge explosions. Limbs and heads streaming with blood rolled and bounced out from the monstrous dust clouds.

    Giant rocks continued raining down, transforming all the bandits they touched into paste. The crossbow bolts whizzed past, strong prative power piercing through several bandits before stopping. The area in front of Brettel City had transformed instantly into a river of blood with countless corpses everywhere.

 Chapter 332: Corpses scattered across the ground

    Chapter 332: Corpses scattered across the ground

    The change of nearly a hundred bandits had been forever halted in just a blink of an eye, thanks to the bombardment of two war chariots, five ballistae, and three stone-throwing catapults.

    As the smoke from the explosives billowed above the battlefield, Fass¡¯ insane roaring rang loud and clear, ¡°Mages! Push the mages¡¯ tower forward! Launch the ballistae! Be quick about it!¡±

    As Fass hollered orders left and right, the bandits beneath the tower pushed with all their might. The ballistae that the bandits had transported were quickly brought up from the rear. There were several bandits with iron shields in hand, standing in front of each ballista to force open a path.

    The war chariots continued to enthusiastically spout mes as stone-throwing catapults drew beautiful arcs across the sky before smashing the ground with terrifying, earth-shattering rumbles. Each impact created its own unique pattern, a painting of blood and severed body parts. Six bolts darted through the air with each shot to reap cheap lives like cold, fatal des.

    Five hundred meters of the path that lead to Brettel City¡¯s gates had turned into a literal hell on earth. The bandits who had charged forward was met with overwhelming firepower. Anyone in range of the barrage had no chance of making it out alive.

    ¡°Spread out, spread out already! You damned stupid fools! How many time have I told you?!¡± Fass¡¯ shouts were verging on hysterical, but it was of no use. The rumbling of the war chariots overrode his words to the point where only the row of bandits behind him could hear his words.

    The Greenfire Bandits had a total of six thousand members, and Fass had certainly not nned onmitting his entire force at once. Thus, the bandits who¡¯de to attack Brettel City were definitely not the true elites of the Greenfire Bandits.

    Fass only had roughly a thousand trusted followers when he left the Narsen Duchy. The band had swollen to their current numbers by recruiting during raids as they traveled. As such, those currently charging towards Brettel City were the newest recruits, the ones whose strength Fass wasn¡¯t quite satisfied with. Theirbat ability was the weakest in Greenfire.

    This was the case in every attempted siege, the cannon fodder was always the first to be sent out. In Fass¡¯ heart, these two thousand underlings werepletely expendable. As long as there were enough gold coins, he never had to worry about not being able to recruit moreckeys amidst the never-ending chaos surrounding the seven grand duchies. ording to Fass¡¯ initial n, these two thousand underlings were more than enough to bring down Brettel City.

    What quite surprised Fass was Brettel City¡¯s defensive ability. He¡¯d originally thought he¡¯d face the bombardment of the magic crystal cannons, yet unexpectedly, he¡¯d seen no sign of them and had instead discovered other defensive emcements. Further, this array of defensive artillery were all time-tested instruments of war. Once they started their lethal spray from the tall city walls, they reaped life like a scythe through corn.

    Two thousand bandits were approaching Brettel City step by step beneath the massive artillery shelling and missiles. After paying the price in four hundred more deaths, a portion of the bandits reached the city wall. They¡¯d brought woodendders, and quickly set them up against the city wall, doing their best to dodge the heavy bombardment.

    ¡°Faster! Fill the bolts and load the goblin explosives into the war chariots!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s expression was indifferent, but the speed of his speech was extremely fast as he yelled orders to the soldiers around him.

    These soldiers had only recently be familiar with war chariots and ballistae. Faulke had intensely drilled them over several days and nights and barely pounded the basics of using war chariots, ballistae, and catapults into them. As such, they weren¡¯t too skilled, especially under the pressure of a chaotic battlefield. The lingering scent of death and blooded steel affected the speed at which these soldiers operated the equipment.

    Kaka... kaka...

    A strange noise suddenly came to Han Shuo¡¯s attention. He looked around, puzzled, until his eyes came tond on little Fatty Jack. Thetter¡¯s lips were trembling, and his teeth were chattering at an astonishing rate to create that noise.

    Little Fatty Jack stood beside Han Shuo as he looked into the battlefield where flesh and blood flew. He saw boulders smash bodies into a blurry meat paste. He witnessed limbs flying from the explosions created by the war chariots. He was transfixed as the frenzied storm of bolts literally flung the bandits into the air as they tore through them. He couldn¡¯t restrain his trembling.

    ¡°Wuu wuu, this is too terrible!¡± The little fatty¡¯s voice was a bit muffled, his small eyes bloodshot. He cried out involuntarily with trembling lips, his entire being caught in a strange, dull state of helplessness.

    ¡°Ready! Pour down the oil!¡± Han Shuo flicked his eyes away from Jack. He didn¡¯t say a word upon seeing thetter was still next to him. Instead, he loudly shouted to the soldiers around him.

    Han Shuo had already known before the battle began that little Fatty Jack, having never experienced such a scene, would definitely be frightened by the cruelty of war. Jack¡¯s expression of terror was well within Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, so he wasn¡¯t the least bit surprised.

    The Demonyer Edge could no longer resist the temptation, and shot out from the back of Han Shuo¡¯s neck to hover high above the battlefield. Unseen from the battlefield, it started to forcefully absorb souls from the cacophony of agonized and despairing screams below.

    Whoosh whoosh whoosh!

    The bandits finally fired their ballistae. A rain of bolts began to furiously assault the defenders atop Brettel City¡¯s wall. Surprised by the sudden hail of death, several archers aiming at maelstrom below were immediately killed. The actions of the soldiers controlling war chariots and stone-throwing catapults also grew a bit frantic.

    A low whistling sound apanied one of the bolts, aiming straight for little Fatty Jack, who was leaning against the wall and watching the tragic scene below. When he heard the screeching whistle, Jack was scared witless as he screamed raspily, ¡°Bryan, save me!¡±

    Han Shuo reached out with his left hand. Bloody lights shot out from his five fingers like he¡¯d suddenly grown sharp ws. When that bolt was only roughly ten meters away from Jack, the bloody light from Han Shuo¡¯s five fingers clenched around it, grinding the bolt into splinters.

    ¡°Step back, don¡¯t stand too close to the edge of the city wall!¡± Han Shuo shouted lightly, waving his right hand and sending the shield of a fallen soldier abruptly crashing down in front of Jack, covering most of his plump body.

    Creaking sounds suddenly fell into Han Shuo¡¯s ears. He wheeled around to feel surges of magic ripples gradually converge in the distance, the sound of the magic incantations growing more audible. Several mages on the slowly approaching tower had begun to chant the magic spells of their respective elements, guarded zealously by the shield wielding bandits.

    ¡°I¡¯ve been waiting for you to arrive!¡± Han Shuo said derisively. He reached out with his mind, and a bloody halo dropped from the heavens.

    The Demonyer Edge was executing ¡°Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡± under Han Shuo¡¯s guidance. The Demonyer Edge, looking only a little longer than a dagger, spun a breakneck pace as it dove straight down. Each rotation of the Demonyer Edge caused a dagger-like bloody light to shoot out.

    The Demonyer Edge¡¯s high-speed rotation caused it to gradually blur into a ball of crimson light as it descended. Scarlet slivers, rapidly increasing in number by the second, coalesced around it as they formed thousands of des. The countless des swirled into a huge orb, swirling around the Demonyer Edge in wide arcs as they crisscrossed without interfering with each. The light they gave off was a deep rich ruby, an awe-inspiring sight spilling down onto the mages on the tower below.

    From afar, it looked like a small, disc-sized sun hade into existence, except that this sun was brimming with sharp, rotating barbs of bloody light. As the vermillion sphere continued its descent, its rotation grew even more ferocious. A palpable surge of ughter emanated from it even before itnded, causing terror to sprout in the heart of onlookers.

    The dazzling orb of shing lightnded in the midst of the mages on the tower. Despite being protected by iron shields and magical barriers of various strengths, the tower was instantly macerated. The wood it was made of became splinters, then dust amidst the agonized screams of the bandits and mages. Mangled flesh, blood and steel painted a scarlet portrait as the fragile mages and the heavily armored bandits were torn apart, the rotating des of light resplendent as they dealt death with equal parts beauty and ruthlessness.

    No one on the tower had the strength to do anything in the face of Han Shuo¡¯s ¡°Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡±.

    The ten thousand sanguine rays of the Demonyer Edge had vaporized everything it had touched, whether it be the humans, the wooden tower, or the iron shields. Fass had spent a great deal of money to form this team of bandit mages, and now, theyy scattered across the battlefield, too mangled even to be recognizable as human remains anymore.

    Having been injected with thirty percent of his magical yuan, one strike of the ¡°Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡± through all those people and the tower was far from enough to consume its power. The orb transformed into an enormous scarlet spinning cactus, hurling des of crimson light at the bandits around the tower. Like a hurricane, the Demonyer Edge¡¯s ¡°Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡± raged unchallenged across the battlefield. A storm of blood in every sense of the word, everything it encountered was obliterated, be it human, ballistae, or sturdy shields.

    An unnaturally beautiful red drizzle of blood began to pour down on the field. None out of a hundred bandit corpses were whole after the Demonyer Edge made a circle, no piece of meatrger than an ear . Since even iron shields couldn¡¯t defend against the Demonyer Edge, it was no surprise to find even bones minced finely as well.

    ¡°Damn it! Where¡¯s the tower? Where are the mages?¡± Fass had been paying attention to the Brettel City wall, and had missed the events around the tower. Only when the crimson orb of light had made its way over to him did he discover that the tower was gone.

    ¡°Dead, all dead! It was that thing! It was all because of that thing!!¡± A bandit by Fass¡¯ side had witnessed the entire thing. He pointed at the blood orb that was responsible, his voice shrill with terror.

    The horror of the blood orb wasn¡¯t quite over yet. Ear-piercing screams once again echoed across the battlefield. They belonged to the bandits who¡¯d been approached by the drifting blood orb. To no avail, all of them desperately attempted to dodge by rolling and jumping. However, every bandit that was touched by the blood orb instantly turned into a shower of mangled flesh, blood, and bones. No one was lucky enough to escape.

    ¡°Attack that thing, attack it!!¡± Fass¡¯ heart was beating violently, panic barely kept at bay. He hastily roaredmands to the bandits around him.

    Dozens of sharp axes were fiercely hurled at the quickly approaching, whirling Demonyer Edge. However, just when they almost neared the Demonyer Edge, the magical yuan powering the ¡°Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡± was exhausted, and it vanished into thin air. Like a star of death returning to the universe afterpleting its mission, its disappearance sent the bandits reeling with relief.

    ¡°What is that thing?! Curse that necromancer! He must¡¯ve used some sort of necromancy magic to create that damned monster. Don¡¯t be afraid, keep attacking! I think they¡¯re almost done for!¡±

    Humans were always fearful of the unknown, and Fass was no exception.

    When he had spotted the death dealing orb disappear from the sky, Fass¡¯ heart unclenched slightly. He then roared madly at the frightened bandits, as if tofort himself.

    It was as Fass said. Even though the Demonyer Edge had thrown the battlefield into disarray by wiping out the magic users, the bandits still held the advantage in numbers. Moreover, they had begun to use their iron hooks and woodendders to gradually scale the city walls.

    There were only three hundred soldiers manning Brettel City¡¯s walls in total. Of those, twenty had died up until now, mostly due to the ballistae attacks. The remaining two hundred odd soldiers were frantically hauling boulders to load the stone-throwing catapults and reloading bolts for the ballistae. As a result, those soldiers who had been assigned the task of transporting boulders were now deprived of energy, sprawled t on the ground.

    Several soldiers could barely manage to bring themselves to pour oil down the city walls, but they were also heavily panting, with little strength left. However, there were still roughly twelve hundred of the original two thousand bandits left, of which five hundred had already reached the foot of the city wall, trying to climb up the walls.

    ¡°My Lord, our men are really not enough!¡± Seeing the ferocious bandits about to climb up, a captain almost burst into tears, ¡°What do we do? What do we do?¡±

    ¡°Light the fires. We won¡¯t be losing as long I¡¯m alive today. What are you all so worried about?¡± Han Shuo harrumphed coldly.

    ¡°Light the fires, light the fires! Burn those bastards to death!¡± The captain shouted loudly to the soldiers, who¡¯d been waiting for the signal for quite a long time now. They ruthlessly tossed burning torches onto the city walls that were now drenched with oil.

    Boom...

    The sparks instantly set the slick oil ame, turning the surface of the city wall into a zing pyre for any bandits unfortunate enough to be caught on the walls. Harrowing screams dyed the air as the bandits were slowly incinerated.

    Some of the bandits quickly jumped off thedder when they say the soldiers on the city wall wielding torches. The more experienced ones managed to pull thedders from the city, allowing the bandits to slowly mber down to safety.

    However, that safety was short lived, as the soldiers immediately loosed a volley of arrows at the surviving bandits. Some sharpshooters managed to pick off the bandits supporting some of thedders, causing the bandits on their respectivedders to plummet to their deaths.

    However, the amount of oil they had on hand was limited, while the walls were too wide. There simply wasn¡¯t enough ground they could cover, and sure enough, a cadre of bandits had almost reached the top of the wall in one of those oil free corners.

    Whoosh whoosh whoosh!

    Han Shuo finally took out the bone staff and chanted the bone spear incantation. Bone spears shot out like arrows, tearing through the dozens of bandits who¡¯d scaled the wall at one of those lightly guarded points..

    The bandits at the foot of the city wall also raised up bows with ming arrows. Once the four hundred bandits steadied the rate in which they could release the arrows, the exposed soldiers from the city wall couldn¡¯t hold up beneath the onught. Some of the more careless ones were killed under the rain of me tipped shafts. Even Han Shuo couldn¡¯t have saved them, he¡¯d already blocked as many of the arrows as he could, otherwise, there might have been even more casualties.

    ¡°My Lord, is it time yet?¡± Another captain was still rtively calm in the face of such odds. He¡¯d personally seen Han Shuo summon a massive undead army, but as he saw hisrades gradually sumb under the unending assault, he finally opened his mouth to ask Han Shuo.

    At this moment, the initial two thousand Greenfire cannon fodder bandits were still blindly charging forward. A portion had been burned to death by the fires, and another two hundred died from the dozen soldiers who still had the strength to keep the ballistae firing.

    There were less than eight hundred bandits remaining from the original two thousand, from which roughly six hundred had reached the foot of the city wall.

    The war chariots on the city wall had also used up their goblin explosives, with only a hundred bolts or so remaining. All the colossal boulders within the city had been catapulted into the enemy ranks. Finally, the number of soldiers on Brettel City¡¯s wall who could stand straight didn¡¯t even number fifty.

    If Han Shuo still refrained from making his move now, the Brettel City gates might actually fall to the bandits. Therefore, upon seeing the bandits reveal their fanatical excitement after finally reaching the foot of the city wall, Han Shuo clutched the bone staff and calmly said with a nod, ¡°It is indeed time.¡±

    Fass of the Greenfire Bandits licked his lips as he looked at the weary defenses of Brettel City. A low sinisterugh bubbled forth and his voice grew cruel as he said, ¡°Young city lord, you will pay a painful price for your arrogance! I will peel your skin, remove your bones, and torture you so badly, you¡¯ll feel a pain worse than death!¡±

    ¡°Boss, he¡¯s also a necromancer, you should be a bit more careful!¡± A bandit next to Fass suddenly remembered the rumors about Han Shuo and hastily reminded him.

    ¡°Haha, necromancer? A mage who can only summon useless skeletons? What can that sort of mage do in a head on battle?¡± Fass turned to that bandit and continued, ¡°Command a thousand more men to rush forward. Bring down Brettel City in one swift move!¡±

    The minor leader waved his hand after Fass¡¯ orders and said, ¡°Tuku, you guys rush forward, tten this damned Brettel City as soon as possible!¡±

    Tuku had originally been Fass¡¯ personal guard and the leader of the thousand strong brigade. This brigade was different from the previous two thousand strong cannon fodder. Sharper weapons, sturdier armor, and even a special five hundred man team in their ranks who rode fierce warhorses simrly bedecked in full body armor. This was obviously a standard knight brigade.

    The brigade charged across a ground full of corpses towards Brettel City with a wave of Tuku¡¯s spear. Amongst them, the five hundred man squad riding fierce warhorses reached the foot of the city wall as fast as the wind. Brettel City¡¯s soldiers werepletely worn out, only managing to fire a disorganized volley of a dozen arrows at the iing force. This simply wasn¡¯t enough to injure the fully armored knights and warhorses.

    ¡°Heh heh, they¡¯re done for! I knew it!¡± A cold sneer stretched Fass¡¯ face. The light of victory was already dawning in his eyes.

    He¡¯d even started to mentally imagine how he would slowly torture Han Shuo after capturing him?

    ¡°Eh? Where¡¯s the sun? Why can¡¯t I see the sun?¡± Upon reaching the city wall, the bandit knights suddenly felt the sky strangely darken. A gloom that verged on creepy, uncharacteristic for a day only barely past noon, covered the sky. There was no reason for it to be dark so quickly

    The originally clear and bright sky now had thunderheads blotting out the sun like a verdant ink. Appearing from who knew where, these green-ck clouds created ayer that was imprable to sunlight, choking the battlefield of any light it could find. As these clouds gathered, an eerie atmosphere descended on the battlefield, and a grim premonition began to sprout in the hearts of the bandits.

    ¡°Don¡¯t make a fuss. The weather here has always been creepy. It¡¯s just about to rain.¡±

    ¡°The oil and fire will lose their effect if it rains. We must be blessed by the gods! Let¡¯s use this opportunity to massacre them!¡± Leader Tuku absentmindedlyforted his subordinates. He pointed at the group of bandits who were still crazily climbing the city wall and shouted, ¡°Hurry up! Wipe out all of those weak, cowardly soldiers!.¡±

    ¡°You really run your mouth too much!¡± Han Shuo had finally finished chanting his lengthy incantation. He swiped at the air with the bone staff, releasing a thinyer of ash-gray mist. The mist, thick with the stench of death, slowly drifted down to the foot of the Brettel City walls.

    The battlefield now reeked of a barren, morose smell. Thin, ash-gray mist slowly drifted from the center of the battlefield, slowly creeping between and over the corpses. Several carrion crows, circling the battlefield, took one whiff of the corpse scent blown over by the faint, ash-gray mist, and took wing instantly, as if something in the gray mist struck a deep chord of fear in their hearts.

    ¡°Damned weather, ck clouds and gray mist! It seems like it¡¯s really going to rain! Hurry, hurry up! Ah, one of you is up, hah!¡± Tuku lifted his head to look up at the city wall. He happily shouted on, as if encouraging the bandits.

    A crunching sound apanied his words. The bandit who had painstakingly avoided arrows and burning oil had his neck casually twisted into an inhuman direction by Han Shuo. Like tossing out garbage, Han Shuo chucked him at the bandits grouped below.

    Crash...

    The body of the first bandit to climb up the city wall and had his neck twisted for his efforts made a huge sound as he was thrown down. The bandits below, who were about to desperately surge up thedders, were greatly shocked.

    Then, an even more terrifying sight captured their gazes, something that happened right in front of them!

    When the gray mist drifted across the corpse in front of them, they first saw a finger twitch. Then, twisted neck and all, the body slowly and jerkily rose to its feet. The pupils that¡¯d lost the light of life had given way to a dead gray color. Despite being somewhat stiff, the corpse¡¯s next action left no room for doubt as to its intentions. It leapt on a nearby bandit and repeatedly stabbed him to death.

    The hysterical scream that tore its way out of the bandits was like they¡¯d encountered demons in the light of day. In the face of such an illogical situation, the courage of this bandit squadron melted away like water in a desert. Fueled entirely by instinctive fear, they fled.

    At the same time, more frantic screaming spread from all corners of the battlefield, as if the screaming was contagious. Bandits all over saw their dead brothers open their fish-like, gray eyes one after the other and numbly struggle to their feet. Moreover, their dead brothers even waved weapons and aimed to kill them. Mass hysteria had infected the living.

    ¡°This, this is, this is the lost legendary necromancy magic ¡®Corpse Reanimation¡¯! My god! How did that damnable evil necromancer master it?!¡± The leader of the Greenfire bandit group was aghast as he saw the scene from afar. He¡¯d also heard of this ancient legend. His scalp began to tingle at the sight of corpses rising to their feet.

    While Fass screeched in horror, more and more corpses stood up with thest lingering desires they had in life. They began to ruthlessly assault any living being nearby, never knowing that the targets of their attacks were once their closerades who¡¯d drank, chatted, andughed with themst night.

    The terror from the resurrected corpses instantly spread through the entire army of bandits attacking the city. The terrified bandits had no intention of carrying on with their siege. Their only thought was to escape from this evil ce as quickly as possible. Incredibly, some bandits with bloodstained hands even started to sing holy hymns of the Church of Light, as if being instructed to do so by the gods and spirits. It seemed that they thought doing so would be enough to purify the power of darkness around them.

    It was a pity that the God of Light would never extend an olive branch to these atheists. When a zombie used its weapon to stab a hole into a singing bandit, the rest of the bandits who were singing the holy hymn immediately stopped their futile efforts. With incredible crity, they wheeled and bolted, trying to escape.

    ¡°Want to run? Not gonna be that easy!¡± Han Shuo grinned like a madcap up on the city wall. He floated above the city wall like a sovereign of evil descending upon his kingdom, waving the bone staff in his hand. Acid bogs appeared along the path Fass and his people were taking.

    ¡°Shoot him dead, shoot him dead now!¡± Fass pointed at Han Shuo and roared madly, trying to suppress the fear in his heart. He also took out a valuable bow, taking aim at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Poor Fass, so what if I yed you? See how many gold coins you¡¯ve left for me, and all these weapons and armor all over the ground. Maybe there are even some gold coins on the dead bandits. How should I thank you?¡± Han Shuoughed cutely as he squinted at Fass. He lifted his right palm towards the sky as a radiant crimson light shone from the heavens and onto his palm. The beauty of the ¡°Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡± was slowly gracing the bandits with its presence again.

 Chapter 333: Something unforeseen

    Chapter 333: Something unforeseen

    Dozens of arrows whistled through the air as they hurtled towards Han Shuo like raindrops. However, the arrows had yet to arrive when the life-reaping light expanded in his palm and shot out once again.

    As the Demonyer Edge was infused with another thirty percent of Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan, countless resentful wails hissed out. The fresh souls, that the Demonyer Edge had just absorbed, still yearned for life. They emitted an air of unwillingness and grievance that rose into the sky.

    However, the bandits¡¯ souls were tightly bound by the power of the Demonyer Edge. They were simply unable to escape this eternal prison. Instead, the resentment and hatred made the ¡°Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡± even more powerful. Each de of light was brilliant like blooming, colorful fireworks, charming and beautiful.

    The Demonyer Edge shot out of Han Shuo¡¯s grasp and once again waltzed through the sky, creating a spiky, ring red sun. None of the arrows reached Han Shuo as they were ground to dust by the ¡°Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡±. The attack didn¡¯t lose one iota of momentum. It stretched the endless resentment and murderous intent into a dazzling, beautiful arc in the sky, aiming directly at Fass¡¯ group.

    ¡°No! Boss, retreat quickly!¡± A bandit next to Fass cried out loudly. As soon as the shocked scream rang out, everyone turned their horses around, fleeing with their tails between their legs like defeated dogs.

    Fass had originally wanted to scold the underling when he saw thetter frantically fleeing. However, he suddenly recalled the brutal scene from earlier created by the shing, bloody lights and couldn¡¯t help but tremble with cold chills. Fass no longer dared to put on a heroic front. He yanked on the reins of his horse and fled.

    The rotating, brilliant, bloody light was a ferocious life-reaping spectre for every person it shone down upon. Everything was disintegrated. Six minor leader bandits were first smashed to pieces. Then, the Demonyer Edge roiled forth with its billowing murderous aura, spinning mid-air with a savage screech under Han Shuo¡¯s control. The weapon pursued after Fass¡¯ group, slowing down for no man.

    The corpses below Brettel City wall were resurrected one by one whilst under the Canopy of Necromancy, blindly attacking all beings in their surroundings. A corpse strutted around with its intestines intestines hanging out, wielding its weapon and dripping with blood. This was obviously a major blow to the bandits, who¡¯d been relentlessly rushing at Brettel City.

    A human¡¯s most instinctive reaction in the face of fear would be to escape as far as possible. These bandits fully illustrated the depths of this reaction. The elite bandits on warhorses, under Tuku¡¯smand, fled at a much faster pace than what they¡¯d charged forward with. Some had taken the opportunity to dash out like lightning before Han Shuo had created the acid swamps. It was quite the mystery where such potential hade from.

    Of course, the majority of the bandits were taken out by the acid swamps. Puffs of deadly air drifted from the swamps, filling the atmosphere with the smell of corrosion. A dozen bandits, who¡¯d risked their lives to rush straight into the acid swamps first, were instantly dissolved into a dozen skeletons. The remaining bandits, who¡¯d yet to escape suddenly came to aplete stop.

    In front of them was a multitude of acid swamps capable of granting an instant death, whilst at the rear, corpses of their former allies were drawing closer with each step. The bandits very much cherished their lives. They desperately considered which of the two sides would grant them the higher chance of survival.

    After a short while, the desire to live won over the fear of corpses. Unlike Han Shuo, the bandits had no way to fly. They could only suppress the fear in their hearts, tightly clench their weapons, and face the slowly approaching corpses. These formerly dead bodies might have been their good friends in the past, but the bandits knew what had to be done under the threat of death.

    ¡°Kill them!¡± It was unknown which bandit had let out this cry. The still surviving bandits no longer hesitated. They used the sharp weapons in hands against the corpses who¡¯d beenrades not long before, in order to protect their own lives. They cut off the heads of the corpses, letting theirrades die with aplete body.

    Thebat strength of the resurrected corpses wasn¡¯t particrly strong; it was half of their strength when they¡¯d still been alive. They weren¡¯t as flexible as the zombie warriors summoned from the other dimension either. These corpses existed only to create fear in their opponents. Once the other party overcame the fear in their hearts and took action against these corpses, they¡¯d discover that, not only were thetter¡¯s actions quite slow, but their strength had also been negatively affected. These corpses couldn¡¯t feel pain, but as long as their heads and hearts were destroyed, they wouldn¡¯t be able to stand back up.

    The bandits quickly discovered the weaknesses of the corpses. They were no longer scared after destroying a few of them. Their fear gradually subsiding, the bandits started to act together and annihted the reanimated corpses.

    These corpses no longer seemed too terriblepared to the acid swamps blocking the retreating path. As long as the bandits tried not to think about how the dead were once their friends, they would be able to deftly and neatly dispose of the corpses. The bandits weren¡¯t kind folk to begin with, most of them were cruel and unscrupulous. They consoled themselves with the fact that the people facing them were already dead, as they wielded the sharp weapons in their hands to cut off the heads of their formerrades without hesitation.

    Standing proudly in the sky, Han Shuo skillfully utilized his mental strength to manipte the Demonyer Edge, making it pursue Fass. Looking down upon the bandits, who were slowly calming down, he let out a light exmation and mumbled, ¡°I¡¯ve underestimated their ruthlessness. No wonder they could be bandits. Soldiers wouldn¡¯t be able to do that to their formerrade in arms.¡±

    After muttering to himself, Han Shuo mused for a bit. He then revealed a cruel grin and said, ¡°It seems like I have to give them a strong shot!¡±

    When Han Shuo intended to use the bone staff to summon the undead army with his remaining mental strength, he suddenly heard an earth-shattering roar. The entire Brettel City seemed to shake after that huge rumbling sound.

    That direction of that sound hade from behind Han Shuo. He nked for a moment, before lightly eximing, ¡°The magic crystal cannons are finally in use!¡±

    Taking in a deep breath, Han Shuo nned to once again chant the lengthy magic incantation when he suddenly caught sight of a group in white outfits right where Fass¡¯ group was fleeing towards. It was a team of roughly a hundred people who were slowly approaching. Amongst them was Kosse, who¡¯d once fought against Han Shuo. There were also the Temrs of the Church of Light, as well as several others in white ritual outfits.

    Han Shuo was inwardly shocked. The Demonyer Edge originally chasing Fass suddenly changed its direction to charge directly towards Kosse¡¯s group. The weapon shot out bloody light in all directions as it fiercely targeted the Temrs surrounding Kosse.

    With his divine weapon ¡°Revtion¡± of the Church of Light, Kosse could easily turn the tables. Under the holy light of ¡°Revtion¡±, not only would the corpses, but even the undead army summoned by Han Shuo would be useless.

    In the middle of this enormous battlefield, the defenses of Brettel City nowpletely relied on the undead creatures. Once this support was lost, Brettel City would officially embark down the path towards its doom.

    Therefore, upon seeing Kosse appear in the distance, Han Shuo was determined to destroy this person above all else. Otherwise, the difficulty of winning would be akin to reaching for the heavens once Kosse opened ¡°Revtion¡± to sing the divine hymns of blessing.

    The ¡°Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡± spun rapidly and spewed out fatal bloody light straight at Kosse¡¯s group with enormous murderous intent. Several low rank Temrs at the front had yet to even unsheathe their weapons and make their move when the great, prickly orb collided with them.

    The Demonyer Edge was as if thousands of spinning sharp des. It whirled right into the midst of the low rank Temrs, once more disying its destructive power as it ground everything to dust. Several Temrs at the front had their armors shattered, with even the bodies inside being crushed as well.

    However, the Temrs¡¯ armors were obviously much more sturdy than that of the bandits. The bandits¡¯ armor hadn¡¯t even made a sound when they were transformed into powder, as if it was as delicate as the flesh of their owners.

    But of course, these were the Temrs of the Church of Light. The alchemists must have forged their armors using a special method, adding a magic resistance effect. Even though the Temrs also transformed into a bloody rain like the bandits upon being crushed by ¡°Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡±, it actually took five times the amount of time whenpared to the bandits.

    It was because this process took five times the amount of time that it gave the six high ranked Temrs around Kosse time to create a hexagonal formation. They quickly surrounded the rapidly spinning Demonyer Edge in the center. Their six longswords, which had been blessed by baptism in holy water, burst out with a pure, divine light, shooting all at once at the Demonyer Edge erupting with a thousand rays of bloody light.

    A string of pleasing, metallic sounds rang out, followed by sprays of flying firesparks. The longswords possessed a certain purification effect after being baptized in holy water. The portion of soul energy that the Demonyer Edge had just absorbed but had yet to fully assimte was actually released back into the heavens and earth.

    The remaining power of the holy light stopped the Demonyer Edge from its continued rotation. It seemed that the sword formation of the six high ranked Temrs had indeed some miraculous effect. The Demonyer Edge¡¯s speed became increasingly slower due to gradually exhausting its supply magical yuan. The weapon ultimately shot from within the sword formation into the sky under Han Shuo¡¯s mental control.

    The six high ranked Temrs with the cross insignias on their chests were panting a bit after the Demonyer Edge disappeared into the sky. Their eyes followed the weapon¡¯s disappearance with lingering fear in their hearts, as if afraid that it would return again.

    Red Archbishop Kosse was inwardly trembling in fear at the happenings before his eyes. He held ¡°Revtion¡± and prayed over and over. Only when he saw that the Demonyer Edge had truly disappeared, did he turn to speak to Han Shuo, ¡°Heretic, your sins cannot be forgiven! Being burned by the holy me shall be your final destination!¡±

    Kosse had tried to patiently persuade Han Shuost time, but he no longer had any patience with thetter today. In Kosse¡¯s eyes, Han Shuo was a genuine demon through and through, even more evil than the Cmity Church. He must be exterminated at all costs, so as to free more people from his evil.

    ¡°I¡¯m actually waiting to be burned by your holy mes, but I¡¯m afraid that you won¡¯t have the opportunity to do so!¡± Han Shuo coldly snorted with disdain. He suddenly set his right hand on fire, wrapping his entire right arm in the mes. Han Shuo nced at his zing right arm before ring coldly at Kosse, asking, ¡°Isn¡¯t the color of your holy me also something like this?¡±

    ¡°Heretic who dares to spheme the holy me? Ye shall be judged by the God of Light!¡± Kosse held his head high and shouted loudly. He then sang the holy hymn within the careful protection of the six Temrs.

    Along with the melodious hymn that Kosse was singing, the Church of Light¡¯s divine artifact, ¡°Revtion¡±, began to quickly flip its pages quickly, even though there was no presence of wind. Circle after circle of light spread out into the surrounding with their holy presence. The corpses resurrected by Han Shuo instantly turned to dust under the shining of the holy light.

    Even the green-ck Canopy of Necromancy that blotted out the sky was torn apart by rays of dazzling golden radiance, the acid swamps evaporated as well. In just a moment, the vast empire of death that Han Shuo had poured a great deal of mental strength into to build, had crumbled under the enclosure of the holy light.

    It was indeed correct to say that the Church of Light was the natural enemy of necromancers. Han Shuo obviously didn¡¯t think much of low ranked light mages. However, Kosse, who could use the power of the divine weapon ¡°Revtion¡±, truly posed a great threat to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo had originally been certain of his victory, but now had his momentum disrupted due to the emergence of Kosse and his group. If he had no way to use his undead creatures to defend the city, protecting Brettel City with Han Shuo alone would be as hard as ascending to the heavens.

    ¡°I hate this light!¡± Han Shuo spoke with disgust when he saw the halos of holy light spreading out. However, his mind rapidly spun for a way to deal with them.

    This was because he¡¯d suddenly discovered that upon Kosse¡¯s appearance, the desperately fleeing bandit leader Fass had led his underlings to return again.

    The holy light cleared away all dangers given by the corpses and acid swamps. The several hundred bandits below the Brettel City walls once again began eyeing the sparsely scattered soldiers.

 Chapter 334: I really feel ashamed for you, blech!

    Chapter 334: I really feel ashamed for you, blech!

    Since things had already reached this point, Han Shuo could only summon the fire elite zombie, wood elite zombie, earth elite zombie, as well as the little skeleton. Otherwise, he had no chance of defeating the bandits and the Church of Light.

    Ripples of divine light slowly spread out from ¡°Revtion¡± as Kosse stood surrounded by six Temrs and chanted. These ripples slowly purified thend of death that Han Shuo had created with so much mental strength. Han Shuo no longer remained in the air to chase after Kosse. Instead, he slowly floated backwards.

    Han Shuo threw out the Bloodlust Fang with a wave of his hand. The moment it flew out, it brought forth a dense mist of blood. This demonic treasure that Han Shuo had meticulously refined didn¡¯t have an aura of death on it. Thus, he was naturally not afraid that the holy light would purify it.

    The bandits touched by the mist of blood from the Bloodlust Fang began to let out terrible howls. The Bloodlust Fang could quicken the cirction of blood in their body, causing them to explode and die once their bodies couldn¡¯t handle the speed anymore.

    Bandits clenched their chest and roared in pain everywhere the mist of blood spread to, but they were unable to change the fact that the blood within their bodies was flowing too quickly. Clear cracking sounds rang in the air, their bones breaking under the horrific eleration of blood. Before the pain couldpletely register, the snapped bones forced themselves through the soft skin, causing the trapped blood to rush towards the exit. Like a punctured boiler, the bandits would literally be ripped apart by the pressure of the elerating blood, dying instantly within the mist of blood.

    While this happened, Han Shuo concentrated and waved the skeletal staff in his left hand. Soon enough, the little skeleton, earth elite zombie, wood elite zombie, and fire elite zombie appeared. Under the cover of the mist of blood from the Bloodlust Fang, the earth elite zombie sank into the ground and snuck silently towards Kosse.

    The little skeleton grabbed the wood elite zombie and soared high into the sky, directlynding on the city walls of Brettel City.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s orders, the little skeleton and the wood elite zombie took charge of securing the ramparts of Brettel City. If a bandit managed to scale the city wall, the little skeleton and wood elite zombie were responsible for killing them.

    The moment the fire elite zombie appeared from the other dimension, he caused pirs of fire to shoot up into the sky. As he manipted the mes, the fire lotus sigil on the fire elite zombie¡¯s forehead gradually grew clearer, finally reaching the brilliance of a burning me. As it flickered on his forehead, me lotuses started to detach and drift out of it.

    The fire elite zombie had gradually grasped how to control the fire lotus, which was a supreme treasure of fire. The ming lotuses that drifted out from the fire lotus were initially only the size of a fingernail. Yet, this clearly wasn¡¯t their true form. The ming lotuses increased in size as the wind blew, eventually causing each one to be the size of arge bowl.

    As the mes on the fire elite zombie burned,rger andrger lotuses floated out the sigil on his forehead, growing in size till they reached the size of thergest lotuses drifting in the air. They then flew towards the surrounding bandits. Any bandit that even had a sparknd on them was instantly incinerated.

    This ferocity of this sort of me was beyond their imagination. Even if they quickly used their pouches of water to try and douse it, they were unable to extinguish the little sparks. Anything that came into contact with the little fingernail sized sparks would burn, regardless of what it was. Skin, clothes, even armor and weapons all seemed to fuel the mes in burning even more brightly.

    In the span of a few breaths, these bandits who were unwary enough to have sparksnd on them howled. The sparks grew to great congrations, wreathing them in me. The terrible smell of burnt flesh began to dominate the battlefield, as their bodies were incinerated.

    The people on fire werepletely turned into charcoal, the living transformed into the dead. The process was just that short. Under the extremely painful incineration of those strangely beautiful mes, several scores of bandits near the fire elite zombie were transformed into charred cinders.

    On the other side, the earth elite zombie, who was deep in the ground, used his ability as the favored child of the earth to steadily make his way over to Kosse and the others during the chaos above.

    As the red archbishop of the Church of Light, Kosse did still possess some mercy when dealing with heretics. As he saw the bandits ignite and turn into charred pieces of meat, Kosse took a breath from the sacred hymn he was chanting and to yell at the surrounding Temrs, ¡°Save them!¡±

    Han Shuo continued to use the Bloodlust Fang to harvest lives on the battlefield whilst keeping his attention on Kosse. When he saw that Kosse slowly approach, still within his circle of protection from the Temrs, Han Shuo immediately gave the earth elite zombie, already in ce underneath them, the order to attack.

    The ground rumbled, vibrating like an earthquake as the earth elite zombie started his attack. Earthen spikes shot up, towards the Temrs and white priests of the Church of Light. Their attention wholly on what was in front of them, they werepletely caught off guard, instantly killing approximately ten people.

    Those earthen spikes urately prated the feet of the horsed Temrs. When this unprotected part of the foot was suddenly drilled by the earthen spike tips, the attack had marvelous results. Despite their excellent armor, the Temrs tumbled from their warhorses with howls.

    The priests in white, who were purifying the souls on the battlefield, were the target of Han Shuo¡¯s hatred. Their purification of the deceased souls had stopped the Demonyer Edge from gaining more power. It meant that they were indirectly obstructing the Demonyer Edge¡¯s evolution.

    The Demonyer Edge still did not truly have a soul of its own at this point in time. The Demonyer Edge would only evolve and gain its own soul once it absorbed enough soul energy from others. Only then would the Demonyer Edge be a truly unparallelled tool for murder.

    Had Shuo had felt like a fish in water amidst the countless battles that had urred after he¡¯d arrived at Brettel City. As the Demonyer Edge absorbed the souls of the deceased, its growth had elerated. Han Shuo could even feel that the Demonyer Edge was barely a step away from evolution. He would not let those pesky priests from the Church of Light put an end to it!

    Thus, when Kosse and the others approached him, Han Shuo ordered the earth elite zombie to prioritize the white clothed priests. The priests, who normally weren¡¯t in the thick of battle, naturally weren¡¯t wearing armor. Each earth spike managed to impale a priest through, killing them instantly. After the earth elite zombie was done his first wave of attacks, aside from Kosse, well protected by the Temrs, none of the white priests had been able to escape Han Shuo¡¯s wrath.

    ¡°Demon! I must get rid of this demon!¡± Kosse tightened his grip on ¡°Revtion¡±, then roared furiously towards Han Shuo as he watched the white priests die.

    ¡°You asked for this! I¡¯ve never offended your Church of Light. It was you who relentlessly pursued me! Heh, any believers of the Church of Light who dares to offend me from now on, I¡¯ll kill every one I see! I don¡¯t believe that I can¡¯t kill all of you,¡± Han Shuo yelled coldly as he looked down at the trembling Kosse from his vantage point high in the sky.

    ¡°Shoot him down! Axes, spears, polearms, hurry!¡± Fass roared with a pained heart as he watched his subordinates being consumed by the sea of mes.

    The remaining two bandit ballistae turned towards the fire elite zombie in the center of the sea of mes. At the same time, a multitude of sharp weapons was flung at the fire elite zombie. The lotus armor on the fire elite zombie rang out multiple times as he manipted the fire lotuses withplete abandon.

    Every arrow, de, and sword shot at him was melted into g or incinerated to dust by the scorching mes before they evennded on the fire zombie. When the remains finallynded on him, the impacts were utterly negligible. The fire elite zombie had the natural ability to reconstruct his body after taking damage, and had already done so once already. This body was already quite tough, the soft blows on his skin did hardly any damage.

    However, even though the elite zombies of the five elements were nurtured in the five absolute elemental locations, the power in their bodies was not endless. Nothing truly possessed eternal power. After twenty to thirty lotus mes floated out of the fire elite zombie¡¯s forehead, he also grew tired and sent a signal to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo could clearly sense the fire elite zombie¡¯s thoughts. The fire elite zombie was not yet mature and so would naturally feel tired after releasing so much power at once. Sparks flew everywhere the twenty to thirty lotus mes went, while the bandits that were grazed by even a tiny spark were burned to death.

    Approximately three hundred burnt ck corpses were forever fossilized on the ground. This had been caused by the fire elite zombie alone, who had not yet learned to fully control the power of the fire lotuses. Once the fire elite zombie matured enough to the point that it could control the fire lotus more deftly, his deadliness would be infinitely more terrifying.

    Furthermore, when the elite zombies of the five elements were born, each one of them would possess their own natural way of cultivating. That meant that the elite zombies of the five elements were at their weakest when they first emerged. Once they slowly ascended using their cultivation method, their strengths would gradually increase over time, and they would be able to use their natural talents and abilities with far more ease.

    Han Shuo did not doubt that when the elite zombies of the fire elements evolved to the final stage, they would absolutely be able to destroy the world. Furthermore, they would be capable of working together in a formation too. Since the water elite zombie was also being nurtured at the moment, Han Shuo would easily be able to practice setting up the formation once he created the most elusive metal elite zombie.

    Having used up all of his energy in one go, the fire elite zombie was beginning to show signs of exhaustion. He disappeared amidst the raging mes into the other dimension with a wave of the skeletal staff in Han Shuo¡¯s hand.

    When the fire elite zombie disappeared, the fire lotuses gradually dispersed into the air after losing their source of energy. However, they still managed to take the lives of fifty more bandits before they did so.

    The screaming, crying, and dodging bandits all breathed a sigh of relief when they saw the life-reaping lotuses dissipate. They secretly cursed and criticized the boss in their hearts. What was ¡°not too dangerous¡± here? The previously defenseless Brettel City had suddenly be a terrifying demon castle. Anything amazing or weird they could imagine¡ªthis ce had them all.

    At this point, more than half of the six thousand Greenfire Bandits led by Fass had died in battle. Thirty-two hundred of them had died an inexplicable death, and roughly a thousand of those belonged to the elite troops.

    Fass wanted to cry but had no tears when he saw the corpses littering the ground. Brettel City was like a demon city that had exposed its fangs. It was a tireless killing machine thoroughly disying its violence and brutality.

    The elite bandits, who¡¯d painstakingly climbed the Brettel City wall, were assaulted by the two strange undead creatures. They fell down one by one, breathing theirst in mid-air while tumbling down.

    That was to the credit of the little skeleton and wood elite zombie.

    Fass had initially thought that the Red Archbishop would easily break through Brettel City¡¯s defenses when the bane of necromancers ¨C the Church of Light ¨C appeared. Now that Fass saw the little skeleton and wood elite zombie easily ughter the bandits after they scaled the city wall with great difficulty, while the two capered madly beneath the holy light. Fass cursed eighteen generations of Kosse¡¯s ancestors in his heart.

    What natural nightmare of necromancers? What envoy of the Light on the Profound Continent? Complete bullshit!

    The Red Archbishop and divine artifact ¡°Revtion¡±bined can¡¯t even purify a puny skeleton and a few zombies? You¡¯ll be the death of us!

    Fass cursed inwardly. He saw bandits spontaneously explode when enveloped by the drifting bloody mist emitting from the Bloodlust Fang. Simultaneously, he saw men and horses of Kosse¡¯s team from the Church of Light unable to protect their own. Fass tried to think of a countermeasure in a hurry.

    At this point, Fass had also figured out that Brettel City was relying mostly on Han Shuo¡¯s support. Too many brothers had died or retreated in dejection. If word of this spread, the fame of the Greenfire Bandits would fall into a bottomless abyss.

    However, if they didn¡¯t leave now, who knew how many more astonishing methods the horrifying city lord of Brettel still had up his sleeve? Fass was now truly scared of Han Shuo deep in his heart now. He privately cursed the bastard who had brought him the intelligence and encouraged him to attack this city a hundred times.

    Whoosh whoosh whoosh!

    The distant ballista began to once more shoot bolt after bolt. mes suddenly shot out again from the war chariots, falling directly onto the Church of Light¡¯s Temrs. Three Temrs, along with their horses, were instantly sent flying.

    The tired soldiers on Brettel City wall had rested for enough time. Having slowly recovered their strength, the soldiers resumed their control over the defensive weaponry to barrage the enemy.

    ¡°F*ck! Retreat! Retreat!¡± Fass no longer hesitated when he saw the mes surging through the sky from the war chariots. A million gold coins was indeed worth attempting a raid, but given this situation, he might not even live to enjoy it. The war chariotsing back to life again meant that the soldiers on the city wall had the strength to continue fighting.

    Recalling the terrifying lethality of the war chariots and ballistae from before, and turning to see less than half his men remaining, Fass painfully issued the order to retreat.

    The bandits had long since been scared witless and were only awaiting this order from Fass himself. They didn¡¯t dare to remain in ce as soon as they heard the angelic word ¡°retreat¡±. They followed Fass, beating a hasty retreat as fast as they could.

    ¡°Useless Church of Light! How the hell are you people the messengers of Light?! You can¡¯t even purify four dark creatures, I really feel ashamed for you, blech!¡± Fass stopped his horse just before he ran past Kosse and the others. He red furiously at Kosse,, in the center of the Temrs, spitting out a thick wad of phlegm to vent his rage and contempt before actually leaving.

    Fass had been toyed with by Han Shuo from the start. When he¡¯d seen the Church of Light appear and purify the corpses with holy light, Fass had thought that he¡¯d seen the light of victory. Who would have known that the purification power of the holy light wasn¡¯t strong enough? In addition, some more undead creatures appeared and caused even more damage. Fass then felt that he¡¯d been toyed with by Kosse, so it was easy to imagine the grievances in his heart.

    Had Fass not taken the Church of Light¡¯s influence over the Continent into consideration, had he weighed the fact that the Temrs were the trump card of the Church of Light; given his brutal nature, Fass would definitely have ferociously charged forward with his underlings and chopped these ipetent Church of Light believers into pieces already.

    ¡°Shoot! Aim at the people in white outfits!¡± Floating in the sky, Han Shuo had withdrawn the Bloodlust Fang, now dripping with blood. He shouted an order to the distant soldiers on the city wall.

    The soldiers had restored their strength. Upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯smand, they immediately turned the war chariots and ballistae to shoot what little firepower they had left at the Church of Light¡¯s group. The Temrs and their horses staggered, with even Kosse almost being struck by the goblin explosives.

    ¡°Bishop, what do you think of this situation?¡± A Temr with a cross insignia on his chest, desperately protected Kosse whilst asking hesitantly, as if he wanted to say something but stopped himself.

    Kosse had been insulted by Fass before leaving and was wearing an ugly expression on his old face. Kosse¡¯s sorry figure dodged the goblin bomb, before closing his eyes andmanding in a low voice, ¡°I¡¯ve failed, again. It seems that I will need to personally see the Pope this time. Let¡¯s go, we leave immediately!¡±

    The Temr waved his sword to point behind him as soon as Kosse¡¯s order was given. The Temrs grouped up, rushing forward to collect their thirty seven corpses, cing them on the warhorses. They then left the battlefield that was smoking with explosive residue, not leaving behind a single item of the deceased.

    ¡°They¡¯re gone, they¡¯ve all retreated!¡± An exhausted soldier looked at the gradually disappearing enemies and revealed an ugly, but sincere smile.

    Some soldiers, who could still barely stand straight, saw the distant Han Shuo standing proudly in the sky above the battlefield like a demon god. They felt that, as long as this city lord was still alive, Brettel City would never be attacked by anyone from now on.

    Han Shuo used the yin demon to carefully watch the leaving enemies. When he had made certain that they¡¯d truly withdrawn, his eyes swept over the scattered corpses that littered the vast pockmarked battlefield in front of Brettel City and loudly shouted, ¡°All soldiers with any energy, defend this ce well. Don¡¯t rx for even a moment!¡±

    These people were truly tired to death already. When Han Shuo¡¯s ears caught the deafening rumbles from the other two city gates, he understood that the battle with the two other sides had yet to wrap up. However, the soldiers on his side had no energy left to reinforce the other sides, thanks to it being the most devastating battlefield. Han Shuo knew that they were spending every bit of effort just to remain on their feet, so he intended to personally go to the other battlefields.

    The anxious civilians of Brettel City heard the weak cheering from the soldiers over on Han Shuo¡¯s side. These residents had been paying close attention to any changes from this side, for fear of being ughtered, along with the massacre of the entire city. Some bold folk had even climbed onto the city wall to watch the entire battle.

    Therefore, when the Temrs and Fass¡¯ bandit horde retreated, the civilians in this area immediately began to jubntly cheer. The people here had always been living a life full of fear, but now felt an intense sense of excitement and happiness filling their hearts. Being able to retain their lives in the face of the threat of a massacre made them extraordinarily happy.

    For so many years, the city lords had always been the first to flee.

    Han Shuo had finally broken this tradition with his arrival. He had seemingly turned the tides with the power of one person alone.

    Han Shuo had used all of his miraculous powers to firmly guard the vast Brettel City.

    Victory came full of hardship through twists and turns, but its fruits were sweet beyond belief. They had been limping along in life for all this time and now felt an unvarnished excitement at this moment of victory, because they were the ones to personally witness it.

    When the civilians on Han Shuo¡¯s side erupted in cheers, the people on the three other sides also gradually smiled. At the city gates defended by Faulke, some civilians even took the initiative to join the struggle against the foreign enemies. These civilians didn¡¯t know how to use defensive equipment, but they could join forces by helping to move the huge boulders onto the stone-throwing catapults. Then, they saw with their own eyes how the boulders they personally loaded fell on the bandits, causing horrifying fatalities.

    On Faulke¡¯s side, when the prepared boulders were used up, the civilians volunteered to move household items from the nearby houses and ce them onto the stone-throwing catapults. This gave the desperate invaders an even more unforgettable blow.

    The side defended by Dick, Chester, and Fabian were facing the Flying Dragon Bandits.

    This gate had two magic crystal cannons, four war chariots, seven ballistae, six rows of stone-throwing catapults, and a thousand elite soldiers. Dick and the others had no experience inmanding an army, so Faulke had arranged a thousand skilled soldiers for defense. Han Shuo had ced a huge amount of firepower on this side precisely because he was worried that they couldn¡¯t withstand being overwhelmed.

    The leader of the Flying Dragon Bandits, Afie, was a petty, sinister man with a vicious heart. He¡¯d already had another n in mind from the beginning. When Fass shot the signal into the sky, Afie didn¡¯t immediately rush forward to assault the gates. Instead, he waited for a while for the signals from all of the three other sides before he gave the order to attack.

    Afie was somewhat frightened from the responding signals from the three sides. He¡¯d had his underlings categorize the signals into three colors: red, blue, and yellow. Yellow signaled that the attack was going smoothly, blue meant there were some difficulties, and red meant that the assault in that area had encountered a fatal blow.

    Of the responding signals from the three sides, those from Han Shuo¡¯s and Faulke¡¯s sides were both red. This showed that the attack on those two gates had met with a fatal blow from the beginning. Because Dorcas had just begun to lure his enemies inside and hadn¡¯t violently erupted with overwhelming firepower from the start, the Flying Dragon bandits on this side only released a blue signal.

    Two red and one blue signals didn¡¯t really look too optimistic. Afie nned to preserve the bulk of his forces, so he let some of his underlings outside attack the gate guarded by Dick and Chester.

    Chester had never faced such a battle before. Upon seeing Afie¡¯s bandits rush over, they immediately issued orders tounch an intense bombardment.

    Because Han Shuo was worried they would be unable to bear the attacks, the firepower on their side was the fiercest. The two magic crystal cannons and war chariots spat out surges of mes at the same time as the ballista and catapults let loose their lethal barrage. Half of the several hundred low rank bandits sent out by Afie were killed instantly.

    Afie jumped in fright. He immediately gave an order to hold and observe, his heart somewhat chilled in fright.

    When his enemies were sessfully lured into his trap, Dorcas unleashed devastating firepower. Those closest to the source died instantly and the few hundred bandits who¡¯d reached the walls didn¡¯t leave behind enough for a grave by the time Dorcas was done.

    When the bandit who¡¯d released the blue signal saw the originally calm firepower be violent, he hurriedly released two red signals in a row out of shock.

    Afie had already been a little worried in his heart when he saw the sudden two red signals in a row after the blue signal. He instantly ordered a retreat of a hundred meters, not allowing anyone to continue attacking.

    Afie didn¡¯t mobilize a single soldier until the moment Fass withdrew. He only remained on his warhorse and red at the enemies on the distant city wall, as if trying to cow the opponents with his presence alone. Afie was waiting for the other bandit groups who¡¯d attacked Brettel City to gain some footholds first. Only then would he made a move against those bastards on the city wall.

    When the news of Fass¡¯ failure was delivered one step ahead to him, the frightened Afie knew that they wouldn¡¯t be able to reap any benefits this time. He immediately issued an order to retreat without another word. The bandit group, who always advanced fiercely and bravely, now quickly retreated far away, leaving behind roughly two hundred corpses.

    It was the first time Chester and Fabian had experienced such a battle. Seeing Afie dejectedly leave in resentment, they thoughtcently, ¡°Our side is indeed powerful. We¡¯re only fighting from a distance. Could it be that we already scared them off with just our momentum alone?¡±

 Chapter 335: The Fruits of Victory

    Chapter 335: The Fruits of Victory

    Han Shuo was most concerned about the gates that Chester and Dick were responsible for. But when he reached the gates, he found the soldiers safe and sound. The vestiges of their battle didn¡¯t seem too prominent. The two hundred bandit corpses indicated that the bandits¡¯ losses hadn¡¯t been too severe, either.

    ¡°Are you alright?¡± Han Shuo descended, an aura of victory swirling around him, and looked at the immeasurably self-satisfied Chester and the others, letting out a sigh of relief as he did so.

    ¡°We¡¯re fine, my lord. Those cowardly bandits charged us only the once, and then just stayed in the distance and observed the gate. They suddenly retreated just now.¡± Chester gave a rxed smile, pointing in the direction that Afie had run off in.

    Looking into the distance, Han Shuo nodded, saying ¡°That¡¯s good. Leave three hundred to defend this gate; the rest of you, go help Dorcas.¡±

    ¡°Alright, we¡¯ll depart immediately!¡± Dick and Chester responded in tandem, turning to give spirited orders to the idle troops, haranguing them to get various appendages in order and head out to aid the other two sides.

    Rumble...

    A deafening explosion sounded from the direction of the other two walls. Han Shuo flew directly over to Faulke¡¯s defensive perimeter. Dorcas had already demonstrated his military genius during the merchant kidnapping incident, and was now once again doing so in exterminating the bandits. Han Shuo trusted that he was fine.

    On the contrary, it was the high-born, stronger Faulke who needed help. Although it may have been because of his status as a knight, but he was bound by a code of conduct that limited his effectiveness. On the battlefield, his formations weren¡¯t flexible enough, and Han Shuo was worried that he might fall into trouble.

    When Han Shuo arrived at the city wall under Faulke¡¯smand, he found bandit corpses lying everywhere. Looking at the walls, the bandits seemed to have exacted their revenge in kind, leaving countless soldier corpses riddled with arrows. Han Shuo immediately understood that the battle here must have been very intense.

    The bandit group Faulke was fighting was the Battleaxe Mercenary Group. The towering leader of the Battleaxe Mercenary Group, Bynam, wasn¡¯t good atmanding troops like Fass, nor was his head filled with crafty schemes like Alfie. This single minded simpleton had been blinded by the prospect of a million gold coins and had justmitted all his troops in a frontal assault.

    Defending the wall, Faulke fought against the assault as if his life depended on it. With the battle devolving into a war of attrition, the barbaric Bynam, who¡¯d sustained severe casualties, did not appear to know the definition of ¡°retreat¡±. He yelled madly at his soldiers to continue attacking the walls. Faulke¡¯s side had lost a hundred men, with around four hundred more with various injuries. The remaining soldiers were all bone deep exhausted.

    If it hadn¡¯t been for the citizens of Brettel City joining the fray against the bandits at the tipping point then Faulke¡¯s side would have been in severe danger. When Han Shuo arrived, the battle had once again reached a critical juncture. Tens of ferocious bandits had already stormed the city walls, entangling the soldiers in furious battle.

    The exhausted soldiers used theirst vestiges of energy to hack, sh, and cut their foes down. A few citizens, unafraid of death in the face of the bandit threat, had willingly joined the fray. Wielding spears and javelins, they furiously stabbed and thrust at the bandits climbing the city walls.

    Like a bolt of lightning, Han Shuo mmed into the city wall like a tornado of death.

    He whistled loudly and charged the bandits on the wall alone. Like an unstoppable boulder, he tore through bandits using his bare hands, leaving behind a trail of what could only be described as vivisection specimens.

    As these bandits died at his hand, there was nothing to stop Han Shuo from starting his loud, long chant with his bone staff. A horrifying army of undead gradually gathered beneath the city walls.

    With a single stroke from the evil knight¡¯s killing aura infused bone spear, several bandits were mutted and swept away. Flocks of gargoyles hurtled by like ravens, unhorsing and carrying off the bandits that hade galloping in on horses. The bandits that were carried off would be torn to pieces by the gargoyles¡¯ ws long before they hit the ground.

    This time, when acid marshes appeared amidst the bandits, the sounds of screaming never stopped. Under the corrosion of the acid marshes, scores of bandits became brand-new, snowy white skeletons.

    Han Shuo¡¯s actions hadpletely turned the situation around. Surging waves of magic rippled out whenever the demon-like Han Shuo waved his bone staff. Groups of undead soldiers would rise up, or mind-bogglingly destructive acid marshes would appear. From time to time, a few corpses would even explode. The Battleaxe Mercenary Group¡¯s casualties soared exponentially with every passing second.

    The battlefield was aplete rout by the time Han Shuo was done. The furious leader of the Battleaxe Mercenary Group, Bynam, was roaring nonstop. In his fury, hepletely overestimated himself, jumping on a hose and boldly charged towards Han Shuo. However, a shake of the bone staff sent a st of magic towards him. The st turned into rows of bonences that flew through the air, a dense rain that blotted out the sun.

    There were no flukes. Every part of Bynam and his horse that weren¡¯t covered by armor was pierced through by bonences. Two bonences found his eye sockets. Bynam died on the spot without even uttering a sound.

    ¡°Boss! The boss is dead!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s arrival caused panic amongst the bandits. The shocked and fearful bandits began shrieking loudly upon discovering that their leader was dead.

    The remaining Battleaxe bandits all bolted as if using this as an excuse, recklessly running from this area. An audacious yet careful bandit pretended to retrieve Bynam¡¯s corpse, secretly taking off thetter¡¯s space ring and pocketing it.

    Han Shuo loved looting the dead and discovered the bandit¡¯s actions with a nce. Heughed lightly, flying from the city walls like a specter, silently catching up to the ecstatic bandit who was hurriedly running away. He said, ¡°Sometimes, the wealth of the dead will also cause you to lose your life!¡±

    The bandit who had taken Bynam¡¯s space ring thought that it was an avariciouspatriot who desired a share of the wealth upon hearing those wordsing from behind him. He turned around and struck out with a battleaxe with an ominous glint in his eyes.

    The battleaxe heading towards him flew away with a ¡°Ding! ¡± upon meeting a flick of Han Shuo¡¯s right forefinger. The reverb travelled down the bandit¡¯s arm, sending him staggering backwards. . He turned around, finally seeing who the person behind him was.

    Once he saw who was behind him, the bandit didn¡¯t dare hold back. He threw himself into a roll and tried to crawl through the underbrush to escape. Unfortunately, in front of the airborne Han Shuo, the bandit¡¯s actions were as transparent as a clear spring. Han Shuo easily impaled the bandit from behind, relieving him of Bynam¡¯s space ring andughing as he flew back to Faulke.

    ¡°Some more unexpected revenue!¡± Han Shuoughingly said to the panting Faulke.

    Faulke understood that the danger he was facing was gone with Han Shuo¡¯s arrival. Faulke was also fully aware of the magnitude of Han Shuo¡¯s astounding power, and that the battle would be over the instant Han Shuo appeared. The facts proved Faulke¡¯s judgement correct.

    The bandits did not dare to linger after Bynam¡¯s death, especially in the face of the undead army¡¯s terrifyingbat ability. As such, they retreated from the city like a tide, leaving behind a thousand or so corpses.

    The rumbling of the magic cannons from the other side of the city gradually subsided as well.

    No longer hearing the sound of the cannons, Han Shuo understood that Dorcas¡¯ battle must also be drawing to a close. This was the first trial that Brettel City had faced, and they¡¯d managed to pull through with everyone¡¯s cooperation.

    Having witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s frightening strength, all of the citizens who¡¯d participated in the battle looked at Han Shuo with reverence. When thest bandit disappeared over the horizon, this reverence gradually grew into trust. Loud cheers suddenly broke out around the city walls.

    ¡°Today, all citizens who participated in the battle shall be rewarded five gold coins. Faulke, you¡¯ll be responsible for the distribution of the rewards.¡± Han Shuo instructed, smiling slightly as he looked at the citizens who were revelling in the joy of their survival.

    The cheering citizens let out even more excited cheers as soon as the words left Han Shuo¡¯s mouth. The look in their eyes as they looked towards Han Shuo became even more ardent. How grandiose the city lord of Brettel City seemed!

    ¡°Rest assured, my lord. I won¡¯t unfairly treat the civilians who have aided us.¡± Faulke bowed respectfully and looked at the bandit corpses outside the city. The armor and weapons left behind by the bandits will certainly be worth a pretty penny. Also, their money pouches will likely contain plenty of gold coins?

    ¡°Yeah, the bandits really have left. You clean up the battlefield, I¡¯m going to go check on Dorcas!¡± Han Shuo gave instructions to Faulke and then streaked across the sky towards the section of the wall left to Dorcas.

    The cannon fire gradually subsided, and Han Shuo looked through the distant, thick smoke from the magic cannons. In the distance, the bandits were beating a hasty retreat. The battlefield was littered with corpses, and the numerous pockmarks were a direct indicator of a battle just as fierce as the other two. Dorcas had not let Han Shuo down.

    Arriving at the wall beside Dorcas, Han Shuo found him making a list of their casualties. Taking a nce, Han Shuo found the bodies of tens of soldiers neatly arranged towards the side. Dorcas and the rest of the soldiers were standing in front of the corpses, solemnly saluting the fallen after they had finished their count.

    End of part 1 of the chapter.

    Han Shuo walked up to Dorcas, not saying anything. The bodies of the young soldiers lying in front of them were all riddled with arrows. There were more who were killed by flying battleaxes, some even missing limbs. They must have suffered considerably prior to dying.

    A grief-stricken aura emanated from the saluting Dorcas and soldiers. Han Shuo copied them, and saluted to pay his respects to the deceased. After a while, Dorcas opened his mouth and said, ¡°There will certainly be casualties in war. Nobody has the power to change this. The only thing I can do is make sure that our casualties are as few as possible, and make sure the enemy suffers as many of these tragedies as possible.¡±

    Nodding his head in agreement, Han Shuo said ¡°That¡¯s right. Sometimes, being cruel to your enemy is being benevolent to yourself. I think we need to upgrade our soldiers¡¯ equipment, with sturdier armor and weapons. This will make it easier for our soldiers to survive.¡±

    ¡°My Lord, how are the conditions of the other three walls?¡± Dorcas took a deep breath, finally taking his eyes off the soldier¡¯s corpses.

    ¡°Apart from Dick¡¯s section, the others are more or less the same as yours; though we all held out.¡± Han Shuo gave a gratified smile as he answered Dorcas¡¯s question.

    Nodding his head, Dorcas heaved a sigh of relief and said ¡°That¡¯s good!¡±

    Clop, clop, clop.

    At this time, Dick, Chester, and the others had finally dashed all the way across the city. Upon discovering Han Shuo already standing there, they understood that the battle must have already ended.

    It had turned to dusk at some point. Thest ray of sunshine gave birth to a fiery sunset. Under the glow of the sunset, the drifting smoke painted the world in blood, adding a touch of deste beauty to the battlefield that looked like hell on earth.

    Flocks of crows cawed as they flew, swooping down on the corpses of the bandits. They gleefully tore at and swallowed that beautiful flesh, giving off cries that disgusted people. As the sun set, the dense mass of crows grew more numerous, their grim screeches a bitter end to the unbearable scene.

    ¡°It¡¯s over. It¡¯s finally over!¡± Han Shuo mumbled a few words to himself, returning to the governor¡¯s manor.

    Smoke continued to billow outside Brettel City for three consecutive days. The citizens who resided close to the city gates all smelt the strong, pungent odor of burnt flesh.

    A total of fifteen thousand bandits had attacked the city. In the end, they¡¯d left behind eight thousand corpses, four hundred thousand gold worth of armor and weapons, as well as roughly two hundred thousand gold as loot. In addition, the Battleaxe leader¡¯s spatial ring also contained three hundred thousand gold.

    The fourrge bandit groups had arrived greedy for gold. Unfortunately, not only did they not receive a single gold coin from Brettel City, but they gifted arge amount of gold instead. Just as Han Shuo had predicted.

    In this battle, Brettel City¡¯s city guard death toll was three hundred and twenty seven. The injured numbered seven hundred and sixty nine. Those who had survived had essentially all suffered some form of injury. Furthermore, the magic crystals for the six magic crystal cannons were all depleted.

    The goblin explosives and the more than ten thousand crossbow bolts that the merchants had transported over had also been almostpletely consumed. There was not a drop remaining in the dozens of fire oil barrels, while the giant rocks used by the catapults had run out.

    The few bandits who¡¯d managed to scale the city walls had managed to destroy two war chariots, four ballistae, and a cumbersome catapult. The bandits also knew the astronomical prices of the magic crystal cannons and the specially refined magic ores they were made from. However, the six magic crystal cannons had been left untouched.

    Han Shou finally gained the respect of all of Brettel City¡¯s residents after this battle, with army recruitment at an unprecedented high as enthusiastic young citizens flocked towards recruitment centers. Han Shuo¡¯s god-like power and influence had spread through the entirety of Brettel City. In the span of just three days, these residents who were at first filled with doubt towards Han Shuo had deified him.

    To the younger generation, Han Shuo had be an unreachable myth and legend. There were a few pretty girls and beautiful women, who in thest three days had lightly powdered and gorgeously dressed themselves,ing up with excuses to hover around the city lord manor¡¯s main door. Each one of them looked flirtatiously in every direction, carrying who knows what thoughts in their heads.

    The previously despised Brettel City city guard had also seemed to be hotmodities. Some residents excitedly introduced their beautiful daughters to the soldiers that were dressed in shiny armor. Brettel City had dramatically changed overnight.

    Han Shuo, Jack, Chester and the rest were chatting with the merchants led by Fabian at the city gate leading to Seamist City. Of these merchants who had darede to Brettel City, every one of them were true merchants, daring risk to obtain fortune. They had gained a new understanding of the city after experiencing the defensive battle of Brettel City.

    The siege munitions escorted by the merchants this time had been utterly depleted. Yet, therger threat of the seven duchies still existed. Therefore, when the corpses were cleared and the roads slightly repaired, Han Shuo immediately spentrge amounts of gold to purchase even more munitions. Apart from unending war arsenal, he purchased evenrger amounts of food and daily necessities.

    Merchants would never rest as long as there was money. When therge deposit was handed over to them, the merchants were simrly anxious to leave the city to handle their affairs, emboldened by the trust that Brettel City and Han Shuo was cing in them. In addition, Fabian held a letter that Han Shuo had passed to him. Within the letter was a list of special ingredients that Han Shuo required, as well as a few warm and sweet words for Phoebe.

    ¡°Jack, have you truly decided to stay?¡± Fabian looked at his distant nephew, asking one more time.

    Little Fatty Jack nodded his head, a surprisingly firm answer following, ¡°Yes, I think this city needs me more. Furthermore, Bryan will be giving me the position of finance minister.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry Old Fabian, I¡¯ll take good care of Jack. Let him stay and try since this fellow is so persistent.¡± Han Shuoughed as he spoke to Fabian.

    When Han Shuo found Jack two days ago, thetter had been still hiding in his room vomiting nonstop. Having witnessed the defense of the city from beginning to end, Jack¡¯s appetite for meat decreased drastically, continually vomiting as he revisited the experience over the past few days. At that time, Han Shuo thought that Jack would leave, shellshocked after experiencing this gruesome battle. Surprisingly, this fellow had an amazing perseverance, insisting on his continual presence in Brettel City.

    Han Shuo had found out from Fabian that Jack was talented in resource management and finance. Under the guidance of a few Boozt experts experienced in trade, Jack disyed a level of financial management that moved even Phoebe. The reason why Phoebe gave such consideration for Jack, apart from the rtionship between Jack and Han Shuo, was because of his performance in management.

    Knowing this situation and seeing Jack insist on staying in Brettel City, Han Shuo did not continue persuading him and instead gave Jack the position of finance minister. He did so in front of Faulke, Dorcas and the rest. The gold that had previously been obtained from Redbeard Tuoba, the four hundred thousand from Helen Tina, and all the gold that was obtained from the battle were all handed over to Jack, cing him in charge of managing thisrge amount of wealth.

    Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t dare to hand such arge sum of gold to any other person. He trusted only Jack, someone who¡¯d grown up with him at Babylon Academy.

    Han Shuo was finally Brettel City¡¯s true master. He could appoint any personnel for any areas without need for any other approval. Faulke, Dorcas and the rest had no authority to interfere or intervene.

    Jack was silent for a long time as he struggled between excitement and panic at holding such arge sum of wealth. Only after Han Shuo¡¯s continual reassurance did he slowly adapt to the role as finance minister.

    Fabian¡¯s words to Han Shuo were truly urate. With such arge wealth in Jack¡¯s possession, Jack systematically started to clearly allocate the usage and distribution of the gold once he¡¯d gotten over his initial panic. Every amount was thoroughly recorded, causing Han Shuo to have a whole new level of respect for Jack.

    Faulke and the rest initially doubted Jack, but were all shocked after receiving their stipend from Jack and hearing him clearly name the price of each armor and weapon. When Jack initiated contact with several merchants to help Faulke and Dorcas purchase some war equipment that were in high demand, both gradually rxed when Jack bought the equipment at a price much lower than they¡¯d imagined.

    Busy Jack disyed the brains of a qualified finance minister in three short days. The young Jack was gradually epted by Faulke and the rest. The few of them felt in their hearts that such a young finance minister was perhaps not a bad thing.

    ¡°Alright then, you all take care!¡± Fabian looked at the two youthful faces in front of him, as if seeing that Brettel City regain its vitality under their care, emerging brightly onto the chaotic stage that was the eastern region.

    The merchants were escorted towards Seamist City by guards led by Chester amidst the farewells of Han Shuo and the others, gradually disappearing from Han Shuo¡¯s line of sight.

    Han Shuo knew that Brettel City would definitely be even more powerful and prosperous the next time they came.

 Chapter 336: The mountain chiefs

    Chapter 336: The mountain chiefs

    Today was a beautiful, sunny, and mild day in Brettel City. The four city gates had been properly repaired and cleaned up. Aside from the potholes in front of the city gates that temporarily couldn¡¯t be restored to their original state, the terrifying scenery from several days ago had vanished without a trace.

    The five mountain chiefs in the surrounding areas brought some of their brothers and sisters to Brettel City under the warm sunshine.

    The earth-shaking happenings in Brettel City a few days ago had spread throughout the surrounding area for dozens of miles. It was easy to see how fierce the battle had been from the deep scars on the city gates when the mountain chiefs arrived. Through the information they had received from Dick, who was also a mountain man, they instantly understood the situation that had arisen several days ago. They were now in awe and more respectful towards the newly appointed, young city lord of Brettel.

    Among them, Fulkin of Mount Taki had long since witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s powerful might. He¡¯d even made a gesture of goodwill before the fighting had started. Otherwise, Faulke wouldn¡¯t have been able to easily transport therge amount of siege equipment back to the city that night. As for the other four mountain chiefs, they all behaved and came docilely to the city lord¡¯s mansion under Dick¡¯s guidance.

    The new changes in appearance of Brettel City along the way left a deep impression on them. The magic crystal cannons, war chariots, and other equipment carried overwhelming momentum and looked much fiercer after enduring the terrors of battle.

    The soldiers weing them along the way may have been the same soldiers of Brettel City, but the presence these soldiers exuded now gave them a strange feeling. Having survived such a brutal battle, these soldiers were no longer timid and cowardly like they had been in the past. Their armor shone brilliantly, and their bearings were cold and calm with a faint brutal, killing air.

    ¡°Are these people the same tattered soldiers in the past who ran even faster than the civilians?¡± Some mountain chiefs couldn¡¯t help but inwardly wonder when they saw the drastic changes in these soldiers.

    As they stood before the main gates of the city lord¡¯s mansion, the mountain chiefs saw some smiling civilians take it upon themselves to clean up the surrounding roads. There were also some beautiful girls and women shyly gathered around the front of the city lord¡¯s mansion, chattering andughing in low voices. The mountain chiefs felt that Brettel City had be extremely different.

    ¡°His Lordship isn¡¯t someone who can be provoked. Zack, you shouldn¡¯t run your mouth, it won¡¯t end well if you offend His Lordship!¡± Dick was quite familiar with the mountain chiefs. Knowing that Zack was the most rude and careless of the bunch, Dick had constantly warned him along the way.

    ¡°Dick, old pal, you¡¯ve been running your mouth more and more nowadays. I remember that you used to be a man of few words before. When did you be so long-winded?¡± Zack was a short, sturdy man. It was unknown whether or not his skin was as ck as charcoal due to year round mining.

    ¡°Elder cousin Dick, is this city lord truly as powerful as you say? Or are you deliberately exaggerating?¡± A female mountain chief called Delia spoke up. She had inherited the leadership of Mount Silk from her father. Delia had a high nose ¨C a typical feature of the mountain people, and a beautiful pair of straight, long, and slender legs. She was around 173 centimeters tall, quite a bit taller than the average woman.

    Delia¡¯s appearance was just as charming as her body. Her wheat colored skin shone with a healthy luster, her eyes wild while still preserving the curiosity of a young girl. Her curvy body was covered simply by some leather armor at the important parts of the chest and belly. However, her arms and legs were both exposed, with a valuable dagger sheathed on her left calf. She very much had her own sense of style.

    Both Zack and a young mountain chief Kent next to him revealed traces of a fervent expression upon hearing Delia¡¯s words. It seemed that they were very interested in Delia.

    In a ce where beautiful women were scarce, like Brettel City, Delia quickly became the focus of many men¡¯s attention. However, Delia was a senior swordsman, in addition to holding the mining rights to Mount Silk. No ordinary person would have the right to capture her.

    Delia had the frank personality of a mountain woman and was like a thorny rose. In a ce where she was the focus of local men, Delia liked to use her advantages to y off the men who lusted for her. However, she never spoke encouragingly to any man, nor did any man have the ability to take advantage of her.

    Dick was Delia¡¯s distant rtive. He could only smile wryly at this wild cat of a distant little cousin of his and warn her, ¡°You¡¯d best behave! Don¡¯t try your tricks in front of His Lordship, he¡¯s not someone you can handle!¡±

    ¡°Humph! Just a young man, what¡¯s so great about him?!¡± Delia pouted and snorted gently. That¡¯s what she said, but she had actually be even more interested in Han Shuo.

    ¡°Alright, alright. Hurry up, don¡¯t keep the city lord waiting for too long!¡± Adleman, the oldest mountain chief, abruptly opened his mouth with a light scold.

    Adleman held the most prestige amongst the five mountain chiefs. He belonged to the same generation as the grandfathers of Delia, Zack, and Kent, and they¡¯d always banded up to resist the bandits¡¯ assaults. They had also kept in touch with each other over the years. Whenever the mountain chiefs fathered together, Adleman often gave guidance to the rest as their senior.

    The others had no more words to say upon hearing Adleman¡¯s words. Only Dick was summarizing some of Han Shuo¡¯s recent matters to the others in a low voice, particrly Han Shuo¡¯s personality. Dick narrated in detail about how Han Shuo had personally killed a soldier who¡¯d dared to defy him when he¡¯d just arrived in Brettel City.

    The mountain chiefs understood very well from Dick¡¯s previous messages that this new city lord wasn¡¯t one to be trifled with. When Dick described Han Shuo¡¯s cruel and ruthless style, they all felt some apprehension in their hearts. As for Delia, she became even more curious about Han Shuo.

    ¡°Everyone best not to provoke this person. I don¡¯t care what you do, our Mount Tali will definitely have a good rtionship with him anyway. We don¡¯t have any intention of making things difficult for him.¡± Fulkin had nned to get along with Han Shuo after personally seeing Han Shuo destroy Troda in a fight. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have had taken the initiative to descend the mountain and help Faulke, doing Han Shuo a favor.

    Fulkin was the most stubborn amongst the five mountain chiefs. It had been years since he¡¯d been willing to serve someone. When even Fulkin had made his stand before he¡¯d met Han Shuo, the fear and awe in the others¡¯ hearts instantly increased.

    They¡¯d walked past broad, stone steps after a while as Dick finally led the five mountain chiefs to the banquet area in the city lord¡¯s mansion.

    Han Shuo had retained all of the chefs that he¡¯d recruited in the city lord¡¯s mansionst time. The banquet was held in the merchants¡¯ living room. Dorcas, Faulke, Chester, and Jack had arrived ahead of time to wait for the five mountain chiefs.

    ¡°Let me introduce to you all, these are my five fellow mountain chiefs of the mountain mines around Brettel City!¡± Dick pointed towards the five mountain people before introducing Dorcas and the others as well.

    After Dick finished the introduction of both sides, Fulkin, who¡¯d helped Faulke resist the banditsst time,ughed heartily as they gave each other a hug full of heroic spirit.

    Fulkin said in a loud voice, ¡°Faulke, my brave brother, I have heard of your amazing exploits even in Mount Tali!¡±

    As a true knight, Faulke gave Fulkin a courteous, small smile, his voice warm and friendly, ¡°You overpraise me. I dly wee your visit.¡±

    ¡°Oh, where is your city lord?¡± Zack shifted his gaze around. He was waiting for Dick to introduce the young, miraculous city lord only to find that Dick wasn¡¯t ying along.

    Dorcas swept a cold nce at Zack, shouting in a low, somewhat sinister voice, ¡°¡®Your¡¯ city lord? Do you mean that you people aren¡¯t under His Lordship¡¯s jurisdiction?¡±

    Although Dorcas¡¯ strength wasn¡¯t strong, the presence he¡¯d umted through the intense ughter of battle couldn¡¯t be looked down upon. His low shout was dark and chilling. like a sharp sword edge.

    ¡°Shut up Zack!¡± Ever since Dorcas had been brought back by Han Shuo, he¡¯d gradually revealed his talent during the several battles. Dorcas had be the soldiers¡¯ object of trust, his deterrence of his presence slowly outstripping even that of Faulke¡¯s. Dick understood full well that this person¡¯s loyalty to Han Shuo was somewhat blindly unreasonable, so he hurriedly scolded Zack.

    The mountain chiefs around Brettel City had always looked down on the city lords. Thus, they naturally wouldn¡¯t show any respect in their usual conversation. Old habits died hard, immediately angering Dorcas.

    With his 190 centimeters tall body, Dorcas stood there like a sharp unsheathed sword. No one could ignore his presence. It was a pity that his determined face currently wore cold indifference, an expression that rejected people froming within a thousand mile radius of him, making him unapproachable.

    ¡°Our apologies, we haven¡¯t been respectful enough because the previous city lords had been ipetent. Zack¡¯s mouth is unable to adapt so quickly, I think that he didn¡¯t mean to offend His Lordship. I hope you will overlook this.¡± The old Adleman hurriedly spoke up in an effort to mediate, surreptitiously giving Zack several eye signals.

    Dick and Fulkin also winked and red fiercely at Zack, motioning for thetter to quickly show a respectful attitude so as to avoid making Dorcas unhappy.

    Zack was crude, but not stupid. Even though he still held some grievances in his heart, Zack ultimately bowed when the three looked at him and said in a small voice, ¡°I¡¯m sorry!¡±

    Dorcas threw Zack a nce and snorted coldly, not saying another word. He picked up his wine ss before going to seek out Jack to discuss about needing more war equipment, not continuing to pursue Zack¡¯s disrespectful manners anymore.

    ¡°Faulke, where is His Lordship?¡± Dick inwardly heaved a sigh of relief upon seeing that the most unsociable Dorcas had taken his leave. He then turned to ask Faulke, who¡¯d been chatting andughing with Fulkin.

    ¡°Ah, His Lordship said that it was rare for him to have guests, so he wanted to personally prepare some good food, telling us to stay here and wait for him for a bit.¡± Faulke exinedughingly. His stared fixedly at Delia, not hiding his interest for her.

    ¡°Another stinky pervert!¡± Delia curled her lips somewhat pridefully. She threw Faulke a re before turning her head away, inwardlying to this judgment about him in her heart.

    When Delia turned her line of sight away from Faulke, her eyes followed the indifferent Dorcas with some interest. She discovered some interesting points in his seemingly forever unapproachable face. It seemed Delia paid more attention to men who didn¡¯t pay any attention to her.

    The smooth tongued knight Faulke, humorous Chester, and Dick chatted with the five mountain chiefs. All of the five mountain chiefs were both fearful and respectful towards the new city lord. No one dared to be carelessly unfriendly in their manner of speech. They sipped from their wine sses while gathering more information about the city lord from Faulke and Chester.

    The young Zack and Kent were still extraordinarily curious about the rumors regarding Han Shuo¡¯s kidnapping of the grand duke Helen Tina. Chester and Dick were no gentleman either and paid no heed to Han Shuo¡¯s heroic image, narrating their self-confirmed true understandings to the two with low, pervertedughs.

    Delia, who wasn¡¯t very far from them, was also very curious. Upon hearing the four perverts¡¯ dirtyughs, Delia paid attention to their conversation and ¡°identally¡± heard some things she shouldn¡¯t have heard. She couldn¡¯t help but blush to her ears, spitting in contempt and scolding in a low voice, ¡°I didn¡¯t think this city lord would be so lewd. Humph! It seems he¡¯s much more lustful and perverted than the men in Brettel City!¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, His Lordship is truly an expert!¡± In this aspect, the dirty men seemed to think nothing of being brutal to a notoriously vicious woman. It wasn¡¯t something despicable, and they even felt some glory in it.

    After Dick and Chester described it once over, the two young mountain chiefs all revealed looks of awe, the kind of awe that was much greater than when they had heard about Han Shuo killing many bandits. This made the eavesdropping Delia despise the four of them. She inwardly cursed that men were nothing good.

    ¡°My apologies to you for beingte. The ingredients in Brettel City are too rare. Although I¡¯m a littlete, we will be able to enjoy some exotic food!¡± A heartyugh resounded from within the room suddenly. The handsome, refined Han Shuo stepped out leisurely from inside.

    TLC of an advance GDK chapter going on right abouuuuut now. ??

 Chapter 337: Complete acceptance

    Chapter 337: Complete eptance

    Even in front of the umonly tall mountain people, Han Shuo¡¯s stature of over 190 centimeters exuded a natural deterrence that made him stand out like a crane among a flock of chickens when he walked out of the house. Practicing demonic magic had also given him an evil aura, making him even more attractive.

    Smiling lightly as he approached, Han Shuo took out te after te of gleaming, roasted shiny golden meat from his space ring and ced them onto the table in front of everyone.

    ¡°Ladies and gentlemen, these are some very rare meats from distantnds that I¡¯ve taken pains to hunt and prepare. Would you like to have a taste?¡± Pulling all the dishes out, Han Shuo smiled as he invited everyone to try a piece.

    Jack was pulled to the other side by Dorcas to discuss military budgets. But when he smelled the mouthwatering fragrance of roasted meat, something he hadn¡¯t tasted in so long, his belly couldn¡¯t control its desire for good food. Jack quickly threw off the pestering Dorcas and came running over.

    Dorcas was a fanatic with a fiery thirst for war. His only interest was slowly polishing his training methods to create an even more powerful, explosive force out of the soldiers under hismand.

    Therefore, Dorcas became especially interested in Little Fatty Jack, since he was in charge of the budget. Dorcas used all the tricks at his disposal to pry more and more money for equipment out of Jack. To be sure, Jack was a little scared at first, but after a while grew used to Dorcas. Now, he gave as good as he got in those little discussions with Dorcas, leaving him with just what was required.

    ¡°You little brat, heh.¡± Han Shuo shook his head when he saw Jack quickly run over, then spoke to the five mountain chiefs in a rxed manner, ¡°No worries, everyone hurry up and try some, these things aren¡¯t delicacies you¡¯d find normally.¡±

    Even Fulkin, who was the only one among the mountain chiefs who knew Han Shuo, felt some fear and trepidation when he saw that thetter wasn¡¯t aloof and lofty as they¡¯d imagined. He actually became even more cautious.

    Jack was most familiar with Han Shuo since he¡¯d been Han Shuo¡¯s only friend over the years. Therefore, he wasn¡¯t as polite as others. He used a fork to stab into arge piece of fragrant, tender meat, and chomped down on it. As he chewed, he let out a surprised exmation of praise, ¡°Mmmm, so tasty, what is this meat? It¡¯s really so fragrant!¡±

    ¡°This is a Manticore¡¯s forelimb, tastes good, doesn¡¯t it?¡± Han Shuo answered, with a smile. He pointed to the dishes one by one as he introduced them, ¡°This one here is the tail of a Deepwater Venom Python, it¡¯s the most chewy. That dish over there is the brain of a Harpy, you have to try to know how it tastes. And this is......¡±

    Let alone the five mountain chiefs, even Faulke, Dorcas, and the others grew wide-eyed and openmouthed with astonishment as Han Shuo¡¯s introduction went on. They couldn¡¯t understand how the meat in front of them could possiblye from high ranked magic creatures like those described. Hunting magic creatures of that rank would require a team of experienced, skilled adventurers. If any ordinary person attempted to do so, they would only face death.

    ¡°Furthermore, there are no such creatures around Brettel City. Where on earth did he go to hunt? Ohh, these creatures are not something an ordinary person could hunt, the city lord really is an incredible freak!¡±

    No one needed to look at each other to know that everyone present was feeling the same, gracing Han Shuo with a strange look.

    ¡°What!? This is the forelimb of a Manticore!?¡± Jack jumped in fright, the fork in his hand still holding arge piece of jiggling meat. He¡¯d heard once that a single swipe from a Manticore could tear a person in half. He couldn¡¯t help but cry out when he linked that image to the lovely piece of meat he was chewing on.

    ¡°Indeed, how does it taste?¡± Han Shuoughed out loud, staring at Jack.

    ¡°The taste is no problem, but when I imagine the scene of the Manticore tearing up people and the ground using its front ws, I¡¯m still scared!¡± Jack had some lingering fear, his eyes rolling as he looked over at the delicious dish. He seemed to want to eat, but couldn¡¯t ovee the pressure in his heart.

    Han Shuo nced at the others and discovered their odd expressions. He let out augh, amused, ¡°What, can it be that you guys don¡¯t dare to eat? Hehe, I hunted these specifically to serve you, are you not giving me face?¡±

    Dorcas silently walked towards the Harpy dish under Han Shuo¡¯s watchful eyes. He forked arge piece of charred, ck meat and swallowed it with a heavy expression.

    ¡°What¡¯s the big deal, humph!¡± To Han Shuo¡¯s surprise, Delia snorted, pouting as she picked up her knife and fork to start on the Deepwater Venom Python. She chose a piece of short rib with some cartge in it, chewing it carefully.

    As she chewed that morsel, Delia¡¯s brows began to rx. She began to excitedly waver her cutlery, cutting a bigger piece. As she chewed, she praised, ¡°It tastes really good!¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, the Deepwater Venom Python is extremely poisonous, even I don¡¯t know if I¡¯ve prepared it properly. Big trouble coulde my way if by chance something had gone wrong!, Han Shuo¡¯s lips curled as he muttered to himself, looking at Delia chew voraciously with her small mouth.

    Delia had thrown her image to the wind as she ate heartily. Her small ears happened to catch Han Shuo¡¯s mumbling. Her lively actions immediately froze stiff. Her delicate red cheeks paling, she stared at Han Shuo and her voice trembled, ¡°What did you say?¡±

    ¡°Nothing, hehe! The Deepwater Venom Python is extremely poisonous. If I hadn¡¯t prepared it properly, you probably wouldn¡¯t be conscious by now¡± A loudugh escaped Han Shuo as he exined it.

    ¡°Damn it! You even scared me!¡± Delia red ferociously at Han Shuo but didn¡¯t pursue the matter. She focused all of her attention on the Deepwater Venom Python dish.

    The other four mountain chiefs as well as Faulke, Dick, and Chester had reacted by now, particrly little fatty Jack, who took off with an entire te.

    These rare dishes were originally hard to even catch a glimpse of, let alone savor like this. Yet, Han Shuo had brought forth quite arge amount of these delicacies. However, there were more than enough people present. With the mountain people¡¯s famouslyrge appetite, Delia was afraid that the others would wipe out the remaining dishes while she wasted time talking. Therefore, she no longer paid attention to Han Shuo and instead rejoined the tussle over the food.

    The six dishes were spotless after some time, the maniacs having cleaned off the entire table. Some even held onto their forks, as if they hadn¡¯t gotten enough. On one hand, the food was delicious beyond belief, causing them to eat quickly. But the rare ingredients were also delicacies in their own right, which was an additional incentive to devour the food.

    When the servants hired by Han Shuo set up the food that the chefs had diligently cooked, the guests felt them to be dull and nd. They now despised the ordinary food.

    Their ptes satiated after food and drink, the bunch followed Han Shuo to the meeting chamber, leaving the mess for the servants to clean up.

    Unlike the antisocial image that the five mountain chiefs had expected, Han Shuo always maintained a smile, asionally cracking jokes. Everyone was now a bit less cautious and more warm when they sat down now. The exotic food had undoubtedly yed arge role in this.

    Han Shuo sat in the center, as befitting his position. He smiled and nced at the five mountain chiefs. Seeing them settle down properly one by one with restrained smiles, he nodded and said, ¡°Don¡¯t be nervous. I¡¯ve invited you here to discuss a matter of mutual benefit. You are all people from Brettel City. Maybe the former city lord couldn¡¯t hold your trust, so you gradually severed your connections with the city.¡±

    ¡°This time, his Majesty has bestowed Brettel City to me, and I will not let the city bear the brunt of the ravaging from the seven grand duchies and other bandit groups. Not only Brettel City, but the five mines of your group will be protected as well. From now on I hope that we can join forces and develop the city.¡±

    ¡°Your Lordship, I believe you can bring peace to Brettel City. I, the chief of Mount Tali, am willing to be at Your Lordship¡¯s disposal. I know that you will not treat us poorly.¡± Fulkin had already made his decision. He knew that Han Shuo alone could severely injure Mount Tali. Seeing the impressive array of defenses that Brettel City boasted had simply solidfied his decision.

    Han Shuo had already expected Fulkin¡¯s goodwill. When he heard these words, he said with a smile, ¡°Many thanks to you, Fulkin. When Faulke faced the threat of the banditsst time, your Mount Tali had lent a helping hand. This lord has remembered this in my heart.¡±

    ¡°Your Lordship is too polite. I held the former city lord in disdain because he ignored his own citizens. However you arepletely different from him. As an original member of Brettel City, this is what I should do. Not to mention since Your Lordship helped us break the siege against Mount Talist time, Troda will nevere back to disturb us again.¡± Fulkin was very sensible. Since he had decided to cooperate with Han Shuo, he spared no effort in forming a better rtionship.

    Seeing Fulkin make his stand, the other four mountain chiefs couldn¡¯t help but look at each other. They knew in their hearts that this newly appointed city lord excelled in all aspects. Their only concern was that Han Shuo would take over their mines. This was the reason why they weren¡¯t ready topromise.

    The mines were their main source of ie and also the basis for their survival. ording to what Han Shuo had said, everything around Brettel City belonged to the city lord, did that not mean their mines also belonged to him?

    Han Shuo slightly smiled, he looked at the four mountain chiefs and said, ¡°You four, are you willing to support me?¡±

    Their four hearts jumped when his words resounded. The three young mountain chiefs didn¡¯t speak and focused their gaze on the oldest, Adleman. Adleman was silent for a while, then bit the bullet and spoke respectfully to Han Shuo, ¡°Your Lordship, we are your people. We certainly want Brettel City to develop, but we do not know how we could be of help to Your Lordship. We hope that you will rify this for us.¡±

    Han Shuo smiled, nodding his head, ¡°Since you already admit to be the citizens of Brettel, this is now easy to handle. To be honest, Brettel City currently is notcking anything except for manpower. The merchants deliver a steady stream of materials, I also have enough gold coins to support the city¡¯s operation. Only the problem of theck of poption can¡¯t be solved in a short amount of time.¡±

    ¡°I know that there are thirty to forty thousand people around the mines on your mountains. Miners excluded, that total includes arge portion of elderly, women and children. Their living conditions near the five mines are not ideal. They only left Brettel due to the ipetence of the former city lord. They did so because Brettel wasn¡¯t secure. But now that Brettel is very safe, if you five are willing to, let theme down from the mountain. There are a lot of vacant houses in the city and living conditions are much better for them. What do you think?¡±

    Adleman was moved listening to Han Shuo¡¯s words. He knew in his heart that it was indeed difficult to live in the mountains. Except for the variety of ores from the five mines, the trees were sparse, the wildlife had long been hunted, and water needed to be hauled from the foot of the mountain.

    The miners worked day and night in the mountains just to exchange for some food transported by the merchants. The mountain people lived in the caves all year round without seeing sunlight in order to prevent raids from the bandits. If not for wanting to ensure their own lives, who would want to live like a savage on the mountain?

    Adleman was genuinely touched for Han Shuo to first think of the pitiful mountain people¡¯s well-being. He suddenly kowtowed towards Han Shuo, speaking in a thick voice as tears spilled without end from his eyes, ¡°I thank the city lord for your good intentions on behalf of all the mountain people. I won¡¯t say any more unnecessary words. As long as Your Lordship can guarantee they will notck for food and clothing and give them a stable living environment, I will do so without a word even if Your Lordship wishes us to hand over the mines.¡±

    ¡°Elder, please rise. They are also my people, giving them a good living environment is what I should do. The five mines are the basis for your survival, from now on they are still under your control. There is only one thing, even though we have a lot of siege equipment, there isn¡¯t enough manpower to operate them. Once the official army of the seven grand duchies invade, I¡¯m afraid that with just three thousand city guards, we won¡¯t be able to control the situation even with many equipment.¡±

    ¡°My only request of you is that you will join us when facingmon enemies and help stop them. We will provide enough siege weaponry. As long as we have enough manpower on the city wall, the seven grand duchies can never even dream of breaking our defenses. Are you all willing to work alongside me, fighting for the safety of Brettel City and her people?¡±

    There were no longer any rifts when they¡¯d spoken to this point. Adleman had worked hard all his life to resist the constant plundering of the seven grand duchies and bandit troops, trying to provide the mountain people with a better life.

    Han Shuo¡¯s approach didn¡¯t conflict with his ideals. Adleman no longer held any traces of hesitation towards Han Shuo¡¯s proposal,. He immediately shouted at the three young mountain chiefs, ¡°You three little babies, why are you not with me thanking his Lordship for his grace?¡±

    The three young people also no longer held any doubts at this point. Even Fulkin, who¡¯d previously expressed his allegiance, bent one knee down to Han Shuo. Each made a vow that they would use their everything to defend the safety of Brettel City.

    Helping each of the mountain chiefs to their feet, Han Shuo said with a smile, ¡°Thest time I went to Mount Tali, I saw that your equipment wasn¡¯t very good. The bandits left behind tens of thousands of equipment this time. They would upy too much warehouse space in Brettel City. Why don¡¯t you take them and equip yourself?¡±

    The mountain people were hard at work mining ores for many years to trade them all for food and daily necessities, maintaining the basic livelihood of their elderly and children. They simply couldn¡¯t spare gold coins for weapons and armor. Some people only had rough iron bars of inferior materials to use.

    Hearing this, the five mountain chiefs remembered the three thousand shiny armored city guards holding sharp, cold glinted weapons on their way here. They were red in the face with embarrassment when theypared that memory to their own shabbily dressed subordinates.

    ¡°Many thanks to My Lord, many thanks to My Lord!¡± Fulkin was first to react, once again falling down on his knees.

    As Fulkin willingingly paid obeisance, the other four mountain chiefs did the same withplete willingness. Each were full of excitement and admiration as their eyes looked at Han Shuo, increasingly convinced.

    ¡°Haha, everyone please stand up. This is just the beginning. I think with gradual development, the future of Brettel will bloom for the better!¡± Han Shuo once again lifted the five mountain chiefs up, chuckling merrily.

    ¡°Wuuu, there goes hundreds of thousands of gold coins.¡± Only Jack, the finance minister, was sighing painfully. However, his cry didn¡¯t garner any attention amidst the joyful cheering of the crowd.

 Chapter 338: Exploring the underground world again

    Chapter 338: Exploring the underground world again

    Arge portion of mountain people who had lived around the five mines for many years already came down from the mountains under the arrangements of the five mountain chiefs, and once again returned to Brettel City.

    The news of the four bandit groups¡¯ defeat had inadvertently spread throughout the seven grand duchies. The smaller bandit groups wouldn¡¯t dare rob Brettel City again. Even the seven grand duchies who were still locked in conflict were shocked by this news. Overnight, Brettel City had transformed from a city anyone could bully to a taboo existence, its new status paved by the corpses of ten thousand bandits.

    When Brettel City was busy preparing for the mountain people, Han Shuo left Dorcas and the others a few instructions, then soundlessly disappeared.

    All of the magic crystal ores had been used up. These weren¡¯t easily acquired either. Although they were unlike the goblin missiles for the war chariots where they were extremely rare and monopolized by the various empires for use in magical formations. Han Shuo had already instructed Fabian to acquire some more crystal ores, but now the former also began to think of other ways to obtain crystal ores.

    Han Shuo first thought was of the underground world. Thest time he was in the Dark Forest, he¡¯d heard that this world possessed magic crystal mines. Now that Brettel City had temporarily calmed down, Han Shuo once again set out for the Dark Forest by himself.

    Arriving at the Dark Forest, Han Shuo didn¡¯t tarry and went straight to the entrance of the underground world.

    He didn¡¯t immediately rush in, but released a yin demon to sweep a five mile radius. After the yin demon covered the area, Han Shuo didn¡¯t find any traces of the Redbud Knights, which meant they had either stopped probing the underground world or had gone in.

    He didn¡¯t spend too much time hesitating. Han Shuo hadn¡¯t informed the forest trolls this time either and ventured into the underground world alone. After a long winding underground tunnel, he gradually reached the depths of the world. Since his power had greatly expanded since thest time he was here, Han Shuo only needed one hour of uninterrupted flight before officially entering the underground world.

    There weren¡¯t many changespared tost time. ording to the division of the underground world¡¯syers, the lizardmen were oneyer above Han Shuo, while the Dark Dragon City seemed to be ayer below.

    The underground world had a clear hierarchy. The weakest races lived in the upperyers, and the lower a race lived, the more powerful it was. ording to legend, some races at the very bottom of the underground world resided were so powerful that they were even headaches for the gods. However, those races were said to be cursed. They were bound by an unknown force, forever unable to leave the underground world that was bereft of light all year round.

    ¡°If I knew sooner I¡¯d have summoned Gilbert here. He¡¯s from the underground world and must be familiar with the lizardmen. I could save much effort with him here.¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help butment after entering the underground world. He¡¯d forgotten that he had no clue where the lizardmen lived.

    The underground world was just as vast as the world aboveground. The roads were endless, numerous andplicated. If one didn¡¯t know the way around here and became lost, they¡¯d be hard pressed to find the way back. Fortunately, Han Shuo¡¯s memory was astonishing after his brain had been developed by his magic cultivation. He slowly walked along the road where he encountered the lizardmen previously.

    Last time in the underground world, Han Shuo had gotten into a conflict with the dark elves. It was due to Gilbert¡¯s presence that he¡¯d be familiar with the lizardmen. Just as humans saw the lizardmen to be all alike, in the eyes of the lizardmen all humans looked the same. Han Shuo didn¡¯t know if the lizardmen could still recognize him.

    Relying on his memory, Han Shuo walked back to where he¡¯d met the lizardmen. He encountered many strange races along the way. There were goblins with grey blue skin, dark batmen who liked gloomy humid ces and even dark elves, but he didn¡¯t see any lizardmen.

    The yin demon released by Han Shuo was also floating around to find traces of the lizardmen to no avail even after a long time.

    When Han Shuo entered a dark, humid area, an ear-piercing screech suddenly assaulted his ears. He looked up to discover a mass of ck shadows flying towards him, which turned out to be a group of men who could transform into bats. Astonishingly enough, they were trying to attack him.

    ¡°Human, leave everything you have here and we will consider giving you an easier death!¡± A batman in the front of the group spoke awkwardly in themon tongue, heading straight for Han Shuo¡¯s head.

    The batmen¡¯s bodies were smaller than that of an average human. However, they had umbre-like pair of wings and sharp ws that humans didn¡¯t have. These batmen liked to live in flocks and were just as infamous as the forest trolls aboveground. They wouldn¡¯t hold back once they encountered easily bullied individuals and would bare their fangs to tear their prey apart, looting their targets.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t terrified and instead rejoiced when he saw the batmen fly out from the spacious, gloomy and damp cave. He sneered evilly, bloody lights shooting out from his ten fingers that were dancing in the air as if ying an invisible piano. Each light was as sharp as a de, crisscrossing to form an unavoidable streak of light. As they sunk into the iing mass of pping batmen, agonized, piercing shrieks echoed through the air as they fell.

    Han Shuo actually didn¡¯t touch the talking batman. Thetter¡¯s small, beady eyes gleamed with fear¡¯s light as he watched hispanions massacred by Han Shuo without even the slightest hint of resistance. He turned around quickly, trying to get away from this fiend of disaster.

    ¡°And where do you think you¡¯re running to!?¡± Han Shuo lightly shouted, releasing his mental strength. His recently practiced demon spell ¡°Soul Tremor¡± immediately surged into the batman.

    The batman¡¯s body plummeted like a ne fresh out of fuel. He vainly tried to p his way out of his uncontrolled fall, but smashed into the ground with a thundering impact, leaving him dizzy and disoriented.

    When the batman managed toe to, he was greeted with the face of a human smiling diabolically. The batman¡¯s individual power was almost negligable, so he swept his small, beady eyes around to see none of his brethren. His wings trembling in his fear, the batman shrieked inmon continentalnguage, ¡°Powerful human mage, please forgive the offense of this lowly petty bat, I beg you to forgive me!¡±

    ¡°You speak humannguage very well, otherwise you¡¯d be dead already.¡± Han Shuo kicked the batman into the air when it¡¯d just gotten up. Han Shuoughed heartily and didn¡¯t wait for thetter tond before kicking the batman around like a rubber ball.

    ¡°Good, I now forgive your offenses!¡± Han Shuo stopped his torturing when he saw that the batman was on the verge of falling apart, smiling merrily, ¡°Now, you¡¯ll answer each question I ask. I don¡¯t mind dismantling your fragile skeleton if your answers aren¡¯t good enough.¡±

    The best way to deal with these batmen was to be brutal and domineering. This kind of race bullied the weak and feared the strong. They would bite the weak without a care, but would be meek and honest in front someone stronger. The way Han Shuo handled this batman made him toss away any idea of fleeing or lying. It responded in a shrill voice, ¡°Powerful human mage, my answers will definitely satisfy you. Us batmen are aware of all happenings in this underground world!¡±

    ¡°Very good!¡± nodded Han Shuo. He smilingly asked, ¡°Did arge group of humans recently enter the underground world? If so, where did they go? Where are the lizardmen? I heard the lizardmen recently discovered a magic crystal mine, do you know its location?¡±

    Just as the scared stiff batman heard Han Shuo¡¯s question, he immediately answered, ¡°So you are also a treasure hunter. The lizardmen have indeed discovered a magic crystal mine. There were many humans entering the underground world recently, but the biggest group seems to be a knight brigade, and their goal is definitely the lizardmen¡¯s mine. Are you with that group?¡±

    ¡°Cut the nonsense, just answer my questions!¡± Han Shuo secretly rejoiced. The Redbud Knights had already entered the underground world indeed. This might be rted to the threats from the golden dragon, otherwise Celt wouldn¡¯t have been in such a hurry.

    ¡°Yes, yes, Lord Mage please ask!¡± The batman started in fright and spoke up hastily.

    ¡°Any other humans besides that group of knights? Also, where are the lizardmen and the magic crystal mine? Has anything major happened recently?¡± Han Shuo continued his line of questioning.

    ¡°There were also several human groups in addition to those knights, but their members didn¡¯t number many and their upations were too random, so us batmen don¡¯t know the specifics.¡±

    ¡°Only the lizardmen know the magic crystal mine¡¯s location. I only know where the lizardmen live, honest!¡± The batman quickly answered.

    Staring sharply at the batman for a while, Han Shuo realized that this batman only seemed to know so much. He casually asked some more questions. The information the batman knew was limited indeed, so Han Shuo ordered after a short interrogation, ¡°Good, take me to the lizardmen¡¯s ce, and I will spare your life.¡±

    The batman didn¡¯t dare to mess around after being threatened by Han Shuo. It led him through theplex, winding roads straight to the area where the lizardmen lived. One had to admit, the roads underground were winding with countless twists and turns, and even Han Shuo with his astounding memory was confused along the way. Had it not been for the batman, a native to this underground world, leading the way, Han Shuo simply couldn¡¯t have found the lizardmen.

    After more than an hour, through who knew how many deep caves, twists and turns, the batman finally stopped at a valley. He pointed to a densely caved area ahead and said to Han Shuo, ¡°That¡¯s where the lizardmen live, they like caves even more than us. Therge and small caves you¡¯re seeing are their houses.¡±

    ¡°The underground world lizardmen really live in such a ce?¡± When he saw the batman¡¯s beady eyes flicker, Han Shuo was suspicious again and asked for confirmation.

    ¡°Powerful Lord Mage, most of the lizardmen gather in this ce. The total number of lizardmen far exceeds your imagination, they are scattered in thousands of such areas all over the underground world. You won¡¯t make me take you to every single one, would you?¡± Seeing Han Shuo squint at him, the batman hastily yelped as it couldn¡¯t stop chills from running down its body.

    Han Shuo had actually harbored this idea. However, the yin demon suddenly discovered a human sneaking around. This human¡¯s outfit was a bit familiar, so Han Shuo turned to the panicked batman, waving his hand as if swatting away a fly and said, ¡°Scram, your role here is done.¡±

    The batman felt that it had been pardoned when it heard Han Shuo say this. However, its movements were awkward, tiny eyes staring fixedly at Han Shuo while it cautiously pped his wings backwards.

    Seeing this odd action, Han Shuo asked with surprise, ¡°I already told you to leave, why are you still here?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m afraid you¡¯d kill me to keep me silent. The whole underground world knows you humans are the worst at keeping promises!¡± Contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, this pathetic batman looked at him pathetically, answering fearfully.

    Han Shuo was stunned, then snapped, ¡°You are worthless to me, I won¡¯t waste my mental power if killing you don¡¯t bring me the slightest bit of benefit.¡±

    The batman finally heaved a sigh of relief when it heard this. Not daring to stay next to Han Shuo anymore, it pped its wings and turned its body, quickly fleeing far away.

    The sneaky human was hiding behind the boulders. Han Shuo was certain they were from the Dark Mantle when he saw their outfits and hoods. Dark Mantle members usually wore this concealing, loose outfit whenever they were conducting missions.

    Han Shuo jumped out like an arrow towards the colleague hiding behind grey boulder after the batman had left. They were blending in perfectly, one with the rock. Han Shuo didn¡¯t make a sound to alert this person as he approached. When his big hand patted the colleague, thetter was startled like birds scared by the twang of a bowstring and jumping from their dormant position. They quickly started chant out two fireballs.

    This colleague was wearing a hood which concealed their face, but the magic chanting exposed their identity as female. The only thing visible were her eyes, which were full of horror. As the fireballs sted out, she suddenly eximed, ¡°Bryan?!¡±

    Han Shuo waved his hand. Two inconspicuous purple shes shot out in the blink of an eye and the two fireballs were scattered into sparks. Han Shuo assessed this concealed fire mage with some astonishment then asked with surprise, ¡°You know me?¡±

    Pulling off the hood to reveal a familiar youthful face, it was the fire journeyman mage Chrissie whom he¡¯d metst time in the Dark Mantle headquarters. The short haired Chrissie gave a surprised cheer, then waving her hands around as she quickly exined, ¡°I¡¯m Chrissie, we metst time at Dark Mantle headquarters, have you forgotten me?¡±

    With Han Shuo¡¯s memory, even a nce was enough to never forget someone¡¯s face. Chrissie was no exception. Hearing her words, he nodded his head with a smile and replied, ¡°So it¡¯s you. Ah, I didn¡¯t expect to meet you again here in this underground world. What a coincidence.¡±

    ¡°Yes, yes, really a coincidence. I heard you are the city lord of Brettel. Woah, you are really formidable, already a count! Mm, right, shouldn¡¯t you be at Brettel, why are you here? Can it be you are also in on this mission? If so that¡¯s really great, I heard you even defeated Leah Cain...¡±

    Chrissie wouldn¡¯t stop once she opened her mouth. Question after question were asked quick session in her sweet, crispy voice. As the fully excited Chrissie seemed to have no intention of stopping, Han Shuo had no choice but to give a slight cough, cutting off her endless interrogation.

    ¡°Eh, Chrissie, can you take me to the person in charge first? Oh, if you know wheredy Emily is, it¡¯s best to take me to see her directly.¡± Han Shuo finally got the chance to ask when he saw Chrissie¡¯s bbering take a pause.

    Han Shuo had known that Cecilia was in charge of this missionst time in the Dark Forest. Emily was acting as her assistant, and he¡¯d be able to obtain all the necessary information if he found her.

    ¡°No problem, I know where Madame Emily is, I will take you to see her right now!¡± Chrissie readily agreed after she took off her hood.

    ¡°Then many thanks to you, Chrissie.¡± Han Shuo said smilingly.

    Chrissie didn¡¯t continue to probe around for the lizardmen¡¯s movement, but cheerfully acted as Han Shuo¡¯s guide, turning left and right on theplicated roads while telling him about the current status of the underground world.

    Han Shuo smiled lightly as he listened to Chrissie talk. Every now and then he asked some questions about a few things he was interested in, gradually grasping the current situation in the underground world.

 Chapter 339: It was indeed me

    Chapter 339: It was indeed me

    Han Shuo learned from Chrissie that the Redbud Knights had indeed traveled to the underground world, and the Celt had alreadyunched one attack against the lizardmen already. The lizard men naturally couldn¡¯t stand up to the attacks of the Redbud Knights, but there was an extraordinary presence living in the magical crystal ore mine that the lizardmen guarded.

    A dreadfully fierce battle had seemed to take ce when Celt and the Redbud Knights entered the mine. A strange entity living within the mine had suddenly turned very terrifying, and even one of the top ten knight troops on the Continent hadn¡¯te off on top in the exchange.

    The Redbud Knights decided to furl their banners and cover their drums after failing three times. They were now hiding in some cavern, and not even the Dark Mantle knew where they were holing up. They had concentrated their attention on the area that the lizardmen were living in and was observing every move that urred there.

    ¡°Bryan, why have youe to the underground world? Are you also part of this mission?¡± Chrissie asked Han Shuo excitedly after describing the current situation to him.

    Han Shuo shook his head with a smile, ¡°I was passing through the Dark Forest and happened to fight with Celt of the Redbud Knights earlier. I¡¯vee for him.¡±

    Even Celt¡¯s green dragon had been killed, so he must hate Han Shuo to the bones, not to mention that thetter had chopped off one of Celt¡¯s ears. This was the kind of grudge that demanded retribution no matter what. To Han Shuo, Celt was an enormous threat who controlled the Redbud Knights. Not only was his strength umon, but he was an important national figure as well. There would be no end of trouble once Celt learned of Han Shuo¡¯s identity.

    Therefore, Han Shuo hade to the Dark Forest this time from Brettel City to see if there was a way he could obtain more magical crystal cores, and also to see if he could fully uproot the problem that was Celt to prevent future troubles for him after he walked out of the Dark Forest.

    ¡°What, you¡¯ve fought Commander Celt of the Redbud Knights?¡± Chrissie suddenly shrieked and looked at Han Shuo incredulously. She immediately followed up with, ¡°I heard that someone killed Celt¡¯s green dragon, and even one of his ears was sliced off! Was that you?¡±

    The light of intense curiosity shone in Chrissie¡¯s eyes as she fixed her gaze onto Han Shuo. She seemed to have guessed something. It was rather Han Shuo who hadn¡¯t anticipated that the news would spread so quickly. He was quite surprised by Chrissie. They were both hiding behind some red nts with enormous banana-shaped leafs. This was likely the temporary meeting ce of the Dark Mantle for this mission.

    A low shout traveled in before Han Shuo had time to respond, ¡°Who is it?¡±

    Chrissie snapped out of her curiosity when she heard this voice and also called back in a low voice. ¡°It¡¯s Three Dark Star Chrissie. Is it Wace?¡±

    ¡°So it¡¯s Chrissie! Mm,e on over.¡± The voice wasn¡¯t as nervous as before. Itughed softly instead, with a young face popping out from behind a few red leaves. When the boy lifted his head and saw Han Shuo, he was immediately a bit unhappy. ¡°Why is it you? What are you doing here?¡±

    Thest time Cecilia had tried to use the forest trolls to block the pursuit of Celt and the Redbud Knights, Han Shuo had forcefully prevented her from doing so. The other Dark Mantle members with Cecilia then had expressed their furious dissatisfaction. The one called Wace was likely one of the shrouded figures then, which was why he was immediately unhappy upon seeing Han Shuo.

    When Chrissie saw that Wace¡¯s expression had changed for the worse, she thought that Wace didn¡¯t know who Han Shuo was and hastened to exin, ¡°What are you doing Wace? Bryan is one of us! Haven¡¯t you heard of his name before?¡±

    ¡°Hmph! He tripped up our ns at a critical moment, I don¡¯t think he¡¯s one of ours at all!¡± Wace was quite loyal to Cecilia as he snorted derisively.

    ¡°Chrissie, take me to Emily.¡± Han Shuo wasn¡¯t overly concerned with an angry Wace and only spoke to Chrissie at his side.

    ¡°Apologies, we don¡¯t wee people like you here!¡± The young man named Wace suddenly drew himself straight from beneath the red banana-shaped leaf and blocked Han Shuo¡¯s path with a cold face.

    Han Shuo flicked a nce at Wace and went on his way, not caring about Wace¡¯s obstruction at all. When he reached thetter¡¯s position and saw that he had no intent of moving out of the way, Han Shuo slowly reached out a hand to send a surge of strength into Wace¡¯s body.

    The force behind the strength caused Wace to stagger. He backed up a few times in a bedraggled fashion before finally falling on his butt on the ground. There were a few traces of humiliation mixed in with the anger on his face as he shouted, ¡°What do you want to do?¡±

    ¡°Whether or not I can go in isn¡¯t up to you. You¡¯re just a small Dark Star envoy and have no right or strength to stop me. Just don¡¯t try then!¡± Han Shuo expressed the most direct kind of contempt and looked back at Chrissie, who wasing over to try and smooth things over. He smiled, ¡°Let¡¯s go and see Emily.¡±

    Chrissie was stunned in her tracks by Han Shuo¡¯s disy of strength and then turned her head with an exmation of surprise, ¡°It must be you! The mysterious person who killed Celt¡¯s green dragon and sliced off his ear must be you!¡±

    Wace had been about to stand up and challenge Han Shuo again when his face suddenly went as white as paper. His knees weakened, as he was so frightened he fell into a sitting position.

    Han Shuo chuckled softly and flicked his eyes contemptuously at Wace, urging Chrissie onwards, ¡°Speak no more of this, I need to see Emily urgently.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯sck of denial was a subtle admission to things. Chrissie¡¯s gaze at Han Shuo was full of worship as she ran over excitedly to Han Shuo. When she passed by Wace on the ground, she said a bit apologetically, ¡°Sorry Wace, you don¡¯t have much at the moment either, so I¡¯ll be going now.¡±

    Chrissie no longer looked at the ashen faced Wace after she spoke, hopping over to Han Shuo¡¯s side and saying enthusiastically, ¡°Let¡¯s go, I¡¯ll take you Madame Emily. Oh Bryan, how did you slice off Celt¡¯s ear? That was too amazing!¡±

    Han Shuo discovered that the Dark Mantle had chosen their hideout quite carefully along the way. The leafy fauna grew everywhere, and there were plenty of random rock outcroppings to hide behind. This ce was perfect for the Dark Mantle members who were adept at concealing themselves.

    All sorts of rm mechanisms were set up starting from where Wace had been stationed. These were made by hand and employed some magic elements in them as well. They appeared very adorable and practical. Han Shuo learned that these had all been made by Cecilia.

    Although the curious Chrissie kept asking about Celt¡¯s destroyed ear, Han Shuo didn¡¯t say much more on this matter. He took the attitude of neither confirming nor denying things. When he saw Emily, thetter repressed the agitation in her heart with great effort and spoke with the dignity befitting her situation, ¡°Thank you, Chrissie. I¡¯d like to discuss with Bryan the matters of this mission alone.¡±

    ¡°Alright then, Madame Emily.¡± Chrissie responded with disappointment, casting a longing look at Han Shuo before she left. ¡°Remember to tell me the details next time, I really want to know what happened with that!¡±

    ¡°No problem, I¡¯ll tell you next time. Thank you Chrissie!¡± Han Shuo responded with a friendly smile and then walked with Emily towards a cave.

    Apart from the lush growth of the red, banana-shaped leaf nts around this area, there were also some small caves. It looked like Emily was temporarily taking residence in one of the caves. Perhaps she didn¡¯t want other people to see them as she avoided some of the caves with soundsing out of them and walked to a remote corner.

    ¡°You little bastard has started tempting other girls again. You have me and Phoebe, isn¡¯t that enough for you?¡± Emily immediately pinched Han Shuo halfway when she saw that there were no other voices, cursing him in a low voice.

    Han Shuo felt quite aggrieved as heughed wryly. When he saw Emily let go out of fear of hurting him, he exined, ¡°It¡¯s not like what you think! I only met her on the way and had her take me toe find you!¡±

    ¡°Hmph!¡± Emily looked at Han Shuo distrustingly. ¡°Then what was she talking about, what details and what exnation?¡±

    ¡°Eh... she wants to know how I killed Celt¡¯s green dragon and sliced off his ear?¡± Han Shuo responded honestly.

    ¡°What! You did it?!¡± Emily was startled as she looked at Han Shuo incredulously.

    Nodding, since Han Shuo had no secrets in front of Emily, he said, ¡°It was indeed me.¡±

 Chapter 340: The upside down Gourd Mountain

    Chapter 340: The upside down Gourd Mountain

    ¡°No wonder, Celt has captured and killed three of our members during this time. He must have heard from Kassel that it was you who saved usst time. Celt should already know your identity by now.¡±

    The traitor druid, Kassel, had been pursuing Cecilia and her group when Han Shuo had suddenly rushed out to block him. After returning to the Redbud Knights, Kassel must have reported the situation to Celt. As many members of the Dark Mantle knew of Han Shuo, the three captured must have revealed the truth under Celt¡¯s torture.

    ¡°If that¡¯s the case, I¡¯d also like to use this opportunity to kill Celt. I¡¯m sure he has yet to recover from his injury. Now is the best time to go for it.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s voice was as cold as the tundra wind;he was determined to destroy his enemy at the roots.

    ¡°You¡¯re right, Celt indeed hasn¡¯t recovered, but because of this he is now heavily protected by the guards. The Redbud Knights are one of the top ten knight troops on the Continent, and Celt and Kassel aren¡¯t its only experts. This time, I heard that the fire grand magus Marceau had alsoe along. That old woman¡¯s too powerful, and extremely difficult to deal with.¡± Fearing that he had taken this matter too lightly, Emily hurriedly told Han Shuo everything about the Redbud Knights.

    Han Shou¡¯s lips curved into a disdainful smile as he replied, ¡°That fire grand magus is already dead, so she won¡¯t be posing a threat anymore. No worries there!¡±

    Emily was once again stunned when she heard these words. She stared nkly at the confident Han Shuo, trying to feel him out, ¡°You killed her too?¡±

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo said, ¡°Yup, still me!¡±

    Emily was speechless.

    Pulling Emily into his embrace, Han Shuo whispered with a grin, ¡°I haven¡¯t seen you in a long time, and I¡¯ve really missed you too much. Bringing me to this remote corner, is it that you want me to... heh heh......¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s hands started misbehaving as he clung to Emily. Panting softly under his skillful hands, her eyes turned soft as she petntly proimed, ¡°I only intended to discuss business quietly, don¡¯t misunderstand!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve already misunderstood!¡± Han Shuo let out a low growl, picked up Emily, and ran straight into the cave. The sound of suppressed panting and moaning echoed out from inside momentster.

    After a long while, the two walked out from the cave, their clothes still a little messy. Emily¡¯s eyes were watery, moist with a charming subservience. Her soft body leaned on Han Shuo as she spoke with a hint of worry, ¡°Cecilia is in charge of this mission. She seems to have some prejudice against you; what should we do?¡±

    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter. My mission and yours don¡¯t conflict, and I have no intention of taking credit from her. I only need to kill Celt, then go see if I can get any magic crystal ores.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t care about Cecilia¡¯s impression of him, nor did he hold any goodwill towards her. If it wasn¡¯t for Emily being on her team, he wouldn¡¯t have blocked Kassel from pursuing themst time.

    ¡°Aii!¡± Emily heaved a sigh and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Cecilia is actually a very nice person. She is friendly with everyone, and my private rtionship with her is even better. I don¡¯t know why she would be like this towards you.¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s not talk about this anymore, I need to go to the mine. If anything happens, as long as I know you¡¯re still here, I¡¯lle for you. Rest assured that no one will find me if I don¡¯t want them to.¡± Han Shuo had obtained all the necessary information from Emily and didn¡¯t intend to stay any longer. He was ready to go explore inside the magic crystal mine by himself.

    The Dark Mantle¡¯s purpose in taking a trip to the Dark Forest this time was to observe the movement of the Redbud Knights of the Brut Merchant Alliance. The higher-ups of the Empire naturally needed a clear grasp of what the Redbud Knights were doing at the border of Lancelot Empire. Cecilia was in charge of matters outside the border, so she had taken on this important mission. Her reports were needed to slowly unravel the intentions of the Redbud Knights.

    Magic crystal mines were a scarce resource for any country. However, the underground world held all kinds of races, and their numbers were countless, almost beyond imagination. As such, the higher-ups of the Lancelot Empire didn¡¯t intend to keep their knowledge of this mine to themselves. They only hoped to disrupt whatever the Redbuds Knights were nning and gain enough of an advantage to obtain some magic crystal ores.

    When the Redbud Knights advanced into the underground world, they¡¯d vanished without a trace after a tragic defeat at the magic crystal mine guarded by the lizardmen. However, ording to Emily, they had yet to leave the underground world and seemed to have started plundering the other races down here.

    Various races held sway over different regions in the underground world. The dark elves possessed a great number of dark magic equipments, the merpeople territory was rich with a variety of beautiful crystals, and other strange races had various rare resources.

    Exploring the underground world was the same as entering a hunting ground to Celt. All of the races of this world had be his prey Except for the setback at the magic crystal mine where the lizardmen hindered his army, the valuables of the other races were all his for the taking.

    The vast underground world covered an enormous area. Even the Dark Mantle, with itsrge manpower and secure base, couldn¡¯t find any trace of the Redbud Knights; Han Shuo naturally wouldn¡¯t waste his time on them. He was interested in the magic crystal mine and even more curious about the powerful entity that lived within it. He wanted to know how it could force Celt, a foe armed to the teeth, to retreat empty handed.

    Han Shuo nimbly made his way through the lush shrubs of the lizardmen territory like a lightly flying insect. Numerous caves were hidden in the various crevices of the area. Thanks to his powerful consciousness coupled with a yin demon covering the area, Han Shuo didn¡¯t rouse the attention of a single lizardman. He flew all the way to the innermost line, and stopped only when he reached a reddish-brown mountain with a bald top.

    The underground world didn¡¯t go without light all year round. Various glowing nts grew on top of the thousand-meter high rock wall, covering the underground world in a soft, dim light. The reddish brown bald mountain was roughly two hundred to three hundred meters high. No other nts or animals resided on it except for some reddish brown rock.

    Looking from afar, this mountain was like an upside down gourd, wide at its peak and leaner further down. This made one worry if the slender mountain foot could bear the weight of the two heavy, gourd-shaped spheres of rock. Manyrge and small caves could be seen dotted across this bald gourd mountain. None of them betrayed their depths, seemingly bottomless and leading to who knew where.

    Several reddish-brown lizardmen with weapons in hand were cautiously guarding the caves, alert against the possibility of the Redbud Knights invading them again. There were many messy footsteps, several uneven potholes, and some shrubs with scattered leaves around the mountain as if they had been cut across by a sharp knife.

    Looking at this scene from the outside, Han Shuo understood that this ce must have been the location of the battle. He examined the area minutely, brainstorming a method to infiltrate the magic crystal mine. Finally, he summoned the earth elite zombie and had the zombie take him to the depths of the bald mountain, to feel out the situation. If he couldn¡¯t reach the center of the mine through the earth elite zombie, he would have think of other ways.

    As long as the ground was soil, it wouldn¡¯t hinder the earth elite zombie. The earth elite zombie appeared along with Han Shuo¡¯s magic incantation, then disappeared into the earth in the blink of an eye. Through his spiritual connection with the earth elite zombie, Han Shuo knew he was slowly advancing to the mine as per his orders.

    End of part 1 of the chapter.

    However, the earth elite zombie had yet to draw near the area when suddenly, a howl came from within the magic crystal mine. It shook the mountain, as if a sleeping monster had been awoken. A strange energy swept into the earth from the mountain, heading straight towards the earth elite zombie.

    Han Shuo could immediately sense the powerful presence within the bald mountain. He quickly assessed the situation and concluded that this was a powerful creatureparable to the Lord of the mes. The earth elite zombie was still far from the mountain, so Han Shuo hastily ordered him to retreat.

    The earth elite zombie retreated nimbly, like a little eel, to Han Shuo¡¯s feet. He jumped out of the earth to Han Shuo¡¯s side without waiting for that strange energy to draw near.

    Han Shuo waved the white bone staff in his left hand. A mass of ck mist appeared, wrapping around the emerging earth elite zombie, and the white bone staff issued a light breeze. As the breeze gradually dispersed the ck mist, the earth elite zombie had also disappeared without a trace.

    Upon reaching Han Shuo¡¯s feet, the strange energy suddenly lost its target, and returned to the bald mountain¡¯s depths. After the mountain-shaking howl, hundreds of lizardmen sprang out from the various caves with weapons in hands, cautiously prepared and ready for any iing attack.

    ¡°No wonder Celt failed multiple times. With such a powerful creature guarding the magic crystal mine, this would certainly give him a headache.¡± Han Shuo muttered to himself, slowly retreating to a darker, more remote corner. He watched the now alert lizardmen from afar, knowing that they had received news of his invasion with the help of that strange creature.

    With such a powerful creature entrenched in the upside down gourd mountain, it would be somewhat difficult if Han Shuo wanted to advance into the mine. This creature had a terrifying spiritual presence, it had even discovered the earth elite zombie sneaking in from beneath the earth. As such, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t guarantee if he himself could enter the mine by suppressing his presence.

    Han Shuo naturally wouldn¡¯t risk it as long as there was a single shred of uncertainty. Not to mention the powerful creature, just the hundreds of lizardmen endlessly appearing from within the mine would leave him hard pressed.

    After hesitating for a bit, Han Shuo temporarily dispelled the idea of sneaking in. He¡¯d wait for the Redbud Knights¡¯ to arrive to aid Celt, and then decide his next course of action ordingly.

    Be it Celt or any other person, as long as their final goal was the magic crystal mine, they would appear again. Han Shuo fully understood this, so he wasn¡¯t in a hurry to leave. Instead, he remained hiding beneath the rocks, silently meditating while awaiting the arrival of those people.

    Upon reaching the separate demon realm of demonic magic, one would reach a bottleneck, and future progress would be increasingly harder. However, with each realm¡¯s breakthrough, the cultivator¡¯s power would immediately increase ten, a hundred foldpared to before. Chu Cang Lan was able to fly to the moon at the mere peak of the nine changes realm. Reaching that realm in this world could beparable to the gods.

    Han Shuo only needed to make a breakthrough from the realm of ¡°separate demon¡± to ¡°carnal¡±, and then take one more step to reach the ¡°nine changes¡± realm. Unfortunately, starting from the ¡°separate demon¡± realm, each realm wouldposed of many obstacles. Without fortuitous encounters during their cultivation, demonic practitioners would have to spend year after year in hard training before they could take another step forward.

    ording to the memory of Chu Cang Lan, Han Shuo knew that without fortuitous encounters, it¡¯d take at least a hundred years to advance from the realm of ¡°separate demon¡± to the ¡°carnal¡± realm. Even five hundred years wouldn¡¯t necessarily be enough to go from ¡°carnal¡± to ¡°nine changes¡±. No one could say if the cultivator wouldn¡¯t go mad with obsession midway through their practice either. As for breaking through from the ¡°nine changes¡± to the ¡°omen¡± realm, even Chu Cang Lan had no clue. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have kidnapped t Han Shuo, taken him to the moon and fought the three strong experts to seek a chance of breaking through in the decisive battle.

    ¡°One hundred years is really too long. I need to find other ways to do this.¡± Han Shuo murmured, silently imprinting the information regarding ¡°fortuitous encounters¡± from Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memory in his heart. He would be ready for any opportunity in the future.

    The so-called ¡°fortuitous encounter¡± was simply a ce with an enormous amount of demonic qi suitable for his magical cultivation or swallowing a treasure nurtured by heaven and earth for hundreds of millions of years. It could also mean refining magical treasures and then using those to nourish the demon infant. There was also the method of devouring fellow demonic cultivators.

    Sitting cross-legged behind a rock, Han Shuo considered the feasibility of these ¡°fortuitous encounters¡± as well as some other things, such as the way to cultivate both magic and demonic magic together. After a few days passed unknowingly, Han Shuo¡¯s mind brightened as he suddenly thought of a new idea.

    Thest time he fought Kosse, thetter had destroyed much of Han Shuo¡¯s necromancy magic with his divine artifact ¡°Revtion¡±. The undead creatures and Acid Bog had all dissipated after being purified under the holy light. To a necromancer like Han Shuo, this was simply a fatal blow.

    Had it not been for Han Shuo¡¯s practice of demonic magic that allowed him to use mysterious methods to create five divine elemental zombies, he would have lost the fight against Kosse and the knights.

    The reason why the Church of Light and the Cmity Church were so afraid of Han Shuo was that his little skeleton and creatures didn¡¯t fear light magic. Han Shuo was nning on honing in precisely on this point.

    High-ranked undead creatures such as the evil knight possessed frightening lethality and attacking abilities, so they weren¡¯t too afraid of normal light magic. However, if Kosse used ¡°Revtion¡± to release the holy light, Han Shuo knew that even evil knights would be hard pressed to avoid serious injury.

    Necromancers and the Cmity Church actually possessed a long and illustrious history, but due to the effect of holy light on undead creatures, they¡¯d always been at a disadvantage against the Church of Light. Once this rule was broken, Han Shuo believed the Church of Light wouldn¡¯t be able to hold onto their absolute advantage forever.

    The Church of Light fears this the most, so I really should leverage this. I have the high-ranked evil knight and soon I will be able to summon bone demons and old fey zombies. I don¡¯t expect them to have the same ability as little skeleton or the earth elite zombie. However, if I refine them again with the demonic magic secret bone method, then they shouldn¡¯t fear the corrosion of light magic anymore right?

    High-ranked undead creatures such as the evil knight, the bone demon and the old fey zombie would be frighteningly lethal without the weakness of holy light. When the Church of Light has to face a never ending stream of undead creatures fearless in the face of their light magic, won¡¯t they be scared to death then?

    The more Han Shuo pondered, the more he understood that this was the fastest way to improve his strength. As long as he sessfully created anti-light creatures, Han Shuo believed Kosse would meet his maker no matter how many knights he had backing him up.

    ¡°It looks like I need to start experimenting with how to rid the undead of their weakness to holy light upon my return to the Cemetery of Death this time.¡± Han Shuo thought to himself as he made up his mind.

    At that moment, the yin demon around Han Shuo sensed a big group of living creaturesing near. It looked toward their direction and saw some familiar dark elves, in addition to the brightly armored Redbud Knights. Even dark elf Dana, with whom Han Shuo had dealings with before, had brought her tribe to follow Celt.

    ¡°Interesting, all of my enemies have gathered!¡± Han Shuo muttered, standing up from his cross-legged posture. He was ready to see how this group would deal with the powerful creature residing inside the mountain.

 Chapter 341: An ancient magical formation

    Chapter 341: An ancient magical formation

    Celt certainly felt like his luck had run drytely. Really, it was almost like he was the epitome of bad luck! This trip to the Dark Forest should¡¯ve been a rich experience, fat with loot and rewards. There was no way he would¡¯ve expected to encounter setbacks by the dozen.

    To begin, the Dark Mantle had seemingly set their eyes on him the second he¡¯d set foot in the Dark Forest. They stuck to him like a bunch of irritating flies, never leaving him or his group unwatched. When he¡¯d finally managed to loot the den of a golden dragon, an elusive expert hade along to pursue him. That battle had cost him his steed, as well as his ear.

    Even that fire grand magus Marceau, who he¡¯d taken great effort to invite, had inexplicably disappeared. Her two disciples wouldn¡¯t stop nattering about her all day either, so that hadn¡¯t helped his mood.

    Finally when he¡¯d reached the underground world, Celt had assumed that he could take advantage of his superior forces to easily subdue that creature. Yet once again, he¡¯d encountered a severe setback. Even after three consecutive attempts, they¡¯d failed to upy the magic crystal mine. Other than three hundred injured men, they¡¯d gained nothing.

    In the end, his low numbers had forced him into an alliance with the dark elves that disgusted him so. His pride and arrogance had taken a severe blow in thest few days, and he intended to rectify that shortly. He would vent all his ill humor by seizing the magic crystal mine and thoroughly torturing any lizardmen who dared to block his path.

    ¡°Mister Celt, I hope you can appreciate and cherish this opportunity that you¡¯ve been blessed with. It¡¯s not very often we dark elves are willing to work with others.¡± A refined, elegantly attired male dark elf was speaking to Celt. A natural intricate web of creases and folds decorated his left cheek, and a tuft of a beard grew from his chin. All in all, the effect made him look a bit sinister.

    This male dark elf¡¯s outfit was that of a noble, gorgeous and luxurious. A ck magic staff waszily gripped in his left hand as his slow words reached Celt.

    Celt¡¯s face clouded over. He ordered the knights to stop when they were about to reach the gourd-shaped mountain guarded by the lizardmen. Turning his head to nce at the elegant male dark elf, he said in a neutral tone, ¡°Distinguished Sir Arlen, you should know that we are acting in mutual benefit this time, and not that I¡¯ve begged you toe with me.¡±

    ¡°Our aim is the magic crystal mine, while you dark elves would be equally happy to seerge numbers of the lizardmen eradicated. If that strange creature continues to protect the lizardmen, it won¡¯t be an easy matter for you to upy their territory. That creature is afraid of me, so I hope you¡¯ve prepared enough goblin missiles, or we can just turn back right now.¡±

    ¡°Mister Celt, rest assured that the sage dark elves are the true masters of thisyer. Those cowardly goblins offer us an astonishing number of missiles in tribute every year. That enormous creature will surely be sted into smithereens.¡± The dark elf Dana was as flirtatious as ever, smiling obsequiously at Celt. Her limpid eyes that were capable of drawing people in, were sweeping up and down his body. Celt secretly swallowed a mouthful of drool that was threatening to leak out the side of his mouth. This wanton woman is alluring alright! However, he naturally wouldn¡¯t reveal the unbridled side of him that ¡°gone to war¡± with a naked Dana in front of his subordinates.

    Celt solemnly revealed a charming smile and nodded, ¡°Then I¡¯m relieved. We have gone in thrice and have some understanding of this creature. It seems unable to leave the foot of the gourd mountain. If not, we would have absolutely incurred a much bigger loss in ourst three attempts. As the lizardmen are protecting the magic crystal mine, we don¡¯t know whether or not that strange creature has evolved from the lizardmen. It looks like an enormous lizard a thousand timesrger than the lizardmen and upies arge area underneath the gourd mountain. You should be careful when you go in, it¡¯s best to immediately retreat from the gourd mountain if there¡¯s anything you can¡¯t handle.¡±

    ¡°Well then, what are we waiting for? Let¡¯s send those lizardmen to hell!¡± Dark elf leader Arlen waved the dark magic scepter in hand, gesturing for his dark elves to begin the assault.

    Celt hesitated no more upon hearing his words. He nodded to the several knight captains to his rear. He himself drew out a bright sword, but it wasn¡¯t the divine artifact ¡°Starry Sky¡±. Celt headed straight for the gourd mountain together with the traitor druid Kassel.

    ¡°So that fellow is afraid of fire, huh? Celt¡¯s finally provided some useful information!¡± Han Shuo secretly thought as he eavesdropped through the yin demon.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t immediately rush into the gourd mountain the lizardmen were guarding. Instead, he used the yin demon to determine Celt¡¯s course of action, hiding himself in a dark corner and waiting to take advantage of the ensuing chaos to silently sneak in.

    The Redbud Knights and the dark elf invaders advanced openly towards the gourd mountain, apanied by Celt¡¯s long and loud howl. Arlen stood forth as their obvious leader as even matriarch Dana, who¡¯d attempted to take advantage of Han Shuost time, followed Arlen¡¯s lead.

    Arlen led several several bow or staff wielding dark elves to stroll leisurely up to the gourd mountain. He watched the lizardmen, running out of their caves after receiving the rm, and spoke with a voice dripping with disdain, ¡°You base and vulgar lizardmen! You have neither the qualification nor the rights to enjoy this fertilend. I will give you a onest chance. As long as you get the hell out of Paparlia, we noble dark elves will let you go.¡±

    Each race had its own uniquenguage in the vast underground world. However, they still used themon humannguage when conversing, as the humannguage was concise and simple. Moreover, after so many years of development, human civilization was undoubtedly the leader of the entire Continent.

    Many lizardmen walked out of the mountain caves. They stared in anger at Arlen and hisckeys touting their own nobility. A lizardman with a rtively coarse big tail pointed a weapon that looked like a cross between a knife and a fork at the extravagantly clothed Arlen. He shouted shrilly in themon tongue, ¡°Despicable, greedy dark elves, thisnd is protected by the guardian god of our race! No one can even dreaming of intruding! If you dark elves dare to wage a war with our true god, we will fight this bloody battle with you till the end! Our true god shall destroy you despicable, dirty offenders!¡±

    ¡°Hmph, just an enormous lizard; how did it be your true god?¡± Arlen snorted dismissively, creating an odd hand seal in front of his chest. He spoke with a somewhat pious expression, ¡°We are blessed with the protection of Goddess Rose, and will sweep out all the races in thisyer. The dark elves shall unify all the great races in the world, and no one can stop this!¡±

    ¡°How dare you greedy dark elves look down on our mighty true god!! You will pay the price!¡± The lizardman¡¯s shrill voice became even sharper. He raised his tail high as he bellowed, snapping it in the air like an enormous whip.

    The lizardmen possessed strong, fleshy bodies with incredible raw battle strength. However, they were unable to grasp the profundities of magic, so their culture was far more crude and vulgarpared to the illustrious history of the dark elves.

    The dark elves proimed themselves the most ancient and noble race of the underground world. They considered the lizardmen as wild beasts that only knew to use physical strength. With their magic at the forefront of every assault, the dark elves often won the battles against the lizardmen, forcing them to scatter across the underground world in a desperate attempt to survive over the years.

    However, every race of high intelligence had amon problem ¨C civil war. From the self-styled most ancient dark elf race to the human race, they all suffered from this strange disease. Different dark elf tribes constantly fought among each other in immense battles. If it wasn¡¯t for an inability for them to unite, they could have long since conquered thisyer of the underground world.

    Although the lizardmen couldn¡¯tpare to the dark elves in terms of overall fighting capability as they didn¡¯t know how to use magic, they possessed amazing unity. They had survived by virtue of this unity as well as physicalbat effectiveness for the longest time. This was why they hadn¡¯t been conquered by dark elves up until now.

    When the lizardman cracked his tail in midair, his brethren flung out numerous crude spears, heading straight for the boasting Arlen.

    The spears did appear quite simple to Han Shuo. They were essentially only sharpened, durable wooden sticks. This greatly limited their lethality.

    In sharp contrast to the lizardmen, the dark elves obviously knew how to utilize sharp weapons. Not only were their bows and swords abnormally sharp, but they were also engraved with intricate patterns. Their weapons did indeed far surpass those of the so-called savage lizardmen in terms of practicality and aesthetics.

    The two young archers behind Arlen twanged their bows, shattering the oing spears in midair.

    Completely unruffled, Arlen looked coldly at the lizardmen and mocked, ¡°Lowly lizardmen who don¡¯t know their ce! All your race knows is brute strength. The likes of you can only serve as our domestic animals!¡±

    Celt could not be any less interested in the bickering between the dark elves and the lizardmen. As the leader of the Redbud Knights, he held the title of marquis in the Brut Empire. He¡¯d lost all patience by now as he interrupted Arlen¡¯s speech, speaking to Kassel, ¡°We¡¯re familiar with the inside, lead the way.¡±

    Kassel nodded. He understood that as a traitor to the druids, joining the Redbud Knights meant absolute devotion to the leader. Kassel charged forward as soon as Celt finished speaking, his body shifting into the form of an enormous eagle in mid-air.

    The Redbud Knights abandoned their horses and followed Kassel to charge towards the gourd mountain caves. When he saw his men already deployed, Celt turned to dark Arlen with some displeasure, ¡°Distinguished Sir Arlen, shouldn¡¯t you be taking action already?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t need you to remind me.¡± Arlen didn¡¯t put on a good face either for humans. Although he admitted that humans was more advanced than the dark elves in some areas, humans were still known for being despicable and shameless. Their notorious reputation in the underground world was more infamous than even the batmen.

    ¡°Let¡¯s move!¡± Dana smiled charmingly as she gave the order to herckeys. The branch of dark elves answering to her rushed out ahead, aiming fine arrows straight at the lizardmen.

    Just as Dana¡¯s elves took action, the numerous dark elves behind her divided into teams and charged the gourd mountain. A part of them stayed behind with Arlen.

    Frowning as he watched at the conflict break out, Arlen felt something was amiss. He spoke to Celt nearby, ¡°As long as that damned creature appears, our goblin missiles will end its life along with the gourd mountain.¡±

    ¡°I hope so!¡± Celt didn¡¯t respond much to Arlen¡¯s egoism. He too looked down on the lizardmen just as Arlen did, and included the dark elves in this disdain as well.

    In the human world aboveground, be it the dark elves or the forest elves, they were all enved objects. Human imed themselves to be the center of all things, raising the dark elves as domesticated help. Aristocrats such as Celt even had one or two young and beautiful dark elves serving at them at home.

    The vigorous lizardmen immediately retreated back to their caves just as the Redbud Knights and the dark elves mounted their assault. Several dark elves carried enormous bundles on the backs. Han Shuo surmised that those must be the goblin missiles he¡¯d seen before.

    Looking at their postures, it seemed that they intended to throw those massive bombs directly inside the gourd mountain, trying to blow up that enormous creature along with all of the lizardmen in one go.

    Han Shuo¡¯s spirit could sense the seething anger of the creature inside. He knew it wouldn¡¯t be able to worry about too many things at once, so he once again summoned the earth elite zombie andmanded it to sneak into the gourd mountain.

    The earth elite zombie sank into the ground, and was no longer obstructed and chased back by that strange force this time. As there was a very high number of Redbud Knights and dark elves inside the gourd mountain, it was impossible for the strange, powerful creature to sense and scan every single one.

    In addition, its rage had reached the peak and finally boiled over. The piercing sound of its howling cry rumbled out from the depths of the mountain. The whole gourd mountain seemed to shake beneath its howl. Han Shuo was worried that the thin bottom of the mountain would not be able to support the upper part of the mountain and crumble away.

    Han Shuo attached the only yin demon he had to the earth elite zombie. He could see the situation underground through the earth elite zombie¡¯s vision, but since it had yet to reach the mainbat area, the zombie couldn¡¯t send any useful information. Han Shuo could only ce his attention on the Redbud Knights and dark elves alliance.

    In Han Shuo¡¯s view, the strength of the Redbud Knights far exceeded that of the dark elves, be it their equipment or individual power. They wore bulky armor, yet their speed still outstripped the sparsely dressed dark elves even without the support of the horses.

    The knights all possessed cold and confident looks, having been through various battles. Their bodies were that of true warriors, sturdy with restrained viciousness. Each knight formed either triangle or diamond shaped formations as they charged,plementing theirrades while helping themselves run swiftly. This helped them avoid ambushes from the sides and the rear.

    The arrogant dark elves fell far behind in this aspect. They still messily charged forward like a swarm of bees, their tactics unchanged in thest thousand years. The dark elves had resided in the underground world for who knew how long, yet had never fought hand in hand in proper formations like the humans, let alone coordinating skillfully with each other.

    As Han Shuo observed the battle, he suddenly saw a scene on his mind. He immediately understood that the earth elite zombie had cleared all the underground obstacles and had reached that powerful creature¡¯s location beneath the gourd mountain.

    The earth elite zombie was showing Han Shuo his line of sight from beneath the enormous creature. The first thing it conveyed was a huge, ancient octagonal magical formation up above. A much smaller, also octagonal arrayy in each corner of the formation. Each small array was filled with magic elements.

    A ten meter long, enormous reddish brown tail was in the center of the formation. The tail itself was like a small hill entrenched in the formation. Circles of colorful lightning shot out of the formation, as if restricting it, whenever it struggled.

    ¡°Can it be that the huge creature is being sealed beneath this gourd-shaped mountain by this formation? If the goblin missiles destroy this mountain, won¡¯t the imprisoning formation be broken?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s heart spasmed with shock as he thought worriedly.

 Chapter 342: The Ancient Lizard King

    Chapter 342: The Ancient Lizard King

    The yin demon circled around the enormous ancient octagonal formation, taking note of every detail. Through the yin demon, Han Shuo saw chunks ofrge, clear magic crystal ores piled on the surface of the formation, obscuring the intricate details of the formation. These miniature hills obviously provided an endless source of energy for the formation.

    As the earth elite zombie and the yin demon drew near therge creature, they saw that therge creature¡¯s lower body, as well as the base of its tail, were sunk into the center of the formation. The creature seemed to sense the two as it snapped the end of its ten meter long tail in the air. The dark red tail whipped through the air like a giant metal chain as it sought to smash the earth elite zombie into the ground.

    Half the earth elite zombie¡¯s body was still underground. When he saw the python-like tail pping down, he quickly dove into the depths of the earth. He could hear an enormous crash as the ground started shaking above his head.

    A strange force shot out from the tail, shooting directly at the earth elite zombie as it dove into the ground. The earth elite zombie was given a huge fright when he sensed this force following him, and quickly tried to flee back to Han Shuo. He was only halfway there when the strange force caught up and surged into his body!.

    The earth elite zombie began to thrash as the strange energy passed through his body. When the wave of forcepletely passed through him, he came to, utterly disoriented. Fortunately, Han Shuo had refined him using magical yuan as well the energy from the ce of extreme earth. He was also surrounded by his natural habitat of earth as well, so the strange energy didn¡¯t leave any damage behind as it passed through him.

    When the strange creature sensed that the earth elite zombie was alive and well even after the force wave had hit him, it flew into a rage. It furiously mmed its tail into the ground several times, sending a multitude of force waves at the earth elite zombie.

    Even though the earth elite zombie was still dazed from earlier, his perception was heightened beneath the earth. When he felt more waves of forceing his way, he instinctively drew on the power of the earth to defend himself. Using himself as the epicenter, he started to vibrate the earth around him.

    As they broke their way through the vibrating earth, the force waves were gradually weakened. The attrition of their energy meant that when they finally surged through the earth elite zombie, he didn¡¯t show the slightest reaction.

    The earth elite zombie had been disoriented by the st of strange energy because he hadn¡¯t managed to use his natural talents in time. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have ended up in such an embarrassing predicament straight off the bat.

    ¡°Eh?!¡± Han Shuo was astonished, then muttered thoughtfully, ¡°It seems the five divine element zombies need to face dangers more often, otherwise they won¡¯t even know how to use their own natural powers. The earth elite zombie most definitely didn¡¯t know that this earthquake type ability could withstand the energy attacks, but magically mastered this ability when faced with danger.¡±

    As Han Shuo pondered silently, the strange creature restrained by the formation was being driven mad by the repeated failure of its attacks. However, as restricted as it was, there was nothing more it could do to the safely ensconced earth elite zombie at the moment.

    Instead, it switched its attention to the Redbud Knights and dark elves, seemingly venting its frustration with the earth elite zombie on them. The entire mountain trembled as it howled. The piercing howl was apanied by force waves like those aimed at the earth zombie, except this time aimed at those petty ants who dared to step foot into its domain.

    The Redbud Knights and dark elves werepletely caught off guard by the bizarre force waves. The Redbud Knights fared better than the dark elves, since they battled while enclosed by their fighting aura. They only bled from their noses and mouths when they were hit, slowing down as they fought through the effects. However, the dark elves didn¡¯t fight under any such protection, and their weak fighters died or were severely injured by the dozen when the force waves hit them out of the blue.

    However, their total force numbered at least a thousand. The powerful creature was restrained by the ancient confining formation, and even its force wave attacks couldn¡¯t keep the invaders from swarming the mountain, eventually invading the entrance caves.

    Even as the dark elves died in droves, they still managed to ce arge amount of goblin missiles in various key regions of the mountain. On the other hand, Kassel led the Redbud Knights in teams to flush the dusky narrow caves, ughtering every lizardman they could find.

    The lizardmen possessed strong bodies, but wielded crude weapons. They were no match for the highly trained Knights, not to mention the existence of a powerful shapeshifting druid like Kassel. As they retreated further into the caves, the lizardmen left a trail of corpses behind.

    The dark elves followed closely behind the Redbud Knights, busily burying goblin missiles in every corner of the caves. The running battle drew closer and closer to the ancient creature as the Redbud Knights and dark elves trailed the lizardmen to the location of their ¡°true God¡±.

    The terrific casualties that the lizardmen fielded caught the eye of the powerful creature. At the bottom of the gourd mountain, the strange creature howled in fury as itpletely lost interest in the earth elite zombie. It roared as it mobilized several force waves to simultaneously smash into the Redbud Knights.

    Even the umonly strong Redbud Knights couldn¡¯t withstand the impact of multiple force waves hitting them simultaneously. They died as they fought, the strange energy savaging their bodies. The weaker dark elves endured worse casualties, with several hundred dying before they reached the innermost area.

    By this point, Han Shuo could determine that whatever the Redbud Knights and dark elves alliance nned to do, it was a risky and daring n .He was sure that the powerful creature was currently being restrained by the formation. In fact, it was restrained to the point where it could only reveal half its body.

    The Redbud Knights could only see the upper half of the great lizard¡¯s body and the chunks of umted magic crystal ores scattered around it. They simply couldn¡¯t see the buried lower half of its body or the ancient magic formation.

    It was one thing if the goblin missiles sted the mountain apart and killed the strange creature. However, if the creature managed to survive the st, then the destroyed mountain would no longer able to contain it. Han Shuo was sure that once it was released from the magic formation that had imprisoned it for aeons, the Redbud Knights and dark elves were bound to bear the brunt of its horrifying rage. However, this wasn¡¯t something Han Shuo needed to worry about.

    For Han Shuo, his only purpose was to kill Celt, as well as to obtain as many magic crystal ores as possible. For the strange creature to survive would be the most ideal oue.

    He mused for a bit, but was immediately struck with a wonderful idea.

    Calling the earth elite zombie to him, the two headed for the strange creature, tunneling into the depths of the earth. Yet when Han Shuo emerged from the tunnels right outside the ancient magic formation, he was greeted by the ten meter long python-like tail.

    It was certainly impressive that the creature could urate locate Han Shuo while its head was up above. Han Shuo swiftly dashed to a remote corner. The tail chased him until it stopped seven meters from him, thrashing furiously but unable to reach Han Shuo at all.

    ¡°Hey, I mean no harm, I just want to offer some help.¡± Han Shuo shouted up to the ten meter long tail, disregarding whether it could understand him or not.

    ¡°Tiny feeble presence, you will pay the price!¡± A message sent purely via consciousness shook the space around Han Shuo, seemingly issued by the strange creature.

    Normally, the higher ranked a creature, the more intelligence they possessed. The dark dragon Gilbert or the gold dragon could both speak human tongue, and even the Lord of the mes had the ability to directlymunicate with its mind. Being able tomunicate with humans meant that this creature was no less powerful than the Lord of the mes.

    This was indeed within Han Shuo¡¯s expectations. The creature had immediately responded as soon as Han Shuo shouted. Communicating directly with one¡¯s mind was even clearer than using spokennguage.

    ¡°Powerful being, I¡¯m not with those people above, I¡¯vee to help you! I can use their power to break the formation while not harming you in the slightest. I only want the magic crystal ores at the bottom of the gourd mountain. What do you think?¡± Han Shuo immediately put forth his proposal after learning they couldmunicate.

    ¡°Pathetic creature, those stupid fellows would still help me st open this gourd mountain even without your help. I fed them false information that I¡¯m afraid of fire and missiles. Now they are acting right in ordance with my n, helping me destroy the mountain! No one can stop this anymore. Even if you are not with them, they won¡¯t believe you if you inform them either. Your proposal holds no value!¡± The creatureughed proudly,pletely out of Han Shuo¡¯s expectations.

    Han Shuo expression changed slightly as he heard the ancient creature boast. Who would have imagined that this creature was actually so cunning? It didn¡¯t appear to fear me and missiles like Celt spected. It had faked disadvantages in the previous battle just to create this situation.

    Han Shuo suddenly looked befuddled and responded, ¡°If that¡¯s the case, why didn¡¯t you ask the lizardmen to get you out? It wouldn¡¯t be difficult for them to gather goblin missiles. Since they believe you to be their ¡®true God¡¯, they would help you even more willingly. Why use enemies to help you?¡±

    ¡°I would have long since left this damned ce already if they couldmunicate with me! They are cursed by the gods to forever be bound in their body, unable to break through their shackles. They can¡¯t use anything else other than the power of the flesh tomunicate. They simply don¡¯t understand me.¡±

    ¡°Those poor creatures only know the crudest of methods, and that is to remove all magical crystal ores around me. They thought it was the only way for me to leave this damned cage.¡± The creature seemed to have been imprisoned for far too long, talking nonstop with Han Shuo.

    When he heard this, Han Shuo suddenly remembered that the lizardmen indeed only knew how to use their bodily strength. The power of their souls and depths of their wisdom were pathetically shallow. Maybe this was the reason why they were unable to obtain information from the enormous creature in this space, and could only call upon their determination to surmount every obstacle and remove thest bit of each magic crystal ore from the mountain.

    End of Part 1 of the chapter.

    So it seemed that it was not for their self-interest that the lizardmen upied the gourd-shaped mountain and tirelessly mined the ore, but to help release their ¡°true God¡± from bondage! Come to think of it, they didn¡¯t even know how to forgeplex weapons, how would they possibly understand the true value of magic crystal ore?

    From this strange creature¡¯s exnation, Han Shuo knew that it was now impossible to prevent it from escaping the ancient formation. Celt was on the verge of blowing the entire mountain sky high, and all it needed was a single damaged corner to break free from its age old imprisonment.

    Thinking quickly, Han Shuo began to think of another way. Looking at the ten meter long, dark red tail, he remembered Arlen¡¯s words of the lizardmen¡¯s true god being just arge lizard. Inspiration struck, could this strange creature be protecting the lizardmen?

    ¡°Mighty presence, there are still hundreds of lizardmen who worship you trapped within this mountain. Once the invaders blow up the mountain, a mighty being as you would be able to survive, but the poor lizardmen would be wiped out to thest man.¡± Han Shuo paused for effect. He could sense the creature;s hesitation clouding the atmosphere. He continued, ¡°However, I can can ensure their survival. As long as you promise me the magic crystal ores in this mine, I will lead them to a safe location before the explosion.¡±

    ¡°Lowly tiny being, I, the great Ancient Lizard King Dagassi, agree to your request. As long as you can ensure their safety, you can take as much of this ore as you can carry.¡± After a brief silence, the Ancient Lizard King Dagassi gave Han Shuo his promise.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t linger after receiving Dagassi¡¯s promise. He immediately ordered the earth elite zombie to dig a tunnel to the surface. The earth elite zombieplied, earth readily parting for him. However, halfway through, the zombie sent him a message of helplessness. Han Shuo had already guessed the root of the problem and quickly shot towards the half finished tunnel.

    Apart from therge space that the ancient magic formation upied, the earth was justpacted soil from the outskirts of the mountain to Ancient Lizard King Dagassi¡¯s enormous tail. The earth elite zombie discovered that magic crystal ores harder than iron ores stood in his way as he started digging upwards.

    Even the earth elite zombie¡¯s natural powers were useless against magic crystal ores. He stopped halfway, at a loss of how to proceed. After all, the earth elite zombie was just an earth elite zombie. He didn¡¯t have the power of the metal elite zombie to level and ravage mountains.

    ¡°My poor children are dying in droves. Little human, hurry up and act.¡± Ancient Lizard King Dagassi sent a surge of urgent messages into Han Shuo¡¯s mind.

    Pressed for time, Han Shuo took out the peerless Demonyer Edge. The weapon spun like a drill in his hand as he thrust it upwards. Large chunks of magic crystal ore vanished into Han Shuo¡¯s space ring before they¡¯d even had time to touch the ground. Although his speed was a bit slower than the earth elite zombie¡¯s use of his natural talents, Han Shuo was still able to drill upwards at the rate of several meters per second with the help of the Demonyer Edge.

    As the Ancient Lizard King hurried him on, each rotation of the Demonyer Edge brought with it arge chunk of magic crystal ore into Han Shuo¡¯s space ring. Within a few moments, he arrived where the upper body and head of the Lizard King was located, above the magic formation.

    Han Shuo looked up and couldn¡¯t help but give a low exmation. This Ancient Lizard King did indeed look like an enormous lizardman, but for a few differences. A sharp horn grew from the top of his head, and a line of red, sword-like sharp spikes sprouted down its back from the horn.

    The Ancient Lizard King was even bigger than the green dragon. He resembled a towering mountain of reddish-brown muscle. At the height of twenty meters, his body seemed to be made of thick, reddish-brown boulders.

    His deep red eyes shone like twonterns high in the air. He stared down at the ant-like Han Shuo beneath him, once again sending out urgent messages.

    ¡°Understood, understood. I will help your children survive.¡± Han Shuo replied to the Lizard King¡¯s impatient nagging. He quickly rushed into theplexwork of caves whilst admiring the Ancient Lizard King¡¯s massive form.

    ¡°I¡¯m a messenger from your ¡®true God¡¯! ording to hismand, I am here to lead you to a ce of safety!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s shout came right when the lizardmen were desperately engaged in a rearguard action. They were fiercely resisting the Redbud Knights¡¯ onught while retreating towards the Ancient Lizard King.

    ¡°Despicable human, why are you here?¡± The leader with the big tail suddenly panicked, crying out in an awkward version of themon tongue as he pointed at Han Shuo as if wanting to initiate attacks.

    ¡°I¡¯m helping you as the messenger of your ¡®true God¡¯. You¡¯ll know if youe with me!¡± Han Shuo exined then immediately shouted, ¡°Don¡¯t do anything unnecessary! They haveid explosives over the entire mountain. All you have to do is hurry to your God¡¯s side.¡±

    Without staying back to see if the lizardmen believed him or not, Han Shuo flew straight back to the Ancient Lizard King. When the retreating lizardmen heard his words, they sped up their retreat to the Ancient Lizard King, possibly because they believed Han Shuo, or possibly because they were worried about the safety of their ¡®true God¡¯ and didn¡¯t want to fight with the Redbud Knights.

    Only when the remaining lizardmen saw that Han Shuo standing unscathed next to their ¡®true God¡¯ did they somewhat believe Han Shuo. They first kowtowed to the Lizard King before the leader looked up at him and asked humbly, ¡°True God, what are we to do? The enemy has already invaded!¡±

    The Ancient Lizard King thrashed a bit and let loose a long howl. Sounds of explosion spread throughout the entire space and the gourd-shaped mountain began to shake violently.

    ¡°Human, lead them in, time is running out!¡± The Lizard King¡¯s consciousness permeated the air, but it was a pity that the lizardmen couldn¡¯t understand the message.

    ¡°There is a passage here. All of you can hide inside and be safe from the explosion. Your ¡®true God¡¯ said the missiles won¡¯t be able to hurt him. He will handle the rest.¡± Han Shuo quickly shouted after seeing the Redbud Knights enter to ce the explosives in the cave.

    The leader nced at Han Shuo, still safe and sound at the feet of their ¡°true God¡±, and seemed to believe his words. The leader rapidly fired something off in the lizardmen tongue to his brethren. They stopped hesitating and followed behind their leader to travel further into the ground via Han Shuo¡¯s tunnel.

    After all of the lizardmen had safely made their way into the tunnel, Ancient Lizard King once again filled the space with his words, ¡°Human, don¡¯t let those damnable invaders throw explosives in here. Even though I won¡¯t die from the explosion, it will still injure me. Besides, that smell is highly unpleasant.¡±

    There were seven caves leading from the mountain¡¯s depths to this area. The Redbuds Knight and the dark elf invaders also seemed frightened of the mountain-like Lizard King as they hadn¡¯t charged in here. Instead, they stood at the entrance and threw down the explosives.

    Han Shuo summoned roughly a hundred dark creatures after hearing the Lizard King. They were everywhere, throwing back every missile that was thrown in. When the Redbud Knights and dark elves outside discovered that their bags of explosives had been thrown back out, they all fumed with rage.

    The skeletal warriors naturally couldn¡¯t understand the rage outside the caves. They only knew that they should obey Han Shuo¡¯s everymand, and continued to diligently throw out the missiles. The situation of the entire area had turned somewhatical.

    The remaining yin demon had been slowly trailing the Redbud Knights all along. As Han Shuo observed them for a while, he suddenly sneered, ¡°Since you guys have set foot here, don¡¯t dream of escaping. Enjoy the craziness of the goblin missiles together with the mountain!¡±

    Another incantation brought several bulky hate warriors into existence. They too joined the zombies and the skeletal warriors in throwing the missiles out of the cave. The hate warriors and zombies slowly moved forward, creating a blockade at the cave entrances. Once they¡¯d sealed off the cave entrances, Han Shuo shoved some of the remaining goblin missiles into his space ring.

    The knights and dark elves furiously attacked the dark creatures that had suddenly appeared. They picked up the goblin missiles on the ground and prepared to throw them back down at the Ancient Lizard King below, while vigorously cursing the dark creatures.

    These goblin missiles were intricately made. They wouldn¡¯t explode unless ignited with a fierce me, but once lit, they turned into a veritable ocean of me. The invaders had strategically ced explosives so that they could chain the whole explosion. The mountain would be hard pressed to withstand such arge amount of goblin missiles going off all at once and would inevitably copse.

    The Ancient Lizard King was to be the main bearer of the explosion¡¯s brunt this time. Only when the explosives filled the area around him would the destructive effects be maximized. That was why the Redbud Knights were working so tirelessly to prate the dark creatures¡¯ blockade.

    After all the lizardmen had evacuated through the tunnel and the caves were blocked by the undead creatures, the Ancient Lizard King became even more impatient, sending another message, ¡°That¡¯s enough. Help me ignite arge fire and bury all these knights inside.¡±

    ¡°Pleasure to be of service!¡± Han Shuo snickered coldly, a red me shooting out from his hand. A zombie suddenly turned its body sideways, letting the me pass through the gap.

    ¡°Fire, it¡¯s fire! Extinguish it!¡± The Redbud Knights, still fighting the dark creatures, suddenly lost their wits when they saw the fiery stream. Their loud screams turned into wails as they realized precisely how many goblin missiles had been ced around the mountain. They would be in dire straits if the explosion urred before they withdrew from the gourd mountain.

    A few more mes flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s hand, shooting through the gaps between the zombie warriors like arrows. Theynded on the knights and dark elves who had yet to catch on fire.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind suddenly moved with a thought, a me arcing directly into a goblin missile held by a hate warrior.

 Chapter 343: Landslide

    Chapter 343: Landslide

    A loud crack followed Han Shuo¡¯s strategic retreat down the tunnel. Like a fuse, the first explosion led to a chained set of sts. The entire mountain shook as the explosives shattered every corner, earth and rock shifting in the wake of the goblin missile detonation.

    As explosions ripped through the air above it, the ten-meter long tail of the Ancient Lizard King danced like a python. Its colossal body struggled intensely, trying to break the imprisonment of the ancient formation.

    Celt was still waiting for his subordinates outside when the sts violently shook the mountain. Unprepared for the sudden explosion, it felt like his heart had been pounded by a gigantic mallet, even sending his breathing into chaos.

    When he heard the thunderous explosion and saw the gourd mountain crumbling, the pupils of the gorgeously dressed noble dark elf Arlen dted violently. He turned to grab Celt by hispel, roaring, ¡°How can this be, why did the goblin missiles explode now?! Damn it, you set us up, didn¡¯t you?¡±

    Celt was even more furious than Arlen. Celt threw thetter away with such force that the dark elf stumbled. Celt¡¯s handsome visage was twisted into a ferocious grimace as he bit off, ¡°Have you no eyes?! Do you not see my people inside too?¡±

    Rumble......

    With onest rumble, the mountain finally copsed in on itself. Dust wreathed around the rubble, slowly settling in the wake of the sts. Celt and Arlen began to argue furiously, but was quickly interrupted by a series of loud cracks. Something deep within the mountain exploded upwards, throwing the gourd shaped mountain sky high into the distance until it smashed into the ground far away.

    A new cloud of dust once again settled over the region. No longer did thendscape have a silhouette of a gourd-shaped mountain, just a pile of reddish brown rubble, a monument of ruin. The only other aftermath of the explosion was the scattered pieces of what was left of the Redbud Knights and the dark elves.

    Celt shoved Arlen away rudely. Thetter staggered back a step, staring nkly at the ruined gourd mountain, muttering, ¡°Those were my most elite tribesmen! How could this be, how could this be!?¡±

    Celt, on the other hand, waspletely clear-headed. His expression was a vicious scowl as he shouted in fury, ¡°Someone must have been stirring up trouble, otherwise that big lizard wouldn¡¯t have been able to escape the mountain and keep my knights from retreating! This matter is not that simple.¡±

    A light went off in Arlen¡¯s head when he heard Celt, following up with a shout, ¡°Indeed, there must be something wrong! Those lowly lizardmen would have been no match for my brave tribesmen by themselves.¡±

    However at that moment, the object of Celt and Arlen¡¯s suspicions, Han Shuo, stood witness to an incredible sight. Creaks echoed around the chamber as the ancient magical formation started to copse. The explosion had finally destroyed a keyponent of the formation while reducing the mountain to rubble. As the Ancient Lizard King thrashed like a being possessed, an enormous snap resounded. The ancient magical formation that had bound him for eons... had finally cracked open.

    ¡°Aowuuuu......¡±

    An unearthly howl, unlike anything unleashed before, ripped out of the ruined remnants of the mountain. The Ancient Lizard King Degassi exerted every iota of his tremendous strength to further break the formation. The formation had already passed its breaking point from the goblin missiles, and the first crack spread like an errant spiderweb, reaching six of the eight corners.

    The Ancient Lizard King brought his massive presence crashing down on every corner of the octagonal magic formation. As each corner crumbled, Dagassi¡¯s aura grew one bit stronger. There was a moment of silence when thest of the corners shattered, and Dagassi erupted from underneath the thousands of pounds of rocks that had previously buried him.

    A mountain of corded muscle broke free from the rubble, apanied by a roar that shook the earth and skies. The Ancient Lizard King took a moment to beat his chest and stamp his feet, giving full vent to his innumerable years of umted resentment.

    Han Shuo, hiding within the tunnel, suddenly grew aghast. As each formation corner was destroyed, the presence of the Ancient Lizard King had be one notch corner. He had originally estimated the Ancient Lizard King to be as powerful as the Lord of the mes, but he had been badly mistaken. With the formation in ruins, it seemed his true ability was far more terrifying.

    ¡°The ancient magical formation not only confined his body, but also suppressed his power. I didn¡¯t expect this Ancient Lizard King to be so powerful. It may be that only demigods could defeat him!¡± Han Shuo was strangely terrified when he sensed the Ancient Lizard King¡¯s power.

    The lizardmen next to him were gibbering rapidly with excitement, each with an extremely fervent expression. The lizardmen all kowtowed when they saw the Ancient Lizard King¡¯s thick thighs pull free from the cracked ancient formation like towering old trees.

    Han Shuo no longer wanted to remain anywhere in the vicinity of this terrifying creature. He shot out from the tunnel that had been torn apart by the Ancient Lizard King. At the same time, his sharp eyes caught sight of a small ground pangolin sneaking out. It was carefully avoiding the furious Ancient Lizard King.

    Han Shuo felt something odd when he saw this incredibly small pangolin. The pangolin suddenly shapeshifted into a hawk and put on a burst of speed, wing frantically at the air to move faster. Han Shuo instantly identified it to be Kassel in disguise.

    Standing at the feet of the mountain-like Ancient Lizard King, Han Shuo looked at the stunned invaders. He discovered that Kassel was flying back to Celt¡¯s side, so he held off on dealing with him just yet.

    Both the two leaders of the invasion, Celt and Arlen, had oddly colored expressions on their faces. Their lips grew dry when they saw the enormous monster climb out of the ruins, at a loss of what to do next.

    ¡°Human, didn¡¯t you say the creature feared me and missiles?! Why is the mountain gone, but he still alive and well?¡± Arlen suddenly felt that he had been toyed with. Truth be told, if it wasn¡¯t for the Redbud Knights suffering a loss as big as his, he would¡¯ve already thrown caution to the wind to attack Celt.

    Celt was also at a loss for words when confronted with the massive creature who was embroiled in venting its anger amidst wild howls. He weakly stammered, ¡°I, how would I know?¡±

    Kassel flew over and shifted back to human form in a hurry. Before the two invaders could begin arguing again, he pointed at the nondescript figure that was Han Shuo, standing at the feet of the Ancient Lizard King. Kassel¡¯s face was ck as he said, ¡°It¡¯s him! He helped the old Lizard King escape! Otherwise, that big lizard would¡¯ve definitely been finished.¡±

    Only then did Celt, Arlen and the dark elf matriarch Dana notice the inconspicuous Han Shuo. Celt and Dana immediately recognized Han Shuo. Their blood hatred of Han Shuo nearly sent them charging straight at him, regardless of the consequences, when they saw him.

    ¡°It¡¯s him again! His name is Bryan, a nobleman of the Lancelot Empire. I must personally kill him!¡± Celt growled between gritted teeth, his eyes fixed on Han Shuo as he exined to Arlen.

    End of part 1 of the chapter!

    ¡°I know him! He ruined our nsst time, or else we could have made the lizardmen suffer a great deal!¡± The bewitching Dana was no different, screeching her fury as she pointed at Han Shuo.

    ¡°You shameless, despicable little invaders! I¡¯m going to rip you to shreds right now to appease my anger!¡° The Ancient Lizard King finally took note of Celt and his band, causing the air to shake with his mental message. He threw his head back in a long roar to the heavens as he began to move towards them.

    The earth shook with each foot he stomped down with. Dagassi moved several dozens of meters with each step as his colossal body moved with a speed that belied its size. He quickly caught up with the remnants of the invading army, ttening a group of heavy armor Redbud Knights into meat paste as he made his way over to where Celt was.

    Dagassi¡¯s ten meter long tail writhed like it had a mind of its own. Several dozens of Redbud Knights and dark elves were batted into the air like twigs with each swing. The massive body of the Ancient Lizard King moved with an unparalleled presence, projecting an irresistible momentum.

    He made the earth tremble with each step, trampling several knights into the mud with each footfall. His tail was like a deadly weapon, snapping in the air with each step, reaping the lives of the knights and dark elves one by one.

    Celt and Arlen¡¯s underlings repeatedly fired magic spells at the Ancient Lizard King¡¯s body. However, his huge, rock-like body seemed to possess an outstanding anti-magic effect. That level of attacks simply couldn¡¯t hurt him at all.

    Arrows, spears andnces couldn¡¯t pierce his durable body either. Only the two archers wielding strange bows next to Arlen could shoot out arrows possessing dark magic elements, prating his skin to leave a minor wound on the Ancient Lizard King¡¯s body.

    It was a pity that that level of injury was like a mosquito bite to the Ancient Lizard King. Their effects were minimal, incapable of hindering him as he ravaged their forces. More and more Redbud Knights and dark elves were trampled into bits.

    What was even more horrifying was the Ancient Lizard King¡¯s wondrous attacks. Waves and waves of strange, mental energy shot in all directions, even much more powerful now that the old Ancient Lizard King was unsealed. It only took two of these attacks to heavily injure a Redbud Knight, and three to kill one on the spot.

    The dark elves were even worse off. Each sessful attack meant the death of a dark elf. The only exception was Arlen, who could rely on defensive magics to withstand the attacks.

    ¡°Retreat, we all need to retreat!¡± Celt painfully gave a loud shout. He didn¡¯t take out his artifact ¡°Starry Sky¡±. He knew that even if he did, he still wouldn¡¯t be able to defeat the Ancient Lizard King with the power he currently possessed. That was why he decisively issued a retreat order.

    Needless to say, Arlen was absolutely out of his mind with terror, and just charged haphazardly. In his panic to survive, he even left Dana behind. It was a pity that Dana¡¯s strength didn¡¯t amount to much. In a moment of carelessness, she tripped when she was fleeing and saw a reddish ck mountain loom into view as she scrambled to her feet. That was thest thing she saw before she was ttened into meat paste.

    Following Dagassi, Han Shuo happily had the Demonyer Edge absorb the power of the dead invaders. The yin demon was also closely observing Celt, waiting for the moment he lost focus to deliver a fatal blow.

    By this time, Cecilia had led her Dark Mantle team to the site of the battle. They had hardly reached the battle when the enormous figure of the Ancient Lizard revealed itself and shocked them silly. They stood at a distance,pletely stunned by the turn of events.

    ¡°That, what is that thing, it¡¯s so big!¡± The fire journeyman mage Chrissie even cheered with a look of joy and excitement.

    ¡°This must be the creature inside the magic crystal mine. Such strong undtions of power, it should be close to a rank five super rank magic creature. How could such a powerful creature appear in thisyer?¡± Cecilia couldn¡¯t help but exim in shock as she watched the mountainous Ancient Lizard King pursue Celt and Arlen.

    ¡°Bryan, that¡¯s Bryan!¡± Emily also eximed. She had flown into the sky using her levitation skills, which allowed her to see further. She shouted loudly upon seeing Han Shuo next to the waist of Ancient Lizard King.

    Han Shuo had originally been near the Ancient Lizard King¡¯s waist. He flew up to the Ancient Lizard King¡¯s shoulder in the blink of an eye. Pointing at the panicked and escaping Celt and Arlen, he said, ¡°These two fellows are the leaders. Kill them and you can avenge your children¡¯s deaths!¡±

    ¡°Aowuuuuu......¡±

    Dagassi once again let out an earth-shattering roar. The sound wave itself was like a terrifying weapon, turning the shrubs and leaves into dust.

    ¡°Damn it, I definitely won¡¯t forgive that despicable human!¡± The noble dark elf Arlen had almost been injured by that sound wave, and couldn¡¯t help but curse when he heard Han Shuo egg the Ancient Lizard King onwards.

    Celt was well aware of how powerful Han Shuo was. He believed that even without the Ancient Lizard King in the picture, Han Shuo would have no trouble annihting Arlen. Celt kept his mouth shut, sneering inwardly at Arlen while frantically searching for a path to escape. He just wanted to get away from this terrifying Ancient Lizard King as soon as possible.

    Dagassi had killed more than a thousand of Redbud Knights and dark elves by then. Only a few hundreds were left of the invaders, and they were bolting in all directions. Not a single one dared to look back, let alone stop to catch their breath.

    So advised by Han Shuo, the Ancient Lizard King fixed his eyes on Celt and Arlen and no longer paid any heed to the small fry. His huge body seemed slow, but every step carried him dozens of meters. In addition, he was repeatedly using his presence to attack. The two fellows were being pursued miserably, as they hatefully cursed the instigator in their hearts. Their curses warmly greeted each and every one of Han Shuo¡¯s eighteen generations of ancestors.

    ¡°It¡¯s really that brat, why is he together with that monster?¡± Cecilia was floating next to Emily in the air using an unknown method, looking at Han Shuo sittingfortably on the Ancient Lizard King¡¯s shoulder. Her heart was in turmoil and her feelings all disarray, as if jars of five-spice powder had been upended.

    Cecilia actually hadn¡¯t found Han Shuo annoying in the beginning. On the contrary, she even somewhat appreciated his strength. However, Han Shuo had repeatedly gone against her, from the orc¡¯s shop in the Valley of Sunshine to this mission. He had never once let her conduct her business smoothly.

    This made Cecilia, having be one of the three heavyweights in the Dark Mantle at a young age, extremely furious. In her heart, she wanted to see Han Shuo fail. The more he failed, the happier she would feel.

    However, reality never pleased her. Earlier she learned from Chrissie that he had caused the loss of Celt¡¯s ear along with the green dragon. Now seeing him in high spirits with the big lizard chasing Celt, how was he failing as she¡¯d wished?

    The mission to deal with Celt was originally theirs, but now that the lone Han Shuo had inserted himself, he¡¯d interrupted their n. He hadn¡¯t even seemed to exert himself at all, yet was able to force Celt into such a miserable state. This was an embarrassment for Cecilia, who¡¯d spent so much time on Celt but was still helpless.

    ¡°Ah, it¡¯s really Bryan, he is so handsome!¡± Chrissie finally saw Han Shuo and couldn¡¯t help but yell.

    ¡°You little boy-crazy girl, hurry up and shut your mouth. Don¡¯t lead that big lizard here!¡± Fearing the lizard woulde, Cecilia snapped at Chrissie.

    What one didn¡¯t want was obviously what one would get. The Ancient Lizard King didn¡¯t hear them, but the wicked Celt obviously did. He suddenly changed directions, leading the experts of the Redbud Knights straight in their direction.

 Chapter 344: Deathly pursuit

    Chapter 344: Deathly pursuit

    ¡°Not good, that sted Celt! Everyone, be careful!¡± Cecilia¡¯s pretty face paled when she saw Celt¡¯s sudden change in direction. Celt led the group of knights as well as Arlen and his dark elves in an about face towards the stunned Cecilia.

    ¡°Master, that Bryan is also a member of Dark Mantle. He won¡¯t dare to act impudently as long as we capture those women.¡± Kassel vigorously urged Celt along. The Ancient Lizard King¡¯s appearance and subsequent brutality had struck a deep chord of fear within him.

    ¡°If they¡¯re with Bryan, we can use them to force him to submit.¡± Celt responded tightly. He coldly rushed towards Cecilia as he drew ¡°Starry Sky¡± from his space ring.

    From his position atop the old Lizard King¡¯s shoulder, Han Shuo quickly identified Emily from afar. Since the Redbud Knights and dark elves had made such a shy mess of things, it was impossible to keep Dark Mantle in the dark. Their appearance at this juncture was well within Han Shuo¡¯s expectations.

    ¡°You can¡¯t let those ones leave alive, otherwise you can definitely expect this ce to turn into a warzone in the near future!¡± Han Shuo whispered urgently in the old Lizard King¡¯s ear. His eyes were fixed on the two leaders, a murderous glint shing through his eyes.

    ¡°I don¡¯t need you to remind me.¡± The Ancient Lizard King didn¡¯t bother with audible speech, letting his voice echo within Han Shuo¡¯s mind.

    At this point, the Ancient Lizard King had left the corpses of more than a thousand knights and dark elves in his wake as he rampaged through thebined army. The lucky survivors bolted in every direction, doing their damnedest to put as much distance as they could between them and the ferocious figure of the Lizard King.

    Suddenly, russet colored light shone over the massive body of the Ancient Lizard King. Astonishingly, his enormous body began to shrink, the light folding inwards.

    Still atop the Lizard King¡¯s shoulder, Han Shuo had front row seats to witness this transformation. A quick mental message from the old Lizard King assuaged his worries, the Lizard King was simply transforming into his human form. Han Shuo leaped off his perch, hovering in the air.

    Dagassi¡¯s colossal body rapidly shrunk under the russet colored light. The twenty meter tall form of the prehistoric apex predator was reced with a hundred and seventy centimeter tall old man within ten breaths. His face was flushed, and the only remnant of his previous form was a lizardman¡¯s tail extending from his spine. A red robe appeared out of nowhere, casually draping itself over him.

    Dagassi¡¯s transformation had actually resulted in such an earth shattering change to his features. Nowhere could one see the behemoth that had ughtered knights and elves like swatting flies in this small, normal looking old man. He looked up to see Han Shuo hovering in the sky above him. He stretched, shouting in the human tongue, ¡°Get your friends somewhere safe, I¡¯m going to exact my blood price from those invaders.¡±

    The old Lizard King had forgone mental transmission, instead using themon tongue. It seemed that the ancient magical formation that bound him had also sealed his ability to freely transform. Now that he could shift into a human form, he¡¯d regained the ability to use themon human tongue.

    As he spoke, he lifted himself haltingly off the ground. His actions seemed a bit out of practice, seemingly searching for that familiarity he once had in the air, the sense he¡¯d lost from being sealed underground for so long.

    Dagassi¡¯s reminder broke Han Shuo¡¯s fascination with the Lizard King¡¯s transformation. He looked up to see Celt and his group almost at Cecilia and her group¡¯s heels. Kassel had taken the opportunity to shapeshift into his favorite great earthen bear, causing the ground to crack beneath his charge as he charged Cecilia.

    The noble dark elf Arlen gazed dumbstruck, eyes wide, at Kassel¡¯s transformation. Turning his head, he caught sight of ¡°Starry Sky¡± in Celt¡¯s hands. Apprehension grew in his heart as he remembered how arrogant he¡¯d been in front of them earlier.

    He broke out in a cold sweat. Arlen had been rudely woken to the fact that his men¡¯s strength paled inparison to that of the Redbud Knights during the Ancient Lizard King¡¯s rampage earlier. With ¡°Starry Sky¡±, he could admit that he was no longer Celt¡¯s match. Now that this druid subordinate had revealed a transformation skill that allowed him to turn into a great earthern bear, Arlen realized that if he¡¯d reallye to blows with Celt, he really would¡¯ve been defeated miserably.

    While Arlen¡¯s heart trembled with fear, a different sort of emotion was rousing within Cecilia¡¯s heart. She cursed vehemently inside as she hovered in the air, shouting, ¡°Move! Don¡¯t just stand there, Celt ising!¡±

    Even in his current state, Celt was renowned as the leader of the Redbud Knights, one of the top ten knight troops, across the Profound Continent. The loss of his green dragon didn¡¯t cause noticeable drop in his strength when he wielded ¡°Starry Sky¡±. Cecilia may be one of the three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle, but she didn¡¯t specialize inbat. With little experience to draw on, seeing Celt and his band form a charge immediately caused her to panic.

    ¡°Annoying women, don¡¯t expect to leave here alive today!¡± Celt shouted. ¡°Starry Sky¡± started to emit a blinding light as his charge turned into a full assault. It was like the stars had descended on the entire underground world. Off to the side, the great earthen bear Kassel also mounted his own assault to pressure Cecilia and her band.

    In the face of this twin onught, a crimson light suddenly streaked through the sky. Even as it sped through the sky, its point rapidly coalesced into a dense orb of bloodlust. The blood colored orb of light began to rapidly spin, as its slivers began to rattle in warning. The enormous ball of prickly, crimson light shook as it continued to rapidly rotate in midair. Han Shuo had finally unleashed the ¡°Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡±.

    The wails of weeping ghosts and howling wolves apanied the ¡°Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡± as it shot out from the Demonyer Edge. It careened through the air towards Kassel¡¯s great earthen bear form. He was on the verge ofshing out in a powerful blow against Emily when he sensed the dense aura of killing intent locking onto him from behind. Quick as thought, Kassel changed targets, skidding to a stop as he turned to face the scarlet orb that was screaming through the air towards him.

    Emily was no slouch, she quickly harnessed her levitation skills to throw herself out of harm¡¯s way. Her dark hair danced in the wind as she chanted under her breath, magic staff in hand. Two massive Hands of Death appeared in mid air, swiping at Kassel¡¯s transformed feet.

    Kassel has zeroed in on Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge as the biggest threat, and didn¡¯t expect Emily tounch a counterattack mid-retreat. Both of his feet were firmly grabbed by her two Hands of Death.

    There was no time left to try and pry himself loose. Kassel could only grit his teeth and use his front ws to catch the spinning scarlet orb. The crimson light rotated madly in the bear¡¯s ws, fiery sparks shooting out from its palms as the bear stamped his feet in agony.

    After depleting thirty percent of its energy reserves in that one attack against Kassel, the Demonyer Edge once again turned into a streak of red light and returned to Han Shuo, leaving behind the wailing Kassel with his two mangled bear arms.

    Emily suddenly decided to not pursue Celt and dark elf Arlen either as she sped further away.

    Boom......

    A strong force smashed down from the sky, abruptly trampling the ten meters tall bear into the ground. Dozens of attacking force waves simultaneously invaded Kassel¡¯s body. He bled profusely from his nose and mouth, his body shrinking back into human form.

    The one who¡¯d attacked Kassel from above was indeed the Ancient Lizard King Dagassi, who descended from a red dot in the middle of the sky tond next to Kassel. ¡°You are one of the main perpetrators, how could I let you escape!?¡± Dagassi was still using the form of a ruddy old man, so he stomped right on Kassel¡¯s head.

    Kassel¡¯s skull shattered like a rotten watermelon with a crunching sound.

    End of Part 1 of the chapter.

    On the other side, Cecilia and the Dark Mantle members were desperately trying to evade Celt and Arlen¡¯s pursuit. Thetter two were obviously unaware of Han Shuo and Cecilia¡¯s dubious rtionship. The only reason Han Shuo had rushed over was to rescue Emily. He didn¡¯t care for the rest, and he watched Cecilia¡¯s group fleeing without offering a helping hand.

    Only when he saw the fire journeyman mage Chrissie almost caught by a Redbud Knight¡¯s killing move did Han Shuo make a move, blocking the attack for her. He shouted from afar, ¡°Chrissie,e over to my side! I will keep you safe!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, hurry and help Mistress Cecilia. Hurry!¡± Chrissie seemed to care very much for Cecilia. She didn¡¯t run to Han Shuo, instead disregarding her own safety to ask him to save Cecilia.

    Emily was not too far away from Han Shuo at this moment. Knowing the grudge between him and Cecilia, her elegant ck brows furrowed. She didn¡¯t say anything to persuade him, flying directly to Cecilia instead.

    Standing proudly in the air, Han Shuo saw Emily flying to Cecilia without another word. He couldn¡¯t help but let out a low curse before rushing after her. He couldn¡¯t care less whether Cecilia lived or died. Emily however, was his woman. He absolutely didn¡¯t want anything to happen to her.

    In actuality, Emily was secretly paying attention to Han Shuo¡¯s actions. A sweet feeling surged in her heart when she saw him fly after her. She knew Han Shuo had only followed to ensure her safety. He still wouldn¡¯t interfere even if Cecilia was in grave danger.

    Celt was busily pursuing Cecilia, but Arlen saw Emily fly over. He immediately gave an order to the two dark elven archers behind him. The archers raised their bows and aimed at Emily, magical fluctuationsing into existence around the arrowheads.

    The ck magic scepter in Arlen¡¯s hand waved once as he chanted a spell in the dark elven tongue. An enormous ck python formed from dark elements slithered out from the magic scepter. It shook its head and tail and sprang towards Emily, its blood maw gaping open.

    ¡°You want to die?!¡± Han Shuo roared, the Demonyer Edge flying out of his right hand. Bloody light exploded out right in the middle of the enormous python.

    The Demonyer Edge was like a bloody mire, a terrifying suction force devouring everything around it. Even the air was no exception as the vacuum force began to increase. The ck python was helpless in the face of such a power and was sucked in whole.

    The two archers next to Arlen couldn¡¯t resist either. They shrieked, but simply couldn¡¯t control their bodies and were involuntarily sucked into the mire. The archers, along with the surrounding gravel and nts whirled into the air, heading straight onto the mire created by the Demonyer Edge.

    Arlen¡¯s soul seemed to have fled his body in his fright. He decisively stabbed the ck magic scepter into the ground, tightly holding onto it with one hand. He took out a dark magic scroll with another hand. He quickly drew something on the scroll, and a mass of ck mist rose from it to wrap around his body.

    Many gas beings that resembled Arlen formed from the ck mist, sent flying with the slightest gust of wind. These gaseous beings twisted like leaves in the wind, but they didn¡¯t seem affected by the Demonyer Edge¡¯s suction force. Soon, they were drifting further and further away, about to vanish into the distance.

    However, Arlen had obviously forgotten about the existence of the old Lizard King Dagassi. He¡¯d been observing the changes in the scene without making a move. All of a sudden, he shot dozens of force waves underground.

    A mournful cry came from the depths of the earth. When he heard it was indeed Arlen¡¯s scream, Dagassi cackled and murmured, ¡°You despicable dark elves still dare to try and flee in my presence?¡±

    ¡°Dagassi, what are you just standing there for? Killing them was your responsibility, when did it shift to me?!¡± Han Shuo had long seen that the Ancient Lizard King had taken the position of a bystander, watching with an eye of interest. He couldn¡¯t help but yell loudly when he sensed Arlen being killed underground.

    ¡°Funny little human fellow, you alone seem capable of handling them. I¡¯ll just act as your assistant.¡± Dagassi had suddenly developed an interest in Han Shuo, continuing, ¡°I¡¯ve lived for countless years, but this is the first time I¡¯ming across something like yourbat style. This cultivation method of yours seems rather special, so I¡¯m waiting to see how many more miraculous areas there are to you.¡±

    Dagassi was very powerful, and naturally his eyesight was rather sharp. He only needed a little bit of time to realize that Han Shuo¡¯s magic cultivation didn¡¯t resemble fighting aura nor follow the ts of magical elements. He¡¯d never seen anything like it in his life. As a result, Dagassi was immediately interested in Han Shuo, and decided to see what depths this human had. This was why he hadn¡¯t hurried to go on the offensive.

    Hearing his words, Han Shuo snorted coldly, ¡°If so, then just watch.¡±

    Han Shuo moved like lightning to Emily¡¯s side as his words fell on Dagassi¡¯s ears, grabbing her waist and stopping her from flying. He then shouted to Celt, ¡°Celt, chasing those people is useless. I don¡¯t care if they die. If you don¡¯t run away, you¡¯ll be dead without a doubt. Are you crazy?¡±

    Celt, who was diligently chasing Cecilia and her team, almost vomited blood in anger upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words. He looked back and saw no trace of Arlen, just Han Shuo standing there with a mocking look. Han Shuo appeared to have no intention of saving those people. He obviously wasn¡¯t joking.

    ¡°Damned Kassel, giving me false information!¡± Celt spat out a low curse. He took a moment to think, and quit chasing Cecilia. He gathered the remnants of his Redbud Knights and forged a path deep into the bushes.

    ¡°Emily, how did that Cecilia be one of the Dark Mantle¡¯s three heavyweights? Her strength can¡¯tpare with Candide or your brother Amyes!¡± Han Shuo asked Emily in surprise when he saw that Cecilia only knew how to duck and weave.

    Han Shuo¡¯s jeering had forced Celt to give up on chasing Cecilia. Emily struggled out of his embrace in embarrassment when she saw Cecilia was safe and sound. She timidly looked around, slowly floating down before finally replying to Han Shuo, who was still closely following her.

    ¡°Sister Cecilia doesn¡¯t specialize in fighting. Moreover, her grandfather is one of the oldest veterans of Dark Mantle, and is also the only sacred magus of the Empire. You¡¯ve even met him before.¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned by her words. He eximed, ¡°No wonder! I thought her power was too weak for her to hold this position at such a young age. She has so many strange magic artifacts, so it¡¯s all thanks to her sacred magus grandfather. Oh right, I don¡¯t remember meeting any sacred magus, where have I met him? You aren¡¯t kidding me, are you?¡±

    ¡°Of course not, but I can¡¯t tell you who he is since it¡¯s a rule. Anyway, you¡¯ll definitely meet him after you reach a certain rank in Dark Mantle.¡± Emily smiled delicately and said, seemingly amused at Han Shuo¡¯s confused expression.

    ¡°Her grandfather, I have met him...?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts raced. When he came up empty handed after a moment, he no longer spared effort thinking about it.

    ¡°You little brat, you¡¯re definitely a scoundrel of the first degree, making an old man like me take action myself!¡± The old Lizard King¡¯s voice rolled in waves from behind. Han Shuo then saw a red shadow shoot through the air in Celt¡¯s direction.

    ¡°Right, Celt has an artifact and a space ring, we still need to take a look.¡± Han Shuo suddenly remembered the wealth that Celt carried. He hurriedly pulled Emily along and flew towards the two.

    The earth elite zombie was still deep underground, following Han Shuo¡¯s orders. It tunneled towards Arlen¡¯s corpse, ready to strip him bare of his valuables.

    As for Kassel, whose head had been crushed by Dagassi, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t care less. The druids worshipped nature and didn¡¯t like to collect weath. The traitor Kassel hadn¡¯t had any opportunities to collect magic crystal ores, and Han Shuo hadn¡¯t seen a space ring on his hands either. Obviously, he wasn¡¯t a generous sort.

 Chapter 345: Rank five demigod existence

    Chapter 345: Rank five demigod existence

    The power of Ancient Lizard King Dagassi was indeed horrifying. By the time Han Shuo and Emily arrived, he was kicking Celt around like a ball.

    Celt¡¯s thick armor was far more durable and solid than ordinary armor. However, under Dagassi¡¯s blows, they dented like scrap metal. The sounds of bones cracking echoed from Celt¡¯s body.

    The Redbud Knights were extremely loyal to Celt. They fearlessly went up against Dagassi,unching an offensive to buy enough time for Celt to escape.

    Unfortunately, the power gap was toorge. Dagassi didn¡¯t even need to use that much force to disembowel more than a dozen knights with explosions, killing them on the spot. The fighting aura from their swords and spears simply weren¡¯t enough to cause the Ancient Lizard King any harm.

    Maybe if Celt had been one rank higher,bining the strength of a divine knight and his artifact ¡°Starry Sky¡±, he might have been able to pose a threat to Dagassi. However, it appeared he would never have this opportunity. His body had just crumpled to the ground when it was firmly stepped on by Dagassi.

    A crunching sound resounded, and onest footprint was now imprinted on his chest. His internal organs sttered open with the impact, blood overflowing from the footprint. Celt¡¯s eyes rolled upwards as he lost all signs of life.

    The cosmic light imbuing the ¡°Starry Sky¡± dulled after Celt¡¯s death. The weapony quietly amongst the bushes. It didn¡¯t have any of the characteristics of a divine artifact.

    Flying over with Emily, Han Shuo¡¯s eyes were shining as he stared at ¡°Starry Sky¡±, and he shot forward without a word. However before he couldy hands on it, the artifact lying in the bush suddenly flew into Dagassi¡¯s hand.

    ¡°What? You want this thing?¡± Dagassi looked at Han Shuo and asked, shaking the ¡°Starry Sky¡± in his hand a bit.

    Han Shuo nodded, feeling somewhat embarrassed. He gave a dryugh, ¡°I do want it.¡±

    ¡°I see the weapon in your hand is even more ferocious than this one, aren¡¯t you a little greedy?¡± The transformed Dagassi wasn¡¯t a monster without emotion anymore. On the contrary, he was very human as he spoke to Han Shuo with a teasing tone.

    ¡°I don¡¯t need that sword, but I have a very good friend. If they can use that sword, their strength will improve by a lot.¡± Han Shuo rxed, squinting at the joking Dagassi.

    ¡°Hmph, it¡¯s for that chit Phoebe, isn¡¯t it?¡± Han Shuo had been anxious to get to ¡°Starry Sky¡± earlier, so he¡¯d shot ahead and left Emily behind. She used her levitation skills and floated to his side, her delicate face obviously expressing some anger.

    Hearing Emily¡¯s words and seeing her jealous appearance, Han Shuo didn¡¯t know what to say and just stood there, smiling dryly.

    ¡°This sword is indeed not bad, but I killed Celt, so it should belong to me!¡± The Ancient Lizard King Dagassi looked at Han Shuo with a smile on his face. He only continued when he saw thetter nod his head, ¡°But this sword is of no use to me. If you really want it, I can give it to you. As long as you agree to some of my conditions, I will also give you that human¡¯s space ring as well.¡±

    Hearing that there was still room for negotiation in the Ancient Lizard King¡¯s words. Han Shuo was startled as he asked, ¡°Tell me about the conditions first.¡±

    Dagassi was in no rush to speak. He swished his tail towards Celt, and thetter¡¯s space ring flew into his hand. Dagassi nced at the ring caught in his hand, and waves of strange energy surged into the ring.

    With a snapping sound, the ring¡¯s magical boundary was forcibly destroyed. Dagassi explored Celt¡¯s ring a little, then squinted andughed cheerfully at Han Shuo, ¡°Lots of good stuff inside, hmm. An estimated value of at least a million gold coins. This fellow was quite the money maker.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart itched with greed when he heard Dagassi¡¯s words. However, thetter still hadn¡¯t stated his conditions, so Han Shuo also wasn¡¯t in a hurry to ask. He stared at Dagassi as he waited, knowing thetter would definitely bring up his conditions in a moment.

    ¡°All of the magic crystal ores below the gourd mountain, plus this priceless divine artifact and the wealth inside this space ring, they can all belong to you if you promise me a few things.¡±

    After taking a deep breath, Dagassi stated his conditions to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Name it!¡± Han Shuo said simply.

    ¡°First, protect the lizardmen in my stead as long as you¡¯re alive. Moreover, if we have the chance to meet again, I hope you will agree to one more condition. I will not say what it is for the time being, but you have to agree to it.¡± Dagassi looked at Han Shuo and said solemnly.

    ¡°With you here, who would dare to touch the lizardmen? As long as you are willing to spend some time in the underground world, thisyer can easily be dominated by the lizardmen. Why would you need my help then?¡± Surprised, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but give voice to his doubts.

    Shaking his head, the Ancient Lizard King heaved a long sigh and said, ¡°I cannot stay in the underground world. Otherwise, it may directly lead to the genocide of my children. There are some things you can¡¯t understand now. Maybe the next time you meet, you¡¯ll understand.¡±

    ¡°Wait for me to talk to my children, then I will leave to take revenge on the one who imprisoned me. Perhaps we will never have the chance to meet again, as I¡¯m likely to face death. However if we do meet a next time, I think your strength would far surpass now. By then, if I haven¡¯t yet died, you may be able to help me.¡±

    The power of Ancient Lizard King was even greater than that of the Lord of the mes. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t even imagine the kind of people or creatures that could kill him. Dagassi seemed ready for death, and Han Shuo didn¡¯t know how his future self could help him. However for Han Shuo, the immediate benefits at hand significantly outweighed his future worries.

    Therefore, he only hesitated a little then nodded readily in agreement, ¡°I will help you take care of the lizardmen as long as I¡¯m alive. However my ability is limited, and I can only try my best. On the other hand, next time we meet, I hope your condition won¡¯t be too difficult to achieve.¡±

    ¡°Haha, good, very good!¡± The Ancient Lizard Kingughed loudly. He didn¡¯t make Han Shuo swear a solemn vow to the gods. He readily threw ¡°Starry Sky¡± and Celt¡¯s space ring to Han Shuo, saying, ¡°I believe you. Let¡¯s go, I¡¯ll help you get the magic crystal ores and settle matters with my children.¡±

    Han Shuo held the space ring and checked it with his consciousness. He was immediately dazzled by the wealth inside. There were all kinds of translucent, sparkling crystals of different colors and piles of gold, silver and beautiful jade. Celt must have plundered them from the golden dragon or the underground world.

    Aside from that, there were weapons and equipment that had the distinct aura of magic elements. They must have been forged by a great alchemist and were items of priceless value. There were also three ownerless crystal cards of a hundred thousand gold coins. Anyone could directly withdraw money from these cards.

    Just as Dagassi had said, the total value of Celt¡¯s space ring was at least a million gold coins. If Phoebe sold thisrge number of crystals, gold, silver and jade, they¡¯d possibly be worth more than a million gold coins.

    ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll go with you.¡± Han Shuo said. However, he hesitated a little upon seeing the dead bodies littered over the ground, ¡°The weapons and armor of the dead Redbud Knights and dark elves are very good. They may even have more gold coins in their pockets. If you don¡¯t mind, can I loot them all before we leave?¡±

    A deepugh bubbled out of Dagassi. He was about to agree when his eyes brightened suddenly, he said, ¡°Those armors aren¡¯t suitable for my children because of their body structures, but the weapons can be used. How about the armor and the other items to you, but the weapons to my children. What do you say?¡±

    ¡°No problem.¡± Han Shuo readily agreed, thenughed and said, ¡°Wait a moment, I¡¯ll collect these things quickly.¡±

    Han Shuo took out the bone staff when he finished speaking, chanting a spell. Rows of white skeletal warriors walked out from thin air, scattering out like snowkes and collecting the equipment and valuables on Han Shuo¡¯s orders.

    While Han Shuo took out the bone staff, the Ancient Lizard King Dagassi suddenly shot forward like lightning, screeching to a halt in front of Han Shuo, his eyes fixed on the bone staff. His expression was in absolute contrast to the rxed one he had on before.

    Han Shuo was scared stiff by this drastic change. Seeing the old Ancient Lizard King staring strangely at his bone staff, he hurriedly withdrew it. Taking a step back while feeling somewhat guilty, he asked, ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡±

    After Han Shuo put away the bone staff, all of Dagassi¡¯s surprise and attention refocused on him instead. Han Shuo felt a bit uneasy by that shocked look, not knowing what was runnign through Dagassi¡¯s mind.

    The old Ancient Lizard King finally broke the tense silence with a loudugh, ¡°Little fellow, it seems we do have some shared fortune! Do you know the origin of that bone staff?¡±

    Han Shuo was dumbfounded. He looked at the Ancient Lizard King in shock, gingerly asking, ¡°Could it be that you know?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, looks like you don¡¯t know anything about it. That bone staff belonged to my previous master. Do you want to know its secrets?¡± The Ancient Lizard King asked Han Shuo, looking somewhat excited.

    ¡°Your previous master!¡± Han Shuo was shocked, then eximed, ¡°You¡¯re from the Cmity Church?¡±

    ¡°Cmity Church? What kind of organization is that? I¡¯ve never heard of it.¡± The Ancient Lizard King replied with a frown, then sighed, ¡°Since the bone staff is now in your hands, my master is either dead, or not on this ne. I wonder where the master is now, aii!¡±

    When he heard that Dagassi didn¡¯t know anything about the Cmity Church, Han Shuo thought for a bit then asked, ¡°Just what realm are you? How long have you lived?¡±

    ¡°I was already following master when I was just a mutated lizard. I¡¯m currently a rank five super rank magic creature. As for how long I have lived, even I myself don¡¯t remember clearly. I only know that I have been sealed here for about five thousand years.¡± Dagassi exined to Han Shuo with a smile. His attitude toward thetter was even more cordial than before.

    An old monster indeed! Han Shuo secretly eximed. No wonder he didn¡¯t know about the Cmity Church. The Cmity Church had less than a thousand years of history, it wouldn¡¯t be strange for the Ancient Lizard King to not know of them. It appeared the origin of this bone staff was even more ancient than the Cmity Church knew, and had deeper connections than just the Cmity Church.

    ¡°Can you tell me about the abilities of the bone staff as well as its origin?¡± When it came to the secrets of the bone staff, Han Shuo could only hope to slowly uncover the fog that surrounded it. He very much wanted to learn what secrets it held.

    ¡°Heh heh, when you figure out all the mysteries of the bone staff, you will naturallye to understand the matter of five thousand years ago. Whether master died on this ne or has already left it, master has definitely left an exnation of everything inside the bone staff. As long as youpletely grasp the staff, it will tell you everything you want to know. Me telling you is useless, and what I know can¡¯t be as detailed as what master has left inside the staff. You should figure it out on your own.¡± Just like that necromancy archmage Wolf, the Ancient Lizard King didn¡¯t directly tell Han Shuo the secrets of the bone staff. He only left some clues for Han Shuo to use in digging out the truth on his own.

    ¡°You¡¯ve reached the strength of a fifth rank creature. Isn¡¯t that the same as a demigod, who else in this world could be more powerful than you?¡± While inwardly criticizing the Ancient Lizard King for not straight out telling him everything, Han Shuo suddenly remembered the Ancient Lizard King¡¯s words earlier.

    ¡°I may seem powerful in the Profound Continent, but I can tell you, this continent is not as simple as you see it to be. Here, there¡¯¡¯s nock of beings like me. If the powerful existences from five thousand years ago are still around in the Profound Continent, then even more terrifying beings than me definitely exist. You should take precautions.¡± Dagassi looked deeply at Han Shuo, reminding him carefully.

    Han Shuo was once again shocked by these words. The most powerful presences in the various human countries only stood at the sacred rank. Han Shuo had never heard of any existences surpassing the demigods. If he hadn¡¯t met Dagassi here, he would never have known that his continent had a rank five super rank magic creature on par with demigods.

    As far as Han Shuo knew, Dagassi¡¯s level of power allowed him the freedom to do whatever he wished on the Profound Continent. But, his words didn¡¯t have a trace of arrogance. Far from it, in fact, it actually seemed to hold a hint of trepidation when talking about those existences more powerful than him on the Profound Continent.

    If Dagassi was already a rank five super rank magic creature with power equivalent to a demigod, then those that were even more powerful than him, how shockingly terrifying would they be... were they, ¡°Gods¡±?

    This was something Han Shuo simply couldn¡¯t imagine at his level. His mind was a mess thanks to Dagassi¡¯s words. When the the bunch of skeletal warriors finished collecting the spoils of battle, he cast the issue to the back of his mind and said, ¡°Who cares about those powerful beings? I just need to do my job well. I¡¯m only a small character. Heh heh, I won¡¯t get in any conflict with them.¡±

    It¡¯s not up to you to decide anymore since you hold the bone staff. Dagassi sighed in his heart, but he didn¡¯t speak it out. He looked at Han Shuo with emotion, as if looking as his master. He hadn¡¯t known of his master¡¯s fate for the thousands of years they¡¯d been apart. A strange light sparkled in his eyes.

    ¡°Bryan, should I go with you?¡± Emily had listened for a while and was simrly perplexed. When she saw Cecilia and the others who had escaped Celt slowly approach, she hurriedly maintained a distance from Han Shuo to avoid raising any suspicion.

    This time, Han Shuo also saw Cecilia and the others walk over. They were obviously afraid of the Ancient Lizard King Dagassi¡¯s existence. Their postures were as unassuming as they could be, fearing thetter¡¯s displeasure.

 Chapter 346: Collecting the spoils of war

    Chapter 346: Collecting the spoils of war

    Han Shuo was in no rush to leave. When Emily saw Cecilia and the Dark Mantle members slowly making their way over, she felt like she needed to a bit cautious, maintaining an appropriate distance from Han Shuo to avoid rousing suspicion.

    After all, Emily was the daughter-inw of the Betteridge family. No matter what she felt towards Hand Shuo in private, they couldn¡¯t let outsiders know of it. Be it Emily or Han Shuo, that particr bit of information would only bring them unnecessary troubles in the foreseeable future.

    After he saw the bone staff in Han Shuo¡¯s hand, Ancient Lizard King Dagassi¡¯s attitude towards thetter had grown considerably better. His long years of life had also seemingly forged an incredible level of patience. His expression remained unchanged as he watched Cecilia and the others slowly inch their way over.

    ¡°I can just take care of these people if you think they¡¯re in the way, it won¡¯t take me too long.¡± Dagassi casually remarked. A wicked grin crossed his face as he saw their timid approach.

    Dagassi¡¯s attitude towards Cecilia and the others could only be described as extreme contempt. He wasn¡¯t afraid to let them overhear his conversation with Han Shuo. For a demi-god existence like himself, Cecilia¡¯s group were no different than ants, an eyesore that only needed a flick of a limb to eradicate.

    Cecilia and her team had only approached the group because they saw Han Shuo and Emily getting along well with the Ancient Lizard King. Cecilia¡¯s face nched when she heard Dagassi¡¯s offer. She couldn¡¯t help but take a few steps back and stare nervously at Han Shuo.

    ¡°No need, they are my colleagues.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s answer allowed Cecilia to heave a sigh of relief. But only when she saw the Ancient Lizard King nod at Han Shuo did she slowly walk over to their side. She first nodded at Emily and then spoke to Dagassi, ¡°Powerful being, I am of the Lancelot Empire and in charge of dealing with the enemy this time, I...¡±

    ¡°I have no interest in your words.¡± Dagassi interrupted before Cecilia could make much headway, let alone finish, ¡°Puny human girl, those who dared to invade lie dead. Whatever happens in this area is under my control, and the underground world is not a ce for you humans to set foot in. I won¡¯t kill you since you are his colleagues, but if you value this temporary amnesty, I hope you leave this world as quickly as possible.¡±

    ¡°I...¡± Cecilia was about to say more, but was quickly stopped by Emily, ¡°Alright little sister Cecilia, as far as I can see, we¡¯ve sessfullypleted our mission. Even if it wasn¡¯t exactly due to our actions, the name of the Redbud Knights will no longer be spoken on this continent. We should definitely leave. We¡¯ve aplished a great deed here.¡±

    Emily desperately winked to signal Cecilia while saying this. Cecilia was no fool, she caught Emily¡¯s signal and nodded. She then turned to Han Shuo and said bitterly, ¡°I know you spent a lot of effort on this, and I will report it in detail to the higher-ups. However, our private grudge isn¡¯t over.¡±

    Shrugging, Han Shuo smiled ndly, ¡°Whatever you want!¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t care, but the Lizard King immediately rolled his eyes upon hearing that they had a private grudge. A mass of energy as weighty as a mountain emanated from his body, rapidly spreading out. The Ancient Lizard King didn¡¯t even need to transform into his massive appearance to bring pressure down on Cecilia and her group.

    ¡°I think I¡¯ll still help you kill them. She and you seemed to have some grudges. If they never leave the underground world, your words will simply be truth. Then, all your problems will be solved, how about that?¡± The Lizard King loudlyughed and looked at Han Shuo as he offered his help once again. His powerful presence alone made Cecilia feel great difort.

    Han Shuo felt no goodwill towards Cecilia, however it wasn¡¯t to the point of wanting to take her life. Moreover the rtionship between Emily and Cecilia was very good, so Han Shuo couldn¡¯t kill her in front of Emily.

    Therefore, he again shook his head, ¡°They¡¯re my colleagues. Although there are some misunderstandings, we are not enemies. Just let them leave.¡±

    As Dagassi took back his aura, the sweating Cecilia and her team were able to resume their regr breathing. This time, Cecilia didn¡¯t wait for Emily¡¯s wink before she turned around without another word. As she left, she nced back at Han Shuo and whispered a sentence, ¡°Thank you!¡±

    Cecilia understood in her heart that if Han Shuo hadn¡¯t stopped him, Dagassi, who had killed enough Redbud Knights and dark elves to form a river of blood, would definitely have exterminated them all with a single gesture. Although she still had some negative opinions about Han Shuo, he¡¯d definitely saved her life this time. Even if in she didn¡¯t want to thank her in the depths of her heart, she still had to.

    Unconsciously, Cecilia¡¯s resentment for Han Shuo had dissolved a bit. Her heart was full of doubt, she didn¡¯t understand how Han Shuo could forge a rtionship with such a powerful creature, or how he could make the Ancient Lizard King listen to his words so easily.

    Her mind shed as she suddenly remembered something else. As she left with Emily, Cecilia pulled on Emily¡¯s arm when no one was next to them and asked in a low, suspicious voice, ¡°Are you with that Bryan?¡±

    Emily¡¯s heart pounded, her cheeks uncontrobly red with red. She pretended to calmly tell off Cecilia, ¡°What nonsense are you sprouting? I only worked with him on a couple of asions and developed a friendship.¡±

    ¡°Is that so?¡± Cecilia stared at Emily, puzzled, ¡°It feels odder the more I think about it. Bryan¡¯s rtionship with me is selfish and unfriendly. He shouldn¡¯t have helped usst time Kassel pursued us, I only discoveredter that it was because of you, big sister.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s the same this time. He went to the underground world, going through Chrissie just to look for you. He protected only you in the fight before, even that big lizard didn¡¯t target you with his murderous intent. I know that Bryan is no saint. I kept wondering what kind of rtionship you two have to make him so concerned about you. I think he only did so because he loves you, isn¡¯t that right, big sister Emily?¡±

    ¡°Of course not. What are you guessing madly for? It¡¯s just that he wasn¡¯t as powerful before and I saved his life once. That¡¯s why he¡¯s helping me now. You can stop spouting random nonsense now.¡± Emily strongly denied everything with all her might. She knew that she had to deny things no matter what, or the oue wouldn¡¯t be good for either Han Shuo or her.

    ¡°Big sister Emily, look at yourself, why do you still not admit to things?¡± Cecilia stared at Emily in surprise. Her hand rose, holding a small mirror in front of thetter¡¯s face.

    In the mirror, Emily¡¯s face was embarrassed and red with a secret delight, an unconscious response to when Cecilia said Han Shuo only did what he did because he loved her. Emily couldn¡¯t help the feelings in her heart from showing on her face. Looking at this bashful and flushing appearance, no one would believe her if she said she had nothing to do with Han Shuo.

    Seeing that Cecilia¡¯s face showed absolute confidence in her theory of Emily and Han Shuo¡¯s intimate rtionship, Emily softly sighed and said, ¡°Little sister Cecilia, I do have some goodwill towards him. However, you know my situation. I¡¯m the widow of the Betteridge family, and my age is greater than his. Even if I harbor affection for him, he won¡¯t bother with me. My identity dooms me to be forever avoided by men, aiii!¡±

    Emily heaved and sighed pitifully. Hearing her exin, Cecilia was stunned and came to a sudden realization. To think her big sister Emily¡¯s love for Bryan was one-sided! Her thoughts spun to a close, and seeing Emily¡¯s deste expression, she hastily spoke, ¡°Big sister Emily, I¡¯m sure this Bryan is far from ordinary. With his strength, sooner orter he will grasp immense power. You know that as long as he has enough power, nothing is impossible for him in the Lancelot Empire, rest assured. By then we will also have my grandpa, he can help you too!¡±

    Emily was genuinely touched upon hearing Cecilia¡¯s words, and thest sentence in particr made her heart rejoice. Cecilia¡¯s grandfather held a distinguished identity in the Lancelot Empire. If she and Han Shuo were determined to be together in the future, things would go a lot smoother with the old man¡¯s help.

    ¡°Really? If Bryan and I can be together, you¡¯ll ask your grandfather to help me?¡± Emily asked, feeling happy in her heart.

    ¡°Of course, grandpa dotes on me the most. If I¡¯m willing to help you, he¡¯ll help too.¡±Cecilia proudly replied.

    ¡°Then I¡¯ll have to thank you in advance!¡± Emily was overjoyed.

    ¡°Hehe, us sisters shouldn¡¯t be so polite. Right, tell me about how you saved that cocky brat previously. Now I¡¯m very interested in his matters!¡± Cecilia snickered.

    While the two women leading the Dark Mantle members away, Han Shuo also crammed all the weapons, armor and money bags that had been sorted out by the skeletal warriors into his space ring. His space ring could only hold a part of them, the rest was stuffed into Celt¡¯s space ring.

    Han Shuo remembered the space ring of the fire grand magus Marceau in the end. He conveniently asked the old Lizard King Dagassi to break its magical enchantment brand and harvested roughly three hundred thousand gold coins from it. There were also some valuable magical equipment, the most precious of which being a strange tent.

    The tent looked as if it could only amodate two or three people, however, when Han Shuo actually went inside, he discovered that the space was much wider than he¡¯d imagined. It was divided into three levels, with a hundred rooms of various sizes. Each room was clean and brightly decorated, luxurious carpets covering the floor.

    There were several magicboratories containing magical equipment on the top level, along with a library on fire magic. There were even two storage rooms with a number of fire attributed magical items. This should be the ce where Marceau normally carried out magic experiments.

    The unassuming tent had turned out to be a valuable space treasure, the area inside no smaller than Han Shuo¡¯s residence in the City of Brettel. This magical tent was definitely created by thebined effort of a space sacred magister and a grand alchemist.

    The amodations of this tent was even muchrger than that of the space ring. More importantly, when used for traveling in the wilderness, hundreds of adventurers could stay in it when this tent was set up. For mercenaries who often went out for missions, this kind of space treasure was of a value that wasparable to a divine artifact.

    ¡°This thing is no artifact, but its practical value is even greater than one. If you want, it can sell for at least three hundred thousand gold coins.¡± The Ancient Lizard King told Han Shuo after understanding the tent¡¯s marvelous ability.

    ¡°Such a magical treasureparable to a divine artifact, I won¡¯t be selling it. It¡¯s better to keep for my own use.¡± Han Shuo replied to the Ancient Lizard King.

    After stripping all the dead knights and dark elves of their valuables, Han Shuo and the Ancient Lizard King Dagassi returned to the ruins of the gourd-shaped mountain. Thanks to the earth elite zombie, a tunnel leading out of the underground space had been dug, and all of the lizardmen filed out through it.

    ¡°Where is our great ¡®true God¡¯?¡± The leader with the longest tail anxiously asked as soon as Han Shuo and the old Lizard King Dagassi arrived.

    Pointing at Dagassi in human form, his long tail swishing through the air, Han Shuo smiled and exined, ¡°Isn¡¯t that him?¡±

    Hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, the lizardmen appeared somewhat horrified as they looked at the Ancient Lizard King. Only when they felt a familiar presence from him did they feel relief and submit. Under the orders of their leader, the lizardmen kowtowed towards Dagassi, their mouths rapidly speaking in lizardmen tongue.

    The old Lizard King was no longer bound by the ancient magical formation in his human form. He also rumbled forth in gibberish, conversing with the lizardmen in gratification. Han Shuo didn¡¯t understand a thing, but refrained from speaking. He just stood there with a dry look.

    The earth elite zombie stood there for a while after leading the lizardmen out and watched the bunch while crudely touching its head. It was even somewhat frightened of the Ancient Lizard King. Sensing thetter¡¯s powerful presence, it silently went to Han Shuo¡¯s side, pulling the corner of his clothes as it sent him a message, ¡°Is there anything else ah? If not let me go back!¡±

    Han Shuo was dumbfounded as he looked at the earth elite zombie who¡¯d just sent a message to him. He had yet to open his mouth to speak when on the other side, the Ancient Lizard King¡¯s attention had been caught by the earth elite zombie. He was stupefied, and asked in disbelief, ¡°Did, did this zombie warrior justmunicate with you?!¡±

    ¡°Ehh... I think so.¡± Han Shuo replied. He was also inwardly a little shocked. The earth elite zombie could originallymunicate with him, but only in the form of listening and obeying orders. The messages had also been simple reports of the fights, unlike now when it¡¯d expressed its own opinion.

    It appeared that, unwittingly, the earth elite zombie was gradually developing an autonomy like the little skeleton. This also showed that it was getting stronger and stronger, otherwise it couldn¡¯t have developed its own ideas so quickly.

    ¡°If I didn¡¯t hear wrong, he wanted to take the initiative to return to the necromancy dimension. He is your summoned creature, but also has his own consciousness?¡± The Ancient Lizard King couldn¡¯t suppress his wonder. He could also sense the message sent by the earth elite zombie to Han Shuo.

    ¡°He is different from other ordinary undead creatures. You¡¯ve also seen it, he can utilize the power of earth to move freely underground and create tunnels. Hehe, this has to do with my magical cultivation. I can use this art to alter the summoned undead. It not only gives them higher intellect, but also more power and even the ability to evolve.¡± For some unknown reason, Han Shuo had a favorable impression of the Lizard King. He could feel thetter¡¯s passion and trust in him and understood in his heart that he wouldn¡¯t harm Han Shuo. Therefore, Han Shuo answered without concealing anything.

    ¡°Unbelievable. Unbelievable indeed. Even my master couldn¡¯t bestow undead creatures with intelligence and the ability to evolve. It seemed your techniques are even more incredible than I¡¯d imagined.¡± Dagassi eximed.

    ¡°Hehe, I also think this art is amazing. I believe that once I break through again, I may possess power on par with yours.¡± Han Shuo confidently said. He remembered that Chu Cang Lan earlier could traverse the moon at the ¡°nine changes¡± realm. He also understood that the ¡°carnal¡± realm would definitely increase his power tenfold, or even a hundredfold.

    ¡°Very good. I look forward to our next meeting. If I¡¯m still alive then, we will definitely have the chance to meet. Maybe you really can help me at that time.¡± Dagassi said contentedly. He turned back to the lizardmen and resumed his quick gibberish.

    After the lizardmen leader listened to Dagassi¡¯s words, he turned to Han Shuo and said respectfully, ¡°From now on, us lizardmen of the underground world will follow your instructions.¡±

 Chapter 347: Becoming a Dark Sun envoy

    Chapter 347: Bing a Dark Sun envoy

    Han Shuo stayed deep in the underground for several days. With the help of Ancient Lizard King Dagassi, he collected the magic crystal ores deep within the underground.

    Han Shuo exited the gourd mountain ruins when his space ring couldn¡¯t hold any more. This trip to the underground world had bestowed him with rich harvest, not only was Celt dead, but, Han Shuo had even won the friendship of the lizardmen.

    Han Shuo¡¯s space ring was also filled to the brim. He¡¯d looted the Redbud Knights thoroughly, as well as the wealth that Celt had umted over many years, and some of Arlen¡¯s magic equipment as well. The total harvest, if converted to gold coins, would amount to more than two million.

    ¡°Alright, I will ttinave the underground world for now and collect the rest of the ores next time Ie back. I¡¯ll also bring more weapons for you in my next visit, so you can resist the dark elves¡¯ invasion.¡± Han Shuo said to the lizardmen leader.

    ¡°Next time youe, I should already have left this underground world. I hope for the chance for us to meet again. I also hope you can take care of them for me.¡± Dagassi reminded as he looked at Han Shuo about to leave.

    ¡°Rest assured, I will help you take care of them.¡± Han Shuo agreed with a vow.

    In the past couple of days, Dagassi had been like a kind elder, imparting Han Shuo with many interesting things. Han Shuo had unconsciously developed favorable impression of Dagassi. Now as he was about to leave, he actually felt somewhat reluctant. From Dagassi words, Han Shuo knew that this time the old lizard didn¡¯t simply intend on leaving the underground world, he seemed to want to depart the ne containing the Profound Continent.

    Dagassi only glossed over some of the deeper secrets and didn¡¯t tell Han SHuo much. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t understand the thoughts of the demigods, so he didn¡¯t pursue things to the end by asking too many questions. He only faintly understood that the power of Dagassi¡¯s enemy was just as much terrifying.

    Han Shuo¡¯s farewell to Dagassi was cool, calm and didn¡¯t drag on. He didn¡¯t remain in the underground world after leaving the area. Ge followed the old road back to the surface by using his astounding memory.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t encounter anything out of the ordinary along the way. He asionally met a few attempts of others races wanting to rob him and used heavy handed methods to kill them instead. He easily made his way back to the Dark Forest.

    Having stayed in the underground world for more than ten days, Han Shuo felt afortable sensation as if he was being reborn when he saw the sun shining above his head. The warm sunlight shone down, lifting his mood into an extremely happy state.

    The Dark Forest was rich with lush green trees mixed with exotic nts. Fragrance overflowed in the warm spring light and permeated the heart with a peacefulness that refreshed the mind. Han Shuo luxuriated in this warm andfortable feeling that was a far cry from the gloomy humid, underground world, heading for the direction of the Cemetery of Death.

    When he was back in the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo didn¡¯t linger and went directly to Brettel City. Rich harvest in hand, he immediately set up a small meeting with little fatty Jack, Dorcas as well as Faulke and Chester.

    ¡°You were gone all of a sudden for more than ten days, where did you go?¡± Jack had the closest rtionship with Han Shuo, so he started peppering thetter with questions immediately.

    ¡°Hehe, I made a trip to the Dark Forest. Have things been quiet in Brettel City recently?¡± Han Shuo smiled slightly and didn¡¯t hide his trip to the Dark Forest. Only the existence of the Cemetery of Death remained under wraps.

    The Redbud Knights and dark elves had suffered heavy losses in the underground world. However, a small number of them had still escaped. News of Han Shuo¡¯s actions in the underground world must have spread already.

    Dick, the local Dark Mantle liaison, bowed respectfully towards Han Shuo and said, ¡°My Lord, I would like to report some information alone.¡±

    ¡°This is all our own people here. There is no need to hide anything, you can speak directly.¡± Han Shuo knew Dick must have gathered some information from his higher-ups. Jack, Dorcas, Faulke and Chester were all his trusted people. Since Faulke had been sent here by Lawrence, thetter must have mentioned Han Shuo¡¯s identity as a Dark Mantle member to Faulke already. Han Shuo had nothing to hide in front of him.

    Jack and Dorcas had spent much time with Dicktely, so they more or less knew of his identity. The existence of Dark Mantle in the Lancelot Empire wasn¡¯t much of a secret. Although people didn¡¯t talk about it openly, they all knew about it in their minds.

    ¡°Master Candide ryed that your deeds in the underground world are highly appreciated. The Dark Forest is on the edge of the border of our Empire. For the Redbud Knights to suffer heavy losses, even though the Brut Business Alliance will likely be extremely indignant, they presumably won¡¯t make any radical responses. Master Candide told you to be at ease.¡± Dick started his report when he saw Han Shuo was nonchnt about his privacy.

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo smiled, ¡°You may carry on.¡±

    Dorcas, Jack and Faulke listened but couldn¡¯t understand anything. However, Faulke and Dorcas knew that Candide was one of the three heavyweights of Dark Mantle. From Dick¡¯s words, they knew Han Shuo¡¯s rtionship with Candide wasn¡¯t superficial. They were inwardly amazed.

    ¡°Master Candide said this time you achieved a great deed this time. His Majesty has approved that you will be a one star Dark Sun envoy from now on. You only need to visit the Dark Mantle headquarters to upgrade your badge. Congrattions to you, my Lord!¡± Dick¡¯s face was full of worship as he grew excited himself.

    ¡°Dark Sun envoy, hehe, it seems that Cecilia didn¡¯t conceal any of my credit. This woman knows what to do.¡± Han Shuo smiled contentedly and murmured to himself.

    Going from Star to Moon was one level, from Moon to Sun was another. Bing a Dark Sun envoy meant that from now on, Han Shuo was officially a high ranked member of the Dark Mantle and was now able to enjoy even more special treatment. He could recruit his own subordinates and redistribute the organization¡¯s members in a location.

    ¡°My Lord, Dark Sun envoys have the rights to assign missions to Dark Star members, and can also can directly bestow credit on them and raise their level.¡± Chester looked excitedly at Han Shuo and stated a reminder.

    ¡°Rest assured, now that I¡¯m a Dark Sun envoy, you will naturally receive some benefits.¡± Han Shuoughed as he responded, then turned to Dick, ¡°Anything else apart from this?¡±

    ¡°Master Candide said you don¡¯t have to worry about anything else, he will help deal with the detrimental remarks against you, you only need to take good care of Brettle City.¡± Dick hesitated a little before answering this time.

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo appeared to understand itpletely. He was aware that Cecilia had reported everything correctly, evenst time¡¯s matter when he stopped her from acting against the forest trolls.

    ¡°Alright, I understand.¡± Han Shuo looked at Dorcas and Faulke, asked, ¡°How is the situation in Brettel City recently? Have the mountain peoplee down from the mountain? Any action from the seven grand duchies?¡±

    ¡°A total of twenty thousand people havee down the mountain and are currently residing in Brettel City. The five chiefs of the mountain people are actively cooperating, so the process is going smoothly. The fighting in the seven grand duchies had slowly subsided, only Helen Tina of Helon Duchy has been struggling with the rebels within hernd. However, it¡¯s drawing close to an end now.¡± Dorcas replied.

    Ever since Dorcas joined the army, he had gradually reced Faulke¡¯s position due to his own efforts and Han Shuo¡¯s deliberate arrangements. Dorcas was a military man through and through and had never hidden this desire to fight. Due of many years of formal military education, he was much more adept in leading operations than Faulke, who had originally a knight.

    Faulke also understood in his heart that Dorcas was supper to him in this aspect. Coupled with the fact that thetter had won Han Shuo¡¯s trust, Faulke was powerless against this gradual shift in power. Fortunately, Han Shuo didn¡¯t mistreat him, letting Faulke form his team of trusted confidants and strongest soldiers in Brettel into a brigade of a thousand knights.

    Han Shuo provided this knight brigade with the most luxurious equipment. Their armor, weapons and equipment were all the most expensive in Brettel City. Han Shuo had poured a great deal of resources into this brigade as it was equipped with the best goods currently in the market. Currently, his investment stood at three hundred thousand gold coins. Except for ack of horses, just based on the equipment alone, this brigade was no inferior to the official Royal Knights of the Empire.

    Of course whenpared to the top ten knights associations in the Profound Continent, this brigade was far inferior in whether fighting power or equipment. However in Brettel City or even in the seven grand duchies, this fledgling brigade couldn¡¯t be underestimated.

    As a pure knight, nothing moved his heart so much asmanding an official knight brigade, so Faulke didn¡¯t feel too much unpleasantness at the loss in military power. On the contrary, he poured his heart into training the brigade.

    ¡°So for the time being, the seven grand duchies seem to have not enough power to deal with us?¡± Han Shuo asked with a smile.

    Nodding his head, Dorcas confirmed, ¡°The seven grand duchies won¡¯t do anything for at least a month. But when they start to act again, it won¡¯t be just one duchying alone. News of the four great bandit regiments suffering heavy losses has spread all over the seven grand duchies. Even if each duchy puts all their strength behind an attack, their power still can¡¯tpare to thebined force of the four great bandit regiments. With the bandits¡¯ defeat as a lesson, they definitely won¡¯t act rashly before they arepletely confident.¡±

    Dorcas continued after a short pause, ¡°In other words, the seven grand duchies won¡¯t act now, but once they do, I¡¯m afraid Brettel City would face a hard battle!¡±

    ¡°Hmph! The seven grand duchies want Brettel City to be their hunting ground, I think it¡¯s time to change this perspective of theirs. Only when we kill each and every one thates, will theymit this to their memories for the rest of their lives.¡± Han Shuo said with a cold face. He was silent for a while after, then suddenly spoke to Dorcas and Faulke, ¡°Make good use of this time period when Brettel is still safe to train your soldiers. Make the bandits that have invaded Brettel in recent years your target. I know that beside the four great bandit groups, there are also seven or eight smaller bandit groups. All of you can think of ways to make them spit out everything they looted from us.¡±

    Dorcas¡¯ eyes sparkled with a fierce light after he heard these words, he immediately replied, ¡°My Lord, rest assured, I know what to do.¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, from my trip to the underground world this time, I suddenly realized that in order for Brettel City to quickly be powerful, the fastest way is to plunder the resources from others. Train our soldiers on one hand, plunder others on the other. We get the best of both worlds in this world.¡± Han Shuo made a fortune on dirty money in the underground world, he finally understood why there were so many bandits in the seven grand duchies. Even one of the top ten knight troops of the maind, the Redbud Knights, didn¡¯t mind traveling thousands of miles all the way to the Dark Forest.

    ¡°My Lord, I have some interesting news.¡± Dick put on a creepy smile as he spoke to Han Shuo with a smile.

    When he saw Dick smile despicably, Han Shuo knew the words about toe out from his mouth were definitely nothing serious. He wasn¡¯t angry however, ¡°What interesting news? I can¡¯t help but want to beat you after seeing that smile.¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, the Narsen Duchy was originally friendly with the Helon Duchy, but they seem to have been extremely unhappy with each othertely. Grand duke Benedict of the Narsen Duchy didn¡¯t even help Helen Tina with her internal strife. Do you know why, my Lord?¡± Dick looked at Han Shuo with an evil cackle.

    Furrowing his brows, Han Shuo said, ¡°Why?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s to your credit, my Lord. Now all the seven grand duchies know that you¡¯ve had Helen Tina, Benedict, an ardent pursuer for many years, also knows. He has been pursuing Helen Tina for so long in vain, but my Lord was able to have her after having just arrived at Brettel City a few months ago.¡±

    ¡°For Benedict, a used woman has naturally lost her vor. His attitude towards the Helon Duchy also changed greatly. He only stood on the sidelines to watch when Helen Tina faced her enemies.¡± Dick exined whileughing, then he sighed, ¡°My Lord is very farsighted, easily splitting up the two most solid allies.¡±

    ¡°Indeed, my Lord has great vision. We areck his charisma and definitely have to learn from my Lord!¡± Chester had the same look of admiration on this face as he nodded and sighed emotionally.

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression darkened. He looked at these innately dirty fellows and grunted, ¡°So you spread this news, I didn¡¯t think you would be so despicable.¡±

    Chester and Dickughed awkwardly without a word, while Jack was full of interest and said with envy, ¡°Bryan, I heard that that woman is very beautiful, you are really blessed!¡±

    It appeared these fellows wouldn¡¯t believe his exnation, so Han Shuo didn¡¯t try to exin himself anymore. He took out Celt¡¯s space ring with all the armor from the Redbud Knights, along with an enormous amount of magic crystal ore, and said to Jack, ¡°This ring is loaded with armor from the Redbud Knights and magic crystal ore. You go put them in the warehouse and keep the ring.¡±

    ¡°You are giving this space ring to me?¡± Jack looked with surprise at Han Shuo handing over the space ring, his voice high.

    ¡°Mhm, this ring originally belonged to the Redbud Knights leader Celt. The space inside is enough for you to transport goods.¡± Han Shuo smiled at Jack, then took out fire grand magus Marceau¡¯s space ring and handed it over as well, ¡°There are a number of crystals, jade and a variety of jewelry inside, worth nearly a million gold coins. They are to be used as the capital for Brettel¡¯s operations, you have full control over them.¡±

    Jack sensed Celt¡¯s space ring and discovered the massive amount of armor and magic crystal ore inside, he smiled excitedly at Faulke, ¡°Faulke, you can have even better armor now. The magic crystal ore inside is also enough for our magic crystal cannons to use for a while.¡±

    ¡°Very good, His Lordship took one trip outside and truly really rich harvest!¡± Faulke let out a happy cry hearing Jack¡¯s words.

    There were the harvested ore, armor from the dead Redbud Knights, plus the crystal, jade and gold coins that Celt had plundered from the underground world in Celt and Marceu¡¯s space rings. Han Shuo had stored some magical equipment, the ¡°Starry Sky¡± and the magical space tent in his own space ring.

    The things he gave Jack were all rted to money as they didn¡¯t provide any practical uses for Han Shuo. Brettel City was currently his greatest asset, what he cared about the most was to make Brettel more powerful. These gold coins would fully demonstrate their value in Jack¡¯s hands.

    ¡°Good, I¡¯m counting on you to make good use of these things.¡± Han Shuo said to Jack and the bunch. With these things, he knew that Brettel City would be even more powerful.

 Chapter 348: Demon-rearing

    Chapter 348: Demon-rearing

    Five days passed, and Fabian arrived at Brettel City, followed by a group of merchants. They had brought far more goods this time than their previous trip. The enthusiasm of the merchants who had tasted an untapped market far exceeded Han Shuo¡¯s expectations.

    Every merchant had brought along a caravan this time. Each had carriages pulled by earth dragons,den with bags of various sizes. Inside the various pouches were goblin missiles and sacks full of crossbows and arrows.

    The goods on the carriages at the rear were wrapped tightly in canvas. Although, from the look of the bulky packages, it didn¡¯t take a genius to figure out that each carriage held ammunition, and lots of it. Tworge and slow-moving earth dragons pulled a carriage, each 5 meters wide and 10 meters long. Each of these gigantic carriages wererge enough to amodate 10 battle wagons or catapults.

    The carriages being pulled by the dragons contained at least 20 battle wagons, while the 27 smaller carriages behind them were pulled by warhorses. Although these 27 carriages weren¡¯t asrge as the ones pulled by the earth dragons, each wasrge enough to amodate 3 battle wagons apiece.

    Located even farther back were Cloudmound Beasts. Extraordinarily, these creatures were just as strong as the earth dragons, but also just as slow. They were twice asrge as warhorses, each long leg asrge as elephants. They carried sacks full of food and daily necessities. These should be able to replenish Brettel City¡¯s warehouses.

    The number of merchants had doubled,pared tost time, each wearing a smile that only grew wider as they drew closer to the city. They all wore casual expressions, each talking about their soon-to-be profits.

    They hadn¡¯t encountered a single corpse on the road from Seamist City to Brettel City, nor did they see hide nor hair of bandits. After Dorcas¡¯ extermination campaign, all the bandits had been eradicated. Those who cooperated had been conscripted as hard working janitors, working to keep the roads free of detritus.

    When they noticed these subtle details, the merchants began to gradually rx. When they reached the city, Jack, Brettel City¡¯s finance minister, paid the merchants in one lump sum afterpleting an inventory of the delivered goods.

    The merchants who hade such a long distance were utterly delighted to receive their money. They didn¡¯t immediately leave Brettel City, but nagged Jack to allow them to open a store in Brettel City.

    ¡°Jack, the Boozt Merchant Guild also ns to open a branch here, help us prepare a suitable location,¡± Fabian said to Jack.

    ¡°Understood. The branch of the Boozt Merchant Guild will be the first to be arranged,¡± Jack promised, smiling. Despite the objections of the nearby merchants, he covertly brought Fabian aside, sneakily asking, ¡°These merchants have finallye to their senses and want to set up shop in Brettel City?¡±

    ¡°Aye. Ever since the four great bandit groups had been defeated, Brettel City has be known as a merchant¡¯s wondend after our painstaking marketing campaign. To be frank, the mines surrounding Brettel City are rich in resources. As long as we have enough smiths, Brettel City will certainly be able to use these resources to create weapons.¡±

    ¡°Brettel City is also the closest juncture to the seven grand duchies. As far as the nobility of the seven grand duchies were concerned, the Lancelot Empire¡¯s ornate clothing and porcin were luxury products that they were willing to spendrge quantities of money on. On the other hand, the hardy horses, furs and jewels produced by the seven grand duchies are also very much in demand by the Lancelot Empire.¡±

    If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that Brettel City¡¯s safety could not be guaranteed, the ideal location of this city would¡¯ve propelled this city to bing the ce to be for merchants. Now that word of the four bandit groups¡¯ defeat is spreading, along with the guarantee of safe passage, many merchants will start to willingly seek out Boozt Merchant Guild to sell their wares here.¡±

    ¡°Just wait and see, this is only the first wave. As long as Brettel City can give the merchants a sense of safety, more and more merchants wille flocking. At that time, we¡¯d be hardpressed to even try stopping activity.¡± Fabian exined to Jack.

    ¡°It seems that our choice was a wise one.¡± The little fatty smiled until his small eyes were nearly creases upon hearing Fabian¡¯s words, ¡°Guess what, Bryan made a trip to the underground world a while ago. Do you know how many valuable things he brought back? Haha, I now have two million gold coins at my disposal! If we include the crystals and other valuables, then the money at my disposal reaches three million! I would never have thought that I would be able to one day control so much money!¡±

    Fabian was visibly shocked upon hearing Jack say these words, then sighed, ¡°Follow Bryan well, you little brat. The very fact that he¡¯s given you so much money to look after is proof of his trust. As long as you work hard, bing a noble is only a matter of time.¡±

    ¡°Rest assured, uncle, I know what to do. The crystals, gold, silver, jewels and other valuables have to be sold through the merchant guilds. Brettel City is an iron stronghold as long as we have enough money,¡± Jack replied.

    ¡°There are a couple of merchants here who probably have an interest in your products. You should find them and negotiate directly.¡± Fabianughed, and said ¡°We¡¯re off to see Bryan, Phoebe asked me to bring him a few things.¡±

    ¡°Go on in. He¡¯s waiting for you.¡± Jack replied.

    Fabian soon found Han Shuo¡¯s room after leaving Jack. Han Shuo was waiting impatiently, as he already knew that Fabian wasing. Han Shuo weed Fabian in as soon as thetter¡¯s footsteps sounded. Smiling, he said ¡°Mister Fabian. Did Phoebe ask you to bring me anything?¡±

    ¡°Of course. This space ring contains what you need.¡± Fabianughed, handing Han Shuo the space ring. Han Shuo focused his mental strength into the space ring and immediately joined Fabian inughter.

    ¡°Take this sword to Phoebe for me. Be careful, and make sure that nothing happens along the way.¡± Taking out the divine weapon ¡°Starry Sky¡±, Han Shuo handed it over to Fabian with a warning, ¡°This is the divine weapon, ¡°Starry Sky¡±, formerly of the leader of the Redbud Knights, Celt. You should know its value.¡±

    Fabian¡¯s expression immediately grew serious as he realized what he was holding. He stored ¡°Starry Sky¡± into his own space ring, saying, ¡°Rest assured, I will definitely bring this sword to Miss Phoebe.¡±

    ¡°Tell Phoebe to continue collecting the things on this list.¡± Han Shuo once again took out a list and handed it to Fabian.

    ¡°Understood, I know what to do.¡± Fabian tucked the letter away, continuing to reassure Han Shuo.

    After Fabian took his leave, Han Shuo found Chester and gave him some instructions, then returned to the Cemetery of Death.

    The Cemetery of Death was immersed in the aura of death all year round. Arge, oval hole had appeared amongst the white bones. The hole was surrounded by 12 colourful banners, each around 10 meters tall and still managing to flutter despite thepleteck of wind. Each banner was emzoned with an exotic symbol.

    The oval pit was filled withrge bone spikes, all sticking upwards. Some of these bones had been pulled from the green dragon¡¯s corpse by Han Shuo, while the others came from the taboond fromst time. All of the bones were from deceased powerful magic creatures.

    Han Shuo dumped buckets of ck and shimmering violet liquid into the oval pit. Bucket after bucket were dumped in, Han Shuo seemingly having an endless supply from his space ring. All of it went inside the pit.

    This liquid was either metallic-smelling blood or juices of a much more gruesome nature. It came in many colors, and the smell was far from ttering. After tens of buckets had been dumped into the pit, Han Shuo took out a dagger and shallowly slit his wrist. He held it over the hole as drops of fresh blood dripped from his arm.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s fresh blood sshed into the hole, the liquid began to emit red smoke. Surprisingly, the drops of Han Shuo¡¯s blood didn¡¯t diffuse, instead swimming around like red agates. The tranquil liquid began to bubble, catalyzed by Han Shuo¡¯s blood, as crackling filled the air.

    Han Shuo tilted his head up and whistled, a long low dragon¡¯s cry that promised of sinister things toe. The Demonyer Edge shot out from the nape of Han Shuo¡¯s neck, bringing with it the ghosts of the fallen. The silently iling and screaming ghosts resembled a nest of snakes as they were drawn into the twelve banners. After hundreds of ghosts were absorbed by the banners, a killing aura began to drift out from the banner, slowly rising to the skies.

    The killing aura seemed to be attracted to the liquid in the hole, arcing down into the hole at a speed visible to the eye. With the help of this killing aura, Han Shuo¡¯s originally emulsified blood gradually dissolved into the liquid contained within the hole, soon vanishing without a trace.

    Taking a deep breath, Han Shuo circted his magical yuan towards the wound on his wrist, watching as the cut made by his dagger rapidly healed.

    Taking out the skeletal staff, Han Shuo began to rapidly chant an incantation. Three horsed evil knights suddenly appeared in front of Han Shuo. He pointed his staff at the hole in the ground. The contract-bound evil knights didn¡¯t hesitate, jumping in one after the other into the hole.

    When the first evil knight and his horsended in the pit, the previously silent knight and horse suddenly threw their heads back in a soundless roar. Not a sound came out of the pit as the two wailed, the knight¡¯s bronze colored armor and horse sizzling as they came in contact with the liquid. Both of them gave off clouds of smoke, which rose high into the air.

    The evil knight and his mount appeared as if they were suffering the worst pain imaginable. The evil knight, who normally would not dare vite the contract, suddenly attempted to break the power of the contract, trying to leave the hole that caused him so much suffering, his body twisting and thrashing in his agony.

    The evil knight wasn¡¯t a lowly existence like the skeleton warriors. These strong fighters had their own version of intelligence in their dimension. Although their prodigious strength was restricted by the magical contract, the harrowing pain that exceeded that of death forced him to instinctively struggle against the contract.

    Han Shuo cursed under his breath as he held the skeletal staff. ¡°How can you be reborn if you don¡¯t suffer this kind of pain? You don¡¯t know what¡¯s good for you. You¡¯ll know what this pain has brought you after you¡¯ve been tempered and your body reforged. Just the materials required for this ¡°Twelve Demon Rearing Fragments Formation¡± costs at least a hundred thousand gold coins. Stop struggling!¡±

    As Han Shuo cursed, he used his consciousness to suppress the evil knight¡¯s struggles and force the other two evil knights into the pit as well.

    Just like the first evil knight, the other two evil knights who were forced into the pit also began resisting due to the overwhelming pain, attempting to break the contract Han Shuo held over them.

    Han Shuo could easily deal with a single evil knight¡¯s rebellion. However, if three evil knights and their steeds resisted as a group, then even he would have trouble dealing with them. Han Shuo was forced to use all of his avable mental strength to firmly suppress theirbined assault on the magical contract.

    ¡°Nine cycles of demon reincarnation, scattered souls return to your positions, reduce!¡± Even as Han Shuo used his mental strength to yank the evil knights back under control, he still had to split some effort out to manipte the spell.

    After he spat out the words, the killing aura drifting out of the twelve banners began to thicken. The mysterious patterns that the banners were inscribed with began to form faces. Under the infusion of the ghosts¡¯ power, twelve sinister demon faces gradually appeared. Although each demon¡¯s face was unique, they had one frightening simrity. They struck fear into the hearts of men and women alike.

    These twelve demon faces were identical to the demon heads that had entered Han Shuo¡¯s body when he advanced to the separate demon realm. After the twelve grimacing demon faces had all appeared on the banners, twelve demon heads slowly emerged from Han Shuo¡¯s body, floating in front of their respective faces.

    After the twelve demon heads had returned to the banners from Han Shuo¡¯s body, the killing aura exuded by the banners suddenly swirled into a vortex, gathering in the center of the central pit. The three knights and their mounts felt like their souls had suddenly been set afire. Their pain had doubled, and they began to struggle even more fiercely against the contract that bound them.

    Han Shuo froze in ce, barely managing to put the skeletal staff away. He sat in ce in front of the pit, using every iota of his formidable mental strength to suppress the evil knights and their steeds. In the pit, the evil knights swung their bonences wildly, as if wishing to decapitate Han Shuo that very instant.

 Chapter 349: The dignity of the little skeleton in the other dimension

    Chapter 349: The dignity of the little skeleton in the other dimension

    Despite theplete absence of wind, twelverge banner fluttered vigorously in the wind. Baleful aura swirled around, flowing like mercury towards the pit in the middle. Inside the pit, the liquid boiled like fire oil, searing the three evil knights and their mounts and sending smoke billowing into the air.

    Han Shuo closed his eyes as he sat, facing three evil knights. His mental strength flowed like an unstoppable river, holding the three evil knights true to their contract. As the mounts of the evil knights were weaker, they gradually lost the strength to continue struggling fruitlessly.

    Three enormous bone spurs continued to madly thrust at Han Shuo. A millisecond of rxation, and the evil knights would ruthlessly exploit the advantage to pierce right through Han Shyo¡¯s head. Han Shuo was fully focused on his task, iron-willed to the end. Inextricable patterns of mental strength weaved into a formless in the sky, grinding away at the mountain of resistance that was the will of the three evil knights.

    The Cemetery of Death wasn¡¯t touched by either the sun or moon, eternally shrouded in faint, dim light. Hence, one could never sense the passage of time. After an indeterminate amount of time, the three bonences struggling to reach Han Shuo slowly lost their strength. Like the bodies of the evil knights, they listlessly fell back into the pit.

    Han Shuo¡¯s whole body looked like it had been carved from stone, not a single sign of life from his cross-legged position. The twelve banners still absorbed ghosts and radiated killing aura that converged on the pit. After what felt like a few days, the bodies of the three evil knightspletely dissolved into the liquid, with not a trace left behind.

    At longst, Han Shuo moved, a gasp of air escaping his lips as his eyes opened. His voice was haggard with exhaustion, ¡°That was so damn tiring!¡±. It had only been three evil knights and their mounts, but the process of reforming their bodies had already caused Han Shuo this much trouble. It seemed that Han Shuo¡¯s initial hypotheses were true. It was impossible to use demonic arts to reform every undead creature¡¯s body.

    For one, this kind of refining used overlyplex and highly precious ingredients. If the countless skeleton warriors and zombie warriors under Han Shuo¡¯smand were to all be refined, even his prodigious savings wouldn¡¯t be enough to support it. Just refining these three evil knights already cost at least a hundred thousand gold. Refining every skeleton warrior and zombie warrior would drive him to bankruptcy and beyond. Even then, he still wouldn¡¯t be done!

    Also, refining undead creatures in this manner took too much of his time and energy, with very little benefits to such an enormous undertaking. After all, skeleton warriors and zombie warriors were essentially cannon fodder. Even he rendered them immune to light magic¡¯s corrosive effect, their usage was limited. As such, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t willing to waste mountains of gold on them.

    Evil knights were currently the strongest undead creatures that Han Shuo could summon. Even within undead creatures, they were considered high level. They had great utility and flexibility once their fire-breathing steeds could take the field with them. Their monstrous innate strength could bebined with hardy armor to produce abatant that was tougher than a human knight. Han Shuo had already had to use all of his mental strength to suppress the fierce resistance of three evil knights and their warhorses. While Han Shuo could summon bone demons and old fey zombies, he definitely couldn¡¯t refine three of them at one go. This was because the resistance from the Bone Devils and Old Corpse Demons would definitely be stronger.

    Standing up from his cross-legged position, Han Shuo summoned the twelve demon heads from the banners with a thought. Howling, they reluctantly returned into Han Shuo¡¯s body. Since the bodies of the three evil knights were already merged into the pit, Han Shuo didn¡¯t need to suppress the matrix with his magical yuan any longer .

    The twelve demon heads had formed when Han Shuo had reached the separate demon stage, using therge baleful aura within the Valley of Sunshine as a catalyst. These twelve demon heads innately contained vicious killing intent, every demon head formed from thest vicious obsession of many hateful souls. It was the best ingredient to refine the ¡°mystical demons¡± that were one level above the ¡°yin demons¡±.

    Of the three previously refined yin demons, there was currently only usable one left. Han Shuo was convinced that one yin demon was far from adequate to maintain his battlefield advantage. When he¡¯d advanced to the separate demon realm back at the Valley of Sunshine, Han Shuo had deliberately saved the boundless murderous aura, coagting it into the twelve demon heads. When the ingredients needed to refine mystical demons were gathered, the twelve demon heads would be used as the base ingredient for the mystical demons.

    After making sure the area would operate without supervision, Han Shuo headed for the specialized area for refining ¡®original demons¡± and ¡°yin demons¡±. He first summoned the earth elite zombie,manding it to modify theyout of the yin demon cave, molding it into a cave suitable for cultivation ¡°mystical demons¡±. When the modifications wereplete, Han Shuo took out the ingredients he needed, and ced them in the centers of the formation eyes around the cave.

    Once he hadpleted all the preparations, Han Shuo dismissed the earth elite zombie and ced twelve drops of his own essence blood into the mystical demon cave. The blood essence began to revolve in mid air within the mystical demon cave. The twelve demon heads emerged from Han Shuo¡¯s body at hismand, each swallowing a drop of blood essence. As if at some unknown signal, the cave¡¯s enormous energy began to activate. Han Shuo then summoned a few hundred wraiths and tossed in a few spirits from the Demonyer Edge to act as fodder for the mystical demon¡¯s evolution.

    Han Shuo then dug deep into his magical yuan reserves, pouring the remnants into the mystical demon cave to maintain its normal operations. When the twelve demon heads began to howl and rip at the wraiths and spirits in the matrix, the exhausted Han Shuo returned to the center of the Cemetery of Death.

    The two matrices had now resumed normal operations. Han Shuo had not only expended arge amount of mental strength, but also used significant amounts of magical yuan and blood essence. This was even more exhausting than when he¡¯d fought against Kosse at Brettel City. At that time, he had the little skeleton, the earth elite zombie, and the fire elite zombie assisting him. But something like this refining process was something only he could handle. As a result, he was bone deep exhausted.

    Sitting on the ground in the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo pondered for a moment and took out the skeletal staff, meticulously examining the tri-colored skeletal staff. He wanted to make use of this interlude to examine the secrets of the skeletal staff.

    Cmity Church¡¯s necromancer archmage Wolf as well as Ancient Lizard King Dagassi had seemed to know traces of the skeletal staff¡¯s origin. This skeletal staff, which had transformed from the Eye of Darkness, was the key to opening the Cemetery of Death. It definitely held many hidden secrets.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t possessed the skeletal staff for a long time. His understanding of the skeletal staff only went as far as seeing that it enhanced his necromancy magic. If not for the necromancer archmage Wolf using the skeletal staff¡¯s power to rejuvenate his life, Han Shuo would perhaps never have guessed that the skeletal staff could have such an effect.

    ¡°Skeleton staff, oh skeletal staff. How many secrets are you hiding!¡± Han Shuo mumbled to himself as he stroked the three colored skulls.

    The exhausted Han Shuo fell unconscious. He semi-consciously felt like he¡¯d been shrouded by the thi-colored light from the skeletal staff, spinning him around. Colorful lights streamed quickly past his body. It felt like he was falling from a great height into an endless abyss.

    Just when Han Shuo felt nauseous from the dizzy feeling, he suddenly sensed a familiar smell intrude on his consciousness. This smell seemed toe from an area of the abyss he¡¯d fallen into. Han Shuo¡¯s groggy consciousnesstched firmly onto the familiar smell, gradually sinking back into unconsciousness.

    There was an infinite ck void in the distance. The surroundings seemed to have been forever shrouded in torpid grey, and grey and ck cloud constantly rolled over the horizon. The whole area was filed with the smell of death, destion and wilderness.

    Swamps and tree husks that were void of branches and leaves dotted thendscape closer to him. A variety of undead creatures stumbled across the wilderness, aimlessly wandering in the deste space.

    There was no cycle of day and night in this deste ce, nor any sense of time. There was only loneliness and despair, deathly stillness and destion.

    For a moment, Han Shuo thought he was still within the Cemetery of Death. It was too simr to the Cemetery of Death¡¯s evesting dusk. But when a pack of gargoyles soared over his head, followed by a horde of skeletons and zombies on the ground, Han Shuo was suddenly struck by the very real fact it wasn¡¯t indeed the Cemetery of Death.

    He clearly remembered that he hadn¡¯t summoned these low level undead creatures in the Cemetery of Death. Han Shuo suddenly felt like he was in a dream. Only when he followed this line of thought to its end did he realise he didn¡¯t have a body, existing as just pure awareness. However, as soon as Han Shuo thought about his body, his exhausted mental strength slowly filled the area of his consciousness. A identical copy of his body rapidly coalesced into being.

    His left hand touched his right, both hands obviously making contact. However, Han Shuo didn¡¯t feel any contact between his skin; everything felt so strange. But he felt a sense of intimacy towards the surroundings. As for what felt intimate, he couldn¡¯t quite ce his finger on it.

    The dense horde of undead creatures suddenly charged down from a bare mountain. These undead creatures were arranged neatly in order. Right at the front were skeleton warriors and zombie warriors, behind them were skeleton archers and rows of gargoyles. Even further back were two evil knights.

    These undead creatures actually numbered three or four thousand. However, the majority of them were skeleton warriors, zombie warriors and ghouls, only a small portion were hate warriors and evil knights. Charging down from the towering mountain, they flocked towards a steep canyon.

    Han Shuo¡¯s body and consciousness slowly floated into the canyon. Only when he reached the canyon did Han Shuo realise that the interior of the canyon was simrly flooded with undead creatures. Right down the center of the canyon was a pitched melee of undead creatures. ws and teeth were used to their fullest potential as they wrestled and tore at each other, incapable of feeling pain and knowing retreat. It was a magnificent yet chilling scene.

    When weak undead creatures such as skeleton warriors and zombie werepletely destroyed, those low level souls would immediately disperse. But from hate warriors onwards, their souls wouldn¡¯t immediately disperse upon elimination. The undead creatures around them would fight to im a part of that soul power, devouring it to strengthen themselves.

    From the middle of the struggle rose a five meter tall, enormous mummy lord. Wrapped in strips of corroded white cloth which exuded a deathly aura, he slowly rose from deep within the ground of the canyon. This mummy lord seemed to be the leader of the undead creatures within the canyon. When he rose up from deep within the ground, his whole body unleashed an iparable storm of death.

    When the undead creatures charging down from the mountain came into contact with the death storm, they immediately turned into ashes. The strips of cloth around his body danced like weapons, cutting apart any hostile creature unfortunate enough to be caught in its path. Only an evil knight that descended was able to block the attack with his bone spear, driving his fire-breathing warhorse to retreat to the side.

    In the hierarchy of undead creatures, mummy lords ranked higher than evil knights. As such, in skirmishes between undead creatures, a difference in level usually meant a foregone conclusion. Unless there were ten evil knights attacking the mummy lord, this battle had no suspense in its oue.

    End of part one of the chapter.

    When the mummy lord emerged from the ground, the surrounding undead creatures that had charged down from the bald mountain were ground to dust by the death storm. More than seven hundred undead creatures turned into ashes in moments.

    ¡°The being who¡¯s holing up on high ground, ept this challenge from the mummy lord Pharaoh! That mountain is not a height that can be held by someone as weak as you, so hand over the territory to me!¡± Mummy lord Pharaoh roared at the towering mountain as arge amount of mental strength swept through the whole area.

    ¡°My Lord Majesty, how can you tolerate the transgressions of that lowly mummy?¡± The evil knight that¡¯d retreated on his fire-breathing warhorse hissed sternly.

    The sounds of rocks shifting suddenly sounded from around the canyon. The iparably familiar wood and fire elite zombie separately rode out on fire-breathing warhorses, dashing in from both sides of the valley.

    An enormous shadow dived down from the tops of the mountain, the incredible undead porcupine full of bone spurs. The little skeleton was wielding a bone dagger that had transformed into a spear three meters long. The seven bone spurs stood upright from his spine. His grand aura covered the scene as hended.

    ¡°Humble mummy lord, my territory is not a ce where you can just casually trespass. Now, not only do I desire your soul¡¯s dissipation, but from today forth, the north side of the mummy lord¡¯s territory is also under my control.¡± The little skeleton¡¯s thoughts exploded out like a raging flood,pletely disproportionate to its tiny figure high in the sky.

    ¡°My Lord Majesty, you must unite and rule the darkness.¡± The evil knight that¡¯d previously spoken dismounted, going down on one knee in front of the gant figure of the little skeleton flying high above the battlefield. His face was filled with solemn worship.

    This was the first time the mummy lord Pharaoh had set eyes on the rumoured superb mutated skeleton. The aura exploding from the little skeleton¡¯s figure instantly terrified Pharaoh. There was also the ming fire elite zombie, seemingly tossing two fireballs from hand to hand while sitting on the back of the warhorse. The scorchingly high temperature caused the cold loving mummy lord Pharaoh to feel extremely ufortable.

    Pharaoh suddenly felt like he¡¯d fallen for a trap this time. He¡¯d survived in this world for an extremely long time now, he wasn¡¯t like the typical trudging undead creatures around. He¡¯d long since gained true intelligence.

    That bad feeling he had solidified his decision to leave, and he attempted to return underground. However, the previously soft earth had suddenly be as hard as diamonds. Just as the mummy lord Pharaoh started to panic, the simple-minded earth elite zombie slowly emerged from the earth. Grinning at Pharaoh, it naively said, ¡°You can¡¯t escape, right?¡±

    The previously awe-inspiring mummy lord Pharaoh suddenly realised all his escape paths had been cut off. He howled furiously, ¡°Despicable being, you are too sinister!¡±

    The little skeleton didn¡¯t respond. The undead creature beneath him suddenly dove at Pharaoh. The little skeleton lifted the three meter long bone spear, the baleful aura in the surroundings surging into the bone spear. The bone spear absorbed arge amount of deathly aura, bing as heavy as a mountain. As it pierced towards Pharaoh, the mummy lord threw back his head in a roar of defiance.

    The strips of cloth on Pharaoh¡¯s body danced as it crushed everyone within its range. But when the little skeleton¡¯s bone spear descended, it tore straight through the strips wrapped around his body, piercing through to his chest in one strike, pinning him to the ground.

    ¡°Submit, or die!¡± The little skeleton coldy shouted as his huge aura fiercely bombarded every inch of the mummy lord pinned by the bone spear.

    Unable to struggle loose, Pharaoh yielded to the little skeleton¡¯s viciousness after a mournful howl. He docilely bent his head to the little skeleton and said, ¡°I, mummy lord Pharaoh, submit to My Lord.¡±

    The little skeleton wasn¡¯t in a hurry to remove the bone spear from the mummy lord¡¯s body. He drew a contract mark in the dusky air with his free left hand, making the mummy lord hand over some of his soul to brand the contract. Only then did he remove the bone spear without concern for the mummy lord¡¯s pain, turning around and saying, ¡°Return to the mountain!¡±

    The mummy lord didn¡¯t have any chance to resist now that the one-sided master and servant contract was formed. He struggled to his feet, lumbering off with slow steps behind the earth and wood elite zombies, his goal clearly the towering mountain.

    Han Shuo had seen everything clearly and was filled with surprise. He finally knew where he was at this time. This was the other dimension in which the undead creatures lived.

    Han Shuo never would have imagined that the little skeleton and earth zombie would actually have an enormous troop in the other dimension. It even looked like they were getting on rather well. No wonder the earth elite zombie had asked to returnst time if there wasn¡¯t anything for him. Looking at this battle, it seemed that the little skeleton had brought along the earth, wood and fire elite zombies, and was conducting a mighty invasion in the other dimension.

    A high level undead creature like the mummy lord could only be summoned by a necromancer archmage, simr to the bone demons. Yet the little skeleton had handled the mummy lord with a single strike. This fully proved that the little skeleton¡¯s level was higher than the mummy lord. This was something that Han Shuo never would have thought of.

    When the mummy lord was subdued by the little skeleton, Han Shuo suddenly panicked. He suddenly remembered that he didn¡¯t know how to return to the Profound Continent. There weren¡¯t any people or things that Han Shuo was familiar with in this eternally deste and still space.

    If he could only remain in this foreignherworld in his consciousness, it would beplete torture to Han Shuo. At present, even his body was formed by his consciousness, so not only could Han Shuo not control anything, he couldn¡¯t cast any magic either. This was an extremely unfavourable situation for Han Shuo.

    Looking at the little skeleton fly towards the towering bald mountain, Han Shuo repeatedly screamed mentally in an attempt to contact the little skeleton. In the midst of that, a sharp pain suddenly spread across Han Shuo¡¯s whole body. This kind of agony was unbearable even to Han Shuo¡¯s tough nerves. As a result, his consciousness gradually dissipated.

    The little skeleton, who was travelling towards the towering mountain with the elite zombies, suddenly paused, looking towards the area where Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness vanished. He suddenly turned the flying undead creature and flew towards the area where Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness had just been. The purple demon eye sparkled, filled with uncertainty.

    The earth, wood and fire elite zombies all spurred their fire-breathing warhorses to pass through the ranks of the undead army to stand next to the little skeleton. The earth elite zombie asked innocently, ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡±

    ¡°Father was here.¡± The little skeleton, who only had two holes for a nose, moved with a crunching noise and responded to the three special undead creatures.

    ¡°How can Father be here, this is our world!¡± The earth zombie looked naively at the little skeleton, trying to understand.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know, but I just felt the connection between Father and myself. He was just here!¡± The little skeleton swung the three meter bonence in his hand, the tip of the bonence stopping at the area where Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness previously stayed, saying, ¡°Right here, if you sniff carefully, you can still smell Father¡¯s scent.¡±

    With this sentence from the little skeleton, the three undead creatures all drew close to the area. Among them, the wood and fire elite zombie shook their heads, having yet to fully develop their own consciousness. They currently could only rely on the little skeleton to think. Only the earth zombie deeply breathed in a few breaths of air, as if really smelling Han Shuo¡¯s scent. It replied while shaking its head, ¡°Yes. Father has truly been here!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s return to the mountain, Father has already left. We still need to take over Pharaoh¡¯s territoriester.¡± said the little skeleton, and then spurred the undead creature into the sky, howling as he made his way to the towering mountain.

    Han Shuo shot to his feet as if his head had been struck by lightning. When hended on the ground, he was covered in a cold sweat, his heart still palpitating with fear.

    The skeletal staff that was in his hand fell to the ground at this moment. It rattled as it bounced on the smooth hard ground of the Cemetery of Death. There weren¡¯t any changes to the skeletal staff that was now quietly lying on the ground. However, Han Shuo knew that the skeletal staff had just brought him to another ce.

    Travelling to the deste and still dimension had given Han Shuo a scare. What Han Shuo was afraid of wasn¡¯t the existence of and war in the other dimension. Instead, he was scared that he couldn¡¯t return to the Profound Continent. He had existed only as a consciousness in that paradise for necromancy, but his body had remained on the Profound Continent.

    The effect on a necromancer like Han Shuo was obvious, he was unable to use much of his power there. If he was stuck eternally in that area, facing deste and deathly undead creatures for the rest of his life would be akin to torture to Han Shuo.

    Being used to the riotous colors of this world, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t easily adapt to the monochromatic other dimension. Besides, this world still had Han Shuo¡¯s close friends, who were made of flesh and blood like Han Shuo, unlike the creatures in the other dimension.

    ¡°That was close, this skeletal staff is really odd, luckily it finally sent me back. If not, my life would have been destroyed.¡± Han Shuo spoke to himself for a while. Only then did he look at the skeletal staff again. His mind was thinking furiously as to how he had passed through the variousyered nes, with his consciousnessnding in that space.

    Unfortunately, even after pondering for a long while, Han Shuo still didn¡¯t know how he¡¯d done so. Shaking his head, Han Shuo didn¡¯t carry on thinking about this question. He instead recalled the little skeleton¡¯s amazing performance in that space. Han Shuo wanted to immediately use the skeletal staff to summon the little skeleton over, but had a lingering fear of the skeletal staff¡¯s previous changes. He temporarily gave up on the thought of immediately summoning the little skeleton.

    ¡°Who knew the little skeleton was actually so well established. He looks even more awesome than me in the Profound Continent! When did this fellow be so formidable, eh?¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t resist sighing. When he remembered the scene where the little skeleton hadnded, and the looks of fear from a few of the low level creatures, he finally understood what was going on.

 Chapter 350: The excited dark dragon

    Chapter 350: The excited dark dragon

    Han Shuo, who¡¯d just returned from the necromancer¡¯s dimension, spent the next couple of days recovering. After he was fully rested, he went to the dark forest and caught a few magic beasts, continuing to practice the ¡°Trembling Soul¡± magic.

    After a few days of practice, Han Shuo was finally able to manipte his mental strength at will. When a ¡°Trembling Soul¡± spell was fired, a wild beast would simply fall down, blood flowing from its nose and mouth.

    When Han Shuo could control ¡°Trembling Soul¡± as he would, he began studying spells that higher ranked necromancers should be proficient in.

    The most important matters were the summoning spells for bone demons, old fey zombies and mummy lords. As necromancers progressed, not only would the level of their summoned creatures grow higher, but they would also be able to summon other kinds of creatures. Necromancy archmages like Han Shuo should be able to call forth bone demons, old fey zombies, and mummy lords.

    In reality, apart from a few differences in the incantations, there weren¡¯t many differences between summoning the three. Even though their soul brands were different, the strength required to summon any one of them were roughly the same. As long as Han Shuo mastered summoning bone demons, he would then be able to summon the other two undead creatures just by slightly modifying the incantation.

    Although, just like the ¡°Trembling Soul¡± spell, the farther a necromancer progressed, the harder the advanced spells would be to master. Han Shuo¡¯s understanding of necromancy magic from the deceased archmage yton was now useless.

    Starting from this realm, Han Shuo would have to carefully study necromancy magic by himself. Luckily, the Cemetery of Death had many books that Han Shuo could peruse. The number of references concerning the essence of necromancy were too many to count.

    As the three evil knights and twelve mystical demons were still being refined, Han Shuo used this time to study more advanced necromancy magic.

    The days flew by. One day, Han Shuo suddenly sensed a familiar presence outside the Cemetery of Death whilst chanting his incantations.

    Suddenly awakening from his deep contemtion, Han Shuo held the skeleton staff as he walked out of the Cemetery of Death, running into dark dragon Gilbert wandering outside, ¡°What are you doing here?¡±

    ¡°Esteemed master, I felt your presence, and it just so happened that I was in the Valley of Sunshine. Hence I came over to find you.¡± Dark dragon Gilbert cheered up when he saw Han Shuo appear.

    Gilbert hadn¡¯t seem to have undergone any great changes. However, Han Shuo could feel from Gilbert¡¯s body that his aura seemed to have strengthened a little. After Gilbert walked into the Cemetery of Death, he immediately began chattering, reporting on what had happened in the Valley of Sunshine.

    Han Shuo gradually came to understand the situation in Valley of Sunshine from Gilbert¡¯s stories. Ever since Han Shuo had previously schemed against the various powers that had converged on the hidden valley with the mithril mine, the four great powers had formed a temporary truce. Instead, they focused all their attention on crusading against the culprit behind the scenes.

    Laureton had previously said that whichever faction was the first to find the culprit behind the scenes would hold power in the Valley of Sunshine. So, all the powers,rge or small, were trying to find the culprit behind the scenes. However, even after so many months, there was still no results.

    Trunks understood that the real culprit, Han Shuo, had long since left the valley. Towards this issue, he pretended to express concern, but also silently expanded the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. Unwittingly, the silent and unknown Soul Destroyers had gradually be the fifth great power in Valley of Sunshine thanks to its abundant funds and Trunks¡¯ prestige.

    Having consumed one of Han Shuo¡¯s Rebirth Pills, Trunks¡¯ strength had advanced from swordmaster to great swordmaster. Out of all the different factions in the Valley of Sunshine, only Laureton, who could go thrice berserk, could beat him. Florida and Adam Melo were both inferior to Trunks.

    This period of time was the Soul Destroyers¡¯ chance to rise. As they shot through the ranks of their peers, they absorbed even more outstanding experts. Trunks previous ruthlessness now had an added edge of insidiousness to it. He wasn¡¯t in a hurry to immediately deal with Florida, intending to slowly torment him a bit at a time.

    Gilbert took on some missions with Trunks,pleting every operation perfectly. In this process, Gilbert frequently visited many brothels, using the skills that Han Shuo taught him to secretly absorb some yin energy. Thus, his strength also rapidly improved.

    After he finished listening to Gilbert narrate the situation in the Valley of Sunshine, Han Shuo was actually slightly worried. Currently, Trunks¡¯ Soul Destroyers were the fifth greatest power in the Valley of Sunshine. This also meant that Soul Destroyers had the right to participate in the fight for the leadership over the Valley of Sunshine. Previously, when the Soul Destroyers didn¡¯t have this level of strength, only Florida would spare no effort in suppressing him. Now that the Soul Destroyers truly had such strength, the other three sides naturally would ce more attention on Trunks.

    Even the Berserker Warriors¡¯ Laureton would unfortunately not be as friendly to Trunks as he previously was. After all, Trunks possessed the strength to threaten his Cairo mercenary band. There were no friends who were forever in this world. Once there was a clear conflict of interest, it was very possible that some dirty things would happen.

    Han Shuo contemted for a while, understanding in his heart that Trunks and the rest would perhaps find it more difficult to develop in the future. However, Han Shuo believed in Trunks¡¯ ability and didn¡¯t care too much about this. After thinking for a while, he smiled slightly and said to dark dragon Gilbert, ¡°I have something for you.¡±

    ¡°What is it?¡± After Gilbert exined the details of the situation in the Valley of Sunshine to Han Shuo, he was surprised by Han Shuo¡¯s response.

    Han Shuo took the green dragon¡¯s magical core from his space ring, lustrous green energy whirling within. The massive amount of energy contained within immediately caused Gilbert to go mad with joy, loudly screaming with delight, ¡°A supreme magical core?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. This is a green dragon¡¯s magical core, I believe this magical core should be useful to you?¡± Han Shuo grinned at Gilbert and asked.

    Unable to stop nodding his head like a chicken pecking rice, Gilbert was tremendously excited, his right hand already holding up the green dragon¡¯s magical core in his palm,ughing boisterously, ¡°Useful. Too useful! I can feel the enormous energy contained within. With this green dragon magical core that¡¯s of a higher rank than me, I can definitely evolve to the second level!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s good, swallow it immediately and just evolve in the Cemetery of Death.¡± This green dragon¡¯s magical core had obviously been specially prepared by Han Shuo for Gilbert. Seeing Gilbert looking surprised and excited to the point of madness, he smiled.

    Apart from his lewdness, Gilbert could also be considered a loyal follower. Previously in the taboond deep within the Dark Forest, he¡¯d disyed loyalty that¡¯d touched Han Shuo. If not, Han Shuo, who was berserk at that time, perhaps would have been lost forever.

    ¡°Thank you, Master. Master, you are too great! Your loyal servant praises you from the bottom of his heart...¡± Gilbert sang unceasing praises as he clutched the green dragon¡¯s magical core. Gilbert had interacted with humans for a long period of time during this time. His boot-licking skills had greatly improved, and he almost didn¡¯t repeat a single sentence.

    ¡°Alright, alright. Just swallow the green dragon¡¯s magical core for me. Less of that nonsense.¡± Han Shuo interrupted Gilbert¡¯s fawning, not knowing whether tough or cry.

    Gilbert stopped his nonsense this time, animatedly nodding his head and speaking to Han Shuo, ¡°Master, I need to transform to my original form, which might be inconvenient in the Cemetery of Death. I¡¯ll just proceed outside.¡±

    ¡°Go, but you need to be careful. Don¡¯t mess up the formation I set up.¡± Han Shuo frantically reminded him as Gilbert rushed excitedly for the entrance of the Cemetery of Death, the green dragon¡¯s magical core in hand.

    ¡°Be at ease, Master. I know what I should be doing!¡± Gilbert replied, greatly avoiding the tworge formations Han Shuo had set up. He only swallowed the green dragon¡¯s magical core after reaching another area.

    It looked like Gilbert would be able to be a level two super magical beast in the near future, Han Shuo mused. He decided to continue studying necromancy and practice incantations in the Cemetery of Death.

    A few days passed when Han Shuo suddenly thought of the dwarves in the valley. Thinking of the dwarves¡¯ skills in forging weapons and remembering his promise to Ancient Lizard King Dagassi, he departed the Cemetery of Death, travelling to the valley where the dwarves resided.

    Winter had passed, and the dwarves¡¯ valley was filled with the fresh smell of flora. The dwarves guarding the valley all recognized Han Shuo. Han Shuo smoothly entered the dwarf vige, seeing a few dwarves brewing fruit wine. When the dwarves that were brewing wine saw Han Shuo appear, all of them cheered endlessly, regardless of adults or children.

    Encouraged by a woman, a dwarf child less than a meter tall walked towards Han Shuo with a ss filled with fruity smelling wine. ¡°Uncle Han, this is for you, it¡¯s very delicious.¡± This dwarf child stood on his tiptoes, handing over the ss filled with wine to Han Shuo.

    Kneeling down, Han Shuo rubbed the little dwarf child¡¯s head and received the ss with a smile. ¡°Thank you!¡±

    The dwarf child¡¯s smiling face blushed, as he shyly ran to his mother¡¯s side and said, ¡°Uncle Han thanked me.¡±

    The honest dwarves, no matter young or old, all roared withughter. The vige was filled with a cheerful atmosphere. It looked like the dwarves had been living pretty well during this period of time.

    When Bet who had heard the news and saw that Han Shuo had arrived, he shouted from afar, ¡°Yo, Han. It¡¯s been a long time since you¡¯ve came!¡± He¡¯d been forging weapons just now and was naked from the waist up. His face was covered in soot and he was holding arge mallet in his left hand.

    ¡°Hehe. I¡¯ve been a bit busy recently. Have you all been well recently?¡± Han Shuo asked smilingly.

    ¡°Of course, spring has arrived. We haven¡¯t even finished the food you provided us for the winter. There¡¯s still a lot of bacon. We¡¯ve mined some ore and I was just instructing the youngsters in the dwarf weapon forging skills. Life is much better than it was previously.¡± Bet chuckled as he replied, looking visibly refreshed.

    ¡°Where¡¯s the vige chief? I¡¯vee to discuss arge deal with you all.¡±

    ¡°Han, the gates to the dwarf vige are forever open for you. To forge weapons for you is an honor for the dwarves and doesn¡¯t count as business.¡± Chief Calvin leaned on a cane as he stroked his braided beard with a beaming smile, walking out from a distant stone house.

    Calvin looked visibly older, and his body was getting weaker. When one reached a specific age, struggles with walking were inevitable. Calvin¡¯s beard was fully silver now and he had to rely on a cane. It looked like he simrly couldn¡¯t resist the effects of aging.

    However, Calvin was in high spirits, and his chuckling look made him seem full of benevolence. When two young dwarves saw Calvin appearing, they took the initiative to go up and support the chief. Bet asked, ¡°Elder, why have youe out?¡±

    ¡°Han is here, of course I have toe visit. Bet, I¡¯m not as old as you think, don¡¯t you see I walked over on my own? Heh!¡± Calvinughed and bowed towards Han Shuo. ¡°The dwarves in this vige will forever thank you for your favor. There¡¯s no business between friends. We will forge all the weapons you need, this is our attitude towards friends.¡±

    When he¡¯de over this time, Han Shuo had primarily wanted the dwarves to help forge some weapons for the lizardmen in the underground world. Han Shuo promised Ancient Lizard King Dagassi to help look after the lizardmen. Although the lizardmen had obtained some weapons from the corpses of the Redbud Knights, those weapons were far from enough for their use.

    In addition, lizardmen were built differently than normal humans. Han Shuo wanted to ask the dwarves to forge them some weapons tailored for their use. Of course, Brettel City¡¯s city guards also needed the dwarven-forged weapons. This was because the weapons forged by the dwarves were much more outstanding than normal weapons.

    Calvin listened carefully to Han Shuo¡¯s descriptions. When Han Shuo finished, Calvin smiled as he said, ¡°Don¡¯t worry. The children are coincidentally very free recently. We still have enough food currently and don¡¯t need to hunt. I will make arrangements for them to forge the weapons you need.¡±

    ¡°Many thanks, Elder!¡± Han Shuo sincerely expressed his gratitude.

    ¡°Haha, there¡¯s no need for such polite words between friends. It¡¯s rare for you to havee, do try out our freshly brewed fruit wine.¡± Calvin proudly said, pulling Han Shuo towards the women brewing wine.

 Chapter 351: Father?

    Chapter 351: Father?

    In the blink of an eye, over a month had flown by.

    One day, twelve consecutive rumbling sounds rang out in the sinister Cemetery of Death. Twelve enormous banners unfurled in the explosions.

    Han Shuo sat cross-legged right in the center, his eyes fixed on the twelve gs in the middle of the pit. The liquid inside the pit had turned into a pitch ck pool, bubbles of various sizes rising to the surface. ck mist churned and coiled out of it, drifting around the Cemetery of Death without dispersing.

    As the bubbles popped and crackled, that pitch ck pool of liquid was gradually absorbed by the three evil knights and their fire warhorses. The evil knights had originally been submerged deep in the liquid in the pit. Now they were sucking in the ck liquid like they were dying of thirst. Finally, the three evil knights and their mounts had fully absorbed the liquid, revealing their figures. They were now inky ck from head to toe, with the eyes of both the riders and the mounts glinting faintly red with the light of eternal mes.

    Apart from the vicious deathly aura drifting around them, there was now another baleful presence swirling around them. Feeling the enormous changes urring within their bodies, the three silently threw back their heads and howled to the heavens, the bone spears in their hands dancing madly.

    Because they could no longer bear the deep agony in their souls, the three evil knights once again tried to attack the power of the contract as their bodies came clear of the liquid in the pit. They wanted to escape from Han Shuo and from the very.

    ¡°Hmph! High rank undead creatures are indeed a little annoying. At least you understand the concept of resistance!¡± Han Shuo coldly snorted, abruptly standing up from his cross-legged sitting posture. He then sent his mental strength crashing down on the three evil knights, forcing obedience on them while revolving the secret arts of demonic magic.

    The three evil knights¡¯ mournful, miserable howls were abruptly cut short. As both riders and horses looked at Han Shuo in horror, the mes in their eyes became weak and feeble, like a candly in the midst of a tempest. Their bodies and souls seemed ready to dissipate at the slightest provocation.

    The liquid inside the cave that enhanced their bodies had contained Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence. Since the three evil knights and their fire warhorses hadpletely absorbed it, Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence now flowed within their bodies. This meant that he waspletely capable of turning them into dust without leaving behind the slightest trace.

    Therefore, when Han Shuo punished and tortured the three evil knights and their steeds using his own blood essence, the fear that struck them was the most primal of them. The three evil knights had been ready to exert their everything to break away from Han Shuo¡¯s contract, but now all of them were crawling on the ground, their entire beings trembling.

    Han Shuoe could sense the feeling of fear and awe from the depths of the three evil knights¡¯ souls. He snorted coldly, stepping in front of the three evil knights who no longer dared to resist, and ced three ¡°Dark Seals¡± on each of them. With this magic, he could directly summon them from the other dimension.

    If Han Shuo hadn¡¯t imprinted the ¡°Dark Seals¡± onto them, he wouldn¡¯t be able to call upon them in his next summons once he sent them back to the other dimension. Without an identifying brand on their bodies, the next summons would¡¯ve chosen a random set of evil knights. In the vast, boundlessness of the other dimension, there was a countless amount of these low level existences. It would take a miracle to summon the same set once again.

    However, as long as a ¡°Dark Seal¡± was stamped onto their bodies, Han Shuo could find them anywhere in the other dimension through the brands. From there, he could bring the refined evil knights directly to this ne.

    After branding the evil knights and their fire warhorses one by one, Han Shuo intended to send them back to the other dimension. However, he suddenly recalled how he¡¯d seen undead creatures including the little skeleton, earth, fire and wood elite zombies thrive in that haven of necromancy during his tripst time.

    Han Shuo understood that the little skeleton and the crew were vigorously carrying out an invasion in that dimension. As their strength was improving constantly, Han Shuo was well aware of the strong undead creatures in the other dimension, and how the mummy lord wasn¡¯t the strongest creature in the other dimension either.

    When he reached the rank of grand magus necromancer, Han Shuo could call upon undead creatures such as the mummy lords, bone demons and old fey zombies. However, there were races beyond the undead creatures, above the mummy lords. Those super high rank undead creatures included creatures like bone dragons, skeleton kings and zombie kings. Only necromancers at the rank of sacred magus were able to summon them.

    ording to legend, necromancers beyond the rank of sacred magus could even summon undead creatures that wielded the strength of demigods from the strange world. How mighty were these undead creatures? What kind of form did they appear in? Even Han Shuo wasn¡¯t sure...

    In the endlessly vast other dimension, Han Shuo didn¡¯t know whether or not undead creatures with the power of demigods existed. The little skeleton¡¯s strength was constantly being enhanced, but Han Shuo was still somewhat worried about him. This was why he wanted the little skeleton to take the three evil knights back to the other dimension, thereby increasing his strength again.

    When his thoughts reached this point, Han Shuo took out the skeletal staff and started chanting an incantation. Since he¡¯dst identally entered the other dimension, there had been a period of time when Han Shuo had had some apprehension towards this magic staff. However, after a few days studying it, he didn¡¯t find any differences when he started using it in chanting incantations again. Han Shuo didn¡¯t know how the previous matter actually urred, and so decided not to care too much about it.

    A ck light shed from the void. The little skeletonnded, still atop the spiky undead creature. When they arrived, the three evil knights instantly sensed the familiar air of death from this dimension. When they saw clearly that it was just a little skeletonmanding them, the three evil knights emitted the might of a high rank undead creature, as if wanting to terrify the little skeleton.

    The little skeleton swept a nce over the three evil knights, his purple eye socket shing with light. He lightly tapped the three meter long bone spur on the spiky undead creature. Thetter suddenly turned to the three evil knights and let out a silent roar. A billowing surge of murderous intent abruptly rolled out.

    The three evil knights, who had nned on showing off their strength in front of the little skeleton, suddenly felt the powerful might of that odd undead creature. They suddenly jolted in shock, their instinctive fear of higher level undead creatures causing them to retreat a few steps.

    ¡°Father!¡± After scaring off the three evil knights, the little skeleton leapt off from his undead creature. He ran straight to Han Shuo, joyously transmitting this message.

    Han Shuo was shocked. He looked at the little skeleton who¡¯d lived with him ever since the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. The little skeleton had secretly helped him throw out garbage in the middle of the night. Now that Han Shuo heard the little skeleton call him like this, he was at a sudden loss of words.

    ¡°Father, you have been to my hometown, right?¡± The little skeleton stuck the three meter long bone spear into the ground as he walked up in front of Han Shuo. He looked up, blinking his purple eye socket at Han Shuo to transmit this message.

    The word ¡°father¡± that the little skeleton called him stunned Han Shuo. He suddenly found himself increasingly unable to see through the little skeleton. From simplemunication to a conversation, this change had happened in only two years. Looking at the little skeleton in front of him with a sparkling purple eye socket, Han Shuo was shaken to the extreme.

    He finally snapped out his shock after a while, nodding, ¡°That¡¯s right. I visited the other dimensionst time.¡± Pausing for a bit, Han Shuo asked with some hesitation, ¡°Do you finally have your ownplete consciousness? Why do you call me father? What¡¯s going on?¡±

    ¡°You created me. Your blood runs within my body, and you¡¯ve also always considered me your child. You are my father.¡± The little skeleton blinked his purple eye and continued to send messages, ¡°Father, not only do I have aplete consciousness, I also have some miraculous powers. These were all given by you.¡±

    Han Shuo had originally seen the tiny little skeleton as a little child. Thetter¡¯s disy of childish behavior had always reinforced this illusion, especially after leaving the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. Perhaps that was why Han Shuo subconsciously considered the little skeleton his child. As for the little skeleton, he could feel the deep feeling of love through the spirit connection with Han Shuo and gradually took Han Shuo as his father.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind was a bit chaotic after the little skeleton¡¯s sudden thunderous call of ¡°father¡±. His heart was full of questions, but Han Shuo didn¡¯t know where to start. He fell silent for a while before saying, ¡°I¡¯ve enhanced the three evil knights so their power has increased quite a bit. Take them with you, they should be of help.¡±

    ¡°Thank you, father! I will discipline them well.¡± The little skeleton eximed in delight. He didn¡¯t have the arrogance in front of Han Shuo that let him look down on the world like he had in the other dimension. Instead, he acted more like a naughty child.

    The little skeleton pulled the three meter long bone spur from the ground before walking towards the three evil knights. The closer he drew to them, the more violently the air of death around him surged. All of the deadly air from the Cemetery of Death seemed to churn like a whirlpool, the little skeleton firmly in the eye of the hurricane as he strode forward.

    The three evil knights suddenly trembled. The mes in their eyes shed as they stared at the little skeleton with seven spurs behind his back. They seemed to have figured out the little skeleton¡¯s extraordinary origin.

    High level undead creatures possessed a might that any undead creature of lower ranks was simply incapable of resisting. The little skeleton walked proudly up to the three evil knights, tapping his huge bone spur on each one, fire warhorses included, seemingly issuing an order.

    The bone spur rang out clearly as it tapped on the riders and mounts. The mes in their eyes flickered intensely as their postures turned submissive. It seemed they had all yielded to the little skeleton¡¯s might.

    Han Shuo watched the little skeleton tame the three evil knights smoothly, feeling quite incredulous. Even Han Shuo himself had to use his blood essence to subdue the three evil knights when he dealt with them. He didn¡¯t expect the little skeleton to have no need of anything. He¡¯d used his identity as a higher rank creature to the point where they didn¡¯t dare to lift their heads.

    Whether it was because of different refining methods, or because the little skeleton, earth, wood and fire elite zombies had all started off at a low level, they had all readily epted Han Shuo without any resistance during the demonic magic¡¯s refining process.

    When he¡¯d refined the little skeleton, Han Shuo had felt their souls interconnect. He dared to say so because thetter had inherited a portion of his memory in addition to some of his power. Otherwise, it¡¯d be absolutely impossible for the little skeleton to skillfully disy the Law of Activating Magic using the seven bone spurs on his back.

    As for the fire, wood and earth elite zombies, they had been refined via the secret zombie refining process. In addition to Han Shuo painstakingly collecting the materials, they¡¯d also absorbed the five extreme elements from the extreme ces of their respective elements. Who knew how much power had been stored up in those locations? The enormity and rarity of that power was immeasurable.

    Perhaps it was due to those reasons that the four undead creatures ¨C the little skeleton, earth, wood and fire elite zombies could directlymunicate with Han Shuo through their minds. They had extraordinary abilities to begin with, as well as the surprising ability to evolve. On the contrary, for those three evil knights or even higher rank undead creatures, Han Shuo could only give them orders, notmunicate mentally with them.

    End of part one of the chapter.

    They likewisecked the fortuitous chances of the little skeleton, and a part of Han Shuo¡¯s memories. Neither had they absorbed an enormous amount of elements from the heavens and earth like the other three zombie fellows. Moreover, because their starting rank was already much higher than the zombies and skeletons, they¡¯d even tried to resist Han Shuo¡¯s effort to improve their physical bodies. Perhaps due to these reasons that despite being strong, they were still a far cry from the four of little skeleton inner circle ¨C the undead creatures who Han Shuo had tempered first.

    ¡°Father, they will listen obediently from now on.¡± The little skeleton pointed at the three trembling evil knights, saying to the silently pondering Han Shuo.

    ¡°Heh heh, you can take them back. My mind is a bit of a mess right now.¡± Han Shuo smiled with the little skeleton. Then, when he was about to cast the spell, Han Shuo suddenly looked at the undead creature that was the little skeleton¡¯s steed and asked, ¡°Right, what is this strange fellow? Why have I never seen it before?¡±

    ¡°Oh, he was originally a bone demon. Father found me lots of good bonesst time. I dismantled this bone demon and used some of those fine bones to create its wings, so it turned out looking like this. Father, did I make it ugly?¡± After answering, the little skeleton asked Han Shuo, somewhat embarrassed.

    ¡°No, it looks very nice.¡± Han Shuo replied, before sending the little skeleton and the three evil knights back to the strange world. With his connection with the little skeleton, Han Shuo sent the three evil knights to the little skeleton¡¯s territory. From now on, those three were destined to be its underlings, to be its vanguard in battle.

    ¡°When did you have the ability to refine undead creatures?¡± After the little skeleton and three evil knights disappeared, Han Shuo muttered with a heart filled with shock.

    Although the little skeleton¡¯s enhancement on that bone demon was a simple dismantling and reassembly of the bones, Han Shuo could see from this action that the little skeleton was simply incredible. He was sure that the little skeleton had received that enhancement method from his memory. Otherwise, the little skeleton certainly wouldn¡¯t have had this ability.

    That the little skeleton had unconsciously grown into this existence was a big, pleasant surprise for Han Shuo. For someone who had personally created this miracle, the little skeleton¡¯s rapid development had astounded Han Shuo in the beginning. Now it had transformed to excitement and ecstasy. The more he thought about it, the more satisfied he was of his masterpiece.

    Deep down in his heart, Han Shuo had truly regarded the little skeleton as his child, so he was supremely excited when thetter had called him ¡°father¡±. He had some difficulties adapting at first, but after the little skeleton had left for the other dimension, Han Shuo felt a kind of longing. Han Shuo suddenly realized that he¡¯d seen the little skeleton as his child from very long ago. His doting and worries for thetter were indeed the behavior of a father for his child!

    ¡°Ahh, child. I finally have a child!¡± A while after the little skeleton left, inside the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo threw back his head and let out an insaneugh to the heavens. Hisughter was full of joy and excitement.

    The three evil knights had emerged, but the twelve mystical demons still needed some more time to take shape. The evil knights only needed to absorb some energy, so this process naturally didn¡¯t take much time, However, the twelve yin demons were an evolution to another form. This process was much moreplicated than a simple energy absorption. ordingly, the time taken was longer.

    After dark dragon Gilbert swallowed the magic core of the green dragon, he nested in the Cemetery of Death and fell into hibernation. His huge body curled up into a ball, his scales and skin sometimes overflowing with stinky liquid and some lights began to sh deep within his body.

    Gilbert¡¯s evolution might take quite a while, and Han Shuo didn¡¯t continue studying archmage necromancer rank magic anymore. Seeing that everything was proceeding in a good direction in the Cemetery of Death, he once again returned to Brettel City.

    Having left Brettel City for some time, Han Shuo was surprised to see life had suddenly be more bustling than when he had left it. The streets were pathetically deserted in the past, and it was practically impossible to see anyone walking back and forth.

    However, when Han Shuo released the yin demon to make a quick scouting trip upon his return, he suddenly saw many changes had urred unknowingly in Brettel City. As city lord, these changes greatly pleased him.

    Because the mountain people on the surrounding mountains had migrated into Brettel City, the city¡¯s poption had increased. In addition, the merchants outside had flooded the city in pursuit of profit. Not only did they bring various daily necessities, some of the bold merchants had even opened up shops in Brettel City.

    After the demand for food was met, those merchants started to sell luxurious clothes along with daily necessities. The poption of Brettel City wasn¡¯t high, but the young men who¡¯d joined the city guard had earned a good monthly sry.

    Every month, the honest young men in the city all received gold coins which were used to improve the originally poor life of their families. As long as each family had a young man at the right age, the entire family could live in style in Brettel City. Enthusiasm for enlisting in the military was unprecedented. Some young men in Seamist City even took the risk toe here to enlist as their life¡¯sst chance.

    Unknowingly, the number of city guards had increased from the original three thousand to five thousand. With the war crazy Dorcas stationed there, Jack didn¡¯t need to spend gold coins to forge equipment for the soldiers. Dorcas was pushing his men topete with Faulke¡¯s elite knights, seeing who did the best in punishing the bandits around Brettel City.

    Dorcas and Faulke were extremely effective as a pair. Not only did they wipe out two bandit organizations, the gold coins that came as the spoils of battle were enough to equip the soldiers. Brettel City had gone from its passive turtling, suffering humiliation here and there, to actively striking out, visiting retribution on the bandits. The city had gradually risen up within the span of a few months, attracting the attention of the seven grand duchies. The seven grand duchies who were originally tangled in the chaos of small wars suddenly called a truce.

    The seven grand duchies all had the same feeling ¨C the wolf ising!

    After the yin demon finished touring around Brettel City, Han Shuo listened to a report of the city¡¯s current situation from Dick and Chester. Dorcas and Faulke were still personally leading a thousand city guards in a sweep through the some of therge bandit groups in the surrounding area.

    Dorcas had outstanding military strategy and stood as the military¡¯s head, while Faulke and his knights held all the power and equipment of a standard knight brigade. Their furious pace of raids against the nearby bandit camps almost seemed like apetition to see who could wipe out more bandits. The soldiers were forged in the crucible of constant warfare, bing increasingly adept at battle.

    ¡°Bryan, the number of merchantsing to the city isn¡¯t small. ording to the current situation, Brettel will definitely be a big city and attract more immigrants.¡± Jackughed, his cheeks wobbling at the effort, and carried on, ¡°I can already see the mountain peopleing down soon. Now that the benefits and treatments in Brettel City are this good, it¡¯s much more profitable than their mining job.¡±

    ¡°We don¡¯t have to wait for long. The five mountain chiefs have already made this decision. Except for Adleman whocks ambition in his old age, the four other chiefs all want to lead their subordinates down to be the official army of Brettel City.¡± Dick looked at Han Shuo and smiled wryly, ¡°Those four fellows have been urging me so many times already. They wanted me to tell Your Lordship about this, but Your Lordship hasn¡¯t been in the city. So this matter was dyed.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind raced when he heard Chester¡¯s words. He asked with a seemingly very interested expression, ¡°What is this about? Aren¡¯t they doing very well with mining ore?¡±

    ¡°This depends on who wepare it with. To the native civilians, their mining ie is pretty good. But topare with the city guards¡¯ benefits, their money from mining isn¡¯t enough to support the daily expenses of their subordinates.¡±

    ¡°Up until now, the mountain people had not been faring too poorly, but since Your Lordship¡¯se, that¡¯s taken a quick turn. The ie of a soldier is now far better than the ie from mining. Moreover, Dorcas and Faulke have collected a great deal of weapons, armor and even gold from wiping out the bandits. This supplemental ie from raids far exceeds that from mining.¡±

    ¡°The seven grand duchies are locked in chaotic fighting, which make it a ce of easy profit. Be it selling weapons, warhorses or directly robbing the bandits, they are all the fastest means to umte wealth. My Lord, Brettel City developing this quickly is also due this reason ¨C plundering the wealth of others.¡±

    ¡°Hehe, to the mountain people, following Your Lordship is obviously much more promising than mining. Not to mention that Dorcas and Faulke also brought some bandits back to be ves. With these ves, the mines don¡¯t need too much manpower. The mountain folk are all good fighters with their strong bodies. It¡¯s a matter of course that they have the idea to join the army.¡± Dick exined to Han Shuo.

    As Dick finished speaking, Han Shuo smiled and said, ¡°It seems everything is for ¡®profit¡¯. However, how is the loyalty of these mountain people?¡±

    ¡°My Lord, with you here in Brettel City, do you think they¡¯d dare to be disloyal?¡± Chester suddenly asked back with a smile.

    Chester¡¯s boot licking was perfect timing. Han Shuo smiled and mused for a moment, saying, ¡°The number of mountain people capable of fighting from the five mountains is about ten thousand. That number alone will double the amount of Brettel city guards. If they decide to join, all the war chariots and stone-throwing catapults at the city gates¡¯ can be put in operation.¡±

    ¡°Brettel City currently is overflowing with capital, so the prospects of future development goes without saying. This matter of expanding the army is imperative! Ten thousand mountain people will make truly fine soldiers. They¡¯ve been shing with the bandits for many years, so there¡¯s no doubt about their fighting ability. I think this is very interesting, but I just don¡¯t know if the mountain people are actually sincere.¡±

    ¡°My Lord, regarding their illustration of sincerity, I think they are sincere.¡± Dick immediately guaranteed.

    ¡°Oh, how do you know that?¡± Han Shuo smiled superciliously, looking at him and asking again, ¡°You can make the decisions in their stead?¡±

    Dick was about to say that he was a mountain man but upon hearing Han Shuo add the question at the end, he couldn¡¯t help but smile wryly, ¡°My Lord, although I cannot make decisions for them, I know how they think. As long as Your Lordship acts with moderation, with their current level of trust and gratitude towards Your Lordship, they will definitely be willing to listen to your orders.¡±

    ¡°Is that so?¡± Han Shuo fell silent for a bit before speaking to Dick with a smile, ¡°Well then, help me pass my words to the mountain people, I¡¯m also d to let them join the army, but their squads must be split up, and their original leaders no longer theirmanders.¡±

    ¡°In addition, all of the mountain army leaders will start from the rank of captain, and can only return to their original rank through meritorious battle service. For now, all of the mountain people must be under our lead. I will allow them to join the army if they can agree to these conditions, sharing the same treatment as our soldiers.¡±

    Han Shuo was thinking for himself as well. Taking all five mountains into ount, there were about ten thousand mountain fighters. If they were still left under the control of their original leaders, it could bring about unbearable damage if they nursed the idea of rebellion after entering Brettel City while outnumbering the city guards.

    One absolutely needed to defend against the hearts of people. Even if he wasn¡¯t thinking of himself, Han Shuo¡¯s position was one that demanded that he act responsible for the city¡¯s people. Though he believed that the mountain chiefs wouldn¡¯t dare to rebel, there was no guarantee for anything in everything. Everyone could have this kind of wild ambition. Han Shuo didn¡¯t want to risk the lives of the civilians.

    Moreover, the mountain chiefs were still young. Whether or not they were suitable tomand so many soldiers needed to be judged through their true abilities. In the low likelihood that these young chiefs were useless good-for-nothings, not only would Han Shuo lose his gold, it might create atent danger in Brettel City.

    Since bing the city lord of Brettel City, Han Shuo¡¯s attitude and bearing had also developed alongside him assuming his position. He was bing increasingly careful and mature. There was no longer any of that single minded ruthlessness he had in the past.

    ¡°Good, I will definitely pass on Your Lordship¡¯s words.¡± Dick didn¡¯t dare guarantee anything else after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, because his conditions were indeed somewhat harsh.

 Chapter 352: Stone Men

    Chapter 352: Stone Men

    After three days, the five chiefs of the mountain people once again met in Brettel City. Apart from the aged Adleman, the other fourparatively young leaders actually all agreed to Han Shuo¡¯s demands.

    Eventually, even Adleman whocked the others¡¯ lofty ambitions, agreed with the four young mountain leaders to bring down the majority of the mountain people in the mines to join the army. Adleman would be responsible for extracting ore from the five nearby mines and a portion of the ore would be allocated to the four young leaders.

    Brettel City was now brimming with life. Eight thousand people came from the five mines to join the city¡¯s burgeoning popce. Dorcas, called back by the news, decided to reorganize his troops. He broke up their traditional formations to form fourrge units, cing Han Shuo¡¯s people as theirmanders.

    Even though the mountain people had previously acquired a smattering of weapons and armor, Brettel City didn¡¯t have the equipment to fully arm eight thousand new recruits.

    An armaments workshop funded by the Boozt Merchant Guild was quickly set up by Jack and Dorcas. It began operating at the site of the former workshops on Mount Silk. In addition, Brettel City also allocated funds to purchase smelting facilities, while the Boozt Merchant Guild was put in charge of hiring skilled metalworkers.

    Since Han Shuo still had the assistance of the dwarves from the Dark Forest, he instructed the weaponsmiths at Mount Silk to focus on forging armour. The dwarves¡¯ ability to forge weapons was far superior to anything a human could make, but in return, their armor weren¡¯t as refinedpared to those forged by humans.

    Dorcas sent every one of the four mountain people units into harsh training, a regimen of his own devising. A former student of the Lancelot Imperial Academy, Dorcas was definitely a talented fieldmander. Under his training, the eight thousand mountain people saw a noticeable improvement in their strength.

    After Faulke returned, he began instructing the mountain people in the proper usage ofbat wagons, ballista wagons, and catapults. This type of powerful defensive weaponry required strong people to operate them, and the mountain people were perfectly suited to this task. Under the auspices of Faulke, the mountain people learned how to properly operate Brettel City¡¯s gates and thebat wagons.

    As the days passed, Dorcas found Han Shuo one day, and proposed a suggestion. ¡°My Lord, the moat outside of Brettel City¡¯s gates is full of shallow sewage. Now that we have the eight thousand mountain people at our disposal, we can spend some time making the moat even deeper. This way, even if the seven grand duchies decide to invade, the moat will cause them to lose a lot of men.¡±

    Brettel City¡¯s moat had originally only been halfpleted, but since Brettel City had been sacked again and again by the seven grand duchies, the construction of the moat had been left as an unfinished project. In the end, Brettel City became a lost cause, and the moat was eventually forgotten.

    Dorcas was indeed a skilled strategist, immediately seeing the value in the moat outside Brettel City¡¯s gates. Since the moat had already been given an initial shape, it wouldn¡¯t take too much time and material to finish building it. When Brettel City¡¯s moat wasplete, it would act as a severe blow to the invaders.

    This suggestion was immediately taken to heart by Han Shuo. The mountain people, rxing after learning how to operate the defensive siege weaponry, were immediately put to work again on expanding the city¡¯s moats and making them deeper.

    Han Shuo¡¯s arrival had also drastically increased the number of Dark Mantle agents operating in Brettel City. With Dick managing them, they then proceeded to infiltrate the seven grand duchies, resulting in a steady stream of information. If information concerning Brettel City was brought up, that would also be dutifully recorded and passed on to Dick, then Han Shuo.

    As an emissary of Second Dark Star, Han Shuo far outranked Dick. In fact, Han Shuo even possessed the authority to award medals and citations to members who had contributions to their name. Amongst those select few stood Chester. Under Han Shuo¡¯s deliberate rmendation, he became the second most powerful person in Brettel City¡¯s Dark Mantle branch, second only to Dick. In addition, Chester had also risen in rank within Dark Mantle.

    One day, Adleman suddenly sought out Han Shuo, who was studying necromancy magic. Delia of Mount Silk, who¡¯d entered the military by now, also entered by his side.

    ¡°My lord, numerous stone men have appeared at the mines halfway up the mountain. These stone men have been attacking miners at the deepest ces in the mines, causing scores of deaths. These stone men don¡¯t fear magic, and their bodies are too tough. We don¡¯t know how to deal with them, so we were wondering if you would be able to help us.¡± Upon finding Han Shuo, Adleman immediately told him what had happened.

    Han Shuo was shocked. Frowning, he asked ¡°Stone men? How can there be stone men in the mines? Was there anything like this in the past?¡±

    Wearing soft armour, the heroic and imposing Delia had a tall nose and long legs. Standing ramrod straight, she presented an imposing figure. She shook her head at Han Shuo¡¯s question, replying, ¡°No, this has never happened before. Even since my father took over Mount Silk, there were never been any traces of stone men in there.¡±

    Delia was originally the leader of Mount Silk. Even now, Delia still had many subordinates on the mountain. The people of Delia¡¯s father¡¯s generation had lived there before. Now that stone men had appeared, the former leader of the mountain people was now the focus of attention.

    ¡°Those stone men found halfway up Mount Silk... did you suddenly find them after re-opening an area?¡± Han Shuo continued to ask, brows furrowed.

    Nowadays, not only did Mount Silk have mountain people mining there, but it also had a coborative armaments workshop jointly owned by the Boozt Merchant Guild and Brettel City. It produced ten or so sets of high-quality armor every day. When more metalworkers arrived, the weapons workshop would then be able to operate more to Han Shuo¡¯s satisfaction.

    The mines on Mount Silk had abundant supplies of iron and copper ore. Taking advantage of this, the ore could be directly smelted into iron and copper. They would then be mixed with various other metals and forged into suits of armour by experienced metalworkers. In the eyes of Han Shuo, not only was Mount Silk an important source of ore, but also the crux of his armament campaign. As such, Han Shuo was greatly concerned about what Adleman had said.

    ¡°It is, My Lord. When we were excavating further below, we found that the iron deposits seemed to be even richer. When we were nning to send people down, a bunch of stone men appeared from an unknown ce. These stone men seemed to have a very pitiful intelligence, making it impossible tomunicate with them. They immediately began attacking us, and killed quite a few of our miners.¡± Adleman replied.

    ¡°So it¡¯s like this!¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment and nodded. He said ¡°I¡¯ll go with you to Mount Silk to see what¡¯s going on with the stone men in the mines.¡±

    ¡°Thank you, My Lord!¡± Adleman gratefully replied.

    ¡°My Lord, Mount Silk was my region to govern; even now, I still have many friends there. I want to go with you to take a look. I hope that My Lord will allow me to.¡± Delia stared at Han Shuo with glittering eyes, beseeching him. Since entering the military, the mountain folk had to follow orders and couldn¡¯t do as they wished. It looked like Dorcas¡¯ trainingtely had already taken effect. Delia seemed much more rule abiding now than the first time Han Shuo had met her.

    Han Shuo simply nodded ¡°Alright then.¡±

    One could see quite a bit of green at the base of Mount Silk. However, the amount of green decreased as one went up the mountain. There were craggy rocks as far as the eye could see, without a trace of flora or fauna.

    Spring had arrived. The warm weather also felt veryfortable. Han Shuo, Adleman, and Delia, along with a group of mountain people, walked towards Mount Silk. Due to his advanced age, Adleman walked more slowly than the rest, so Han Shuo had no choice but to walk slowly up the mountain with him.

    Delia radiated her beauty along the way, dressed in light armour. Her arms and legs were bare, and she wore sparkling silver armor covering the ¡°important ces¡± on her chest. She glistened beneath the sun. Itplimented her wheat-colored skin, mesmerizing and attracting the gazes of Adleman¡¯s young escorts.

    In Brettel City, Delia was known as the number one beauty amongst the mountain people. But by the same token, her strength was also something extraordinary. Due to her previous position, nobody dared to be impudent. Delia was now a mere captain, but since her strength was enough to suppress both Jack and Kent, ordinary mountain people had no way of catching her attention.

    On the way to Mount Silk, Han Shuo thought about the stone men in the mines with a heart full of suspicion. Not knowing where the mountain people hade from, he didn¡¯t pay attention to Delia¡¯s infatuated fans.

    Halfway up Mount Silk, Delia asked Han Shuo ¡°My Lord, how do you n on dealing with those stone men?¡±

    Han Shuo was in deep thought. He turned his head and gave a dazzling smile, saying ¡°We¡¯ll see after we arrive there. We won¡¯t know how to deal with the stone men before we see them.¡±

    ¡°If it¡¯s like this...if the stone men attack us in the same way that our enemies attack us, then what do we do?¡± Delia continued to inquire, looking at Han Shuo with shining eyes.

    ¡°Then we¡¯ll turn them into stone forever.¡± Han Shuo casually replied.

    Hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, Delia nodded, saying ¡°They dared to kill people from my tribe. I won¡¯t let them off the hook. Damnable stone men, I¡¯ll make you pay!¡±

    It seemed as if Delia really cared about the ten or so miners who were killed. From this, Han Shuo deduced that Delia was a person who really cared for her subordinates. Even though she was no longer responsible for Mount Silk, upon hearing that there was a crisis, she had immediately requested to go investigate with Han Shuo. This proved that Delia was indeed kind to her subordinates.

    After Han Shuo had made his stance towards the stone men clear, Delia appeared more rxed around Han Shuo,ter excitedly inquiring about Han Shuo¡¯s experiences, especially his challenge of various experts in the Lancelot Empire and the corpses thaty behind him because of then. She also inquired about his conflict with the Brut Merchant Alliance, Cain, and the like-minded. Delia expressed a strong interest in these things.

    There were many merchants in Brettel City who hade from Ossen City. These merchants were very familiar with some of Han Shuo¡¯s exploits. Due to their reverence of Han Shuo, they exaggerated stories of Han Shuo¡¯s heroic deeds, and ryed those to the citizens of Brettel City.

    This unconsciously resulted in the citizens of Brettel City alling to know Han Shuo¡¯s past experiences. Combined with his previous battles with the four bandit groups, Han Shuo¡¯s prestige in the city was beyond imagination. In the eyes of the citizens of Brettel City, a city lord who could provide safety and prosperity was far more trustworthy than that king in Ossen City who had abandoned them.

    Responding to Delia¡¯s excited questioning, Han Shuo didn¡¯t say much, only borating a few sentences. However, the more Han Shuo appeared remote, the more interested Delia became. Delia spent the whole journey asking about Han Shuo¡¯s duels with other strong figures.

    After a headache inducing talk, the group finally reached the entrance of the mines. There was already a group of miners, with dust-coated faces and muddy clothes, waiting for them. These young miners were pleasantly surprised upon seeing Delia, joyfully shouting ¡°Boss!¡±

    From the miners¡¯ genuine delight in seeing Delia, Han Shuo could tell that Delia was a good leader in their eyes. He looked a bit askance at her. When Delia saw Han Shuo look at her with surprise, she stuck out her well-rounded bosom with a bit of pride, seeming to say that, ¡°See that? I¡¯m actually quite good!¡±

    Han Shuoughed involuntarily at Delia¡¯s behavior and didn¡¯t excessively voice his opinion. When Delia asked about the miners using the tone of a leader, Han Shuo released the yin demon while listening to the content of their conversation, slowly flying toward the area said to have problems.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go inside and see what¡¯s going on.¡± Delia instructed to a group of miners as Han Shuo used the yin demon to look inside.

    ¡°Hold on. Mister Adleman, you shouldn¡¯t go inside.¡± Han Shuo suddenly said. ¡°It¡¯s cold and wet inside. With your advanced age, you should wait outside for a bit.¡±

    Adleman didn¡¯t persist, knowing that with his body¡¯s condition, he would only be a nuisance if he went inside. He smiled and agreed, saying ¡°Thank you for My Lord¡¯s understanding.¡± Smiling and nodding his head, Han Shuo looked at Delia and her group, and led the group into the dark caverns of the mine.

 Chapter 353: Place of extreme metal

    Chapter 353: ce of extreme metal

    The caverns of the mines were dark and humid. Yet Han Shuo, someone who should¡¯ve been unfamiliar with the mine, was rushing forward as if very familiar with the area.

    At first, Delia had even expected him to take the rearmost position. Who would¡¯ve thought that Han Shuo would just advance without even taking one step backward from beginning to end? What was even more surprising that Han Shuo led the way like he was the guide. There was no mistakes made as he went straight into the depths of the mine.

    After a while, Delia couldn¡¯t hold in her curiosity, as the miners began to doubt their guide. She quickly walked up to Han Shuo, bright eyes staring at him as she inquired, ¡°My Lord, you¡¯ve been to Mount Silk before, haven¡¯t you?¡±

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo replied, ¡°No, I haven¡¯t. This is the my first time at Mount Silk. Why?¡±

    ¡°Really? Then howe you are so familiar with the terrain inside the mine? You haven¡¯t stopped to consider any path but one and yet you haven¡¯t taken a single incorrect turn. If you haven¡¯t been to Mount Silk before, how are you so familiar with the twists and turns here?¡± Delia was bing more and more doubtful and chased after the leisurely striding Han Shuo with a bunch of questions.

    In Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, this group of people, including Delia, wasn¡¯t very strong at all. Since the stone men deep inside the cave had no fear of magic and possessed rock solid bodies, Han Shuo had released the yin demon to scout ahead so that they wouldn¡¯t be suddenly ughtered. This, coupled with some of the miners¡¯ description, let him proceed with naturally no hesitation at all. But who knew that it would rouse Delia¡¯s doubts?

    Han Shuoughed softly and said, ¡°Didn¡¯t I already hear you guys describe the situation before we entered? My intuition towards cave terrain is highly sensitive. From your description, I can instantly and urately determine the terrain of this area. Do you believe me or not?¡±

    Hearing Han Shuo¡¯s exnation, Delia was stunned before asking with a half doubtful expression, ¡°Really?¡±

    ¡°Of course!¡± Han Shuoughed out loud, ¡°I¡¯ve never been to Mount Silk before, let alone have the chance to explore this mine. How would I be this familiar with the way if I don¡¯t have a keen sense for cave terrain?¡±

    Delia thought carefully about it. With Han Shuo¡¯s identity as the Brettel city lord and also a count, he really wouldn¡¯t have the free time toe explore the mine. Faced with this logic, she was mostly convinced upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s exnation. Subconsciously, her gaze towards him held a bit more admiration as she told herself that the city lord was really as incredible as the legends said. He was a true man indeed!

    Seeing that Delia didn¡¯t ask any other questions, Han Shuo continued to hurry onward. He had turned from guest to the guide thanks to the yin demon. The miners and Delia had be his attendants.

    The only remaining yin demon slowly went deep into the belly of Mount Silk. It soon reached a narrow and dry area based on the miners and Delia¡¯s description. This area connected the entrances of three deep tunnels to the passage they wereing in through. Rocks pressed down on the tunnel¡¯s¡¯ ceiling. If they wanted to continue ahead, they would need to be crawling on their bellies.

    ording to the miners, this was the ce they¡¯d encountered some stone menst time they¡¯d been here mining. There were even some traces left behind fromst time¡¯s mining. However, the yin demon was invisible. They wouldn¡¯t be able to discover its existence even if the stone men were hiding in the surroundings.

    Han Shuo instantly sped up when he found the right ce. Delia and the miners behind was greatly surprised as they watched his body shuffle quickly through the caves with extreme sensitivity. At this point, Delia truly believed that Han Shuo had a natural intuition for caves like he¡¯d just said. He could still determine the urate direction from theplex crossroads.

    ¡°Be careful, My Lord! Up ahead is the area where the stone men appearedst time!¡± The miners were panting heavily as they tried to keep up with Han Shuo, who was almost flying as he hurtled forward. He slowly decreased his speed so as to allow them to catch up when he heard their raised voices. At this moment, Delia finally caught up. She walked up, taking a few deep breaths to calm her heaving breasts. Her voice was filled with worry as she said, ¡°My Lord, please be careful. These stone men aren¡¯t easy to deal with. We should just advance calmly and cautiously.¡±

    It turned out Delia wasn¡¯t as casual and careless as she appeared to be. She was very careful and meticulous when it came to critical moments. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but nce at her in surprise. Right now, Delia was trying her best to regain her breath and calm her racing heart. Her twin peaks rose and fell in rhythm, attracting his attention. Han Shuo¡¯s heart skipped a beat, and he couldn¡¯t help but sneak a few more nces at her chest.

    People said any woman could tell from the men¡¯s eyes which part of her body was the focal point of attention. No matter what kind of concealing method a man did use, the woman being observed could still sense if that man had snuck a peek at her breasts or not.

    These words indeed had some truth to them. Although they were currently in the middle of a dark cave, Delia might just have discovered Han Shuo¡¯s eyes on her chest. She was somewhat shy under his lingering gaze on her towering peaks. Instinctively, Delia slightly bent down, as if wanting to cover some parts of her full chest through the bending of her waist.

    ¡°Alright, I think we¡¯ve reached the ce. You guys stay close so I can take care of you in case there¡¯s any danger.¡± Han Shuo slowed to a stop and turned to tell the people behind him.

    The miners quickly caught up, but stillgged behind Han Shuo and Delia. Fortunately, the light in the tunnel was dim, and they didn¡¯t have Han Shuo¡¯s eyesight. Being a distance behind, they didn¡¯t see the flush on Delia¡¯s face.

    The three tunnels converged midway. As the group walked a few hundred meters more, the ceiling above their heads gradually became lower. The path also narrowed, allowing only two people walk side by side. Everyone had to bend down at this point to prevent their heads from hitting the rocks.

    After passing through the narrow path, the group reached the area where the yin demon had stopped at. This ce was actually very wide, however, the rocks above their head extended quite a ways down. There were three ttened tunnels around, ones where one had to crawl on their belly if they wanted to pass.

    This ce was precisely where the stone men had suddenly appeared and attackedst time, resulting in many casualties for the miners.

    Han Shuo was 190 centimeters tall. He couldn¡¯t walked upright even if he bent down, so he had to squat down to inspect the situation. The miners who¡¯d been here before all revealed nervous expressions as they looked around carefully. They raised the crude mining tools in their hand, as if getting ready to deal with any stone men that emerged.

    Even Delia looked a little nervous. She pulled out the dagger tied to her left leg, looking around with vignce. Han Shuo and Delia were now leaning close to each other. In this area where they could face attacks at any moment, her bashfulness had long since been thrown far out of mind.

    It was due to Han Shuo¡¯s notoriety outside that Delia and the miners now felt a reassuring feeling of being able to rely on someone. If it¡¯d just been them, they would¡¯ve been on the verge of panic, not just nervous.

    Han Shuo squatted down to take a look around once before asking the miners, ¡°How tall are these stone men and what do they look like?¡±

    ¡°They¡¯re only 150 centimeters tall, but are wide horizontally so they can move very flexibly without being restrained by the low ceiling.¡± One of the miners replied.

    Hearing his words, Han Shuo looked at the three tunnels and took an estimation. The tunnels were only around a meter tall, so a human had to crawl on their belly to enter. ording to the miners, the stone men were 150 centimeters tall and very wide horizontally. They couldn¡¯t havee out from those three tunnels.

    Except for the three tunnels in this area, there was only the passage that they had juste through. If the stone men didn¡¯te from the three tunnels, could it be that they came from the passage as well?

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was full of doubts. He didn¡¯t continue observing the surrounding anymore, and sat still to think instead. He suddenly whistled in a low tone. The whistle started out faint and low, gradually became louder and high pitched, then ending in an echo like a dragon roar.

    ¡°Alright, if the stone men are close by, they will definitely hear it ande over. We only have to wait and see.¡± Han Shuo turned to tell the nervous looking miners.

    End of part one of the chapter.

    To Han Shuo¡¯s left, Delia was bending down to survey the surroundings, revealing her breathtaking curves of her waist. She only wore a soft leather miniskirt on her lower body, entuating the curve of her hips and her tantalizing bare legs. When Han Shuo caught sight of her when he turned to give orders to the miners, he couldn¡¯t help but spend a little time savoring her round buttocks.

    Most of the nervous miners didn¡¯t notice, except for the three who identally saw this beautiful scene as well. The three young men all swallowed hard, and suddenly developed a slight hunch to their posture, trying to conceal a newly rising bulge..

    Looking around, Delia abruptly turned around quickly, her bright eyes looking straight at Han Shuo, whose stare was fixed on her hips. Caught red handed, Han Shuo awkwardly coughed dryly and conscientiously turned his head away.

    Delia was flushing red. She red ferociously at the awkward Han Shuo and snorted lightly. She then angrily turned to the three miners and shouted, ¡°What are you rascals looking at? Could it be you guys already want to seek death after I leave Mount SIlk for a few days?¡±

    Finishing speaking, Delia lowered her voice to mutter, ¡°Men really are no good!¡± It was unknown whether or not this sentence was deliberately said only for Han Shuo¡¯s ears, but he¡¯d heard it indeed. He secretly thought, ¡®Aren¡¯t women meant to be looked at by men? How did you know we were peeping at you? You bent over to expose that wonderfully beautiful curved butt. Wasn¡¯t that intentional?¡¯

    As Han Shuo mused, several almost intangible wisps floated in from the three narrow tunnels. Han Shuo looked around but didn¡¯t find anything that would¡¯ve provoked them. However, as a necromancer and a demonic cultivator, he could immediately sense that these breaths was simr to the existence of the wraiths.

    He quietly cast a soul exploration magic, observing the eight murky mists, which were hidden from human eyes, slowly moving to a few dark corners. They slowly spread out, each coiling on top of arge block of rock. They then imbued each rock with a strange power.

    The originally solid rocks slowly became malleable after being suffused with these pulses of power. Afterwards, it was like someone was molding these rocks, as they split into eight stone men that the miners had faced before. Han Shuo, who was adept at both demonic magic and necromancy magic, saw this stone shaping process clearly.

    After the eight stone men slowly emerged from the corners, Han Shuo finally understood how they¡¯d suddenly appeared in this cest time. So it¡¯s actually like this, hmm! Evidently, only the souls came out of those three narrow passages, which then used the rocks here to reform their bodies.

    ¡°Eight of them, with fully formed bodies. Are they getting ready to attack?¡± Han Shuo took out the skeletal staff to summon dozens of skeletal warriors as well as zombie warriors. Some of them surrounded Delia and the miners as Han Shuo looked at the eight stone men slowlying out of the dark corners.

    The rock ceiling of this area was too low, higher rank undead creatures like the hate warriors and evil knights would be hard pressed to disy their full power. Only the short and small skeletal and zombie warriors could easily move about in this ce.

    Delia was scared out of her wits at suddenly being surrounded by a crowd of skeletal and zombie warriors. These undead creatures naturally didn¡¯t look very pleasing to the eye, and the morass of deathly aura that enveloped them sent a shiver of fear through her.

    However, upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words and seeing that they only surrounded her without any intention to attack, Delia knew that these were the guards that Han Shuo had summoned for her. She then immediately felt reassured in her heart.

    ¡°My Lord, have the stone men appeared?¡± Delia calmed down and finally reacted to Han Shuo¡¯s words, raising her dagger.

    The light here was too dim. The eight stone men were also forming in the shadows, so Delia¡¯s group simply couldn¡¯t see their movement. Nodding his head, Han Shuo smiled and said, ¡°That¡¯s right, eight stone men.¡±

    The eight scattered stone men suddenly began to attack Han Shuo as they spoke, charging in from the eight dark corners. Their bodies were formed from the iron ore of this mine, and thus ordinary magic attacks wouldn¡¯t be very effective. Even standard weapons weren¡¯t much of a threat to these stone men. No wonder so many miners had died herest time.

    However, Han Shuo¡¯s current body was much more solid than iron and rocks. He didn¡¯t even need to take out the Demonyer Edge to deal with these stone men; he just crouched and smashed directly into them.

    ¡°Interesting, just what kind of creature are you guys?¡± Han Shuo still had the leisure to ask questions even when wrestling with eight stone men.

    Surrounded by the undead creatures, Delia watched Han Shuo face the attacks from the stone men without fear. Even though some fists and kicks connected, he didn¡¯t respond at all. It was as if Han Shuo¡¯s body was even more solid than the stone men made of iron ore.

    Han Shuo mmed his bare fists on the eight stone men¡¯s bodies. This time, it was them who was forced to retreat. Sounds of metal rang out as Han Shuo¡¯s fists connected with their iron bodies, rendering Delia¡¯s group speechless as they watched with eyes and mouths wide open.

    In the Profound Continent, the only ones who counted as experts at closebat were swordsmen and knights. But they too had to use fighting aura to enhance the defensive abilities of their physical bodies. No one had ever heard of a physical body strong enough to not require the supplementation of fighting aura.

    And indeed, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t using the defensive power of magical yuan. He was simply using the durability of his body to forcefully block the stone men¡¯s attacks. When his magical cultivation reached the separate demon realm, Han Shuo¡¯s body was far sturdier than iron. Ordinary swords wouldn¡¯t even leave a mark on him anymore

    After fighting for a while and discovering that these eight stone men didn¡¯t show any signs ofmunicating amongst themselves, Han Shuo became impatient. He began to gather a bit of magical yuan on his hands as he attacked. The stone men were already reeling from the physical blows, they couldn¡¯t withstand these newly reinforced blows. Han Shuo grabbed their necks in his hand, ignoring the blows they were raining on his chests and beheading them with one crush.

    The speed of Han Shuo¡¯s movements suddenly increased. His fists, now packed with magical yuan, smashed the stone men¡¯s bodies into fragments. In the blink of an eye, the eight stone men werepletely pulverized into stone chips. Not a single whole block of stone remained.

    ¡°His Lordship is truly so strong!¡± A miner couldn¡¯t stop mumbling, a look of worship on his face.

    Delia¡¯s pretty eyes glinted with a strange light as she stared at Han Shuo. She¡¯d just watched him smash the stone men to shards using nothing but his bare hands. In the eyes of a woman who worshipped wild and strong men, this was far too irresistible. Delia couldn¡¯t stop her heart from pounding.

    ¡°Want to run? Heh heh, won¡¯t be that easy!¡± After Han Shuo destroyed the bodies of the eight stone men, the eight murky wisps from the three tunnels seemed to know that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t someone they could deal with. They began to slowly gather, nning to return the way they¡¯de.

    Be it his identity as a demonic cultivator or a necromancer, Han Shuo had methods aplenty to deal with this kind of weird soul. His left hand stretching out, a surge of murderous intent flooded out from his palm like a miniature vortex. This murderous intent was harmless to physical bodies, but those eight wisps were unable to resist its suction.

    Not only were the eight souls unable to take a single step away from Han Shuo, they were slowly absorbed by the force of the small vortex on his palm. When the eight of them fell into his palm, they were tightly held down by the murderous intent, unable to break free.

    ¡°Speak! What kind of thing are you?¡± This time, Han Shuo didn¡¯t speak audibly, but used his consciousness to transmit the message.

    The murkiness of the eight souls whirling in the high speed of the vortex on his palm slowly dispersed, and they became eight sparkling green light dots. Just like eight beautiful shining stars, the tiny tornado in Han Shuo¡¯s hand had be a facsimile of the deep and profound Milky Way.

    What should have been a dark and scary scene had turned into an intoxicatingly beautiful picture in Delia¡¯s eyes. It was as if Han Shuo¡¯s hand was an endless starry sky, sparkling with the twinkling of the night stars. If, at this moment, someone asked her which man could pluck the stars from the night sky for her, she¡¯d instantly answer without hesitation: it was definitely the man right in front of her. There was a sky full of stars in his grasp.

    After using his consciousness to transmit the message, Han Shuo felt a weak response. The consciousness of these eight souls was too smallpared to his powerful consciousness. Therefore, the message they transmitted was also very faint, ¡°Mercy please. We are the miners who died to the mine copse before. Our souls didn¡¯t disperse, but drifted to a strange ce and absorbed a strange energy, bing what you see here.¡±

    Han Shuo stilled his mind to listen carefully. When he gradually understood the message, he was stunned, ¡°What was that strange ce?¡±

    ¡°We don¡¯t know either. Strange energy filled that area. We don¡¯t know why our souls slowly became powerful when we absorbed some of that energy. We can even have the power to manipte stone and form bodies of stone for ourselves. We couldn¡¯t let the miners harvest that area and destroy that ce of miraculous energy, so we attacked the miners. We beg you, please let us go. We won¡¯t dare to do that from now on.¡± The eight souls on Han Shuo¡¯s palm had joined together, clearing up the message they transmitted.

    Han Shuo first frowned in doubt when he started listening, before inspiration struck. He suddenly yelled out in delight, ¡°Haha, I know now. So that¡¯s how it is!¡±

    This joyous loud scream wasn¡¯t a silentmunication, but a loud cheer that broke through the air. This made Delia¡¯s group jump in shock. They stared inexplicably at him, not knowing why he¡¯d suddenly became so high spirited.

    ¡°My Lord, what is it?¡± When she looked at Han Shuo this time, Delia didn¡¯t know why she suddenly felt that he was the most tempting of men. Her voice had unknowingly turned soft and tender.

    ¡°Nothing much.¡± Han Shuo took out the skeletal staff to send all of the undead creatures around Delia¡¯s group back to the strange dimension. He then thought for a bit before responding, ¡°You guys should stop mining from this area from now, or you¡¯ll meet with danger. You can juste pick up harvested ore once a month. Mm, rest assured the stone men won¡¯t attack you anymore. Alright, you guys leave first, leave this matter for me to handle.¡±

    Delia¡¯s crew was full of doubt at Han Shuo¡¯s words. They only saw him easily annihte the stone men, but didn¡¯t know why he would say what he had.

    ¡°My Lord, can you tell us what¡¯s going on here?¡± Delia thought for a moment before asking Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oh, the stone men have submitted to me. From now on, they will have to mine a portion of ore every month, at rates surely more productive than you. You only need toe here once a month to collect it. I have agreed to let them have the area around these three tunnels as their living ce in return for helping you with the mining.¡± Han Shuo smiled and exined to Delia.

    ¡°But, didn¡¯t the stone men die already?¡± Delia asked, puzzled.

    ¡°They didn¡¯t. Their souls are still in my hand. You guys can be at ease and leave. From now on, you only have toe here once a month to collect the ore. This is the best of both worlds.¡± Han Shuo exined to Delia.

    Delia had originallye looking for the stone men to settle their debt. Now that Han Shuo had destroyed their bodies, captured their souls, and offered such favorable conditions, she readily agreed to Han Shuo¡¯s words without asking too much about it.

    ¡°Alright. I¡¯ll leave with them first. I¡¯ll wait for you at the entrance.¡± Delia didn¡¯t ask why Han Shuo wanted to remain here. She spoke a few words to the miners before leading them back the way they¡¯de.

    After Delia¡¯s group left, Han Shuo followed the guidance of the stone men¡¯s souls to crawl into a narrow tunnel on his belly. Proceeding forward for seven, eight hundred meters, he suddenly emerged into a vast area.

    Every part of this area was covered by stones of various colors. The rock wall over his head was a light silver color, sparkling with a silvery sheen. A variety red, purple and white ores were present, some of which Han Shuo knew and some he¡¯d never heard of before. They were scattered everywhere in this wondrous area.

    A dense sense of metal element filled the area. There was an enormous rock pir in the center exuding a concentrated force of metal.

    The ce of extreme metal ¨C thest of the five ces of extreme elements, had finally revealed itself in front of Han Shuo!

 Chapter 354: Metal attribute treasure â€“ The Golden Cudgel?

    Chapter 354: Metal attribute treasure ¨C The Golden Cudgel?

    The central stone pir in the ce of extreme metal was shining with a faint golden luster. It was also where the metal element was the most dense.

    The ce of extreme metal was the most difficult one to form out of the five extreme ces, because no matter where, humans had a tireless and endless enthusiasm for harvesting ore. Be it tnd or high mountain, as long as that area was rich with ore, people would flock to it like flies to cow dung and exploit all of its minerals.

    It¡¯d take hundreds of thousands of years for a ce of extreme metal to gradually form. If this formation process was disturbed because of the exploitation of the ore, it¡¯d be difficult for it to restore itself back its natural state. All of the five ces of extreme elements were formed thanks to their unique terrain as well as the forces of nature. Even Chu Cang Lan, who¡¯d cultivated his demonic magic to the nine changes realm, had been incapable of using human ability to create the five ces of extreme elements or repair them when they were damaged.

    All five ces of extreme elements had been formed from millions of years of umtion. IT was simply impossible to use human effort to change this. Just like the ce of extreme fire, this ce of extreme metal had also existed for eons. The enormous, glittering stone pir in the center must be the metal attribute treasure nurtured by the ce of extreme metal.

    There was a legend in Han Shuo¡¯s previous world about the Immortal Monkey King. He had originally been a stone monkey who obtained his weapon, the magic needle of the Calm Sea ¨C the Golden Cudgel, from the Dragon Pce beneath the seas. ording to the legend, the cudgel was the metal attribute treasure born from an extreme metal ce millions of years old.

    Because the Monkey King himself was born with the metal attribute, he was able to skillfully utilize the power of the metal attribute treasure. That was how he¡¯d became an evesting, legendary, immortal existence back on Han Shuo¡¯s Earth.

    It seemed the shimmering golden stone pir standing quietly in the center of the cavern was the treasure of this ce of extreme metal. As for whether or not its power was as miraculous as the Golden Cudgel, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t too aware.

    However, Han Shuo understood that only the elite zombie refined from the ce of extreme metal would have the ability to master this metal attribute treasure. It was like how it had to be the fire elite zombie who took charge of the fire attribute treasure ¨C the fire lotus. Therefore, Han Shuo didn¡¯t easily touch that metal attribute treasure, afraid that he would destroy the natural operations of the ce of extreme metal.

    Arriving next to the stone pir, Han Shuo reached out to gently tap it. A crisp metallic ring echoed out, it was indeed the sound of metal. Dense ripples of metal element slowly rolled from the stone pir onto his fingertips, turning Han Shuo¡¯s body a little stiff.

    ¡°Sure enough, a metal attribute treasure alright. It seems the metal elite zombie is quite lucky!¡± Han Shuo softly eximed. He took a tour around the ce of extreme metal to view a variety of precious, rare ores that shimmered slightly. Han Shuo¡¯s heart was filled with delight. However, he didn¡¯t move a single ore in the ce of extreme metal. Han Shuo didn¡¯t want to act rashly before he gathered all of the materials to refine the metal elite zombie. He wanted to avoid changing the natural formation of this ce and prevent causing irreversible damage.

    ¡°Metal elite zombie ah metal elite zombie, you are the only one left. Now even your weapon is already made.¡± Han Shuo murmured. He opened his right hand, scattering the eight light dots in the ce of extreme metal. He ordered, ¡°Protect this ce well. Kill anyone, even the miners, who tries toe here.¡±

    ¡°Understood. We won¡¯t let anyone vandalize this ce.¡± The eight souls transmitted their resolution in response.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t remain in the ce of extreme metal. As his heart burned with the anxiety to immediately gather all of the necessary materials to refine the metal elite zombie, he instantly left the way he¡¯de in. At the area with the three tunnels, Han Shuo used the Demonyer Edge to slice off a few huge stone boulders to block the tunnels, leaving only a hole as thick as an arm for the souls enter and exit.

    Stepping out of the belly of Mount Silk, Han Shuo saw Delia and the miners still waiting at the entrance. The administrator of the five mines,elder Adleman, was also there.

    ¡°Did you handle everything?¡± Delia¡¯s eyes instantly brightened as soon as she saw Han Shuo, asking enthusiastically.

    Han Shuo nodded with a radiant smile and said, ¡°That¡¯s right. From now on, not only will those stone men stop attacking the miners, they will even hand over some ore to you.¡±

    Pausing for a bit, Han Shuo looked solemnly at Delia and Adleman before saying, ¡°However, you have to remember, no one is allowed through the three tunnels that the stone men reside in. It won¡¯t be my responsibility if anyone dies after trespassing.¡±

    Adleman hastily guaranteed the oue when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s warning, ¡°Rest assured, My Lord, I will definitely discipline the miners well and won¡¯t let them enter that area.¡±

    ¡°My Lord, rest assured, I think they won¡¯t dare toe in anyway. After all, only my Lord can deal with those stone men. How can some miners possibly be their opponents?¡± Delia¡¯s brightly shining eyes were still glued to Han Shuo¡¯s body as she replied with a chuckle.

    Han Shuo also thought that to be the case when he heard Delia¡¯s words. He recalled that the rock solid stone men didn¡¯t seem to fear magic. In that narrow space, even senior swordsmen would be courting death if they were to face the stone men. Although the bodies of the mountain people were strong and sturdy, their strength was still a far cry from that of the stone men. They naturally wouldn¡¯t be so foolish to go seek their own death.

    ¡°Alright. You guys only need to go to that ce once a month to collect the ore. The stone men have already agreed to my demands. They are much better at harvesting ores than you guys anyway. They will always help you mine the ore as long as you don¡¯t interfere with their lives.¡± Han Shuo replied.

    ¡°Many thanks to my Lord, many thanks to my Lord!¡± Adleman was truly grateful to Han Shuo, bowing ceremoniously as he spoke..

    ¡°Elder, no need to stand on ceremony. This is only something I should do as the city lord of Brettel City.¡± Han Shuo helped him up and spoke with all sincerity.

    With the stone men crisis resolved, Han Shuo didn¡¯t remain on Mount Silk. Adleman and his subordinates resided on Mount Silk, so they didn¡¯t return to Brettel City. There were now only Han Shuo and Delia on the way back.

    Han Shuo was feeling a mounting sense of urgency, and he desperately wanted to ditch Delia and return straight to Brettel City. However, as he thought about it carefully, he came to the conclusion that doing so would be a bit rude to her. Therefore, Han Shuo slowly walked through the rugged mountain road down to the main road with her.

    Han Shuo now felt a tad guilty about his actions. He¡¯d been caught peeping at her in the mine and still hadn¡¯t take the initiative to start a conversation. However, Delia¡¯s gaze at him had been somewhat strange ever since they¡¯d left the mine. Her sexily dressed, hot body didn¡¯t seem to be ill at ease either. Instead, she even tried to deliberately puff out her chest.

    Even though Han Shuo was no gentleman, they were currently observing propriety as they made their way down the mountain. He¡¯d already been caught stealing nces, and his mind was upied by the the matter of finding the materials to refine the metal elite zombie, so his perverted nature wasn¡¯t as strong as usual. He didn¡¯t sneak a single nce at Delia¡¯s chest along the way.

    However, such behavior from Han Shuo was mistakenly branded as hypocrisy by Delia. With her identity as the most beautiful mountain woman in addition to her outstanding strength, her eye for men was very finicky. She hadn¡¯t chosen anyone among the young mountain men for so many years, and only toyed around with those who admired her.

    Delia¡¯s 170 centimeters body was very tall. To the general mountain people, that height was enough capital for her to strut around with. However, in the face of Han Shuo¡¯s 190 centimeters height, Delia no longer felt proud. Moreover, back in the mine, she had been even more overwhelmed upon witnessing Han Shuo¡¯s thunderous assault that shattered the stone men to pieces. With her heart that only sought to admire the strong, Han Shuo was her perfect target in every aspect.

    Suddenly, Delia leapt to block the road in front of Han Shuo, her shining eyes staring hotly at him, her soft, silky breasts heaving.

    Han Shuo was caught off guard and almost bumped into Delia¡¯s soft chest. He immediately came to a stop, subconsciously taking a step back. He looked at her, somewhat confused as he asked, ¡°What is it?¡±

    ¡°My Lord, you are a true man. I like you!¡± Contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, Delia¡¯s burning eyes was fixed on him as she boldly confessed her true feelings. The mountain women were very straightforward in their character, and Delia was one of the more outstanding specimens. She was wild, daring in love and daring in hate. The normal women of Lancelot Empire weren¡¯t so bold and frank.

    Such a confession from Delia astonished Han Shuo. He squinted, and swept his eyes up and down Delia¡¯s body, as if wanting to see her clearly.

    As Han Shuo eyes roamed her body, Delia instinctively felt somewhat shy, especially when his eyes fell upon her tall and full twin peaks. Some of the sensitive parts near her waist also weren¡¯t spared. Under the caress of his bold gaze, her body started to burn, making her a little embarrassed. However, Delia wasn¡¯t as timid as those ordinary women. She had confirmed Han Shuo her target, so she didn¡¯t retreat despite her shyness. Instead, she even pushed out her breasts, seeming very confident in her own body.

    ¡°You¡¯re not bad.¡± Han Shuo suddenly smiled faintly a long whileter and spoke softly.

    Delia was delighted. A passionate smile blooming on her lips, she spoke boldly to Han Shuo, ¡°My Lord, then, you want me, don¡¯t you?¡±

    End of part one of the chapter.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo answered, ¡°I¡¯m sorry. I already have a woman, and I love my woman.¡±

    Delia¡¯s face dimmed when she heard those words. She silently hung her head for a moment before lifting her face again and said stubbornly, ¡°I, Delia, have never had any man before. Only you have been powerful enough to make me lose my resolve. Whether or not you have a woman, I want to be your woman.¡±

    Han Shuo was bbergasted. He looked at Delia¡¯s stubborn face, the face of a woman who didn¡¯t seem to know the meaning of defeat. His first thought was that either this woman had been feted by the gazes of adoration of the mountain men for too long, or maybe her standards were too high. It seemed like she was setting her mind on her own objective, regardless of his willingness.

    Han Shuo himself wasn¡¯t a gentleman who could control his desires with a beautiful woman sitting on hisp. Otherwise, there wouldn¡¯t be Emily and Phoebe, and of course, Fanny whom he was obsessed with. Of course, Han Shuo was a horny male that had to mount every woman he saw. A demonic practitioner like Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t have any scruples about the secr constraints. As long as he was genuinely interested in a woman, he¡¯d throw all morality to the wind.

    Delia¡¯s body was extremely tempting, and her face was also very beautiful. Han Shuo didn¡¯t deny that he lusted for her beauty. However, that was all it was, lust. If there was no responsibility attached to having sex with her, he would¡¯ve have taken her without hesitation.

    However, everything had its limits. If Delia persistently wanted to be with him, but he only stayed at Brettel City long enough to toy with her, only to abandon her afterwards, then the thirty thousand mountain men here would be unwilling to let go of this matter. Han Shuo also didn¡¯t want to poke at this kind of hot potato.

    ¡°Hehe, I really do have, and not just one.¡± Han Shuo first exined a little before continuing, ¡°Honestly speaking, I only have a bit of interest towards you. However, it¡¯s just the interest a man would have towards the body of a beautiful woman, not the kind that you feel. You should understand what I mean, yes?¡±

    ¡°What? You have more than one woman?¡± Contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, Delia didn¡¯t care too much about the implications of his words. Her surprise had only led her to rify the first sentence.

    Han Shuo nodded, inwardly pondering if Delia would sprout some nonsense. However, as he thought about it, this matter would be exposed sooner orter, so he didn¡¯t deny it. Han Shuo answered with a nod, ¡°Mhm, there is indeed more than one. So what of it?¡±

    ¡°Then that means you won¡¯t mind having me as another one! I¡¯m willing to be one of your women. It¡¯s still better than being the sole woman in the heart of a mediocre man.¡± Her eyes gleaming with excitement, Delia continued, ¡°I knew it. A man like you can¡¯t just have one woman. Adding me in should be no problem, right?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes and mouth were wide open in shock at Delia¡¯s words. These mountain women were unexpectedly bold and straightforward. Even someone as free as Han Shuo, who¡¯d always done whatever he wanted, found this attitude hard to digest.

    Delia still wanted to discuss this matter in detail, while Han Shuo was set on heading out to find the materials to refine the metal elite zombie. Not knowing how to respond to Delia, he responded directly, ¡°Let¡¯s discuss thister. For now, I still have no interest in you. I¡¯ll consider your proposal when I¡¯m interested in you. Alright, I have some matters to take care of, so I¡¯m going first.¡±

    Han Shuo shot towards the sky as soon as thest words left his mouth. His magical yuan circted to radiate an aura that ced him high over the entire world, and he turned into a ck streak of light that disappeared into the clouds without a trace.

    Delia watched with infatuation as Han Shuo¡¯s flying posture gradually disappeared into the horizon. She revealed a resolute smile, firmly nodding her head and whispering to herself, ¡°I¡¯ll definitely make you fall for me. My Lord, keke, only a man like you can make me submit from the bottom of my heart!¡±

    Of course, Han Shuo didn¡¯t hear these words. He flew all the way to Brettel City and looked for little fatty Jack, giving him the list of materials needed to refine the metal elite zombie, saying, ¡°Acquire these materials for me. Use the Boozt Merchant Guild or whatever merchant guild, just get me these materials as soon as possible.¡±

    ¡°No problem!¡± Possessing a mountain of gold coins, Jack replied with a hundred percent of his lung power. He was projecting an extraordinary spirit that screamed ¡®Consider it done!¡¯. When he finished those words, he added, ¡°Oh, right, Dick was looking for you.¡±

    Hearing that Dick was looking for him, Han Shuo parted ways with Jack. He went straight to the Dark Mantle stronghold in Brettel City, since Dick was normally there. He really did find Dick there after arriving at the Brettel City¡¯s Dark Mantle stronghold. Thetter was processing and organizing some intelligence on the seven grand duchies sent back from his subordinates.

    Seeing Han Shuo abruptlye in, Dick quickly stood up to salute with surprise. He then sat down and asked with a smile, ¡°My Lord, what have youe here for?¡±

    ¡°I heard from Jack that you were looking for me. Did something happen?¡± Han Shuo asked Dick as soon as he sat down.

    There were only six members, including Dick, in this secret stronghold. However, Han Shuo was absolutely sure that there were more than six Dark Mantle members stationed at Brettel City. It was just that they were usually scattered across the city or the seven grand duchies. They were all undercover or carrying out a secret mission.

    They wouldn¡¯te here unless circumstances warranted it. Only when they acquired an urate piece of intelligence or sessfullypleted a mission would theye in to report to Dick. Originally, Dick had been stretched thin for manpower. However, when Han Shuo had arrived here, Candide had reassigned some members to Brettel City to be under Han Shuo¡¯s directmand.

    All of the Lancelot Empire¡¯s secret activities were singlehandedly managed by Candide. Even Brettel City, located at the extreme east of the Empire, was under his control. As Candide¡¯s most outstanding underling, Han Shuo also had the right to manage the personnelwork of the Dark Mantle in Brettel City in addition to being the Brettel city lord. Dick was naturally under Han Shuo¡¯s jurisdiction.

    ¡°My Lord, I looked for you because I¡¯ve acquired some information. It was just that you weren¡¯t in the mansion at that time. I didn¡¯t expect you to personallye find me. The honor truly frightens this little one.¡± Dick himself also sat down with a smile before exining to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Alright alright, less nonsense. What actually happened?¡± In private, Han Shuo and Dick never continued their master-servant act for long.

    Dick chuckled and let out a cough. Face turning solemn, he said, ¡°We may just have a big problem this time. All of the seven grand duchies havee to a truce. ording to the information our people sent back, the grand dukes of all seven duchies will soon have a secret meeting at a mountain valley. We have no way to knowing the agenda for the meeting, but I¡¯m almost certain they¡¯re convening to figure out how to deal with us.¡±

    The seven grand duchies had tirelessly waged war within themselves when Brettel City was no threat. However, now that the Brettel City had revealed its ferocious, domineering momentum, it naturally became the single biggest threat to the seven grand duchies.

    The seven grand duchies were all split from the Vanerdun Dynasty. A hundred years ago, the royal family had fought amongst each other for the throne and split the Vanerdun Dynasty into seven duchies. Afterwards, they had gradually became today¡¯s seven grand duchies. When there was no external threat, they delighted in invading each other for benefits. However, their history made them family, and amon enemy would quickly find themselves facing a tight knit alliance of the seven duchies. .

    The Lancelot Empire hadn¡¯t clearly understood this peculiar situationst time and was tempted into invading the seven grand duchies. Ultimately, the seven grand duchies had allied to beat the Lancelot Empire into retreat. Also from that event, Brettel City had fallen into a slump, reduced into a worthless existence.

    ¡°It seems the seven grand duchies now consider Brettel City a new threat. Hehe, we should be proud. Brettel City¡¯s poption doesn¡¯t even touch a hundred thousand, far less than any of the seven grand duchies. I didn¡¯t think they¡¯d think so highly of us.¡± Han Shuo smiled coldly at Dick.

    ¡°My Lord, the seven grand duchies absolutely can¡¯t be taken lightly. They can¡¯t bepared to ordinary bandit groups. They are a true army. Not only do they possessplete sets of siege equipment, their years of constant warfare has resulted in theirmon soldiers being of high quality. They are even one notch stronger than the standard army of the Lancelot Empire.¡± Dick smiled wryly as he exined to Han Shuo, ¡°In addition, each duchy has at least thirty to forty thousand soldiers on standby, not to mention the many private armies of the local aristocrats. If every man is roused to fight, and the seven grand duchiesbine forces, their total force would probably be double that of our poption. We absolutely cannot underestimate them!¡±

    ¡°Rest assured. I already have a n. I just won¡¯t let them ally together.¡± Han Shuoughed sinisterly as his thoughts began to spin.

 Chapter 355: Ambush

    Chapter 355: Ambush

    The seven grand duchies had gathered at a secret meeting ce in Sakamimir Valley. Although the seven grand dukes had created an alliance to fight against Brettel City, they did not trust each other enough to try holding this meeting in one of their duchies.

    Thus, in the end the seven grand dukes decided to gather their armies at a neutral location, Sakamimir Valley. The majority of the soldiers were temporarily camping in the ins outside the valley, while the seven grand dukes and their most elite experts convened at the center of the valley.

    Warm,fortable sunlight bathed the flowers and nts that grew on the valley¡¯s slopes. At the center of the Sakamimir Valley, a simple tent had been erected on some t ground next to a stream. Inside stood seven grand dukes, secretly negotiating something as their subordinates stood by their sides.

    If a mishap actually urred here, the seven grand duchies would suffer a fatal blow. Thus, not only were there numerous knights guarding the tent, but the tent wasyered with magical barriers protecting the seven grand dukes within.

    The points of contention within the tent was who the leader of the allied army would be, what checks and bnces should be put in ce, and how they would split the spoils of war. The years of warfare between them before this had created several grudges on the battlefield. This sudden new threat forced them to leave their differences unresolved, so there were bound to be some conflicts arising.

    Helen Tina of the Helon Duchy had been feeling extremely agitatedtely, and it showed; she was not as beautiful as before. She was clearly very haggard. The news of her being vited had spread like wildfire among the seven grand dukes. Thus, Helen Tina had be a target of ridicule overnight. Furthermore, anyone who saw her would have a strange look in their eyes. Those gazes made Helen Tina itch.

    Furthermore, Benedict Sackville of Narsen Duchy, who had originally been a reliable ally, had be distant ever since the news had gone on to be public knowledge. Even now, after meeting Benedict Sackville here in person, he was clearly not as attentive as before, only giving her a polite greeting.

    Helen Tina understood the root of the problem. However, because Han Shuo had truly captured her and imprisoned her within Brettel City for a couple of days, even if she had a hundred mouths, she wouldn¡¯t be able to exin her innocence. During this time, the arrogant Helen Tina had also suffered a lot from those strange looks from others. Even some of Helen Empire¡¯s citizens believed that the tainted Helen Tina was not suited to be a grand duke.

    If it wasn¡¯t for her merciless and bloody methods in suppressing the rebellion, killing nine rebelling nobles in session, perhaps she would have lost her status within Helen Duchy. Now, in the middle of the meeting between the seven duchies, Helen Tina was once again treated with neglect.

    At this time, Benedict Sackville was embroiled in an argument with Bavenden Duchy¡¯s Alec Ambridge. The crux of the problemy in the distribution of the spoils of war. Specifically, Alec Ambridge fancied the six magic crystal cannons within Brettel City that was worth six hundred thousand gold coins. Thus, he relentlessly fought for the right to take all six of them.

    Benedict Sackville had originally purchased these six magic crystal cannons for Helen Tina from the distant Brut Merchant Alliance through his secret channel. Thus, Benedict Sackville believed that these six magic crystal cannons were naturally his and put his foot down, notpromising in the slightest.

    Suddenly, Helen Tina, the one who¡¯d handed over six hundred thousand gold coins for the cannons in the first ce, waspletely forgotten. In the past, Benedict Sackville would have relentlessly pursued Helen at any expense. But now, he¡¯d reversed his position and was actively trying to recoup his losses.

    After taking a cold nce at the argument heating up between the six other grand dukes, Helen Tina¡¯s heart became increasingly agitated. Unconsciously, her thoughts began to wander back to that which she had be intimately familiar with over the past year or so, Han Shuo¡¯s utter ruthlessness. Comparing the six guys in front of her to the memory of that ruthless tormentor, she faintly felt like these six guys droning on in front of her were far from true men.

    Instead, the image of Brettel City Lord¡¯s ruthless and demon-like eyes kept popping up in her mind again and again. She had this gut feeling that the six grand dukes in front of her had no way of defeating the ruthless lord of Brettel City.

    Brettel City¡¯s poption didn¡¯t even reach a hundred thousand people. Without even mentioning the other six grand dukes, even the Helen Duchy alone had a military strength capable of defeating their target. Now that the alliance of six grand dukedoms intended to advance towards Brettel City, she was truly having a ridiculous thought. Even Helen Tina herself felt as though she was being absurd believing that the allied troops would be defeated.

    ¡°Duchess Helen, what do you want from Brettel City?¡± Grand Duke Randy Ard of Bonton Duchy politely walked over to the almost statue-like Helen Tina.

    Waking up from her contemtion, Helen Tina silently thought for a moment before her red lips moved, saying softly, ¡°I only want the life of Brettel City¡¯s lord. Although, victory may note as easy as we think here. I have nothing to support this im but instinct, but I feel it to be true.¡±

    ¡°Haha. Grand Duchess Helen, you must be really tired. We will surely win with the army of seven grand dukedoms allied together. Even the Lancelot Empire that soars with fame and prestige was easily defeated by us that day. But now you¡¯re saying just one shabby little Brettel City will be able to obstruct our advance? That¡¯s just way too ridiculous! Hah, after you were captured by that city lord, it seems your courage was also broken. Am I wrong, Grand Duchess Helen?¡± Alec Ambridge overheard the conversation and abruptly broke in. His sneer had no intention of concealing his contempt, outright breaking out inughter at Helen Tina.

    Originally, at such moments Benedict Sackville, who had just been arguing hot headedly with Alec Ambridge, would¡¯ve spoken out for Helen Tina. However, he was unexpectedly silent, even slowly nodding his head. It was apparently the first time he¡¯d agreed with someone who was just his enemy a moment ago.

    Helen Tina only felt a cold feeling in her heart, looking at the man who had repeated over and over again that he would take care of her until he died. She had the sudden urge tough.

    ¡°I am a little tired. You guys can keep discussing.¡± Helen Tina stood up wearily and spoke to the six other grand dukes before walking out alone.

    None of the six grand dukes urged Helen Tina to stay. Instead, Alec Ambridge waited until after she left before snorting, ¡°It looks like she¡¯s been conquered by the new city lord¡¯s skills in bed. She can¡¯t even grasp the current situation. Hehe. I really don¡¯t understand how someone could¡¯ve been so foolish in the past to relentlessly chase her.¡±

    ¡°Who are you talking about, huh?!¡± Benedict Sackville roared as his temper boiled over. Madly chasing after Helen Tina was now his greatest disgrace. He wouldn¡¯t let anyone who offended him in this respect off the hook.

    ¡°Hehe, nothing, nothing!¡± Alec Ambridge had unexpectedly found that prodding at Benedict Sackville was something rather pleasant. Seeing him burst into anger was especially gratifying especially since he had not been able to win during the fight for the magic crystal cannons.

    In the ins outside the valley, within one of the Helon Duchy¡¯s stationed tents, Helen Tina¡¯s calm face disappeared. Her heart slowly sank to a new low.

    ¡°Helen? What¡¯s wrong, why are you unhappy again?¡± Within the tent, a high ranked super beast named Firewind transformed from a phoenix into a beautiful female dressed in red before pouring a cup of tea and handing it to Helen Tina with both hands.

    ¡°Sister Firewind. Could it be that being a virgin is that important? Why is that after I came back from Brettel City, it seems like everyone dislikes me?¡± Helen Tina sighed to Firewind.

    ¡°Helen, why would you say such a thing? That Bryan did not actually do anything to you, he only ckmailed you to get a million gold coins. That¡¯s all.¡± Firewind looked at Helen Tina with astonishment and asked, confused.

    After putting down the tea cup Firewind gave her, Helen Tina sighed again and spoke with annoyance, ¡°But, everyone believes that the affair actually happened, and I basically have no way of exining it whatsoever.

    ¡°Just ignore them. They¡¯re just a bunch of nobodies. As long as you know you did not do anything in your heart, everything will be fine. What¡¯s the point of bickering so much?¡± Firewind continued persuading Helen Tina and said, ¡°If it wasn¡¯t for that guy being so powerful, I¡¯d have already killed him for you

    ¡°Don¡¯t say such an outrageous thing. He is not someone we can win against. If not, I wouldn¡¯t have allied with the other seven dukedoms.¡± Helen Tina was suddenly rmed and hastily persuaded Firewind against acting rashly. Soon after, she shook her head and bitterlyughed before saying, ¡°Sometimes I can¡¯t help but think if I¡¯d actually raped by that guy, maybe he would have taken care of me. But, I know that¡¯s it¡¯s just a fool¡¯s dream.¡±

    ¡°How could you say such a thing?! He is your biggest sworn enemy. Not only has he ckmailed you into giving him one million gold coins, he even made such vile information public. We must find a way to kill him and im your innocence.¡± Firewind hatefully said.

    Sighing once more, Helen Tina helplessly responded, ¡°I still cannot prove my innocence even if we kill him. This Brettel City¡¯s City Lord is not only sinister, but his strength is also exceptional. I don¡¯t know why, but I keep feeling as though he is always nearby. It seems I really am bing muddle headed.¡±

    Looking at the fretting face of Helen Tina, Firewind also sighed in her heart. She was truly clueless as to how tofort her.

    Ever since Helen Tina left Brettel City and returned home, she had to deal with everyone¡¯s skeptical looks, mocking, and ridicule. In the past when Helen Tina was within Helon Duchy, she was considered as a true living goddess. But now, she has be the nation¡¯s target of ridicule and had truly fallen from grace. For the moment, Helen Tina truly had no way of adapting to the sudden change. Even her customary smiles had practically disappeared due to an overwhelming amount of depressing torment.

    It¡¯s all because of that Bryan, I must help Helen kill him! Firewind secretly thought in her heart.

    Han Shuo was atop of a dirt mound, five kilometers away from Helen Tina¡¯s tent. Through a yin demon, he was able to hear Helen Tina¡¯s conversation with extraordinary rity.

    ¡°This bitch still owes me six hundred thousand gold coins. Now that I count the days, it¡¯s about time that I get the rest of the money.¡± Han Shuo muttered to himself. Moving his head and looking in the direction of Helen Tina, Han Shuo started stealthily advancing towards Sakamimir Valley.

    A yin demon left Helen Tina¡¯s tent and gradually approached Han Shuo. Together, they advanced towards Sakamimir Valley. When they were almost at the central tent, Han Shuo concealed himself with the earth elite zombie and hid in the depths of the earth. Only a yin demon could secretly snoop around the central tents area.

    The six grand dukes were still inside the tent. They had spared no effort in setting up the tent¡¯s security. All kinds of magical enchantments were crammed into the area. Even after probing the area with the yin demon for half a day, Han Shuo came to the conclusion that he had no means of approaching the area silently.

    ¡®It seems like I can only wait until they leave. These guys have truly reached new heights in defensive and security measures. The enchantments not only cover the sky, but they¡¯ve even warded the ground beneath it. They even have the main army of seven grand dukedoms stationed around the tent. Even a legion of undead wouldn¡¯t be able to exterminate them. They are truly a group of guys afraid of death.¡¯ Han Shuo secretly thought in his heart. He hid motionlessly in the depths of the earth while the yin demon continued to snoop around the area.

    After about one and a half hours, the six grand dukes came out of the tent, wearing dissatisfied expressions. It seemed like the negotiations had yet to reach a conclusion and that the operations for defeating Brettel City will have to wait for another day or two. Only after properly arranging everything could they advance forward.

    All six grand dukes had their experts beside them on full guard. This was a prime opportunity for an assassination. Thus, each and every one of them brought experts from their dukedoms. Furthermore, each of the Dukes also had the aura of a formidable powerhouse protecting them.

    In fact, there were definitely be those who would take part in shady businesses and secretly backstab another if the chance arises. This kind of urrence had urred in the previous meetings between the seven grand duchies. This was why they¡¯d all be so cautious and solemn.

    Han Shuo hid in the deepest parts of the earth without any intentions of secretly killing anyone. Instead, he waited until after they¡¯d all left the valley before finally slowly following one of them under the cover of night. The targeted area was the staging area of Alec Ambridge¡¯s army from the Bavenden Duchy.

    The dead of the night. It was truly the most perfect time to do something surreptitious.

    Even though Grand Duke Alec Ambridge hade here to attend a conference, he had obviously not forgotten to pack for leisure. Inside a gorgeous tent set up in the middle of his massive army, Alec Ambridge pressed a female knight known for her amazing figure down on top of a table. His hands moved to take off her armor from behind, leaving only her bare buttocks sticking high up in the air.

    The female knight was syed on top of the table, her fine ck hair trailing down her back and entuating her cheeks. Such a perfectly moisturized, plump and round butt. It was trulypatible for Grand Duke Alec Ambridge¡¯s conquest!

    There were actually two other men in the tent as well. They each wore a sinister expression and were both great swordmasters. The two men actually looked at Alec Ambridge¡¯s lewd celebrations with indifference and familiarity as they grasped their longswords and coldly surveyed the area.

    Alec Ambridge happily let out a groan in high spirits. After discharging his seed and feeling a pleasure that came from his lower abdomen spreading throughout his entire body, he suddenly felt as though the ground under his feet was swaying a little too hard.

    However, due to the momentarily pleasurable dizziness, Alec Ambridge did not care too much about the change urring under his feet. But when a burst of piercing pain came shooting up his leg, Alec Ambridge suddenly shouted in rm, grabbed the female knight that he was still mounting, and tossed her under the soles of his feet.

    ¡°Puuu.....¡±

    Below the floor, sharp weapons easily prated the famous knight, causing her to twitch in reaction. Her mithril armor, noted for its durability, was easily broken through as the weapon didn¡¯t slow, stabbing deeper with the same level of force.

    The terrified Alec Ambridge started feeling the pit of his stomach turning cold. In spite of his left leg¡¯s painful wound, he turned and limped towards the tent¡¯s exit while shouting loudly, ¡°Assassin. There¡¯s an assassin!¡±

    The two great swordmasters within the tent had already rushed over before he had even used the female knight as a meat shield. The two experts let out two dazzling silver rays of light which ruthlessly fell onto the female knight who was barely alive.

    After the silver swords pierced into the female knight, the two men drew back. They rudely threw the corpse that was now riddled with gaping wounds to the side, and cautiously looked down into the hole. The hole was about the size of a human arm. It seems like the attack probably came from this arm-sized hole.

    ¡°Damn it, wasn¡¯t the ground covered with a protective rock barrier? Howe there are still people that can attack me?!¡± Alec Ambridge frowned at his mutted left foot and said, ¡°Fortunately, I managed to react in time, otherwise I definitely would¡¯ve died today. That shitty earth mage actually dared toze around. I want him dead!¡±

    One of the great swordmasters responded with a darkened face. ¡°Your Grace, the protective rock barrier below us is still there, only the enemy is exceedingly powerful. His weapon¡¯s piercing strength exceeds the rock barrier¡¯s protective capabilities. This guy is definitely not any regr expert. Thankfully, Your Grace is alright. However, we still don¡¯t know who would actually want Your Grace¡¯s life¡±

    ¡°Who else could it be, but that damned Benedict Sackville! All I did was mock him with a few words, but he actually dispatched people to attack me at night. This guy really deserves death!!¡± Alec Ambridge shouted before advancing outside the tent and shouting once more, ¡°Priest. Damn it priest, hurry the f*ck here! One of my legs is about to be crippled! I spend so much gold on your pay, but when I am in need, you guys can¡¯t even speed it up a little?!¡±

    During Alec Ambridge¡¯s ranting, Han Shuo, who just failed the assassination, left in sorrow. Even the tunnel formed by the earth elite zombie had swiftly been filled up again.

    Han Shuo had originally wanted to directly kill Alec Ambridge, but who would¡¯ve guessed that he would actually be so heartless? He¡¯d unexpectedly grabbed the female knight he¡¯d just screwed and sacrificed her to block a deadly attack at the critical moment. Luckily, Han Shuo had connected to the yin demon when he was leaving and heard Alec Ambridge¡¯s statement suspecting Benedict Sackville. In fact, in the end, Han Shuo¡¯s objective had been achieved, and he didn¡¯t consider any more reckless actions. This night could be considered a sess.

 Chapter 356: A pack of mad dogs

    Chapter 356: A pack of mad dogs

    The seven grand dukes all took special care to ensure their own safety. They paid attention to every detail so as to protect themselves, particrly in this Sakamimir Valley.

    After leaving Alec Ambridge¡¯s tent, Han Shuo took a trip to visit Duke Nehem Beige of Bisli Duchy. He had originally intended to make a move on this Nehem guy. However, Han Shuo had yet to draw near when he sensed a holy presence from within thetter¡¯s tent.

    Han Shuo was very familiar with this holy presence and immediately understood that a member of the Church of Light was in that tent. It was no ordinary member either, the intensity of the presence was a good testament to that person¡¯s strength. It was most likely to be Kosse of the Church of Light.

    As a result, Han Shuo didn¡¯t touch Nehem Beige. He hid himself deep in the underground, only using the yin demon to spy on that area from afar. Only when dawn broke did he see Kosse and his group quietly leaving that tent through the yin demon.

    Nehem Beige himself was a sky rider. Out of the seven grand duchies, Bisli Duchy hosted many Light Temples of the Church of Light. This duchy guided its civilians¡¯ beliefs so that they would offer their faith and devotion to the God of Light.

    At that moment, Han Shuo was witnessing the close rtionship between Nehem Beige and Kosse, which made him recall the friendly attitude between Bisli Duchy and the Church of Light. Han Shuo had this faint feeling that this Nehem Beige himself was a believer of the Church of Light. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have spared so much effort to support the Church of Light.

    After Kosse left, there were still light magic pulses inside Nehem Beige¡¯s tent, in addition to two hidden powerful presences. Dawn had broken, but Nehem Beige and his subordinates were still deep in discussion even after Kosse had left. Han Shuo pondered for a bit and decided to give up on dealing with Nehem Beige.

    Today in the Sakamimir Valley, the seven grand duchies discussed the matters regarding Brettel City. After the assault the previous night, Alec Ambridge dragged himself on his bandaged stiff left leg, and loudly cursed Benedict Sackville out as soon as he arrived, using thetter of despicably ambushing him the previous night.

    Benedict Sackville had already felt like he¡¯d been greatly wronged the previous day. Now that Alec Ambridge was bringing an unfounded usation against him and ridiculing him to boot, Benedict could no longer suppress the fires of anger in his belly. Neither of the two men were willing to let go of the issue and they almost fought it out right inside the tent. Had it not been for the other grand dukesing forward to stop them, the two might have escted things to a brawl. Even though they were forcibly separated afterwards, their fury didn¡¯t disperse. A ferocious light shing in their eyes, no one knew what kind of insidious scheme they were plotting against each other.

    Grand Duke Burt Zili of Boulet Duchy came to the fore at this meeting, vociferously dissatisfied with the current distribution of benefits. He insisted on taking the five mines as his own after Brettel City was captured. Burt Zili was persistent, but the other grand dukes also desired the mines, so they were naturally unwilling to agree. Today¡¯s discussion once again ultimately ended in each of them going their own way.

    ¡°At this rate, the seven grand duchies would be already at war even before the attack on Brettel City can beunched. These people can never join hands unless they are well and truly backed into a corner. Only because the Lancelot Empire came knocking on the doorsst time did they learn to quickly work together.¡±

    ¡°It seems they have yet to take the threat of Brettel City seriously. These people only know to quarrel all day; what grand deed can they actually aplish?¡± Going back to her own tent, Helen Tinained to Firewind with a frown.

    ¡°Just let them fuss. The day wille when Brettel City really attacks, and they will learn the meaning of fear.¡± Having joined the discussion in the tent with Helen Tina, Firewind had seen the expressions of the seven grand dukes clearly. Even though Firewind didn¡¯t have to right to speak, she still inwardly despised the other six grand dukes who only cared about grabbing fame and benefits.

    ¡°Your Grace, Grand Duke Burt Zili of Boulet Duchy requests an audience.¡± as Helen Tina and Firewind whispered theirints to each other, the guard¡¯s voice rang out.

    ¡°What is this fellowing to our ce for? The smell on his body really makes me ufortable.¡± Firewind frowned and spoke to Helen Tina when she heard the guard¡¯s words.

    ¡°Invite him in.¡± Helen Tina told the guard outside before turning to Firewind, ¡°This person has always been the sworn enemy of Bisli Duchy. This time, Nehem Beige of the Bisli Duchy was the one who proposed to join forces and attack Brettel City. As I see it, this Burt Zili seems to be deliberately destroying the stability of the alliance. I don¡¯t know what this man hase to see me for.¡±

    As Helen Tina and Firewind continued their conversation, Grand Duke Burt Zili of Boulet Duchy came in with a slight smile on his face. Burt Zili was an old summoner. However, rumors had it that he had signed a contract with the Evil God. His summoning could often call upon monsters from hell.

    Burt Zilli¡¯s body seemed to emanate a frighteningly sinister aura. Even when he was smiling kindly, other people would still feel his smiling face to be vicious. The fire phoenix was a holy super rank creature, so she was extremely annoyed at the smelling off Burt Zili¡¯s body. Therefore, the fire phoenix instinctively kept a distance between them upon seeing hime in.

    ¡°Grand Duke Burt, what business do you have with me?¡± Helen Tina¡¯s territory was quite a distance from Burt Zili¡¯s Boulet Duchy, so there was no real conflict between them. However, Helen Tina disliked this sinister grand duke. Moreover, her mood hadn¡¯t been every goodtely, so she naturally didn¡¯t give him face.

    ¡°Heh heh, Ie here to discuss the matter regarding Brettel City with Grand Duke Helen Tina. Since you¡¯ve stayed at Brettel City for a period of time, what do you feel about Brettel City and its city lord?¡± Burt Zili exposed an amiable smile and asked Helen Tina in a friendly manner.

    Her face growing colder by the second, Helen Tina said, ¡°Grand Duke Burt, did youe here to especially make fun of me?¡±

    ¡°No, no!¡± Burt Zili hastily waved his hands, gesturing that Helen Tina shouldn¡¯t misunderstand him. He then exined, ¡°As the saying goes, know your enemy and know yourself, and a hundred victories out of a hundred battles. Amongst us seven grand duchies, Grand Duke Helen Tina must be the most familiar with Brettel City. I want to hear your point of view on Brettel City and that city lord.¡±

    Letting out a snort, Helen Tina said with a stern face, ¡°I¡¯m not very familiar with Brettel City, but I know that city lord Bryan is no ordinary person. You haven¡¯t truly seen what you¡¯re dealing with. He alone repelled the group of Red Archbishop Kosse and several Temrs of the Church of Light. This person is ruthless without measure. Once he sets his eyes on something, he won¡¯t hesitate to go for it, using any means, fair or foul. Whether you believe it or not, this person is far from easy to deal with. If the alliance keeps wasting time like this, we¡¯ll simply be giving Brettel City time to prepare.

    ¡°Heh heh, it seems his person is very much to my taste, interesting, interesting!¡± Burt Zili said with a wickedugh, before fixing his eyes on Helen Tina, asking, ¡°Grand Duke Helen Tina, what have you prepared to deal with Brettel City this time? Are you interested in forming a secret alliance?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not interested at the moment, sorry.¡± Helen Tina politely refused, her reply neither warm nor cold.

    Nodding his head, Burt Zili cackled creepily without any further offer and said, ¡°You can try thinking about it. I¡¯m very interested in cooperating with you. Alright, I have disturbed you enough today. My apologies.¡±

    ¡°Mm, I won¡¯t see you off!¡± Helen Tina said.

    Waiting until Burt Zili had left, Helen Tina said with a sense of wariness pricking her, ¡°Really inexplicable. Did this person take a trip here just to ask about that city lord Bryan? It feels like he was a bit off.¡±

    ¡°Ignore him. I realized that when he was inside the tent, my whole body felt ufortable. I really wanted to burn him to death.¡± Firewind said to Helen Tina with a frown.

    After leaving Helen Tina¡¯s ce, Burt Zili went straight back into his own tent, inside of which was a person whom Han Shuo was very familiar with. This person waszing in the middle of a big bed covered in sea mink fur. Seeing Burte in, he asked, ¡°How did it go?¡±

    ¡°That little girl really didn¡¯t seem to know anything. But it¡¯s no problem, this doesn¡¯t affect our n. Wolf, you really think that person can bring us benefits?¡± Burt Zili nced at Wolf on his own bed and asked.

    Grand magus necromancer Wolf of the Cmity Church had turned into a handsome, elegant youth after being rejuvenated by Han Shuo¡¯s skeletal staff. His skin was now fairer than that of any women. With the sharp ws resulting from his merge with the old fey zombie having vanished without a trace, his hands had be slender and pretty.

    Wolf slowly sat up on the big sea mink furred bed, saying with a condescending smile, ¡°Old friend, the power of that Bryan is beyond what you can imagine. He also has the skeletal staff. The higher-ups have passed down the order, we can¡¯t let anything happen to him no matter what. What we have to do is try our best to support him.¡±

    ¡°The Pope only thinks highly of him as the owner of the skeletal staff. We should just grab his skeletal magic staff, it¡¯ll be more convenient and less troublesome that way.¡± Burt Zili frowned in thought before telling Wolf.

    Grand magus necromancer Wolf, who¡¯d lived for who knows how many years, shook his head and exined with a smile, ¡°It¡¯s not that easy. Kosse personally led three hundred Temrs but still failed to catch him, and both his attempts resulted in him retreating with heavy injuries. Do you think we can catch him so easily?¡±

    ¡°Not to mention that he is now an archmage necromancer. Oh, no, his mental strength must have exceeded the level of an archmage. The skeletal staff is rted to the secret of the holynd. What we want is to do recruit him into our church by any means. On the other hand, I can guarantee that having a rtionship with him will be extremely beneficial for us.¡±

    ¡°Alright then. Your decisions have always been correct all these years. I will act in ordance with the n. I only hope that he won¡¯t disappoint us!¡± Burt Zili replied.

    Han Shuo had followed the yin demon there while Burt Zili and grand magus necromancer Wolf were conversing in the tent. His consciousness could clearly discover the evil presence from Wolf¡¯s body inside the tent.

    Burt Zili¡¯s Boulet Duchy had been fighting all out with Nehem Beige¡¯s Bisli Duchy that worshipped the Church of Light, for many years. This had never once been resolved. Han Shuo initially hadn¡¯t known what was going on. Now that he felt Wolf¡¯s presence inside the tent, he instantly understood.

    It seemed that grand duke Nehem Beige of Bisli Duchy was a member of the Church of Light, while grand duke Burt Zili of Boulet Duchy was of the Cmity Church. These were the two most religious groups in the Continent. Evidently, it seemed that their many years of both open strife and veiled struggle weren¡¯t just limited to some small-scaled battles. They had actually been secretly manipting the grand battle among the duchies!

    Wolf¡¯s appearance had previously been rejuvenated thanks to the power of the skeletal staff. From the conversation just now, Han Shuo understood that Wolf seemed to be greatly concerned about him and want to protect him as much as possible. From this, Han Shuo understood that the reason must be due to the skeletal staff.

    Having no way to close in and eavesdrop on their conversation, Han Shuo didn¡¯t know what conspiracy that the two senior members of the Cmity Church were cooking up inside the tent. However, upon finding out that Burt Zili belonged to the Cmity Church, Han Shuo threw away the possibility that the former wanted to hurt him. However, he had no intention of revealing himself to talk to them either. Han Shuo once again left quietly.

    After leaving the area, Han Shuo chose Grand Duke Argi Gilles of Etman Duchy to be his next target. Like the other areas, Argi Gilles¡¯ tent was also under strict protection. Han Shuo took a moment to discover that both the sky and ground were cut off by magic barriers. He understood that there wasn¡¯t much chance to kill this guy in one blow.

    ¡°F*ck, the seven grand dukes all really do fear death. It seems they don¡¯t have the tiniest bit of trust in each other, bringing this many experts to a meeting.¡± Han Shuo cursed in a low voice.

    However, since he¡¯d alreadye anyway, he couldn¡¯t leave empty-handed. Han Shuo mused for a bit and released the yin demon to inspect the area. Suddenly, he discovered that except for Argi Gilles¡¯ own tent which was strictly protected, the tents of some senior generals were left unguarded.

    Ruthlessness surging in his heart, Han Shuo decided to leave Argi Gilles alone and shifted his eyes to his subordinates. There were usually only a few guards walking around the inside and outside of these people¡¯s tents. Naturally, their protection couldn¡¯t be as strict as Argi Gilles¡¯. The earth elite zombie utilized his ability to travel underground to sneak into the tents of these people. Han Shuo was easily able to conceal his presence at the separate demon realm, soundlessly murdering all six high rank subordinates of Argi Gilles.

    After leaving Argi Gilles¡¯ tent, Han Shuo continued on to Grand Duke Randy Ard¡¯s tent. Using the same method as with Argi, he once again assassinated his four senior generals before leaving in silence. Making a bit of a detour, he again went to Alec Ambridge¡¯s tent and took care of three senior generals in the same way.

    Benedict Sackville of Narsen Duchy was also ambushed that night. The tent was engulfed in a massive explosion. Benedict Sackville himself escaped just in time to keep his life, but his hair and brows were burnt cleanly off.

    Overnight, apart from Helen Tina of Helon Duchy, Burt Zili of Boulet Duchy and Nehem Beige of Bisli Duchy, the troops of the other four all encountered some kind of big incident. Sakamimir Valley, the originally gathering ce to discuss an act of alliance against Brettel City, had suddenly changedpletely in nature.

    The four attacked duchies suspected some of the others duchies that previously had grudges with them. In the tent, tempers ran high as the men raged at each other. Amongst them, Benedict Sackville was the one with the clearest mind, but had longe to the conclusion that Alec Ambridge was the one who¡¯d attacked himst night. Alec Ambridge also believed that the massacre of his generals had something to do with Benedict.

    This time, the two threw all face to the wind and broke out into a fight right at Sakamimir Valley. The rest of the grand dukes all had darkened faces, resentfully staring at each other in utter silence while constantly thinking of a way to retaliate. The other two attacked duchies also nursed bellies full of resentment, ming everything on the two duchies who were previously their enemies.

    The Helon, Boulet and Bisly duchies, who¡¯d passed the night in safety, became the first objects of suspicion. The shaky alliance had already secretly changed in nature. During the day, the seven grand duchies investigated the roots of the problem to affix responsibility. At night, each parties sent their killers to kill each other. It wasn¡¯t very peaceful at all.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t make a move for three days in a row. The seven grand duchies faced each other each day with new hatred piling up on the old ones as ck hooded men lurked everywhere, blurry figures shing through the sky and on the ground. In the areas where the seven grand duchies had set up camp, one would hear a few tragic screams echo from time to time, as another person was assassinated.

    Han Shuo had initially prepared to make a few more choice assassinations, but he found out that he basically no longer had any chance to do so. There were too many ck hooded men at night that one yin demon wasn¡¯t enough to keep his cover from being blown. He simply didn¡¯t know who came from which duchy, and the situation was gradually thrown into chaos anyway.

    ¡°The seven grand dukes are indeed a pack of mad dogs!¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but exim when he found that he had nothing to do.

 Chapter 357: Collecting on debts

    Chapter 357: Collecting on debts

    Chaos, the situation had fallen into utter chaos!

    The seven grand dukes had originally gathered here in Sakamimir Valley to deal with Brettel City. But for some reason, all these old grudges and new hatred had erupted, with all of the parties attacking each other and turning the entire thing into utter shambles.

    At first, they¡¯d only snuck around to assassinate members of the enemy duchy at night. But as the dead kept piling up, fury deprived the seven grand dukes of logic as they started to use their armies. It¡¯d changed from a meeting to discuss an alliance to an outright battlefield.

    ¡°What actually happened here?¡± Red Archbishop Kosse was nursing a bad headache as he questioned Nehem Beige inside the duke¡¯s tent.

    Nehem Beige¡¯s headache wasn¡¯t much better. A wry smile was on his face as he spoke to Kosse, ¡°The seven grand duchies have umted too many years of deep bone hatred, and a small fuse is enough to ignite the bonfire. Even I am at a loss to stem this.¡±

    ¡°Aii, it seems we really can¡¯t rely on these people. Oh right, say, could it be that Burt Zili of Boulet Duchy has secretly executed some dirty tricks? He¡¯s from the Cmity Church. I think he definitely won¡¯t agree to something happening to that city lord Bryan.¡± Kosse asked Nehem Beige.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know, it¡¯s possible. But it¡¯s aplete madhouse now, and it¡¯s utterly out of my control. It seems that we have to change our n.¡± Nehem Beige heaved a long sigh and responded.

    ¡°Forget it, I will think of another way.¡± Kosse replied helplessly.

    On the t in of Sakamimir Valley, the seven grand duchies, who¡¯d always been enemies, had suddenly gone from secret assassination to open fighting. Han Shuo had only thrown a small stone behind the scenes, he also hadn¡¯t expected the deep bone hatred among the seven grand duchies to be so deep.

    Seeing the area around Sakamimir Valley turn into a battlefield, he no longer paid any heed to the situation here. Instead, he chased after Helen Tina, who was returning to Helon Duchy.

    Out of the seven grand dukes, Helen Tina had been the first to be disheartened. Right at the beginning of the battle, she¡¯d instantly understood that this alliance matter had gone down the drain. At this moment, Helon Duchy had just been through an civil war, and its strength the weakest. Therefore, Helen Tina made a wise choice to immediately leave the valley and return to her duchy.

    After two days on the road, Helen Tina passed down an order for the army to camp in a small mountain valley. After arranging the guards to keep watch on the surroundings, Helen Tina and Firewind went to take a bath at a small hot spring.

    ¡°It looks like only upon staring death in the face will they set aside their prejudices!¡± Helen Tinaynguidly in the hot spring, speaking angrily to Firewind.

    The fire phoenix had transformed into her original body. She stood at the edge of the hot spring, cleaning her gorgeous feathers as she spoke in human tongue, ¡°We don¡¯t need to worry about them, just let them bear the consequences of their own actions. With the way the situation is developing, they definitely won¡¯t be able to fight against that ruthless city lord.¡±

    ¡°Right, I still owe that Brettel city lord six hundred thousand gold coins. Aii, this demon. What should I do?¡± Helen Tina asked the fire phoenix, her expression worried.

    ¡°Keep dying it. Our duchy has just been through a civil war, and all of the wealth is concentrated in the hands of the aristocrats. If we draw six hundred thousand gold coins from our national treasury to pay him, I¡¯m afraid Helon Duchy will officially be in trouble.¡± The fire phoenix was also very helpless as she advised Helen Tina.

    ¡°But that demon is no generous, forgiving person. The longer we drag it out, the more I¡¯m afraid that he¡¯ll create trouble for us.¡± Helen Tina knew Han Shuo wasn¡¯t the kind sort. She understood how terrifying his power was, so she was truly afraid that he would make a move on them.

    As Helen Tina and Firewind were talking, a faint undtion spread from the outside to the opposite end of the hot spring. A shadow soundlessly appeared like a ghost in the darkness on the other side of the hot spring. Then, it suddenly stopped and stood quietly on a protruding rock.

    ¡°Hehe, it seems you understand me well, I¡¯m truly honored. That¡¯s right, this demon hase here today to collect the money, so pay up!¡± The gloomy shadow in the darkness suddenly opened its mouth to speak.

    Helen Tina, who¡¯d been bathing in the hot spring, let out a deafening scream. This familiar voice had been the object of her resentment for so long. Helen Tina didn¡¯t need to see the person to know that Han Shuo had arrived.

    Still letting out a scream, Helen Tina hastily ducked her smooth shoulders into the water, afraid that Han Shuo would see her white bare skin. The fire phoenix, who¡¯d been cleaning her zing red feathers, also let out a shrill scream. She pped her wings and shot towards Han Shuo.

    The fire phoenix pped her wings once, sending a violent me rolling straight towards Han Shuo. However, Han Shuo didn¡¯t wait for the fire phoenix¡¯s me to approach. The spring water right before Han Shuo suddenly gathered into a water screen under the influence of magical yuan, churning back at the fire phoenix in a huge wave. It enveloped the me that she¡¯d shot out.

    The hot spring water transformed into a water curtain, instantly extinguishing the surging me. Not only that, even the fire phoenix was dragged onto the hot spring and became a drenched sorry-looking chicken.

    Without waiting for the furious fire phoenix to rise in fury, Han Shuo instantly cackled, ¡°If you guys value the lives of your underlings, don¡¯t be in such a hurry to make a move.¡±

    As these words fell, Helen Tina screamed at the fire phoenix, who was fluttering her wings and about to keep on attacking Han Shuo, ¡°Big sister Firewind, don¡¯t!¡±

    Upon hearing this scream, Firewind immediately stopped. She pped her wings to fly out of the hot spring andnded next to Helen Tina, before furiously shouting at Han Shuo, ¡°What did you do to them?!¡±

    Helen Tina was a woman, so when she came to bathe in the hot spring, all of the guards around her had to be female. The strength of these female guards weren¡¯t bad, but Helen Tina knew that Han Shuo¡¯s power was even more terrifying. She was worried for their lives, and she was well aware that Firewind wasn¡¯t Han Shuo¡¯s opponent, so she stopped Firewind upon hearing his words.

    ¡°Nothing, let¡¯s just get to our business!¡± Seeing Helen Tina¡¯s body shrink under the hot spring, Han Shuo first asked with a smile, ¡°Grand Duke Helen Tina, your skin truly isn¡¯t bad. Hehe, but you still owe me gold coins, shouldn¡¯t you be paying them back already?¡±

    ¡°You, you demon, shut your shifty eyes!¡± Helen Tina yelled out, before saying, ¡°I don¡¯t have that many gold coins at the moment. Wait for a while, I¡¯ll pay you back. Don¡¯t worry, I won¡¯t renege on my debt.¡±

    Both Firewind and Helen Tina were experts with fire. This was why Han Shuo had chosen this hot spring to show himself. With this hot spring, ordinary fire magic was basically useless. Upon hearing Helen Tina¡¯s words, Han Shuo said smugly, ¡°Your Grace, lying is a bad habit. I¡¯ve been here for a while already and personally heard your conversation. I think, you should just take out six hundred thousand gold coins and pay me back.¡±

    ¡°You, you¡¯vee for a while already?¡± Helen Tina was dumbstruck, before yelling loudly, ¡°Then, you have seen me bathe. You despicable demon, sooner orter karma will visit you!!¡±

    ¡°Eh... Let¡¯s not talk about this. Less nonsense, hurry up and pay it, or I¡¯lle into the water!¡± Han Shuo was a bit embarrassed at first. Honestly, he¡¯d seen Helen Tina¡¯s body from head to toe through the yin demon and even had a physiological reaction while doing so. Now that he listened to Helen Tina shout about this, Han Shuo was embarrassed to the point of anger, so he could only shout over her.

    Helen Tina was so furious that her entire body was trembling. Upon hearing Han Shuo speak so unreasonably, Firewind would have alreadyid down her life to attack him had it not been for the still rational Helen Tina holding her back.

    ¡°Come down if you want to then. You¡¯re a demon who already spread that vicious news. No one would want me now anyway, so just kill me already. I¡¯m not paying you any gold coins.¡± Helen Tina was going insane because of Han Shuo¡¯s torture. Her mind now blinded by fury, she disregarded all decorum and shouted at him.

    Spitting out these words, she felt as if the grievances she¡¯d suppressed for so long was gushing forth out like a torrent. She stood up in the hot spring, disying her perfect body right in front of Han Shuo as she continued to vent, ¡°Look! If you want to look then look! Just kill me, haven¡¯t you been torturing me enough? How many evil vicious tricks you actually have, show me all of them!!¡±

    Once a woman went crazy, it was basically impossible to reason with her. And that was precisely the portrait of Helen Tina at the moment. Ever since she¡¯d returned from Brettel City, she¡¯d suddenly discovered that her whole world had changed. It was all because of Han Shuo¡¯s appearance that her life had been sopletely screwed.

    All of the previous looks of respect and admiration had be those of contempt and disdain. Even the originally loyal citizens treated her like she was an unclean woman, as if a vited woman didn¡¯t deserve to be the grand duke of their Helon Duchy. Helen Tina, who¡¯d always been quite proud, had to put up with many grievances and feelings of utter helplessness during this time.

    Now, the culprit who¡¯d caused all of this was standing right in front of her, aggressively threatening her without easing up, wanting to push her to the point of death. Helen Tina was unable to fight, nor could she escape. She simply had no way to deal with Han Shuo, always worried that he¡¯d take the lives of her and the fire phoenix. Her rational mind had finally snapped.

    Facing this onught, Han Shuo was more than a little dumbfounded. His eyes wandered up and down her perfect, stunning body. He took a few more nces at her full peaks and the grassynd under the abdomen which still lingered with some sparkling water drops. Han Shuo secretly swallowed. Looking at Helen Tina¡¯s fierce posture, fearless in the face of death, he didn¡¯t know what to do for the moment.

    ¡°I only want you to pay back the money. You shouldn¡¯t want to die at every little thing. There¡¯s hope as long as you are alive, I don¡¯t want to kill you.¡± Han Shuo discourteously swept his gaze over Helen Tina¡¯s body again, before looking at her in the eyes and saying with a dry smile.

    ¡°It¡¯s because of your appearance that my life has lost all hope!!¡± Helen Tina screamed resentfully, furiously ring at Han Shuo.

    ¡°I can¡¯t stand it, Helen, don¡¯t stop me, I¡¯ll risk my life with him!¡± The fire phoenix looked up to face the sky and let out a cry. She struggled out of Helen Tina¡¯s grasp, her entire body zing with violent mes as she desperately shot towards Han Shuo.

    Seeing the fire phoenix angrily hurl herself over, Han Shuo¡¯s palm lightly tapped down on the surface of the hot spring. He circted the magical yuan before flicking up his hand. Water curtains rose up one after another from the hot spring, rolling towards the fire phoenix.

    The furious rushing fire phoenix was hit by five, six water screens and once again swept into the hot spring. Han Shuoughed sinisterly and shot towards the fire phoenix, saying smugly, ¡°Lucky I chose this ce, otherwise, it¡¯d be somewhat troublesome.¡±

    ¡°No. I beg you, don¡¯t kill big sister Firewind. Demon, I¡¯ll give you the gold coins!¡± Helen Tina burst out into tears and yelled loudly upon seeing Han Shuo shoot through the air towards the fire phoenix.

    Han Shuo only intended to catch the fire phoenix. He hadn¡¯t expected Helen Tina to care about her so much. He smiled delightfully and said, ¡°Very good, I won¡¯t kill her. Give me the gold coins.¡±

    ¡°Helen, don¡¯t give him the gold coins. If you do, Helon Duchy will truly go out of control!¡± From inside the hot spring, the fire phoenix who was pping her wings and about to fly up suddenly shouted out.

    Han Shuo was about to shut the fire phoenix up when he suddenly sensed several powerful presences approach. He furrowed his brows and had the yin demon scout them. Han Shuo¡¯s face changed into a stern expression, ¡°Perhaps, your Helon Duchy is out of your control already!¡±

    Helen Tina¡¯s heart took another shock at those words. She stared at Han Shuo and said, ¡°What do you mean?!¡±

    ¡°There are peopleing. One of them is a general in your army. I can see that the iing people must belong to your Helon Duchy. It looks like you¡¯re in trouble.¡± Han Shuo looked at Helen Tina.

    Helen Tina and the fire phoenix traded nces. Helen Tina seemed to recover her rational mind upon facing something she could actually deal with. She turned her back on Han Shuo and stepped ashore, putting her clothes on.

    The fire phoenix also rose out of the hot spring to return to Helen Tina¡¯s side. After Helen Tina put on her zing red magic robe, she walked over to face Han Shuo. Her entire body radiated a refreshing light after a bath, giving him a feeling of stunning beauty.

    ¡°Demon, what exactly did you do to my guards?¡± Helen Tina inquired as she stood face to face with Han Shuo.

    ¡°Nothing. They are all outside. I only glided past them toe in here and set up a soundproof enchantment around you. However, they can¡¯t fight back against those people, that I¡¯m sure of!¡± The majority of these female guards had the strength of journeyman and senior swordsmen. There were twenty-seven of them in total, staying about three hundred meters away from the hot spring where Helen Tina was.

    These female guards were useless against Han Shuo, who could traverse the sky and tunnel through the ground. He basically didn¡¯t need to attack them as he could just soundlessly go underground to enter the hot spring area without disturbing any of the female guards.

    ¡°Protect the duke!¡± From around the hot spring suddenly echoed the sounds of fighting and the surprised screams of the female guards.

    When the sounds from outside reached this ce, Han Shuo knew that the enchantment had been broken. Afterwards, the sounds of fierce fighting quickly approached, and three female guards broke through the trees with panic on their faces. The leader, a middle-aged women, anxiously shouted, ¡°Your Grace, Ferrodias has rebelled. He led people here to attack you! We can¡¯t stop him anymore. Your Grace, hurry and escape!¡±

    At this moment, Helen Tina and the fire phoenix stood together with the three female guards. Helen Tina took out her magic staff and asked, panic in her voice, ¡°How much longer until they reach this ce?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, we¡¯ve alreadye, haven¡¯t we!¡± The smug voice of a middle-aged man suddenly rang through the air. Then, an earth rider riding a warhorse in full body armor, suddenly appeared alongside thirty knights and six mages.

    A long brown haired middle-aged man rode in front. His body was quite sturdy, so this must have been the Ferrodias the woman had just mentioned. Upon his appearance, he immediately led his people straight to Helen Tina. He first respectfully bowed ceremoniously, before saying with a smile, ¡°Your Grace, you arepletely surrounded. The knights of Helon Duchy no longer need you, so just tie your hands and resign yourself to capture!¡±

    Helen Tina¡¯s pretty face red up in rage. Her finger rose to point at him, using and enraged, ¡°I never thought you would dare to betray me. When you were still a civilian, it was I who let you join my knights. From a civilian to a count, it¡¯s me who bestowed everyone on you, and yet you betray me!!¡±

    Shaking his head, Ferrodias said, ¡°It¡¯s not me who has betrayed you, but rather your people that have betrayed you. I can only conform with the public opinion. Your Grace, there is no need to resist, otherwise you will see more unpleasant things.¡±

    Raising the magic staff in her hand, Helen Tina furiously said, ¡°I won¡¯t satisfy your wishes!¡±

    Finishing those words, Helen Tina was about to chant a magic incantation to burn the traitor in front of her to death. However, she had yet toplete the incantation, when the middle-aged female guard next to her threw out a huge, glittering ash gray. The caught Helen Tina and the fire phoenix by surprise as it shrouded them.

    Helen Tinapleted the magic incantation only to discover that her fire magic had produced no effect at all. The gray above her head had sealed all of her magic.

    ¡°Aunt Wellie, even you have betrayed me?¡± Helen Tina¡¯s heart sank into grief. She looked to the aunt who¡¯d taken care of her ever since she was a little girl with a desperate expression.

    The middle-aged women indifferently took a few steps back, her voice cold as ice, ¡°Helen, ept your fate.¡±

    ¡°Hehe, Your Grace, I advised you to not resist or you¡¯d encounter some embarrassing situations, yet you didn¡¯t believe me.¡± Pausing for a bit, Ferrodias once again smiled, making Helen Tina despair even more as he said, ¡°I will hand you over to Grand Duke Benedict Sackville. Even though you are no longer a virgin, that person is still willing to take fifty thousand gold coins for you. But of course, in his hands, I¡¯m afraid that you will no longer be a goddess of his heart, but just a ve under his feet. Haha!¡±

    Precisely at this moment, a polite voice rang out. ¡°Everyone, you seem to have forgotten my existence!¡± Han Shuo stepped out, grinning at the traitors surrounding Helen Tina.

 Chapter 358: Youâ€™re all done for!

    Chapter 358: You¡¯re all done for!

    Ferrodias and hispanions had originally ignored Han Shuo¡¯s existence. In their eyes, such a youngling was not worth fearing whatsoever and therefore unworthy of any attention. However, only when Han Shuo spoke up, did Ferrodias finally deign to take notice of him.

    ¡°Who are you?¡± Ferrodias knitted his brows and looked at Han Shuo with displeasure before saying, ¡°Well, regardless of who you are, since you¡¯re here, let¡¯s just say, you¡¯re out of luck!¡±

    With a wave of his hand, Ferrodias signaled a knight beside him, ¡°Kill him!¡±

    From behind Ferrodias¡¯ back, a knight suddenly rushed out, charging straight at Han Shuo, who was still standing beside the hot spring.

    Helen and the phoenix were imprisoned within a magical skill, and were subject to a barrage by a dozen or more archers. In addition, the three former members of Helen Tina¡¯s personal guard also aimed their weapons at the two individuals within the barrier. As a super rank magical creature, the phoenix would be able to make trouble even without using magic attacks.

    But Helen¡¯s fragile body was only barely able to stand up against so many attacks. The phoenix didn¡¯t dare truly exert herself under these circumstances. That momentary hesitation was a fatal mistake, as a magic arrow punched through the phoenix¡¯s body. The phoenix fell with a gasp, weak and without a trace of power. As the phoenix felt her powers gradually fade, she looked at the calm face of Han Shuo before pulling on the edge of Helen Tina¡¯s dress, saying, ¡°This is bad, the arrow tips are poisoned!¡±

    Helen Tina was originally filled with despair. But when she heard the sound of Han Shuo¡¯s voice, hope reignited within her breast. As her thoughts took a rapid turn, she cutely yelled at Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan, help me kill them!¡±

    Han Shuo was only momentarily stunned by the unfamiliar sound of Helen Tina¡¯s cute, coquettish voice that was usually reserved for loved ones. He took a quick nce at Helen Tina before a smile tugged at his lips. He teased back, ¡°Dearest one, rest assured, you still owe me so many gold coins, how would I willingly let others capture you?¡±

    Being spoken to like this, Helen Tina couldn¡¯t help but blush while secretly sighing in her heart. She would never have thought that, to survive, she would actually have to yield to this demon. But in actuality, when Han Shuo teased her with the words ¡°Dearest one¡±, it left a faint ripple within her heart. Although Helen Tina knew that Han Shuo was only teasing her, without knowing why, her heart still had a somewhat unusual feeling. Furthermore, her blushing cheeks apparently weren¡¯t just a pretense, causing her to feel extremely awkward and clueless on how to reply.

    As for that senior knight charging over on a warhorse, Han Shuo never took a nce at him from beginning to end. Only when he arrived right in front of him did Han Shuo casually release a long snake-like purple me, which violently spread through the high-ranking knight and his warhorse.

    All everyone saw was the senior knight rushing at Han Shuo with his warhorse before suddenly igniting in purple mes. As the knight and warhorse braved a freezing cold chill, they gradually slowed to a stop before freezing at a speed clearly visible to the naked eye.

    Han Shuo controlled the me so that the senior knight and warhorse were within a hand¡¯s reach before freezing them both into a sparkling ice sculpture. Afterwards, Han Shuo casually used one hand to tip the man-and-horse ice sculpture over, causing their frozen flesh to fall and shatter with a loud bang.

    Seeing his high-ranking subordinate senior knight tragically die in such a strange way, Ferrodias took another nce at Han Shuo. His gaze had now changed into a dignified and solemn look, continuing in an imposing manner, ¡°Who on earth are you? The things that are happening in the Helon Dukedom is unrted to you, so as long as you leave, I will not investigate this further.¡±

    Ferrodias had be apprehensive after Han Shuo had disyed his prowess. From start to end, Han Shuo seemed as if he barely used any of his strength. Although it seemed as if he was taking a leisurely walk around his own courtyard, he had still killed one of Ferrodias¡¯ senior knights in such a tragic manner. Thus, Ferrodias immediately felt that Han Shuo was somewhat enigmatic.

    ¡°Did you not have your eyes and ears open? You didn¡¯t hear the words I just said? Your Grand Duchess Helen is my woman, so take a guess, am I going to leave just like that?¡± Han Shuo lectured Ferrodias with displeasure, staring at Helen Tina as he spoke. He obviously didn¡¯t think much of Ferrodias.

    ¡°Humph, since you¡¯re looking for death, then you can¡¯t me us!¡± Ferrodias understood that Han Shuo was determined to intervene. So, after a cold snort, he gave amand to the people behind him. The mages slowly scattered in preparation for a joint attack.

    Being stared at by Han Shuo, Helen Tina felt humiliated in her heart. She knew that he was only joking with her when he said that she was his woman. However, Helen Tina couldn¡¯t help but to feel an indescribably strange feeling rise in her heart.

    Suddenly a thought rose in her mind. Perhaps, it wouldn¡¯t be so bad to be his woman. But she immediately suppressed the thought right afterwards. Impossible! He¡¯s the reason why she had be aughing stock, so she should be trying to kill him at all costs. How could she have such an absurd thought instead!

    Han Shuo gently walked over to Helen Tina, gazing into her eyes as he said in an increasingly tender voice, ¡°How could I possibly let you stay trapped? Furthermore, you owe me far more than just fifty thousand gold coins. Isn¡¯t that so, Helen?

    ¡°You! Don¡¯te closer. If you daree closer, we will kill her!¡± The middle aged female imperial guard suddenly held a dagger to Helen Tina and shrieked in panic upon seeing Han Shuo approaching.

    Shooting a nce at the middle aged woman, Han Shuo sighed in sorrow before saying, ¡°She is worth fifty thousand gold coins, do you dare kill her? Besides, you never had a chance to kill her!¡±

    The moment the words fell, the earth suddenly trembled as several sharp spikes suddenly protruded from the ground, stabbing into the middle aged woman, the rest of the guards, and the nearby traitors. They were all left suspended on the protruding spikes just like that.

    Ferrodias¡¯ face changed greatly, as did the look in his eyes when he looked at Han Shuo. He scanned the ground beneath his feet with lingering fear. He feared a spike would suddenly burst out of the ground, impaling him to death. There had been a clearck of Han Shuo chanting any magical incantations before the spike suddenly killed several of his subordinates. Ferrodias grew more and more stunned at this young man¡¯s prowess.

    Helen Tina and the phoenix were naturally safe and sound within the enormous magical. They watched Han Shuo approach leisurely, and then listened to him say with a smile, ¡°How about that? Even though I helped you deal with these people, I won¡¯t add any additional payments. Instead, you just have to return the gold coins you already owe me. This is quite generous of me, right?

    Helen Tina looked at Han Shuo¡¯s tender face in a daze while listening to his gentle and soft voice. She suddenly had a weird delusion. This version of Han Shuo was just like Benedict Sackville when he unrelentingly chased after her in a modest and urbane manner. That sort of tender, modest behavior made her feel like a goddess and made her fall into a trance.

    ¡°Helen, what¡¯s wrong?¡± The phoenix beside her pulled on Helen Tina, who was looking at Han Shuo in a daze, and asked her anxiously.

    Helen Tina suddenly stirred and noticed several of Ferrodias¡¯ mages approaching them with incantations. As they drew close, Helen couldn¡¯t help but snort, ¡°If you don¡¯t kill them, they would still kill you. I¡¯m not interested in such deals.¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned the moment those words came out. Soon after, he opened his hands to the approaching Ferrodias and said, ¡°Alright, this is not my business, you guys can continue. I¡¯ll just take my leave first. Truthfully, I am not too familiar with Grand Duke Helen, I was just making a joke with you guys, that¡¯s all!¡±

    Ferrodias had been about to start killing when he was suddenly stopped in his tracks by Han Shuo¡¯s words. He hastily stopped his mages from finishing their incantations and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Fine, I also don¡¯t want to be enemies with you. As long as you don¡¯t get involved in this matter, I will act as if this never happened.¡±

    ¡°Sure. You guys continue. Bye now!¡± Han Shuoughed lightly. It seemed like he truly intended to leave.

    ¡°You demon, I promise you. I already promised you, you thrice-damned demon, don¡¯t leave!¡± Helen Tina let out a panicked shriek as she hastily shouted at him.

    ¡°Why didn¡¯t you say so earlier? Don¡¯t waste my time!¡± Han Shuo stopped, then raised his hand again and said to Ferrodias, ¡°My bad. You¡¯re screwed now!¡±

    ¡°Motherf*cker. You tricked me. Get rid of him!¡± Ferrodias had originally decided against provoking Han Shuo after seeing a demonstration of his powers. But who knew Han Shuo would retract his words and use him as the butt of a joke? Suddenly, Ferrodias felt an uncontroble anger rise in him as he shouted his orders.

    Some of the mages had long since harbored a dislike of Han Shuo, they immediately restarted their incantations the moment they heard Ferrodias¡¯ urgentmand.

    ¡°So what if I tricked you? All you are is trash. You are only fit to be yed with!¡± Han Shuo said this with all smiles as he calmly took out the skeletal staff and chanted out a magical spell of some length.

    Rows of undead creatures suddenly appeared around Ferrodias as Han Shuo chanted. More than a hundred of them appeared in the blink of an eye, while a squadron of gargoyles whizzed towards the still chanting mages. Frightened, they could only stop their incantations and frantically take cover.

    ¡°You! You! Just who on earth are you?!¡± When several hundred undeads surrounded Ferrodias, three of which were powerful evil knights, Ferrodias could finally no longer contain the fear within his heart and cry out in rm.

    Shrugging his shoulders, Han Shou said, ¡°You¡¯re about to die, why bother with so many questions?¡±

    ¡°Bryan. Bryan. You¡¯re Bryan, the newly appointed city lord of Brettel City¡± One of the mages suddenly cried out in rm. He had obviously heard the way Helen Tina addressed Han Shuo and had connected the dots, shouting out in rm.

    ¡°Yep, perhaps you guys can die content now!¡± Han Shuo replied with a smirk. He waved his hand with the bone staff and caused an enormous undead creature to wink into existence, drowning the people beneath it.

    Among these people, the most powerful was still earth knight Ferrodias. Han Shuopletely ignored the little mages. Their ending was easy to imagine after the enormous undead creature mmed into them.

    Indeed. Even when the mages only had the gargoyles to worry about, they were still caught in a bad situation. Now, with hundreds of undeads, their little spells¡¯ destructive power was fundamentally useless. On the other hand, although Ferrodias¡¯ power was sufficient, just one evil knight alone was capable of preventing him from obtaining victory. Now, with three evil knights surrounding him, he was guaranteed to die tragically.

    A miserable and mournful howl echoed from Ferrodias and his people. After the legion of undead attacked, the group of people who had been prancing around arrogantly just a moment ago, were torn into pieces. The terrifying screams could make one¡¯s hair stand on end.

    But when Helen Tina¡¯s traitors screamed in a manner that could cause shudders up and down one¡¯s back, she actually had a kind of delightful, carefree feeling. This was because she felt like she had always treated them fairly and could never have imagined that these people would actually one day betray her. Thankfully, Han Shuo was in the vicinity, otherwise, Helen Tina would probably have been captured and fated to be Benedict Sackville¡¯s ve

    Helen Tina might have reluctantly epted things if it¡¯d been a rebellion from ordinary folk, but when those who she treated with sincerity betrayed her, it truly became hard to extinguish such intense hatred for them. After hearing the petrified screams, Helen Tina gnashed her teeth and shouted, ¡°Serves you right. As traitors, this is what you deserve!¡±

    ¡°Pfft. I say, Miss Helen, they¡¯re already screwed, shouldn¡¯t you return the gold coins you owe me already?¡± Han Shuoughingly walked in front of Helen Tina and gantly helped Helen Tina remove the magical imprisoning before prompting her to pay back the debt. He also smoothly stored the into his space ring.

    ¡°You, are you finished yet?¡± Helen Tina looked at Han Shuo¡¯s smiling face and suddenly felt a belly full of anger. In the end, she couldn¡¯t help but to shout at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo said astoundedly, ¡°What! Are you actually looking to renege on the debt. Hehe. You should know that although they¡¯re all dead, I can still very easily get rid of you. Even worse, I can directly bring you to Benedict Sackville and exchange you for fifty thousand gold coins.¡±

    ¡°You dare!¡± Helen Tina hatefully stared at Han Shuo with wide eyes. After staying silent for a moment, she took a deep breath, as if fortifying herself and said, ¡°Bryan, I have a proposal.¡±

    ¡°What kind of proposal; let me hear it¡± Han Shuo asked.

    ¡°A marriage between us. The dowry is Helon Dukedom, what do you think?¡± Although Helen Tina was blushing and ashamed, her eyes were resolute as she looked deeply at Han Shuo.

 Chapter 359: You are not the only one

    Chapter 359: You are not the only one

    ¡°Helen, are you crazy!? How could you even have such an insane idea?!¡± Even trapped in the magic, the fire phoenix nearly deafened everyone with her shout, looking at Helen Tina with in disbelief upon hearing thetter¡¯s words.

    ¡°I¡¯m not crazy. Big sister Firewind, this is the only way to restore Helon Duchy¡¯s stability and also stop others from looking at me with those eyes. Only when this demon marries me will I be able to wash the impurities off my body! The others will only believe his words.¡± Helen Tina heaved a long sigh as she said helplessly to Firewind.

    With regards to Helen Tina being vited by Han Shuo, as long as Han Shuo stood up to speak the truth, it didn¡¯t matter if there were still people who didn¡¯t believe those words. Everything would be fine as long as he married Helen. At least, the people of Helon Duchy wouldn¡¯t keep objecting to everything.

    ¡°But you know who he is! He¡¯s the city lord of Brettel! The people of Helon Duchy still consider Brettel their personal hunting ground. I¡¯m afraid that they can¡¯t ept this matter at all.¡± The fire phoenix persistently tried to persuade Helen Tina out of what she considered the most foolish of ideas.

    ¡°It¡¯s fine, they will gradually learn to ept it. I understand them, the civilians are the most easily deceived but also the most easy to calm down. As long as the rebellious aristocrats are removed, the civilians will behave as long as their livelihoods aren¡¯t threatened.¡± Helen Tina said stubbornly. Her pretty eyes shed with a cold glint as she seemed to think about visiting some murder and bloodshed on those rebels.

    Han Shuo looked at Helen Tina from a distance, listening to the two women¡¯s conversation. Her offer had greatly tempted him, since she was backed by the entirety of Helon Duchy. Han Shuo also had absolute belief that as long as he married Helen Tina, he could definitely use her hands to tame Helon Duchy into submission..Looking at it from the aspect of absolute interest, this seemed to give nothing but profits without the slightest loss. The only thing Han Shuo was worried about was, once this matter was leaked out, the other three women just might not spare him. This was truly a difficult problem!

    ¡°What do you think? No matter how we look at it, a proud person like you won¡¯t decline this kind of offer, right?¡± Helen Tina¡¯s bright eyes stared at Han Shuo, her face slowly returning to her naturalplexion as her embarrasment faded. She was simply discussing business.

    ¡°Eh... this... Actually, I already have a woman!¡± Han Shuo scratched his head, exining his problem to Helen Tina.

    ¡°What woman? Is she even more valuable than the Helon Duchy?¡± Helen Tina wasn¡¯t surprised. It¡¯d be strange if someone like Han Shuo didn¡¯t have any women. However, Helen Tina believed in her own value and that of Helon Duchy behind her. It should be enough to make Han Shuo ept her offer.

    ¡°Feelings are not things, and they can¡¯t be measured by pure economical value either!¡± Han Shuo answered Helen Tina. His mind quickly spun as he tried to think things through. He smiled a whileter and responded, ¡°Your current Helon Duchy has powerful enemies outside and civil war inside. Even your grand duke position is in danger, so this dowry of yours isn¡¯t exactly reliable!¡±

    ¡°Humph! If I¡¯m to marry you with Helon Duchy as my dowry, of course there¡¯s a condition. You must help me stabilize Helon Duchy. On the other hand, even if I marry you, Helon Duchy will still be mine to manage.¡± Helen Tina answered like it was a matter of course. She was determined to make such a decision out of consideration for herself, as well as her admiration for Han Shuo¡¯s ability. Otherwise, even if he had really vited her, had he been an ipetent man, she absolutely still wouldn¡¯t consider him.

    ¡°This means that you still need my help to stabilize the Helon Duchy. Then it can¡¯t be considered as you giving me Helon Duchy as your dowry.¡± Han Shuo looked at Helen Tina with a supercilious smile, as he spoke in a measured tone.

    Helen Tina flew into a rage when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s words. She rolled her eyes at Han Shuo and said, ¡°You demon, you¡¯ll even bargain with me about this kind of thing! After you marry me, I myself will be your person, so Helon Duchy will naturally be yours also. If you don¡¯t want to, then forget it! It¡¯s not like I¡¯ll die without you!¡±

    Helen Tina had already tossed her self esteem into an abyss when she decided to discuss her marriage with Han Shuo. For someone as proud as her, it was already embarrassing enough to discuss this topic with Han Shuo face to face while pretending to be calm about it. She didn¡¯t expect him to be such a politician and be still weighing the gains and losses. This made Helen Tina feel humiliated, so she couldn¡¯t help but say so in her rage.

    ¡°Don¡¯t be agitated, don¡¯t be agitated!¡± Han Shuo hastily smoothed things over a little. He then adopted a stern face and a low tone, ¡°Firstly, the position of my women won¡¯t change because of you. Moreover, this transaction temporarily cannot be made public; your position in the seven grand duchies is still useful for me. However, I will help you hold Helon Duchy in the palm of your hand.¡±

    Helen Tina¡¯s raging waves of anger slightly calmed when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s words. Somewhat puzzled, she asked, ¡°What do you mean?¡±

    ¡°That is to say, you are just one of my women. Not only are you not the only one, but our rtionship also can¡¯t be made public. It¡¯s still greatly useful for me if Helon Duchy remains as part of the seven grand duchies. However, I will consolidate the practical power of Helon Duchy in your hands, so you can keep governing Helon Duchy. What do you think?¡± Han Shuo exined.

    Helen Tina quickly considered the pros and cons. She knew full well that the kind of man like Han Shuo simply couldn¡¯t be tied down by any woman. Of course, she also didn¡¯t think that she could tame him into docility. Therefore, although the first condition made her vaguely ufortable, she could still ept it for the bigger picture.

    As for the second condition, after Helen Tina¡¯s train of thought reached its natural conclusion, she was immediately terrified. She herself was the grand duke of Helon Duchy. Being able to climb up to this position as a woman, she was naturally no fool. What did it mean for Helon Duchy alone to remain among the seven grand duchies? It was as clear as day to Helen Tina that Han Shuo had a desire, an ambition that spanned all seven grand duchies!

    If there was one duchy in the seven grand duchies that rebelled secretly, it would definitely y a crucial role. This could change a war¡¯s status almost immediately, and help Han Shuo achieve his ambition. As her thoughts reached this point, Helen Tina¡¯s gaze at Han Shuo was somewhat different.

    A man with ambition was always attractive to women. It was even more deadly for the women if this man possessed the strength to match that ambition. Especially to a woman who was unwilling to live a mediocre life like Helen Tina, this kind of temptation was even greater. Therefore, the more Helen Tina looked at Han Shuo, the more she found him pleasing to the eyes. The more she looked, the more outstanding he seemed.

    ¡°Helen, Helen!¡± The fire phoenix next to Helen Tina saw her stare dumbly at Han Shuo, her eyes sparkling with a brilliant light that made the former feel somewhat embarrassed. Helen Tina¡¯s gaze was clearly revealing lust, the unique feature of a boy crazy girl.

    ¡°What, big sister Firewind?¡± Helen Tina was startled. She looked to the fire phoenix, somewhat surprised.

    ¡°Eh, nothing!¡± The fire phoenix saw that Han Shuo didn¡¯t say anything else, so she coughed lightly to cover up her slip.

    However, Helen Tina had been with the fire phoenix for many years already. Upon seeing the fire phoenix¡¯s expression, Helen Tina immediately recalled her behavior just now. She suddenly reacted fiercely, her face flushed red as she red hatefully at Han Shuo, saying, ¡°I can agree to your conditions, but how can you stabilize Helon Duchy?¡±

    ¡°Very easy. I¡¯ll just announce to everyone that the only that happenedst time when I captured was exhorting gold coins, and that I definitely didn¡¯t vite you or develop a rtionship with you. Those rumors were just because my subordinates love to shoot off their mouths with their own spections. Eh, this is actually the truth as well. It wasn¡¯t me who spread these vicious news.¡±

    ¡°Other people may not believe if you say these things. But if theye from me, a fair portion of people will believe them. Anyhow, this isn¡¯t a bad thing to Brettel City either as it can even help raise the morale of the Brettel soldiers. So if it was the truth, I would have actually admitted to it with my personality.¡±

    ¡°Of course, there will be people who won¡¯t believe. Your Helon Duchy will certainly have those people. However, I can just help you take care of those aristocrats who dare to resist. Bloodshed forges a solid regime, and you obviously understand this principle. You don¡¯t have to worry too much.¡± Han Shuo leisurely exined.

    ¡°It really wasn¡¯t you who spread that news?¡± Helen Tina furrowed her brows in thought for a while after Han Shuo finished speaking before she looked at him.

    Han Shuo shrugged as he gave her a wry smile, ¡°It really wasn¡¯t me. I¡¯m not that bored!¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t believe you. I know how despicable and insidious you are!¡± Helen Tina said with resentment. Then, she suddenly thought better of it, saying, ¡°Aren¡¯t you afraid that I¡¯d run away? That after I use you, I will join the alliance to destroy Brettel City?¡±

    ¡°I certainly am, so I too have a condition!¡± Han Shuoughed wickedly.

    Helen Tina had a bad premonition when she saw Han Shuough. She gingerly asked, ¡°What condition?¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, I want your body first!¡± Han Shuo swept his lecherous eyes up and down Helen Tina¡¯s enchantingly curving body. He named the condition without the slightest bit of shame.

    ¡°No! You, you demon! Absolutely not! No!¡± Helen Tina had had a feeling that Han Shuo¡¯s words would be unpleasant, but she still panicked and found it uneptable when she officially heard his shameless condition.

    ¡°Helen, don¡¯t agree to it. He¡¯s just a liar!¡± The fire phoenix furiously said.

    ¡°If you don¡¯t agree, then this matter is over. You pay me the gold coins, and I¡¯ll leave this ce. From now on, we¡¯ll be meeting each other across the battlefield.¡± Han Shuo shrugged indifferently, seemingly not caring too much about Helen Tina¡¯s body, as if he wasn¡¯t the same person who¡¯d just lecherously eyed her up and down.

    For some unknown reason, Helen Tina felt her heart clench when she heard Han Shuo say they¡¯d be meeting on the battlefield. Just thinking about that possibility gave her a feeling of difort. This kind of feeling made her extremely ufortable, but she didn¡¯t know why it was actually happening.

    End of part one of the chapter.

    Helen Tina gritted her teeth in silence for a while, before raising her head to re resentfully at Han Shuo. She said with determination, ¡°I agree, but only after you help me get rid of all of the hidden troubles in Helon Duchy. Otherwise, this matter is over here and now!¡±

    ¡°No problem. Haha, the beauty has personally sent herself to my door with a duchy as the dowry. Only a fool would refuse this toast!¡± Han Shuo was smug as hisughter echoed into the sky. He hadn¡¯t expected to stumble upon such an unexpected harvest on this trip to the seven grand duchies. It seemed that the evil bunch of Chester, Dick, and the others who¡¯d spread those vicious rumors had done him a great favor. Women are truly a strange creature; their hearts were fickle indeed!

    As Han Shuo and Helen Tina were talking, the miserable, tragic screams around them also gradually stopped. As he turned his head to look, Han Shuo found that none of the rebels, including Ferrodias, had escaped from the savage ws of the great undead army. All of them had fallen, corpses doomed to eternal silence.

    But the surrounding area was a little bloody. With a beauty right next to him, Han Shuo felt that the scenery didn¡¯t look too good. He took out the skeletal staff and chanted out a quick incantation, causing the group of undead creatures to slowly fade away.

    ¡°Alright. Let¡¯s first leave this ce and see if the army still heeds yourmand.¡± Han Shuo smiled at Helen Tina and said.

    ¡°Rest assured. Not everyone in my army is like that bastard Ferrodias. My family guards definitely won¡¯t betray me, that I can guarantee!¡± Helen Tina said proudly.

    Han Shuo actually believed this. From the moment he¡¯d set foot into the seven grand duchies. Han Shuo already knew a little about Helen Tina¡¯s situation. Her family n was thergest aristocratic n in the Helon Duchy, holding the majority of control over Helon Duchy¡¯s soldiers. Otherwise, she would long have been overthrown by the rebels.

    To Helen Tina¡¯s n, only with Helen Tina herself in the position of grand duke could the benefits of the n be maintained. Once Helen Tina fell, her family n would naturally suffer the consequences. Helen Tina understood this fact clearly, which was why she¡¯d given various positions of power in the Helon Duchy to her family members. As such, she¡¯d been able to sustain her position until now despite being opposed by the people and a minority of the aristocrats.

    The seven great dukes of the seven grand duchies all followed the same practice. Once they sessfully climbed in their positions of power, they would spare no effort to let their family members take over the important positions of the duchy. The benefit was that the power and benefits would remain concentrated in their family n even when some domestic aristocrats opposed them. In addition, they could rely on the virtue of n power to pressure those aristocrats. However, the incredible disadvantage was that not all of the trusted n members was talented. If they held power in the duchy with mediocre ability, then not only was it impossible to fully exploit the potential of the duchy¡¯s territory, the national strength would also gradually be exhausted.

    ¡°Alright, no need to be arrogant in front of me. If you don¡¯t even have this little bit of ability, you aren¡¯t fit to be my woman!¡± Han Shuo sent a verbal jab at Helen Tina. Turning his attention to the fire phoenix, he frowned. The fire phoenix¡¯s entire body was powerless after being struck by the magic arrow. ¡°The poisoned magic arrow broke off inside her body. This¡¯ll be a little troublesome.¡±

    ¡°My body is only a little weak right now. With my race¡¯s natural healing ability, it¡¯ll only take a few days to recover!¡± The fire phoenix angrily said. Evidently, she hadn¡¯t adapted to Han Shuo¡¯s new identity, and her attitude was still unfriendly. After all, she had been putting her heart and mind into killing Han Shuo to take revenge for Helen Tina until today. Who would have expected that there¡¯d be such a dramatic turn of events? This super rank magic creature had yet to fully ept the situation.

    ¡°No need to make such a fuss. You can¡¯t be my burden right now!¡± Han Shuo walked straight to the fire phoenix and firmly pulled out the broken magic arrow without caring about her pain. Afterwards, his left hand firmly held her body down despite her struggling and he ced his right hand on the wound.

    The effect from the poisoned magic arrow had weakened her enough that her feeble struggling couldn¡¯t shake of Han Shuo¡¯s hands. A powerful suction force radiated through her body through Han Shuo¡¯s big hand. The poison overflowing her body quickly flowed out through the wound under the power of the force.

    The poison in her body flowed into Han Shuo¡¯s palm that was touching her wound. As her previously suppressed power was gradually restored, the fire phoenix understood that Han Shuo was helping her, and she no longer trembled her feathers. Her struggling body gradually quieted down, her zing feathers once again recovering their luster.

    When Han Shuo let go, the fire phoenix once again felt her power overflowing. She happily let out a high pitched chirp and pped her wings to shoot up into the sky, starting to swoop around joyously.

    ¡°Big sister Firewind, is, is she okay?¡± Helen Tina was very pleasantly surprised. Her eyes that looked at Han Shuo carried a somewhat different meaning, her body also involuntarily moving closer to Han Shuo.

    Nodding, Han Shuo flipped his palm and flicked a pile of stinking blood on the ground. He then casually replied, ¡°I¡¯ve sucked out the poison in her body. You see her skipping and jumping around like that, does she look anywhere near injured?¡±

    ¡°Alright, consider it as us owing you a favor, thank you!¡± Helen Tina very reluctantly thanked Han Shuo. She was also a little apprehensive about the miracle he¡¯d just worked. She was very clear about his astounding strength, but he shouldn¡¯t be a priest nor an alchemist. But even priests and alchemists didn¡¯t seem to have such a miraculous ability!

    In the Profound Continent, once poison entered the blood, no priests nor alchemists could easily suck it out like Han Shuo had done. To Helen Tina, this was something incredibly miraculous. She suddenly felt d about her decision, thinking how fortunate she was to avoid bing the mortal enemy of this person. Otherwise, it would have brought about irreversible disaster to the Helon Duchy.

    Taking advantage of Helen Tina¡¯s surprise, Han Shuo quickly reached out to caress her pretty, silky smooth, warm cheek. Helen Tina¡¯s pretty face looked shocked as she turned to face him. Enjoying the delightful smoothness of her skin, Han Shuo smiled gantly and said, ¡°We¡¯re already family, so why act polite?¡±

    Helen Tina jolted out of her silent pondering and suddenly reacted. She flung her head back in rm and retreated a few steps back. She red hatefully at Han Shuo, saying, ¡°We are not a family yet. You, behave, or I won¡¯t be polite!¡±

    ¡°Oh? Okay, I¡¯d like to see how you¡¯ll be impolite!¡± Han Shuo paid no heed to Helen Tina¡¯s threat and stalked towards her. He found it somewhat interesting to tease this proud and arrogant grand duke.

    ¡°Bryan, can you stop acting like that? We need to have a proper discussion about the internal affairs of my duchy.¡± Helen Tina changed tacks like the breeze, using a fatigued, weak voice to persuade Han Shuo upon seeing him approach.

    Helen Tina knew full well that it was simply impossible to stop Han Shuo head on with her power. Han Shuo¡¯s shocking strength was powerful as that of a demon god. She had almost lost the will to resist. Helen Tina was already considering this man as her greatest support. He might just be able to give her everything she needed. Subconsciously, Helen Tina had long since admitted defeat, which finally dawned on her when she saw Han Shuo draw near.

    Han Shuo was startled. He looked closely at Helen Tina. At this moment, the weak Helen also had a kind of charm that roused an inexplicable pity in him. He didn¡¯t continue to aggressively approach her, but instead abruptly stopped his steps and said with a smile, ¡°Then forget it. Let¡¯s talk about your duchy¡¯s affairs!¡±

    ¡°Ferrodias is just one of my senior knights. I¡¯m absolutely sure he wouldn¡¯t have to guts to betray me without someone to encourage him. Humph! Currently in the duchy, only Marquis Kekaru hold the advantage in taking my ce. He¡¯s always been impatiently waiting in the shadows, so I reckon he¡¯s prepared to strike a fatal blow to push me off the political stage. I dare say for sure that he is the person pulling the strings behind the scenes.¡± Killing intent shed in Helen Tina¡¯s bright eyes as she bit off her words.

    ¡°Very good. Now that we know who it is, I¡¯lle to Helon Duchy with you, and kill all of those traitors, so they will never have the chance to even foster the idea of rebelling against you.¡± Said Han Shuo coldly.

 Chapter 360: Receiving some benefits

    Chapter 360: Receiving some benefits

    When Han Shuo and Helen returned to the army station, it was just as she had said¡ªher family¡¯s trusted aides werepletely oblivious to Ferrodias¡¯ actions. He¡¯d obviously been acting in his interest, and Helen¡¯s actions were written off as arresting and suitably punishing him.

    Ferrodias¡¯ original n was to capture and bring Helen to Marquis Kekaru of Helon Duchy. After Helen, the pir of her family¡¯s army, disappeared, Kekaru would be able to defeat the Helon Duchy¡¯s army and be the duke with Benedict Sackville¡¯s backing.

    After Han Shuo and Helen returned to the stationed army, they didn¡¯t openly appear before the army. That was mostly because Han Shuo had plenty of methods to privately meet Helen.

    After dealing with Ferrodias, Helen began traveling back to the nearby Helon Duchy. She had prepared her cover story of being attacked by assassins on her way back. Because no one except her people had survived, the news of the revolt hadn¡¯t been divulged.

    The next day, Han Shuo stealthily followed the army troops back to Helon Duchy. The Helon Duchy was as powerful as a province in Lancelot Empire. It too had five cities and more than ten different sized towns. Helon City acted as the capital city of Helon Duchy, located in the center of the duchy. The other four cities were each owned by the four marquises, although one was still reeling from their marquis¡¯ death at Helen Tina¡¯s hands during the previous civil unrest.

    Marquis Kekaru was the lord of Seagate City, one of the four cities of Helon Duchy. Although he hadn¡¯t revealed any intentions of revolting during the previous unrest, he¡¯d suddenly decided to rebel this time. This person had apparently waited patiently for the perfect moment for a long while now.

    Han Shou and Helen returned to the Helon Duchy together. Along the way, Helen gathered her private army, totaling thirty thousand troops, Helon Duchy¡¯s most elite cavalry regiment, and all led by Helen¡¯s most trusted family aides.

    Seagate CIty was an unavoidable stop on the road back to Helon Duchy. After marching for two days, Helen¡¯s army finally approached its gates.

    Since Helen was a woman and a famous fire archmage, she had always stayed within a spacious and luxurious chariot pulled by four war-horses.

    At this moment, apart from Helen, an additional person, Han Shuo, had appeared in the chariot as well. Within the spacious chariot was a soft rug that felt amazinglyfortable to step on. There was also some blush, powder, alongside some fresh fruits that sparkled on top of a small shelf.

    Helenzily leaned into her seat and looked at the rxed Han Shuo before saying, ¡°Seagate City is Kekaru¡¯s territory. This cunning fox has always hidden his intentions in the past. Although I know he has done damnable things, I never could find an excuse to deal with him. Furthermore, he always has several experts protecting him. As long as he stays within Seagate City, it will not be easy for me to kill him.¡±

    ¡°How many city guards are in Seagate City right now? If you returned now, would he dare open the city gates and let you enter?¡± Han Shuo casually asked Helen while rudely plucking a bunch of grapes from the side. While looking at Han Shuo¡¯s unperturbed attitude, Helen actually felt aforting sense of security. It was as if she did not need to fear anything with this demon next to her.

    ¡°Although Seagate City has fifty thousand soldiers in total, only ten thousand of them are elite soldiers. The only way he can avoid outright battle is if he opens the city gates and wees me. Even though I can easily suppress him after entering Seagate City, I don¡¯t have any evidence that Ferrodias¡¯ revolt was secretly incited by him. If I act against him without any justifiable cause, I¡¯m afraid the citizens and the nobles will raise a fuss.¡± Helen lightly wrinkled her eyebrows, annoyance seeping into her tone.

    Only after Han Shuo plucked thest grape off the bunch and wiped his hands on the expensive rug did he reply, ¡°Simple. As long as I kill Marquis Kekaru and all of his sessors, you can use the excuse of finding the killer to take control of Seagate City.¡± Han Shuo continued, ¡°Hehe, you are the duchess of Helon Duchy and you even have thirty thousand elite soldiers at your beck and call. As such, this is the logical move for you. Oh, by the way, you can also randomly arrange some people at the scene to falsely use your enemies of killing Kekaru. This will definitely hurt your enemies. Hm, in fact, I think Benedict Sackville of Narsen Duchy is a particrly viable candidate. What do you think?¡±

    After being embroiled in Helon Duchy¡¯s power struggle for all these years, Helen was well versed in scheming. Thus, after listening to Han Shuo¡¯s suggestion, she smiled sweetly and nodded before replying, ¡°Precisely my thoughts. As long as Kekaru and his heirs all die, I can justifiably allow my trusted aides to take control of Seagate City. Hehe, I already have the perfect candidate in mind. I already had this kind of a n in motion during the previous civil unrest, it¡¯s just that the assassins I sent were unable toplete their missions. But since you¡¯re here this time, it will definitely be a sess.

    As expected from such a vicious woman. As soon as the discussion moved to this sort of topic, Han Shuo noticed a dazzling light shining from her eyes. Her mouth curved into a sweet smile that could seduce and arouse any man¡¯s heart. Even Han Shuo felt a slight tug on his heart.

    When this sort of woman hated a guy, they would try to bring about their death regardless of what cost they had to pay. However, when this sort of woman truly fell in love with a man, they would be willing to abandon everything just to be there for her man.

    Han Shuo stared at Helen. Perhaps Helen didn¡¯t hate him so much anymore, but he also knew that Helen was still not helping him wholeheartedly. Only when he thoroughly conquered her would she be a truly sharp weapon in his hands. Otherwise, he would only be harming himself.

    To make such a person submit, both your body and mind was necessary to make her surrender. It was a long and hard battle for Han Shuo to have realized the importance of this. Only in this way could he influence her heart and slowly make her his vassal. One of the best examples of this was Emily.

    Thinking about this, Han Shuo lightlyughed and moved his face close to Helen who waszily leaned backwards. As Helen¡¯s face paled in panic, Han Shuo suddenly pulled Helen on top of his thighs and rudely kissed her bright red lips,pletely ignoring her will.

    A very seductive fragrance entered Han Shuo¡¯s nose from Helen¡¯s body. This fragrance caused Han Shuo to be uncontrobly engrossed, just like how an alcoholic would be lost in the most excellent of wine. To his credit, Han Shuo did not actually kiss her without restraint. After a light kiss on Helen¡¯s intoxicatingly red lips, he chuckled and released Helen. Then,ughing at Helen¡¯s charmingly flushed face, he said, ¡°I lost control of myself because you¡¯re just too mesmerizing. Haha. Since I will have to take care of your enemies soon, I should at least get such a benefit right?¡±

    ¡°You..... You perverted bastard! You just stole a kiss!!¡± Blushing hotly, Helen scrambled off his thighs and red fiercely at Han Shuo. Originally, she wanted to rush towards Han Shuo and get revenge, but remembering that he was a tiger inmb¡¯s clothing, she could only fiercely throw a crystal cup towards Han Shuo in a fit of rage.

    He leisurely snatched the crystal cup out of the air. Cup in hand, Han Shuo leisurely poured out some wine and walked towards Helen hiding at the corner of the carriage, grinning, ¡°Here, ept this cup of wine as an apology from me. Heh, as you know, I¡¯m but a normal man while you are such a mesmerizing beautiful woman. It¡¯s a miracle that I didn¡¯t do anything else to you while riding in such a carriage. You better not anger me now!¡±

    Being told off by Han Shuo like this, Helen felt her heart tremble as she angrily red at Han Shuo. Even her slender white neck was starting to flush red. But in reality, being praised as a mesmerizing beautiful woman by Han Shuo made her a little happy. Since she would be his sooner orter, giving him some benefits in advance wouldn¡¯t hurt.

    ¡°Fine, take it as I¡¯ve forgiven you for now, but you can¡¯t be so unruly in the future, especially when there are other people around!¡± Helen hatefully red at Han Shuo for a moment. In the end, she obediently picked up the wine cup and took a sip in defeat.

    ¡°Of course, when others are around, you are the goddess of Helon Duchy!¡± Han Shuo promised Helen first, and then saidughingly, ¡°But when it¡¯s only the two of us, you will be freely assaulted by me!¡±

    ¡°Humph!¡± Helen red at Han Shuo for a moment and then seriously said, ¡°Alright, you¡¯ve kissed me and got what you wanted. Soon we will be entering the city and perhaps, Kekaru will even be entering the carriage to wee me. So, shouldn¡¯t you be leaving now?¡±

    ¡°No problem, I¡¯ll leave right now!¡± Han Shuo answered with augh. Suddenly, Han Shuo appeared next to Helen like lightning and licked her neck before lightly praising her as he walked away, ¡°So fragrant!¡±

    A burst of mist slowly floated out of the carriage without alerting a single imperial guard nearby. As the mist slowly scattered due to a breeze, Han Shuo had already disappeared without a trace.

    Left behind the carriage was a Helen whose white neck had just been vited by Han Shuo before he left. A constant burning sensation kepting from her vited neck, causing her heart to tremble and her face to blush. In annoyance, she could only spit on the floor and lightly say to herself, ¡°This damned brat! He really is a damned pervert. I really don¡¯t know if I can deal with him until after he has taken care of my enemies. Ai, meeting him has really put me at my wit¡¯s end. How annoying!¡±

    A few minutester, Helen¡¯s army troops slowly stopped in front of Seagate City. A sentinel had already alerted Seagate City of her arrival beforehand. Thus, Marquis Kekaru, who was within the city, should¡¯ve received the news of her arrival.

    At this time, Kekeru was in a small building in front of the city gate. He had a dark expression on his face as he listened attentively to his trusted aides who talked unceasingly, remaining silent himself.

    He was attired in noble robes, and was of noble stature. His gray sideburns give him away as past his prime. Clearly, he did not have an outstanding appearance. But his outward appearance hid a pair of calctive eyes that seemed like he never ceased pondering.

    ¡°Sir Marquis, Ferrodias has died and the n has most likely failed. Right now, you can be considered the biggest threat to the duke of Helon Duchy. Furthermore, that vicious bitch has never concerned herself with sentimentalism and likely knows that you are the instigator. You must not let her into the city, otherwise, we will definitely die as part of a bloody revenge.¡± The Seagate City administrator did his best to persuade the marquis.

    ¡°Yes father, this bitch is famous for her viciousness. If her elite army enters the city, our army will have no way of suppressing her. We can only borrow Seagate City¡¯s defensive strength to stall and prevent her from entering the city. During that time, we can ally with other nobles before finally entering an official war.¡± Kekaru¡¯s son, Kesega, was d in luminous knight armor and did his best to persuade Kekaru as well. Nevertheless, Kekaru remained wordless as he walked back and forth while his eyeballs darted to and fro. It seemed that even he had be extremely anxious, losing his typical decisive nature.

    ¡°Father, hurry and make a decision. They will be arriving soon.¡± As the time ticked away, Kesega anxiously reminded him again after seeing Kekaru remain silent.

    After a long silence, Kekaru deeply exhaled and said, ¡°Open the gates ande wee the duke with me. You guys cannot make any mistakes whatsoever!¡±

    ¡°Sir Marquis. This could cost us our lives!¡± The administrator hurriedly protested in fear.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, even if she knows it was me, she doesn¡¯t have any proof. Hmph! I¡¯ve been in charge of Seagate city for so many years; both nobles and citizens support me. If she dares act against me without evidence, the citizens will not approve of her. You don¡¯t need to worry, she shouldn¡¯t dare openly take any action against me. But, if she still decides to use assassins likest time, we only need to be more vignt and it will still be fine.¡±

    ¡°Furthermore, the time is not yet ripe for us to rebel. We could suffer a huge loss to the family forces she holds in her hand, and there¡¯s no certainty we wille out victorious. But even if we doe out victorious, the conflict will just weaken Helon Duchy even further, and we¡¯ll be the weakest among the seven Grand Duchies. Instead of such a result, we should continue controlling Seagate City and wait for a better opportunity.¡± Kekaru said to the two people.

    After thinking about what Kekaru said, the two, although still unwilling, knew that his analysis was reasonable. Furthermore, knowing how futile it would be for anyone to try and change Kekaru¡¯s decisions due to his decisive nature, they did not continue trying to persuade him.

 Chapter 361: Massacre

    Chapter 361: Massacre

    Helen¡¯s entourage smoothly entered Seagate City with a warm wee from Kekaru, and was brought to a manor at the southern end of the city.

    Along the way, Helen¡¯s charming face was darkened and unhappy. Previously when Helen hade to Seagate, the citizens who had heard the news would crowd and crane their heads for a tiny peek at her face. However this time round, apart from Kekaru¡¯s men, the road was only sparsely filled with citizens. These people only viewed her carriage from far away, not showing any signs of respect. This made Helen feel ufortable inside.

    After properly arranging her personal guard at the manor, Helen declined Kekaru¡¯s offer of a banquet in her honor, citing tiredness. She feared that Kekaru would assassinate her in his own castle. She was afraid of Kekaru¡®s schemes. Just like her, Kekaru was not a benevolent person. It was entirely possible that he would take action at the banquet.

    On the other hand, Helen also didn¡¯t want to endure the inevitable unfriendly gazes at the banquet. She¡¯d had enough of these looks of disdain. However, she couldn¡¯t kill them just because of their hidden looks of disdain.

    This manor was where Kekaru received distinguished guests. It had arge area that was surrounded by Helen¡¯s thirty thousand strong personal guard. Helen was in the center of the area and was safe enough to sleep peacefully. The full moon slowly appeared in the night sky. At the door of a central luxurious and spacious room, ten guards stood tensely on duty. In the room, Helen was endlessly worrying alone.

    Without any wind, the window voluntarily opened, and a cloud of grey fog suddenly flew in front of Helen. The fog stopped whirling when the window shut, revealing Han Shuo¡¯s figure.

    ¡°You¡¯re here!¡± Helen gathered her scattered thoughts, raising her head to nce at Han Shuo. She softly muttered, ¡°Kekaru has always wanted to remove me from my position as Duke. He previously wanted me to marry his son Kasega but I declined. His Seagate City has always not fully obeyed my orders. If it wasn¡¯t for me trying to prevent Helon Duchy from falling into turmoil, I would have long since acted against him, and not resorted to employing assassins.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll make a trip there tonight. I¡¯ll help you handle him!¡± Han Shuo calmly looked at Helen, as though he had just uttered a simple andmon thing.

    ¡°If it¡¯s possible, I want to work with you. I want to personally end his life. This person was the one who murdered my mother. I hate him!¡± Helen was a little unusual today, speaking to Han Shuo with some viciousness.

    Wrinkling his eyebrows, Han Shuo considered for a while before replying, ¡°How about this. You stay here, I¡¯ll bring him over and let you kill him yourself.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t probe the statement regarding Helen¡¯s mother. Everyone was sure to have a few memories that haunted them. Han Shuo believed this incident was definitely not a pleasant memory. At times, to respect someone¡¯s privacy was more moving than expressing respect on the surface.

    Helen raised her head and deeply looked at Han Shuo, unclear if she had thought of something sad, her gaze a little frail. Sheughed at herself, saying, ¡°Thank you. In the end, I¡¯m still a woman. Seems like I also need a man¡¯s shoulder to lean on. After all these years, I¡¯m truly tired.¡±

    Smiling and nodding, Han Shuo tried walking toward Helen. When he realized Helen¡¯s gaze wasn¡¯t alert, he continued to walk towards her. When he reached her side, Han Shuo lightly embraced her. Feeling Helen¡¯s shivering body, Han Shuo patted her shoulder and gently said, ¡°It¡¯s alright. I won¡¯t ask about your past, but I will bring Kekaru in front of you. You can exact the price for his sins then.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, I don¡¯t know if I should hate you. When I came over today, none of the citizens came over to wee me. It looks like they¡¯ve already started to reject me in their hearts. The main cause of this was you, but for some reason I can¡¯t hate you. Why, Bryan, why can¡¯t I hate you?¡± Helen leaned softly against Han Shuo¡¯s shoulder, her voice a tired, weak whisper.

    ¡°Perhaps you should hate me, but if you always listen to me, not only will I not let you hate me, I¡¯ll help you gradually be happy again. I promise!¡± Han Shuo whispered in Helen¡¯s ear, adding, ¡°Alright, you should first rest for a while. To decrease your hatred of me, I¡¯ll first start with Kekaru.¡±

    Lightly pushing away Helen, who¡¯d exposed her weakness in the quiet night, Han Shuo silently left the room like a ghost in the night, weightlessly floating toward Kekaru¡¯s castle. To Han Shuo, his only prey was Helen. As long as Helen held the reins of Helon Duchy, he could covertly control Helon Duchy without wasting any men or resources. At an appropriate moment, this secretly traitorous Helon Duchy could be a hidden de in the coalition army, bringing Han Shuo immense benefits.

    Although Helen was the Duke of Helon Duchy, she was still a woman. The most reliable way to treat a woman was to conquer her heart. A man should be publicly overbearing in the day, but gentle and refined at night. They was equally lethal to a woman. Helen was of great use to Han Shuo. Hence, Han Shuo didn¡¯t mind spending some time to thoroughly and securely have both her and her Duchy in his palm.

    Deep in Kekaru¡¯s castle was a secret room guarded zealously by soldiers. In that room were the three people from the morning, gathered again at night. ¡°Father, that woman is staying in Seagate City. We must definitely kill her before she leaves. Otherwise, once she leaves, I¡¯m afraid we won¡¯t have another opportunity.¡± Kasega looked at his father Kekaru, once again proposing his idea.

    ¡°Lord Marquis, I¡¯m afraid this is our only opportunity. If we really wait till she returns to Helon City, it would be hard for us to act even if we wanted to!¡± Administrator Mori simrly advised.

    Kekaru¡¯s eyes were still calcting as he replied to the both of them, ¡°I also know that. However, she has thirty thousand elite troops by her side. Assassinating her is no easy feat.¡±

    ¡°Lord Father, she can¡¯t always be hiding within her thirty thousand troops. We only need to find ways to make her leave their protection. It¡¯s not difficult for us to kill her in Seagate City. We only need a reasonable excuse.¡± Kasega replied.

    ¡°Lord, isn¡¯t Young Master Kasega engaged to the Galileo Family¡¯s Miss Lejeame? We can seize this opportunity to arrange their marriage in the next two days. With the Lord¡¯s standing in the Duchy and with her being in Seagate City, she has no reason to not appear to express her congrattions. She can¡¯t possibly bring her thirty thousand guards to the wedding banquet. As long as shees, we¡¯ll be able to kill her. What do you think of that?¡± Magistrate Mori¡¯s eyes shone with maliciousness.

    ¡°Uncle Mori, this method isn¡¯t bad!¡± Kasega smiled dly, turning to Kekaru, ¡°Father, what do you think?¡±

    Kekaru¡¯s eyes continued to spin in thought, only nodding after a while, saying ¡°That could work. However, we have to be extra cautious, so I¡¯m going to need to consider it more carefully. We can only act when we¡¯re assured of sess. This woman is not simple. We massacred her mother¡¯s n years ago, but she actually managed to escape. All these years, she¡¯s clearly known that we were the culprits, but she¡¯s never showed it. This calcting shrewdness is something no normal youngster would possess.¡±

    ¡°Hmph. I want to kill her the way the Lord Father killed her mother. This woman doesn¡¯t give us face, going as far as rejecting my offer of marriage. And then she ended up being raped by an unknown brat. She brought that upon herself! What¡¯s the use of a woman in such a high position? A guy still rode her in the end!¡± Kasega was still brooding over Helen¡¯s rejection, and ridiculed her viciously.

    ¡°Capturing her is enough. We can¡¯t touch her. I¡¯ve promised Benedict Sackville to immediately hand Helen over once we captured her. After all, the thirty thousand family troops aren¡¯t easy to handle. We still need to rely on Benedict Sackville¡¯s help.¡± Kekaru reminded Kasega.

    ¡°Lord Father, I can still fool around right? It¡¯s not even her first time anymore. Even when she reaches Benedict Sackville¡¯s hands, he also won¡¯t be able to tell! This woman has always been like a goddess high above, and I¡¯ve long since wanted to sample the feeling of riding her. Lord Father, please allow me to taste this feeling!¡± Kasega seemed to be imagining the scene of Helen being conquered by him as he pleaded with Kekaru.

    Kekaru was still extremely doting on his only son. He also knew that after Helen had rejected Kasega, his son had toyed three maids to death before calming down. He hesitated a moment, before nodding, ¡°Fooling around is possible. However, after that you must erase that memory. If not, once Benedict Sackville finds out, it would be bad. We still need to deal with that person in the future.¡±

    ¡°Thank you father, thank you father! Haha. I¡¯ve been wanting to ride that bitch for a long time!¡± Kasega smiled deviously and chuckled. Hints of obscene violence slowly grew in his face. Administrator Mori licked his lips, simrly forcing a fewughs as he itched on the inside. However, he knew there were things he couldn¡¯t touch. Hence, he naturally didn¡¯t dare to state any presumptuous requests.

    As the three vicious vile characters were imagining a better future for them, a crisp abnormal sound suddenly came from under their feet. This secret room was underground, its perimeter reinforced with thick iron tes, impervious to the attack of des, swords or magic. It was the safe haven where Kekaru discussed his evil ns.

    Logically speaking, there shouldn¡¯t be such abnormal sounds echoing with the thick iron tes beneath their feet. Therefore, when that abnormal sound appeared, the three despicable people were stunned for a while, all of them looking dumbfoundedly at the ground. However, before they reacted, the previously soft abnormal sound suddenly amplified. The three of them were shocked. Kekaru was the first to react, shouting, ¡°Assassins!¡±

    With this shout, Kekaru was the first to rush toward the opening mechanism, trying to alert the surrounding guards. Kasega took out a knight¡¯s saber, focusing all his attention under his feet, ready to deal a fatal blow to anyoneing from below.

    ng!

    An arc shaped disc violently burst through the ground with an ear piercing sound. The disc was extremely thick, and was obviously the iron te that protected their feet. At the same time, a figure dashed out of the circr hole in the ground.

    Kasega gave a loud shout, his sword piercing towards Han Shuo, who¡¯d used the Demonyer Edge to cut open arge hole with much difficulty. Han Shuo had wasted more than ten minutes using the all-conquering Demonyer Edge to cut a hole in the iron te, inwardly cursing the designer of the building. He wielded the Demonyer Edge to parry the attack.

    With a spate of clear ngs and bangs, Kasega¡¯s knight saber was turned into scrap iron. One of Kasega¡¯s arms had gone the course of his saber and turned into bloody minced meat. As Kasega screamed in horror, Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge was suddenly flung out, pinning Kekaru¡¯s outstretched left hand to the wall. He¡¯d run to the mechanism with much difficulty and had wanted to shout for help. The Demonyer Edge was firmly embedded into the wall, continuing to pin his left hand to the wall, a distance from the mechanism.

    ¡°Damn it, who are you? Who let you in?!¡± Kekaru looked at Han Shuo, shouting miserably. His left hand was pinned on the wall by the Demonyer Edge, fresh blood trickling downward in streams. The heart wrenching pain made Kekaru want to cry.

    ¡°My hand, my hand, ahhh.....¡± Kasega¡¯s right arm waspletely torn to pieces. Currently it looked like a skinned and sharpened slice of pineapple, streams of blood dripping from the meridians, gruesome beyond belief.

    ¡°Bloody hell, a birdface like you wants to encroach on my woman?!¡± Han Shuo snorted, ignoring the howls of the father and son duo. Walking to the front of the frightened administrator, he grinned as he asked, ¡°Apart from old Kekaru¡¯s three sons, five daughters and forty seven assorted rtives in this castle, are there any others that have the qualifications to seed his position as marquis?¡±

    ¡°N, no!¡± Magistrate Mori looked at the grinning Han Shuo, his fear causing him to shiver uncontrobly. After answering while trembling, he cowardly kneeled before Han Shuo, crying, ¡°This is nothing to do with me, don¡¯t kill me. I am innocent.¡±

    ¡°Ok. Looks like we shouldn¡¯t have missed out on anyone.¡± Han Shuo muttered to himself. Grabbing the administrator¡¯s neck with one hand, he said, ¡°The deadly trap you just disyed is extremely interesting. I¡¯m afraid that people like you are the most scary, I can¡¯t spare your life!¡± Han Shuo twisted his hand after he finished this sentence, making a clear crack ring out. The administrator, his back to Kekaru, hadn¡¯t shifted his position, but he was now facing Kekaru with an agonized wail on his face. It was apparent his neck had been broken.

 Chapter 362: Sinking into depravity

    Chapter 362: Sinking into depravity

    ¡°You...who are you?! Don¡¯t hurt us, we¡¯ll give you anything you want!¡± Kekaru implored Han Shuo, trying to ignore the excruciating pain from his left hand.

    ¡°Heh heh, nope. You don¡¯t have the means of giving me what I want!¡± Han Shuo casually responded, his hand forcing Kesega down on the floor. Kesega was in so much pain, he had long forgotten his delusional fantasies with Helen. Looking at Han Shuo¡¯s hand pressing down, he felt a great force pushing down on him, leaving him incapable of moving a single step.

    ¡°Don¡¯t.... Don¡¯t kill me!¡± Kesega was paralyzed, and could only beg for forgiveness.

    Pfft! Han Shuo¡¯s hand grazed Kesega¡¯s head. Magical yuan emitted from his hand burrowed into Kesega¡¯s head, turning it into paste. His body slumped to the ground, now just a boneless mass of flesh.

    Han Shuo walked to Kekaru ¡¯s side. Ignoring his screaming, he smiled, ¡°Apart from you, your entire n is dead. Although, you¡¯re pretty lucky. I won¡¯t kill you.¡±

    ¡°Fiend! You fiend, what grudge do you have against me!? Why are you doing this to me?¡± Kekaru nched when he heard of his n member¡¯s deaths. He ignored the pain in his left hand and tore it free of the wall, charging at Han Shuo. He was consumed by the urge to at leastnd a couple of blows on Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo focused his mental strength and cast a Soul Tremor spell. A stabbing pain exploded in Kekaru¡¯s head before he could do more than take a few steps in Han Shuo¡¯s direction. Dizzy from the pain, he stumbled forward a few steps before sumbing to the agony and passing out.

    The Demonyer Edge, still stuck in Kekaru ¡¯s left hand, flew into Han Shuo¡¯s hand of its own volition. Scooping up the unconscious Kekaru, he dived back into the gaping hole in the ground, once again entering the depths of the earth.

    If someone excavated the ground right now, they¡¯d discover numerous tunnels meeting and separating across the city. Each of the tunnels opened up next to the various rtives of Marquis Kekaru living in the castle. Not a single rtive was spared.

    This intricate tunnelwork extended several meters down into the ground. Even with several hundred people working on it, it would still require around 10 days toplete. The castle contained many of Kekaru¡¯s personal guard, as well as a number of mages. Under normal circumstances, the tunnels would immediately be discovered as soon as anyone heard suspicious sounds from beneath the earth. Obviously, some of these things could not be exined usingmon sense. As Han Shuo made his way through the tunnels, the tunnels copses under the pressure of the earth. Once Han Shuo left, there were no traces in the ground beneath the castle that a tunnel had ever existed, let alone that intricatework.

    The dark night was lit by moonlight, streaming down like mercury. Under the light caress of the evening breeze, Han Shuo easily slipped into Helen¡¯s mansion. He released a ck fog magic as he did so, shrouding himself in a ck mantle. Even the moonlight had beenpletely obscured.

    Helen was alone in the residence, not knowing why she was starting to worry about Han Shuo. This kind of feeling bothered Helen. She had never been worried about the safety of a man before, especially a man that should have been the target of her hate. However, she had no way of controlling her internal emotions. Knowing what Han Shuo was attempting, she became more agitated every minute and every second that Han Shuo was gone, fearing that Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t be able to return safely.

    ¡°Please don¡¯t run into any trouble!¡± Helen muttered, with her eyebrows furrowed and a worried expression on her face. The room lights had long been extinguished. Helen stood near the window, staring off in the direction Han Shuo left. The moonlight yed across Helen¡¯s white skin, seeming cold and deste. It was a moving sight, and birthed pity in the heart of anyone who was watching.

    When the ck fog magic neared the mansion, Helen first felt the moonlight disappear. Looking around, the corners of Helen¡¯s lips lifted. Giving a softugh of joy, she opened the window wider, and took a few steps back. When Helen opened the window, the breeze blew in a cloud of gray dust. The window silently closed, and a gray figure gradually materialized.

    ¡°Are you alright?¡± Helen didn¡¯t ask Han Shuo whether Kekaru had been killed, but first inquired about Han Shuo¡¯s condition. It seemed that, in the depths of Helen¡¯s heart, Han Shuo¡¯s safety was more important than whether Kekaru lived or died.

    When he heard these words, Han Shuo noticed the change in attitude she had towards him. His heart unconsciously growing warm, he smiled and gently said, ¡°Thank you for your concern. I¡¯m alright.¡±

    The upper portion of his left hand that was carrying Kekaru was already frozen by the cold air currents. Not a single drop of blood had been spilled, nor would the smell of blood permeate the room. Not even a hair of evidence would be left behind.

    Having finished speaking, Han Shuo fully reformed, carrying Kekaru. Helen immediately saw the unconscious Kekaru. Helen¡¯s eyes, so warm when looking at Han Shuo, gradually filled with an unfathomable hate when looking at Kekaru. She said, ¡°I¡¯ve finally gotten my hands on you, old dog!¡±

    Giving Helen a meaningful look, Han Shuo carried Kekaru to a room further inside the mansion. Casually throwing him into the room, Han Shuo cast a silencing spell around the area. Having cast the spell, he said to the murderously cold Helen ¡°Alright, you can wake him now. Kill him slowly, I¡¯ll stand guard outside.¡±

    Perhaps it was because Helen had been suppressing her hate for so long, having waited for several years, that she didn¡¯t say a word to Han Shuo with her nemesis at her fingertips. Wearing an icy expression on her face, Helen entered the room that once served as a storage room. When the door mmed shut, Han Shuo didn¡¯t spare energy on eavesdropping. He casually walked over to where Helen was sitting before, and took out another cup of wine. Pouring himself a full ss, he sipped the fine wine as he pulled out a thick necromancy book, immersing himself in study.

    Apart from the spell ¡°gue¡±, Han Shuo had already mastered all of the spells that an arch needed to know. His mental strength was already at the level of a grand magus, and he spent all his time studying the art of summoning creatures from the underworld.

    Old fey zombies, mummy lords, and bone demons. These three creatures could all be controlled by archmages, though their more advanced summoning techniques differed slightly. When Han Shuo was summoning, a contact was often made with immediately after summoning. As a result, Han Shuo could easily summon them into this world.

    When summoned, these kinds of low-level creatures didn¡¯t have the ability to resist, arriving at Han Shuo¡¯s whim, not knowing to think whether to go or not. Starting from evil knights, the summoning techniques became vastly different. Even if Han Shuo could feel the presence of the evil knights, he would have to expend arge amount of energy to crush their resistance. Only then would he be able to control their actions, using the power of a contract to summon them to this world.

    Summoned creatures at the grand magus level all had their own consciousness. Their power was far greater than creatures of other levels. Even in the underworld, creatures of this level acted as ambitious overlords. At the very least, they would be loners that most inferior creatures did not dare disturb.

    Not only did these creatures have their own will, but they were also haughty and arrogant. A simple contract wouldn¡¯t be able to bind them. It was exactly because of this that the summoning techniques for them were much moreplicated and mysterious, including deep probes for spiritual power, in order to understand the temperament of the underworld¡¯s creatures.

    Apart from this, when a contract was formed between a necromancer and an undead creature, the necromancer required sufficient strength in order to make the creature pledge its allegiance, otherwise they would have to deal with that creature¡¯s resistance.

    During the process of resistance, the summoner had to use their energy to suppress the creature being summoned, as well as maintain the uracy of the summoning ritual. Any mispronounced syble or hand gesture was uneptable. The interconnected energy patterns would fail and the bacsh from the failed summoning would hit the summoner. It was highly likely that the summoned creature would then be trapped between two nes, forever unable to return.

    Han Shuo was currently studying the details of each of the high-ranked undead creatures. The old fey zombie¡¯s ws and teeth were razor sharp, with nimble movements. Their body structure was simr to those of silver apes, though they were obviously smaller. However, the old fey zombie had the silver apes¡¯ sharp ws and teeth, and were just as fast.

    The mummy lords were as strong as the stoutest rock. Laying in a coffin all day, their speed was poor, but they were strong. In addition, they were corrosive, capable of mixing a death aura with streamers in their bodies. As such, they were equally hard to fight against.

    Bone demons wereprised entirely ofrge bones that were held together. Out of the three undead creatures, bone demons were the most unique of them all. Since their entire body were formed from bone, if the bones that formed them were strong and filled with death energy, then the power of the bone demon would be even more terrifying. In addition, they had excellent defensive properties against both physical and magical attacks.

    If needed, the bone demon could also fire out the bones on its body. The force of these bone projectiles was terrifyingly high; a single projectile was enough to deal a fatal blow. After firing the projectiles, the bone demon could reattach the projectiles to its body. However, if the bones that made up the bone demon¡¯s body didn¡¯t contain arge amount of death energy, then the bone demon would be both slow and weak, and would be severely injured by both physical and magical attacks. Bone demons could be big and strong, or they could be small and weak. As such, bone demons were the most variable amongst the three magical creatures.

    However, Han Shuo knew that the bone demon modified with wings by the little skeleton would certainly be strong. It¡¯d been rebuilt by the little skeleton with bones from the high ranking creature in the forbiddennd, and contained a portion of the high-ranking magical creature¡¯s energy. Forged from these bones, the bone demon would absorb death energy at a faster pace in the other dimension. The creature could fly, which meant that it possessed sufficient intelligence to control gravity. Otherwise, that bit of rotting flesh on its bones wouldn¡¯t have allowed it to fly with such agility.

    Han Shou had grasped the characteristics of the three creatures, but the power of their souls were different. He was currently focused on the old fey zombies. He knew that he needed to find the right method of deploying his mental strength to ensure a response from an old fey zombie, in order to sessfully use the contract to summon the creature.

    Just as Han Shuo was studying the thick tome with furrowed brows, he suddenly heard a devastating scream that tore its way out of the room. The magical boundary suppressed it so that the guards couldn¡¯t hear, but Han Shuo caught every hint of it. He knew that this was the final agonizing wail that Kekaru had uttered before he died.

    This was indeed the case, as Helen walked out a short while after with her hands covered in blood. She ran towards Han Shuo, sobs wracking her body as she held him tightly before he could prepare himself.

    The sharp stench of blood and Helen¡¯s own fragrance wafted into his nostrils. He wasn¡¯t opposed to the smell, but didn¡¯t want the guards outside to detect it. He lifted up his left hand slightly and shut the open door. A vortex churned in his hand as it carefully sucked away the scent of blood. After a round of weeping, Helen finally calmed down, and the vortex had coalesced the stench of blood into a slowly rolling bloody pearl. It was still vibrating slightly as it sucked in all the scent of blood from Helen, not letting the slightest bit drift outside.

    ¡°I¡¯m all better now. I¡¯m sorry for getting you dirty!¡± Helen slowly pushed Han Shuo away and saw that she¡¯d dirtied him all over with fresh blood. She apologized, as translucent tears still hung from her eyshes.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it. Why isn¡¯t Firewind by your side? She should be with you at this time!¡± Han Shuo had only just discovered that the usual omnipresent Firewind wasn¡¯t there, and asked in bafflement.

    ¡°Sister Firewind doesn¡¯t like it when there are too many humans around her. Unless there¡¯s something special, she won¡¯t appear when too many people are around. She¡¯s made her camp in the forests of the valley. I usually just call telepathically if I need her. Since you¡¯re with me, there¡¯s no danger to my being, so I didn¡¯t summon her.¡± Helen exined.

    ¡°I see!¡± Han Shuo responded, then said, ¡°I also have a super rank magical pet, but he¡¯s a dark dragon. That guy seems to love hanging out in crowds all day. In any case, the more the merrier! It seems that not all super rank magical creatures are the same.¡±

    ¡°You even have a dark dragon!¡± Helen was astonished.

    ¡°Mm hmm, he¡¯s evolving into his second stage at the moment, so I put him somewhere safe.¡± Han Shuo replied.

    Helen looked at him, stunned and was about to express how amazing he was. She immediately thought of all the magical parts to him and felt that she didn¡¯t need to make a big deal of this bit. She suddenly saw that his chest was covered with blood, but was quickly distracted by the rotating, bloody pearl in his left hand. ¡°What¡¯s this?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t want the scent of blood to spread beyond this room. I¡¯ve coalesced them into a drop of blood.¡± Han Shuo exined.

    ¡°You¡¯re an amazing person!¡± Helen still couldn¡¯t help but sigh with amazement, then pulled him by the hand to the bathroom. Her face reddened for some reason as she said lowly, ¡°Why don¡¯t you wash the blood off yourself first? You¡¯re surely ufortable.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart lurched when Helen spoke thus, and when her smooth, boneless small hand tugged on his wrist, Han Shuo could feel the sensuous beauty of her hand. Light started gleaming in his eyes as he looked at Helen with some more anticipation.

    Kekaru¡¯s mansion for guests was exceedingly opulent. Helen¡¯s rooms alone were filled with more than ten room of various sizes. The powder room, bathroom, living room, bedroom, storage room, andundry room were all present and decked outvishly. Han Shuo¡¯s Brettel City castle was like a country farm whenpared to this.

    There was a wide, oval shaped bathing pool in the center of the bathroom. There was a small magic formation beneath it, with one Firespark Stone providing the heat. The water within the pool was maintained at afortable temperature, and Helen¡¯s face became redder and redder within the haziness of the water mist. She actually tenderly helped Han Shuo out of his clothes.

    When Han Shuo¡¯s clothes had been taken off, his 190 centimeter tall body was the epitome of a perfect male body as it was fully revealed in front of Helen. Ever inch of his skin and muscles were filled with explosive power, and he seemed to be a poised, vicious hunting beast even when standing at ease. His naked body gave others an overwhelmingly dominating ferocity.

    Han Shuo¡¯s buff body epassed a wild power and was reflected from Helen¡¯s eyes. When she took off the clothes on his lower body, she raised her head to look worshipfully at the towering man. She seemed to sink into a bottomless inescapable abyss.

    ¡°Is this demon-god like person to be my man in the future?¡± Helen murmured deeply in her heart, looking at Han Shuo with mesmerized eyes as she speechlessly stared at the spectacle before her.

 Chapter 363: Twelve Ubiquitous Shadows

    Chapter 363: Twelve Ubiquitous Shadows

    As thepletely naked Han Shuo looked down at Helen, who was looking back in a daze, Han Shuo revealed a grin that was as brilliant and bright as the sunshine. As he walked towards the middle of the pool, water began rippling outwards. The water wrapped itself around him as he started to clean his bloodstained body.

    Only after hearing the sshing water sounds did Helen Tina wake up from her enraptured state and start scolding her weak will. After looking at Han Shuo¡¯s broad and healthy back, she shook her head, seemingly trying to scatter the detailed figure lingering in her mind. She smiled sweetly and said tenderly, ¡°Alright, you should wash up first, I¡¯ll wait outside.¡±

    ¡°Hehe, and here I was thinking that you would bathe with me. Well, if you actuallye down, I promise I won¡¯t do a thing, alright?¡± Han Shuo turned his head andughed brightly before suddenly teasing her with an invitation.

    Helen grew ming red, like she was intoxicated. She seriously considered what was just said before smiling tenderly, ¡°No, I¡¯m afraid I won¡¯t be able to control myself and directly jump into your arms. Hehe. Okay. Properly clean yourself first. I¡¯lle back after you have properly cleaned yourself.¡±

    Han Shuo was momentarily startled. But because the sentence confirmed Han Shuo¡¯s charisma, heughed out loud and happily said, ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll wait for the day you truly set aside your modesty then!¡±

    Helen threw her head back in a lovableugh. For several months now, her heart had been covered in a depressing haze, but now it seems like she has finally pushed away the ck clouds and allowed the rainbow within to spring forth. With an exceptionally happier mindset, she left behind a tinklingugh, ringing through the air like a silver bell. After Helen left, Han Shuo stayed in the public bath, leisurely cleaning all the bloodstains off him. Afterwards, Helen switched with Han Shuo and began cleaning herself as well.

    Han Shuo sat crossed legged within the guest room, drinking a cup of good wine and reading his thick book of necromancy while waiting for Helen to change into a loose,fortable bathrobe. Seeing Helen¡¯s amazingly beautiful appearance, as lovely as a lotus flower rising from the water, Han Shuo first smilingly gasped in praise. Then he waited for the corner of Helen¡¯s mouth to curve into a smile before finally sighing lightly, ¡°Your Helon Duchy is currently rife with internal troubles, and is mostly likely the weakest power among the seven grand duchies. While you were originally allied with Benedict Sackville, it is most likely that he¡¯s the mastermind behind Kekaru¡¯s betrayal and has probably been interfering with your national affairs. But our first priority is the internal strife. The sooner we settle that, the less likely that we¡¯ll see any more negative developments.¡±

    Seeing Han Shuo bringing up this topic, Helen creased her eyebrows and lightly sighed before saying, ¡°Even if this bout of internal strife never urred, my Helon Duchy would still be the weakest among the seven duchies. We have limited resources within our national borders; our ores and rations are naturallycking inparison to the other dukedoms.¡±

    Over the past years, I have continuously traded our warhorses for rations from Narsen Duchy. I¡¯ve also engaged in trade with the other duchies and the distant Brut Merchant Alliance for war materials. My nation was never destined to be prosperous from the start. Now, with the unceasing internal strifes as well, my Helon Duchy is really facing disaster after disaster. So when you ckmailed me out of six hundred gold coins, my grand and magnificent Helon Duchy was no more.¡±

    As if suddenly remembering Han Shuo¡¯s ckmailing, she hatefully eyed Han Shuo and heavily snorted with irritation after finishing her words.

    Only after Han Shuo awkwardly forced a couple ofughs, did he open his mouth to say, ¡°Honestly, if you hadn¡¯t be hostile with the Lancelot Empire and decided to use Brettel City as a hunting ground, the merchants of the Lancelot Empire would¡¯vepletely solved your problems. Lancelot Empire has no means of getting warhorses, thus, if your dukedom sold your valiant warhorses to them, you will definitely receive significant benefits in return.¡±

    Han Shuo continued ¡°Unfortunately, even those greedy merchants do not dare to rashlye here after the stories of massacres and raids on Brettel City. To those merchants, all of the seven grand dukes are as dangerous as savage beasts and fierce floods. Thus, they naturally won¡¯t open trade with you. Consequently, you will also be unable to use the natural resources within your borders and gain the goods you need.¡±

    ¡°Humph. In reality, your Lancelot Empire was asking for it. At the time, if it wasn¡¯t because your Lancelot Empire wanted to conquer us seven grand duchies and enter our borders, killing and looting everything, would we have suddenly stopped our bickering? Would we have recklessly formed an alliance to defeat your Lancelot Empire?¡± As if suddenly remembering the time when the Lancelot Empire¡¯s army troops arrived like savage beasts, Helen¡¯s voice had an undercurrent of anger even as she continued to have a charming expression on her face.

    ¡°The rtionships between nations will always be either that of the conquered or the conquerors. Every nation¡¯s king will always use whatever methods they have at their disposal to expand their territories. Lancelot Empire is like this. Kasi Empire is like this. Even the seven grand dukes are like this. Otherwise, what would be the point to the unceasing strife between them?¡± Han Shuo conveyed this eternally inarguable fact to Helen beforeughing wryly, ¡°The past is unrted to us. But with our current rtionship, we can privately smuggle and participate in some shady business. Do you have anypletely trustworthy subordinates at hand?¡±

    ¡°Naturally. My family¡¯s trusted aides can bepletely trusted. No matter what kind of decisions I make, they will always support me.¡± Helen proudly said.

    Han Shuo nodded his head and said, ¡°Great. Let¡¯s do it like that. It so happens that I can also use Lancelot Empire¡¯s war materials and exchange them for your Helon Duchy¡¯s warhorses. Hmm, rations can also be included. This exchange will be beneficial for both of our sides.¡±

    After listening to Han Shuo¡¯s words, Helen smiled sweetly and agreed, ¡°Our Helon Duchy¡¯s warhorses are widely renowned. How many horses and how much gold are you nning to pay?¡±

    ¡°This sort of business should be discussed by our subordinates. We only need to focus and make decisions on the big picture.¡± Han Shuo shot a nce and lightly smiled at Hele before saying, ¡°Don¡¯t think about trying to tempt me with things like seduction. I will personally organize suitable talents within Brettel City that will discuss this with your subordinates. Thus, we won¡¯t need to discuss it precisely and identally hurt our feelings!¡±

    Hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, Helen spat on the floor saying with a red face, ¡°Who has feelings for you! You treacherous and stingy man, I can¡¯t even get a small advantage off you!¡±

    ¡°Alright. Alright. I am going on a trip tonight. You should be extra careful. Right now, Kekaru¡¯s family are all dead, and it¡¯s best if you take precautions as soon as possible. Starting tomorrow, you¡¯ll be extremely busy, so now¡¯s not a good time at all to talk about our love and passion for each other.¡± Han Shuo said to Helen.

    ¡°You. You actually killed Kekaru¡¯s entire n!¡± Helen was suddenly frightened and was unable to react for a moment, staring appalled at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Mm. Don¡¯t worry, any kinsman with the qualifications to seed his dukedom is dead. Even several of his loyal subordinate will not be seeing dawn. Tomorrow, you¡¯ll see true chaos erupt in Seagate City. You should probably seize an opportunity to get rid of Kekaru¡¯s corpse. Additionally, create a mess to show that you suffered an assassination attempt. Even better, you should also capture a few people and make them seem like they¡¯re from Narsen Duchy.¡± Han Shuo said to Helen with a smile.

    ¡°Well done, well done!¡±Helen trembled in joy before smiling sweetly. Her eyes glittered with a sinister light as she said, ¡°Rest assured, I am an expert at such things. At this time tomorrow, Seagate City should be within my grasp. I have waited for such a day for far too long.¡±

    ¡°Hehe. I like it when you emit such confidence. Alright, I will leave for now. You should summon Firewind and guarantee your safety first.¡± Han Shuo finally left after repeatedly warning her.

    Back at the Lancelot Empire¡¯s Dark Mantle organization, agents could be seen everywhere. After Han Shuo had arrived in Brettel City, the Dark Mantle¡¯s stronghold had gradually strengthened as Candide personally prepared members to infiltrate Brettel City who Dickter arranged to go to the seven grand duchies.

    After bing a two star Dark Sun in the Dark Mantle, Han Shuo used his privileges and expanded the number of secret agents. Hemanded Jack to set aside a hundred thousand gold coins as operational funds for the agents who would infiltrate into the seven grand dukedoms. With enough funds, they could set up their own stronghold within the dukedoms and gradually scale in power and influence.

    As Brettel City¡¯s city lord and Dark Mantle¡¯s two star Dark Sun Envoy, Han Shuo only needed to arrive at any one of the major cities amongst the seven grand duchies to find the Dark Mantle agents. After meeting these agents, Han Shuo would receive all thetest information concerning those cities and use them to build a directmunication link to Brettel City.

    The night before Han Shuo assassinated Kekaru, he¡¯d left a message within Seagate City. After Helen left, Han Shuo headed straight towards that area. Right as Han Shuo entered the streets, he suddenly noticed that the entire Seagate City had erupted like an overturned nest of ants. Squads of imperial bodyguards wearing iplete armor and fearful faces started going house to house in a manhunt.

    Suddenly, Seagate City was enveloped with the sounds of iron hoofbeats of warhorses and the panicked screams of civilians. As Han Shuo looked at this kind of situation develop, he immediately realized that the massacre at Kekaru¡¯s castle had already discovered by the people. Otherwise, there would not be such a chaotic situation at Seagate City. The city gates were locked down and civilians could not leave the city without permission. A couple of Seagate City¡¯s knight captains had terrified expressions as they walked out of Kekaru¡¯s castle shouting out to lock the city gates. Afterwards, they directly headed towards Helen¡¯s manor.

    These individuals were just some small and insignificant outer members of Kekaru¡¯s group. Perhaps, they didn¡¯t even know that Kekaru had thoughts of betrayal. Now, suddenly seeing Kekaru¡¯s castle bing an enormous murder case, they first believed that the enemy duchies were invading with their armies. Thus, they arranged soldiers to defend the city gate while rushing towards the true grand duke of Helon Duchy.

    Before he¡¯d even entered Seagate City, Han Shuo had already realized that there were already a couple of Helen¡¯s chess pieces amongst these people. Currently, Kekaru¡¯s power structure had been swept clean by Han Shuo. Thus, the individuals without the qualifications to be the high-ranking official of Seagate City¡¯s army suddenly became the ones with the most power. They were naturally able to hold temporary office as themander-in-chief.

    As Seagate City descended into chaos, Han Shuo quietly arrived at the messiest street furthest from the chaos. Next to a courtyard was an elderly man wearing a panicked expression looking in all directions, waiting. The major news of the huge changes at Seagate City had not arrived here, but the city guards were still advancing in all directions. Perhaps the elderly man wore a panicked expression because he had already received the news.

    After Han Shuo suddenly stopped, the elderly man was obviously frightened for a moment as he hurriedly retreated backwards. After noticing the tablet that Han Shuo revealed in his hands, he loosened his breath and saluted respectfully, ¡°Honorable Sir!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go. Bring me somewhere we can chat!¡± Han Shuo said. The elder did not hesitate to bring Han Shuo along the very messy street. Only after walking past six blocks did they stop inside a small farm. The farm was raising a few thin and weak warhorses while the horse-shack was filled with stinking weed.

    After arriving here, the elderly man entered a small room made of thatch. After entering the room, the elderly man threw a couple of nces outside the shack through a small hole before finally opening the secret pathway under the bed. He then stepped aside, letting Han Shuo enter first.

    After passing through a dark tunnel, they finally arrived at a underground private hideout with three rooms. There were four individuals inside wearing four different expressions. They were dressed in either business type clothing or farmer type clothing. They were all extremely shocked at the sight of Han Shuo. Only after Han Shuo showed the tablet in his hands did they slowly calm down. They hastily bowed before saying, ¡°Honorable Sir Envoy!¡±

    The individuals within the Dark Mantle only obeyed the high ranked individuals within the Dark Mantle. Thus, Han Shuo did not use his identity as the Brettel City¡¯s lord, but instead only used his identity as the Second Dark Sun envoy to make them docile and obedient.

    ¡°Mm, we¡¯re all on the same side, so don¡¯t bother with formality!¡± Han Shuo said indifferently before bluntly sitting down on the central seat. At this moment, the elderly man that let Han Shuo enter first entered as well.

    ¡°Informing Sir, Seagate City has broke out with an extremely frightening murder case. Seagate City¡¯s Honorable Marquis Kekaru¡¯s entire family as well as all of his n members have been massacred. We have just received this information. This event willpletely alter the power struggle within Seagate City.¡± The elderly man paid his respects and hastily reported the groundbreaking news to Han Shuo.

    The search had only just begun in the core regions of Seagate City. Being able to receive urate information in this remote and dirty region was a feat in and of itself, and left Han Shuo extremely satisfied. Nodding his head, Han Shuo said, ¡°I already know about such things. You are doing well.¡±

    ¡°Honorable Sir, the Helon Duchy¡¯s grand duke is currently residing within Seagate City. This vicious woman will definitely seize this chance to take control of the city. Now with Kekaru¡¯s entire family wiped clean, we still don¡¯t know whether this was done by this woman or not. However, ording to our intelligence, this woman should not have such power at her disposal. Thus, we believe it was not done by her.....¡± The elderly man strenuously creased his eyebrows and analyzed, seemingly wanting toe to another clue.

    Han Shuo waved his hands, stopping the elderly man from continuing. He smiled. ¡°That¡¯s enough. Let¡¯s not talk about this for now. I will write a letter and you just need to dispatch someone to give it to Dick. We don¡¯t need to discuss anything else.¡±

    Hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, the elderly man immediately stopped his spections and respectfully nodded, ¡°As youmand, honorable sir!¡±

    Taking out a piece of paper and a pen, Han Shuo wrote a flowery letter in a very meandering way before sealing it up and handing it over to the elderly man. He smilingly asked, ¡°What is your name?¡±

    ¡°In response to the honored envoy. I am Dnte, a Third Dark Star and the person currently in charge of Seagate City. In the past, I was doing missions in the southern part of the empire. However, I migrated to the seven grand duchies under Candide¡¯smand.¡± Dnte replied very respectfully.

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo smiled, ¡°ce this letter in Dick¡¯s hand as quickly as possible.¡±

    ¡°I understand, Sir!¡± Dnte answered.

    Inside the Dark Mantle, there was always be a secret magic array that connected directly to others located in other cities. However, only the Dark Mantle could grasp such technology and generally only with a grand space magus could they set up such a technological marvel. However, there would naturally be no need to use a huge amount of financial resources just to create a magical array tomunicate with Brettel City from the seven grand duchies. Thus, they could only use this kind of old-fashioned way ofmunicating.

    After Dnte carefully put away the letter, Han Shuo once again looked to him for more news about Seagate City. Only after Dnte had gone on at length did Han Shuo finally say, ¡°Alright. All of you must properly conduct your business here at Seagate City. The Empire will not forget your former contributions. All the information you gather, all the missions you do, they will all be recorded by the Dark Mantle.¡± After all the other Dark Mantle members heard Han Shuo¡¯s statement, they bowed, showing theirpliance.

    ¡°Right now, Seagate City is dangerous beyond any semnce of doubt. Take extra care and do not be exposed by any means.¡± After repeatedly warning them, Han Shuo left the secret stronghold and disappeared into the darkness of the night.

    Han Shuo stopped in the deepest parts of the jungle outside of Seagate City. Using the earth elite zombie, he created a secret cave within the earth and set up the transportation matrix that connected to the Cemetery of Death to directly return there.

    Calcting the time, Han Shuo knew that the twelve mystical demons should be emerging from the refining process. He¡¯d gone to Helon Duchy alone this time. As long as he had the twelve mystical demons, Han Shuo would basically have twelve shadows that would be of immense help.

    Compared to original demons and yin demons, not only did the mystical demons have more wonderful uses, but they could also range ten times as far from Han Shuo. As long as the twelve mystical demons came out, they could scatter and hide within any nook and corner of Seagate City. Even if Han Shuo did not take one step out of his room he could still monitor the entire situation of Seagate City through the twelve mystical demons.

 Chapter 364: Secret art of possession

    Chapter 364: Secret art of possession

    Within the Cemetery of Death, dark dragon Gilbert was still in the midst of evolving. Further in, the mystical demon cave had long since stopped operating. Inside the grimace shaped mystical demon cave were twelve blood red agate-like blood pearls. The blood pearls rolled around the mystical demon cave like droplets, following a special path.

    Han Shuo arrived in front of the mystical demon cave and waved. A lump of blood light shot out, piercing toward the twelve drops of blood red agate-like blood pearls.

    Crick crack...

    The crisp sounds of twelve eggs cracking floated through the air. The twelve blood pearls fragmented, each blood pearl emitting a clump of blood mist. The blood mist gradually agglomerated into something bigger, forming ferocious ghostly figures. The twelve mystical demons differed in shape, but were exactly the same. When the twelve mystical demons were all floated in front of Han Shuo, they each swallowed their respective fragmented blood pearl into their abdomens before flinging their heads back and hissing toward the sky.

    Han Shuo released the remaining yin demon from his body. One of the mystical demons pounced forward, devouring the released yin demon, chewing it thoroughly before swallowing it.

    With a thought, the twelve mystical demons fluttered like ghosts towards Han Shuo, transforming into twelve droplets of blood, entrenching themselves around Han Shuo¡¯s demon infant, absorbing the energy the demon infant exuded.

    The mystical demons were of a higher level than the yin demons. With the existence of the mystical demons, the yin demon was no longer of use. It would be caught and eaten by the mystical demons even if it hid within the body. Han Shuo also knew that a low level demon leader like the yin demon had no way of surviving within his body. Hence, it was better to just let it be eaten by the mystical demons, lest it continue absorbing the energy within his body.

    At the separate demon realm, the energy that Han Shuo¡¯s demon infant was able to release was incredibly rich. The mystical demons, interlinked with Han Shuo¡¯s blood, only needed to absorb a small portion of energy within his body to be infinitely useful to Han Shuo. Inparison to the lower levelled origin demons and yin demons, the mystical demons were able to separate from Han Shuo for longer distances. If a mystical demon could possess another person¡¯s brain, it could separate itself from Han Shuo with no obstacles.

    Once a mystical demon possessed a person¡¯s brain, it would feed on the person¡¯s brain everyday, not requiring replenishment by Han Shuo¡¯s internal energy. At the beginning, by feeding on the person¡¯s brain, mystical demons could gradually alter a person¡¯s thoughts, affecting his or her judgement.

    As time passed, and the person¡¯s brain had been fully consumed by the mystical demon, the mystical demon would be their substitute, bing a mystical demon in that person¡¯s body, free for Han Shuo to use. This was equal to the most brilliant arts of puppetry. The final result was a puppet body for the mystical demon to use, onlycking the original person¡¯s soul.

    Once a mystical demon started its possession, as the mystical demon¡¯s owner, Han Shuo could already control the person¡¯s thoughts and easily obtain the target¡¯s secrets. Even if the person hadn¡¯t died yet, Han Shuo could still use the mystical demon to change their decisions, making them inadvertently follow Han Shuo¡¯s directions.

    With these twelve mystical demons, as long as Han Shuo could let themtch onto the minds of the seven grand dukes, Han Shuo couldpletely rely on six mystical demons to control six dukes. He would be able to influence their judgement and decision making from the start. At the end, when the mystical demons had consumed their brains, Han Shuo would be able to thoroughly control them.

    On the other hand, even outside of possession, the mystical demons had a variety of uses. The omnidirectional, traceless scouting was the demon skulls¡¯ innate ability. The mystical demons, simr to the yin demons, could also easily take Han Shuo¡¯s appearance and even speak, essentially bing another Han Shuo.

    The strength of the mystical demon was of course iparable to Han Shuo himself. However in critical situations, it could be Han Shuo¡¯s substitute. This was equivalent to giving Han Shuo twelve extra lives. Although the mystical demon was weaker than Han Shuo, it still had an advantage over ordinary experts, being able to toggle between corporeal and formless figures. In a battle, they could attack in a swarm, fast enough to only leave behind a trail of bloody light. They were very hard for ordinary people to deal with.

    With the twelve mystical demons nestled in his body, Han Shuo now felt more confident. Seeing that the dark dragon Gilbert had not woken up, Han Shuo took out the skeleton staff to open the enchantment surrounding the Cemetery of Death and headed toward the Valley of Sunshine.

    Within the Valley of Sunshine, the water zombie Han Shuo left in the ce of extreme water had sent a message. The water elite zombie was ready to emerge.

    Flying the distance from the Dark Forest to the Valley of Sunshine, Han Shuo did not openly enter through the front gate as he did not know the current situation in the Valley of Sunshine. He instead descended from the sky into a secluded corner, and then directly snuck into the ce where he was refining the elite water zombie.

    This storefront was Han Shuo¡¯s personal property. The Soul Destroyer mercenary band did not station anyone here, but sent people to asionally clean the ce. When Han Shuo entered the shop, he realized the ce was clean, with no spiderwebs anywhere inside the building.

    This haunted and cursed store was quite famous within the Valley of Sunshine. After many had mysteriously died within its premises, ordinary people would take a roundabout way whenever they reached this area. Nobody dared to pass by this ce. At first, blood water demons had made their home within the store, but had been quickly been destroyed by Han Shuo. However, he had thenid the Asura Illusion Formation, which was equally dangerous.

    Han Shuo easily entered the underground ce of extreme water. Han Shuo already had the experience of dealing with the earth, wood and fire elite zombies. Hence, he didn¡¯t waste much time extracting it from the ce of extreme water. Compared to the other three elite zombies, the water zombie appeared extremely normal. Apart from its body having an additional amber colored armor, it did not have any other noticeable features.

    Han Shuo had some ideas with regard to the water elite zombies¡¯ abilities and wasn¡¯t in a hurry to make it disy its skills to him. After he had set a ¡®Dark Seal¡¯ on the water zombie, Han Shuo summoned the little skeleton and handed the water zombie off to him. Shortly after, he sent both of them back to the other dimension.

    With the water zombie dealt with, Han Shuo didn¡¯t continue staying in the Valley of Sunshine, lest he been seen and give the Cairo mercenary band a bad impression. The Valley of Sunshine was currently still under their control. Han Shuo¡¯s actions of stealthily entering was already scoffing at those in power.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t clear about the current rtionship between the Soul Destroyer mercenary band and the Cairo mercenary band. However, there was no need to unnecessarily be in conflict with the Cairo mercenary band. Hence, once the matter of the water zombie was settled, Han Shuo silently left the Valley of Sunshine and headed toward the hidden location of the Soul Destroyer mercenary band.

    Every time he came over, Han Shuo always discovered that the Soul Destroyer mercenary band had a distinct change. This time, it was even more so. Unknowingly, the Soul Destroyer mercenary band had already be arge thousand-strong mercenary band. In recent times, recruitment must have expanded like wildfire. With Han Shuo¡¯s financial support and Trunks¡¯ own abilities, it¡¯s no wonder the Soul Destroyer mercenary band had the strength to contest for the Valley of Sunshine.

    This time around, Trunks wasn¡¯t in the secret grounds. Han Shuo found out from Grant that Trunks had gone to secretly meet with the female bandit J and should be back soon. Ever since Trunks found his long lost younger sister Annie with the female bandit J, he frequently found excuses to look for J. On one hand, he could see Annie, and on the other, he could negotiate with J on when they would help Annie take revenge.

    The female bandit J was also a bold, straightforward yet odd woman and was quite agreeable with Trunks. As time passed, the two gradually became more familiar. One was from a mercenary band in the Valley of Sunshine, the other from arge bandit group outside the Valley of Sunshine. The two leaders actually unwittingly established a good friendship.

    Han Shuo was also surprised when Grant said this. No one expected that Trunks was actually able to get along well with that tomboy. This J was like a man. Her words were bare of womanly gentleness, and she even used foulnguage from time to time. Add that to her preference for women, she could be described as an exception amongst women. Who would have known that Trunks could still be able to establish a friendship with her. It looked like Annie yed an important part in the friendship between Trunks and J.

    Han Shuo waited for half a day. Midway, Odysseus¡¯s group returned and had a few drinks with Han Shuo whom they hadn¡¯t seen for a few months. Everyone was in high spirits.

    Trunks definitely did not treat Odysseus¡¯ group shabbily after they joined. As the members in Odysseus¡¯ group were quite strong, they gradually gained prestige in the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. They had formed a tacit understanding and had mutual trust. Hence, they generally couldplete the harder missions, and were very popr in the Soul Destroyer mercenary band.

    While Han Shuo, Odysseus and the rest were drinking and chatting, Trunks returned andughingly joined in the army of people having food and drinks. These battle-hardened mercenaries were all very forthright and were generally men who hadrge bowls of alcohol and meat. They believed in true masters and had the attitude of enjoying life.

    The newer additions to the Soul Destroyer mercenary band initially didn¡¯t know Han Shuo¡¯s identity. But when a few veteran mercenaries divulged Han Shuo¡¯s identity, these new additions all revealed worshipping gazes. Some of the young mercenaries couldn¡¯t remain calm, and even excitedly proposed a toast to Han Shuo.

    Although Han Shuo didn¡¯t visit the Valley of Sunshine often, he had left behind deeds worth of stories every time he came. He¡¯d defeated both the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band¡¯s current leader, Florida and Adam Menlo, the head of the House of Menlo. Particrly during the battle in the valley, Han Shuo had appeared all of a sudden and allied with Cairo mercenary band¡¯s leader Laureton, assisting him in leading the Cairo mercenary band¡¯s experts out of the valley. His hand in illing the Church of Light¡¯s grand magus, Ferguson, was even more widespread within the Valley of Sunshine.

    Even when Han Shuo wasn¡¯t physically in the Valley of Sunshine, stories about Han Shuo continued to spread in the Valley of Sunshine. Han Shuo¡¯s reputation yed arge part in attracting young mercenaries to the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. Trunks had really benefited from Han Shuo in attracting so many young mercenary experts that had potential and yet were willing to do their utmost to enter the mercenary band.

    ¡°What¡¯s the current situation?¡± After the loud drinking in the square, Trunks and Han Shuo went alone to a secret room within the mountain.

    Trunksughed wryly before saying, ¡°The Soul Destroyers have a good momentum going for now, but that¡¯s also why the other fourrge mercenary bands have started to raise their guard. Even the previously amicable Cairo mercenary band has be less friendly towards us. It¡¯s been a delicate bncing act, and there¡¯s always a fear of having the four mercenary groups banding together to deal with our Soul Destroyer mercenary band. In any case, there¡¯s a strong undercurrent at y in the Valley of Sunshine. Like a powder keg, all this situation is missing is a single spark.

    Han Shuo nodded, replying, ¡°This was inevitable from the start; everyone wants a piece of the rich pickings known as the Valley of Sunshine. With its ideally ced location in the middle of three countries, controlling the Valley of Sunshine would reaprge quantities of gold coins and some hidden benefits. For mercenary bands that seek to expand rapidly, controlling the Valley of Sunshine is the fastest channel for growth.¡±

    ¡°I agree. In any case, the current situation is slightly chaotic. Our Soul Destroyer mercenary band has temporarily refrained from any activities that end up with us seizing power. It was precisely because I have shown no interest in maintaining order in the Valley of Sunshine that the other mercenary bands have not acted against us for this long. Instead, I¡¯ve secretly allied with J to brainstorm ways to obtain revenge for Annie.¡±

    ¡°However, our enemies include Florida, Butcher Gustav and the much harder to deal with Kasi Empire¡¯s Bradley. Bradley Pillon? Pillon is the biological brother of Kasi Empire¡¯s emperor. I¡¯m afraid that I don¡¯t have any means to deal with him for the time being. Currently, J and I are in discussion about a n to first kill Butcher Gustav.¡±

    ¡°Butcher Gustav and Florida have engaged in shady business dealings for a long time. Striking down Gustav will also deal a blow to Florida¡¯s strength. In this way, I will slowly bleed Florida to death. After I¡¯ve obtained sufficient strength, I would deal with Kasi Empire¡¯s Bradley Pillon. I want to leave him forst.¡± Trunks spoke, his words dripping with hatred.

    ¡°How about I help you to first get rid of Gustav and Florida first, since I¡¯m already here in the Valley of Sunshine. Although the two of them have decent strength, they aren¡¯t a threat to me. If I want to kill the two of them, they definitely wouldn¡¯t be able to escape.¡± Han Shuo pondered for a moment before suggesting a course of action to Trunks.

    Trunks resolutely shook his head as he replied, ¡°I appreciate your good intentions. However, I want to personally visit my vengeance on these three, in as agonizing a fashion as I can. Annie is like a biological sister to me. For her to have suffered such arge grievance, I must let those bastards repay their debt in blood!¡±

    Han Shuo sighed lightly when he saw Trunks¡¯ persistence, nodding as he replied, ¡°Since that¡¯s the case, I¡¯ll stay uninvolved then. Oh, Gilbert is currently at my ce. He is at a crucial stage of his second evolution, so it¡¯s unlikely he¡¯ll be able to help you. Be more careful while you are alone.¡±

    ¡°Understood, be at ease and go settle your own matters. Leave the Valley of Sunshine to me. I will contact you when there is truly no other solution. Ha, I heard you even got rid of the Brut Merchant Alliance¡¯s Redbud Knights. It seems you¡¯re getting stronger and stronger!¡± Trunks sighed in admiration.

    The distance between the Dark Forest and the Valley of Sunshine wasn¡¯t very far. As mercenaries were all people who travelled extensively, news was always fast and abundant. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t at all surprised that Trunks was aware of his exploits.

    ¡°Hehe, that was all Celt¡¯s own bad luck. Mm, you know where Dark Mantle has people in this ce. If there¡¯s any especially important matters, you can contact me through them. Of course, you can also leave a message at the address I gave you. I believe that with you in the Valley of Sunshine, the entire Valley will belong to our Soul Destroyer mercenary band sooner orter. I¡¯ll be off, then¡± Han Shuoughed as he spoke.

    Trunks replied expansively to Han Shuo¡¯s statement, saying, ¡°Be at ease, I¡¯ve eaten one of your pills and am now a great swordmaster. In the whole Valley of Sunshine, who else is my match apart from that violent berserker Laureton? Furthermore, we are different from the berserkers. We have an unlimited set of possibilities to break through. I believe that with the passing of time, my strength would eventually surpass Laureton. He can only be thrice berserk. I¡¯ve never heard of a berserker who could be four times berserk!¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t say much when he saw Trunk¡¯s confidence. With Trunk¡¯s reminder, Han Shuo had also remembered his promise with Ancient Lizard King Dagassi. He¡¯d have to make a trip to visit the dwarf valley to collect the forged weapons and deliver them to the lizardmen in the underground world.

    Using the Art of Demonic Ninth Heavens, Han Shuo headed for the dwarf valley. From the dwarf valley, he collected more than a thousand freshly forged sharp weapons. These weapons all contained a tiny portion of ck iron ore, causing their sharpness to far exceed ordinary weapons.

    The travel-worn Han Shuo didn¡¯t stay long in the dwarf valley, flying quickly to the entrance of the underground world. He then shuttled through the intricate andplicated tunnels of the underground world, directly heading for the area where the lizardmen lived.

    Han Shuo was not aware of the specific instructions the Ancient Lizard King Dagassi had given the lizardmen leader when he¡¯d previously introduced Han Shuo. However, thanks to Dagassi¡¯s instructions, the lizardmen leader was iparable respectful toward Han Shuo. This made Han Shuo feel a sense of responsibility toward them, simr to how he treated the forest trolls.

    Han Shuo¡¯s brain worked continuously as he headed to the lizardmen¡¯s territory, silently thinking. Apart from the forest trolls and the dwarf valley aboveground, he now had thepletely docile lizardmen underground. If he added the nearby Soul Destroyer mercenary band in the Valley of Sunshine, this was also quite arge power.

    If he could harmonize these powers together, it would form an exceptionallyrge force in the Dark Forest. Perhaps it might even be able to alter the situation in the Dark Forest?

 Chapter 365: Mysterious matriarch

    Chapter 365: Mysterious matriarch

    When Han Shuo reached the lizardmen¡¯s living area, the first thing he heard was actually the cacophony of fighting. Looking around, Han Shuo saw the whole ce filled with dark elves, charging toward the lizardmen¡¯s caves within therge reddish-brown mountain.

    The lizardmen hid within the caves of the reddish brown mountain, using their crude weapons to defend against the dark elves¡¯ attacks. These dark elves were all dressed in different colors, including violet, ck, light green and several other colors. They were clearly an alliance of different ns.

    There were almost ten thousand dark elves, but only a small portion were actually attacking therge mountain. Nearly seven thousand of them were still spectating outside, yet to participate in the attack.

    There were a few handsome looking youths among the dark elves. Each of them had a particrly ancient scenting off them, giving Han Shuo a headache. By virtue of that scent, Han Shuo could tell that their true age did not match with their youthful appearance.

    There was also a tent of purple veils in the middle of the handsome youths. Han Shuo could sense a monstrous presence within the tent, evil yet somehow charming. When he tried to probe the tent with his consciousness, the person within instantly reacted, sending a wave of aura back along the route of Han Shuo¡¯s mental energy.

    Han Shuo was shocked, concealing his own aura in a hurry. He gave up on the idea of directly barging through, deciding to use the earth elite zombie to open a secret passageway into the center. Han Shuo decided to meet up with the lizardmen¡¯s leader before nning his next move.

    Based on the aura, Han Shuo sensed the vast strength of the person inside the purple veil tent. Although this person¡¯s strength was not as monstrous as Ancient Lizard King Dagassi, it was much stronger than the typical great swordmaster or grand magus. Han Shuo carefully pondered for a moment. This person¡¯s aura felt roughly as strong as Lawrence¡¯s master, sacred swordsman Karel Ascot. When he reached this conclusion, he was aghast.

    Han Shuo had never thought that he would meet such a strong expert in the underground world. With Han Shuo¡¯s current strength in the separate demon realm, the Demonyer Edge and the little skeleton, he could still manage a fight with such an expert. However, this expert was also apanied by a few talented youths with particrly strong auras. Although they couldn¡¯t hold a candle to the expert in the purple tent, they would pose a major problem to Han Shuo.

    Furthermore, there were still more than seven thousand dark elves surrounding them. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t presumptuous to think he could fight against this group of formidable dark elves by himself.

    Using the earth elite zombie to create a passageway, Han Shuo travelled toward the center of the reddish-brownrge mountain. Along the way, he constantly heard waves of clinks and ngs from battles. It seemed like just above him should be where the dark elves and lizardmen were fighting.

    When he¡¯d left the underground world the previous time, Han Shuo had discovered the location of the core zone of the lizardmen area, as well as the method to directly contact the lizardmen. After Han Shuo hurriedly made his way to the central area, he used the Demonyer Edge to cut open the hard rocks, directly breaking through to a crucial gathering point in the mountain.

    The crucial junction was arge ring-shaped cave. It was about as big as a basketball court, and its ceiling was covered with bright red sharp stones that looked like they might drop at any moment. There were stone plinths spread over the whole cave. These stone plinths had been ground down by the lizardmen until they were t and suitable for sitting.

    At present, arge group of lizardmen had gathered. It looked like they were discussing ways to deal with the dark elves. When Han Shuo appeared, the lizardmen head was pleasantly surprised. In the lizardmen¡¯s tongue, he lept to his feet and jabbered a few sentences, leading the bunch of lizardmen in a bow towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°True God¡¯s envoy, you must be here to save us. We have been waiting so long for you.¡± The lizardmen¡¯s head used themon tongue in as respectful a manner as he could.

    Wrinkling his eyebrows, Han Shuo replied, ¡°The True God must have already left this ce. What¡¯s the matter with all those dark elves outside, why would they dare toe here?¡±

    ¡°Lord envoy, not long after the True God left, all the dark elves in the underground world unexpectedly stopped their internal conflicts, having all been subdued by a dark elf named Adele. It is said that this dark elf couldmunicate with their beloved evil goddess, Rose. She possessed an evil strength, unifying all the underground worlds¡¯ dark elves in one short month.¡±

    The leader hastily exined more, ¡°She has led the dark elves in constantly attacking us lizardmen the past few days. However, these bastards currently still do not dare confirm if our true god has left. Hence, they have unceasingly probed us, but don¡¯t dare to truly force their way in.¡±

    The dark elf named Adele had suddenly appeared after Dagassi left. She had managed to unify the scattered dark elves in a short month, forming the single most terrifying power in thisyer of the underground world. When Han Shuo heard the lizardman leader¡¯s exnation, he was a little confused. He did not know how Adele had suddenly appeared and even seemed to know a little bit about Ancient Lizard King Dagassi.

    Without a doubt, the expert that had felt Han Shuo¡¯s mental probing was the dark elf Adele. If not for fear of Ancient Lizard King Dagassi¡¯s presence, based on the strong aura Han Shuo felt from her body and the strength of the ancient dark elves beside her, they would have long since broken through this ce and enved all the lizardmen.

    As for how this dark elf Adele appeared, this wasn¡¯t something Han Shuo had the time to think about at this moment. Coming to the underground world this time around was precisely to fulfill Han Shuo¡¯s promise to Dagassi to protect the lizardmen. Hence, once the lizardmen¡¯s leader had exined the situation to him, Han Shuo immediately took out all the weapons he had brought in the spatial ring this time round, saying, ¡°I have brought these weapons for all of you. Don¡¯t worry, i¡¯ll help you in repelling the dark elves together.¡±

    ¡°Many thanks, Lord Envoy!¡± The leader of the lizardmen gratefully kowtowed in thanks.

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo didn¡¯t have much to say. Looking on as the lizardmen leader arranging manpower to rapidly distribute the weapons, he then released all twelve of the newly refined mystical zombies. Ten of the mystical zombies flooded the wholeplex cave, while the other two flew out of the reddish brown colored mountain, hanging over the sky and spying on the dark elves¡¯ movements from a distance. At the dark elves¡¯ campsite, a handsome youth asked, ¡°Matriarch, it¡¯s been five days. The lizardmen arepletely unable to resist; should we start our main attack?¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s wait a while more, I felt a weird aura just now. It actually tried to spy on me. When I wanted to search for the source, the aura vanished. This is quite strange.¡± Azy yet bone-chilling female voice wafted from the tent. When the few hundreds of ¡°young¡± dark elves beside the tent heard this voice, they all went a little dry in the mouth. A wave of trepidation arose from their hearts.

    ¡°Matriarch, what kind of existence is thatrge lizard? Hasn¡¯t he already left? If not, he would have alreadye out and attacked us.¡± A handsome dark elf gulped before respectfully speaking up.

    ¡°You ask me, but who should I ask? Same as you, I just escaped from that dreaded ce. Do you think I¡¯m omniscient? However, I already heard legends about him when I was alive. All of you are still a little young. I guess your ancestors hadn¡¯t mentioned it to any of you. In any case, you all just need to remember, he is a extremely strong lizard!¡± The female voice within the purple veil tent seemed to hold a hint of me, but it still soundedfortable and tantalizing to the ears.

    ¡°Matriarch, I really can¡¯t figure it out; why did he not assist the lizardmen to clear the underground world when he broke out from under the gourd mountain? With such a strong figure around, the lizardmen could have eradicated us dark elves without much effort!¡±

    ¡°The few of us were even imprisoned by those undying ck dragons in theyer below at that time. He shouldn¡¯t have any difficulty in conquering this entireyer, so why would he dy till now?¡± Another handsome youth was puzzled as he spoke up too.

    ¡°Idiot, have you been imprisoned for too long?! Didn¡¯t you listen to the children¡¯s descriptions? I¡¯m afraid even the dark dragon race from theyer below wouldn¡¯t be able to deal with this giant lizard. Do you think we can obstruct him with just the few of us?¡± The voice from inside the tent came outced with anger. Then, as if the anger was never present, a seductiveugh apanied her next words, ¡°As for why thatrge lizard hasn¡¯t retaliated against us, it definitely isn¡¯t because it¡¯s afraid of us. With just the few of us, we are definitely not a match for a strong existence like him.¡±

    ¡°Then, who is he afraid of?¡± The dark elf that had previously asked the question followed up.

    ¡°All of you are idiots! It is because your faith in the goddess is not sincere enough, that even after living for so long, you still can¡¯t feel her presence deep within your soul!¡± The goddess within the tent scolded. The antiquated elves standing around were all extremely submissive, every one of them agreeing profusely. However, after being reprimanded by Adele, these old farts faintly understood the meaning of her answer. It seemed like the powerful lizard¡¯s hesitation should be due to their goddess, and not because of them.

    ¡°Alright, let¡¯s wait a while more. Previously, the captured lizardmen said that their true god had already left and would not return to this ce. That is why we are here. Otherwise, I definitely wouldn¡¯t dare bring the few of you idiots here to throw away your lives. I suspect thatrge lizard has truly left. If not, it would have long since charged out to kill us.¡± Adele patiently exined to the few old fellows.

    At this moment, a dark elf holding a bow suddenly rushed out from within a cave. He reached the front of the purple tent, looking surprised as he reported, ¡°Matriarch, those lizardmen have suddenly gotten hold of some sharp weapons. These weapons looked like they were tailor made for the lizardmen. They hold the weapons with ease and can easily sh through our bodies. Furthermore, for an unknown reason, there is suddenly an influx of undead creatures within the caves. These undead creatures have blocked the passageways, helping the lizardmen resist our attack.

    Adele¡¯s cry in surprise traveled from the tent, making the elves around her shudder in silent pleasure. After, there was a period of silence before Adele replied, ¡°It should be that necromancer named Bryan, it can¡¯t be wrong then. Looks like he was the one who had just tried to spy on my existence. Sikong, make a trip. See if you can find that necromancer and bring him to me.¡±

    The dark elf who had continuously asked questions listened respectfully and nodded. Without any further ado, he leapt forward like a feather and entered the cave. Sikong took out a blue crystal ball the size of a human head and held it with both hands. As he travelled within the caves, the crystal ball gradually absorbed the ck silk like thread that escaped from his palm. These threads slowly floated within the blue crystal ball, forming a line after another that depicted the passageways of the cave.

    A plume of faint blue gentle light twirled out of the crystal ball like a fish, looking like it was sensing theplex passageways within the cave. A map for arge portion of the cave was gradually depicted within the blue crystal ball.

    Han Shuo was still at the central lizardmen cave. Through the twelve illusory mystical demons, Han Shuo overhead the dark elf matriarch Adele rebuking the other dark elves and roughly understood that they had escaped from the prison of the dark dragon n on theyer beneath him. As for how they escaped, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t too sure, but from listening to Adele¡¯s conversation, these few dark elves that had suddenly appeared should¡¯ve lived for a very long time.

    Once the dark elf Sikong entered the cave, a mystical demon had already detected him and clearly saw the activity within the crystal ball that he held. Han Shuo, who was in the midst of arranging the lizardmen¡¯s formation for resisting the dark elves, suddenly shouted to the lizardmen leader, ¡°Help me look after these guys for a while, I¡¯m making a trip!¡±

    Finishing his sentence, Han Shuo flew out of the area. The mystical demons had been floating around in theplex passageways for quite a long time. Thus, Han Shuo had long since familiarized himself with the terrain, finding the dark elf that had entered the cave system in a very short period of time.

    ¡°Are you looking for me?¡± Han Shuo suddenly appeared from within a far-off cave, facing the dark elf Sikong who still held the crystal ball in his hand.

    ¡°Eh. I never would have thought you would appear on your own ord. Necromancer, when previously you had foiled our ns, I did not expect that you still dared to appear this time around!¡± Seeing Han Shuo voluntarily appear, Sikong dlyughed, shining the blue crystal ball in his hand towards the sky.

    Out of a sudden, all the absorbed lines within the crystal ball bursted out from the crystal ball. The blue lines started crisscrossing, quickly forming a giant which rapidly enclosed the entire cave, with ten of lines entangled around Han Shuo.

    ¡°Haha, a mere necromancer actually dares to foil our noble dark elves¡¯ ns. You must be looking to die!¡± Sikong confidently proimed toward Han Shuo who was caught in the blue spiderweb. Completing the chant for a spell, the crystal ball that had released countless blue lines slowly floated and followed him in flying out of the cave.

    Being trapped in the blue spiderweb, apart from feeling the binding force, Han Shuo also felt a weak force leaking out which continuously weakened his mental strength. Although this dark elf Sikong appeared handsome and young, he must have already lived for countless years.

    The dark elves¡¯ lifespan was much longer than humans. As long as they weren¡¯t killed by others, it wasn¡¯t difficult for them to live for hundreds of years. Although a dark elf¡¯s strength wasn¡¯tpletely measured based on their age, a majority of the older dark elves were much harder to deal withpared to younger dark elves.

    The dark elves also had the advantage of practicing a few sinister spells. Dark elves that had lived for hundreds of years were often all dark mages that were exceedingly hard to deal with. Furthermore, as the dark elves worshipped the Evil Goddess Rose, they could also possess a special kind of strength, and hence were usually hard to fight against.

    Looking at this confident old dark elf, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t worried in the slightest, even entangled in the blue spiderweb. After Sikong had said his piece and nned to drag Han Shuo out of the cave, Han Shuo grinned toward Sikong, revealing a weird smile. He then whistled, and a blood mist shot out of him. The Demonyer Edge was like a soaring dragon with a blood red light trail,pletely shing apart the blue spiderweb that was entangling Han Shuo.

    When the old dark elf Sikong saw Han Shuo¡¯s sudden outburst of violent aura that sliced through his blue spiderweb in an instant, he started panicking. When Han Shuo stared at him while chuckling weirdly, Sikong rapidly calcted, suddenly realising that he had no certainty of beating Han Shuo. The aura from Han Shuo¡¯s body made him tremble, and he ran away without saying another word.

 Chapter 366: How do you want to play?

    Chapter 366: How do you want to y?

    ¡°Since you¡¯ve alreadye all this way... Don¡¯t even think about leaving!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face split into an evil grin as he executed the ¡°Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡± with his Demonyer Edge, letting the sky be segmented by a bloody red light.

    The Demonyer Edge produced sharp, bloody lights one after the other. Together, they became a mass of bloody red light that swept towards the seemingly young dark elf, Sikong. As Sikong saw this whirling mass of bloody light releasing a deadly, terrifyingly baleful aura that seemed sharper than a honed de, he began retreating even faster.

    The ¡°Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡± closely and relentlessly pursued Sikong like a parasitic apparition. Along the way, it came to the not so spaciously drilled underground passageway from which Sikong had entered. An enormous hail-like downfall of broken rocks fell as the ¡°Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡± tore through the tunnel, forcefully broadening the underground passageway by a fold.

    As the couple of dark elves entered, they saw a mass of red de-like lights closely pursuing Sikong. One of them yelled, ¡°Protect the elder!¡±

    A few truly young dark elves bravely stood in front of Sikong without thinking about their own safety. Torn and crushed by the bloody light, their remaining pieces of their minced bodies were scattered among the rocks below.

    After experiencing the bloody light¡¯s powers, Sikong was truly frightened out of his wits as he began to run at a breakneck pace. The crystal ball that had been grasped in his hands all along began glowing a misty blue, using a bit of the evil goddess¡¯s power bestowed within. The light from the crystal ball began rapidly weaving a protective screen as thin as a cicada¡¯s wing as it wove through the air like a snake.

    The bloody light bombarded the top of the protective screen. The intricate linking of thousands of strands of light gave the faintly radiating blue a powerful defense and began rapidly shredding the multiple bloody red lights. As the protective screen that was as thin as a cicada¡¯s wing shattered with a loud bang, Sikong had long since seized the chance to tumble out of the cave, albeit frightened and his back damp from cold sweat long ago.

    Sikong had obviously realized that although he had already lived for a couple hundreds of years, he really wasn¡¯t a match for the Han Shuo inside. As one¡¯s age increased, one¡¯s fear of death also increased, and Sikong was no exception to that. The moment he experienced Han Shuo¡¯s power, he immediately threw away the thought of fighting Han Shuo to the death. Instead, he began retreating even faster than before, directly fleeing until he was in front of a purple veil tent.

    ¡°Matriarch, forgive my ipetence, but there is a young necromancer inside with an incredibly powerful ability. Not only could I not capture him, but I was even forced to retreat back here!¡± Sikong¡¯s nerves were frayed as he trembled when reporting to Adele within the purple veil tent.

    ¡°Idiot, if you can¡¯t even take down a young necromancer, then all your years of life has been truly useless!¡± Adele, who had been smiling merrily, suddenly became angry after hearing what was just said.

    Ten silk-like ck grass strands that were as flexible as tentacles extended from within the purple veil tent, firmly binding up the fearful Sikong. The ck strands seemed to be even more tenacious than metal, causing the trussed up Sikong to feel his limbs gradually lose blood. Sikong¡¯s breathing gradually becameborious as his body trembled and his veins began to pop from the pressure exerted by the silky strands.

    The surrounding dark elf elders all began feeling apprehensive as they helplessly looked at Sikong, bound by the silk as his skin began to tear and blood began to cover him from head to toe. Even though Sikong was her favored boy toy, no one dared to plead for mercy. Women were the most vicious indeed. If she even felt the tiniest dissatisfaction, she would immediately began treating them cruelly, causing blood tovishly decorate the ground.

    Sikong felt a bone-piercing like pain. Yet, because he was bound too tightly, he couldn¡¯t even scream. Instead, he could only softly whimper. Nevertheless, he still did not dare to beg for forgiveness, seemingly extremely afraid of Adele.

    Breaking the unbearable silence, Adele coldly snorted within the purple veil tent, only after seeing Sikong faltering for breath. Afterwards, the ck light binding Sikong slithered back into the purple veil tent like a demon snake.

    Due to his weak and paralyzed body, Sikong copsed on top of his own pool of blood. Only, he continued to persevere as before, kowtowing and happily saying, ¡°Thank you Matriarch, many thanks for your mercy, Matriarch!¡±

    The purple veil tent was suddenly lifted by a light-purple colored arm. An arm that could send the hearts of men into a fluster, it brimmed with a bewitching luster, an alluring, full and boneless arm. After the tent-p was lifted open, a beautiful woman appeared. She was like a bringer of catastrophes, capable of making all living things go crazy for her as she knitted her brows, walking out from inside.

    The beautiful woman¡¯s entire body was covered with an exotic, light-purple skin. Yet, she had a head full of long emerald-like green hair and two sharp ears, indicating her race as an elf. She nearly possessed all of the characteristics of an absolutely beautiful fairy. With a soul-stirring and attractive charm, she only needed to stand in front of men, without moving or speaking at all, to fill men with desire. An unrestrained desire would fill their hearts and loins as men drank in her sight like the finest alcohol. All they would want would be to jump her, fiercely pressing her below them and conquering her.

    This matriarch of the dark elves, Adele, was undoubtedly an extremely pretty, coquettish, and dangerous beauty. Just a glimpse of her smile was seduction of the highest quality, capable of causing people to be unconsciously obsessed, willingly falling into oblivion for eternity.

    Lightly sighing with deep feeling, Adele walked next to Sikong, attired in a purple dress that hugged her curves. Deep emotions seemed to burst out of her chest as she said helplessly, ¡°How could I bear to kill you? Over the endless years, there were only a couple of you that apanied me, allowing me to feel a hint of joy while imprisoned within this dark underworld. But, although none of you were talented, handsome youths, you should still amount to more by now by now. After all, you¡¯ve lived for such a long time, such an endless number of years, so how could you still not have attained even a wee bit of additional courage, bing increasingly timid instead?¡±

    Sikong only trembled slightly while his bodyy immersed within a pool of blood. He seemed to be seriously listening to Adele¡¯s lecture without a word.

    Adele shot a nce at Sikong, lying next to her leg and curled within a pool of blood. She sighed once more, expressing her exasperation with their failures. She suddenly raised her head towards the huge brownish red mountain in front of her and yelled towards the lizardmen¡¯s dwelling ce, ¡°Hey necromancer, let¡¯s bothe out and have a chat.¡±

    This shout seemed to have formed through the convergence of a thousand sound waves. Unexpectedly, it directly passed through the intricate and sophisticated mountain holes, descending right into the mountain¡¯s core. Even if Adele hadn¡¯t deliberately used her mental strength to amplify her voice, Han Shuo would still have heard Adele¡¯s yell through his two mystical demons constantly watching her.

    After Adele finished speaking in themonnguage of the humans, she once again yelled in thenguage of the elves. The dark elves, originally doing their best to infiltrate the lizardmen¡¯s cave, suddenly withdrew like a current of water. In an amazingly short period, the dark elves managed to reorganize themselves outside When Han Shuo saw all the dark elves withdrawing through the mystical demons, he realized that it was definitely due to Adele¡¯smand. Knitting his brows, he hesitated for a moment before calmly walking out of the cave. Only, he didn¡¯t go too far from the cave.

    After Han Shuo left the cave, several lizardmen that were currently tracking Han Shuo quickly reported his movements to the leader of the lizardmen. After the leader learned of this news, he told the lizardmen to follow him outside. When Han Shuo was standing not too far from Adele, the lizardmen leader arrived behind Han Shuo with his people.

    When Han Shuo walked out from within the cave, he only caught a glimpse at the dark elf matriarch, Adele, before being immediately taken aback. However, Adele¡¯s beautiful face that could make all living things go crazy, only made Han Shuo astonished for a moment. Han Shuo¡¯s willpower had been tempered too often for this sort of trick to work. His expression remained natural as he spoke, ¡°Well, I¡¯vee, so what do you want to chat with me about?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, that big lizard. It left already, right?¡± Adele smiled sweetly as the surrounding young dark elves obviously swallowed their saliva.

    Unexpectedly Han Shuo nodded with a smile, not hiding the truth, ¡°Correct, he has indeed already left this ce. I can¡¯t say when he¡¯ll be back, but even if he doesn¡¯te back anytime soon, hehe, I will still help these lizardmen people. If you have any intentions of enving the lizardmen people, then we can continue to y.¡±

    Adele had likely decided to cause amotion today after constant probes up until now. They¡¯d even discovered that Degassi had left. Thus, Adele was most likely feeling confident attacking today. However, since Han Shuo has entered the underground world, he would naturally try his utmost to help the lizardmen people deal with the dark elves¡¯ encroachment. He would also not need to rely on a vague lie to preserve the lizardmen¡¯s safety at all.

    Adele started unceasinglyughing, causing Han Shuo¡¯s heart to undte. She amusingly sized up Han Shuo, saying, ¡°Continue to y? Now that the big lizard has left, are you capable of stopping me, all alone?¡±

    ¡°Who knows?¡± Han Shuo calmly said while the corner of his mouth evoked a pondering smile as he looked at Adele and said, ¡°Do you want to test me?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s only natural that I would want to test you. After all, you were able to force Sikong to withdraw. This clearly indicates that you¡¯re definitely out of the ordinary. Only, young man, how young are you? I believe, considering your human age, no matter how strong you, you still must have a limit. I also don¡¯t believe you can obstruct our march to conquer the underground world.¡± Adele tactfully smiled, brimming with confidence.

    Shrugging his shoulders, Han Shuo said, ¡°Then we have nothing to chat about. How do you want to y? No matter what kind of method you want to use, I¡¯m willing to apany you. Hehe, if it¡¯s body-on-bodybat, I would wee it even more, haha!¡±

    Even if the lizardmen leader¡¯s people as well as countless undead creatures were behind him, Han Shuo was notpletely assured of victory facing this Adele. After all, just Adele¡¯s personal strength was enough to keep him busy, and the couple of pretty, handsome, and obedient dark elves who had lived for so long also had strength that couldn¡¯t be belittled. Additionally, they had even brought approximately ten thousand dark elf experts.

    However, Han Shuo did not believe that Adele would fight him to the death to defeat the lizardmen people. Thus, he had no fear as he threatened Adele, even going as far as leering at her.

 Chapter 367: Burying the hatchet in each otherâ€™s flesh

    Chapter 367: Burying the hatchet in each other¡¯s flesh

    ¡°Body-on-bodybat in bed......¡± Adele suddenly smiled enchantingly, her delicate beautiful body trembling as she gazed at Han Shuo with limpid eyes. Her eyes were like a pool of spring water, as if wanting to draw Han Shuo deep into its depths with its beautiful scenery.

    The dark elves were a race that were naturallyscivious in nature, just like the dark dragons. This was especially the case for female dark elves, where seven out of ten of them were harlots.

    Adele, flirtatious and charming to no end, was evidently a well-known figure. The few dark elf elders by her side ought to have also taken their turn as her bed-warmer. She was unabashed whilst speaking of such matters in front of so many subordinates. Instead, she was actively engaged, seemingly willing to put aside the dignity of her position to immediately engage Han Shuo in carefree, uninhibited grinding.

    ¡°Heh heh, the madame¡¯s outstanding beauty enchants everyone. If you are truly interested in this aspect, I will definitely do my utmost to apany you.¡± Han Shuo also felt his heart itch when he saw Adele¡¯s enchanting smile. Adele was obviously a ravenous, wanton woman, seemingly born seductive. On the other hand, Han Shuo had never been a sanctimonious knight, barely concealing the desire that existed in his heart.

    Adele couldn¡¯t help but give Han Shuo another once over after his response. The tall and imposing Han Shuo was like a javelin as he stood there, giving off an overbearing might. His handsome yet dispassionate looks, his imposing height and a body covered in violent and explosive muscles weren¡¯t things the beautiful but thin dark elves by her side couldpare to.

    The more Adele looked at Han Shuo, the faster her heart beat. Her rosy small tongue subconsciously licked her brilliant red lips, her delicate peach colored face flushing red as if she were intoxicated, flirtingly enticing.

    There were gulping sounds from the dark elves who watched Adele from the side, including a few female dark elves who had special urges. They really would have directly rushed to embrace Adele, if not for the misgivings that rose from her strength and prestige.

    ¡°Little fellow, you are truly an interesting human. Although the humans I¡¯ve seen all contained naked lust in their hearts, all of them acted as decently as they could on the surface, but transformed into savage beasts once they got into bed. Hehe, you are different from them. Even in front of so many people, you actually don¡¯t bother concealing your desire at all. This is truly unexpected.¡± Adele softly and slowly mused out loud as she smiled and gazed at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo bowed courteously in response to Adele¡¯s praise before looking at her with a smile. Although he didn¡¯t reply, an imposing manner that didn¡¯t fear any threats naturally radiated outward.

    ¡°Hehe. If you have it in you to make me acknowledge your strength, I¡¯ll certainly apany you in a battle in bed.¡± Adele slowly walked toward Han Shuo as she finished her sentence, smiling seductively as she said, ¡°It is now time for you to prove your strength.¡±

    Han Shuo remained silent, before retrieving the skeleton staff from his space ring. He then said to Adele, ¡°I hope I can satisfy you. Heh heh. Honestly speaking, I¡¯m certainly very interested in you!¡±

    Adele was just about to answer when she noticed the skeleton staff in Han Shuo¡¯s hands. Her expression changed as she carefully looked at Han Shuo¡¯s staff a few more times. Only then did she ask, a hint of horror in her voice, ¡°The skeleton staff! You¡¯re from the Cmity Church?¡±

    Han Shuo was shocked as he looked at the skeleton staff that was tightly grasped in his hand. He thought quickly, why do all the older fellows in this world seem to recognize the skeleton staff? Since Adele immediately thought of Cmity Church when she saw the skeleton staff, it seemed that she had not lived for that long, at least not as long as Ancient Lizard King Dagassi.

    ¡°When did the Cmity Church¡¯s influence reach the underground world? What is your rtionship with the lizardmen? Could it be that you want to protect these stupid lizardmen?¡± Adele chattered on without waiting for Han Shuo to reply. Seeing Han Shuo remain silent, Adele furiously continued, ¡°Forget it. If you insist on protecting these lizardmen, I will show you some face. However, the underground world is our territory. If you¡¯re thinking of conquering the underground world, the dark elves will definitely resist to our deaths.¡±

    Hearing Adele¡¯s impassioned speech, Han Shuo, who¡¯d originally ready to fight a round with Adele, suddenly froze. Han Shuo understood from Adele¡¯s tone that she did not fear him, but clearly feared the Cmity Church. She did not dare to make a move against the lizardmen due to Han Shuo being someone from the Cmity Church.

    The Cmity Church was a sinister existence throughout the whole Profound Continent that incited terror just by their name. The dark elves, who were simrly considered evil, naturally knew of Cmity Church¡¯s formidable prowess.

    Among the sinister powers and evil races in the Profound Continent, the Cmity Church was without question the number one most evil power. Even for someone like Adele, once she saw Han Shuo holding the skeleton staff, she immediately admitted defeat and renounced enving the lizardmen without Han Shuo even saying a word.

    There was a period of time in which the skeleton staff was synonymous with the Cmity Church. The one who wielded the skeleton staff was absolutely one of the top figures in the Cmity Church. When Adele saw the skeleton staff appear in Han Shuo¡¯s hand, she did not have any doubts, treating Han Shuo as a high ranking figure of the Cmity Church. She immediately extinguished any intention of bing enemies with Han Shuo.

    An evil power like the dark elves did not fear any country in the continent. These countries normally would not set foot in the underground world. In addition, a country¡¯s strength was limited. Hence, Adele did not fear them even if they really set foot in the underground world. However, the infamous Cmity Church¡¯s viciousness and persistence toward their enemies would cause any party to be terrified. Even if someone was in the underground world when they provoked the Cmity Church, they would also be faced with a never-ending, fearsome retaliation.

    Adele had just returned from theyer below. She definitely did not want to immediately offend the number one most evil power in the world. Hence, she voluntarily conceded in front Han Shuo.

    A flurry of ideas passed through Han Shuo¡¯s mind. The Cmity Church¡¯s identity was indeed worth of being the Profound Continent¡¯s most feared evil power, if just mentioning its name unexpectedly led to experts like Adele admitting defeat. He reacted quickly to Adele¡¯s words.

    ¡°Since you recognize the skeleton staff, you obviously know my identity. Heh heh. The lizardmen¡¯s true god Dagassi has close ties with the Cmity Church. Perhaps you do not know that Dagassi has already left this ce and would not threaten the dark elves. However, Dagassi had requested that the Cmity Church would take care of the lizardmen when he left. Therefore, we will not let the lizardmen be enved by the dark elves.

    ¡°The Cmity Church does not have unfriendly intentions toward the underground world¡¯s dark elves. In fact, we have all been invaded by the light side, and should not be fighting internally. If you could give the Cmity Church face and not cause trouble for the lizardmen, I believe this will end as a very pleasant encounter.¡± Han Shuo portrayed the image of a high-ranking figure in the Cmity Church, speaking proudly yet respectfully to the dark elves¡¯ ancestor Adele.

    ¡°Of course, since the lizardmen are under your protection, the dark elves will not attack them from now on.¡± Adele didn¡¯t hesitate, giggling as she replied, ¡°Distinguished friend, since you havee to the underground world, you definitely muste be our guest in our dark elf territory.¡±

    As expected, Adele immediately agreed to Han Shuo¡¯s request. She then giggled as she sincerely proposed an invitation. Adele even cast a soul-wrenching coquettish nce Han Shuo¡¯s way as she made the proposal. Han Shuo felt an unbearable itch from the tant seduction.

    End of Part 1 of the chapter.

    Even war was avoided at this point. Simply due to the skeleton staff in his hand, Han Shuo had extinguished Adele¡¯s ideas for enving the lizardmen, and even had her sincerely invite Han Shuo in an attempt to build a favorable rtionship.

    Han Shuo did not expect this, and the oue was obviously more ideal than he could have imagined. Han Shuo turned around to look at the lizardmen¡¯s leader, grinning as he said, ¡°I¡¯ll be making a trip. I believe the dark elves will leave you alone in the future.¡±

    Within the underground world, the slow-witted lizardmen were not as well-informed as the dark elves. The lizardmen leader had never heard of the existence of the Cmity Church. However, he understood from Adele¡¯s words that Han Shuo hailed from an outstanding power and this power was dreaded by even the dark elves touted as the strongest in thisyer.

    The dark elves were already thisyer¡¯s strongest race to begin with. Now that they had renounced their internal conflicts and gathered together, this strength had reached extraordinary levels. In addition, they now even had a mysterious group of experts. The lizardmen¡¯s leader understood that if they were to fight to the end against the dark elves, it would only lead to their deaths.

    Now that he saw Adele had taken the initiative to let them go, the lizardmen leader naturally did not foolishly say anything and only bowed respectfully toward Han Shuo, saying, ¡°Thank you, Sir Envoy!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded as he left with Adele, who had been smiling enchantingly by the side. They began to make their way to dark elf territory. The territory upied by the dark elves was the most vast and fertile in thisyer of the underground world. Han Shuo continued to make light conversation with Adele as they travelled

    Evidently, Adele was extremely curious about Han Shuo¡¯s identity. Along the way, she continuously probed for clues about Han Shuo¡¯s true status in the Cmity Church. However, Han Shuo constantly evaded her probing, not revealing the slightest bit of information. Truthfully, Han Shuo was unable to divulge any secrets even if he wanted to, as he wasn¡¯t familiar with the Cmity Church or their internal structure.

    However, Adele had closely examined the skeleton staff once Han Shuo had brought it out, and had felt the bizarre strength it contained. Hence, she didn¡¯t suspect Han Shuo¡¯s identity at all. The more ambiguously Han Shuo spoke, the more Adele felt that Han Shuo possessed an extremely high-ranking position in the Cmity Church. For Han Shuo to already be wielding the skeleton staff at such a young age, it already sufficiently illustrated that he wasn¡¯t a simple character.

    The merrily beaming Adele didn¡¯t forget to try and seduce Han Shuo on the way back. She didn¡¯t sit in the purple light veil tent, but instead walked alongside Han Shuo, swaying her hips and sashaying her butt enticingly with every step. From time to time, Adele would inadvertently brush up against Han Shuo, the sides of her beautiful legsing into contact with him again and again. This caused Han Shuo to be unceasingly aroused throughout the whole journey, his ¡°lust¡± rising rapidly.

    Adele was clearly very apprehensive of the Cmity Church and was full of reverence toward Han Shuo. When she discovered that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t willing to reveal his identity, Adele didn¡¯t continue to probe further, and instead introduced the scenery along the way to him.

    The underground world wasn¡¯t as dank and wet as rumored. Although it was truly in eternal night, the ceiling thousands of meters above the underground world sparkled with strange light. Furthermore, nts that glistened grew everywhere, causing many ces in the underground world to be as fully light as a brightly lit day outside.

    Simr to the world above, the underground world had its own mountains and streams, so much so that the beautiful scenery in those ces was even more magnificent than those above ground. The coquettish Adele was someone who also indulged in beautifulndscapes. She wasn¡¯t at all in a hurry to return and had simply ordered a portion of the group to return first. She then personally led a few hundreds experts on a detour with Han Shuo, showing him various exotdscapes.

    The dark elves were the overlords of thisyer of the underground world. Adele had absolute confidence in her own strength, and believed that there weren¡¯t many living creatures that could threaten her in thisyer. The batmen and earth goblins they ran into along the way all went into hiding when they saw Adele¡¯s group, as though hiding from a demon. They seemed extremely afraid of Adele.

    Adele finally brought Han Shuo to her dark elf territory after visiting twelve spectacr scenic locations in the underground world.

    The dark elf territory was a vast patch of forest where all kinds of bizarre nts grew. Dozens of towering trees grew tall, vibrant with life. The abundant, enchanting emerald presence of life nourished a forest that seemed to be brimming with vitality.

    The way forward was filled with all kinds of verdant and thick nts, with just a hint of evil in their presence. There were many beautiful demonic spider webs that stretched across the trees that seemed to reach for the sky. Within these spiderwebs were crystals of various colors that seemed to be using thework of webs to absorb the forest¡¯s energy. There were also many small red, purple and ck spiders that actively moved about the forest. They had friendly dealings with the dark elves, and served as their defensive scouts. When the spiders saw Adele appear, they danced elegantly on top of the ancient trees, appearing to be narrating something to Adele.

    The evil goddess Rose worshipped by the dark elves was rumored to have the head of a human but the body of a spider. Han Shuo did not know the truth of this matter, but based on the situation he saw, there may be some truth to the rumors. Adele could obviouslymunicate with the small spiders, ordering them to work for her.

    The further in they went, the more lush and tall the various ancient trees were. There were many wooden houses located in the center of the forest brimming with natural energy. Some of the houses were formed from woven branches while many tall houses were previously ancient trees that reached the skies, but had since died and withered. These ancient trees formed a simple yet gorgeous pce when they were hollowed out, appearing extremely exotic.

    The dark elves had an innate fondness toward fine objects. Their pce buildings boasted delicate patterns carefully carved into the outside trunk. These patterns served no other purpose and were purely for aesthetics. Many dark elves were very aplished in the arts, and every magic weapon they made were iparably refined. Although the dark elves¡¯ magic weapons might not be the best in the continent, they were definitely the most beautiful and refined.

    Along the way, Han Shuo recognized the dark elves¡¯ pursuit of artistic excellence above everything else. From the buildings, armor, clothes to even food and religious offerings, every object or activity had to be artistically beautiful.

    ¡°This is the dark elves¡¯ most important territory in the underground world. As the matriarch of the dark elves, I am honored to have brought you here.¡± Adele smiled sweetly as she directly brought Han Shuo toward the interior.

    All the dark elves in the area respectfully bowed in greeting when they saw Adele approach. Adele possessed an extremely prestigious position among the dark elves. As she was able tomunicate with the evil goddess Rose, her status was simr to Han Shuo¡¯s position among the lizardmen, both appearing as their respective god¡¯s messenger.

    However, as Adele was also a dark elf, her position among the dark elves was even higher. That the constantly warring dark elves could unite together after her appearance was testament to her vaunted position.

    ¡°Madame is too kind. I instead should be honored to be able to be here.¡± Han Shuo grinned as he answered.

    Adele led Han Shuo to a wooden pce that had previously been an enormous ancient tree. After entering, Han Shuo discovered that the floor was covered with carpets embroidered withplicated patterns, and the surrounding wooden walls had the strange image of the evil goddess Rose portrayed as a half-human, half spider. Many suspended crystal chandeliers glittered with bright, gorgeous radiance, imparting the ce with a natural splendor.

    At this moment, Adele pped her hands and five alluring female dark elves, all with different skin colors but equally beautiful, suddenly walked out. These five dark elves wore thin yarn skirts, their expressions were either shy, provocative or pure, with all their gazes focused on Han Shuo by Adele¡¯s side.

    ¡°Properly attend to our distinguished guest!¡± Adele smiled faintly, giving her orders to the five beautiful and seductive dark elves.

    The five young female dark elves walked together towards Han Shuo, all of them carrying fruit tes and wine sses, lightly smiling with unique expressions as they headed over.

 Chapter 368: Going on a Punitive Expedition

    Chapter 368: Going on a Punitive Expedition

    This banquet was no different than the ones at home. Served by the five young, pretty dark elves, Han Shuo drank fine wine and ate tender meat in extremefort. As per Adele¡¯smand, the five young dark elves wore revealing clothing and smiled sweetly as they plied Han Shuo with more wine. Intentionally or not, the elves lightly brushed their bodies with Han Shuo, setting his lust ame.

    As Han Shuo seemed to be fall into an intoxicated haze, Adele meaningfully nced at the couple of dark elf elders who had been smiling obsequiously since the start. Adele¡¯s lovers withdrew themselves from the room with smiles on their face.

    After the elders left, Adele gave another meaningful look towards the five dark elves that served Han Shuo. All five of the dark elves were equally beautiful, and began to undress in front of Han Shuo. They then slid into his arms as they smiled charmingly at him.

    ¡°Haha, honorable guest, enjoy these beauties. If you feel like these five girls are still unable to satisfy you, then I will willingly serve you.¡± Adele smiled enchantingly towards Han Shuo as she took the initiative to depart.

    ¡°How about all of you simplye at me together then!¡± Han Shuo let his hands rove unabashedly over the dark elves who had just jumped into his arms, while inviting Adele with a smile.

    Adele rebuked him with a lightugh, ¡°How will that do? I am the matriarch of the dark elves, and I definitely can¡¯t serve you alongside them. Hehe, I am actually better than all five of them alone, so only if you can satisfy all five of them can you possibly let me feel satisfied. However, you need to show me some proof first, hmm?¡± After saying these words, Adele did not remain any longer. As she looked at Han Shuo start making moves on the five young dark elves without restraint, she endured the restlessness in her heart and left, gently chuckling.

    The instant Adele left, Han Shuo unrestrainedly pinned down a mostly naked and delicate dark elf who¡¯d been in his arms. A long and heartyugh sounded as he began a punitive expedition to conquer their bodies.

    The twelve mystical demons silently left Han Shuo¡¯s body, spreading out to cover the dark elves¡¯ territory. Two of the twelve mystical demons were ordered to follow Adele and determine the purpose of her departure.

    As the full bodied girl under his body tactfully begged for forgiveness in a sweet and soft voice, Han Shuo reached out a hand to pull over another girl. This dark elf possessed a purple skin-toned body and long, dark purple hair. He couldn¡¯t help but grope her own well-rounded breasts as she gazed at him blushingly. She was just like a blooming purple rose.

    Failing to repress her innermost desires, the dark elf under Han Shuo¡¯s body instantly started shouting in a joyous and high spirited manner. The trembling and unrepressed shout was akin to a melodious and enchanting song that could dissolve a person¡¯s heart. As the other three dark elves flushed with excitement, they began to tangle together with a wordless croon.

    The dark elves were known for theirsciviousness, the female dark elves especially so. As the three dark elves started to walk towards Han Shuo, two of them had a bashful expression. The other appeared somewhat aloof, emitting a different kind of charm. However, when they truly started battling with their bodies, the originally shy and blushing dark elves actually started gradually bing wild and uninhibited. Before Han Shuo had even truly overwhelmed them with ecstasy, they had actually already became wild themselves.

    As Han Shuo continued his punitive expedition on the dark elf under his body, he saw Adele, through the mystical demon¡¯s gaze, arriving within a luxurious room two floors below. Sikong and those few male dark elves were waiting there. Besides them was also a young male elf.

    The joyous and extremely spirited mor from Han Shuo¡¯s room constantly entered this meeting room. Adele¡¯s face was a stunning crimson as she looked like a worm was writhing in her heart. Her visage expressed her great desire to immediately rece the woman under Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    Subconsciously licking her red lips lightly once more, Adele forcefully repressed the restlessness in her heart before asking Sikong, ¡°Tell me what urred in the battle between the two of you again.¡±

    Sikong was still deeply wounded, blood marring his arms and face. With a deep breath, he quickly summarized the confrontation between him and Han Shuo in a soft voice. After he was done, he also added, ¡°Besides the intense smell of a necromancer on his body, he also cultivates an incredible fighting aura. Oh, that¡¯s not right, it doesn¡¯t seem very much like a fighting aura, since it¡¯s so suffused with evil. It¡¯s highly likely that he¡¯s a high-ranking member of the Cmity Church.¡±

    ¡°Of course you imbecile, as if I needed your warning! Being able to hold a magical stuff with human skulls already clearly shows his identity. The only thing I don¡¯t understand is that big lizard¡¯s actions. Why would it make such a shady transaction with the Cmity Church. This is truly odd.¡± The devastatingly beautiful Adele ¡®s eyebrows creased as she voiced her doubts.

    ¡°Matriarch, do we still need to deal with the lizardmen? This person¡¯s age is still young, so he¡¯s definitely not a match for you. Now that he¡¯s entered our domain, should we take advantage of the situation and be rid of him?¡± A different dark elf elder piped up.

    ¡°You fool! Since he¡¯d dared to enter our domain, he¡¯s definitely confident in his ability to leave. Let alone leave, he surely has a way to send out information. You fools, can¡¯t you use your brains?!¡± Adele snapped.

    Adele shot a nce at the only young dark elf here after scolding them. Her voice tinkled with augh as she tenderly said, ¡°Young child, I heard you met this human before when following Dana?¡±

    ¡°In response to the Matriarch, this person hase to the underground world once previously. He started off helping us deal with a young dark dragon. However, because Chief Dana targeted him, wanting to capture everything in one fell swoop, he somehow betrayed us and left more than half of us dead. In the end, he even stole the Eternal Sigh of Darkness 1 and made that dark dragon his magical pet.¡± This young dark elf respectfully reported.

    Adele started and hastily inquired, ¡°What? The Eternal Sigh of Darkness is in his hands?¡±

    Nodding, the dark elf replied, ¡°Yes Matriarch, he stole it from the hands of Chief Dana. Last time when we went to deal with the lizardmen, that big lizard crushed Chief Dana to death. A lot of us saw him then too. I¡¯m sure it¡¯s him.¡±

    ¡°Dark dragon, he made a young dark dragon his magical pet.....¡± Elder Sikong muttered to himself before suddenly saying in astonishment, ¡°Matriarch, that dark dragon wouldn¡¯t be Gilbert, the son of Gilges, the head of the dark dragons, would it? When we left the underground world, we promised Gilges, that old bastard, that we would be responsible for finding his son.¡±

    When she heard Sikong¡¯s words, Adele¡¯s expression changed, ¡°That¡¯s very likely. That young lewd dragon and this Bryan have simr temperaments. They¡¯re probably running together. If that¡¯s indeed the case, we definitely must not move against him now. This person is not someone we can provoke.¡±

    ¡°Matriarch, then what do we do? Are we going to just let the lizardmen go?¡± The young dark elf hastily spoke, seeming to have a deeply-rooted hatred for the lizardmen

    Adele shot a nce at the young dark elf and responded, ¡°And just how important are the lizardmen? This underground world houses so many races, and they are by no means crucial. Besides upying a few mines, they have no other aplishments. The present situation will not change whether or not we provoke them. However, if we can strike a good rtionship with this Cmity Church fellow, perhaps we will be able to return to the world above and forcefully reim the fertilends of the damned forest elves.¡±

    The young dark elf was pleasantly surprised to hear those words, ¡°We can actually return to the world above and even take back everything that belonged to us from the hands of the forest elves?¡±

    ¡°In this world, there is no such thing as impossible!¡± Adele confidently said.

    As Adele and several dark elf elders spoke, their ears had been constantly taking in the unrestrained moans from above. But when their conversation reached this point, the sounds from above suddenly started gradually calming down. It quickly dwindled into silence, and not a single dark female elf¡¯s voice sound.

    As Adele knitted her brows to listen for a moment, she suddenly couldn¡¯t help but feel rmed. She noticed that not even one of her subordinates hade down. All five of those dark elves were actually from a group within the dark elf race that were the most skilled at sex and the most in need of vigor. Theirsciviousness wouldn¡¯t topple even after going through ten guys in a night. ording to Adele¡¯s instructions, after they¡¯d dealt with Han Shuo, they would send a signal to inform her.

    However, from the present situation, it seemed that the elves had already submitted. Not a single one of the five harlots had sent a signal or continued to make any noise.

    ¡°Why is there no more noise?¡± An elder asked suspiciously.

    ¡°He¡¯s probably finally incapable of continuing. To be able tost so long, it seems like this human actually has some tricks indeed!¡± Another elder replied.

    Adele shot a nce at the two elves and lightly humphed before saying, ¡°You think everyone is useless like all of you?¡±

    ¡°Heh, can one human be capable of subduing those five sluts in such a short time?¡± One elder sneered.

    ¡°You¡¯re right!¡± Adele disdainfully shot a nce at him before muttering, ¡°Do I actually have to personally take the field?¡±

    Adele¡¯s body started growing hot from head to toe after speaking, her cheeks turning an alluring blood-red. Without taking another look at the couple of male dark elves here, she twisted her waist, excitedly swaying her buttocks to and fro as she walked upwards.

    When Adele finally arrived, she saw Han Shuo¡¯spletely naked body casually sitting on top of a chair, a smile on his face as he gazed at the restless Adele burning in mes of passion. At Han Shuo¡¯s fett, five wanton dark elvesy on top of a rug like five balls of cotton. They seemed tock the strength to even raise their fingers in greeting.

    Adele merely shot a nce at Han Shuo¡¯s spirited and fierce thing on his lower body before suddenly feeling a tremble in her heart. Then, looking at the scene that had be a mess, the throbbing in her heart became increasingly intense, and she was sure that the sound of her thumping heart was echoing across the room.

    ¡°I¡¯ve been waiting for you all along!¡± Han Shuo smilingly looked at Adele as he opened both of his hands in an inviting manner, ¡°How abouting here, mydy!¡±

    Adele suddenly emitted a moving moan as the clothing on her body drifted towards the ground like pieces of a feather. She unreservedly disyed a perfect, naked body that was ravishingly beautiful out in the open. Then, like a moth flying into mes, her plump butt directly fell on top of Han Shuo who sat upright on a chair,

    Han Shuo and Adele simultaneously emitted a loud moaning sound that brimmed with endless joy and satisfaction.

    In the room that Adele had left, the male dark elves left were discussing things, seemingly disbelieving the words Adele said before she left.

    However, after Adele¡¯s prolonged moan traveled into the room, the faces of each and every one of the male dark elves became extremely unsightly. From the moment her voice rang out, it signified that her judgement was correct. That Han Shuo had indeed conquered the five dark elves in a very short time frame and had now started his expedition on Matriarch Adele.

    Some human males were indeed stronger than dark elves in this field. However, the ability of female dark elves in this field was also very well-known throughout the Profound Continent. Even if an unusually endowed and gifted human male confronted a female dark elf, they wouldn¡¯t have any advantages whatsoever. Those first five wanton dark elves were actually well-known figures among the dark elves, but who would¡¯ve expected that Han Shuo would deal with them with ease?

    Now that Adele had personally taken the field, the previously disdainful words that she said to them became fact. This seemed to resemble a p to a face and caused their self-respect in this matter to suffer an enormous humiliation.

    ¡°What a frightening fellow. Seems like only the matriarch can make him sumb!¡± Sikong said towards the few people beside him as the blood on his face gradually faded away. The other people had a noticeably envious look. However after Sikong¡¯s words, they also all nodded and said, ¡°Naturally!¡±

    Sikong and the others were originally Adele¡¯s lovers. This was a normal situation within the dark elf race; but even with all of them together, they still weren¡¯t a match for Adele. Perhaps, because they knew how frightening Adele was in this respect, they were constantly afraid of Adele deep in their hearts and were unable to raise their heads.

    As Sikong and the others resumed their discussion, another prolonged moan came from Adele above. Theplexion of the five elders changed greatly after hearing this. Sikong couldn¡¯t help but to cry out in rm first, saying, ¡°How is that possible!¡±

    The others also had faces filled with incredulity. Each and every one of them looked at each other with dismay, not knowing what to do. From that prolonged moan, they could obviously recognize that Adele had climaxed.

    But, without waiting for the five dark elves to react, Adele suddenly emitted another extremely carefree moan and let out a shrieking ¡°No¡±. The five ck elves were once again stupefied. Amongst them, Sikong was aghast, ¡°He¡¯s still going, can it be that even the matriarch is also unable to continue?¡±

    ¡°Impossible. Even if the matriarch climaxes, she still shouldn¡¯t say the word ¡®No¡¯. Perhaps she¡¯s purposefully putting on an act. You all should know that the more weakly a woman resists, the more likely a male will orgasm torrentially and delightfully!¡± Among them, a dark elf elder thought for a moment before analyzing with great pomp.

    The other dark elves immediately reacted. Amongst them, Sikong drew many inferences and suddenly said in realization, ¡°The matriarch is truly powerful. It seems like her recent moaning sound is just to confuse this terrifying human.¡±

    ¡°That must be so. What kind of person is the matriarch? As if such a young and vigorous fellow is capable of conquering our matriarch!¡±

    ¡°Mm, We seemed to have overthought the situation. It seems like the matriarch has once again earned herself another servant between her legs.¡±

    As the couple of dark elf elders discussed and believed themselves to be infallible, Adele¡¯s panic-stricken voice became louder and louder above them. An unceasing shrieking sound started, ¡°No. Don¡¯t, don¡¯t do this, I beg you!¡±

    ¡°The matriarch¡¯s act is so genuine. It seems like he will soon be done for!¡± Sikong continued to voice his opinion.

    ¡°Ah.... Damned Sikong, hurry and save me, save me!¡± Suddenly, after Adele¡¯s wretched and mournful howling, she unexpectedly started shouting for assistance.

    Sikong leapt up with fright and spoke, stunned, ¡°Did you hear that clearly?! The matriarch is shouting for me to save her, could something have truly happened?¡±

    ¡°Ah.... Just kill me, you demon, just kill me!¡± From above, Adele screamed frantically without a hint of joy at all.

    The dark elf elders finally started reacting at this time, suddenly realizing that a very major incident must¡¯ve happened above. They rushed out of the meeting room with a shout as they hastily made their way upstairs.

    They barged into the room and gaped at the sight that greeted them. Adele was firmly pressed down on top of the chair and was being vigorously pounded from behind. But that wasn¡¯t what transfixed them. Adele¡¯s body seemed to visibly age, as if the wheel of time had quickened by a thousand times.

    Her long hair on her head gradually started bing grey. Following this change, Adele¡¯s powerful aura also began to slowly flow into Han Shuo¡¯s body, causing his originally mellow aura to start to soaring unceasingly.

    ¡°Hey, you guys came!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s big arm firmly pinned down Adele as he continued his punitive expedition. Turning his head towards the couple of dark elf elders, his smirk seemed to turn into a somewhat ruthless smile.

    ¡°Let go of our matriarch, otherwise, we will kill you!¡± Sikong hissed severely as he pulled out the crystal ball he¡¯d used previously.

    ¡°I¡¯m almost ready, just wait a moment!¡± Han Shuoughed as he started pounding in an increasingly fierce manner. Soon after he began exerting himself with a burst of speed right in front of the dark elf elders, he flung his head back, howling loudly with tion as his body began to uncontrobly tremble for a short burst.

    As he finished, he took another look at the dark elf matriarch Adele. At that moment, the ravishingly beautiful Madam Adele, whose looks could fell cities and topple empires, had be a grey haired, loose skinned dark elf granny. Her skin didn¡¯t have the slightest luster of life to it. It was clear, she would never again regain her youthful radiance.

    From his space ring, Han Shuo cheerfully and happily took out another shirt and put it on. Han Shuo, having just absorbed all of the power of Adele¡¯s body, only felt an unprecedented contentment as he faced the several dark elf elders with a smile. ¡°Adele¡¯s dead. You guys should all go die too!¡±

 Chapter 369: Traitors

    Chapter 369: Traitors

    Adele¡¯s death, coupled with Han Shuo¡¯s ruthless words sent chills over the dark elf elders. Especially Sikong, who had personally fought Han Shuo, was deeply affected.

    Sikong, who¡¯d been the first to suggesting here, didn¡¯t feel the slightest desire for revenge upon seeing Adele¡¯s corpse. He actually shrank back as a fearful look crossed his face,¡°Wh-what do you want?¡±

    Han Shuoughed, and grinned as he said, ¡°I want your deaths of course!¡±

    ¡°You also gain no benefit if we die, and you might not even be able to defeat the five of us.¡± Sikong opened his mouth again, his expression bing slightly calmer. ¡°Let¡¯s negotiate.¡±

    It was at this time that the naked elf girls lying on the carpet slowly woke up groggily. Upon seeing the situation, they panicked and ran to the elders, screaming, ¡°Elders, Save us!¡±

    The dark elf elders were unsure of what to do when they saw the five naked bodies running towards them. They didn¡¯t have much time to think however, as the five elf girls all ran into the embrace of various elders. Still wearing an expression of fear, they gabbled, ¡°We¡¯re scared! Let¡¯s leave this ce!¡±

    Pfft.

    Sikong stared in disbelief at the delicate dagger protruding from his stomach, then stared with disbelief at the squirming girls in his embrace. However, their faces no longer held any trace of fear now, but instead wore expressions of indifference.

    The other elders met the same fate as Sikong. Each of the elf girls that had barreled into their embrace had struck a fatal blow with daggers into each of their chests, all with cold vicious expressions on their faces.

    ¡°Trying to kill you folks in your own territory wasn¡¯t easy. Heh heh, but it seems the people who want you dead are your own people!¡± Han Shuo exined with a smile, coldly watching Sikong fall into a puddle of his own blood.

    ¡°W-why?¡± Sikong asked the dark elf girl, unable to ept the situation.

    ¡°Why did you old bastardse up from down below? All of the races were doing just fine until you came and stole our spots, bing our vers! Keke, every race has them, not to mention us dark elves. As long as you die, then we¡¯ll be the true holders of power amongst the dark elves!¡± The dark elf girl coldly smiled. She squatted and grasped the dagger tightly, shoving it even farther in. Sikong¡¯s eyes widened, and went ssy, never to see again.

    All of the dark elf elders were extraordinary magic users. However, they would have never thought that their own subordinates would act against them, and immediately fell victim to the dark elf girls¡¯ covert ambush.

    Emitting a small sound of inquiry, Han Shuo flew towards one of the dark elf elders like lightning. One of the elders had just struggled to his feet from a puddle of his own blood when Han Shuo ced his palm on the elder¡¯s back. An explosive sound rang out from within the elder¡¯s body. This elder, who had not fallen in the sneak attack, was finally dead for good.

    Having made preparations for hand-to-handbat with Han Shuo, Adele had not posted any dark elf sentries nearby. Knowing that she would likely be loud, she would likely not want her subordinates to hear her, as she was the main wielder of political power amongst the dark elves. As a result, she had dismissed her bodyguards.

    This made it so that even after the battle had finished, there were still no sentries who were aware of the earthshaking situation that had urred. They were still busily going about their own business in the distance.

    ¡°Didn¡¯t you say you¡¯ll work with us? Why did you still kill Adele in the end?¡± A dark elf girl named Shin asked Han Shuo with puzzlement as she wiped her bloodstained arm on the carpet, putting on her gauze thin clothes.

    After Han Shuo¡¯s disy of strength from pushing all five of them down in such a short time, Siyalin and the rest had made a proposal to Han Shuo, hoping that Han Shuo would help kill Adele and the elders. However, they were tactfully declined by Han Shuo.

    Shrugging, Han Shuo said with resignation, ¡°Adele acted against me, so I suddenly changed my mind.¡±

    When Han Shuo said these words, he sighed lightly. There seemed to be several red strands moving around in his body. Two ck dots were being seemingly harried by the red strands into the palm of his hand. The skin of Han Shuo¡¯s palms suddenly burst open, and two blue spiders the size of beans emerged.

    Two balls of me materialized in Han Shuo¡¯s palms, turning the two blue spiders into ashes. Han Shuo blew, and the ashes vanished in the air.

    Han Shuo originally hadn¡¯t intended to act against Adele. However, it¡¯d be apparent that Adele was conspiring against him. With Han Shuo¡¯s level of power, it was utter simplicity to discover any oddities within his body. Judging by Adele¡¯s use of two spiders to infiltrate Han Shuo¡¯s body, it was obvious that she didn¡¯t have any good intentions.

    These two spiders were imnted into Han Shuo¡¯s body when he and Adele had been kissing passionately. He hadn¡¯t even felt them in the heat of the moment. Had Han Shuo not been as powerful as he was, he never would have known that Adele was acting against him.

    With Han Shuo¡¯s temperament, he wouldn¡¯t hold any kind feelings towards Adele since she made the first move. During their fierce body-on-bodybat, Han Shuo suddenly used the demonic secret technique to absorb Adele¡¯s energy, taking yin to replenish yang.

    Adele was a strange dark mage and also had a strange energy in her body. This energy waspletely different from the other forms of energy Han Shuo was familiar with, containing some sort of evil, wanton power. Han Shuo had detected a trace of evil divine power within the energy, and assumed that it must havee from the evil goddess Rose. It was precisely because Adele¡¯s body contained this kind of depraved evil power that she was so powerful as a mere dark archmage. She¡¯d resisted madly when he was draining her yin, but she only had the power of a mage. When faced with Han Shuo, whose physical body was as tyrannical as a magical beast, her struggling was futile.

    When using the demonic technique to drain Adele¡¯s energy, most of the absorbed energy had been from the dark goddess Rose. After filtering out the impurities, only a fifth of the original amount was left. However, even this small amount of energy nourish Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan. The demon infant in his body was gaining more and more sentience, loosening Han Shuo¡¯s inhibitions.

    As for Adele¡¯s mental strength, it wasn¡¯t something that the secret technique could harvest. Unfortunately for her, under Han Shuo¡¯s relentless ¡°Soul Tremor¡± spells, it was impossible for her to focus enough to concentrate her mental strength to attack him.

    ¡°It seems that the strength in my heart has been getting stronger recently. Could it be that I¡¯m on the verge of a breakthrough to the carnal realm?¡± Han Shuo suddenly began to doubt his progress. Recently, he had been feeling the strong urge to ¡°subdue¡± every pretty girl he came across. Even towards enemies, Han Shuo had the urge to behead them, with wild thoughts of massacres and other brutality oozing their way into his thoughts.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo temporarily dispelled those thoughts from his head. ncing at the five elf girls who had finished dressing themselves and were standing in front of him, he said ¡°Alright, these old bastards who were preventing you from taking power are all dead. Now can we talk about matters rting to us?¡±

    Shn nodded her head, and said ¡°Leave the rest to us. We¡¯ll give you five hundred thousand gold coins as long as you give us the Eternal Sigh of Darkness. We¡¯ll also promise not to disturb the lizardmen. What do you say?¡±

    ¡°No problem.¡± Han Shuo readily agreed, taking the bow he¡¯d acquired from Dana.¡°It¡¯s useless in my hands anyway; it¡¯s a very good deal for me to exchange this for five hundred thousand gold coins.¡±

    Adele and the dark elf elders weren¡¯t carrying anything that was of interest to Han Shuo. Perhaps it was due to the fact that they had just arrived from theyer below, but theycked the opportunity to collect any wealth, meaning that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t loot any satisfactory war spoils off them.

    ¡°In addition, we agree to establish long-term agreements. Here in the underground world, we have many things that you people abovegroundck. I believe that these things could be exchanged for some fine wine, as well as some fine art, including gems that increase power. With those items, we dark elves can craft beautiful magical weapons. If you were to sell them outside, they should be items that nobles fight over to acquire.¡± Shin said to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Haha, don¡¯t worry, I won¡¯t let you down. Of course, you also have to satisfy me as well. Let¡¯s get rich together!¡± Han Shuo happily said to the five dark elf girls, who were about to be the next group of dark elf elders.

 Chapter 370: Summoning the Old Fey Corpse

    Chapter 370: Summoning the Old Fey Corpse

    After Han Shuo departed dark elves¡¯ territory, the five female dark elves worked together to drag the corpse of Adele and the dark elf elders into one of the deepest cer rooms. They falsely imed to others that Adele and the other dark elf elders had already begun touring the world above.

    After a couple of days, the cer was suddenly filled with tens of thousands of small spiders. It seemed as though every spider in dark elf territory had somehow made their way into the cer. Somehow, none of the dark elves within the territory detected these spiders.

    Tens of thousands of small spiders were densely packed together,pletely filling up the cer. As the spiders crazily squirmed on top of Adele¡¯s body, the small spiders began spitting a strange, magical silk one after the other. As the silk fell onto Adele¡¯s body, the small spiders began drying up one after the other, losing their lives. They had spat out their very own life force along with the silk.

    This process continued for some time. Finally, after the tens of thousands of small spiders that had entered the cer room had all spat out their life force, they all died within the cer room.

    Adele¡¯s dried up and shriveled body slowly began weathering. After a few days, only white skeletal bones remained. However, within Adele¡¯s skull, there was actually an additional thumb-sized blue pearl that emitted a blue haze. The pearl was filled with the evil goddess Rose¡¯s evil power, simr to what Han Shuo had previously absorbed.

    One day, this blue pearl suddenly burst, expelling hundreds of thousands of blue colored threads of silk. They inserted themselves within the bodies of the several dark elf elders that had already died. The silk actually began extracting strands of blue light from within the elders¡¯ body. Within just a moment¡¯s time, the body of all the several dark elf elders hadpletely transformed into ashes, blown away on the air. Then, during the middle of the night, the blue colored pearl slowly flew out of the cer, flying towards the temple of evil goddess Rose.

    In the middle of the temple, an innocent and pure young female dark elf was facing the statue of Rose, piously praying. This dark elf youngdy appeared to have the age of a sixteen or seventeen year old human girl, seemingly uncorrupted by the profoundly lewd and evil cultures of the dark elf race. She worshipped Rose¡¯s statue, looking like a most devoted believer.

    While facing the statue of Rose, she kowtowed continuously while murmuring in thenguage of the dark elves. Suddenly, the blue pearl flew over her head and hovered there. Then, the blue pearl abruptly burst, emitting blue colored rays of light that tightly wrapped around the youngdy below.

    After the blue colored pearl emitted its tremendous power, it began transferring that power into the youngdy¡¯s body. The youngdy began to shriek in pain, but the strands had tightly wound around every inch of her body, even sealing her mouth. So even her wretched screams were stifled as she struggled in vain.

    The youngdy¡¯s originally jade-green pupils gradually turned white. The muffled shrieks also began to gradually quiet down. After a while, the blue pearl, along with the hundreds of thousands of blue strands of light, slowly began merging into the youngdy¡¯s body. The blue colored light continued to linger within the youngdy¡¯s body as she copsed in front of the statue. Only when it was nearly dawn did the blue lightpletely disappear, and her pupils gradually regain their previous jade-green look.

    When the youngdy stood up and faced the statue, she performed a rite in deep gratitude. Then, she gnashed her teeth and said, ¡°Bryan, I will make you taste every iota of my suffering. I swear, I will use the same method to kill you!¡±

    At that moment, a carefree and wildugh echoed from the Cemetery of Death, brimming with the sound of joy andfort.

    An approximately two meter tall old fey zombie stood in front of Han Shuo. Its body was covered with long, green hair, and its teeth and ws looked razor sharp. At longst, Han Shuo had sessfully summoned it, and it wasted no time in roaring its displeasure. This advanced ranked zombie was actually not being restrained by thews of the heavens and earth of the Profound Continent. Instead, it was moring in an immensely loud voice that spread powerfully throughout the Cemetery of Death, mixing with Han Shuo¡¯s wildughter.

    After the old fey zombie roared, it raised its head and saw the creator of the contract in front of him. Unexpectedly, it shot straight towards him. Its speed made it seem like a bolt of green lightning as it flew, its one-meter long talons humming through the wind. It had an astonishingly and iparably imposing aura.

    ¡°Damn it, it seems like it wasn¡¯t entirely sessful. There¡¯s another part that needs fixing. Otherwise, this formidable zombie would not have immediately attacked me right after arriving within this dimension. If this was during an actual battle, the necromancer would have been screwed.¡± Han Shuo cursed softly. Seeing the old fey zombie charging at him, he hurriedly took out the Demonyer Edge.

    Han Shuo¡¯s left hand grasped a skeleton staff. A quick wave and incantationter, an enormous bone shield crashed in front of Han Shuo right before a sharp bone spur could skewer him. The old fey zombie¡¯s attack crashed audibly into the shield, with thetter exploding fiercely. The old fey zombie tumbled to the ground from the force of the impact.

    The bone shield summoned by a grand magus was considerably more powerful and covered a wider area. Thus, when the old fey zombie charged towards the bone shield, it couldn¡¯t pierce through the bone shield¡¯s defenses. It was only capable of cracking the shield.

    Without waiting for the old fey zombie to scramble back up, the Demonyer Edge suddenly flew out of Han Shuo¡¯s hands. The screech of metal striking metal rang out as two of the old fey zombie¡¯s sharp ws were severed. However, Han Shuo was still shocked as he wondered exactly what on earth the old fey zombie¡¯s sharp ws were made of. Only two ws had been shorn off after the Demonyer Edge¡¯s strike descended, and that too with difficulty.

    Han Shuo knew in his heart just how sharp the Demonyer Edge was. Furthermore, after tempering it meticulously once more with enormous amounts of killing intent, it could effortlessly split rocks and chop metal. Han Shuo truly had never anticipated that this old fey zombie would actually be so frightening. When the Demonyer Edge chopped downwards, it had only snapped apart two of its sharp ws.

    The old fey zombie fell to a sitting position, baring its fangs and howling loudly once more. Then, it once againunched itself towards Han Shuo as he also began waving the skeleton staff in his hands again. This time, a hundred or so bone spears appeared, breaking through the skies. Although they were incapable of piercing the old fey zombie, they were enough to force it to backtrack in retreat.

    Taking advantage of the respite, Han Shuo relied on the contract¡¯s powerful connection to the other world and used the skeleton staff to forcefully return the old fey zombie back to its world.

    It was not that Han Shuo feared the old fey zombie. It wasn¡¯t a difficult task for him to kill this old fey zombie with his strength. However, because the old fey zombie had begununching attacks towards its master right after being summoned, Han Shuo knew that there was a problem in his incantation. Thus, the most important problem currently was how to chant the summoning technique properly and not to continue dilly-dallying with the old fey zombie.

    After Han Shuo left the underground world, he had stayed within the Cemetery of Death for a few days and practiced grand magus ranked summoning techniques. After studying intensively for such a while, Han Shuo had slowly starting grasping the technique. Because of this, he was finally capable of summoning the old fey zombie from another dimension today.

    ¡°The old fey zombie immediately started to attack me after arriving at this dimension. It must be because it was notpletely under the restricting power of the contract. Otherwise, it would absolutely not dare to attack me.¡± Han Shuo muttered to himself while knitting his brows and reconsidering the details of the summoning technique he had just used.

    He took out that thick tome of necromancy and once again began reading it earnestly. After a little while, he suddenly had a thought sh into his mind as he cried out, ¡°Ah! Was I supposed to make the contract mid-way through?¡±

    When Han Shuo had used the summoning technique to call forth the old fey zombie into the Profound Continent, he¡¯d first used the incantation to create a connection with the other dimension. Then, after chanting some sybles to locate the old fey zombie¡¯s position, Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength had instantly traversed through an endless distance of the boundless space, before arriving at the other dimension. Finally, Han Shuo would then randomly target an old fey zombie with his mental strength.

    Following these events, the mental strength must then be used to firmly suppress the old fey zombie that was targeted. Then, while the old fey zombie was being suppressed and was incapable of resisting, the zombie must be dragged into the space tunnel. The old fey zombie would then pass through the space tunnel before finally descending on the Profound Continent.

    However, Han Shuo noticed an annotation in a remote corner of the cryptic book. It stated that when a creature was in it¡¯s original dimension, that would be when it was in its most formidable state. However, when it left its dimension and entered the space tunnel, it would enter its weakest state. But when it descended onto a material world, it would restore its power once more.

    It was only natural that zombies would always be at their most formidable when freely traversing through their own undead world. But after arriving within the material world of the Profound Continent, they would begin suffering to a certain extent due to ack of intense death energy.

    Even so, zombies were still capable of exhibiting a powerful force within material worlds. As long as there were living creatures in the material world, death energy would certainly exist from the departed spirits. Although the death energy wouldn¡¯t be as pure and condensed as their own world, it would still be able to provide the zombies with necessary strength. Additionally, with the death energy that was innate to the zombies, their strength would also be on par with their strength on home world even if they descended onto the Profound Continent.

    However, the process of entering the material world inevitably required entering through the profound space tunnel. This distance should have originally been distant beyond measure, but was shrunk to the span of an instant under either the powerful influence of the contract, the caster¡¯s mental energy, or rules of space epassed in the contract.

    ording to the differences in one¡¯s mental prowess as a necromancer and one¡¯s skill at chanting spells, the speed with which a zombie entered through the space tunnel from its dimension and entered the material world would also differ. The stronger a necromancer was and the better they understood the essence of necromancy magic, the less time a necromancer would waste on incantations.

    Under normal circumstances, when a magic apprentice became an archmage, it would take three to five seconds for a zombie to leave its dimension and enter this material world. As for Han Shuo, he could already be considered as at the grand magus rank. Thus, he only needed a brief second.

    If the spell was cast by a sacred magus necromancer, then the time to traverse the space tunnel would be calcted in the milliseconds. As a result, the zombie would descend onto the material world in a sh right after the incantation wasplete. (The process of chanting the incantation was in reality just a way tomunicate with the creature in the other dimension. It was a string of events rted to finding, suppressing, and binding the creature to the contract.)

    However, regardless of whether one was a magic apprentice having just entered the world of necromancy, or a sacred magus who had already deeply understood the essence of necromancy as a sacred magus, a summoning always required traversing space tunnels. This was true whether the summoned creature was the weakest skeleton warrior or the most frightening undead bone dragon.

    Although the time to travel through the space tunnel depended on a magician¡¯s strength, this step was unavoidable. ording to this note, it seemed that regardless of how strong the undead creature was, they all became extremely weak when brought into the space tunnel devoid of death energy.

    ording to the contents within the book, taking advantage of that moment of weakness to enforce the contract was the most logically secure method. Han Shuo seemed to have suddenlyprehended something as his heart somewhat stirred. He began to chant the spell once again. After carefully concentrating his mental power to an optimal state, he connected with an old fey zombie in the other dimension as the sybles of the incantation rose and fell.

    During the spirited struggling from the old fey zombie, Han Shuo¡¯s mental energy burst out like a mountain flood, suppressing the zombie¡¯s struggle. Following the continued chanting of the necromancy spell, Han Shuo¡¯s mental energy gradually eliminated the old fey zombie¡¯s resistance. He then drove the old fey zombie to enter and cross through the space tunnel with the appropriate sybles.

    The moment the old fey zombie faded into the space tunnel, Han Shuo immediately exerted all his strength to rapidly conclude the contract in less than a second. One secondter, the old fey zombie suddenly descended in front of Han Shuo in the Cemetery of Death,

    After lightly exhaling, Han Shuo brightly gazed and stared attentively at the old fey zombie that had just been summoned; he would be prepared for any sudden contingencies. This time, the hideous looking old fey zombie didn¡¯t make any movement whatsoever. It wasn¡¯t likest time, charging wildly towards Han Shuo.

    After deeply and attentively watching the old fey zombie for a while, Han Shuo gradually grew happier in his heart. He tried to transmit amand. The old fey zombie immediately began flying in a circle. Although, Han Shuo felt a feeling of impatience verging on loathing from the old fey zombie for forcing it to do such a pointless action, it continued to fly ording to Han Shuo¡¯smand. Resistance was impossible under the contract¡¯s power.

    ¡°Sess. I¡¯ve finally seeded!¡± Han Shuo wildlyughed out loud as he felt a strong sense of satisfaction taking over his heart. Obviously, this time¡¯s incantation was a sess.

    The necromancy grand magus level old fey zombie summoning technique had finally truly been realized under Han Shuo¡¯s assiduous hard work. Being able to sessfully use this meant that grasping the next summoning techniques for the bone devil and mummy lords would now be much quicker and easier.

 Chapter 371: A womanâ€™s heart

    Chapter 371: A woman¡¯s heart

    Using the Cemetery of Death¡¯s transportation array, Han Shuo arrived at an deste area within an underground abyss near Seagate City. After summoning the elite earth zombie to tunnel to the surface, he left the underground abyss and hurriedly headed towards Seagate City.

    With the kind of power Han Shuo had at his fingertips, any city¡¯s defense was as useful as a paper shield in front of him. He swooped in unseen,nding in a deserted corner of Seagate City. After which, he made his way casually to the manor Helen had taken as her residence during her first trip. However, only after Han Shuo arrived at that ce did he notice that Helen and his personal guards had already left Seagate City long ago.

    He changed headings, soon arriving at the Dark Mantle¡¯s stronghold at Seagate City. He called for Dnte, and soon found out that Helen had already swept through the city in a bloody purge. She¡¯d gainedplete control of Seagate City.

    The letter that Han Shuo sentst time had already entered Dick¡¯s hands. ording to Han Shuo¡¯smands, Brettel City had begun spreading another rumor of how Helen had absolutely never been in an intimate rtionship with Han Shuo and how the previous rumor about Helen¡¯s rape was just an assumption made by his subordinates.

    Furthermore, Brettel City also made a formal statement attesting to the veracity of their new rumor. This was quickly and deliberately spread widely throughout the seven grand duchies. Indeed, that alone convinced a majority of people. However, some narrow-minded people were still as before, disbelieving in the authenticity of this message.

    As this official statement and its apanying rumors started to spread through the duchies, some of the citizens of the Helon Duchy who deeply respected their grand duke Helen began to believe in her again. Helen originally felt that it was beneath her dignity toe out and testify as to its authenticity in public. But after facing so many impassive faces and thinly veiled contempt, she took advantage of the situation to finally stand up to say her piece to the public after Brettel City sent out its statement.

    Helen agreed to an evaluation of her body held by the various nobles of the Helon Duchy, overseen by severaldies of prestigious, virtuous reputation. Three old specialists dispatched by a couple of powerful nobles to examine Helen¡¯s body finally confirmed that Helen was indeed a truly intact virgin.

    After the powerful nobles anddies published a formal statement together, all the citizenspletely believed the authenticity of the situation, clearing Helen in their eyes. Perhaps because the citizens felt that they had insulted their own grand duke¡¯s reputation, they all began grieving,menting, and even reflecting on their previous actions of despising Helen. After going through this event, the citizens of the dukedom began viewing Helen with an unprecedented level of respect and admiration.

    Taking advantage of her citizen¡¯s newfound faith, Helen swiftly and decisively rooted out several political enemies in rapid session,pletely cleaning her court of conspiring nobles and disloyal aristocrats. After she had finished her blood spattered massacre, there wasn¡¯t a single noble left in the entire Helon Duchy that ever dared rebel again.

    At this moment, Benedict Sackville, who had originally treated Helen with iparable disdain and indifference, immediately sent an ardent letter to Helen. On one side, he bitterly and hatefully expressed his remorse. On the other, he was like his former self, stubbornly starting to pursue Helen again.

    At the Helon Duchy residence within Seagate City, Helen held up the letter that was filled with his touching words of love. She tore the letter into fragments with a cold sneer as she spoke to Firewind by her side, ¡°I have thoroughly and clearly seen through the true face of Benedict Sackville after this event. What he was pursuing all along was Helon Duchy, and never me. Back then, when all the citizens and nobles of the Helon Duchy rebelled against me, not only did he not extend a hand in help, but he even schemed against me in the shadows. Yet now that I¡¯ve restored my power within Helon Duchy, he has once again begun to chase me like an annoying fly. It seems that only the Duchy has ever been the true target of his affections.¡±

    Firewind had transformed into her human form, and so nodded at Helen¡¯s words. ¡°I told you long ago that Benedict Sackville wasn¡¯t a trustworthy person. Politicians, they always act for their own benefit. This person¡¯s hypocritical behavior makes me feel nauseous. I really don¡¯t know how you could have willingly cooperated with him before.¡±

    Helen¡¯s tender and beautiful cheeks slightly reddened from Firewind¡¯s words. ¡°Sister Firewind, I was just using him, that¡¯s all. It was just a thing between nations. Narsen Duchy has the same enemies as me, so I was just using him to defeat the enemy. That¡¯s all.¡±

    After pausing for a moment, Helen¡¯s face became even redder. She hesitated for a moment, and asked Firewind somewhat cowardly, ¡°Sister Firewind, what do you think of Bryan?¡±

    Firewind nked momentarily before gritting her teeth with hate. ¡°That despicable and baseless person?¡±

    Without knowing why, Helen¡¯s heart itched ever so slightly when she heard Firewind call Han Shuo a despicable and baseless person. It was as if the depths of her heart was unwilling to heard anyone vilify Han Shuo. Even someone as intimate as her sister Firewind was not an exception.

    ¡°Mm, exactly that Bryan. Sister Firewind, what do you think of him?¡± Because Helen and Firewind had such a close rtionship for so many years, she naturally didn¡¯t rebuke her and even looked expectantly at Firewind.

    After Firewind had flung out her earlier sentence, she shot a nce at Helen and noticed an expectant expression within her eyes. Firewind had already noticed that Helen didn¡¯t have a single bit of her previous resentment. Firewind sighed in her heart and forced augh as she said, ¡°Helen, this Bryan is even harder to deal with than Benedict Sackville. I could even sense a little bit of his filthy thoughts being directed towards you when he was facing Benedict Sackville. Furthermore, he wears a hypocritical expression that ispletely at odds with his innermost thoughts.¡±

    ¡°However, when I¡¯m together with Bryan, I¡¯mpletely incapable of sensing his heart¡¯s mood. He seemed like a bottomless cold pond, an unfathomably grim feeling. As for going even deeper, that is something I have absolutely no way of prying into. Ai, that man is too powerful. If he wanted to kill us, we couldn¡¯t even put up a decent fight, let alone survive. I know we can¡¯t defeat him, but I also don¡¯t know if your methods are truly the right way of doing things.¡±

    Firewind knew that Helen had already unconsciously developed feelings for Han Shuo. Han Shuo indeed had the ability to attract any woman. However, this type of guy was simply a type of poison for a women. If one became addicted then it would be hard to free oneself. However, to the ambitious and exuberant Helen, only an equally ambitious kind of tyrannical person was the most suitable for her.

    Han Shuo was exactly this kind of person. Looking at it from Helen¡¯s point of view, the frighteningly powerful, decisive, and fierce Han Shuo was filled with a deadly attractiveness. If Helen had such a guy constantly supporting her, then it wouldn¡¯t be a bad thing even if the seven grand duchies warred all year round. s, this guy schemed way too much. It was clear that he would never be satisfied with just one Helon Duchy. When he begins trying to seize all the seven grand duchies, Firewind didn¡¯t know if it would be Helen¡¯s good fortune or misfortune to follow him.

    ¡°Sister Firewind, I already know what I want. Benedict Sackville can¡¯t give me the things I want, but I think Bryan can. Additionally, I don¡¯t know why but I¡¯ve noticed that I can¡¯t feel any hatred for him. Perhaps, I am just too sentimental. I can hate someone to the bone, but I can also transform this hatred into love after something¡¯s happened. Ai.....¡± Helen heaved a sigh as her voice becameden with emotion.

    As Firewind and Helen pondered within the duke¡¯s home, a ball of light mist slowly drifted over. After passing the courtyard, it rose in spirals, before finally descending down towards Helen¡¯s window.

    Right as Helen was about to talk to Firewind, she noticed a light mist gently appearing and slowly rising in spirals. She couldn¡¯t restrain the pleasant surprise in her heart as she rushed to cheerfully say, ¡°He¡¯s here.¡±

    The Firewind Phoenix started, staring nkly. Then she started sensing an evil aura slowly filling the room. This aura of necromancy and demonic magic on Han Shuo¡¯s body was somewhat taboo to Firewind. Thus, seeing the light misting, Firewind knitted her brows and retreated a couple of steps back, increasing the distance between her and the gradually materializing Han Shuo.

    ¡°You came?¡± When Helen saw Han Shuo calmly appearing, she suddenly had an impulse to throw herself onto Han Shuo, entering his bosom. But the joy on her face was indeed genuine and sincere.

    ¡°Mm, I was dyed for a few days due to some things. But, all is fine. Now that you¡¯ve seized Seagate City, the entire Helen Duchy should be more secure than before, correct?¡± Han Shuo nodded and smiled. Looking at Helen¡¯s sincere and joyous face, Han Shuo was feeling truly happy in his heart indeed. He was happy that this girl was gradually falling deeper into his snare of love.

    Helen had rooted out her political enemies in a short time through a bloody purge, reconsolidating her hold on the Helon Duchy. This sort of decisive move made Han Shuo somewhat admire Helen¡¯s ability. Thinking about how this woman had ascended to the highest point within Helon Duchy, it seemed that she really did have some methods to her name.

    Seeing that Firewind was also here, Helen didn¡¯t feel it appropriate to act excessively intimate. So after her initial delight, she immediately got down to business, ¡°Oh right, the thing you mentionedst time; how is it going?¡±

    ¡°My people have arrived within Seagate City. Only, because I had yet to arrive, they never dared to get in touch with you. Mm, they are currently right outside. I believe Helen Duchy ispletely within your grasp at the moment, so I ought to be able to secretly conduct some business deals now, right?¡± Han Shuoughingly replied.

    Seeing that Han Shuo was talking, Helen took advantage of the situation to give Firewind a meaningful nce. As Helen¡¯s face reddened with some shyness, she blushed with shame and said to Firewind, ¡°Sister Firewind, please invite them in.¡±

    Seeing Helen¡¯s face that seemed like it was surging with a longing for love, Firewind sighed in her heart. How would she not know that Helen wanted to send her away so Helen could say some intimate words to Han Shuo!

    ¡°Yup, I¡¯ll be right back!¡± Firewind replied before directly walking, headed outside. In her heart, she couldn¡¯t help but to silently curse Helen for paying more attention to a lover than to a friend.

    Right after Firewind left, Helen immediately reddened, retreating a few steps back as she looked at Han Shuo getting closer with every step. She softly said, ¡°Wh-What do you want to do this time?

    Helen retreated until she was t against a wall. Leaning against the wooden wall, she blushingly said in a low voice, ¡°This is the the Duke¡¯s official residence, you had better not act recklessly.¡±

    Both of Han Shuo¡¯s hands suddenly pressed down on the wooden wall on either side of Helen¡¯s shoulders. Looking at Helen ovee with panic, Han Shuo felt an additional feeling of conquest filling him as he beamed straight down at her. ¡°The Helon Duchy ispletely in your control. ording to the agreement, shouldn¡¯t you be taking the initiative to serve me in bed?¡±

    Helen suddenly grew frantic as she secretly thought how this scoundrel was actually so shameless to brazenly ask for such a reward. However, it made Helen¡¯s heart began pound at an increasingly faster pace as she blushingly pleaded. ¡°Give me some more time, I am still not prepared. Also, I just proved to the people that I¡¯m still pure and innocent. If you immediately take me, someone might see through this.¡±

    Han Shuo began having second thoughts after she said this. That would indeed true. If Helen experienced sex for the first time, an experienced person could immediately see through her. However, Han Shuo was extremely confident in his abilities. He believed he would definitely be able to alter the impression Helen gave to others to the point where it could mask the clues.

    ¡°Fine then. I will once again give you some more time.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s sudden response came after a moment of thinking. Just enough time for Helen¡¯s nervousness to reach its peak. Right as she rxed, Han Shuo suddenlyughed mischievously, ¡°However, shouldn¡¯t I receive some interest first?¡±

    As soon as those words hit her, Helen¡¯s heart that had just been pacified suddenly began to race. Bashfully and secretly raising her head to shoot a nce at Han Shuo, she noticed that a burning passion had started to smolder in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes. She then hastily lowered her head, softly saying, ¡°Wh-What do you actually want to do?¡±

    ¡°A kiss!¡± Han Shuoughed.

    This guy is indeed still the same, a pervert. Helen sighed surreptitiously. However, she wasn¡¯t actually mad, only somewhat bashful. That¡¯s all. Helen hesitated for a moment, thinking since he¡¯d agreed to not do that thing, it only seemed fair to give him a little benefit. Then, her thoughts suddenly became disorderly. She secretly thought in her heart, I will be his sooner orter anyways, so why does it matter...

    When her thoughts reached this point, Helen closed her eyes, raised her head and blushingly waited for the iing kiss. However, after waiting for a while, Helen didn¡¯t hear the slightest noise. She opened her eyes, her gaze doubtful as she looked at Han Shuo, who was gazing back at her with a face full of smiles.

    Pointing at his own lips, Han Shuo said, ¡°I want you to take action and kiss me!¡±

    Th-this bastard. He is so shameless. He actually wants me to personally kiss him! Helen¡¯s maiden heart started to thump wildly. Even her neck flushed red. The blush started spreading down the rest of her body. She had no idea what to do and bashfully blushed with shame.

    ¡°Hurry up, otherwise Firewind and the rest of them will soon be here. If you don¡¯t kiss me before they enter, then I¡¯ll just have to kiss you right in front of them.¡± Han Shuo looked down at Helen as he teased her.

    Helen felt frantic after hearing those words. Picturing what Han Shuo said, Helen became even more afraid within. She sighed inwardly as she closed her eyes, stood on her tiptoes and lightly reached towards Han Shuo¡¯s big lips with her charming face. Their lips touched, and they kissed.

 Chapter 372: Teacher of the State Stratholme

    Chapter 372: Teacher of the State Stratholme

    This kiss was destined to be brief due to Firewind¡¯s approaching footsteps. Han Shuo only managed to have a little taste before it ended. He didn¡¯t have the chance to probe into Helen¡¯s sweet fragrance.

    Just as Helen was feeling baffled about how Han Shuo was not as avaricious as he had been before, she also caught wind of Firewind¡¯s nearing footsteps. After raising her head to look at Han Shuo with her limpid eyes, she immediately realized that it was not because Han Shuo was not avaricious, but rather, it was because Firewind was already here.

    Before Firewind had even arrived, Han Shuo had entered the bedroom to get a sip of tea. On this expedition, a couple of merchants from Lancelot Empire hade to Helon City alongside Fabian. Although these merchants were on very good terms with Brettel City¡¯s Chamber of Commerce, Han Shuo would not allow them to discover the rtionship between him and Helen.

    Even Fabian had no clue of the exact circumstances. He had onlye because he heard from Dick that this would be a safe trip. Fabian was loyal and devoted to Phoebe. Although his rtionship with Han Shuo was also extremely strong, Phoebe was Fabian¡¯s true master. Fabian would always be there to support Han Shuo, for any other matter. However, if he discovered that Han Shuo had an additional woman, which happened to be Helen, Han Shuo was unable to predict how he would respond.

    If Fabian had honestly reported to Phoebe about Han Shuo¡¯s yboy-like actions, Phoebe would probably create some kind of noisy disturbance due to her jealous nature.

    When Firewind brought Fabian and the Lancelot Empire¡¯s merchants along, she had only shot a nce at Helen¡¯s face and discovered her lingering sweet blush. After subconsciously pursing her lips, Firewind couldn¡¯t help but start thinking askew and ming Helen, giving her an angry eyeroll.

    Attempting to gloss it over, Helen coughed due to the awkward atmosphere. She secretly cursed at Han Shuo. Only then did she look at Fabian and the merchants with a smile, before saying, ¡°Wee to my Helon Duchy. I believe everyone knew what we would be discussing today before entering this room.¡±

    Fabian had only heard from Dick that Helen wanted to conduct some secret business deals merchants from the Lancelot Empire. With Fabian¡¯s sensitive sense of a profiteer, he immediately smelled a great opportunity for profit and gold upon receiving the invitation. Currently, as the person in charge of the Helon Duchy, grand duke Helen had a hundred percent control over the Helon Duchy. With such a character taking the initiative to invite people, no matter which merchant group came, they would definitely receive ample benefits.

    Fabian smiled faintly and bowed respectfully. ¡°Of course. Our Boozt Merchant Guild is capable of providing the Helon Duchy with everything it needs. Additionally, we will also purchase some goods from your Helon Duchy at a reasonable and fair price. Both of our parties will definitely benefit from such a business transaction.¡±

    As Helen and Fabian conversed, a bodyguard reported from outside the room, ¡°Honored Duke, they have arrived.¡±

    ¡°Have theme in.¡±Helen gracefully and elegantlymanded.

    Shortly after, a party of seven walked in. The vibe they emitted made them seem quite simr to Fabian and his people. Each and every one of them was overweight. The cunning sparkle in their eyes expressed their greedy desire for profit.

    ¡°Honored Grand Duke!¡± After this party of seven entered, they all suddenly became even more respectful than thest. After going through this bloody purge, they would be hard pressed to find another noble that would dare to revolt against Helen within Helon Duchy. Helen¡¯s viciousness was also extensively circted amongst the nobles and merchants, making the merchants even more fearful and apprehensive in their hearts.

    ¡°Mm. Rise!¡± Helenmanded before introducing Fabian. ¡°These are my Helon Duchy¡¯s merchants. From now on, the business deals between you and my Helon Duchy will bepleted through you guys alone. However, you can rest assured. In the future, when you are within Helon Duchy¡¯s national borders, your safety will bepletely assured by me.¡±

    ¡°Thank you, Sir Duke. This is a kind of business deal that is advantageous to the both of us and will definitely be to everyone¡¯s satisfaction.¡± Fabian lightly smiled and said.

    Helen nodded, ¡°I just wanted to give both of your parties a proper introduction to each other today, make sure you are reassured about working together, and to let you know that the business transaction between you will be under my protection. Mm. Alright then, you guys should find somewhere to discuss amongst yourselves the specifics of the deal. I must also beseech you guys to not let anybody know about the business deals going on today. The more secretive you are, the better it will be.¡±

    ¡°Rest assured Grand Duke, we know what we ought to do!¡± Together, Fabian and the Helon Duchy¡¯s merchants replied with great sincerity, before departing. As the merchants journeyed to their destination, they had already begun to discuss the details of their business.

    Only until after Fabian and the rest left did Han Shuo walk out from within, saying to Helen, ¡°I reckon that, with Lancelot Empire¡¯s merchants, your goods won¡¯t have to pass through Narsen Duchy anymore. The Brut Merchant Alliance is too distant from your Helon Duchy while you also have to deal with Benedict Sackville sticking his nose into your business in the midst of transportation. Your previous business deal with them is inferior to the partnership you will have with Fabian.¡±

    ¡°You brought these merchants over so ardently, but is it not because you have an eye on my Helon Duchy¡¯s war horses!?¡± Helen shot a nce towards Han Shuo as he walked out of the bedroom, harrumphing with a pout.

    Being told off like this, Han Shuo forced augh, ¡°This has always been a mutually beneficial deal. We will both be able to obtain benefits from each other.¡±

    After pausing for a moment, Han Shuo said, ¡°Alright, the seeds of internal strife in your Helen Duchy have been weeded out, so I believe that I should also leave the Helon Duchy for the time being.¡±

    ¡°Ah, you¡¯re leaving already?¡± Helen involuntarily started to feel a sense of disappointment rising within her as she said to Han Shuo, ¡°Helen Duchy actually has a lot of wonders that deserve touring. How about I personally bring you out to have some fun? In any case, I shouldn¡¯t have too much official business to do in the near future.¡± When Helen heard that Han Shuo wanted to leave, she felt somewhat reluctant and unwilling., As she had wanted Han Shuo to stay in Helon Duchy for a little while longer, she couldn¡¯t help but make this proposal.

    Han Shuoughed involuntarily, ¡°Look at me, am I such a refined person?

    Helen¡¯s expression darkened as she stayed silent for a moment before suddenly saying softly, ¡°You¡¯ve just arrived here and haven¡¯t even been here for a whole day, but you want to leave just like that? You can¡¯t even stay for a few days? Not even to apany me?¡±

    Helen¡¯s slender, shapely eyebrows lightly creased as her eyes brimmed with disappointment and sadness. She knew in her heart that Han Shuo was not the type of person to tie himself down for a woman. However, for the couple of days after Han Shuo had left, she didn¡¯t know why, but she couldn¡¯t resist her longing for Han Shuo at all. Now that she had luckily encountered Han Shuo again, she naturally didn¡¯t want him to leave so soon.

    Han Shuo silently looked at Helen, the corner of his mouth starting to break into a smile. After hesitating for a moment, he said, ¡°If I stay here for a few days, then I won¡¯t be able to guarantee that you can continue to maintain your pure and holy image within the Helon Duchy.¡±

    ¡°Ahem ahem...¡± Firewind dryly coughed twice from afar. She waited until Han Shuo and the blushing Helen diverted their attention towards her before opening her mouth to say, ¡°I still have some things to attend to, so I¡¯ll be leaving first!¡±

    Without waiting for either of the two to speak, Firewind suddenly stamped her feet before walking straight out the door. Within a blink of an eye, she had disappeared without a trace in a truly neat and tidy manner.

    Helen hatefully red at Han Shuo before rebuking, ¡°This is all your fault! How could you say such things in front of Firewind?¡±

    Shrugging his shoulders, Han Shuo suddenly said, ¡°It¡¯s her that wasn¡¯t being tactful. While we were having some alone time together, she should¡¯ve found an excuse to take her leave. Heh heh you will eventually be my woman, while as the Duke, this is also your mansion, so the things that I spoke to you about really can¡¯t be considered inappropriate.¡±

    ¡°How will that do?! Sister Firewind is just like a blood sister to me, and she will definitely tease me for this.¡± Helen resentfully faced Han Shuo as she shouted in disagreement. She seemed like a young girl who had just tasted love for the first time.

    ¡°Alright, alright. I won¡¯t mess with you anymore. I actually need to leave now.¡± Han Shuo prepared to leave the Helen Duchy. He wanted to go on a trip to the other seven duchies and see if he could find an opportunity to attach his mystical demons to the minds of a couple of the grand dukes. Afterwards, he would take advantage of the situation to gain control of a few of the grand dukes and gradually nibble away at the seven grand duchy¡¯s power.

    ¡°Ar-Are you really going to just leave right now?¡± Helen nipped her lips, anxiously looking at Han Shuo. After hesitating for a moment, she lowered her head blushingly and suggested, ¡°If you¡¯re willing to stay and apany me for a few days, I will agree to anything else as long as you don¡¯t truly take me.¡±

    After saying this, Helen¡¯s head was nearly buried within her own towering peak. She couldn¡¯t help but to secretly curse at herself for being such a despicable person, wondering how could she have taken the initiative to yield to Han Shuo so quickly, but in the end, she had said these words aloud, and since she¡¯d done so, it was yielding to Han Shuo in one way or another.

    Han Shuo nked as his eyes fervently looked at the bashful face of Helen, a goddess to the citizens of Helen Duchy. His heart had suddenly became incessantly hot with impatience. Standing before him, gorgeous beyond measure, was the cause of this heat, a bashful Helen. She possessed a charm that could seize control of any men¡¯s soul, causing Han Shuo to feel somewhat unable to control himself, nearly running amok.

    ¡°Alright then, I will stay and apany you for a few days.¡± Han Shuo agreed and suddenly held her by the waist to lift her up. Then, under Helen¡¯s bashful and soft cry, Han Shuo firmly face towards Helen¡¯s rosy and fragrant lip, plundering her mouth deeply. Before Helen secretly left her mansion, she had temporarily handed some official business to a trustworthy subordinate. Then, Han Shuo apanied Helen and roamed throughout the Helen Duchy for the next two days.

    Helen Duchy was equivalent to a province within the Lancelot Empire, and there were indeed some beautiful sceneries within the several cities. Helen had always been too busy up to now and could never find an asion to go sightseeing within her own duchy by herself. This time, she was seriously exhrated to travel with Han Shuo, taking advantage of his existence.

    Han Shuo and Helen were both able to defy gravity and fly through the air. In addition to this, Han Shuo also had sufficient power to protect Helen, and thus, for the purpose of having some alone time together, they were naturally heartless and decided to exclude Firewind once again.

    Several famous mountains,rge rivers, and beautifulndscapes of ravines instigated both of them to make full use of the two days and visit everything.

    Truthfully, Han Shuo hadpletely explored Helen¡¯s body to the greatest extent at his own convenience within these past two days. Besides the forbidden area of ecstasy, every other advantage on Helen¡¯s body had been taken by Han Shuo. At the start, Helen would be reserved and resisted, but as Han Shuo slowly behaved more intimately with her, she gradually let go of herself. Two dayster, there was no estrangement between the two any longer.

    A downright torrential waterfall cascaded like a flood, torrenting downwards with a myriad of silver streaks. It fell into a deep, bottomless cold pond, causing droplets of water to stter like sparkling and translucent crystals.

    Within the surroundings of the deep and cold pond, much lush vegetation grew. A few flower buds released delicate fragrances, as various kinds of birds chirped happily, dancing through the air. The feeling of spring tinged the air as the area was embellished to the brim with a thriving depiction of life.

    On the branches of an old, towering tree, that had leaves and branches that were verdantly big and lush, Han Shuo embraced Helen and gazed at the beautiful scenery with a smile. He listened as Helen murmured all the different interesting events that had happened during her time within Helon Duchy.

    For the past two days, Helen had relinquished the arrogant and dignified aura that kingdom lords had. She was a dainty and delicate girl who¡¯d fallen in love, apanying Han Shuo as much as she liked,ughing and smiling with joy. The more she looked at the man in front of her, the more satisfied she became. Some kind of feeling that was called contentment slowly but leisurely bubbled up from the bottom of her heart.

    Snuggling on Han Shuo¡¯s bosom and slightly adjusting her posture, she looked at the scene in front of Han Shuo as she said, ¡°If you want to conquer the seven grand duchies, there is one person that you should always keep in your mind.¡±

    For a moment, Han Shuo stared nkly. Then, he yielded, puzzlingly asking, ¡°Who?¡±

    ¡°Stratholme of Stranglethorn Vale!¡± Helen replied with a grave expression.

    ¡°Who is this person? Howe I¡¯ve never heard of him before?¡± Han Shuo became even more puzzled, as he confusingly inquired.

    ¡°The current seven grand duchies was once the imperial court of Verdun. When the imperial court of Verdun was in its golden age, it was not at all inferior to your Lancelot Empire. During the days of the imperial court of Verdun, the teacher of the state was the sacred swordmaster Stratholme. Although the imperial court of Verdun is no more and has since been divided into the seven grand duchies, the former teacher of the state, Stratholme, is still living in Stranglethorn Vale. This person should still be living healthily even now. If the seven grand dukes are invaded by foreign enemies, and on the verge of being destroyed, he will definitely leave Stranglethorn Vale to assist the seven grand dukedoms.¡± Helen gazed at Han Shuo as she exined.

    Hearing such words from Helen, Han Shuo truly felt extremely astonished. He couldn¡¯t help but to investigate the details, asking, ¡°The imperial court of Verdun has disappeared for so long. Are you sure this guy is still alive?¡±

    Nodding her head, Helen said, ¡°So the legends say. Last time, when your Lancelot Empire invaded our seven grand dukedoms, Stratholme proved to have a crucial effect. On the surface, the seven grand dukes don¡¯t have someone at the level of a sacred swordmaster nor a sacred magus. However, the Lancelot Empire received a warning from Stratholme. When they previously invaded our seven grand dukedoms, your Lancelot Empire did not dispatch their sacred swordmaster, nor their sacred magus to attack. When the imperial court of Verdun was still present, the Teacher of the State, Stratholme was precisely the sacred swordmaster well renowned throughout the continent. Even though the imperial court of Verdun has been the thing of the past for so long, Stratholme is still living healthily even to date. No one knows how powerful he truly is. However, legends say that,st time, after the teacher of the state Stratholme gave a warning to your Lancelot Empire¡¯s powerhouses, they truly did not dare to use their sacred magus¡¯ taboo magic to reverse your Lancelot Empire¡¯s losing prospects.¡±

    Han Shuo was aghast as he silently nodded his head. In his heart, he firmly remembered this name: Stratholme.

 Chapter 373: Backlash

    Chapter 373: Bacsh

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t remain in Helon Duchy for long in the end. He stayed for exactly two days, just like he¡¯d said. He rushed straight towards Narsen Duchy after separating from Helen and arrived at Duke Benedict Sackville¡¯s residence within the night.

    The former teacher of the state, Stratholme of Verdun¡¯s Imperial Court, had left a deep and profound impression on Han Shuo. Thanks to Helen, Han Shuo realized that this teacher of the state was still alive. By normal standards, when an expert advanced to the level of a sacred magus or swordsman, their lifespan would extend ordingly. Stratholme had broken through to be a sacred level of existence a long time ago. Having been a sacred swordmaster for so long, the reclusive Stratholme was most likely still living healthily, ording to logic.

    This teacher of the state from the imperial court was also the seven grand duchy¡¯s sole sacred level existence. If Han Shuo wanted to seize the seven grand duchies for himself, then this Stratholme would indeed be a threat. Luckily, this person had already secluded himself long ago and Han Shuo only needed to make use of his mystical demons and attach them to the grand dukes before slowly turning them into his personal puppets one after another.

    Han Shuo believed that this method would definitely be more dependable than the Lancelot Empire¡¯s previousrge scale invasion. Stratholme wouldn¡¯t detect anything while staying secluded within Stranglethorn Vale. Han Shuo reckoned that by the time he hadpletely taken over the seven grand dukedoms in secret, his strength would most definitely have improved by another step. At that time, Han Shuo might even be able to do something about Stratholme even if thetter came.

    During this night, a splendid sight could be seen within Benedict Sackville¡¯s mansion. Within the central courtyard, a banquet seemed to be underway as shadows flickered to and fro. Many knightspletely d in armor tightly defended the area. A crystalntern hung from the ceiling in the main hall, while below, each and every noble from the Narsen Duchy wore formal attire and exuded a graceful bearing. They held wine sses and conversed cheerfully with each other.

    Benedict Sackville was naturally the most dazzling figure amongst them. The Narsen Duchy nobles surrounded Benedict, while constantly trying to pry some information from his mouth in a roundabout and indirect way.

    The seven grand duchies¡¯ previous meeting at Sakamimir Valley had ended on a sour note. When the war had entered its most chaotic state, several of the grand duchies had suffered under an assassination attempt. As a result, those dukedoms had some weakened their military strength. Narsen Duchy was also not an exception as many of their high ranking generals were assassinated during the battle. Now that Benedict Sackville had returned to the dukedom, the first thing he wanted to do was naturally fill the gaps that¡¯d urred due to the loss of their outstanding generals.

    After hearing this news, all the Narsen Duchy nobles began rmending their own family¡¯s younger generation with utmost of efforts. They hoped their younger generation could fill the gap and be a character wielding true power within Narsen Duchy. Benedict Sackville also clearly understood the intentions of these nobles and also understood that it was the perfect moment to recruit. Thus, he was holding this banquet within his mansion intending to understand everyone¡¯s thoughts while also gaining some personal benefits.

    After sending out his mystical demons, Han Shuo grasped a clear view of the situation within Benedict Sackville¡¯s mansion. He knew how many experts were concealed within the mansion, and that a magical enchantment had been set up in a particr corner. Nothing could escape his prying eyes.

    While hiding outside the Duke¡¯s mansion, Han Shuo seemed like a hunter in the night, calmly staring at his prey and patiently seeking for the best opportunity-to send his mystical demons into Benedict Sackville¡¯s brain.

    Although the mystical demons had magical ability, trying to insert the demon into someone¡¯s brain was not that easy. Firstly, Han Shuo had to be standing right next to Benedict Sackville. When he began using his demons, he would have to promptly act in ordance to the secret demonic method without stopping. If he made even the slightest mistake, Benedict Sackville could immediately die a tragic death or even be an idiot, an oue that would sh with Han Shuo¡¯s wishes.

    During this intrusion, Benedict Sackville could not possess even a single ounce of resistance, while his mind had to maintain a state as innocent as a newborn child. Only like this would the mystical demon be prone to sessfully invade one¡¯s brain.

    Generally speaking, the most perfect timing was during a dream. Thus, Han Shuo would only descend next to Benedict Sackville¡¯s side when thetter entered deep into a nightmare. Then, taking advantage of his muddleheaded state, Han Shuo would sessfully imnt the mystical demon right into his brain.

    Everyone dreamt. However, dreams were not a nightly urrence and sometimes a person wouldn¡¯t dream for days on end. Han Shuo had to wait until Benedict Sackville finally dreamed. Thankfully, when a person dreamed, they would be sufficiently rxed towards their surroundings which would allow Han Shuo to arrive soundlessly beside his target.

    Han Shuo continued to linger in the vicinity of the duke¡¯s mansion over the next five days. His mystical demons would incessantly monitor Benedict Sackville, particrly at night. He remained clueless throughout of this tight surveince.

    Benedict Sackville was only beenpletely exhausted once over the next five days due to his official business on the third day. That day, he sank deep into his nightmare because he was excessively tired. However, Benedict Sackville had an iparably tight protection around his mansion¡¯s room on that day. There were experts upon experts protecting the room outside, while all sorts of magical warning enchantments were present within his room.

    That day, Han Shuo was only certain that he could forcefully charge in and kill Benedict Sackville. He could not guarantee that his mystical demons could intrude into his brain without warning.

    Han Shuo had even carefully considered his gains and losses. In the end, he felt that even if he killed Benedict Sackville, there would be another noble that would be the new duke of Narsen Duchy. Rather than wasting time like this, he might as well just take control of Benedict Sackville.

    Precisely because of this, Han Shuo abandoned his thought of killing Benedict Sackville that night and continued to wait for the next opportunity.

    On the six night. Han Shuo unexpectedly noticed through his mystical demons that Benedict Sackville had left his mansion for the first time. While surprised, Han Shuo used his mystical demons to attentively watch Benedict Sackville on one hand and silently caught up to him on the other. He intended to see just what Benedict Sackville was up to.

    Things went contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectations. Instead of going somewhere for official business, Benedict Sackville was obviously headed somewhere else. After walking along the streets within Narsen Duchy¡¯s Northwest city, Benedict finally arrived at a serene and elegantly quiet manor from the back door.

    Twelve mystical demons scattered within the manor. In only a few minutes, Han Shuo had already discovered the type of ce this serene and elegant manor was like. It was like the Rose Garden that Lawrence had previously brought Han Shuo to in the northern part of Ossen City. This manor was a noble¡¯s special venue for licentious activities.

    This manor was undoubtedly Narsen Duchy¡¯s most well renowned ce and it was even a bit bigger than Ossen City¡¯s Rose Garden. Inside, all kinds of atrociously shady business urred in innumerable fashion. After the twelve mystical demons circled the ce, Han Shuo gained a much deeper familiarity to the licentious and rotten behavior of the nobles.

    Benedict Sackville was this ce¡¯s owner. Han Shuo was still able to learn of this fact very quickly when he merely used two of his mystical demons to watch Benedict Sackville attentively. As Narsen Duchy¡¯s most influential men and as this ce¡¯s owner, Benedict Sackville did not need to waste much of any of his energy while secretly controlling this ce. Benedict Sackville first heard a report about current financial affairs in a heavily guarded room. Afterwards, he began walking towards a delicately serene and elegant small house with a chuckle.

    A mother-daughter pair were waiting within this house. Han Shuo had already seen the the stunning mother-daughter pair when Benedict Sackville had held a personal banquet in his mansionst time. They were the wife and daughter of Count Delbert. Delbert¡¯s wife was past forty. However, because she had properly maintained her looks, she seemed to be barely thirty years old.

    As Delbert¡¯s wife and her daughter Deyali stood there together, they seemed not like a mother and daughter. They seemed more like sisters as their faces glowed with smiles, weing the person in control of Narsen Duchy, Benedict Sackville.

    Han Shuo was stunned through the eyes and ears of the mystical demons. Apparently, the mother-daughter pair had served Benedict Sackville before, and it was actually with Delbert¡¯s approval. It was precisely because of Delbert¡¯s encouragement that they were actually standing there. They jointly served Benedict Sackville in bed exchange for the only and youngest son of their family to be a captain knight under Benedict Sackville.

    After discovering this situation from his mystical demons, Han Shuo¡¯s understanding of the secret and filthy actions of the nobles increased to an even deeper level. Who would¡¯ve expected that Count Delbert would actually allow his own wife and daughter to serve Benedict Sackville just so his son could advance? While Han Shuo felt this was inconceivable, he also felt that this had truly opened his eyes as well.

    This mother-daughter pair were indeed of the highest quality. The mother was seductively mature with ample, round curves while the daughter was full of youthful energy, possessing a whiff of a charmingly beautiful charm. As the two stood together, it was truly a scene for the perverted. The more ethics and taboos were vited, the more vigorous a male would be. When a mother-daughter pair simultaneously resolved to serve the same person, this was increase the male¡¯s vigor by ten times over.

    Even Han Shuo was feeling a restlessness, not to mention Benedict Sackville. Han Shuo could barely restrain his rod from firing up when imagining this kind of service from a mother-daughter pair. Seeing Delbert¡¯s wife continue to smile charmingly while saying some good words for her son, Han Shuo¡¯s eyes felt somewhat glued to her distinctive charm, her graceful and mature noblewoman look.

    ¡°My God! I can¡¯t just let that old thing Benedict Sackville enjoy these benefits!¡± Han Shuo secretly gulped a mouthful of saliva as he ruthlessly began thinking. His brain started considering different ideas at the speed of light.

    Han Shuo felt as though he was gradually losing some control over himself as he kept seeing the splendid and heart throbbing scene. He didn¡¯t know if he was about to enter the carnal realm or not, but he had this kind of impulsive desire to ruthlessly ravage the women there at any cost. As the charming daughter-female pair continued standing there, Han Shuo began thinking of the pleasing, forbidden situation, bing somewhat even more agitated.

    When Han Shuo began thinking of such taboo things, the demonic infant within him suddenly began overflowing with a bizarre power. These strands of power that came from within the demonic infant began releasing at an increasingly faster pace. Han Shuo soon found it even harder to control himself as his skin became flushed with a deeper red.

    rmed, Han Shuo suddenly reacted,ing to his senses. The strand of power that came from the demonic infant was circting with a bizarre power that carried an excessively nefarious aura. This kind of aura was the energy that Han Shuo had previously absorbed from the dark elf matriarch Adele.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on? I had clearly removed the energy residuest time and this aura of nefarious energy should¡¯ve been already been expelled from my body. Howe there¡¯s actually strands of this energy still circting within the demonic infant?! Hm? That¡¯s not right! Why wasn¡¯t there such a dramatic movementst time when I faced Helen.¡± No matter what kind of unusual change the demonic infant underwent, Han Shuo could still make everything crystal clear with his consciousness. However, when he noticed that the demonic infant was rotating rapidly and that the excessively nefarious energy was bing faster and faster, Han Shuo felt somewhat puzzled.

    He knew that he had not entered the carnal realm yet. ording to logic, when he entered the carnal realm, he would perhaps be more lustful, but this wasn¡¯t just affect his lust, but other aspects as well. Could the reason that this strand of excessively nefarious energy became so merry due to the absorption of Adele¡¯s power?

    Although Han Shuo felt somewhat bewildered, he did began to gradually notice that the intense lust within his body was slowly bing harder to control as the nefarious energy circted within the the demonic infant. Han Shuo had always done as he would in being a demonic cultivator. Plus, he would also never rejected this kind of lust causing him to gradually overflow with the desire to follow his desires.

    ¡°Can¡¯t let Benedict Sackville get this benefit! I must think of a n!¡± While Han Shuo ignored his spreading lust, his brain was rotating at high speeds.

    Due to the fact that this current ce was not Benedict Sackville¡¯s mansion, the defenses were much more inferior. There were only some personal guards around the elegant and refined room he was in. There weren¡¯t anyplicated magical enchantments that had been set up inside either.

    After hesitating for just a moment, Han Shuo suddenly released a dark and dense fog and took advantage of the situation to slowly float into the room in which Benedict Sackville and Delbert¡¯s wife and daughter were in. The three of them were still drinking wine at this point. As Han Shuo drifted over, he was somewhat unable to control the blue dots of light as they slowly flowed out of his body.

    The spots of light were not so obvious as Han Shuo was shrouded in a dark, dense fog. Benedict Sackville and the mother-daughter pair slowly inhaled the blue light through their nose and mouth. All this while, not only was Han Shuo began gradually entering a bleary minded state and starting to breath in a coarser way, even the mother-daughter pair and Benedict Sackville were as well.

    Including Han Shuo amongst them, the four individuals within the room were all shrouded by the bright blue spots of light that contained a nefarious energy, which slowly drifted through the air to cover the entire room. As Han Shuo identally allowed the release of such energy, he even became somewhat sober, gaining some reason. However, the other three individuals had bepletely dull.

    The two mother-daughter pair that had been sitting together at this moment was first to give in to their heart¡¯s desire due to their weak wills. The two began embracing each other and revealing their breasts, moaning together. Just as Benedict Sackville suddenly roared in a low voice and attempted to pounce on them with his red eyes, the rtively sober Han Shuo knocked him out with a stamp of his leg. Then, Han Shuo pounced onto thepletely delirious mother-daughter pair like a beast.

    A hard to supress sound suddenly sounded from the room as these two mother-daughter pair writhed together with Han Shuo. There was no sense of shame as the two served Han Shuo together. On the contrary, they served Han Shuo with utmost enthused fervor under Han Shuo¡¯s nefarious power.

    ....outside the elegant and refined room, the experts that Benedict Sackville had brought with him all began disy an expression of envy as they listened to the beautiful, high-pitched, and suave moaning. They softly and secretly discussed with each other, a bit clueless to the fact that their grand duke had already been knocked out.

    After a long time, the moaning within the room gradually calmed down as the window suddenly opened without wind. A lump of light smoke floated past as Han Shuo¡¯s entire body disappeared from here like a ghost. The ck smoke swiftly floated away under the night. It disappeared without a trace in the blink of an eye.

    After Han Shuo left, he flew at high altitudes towards the wilderness while enduring the monstrous changes urring to his body. He summoned the elite earth zombie to open up some space within the underground abyss. As Han Shuo screamed with agonized howls, he took out a transportation array and arrived at the Cemetery of Death.

    After coupling with Adele and absorbing her energy, Han Shuo had suddenly received some bacsh from the excessively nefarious energy. It only held a small bit of power originally, but now it seemed more like boiling water as it red up within his demonic infant. When the demonic infant, the foundation of Han Shuo¡¯s demonic cultivation, was suddenly rinsed with such a baleful and chaotic aura, he actually became uncontrobly violent and ferocious.

    Deep within Han Shuo, there seemed to be an additional strand of energy that came from a boundless, distant ce that was prating into him. That strand of energy spurred on the energy that Han Shuo absorbed from Adele, who¡¯d received it from the spider goddess Rose, causing Han Shuo to feel an enormous amount of pain.

    Within the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo emitted heart wrenching screams as his durable body actually split open. Han Shuo felt that the foreign energy within him was bing harder and harder to control. In the end, Han Shuo mobilized the Demonyer Edge¡¯ enormous and boundless amount of wrathful power to fight against the power surging within him.

    Within Han Shuo¡¯s whole body, an enormous amount of pure demonic yuan energy plus the Demonyer Edge, that had absorbed tens of thousands of creatures and various kinds of negative energy,bined to form a powerful strike erupted like that of a torrential mountain flood. Following this, his inner body became a cruel battlefield as his demonic infant¡¯s power and the strength in his Demonyer Edge¡¯s souls fought to the death against Adele¡¯s leftover power, as well as the sudden energy that had intruded into his body.

    Without knowing how much time had passed, Han Shuo¡¯s magical cultivation and Demonyer Edge¡¯s power gradually started gaining the advantage. Only after wasting such an endless amount of time did Han Shuo finally extinguish without a trace the detrimental energy within him.

    ¡°Pft!¡± Within the distant underground world, a dark elf was making offerings to the spider goddess Rose within a temple. A spider shaped, ck temple held a youngdy at it¡¯s center, who had suddenly spat out a mouthful of blood. The youngdy was facing the spider goddess Rose¡¯s statue in front of her as she muttered, ¡°Wielding such inexhaustible divine dark power. Why couldn¡¯t I even imprison and reduce him to be my captive even with your divine powers?

    ¡°Pft!¡± Another mouthful of blood was spat out as the youngdy face¡¯s trembled in fear. She frighteningly faced the spider goddess Rose¡¯s statue and kowtowed while promptly saying, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I shouldn¡¯t have questioned your might. Because you had to suffer the powerfulws of restriction, you indeed couldn¡¯t transmit even one in one thousandth of your true power. Your most pious believer wishes to ept punishment from you...¡±

    As the youngdy muttered to herself in a prayer, her beautiful skin suddenly split open as blood flew went everywhere. It seemed like an invisible whip had whipped her. Yet, the youngdy did not dare utter a sound as she continued to sincerely pray in thenguage of the dark elves.

 Chapter 374: A Philosophy of Blasphemy

    Chapter 374: A Philosophy of sphemy

    This chapter is unedited. etvre is halting trantions at chapter 380. Please check this post for further details.

    Within the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo copsed in the center of therge-scale transportation array, his clothing long since ripped to pieces. His curled up, naked body constantly bled through his cuts and broken flesh. The wounds throughout his body were so deep that even his bones were visible.

    Han Shuo¡¯s magical yuan circted silently within his unconscious body. They were like many tiny streams trickling towards his withered meridians, moistening them. One after the other, they swam towards every nook and cranny within his body, bringing a cool and refreshing feeling.

    While unconscious, Han Shuo¡¯s tattered and wounded body gradually healed at an astonishing rate. Shortly, his body hadpletely recovered to how he was before; with not even a trace of a scar. After his body recovered from this incredible torment, it actually seemed even firmer and stronger than before.

    Because there was no sun nor moon at the Cemetery of Death, how much time had psed was also a mystery. As Han Shuo leisurely woke up, he noticed immediately that he was not suffering from painful cuts all over his body. Instead, the cells within his body seemed to be brimming with a surging power.

    Then, moving from his curled posture and standing up with a stretch, all of the bones within his body cracked explosively nonstop. After probing his body with his consciousness, Han Shuo noticed that the vital organs within his body were still notpletely healed. With a thought, he manipted his magical yuan to wrap around them.

    Waves of bizarre power came pouring into Han Shuo¡¯s vital organs. Under the nourishment of his yuan power, Han Shuo¡¯s vital organs began recovering faster by a hundredfold. With just a moment¡¯s effort, the weird feeling within his body disappeared.

    After a light exhale, Han Shuo left the Cemetery of Death and arrived near a torrential waterfall. Under this cascading waterfall, Han Shuo sat cross-legged on top of the rock experiencing the most turbulent waters. Despite the iparably violent current that heavily battered Han Shuo, he stayedpletely motionless, sitting erect on top of the rock.

    After another few days, Han Shuo finally walked off the rock and looked towards the entrance of the underworld. After hesitating a moment, he finally started heading towards the Cemetery of Death.

    Then, a mark suddenly attracted Han Shuo¡¯s attention. He approached it and took a quick look before clearing the rocks away and extracting a letter from deep within the underground abyss. Han Shuo reassembled the message ording to a special code before reading the contents of the letter.

    This letter was most likely sent here through Emily¡¯s people after she¡¯d personally written it, describing some crucial matters. The current power struggle between the princes had reached a climax within Ossen City due to the deteriorating health of the king. This also caused Lawrence¡¯s identity to be revealed, putting him at a severe disadvantage.

    Because King Uhtred Lancelot and the chancellor of finance¡¯s wife had had an illicit affair, resulting in Lawrence, the nobles rejected Lawrence. Furthermore, even the somewhat less traditional nobles also clearly expressed their opposition against Lawrence¡¯s session to the throne due to his identity.

    The king was still alive and functioning well at the moment. He was forcefully suppressing the dissension and legitimizing Lawrence. However, the situation was still developing unfavorably. As of now, Lawrence¡¯s status within Ossen City was somewhat awkward as his faction was the weakest among the princes.

    Seeing His Majesty¡¯s health continue to worsen, Lawrence felt anxious. He knew that the moment Uhtred passed away, the situation within Ossen City would be even harder to control. At that time, not only would a bastard of the king not obtain the throne, but perhaps even his life would be hard to preserve.

    Yet while Lawrence was apprehensive, experiencing these iparably troublesome and apprehensive days, Brettel City was outshining the other cities. Favorable news kept arriving one after another, describing how this waste of a city had suddenly began erupting with a new vibrant energy. Although Han Shuo was far from the empire¡¯s capital, his name continued to resound, making him more and more famous.

    Precisely because of this, Lawrence suddenly thought of Han Shuo, hoping he would return to Ossen City and help him. During such a crucial moment, Lawrence hoped that while Uhtred had yet to die he could borrow Han Shuo¡¯s support to improve the situation. At the very least, Lawrence could still make the other princes somewhat more apprehensive with Han Shuo in Ossen City.

    Han Shuo had already made his decision after he finished reading the contents.

    The moment he entered the Cemetery of Death, a dragon¡¯s melodious howl resonated throughout the entire cemetery. Fortunately there was an enchantment enveloping the entire cemetery that never dispersed, or the sound would¡¯ve travelled for hundreds of miles.

    ¡°Honorable Master, you have finally returned.¡± Gilbert was in his dragon form hovering in the skies, but after seeing him, he swept directly towards Han Shuo.

    Gilbert¡¯s body seemed to have erged somewhat while the scales covering his body had be pitch ck. He exuded a sinister, ancient, and deste feeling. Han Shuo knew that this sinister aura came naturally from Gilbert, while that ancient and deste feeling was due to absorbing the green dragon beast¡¯s crystal core.

    After the uproar, his enormous body gradually shrank and transformed into a person with coarse ck skin. His dark ck eyes had an additional hint of otherworldliness to them. However, because his body¡¯s sinister aura was too heavy, that hint of otherworldliness waspletely hidden.

    Han Shuo only shot a nce at Gilbert before immediately sensing a stronger power from Gilbert¡¯s body. He asked with a smile, ¡°How was it?¡±

    ¡°Great! Fantastic! That green dragon beast¡¯s crystal core had an extraordinarily powerful energy which allowed me to advance to the second level of a super rank magical beast. Additionally, I feel that even though I am just at the middle of the second level, my current strength is still extraordinarily powerful. Muahaha! Thank you very much for your grace Master.¡± Gilbertughed loudly and heartily, his voice brimming with satisfaction.

    ¡°I have received news from the underground world and I believe it will spark your interest a little.¡±Han Shuo waited until Gilbert¡¯s exuberantugh subsided before saying in a measured tone.

    ¡°What news? Hehe, I have finally recognized that my decision to follow you, Master, was a correct one. If I didn¡¯t follow you Master, how would I be able to advance to the second level so quickly?¡± Gilbert clearly understood that all of this was due to Han Shuo¡¯s favors. Thus, he couldn¡¯t help but to start bootlicking.

    ¡°Gilbert, who would¡¯ve thought that you would actually be the grandson of the underground world¡¯s dark dragon patriarch. You brat, your background is not humble.¡± Han Shuo was all smiles as he looked at Gilbert. Gilbert felt taken aback, Han Shuo continued, ¡°That patriarch grandpa of yours seems to be extremely worried about you. He even got the dark elves to scout for word of you. It seems like you, runaway-brat, is actually quite the favorite.¡±

    ¡°Great Master, how could you know about these things? Could it be that you¡¯ve actually entered the underground world¡¯s dark dragon city? The astonished Gilbert looked at Han Shuo as he puzzledly pushed for answers.

    Gilbert had never told anyone about his identity. Thus, he believed that there shouldn¡¯t be anyone who could know this. He truly felt confused now that he had heard such a statement indicating a clear understanding of his origins from Han Shuo.

    ¡°Your dark dragon city has some prisoners. Among them is a group of powerful dark elves from the previous generation. One of them was called Adele. Do you recognize this name?

    ¡°Adele. I seem to have heard of this name, however I have never seen her before. Within our dark dragon City, there are indeed some fellows imprisoned within that have grossly offended us. However, I just don¡¯t have any interest in such things. Master, why do you ask?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s precisely because this Adele had made a promise to your grandpa that she would help to find your whereabouts. However, I¡¯ve already killed her. Not long ago, I absorbed the energy on her body. As a result, I nearly brought trouble to myself and received a bacsh. So, I want to ask about things pertaining to Adele.¡±

    After hearing this from Han Shuo,Gilbert was extremely surprised. Then, he stared into space before saying,¡±I heard that this Adele seems to be the former matriarch of the dark elf n. She can use the faith of the dark elves to connect to the evil goddess Rose. As a result, she possesses some extraordinarily frightening powers in bed.¡±

    ¡°Adele has been imprisoned within dark dragon city for many years now and it is said that she is extraordinarily beautiful. Considering the fact that our race has such a lustful temperament, we would¡¯ve already jumped on top of her long ago. However, precisely because she can use the power of Rose, not a single dark dragon dares to forcefully take her to bed. They fear that she will suddenly use some treacherous methods while under pleasure.¡±

    ¡°Master, it is also said that Adele herself is also extraordinarily powerful. I¡¯m afraid that even our n¡¯s second and third ranked dark dragons are not a match for her. It is said that due to her devout faith in Rose, Adele canmunicate with Rose and acquire her divine energy. Our dark dragon race is deeply afraid that killing her will provoke the anger of that evil goddess. Thus, we have continued to only keep her imprisoned within. Don¡¯t tell me that you¡¯ve truly killed her?¡±

    ¡°I f*cked her to death!¡± Han Shuo calmly replied.

    ¡°Wahaha....¡± The littlescivious Gilbert became excited as he looked at Han Shuo with worship, ¡°Master, what happened? Do tell! Hurry and tell your faithful servant the specifics of the situation.¡±

    Seeing Gilbert suddenly bing excited right after hearing this, Han Shuo walloped him angrily. Only then did he describe the things that he had experienced. Finally, after describing the previous incident where there was a hard to suppress lust, he calmly continued, ¡°I can guarantee that when I went crazy with lust not long ago, besides the energy that I had absorbed from Adele, there was also an even more tremendous and sinister power within my body. That strand of energy brought with it a bit of aura that shouldn¡¯t exist within this ne. If things are as I predict, it probably came from the Spider Goddess Rose. I really don¡¯t know how this could¡¯ve happened. Don¡¯t tell me that the fact that I killed Adele was actually discovered! Could there actually be the existence of deities within this world?¡±

    Listening to Han Shuo¡¯s description of his experiences, Gilbert¡¯s previous excitement transformed into rare seriousness. After thinking for a moment, he said to Han Shuo, ¡°Master, I¡¯ve heard from Grandpa* that this world is not as simple as we think. Even with our dark dragon powers, we can only live in the underground world as if we are suffering from some kind of restriction. Even though my grandpa¡¯s power is frightening, he still can¡¯t avoid such restrictions. I can¡¯t think of anything else that can actually constrain our race within the underground world besides the universal concept of gods.¡±

    Knitting his eyebrows tightly, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but to raise his head towards the gloomy and deathly still sky of the Cemetery of Death, sunless and moonless all year round. He began thinking of the Church of Light¡¯s Deity of Light, the Temple Knights, the holy aura on Kosse¡¯s body, and the feeling that Han Shuo felt from the Revtion artifact.

    Then he thought of the existence of the Cmity Church and the skeletal staff within his own hands. When he¡¯d first held this skeletal staff, he entered an absentminded state and saw the shadow of a ten thousand meter giant in his mind. Now that Han Shuo had gained a faintyer of understanding, gradually believing in that kind of imaginary existence of gods.

    ¡°Master, perhaps you were really attacked by that spider goddessst time. However, it is said that deities cannot truly intervene with the mortal ne. Else, they would suffer restrictions from thews of this spatial world. Look, even that excessively evil spider goddess cannot do anything to you. This is sufficient proof that even she cannot vite this all-powerfulw. There is no need for us to fear her.¡± The dark dragon Gilbert casually consoled Han Shuo.

    Silently nodding his head, Han Shuo finally recognized how insignificant he was. Thinking of the giant¡¯s presence that emitted an aura from millions and millions of years ago, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but to feel some reverence within his heart as he said to Gilbert, ¡°Indeed, we cannot surmise the existence of deities, however these deities must be subjected to this spatial world¡¯s restrictive powers. Otherwise, the moment they descend onto this ne, this ne would possibly be turned into ruins.¡±

    ¡°Mmn, the deities must also be antagonistic towards each other, otherwise the Church of Light and the Cmity Church would not wage war for so many years.¡± Gilbert was also agnostic and didn¡¯t have any feelings towards them at all. Regardless of whether they were evil or righteous gods, he remained as carefree as always, seemingly without a care for the world.

    Han Shuo did not think much more about it as he nodded his head, ¡°Alright, since you¡¯ve already evolved to the second level, then you should proceed to the Valley of Sunshine and help Trunks. I believe that the Valley of Sunshine will have arge disturbance soon. If you are within the Valley of Sunshine then the Soul Destroyer Mercenary will be somewhat more secure. Ah, right, you need to pay attention to the matters pertaining to dark dragon city. Your grandpa has been constantly looking for you. I think that even if you don¡¯t return, you should still let someone deliver some news to your grandpa so he won¡¯t need to worry.

    ¡°I understand Master, I think that if my grandpa knew I¡¯ve already entered the second level, he will definitely be extremely happy. When I was in dark dragon city, that old guy would constantly pressure me to cultivate for the entire day. I¡¯ve already cultivated or all these years yet I was still at the first level. Now look at me, it¡¯s been barely any time since I¡¯ve left, yet I¡¯ve already seeded in my advancement. This clearly indicates that his methods are useless!¡± Gilbert indifferently replied to Han Shuo, seeming wholly unconcerned with his master¡¯s words.

    ¡°Alright, I need to return to Ossen City and deal with some matters. However, I will constantly pay attention to the matters within the Valley of Sunshine.¡± Han Shuo informed him. Then, after Gilbert left, he too took a step into the transportation array.

 Chapter 375: The Sculpture

    Chapter 375: The Sculpture

    This chapter is unedited. etvre will be halting trantion of GDK this weekend. Please go here for future news of the series.

    Lancelot Empire¡¯s Ossen City. Boozt Merchant Guild Headquarters.

    Phoebe and Lawrence sat upright sipping tea within an elegant secondary courtyard. Lawrence wore a clouded expression. Although his identity as a prince was already recognized by the king, he was still living miserably.

    In contrast, Phoebe, who sat opposite from him, had a charming appearance that was bing increasingly natural and elegant. But because she also held that divine weapon, ¡°Starry Sky¡±, she even had a somewhat icily arrogant charm. As Phoebe fondled with the ¡°Starry Sky¡± within her hands, unwilling to part with it, her thought began uncontrobly floating towards the distant Brettel City.

    ¡°Junior sister, your current Boozt Merchant Guild is bing more and more influential thanks to your work. Bryan is also like a fish in water in Brettel City. However, my days just aren¡¯t so well. I will probably be immediately killed by Charles right after royal father passes away. Did you truly help me deliver my letter to Bryan or not?¡± Lawrence looked at the Phoebe in front of him and asked somewhat helplessly.

    ¡°Senior Brother, it¡¯s not like Brettel City doesn¡¯t have any of your people. You should be even clearer than me whether Bryan is within Brettel City or not. But what you¡¯re saying is also true. It¡¯s already been so many months. Just why isn¡¯t there even the slightest trace of him. Could it be that he¡¯s gone to do another evil deed again?¡± Phoebe¡¯s long eyshes fluttered as her pupils sparkled with doubt.

    Lawrence had dispatched some people to Brettel City before, Faulke being one of them. Afterwards, Lawrence had also arranged some talented politicians to enter Brettel City one after the other. Although these people were currently holding suitable positions within Brettel City, they would continue to ry information to Lawrence just like before. From the information they had sent, it seemed that Han Shuo was really not within Brettel City.

    Lawrence sighed before suddenly saying to Phoebe, ¡°I also have the Dark Mantle agents helping me inquire for any information of him. But, even until now, there has not been even the slightest hint of him at all. What do you think? Could something have happened to him?¡±

    Phoebeughed proudly while promptly taking out the divine weapon ¡°Starry Sky¡±, which emitted a bright and sparkling starlight. She shot a disdainful nce at Lawrence and said, ¡°He could even kill Celt, the number one Redbud Knightmander out of the Continent¡¯s ten great knight troops. Furthermore, Celt was also a very powerful dragon rider. Just what kind of mishaps do you think he will face?¡±

    That fellow is extremely crafty and sinister while his sensitivity is frighteningly sharp. Even if he encounters a dangerous situation, he would still be able to escape in advance. He definitely won¡¯t have any mishaps. Instead, he is definitely doing some evil deeds in secret once again. These words were naturally not spoken to Lawrence, but secretly mused within her own heart instead.

    Lawrence carefully reconsidered and found it reasonable. It wasn¡¯t his first day knowing Han Shuo, so he naturally understood that with Han Shuo¡¯s personality and strength, he would absolutely not indulge in foolish and reckless actions of courage. The moment he noticed that he was in a helpless situation, he would always leave immediately in a sorry manner. ording to reason, no idents should¡¯ve urred to him indeed.

    As his hands massaged his temples, Lawrence said somewhat exhausted, ¡°Junior sister, I must have been too anxioustely, causing my thoughts to gradually be somewhat chaotic recently.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. With your rtionship with Bryan, as long as he knows about the current circumstances within Ossen City, he shoulde back and help you. Mm, I have heard that not long ago, the seven grand duchies tried to unite and defeat Brettel City. I think Bryan has possibly gone to the seven grand duchies to do some secretive things. You needn¡¯t worry about it. He will definitelye to find you after he has finished dealing with his matters.¡± Phoebe said,forting Lawrence. She knew that Lawrence had really been forced to the edge by the princes and she naturally understood Lawrence¡¯s current feelings.

    ¡°Hopefully he will rush back before my royal father passes away. Besides, we also have no clue what¡¯s going on with our master. The situation has already reached such a state, but he has yet to take a derative stand. Even I have no idea if he will support me in the end or not.¡± Lawrenceined with a headache. Then, he turned to Phoebe, ¡°Junior sister, you¡¯re our master¡¯s most loved disciple. Do you have a clue as to what our master will n in the end?¡±

    Phoebe thought for a moment before replying, ¡°Master has always been solely responsible for teaching us various kinds of knowledge. I feel like he wants you to be king relying on your own strength. You should also know, our master has always made us work hard for our own goals. He has never once relied on his identity to help us before.¡±

    ¡°Sigh. If I really just rely on my own strength, it¡¯s basically impossible for me to be king based on the current circumstances.¡± Lawrence seemingly knew about a bit of his master¡¯s personality, as he couldn¡¯t help but to sigh.

    ¡°Although Master won¡¯t justly and openly help you, however, he also wouldn¡¯t let others bully you. If not for Master letting Grandpa Bonds secretly protect you, I¡¯m afraid you would have already been secretly killed by others. This proves that Master also cares very much for you.¡± Phoebe continued to console Lawrence.

    Hearing this, Lawrence nodded his head and agreed, ¡°This is also true. Fortunately Bonds was there to help me several times, otherwise I would have really have been killed long ago.¡±

    Phoebe did not continue to speak as she continued to focus on polishing the ¡°Starry Sky¡± that was already clearly shining like a reflective mirror. She treated it as though this sword was Han Shuo.

    ¡°When I came over, Master wanted me to tell you that you shouldn¡¯t depend too heavily on the weapons in your hands. Weapons will forever be dead objects. They might be able to make you a little bit stronger but they won¡¯t increase your personal strength.¡± Lawrence stood up and said to Phoebe.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I have an even higherprehension towards Master¡¯s martial skills than you. You had better put more effort into thinking how you can get some additional advantages from your royal father instead.¡± Phoebe said indifferently before continuing to wipe the divine weapon within her hand. When she thought of the fact that this damned guy had still yet to see her after so long, she realized that, in the end, this long-distance rtionship was definitely not going to work!

    As Phoebe reminisced and mentally nagged Han Shuo, he had already arrived at Ossen City. Only after arriving at Ossen City did Han Shuo notice that three months had already passed while he was unconscious and resisting spider goddess Rose¡¯s power within the Cemetery of Death. During these three months, the seven grand duchies continued to unceasingly go on campaigns against each other while Brettel City and the Helon Duchy had already conducted numerous secret business deals in secret.

    Han Shuo did not make another move towards Narsen Duchy¡¯s Benedict Sackville at all. On one hand, the opportunity was hard to seek while on the other, there were still other more important matters waiting to be done. After returning to Brettel City from Narsen Duchy, Han Shuo took the necessary materials to refine an elite metal zombie from Jack, entered Mount Silk, and nted the future elite metal zombie within. Then, after handing over some tasks to Jack and the others, Han Shuo left Brettel City, passed through Seamist City¡¯s transporting array, and arrived at Ossen City.

    Because Faulke and the other former subordinates of Lawrence had already told Han Shuo that he wanted to urgently see him, Han Shuo immediately left for Ossen City. Knowing Han Shuo¡¯s destination, Faulke and the rest didn¡¯t report to Lawrence about Han Shuo¡¯s appearance because they knew that Han Shuo would arrive there first.

    After entering Ossen City, Han Shuo hurried towards Fanny¡¯sboratory ce first because the teleportation array was near Babylon Academy. Han Shuo had not seen Fanny for ages and was truly longing for the bright and beautifully moving teacher at the moment.

    Han Shuo headed for Babylon Academy under the cover of the dusky night. On the road, Han Shuo avoided some rtively crowded areas and headed towards the necromancy major.

    The moment Han Shuo arrived at the long hallway with the sculptures that Jack and him frequently cleaned off, he suddenly noticed an extremely familiar-looking new sculpture. The finished sculpture was made of pure white, white jade and was meticulously carved. This imposingly tall sculpture faced the sky while holding a magical staff, and was posturing as if it was chanting a magical chant.

    Under this new sculpture, a morous engraving of small characters stated: Bryan, a graduate of Babylon Academy¡¯s Institute of Necromancy. Graduated in two years and three months-the fastest graduation speed in history. He is currently an archmage necromancer and has formerly defeated Great Swordmaster Leah Cain....

    As Han Shuo looked at his own sculpture, he suddenly assailed with indescribable emotions. When he and Jack had been both wiping these sculptures, they had once been filled with ambition and desire to stand amongst these sculptures. But, after reminiscing through these times, he truly felt a spontaneous pride and satisfaction of attaining his achievements when he truly saw his own sculpture.

    ¡°I... never expected ¨C I really never expected that one day my own sculpture would be able to stand here and be a motivational model for future generations.¡± Han Shuo muttered to himself as he looked at his own sculpture in front of him.

    ¡°It¡¯s because of you that new student enrollment in the necromancy major has increased by many folds. Hehe, Fanny has be even more and more busy now!¡± A kind voice sounded from behind Han Shuo. Babylon Academy¡¯s Dean Emma gradually walked in front of Han Shuo.

    As a space grand magus, Emma possessed a peculiar ability of walking through space. Within this region, as long as Emma wanted to find someone, she could immediately appear in front of that person¡¯s face.

    After the space fluctuated, Han Shuo immediately knew that Emma had noticed his arrival. When Emma¡¯s voice sounded, Han Shuo was not even a little surprised as he smilingly looked at the all too familiar Dean Emma, saying, ¡°I truly never expected that my sculpture would be able to stand here.¡±

    ¡°Hehe, you already had the qualifications to stand here when you advanced from a magical apprentice to an archmage in three years. Even more so, after you graduated from this Academy, your every action maintained this stunning incredulity. The necromancy major is this Academy¡¯s weakest major, but such a character like you could still emerge from it! It¡¯s only natural for your sculpture to be erected.¡± Amy kindly smiled as she walked in front of Han Shuo¡¯s sculpture and lightly pressed her thumb on the annotation below the sculpture. She had just added another character, transforming the symbols of archmage into grand magus. Emma seemed to have already ascertained that Han Shuo was a grand magus necromancer.

 Chapter 376: Pointers

    Chapter 376: Pointers

    ¡°But I still haven¡¯t gone to the Magic Association to verify my strength yet, Dean Emma.¡± Looking at Emma¡¯s movements, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help butugh lightly.

    Emma winked as she responded, beaming merrily, ¡°So, you¡¯re admitting that you possess the strength of a grand magus?¡±

    Han Shuo had no idea how Emma could see through to his true strength from just one look, but he also didn¡¯t feel the need to conceal such facts. It would be fine as long as his demonic magic was kept a secret. He didn¡¯t need to conceal his achievements as a mage. After hearing what was said, he nodded his head, ¡°That¡¯s right!¡±

    Han Shuo only considered his demonic magic as his most important secret, while he considered his strength as a mage as leverage for gaining additional benefits. Thus, he was actually preparing to go to the Magic Association to verify his qualifications as a grand magus. Regardless of nation, all grand magus ranked mages could obtain extremely high statuses. If Han Shuo went to the Magic Association to verify his qualifications, his future career would be impacted positively.

    ¡°As I thought. I could sense a bit of an aura on your body, but the most significant reason is because you killed Celt. To be able to kill a sky rider with a green dragon as a pet, your strength naturally has to be at the grand magus level.¡± Emma replied matter of factly.

    ¡°Dean Emma, why have youe to see me?¡± Han Shuo knew that Emma was extremely busy and there were a lot of a lot of small and big matters within Babylon Academy that she had to deal with. She definitely came to see Han Shuo for some particr matters this time.

    Emma nodded as expected before looking at Han Shuo with a smile, ¡°Necromancers are sparse within the Empire. There are even pitifully fewer grand magus ranked necromancers. The ones I know only know to practice magic and there are very few that appear in public. Hehe, you were also part of the Babylon Academy. Even more importantly, you¡¯ve also promised Fanny that you would give some pointers in your free time to the students of your major. However, I hope that wasn¡¯t an empty promise, but that you actually try to seriously guide them when you have the time.¡±

    ¡°Hehe, Dean Emma, don¡¯t worry, I will definitely give them some pointers if I¡¯m free.¡± Han Shuo did not readily make a conclusive promise. Han Shuo currently had way too many matters on hands, and he couldn¡¯t remain at Babylon Academy to guide the students. However, if he really had some time, even if it was just for the sake of Fanny¡¯s reputation, Han Shuo would still be willing to lecture them for one or two sses.

    ¡°That would be great, hehe.¡± Emma was wreathed with smiles as she nodded her head. After pausing for a moment, she continued, ¡°I know you came to find Fanny. She has been somewhat busy recently. However, she is nevertheless blossoming and bing increasingly beautiful. Oh, that¡¯s right, I almost forgot. Fanny has also advanced to archmage. You best treat her well, for she is also very amazing.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s longing for Fanny became even more impossible to be restrained when he listened to Emma. Heughed, ¡°I¡¯m actually looking for Fanny for some important matters. Then, I¡¯ll be on my way.¡±

    ¡°Mnn, go ahead.¡± Emma didn¡¯t obstruct Han Shuo.

    The sky darkened after Emma and Han Shuo finished conversing. However, Han Shuo was iparably familiar with the necromancy major and easily detoured around the students, traversing straight towards Fanny¡¯sboratory.

    Han Shuo yet to enter Fanny¡¯sboratory when he suddenly heard an oppressive stamping of footsteps from within. Feeling startled, he continued listening. He couldn¡¯t help but to show another stunned expression. He could hear an incredibly bulky creature via the heavy footsteps within the room. Han Shuo did not knock and walked in directly.

    An evil knight was holding an enormous spur and making stabbing movements within Fanny¡¯sboratory, on top of an open area. A magical array was present five meters from the creature. Fanny was panting inside while controlling the evil knight, seemingly as though arge amount of her mental strength had been consumed.

    After summoning an evil knight, the necromancer did not need too much mental strength to control it because it was a kind of advanced undead creature. Just amand to attack would suffice. An evil knight resembled neither a zombie nor a skeletal warrior, and it naturally didn¡¯t require a summoner to dictate how to attack. It¡¯s wisdom waspletely enough for it to disy its powers freely and effectively..

    Naturally, if the necromancer wished, he could still use his mental strength to control the evil knight. However, this would not only consume his mental strength at a faster pace, it would also not help the evil knight disy its true powers.

    In short, right after summoning the evil knight, this kind of advanced undead only needed the necromancer to transmit an attackmand and it would suffice. Unlike skeletal warriors and zombies, It simply didn¡¯t need the use of mental strength to control it. Instead, this would hinder the evil knight¡¯s natural attacking ability.

    Fanny was naturally caught up in a misconception that she believed this kind of advanced undead creature needed to be manipted like a skeletal warrior or a zombie. Looking at her huffing, seemingly seriously practicing and using her mental strength in an attempt to facilitate the advanced evil knight¡¯s attacking abilities, Han Shuo felt that it was somewhatughable.

    Fanny was indeed as Dean Emma had described. She had be increasingly beautiful after these several months. This was naturally due to the credit of the Rebirth Pill. Her skin was as white as jade, and the substantial improvement to her inner body was also the reason why she had advanced to the level of archmage so quickly.

    Han Shuo entered soundlessly. Fanny had just started to struggle with the evil knight and did not sense Han Shuo¡¯s existence whatsoever. Only when she manipted the evil knight to turn around and stab forward did she suddenly notice Han Shuo standing by the door, grinning. Fanny pupil¡¯s blossomed with incredible happiness and surprise. But suddenly, she started grinding her teeth and stabbing her jade-like fingers hatefully at Han Shuo.

    Under Fanny¡¯s maniption, the evil knight¡¯s enormous spur suddenly rose, piercing towards Han Shuo who stood there, smiling.

    Han Shuo was taking in all of Fanny¡¯s expressions. How would he not know exactly why Fanny was attacking like a spoiled child? He knew that she was angered because he hadn¡¯te to see her for a very long time. Han Shuo was still smiling and gazing at her with deep emotions as the imminent spur pierced towards him.

    When the enormous spur pierced near the top of Han Shuo¡¯s head, Fanny¡¯s lovely face suddenly changed colors. She hastily used her mental strength to control and stop the spur from continuing in case the spur truly harmed Han Shuo.

    However, the spur was truly as quick as a gale while Fanny was obviously still not familiar enough to properly control the evil knight. Thus, Fanny¡¯s mental strength was mostly useless as the spur continued to pierce towards Han Shuo¡¯s head. It only slowed somewhat while emitting an ear-piercing, shrieking sound like the braking of a car.

    Fanny became iparably frightened. At the moment, she was unable to open her mouth to urge Han Shuo to jump out of the way. She could only look at Han Shuo, terrified while exerting all of her mental strength to try and stop the spur.

    Ding!

    In the end, the spur stillnded on Han Shuo¡¯s head. However, an unexpected metallic sound of collision rang out after a ck cloud of light briefly took form on top of Han Shuo¡¯s head, before disappearing strangely afterwards.

    Han Shuo continued to smile, standing there without even the slightest movement. The spur¡¯s pierce did not even touch one hair on Han Shuo¡¯s head. In the end, the evil knight also ceased to a stop under Fanny¡¯smand.

    In the next moment, Fanny suddenly threw herself into Han Shuo¡¯s chest and recklessly started beating Han Shuo¡¯s sturdy chest. A faint sobbing sound could be heard as she said, ¡°Idiot, you can even kill Celt, so why didn¡¯t you dodge? Are you trying to die?¡±

    Han Shuo hugged Fanny tightly, saying softly, ¡°How could you actually hurt me?¡± before suddenly kissing Fanny firmly in the lips. The two people were vigorously tangling together like snakes, even their souls seemed to be blending together.

    This kiss persisted for ages. Only when Han Shuo¡¯s hands start unconsciously climbing over Fanny¡¯s body parts did Fanny suddenly awaken, abruptly pushing Han Shuo away. She red at Han Shuo with a redden face, saying cutely, ¡°I am your teacher! This is also a school. Behave!¡±

    The moment Han Shuo saw Fanny¡¯s lovely and charming appearance and heard her words, he felt even more excited. He couldn¡¯t help but chuckle evilly when he thought back to when he¡¯d been an ordinary student who greatly revered her. ¡°It¡¯s precisely because you are my teacher that when I kissed you, I became even more excited. You can¡¯t escape from the palm of my hands.¡±

    Right after these words sounded, Han Shuo captured Fanny once again and advanced towards Fanny¡¯s face, giving her another deep kiss. Then, he used his two hands to feel her soft and smooth back before gradually shifting his big hands lower. Before Fanny had time to react, Han Shuo suddenly palmed Fanny¡¯s outstandingly smooth and round butt and squeezed without restraint.

    Fanny struggled and whimpered while pushing Han Shuo away again with a red face. She once again red hatefully at Han Shuo before taking a few steps back saying, ¡°You little pervert. You haven¡¯t even seen my father yet. Behave yourself!¡±

    Han Shuo paused. Then, looking at the evil knight next to him, he exined to Fanny with an unchanging expression, ¡°An evil knight is not controlled like a zombie nor a skeletal warrior. Instead, since an evil knight possess it¡¯s own intelligence, it¡¯s only able topletely bring out its true fighting strength when it¡¯s not being controlled by mental strength.

    Fanny listened and looked at Han Shuo astonished, before saying in doubt, ¡°It can bring out it¡¯s most powerful fighting strength just by relying on itself?¡±

    Han Shuo replied while nodding his head, ¡°Of course, an evil knight is an advanced undead creature. Not only do they possess intelligence, they also possess their own dignity. If you don¡¯t let it disy its own strength as it likes, but use your own mental strength to force it to submission, it will instinctively try to resist. There are no advantages to this at all...¡±

    Han Shuo and Fanny¡¯s position had unknowingly reversed. Originally, it was always Han Shuo who would inquire about some difficult magic problems. But the Han Shuo of today could actually discover Fanny¡¯s misconceptions from just a glimpse at her actions and even help her correct it.

 Chapter 377: Rapid Progress

    Chapter 377: Rapid Progress

    All chapters post 373 were not edited. etvre is stopping trantion at chapter 380, please refer to this link for more information about the future of the series.

    Fanny had no choice but to admit that her former student, Han Shuo, had already exceeded her knowledge in the essence of necromancy.

    Looking at Han Shuo¡¯s waxing eloquence, Fanny¡¯s train of thought floated to the past, thinking of when Han Shuo was still a magic apprentice. The willful, diligent quest for knowledge while cultivating, enduring a life of silence and solitude. At this moment, Fanny seemed to haveprehended a little of something.

    This male standing in front of her had lost any traces of his former self. Previously, he¡¯d been a cowardly youngster with a delicate body, not even a hundred seventy centimeters tall. He had been a youngster that silently disposed of trash all day long, and waspletely powerless in the face of others bullying him. Was he truly this outstanding, formidable male that was currently in front of her?

    Fanny¡¯s mind was somewhat temporarily distracted as she dazedly looked at Han Shuo, spellbound. She¡¯d already forgotten the magic exnation that Han Shuo had just given to her. Only after a long time when Han Shuo suddenly emitted a loud noise did Fanny finally awaken. Her bright, clear eyes looked towards Han Shuo with an apologetic smile. She exined, ¡°I don¡¯t know why, but I¡¯ve noticed that the current you seems to have no features that ovep with the previous you. Seemingly, within just a split second, you changed into apletely different person. Even now, you are constantly changing. It makes me feel as if I¡¯m in a dream.¡±

    Within a few short years, Han Shuo had already matured to a point where others could only hope to reach. Now, even his teacher Fanny needed to admire him. Although Lancelot Empire had nock of geniuses, Han Shuo¡¯s talent and development speed was unique to him alone.

    Han Shuo shed a dashing smile and said, ¡°I have changed far too much from my past self, so this kind of feeling you have is extremely normal. Hehe, everyone can change. This is how humans evolve. Only when someone experiences something that no one else can imagine does he grow and mature quickly.¡±

    Only Han Shuo knew in his heart that he was from apletely different world from Bryan. They had always beenpletely different individuals withpletely different temperaments and experiences. Thus, for Fanny to notice these inconsistencies was apletely normal phenomenon. As a result, Han Shuo found an excuse to remove the suspicions within Fanny¡¯s heart.

    ¡°Bryan, I¡¯ve always been within the Academy for the few years you¡¯ve been gone, but you¡¯ve rarelye to train. I¡¯ve constantly wanted to know what you¡¯ve been doing all these years. Why is that every time you return here, you always startle people? ording to what you¡¯ve said, you must¡¯ve experienced something I ampletely unable to imagine, else your transformation wouldn¡¯t be so quick. Can you tell me?¡± Fanny looked at Han Shuo in a daze as she inquired what happened in those days.

    After Fanny¡¯s sudden question, Han Shuo thought for a moment before saying, ¡°The experiences I had are too numerous, and it¡¯s too inappropriate for me to narrate them one after the other. However, it¡¯s precisely as you guessed. My experiences have indeed been extremely rich these few years. Hehe. Simply put, at every moment, I was always in the midst of passing through a life-threatening situation. It is precisely because of these situations that my potential was stimted, and thus, my improvements unceasing.

    ¡°Bryan. Your life has truly been tough on you these past couple of years. I never asked but that didn¡¯t mean I wasn¡¯t concerned about you. It¡¯s just I had no idea how I should help you....¡± Fanny looked up at Han Shuo while gently and softly chatting. Her hands touched Han Shuo¡¯s face, lightly caressing his unswerving, determined expression, seemingly trying to smoothen away those few years of hardships.

    Han Shuo closed his eyes, feeling at ease as he allowed Fanny to caress his face. Unexpectedly, there were no traces of sexual desire within his heart. Instead, every experience he had since he¡¯d been born into the world slowly and vividly reyed in his mind. Han Shuo even started to think of his parents from the other world.

    Han Shuo did not vite Fanny that night. This was mainly because when she encountered some problems in her magic knowledge, Han Shuo helped her by meticulously exining it in fine detail. From being engrossed with Han Shuo¡¯s exnations, Fanny gradually drifted to sleep. A sweet smile hung on the corner of her mouth as she emitted a softugh. She gradually fell asleep in Han Shuo¡¯s chest.

    Seeing Fanny falling asleep, Han Shuo maintained a constant, unmoving posture, allowing Fanny to sleep infort. He took out a necromancy tome from his space ring and began to diligently delve into it once more.

    When Han Shuo advanced to his current magical cultivation realm, the need for sleep gradually disappeared from his life. Even if his body and mind werepletely exhausted, he only needed a brief moment to circte his magical yuan topletely recover. He never needed to sleep again to recover his body and mind. Precisely because of this, Han Shuo had even more time and energy to improve himself. In addition, Han Shuo¡¯s brain had developed substantially. Thus, the throbbing and wondrous characters within the cryptic magic tome were slowly unraveled under his meditation and studying.

    Books were the most valuable of legacies left behind by his predecessor. This author was also a person with extraordinary ability and wisdom, particrly in the discipline of magic. It wasn¡¯t an easy matter for sessors to want to use this book to find a proper cultivation path.

    The existence of the Babylon Academy of Martial Arts would be meaningless if anyone could improve just through books. However, it wasn¡¯t easy to find a teacher that could give proper guidance to someone at Han Shuo¡¯s realm. Only a book filled with experiences left behind by a predecessor could provide such guidance. Only such a method could allow someone to breakthrough their constraints in the fastest way.

    However, magical tomes were cryptic and difficult to understand.. The more advanced the tome, the moreplex it was. Taking this necromancy book in Han Shuo¡¯s hand, for example. If an untalent individual were to take a look at the symbols and incantations within, they would immediately be bewildered, let alone grasp the true meaning within each symbol.

    After Han Shuo¡¯s brain region had been excavated due to a breakthrough in his magical cultivation, his perception, memory, andprehension became even more superiorpared to ordinary people. When he delved into books in meditation, hisprehension speed was many times faster than his peers. It was precisely because Han Shuo could rece his sleep with cultivation, and the fact that his brain was too powerful, that he could grasp the old fey corpse summoning technique so quickly.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t wait for Fanny to wake up in the morning before soundlessly leaving theboratory. He headed straight for the Magic Association.

    Han Shuo met the same youngdy as before after entering the Magic Association. The youngdy immediately became excited after seeing Han Shuo enter. She blurted, ¡°You¡¯re Count Bryan right? I recognize you from before. Howe you¡¯ve returned to Ossen City? Hehe. I¡¯ve heard that you¡¯ve wiped out a lot of bandits while you were at Brettel City. You¡¯re so amazing!¡±

    Previously, when Han Shuo advanced to an archmage necromancer, it was also this youngdy who¡¯d received him. She seemed to have a very deep impression of Han Shuo. She immediately started blurting with excitement the moment she saw Han Shuo entering.

    The youngdy¡¯s sudden acmation attracted a lot of attention. There were powerful swordsmen as well as mages dressed in a variety of different colored mage gowns within the lounge. Some of them were the Magic Association¡¯s people while some were probably here to verify their rank.

    Now, after hearing this youngdies excited shout, they all suddenly moved their eyes onto Han Shuo¡¯s body. Their eyes brimmed with surprise.

    Han Shuo swept a nce at these people. Then, he spoke demurely to the youngdy, smiling faintly. He opened his mouth to say, ¡°I¡¯vee to the Magic Association to confirm my rank. Oh, that¡¯s right. Is Mister Ares currently here?¡±

    ¡°Please wait a moment. Mister Ares is currently helping Carlos verify his rank, but he will be avable shortly.¡± The youngdy smiled and answered. Then, realizing something, she suddenly asked, startled,, ¡°Are you here to verify your magic rank as a grand magus necromancer?¡±

    Han Shuo had already previously advanced to the archmage rank. Now, in less than two years time, Han Shuo came again to verify his new rank as a grand magus necromancer. The youngdy was clearly shocked.

    Not only this youngdy, but even the surrounding mages were all shocked, looking at Han Shuo. They seemed to be looking at a true monster, their eyeballs nearly falling out in shock.

    Although an archmage and grand magus was only a one character difference apart in Mandarin, they were actually worlds apart. Any mage capable of bing an archmage will always be acknowledged for their wisdom and ability in the hearts of all mages. They would absolutely be incapable of advancing to an archmage without such traits.

    However, even if such an individual wanted to advance from an archmage to an grand magus in two years, it was normally impossible.

    Different people had different aptitudes towards magic and naturallyprehended at different speeds. However, the process of advancing to a grand magus from an archmage normally required ten years minimum. Yet, Han Shuo had done it in only two short years. This kind of extreme speed was simply terrifying. As a result, the look that the other mages within the room gave to Han Shuo was understandable.

    If the sum of Han Shuo¡¯s magic career was totalled up, then the time he used would only amount to roughly four years. The speed at which he¡¯d changed from an individual with no knowledge of magic, to suddenly bing a grand magus who could shake any nation seemed impossible.

    Right as the youngdy blurted such words, Ares Hosein, the Magic Association¡¯s supervisor, entered the room from above. Apanying him was a person with elegant, long hair. He was a youth, appearing under thirty years old. He was clothed in a grey, white magic robe as he soundlessly walked with a carefree smile on his face.

    After a simple nce at the symbol on his magic robe, Han Shuo immediately realized that he was probably the Carlos who wanted to verify his rank with Ares. He obviously just became a wind grand magus as he came down in an iparably joyful mood. Currently, he was walking with Ares, smiling and merrily chatting with him.

    Ares mindlessly shot a nce downstairs and saw Han Shuo standing there like an immovable pole,a crane among chickens. Ares immediately eximed, ¡°Hey! Youngd, you must be Bryan. I remember you. Hehe, why have youe to the Magic Association?¡±

    Smiling, Han Shuo nodded his head and calmly said, ¡°Mister Ares, I want to reconfirm my magic rank. Hehe. I think I should have the qualifications to wear a grand magus medallion.¡±

    Ares became iparably astonished and carefully sized up Han Shuo with a few looks just like the others. Then, he rubbed his chin, doubtfully saying, ¡°If I recall correctly, thest time you came here to verify your rank should be only two years ago. Don¡¯t tell me you¡¯re already ready to verify your new rank as a grand magus necromancer?¡±

    Han Shuo reaffirmed with a nod of his head, saying, ¡°Correct!¡±

    ¡°Inconceivable, truly inconceivable. Today is truly a bright day for my Association. Hehe. The Lancelot Empire is notcking in talented individuals indeed. Carlos is not even thirty years old but he already advanced to be a wind grand magus. Who would¡¯ve thought, another woulde right afterwards, although I don¡¯t know if you can actually bring about this miracle. I believe you¡¯re definitely not even thirty years old, right?¡± Ares kept shaking his head in praise and surprise as he looked at Han Shuo, sighing emotionally.

    When Han Shuo entered Bryan¡¯s body, Bryan had only been sixteen years old. Since then, only four years had passed. Han Shuo¡¯s true age should only be twenty years old in this world. However, due to the excess of life and death situations Han Shuo experienced, plus Han Shuo¡¯s former age of 29 before entering Bryan¡¯s body, he appeared somewhat more mature on the exterior.

    ¡°That¡¯s not important. Hehe. The important point is whether or not I can be verified as a grand magus necromancer or not.¡° Han Shuo didn¡¯t care about this sort of fame andughingly responded to Ares.

    ¡°Oh, you¡¯re that Brettel City¡¯s Lord, Bryan. Hehe. I¡¯ve been truly wanting to meet you and it¡¯s my pleasure to be able to see you here today. I¡¯m Carlos.¡± At this time, Carlos, the wind grand magus who walked down with Ares, suddenlyughed and greeted Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo replied courteously with a smile and said, ¡°Correct, I¡¯m Bryan. My pleasure to make your acquaintance, Carlos.¡±

    With regards to this Carlos, Han Shuo seemed to recall someone discussing him when Han Shuost set foot in the Dark Mantle Headquarters. Han Shuo hadn¡¯t paid attentionst time however. Since this person could be a wind grand magus before turning thirty years old, Han Shuo dared to postte that this person was extremely well known in the Lancelot Empire. He made a mental note to himself to find some time to look up this person when he returned to the Dark Mantle headquarters. There would definitely some information about this guy.

    ¡°Young master, we must go!¡± Within the lounge, an elderly person who seemed like a butler said to Carlos.

    ¡°No rush. Hehe. I want to wait until Bryan verifies his rank before leaving.¡± Carlos replied to the butler with a smile. Then, he smiled towards Han Shuo saying, ¡°If you don¡¯t mind, can I observe?¡±

    Han Shuo noticed that besides the Magic Association¡¯s people within the lounge, everyone else appeared to be Carlos¡¯ servant. He wondered how powerful this person¡¯s identity must be. Therefore, he wrinkled his brows before saying with a carefree smile, ¡°Hehe, No problem!¡±

 Chapter 378: A Summit of Dignitaries

    Chapter 378: A Summit of Dignitaries

    This test was no different from the previous one, with mental strength being tested first. Since Han Shuo had indeed reached the grand magus level, he effortlessly passed the mental strength test.

    The next necromancer test was just as simple as well. Since an even more powerful summoning technique was the most effective representation of reaching the grand magus necromancer level, Han Shuo did just that. After Han Shuo¡¯s chant, an old fey corpse descended from another world. The appearance of this old fey corpse proved everything.

    WIthout a doubt, the appearance of the undead creature proved Han Shuo¡¯s strength. Ares gazed deeply at the old fey corpse and sensed a thick sense of death emitting from its body. He nodded his head in astonishment before saying to Han Shuo, ¡°It¡¯s true. You¡¯ve actually be a grand magus necromancer! Inconceivable!¡±

    Carlos¡¯ eyes radiated with an astonished sparkle as he looked probingly at Han Shuo. After a good while, he sighed with emotions saying, ¡°Your reputation is truly justified. It seems like the aplishments you¡¯ve obtained thus far have truly not just been a fluke. Congrattions Bryan!¡±

    Han Shuo politely nodded his head towards Carlos, beforeughing, ¡°Many thanks.¡±

    ¡°Alright, there¡¯s no problems. Just wait a moment, I¡¯ll immediately handle the proper formalities.¡± Ares headed straight up after saying this to Han Shuo. He was most likely going to deal with Han Shuo¡¯s matters and record his current rank within the Magic Association.

    After Ares left, Carlos looked at Han Shuo. Although hesitant, he opened his mouth in the end and said, ¡°Bryan, your rtionship with Prince Lawrence is extremely close right?¡±

    Han Shuo was surprised, unable to determine the purpose of Carlo¡¯s words. But he still nodded his head and looked at Carlos, surprised, ¡°Yep, what¡¯s the matter?¡±

    ¡°I have some words but I don¡¯t know if they are appropriate.¡± Carlos appeared reluctant and faltered.

    ¡°Hehe, it won¡¯t hurt. Go ahead and just say it.¡± Han Shuoughed while bing increasingly perplexed.

    Carlos¡¯splexion suddenly became stern as he deeply looked at Han Shuo, ¡°Then, I¡¯ll be frank. Among the four princes, Prince Lawrence is the most hopeless and will probably fail to inherit the title of king. Additionally because of Lawrence¡¯s peculiar identity, I¡¯m afraid the moment when His Majesty passes away, Lawrence will also be the first to suffer. Forgive my words but it¡¯s best if you don¡¯t be too close with Prince Lawrence. Only by keeping clear will you be able to provide the most help to Brettel City.¡±

    Han Shuo had already known of Lawrence¡¯s predicament thanks to Emily¡¯s letter. Furthermore, when Han Shuo had first met Lawrence and found out that he was of illegitimate birth and status, he already knew that there would be such a day sooner orter. Candide had warned him once as well. Thus, Han Shuo naturally already knew that with Lawrence¡¯s identity, it would definitely be very challenging for Lawrence to inherit the title of king against the other princes.

    However, Lawrence had treated Han Shuo with sincerity and Han Shuo had once promised that he would try his hardest to help him. Even when Han Shuo took control of Brettel City, Lawrence still continued to help him as best as he could. Now that Lawrence has truly sunk into a predicament, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t just sit there and ignore him no matter what.

    ¡°Thanks for your warning, however I am someone who returns favor with favor and repays my gratitude. Since Prince Lawrence has once helped me, now that he has encountered some dangerous times, I will still help him no matter how dangerous and how detrimental it is to me. This is my immutable, societal code of conduct. Hehe, still though, thank you.¡± Han Shuo smiled at Carlos, clearly expressing his stance.

    After hearing this, Carlos sighed disappointedly while nodding his head, ¡°Bryan, I very much admire your methods, but you should still reconsider this prudently. This matter will not only implicate you alone. Once Lawrence fails to weld power, you, your Brettel City, and all of your friends will also be implicated because of this matter. Sometimes, even if it isn¡¯t for your own good, you should still think about it for others.¡±

    This statement was reasonable. However, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t change his decision just for these couple of words. At the moment, Brettel City was iparably stable. Plus, Han Shuo could also rely on the Cemetery of Death. Even if Carlo¡¯s words became a reality, Han Shuo could still guarantee that he could bring everyone around him to safety.

    ¡°I am extremely grateful for your good intentions. Hehe. However, when I make a decision, I normally don¡¯t regret them. Even if my decision is wrong, I will still carry it out to the end!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s expression remained the same as he calmly replied. Obviously, he wasn¡¯t tempted due to Carlos¡¯s words.

    After Han Shuo had said such words, Carlos knew that it would be useless to try to continue to persuade him. Carlos sighed helplessly before saying, ¡°I really didn¡¯t wish to be your enemy. However, if things develop normally, I¡¯m afraid some things will truly be unavoidable. Sigh!¡±

    ¡°What are you guys saying, you two fellows are Lancelot Empire¡¯s rare and talented characters. Hehe. It seems like every nation has their own talented mage. Bryan, you¡¯re only twenty years old and you could actually be a grand magus necromancer. Truly an abnormal freak.¡± Right at this moment, Ares came from upstairs and chuckled at the two of them.

    ¡°It¡¯s nothing. Mister Ares and Bryan, I still have some things to do. Goodbye.¡± Carlos politely said his farewells to Ares and Bryan before immediately heading downstairs and leaving.

    Han Shuo looked at Carlos¡¯s departing figure. He knew that this person was definitely supporting of one of the other three princes. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have said those words. Perhaps because Carlos was wary of Han Shuo¡¯s power or perhaps because he didn¡¯t want to face such a strong adversary, he tried so hard to persuade Han Shuo.

    But to Han Shuo, after his magical cultivation had entered the carnal realm, he wouldn¡¯t necessarily lose even if he faced a sacred swordmaster. Carlos would absolutely not be Han Shuo¡¯s match since he was someone who had only just recently advanced to be a wind grand magus. Thus, Han Shuo did not ce Carlos on too high a pedestal in his heart.

    ¡°Bryan, your data has already been rewritten. From this point on, you¡¯re a grand magus necromancer. As promised, this is your new medallion and certificate. You can now order your own magical robe and embroider a symbol representing your strength as a grand magus necromancer.¡± Ares chuckled at Han Shuo before cing the certificate proving his new rank into his hand.

    ¡°Thank you Mister Ares!¡± Han Shuo expressed his thanks and then opened his mouth to continue, ¡°Alright, then I¡¯ll also take my leave.¡±

    ¡°Wait a moment!¡± Ares smilingly shouted loudly before opening his mouth, continuing, ¡°I¡¯m good friends with your Academy¡¯s Dean, Emma. She has erected a statue of you within the Academy and has once came here to verify your rank. If you don¡¯t mind, I will hand her the newest information about you. Hehe. This will greatly improve your status within Babylon Academy.¡±

    Han Shuo was startled. Then he smiled and nodded his hand, ¡°As you wish. Hehe. I won¡¯t mind. However, Dean Emma already knows of my new strength. I think whether you inform her or not will not actually matter.¡±

    ¡°Oh, is that so. Hehe, then I¡¯ll just forget about it.¡± Aresughed and then continued, ¡°Alright, go ahead and do whatever you need to do. I hope the next time we meet I can verify your new rank as a sacred magus. It would be my greatest honor if I could still be alive to verify your rank for you.¡±

    Han Shuoughed cheerfully and chuckled, ¡°I hope so. But you must live a few days longer Mister Ares!¡±

    After finishing these words, Han Shuo did not continue to remain within the Magic Association. He headed downstairs and walked out.

    Carlos had already left a moment ago with his crowd of servants. Thus, when Han Shuo starteding downstairs, that youngdy obviously already knew that Han Shuo had sessfully confirmed his new rank. She excitedly looked at Han Shuo with worship, ¡°You are truly very amazing. I have worked here for several years but I have yet to see such a young grand magus before!¡±

    Han Shuo only nodded his head at her reservedly and didn¡¯t say anything. After augh, he walked out the door and headed for the Dark Mantle Headquarters.

    Mt. Ordas. Dark Mantle Headquarters.

    This time, Han Shuo was immediately received with great fanfare after shing his identity medallion. One of the agents brought Han Shuo towards a building.

    ¡°Sir. Please wait a moment. I will go inside to send them a message first.¡± That Dark Mantle agent brought Han Shuo to a wide doorway made of rock before respectfully informing Han Shuo

    Although separated by the thick and wide doorway, Han Shuo could still sense a couple of powerful auras from within. Han Shuo always kept an impression of any new acquaintances he made. Furthermore, even if he was separated arge distance, he could still distinguish between them through their auras. After his magical cultivation advanced to the new rank and his consciousness improved greatly, Han Shuo could even more easily differentiate between everyone¡¯s differing auras. Thus, this stone door that was shrouded by someplicated andplex magic enchantments waspletely incapable of blocking Han Shuo¡¯s mental probing.

    ¡°Mm, go ahead.¡± Han Shuo nodded his head and said to the agent guide.

    Han Shuo¡¯s current status was already different from his former days; as a Dark Sun Envoy, he was definitely at the top of the socialdder. Last time when Han Shuo ruined Celt¡¯s operation in the underground world, he had already advanced to a Second Dark Sun Envoy. Within the entire Dark Mantle Organization, there were not many that was a Second Dark Sun Envoy like Han Shuo. Thus, this agent naturally treated Han Shuo with great caution and respect.

    From this agent, Han Shuo discovered that Dark Mantle¡¯s three heavyweights had all congregated here today. Furthermore, even some senior figures that had gone into seclusion were included in this meeting. They seemed to be negotiating about some big matters. Within the entire Dark Mantle¡¯s enormous organization, only those that were above Third Dark Sun Envoys could participate in this discussion. However, these agent knew that Han Shuo¡¯s identity was unique and immediately went inside to inform the dignitaries.

    Han Shuo could sense Candide and Amyes¡¯ aura inside, as well as the not-so-friendly Cecilia. Besides them, there was also anotherpletely unfamiliar aura. Since all of these people had gathered, there were definitely important matters needing to be discussed. Of this that was certain.

    The Dark Mantle headquarters had a tight defense in the perimeter. There were even moreplicated and strange magical enchantments assembled within. Thus, Han Shuo didn¡¯t release his mystical demons to eavesdrop and only stood outside, waiting.

    After a while, that agent came out with another person. This person was extremely robust and also at the prime of his life. His coarse palms indicated that he was most likely a user of heavy weaponry. His sideburns were preserved in lushful disy. After arriving he nodded his head to Han Shuo and said, ¡°Bryan, right? Follow me.¡±

    After saying these words, he said to the agent who guided Han Shuo, ¡°Alright, there are no more matters here for you.¡±

    While heading inside, this robust man opened his mouth to introduce himself, ¡°I¡¯m the same as you. I¡¯m also a Second Dark Sun envoy. Hehe. The upper guys have given verbal orders to bring you to them.¡±

    This was an extremely spacious passageway. There were powerful crossbow mechanisms on the walls, as well as various magic cannons and hidden magical enchantments. Han Shuo dared guarantee that if one didn¡¯t have the qualifications to enter but still barged in, what weed him would be a road to death.

    After passing through the spacious passageway, they arrived at another gate that was protected by another two agents. The robust agent that guided Han Shuo signaled to open the gate and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Go ahead, enter.¡±

    Han Shuo was startled, took a look at this guy and said, ¡°You¡¯re not going in with me?¡±

    He smiled ruefully and shook his head before helplessly replying,¡±I don¡¯t have the qualifications to enter. Although we¡¯re both Second Dark Sun envoys, I only have the qualifications to stay here on guard. Hehe. They let you have a good guide, but here is where I stop.¡±

    Hearing this, Han Shuo unconsciously fell silent beforeughing apologetically at him. Then, he walked through the door without saying anything else.

    The moment after Han Shuo¡¯s stepsnded inside, a formation suddenly mobilized into action. Han Shuo then noticed that he had already appeared within a secretive and sealed, wide stone room

    The stone room was roughly the size of a basketball court. There were white marble tables and chairs individually ced in the surroundings. The tables were filled with various refreshments and fruits. Epassing one of therge rhombus table were thirteen chairs. Every chair carried a person. At this moment, these thirteen individuals unanimously gazed towards Han Shuo.

    At one corner of the rhombus table sat the three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle. They were obviously Candide, Amyes, and Cecilia. Emily sat upright at a different side while only shooting Han Shuo a nce with her eyes. She purposely didn¡¯t over do it, probably to avoid arousing suspicion and letting others discover something.

    These thirteen individuals were the Dark Mantles¡¯ truest senior levels. Among them, even the lowest ranked Emily had advanced to the Third Dark Sun while the highest ones were like Candide and Cecilia were Fifth Dark Star.

    However, after Han Shuo shot a nce around, he suddenly noticed that the three heavyweights were actually not sitting at the main seat. Instead, at the most honorable seat sat two unimpressively looking old man. Han Shuo had seen one of them once. He was precisely the elder thatughed all day while looking after a shop at the Valley of Sunshine¡¯s Dark Mantle stronghold.

 Chapter 379: Elder

    Chapter 379: Elder

    Usual reminder that this chapter is not edited, etvre is stopping at chapter 380, h h.

    The Dark Mantle stronghold in the Valley of Sunshine wasn¡¯t veryrge, and itcked both personnel and resourcespared to ones in other cities, but the oldest member here was actually the one sitting in the most esteemed position!

    Even Han Shuo had ignored the existence of this person in the Valley of Sunshine the entire time. All Han Shuo knew about him was that he smiled all day as he guarded the shop in order to conceal the existence of the Dark Mantle base within. He never imagined that the man was a founding member of the Dark Mantle.

    The old man looked at Han Shuo with shining eyes. Laughing, he nodded his head at Han Shuo, saying ¡°What, do you not recognize me?¡±

    ¡°No, it¡¯s just that I didn¡¯t expect to see you here. I¡¯m just surprised.¡± Han Shuo earnestly said.

    ¡°Brian, this is Teacher Sabakas. He is the previous Fifth Dark Sun. The Valley of Sunshine is the ce where Teacher Sabakas has retired to, so that identity was naturally false.¡± Candice retained his sinister look. However, he stood up when he was introducing Sabakas to Han Shuo, as a sign of respect for the former.

    Han Shuo was actually unable to feel any hint of the elements from Sabakas, causing him to be shocked. He immediately understood that Sabakas was either a normal person who didn¡¯t know any spells or fighting techniques, or was a powerful person that even Han Shuo couldn¡¯t tell the strength of. The fact that he could sit in such a spot naturally meant that he wasn¡¯t a normal person that didn¡¯t know anything, thus, Han Shuo could already imagine just how powerful Sabakas was.

    ¡°Greetings, old sir!¡± Han Shuo bowed respectfully and greeted him with a smile.

    Sabakas nodded and waved his left hand. The space around Emily twisted for a moment, before a baster chair identical to theirsnded beside Emily. Sabakas smiled towards Han Shuo, ¡°Go ahead and take a seat.¡±

    Han Shuo thanked the elder, he walked over to the chair to sit down, leaning against Emily. After Han Shuo sat down, Emily leaned close to Han Shuo and whispered, ¡°Sabakas is Cecilia¡¯s grandfather, the space sacred magus of the Lancelot Empire. The dean of your Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, Emma, was taught by him as well. Therge scale magic teleportation formations as well as all of the teleportation formations here were set up by him.¡±

    Han Shuo was shocked and couldn¡¯t help but look at Sabakas once again, remembering what Emily had said to him in the underground the previous time. Emily had said that Cecilia¡¯s grandfather was a really amazing person, and Han Shuo had seen him before. Han Shuo was unable to think of who it was for a long time, and now he finally understood.

    An old woman with loose skin that creased into ravines on her face sat with Sabakas. Her two hands continuously turned and toyed with a crystal ball, while her grey eyes were full of loneliness, causing her to seem different from the other people there.

    When Han Shuo entered, the old woman who looked like a witch didn¡¯t pay any attention to him at all. She merely sat there silently as if she was asleep. However, the crystal ball in her hands continued to rotate, as if reminding everyone else that she was still listening to their conversation.

    ¡°That is the mysterious seer, Grace. I only just found out about her existence from my older brother, but I don¡¯t know what she does exactly. However, the mysterious existence of a seer was apparently able to see the future. I don¡¯t know whether it was true or not either.¡± Emily exined for Han Shuo once again when she saw him look towards that old witch.

    Han Shuo sat properly without saying anything, and merely nodded slightly in order to show that he¡¯d heard Emily¡¯s introduction. He swept his nce over Sabakas and the witch-like old seer, Grace. His heart was filled with shock. One of them was a space sacred magus, the other was a seer who was beyond mysterious.

    These two people should be people on the level of an elder in the Dark Mantle. Adding onto the fact that the three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle were present, Han Shuo truly felt a bit of anticipation for the uing meeting. He sat there without moving an inch, and prepared himself to listen to what they were going to talk about.

    ¡°Bryan, I know all about what you did within the Valley of Sunshine. Hehe, you¡¯re not bad hmm? We can all have our own opinions when we discuss here. Since you sit here, then you can speak out your opinion for things we discuss here as well.¡± Sabakas chuckled as he looked towards Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo thanked him before continuing to sitting with a proper posture and saying too much. Han Shuo took a look at the thirteen people present, and understood that the ones that could sit here must be the true senior executives within the Dark Mantle organization. His heart was filled with curiosity, because he didn¡¯t know what sort of thing could actually make these people gather together.

    After a while, Han Shuo gradually understood why these people gathered. It was also because of the battle of power between the princes.

    When a new king needed to be chosen in a country, the country would face another gory bloodbath. Regardless of what power a person belonged to, it was improbable to remove themselves entirely. Even normally neutral organizations such as the Dark Mantle needed to make this headache-inducing choice as well.

    This Dark Mantle organization that directly served the king would also be the hand of shadows for the new king. After the new king is selected, he would definitely choose the person he trust most to manage this huge powerful organization. If the Dark Mantle chose the wrong side right now, the Dark Mantle management would be washed clean in the future.

    After listening to it for a while, Han Shuo noticed that they seemed to want to remain neutral, but several princes had already sent a clear invitation to them. All three of the Dark Mantle heavyweights had been invited by the princes, but all three of them had declined the invitations and disyed a neutral standing. However, they understood that if they truly remained neutral, then any of the princes would exclude them out of their trusted followers.

    The Dark Mantle organization has always been the most trusted existence of the king, if they were unable to gain the trust of the new king, then the management within would be refreshed. When that happens, it would be unknown whether the three heavyweights would continue to be the current three.

    Out of these thirteen people, some of them did lean towards the first prince, Charles, who was the most powerful right now. They felt that Charles had the most right to the throne. Of course, one or two did choose the other two princes for their own reasons. However, nobody thought well of Lawrence, the bastard son, so nobody mentioned him.

    ¡°Bryan, I heard that you¡¯re close with Lawrence, what do you think about this?¡± Cecilia suddenly nced at Han Shuo. While the Third and Fourth Dark Suns had already expressed their opinions, the two elders and the three heavyweights hadn¡¯t yet.

    Han Shuo had remained silent and merely listened to everyone¡¯s discussion, so he was a bit shocked as he did not expect Cecilia to suddenly ask him a question.

    All of a sudden, the gazes of all thirteen people within the room fell onto Han Shuo. Han Shuo, recently be extremely influential in both the Dark Mantle and the imperial structure, was in a slightly different position towards them. As a city in the east, Brettel City was beyond vibrant. As the city lord, Han Shuo had enough chips to side with anyone.

    Han Shuo drew a nk for a moment, then thought about it without smiling, ¡°I will help Lawrence with my identity as the city lord of Brettel City. Repaying favors is my policy, no matter how bad you think his chances are, I will support him.¡±

    ¡°Lawrence, that bastard son Lawrence?¡± Cecilia said in disdain and shook her head. ¡°Anyone has a chance except him.¡±

    Han Shuo smiled without speaking and understood that the people there all wouldn¡¯t think that Lawrence had good chances. Some of the other envoys also carried disdain on their faces as they ignored Han Shuo¡¯s attitude. Then, they looked away from Han Shuo and towards Cecilia and the other higher-ups.

    At this moment, the crystal ball in Grace the old seer¡¯s hand suddenly emitted a soft light. At the same time, Grace¡¯s eyes slowly cleared as she moved her heavy eyelids to stare at shimmering light within the pale-green fog of the crystal ball in her hands.

    The smiling expression of space sacred magus, Sabakas, suddenly tensed as he looked solemnly at the old seer. Candide and the rest of the three heavyweights were also very shocked as they looked at the old seer, Grace, who¡¯d seemed to be asleep ever since Han Shuo had entered the room.

    As the light in the crystal ball she held suddenly faded, the deep wrinkles on Grace¡¯s face suddenly trembled slightly. Then she started to cough intensely, seeming like her life would end at any time, like a candle extinguished in the wind. Her coughs seemed like they would tear herself apart, and in the end, she even coughed up a mouthful of blood onto the crystal ball.

    The crystal ball she held suddenly shattered, while Grace¡¯s body shook and she nearly fell down from her sitting position. After a while, her intense coughing gradually stopped as her eyes were filled with an unfocused white once again, as if her old eyes were unable to see the surrounding clearly.

    The Third and Fourth Dark Suns only found it strange, but Sabakas and the three heavyweights looked at Grace with shining eyes, as if they didn¡¯t dare to breath, just like they were waiting for something.

    Grace, who hadn¡¯t uttered a single word since the start of the meeting, suddenly looked towards Sabakas and the three heavyweights with her blurred and lifeless grey eyes. In the end, she finally set her gaze upon Han SHuo, who was sitting in the corner. Sabakas and the three heavyweights were suddenly shocked as well as they set their gazes upon Han Shuo.

    ¡°What path should we take for the future?¡± Sabakas looked at Han Shuo in shock, then looked towards the old seer and asked a bit cautiously.

    ¡°Sabakas, I¡¯m a bit tired.¡± The old seer replied with a tremble. She¡¯d already retracted her gaze from Han Shuo as if it was just a casual nce.

    Sabakas nodded, then looked towards Candide and the rest of the three heavyweights, ¡°I¡¯ll take her back to rest first. You guys continue to chat, but don¡¯t make your decision yet.¡±

    All three heavyweights stood up together and saluted both Sabakas and Grace, before respectfully sending Sabakas, the Dark Mantle elder out.

    Sabakas smiled as a cloud of light wrapped around him and Grace. The two of them disappeared with the fading of the light. Even Han Shuo was unable to feel even a hint of their aura, so they seemed to have already left the ce.

    After Sabakas and Grace left, the three heavyweights no longer said anything about the future path that the Dark Mantle should take, seeming to await the guidance of Sakabas and Grace. During the remaining time, all they discussed about were the great events happening with the Dark Mantle recently. The Third and Fourth Dark Suns all reported the issues they had, then spoke about all the strange situations and situations that threatened the safety of the Empire which urred within their region.

    ¡°Bryan, how is the situation with Brettel City and the seven grand duchies?¡± Candide took a look at Han Shuo after everyone else finished reporting and directed a question to Han Shuo.

    Although Han Shuo was the city lord of Brettel City, he was merely a Rank Two Dark Sun envoy, making his position the lowest there. Hearing Candide¡¯s question, Han Shuo stood up from his seat and said with ease, ¡°The Dark Mantle stronghold within Brettel City is developing well. Currently, its points had already spread out to every single major city within the seven grand duchies with Brettel City as the center. They would use letters to report all major events that were urring locally to the Brettel City through letters.¡±

    ¡°Very good. The seven grand duchies should indeed be properly watched, they have always been discontent with their ce,¡± Candide replied.

    ¡°My lord, do you know about Stratholme of Stranglethorn Valley within the seven duchies?¡± Han Shuo thought about it, then suddenly asked Candide before sitting down.

    The moment he said that, the eleven people remaining after Sabakas and Grace had left all wore ugly expressions. Candide even shook his head helplessly with a sullen expression and then looked at Han Shuo in shock, ¡°You met that old monster?¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head, ¡°No, but I did hear that he was the previous imperial adviser of the Vanerdun Dynasty. He originally had the strength of a sacred swordsmaster thest time the Empire entered the seven grand duchies. Apparently he issued a warning to the experts on our side. I wonder if this really urred?¡±

    Candide shook his head helplessly, ¡°This is the shame of the empire, if it wasn¡¯t for the existence of this old monster, the seven grand duchies would have already been conquered. How could the seven grand duchies stand up against us without a single sacred magus?. The only reason we haven¡¯t attacked with sacred magi is because of the existence of this old monster.¡±

    Han Shuo was rather shocked when he heard Candide admit it. He fixed Stratholme more firmly in his heart, and thought about whether he should be more vignt against the seven duchies.

 Chapter 380: Han Shuoâ€™s headache of a matter

    Chapter 380: Han Shuo¡¯s headache of a matter

    Note, this is unedited, the usual, hh. Remember to check the teaser for more info!

    After the two senior figures left, the discussion that followed didn¡¯t include anything important. Everyone was mostly just concerned about Dark Mantle¡¯s future movements, so when this issue was dismissed, the meeting quickly concluded.

    Everyone dispersed after the meeting. With Candide¡¯s indication, Han Shuo followed Candide to his private room. He helped confirm Han Shuo¡¯s identity as a Second Dark Sun envoy before finally asking, ¡°Your development recently in Brettel City is going pretty well. Since I have already discussed this with His Majesty, your arrival this time is perfect. I believe His Majesty will confer upon you the rank of a Marquis.¡±

    ¡°If that¡¯s true, It would be fantastic. Currently, Brettel City has a thousand things to be taken care of. I need to report to His Majesty and see if I can set up arge-scale transporting formation array within Brettel City. With it, Brettel City can develop even faster.¡± Han Shuo realized thatmunicating with other cities was inevitably linked to bing a major city. As of now, it was very inconvenient for Brettel City tomunicate with the outside world. But, if he could have his ownrge-scale transporting formation array, Brettel City¡¯s development could speed up.

    After hearing this from Han Shuo, Candide¡¯s head started to hurt slightly. He thought about it for a moment said, ¡°I can¡¯t guarantee if His Majesty will agree. Even though Brettel City has defeated some bandit groups now, they are just some bandits in the end. As long as Brettel City cannot reveal a power capable of withstanding the seven grand dukedoms, I believe His Majesty will not feel at ease setting up arge-scale transportation formation array within Brettel City.¡±

    ¡°If the seven grand dukedoms breached a Brettel City that just so happened to have a transportation formation, the seven grand dukedoms could easily expend some magic crystals to send armed forces into the cities of the Lancelot Empire. This would cause a catastrophe. Thus, His Majesty will definitely treat this cautiously.¡±

    Han Shuo also understood Candide¡¯s meaning. After listening, Han Shuo nodded his head and said, ¡°It seems like His Majesty will not truly be at ease before Brettel City can defeat the seven grand dukedoms.¡±

    ¡°Ai, His Majesty¡¯s health is worsening and I don¡¯t think he will be able tost much longer. Why did youe here from Brettel City this time, is it for Lawrence?¡± Candide sighed before specifically inquiring from Han Shuo.

    By no means did Han Shuo try to conceal the truth. He nodded his head and replied, ¡°Yes, Lawrence and I have a pretty good rtionship. My principle is to repay favor with favor. Sir Candide, you don¡¯t need to try to convince me otherwise.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not trying to convince you. It¡¯s just that I feel like you should carefully consider it again. Your influence in Lancelot Empire isn¡¯t small anymore. As long as you can make Brettel City somewhat more stable, your future prospects will be boundless and immeasurable. But, if you fight for Lawrence¡¯s power, I worry not only for you, but also your current foundation. You ought to carefully consider this once more.¡±

    Candide also didn¡¯t know if he should persuade Han Shuo or not. Originally, when he brought Han Shuo into Dark Mantle, he never anticipated that Han Shuo would have such aplishments as he did today. Furthermore, based on the current situation, as long as Han Shuo continued to develop smoothly, it was entirely possible that he could be one of the overlords in the Lancelot Empire.

    On one side, he¡¯d been the one to bring Han Shuo in and on the other, Han Shuo was his wife Emma¡¯s student. Regardless of which point he considered it from, Candide would never wish for Han Shuo to make a wrong choice and mistakenly continue down the wrong path. Thus, Candide tried to advise Han Shuo time and time again. But because he had worked for Dark Mantle for so long and had received so much information through his many channels, he knew Han Shuo was the type to stick to his decisions and not the type to be swayed. Thus, Candide was really clueless on what the proper action was.

    ¡°Sigh. Alright, I won¡¯t interfere in your matters anymore. Before Madams Grace clearly chooses the direction that our Dark Mantle will take, no one will know what kind of road the Dark Mantle will take in the future.¡± Candide sighed and said to Han Shuo.

    Hearing Candide¡¯s words, Han Shuo could help but feel dumbfounded. After a moment of hesitation, he inquired, ¡°Sir, is Madame Grace truly capable of looking clearly into the future?¡±

    Han Shuo had understood long ago that the most mysterious profession in this world was a seer. He also knew all the different miraculous descriptions about divining. However, he wasn¡¯t the type of person to believe in that kind of abstruse prophecy at all. Thus, he was still half doubting even now.

    Candide¡¯s face turned solemn as he firmly said to Han Shuo, ¡°Although the Lancelot Empire has faced many important events throughout the years, Grace has chosen the correct path every time. Furthermore, the Dark Mantle¡¯s ability to be such a powerful weapon of darkness within the Lancelot Empire is also directly rted to Madame Grace¡¯s guidance.¡±

    ¡°In addition, His Majesty cares about Madame Grace the most. Her prophecies can even alter His Majesty¡¯s decisions. Even now, His Majesty can¡¯t decide on which prince will be the next king. One of the reasons is precisely because Madame Grace has yet to tell His Majesty which prince is the true wise king.¡±

    ¡°Mm. Also, Lawrence¡¯s master, also Karel Ascot, is in fact also waiting for Madame Grace to point the way. Whether or not the Dark Mantle can avert disaster this time is also dependant on Madam¡¯s proper instructions. Thus, none of us have made any decisions even now.¡±

    Han Shuo was truly startled listening to Candide. Who would¡¯ve thought that the old woman, who seemed as if she would die at any moment, was actually ying a critical role? She had the power to affect the decisions of sacred swordmaster Karel and the king! Han Shuo¡¯s heart was filled with amazement.

    Afterwards, Han Shuo suddenly remembered the crystal ball that had shattered in the old seer¡¯s hand. When she¡¯d gazed deeply at him previously, Han Shuo had originally believed that perhaps she was only shooting him a random nce. But, listening to Candide today, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but to start imagining some wild thoughts. Could her gaze have a special hidden meaning?

    ¡°Based on what you¡¯re saying, as long as Madame Grace acknowledges a prince, that prince will definitely gain great advantages?¡± Han Shuo inquired of Candide after thinking for a moment.

    Candide nodded his head affirmatively before giving an example to emphasize the importance of the old seer, Grace. ¡°Even if it¡¯s Lawrence, as long as Madame Grace says he can bring prosperity, power, and riches to the Lancelot Empire, then even he will have great hopes to seed as the new king.¡±

    ¡°Hopefully the old seer will actually support Lawrence, hehe. Who knows, I feel like Lawrence has quite the monarch¡¯s vibe.¡± Han Shuo self deprecated before asking, ¡°That Stratholme, what actually happened with him?¡±

    As these words fell, Candide¡¯s darkenedplexion be even more sinister and hazy. He hesitated a moment before saying to Han Shuo, ¡°Last time, when the Empire invaded the seven grand dukedoms, besides sacred swordmaster Karel Ascot, there was also the earth sacred magus, Dempsey Gayer, who apanied them.¡±

    ¡°Everyone originally believed that the fragmented seven grand dukedoms would definitely be defeated. The rumors reflected the real situation. Because of the sudden alliance between the seven grand duchies, the Imperial Army began facing obstructions everywhere. However, because the Empire secretly believed the seven grand dukedoms didn¡¯t have the existence of a sacred magus, they wanted to vite a continental pact and use taboo magic to reverse the situation. In the end, before the earth sacred magus, Dempsey Gayer, could even make a move, the old monster Stratholme sought him out.¡±

    ¡°The old monster Stratholme openly challenged sacred swordmaster Karel Ascot, the pride of our nation. This fight was witnessed by no one except the earth sacred magus Dempsey Gayer. However, although no one knows the specifics, both the sacred swordmaster Karel Ascot and the earth sacred magus Dempsey Gayer did not make any more moves during the war.¡±

    ¡°During the many years of the existence of the Verdun Dynasty, Stratholme was the teacher of the state and had been as strong as a sacred swordmaster long ago. Along with the fact that he had yet to die after all these years, the moment he moved, sacred swordmaster Karel Ascot and earth sacred magus Dempsey Gayer of the Lancelot Empire became apprehensive in their hearts. This already clearly exins his strength.

    ¡°Ah, at that time, a soldier saw that old monster and said Stratholme did not look as old as what people imagined. On the contrary, he had an elegant, youthful look. Precisely because of this, from that point on, we have always called Stratholme, the former teacher of the state of Verdun¡¯s Imperial Court, an old monster.¡± Candide continued to exin.

    Han Shuo taciturnly knitted his brows and thought for a moment before opening his mouth to say, ¡°I see. Alright, I will leave this ce first. If you need me for anything, you can just find me within Ossen City. I will be staying here for a while.¡±

    ¡°Mm, you need to be careful. Ossen City is not too peaceful right now.¡± Candide nodded and said. Seeing Han Shuo leaving, Candide hesitated for a moment before abruptly opening his mouth and saying, ¡°Wait a moment!¡±

    Pausing for a moment, Han Shuo turned his head towards Candide and said, ¡°Is there anything else?¡±

    ¡°Also, you should pay more attention to your rtionship with Emily. Aymes is not an easy person to get along with. Additionally, the Hahn¡¯s family is one of the most influential families in the empire. For both your own sakes, you should be a little careful.¡± Candide sighed before continuing, ¡°Ai, everything¡¯s good about you, but that you are simply a bit too much of a yer. Also, you need to be even more careful with Fanny. I just learned this from your own dean a while ago that her father is Commander Firenze of the Howling Legion. He¡¯s a notorious butcher who¡¯s even more difficult to deal with than Aymes. And also Phoebe, she is sacred swordmaster Karel Ascot¡¯s most doted upon disciple. The at the kind of women you¡¯ve set your sights on! I really don¡¯t know how to help you.¡±

    After hearing Candide¡¯s words, Han Shuo¡¯s face changed. Although, he already knew clearly about Emily and Phoebe¡¯s identity and was only clueless about Fanny¡¯s identity, he¡¯d never would¡¯ve thought that Fanny¡¯s background would actually be even bigger than theirs. Her father was actually the Howling Legion¡¯smander!

    As a Second Dark Sun, he naturally knew of such a renowned person in the Lancelot Empire. Firenze¡¯s Howling Legion was without a doubt the Empire¡¯s most powerful legion in the army. As a regiment¡¯smander that behaved ruthlessly, sinisterly, and fiercely, he was a notorious, fierce lunatic in the Lancelot Empire.

    After all these years, Firenze¡¯s Howling Legion has continued to defend and resist the barbaric orcs in the Southern Border, causing tens of thousands of orcs to die to his men. Thus, within the Orc Empire, the name Firenze was synonymous to demons and nightmares. It could even be said that everyone feared and also cursed him.

    Firenze was the same even in the Empire, known and distinguished for his fierceness. Hepletelycked the proper etiquette and the grace as befitting a noble. When¡¯d once attended a private banquet hosted by His Majesty, Firenze had even dared to crudelye to blows with any noble that he¡¯d found unpleasing to the eyes.

    But His Majesty the king, Uhtred Lancelot, found these people very important. It is precisely because of Firenze¡¯s existence that the barbaric orcs could forever be isted to the south. Firenze was regarded so highly that even though he has offended a lot of nobles and has even cursed grand duke Ashburn as hypocritical and despicable, he was still living as nicely as before after all these years.

    Because he¡¯d once beaten up Grand Duke Ashburn during a banquet, the king really couldn¡¯t put up with him any longer and thrown him into the dungeons. However, the moment this news spread out of the Lancelot Empire, the barbaric orcs immediately started cheering and celebrating. Afterwards, their army forces started invading various cities along the southern border.

    His Majesty the King had sent several generals forward in defense. But, ultimately, there were no one capable of preserving the situation. Seeing one city after another on the verge of being conquered, even the king had no choice but to beg Firenze toe out and face the enemy. However, Firenze had actually refused. In the end, only after two cities of the empire¡¯s southern border was breached did Grand Duke Ashburn personally go to prison and bow his head before Firenze. That was when he emerged from prison and drove the orc army out of the southern territory.

    Within the southern border region, this Firenze was as if a living god. In the entire Lancelot Empire, besides His Majesty the King, Ashburn was most apprehensive and most afraid of Firenze.

    Han Shuo had already looked through this information a long time ago thanks to the Dark Mantle¡¯s intelligence. Now, hearing that Fanny¡¯s old man was actually confirmed to be Firenze, he was struck dumb. He couldn¡¯t help but ask Candide again with a somewhat dry mouth, ¡°You¡¯re certain that Fanny¡¯s father is him?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s him, this information is from your Dean, Emma. Even I only found out just recently. Ai, You should pray for your own good fortune. I had already warned you to not be too unfaithful, now let¡¯s see just how you¡¯ll end up.¡± Candide smiled ruefully as he helplessly said to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Eh, It seems like this really is a somewhat difficult problem to deal with. Ai, Teacher Fanny is such a gentle, soft, and virtuous woman, how could she have such a messed up old man. This world is truly miraculous!¡± Han Shuomented with a headache.

    ¡°Firenze is extremely doting towards Fanny because her mother had an untimely death. I think you should still take the next step with Fanny. If you can make Fanny docile and obedient, who knows, maybe you can escape this cmity.¡± Candide came up with this idea.

    Han Shuo sighed miserably. But after inspiration suddenly struck, he abruptly asked Candide, ¡°If I settle things with Emily, Phoebe, and Fanny, then there would be the Hahn Family and Amyes behind Emily. On top of that, there would be the sacred swordmaster, Karel Ascot, and that madman, Firenze. If I also include the entire Dark Mantle, what do you think, could I help Lawrence? Would he have hope in seeding as the king?¡±

    Candide¡¯s body shook right after these words were spoken. Afterwards, he stared at Han Shuo¡¯s increasingly brightening gaze. After some time, he finally opened his mouth to say, ¡°If you really do so, then Lawrence would have great hope to win. But, if even Madame Grace helps him, then this is practically in the bag. Oh, right, do you think Lawrence knows about your rtionship with the three woman?¡±

    Han Shuo started. After carefully thinking for a moment, he nodded his head and said, ¡°I believe Lawrence should know about the rtionship between the three women and me. However, he has never talked about it much before.¡±

    Candide was suddenly frightened. After a sudden sigh, he said, ¡°It seems like among the few princes, Lawrence should be the most difficult to deal with. I can clearly tell you that Lawrence also knew about Fanny¡¯s identity. It¡¯s no wonder that Lawrence spared no effort to help you, he wanted to to rope you in. If Lawrence had already calcted to such a day long ago, then this Lawrence is truly too frightening of a youngster.¡±

    Listening to Candide¡¯s words, Han Shuo also felt somewhat apprehensive. He carefully recalled the events of meeting Lawrence. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but to feel amazed as he discovered that Candide¡¯s statement was very likely to be true.

    However, in any case, Lawrence has constantly helped Han Shuo, and i wass also because of his existence that Han Shuo could climb up to his position so quickly. After staying silent for a moment, Han Shuo spilled out augh, ¡°It seems Lawrence is actually the most capable. I think my choice just might be correct because only a person that has nned so far can distinguish himself among the various factions.¡±

    ¡°Maybe your choice might actually be the correct one. Forget it, I should just wait until Madame Grace decides.¡± Candide sighed and said to Han Shuo with a slight headache.

    To Candide, the most proper judgements can only be made by people who could clearly see the future like Madame Grace. Any other decisions were not guaranteed. If Han Shuo could grab ahold of all three powers, perhaps there would truly be some vague hope in helping Lawrence seize power. However, this is still only hope and nothing more.

    ¡°Oh, thats right, His Majesty¡¯s health is bing increasingly feeble, and he probably can¡¯tst much longer. When I went to see His Majestyst time, His Majesty was constantly thinking about the miracles of your body and trying to understand your mystical martial arts skills, hoping to be able to use it within the army. What do you think about this?¡± Candide thought for a moment before asking Han Shuo.

    ¡°I will consider this carefully. I will give you my answer after some time.¡± Han Shuo predicted.

    And here is where the trantion ends, thanks to all the pirate sites and readers who think pirates are the trantors despite being told otherwise. I¡¯ve actually seen people justify their decision to pirate to the end of the world, so here¡¯s my response when four hours of work are stolen in four seconds. Enjoy the end of etvre¡¯s trantions, and please support the real deal next time.

 Chapter 381: Luring into demonhood

    Once Han Shuo returned to his official residence, Kas immediately reported to Han Shuo that third prince Lawrence had been waiting for him all along.

    Lancelot Empire¡¯s King Uhtred originally had three princes, eldest prince Charles, second prince Cyril and youngest prince Beverly. Of the three princes, eldest prince Charles was intrepid and fond of battle, second prince Cyril was the standard for a cultured noble, while the youngest prince was only fifteen, still yet to be considered an adult.

    (TL note: I know Beverly is moremonly known as a feminine name, but, 1. That¡¯s what is written in the raws. 2. Beverly was traditionally amonly given masculine name.)

    When Lawrence¡¯s identity was revealed, he became the third prince. However, the title of third prince was only what the public addressed him as on the surface. The way they silently criticized him was hidden within their hearts.

    Han Shuo had just returned to his residence when he found out from Kas that Lawrence was waiting for him, causing him to exim internally at Lawrence¡¯s informationwork. After entering Ossen City from Brettel City, Han Shuo had never showed his face to anyone, only visiting the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, as well as the Dark Mantle Headquarters. News from Brettel City should not have arrived that quickly. It was evident from Lawrence¡¯s arrival that he had other quick information channels.

    Compared to his former cheerfulness, Lawrence¡¯s expression had an added gloominess. It was unclear if it was because things recently had not gone ording to his wishes, Lawrence¡¯s temperament had be colder. However when he saw Han Shuo enter, he still embraced Han Shuo whileughing heartily.

    After an intimate discussion with Candide, Han Shuo had a new level of understanding toward Lawrence¡¯s ns and thoughts. Seeing Lawrence initiating a hug, Han Shuo also had a happy expression hugging Lawrence tightly out of a sudden. He then enquired on Lawrence¡¯s health, stillughing loudly.

    After exchanging pleasantries, Han Shuo waved his hand to instruct the servant that had sent light refreshments to withdraw. He lightly sipped on his cup of tea that originated from the south of Oden Empire, before looking toward Lawrence and said, ¡°It hasn¡¯t been long since we met, I didn¡¯t expect that the situation has already reached such an extent.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, there¡¯s finally news of you. This period of time, my days in the capital have been unbearable. Charles has been undermining me and currently within the capital. Apart from my foster father and Uncle Boris, none of the nobles support me. Ai, this is because my identity is rtively awkward. I know those nobles despise me. However, this situation isn¡¯t something I can avoid. Otherwise, Charles and the rest definitely wouldn¡¯t let me off.¡± Lawrence didn¡¯t hypocritically say anything else, getting right to the point and venting out his current predicament.

    Of the other three princes, eldest prince Charles had Grand Duke Ashburn¡®s support. On top of that, his mother was also the current queen. Hence he was the most likely to seed the throne. Second prince Cyril was usually in the capital and had friendly rtions with every powerful noble, conducting himself as someone who was good natured and understood the will of the people. Hence, there was also a group of nobles that supported him.

    Although the youngest prince Beverly was not yet considered an adult, his mother was the woman the king currently loved the most dearly. With her constantly whispering sweet nothings to the king, Uhtred appeared to extremely love Beverly. Furthermore, Beverly¡¯s grandfather was Northern Bimson City¡¯s Marquis and his n¡¯s strength was not to be belittled.

    Actually, if not for his overly awkward identity, with his father and uncle¡¯s support, in addition to his master being sacred swordmaster Karel Ascot, Lawrence who had joined in btedly still had some capital. Unfortunately, due to his identity as an illegitimate child, these were not considered as a massive capital, simply unable to provide him with any assurance.

    Han Shuo knew from Candide¡¯s words that old astrologer Madame Grace had the power to sway the decision with her words. Lawrence¡¯s master Karel had not dered his support seemingly also waiting for Madame Grace¡¯s opinion. Lawrence did not seem to have an understanding in this field, sighing in despair as he narrated to Han Shuo.

    After a while, Han Shuo finally replied, ¡°I¡¯ve just returned from Dark Mantle and had obtained a piece of extremely important information. Within Dark Mantle, there is a senior astrologer Madame Grace. One word from her is capable to bring about immense benefits for you. The reason why your master has dyed dering his position is perhaps also due to his consideration of the bigger picture for Lancelot Empire...¡±

    After Han Shuo had described all the information gathered by Dark Mantle to Lawrence once, Lawrence knitted his brows and pondered for a while. He then gazed deeply at Han Shuo, replying, ¡°Bryan, thank you. This information is extremely important. Madame Grace is my father¡¯s personal astrologer, and I¡¯ve heard a few rumors about her. However, astrology is too vague. In any case, I need to make early preparations.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded his head, understanding that to a few people that were fond of power, the mysterious astrology wasn¡¯t something that would be overly bothered about. Just take the incident this time round. Even though the venerable astrologer Grace said Lawrence would bring prosperity to Lancelot Empire, the other three princes would surely not surrender and willingly yield the throne to Lawrence.

    The mysterious astrology was only one aspect. Those that strived for strength and power would definitely not willingly resign to their fates. Lawrence was such a person. When Han Shuo heard Lawrence¡¯s narration, he couldn¡¯t help thinking of Lawrence¡¯s ns and nodding inwardly. Han Shuo knew Lawrence was definitely not easy to deal with.

    However, Han Shuo¡¯s choice was Lawrence. The tougher Lawrence was to deal with, the more relieved Han Shuo was. He smiled and nodded after hearing what was said, replying, ¡°Be at ease, whatever the final conclusion of the astrology is, myself and Brettel City would stand behind you. Who cares about what divine prophecy, we would still stake it all. Hehe, of course, if the situation is beneficial to us, that would naturally be even better.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, thank you. If I am able to seed the throne, Dark Mantle will only have you as the head in the future.¡± Lawrence solemnly promised Han Shuo.

    ¡°I¡¯m not taking into ount your promises for the future. I¡¯m only basing on your previous assistance and our friendship, that I spare no effort in aiding you.¡± Han Shuo smiled as he exined to Lawrence. Things in the future were forever hard to predict, nothing was absolute. Promises of the future were just like astrology, both matters only vague and illusory.

    ¡°I understand. It looks like I should make a move through Madame Grace. Although I know such an action might be fruitless, i still need to try.¡± Lawrence understood that to characters such as Madame Grace and Karel Ascot, they viewed the future of Lancelot Empire with utmost importance, rather than who obtains power.

    After Lawrence received Han Shuo¡¯s guarantee, he felt as though a weight has been lifted from his shoulders. He then discussed further with Han Shuo on a few details, before departing Han Shuo¡¯s residence.

    A while after Lawrence had left, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help knitting his brows as he exited the hall and look toward the adjacent roof. As though he was muttering to himself, he said, ¡°He has already left, why have you still remained here?¡±

    After he said that sentence, a shadow descended from the opposing roof. Bonds, who Han Shuo had previously seen in the Rose Garden, suddenly appeared in front of Han Shuo. A killing intent reeking of blood slowly drifted out, flooding Han Shuo from all directions.

    The old assassin Bonds face was covered with scars, appearing terrifyingly malevolent. He had been hiding there ever since Lawrence entered entered Han Shuo¡¯s residence. When Han Shuo arrived, he could already sense the strong smell of blood on Bonds¡¯ body. He knew that Bonds¡¯s objective was to protect Lawrence, hence he didn¡¯t bother about his existence.

    However, after Lawrence and Han Shuo had finished speaking, Bonds theoretically should have left. Yet, Han Shuo saw that he did not depart together with Lawrence. Hence, he puzzledly stepped out, appearing to be talking to himself as he questioned Bonds.

    ¡°How were you able to pinpoint my location?¡± Bonds somewhat suspiciously inquired, his gaze focused on Han Shuo while killing intent pervaded his whole body.

    Han Shuo knew that owing to his hands have been dyed in blood and that he deliberately trained in this aspect, Bonds was able to cause a killing intent to pervade naturally. It wasn¡¯t that his heart was filled with killing intent. Han Shuo smiled faintly before saying, ¡°The killing intent on your body is too strong. Also, you don¡¯t know how topletely conceal your aura. Naturally I would be able to sense it. Hehe, I suppose that ever since you trained your killing intent, you should have stopped being an assassin?

    The top assassins couldpletely conceal the killing intent from their bodies. Only in that way would they be able to kill the target in one strike before the target can even react. Bonds was formerly one of the finest assassins. However, he clearly focused on researching the users of the killing intent. Gradually, he was unable to contain the strong killing intent and the scent of blood on his body also bing thicker. To a top assassin, these were uneptable ws.

    Bonds was stunned from what he heard. After a while, he replied, ¡°That¡¯s right, when the killing intent from my body was unable to be concealed anymore, I stopped being an assassin. However, when in actualbat, my killing intent is able to destroy the enemy¡¯s willpower. When fighting head on against someone of the same strength, I am able to hold absolute advantage, even two opponents attacking together might not be my opponent.¡±

    This person was actually a good sapling. With such a body condition, training in the demonic arts would result in twice the result for half the effort. With Han Shuo¡¯s meticulous guidance and by only specializing in a demonic god ying martial technique, he definitely could be an outstanding character and his strength would also advance rapidly.

    ¡°Actually, I have a method to conceal the killing intent on your body and also a way to better control and utilize the killing intent. Heh Heh, your self-created path has simrities with the martial technique I train in. If you train in ordance with my method, you would definitely be able to substantially raise your strength in a short time. Furthermore, there¡¯s still unlimited potential to improve.¡± Han Shuo suddenly recalled that King Uhtred previously had the desire to let him inherit the Martial Skills Hall. This Bonds was a suitable candidate, however, the only apprehension Han Shuo had was the rtionship between Bonds and sacred swordmaster Karel Ascot.

    As long as Bonds cultivated the technique Han Shuo imparted, Han Shuo hadplete confidence in controlling Bonds and making him a loyal henchman in the future. Hence, Han Shuo began testing him.

    Hey all... do let me know where I can improve! Also, some people have already asked if I have a Patreon, do check it out here! It¡¯s still a work in progress!

 Chapter 382: Snatching oneâ€™s Subordinate

    Chapter 382: Snatching one¡¯s Subordinate

    When Bonds heard Han Shuo¡¯s statement. The earthworm-like scars on his face seemed to be alive due to his excitement, causing those who see him to be frightened as though they¡¯ve seen a ghost during the day.

    Even Bonds¡¯ current master sacred swordmaster Karel did not have a way to control the killing intent on his body. All along, Bonds had been experimenting by himself. As the exploration into the unknown was filled with uncertainty and danger, even sacred swordsmaster Karel was unable to provide him with any form of assistance.

    To sacred swordsmaster Karel Ascot, Bonds¡¯ meticulous studying of killing intent waspletely unorthodox. He didn¡¯t believe in wasting time on such things and had previously persuaded Bonds to go back to training in the orthodox field of training dou qi. Unfortunately, Bonds had already delved deeper and deeper, gradually bing obsessed in the experimenting and it was hard for him to extricate himself. Karel was unable to persuade Bonds and with his heart feeling disdain, he naturally would not be able to assist Bonds in this ¡°unorthodox¡± path.

    At present, he heard Han Shuo mention that Han Shuo possessed a technique that could conceal and control his killing intent. To Bonds who had always been alone in this unfamiliar field, Han Shuo¡¯s statement was like words from heaven, as though ripping open Bonds¡¯ many years of lonesomeness. Bonds immediately couldn¡¯t maintain self-control.

    ¡°A-Are you for real?¡± Due to Bonds¡¯ excited mood, his face trembled violently and his tone was filled with disbelief.

    Previously, Bonds had seen Han Shuo¡¯s battle against Brut Merchant ¡®s Leah Cain, as well has the miracles Han Shuo disyed the first time Bonds saw him. These gave Bonds the surprised feeling of meeting someone simr to him. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have stayed behind today after Lawrence had left and attempt to chat in detail with Han Shuo. He wanted to see if he could obtain any long-awaited gains from Han Shuo.

    Affirmatively nodding his head, Han Shuo confidently replied, ¡°Not only to wield the killing intent on your body, I also have a way to absorb the aura of death in a battlefield. Heh heh, I believe that in the entire Profound Continent, I am the only one who is proficient in such a technique.¡±

    With that sentence, Han Shuo¡¯s demonic aura ferociously flowed out, clouds of blood red fog suddenly emerged from Han Shuo¡¯s body. Contained within the blood red fog clouds was a ruthless killing intent filled with despair and endless resentment, causing one¡¯s spirit to tremble. Under Han Shuo¡¯s mental maniption, the clouds of killing intent transformed into des that simr to needles, forming a seemingly corporeal petal of a blooming blood red sinister devilish flower.

    Bonds¡¯ eyes popped out, his gaze fixed on Han Shuo. The numerous, crisscrossed scars on his face appeared to be wriggling about, resembling earthworms. The heavy scent of blood on Bonds¡¯ body couldn¡¯t be contained as it spread out. However, he was unable to emte Han Shuo¡¯s proficient maniption of this bizarre energy.

    Bonds could sense the power contained within as well as superficially urge a person¡¯s fighting spirit through that power. However, he had never imagined manipting that power to the subtlety that Han Shuo disyed. It was also from Han Shuo¡¯s disy that Bonds finally understood that by continuing to practice in this field, he would be able to disy a brilliance and destruction that is more formidable than dou qi.

    ¡°C-Count Bryan, is it possible for you to teach me this martial technique?¡± Normally with Bonds¡¯ status and seniority, he wouldn¡¯t be acting so mannerlessly. However, he had already endured the feeling of helplessness and loss from years of fumbling in destion for too long. Now that he saw a resplendent path appearing before his eyes, this old man who had solitarily explored the unknown all along was unable to contain himself any longer.

    Han Shuoughed involuntarily, apologetically shaking his head as he replied, ¡°Hehe, Old Mister Bonds, you must be kidding. Not mentioning this mysterious technique, even the extensive dou qi in the Profound Continent, it wasn¡¯t that easy for someone who wants to practice another person¡¯s dou qi technique.¡±

    Bonds¡¯ eyes contained a hard-to-contain dimness. Sighing, Bonds sounded bitter as he replied, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I was too rude. However, I truly wish to be able to practice such a martial technique, no matter the price I need to pay! In this world, perhaps you are the only one who is capable of giving me guidance in this lonely path. I¡¯ve already experienced too much of the danger and suffering of helplessly fumbling alone.¡±

    Han Shuo, who was staring fixedly on the old man¡¯s eyes, clearly saw every trace of emotion that was reflected in his eyes. When Bonds¡¯ internal regret was exposed, Han Shuo knitted his eyebrows, thinking hard for a while. He then hesitated for another moment, his brows still tightly knitted as he muttered to himself, ¡°Actually when my teacher left behind this martial technique, he indeed did not state that it couldn¡¯t be divulged to an outsider.¡± Bonds who had just reached his lowest point had a delighted expression when he heard what Han Shuo said, emotionally looking toward Han Shuo as he probed, ¡°B-Bryan, y-you...¡±

    Flustered, Bonds spoke incoherently. Nevertheless, Han Shuo knew what Bonds wanted to convey. Appearing to earnestly consider for a while, only then did Han Shuo suddenly say, ¡°It¡¯s not out of the question that you wish to practice this martial technique. However, you must be a part of our sect. This can be considered me substituting my deceased teacher in epting a disciple. However, you are always following Mister Karel and even consider yourself his servant. I think this might not be very appropriate. It looks as if this would be impossible.¡±

    ¡°No, it¡¯s possible, it¡¯s possible!¡± Bonds hastily cried out in rm. Under Han Shuo¡¯s astonished gaze, Bonds immediately exined, ¡°There is a designated time of five years for me to follow Master. In order to repay Master¡¯s kindness, I¡¯ve already followed him for seven years. Although I¡¯m still willing to stay by my master¡¯s side now, I¡¯ve already regained my freedom. As long as I let my master know, it shouldn¡¯t be a problem. If you don¡¯t mind, I wish to enter your sect and receive your teachings in the mysterious technique.¡±

    He didn¡¯t expect that Bonds had obviously already regained freedom, yet still willingly stayed by the side of sacred swordmaster Karel. It seems like this person is actually extremely suitable to be his henchman. In principle, this matter shouldn¡¯t have any problems. Nevertheless, Han Shuo was still a little worried about sacred swordsman Karel, somewhat uneasy that he would be enemies with Karel due to this matter.

    However, Han Shuo believed that with his current strength, he need not be afraid of sacred swordsman Karel. Furthermore, Bonds was a candidate extremely suited for demonhood. After hesitating for a while, Han Shuo exined to Bonds, ¡°It¡¯s best if you think it over again. You must know, once you start training with me, you would be under my restrictions.

    Furthermore, our sect has many rules. As your senior, I have the right to order you to do things you may be unwilling to do. If you refuse, it would be viting the master¡¯s teachings. I have the right to revoke the martial techniques you have learned. In addition, you should first let Mister Karel know and then carefully consider for a few days. Once you have carefully deliberated and have a genuine decision, you can always look for me once more to have a chat.¡±

    When Han Shuo said this, Bonds¡¯ eyes gradually regained its brightness. Having lived for many years, Bonds naturally wasn¡¯t an ignorant person that couldn¡¯t view a situation clearly. Although his mind was slightly flustered due to Han Shuo¡¯s martial technique, when Han Shuo mentioned the rules and restrictions, Bonds immediately understood the meaning Han Shuo wanted to convey ¨C You have to listen to mepletely, regardless of right or wrong!

    This was actually the same as when he attended to his current master Karel, taking of all his master¡¯s affairs with the status of a servant, be it murder, arson or robbery. So long as Master passed down the orders, he had to do his utmost in executing it. What Han Shuo wanted to express was actually the same idea.

    After Bonds¡¯ eyes cleared, he then truly started considering his options. From Han Shuo¡¯s body, he could see Han Shuo¡¯s ambition. Moreover, an intense viciousness could be felt from Han Shuo and he was definitely not a kindly, amiable person like Karel no matter how you looked. Once he followed Han Shuo, it looks like he would definitely resume his old trade and be involved in some shady business.

    However, Karel was unable to provide what he wanted. But Han Shuo could. Furthermore,paring the benevolent good-natured sacred swordmaster Karel and the vicious youngster, Han Shuo seemed more to his liking instead.

    Bonds whose hands have been covered in blood recalled fondly the wonderful feeling of ughter. Stemming from his unrestrained delving into killing intent, he had be addicted to ughter, unable to extricate himself. Even after staying by Karel¡¯s side for many years, Bonds still could not forget that feeling. Han Shuo¡¯s appearance presented him with an alternative path ¨C a path that he had been longing for!

    Hesitating between rationality and enticement, Bonds was unable to immediately make a decision. In the end, he said to Han Shuo, ¡°I will carefully consider your proposal, I will look for you when I¡¯ve made a decision.¡±

    ¡°No matter what you decide, I will respect your decision.¡± Han Shuo smiled as he replied.

    Before Bonds left, he suddenly thought of something. He turned his head toward Han Shuo, asking, ¡°What is the name of this branch of martial skills that you practice?¡±

    ¡°Sky Demon Gate!¡±

    ¡°Sky Demon Gate... Sky Demon Gate, I¡¯ll remember it!¡± Bonds muttered to himself, turning and leaping onto the roof before vanishing in the blink of an eye.

    ¡°Heh heh, once you enter the path of demons, you never be able to leave from my control. Karel, Karel, it¡¯s not that I intentionally want to snatch your subordinate. In reality, you are simply unable to properly instruct such a talent.¡± After Bonds left, Han Shuo muttered to himself, feeling immensely pleased.

    Within the Duke¡¯s mansion.

    Today, Duke Ashburn secretly met with a few special guests, a group of clerics belonging to the Church of Light.

    The Church of Light¡¯s Red Archbishop Kosse, who was based in the Lancelot Kingdom, as well as a few Temple Knights and White Priests were chatting happily with Duke Ashburn and eldest prince Charles within Duke Ashburn¡¯s mansion.

    The Church of Light was viewed as the religious organization with thergest influence in the whole continent. In the Profound Continent, many countries had various kinds of military organizations. Any country with a Temple of Light would have the protection of Temple Knights. The number of Temple Knights varied depending on the size of the temple.

    Within the Oden Kingdom where the Church of Light was headquartered at, the Temple of Light possessed a regiment of ten thousand Temple Knights. All these years, there always existed tenrge knight regiments with the continent. The Church of Light¡¯s Temple Knights have always had an impressive reputation. It is even rumored in the outside world that the Temple Knight regiment was the strongest knight regiment in the whole continent.

    Furthermore, numerous figures in the Church of Light simrly had astonishing strength. For example, a character like Red Archbishop Kosse, who possessed a divine artifact, was a nightmare to anyone, especially darkness magicians and necromancers. Once they met the divine artifact-wielding Red Archbishop Kosse, it would basically allow Kosse to proim the might of the God of Light, proving their lowliness. The Church¡¯s strength in the Profound Continent was unfathomablyrge. Faith was the vaguest and the hardest thing toprehend. Often, it could cause an ordinary person to be fanatic and prejudiced and then doing unreasonable things. The Church of Light was an expert in exploiting the strength of faith, causing both the ignorant masses and nobility to be prejudiced, not necessarily in a proper orientation.

    Within the Lancelot Kingdom, the strength of the Church of Light simrly not be underestimated. Every city in the Lancelot Kingdom had a temple of the Church of Light. ces with a Temple of Light would naturally have the armed forces from the Church of Light. The private forces thatpletely worshiped the God of Light was, in fact, a factor of instability to any kingdom.

    However, perhaps it¡¯s due to the Church of Light¡¯s influence being toorge, in any country, the private forces of the Church of Light was actually awful existence. This stemmed from the thoughts and demands in worshipping the God of Light. Even Lancelot Kingdom¡¯s King Uhtred epted this tacitly.

    Fortunately, the Church of Light wasn¡¯t the principal church in the Lancelot Kingdom.The people also worshiped the Goddess of Nature, the Goddess of Ice and Snow as well as other deities. These numerous churches were distributed across every city in the Lancelot Kingdom, but were unable to shake the foundation of the kingdom.

    Now that the Lancelot Kingdom is caught up in the struggle for power by the various princes, it is inevitable that religions choose a candidate to support. The correct choice would bring immediate benefits to their church. For the possibility to be the only religion within the Lancelot Kingdom, Kosse had precisely eyed eldest prince Charles. That was why he would appear within Duke Ashburn¡¯s residence.

    The support of the enormous Church of Light was naturally a joyous affair for Duke Ashburn. Eldest prince Charles was simrly overjoyed. As an orthodox knight, he already had a favorable impression of the Church of Light. When the Church of Light nned to support him, this favorable impression naturally increased many times over.

    Both sides were perfectly contented regarding the discussion of the pledges of power and the provision of assistance, satisfied with the coboration. As Duke Ashburn and eldest prince Charles showed their hospitality to the clerics, Kosse suddenly sighed before saying, ¡°How does Lord Duke view Brettel City¡¯s Count Bryan?¡±

    ¡°He is just a lucky guy who curries favor as he schemes for profits. In addition, this fellow has no foresight. I believe his happy days will soon be over.¡± Duke Ashburn¡¯s face darkened as he lightly smiled, giving his judgment of Han Shuo.

    ¡°Lord Duke is mistaken. That person is definitely not easy to deal with. That person has the backing of the Cmity Church. Being our old adversaries that have hiddenly fought against our Church of Light for hundreds of years, we are fully aware of the fearsomeness of the Cmity Church. To be honest with you, I¡¯ve previously acted personally, bringing a few Temple Knights to seize said person. Yet, I returned in failure twice and was even injured.¡± At this point, Kosse sighed again, before continuing, ¡°The pontiff has instructed that our members within the Lancelot Kingdom should disregard all costs in eliminating this person. I hope Lord Duke will be able to help us.¡±

    When Kosse mentioned the Cmity Church, both Duke Ashburn and eldest prince Charles¡¯s expression suddenly became a little unsightly. A high-ranked noble like Duke Ashburn naturally knew of the existence of the Cmity Church. They were a demonicir that gathered true fiends. Duke Ashburn could never have thought that Han Shuo actually had such an origin. This made Duke Ashburn a little apprehensive.

    However, Duke Ashburn and eldest prince Charles had made a move previously. Both of them believed that Han Shuo was already aware of that. Regardless if it¡¯s Han Shuo himself or the Cmity Church, both parties were ruthless and would settle their grievances. Hence, both of them understood that they had already be mortal enemies with Han Shuo.

    Although the Cmity Church was infamous, the Church of Light was capable of suppressing the Cmity Church in their few hundred years of battle. That was sufficient in proving that the Church of Light was simrly a powerful religious organization. When he heard Kosse mentioning his intention to eliminate Han Shuo, Ashburn immediately replied frankly, ¡°We have tried previously, however it ended in failure. This person supports that illegitimate child, I believe sooner orter he would be at death¡¯s door. Mister Kosse¡¯s opinion is to eliminate him earlier?¡±

    Nodding his head, Red Archbishop Kosse sighed as he said, ¡°This person is the cause of the Profound Continent¡¯s instability. His existence would bring about disaster to the Profound Continent. The Church of Light¡¯s goal all along is precisely to eliminate all existences within the continent that defied the will of God. He is precisely the target that we need to immediately get rid off.¡± ¡°In that case, Lord Bishop, what is your n?¡± Duke Ashburn seized the moment when Kosse ended his emotional statement to question closely.

    ¡°I have a n. However, I need both of you to assist me...¡± , Red Archbishop Kosse nodded as he started describing his intention to the two of them.

 Chapter 383: The other world

    Chapter 383: The other world

    Ossen City. Han Shuo¡¯s official residence.

    Within a secret room, Han Shou grasped the skeletal staff, chanting the incantation for necromancy. After a long and tedious section of incantation, a mummy lord stood before Han Shuo. The mummy lord was stupefied as it inspected Han Shuo, the entire secret room suddenly filled with the deathly scent emitted from its body.

    Of the three summoning spells at grand magus level, Han Shuo has already mastered two of them. He is able to proficiently summon old fey demons and mummy lords, only left with the spell for bone demons. As he still didn¡¯t really understand the characteristics of the bone demon¡¯s bodyposition, Han Shuo temporarily still could seed in summoning a bone demon into this world.

    With an order, the mummy lord unwillingly wielded the ancient strips of cloth that twisted around its body, moving its body in ordance to Han Shuo¡¯s directions.

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo knew that he thoroughly grasped the summoning of the mummy lord. Han Shuo then chanted another spell and with a wave of the white bone staff, the mummy lord returned back to theherworld.

    Keeping the white bone staff, Han Shuo then took out the skeletal staff obtained from the Cemetery of Death. Fiddling with the skeletal staff in his hand, Han Shuo hesitated for a while, intending to use the skeletal staff to summon the old fey demon and mummy lord.

    This skeletal staff was different from the white bone staff. Chanting necromancy while holding the skeletal staff would often result in the might of the summoning spell to be doubled. When Han Shuo used the white bone staff, he could save a little mental strength but he would be unable to summon two old fey demons to the Profound Continent.

    However, if it was channeling the necromancy spell through the skeletal staff, he should be able to momentarily search for two old fey demons. Han Shuo had the experience of using the skeletal staff when summoning evil knights. He believed that old fey demons were perhaps the same as the evil knights and he could simrly summon two old fey demons.

    Han Shuo hesitated for a moment, before starting to chant the necromancy spell to summon old fey demons. When Han Shuo¡¯s spell connected with theherworld and the chanting reached the section to search for old fey demons, Han Shuo¡¯s mental space suddenly felt the two targets that were separated by a long distance.

    These two targets were old fey demons. However, there was a iparable distance between the two old fey demons. In the same moment, both old fey demons felt Han Shuo¡¯s presence. When the feeling of their freedom being threatened entered their souls, the two old fey demons instinctively struggled.

    Han Shuo was startled, fixing his mental strength on suppressing one old fey demon as they were too far apart. Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength couldn¡¯t handle both old fey demons at once, their frantic resistance causing him to get a little dizzy. This was the reason why Han Shuo¡¯s suppression became quite strenuous.

    At this moment, Han Shuo understood that he had neglected an important issue. The personality of old fey demons were vastly different from that of evil knights. Although evil knights were simrly high ranked undead creatures, there were numerous undead creatures in theherworld. In addition, evil knights were considered to still prefer living in a group. When Han Shuo used the skeletal staff to summon evil knights, they would often be from the same location, locating two or three evil knights and then summoning them to the Profound Continent.

    However, old fey demons were an even higher ranked existence and their numbers in theherworld were much lesser than evil knights. Furthermore, as high ranked existences, old fey demons dwelled in separate locations, bing the master of that location. Basically, it highly unlikely for two old fey demons to live together in the same area.

    Han Shuo had precisely overlooked this point. When the spell channeled through the skeletal staff, it immediately sensed two old fey demons were five thousand kilometers apart. As the two old fey demons were too far apart, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t handle both of them at the same time. Old fey demons were also undead creatures with a formidable soul. When Han Shuo focused on one old fey demon, the other old fey demon suddenly revolted, causing Han Shuo to be somewhat unable to suppress it with his mental strength.

    This situation happened too quickly. A necromancy summoning didn¡¯t take long. Because Han Shuo didn¡¯t anticipate such as a situation at the beginning, he simply didn¡¯t have the means to handle it at short notice. When the two old fey demons sensed that Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength was in slight disorder, they frantically resisted further.

    There was a sudden sharp pain in his mind. Distracted, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was a little routed and he felt himself actually bing a strand of peculiar existence. Under the pull from the souls of the two old fey demons, he traversed the spacetime tunnel, arriving at the unknownherworld.

    Han Shuo had had the same experience once. Now that it happened a second time, Han Shuo immediately reacted, his mental strength tenaciously wrapped around that strand of consciousness to prevent harmful substances within the spacetime tunnel from intruding as he involuntarily descended to the world filled with deathly stillness and mystery.

    Within the world which seemed forever monochrome, a thick stationaryyer of grey clouds obstructed the horizon. This ce was filled with swamps everywhere, as well as deathly still forests that were formed fromrge withered trees. These withered trees seemed to have gone through thousands of years of decay and had long since been void of any moisture or nutrients. There were even ash grey colored spider webs suspended from the tree trunks, with many bizarre tiny undead creatures wiggling on the spiderweb.

    Within the swamps which were all over, the aura of death pervade everywhere. The swamps gave off weird bubbles and from time to time, one or two zombies will rigidly climb out of the swamps and then proceed to aimlessly roam the vast silentherworld.

    Theherworld was the final destination of departed spirits. Over the millions of years, the perpetual deathly qi continuously produced various kinds of undead creatures. When an undead creature disappears, the death qi from its body would return to this world, go through many years of bizarre evolution before once again forming another undead creature.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was gradually restored. Han Shuo slowly observed the deathly still area that was covered with swamps. During his observation, Han Shuo tried to absorb the deathly qi from the Cemetery of Death and condense a body that is visible yetcking in form for himself. However, Han Shuo¡¯s whole body was drifting in the air.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo felt the existence of the little skeleton and the zombies. They were in a region far away, but Han Shuo was able to distinctly sense their existence. As for the three evil knights that were refinedter, he could only sense a faint dot.

    Howl... ¡°Petty existence, you have intruded into my world without permission, I want you to suffer the burn of my fury.¡± a shrill voice filled with iparable anger suddenly rang in Han Shuo¡¯s ears. This voice was filled with the roar of ire, scaring Han Shuo greatly.

    With a sudden reaction to his consciousness, Han Shuo felt a shadow rapidly approaching from his left. Han Shuo watched attentively as one of the old fey demons that he had just attempted to summon unexpectedly appeared. The surroundings of the old fey demon were filled with hundreds of low ranking undead creatures. Among them were ghouls, skeleton knights, zombies and three hate warriors.

    It looks like this old fey demon should be the overlord of this area. He still remembered the aura on Han Shuo¡¯s body and when he suddenly realised Han Shuo¡¯s soul appearing within his territory, the old fey demon was incessantly furious, immediately following Han Shuo¡¯s aura that he just sensed and angrily rushed toward Han Shuo.

    In theherworld, the old fey demon could disy its strength as much as it wanted. The rich omnipresent death qi could supply him with sufficient energy. However, for Han Shuo whose consciousness has entered this world, he could not utilise his demonic arts without a physical body and could only utilise his consciousness and necromancy magic to attack.

    Seeing the old fey demon ferociously charging over while brandishing its sharp ws that could rip through iron and stone, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness suddenly locked onto the old fey demon¡¯s body, unleashing a Soul Tremor.

    Bang!

    The old fey demon¡¯s soul that was midair seemed to be heavily hammered on, the sharp pain momentarily spreading to the deepest parts of his soul. Without waiting for the old fey demon to react, many bone spears attacked through the sky, causing the old fey demon to stumble as he dodged. Another Soul Tremor followed immediately, the old fey demon was momentarily dazed.

    However in this other world, the old fey demon had sufficient death qi to utilise, and its soul was extremely formidable. Although Han Shuo¡¯s Soul Tremor attack was able to cause enormous harm to the old fey demon, it was unable to truly kill it. Furthermore, the bone spears were only able to leave shallow white scars on the old fey demon¡¯s body, unable to pierce this high ranking undead creature.

    In such a ce, Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength was exhaustible. Prolonging such as situation, Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength will definitely be used up. At that moment, he would not be able to contain the old fey demon. This high ranking old fey demon would definitely be able to destroy Han Shuo¡¯s soul that had descended to such a ce.

    After the row of bone spears and Soul Tremor, a bone prison formed suddenly, temporarily imprisoning the old fey demon within. Han Shuo saw that the old fey demon did not have any reaction to the Soul Tremor magic and didn¡¯t continue staying in this area, his visible yet immaterial body quickly floated into the distance, resembling an ordinary wraith in theherworld.

    Within theherworld¡¯s overcast sky, there would often be wraiths floating about. These wraiths only had the simplest of consciousness and usually became food for higher ranked undead creatures. They were also the nutrient that Han Shuo used in refining some of his demonic creatures. Han Shuo never though that one day he would enter theherworld and actually be besieged by wraiths.

    Five white misty wraiths suddenly surrounded Han Shuo. These five wraiths sensed that Han Shuo had a different aura from them and attempted to attack Han Shuo as though he was a mutated being.

    When Han Shuo who was visible but had not material body saw the five wraiths approaching, he could sense their ill intentions revealed by their simple consciousness. Han Shuo gathered a small amount of mental strength, unleashing the Soul Tremor magic. With a poof, the five wraiths were turned into grey smoke, bing death qi and returning to the earth.

    The rows of wraiths that were further way felt the momentarily explosion of power from Han Shuo, immediately ssifying Han Shuo as a high ranked undead creature and kept far away from Han Shuo. None of the wraiths dared to approach Han Shuo any more.

    At a towering barren mountain peak an unknown distance away from han Shuo, there was a magestic undead pce. Within a lofty pce where there were strict rankings, on the highest respected tform, the little skeleton sat upright on an enormous throne filled with sharp spikes (TL note: Game of thrones reference?) By his side were the earth zombie, fire zombie, wood zombie and the seemingly timid water zombie.

    Beneath the little skeleton were six evil knights and two bone demons as well as the previously subdued mummy lord. They all knelt on one knee with their heads lowered towards the little skeleton.

    On the pce¡¯s cold ceiling hung the bone demon that was remodelled by little skeleton with the ability to fly as well as numerous gargoyles that curled their bodies and stood in ce silently.

    Behind the few evil knights were a few stupied hate warriors and zombie warriors. They resembled conscientious bodyguards, devotedly standing upright, as though willing to risk their lives for the little skeleton at any moment.

    ¡°My lord, why do you need to depart?¡± The previously subdued mummy lord humbly inquired with his head lowered.

    ¡°All of you, help me properly look after this ce. I¡¯ll be back very soon.¡± The little skeleton had yet to answer, only giving orders as a superior. ¡°The powerful existence from the eastern dead sea mighte in the near future. All of you guard this ce, do not attack others while I¡¯m not around.¡±

    ¡°Understood, my lord!¡± The high ranked undead creatures all replied deferentially. Facing the fiercer little skeleton, they who were previously lords of an area couldn¡¯t help but lower their proud heads.

    ¡°You can withdraw. Properly guard your respective territories!¡± The little skeleton imposingly conveyed his intention. Apart from the three evil knights that had been refined by Han Shuo¡¯s demonic magic, the other evil knights and mummy lords all withdrew after receiving the orders.

    ¡°Father hase here. This world isn¡¯t the same as the material world. Without a corporeal body, Father would possibly run into danger, I must go and protect him!¡± The little skeleton said to the earth zombie and the others after the subordinates have withdrawn.

    ¡°We¡¯ll go too!¡± The earth zombie touched its head, simple-mindedly saying, ¡°We want to see Father in this world too.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s out of the question. You need to stay here and look after our home. With their strength, those subordinates would find it hard to ensure the safety of this ce. I only trust you guys. This is because we have inherited the same bloodline!¡± The little skeleton instructed, before saying, ¡°Be at ease. When i find Father, I¡¯ll bring him over.¡±

    With that sentence, the flying bone demon that was hanging upside down at the top of the hall suddenly spread its wings and soared in front of the little skeleton. The seven bone spurs on the little skeleton¡¯s back trembled, shooting into the body of the already remodeled bone demon. The huge wings of the bone demon made of meshed rotting flesh pped once, bringing the little skeleton away from the summit of the towering death mountain.

 Chapter 384: Comprehending the netherworld

    GDK 384 ¨C Comprehension in theherworld

    The vastherworld, eternally a monotonous grey, various sorts and varieties of undead creatures engaged in never-endingbat, void of any signs of life.

    In this ce, there was no alternating day and night, no sense of time passing, only deathly stillness and bleak coldness. On the deste earth under the grey sky, the undead creaturesplied with ancient teachings, unceasingly scrambling for a more extensive territory. However, they were unaware of the reason for all of this.

    Han Shuo followed the connection he had with the little skeleton, drifting like a spirit in the little skeleton¡¯s direction. As there wasn¡¯t a concept of time, Han Shuo didn¡¯t know how long he had been in this world. As he headed toward the little skeleton, Han Shuo came across many different kinds of undead creatures.

    Many of the undead creatures had extended their sharp ws toward Han Shuo, attempting to swallow Han Shuo who appeared weak. Facing Han Shuo¡¯s Soul Tremor magic, the low ranked undead creatures were usually destroyed by the magic that directly attacked the soul.

    As for higher ranked undead creatures, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was able to sense the existence. By means of his sensing ability, Han Shuo was able to determine the strength of those undead creatures and actively avoid the ancient undead creatures, detouring around their territories as he continued in the direction of the little skeleton.

    After what seemed to be quite some time, Han Shuo felt the distance between the little skeleton and him bing closer and closer. Furthermore, with the connection between the two of them, he became aware that the little skeleton was currently rushing toward him. This made Han Shuo feel touched, moved that even without any orders, due to its worry for him, the little skeleton had travelled from far away just to find him.

    In theherworld where the death qi was iparably rich, Han Shuo who was in the form of a ghost was constantly tempering his mental strength, attempting to manipte this world¡¯s death qi through his demonic powers. Gradually, Han Shuo even discovered some insights.

    Demonic magic was famous for being able to live forever as long as their consciousness wasn¡¯tpletely destroyed. In the separate demon realm, cultivator¡¯s souls would be consciousnesses, possessing many extraordinary uses. Even if a demonic practitioner¡¯s corporeal body is destroyed, as long as the consciousness is strong enough to attach onto another physical body, the practitioner can use this new body to practice demonic magic once again. They would only require to spend a hundred years to regain their previous strength.

    Being transported into this bizarre world, Han Shuo searched for a way to return to the Profound Continent, as well as using this strand of consciousness to seek a way to increase his own strength. Before he could find the method in returning to the Profound Continent, Han Shuo first needed to ensure he could survive in this foreign world.

    Slowly, Han Shuo¡¯s existing consciousness had a strange reaction to the death qi. As Han Shuo continued experimenting, he was now totally able to absorb and manipte the omnipresent death qi in this world, so much so that he could even form weapons from the death qi to attack the undead creatures that had ill intentions.

    At the start, Han Shuo could only condense the death qi into the form of arrows and control the arrows with his consciousness. This was only threatening toward the low ranked skeleton warriors and zombie warriors and wasn¡¯t evenparable to the simple bone spear spell. As Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness gradually understood the uses of the death qi, he could nowpletely utilise his consciousness to condense formidable attacks as long as he is given time. The strength of these attacks could even surpass Han Shuo¡¯s Soul Tremor.

    As a few days passed, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness could gradually condense the death qi to give rise to more clever uses. Han Shuo even experimented with a skeleton remains of excellent quality, condensing the death qi within the bones and forging a skeletal body for himself.

    Contained within the pure white skeleton was the death qi condensed by Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. Under the reckless suppression of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, the death qi became crystal-like spots hidden within the bones. However, the quality of the remains of an ordinary skeleton warrior wasn¡¯t much. When Han Shuo tried to condense even more death qi within the bones, they weren¡¯t able to withstand the death qi and thus exploded.

    Utilizing this sparkling jade like skeletal remains, Han Shuo was able to intimidate many undead creatures that attempted to attack him. Even a few high ranked evil knights who saw Han Shuo¡¯s huge skeleton that glittered with white light withdrew with dread.

    The evil knights clearly took Han Shuo¡¯s jade-like skeleton as a skeleton king which was at the peak of undead creatures. Skeleton kings as well as bone dragons were peak existences among undead creatures. A skeleton king¡¯s body contained iparably rich death qi and posses terrifying strength. Weak undead creatures were simply not its match.

    However, Han Shuo knew that purely using death qi to condense a skeletal body would definitely pale in contrast to a skeleton king¡¯s body and would even be much weaker than the bones on a bone demon. Yet, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t discouraged, continuing to silently delve into the uses of his consciousness in this world as he searched for a way to return to the Profound Continent. He also felt that the distance between the little skeleton and himself was getting closer and closer.

    As Han Shuo passed through an overgrown valley shrouded in rich death qi, his consciousness suddenly detected a few formidable auras. These auras were abnormally chaotic and unstable, as though currently engaged in a huge battle. In the surrounds were many low ranked undead creatures fighting against one another, clearly originating from different factions.

    Looking at the overgrown valley from afar, Han Shuo noticed clouds of dense blue qi within the rich death qi. These blue qi rose in spirals, slowly diffusing from within the valley. Some of the low ranked undead creatures who were battling extended their necks to absorb the blue clouds of gas as though they were an exquisite feast.

    In this desteherworld, there rarely appeared colors that weren¡¯t monochrome. In the period of time that Han Shuo has been in this world, this was the first time he saw a blue color existing. This made Han Shuo feel astonished, as he look toward the magnificent battle. As he sensed thebat between the few auras inside the valley, Han Shuo had some suspicions of the scene within.

    While Han Shuo was being puzzled, the dense blue qi had slowly spread to the area where Han Shuo was in. The wisps of blue qi entered Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, the mental energy that had been consumed seemed to be replenished, recovering little by little.

    Han Shuo was incessantly surprised. Originally, he only allowed the dense blue qi that touched him to seep into his body. However, when Han Shuo felt the benefits the blue qi gave to the mental strength of his consciousness, he immediately started operating his consciousness, analyzing the blue qi within the valley and using the strength of his consciousness to slowly draw the blue qi towards himself.

    This period of time, Han Shuo spent everyday researching how to utilise the strength of his consciousness to manipte the rich death qi that was everywhere in this world. Toward this blue qi which was of apletely different nature, but yet had the same characteristics as the qi in theherworld, Han Shuo very quickly found the trick in sucking in the blue qi.

    When Han Shuo went all out in operating his consciousness, arge portion of death qi that diffused out from the heart of the valley was subjected to the pull from Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, slowly entering him. Han Shuo¡¯s originally exhaused mental strength gradually recovered following the absorption of the blue qi.

    The numerous undead creatures in the surroundings of the valley were still engaged in intense battle. The grey earth was covered in broken bones and rotting flesh. Under the orders of their respective masters, these low ranked undead creatures recklessly fought with each other, yet didn¡¯t forget to avariciously absorb the strands of drifting dense blue qi.

    With a moment of effort, Han Shuo utilised his consciousness to absorbrge amounts of blue qi, recovering 80% of his mental strength. There was no longer any more blue qi spreading out from the heart of the valley and the blue qi that was further away were either absorbed by the numerous undead creatures or had vanished.

    In the form of a pure white skeleton, Han Shuo stood in an area extremely far from the valley. After hesitating for a moment, he suddenly headed for the heart of the valley. At the same time, Han Shuo could sense that the little skeleton was getting nearer and nearer.

    Han Shuo felt from the cloud of dense blue qi that permeated out that there must be a mysterious item in the heart of the valley. An item that could grow one¡¯s mental strength was rarely heard of in the Profound Continent. Han Shuo never would have thought that in this foreign eternally deste other world would actually have such an extraordinary item.

    What made Han Shuo more apprehensive was that when Han Shuo absorbed the dense blue qi, there was actually an indistinct familiar feeling. At the start, Han Shuo didn¡¯t react, only reacting he stopped absorbing after the dense blue qi no longer spread from within the valley.

    Apparently when he was previously beneath the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo had absorbed some kind of special energy which made his mental strength grow substantially. The feeling he had when he absorbed that energy was simr to when he was absorbing the dense blue qi. However, previous that energy was boundless, directly allowing Han Shuo to possess the mental strength of a grand magus. When he had just absorbed the dense blue qi, it fell way short of that energy but it definitely had a simr aura.

    ¡°Who knows what item is within the valley that is actually able to give off such a mysterious blue qi!¡±

    It was precisely this suspicion that led Han Shuo to still decide to go into the valley and investigate, even though he sensed a few undead creatures that could threaten his existence.

    The jade-like white skeletal body wasrger than ordinary skeleton warriors. At approximately 1.8m tall, it currently headed toward the source of the battle. Along the way, many low ranked skeleton and zombie warriors immediately divided a portion of their forces to attack Han Shuo¡¯s condensed body when they noticed another enemy faction approaching.

    En route, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness started manipting death qi. When the skeleton warriors and zombie warriors have crowded around, a crescent shaped greyish-white light beam condensed purely from death qi suddenly shot out from the front of hisrge skeletal body.

    The more than ten skeleton warriors and zombie warriors that were the first to crowd around were struck by the condensed light beam, their frail souls were unable to bear the power, copsing in session and dissipating. With a wave of cracking sounds, the bones of the skeleton warriors fell apart, the zombie warriors had also be heaps of rotting flesh and falling over.

    A light beam condensed from death qi shed past, more than ten skeleton warriors and zombie warriors copsed. Another group of skeleton warriors and zombie warriors which had intended toe over paused for a moment. Under the powerful strength that Han Shuo deliberately released, they realised this skeleton warrior was muchrger, its bones were more sparkly and translucent different from their own bodies.

    Of these low ranked undead creatures, many of them had never seen a skeleton king. However, from the moment they were born, there was an imprint of this high ranked undead creature on their soul. When they examined the body Han Shuo condensed carefully, they mistook Han Shuo as the skeleton king at the peak of all undead creatures.

    A path suddenly appeared voluntarily. These undead creatures still fought with each other, but not one undead creature dared to intercept Han Shuo anymore, as though ignoring Han Shuo¡¯s existence.

    However, Han Shuo knew this was their instinctive reaction toward high ranked undead creatures. The voluntarily formed path directly lead to the depths of the valley. These low ranked undead creatures knew Han Shuo¡¯s objective was the depths of the valley. They expectedly provided a clear passage.

    ¡°ng... ng...¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness controlled this condensed skeletal body, heading toward the valley a step at a time. The surrounding undead creatures still fought furiously, but not one undead creature got in Han Shuo¡¯s way.

    At the center of the valley, the few formidable undead creatures still fought against each other. Han Shuo was able to sense their vast strength. As he entered deep into the valley, Han Shuo gradually slowed his steps, starting to cautiously size up the situation all around, preparing to immediately depart in an unfavourable situation.

    The surroundings were filled with even more undead creatures that incessantly fought. As there were many hate warriors and a few evil knights mixed within the undead creatures here, Han Shuo knew that he was already approaching his target. Han Shuo deliberately released an unyielding posture as he passed through these higher ranked undead creatures, finally entering the heart of the valley. A clear, pitch-ck spring immediately entered Han Shuo¡¯s sight, a sinister looking nt floating on the spring. It had many branches that were spread out, appearing menacing yet devilishly beautiful like a man-eating flower. Its branches and leaves appeared like countless withered hands, propping a cloud of blue smoke. Within the blue smoke, there was an eyeball sized teardrop simr to a sapphire, shooting out resplendent, bizarre light.

 Chapter 385: Evolution of undead creatures

    GDK 385 ¨C Evolution of undead creatures

    In this monochromatic world, Han Shuo was truly stunned when he first nced at that vibrant color.

    In the middle of the pitch-ck spring, that sinister-looking nt¡¯s lushwork of withered branches propped up a hazy cloud of blue gas. Within the cloud, a drop of sapphire-shaped resplendent teardrop gave off an even more magnificent radiance.

    Han Shuo was sure that the blue gas that had previously spread out from within the valley should have originated from the nt in the middle of the spring. From Han Shuo¡¯s perspective, he could clearly see that the blue gas had originated from the revolving teardrop in the middle of the blue cloud.

    The pitch-ck spring was brimming with destion and deathly stillness. Organisms being nurtured from this sort of weird spring would definitely be fierce undead creatures or nts and there certainly would not be any amicable existences.

    Han Shuo carefully examined the ck spring, realising that there were many seaweed-like ck nts floating within the spring. These nts had blended into the spring, the tentacle like streamers spreading in the constant sway of the spring water, appearing like they want to capture something and pull it into the depths of the spring.

    Once he had finished observing theyout of the center of the valley, Han Shuo¡¯s line of sight started looking indiscriminately around the spring. Only now did he notice several undead creatures battling in the vicinity of the ck spring.

    A mummy lord, a floating apparition and a five to six meter tall knight that rode arge ming horse and brandishing a broadsword. These three high ranked undead creatures surrounded the spring in the middle as they engaged one another in intensebat.

    Han Shuo had only swept his eyes over, his attention concentrated on that huge knight that rode therge ming horse. The huge knight held a gigantic broadsword which was full of rusted spots. The broadsword was over two meters in length and was brimming with a rotting aura. The huge knight¡¯s appearance resembled that of an evil knight. However, there were barbs that grew from around its arms, knees and shoulders. Its build was also much taller than an evil knight¡¯s.

    Han Shuo had some impression of this huge knight. A long time ago when the little skeleton was still quite weak, Han Shuo had once received the little skeleton¡¯s distress message. At that time, Han Shuo immediately summoned the little skeleton to the Profound Continent out of worry. However, through the strength of their contract, Han Shuo still faintly saw the formidable undead creature that was chasing the little skeleton. That formidable undead creature was precisely this huge knight.

    For this peculiar knight to be able to force the little skeleton to flee theherworld, its strength was naturally extremely valiant. Han Shuo would never have imagined that he would meet this formidable undead creature in theherworld. The mummy lord and the floating apparition had joined hands in facing this huge knight. Han Shuo was iparably familiar with a mummy lord. However, the floating apparition was rather unfamiliar to him.

    What made Han Shuo extremely astonished was that this mummy lord carried a greyish white sarcophagus which wasrge enough to fit his entire body. This mummy lord clearly wielded that sarcophagus as a weapon, proficiently manipting the sarcophagus to face the enemy. The majority of the strikes from the terrifying knight¡¯s two meter long broadsword were blocked by the sarcophagus.

    As for that floating apparition, Han Shuo did not know at all what undead creature it was. However, Han Shuo could sense from its body the aura of the mostmon undead creature in theherworld, the wraith. Merely, the aura on the apparition was exponentially stronger than that of a wraith.

    The floating apparition constantly hid behind the mummy lord, behaving like a magician in the Profound Continent, utilising profound magic to attack that huge knight. Ripples of grey magic shot out in waves from the apparition¡¯s direction, attacking the huge knight¡¯s body.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s attentive gaze, the knight¡¯s two meter long rusted broadsword suddenly thrusted. The carrion belt in the mummy lord¡¯s hands moved, the sarcophagus floating above his head striking towards that broadsword. At this moment, there was a terrifying boom when the knight¡¯s broadsword struck the sarcophagus and the sarcophagus suddenly flew up into the air.

    The knight took the opportunity to urge the ming horse toward the mummy lord. The ming horse suddenly breathed out a spout of mes that rolled toward the mummy lord. The mummy lord was obviously a little frantic as the sarcophagus flying above his head couldn¡¯t be moved so quickly.

    At this moment, the floating apparition behind him suddenly transmitted a bizarre soul undtion. Countless wraiths suddenly swam out from within the apparition¡¯s body, forming a tidy formation and blocking the me breath. It simply utilised many wraiths to drown out the mes from the ming horse.

    The apparition had obstructed the ming horse¡¯s me breath and the sarcophagus that flew into the sky had also been caught by the mummy lord, just in time to block the evil knight¡¯s next attack. The three undead creatures continued fighting once again, being tangled in a stalemate.

    The low ranked undead creatures were still fighting ferociously in Han Shuo¡¯s surroundings. These undead creatures clearly felt the formidable aura from Han Shuo¡¯s body, but all of them ignored Han Shuo¡¯s existence. This allowed Han Shuo to peacefully watch the battle, taking in the whole scene of the battle between the three unusual undead creatures

    Han Shuo stared at that floating apparition for a long time before he suddenly understood. To be able to control that many wraiths and also carry the aura of wraiths on its body, the apparition was surely a high ranked undead creature that had evolved from wraiths. That particrly queer huge knight was most likely an evolution from an evil knight.

    In theherworld where ranks were rigid, most higher ranked creatures possessed extremelyrge fighting strengths. However, this was not absolute. Lower ranked undead creatures had the possibility of undergoing evolution and be high ranked undead creatures as well. For example, the majority of skeleton kings that could be as strong as a bone dragon had fortuitous urrences and were naturally produced. However, there were also skeleton kings which could have been the lowliest skeleton that underwent countless evolutions.

    Although the probability was extremely small, it existed. Spirits in theherworld could swallow each other. If low ranked undead creatures were able to swallow the spirit of a formidable bone dragon, they could substantially improve a few stages. Merely, this probability was extremely low. Typically, weaker undead creatures would only instinctively escape when facing someone higher ranked than them. They would never dare to attack unless they had a master and only under their master¡¯s orders would they disregard their lives and attack.

    However, even if they attacked, when facing a higher ranked undead creature, there would never be any flukes and would definitely be massacred, let alone being able to swallow the spiritual strength of a higher ranked undead creature. Most of the low ranked undead creatures that were able to evolve had coincidentallye across high ranked undead creatures that were almost killed by even stronger undead creatures. While the even stronger undead creature had not arrived, they were then able to conveniently swallow the spirit of the higher ranked undead creature.

    Taking the formidable bone dragon as an example, it could kill or seriously injure a group of hate warriors with one breath. The spirits of these lower ranked undead creatures were of no interest to the bone dragon. If there just happened to be a skeleton or zombie warrior in the vicinity after the bone dragon left, they would be able to conveniently devour a higher ranked hate warrior¡¯s spirit.

    When such a low probability matter repeatedly happens on a low ranked undead creature, the low ranked undead creature that had swallowed the spirits of many high ranked undead creatures would be able to gradually evolve and be a high ranked undead creature that surpassed its birth restrictions. This apparition was perhaps an example of such an existence that had extremely astonishing luck.

    Han Shuo looked at the alliance of the apparition and the mummy lord withstanding the knight¡¯s assault and then looked at the sapphire-like teardrop which contained bizarre energy that was being propped in the middle of the spring by sinister-looking ntswork of branches. His thoughts were filled with indecision, not knowing if he should take advantage of the situation to obtain the teardrop.

    The three formidable undead creatures appeared to also be fighting over that drop of liquid in the middle of the spring. The huge knight¡¯s strength was incredibly astonishing with Han Shuo¡¯s condensed body of the skeleton king probably unable to withstand a strike of that knight¡¯s broadsword. Furthermore, that apparition and mummy lord were also enemies. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t confident in handling them without having his true body.

    However, Han Shuo knew that the sapphire-like liquid in the middle of the spring was able to improve his mental strength. Such miraculous items were unheard of in the Profound Continent. To have reached this ce after much difficulty, the greed in his heart simply couldn¡¯t be contained. While Han Shuo was hesitating again and again, he sensed that little skeleton was closing in on his location.

    Suddenly, the knight that was in the midst of chasing the mummy lord and the apparition appeared extremely irritated. After continuously attacking frantically to no avail, the knight suddenly gave up and urged the ming horse toward the nt in the middle of the spring. The mummy lord and the apparition paused for a moment before hastily attacking the knight. The mummy lord¡¯s sarcophagus descended toward the knight with a loud rumble, while the apparition produced numerous wraiths that charged towards the huge knight.

    The huge knight did a sweep with his rusted broadsword. An earth-shattering rotting aura rippled out, abruptly annihting the numerous wraiths while the sarcophagus was struck into the air with his fist. After that, an imposing consciousness spread out from the huge knight, ¡°You two cowardly and despicable existences, that fellow from the Thousand Meter Dead Mountain Pce ising over. If you cooperate with me in getting rid of him, the luster gem within the dead water is yours. I only want that fellow¡¯s spiritual energy. What do you think?¡±

    When the mummy lord and the apparition saw the evil knight give up and transmit such an intention, they were obviously slightly unsettled. The two of them discussed for a while, before the apparition transmitted a faint message, ¡°Alright, the three of us shall make a vow to abide by this promise.¡±

    Han Shuo looked at the interaction between the three formidable undead creatures from afar. From their conversations, Han Shuo understood that therge knight sensed the little skeleton¡¯s existence and their tone indicated their fear of the little skeleton. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t have imagined that in thisherworld, the little skeleton of the Thousand Meter Dead Mountain Pce was actually such a huge power.

    The huge knight, the mummy lord and the apparition intended to ally due to their apprehension toward the little skeleton¡¯s existence. As these three fellows dared to stay behind and face the little skeleton, that showed that they should have some confidence. Han Shuo who had already been watching for a while from afar thought for a moment before walking out from within the crowd of low ranked undead creatures.

    ¡°Count me in as well.¡± Han Shuo sent a message through his consciousness, expressing his opinion to the three undead creatures.

    At the start, Han Shuo had only stood among the crowd of low ranked undead creatures in the surroundings of the valley. Having deliberately hidden as he watched, the three undead creatures that were constantly battling did not notice Han Shuo. When Han Shuo slowly walked out from the distance, he immediately caused the three undead creatures to panic.

    At first, the three undead creatures clearly lost their heads out of fear, being intimidated by Han Shuo¡¯s appearance as a skeleton king. However, these three formidable undead creatures were different from the low ranked undead creatures that gave way to Han Shuo. They could sense from the aura on Han Shuo¡¯s body that it wasn¡¯t identical to a skeleton king¡¯s aura as well as the aura on Han Shuo¡¯s body wasn¡¯t as frightening as that of a skeleton king¡¯s.

    After being startled, the huge knight reacted, sending Han Shuo a message, ¡°Cowardly voyeur, what can you contribute and what do you wish to obtain?¡±

    ¡°I want a third of the serene luster gem. I can aid you in dealing with that fellow.¡± Han Shuo replied through his consciousness.

    ¡°That would depend on your ability!¡± The knight sent an irascible message, driving the ming horse toward Han Shuo. The earth-shattering rotting aura spread out from his body, converging on the broadsword as it stabbed toward Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was stunned, frantically chanting spells, on one hand sending a spray of bone spears to attack the huge knight, on the other hand, using his consciousness to condense the rich death qi, forming a gigantic saber to smash toward the charging knight. When the spray of bone spearsnded on the huge knight¡¯s body, it only resulted in nking sounds, unable to harm the formidable knight. Only when that saber condensed from rich death qi smashed on the knight¡¯s broadsword did he obstruct his attack.

    Just as the knight avoided the spray of bone spears and had almost arrived in front of Han Shuo, he suddenly reined his horse, turning his head to look at the apparition and the mummy lord, transmitting, ¡°He has the qualifications to share a third of the luster gem, do the two of you have any opinion? The fellow from the Thousand Meter Death Mountain Pce is extremely frightening, there is more hope with an additional helper.¡±

    The two other undead creatures hesitated for a moment. But when considering the little skeleton¡¯s frightening deterrence and their interest of the serene luster gem, they ultimately agreedpletely with the huge knight¡¯s proposal, considering Han Shuo as an ally.

 Chapter 386: A stronger hidden expert

    GDK 386 ¨C A stronger hidden expert

    Once the three undead creatures agreed on Han Shuo¡¯s participation, Han Shuo immediately startedmunicating with the little skeleton. As the distance between them was bing shorter, Han Shuo could easily convey his thoughts to the little skeleton. The clever little skeleton who was currently flying over at high speed on a bone demonpletely understood Han Shuo¡¯s intention.

    When the three undead creatures saw that Han Shuo had agreed, they did not try to retrieve the serene luster gem in the middle of the ck spring. Instead, they spread out in front of the spring, ordering the surrounding low ranked undead creatures to stop fighting and to slowly encircle this location.

    There were two evil knights in the surroundings who slowly headed towards the huge knight that brandished the two meter broadsword, while a few hate warriors stood separately in front of the apparition and the mummy lord. They thoroughly guarded this area, intending to make this ce the resting grounds of the approaching little skeleton.

    A shrill whistle could be heard graduallying closer. Under the dusky sky, a huge shadow slowly approached. The wings connected to the variant bone demon¡¯s rotting corpse were five to six meters in length when fully extended. In addition, its whole body was covered with fearsome bone spears. This caused the bone demon that could fly to have ample deterring strength.

    More than ten sparkling white bones formed a cushion on the back of the flying bone demon. Seated on it was the little skeleton who held a long, sharp bone spear. Its Purple Demon Eye was filled with a glistening radiance while its small body gave off an imposing presence.

    The huge knight waved his rusted two meter long sword at the little skeleton who was flying over on the bone demon, spreading out his indignant consciousness, ¡°This time, you wouldn¡¯t be able to escape!¡±

    ¡°You are currently no longer a match for me. If you submit to me, I will spare your life!¡± When the little skeleton had arrived, he unyieldingly stayed in the air, looking down as he rode the bone demon, his dignified consciousness transmitted over.

    ¡°You can forget about that happening. I would rather let my soul be obliterated than to be your ve!¡± the knight roared. He then gave amand to his subordinates, ¡°Kill this wretched skeleton!¡±

    As the knight shouted out his orders, the mummy lord and the apparition also ordered their subordinates to attack. Hundreds upon hundreds of undead creatures were like a locust swarm as they charged toward the little skeleton and his bone demon mount. Among them were gargoyles that could fly, which formed groups and attacked in waves and were the first to charge towards the little skeleton with no fear of death.

    Looking down on the various low ranked undead creatures approaching, the little skeleton¡¯s Purple Demon Eye suddenly emitted purple light halos. They spread out like waves of running water from his Purple Demon Eye, gradually covering the surrounding area around the little skeleton. The whole area was filled with a vicious, imposing aura.

    When the charging low ranked undead creatures were hit by the waves of mysterious aura, they were all suddenly stunned, seemingly forgetting that they had to attack the little skeleton. Even the gargoyles that didn¡¯t fear death had bypassed the little skeleton and headed into the distance.

    ¡° You lowly, weak existences, step down!¡± a harsh dignified consciousness was suddenly transmitted from the little skeleton, extending out in all directions.

    All the low ranked undead creatures that were enveloped by the purple light from the Purple Demon Eye were caught in a daze. They hesitated for a moment, as though fearing the little skeleton¡¯s might and actually disobeyed the suicidal orders from the knight and the mummy lord, all of them voluntarily opening up a path.

    Only the two evil knights appeared to have barely resisted the corrosion of the Purple Demon Eye¡¯s bright light on their consciousness. After being dazed for a long while, they actually charged toward the little skeleton again. Along the way, the two evil knights conveniently grabbed a few skeleton warriors by their sides, dismantling the skeleton warrior¡¯s bones and shot them toward the little skeleton in the sky.

    ¡°Bang, bang, bang...¡±

    Without even waiting for the bone spears to close in, the little skeleton swept with the long bone spear in his hand. An earth-shattering death qi emerged violently, causing all the bone spears shooting toward him to explode.

    The little skeleton did not seem to put the two evil knights in his eyes, still looking into the distance at the three undead creatures as well as Han Shuo. He transmitted another message through his consciousness, ¡°Since you don¡¯t acknowledge your allegiance, the only alternative is death!¡±

    The bone demon beneath him suddenly flew forward, heading for the five meter tall knight. The little skeleton tightly grasped his three meter long bone spear, an enormous amount of death qi that carried dense killing intent assaulted the four undead creatures below. The mummy lord was the first to act, throwing out his sarcophagus toward the bone demon below the little skeleton. Numerous wraiths flew out of the apparition once again, heading toward the little skeleton in an orderly formation.

    The huge knight guided his ming horse, looking up at the iing little skeleton while charging toward him. Under the momentum of his charge, he threw out the two meter long broadsword, shing toward the little skeleton. His throw possessed an impressive force, appearing extremely powerful.

    The little skeleton drew the spear before suddenly thrusting it forward. The long spear was like a sponge, absorbing the rich death qi in the surroundings before flying out like lightning toward the iing broadsword. With a ¡°ng¡±, the knight¡¯s broadsword descended toward the ground. At the same time, the bone demon pped its wings, pushing the mummy lord¡¯s sarcophagus aside.

    As for the wraiths sent by the apparition to attack, they were obstructed by the Purple Demon Eye¡¯s purple rays of light even before they could get close to the little skeleton. The purple rays of light seemed to have suddenly formed an invisible barrier and the hundreds of wraiths were simply unable to charge through the barrier.

    Han Shuo coordinated with the other undead creatures and shot out two rows of bone spears. However, the bone spears were simrly repelled by the invisible barrier created from the light of the Purple Demon Eye, descending from high above. This made Han Shuo even more amazed. How did the little skeleton control the Demon Eye of Datara that they obtained from the forest trolls to achieve such a miraculous effect?

    Bone spears conjured with Han Shuo¡¯s grand magus leveled mental strength had strong prative strength. Although they were unable to pierce through those iparably firm physical defenses, the barrier should theoretically be able to obstruct the formless wraiths, but shouldn¡¯t be able to block the powerful bone spears. However, the truth was actually so inconceivable. Han Shuo gradually felt that the little skeleton was bing more and more mysterious.

    After the little skeleton blocked all their attacks, he guided the bone demon to circle around toward the mummy lord and the apparition. The knight who had just caught his descending broadsword was a distance away from the mummy lord and the apparition and didn¡¯t have enough time to assist them.

    Han Shuo was inparison much closer to the mummy lord and the apparition. Seeing the mummy lord and the apparition¡¯s panicked expressions, Han Shuo took the initiative to transmit a message, ¡°I¡¯ll assist the two of you!¡±

    Han Shuo immediately rushed toward the mummy lord and the apparition after transmitting his message. As soon as he sent the message, Han Shuo immediately rushed toward the mummy lord and the apparition. He had already prepared the Soul Tremor magic as well asmunicated with the little skeleton. Once the little skeleton attacked the mummy lord, Han Shuo would seize the opportunity to unleash Soul Tremor on the apparition.

    Regardless the form of the undead creature, their soul was the foundation of their existence. This was the same for the peculiar apparition. If it was taken by surprise by Han Shuo¡¯s Soul Tremor, even if its soul wasn¡¯t destroyed, it would be severely injured. At that time, Han Shuo and the little skeleton would be able to easily kill the apparition first.

    After that, with Han Shuo obstructing the mummy lord and the little skeleton directly killing the huge knight, they would be able topletely control the situation. None of the three undead creatures would be able to escape from the schemes of Han Shuo and the little skeleton.

    Han Shuo¡¯s n was extremely good. If the situation proceeded as nned, that would be everything he could wish for. However, just as Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness firmly locked onto the apparition and was ready to eliminate the apparition at any time. His consciousness suddenly felt a faint fluctuation from the depths of the pitch-ck spring.

    The fluctuation was extremely slight, as though it had been identally leaked due to a soul being excessively excited. If Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness had not improved to its current state, it would perhaps have been hard for him to sense that weak fluctuation. As the fluctuation seemed to contain an ancient aura, it was obvious that there was a formidable undead creature hiding in the spring. This formidable undead creature was unable to be detected by the nearby knight, apparition and even the little skeleton, sufficiently illustrating its strength.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness hurriedly circted, attentivelyprehending that unintentionally leaked aura with added caution. Han Shuo was suddenly rmed, momentarily matching that aura with a formidable undead creature recorded in necromancy books.

    The strongest existence known in general to necromancers was the bone dragon. The pitch-ck spring had actually contained an extremely cunning bone dragon!

    The bone dragon has always been a domineering undead creature in theherworld. Apart from a few more frightening unknown existences, the bone dragon, skeleton king and zombie king were deemed the highest ranked undead creatures. In the Profound Continent, necromancers had to reach the rank of sacred magus to be able to summon bone dragons.

    The bone dragon had always known as the strongest undead creature. This bone dragon that had concealed itself in the spring from beginning to end had made use of the wisps of smoke overflowing the serene luster gem above its head to attract strong undead creatures to this location. Its intentions were extremely clear for all to see.

    It seems that the drop of serene luster gem in the middle of the pitch-ck spring ought to have always been the bone dragon¡¯s bait to lure in strong undead creatures. The huge knight, mummy lord, apparition as well as Han Shuo had all fallen into the bone dragon¡¯s trap. If Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness had not suddenly sensed the slight fluctuation that arose from the bone dragon¡¯s excitement, he reckoned that the one who benefits eventually would have been the bone dragon.

    As he charged toward the apparition, Han Shuo hurriedlymunicated with the little skeleton, describing everything that he had just sensed to the little skeleton before inquiring if the little skeleton possessed the strength to defeat the bone dragon.

    ¡°Father, I would definitely be able to kill and behead the bone dragon in the future. However, I¡¯m unable to do that now. I still do not have that strength for the time being!¡± The little skeleton sent a message over, on one hand stating that he possessed the possibility of infinite evolutions while on the other hand, he stated that he temporarily didn¡¯t have the power to deal with the bone dragon.¡±

    When Han Shuo heard that the little skeleton wasn¡¯t a match for the bone dragon, his brain rapidly worked. When he neared the apparition, he immediately issued a different instruction to the little skeleton.

    The mummy lord¡¯s sarcophagus suddenly smashed toward the little skeleton, while the apparition erratically retreated, while unleashing an unknown enchantment. The wraiths that had emerged from its body suddenly assembled into a giganticwork of wraiths, attempting to trap the little skeleton.

    Han Shuo materialized a bone shield, the huge sinister bone shield suddenly obstructed the mummy lord¡¯s way, establishing a solid defense for the mummy lord and the apparition. This allowed the mummy lord and apparition to rx, only focusing on attacking the little skeleton.

    When the little skeleton who was riding the bone demon saw that he was about to be trapped by the apparition¡¯swork of wraiths, the bone demon suddenly changed its direction, descending toward the pitch-ck spring.

    While the undead creatures had yet to react, the seven bone spurs on the little skeleton¡¯s back suddenly shot out toward the sinister-looking nt. He also firmly threw his javelin-like three meter bone spear into the middle of the spring.

    A frightening roar suddenly sounded from the depths of the lifeless spring. The pitch-ck spring suddenly boiled, forming huge waves.

    Bone spears condensed from the surrounding surging death qi suddenly shot into the depths of the boiling spring, appearing to have pierced the extremely cunning bone dragon, causing the bone dragon to temporarily be unable to emerge from the depths of the spring.

    Right at this moment, the little skeleton¡¯s seven bone spurs shot toward the sinister-looking nt,pletely chopping through the nt¡¯s rhizomes. Faint blue smoke started to leak out from the serene luster gem that seemed to be supported by numerous withered branches and leaves. After chopping through the nt, the seven bone spurs seized the opportunity to congregate and lift up the serene luster gem which flew into the little skeleton¡¯s palm in the blink of an eye.

    The three meter long bone spear suddenly flew out from within the ground, resembling lightning as it returned to the little skeleton¡¯s hand. The little skeleton then urged the bone demon to fly toward Han Shuo without even looking at the rapidly boiling pitch-ck spring.

    ¡°Treacherous, despicable skeleton, I, bone dragon Zasika, will inevitably exterminate you!¡± A loud roar could be heard from underground as a huge bone dragon whose whole body was made up of steel like long bones suddenly rose out of the spring, giving off a formidable death qi which spread through the entire valley.

    The huge knight, mummy lord and the apparition who were about to attack the little skeleton from all directions suddenly nced at each other in terror before frantically fleeing toward the surroundings of the valley, ignoring the little skeleton. The lower ranked zombie warriors and hate warriors seemed to be petrified in fear, instinctively submitting themselves and not daring to move from their positions.

 Chapter 387: Absorbing the serene luster gem

    GDK 387 ¨C Absorbing the serene luster gem

    The extremely cunning bone dragon Zasika was around fifteen meters long. His body was made out of thick and solid white bones, as though it was built from the hardest iron and stone. Its body was also overflowing in rich death qi.

    When the bone dragon roared, all the higher ranked undead creatures started to flee, while the low ranked undead creatures stood still, shivering under the pressure of the bone dragon¡¯s imposing aura.

    Theherworld¡¯s bone dragon was different from the Profound Continent¡¯s standard dragon race. As a special n of dragons that were born in theherworld, bone dragons possessed enormous strength from the moment they were born. This was because they were formed from pure white bones that were resistant to the majority of physical and magical attacks.

    Bone dragons were peculiar creatures brought up in theherworld¡¯s unusual environment. They were also able to nimbly manipte theherworld¡¯s death qi, even possessing a few mystical dragon breath abilities. This resulted in them being more powerful than most dragon ns in the Profound Continent.

    The three undead creatures that had nned to surround and attack the little skeleton had already fled in different directions upon hearing the bone dragon¡¯s roar, no longer interested in attacking the little skeleton. The little skeleton who had obtained the serene luster gem while bone dragon Zasika wasn¡¯t paying attention immediately flew toward Han Shuo. When he was about to reach Han Shuo, Han Shuo immediately abandoned the skeletal body he had condensed from death qi and willed his consciousness to float by the little skeleton¡¯s side.

    Once Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness reached the little skeleton¡¯s side, the little skeleton shoved the serene luster gem into Han Shuo¡¯s wraith-like consciousness without a second thought. He then urged the bone demon to escape into the distance.

    When the bone dragon flew out of the pitch-ck spring, it immediately emitted the imposing aura of a high ranked undead creature. Once the numerous undead creatures had fled, he stared at the rapidly fleeing little skeleton and roared, ¡°Sinister, despicable skeleton, you won¡¯t be able to escape.¡±

    After uttering a long, loud cry into the boundless sky, the bone dragon directly pursued the little skeleton. The bone demon beneath the little skeleton had been remolded by the little skeleton with the bones of the supreme ranked magical creature found within the taboond of the Profound Continent. Within theherworld, the flying speed of the remolded bone demon was actually extremely quick. Even the lightning quick bone dragon Zasika wasn¡¯t able to catch up in a short period of time.

    At this moment, the serene luster gem that the little skeleton casually stuffed into Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness suddenly blended with the mental energy within his consciousness. A mysterious mental energy suddenly entered Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, graduallybining with the original mental energy within.

    Han Shuo suddenly trembled. This method of growing his mental strength had the same feeling as when he was imbued with mental strength under the Cemetery of Death. Han Shuo could almost confirm immediately that the item that had improved his mental strength in the Cemetery of Death must have also been a serene luster gem.

    However, this wasn¡¯t the time to ponder why there would be a serene luster gem in the Cemetery of Death. Having had prior experience, Han Shuo immediately absorbed the mental energy flowing out from the serene luster gem into his consciousness to his heart¡¯s content. He also tried his utmost in seizing the chance to refine the serene luster gem¡¯s mysterious energy.

    Out of a sudden, an iparably huge amount of mental energy rushed into Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. This caused a sharp pain to spread out, soon after Han Shuo was dizzy and wasn¡¯t sure what he should do.

    ¡°Argh...¡±

    As Han Shuo gave out a resonant shout in pain, back in the Profound Continent, the skeletal staff his true body was holding on to whistled sharply and endlessly. Han Shuo¡¯s originally muddled eyes gradually regained rity.

    While a huge amount of mental energy was still revolving within his mind, Han Shuo suddenly felt that he was holding something hard in his left hand. Looking down, he saw that it was actually the mysterious skeletal staff. Han Shuo was shocked but became ecstatic shortly after. He understood that he had once again returned unfathomably to the Profound Continent from theherworld.

    Excessively excited, Han Shuo didn¡¯t ponder any further, hastily discarding all distracting thoughts and started melding the remaining pure mental energy flowing within his consciousness with his original mental energy. At this moment, he was filled with immense joy.

    After an unknown period of time, Han Shuo gradually sensed that the mental energy from theherworld¡¯s serene luster gem had been fully absorbed. At that moment, an intense shout was transmitted from the little skeleton in theherworld. Han Shuo suddenly recalled the recent experience of escaping from theherworld and remembered that the little skeleton was still being pursued by bone dragon Zasika.

    The little skeleton¡¯s shout was obviously a cry for help. Han Shuo didn¡¯t hesitate, chanting the lowest ranked necromancy spell. The little skeleton riding the bone demon abruptly arrived in the hidden underground room.

    The little skeleton had actuallye out unscathed. However, the bone demon he was riding on had more than ten of its bones broken, probably by the bone dragon. Once he arrived from theherworld, the little skeleton patted his chest like a human, while still having lingering fears. He then transmitted a message to Han Shuo, ¡°That cunning bone dragon is truly extremely frightening. However, I will definitely make him pay in the future.¡±

    Han Shuo looked toward the little skeleton, his heart truly had unbounded emotions. This little skeleton who had the ambition to kill the bone dragon was the same fellow that helped him at that time to clear the garbage in the middle of the night?

    ¡°Father, how did you enter my world?¡± The little skeleton asked, its Purple Demon Eye glistening as it looked at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo had gradually adapted to the way the little skeleton addressed him. Heughed bitterly as he shook his head, replying, ¡°I have no idea. However, I understand that it has something to do with this skeletal staff. For the time being, I still have not fullyprehended how it happens. However, I believe I would be able to be clear about the situation very quickly.¡±

    After Han Shuo exined the situation to the little skeleton, he knitted his brows, inquiring, ¡°Do you know what exactly is the serene luster gem that I absorbed?¡±

    ¡°This type of serene luster gem is an extremely rare item in our world. It can temper our souls, causing our souls to be purer. It is extremely beneficial to our evolution.¡± The little skeleton exined for a while, pausing for a moment before continuing, ¡°Father, in our world, there simrly are some unusual items as well as peculiar existences. For example, that apparition had evolved from a wraith. That huge knight is a soul from another ne that descended into our world and was developed from an evil knight¡¯s body after absorbing death qi within the world...¡±

    The little skeleton seemed to have nned to exin the world he knew to Han Shuo, taking great pains to exin the situation in theherworld to Han Shuo, as though to sweep away the misunderstandings Han Shuo had of theherworld.

    From the little skeleton¡¯s descriptions, Han Shuo gradually realized that he still had a one-sided understanding of theherworld. It turns out that the creatures in theherworld were not limited to those that he knew from necromancy texts. The undead creatures that were listed on necromancy texts were those that ancient necromancers were aware of and had found the corresponding summoning spell.

    There were also a few evolved or mutated undead creatures as well as entric undead creatures that had been naturally produced by death qi in a particr asion at a particr location. These undead creatures were not known to necromancers and had never been sessfully summoned. These special existences were equally formidable, so much so that some of them were stronger than bone dragons.

    However, previous necromancers had never encountered them nor had the way to summon them. Hence, they did not exist in necromancy books. However, for the little skeleton who had spent much time in theherworld, he who had the same origin as these undead creatures naturally understood a few peculiarities that previous necromancers didn¡¯t know of.

    ording to the little skeleton¡¯s narration, Han Shuo also found out that theherworld was split into regions and territories. Some of the most ancient formidable existences upied vast territories, ceaselessly campaigning against one another. There were even extremely formidable undead creatures that possessed the strength to tear apart the restrictions of their position, having the frightening strength to travel across the world with their own strength.

    ¡°Father, I ought to return!¡± while Han Shuo was slowlyprehending the little skeleton¡¯s words, the little skeleton suddenly transmitted a message.

    Much time has passed. As Han Shuo also had a mental connection to the earth zombie and the other zombies, he could directly send the little skeleton to their side. In that case, the little skeleton and bone dragon Zasika would be separated by an extremelyrge distance and the bone dragon would naturally be unable to endanger the little skeleton again.

    Once the little skeleton reminded Han Shuo, he smiled as he nodded his head and then sent the little skeleton back to theherworld. Even after the little skeleton had left, Han Shuo still pondered on the little skeleton¡¯s narration. The things that the little skeleton had just mentioned exceeded Han Shuo¡¯sprehension, causing Han Shuo to momentarily be unable to adapt.

    Han Shuo had gained a new level of understanding of theherworld from the little skeleton¡¯s descriptions. He was also clear that that world was different from what he first imagined. It seemed like not all the creatures in theherworld could be summoned by necromancers. Many formidable undead creatures that had transcended the bindings of their position would definitely not be restricted by the strength of a necromancer¡¯s contract.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo stopped thinking about matters concerning theherworld. Han Shuo then chanted a spell and utilizing his mental energy, rows of bone spears took shape in front of him, silently forming motionlessly in the air. Han Shuo simply counted the number of bone spears and was pleasantly surprised to find out that the number of bone spears had increased by a third. This meant that Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength had indeed improved substantially. Although his mental strength was still within the realm of grand magus, the stronger his mental strength, the might from a spell would also be greater. Currently, Han Shuo could release that many more bone spears with the same spell. This sufficiently proved that Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength had indeed undergone substantial improvement in theherworld.

    ¡°Serene luster gem. Truly a good item. However, why would a serene luster gem appear under the Cemetery of Death? Also, why would the skeletal staff be able to let the soul enter theherworld, could it be that there was some kind of connection between the Cemetery of Death and the creatures in the undead world?¡± Han Shuo knitted his brows as he contemted.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t resolve this question in a short time. However, he knew that the Cemetery of Death definitely contained many secrets and nned to carefully explore the Cemetery of Death after a period of time, to take a look if there were other items that he had yet to discover.

    After his consciousness had entered theherworld, Han Shuo had lost track of time. Now that he had returned to the Profound Continent, Han Shuo didn¡¯t know how long had passed, hastily exiting the hidden room and returning to the ground level of his official residence and calling Steward Kas over.

    Steward Kas immediately spoke when he rushed over, ¡°Lord Count, where have you been the past few days! Miss Phoebe hase over three times to look for you and His Majesty has also requested for you to head to the royal pce and meet him. Furthermore, there has been bad rumors about you spreading around, making me extremely anxious.¡±

    ¡°What bad rumors?¡± Han Shuo first grasped the main issue, inquiring from Kas about the harmful news about himself.

    ¡°This... this...¡± Steward Kas hummed and hawed, only replied fearfully when Han Shuo stared at him, ¡°There has been rumors spreading that you are a member of the Cmity Church. Very few ordinary people know about the Cmity Church but many nobles and people of status understood that the Cmity Church was an evil organization.

    Han Shuo was shocked when he heard Kas¡¯s response. The Cmity Church was the symbol of evil in the eyes of many nobles. Of everyone in the continent that knew of the Cmity Church¡¯s existence, there shouldn¡¯t be many that held good impressions of them.

    Han Shuo had never dared to have too much contact with the Cmity Church precisely because he was afraid of leaving such an impression. Never would he have thought that although he always kept a distance from them, such a situation still happened in the end.

    Without much consideration, Han Shuo knew who the rumors had originated from. Apart from the Church of Light and Lawrence¡¯s political enemies, Han Shuo did not have many enemies within the Lancelot Kingdom. In recent days, it was the moment for Han Shuo who was rising rapidly within the kingdom to have major undertakings. However, it was precisely this rumor that could ruin Han Shuo.

    This matter was quite thorny. Han Shuo hesitated a moment, before replying Steward Kas, ¡°I understand. You can withdraw first and help me invite Prince Lawrence and Miss Phoebe over. Just tell them that I want to talk to them tonight.¡±

    After giving Kas his orders, Han Shuo immediately left the manor. He hesitated a moment, before heading to the Dark Mantle¡¯s headquarters to look for Candide.

    When Candide saw Han Shuo, he immediately said, ¡°Why have you only appeared now! Come with me to meet the king. I¡¯m aware of your affairs and have already spoken to his majesty about it previously. This matter has be quite huge, we must handle it carefully.¡±

    While on their way to the royal pce, Candide pointed out that the rumors had originated from the Church of Light, eldest prince Charles as well as the Grand Duke. As one of the three heavyweights of Dark Mantle, it was naturally very simple for Candide to investigate such a matter.

    Han Shuo and Candide discussed for a while, before directly entering the royal pce through the Dark Mantle¡¯s teleporting array, immediately heading for King Uhtred¡¯s pce.

 Chapter 388: His Majestyâ€™s plea

    GDK 388 ¨C His Majesty¡¯s plea

    An old man past his prime sat on the throne, living thest vestiges of his life. The aura of life seemed to be slipping away from his body at every moment. He could only keep his frail body straight by leaning against the throne, his originally bright eyes had also been veiled by ayer of gray.

    Han Shuo followed Candide inside. ncing at the declining Uhtred, Han Shuo understood that his death was imminent. It was no wonder that the princes of the Lancelot Empire were so brazen in their attempts to seize power.

    ¡°Your Majesty, Count Bryan hase to see you!¡± Candide said respectfully after saluting the emperor.

    Uhtred coughed violently, his gray eyes gradually showing a hint of vitality. Forcing himself upright, he swept his eyes over Candide and Han Shuo, ultimately fixing his gaze on Han Shuo as he asked weakly, ¡°Bryan, Candide has already mentioned to me your achievements in Brettel City over the past few months, you¡¯ve done quite well!¡±

    ¡°Your Majesty tters me, this was my duty.¡± Han Shuo had discussed with Candide on the way here and understood that it was best that he watched his mouth when speaking to such a person, only responding to any questions asked.

    ¡°I heard news circting outside about you having some sort of rtionship with the Cmity Church. Hoho, that¡¯s rather interesting. With your clean origins and the contributions you made for the Lancelot Empire, how could they implicate you with a sinister church like them!¡± Uhtred muttered, as though he was speaking to himself.

    ¡°Your Majesty should realize that those are purely rumors fabricated by enemies.¡±Han Shuo replied. ¡°In that case, do you know who is making up such rumors and what their intentions are?¡± Uhtred looked at Han Shuo and inquired.

    Han Shuo replied while shaking his head, ¡°I don¡¯t know.¡±

    ¡°Candide, you can leave first. I have something I want to speak to Bryan about alone.¡± Uhtred did not question this matter in detail, ncing at Candide instead and instructed in a soft voice.

    Candida didn¡¯t respond, bowing politely toward Uhtred before turning around to leave the main hall. He only gave Han Shuo a meaningful nce as he passed by, to hint that Han Shuo should not say things that ought not to be said.

    After Candide left, Uhtred suddenly sighed and said: ¡°Among my sons, I feel I owe Lawrence the most. I heard you and Lawrence are very close, is that true?¡±

    Han Shuo was started, unable to really grasp Uhtred¡¯s intentions. Most of the nobles in Ossen City were in the know about the rtionship between him and Lawrence, so it wasn¡¯t at all strange for Uhtred to know about his rtionship with Lawrence. Han Shuo hesitated for a moment, then nodded honestly and replied, ¡°Yes, your Majesty!¡±

    ¡°In that case, you¡¯re definitely supporting Lawrence?¡± Uhtred asked once more.

    ¡°Yes, Your Majesty!¡± Han Shuo answered once again.

    Uhtred was silent for a long time, his two pupils affixed intently on Han Shuo. It was only when Uhtred saw Han Shuo looking a little uneasy that he spoke, ¡°Bryan. There are some matters that I want to discuss with you.¡± ¡°Your Majesty, feel free to tell me anything. As your subject, I will naturally willing to share some of your worries.¡± Han Shuo replied again.

    Uhtred sighed. He suddenly stared at Han Shuo, saying, ¡°Bryan, I hope you can promise me one thing. Regardless of how my other three sons treat you, please spare their lives.¡±

    Han Shuo was momentarily speechless, suspiciously looking toward Uhtred as he inquired, ¡°Why has Your Majesty said such a thing?¡±

    ¡°Bryan, if you agree to my terms, I will hand the throne to Lawrence and help you two to consolidate the power of Lancelot Empire.¡± Uhtred stared fixedly on Han Shuo speaking prudently.

    Han Shuo felt extremely stirred up, astonished as he looked at Uhtred, momentarily unsure what was wrong with Uhtred to have actually said such an ineffable sentence. He simply looked at Uhtred in a daze, forgetting to reply.

    ¡°As long as you agree to my terms, I¡¯ll assist you and Lawrence. What do you think?¡± Uhtred immediately followed up, appearing somewhat anxious, so much so that it contained a hint of pleading.

    As the true ruler of Lancelot Empire, as long as Uhtred hasn¡¯t passed away, even if he was extremely ill, he was still the person who held the utmost power in Lancelot Empire. However at this moment, Uhtred¡¯s tone while speaking to Han Shuo unexpectedly had an odd hint of pleading. This was something Han Shuo could never have expected.

    In such a moment, Han Shuo even thought if Uhtred¡¯s illness was too severe, that caused Uhtred to absent-mindedly say such ridiculous things. However, when Han Shuo carefully observed Uhtred, he discovered that although Uhtred¡¯s body was iparably weak, his spirit wasn¡¯t confused at all. That proved that Uhtred¡¯s emotional state was indeed normal.

    While Han Shuo was still extremely astounded, Uhtred asked once again. Han Shuo rapidly racked his brains and then probed Uhtred, ¡°As long as I spare the lives of the three princes?¡±

    Uhtred had a delighted expression as he rapidly nodding his head, hurriedly saying, ¡°That¡¯s right, as long as you spare their lives. You can strip them of all their power and even imprison them in a small cell, as long as they are able to survive.¡±

    ¡°In that case, I¡¯ll agree to your terms, Your Majesty!¡± Han Shuo no longer hesitated, immediately responding.

    Lancelot Empire¡¯s true ruler, His Majesty Uhtred actually visibly sighed in relief. His weak expression gave a slight smile as he waved his hand as he said, ¡°Bryan, I now confer you the title of Marquis. In addition, I willmand space sacred magus Mister Sabakas to help establish a magic transporting array in Brettel City as well as help you eliminate the unfavorable news about you. Also...¡±

    Uhtred suddenly narrated a series of promises, causing Han Shuo to be stunned, staring nkly as he wondered what was going on with Uhtred today. When Uhtred finished narrating his promises, he then said, ¡°Bryan, you can take your leave. I hope you will not mention today¡¯s matter to anyone else, not even to Candide or Lawrence.¡±

    ¡°Your Majesty, I¡¯ll promise you. However, could you tell me the reason? I am truly unable toprehend why you would make such a decision.¡± Han Shuo looked bbergasted at Uhtred while he asked.

    Uhtred shook his head,ughing bitterly as he replied, ¡°It¡¯s better if you aren¡¯t aware. This is for your benefit. You may leave now!¡±

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t make sense of the matter, looking at Uhtred bafflingly. He stared nkly for a moment before knitting his brows, bowing to Uhtred before exiting. He was feeling extremely puzzled but didn¡¯t know who he could rant to.

    When Han Shuo left, Uhtred seemed to age even more, sighing as he said, ¡°As a father, I have done all I can for the three of you. Hopefully, all of you are able to survive after I die.¡±

    Space sacred magus Sabakas and old astrologer Madam Grace abruptly appeared before Uhtred. Madam Grace was extremely pale, appearing more likely than Uhtred to die. There didn¡¯t seem to be much vitality in her whole body.

    When Uhtred saw the two of them appear, he sighed again. He looked toward old astrologer Madam Grace and said, ¡°Madam, I¡¯ve never doubted your judgement all these years. You said that Bryan will truly help Lancelot Empire prosper?¡±

    Grace wiggled her lips, as though wanting to drive away the thick wrinkles by her mouth, replying with a weak voice, ¡°Your Majesty, on your request I¡¯ve consumed my vitality to make a divination. I only know that whoever this person assists, that person will be able to be the new king. As long as he is present in Lancelot Empire, Lancelot Empire will not perish. That is all!¡±

    ¡°That is already sufficient. I didn¡¯t expect that the person influencing my Lancelot Empire¡¯s future would actually be such a young fellow.¡± Uhtred muttered to himself, before looking toward Grace and Sabakas, suddenly saying, ¡°My days are numbered. I hope that you will promise me one thing after I die.¡±

    ¡°Your Majesty, you need not exhort me, I think I might leave this world before you. I have also been extremely tired in recent years, my life has also finally ought to reach its end.¡± old astrologer Grace faintly sighed as she helplessly replied Uhtred.

    ¡°Madam, I¡¯m sorry. You had consumed your vitality for Lancelot Empire.¡± Uhtred understood that every time old astrologer Madam Grace made a divination, it would consume her vitality. The moreplicated the matter, the more vitality would be consumed.

    The divination this time was regarding the fate of the entire Lancelot Empire and hadpletely exhausted her vitality. Her death could be said to be single-handedly caused by Uhtred. However, as it concerned Lancelot Empire¡¯s future, Uhtred had no other choice and could only have old astrologer Grace give some rity.

    Even without old astrologer Madam Grace¡¯s foretelling, matters might still progress along the same trajectory. However, the struggle for power among the princes would undoubtedly result in irreversible damage to Lancelot Empire¡¯s overall strength. In that situation, even if Lawrence seeded in seizing the throne, Lancelot Empire¡¯s strength would be far from before.

    Uhtred was precisely afraid of such a situation urring. Hence he would rather have old astrologer Grace consume her vitality to foretell the future. This was so that he could minimize the loss in the kingdom¡¯s strength so that when Lawrence seeded the throne, Lancelot Empire would still be as prosperous as before.

    ¡°You need not apologize. My teacher had also exhausted her vitality and died for the sake of Lancelot Empire. Perhaps this is precisely the destiny for us astrologers. Ai...¡± old astrologer Madam Grace helplessly sighed, before looking toward Sabakas and said, ¡°In the limited time I have remaining, I hope you can send me to ces I have never seen before.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, no matter where you want to go, I¡¯m able to bring you there.¡± Sabakas amiably smiled as he replied, he then turned his head toward Lancelot Empire¡¯s King Uhtred and asked, ¡°Your Majesty, what did you want to tell me a moment ago?¡±

    ¡°If Bryan does not abide by his promise, I hope that you can help me kill him.¡± Uhtred hesitated a moment before replying Sabakas.

    ¡°Your Majesty, I can only promise you that I will try my utmost. If the dayes when I might not be able to deal with him, I hope you would forgive me.¡± space sacred magus Sabakas carefully thought it over before replying Uhtred.

    When one reaches a simr realm as Sabakas, they would long since considered to have surpassed authority. Even Lancelot Empire¡¯s king would not have the authority to order him to do things he isn¡¯t willing to do. Sabakas vaguely knew a few things from astrologer Grace¡¯s prophecy and that was why he replied Uhtred in this way.

    Uhtred nodded, smiling as he said, ¡°In that case, I can only thank you.¡±

    ¡°Alright, Your Majesty probably has many matters to attend to, we wouldn¡¯t continue disturbing you then.¡± Sabakas replied, neither haughty nor humble. He looked toward old astrologer Grace as a white light wrapped around the two of them. They then disappeared in a sh. Lancelot Empire¡¯s King Uhtred then started to help Lawrence pave the way to the throne.

    When Han Shuo returned to his residence from the pce, he discovered that Lawrence and Phoebe had not waited till the evening and had already been waiting. It looked like they were extremely eager to meet Han Shuo.

    Phoebe¡¯s eyes were glistening, her line of sight never leaving Han Shuo from beginning to end. When Han Shuo had sent his servants away and led the two of them to an inner living room, Phoebe protested coquettishly with a hint of rage, ¡°What kind of guy are you. Having returned to Ossen City yet you never came over to look for me, has your time in Brettel City been too satisfying that you have forgotten this old me?¡±

    Along the way, Han Shuo was somewhat muddle-headed, continuously pondering over what King Uhtred had told him. He was unable to understand what was going on with Uhtred, to have actually made such a queer proposal.

    Han Shuo only reacted when he heard Phoebe protesting coquettishly, couldn¡¯t help but smile bitterly as he replied, ¡°Mydy, of all people to forget I would never forget you. You should know that whenever I obtain something good, the first person I think of is precisely you. If not, why would Starry Sky arrive in your hands so quickly.¡±

    Hearing Han Shuo¡¯s reply, Phoebe¡¯s beautiful expression had an added delight and her voice became much gentler as she tenderly questioned, ¡°In that case, what shameful deeds have you done ever since you returned to Ossen City? I¡¯vee over a few times but the steward had always said that you weren¡¯t within the residence.¡±

    ¡°That was because I had to handle some proper business. The majority of the time was spent in the Dark Mantle¡¯s headquarters participating in meetings. I had also just visited the pce. In short, I have not been idle.¡± Han Shuo exined to Phoebe.

    ¡°Alright, alright. The two of you can slowly chat after I leave.¡± Lawrence teased before looking toward Han Shuo and asked, ¡°Bryan, you have just returned from the pce, what did my royal father talk to you about?¡±

    When Lawrence spoke out, Phoebe blushed as though thinking that once Lawrence leaves, she would engage in wonderful matters with Han Shuo. She suddenly became silent while her face bing red.

    Han Shuo knew what Lawrence was concerned about, recalling his recent agreement with His Majesty. He couldn¡¯t help but have a bout of suspicion once again. He then smiled bitterly as he shook his head, replying, ¡°Lawrence, I¡¯ve promised His Majesty that I wouldn¡¯t divulge our conversation to anyone else. His Majesty had especially urged me before I left to not tell you about our discussion.¡±

    Lawrence became solemn and distracted, hesitating for a moment before asking, ¡°Then, could you tell me if I was mentioned in your conversation and did the matters you discussed to my benefit?¡±

    Han Shuo thought for a moment before nodding and replied, ¡°Lawrence, I can definitively tell you, the focus of my conversation with His Majesty is precisely about you. Merely, they are all matters that are advantageous to you. I believe the likelihood of you obtaining the throne will increase dramatically.¡±

    ¡°Is... is that for real? Bryan, you are speaking the truth?¡± Hearing Han Shuo¡¯s reply, Lawrence was clearly indescribably ecstatic, to the extent that he suddenly stood up from his chair. Lawrence, who was unable to hold back the ecstasy in his heart, directly stood in front of Han Shuo, pressing down on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulders, impatiently inquiring as he looked into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes.

    Han Shuo gave his affirmation, repetitively nodding his head as he said, ¡°That¡¯s right. Although I can divulge the specifics of our conversations, I can guarantee that your royal father would definitely pave the way for you. Lawrence, your fortune has arrived!¡±

    Lawrence endlesslyughed to his heart¡¯s content, his wild side being revealed after experiencing a long period of oppression. Heughed heartily as he said, ¡°Thank you, Bryan. You are my luck. No matter what you and royal father spoke about, I believe you definitely yed arge part. I will never forget your kindness.¡±

    Lawrence¡¯s mind was extremely nimble, realizing that Han Shuo was a key person just from his words. Otherwise, why would Uhtred not find others to talk to, only looking for him?

    ¡°Bryan, you wouldn¡¯t be joking right? Don¡¯t tell me that His Highness ns to support Senior Lawrence?¡± Phoebe reacted from her charming and gentle reverie, having a shocked expression as she looked at Han Shuo, as if she didn¡¯t believe what Han Shuo was saying.

    ¡°Don¡¯t ask me about the specifics. Honestly speaking, even now I still can¡¯t believe it myself. However, the truth is as such. You will be aware of it very soon.¡± Han Shuo spread his arms in a helpless posture as he exined to Phoebe.

    Lawrence had yet calmed down from his surprise, animatedly saying, ¡°Alright, in that case, I¡¯ll return early to prepare. If it turns out as you said, I need to immediately make arrangements.¡±

    ¡°Go ahead, you should indeed make proper preparations.¡± Han Shuo dly agreed.

    ¡°Senior, you only remember your own matters, did you forget what we discussed just now? Bryan is currently in great danger. If you don¡¯t help him now, he would bebeled as a member of an evil church by Charles and the others!¡± seeing Lawrence wanting to leave, Phoebe snorted lightly, unable to resist rebuking Lawrence.

    Lawrence pped his own head. That was the reason why they were here. He first smiled apologetically toward Han Shuo before saying with a grave expression, ¡°Bryan, there are currently some rumors that are extremely harmful to you. I think we should carefully figure out a strategy to handle this. This matter is disseminated by Church of Light¡¯s Kosse and Charles. Their aim is to ruin the reputation and image you had exhaustingly established in Brettel City.¡±

    ¡°We shouldn¡¯t bother about these matters. His Majesty has already agreed to help me clear up this matter.¡± Han Shuo calmly replied Lawrence.

    Lawrence and Phoebe looked at each other, both having stunned expressions. Seeing Lawrence¡¯s expression, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but smile as he said, ¡°Alright, you should just leave first and be busy with your own matters. There¡¯s no need to be troubled about these matters, your royal father will help us with them.¡±

    ¡°Alright then, I won¡¯t bother the two of you any longer.¡± Lawrence understood, winking at Han Shuo and Phoebe,ughing as he left.

    ¡°Hey, what¡¯s with your expression. Dammit, you have been led astray by Han Shuo!¡± Phoebe¡¯s charming face was captivatingly red as she rained curses towards Lawrence¡¯s rear view.

    Once Lawrence left, Han Shuo smiled as he walked toward Phoebe, pulling her into his embrace, carrying the iling Phoebe directly to his bedroom. Along the way, he stroked his hands up and down restlessly along Phoebe¡¯s body. A whileter, Phoebe hadzily curled up on Han Shuo¡¯s wide chest, her whole body not having the slightest strength. However, Han Shuo was still in high spirits, without any signs of exhaustion. He instead conveniently took out a necromancy book, assiduously studying it.

    Phoebe had not used any of the aura in her body, her exhaustion was purely from her physical body. Looking at Han Shuo who was in great spirits, Phoebe had a sweet smiling expression. Herints from these few days had all disappeared, unable to conceal her extremely content amorous feelings. She was obviously extremely pleased.

    A strand of mysterious energy flowed within Phoebe¡¯s body, slowly circting through Phoebe¡¯s limbs and bones, nourishing Phoebe¡¯s body. It gave Phoebe an extremelyfortable feeling, as though that strand of energy was replenishing her body, helping her body gradually recover and even strengthen.

    Phoebe finely examined the refinement and nourishment of that strand of energy, suddenly reacting. This mysterious energy came from Han Shuo. Previously every time after she had experienced pleasure with Han Shuo, Phoebe seemed to sense the existence of such an energy even while dazed. Merely the previous few times Phoebe had been overly exhausted and had fallen asleep immediately and had never sensed it as clearly before.

    However, Phoebe could sense that her body was improving. Previously when she refined her niedan, her body seemed to also be purified. The training of her aura had been much easier aspared to the past. It also seemed like the changes in her body was the reason why Phoebe was able to be a great swordsman so quickly.

    Slowly sensing for a while, Phoebe couldn¡¯t help but fiercely gaze at Han Shuo who was solemnly studying the necromancy book. She suddenly understood in her hear that every time they had engaged in pleasure, Han Shuo would send a strand of unknown energy into her body, helping her remold her body, causing her body¡¯s state to be better.

    ¡°Bryan!¡± Phoebe suddenly whispered softly, raising her head to look at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo, who was studying a bone demon¡¯s characteristics, lightly grunted in response, smiling as he looked at Phoebe, hisrge hand conveniently smacking Phoebe¡¯s perky and round butt as he asked teasingly, ¡°Yes? You want more?¡±

    Phoebe¡¯s stunningly beautiful face reddened, blushing in shame as she pulling up the thin quilt to cover her body, hiding her nosebleed inducing perfect curves, saying softly, ¡°No, my whole body is already devoid of strength, you damned fellow!¡±

    ¡°Hehe, what do you want to say then?¡± Han Shuo put down the necromancy book in his hand, his left hand tenderly helping her pull the quilt to conceal her jade-like skin, smiling as he asked.

    ¡°Have you always left behind something special within my body every time we pleasured each other?¡± Phoebe¡¯s face was red as she inquired in a low voice.

    ¡°Of course, I have indeed left behind something special. Heh heh. Those are the seeds of life, the original essence in creating humans. Merely they haven¡¯t been able to germinate. Why have you asked about this? Could it be that you want to ask why your stomach has not be big? Oh, you can¡¯t me me, perhaps you haven¡¯t worked hard enough?¡± Han Shuo smiled deviously as he replied Phoebe.

    When Phoebe saw Han Shuo¡¯s evil smile, she knew that he must have misunderstood her question. She couldn¡¯t help but embarrassedly reproached him, ¡°Not that thing. I am referring to the energy that helped me alter my body!¡±

    When Phoebe said that, Han Shuo was suddenly enlightened, replying, ¡°So you were referring to that. Hehe, don¡¯t worry, that energy is only beneficial to your body and would absolutely not cause any harm. You shouldn¡¯t care too much about it. In any case, you only need to know that it would cause your body to improve.¡±

    ¡°I know, of course I know the benefits that energy brings about to my body. I¡¯m only worried if it would cause harm to your strength?¡± Phoebe naturally understood the changes to her body. However, as a young great swordmaster, Phoebe knew that no matter what kind of energy leaves the main body, it would have an effect on the person involved. What she was worried about was whether Han Shuo was harmed.

    ¡°Heh heh, you need not worry. This is called duo cultivation. When I transmit energy into you, I¡¯m actually also obtaining some energy from your body. It¡¯s just that you aren¡¯t aware of it. Otherwise, why would I make you perform so many unusual positions? This is actually a type of martial technique. To think that you still have wild thoughts.¡± Han Shuo smiled as he exined to Phoebe.

    Listening to Han Shuo¡¯s exnation, Phoebe¡¯s blush had spread from her neck to her whole body. She couldn¡¯t help but hammer Han Shuo¡¯s chest, saying, ¡°Nonsense! Since when was there a technique that was practiced this way. You wanting me to assume so many embarrassing positions was simply to satisfy your unusual hobby. You evil person. Still wanting to lie to me!¡±

    Helplessly shrugging his shoulders, Han Shuo smiled bitterly as he exined, ¡°Mydy, I am truly not deceiving you. There are countless martial techniques that you don¡¯t know about. However, this technique indeed exists. The positions I want you to assume also really have special purposes. It is just that you haven¡¯t carefully experienced it and have instead been lost in pleasure. If you are able to carefullyprehend it the next time, you would know that I¡¯m telling the truth.¡±

    Phoebe was only somewhat convinced by Han Shuo¡¯s exnation, staring nkly at Han Shuo for a while, realizing that Han Shuo didn¡¯t seem to be joking. She then softly said, ¡°Bryan, you are saying the truth. That is truly a type of martial technique.¡± Nodding his head, Han Shuo smiled as he replied, ¡°Of course. It is precisely through this method that our pleasure would aid in increasing each other¡¯s strength. Don¡¯t you worry, the energy within your body wouldn¡¯t cause me any harm.¡±

    As Han Shuo exined, although Phoebe was still astonished, she didn¡¯t continue questioning this matter. She instead knitted her brows as she pondered. After a while, Phoebe suddenly recalled something, intensely looking at Han Shuo as she asked, ¡°Bryan, there¡¯s a question I¡¯ve held back for very long, you must answer me today.¡±

    ¡°Speak, what¡¯s your question?¡± Han Shuo¡¯srge hand caressed Phoebe¡¯s smooth back, his eyes squinting as he saidzily.

    ¡°What¡¯s the deal with Emily? Don¡¯t tell me that you have no rtion with Emily. Hmph, I¡¯ve seen her a few times, her skin and state of her body are simply identical to mine. Bryan, I hope you can honestly tell me about the rtionship between the two of you and not lie to me.¡± Phoebe stared fixedly at Han Shuo as she questioned him overbearingly.

    When Han Shuo heard the name ¡°Emily¡±, he unexpectedly shuddered. When Phoebe finished her question, his mind had suddenly be a mess. After hurriedly considered for a moment, Han Shuo sighed as he said, ¡°Since you already know, I won¡¯t hide it from you any longer. The previous time in the Dark Forest, due to my martial technique undergoing cultivation deviation, I raped her while I was unconscious...¡±

    Since things have reached this point, Han Shuo knew that no amount of concealment would be effective, thus he systematically described the matters between Emily and himself.

    ¡°As I expected, you really had an affair with her. I had always been wondering why her skin was as white and glossy as mine. Great, it turns out it had been nourished by you. Bryan ah Bryan, you are truly awesome, to actually dare to rape the Betteridge Family¡¯s daughter-inw...¡± on one hand, Phoebe was ring angrily at Han Shuo as she mored, on the other hand, she wanted to wear her clothes and leave in spite of Han Shuo¡¯s obstruction.

    Han Shuo embraced Phoebe tightly, hurriedly exining, ¡°Under those circumstances, I had no choice. You should know that you are the most important to me. To have been together with Emily was just a coincidence...¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t think it¡¯s that simple. That Emily has such a seductive appearance. Is she very good in bed? Did she tempt you till you are confused and disoriented? Do you know that she is Mister Han¡¯s daughter-inw? That her brother is the terrifying Amyes?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and then exined, ¡°However, when I raped her, I only took her as a spy of the Empire!¡±

    Shaking of Han Shuo, Phoebe swiftly wore her clothes, hatefully staring at Han Shuo, her expression filled with resentment as she shouted, ¡°I had already felt that there was something fishy between you and Emily previously at the banquet by Lawrence¡¯s father. It looks like you two have known each other since long ago. Emily has gone too far, to actually following your bad example in deceiving me.¡±

    When she finished her sentence, Phoebe had already finished dressing up and was furiously heading out.

    ¡°Where are you going?¡± Han Shuo was shocked, hastily putting on his clothes.

    ¡°I¡¯m going to find that coquettish hussy, Emily. Don¡¯t follow me, I want to speak to her alone.¡± Phoebe replied with a sentence before rushing out of Han Shuo¡¯s residence.

 Chapter 389: Improving circumstances of the necromancy major

    GDK 389 ¨C Improving circumstances of the necromancy major

    Phoebe was furious as she left, herst sentence firmly rejecting Han Shuo¡¯s n to follow her. Han Shuo, who had gotten up to put on his clothes, hesitated for a while before ultimately deciding not to follow Phoebe.

    The Betteridge Family was a celebrated noble family within the empire. Even though Mister Hahn has withdrawn from the military, his influence still remained. If Phoebe went to talk to Emily by herself, it would perhaps not cause much of a problem. However, if Han Shuo went along as well, what would happen between the twodies and Han Shuo would be unpredictable.

    Han Shuo definitely didn¡¯t want to be screamed at by two girls within the Betteridge Family. If that happened, not only would it affect Han Shuo¡¯s career, it would also ruin the reputation of Phoebe and Emily.

    Han Shuo frowned as he nked out momentarily, not knowing what he should do. He decided to just send out two mystical demons to follow behind Phoebe.

    In recent times, Ossen City was shrouded in darkness, with hidden dangers everywhere. Han Shou was afraid that Phoebe who supported Lawrence would encounter trouble. Furthermore, he also wanted to find out what Phoebe wanted to talk to Emily about. If the situation goes south, he would have no choice and be forced to step in.

    As the mystical demons followed Phoebe to the Betteridge Family, contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, the originally enraged Phoebe had already concealed her emotions when she reached the doorstep of the Betteridge Family and was instead tranquil as she asked the guard if she could meet Emily.

    When Han Shuo saw that Phoebe did not cause a racket the moment she reached the Betteridge Family, he couldn¡¯t help letting out a breath. He understood that although Phoebe was angry, she still knew to act appropriately. When Emily heard that Phoebe had speciallye to visit, she was suddenly started. She knew she was hiding something and the previous few times she had met Phoebe, she had faintly felt that something was inappropriate and knew that an intelligent woman like Phoebe would definitely sense something.

    Now that Phoebe hade to look for her specifically, Emily knew that the trouble that would havee has finally arrived. She calmed her disturbed state of mind and then actively head out to wee Phoebe.

    ¡°Hey, Miss Phoebe? Hehe, it¡¯s been awhile since we met, to what do I owe this visit?¡± Emily has been part of Dark Mantle for many years and was still able to show a natural appearance even though she had a guilty conscience, showing a splendid smile as greeting Phoebe like a sister.

    ¡°Hehe, Miss Emily, isn¡¯t that because I miss you. Oh, it¡¯s been a long time since we met, sister Emily seems to be looking much younger, what is your secret? You must share it with me!¡± Phoebe who has run a business for a long time was also able to hold in her anger, smiling as she greeted Emily.

    Emily felt troubled. When Phoebe mentioned her sore spot, she knew that Phoebe did note with good intentions. Emily naturally knew the cause of the changes to her body. The beautiful fair-skinned Phoebe was in an extremely simr condition as herself. It was naturally self-evident the reason for Phoebe to bring up this matter.

    ¡°I don¡¯t deserve Miss Phoebe¡¯s praise. Perhaps it is because there isn¡¯t much happening recently, being idle and having slept much more. I definitely don¡¯t look younger!¡± Emily smiled as she yed down the matter. Seeing that there were still guards around, she couldn¡¯t help but lightly chuckle as she walked toward Phoebe, smiling as she said, ¡°Since it is rare for you toe over, let¡¯s head to my room to talk about more intimate matters.¡±

    ¡°That was exactly my intention!¡± Phoebe smiled lightly as she replied, still keeping a natural expression as she walked into the residence with Emily. The two of them looked like a pair of sisters, as though there was simply no friction between them.

    Han Shuo who had seen and heard the whole conversation between the two of them through a mystical demon couldn¡¯t help but inwardly admire the calmness of both women and also sort of understood how elegant women fought. It wasn¡¯t the loud shouting and screaming he imagined, but was instead a more obscure and implicit battle.

    After Emily led Phoebe into her personal room, Emily very carefully cedyer uponyer of enchantments around the room, perhaps to prevent their conversation from leaking. Phoebe looked on indifferently as Emily ced soundproofing, vision-obscuring enchantments, not saying a word.

    Once Emily had finished cing her enchantments, Han Shuo¡¯s two mystical demons felt a dark aura gradually spreading out in all directions. After hesitating for a moment, Han Shuo withdrew the two mystical demons, having them stay outside the room. In that way, the mystical demons would not be discovered by Emily¡¯s enchantments, but he would also not be able to hear their conversation.

    ¡°Hai, having too many women is indeed troublesome!¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but sigh. However, he knew that by his nature, his self-control in this area was definitelycking.

    Just as Han Shuo was sighing, Steward Kas came in, looking for Han Shuo, handing over a letter while saying respectfully, ¡°Lord Marquis, this is a letter for you.¡±

    ¡°Lord Marquis?¡± Han Shuo was stunned, looking over at Steward Kas before questioning suspiciously, ¡°Kas, did you address me wrongly?¡±

    ¡°No, I definitely did not!¡± Steward Kas answered, smiling as he looked toward Han Shuo before continuing, ¡°Lord Marquis, although His Majesty¡¯s official document has not been issued, there¡¯s no need for you to keep us in the dark. Hehe, we are your staff, yet we had to find out from others that His Majesty had conferred upon you a higher title.

    When Kas made that statement, Han Shuo had a sudden realization. He understood that Lancelot Empire¡¯s King Uhtred must have immediately set out to help Lawrence pave the way once Han Shuo left the pce. His title of Marquis must have also been announced in advance.

    Now that even Steward Kas knew about this, it adequately illustrated that King Uhtred had disseminated the news of Han Shuo¡¯s promotion. Han Shuo could only sigh at King Uhtred¡¯s high efficiency. He then knitted his brows and asked, ¡°Oh, as for those negative rumors about me, are they still being spread?¡±

    ¡°Lord Marquis, His Majesty has already confirmed your innocent background and ordered that no one should doubt your loyalty to the Empire. If anyone dared to spread rumors about you, His Majesty would immediately punish him for nder. Within a day¡¯s time, there was no longer anyone that dared talk about you being from the Cmity Church.¡± Steward Kas looked at Han Shuo reverently as he answered sincerely.

    Han Shou had merely made a trip to the imperial pce, yet once he returned, His Majesty made a series of major actions, suppressing all the negative discussions about Han Shuo and even conferred the noble title of Marquis upon Han Shuo. This was ample proof of His Majesty¡¯s trust and generosity toward Han Shuo. Kas was truly convinced by Han Shuo.

    However, Kas would never know that within the pce, Lancelot Empire¡¯s most powerful person actually had a pleading tone when talking to Han Shuo, not having the slightest arrogant attitude of a superior towards a subordinate.

    ¡°Who sent the letter?¡± Han Shuo nonchntly asked while looking at the letter.

    ¡°The person who sent it seemed to be a student of Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. He said that it was Master Fanny that told him to pass this to you. You had previously made it clear to pay special attention to matters regarding Master Fanny. Hence, I didn¡¯t dare tarry, delivering it to you immediately.¡± Steward Kas replied.

    ¡°That¡¯s good!¡± Han Shuo gave praise before waving his hand for Kas to withdraw. He then opened the envelope to retrieve and read the light green letter within.

    Fanny¡¯s penmanship was deft and graceful. The contents of the letter contained faint attraction, faintly disying part of Fanny¡¯s longing. It also mentioned that today was the first day for the necromancy major to recruit new students and she hoped that Han Shuo could find time to make a trip to the necromancy major and perhaps make a speech, so as to keep up appearances for the necromancy major.

    After he finished reading the letter, Han Shuo¡¯s nose was filled with the delicate fragrance of the light green writing paper, as if smelling the refreshing scent on Fanny¡¯s body. Remembering Dean Emma¡¯s previous expectations of him, Han Shuo hesitated for a moment, before deciding to make a trip to Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. Brimming in the scent of spring, Babylon Academy¡¯s yearly recruitment was in full swing.

    As Lancelot Empire¡¯srgest incubator for talent, Babylon Academy of Magic and Force was the ce everyone, regardless of nobles ormoners, yearned to join. Every youngster¡¯s goal was to be a noble mage or knight. If one did not have outstanding talent in magic, picking the next choice in bing a swordsman was also a decent choice.

    As the empire¡¯srgest training institution, the yearly recruitment of Babylon Academy of Magic and Force which is located in the empire¡¯s capital was always extremely lively. Most of the empire¡¯s talents would flock to Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, hoping to be able to be a student of the academy.

    Generally, as long as one enters Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, and sessfully graduates, one would have a beautiful future, regardless if they are amoner or a noble. Of course, if the student was a child of nobility and studied magic, the student¡¯s prospects would naturally be even brighter.

    Students would undergo many tests and would be able to choose a major suited to their mental strength and their ability to sense the magical elements. Generally, if one was able to sense a particr element better, it would be easier for them to study in that major. Of course, this wasn¡¯t absolute. There were people who were only able to weakly sense the darkness element, but due to their interest, they eventually became dark grand magi. The foundation only ys a small part while one¡¯s final aplishments would still be dependent on themselves.

    Hence, when students pass all the different tests and reach the time in choosing their major, the crux would often be their interest and the major¡¯s strength rather than the student choosing the major based on which element they could sense the strongest.

    All along, Babylon Academy of Magic and Force advocated and insisted all along on respecting the student¡¯s interest and choice. None of the majors had the right to force outstanding students to join their major. The final decision would be made by the student, while what each major had to do was to take advantage of their strengths in attracting excellent students to join.

    This was the same for the necromancy major. The necromancy major that had declined for many years had be a branch of the dark major. However, the necromancy major and dark major were after all not the same major. When it¡¯s time to recruit new students, the necromancy major also had the qualifications to recruit students independently.

    In an iparably wide za, each magic major of Babylon Academy of Magic and Force upied their own area, individually establishing numerous recruitment points for the light, dark, fire, water, wind, earth, lightning, summoning, space and necromancy majors.

    Every major had made their recruitment point noticeable, either disyingrge banners that stated their major¡¯s strengths or inviting outstanding seniors that had graduated from their major to attend and attract the crowd or promising benefits for entering their major. Every major spared no effort in showing off their major, so as to draw outstanding students to their own major.

    Talent was the most fundamental aspect of a student in Babylon Academy. As long as a major was able to produce an extraordinary mage, not only would it bring glory to the whole major, the major would also have an advantage in all future school activities. The stronger the major, the more funds and resources they could apply for.

    Taking the earth major for example. Thirty years ago, the constantly declining earth major had weed Dempus Gaier, causing the earth major to lead in many consecutive schoolpetitions by a wide margin. The current Dempus Gaier had be a well-known earth sacred magus within Lancelot Empire, allowing the earth major to rise from many years of decline to be the strongest major in the academy.

    There were many simr examples, the reason why the light and dark major had held the advantage for so many years was also due to the appearance of a few outstanding students in recent years. The weak and bullied necromancy major also stood out due to Han Shuo¡¯s appearance, faintly showing signs of splitting from the dark major and bing independent.

    In the remote northeast corner of the za, five tall skeleton warriors raised arge banner which showed ¡°The necromancy major wees you to join them¡± behind arge table. The two instructors, Fanny and Gene sat at the desk, while Lisa, Amy, Athena and the other necromancy students were shouting their lungs out.

    ¡°Why are we allocated this area, this area clearly deviates from the core zone. Those fellows in the dark major are obviously forcing us aside. Hmph!¡± Lisa angrily shouted, turning her head to look at the calm Fanny before asking, ¡°Master Fanny, do you think Bryan wille? It has been a long time since hest came by the necromancy major. That fellow has be a celebrity in the empire, could it be that he has forgotten his friends here, oh and you as well?¡±

    A long time has passed and Lisa had long since got over her previous anger toward Fanny and Han Shuo. However, only Lisa knew if she still bitterly longed for Han Shuo, and even Fanny was unable to see through her.

    Having experienced the tragic downfall of her family, Lisa was much stronger than Fanny could imagine. She was no longer the previously willful girl who only knew to cause trouble. Rather, she had truly calmed her mind in studying necromancy magic. Currently, Lisa had actually be a journeyman mage with Fanny¡¯s assistance.

    Fanny smiled as she nced at Lisa, exining, ¡°Haven¡¯t I already asked Derek to send a letter to him? If he has received my letter and just so happen to have nothing to handle, I believe he woulde. Hehe, don¡¯t be worried. Although the location of our necromancy major is slightly secluded, I still believe there will be students thate on ount of its reputation.¡±

    Fanny naturally wouldn¡¯t tell Lisa that when Han Shuo had returned from Brettel City, the first person he had looked for was herself. At that time, when Han Shuo told her that he had immediately headed to Babylon Academy to look for her once he entered Ossen City, Fanny was secretly delighted for quite a while.

    In this period of time, Han Shuo has risen rapidly within the empire, with nobles andmoners everywhere spreading Han Shuo¡¯s impressive aplishments. In particr, Han Shuo¡¯s achievement of killing the leader of Brut Merchant Alliance¡¯s Redbud Knights, Celt and his green dragon was spread widely to every corner of Lancelot Empire.

    Han Shuo¡¯s rise had caused the necromancy major to simrly be in the spotlight. Currently within Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, none of the other majors dared to tantly bully the necromancy major. Even Dean Emma was clearly siding the necromancy major, which made Fanny feel extremely rxed.

    ¡°Master Fanny, how many new students do you think we can recruit this year?¡± Gene asked Fanny who was sitting beside him. Gene who was originally infatuated with Fanny had previously seen Fanny and Han Shuo being intimate by ident. In addition, with Fanny had seeded in bing a necromancy archmage, his feelings had gradually faded.

    No matter which aspect waspared, an adept mage instructor like himself was a far cry from the rising necromancy grand magus Han Shuo. When Fanny had also be a necromancy archmage, Gene had given up even morepletely.

    In this way, Gene focused his energy on his career, on one hand striving hard in studying magic, on the other hand, attempting to develop and promote teaching as a career. His contribution to the growth of the necromancy major in this period of time wasn¡¯t small.

    Previously when he had returned to his hometown, Gene had mentioned that he was once the instructor of Brettel City¡¯s Count Bryan, immediately causing a sensation in the small town. Gene had also benefited from Han Shuo¡¯s status, causing Gene¡¯s resentment toward Han Shuo to slowly dissipate. ¡°Who knows? Hehe, perhaps there will be a few.¡± Fanny smiled as she replied.

    ¡°Excuse me, may I ask, is this the necromancy major? Did the Empire¡¯s necromancy grand magus Count Bryan graduate from this major?¡± a youngster that was dressed exquisitely and was followed by a steward hade over and inquired courteously.

    ¡°That¡¯s right, Bryan did indeed graduate from our major.¡± Gene was delighted, hastily answering.

    ¡°Ha, I¡¯ve finally found it, why are you so secluded!¡± The youngster shouted excitedly, before animatedly saying, ¡°My mental strength is excellent and have the strongest affinity for dark magic. However, I choose the necromancy major, I hope you will ept me!¡±

    After finishing his sentence, the youngster shouted loudly toward a fewpanions that were pacing back and forth in the distance, ¡°Friends, I¡¯ve found the necromancy major. They are over here, you shoulde over!¡±

    After the youngster shouted, the other teenagers all had delighted expressions, excitedly running towards Fanny¡¯s direction. The results of these students in the mental strength test were exceptional and they were also all from noble backgrounds. They were precisely the people that instructors of every major coveted. No one expected that all of a sudden, all of them would run toward the necromancy major.

 Chapter 390: Respect

    GDK 390 ¨C Respect

    ¡°Haha, wee, wee. Choosing the necromancy major is definitely the correct decision!¡± When Gene saw these few young students making a beeline for their position, he couldn¡¯t help but chuckle as he hastily stood up, taking out a few pamphlets and passed one to each person. He smiled as he exined, ¡°Everyone fill in your details. Hehe, there aren¡¯t many rules in our necromancy major and the school fees is the lowest.¡±

    These youngsters that came over were clearly attracted by Han Shuo¡¯s reputation. After hearing Gene¡¯s instructions, all of them excitedly leaned over the table to fill in their forms.

    There were a few youngsters that had been lingering a distance away and they didn¡¯t seem to be from the same group. However, their goal was identical and were also searching for the necromancy major¡¯s location. When they heard the shoutsing from this direction, all of them had an excited look as they headed for the necromancy major¡¯s area.

    ¡°Hey Carlisle, your mental strength is excellent and your affinity with the darkness element is extremely high. As long as you are willing to study dark magic, you will definitely be a dark grand magus. Don¡¯t leave, for a student like you, our dark major also gives many benefits.¡± a dark magic professor hastily shouted as he looked at a youngster directly heading toward the necromancy major in the corner.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry but I was under the impression that the dark major and necromancy major were the same and hence came over here. I didn¡¯t that that the necromancy major could actually enroll students on their own. I apologise. The reason I¡¯m here is because i want to be a necromancy grand magus like Marquis Bryan, not because of the dark major!¡± For this youngster to find out about Han Shuo¡¯s title of Marquis, he definitely does note from a simple background. He was neither haughty nor humble as he replied, performing a bow before leaving the dark major¡¯s recruitment point inrge strides without any hesitation.

    The expression of dark major archmage Deo who was sitting behind the dark major¡¯s recruitment table gradually became unsightly. Carlisle was a student that he fancied for a long time. From the start when Carlisle entered Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, Deo was immediately certain that Carlisle was a good seedling in studying dark magic.

    So as to recruit Carlisle, Deo even sent a few teachers to separately approach him. Carlisle had also showed great passion from the start and was always extremely pleased. Who would have known that in the end, Carlisle actually headed for the necromancy major without even looking back, even saying that the reason why he was amicable with them was purely because he misunderstood the rtion between the dark major and the necromancy major. That was practically a p to Deo¡¯s face.

    ¡°Isn¡¯t it just a petty ve achieving unexpected sess, what is so amazing about that. Hmph.¡± The dark major teacher that was rejected by Carlisle couldn¡¯t help but censure furiously, attempting to vent the resentment in his heart.

    ¡°Deo, isn¡¯t the necromancy major a branch of the dark major? Why does the current situation seem like the necromancy major faintly pressuring the dark major instead. I didn¡¯t expect that in the time that I left the dark major, not only did you not progress, you actually led the dark major to such a state?¡± A tall and lean middle aged magus appeared next to Deo, frowning as he berated Deo who was the dark major¡¯s person in charge.

    ¡°Crowley, although you have be a dark grand magus, you have always been outside the Lancelot Empire. Previously your reputation was very big, but there hasn¡¯t been any youngsters that know about you for a long time. However, this Bryan has been rising rapidly these days and within the hearts of the youngsters in the Empire, only he is a true hero. Your era has passed.¡± Deo nced at the middle aged magus, smiling bitterly as he replied.

    Crowley and Deo were both previously from Babylon Academy¡¯s dark major. At that time when Crowley was in the dark major, thepetition between majors had been dominated by the dark major for consecutive years. He only took a very short time after he advanced to the rank of adept mage and graduated to advance even further to be a dark archmage, causing a sensation within the Lancelot Empire for many years.

    However, after Crowley became an archmage, he couldn¡¯t make a breakthrough. After a while, he left Lancelot Empire, travelling to many nations within the Profound Continent and was finally able to be a dark grand magus a few years ago. Deo and Crowley were from the same year, but Deo clearly didn¡¯t have as much talent as Crowley, only reaching the rank of dark archmage. Deo had heard that Crowley had returned to the Lancelot Empire and thus invited him to show his support.

    Unfortunately, Crowley had left the Lancelot Empire for too long that even some of the elderly had forgotten about him, not to mention the young students that adored heroes. Crowley had been standing here for quite a while and even though Deo painstakingly introduced him, there wasn¡¯t anyone that took notice of him.

    ¡°Deo, that fellow Bryan really became a necromancy grand magus in such a short time?¡± a magus who studied dark magic would naturally have a sinister aura wrapping around their body. Candide, one of the three heavyweights of Dark Mantle had this aura, and this grand magus named Crowley had this aura too. The somber expression he gave Deo would definitely cause an average person who saw it to be fearful.

    When Deo heard Crowley¡¯s question, although he was extremely unwilling to admit it, but the truth could not be changed. He could only smile bitterly and replied, ¡°That youngster is a freak, he really became a necromancy grand magus that quickly. What is more frightening is that he simply didn¡¯t stay in the necromancy major for a long time, only appearing a few times at crucial moments. No one knows how he managed to train that quickly.¡±

    ¡°Oh, hehe, that¡¯s indeed somewhat interesting. Unfortunately that person isn¡¯t here, otherwise I would truly want to meet him. I have been forgotten by the people in Lancelot Empire for too long and would indeed need topete with an expert so that more people will know that I¡¯ve returned.¡± Crowley muttered to himself while having a pensive expression.

    Deo nced at Crowley, egging him on, ¡°That¡¯s right, Crowley, currently that fellow is having rising prestige within Lancelot Empire. The fastest way for you to make a name for yourself is to defeat him. Hehe, you can indeed try. That fellow had just advanced to necromancy grand magus and I feel he is surely not your match.¡±

    As Deo and Crowley were previously in the same year, Deo was extremely clear about Crowley¡¯s character. Deo could tell just by looking at Crowley¡¯s expression what he was thinking about and couldn¡¯t help but egg him on. In the years when Crowley was still in the dark major, he was famous for being proud and arrogant. Deo could see that Crowley¡¯s temperament had not changed even after so many years.

    ¡°Unfortunately, that fellow isn¡¯t here today. Otherwise I could seize the opportunity to stop his rise!¡± Deo¡¯s suggestion matched Crowley¡¯s intentions. He was absolutely confident in his own strength and couldn¡¯t help but be restless.

    While they were discussing at the dark major, other teachers in the rest of the majors were also silently cursing. This was especially so at the light major. At this moment, the person in charge of the light major, archmage Voignder was simrly having a deted expression as he shouted furiously, ¡°What is going on!! Liliac had such a strong affinity with the light element but actually headed to the enemy necromancy major. Doesn¡¯t she know that with her circumstances, studying light magic would have the best prospects? How can those dark creatures of the necromancy major be able to match light magic, this is simply preposterous!¡±

    Seated behind the light major¡¯s area was someone Han Shuo was familiar with ¨C one of Dark Mantle¡¯s three heavyweights, light grand magus Amyes. Currently, Amyes was enjoying a pot of good tea, sitting leisurely and smiling as he looked at Voignder, not sharing any opinions.

    The swordmasters stood behind Amyes, dedicated to Amyes¡¯ protection. They also didn¡¯t care about Voignder¡¯s words. In their eyes, Amyes¡¯ safety was the most important.

    Voignder indignantlyined and then faced the invited Amyes and said, ¡°Lord Amyes, do you think this matter is absurd? The necromancy major is such a small major, yet they actually became so lucky because of a small servant, even snatching away our light major¡¯s students.¡±

    Amyes had previously graduated from the light major, eventually bing a chancellor of authority within the Lancelot Empire. In the eyes of Lancelot Empire¡¯s nobles, Amyes was a terrifying demon. Once Amyes has fixed his attention on a certain noble family, that noble family will definitely meet with misfortune.

    However, although Amyes didn¡¯t have a favourable impression of Voignder who was two ranks below himself, he still had some feelings for the light major. Hence when he received Voignder¡¯s invitation, Amyes agreed to attend. At present, as he heard Voignder¡¯sints, Amyes only smiled faintly and replied gracefully, ¡°Bryan is a Marquis of the Empire and is regarded highly by His Majesty. It is best that you are careful with what you say.¡±

    For Voignder who didn¡¯t know that Han Shuo was a member of Dark Mantle to blindly ridicule Han Shuo in front of Amyes, he would definitely not get any benefits. When Voignder heard Amyes reply, he was astonished as he looked at Amyes, not understanding why Amyes was speaking on behalf of Han Shuo.

    ¡°Haha, you should just carry on with your own matters. Those students that enter the necromancy major have all done so out of blind adoration of a hero. After some time, when they realise they are not suited to studying necromancy magic, I believe they will still recognise the facts and return to the light major. There¡¯s no need for you to worry.¡± As a high-ranking member of Dark Mantle, Amyes could see the main issue in a nce and couldn¡¯t help but console Voignder. ¡°I, I just can¡¯t swallow my anger!¡± Voignder pondered for a moment and understood that what Amyes said was reasonable. However, he still couldn¡¯t help but shout angrily.

    Amyes hiddenly looked at Voignder in disdain, thinking in his heart that the current Bryan is simply not someone a teacher of the light major can contend against. Pondering for a while, as well as taking to ount his feelings for the light major, Amyes reminded, ¡°Voignder, I¡¯ll say one thing, this Bryan isn¡¯t someone you can provoke. Even if you can¡¯t swallow your anger you should forcefully contain it. If not, it would it would lead to your own demise.¡±

    Amyes controlled a division of Dark Mantle and had a close rtionship with His Majesty. From the series of arrangements His Majesty had made today, he could already spot some clues and understood that prior to His Majesty¡¯s passing, no one within Lancelot Empire would be able to act against Han Shuo. Even he himself wouldn¡¯t not be able to, much less a light major¡¯s teacher?

    ¡°Th-this, Lord Amyes, where do these words stem from?¡± Voignder was startled, somewhat baffled as he inquired.

    ¡°Goprehend it yourself. Haha, the reason why I¡¯ve said this to you is on the ount of you inviting me. Look at those fellows in the dark major, I can guarantee that they would pay bitterly sooner orter. Oh, it¡¯s not sooner orter, maybe they would pay bitterly very soon. Ha, That fellow actually came, didn¡¯t he just depart from His Majesty¡¯s ce not long ago?¡± Amyes first warned Voignder, before suddenly spotting a tall and imposing figure in the distance. He couldn¡¯t help but eximing softly.

    Following Amyes line of sight, Voignder also saw the approaching Han Shuo. He couldn¡¯t help but cry in rm, ¡°Good gracious, how has that fellow be so tall!¡±

    The previous time Voignder saw Han Shuo, he wasn¡¯t even 1.80 meters. Han Shuo had immediately looked for Fanny every time he went to the necromancy major and normal people would simply not have the chance to see Han Shuo. The figure of Han Shuo who trained in demonic magic was currently as imposing as a demonic god, naturally exuding devilishly attractive traits.

    Even though he was within a sea of people, Han Shuo¡¯s tall and imposing body and traits would still draw in everyone¡¯s gaze, causing everyone to focus their attention on him, inevitably bing everyone¡¯s focal point.

    ¡°Master Fanny, it¡¯s Bryan!! Bryan¡¯s here, he really came!¡± Lisa was originally ncing around senselessly, not expecting Han Shuo to really return. When she saw Han Shuo¡¯s prominent figure in the corner of her eye, her heart was in upheaval and she was unable to resist crying out in surprise.

    ¡°It seems that only when I truly see him that I realise that all these days of trying to forget him has been useless. I, I¡¯m still unable to forget him!¡± after crying out in surprise, Lisa¡¯s expression suddenly dulled as she sighed inwardly.

    When she heard Lisa¡¯s cry, Fanny¡¯s eyes gave off a joyous radiance of disbelief. She was somewhat unable to resist immediately standing up, but remembered that there were many people around. She couldn¡¯t help but blush as she sat back down, scolding herself inwardly for losing control. She imitated the action of taking a sip of water, controlling her tone as much as possible as she said to the group of excited youngsters, ¡°That person is Bryan, he can be considered as your senior.¡±

    These new necromancy students that rushed over due to Han Shuo¡¯s reputation had justpleted the procedures to enter the necromancy major. When they heard Fanny¡¯s sentence, they couldn¡¯t help but blush, all of them standing on tiptoe to do their utmost in seeing a little further, searching for any trace of their hero. In that moment, their young and tender hearts were filled with emotions and excitement.

    As Han Shuo continued walking, he realised that due to his appearance, numerous gazes were uniformly converging on him. When Han Shuo looked around and did not immediately see the necromancy major¡¯s recruitment point, he couldn¡¯t help but be suspicious.

    However, Han Shuo understood that the necromancy major was a branch of the dark major and the dark major¡¯s location was actually extremely conspicuous. Only after a mystical demon floated upward to overlook the area, did he spot Fanny in a corner behind the dark major. When Han Shuo saw the words on the banner being held up by five skeleton warriors, he couldn¡¯t help butugh and think inwardly, as Lancelot Empire¡¯srgest magic academy, why does the recruitment seem like a food market?

    Han Shuo continued walking toward the necromancy major as he pondered. Just as Han Shuo was about to reach the necromancy major¡¯s recruitment point, Deo hastily pulled Crowley, saying in a low voice, ¡°That fellow is Bryan, if you intend to seize the chance to be famous, defeating him is a good idea!¡±

    Crowley followed Deo¡¯s gaze, couldn¡¯t help but blew a raspberry, ¡°Deo, did you make a mistake, is that fellow really a necromancer? Why does he look like he¡¯s more well-built than barbarian warriors!¡±

    Deo was somewhat speechless, having an ugly expression as he exined, ¡°That¡¯s right, it¡¯s him. Merely, it is said that he also practices a mysterious martial technique and had previously defeated Brut Merchant Alliance¡¯s Leah Cain. Crowley, could it be that you are afraid?¡±

    ¡°Also practices a martial technique...¡± Crowley stared nkly, before smiling confidently as he replied, ¡°A magus that isn¡¯t focused on one thing is the easiest to deal with. If you didn¡¯t mention this point, I would still be somewhat apprehensive. Since that is the case, I feel reassured.¡±

    As Han Shuo headed for the necromancy major, he was slightly surprised at the amount of attention he was getting. He didn¡¯t think that his appearance would actually cause such so many people to be flustered.

    The light major¡¯s recruitment point was also at a very eye-catching location. Han Shuo had noticed Amyes through a mystical demon and when he passed by the light major¡¯s recruitment point, he couldn¡¯t help but nodding his head to send his greetings to Amyes who was leisurely sipping tea. As Amyes was one of the three heavyweights of Dark Mantle, he could also be considered Han Shuo¡¯s immediate superior. Furthermore, Amyes was Emily¡¯s brother. No matter publicly or privately, Han Shuo had to show respect when he saw Amyes.

    When Amyes who was originally sitting there leisurely sipping tea saw Han Shuo¡¯s greeting, he didn¡¯t dare be disrespectful and actually stood up and smiled as he returned the greeting.

    For someone like Amyes to be so respectful to an upstart like Han Shuo, Voignder was slightly surprised. As he recalled what Amyes had advised him, Voignder suddenly understood, and instead viewed the dark major in schadenfreude. Seeing Crowley¡¯s restless appearance, it seemed like a show was about to begin.

    Seeing Amyes stand up to return the greeting, Han Shuo was simrly astonished. No matter how he saw it, with Amyes¡¯ status, even returning the greeting while seated was already showing face to Han Shuo. He truly didn¡¯t think that Amyes would actually stand and show his respect.

    This signified that Amyes treated Han Shuo as someone on the same level and simply not treating Han Shuo as a subordinate. Otherwise, regardless of his age or qualifications within Dark Mantle, there was simply no need for Amyes to stand and return the greeting.

    Showing a splendid smile, Han Shuo who was slightly confused directly headed for the necromancy major, not thinking deeply about the reason behind Amyes¡¯ friendliness.

    Suddenly, a malicious looking middle aged magus stood in Han Shuo¡¯s way. Crowley hiddenly measured up Han Shuo, suddenly saying, ¡°Are you Count Bryan? Haha, let me introduce myself, I am Crowley and have graduated from Babylon Academy¡¯s dark major. I have always been fascinated by the exploration of magic and have recently just returned to Lancelot Empire...¡±

    ¡°Get to the point!¡± Han Shuo knitted his brows, interrupting before Crowley couldplete her sentence.

    Crowley had an embarrassed expression, not expecting that with Han Shuo¡¯s position as a noble Count, he actually rudely interrupted his speech. That caused Crowley to be dazed for a moment.

    ¡°I heard that Count Bryan is a necromancy grand magus. May I know if Lord Count would give me the honor ofparing notes with me?¡± After Crowley was interrupted by Han Shuo, he was a little annoyed, getting right to the point and issuing his challenge.

    When they heard this sentence, the students and teachers in the dark major were shocked. The attention of the nearby majors were all focused here and had also heard Crowley¡¯s loud challenge. They all became excited in an instant, hastily abandoning their current tasks and rushed over.

    Over at the necromancy major, Fanny had continuously gazed at Han Shuo once he appeared and had clearly heard the challenge by dark major¡¯s Crowley. Before Fanny could express anything, Lisa and the other students had already headed over. Fanny hesitated a moment, turning around and said to Gene, ¡°Master Gene, sorry to trouble you to look after this ce, I¡¯ll head over to take a look!¡±

    ¡°Sure, go ahead. I will look after this area.¡± Gene knew the real rtionship between Fanny and Han Shuo, nodding understandingly as he replied.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go over and take a look too. Haha, where did this fellowe from, to go as far as to challenge our hero.¡± all the new necromancy students that had joined because of Han Shuo¡¯s reputation excitedly ran over.

    Amyes who had just sat down suddenly spurted out a mouth of tea, awkwardly looking at Voignder who was on the receiving end. He embarrassingly smiled before saying, ¡°I¡¯m really sorry, that fellow really did as i predicted, wanting to seize the opportunity to make a name for himself. Haha.¡± ¡°It¡¯s nothing, it¡¯s nothing, my lord is indeed formidable.¡± as Voignder used a napkin to wipe away the tea on his body, he smiled andplimented Amyes. He wouldn¡¯t dare me Amyes!

 Chapter 391: No turning back

    GDK 391 ¨C No turning back

    Han Shuo surveyed the no longer young magus in front of him. Crowley was a dark grand magus. An average student in Babylon Academy of Magic and Force might not have any impression of him. However, Han Shuo who once did odd jobs within the necromancy major knew of this person¡¯s existence.

    At that time, Han Shuo and Jack were always in charge of cleaning the statues along the path first thing in the morning. All the outstanding graduates from past years of the academy each had a statue ced along the path. Crowley was impressively one of the numerous statues which Han Shuo had previously cleaned for a period of time.

    The time when Crowley was in the dark major was formerly also the dark major¡¯s period of glory. Ever since Crowley became a journeyman mage, four consecutive years of the academy¡¯spetition between majors had been swept by the dark major¡¯s team that was led by Crowley. After Crowley had graduated from the dark major, he very quickly also became a dark archmage. Crowley really had many major achievements before he traveled around the Profound Continent in the past few years.

    Merely, too much time has passed. Due to Crowley¡¯s fascination in further advancing, his reputation had slowly waned and was gradually forgotten by the people in Lancelot Empire. It even reached the point where some new teachers and students of the dark major had never heard any information about him.

    Han Shuo looked at Crowley who had issued him a challenge, recalling the time when he was an errand ve looking up at Crowley¡¯s statue. Han Shuo suddenly had an absurd feeling in his heart. Just a while ago, he had actually be such a person¡¯s opponent and was even being challenged by him. Han Shuo could feel a sense of pride rising within himself.

    It was precisely because of this that Han Shuo had an extremely splendid smile. However, when Crowley saw Han Shuo¡¯s splendid smile, Crowley interpreted it as Han Shuopletely looking down on him. Crowley felt that he was being insulted, holding back the anger in his heart and said, ¡°Count Bryan, what is the meaning of this. Could it be that you feel contempt about my challenge and intend to reject it?¡±

    Smiling as he shook his head, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but straightened his mind which was imagining wildly. He then sized up Crowley more seriously, hesitating a moment before knitting his brows and said, ¡°You have misunderstood. I was only recalling past events. When I was still an errant servant in the necromancy department, I had previously cleaned your statue. Who would have guessed that today you would issue a challenge to me? Honestly speaking, I feel extremely honored!¡±

    Crowley was astonished and couldn¡¯t help but turn his head to look at his old friend in the dark major, Deo, seemingly wanting to seek confirmation from Deo about the matter.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. A few years ago, as an errand servant, he had previously cleaned the hallway leading to the dark major¡¯s building. Ah, when you became a dark grand magus had previously applied with the dean to ce your statue there. What is said is correct, he had indeed cleaned your statue before.¡± Deo felt somewhat awkward as he exined but still narrated in full detail to clear Crowley¡¯s doubts.

    When Crowley heard Deo¡¯s exnation and considered that Han Shuo had previously cleaned his statue, he couldn¡¯t help but hesitate slightly in his heart and actually didn¡¯t really want to challenge Han Shuo anymore. No matter what, Han Shuo had previously shown respect to him. For him to act in this way appeared slightly insincere.

    By the side, the dark major¡¯s person in charge Deo saw Crowley showing some hesitation, he couldn¡¯t help but hastily gave Crowley a meaningful nce before smiling slightly and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Count Bryan, so do you actually n to ept Crowley¡¯s challenge or not?¡±

    ¡°Of course, didn¡¯t I just say it a moment ago, I¡¯m extremely honored!¡± Han Shuo smiled cheerfully as he replied, shooting a nce at Deo. Han Shuo understood what Deo was nning, but he had absolute confidence and wasn¡¯t afraid of defeating Crowley here.

    ¡°Very good. In that case, I would act as the witness, are both of you agreeable?¡± Suddenly, Amyes walked over from the light major¡¯s area, gracefully smiling as he suggested.

    The light major¡¯s person in charge, Voignder had also walked over with Amyes. Voignder had a schadenfreude expression as he looked over. Regardless of the dark major¡¯s Crowley or Han Shuo, they were considered the enemy to Voignder. For these two sides to battle, he would be enjoying happily no matter who won or lost.

    ¡°Crowley, this is Lord Amyes, you should have heard of him!¡± When Deo saw Amyes turning up uninvited and even made such a suggestion, hastily introducing Amyes to Crowley who had left the Lancelot Empire for a long time.

    Previously when Crowley left the Lancelot Empire, Amyes was only a Dark Star envoy of Dark Mantle. Thus, he would naturally not know Amyes. However, when he returned to the Lancelot Empire, he did find out about the current bigwigs in the Lancelot Empire. When he heard Deo¡¯s introduction, he immediately greeted Amyes respectfully, grinning as he said, ¡°Of course. With Lord Amyes witnessing this battle would be for the best.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m extremely honored as well.¡± Han Shuo bowed toward Amyes courteously as he replied, causing Amyes to return the greeting once again.

    The surrounding teachers and students from the various factions all continuously rushed over. These people have heard of Han Shuo¡¯s great name and seeing that Han Shuo, a recently broken through grand magus necromancer upstart was sparring with a dark grand magus of unknown origin, all of them were indescribably excited.

    There weren¡¯t many grand magus ranked characters within Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, with most teachers of the various factions being at adept mage or archmage ranks. As the students would hardly even be able to see teachers sparring with each other, they had definitely note across a spar between two grand magi and hence were extremely excited.

    ¡°Bryan, all the best, you will definitely win!¡± Out of a sudden, a familiar voice rang in his ear. Han Shou turned to take a look, noticing Lisa in a corner of the surrounding waving a fist animatedly to cheer him on.

    Han Shuo felt a warmth in his heart, recalling how Lisa had always believed and supported him a long time ago. After all these time, Lisa had matured from an unruly and willful girl, not only appearing more youthful and energetic, she also had an additional unyielding temperament. It seems that the period of time where she suffered pain had also given her benefits.

    While Han Shuo gazed at Lisa, he also saw Fanny who was beside Lisa. Fanny didn¡¯t have the same unconditional trust that Lisa had in Han Shuo. Instead, her eyes were forever filled with worry. No matter how strong Han Shuo became, as long as there was a trace of danger, she would be worried for Han Shuo.

    Admiring the two women¡¯s splendid grins, Han Shuo then turned back to face Crowley, courteously inquiring, ¡°How would you like topete? With my persistent character, those that have battled me opening have never been able to survive.¡±

    Hearing this statement, Crowley was startled, showing an obvious stunned expression. What Crowley knew about Han Shuo¡¯s origins and past was based on what Deo had told him. He personally didn¡¯t know much about Han Shuo¡¯s matters. Now that he heard Han Shuo making such a statement, he suddenly had an uneasy feeling.

    ¡°On this point, I can help Bryan borate. Including Brut Merchant Alliance¡¯s Leah Cain, Bryan had dueled and killed his opponent on thirteen asions. Right, just to warn Mister Crowley, among those that Bryan has killed include Redbud Knightsmander, dragon rider Celt. Hehe, I was afraid you didn¡¯t know, hence I¡¯m informing you in advance.¡± Amyes could see that Crowley was somewhat astonished, figuring out that he perhaps was clear about Han Shuo¡¯s past and hence couldn¡¯t help but enlighten Crowley.

    Hearing Amyes¡¯ments, Crowley was shaken once again, his gaze towards Deo already containing hints of resentment. When Deo saw Crowley looking at him resentfully, he clearly had a guilty conscience, awkwardly turning his head. After hesitating for a moment, Deo suddenly said, ¡°Let¡¯s forget about it, hehe, both of you are in fact considered members of our dark major. Let¡¯s notpete on such an auspicious day, lest we harm the friendly rtions.¡±

    When Deo saw Crowley¡¯s resentful gaze, as well as heard Amyes¡¯ reminder, he finally cleared his mind of his fury. Crowley was invited by the dark major, if he was defeated by Han Shuo, Deo would definitely be reproached and perhaps even the dark major¡¯s teachers would push the me to him after the event.

    ¡°Mister Crowley, I feel that we should just let it pass. Hehe, what Mister Deo said is reasonable. Let¡¯s not hurt the harmony, both of you are considered to be on the same side!¡± Amyes smiled gently as he advised Crowley.

    ¡°No, I still wish topare notes with Count Bryan.¡± Under the gaze of the crowd, Crowley had no means of backing down. Hence, he forced himself to insist onpeting.

    At this moment, a ray of white light radiated in the center and Babylon Academy¡¯s Dean Emma appeared. She looked at both Han Shuo and Crowley before smiling and said, ¡°Comparing notes in magic is amon way of improvement among magi. However, as you aren¡¯t enemies, there¡¯s no need for a life or death duel. Bryan, today¡¯s our annual recruitment, you wouldn¡¯t be thinking of not giving face to your alma mater right?¡±

    ¡°Of course not, I was just joking. Hehe. In any case, it¡¯s just a spar. If Mister Crowley doesn¡¯t mind, how about we change our location?¡± When Han Shuo saw Emma appear, he immediately had a friendly smile on his face and invited Crowley to another location.

    Crowley was clearly relieved, forcefullyughing as he replied, ¡°I¡¯ve left for too long and aren¡¯t familiar with this ce. Where do you think would be a more suitable location?¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s no need to choose, just use the dark major¡¯s number one practice grounds. There¡¯s arge-scale magic barrier there. It should be fine as long as the both of you pay a little attention, please do not harm the friendly rtions.¡± when Emma saw that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t serious, she felt relieved, smiling as she spoke.

    Just like this, Han Shuo and Crowley both agreed. The recruitment was suddenly paused midway and when Han Shuo and Crowley entered therge practice grounds, teachers and students of the various majors had also rushed over.

 Chapter 392: I admit defeat

    GDK 392 ¨C I admit defeat

    The dark major¡¯s number one practice field was extremely wide. The sparring between Han Shuo and Crowley had attracted numerous teachers and students over to watch. Among them were Amyes and Dean Emma, who were the witnesses for the battle as well as being in charge of ensuring everyone¡¯s safety.

    There was a barrier deployed within the practice field to prevent the strength of the magic from spreading out. On top of that, Emma personally partitioned a separate small space for the audience to hide in while they watched the battle. The recruitment outside could be considered to have been temporarily ceased.

    ¡°Dean, why are you willing to let the two of them duel on such an asion?¡± as Amyes and Emma stood together, Amyes who was dressed in a spotless white robe and appearing otherworldly refined, had a smile on his face as he asked Dean Emma.

    Emma nced at Amyes who was just walking out of Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. Previously when Amyes was studying in the light major, Emma was already the teacher in charge of the space major. Emma could also be considered as Amyes senior within Babylon Academy. Hence, Amyes was very respectful toward her.

    ¡°During that time, that fellow Crowley was proud and arrogant. I see that he has not really changed even after such a long time and dampening his spirit isn¡¯t a bad thing. Besides, Bryan had just be a grand magus necromancer and probably still isn¡¯t very adept at controlling some of the new necromancy magic. A spar which doesn¡¯t cause disharmony would actually really be beneficial to their progress.¡± Emma benevolently smiled, her face covered with wrinkles as she exined to Amyes.

    ¡°In that case, who do you think will win?¡± Amyes pondered for a while, before inquiring.

    ¡°Hehe, I believe you ought to be clearer than me on this?¡± Emma faintly smiled as she nced at Amyes, as though implying something.

    Amyes chuckled when he heard Emma¡¯s response, nodding his head without replying. As one of the heavyweights of Dark Mantle, Amyes knew of Han Shuo¡¯s aplishments in recent days. Through the baptism of blood and fire, Han Shuo, as a necromancer who grasped mysterious techniques, had already done many hiddenrge-scale moves.

    Apart from Redbud Knights¡¯ leader dragon rider Celt, Han Shuo had also fought with the Church of Light¡¯s Red Archbishop Kosse multiple times. Amyes was also aware of other news. To be able to kill light grand magus Ferguson before bing a grand magus himself, regardless of how you saw it, Han Shuo had a higher chance of winning.

    The reason why Amyes was interested to judge the battle this time around, was simply because he wanted to personally witness Han Shuo¡¯s improvement. In fact, Amyes wouldn¡¯t be surprised at a victory. Han Shuo beating Crowley was something both Amyes and Emma felt was inevitable.

    Members of every faction were full of expectations as they watched the two grand magus in the center. The eyes of necromancy major¡¯s Fanny, Lisa and other students were even brighter, their gazes fixed on Han Shuo, wanting to clearly see Han Shuo¡¯s every move.

    ¡°Within the Lancelot Empire, it isn¡¯t that there aren¡¯t grand magus necromancers. However, those people were absorbed in exploring magical knowledge and rarely appeared before others. This would perhaps be the only time your generation would be able to watch a grand magus necromancer fight. No matter what, you have to watch attentively.¡±

    Although Fanny was worried for Han Shuo, there wasn¡¯t much she could say now that things have developed to this point. As an instructor for the necromancy major, Fanny gave instructions to all the students to watch carefully, with Fanny herself alsopletely focusing her attention on the fight.

    ¡°Teacher Fanny, don¡¯t worry. We will earnestly watch Bryan¡¯s moves.¡± Lisa shouted excitedly, her bright eyes fixed on Han Shuo¡¯s figure from the beginning.

    ¡°Although it¡¯s just a spar, Mister Crowley shouldn¡¯t hold back. Hehe, I¡¯m a necromancer, if you give me the time to summon undead creatures, I think that would be disadvantageous to you.¡± Han Shuo smiled calmly as he said to the opposing Crowley who had taken out a green magic staff.

    Han Shuo hadplete confidence in dealing with Crowley. As his mental strength had once again improved greatly after just returning from theherworld, Han Shuo¡¯s mental state was unprecedentedly good. Having reached the separate demon realm, Han Shuo could monitor Crowley¡¯s every movement with the assistance of a few mystical demons. The strength and speed of his body were also something Crowley couldn¡¯tpare to. As Han Shuo stably surpassed Crowley in all aspects, he appeared extremely confident.

    ¡°In that case, I wouldn¡¯t be polite. Count Bryan, please be careful.¡± Crowley, who had learned of Han Shuo¡¯s prowess from Deo and Amyes just before entering the practice field, did not underestimate him because of his age. He instead regarded Han Shuo as the strongest opponent in his whole life. Once Crowley, who did not dare rx the slightest, finished speaking, the magic staff in his hand started emitting grayish-brown light following his incantation. The dark elements within the practice field suddenly seemed to enliven like elves. As Crowley slowly chanted his magic spell, six huge Hands of Death suddenly formed around Han Shuo, fiercely crushing down toward Han Shuo.

    The grand magus ranked Crowley was indeed outstanding, already using the mighty Hands of Death as his first move. Furthermore, he was able to form six at once, clearly treating Han Shuo as his life¡¯s most formidable opponent.

    The six Hands of Death were much more lifelike than what Emily had used. The six gigantic Hands of Death even had fine veined patterns on their palms, as though really belonging to some dark world¡¯s creature. The coarse and long fingers also had sharp hook-like fingernails, appearing extremely terrifying.

    It could be seen that Crowley was extremely cautious and didn¡¯t immediately attack Han Shuo violently. He simply nimbly manipted six Hands of Death to gradually approach Han Shuo. In this way, he would slowly cause terrifying pressure to Han Shuo yet still abiding by the principles of a spar.

    When Han Shuo saw the six Hands of Death uniformly pressing on, he understood that Crowley really did not intend to gun for his life and was really in ordance with Emma¡¯s words to purely spar. This caused Han Shuo who was prepared to deal with sudden changes to have a favorable impression of Crowley.

    Taking out his white bone staff, Han Shuo recited the incantation for the Soul Vortex necromancy magic. Out of a sudden, hundreds of wraiths appeared, revolving rapidly in the void in front of Han Shuo, forming a vortex that sucked up the surrounding magic elements. The six Hands of Death that were slowly pressing toward Han Shuo suddenly felt the intense force of attraction generated by the Soul Vortex, one after another involuntarily being sucked toward the Soul Vortex in front of Han Shuo.

    ¡®Soul Vortex¡¯ was a grand magus ranked necromancy magic that Han Shuo had just mastered. This necromancy magic utilized the power of wraiths. In theherworld, a single wraith¡¯s strength was next to nothing. However, by controlling hundreds of wraiths with his mental energy and forming ¡®Soul Tremor¡¯ ording to necromancyws, Han Shuo was able to generate enormous might.

    Against those peculiar magic that contained magic elements, this ¡®Soul Vortex¡¯ was able to create an intense suction force, pulling these magic attacks into the vortex and using the numerous wraiths to grind them away little by little. Furthermore, if creatures with souls were sucked into the ¡®Soul Vortex¡¯, the numerous wraiths could directly bind the creature¡¯s soul and dragging it from the Profound Continent into theherworld.

    For all living creatures in this world, once they were dragged to theherworld, their soul would never find the way to return. To the people in the Profound Continent, creatures who were dragged into theherworld can be considered as dead.

    After the ¡®Soul Vortex¡¯ was formed, Han Shuo¡¯s silk-like mental energy entered the spell, assisting the revolving of the wraiths and vortex. The strength of the suction force gradually increased after the insertion of Han Shuo¡¯s mental energy and the revolving of the vortex. The six Hands of Death which were slowly pressing towards Han Shuo suddenly became extremely heavy, as though bing a stream flowing into the ocean, slowly entering the ¡®Soul Vortex¡¯.

    Crowley and Han Shuo were separated by a big distance, hence Crowley wasn¡¯t affected by the pull of the ¡®Soul Vortex¡¯. Furthermore, the suction force formed by the ¡®Soul Vortex¡¯ was only effective toward attacks formed from magic elements and living creatures possessing souls. It wasn¡¯t effective toward ordinary objects and physical attacks.

    When Crowley saw the six Hands of Death actually being absorbedpletely, his expression became even heavier. He understood in his heart that Han Shuo¡¯s grand magus necromancer strength was indeed extremely formidable. The disappearance of the six Hands of Death caused Crowley to be fearful and simultaneously be even more cautious.

    Following his reciting of another spell, the green magic staff in his hand started slowly emitting gloomy light again. When Crowley finished reciting his spell, he pointed the green magic staff at Han Shuo, causing a mysterious contract to suddenly form between himself and Han Shuo.

    Dense dark elements suddenly condensed together, violently crowding into the space surrounding Han Shuo. Han Shuo¡¯s body suddenly tense and was actually unable to move. Not only his limbs were bound, even his mouth seemed to be covered, the dark elements were like a rope, slowly constricting around Han Shuo.

    ¡®Prison of Darkness¡¯ was an advanced dark magic, utilizing one¡¯s mental energy to gather the dark element and form a contract with the enemy and firmly imprisoning the enemy, causing the enemy to be unable to move his body.

    In just a sudden, apart from his mental energy and demonic yuan energy that could still be circted, Han Shuo¡¯s physical body had been firmly bound by the dark elements. During this process, Crowley waved his green magic staff once again and five Spheres of Destruction slowly formed and approached Han Shuo.

    Crowley had a slightly pleased expression. This was his most proficient and most confident magic. Han Shuo had just advanced to be a grand magus necromancer, hence his mental strength definitely shouldn¡¯t be as resilient as his own. ¡®Prison of Darkness¡¯ was actually just a contest of mental strength. For a high ranked dark grand magus like Crowley, he could use ¡®Prison of Darkness¡¯ topletely imprison magi who had lower mental strength than himself, causing them to be unable to move.

    He had specifically focused on this weak point of Han Shuo just advancing to be a grand magus necromancer, believing that Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength was definitely not as abundant as his own. This was why he had suddenly unleashed the ¡®Prison of Darkness¡¯. When Han Shuo was restricted by ¡®Prison of Darkness¡¯ Crowley felt pleased with himself, thinking his heart that such a prominent figure was actually restricted by the ¡®Prison of Darkness¡¯.

    Emma and Amyes who were by the side both watched him attentively. Adding that Crowley had only wanted to make use of Han Shuo to be famous, he would definitely not n to kill Han Shuo. Thus, when the deadly Spheres of Destruction were formed, Crowley did not immediatelyunch them at Han Shuo and had slowly sent them toward Han Shuo instead.

    ¡°Count Bryan, you¡¯ve lost. Concede before the Sphere of Destruction hits you!¡± Crowley had a confident expression, smiling as he looked at the motionless Han Shuo.

    Hearing this sentence, the surrounding spectators were in an uproar, evidently not foreseeing such a situation to happen. Those necromancy students that had joined due to Han Shuo¡¯s reputation all showed doubtful, hesitating expressions. Lisa upon seeing their expressions suddenly shouted angrily, ¡°You brats, what kind of expression is that. How could Bryan lose to such an old fellow.¡±

    Lisa¡¯s fiend-like appearance actually intimidated the new students, causing them to involuntarily turn their heads and not dare to look at the fiery Lisa, so as to avoid Lisa unleashing her anger on them.

    ¡°Hehe, Crowley is indeed Crowley. Once he spotted the weakness in the brat¡¯s mental strength, he used the ¡®Prison of Darkness¡¯ to restrict him before he could summon any undead creatures. Who would have thought, it seems like Crowley is really going to win!¡± Dark major¡¯s teacher-in-charge Deo couldn¡¯t repress his happiness, his voice sounding happier than usual as he exined to the surrounding dark major¡¯s instructors and students.

    Contrariwise, Dean Emma and Amyes both had calm expressions, as though not at all anxious for Han Shuo and instead gazed amusingly at Han Shuo, wanting to see how Han Shuo responded.

    Having absorbed a serene luster gem, Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength wasn¡¯t weaker than Crowley¡¯s. However, Han Shuo did not use his mental strength to resist Crowley and instead incited his demonic yuan energy to strengthen his body once again. When Han Shuo suddenly struggled, a sharp and clear ¡°Pa¡± sounded.

    ¡°That doesn¡¯t seem likely!¡± Han Shuo smiled as he replied. The ¡®Prison of Darkness¡¯ had been broken and he waved the white bone staff, shooting out rows of bone spears, smashing apart the five Spheres of Destruction that had yet to reach his body. He then summoned an old fey demon to charge toward Crowley, before summoning a few evil knights and an undead army to emerge.

    ¡°Crowley lost!¡± Emma smiled as she said, before looking at Amyes and asked, ¡°However, how did Bryan break Crowley¡¯s ¡®Prison of Darkness¡¯? I did not detect any fluctuation in his mental energy. Hehe, Amyes, did you notice how he did it?¡±

    Amyes shrugged his shoulders as he replied gracefully, ¡°Even the Dean did not see it clearly, how could I have figured it out. Hehe, however, Bryan has always been following Lord Candide. I believe based on your rtionship with Lord Candide, you ought to be more familiar regarding Bryan¡¯s situation.¡±

    Amyes had previously focused his attention on Han Shuo, precisely to see how he reacted. He had never doubted Han Shuo¡¯s victory because as a character who could defeat Celt as well as Red Archbishop Kosse, Han Shuo was definitely not someone Crowley could defeat.

    Merely, what surprised Amyes was that even with hisplete attention, he did not decipher how Han Shuo had achieved victory. However, the only thing Amyes could confirm was that Han Shuo really did not utilize mental energy!

    Right, it must definitely be that mysterious martial technique. This fellow could already unleash such strength just by using his martial technique. With his strength as a grand magus necromancer in addition to that, it seems that Lancelot Empire would really be his to control in the future. To have such a mysterious martial technique, who exactly is his master? Why have i not heard of him and have also not been able to find out? This is indeed too strange. Amyes thought silently as he gazed at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Did you see that, did all you fools see that?¡± Lisa was ecstatic, shouting at the youngsters, cheering after Han Shuo easily neutralized the Prison of Darkness.

    When Han Shuo summoned his undead creatures, these youngsters had all cried out in surprise. Some of the youngsters were iparably excited as they saw the sinister dark creatures, shouting to theirpanions, ¡°Look at that, that¡¯s called an evil knight. It¡¯s as powerful as a human earth knight but its physical body is even harder.¡±

    The girls were somewhat instinctively fearful of these fierce undead creatures. However, with the exnation of these youngsters, they became extremely inquisitive. In particr, Lisa¡¯s shouting had allowed them to rx and start to timidly size up these undead creatures.

    From the moment Han Shuo opened his mouth to speak, Crowley knew that he had lost. When he saw the enormous undead army appear, Crowley had thoroughly lost confidence in achieving victory.

    In the Profound Continent, the bane of necromancers are light magi. Apart from them, in duels between magi of the same rank, once numerous undead creatures appear, it would essentially signify the necromancer¡¯s victory. For instance, just the old fey demon that had appeared this time was enough to cause a headache for Crowley. Adding on the numerous undead creatures, apart from rapidly purifying them with light magic, magi of other majors would appear to be out of options.

    Sure enough, even before the old fey demon had reached Crowley, Crowley sighed dejectedly, putting down the green magic staff in his hand and shouted loudly, ¡°Count Bryan, I admit defeat!¡±

 Chapter 393: Being a role model

    GDK 393 ¨C Being a role model

    At this moment, the old fey demon and its thick sharp ws had already charged before Crowley. Hearing Crowley¡¯s deration, Han Shuo gave orders with a thought. All the undead creatures froze in a sh, disying Han Shuo¡¯s extraordinary maniption ability to the extreme.

    Although Crowley was conceited and vain, he still abided by the rules during the sparring. When he felt that he was able to beat Han Shuofortably, he still didn¡¯t increase the speed of the Spheres of Destruction to attack Han Shuo. This caused Han Shuo to have a good impression of him and thus when Han Shuo saw him admitting defeat, Han Shuo immediately made the undead creatures cease their attack.

    When Crowley was flustered as he looked at the old fey demon in front of him, all the undead creatures from the surroundings suddenly disappeared following Han Shuo¡¯s long incantation. Only when the old fey demon that was the first to appear in front of him also suddenly disappeared did Crowley truly loosened his breath.

    ¡°Mister Crowley, your strength is extremely profound. I believe that most grand magi would not be your match. If Mister Crowley is interested, I can help to rmend you to Third Prince Lawrence, there¡¯s no harm in considering it.¡± after sending all the undead creatures back to theherworld, Han Shuo had gone over to the side of dark grand magus Crowley,menting in a low voice.

    Crowley¡¯s strength was truly remarkable. There weren¡¯t many magi who could be grand magus in the Lancelot Empire and all of them possessed lofty positions. Since Crowley had returned from travel across various countries, he would surely wish to have an illustrious status within the empire. Such a character was a target that every power would pursue. This was the same for Lawrence as well, hence Han Shuo invited him on behalf of Lawrence.

    Crowley clearly understood a little of Lancelot Empire¡¯s current situation and couldn¡¯t help but show an ufortable expression. As His Majesty¡¯s illegitimate child, Lawrence was the least supported sessor. If Crowley followed Lawrence, he simply wouldn¡¯t know if he would suffer a cmity after the sessor has been chosen.

    ¡°Mister Crowley, I know what you are apprehensive about. However, some matters aren¡¯t determined by external rumors. Hehe, you give Lawrence some time which can also be considered giving yourself some time. You can decide again on which power you choose after a few days.¡± When Han Shuo saw that Crowley didn¡¯t respond, he smiled and borated further.

    ¡°Alright, on ount of Count Bryan¡¯s honor, I¡¯ll consider for a few more days.¡± Crowley could tell that there were hidden meanings within Han Shuo¡¯s sentence and thus hesitated a while before replying.

    Han Shuo nodded his head, smiling as he replied, ¡°In the future, you will definitely be proud of your decision today!¡±

    Han Shuo directly departed the practice field without exining further, not showing any reaction to the crowd¡¯s shock and the necromancy students¡¯ cheers. He first nodded his head toward Amyes and Dean Emma from afar to send his regards, before heading toward Fanny¡¯s group of necromancy major student, smiling as he said, ¡°Teacher Fanny, the recruitment can continue.¡±

    When Fanny saw Han Shuo heading over with his eyes on her from beginning to end, she felt shy yet delighted, hurriedly saying, ¡°Let¡¯s go, everyone shouldn¡¯t stay here anymore. Let¡¯s continue with our unfinished matters.¡±

    When Han Shuo and Fanny left the area together, Amyes¡¯s gaze was continuously fixed on Han Shuo¡¯s movement. Only after Han Shuo disappeared from the practice field did he mumble softly to himself while seeming to be thinking about something, ¡°That youngster is still a Casanova. That female teacher, why does it seem like I¡¯ve seen her before somewhere...¡±

    Dean Emma nced at Amyes who seemed to be deep in thought and felt somewhat amazed. Who knew that Amyes¡¯ gaze was that sharp, appearing to recall something just by taking a glimpse at Fanny. This caused Emma to be shocked, thinking inwardly that as one of the three heavyweights, just like Candide, Amyes really can¡¯t be belittled.

    ¡°Alright, this matter has already ended, I¡¯ll also take my leave. Hehe, Amyes do take a good walk around, it seems like you haven¡¯t returned to your alma mater for a long time.¡± Seeing Amyes having an expression of deep thought, Emma suddenly spoke, as though not wanting him to realize Fanny¡¯s identity that quickly.

    As one of the three heavyweights of the Empire¡¯s Dark Mantle, Amyes knew the secret matters of each noble at the back of his hand, even Firenze at the southern border of the empire was no exception. Having browsed over numerous materials, Amyes had once seen information pertaining to Firenze¡¯s family. However, Fanny was much younger at that time and Amyes only saw a few pictures at that time. For him to be able to feel that someone was familiar just based on pictures he saw a few years ago, his memory is already extremely astonishing.

    Amyes who was pondering deeply had his thoughts broken by Emma¡¯s words. He didn¡¯t continue contemting and instead smiled gracefully and replied, ¡°Dean, go ahead to handle your matters, I¡¯ll just walk around casually and will be leaving soon.¡±

    Emma smiled and nodded, a streak of white light shed as she disappeared. After Emma left, Amyes couldn¡¯t help but nce at Crowley who had just walked out of the practice field. He suddenly said, ¡°Mister Crowley, it¡¯s best if you carefully consider what Marquis Bryan had just said. Hehe, as a schoolmate, I hope that you would make the right choice.¡±

    ¡°Mar... Marquis?¡± Crowley who was currently sampling the bitter taste of defeat raised his head and say that the one who spoke was Amyes. Thinking over what Amyes had just said, he couldn¡¯t help but be suspicious.

    ¡°Yes, Marquis Bryan! Just today, His Majesty has already officially conferred Bryan as Marquis. The various cities and towns surrounding Brettel City, including a few bandit areas that he upied, would be Marquis Bryan¡¯s territory. Besides, I¡¯m afraid that no one amongst equally ranked grand magi would be able to defeat him. For you to lose to him isn¡¯t something shameful, you shouldn¡¯t mind too much about it. Instead, you should properly think about what he said to you previously. I¡¯ve said my piece, it¡¯s up to you if you listen!¡± Amyes smiled as he exined, before leaving with two swordmasters, not waiting for Crowley¡¯s response.

    ¡°Marquis, he¡¯s actually already a Marquis!¡± Crowley muttered to himself, before his eyes slowly brightened, saying to himself softly, ¡°That Amyes is His Majesty¡¯s Hand of Darkness and surely knows of certain matters. It looks like in this trip back to school, it appears that apart from being defeated, I still gained something. I must definitely consider things properly.¡±

    While Crowley was still deliberating which power he should join, Han Shuo and Fanny¡¯s group had already reached the necromancy major¡¯s area. With Han Shuo overseeing the necromancy major, the recruitment of the necromancy major was iparably smooth. In the end, there were actually more than fifty students joining the necromancy major. Amongst them, there were more than ten who had excellent mental strength, greatly surpassing the other majors.

    ¡°Haha, this is great. ording to our academy¡¯s regtions, as long as the number of students in a major exceeds a hundred, the major can be apletely independent and self-sufficient major. Teacher Fanny, our current enrollment has a hundred and thirty-two people and can clearly apply to the dean to be independent of the dark major.¡± after tidying up all the documents, Gene couldn¡¯t help butugh heartily.

    When she heard Gene¡¯s statement, Fanny was also delighted, smiling as she said, ¡°That¡¯s right. Our necromancy major can now bepletely independent and no longer be part of the dark major. That shouldn¡¯t be a problem!¡±

    ¡°Awesome, I have long since had enough of the faces of those fellows in the dark major. In the future, we no longer need to mix with them. Our necromancy major would just be the necromancy major, no longer a branch of another major.¡± Lisa was extremely excited as she shouted loudly.

    Lisa¡¯s voice was extremely loud, transmitting into the distance. The dark major wasn¡¯t far from the necromancy major and the dark major¡¯s teacher-in-charge Deo clearly heard Lisa¡¯s deliberate shout. However, Han Shuo was currently with the necromancy major, and Crowley had just been defeated by Han Shuo. Furthermore, Deo found out from Crowley that Han Shuo had already be a Marquis. This made Deo even more fearful of provoking Han Shuo. Although he was extremely unhappy, he didn¡¯t dare to respond.

    Amidst the cheers from everyone in the necromancy major, the two instructors, Fanny and Gene led the newly epted students to the necromancy major to handle the relevant procedures. When they reached the necromancy major¡¯s area, Gene took charge of matters, while Han Shuo followed Fanny, talking a little about the essence of necromancy magic in the necromancy major¡¯s practice field, as well as helping to clear some of the problematic doubts of the students.

    Having studied necromancy magic to the rank of grand magus necromancer, Han Shuo¡¯s theoretical and practical knowledge both greatly surpassed Fanny. Hisprehension of necromancy magic was much higher as well. Many questions that Gene and Fanny couldn¡¯t exin became easy when they reached Han Shuo.

    Afterwards, even Gene who had finished handling matters had came over. After hesitating a while, Gene also asked Han Shuo about a few questions he usually came across. The necromancy major had a harmonious atmosphere, with Han Shuo¡¯s existence bringing hope to both the necromancy major¡¯s new and existing students.

    It seemed that from this moment onward, the necromancy major who had always had a small and weak image no longer existed. With Han Shuo¡¯s astronomical rise within the Empire¡¯s ranks, the necromancy major also rose in tandem within Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, gradually having its own sense of proportion, breaking away from the longstanding dependent rtionship with the dark major.

    Only when the sky had gradually darkened did everyone disperse at Fanny and Gene¡¯s instructions. Toward the end when even Gene had left, Lisa hesitated a moment, staring at Han Shuo as she asked, ¡°Bryan if I want to look for you, can I find you at your residence?¡±

    ¡°Of course. If you are free, you cane over to look for me anytime. Hehe, of course, I wouldn¡¯t be in my residence most of the time. If you are unable to find me, please don¡¯t me me.¡± Han Shuo smiled as he replied.

    ¡°Hee hee, as long as you agree. Alright, I¡¯ll leave first. Teacher Fanny, Bryan is extremely popr nowadays, you need to watch him closely!¡± Lisa smiled happily before winking toward Fanny, pulling a funny face before leaving.

    After Lisa had left, Fanny¡¯s charming face was flushed. She gazed at Han Shuo affectionately and said, ¡°Bryan, thank you. I didn¡¯t think you woulde by today.¡±

    ¡°I just happen to be free and no matter what I have to give you face. Right, if you really want to thank me, you shouldn¡¯t simply use words. I generally prefer people to express themselves through their actions.¡± Han Shuoughed deviously, beaming at Fanny as he replied.

    Fanny resentfully rolled her eyes at Han Shuo, before hesitating a moment and whispered, ¡°In that case, how do you want me to show my thanks?¡±

    Out of a sudden, Han Shuo had already appeared in front of Fanny, lowering his head as he looked at Fanny whose blush had spread to her neck, extending a finger and pointed at his lips, chuckling as he said, ¡°Take the initiative to kiss me once, that can be considered expressing your thanks!¡±

    ¡°You, you brat. You have already be a high-ranked noble, why have you still not changed your lewd heart!¡± Fanny blushed, unable to resist beating Han Shuo¡¯s chest with her fist as she pouted yfully.

    ¡°Come on, who asked Teacher to be so beautiful and alluring. Hehe, my soul has already been hooked by you. If I don¡¯t flirt with you, who should I flirt with!¡± Han Shuo frivolously moved his lips toward Fanny, continuously pestering Fanny.

    Fanny¡¯s present mood was unprecedentedly good and besides, she also truly liked Han Shuo. After acting coy for a while, she was eventually still unable to resist Han Shuo, blushing as she superficially kissed Han Shuo¡¯s lips.

    However, when Fanny shifted away, she was embraced by Han Shuo, who forcefully kissed her. Out of Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, Fanny responded ardently soon after, giving Han Shuo a carefree, uninhibited and breathtaking feeling. Overwhelmed by Fanny¡¯s response, Han Shuo¡¯s hands started moving dishonestly again, wandering around Fanny¡¯s beautiful body.

    Only when Fanny was kissed till she was out of breath and her body was iparably fervent did she moan softly as she pushed Han Shuo away to gasp for breath. Still blushing, she moved further away from Han Shuo, calming her rapidly heaving plump peaks. She then said tenderly, ¡°Bryan, my father will reach Ossen City soon. If you don¡¯t meet him this time around, he said that he would lead his troops to attack Brettel City!¡±

    Hearing this, Han Shuo suddenly sobered, as though a bucket of cold water had been poured on him. He knitted his brows and forced a smiled as he asked Fanny, ¡°You¡¯ve told your father my identity?¡±

    Nodding her head, Fanny hastily exined, ¡°He has constantly asked and even investigated. I only told him when I knew that we would definitely be unable to conceal it any longer. Furthermore, you might not know my father¡¯s identity. You shouldn¡¯t be under the impression that he is joking. My father is different from other people, he is capable of doing anything.¡±

    ¡°I know, your father is the true lord in the eyes of the people at the southern border, Howling Legion¡¯s Firenze?¡± Han Shuo took a deep breath before looking at Fanny and replied.

    ¡°How, how did you find out? When did you find out about this?¡± Fanny was shocked as she lightly cried out.

    ¡°A few days ago. When I had just returned from Brettel City, Dean Emma told me when I came to look for you.¡± Han Shuo honestly exined to Fanny, before replying reluctantly, ¡°Alright, when your father arrives, I¡¯ll go with you to meet him.¡±

    Han Shuo knew that since Firenze was clear about his origin as well as his rtionship with Fanny, Han Shuo could forget about avoiding him. Presently, Han Shuo was already hard pressed by Emily and Phoebe. He didn¡¯t know what the two of them were talking about and even now, they still haven¡¯te out of the room. Adding in Fanny into the equation, once the three of them know about each other, he wasn¡¯t sure what problems might arise.

    Emily was Betteridge Family¡¯s daughter-inw, her older brother was one of the three heavyweights, Amyes. Behind Phoebe was sacred swordsman Karel, while Fanny¡¯s father, Firenze was a well-known madman, known to be someone you wouldn¡¯t want to provoke. Han Shuo had a headache thinking about what he had to endure once the matter was thoroughly exposed

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, my father treats me the best. He wouldn¡¯t do anything to you. Furthermore, you might just be the type my father likes. Hehe, there¡¯s no need for you to worry.¡± Fanny thought that Han Shuo was worried about her father, thus she couldn¡¯t help butugh as she exined.

    Han Shuo smiled bitterly as he nodded, before saying, ¡°Alright, I understand. It¡¯s already quitete, I have to leave.¡±

    ¡°Ok, I¡¯ll send you off.¡± When Fanny knew that Han Shuo agreed to meet her father, her mood clearly improved. She cheerfully walked toward Han Shuo, blushing as she tiptoed and gently kissed Han Shuo¡¯s cheek, before pulling the infatuated Han Shuo along as she said, ¡°Let¡¯s go, I¡¯ll walk you out.¡±

    Han Shuo who had just been kissed by Fanny suddenly made up his mind. No matter what happened in the future, as long as Fanny was willing to be with him, no matter Firenze, sacred swordmaster Karel or Amyes, no one should think of meddling in his affairs. If a peaceful solution couldn¡¯t be found, he wouldn¡¯t hesitate in using force to resolve matters.

    Han Shuo steeled his heart and was no longer agonized, deciding to just deal with matters as they arose. He talked andughed with Fanny as they walked out of the academy.

    ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll take my leave.¡± Han Shuo turned around and smiled at Fanny, before heading back to his own residence.

    After Han Shuo left, Fanny returned to the necromancy major alone. Along the way, Amyes just happened to be leaving and coincidently saw Fanny. When Amyes saw Fanny once again, the sense of familiarity became stronger. He knitted his brows as he watched Fanny disappear into the distance. After a moment of serious thinking, Amyes suddenly started, muttering softly, ¡°Could it truly be that lunatic¡¯s daughter!¡±

    ¡°Lord, what¡¯s wrong!¡± one of the swordmasters next to Amyes inquired.

    ¡°No, nothing¡¯s wrong. Come, let¡¯s quickly return to the Dark Mantle, I¡¯ve some matters to investigate.¡± Amyes answered, suddenly hastening his steps.

 Chapter 394: Han Shuoâ€™s promise

    GDK 394 ¨C Han Shuo¡¯s promise

    After leaving Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, Han Shuo had originally decided to return to his residence. However, he discovered through his mystical demon that Emily and Phoebe were walking out of her room.

    Contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, Emily¡¯s eyes were red, as though she cried. Phoebe, who originally came to admonish Emily was not as overbearing as he had imagined and was instead repeatedly persuading Emily.

    Holding each other¡¯s hands, their friendship had deepened since the time when they were in the Valley of Sunshine. Emily¡¯s eyes were red as she continuously took tissues to wipe the corners of her eyes, her miserable appearance causing others to feel pity for her. Phoebe gently supported Emily as she sighed, ¡°Elder sister, I was rude. I didn¡¯t know your life had been like this.¡±

    ¡°Let it pass Phoebe, it¡¯s already hard for you to be able to forgive me. I am indeed at fault regarding this matter. An unexpectedbination of factors just so happened to ur. Ai...¡± Emily gently wiped the corner of her eyes as she confided in Phoebe.

    ¡°Alright, alright. We¡¯ve almost reached your doorstep, you should head back in and not let others see you in this state. It¡¯s all that guy¡¯s fault, not yours. I¡¯ll settle scores with him and shouldn¡¯t have caused trouble for you.¡± Phoebe persuaded Emily, stubbornly urging her to return to her room.

    ¡°Phoebe, thank you. You are a good woman, no wonder he likes you so much.¡± After entering her room, Emily held Phoebe¡¯s hand and said sincerely.

    ¡°Haiz, I wouldn¡¯t have expected that Sister¡¯s life was worse than mine. I had always thought that as a daughter-inw of Betteridge Family and also having a brother who wields great authority, your life was surely more blessed than mine. Let¡¯s forget it, I will be leaving first. It¡¯s already quitete, you should get some rest.¡± After she finished speaking, Phoebe released Emily¡¯s hands from her grasp and departed from Emily¡¯s residence.

    Han Shuo had heard the whole conversation through his mystical demon, causing him to momentarily feel puzzled. He had originally believed that even if both of them did not cause a ruckus, they would be ridiculing and abusing each other. Who would have thought that the matter would turn out in this way?

    Altering his direction, Han Shuo headed towards Betteridge Family. Emily who had just wept precisely needed hisfort at this moment. No matter the situation, Han Shuo did not wish for Emily to be hurt. Having made this decision in his heart, he hastened over.

    Having been busy in Babylon Academy of Magic and Force for a long time, the sky had already darkened when Han Shuo left. There were currently very few people on the streets as the night quietly descended. Han Shuo was like a demon in the night, drifting silently across the empty streets toward the Betteridge Family.

    Han Shuo did not bother about Phoebe who had left on a carriage, only dispatching a mystical demon to observe and ensure her safety. He had observed during the conversation between the two girls that Phoebe¡¯s emotions seemed to be in check and there shouldn¡¯t be any problems. Currently, only the red-eyed Emily required hisfort. Hence Han Shuo was naturally able to distinguish who he should prioritize.

    Although the security of the Betteridge Family was tight, it meant nothing to Han Shuo who had the mystical demons. He easily avoided the guards and silently arrived in front of Emily¡¯s room.

    Emily¡¯s magic barrier was still active around her room, hence Han Shuo did not force his way in, for fear of Emily¡¯s erroneous retaliation. Instead, he gently knocked on the door.

    ¡°Who¡¯s that!¡± Emily asked as she slowly headed toward the door.

    ¡°It¡¯s me!¡± Han Shuo said softly.

    Emily hastened her steps and arrived at the door within a breath. Upon opening the door, Emily saw that it was indeed Han Shuo and her red eyes suddenly brightened. Looking around to ensure that there was no one around, she then pulled him into the room.

    ¡°Why are you here? This is the Betteridge Family, what would happen if you were seen?¡± After pulling Han Shuo in, Emily hurriedly closed the door and set up a soundproof barrier before questioning him.

    ¡°I was worried about you.¡± Han Shuo suddenly embraced Emily tightly as he replied tenderly.

    ¡°I am alright. Phoebe had just left, did you see her?¡± Being held tightly by Han Shuo, Emily felt her heart calm down and asked softly.

    ¡°No, after she found out about this matter today, I was afraid that she would make a scene. Hence I did not head over as well. However, I was keeping an eye on the situation the whole time. Did Phoebe do anything to you? You, you cried?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s heart ached as he stretched his hand over to stroke the corners of Emily¡¯s eyes as he replied tenderly.

    ¡°Hehe, it¡¯s enough for me as long as I know you are worried about me. Phoebe is a good girl, she did note over to cause a scene. Instead, we bared our hearts to each other and talked. Phoebe even consoled me constantly. You have a good eye for women.¡± Feeling Han Shuo¡¯s tenderness, she suddenly felt that all her previous sufferings were worth it.

    Han Shuo did not speak anymore and instead embraced Emily and gave her a kiss. At this moment, what Emily needed was precisely Han Shuo¡¯sfort. She couldn¡¯t help but respond enthusiastically, even taking the initiative to help Han Shuo undress. As they kissed intensely, she led Han Shuo to her inner chamber.

    Han Shuo could feel Emily¡¯s fiery passion. With thoughts of atonement, Han Shuo was more deliberate in pleasing her. Hisrge hands started wandering around Emily¡¯s body tenderly while his lips were continuously joined with hers. When Emily was out of breath, he whispered sweet nothings into her ears instead.

    ¡°Bryan. Oh... Bryan...¡± Emily moaned softly, appearing extremely aroused.

    While Han Shuo¡¯srge hands were fondling Emily¡¯s round, satiny bum, Emily had already spontaneously assisted in stripping off her clothespletely. She suddenly fell backward onto her soft pink colored bed, disying her naked body to Han Shuo. Her almond eyes gazed longingly at Han Shuo, gasping as she said softly, ¡°Bryan, I don¡¯t need you to be gentle, be rougher with me!¡±

    Han Shuo was startled for a moment, but soon after he growled as he pounced toward Emily. Discarding all notions of being gentle, he instead treated Emily violently.

    The Emily today was wilder than ever before, intensely pandering to Han Shuo till the point where her delicate body could no longer withstand Han Shuo¡¯s tempestuous priapic assault. In the end, she fell asleep immediately, devoid of any trace of energy in her body.

    As Han Shuo gazed at Emily as she slept in the wake of their pleasure, having been utterly wrung out, he suddenly felt a sense of guilt. Emily was actually his first woman. He had raped her at the beginning and he had only viewed her as a tool to satiate his lust for the longest time.

    Only following Emily¡¯s silent efforts toward Han Shuo, did he gradually developed feelings for her. However, due to her unique identity, he was unable to give her a proper status. In principle, Phoebe should actually be the one that he should denounce. Emily, who had be his woman while bearing an unusual identity was the real victim.

    Ever since Emily and Han Shuo got together, she had always considered his needs and gave her all in doing things for him. As he gazed at the woman fast asleep in front of him, Han Shuo started unwittingly reminiscing about the past. The more he recalled past events between the two of them, the guiltier he felt.

    ¡°Ai, I owe you too much, it has been hard on you.¡± Han Shuo sighed, muttering to himself as he gently caressed Emily¡¯s face.

    ¡°Everything was by my own will, I have never med you. Besides, I know you treat me well, there¡¯s nothing to feel guilty about.¡± The side of Emily¡¯s lips suddenly curled into a blissful smile, as she opened her eyes after finishing her sentence.

    ¡°Oh? Why have you woken up so quickly and not sleep a while more?¡± Seeing Emily awaken, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but knit his brows as he gently chided her.

    ¡°It¡¯s alright. After having sex with you, I could feel the mysterious energy you left within me. This energy has helped me improve my body, which is why I could recover so quickly. Bryan, everything was really of my own will. I know that your heart actually aches for me, but so long as you love me, I don¡¯t hope for anything else. After all, my identity has been fixed.¡± Emily stretched out her hand to caress Han Shuo¡¯s firm face, smiling as she spoke softly.

    ¡°You will definitely get a formal status soon. I swear that I will give it to you, this is something you deserve!¡± Han Shuo looked at Emily who had done much for him and promised resolutely.

    ¡°Bryan, do you want to know what is Phoebe¡¯s stance regarding our rtionship?¡± Emily had a joyous expression, kissing his chest before smiling as she asked.

    ¡°No matter what Phoebe¡¯s stance is, it will not affect our rtionship. Even if she firmly disagrees, it wouldn¡¯t change a thing. Don¡¯t worry, I will talk to Phoebe about this.¡± Han Shuo promised once again, determined to not let Emily suffer any grievances.

    ¡°Gege, your words really made me happy!¡± Emily chuckled and continued, ¡°In any case, Phoebe agreed!¡±

 Chapter 395: Entering the sect

    GDK 395 ¨C Entering the sect

    ¡°Agreed? What did she agree to?¡± Han Shuo stared nkly and asked suspiciously.

    ¡°Naturally it¡¯s agreeing to our matter!¡± Emily exined cheerfully, ¡°I told Phoebe everything regarding our rtionship, emphasizing that due to my identity,we can¡¯t reveal our rtionship. I also shared how my husband had suddenly died on the battlefield soon after I entered Betteridge Family. After hearing me out, Phoebe even advised me for quite a while!¡±

    Han Shuo was amazed, suddenly feeling that Phoebe was really fair and reasonable. On the other hand, Emily was also extremely intelligent to be able to be apart of Dark Mantle for so long. Making Phoebe approve of her identity with a few words was enough to prove that Emily¡¯s ability.

    Hearing Emily¡¯s words, Han Shuo finally rxed. He smiled as he gave her a light kiss before saying, ¡°Emily, you are really capable.¡±

    ¡°Alright, alright. Enough of your honeyed words.¡± Emily happily pushed Han Shuo before saying, ¡°It¡¯s already quitete, you shouldn¡¯t stay here. I still need to go over and send my regards to Father.¡±

    Hearing Emily mention the Betteridge Family head Mister Hahn, Han Shuo thought for a moment before asking, ¡°Which prince does Mister Hahn support?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know, perhaps it is because Father has retired from the military for too long. When the empire was in turmoil, Father was not part of the empire¡¯s government and neither has he mentioned the matters between the princes to me.¡± Hearing Han Shuo bring up official matters, Emily knitted her brows as she answered. Being silent for a moment, Han Shuo then replied, ¡°If Mister Hahn mentions this matter, or has ns to support a certain prince, you should urge him to not act impulsively this few days, so as to not lead the Betteridge Family down the wrong path.¡±

    Emily was shocked, asking astoundedly, ¡°Why would you say this?¡±

    ¡°Everyone doesn¡¯t think highly of Lawrence. However, if nothing unexpected happens, the next king would be Lawrence. These few days, you should quietly observe from the side. I reckon that His Majesty would make major decisions very soon.¡± After discussing terms with King Uhtred, he understood that Lawrence¡¯s situation would change drastically. Hence, he reminded Emily.

    ¡°Are you sure your information is urate?¡± Emily clearly understood the gravity of this information, having a serious expression as she asked Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo nodded his head affirmatively and said, ¡°I went to the pce today and heard this from the king himself. It¡¯s definitely true.¡±

    ¡°In that case, I must share this news with my father and brother immediately. In addition, there are a few other friends who are still observing the situation, I must remind them before it¡¯s toote.¡± Upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, Emily already started wearing her clothes, carrying a worried expression.

    As this matter concerned all nobles of Lancelot Empire, every noble must take a side in this matter. If they chose the wrong side, their family might suffer a decline. Therefore, they must act with caution.

    Han Shuo could understand Emily¡¯s anxiety. He stood up and gently helped her put on her silk dress, helped her straighten her disheveled hair and even applied rouge amidst her blissful smile before saying, ¡°Alright, be careful on your way.¡±

    Emily obediently waited for Han Shuo to finish helping her before happily giving him a kiss. She said with a smile, ¡°I know, you shouldn¡¯t stay here for too long. We are in the Betteridge Family residence.¡±

    ¡°I will leave now.¡± Han Shuo smiled. After sorting his clothes and watching Emily leave to find Hahns, he left silently as well.

    Upon entering his residence, Han Shuo felt the heavy killing intent from Bonds. With a nce, he saw Bonds hiding in the shadows.

    ¡°Lord Marquis!¡± Han Shuo hadn¡¯t even entered his room when Bonds suddenly shouted in a low voice and walked out from the shadows.

    There were no strong guards within Han Shuo¡¯s residence. Apart from Han Shuo, there was no one else within the residence that he would be worried about. Therefore he did noty down any formations. After all, an expert like Bonds would not be seen by normal people.

    Bonds was dressed long gray robes, had a malevolent face and was shrouded with dense killing intent. Any normal person who saw him would definitely be filled with fear. ¡°Let¡¯s talk inside!¡± Han Shuo nced at Bonds, smiling before entering his room with Bonds following behind.

    Inside the room, Han Shuo surveyed the area through his mystical demons. He saw that there were no suspicious individuals in the surroundings. Phoebe had also returned to Boozt Merchant Guild after being unable to meet Han Shuo.

    Sitting down, Han Shuo smiled at Bonds and asked, ¡°So what is your decision?¡±

    Bonds had an excited expression as he nodded his head and answered, ¡°I would like to learn your martial technique. Lord Karel has already agreed, but he wants to meet you in person.¡±

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t shocked. In this world, only Han Shuo could give Bonds what he needed, with Bonds¡¯ degree of obsession with this martial technique, he would definitely agree. What Han Shuo did not understand was why Karel Ascot would want to see him.

    Staring nkly for a moment, Han Shuo frowned as he asked, ¡°Why does Mister Karel want to see me?¡±

    Bonds answered while shaking his head, ¡°I¡¯m not sure.¡±

    ¡°I see.¡± Han Shuo muttered to himself before asking, ¡°When does he want to see me? Where should I look for him?¡±

    ¡°If you have the time, my Lord wants me to bring you to see him.¡± Bonds respectfully answered.

    ¡°In that case, how about I go meet him immediately. Oh, it iste already. Would Lord Karel already be resting?¡± Han Shuo originally wanted to meet him immediately, but thinking further, he corrected himself.

    ¡°It¡¯s alright, my lord usually rests veryte. If you are free, we can leave now.¡± Bonds answered.

    ¡°Alright then, let¡¯s leave now.¡± Han Shuo coolly said before heading with Bonds in the direction of the northern Rose Garden.

    Under the serene glow of moonlight, Han Shuo and Bonds made their way toward the north. The speed of Bonds who was an experienced assassin was as fast as lightning. In addition, he was used to moving through dark ces, therefore normal people could not detect his presence.

    Han Shuo, who had reached the separate demon realm, had a few mystical demons to observe his surroundings. Han Shuo drifted around like a specter, not afraid of being seen even on the bright streets.As his speed was also extremely fast, Han Shuo¡¯s shadow was like a stream of smoke brushing past.

    Compared to Bond¡¯s carefulness, Han Shuo appeared calm. With his mystical demons, Han Shuo could easily avoid areas where there were people and still follow Bonds closely.

    Upon reaching the region of the Northern Rose Garden, both of them decreased their speeds. In the dead of night, it was the perfect time to carry out indecent matters. On the streets towards Northern Rose Garden, many beautiful carriages could be seen quietly traveling along, with a few butlers or servants gracefully leading them from the front. All of them were headed for the Northern Rose Garden.

    As Lancelot Empire¡¯s famous red light district, business at the Northern Rose Garden was fantastic. With the saint swordsman Karel overseeing the safety and Lawrence excelling at running a business, the Northern Rose Garden had simply be air for ecstasy.

    It was because of the sudden increase in traffic toward the Northern Rose Garden that Han Shuo and Bonds had to slow down. Since Bonds was familiar with the area, he led Han Shuo toward the back door.

    The back door of the Rose Garden was more remote. Usually, only staff used this entrance, unless it was to receive those with sensitive identities. The nobles who were seeking pleasure would not pass by this ce.

    ¡°Bonds, since you have already decided to join my sect, there are some matters I need to make clear.¡± Han Shuo said to Bonds as they headed toward the rear entrance.

    ¡°Please give your instructions!¡± Bonds respectfully replied.

    ¡°Bonds, you need not be too polite. In the future, you can just call me Senior Brother instead of Marquis. Our sect is called Heavenly Demon Sect and only a few people within the Profound Continent know of us. Our master was formerly an otherworldly expert. He hade to the Profound Continent by chance and imparted this martial technique to me before leaving...¡± Han Shuo suppressed his voice as he spun some lies.

    Bonds listened earnestly. After Han Shuo finished, Bonds was shocked and excitedly said, ¡°To think that Master was so powerful, he was actually an otherworldly expert. No wonder he possessed such mysterious techniques which are unheard of in the whole Profound Continent. Not being able to meet such a figure is indeed regrettable!¡±

    ¡°Heh heh, Master¡¯s strength is unfathomable. I will impart Heavenly Demon Sect¡¯s marital technique to you on behalf of Master. With your aptitude, it will definitely be of much use. Don¡¯t worry, the use and concealment of killing intent is the fundamentals of the Heavenly Demon manual. You will not only be able to quickly grasp it, you will also obtain stronger killing techniques.¡± Han Shuo solemnly said.

    The technique Han Shuo would impart to Bonds was called God ying Devil Path, it is not an orthodox demonic cultivator¡¯s technique. Even if Bonds cultivated it to the peak, he would not be able to reach Han Shuo¡¯s level. However, if Bonds was able to proficiently grasp this technique, his strength would definitely soar.

    However, this kind of progress had the slight intention of spoiling things through excessive enthusiasm. Itpletely took advantage of Bonds¡¯ dense killing intent to rapidly increase his strength. However, it wasn¡¯t a step by step technique like the one Han Shuo was practicing and didn¡¯t have the unlimited possibility for improvement. Han Shuo only needed a junior brother that was able to help him root out dissidents and not someone who could contend against him in terms of demonic arts. Therefore, no matter how much Bonds improved, he wouldn¡¯t be able to threaten Han Shuo¡¯s position.

    ¡°Senior Brother, thank you.¡± When they were about to enter Northern Rose Garden, Bonds bowed respectfully to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a hurry to enter Rose Garden. He smiled and replied after receiving Bonds¡¯ bow, ¡°As you have yet officially entered the sect, I still can¡¯t immediately impart our sect¡¯s technique to you. Once I met Mister Karel, I will help you handle the entrance rites. After you have officially joined Heavenly Demon Sect, I will help you reform your body before teaching you our sect¡¯s techniques.¡±

    ¡°I will listen to senior brother.¡± Although Bonds was older, he was still respectful in front of Han Shuo and did not dare to have any slightest neglect.

    Han Shuo smiled as he nodded his head, ¡°Alright, bring me into the Rose Garden.¡±

    Bonds led Han Shuo down the path Lawrence had previously used that led to the secret chamber. After opening the passageway, Bonds led Han Shuo through manyplicated alleys before they finally reached the location of saint swordsman Karel.

    Saint swordsman Karel was sitting on a boulder in the huge white space. Although his hair was white, he was glistening with vigor as his kindly eyes leisurely looked toward the front. Seeing Han Shuo enter, Karel smiled, ¡°Kid, you are truly not simple!¡±

    Bonds left after leading Han Shuo to the location, leaving Karel and Han Shuo alone. After hearing Karel¡¯s praise, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but smile reservedly, ¡°You are overly praising me.¡±

    ¡°For you to have gifted divine weapon Starry Sky to Phoebe, hehe, your intentions are very good.¡± Karel smiled before continuing, ¡°I won¡¯t get involved in the matter of you instructing Bonds, you need not be worried. I have never regarded Bonds as a servant and he always had his freedom. For him to be so excited to learn this martial technique from you, you must definitely possess something that attracts him. I will respect his decision.¡±

    ¡°In that case, why have you summoned me?¡± Han Shuo had a rxed expression as he smiled and asked.

    ¡°I only wish to see the person whom old astrologer Madam Grace had prophesied to be able to bring prosperity to the Lancelot Empire. And also to find out what do you n to do for the Lancelot Empire.¡± Karel stared brightly at Han Shuo, smiling as he replied.

    Han Shuo suddenly realized why Uhtred had spoken in such a strange manner!

 Chapter 396: Sacred swordmasterâ€™s proposal

    GDK 396 ¨C Sacred swordmaster¡¯s proposal

    It turns out that everything was because of old astrologer Grace¡¯s divination. It seems like he would really be the savior of the Lancelot Empire in the future? Previously in the Dark Mantle headquarters, Grace had a peculiar expression as she looked at him. Could she have seen something then?

    Hearing Karel¡¯s sentence, Han Shuo suddenly had some realization. He knitted his brows to ponder for a moment, before smiling bitterly as he looked toward Karel and said, ¡°To be frank with you, I have only just heard of this news. I have not thought about what I can do for the Lancelot Empire and have only considered what I should do for myself.¡±

    When Karel heard Han Shuo¡¯s truthful answer, heughed involuntarily and said, ¡°Perhaps, in the course of you helping yourself, you would have also unknowingly helped Lancelot Empire alter its power and aplishing an expansion of its territory. For example, assisting Lawrence in bing king or you ambitiously attacking the seven duchies. Although these can be considered your own actions, their final oue would still alter the structure of the Lancelot Empire.¡±

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but consider for a moment upon hearing what Karel said. He suddenly realized that what Karel said indeed made sense. He had been considered a member of the Lancelot Empire ever since he arrived in this world. He personally felt that life in this country was pretty good and he also had many friends and lovers within the country. In this case, when Han Shuo realizes his own ambitions, he is also considered to be benefiting the Lancelot Empire at the same time.

    ¡°Haha, my lord is truly a wise person. What you said really makes a lot of sense.¡± Han Shuo looked at Karel, not hiding his ttery at all.

    When Karel heard Han Shuo ttering himself so brazenly, his gaze became a little odd. He smiled faintly as he said to Han Shuo, ¡°Phoebe is my dearest disciple and your rtionship with Phoebe can be considered to be official. Furthermore, Lawrence is also my disciple. You aren¡¯t really an outsider. There isn¡¯t a big difference in Bonds following you or me. Also, I¡¯ll mention some things openly to you.¡±

    ¡°If senior has any advice, do not hesitate to share them. I will definitely keep your words in mind.¡± Han Shuo was initially still worried that Karel would not allow Bonds to study under him. Now that he heard Karel putting it this way, he also felt that it was reasonable. Based on Karel¡¯s rtionship with Phoebe and Lawrence, they were truly not strangers to each other. For Bonds to follow Han Shuo, they were still considered to be on the same faction.

    However, Han Shuo faintly realized inwardly that Bonds finding him today to give his reply was most likely because Karel had received some information from old astrologer Grace. He understood that Lawrence and Han Shuo were the future hope of Lancelot Empire and thus was willing to allow Bonds to train under Han Shuo.

    Seeing that Han Shuo was sincere, Karel smiled as he nodded and said, ¡°You might have already learned a little from Lawrence regarding Bonds¡¯ origins. At that time when Bonds was an assassin, his hands were truly considered to be reeking in blood. Bonds¡¯ assassin habits have not diminished even after so many years. I hope that you are able to lead him onto the path of righteousness and not be an irrational tool for ughter. Can you promise me this?¡± It seems that Karel was pretty good to Bonds. Not only did he respect Bonds decision and allow Bonds to leave his side, he was also worried about Bonds¡¯ future. However, Han Shuo¡¯s purpose in teaching Bonds the God ying Devil Path was to groom Bonds into a tool to eliminate dissidents. Merely, with a proper demonic cultivation, Bonds wouldn¡¯t lose his rationality to be a madman that only knows of ughter.

    Han Shuo hesitated for a moment, frowning as he pondered over and over before honestly replying Karel, ¡°Bonds¡¯ bloodthirsty nature wouldn¡¯t be altered even after training with me. However, my martial technique would be able to properly guide him and allow him to not lose his rationality. When he is able to break through his own bindings, he would no longer need to rely on ughter to increase his strength.

    Therefore, I can only guarantee that he would always be clear-headed and not be a killing machine that you mentioned. However, for him to progress in the early stages of the martial technique, it would definitely require his potential to be ignited through killing. Only by releasing the killing intent he had forcefully suppressed all these years would he improve by leaps and bounds.¡±

    Karel was stunned when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s exnation. He stared at Han Shuo for a long time before saying, ¡°What exactly is this unusual training method that you want to impart to him? Why does it sound like one of those evil techniques of the Cmity Church? Could you really be as the rumors said, being a member of the Cmity Church?¡±

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo smiled bitterly as he exined, ¡°It¡¯spletely different. My martial technique is a practice method that is simr to fusing fighting aura and magic. Ah, I¡¯m also unsure of how I should exin it. In any case, my master said that such a martial technique doesn¡¯t originate from the Profound Continent.¡±

    Karel was shocked when he heard this, gazing deeply at Han Shuo for a long time before eximing with an excited expression, ¡°A martial technique not belonging to the Profound Continent?! What kind of extraordinary person is your master?¡±

    ¡°That is indeed what he told me. My master possesses enough formidable strength that he could escape the bindings of nes without the use of magical arrays. He also has magical powers able to move mountains and drain seas...¡± Han Shuo based his description on his understanding of Chu Cang Lan¡¯s abilities.

    Ever since Han Shuo revealed his demonic magic, Lancelot Empire¡¯s King Uhtred had known that Han Shuo possessed a mysterious martial technique. sacred swordmaster Karel had naturally known about this long ago. However, the origin of this martial technique was a perpetual curious question to them. Han Shuo naturally required a set of lies to fill this gap and hence repeated to Karel what he had said to Bonds.

    When Han Shuo finished his description, Karel was looking at Han Shuo appalling and said, ¡°Your master is perhaps a true divine ranked character. I really don¡¯t know how you were that fortunate to run into such a character. No wonder Grace prophesied that whoever you support would be able to be Lancelot Empire¡¯s newly-appointed king. It seems like Grace¡¯s astrologer is indeed mystical.¡±

    Whoever I support would be able to be Lancelot Empire¡¯s king? Han Shuo was simrly shocked and became emotional once again. It¡¯s no wonder Uhtred even had a trace of pleading in his tone when he spoke with Han Shuo. The old astrologer seemed to have really helped him.

    However, the old astrologer was able to predict the future, was she also able to see the past? Was she able to see his true origins and find out that the original Bryan had already died long ago?

    ¡°Bryan, is-is your master currently still in the Profound Continent? C-can I visit him?¡± While Han Shuo was letting his imagination run wild, the emotions of sacred swordmaster Karel was suddenly in chaos, his eyes glistening as he looked at Han Shuo and asked.

    Han Shuo abruptly returned from his wild thoughts, smiling bitterly as he shook his head. Repeating what he said to Bonds to fob Karel off, ¡°After Master imparted this martial technique to me, he departed from the Profound Continent. I¡¯m also clueless regarding his whereabouts. I¡¯m sorry.¡±

    ¡°So that is the case!¡± Karel was clearly somewhat disappointed as he muttered, ¡°It¡¯s truly a pity. I¡¯ve already remained in this rank for so long, if I have the opportunity to meet such a formidable person and maybe ask for guidance regarding some problems, perhaps I would be able to break through my bindings...¡±

    For people who have reached the level of sacred swordmaster Karel, their only concern was to constantly improve their strength. At his age, he was already numb toward wealth, rank, fame, and power. Even the strength of a country was unable to contain people like him and they only longed for and pursued the rumored half-divine realm mentioned by their ancestors.

    ¡°Previously when I visited the underground world, I met a grade five magical creature. Maybe you have already found out some information about him through the Dark Mantle. The Ancient Lizard King Dagassi had left after reaching the half-divine realm. I suspect that maybe he has also left the Profound Continent and headed for a more expansive ne.¡± Han Shuo was silent for a while before suddenly speaking again.

    Karel who was contemting something was roused by Han Shuo¡¯s statement. Soon after, Karel sighed and said, ¡°Legends have said that those who reach the half-divine realm would be actively approached by the guardian of the ne of the Profound Continent and the guardian could assist these characters to break away from the Profound Continent¡¯s constraints.

    This information was told to us by Stranglethorn Vale¡¯s Stratholme when we previously went to the Seven Grand Duchies. Stratholme was only a step away from the half-divine realm and he vaguely knew some of the Profound Continent¡¯s deeper secrets. It appears that the half-divine magical creature should have obtained the qualifications to leave.¡±

    Old demon Stratholme! Han Shuo creased his brows when he heard of this person once again, this time from Karel. Han Shuopletely understood Stratholme¡¯s true strength, a step away from the half-divine realm. It would seem that he was more formidable than Karel.

    Only experts that reached the strength of half-divine realm would possess the qualifications to be summoned by the ne¡¯s guardian. It seemed like the Profound Continent was indeed full of unknown mysteries. Han Shuo was secretly rmed as he replied, ¡°I reckon that Dagassi has indeed left. Ah, such a distant dream, I truly don¡¯t know when would I have such qualifications.¡±

    ¡°You still have a long time to explore. Furthermore, you have a good master and ought to be quicker than us. Ai, for people like us who are already too old, this bottleneck has been restricting us all along. We can only wait bitterly if we are unable to make a breakthrough.¡± Karel sighed, his snow-white hair and loose skin demonstrating the ruthlessness of time. An expert like him could really live much longer than ordinary people but the distance of this final step was iparably far.

    As he looked at Karel, this was the first time Han Shuo realized that even those supreme characters in the Lancelot Empire had their own troubles. Perhaps this was also his only worry! Han Shuo didn¡¯t know how to respond and only maintained taciturn in front of Karel, waiting for Karel to awaken from his moodiness.

    After a while, Karel vaguely had a trace ofprehension. He then looked at Han Shuo engrossingly, smiling as he said, ¡°I¡¯ve heard Bonds describe many of your miracles but I¡¯ve still never truly seen your martial technique. Maybe your martial technique would be able to give me some inspiration. If you don¡¯t mind, we can spar a little.¡±

    Han Shuo was somewhat startled that with Karel¡¯s status, he would suggest to spar with himself. However, Han Shuo understood that what Karel fancied was the technique he practiced and not Han Shuo¡¯s personal strength.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before smiling and replied modestly, ¡°A spar is out of the question. For you to be willing to advise me is already more than I could wish for. Do forgive me in advance for being presumptuous.¡±

    Karel seemed to appreciate Han Shuo¡¯s straightforwardness, smiling as he nodded his head and said, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, just use your martial technique to attack me. I¡¯m extremely curious about your martial technique. Let¡¯s see what¡¯s the difference with the fighting aura I cultivated!¡±

    Han Shuo was simrly excited when he heard Karel¡¯s sentence as he had not figured out his true strength ever since he reached the separate demon realm. Han Shuo felt sufficiently confident when facing great swordsman ranked opponents but he had yet toe across sacred swordmaster ranked experts.

    Although the dark elves¡¯ matriarch Adele that he previously met in the underground world was extremely strong, Han Shuo realized as he stood before Karel that Adele was still weaker than Karel. Furthermore, Han Shuo didn¡¯t truly fight with Adele previously, purely using evil ways to harvest yin to replenish yang and sucked Adele dry and not genuinely fought with Adele.

    Han Shuo could perhaps be able to truly understand the current strength of his separate demon realm through fighting with sacred swordmaster Karel. This would also help him make an urate judgment the next time he met a strong opponent. Therefore, Han Shuo was somewhat excited when he heard Karel¡¯s proposal for them to spar.

    ¡°The martial technique i practice is called demonic magic, which resembles fighting aura but has different characteristics to fighting aura. Perhaps you would be able to sense it in a while.¡± Han Shuo retreated a few steps, the Demonyer Edge suddenly appearing in his hand.

    ¡°For Bonds to think so highly of you, it proves that your martial technique definitely has its peculiarities. Hehe, Bryan, you don¡¯t need to hold back. Don¡¯t hesitate to attack me.¡± Karel stood up from the boulder, taking out a translucent longsword from his spatial ring. The longsword was three fingers wide, a hundred and thirty centimeters in length and had a cross engraved on the sword hilt.

 Chapter 397: Cross Slash

    Chapter 397: Cross sh

    Han Shuo was fully aware that when one trained their fighting aura to Karel¡¯s level, its power would be extremely frightening. Besides, Han Shuo had intended all along to test his strength against Karel, hence he did not hold back.

    Demonic yuan energy rushed into the Demonyer Edge, activating the power of the violent spirits within, causing it to suddenly burst out with killing intent. With the Demonyer edge as the core, the killing intent rippled out into the surroundings.

    The waves of killing intent appeared material, the friction with the atmosphere producing a peculiar ¡®chichi¡¯ sound as it rippled in the sky. A sinister and ruthless aura could no longer be contained as it flowed out from Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    Sacred swordmaster Karel was visibly moved, his snow-white brows tightening as his abstruse eyes brightened. As Karel was able to reach the level of sacred swordmaster, it naturally showed that he had outstanding talent. Over many years of fighting, he had seen countless experts as he watched over Lancelot Empire with his rich fighting experience.

    Karel could clearly sense the Demonyer Edge in Han Shuo¡¯s hand bursting with frightening killing intent. The killing intent that had spread all around had a hint of viciousness, as though containing a violent explosive force, causing Karel to truly be startled.

    Within the Profound Continent, most experts gradually realised the importance of imposing themselves before battle. However, there has never been anyone who could transform this vigor into strength during battle. This was simr to Bonds¡¯ use of killing intent to destroy a person¡¯s willpower. However, Han Shuo¡¯s killing intent was more material. Karel understood that this sort of aura truly existed, unlike Bonds¡¯ killing intent which could only intimidate a person¡¯s spirit.

    As sacred swordmaster Karel was staring at Han Shuo, Han Shuo swung the Demonyer Edge filled with demonic yuan energy toward Karel, unleashing the ¡®Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡¯. The Demonyer Edge suddenly revolved rapidly, the bloody radiance resembling the petals of a blooming flower.

    With every rotation, a quill-like blood light was formed. Midway through the ¡®Bloody radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡¯, the blood colored light have already formed a hedgehog-like ball of quills, containing dense killing intent and giving off a sharp whistle as it flew at high-speed toward saint swordmaster Karel.

    ¡°Mystical martial technique!¡± Karel suddenly praised loudly, suddenly raising the longsword in his hand, gathering a golden colored fighting aura and sending a sword thrust toward the approaching blood colored ball of quills.

    Golden fighting aura was something only sacred swordmasters and sacred knights were able to use. This was the appearance of fighting aura at peak concentration. Han Shuo could clearly sense the destructive power it contained. Although the golden fighting aura was different in nature from demonic yuan energy, it simrly contained formidable explosive strength.

    As Karel raised his longsword, it emitted lustrous golden light. As his raised arm drew circr arcs, the tip of the longsword suddenly shot out waves of crossed-shaped swordlight. The crossed-shaped swordlight were arranged from small to big as they struck Han Shuo¡¯s blood colored ball of quills in session.

    With the moniker of ¡®Cross saint swordmaster¡¯, Karel was indeed befitting of his reputation. The various sword lights all formed crosses as they shot toward Han Shuo¡¯s ball of quills, rapidly grinding away at the demonic yuan energy contained within the Demonyer Edge.

    The tyrannical ¡®Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts¡¯ was neutralized by the cross-shaped sword lights even before reaching Karel. From start to finish, Karel had a rxed expression, clearly yet to use the limits of his strength.

    When the blooming Ten Thousand Cuts were all obliterated and revealing the Demonyer Edge¡¯s original appearance, Han Shuo acted. The Demonyer Edge which had been shooting towards Karel in a straight line suddenly froze in midair, before suddenly following a mysterious curved trajectory as it shed toward Karel.

    ¡°Oh? Interesting!¡± Karel eximed softly, raising his head to watch the Demonyer Edge¡¯s downward chop as he struck out with his sword to brush away the approaching Demonyer Edge.

    Han Shuo who was originally watching Karel with both eyes suddenly shut his eyes, fully concentrating on controlling the Demonyer Edge, using the ¡®Law of Activating Magic¡¯ to unceasingly sh at Karel from all directions.

    At the beginning, the Demonyer Edge wasn¡¯t very fast. However, Han Shuo slowly increased its speed, causing the Demonyer Edge to gradually be a lightning-like phantom. He also incited the violent spirits within the Demonyer Edge, causing an endless resentful aura to spread out.

    At first, saint swordmaster Karel was still able to effortlessly deal with Han Shuo¡¯s attacks. However, his expression became serious soon after. Bright golden light enveloped Karel¡¯s body, as crossed-shaped sword lights shot out. On one hand, he had to use his longsword to resist the Demonyer Edge¡¯s high speed shes while on the other, he has to concentrate his mental strength to withstand the demonic aura emitting from the Demonyer Edge.

    It must be said that sacred swordmaster Karel was indeed exceptional. As Karel who was able to stand proudly at the peak of Lancelot Empire faced Han Shuo¡¯s all out tempest, he had never given off the slightest indication of defeat, appearing as calm as before.

    When Han Shuo had exhausted half of his demonic yuan energy, he saw that Karel still hadn¡¯t shown any weariness. Han Shuo then poured mystical cial spellfire into the Demonyer Edge, causing blossoms of red and purple spell fire to shoot out with every sh of the Demonyer Edge. Extremely cold and extremely hot energy constantly shot out, causing much inconvenience to Karel.

    Afterwards, twelve mystical demons became corporeal, bing malevolent ghosts as they attempted to enter Karel¡¯s body. Karel gave a gasp of surprise before suddenly eximing, ¡°Truly mysterious. This martial technique is indeed different from any training method in the Profound Continent.¡±

    Facing numerous attacks, Karel still had the opportunity to shout. Shortly after, the longsword in his hand suddenly exploded in resplendent golden light as a giant cross-shaped sword light emerged abruptly, carrying a ravaging force as it spread in all directions, unexpectedly causing a sudden explosion.

    The boulder he was on was the first to be unable to bear the impact as it broke into pieces with a bang. As rubble flew about, the ground actually started to cave in, as though a enormous force had bombarded the ground, crushing everything in the surroundings.

    Han Shuo was shocked, rapidly recalling the twelve mystical demons and soared into the sky andnded next to Karel in a sh. The Demonyer Edge that had been attacking constantly flew back into Han Shuo¡¯s hand, the remaining demonic yuan energy frantically pouring into the Demonyer Edge while the killing intent and the wrathful energy from the violent spirits within the Demonyer Edge converged to form a seven meter long blood colored edge which violently shed in tandem with the Demonyer Edge toward Karel¡¯s astonishing giant cross-shaped sword light.

    A fierce explosion spread out from the point of contact, causing the barrier that enveloped the area to copse. The vast space suddenly regained its original appearance, revealing the original form of the wide stone room. When the barrier was destroyed, a fierce ripple simultaneously spread out, causing the ground to tremor in its wake.

    An astonishing explosive force suddenly rushed through the Demonyer Edge, rushing through the sword hilt into Han Shuo¡¯s body. Han Shuo¡¯s descending body couldn¡¯t resist flying backward at high speed before finally crashing into the rock ceiling and forming a three meter deep indent.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on, what¡¯s going on?¡±

    ¡°Is there an earthquake?¡±

    ¡°Ah, the bed is still moving!¡±

    Within the Rose Garden above the two of them, nobles who were in the process of seeking pleasure with beauties suddenly felt the tremors under their feet. They were all shocked and started talking about it one after another.

    A few of the guards watching over the Rose Garden were surprised as well, not knowing what had happened as they aimlessly attempted to find the cause of the earthquake.

    Just at this moment, the fierce looking Bonds suddenly appeared among the guards of the Rose Garden, chiding coldly, ¡°What are you panicking for, it¡¯s just a small earthquake. We are at the heart of Ossen City. Apart from some alteration to nature, what else can happen.¡±

    Bonds was a true fiend in the eyes of these guards. When Bonds spoke, all the guards quietened down, following Bonds instructions to console the fearful nobles. The majority of the nobles calmed down upon hearing the guards¡¯ exnation.

    However, there were still a few cowardly nobles who immediately abandoned the beauties in their bed and hurriedly fled the Rose Garden, afraid that there would be a few more tremors from below the Rose Garden, causing them to leave their precious lives in this ce.

    Although Bonds calmed the fric mood of the guards, he was still restless, unable to understand what had happened. He had just brought Han Shuo underground and Bonds didn¡¯t wish that anything happened to either his old master Karel or his newly recognised senior brother.

    Yet, the fierce tremors was clearly caused by the exchange between the two of them. Bonds was aware of saint swordmaster Karel¡¯s terrifying strength and also knew that Han Shuo was a reckless, unfearing character. He feared that the two of them had not reach a conclusion in their fight and after finally waiting for the people aboveground to settle down, Bonds hurriedly headed for the secret location.

    The flustered Bonds had just entered the underground when he heard Karel¡¯s brightughter even before reaching Karel¡¯s location. Once he heard Karel¡¯sughter, he suddenly rxed yet was somewhat apprehensive.

    A space archmage had deployed aplicated barrier around Karel¡¯s wide practice chamber. Not only was it able to iste sound and sight, once someone entered the barrier, they would have the feeling of entering a separate world. Currently, Bonds was able to hear Karel¡¯sughter even before nearing that area, which indicated a shocking fact.

    The barrier has been destroyed!

    Once Bonds verified this matter, he hastily entered the vast stone room. The scene that entered his eyes was beyond his expectations. The boulder which saint swordmaster Karel usually sat on had be a small stone, while Karel stood on an area which seemed to be the epicenter of the earthquake, smiling as he looked at an indent in the ceiling.

    Within the indent, Han Shuo shook his shoulders and twisted his body within the deep indentation. The solid rock shattered and fell as Han Shuo simrly smiled as he leaped to the ground.

    ¡°Bonds, it seems like your choice is indeed decent. This brat¡¯s martial technique is atrocious. In my many years of traveling the continent, I¡¯ve never seen nor heard of such a martial technique. He had only trained for a few years and already possess such frightening strength. As time passes, I really don¡¯t know how strong he would get. No wonder old astrologer Grace made such a prediction.¡± saint swordmaster Karel smiled as he look at the entering Bonds, showing his approval.

    Bonds was very respectful as he faced Karel and said, ¡°I¡¯ve seen senior brother¡¯s martial technique before and it¡¯s extremely mysterious. He had long since proficiently use the thing that I have always bitterly studied yet have been unable toprehend to a level that far exceeds my imagination.

    Popping sounds emitted from Han Shuo who had justnded on the ground. As Han Shuo moved his muscles and bones, traces of blood and ck colored radiance circted through his skin like electricity. Han Shuo smiled as he creaked his neck and said, ¡°Mister Karel¡¯s truly deserving of his reputation. It seems that you still haven¡¯t utilized your full strength. Hehe, I¡¯ve truly benefited from this battle.¡±

    With just a sword and golden fighting aura, Karel stood tall while under Han Shuo¡¯s torrential attacks. At the end, his strike of explosive force possessed unparallelled ferocity,pletely shing with his elderly appearance of one past his prime. This caused Han Shuo to truly be amazed.

    Wine truly gets better with age. Han Shuo understood that just with his demonic magic at separate demon realm, he shouldn¡¯t be able to defeat Karel. However, if he used necromancy magic as well as summoned the little skeleton and the four zombies, he had confidence in beating Karel. From his previous visit to the other dimension, Han Shuo knew that the little skeleton¡¯s strength was far from ordinary.

    ¡°I didn¡¯t utilize my full strength, but you didn¡¯t use necromancy magic either right? Hehe The undead creatures summoned by a grand magus necromancer would indeed be troublesome to deal with. Brat, you are pretty good, Phoebe really has good taste.¡± Karel smiled as he said, pausing for a moment before continuing, ¡°Our spar has let me realize that your martial technique is extremely peculiar. It¡¯s simr to the fusion of fighting aura and magic and looks like it is indeed suitable for Bonds to train in.¡±

    Fighting aura only possessed pure destructive energy. However, Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan energy was able to forge the body, treat certain illnesses and even influence an opponent¡¯s soul, truly possessing all kinds of remarkable abilities.

    Fighting aura was slowly formed by purely training the body. Demonic yuan energy could form a consciousness and a demon infant. Killing intent as well as the unique energy of Heaven and earth or even some herbs and strange items wera ble to enhance demonic yuan energy. From certain angles, demonic yuan energy was indeed way more mysterious.

    ¡°Bonds, wait outside with Bryan. I need to properly meditate. I¡¯ve obtained great gains from this battle!¡± Karel smiled and instructed Bonds while Han Shuo was contemting.

 Chapter 398: A structure from the other dimension?

    GDK Chapter 398 ¨C A structure from the other dimension?

    As they walked out the Northern Rose Garden, Bonds followed Han Shuo closely the entire time.

    As Han Shuo stared bbergasted at Bonds, Bonds said respectfully, ¡°Senior brother, from today onward, I will officially leave the Rose Garden and follow you.¡±

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t expected Bonds to be so straightforward. After thinking for a moment, he smiled and said, ¡°How about this? In this period of time, you will still be in charge of protecting Lawrence and ensuring his safety. When he doesn¡¯t need your protection anymore, you can return to my side. I make preparations to arrange for your entrance ceremony after some time. Once we performed the ceremony, I will immediately impart to you the martial technique.¡±

    ¡°Alright then. In that case, I will continue to protect Prince Lawrence.¡± Hao Shuo¡¯s instructions were now of higher importance than Karel¡¯s. Bonds was used to listening to orders, hence he nodded and agreed.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s orders, Bonds gradually sunk into the darkness. Han Shuo understood that Bonds had gone to secretly protect Lawrence and headed back to his residence alone.

    It was currently a sensitive time in Ossen City. The streets were tightly guarded during the night as city guards patrolled all pathways within the city. Even while the nobles entertained themselves at night, they still wouldn¡¯t forget to talk about proper business.

    Han Shuo had previously heard via a mystical demon the discussion between many nobles within the Northern Rose Garden about the princes, debating about which prince they should support.

    Han Shuo had also just realized abruptly why King Uhtred already acted quickly. All of a sudden, all officials who had close rtions with Lawrence had been, more or less, promoted for all kinds of reasons.

    Lawrence, who originally had the least support, was suddenly being ardently paid attention to.. King Uhtred¡¯s obvious favoritism caused the nobles and princes to be apprehensive, as they couldn¡¯t understand the reason behind Uhtred¡¯s actions.

    Sacred swordmaster Karel, who had always maintained neutrality and had never expressed his support for Lawrence, had dered when he left the imperial pce that if anyone dared to deal with Lawrence underhandedly, they would face his wrath. Karel had even hinted at Duke Ashburn¡¯s despicableness.

    Even the Dark Mantle organization which acted as the empire¡¯s underground agents suddenly had close dealings with Lawrence. Amyes who was feared by all nobles was even seen visiting Lawrence¡¯s residence at night. This seemingly proved that the Dark Mantle and Lawrence had allied secretly.

    Lawrence, who had been suppressed by the other princes for a long time, suddenly had a surge in circumstances and became the topic of discussion between nobles. A number of influential personages who had never taken Lawrence seriously now had a sudden change of opinion.

    ¡°King Uhtred has been in power in the Lancelot Empire for many years. It seems that before Uhtred dies, the whole Lancelot Empire will act as hemands. His sessor would ultimately still be his personal choice.¡± Han Shuo pondered inwardly as he unhurriedly walked toward his residence.

    Late in the night, the streets were quiet. Han Shuo moved swiftly, not leaving any tracks on the streets. A couple of mystical demons watched the surroundings stealthily as Han Shuo easily evaded the city guards and returned quickly to his own residence.

    When Han Shuo reached his residence, he realized that other than a few guards and the old steward, all the servants had already slept. When Kas saw Han Shuo appear, he hastily greeted him and soon after said in a low voice, ¡°Lord Marquis, there¡¯s someone in the room who wishes to see you.¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly, baffled that someone actually came over sote at night and couldn¡¯t help but be astonished. A mystical demon flew over in the direction Kas had given and soon after a handsome and graceful figure suddenly entered Han Shuo¡¯s sight.

    It was actually him! Han Shuo was shocked. He then nodded towards Kas and instructed, ¡°Alright then, it¡¯s already quitete. You should rest early. I can go over by myself.¡±

    Kas didn¡¯t say anything else, bowing towards Han Shuo and then immediately withdrawing.

    Han Shuo walked over to the room for receiving guests. Once he entered, the door closed automatically. Han Shuo frowned when he saw the handsome grand magus necromancer before him and asked, ¡°Why are you here?¡±

    Wolf gave a carefree smile and leisurely looked at Han Shuo, ¡°I came over to thank you. Thanks to the skeletal staff, you¡¯ve helped me regain my youth. Hehe. I¡¯m especially grateful for this..¡±

    ¡°In recent days, there have been some rumors circting that are not beneficial to me. I wouldn¡¯t want your arrival to cause misunderstandings. If there aren¡¯t any matters, it¡¯s best that you don¡¯te over and cause trouble for me. Your identity is too sensitive and you¡¯re someone I cannot provoke.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t have any enmity towards Wolf, but he didn¡¯t have any favorable impression of him either. Nowadays, Kosse¡¯s group had been stopping at nothing to cause him to lose his standing within Ossen City. Even though Han Shuo had Uhtred¡¯s help, if he really let Kossetch onto credible evidence, it would be hard for Han Shuo to manage.

    ¡°Rx. It¡¯s precisely because I don¡¯t want to give you trouble that I chose to appear sote at night. Furthermore, an average people wouldn¡¯t know my identity. Even if it were previous enemies from the Church of Light, they probably wouldn¡¯t be able to recognize me too. Hence, you need not worry, I won¡¯t bring you any trouble.¡± Wolf exined.

    Hearing him say this, Han Shuo examined Wolf¡¯s appearance carefully and couldn¡¯t help but agree that his words did contain some truth. It was impossible to connect the current Wolf who was elegant, handsome and full of a dignified aura with the previous Wolf who looked inhuman and had a dense aura of death. If not for the changes due to the skeletal staff, even if someone were to beat Han Shuo to death, he wouldn¡¯t believe that the graceful youth in front of him was that centuries-old Wolf.

    ¡°Why have youe to find me?¡± Han Shuo rxed slightly, but still wrinkled his brows and annoyedly looked at Wolf.

    ¡°Hey, we should be considered allies, and are truly friends. From the beginning, our Cmity Church has always thought of you as a friend. Besides, I¡¯m also a necromancer, you shouldn¡¯t be so indifferent toward me.¡± Wolf shrugged and said with a little sorrow.

    Han Shuo was shocked by his words. Thinking about it, it was indeed as Wolf said. Everyone in the Profound Continent was afraid of the evil Cmity Church. Once he showed his ability to refine undead creatures that weren¡¯t afraid of light magic, they had tossed him an olive branch and even spared no effort in protecting him.

    When Wolf discovered that Han Shuo had the skeletal staff, Cmity Church¡¯s attitude towards Han Shuo was so amicable that it made him a little vexed. Looking at the earnest Wolf in front of him, Han Shuo really didn¡¯t know how to treat him.

    Han Shuo rxed, no longer having a cold and emotionless expression. He smiled faintly as he pulled over a chair, sat down and asked, ¡°In that case, could Mister Wolf tell me what you came here for? And also, how exactly does Cmity Church want to treat me?¡±

    When Wolf saw that Han Shuo¡¯s expression was no longer indifferent, he smiled happily and said, ¡°This should be the way! We will be friends. Hehe. Very good friends!! There aren¡¯t many necromancers in this world and even fewer Grand magus necromancers Yet, both you and I are grand magus necromancers. We ought to have many simr interests. Ha. I really had not expected that you would actually be a grand magus necromancer so quickly. Hehe. It seems like you must have gained many things from the Holy Land.¡±

    ¡°Holy Land? What Holy Land?¡± Han Shuo looked distracted and asked suspiciously.

    Wolf seemed to know that Han Shuo would ask this question. He straightened himself, appearing slightly excited as he said, ¡° The Holy Land is what our Cmity Church calls that ce. Most of the people in the Profound Continent call it the Cemetery of Death. Hehe, since the skeleton staff is in your possession I don¡¯t think you would be able to deny that you¡¯ve been to the Holy Land.

    Moreover, you¡¯ve only practiced necromancy for less than five years and yet you¡¯ve already be a grand magus necromancer, which took me a couple of centuries to reach. This is already enough to illustrate the issue. There¡¯s also the undead creatures that aren¡¯t afraid of light magic and other mysteries that prove that you¡¯ve been to the Holy Land.¡±

    When Wolf said this, Han Shuo¡¯s heart surged with waves of emotion. He realized that he hadn¡¯t been cautious enough, or it could be said that he knew too little about the Cmity Church and the secrets about necromancers. This was why Wolf was able to recognize the skeletal staff. For Wolf to be so certain in his words, clearly showed that he had surmised the truth.

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression momentarily wavered, his eyes indistinctly revealing an ominous glint. He was considering if he should kill everyone who knew his secrets but after a round of contemtion, he knew it was already toote. Wolf had probably already shared this information with the Cmity Church.

    Observing Han Shuo¡¯s virulent gaze, even Wolf who had lived for a long time felt apprehensive. As a necromancer who had high aplishments, Wolf could clearly sense Han Shuo¡¯s concealed killing intent. Wolf who was being stared fixedly by Han Shuo unexpectedly had a feeling of palpitation, causing him to be startled.

    Only when faced with the rebuke of high-ranked people in the evil Cmity Church would Wolf have such a feeling of apprehension. He would never have thought that he would feel a hint of fear from someone who was so much younger than him. Wolf was very clear what this feeling implied.

    He knew that only when experts who could threaten his life were discontented and had the intention to kill him would he instinctually palpitate in fear!

    Could this youth who had just be a grand magus necromancer possess the ability to kill him?

    Illusion, it must an illusion! Wolf reassured himself before awkwardly saying to Han Shuo, ¡°Don¡¯t be so hostile towards me. Our Cmity Church will really never be your enemy. Since the skeletal staff has already recognized you as its master, you are a noble within our Cmity Church. There are many areas in which the Cmity Church will need rely on you, hence we require you to be living well.¡±

    ¡°In that case, if my death brings about more benefits, you all would¡¯ve already acted?¡± Han Shuo squinted his eyes, sizing up Wolf as he replied slowly.

    ¡°Uh...¡± Wolf¡¯s expression became more awkward. He hesitated for a while before nodding and said, ¡°If we could kill you and there would be only benefits and no harm to the Cmity Church, I think my superiors would have given the order to kill you long ago and not decree to protect you and cooperate with you.¡±

    Wolf could still be considered as a frank person. Han Shuo knew how the infamously evil Cmity Church handled matters. When he first saw Belinda, even though she was just an alchemist, she had already attempted to kill everyone in the hotel without inhibition. She didn¡¯t ce any importance on the lives of strangers, believing that everything was proper and as a matter of course.

    Coldly snorting, Han Shuo knew that Wolf already knew about the matters regarding the Cemetery of Death. However, Han Shuo naturally wouldn¡¯t reveal any details. He expressionlessly replied, ¡°Don¡¯t stick your noses into my business. Be honest about the reason why you are here!¡±

    Seeing Han Shuo bing displeased, Wolf hastily exined, ¡°Regarding the Holy Land, we can temporarily not discuss it. I came here to inform you regarding some secrets of the skeletal staff and the Holy Land. This would probably be the information that you long for the most.¡±

    ¡°Oh? Didn¡¯t you previously say that if I didn¡¯t join the Cmity Church you wouldn¡¯t tell me the secrets about the skeletal staff? Why have you now specificallye here to tell me this information? I had clearly stated previously that I wouldn¡¯t join the Cmity Church. It¡¯s best if you don¡¯t act rashly.¡± Han Shuo said to Wolf.

    For some unknown reason, the grand magus necromancer Wolf, who should¡¯ve been aloof and surpassed ordinary people, was unbelievably humble and even seemed to be deliberately currying favor as he spoke to Han Shuo.

    From the time you picked up the skeleton staff, you¡¯re already considered a member of our Cmity Church! Wolf said inwardly before smiling as he exined, ¡°Don¡¯t worry. My superiors gave me the order and so I will naturally tell you the situation of the skeletal staff and the Holy Land. However, what I will tell you is only what I know. There are things that I don¡¯t know about and I¡¯m powerless to help.¡±

    ¡°In that case, it would be a waste to not listen. Go ahead then.¡± Han Shuo spoke indifferently, no longer appearing as pressing as the previous time. However, he was inwardly so curious that he could die. Only he himself could understand this fact.

    ¡°Then I¡¯ll first talk about the Holy Land. Within the Cmity Church, it is rumored that the Holy Land possesses a magical transportation array. That transportation array has the mysterious ability to connect between nes, in particr, it can intemunicate with theherworld. Necromancers can rely on their original body to enter theherworld to explore unknown territories within theher realm and improve their necromancy magic.

    Furthermore, there is another legend within the Cmity Church. I¡¯m not sure whether this legend is true but I¡¯ve once heard the pope say that the Holy Land wasn¡¯t a structure of the Profound Continent. Instead, it came from another ne to the Profound Continent. I surmise that the ne it came from was theherworld.¡± Wolf breathed in deeply as he exined to Han Shuo.

 Chapter 399: Three abilities of the Tri-colored skeletal staff

    Chapter 399: Three abilities of the Tri-colored skeletal staff

    Hearing what Wolf said, emotions surged uncontrobly within Han Shuo¡¯s heart. The Cmity Church was probably aware of some information regarding the Cemetery of Death. What Wolf had just stated was probably true.

    The center of the firstyer in the Cemetery of Death was indeed an ancient magic transportation array. It is precisely through this ancient magic transportation array that Han Shuo could travel everywhere without restrictions. When he heard Wolf say that the transportation array could also connect between nes, Han Shuo was indescribably astonished.

    Common magic transportation arrays within the continent normally had a limitation of distance. For example, the transportation arrays betweenrge cities in Lancelot Empire could only cover a few hundred kilometers. No one has ever heard of deploying a transportation array that could cover a distance of several thousand kilometers.

    The further the limit of the transportation array, the higher the requirements were. Apart from theprehension of the person setting up the array, a painstaking effort had to be expended on materials and finding a favorable location. A space sacred magus could only set up a transportation array that had a maximum distance of two thousand to two and a half thousand kilometers.

    Yet, therge-scale transportation array in the center of the Cemetery of Death could, ording to Wolf, transport across nes. This was extremely inconceivable to Han Shuo. When Wolf mentioned that the Cemetery of Death was a structure from a different ne, Han Shuo felt even more light-headed.

    Seeing Han Shuo¡¯s shocked expression, Wolf continued, ¡°Of course, the Holy Land also has another saying. It is said that the transportation array can be moved and it was simr to a Magic Tower and was self-sufficient in attacking and defending. These were all legends handed down within the church, but I think they are trustworthy.

    ¡°As for the skeletal staff in your hands, you can see it as the key to entering the Holy Land. The tri-colored skulls on the skeletal staff each possess a strange power. Firstly, it can multiply the strength of a necromancer¡¯s spells. I think you are already very clear about this power. The second strange power, you¡¯ve already tried it on me. It is the miraculous ability to let a necromancer be youthful again. Not only can it be used by the necromancer in possession of the skeletal staff, it can also be used on other people.

    The final power of the skeletal staff, which I¡¯m unsure if you have tried it before, is rumored to be able to open the pathway to theherworld. The user would be able to enter and exit theherworld with just a thought. This ability is the most unfathomable. It can allow necromancers familiarize with theherworld and let them reach a higher level of understanding in necromancy.

    Each of the tri-colored skulls contained a different power. However, these three abilities are only theories that have been passed down in the Cmity Church for a long time. As for whether the skeletal staff has more secrets, it¡¯s not something I¡¯m able toprehend. What I have just told you is all that I know.¡±

    Han Shuo had seen all of the three peculiar abilities of the tri-colored skeletal staff. Hence, he believed Wolf without any doubt. Increasing the strength of magic, recovering one¡¯s youth and voluntarily entering theherworld with his soul. Han Shuo had experienced all of the three abilities, but other than the first ability to increase the strength of his spells, Han Shuo simply have notprehended the other two mystical abilities.

    In particr, Han Shuo didn¡¯t know anything regarding the mysteries of thest ability. Both the times he entered theherworld had all been him unexinably entering and exiting. It was absolutely not how Wolf described, going back and forth with just a thought. It seemed that it wasn¡¯t caused by the skeletal staff, rather it was that Han Shuo hadn¡¯t truly grasped the key in utilizing the skeletal staff.

    ording to Wolf, once Han Shuo truly controlled the skeletal staff¡¯s powers, he would really be able to go back and forth with just a thought, meet up with the little skeleton and the various zombies within theherworld, easily investigate the unknown mysteries of theherworld and rify if the Cemetery of Death was really an unusual structure originating from theherworld as Wolf had described.

    ¡°I came here in ordance with my superiors¡¯ orders to tell you some secrets about the skeletal staff and the Holy Land. I think that once you know of these things, you should have a direction for exploration. Hehe. The Cmity Church will be your strong backing. You who wields the skeletal staff is an important part of our Cmity Church. You can deny this, but our core members have already acknowledged this.¡± Wolf smiled as he exined to Han Shuo who was currently deep in thought.

    Han Shuo¡¯s contemtion was interrupted by Wolf. Soon after, he gave Wolf a nce and said, ¡°What you acknowledge should be the skeletal staff and the Cemetery of Death, right?¡±

    ¡°They¡¯re all the same. The role of the skeletal staff on our Cmity Church is extremely important. Once you¡¯ve truly grasped all the uses of the skeletal staff, there will be superiors who will personallye to find you.¡± Wolf replied without answering Han Shuo¡¯s question directly.

    ¡°The skeletal staff is of great use to the Cmity Church? Is it primarily because of thest two abilities?¡± Han Shuo hesitated for a while before questioning closely.

    Wolf stared nkly, thinking for a while before nodding as he replied, ¡°You can put it that way. I¡¯m not clear of the specific circumstances, but I know that the Cmity Church has some very powerful existences. However, due to their old age, their bodies have already be extremely weak. Some of them are even reaching the end of their lives. If the skeletal staff is able to grant them a restoration of their youth, these unparalleled existences would cause the Church of Light to tremble.

    ¡°And you are a person who can bestow upon them renewed physical strength and allow them to live longer. Hence, your importance to the Cmity Church is self-evident. More importantly, only you can open the Holy Land. In the future, secrets regarding the Holy Land would also need to be uncovered by you.¡±

    These words were probably not what the superiors instructed him to say and were simply Wolf taking the initiative to show goodwill. Thus, he paused before adding another sentence, ¡°Bryan, these are my own words. I hope you will have a good impression of me. That way, I¡¯ll be inwardly grateful.¡±

    Han Shuo was still reveling in the shock of Wolf¡¯s words. He nodded when he heard what Wolf said, but didn¡¯t make any promises.

    ¡°Alright then, it¡¯s already quitete. I will be leaving now.¡± After Wolf finished speaking, he respectfully gave Han Shuo a card and said, ¡°This contains the way to contact me. If you require my or our strength, you can look for me at any time. We will spare no effort in assisting you.¡±

    Han Shuo received the card in passing as he apathetically nodded again. His head was filled with the details of the Cemetery of Death and the skeletal staff. Han Shuo was extremely shocked when he heard about these matters from Wolf, causing him to want to rapidly understand the main points.

    Han Shuo knew all along that the Cemetery of Death contained many secrets. However, he hadn¡¯t been able to decipher its real secrets despite staying in the Cemetery of Death for quite a period of time. However, Wolf¡¯s sharing had given Han Shuo a direction to explore, allowing Han Shuo to realize the aspects of the Cemetery of Death which were the most attractive.

    ¡°Perhaps I should enter a deeper level in the Cemetery of Death to explore. Maybe the next level might have the answers I need!¡± Han Shuo silently assessed the situation and made a decision.

    While Han Shuo was pondering quietly, grand magus necromancer Wolf had already left soundlessly. Han Shuo raised his head to look outside, realizing that the full moon in the sky was gradually bing hidden. Without him knowing, the night had almost passed by.

    Han Shuo thought for a while. His curiosity about the mysteries of the Cemetery of Death and the skeletal staff was getting stronger and stronger. With the magic transportation array that directly led to the Cemetery of Death, traveling to and fro was extremely convenient. Since there didn¡¯t seem to be any important matters tomorrow, Han Shuo immediately went to the secret chamber and activated the transportation array.

    Once Han Shuo reached the Cemetery of Death, even before Han Shuo could uncover the secrets within the Cemetery of Death, the connection between dark dragon Gilbert and himself was immediately established.

    The distance between Lancelot Empire¡¯s Ossen City and the Valley of Sunshine was too far. Although Han Shuo and Gilbert had the power of the contract between them, it only allowed Han Shuo to detect whether Gilbert was dead and couldn¡¯t sense his location or thoughts.

    However, the Dark Forest was very close to the Valley of Sunshine. As both Han Shuo and Gilbert¡¯s strength had increased by a substantial amount, the connection between them had be clearer. Once Han Shuo established a connection with Gilbert, he immediately sensed that Gilbert wanted to meet him urgently.

    Han Shuo, who had originally nned on exploring the secrets of the Cemetery of Death, recognized Gilbert¡¯s urgency. He had no choice but temporarily shelve his n of immediately investigating the Cemetery of Death. He hurriedly left the Cemetery of Death and rushed toward the Valley of Sunshine.

    Along the way, Han Shuo unleashed the Art of Demonic Nine Heavens. Without wasting too much time, he arrived at the cliff within the Valley of Sunshine where the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Group were hiding. Gilbert had already felt Han Shuo¡¯s aura and had waited at the bottom of the cliff for a long time.

    There was also a coquettish and attractive woman standing beside Gilbert. The woman had a well-developed body and a gorgeous appearance. Her sepia-colored hair was weaved into nine little braids which cascaded down her shoulders, making her appear pretty and mature, possessing a unique vor.

    When Han Shuonded, the woman was evidently somewhat fearful, unconsciously moving nearer to Gilbert. Gilbert casually embraced the charming woman and exined to Han Shuo, ¡°This is Lania. She was subdued by me in the Dark Forest. You¡¯ve seen her before!¡±

    Hydra! Han Shuo stared nkly but understood soon after. He couldn¡¯t help but take another look. Lania bowed politely toward Han Shuo and said delicately, ¡°Master!¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t further question the hydra, Lania, and only nodded toward her. He then frowned and asked Gilbert, ¡°What happened that made you so anxious for me toe?¡±

    ¡°Trunks is missing. There¡¯s no sign of him in the whole Valley of Sunshine!¡± Gilbert said worriedly.

 Chapter 400: Fallen tiger in grassland

    Chapter 400: Fallen tiger in grasnd1

    ¡°What happened?¡± Han Shuo was somewhat in disbelief. Trunks currently had the strength of a great swordmaster and perhaps in the entire Valley of Sunshine, only the thrice berserk berserker Laureton could overpower him in battle. However, even Laureton didn¡¯t have the power to kill Trunks by himself.

    Trunks was a cautious man who was also very familiar with the terrain near the Valley of Sunshine. He shouldn¡¯t have met with any trouble, but now that he had suddenly went missing truly surprised Han Shuo.

    ¡°After he returned from J¡¯s ce, there had been no trace of him for four days in a row. Even when there were no missions, he had never been away for that long. And even if he didn¡¯t return, he should have left a message, but there has been no news this time around. We sent people to ask J and learned that Trunks had indeed left from her ce. He¡¯d brought a dozen brothers along, there is no trace of them, either.¡± Dark dragon Gilbert exined to Han Shuo with a glum face.

    Knitting his brows, Han Shuo pondered for a while before asking, ¡°Has Trunks had disputes with any powers recently?¡±

    ¡°Ten days ago, we ambushed the Butcher bandit group together with J under Trunks¡¯ lead. Trunks and J even killed Butcher Gustav. His bandit group can be considered to be wiped out from the Valley of Sunshine. Apart from this, we didn¡¯t have any other disputes with other forces.¡± It was Grant who¡¯d spoken. As Trunk¡¯s old friend, he was very worried for Trunks¡¯ safety. As the Valley of Sunshine was in an area situated at the center of three countries, over the years, it had be a special area where the most abundant goods from the three countries could be gathered. Han Shuo had provided Trunks the capital to create the Soul Destroyer mercenary band with the original intention precisely to take over the Valley of Sunshine. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have given Trunks a Rebirth Pill for Trunks¡¯ reformation.

    These days, the Soul Destroyer mercenary group had gradually grown in scale, bing one of the powers within the Valley of Sunshine. Trunks suddenly having a mishap had already impacted the development of the Soul Destroyer mercenary group, which wasn¡¯t an oue Han Shuo was willing to see. As he listened to Gilbert and Grant narrate what¡¯d happened, Han Shuo had beenpletely silent.

    ¡°Honored master, do you think something has happened to Trunks?¡± Gilbert couldn¡¯t help but ask upon seeing Han Shuo staying silent.

    ¡°Nonsense!¡± Han Shuo unhappily berated. He thought for a bit before saying, ¡°We temporarily don¡¯t know Trunks¡¯ situation, so everyone shouldn¡¯t act rashly. Don¡¯t take on any mission for now, let¡¯s wait for Trunks¡¯ matter to be settled first.¡±

    ¡°Master, we have been searching for Trunks for days but there¡¯s no news of him. Do we keep looking?¡± Gilbert scratched his head in distress as he asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°You guys assemble everyone, I think we have run into big trouble this time. Currently in the Valley of Sunshine, the number of powers that dare to touch the Soul Destroyer mercenary band can be counted on the fingers. Since something bad has happened to Trunks, I think the Soul Destroyer is next on the list.¡± Taking a deep breath, Han Shuo told the dark dragon and Grant.

    ¡°Right, why don¡¯t I see Odysseus¡¯ group?¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but ask in surprise when he discovered that Odysseus¡¯ unique little group wasn¡¯t here.

    ¡°They are on a mission and temporarily haven¡¯t returned to the Valley of Sunshine. They should still be in the Orc Empire at the moment.¡± Gilbert quickly answered.

    ¡°Alright, Gilbert, follow me outside, the rest remain in the valley. It¡¯s best to call the brothers outside to return. Watch over this ce carefully.¡± Han Shuo threw Gilbert a nce before directly walking out.

    Lania the hydra was in human form as Gilbert casually held her in his embrace. She couldn¡¯t help but speak out upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, ¡°Master, I can also be of help!¡±

    The hydra race was also one ofscivious nature, no different from the underground world¡¯s dark dragon race. In the previous trip to the depths of the Dark Forest, this hydra had once tried to surreptitiously kill Han Shuo and Gilbert, which had unexpectedly convenienced Gilbert. The hydra and Gilbert¡¯s deadlybat had instead evolved into a sex war and the dark dragon had used the demonic method Han Shuo had taught him to subdue her.

    The current strength of the hydra Lania was obviously beneath that of Gilbert. As someone who indulged in sexual desire, after she was conquered by Gilbert, she had unwittingly be the submissive one in the rtionship. Gilbert was Han Shuo¡¯s magic pet, so the hydra naturally addressed Han Shuo as master.

    Furrowing his brows, Han Shuo thought for a while. He then nced at the hydra and said, ¡°You stay here for now. It¡¯d be bad if there¡¯s no expert to oversee this ce.¡±

    ¡°Mhm, you remain here.¡± Gilbert stared at the hydra and chided, ¡°What master says goes. From now on, you aren¡¯t allowed to have any objection.¡±

    Lania softly smiled in a coquettish, fawning manner and chuckled, ¡°Alright then, I¡¯ll stay here and guard this ce well for you guys.¡±

    Seeing that Han Shuo didn¡¯t have his previous ruthless appearance, the hydra Lania slowly rxed, her speech and behavior no longer as cautious as before.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t say anything else. He nced at dragon Gilbert and leaped into the air. Gilbert transformed right at Han Shuo¡¯s feet to urately catch him and flew up high into the sky.

    ¡°Master, where to?!¡± After Gilbert flew Han Shuo up high in the sky, he inadvertently asked.

    ¡°Nowhere. Just take me to a high altitude and stop there!¡± Han Shuo instructed. The twelve mystical demons floated out one by one, flying towards the directions of the big powers in the Valley of Sunshine.

    The Valley of Sunshine was only that big of an area, there weren¡¯t many people who¡¯d have the guts to attack Trunks, only those that were afraid that he¡¯d be a threat to their status. Han Shuo didn¡¯t need to think to know that Trunks¡¯ disappearance certainly had to do with those people.

    It made sense when one thought about it. The Soul Destroyer mercenary band had gradually expanded to the point that it had the power to control the Valley of Sunshine. To the other powers, Trunks had without a doubt be the thorn in their flesh. They¡¯d be very willing to eradicate the Soul Destroyer mercenary band.

    The twelve mystical demons spread out and drifted in every direction of the Valley of Sunshine, towards the Cairo mercenary band, the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band, the Menlo family, the Katar Orc tribe and even J¡¯s bandit group along with some other small powers. Each power was visited by a mystical demon.

    With the existence of these twelve mystical demons, Han Shuo had the entire Valley of Sunshine and its major forces under his monitoring. Since the Valley of Sunshine was only that big, the people who¡¯d put their hands on Trunks would definitely reveal themselves, Han Shuo was a hundred percent sure of it. Deep within the forest, there was an extremely hidden cave surrounded and heavily concealed by thick tree branches. The cave itself was very narrow and hard to move within.

    However, from the depths of this cave echoed the miserable screaming of Trunks. Both his hands and feet were restrained by coarse ck manacles while a long and thin iron chain was pierced through his shoulder de.

    Thunder archmage Asa, who followed Florida of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band, was currently staring viciously at Trunks. As he waved the magic staff in his hand, bolts of lightning struck on Trunks¡¯ body like electric snakes, adding many ck scars on Trunks¡¯ already seriously injured body.

    ¡°Trunks, you also have such a day. When you killed my father Gustav, you didn¡¯t think that such a day woulde right?¡± Thunder archmage Asa red at Trunks with deep hatred. He maliciously whispered an incantation while tedly striking bolts of lightning on Trunks¡¯ body.

    ¡°Damnable old dog. Ahh...¡± As Trunks screamed out loud in agony, a lightning bolt struck right at his mouth, leaving a ck scar on his lips. Two streaks of blood slowly trickled down from the corners of his mouth.

    Trunks¡¯ entire body was covered in cuts and bruises and tightly imprisoned. In the surrounding was several experts that were sent by various powers to keep watch on him. Asa indeed held a bone-deep grudge towards Trunks, which was why he¡¯d secretlye to take it out on him. If not for the tacit understanding between the experts of the other powers, Asa might have ruthlessly killed Trunks the day Trunks had been caught.

    Trunks looked at Asa who was continuously striking him with lightning bolts, his heart also filled with an endless hatred. He had never expected the thunder archmage always following Florida to be the son of Butcher Gustav. No wonder the rtionship between the Butcher and the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band was so amicable. It turned out this was why Florida regarded Asa so highly.

    ¡°Heh heh, although I can¡¯t kill you, I will slowly torture you. The Soul Destroyer mercenary band has rapidly developed in the past two years, but so what? Haha, in two days, they shall be exterminated by our allied forces. After the Soul Destroyer is finished, I will peel your skin off a bit at a time while you are still alive.

    Hah, even if you want revenge, you shall never have that chance. Annie who you consider your sister, heh heh, not just Florida who have ridden her, even I and my father have yed with her. What can you do about that? Aren¡¯t you just like a dog all chained up by me? Haha...¡± Asa had gone insane as he screamed loudly, striking down one lightning bolt after another.

    ¡°Ahhhh... I¡¯ll kill you beasts, I swear I will!¡± Trunks could no longer suppress his fury and howled wretchedly when he heard Asa¡¯s narration. The chains all over his body resounded with metallic sounds as Trunks appeared as if he was truly going insane.

    1. Fallen tiger in grasnd is a Chinese saying which describes that when the tiger leaves the mountains and is trapped in the grasnds, even a dog can bully the tiger. It describes people of status and power losing their status/power.

 Chapter 401: The alliance based on benefits

    Chapter 401: The alliance based on benefits

    It didn¡¯t take Han Shuo much effort to thoroughly understand the situation through the mystical demons snooping around. The one behind this hostility directed at Trunks and the Soul Destroyer was Florida of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band. The other participants included the House of Menlo as well as Laureton of the Cairo mercenary band.

    In this world, there was no eternal friends, only eternal benefits. These words had urately summed up the situation!

    In the past, when Laureton and Florida had beenpeting for power, Han Shuo and Trunks had sided with Laureton. The night Laureton had been surrounded by the four great powers in the small mountain valley, Han Shuo had even aided him toe out of it alive.

    From that time, the Cairo mercenary band and Soul Destroyer mercenary band had close rtions with Laureton and Trunks constantly cooperating. In the eyes of outsiders, the Cairo and Soul Destroyer mercenary bands had seemed to have formed an alliance.

    However, with the Soul Destroyer rapid development in addition to Han Shuo¡¯s zing reputation in the Lancelot Empire, it had pushed the Soul Destroyer mercenary band to be the fifth great power in the Valley of Sunshine. In the recent days, Trunks killing Butcher Gustav had caused the residents in the Valley of Sunshine to be rmed. Laureton and Florida who were originally the two most promising contenders for the control over the Valley of Sunshine had finally realized that the situation was delicate.

    When one¡¯s own interest was threatened, friendship and alliance were as fragile as the vows of politicians. Florida and Laureton immediately joined forces. Since Adam Menlo had been heavily injured by Han Shuo previously, he was extremely happy to also participate in this long-nned insidious scheme.

    The result was Trunks being ambushed by Laureton and the rest while on the way back from J¡¯s ce and the mercenaries with himpletely annihted. Trunks himself had been captured alive and imprisoned in a hidden cave within the belly of a mountain valley. The major powers had all sent their experts to keep watch over him.

    They didn¡¯t immediately kill Trunks because although Laureton and the rest coveted the wealth of the Soul Destroyer mercenary band, they didn¡¯t have much information on the detailedyout of the Soul Destroyer mercenary band¡¯s base. Therefore, they intended to get it from Trunks¡¯ own mouth before making their next move, which would also help decrease the losses on their side.

    However, Trunks¡¯ tenacity was beyond their expectation. Under the rounds of torture and extortion, he still hadn¡¯t revealed any information that they¡¯d wanted. Hence, his body was tormented ck and blue till he was on the verge of death.

    Presently, in a mansion defended by the Cairo mercenary band within the Valley of Sunshine, the three powers were discussing when tounch their attack on the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. The Soul Destroyer mercenary band had existed in the Valley of Sunshine for a long time. Laureton and the others had long since known its exact location even without Trunks telling them.

    Were it not for them not understanding how dangerous the terrain of that area truly was, they¡¯d have already joined hands to wipe out the Soul Destroyer mercenary band, instead of waiting until now to make their move. In the past several days, the three powers had constantly sent people to that region to explore. They had clearly seen the defensiveyout on the surface and were about to make a move in a few days.

    The major powers in the Valley of Sunshine had been through repeated wars, from which all the parties had sustained a great loss in strength. After Han Shuo had killed light grand magus Ferguson, the rtionship between Florida and the Church of Light had been somewhat frail. However, with the existence of the secret silver mine in this area, their rtionship slowly stabilized again.

    Because of Han Shuo, Cmity Church¡¯s dark archmage Edwin naturally wouldn¡¯t deal with the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. The Cmity Church and Edwin had originally been cooperating with Laureton, but they had gradually drifted apart. Edwin had sought Trunks out a few times to offer his help, but Trunks had refused his goodwill.

    Following Trunks¡¯ disappearance, the Cmity Church¡¯s Edwin had actually made quite an effort to find out the truth of the situation. However, with the alliance of the three powers in the Valley of Sunshine and the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band being backed up by the Church of Light, Edwin didn¡¯t dare to act rashly even though he knew the truth.

    The twelve mystical demons had dispersed, scenes of what they see constantly being reflected in Han Shuo¡¯s mind. His brain that¡¯d been expanded by demonic magic methodically took in those images, analyzing the contents of speech and actions to gradually discover what was going on.

    Finally, he found out the exact location where Trunks was imprisoned!

    As dark dragon Gilbert floated in the sky above the Valley of Sunshine, puffs of white clouds drifted around him. The glorious sun shone down upon the entire mountain valley, causing even the pitch ck body of the dark dragon to be glistening under the sunlight.

    Sitting cross-legged on Gilbert¡¯s back which was much wider than a horse carriage, Han Shuo had his eyes closed as he collected information. Suddenly, he slowly opened his bright eyes. As he nced down at the lush forest within the Valley of Sunshine, his eyes became increasingly bright.

    ¡°I must quickly settle the problems in the Valley of Sunshine. My steps can¡¯t just stop at this ce!¡± Han Shuo murmured.

    The matters of Brettel City, the seven grand duchies, the internal struggle in the Empire, the unceasing disturbances from the Church of Light, the secrets of the Cemetery of Death and the skeletal staff, the study of demonic magic and necromancy magic, the rivalry of the women. Too many matters were constantly piling up, waiting for him to handle. Han Shuo now had this feeling of wanting to be able to use the doppelganger technique.

    Han Shuo¡¯s increasingly heightened vision was proportionate to the growth in his ambitions and strength. Now that he looked at the various disturbances in the Valley of Sunshine, he felt that it wouldn¡¯t be very hard to deal with all of them. From the time he learned that Trunks was captured, Han Shuo wanted to take care of all of the matters in the Valley of Sunshine in one go.

    ¡°Go, fly downward!¡± Han Shuo instructed dark dragon Gilbert, showing him the exact location.

    ¡°Master, you¡¯ve found Trunks?¡± Seeing that Han Shuo, who¡¯d closed his eyes and been silent for a long time in the air, suddenly pointing out a location for him, Gilbert couldn¡¯t help but ask suspiciously.

    ¡°Of course, the direction we¡¯re heading is where Trunks is held.¡± Han Shuo replied before urging, ¡°Alright, hurry up a little!¡±

    In the depths of a dark, gloomy mountain cave, thunder archmage Asa was still tirelessly torturing Trunks. Trunks had been roaring in madness, but after the violent electric currents had pierced through his body in addition to Asa pressing a burning red iron piece on his body, Trunks couldn¡¯t bear it anymore and had fallen unconscious.

    However, Asa clearly had no intention of letting Trunks get off easy. Every time Trunks passed out, Asa would be sure to ruthlessly woke him up. After a few rounds, Trunks was on his dying breath and no longer had the strength to roar anymore. His unfocused eyes carried a deep-rooted hatred as he calmly red at Asa, his eyes containing a light which frightened Asa.

    Asa¡¯s guilty conscience churned in fear of Trunks¡¯ deep-rooted enmity. However, this feeling of guilt quickly turned into even more insane torturing as the burning red iron once again pressed upon Trunks¡¯ chest. Trunks could only stretch his mouth wide in agony, not even letting out a single groan. His face twisted into a terrifyingly savage expression like a demon from stepping out from the eighteenth level of hell.

    ¡°Lord Asa, you should stop now, or he might die!¡± A swordsman named Tru came over with a frown, reaching his hand out to forcefully seize the burning iron which Asa had been clutching tightly.

    Asa¡¯s face darkened, he red at Tru and said in a displeased manner, ¡°Tru, my matters isn¡¯t something your House of Menlo can care about!¡±

    ¡°I have no interest in caring about you, but Trunks¡¯ life is to be kept. This is the decision agreed by all three leaders. No matter how you tortured Trunks, I have no problem as long as he doesn¡¯t die. But if you kill him, we will have to bear the me of negligence. Do not cause troubles for us!¡± Tru wasn¡¯t afraid of Asa, cing the iron in its original ce as he said coldly.

    Some of the injuries on Trunks¡¯ body were starting to rot, there was even pus flowing from his neck and chest. Tru who standing nearby involuntarily covered his mouth when he smelled the nauseating smell, disgusted as he fanned with his hand, ¡°F*ck. You can still stand it?! Forget about it for today. Wait until his body gets better before toying with him again. Otherwise, everyone will object.¡±

    As Tru said this, he had already lost his patience and walked out. A few members of the Cairo mercenary band looked at Asa in annoyance. One person chimed in, ¡°Asa, your Florida has also agreed. You¡¯d better be more content, don¡¯t break the rules.¡±

    The others people in the mountain cave all revealed an annoyed expression. Even the members of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band who were stationed here with Asa also persuaded him to not make a fuss. Thinking for a while, Asa turned his head to nce at the unconscious Trunks who was on the verge of death, the fury in his heart subsiding a little.

    With that many people dissuading him, Asa also didn¡¯t dare to recklessly act on his own ord, so as to avoid rousing the anger of others. He understood that his position in the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band was no longer as firm due to the death of his father Gustav. What was more loathsome was that the bandit group had split up after his father died and simply didn¡¯t remain under him. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have had to stay in the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band and suffered humiliation.

    While Asa was drowned in hatred, sounds of heavy steps resounded from the outside. The sounds were very faint at first, gradually bing clearer.

    ¡°Who is it?¡± The still unhappy Asa shouted loudly, ¡°Since you¡¯ve alreadye, don¡¯t you know to report your name?¡±

    The sounds of footsteps were still approached slowly. However, the person didn¡¯t respond. Asa couldn¡¯t help but curse again, ¡°F*ck, are you mute? Don¡¯t you know how to speak?¡±

    ¡°Something¡¯s not right!¡± Tru frowned, suddenly taking out a long sword as he said to the people next to him.

    ¡°Only we know about this ce, what can go wrong? You¡¯re overly suspicious. Don¡¯t those fellows always deliver our food at this time? It must be them!¡± Asa took this opportunity to say a few words to Tru.

    The footsteps were still approaching. The sound of each step contained a strange rhythm, giving rise to a sense of terror in people¡¯s hearts. It was as if a demon was slowly nearing, its ghastly huge mouth hidden within the darkness, ready to bite into your neck at any moment.

    Tru threw a disdainful nce at Asa, thinking that this bandit¡¯s son was indeed not a true mercenary. Be it Cairo mercenary band or the House of Menlo, they were both strict and well-disciplined organizations. There would absolutely not be such a conduct ofing without giving a signal.

    ¡°Brothers, be a little careful. The situation is a bit strange!¡± Tru tightly grasped his long sword and warned the people on his side.

    Some experienced mercenaries from the Cairo mercenary band didn¡¯t need Tru¡¯s reminder and had already gathered together cautiously. Even Asa¡¯s group from the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band had also clearly separated from the other two powers.

    At this critical moment, as the three powers had only joined forces for profit, they still only trusted their own people rather than the fake allies who reluctantly cooperated for the sake of benefits. The Valley of Sunshine was precisely such a ce. They were enemies, be it past or future. However, they currently stood together peacefully in the face of amon enemy.

    Tap... tap... The footsteps were getting closer, bing clearer!

    Tru nced at the fire adept mage next to him and said, ¡°Cast a me!¡±

    When that fire adept mage heard Tru¡¯s order, a fire snake meandered its way into the passage, the brown-gray wall could be seen clearly when it glided through.

    At this point, even Asa knew that something was wrong. He stared raptly at the only entrance. The members of the Cairo mercenary band had a tacit understanding among themselves as they formed a square formation, ready to face the iing person¡¯s attacks at any moment.

    While everyone was focusing their attention on the only tunnel, a string of clear, crisp sounds suddenly rang out from Trunks¡¯ location behind their backs. All of them who had their eyes glued on the tunnel turned around to look when they suddenly heard such loud sounds breaking the silence.

    Right next to Trunks was Han Shuo with the Demonyer Edge in hand and a darkened expression as he cut off the iron chains on Trunks¡¯ body. The durable iron chains which were made from the recently mined mithril broke apart with each crisp sound. The slender chain piercing through Trunks¡¯ shoulder de was also carefully taken out by Han Shuo.

    Tru¡¯s group who had suddenly turned around didn¡¯t know how Han Shuo got in. There was only one tunnel which they heard the sound of footsteps from within the cave and they¡¯d all ced their full attention there. Yet, they really hadn¡¯t seen anyoneing in from the tunnel!

    However, Han Shuo had indeed suddenly appeared out of thin air, as if he¡¯d been standing there all along. His sudden arrival was in such an eerie way that it gave people an extremely vexed feeling.

    Seeing the gloomy-faced Han Shuo appear, all of the people keeping watch on Trunks inside the mountain cave felt their hearts tremble momentarily. They saw that Han Shuo had acted as if he didn¡¯t see them and only focused on breaking Trunks¡¯ shackles with a dark expression. Unknowingly, a feeling of terror couldn¡¯t help but gradually form from the bottom of their hearts.

    Although Han Shuo hadn¡¯t been present in the Valley of Sunshine, stories of him were always spreading around the Valley. The people in the mountain cave, including Asa and Tru, were all experts of the three powers. Not only did they know of Han Shuo, some of them had once witnessed with their own eyes Han Shuo¡¯s actions.

    Presently in this narrow belly of the mountain, Han Shuo had noiselessly appeared like a ghost, only silently removing Trunks¡¯ shackles. The invisible suppression was as heavy as a mountain, causing palpitations as they grew flustered.

    Asa¡¯s lips were dry. He once had his hand chopped off by Han Shuo. At that time in the mountain valley, he had witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s every blow as he struck Ferguson to death. When Han Shuo left, the stories of him didn¡¯t disappear and were instead spread throughout the Valley of Sunshine by the mercenaries who traveled extensively. In particr, the deed of Han Shuo beheading the dragon knight Celt was even more rapidly exaggerated.

    Asa knew full well the rtionship between Han Shuo and Trunks. He watched as Han Shuo worked on removing the bindings of the dying Trunks with a somber countenance, an icy cold chill abruptly spreading through his entire body. Asa¡¯s mind spun rapidly and he suddenly came to a very wise decision after watching Han Shuo for only a dozen seconds.

    Whoosh! Asa was the first to rush into the tunnel to leave the cave, fleeing without a fight!

    ¡°Damned bastard!¡± Tru turned to take a quick look, lowly cursing at Asa¡¯s shameless cowardice. Shortly after, he also felt a bit terrified, tightly gripping the long sword in his hand as he put on a strong front and looked coldly at Han Shuo, ¡°Count Bryan, this has nothing to do with you. You can¡¯t dictate the matters in our Valley of Sunshine. If you leave now, we won¡¯t stop you. Otherwise...¡±

    ¡°Ah? Asa, why do you already returned?¡± Not waiting for Tru to finish, the fire archmage next to him suddenly cried out in surprise.

    Tru was stunned. He didn¡¯t rebuke the underling for cutting off on the threat that he¡¯d summoned his courage to say. Tru promptly turned around to see Asa having a bitter expression as he really returned step by step. Tap, tap... The footsteps in the cave still echoed within everyone¡¯s hearts and actually became heavier!

 Chapter 402: Cutting off the tongue

    Chapter 402: Cutting off the tongue

    A 2.5 meters tall creature who was made of white bones that swayed in disorder from the skeleton slowly made its way forward.

    This creature was formed purely from bones that were as sharp asnces. The bones fanned out like blooming flower petals,pletely obstructing the narrow passage. With each step, a dense aura of death assaulted their senses, as though warning everyone that it didn¡¯t belong to this world.

    As a high ranked undead creature, the bone demon had to bear the restrictions of the contract to enter this world. It brought along theherworld¡¯s deathly aura, destion and loathing toward the creatures in this world. As it possessed high intelligence, it could sense the fear of the creatures in front of itself.

    When it reached the entrance of the passage, the power of contract ordered it to halt. Its original intention to kill the creatures in front was abruptly forced to an end. When it had arrived, it had already furiously struggled against the caster¡¯s contract and understood that the caster was capable of ruining its strength, so it hadn¡¯t resisted.

    When everybody inside the cave looked towards Asa, they naturally saw this huge bone demoning andpletely blocking the exit. Behind the swaying sharp spears of the bone demon came the constantly echoing sound of heavy footsteps, like drum beats pounding on their panicking hearts.

    In the span of a few breaths, a few balls of ghostly fires lit up behind the bone demon, appearing like mininterns that slowly drew nearer along with the footsteps. When the ghostly fires reached the bone demon, everyone could see the shadows of a few huge knights under the light from the ghostly fires as they tightly blocked the exit.

    At this point, everybody in the mountain cave knew that the only way out was sealed. If they wanted to leave, the only method was to kill the bone demon and evil knights. However, who knew whether there¡¯d be countless undead creatures in addition to the bone demon and the evil knights?

    Within the narrow mountain cave, If there really were arge number of undead creatures, as they didn¡¯t have a light mage, it¡¯d simply be harder to get out alive than to reach the sky. As these people¡¯s brains quickly spun and they saw that these undead creatures had no intention of entering the cave, their anxious hearts temporarily calmed down. Their eyes couldn¡¯t help but turn towards Han Shuo again.

    At this moment, Han Shuo had cut all the chains off Trunks and had applied several colorful medicines on his body. Even the rotting wounds full of pus were cleaned up. During this process, Han Shuo¡¯s darkened face looked terrifying.

    ¡°Count Bryan, this is none of your business. By saving Trunks, you¡¯ll be the enemy of our three powers in the Valley of Sunshine. You should consider carefully!¡± Tru stammered for a while, before summoning his courage to speak out toward Han Shuo under everyone¡¯s intense gaze.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t reply, not even turning his head to nce at Tru!

    As he ced his right hand on Trunks¡¯ back, ck rays of light entered Trunks¡¯ body from the hidden angle. The unconscious Trunks could only sense that his fading vitality once again returned little by little.

    Trunks gradually even felt a thread of strength. Harboring a bone-deep hatred, he abruptly shouted in his weakened condition, ¡°Asa, I will kill you! I won¡¯t let you off even if I die!¡±

    Lightning archmage Asa clearly heard Trunks¡¯ subconscious, weak shout. His face was immediately paled as white as paper, his fingers tightly gripping the magic staff. His eyes flickered as he turned to look behind. However, when he saw the bone demon¡¯s zing eyes and the evil knights riding their fire-spitting warhorses, he hastily turned his head back.

    After the light shout, Trunks slowly regained his consciousness. As his strength and vitality gradually recovered, he opened his eyes with difficulty. The first thing that entered his eyes was Han Shuo¡¯s frightfully somber face.

    However, when he saw Han Shuo¡¯s terrifying, gloomy face, Trunks was extremely excited. His mouth pulled up into a silent, wry smile, his dry lips slowly moved, ¡°Bryan, you came?¡±

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo softly sighed and said, ¡°I came a littlete, you are already this heavily wounded.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not dead, so it¡¯s not toote! As long as I¡¯m not dead, I still have hope for revenge. Even if my arms and legs are cut off, at least I still have teeth, I want to devour these beasts!!¡± Trunks¡¯ voice wasn¡¯t loud, but the enmity in it caused everyone to feel an endless chill.

    To the side, Asa felt a chill from the bottom of his heart. His eyes quickly looked around and nced toward Tru shortly after. By another side, Tru was silentlymunicating with the people from the Cairo mercenary band. The gap between the three powers unknowingly narrowed, as they clearly knew what should be done when facing amon enemy.

    Han Shuo was indifferent to their actions, only having his eyes on Trunks. Only after Trunks finished speaking did Han Shuo reply, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, you¡¯ve eaten a Rebirth Pill, even if your tendons are cut off, I can still heal you till your previous state!¡±

    ¡°Gilbert,e over here and help me take good care of Trunks!¡± Han Shuo shouted towards the area behind Trunks. A rumbling sound could be heard from underground and a momentter, dark dragon Gilbert burrowed out.

    When the mystical demon had spotted Trunks suffering such inhuman torture, Han Shuo had immediately ordered Gilbert to approach from underground at the fastest speed possible, while he summoned the undead creatures to seal the only way out of the cave. When Han Shuo had made his way to Trunks¡¯ location, dark dragon Gilbert was still in the underground passage hence he was a few minutes slower.

    After Gilbert appeared, he took a look at Trunks and his eyes became bloodshot. He instantly roared in rage, ¡°I want to eat all of you!¡±

    This period of time, Gilbert had always stayed with Trunks, unknowingly giving rise their friendship. Trunks was a person of good character, treating Gilbert with extraordinary generosity. As for dark dragon Gilbert, apart from a few bad points, he was very upright. When he saw Trunks being tortured to the point of being unrecognizable, he couldn¡¯t suppress the rage in his heart.

    Stopping Gilbert with one hand, Han Shuo instructed coldly, ¡°Look after Trunks. As for these people in the mountain cave, just leave them to me.¡±

    ¡°Master, I want to kill them, I want to avenge Trunks too!¡± Dark dragon Gilbert simply couldn¡¯t bear to see Trunks¡¯ miserable state. There was even a trace of sobbing in his voice. This was the result of Gilbert¡¯s excessive wrath and grief.

    ¡°Rest assured, there¡¯ll be an opportunity, you and Trunks will have that opportunity!¡± Han Shuo solemnly vowed and once again instructed, ¡°Look after Trunks well, don¡¯t let him suffer any more harm!¡±

    Holding back the tears that had almost flowed out, Gilbert¡¯s voice was choked with emotions as he nodded in assent. Holding a bucket of clean water, he helped Trunks clean up the stench off his wounds. Gilbert couldn¡¯t help shouting out in sobs, ¡°Damn it, how could you be so careless, you fool...¡±

    To Trunks, the pain had already numbed his senses. However, when he saw the dark dragon expressing his feelings of anger to the point of crying and Han Shuo forcefully repressing his anger which caused him to appear sinister and terrifying, something warm slowly merged with the demonic yuan energy that Han Shuo had transferred into his body, nourishing his injured body.

    ¡°You, what do you want? We, we are not afraid of you. It¡¯s best if you consider it clearly!¡± Seeing Han Shuo approach steadily with a gloomy expression after Trunks¡¯ injury had stabilized, Asa shouted, appearing fierce while being cowardly at heart.

    Not wasting any words, Han Shuo suddenly transformed into a blood-colored streak, charging into the center of these people like lightning and casting out punches and kicks. The sounds of bones breaking echoed through the mountain cave, making one¡¯s scalp tingle.

    In such a narrow area, Han Shuo¡¯s demonic arts fully disyed its advantages. As the frenzied, violent attacks fell down, there was simply no one who was capable of withstanding his assault. The strongest people here were swordmaster Tru and lightning archmage Asa, who were simply no threat to the current Han Shuo.

    In just a few minutes, the fifteen experts of the three great powers inside the mountain cave that held Trunks captive not only had their bones broken but also their tendons cut. Such an injury to the swordsmen and knights who cultivated fighting aura meant that they had thoroughly be useless. To the mages like Asa, Han Shuo cut off their tongues in addition to those injuries, hence they¡¯d never be able to cast any magic ever again.

    ¡°I won¡¯t kill you. When Trunks recovers, he will slowly skin you alive. Only in this way can the damage he¡¯d suffered bepensated.¡± Looking at the mass of meatying paralyzed on the ground, as well as Asa constantly spitting out blood due to his tongue being cut off, Han Shuo calmly pronounced their fate.

    With his tendons snapped and bones broken, Asa couldn¡¯t even let out a tragic howl, his eyes filled with despair and regret. He regretted not having killed Trunks earlier, regretted not throwing everything to the wind to kill Han Shuo the first time Han Shuo hade to the Valley of Sunshine.

    Dark dragon Gilbert¡¯s choked voice gradually returned to normal in light of the perpetrators suffering. Trunks¡¯ weakened body also slowly recovered some strength. With the support of the dark dragon and Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan energy, he could even stand up with some difficulty.

    Trunks looked at Asa¡¯s miserable state, suddenly letting out a crazyughter. His owl-likeughter was filled with endless resentment and unspeakable satisfaction.

    As Trunks madlyughed like a devil, the pain and pressure from thest few days seemed to be released along with hisughter. He stared steadfastly at Asa as heughed to his heart¡¯s content, his eyes filled with a bone-deep resentment which enveloped Asa like an ice cold prison, causing him to feel a chill that prated to his bones.

    Asa understood that this time in Trunks¡¯ hands, the suffering he¡¯d have to bear would be much more extreme. Asa who had released his anger as much as he liked on Trunks¡¯ body had no doubts that once Trunks recovered his strength, Trunks would torture him to his death. With hispletely handicapped body and cut off tongue, Asa¡¯s heart was filled with only despair. Unfortunately for him, he couldn¡¯t even beg for death in his current situation and could only wait for the iing, endless suffering.

    After a long time, Trunks¡¯ wildughter eventually subsided. He¡¯dughed to the point that tears were flowing. After his emotions calmed, Trunks remained silent for a little before speaking in a much lower tone, ¡°Bryan, this time it was Laureton, Florida and Adam Menlo allying, otherwise I would have definitely escaped!¡±

    Having reached the ranks of great swordmaster, within the Valley of Sunshine, only the three times berserk Laureton was able to fight evenly with him. It was due to this confidence that Trunks dared to act without fear. Unfortunately, he had underestimated the despicableness and shamelessness of others and had been captured alive in an ambush.

    ¡°Say no more, I already know. None of them shall escape your revenge, I promise!¡± Han Shuo took in a deep breath and calmly promised Trunks.

    ¡°Bryan, I could never have expected Laureton to make a move so quickly! Just the night before, Laureton was still drinking and chatting with me. Ha, I was truly too na?ve to actually overlook him!¡± Trunks¡¯ smile was self-mocking, but his voice was filled with hatred towards Laureton.

    ¡°Laureton... Laureton...¡± Han Shuo mumbled twice, his eyes gradually bing cold.

    ¡°Master, Trunks¡¯ body is still very bad, he shouldn¡¯t stay too long in this ce, we should leave immediately!¡± Dark dragon Gilbert wiped the tear stains from the corners of his eyes. Not caring for the filthiness and foul stench from Trunks¡¯ body, he supported Trunks onto his body,

    Han Shuo calmly nodded in agreement. The bone demon blocking the cave entrance suddenly walked out, with a few zombie warriors following close behind. At Han Shuo¡¯s order, they picked up all of the bodies from the ground.

    During this process, Han Shuomanded the bone demon to provide a dozen bones. Each zombie warrior made use of the bones¡¯ sharpness to pierce these people¡¯s legs like piercing grilled fish, heightening their pain. ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Han Shuo eximed, following up with an incantation. The undead creatures in the depths of the passage disappeared, causing the passage to appear wider.

 Chapter 403: Gargoyle Swarm

    At the same time when the Rebirth Pill helped Trunks reach the level of great swordmaster, it also helped him reform his body, causing his meridians to be more durable than a normal person¡¯s. It was precisely because of this that Han Shuo was able to use the demonic yuan energy to help him recover after they returned to the Soul Destroyer mercenary band¡¯s base.

    As expected, when Han Shuo brought the severely injured Trunks back to the Soul Destroyer mercenary band¡¯s base, the mercenaries had the urge to almost immediately fight to the death against the three powers when they understood the situation. Some mercenaries even charged out in their fury and were only hauled back by Gilbert under Han Shuo¡¯s instructions.

    Gilbert clearly had some standing within the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. Although the mercenaries were unwilling when they were unyieldingly hauled back by Gilbert, they still yielded to Gilbert¡¯s might.

    This is to be expected. A mercenary band is also a ce where the strong are worshipped. The person with the harder fist would have more persuasiveness. Within the Soul Destroyer mercenary band, even the strength of Trunks was below dark dragon Gilbert. As Gilbert has been in the Soul Destroyer mercenary band for so long, the other mercenaries have long since understood his fearfulness and difficulty to work with. At times, there was no difference between his orders and Trunks¡¯.

    While Gilbert was suppressing the impulsive mercenaries, Han Shuo immediately headed toward the inner dwelling without hesitation. He instructed Gilbert without lifting his head, ¡°Use cruel methods to torture those people for me. However, do keep them alive. When Trunks recovers, Trunks will end them himself.¡±

    After speaking, Han Shuo already brought Trunks to the interior of the dwelling, leaving behind Asa and the rest whose legs have been pierced like skewers by the bone spears.

    As Grant and the rest looked at Asa and the rest who had their tendons cut, their bones broken from head to toe, they still felt unresolved hatred in their hearts. Once Han Shuo left, they followed Gilbert to each choose a victim, bringing them to the dark and damp prison area. There was an entire set of torture tools there!

    Bringing Trunks into a bright stone room, Han Shuo sat cross-legged behind Trunks. His palms were ced on Trunks¡¯ back, slowly sending strands of demonic yuan energy into Trunks¡¯ body, gradually mending Trunks¡¯ damaged body.

    The reason why demonic yuan energy was more mystical than fighting aura was that apart from possessing enormous killing power, it could also possess more wonderful uses through practiced maniption. Aiding the injured in recovering was one of these uses of demonic yuan energy.

    Trunks¡¯ current situation was that the tendons on his limbs were all snapped. However, Trunks¡¯ fighting aura still existed and once Trunks¡¯ tendons healed, it wouldn¡¯t affect his strength. To a swordsman, tendons snapping signified that a person had be a cripple. Even stronger swordsmen would not be of any threat, hence Asa and the rest didn¡¯t do more than was required.

    Regardless of priests or alchemists in the Profound Continent, their attainments in the treatment of the body and meridians would still be beneath Han Shuo. Hence, Han Shuo had a solution to an unsolvable problem to most people. Trunks¡¯ body which had been reformed by the Rebirth pill was easily cleansed of disorder by the cirction of Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan energy.

    As it treated the injuries, the demonic yuan energy became like gentle flowing water, wrapping around all the broken meridians. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness pried into Trunks¡¯ body, slowly reattaching the broken meridians and then activated the surplus energy from the Rebirth pill to gather around the broken meridians.

    Trunks¡¯ body was much stronger than an ordinary person¡¯s, but it was still far from Han Shuo¡¯s. Hence, when Han Shuo treated Trunks¡¯ injuries, he didn¡¯t use up much demonic yuan energy. He only needed to get familiar with the precision of meridians and to proficiently set things right.

    As time passed silently, Han Shuo who was seated behind Trunks didn¡¯t need to focus that attentively as Trunks¡¯ condition became better. The meridians only needed to be slowly nourished by Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan energy. Hence, Han Shuo was able to divert his demonic yuan energy to other matters.

    The disappearance of Trunks and the experts of the three powers from the cave in the mountain was discovered by the next wave of people. The three powers were all flustered, not knowing what had happened. Laureton, Florida and Adam Menlo had once again got together anxiously to investigate deeper.

    However, no matter how they guessed, they couldn¡¯t figure out how the extremely hidden cave was exposed. In the end, the three powers inevitably believed after deliberating that there was a spy within their men, inwardly thinking who among their men could be the culprit.

    Without a doubt, the three experts understood that Trunks was rescued and it should be rted to the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. The three powers who originally hesitated in taking action due to self-interest and all kinds of scruples now knew that there was no turning back. Laureton and the two others were experienced people, deciding together to immediately attack the Soul Destroyer mercenary band.

    As matters stand, wanting to destroy the Soul Destroyer mercenary band while not incurring any losses by capturing Trunks clearly wouldn¡¯t work. Although the three powers who have fought which each other for so long knew that this time around they would again incur more losses, they couldn¡¯t care too much about it anymore.

    At their orders, the Cairo mercenary band, Rainbow Sickle mercenary band, House of Menlo and another five or six smaller mercenary bands driven by profits rapidly gathered more than six thousand people who brazenly departed for the Soul Destroyer mercenary band.

    They had no choice but to stop when they reached the location of the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. The various leaders gathered together and started to discuss how to attack the Soul Destroyer mercenary band.

    The terrain of the Soul Destroyer mercenary band was extremely special. It was on a protruding wall under a precipice, like a piece of rock hanging halfway up the mountain. This location was just a sheet of whiteness when seen from below, totally concealed by fog. There was only one route that led from the precipice above.

    However, if one tries to enter from above, people from the Soul Destroyer mercenary band would naturally discover it. Hence, attacking from above was an incredibly painful affair. It was certain that the losses of the few powers would far exceed their expectations.

    As the proverb goes, it was easier to ascend a mountain then descend from it. This saying simrly applied to battling on such a terrain. Sieging a location was always extremely difficult. That was because the process of climbing up the city walls was truly too painful.

    However, while climbing up a city¡¯s walls, although it was extremely disadvantageous when facing the attacks from above, it was still possible to raise your head and clearly face the sky and use your weapon to block iing attacks. However, in this location, when descending from the precipice, it would be tough to deal with attacks from below and might even be impossible to see the situation underneath.

    Firstly it was because of the fog, secondly, they had to be more cautious while descending as a slip would cause them to fall to their deaths. For Trunks to find such a ce to be the Soul Destroyer mercenary band¡¯s base, it was an extremely wise decision. This location was hard to attack and if anyone tried to enter, they had to pay an unimaginable price.

    Right at this moment, although Laureton and the rest had captured Trunks alive, they didn¡¯t dare to rashly attack the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. However, after Trunks had been rescued, they had no other choice but to face this special terrain. Even the method of entering had caused them to debate for a long time.

    The three of them were all the astute type and understood that the one who descended first would definitely suffer the most losses.They naturally didn¡¯t want to be the first to descend. However, the others also weren¡¯t fools. None of the powers were willing to lead such a suicidal attack. Hence when they really had to attack, the delegation suddenly halted.

    As they discussed, none of them were willing to let their subordinates be the first to descend. When he recalled that the Soul Destroyer mercenary band were not in the least inferior to them and that this was an easily guarded terrain, Laureton had a headache, not knowing what to do.

    ¡°How about we would just keep watch over this precipice. They can¡¯t always stay within their base. Otherwise, food and water would definitely be a problem. Once they emerge from their base, we can easily kill them with our strength. We would face cruel attacks if we descend. However, it would simrly be difficult for them to ascend. We can hound them to death by blocking up this position.¡± Florida had a darkened expression as he proposed this malicious n.

    Everyone knew that this n was useful. However, this would cause the battle to be a long war of attrition. No one could guess how much provision the Soul Destroyer mercenary band had and if they truly wasted their time here, they were unsure if there would be problems at their own bases.

    ¡°All of you also know that that fellow Gilbert is a dark dragon. Furthermore, the Soul

    Destroyer mercenary band also has many mages that can use floating magic. If they depart and use spatial rings to transport provisions, there¡¯s no knowing how much time we would waste. I don¡¯t think this n would work.¡± Adam Menlo thought for a while, before suddenly voicing his opposition.

    ¡°In that case, what do you think we should do?¡± When Florida saw that his idea was overruled, his expression became more unsightly as he asked Adam Menlo.

    Staying silent for a while, Adam Menlo seemed to be making up his mind. He raised his head to look at Laureton and Florida, saying, ¡°Our House still has a batch of tamed flying creatures. Adding them to the current flying creatures present, they are able to carry three hundred people at one time. If these three hundred men are the experts from our three powers, if they utilizerge-scale killing spells when they reach, they should definitely be able to hold for a short while. After that, the flying creatures will repeatedly shuttle our men down. In this way, I feel that we wouldn¡¯t need to undergo the process of slowly descending.¡±

    Hearing his words, everyone was overjoyed. Florida was equally excited as he smiled and said, ¡°Old thing, you obviously have such a good method, why didn¡¯t you mention it earlier?¡±

    Adam Menlo¡¯s expression darkened as his eyes twitched, thinking inwardly. Those are what is guarding my base and I originally intended to use them to deal with you all in the end. If not for us really no having other means, why would I bring them out? Of course, Adam Menlo naturally didn¡¯t say these words aloud, only appearing calm and silent.

    ¡°Hey, with this method, every issue can be solved. If we are able to annihte the Soul Destroyer mercenary band, the contribution of your House of Menlo is the biggest. Come,e, let us carefully discuss how many experts each power would send.¡± Lauretonughed refreshingly as he shouted at the leaders of the various powers.

    ¡ª

    After a whole day and night, Han Shuo who had brought Trunks into the interior of the mountain finally exited the cave. Gilbert, Grant and the rest quickly hurried over when they heard the news. Once Gilbert saw Han Shuo, he hurriedly inquired, ¡°Master, how is Trunks?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, after resting for a month, Trunks would be able to be as before!¡± Han Shuo consoled Gilbert. His expression darkened soon after as he said, ¡°The three powers and other small mercenary bands are already in the vicinity and a currently discussing how to attack us. They have six thousand people, we must deal with them cautiously.¡±

    ¡°We have a thousand and seven hundred people here. Rely on the terrain advantage, they can forget about easily attacking us. Hmph, Leader had been tormented by them till such a state. We must make them pay the price. Whoever dares to descend will die by our hands.¡± Grant and Trunks were friends for many years and had even worked together in the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band. He was unable to restrain his anger and shouted loudly.

    Han Shuo could totally understand Grant¡¯s anger. However, he still shared what he heard, ¡°The House of Menlo is dispatching their secret flying creatures. These creatures can carry three hundred men down each time. If there are tens of mages within this three hundred,rge-scale killing spells would cause an enormous obstruction to us.

    During that time, these flying creatures can bring another three hundred people down. At that time, the advantages of this location would no longer exist. Hence, we absolutely cannot lower our guard and must have the proper preparation. Otherwise, we would definitely lose this battle.¡±

    Hearing what Han Shuo said, Grant was shocked and suddenly calmed down. He knew that if it was truly as Han Shuo described, the one thousand and seven hundred people in the Soul Destroyer mercenary band simply had no way of resisting the attack of six thousand people.

    ¡°What should we do then?¡± Grant somewhat anxiously inquired.

    ¡°Master, Lania and I will transform into our true forms and exterminate them from the sky.¡± dark dragon Gilbert shouted viciously, prepared for a massacre.

    ¡°If it was only three hundred ordinary swordsmen, Lania and yourself transforming into your true forms would be enough. However, there are many mages within these three hundred experts. The two of you definitely wouldn¡¯t be able to resist the attacks of so many experts. Furthermore, their goal is only to descend here. How many people can you and Lania prevent froming down? Although this is an idea, it doesn¡¯t cover all grounds!¡± Han Shuo looked at the eager dark dragon Gilbert, calming stating the facts.

    ¡°What should we do then?¡± This time it was the hydra Lania who asked, the coquettish Lania and the wanton Gilbert were truly a match made in heaven. When the twoscivious races bonded, their turbulent feelings caused even Han Shuo to be stupefied.

    ¡°Yea. Master, what do you think we should do?¡± Gilbert had a puzzled expression as he bitterly asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°We¡¯ll follow your suggestion, with Lania and yourself intercepting them in the air. In addition, I will summon many gargoyles to help you. When they are about tond, the archers below will fire constantly. As long as the first wave of the strongest experts is killed, it would be hard for them to win this battle.¡± Han Shuo sneered as he replied Gilbert.

    Part 2

    Laureton, Florida and Adam Menlo simply had no idea that their every move was under Han Shuo¡¯s surveince. They were still under the impression that their attack would be extremely unexpected and at least the first wave of flying magical creatures would be able to easily descend and cause huge problems for the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. They would then be able to unceasingly transport experts down, settling the battle in one go.

    Unfortunately, they would never have guessed that Han Shuo was able to know their every intention and was able to calmly put in ce preventive measures to attack their ¡°hidden¡± descend head-on. With arge number of gargoyles, Han Shuo had confidence in dealing a disastrous setback to the first wave of experts.

    Once most of the experts in the first wave were killed, not only would it have a great impact on their morale, the next wave of experts would also be afraid to descend on the flying magical creatures. With the advantageous terrain, Han Shuo believed that the three powers wouldn¡¯t achieve what they wanted this time around.

    The twelve mystical demons scrutinized every action of the three powers. Han Shuo methodically instructed Grant and the rest to gather the mercenaries that were good at shooting, distributing all the various bows and arrows. Even the spears and javelins were all brought out, in preparation to face the first wave of experts on the flying magical creatures.

    As time passed silently, Laureton and the rest had discussed for a long time. Finally, they finally determined the three hundred experts in the first wave and they would be protecting tens of valuable mages. The first wave could be described as the concentration of the strongest experts in the few powers, with the weakest swordsmen which were included in the first wave also reaching the rank of senior swordsmen.

    The dead of night was able to conceal their movements. At night, the fog would also be denser, hence the operation was expectedly arranged to be a night mission.

    As the full moon slowly rose into the sky and shined gentle moonlight, the lofty precipice was shrouded in white mist. More than two hundred harpies, frost eagles, griffins, pegasus and various flying magical creatures were formed into teams. They were gathered from the House of Menlo under Adam Menlo¡¯s orders.

    The three hundred experts picked out from the various powers were ready and waiting for these flying magical beasts to appear. At the instructions of the heads of the three powers, all of them mounted the tamed magical creatures. The leaders Adam Menlo and Florida were also among them.

    Florida himself was a mage and didn¡¯t require any flying magical creature mount. Adam Menlo rode his super rank golden-winged roc, which had finally recovered after he had spent a huge amount of resources on it. However, the feathers on the golden-winged roc were very sparse, making it look a little miserable.

    The golden-winged roc was in such miserable circumstances due to protecting Adam Menlo. It was also because of Adam Menlo¡¯s endless hatred toward Han Shuo that he made a move on Trunks.

    Although Laureton could reach thrice berserk and his strength was higher than both Adam Menlo and Florida, he still was unable to fly.

    Furthermore, they needed someone to control and arrange matters for the majority left behind. Hence Laureton rationally stayed behind to take charge, instead of joining the first wave of attack.

    Under the hazy moonlight, the flying magical creatures spread their wings, forming a screen in the sky which obstructed the moonlight. Lifting his head as he gazed at the ascending magical creatures, Laureton was actually somewhat uneasy.

    Actually, ever since Trunks had suddenly be miraculously rescued, Laureton had an uneasy feeling. This was because, no matter how he saw it, the Soul Destroyer mercenary band should have sunk into fric circumstances after they lost their leader Trunks. He was clear about dark dragon Gilbert¡¯s strength, but as he had been in contact with Gilbert before, Laureton knew that Gilbert was purely a subordinate and definitely wouldn¡¯t be able toe up with any meticulous ns!

    The reason why Laureton waited for so long was that he firmly believed that the Soul Destroyer mercenary band would leave their natural stronghold and attack. At that time, they would be able to easily annihte the Soul Destroyer mercenary band¡¯s experts. However, the Soul Destroyer mercenary band¡¯s ability to stay calm surpassed his expectations. Not only did they not exit their natural stronghold, they even recalled all their experts in the surroundings.

    When the news of Trunks¡¯ disappearance had spread, Laureton was truly surprised. After much contemtion, he gradually felt that there was another hidden hand within the Soul Destroyer mercenary band controlling the ground. It was precisely because of this hidden existence that the Soul Destroyer mercenary band were able to stabilize and slowly start to organize their resistance.

    ¡°I must be thinking too much. Currently, it has reached an important period of time within Ossen City. That fellow shouldn¡¯t havee.¡±Laureton rubbed his head as he muttered to himself.

    ¡°Leader, it would be absolutely safe this time around. The person you are worried about wouldn¡¯t appear. I¡¯ve received news yesterday that he is definitely still within Ossen City. It is impossible that he would show up in the Valley of Sunshine. Don¡¯t worry, we will definitely be able to eradicate the Soul Destroyer mercenary band.¡± Harris understood what Laureton was worried about. The reason why Laureton had chosen to act this time around was precisely because he was sure that Han Shuo was too busy to worry about the matters of the Valley of Sunshine. Otherwise, Laureton might still be hesitating!

    ¡°I hope that is the case. Although Trunks was frightening, he still isn¡¯t my primary concern. Only that fellow would be the most troublesome opponent. Ah, it¡¯s a pity. Trunks and that fellow are true men. If not for Trunks¡¯ Soul Destroyer mercenary band bing the biggest threat to our mercenary band, perhaps I could still be friends with them.¡± Laureton sighed as he said to Harris.

    ¡°This is their choice. When they first arrived in the Valley of Sunshine, Leader had already tossed them an olive branch, only for them to reject it. Now that things have reached this point, Leader can¡¯t be med to have acted ruthlessly. This is all due to their ambition to seize the power in our hands.¡± Harris knitted his brows as he reassured Laureton.

    ¡°Forget it, let¡¯s drop the conversation. However, I feel that something¡¯s not right. I hope that Florida and Adam Menlo wouldn¡¯t disappoint me this time.¡± Laureton¡¯s bald head was illuminated by the moonlight. This meant that Adam Menlo¡¯s flying magical creatures no longer concealed the moonlight and had already entered the foggy area.

    ¡°Everyone be careful. Although they are unable to notice us, we still need to be attentive and be cautious of any changes!¡± Adam Menlo said to the surrounding people while on his super rank golden-winged roc.

    ¡°Leader, be at ease. We know what needs to be done.¡± The people from the House of Menlo smiled as they responded, grasping the magical staffs in their hands tightly, prepared to deal with any possible changes.

    A short distance away from Adam Menlo¡¯s flying troop, Florida¡¯s eyes sparkled as he carefully watched for any potential anomalies. He then softly whispered to his trusted aides, as though discussing details of the operationter.

    As the wave of people passed through the dense fog, they reached an area where the fog was thinner. In a few hundred meters, they would have entered the territory of the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. A huge indistinct shadow gradually appeared from within the thin fog. Transforming into a dark dragon, Gilbert¡¯sntern-like eyes stared at the three hundred intruders. Without saying a word, a dragon breath which was mixed with a fishy smell was shot out.

    Having evolved into a rank two magical creature, the toxins in Gilbert¡¯s breath was even more frightening. In such a humid environment, the strength of the toxins was enhanced substantially. More than ten swordsmen and mages who rode on harpies were the first to be sprayed head-on by Gilbert¡¯s breath.

    An extremely stifling feeling was suddenly felt on their chests as if they were suddenly being crushed by a mountain. Apart from the harpies who were also poisonous magical creatures, the humans were all dizzy with blood flowing from their nose and mouth. Besides the toxins, the force of the dragon breath was also equally terrifying. The harpies shrilled loudly as they swayed, throwing off more than ten people in the process.

    ¡°Dark dragon! It¡¯s that dark dragon!¡± Terrified shouts could suddenly be heard. Some people have clearly spotted Gilbert.

    ¡°Hey, all of you dare toe to my territory, die for me!¡± Gilbert¡¯s imposing voice resounded through the sky. With a swing of his neck, a raging fireball was shot out, burning down more than ten magical creatures and humans who had scattered.

    ¡°Attack, it¡¯s just a dark dragon, there¡¯s nothing to be afraid of!¡± Adam Menlo who had just arrived suddenly shouted aloud, the wings of the golden-winged roc underneath him suddenly set off a hurricane, covering an area of ten meters, directing Gilbert¡¯s fireball to the side.

    Riding the golden-winged roc, Adam Menlo who held a pike which sparkled in silver radiance charged toward Gilbert like lightning. On the other side, a few mages who had steadied themselves interweaved magic spells and continuously shooting them toward Gilbert.

    If it was only Adam Menlo, Gilbert wasn¡¯t afraid. However, just as Han Shuo described, the first wave of attack which gathered the strongest experts from the three powers was definitely not something Gilbert could deal with himself. Several magic spells of different types suddenly flew over and Gilbert had no choice but to dodge the attacks and hide within the dense fog.

    ¡°Hmph, with just a dark dragon, what can you achieve!¡± Adam Menlo loudly ridiculed, waving his hand and said, ¡°Our whereabouts are exposed, we need to quickly head to that ce. We must not dy and give them the chance to prepare.¡±

    ¡°Charge. After tonight, the Soul Destroyer mercenary band would forever disappear from the Valley of Sunshine!¡± Florida simrly shouted coldly, utilizing floating magic to take the lead toward Adam Menlo¡¯s location. ¡°Huhu... Huhu... ¡° strange noises suddenly appeared from all directions.

    ¡°That¡¯s weird, what¡¯s that sound!¡± A mercenary said what was on everyone¡¯s mind as everyone looked around puzzledly, not knowing what was that queer sound.

    Out of a sudden, a dense crowd of creatures enveloped them like a dark cloud as dense as a swarm of locusts. They saw thousands upon thousands of gargoyles that were arranged in orderly lines rapidly approaching the area.

    Gargoyles aren¡¯t formidable undead creatures, their individual fighting strength was lower than any flying magical creature from the House of Menlo.

    However, gargoyles usually appeared in groups!

    There would definitely not be just one or two gargoyles appearing. This time around, with his greatly improved mental energy, Han Shuo had summoned more than four thousand gargoyles at once, which seriously seemed like a dense dark cloud.

    Any living creature at scale would be extremely terrifying. Even for mosquitoes and ants, once they were at scale, they would also be the nightmare of stronger creatures. For gargoyles who individually had an extraordinary attack, once they were at scale, they would naturally be more terrifying. When the surrounding gargoyles seemed to fill up the entire space, the first wave of experts who had thought that their sneak attack wouldn¡¯t be detected were all momentarily stunned.

    ¡°Light mages, purify these filthy existences for me!¡± Florida was only distracted for two seconds and was the first to shout out orders when the gargoyles were getting closer.

    After he shouted, Florida himself started to act, rapidly retrieving his magic staff and reciting a magic spell. A ring condensed from light elements suddenly flew toward the gargoyle swarm. The ring immediately turned thirty gargoyles into asses when it charged into the gargoyle swarm.

    There were another seven light mages within this group of experts. They were unwilling to fall behind, all of them unleashing the light magic they were proficient at when they saw Florida making his move. As each light magic spell entered the gargoyle swarm, they really caused huge damage to the group of gargoyles.

    However, the strongest Florida was only a light archmage. The stronger of the rest were only adept mages while the weaker ones were only novice mages. There was a limit to the strength of the light magic they could unleash and a loss of two hundred gargoyles was simply negligible whenpared to their total number of four thousand.

    ¡°Idiots! Undead creatures do fear light magic, but other elements of magic were also useful. Why are all of you staring nkly over there, act quickly!¡± When Adam Menlo saw that the remaining mages merely watched when the light mages acted, he cursed them exasperatedly.

    Being scolded by Adam Menlo, these people suddenly reacted, the mages started chanting different spells one after another. Wind des, lightning and fire serpents whistled as the flew from every direction toward the gargoyles, suddenly causing the deaths of another four to five hundred.

    However, at this moment, the gargoyles had finally charged into their ranks. Groups of gargoyles scattered, wing and biting specifically at these mages. The magical creatures under them also spared no effort in battling the gargoyle swarm.

    Suddenly, magnificent rays of light radiated in the whole sky as a dark shadow flew about, apanied by mournful cries from time to time as one person after another fell from the towering height, their bodies torn and their bones crushed.

    ¡°Wakaka, I¡¯m here again. I want to see how do you all beat me this time around!¡± dark dragon Gilbert shouted arrogantly once again, his enormous body extending out.

    By dark dragon Gilbert¡¯s side, hydra Lania was like an enormous octopus, charging together with dark dragon Gilbert towards the experts who were attacked by the gargoyle swarm.

    ¡°Florida, we meet again!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s voice suddenly sounded. Within another wave of gargoyles, Han Shuo had a dark expression as he walked on the air toward Florida.

    Behind Han Shuo, the numerous gargoyles whistled and danced violently, as an enormous undead flying creature slowly appeared from within the gargoyle swarm. The majestic little skeleton raised his three-meter long bone spear as he rode on the bone demon, closely following behind Han Shuo.

 Chapter 404: I learned it from you

    GDK 404 ¨C I learned it from you

    When the first gargoyle appeared, Florida already knew that the fiend had arrived. However, this battle had no turning back. Hence, Florida attacked without regard, attempting to first decrease the number of undead creatures as much as possible and forcefully charging to the Soul Destroyer mercenary band¡¯s base and fight them to the death.

    Countless gargoyles surrounded Han Shuo, apanying Han Shuo as he headed toward Florida. At this moment, Florida was frightened but the ire in his heart also couldn¡¯t be contained, unwaveringly staring at Han Shuo with a hostile gaze.

    Florida had no reason not to hate him!

    From the day Han Shuo arrived at the Valley of Sunshine, it seemed to have cemented Florida¡¯s ill fortune. Firstly, Han Shuo snatched away Phoebe who Florida fancied. Soon after, he had grouped together with Florida¡¯s arch-enemy Trunks. He also embarrassed Florida time and time again, even seriously injuring him in public.

    Besides that, Han Shuo had even wrecked their meticulously nned ambush, violently killing his beloved grandfather, causing his rtionship with the Church of Light to unprecedentedly worsen.

    Before Han Shuo came to the Valley of Sunshine, everything within the Valley of Sunshine operated as Florida fancied. Drawing support from the Church of Light, Florida hadplete confidence in recing the Cairo mercenary band and be the true master of the Valley of Sunshine and control the enormous resources of the Valley of Sunshine.

    Based on his n, the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band would have the rights to control the Valley of Sunshine, while Butcher Gustav assisted in the shadows. He would be able to nibble away at the various powers within the Valley of Sunshine and possess everything in the Valley of Sunshine at that time.

    Unfortunately, Han Shuo¡¯s appearance caused the situation to keep regressing, developing in apletely different trajectory from what he imagined. When Han Shuo left, he still left behind the cancerous Soul Destroyer mercenary band, nibbling at his hopes and expectations little by little.

    ¡°My greatest mistake is precisely that I didn¡¯t risk everything to kill you in the beginning!¡± Giving Han Shuo a death stare, Florida gnashed his teeth as he spoke, his voice filled with bitter resentment and hatred.

    Han Shuo suddenlyughed, hisughter extremely bright and clear, as if hisughter became a huge winding dragon that soared into the skies. Not just the immediate area, even Laureton and the rest below were able to hear it clearly.

    ¡°Florida, I truly feel pity for you. You naively believed that with your grandfather¡¯s support, you would be able to act as you wished in the Valley of Sunshine. On one hand, you despicably seized the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band, and on another, you coborated with the most merciless bandit in the shadows. You really think that you are above thew!

    Heh, what a pity, what a pity. There¡¯s not only you who is smart and it¡¯s not your turn to call the shots. Your grandfather wasn¡¯t able to protect you your whole life. Now that that old bastard Ferguson is dead, you no longer have any cards to y. Ha, why am I saying so much nonsense to you? In any case, you will die soon!¡± Han Shuo smiled as he mocked Florida.

    When he heard Han Shuo¡¯s mocking, Florida¡¯s expression became extremely downcast as if someone had stepped on him with a filthy shoe. He red hatefully at the gradually approaching Han Shuo, taking a deep breath and said, ¡°Today, only one of us will survive!¡±

    ¡°Of course it is you who will die!¡± Han Shuo shouted coldly, suddenly speeding up his steps toward Florida. He was like a streak of lightning that cut across the sky, charging towards Florida at great speed.

    At the same time, the other thousands of gargoyles behind Han Shuo suddenly scattered into different troops, swarming like locusts toward the experts that were being attacked by the previous group of gargoyles.

    The little skeleton who rode on the flying bone demon stood majestically on a t portion of the bone demon¡¯s back. With his Purple Demon Eye sparkling, he sized up the battlefield. Pointing his three-meter long bone spear toward Adam Menlo, the wings of the bone demon pped once, directly gliding toward Adam Menlo.

    The harpies, frost eagles, pegasus, griffins, wyverns and various types of magical creatures had all been tamed by the House of Menlo at high costs. These flying magical beasts were each able to face a few gargoyles at once. Furthermore, they were either carrying a high ranked swordsman or a mage. In theory, they shouldn¡¯t be at much of a disadvantage.

    Unfortunately, the reality wasn¡¯t as such. Although a magical creature and the expert riding it should be able to handle tens of gargoyles, when a swarm of gargoyles suddenly charged over, the dense aura was able to shake their confidence. The strong rotting stench was hard to bear, causing more trouble than they expected.

    There were simply too many gargoyles. When tens of gargoyles attacked a magical creature together, even creatures like harpies and griffins were unable to withstand it. Furthermore, there were also Gilbert and hydra Lania, two tyrannical super rank magical creatures stirring up trouble. In just a few moments, many experts had either been killed by the gargoyles or the magical creature they rode had been beat to death, causing them to also fall into the endless abyss.

    Within theyers of gargoyles, the little skeleton held its three-meter long bone spear. The little skeleton and the bone demon were both immune to ordinary spells. As it rode the bone demon, it was iparably awe-inspiring. While flying toward Adam Menlo, a harpy brandished its sharp w toward the little skeleton. Before it could even near the little skeleton, it was pierced through by the little skeleton¡¯s three-meter long bone spear.

    After the petite little skeleton had pierced through the several meter long harpy, the powerful spear didn¡¯t pause and instead followed through to kill the fire mage as well. The little skeleton used the bone spear easily lift up the huge and heavy harpy. With a mysterious tremble of his finger bone, an enormous amount of death qi violently flowed through the bone spear into the harpy¡¯s body. The harpy suddenly exploded wildly above his head.

    Chunks of the harpy¡¯s flesh mixed with rich death qi scattered like heavy rocks. Whoever was hit by the flesh of the harpy and was infected by even the tiniest amount of death qi would ice cold and ufortable from head to toe, causing their movements to be stiff.

    As the little skeleton headed toward Adam Menlo, it had merely got rid of a harpy effortlessly along the way. Suddenly, everyone understood the terror of this undead creature. As they dealt with the countless gargoyles that covered the sky, they were still extremely well coordinated, opening a path for the little skeleton directly toward Adam Menlo.

    As Adam Menlo closely watched dark dragon Gilbert, the super rank golden-winged roc under him was able to proficiently manipte wind magic, sending out waves of wind des in all directions without much movement from its wings. All the gargoyles that were attempting to approach Adam Menlo were killed one after another by the golden-winged roc¡¯s wind des.

    Facing a golden-winged roc which was a super rank magical creature of the highest level, the swarms of gargoyles were clearly unable to achieve much. Even with most of its feathers missing. The defensive ability of the golden-winged roc body was still much stronger than ordinary magical creatures.

    It was exactly because of this that Han Shuo didn¡¯t waste many gargoyles in attacking Adam Menlo, merely asking Gilbert to impede him. Having evolved and bing a rank two magical creature, Gilbert could be said to be evenly matched with the golden-winged roc that Han Shuo had previously severely injured.

    All kinds of toxins and raging mes were shot out, mixing with Lania¡¯s reckless attacks. These created arge hindrance to Adam Menlo and the golden-winged roc, causing Adam Menlo to be pestered beyond his endurance.

    However, the golden-winged roc was a super rank magical creature and Adam Menlo himself was a sky rider. With the two of thembined together, their strengths were amplified. Hence, Gilbert and Lania were unable to get an advantage.

    Just as Gilbert was shouting arrogantly at Adam Menlo as he annoyed him, the little skeleton appeared on its bone demon. When the little skeleton reached the area, his Purple Demon Eye shone as it made peculiar gestures toward Gilbert.

    The little skeleton first used the bone spear to point at Gilbert before pointing toward the others who were desperately resisting the gargoyles. Soon after, at Gilbert¡¯s amazement, the little skeleton then pointed his bone spear at Adam Menlo, before using his other hand to point toward himself.

    After he finished gesturing, the little skeleton¡¯s Purple Demon Eye sparkled as he looked straight at Gilbert. Gilbert¡¯sntern-like eyes stared foolishly at the little skeleton. While Lania was still obstructing Adam Menlo and the golden-winged roc, Gilbert finally asked cautiously, ¡°Are you saying that you want me to attack the others and leave this fellow to you?¡±

    The little skeleton¡¯s Purple Demon Eye brightened, casually nodding toward Gilbert, implying, ¡°That¡¯s right. Get a move on, don¡¯t obstruct me anymore!¡±

    Dark dragon Gilbert was extremely bbergasted, attentively watching the little skeleton and the undead creature he rode, somewhat stunned for a moment.

    ¡°Dammit, you heartless creature, you still aren¡¯ting to help me?¡± By the side, Lania was desperately fending off Adam Menlo¡¯s attacks. When she suddenly saw that Gilbert who was originally fighting side by side with her actually staring nkly at the side, she couldn¡¯t help but scold him hastily.

    Dark dragon Gilbert quickly came to his senses, looking at the little skeleton once again, he saw the little skeleton raising the three-meter-long bone spear and arrogantly charged toward Adam Menlo. When the three-meter-long bone spear pointed at Adam Menlo, an iparably huge amount of death qi rippled in all directions.

    It was only at this moment that Gilbert truly felt that the seemingly small body of the little skeleton contained such a frightening mystical power! Gilbert suddenly understood that although he had evolved into a rank two magical creature, the little skeleton was actually more terrifying than him, so much so that the little skeleton possessed enough strength to kill Gilbert himself.

    ¡°Lania, let¡¯s go. We¡¯ll go and kill others rather than torment this old thing!¡± Having understood the little skeleton¡¯s message, Gilbert suddenly shouted loudly toward Lania.

    ¡°You idiot! Are you crazy? Didn¡¯t master instruct the two of us to impede this old thing. Are you seeking to be punished? Why aren¡¯t youing over to help me!¡± As Lania spoke, her body gradually became hidden and soon after an enormous column of water charged toward Adam Menlo.

    ¡°There is someone who offered to deal with him, let¡¯s not stay and hinder him any longer, let¡¯s leave!¡± dark dragon Gilbert replied loudly, ¡°You coquettishdy, hurry up ande with me!¡± Lania who had used the column of water to conceal her body gradually revealed herself. When she saw the little skeleton who was riding the flying bone demon over, Lania suddenly felt a feeling of being betweenughter and tears rise within her heart. She then mocked Gilbert, saying, ¡°Stupid dragon, this little skeleton is the volunteer you mentioned?¡±

    Just as Lania finished her sentence, the little skeleton¡¯s Purple Demon Eye sudden lit up with ring purple light. The three meter long bone spear suddenly transmitted a surge of death qi, causing a feeling of destion to spread in all directions.

    Lania naturally felt the tremendous aura and was iparably surprised as she watched the little skeleton fly over. She immediately became silent, and with Gilbert¡¯s repeated urging, Lania no longer hesitated, her heart filled with countless doubts as she hurriedly avoided the approaching little skeleton and bone demon, flying to Gilbert¡¯s side.

    ¡°What, what is with this little skeleton? Why do I feel a terrifying strength from him?¡± When Lania reached Gilbert¡¯s side, she could no longer suppress the puzzlement in her heart, frantically asking Gilbert.

    Part 2

    ¡°Don¡¯t ask me, I don¡¯t know either. I only know that he is Master¡¯s first undead creature. However, what I would never be able to understand is, how does a little skeleton have the same frightening aura as a bone dragon!¡± Gilbert blinked hisntern-sized eyes as he exined to Lania.

    Hearing Gilbert¡¯s exnation, Lania was dumbfounded. She couldn¡¯t help but cast her line of sight toward Gilbert¡¯s master.

    In an area fifty meters away, Han Shuo had a ruthless and gloomy expression as he manipted the Demonyer Edge which was dripping fresh blood, setting out to massacre all the enemies around him.

    Florida was holed up withinyers of protection by his Rainbow Sickle mercenary band, unceasingly casting various light magic spells to purify the surrounding frantically charging gargoyles. The gargoyles were annihted one after another by his light magic.

    As a light mage, Florida was thergest threat to these undead creatures within the group. As he was also the leader of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band, his subordinates all surrounded him, doing their utmost to protect him.

    Florida, who was being protected by the crowd, consumed all his energy to cast light magic spells in session, purifying all the gargoyles in their immediate area into dust. The low-rank gargoyles were as frail as zombie warriors, being eliminated one after another by the light archmage¡¯s light magic.

    As the battle raged on in the air, it was only Florida¡¯s area that didn¡¯t have many gargoyles breaking through. Based on the situation, this area ought to be the area where the elites of the three powers felt the mostfortable.

    However, the reality was that the area Florida was in suffered the most casualties. The number of magical creatures and elites killed far exceeded the number that was besieged by gargoyles in other areas.

    Simply because Han Shuo was here!

    As he wielded the Demonyer Edge, Han Shuo stared at Florida like a blood-soaked demon god. Han Shuo¡¯s current strength far exceeded Florida¡¯s. If not for the valiant mercenaries from the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band who sacrificed their lives to resist Han Shuo, Florida would have long since died by Han Shuo¡¯s hand.

    Despite the sacrifices of the mercenaries and theyers of protection, Florida¡¯s leg was still pierced through, resulting in a bloody hole. If not for a swordmaster by his side reacting in time, Florida might have suffered even heavier injuries.

    In just a moment of effort, the Demonyer Edge had killed five harpies, three griffins, two frost eagles and thirteen experts of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band. The drops of scarlet blood that rolled off the Demonyer Edge symbolized the experts Florida depended on to still be alive until now.

    ¡°Heh, how long more can you hide for!¡± Han Shuo smiled ruthlessly, tossing a pegasus¡¯ corpse downwards as he ridiculed Florida.

    ¡°Le, leader, what should we do, should we retreat?¡± by Florida¡¯s side, the swordmaster who had saved Florida¡¯s life looked at the fiend-like Han Shuo, his lips trembling as he asked Florida.

    ¡°We still have a chance. Don¡¯t you see that the number of gargoyles in the sky decreasing? Gargoyles are after all just low ranked undead creatures. Under the attack of so many spells, they are simply unable to obstruct our progress!¡± Florida who was hidden in the crowd inspected the surroundings and replied encouragingly. ¡°But we are only left with a hundred people!¡± The swordmaster clearly feared Florida but still stated the facts.

    ¡°We must obtain victory. Otherwise, the three powers would no longer have the chance to hold the greatest power in the Valley of Sunshine!¡± Florida was flustered and exasperated as he bellowed in rage.

    How could he not know that two-thirds of the experts from the three powers have already died? However, he understood that at this moment, they could only persist and fight on. Otherwise, the huge number of casualties would have been in vain.

    Swish, swish, swish!

    Arge amount of arrows suddenly shot out from the Soul Destroyer mercenary band in the distance. The arrow rain was locked onto the invading magical creatures and in just a moment, more than ten magical creatures who were nearing the area were suddenly riddled with holes like a ho¡¯s nest.

    ¡°Everyone retreat!¡± A roar that resounded across the whole area suddenly sounded from a remote ce, the sound originating from Cairo mercenary band¡¯s Laureton.

    Laureton¡¯s bald head was iparably shiny and his expression extremely unsightly. A mage stood by his side, casting Sky¡¯s Eye and describing the battle in the sky to Laureton.

    Although Laureton had yet to participate in the battle, there were already other experts from the Cairo mercenary band that had entered the battle in the skies. Seeing many of his trusted brothers dying tragically, Laureton knew that the so-called sneak-attack hadpletely failed. Laureton had no choice but to berserk and call for a retreat so as to prevent the losses from increasing.

    As Laureton¡¯s roar resounded through the sky, Florida and Adam Menlo who were above naturally heard it. Without waiting for them to move, the surviving experts of the Cairo mercenary band immediately descended without saying a single word.

    While Adam Menlo was forced to repeatedly fall back by the three-meter-long bone spear wielding little skeleton, the sullen and depressed feeling in his heart was the strongest in his entire life. He was unable to understand how the little skeleton before him would have such a rich and strong aura of death.

    The little skeleton¡¯s bone spear carried a terrifying corrosive death qi, every attack causing iparable suffering to Adam Menlo. If not for the golden-winged roc helping him to fend off the attacks and receiving many wounds in the process, the little skeleton might have already pierced through Adam Menlo¡¯s body.

    ¡°Wh, what exactly are you?¡± Adam Menlo asked repeated. He could sense that the little skeleton possessed intelligence. Unfortunately, the little skeleton was unable to answer him and instead wielded his bone spear repeatedly, causing Adam Menlo to retreat little by little.

    ¡°Ma, master, I can¡¯t hold on!¡± After the golden-winged roc helped Adam Menlo withstand a few strikes, it had eventually reached its limits and gently called to Adam Menlo.

    At the very same moment, Laureton¡¯s loud shouts could be heard from below. Adam Menlo could only stare nkly for a moment. When he realized that the people from the Cairo mercenary band retreating in an attempt to break away from the battlefield, he suddenly felt a powerless feeling of despair rise in his heart. ¡°Let¡¯s go. We¡¯ll, we¡¯ll retreat too!¡± When Adam Menlo gave the order, he truly felt like crying. Having brought out the hidden cards of the House of Menlo, Adam Menlo originally thought that they would be able to effortlessly eliminate the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. Who would have known that the jinx would appear once again, simply using a swarm of gargoyles that filled the sky to turn around the situation and even causing huge losses?

    Although this wave of attackers only had three hundred people, these were the true elites of the three powers, the foundation they depended on. Each one of them was an expert that could face ten people alone. But who would have thought that in the end, they would suffer such a fate.

    A shrill cry could suddenly be heard from the golden-winged roc. The golden-winged roc rolled in pain while saying, ¡°Master, master, there¡¯s something happening within my body. I can¡¯t, I can¡¯t take it anymore!¡±

    A clear popping sound could suddenly be heard from within the golden-winged roc¡¯s body. The golden-winged roc¡¯s huge body could be seen withering slowly as fresh blood sprayed out like fine rain.

    Intense corrosive death qi which converged within the rich killing intent suddenly exploded violently within the golden-winged roc, causing the interior of the golden-winged roc to rapidly shatter and the aura of life ot gradually leave the golden-winged roc.

    In the distance, Han Shuo who was preparing to finish Florida off suddenly detected an extremely familiar aura. Turning toward the aura, he suddenly discovered the changes within the golden-winged roc¡¯s body, sensing the familiar sinister killing intent within. Han Shuo was shocked as he looked at the little skeleton whose Purple Demon Eye sparkled in bright light as he closely watched the golden-winged roc.Only Han Shuo knew that the intense death qi within the golden-winged roc was bound into a ball by the demonic magic¡¯s Hidden Explosion Technique. He had inserted the concealed explosive death qi when the bone spear pierced through the golden-winged roc¡¯s body, suddenly detonating it when it was unprepared, causing the golden-winged roc¡¯s innards to suddenly explode!

    Han Shuo had already known previously that the little skeleton knew some demonic magic. However, he had never expected that the little skeleton had be so sinister. For an undead creature to use such malicious methods, this made Han Shuo to truly feel extremely stunned, causing him to sigh.

    ¡°This fellow is truly bing more and more vicious, able to control such a vicious method. I truly don¡¯t know how he does it!¡± Han Shuo repeatedlymented in his heart.

    ¡°Father, I learned all of these from you. I¡¯ve inherited part of your intelligence!¡± The little skeleton suddenly transmitted a message, as though he knew of Han Shuo¡¯s puzzlement and want to give Han Shuo an exnation.

    Han Shuo was stunned, staring nkly on the spot. Am I that sinister and malicious? Han Shuoughed bitterly as he thought to himself.

    ¡°Strike him hard while he¡¯s down! I learned this from Father as well!¡± The little skeleton transmitted another message over. As Han Shuo watched in astonishment, the little skeleton rode the bone skeleton and suddenly flew toward Adam Menlo.

    Adam Menlo who was sent rolling repeatedly due to the inner explosion of the golden-winged roc wasn¡¯t able to even stand still at this moment, simply unable to construct an effective defense.

    Right at this moment, the little skeleton¡¯s bone spear shot over once again. This time around, there was no longer the golden-winged roc helping him to withstand it. By the time Adam Menlo could react, the sharp pain from the bone spear had already spread through his whole body. He lowered his head, discovering a huge hole in his chest.

    The three meter long bone spear which had seized his life flew in a loop after it pierced through his body, returning to the little skeleton¡¯s hand once again. The little skeleton¡¯s sparkling Purple Demon Eye looked on as Adam Menlo gradually lost consciousness before turning around to leave.

    ¡°Father, did I do the right thing?¡± After the little skeleton killed Adam Menlo, he sent a message to Han Shuo once again to seek confirmation.

    At this point, Han Shuo was thoroughly speechless!

 Chapter 405: Unable to escape

    GDK 405 ¨C Unable to escape

    Not only did the little skeleton have intelligence, it was also a little sinister and ruthless. This really caused Han Shuo to feel conflicted.

    However, what Han Shuo could be sure of was that the current the little skeleton would be able to survive better in theherworld. In that realm full of ughter and invasion, the little skeleton was strong enough to let him feel reassured.

    With the head of the House of Menlo dead, the willpower that Florida had just barely maintained finally copsed. Florida no longer dared to continue staying in the air, desperately yelling for his men to retreat and flew towards Laureton.

    ¡°Hehe, you are still thinking of escaping!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s coldugh suddenly arose. Issuing an order, dark dragon Gilbert, hydra Lania and the little skeleton all abruptly gathered by Han Shuo¡¯s side and fought their way toward Florida.

    There were still around twenty experts of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band surrounding Florida. Once Florida met up with Laureton, killing him would be extremely difficult. This time, Han Shuo was resolute in killing Florida, so as to avoid leaving endless trouble for Trunks.

    Before, when Han Shuo alone headed towards Florida with murderous intent, the experts that surrounded Florida disregarded everything to attack Han Shuo. Although Han Shuo had killed a number of experts along the way, he was still unable to finish off Florida like he¡¯d wanted to.

    However, with the addition of two super rank magical creatures and the little skeleton, the experts surrounding Florida were unable to threaten them. Han Shuo only needed to keep his eyes on Florida. The rest were naturally disposed of by the little skeleton and the others.

    Rain of fire, ice cones, wind des, lightning and other spells were recklessly aimed at Han Shuo and the others. Because of this shower of magic, the dim sky suddenly became colorful, as though a group of beautiful fireworks was morously blooming open.

    Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan energy circted, a thin cicada wing-like protectiveyer surrounded his body. On the outer surface, arge bone shield with bone thorns savagely poking out formed. Most of the spells were blocked by the bone shield. Gilbert and Lania made use of this opportunity to release attacks of toxins and torrential rain.

    Bearing the murky protectiveyer, Han Shuo shed through the crowd. After continuously shifting a few times, he had already arrived in front of Florida.

    A dense burst of bone spears suddenly shot out explosively from Han Shuo. The group of people who were defending against Gilbert and Lania¡¯s attacks became even more flustered. At this time, the Demonyer Edge in Han Shuo¡¯s hands soundlessly disappeared again and gradually closing in from a hidden angle.

    The little skeleton, who was riding the bone demon, had unexpectedly arrived behind Florida¡¯s group. It imposingly raised up its three-meter-long bonence and thrusting it toward Florida and the others who have just reacted. The rich death qi carried a coldness and destion that did not exist in this world.

    ¡°Be-behind!¡± Florida¡¯s group of people reacted rtively swiftly. Once they felt the violent wind from behind, they realized the danger behind them.

    When the little skeleton killed Adam Menlo earlier, as Han Shuo did not fiercely attack Florida¡¯s group as he was watching attentively in surprise, they also had the time to see the whole process. The little skeleton who was able to kill Adam Menlo who was riding the golden-winged roc was definitely as dangerous to Florida as Han Shuo himself. Hence he immediately shouted loudly once he saw the little skeleton attacking from behind them.

    With the current state of the situation, it was clear that the number of people assisting Florida wasn¡¯t enough. With Gilbert and Lania attacking from the sides, the overbearing Han Shuo attacked from the front and suddenly there was an otherworldly powerhouse appearing behind them.

    If they were focused on one side, they wouldn¡¯t be able to resist another. Facing the waves of simultaneous attacks, Florida suddenly felt an intense unease within his heart. He looked at Han Shuo who was sneering as he killed his way over, suddenly realizing that Han Shuo¡¯s weapon had disappeared. Florida was immediately terror-stricken when he came to this realization.

    Unfortunately, his realization was still toote. The group of experts that had been distributing their efforts to deal with the three creatures was momentarily too busy to attend to Florida. When they heard a sharp cry, they realized that there was a bad turn of events.

    Florida, who was exerting himself to support his defensive the light and lightning spells to their peaks, was still unable to stop the Demonyer Edge. His lightning and light magic barrier shattered into tiny ss-like specks. The Demonyer Edge sted through Florida¡¯s barrier and pierced through his neck, leaving behind a bloody hole.

    The hatred in Florida¡¯s eyes gradually rescinded. Without the support of mental energy, Florida¡¯s body fell sharply. A leader of the four big powers in the Valley of Sunshine had eventually died by Han Shuo¡¯s hand.

    When the experts from the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band who had been tightly surrounding Florida saw Han Shuo seizing the chance to kill Florida, a feeling of despair and helplessness arose in their hearts. At this moment, the attacks of the little skeleton, Gilbert and the others fell like torrential rain, immediately taking another ten lives.

    After Florida died, the first wave of experts no longer had a leader. The remaining tens of experts desperately started to retreat but continued to be killed by Han Shuo¡¯s group. Before they could reach Laureton, another twenty odd people had died.

    Of the three hundred experts and the many flying magical creatures that had participated in the battle, only neen people and eleven magical beasts had returned to Laureton¡¯s area alive. Adam Menlo and Florida of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band would both disappear forever from the power struggle within the Valley of Sunshine.

    ¡°Ha. Laureton, it¡¯s been a while!¡± Chasing after the enemy mercenaries, Han Shuo arrogantly stood in the sky, as he mockingly greeted Laureton.

    On both sides of Han Shuo were the two super rank magical creatures and the little skeleton. Several hundred gargoyles were like guards as they quietly pped their wings behind Han Shuo. Having calcted their altitude, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t afraid of arrows being shot from below.

    Laureton raised his head to stare at the sky. Seeing Han Shuo looking at him derisively, all sorts of feelings suddenly appeared in his heart. The corpses of Florida and Adam Menlo wereid out by Laureton¡¯s side. With the other two leaders of the three powers dead, Laureton ought to be happy. But as he looked at Han Shuo, Laureton only felt increasingly flustered.

    ¡°Yes, we have not seen each other for a while. I should have expected that you had arrived long ago. Apart from you, Trunks simply didn¡¯t have any other cards!¡± Laureton sighed before taking a deep breath. He then looked at Han Shuo and said, ¡°As matters stand, I don¡¯t have any other things to say. That¡¯s right. It was indeed me that kidnapped Trunks, but I don¡¯t regret it!¡±

    With the current situation within the Valley of Sunshine, if Laureton didn¡¯t act to deal with Trunks, the Soul Destroyer mercenary band would rece the Cairo mercenary band¡¯s position in the Valley of Sunshine sooner orter. Naturally, he had to think of his subordinates, thus what he did was understandable.

    ¡°Indeed, there is nothing much to say. From today onwards, Cairo Mercenary band will be my mortal enemy. Laureton, try your best.¡± Han Shuo smiled as he looked at Laureton. He took onest nce at Florida and Adam Menlo¡¯s corpses and then headed back towards the Soul Destroyer mercenary band.

    The first wave of attacks from these powers had resulted in a devastating price. Not only did this lose their most capable elites, even Florida and Adam Menlo were killed. In such a situation, the group that had formed out of benefits would be powerless against the Soul Destroyer mercenary band.

    Humans were always selfish. With Florida and Adam Menlo dead, Han Shuo was almost certain that the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band and the House of Menlo would immediately break out into chaos, especially Florida¡¯s Rainbow Sickle mercenary band which would definitely fall into a period of civil strife or break apart.

    In that case, the group¡¯s threat to the Soul Destroyer mercenary band will decrease substantially. Han Shuo only needed to observe as they copsed. Hence, he left carefreely.

    Things indeed developed as Han Shuo had predicted. After Han Shuo left, the people from the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band and the House of Menlo immediately sank into strife.

    In particr, the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band had immediately split into a few smaller groups. Only a small portion strived for revenge. The remaining majority advocated leaving this ce as soon as possible. The House of Menlo was slightly better off since Adam Menlo was after all, their senior. As the majority of the authority within the House of Menlo were in the hands of rtives, most were yelling sorrowfully about first taking revenge for Adam Menlo before deciding on other matters.

    The sudden quarrels disrupted Laureton¡¯s thoughts. Looking at the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band, which was already prepared to leave, and the frightened leaders of the small powers, Laureton suddenly had a helpless feeling.

    So many flying magical creatures had been killed. Wanting to rely on flying magical creatures to enter the Soul Destroyer mercenary band waspletely impossible. With the existence of spatial rings, trying to starve the Soul Destroyer mercenary band to death with a siege was also impossible. The only way was to attack head-on. However, this method woulde at arge cost which they simply couldn¡¯t afford.

    At this moment, Laureton had no confidence in victory. As he looked at the people of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band and the House of Menlo arguing endlessly, he suddenly felt somewhat helpless.

    ¡°Chief, should we make use of this opportunity to eliminate the two groups?¡± While Laureton was feeling vexed, Harris suddenly approached and lowered his voice as he made a vicious suggestion.

    ncing at Harris before looking in the direction that Han Shuo had left, he smiled bitterly and said, ¡°That fellow definitely wishes for us to do so. If we were to fight with those other two parties, it would be following his wishes. Once all three groups depleted their power and energy, the master of the Valley of Sunshine would really be the Soul Destroyer mercenary band.

    Harris was stunned for a moment. He processed Laureton¡¯s words for a while before nodding and saying, ¡°Chief is still more far-sighted. In any case, with Florida and Adam Menlo¡¯s deaths, we have two fewer enemies. The current Rainbow Sickle mercenary band and House of Menlo are no longer enemies to fear.¡±

    ¡°That is also true. However, if we are unable to eliminate the Soul Destroyer mercenary band now, their reputation will increase greatly. In the future, other than our Cairo mercenary band, there will no longer be any powers that can shake their position. I¡¯m unsure if this is fortune or misfortune!¡± Laureton replied painfully.

    Just as Laureton and Harris were discussing quietly, some of the leaders of the smaller mercenary bands had walked over together. One of them gloomily looked at Laureton and said, ¡°Chief Laureton, now that the situation has be like this, I think we no longer have the opportunity to destroy the Soul Destroyer mercenary band.

    If the Cairo mercenary band wants us to spearhead the attack and essentially throw our lives away, I apologize. We are unwilling to exchange the price of our brothers¡¯ lives for the benefits that you are giving us. Based on the current situation, I feel that we should just disperse!¡±

    ¡°I agree. That ce is too hard to attack. Without the assistance of flying magical creatures, we simply have no chance of winning at all.¡± a leader of another small mercenary band shouted.

    It seemed that there weren¡¯t just one or two of them who had such thoughts. All of them who had walked over together probably already nned to leave.

    A bunch of short-sighted fellows! Laureton cursed them inwardly. After being silent for a moment, he said, ¡°Consider this carefully. If we are unable to eliminate the Soul Destroyer mercenary band now, everyone that participated in this attack will all suffer a cmity. Our Cairo mercenary band has sufficient strength and aren¡¯t afraid of Trunks¡¯ revenge. As for you guys, it might be a troublesome matter.¡±

    ¡°Chief Laureton need not to remind us of that. We¡¯ve naturally also thought of it.¡± That person replied.

    ¡°Then do as you¡¯d like. In any case, I¡¯ve already reminded you guys. When the timees where Trunks seeks you all out for revenge, don¡¯te and find me!¡± Laureton coldly snorted and disdained upon continuing to talk to them. These people looked at each other, simultaneously bidding their farewells before leading their members to leave. The majority of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band had lost their faith in Laureton once Florida died.They had already left without even notifying him.

    Of the six thousand people that hade to attack the Soul Destroyer mercenary band, only around three thousand were still alive. If they wanted to attack the base of the Soul Destroyer mercenary band without flying magical creatures, it wouldn¡¯t be just a problem of the number of casualties. Instead, the question would be if they would be able to eliminate the Soul Destroyer mercenary band after suffering heavy casualties!

 Chapter 406: Three Great Enchantments

    GDK 406 ¨C Three Great Enchantments

    When Han Shuo returned to the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band, he discovered that with the support of Grant, Trunks was sitting in the middle of the practice arena and was currently raising his head and staring into the vast white sky.

    Trunks was still very weak. Although his wounds had been treated, it would be impossible for him to recover without ten to fifteen days of rest. The most severe injuries were his severed hand and feet tendons. Roughly a month would be needed for them to reattach and regain their original durability.

    It was very clear that Trunks was worried about the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. However, as his tendons were severed, he could only sit here weakly, simr to a disabled person, unable to move his hands and feet.

    Luckily his eyes had gradually recovered its light. As he gazed into the sky, he had a thoughtful expression, indicating that although he suffered heavy injuries, he still had a strong mentality.

    ¡°Why have youe out here. It is best if you sincerely stay indoors and recuperate for this period of time. Don¡¯t worry, the invaders have already retreated in heavy defeat. In the short term, Laureton would definitely be powerless to deal with us.¡± Han Shuo descended by Trunks¡¯ side and berated.

    ¡°It¡¯s ok, I¡¯m feeling better now. Hehe. I¡¯m not willing to hide inside and bitterly wait for others to bring me information during the Soul Destroyer mercenary band¡¯s most dangerous period of time.¡± Trunks smiled as he replied. Pausing for a moment, he knitted his brows and asked, ¡°Bryan, is Florida dead?¡±

    Han Shuo replied while nodding, ¡°That¡¯s right. I know you wanted to personally kill him, but there are immense benefits for us in killing him now. With his death, the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band would fall into disunity. The number of our enemies would also decrease greatly. Hence, I didn¡¯t let him get away.¡±

    Trunks sighed and said ruefully, ¡°Hai, not killing personally can be considered regretfully but his early demise is indeed beneficial to us. If I had got rid of him previously, all these disorderly matters wouldn¡¯t have happened. It seems that I am to me for all of these matters.¡±

    ¡°Besides Florida, Adam Menlo died as well. The two of them were the pirs of the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band and the House of Menlo respectively. Their deaths have caused great repercussions for the two powers. Currently, there are still three thousand people in the surroundings, including the people under Laureton. However, I believe they would be departing shortly.¡± Han Shuo narrated the details of the battle to Trunks.

    ¡°Don¡¯t need to worry about the remaining matters here. I know you have many matters to deal with. Leave Laureton to me. I¡¯ll send Laureton packing.¡± Trunks replied.

    ¡°It¡¯s just one Laureton, I can remove him in passing. It wouldn¡¯t take up too much of my time.¡± Han Shuo looked at Trunks in astonishment. ¡°Based on his current injuries, he definitely won¡¯t fight with you in the near future.¡± Han Shuo was somewhat worried.

    ¡°Bryan, the Valley of Sunshine has its own rules. If I want to convince others, I should notpletely rely on your strength. Only if I openly get rid of Laureton and the Cairo mercenary band would I be able to sessfully hold power in the Valley of Sunshine and win the respect of others.¡± Trunks who still had a weakplexion said resolutely.

    Han Shuo was stunned, hesitating a moment before saying, ¡°But, your injuries...¡±

    ¡°Hehe, don¡¯t need to worry. It¡¯s not like I would immediately deal with Laureton. As you said, based on Laureton¡¯s personality, he definitely won¡¯t dare to attack this ce without absolute certainty. Now that the flying magical creatures of the House of Menlo have also been killed by you, they definitely wouldn¡¯t dare to attack in the near future.

    We still have Gilbert here. As time passes, they would surely give up. Be rest assured. After experiencing the pain previously, I would no longer becent. I have the confidence in eradicating Laureton and the Cairo mercenary band!¡± Trunks looked extremely confident. Having experienced the ruthless torture previously, there seemed to be a change in Trunks¡¯ body.

    When Han Shuo heard what Trunks said, he looked at Trunks deeply and hesitated for a while before smiling and said, ¡°Since you are so insistent about it, I would no longer interfere with the matters of the Valley of Sunshine. However, if you face any difficulties, you must inform me as quickly as possible!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. The Soul Destroyer mercenary band isn¡¯t solely mine. I know what needs to be done!¡± Trunks smiled as he replied.

    ¡°Gilbert, you stay here. Before Trunks recovers, look after him properly for me!¡± Han Shuo looked at Gilbert and instructed.

    ¡°Understood, honorable master.¡± Gilbert acknowledged Han Shuo¡¯s instructions.

    Trunks actually wanted to rely on his own strength. To firmly wield power within the Valley of Sunshine, he indeed couldn¡¯t rely on others for everything and could only utilize the strength he had to get rid of the strongest power in the Valley of Sunshine, the Cairo mercenary band. Only then can Trunks truly obtain everyone¡¯s respect.

    For him to have such a realization and train of thought, Han Shuo was surprised and at the same time, full of admiration. This proved that Trunks was truly a talent. Furthermore, Han Shuo could see the changes in Trunks ever since he had rescued Trunks. He realized that Trunks had be stronger and more ruthless, no longer as careless and benevolent.

    The previous lesson was really too cruel. Trunks had to go through torment more painful than death. There would no longer be any situations too difficult for him from now on. Han Shuo precisely noticed this and suddenly understood why Trunks asked Han Shuo to leave Laureton to him. Apart from using Laureton to test his methods, he also wanted to use Laureton to polish his martial technique.

    Currently, only Laureton was able to deal with Trunks within the entire Valley of Sunshine. If Han Shuo killed Laureton now, Trunks would lose the most suitable opponent. Not only would he lose much pleasure, he would also lose a turning point in making a breakthrough. It was also only through Laureton that Trunks would be able to improve once again.

    Having understood Trunks¡¯ intention, Han Shuo didn¡¯t insist on his own thoughts and truly let go off matters within the Valley of Sunshine. He then said his goodbyes to Trunks and Gilbert within the same day, returning to the Cemetery of Death from the Valley of Sunshine.

    Returning to the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo followed his original purpose and headed down to explore.

    The reason why he returned to Cemetery of Death was due to Wolf¡¯s information. Were it not for Gilbert suddenly requesting for emergency assistance, Han Shuo would have already long since explored the thirdyer of the Cemetery of Death. Now that he had returned, Han Shuo immediately headed below the Cemetery of Death.

    Having had the previous experiences, Han Shuo¡¯s exploration seemed to be a walk in the park. Han Shuo instilled his mental energy into the first twoyers, easily breaking through the enchantments and headed for the passageway that led to the thirdyer. Han Shuo only stopped when he sensed the existence of an enchantment.

    Taking a deep breath, Han Shuo slowly condensed his mental energy to probe the area where the enchantment was.

    Bang...

    Han Shuo¡¯s mental energy had just touched the area when his mind was suddenly jolted as arge force suddenly rushed forward, like countless small snakes forcing their way into Han Shuo¡¯s mind. This caused Han Shuo to feel an endless tingling pain.

    Fortunately, Han Shuo had prior experience, hastily holding his breath in rapt attention, directing stronger mental energy into the enchantment, attempting to break through the enchantment like the previous two asions. The skeletal staff in his hand shone brightly in tri-colored light.

    Peng!

    Han Shuo had suddenly struck out, yet the enchantment had not been broken and Han Shuo himself was repelled. Right when Han Shuo was bing extremely frightened, the countless snake-like energy that barged into Han Shuo¡¯s mind suddenly became orderly from its original chaos, forming lines of bright magic symbols.

    As Han Shuo had delved into necromancy magic for a long time, when those magic symbols appeared in his mind, he was extremely surprised. Soon after, the tri-colored light from the skeletal staff in his hand suddenly became brighter as three strands of demonic light climbed along Han Shuo¡¯s arm and slowly entered his body.

    The tri-colored light from the skeletal staff traveled up Han Shuo¡¯s arm, directly flowing into Han Shuo¡¯s mind,ing together with the countless magical symbols and arranging into paragraphs of incantations that Han Shuo could understand, as well as paragraphs of information.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before quicklying to himself, hastily memorizing the information that had appeared in his mind. The paragraphs of incantations and information were rapidly imprinted into his mind. The entire process didn¡¯t persist for too long. With the degree of development of his brain, Han Shuo very quickly remembered the information within his mind.

    ¡°Before bing a sacred magus necromancer, the next enchantment cannot be opened. It contains the secret for a necromancer to be God...¡±

    ¡°The skeletal staff possesses three basic abilities. Apart from the first ability of doubling the might of spells, the other two abilities require additional incantations. The incantations specifically are...¡±

    ¡°Enchantment of Fear, Enchantment of Weakness and Enchantment of Age. The incantations and way of applying these enchantments are...¡±

    The magic symbols swiveled around Han Shuo¡¯s mind, finally forming three pieces of information. The first was that only a sacred magus can enter the nextyer. Secondly, the incantations for rejuvenation and entering theherworld andstly, the three long lost enchantments of necromancers.

    The nextyer actually had the secret for a necromancer to be God!

    Han Shuo was extremely surprised as he looked ahead toward the pathway blocked by a single enchantment. He was shocked by the information within his mind and was lost in thought for a long time. There were too many thoughts appearing in his mind.

    Han Shuo only slowly suppressed his chaotic state of mind after a long time. The first piece of information still didn¡¯t mean much to him, but the second and third piece of information was of great use at the present time.

    Of the three mysterious abilities of the skeletal staff, the ability to double the power of spells didn¡¯t need a supporting incantation, but the rejuvenation ability and the ability for the soul to freely enter theherworld were not as simple to bring about. For example, for the soul to travel back and forth from theherworld, it required the support of manyplicated incantations as well as a precise understanding of your own soul.

    For the rejuvenation ability to seed, it needed to utilize the energy contained within the skeletal staff. This energy wasn¡¯t something everyone could endure and only those that have been approved by the skeletal staff would be able to transform themselves through the energy contained within the skeletal staff.

    Previously, Wolf obviously fulfilled this condition. ording to Wolf, all the disciples of the Cmity Church seemed to fulfill the condition to be reformed by the skeletal staff. All the old fellows within the Cmity Church who had lived for countless years could make use of this energy to return to their youth.

    Enchantment of Fear, Enchantment of Weakness and Enchantment of Age are three of the ancient necromancers¡¯rge-scale magic enchantments. Enemies who were shrouded by the Enchantment of Fear would have dread forming in their hearts, their ability to judge and their willpower would be influenced by the Enchantment of Fear and drop substantially. The Enchantment of Weakness, on the other hand, would cause enemies to lose the strength of their bodies, causing their fighting strength to decrease greatly.

    The most fearsome was definitely the Enchantment of Age. However, the Enchantment of Age could only be used by a sacred magus necromancer. Necromancers who reach the rank of sacred magus would already have an extremely exquisite understanding of the soul. By utilizing an enormous amount of mental energy to deploy the Enchantment of Age, any living creature that enters the enchantment would age faster.

    If the living creature stayed within the Enchantment of Age for over a fixed amount of time, the living creature would die of old age immediately. This was an extremely malicious spell which reduced the origin vitality of a living creature¡¯s soul. No matter how strong an opponent was, if they were not as aplished in understanding the soul, they would be helpless within the Enchantment of Age.

    Han Shuo was able to immediately practice the Enchantment of Fear and Enchantment of Weakness. Using these two enchantments in tandem would also create ayering effect. Using these enchantments together with a necromancer¡¯s undead army would simply be a nightmare to any enemy.

    Perhaps it was precisely becausebining these two enchantments with the undead army was really too formidable that during the glorious era of necromancers, they would be eliminated from all the magician associations within the continent. From that moment on, the three enchantments disappeared forever from the world.

    The reason why the Enchantment of Age could only be practiced by a sacred magus necromancer was perhaps due to the frightening power of the Enchantment of Age which caused it to be unable to ovey with the other two enchantments.

    No matter how strong a living creature was, once it entered the Enchantment of Age and didn¡¯t exit immediately, its body would rapidly age. Even if it immediately left the Enchantment of Age, a part of its body would still be affected and would never recover.

    However, Han Shuo¡¯s skeletal staff was able to let victims of the Enchantment of Age rejuvenate. Combining both the Enchantment of Age and the skeletal staff, everything could be considered to be in control. He would be able to send his own men into the enchantment to intercept the enemy. And when the enemy has retreated or died, Han Shuo can use the skeletal staff to rejuvenate the youth lost by his own people within the Enchantment of Age.

    The practice method as well as the full incantations of the three great enchantments that were the secret behind necromancers ruling the continent werepletely engraved into Han Shuo¡¯s mind at this moment.

    TL note: I¡¯m still not very satisfied with the names of the 3 enchantments. Will probably change them when Ie up with a better name. Do leavements with your suggestions!

 Chapter 407: Bigwigs

    GDK 407 ¨C Bigwigs

    When Han Shuo obtained the information that he couldn¡¯t enter the next level before bing a sacred magus necromancer, he didn¡¯t force matters and withdrew along his original path.

    Numerous magical spells and practice methods had been imprinted on Han Shuo¡¯s mind. However, if he wanted to seed in practicing all of them, it wasn¡¯t an easy thing to do. Hence, Han Shuo didn¡¯t stay in the Cemetery of Death any longer and instead returned to his mansion in Ossen City through the teleportation array.

    Having left Ossen City for a few days, Han Shuo sought out Steward Kas once he returned to find out what has been happening in Ossen City.

    King Uhtred has already made known his stance in thest few days. He had steeled his heart to help Lawrence ascend the throne. The entire Lancelot Empire was momentarily in shock, unable to understand why Uhtred made this decision.

    When the Dark Mantle Organization, King Uhtred¡¯s hand in the shadows, suddenly having closer rtions with Lawrence, many already guessed that they were also leaning toward Lawrence. The Empire¡¯s legendary figure sacred swordmaster Karel also no longer sat on the fence, finally announcing officially that he supported Lawrence to be the next king.

    With King Uhtred¡¯s help, Lawrence¡¯s trusted aides gradually started to grasp power within the empire. His foster father and uncle Boris received important positions, bing influential ministers within the empire. Everyone could make out Uhtred¡¯s intentions.

    In this period of time, the other princes and the powers under them visited the pce more often. Duke Ashburn and Prince Charles even visited the pce a few times a day, attempting to rely on their own abilities to change His Majesty¡¯s decision.

    There were also some stubborn conservative ministers who allied and petitioned Uhtred to change his mind. They believed that as an illegitimate child, Lawrence simply wasn¡¯t fit for the honor of being at the apex of power in the Lancelot Empire. These people were old officials and their old-fashioned noble traditions caused them to be unable to ept the matter. They felt that this was sphemy towards the royal family of the Lancelot Empire.

    King Uther¡¯s queen and his favored concubines had also joined the opposing side one after another in order to get an answer from him. In a short time, Ossen City descended into chaos. Yet at this time, Uhtred¡¯s illness suddenly rpsed and he fell into aa, even showing signs of being able to hold on.

    When the princes saw such a situation happen, they followed King Uhtred orders overtly, but secretly started to assemble their forces in preparation for purging the iing powers. Within the seemingly tranquil Ossen City, many unfamiliar faces started to appear as a storm was slowly brewing.

    Once King Uhtred died, the long-anticipated storm would inevitably break out with a bang. At that time, it would be difficult to say if it would engulf the entire Lancelot Empire. At this moment, themander of the Southern border, Firenze suddenly returned to Ossen City. This baleful star would cause the already chaotic Ossen City to be filled with even more variables.

    As he listened to Steward Kas¡¯s description, Han Shuo was stunned. He really didn¡¯t anticipate that in just a few days, Ossen City would actually experience such drastic changes. It seems that ever since King Uhtred knew that his days were numbered, his swift and decisive actions yed a huge role.

    In the few days where Han Shuo was away, Phoebe hade to look for him three times while Lawrence came twice. Emily and some of the nobles in Ossen City had alsoe to visit him. When Kas finished his report, Han Shuo thought for a moment before immediately heading for Lawrence¡¯s residence.

    Lawrence was currently the focus of all of Ossen City. In the cruel contest for the throne, Lawrence could not fail. Only with Lawrence¡¯s ascension could Han Shuo¡¯s interests be maintained and even progress to the next level.

    After hurrying into Lawrence¡¯s residence, he was informed by the steward that Lawrence was currently in a secret discussion with others. However, the steward clearly knew of the unusual rtionship between Han Shuo and Lawrence. When he saw Han Shuo arrive, he immediately went to report. After a while, the steward returned and respectfully led Han Shuo to Lawrence¡¯s secret meeting.

    Han Shuo saw many acquaintances within Lawrence¡¯s secret room, including Lawrence¡¯s adoptive father, Eevee, Uncle Boris, Phoebe, Emily, Betteridge Family¡¯s Old Hahn and ten other unfamiliar nobles who seemed to also be supporting Lawrence.

    When Han Shuo arrived, Lawrence immediately stood up and smiled as he went up to him and said ¡°Where did you run off to. Why have you only arrived now?¡±

    Lawrence had also gone to the pce many times in recent days. When Uhtred met with him alone, he repeatedly urged Lawrence to keep Han Shuo firmly by his side and that Han Shuo was the key to his future.

    Although Uhtred did not divulge astrologer Grace¡¯s evaluation of Han Shuo, Lawrence was an extremely smart person. He already figured out what was going on from the attitudes of the people around him and understood that Han Shuo would be his life¡¯s benefactor.

    It was precisely because of this that as soon as Han Shuo walked inside, Lawrence was still the first to stand up and personally weed Han Shuo inside in an extremely amiable manner. This came as a slight surprise to some of his supporters who weren¡¯t familiar with Han Shuo.

    ¡°Nothing much. I had some stuff to settle so I went out for a while. Wow! There are so many people!¡± Han Shuo casually fobbed Lawrence off. He couldn¡¯t help but exim when he saw the surrounding people.

    ¡°Ha. Bryan, you are really amazing. In such a short period of time, you have be a Marquis. I indeed didn¡¯t evaluate you wrongly.¡± Lawrence¡¯s uncle Borisughed as he greeted Han Shuo.

    Originally, Lawrence had arranged for Han Shuo to hold a post within Boris¡¯s Northern Army in order to let Han Shuo gain military merit. Boris himself was only just a Count. Who would have thought that Han Shuo had risen up the ranks in such a short time? Based on their current authority, Han Shuo had clearly surpassed him.

    However, while in the Northern Army, Boris was extremely friendly toward Han Shuo as he knew of Han Shuo¡¯s prospective growth. Their rtionship in private was also pretty good. Hence when he saw Han Shuoing in, he immediately greeted him amicably.

    ¡°Hehe. Lord Boris over-praises me!¡± Han Shuo smiled as he bowed to Borris.

    Sitting next to Boris were Emily and Phoebe. The two of them were extremely close to each other, constantly whispering softly. Only after Han Shuo came in did their bright eyes stay fixed on him. Seated beside Emily was old Hahn, hence she turned her head after ncing at Han Shuo so as to avoid arousing suspicion.

    However, Phoebe seemed to still harbor some residual anger as she couldn¡¯t resist ring at Han Shuo a few more times. Her beautiful big eyes revealed an angry overtone, seeming to rebuke him for his mysterious disappearance.

    ¡°Young man, not bad. I still haven¡¯t had the time to thank you for saving me previously! Haha. I¡¯ve told you that when you have time,e over and have some fun. I will definitely entertain you well. I didn¡¯t expect that till now you still haven¡¯t visited. What¡¯s the matter? Could it be that you look down on my Betteridge family?¡±Old Hahn smiled as he greeted Han Shuo before pretending to be angry as he spoke.

    I¡¯ve already gone to the Betteridge Family and even snatched your daughter-inw. Han Shuo said inwardly as he kept a wronged expression on his face. He innocently spread his arms and exined, ¡°You are also aware that I have always been at Brettel City and only got back recently. There are too many matters to handle. Ha, I will definitely visit the next time I have time!¡±

    ¡°Okay then. I was just joking with you. I know that you are now a very busy person. Looking at you, I truly feel somewhat amazed. You saved my life thest time we met, but at that time, you were still an unknown. Who would have thought that in just a few years you have already be a formidable figure within the Empire? Awesome!¡± Old Hahn smiled with emotion.

    As Old Hahn was talking, Lawrence had already brought Han Shuo to his side and pointed at the chair next to him, indicating for Han Shuo to sit. Only then did he introduce the strangers around him to Han Shuo. ¡°Hehe, I won¡¯t introduce these people as you already know them anyway. However, you are perhaps unfamiliar with these people, but in the future, we will all be on the same side. This is the current Lord of Valen City...¡±

    Each time Lawrence introduced someone, Han Shuo would nod in respect. These people were either lord of their cities or either a Count or a Marquis. They all are top characters among the nobles. With Lawrence¡¯s introduction, Han Shuo slowly understood the powers under his control.

    Three Counts and two Marquis. They were all powerful figures within Ossen City and were all middle-aged. They were either in charge of a big Family, held key positions under King Uhtred or had military power. It seemed like only the people of their age would not stubbornly hold onto the idea that an illegitimate child could not obtain the throne.

    As Lawrence introduced them, the nobles would nod amicably toward Han Shuo. Currently, Han Shuo had the authority over Brettel City and was favored by the king. His status as a Marquis was simr to their own status. In addition, they were now in the same faction. It would be odd if they were unfriendly toward Han Shuo!

    When Lawrence finished the introductions, Han Shuo was more or less familiar with Lawrence¡¯s current strength. These Marquises and Counts were people that held true power. In addition, he had the support of the Betteridge Family and the Dark Mantle. Furthermore, there were still a few experts that surpassed worldly powers that supported him. In this case, Lawrence truly possessed the means to oppose Eldest Prince Charles.

    It seemed like that Uhtred¡¯s swift and decisive actions had indeed brought about the greatest benefit to Lawrence. It caused Lawrence¡¯s power to rise greatly while also convincing more nobles to support him, allowing Lawrence to possess the qualifications to go against Charles and vie for the throne.

    After Lawrence introduced the nobles that Han Shuo were not familiar with, he paused for a while before continuing, ¡°We were just discussing a few matters. Let me summarize them for you. Currently, we should use our forces to their maximum potential and let the talents under us acquire power while my father is still alive.

    On the other hand, based on our current foundation, we still need to obtain stronger support in preparation for Charles and others¡¯ desperate actions. The empire¡¯s authority is basically in the hands of the nobles. Even though my royal father clearly supports me, if those nobles support Charles, they would still coborate with Charles to resist me when my royal father dies. This matter is extremely hard to solve.

    Ah. The most important issue is my identity. Those stubborn fellows clearly would not choose me but they hold too much power in their hands that without them making mistakes, my father has no means whatsoever to reduce the authority in their hands. This really is a headache-inducing problem.¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t say a word after he sat down, only listening to Lawrence¡¯s descriptions. When Lawrence finished talking, Han Shuo understood that the situation was not as ideal as he had imagined. It seemed like even though they had Uhtred¡¯s support, Charles¡¯ prior advantage was too huge. Lawrence would never be able to peacefully ascend the throne

    ¡°Your Highness, Duke Ashburn has an enormous influence within the empire. The bigwigs he has made friends with include the majority of nobles. With him supporting the eldest Prince, they would be extremely hard to deal with. Currently, His Majesty is able to suppress him but if he dies, Duke Ashburn would surely oppose with all his strength.The power in his hands is enough to alter the entire situation. This is really difficult to manage!¡± A Count named Talric said to Lawrence.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Once His Majesty meets his demise, no one can control Duke Ashburn. This is truly hard to handle!¡± Lawrence¡¯s foster father, Eevee said while frowning.

    ¡°Hehe, you all neglected the person that just got to Ossen City. If Lawrence can obtain this person¡¯s support, I think the situation would be totally different!¡± Old Hahn suddenly chuckled and said.

    When they heard those words, everyone was moved but they sighed soon after. Boris replied, ¡°That unreasonable madman is indeed no ordinary person but he doesn¡¯t even listen to His Majesty¡¯s orders. Who would be able to convince him?¡±

    Lawrence was distracted for a moment, before looking fervently at Han Shuo. However, when he saw Emily and Phoebe, he hurriedly retracted his gaze.

    Han Shuo realized simply from Lawrence¡¯s expression that he knew of the rtionship between Fanny and the madman Firenze. He cannot help but sigh inwardly. He knew that Lawrence definitely had a goal when Lawrence painstakingly made friends with himself. Lawrence had actually started to rope him in so long ago. It seems that of all the princes, Lawrence had nned the furthest ahead.

 Chapter 408: Fannyâ€™s deep emotions

    GDK 408 ¨C Fanny¡¯s deep emotions

    Han Shuo did not express his opinion on what they discussed next, merely thinking about the madman Firenze¡¯s arrival in Ossen City and the effect it would cause on him.

    Based on what Han Shuo had promised Fanny, he knew that since Firenze had reached Ossen City, he would definitely meet Firenze in the near future. The matter of Han Shuo already having Phoebe and Emily by his side would be exposed sooner orter. He wasn¡¯t sure what great reaction Fanny would have once she found out!

    It was the same for Phoebe, who had just epted Emily yet still had residual anger. If she found out about Fanny as well, she might insist on bringing out a cage. Unfortunately, since things have reached such a situation, there was no way he could conceal it any longer.

    ¡°Bryan, Bryan!¡± Lawrence suddenly shouted twice.

    Han Shuo suddenly came to his senses. He looked astonished at Lawrence and asked, ¡°What¡¯s up?¡±

    ¡°What do you think we should do next, Charles is our main opponent. Do you have any ideas?¡± Lawrence looked brightly at Han Shuo as he sought Han Shuo¡¯s opinion.

    Han Shuo was currently feeling troubled and simply did not seriously listen to their discussion. He shook his head in response and said, ¡°I don¡¯t have any good ideas.¡±

    When Lawrence heard Han Shuo¡¯s reply and saw that he had a vexed expression, he understood that Han Shuo was perhaps upied by some other thoughts. He nodded without asking further, continuing to discuss with the other nobles instead.

    After a short while, they finished their discussion. The nobles left in session, including Emily and Old Hahn, only leaving Phoebe, Lawrence and Han Shuo in the room.

    ¡°Bryan, thank you for introducing Mister Crowley to me, allowing me to have such a strong grand magus by my side!¡± After the rest had left, Lawrence thanked Han Shuo sincerely.

    Han Shuo was stunned for a moment before responding and said, ¡°That Crowley has joined you?¡±

    ¡°Yes, Mister Crowley said that he followed your advice and decided to join me.¡± Lawrence smiled as he exined.

    ¡°That¡¯s good. Lawrence, I have some matters to speak with Phoebe, we¡¯ll be leaving first!¡± Han Shuo pondered for a moment before saying to Lawrence.

    ¡°Alright then, you two can leave first.¡± Lawrence smiled as he got up to send them off.

    Phoebe pouted, appearing to still be angry at Han Shuo. Under Lawrence¡¯s gaze, she got into her own carriage. Han Shuo hesitated for a moment but on second thought, since many people knew of his rtionship with Phoebe, he got on soon after.

    Based on the current situation, his rtionship with the three women would perhaps no longer able to be concealed. Han Shuo seriously considered for a moment, deciding to just confess to the three women. Of the three women, Emily was the only one who wouldn¡¯t mind it too much. Besides, Emily faintly knew of some information through the Dark Mantle, hence Han Shuo wasn¡¯t worried about her.

    However, both Phoebe and Fanny were huge problems. He was unable to conceal it further even if he wanted to and it would be worse if they found out by themselves. Reaching this situation, Han Shuo really had no other ideas and resigned to his fate and tell them the truth.

    Within the elegant horse carriage, Han Shuo had a reserved expression as he remained silent. Phoebe¡¯s anger toward Han Shuo had yet to diminish, pouting and also not saying a word. In a moment, the atmosphere within the carriage was somewhat tense.

    After a short while, Han Shuo took a deep breath, turning his head to look at Phoebe and said in a low voice, ¡°Phoebe, apart from you and Emily, I still have another woman!¡±

    Phoebe¡¯s eyebrows raised, her eyes overflowing with disbelief. There were signs of rageing from her delicate body as she clenched her teeth and unwaveringly stared at Han Shuo before saying sharply, ¡°You, what did you say?!¡±

    ¡°Apart from Emily and yourself, I still have another woman. Her name is Fanny, she was previously my teacher. She¡¯s also the first woman I liked.¡± Han Shuo sounded downcast, sighing when he finished.

    ¡°What, what is the meaning of this? Why are you telling me this?¡± Phoebe couldn¡¯t contain her rage. She already found it hard to ept Emily. Now, Han Shuo suddenly said that there is another woman. Phoebe¡¯s mind buzzed as she felt a sharp pain prating her heart.

    ¡°She is a teacher at my academy and took care of me from the start...¡± Han Shuo described his rtionship with Fanny. He then sighed as he gazed at Phoebe and said, ¡°Sorry, I shouldn¡¯t have deceived you. That was because I didn¡¯t want you to be happy. That was what had happened. I¡¯m saying so much to you not because I want you to forgive me but to let you know that as a matter of fact, I¡¯m truly a bad person like you said and am even the extremely bad kind.¡±

    ¡°Leave, leave immediately, I don¡¯t want to ever see you again!¡± Phoebe cried incessantly, suddenly crying out sharply to the point of losing her voice.

    When Han Shuo saw Phoebe losing control of her emotions, he suddenly felt an extremely strong grievance. He knew that it would be useless to say anything at this moment and thus simply nodded before opening the carriage¡¯s window and flew out.

    Han Shuo knew since a long time ago that Phoebe was a headstrong person. Such an independent woman would not easily forgive him for deceiving her. Perhaps it was precisely because Phoebe had strong feelings for him, hence she was so hurt by what Han Shuo said today.

    Han Shuo suddenly understood the pain of the woman he loved dearly. The anguish he felt didn¡¯t seem any less than what Phoebe was feeling. Han Shuo himself had an extreme pain in his heart. Carrying that intense pain in his heart, Han Shuo made his way toward Babylon Academy of Magic and Force.

    When Han Shuo reached Fanny¡¯sboratory, it just happened to be after lunchtime. Ever since Han Shuo visited a few days ago, Fanny felt extremely content and was very cheerful the past few days.

    When she opened theboratory¡¯ door intending to first rest for a while, she suddenly saw Han Shuo who was seated on a chair within the room. The current Han Shuo seemed absent-minded and looked somewhat pale. He sat gloomily without saying a word, as though he had an extremely heavy load on his mind.

    With a nce, Fanny suddenly realized that the current Han Shuo waspletely different from the past. Previously, Han Shuo always had a strong fighting spirit or was frivolous and improper. He had never been as downcast and absent-minded as he was today.

    ¡°Bryan, what happened to you? Are you ill?¡± Fanny was flustered, hurrying to Han Shuo¡¯s side, raising a hand to feel his forehead.

    Hearing Fanny¡¯s voice, Han Shuo was startled. When he saw Fanny filled with concern for himself, the pain in his heart increased. He stared nkly for a while, perhaps wanting to feel more of Fanny¡¯s gentle feelings as he simply stared deeply at Fanny as he carefully appreciated the temperature of Fanny¡¯s warm hand.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong, why are you saying anything. What¡¯s going on?¡± When Fanny saw Han Shuo not saying a word and simply staring nkly at herself, she felt more fric, impatiently questioning Han Shuo as her worry was disyed on her face.

    ¡°Fanny, I¡¯ve let you down!¡± Han Shuo who was staring nkly at Fanny didn¡¯t know if this tenderness would still exist after he spoke. However, he knew that he was unable to hide, finally sighed and said to Fanny.

    ¡°You aren¡¯t ill right? What nonsense are you saying?¡± Fanny beamed as she pulled back her hand from Han Shuo¡¯s forehead, looking tenderly at Han Shuo¡¯s eyes as she replied.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t dare to look straight at Fanny¡¯s eyes and guiltily lowered his head. He suddenly remembered that he had not had physical rtions with Fanny. In that case, as long as he told Fanny the truth, it wouldn¡¯t cause much harm to Fanny.

    Toward his loved ones, Han Shuo had never been a heartless person. The reason why Han Shuo had concealed this matter for such a long time, apart from enjoying the wonderful feeling of having multiple women, it was because he didn¡¯t want to heartlessly cause them pain.

    However, Han Shuo only suddenly realized at this moment that his actions of hiding the truth would indeed not cause them pain in the short term, but such actions would cause them a lifetime of anguish.

    This was precisely why Han Shuo decided to sincerely exin the truth to both parties. However, the guilty Han Shuo didn¡¯t dare face Fanny¡¯s gentle feelings. Under Fanny¡¯s impatient inquiry, Han Shuo used the same downcast voice to exin, ¡°Apart from you, I still have two other women. I¡¯ve let you down!¡±

    Fanny¡¯s hand which was tenderly caressing Han Shuo¡¯s hair suddenly stopped. Han Shuo instinctively raised his head to look, suddenly realizing that Fanny had frozen in position, her tender eyes filled with helplessness and pain. Her rosy lips paled, constantly squirmed as if she wanted to say something yet was unable to make up any sound.

    Two streams of tears flowed down her smooth cheeks, sliding down her neck. After a very long time, Fanny¡¯s dimmed eyes focused on Han Shuo. She had a bleak expression, sounding forlorn as she said softly, ¡°Bryan, are you telling me this because you want to break off our rtionship?¡±

    Han Shuo froze, unable to understand Fanny¡¯s response. He had thought that Fanny should be furious like Phoebe was, chasing him away regardless of everything. He did not think that in this moment, Fanny actually had such a grim and frightened expression like a helpless blossoming flower bud.

    An intense feeling of self-me suddenly rushed into Han Shuo¡¯s heart.Han Shuo¡¯s eyes reddened as he pulled Fanny into his embrace, choking with emotion as he said, ¡°Sorry, it¡¯s all my fault. Sorry...¡±

    ¡°Bryan, I, I¡¯ve already known long ago regarding the matters between Miss Phoebe and yourself.¡± Fanny faintly spoke, before exerting all her strength to embrace Han Shuo tightly, as though afraid that Han Shuo would depart from her side.

    Han Shuo had a lifeless expression, subconsciously hugging Fanny tightly without knowing the reason why. His mind was filled with questions. She actually knew. How did she find out?

    ¡°You are the dazzling new star of the Empire. Information about you is spread everywhere. Among them naturally includes matters regarding Miss Phoebe and yourself. It¡¯s funny that you still deceive yourself and assume that I¡¯m unaware. The first time I heard that information, I didn¡¯t believe it. However, slowly through my own understanding, I finally believed the information. I¡¯m truly a weak woman. I should have always maintained a distance from you from the start and not fall for your enticement. However, in the days where you aren¡¯t around, my mind ispletely filled with your image, forever impossible to get rid of.

    Sorry, I¡¯m unable to do it!

    Even though I¡¯m fully aware that you already have Miss Phoebe, I¡¯m still unable to leave you. Once I imagine that we would no longer interact, I would feel suffocated. You would never be able to understand this feeling. I¡¯m useless. I¡¯m unable to walk away from your vortex of emotions and instead can¡¯t help but sink deeper...¡± Fanny muttered as she mocked herself while in Han Shuo¡¯s bosom, her voice full of helplessness and misery.

    Her narration from the bottom of her heart ruthlessly tore apart Han Shuo¡¯s opinionated guise. Han Shuo felt dizzy from an iparably intense happiness. Even though this happiness contained a hint of extreme agony, even though this happiness made Han Shuo¡¯s lips dry up and his eyes redden, causing his firm heart to weaken...

    ¡°I know, Phoebe is a good woman. Have youe here after deciding to leave me?¡± Fanny murmured in sorrow, her tone filled with agony and destion. Her tears were like a pearl ne that had snapped, pearl after pearl dripping on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulder.

    ¡°No!¡± Han Shuo bellowed, before continuing to say, ¡°I will never leave you. Never! I said so much just to request your forgiveness. I have never thought of leaving you! Sorry, it¡¯s all my fault, it¡¯s all my fault...¡±

    Fanny¡¯s delicate body trembled slightly as she suddenly stood up, teardrops still hanging from her eyes that indescribably anticipated, gazing toward Han Shuo¡¯s face. Her voice trembled and was filled with disbelief as she said softly, ¡°Bryan, are, are you saying the truth?¡±

    Repeatedly nodding his head, Han Shuo had never been as serious as he was now, his voice choking with emotion as he guaranteed, ¡°So long as you don¡¯t leave me, I will never be the one to let go and leave you. I promise!¡± ¡°But I only recognized the fact that I can never leave you after two years of torment and suffering. I don¡¯t mind that you are with Miss Phoebe and other women. However, would Miss Phoebe care about my existence?¡± Fanny said bitterly.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know. However, I would give her and myself some time. Perhaps, she would finally make a good decision. However, regardless of her decision, it would not change my feelings for you. It definitely won¡¯t!¡± Han Shuo said resolutely.

    Fanny¡¯s eyes were filled with surprise and happiness that couldn¡¯t be contained. She took the initiative to hug Han Shuo tightly again, standing on tiptoe to ardently kiss Han Shuo. Her hands had brazenly slipped into Han Shuo¡¯s clothes, caressing Han Shuo¡¯s strong body while trying to help Han Shuo undress.

 Chapter 409: Refusal

    GDK 409 ¨C Refusal

    It was unclear what Fanny¡¯s thoughts were as for the first time, she was so spontaneous and so passionate. Both her kisses and actions were iparably bold and unrestrained.

    At this moment, Han Shuo was unexpectedly the passive receiver. Fanny¡¯s previous words contained a sea of deep emotions, brought about an enormous shock to Han Shuo, causing him to feel extremely guilty toward Fanny.

    When the two of them kissed, Han Shuo who had always been the aggressor in the past instead wasn¡¯t that overbearing.

    ¡°Oh... Bryan...¡± Fanny¡¯s loveable appearance was bright red and contained shyness as she moaned softly. Han Shuo¡¯s outer clothing had unconsciously been taken off by Fanny.

    Han Shuo¡¯s naked upper body was extremely robust, each inch of muscle seemed to be brimming with explosive force. When Fanny became out of breath, her fragrant lips left Han Shuo¡¯s as she took deep breaths. As she gazed at Han Shuo¡¯s chiseled body, her eyes were brimming with dense amorous feelings.

    ¡°Do... Do me now...¡± There was a mouse-like squeak. Fanny blushed as she buried her head in Han Shuo¡¯s chest, inhaling the rich manly scent from Han Shuo¡¯s body. She simply felt that her heart was in a mess and was able to clearly hear her own heart beating.

    ¡°We can¡¯t!¡± Han Shuo smiled bitterly as he refused.

    Fanny lost her head out of fear, suddenly lifting her head to stare at Han Shuo. Her blushing expression was clearly filled with sorrow and puzzlement, her eyes brimming with doubt and panic.

    ¡°Umm... Teacher Gene ising over and it¡¯s presently daytime. You still need to go teach a sster! How about, at night?¡± Han Shuo smiled bitterly, scratching his head as he spoke softly to Fanny.

    Hearing Han Shuo¡¯s exnation, Fanny suddenly came to her senses, her face still red as she hurriedly dressed Han Shuo and said anxious, ¡°That¡¯s right, that¡¯s right. In that case, you should leave first, we¡¯ll talk about it another day.¡±

    Right at this moment, Gene¡¯s footsteps had already neared till the point that Fanny herself could hear them.

    Fanny became even more hurried as she had harbored ulterior motives, desperately urging Han Shuo to make haste and leave. Han Shuo smiled bitterly and nodded while draping his shirt over his shoulders, departing Fanny¡¯sboratory before Gene had reached.

    As he headed back to his residence, Han Shuo felt ineffably moved by Fanny¡¯s deep emotions. He had never expected that Fanny had actually been struggling bitterly for so long because of him. Also, even though Fanny knew about his matters, she still didn¡¯t want to leave him. Her strong feelings caused Han Shuo to feel that he was unable to return the favor to her.

    Just as Han Shuo reached his residence, Steward Kas hurriedly rushed over, having a grave expression as he said, ¡°Lord Marquis, Grand Duke Ashburn and Eldest Prince Charles request a meeting. They have already been waiting for some time.¡±

    ¡°What are they here for?¡± Han Shuo was startled and knitted his brows in puzzlement.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know,¡± Kas replied respectfully.

    With his heart filled with suspicion, Han Shuo walked toward the hall used for receiving esteemed guests. With a nce, he saw Eldest Prince Charles who hest saw in the Northern Rose Garden. It was actually the first time he was meeting Duke Ashburn who was by Charles¡¯s side. When he looked at Duke Ashburn, Han Shuo immediately knew that he was a crafty old fox and definitely not a person easy to deal with.

    The two of them had a rxed expression as they sipped tea within the hall, actually not bringing a single attendant with them. Once Han Shuo heard Steward Kas¡¯ report, he immediately sent out a mystic demon to observe the surroundings of the mansion. Only then did he notice that there were two luxurious horse carriages stopped by the front gate and a squadron of knights keeping watch by their side.

    Han Shuo who was vexed due to Fanny and Phoebe¡¯s matters had been deep in thought on the journey back and had neglected the surrounding situation. Only after he instructed the mystic demon to circle around the estate did he realize the different situations within the mansion.

    As this was the capital, Ossen City, Ashburn and Eldest Prince Charles who had openlye to visit Han Shuo were naturally unafraid that Han Shuo would suddenly rise in revolt. Hence they boldly left the squadron of knights outside, not bringing a single expert along for protection. On the surface, the two of them still seemed to have quite the presence.

    When he saw Han Shuo enter, Ashburn nced at Charles before standing. He smiled and nodded toward Han Shuo before saying, ¡°Marquis Bryan has such a well-known reputation. Seeing you today, it is indeed well-deserved. An outstanding male like Marquis Bryan is truly rare within our Lancelot Empire. Haha.¡±

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a good mood. Having heard many asions where old fox Ashburn and Charles threw their weight around, he didn¡¯t have a good impression of the two of them. He replied while faking a smile, ¡°Lord Duke is over-praising me. In front of Lord Duke, no one else is fit to be famed for a well-known reputation.

    ¡°Greetings Eldest Prince.¡± Han Shuo then bowed toward Eldest Prince Charles in ordance to etiquette.

    ¡°Hehe, be at ease. Previously there were some misunderstandings with Marquis Bryan. I¡¯vee this time precisely because I wish to our prior misunderstandings.¡± Eldest Prince Charles looked at Han Shuo amiably, his friendly manner as different as night and day from the previous time at the Rose Garden.

    ¡°Your Highness is too courteous. We never had any misunderstandings. The way you say it makes me worry about what had happened.¡± Han Shuo was stunned, before replying Charles while having an expression that he was unable to make head or tail of the situation.

    Coughing softly, Duke Ashburn smiled and said, ¡°Previously we had Cameron to assist with some matters. I didn¡¯t expect that Mister Cameron actually became apetitor to Miss Phoebe¡¯s business. Cameron truly deserves to die, actually using Charles¡¯ title to intimidate people, audaciously finding trouble with Miss Phoebe.

    Hehe, at the start, we didn¡¯t know of this matter. However, I suppose that Marquis Bryan would perhaps misunderstand that we had prompted Cameron to act that way. Hence, we have speciallye to rify the matter with Marquis Bryan. We hope that Marquis Bryan wouldn¡¯t misunderstand us due to that matter. Honestly speaking, Charles and I have always extremely admired you and wish to be friends with you.¡±

    Misunderstanding? There was simply no misunderstanding. Without your instructions, why would Cameron dare to use his connection with you to intimidate Phoebe?

    Han Shuo sneered inwardly. He already understood their goal from Ashburn and Charles¡¯ tone. He was certain that this was because of his status in Uhtred¡¯s heart. This caused the two of them to realize his importance. This was why they would deign and deliberately want to make friends with him.

    ¡°Hehe, that must be a misunderstanding. That matter had happened so long ago that I almost forgot about it. There¡¯s nothing much to discuss.¡± Han Shuo squinted his eyes, ying down the issue. Shortly after, he smiled as he looked at Ashburn and Charles while asking, ¡°May I know, are there any other matters causing Lord Duke and His Highness to visit?¡±

    ¡°The development of Brettel City has been the most inspirational news in recent days. The city lord of Seamist City which neighbors Brettel City, Kairov, has extremely close rtions with me. Hehe, if Brettel City and Seamist City are able to work closely together, the development in all areas would be even faster.

    My visit today is precisely to discuss with Marquis Bryan the aid that Seamist City can provide Brettel City, such as manpower and resources that Brettel City needs urgently.¡± Eldest Prince Charles smiled as he looked at Han Shuo, slowly exining his proposal.

    Seamist City City Lord Kairov was a member of the Haug Family, his sister Kalina was Eldest Prince Charles¡¯ wife. His rtionship with Charles was naturally extremely intimate. The distance between Seamist City and Brettel City isn¡¯t very far. If Seamist City was able to provide some effective help, it would naturally be extremely beneficial to Brettel City¡¯s development. This was something Han Shuo was aware of.

    ¡°In that case, what does Brettel City have to invest on their part?¡± Han Shuo remained calm and collected as he inquired.

    ¡°There¡¯s no need for any investment. As long as I¡¯m able to gain Marquis Bryan¡¯s friendship, I would be satisfied.¡± Charles¡¯s scorching gaze was fixed on Han Shuo as he replied.

    Grand Duke Ashburn smiled as he looked at Han Shuo. He pondered for a moment before saying, ¡°Marquis Bryan, to be frank, I admire you greatly. If you don¡¯t mind, we can discuss in depth on the possibility of many coborations. The power and benefit we are able to provide you far surpasses what others can give you. As long as you work together with us, power, wealth, women are all easily obtained.¡±

    Han Shuo chuckled as he looked at the two of them, firmly shaking his head under their expectant gazes and said, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I¡¯m a person who cherishes old friendships and also know to return the favor of others. Both of you should understand what I mean!¡±

    Hearing Han Shuo¡¯s response, Eldest Prince Charles¡¯ expression sank. Just as he wanted to speak out, Ashburn red at him. Soon after, Ashburn smiled and said, ¡°So that is the case. I understand. Since that is the case, we¡¯ll take our leave. We apologize for brazenly disturbing. Hope you can forgive us.¡±

    After he was stared at by Ashburn, Charles did not suddenly forget himself. Merely, his calm gaze toward Han Shuo had an added resentment, as if angry at Han Shuo¡¯s rejection and failing to appreciate his kindness.

    ¡°In that case, I won¡¯t see you out.¡± Han Shuo looked astonishedly at Grand Duke Ashburn. He didn¡¯t expect that Ashburn would actually be that direct, not dragging on the situation the slightest once he understood that there was no hope.

    ¡°Marquis Bryan, do take care of yourself!¡± Before Charles left, he suddenly turned back to look at Han Shuo, implying a hidden intention within his words.

    ¡°I thank Eldest Prince for his reminder, I will be careful.¡± Han Shuo expression suddenly turned cold, replying sarcastically.

    Han Shuo could clearly hear the threat within Charles¡¯ tone. He knew that after today, there was no chance of being friends with Charles and Ashburn and could only be enemies till one side is dead.

 Chapter 410: Sudden changes within Ossen City

    GDK 410 ¨C Sudden changes within Ossen City

    Han Shuo knew that Charles definitely wouldn¡¯t let him off. However, Han Shuo didn¡¯t expect that Charles¡¯s retaliation woulde so quickly and that violently.

    That same night, Han Shuo who was studying the method of connecting to theherworld suddenly felt through his consciousness several formidable auras that were gradually heading for his mansion from afar.

    Han Shuo was suddenly roused from his contemtion, immediately sending out twelve mystic demons, spreading out in twelve directions with the mansion as the center, like a spider web.

    A five hundred strong knight troop, including two hundred Temple knights from the Church of Light headed for Han Shuo¡¯s mansion from four directions. The Church of Light¡¯s light grand magus Kosse, a few other unfamiliar experts from the Church of Light as well as formidable deathsworn under Ashburn were separately leading troops as they encircled the mansion.

    There was no moonlight that night. In the pitch-ck curtain of night, they did not conceal themselves, simply heading openly toward Han Shuo¡¯s mansion. Han Shuo was able to see the killing intent within the eyes of these knights.

    Han Shuo was rmed, hurriedly exiting his hidden room. The scene he saw through the twelve mystic demons simply exceeded Han Shuo¡¯s imagination. No matter howrge the influence Ashburn and Charles had, how would they dare to be so unbridled in the capital of Lancelot Empire, Ossen City?

    The area Han Shuo was living in was surrounded by wealthy and respectable people and were all influential characters within the Empire. Even though it was a moonless night, such arge movement would definitely be unable to be concealed. Furthermore, Ossen City was the Dark Mantle¡¯s headquarters. Ashburn was after all not King Uhtred. On what basis is he so unbridled?

    A series of misgivings rushed into Han Shuo¡¯s mind. He only felt that Ashburn must be insane. Such a crazy movement definitely shouldn¡¯t be something that old fox dares to do. Unfortunately, with the appearance of Kosse and the presence of other members of his dukedom already proved that this operation is indeed incited by Ashburn.

    While Han Shuo was still at a loss, a nearby mansion suddenly ignited in mes which reached the sky. A mystic demon just happened to see the situation in that direction and observed a group of knights charge in and kill everyone they see. In the blink of an eye, blood dyed the ground red and not even one servant was let off.

    Han Shuo vaguely recalled that the mansion should be Count Talric¡¯s. Talric was inclined toward Lawrence. Han Shuo even saw him in the morning and found out through Lawrence¡¯s introduction that his mansion wasn¡¯t far from his own. He didn¡¯t expect that Talric¡¯s mansion would already be in its current state.

    A thought shed in Han Shuo¡¯s mind, in sudden realization. Since Ashburn dared to act so brazenly and disregard King Uhtred¡¯s authority, there are only two possibilities. Either Ashburn knew that the situation was far from good and preemptively revolted.

    The other possibility was that King Uhtred had already died. In that case, Ashburn would no longer be restricted by anyone. Hence he would dare to freely act, eradicating the people who were detrimental to him at the fastest speed and swiftly take Ossen City under his control.

    However, if Ashburn wanted to revolt, he should have acted from the day King Uhtred made known that he would support Lawrence and definitely wouldn¡¯t look on unfeelingly as Uhtred delegated power bit by bit toward Lawrence. It seems that the first possibility was much smaller and that King Uhtred¡¯s sudden demise was instead the most usible.

    With this suspicion, he only kept two mystic demons within his mansion, spreading the other ten mystic demons further away. Among them, one mystic demon directly headed in the direction of the royal pce.

    Through the mystic demons, Han Shuo discovered even more troops being mobilized in the pitch-ck night. There were other regions who were simrly engaged in cruel ughter. These included nobles who supported Lawrence as well as powers under the Second and Third Prince.

    All of a sudden, huge clouds of smoke rose from the entire inner Ossen City. Ashburn and Eldest Prince Charles had without a doubt alreadyunched their operation of massacring the influences that opposed them to officially start on this moonless night. Any powers that opposed Ashburn and Charles were fated to meet with death or injuries tonight.

    Coming to this realization, Han Shuo rapidly headed for Steward Kas¡¯ room. Steward Kas was quite old and hence didn¡¯t sleep deeply. Furthermore, Han Shuo deliberately made louder footsteps when he headed over. Hence, Kas immediately woke up.

    ¡°Lord Marquis, what¡¯s going on?¡± Kas had never seen Han Shuo that impatient. He nimbly sat up and immediately inquired. ¡°Don¡¯t bring anything along, immediately wake up all the servants. All of you are to leave the mansion and flee for your lives. Duke Ashburn has revolted. A regiment of knights is currently heading for this location. Once they arrive, everyone here will be killed. Hurry, leave this ce immediately!¡± Han Shuo rapidly exined the situation. Once he finished exining, he didn¡¯t wait for a response and hurriedly left the mansion, immediately heading for the Boozt Merchant Guild where Phoebe was.

    This mansion was bestowed to Han Shuo by Uhtred. However, Han Shuo clearly didn¡¯t take it as a real home. There wasn¡¯t anyone here that Han Shuo truly cared about. Han Shuo also had a habit of keeping valuables within his spatial ring. At this moment, there weren¡¯t any person or item that was worth. Hence, he immediately left after warning Kas.

    There weren¡¯t many people who knew of Han Shuo and Fanny¡¯s rtionship. Furthermore, Fanny and Lawrence didn¡¯t have any interactions. On top of that, Fanny¡¯s father was Firenze. As the Lord of the Southern border, Firenze was one of the few people that Ashburn worried about. Han Shuo simply didn¡¯t need to worry about Fanny¡¯s safety.

    Emily was within the Dark Mantle Headquarters. Within the entire Ossen City, the defenses of the Dark Mantle Headquarters was the most secure. There were countless teleportation arrays within that linked to every major city within the empire. Even if Ashburn had overwhelming methods, he also wouldn¡¯t be able to breach the Dark Mantle Headquarters in a short period of time. Wanting to capture the higher ranking people of the Dark Mantle was even more impossible.

    Hence, Han Shuo was simrly not worried about Emily.

    However, Phoebe was close to Lawrence and the Boozt Merchant Guild had repeatedly foiled Grand Duke Ashburn¡¯s matters. Hence, they were the most likely to be attacked.

    As the Grand Duke of the empire, the power Ashburn wielded was second to King Uhtred. Even Phoebe¡¯s master sacred swordmaster Karel would simrly not be taken seriously by Ashburn. With the full support of the Church of Light, the number of experts Ashburn controlled was surely even greater. It was almost impossible for sacred swordmaster Karel to depend on his own strength to kill Ashburn.

    Han Shuo traveled as fast as lightning, directly heading for the Boozt Merchant Guild. Along the way, he discovered through his mystic demons, even more, changes happening within Ossen City. Many mansions were reduced to ruins in an extremely short period of time. A few small mansions were subjected to a number ofrge-scale killing spells and were razed to the ground within a few breaths.

    Ashburn¡¯s vicious actions were extremely resolute. As long as it was a hostile power, regardless of whether they were servants or guests, he didn¡¯t let a single person off. Many of the nobles¡¯ mansions were involved in the cruel massacre. During this course of events, the army he controlled headed for the city gates, probably intending to seize control of all the city gates.

    The teleportation arrays within Ossen City had been seized by Ashburn a long time ago. Layers uponyers of troops firmly surrounded the magic arrays. No one would be able to leave Ossen City through the magic arrays. It seems that Ashburn and Charles had nned to thoroughly seize control of the entire Ossen City, disposing of all their enemies within.

    The mystic demon that headed for the royal pce heard wails even before it neared. Troops that were under Eldest Prince Charles had already seized control of the royal pce. The mystic demon simply made a pass around the pce and discovered that King Uhtred had indeed died and some rebels were already killed on the spot.

    From these signs, Han Shuo suddenly realized that King Uhtred¡¯s sudden demise was perhaps rted to Eldest Prince Charles. Otherwise, the royal pce wouldn¡¯t be sealed off, not allowing any news to be spread. The other princes were unfortunately kept in the dark, simply unaware of the king¡¯s passing.

    Within Ashburn¡¯s mansion, Ashburn and Eldest Prince Charles were seated together with many supporting nobles who had darkened expressions. As they directed officers to seize important positions, they read out names of nobles one after another, sending their subordinates to go and eradicate them.

    A mystic demon stayed in the vicinity and was able to clearly listen to the conversation between Ashburn, Charles and the others. Han Shuo finally understood that tonight¡¯s incidents were indeed Ashburn and Charles fiercely striking back.

    Out of a sudden, a mystic demon who had reached Boozt Merchant Guild ahead of time saw from afar a squadron of soldiers currently killing people unfeelingly. The merchants and guards of the Boozt Merchant Guild died tragically one after another under the arrows of these soldiers. However, it was fortunate that these people had just begun at the front of the building and clearly haven¡¯t prated into the interior. Han Shuo reckoned that Phoebe was still fine for the time being.

    However, Han Shuo was still extremely worried, activating the Art of Demonic Ninth Heavens to its peak, heading for the Boozt Merchant Guild with the speed of a meteor. He constantly prayed inwardly that nothing would happen to Phoebe. If anything happened to Phoebe, even though Han Shuo had previously promised Uhtred, he would ignore that promise and skin Charles alive.

 Chapter 411: Chopping their hands off

    GDK 411 ¨C Chopping their hands off

    Smoke rose everywhere from within the Boozt Merchant Guild. The soldiers under Ashburn¡¯smand charged in, killing everyone they see. The guards within the guild simply didn¡¯t have the chance to retaliate with most of them being killed or injured in an instant.

    Phoebe who was distraught from Han Shuo¡¯s words held divine weapon Starry Sky and led the guards within the guild to do their utmost in resisting. However, the situation was clearly far from good.

    The soldiers that attacked Boozt Merchant Guild included some experts that supported Charles. There was also a Temple Knight from the Church of Light who held a silver spear and did not put anyone in his eyes. Every strike of his spear would inevitably lead to the death of a guard.

    There were also a few mages that continuously released spells. The Boozt Merchant Guild¡¯s buildings caught fire in session. The stocked up grains and goods burned within therge fire. Some servants were burning all over as they exited their rooms, only to face a rain of arrows that was shot over. Those innocent servants were all shot dead.

    In an extremely short time, Boozt Merchant Guild fell into the enemy¡¯s hands under the unyielding attack. Only Phoebe and a group of loyal guards were hurriedly retreating toward the back gate. During the time, the guards by Phoebe¡¯s side were being killed in session.

    ¡°Miss Phoebe, you won¡¯t be able to escape today!¡± Space archmage Aubrey smiled deviously as he gazed at Phoebe and said unhurriedly.

    Previously, it was precisely space archmage Aubrey and Cameron that hade to Boozt Merchant Guild to coerce Phoebe. Unfortunately, they just so happen to run into Han Shuo. In the end, Aubrey and Cameron were both inflicted by Han Shuo¡¯s poison of fire and ice, causing him to suffer from icy cold and scorching heat for the next few days.

    Aubrey naturally realized that it was Han Shuo¡¯s doing. However, he knew that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t someone he could provoke. Hence, he could only swallow this suffering and hide the thought of revenge in his heart.

    Havinge to the Boozt Merchant Guild again today, Aubrey had a Temple Knight from the Church of Light as well as many other mage experts with him. He waspletely confident that in sessfully aplishing what he didn¡¯tplete previously, to capture Phoebe and use her to threaten sacred swordmaster Karel, causing Karel to not dare to act recklessly.

    Behind Aubrey was a squadron of hundred soldiers as well as the Temple Knight who had the pattern of an olive branch on his chest. The fleeing Phoebe only had thirty guards with her. Even though Phoebe herself was a great swordmaster, there was no way she could prevail over these opponents.

    As Aubrey spoke, he had already released a Spatial Rend, sending a shining sharp de over. The guards beside Phoebe suddenly lostrge chunks of flesh as the Spatial Rend took away a part of their body into a different space.

    ¡°Bang!¡± Phoebe who was withdrawing suddenly felt an invisible wall striking her back, her whole body actually shot forward a few steps.

    ¡°Aubrey, you still dare to appear at my Boozt Merchant Guild? Are you all crazy? You actually dare to disregard everything and kill so many servants and guards?¡± Phoebe clearly didn¡¯t know that King Uhtred had died and just like Han Shuo at the beginning, her heart filled with extreme appall. She had never imagined that Ashburn would dare to be so brazen.

    ¡°Haha, we aren¡¯t insane. After tonight, Ossen City and Lancelot Empire would both belong to His Highness Charles. Tonight, every hostile power would be eliminated.¡± Aubreyughed savagely before replying.

    ¡°Less superfluous words. Capture this woman as quickly as possible. We still have other matters to handle.¡± the Temple Knight suddenly spoke.

    Hearing the Temple Knight speak, Aubrey embarrassedly stoppedughing, nodding as he replied, ¡°Lord Crespo, this woman is a great swordmaster. We will need to work together to capture her alive.¡±

    ¡°Make your move then!¡± The Temple Knight named Crespo didn¡¯t say any useless words, raising his silver spear and headed toward Phoebe.

    As he brandished the silver spear, a milky-white brilliance burst out from the spear point. A holy aura gradually spread from Crespo¡¯s body. His silver armor suddenly burst into bright light, causing Crespo¡¯s aura to rise tremendously.

    Phoebe was startled, slightly retreating even before Crespo approached. Soon after, she brandished the divine weapon ¡°Starry Sky¡±, suddenlyunching a huge Cross sh which reached Crespo in a sh.

    Crespo snorted softly, lifting up his spear toward the middle of the arriving huge Cross sh. The Cross sh suddenly rose into the sky, shing a tree branch the thickness of a bowl into two.

    ¡°Merely a recently advanced great swordmaster, you should just wait obediently to be captured.¡± Crespo said coldly, his body turning into a string of afterimages due to his high speed. The spear in his hand suddenly appeared to be several hundred as they stabbed toward Phoebe.

    A ring of starry radiance suddenly burst out from the divine weapon ¡°Starry Sky¡±. The specks of starlight proliferated outward, forming many Cross shes. They carried a terrifying force as they exploded all of a sudden. As the several hundred blurry silver spears were suddenly broken into dust, the explosive force spread out, causing Crespo to groan and hastily fall back a few steps.

    ¡°Good, very good. You are actually able to borrow the power of the divine weapon to unleash Karel¡¯s Cross sh to attack. No wonder that old fellow Karel thinks so highly of you!¡± Crespo retreated a few steps, seven to eight small holes appearing at the shoulder area of his silver armor, his expression cold as he spoke.

    ¡°Who would have expected that the Church of Light¡¯s Temple Knight would actually be the dog of the Eldest Prince. Is this something your religious organization that transcended worldly power should be doing?¡± Phoebe simrly mocked him, her face filled with disdain.

    ¡°Miss, hurry up and leave, we¡¯ll bring up the rear.¡± the head guard of Boozt Merchant Guild impatiently begged Phoebe.

    Phoebe shook her head and said helplessly, ¡°There¡¯s no way to escape!¡±

    Phoebe¡¯s side didn¡¯t have any formidable mages. Facing troops who possessed warhorses and were coordinating with mages and archers, escape wasn¡¯t a sensible choice because the speed of mages who could fly greatly surpassed them.

    ¡°Aubrey, ask your men to act together. After we take down this woman, we still have to handle other matters. Don¡¯t waste too much time.¡± Crespo shot a nce at Aubrey, frowning as he said coldly.

    Aubrey nodded his head in agreement as he replied, ¡°Alright then, we¡¯ll act together.¡±

    After nodding toward Aubrey, Crespo raised his spear once again and headed toward Phoebe. With a simple swivel of his spear, a burst of silver light suddenly shot out. At the same moment, Aubrey starting chanting an incantation, a space type magic shackles caused the surrounding space to fluctuate as it shot toward Phoebe.

    The magi beside Aubrey chanted incantations one after another. Magic barriers of every major descended toward Phoebe. The archers from a distance away had also arrived, all of them drawing their bows and aiming toward Phoebe.

    Bang...

    As Phoebe¡¯s strike obstructed Crespo¡¯s silver light, she suddenly felt a strong force and couldn¡¯t help but fall back a couple of steps. These two steps caused Phoebe to fall into the path of the space magic shackles. All kinds of formless energy suddenly rushed forth, causing Phoebe to feel like she was being entangled within a myriad of ropes, unable to move the slightest.

    ¡°Bring her away. With Phoebe in our hands, that old bastard Karel will definitely know his ce!¡± Aubreyughed heartily in pride as he instructed a few knights behind him.

    ¡°Heh heh, this woman is really beautiful. Tsk tsk, her skin is extremely smooth. I have never seen a woman with such delicate skin.¡± A knight who came over had a lecherous smile, attempting to stroke Phoebe¡¯s face as he used a rope to tie her up.

    As Phoebe who couldn¡¯t move and could speak saw the rough hand approaching her face, her eyes were filled with intense panic and ire. She uncontrobly thought of Han Shuo in this vulnerable moment, thinking, ¡°How good will it be if you scoundrel is able toe and rescue me. As long as you appear, I might even forgive you. I don¡¯t want anyone apart from you to touch me...¡±

    When a woman was frightened, vulnerable and helpless, the first person she would think of would definitely be her man. Phoebe was no exception. When she saw the knight¡¯s hand about to caress her face, as she lost her head out of fear, Phoebe called out for Han Shuo in her heart.

    Swish!

    Just as the rough hand was about to touch Phoebe¡¯s face, a noise suddenly sounded. Soon after, the knight was suddenly howling miserably. That coarse hand was chopped off at the wrist, dripping with blood as it fell by Phoebe¡¯s feet.

    ¡°Who is that!¡± Crespo suddenly shouted loudly, on guard as he looked around in all directions. The silver spear in his hand shed intermittently with silver light.

    Swish!

    In the moonless night, a strand of ck light shed past, The knight who had his hand chopped off howled mournfully once again. Everyone took a look, realizing that the knight¡¯s other hand had also been chopped off.

    ¡°Capture Phoebe, hurry!¡± Aubrey suddenly came to his senses, hastily instructed the knights who were still distracted.

    The few of them immediately started to move, nning to first tie Phoebe up with the thick rope in their hands.

    Swish, swish, swish!

    The strand of ck light appeared repeatedly, resembling ck thread that weaved the curtain of night. The knights that attempted to approach Phoebe had their extended hands chopped off one after another. In a sh, more hands actually appeared by Phoebe¡¯s feet.

    Phoebe was shackled by magic and couldn¡¯t move, but her eyes didn¡¯t miss anything that urred around her. She suddenly felt an intense happiness fill her heart. Without even needing to think, Phoebe knew that Han Shuo had arrived. With the current crisis resolved, Phoebe momentarily forgot Han Shuo¡¯s bad points, only remembering that Han Shuo had assisted her time and time again.

    ¡°Bryan... Damn it, why have you only arrived now...¡± Phoebe shouted loudly in her heart. Her eyes were brimming with happiness and serenity. She was no longer worried about the surrounding danger as if with the existence of that strand of ck light, there would no longer be any danger to her.

    ¡°Come out, you cowardly sneak attacker!¡± Crespo suddenly shouted loudly as he charged toward Phoebe.

    ¡°That person, that person has arrived!¡± Aubrey suddenly recovered from his shock and shouted to Crespo.

    Crespo was distracted momentarily, before quicklying to his senses and shouting at once, ¡°That¡¯s impossible. That fellow is powerless to defend himself, he shouldn¡¯t be able to appear her that quickly!¡±

    ¡°ording to who?¡± A chilling voice suddenly came from afar. As the voice sounded, a shadow already stood by Phoebe¡¯s side.

    Han Shuo nced at Crespo, his left hand gently pressing on Phoebe¡¯s back and suddenly erupted in violent energy. A string of crackling sounds rang in Phoebe¡¯s surroundings. Several barriers and Aubrey¡¯s shackles suddenly broke into many pieces.

    Phoebe who was previously shackled and unable to move suddenly felt that she was able to move her whole body. Prior to Han Shuo¡¯s arrival, Phoebe was continuously calling out for him in her heart, even thinking to herself that if Han Shuo saved her once again, she would forgive his fickleness. However, when Han Shuo really appeared and Phoebe¡¯s danger was removed, she once again brooded over the previous matter, feeling that she shouldn¡¯t forgive him that easily. Hence, she snorted softly but didn¡¯t say anything.

    ¡°Heh heh, you even dare to touch my woman. Courting death!¡± After Han Shuo broke Phoebe¡¯s shackles with a strike, he menacingly gazed at the people in front of him and said coldly.

    ¡°Bah! Who is your woman? You fickle scoundrel!¡± Phoebe was happy yet ashamed and couldn¡¯t help but hatefully re at Han Shuo, panting in rage as she said, ¡°I still haven¡¯t forgiven you for that matter. Please refrain from talking rubbish!¡±

    ¡°Of course Miss Phoebe is my woman. If you aren¡¯t my woman, why would I travel all the way to the north of the city to save you?¡± Han Shuo grinned as he replied Phoebe.

    ¡°It¡¯s really you. How is that possible, how did you manage to escape from Lord Kosse¡¯s grasp?¡± Crespo¡¯s expression changed, looking at Han Shuo in shock as he spoke.

    ¡°Kosse? Ha, in several fights, it seemed that the one who is always fleeing is that fellow?¡± Han Shuo said calmly to Crespo. As he spoke, Han Shuo had already taken out the skeletal staff, his expression gradually became colder.

    ¡°It is different this time. Apart from Lord Kosse, there¡¯s also Lord Blount. How did you manage to escape?¡± Crespo was at a loss, retreating in fear.

    Han Shuo¡¯s evil reputation was currently extremely well-known in the Church of Light. Red Archbishop Kosse was repeatedly defeated by him. Han Shuo¡¯s strength was also gradually acknowledged by the people within the Church of Light. Crespo still had self-awareness, knowing that with his strength, he definitely wasn¡¯t Han Shuo¡¯s match. The notion of retreating had appeared in his heart.

    ¡°Every single one of you will not leave here alive!¡± Han Shuo pronounced their fate, the skeletal staff beginning to summon undead creatures.

    Red Archbishop Kosse who wielded the ¡®Revtion¡¯ divine artifact wasn¡¯t here and there weren¡¯t any light mages who could quickly purify undead creatures present. Han Shuo hadplete confidence in swiftly killing all of them.

 Chapter 412: Sacred Knight

    GDK 412 ¨C Sacred Knight

    Under the summons of the skeletal staff, waves of undead creatures densely filled Han Shuo¡¯s surroundings. Han Shuo held Phoebe in one hand and the skeletal staff in the other, rapidly reciting incantations.

    ¡°Retreat!¡± Crespo decisively gave the order, taking the lead in withdrawing.

    When Aubrey who was in charge of the current operation saw Han Shuo suddenly appearing by Phoebe¡¯s side, he immediately knew that they had failed once again. When groups of undead creatures gradually appeared, Aubrey had also thought of withdrawing. Crespo¡¯s call for retreat matched his intentions and he simrly started to escape toward the rear.

    ¡°Want to run? It¡¯s toote!¡± Han Shuo released Phoebe¡¯s hand which he had been holding firmly and suddenly flew toward Aubrey. He held the skeletal staff in his left hand as before, while the Demonyer Edge shot out from his right palm.

    Aubrey had already suffered great losses to Han Shuo previously. Once he saw Han Shuo directly charging toward him, his expression changed at once. He hastily shouted at the archers on the surrounding roofs, ¡°Shoot him to death!¡±

    A rain of arrows shot toward Han Shuo, the power and speed of the arrows indicating that the strength of these archers was out of the ordinary. However, even before the arrow rain could reach Han Shuo, Han Shuo¡¯s skeletal staff shook, causing several towering bone shields to appear in all directions, blocking off the entire arrow rain.

    Han Shuo¡¯s speed exceeded Aubrey¡¯s imagination. When Aubrey turned his head to take a look, the cold and vicious Han Shuo was actually only a short distance away from him.

    ¡°Be careful!¡± Crespo suddenly shouted loudly, the silver spear in his hand thrust like a drill at high speed toward Han Shuo. Han Shuo turned his head to nce at Crespo before raising his right hand. The Demonyer Edge turned into a sh of ck light and stabbed toward the spear point with a swish.

    ¡°ng!¡±

    A magnificent radiance blossomed. Crespo only felt an enormous force rush into his body through the spear, rushing from his arm into his five viscera and six bowels, causing severe wounds to his divine body in a sh. He couldn¡¯t help but spit out a mouthful of blood, hisplexion pale as he continued to retreat.

    ¡°Dong!¡± Crespo¡¯s silver spear had actually been split into two as it fell on the stone floor.

    The excessive might of the Demonyer Edge didn¡¯t decrease as it continued like a shadow toward Crespo¡¯s chest. Even before Crespo could stand firmly, there was merely a ¡°puu¡± sound as the Demonyer Edge prated Crespo¡¯s silver armor and cut open arge hole in his chest.

    As a piercing pain spread from his chest, Crespo¡¯s pale face was filled with despair as he looked in a daze at the hole in his chest. With ast ¡°How is that possible¡±, he copsed loudly soon after.

    Aubrey was terror-stricken, reckless escaping into the distance, no longer caring about the lives of the others.

    Crespo was the main assistance for this operation. He was a sky rider and after joining the Church of Light¡¯s Temple Knights, because of his pious belief toward the God of Light, he had received additional divine protection and was much stronger than an ordinary sky rider.

    The silver spear and his bright silver armor were both items that only high-ranking Temple Knights possessed. They were both extremely high-quality items in the eyes of all cksmiths within the continent. The spear and armor both contained divine energy. Who would have thought that under the attack of that weapon, they were broken apart like paper mache, causing Aubrey to tremble in fear.

    Aubrey who was fleeing with all his might clearly didn¡¯t realize that Han Shuo¡¯s speed far exceeded his own. Even before Aubrey could leave Boozt Merchant Guild¡¯s area of influence, a cold shout was heard behind him. Aubrey was overwhelmed with shock, disregarding everything to start using the teleportation spell which he was yet to be proficient in.

    As a space archmage, Aubrey¡¯sprehension of space magic could only be considered a drop in the ocean. He was unable to freely teleport short distances unlike space grand magi like Emma.

    However, Aubrey had no other choice as matters stand. He knew in his heart that he absolutely wasn¡¯t a match for Han Shuo. Since he had no hope of escaping through speed, he could only brave death and use that yet to be mastered spatial magic.

    When people are in dire straits they would always burst forth with sometent potential. Aubrey who usually needed two seconds to cast a magic spell only used one second to cast the unmastered spell. Before Han Shuo neared Aubrey, he suddenly felt violent spatial fluctuations from Aubrey¡¯s surroundings.

    The space suddenly shattered like a mirror. Aubrey was aghast and howled miserably. His body seemed to be within the broken space, split into several fragments. When the space returned to normal, Aubrey had disappeared without a trace. Han Shuo stood unmoving, apprehensive about the space magic. The effect of recklessly using unfamiliar magic would sometimes be much more powerful than standard space magic. Aubrey was clearly in such a situation. When Han Shuo saw Aubrey¡¯s body split in tandem with the space around him, he assumed that there must have been a problem with the spell and hence Aubrey had thrown away his life with it.

    If Han Shuo had suddenly entered that region before it returned to normal, he would very possibly be affected by the spell and unable to escape. On the off chance that he ends up in an alternate space, Han Shuo would really feel like crying.

    Aubrey¡¯s status was unknown, but Han Shuo felt that most likely he was dead. Without wasting any more time, Han Shuo immediately headed to Phoebe¡¯s side, holding onto Phoebe again and said hastily, ¡°We should leave first. I reckon that Lawrence¡¯s location would be the most dangerous!¡±

    Phoebe was startled yet happy, startled when she heard Han Shuo describe Lawrence¡¯s danger. She knew that Lawrence was the most crucial person. For Ashburn to dare to attack her so brazenly, Lawrence was probably in deep trouble as well.

    If Lawrence was killed, Eldest Prince Charles and Duke Ashburn would truly be able to control the situation. If that happens, the only remaining option for Han Shuo and herself would be to escape.

    Her happiness stemmed from the fact that Han Shuo clearly knew that Lawrence was in greater danger, but he still prioritized her rescue. This clearly proved that her importance to Han Shuo was above all else. Even though Lawrence¡¯s survival would bring Han Shuo greater power and benefits, Han Shuo had stille to save her first in such an important situation. Phoebe was truly touched by this.

    ¡°What about them?¡± Phoebe immediately agreed but inquired about the guards and the few merchants from the Boozt Merchant Guild beside her.

    ¡°Let them flee by themselves. Don¡¯t worry, the remaining enemies are confronting my undead creatures. They simply have no chance to attack them again.¡± Han Shuo hastily instructed.

    ¡°Miss, you two should leave first. We know what to do.¡± The guard leader hurried said to Phoebe.

    Phoebe hesitated for a moment before nodding and saying, ¡°Alright then. All of you take care too. Quickly leave this ce.¡±

    Han Shuo no longer said any superfluous words, holding Phoebe by the waist and directly flying toward Lawrence¡¯s mansion.

    ¡°Bastard, how could you do that in public?¡± As Phoebe was grabbed by the waist, she smelt Han Shuo¡¯s familiar smell. Her tender and beautiful face was red from blushing as she resentfully chided him.

    ¡°What¡¯s your concern? In any case, all of them know that you are my woman.¡± Han Shuo casually replied, clearly not at all embarrassed.

    ¡°You, you still dare to say that. I haven¡¯t forgiven you!¡± Phoebe hatefully rolled her eyes at Han Shuo, her residual anger yet to fade.

    ¡°We¡¯ll talk about thister. Don¡¯t talk anymore, we need to quickly find Lawrence. If Lawrence has indeed died, I will immediately bring you away from Ossen City and return at the fastest speed to my Brettel City.¡± Han Shuo replied.

    ¡°Bryan, it seems like you don¡¯t care about Lawrence¡¯s life or death. Is that true?¡± Phoebe looked astonishedly at Han Shuo with some uncertainty.

    ¡°No. I¡¯m merely being realistic and stating the facts. If I didn¡¯t care about Lawrence¡¯s fate, I wouldn¡¯t be going to save him now. Alright, no more talking!¡± Han Shuo casually replied before suddenly increasing his speed, heading toward Lawrence¡¯s mansion like a streak of lightning.

    Ever since Han Shuo knew that Lawrence had purposely made friends with him with ulterior motives, he had no longer treated Lawrence as a true friend. Lawrence who thought deeply and nned everything carefully had only been acting for his own interests. Han Shuo understood this and didn¡¯t feel any resentment toward Lawrence¡¯s actions.

    However, it was also impossible for Han Shuo to not have any ill-feelings! Merely, Han Shuo¡¯s interests were firmly tied to Lawrence. Only if Lawrence ascended the throne would Han Shuo be able to obtain the most benefits. Although this rtionship which was purely based on benefits was firm, it wouldn¡¯t involve too much personal feelings.

    It can only be said that Han Shuo going to Lawrence¡¯s aid was entirely for his own interests and not because of personal rtions between them. Hence, Han Shuo didn¡¯t have much feelings regarding Lawrence¡¯s life or death. That was why he had an apathetic expression when talking about Lawrence¡¯s situation.

    Soaring mes could be seen from afar even before they reached Lawrence¡¯s mansion, illuminating the moonless night. The fire from Lawrence¡¯s mansion was really too conspicuous.

    There were also mansions of other nobles in the surroundings of Lawrence¡¯s mansion. However, these mansions were untouched, the gates firmly shut without a single person emerging to take a look, as though they had suddenly be blind and deaf, ignoring the sound of activitying from Lawrence¡¯s mansion. All of them seemed to have sunk into the deepest sleep.

    As Han Shuo nced at the strangely silent mansions, the mystic demons had made a loop at a high altitude, suddenly realizing that the people within these seemingly silent mansions were simrly losing their head out of fear. However, at the strict orders of their owners, no one dared to make a sound and no one was curious enough to exit the mansion to take a look.

    This was the best example of the hypocrisy of the world. The nobles within these mansions were not Lawrence¡¯s closest allies. Most of them had yet to indicate which side they supported and hence luckily escaped a cmity. The older nobles all knew what they were doing, realizing that the only people within the entire Lancelot Empire who dared to attack Lawrence¡¯s residence were Ashburn and Eldest Prince Charles. They were not people these nobles could contend against and thus, being a bystander was the most sensible decision.

    ¡°Rumble...¡±

    A huge bang could be heard from within Lawrence¡¯s mansion. From afar, Han Shuo saw many tall buildings copse loudly. Within the dark sky, two gold figures were extremely gaudy as they soared uninhibitedly over several buildings. Gold light would frequently sh out and would result in the copse of another building.

    Slender gorges would appear after the shes of gold light. The magic barriers surrounding Lawrence¡¯s entire residence was constantly being destroyed and many servants were killed in session, their corpses lying in disarray.

    Several knights dressed in brown, silver and grey armors, as well as several white, red and ck robed magi, surrounded Lawrence¡¯s mansion from all directions. These people included experts under Ashburn, experts under Eldest Prince Charles as well as experts dispatched by the Church of Light.

    When Han Shuo and Phoebe almost reached that area, a mystic demon had finally approached in advance, suddenly detecting the two figures that were constantly soaring uninhibitedly. One of them was actually sacred swordmaster Karel, while the other was a golden-haired elder who donned gold knight armor.

    The golden-haired elder held a gold pike and there was a symbol of an angel on the chest te of his gold armor. The angel design was extremely lifelike, its wings appearing to be continuously pping.

    The angel engraved on the Temple Knight¡¯s chest was a symbol that he had been blessed by the God of Light. Every Temple Knight that possesses the angel engravement had frightening strengthparable to sacred knights. If the Temple Knight was also personally a sacred knight, his strength would be even more terrifying.

    However, these kind of Temple Knights were extremely rare within the Church of Light. They would definitely not leave the Temple of Light under normal situations. It is said that only when evil heretics that spheme the God of Light appear would these rarely seen Temple Knights leave the Temple of Light, delivering punishment on these heretics on behalf of the God of Light.

    Han Shuo had never expected to actually see one within the Lancelot Empire and was thoroughly shocked. As strands of gold light flowed from the gold pike in the Temple Knight¡¯s hand, a matchless sacred aura proliferated, giving Han Shuo an extremely indisposed feeling.

    Only sacred knights and sacred swordmasters possessed gold fighting aura. For this Temple Knight to be able to unleash gold fighting aura, it proved that he was a sacred knight. In the event such a formidable existence obtains the blessing of the God of Light, his frightful personal strength will be shocking. Han Shuo merely took a look and already secretly started worrying for sacred swordmaster Karel.

    With so many experts besieging Lawrence¡¯s mansion, Han Shuo naturally wouldn¡¯t charge in stupidly. He hurriedly summoned the earth zombie to create a tunnel leading to the center of Lawrence¡¯s mansion before bringing Phoebe along and entered the tunnel.

 Chapter 413: Hiding underground

    GDK 413 ¨C Hiding underground

    Seeing arge hole appearing from the earth, Phoebe was filled with questions, her eyes gleaming as she looked at the earth zombie that had created the passageway.

    As the earth zombie headed forward, even the most exquisite pangolins didn¡¯t have his remarkable ability to split the earth. The earth in front of him automatically pulled back and scattered, splitting open a continuously extending passage at a speed visible to the naked eye, allowing him to travel effortlessly.

    ¡°What, what kind of earth magic is this?¡± Phoebe who followed behind Han Shuo closely had watched for a while and was unable to suppress her curiosity, her astonishment written all over her face as she looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°It¡¯s not rted to magic.¡± Han Shuo replied. He knitted his brows to consider for a moment before reluctantly exining, ¡°As a matter of fact, this is somewhat simr to the martial technique I practice. It¡¯s an existence that is neither within the realm of fighting aura nor magic.¡±

    Phoebe¡¯s jaw dropped, her lips opened wide in surprise. She stared nkly at Han Shuo as she said, ¡°Apart from those two women, it seems like there are many other things that you are hiding from me!¡±

    ¡°There isn¡¯t! It is just that this matter is hard to exin. The martial technique I practice is totally different from the schools of magic and fighting aura and there are also someplexities. Hence, you might not understand even if I exined it to you.¡± Han Shuo smiled bitterly as he replied, tightly grasping Phoebe¡¯s hand.

    Phoebe rolled her eyes in anger at Han Shuo, thinking inwardly that she definitely had to watch him closely in the future. This fellow has been extremely lecherous all along and simply can¡¯t resist enticement. Once hees across gorgeous women he would always be unable to resist and have devious thoughts. If things continued this way, there¡¯s no knowing how much emotional debt he would cause!

    ¡°Alright, we have reached. Be more focused, don¡¯t let your thoughts wander!¡± While Phoebe was pondering silently, Han Shuo suddenly said seriously as he looked toward the slope.

    The earth zombie stood in ce without moving as it waited for Han Shuo and Phoebe to approach. He then turned around to send Han Shuo a message, ¡°Father, should I immediately create an opening to the surface?¡±

    Unknowingly, the little skeleton, earth, wood, fire and water zombies have all gotten used to addressing Han Shuo as their father. Han Shuo was extremely ufortable at the start but had unexpectedly slowly gotten used to it. As the calls of ¡°Father¡± entered his heart, it actually gave Han Shuo a feeling of novelty.

    It was as if these five undead creatures that Han Shuo had refined had truly be his flesh and blood, actually causing Han Shuo to feel unwilling to part with them. If Han Shuo didn¡¯tmunicate with the five zombies for a period of time, he would have a faint longing and worry for them, afraid that they would encounter an ident in theherworld.

    ¡°Let¡¯s wait awhile.¡± Han Shuo replied before turning to Phoebe and said, ¡°The exit is right above us. We are currently right below Lawrence and the rest. We shouldn¡¯t hastily head up immediately, so as to avoid Lawrence and the rest attacking us recklessly without understanding the situation. You should stay here temporarily, I¡¯ll see if I can give your master a hand.¡±

    ¡°My master, how is my master?¡± Although Han Shuo was able to observe the situation outside through the mystical demons, Phoebe naturally didn¡¯t have such an ability. Upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯sment, she was puzzled and questioned further.

    ¡°He met with some trouble.¡± Han Shuo exined.

    ¡°How is that possible? My master is a sacred swordmaster. How could he encounter any trouble?¡± Phoebe had a blind confidence in Karel, smiling lightly as she asked Han Shuo, her expression not showing any nervousness.

    ¡°Your master is currently battling with a Temple Knight from the Church of Light. He is a sacred knight from the Church of Light, apart from the fighting aura he has, the sacred knight has also obtained the blessing of God.¡± Han Shuo had an imposing expression as he exined to Phoebe.

    Phoebe¡¯s expression suddenly changed. She clearly knew some information of the Church of Light and hastily cried out, ¡°How is that possible, my master once mentioned that the number of such strong Temple Knights could be counted with one hand. Why has he left the Temple of Light?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know either!¡± Han Shuo replied, creasing his brows as he thought in his heart. Could it be because of me?

    ¡°Act quickly then, I don¡¯t want my master to be harmed. Although I know my master¡¯s strength, there have always been stories about these formidable Temple Knights from the Church of Light spreading through the continent. These stories all describe the power of such a character, hence I can¡¯t help but feel worried about my master.¡± Phoebe¡¯s expression was filled with impatience due to her worry for her master.

    Han Shuo nodded and withdrew with the earth zombie.

    Above them, sacred swordmaster Karel and the Church of Light¡¯s sacred knight were battling nonstop, causing buildings to copse one after another. There were many deep gorges in the earth where sword light had passed by. Enormous power proliferated from both of them, causing everyone in the surroundings to frantically keep their distance so as to avoid being affected by the shockwaves.

    Han Shuo was able to observe the battle above him clearly through two mystical demons. Han Shuo who remained underground wandered through the passages that the earth zombie constantly established, constantly lingering at the sacred knight¡¯snding areas in preparation of mounting a sneak attack when the opportunity presents itself.

    The golden-haired elder who wielded the golden pike looked like a moving block of gold from afar. The golden armor on his body was iparably firm while brilliant golden light shone as he brandished his pike, extremely dazzling in the dark night. Karel¡¯s expression was heavy as his while hair fluttered,unching a Cross sh everytime he extended his longsword.

    Karel was clearly going all out in this battle, with every Cross shrger and containing much more power than when he was sparring with Han Shuo. These Cross shes were like revolving sickles, bursting apart rocks and copsing buildings in their paths, destroying every single obstruction.

    The sacred knight was serene, singing a song of faith toward the God of Light. Under the blessing of God, his armor was as hard as diamonds. Every thrust also glittered in golden light, interweaved with a bizarre sacred aura as it exploded every approaching Cross sh into specks.

    The battle between two peak experts caused Lawrence¡¯s mansion to appear as if it encounteredndslides and cracks on the earth. None of the numerous experts in the surroundings dared to approach, afraid that they would be suddenly torn apart by fighting aura.

    During this process, even more soldiers and knights had headed here from afar, surrounding Lawrence¡¯s mansion withyers of encirclement. The circumstances for Lawrence¡¯s side was bing more and more unfavorable.

    The terrifying battle between the two experts above caused Han Shuo to be extremely mind-blown. Han Shuo could clearly see every movement made through two mystical demons. At this moment, he suddenly realized that Karel had indeed not used his full strength previously. Otherwise, he would definitely have been defeated.

    While the two experts were battling, Han Shuo borrowed the earth zombie¡¯s powers to rapidly shuttle through the earth, attempting to suddenlyunch a fatal attack toward the sacred knight. Han Shuo faintly felt that the sacred knight¡¯s target was perhaps himself. Although taking advantage of someone else¡¯s attack to mount a sneak attack was somewhat contemptible, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t able to care so much about that.

    Under the actions of the earth zombie, there were already criss-crossed tunnels underground. While Han Shuo observed the battle with the help of the mystical demon, he also constantly traveled around, ready at any moment for apse in concentration from the sacred knight to suddenly appear from underground to give him a painful lesson.

    ¡°Karel, I feel you should bravely withdraw. You simply won¡¯t be able to control the current situation by yourself. As your friend for many years, I truly cannot bear to see you have such an ending.

    As long as you abandon Lawrence, I, Dempus, can promise that you will be able to peacefully enjoy yourter years and all your disciples apart from Lawrence will be safe and sound.¡± A grey-haired old magus past his prime suddenly sighed from afar. His voice didn¡¯t seem very loud but still resonated through every corner of Lawrence¡¯s mansion.

    Han Shuo who had been constantly staring at the sacred knight¡¯s steps naturally also heard the old magus Dempus¡¯ words and couldn¡¯t resist sending one of the mystical demons to watch this old magus.

    ng!

    A lump of dazzling golden light blossomed from the location of the voice, standing out like ring sunlight in the pitch-ck night sky. However, the light disappeared in a sh.

    ¡°Dempus you old bastard, you clearly know of astrologer Grace¡¯s prophecy. Yet you actually dare to disregard the future of Lancelot Empire. You will be a sinner of the Lancelot Empire for all eternity, do you know that?¡± Karel whonded after an exchange with the sacred knight glowered at Dempus and berated furiously.

    ¡°To the God of Light, the insignificant astrologer is merely unorthodox sorcery. Karel, you are an amazing opponent. It is a pity that you have been led astray yet obstinately unwilling to change your ways. Those who go against the God of Light will definitely not have a good ending!¡± The sacred knightnded on a dpidated roof and sighed.

    Han Shuo was currently right underneath the sacred knight. However, the sacred knight wasn¡¯t locked in battle with Karel at this moment. If Han Shuo was to mount a sneak attack at this moment, he would definitely not obtain the desired result and would very likely be wounded by the sacred knight. Hence Han Shuo didn¡¯t act rashly.

    ¡°Karel, I know that Lawrence is your disciple. However, he is just an illegitimate child. Such a person definitely can¡¯t be Lancelot Empire¡¯s new king, it¡¯s better if you renounce him. I¡¯m feeling somewhat impatient. If you still don¡¯te to your senses, I¡¯ll have no choice but to act personally.¡± The old magus said grudgingly.

    In the distance, Lawrence¡¯s expression was extremely unsightly, his eyes having an ominous glint as he looked at the old magus who addressed him as a bastard as if itching to charge forward and rip that old magus into pieces.

    ¡°You dare?¡± Karel shouted indignantly, raising his longsword and charged toward the old magus.

    ¡°You won¡¯t be able to make it!¡± The sacred knight who stood on another roof smiled as he eximed, brandishing his gold pike and obstructed Karel once again. Brilliant golden light started to shoot out once again.

    ¡°Since you insist on defending that bastard, in that case, I have to regretfully tell you, old friend, I won¡¯t dy any longer.¡± The old magus in the distance grudgingly said, taking out an earthen yellow magic staff that was embedded with many gems from his spatial ring.

    Rich earth element suddenly erupted from deep within the earth, rushing from all directions toward the old magus. He had yet to chant any incantations, yet had such a strong absorption of magic elements. This caused Han Shuo¡¯s expression to change abruptly.

    Dempus? Earth sacred magus Dempus Geier? Han Shuo suddenly came to his senses as he hesitated for a moment. He then immediately gave an order to the earth zombie, rapidly heading in the direction of earth sacred magus Dempus.

    Although the sacred knight was simrly extremely threatening, if the sacred magus Dempus could casually release earth magic, perhaps arge-scale killing magic would be enough topletely decimate Lawrence¡¯s group of people.

    Earth magic in the hands of a sacred magus would perhaps cause several mysterious restrictions to the earth. Han Shuo was worried that this person¡¯s presence would affect the earth zombie¡¯s power underground and hence hastily abandoned the constantly watched sacred knight and rushed toward the direction of Dempus Geier.

    ¡°The boundless power of the earth...¡± Dempus Geier chanted solemnly as he held his magic staff.

    As the rich earth element erupted underground, it gradually caused slight tremors to form. Han Shuo who was currently underground was able to clearly feel the sudden increase of energy within the earth. Han Shuo cautiously concealed his aurapletely and continued flying toward Dempus withouting into contact with any soil.

    As the earth element was everywhere underground, Han Shuo was afraid thating into contact with the earth will cause Dempus who was focusing his attention on releasing earth magic to notice. As the darling of the earth, the earth zombie was identical to the power of the earth. He could be seen as the vast earth and thus Han Shuo wasn¡¯t the slightest worried that the earth zombie would be discovered.

    ¡°Father, there¡¯s a change happening to the earth. My current strength is unable to prevent this change, but I¡¯m able to change its direction. Should I change its direction?¡± As Han Shuo was charging toward Dempus, the earth zombie suddenly sent a message.

    Han Shuo was stunned for a moment before hastily inquiring, ¡°What do you mean?¡±

    ¡°The power contained within the earth will form an enormous earthquake. There will be many tears in the earth. I can¡¯t prevent that situation from happening, but I am able to change the location of the earthquake, altering where the appears!¡± The earth zombie earnestly replied.

    Han Shuo only stared nkly for a few seconds but soon after replied estastically, ¡°Very good, alter the location of this earthquake and ce it at that old fellow¡¯s surroundings. Precisely where the most people have gathered!¡±

    Han Shuo was overjoyed at the unexpected good news as he instructed the earth zombie. He held onto the Demonyer Edge, already reaching the area under earth sacred magus Dempus. He then unfeelingly condensed demonic yuan energy as he stabbed upwards with his entire body.

 Chapter 414: Hatred

    GDK 414 ¨C Hatred

    ¡°... With my willpower as a guide, Shatter Earth!¡± Earth sacred magus Dempus finallypleted the long and tedious incantation.

    Sacred magus Dempus¡¯ grey eyebrows suddenly creased. He sensed that the direction of the flow of the earth element underground seemed to be somewhat uncontroble. This was a situation that had never appeared in ten years, causing him to be under the impression that due to his age, did he recite a syble of the incantation wrongly?

    Just as Dempus was somewhat muddle-headed, he suddenly felt a soaring killing intent from underneath his feet. The killing intent was not concealed the slightest. When he had just sensed it, the killing intent had already torn through the solid ground, piercing toward him like an all-conquering sharp sword.

    Earth sacred magus Dempus was terrified and no longer had the time to set the out of control ¡®Shatter Earth¡¯ right. All his attention was on the danger that suddenly arrived. The soaring killing intent that tore apart the solid ground appeared blood red in color as it stabbed toward his sole.

    Warning bells sounded in Dempus¡¯ head, suddenly jumping off the ground in panic and utilizing the levitation skill to fly into the sky. He hastily cast the ¡®Earth Armor¡¯ spell at the same time, causing rich earth element to frantically converge from all directions onto his body.

    A greyish-brown armor was condensed from the dense earth element, covering earth sacred magus Dempus¡¯ body in a sh. He also released a tenfold gravity magic, only enveloping the area under his feet. Han Shuo who was charging upwards at lightning speed suddenly felt the pressure increase tenfold just as the Demonyer Edge was about to stab into the sole of Dempus. His rocketing speed was unknowingly dyed. Han Shuo made a prompt decision, frantically pouring demonic yuan energy into the Demonyer Edge while his body suddenly fell.

    The Demonyer Edge infused with demonic yuan energy suddenly burst out in a myriad of blood-colored light, no longer being affected by gravity after hovering in the air for a moment. With the blood-colored light chopping upward, the Demonyer Edge exploded toward earth sacred magus Dempus.

    Dempus was dumbstruck. He no longer had the time to cast another spell, using his entire strength to smash downward with his magic staff without the slightest hesitation. The interior of his magic staff had simrly rich in earth element, bing as hard as diamond.

    There was a sharp screech as the two weapons collided. Dempus¡¯s magic staff was shattered into pieces by the Demonyer Edge. The Demonyer Edge which was like an arrow at the end of its flight, but still persisted in bombarding Dempus, enveloping Dempus who was covered in earth armor, discharging thest of its energy into Dempus¡¯ body.

    Dempus¡¯ earth armor didn¡¯t have any marks but strands of cold aura from the Demonyer Edge had prated the physical defenses of the earth armor and directly enter Dempus¡¯ frail body. Earth sacred magus Dempus shivered, his eyebrows suddenly freezing.

    It was only at this moment that some experts that were by Dempus¡¯ side hade to their senses. Many spells and weapons shot toward the Demonyer Edge in a sh. The Demonyer Edge snaked around like a python, avoid a majority of the attacks before suddenly entering the ground and disappearing.

    Rumble...

    At the same moment, the rumbling sounds of an earthquake could suddenly be heard from under their feet. These knights and soldiers started losing their bnce and swaying around. Out of a sudden, numerous earth spikes appeared from the ground, killing some soldiers and knights who were unable to dodge in time.

    Apanying the fierce rumbling sound, the earth suddenly split open with many gorges, with the bottomless gorges swallowing tens of lives.

    Momentarily, the area with Dempus at the center had be the main area affected by the ¡®Shatter Earth¡¯ spell. As the rumbling continued, people were constantly killed by the astonishing might of the earth magic.

    Dempus could sense the scattered cold aura within his body, feeling his body turn cold like winter. His limbs suddenly became somewhat stiff and numb. He was so cold that he emitted cold air all over, with signs of freezing already appearing on his hair and eyebrows.

    Dempus clearly realized the abnormal movement under his feet but at this moment, his limbs were frozen from the cold aura and he was unable to suppress the anomaly under his feet. He could only shiver as he watched the huge number of casualties caused by his earth magic.

    ¡°Lord Magus, what-what is going on?¡± a Temple Knight from the Church of Light who was being pulled up from a gorge by a White Priest looked furiously at Dempus who floating in the air and reproached. ¡°Kaka, kaka...¡± Dempus panicked, attempting to exin that all these weren¡¯t his fault, but he was only able to let out some trembling sounds.

    ¡°Is Lord Magus too old, to have actually made a mistake with such a crucial spell. Do you know how many experts we lost because of your error?¡± Another White Priest of the Church of Light said, simrly looking furious.

    Sacred swordmaster Karel who was charging over hurriedly from afar suddenly sensed something odd from Dempus¡¯ location. Karel was filled with doubts. He sent a few Cross shes to force the sacred knight to retreat before looking into the distance at Dempus¡¯ location. He suddenly came to a realization, abandoning the sacred knight to turn around and fly toward Lawrence¡¯s location.

    The survivors by Dempus¡¯ side were in a flurry to pick up the pieces, not having the time to care about Han Shuo who had gone underground once again. They rescued theirrades who were still hanging onto the gorges as well as help those who were only injured by the earth spikes to treat their wounds.

    Han Shuo rapidly distanced himself from Dempus¡¯ area after he attacked as the Demonyer Edge returned to his hand. Han Shuo had unknowingly arrived underneath the Church of Light¡¯s sacred knight. He calmly observed the sacred knight through a mystical demon. Han Shuo realized that the sacred knight was looking at Dempus in puzzlement, his brows wrinkled as though he was contemting something.

    Han Shuo held his breath in rapt attention, not in a hurry to act. He merely paid attention to the change in the sacred knight¡¯s expression through the mystical demons, looking for the most opportune moment to strike a fatal blow to the sacred knight. The sacred knight was looking at Dempus in puzzlement when he suddenly seemed to have understood something. His expression changed from puzzlement to anxiety, vibrating the golden pike in his hand and hurried toward Dempus, appearing to want to help Dempus disperse the cold aura within his body.

    Han Shuo, who had been waiting for the opportune moment, suddenly unleashing the same skill, once again using the Demonyer Edge¡¯s all-conquering sharpness to split apart the ground and stab toward the sole of the sacred knight¡¯s left leg that had not moved.

    A tremendous killing intent that couldn¡¯t be masked caused the sacred knight¡¯s expression to change drastically. Soon after, he suddenly retracted his right foot that had taken a step forward. A mixture of divine energy and fighting aura suddenly shot out from his right sole. Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge had just pierced the ground when the torrent of energy rushed violently toward him.

    Rumble...

    The sacred knight stamped his right foot. Arge ball of golden light suddenly entered the ground with his foot at its center, suddenly creating a round hole.

    Han Shuo totally didn¡¯t foresee that the sacred knight would react so quickly. The Demonyer Edge had yet to pierce his left foot when the terrifying force that erupted from his right foot arrived. The soft ground suddenly became as heavy as a mountain under the strength of his stamp, bing so firm that it stopped Han Shuo¡¯s sneak attack while underground.

    ¡°Hehe, Marquis Bryan, I knew it was you!¡± The sacred knightughed heartily, suddenly piercing his golden pike which was trembling with golden light into the hole under his foot. In a moment, needle-like fighting aura punctured the ground, violently shooting toward Han Shuo at high speed. The strands of golden fighting aura contained divine energy which Han Shuo loathed and were so quick that Han Shuo was unable to dodge, appearing in front of Han Shuo in a sh.

    As he cursed in his heart, Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge condensed a ck screen from demonic yuan energy, resisting the pration of the strands of fighting aura. His body hurriedly formed a protective shield, forming a secondyer of defense against the attack of the golden strands.

    The ck screen condensed in a hurry broke like an eggshell when encountering the fifty-seventh strand of golden light. The remaining strands of golden light struck Han Shuo like golden lightning. Han Shuo only felt like his body was being pierced continuously by steel needles. His tenacious body was unable to withstand it, suddenly spitting out a mouthful of blood.

    As the protective shield dulled, Han Shuo appeared as if he was struck by tens of arrows, his body suddenly having many additional finger sized holes. Even his forehead had three wounds, causing Han Shuo¡¯s handsome face to be ruined and to look extremely terrifying.

    ¡°Brat, I knew long ago that you harbor malicious intentions and have been waiting for your sneak attack. Hehe, you are still too inexperienced!¡± The sacred knight¡¯sughter could be heard from above. He raised his pike, intending to attack Han Shuo again.

    This was the greatest defeat Han Shuo had suffered since he started cultivating. He cursed the ancestors of the sacred knight in his heart, realizing that his n to mount a sneak attack had been seen through long ago and had instead ended up worse off. He resisted the urge to charge out and go all out against the sacred knight. Han Shuo didn¡¯t wait for the sacred knight¡¯s next wave of attacks, making a prompt decision to return along his original path.

    Having trained till his current level, as long as Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness didn¡¯t scatter and the demonic infant wasn¡¯t destroyed, he would still be able to recover no matter the degree of injury to his physical body. Hence, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t worried about his disfigured face. As there were too many opposing experts, Han Shuo knew that forcing his way out was useless. Even though he felt extremely unwilling in his heart, he had no choice but to retreat.

    The earth zombie who had just wrecked earth sacred magus Dempus¡¯ ¡®Shatter Earth¡¯ spell suddenly felt the boundless wrath and resentment in Han Shuo¡¯s heart. The earth zombie disobeyed Han Shuo¡¯s instructions for the first time and actually stubbornly emerging from within the ground. All of a sudden, thousands of earth spikes rose from the ground.

    The ground became like a continuous sea of trees rising indefinitely. When the sacred knight was looking unstable, the naive earth zombie had already disregarded everything and charged toward the sacred knight. As he charged, lumps of earth flew up and adhered to the earth zombie¡¯s body.

    In an extremely short time, the earth zombie was covered in numerous clumps of soil, forming a ten-meter tall y man. His original naive look could no longer be seen, as though he had merged with the earth as he ferociously walked toward the sacred knight who was somewhat in a daze.

    ¡°No!¡± Han Shuo who was deep underground suddenly screamed his lungs out, flying into the sky once again in spite of his body being drenched in blood from his injuries and charging anxiously toward the sacred knight.

    However, even before Han Shuo could reach the sacred knight, his golden pike had suddenly shot out a ring golden light, with the pike stabbing into the middle of the sole of the ten meter tall y man the earth zombie had transformed into, causing a torrent of energy to suddenly erupt and charge into the earth zombie¡¯s body.

    The earth zombie¡¯s body that was formed from soil suddenly shot out gold light after the golden light from the sacred knight entered its body. Soon after, the earth on his body started falling piece by piece. The earth zombie who had returned to its original size was struck by a beam of golden light, suddenly flying backward. Arge chunk of his naturally formed armor had sunk in at the chest.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes turned red. He had never been as angry as he was at this moment. The little skeleton and the other zombies in the other ne all transmitted strong messages of wanting toe to this ne and join strengths with Han Shuo to savagely retaliate against the enemy who dared to harm Han Shuo and the earth zombie.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t lose his rationality, forcefully obstructing the strong desire of the little skeleton and the rest. When he saw the earth zombie actually struggling in an attempt to charge toward that sacred knight once again for revenge once hended on the ground, Han Shuo choked with emotion as he shouted, ¡°Idiot!¡±

    Soon after, Han Shuo ignored the earth zombie¡¯s stubborn desire, chanting at the fastest speed in his life and forcefully sent this naive earth zombie back to theherworld.

    ¡°Stupid undead creature, truly courting death!¡± The sacred knightughed as he looked at Han Shuo, pointing his pike toward Han Shuo and said, ¡°My target this time is you. Your strength is pretty good, no wonder you are able to force Kosse to retreat twice! However, your good luck ends here!¡±

    Han Shuo had never hated someone the way he did now. Until now, Han Shuo¡¯s attitude toward the Church of Light had always been to ignore them, only adopting measures to counterattack. It was only when the earth zombie was injured because of him that Han Shuo was truly determined to oppose the Church of Light till one party is eliminated.

    Staring at the sacred knight who had a rxed expression, Han Shuo breathed violently, ignoring the blood flowing from his wounds. Blood flowed out from the wounds on the bridge of his nose and his left cheek due to his stirred up emotions, causing him to look like a demon that had walked out from the depths of hell.

    ¡°I¡¯ll remember you. For every day I live, the Church of Light will never have another day of peace!¡± Han Shuo unhurriedly dered word by word before turning around and flying toward Karel with the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens.

    Lancelot Empire¡¯s space sacred magus Sabakas had unknowingly appeared and was currently drawing a teleportation array under Lawrence¡¯s feet. Apart from Sabakas who was concentrating on drawing the magic array, everyone else had their eyes fixed on Han Shuo.

    Tears constantly fell from Phoebe¡¯s eyes, but she was forcefully restrained by Karel, preventing her from attempting to fly to Han Shuo¡¯s side.

 Chapter 415: Miraculous speed of recovery

    GDK 415 ¨C Miraculous speed of recovery

    When the sacred knight who had injured Han Shuo saw Han Shuo turn around to fly toward Lawrence, he hesitated for a moment but did not pursue and attack.

    Apart from sacred swordmaster Karel, there was also space sacred magus in the direction Han Shuo flew in. With two sacred ranked experts there and earth sacred magus Dempus yet to recover, the sacred knight clearly felt some apprehension.

    With the sacred knight not daring to act blindly, the experts from the Church of Light as well as under Ashburn and Prince Charles naturally wouldn¡¯t foolishly charge forward to their deaths. Hence, they all looked on helplessly as Han Shuo shouted vicious words before flying rapidly toward Lawrence¡¯s side.

    As of now, Lawrence¡¯s residence had been thoroughly wrecked by the fight between the two sacred ranked experts and the ¡®Shatter Earth¡¯ spell. All that could be seen were copsed buildings and destion.

    The servants, workers and maids in Lawrence¡¯s residence had long since been massacred. Currently there were merely less than ten trusted aides by Lawrence¡¯s side. In contrast, even after the losses to the ¡®Shatter Earth¡¯ spell, the enemy still had almost four hundred experts with astonishing strength from various professions. The sounds of iron hoofs could be heard gradually approaching, seeming that there were still reinforcement troops heading over.

    Earth sacred magus Dempus lightly exhaled as strands of purple specks floated out of his body. The cold aura that prated the bones was diffused out with the purple specks.

    Dempus was after all a sacred magus and was extremely proficient in manipting mental energy. Although the invasion of the cold aura was able to chill and even freeze his body, once he came to his senses and used his mental energy to dispel the chilliness, the cold aura was clearly unable to threaten his life.

    Furthermore, when the cold aura from the Demonyer Edge entered his body, it was after he had resisted it twice with magic. Only a few strands of the dense cold poison was able to enter his body. A magus at his level naturally wouldn¡¯t be killed that easily by a few strands of cold poison.

    After Dempus dispelled the cold aura within his body, he still had some lingering fears. Fortunately, he had reacted promptly and there were many experts guarding by his side. Otherwise, if Han Shuo had the opportunity to attack after Dempus was affected by the cold poison, his life might truly have been lost.

    Such a frightening martial technique! Dempus felt aghast, gazing toward the faraway Han Shuo who was wounded from head to toe but still appearing malevolent as he headed toward Lawrence. He thought in his heart about astrologer Grace¡¯s prophecy that this person would bring prosperity to Lancelot Empire. Could it really be true?

    ¡°Bryan, are-are you ok?¡± Phoebe struggled with all her might to escape from Karel¡¯s grasp, tearfully rushing toward Han Shuo, her delicate hands trembling as she caressed the terrible wounds on Han Shuo¡¯s face.

    ¡°It¡¯s nothing, don¡¯t need to worry!¡± Han Shuo gave an unsightly grin as he consoled Phoebe who was crying uncontrobly. He reached out to grab Phoebe¡¯s hand which was caressing the wounds on his face and walked toward Lawrence.

    Lawrence¡¯s expression was filled with concern as he asked hurriedly, ¡°Healer, where¡¯s the healer?¡±

    ¡°Dead, dead a long time ago!¡± dark grand magus Crowley who had pledged allegiance to Lawrence sighed softly and then took out a medicine bottle, passing it over to Han Shuo as he said, ¡°Quickly apply this on your wounds!¡±

    ¡°Senior!¡± Old assassin Bonds who had watching Han Shuo all along called out softly.

    Bonds was no longer young and had seen all sorts of situations as an assassin. He didn¡¯t deliberately express his concern in front of Han Shuo, but the killing intent on his body be even stronger, obviously not directed at the people by Han Shuo¡¯s side.

    ¡°I¡¯m ok!¡± Han Shuo smiled as he declined. However, when his smile was disyed on that frightening face, it didn¡¯t cause people to feel reassured. To say the least, Phoebe started crying bitterly once again.

    ¡°I¡¯m really fine, I am already no longer bleeding from my wounds. The martial technique I practice is special. These injuries may look extremely serious, but they don¡¯t have a substantial effect on me.¡± When Han Shuo saw everyone anxiously trying to apply medicine to his body, he couldn¡¯t help but exin again.

    Hearing Han Shuo¡¯s statement, everyone couldn¡¯t help but be filled with doubts as they earnestly sized up Han Shuo. Everyone¡¯s expression suddenly changed.

    The wounds that had covered Han Shuo¡¯s entire body were previously still finger-sized and dripping with blood. All the blood had since congealed like ice. The scarlet injured muscle fibers started wiggling like worms and the originally finger-sized wounds actually shrunk by a fold.

    Sacred swordmaster Karel who had been calm doubted his eyes, subconsciously closing his eyes before opening them again, his eyes shining as he fixed his eyes on the wounds on Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    Really shrunk by a fold!

    Karel was moved, his torch-like eyes clearly saw that Han Shuo¡¯s wounds were about the size of a little finger and was oozing with scarlet blood. However, not only did the bleeding stop, even the wounds were only the size of chopsticks.

    Han Shuo had charged out from within the ground, sent that peculiar undead creature back to theherworld and then flew toward them. All these only took at most two minutes!

    Two minutes was roughly equivalent to the duration where one is entranced. Such an outrageous change in such a short time, Karel couldn¡¯t help but be indescribably shocked!

    Bonds¡¯ expression was burning hot, his eyes shining as he stared at the changes of a wound on Han Shuo¡¯s belly. This wound which was near to Han Shuo¡¯s demon infant was currently just the width of a toothpick and was far from the terrifying sight at the beginning.

    Demonic arts! This is precisely the might of demonic arts! Bonds shouted in his heart. He who was on the verge of cultivating secret demonic arts felt his heartbeat suddenly increasing at this moment. The excitement in his heart became somewhat unable to be contained.

    ¡°Alright, you all need not take care of me, I¡¯ll be able to recover very soon. Currently, we should rather be thinking of how to obstruct the attack of those people and fight for sufficient time for Mister Sabakas!¡± Han Shuo turned his head to look at the restless enemies and said calmly.

    With Han Shuo¡¯s reminder, everyone discovered the anomalies in his body. When they heard him speaking with his usual calm expression, they suddenly realized the unfavorability of their situation and looked at the enemy. They suddenly realized that the sacred knight and earth sacred magus Dempus were recklessly charging over.

    Space sacred magus Sabakas was the only one who didn¡¯t turn to look at Han Shuo. At this moment, he was holding a pointed magic staff, carving aplicated space magic array on the smooth rock ground.

    The three-meter long magic array was in an irregr rhombus shape. With every stroke of Sabakas¡¯ magic staff, a slender line will appear and strands of elemental energy would flow through the sharp tip of the magic staff and enter each line of the magic array.

    The focused Sabakas had totally immersed himself. In his eyes, there was nothing else except the magic array under his feet. He had simply ignored all other activity, as though he wouldn¡¯t even crease his brows if the heaven fell and earth rendered.

    As a space sacred magus, no one could stop him if Sabakas wanted to leave by himself. If Sabakas wished, he could even bring a few people along. Unfortunately, there were too many important people here. Even Sabakas was unable to act without a care for the lives of others and hence could only utilize a magic transportation array.

    The sacred knight and earth sacred magus who were charging over were clearly aiming to prevent Sabakas frompleting his magic array. Having the superiority in numbers, they nned to get rid of everyone here once and for all, so as to avoid leaving behind endless trouble.

    While Dempus was flying over, another magic staff actually appeared in his hand as he started chanting a long magic spell once again. His eyes were fixed on Han Shuo, as if Han Shuo was his greatest enemy.

    ¡°Pay attention, we definitely can¡¯t let anyone disturb Sabakas!¡± sacred swordmaster Karel drew back his astonishment toward Han Shuo and instructed hastily.

    The strongest person in a team was usually the leader. Karel¡¯s words caused everyone by Lawrence to focus their attention, immediately going to a square-shaped formation with Sabakas in the middle, intending to obtain enough time for Sabakas.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± When everyone had prepared to fight for time for Sabakas, Sabakas who had been fully focused on deploying the space magic array suddenly called out.

    Everyone¡¯s expression rxed as, under Sabakas¡¯s directions, Lawrence and those who were the weakest took the lead to stand in the magic transportation array.

    ¡°Don¡¯t let them get away!¡± the sacred knight shouted loudly while charging over.

    ¡°Meteor Shower!¡± Dempus who had been constantly chanting earth magicpleted his current incantation. Rumbling sounds suddenly appeared above everyone as several hundred meteorites suddenly smashed downward.

    It was obvious that such a concentrated Meteor Shower could cause when it fell on such a small area.

    The skeletal staff suddenly appeared in Han Shuo¡¯s hand as numerous bone spears flew into the sky like an arrow rain. A pretty white bone shield blossomed in malevolent beauty as it covered above everyone¡¯s heads.

    Several magi simultaneously cast defensive spells. Sacred swordmaster Karel held his longsword as he looked cooly above him, prepared to obstruct the descending attack at any time.

    Zhi, zhi... As the meteorites rumbled downward, a peculiar sound could be heard in the sky.

    Han Shuo looked up, realizing that the sky had suddenly split open and formed a ck hole, like a demon opening its giant mouth, simr to tearing a ck bup in the sky. As the mighty Meteor Shower was swallowed bit by bit by the huge ck hole, Han Shuo¡¯s defensive measures were simply untouched.

    ¡°Alright, it¡¯s your turn!¡± space sacred magus Sabakas pointed at the magic array in front of him and said to the remaining Han Shuo, Karel, Crowley and Phoebe. He had a calm expression, devoid of the slightest nervous from confronting danger, which was truly surprising!

    Han Shuo stared nkly as he looked at space sacred magus Sabakas in amazement. The current Sabakas didn¡¯t have his usual amiable smile, his focused expression giving off a feeling of solemness.The previous ck hole which had swallowed the Meteor Shower was indeed cast by this old man.

    However, Han Shuo didn¡¯t hear Sabakas chanting any incantations. This caused Han Shuo to be amazed as well as realize that Sabakas was already able to silently cast magic. It seems that even though they were both sacred magus, Sabakas¡¯prehension of the essence of magic ought to be higher than Dempus.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± While Han Shuo was in a daze, Phoebe grabbed onto him, forcefully pulling him into Sabakas¡¯ transportation array.

    Even before Han Shuo could react, Sabakas had already activated the magic array. A beam of white light suddenly shone as Han Shuo and the rest disappeared.

    There was only space sacred magus Sabakas remaining in the whole area. The sharp end of his magic staff pierced downward, causing the magic array that he had painstakingly deployed to suddenly shatter and no longer resemble its original appearance.

    ¡°Dempus, I didn¡¯t expect someone at your realm would actually act in a way against Lancelot Empire¡¯s future. As your friend for many years, I feel grief for you!¡± After Sabakas destroyed the space magic array, he sighed as he looked at Dempus before him.

    ¡°I don¡¯t believe in vague prophecies. Letting that illegitimate child be the king of Lancelot Empire is simply a preposterous sphemy. Apart from myself, many nobles within the empire would not allow such a thing to happen.

    I¡¯ve no choice but to act this way precisely for the Empire¡¯s future. You are the ones that are obstinately persistent. You shouldn¡¯t believe the words of a muddleheaded astrologer and bet the kingdom¡¯s future on a heresy. He is a vicious disciple of the Cmity Church. Why would he bring prosperity to the Lancelot Empire in the future?¡± Dempus righteously rebuked Sabakas, clearly wasn¡¯t one who believed in fate.

    ¡°Mister Sabakas, I respect your character greatly and have also heard many stories about you. However, I still have to say that even if you save Lawrence and the rest, you would still be unable to change their fate. Currently, the entire Ossen City is under the control of Duke Ashburn and eldest prince Charles. Lawrence and the others will ultimately not be able to escape.¡± the sacred knightughed loudly as said to Sabakas.

    ¡°That is not necessarily the case!¡± Sabakas calmly looked at the sacred knight and said, ¡°There is at least one region that you wouldn¡¯t be able to control easily!¡±

    The Dark Mantle Headquarters had a tighter defense than the royal pce. Even though they had seized the royal pce, the Dark Mantle Headquarters would not be easily conquered. As the chief elder of the Dark Mantle, Sabakas is the one who arranged the defensive measures on Mt. Ordas. He clearly understood Mt. Ordas¡¯ formidable defenses.

    ¡°It¡¯s undeniable that the Dark Mantle Headquarters is indeed hard to be attacked from the outside!¡± the sacred knight had a serious expression as he spoke. He once again revealed a smile soon after as he said, ¡°However if there starts to be disorder internally, the situation would be totally different!¡±

    Space sacred magus Sabakas¡¯ expression changed when he heard the sacred knight¡¯s words. He no longer spoke superfluous words with them, hurriedly brandishing his magic staff and disappeared with a beam of light.

 Chapter 416: Everything was under control

    GDK 416 ¨C Everything was under control

    Mt. Ordas, Dark Mantle Headquarters.

    Sabakas¡¯s space magic array led directly to the Dark Mantle¡¯s headquarters. However, when Han Shuo and the rest arrived, they discovered that the situation within the headquarters wasn¡¯t as stable as they had thought.

    Mt. Ordas, which had the best defenses within Ossen City, was having a civil strife. All kinds of tight defenses measures had been damaged. A small group of high-ranking personnel who sided with eldest Prince Charles harbored ulterior motives as they destroyed the Dark Mantle¡¯s defenses from within.

    Out of the eleven high-ranking officials at their previous meeting, apart from the three heads who firmly believed in the two chief elders¡¯ judgment, five of them had secretly defected to eldest prince Charles and had revolted at the most crucial moment. Not only did they destroyed the defenses within the headquarters, they even allied with the empire¡¯s troops to attack the Dark Mantle.

    The sudden internal revolt caused the heavily guarded Mt. Ordas to simrly be a battlefield. When Han Shuo and the rest had arrived at the Dark Mantle¡¯s headquarters through the transportation array, they could hear numerous shouts, which indicated that the situation here was equally not optimistic.

    The space seemed to be ripped open by a sharp de as an opening appeared in front of Han Shuo and the others. ¡°There are people who defected! Perhaps they think that Amyes and the other two have held their position for too long and feel that they themselves should rece them.¡± space sacred magus Sabakas said with a vexed expression as he appeared.

    Under the effects of his demonic yuan energy, Han Shuo¡¯s wounds were still slowly shrinking and closing. Mystical demons cruised through the various passageways within the Dark Mantle headquarters, slowly projecting the situation here within his mind.

    There was a five thousand-strong army at the foot of the Mt. Ordas which thoroughly surrounded the Dark Mantle headquarters. The five high ranking members had joined hands with forces of Charles and Duke Ashburn and were currently attacking the Dark Mantle Headquarters. This gang of five had destroyed all the defenses of the Dark Mantle at the beginning and were very familiar with theyout of the headquarters.

    Under theirmand, the battle advanced orderly. As the Lancelot Empire¡¯s king¡¯s hand in the darkness, even with the appearance of five traitors, the Dark Mantle was still able to withstand the attack by leveraging their geographical advantage over the enemy. It was clear that the members who had remained within the Dark Mantle headquarters were all genuine experts.

    Faced with the betrayal of former allies, the hatred in their hearts couldn¡¯t be suppressed. If not for the overwhelming number of enemies, they would have perhaps rushed out of Mt. Ordas and sliced the five traitors into a thousand pieces.

    ¡°There are only five thousand troops at the foot of the mountain and it isn¡¯t a veryrge number. With our arrival, we should be able to eliminate them easily!¡± Having surveyed the situation through his mystical demons, Han Shuo knitted his brows as he said to Sabakas.

    Sabakas was stunned and astonished by Han Shuo¡¯s ability to assess the general situation. As a master of space magic, Sabakas had gone to the surroundings to observe the situation while heading over so as to understand the forces surrounding Mt. Ordas. He didn¡¯t expect that Han Shuo who had just arrived to actually also work out the situation in the surroundings. Sabakas has heard much of Han Shuo¡¯s miracles from others but he was clearly skeptical without witnessing it himself. Currently, when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s statement and took a closer look at Han Shuo, he noticed that the bleeding wounds on his face hadpletely healed without a trace.

    ¡°Grace¡¯s prophecy was right! The emergence of such an amazing person in the empire would definitely bring a new dawn to Lancelot Empire¡¯s future. It looks like we should have a way out from this nasty situation.¡± Sabakas thought.

    ¡°These men are soldiers of the Lancelot Empire and they have no choice to attack Mt. Ordas due to the orders of Charles and Ashburn. As soldiers who only know to obey a superior¡¯s orders, they are not to me. The fault lies with those who give them those orders.¡± sacred swordmaster Karel said before looking at Han Shuo and continued, ¡°Therefore, these men, who are the backbone of the Lancelot Empire¡¯s strength, cannot be sacrificed innocently!¡±

    As the mystical demons surveyed the surroundings, Han Shuo realized that there were no light magi who could threaten his undead army within the forces surrounding Mt. Ordas. He nned to summon his undead army andbine with Sabakas¡¯s space magic to resolve the threat in one go, but he didn¡¯t expect this idea to be rejected by Karel.

    Although Han Shuo¡¯s soul had descended to the Lancelot Empire, he didn¡¯t think of himself as a citizen of the empire. He made such a proposal because he didn¡¯t ce much importance on the lives of those people. On the other hand, sacred swordmaster Karel who had taken responsibility for Lancelot Empire¡¯s future all along obviously wouldn¡¯t agree to let those innocent soldiers die tragically from terrifying magic.

    ¡°Let¡¯s first look for Candide and the rest before thinking of other ns,¡± Sabakas said calmly.

    ¡°There¡¯s no need for that. They are heading over!¡± Han Shuo replied.

    Not long after Han Shuopleted his sentence, the three heads of the Dark Mantle and the remaining high-ranking members that supported Sabakas¡¯ decision had all arrived in this area.

    ¡°Grandpa, we sensed a disturbance in the transportation array and saw your arrival using the magic mirror¡± Cecilia had a solemn expression as she spoke.

    Emily was also among the people who had just arrived. It was clear that her attention was on Han Shuo¡¯s body from the start. The bloodstains on Han Shuo¡¯s body were still sticky and there were two tiny wounds on his chest that had notpletely healed.

    Without having to think further, Emily knew that Han Shuo was injured. Her eyes suddenly reddened, wanting to disregard everything and lean on Han Shuo like Phoebe did, personally treat his wounds and ask him about his injuries.

    Unfortunately, she was well aware of her status and understood that doing so will only cause more trouble for Han Shuo. In such circumstances, all Emily could do was to hold back to the worry in her heart and only secretly express her concern and worry through her gaze.

    In this group, the person that Han Shuo cared most about was Emily. When Han Shuo arrived at the Dark Mantle headquarters and discovered that the Dark Mantle was surrounded by enemies, Han Shuo immediately started to use his mystical demons to look for her. He only truly calmed down when he found out that Emily was safe and sound.

    Han Shuo had noticed her concern through her reddened eyes and he couldn¡¯t help but feel warmth in his heart. Right at this moment, Phoebe wrote the word ¡®quiet¡¯ on Han Shuo¡¯s hand before struggling free of his tight grip and walked towards Emily.

    Candide and Amyes greeted Sabakas respectfully before Amyes immediately described the situation at hand and said, ¡°It was because of our negligence that caused this internal revolt. Fortunately, the real power in the Dark Mantle had always been in the hands of the three of us. Therefore, although there was heavy damage to the headquarters from the start, the three of us was able to stabilize the situation.¡±

    As matters have reached such an extent, Amyes, Candide, and the others clearly new the actual situation. Candide had a gloomy face as he continued after Amyes, ¡°These traitors were primarily responsible for gathering and sending news from His Majesty¡¯s pce. The news of His Majesty¡¯s demise was not leaked at all and it is precisely because we didn¡¯t make any prior preparations that we are in such a passive situation.¡±

    ¡°They must all die!¡± Lawrence shouted word by word.

    Lawrence, who was already grieving, currently had an ice-cold expression on his face. Uhtred¡¯s devoted encouragement and support during this period of time had caused Lawrence to have deep feelings toward Uhtred. As a stubborn person himself, Lawrence clearly knew that Uhtred¡¯s sudden death had an undeniable connection with Charles and Ashburn.

    ¡°Of Ossen City¡¯s four city gates, the northern gate is under the supervision of Count Boris. I reckon that currently, only the northern wall is slightly safer.¡± Amyes said with a heavy expression.

    Lawrence nodded and said calmly, ¡°It is best that resolve the rebellion within Ossen City. I¡¯m afraid that once we leave Ossen City, Charles and Ashburn will be able to distort the truth. I definitely don¡¯t want to see this rebellion resulting inrge-scale war. In that situation, even if we were to win the war, the Lancelot Empire will be greatly weakened!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. It¡¯s best to resolve matters within Ossen City. However, I¡¯m afraid that this is also what Ashburn and Charles want. Currently, there are powerful enemies outside Lancelot Empire. If Lancelot Empire sinks into civil strife due to the princes fighting over the throne, I reckon that Lancelot Empire will surely be heading toward its destruction.¡± Karel strongly agreed with Lawrence¡¯s suggestion and immediately stated his stand on the matter.

    ¡°In that case, the fastest way to end the rebellion is by eliminating Charles and Ashburn. The enemy will be like a headless snake once they are killed. However, this matter won¡¯t be easy to carry out, as they surely would have considered this and take precautions. I reckon that there must be numerous experts protecting them.¡± Lawrence continued.

    ¡°Let¡¯s temporarily not discuss this. Old Hahn and the rest are at the northern wall. Apart from him, there are also a few Marquises under your father that are still alive. They are all within the castle by the northern wall. Ashburn and his men have yet to truly attack the northern wall for the time being. We can make that location our base camp. We can discuss in detail after we reach.¡± Han Shuo suddenly spoke.

    Lawrence was shocked when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s words and asked, ¡°They are all over there?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded affirmatively and said, ¡°That¡¯s right. Besides them, the second prince, the youngest prince, and their men who had survived are all at the northern wall. Currently, apart from the northern wall, the entire Ossen City is filled with soldiers and knights under Duke Ashburn and eldest prince Charles. Only that location is temporarily safe.¡±

    The twelve mystical demons scattered to every corner of Ossen City, constantly patrolling and surveying the entire Ossen City. Nobody knew the situation within the city better than Han Shuo. He was calm and collected, as though everything was under his control.

 Chapter 417: I can

    GDK 417 ¨C I can

    In such a crucial time, the role of a person who is able to urately view the overall situation goes without saying. Hence, when everyone realized Han Shuo could expertly exin the situation in each district of Ossen City, they were so shocked by Han Shuo¡¯s calm and natural expression that they were momentarily absent-minded.

    ¡°Bryan, your body is here, so how are you able to know the situation in each district of Ossen City? After the five traitors appeared within the Dark Mantle, many branches were met with destruction. The five of them know the location of several main branches of the Dark Mantle. Even the Dark Mantle is unable to easily grasp the situation of Ossen City at the moment, don¡¯t tell me that you are able to?¡± Sabakas stared nkly at Han Shuo, asking in amazement after a long while.

    Han Shuo nodded his head as he calmly admitted, ¡°I can!¡±

    Hearing his reply, everyone¡¯s expression was a mix of surprise and delight, but clearly more delighted than surprised.

    If what Han Shuo said is true, Han Shuo would be able to achieve the intelligence gathering and monitoring that each branch of the Dark Mantle was originally responsible for by himself. In the current extremely chaotic Ossen City, if Han Shuo was truly able to understand clearly the situation in every area of Ossen City, everyone would be able to make the proper decision and seize an opportunity to turn around the current unfavorable situation.

    When the Dark Mantle¡¯s three heavyweights and the two sacred rank characters heard Han Shuo reply ¡°I can¡± so confidently, they were expressionless for a moment, so much so that they forgot about the many experts surrounding them on the outside.

    While the rest of them were ineffably shocked, Han Shuo seemed to think that they weren¡¯t surprised enough, continuing to say, ¡°I am not only able to observe the situation in the four districts of Ossen City, even Ashburn and Charles¡¯ conversation, as well as the implementation and details of their every move, I am able to observe without missing out anything.

    As long as I want to, apart from a few areas that have deployedyers of barriers, as long as I¡¯m given a bit of time, I am able to clearly observe any area in Ossen City and be aware of what they are doing or saying. I¡¯m speaking the truth. For example, currently, Ashburn and Charles are gathered together, discussing how to capture the northern city district. Oh, they say that among Count Boris¡¯ men, there¡¯s an officer named Bishop who is actually one of their men...¡±

    ¡°Oh, what¡¯s wrong?¡± While Han Shuo was speaking, he suddenly discovered that everyone by his side was looking dull as they stared nkly at himself, hence he couldn¡¯t help but ask in bafflement.

    ¡°Are, are you God?¡± dark grand magus Crowley who had previously lost to Han Shuo stared nkly for a while before speaking out everyone¡¯s thoughts in a revering tone.

    Are you God? The three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle and the two sacred magus as well as Bonds, Emily and Phoebe suddenly realized that what they wanted to say was actually mentioned by that fellow first.

    The ability to observe any area in a city clearly, finding out any information he wanted to know without overlooking anything. Such an existence, apart from ¡°God¡±, even a half-God realm expert had no way of achieving it. Could this fellow before them be a ¡°Hidden God¡± that was banished to the mortal world?

    Harboring this sort of doubt, everyone¡¯s vision was uniformly fixed on Han Shuo as they waited anxiously for Han Shuo to exin.

    Han Shuo naturally wasn¡¯t stupid. His temporary puzzlement was swept aside by Crowley¡¯s ¡°Are you God?¡±, immediately understanding what his omnipresent twelve mystical demons meant to the people of this world!

    ¡°No, this is a special use that supplements the martial technique I train in. It¡¯s nothing amazing. Oh, that¡¯s right. Bonds, I will impart this martial technique to you after some time. At that time, you will understand what is going on!¡± Han Shuo exined hastily.

    When Bonds who had a a nk expression heard Han Shuo¡¯s sentence, he almost fainted in happiness. Luckily, Bonds had not lived for so long in vain. He hastily stabilized his disturbed mood, trembling as he said, ¡°Thank you senior, thank you senior!¡±

    Everyone¡¯s envious expression was fixed on the excited Bonds in a split second. Even the calm sacred swordmaster Karel had the slightest of envy toward Bonds. He felt that Bonds¡¯ foresight was so vicious, actually finding such a mystical senior.

    ¡°I want to learn too!¡± Phoebe¡¯s eyes were fixed on Han Shuo as she said bluntly.

    Han Shuo was slightly distracted, shooting a nce at Phoebe. He sighed and said in feigned seriousness, ¡°Our sect¡¯s secrets cannot be passed to outsiders, not even to our wives!¡±

    However, Han Shuo was actually thinking inwardly that since she had a request from him, he had to seize it properly and not agree rashly. At the very least, he had to let her know her ce.

    ¡°Phoebe, don¡¯t cause a scene!¡± sacred swordmaster Karel frowned as he berated Phoebe.

    Phoebe dreaded her master the most. She stared at Han Shuo resentfully when she heard Karel¡¯s words, thinking inwardly that when they were alone, she must obtain this martial technique from Han Shuo be it through harassing or emotional attacks.

    ¡°I am familiar with Bishop. I didn¡¯t expect that he is actually a traitor. We need to immediately head to the northern city district and stabilize the situation there.¡± Lawrence was feeling extremely impatient, nning to first head for Boris at the northern district. This was because as of now, only the northern city guard was still under their control.

    ¡°All of you leave first, I¡¯ll seal off Mt. Ordas!¡± Candide¡¯s expression was unchangingly gloomly as he hesitated for a while before saying to everyone.

    Space sacred magus Sabakas hesitated for a moment when he heard Candide before nodding his head soon after and said, ¡°Alright, it¡¯s a good idea to temporarily seal off Mt. Ordas. At least we will still be able to temporarily hide in Mt. Ordas if we fail to defend the northern city district or leave Ossen City from the magic array in Mt. Ordas. Thankfully, the power of Dark Mantle has always been in the hands of the three of you. Otherwise if those fellows happened to know more secrets of the Dark Mantle, I fear that it would truly be very problematic this time around.¡±

    From the conversation between Candide and Sabakas, Han Shuo realized that the Dark Mantle was still hiding many secrets. Even the idea of sealing the mountain was new to Han Shuo. However, it seems like the entire Mt. Ordas should be able to be sealed off. The two of them mentioned that the Dark Mantle Headquarters could still be thest stronghold after sealing off the mountain, indicating that the safety of Mt. Ordas after sealing it off need not be doubted.

    ¡°Candide, we¡¯ll temporarily leave this area to you, this is my token.¡± Amyes held the token that represented his status and passed it to Candide.

    ¡°Be careful!¡± Cecilia was solemn as she also passed the token that represented her status over to Candide.

    ¡°To seal Mt. Ordas, the identity tokens of all three heavyweights are needed. Once Mt. Ordas is sealed, every entrance and all magical arrays would be sealed. Apart from the few of us, anyone else who doesn¡¯t know the method would be unable to freely enter and exit Mt. Ordas.¡± Amyes exined to Han Shuo, Lawrence and the others.

    This secret was something even Han Shuo didn¡¯t know. When Han Shuo looked toward Emily, he realized that Emily was simrly puzzled. After observing everyone else, Han Shuo realized that even though there were many high ranked personnel of the Dark Mantle here, he reckoned that the only people who actually knew this secret were the three heavyweights and chief elder Sabakas.

    It seems that as the empire¡¯srgest and most formidable organization, the secrets hidden by the Dark Mantle ought to not only be as sporadic as it appeared to everyone. The sealing of the entire Mt. Ordas was most likely just the tip of the iceberg.

    After Amyes finished exining, everyone made the prompt decision to utilize the existing magic array here to directly reach the Dark Mantle branch at the northern city district before Candide sealed off Mt. Ordas.

    The northern district had simrly suffered from attacks. Han Shuo¡¯s mansion was in this area. However, aspared to the other districts, the northern district was still considered safe. Those that had attacked Han Shuo¡¯s mansion, regardless of whether they ultimately seeded, had left the northern city district before the northern city army¡¯s knight regiment were able to arrive.

    When they reached Count Boris¡¯ castle, the people who supported Lawrence had all gathered. As Han Shuo was able to clearly observe theyout of Ashburn and Charles¡¯ troops and also know the details of their next actions, Han Shuo had be the most important person here.

    With Han Shuo¡¯s description, the distribution of Ashburn and the eldest prince¡¯s troops, the secret operations of every noble, the current situation within the imperial pce, the movements of the other two princes were known without omission by everyone.

    With all the chaos within Ossen City, the extent of benefits of having Han Shuo who was able to observe the entire situation clearly was reflected very quickly.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s directions for two days in a row, twelve traitors headed by Bishop within the northern city guard were all executed. Some lucky surviving nobles who opposed Ashburn were sent by sacred magus Sabakas one after another into the castle. Two attacks by Ashburn and the rest were ambushed by traps that were deployed in advance, with their head being killed on the spot.

    Leveraging on Han Shuo¡¯s existence, Lawrence, Old Hahn and other military strategists skillfully utilized the power they held to firmly defend the northern city district in such disadvantageous circumstances. Furthermore, they slowly umted their strength, forming the only force that was able to threaten Ashburn and Charles¡¯ power within Ossen City. However, the superiority of Ashburn, Charles and the others were too great. Currently, four out of the five districts of Ossen City were under their control. The forces under them was also four times that of Lawrence and the others. The small victories by the northern city guard appeared to be insufficient in reversing the overall situation.

    On the third day of everyone worriedly pondering how to solve this problem, Han Shuo suddenly saw through a mystical demon that a fifty thousand strong Ironblood troop was staying by Ossen City¡¯s northern city gate.

    It was also during the night of that same day that a thin middle-aged man pulled along Fanny as he abused Han Shuo while bursting into the castle at the northern city district, bring about a new problem for Han Shuo!

 Chapter 418: Tripartite talks

    GDK 418 ¨C Tripartite talks

    ¡°Get that brat Bryan out here!¡± A thin middle-aged man swore and shouted, dragging along a reluctant Fanny as they burst into the castle.

    The guards stationed along the heavily-guarded pathway seemed to recognize this thin middle-aged man. Everyone frowned and was worried but surprisingly none of them dared to stop him.

    Due to Han Shuo¡¯s stunning ability during thest three days, he had gained an exquisitely high status. Even in Ossen City, it was exceedingly rare to find someone who dared to abuse a noble so unbridled. A few soldiers who couldn¡¯t identify this man were extremely furious but suddenly quietened down after the veterans sinctly exined, their expression filled with hints of reverence when they looked at this man again.

    The loud curses were clearly audible from the assembly room at the third-floor of the castle where Han Shuo and his party were gathered. Old Hahn, Boris, Eevee, sacred swordmaster Karel, sacred magus Sabakas as well as Amyes and the others from the Dark Mantle smiled bitterly when they heard that voice.

    Lawrence, Amyes and those who knew what was going on, suddenly nced at Han Shuo with glinting eyes. Emily was even more ufortable. No one knew what unpredictable oue this madman¡¯s arrival would bring.

    ¡°Why has this guye over?¡± Old Hahn¡¯s expression suddenly changed, and soon after looked bbergasted at Han Shuo who was smiling wryly and asked probingly, ¡°Why would you have animosity with him?¡±

    Han Shuo awkwardly scratched his head, his face bitter as he exined, ¡°I don¡¯t have any animosity with him. Forget it, let¡¯s deal with things as they happen. I¡¯ll go take a look.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, this madman cannot be provoked, you must treat him with caution!¡± Just as Han Shuo stood up from his seat and was heading out, Lawrence suddenly spoke while having a queer expression.

    ¡°I¡¯ll take note of that!¡± Han Shuo replied and directly headed towards the exit.

    Lawrence was familiar with Han Shuo¡¯s temperament, but he still didn¡¯t feelpletely assured, so he got up and followed him out. Those who sat around the table were all people of status. Some of them were somewhat well acquainted with Firenze. When they saw Lawrence getting up and leaving, they hesitated for a moment before following suit, leaving just space sacred magus Sabakas and sacred swordmaster Karel in the room.

    In the whole Lancelot Empire, it could be said that the only person that Duke Ashburn and eldest Prince Charles was apprehensive about was the southern border¡¯s war god, Firenze. In the entire Lancelot Empire, the one person who could defend the southern border from the bloodthirsty orcs was none other than this man.

    The citizens within the dozens of cities at the southern border were extremely valiant. In the many years of battle with the Orc Empire, every soldier and knight have been tempered to be exceedingly strong and powerful. The strongest knight regiment and legion within the Lancelot Empire were all at the southern border. But without this man¡¯s leadership, the vast southern border would have turned into the orc¡¯snd and Lancelot Empire would also be invaded by the bestial Orcs.

    It could be said that no matter who ultimately won the civil war, Firenze¡¯s status at the southern border will not be affected. This was because, other than this madman, no one else could stabilize the situation at the southern border. Based on this, he had be the one who had the most freedom to act as he wanted.

    While such a civil strife was going on, If this man wanted to, he could dere independence from the Lancelot Empire, and be the true monarch of the southern border.

    ¡°Where¡¯s that little bastard,e out now!¡± Firenze shouted as he walked. Although there were numerous densely packed soldiers in the surroundings, no one dared to obstruct him and instead took the initiative to open a path for him.

    ¡°Father!¡± Fanny, who was being held by Firenze, was blushing as if she was embarrassed to have such a father.

    ¡°You stay out of this. This little bastard is a womanizer at such young age. I must definitely teach him a lesson today. I don¡¯t care that he¡¯s the city lord of Brettel City. If he pisses me off, I¡¯ll dere war on him. Lancelot Empire is already in disorder anyways, it wouldn¡¯t matter if I add some oil to the fire!¡± Firenze shouted in rage as he dragged Fanny to the second floor.

    At the beginning, Firenze was quite pleased when Fanny was talked about Bryan¡¯s status. He had also heard of some of Bryan¡¯s achievements. He felt that Bryan met his expectations and was suitable. Fanny marrying him would also not disgrace himself.

    However, Firenze was unhappy that Bryan stood him up multiple times. This time he had obviouslye to Ossen City, but Bryan still did not take the initiative to pay his respects. This cause Firenze to feel angry. However, he was still able to ept it reluctantly as he understood that Ossen City wasn¡¯t in a good situation. However, when he started using his own power to find out more about Han Shuo, he suddenly realized that Han Shuo was actually a couple with Boozt Merchant Alliance¡¯s Phoebe.

    This news was shocking to Firenze who was far away from Ossen City. When he was aware of this matter, Firenze immediately thought that Han Shuo had cheated his daughter¡¯s feelings. He had nearly charged to Han Shuo¡¯s mansion and cause a scene. However, he managed to resist the urge and instead went to interrogate Fanny.

    He discovered that not only did Fanny know about Han Shuo¡¯s sinful acts, she had actually still coyly say that she was fine with it. Fanny¡¯s conformist thoughts almost caused Firenze to faint in anger. When Fanny courageously said that apart from Phoebe, Han Shuo still had another woman named Emily, Firenze truly exploded! Without saying a word, he immediately dragged Fanny along to find Han Shuo and make things clear.

    ¡°Uh, I¡¯m Bryan.¡± An anxious but helpless Han Shuo stood on the stone steps that connected the second floor with the third floor as he looked at Firenze, whoseplexion was red with anger.

    ¡°You still have the guts toe out, Not bad, not bad¡± Firenze gnashed his teeth, casually snatching a pike from a guard standing beside him and threw it toward Han Shuo.

    The dazzling pike was like silver lightning and was in front of Han Shuo in the blink of an eye.

    Firenze was an outstandingmander and was personally a Sky Rider. His strike was filled with fighting aura and it was not to be belittled.

    Han Shuo knew Firenze will not let things go easily. He lifted his left hand and the Demonyer Edge emerged from his palm and struck the tip of the pike with a ng, causing the pike to shatter into pieces. ¡°Father! You said you¡¯ll talk about it!¡± Fanny shouted as she tried to pull back Firenze with both her hands while looking helplessly at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Aren¡¯t we talking now? Otherwise, why would Ie here alone?! This guy can kill Leah Cain by himself and there are so many old farts here protecting him. If this is not called talking, I don¡¯t know what is!¡± Firenze red at Fanny and lightly scolded, ¡°Lass, let go of me, I still have more things to talk with him!¡±

    Old Hahn, Amyes and the rest had just reached Han Shuo¡¯s side when they heard Firenze¡¯s ¡°so many old farts¡±. Old Hahn was furious, pointing at Firenze as he shouted angrily, ¡°You lunatic, who are you calling old farts?¡±

    ¡°I didn¡¯t say it was you!¡± Firenze snorted coldly.

    Old Hahn face rxed. Just when he decided not to pursue this further, he was driven mad by what Firenze said next.

    ¡°I¡¯m addressing all of you! Including old fart Karel that¡¯s still inside! Don¡¯t think that I wouldn¡¯t know you¡¯re here just because you stay inside!¡° Firenze sneered when he saw Old Hahn¡¯s expression rx before resolutely continuing his sentence.

    Han Shuo was stunned and stared nkly at Firenze. He thought in his heart that this man really had a unique personality. It seems that the person who dared to beat up Grand Duke Ashburn within the main hall was indeed not an ordinary person.

    ¡°Damn it, you mad dog, when did I ever offend you?¡± Old Hahn rarely became angry in his recent years. However, he was so angered as soon as he met with Firenze that he threw a vulgar remark.

    ¡°Your daughter-inw seduced my daughter¡¯s man! And Karel¡¯s apprentice also snatched my daughter¡¯s man! Damn it, are you all bully me because I¡¯m far away at the southern border?!¡± Firenze was indeed a madman as Old Hahn described, cursing anyone he got his hands on.

    When he said that, Emily¡¯s pretty face turned deathly white. Han Shuo also trembled inwardly, thinking to himself that the situation was going downhill.

    Sure enough, Old Hahn¡¯s expression suddenly sank. He gave Firenze a cold, frosty gaze and asked, ¡°What do you mean? Please make yourself clear! If you dare to randomly nder my family¡¯s name and reputation, I¡¯ll pursue this with my entire life¡±

    Sacred swordmaster Karel and Sabakas had walked out at an unknown time and heard the conversation too. Karel glowered at Firenze and shouted loudly, ¡°What the hell do you want? The empire is in chaos and we have no time for your nonsense!¡±

    ¡°This brat is in a rtionship with Phoebe and Emily, but still dared to go after my daughter. Don¡¯t you all know about it?¡± Firenze didn¡¯t fear the rage of Old Hahn and Karel. He sneered as he paused, as though he had not cause enough chaos. He then added coldly, ¡°I will definitely pursue this matter till the end. As long as it¡¯s not settled, the civil strife within the empire has nothing to do with me. Do whatever you guys want, whoever lives or dies is none of my business. Hmph, even if Lancelot Empire was finished, I will not let anyone bully my daughter. If the few of you want to y, I¡¯ll apany you until the end!¡±

    When he finished, everyone¡¯s gaze was on Han Shuo, Fanny, Emily, and Phoebe. Old Hahn and Karel¡¯s expressions turned ashen. On one hand, they were dumbfounded by the sudden revtion, and the other, they were shocked by Firenze¡¯s reckless words.

    To Old Hahn and Karel, their whole life had been dedicated to the Lancelot Empire. To them, the only thing they truly cared about was the future of Lancelot Empire. They could never be like the lunatic Firenze and disregard Lancelot Empire¡¯s survival.

    ¡°Emily, is what he said true?¡± Old Hahn was somewhat embarrassed as he asked a pitiful looking Emily, who looked as though she was going to cry.

 Chapter 419: Iâ€™m willing.

    GDK 419 ¨C I¡¯m willing.

    As matters stand, it simply could no longer be concealed. Han Shuo didn¡¯t expect that at such a crucial time, they were actually ced in such a situation.

    Emily¡¯s eyes watered. Being exposed in front of so many people waspletely out of her expectations. At this moment, the feeling of bitterness, misery, helplessness, fear and many other feelings swarmed her, causing Emily¡¯s inferior heart to be severely hurt. Tears uncontrobly flowed down her tender face.

    ¡°It¡¯s true!¡± Unexpectedly, Han Shuo replied coldly before Emily could respond.

    When everyone¡¯s gaze turned toward Han Shuo, he released the hand of Phoebe whose face was pale as she looked at him, directly walking toward the crying Emily and holding Emily¡¯s hand tightly in front of everyone. His face was gloomy as he slowly observed everyone and said, ¡°What he said is the truth, Emily is my woman. However, I was the one who pursued her bitterly, there¡¯s nothing to do with anyone else!¡±

    Old Hahn¡¯s face became ashen, ring at Han Shuo and Emily in anger as he said, ¡°Good, very good, I never would have thought that our Betteridge Family would actually produce such a scandal!¡±

    ¡°I apologize on behalf of my sister! However, if anyone wants to bully my sister, they would have to see if I¡¯m agreeable!¡± After a brief shock, Amyes resisted the urge of questioning Emily and instead sneered as he looked at everyone.

    As Emily¡¯s blood brother, the amount of love Amyes showed Emily was something only they knew. At such a crucial time, Amyes stood by Emily¡¯s side without the slightest hesitation. Seeing Emily trying to conceal her tears, Amyes who was the God of Death in the eyes of the empire¡¯s nobles was simrly angered.

    ¡°Bryan, look at the good you have done!¡± sacred swordmaster Karel stared coldly at Han Shuo as he shouted in anger.

    In a sh, everyone¡¯s gaze gathered again on Han Shuo. Everyone only came to their senses at this moment. The main culprit should be Han Shuo. All kinds of criticizing and angry gazesnded on Han Shuo.

    Facing everyone¡¯s ire, Han Shuo had a gloomy expression as he looked at everyone and said, ¡°This is our matter and doesn¡¯t seem to be rted to you. Whoever feels that they can use the power in their hands to exert pressure on me, we shall wait and see what happens.¡±

    ¡°Brat, you have guts!¡± Firenze was so angry that heughed, pointing at Han Shuo as he said, ¡°As long as you immediately leave that two women and only concentrate on my daughter, I can treat the matters before as bygones. So long as you follow me back to the southern border, no matter how chaotic Lancelot Empire is, I can guarantee that you will be free of worries.¡±

    Firenze paused for a moment before continuing, ¡°If not, we shall struggle to our deaths. Let¡¯s see who will still beughing at the end!¡±

    ¡°Father!¡± At this moment, Fanny also had a distressed expression as she couldn¡¯t help but shout loudly. Fanny didn¡¯t expect that things would develop in such a way. However, she was also unable to control Firenze¡¯s temper and simply unable to tell when he would go crazy. Currently, Emily, Phoebe, herself, as well as Han Shuo, were extremely embarrassed.

    What was originally Han Shuo¡¯s personal matters was now like a tripartite talk. Fanny had expectedly med herself, thinking inwardly, ¡°Bryan would definitely hate me. Ah, what should I do now?¡±

    ¡°Bryan, since things have reached this stage, shouldn¡¯t you give us an exnation?¡± Old Hahn¡¯s face was ashen as he glowered at Han Shuo.

    Looking at the crying Emily, gazing at the distressed Fanny and taking a look at the terrified Phoebe, Han Shuo took a deep breath. As everyone watched attentively, Han Shuo said, ¡°I have already described the sequence of events to the three of you. The three of you should already be clear about what had happened. As matters stand, I don¡¯t have anything else to say, all of you are aware of how I feel about each of you.

    Right now, I¡¯ll give all of you a choice. You should also give yourself this choice. If you are willing to be with me, you just need to nod in agreement. I will face any difficulty that arises with you. As long as you are willing to be with me, I promise that I will treat you well in the future, and definitely not let anyone bully you.

    If you are unable to ept this, you can take it as something I owe you in this lifetime. Our rtionship in this life will end here and from today onward, we will no longer have any emotional connection!¡±

    ¡°Brat, what nonsense are you spouting! Could it be that till now you still want to have all of them?¡± Firenze raged, lifting his sleeves with the intention of punishing Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression darkened as he red at Firenze and said in anger, ¡°What does this have to do with you! The person I want to marry isn¡¯t you, why do you have so much to say?¡±

    ¡°Damn it, You stinky brat has such a temper. There¡¯s no one else within Lancelot Empire that dares to talk to me like that. You should take a look at your...¡± Firenze shouted loudly as he prepared to charge toward Han Shuo.

    ¡°Father, you don¡¯t need to bother about my matters!¡± Fanny held onto Firenze and shouted loudly.

    ¡°I¡¯m willing. I don¡¯t care about anything else. As long as you want me, I will follow you!¡± Emily who had tears rolling down her face was the first to dere her stand while she sobbed. She was already willing to give up everything.

    Emily gripped Han Shuo¡¯s hand tightly. Because she was using strength, her fingertips had even entered his skin. Emily seemed to want to gain strength and courage through this method.

    ¡°Brother, I¡¯m sorry. I love him. I¡¯m sorry to cause trouble for you, but I¡¯m unable to leave him!¡± Emily¡¯s tears rolled down her face as she spoke while looking at Amyes.

    Amyes trembled, suddenly recalling their misery when they were younger and how they relied on each other for many years...

    ¡°Fool, what are you saying all these for. No matter what, I will always be on your side!¡± Amyes had a doting expression as he smiled and replied Emily gently.

    It is said that an elder brother is like a father. Amyes had always treated Emily this way. When they were younger, their parents had died and it was Amyes who had worked hard to raise Emily. Everything the two of them had today had been the result of them risking their lives and their efforts. In Amyes¡¯ heart, the most important person in this world was his sister. He had married Emily off to the Betteridge Family yet Emily¡¯s husband had suddenly died on the battlefield even before they had consummated their marriage. All these years, Emily had be a widow that was difficult to ept.

    Amyes clearly understood the pain Emily endured all these years. He ced all the me on himself and had always wished for Emily to strive for happiness once again. However, Emily simply didn¡¯t have anyone that she fancied. Amyes didn¡¯t think that the current situation was ideal, but it wasn¡¯t bad either. Without thinking, he naturally ced the most importance on his sister¡¯s happiness.

    ¡°Thank you, brother!¡± Emily cried as she expressed her thanks. Soon after, she looked toward Old Hahn who had a queer expression and said, ¡°Father, all these years, I have been very happy living in the Betteridge family. I have truly looked upon you as my father. I also know that you love me dearly. I am extremely grateful toward you and I know that my actions would possibly smear the Betteridge family¡¯s name. I¡¯m sorry, really sorry, please forgive me. Father, you will always be my father.¡±

    Old Hahn was startled and stared nkly at Emily. After quite a while, Old Hahn sighed. He didn¡¯t say anything, his expression deste as he walked back to the assembly room on the third floor.

    ¡°I¡¯m also willing. I don¡¯t wish for anything much. Father, I beg you to not bother about my affairs!¡± Fanny had a death grip on Firenze as if she feared that Firenze would be so furious that he disregarded everything. She continued sharply, ¡°If you don¡¯t promise me, I will leave home once again and you will never be able to see me again!¡±

    Firenze who was shouting loudly that he wanted to kill Han Shuo was suddenly stunned, his expression reddened as he pointed at Han Shuo and sworn while saying, ¡°What¡¯s so good about this brat. There are so many good men within Lancelot Empire. Why must you insist on being with a half-hearted fellow? Because of him, you are actually thinking of abandoning your family?¡±

    ¡°Father, you are incredible at war but you would never understand what is true love. My mother had waited for you her entire life, always worried that something would happen to you on the battlefield. When she was sick, you were still fighting more than a thousand miles away. Even when Mother died unhappily from her illness, you weren¡¯t present by her side.

    You already ruined her life¡¯s happiness. Don¡¯t tell me that you want to also destroy my happiness?¡± Fanny was somewhat hysterical when she saw Firenze throwing off her hand and charge toward Han Shuo and suddenly screamed.

    Firenze who had struggled free of Fanny with great difficulty suddenly stopped in his tracks. His face was distorted and his breath uneven, showing signs of a beast wanting to run away.

    Everyone was startled. Some of them looked at Firenze nervously, afraid that he would act recklessly. This person¡¯s reputation had always been that he didn¡¯t behave like an ordinary person. Therefore, everyone had reason to believe that he would go crazy.

    Even Han Shuo was somewhat fearful, secretly increasing his vignce. He felt that if Firenze dared to recklessly attack himself, he would preemptively knock Firenze unconscious and tie him up, so as to avoid his fluctuating exuberant energy. He would then exin to Fanny afterward.

    Under everyone¡¯s watchful gaze, Firenze¡¯s distorted face actually calmed down gradually. However, his expression was still dark and frightening. After a long while, Firenze turned around to look at Fanny and spoke in a tranquil tone for the first time since he came and asked, ¡°Lass, are you truly certain?¡±

    Fanny immediately nodded her head, her expression firm as she replied, ¡°Father, I am certain.¡±

    ¡°Brat, are you able to give Fanny happiness?¡± Firenze suddenly stared at Han Shuo and inquired word by word.

    ¡°As long as I am alive, no one can bully her!¡± Han Shuo raised his hand and pledged while having a serene expression.

 Chapter 420: Iâ€™m unwilling to part with you

    GDK 420 ¨C I¡¯m unwilling to part with you

    ¡°Father!¡± Fanny silently walked to Firenze¡¯s side, her eyes filled with expectation as she gazed at him and spoke softly.

    Firenze stared nkly at Han Shuo for a long time before suddenly shaking his head as he sighed and said, ¡°Forget it, since you insist, I wouldn¡¯t obstruct you.¡±

    ¡°Thank you, Father!¡± Fanny had a delighted expression as she then gazed at Han Shuo lovingly.

    Han Shuo also sighed in relief as he nodded toward Fanny. He then bowed in salute to Firenze and said, ¡°I will give her happiness, I promise!¡±

    ¡°Hmph! You have so many women yet still dare to say you will give her happiness. If you bully my daughter, I don¡¯t care who you are, I¡¯ll definitely go all out to settle the debt!¡± Firenze didn¡¯t give any face to Han Shuo as he shouted coldly in response.

    Han Shuo smiled bitterly without responding. He hesitated for a while before casting his gaze toward Phoebe. Of the three women, Phoebe had the most unyielding personality and was the most independent. Currently, Fanny and Emily had already stated their stand, and only the pale-faced Phoebe was left.

    Phoebe looked as if she had suffered arge stimulus. Her originally delicate face had be exceedingly white, as she stared in a daze at Han Shuo without saying a word as if she had suddenly be a fool.

    By Phoebe¡¯s side, Lawrence suddenly coughed and pulled Phoebe¡¯s sleeve in passing, reminding the distracted Phoebe to not hesitate any longer.

    Phoebe suddenly came to her senses, struggling repeatedly in her heart. She recalled many past events which she had gone through with Han Shuo, the uncertainty when they assassinated her rival together in the Boozt Merchant Guild, the sweetness when they were escaping together, thinking of Han Shuo¡¯s care for her, even presenting the divine weapon ¡®Starry Sky¡¯ as a gift without hesitation...

    These warm scenes were like snares of love. When Phoebe thought of these moments, they bound her even more tightly, causing her to feel stifled.

    However, as a strong independent woman, Phoebe never had the intention of sharing a man with others. She had shown great determination to understand the details of the situation for Emily¡¯s matter previously before she finally forgave Han Shuo for running amok.

    However, Fanny¡¯s situation was somewhat different from Emily¡¯s. The way Han Shuo¡¯s treated Fanny also caused her to realize how strong the love was between the two of them. Furthermore, Fanny had a superior upbringing and family background. All of these added together clearly caused Phoebe to somewhat be unable to ept the situation.

    Han Shuo silently watched Phoebe. When he saw Phoebe look like she was struggling indeterminately, the guilt in his heart grew exponentially. He endured the pain in his heart as he said bitterly, ¡°Let¡¯s forget it. Phoebe, I¡¯ve let you down in this lifetime!¡±

    When she heard Han Shuo¡¯s words, Phoebe¡¯s eyes were suddenly upied by endless pain, her face suddenly bing as white as a sheet. Phoebe looked at Han Shuo in disbelief, her heart akin to have been stabbed and shattered. With a sway, Phoebe actually fell backward.

    When Han Shuo who had been keeping a close watch on Phoebe saw her body sway and fall backward, he was terrified. He was by Phoebe¡¯s side without a second thought, supporting her before she could fall on the ground and shout worriedly, ¡°Phoebe, are you ok?¡±

    There was a sh of white light. Karel had also moved to Phoebe¡¯s side. As Han Shuo had rushed over first, Karel who was initially prepared to support Phoebe could only anxiously extend two fingers and ce them on Phoebe¡¯s nose. After pausing for three seconds, he clearly loosened his breath. He held back the anger in his heart as he said, ¡°She has fainted, it¡¯s all because of you!¡±

    At this moment, Han Shuo didn¡¯t have the energy to argue with Karel.When he heard Karel say that Phoebe had simply fainted, his heart calmed. He then ced his right hand on Phoebe¡¯s back and circte demonic yuan energy into her body.

    The sorrowful and heartbroken Phoebe felt afortable warmth in the middle of her back and slowly came to soon after. When she saw Han Shuo¡¯s worried expression immediately as she opened her eyes, she only felt a myriad of emotions entering her heart at the same time. She could no longer pretend to be strong and her tears suddenly flowed like a fountain as she cried bitterly at the top of her voice.

    As two fists bombarded Han Shuo¡¯s chest like raindrops, Phoebe scolded as she hit him, ¡°You heartless scoundrel, you actually dare to say those words to me. You¡¯ve swindled away my life¡¯s happiness and now you still want to stand aside and do nothing. Do you actually have a conscience...¡±

    There were constant pounding sounds as Phoebe hit Han Shuo¡¯s chest, his expression filled with pain. As he looked at Phoebe who was bawling in his embrace, Han Shuo simrly felt extremely distressed. However, Han Shuo really didn¡¯t know what to say to console Phoebe at this moment and could only repeatedly say ¡°I¡¯m sorry.¡±

    Phoebe had never lost control of herself like she did today. No matter what difficulties she came across, she would never be as weak as she was today. Furthermore, there were so many elders and officials present here. With Phoebe¡¯s character, it was even more unlikely that she would reveal signs of weakness.

    However, when Han Shuo said the words ¡°Let¡¯s forget it¡±, Phoebe felt as though the sky had copsed. The world seemed to turn grey in a split second, no longer having any color. That piercing pain destroyed all of Phoebe¡¯s pretense, causing her to feel as though she was beaten ck and blue.

    Emly and Fanny¡¯s line of sight had never left Han Shuo from the beginning. When they saw Phoebe pounding her fists repeatedly on Han Shuo¡¯s chest, they both felt incessantly distressed, fearing that Phoebe would not know what¡¯s important and injure Han Shuo.

    Everyone observing by the side had different expressions as they looked at Han Shuo and the three women, not knowing what they should say. They actually wanted to interfere in this matter, but unfortunately, they weren¡¯t able to make the decision in this situation and could only look on helplessly as the unorthodox situation developed in a way they totally couldn¡¯t exin.

    ¡°That¡¯s great, that¡¯s great. Bryan truly has his ways!¡± The happiest person in the crowd was definitely Lawrence, who felt ecstatic by the way things turned out.

    Han Shuo and the three women represented four different powers. If they be hostile toward each other, Lawrence would definitely not have any hope of ascending the throne. During this period of time, Lawrence felt as though he was sitting on pins and needles and was more nervous than anyone else. He was truly afraid that the four parties would recklessly cause enormous disturbances, destroying all of his hopes.

    Even now, Phoebe was still crying loudly as she leaned into Han Shuo¡¯s embrace. Lawrence was finally able to truly rx. He knew in his heart that although none of the three parties were pleased with this oue, due to the three women¡¯s insistence, none of them were able to change this favorable situation.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry!¡± Han Shuo embraced Phoebe, repeating the same words as before.

    Weary from both hitting and scolding Han Shuo, Phoebe gradually suppressed the pain in her heart, wiping the neverending tears from her eyes and fiercely red at Han Shuo and said, ¡°In this lifetime, you can forget about trying to abandon me. If you dare to do such a thing, I¡¯ll kill you and thenmit suicide!¡±

    ¡°So long as you are willing to be with me, why would I be willing to part with you!¡± Han Shuo looked at Phoebe and said with deep emotion.

    ¡°We are already like this, how can I not be with you. You scoundrel, you heartless creature!¡± Phoebe felt indignant, once again sending a fist toward Han Shuo¡¯s chest.

    When he heard what Phoebe said, Karel¡¯s expression changed, clearly understanding the hidden meaning within Phoebe¡¯s words. The people around them were all cunning fellows and when they heard Phoebe divulge such information, they were able to grasp the crucial point in a sh. Their eyes flickered as they shifted their gaze between Han Shuo and the three women.

    When Han Shuo saw the gazes of these people, he immediately understood. Surprisingly, Han Shuo¡¯s thick-skinned face turned red as he coughed dryly.

    Phoebe, Emily, and Fanny gradually understood somewhat. Under the strange gazes from everyone, all of them started to blush. Phoebe inwardly scolded herself for bbing. Unfortunately, this wasn¡¯t the time to try and exin herself and she momentarily became shy and embarrassed, not knowing what she should do.

    As the three women had all taken a Rebirth Pill, their skin was all fair and glossy, delicate like water. Among them, as Emily and Phoebe had received Han Shuo¡¯s nourishment, their bodies faintly had a hint of charm and maturity. If one looked seriously, they were indeed somewhat different from Fanny.

    Forget it, let¡¯s forget about it. She had been disappointing too, having given her body to this brat. What else can I say? Sacred swordmaster Karel sighed in his heart, staring distractedly at Phoebe for a while before finally saying, ¡°Let¡¯s let it be. You have grown up, I¡¯m unable to control you anyways.¡±

    ¡°Master!¡± Phoebe cried out softly, continuing to say, ¡°Master, I¡¯m sorry. I¡¯ve caused you to be disappointed.¡±

    ¡°Hai!¡¯ space sacred magus Sabakas sighed. When he saw everyone look at him in puzzlement, he smiled and said, ¡°It is most appropriate that the youngsters handle their own matters. Hehe, we have all grown older. How can we restrict them on every matter? Presently, Lancelot Empire is suffering from internal trouble and outside aggression and is precisely in its most challenging situation. Everyone here is the backbone of the empire. What we should be doing now should be resolving the empire¡¯s problems!¡±

    As Sabakas was a senior with good moral standing and reputation within the empire, even that madman Firenze somewhat respected him. Now that he had spoken, everyone was resentful but didn¡¯t say anything else.

    As the protector of Lancelot Empire, Karel naturally wouldn¡¯t be like Firenze and disregard the survival of the empire. When he heard what Sabakas said, he gradually calmed down and was in deep thought, not saying a word.

    Sabakas paused for a moment. Seeing that everyone still seemed to show him respect, he loosened a breath. Just as he was about to seize the opportunity and let all parties reconcile, Han Shuo suddenly creased his eyebrows and said, ¡°Ashburn and eldest prince Charles have personally led their troops and are headed for the northern city district. It looks like they intend to settle the situation of the entire Lancelot Empire in one battle!¡±

 Chapter 421: We want to become even stronger

    GDK 421 ¨C We want to be even stronger

    The sudden changes caused everyone to rapidly free themselves from the matter between Han Shuo and the three women. Everyone had a heavy expression as they started to worry about the attack from Ashburn, Charles, and their forces.

    ¡°Brat, how do you know that that old fox Ashburn ising over?¡± Firenze looked at Han Shuo suspiciously, as if he didn¡¯t really believe what Han Shuo was saying.

    Among the people present, Firenze was the most unfamiliar with Han Shuo, unlike Karel, Sabakas and the rest who knew that Han Shuo possessed a mysterious martial technique that was able to clearly observe the entire area. Hence when he saw that Han Shuo had said those words so confidently, he naturally didn¡¯t believe him.

    ¡°He indeed knows.¡± Sabakas exined to Firenze, ¡°It is precisely due to his mystical observational ability that we are still able to hold the fort here.¡±

    Firenze was stunned, his eyes filled with amazement as he looked at Han Shuo, notprehending how Han Shuo was able to do it. Firenze knew that Sabakas wasn¡¯t someone who spoke lightly. Since he said that Han Shuo had such an ability, that meant that Han Shuo was definitely able to do it.

    ¡°This time around, those that are heading over include the city guards from the other city gates. With our current forces, we shouldn¡¯t be able to ward them off. Furthermore, that sacred knight and Temple Knights from the Church of Light, as well as earth sacred magus Dempus are within this group of people...¡± Han Shuo shut his eyes, describing theposition and strength of Ashburn¡¯s forces as observed through his mystical demons, no details able to escape his sights.

    These days, everyone was already familiar with Han Shuo¡¯s mystical observation ability and they earnestly listened to Han Shuo¡¯s detailed exnation of Ashburn¡¯s troops. As Han Shuo¡¯s low voice continued, numerous images were revealed in front of everyone¡¯s eyes. The movements of Ashburn and the rest wereid bare.

    When Han Shuo finished speaking, Firenze was calm as he said, ¡°It seems like Ashburn intends to seize the northern city district in one go.¡±

    ¡°Firenze, what do you think we should do?¡± Old Hahn had unknowingly walked over and asked Firenze seriously.

    ¡°Give the order to open Ossen City. I¡¯ll bring my troops over. Hmph, Ashburn has be insane. It looks like what His Highness expected is indeed happening!¡± Firenze said, his voice filled with murderous spirit.

    ¡°You, you will lead your troops over?¡± Old Hahn was clearly startled, staring stupefied at Firenze as he replied.

    ¡°Obviously. Otherwise, in this time of great chaos, why would Ie unapanied to Ossen City? Do you think I¡¯m just here to watch a show?¡± Firenze unhappily red at Old Hahn, casually pointing toward the head of the northern city guards, Boris, and said, ¡°How about you and me head over to the northern gate together?¡±

    ¡°Sure, I¡¯ll immediately make a trip with you!¡± Boris didn¡¯t express any annoyance toward Firenze¡¯s gestures, immediately agreeing to Firenze¡¯s suggestion.

    In front of Firenze, regardless of experience or seniority, Boris was far inferior to him. Firenze had always been arrogant and haughty. However, he had a basis for being this arrogant. This was something everyone in the Lancelot Empire was clear about. Furthermore, seeing that Firenze¡¯s intention was clearly to assist Lawrence, the unusual situation beforehand seemed to be forgotten. Emily was extremely pleased with the current oue, seeing her brother¡¯s unconditional support and Old Hahn having no choice but to take an indifferent attitude as he didn¡¯t want to sink into further disorder. All these caused the miserable Emily to feel reborn.

    ¡°My two sisters, what are your thoughts?¡± After speaking to Han Shuo, Emily smiled as she nced at Fanny and Phoebe.

    Fanny and Phoebe ignored the nce, somewhat ufortably nodding their heads. As she was nodding her head, Phoebe suddenly thought of something, ring at Han Shuo as she said, ¡°You are not allowed to use your martial technique to eavesdrop. You are too vile. Hmph, based on what you said, your martial technique is able to spy on the entire city. Doesn¡¯t that mean that you are able to watch any woman bathing? You repulsive fellow, how could you practice such an obscene and vulgar martial technique!¡±

    When they heard what Phoebe said, Fanny and Emily¡¯s eyebrows suddenly creased, as if suddenly realizing such a possibility. As they thought about Han Shuo¡¯s actions all along, the three women were worried about Han Shuo¡¯s character. Their gazes toward Han Shuo suddenly became much sharper.

    Han Shuo felt a headache iing and hurriedly said, ¡°There¡¯s another anomaly, I need to tell them immediately!¡±

    After he spoke, Han Shuo didn¡¯t care about the three women¡¯s mor, hurriedly leaving the side of the three women and headed for an area of rubble at the back of the castle.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t head for the assembly room where Sabakas and the rest were. After the matter that had just happened, Amyes, Karel, Old Hahn and the others would probably not be pleased with him. Han Shuo knew that they felt anger in their hearts and naturally wouldn¡¯t bring trouble upon himself.

    Using the Demonyer Edge to carve out arge, hidden cave, Han Shuo arranged a transporting array and teleported to the Cemetery of Death.

    Within the dusky Cemetery of Death, the earth zombie lied quietly in the ce of extreme earth, looking as if he was in aa. Faint strands of earthen yellow earth essence energy from the surroundings slowly flowed into the earth zombie¡¯s body, gradually restoring the wounded earth zombie.

    A greater part of the earth essence energy within the Cemetery of Death¡¯s ce of extreme earth had been consumed when refining the earth elite zombie and there was only very little remaining currently. Han Shuo had ced the earth zombie here three days ago, taking advantage of the remaining earth essence energy within the ce of extreme earth to restore the earth zombie¡¯s wounds.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s heart ached as he looked at the silent earth zombie deep underground, Han Shuo sensed the little skeleton¡¯s call. He hesitated for a moment before summoning the little skeleton before him.

    ¡°Father, we want to seek revenge for him!¡± the little skeleton transmitted immediately after he arrived.

    ¡°I know, I¡¯m currently awaiting the opportunity, waiting for a chance to send that knight to his death!¡± Han Shuo replied.

    ¡°We want to be stronger!¡± The little skeleton transmitted another message. Soon after, there was a walnut-like ck fruit in his hand. The little skeleton handed over the fruit to Han Shuo and said, ¡°Father, this fruit is for you. It¡¯s extremely useful!¡±

    The ck fruit looked like a walnut. There was nothing unusual about its ordinary appearance. However, when Han Shuo examined with his consciousness, he immediately felt that the fruit contained a bizarre energy and was stunned.

    ¡°What is this, what¡¯s its use?¡± Han Shuo extended his hand as he spoke, taking the fruit that the little skeleton handed over.

    Tens of thousands of brilliance suddenly exploded out of the fruit, binding around Han Shuo momentarily like ribbons. Han Shuo immediately became like a cocoon.

 Chapter 422: Radiant Translations

    GDK 422 ¨C

    part 1

    The ribbon-like brilliance wrapped tightly around Han Shuo¡¯s entire body, but Han Shuo didn¡¯t have the feeling of being restricted.

    Strands of light slowly entered Han Shuo¡¯s skin, causing a refreshing feeling to flow through his whole body, as though he had entered a cool and refreshingke.

    When the little skeleton saw Han Shuo being wrapped up by the ck fruit after receiving the ck fruit from him, he extended his snowy white hands which were holding a few thumb-sized ores in his palms. The little skeleton¡¯s Purple Demon Eye shined brightly, as though he was pondering about something.

    After staring nkly for a while, he put his palms together and started to grind them against each other. As an ear-piercing creaking sound emitted from his palms, a dense deathly aura suddenly emanated from his palms, and the creaking sound stopped abruptly.

    Grains of greyish-white sand-like particles slowly flowed out from between the little skeleton¡¯s palms. He quickly rushed to Han Shuo¡¯s side, sprinkling the sand-like particles on Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    As the fine grains were falling Han Shuo¡¯s body, they suddenly sparkled like stars in the night, giving off a bizarre yet beautiful sight. However, when the fine particlesnded on his body, they disappeared without a trace, like water that flowed into the sea and no more sparkles could be seen.

    The little skeleton¡¯s Purple Demon Eye actually exuded a serene dense color which moved non-stop as it winded around Han Shuo who was encased by the ck fruit. It sprinkled the particles from the little skeleton¡¯s hands even throughout Han Shuo¡¯s body, making sure not miss a spot.

    At first, Han Shuo had a snug andzy feeling, as though he was soaking in a refreshing pool of water, causing him to benguid and somewhat drowsy.

    However, when the fine particlesnded on his body, the areas where the particlesnded had a sudden fiery, stinging pain. The thread-like particles seemed to have spirituality as they slowly assimted into Han Shuo¡¯s bones.

    Han Shuo who was originally feelingnguid andfortable, suddenly felt his body be incredibly heavy. Wherever the fine grainsnded on, the surrounding bones would felt as though they were cast with lead. Han Shuo realized that the heavy sensation wasn¡¯t an illusion, but was actually happening.

    Han Shuo did an internal inspection using his consciousness, and distinctly saw specks of starlight-like radiance slowly fusing into his skeleton, gradually reinforcing his bones and causing them to strengthen. This felt simr to the first time Han Shuo felt that he was reborn.

    Gradually, the numerous strands of light from the fruitpletely entered Han Shuo¡¯s body. The little skeleton had already stopped moving around Han Shuo. The fine sand-like particles from his hands had flowed into Han Shuo¡¯s skeleton like water, fusing with the fruit¡¯s radiance, enhancing every inch of Han Shuo¡¯s bones.

    Throughout the process, Han Shuo¡¯s bones ached as though they were pierced by many fine needles. However, having practiced his demonic arts till this level, Han Shuo had endured all kinds of pain. Whenpared to the time when his skull was cut open, where he had felt terrifying pain as though his brain was sliced into many pieces, the current pain was easily endured by Han Shuo.

    Therefore, Han Shuo did not reveal any signs of being unable to endure throughout the process, nor did he even groan. He was quiet as though he had fallen asleep.

    The little skeleton who was beside Han Shuo, looked at him in a daze, as though Han Shuo¡¯s expression was extremely strange.

    After an indefinite amount of time, Han Shuo felt the pain throughout his body subsiding, allowing Han Shuo to be able to ignore it. Right at this moment, he exhaled and opened his eyes. When he looked down, Han Shuo realized that he had alreadypletely recovered, and there wasn¡¯t anything abnormal with his body anymore.

    He cracked his neck, swung his arms, flexing his muscles and bones. Han Shuo suddenly had an odd expression. This was because Han Shuo suddenly felt that his body weight had increased tenfold. This was truly inconceivable!

    That ordinary-looking fruit had strengthened Han Shuo¡¯s bones and increased their density, causing their durability to be extremely astonishing. As his bones were strengthed, his weight had increased along with it. Although Han Shuo was mentally prepared and understood that there would be changes to his body, when the changes were way beyond his expectations, Han Shuo was also extremely amazed.

    ¡°What kind of fruit is this? What are its uses?¡± A shocked Han Shuo stared nkly for a while before he asked the little skeleton.

    ¡°We call it ¡®ck resolute crystal¡¯. Just like the serene luster gem you had taken previously, they are extremely miraculous items from my world. The serene luster gem can strengthen one¡¯s soul, causing the soul to be purer; the ck resolute crystal strengthens one¡¯s bones and can make our bones much harder.

    A ck resolute crystal like this can strengthen an evil knight¡¯s body several times. I had previously consumed a ck resolute crystal and had suffered terribly. However, after absorbing the ck resolute crystal¡¯s energy, I could detect that my bones became much more solid.¡° The little skeleton exined to Han Shuo, pausing for a moment before sighing in admiration, ¡°Father, you are truly amazing! You actually didn¡¯t have the slightest dreading of the pain!¡±

    It turns out that the fruit was something as precious as the serene luster gem. No wonder it had such a miraculous effect! During Han Shuo¡¯s previous visit to theherworld, he had seen with his own eyes how the undead creatures fought desperately over a serene luster gem. Therefore, he knew that this ck resolute crystal was definitely also a highly sought-after item that all undead creatures will scramble for.

    The little skeleton had actually not kept such a valuable treasure to improve his own strength and instead gifted it to Han Shuo without the slightest hesitation. This caused Han Shuo to be extremely moved. As Han Shuo looked at the ordinary-looking little skeleton and was just about to praise him, he suddenly thought of another matter.

    In the past, whenever changes happened to Han Shuo¡¯s body, time would past unwittingly. He didn¡¯t know if a long time had passed this time around when he used the ck resolute crystal to strengthen his bones. As Ossen City was currently at its most chaotic moments, time was the most precious thing. As someone who could observe the whole situation remotely, Han Shuo was someone who could not be missing at this critical moment.

    ¡°How much time has passed?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s eyebrows creased as he hurriedly asked the little skeleton.

    ¡°I have no idea!¡± the little skeleton calmly replied.

    Han Shuo came to his senses soon after. The Cemetery of Death was the same as theherworld where there was no concept of time. The Cemetery of Death was encapsted by a strong barrier. Neither sunlight nor moonlight could prate it, and therefore it was naturally impossible to derive time from the rise and setting of the sun and moon.

    Thinking about the impending major battle, Han Shuo immediately panicked. He didn¡¯t dare to continue staying in the Cemetery of Death. After sending the little skeleton back to theherworld, he hurriedly stood in the center of the Cemetery of Death¡¯s magical transportation array.

    All of a sudden, the sounds of horses trampling, magic exploding and the wretched howls of warriors¡¯ at death¡¯s door all rushed into Han Shuo¡¯s ears. The source of these sounds wasn¡¯t that far away.

    Sure enough, the battle had already begun! Han Shuo immediately came to his senses, tidying up the magic array. All kinds of images were being projected into his brain, allowing him to clearly observe everything that was happening.

    So long as Han Shuo was within Ossen City, the mystical demons would be able to transmit every scene of Ossen City into his brain. However, if Han Shuo is too far away from Ossen City, the connection between Han Shuo and the mystical demons will be too weak to support the transfer of information. Moreover, the Cemetery of Death has a peculiar barrier, and therefore Han Shuo naturally wasn¡¯t able to know the happenings within Ossen City while in the Cemetery of Death.

    However, once Han Shuo returned Ossen City via the transportation array, his connection with the twelve mystical demons was immediately re-established, allowing him to possess the ability to control the whole situation again.

    Through the mystical demons¡¯ point of view, Han Shuo saw that fierce battles were ongoing on several wide spaces around the castle. The powers headed by Firenze, Karel, and Lawrence were fighting relentlessly with Ashburn and eldest prince Charles¡¯ troops, with deaths urring at every moment.

    This castle was originally used for storage of military supplies and it just so happened that there were no residents in the surroundings. The surroundings were simply vast opennd, allowing the two sides to have the perfect location for battle.

    TL note: So, the ck resolute crystal is supposed to be an item simr to the previous serene luster gem. The raws for this is ºÚ¼á¾§. Wanted it to have a simr style of naming with the serene luster gem. Do give your thoughts on what you feel about the name and any suggestions on what else it could be caught that might fit better!

    part 2

    Everywhere he looked was involved in a vigorous battle. Every plot ofnd within a few kilometers radius of the castle was densely packed with troops fighting. Apart from the northern city district, mystical demons ced in the different districts observed that the other districts including the imperial pce were also shrouded in the mes of battle.

    However,pared to the great battle ongoing at the northern city district, the battles at the other districts were clearly smaller in scale. This was because, headed by Lawrence, those high-ranking figures that could threaten Charles were currently all gathered in the northern city district.

    It was unknown if there was a tacit agreement, none of the sacred rank experts participated in the battle. Karel and Sabakas on Lawrence¡¯s side, Dempus and the sacred knight on Charles¡¯ side, all watched by the sidelines as their troops went all out in battle.

    Both Lawrence and Charles knew the incredible lethality of sacred rank experts, especially that of sacred magi. A single forbidden magic spell was enough to turn the tide of battle. However, every kingdom within the Profound Continent had a tacit agreement, that sacred magi would not use forbidden magic in an ordinary battle.

    With forbidden magic not permitted against foreign enemies, it was naturally must not be used during internal conflict. Even though Ossen City was rather huge, if it was really bombarded by a few forbidden magic spells, Lancelot Empire¡¯s capital, Ossen City would disappear from the continent, with countless casualties among the residents.

    This was precisely why both space sacred magus Sabakas and earth sacred magus Dempus have been looking on without lifting a finger during this war. Neither of them dared to use forbidden magic on the opposing army which was from the same empire.

    Firenze was themander of the war. At a high vantage point at the middle of the castle, Firenze roared unendingly as several armored officers under hismand arranged their troops methodically in ordance to Firenze¡¯s orders and attacked Ashburn and Charles¡¯ troops from all directions.

    Han Shuo observed the overall situation through his mystical demons. He suddenly realized that under Firenze¡¯s never-ending roar, the troops from his Howling Legion looked as though they were randomly dispersed, but indistinctly formed various peculiar formations that divided Ashburn and Charles¡¯ army into severalrge chunks, and quietly surrounded every one of them.

    Only Han Shuo who could see the view the overall situation through his mystical demons could clearly see this strange transformation. The participating soldiers and generals would never be able to notice the quiet changes in battle without overlooking anything.

    The Howling Legion, which Firenze had brought, had the same design painted on their armor. These soldiers came from the southern border and they had many years of experience fighting against the brutal Orcs. All their weapons have been doused in too much blood. Each and every one of them looked valiant and had a cold expression. Their fighting strength was more fearsome than the Redbud Knights that Han Shuo had seen previously.

    The fighting strength of the city guards of Ossen City was also ranked among the best. However, when facing against Firenze¡¯s Howling Legion, they were clearly being suppressed. Apart from being slightly better equipped, their battle experience, troop coordination, and individual strength were all greatly inferior to the Howling Legion.

    Han Shuo suddenly noticed that Firenze¡¯s Howling Legion and the northern city guards were actually gradually gaining the upper hand under Firenze¡¯s seemingly crazymands. Unknowingly, they were slowly withering away Ashburn and Charles¡¯ troops.

    This madman who was able to stand tall at the southern border for so many years, preventing the barbaric Orcs from prating the southern border defense line, definitely had a well-deserved reputation! Han Shuo was in awe and deeply convinced with Firenze¡¯s remarkablemanding skills.

    ¡°Firenze! These men are soldiers of the Lancelot Empire. They are innocent and have no choice but to fight simply because of the orders of Charles and Ashburn. If they were all killed, it would be Lancelot Empire¡¯s loss! ¡± sacred swordmaster Karel was enraged as he red at Firenze.

    Karel ced the utmost priority on the future of the Lancelot Empire. When he saw that under Firenze¡¯smands, the northern city district hadpletely turned into a war zone, with corpses lying everywhere in the northern city district, corpses which belonged to soldiers who were loyal and faithful to the Lancelot Empire. However, because they were under a differentmander, they had no choice but to kill each other mercilessly. The loss of the empire¡¯s own people was clearly what Karel didn¡¯t want to see and hence he continuously made a racket.

    Even Dark Mantle¡¯s chief elder Sabakas felt endless grief as he saw the ever increasing losses. He hesitated for a moment before shouting, ¡°Firenze! At the rate you¡¯re going, even if we win the war, the empire¡¯s strength will be greatly weakened! ¡±

    Firenze was unmoved and continued to howl outmands to his officers. When he saw that Sabakas and Karel were still moring, he suddenly red at Karel and said, ¡°During the civil strife of any country within the continent, which of them did not end in rivers of blood? Other than defeating their army, do you think you can make Ashburn yield just by mere words?

    Hmph, with the sacred knight and earth sacred magus Dempus over there, not to mention all kinds of experts around them, even a semi-divine expert might not be enough to kill them! I don¡¯t think that you have a better n?

    Both of you listen up! This matter can only be resolved quickly by shedding blood. The longer a civil strife drags on, the worse off it is for the empire. Dammit, my men are also getting killed but am Iining? What¡¯s the use of being so emotional? Well if you don¡¯t like my methods, I can stand aside and do nothing. Let¡¯s see if you guys can convince the two foxes on the other side to give up the throne with words. Are you willing to take control of the whole battle?¡±

    Firenze spoke unrestrainedly, bombarding the two sacred rank experts like artillery and leaving them speechless and unable to find any grounds to retort.

    Firenze had always been arrogant and conceited. At other times, he might perhaps still show some respect to Sabakas. However, during a state of war, Firenze would immediately turn into a real madman. In order to achieve victory, he would even dare to vite His Majesty¡¯s orders without hesitation. So it¡¯s needless to say that Firenze wouldn¡¯t bat an eye at the advice of the two sacred rank experts.

    After his vulgarity-filled tongueshing, Firenze no longer paid attention to them and continued to howlmands at his officers, conveying information of the battlefield to his troops. His Howling Legion slowly and quietly took control of the battlefield, covertly surrounding Ashburn¡¯s troops without anyone noticing.

    The two sacred rank masters bitterly turned a blind eye and could only sigh. Although they felt aggrieved, there was no other way. They weren¡¯t good atmandingrge-scale warfare. Furthermore, without Firenze and his Howling Legion, this battle would simply be impossible to win.

    Besides, what Firenze said made sense. He who hesitates loses. Unfortunately, the current Lancelot Empire would only be able to swiftly settle its turmoil through blood-filled battle. Otherwise, if either side escaped Ossen City and upies other cities, the battle would continue to spill out into other cities, which would be a destructive blow to the Lancelot Empire.

    Hence, even though the two sacred rank experts were berated and cursed by Firenze, they could only swallow their grievances and no longer dared to contradict Firenze, so as to avoid that fellow having any further crazy behavior.

    Having received images of every location, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but let out a breath of relief. He didn¡¯t stay in the cave that he dug any longer, immediately flying out and headed for the castle.

    ¡°Whoosh whoosh!¡± several long-range arrows streaked across the sky as they pierced toward Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was shocked. He looked downwards and saw a few soldiers from the Howling Legion, their expressions cold as they gave him deadly stares. They had unexpectedly sighted Han Shuo from far away and shot arrows at him.

    Han Shuo¡¯s evaluation of the Howling Legion rose even higher. He cast a spell and a snow white flower bud appeared in mid-air. The bone shield blocked all the arrows and Han Shuo was unharmed. By now, he had already reached the middle of the castle where Firenze was.

 Chapter 423: Instructing a disciple

    GDK 423 ¨C Instructing a disciple

    part 2

    ¡°Alright, alright. Let¡¯s talk about happier things and not lose oneself in grief from the past.¡± Phoebe also consoled Fanny. It looks as if the rtionship between the three women could still be regarded as harmonious and not as prickly as Han Shuo had guessed.

    Just as he was contemting what to say, Han Shuo suddenly felt the Demonyer Edge within his body begin to stir. This caused him to be startled. After he shut his eyes and pondered for a while, Han Shuo suddenly realized something, immediately eximing happily, ¡°It seems like I need to train for a while!¡±

    The battle for Ossen City had been ongoing unceasing for the past two days, with the fiercest battles in the northern city district. Within this extremely short duration, more than ten thousands soldiers had already died in battle. Every one of Ossen City¡¯s city guards was part of Lancelot Empire¡¯s elites while Firenze¡¯s Howling Legion was even more formidable. In these two days, the soldiers that died on the battlefield had left behind soaring killing intent and their spirits filled with hate and ire.

    This type of energy caused ordinary people to feel constrained, as if there was arge mountain pressing down on their chest, giving people a feeling of suppression. Some experts were able to sense this energy even more clearly. However, of this boundless killing intent and negative energy from the deceased, only powerful necromancers within the Profound Continent were able to utilize this energy to obtain a few powerful souls and refine special undead creatures. No one was able to directly absorb this energy.

    However, Han Shuo who trained in demonic arts was able to condense the killing intent and directly absorb it. The boundless resentment and fear left behind by the souls of the dead that had yet to dissipate were also easily absorbed by the Demonyer Edge. It was precisely because the Demonyer Edge had sensed this familiar energy enveloping the world that it transmitted a signal to Han Shuo in its thirst for this energy.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on, why do you suddenly need to train?¡± Phoebe looked at Han Shuo and asked in puzzlement.

    ¡°This is hard to exin. It¡¯s rted to the special martial technique that I train in. Just like how Bonds has dense killing intent because he had killed too many people when he was an assassin and it unwittingly attached to his body, hence he¡¯s able to utilize killing intent to intimidate others, I¡¯m able to do so as well.

    Oh, that¡¯s right. This energy is simrly useful to Bonds.As long as I give him a hand, he will also be able to seize the opportunity to assimte a little of the killing intent that¡¯s present everywhere. Alright, I won¡¯t speak any longer to all of you. I¡¯ll first go and look for Bonds.¡± Han Shuo casually exined and soon after suddenly thought of Bonds and left hurriedly.

    ¡°That bastard!¡± When Phoebe realized that Han Shuo had already disappeared while she was distracted for a moment, she couldn¡¯t help but curse loudly.

    During this two days, Bonds¡¯ tranquil and unfeeling heart had be somewhat unstable. Han Shuo¡¯s mystical martial technique was like an unbelievable revtion to Bonds. Bonds who was about to learn the martial technique from Han Shuo would be excited every time he thought of it.

    At Bonds¡¯ age and rank, what he pursued wasn¡¯t as varied and random as youngsters. Only some considerable benefits would make people of their level excited. Bonds who had been an assassin for many years always considered himself to be extremely cool-headed. However, his mind had been overwhelmed repeatedly these few days by Han Shuo¡¯s mystical martial technique, causing his tranquil heart to finally be excited again.

    ¡°It¡¯s been two days. I hope Senior is fine. In this world, I fear that only Senior would be able to guide me in the correct direction.¡± Bonds thought inwardly. He was truly worried about Han Shuo, afraid that his only beacon in this world would die out.

    As a swishing sound entered his ears, Bonds was suddenly startled, contracting his killing intent as he asked coldly, ¡°Who is it?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, it¡¯s me!¡± Han Shuo chuckled as he replied and soon afternded by Bonds¡¯ side.

    Bonds had uncontainable happiness in his heart, however, his expression didn¡¯t have the slightest difference. He bowed toward Han Shuo and said respectfully, ¡°Senior!¡±

    During the war, Bonds who wasn¡¯t proficient inmanding the battle had been staying alone in a remote room on the third floor.

    There were too many experts on Ashburn and Charles¡¯ side. No matter how strong he was, Bonds was unable to carry out an assassination on any of them. There were currently also many experts within the castle and Lawrence simply wasn¡¯t worried about his safety. Hence, Bonds had suddenly be idle and thus stayed alone in the remote room.

    ¡°I¡¯m looking for you for important matters. Come, let¡¯s go to the highest roof of the castle!¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t say any superfluous words, immediately smiling and instructing Bonds to follow.

    Without saying anything, Bonds immediately nodded and flew with Han Shuo toward the tallest tower of the castle.

    Before Bonds became his disciple, Han Shuo had alreadyid down some ground rules and Bonds had remembered them by heart. One of the rules of not viting the orders of seniors had been repeatedly stressed by Han Shuo. As the senior student who would impart the martial technique to Bonds, Han Shuo naturally became his senior. Bonds had not lived his life in vain, clearly understanding that currently, Han Shuo¡¯s orders were the most important.

    As the battle zed on like wildfire, Han Shuo directly brought Bonds to the clock tower. After they arrived, Han Shuo smiled at Bonds and said, ¡°Originally you would have to enter the sect before I¡¯m able to impart you with our martial technique. However as the war is ongoing unceasingly, the entire Ossen City has been filled with a lot of extraordinary energy. Perhaps you are also able to sense this energy. If I impart the martial technique to you now, it would just so happen to be able to assist you in assimting this energy before it dissipates. In that way, your strength would be able to advance by leaps and bounds.¡±

    Even before Han Shuo finished speaking, Bonds was already brimming with ecstasy. He had been longing for this day and night. When he heard that Han Shuo would impart this martial technique to him, the excitement in his heart simply couldn¡¯t be repressed. His body actually even trembled uncontrobly.

    When Han Shuo mentioned that the martial technique was able to absorb this kind of energy, Bonds was so excited he was about to faint. His voice trembled as he asked, ¡°Sen, senior, you mean that, the energy lingering within Ossen City which is causing people to feel suppressed can be absorbed by this martial technique?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded his head, smiling as he replied, ¡°Of course. In this world, all forms of energy can be absorbed. Death qi, killing intent and even spiritual strength can be absorbed. Hehe, I believe you have also felt it. The soaring killing intent from those soldiers has yet to dissipate. As long as you grasp the God ying Devil Path, you will be able to directly absorb this type of energy.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. I am able to sense the omnipresent killing intent within the battlefield. However, that energy doesn¡¯t belong to me. I¡¯m unable to even control the killing intent in my body proficiently and naturally wouldn¡¯t be able to utilize the killing intent of others.¡± Bonds said honestly.

    ¡°Control your breath and pay attention, I¡¯ll help you familiarize with the new energy!¡± Han Shuo said softly before moving behind Bonds and suddenly send a strand of demonic yuan energy into Bonds¡¯ body.

    After many years of random practice, Bonds had some vague understanding of how to utilize killing intent. The meridians within his body were full of killing intent. Through the transformation from the God ying Devil Path, this killing intent can directly form his own unique energy. It was just that all along, he didn¡¯t know how to make use of this killing intent.

    Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan energy suddenly entered Bonds¡¯ body so as to start assisting the rxed Bonds in setting things right. Han Shuo made use of the demonic yuan energy to first slowly absorb the impure killing intent that was circting through Bonds¡¯ meridians.

    The chart of the meridian flow for the God ying Devil Path had already appeared clearly within Han Shuo¡¯s mind. Han Shuo revolved the killing intent within Bonds¡¯ body in ordance with his memory and slowly guided them along a peculiar path.

    ¡°Remember this cirction method. It can help you increase your strength.¡± Han Shuo said softly, as he transferred another strand of demonic yuan energy into Bonds¡¯ body.

    While he was doing all these things, Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge had already flew up into the sky and constantly revolve in ordance to Han Shuo¡¯s will, forming ayer of thick blood clouds and slowly absorbed all the various kinds of negative energy that lingered within Ossen City and caused the ordinary citizens to be distraught with anxiety.

 Chapter 424

    GDK 424 ¨C

    part 1

    When Bonds heard that this cirction method could allow him to be stronger, he immediately focused his attention, not daring to rx the slightest.

    Bonds¡¯ body was filled with a great amount of killing intent. When it was pulled along by the demonic yuan energy to slowly circte through his meridians, it gradually formed a perfect orbit. With thepletion of every round of cirction, Bonds could feel as though there was something additional within his body. However, Bonds could only go all out in remembering the cirction method of this killing intent and couldn¡¯t manipte the cirction of the killing intent on his own.

    ¡°Pay attention, this is a section of mnemonic chant. As long as you remember this mnemonic chant and are able to understand how it¡¯s used, you would be able to circte the killing intent within your body without relying on the guidance of my demonic yuan energy!¡± Han Shuo said seriously to Bonds.

    Bonds was startled and not daring to move as he waited for Han Shuo to narrate the mnemonic chant. Everything that Han Shuo did for him seemed so novel to Bonds and every word he said was profound and mysterious. Bonds knew nothing at all of this unknown martial technique but he had already witnessed the miracles produced by this martial technique from Han Shuo. Now that the opportunity to learn this martial technique was right in front of him, he didn¡¯t dare to rx no matter what happened.

    Han Shuo¡¯s deep voice rang in Bonds¡¯ ear. Bonds no longer indulged in flights of fancy. When Han Shuo started speaking again, he discarded all distracting thoughts and conscientiously listened to Han Shuo¡¯s narration. Regardless of whether he could understand immediately, first of all, he had tomit the mnemonic chant to his memory.

    Han Shuo repeated the mnemonic chant three times, and then slowly exined the basics of demonic arts. After all, as the demonic arts originated from another world and was different from all the martial techniques and magic within the Profound Continent, it definitely wouldn¡¯t be easy for Bonds, as a native who had never been exposed to demonic arts, to fathom the true meaning behind the mnemonic chant.

    Han Shuo took great pains in rifying some of the general questions regarding demonic arts, and then exined in detail again on how to remember the mnemonic chant. He imparted everything he knew about God ying Devil Path to Bonds, regardless of whether Bonds could understand.

    ¡°Alright, I will leave a small portion of my demonic yuan energy within your body, so as to assist you in forming a vortex to absorb killing intent. You¡¯ll have to figure out the rest on your own. If you encounter anything you don¡¯t understand, note them down for now. When my matters arepleted, I¡¯ll rify your doubts.¡± When Han Shuo felt that his exnations were good enough, he gave Bonds further instructions.

    The few strands of demonic yuan energy that were in Bonds¡¯ body suddenly changed their direction and converged at Bonds¡¯ chest. The strands of demonic yuan energy slowly started to revolve in an arc, spurring the immense killing intent in his body, and gradually forming a vortex that others couldn¡¯t see.

    After this vortex took shape, a substantial-looking killing intent appeared from Bonds¡¯ chest. The dense killing intent was like an unsheathed sharp sword which carried the desire for massacre and destruction. At this moment, the killing intent which was lingering everywhere suddenly converged towards Bonds¡¯s chest, as though they were being attracted by the energy ofmon origin within Bonds.

    Bonds was indescribably ecstatic. If it wasn¡¯t that he couldn¡¯t move his body, he would probably have kneeled in excitement and kowtowed to thank Han Shuo!

    As the person who directly benefited from the killing intent, Bonds had never felt the cirction of killing intent as clearly as he did now. The vortex formed within his body was like an extremely mysterious force, slowly absorbing the killing intent that lingered around the northern city district. It gathered the killing intent within his chest before transforming it with the vortex into strands of ice-cold energy which disseminated through his body.

    Bonds have yet toprehend how to use this energy, but he clearly knew the fearsome destructive power contained within this energy. Once strands of this energy, which an ordinary person could never be able to absorb, entered his body, not only did it not damage his body, it instead gradually turned into an energy that waspatible with the killing intent within his body.

    This feeling could not be sufficiently expressed with just the word ¡°AWESOME¡±!

    ¡°Alright. You just stay over here. It would suffice if you simplyprehend what I just told you. Currently, your body has not been properly tempered. Your bones are not durable enough and many meridian channels are still not cleared. Therefore, the amount of killing intent you can absorb isn¡¯t that much. When you feel that you can¡¯t bear it anymore, you can exert some strength to p your chest to disperse the vortex. That will stop the absorption.¡± Han Shuo silently let go of Bonds and instructed him. Without waiting for Bonds to reply, Han Shuo flew toward a roof which was at another remote part of the castle.

    Brave, courageous soldiers were still constantly fighting, causing arge volume of energy that was useful to Han Shuo to linger in the sky above Ossen City. Bonds was able to absorb a small portion with Han Shuo help. Han Shuo, whose strength was advancing by leaps and bounds, was naturally able to absorb much more of this energy together with his Demonyer Edge.

    If Han Shuo stayed beside Bonds, once he started absorbing the lingering energy, all the energy would directly enter Han Shuo¡¯s body, greatly affecting the killing intent Bonds would absorb. Not only would his absorption rate decrease, the quality of energy would also weaken greatly. Therefore, Han Shuo chose to stay away from Bonds.

    As the demonic yuan energy within his body revolved frantically, an enormous vortex formed in the sky above Han Shuo. Compared to the vortex within Bonds¡¯ body, Han Shuo¡¯ vortex was a thousand times bigger. With demonic yuan energy as the foundation, the vortex slowly started to revolve.

    All the various energy lingering within the northern city district were suddenly like rivers converging into the sea, rushing forth at high speed toward the vortex formed above Han Shuo. In an instant, the color of the sky above the castle changed. The ordinary citizens felt the pressure on their bodies slowly decreasing while the experts were terrified, their expressions grotesque as they raised their head to look at the sky.

    Two spectacles appeared above the castle. One was the blood clouds formed by Demonyer Edge, while the other was a monstrous ck vortex. The Demonyer Edge was in the center of the blood clouds, rapidly absorbing the mix of fear and hatred lingering within the northern city district. On the other hand, the huge bizarre ck vortex was madly swallowing the soaring killing intent.

    The sudden appearance of the two spectacles on the northern city sky, and the impact they had on the negative energy that enveloped the northern city district caused many experts to be bbergasted!

    ¡°Lord Blount, can you sense that?¡° Earth sacred magus Dempus asked the sacred knight gravely.

    The sacred knight Blount creased his brows as he gazed at the two spectacles above the northern city district and said with a deep voice, ¡°I can sense that a sinister energy is present there. I¡¯m unfamiliar with that energy, which is filled with chaos, ughter, and madness. This energy is vastly different from the energy of the Cmity Church. What the hell is going on!¡±

    Dempus was somewhat appalled to learn that experienced sacred knight Blount didn¡¯t know what was happening. He muttered to himself, ¡°I can sense through my mental energy that this energyes from the dead soldiers. However, doesn¡¯t the energy from the soldiers rest between heaven and earth? How could they be drawn together by any forces? This, this is unbelievable!¡±

    ¡°Damnit. If Karel and Sabakas weren¡¯t here, we could actually go over and investigate. However, all we could do now is watch from afar without knowing what¡¯s going on!¡± Blount said resentfully but was also helpless to change the situation.

    The spectacle in the sky appeared above the castle where the northern city guards were garrisoned. This clearly meant that it had something to do with someone within the castle. However, that area was currently heavily guarded, even having two sacred rank experts guarding it. Even Blount and Dempus didn¡¯t dare to risk entering that area to investigate.

    While Blount and Dempus were inexplicably horrified, the experts within the castle had simrly turned pale in fright. All of them looked upwards and stared nkly at the spectacle that appeared, not knowing what was going on.

    part 2

    The blood clouds emitted by the Demonyer Edge were a bewitching blood red color under the illumination of the sun. The clouds enveloped the entire area surrounding the castle. With the obstruction of the blood clouds, the sunlight projected on the ground waspletely blood red in color. Along with blood that was everywhere, the battlefield hadpletely be a world drenched with blood.

    The ring, bewitching blood red color seemed to possess the ability to ignite the endless hatred hidden deep within people¡¯s hearts. Both sides of the battlefield became more reckless as if they had all be killing machines as they crazily unleashed savage attacks at the enemy, resulting in the losses on both sides to increase exponentially.

    The enormous vortex formed by Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan energy was like a crazy ck abyss, rapidly devouring the killing intent that filled the sky in the northern city district. Some grand magi and great swordmasters could feel the fluctuation in energy, As sacred rank experts, Sabakas and Karel could sense the fluctuations even more clearly

    Both of them had astonished expressions, still frightened by the spectacle in the sky. AS the changes appeared in the sky above the castle, both of them even assumed that it was a devastating strike by the enemy on the castle and were panicking and didn¡¯t know what to do.

    ¡°You guys must immediately obliterate these two strange phenomenons, those must definitely be actions taken by the enemy against us!¡± Firenze too was somewhat confused. He had heard about the destructive power of some forbidden magic. If the two spectacles overhead were the prelude to two destructive forbidden magic spells, the people in this district would be in a terrible situation. No matter how good Firenze was atmanding troops, there¡¯s no way he could evade from such arge-scale attack.

    The two sacred rank experts nced at Firenze while having a confused expression. Sabakas hesitated for a moment, and remarked suspiciously, ¡°The energy that formed the two spectacles overhead is somewhat queer. I think that neither the Church of Light nor Dempus is capable of creating these spectacles. This energy is brimming with chaos and ughter, which is poles apart from the energy those two people possess. Something isn¡¯t quite right!¡±

    ¡°I feel that it¡¯s different too. If Ashburn was assisted by someone from the Cmity Church, I might possibly be convinced that this is a terrifying magic attack against us. However, since this energy clearly contains an evil aura and the Cmity Church will definitely not work together with the Church of Light. Therefore we can eliminate that possibility. This is really somewhat odd.¡± Karel also had a doubtful expression as he slowly expressed his thoughts.

    After listening to both of them, Amyes suddenly had a thought and said, ¡°Could it really be Cmity Church and their target is Ashburn and his men? There is a sacred knight from the Church of Light on their side and the Cmity Church and the Church of Light are mortal enemies. Could it indeed be caused by them?¡°

    There was actually another possibility in Amyes¡¯ heart. As one of the three heavyweights of Dark Mantle, Amyes knew Han Shuo better than most people. He knew that Han Shuo seemed to have some connection with the Cmity Church. Generally, the Cmity Church will do their utmost to rope in the Church of Light¡¯s mortal enemies. Since the Church of Light was so adamant in treating Han Shuo as a mortal enemy, the Cmity Church will surely strive to win over Han Shuo and to establish a good rtionship with him.

    However, saying that would damage Han Shuo¡¯s reputation. To Amyes, Karel, and Sabakas, both the Cmity Church and the Church of Light were just regarded as just religions. They didn¡¯t feel reverence or hatred toward these two organizations like original people and hence wouldn¡¯t have any prejudices against Han Shuo due to Amyes¡¯ remarks.

    However, the ordinary nobles of Lancelot Empire had a somewhat instinctively opposition toward the Cmity Church. As Amyes didn¡¯t want them to have a bad impression of Han Shuo, he didn¡¯t mention this reason.

    Sabakas, Karel and the rest were startled when they heard Amyes¡¯ interpretation. Soon after, the two of them nced at each other and Karel said, ¡°Oh, that¡¯s possible too!¡±

    ¡°Hmph. But what if this is actually an impending attack against us? If you don¡¯t take action to resolve this and arge-scale killing magic descends upon us, we simply don¡¯t need to fight this war any longer and we¡¯ll all be done for.¡± Not buying the exnation, Firenze shouted at the two experts.

    Firenze¡¯s words caused Karel and Sabakas hesitated and be unsure on how they should act. If they make the wrong decision, it will result in an unpredictable situation. That oue was something even the two of them couldn¡¯t bear.

    While everyone was still hesitating, Emily had walked over from the second floor. When she overheard their conversation from afar, she hid her mouth as she chuckled and said, ¡°These spectacles are definitely caused by Bryan, all of you don¡¯t need to worry!¡±

    Hearing her statement, everyone was stunned. Amyes immediately asked, ¡°How can you be so sure?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, only he is able to manipte this sort of energy, I have previously witnessed him doing so. There¡¯s no need to worry, it¡¯s definitely him. Apart from him, I had never met anyone who could manipte the energy left behind between heaven and earth by the soldiers that died in battle. Rx, there won¡¯t be any problems.¡± Emily who knew many of Han Shuo¡¯s secrets, smiled as she exined to the crowd.

    Seeing Emily being so confident, sacred swordmaster Karel suddenly came to his senses,ughing heartily as he said, ¡°Right, right. It must be Bryan. Previously when I sparred with him, the energy he used is quite simr to the energy gathering in the sky. I only thought of it after you mentioned it. So that¡¯s what going on!¡±

    Karel¡¯s words clearly had more weight than Emily¡¯s. His remarks caused the crowd to suddenly calm down. Soon after, Sabakas suddenly flew up into the sky to observe the two spectacles more clearly. Within the huge ck vortex, strands of bizarre energy were filtered and transformed by the vortex and entered Han Shuo who was on the roof of the castle little by little.

    Seeing that, Sabakaspletely understood what was going on. He calmlynded in front of everyone, smiling as he exined, ¡°It is indeed caused by Bryan!¡±

    ¡°Yes, he mentioned previously that he had to train for a while and hastily left the lounge we were in. It looks like he is practicing his martial technique. There is nothing to worry about.¡± Emily exined.

    With Emily¡¯s further reassurance, the party turned to look at each other in amazement. They were shocked of the mysterious martial technique Han Shuo uses!

    However, the subject of the crowd¡¯s discussion currently encountered a thorny problem. He was gradually losing control over the changes of the various kinds of chaotic energy within the Demonyer Edge.

    As there was a massive death toll due to the civil strife, it caused too much energy from fear, hatred, and wrath to be present in Ossen City. The soldiers from both factions left behind their tenacious willpower after death. Due to there being too much chaotic energy which couldn¡¯t be rapidly fused together, it caused the energy within the Demonyer Edge to be extremely chaotic.

    However, the Demonyer Edge was still diligently absorbing the negative energy within Ossen City. The blood cloud became denser and denser, causing Han Shuo to feel that he was somewhat losing control.

    When Han Shuo came to his senses, the vast amount of energy absorbed within the Demonyer Edge was already bing disorderly. This caused Han Shuo¡¯s control over the Demonyer Edge to be somewhat difficult. As the huge amount of negative energy could not be fused quickly due to the strong enmity, the original energy within the Demonyer Edge was attempting to neutralize and coalesce them together.

    As a result, it was extremely chaotic within the Demonyer Edge. It was surging like a soaring dragon within the blood cloud. Dense, ruthless, and sinister aura gradually flowed into the blood cloud, affecting the soldiers of both sides who were still fighting the vigorous battle.

 Chapter 425: Han Shuoâ€™s sudden change

    GDK 425 ¨C Han Shuo¡¯s sudden change

    Han Shuo understood that this was because he had been too greedy. However, with things reaching this point, he didn¡¯t have a good solution.

    As his mind was connected with the Demonyer Edge, with the chaotic negative negative energy within the Demonyer Edge scattering everywhere, it gradually affected Han Shuo¡¯s calm frame of mind. An intention of ughter unconsciously leaped into his mind. It was like a toxin enhancer, causing Han Shou¡¯s heartbeat to start increasing.

    Not good! Han Shuo was rmed.

    This feeling had not appeared for a long time. Han Shuo knew that this is a sign of entering demonhood. The Demonyer Edge was unfortunately still wildly absorbing the negative energy within Ossen City, while Han Shuo was absorbing the soaring killing intent through the vortex. Both of these energies required Han Shuo¡¯s maniption and an error on one side will immediately affect the other.

    Han Shuo¡¯s pupils started to gradually turn red. Blood-coloured light wound around his whole body and violent, sinister energy started emanating from Han Shuo. Sabakas and Karel, who were both inside the castle, immediately felt the changes to Han Shuo.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± Karel was terrified as he looked towards the roof that Han Shuo was on.

    Bang, bang bang!

    Just as Karel finished speaking, crackling sounds came from the direction he was looking toward. Rays of scarlet light shot out, causing the pile of rocks that used to be houses in that area to shatter and disintegrate.

    Sabakas stared nkly for two seconds but soon after teleported to the area where Han Shuo sat cross-legged. He saw that Han Shuo¡¯s expression was distorted with malevolence, appearing extremely frightful. Strands of energy within the enormous vortex overhead formed rays of blood-colored light which flowed into Han Shuo¡¯s body like electric currents.

    The sinister and ruthless energy suddenly erupted from Han Shuo¡¯s body. With Han Shuo at the center, the buildings surrounding him copsed with a loud bang one after another. Some of the soldiers in the castle were caught off guard and were immediately affected by this formidable force. In a sh, almost a hundred soldiers were killed.

    Space sacred magus Sabakas¡¯ expression changed dramatically. Without saying another word, he hurriedly deployed a defensive barrier and then concentrated his mental strength and shouted loudly at Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan!¡±

    The pupils of Han Shuo, who was on the verge of falling into demonhood, had be a frightful scarlet color. It was as though blood was flowing within his pupils and appeared extremely terrifying.

    The loud shout made with Sabakas¡¯ condensed mental strength, pierced into Han Shuo¡¯s mind like a sharp needle. Han Shuo felt a slight headache and became clear-headed after a brief moment.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes spun rapidly for a while before he suddenly raised his head and roared toward the sky. An enormous killing intent was mixed within the roar. While Sabakas was ineffably horrified, Han Shuo suddenly flew up toward the sky like a lightning bolt, vanished within the blood cloud.

    The dreadful roar resounded across the entire northern city district like thunder. Many experts sensed the fearsome energy contained within the roar and looked toward the area where Han Shuo was, momentarily clueless about what had happened.

    ¡°What happened?¡± Sacred swordmaster Karel hastily asked the startled Sabakas as he waste to the scene, only seeing a red sh shooting into the sky.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know, I have no idea either!¡± Sabakas came to his senses, immediately shaking his head and answered frantically. He looked at the blood cloud which was amassing and bing denser and said, ¡±However, I have a bad feeling. A moment ago, Bryan looked somewhat terrifying. There¡¯s an extremely formidable energy in his body, so powerful that my heart rate quickened.¡±

    Karel was shocked as he knew Sabakas¡¯ true strength. When he heard Sabakas say that he felt terrified by the strength Han Shuo just revealed, Karel replied gravely, ¡°I can sense soaring killing intent and evil within Bryan¡¯s roar. I think something is amiss.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m also worried about that. Just a moment ago, his gaze looked extremely unfeeling and felt extremely unfamiliar. He was totally different from the Han Shuo we usually see. I¡¯m certain that something we can¡¯t understand must have happened to his body.¡± Sabakas was also feeling down as he replied Karel.

    Karel suddenly shouted in rm, ¡°Look! The blood cloud in the sky is moving! Oh? It¡¯s actually moving in Ashburn¡¯s direction!¡±

    ¡°Guys, what¡¯s going on? What happened here?¡± Firenze hade over and asked calmly.

    Amyes, Emily, and a few others hade along with Firenze. They had all heard the frightening roar originating from here, which filled their hearts with doubt and bafflement, and immediately came to investigate.

    Fanny and Pheobe who were originally still on the second floor had also stopped their conversation and rushed over in a panic. They had no idea why Han Shuo would let out such a terrifying roar, causing them to be filled with worry and panic.

    Sabakas didn¡¯t answer Firenze¡¯s question and instead creased his brows as he looked toward the sky.

    The blood cloud had originally sat quietly in the sky above the castle, continuously absorbing negative energy from the entire northern city district. Although it grew in volume, it didn¡¯t move.

    But now, the thick blood clouds had started to move!

    The blood cloud¡¯s migration caused the weather to change drastically. An oppresive pressure carrying the weight of a mountain came crashing down. An enormous wicked aura gradually left the sky above the castle and headed toward the location of Ashburn and his allies.

    ¡°Emily, do you know what just happened?¡± Amyes creased his brows as he sought rification from Emily.

    Of the people present, Emily was the most familiar with Han Shuo. When Amyespleted his question, everyone turned their gazes toward to Emily, all of them curious and puzzled.

    ¡°This should be what Han Shuo referred to as entering demonhood. He mentioned that this state would cause him to go crazy and even he himself wouldn¡¯t be able to control his own actions. This terrifying state is extremely dangerous but will cause his strength to rise explosively. I don¡¯t really understand it either and that¡¯s all I have heard from him.¡± Emily simrly creased her brows as she exined immediately.

    As Emily exined, everyone saw the numerous houses that had copsed and some of the castle guards who had died tragically, immediately acknowledging Emily¡¯s exnation. Even Sabakas and Karel, didn¡¯t dare to forcefully charge toward Ashburn¡¯s location. Yet, Han Shuo had condensed a thick blood cloud and headed over directly. Such a lunatic action was clearly something that he wouldn¡¯t do in normal situations.

    ¡°Oh no! This means Bryan is in great danger! That location is filled with powerful experts and he even lost his rationality. What should we do?¡± Karel said anxiously.

    ¡°Ai, we can only take it one step at a time. We have to constantly monitor his movements. If anything really goes wrong, we will have to find a way to save him!¡± Sabakas sighed and answered grudgingly.

    As Sabakas spoke, a blue crystal ball the size of a human head materialized in his hand. He then chanted an incantation and the crystal ball suddenly shot out blue light. This blue light was like ripples created when a rock is thrown into ake, constantly swaying.

    As Sabakas continued to recite his spell, the wavering blue light within the crystal ball gradually calmed down. When Sabakas hadpleted his incantation, the crystal ball suddenly disyed a clear scene.

    Within the crystal ball, Han Shuo¡¯s entire body was covered in blood-colored light, his pupils scarlet red. The Demonyer Edge floated above his head and the surroundingyers of blood clouds churned as they moved toward Ashburn¡¯s location.

    Sabakas moved his five fingers over the crystal ball, causing the image within to zoom in and change, revealing the appearances of Ashburn, eldest prince Charles, their allies. Among them were the sacred knight and earth sacred magus Dempus, all of them having shocked expressions as they looked nervously at the blood cloud inching toward them.

    ¡°This crystal ball was given to me by Madam Grace. Although it can¡¯t foresee the future, it can show scenes within a fixed area. We won¡¯t be able to hear any sound though.¡± Sabakas exined.

    ¡°Hmph. You clearly have something good but have been hiding it all along. What a selfish fellow.¡± Firenze remarked impolitely.

    Sabakas cleared his throat, smiling bitterly as he exined, ¡°This crystal ball consumes a lot of mental strength to operate, has a very limited range, and doesn¡¯t transmit sound. It¡¯s a far cry from Han Shuo¡¯s mystical powers. That¡¯s why I had kept it hidden, not because I was being selfish.¡±

    ¡°Alright, alright, let¡¯s see if Bryan will meet with a mishap,¡± Karel said impatiently to Firenze and turned his attention to the changing scenes within Sabakas¡¯s crystal ball.

    While Sabakas and the others were watching the changes happening within the crystal ball attentively, some of the weaker nobles by Ashburn¡¯s side were in misery. The enormous pressure brought by the blood cloud caused them to start gasping for breath.

    ¡°Dammit, what the hell is happening? Why did red clouds suddenly float over!¡± Eldest prince Charles also felt his heart palpating. The pressure was like a mountain pressing onto his body, causing him to feel all over. He can¡¯t help but cuss as he looked toward the sky.

    ¡°Two esteem sacred rank experts, do you know what is happening?¡± Even though Ashburn was the Grand Duke of Lancelot Empire, he didn¡¯t train in either martial arts or magic. He felt the pressure even more clearly and actually had an urge to engage in crazed ughter. To Ashburn who had to be calm to deal with all kinds of situations, this impulse was undoubtedly deadly. Thus, he hastily asked the sacred knight and Dempus.

    The two sacred rank experts had grave expressions as they stared at the blood cloud in the sky. They could clearly sense the blood cloud umting more and more energy. Having absorbed the negative energy which contained the unyielding anger and dread of countless thousands of soldiers killed on the battlefield, the energy within the blood cloud far surpassed their imagination. This caused the two sacred rank experts to feel nervous.

    ¡°This is caused by that brat, Bryan. I can sense that he¡¯s inside the blood cloud!¡± sacred knight Blount said calmly as he looked toward the sky.

    ¡°It¡¯s him? Is that brat courting death? To actually dare to appear here!¡± Eldest prince Charles sneered.

    In addition to two sacred rank masters, there were numerous great swordmasters and grand magi stationed along with a few thousand troops. Charles naturally believed that Han Shuo would definitely be killed.

    However, both scared knight Blount and Dempus could faintly sense the formidability of the energy umted within the blood cloud. However, morale was extremely important at this moment. If Blount and Dempus told the truth, it would definitely cause the soldiers here to be filled with fear.

    Blount and Dempus shot a nce at each other and Dempus suddenly began to chant a magic spell to deploy a barrier for Ashburn and the others, so as to avoid them being influenced by the energy within the blood cloud, so as to prevent them from feeling dread before the battle truly began.

    ¡°Wind magi, use tornados to sweep away that blood cloud.¡± Sacred knight Blount ordered the magi beside him to immediately take action.

    As the blood cloud grew bigger and denser, Blount could clearly feel that energy came from the negative energy condensed within the blood cloud. As Dempus was an earth magus, he was powerless against the blood cloud in the sky. Only wind magi were able to unleash their strength to the greatest degree.

    At Blount¡¯smand, the wind magi on Ashburn¡¯s side began their incantations one after another. The essence of wind suddenly became denser as tornadoes and hurricanes of various sizes gradually formed and headed straight for the blood cloud that was about to reach them.

    However, some things don¡¯t go as nned. Theyers of dense blood cloud unexpectedly didn¡¯t disperse at all under the force of the different wind magic spells and instead continued along its original trajectory toward the location above Ashburn and the others.

    While the wind magi were indescribably stunned, a magus with sharp vision suddenly shouted in fear while pointing at the blood cloud, ¡°Look! There¡¯s someone¡¯s in the middle of the cloud!¡±

    As the magus cried out in fear, others with sharp eyes all paid attention to the center of the blood cloud, spotting an imposing figure that was covered in a blood-colored light that interweaved around his body like lightning and looked as though he had the ability to control the blood cloud. All of a sudden, the figure roared wildly as he pressured downward like the blood cloud.

    All of a sudden, terrifying wicked energy the weight of a mountain abruptly enveloped the entire area. An overbearing weapon wound around the thick blood cloud before suddenly striking downward like a meteor with red light trailing behind. The power within the rapidly descending weapon and the friction with the air produced a terrifying sharp screech.

    In a split second, the entire sky was covered with red light. Blount and Dempus were both so terrified their faces paled.

    ¡°Retreat!¡± Dempus shouted, his hands grabbing onto Ashburn and eldest prince Charles and immediately using his levitation skills to hastily retreat into the distance.

 Chapter 426: Unstoppable

    GDK 426 ¨C Unstoppable

    When the numerous experts on Ashburn¡¯s side saw that Dempus had actually dragged Ashburn and Charles along and retreated, they couldn¡¯t believe their eyes.

    ¡°Everyone withdraw!¡± The Church of Light¡¯s sacred knight Blount suddenly shouted and immediately rushed in Dempus¡¯ direction.

    The Demonyer Edge was entangled within the dense blood cloud and part of the chaotic negative energy within it rushed forth and interweaved with the energy within the blood cloud, causing an iparably formidable force to strike downwards.

    Dempus and Blount were aghast and couldn¡¯t understand what was going on. This was especially true for Blount who had effortlessly inflicted heavy injuries onto Han Shuo just a few days ago. Although he knew that Han Shuo¡¯s strength was out of the ordinary, it still wasn¡¯t something he paid attention to. He could never have anticipated that within a few days, Han Shuo¡¯s strength had unexpectedly reached such a frightening level.

    Both of them had precisely felt the frightening energy contained this strike and immediately started to retreat. This was because even Blount and Dempus weren¡¯t confident in being able to withstand such a powerful strike.

    Seeing Dempus and Blount retreat, the rest of them were naturally rmed and started fleeing from the area in panic in random directions. The figures of some powerful experts became indistinct as they left the area in the blink of an eye.

    The terrifying strike had the force of a copsing mountain, causing a loud rumble as it struck the the hundred people that had yet to leave the area.

    Rumble...

    Trembles and rumbles akin to Judgement Day erupted with that area as the epicenter. Dust storms swept wildly across the cracked earth as hurricanes carried the broken fragments in all directions. The various rays of blood-colored light exploded like fireworks as the sounds of ghosts wailing and wolves howling urred again and again.

    The soldiers who had not left were instantaneously turned into dregs by the strike. Flesh was mixed into the debris as they flew into the distance. From afar, a scene of destion filled the eyes. When the dust settled, the area looked as though it had copsed or encountered a great earthquake, leaving behind a deep oval crater that was ten meters in diameter.

    The deep crater was obviously a result of the strike. Jet-ck corpsesid within the crater, flowing with scarlet blood. Some of the clothes were scorched and still emitting ck smoke. With the crater at the center, the earth seemed severely ravaged, as though a giant awl had bored a hole into it. The center of the crater was so deep the base couldn¡¯t be seen and the area was filled with potholes.

    The might of this strike shocked everyone present. Not only Ashburn and the others by his side who had just escaped were dumbstruck, the jaws of Karel, Sabakas, and the others who were observing the area through crystal ball had dropped, their expressions filled with disbelief.

    By now, Fanny and Phoebe had also hurried over. ¡°This... Bryan did this?¡± Fanny stared nkly as she murmured. She had never thought that Han Shuo was actually frightening.

    Even sacred swordmaster Karel felt his lips be dry as he remarked, ¡°Truly unbelievable. That strike did not contain any magic, yet a strike purely based on martial arts has caused the deaths of numerous people. He even made a deep crater with that terrifying strike. Even if I went all out, I won¡¯t be able to produce such a terrifying strike. I truly have no idea how he achieved it!¡±

    ¡°No wonder Grace said he will bring about a new future to the Lancelot Empire. It seems that she was really far-sighted. If those people didn¡¯t escape in time, that strike would cause the deaths of several hundred people. That¡¯s absolutely terrifying. What¡¯s more peculiar is that the strike didn¡¯t contain any sort of magic and was achieved solely by his mystical martial arts. What a mystery-filled fellow. ¡° Sabakas stated his heartfelt admiration.

    ¡°Mas.. Master, that¡¯s not possible. I know Bryan¡¯s strength and it isn¡¯t this terrifying. Are you saying that he¡¯s stronger than you?¡± Phoebe was dumbfounded, feeling that what she had just seen within the crystal ball wasn¡¯t real.

    Phoebe had believed all along that her master, Karel, was the continent¡¯s strongest person. In the years she has been by Karel¡¯s side, she had witnessed Karel being challenged by countless experts, yet all the experts that dared to challenge Karel suffered crushing defeats in the end without exception.

    Phoebe had seen many of such battles over the years. It left a strong impression in her heart that Karel was omnipotent. She always thought in her heart that Karel was the world¡¯s most fearsome expert and no one could ever surpass him.

    However, when she heard Karel¡¯s current words, Phoebe sensed the hidden meaning within, that the dreadful scene caused by Han Shuo¡¯s strike was something even her master couldn¡¯t aplish. This totally subverted Phoebe¡¯s understanding and was extremely surreal to her.

    ¡°If Bryan can always maintain his strength at such a level, even I would honestly have to flee too!¡± Karel nced at Phoebe who had an odd expression, sighing as he said, ¡°I truly didn¡¯t foresee that this brat would be so terrifying. Could it be that he had deliberately concealed his strength during our spar so as to let me save face?¡±

    ¡°This brat is so terrifying that even Dempus and Blount, two sacred-grade experts, have to immediately retreat. I can imagine how powerful that strike must have been. Otherwise, with Dempus and Blount¡¯s arrogance and statures, they would never retreat when facing the younger generation.¡± Sabakas remarked.

    Amyes was amazed, thinking to himself, ¡°After the civil war is over, if Lawrence ascends to the throne, the brat¡¯s standing in the empire will be as high as that of Grand Duke Ashburn. In that case, Emily¡¯s rtionship with him wouldn¡¯t be considered as a disgrace to her. Hopefully, this man will genuinely treat Emily well.

    While Amyes was sighing in his heart, Firenze was astonished, foolishly staring at Fanny as he asked, ¡°Lass, this brat really used to be your student?¡±

    ¡°Yes, that¡¯s right. Back when he was still in the academy, he was even bullied regrly.¡± Fanny smiled bitterly as she answered Firenze.

    ¡°This world is changing too fast. I¡¯ve be old, I¡¯m definitely old now, I feel that I¡¯m too outdated!¡± Firenze had an odd expression, astonished by Han Shuo¡¯s shocking performance at such young age.

    ¡°Look! He¡¯s starting to move again!¡± The person who cried out this time was Lawrence, his tone brimming with excitement.

    No one on this side could be happier than Lawrence. Seeing Ashburn, Charles, and the others cutting a sorry figure as they flee, Lawrence felt unspeakable joy. Ashburn and Charles had tried to act against him in secret multiple times, nearly seeding in killing him on a few asions. The hatred he had for the duo had long passed the point where he wouldn¡¯t rest till they were dead.

    Now that he saw Ashburn and Charles being humiliated, Lawrence naturally felt extremely overjoyed. Moreover, if the duo was killed at such a crucial moment, the whole Lancelot Empire will undoubtedly fall into his control. Lawrence¡¯s heart palpitated with excitement as he imagined the scene where everyone pledged their allegiance to him.

    When Lawrence cried out in surprise, everyone hastily turned their attention back to the crystal ball in Sabakas¡¯ hand.

    The scene within the crystal ball was still fixed on the heavily destroyed area. In the sky above the destend, a sinister looking Han Shou was roaring wildly. The thick blood clouds behind him emanated a heavy smell of blood, constantly rumbling as he roared.

    A bolt of red lighting suddenly appeared from the bottomless crater and rapidly flew in front of Han Shuo. The blood-red eyed Han Shuo caught it at one go. It was precisely the lethal Demonyer Edge that had caused the frightening attack.

    When the vicious Demonyer Edge entered his hand, a frightening might spread out. His scarlet red eyes scanned the area, and he immediately charged in sacred knight Blount¡¯s direction. A hundred-meter long scarlet red sword light was suddenly shot out from the Demonyer Edge. The scarlet sword light whistled and pulled along a portion of the blood cloud as if it had bizarre powers.

    Han Shuo was like a demon that descended from another ne, his expression malevolent as he held the Demonyer Edge and charged towards Blount. The Demonyer Edge effortlessly destroyed everything in his path. As he flew onward, terrifying power spread out to the whole area.

    Many of Ashburn¡¯s troops that were within a hundred meters of Han Shuo were affected, all of them being sliced and diced into pieces in session by the sword light, causing a bountiful rain of blood to fall. Along the path where Han Shuo flew, sand and stones were sent flying. As the sword light streaked across the area, it left many deep gorges.

    ¡°My two esteem sacred rank experts, what, what was going on?¡± Grand Duke Ashburn asked Blount and earth sacred magus Dempus with a trembling voice as he looked at the fiend-like Han Shuo charging at them imposingly.

    Han Shuo¡¯s current demeanor was really too terrifying and wild. Nothing could stop him along the way, and anyone who dared to obstruct him was obliterated under the hundred-meter-long sword light. In just a brief moment, five hundred elite soldiers under Ashburn were killed.

    These elite soldiers had been protecting Ashburn, and didn¡¯t participate in the ongoing battle. All of them were death soldiers that Ashburn had meticulously asked others to train, consuming a tremendous amount of Ashburn¡¯s gold coins and manpower. Each of them was much stronger than the average soldier.

    However, these elite soldiers that Ashburn relied on were sliced apart like paper when facing the crazed Han Shuo. Not a single one of them could actually survive an attack from Han Shuo.

    ¡°For some unknown reason, that wicked fellow¡¯s strength suddenly rose sharply. It¡¯s as though he could borrow the energy from the dead that had not dispersed. Every strike was filled with frightening negative energy. I truly have no idea how he did it!¡± Sacred knight Blount had a grave expression as he replied Ashburn.

    ¡°What should we do, what should we do now that he¡¯s charging over?¡± Eldest prince Charles voice trembling as he shrieked. He was clearly intimidated by Han Shuo¡¯s sinister appearance and frightening strength.

    ¡°There¡¯s no other way, we could only retreat. Currently, no one in the entire Lancelot Empire can stop him!¡± Earth sacred magus Dempus immediately answered. Although this decision caused him to feel aggrieved, he really didn¡¯t have any other ideas.

    ¡°What did the two of you say in the beginning? There¡¯s no need to worry even if there was a sacred expert? But now you can¡¯t even obstruct a young fellow? You guys are useless! Where else can I withdraw to? If I leave Ossen City, all our ns and efforts will be wasted!¡± Charles was obviously somewhat hysterical and even spoke incoherently as he was truly frightened.

    ¡°Charles, shut up! The judgment of the two esteemed sacred rank experts will not be wrong, you better calm down!¡± When Ashburn saw that the expressions of the two sacred rank experts turned ugly, he hastily berated Charles.

    After getting scolded by Ashburn, Charles came to his senses and immediately became silent.

    ¡°My dearest esteem sacred rank experts, Charles is still young and momentarily forgot his manners. Please do not take it to heart. We will listen to your advice.¡± Ashburn chided Charles before immediately apologizing to Blount and Dempus.

    Even though Ashburn was the Grand Duke of the Lancelot Empire, he still needed to treat these sacred rank experts with great caution, especially now when they needed to rely on the two sacred rank experts. It would further worsen their plight if they were to offend these two experts. Therefore, Ashburn had no choice but to humbly apologize.

    Sacred knight Blount gave a frosty snort and nced at the now silent Charles, ¡°Next time be more careful when you speak. I came here to help you guys because of my good friend Kosse. Otherwise, I wouldn¡¯t care less about whether you are dead or alive.¡±

    Charles secretly cursed him in his heart, thinking that after he took power, he will teach him a lesson. However, he dared not to reveal any dissatisfaction at this moment, and could only nod and smile.

    ¡°Lord Blount, for the sake of spreading the glory and radiance of Church of Light all over Lancelot Empire, please forgive them.¡± Red Archbishop Kosse said to Blount with a smile.

    ¡°Forget it, everything is for the glory of the Church of Light!¡± Blount eximed before saying to Dempus, ¡°Escort them away from this area. I will lead that fellow away. I sense that his primary target is me. It seems like he hates me for injuring him previously.¡±

    ¡°Thank you Mister Blount, take care!¡± Dempus stared nkly for a moment before he replied respectfully.

    Ashburn and Charles nced at each other. Charles was cursing in his heart again, thinking, ¡°Since you knew that his target was you, why did you still stay together with us? Doesn¡¯t this show that you obviously want to harm us? You old fart is sure enough up to no good!¡±

    ¡°Old friend Kosse, I¡¯d have to trouble you to stay by my side. This fellow is a grand magus necromancer. Only with your divine weapon ¡®Revtion¡¯ would be able to nullify his undead army.¡± Blount said to Kosse.

    ¡°Of course.¡± Kosse nodded in agreement.

 Chapter 427: One vs A Hundred

    GDK 427 ¨C One vs A Hundred

    Once Blount finished speaking, Dempus led Grand Duke Ashburn, Charles, and the experts protecting them, withdrawing hurriedly.

    Blount and Kosse formed a group with a few Temple Knights and white priests from the Church of Light and headed in the exact opposite direction of Dempus and the others.

    Blount¡¯s guess was absolutely correct. Currently, Han Shuo had firmly remembered the sacred aura on Blount¡¯s body. The earth elite zombie getting injured was a sore point for Han Shuo. Before entering demonhood, he had deemed Blount as his target, not letting Blount out of his sights.

    As expected, when Blount, Kosse, and the other members of Church of Light left, the fiend-like Han Shuo who was flying over was indeed targeting Blount and persevered in chasing after him.

    Dempus and the others who originally nned to escape quickly suddenly realized that Han Shuo¡¯s target was indeed Blount and immediately let out sighs of relief. Under Ashburn¡¯smand, they changed directions again and circled back towards the center of the battlefield to continue directing their troops in the ongoing war.

    Han Shuo, who had sunk into the state of demonhood, was like a pir of lightning, spurring a frightening sound as he charged towards Blount, Kosse, and his party. He didn¡¯t care about the fates of Ashburn and the others.

    Firenze, who had been observing the crystal ball, gave a cold hmph and said, ¡°Ashburn has returned to court death. Till this point, he actually still unable to tell the oue of the battle.¡±

    ¡°It seems that Blount and the members of the Church of Light are in trouble!¡± Karel¡¯s mood had calmed down, smiling as he said to Sabakas.

    ¡°Yes, that¡¯s right. I was originally prepared to assist Bryan at any moment. I didn¡¯t expect this brat to be so miraculous. It seems that we need not be concerned and just need to deal with Ashburn.¡± Sabakas simrly loosened his breath, his tone rxed as he replied.

    ¡°Do you mean that Bryan shouldn¡¯t be in any trouble?¡± Fanny was the most concerned about Han Shuo¡¯s safety. She hesitated for a moment but still didn¡¯t feel very reassured.

    ¡°Lass, it is those that were being chased by Bryan that should be worried. I think there¡¯s no need for us to worry about that brat. Alright, be at ease, don¡¯t worry about this and that the entire day.¡± Firenze consoled Fanny.

    Emily and Phoebe had normal expressions, only feeling amazed by his extreme performance. Ever since they met Han Shuo, they never had seen him suffer losses. Han Shuo had always given them a powerful strength and hence they had indistinctly formed a blind confidence deep in their hearts.

    Fanny was however different from them. Of the three, Fanny was the first to meet Han Shuo. When Han Shuo was still in the necromancy major and yet to be strong, she even had to step forward at times and help him resolve problems. This deeply-rooted impression wasn¡¯t something that could be altered within a short time. Even though Han Shuo was currently so powerful, she would still worry for him.

    While the crowd was looking upon Han Shuo with varying emotions, the fiend-like Han Shuo had actually already caught up to Blount and started to attack the followers of the Church of Light.

    Standing tall within the blood cloud, Han Shuo lifted the Demonyer Edge within the writhing blood cloud. It emitted a dragon-like sword light and every strike contained boundless might. The magi from the Church of Light continuously weavedyers of defensive barriers. Even sacred knight Blount dare not withstand the strikes by himself.

    A long and narrow red lightning bombarded them from above. It was like the meandering, twisting body of a hundred-meter-long dragon, containing vast amounts of killing intent, directly striking the magic barrier deployed by Kosse and the group of magi.

    A revolving screen of wind, sparkling and translucent ice shield, zing firewall, and a magnificent holy shield of light took shape one after another over their heads, forming a variegated peculiar scene. Blount was in charge of the finalyer of defense, as his fighting aura containing divine energy shot out from his golden pike in the form of dazzling light.

    These followers of the Church of Light concentrated their attention on the sky above, as though they were in anticipation of a great enemy, exerting all their strength to meet the already unavoidable strike.

    Finally, a powerful attack struck down loudly on thebined barriers deployed by the members of the Church of Light.

    It shattered into small pieces, like the stars in the Milky Way, causing multi-colored lights to shoot in all directs with an eardrum-bursting loud sound. The enormous energy contained unmatched ruthlessness, easily destroying six barriers of multiple elements in a sh.

    The magical barriers made with the full strength of those magi was like paper in the face of the destructive force. They seemed to be instantly demolished, simply causing the destructive strike to pause for a moment.

    The relentless strike continued onward, causing another eight magical barriers to shatter into a variety of colored lights. Only when it reached the ¡®Shield of Light¡¯ deployed by Red Archbishop Kosse¡¯s divine weapon ¡®Revtion¡¯, was there a frightening explosion and the force of the strike was truly diminished.

    ¡°Deng, deng, deng!¡±

    Red Archbishop Kosse who had been strenuously concentrating his mental strength to deploy the Shield of Light, couldn¡¯t resist falling backward by three steps before falling on his butt. His brain buzzed and he couldn¡¯t help but spit out a mouthful of blood.

    ¡°Lord Blount, hurry!¡± Kosse took a breath and shouted, as his brain suddenly suffered a wave of pain again.

    ¡°Crack¡± With the crisp sound of an egg cracking, the Shield of Light that Kosse deployed ruptured, and the ferocious strike continued on its path downwards.

    Sacred knight Blount shouted loudly, raising the shining golden spike towards the sky. Holy aura burst out from Blount¡¯s body and fused with the golden spike in his hand, forming a golden lighting that shot out towards Han Shuo¡¯s strike.

    Rumble...

    A series of muffled thunders could suddenly be heard from the clear sky as gold and red interweaved with each other, forming a spectacr sight. However, the terrifying energy transmitted from the two strikes burst out like a torrent, causing multiple spatial tears to appear.

    Blount gave off a muffled groan as terrifying energy suddenly surged into his body. The golden armor on his body gave off a sweet-sounding jingling sound as he suddenly felt as though his internal organs were smashed by a huge hammer, causing him to stagger as blood flowed out of his mouth and nose.

    ¡°Blount¡¯s injured! What a frightening attack!¡± Karel shouted, his expression filled with inexplicable joy.

    Through the crystal ball on Sabakas¡¯s hand, Lawrence and the others saw the situation clearly, especially how blood flowed from Blount¡¯s mouth and nose. Those with sharp eyes even noticed Blount¡¯s brief stagger.

    In contrast to the battered and exhausted Blount, Han Shuo, who had just received the Demonyer Edge in his palm, still carried a malevolent appearance. His scarlet pupils were filled with madness and his unfeeling expression made him appear like a machine sculpted for a massacre.

    Apart from continuously breathing heavily, there were no changes to Han Shuo¡¯s outward appearance. There were no signs of fatigue, only that the blood cloud and shrunk slightly, as though it was dispersed by the turbulent energy released during the battle.

    ¡°Insane, Bryan really is insane. He actually injured the Church of Light¡¯s sacred knight!¡± Cecilia, one of the three heavyweights of Dark Mantle, had been silently monitoring thetest developments, but couldn¡¯t resist shouting in excitement.

    Cecilia who spent years carrying out missions in enemy countries was more familiar than anyone else about the sacred knight¡¯s frightening strength. In the entire Profound Continent, the Church of Light¡¯s sacred knight was always the most formidable existence. Cecilia who had roamed around many countries had heard many rumors about sacred knights and she knew just how formidable these experts who had obtained divine blessing were.

    However, it was such an existence that disdained the experts of the various countries that was now injured by a young man!

    If this matter was to spread, Han Shuo would immediately be a legend in the Profound Continent, easily topping the ranks of the finest experts within the continent.

    To Cecilia, Han Shuo¡¯s performance today could only be described as outrageous. It was also from that moment on that Cecilia thoroughly abandoned any intention ofpeting with Han Shuo.

    Even though she¡¯s Sabakas¡¯s granddaughter, even though she¡¯s one of the three heavyweights of Dark Mantle, even though she always believed that she¡¯s inferior to any youngster.

    However, Han Shou¡¯s stunning performance at this momentpletely overturned her thoughts and made her realize how powerless she was topete with Han Shuo.

    ¡°Based on this strike, Bryan¡¯s name will spread widely throughout the Profound Continent!¡± Space sacred magus Sabakas had a serene expression as he remarked definitively while looking at the unyielding Han Shuo within the crystal ball.

    ¡°Lord Blount, Lord Blount¡¯s injured!¡± Contrary the surprise felt by Sabakas and the others, the followers of the Church of Light beside Blount were all enveloped in fear. These followers continuously repeated that sentence, as though Blount¡¯s injury meant that the mission hadpletely failed.

    Their morale, in the wake of those continuously repeated words, sank to its lowest!

    ¡°Shut up. Those who are alive continue deploying magical barriers. The next wave of attack is arriving. You fools, if you want to live, start moving immediately!¡± The usually unruffled Blount suddenly seemed to lose control, unable to restrain himself from shouting angrily.

    The follows of the Church of Light had no time to think about the change in Blount¡¯s tone at this moment as the thick blood cloud above their heads had started to churn wildly again.

    It was clear in their hearts that this is the sign that the fiend above was taking action!

    ¡°Cough, cough!¡± Red Archbishop Kosse coughed violently for a short while before he tremblingly stood up, holding the divine weapon ¡®Revtion¡¯ as he continued his incantation. He was the first to re-deploy a magical barrier.

    Kosse¡¯s heart was filled with bitterness. Even with his outstanding wisdom and knowledge, he couldn¡¯t figure out how Han Shuo¡¯s strength could rise so dramatically in such a short period of time. Just a few days back, Blount was able to seriously injure Han Shuo. Yet, the strength he revealed today could not be simply described as terrifying. Kosse who originally thought that victory over Ossen City was assured now felt that not only was there no longer any certainty of sess, his heart was also filled with a frightening sense of dispiritedness.

    This fiend, I should have destroyed him when I first met him! Kosse sighed regretfully in his heart.

    When Kosse began his incantation, the magi of the Church of Light who still had the strength to spare, simrly continued to chant incantations for the sake of their own survival, continuing to do what they were already doing.

    Han Shuo¡¯s terrifying speed when he flew over previously made them realize that if they didn¡¯t work as one, they simply wouldn¡¯t be able to escape from Han Shuo as his speed was faster than their levitation skills.

    They didn¡¯t know if their magical barriers would be of use like they did previously but in order to survive for a while longer, they didn¡¯t have much choice but to do as Blount and Kosse ordered.

    The facts proved that their actions were correct.

    Han Shuo¡¯s next strike arrived as expected, but its power was obviously much weaker than the previous strike. However, it still tore through the barriers deployed by these magi, once again knocking out Red Archbishop Kosse. Blount who was defending the same way he did previously was struck directly into the ground in the midst of shimmering golden lights.

    Although the magnitude of this strike was much weaker, its lethality was greater than the previous strike.

    The previous unparalleled attack didn¡¯t kill any followers of the Church of Light as it was blocked by the barriers and Blount.

    Yet, although Han Shuo¡¯s second attack was weaker, the followers of the Church of Light were heavily injured by the first attack, causing the second set of barriers deployed to not be as sturdy and perfect as the first. This resulted in Red Archbishop Kosse being knocked out and Blount¡¯s body being smashed into the ground.

    In addition, over twenty Temple Knights and white priests were immediately cut into pieces by the blood-red sword light.

    As the second attack was much weaker, the preparation time needed for the following attack was also much shorter. Before they could react, the blood-red sword light no longer gathered together and instead wound around the thick blood cloud, Quickly followed by the weaker hammering and before those men could react, forming a blood rain that rained downward, causing unceasing blood-curdling screams to be hearding from below.

    When everyone was fending for themselves, a blood-red light the thickness of an arm suddenly stabbed into the fainted Red Archbishop Kosse. The divine weapon ¡®Revtion¡¯ on his hand suddenly shone brightly, and a ruthless aura suddenly emanated from his body.

    When the members of the Church of Light came to their senses, they suddenly noticed that Kosse was bleeding from his seven apertures and had lost all signs of life. The divine weapon ¡®Revtion¡¯ that he held tightly in his hand had also be dull andckluster.

 Chapter 428: Already a foregone conclusion

    GDK 428 ¨C Already a foregone conclusion

    ¡°Lord Kosse, Lord Kosse! ¡° A white priest near Kosse suddenly shrieked.

    ¡°He¡¯s dead, Lord Kosse is dead!¡± Another Temple Knight suddenly cried out involuntarily. His cry was extremely loud and voice traveled very far away.

    When sacred knight Blount, whose throat was filled with blood, heard the news, he spurted out the blood he had been suppressing. Blount¡¯s originally shiny golden armor was now filled with cracks like a turtle¡¯s shell, appearing to have been seriously damaged from thest attack.

    ¡°Calm down, everybody calm down. Quicky secure the ¡®Revtion¡¯!¡° Blount shouted from afar.

    Beams of blood-red sword light swished as they shot down like a rain of arrows. The remaining blood cloud that enveloped Han Shuo twisted around the descending sword light, enhancing their destructive power. They proved to be a lethal weapon, taking the lives of the followers of the Church of Light below.

    Miserable howls could be heard continuously. Under the bombardment of the blood light, more than half of the Church of Light¡¯s followers were killed in a sh. Their bodies were in a horrifying condition where even the sturdy armor of the Temple Knights was simply unable to withstand the blood light, copsing into pools of blood one after another.

    Blount eximed loudly as he pulled himself out from the ground. He saw that a white priest had already retrieved the Church of Light¡¯s divine weapon, ¡®Revtion¡¯ and swung the golden pike in his hand to block a blood light shooting toward the white priest. His eyes were bloodshot as he stared at Han Shuo who stood imposingly in the sky, his heart filled with boundless hatred. When the rain of blood light finally ceased, there were only slightly more than thirty members that remained around Blount. Their operation against the Lancelot Empire could be considered an utter failure. Even the Church of Light¡¯s representative in Lancelot Empire, Red Archbishop Kosse, was killed on the scene. The losses were way beyond Blount¡¯s expectations.

    The thick blood cloud in the sky had already disappeared. Han Shuo who originally had scarlet eyes and a malevolent expression had actually already returned to normal. At this moment he looked down unfeelingly at the destion but didn¡¯t take any further action.

    He held a scarlet weapon shining in scarlet sword light in his hand. The blood red colour came from within the weapon hilt, as though it had soaked in blood for millions of years. Soaring killing intent emanated from the weapon, giving people an apprehensive feeling.

    ¡°Blount, you didn¡¯t expect this, didn¡¯t you? Hehe, this is the price the Church of Light ought to pay! All these while, the Church of Light has been attacking me like a mad dog, and I¡¯ve simply acted on self-defense.¡± Han Shuo sneered at Blount, continuing, ¡°However, I will not passively wait for your attack. From today onward, I¡¯ll actively seek and destroy every power of the Church of Light one by one. Unfortunately, you won¡¯t live to see that.¡±

    ¡°You wicked heretic, the God of Light would not permit your existence in this world. I guarantee that you will die very soon.¡± Blount clenched his teeth before replying Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo smiled mockingly while shaking his head, lifting the Demonyer Edge and shot toward Blount, as though wanting to behead Blount on the spot.

    But before Han Shuo could get near Blount, Blount had already rushed towards the church member who held ¡®Revtion¡¯ at lightning speed. As he grabbed the divine weapon, his golden armor suddenly burst out in brilliant golden light. A divine energy enveloped Blount, rocketing him up to the sky, shooting toward the horizon like a golden ray.

    ¡°He escaped! The sacred knight actually fled!¡± Cecelia, who had been observing the scene through the crystal ball, shouted in disbelief.

    ¡°Blount was injured quite heavily. It looks like Bryan must had imprinted an unforgettable impression on him.¡± Sacred swordmaster Karel said affirmatively.

    ¡°Within the Church of Light, a sacred knight of Blount¡¯s level, would not be restrained by ordinary people. This is because the Church of Light would absolutely not allow them to be lost. If Blount wanted to leave, he would have done so long ago. It¡¯s just that he wanted to protect Kosse and the other members, and was confident in holding back Bryan, which was why he had dyed his departure.

    Unfortunately, he was still unable to obstruct Bryan and was even badly injured. However, our Lancelot Empire could be considered to have enmity with the Church of Light from today onward. There would be more troublesome matters in the future. The Church of Light has an enormous influence within the Oden Empire, the most powerful kingdom in the Profound Continent. We might face threats from the Oden Empire this time.¡± Sabakas sighed lightly, appearing to be somewhat worried about the future of the Lancelot Empire.

    ¡°Hehe, you can¡¯t say that for sure. Madam Grace prophesied that so long as Bryan remains in the Lancelot Empire, our empire shall enjoysting prosperity. Everything that happened today is in line with the prophecy. Look at the empire¡¯s current situation, are these changes all happening because of Bryan¡¯s existence?

    Maybe Bryan would be like demigod Ayermike Cotton, and bring hundreds of years of prosperity to the Lancelot Empire. Hehe, even though we can¡¯t say for sure, I actually think highly of him. Furthermore, Oden Empire and Lancelot Empire are separated by arge distance. I don¡¯t believe that they will be able to attack us from so far away.¡± sacred swordmaster Karel¡¯s mood seemed pretty good, smiling as he replied Sabakas.

    ¡°What¡¯s there to be afraid of. So what if the Oden Empire¡¯s armyes over? Hmph, I¡¯d love to meet the continent¡¯s strongest army and see how strong they are!¡± Firenze the battle maniac was somewhat eager to give it a try, clearly happy to see the whole world be in chaos.

    Hearing Karel and Firenze¡¯s remarks, Sabakas reflected that Oden Empire and Lancelot Empire were indeed separated by great geographical distances and his heart eased up slightly. Soon after, he moved his fingers, causing the crystal ball on his hand to spin for a moment, and its luster to slowly fade, causing the images within to disappear as well.

    At this moment, Han Shuo was astonished as he looked in the direction that Blount had escaped in, but was feeling relieved in his heart.

    Contrary to Blount¡¯s impression, Han Shuo was currently just strong in appearance but weak in reality. The power he disyed previously was through the energy within the thick blood cloud and the negative energy within the Demonyer Edge. Currently, the thick blood cloud that had been enveloping Han Shuo had already vanished and even the negative energy in Demonyer Edge begin to dwindle.

    Thus, Han Shou no longer had a source of power to borrow from and only had the same strength as when he mounted a sneak attack on Blount previously. If Blount didn¡¯t flee in panic and was determined to fight to the death, he might not have lost to Han Shuo.

    Unfortunately, Han Shuo¡¯s prior performance was too overwhelming. Blount¡¯s injuries caused a dent in his confidence, causing him to go as far as to disregard the other members and evoke the special ability of his armor with divine energy so as to quickly escape the battlefield.

    Han Shuo let out a sigh of relief after Blount left. He couldn¡¯t help but turned his eyes towards the remaining members of the Church of Light who were in despair. These men had seen Kosse being killed, Blount escaping and were intimidated by Han Shuo¡¯s previous disy. Their faces were ashen and no longer had any hope of living under Han Shuo¡¯s gaze.

    After experiencing his earth elite zombie being injured, Han Shuo has no mercy left for the Church of Light. He understood that the animosity between him and the Church of Light would only end when one of them dies. Only when the Church of Lightpletely disappears from the continent, would he be able to live a peaceful life. The only way to solve the problem of such fanatical followers is to kill all of them.

    After Blount escaped, the remaining people were useless troops, which Han Shuo could handle easily with his original strength. He sneered as he looked at the remaining members of the Church of Light. Just as Han Shuo was about to say something, a white priest suddenly sang a song praising and worshipping the God of Light loudly.

    After the white priest finished, he shouted sorrowfully, ¡°The God of Light will definitely purify our souls, and avenge the humiliation we received today.¡±

    After that, under Han Shuo¡¯s gaze, the white priest took the lead with the remaining membersmitting suicide one after another.

    ¡°Truly a group of people whose minds are corrupted. Religion truly poisons the mind!¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but sigh when he saw the followers of the Church of Light, who knew that they couldn¡¯t escape, kill themselves one after another in front of Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo raised his head and looked at the sky. He could still feel the soaring killing intent enveloping the entire Ossen City. Although Han Shuo had already absorbed a portion of it, the undispersed killing intent was still as rich as before. This caused Han Shuo to feel extremely refreshed.

    Currently, under the drain from him entering demonhood, the two types of energy within the Demonyer Edge had miraculously returned to normal. The previous impure energy had been changed into pure negative energy, trickling into the Demonyer Edge. The Demonyer Edge had once again returned to its natural state, bing one with Han Shuo¡¯s mind.

    The energy which Han Shuo had previously absorbed through the giant vortex had already been stored within the demon infant in his body, but it hasn¡¯t been fully assimted for the time being. But in general, he now felt incredibly rxed after releasing all the chaotic energy. He was no longer apprehensive of being delirious and need not worry about an upheaval between the Demonyer Edge and his body for the time being.

    Now that Han Shuo was clear-headed, he quickly observed the situation through his mystical demons. The defeat of Ashburn and his men was now extremely obvious, where even Ashburn and eldest prince Charles had already realized it and were nning to retreat.

    The other regions further from Ossen City had simrly been won under Firenze¡¯s leadership and the cooperation from the other two princes. It seems that Ashburn and Charles¡¯ sudden rebellion had failedpletely.

    When a mystical demon circled around the castle, Han Shuo discovered that the crowd was discussing spiritedly about him. Han Shuo didn¡¯t know whether tough or cry because from their discussions, Han Shuo discovered that his status had suddenly been raised to astonishing heights.

    On top of the clock tower, Bonds was trembling from head to toe, as though he was having a seizure. His face was flushed and he seemed to have lost control over his body. A crazed killing intent could also be seen in his eyes.

    Han Shuo dazed for a moment before quicklying to his senses. He secretly cursed Bonds for his recklessness, as he flew toward Bonds at high-speed.

    A blood-red light streaked across the sky with a sharp whistle. Han Shuo arrived in front of Bonds, extending his left hand, pressing it against Bonds¡¯ chest, and pushed suddenly. The trembling Bonds suddenly returned to normal. ¡°Cough, cough.....¡±

    Bonds was like a drowning person who could suddenly breathe again. His face was flushed as he started to cough violently. The killing intent in his eyes had slowly faded.

    Han Shuo pressed his left hand against Bonds¡¯ back again, drawing out a portion of the chaotic killing intent before Bonds could even react. He then pped his hand against Bonds¡¯ back.

    Bonds gave a muffled groan and fell to the ground. His eyes hadpletely returned to normal, but his face was pale as he knelt before Han Shuo and said, ¡°Senior, thank you!¡±

    Han Shuo snorted coldly and said in anger, ¡°I told you before I left that your body can¡¯t withstand too much killing intent and you should stop the vortex within your body when you felt that you were nearing your limit. Yet, you didn¡¯t listen. If I didn¡¯t arrive in time, your body would have burst apart at any moment.¡±

    ¡°Senior, I¡¯m sorry. I made a mistake!¡± Bonds apologized in terror and exined hastily, ¡°I was too greedy. I had never thought that I could absorb this kind of killing intent to increase my strength. Now that I hade across this opportunity with great difficulty, I really couldn¡¯t suppress the excitement. I kept telling myself that I¡¯ll take just absorb a little more before stopping but had always not wanted to stop. By the time I felt that my body was going to explode, I realized that I couldn¡¯t control my body anymore.¡±

    The temptation to greatly improve one¡¯s strength was something Bonds couldn¡¯t resist. This was also the first time he could absorb this kind of energy. He simply couldn¡¯t extinguish the mes of greed, resulting in such a consequence.

    ¡°Forget about it. It¡¯s also my fault for not reminding you carefully. I thought that at your age, you should have good self-control. Sigh, you must remember, our martial technique is very different from fighting aura and it requires our body to be extremely strong. Before your body could bear it, never rashly absorb energy your body can¡¯t take.¡± Han Shuo sighed as he said.

    ¡°Senior, I¡¯ve learned my lesson. From now on, I will not be so reckless again.¡± Bonds truly acknowledged his own impulsiveness, kneeling before Han Shuo to apologize.

 Chapter 429: New status

    GDK 429 ¨C New status

    When Han Shuo was still lecturing Bonds, Sabakas and the others had hurried over after learning of his return.

    ¡°Bryan, are you alright?¡± Fanny looked tenderly at Han Shuo was the first to speak.

    Han Shuo smiled, shaking his head as he replied, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m fine.¡±

    Emily and Phoebe¡¯s gazes were also fixed on Han Shuo. They were overjoyed to see the man they love showing his extraordinariness and were even happier than if they were the ones in the spotlight. Such was the deep-rooted nature of a woman, to be proud of their man¡¯s achievements.

    ¡°Brat, well done!¡± Even Firenze praised Han Shuo. However, he immediately added, ¡°No matter how powerful you are, if you dare bully my daughter, I¡¯ll will still never let you off.¡±

    ¡°Father, what are you saying, Bryan would never bully me! Ha, I¡¯m still considered his teacher. Even though he¡¯s powerful now, he¡¯s still my student.¡± After these days, Fanny had clearly be less reserved, and appeared much more cheerful and lively.

    When Firenze saw that Fanny revealed a smile as soon as she saw Han Shuo, he understood that Fanny¡¯s feelings for Han Shuo were indeed extremely deep. As he observed her daughter¡¯s sincere joy, Firenze gave a hollowugh and did not continue speaking so as to avoid making her unhappy.

    ¡°Bryan, I didn¡¯t expect your strength to actually be so frightening. It seems that you didn¡¯t go all out in our previous spar. You little brat, did you feel I was unworthy of your full strength?¡± Karel¡¯s expression changed as he said with some displeasure.

    Bryan smiled bitterly and immediately exined, ¡°Mister Karel, you have misunderstood me. A while ago, I was only able to injure Blount because I borrowed external energy. My actual strength is far weaker than Blount. All of you had seen it as well. The blood cloud that enveloped the sky previously was the energy I relied on.

    The energy within the blood cloud has been fully released by me. My strength has returned to its original level. I didn¡¯t hold back during our spar, I¡¯m really not that strong. Please don¡¯t misunderstand.¡±

    ¡°So that was the case. For you to actually be able to manipte the chaotic energy within the blood cloud, your martial technique is truly mystical.¡± Karel was amazed. He was just pretending to be unhappy. He actually had some idea of the truth and simply wanted Han Shuo to verify it personally.

    Bonds had already stood up, staring nkly while being unable to make head or tail of the conversation as he had no idea of what had happened just now.

    When Lawrence saw Bonds¡¯ puzzled expression, he took the initiative to approach Bonds, smiling as he described the extent of the strength Han Shuo had disyed. Lawrence was ineffably excited as he described the happenings. Bonds was iparably shocked when he heard the story. He stared nkly at Han Shuo, feeling as though he was getting to know Han Shuo again. This wasn¡¯t the first time Bonds had felt this way.

    Only experts at Bonds¡¯ level would understand how terrifying sacred knight Blount and earth sacred magus Dempus are. When he heard Lawrence say that two sacred rank experts had to escape from Han Shuo in session, and Blount was even injured in the end, Bonds was extremely shocked.

    However, when the shock faded, his heart was filled with excitement. To Bonds, the stronger Han Shuo was, the more beneficial it was to him. This news implied that Han Shuo¡¯s martial technique had matchless, mystical strength. Bonds, who was currently practicing martial arts imparted by Han Shuo, naturally felt even more expectation about the martial technique.

    ¡°Everyone, the battle in the northern city district has yet to end. I think we should get back to what we need to do.¡± Han Shuo smiled as he said to the group who was buzzing with inquiries about his condition.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s previous performance was truly excessive and the situation in the northern city district was already determined, they had immediately rushed over when Sabakas said that Han Shuo had returned to the castle, desperate to know what was going on. They were extremely curious, their gazes peculiar as they looked at Han Shuo. Even Sabakas and Karel were kinder when they spoke to him, indicating their approval of Han Shuo¡¯s strength.

    Firenze was the first to react when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s statement. He snorted and said, ¡°I was just apanying my daughter to take a look. Well, I still have tomand those idiots to fight, so I won¡¯t apany you any longer.¡±

    Firenze simply walked away as soon as he finished speaking.

    ¡°Lawrence, the situation in the northern city district is under control. It just so happens that I need this time to train. However, there¡¯s something that I want to tell you.¡± Han Shuo said while looking at Lawrence sternly.

    Lawrence currently had an extremely favorable opinion of Han Shuo. Moreover, he understood in his heart that Han Shuo yed a big part in helping him secure control over Ossen City, and gained the upper hand in the war. Therefore, when he heard that Han Shuo had something to say, Lawrence immediately smiled cooperatively and said, ¡°Hey, do not hesitate to be direct with me. You know that there¡¯s no need to be so courteous between us.¡±

    Han Shuo felt morefortable when he heard what Lawrence said. He nced at the three women, Amyes and the others and said, ¡°I would like to discuss this matter with just you and the two sacred rank experts!¡±

    ¡°Alright, let¡¯s get back to our own matters. Everyone, let¡¯s leave.¡± Amyes, one of the three heavyweights of Dark Mantle, smiled gracefully as he responded, taking the lead to leave.

    With Amyes taking the lead and leave, the others in the area left while harboring suspicions. Even Emily, Phoebe and Fanny left one after another at Han Shuo¡¯s request.

    In the blink of an eye, the important people within the castle who hade over out of curiosity took Amyes hint and left the area. Only Han Shuo, Lawrence, space sacred magus Sabakas, and sacred swordmaster Karel was left on the clocktower.

    After the others had gone a distance away from the clocktower, Lawrence looked at Han Shuo in amazement and asked, ¡°Bryan, what¡¯s the matter?¡±

    Space sacred magus Sabakas waved his hand and deployed a space barrier which enveloped the immediate area of the clocktower, preventing their conversation from being leaked. Sabakas faintly understood what Han Shuo was about to say to Lawrence.

    ¡°Since the defeat of Ashburn and eldest prince Charles is inevitable unless something unexpected happens, you will definitely be the new king of the Lancelot Empire. His Majesty had previously discussed a few things with me in secret. You have always been curious as to what His Majesty had said to me. I feel that I can reveal it to you now.¡± Han Shuo looked firmly at Lawrence and said seriously.

    ¡°Oh?¡± Lawrence¡¯s curiosity was suddenly roused, his eyes glistening as he looked at Han Shuo and asked, ¡°Bryan, what did Father say to you? Why was it that after you left the pce, His Majesty began to fully support me?¡±

    Han Shuo nced at space sacred magus Sabakas, and said with a smile, ¡°Mister Sabakas, I believe you know of this?¡±

    Sabakas smile and nodded, replying calmly, ¡°That¡¯s right. I¡¯m indeed aware of that matter.¡±

    When Lawrence¡¯s doubt-filled gaze turned towards Sabakas, he exined, ¡°Old astrologer Madam Grace prophesied that the prince Bryan supports will be the next king of the Lancelot Empire, and shall bring a new wave of prosperity to the empire.

    Hehe, as expected, with the good rtionship you have with Bryan, you would be the fortunate one. Madam Grace has made prophecies for the Lancelot Empire for many years and she has not once let down His Majesty. Therefore, His Majesty believed that you will be his sessor, and will bring prosperity to the empire. That was why he went all out in assisting you.¡±

    When Lawrence heard Sabakas¡¯s exnation, he looked at Han Shuo with a startled expression. It was only now that he realized that the reason he, an illegitimate child, had be the center of attention was due to Han Shuo¡¯s assistance, instead of His Majesty suddenly thinking highly of him.

    To Lawrence who only paid attention to the results, he was clearly somewhat astonished upon hearing Sabakas¡¯ words. He stared nkly at Han Shuo for a long time before finally taking a deep breath and said wholeheartedly to Han Shuo, ¡°So that¡¯s what happened. Bryan, thank you!¡±

    ¡°Since we are friends, hehe, I will naturally assist you. Furthermore, only with you as the king would Lancelot Empire be more prosperous. I know your capabilities, and I truly believe that you would bring a new future to the Lancelot Empire.¡± Han Shuo said with a smile.

    Lawrence gave a wry smile as he shook his head and said, ¡°It seems that I still need to rely on you. If I were to hear those words from Sabakas before today, I would perhaps not take them seriously. However, after I witnessed your unstoppable demeanor just now, I can¡¯t help but admire Madam Grace¡¯s incredible vision.

    Bryan, there truly is boundless potential within you. I still remember your strength when you were still a student in the necromancy major. At that time, you acted as my practice target for just a few gold coins, and I could even defeat you then. But now, how long has it been? In less than five years, you¡¯re already standing on the pinnacle! Oh, and you are just over twenty years old. Your future is something that no one can predict!¡±

    ¡°I have to say that Madam Grace¡¯s prophecy is expectedly urate. Everything has currently developed ording to her predictions. It looks like the Lancelot Empire would really enjoy hundred years of prosperity thanks to Bryan¡¯s existence, just as Madam Grace predicted.¡± Sacred swordmaster Karel also sighed as he remarked.

    ¡°It¡¯s hard to predict what will happen in the future. Hehe, the future won¡¯t always be the same, at least that¡¯s how I feel.¡± Han Shuo said before he swiftly concealed his smile and said, ¡°However, when His Majesty agreed to fully support us, he made me agree to one condition. I believe I should inform you now.¡°

    ¡°Bryan, you¡¯re too polite. No matter what happens, we will still be friends! Moreover, there would be more asions that I would need to rely on you in the future. There¡¯s no need to speak in a roundabout way between us.¡± Lawrence replied.

    From Sabakas and Karel¡¯s ounts, Lawrence also understood how important Han Shuo was to the Lancelot Empire. As someone who could alter the entire Lancelot Empire, his throne would be extremely stable and the Lancelot Empire would grow even more prosperous.

    With Grace even sacrificing her life to show the path to the future, he clearly understood how he should treat Han Shuo, the huge support he should tightly cling onto.

    ¡°Alright then, I will just say it then. His Majesty made me to promise that no matter what happens, the other three princes must live!¡± Han Shuo looked at Lawrence and added, ¡°As a father, His Majesty didn¡¯t wish to have three sons die horrifically by my hand. I¡¯ve promised him, but I still want to respect your opinion.¡±

    ¡°Your Highness, this was also what His Majesty said to us.¡± Sabakas exined, his gaze fixed on Lawrence.

    Lawrence stared nkly and was silent for a while before he creased his brows and said,¡°Since this is Father¡¯sst wish, I know what I should do. But I will still banish or imprison Charles. As for the other two, as long as they don¡¯t oppose me, I¡¯ll let them be princes and not treat them shabbily.¡±

    If it wasn¡¯t for Han Shuo, Sabakas, and Karel¡¯s words, Lawrence would definitely have ruthlessly exterminated Charles. Afterall, Charles caused the greatest harm to him. Lawrence had actually thought of brutally killing Charles with his own hands, so as to make up for the humiliation he suffered previously.

    However, now that Han Shuo and the two sacred rank experts had spoken, and it was also his father¡¯s dying wish, he must let Charles live on, regardless of whether he truly willing, he had to let Charles live. However, apart from letting him live, it wasn¡¯t clear if Lawrence would also humiliate Charles.

    With Lawrence¡¯s guarantee, Han Shuo let out a sigh of relief. He then smiled and said, ¡°Since you agreed, I can be at ease. Alright, Ossen City currently contains special energy I need for my training. I think I¡¯ll need at least three days to train. With the two sacred rank experts and Lord Firenze within Ossen City, I believe Ashburn and the others have already reached the end of the road and I can train at ease.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, train well. Your strength will allow our Lancelot Empire to be stronger!¡± Lawrence immediately smiled and agreed.

    He understood what it meant for an empire to have an expert who is unrestrained. The appearance of demigod Ayermike Cotton at that time had allowed the Lancelot Empire to be established and enjoy a golden age of a hundred years. If Han Shuo could achieve Ayermike Cotton¡¯s level, he too could bring Lancelot Empire to new heights.

    ¡°Alright, this clocktower will be my training group. You should get going with your own matters. Right, please tell Emily and the otherdies not to bother me as the next few days are very important to me!¡± Han Shuo smiled as he chased Lawrence and the others away.

    After the three of them left, Han Shuo closed his eyes to sense the residual energy from the dead that enveloped the whole of Ossen City. With a pleased expression, he muttered to himself, ¡°Whether I can break through to the next realm will depend on the next few days!¡±

 Chapter 430: Assimilation

    GDK 430 ¨C Assimtion

    The political struggle over Ossen City was still ongoing. Wherever there was war, there would definitely be deaths. Adding the number of casualties over the previous two days, there was perhaps already at least forty thousand soldiers who had died within the Ossen City.

    The soaring killing intent enveloped the sky over Ossen City, causing people to feel stifled, as though a huge rock was pressing down on their chest. Some experts even felt that the omnipresent magic essence seemed to be affected by this energy.

    Han Shuo stood on the clock tower of the castle, looking up at the blue dome of heaven. A massive vortex took shape once again, swallowing the fiendish energy omnipresent in Ossen City bit by bit. He Demonyer Edge soared into the sky once more, forming a blood cloud that floated in the sky.

    Han Shuo was much more prudent this time. The Demonyer Edge¡¯s adsorption of negative energy was slowed down, causing the rate at which the blood cloud condensing energy to also slow down. The energy transformation within the Demonyer Edge was more rxed. Han Shuo was able to manipte and firstbine the hostile energy before transferring it into the sword hilt of the Demonyer Edge.

    Unknown if it was due to previously absorbing the ck resolute crystal, the rate at which Han Shuo purified the killing intent had greatly increased. The dense killing intent was first swallowed by the giant vortex overhead, where impurities were removed by the rapidly rotating vortex. The purified enriched energy then flowed into Han Shuo¡¯s body through the stem of the vortex where the demonic yuan energy in his body would further refine it, finally forming the origin energy suitable for Han Shuo¡¯s demon infant to absorb. Through the two-stage purification process, less than one-tenth of the rich killing intent was absorbed by Han Shuo. However, as the casualties within the Ossen City were enormous, one-tenth of that enormous amount of energy still brought about astonishing benefits to Han Shuo.

    Having entered demonhood the previous time, Han Shuo was extremely cautious this time, not anxious for quick sess and also not rapacious. He adopted the most cautious method of absorbing a little at a time, to guard against entering the dreadful state of demonhood again.

    Time passed by quietly. After a whole day, the sky above the castle hadpletely turned blood red. When the scorching sun shone, the castle looked as though it was coated with ayer of blood and a strong scent of blood lingered in the air.

    An enormous ck vortex filled with lightning revolved wildly within the thick blood-red cloud. Vicious killing intent was constantly discharged, causing people to quake in fear.

    This scenested for three days. Some ordinary people within Ossen City felt the pressure on their chest suddenly disappearing. Experts who could sense magical essence also discovered that the indescribable energy within Ossen City was all flowing frantically towards the northern city district, and then disappearing rapidly.

    The experts protecting Lawrence within the castle, suddenly realized that the two spectacles in the sky had gradually reduced in volume. The omnipresent rich smell of blood had be heavier. The blood cloud was no longer as red as blood and was distinctly thinner. After another two days, the blood cloud above the castle seemed to have been blown away, while the vortex above the clock tower had also unknowingly disappeared and the bright clear sky had reappeared above the northern city district. Warm sunlight shone on every corner of the northern city district, causing people to feel warm andfortable.

    Breathing out gently, Han Shuo slowly woke up from his meditative state. He could feel that his body was abundant with surging energy that which covered his meridians, bones, and even his skin and flesh. This caused Han Shuo to feel like he was about to explode. Han Shuo knew that the energy in the sky had all been absorbed into his body, and he had to undergo training in seclusion soon so as topletely control and merge the energy with his original energy, so as to be able to make another breakthrough.

    The Demonyer Edgended silently on his hand, without any signs of vitality. However, Han Shuo could feel the frantic cirction of energy within it. The Demonyer Edge had absorbed even more energy than Han Shuo and the energy was also more vtile. If it was to fully absorb the energy, it also needed a long period of time.

    Therefore, both Han Shuo or the Demonyer Edge needed some time to process the energy they absorbed, and the sooner the better.

    After walking down from the clocktower, Han Show headed toward the lounge on the second floor where Emily, Fanny, and Phoebe were. Along the way, the twelve mystical demons presented the entire situation of Ossen City to Han Shuo.

    As a few days had passed, the battle had ended in the four city districts of Ossen City as well as within the pce. Lawrence and his group of supporters had already moved temporarily into the imperial pce. Ashburn and Lawrence¡¯s mansions were inplete disorder, with clear traces of battle. ¡°Bryan!¡± Fanny immediately shouted in surprise as soon as she saw Han Shuoing over.

    Emily was meditating to enhance her mental energy while Phoebe was practicing her martial arts. When they heard Fanny cry out in surprise, they immediately stopped whatever they were doing and rushed to the room where Fanny was, their eyes immediately focusing on Han Shuo.

    ¡°You bastard, I can¡¯t believe you took no part in such a critical moment and went to train. You are such an unreasonable fellow.¡° Phoebe pouted as she grumbled.

    ¡°What¡¯s the current situation of Ossen City?¡± Han Shuo asked with a faint smile.

    ¡°The situation is determined. Grand Duke Ashburn was killed by sacred swordmaster Karel, while prince Charles is imprisoned for the time being. As for the other two princes, they banished any thoughts of vying over the throne when they saw that Lawrence¡¯s influence greatly exceeded theirs. Lawrence is currently busy picking up the pieces and trying to win people¡¯s hearts. I reckon that it won¡¯t be long before he formally seeds to the throne.¡± Emily exined to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Well, it seems that the civil strife within Lancelot Empire should be already considered over?¡± Han Shuo said with a smile.

    Nodding her head, Emily continued, ¡°There¡¯s indeed nothing much to worried about. Now that the whole of Ossen City is under Lawrence¡¯s control, and he hasmand over so much military strength; with eldest prince imprisoned, no one within the Lancelot Empire could threaten Lawrence¡¯s throne.¡±

    ¡°Since that was the case, I feel reassured.¡± Han Shuo remarked with a smile. Shortly after, he smiled bitterly as he looked at the threedies and said with some difficulty, ¡°However, I reckon that I will need a long period of time to train. It seems that I will have to temporarily part with all of you again.¡±

    ¡°You bastard. You have just returned and are already thinking of leaving? You heartless fellow, don¡¯t you know that we will be concerned about you?¡± When Phoebe heard that Han Shuo was going to leave again, her expression was filled with grief as she shouted to her unwillingness.

    When Emily and Fanny heard that Han Shuo was going to train again and needed a long period of time, they also panicked, their eyes focused on Han Shuo, showing their reluctance to part with him.

    ¡°I¡¯ve no other choice. I must immediately seclude myself to refine that energy. Otherwise, it might affect my current state and might even cause me to enter demonhood again.¡± Han Shuo smiled bitterly as he exined.

    ¡°How long would you need for your training this time?¡± Emily¡¯s brows were creased as she inquired.

    ¡°I¡¯m not certain. If it¡¯s fast, it will be about a year. If it¡¯s slow, it might take two to three years. Sigh, training my martial technique in seclusion is really a very time-consuming matter. I also can¡¯t estimate how long I¡¯ll take.¡± Han Shuo sighed as he replied.

    When they heard that the fastest would be about a year, thedies¡¯ hearts were in disorder. The worry and grief in their gazes became even more prominent.

    ¡°Bryan, there¡¯s something that I need to discuss with you alone.¡± Phoebe pouted her lips and said angrily to Han Shuo. However, after she finished speaking, Phoebe suddenly blushed. At first, Emily also had something to say. But when she heard Phoebe suddenly say the same words she wanted to say, she couldn¡¯t help but look bbergasted at Phoebe. When she saw Phoebe¡¯s blushing face, she immediately thought of something. She secretly cursed in her heart as her face turned red as well.

    Han Shuo stared nkly at first, but when he saw the blush on Phoebe¡¯s face, he suddenly came to a revtion, chuckling as he said, ¡°Alright. I¡¯ll have a chat with you first. After that, I¡¯ll look for Emily to have a chat.¡±

    When she heard Han Shuo chuckling, Phoebe knew that he had realized something. She clenched her teeth resolutely as she red at Han Shuo before heading directly to her room without saying another word.

    ¡°Just a few words with Phoebe!¡± Han Shuo said hurriedly as he walked swiftly toward Phoebe¡¯s room, leaving behind a blushing Emily and a puzzled Fanny.

    ¡°Sister Emily, what do they have to talk about? Why do they need to talk in private?¡± The puzzled Fanny asked Emily.

    ¡°Hehe, they obviously need to talk about some intimate stuff. Hehe, I wonder how long Phoebe the little hussy wouldst.¡± Emily smiled licentiously as she replied amusedly while winking at Fanny.

    Fanny was startled for a moment, but she suddenly heard Phoebe¡¯s soft gasping noises. She immediately came to her senses, her face flushed red and the flush was rapidly spreading toward her neck.

    ¡°Pah!¡± Fanny cursed lightly.

    ¡°Heehee, I think sister Fanny should be aware of what they are talking about now? Hehe, sister Fanny, could it be that Bryan the little lecher had yet to eat you up? Why do you still seem so shy?¡± Fanny giggled as she teased Fanny, looking exceedingly cheerful.

    ¡°Sister Emily, you, you are really...¡± Fanny was extremely bashful, stamping her foot and walking to her room with her head down withoutpleting her sentence.

    The apartment was rather spacious. Apart from the wide living room, there were five to six other rooms. Boris had specially arranged for them to stay here so that it was easy for the threedies to talk to each other.

    When Emily saw Fanny blushing as she retreated to her room, her smile grew even wider. As Emily and Fanny were both magi and the three rooms were extremely close to each other, she would naturally be able to hear certain sounds. With Fanny¡¯s departure, only Emily was left in the living room.

    As soft moans echoed in Emily¡¯s ears, Emily¡¯s heartbeat had unknowingly sped up all of a sudden. Her body had heated unexinably and was hard to tolerate. Emily covertly surveyed her surroundings before blushing as she tiptoed toward the room Phoebe and Han Shuo were in. She then gently stuck her ear on the door to listen to the sounds within the room.

    ¡°Ohh...¡± Phoebe moaned sweetly, her voice trembling, as though she was weeping and sobbing.

    Han Shuo had finally stripped Phoebe naked, hisrge hands wandering over her smooth skin. His every stroke caused Phoebe to moan uncontrobly. Under Han Shuo¡¯s caress, Phoebe¡¯s fair white skin seemed to gradually be somewhat rosy.

    Under the mood of imminent separation, Phoebe¡¯s almond eyes were unfocused, her body expressing the joy and excitement in her heart as Han Shuo teased her body. Lost in his fondling, Phoebe gasped as she took off Han Shuo¡¯s clothes. Not knowing if she was too excited or her mind was somewhat fuzzy, she was rougher than usual when she took off his clothes, even forcibly ripping apart his shirt.

    As Han Shuo had also been holding back for a while, his breathing was rough as he suddenly pressed down on Phoebe, without even thinking of deploying a sound-proofing barrier.

    ¡°AH!¡± Phoebe shrieked, her hands suddenly pushing against Han Shuo¡¯s chest, and her eyes became clear again.

    Phoebe¡¯s scream was really a bit too loud. Even Fanny who was some distance away could hear it clearly. In her room, Fanny lowly scolded Phoebe for having no shame.

    Emily who was outside eavesdropping was stunned. She had deliberately concentrated on her ear to eavesdrop and the scream caused her ear to feel somewhat painful. ¡°You little hoof, why did you have to scream so loudly! You almost killed me!¡± Emily held her left ear as she secretly cursed Phoebe in her heart.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡± Han Shuo, who was about to mount her, looked at Phoebe with a stunned expression as he asked.

    ¡°You almost crushed me! Why are you suddenly so heavy. Luckily, I train in fighting aura and am a great swordmaster. If you were to press down on an ordinary woman, she would be immediately crushed to death!¡± Phoebe¡¯s face was extremely red, lowering her voice as she replied resentfully

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment but came to his senses soon after. After he previously consumed the ck resolute crystal, his weight had suddenly increased by ten folds. No wonder Phoebe would cry out in surprise.

    Luckily, Phoebe was the first. If it was Emily or Fanny, an ident might have happened. Han Shuo inwardly rejoiced, hurriedly reminding himself to be careful next time. He then grinned wickedly as he pounced on Phoebe again. This time, he used a hand to prop himself up.

    Han Shuo, who originally intended to start pounding Phoebe, suddenly had an idea and sat up swiftly. He then forcefully embraced Phoebe¡¯s perfect naked body and ced her on his thigh while she screamed.

    This way, Han Shuo would be in a seated position while Phoebe¡¯s legs would be wrapped around his waist, her butt resting on Han Shuo¡¯s thighs.

    ¡°Scoundrel, you, you big pervert, I¡¯m so embarrassed! Let go of me!¡± Phoebe felt Han Shuo¡¯s raised appendage on her butt, reproaching him in embarrassment.

    ¡°Hehe, we¡¯ll just change our position then!¡± Han Shuo grinned contently, his big hands caressing Phoebe¡¯s butt while ignoring Phoebe¡¯s struggles.

 Chapter 431: My name is Han Hao

    GDK 431 ¨C My name is Han Hao

    As Emily listened to the gasping soundsing from within the room, her body had unconsciously be hotter and weaker. She had also started to breathe irregrly.

    With Han Shuo¡¯s stimtion, Phoebe reached the peak of pleasure extremely quickly, her body was weak and she felt as though she was floating. In a despondent state, she was in a shameful position for a long time, her moans gradually growing louder.

    Just like Emily, Fanny who was a distance away in her own room could hear the faintest gasp. This caused her heart to be in sixes and sevens, scenes of her intimate moments with Han Shuo constantly appearing in her mind. When Fanny thought of what Phoebe and Han Shuo were currently doing, she felt pained and jealous.

    This feeling interwoven with an indescribable feeling of anticipation caused her heart to be in utter chaos. She had no idea what was happening and was unable to calm down, her body and face bing boiling hot.

    The moaning continued for a while, with a loud moaning to an end together with a grunting sound. Emily, whose legs were weak as she pressed her ear against the door, suddenly bumped into the door as her body rxed. The door was unexpectedly not tightly locked and the staggering Emily ended upnding on her butt within the room.

    Emily¡¯s face was very red, her erect twin peaks swayed as she gasped for breath. Her eyes were filled with expectation for amorous feelings. Emily was in a daze as she looked at Han Shuo¡¯s naked, imposing and devilish figure.

    At that moment, Han Shuo had justid down a limp and unconscious Phoebe. His lustful eyesnded on Emily who suddenly broke into the room. Han Shuo had detected her movement long ago and knew that Emily had been eavesdropping for a long time.

    Han Shuo, who had yet to fully release his pent-up lust, suddenly growled and charged toward Emily like a bolt of lightning, lifting the limp Emily and pressing her against the wall, his hands impatiently ripped apart Emily¡¯s clothes. Emily who was already unable to hold back her desires gasped as she cooperated with Han Shuo, hastily taking off her ripped clothes. When Fanny heard Emily¡¯s moan, she began to curse all three of them, shocked by their behavior.

    After a long while, Han Shuo draped a long robe over his shoulders and walked over to Fanny¡¯s room. The blushing Fanny had been secretly listening to the activities from afar. When she heard the heavy footsteps gradually approaching, her heart became extremely flustered, her heart beating so quickly she could even feel it clearly.

    When Han Shuo finally reached her room, Fanny suddenly lost her head and stood up hastily. Her face was red as she looked at Han Shuo as she stammered, ¡°What, what, what are you doing?¡±

    ¡°What do you think?¡± Han Shuo smiled gently as he gazed at Fanny as he walked toward her.

    When Fanny saw Han Shuo approaching her, she retreated in fear. When she had no more space to retreat, she pushed Han Shuo away, pinching her nose and said, ¡°You, you bastard. You didn¡¯t even clean yourself up beforeing to find me. I will not let you have your way today. Who asked you to still have someone else¡¯s scent on your body. There¡¯s no way I can stand that.¡±

    Fanny, who had never experienced such a situation, naturally wouldn¡¯t be as open as Emily or Phoebe who had been nourished by Han Shuo for a long time. She clearly couldn¡¯t ept Han Shuo being intimate with herself after just making love with other women.

    As Han Shuo looked at the somewhat fric Fanny, he knew that Fanny really couldn¡¯t ept it. After thinking of a while, Han Shuo had no choice but to drop his original intentions. Fanny helped him wash off all the sweat and nasty filth on his body in her bath. He then embraced Fanny tenderly, speaking words of love for a long time. He didn¡¯t forcefully vite Fanny in spite of her feelings.

    After spending a night, Han Shuo left the castle of the northern city district alone without even bidding thedies farewell and headed toward the transportation array in Ossen City.

    As a long time had passed, the transportation arrays that were sealed by space sacred magus Sabakas had once again operated as per normal.

    After the previous civil strife, Han Shuo¡¯s status in the Lancelot Empire was raised even further. If not for Han Shuo training and absorbing energy for thest few days, Lawrence would have already bestowed a higher title to Han Shuo.

    However, even though Han Shuo had disappeared for a few days, many bigwigs in Ossen City had learned of Han Shuo¡¯s astonishing actions during the civil strife through various means. In particr, the news of him single-handedly forcing two sacred rank experts to retreat, and even seriously injured sacred knight Blount, had spread across the entire Lancelot Empire.

    Han Shuo¡¯s name has unwittingly resonated throughout the Lancelot Empire and had even faintly surpassed that of sacred swordmaster Karel and space sacred magus Sabakas, bing the number one expert of the Lancelot Empire.

    Thus, when Han Shuo arrived at the transportation array, the gazes of the guards were filled with admiration and excited when they saw Han Shuo appear.

    ¡°Marquis Bryan! It¡¯s Lord Marquis Bryan!¡±

    ¡°Ah! It really is Lord Marquis! Ha, I met Lord Marquis!¡±

    ¡°Lord, are you here to use the transportation array?¡±

    The soldiers that guarded the transportation array were all incredibly passionate as they respectfully asked Han Shuo. When some merchants who hade from afar, heard the guards¡¯ surprise, they suddenly became ineffably excited and also began to rush over, wanting to catch a glimpse of Han Shuo.

    When he saw the crowd rushing toward him like the tide, Han Shuo hastily replied, ¡°I¡¯d like to use the transportation array to head to Seamist City. Please make the adjustments for me.¡±

    ¡°No problem, this way please my lord. I will immediately assist you in operating the array.¡± The head guard replied respectfully, bowing as he earnestly requested for Han Shuo to enter the transportation array.

    Han Shuo suddenly realized that since the battle a few days ago, his status within the Lancelot Empire had reached new heights. Just from the gazes of these soldiers and merchants, Han Shuo could tell how much they revered him. He didn¡¯t dare to stay a moment longer, hurriedly standing on the transportation array. Under the head guard¡¯s activation, the transportation array began to gather the energy within the magic crystals. With a sh of light, Han Shuo had already appeared in Seamist City.

    As soon as he entered Seamist City, Han Shuo immediately established a link with an aura. Han Shuo instantly realized that the elite metal zombie has been sessfully refined.

    Awesome, the five element zombies have finally been assembled! Han Shuo was pleasantly surprised, no longer dallying in Seamist City and instead went to a remote corner and immediately used the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens to fly, streaking across the vast sky like a bolt of lightning and flew rapidly toward Brettel City.

    It has been a few months since he had visited Mount Silk. Han Shuo discovered that the scale of the armaments workshop was five to six timesrger than the previous time he was here. The armaments workshop upied more than half of Mount Silk, with thousands of weaponsmiths in a frenzy as they forged armors.

    The area around Brettel City was rich in ores. Originally, no one was willing to stay here because Brettel City was constantly at war. That was why there weren¡¯t any armaments workshops or processing workshops being established. Even the armaments used by the city guard had to be acquired from other cities.

    The current Brettel City has experienced a fewrge and small battles, bing an iron bastion-like stronghold. Anyone who wanted to attacked Brettel City had to think twice about whether they had the ability. Once safety was ensured, as Brettel City was rich in resources and manpower, the establishments of armament workshops would follow naturally. Afternding on Mount Silk, Han Shuo scanned the mountain through his mystical demons, viewing the scale of operations of the armament workshop on Mount Silk. He nodded inwardly, knowing that with this armament workshop, the soldiers in Brettel City no longer had to worry about armor.

    Without informing Adleman, Han Shuo entered the mine alone, casually strolling straight into the depths of the mine. When he reached the area where he previously met the stone men, he saw that a fewrge wooden signs were erected, with the words ¡°No one is allowed to prate deeper to mine¡± written inrge font.

    It seems like Adleman and the others had remembered Han Shuo¡¯s instructions by heart. They had forbidden anyone to disturb the area surrounding the ce of extreme metal and instead send people every once in a while to collect the ore ced by the stone men as Han Shuo instructed. This way, it didn¡¯t harm the harmonious rtionship and benefitted both sides.

    When Han Shuo entered the ce of extreme metal, the first thing that entered his eyes was the golden rays of light from the sparking golden pir. The elite metal zombie constantly transmitted messages to Han Shuo while some of the spirits which were training within the ce of extreme metal fluttered around Han Shuo, narrating the situation during the time he was away.

    ¡°Alright, I got it. No one wille here and touch this ce. You can still train here in the future but you still got to do some things for me.¡± Han Shuo said to those spirits.

    ¡°We are very willing to serve you!¡± the spirits replied Han Shuo.

    Without replying further, Han Shuo directly went to the area where the elite metal zombie was. Same as the previous asions, Han Shuo removed the array that was converging the metal essence energy and released the elite metal zombie.

    As dazzling golden light filled the area, the elite metal zombie who wore a golden armor appeared. The elite metal zombie who was set free suddenly arrived before the huge golden pir, pressing both hands onto the golden pir. Two sources of energy ofmon origin suddenly converged together.

    As Han Shuo watched attentively, the golden pir that extended to the sky began to shrink bit by bit until it became a short golden rod which the elite metal zombie caught and started to brandish.

    Han Shuo was stunned. Only now was he certain that the metal attribute treasure that has been nurtured for countless millions of years was indeed the same as the weapon of a mystical character in his world. It was a golden cudgel that could change size at will and had the weight of a mountain.

    The elite metal zombie held the golden cudgel in its hand. As the elite metal zombie was refined with pure metal essence energy, the energy in its body made itpatible to control the golden cudgel. Apart from the elite metal zombie, even the current Han Shuo would find it extremely strenuous to wield the golden cudgel and simply be unable to disy the true might of the cudgel.

    As the elite metal zombie wielded the metal attribute treasure effortlessly, it was filled with excitement. As it had just evolved into the elite metal zombie, it didn¡¯t have a very high intelligence. It could only express his joy of being reborn repetitively to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Alright, stop ying around. You can only grow faster if you go to that ce!¡± Han Shuo chuckled as he remarked, chanting an incantation to summon the little skeleton from theherworld.

    When little skeleton appeared from the other dimension and saw the glistening elite metal zombie, his Purple Demon Eye sparkled. He sent Han Shuo a message, ¡°Thank you, father! We now have another brother!¡±

    ¡°Hehe, bring him back with you.¡± Han Shuo said with a smile.

    ¡°Father, why does Little Metal and Little Fire both have weapons but Little Earth, Little Wood, and Little Water doesn¡¯t?¡± The little skeleton didn¡¯t leave immediately as Han Shuo intended, and instead looked at the golden cudgel on the elite metal zombie¡¯s hand and inquired.

    Little Earth, Little Wood, Little Water, Little Metal, and Little Fire? Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment but regained his senses shortly after. ¡°It seemed that the little skeleton had given them names. Not bad. Since they possess intelligence, they were no longer simply undead creatures and should have their own names.¡± Han Shuo thought in his heart.

    ¡°The ces of extreme fire and extreme metal have existed for way longer than the other three ces of extreme elements. After millions of years, they naturally nurtured fire and metal attribute treasures. The other three ces of extreme elements have only existed for ten thousand years, hence they have yet to reach the conditions to nurture treasures.¡± Han Shuo exined to the little skeleton.

    ¡°In that case, couldn¡¯t there be other ces that could nurture such weapons? I can sense that the weapons Little Fire and Little Metal have seemed as though they were forged specifically for them and their strength is greatly increased by those weapons. I want to find such weapons for Little Water, Little Earth, and Little Wood!¡± The little skeleton transmitted.

    Han Shuo trembled when he heard what the little skeleton said and he immediately came to his senses. That¡¯s right, the Profound Continent is so huge. There might be other ces of the five elements. Perhaps those ces might be able to nurture earth, water, and wood attribute treasures! Han Shou thought inwardly, bing more optimistic after he was reminded by the little skeleton.

    ¡°Thanks for the reminder, I will keep that in mind!¡± Han Shuo smiled as he said to the little skeleton. He then began chanting an incantation, preparing to send the little skeleton and the elite metal zombie back to theherworld.

    Just as the little skeleton and earth elite zombie were about to disappear, the little skeleton transmitted a message, ¡°Father, I chose a name for myself. My name is Han Hao!¡±

 Chapter 432: Gaining another mystical skill

    GDK 432 ¨C Gaining another mystical skill

    After the elite metal zomple and the little skeleton were sent back to theherworld, Han Shuo immediately left Mount Silk and returned to Brettel City.

    This time when he returned to Brettel City, Han Shuo did not say much nor did he find out more about Brettel City¡¯s situation. He only went to look for a few people in charge and talked with them for a while, exining that he was about to train for a period of time.

    While Han Shuo wasn¡¯t around, Jack and the others had managed Brettel City excellently. Brettel City grew more prosperous with each passing day and everything was developing smoothly. After the twelve mystical demons surveyed the situation, Han Shuo understood that he simply didn¡¯t need to not worry about the situation in Brettel City.

    Now that Lawrence was on the verge of gaining authority over Lancelot Empire, Han Shuo believed that given his rtionship with Lawrence, Lawrence definitely wouldn¡¯t treat Han Shuo¡¯s subordinates in Brettel City shabbily. Han Shuo knew his importance to Lawrence from Sabakas and Karel¡¯s words. This was precisely why he would feel at ease to train in seclusion.

    Once he ensured everything was in ce, Han Shuo entered the secret room within his mansion in Brettel City and used the teleportation array to go to the Cemetery of Death.

    The Cemetery of Death was filled with dense deathly aura throughout the year and was as dark and dusky as before. Han Shuo headed directly to the location where he had buried the elite earth zombie and discovered that under the nourishment from the ce of extreme earth, the concaved chest of the elite earth zombie no longer looked that unsightly. It seemed that the ce of extreme earth, which had nurtured the elite earth zombie, was indeed extremely effective in healing its injuries.

    As soon as he entered the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo immediately connected with dark dragon Gilbert. From Gilbert¡¯s calm messages, it seemed that there currently shouldn¡¯t be any situation within the Valley of Sunshine that Gilbert couldn¡¯t handle. Hence, Han Shuo told Gilbert that he would be spending a long time to train.

    Han Shuo was currently in the separate demon realm of the nine levels of demonic magic. Whether he could break into the carnal realm would depend on whether he could assimte the enormous amount of energy within his body and if he couldprehend the frame of mind needed for the carnal realm.

    As demonic practitioners paid more attention to forging the physical body, their lifespan was much longer than swordsmen and magi of this world. Even for Han Shuo who was in the separate demon realm, as long as he wasn¡¯t killed or suffered from cultivation deviation, he could easily live for a few hundred years.

    Perhaps it was precisely because time was of abundance to demonic practitioners, that they would spend a lot of time during each seclusion. The duration of seclusion differed based on one¡¯s realm. Demonic practitioners of higher realms would require longer periods of time of training in seclusion.

    Han Shuo had nned to stay in seclusion for an extended duration this time. After he had arranged all worldly matters properly, he then truly entered the so-called state of seclusion by demonic practitioners.

    He sat cross-legged on the ground covered with white bones within the Cemetery of Death. Han Shuo settled his mind down, dispelling the misceneous thoughts from his brain. He could feel the frightening killing intent that filled every part of his body, rapidly revolving the demonic yuan energy within his body and directing the enormous amount of energy within his body toward the demon infant.

    This was a process that used quite a lot of time and energy. Fortunately, Han Shuo had an astonishing endurance and would persevere once he set his mind on something. From the moment Han Sho sat cross-legged on the ground, he no longer moved, simply focused on the thought ofpletely assimting the enormous killing intent within his body, entering the deepestyer of meditation.

    The Cemetery of Death was indeed a good location for training. With the existence of the barrier, there was simply no one who could discover its existence. As there was no other person within the Cemetery of Death, it was absolutely silent, which was extremely suitable for a demonic practitioner like Han Shuo.

    When Han Shuo began to train without any stray thoughts, time already had no meaning to him. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness gradually became empty, without any thoughts. It was to the extent that he even forgot his own existence, as though everything had stilled, including his own consciousness.

    A demonic practitioner had two types of entering demonhood, ssified as active and passive. The active form of entering demonhood was like what happened a few days ago, where the demonic practitioner would sink into a crazed massacre. During that period, the demonic practitioner¡¯s heart would only contain the primal desire to kill ruthlessly, possessing the madness to destroy everything. The demonic practitioner in that state would have absolutely no idea what he or she was doing, and also not be able to feel pain. One¡¯s strength would indeed be more frightening than usual.

    However, this active form of demonhood was extremely dangerous for a demonic practitioner. With a single slip, the demonic practitioner would permanently fall into demonhood, never regaining his consciousness and bing the purest killing machine.

    Previously when Han Shuo entered that state, he had a brief moment of soberness prior to entering demonhood. Due to the hatred buried deep in his heart, he had identified sacred knight Blount as his target. Furthermore, the previous time Han Shuo entered demonhood was purely due to him being unable to control the energy within the Demonyer Edge while attending to the killing intent within his body at the same time.

    When the energy that caused Han Shuo to enter demonhood was released through Han Shuo¡¯s crazed attacks, the energy that didn¡¯t originate from Han Shuo¡¯s body disappeared permanently, allowing Han Shuo to gradually regain his consciousness.

    If the previous time he entered demonhood wasn¡¯t caused by external energy, but was instead due to some kind of stimtion which caused his consciousness to enter demonhood and the demon infant to have the intention of ughter, he wouldn¡¯t have been able to recover so easily.

    In contrast to the harmful active demonhood, the passive type of demonhood was a state that demonic practitioners were most willing to enter. The self-forgetting state of demonhood would allow a demonic practitioner to not have any stray thoughts and was extremely beneficial to a demonic practitioner¡¯s training.

    However, this type of demonhood was extremely hard to enter. Some demonic practitioner would never enter such a state in their entire life while other innately talented demonic practitioners would enter it many times at fortuitous moments. These people would usually be formidable characters of the demonic path. They were extremely skillful, had high perseverance and possessed great knowledge.

    In Han Shuo¡¯s case, this wasn¡¯t the first time he entered demonhood. For an unknown reason, he had once again entered this mysterious state. It was as though the whole world including himself had been discarded from his mind, leaving his consciousness totally empty.

    Han Shuo no longer had any concept of time. He just sat cross-legged in the Cemetery of Death in a selfless state, while a snake-like strand of ck electricity circled across his body as a frightening aura emanated from his body.

    Thick blood-red fog flowed out from his pores and curled around Han Shuo. The fog was then inhaled by Han Shuo through his nose into his body, forming a cycle.

    After an unknown amount of time, Han Shuo was awakened by a wave of crisp pitter-patter noises. When he came to his senses, he suddenly felt that the demon infant in his body had be a vortex, continuously revolving at high speed, releasing strands of energy into his limbs, bones, and meridians.

    The energy filled every corner of Han Shuo¡¯s body, further refining his already otherworldly strong body. Strands of energy surged within Han Shuo¡¯s body and a familiar tearing pain appeared once again, as though countless daggers had stabbed his body.

    As one¡¯s demonic arts improved, one¡¯s body would be tempered repeatedly by the sudden rise in demonic yuan energy, so as to allow one¡¯s body to adapt to the cirction of the qualitatively changed demonic yuan energy, causing one¡¯s body to reach the same realm as one¡¯s cultivation.

    Having experienced this a few times previously, Han Shuo was already used to the pain from strengthening his physical body. When the energy released by the demon infant seeped into Han Shuo¡¯s limbs and bones, he could even sense that his bones were the first to react. His bones that have been refined by ck resolute crystal and was now tempered by the energy from the demon infant seemed to suddenly change peculiarly. This originally iron-like bones seemed to have incited something strange when the strands of energy from the demon infant had seeped into them. With a though, Han Shuo suddenly flung out his left hand. In ordance with his thoughts, his left hand unexpectedly lengthened by ten centimeters.

    Han Shuo was stunned. Shortly after, he punched and kicked toward the sky. Han Shuo discovered that he could actually lengthen part of the bones in his limbs with his thoughts. His iron-like bones had gained a mystical flexibility.

    What was particrly surprising to Han Shuo was that he could actually control the lengthening and shortening of his bones!

    In other words, whenever Han Shuo threw a punch, his arms could suddenly stretch if he wanted to. If he was in closebat, such a miraculous ability to stretch his arms and legs would definitely catch his opponent off guard to great effect, causing his opponent to be unable to defend effectively.

    Moreover, Han Shuo could faintly feel that ten centimeters weren¡¯t the limit. It seems that with practice and a further increase in his strength, it could improve further. Han Shuo was ineffably appalled when he thought about what this meant. Such a mystical ability was simply something no human could possibly achieve.

    There didn¡¯t seem to be such a mystical ability within Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories. A demonic practitioner¡¯s physical body could be very powerful and unnatural. At its most powerful state, even severed arms could be regrown. However, there was no knowledge of an ability where the limbs could be so flexible they could lengthen and shorten.

    Han Shuo carefully thought for a moment and understood that this was perhaps because the little skeleton¡¯s ck resolute crystal and the demonic magic¡¯s tempering had caused a mutation. He thought inwardly, every demonic art was created by man and wasn¡¯t always the same and instead evolved with training.

    Other than his bones bing flexible, Han Shuo¡¯s inner organs, as well as his flesh, was further strengthened. His meridian channels, in particr, had expanded by a shocking amount after being tempered this time around. The cirction speed of his demonic yuan energy was much faster than it used to be.

    After examining his body with his consciousness, Han Shuo discovered that although his physical body had been strengthened, he still seemed to be a step away from the next realm and had not reached the carnal realm. However, Han Shuo could feel that he was extremely close to the next realm. As long as he had a moment of enlightenment, Han Shuo would immediately enter the carnal realm.

    However, the practice of demonic magic was as such, where each realm was extremely profound. Comprehension could not be forced. The strength of Han Shuo¡¯s body was sufficient, and his demonic yuan energy was also enough for him to break through to the next realm. As long as Han Shuo couldprehend the carnal realm, the demon infant will immediately mutate, and his consciousness will advance to the carnal realm.

    Han Shuo gently exhaled, smiling bitterly as he sat down cross-legged again. He carefully went through Chu Cang Lan¡¯s remnant memories. Unfortunately, even though Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories wasplex, it didn¡¯t contain definitive information about theprehending the carnal realm.

    Han Shuo realized that he would still have to depend on his ownprehension. Everything was ready and it all depended on his understanding of the next realm of demonic magic.

    ¡°Father, I¡¯ve already recoveredpletely!¡± When Han Shuo was pondering silently, he suddenly received a message from the elite earth zombie.

    Han Shuo was startled for a moment but came to his senses soon afterward. He turned around and realized that the naive elite earth zombie had left the ce of extreme earth and was looking at Han Shuo from a short distance away.

    The originally dented area on the elite earth zombie¡¯s chest had returned to normal. It looks as if the elite earth zombie had indeed fully recovered.

    ¡°Very good, you¡¯ve finally recovered. Next time, we will kill that bastard. I promise!¡± Han Shuo looked at the elite earth zombie and said solemnly.

    ¡°I know, Father has grown even stronger now.¡± The elite earth zombie transmitted.

    ¡°Alright then, I¡¯ll send you back first. I¡¯ll spend some time to research on a method to freely enter and exit your world. I think that soon after you return, I will be able to meet you all in your world.¡± Han Shuo smiled as he looked at the elite earth zombie and said.

    ¡°Ok, I miss my brothers as well. Father, please hurry and enter our world. There are many interesting things in our world too.¡± The elite earth zombie transmitted.

    ¡°Yes, I know!¡± Han Shuo replied and then sent the elite earth zombie back to theherworld.

    After sending the elite earth zombie away, Han Shuo didn¡¯t continue pondering the issue of the carnal realm and instead started to examine how to utilize the skeleton staff to freely enter and exit theherworld.

    A serene luster gem and a ck resolute crystal had separately been extremely beneficial to Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength and physical body. Such beneficial items that only existed in theherworld had aroused his interest. It also caused Han Shuo to understand that theherworld filled with undead creatures, there was simrly many unusual treasures.

    Most importantly, the little skeleton and the others were in theherworld. The little skeleton had even named itself Han Hao, indicating that the little skeleton¡¯s intelligence was bing higher. Other than his skeletal figure, he was already the same as other highly intelligent lifeforms, possessing his own consciousness and could think clearly and make his own decisions.

    Han Shuo was extremely concerned and also extremely curious about the little skeleton and the others. Only by gaining the ability to freely enter and exit theherworld with his soul, could Han Shuo gain a greater understanding of them and even help the little skeleton and the others to advance faster.

 Chapter 433: Undead Creature in the Dead Sea

    GDK 433 ¨C Undead Creature in the Dead Sea

    Practicing necromancy was simrly quite exhausting. However, Han Shuo was able to grasp the spell pertaining to letting his soul freely travel to and from theherworld rather quickly.

    Perhaps it was because Han Shuo had already experienced entering theherworld twice and also had detailed descriptions on how to use the skeletal staff to travel to and from theherworld, Han Shuo took less than half a month to grasp the spell which allowed one¡¯s soul to cross into theherworld.

    During this half a month, the little skeleton, elite earth zombie, and the others could often sense Han Shuo¡¯s presence in theherworld. However, as Han Shuo still couldn¡¯t master a precise location, he would often find himself extremely far from the little skeleton and the others.

    Every time Han Shuo entered theherworld, he could immediately sense the messages the little skeleton and the others were transmitting to him. As the auras of the little skeleton and the others grew increasingly stronger and clearer, Han Shuo could felt their pressing thoughts to meet him. However, Han Shuo, who was constantly studying the necromancy magic meticulously, wasn¡¯t in a hurry to reach the area where the little skeleton and the others were.

    It was until a long time had passed that Han Shuo truly mastered the method of shuttling his soul to theherworld. With necromancy spells and the assistance from the skeletal staff, Han Shuo could descend into theherworld with a single thought and could rapidly return to the Profound Continent from the lifelessherworld by sensing his physical body.

    After mastering the necromancy spell, Han Shuo spent a few more days to research on how to urately arrive at their location by utilizing his connection with the little skeleton and the others.

    The bodies of the little skeleton and the others were marked not just by Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence, they were also marked by dark seals. Whenever Han Shuo entered theherworld, he could clearly feel the existence of the little skeleton and the others. After numerous adjustments to the skeletal staff and spell based on this connection, Han Shuo was finally able to seed in arriving beside the little skeleton a few dayster.

    ¡°Father!¡± the little skeleton said gently when Han Shuonded beside him.

    The little skeleton, fire elite zombie, and water elite zombie were on top of the bald mountain. And behind the little skeleton stood an army of densely packed undead creatures. These creatures included the three evil knights, the bone demon, and the mummy lord Pharaoh. Even more hate warriors, zombie warriors, and skeletal warriors filled the bald mountain.

    Under the dusky grey sky, hundreds and thousands of gargoyles flew around in every direction. It seemed like they too were part of the little skeleton¡¯s undead army.

    Looking ahead, a vast, ck sea could be seen below the bald mountain and it stretched all the way into the horizon. Within this lifeless and pitch-ck ck sea, there were numerous severed limbs and bones floating on the surface. It was just like another cemetery for the undead creatures and was full of dense deathly aura.

    Several enormous auras hid within the vast ck sea, as though they were secretly observing everything. Han Shuo could sense just how terrifying those few existences were. When he looked at the little skeleton and the others who were ready and waiting, Han Shuo suddenly realized what was going on.

    It seems that the little skeleton had ill intentions when he led his undead army over to this location.

    ¡°Father, you can reach us urately now?¡± When the little skeleton saw that Han Shuo only nced around afternding beside the little skeleton, the little skeleton couldn¡¯t help but repeated his question again.

    Many sounds of breaking and snapping were heard. Under the maniption of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, several bones were forcibly removed from the bodies of around ten skeleton warriors. He then manipted a dense deathly aura to rapidly strengthen these bones, making them tougher. In just a short while, Han Shuo had forged a white skeletal body.

    ¡°When I leave, I¡¯ll return all the bones I took from their bodies.¡± Han Shuo said to the little skeleton.

    ¡°They should be honored to have their bones used by Father. These low-rank skeletal warriors will only obeymands and don¡¯t have much intelligence. Their bones are not that tough. If Father wants a good skeleton body, I can help you find some better bones,¡± the little skeleton said to Han Shuo.

    ¡°There¡¯s no need for that. Once I figure out the mysteries behind the transportation matrix in the Cemetery of Death, my real body will be able to enter this world. By then, my physical body will be in the Netherworld and no other bones will be more suitable for me.¡± Han Shuo exined to the little skeleton.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Father¡¯s physical body is extremely strong. Even a bone dragon¡¯s bone, the strongest bone in this world, is not as durable as Father¡¯s bones.¡± The little skeleton nodded in agreement.

    Howl... While Han Shuo and the little skeleton were chatting, a terrifying howl suddenly sounded from within the boundless ck Sea before them, as though a terrifying undead creature was issuing a challenge to the little skeleton.

    The little skeleton¡¯s Purple Demon Eye suddenly shot out a ray of dazzling purple light. The purple ray appeared solid, piercing through space and actually flew directly towards the direction of the howling. It carried an extremely frosty and ruthless aura.

    Boom! Boom!

    Suddenly, a series of explosions could be hearding from the origin of the howling. The deathly stillness of the ck sea water suddenly looked as though it was boiling, with a few dark pirs abruptly shooting up towards the sky.

    A hideous, octopus-like creature with a colossal body and sharp bone spurs grown on its tentacles, floated to the surface, revealing more than half of its body. It looked up and said angrily, ¡°Petty existence, you dare to challenge my might?! Do you think you can defeat me today?¡±

    Following the octopus-like creature¡¯s emergence, countless grotesquely shaped creatures slowly appeared. These undead creatures looked very simr to othermonly seen undead creatures. It¡¯s just that perhaps because they had been under the ck sea for too long, they don¡¯t look the same as ordinary undead creatures.

    The creatures that appeared included skeletal warriors, zombie warriors, hate warriors, and even powerful high-rank creatures like evil knights. However, these creatures had fins on their body, appearing extremely strange. There were also undead creatures which looked totally different from those which Han Shuo was familiar with. They had obviously evolved from some species of fishes found on the Profound Continent, and also possessed an ugly figure.

    ¡°Tumoja, the vast area of the eastern dead sea will also be my territory. If you pledge allegiance to me, I shall let you live!¡± the little skeleton said loftily to the weird looking undead creature, Tumoja as he rode on his bone demon which had the ability to fly.

    ¡°Ha, you shameless skeleton. You have lost to me time and time again. With your strength, are you worthy of my service? ¡± Tumoja sneered, not fearing the little skeleton.

    ¡°It seems that you are seeking death!¡± the little skeleton shouted and guiding the bone demon he was riding to fly toward that area.

    The elite water zombie who had been standing still took the lead and dashed towards the ck Sea. Before it was even reached the sea, the elite water zombie began to disy its remarkable ability. Under the maniption of its power, the seawater suddenly split apart before him and miraculously formed a passageway directly to the seafloor.

    The undead army brought along by the little skeleton were currently advancing with the elite fire zombie towards the exposed seafloor where the elite water zombie stood. Strands of bizarre energy formed naturally around the elite water zombie as the surging ck seawater surged continuously, crushing many creatures within the seawater.

    When the enormous army from the bald mountain reached his side, the water elite zombie took the lead and headed straight toward the depths of the ck sea. Under the elite water zombie¡¯s control, the surging ck waves split open voluntarily, forming a path which they could walk through.

    ¡°Tumoja, do you see that? My brother can manipte the water of your Dead Sea. You are no longer able to rule this region. But as long as you pledge your allegiance to me, you will still be the hegemon of this dead sea. Otherwise, if you force me to act, I¡¯ll make you pay,¡± the little skeleton rode on his bone demon, flying high above the elite water zombie as he showed disdain for Tumoja, urging it to surrender.

    While the little skeleton flew towards the sea, Han Shuo had also got on the little skeleton¡¯s bone demon. As he looked at the towering little skeleton, who was advising the undead creature beneath to surrender, he suddenly realized that the little skeleton had indeed evolved to be more and more human-like.

    In the past, the little skeleton wouldn¡¯t be so talkative, simply using pure strength to subdue the opponent. The act of using words to convince the enemy to surrender would only be done by high-rank creatures which possess intelligence.

    However, Tumoja was clearly a formidable existence that was unwilling to be ruled. It paid no heed to the little skeleton¡¯s persuasion at all, obviously unconvinced that the little skeleton had the strength to defeat it

    When the little skeleton realized that Tumoja failed to appreciate his kindness, a violent light shed from within his Purple Demon Eye. His three-meter-long bone spur suddenly moved. The dense deathly aura above the dead sea started to rush toward the bone spur in the little skeleton¡¯s hand. An aura of death began to spread from the little skeleton.

    ¡°Puny Tumoja, you shall pay the price for your stupidity!¡± The little skeleton¡¯s thought spread through the whole region as he rode his bone demon and charged toward that undead creature in the Dead Sea.

 Chapter 434: Struck Down From Within

    GDK 434 ¨C Struck Down From Within

    In terms of body mass, even with the flight capable Bone Devil avable, the Little Skeleton was no match for the creature from Dead Sea, Tumoja. However, when Little Skeleton charged towards Tumoja, his demeanor was incredibly formidable, and that caused Han Shuo to be very much surprised.

    When Little Skeleton rode the Bone Devil with Han Shuo and charged towards Tumoja, the army of the undead, led by water elite zombie and fire elite zombie, shed with those oddly shaped creatures belonging to Tumoja in the Dead Sea. For the water elite zombie who have the ability to manipte the power of the Dead Sea, fighting in such a location was piece of cake with enhanced lethality. The seawater would constantly surge and roll, therefore, not only was the seawater unable to get close to the army of the undead, it even caused some visible damages to Tumoja.

    Followed closely behind the water elite zombie were the fire elite zombie, holding a Fire Lotus. One by one, clouds of fierce zes blossomed from the Fire Lotus. Those zing mes seemed out of this world in theherworld which was gloomy and cold throughout the year. It was also frighteningly destructive against the undeads.

    It was especially effective against those undeads which had constantly dwelved in the depths of the Dead Sea, which had grown ustomed to the ice-cold temperatures of the gloomy seawater. Whenever the fierce mes got near, their body would weaken and they would go soft at the knees. And by the time the roasting me of the Fire Lotus entered they bodies, these undeads were all like ice cubes in a hot pan, rapidly melting and evaporating away.

    The reason Little Skeleton brought water elite zombie and fire elite zombie over to the battle this time around, was because the two posed the greatest threat towards the undeads in the Dead Sea. The water elite zombie, being able to manipte the element of water, and the fire elite zombie, containing astonishing amount of heat, both held superior advantages over these Dead Sea creatures.

    With just a little effort of the water elite zombie and fire elite zombie working together, the undeads in the Dead Sea suffered heavy losses and retreated in defeat little by little. With the water elite zombie and fire elite zombie as generals fighting for Little Skeleton¡¯s forces, Little Skeleton did not need to worry about the war below him at all. He¡¯d ce all of his concentration on the boss of those sea creatures, Tumoja.

    The three meter long bone spur on his hand which had contained an enormous amount of the aura of death, shot towards Tumoja in the blink of an eye, something akin to a silver lightning.

    The undead creature seemed to be aware of how terrifying the bone spur on Little Skeleton¡¯s hand was. When it saw that the bone spur will soon arrive on its body, which was floating on sea more than halfway above the surface, it suddenly vanished into the depths of the Dead Sea without a trace.

    The bone spur which Little Skeleton tossed let out a lighting sh at the area where Tumoja was, and shot deep down. Streams of water in the region suddenly shot up into the sky, and series of explosion followed, seemingly that there were explosions under the seawater.

    ¡°Auu........¡±

    Tumoja¡¯s angry roar could be hearding from the depths of the Dead Sea. Judging from the extremely resentful voice, Han Shuo could tell that Tumoja were wounded by the Little Skeleton¡¯s bone spur. Otherwise, it¡¯s scream wouldn¡¯t be filled with so much rage.

    ¡°This undead creature doesn¡¯t belong to our world. Its soul was destroyed in an unusual way, and therefore it appeared in ourherworld. It absorbedrge amounts of the aura of death in our world, and then formed its body in this Dead Sea.

    I know this fe¡¯s presence early on. I had challenged it three times previously, but because my strength was too weak, I had to let it off all three times. But now, I¡¯m confident that I can finish him, all because his improvements are not as quick as mine,¡± Little Skeleton exined slowly for Han Shuo as he turned a deaf ear to Tumoja¡¯s roar from the abyss.

    ¡°It didn¡¯t came about naturally from this world?¡± Han Shuo stared nkly but quickly asked afterwards.

    ¡°Yep, just like you, Father. Some existence with powerful soul from other nes of existence coulde to this world due to some very extraordinary reasons. However, it¡¯s very rare to find any person who could travel freely between two worlds like Father. This fe¡¯s soul couldn¡¯t return to its world aftering here, and so it lived in the Dead Sea.

    But its soul should have been very powerful previously. Aftering to this world, it formed a new body for itself after fusing the energy found in here. The change not only happened to it alone. Those undead creatures which stayed surrounding the Dead Sea, tempted by its energy, all became some oundish, weird undead creatures, and lived in the Dead Sea with it,¡± Little Skeleton exined for Han Shuo.

    Powerful beings from other nes of existence, due to some extraordinary reason, its soul arrived at this world. It then adsorbed the energy inherworld to forge its body, and turned into some undead-like existence. Han Shuo thought for a moment, and soon realized something.

    From Little Skeleton¡¯s exnation just then, Han Shuo learned that theherworld contained not only undead creatures which came about naturally from the aura of death, but turned out to also have some outsiders which mutated here and took their niches. That seemed to be the case. Perhaps if Han Shuo couldn¡¯t freely enter and exit theherworld, given his powerful soul, there was a possibility for him to have turned into a formidable undead creature in this world .

    ¡°Whoosh....¡±

    The undead creature in the Dead Sea named Tumoja, while Han Shuo was still pondering, suddenly emerged from the Dead Sea with its enormous bodypletely revealed.

    Its body indeed looked like the octopus which Han Shuo knows. An oval body, with tentacles all around it. The only difference with an octopus is that this creature named Tumoja was way more hideous and fierce-looking. Sharp bone spurs, a characteristic signature ofherworld creatures, seemed to filled every surface avable on its body.

    On its oval-shaped body, covers ayer of ck-coloured armor which glitters with ck light. The armor seemed extremely hard and sturdy. Right in the middle of its oval-shaped body there were two pupils around the size of a few fists. Below the eyes were a huge mouth filled with dense, white teeths like that of a shark. The sharp teeths seemed to be able to chew apart any object no matter how hard it was.

    ¡°You wretched thing! Today I will destroy youpletely!¡± Tumoja roared. Its enormous body filled the sky and it¡¯s tentacles began to flutter about. Unexpectedly, it began to float up from the the surface of the Dead Sea bit by bit, charging straight towards Little Skeleton.

    ¡°You fool. Leaving the Dead Sea now only ensures your death!¡± Little Skeleton yelled lowly. But this sentence could only be heard by Han Shuo.

    A white lighting suddenly flew out from the depths of the ocean, andnded on Little Skeleton¡¯s hand in the blink of an eye. It was the three meter bone spur Little Skeleton regrly used.

    Afterwards, without waiting for Tumoja¡¯s superfluous words, Little Skeleton and Bone Devil charged towards Tumoja. The seven wing-like bone spurs on Little Skeleton¡¯s back suddenly fluttered everywhere in the sky. When the seven bone spurs moved, Tumoja¡¯s pupil rapidly flickered as well. He was seemingly aware of the frightening power of the seven bone spurs, and wanted to return to the depths of the Dead Sea.

    ¡°Now that you¡¯vee out, don¡¯t think of going back!¡± Little Skeleton¡¯s thought spread through the area.

    The seven bone spurs whizzed towards Tumoja. It roared angrily, and disorderly swung about its thorn tentacles, attempting to fend off the seven bone spurs that suddenly flew out from Little Skeleton¡¯s back.

    But as for Little Skeleton who had long learned how to steer the seven bone spurs with Law of Activating Magic, was even more fluent and adept in controlling the seven bone spurs by now. Thoserge tentacles fluttering around constantly, simply couldn¡¯t intercept any of the seven bone spurs shooting towards it.

    Bright, ck coloured sparks shone on top of the Tumoja¡¯s oval body, caused by the seven bone spurs piercing into Tumoja¡¯s armor-like body. Riding on the Bone Devil, Little Skeleton brought the Bone Devil underneath the enormous body of Tumoja, and together, Little Skeleton and Bone Devil attacked Tumoja¡¯s abdomen right above their heads.

    Therefore, if it wanted to enter the Dead Sea again, Tumoja from the Dead Sea, must first eliminate the threats of Little Skeleton and Bone Devil beneath its abdomen, otherwise it¡¯s vulnerable belly would be exposed to the enemies.

    ¡°Despicable sinister thing, how could there be existence like you in theherworld!¡± Tumoja roared loudly. It then extended its humongous tentacles towards Little Skeleton and Bone Devil, wanting to either strangle or stab Little Skeleton and Bone Devil to death.

    A series of magical incantations were recited, and bone spears one by one materialized in thin air. They flew from Little Skeleton¡¯s side and towards the sky, striking those extended tentacles above him. At the same time, Han Shuo gathered his mental strength, a Soul Shock magical spell was released. The Tumoja roared wildly as if suffering from a heavy strike. After a boring groan, its enormous body began to violently rock.

    ¡°Thank you, Father!¡± Little Skeleton said and gave the Bone Devil a p. His body shot high up into the sky, and actually reached above Tumoja¡¯s heavily armored oval body in the blink of an eye.

    Tumoja had its spirit and soul upside down thanks to Han Shuo¡¯s Soul Shock spell. Little Skeleton took advantage of its current state by suddenly grabbing a bone spur and stab it into Tumoja¡¯s eye. When Tumoja opened its mouth for another thunderous roar, Little Skeleton made a move. During Tumoja¡¯s ghastly sreams, Little Skeleton shot into its abdomen like electricity, disappeared.

    The Bone Devil, who had been given a p by Little Skeleton, flew downwards while carrying Han Shuo on its back. However Han Shuo could still clearly see Little Skeleton break inside into Tumoja¡¯s body, which filled his heart with astonishment. He had no idea why Little Skeleton would go into Tumoja¡¯s body.

    When Han Shuo was still shocked, something even more peculiar suddenly happened!

    The Tumoja which Little Skeleton bored into, suddenly trembled its body violently. Those bone spurs which Little Skeleton left sticking on the surface of Tumoja¡¯s oval body, all ruthlessly pierced inwards, and the tearing caused some jet-ck, ink-like liquid to leak.

    ¡°Damn it! Get out! Get out there!¡± As Tumoja violently struggles, it incessantly roared like usual.

    However, Han Shuo could clearly fell that Tumoja¡¯s vigor grew weaker and weaker. Even its enormous body slowly shrunk and withered.

    On the contrary, for the Little Skeleton inside Tumoja¡¯s body, Han Shuo sensed that its presence grew stronger and stronger. It was as though the energy in Tumoja¡¯s body had all taken in by him.

    This process continued for a very short duration. Just as Han Shuo got slightly distracted, Tumoja¡¯s shrinking body suddenly swell up like a ball being filled with air. Those bone spurs which was pierced on Tumoja¡¯s body, sparkled with Purple Demon Light before Han Shuo. Strands of bizarre energy were drawn out from Tumoja¡¯s body by the bone spurs.

    ¡°St...¡±

    Tumoja¡¯s rapidly inting body reached its limits before suddenly exploding. Its thorn-filled tentacles that once flutter about in the sky, four out of five of them fell apart when its body burst. The Little Skeleton inside Tumoja¡¯s body was dyed with ater of ink. His spotlessly white skeleton looked like ck crystals.

    ¡°I surrender. I¡¯m willing to pledge my allegiance to you!¡± The Tumoja which had its body blown into pieces, finally gave up on resisting. It transmitted its thought of surrender from its disintegrated oval body.

    ¡°Your body have shatter into pieces. With your condition now, you have no more use to me!¡± Little Skeleton replied to Tumoja¡¯s message of surrender. He then pierced the seven bone spurs on Tumoja¡¯s internal body, and through the connections with the seven bone spurs, like veins and arteries, he sucked away all of the enormous soul energy from Tumoja¡¯s body.

    Tumoja¡¯s humongous body rapidly melted away at speeds invisible to the naked eyes. With just a moment of effort, the energy in body of Tumoja was sucked away by Little Skeleton, leaving nothing behind. Not a trace of its soul was left in theherworld. It hadpletely vanished from this world.

    After destroying Tumoja, the seven bone spurs returned to the back of Little Skeleton. When the seven bone spurs re-attached to Little Skeleton¡¯s back, unexpectedly, a membrane as thin as cicada¡¯s wing grew between the bone spurs. Nobody knows why, but perhaps it was when they were used as flow channels to transfer energy, the flow of energy caused mutations to the seven bone spurs. If Han Shuo didn¡¯t pay special attention to it, he might had missed the new feature added to Little Skeleton.

    With the existence of the thinyer of membrane, and the seven bone spurs stuck out from his back, they now look even more like his wings. The Little Skeleton, who had just killed Tumoja, his pitch-ck body began to fall towards to Dead Sea. The seven bone spurs on his back rocked for a moment, and immediately restored his bnce. He steadily fell into to seawater of the Dead Sea.

    After hanging out in the depths of the Dead Sea for a moment, Little Skeleton suddenly surfaced from the seawater. The ck ink on his body was washed away, restoring the pure white appearance of his skeleton. Its texture was extremely dazzling. His demeanor grew even stronger and heavier. Even as Han Shuo who was a great distance away from Little Skeleton, he could sense that within the region, Little Skeleton¡¯s strength is above that of every other undead creatures there.

    Han Shuo then knew, that in this entire eastern part of the Dead Sea, there was no longer any undead creature stronger than Little Skeleton!

 Chapter 435: Tree of Souls

    GDK 435 ¨C Tree of Souls

    ¡°Father,e with me!¡± After flying out from the Dead Sea, Little Skeleton transmitted a message to Han Shuo.

    Without waiting for Han Shuo to react, the Bone Devil which Han Shuo was riding on moved when it received the message. It made a circle with Han Shuo on top of it before flying towards Little Skeleton¡¯s location.

    ¡°Whoosh¡±

    Little Skeletonnded on Bone Devil¡¯s body. After Little Skeleton got onto Bone Devil, it flew straight down towards the sea. Within the blink of an eye, it had fallen into the Dead Sea, continuing its downward path.

    The skeletal body which Han Shuo forged by solidifying the aura of death was extremely tough and durable, but Little Skeleton and Bone Devil¡¯s skeletal bodies were even better than that of Han Shuo. They were not afraid of being corroded by the corrosive seawater. It was just that their rate of sinking to the abyss of the Dead Sea was slightly slower due to buoyancy.

    Down in the depths of the Dead Sea, It was all dark and pitch-ck. Using their eyesight was basically useless down there. Both Han Shuo and Little Skeleton used their senses to feel their way forward. Also, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was exceptionally strong. Even though he came to theherworld from another ne of existence, his consciousness could still clearly map the surrounding scenes.

    At this depth under the ocean, there weren¡¯t many undeads that existed. The deathly still Dead Sea also didn¡¯t host many unique nts. Other than the pitch-ck seawater, there was nothing that especially caught Han Shuo¡¯s attention.

    ¡°Where are we going?¡± Han Shuo asked Little Skeleton.

    ¡°In the depths of the Dead Sea grows a very special nt. The reason I wanted to conquer the eastern Dead Sea, other than dealing with Tumoja, is to get my hands on that nt,¡± Little Skeleton replied.

    When Little Skeleton exined so, Han Shuo¡¯s curiosity immediately peaked. He no longer thought of theherworld as a deste, cold, and barren world. Ever since he experienced the benefits of consuming the serene luster gem and the ck resolute crystal, Han Shuo realized that theherworld was also a miraculous ce.

    Under this deadly seawater of the Dead Sea, Han Shuo did not sense the presence of a single nt. Little Skeleton exined that the reason he constantly aimed Tumoja in his crosshair, was actually to obtain a unique nt in the Dead Sea. That itself tells Han Shuo that this nt in the Dead Sea must be extremely rare and precious, otherwise Little Skeleton would never be willing to spend such considerable cost.

    ¡°What nt is it? What¡¯s so special about it?¡± Han Shuo immediately questioned.

    ¡°Pop! Pop!¡±

    All of a sudden, strange sounds arrived from a distance. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness could clearly sense that many undead creatures were rushing towards them. Although these creatures¡¯ presence were much weaker inparison to Tumoja, it is still higher than those low ranking Dead Sea creatures that fought in the battle just then.

    Little Skeleton did not immediately reply Han Shuo¡¯s question. Obviously, he too had discovered the rapidly approaching undeads. The originally dim Purple Demon Eye of the Little Skeleton, suddenly exploded with brilliant purple light rays. A kind of sinister and bewitching bizarre energy suddenly emanated from the center of Little Skeleton.

    ¡°I have killed Tumoja. You all will acknowledge allegiance to me, or vanish forever like Tumoja. Your choice!¡± Little Skeleton¡¯s powerful message was somanding, it fused with the current, and it traversed far and wide into the distance.

    At that moment, Han Shuo found that the approaching Dead Sea creatures, all looked like creatures which mutated from certain fishes found in the Profound Continent. There were some telltale features of the undeads on these creatures¡¯ bodies like bony outgrowths, while having fish scales-like body structure. They looked very peculiar.

    It was obvious that the powerful message which Little Skeleton transmitted caused an enormous impact on those strange looking Dead Sea creatures. Those undead creatures which were charging with great momentum, suddenly stopped heading towards Little Skeleton when the message was broadcasted, and they beganmunicating with each other.

    ¡°You all have no choice. Without Tumoja, you don¡¯t pose any threat to me. Immediately surrender, and pledge your allegiance to me. Otherwise your only path will be disappearing forever!¡± Little Skeleton pressured them.

    ¡°We are willing to serve you!¡± Without letting Little Skeleton wait for too long, those Dead Sea creatures yielded to his might. One by one, they sweared to serve and acknowledged allegiance to Little Skeleton. For as long as the soul brands from Little Skeleton exists, they will never betray him.

    This was amon phenomenon in theherworld. Once the boss was eliminated, the victor would usually be able to assimte the forces of it¡¯s opponent. It¡¯s proper and to be expected as a matter of course for low level undead creatures serve the high level ones; there¡¯s no such thing as loyalty or betrayal in theherworld.

    ¡°Very good. Take me to the Tree of Souls you are guarding!¡± Little Skeleton transmitted.

    ¡°Master, pleasee with us!¡± those Dead Sea creatures respectfully turned around and lead Little Skeleton and Han Shuo to an even deeper area under the sea.

    ¡°Father, under this eastern part of the Dead Sea, there¡¯s an unusual nt called Tree of Souls. It produces fruits called Pearl of Souls. Consuming it will make us possess wisdom. For Little Earth, Little Gold, and the others, it can make them evolve faster. However, wisdom will only develop on high level creatures, and only high level creatures could digest those experiences which increases one¡¯s wisdom. For creatures like zombie warrior and hate warrior, the Pearl of Souls would had no effect on them even if they consumed it,¡° Little Skeleton exined to Han Shuo.

    ¡°nt that could raise one¡¯s wisdom. What was going on?¡± Han Shuo asked immediately as shock rose in his heart.

    It seems that Little Skeleton wasn¡¯t able to answer this question very clearly. After Han Shuo asked the question, Little Skeleton¡¯s Purple Demon Eye flickers for a while before he replied, ¡°I¡¯m not sure either, as I¡¯ve never seen a Pearl of Souls. I¡¯ve only learned about them from hearsays. As for the specific details, we¡¯ll find out after we go there and take a look.¡±

    Han Shuo was extremely curious, but after hearing what was said, he didn¡¯t follow up with further questions. He continued to focus on getting a glimpse of the surroundings with his consciousness, while silently guessing how the Pearl of Souls could increase an undead¡¯s wisdom.

    After a short while, the group of undead creatures leading Little Skeleton and Han Shuo arrived at a region with dense ck, ink-like water. All sorts of chaotic energy of souls abruptly shot out everywhere and in all directions. The disorder firmly grasped on Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    Han Shuo was startled. It was the first time that his consciousness had met with such energy. The restrictive power it has on his consciousness made Han Shuo felt extremely unwell. However, as Han Shuo had trained proficiently in Demonic Magic for many years, he had learned some insights on the use of his consciousness. Suddenly, his consciousness severed all connections with the surrounding like a sharp knife.

    Those energies which flooded into Han Shuo¡¯s mind were immediately purged or cut off. Not a single bit of soul energy could affect Han Shuo. When he turned his head to the side, he saw that Little Skeleton and Bone Devil too were staring nkly at their ce. They seemed to be frozen by the energy of the souls.

    By means of his connection with Little Skeleton, a ripple of thought suddenly charged toward Little Skeleton. After the thought from Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness entered into the dazing Little Skeleton, he immediately responded, and his Purple Demon Eye shone brightly. That nk state of mind was swept clean. Then, through his connection with the Bone Devil, Little Skeleton too injected his energy into the Bone Devil.

    After being woken by Little Skeleton, the Bone Devil¡¯s enormous body shook slightly, and it immediately broadcasted its thought.

    ¡°Master, these neers didn¡¯t warn you about the situation here. It seems that they were harboring malicious intents!¡± while Bone Devil roared with rage, it flew towards a Dead Sea creature not far from it. Before the Dead Sea creature could react, Bone Devil had chewed it into powder.

    ¡°Master, please forgive us. We thought that if you could kill Tumoja, it must be very easy for you avoid the energy surrounding the Tree of Souls. We are very sorry that we did not remind you in advance.¡± Those Dead Sea creatures were utterly horrified, and hurriedly apologized to Little Skeleton.

    ¡°Fine, pardon them. Humph, I believe you guys wanted to test out my strength huh! I will let it pass this time. If anything like this happen again, I will let none of you continue to exist in thisherworld,¡± Little Skeleton said.

    Following Little Skeleton¡¯smand, the Bone Devil stopped its vigorous pursue. The Dead Sea creature did not fight back but constantly begged for forgiveness. At that moment, the ink-like ck sea water suddenly disappeared. The scene of a big tree made of some brown branches intertwined together appeared, its roots buried deep under a field of rocks, with ten something fist-sized oval-shaped gray fruits hanging on this unique big tree entered their mind.

    One could vaguely see that the seawater surrounding the big tree is grey in color. Spirit energy which looked like segments of memories flooded all around the huge tree in an chaotic manner. It looked as if wisps of them floated into the center of the big tree. Perhaps it was one of the nutrients that the tree needed.

    ¡°Around the Tree of Souls were some floating energy of memories which the Dead Sea adsorbs. The Tree of Souls condenses those emotions and memories into itself, and then forms the Pearl of Souls. These Pearl of Souls can be directly consumed. It will make some dumb high-ranking undead creatures obtain great wisdom.¡± The Dead Sea creatures exined to Little Skeleton.

    ¡°Father, these are the Pearl of Souls. It is said that it could increase one¡¯s wisdom. You should try it!¡± Little Skeleton exined to Han Shuo.

    With great curiosity, Han Shuo walked towards the Tree of Souls, and plucked a Pearl of Souls and dropped it into his consciousness. He then used the energy of his consciousness to smash and remove the hard shell of the fruit.

    All of a sudden, all sorts of messy, chaotic emotions, along with some memories and realizations, suddenly rushed deep into Han Shuo¡¯s mind. The Pearl of Souls was filled with great amounts of experiences. Nobody knows if it came fromherworld creatures. Among these experiences, many were unexinable by Han Shuo, with some portion of it containing novel ideas Han Shuo never heard before.

    While Han Shuo¡¯s mind was still in a big mess, suddenly, a sh of memories about exercising control over one¡¯s desires and unrestrained indulgence jumped into his mind. Han Shuo, who was distressed about the hard to breakthrough Carnal realm, fell into a foolishly paralyzed state, as though he was receiving enlightenment.

 Chapter 436: Suddenly Realizing It Had Been Three Years

    GDK 436 ¨C Suddenly Realizing It Had Been Three Years

    Under the depths of the Dead Sea in theherworld, Han Shuo suddenly gone silent, and his body turned still and didn¡¯t budge at all. It was as though he had sunk into the deepest sleep, with no signs of life.

    Little Skeleton stared at the unmoving Han Shuo who was standing on Bone Devil¡¯s body. In that moment, he had no clue what he should do. However, he could sense the strong presence of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, which he understood that this meant Han Shuo was still alive.

    ¡°Master, what¡¯s going on?¡± Bone Devil asked Little Skeleton.

    The Bone Devil which was forged by Little Skeleton using tough and durable skeletal remains, had followed alongside Little Skeleton for a very long time. It intrinsically feared of Little Skeleton¡¯s formidable strength. It understood that perhaps Little Skeleton had yet to be the most terrifying being in theherworld, and yet, it also knew that Little Skeleton¡¯s strength would constantly increase, and he will grow stronger and stronger. He will surpass more and more powerful creatures.

    However, Bone Devil¡¯s master, unexpectedly also has a mysterious father. Han Shuo, having originated from another ne of existence, made the Bone Devil felt extremely curious about it. It couldn¡¯t understand how could a mighty existence like Little Skeleton would have Han Shuo as its father.

    ¡°This is not something you should ask!¡± Little Skeleton replied. He circled a few rounds around Han Shuo who was on Bone Devil¡¯s body, while looking up and down at the motionless Han Shuo. He seemed to be studying what in the world Han Shuo was doing.

    After a while, Little Skeleton gave Bone Devil a pat and instructed, ¡°Alright. Just look after him for the time being. There¡¯s no need to worry about other things.¡±

    ¡°I will, master!¡±

    In theherworld that has no concept of time, after some unknown amount of time, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness moved, and his soul traversed through a spacetime wormhole, and immediately arrived at the Cemetery of Death in the Profound Continent. But he still sat there upright, motionless.

    Although his body was motionless, the consciousness and demonic yuan in his body was churning wildly. The enormous energy stored within his body was being unceasingly condensed where his demon infant was located. While the demonic yuan was being continuously condensed, the demon infant became more and more distinct. It was as though a magical brush was slowly painting a beautiful picture. Even its pores and fine hairs were clearly visible.

    After a lengthy period of time, the demonic yuan in Han Shuo¡¯s body was condensed by the demon infant. The speed at which it circtes in his body were simr to that of lightning. The minutest details of Han Shuo¡¯s baby infant grew even sharper and more pronounced.

    As Han Shuo had received enlightenment, the consciousness and demon infant in his body started to transform noiselessly. Breaking to the next realm would meant a dramatic rise in strength for Han Shuo, which¡¯d meant that he¡¯d process even more remarkable abilities, which implies that Han Shuo could realize even more of his wishes.....

    After a really really long time, Han Shuo awakened from his deep meditative state. A pair of abstruse eyes sparkled with glistering lights. Whenever he focused his attention and gazed at something, his eyes would appear to be flowing with electric current. It would make people involuntarily feel a palpitating pressure.

    Compared to thest time, Han Shuo¡¯s body did not undergo many changes. Only Han Shuo himself understood where those changes came from. Without needing to rely on his mystical demons to survey the surroundings, with just his consciousness, not a thing within a radius of a few li around him could escape from his observation. Han Shuo and Gilbert¡¯s connection grew clearer by tenfold. Han Shuo could also clearly feel that Little Skeleton was pleasantly surprised even though he was in another dimension. In an instant, Han Shuo discovered that his consciousness had apletely different sensation than it used to be. He joyously appreciated the extremely novel and odd sensation.

    Han Shuo was happy to find that his body was not the same anymore. Now that he has entered the Carnal Realm, all kinds of desires rose from the innermost part of his heart, as though it was urging him to quickly achieve his desires, and let those cravings which were buried deep in his heart for many years to be liberated.

    Again, Han Shuo spent some time to adapting to the new state of his body. And only after he seeded in practicing a few secret demonic cultivation, he finally opened the boundary of the Cemetery of Death, so that the ck Dragon Gilbert could enter.

    ¡°Master! My great master, you have not summoned me for three years!¡± As soon as ck Dragon Gilbert entered the Cemetery of Death, he yelled loudly towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°What?! Three years?!!¡± Han Shuo was greatly shocked and yelled lightly.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. In fact, it had been precisely three years and four months. Counting from the day you said you will begin practicing till today, was three whole years and four months. During that period, you did not once make contact with me. I couldn¡¯t even feel your existence. Honorable master, what kind of martial skills were you practicing? How could it be that it felt as though you had vanished from this world, and even I couldn¡¯t sense your presence?¡± Gilbert asked Han Shuo in astonishment.

    Three years and four months! Han Shuo was bbergasted by the long duration of time. He never thought that he had spent so damn long on this secluded training.

    Han Shuo himself felt as though it¡¯s only been a few months time, and never anticipated that time would unwittingly pass so quickly. Entering demonic stupor and the moment of enlightenment while entering Carnal Realm, it was during these two periods which Han Shuo couldn¡¯t feel the tiniest bit of the passage of time.

    However, what¡¯s for sure was that, it was exactly those two periods which he had spent the most time on. Three years and four months time was like a snap of the fingers for Han Shuo. He didn¡¯t feel that there was anything unusual about it, but he knew what it had meant for a regr person.

    ¡°Gilbert, how are you guys getting by during the three years?¡± Han Shuo hastily asked the ck Dragon.

    ¡°Be at ease, we have been very well. At present, the Valley of Sunshine already fell into the control of our Soul Destroyer mercenary band. Laureton of the Cairo mercenary band had been killed by Trunks, and a portion of their members defected to our mercenary band, and a group of berserkers left the Valley of Sunshine for good.

    The House of Menlo and Rainbow Sickle mercenary band too were crushed by us. Only the orcs tribe and certain small tribes survived outside the Valley of Sunshine. However, tribal chief Katar of the orcs tribe had also expressed his allegiance to Trunks. At this present time, Trunks is already the one who maintains the order in the valley.

    Surrounding the Valley of Sunshine, J¡¯s bandit group held the greatest influence. Only with the existence of J¡¯s bandit group, the merchants in the Valley of Sunshine would rely on Trunks even more, and our business grew bigger and bigger too. Nowadays, Trunks and J are nning in secret, getting prepared to deal with that Grand Duke from Kasi Empire,¡± ck Dragon Gilbert exined to Han Shuo.

    After ck Dragon Gilbert stated his ount, Han Shuo was pleasantly surprised at first. But shortly after he thought for a moment, he felt that the development rate of Trunks¡¯ Soul Destroyer mercenary band was somewhat inconceivable. He couldn¡¯t help but creased his brows and asked, ¡°Originally, just Laureton¡¯s Cairo mercenary band alone was at least as rich and powerful as the Soul Destroyer mercenary band. In addition to this, there were House of Menlo and the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band. How could Trunks take control of the Valley of Sunshine so rapidly?¡±

    ¡°Oh, there¡¯s lots of reason for this. All I know was that Miss Phoebe invested a lot of gold coins into Soul Destroyer mercenary band. In addition, Brettel City had previously sent people to assist Trunks during crucial moments. Other than that, that Dark Grand Magus from Cmity Church always helped us in the dark without seeking our approval. Furthermore, Emily provided a lot of intelligence. And owing to your triumph over the sacred knight of the Church of Light, countless mercenaries who have non-ordinary abilities all joined us. Regardless of timing or geographical conditions, the Soul Destroyer mercenary band was dealt with a favorable hand. Trunks too, was a leader with brains and courage. He seized control of the Valley of Sunshine in just three years.¡±

    After listening to his exnation, Han Shuo suddenly noticed that Trunks indeed held all the advantageous factors. On top of that, Trunks went through a near death experience, which caused him to be even more ruthless and unflustered. There was indeed a fair exnation for how he could wipe out every enemy factions and power from the Valley of Sunshine in three years time.

    ¡°Not bad. Trunks did well. Oh right, how¡¯s the current situation in Lancelot Empire?¡± Han Shuo immediately asked about the current state of the Lancelot Empire after praising Trunks.

    ¡°Lawrence became the new king to the Lancelot Empire. He¡¯s a fantastic king. Under his rule, armed rebellion in Lancelot Empire were quickly resolved. Before any foreign nations could invade the Lancelot Empire, Lawrence stabilized the internal affairs, and intensified the strength of the military.

    Oh, right, Lawrence was very attentive of the Brettel City. As the Brettel City nowadays has its own magical transportation matrix, an unending stream of supplies from various cities moves into the city. Numerous residents too willingly live in the city. The war lunatic named Dorcas, was currently the hottest general in the empire. During these three years, Dorcas had been restless, and constantly conduct arson, murder, and looting against the seven grand duchies. He has sought countless riches for the Brettel City.

    He¡¯s the same as Firenze, a battle lunatic. There was never a day which he did not infringe on the seven grand duchies. However, this fe was extraordinary in controlling the attack strength. Even till now, the seven grand duchies have no ns to unite and attack Brettel City.....¡±

    After listening to GIlbert¡¯s presentation, Han Shuo understood the current situation of the Lancelot Empire to some extent. From ck Dragon Gilbert¡¯s words, Han Shuo knew that all the people and forces who allied with him, were put into important positions thanks to Lawrence¡¯s wield of political power. Lawrence deeply valued Han Shuo existence. He did not treat Han Shuo¡¯s people unfairly because of his absence, but roped them in with great effort.

 Chapter 437: Changes

    GDK 437 ¨C Changes

    Three years¡¯ time is neither long nor short, but it is enough for a city to transform a lot. The originally poor Brettel City had long turned into a prosperous city residing in the eastern part of the Lancelot Empire.

    With Brettel City as their center, the five surrounding mines founded many weaponry and protection gear workshops. Various kinds of civilian and military weapons were forged from those five mines. Not only was the production more than enough to meet the demand for soldiers and civilians in Brettel, they were further exported to the seven grand duchies and every major city in the Lancelot Empire.

    While walking along the streets of Brettel City with Gilbert, Han Shuo gazed at the unending flow of people and the dazzling lineup of shops which were packed throughout both sides of street. He found it difficult to imagine that this was the dpidated city not too long ago.

    This time when Han Shuo and Gilbert returned to Brettel City, they did not utilize the transportation matrix in the Cemetery of Death. Instead, they went there through the transportation matrix in Zajoski City. Han Shuo wanted to try out the transportation matrix in Brettel City and check if it were any good. As for the results ¨C Han Shuo was very satisfied.

    ¡°Master, the magical transportation matrix just now, space sacred magus Sabakas personally came to Brettel City to deploy that. It can connect to any city within the Lancelot Empire. Rightfully, we could use the transportation matrix in Cemetery of Death toe to Brettel City. But why must you take the longer route?¡± ck Dragon Gilbert asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°Nothing much. It¡¯s just, I know how important arge-scale magical transportation matrix is to Brettel City, and so I wanted to personal check out this magical transportation matrix. Hehe, I know Brettel City¡¯s rapid growth was inseparable with the existence of this transportation matrix,¡± Han Shuo replied with a faint smile.

    ¡°Master, you are very right in that regard. This transportation matrix really made a huge difference. After His Majesty the King¡¯s vigorous assistance and backing from Miss Phoebe¡¯s merchant guild, all sorts of talents have been pouring into Brettel City through it. The soldiers within the city are all able-bodied and strong. Whenever any group from the seven grand duchies tried to invade us, they would be defeated by the forces in Brettel every single time. The security here has been guaranteed,¡± ck Dragon Gilbert exined slowly to Han Shuo beside him.

    After reaching at the Brettel City, Han Shuo released the twelve Mystical Demons, and had them moved around the whole Brettel City, taking in the whole scene of the current Brettel City at once. He had apletely new understanding of Brettel City three yearster.

    The four sides of the city wall were erected with magic crystal cannons, along with all kinds ofrge-scale destructive equipments which were clearly visible everywhere. The moat surrounding the city gates had been deepened, and could defend against a cavalry regiment¡¯s assault. Some sharp fences were set up on top of the city wall. It wouldn¡¯t be easy for anyone to intrude.

    A few pointy magic towers stood tall on the city walls. Dense and thick magical elements constantly lingered around the spire of the tower. This kind of magic tower could be powered directly by a magical creature¡¯s core, and can also be operated by a magus¡¯ mental strength, taking in the magical element found everywhere in the continent and use it as an attack.

    Compared to magic crystal cannons, these magic towers were a ss better when it came to flexibility and destructive power. Now that two magic towers were set up for each and every one of the four city¡¯s gates, Han Shuo could nearly imagine the expression on the invaders¡¯ faces when they saw the magic towers.

    On top of the four city gates were soldiers with shining armor and weapons. Han Shuo could tell that they were not ordinary just from the brightness of their weapons and armor. The fully equipped soldiers carried a steady look, obviously warriors with blood of iron that had been nurtured by war. The demeanor they gave told that there must had been many who had died by their hands.

    After the mystical creatures made a few rounds, the scenes of a few city districts all fell onto Han Shuo¡¯s eyes. He walked shoulder to shoulder with Gilbert all the way to the city lord¡¯s mansion. While listening to Gilberts descriptions, Han Shuo had a tranquil and calm smiling expression on his face as he was very satisfied with the current situation in Brettel.

    And finally they arrived at the city¡¯s lord mansion. The grand and wonderful mansion was brimming with prestigious grandeur aspared to its previous state. The mansion¡¯s walls had been broadened and erected much higher than before. Han Shuo only took one look, and it was clear to him that the present day city lord¡¯s mansion had been rebuilt once more. It seems that countless gold coins must have had been consumed.

    Although the city lord¡¯s mansion had increased in size, the guards keeping watch of the mansion¡¯s front door were still the same familiar faces. Two arrogant and energetic looking guards, with their heads high, vigntly scanned all around with their eyes. By the time Han Shuo walked towards the entrance with a smile, one of the guards suddenly trembled, and he stared nkly at Han Shuo.

    The guard stared nkly for a while, and out of nowhere, he kneeled towards Han Shuo with one knee and bowed in salute. With an extremely emotional tone, he shouted, ¡°Lord Marquis, you havepleted your training?¡±

    ¡°Lor.....Lord Marquis, oh my! Lord Marquis have returned to the city!¡± The other guard also recognized Han Shuo. When he heard his colleague¡¯s words, he couldn¡¯t help but turn his head to take a nce, and discovered Han Shuo had really appeared. He shrieked wildly with joy on the spot.

    With a smile on his face, Han Shuo nodded and said, ¡°Yes, Drucker. I¡¯m back.¡±

    The guard who was named Drucker was originally from the first batch of soldiers in Brettel City. At that time, he was extremely self-abased and as thin as a bamboo. But now, his body was tall and sturdy, filled with an imposing, solemn quality from head to toe. He was a different personpared to what he used to be, regardless of how you viewed it.

    ¡°Lord Marquis, you actually still remember my name! Oh my! I¡¯m too emotional now. My Lord, you truly are a brilliant and awesome Lord!¡± When Drucker heard that Han Shuo correctly pronounced his name, he got so emotional that he started to talk incoherently.

    ¡°Alright alright, I¡¯m going in!¡± After Han Shuo saw that Drucker¡¯s voice became louder and louder as he felt more emotional, Han Shuo waved his hand and walked into the mansion house.

    ¡°Lord Marquis is back!, Lord Marquis is home!¡± Another guard immediately gave a loud yell as soon as he saw Han Shuo step foot into the mansion.

    After this guard¡¯s announcement, the whole city lord¡¯s mansion suddenly turned frantic. All kinds of moring sounds could be heard from within the mansion. Outside of the house, a few horses suddenly darted out, heading towards few separate directions in great hurry. Inside the mansion, old butler Kas hurriedly came out to greet Han Shuo. He seemed rather emotional as well.

    Last time during the civil unrest in Ossen City, Han Shuo notified Kas the butler beforehand, and so he brought a group of servants to escape from the heat. By the time tranquility had been reinstated in Ossen City, Kas did not continue to stay in Ossen City, but came to Brettel City without hesitation, and began to take care of everything for Han Shuo in the city lord¡¯s mansion.

    After a moment, Kas the old butler arrived in the front of the door. As soon as he got there, he bowed in salute towards Han Shuo and greeted, ¡°Wee home, Lord Marquis.¡±

    ¡°Hehe. Alright, alright. Let¡¯s talk inside,¡± Han Shuo replied with a smile.

    While on the way inside, Kas the old butler unceasingly arranged those servants to have them prepare everything needed for a banquet. In passing, he exined to Han Shuo, ¡±My Lord, during the three years you were away for practice, Lord Jack became a Viscount, Lord Dorcas became a Count, and a few others were also bestowed with nobility. The few lords who originally temporarily stayed at the city lord¡¯s mansion, were all granted mansion houses by His Majesty as they were all nobles. However the few lords¡¯ mansions are not far from the city lord¡¯s mansion. I have instructed people to invite them here. I reckon they will all be here in abit.¡±

    Three years time can change a lot of things. Lawrence obviously knew how to curry favor from Han Shuo. Thus, Jack, Dorcas, and a few other who have close rtions with Han Shuo, each got bestowed with nobility. With that, because of their nobility, they naturally need not continue staying in the city lord¡¯s mansion. Besides, these people have parents and families of their own too.

    Han Shuo nodded and smiled as he replied, ¡°His Majesty indeed treats us very well.¡±

    ¡°Yes. Brettel City could develop so rapidly was all because of His Majesty¡¯s utmost support. But with that said, Lord Jack and Lord Dorcas¡¯ governance were also inseparable. The two Lords are both great characters. Only with the two in charge of military and administrations, Brettel City could happily enjoy triumphant progress all the way.¡± Kas did not forget to praise Jack and Dorcas.

    Han Shuo had learned all these from Gilbert¡¯s mouth, and he had some knowledge of Jack and Dorcas¡¯ achievements. With the two wielding the authority in Brettel City, one in literary and another in military,

    Jack¡¯s handing of the government affairs and finances made Brettel City¡¯s economy and all sectors grew more and more prosperous. And Dorcas, wielding the military power, not only did he arranged Brettel City to be invulnerable to attacks, he even vigorously went on the offensive against the seven grand duchies, and looted much goods from them.

    Of course, before he officially began training, Han Shuo told Dorcas certain things about seven grand duchies through Jack. With regards to Helen Tina of Helon Duchy and Burt Zili of Boulet Duchy, thetter which Cmity Church secretly controls, Dorcas knew what was going on.

    It was also because Helen Tina and Burt Zili¡¯s assistance in the dark, that Dorcas could so skillfully and easily attack the seven grand duchies. Not forgetting that he could leave so easily after looting.

    The existence of the two who harbor malicious intents, made the seven grand duchies unable to truly form an alliance, and they only could look on helplessly as Brettel City grew more and more powerful. The warhorses purchased from two countries made Brettel City possessed a real knight regiment. Outfitted with finely made weapons, armor, and protection gear, the knight regiment lead by Dorcas became the most terrifying troops amongst the seven grand duchies.

    The duo, Jack and Dorcas, one in literary and another in military, tightly held together the power over Brettel City. In addition, Dick from the Dark Mantle, with the backing of huge fundings, lead the forces of the Dark Mantle to cover the whole of the seven grand duchies like a web of spiders. He provided urate and vast intelligence for the duo. With the three working together, not only was Brettel City invulnerable to attacks while constantly expanding, it became a truly secure and formidable mega city.

    ¡°Through Brettel City, many goods from the seven grand duchies circted to the Lancelot Empire, while a certain goods from the Lancelot Empire also made their way into the seven grand duchies. A lot of aristocrats in the seven grand duchies endorsed the culture of our Lancelot Empire.

    Hehe, although we are a hostile enemy with the seven grand duchies, the merchants, however, ce profit before everything else. Brettel City always treat merchants with open arms, therefore many merchants from the seven grand duchies simply don¡¯t care about their Grand Duke¡¯s constraints, and keep continuously working together with us to circtemodities and supplies.....¡± Kas¡¯ exnations and understanding of the situation was different from Gilbert¡¯s emphasis on main points, and he further exined about the economics and politics in detail for Han Shuo.

    ¡°Haha, Bryan! This damned scoundrel finally returned!¡± a loud and clear shouting came from the outside. Jack chucked while carrying a shy youngdy as he walked inside with ample vigor.

    Three years had passed, and little fatty Jack turned into big fatty Jack. His weight increased in parallel to his grandeur. Owing to his grasping the power over Brettel City and being thought highly of by His Majesty the King, that cowardice and timid Jack had long vanished. The Jack now has an imposing aura on his body, characteristics of people who upy leading positions.

    Han Shuo had been friends with Jack for many years. As soon as he heard the familiarughing of Jack¡¯s voice, afortably warm feeling rose in his heart, and weingly walked towards Jack. While looking at his suit of well tailored nobility clothing, Han Shuo smilingly yelled at him, ¡°Hehe, little fatty now turned into big fatty! Not bad at all. It seems that you certainly ate well for thest three years!¡±

    ¡°Get lost! You brat, how could you stand aside and do nothing for your own city, and handed over all the things to do to us, and got me so exhausted! Now that you are back, not only did you not console me, you even said that I got fatter. Where¡¯s your humanity?!¡± Jack cursed smilingly after he gave an angry nce at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Who¡¯s this?¡± Han Shuo asked with a smile after shooting a nce at the shy, young girl beside Jack.

    ¡°This is Jessica. I¡¯ve mentioned about her to you before!¡± Jack proudly introduced her and winked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oh! I remember it now! Hehe, nice to meet you!¡± Han Shuo recalled that the reason Jack wanted to stay in Brettel City, was because of this girl named Jessica. Now that Han Shuo saw that Jack got the beauty he wanted, he truly felt happy for Jack.

    When Jessica faced Han Shuo, she obviously was somewhat reserved. She shyly and respectfully saluted Han Shuo, and in a somewhat dreaded voice said, ¡°Greetings to Lord Marquis!¡±

    ¡°My Lord, you have finally returned!¡± Dorcas walked towards him from the outside. There wasn¡¯t much changespared to the younger Dorcas, it¡¯s just that even more mark of hardships could be seen on his face, and it was obvious that he was more steady and experienced.

    Dick, Faulke, and a few leaders from the mountainous region arrived in session, and everyone assembled together. With butler Kas taking care of them, they went into the banquet hall and drank as much as they liked. The few characters who were in charge of everything in Brettel City, exined the situation for Han Shuo once again.

 Chapter 438: Deliaâ€™s Hintings

    GDK 438 ¨C Delia¡¯s Hintings

    Everyone at the party happily chatted with each other, with Dorcas and Jack presenting the current situation of Brettel City in detail. Naturally, Dorcas and Jack would reveal certain issues which wasn¡¯t public knowledge to Han Shuo, hence they told him the whole truth.

    Gilbert must have had frequented Brettel City often in thesest three years, as he seemed very familiar with the people here. He was talking cheerfully and wittily with Dick and the others, while putting a straightforward smile on his face, which seemed very calm.

    From the words of Dorcas and Jack, Han Shuo became even more aware of the difficulties met by Brettel City. He realize that beneath the unbounded grandeur exterior, crisis secretly awaited Brettel City as well.

    The Lancelot Empire had achieved stable internal politics. With Lawrence weiding the power, and after some purging, sounds of the rebels could no longer be heard in the Lancelot Empire. Therefore, it wasn¡¯t domestic problems that the Lancelot Empire was confronted with, but it was threats from the few surrounding nations.

    Brettel City, being the easternmost major city, also faced threats from foreign cities and empires simr to the Lancelot Empire. As Brettel City grew stronger and stronger in their ability to threaten the seven grand duchies, with exception of the two duchies of Helen Tina and Burt Zili, the other five duchies made more and more frequent contacts with each other. Their fighting against each other also quieten down.

    Other than the seven grand duchies¡¯ menace, the Brut Merchant Alliance, geographically separated from Brettel by the seven grand duchies, was also eying Brettel City covetously. On one hand it was because Han Shuo had killed Celt, themander of Brut Merchant Alliance¡¯s Redbud Knights. On the other hand, Brettel City¡¯s existence severely threatened Brut Merchant Alliance¡¯s interests.

    Prior to Brettel City growing so prosperous, overwhelming majority of supplies which the seven grand duchies needed were bought from the Brut Merchant Alliance. Certain specialties of the seven grand duchies was exclusively traded to the Alliance. The huge profit margin which Brut Merchant Alliance obtained from the seven grand duchies made a lot of merchants be filthy rich.

    However, thanks to Brettel City¡¯s rapid development, those merchants from the seven grand duchies, who put profit before everything else, began to make frequent contacts with Brettel City. On top of that, most of the goods from Brettel City were far cheaper than those from Brut Merchant Alliance. More and more merchants from the seven grand duchies renounced their coboration with the Brut Merchant Alliance, and began establishing cooperative connections with merchants within Brettel City.

    Hence, Brut Merchant Alliance¡¯s interests had surely suffered damage. Brut Merchant Alliance is a country jointly controlled by big merchant guilds, and it goes without saying that the merchants in that country treasure gold coins above all else. Thus, Brut Merchant Alliance viewed Brettel City as an enemy, and started to secretly back those five grand duchies, with the intention to assist them in eradicating the menace that is Brettel City.

    Unlike the seven grand duchies, the Brut Merchant Alliance, administered by multiple big merchant guilds, is one of the wealthiest nations on the Profound Continent. Not only that they have a mightily strong army, they also hold plentiful war equipments. Their strength was not in the least inferior to that of the Lancelot Empire. With the backing from this country made of united merchant guilds, Brettel City would obviously be met with a lot of trouble.

    ¡°Brut Merchant Alliance, Brut Merchant Alliance, hehe. That filthy rich country. I have yet to have make any moves against them, but unexpectedly, they are getting ready to take care of me. Interesting, very interesting!¡± Han Shuoughed coldly after listening to Dorcas and Jack¡¯s presentation.

    ¡°Bryan, we need to be careful with this Brut Merchant Alliance. They are very much like the Lancelot Empire ¨C a very powerful nation. With merely just our forces in the newly established Brettel City, we are absolutely no match against them,¡± Jack advised Han Shuo when he saw the exuberant ambition on his face.

    ¡°Alright. You big fatty. Just take good care of your administrative tasks. The lord¡¯s ambitions are beyond what you could imagine,¡± Dorcas gently groaned after shooting a nce at Jack.

    ¡°I¡¯m very clear about Brut Merchant Alliance¡¯s real strength. Hehe, but Brut Merchant Alliance too are facing powerful enemies all around them, and so they won¡¯t put all their attention on our side. Now, all we gotta do is figure out how to take care of the seven grand duchies. For the time being, no need to worry about Brut Merchant Alliance,¡± Han Shuo said with a faint smile.

    ¡°Lord Marquis, you¡¯ve grown stronger and stronger!¡± While Han Shuo was conversing with Jack and Dorcas, Delia praised Han Shuo with a lovable smile while approaching him with a ss of dark red fine wine in her hand. She had an exotic gloss on her beautiful face. This beauty from the mountainous region had be a military officer who is brave and good at fighting.

    Delia, who had a long and slender figure, wore a light-purple long skirt tailored to be skin-tight with a girdle. The mermaid-tail-like long skirt made her slender and perfectly straight legs give off a sense of beauty. The moving curves made the chiefs from the mountains linger a little longer in the hall, with their saliva threatening to burst forth out from their mouth.

    With a faint smile, Han Shuo held up high the ss in his hand towards Delia, and courteously replied, ¡°You are overpraising me.¡±

    ¡°Haha, Delia oh Delia. There are so many talented and handsome mountainous men pursuing you, but you had been aloof to them all this time. Could it be that you have been waiting for this guy all along?¡± Jack teasingly said to Delia as he chuckled. It seemed that Jack had grew close to them during the past three years.

    Delia pursed up her lips and gentlyughed, and only after lingering one round on Han Shuo¡¯s body with her eyes, that she replied Jack, ¡°Lord Jack indeed has great insights, you have found me out. Hehe!¡±

    ¡°Eh? So that¡¯s the case. Haha, but Delia, you¡¯re going to get disappointed. This brat has lots ofdies around him, so perhaps you have no chance for that anymore. You must have heard of those three powerfuldies. Bryan wouldn¡¯t dare to continue his womanizing ways anymore,¡± Jack said to Delia in all smiles.

    ¡°Well, not necessarily. For a man like His Lordship, I believe that as long as he has his mind set, perhaps no women could restraint him. Hee hee, my Lord, am I right?¡± Delia replied first Jack, and then asked Han Shuo and looked at him with her bright hot eyes.

    Last time, during the way down from Mount Silk, Delia had revealed her true feelings to Han Shuo. Mountainous people are always outspoken and straightforward in temperament, and Delia was especially so. As soon as she settled on a target, she will strive to fight for it without a bit of secretiveness. Her work method was very straightforward.

    When Han Shuo met with Delia again after three years¡¯ time, he thought the Delia would had long found a sweetheart. But unexpectedly she was single even till now. Han Shuo faintly understood something through Delia¡¯s spicy hot gaze. The sexy and wild Delia, who remained to be the number one beauty of the mountainous people, had some hard-to-describe temptative power on Han Shuo, who had now advanced to the Carnal realm.

    ¡°Ahem! I don¡¯t just set my mind on just anyone,¡± Han Shuo said with a faint smile as he looked Delia, who had her eyes fixed on him.

    Jack who was originally joking with Delia, at that moment, he couldn¡¯t help but took a careful look at Delia. The Jack now had been tempering in political circles for three years, and so with one quick look with his vicious eyes, he could see the fire in Delia¡¯s eyes. All of a sudden, Jack realized that the mocking joke he made just then was actually the truth.

    While in his heart he was admiring Han Shuo¡¯s luck, Jack couldn¡¯t help it but feel worried for Han Shuo. He was well aware of a certain event that happened in Ossen Cityst time, and he also understood the backgrounds and capabilities of the three women. And besides, Jack knew that Han Shuo certainly isn¡¯t someone who is well-behaved. With Delia¡¯s own superior qualifications and her recklessly tempting Han Shuo, Jack need not to think to know what will happen.

    As the most beautiful woman amongst the mountainous people, Delia is an influential figure in the hearts of mountainous people in Brettel City. If therees a day that she had disputes with Han Shuo and/or the threedies of Han Shuo, that will certainly cause a certain impact to those mountainous people. As to how much of an impact it would be, Jack started to inwardly calcte that in his heart.

    ¡°Oh then, my Lord, how do you feel about me? Hehe, if your Lordship does have his mind set on me, I could never resist your Lordship¡¯s charm,¡± Delia said to Han Shuo with a gentle smile, but her tone already carried a not-so-subtle hint.

    ¡°Ahem..... Ahem.....¡± Dorcas made two light coughts. He then frowned in displeasement and said to Delia, ¡°We are right in the middle of a conversation. If there¡¯s nothing else please go stroll somewhere else!¡±

    Even for Dorcas, someone rather sluggish in this aspect, could tell that there was some other vor in her talk. After getting a cue from Jack¡¯s eyes, he immediately came to his senses, and berated Delia.

    Dorcas, as Delia¡¯s superior, held a supremely frightening power in the army of Brettel City. Even the usually bold and fearless Delia was somewhat afraid of him. When he saw Dorcas berated her in a displeased expression, she thought that they really have something important to discuss, and so she apologized to the three and left. But right before leaving, she turned her head to take another look at Han Shuo. Her eyes werepletely filled with seductive provocation and enticement.

    ¡°Bryan, you now have a beautiful and tempting trouble. I don¡¯t know if I should feel happy or worried for you!¡± Jack waited until Delia left the three to themselves before he mockingly said to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Mind your own business, you don¡¯t have to worry about me. I know what¡¯s going on!¡± Han Shuo smilingly toasted to Jack, finished the fine wine that was left in his ss, and he then said to the duo, ¡°I¡¯m going to leave Brettel City for a while to take care of a certain things. But it won¡¯t be too long.¡±

    ¡°Go ahead, my Lord. Don¡¯t worry, we will manage the Brettel City well,¡± Dorcas stated immediately in a respectful voice.

    ¡°You left for three years and there wasn¡¯t much trouble in Brettel City. The Brettel City now will still function even if you leave it. Just go ahead and do whatever you need to do,¡± Jack said smilingly.

    Han Shuo nodded and did not give them any lengthy parting speeches. He knew that with Jack and Dorcas there, Brettel City definitely will not suffer any sort of great cmity. Previously, sacred knight Blount who had heavily injured him and his earth elite zombie, managed to escape death. Now that Han Shuo is in Carnal realm, he had absolute certainty that he could kill Blount. Therefore, he decided to finish Blount as to take revenge for his earth elite zombie.

 Chapter 439: Revenge

    GDK 439 ¨C Revenge

    Two dayster, in one of the seven grand duchies, Bisli Duchy, Grand Duke Nehem Beige was praying in thergest church of the Church of Light within his dukedom.

    This church was also thergest church found in Bisli Duchy, and it possesses a few thousand white priests and knights from the Church of Light. Around the grand hall, numerous disciples of the Church of Light were carefully guarding, protecting the safety of Nehem Beige who was praying inside.

    As the Grand Duke of the Bisli Duchy, Nehem Beige had a majestic statue. After weiding the power of Bisli Duchy, Nehem Beige, who had been a follower of the Church of Light from the beginning, vigorously advocated the Church of Light in his dukedom, and made the people and nobles in the country believe in the God of Light, and to offer the God of Light their sincere beliefs.

    As a Sky Rider himself, Nehem Beige¡¯s strength was out of the ordinary. Church of Light also dispatched numerous experts to protect him, while spreading the footprints of the Church of Light to every city in the Bisli Duchy. This made the popce of the Bisli Duchy more epting of the good fortune from the God Of Light.

    Nehem Beige was also one of the Temple Knights of the Church of Light, and had a fanatical faith in the God of Light. Every few days, he wille to this church in Bisli Duchy to pray, to feel the presence of the God of Light in this holy ce, and to gain those divine energy he could personally feel.

    Facing a statue as he piously kowtowed, Nehem Beige could feel the divine energy contained in his body to slowly flow. That kind of holy energy made him feel veryfortable. His zealousness towards the God of Light made him feel as though he possessed boundless energy.

    All of a sudden, a strange noise entered Nehem Beige¡¯s ears. As he was carefully experiencing the God of Light¡¯s sacred energy, Nehem Beige could keenly sense that a wicked energy was approaching. He immediately creased his brows and stood up from ground, and said to Red Bishop Katos some distance from him, ¡°What¡¯s happening? It feels as though a wicked energy is approaching here.¡±

    Katos was sent by the Church of Light to Bisli Duchy to promote the mysterious teachings of the church. Katos was a very devout follower of the Church of Light, and a priest with extraordinary strength. But his expertise is inprehending the teaching of the Church of Light. Like Nehem Beige, he too had a feverish dedication to the God of Light.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Who the hell is the reckless heathen? So daring and headless toe here to throw away its¡¯ life!¡± Katos could also feel that a wicked presence was getting closer. However, Katos knew that the church has countless rigid defense capabilities, and therefore paid no attention to that puff of evil aura.

    ¡°Oh yes that¡¯s right. Even for someone from Cmity Church, wouldn¡¯t dare to inly infringe on my Bisli Duchy. Any ordinary pagan who daresing here will be met their own death!¡± Nehem Beige faintly smiled and agreed with Katos¡¯ statement. ¡°Hehe, the church is very pleased with our aplishments here in the Bisli Duchy. Next time when we return to the head church, we will be able to get even closer to the God of Light, and appreciate the boundless presence of the God of Light, and obtain even more divine power!¡± Katos said to Nehem Beige with a faint smile.

    Although Nehem Beigh was the Grand Duke of Bisli Duchy, but privately at the Church of Light, his status is below that of Katos. Therefore, Katos doesn¡¯t show much respect towards Nehem Beige, and was very casual in his speech with him.

    ¡°Oh yes. Whenever I thought of holy energy filling my body, I will be very excited. It seems that we need to work even harder. Ai. What a pity that the big heathen named Bryan disappeared for a long time. Otherwise if we could kill him, our contribution will be enough for us to obtain even more divine power and holy water!¡± Nehem Beige replied to Katos.

    Katos forced a smile, shook his head, and said,¡±I think you better stop letting your imagination run wild. Even Lord Blount couldn¡¯t match that fe, so how could we handle him? This contribution is not something that we could obtain.¡±

    ¡°Well, you can¡¯t say that for sure. Lord Blount is indeed powerful, but he was by himself after all, withoutpany. Although our strength is not as powerful as that of Lord Blount, we still have Bisli Duchy on our side. Sometimes, the strength of a sea of people is greater than that of one Sacred Knight. I believe that if we knew where that heretic was, we might really stand a chance,¡± Nehem Beige said ambitiously.

    ¡°Bang Bang.....¡± Violent sounds suddenly came from the outside, as though the rumbling sound of thunders.

    ¡°Aaa.....aoo.....¡± Miserable bawlings suddenly came from outside the door. Apanied by the endless miserable shrieks that were shaking the boundary surrounding the grand hall.

    Negem Beige and Katos gave a nce at each other, they both put on an expression overwhelmed with shock at the same time. The two knew just how many experts were present outside the grand hall, and also understood how incredibly hard was the boundary in that hall. With each wailing sound they heard, they could feel the light barrier, personally deployed by light Sacred magus Bordeaux from the Church of Light, was shaking. Their hearts were crammed with intense fear.

    ¡°Who the hell is that! This light barrier was personally deployed by Lord Bordeaux himself, who could make the barrier tremble that hard?¡± Katos said to Grand Duke Nehem Beige as his body trembled along with the surroundings.

    ¡°I have no idea. Our people are being massacred. We need to rescue them. The enemy must be very terrifying,¡± Nehem Beigh replied and took out some discoloured armour from his space right. In a grave expression, he began to put them on.

    ¡°ng!¡±

    A crisp fracturing sound suddenly came from the very peak of the tall great hall. It sounded as though a drinking ss were smashed onto a rock surface and shattered into pieces.

    When Nehem Beige and Katos heard this crisp sound, an intense feeling of dread suddenly flooded their hearts. Nehem Beige, who was wearing theplete set of knight armour, suddenly yelled softly, ¡°Good gracious! The defense barrier deployed by Lord Bordeaux was breached!¡±

    ¡°What to do? What should we do? The one who came has pretty much around the same strength as Lord Bordeaux. I¡¯m afraid that the two of us cannot deal with this person!¡± Katos said to Nehem Beige in an iparably fric voice. His face had turned pale in fright.

    ¡°For now we can only evacuate!¡± Nehem Beige was rather calm. When we finished his words, he stopped putting on knight¡¯s armour, but hastily went towards a side door.

    When Katos saw Nehem Beige was leaving, without the slightest bit of hesitation, he hurriedly followed behind Nehem Beige, wanting to rapidly leave the area through the side door. He had long forgotten about rescuing those disciples being mercilessly killed outside of the great hall.

    A ¡®Whoosh¡¯ sound was heard, and a man¡¯s shadow stopped at that side door just in time. He was looking at the two with a wide, gloomy, cold smile.

    ¡°You, who are you?¡± Nehem Beige stiffly paused his steps, looked at the imposing Han Shuo, and asked somewhat panicaly.

    Nehem Beige had wielded the power of Bisli Duchy for many years, and had experienced countlessrge and small military campaigns. Given that basis, he shouldn¡¯t had so humiliatingly lost his self-control. But this time when Han Shuo came over, those mournful, miserable shrieks never stopped sounding. Even the renowned barrier of the light Sacred Magus Bordeaux from Church of Light was broken. That really gave him a huge shock, and therefore he had forgotten himself.

    ¡°He¡¯s Bryan. I¡¯ve saw his picture before. He is that big heathen!¡± Behind Nehem Beige, Red Bishop Katos of the Church of Light, suddenly pointed his finger at Han Shuo and shrieked.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Hehe. I think that I heard someone said just now that he wanted to kill me to gain divine power. This is very interesting.¡± Han Shuo sneered and looked at Nemem Beige, and said, ¡±Where is Blount? As long as you tell me where Blount is located, I will let you diefortably!¡±

    ¡°Guards! Guards! Kill this heathen!¡± Nehem Beige suddenly shouted loudly. A shining long sword was suddenly pulled out by him. The shiny bright silver fighting aura violently shot out like he had well practiced it. Included among his fighting aura, it carried a divine energy. His demeanor seemed to be very much astonishing.

    On the corner of his mouth, Han Shuo revealed a trace of cruel smile. He nkly looked at Nehem Beige as he charged forward right until he was right in front of him. Only then did Han Shuo not-so-urgently threw a punch.

    The berserk energy burst forth, and a heavy pressure that was like a mountain enveloped the whole area. Even Katos who was far away felt heavy in his heart, with a feeling of wanting to vomit.

    Rumbles....

    This punch from Han Shuo made Nehem Beige¡¯s fighting aura immediately scatter. The long sword was bent into an arch and fell onto the floor. The remaining might entered into Nehem Beige¡¯s body. A series of crackle and rattle sounds emitted from his body. After the sound stopped, the bones all over in Nehem Beige¡¯s body shattered, but his internal organs remained intact and undamaged.

    Han Shuo grinned as he arrived before Nehem Beige, with one leg stepping on Nehem Beige¡¯s chest, he unenthusiastically asked, ¡°Speak, where is Sacred Knight Blount?¡±

    ¡°Pei! Heretic, I....¡±

    ¡°Krrrack!¡± Without waiting for Nehem Beige toplete his sentence, Han Shuo stomped him with one foot. His mighty leg directly prated Nehem Beige¡¯s chest which had silver armor on it. By the time Han Shuo withdrew his right leg, Nehem Beige had stopped breathing.

 Chapter 440: Bloodbathing the Church

    GDK 440 ¨C Bloodbathing the Church

    Having witnessed the merciless murder of Sky Rider Nehem Beige by Han Shuo, the Red Bishop Katos of the Bisli Duchy couldn¡¯t help take a few steps back, as the fear in his heart urged him to do so.

    After shooting Katos a nce, Han Shuo moved towards him with great speed. Han Shuo had arrived in front of Katos before he could realize what had transpired around him. Han Shou stretched forward his mighty hand as fast as lightning and grabbed Katos by the neck, hanging him in midair.

    ¡°Kaff, Kaff! Damnit, what da hell do you want?¡± Katos blurted out with difficulty. He used both his hands to grip Han Shuo¡¯s mighty hand, in a feeble attempt to ease the choking.

    ¡°Where is Blount located?¡± Han Shuo asked grimly as he held Katos¡¯ neck with one hand.

    ¡°Ugh, ugh....I don¡¯t know.....Really......¡± Katos replied, while his body was being hung in midair. He was twisting around with all his might, but unfortunately for him, he couldn¡¯t break free from Han Shuo¡¯s tight grip.

    ¡°Hehe, do you really think that I can¡¯t do anything to you if you decide not to talk?¡± Han Shuo said with a grim smile. Shortly after he said that, Han Shuo used his empty left hand and pressed the top of Katos¡¯ skull. Katos screeched miserably. Han Shuo exercised his five fingers, and forcibly stuck them into Katos¡¯ skull.

    With this, Han Shou used a secret technique derived from demonic magic called the ¡®Soul Searching Hand¡¯. Five strands of gray smoke flowed out of his left hand along fingers and into his meridian channels. It then passed through Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness to obtain the memories stored in Katos¡¯ mind.

    Being on the receiving end of the demonic magic, Red Bishop Katos was wailing like a banshee while struggling wildly. It was as though he was suffering from the most dreadful pain on earth. That was the kind of yelling that never failed to make one¡¯s blood run cold after listening to it.

    Once ¡®Soul Searching Hand¡¯ was deployed, it will indeed produce an unimaginable amount of pain on the target whose soul was being searched. While performing the search, Han Shuo¡¯s five fingers were in constant motion inside Katos¡¯ brain. Such bouts of pain was not something an ordinary person could endure.

    When Han Shuo used his secret technique to obtain the memories in Katos¡¯ mind, a puff of divine energy in Katos¡¯ body was immediately set into motion, rapidly converging at his forehead, attempting to resist and destroy the wicked energy within his brain. It¡¯s a pity that divine energy such as this was too weak against Han Shuo. Before it could fully converge, Han Shuo broke it up swiftly.

    Under the effects of ¡®Soul Searching Hand¡¯, Katos¡¯ eyes revealed his lifeforce fading slowly, bit by bit. Momentster, his eyeballs rolled back and only sclera could be seen, and the inhuman shrieking disappeared. After his soul hadpletely vanished, he was left with a zero percent chance of being reborn.

    After extracting his hand that was inserted into Katos¡¯ head, Han Shuo pulled out a spotlessly white handkerchief to clean his fingers which was covered in brain juice, and cleaned out the mess that had made its way to his legs. Only then, did he calmly walk out of the grand hall.

    Outside the hall revealed a multitude of bodies strewn all over the floor. The Temple Knights and priests present were simply no match for an expert like Han Shuo. They were destined to be ughtered eventually. But following these events, even more members of the Church of Light were going there,ing from different directions. A legion from the Bisli Duchy, stationed not far away, was also rushing to the scene after receiving the news.

    Han Shuo surveyed the scene from an elevated position, and realized that this trip to the Bisli Duchy could be considered as having achieved its objectives. One of the rulers from the seven grand duchies, Nehem Beige of Bisli Duchy, was killed. Thergest church belonging to the Church of Light had been bathed with blood. The position of the Church of Light in the Bisli Duchy will be met with unprecedented challenges.

    As for Nehem Beige, a Temple Knight from the Church of Light, Han Shuo had originally nned to control him by having a mystical demon possessing his body. However, Han Shuoter discovered that holy aura was present in Nehem Beige¡¯s body, which had a world of difference in terms of naturepared to the mystical demons.

    Only if Han Shuo could get rid of all the divine energy in Nehem Beige¡¯s body, that the mystical demon could possess his mind. But if there was no divine aura within his body, the people from the Church of Light would very quickly suspect an abnormality in Nehem Beige. Therefore, Han Shuo had no other choice but to take action and kill him efficiently.

    There were still other churches of the Church of Light in Bisli Duchy, butparing those with this church, those churches are obviously not on par. Besides, Han Shuo didn¡¯t have the luxury of time to clear all the churches of the Church of Light in Bisli Duchy one by one. Therefore, Han Shuo didn¡¯t linger any longer in Bisli Duchy, and immediately deployed the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens to fly away.

    From Katos¡¯ memory, Han Shuo had obtained a lot of useful information. Katos¡¯ position in the Church of Light wasn¡¯t a low one. Han Shuo learnt of valuable pieces of information from Katos¡¯ memories, like the Church of Light¡¯s position, distribution and secret forces who operated in the dark. The Church of Light was an enormous religious organization. But what set it apart was the armed forces of this religious organization, who were extremely terrifying. Other than the great number of Light Priests and Temple Knights regiments, the Church of Light has three organizations who work in the dark, namely, Heresies Tribunal, Holy Angels, and Grace Believers.

    These three organizations, Heresies Tribunal, Holy Angels, and Grace Believers, were secret forces serving the Church of Light unbeknownst to anyone. There were numerous experts in the three organizations. Several secret operations from the Church of Light were usually carried out by these three organizations. Compared to the Temple Knights, whose strength was known to everyone, these three dark organizations are much more formidable.

    Only after learning of the true strength of the Church of Light, did Han Shuo realize why the Church of Light wielded such a powerful influence throughout the whole Profound Continent. While feeling apprehensive, at the same time, Han Shuo¡¯s intent to ughter grew significantlyrger. After experiencing his strength grow dramatically, Han Shuo felt that the Church of Light no longer posed as a threat to him. The transgressions they made these years, and the harm they did to the earth elite zombie, made Han Shuo realize that the enmity between him and Church of Light was something impossible to alleviate.

    However, Han Shuo did not obtain any precise information about Blount from Katos¡¯ memories. All he knew was that after two years of rehabilitation in the Church of Light¡¯s headquarters, located at Oden Empire, Blount had fully recovered from his injuries obtain from thest time. As to whether the fully recovered Blount was still in Oden Empire, Katos had no idea.

    Although Han Shuo couldn¡¯t obtain definite information from Katos, he still harboured a strong resolve to kill Blount. After giving it some thought, Han Shuo suddenly remembered about the existence of the Cmity Church. With that in mind, he flew towards the Boulet Duchy.

    Last time, when the seven grand duchies attempted to form an alliance to deal with Brettel City, Han Shuo snuck in and learned of the real identity of the Grand Duke, Burt Zili, of Boulet Duchy. This summoner¡¯s meeting with the Necromancy Grand Magus Wolf, made Han Shuo aware that he originated from the Cmity Church.

    Since Burt Zili was a key participant from the Cmity Church, perhaps he might be knowledgeable about the location of certain Sacred Knights, like Blount. Cminity Church and the Church of Light are arch-enemies, and therefore must be very mindful about each other¡¯s operations and movements. Being a religious organization as enormous as the Church of Light, the Cmity Church was indeed a target Han Shuo could make use of.

    Boulet Duchy, Grand Duke Burt Zili¡¯s mansion. Han Shuo came in the dark.

    Under the curtain of the night, underneath the Grand Duke¡¯s mansion, Burt Zili was sitting upright in an altar which had thick green and ck smokes curling up around it. Surrounding the sinister and frightening Burt Zili were countless organs from magical beasts. The whole wicked altar was full of all kinds of organs from high-level magical creatures, which made the wicked altar looked like a strange magical beast pieced together with various kinds of flesh and organs.

    At the middle of the altar, a rhombus shape was sketched using blood, which overflowed with strands of sinister and cold aura whenever Burt Zili¡¯s hands pressed among the air above it. Series of horrifying, inhuman-like howlings went through the middle of the rhombus drawing, giving people an intense palpitating like emotion.

    ¡°Oh....darling,e out,e out quickly!¡± Burt Zili softly yelled with a tender smile on his face. His two eyes were fixated on the middle of the rhombus drawing in the altar.

    The rhombus drawing was the connection from this world to another world, the abyss of an infernal. As the horrible screams grew more and more intense, the smile on Burt Zili¡¯s face grew more and more charming. His two hands manipting the empty space above the rhombus, repeatedly pulling the air upwards, as though he was pulling an invisible thread which raised a certain magical creature from it.

    A lush green odd-looking hand which only had three sharp nails on it, with disgusting liquid stuck on its surface, slowly emerged from the rhombus. A gloomy and cold, nauseating aura was slowly emitted from the inside.

    ¡°Ha! Arise! Arise!!¡± Burt Zili got somewhat excited.

    ¡°Aooo!¡± a bewildering, mournful wailing sounded. Suddenly, a monstrous terrifying, lizard-like creature scuttled out from the center of the rhombus. It had thick green skin all over its body, covered with disgusting fluid. Its body was five meters long and had two tails. This stinky creature has a strong smell of fish on its body. It had two elephant like tusks and pointed teeths in its mouth.

    As soon as it scuttled out from the rhombus, the magical creature shot towards a shadow outside the altar. Its four javelin-like, taper-sharp, devilish hands snatched at the shadow.

    ¡°Eh¡± a soft sound suddenly came from the shadow. Unexpectedly, a type of ruthless energy began to congeal midair. The rapidly approaching magical creature froze all of a sudden in mid-air while maintaining its fierce posture, as though it was being forcibly imprisoned by some kind of energy.

    ¡°Who¡¯s there?¡± Burt Zili immediately cried out in surprise. He was overwhelmed with shock in his heart, and was somewhat gazing at the shadowy spot with fright, where the ¡®eh¡¯ sound came from.

    Only Burt Zili knew of how hidden and tightly guarded this secret field which he practiced summoning magical creatures was. This person who silently entered this secret field obviously gave him an enormous shock. But what was even more shocking was that the high-level magical creature ¡®Dejarka¡¯ was halted and sat frozen in mid-air.

    This high-level magical creature, Dejarka, possessed enough strength to kill a Great swordmaster, and its strength was at its peak formidability when it sprung into the air at high speeds. And yet, as it was before this person in the shadows, this powerful creature appeared to have no ability to resist, whatsoever.

    As for how frighteningly powerful this person might be, Burt Zili simply dared not imagine!

 Chapter 441: Fawning

    GDK 441 ¨C Fawning

    ¡°Who are you!?¡± Burt Zili opened his mouth again. As he uttered these words, his attention was fully focused at the space in front of him, his pair of vicious eyes stared at the shadowy spot, and his body stretched taut. Burt Zili was ready ¡ª not to fight, but to flee at the right moment!

    An expert who could effortlessly freeze a high-level magical creature in mid-air, in addition to breaking into into his secret room without him detecting it, is someone he knew he was no match for. The reason Burt Zili could survive so many years in battle and live on till now, was all because of that urate and precise ability to judge.

    From the shadowy area in which the sound came from, a tall figure revealed themselves. Within the lush green, hazy lighting, that person made their way below the imprisoned high-level magical creature. With a somewhat astonished expression, he took a few nces at the creature that he stopped in mid-air, and then smilingly asked Burt Zili, ¡°Did you summon this?¡±

    Burt Zili who was highly cautious at the moment, took another step backward, and knitted his brows as he took in Han Shuo¡¯s whole body. An awl-like weapon made its way to his left hand. With a gloomy voice, he asked, ¡°That¡¯s right. Who are you? How did you get in here? What do you want?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, the Cmity Church is indeed a really strong organization with a multitude of talented people. This other-worldly magical creature indeed has extraordinary strength. Being able to summon it means that you must have quite the talent in summoning techniques!¡± Han Shuo continued with a smile. He didn¡¯t seem to mind Burt Zili¡¯s vignce.

    ¡°Who in the world are you?¡± Burt Zili asked for the third time. He couldn¡¯t fathom Han Shuo¡¯s intentions foring here, he constantly thought of how he could leave this secret chamber alive. His eyes were twinkling as he nced at the few gateways that would allow a swift exit.

    ¡°Don¡¯t be afraid. I harbour no bad intentions towards you. I¡¯m called Bryan. You may heard of me through Wolf. The reason I am looking for you is to find out certain information,¡± Han Shuo exined unhurriedly with a smile.

    ¡°Bryan? You are the lord of Brettel City? That Bryan?¡± Burt Zili softly shouted. He seemed rather shocked.

    Han Shuo kept silent as he nodded his head. Conveniently, he took out his skeletal staff and waved it at Burt Zili who stood far away, thereby proving his identity.

    Burt Zili confirming his identity, loosened up. His malicious and old face suddenly changed into a cordial smile, as he walked towards Han Shuo inrge strides. ¡°So we¡¯re actually on the same side! You should have told me earlier! You really scared me!¡± said Burt Zili.

    This Burt Zili carried a strange, nauseating smell on his body. Although he was enthusiastic in is walk approaching Han Shuo, it made Han Shuo feel some kind of difort. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but take a few steps backward, and smilingly said, ¡°You might want to send your magical creature back. It might die if it¡¯s been trapped for too long.¡±

    With a wave of his hand, a strand of demonic light flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s palm. In the blink of an eye it fell onto the space where the high-ranking magical creature ¡®Dejarka¡¯ was suspended. After the strand of demonic light broke into its body, the weird magical creature resumed its fierce flight at high speeds.

    ¡°Return!¡± Burt Zili yelled hastily. Strings of long, tedious incantations were then spit out in rapid session.

    The magical creature, Dejarka, which resumed its charge towards Han Shuo baring fangs and brandishing ws, stopped its javelin-like sharp hands from moving, as though it was firmly grasped by some odd energy. It let out hissing sounds of unwillingness as it fell towards the center of the altar quickly and vanished within the rhombus diagram.

    After withdrawing his high level magical creature, Dejarka, Burt Zili gave a few nces to the altar that stank to high heaven, forced a smile, then said, ¡°This ce is not suitable for us to chat. Come, we¡¯ll talk upstairs.¡±

    ¡°Sure!¡± Han Shuo agreed.

    After a short while, Han Shuo and Burt Zili of the Cmity Church arrived at a luxurious lounge located in the Duke¡¯s manor. There weren¡¯t any redundant people guarding its surroundings. Burt Zili personally took out some fruits from the seven grand duchies and ced it on the table before Han Shuo.

    ¡°Wolf and I have been friends for many years. In fact, everything that I know or have learnt about you has been through Wolf. Hehe, we are all on the same side, so there¡¯s no need to feel so reserved. If there¡¯s anything you need, please don¡¯t hesitate to ask. As long as it¡¯s within my means, I will never refuse!¡± Burt Zili said with a smile after serving some umon fruits to Han Shuo. His manner seemed very friendly.

    Han Shuo¡¯s sudden appearance, in addition to his demonstration of imprisoning magical creature ¡®Dejarka¡¯ just then, caused an enormous shock to Burt Zili. Originally, when he heard of the necromancy Grand Magus Wolf¡¯s description of Han Shuo¡¯s strength, he thought that Wolf must be exaggerating. He felt that the young-aged Han Shuo absolutely couldn¡¯t reach the heights that Wolf mentioned.

    However, now after meeting Han Shuo in person, Burt Zili realized that Wolf¡¯s description indeed was somewhat inurate. He was too conservative in his ount of Han Shuo¡¯s strength. The strength of a person who could suspend high level magical creature ¡®Dejarka¡¯ in midair with no difficulty, is certainly way beyond that of a Great swordmaster or a Grand magus.

    It was exactly because of this that Burt Zili¡¯s manner towards Han Shuo was so unusually friendly. The smile on his face even seemed somewhat humble as to curry favor with Han Shuo. If other nobilities of the Boulet Duchy saw that, it would be difficult for them to believe that this Burt Zili is the same guy who was feared as a Grand Duke.

    Cheerfully chewing a big mouthful of fruits, Han Shuo appeared to be very calm and unruffled. It was only after he ate a bunch of grape-like blue coloured fruits, that Han Shuo gave a soft cough, looked at Burt Zili who was sitting upright and still, and said smilingly, ¡°The reason I specifically came to see you is to find out where Sacred Knight Blount is. You might had learned about the grievances I have with him. I don¡¯t want to let him stay alive any longer.¡±

    Burt Zili¡¯s eyes suddenly shone. He confidently replied, ¡°I happened to know the whereabouts of Sacred Knight Blount. He¡¯s currently residing at the Brut Merchant Alliance, doing some detestable things for the Church of Light. The precise location should be Tariq City of the Brut Merchant Alliance. Oh right, they seem to be hunting after someone.¡±

    Han Shuo knew that Cmity Church might be aware of informations about Sacred Knight Blount, because only an enemy would pay so much attention to the trails of a character like Blount. But still, Han Shuo didn¡¯t anticipate that Burt Zili didn¡¯t even need to get to Cmity Church to ask around, and could immediately inform him of the news about Blount. It seems thating here was really the right decision.

    ¡°Thank you very much. I now know what I should do next.¡± Han Shuo stood up with a faint smile, and slightly bowed towards Burt Zili. It looked as if he nned to leave the ce immediately.

    ¡°Hold on!¡± Burt Zili said hurriedly as soon as he saw Han Shuo about to leave without saying anything else. When Han Shuo looked back at him with a puzzled face, Burt Zili quickly continued, ¡°Our dukedom will be your friend. No matter what or when, our duchy will always stand at the side of your Brettel City.¡±

    ¡°Thanks,¡± Han Shuo replied with one word, instead of stating any of his opinions about the matter. He proceeded on his way out by himself. When he reached the doorway, Han Shuo seemed to have remembered something. He stopped, turned around, and said to Burt Zili, ¡°Oh, right. The Grand Duke of Bisli Duchy, Nehem Beige, and Red Bishop Katos have been gotten rid of by me. You can take advantage of the situation and make your moves against the Bisli Duchy.¡± ¡°Rea.. really? You killed Nehem Beige?¡± Burt Zili shrieked right away as his face turned pale.

    Han Shuo nodded his head and did not further exin himself. When Burt Zili was going to question about the details, he suddenly discovered that Han Shuo had disappeared without a trace under the cover of the night.

    The pleasantly surprised Burt Zili, immediately began to gather all the major aristocrats within his dukedom in excitement. They had a secret military affairs meetingte in the night, and schemed on the best way of attacking the Bisli Duchy which had just lost its Grand Duke.

    After Han Shuo left Burt Zili¡¯s manor, he directly flew towards the Brut Merchant Alliance. He deployed ¡®Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡¯ to its fullest, and streaked across the sky like a shooting star.

    Brut Merchant Alliance and Brettel City is separated by the seven grand duchies. At top speed, Han Shuo could fly a distance of up to ten thousand li a day. Using just less than half a day¡¯s worth of time, he arrived at Tariq City, which was located at the southwest of the Brut Merchant Alliance.

    Dark Mantle of Lancelot Empire could be found in every country. Sure enough, it could also be found in Brut Merchant Alliance. After Han Shuo arrived at Tariq City situated on the southwest of Brut Merchant Alliance, he left a message in the city center using themunication protocol of the Dark Mantle members. After waiting for probably half a day, a member of Dark Mantle in Tariq City came over.

    In the prosperous city center of Tariq City, Han Shuo followed this member of Dark Mantle all the way to the local secret headquarters. After entering a mansion house through the back door, the member of the Dark Mantle who didn¡¯t even give one nce backwards finally stopped at the doorway. He then said to Han Shuo with a steady face, ¡°Please allow me to see your identity medallion!¡±

    Han Shuo took out the medallion that represents his status, and revealed it before his fellow member. When the member of Dark Mantle saw the two sun symbols on Han Shuo¡¯s identity medallion, he immediately got shocked, and his manner instantly turned to be iparably respectful. He asked, ¡°Please forgive me for not recognizing Your Lordship. May I know who is Your Lordship?¡±

    ¡°I came from Brettel City!¡± Han Shuo replied smilingly.

    ¡°You, you are Lord Bryan?¡± that Dark Mantle member suddenly let out a light cry, and he then covered his own mouth so as not to startle someone with his shriek of surprise. His eyes were brimming with excitement and adoration when he looked at Han Shuo.

    As he nodded his head, Han Shuo instructed, ¡°Lead me inside. I want to meet the person in charge here!¡±

    ¡°Pleasee inside, pleasee inside. I will immediately go and inform that Your Lordship has arrived!¡± The member hastily brought Han Shuo all the way inside.

    ¡°Eh? It¡¯s you. Why are you here?¡± All of a sudden, one of the three heavyweights of Dark Mantle, Cecilia, let out a yell in surprise. Standing at the front door of the house, she looked at Han Shuo with an expression of astonishment.

 Chapter 442: Complaisant

    GDK 442 ¨C Comisant

    After about three years worth of time gone by, the beautiful looking Cecilia had learnt to live with a little more tranquility and calmness in her life, while losing a bit of her arrogance and unruliness. What remained the same was her pretty appearance and grandeur temperament.

    Nowadays, Han Shuo is more tolerant toward Cecilia as he used to be. This was partly due to her grandpa Sabakas, who personally deployed a transportation matrix for Brettel City, in addition to her change of attitude for not being so sarcastic all the time. Therefore, Han Shuo did not continue his mocking and ridicule towards Cecilia when met with her again.

    ¡°I have concluded my training and came to Tariq City for some personal matters. Long time no see! How¡¯s your grandpa doing?¡± Han Shuo asked Cecilia, as he still held certain respect towards space sacred magus Sabakas.

    Cecilia revealed a faint smile when she heard Han Shuo ask about her grandpa, and replied, ¡°Thank you for your concern, my grandpa is doing well.¡± Looking around, Cecilia noticed that Han Shuo was travelling alone, and she continued, ¡°Come, let¡¯s go inside for discussions.¡±

    From Cecilia¡¯s attitude, Han Shuo could tell that she wasn¡¯t prejudiced against him like she used to be in the past. This was a good development in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes. Given his current strength and status, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t have felt the slightest bit of fear when facing the space sacred magus Sabakas, let alone Cecilia, who became one of the three heavyweights by relying on Sabakas.

    However, since everyone here was members of the Dark Mantle, in the service of the Lancelot Empire, plus Sabakas could have been said as caring toward Han Shuo, it would be ideal if Han Shuo could get along well with Cecilia. No good woulde to either of the parties if a dispute really erupted.

    Thus, when noticing that Cecilia¡¯s approach towards him had changed, he dly trailed behind her and entered the inner section of the mansion.

    When he stepped inside, it felt as though the sky and earth had spun, and space was turned upside down. By the time Han Shuo came to his senses, he realized that he had arrived at a serene, harmonious courtyard. Other than Cecilia, there were a few other members from the Dark Mantle in the courtyard. They seemed to be Cecilia¡¯s subordinates. Each and every one of them were sitting on round stone stools and were discussing something.

    ¡°Let me introduce you to everyone, this is Lord Bryan, fourth Dark Sun envoy of the Dark Mantle. You must have heard of him before,¡± Cecilia said to the Dark Mantle members. As soon as Cecilia entered the ce, the faint smile that was on her face just then immediately vanished, and was reced with a solemn face and a tone of voice which only a superior held.

    However, before members of the Dark Mantle came over to greet him, Han Shuo himself actually got a shock. Puzzlingly he asked Cecilia, ¡°Since when did I be a Fourth Dark Sun?¡±

    ¡°Last time, during the civil strife in Ossen City, you assisted His Majesty the King in crushing the rebels, and furthermore, you seeded in repelling two enemy sacred-grade experts. These contributions were cited as the reasons for your promotion. Oh, right, you disappeared three years for training, so perhaps you weren¡¯t informed about this. You may upgrade your identity te when you return to the Dark Mantle headquarters,¡± Cecilia exined sternly for Han Shuo. She doesn¡¯t seem to be joking.

    Fourth Dark Sun! In such a huge and powerful organization like the Dark Mantle, every promotion can be said to have been an extremely difficult feat. Han Shuo would never have anticipated that he would climb so quickly to this position. This would also mean that throughout the whole Dark Mantle organization, only the three heavyweights could bind him.

    Han Shuo understood in his heart that the reason he could be a Fourth Sun envoy so rapidly, was partly due to his achievements in the civil war, but more significantly, it was because of his good rtions with Lawrence, and old astrologer Madam Grace¡¯s judgement of him.

    ¡°Oh! No wonder!¡± Han Shuo eximed smilingly.

    ¡°Greetings, my Lord!¡± After Cecilia introduction, all the Dark Mantle members at this ce wore either a fawning or envious face. Each and every one of them greeted and bowed their heads towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°Alright, that¡¯s enough. Sit down guys,¡± Cecilia said as she waved her hand. When she saw that the people went back to their seats promptly, she pointed at a ce beside her and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Lord Bryan, here¡¯s your seat.¡±

    Han Shuo sat there without hesitation. He knew that the Dark Mantle is a strict organization, and they pay close attention to where a person sits. More often than not, the seatings are arranged by their ranks. In the Tariq City branch, Cecilia is by right the highest ranked member there, and right beneath her is the rank, Fourth Dark Sun, which Han Shuo possessed. So naturally, his seat was right beside her¡¯s.

    ¡°Oh right, is there something that you need to inquire about, since you visited this branch?¡± Cecilia suddenly asked Han Shuo after he took his seat.

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo replied, ¡°I heard that sacred knight Blount of the Church of Light is currently residing in Tariq City, so I came here looking for him. If anyone knows where Blount is hiding, I hope that you can tell me.¡±

    When Han Shuo spoke, his eyes scanned around through everyone sitting there. Involuntarily, his nces gave off the feeling as if he was looking down on weak, tiny ants. All of a sudden, every Dark Mantle member present felt as if Han Shuo was the actual person in charge there.

    As the person responsible for certain matters for the Empire, and one of the three heavyweights, Cecilia unexpectedly, seemed like a subordinate under Han Shuo¡¯smand. This feeling was extremely odd, but at the same time, exceedingly natural.

    Even Cecilia herself felt that inexplicably strange feeling. All Han Shuo did was simply sit down and speak. He did not make any unusual movements when he talked, but inevitably became the center of everyone¡¯s attention. It had nothing to do with his status or his rank in the Dark Mantle.

    ¡°Sir, I know that sacred knight Blount had been spotted in Tariq City around half a month ago, but I have no idea as to whether he is still in Tariq City!¡± A Dark Mantle member stood up from his round stool and answered Han Shuo respectfully.

    ¡°Thank you. Do you know why he came to Tariq City?¡± Han Shuo asked with a faint smile.

    ¡°I think I know!¡± When this Dark Mantle member showed a dark face, Cecilia suddenly turned her head and said to Han Shuo. ¡°It should be rted to the reason I came here.¡±

    ¡°Oh? What was it?¡± Han Shuo creased his brows and asked attentively.

    ¡°Outside of Tariq City, there¡¯s a canyon named Tarrag. Tarrag Canyon is simr to the Dark Forest of Lancelot Empire, an exotic ce where magical beasts run rampant. All this while, Tarrag Canyon had been considered an off-limits area by the Brut Merchant Alliance. Other than some of the true experts, an average person would never dare venture into Tarrag Canyon.

    Approximately three months ago, some experts who were cultivating in Tarrag Canyon, imed that they had been attacked by some strong magical beasts, and were driven away from Tarrag Canyon. It ismon knowledge that most super-ranked magical beasts live alone, and it¡¯s rare to find those that live in packs. This caught the attention of many different forces. I came here specifically, to investigate about this,¡± Cecilia exined for Han Shuo.

    With a doubtful face and creased brows, Han Shuo looked at Cecilia and asked, ¡°What does this have to do with Blount? Could it be that Blount came here to investigate it as well?¡±

    ¡°No. Blount and his Church of Light members seem to be hunting for someone. This person should be a big heretic which the Church of Light determined, otherwise they wouldn¡¯t have sent Blount to personally set out on the campaign. The person also seems to be aware of the strange phenomenon in Tarrag Canyon. So with nowhere else to escape, this person pushed their luck and got into Tarrag Canyon. Probably hoping that the peculiarity of Tarrag Canyon will cause Blount and his party to abandon their pursuit.

    However, the Church of Light always considered themselves as the spokespeople for God in this world, and naturally wouldn¡¯t care about the monstrosities in Tarrag Canyon. After they discovered that the big heretic entered Tarrag Canyon, Blount and his party made their way in there half a month ago. But since then, there had been no further news about it,¡± Cecilia slowly exined as she looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°So that¡¯s what it is!¡± Han Shuo realized what was going on, and immediately joyfully said to Cecilia,¡±Thank you for the information. Alright, I¡¯m done here. You guys may continue your discussions. I¡¯m going to take a trip to Tarrag Canyon.¡±

    ¡°My Lord, please be careful. Tarrag Canyon is an extremely unforgiving ce. We have lived in Tariq City for many years, and are aware of the mysteries surrounding that ce. Even the lightning sacred magus Reynold D of Brut Merchant Alliance was stranded in there for a long time. After Reynold D learned about the abnormal behaviour of the creatures, he even forbade some adventurers from entering Tarrag Canyon. He, if anyone, should know about the dangers hidden in there!¡± The Dark Mantle member who reported information about sacred knight Blount to Han Shuo just then hastily warned Han Shuo.

    ¡°Thank you for your reminder. I will be careful!¡± Han Shuo thanked him with a smile, although he did not take it to heart.

    Han Shuo, being in the Carnal Realm now, had the confidence to defeat any sacred grade experts. In demonic arts, breaking through to the next realm always meant many folds increase in strength. If he were to fight against sacred knight Blount and earth sacred magus Dempus again, Han Shuo had absolute certainty that he could kill them both.

    At this moment, sacred grade experts were no longer formidable opponents against Han Shuo who had just entered the Carnal Realm. Even for a demi-god existence like the Ancient Lizard King, Han Shuo, who just underwent an unprecedented rise in confidence, would have the nerve to directly contend against him. Han Shuo believed that there weren¡¯t many things in existence found in the Profound Continent that could harm him, and therefore he did not have the slightest bit of fear for the Tarrag Canyon.

    Part 2

    ¡°Bryan, are you going to Tarrag Canyon?¡± Cecilia suddenly asked.

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo replied, ¡°Yep, I¡¯m going there to meet Blount. That guy injured my friend thest time we met. I will not allow him to live in this world any longer.¡±

    ¡°Well then, is it too much to ask for you to enter Tarrag Canyon with us? We are preparing to uncover the secrets of Tarrag Canyon. We are all members of the Dark Mantle, serving the Lancelot Empire. Going in there with you gives us a better sense of assurance. Furthermore, we can help you keep a lookout for news regarding sacred knight Blount¡¯s location. What do you say?¡± Cecilia looked at Han Shuo with a pleading gaze as she sought for his approval.

    His wild, impressive performance in Ossen Cityst time left a deep impression in Cecilia¡¯s heart. Although after the event, Han Shuo did rify that the reason for his dramatic increase in strength was because he borrowed some other people¡¯s energy, but that kind of immense strength made Cecilia feel that it was just an excuse Han Shuo made to be modest.

    Once he returned from his three years of training, he immediately said with iparable confidence that he wanted to kill sacred knight Blount. Even without giving it too much thought, Cecilia could tell that Han Shuo¡¯s strength must have had advanced further. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have made such ims.

    To have an expert such as him apanying them into Tarrag Canyon, will add arge amount of assurance to the safety of Cecilia and her party.

    But now, given Han Shuo¡¯s current status and strength, even the King of the Lancelot Empire would have to meticulously curry favor and rope him in. Therefore, if Cecilia wanted to trouble Han Shuo, her tone would of course need to endearing, instead of summarily and arrogantly giving orders like before.

    After looking at Cecilia who was in a pleading expression, and the newly brightened eyes of the Dark Mantle members, Han Shuo hesitated for a moment, but finally nodded and said, ¡±Alright!¡±

    With the existence of his mystical demons, Han Shuo didn¡¯t need the Dark Mantle members¡¯ help to scout at all after arriving in Tarrag Canyon. The members were actually of little use for Han Shuo. But still, he is a fellow member of the Dark Mantle. Including the fact that he obtained the information he required from them, Han Shuo found it embarrassing to refuse it outright, and therefore he reluctantly epted the request.

    ¡°Thank you. We still in our preparation phase, and will set off to Tarrag Canyon tomorrow, early in the morning. Erm, if you¡¯re tired, I can show you where you may rest,¡± Cecilia earnestly thanked Han Shuo with a very faint smile on her beautiful face.

    ¡°Okay. Please prepare a secret room for me. I will be resting for a while!¡± Han Shuo dly epted. After the hostility between him and Cecilia was extinguished, the attractive looking Cecilia suddenly felt that much more pleasing to the eye. Thinking back on the overbearing Cecilia in the past, andparing that to her current amodating attitude, Han Shuo felt a sense of satisfaction.

    ¡°Follow me!¡± Cecilia walked towards a stair that led upwards. When he stepped inside, he had that giddy feeling as though the earth and sky were spinning again. The next thing he knew, he found himself in a room made of stone. ¡°Rest well. I will go and get ready!¡± Cecilia said smilingly. As soon as her lovable body moved backward, shepletely disappeared from this stony room.

    In this Dark Mantle branch at Tariq City, they were able to utilize some wonderful space refraction magic. Although Han Shuo couldn¡¯t understand it, he could still destroy the boundary by means of brute strength. After arriving at the room made of stone, Han Shuo used some stones found there, and with some wood carved with peculiar symbols, heid out a grimace shaped magical array around the room, and finally took out his skeletal staff.

    As he finished his incantation, Han Shuo closed his eyes. His soul traversed throughyer uponyer of space-time tunnels and emerged in the destednd of departed souls.

    On the summit of a lofty, rocky mountain, the earth elite zombie, wood elite zombie, fire elite zombie, metal elite zombie, and water elite zombie all lined up to form an arc. In the center of the five elite zombies, stones were swept along the ground, and sand whirled about it. Five colours of earthy brown, woodish green, fiery red, golden yellow, and watery white beams, violently shot out in every direction. Whiffs of raging, chaotic energy were released from bodies of the five elite zombies. Earthy brown, fiery red, and golden yellowbined with one another in a bizarre manner.

    Every time the energy of three colours mixed together and converged, it would form dreadful rumbling sounds, and fomenting the chaotic energy the region in their center, fueling the formidable might of this Great Formation of Divine Corpses and Five Elements. A series of explosions came from its center, even the majestic, huge mountain seemed to be trembling uncontrobly.

    The Five Elements ¨C metal, wood, water, fire, and earth, exist in every ne of existence. The elite zombies, as they were nurtured and formed by the Five Elements, could skillfully manipte the Five Elements. The Great Formation of the Divine Corpses and Five Elements could fuse the powers of the Five Elements, increasing the strengths of the five elite zombies, greatly.

    In the center where the fusion of energy happened, chaotic energy shot out everywhere and in all directions. However, at the moment only earth elite zombie, fire elite zombie, and metal elite zombie could fuse their powers together. As for wood elite zombie and water elite zombie, they couldn¡¯t merge their powers with the three at the moment.

    Riding on Bone Devil, Little Skeleton stood proudly on the empty space above the lofty mountain. He was acting as though he was a general, carefully reviewing his soldiers as he looked at them practicing the Great Formation of the Divine Corpses and Five Elements, constantly monitoring any variation in the chaotic energy the five produced. asionally he would intervene and suppress energy that shot towards the ground in order to avoid having his pce located not far away to copse from the quake.

    A spiritual connection suddenly leaped into Little Skeleton¡¯s soul, and his purple demon eye suddenly brightened. His stared at the distorted empty space before him, which looked like ripples of water,yer uponyer whose wrinkles were undted. From there, a mighty soul emerged.

    ¡°Father, why did youe here?¡± Little Skeleton was somewhat surprised as he asked Han Shuo, whose spirit had just descended.

    ¡°I came to see how their practice is going.¡± Han Shuo unfolded his consciousness to cover the five elite zombies below him, who were tirelessly practicing the Great Formation of the Divine Corpses and Five Elements, and observed the changes of the chaotic energy in their center.

    ¡°Little Earth, Little Gold, and Little Fire could fuse their energy together. Only Little Water and Little Wood couldn¡¯t get the hang of it. Father, did youe here to tell them what they should do?¡± Little Skeleton said to Han Shuo.

    ¡°No. The Great Formation of Divine Corpses and Five Elements were imprinted deep into their souls the moment they were born. The Five Elements is an innate skill of theirs, and I¡¯m incapable of guiding them. It can only be done through their own practice andprehensions,¡± Han Shuo replied. After a few thoughts, with his attention focused on water elite zombie and wood elite zombie, he said, ¡°Those two have yet to figure out the technique after spending so much time. Perhaps it is because they have not yet evolved to a certain stage!¡±

    ¡°That could be the case. Of the five, Little Earth was the first to appear. Little Fire and Little Gold have things that they could use to help them. Those two things seem to have helped them evolve faster. That might be why the three could master how to fuse the energy so quickly. Little Water and Little Wood only appearedter on, and didn¡¯t have anything that could help them evolve faster, therefore even until now, they couldn¡¯t proficiently put their innate skills to use!¡± Little Skeleton said to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oh, right, how about the Pearl of Souls from the Tree of Souls. Have you given it a try? How were the results?¡± The reason he could make a breakthrough into Carnal Realm was all thanks to the efficacy of one Pearl of Soul. Therefore, when Han Shuo recalled about the wonderful Tree of Souls, he couldn¡¯t help but asked Little Skeleton.

    ¡°Of course. They all took one Pearl of Souls from the tree. It is indeed beneficial to increasing our wisdom. It¡¯s just that the Tree of Souls needs a long time to bear fruit, therefore it is temporarily out of use for the pearl fruits needed to help Little Water and Little Wood to evolve faster,¡± Little Skeleton replied somewhat helplessly, not knowing how to help water elite zombie and earth elite zombie.

    ¡°Well, it seems that I got to try and find a way to refine some medicinal pellets. To evolve naturally like this takes a rather long time,¡± Han Shuo replied after thinking for a moment.

    ¡°Father, with just the three of their energy fusing together, this Great Formation of Divine Corpses and Five Elements already is terrifying enough in power. Even for a powerful Bone Dragon, I believe that it will be annihted once it is trapped in there!¡± Little Skeleton replied.

    ¡°Yep, I know the score. But once the five powers arebined, their might will be even more terrifying. In addition, as the five evolve and be stronger, the power of the formation will also further increase in strength. I look forward to even more surprises they will bring me!¡±

    ¡°Father, they will not disappoint you.¡±

    ¡°Alright, I have to leave now. Look after them and don¡¯t let any mishap happen. Also, pay a little extra attention when they are practising the formation. They must not be reckless and careless in their practice.

    ¡°Understood!¡±

    After seeing that Little Skeleton understood his instructions, Han Shuo did not continue to stay in theherworld. He recalled his soul to where it was before and arrived at the Profound Continent.

    Sensing for a while, Han Shuo saw that he still had some time to kill. He decided to continue his meticulous study of the three necromancy boundaries he found out in Cemetery of Death ¨C Boundary of Fear, Boundary of Weakness, and Boundary of Aging. In fact, he actually made some progress during his intensive study, and gained some insights and understanding towards the topic.

    It was precisely because of his habit of studying all the time that Han Shuo could progress so rapidly, and reach substantial heights in both fields.

    Whenever he delved into solving a difficult problem, time would always pass rapidly unbeknownst to him. Suddenly, Han Shuo felt that the formation deployed around him trembled slightly, waking him up from his contemtion.

    ¡°Bryan, we can head out now.¡± Cecilia¡¯s voice suddenly arrived in Han Shuo¡¯s ears.

    ¡°Ok!¡± Han Shuo got up, conveniently putting away the rocks and bewildering woods around him, and walked outside the room.

 Chapter 443: Boundary of Weakness

    GDK 443: Boundary of Weakness

    The Tarrag Canyon of the Brut Merchant Alliance is a restricted area. Any ordinary man could only dream of entering such a ce. Just like in the Dark Forest in the Lancelot Empire, only the most willed of adventurers would ever dare venture into its depths.

    Owing to the abnormal behaviors of the magical beasts in Tarrag Canyon some time ago, many eager traveller has been driven away. With the addition of warnings of lightning from sacred magus Reynold D of Brut Merchant Alliance, everyone kept a distance from Tarrag Canyon.

    The followers of the Dark Mantle under Cecilia ventured into the Tarrag Canyon with Cecilia and Han Shuo leading them. They discovered not a trace of a single soul having ever set foot there. The Canyon was eerily tranquil.

    The hills of the Tarrag Canyon were far more unevenpared to the likes of the Dark Forest of the Lancelot Empire, with a swamp at its every crevice.

    ¡°In the recent days, countless forces have dispatched their people to catch a glimpse of activity within the Tarrag Canyon. But the magical beasts that resided there seemed to have gone mad, and with that, increasingly violent, causing countless deaths and driving many more away from the Canyon,¡± Cecilia groaned in annoyance, her voice almost shaky as she dragged along.

    Behind her were twelve Dark Mantle members directly under her control. She usually brought these twelve members of Dark Mantle with her wherever she went. Amongst them were magi, swordsmen, knights, bandits and archers. Together, they formed aplete team.

    These twelve worthy subordinates were carefully handpicked by Cecilia herself. Over the course of years working together they have forged a certain harmony that only the most in-sync of teams could emte, and, through even the most of dire times, emerged the victor. Furthermore, with the addition of the formidable Han Shuo there was no denying the power possessed by this team.

    ¡°Dame, why is it that there has been no trace of human intervention our whole way here?¡± Ticaru the bandit asked solemnly with caution as he examined the area.

    Throughout the journey, Ticaru was focused only on scouring the ce, not unlike a monkey as he scouted in every direction, providing the party with timely information. Despite having travelled deep into the canyon for half the day, they hadn¡¯t met a single team of adventurers, nor anyone at all entering the Tarrag Canyon for that matter. The situation was baffling.

    ording to the scouts of the Dark Mantle, several adventurers had, in the past few days, entered the Tarrag Canyon. It would have made sense to havee across at least a few of them.

    ¡°I have no idea. Perhaps they have ventured far deeper into the canyon. Perhaps we should pick up our pace,¡± Cecilia replied without much thought. Her gaze, intentionally or otherwise,nded on Han Shuo, who was walking behind them.

    Ever since they entered the Tarrag Canyon, Han Shuo had remained silent. He had merely followed closely behind their backs, and would, from time to time, study an enormous magic book. He didn¡¯t seem the least bit concerned with the dangerous endeavour of descending into the Tarrag Canyon.

    And indeed, that was quite simply the case.

    Just when Cecilia woke him up in his secret room, Han Shuo began to delve into the enigma that was the Boundary of Weakness, and was perplexed with certain difficulties of the magic. He continuously withdrew magical tomes from his space ring, and studied and pondered on the subject assiduously.

    Ssssss... A creature was approaching from afar.

    Ticaru the bandit creased his brows, and sprung from arge tree straight towards another. He grabbed onto the branch of a slender willow tree and continued towards the source of the noise to figure out what was happening.

    ¡°It seems as though some magical beasts areing. We must be careful,rge hordes of magical creatures are difficult to handle. Hopefully we won¡¯t be so unlucky this time!¡± Cecilia said to her subordinates as she withdrew a staff specially made for priests.

    Han Shuo, who was in deep thought about how the Boundary of Weakness causes enemies to grow mentally and physically weak, had actually heard the ¡®Sssss¡¯ noise approaching well before the rest did. Without the need for mystical demons dispersing in every direction, Han Shuo managed to detect several hundred magical beasts drawing closer and closer to them with his consciousness. These hundred or so magical beasts approaching were of assorted ranks, mostly ranks three or four. The most powerful of them were just three first-tier magical beasts. There was an absence of any super-ranked magical creatures present in the wave, therefore Han Shuo felt no obligation for concern on his part.

    The bandit, who had earlier swung away past the willows, had just then springboarded himself into the air off a branch, andnded firmly before Cecilia. ¡°The beasts are approaching in the hundreds. They seem to being for us!¡± Ticaru reported in a low voice.

    ¡°Prepare for battle. These magical beasts shouldn¡¯t be too hard to handle!¡± Cecilia ordered decisively. Soon after, they had begun to set up trap boundaries. The archers, magi, and swordsmen assumed their positions, with the magi and archers in the very middle, as they drew their weapons, defending the grounds.

    Sitting in the center, Han Shuo creased his brows, and temporarilyid down his monstrous book. He looked at Cecilia, who was instructing her subordinates to deploy defense boundaries, and asked, grinning faintly, ¡°Need any help?¡±

    ¡°Thanks, but we can handle this for now!¡± Cecilia replied, confident that she could deal with this group of magical beasts.

    Han Shuo nodded his head and without speaking further, continued to study the magical book in his hand, titled ¡®Necromancy Magic¡¯, trying to make sense of the marvels and the deployment of the Boundary of Weakness.

    Not only could the Boundary of Weakness make all those that entered it feel frail and fatigued, it also had paralyzing and incapacitative effects on one¡¯s soul. This is because the Boundary of Weakness is assembled by two segments of incantations ¨C one aimed at the enemy¡¯s physical body, and the other at his soul.

    However, to fully unleash the true wrath of the Boundary of Weakness, one must master perfect a bnce of power against the flesh and soul. Failure on either flesh or soul means failure entirely. Han Shuo had practiced for a long time, but still had yet to grasp it. He was unable to perfectly put together the two incantations, and therefore unable to deliver a true Boundary of Weakness.

    Han Shuo realized, reading the book, that the crux of every living being is its soul. To maim one¡¯s soul would be to, in turn, maim one¡¯s body. If one were to feel mentally feeble and weak, his body would reflect it and begin tock strength. By such reasoning, Han Shuo concluded that the point of attack is to cripple the soul. As soon as the soul perceived itself to be weak, the physical body would also weaken. Han Shuo knew then that he was progressing in the right direction, but needed a moment to digest all the information and truly master it. He racked his brain, hoping to see the light.

    As Han Shuo slowly wrapped his head around it all, hundreds of magical beasts of the Tarrag Canyon rushed forth. They seemed to be able to detect the scent of humans. Their pupils were scarlet red as they roared violently, charging straight at Cecilia and her people.

    ¡°These beasts are mad!¡± Cecilia shouted softly. The magical staff she was waving shot out silvery lights that sprinkled onto the five swordsmen at the forefront, providing them with strength and enhancing their powers.

    Multiple incantations sounded beside Cecilia as the fire magus, lightning magus, and water magus chanted along. Fire Snakes slithered off with vigour, strobes of lighting bombarded through the sky, and tree roots shot out of the ground like pointed stakes, all aimed at the pack of magical beasts rushing towards them.

    As the spells came down, havoc wreaked over the flock of beasts. Many lower ranking creatures immediately lost all fighting capability when hit by the wave of magic. Only some first, second and third rank magical beasts could withstand this wave of magical attack, owing to their resilient bodies, and continue to storm ahead.

    Two archers released torrents of arrows with admirableposure. After streaking through the vast sky, one after another, the arrowsnded clean into the beasts with a swoosh, killing each one of them. Not a single miss.

    Under the double-barreled attack of the magi and archers, a third of the magical beasts had copsed for good before they could even get close. Some of the more powerful magical creatures that were closest to the area could release magic and poisonous fluid. Creatures like the Frost Eagles and Medusa began spewing frost and venom.

    Cecilia ceaselessly performed all sorts of auxiliary spells on her fellowrades, while the three mages deployed boundaries to block iing attacks. The traps that were set up in advance were also deployed, and the magical beasts fell into a pool of blood one after another.

    It must be said that Cecilia and the Dark Mantle members beside her had great rapport and coordination with each other. In the previous ten days, due to the team¡¯s cooperation, a great majority of the magical beasts were killed using spells or arrows before they coulde anywhere near them. And if any of those creatures did manage to get close to them, they would have been met by five unwavering swordsmen defending the front, ready to deflect any approaching enemy at any given time. It looked as though this battle really wasn¡¯t much of a problem for Cecilia and her team.

    At that moment, Han Shuo gazed at the magical beasts, still charging fiercely, unafraid of death. Han Shuo seemed to have had an epiphany of sorts, and urgently chanted an incantation. The chilling element of death that hovered through the air suddenly converged, and formed a ring around the flock of magical beasts.

    All of a sudden, the high-ranking magical creatures which were charging forward became strangely sluggish. It was as though they were collectively hit by some powerful anesthetic, slowing them down to half the speed.

    ¡°I did it!¡± Han Shuo gasped in pride and amazement. He was shocked to see the magical creatures within the Boundary of Weakness be so lethargic.

    All of a sudden, Han Shuo felt an enormously mighty presence sneak towards them. He squinted, spying on it.

 Chapter 444: Beating up a Sneaky Attacker

    GDK 444: Beating up a Sneaky Attacker

    Cecilia and the others were fully focused on dealing with the magical beasts attacking them. Only high-level creatures remained. Rushing forward, they released poisonous fluids and magical spells unceasingly, skills that they are undoubtedly born with.

    It had initially been somewhat of a challenge to Cecilia and her party defeating the beasts. However, after Han Shuo¡¯s Boundary of Weakness came down, the magical beasts slowed down tremendously in an instant. Cecilia and her team managed to then catch their breaths, regather their mental strength and take advantage of the situation to deploy some magical spells, enveloping the remaining magical beasts in an abyss of suffering.

    The meatshields at the frontlines who had been standing upright all the while, dedicated to guarding the area, withdrew their javelins and darted them straight at the beasts, who were yet crawling into range, bodies and souls exhausted by the Boundary of Weakness, impaling them.

    ¡°Thank you!¡± Cecilia shouted to Han Shuo, who was a distance away.

    ¡°No problem! That was nothing,¡± Han Shuo replied with a faint smile.

    Even without the help of Han Shuo¡¯s Boundary of Weakness, Cecilia and her party would have managed to fend off the flock of magical beasts, but it would not have been nearly as simple. There was simply no way the knights and five swordsmen could havee out unscathed as they did had it not been for Han Shuo.

    A swordmaster wielded his imposing weapon of choice as he marched into the field of corpses. He stripped the magical cores off several high-ranking magical creatures one by one. Delighted, he eximed, ¡°What a harvest we have here!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t bother with cores under rank three, they aren¡¯t worth nearly enough gold coins. Besides, we better hurry out!¡± Cecilia instructed from a distance.

    ¡°Yes my Lady, I won¡¯t be long,¡± a second swordmaster named Karey replied, raising his voice as he strode away towards several magical beasts that had earlier been met with rather violent deaths.

    Han Shuo furrowed his brows, sensing someone lurking in the shadows. It was zooming nearer by the second, headed straight for the swordmaster furthest away from everyone else. The figure emitted a queer but powerful aura. Han Shuo was certain that once the figure got close enough to the swordmaster, the oue would be certain death.

    A sudden thought struck Han Shuo. With a tighter consciousness, he became transfixed on the being hiding in the lush undergrowth. Han Shuo was standing beside Cecilia when he was reduced into a lump of ck radiance, then simply disappeared without a trace.

    Cecilia noticed that someone beside her was missing and abruptly turned around confused. ¡°What? Where¡¯s Bryan?¡±

    Meanwhile, swordmaster Karey, who was unwittingly collecting magical core of medusa, suddenly heard a faint rustle, setting him on edge. Without a second to spare, an orb of green smoke had rolled over to him. The green smoke engulfed him before he could react, like being swallowed whole.

    In an instant, Karey felt as though his body was being sped firmly in an enormous hand, from which there was no escape. With such tight pressure against his chest, he hadn¡¯t even the breath to call for help, and could only watch as they receded deep into the shrubbery through the cloud of green smoke, farther and farther away from Cecilia and the others. Karey was brimming with fear without a clue what was going on. He dreaded unknown, but there was nothing he could do. He would not budge and could not speak. Karey grew sullen, his heart gradually sinking.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m right beside you. We have to find out where this thing is taking you!¡± chimed a familiar voice.

    Karey beamed. It was Han Shuo. Through Cecilia, Karey had heard of the frightening power he possessed. And now, having witnessed Han Shuo trail them undetected, Karey was reassured. Han Shuo was everything Cecelia described and more.

    The tremendous orb of green smoke rolled along carrying Karey with it. Only after nearly half a dozen li further into Tarrag Canyon did the smoke begin to slow down as they approached a muddy ground. All of a sudden, the once static sludge began to generate an immense pulling force, drawing Karey into it.

    Han Shuo, who had been trailing along, extended his five right-hand fingers, and out of them stretched five infinitely fine strobes of green light. With his eagle-like ws, he shed at the sludge like a beast.

    The mass of soggy ground blew up. Bit by bit, sludge skewered the sky above it as the ground began to tremble.

    Karey was startled by all the rumbling, all the while knowing he was done for, there was no escaping this. But at that moment, the restraints on his body loosened. Han Shuo stood grimly before him, green lights still shooting from his fingertips. Karey regained mobility and attempted to break away from the smoke surrounding him. The lump of green which had held him so tightly seemed to have lost its grippletely.

    As a swordmaster, Karey wasn¡¯t too weak himself. He crept out in a flurry, hopping off the protruding sludge, which now resembled pirs, and escaping to the shore.

    ¡°Show yourself!¡± Han Shuo yelled towards the sludgy ground as he stood imposingly above it. The lights from his fingertips faded away.

    Just after Han Shuo reimed his explosive energy, the ground settled. The sludge stakes plunged back into the ground, revealing a human figure zed head to toe with mud.

    ¡°Who are you?¡± asked the figure, her weak voice creaking, almost like a rusted hinge.

    Han Shuo was in disbelief. The voice he was hearing, it was undoubtedly that of an elderly woman. The figure was burrowed deep within the shrubbery, her face all the while obscured from Han Shuo as he approached the sludge.

    ¡°Who are you? Why did you attack me?¡± Karey retorted before Han Shuo could reply.

    In a swish, the figure flew off high into the sky, and dove downwards at Han Shuo like a bird of prey ready to scoop up its next meal. She did not answer, and instead cursed, ¡°How dare you meddle with my business! You mischievous child! I will ughter you!¡±

    Streams of green smoke poured from the old woman through seven apertures, who looked simply menacing. Her appearance was very much like that of the foulest of spirits imaginable.

    The green smoke in the air seemed to waft through the air randomly, but it was in fact drifting rapidly at Han Shuo. It began to move several times as fast just as it approached Han Shuo, effortlessly trapping him. The green smoke bore through Han Shuo¡¯s body by the pores of his skin.

    The old woman followed several steps behind the smoke flowing from her eyes and nostrils. As soon as the wisps of green smoke had attached themselves to Han Shuo, she began to let out the most repulsiveugh. A wave of strange energy burst out from her palm, and with it she cursed Han Shuo.

    Strands of green smoke entered Han Shuo¡¯s body, a sensation of millions of ants devouring his flesh and blood from the inside. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness could render clearly everyst abnormality on his body. When he saw that the old woman was covering him with her palm, Han Shuo snorted coldly, and the demon infant within his body began its suction.

    The energy that entered Han Shuo¡¯s body, like a whale taking in water, flowed straight through him into the demon infant. After two rotations, a strange substance, apparently nutrition for the demon infant, formed. Only now did the old woman¡¯s palm reach the top of Han Shuo¡¯s head.

    Her eyes filled with shock and bewilderment. The old woman seemed to have felt the unusual movements of the energy through Han Shuo¡¯s body, and cried out in terror. She attempted to flee as quickly as she could.

    Han Shuo was right beneath the old woman and began to smile. He looked up at her within arms reach, and threw a fist. In a sh, the knife-like demonic yuan poured into the old woman through the center of her palm. It destroyed the strange energy that had been brewing on her palm like a massive, earth-shattering dragon, and continued straight through her guts.

    A stream of blood gushed from the woman¡¯s mouth. She had been struck flying up to the sky. Her face was in pain, her heart filled with regret. Damnit, why did I provoke this guy? After evading the Church of Light all these years, in spite of everything, because of a single moment of foolishness I¡¯m just going to die at the hands of some stupid demon? And all for nothing, she thought, sighing.

    Before the old woman¡¯s body evennded, Han Shuo flew over at lightning speed, and firmly grabbed her by her sludgy, tangled hair. A whiff of demonic yuan flew into her body, and subdued her. He then carried her, descending to the ground.

    They had only dealt blows face-to-face once, but already was she heavily injured and captured alive. Unable to resist, the old woman¡¯s heart filled with dejection and sorrow. She had no idea what the hell was wrong with the world. This young man could actually be more frightening than those of the Church of Light, who had been hunting her for many years. This was uneptable.

    For this ferocious old woman, Han Shuo could show no mercy. He dragged her by the hair towards less muddy waters, and shoved her head into it. A few scrubster, the sludge which had coated her face was mostly gone.

    ¡°Speak. Why are you attacking us? Who are you?¡± Han Shuo demanded coldly, tossing her aside to pull out a clean handkerchief for all the scum on his hands.

 Chapter 445: Same as Heretics, but Big Differences!

    GDK 445: Same as Heretics, but Big Differences!

    Much of the sludge on the woman¡¯s face had not gone away with the dirty water, leaving her barely less filthy than before. But, finally, after a little help from Han Shuo, herplexion could at least be distinguished.

    She appeared to be in her fifties or sixties, hair of ash-grey, long and tangled. The carving knife known as time had left a confluence of wrinkles like ravines on her face, and her skin thin, instic andcking any radiance. Her eyes carried the only distinguishing color on her, a rare green tainted with unresolved resentment.

    Her green eyes fixed on Han Shuo, inspecting him as he raised her. At only what seemed like twenty years old, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t have possessed such pinnacle strength, whether in cultivating magic or martial arts. However, there he was, having just defeated her simply, without room for any resistance.

    Pa! A p flew across the old woman¡¯s face. Han Shuo yelled, ¡±I¡¯m talking to you!¡±

    When it came to Han Shuo, there was no respecting anyone who would mount a sneak attack on another so indiscriminately, not even for an elderly woman. Besides, with those green eyes, she looked none too virtuous anyway.

    She awoke abruptly at the p, her heart loaded with fury, and exploded at Han Shuo, ¡°Little demon, you can kill me, but you will not humiliate me!¡±

    ¡°Shut up and answer my question or you¡¯ll suffer!¡± threatened Han Shuo impatiently as he red at the old woman. He turned to Karey who was walking towards him, and said, ¡°This old hag left a trail behind for a reason. Cecilia and the others must be on their way. Go and catch up with them.¡±

    ¡°Alright. I am forever grateful for your Lordship¡¯s rescue. Your humble subordinate shall engrave this in his heart!¡± Karey bowed at Han Shuo, and finally left.

    ¡°How did you know about the markers?¡± the old woman questioned, though she was unable to move.

    ¡°Did you really think your foolish trickery would escape my discerning eyes?¡± asked Han Shuo sarcastically, ¡°Now speak! Why did you bring us here? What are you nning?¡±

    The green eyes glowed up like strange lights. She has checked her body in silence, and attempted to move with her own power.

    ¡°Stop wasting your energy you old fart! You cannot escape!¡± Han Shuo scolded, staring at her coldly. He was confident that she could not escape.

    ¡°Hm,¡± he scoffed. He got behind the woman and began to caress her back with his mighty hands.

    ¡°What are you doing? What are you doing?! I¡¯ll talk! I¡¯ll tell you everything! Please, spare me!¡± The old woman was frightened to the bone. She could no longer maintain a steady mental state, and began shouting involuntarily. Much to his surprise, she sounded like she was on the verge of tears

    ¡°I beg you, please spare me. I¡¯m old. I could be your grandmother. You wouldn¡¯t do this to your own grandmother! I¡¯m just an ugly-¡±

    ¡°Shut the fuck up. What is the matter with you? I don¡¯t have such unconventional fetishes!¡± Han Shuo shouted. Filled with rage, he pulled back his mighty hands, raised a brow, and asked her in a deep voice, ¡°You have the body of divine favor?¡±

    ¡°Ye... yes. So what?¡± She had been relieved to hear that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t trying to vite her. But after hisst question, she was shocked, and muttered, ¡°How did you know that?¡±

    Han Shuo was about to answer her, but shrugged instead. He raised his head and stared into the distance, then smiled grimly. ¡°I¡¯ve searched high and low for them, but unexpectedly, these men came sending themselves to my doorstep!¡±

    Han Shuo stopped interrupted. He sensed a twenty-strong envoy headed their way. They were men of the Church of Light, experts of mixed professions. And their leader happened to be Han Shuo¡¯s own mortal enemy, sacred knight Blount. They were approaching the area following the trails.

    Just as his consciousness detected the arrival of these men, several mystical demons swooped over to eavesdrop on their conversations.

    A little whileter, Han Shuo¡¯s gaze fixed on the old woman. With a faint smile, he chuckled, ¡°So you are the big heretic that Blount is after! Elizabeth, did you n to kill Karey, and shift the me on the Church of Light? You drew us here so we would confront them? Very smart. Very smart indeed. You sinister cunning old thing, surely not a good thing.¡±

    ¡°How did you know that? Who in the world are you? How is it that you know everything?¡± Elizabeth looked at Han Shuo petrified. Her body trembling, she continued, ¡±You obviously already know the answer, so why ask? What do you want with me?¡±

    ¡°Hush now,¡± he snickered perversely. ¡°They are discussing their reasons for hunting you. Let me listen.¡± Han Shuo pursed his lips and gestured at Elizabeth to stay silent.

    ¡°What, what do you want?¡± Elizabeth¡¯s heart was filled with doubt. This unfathomable young man before her had surprised her quite enough. She had no idea where Han Shuo came from nor what he was up to. A sense of unknown danger lingered with her, an unpleasant feeling, to say the least.

    Minutester, Han Shuo turned to face Elizabeth once more. He had on a sinister smile across his face. Nodding his head, he said, ¡°Not bad, Elizabeth, not bad at all. Your unique body of divine favor can absorb the Church of Light¡¯s holy energy. It¡¯s no wonder the Church hasn¡¯t spared a pain to try to kill you!¡±

    ¡°You know it, you know it all. Fine, what do you really want?¡± Han Shuo had, by now, listed each and every one of her secrets. Elizabeth was certain it would be near impossible to escape from Han Shuo¡¯s palm, and consequently loosened up. She looked at Han Shuo calmly, with a face that seemed to say ¡®do whatever you want to me, I don¡¯t care¡¯.

    ¡°Such an interesting body of divine favor. Very interesting. Hmm, we are both heretics being hunted by the Church of Light. Perhaps we needn¡¯t be so unfriendly towards each other!¡± Han Shuo said with a slight grin.

    ¡°You, you hold grudges with the Church of Light as well?¡± Elizabeth was in a perturbed state of mind. After an unceasing suspension between hope and despair, that cool,posed attitude of hers had long gone without a trace.

    ¡°That¡¯s right, just like you! A big heathen on the run from the Church of Light.¡± Han Shuo beamed at Elizabeth, and continued, ¡°However, that was a long time ago. Now we are not so simr. I am the hunter, and Church of Light is the prey! Hahah, we both are heretics, but with big differences!¡±

    Just after uttering those words, ¡®whooshing¡¯ sounds began, and several human shadowsnded. They were priests of the Church of Light. Two magi that had deployed floatation spells were now hanging in mid air. One of them, oozing with arrogance, said to Elizabeth below, ¡°You shall not escape today!¡±

    The hissing noise crescendoed as more and more people approached. Within the blink of an eye, a group of Temple Knights led by sacred knight Blount arrived by the light priests, and swiftly surrounded the area where Elizabeth was.

    Attention gathered on Elizabeth. Han Shuo, who was directly facing Elizabeth, happened to have his back towards sacred knight Blount. In addition to this, as Blount was fully focused on the limping Elizabeth, he had failed to notice that the lofty figure before him was the same one that had left him heavily injured three years prior.

    Elizabeth could not move at the slightest, and looked on helplessly as experts from Church of Light surrounded her. She grew anxious, what felt like mes licking at her eyebrows. With regards to Han Shuo¡¯s dering himself the hunter and the Church of Light the prey, Elizabeth evidently did not buy it, and pleaded, ¡°Release me! I¡¯ll bring you along to escape through the sludges, otherwise we will die here!¡±

    ¡°Elizabeth, you have murdered countless pious followers through the years. Church of Light has been after you for four odd years, but has never been able to fully surround you. But this time, this time we shall see how you manage to escape!¡± sacred knight Blount chuckled as he looked at Elizabeth. After recovering from his injuries, he still appeared very much calm and unruffled.

    Shit shit shit, I¡¯m going to die here, Elizabeth thought when she saw Han Shuo remain unmoved, while those of the Church of Light tightened around them bit by bit, totally cut off her opportunity to escape. Her heart was eventually crammed with a feeling of despair.

    ¡°Huh? Elizabeth, you¡¯re acting rather odd today! Don¡¯t you usually flee as fast as the wind? Why aren¡¯t you running away today? Could it be that you want to fight us to death? Hahah. With Lord Blount here, you must be courting death!¡± said the first magus to Elizabeth calmly.

    ¡°Enough nonsense, take her down!¡± sacred knight Blount yelled, pacing towards Elizabeth leisurely.

    All of a sudden, a concentrated aura of death could be sensed from outside of the encirclement. The expression Blount¡¯s face flipped and he immediately dropped his foot to look around. He discovered that an innumerable amount of undead creatures had surreptitiously encircled them.

    Only at that moment did sacred knight Blount shift his attention to the person whose back he had faced all along. The imposing view of Han Shuo¡¯s back became oddly familiar. This peculiar familiarity gave Blount an intense feeling of unease. Blount abruptly gestured for the members of the Church of Light to halt, and said to Han Shuo in a deep voice, ¡°That friend over there, we seem to have met somewhere before!¡±

    ¡°Of course. Of course we¡¯ve met, Lord Blount!¡± Han Shuo said in an evil grin and finally turned around, his piercing eyes stuck on Blount.

 Chapter 446: Killing the Enemy

    GDK 446: Killing the Enemy

    Even after three years, when Han Shuo¡¯s voice sounded again, sacred knight Blount could tell exactly who this man, whose back he had been string at, was.

    Blount¡¯s humiliating defeat in their battle all those years ago had undoubtedly left asting impression on him. For Blount, the fight ended most shamefully, truly the lowest moment of his life. For the three years that followed, Blount, who was still recovering from his injuries, could not help but think about Han Shuo. Now that Han Shuo stood right in front of him once again, Blount, a ruthless murderer with a particr aversion to infidels, was unable to control his expression.

    ¡°You!¡± yelled Blount in a voice dripping with hatred. Blount sped a shiny golden spear tightly in the palm of his hand. His veins were popping out. His grip grew tighter and tighter, as though he were trying to break the spear in two. It was obvious how deeply rooted the hatred was in his heart.

    Han Shuo nodded in acknowledgement. Carrying a sinister grin on his face, he said, ¡°We meet again!¡±

    ¡°Lord Blount, who is this child?¡± The talkative magus was puzzled. He could not understand why a sacred knight such as Blount himself, one of majestic status within the Church of Light, would be acquainted with an obviously immature and inexperienced brat.

    ¡°You, you two know each other?¡± muttered Elizabeth, who was paralyzed under Han Shuo¡¯s foot and could do so much as twitch a finger. She looked at Han Shuo, bewildered.

    ¡°Hahah, of course!¡± Han Shuo replied, smiling ominously. Without turning his head, Han Shuo waved his hand and patted Elizabeth on the shoulder. Suddenly, the energy within her that shackled her body disappeared. ¡°Your body of divine favor can absorb the sacred energy from their bodies. How intriguing. Today is your lucky day. Perhaps you may even get to absorb the holy energy of a sacred knight. Elizabeth, be sure to seize the opportunity!¡± Han Shuo said to Elizabeth in a strange tone as she rose to her feet behind him. Han Shuo¡¯s gaze was fixed on Blount.

    Elizabeth stared at the sacred knight Blount who looked as though he was facing against a great rival. A thought suddenly urred to her. She pointed at Han Shuo and said in an appalled tone, ¡°You, you are that necromancer from the Lancelot Empire, aren¡¯t you? I¡¯ve heard about you before. You single-handedly defeated Blount and his men? Oh my! It really is you!¡±

    Elizabeth, an infidel the Church of Light had been hunting tirelessly, surely kept with the news. And of course she would often inquire about those like herself, wanted dead by the Church of Light. The battle for Ossen City three years prior was the single greatest setback the Church of Light had suffered in recent years. The news of this event, propagated by certain parties with differing intentions, had spread across many countries.

    News that the sacred knights, symbolic of the mighty presence of the Church of Light, suffered crippling defeat, spread like wildfire far and wide, as though the gue spell in necromancy magic had been cast. For heretics suffering in hardship due to the Church of Light, this news was music to their ears. Any infidel with the slightestpetency would know the name ¡®Bryan¡¯.

    The men of the Church of Light who encircled Han Shuo and Elizabeth turned pale upon hearing Elizabeth¡¯s words. Three Temple Knights stood closest to Han Shuo and were the first to charge towards Elizabeth, but before Han Shuo even made a move, the three subconsciously took a few steps backward, distancing themselves from Han Shuo, and returning to the circle.

    ¡°Him.... it¡¯s actually him...,¡± the magus of the Church of Light asked Blount doubtfully, mumbling to himself as he stared frightened at Han Shuo. His voice diminished, as though he were afraid of arousing Han Shuo¡¯s attention.

    ¡°Prepare to move! Forget about Elizabeth. Aim every attack at him!¡± Blount softly yelled. Immediately after that he red at Han Shuo, and said, ¡°Three years had passed. I don¡¯t believe that this time you will be able to injure me again!¡±

    As soon as Blount spoke those words, an enormous sacred aura escaped from Blount¡¯s body. The divine aura and his golden fighting aura fused together with perfection. The muscles on his body suddenly burst out glorious golden rays, giving him the appearance of a man cast in gold, a golden man, a truly awesome spectacle in the most literal sense of the word.

    Han Shuo¡¯s pupils gleamed. Through the aura on Blount he could sense just how powerful he was. He discovered that in those three short years, Blount¡¯s strength had improved to some degree. His aura must have doubled by some miraculous transformation.

    ¡°This time, I will not injure you again.¡± Han Shuo looked at Blount with cold eyes, and continued word by word, ¡°I will kill you!¡±

    Han Shuo grinned fiercely as his clenched fist shot at Blount.

    As the golden spear in Blount¡¯s hand brandished withyers uponyers of golden light, Han Shuo used his right fist like a hammer. A radiant, cataclysmic energy congealed in his palm. A garish sh of red light shot violently out of his fist. After the light faded, a scarlet red fist the magnitude of a hill appeared out of thin air, descending rapidly onto Blount.

    Blount was in great fear. He could feel the destructive power contained within the punch. The energy he had gathered in thest three years, gushed into the golden spear in his hand, turning him into a golden sun. He hurled the spear upwards at the gigantic scarlet-red fist smashing down on him. As the golden spear flew up in high speed, a chorus praising the God of Light could be faintly heard.

    When the golden spear stabbed on the scarlet fist, a deafening rumble erupted. The radiance above their heads was enough to momentarily blind every spectator but the two themselves. The immense fluctuation of energy began to fan out violently in every direction. Elizabeth and the members of the Church of Light ducked for shelter.

    It was at this moment that the undead creatures who had been silently surrounding them seemed to have gotten a bugle call to mobilize and attack. Several members of the Church of Light were caught off guard and immediately drowned by the undead creatures. Amid their terrorizing howls, the chilling sounds of undead creatures crunching on human bones could be heard.

    Only Elizabeth was excluded from the attacks of the undead creatures. But listening to the men of the Church of Light being eaten alive by the undead, she could not help but shiver. She was scared witless as she looked at Han Shuo, and thought in her heart that he was indeed the biggest heretic!

    Han Shuo¡¯s madughter rumbled like a storm. ¡°Blount, oh Blount, it seems that despite your efforts in bing stronger, you will die here! No one can save you today!¡±

    Of everyone there, Elizabeth was the mostid-back. The disciples of the Church of Light were surrounded by throngs and throngs of undead creatures summoned by Han Shuo. The creatures did not attack Elizabeth, and in that time she managed to recover from her temporary blindness and could once again see. She turned towards the direction of Han Shuo¡¯s voice.

    However, all she saw was a strange banner of light closing in on Blount, formed by the scarlet fist. Han Shuo, howling withughter, could hardly be seen as he rapidly revolved around Blount. The endless flow of pounding fists led to a clear indication that Blount was not alright.

    Sacred knight Blountcked any strength to fight back, and could only attempt to stand his ground and defend unwaveringly.

    The sacred knight, even in his golden state and with far heightened power, groaned in anguish just as he had done before under Han Shuo¡¯s high speed bombardment. Trails of fresh, dark red blood ran from his nostrils and out the corner of his mouth, staining his golden armour. Not a bit of thatposed, arrogant vigor could be found in him anymore.

    What made Elizabeth even more astonished was that Han Shuo seemed to have yet to exert much strength at all. On the contrary, he looked like he could be doing this in his sleep, taking his time tormenting Blount.

    Sacred knight Blount¡¯s body was convulsing in a fit, his spear waving in the air, as streaks of energy stung him like fire ants, the power in his hands were weakening by the second, and, as such, the speed at which he brandished his golden spear was growing slower and slower.

    Peng! A punch broke throughyers of spear shadows and Han Shuo quietly withdrew his fist. Sacred knight Blount¡¯s hand movements suddenly froze. A series of Pi Li Pa La fracturing sounds emitted from his body. Blount stood nkly before copsing to the ground.

    Under Elizabeth¡¯s dumbstruck gaze, out from the ground on which sacred knight Blountid, a foolish-looking zombie warrior emerged. The zombie had on an unusual, earthy-grey armour. The hard ground was like water to him; he seemed to ascend from the ground without any hindrance.

    Thud! Thud! Thud! When the strange-looking zombie warrior hadpletely floated out of the earth, it stomped on Blount¡¯s body in a mad rampage. Fresh blood spilled uncontrobly all over Blount¡¯s body as the life force in his face faded away little by little.

    ¡°Oi, Elizabeth, how about you hurry over and absorb the divine energy from his body before he¡¯s dead!¡± Elizabeth had still been in a daze, but upon hearing this she was beyond overjoyed.

    ¡°For me? Really?¡± she eximed like it was ecstasy, her voice still quivering. She gazed at Han Shuo from a distance away in pleasant disbelief.

    ¡°Of course. Only by absorbing the divine energy from this sacred knight will you qualify to be my ve!¡± Han Shuo said, smiling.

    ¡°... ve?¡± Elizabeth was dazed again. Her brain was slow toprehend everything she was hearing.

    ¡°Who sent you to my doorstep to provoke me in the first ce? Hurry up and decide! Die or serve me. Make your own choice!¡± GH groaned coldly.

    After three seconds of silence, Elizabeth shot her hand up to dere her position. ¡°I¡¯m willing to be your ve!¡± she eximed, before flinging herself towards a dying Blount.

 Chapter 447: Implanting Demonic Blood

    GDK 447: Imnting Demonic Blood

    What a shame for sacred knight Blount. He had hoped that his three years of painstaking cultivation would allow him to exact his revenge on Han Shuo and finally clear that grudge. That he would, nheless, wind up even more pathetic than thest time was anyone¡¯s guess.

    If not for the golden armour and divine energy protecting his body, sacred knight Blount would perhaps not have had to suffer so much pain. After all, any ordinary man who had been trampled by an earth elite zombie would indeed have died instantly, with considerably less pain.

    Blount, however, was protected by the armour on his body, in addition to his fighting aura and sacred energy. Therefore, he did not immediately die when the earth elite zombie stomped on him repeatedly, but instead, let out harrowing squeals as he died. With the pain of both his physical body and spirit dejected and shrouding him at the same time, Blount hadn¡¯t even the strength to kill himself.

    It was at this moment that the wrinkly old woman rushed towards him in excitement. With fear in Blount¡¯s eyes, Elizabeth pounced on him like a malevolent spirit, her sharp fingers directly piercing into Blount¡¯s neck, exposed and unarmoured.

    All the divine energy, which Blount had received in exchange for his devout conviction, gushed from his body like water from a copsed dam into that of the sinister Elizabeth. Elizabeth, who had earlier been beaten to the bone by Han Shuo, was restored of all energy.

    Streaks of green smoke once again slithered in and out of Elizabeth¡¯s seven apertures like slender green snakes. Her green eyes glittered with wicked vigor, and a vicious look adorned her face, like a mentally deranged prison inmate. Her internal organs, which were unlike those of a regr person, ran like a brand new machine at maximum speed, absorbing and breaking down the divine energy from sacred knight Blount¡¯s body, and converting it into a strange energy that she could readily utilize.

    While Elizabeth, deranged and thrilled, took in the divine energy, Han Shuo appeared behind Elizabeth without warning. With one thought, his consciousness targeted on Elizabeth¡¯s body, taking a clear glimpse into its every minute movement.

    Elizabeth¡¯s bodyposition was as different as could bepared to that of a regr person. If not for her human appearance, with an aura and body structure like that, Han Shuo would have never considered her human. In addition to the differences in skeletal structure and meridians, there were five fist-sized cyclones in her body. As Elizabeth digested the divine energy from Blount¡¯s body, these five cyclones revolved rapidly. They must y a crucial role in the process.

    Thanks to the existence of these five cyclones, Elizabeth could absorb the divine energy in sacred knight Blount¡¯s body. But as for Blount¡¯s painstakingly cultivated fighting aura, the five cyclones had no effect whatsoever. It seemed that the only thing they did was act on the divine power in Blount, which he had apparently obtained through piety to the God of Light.

    Han Shuo was very curious in his heart as he had never heard of a body of divine favor that could digest sacred power. It was no wonder the Church of Light wanted her killed. Han Shuo vaguely believed that this gifted body of hers was rather different from any ordinary body of divine favor. Perhaps there were some secrets hidden within Elizabeth the even she herself did not understand.

    And soon, the divine energy waspletely drained from the body of sacred knight Blount. With such might, even after having lost all his sacred energy, Blount would simply not die. His face was a grim, gravestone shade of grey as he stared nkly, awaiting death.

    Elizabethughed in maniacal satisfaction. Pulling away her two hands from Blount¡¯s neck and dripping with blood, she gestured towards Han Shuo and thanked him, ¡°Thank you, thank you!¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re wee!¡± Han Shuo smiled grotesquely. He approached Elizabeth from the back, and extended his right hand. His middle finger stabbed into the back of her head. At the tip his finger, a drop of dark red blood essence cracked through his skin and shot into the blood vessels in the back of her head. Elizabeth shrieked as the blood essence of Han Shuo¡¯s demonic infant made its way into her brain.

    His unupied left hand pressed gently on Elizabeth¡¯s back. A gust of wicked force of attraction was released. The strands of energy that had just purified through her five cyclones a moment ago gushed from her back. Not a momentter, Han Shuo had absorbed more than half of it.

    ¡°Master, I am your devout servant. Please, spare my life!¡± Her voice diminished as she begged. She was terrified. The energy she had absorbed from the members of the Church of Light were meant to enhance herself. It had never crossed her mind that that same sinister energy in her body could be absorbed by another. There was no way she could suppress the dread in her heart.

    Much to her surprise, all that begging for mercy may have had some effect. After Han Shuo extracted a portion of energy that had been partially converted by the five cyclones, he began to shriek, and let go and ceased to touch her.

    After removing his fingertip from the back of Elizabeth¡¯s head, Han Shuo patted her forehead, and said with a faint smile, ¡°Human and magical beasts can form a master-ve contract, but between humans, it¡¯s somewhat inconvenient. Hahaha, you must have felt a little something extra in your brain, haven¡¯t you?¡±

    ¡°Yes....yes, master. What have you done to me?¡± The biggest heretic on Profound Continent had endless tricks up his sleeves. Who knew if this being was actually human or the devil. He was undefeatable.

    ¡°It¡¯s nothing, really. Just like the binding power of certain contracts, so long as you do not attempt to betray me, you need not worry about that thing in your brain. However, if you do have such thoughts, haha, your brain will end up just like his!¡± Han Shuo smiled wickedly, and his feet stomped on sacred knight Blount¡¯s head.

    Pak! Like a blown up watermelon, fresh dark red blood exploded onto the ground, mixed with brain fluids, white and red.

    ¡°Master, your most humble servant would never do anything to betray you. You will witness your servant¡¯s loyalty. I swear!¡± As she stared at the ruptured head of the sacred knight, she seemed to have seen her own inhuman state after crossing him. Without the slightest doubt of the validity of this wicked young man¡¯s words, she kneeled before Han Shuo and submitted to him with no objections. She paid no heed to the red and white matter that smeared the ground.

    ¡°Very well. I see you understand,¡± Han Shuo said in satisfaction. After a short pause, he continued, ¡°You can absorb divine energy from members of the Church of Light. This is very good.¡± He smirked. ¡°As long as you follow me, I believe that your strength will definitely progress at an ever higher speed.¡±

    ¡°This old ve will remember her master¡¯s kindness for the rest of her life!¡± Elizabeth professed.

    ¡°Alright, get up. There are still a few followers of the Church of Light over there that have yet to die. You may go and absorb all the holy energy in their bodies as well!¡± Han Shuo instructed Elizabeth, and began speaking to her in a gentle manner.

    Without another word, Elizabeth bolted from Han Shuo¡¯s feet like lightning. Strands of monstrous green energy flowed from her orifices, and she set out to deal with the Church of Light members who had yet to die.

    Seeing Elizabeth¡¯s conscientious work ethics, Han Shuo felt reassured. After diffusing a drop of his demonic blood in her body, if Elizabeth had any thought of betraying him, Han Shuo would be the first to know, and he would then mobilize the demonic blood in her brain to instantly kill her.

    Furthermore, Han Shuo, who was able to absorb the energy from Elizabeth¡¯s body directly, would naturally not allow any chance for her to possess a level of strength that surpassed his own. Such a dependable ve, and nevertheless an interesting body of divine favor, was of much use to Han Shuo. The earth elite zombie looked at the pile of mush that had once been the brain of sacred knight Blount, and nkly transmitted to Han Shuo, ¡°Father, is he dead?¡±

    ¡°Yes. He is indeed dead. However there remains energy in his soul, power that will prove useful to me!¡± Han Shuo answered. Shortly after, at a single thought, the Demonyer Edge flew out from his nape. Blount¡¯s soul, which had yet to dissipate, and which any ordinary person couldn¡¯t sense, was suddenly sucked into the Demonyer Edge.

    During thest armed rebellion in Ossen City, the Demonyer Edge had absorbed too much negative energy. Even then it could have been considered as being in hibernation stage, and had yet to fully pacify the negative energy. However, Han Shuo understood in his heart that this was crucial for the Demonyer Edge. As to whether or not it could be an exceptional murder weapon, that depended on whether it couldpletely digest energy and form a ferocious soul.

    Perhaps Blount¡¯s powerful soul, after entering the Demonyer Edge, would act as the main soul, and help the Demonyer Edge speed up to evolve a ferocious soul.

    After Blount¡¯s soul was ingested by the Demonyer Edge, it again concealed itself in Han Shuo¡¯s body. Soon after, Han Shuo¡¯s attention turned to the armour on Blount¡¯s body, the weapon in his hand, and his space ring. A sacred knight of the Church of Light must have plenty of expensive treasure on him, right? Han Shuo thought.

    Without the slightest respect, Han Shuo snatched the armour and golden spear from Blount¡¯s body and ced it in his own space ring. The two pieces of equipment were the works of top-notch alchemists from the Church of Light, and one must have divine energy to use them to their greatest effect. Of course, Han Shuo did not have any allies in the Church of Light, but if he were to sell these items, he would without a doubt receive a good trade.

    Blount¡¯s space ring had been forcibly broken into by Han Shuo. Inside were several chunky books from the Church of Light, some loose gold coins, a couple of low-grade weapons, two simple, unadorned magic scrolls, and some thin yellow paper.

    When he finished rummaging through Blount¡¯s belongings, and saw the contents of the thin yellow paper, Han Shuo¡¯s expression flipped.

 Chapter 448: Classified Documents

    GDK 448: ssified Documents

    The tomes and scattered gold coins of the Church of Light inside of Blount¡¯s space ring did not catch Han Shuo¡¯s attention, and neither did the few knight weapons in there that were clearly far inferior to the one Blount had been wielding. However, there were two magic scrolls that did stand out; one was a space magic scroll for escape, and the other an earth magic scroll for creating a sort of earth shield. Each were meant for ensuring one¡¯s survival.

    But what a pity it was that during the battle just moments ago, the series of attacks on Blount left him with no strength to retaliate. With Han Shuo bombarding Blount with punches left and right, he hadn¡¯t even the chance to activate a magical scroll, and was only released after the bones throughout his body were shattered.

    The two magic scrolls were Han Shuo¡¯s for the taking. Though precious, however, they weren¡¯t incredibly rare. It was the few sheets of thin yellow paper, or more specifically, their contents, that really piqued his interest.

    The Church of Light, the self-proimed mostpassionate church on Profound Continent, was in fact conducting some rather shady business out of the public eye. From the thin yellow papers, Han Shuo found out exactly how Blount had managed to gather so much strength in the span of three years. As it turned out, this miracle owed to the blessings ceremony of Church of Light.

    As the most influential religious organization on the Profound Continent, the Church of Light cared most about two things. One, to gain an abundance of pious followers of the God of Light, and two, to have pure-souled believers selflessly offer sacrifice. Through these official records, Han Shuo learned that once followers with pure souls sacrificed to the God of Light, the blessed would acquire even more divine power from the God of Light.

    However, many of the pure-souled were not followers of the Church of Light. And ever so often, even the firmest believers of the Church of Light would suddenly wake up to the realization that offering their souls meant certain death, and find that perhaps they weren¡¯t so willing to give up everything and surrender their souls. Well, it was at times like these that the Church of Light made use of certain means topel them.

    The proportion of people with iparably pure souls was miniscule amongst humans. Blount¡¯s full recovery and huge increase in strength were paid for with the sacrifice of eighty-seven pure souls.

    Those eighty-seven pure souls were secretly captured from various countries by the Church of Light by all kinds of dishonorable means. The thin yellow papers were application forms submitted by sacred knight Blount to the Church of Light to hold a sacrificial ceremony. On them were the hand signatures of the incumbent pope of the Church of Light, along with other high ranking members.

    ¡°No wonder. No wonder Blount could possess such power in such short time! Clearly, the Church of Light is none more ethical than the likes of the Cmity Church. From the outside they seem respectable, promoting all sorts of virtues and such, but what they do in the shadows is no different from thetter.¡±

    After making such a huge leap in strength, Blount must have thought himself immortal, so he stored the documents in the space ring. But who would have guessed they would now be in the hands of Han Shuo. Han Shuo understood that the documents contained the signatures of over half of the high-ranking Church of Light members, and what that meant.

    Feeling apprehensive about this unusual method through which the Church of Light gained divine energy for its members, Han Shuo also felt a sense of extreme pleasure and thrill for having obtained such information that could be used against the Church.

    ¡°Hahaha, I bet the Cmity Church will be very pleased to hear about this! This document contains the signatures of the pope of the Church of Light and its high-ranking members. They shall make known the wrongs of the Church of Light through their own means,¡± Han Shuoughed to himself in victory.

    ¡°Master, the other members of the Church of Light are all dead!¡± Elizabeth¡¯s face only revealed excitement. The five cyclones in her body were rapidly spinning as energy entered her shriveled body strand by strand.

    Han Shuo very carefully held the sheets of yellow paper in his hand, and turned his attention to the surroundings. Just as Elizabeth had said, this party from the Church of Light, without a single light grand magus in their team, was all dead from the attacks of the undead.

    Han Shuo squinted, and his consciousness made a round on Elizabeth¡¯s body. By his estimations, Elizabeth had absorbed enough divine energy to allow her strength to double. However, even though Elizabeth had taken the divine energy from sacred knight Blount, she was still a long shot away from attaining the level of strength that Blount had possessed.

    On one hand, this was because Blount¡¯s mighty strength hadn¡¯t relied solely on his divine energy. His fighting aura yed the main role. On the other hand, after passing through the conversion cycles, the divine energy which Elizabeth could really utilize was reduced to only a fraction of the input.

    After all, Elizabeth wasn¡¯t a follower of the Church of Light, and couldn¡¯t utilize the sacred energy. This was rather simr to Han Shuo¡¯s situation; he needed topletely remove the dross energy from the enormous killing aura he absorbed, after which, all that was left would always be only a tiny portion of pure energy which he could utilize.

    After absorbing all that sacred energy, Elizabeth¡¯s strength would be barely enough to reach the level of a sacred swordmaster. Even without the demonic blood in her body, the strength she had currently possessed could pose no threat to Han Shuo. After examining deep into Elizabeth, he nodded and said, ¡°Very good. You have done a decent job. I see there is yet raw divine energy in your body. Would you like a quiet ce to digest it?¡±

    ¡°Thank you for master¡¯s concern. My body will slowly convert this energy without the need to deliberately digest it,¡± Elizabeth replied immediately.

    Nodding, Han Shuo did not continue talking, but cast his gaze in another direction.

    Not long after, the Dark Mantle arrived with Karey¡¯s guidance. By then the undead creatures summoned by Han Shuo hadpletely vanished. There were only about a dozen bodies of Church of Light members remaining around Han Shuo and Elizabeth.

    The disciples of the Church of Light died in a grotesque state. Sacred knight Blount¡¯s body became a mound of mush after his bones were shattered and body trampled. The disciples that had been partially devoured by undead creatures died in an even more appalling scene, with parts missing from their bodies. The metallic stench of blood lingered all around.

    Cecilia and her party shot a nce at the scene and felt sick in the stomach. Fortunately the Dark Mantle were a rather resolute, hardy group, and did nothing to embarass themselves before Han Shuo.

    ¡°Bryan, what happened?¡± Carefully avoiding the bloodstains on the ground, she made her way over to Han Shuo.

    ¡°They are the reason I came here this time. Hmm, with Blount dead now, it seems that my business here is settled!¡± Han Shuo said with a faint smile and he raised his head to look at the sky. He was thinking about paying Wolf a visit, and handing him some fascinating ¡®souvenirs¡¯.

    As a sinister organization with influence ranging the whole continent, it was most appropriate for the Cmity Church to do such things. Besides, they were a mortal enemy of the Church of Light, and would never let go of any opportunity to strike the Church of Light. The document in Han Shuo¡¯s hand contained the signatures of their highest leaders, including the pope. Once the Cmity Church exposed them, the clean image of the Church of Light would surely be tarnished. The thought left Han Shuo somewhat impatient.

    ¡°Sacred knight Blount is dead?¡± Cecilia¡¯s petite mouth dropped wide open as she stared bemused at Han Shuo. She could not believe what she was hearing.

    ¡°There, right under my feet. That headless body!¡± Han Shuo said cooly as he pointed at the unsightly Blount. The pool of fresh blood was still warm.

    Cecilia¡¯s expression went nk as she stood there, staring, utterly speechless. ¡°Lord Bryan, that, that old woman, why is she here?¡± Karey asked, pointing at Elizabeth who stood respectfully behind Han Shuo. Karey had almost been killed by Elizabeth.

    ¡°From now onwards she will be my ve!¡± Han Shuo replied. After a short pause, Han Shuo said to Cecilia, ¡°If there¡¯s nothing else, we shall bid farewell!¡±

    Han Shuo did not have much interest in the strange phenomena in the depths of the Tarrag Canyon.

    ¡°Erm... err...¡± Cecelia watched as Han Shuo was leaving, again speechless. She stammered as she filtered through reasons to make him stay, but could not think up an excuse.

    All of a sudden, a rumble came from afar, the sound of a mountain copsing in the depths of the Tarrag Canyon. The ground within a ten mile radius from the epicenter tremored like there was an earthquake.

    Han Shuo, who had just been leaving, furrowed his brows, and discovered that herds and herds of magical creatures of the Tarrag Canyon were running desperately for the edges of the Tarrag Canyon. Among them were even a few super-ranked magical beasts.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on? What¡¯s happening?¡± Cecilia cried in shock as she looked in the direction of the sound.

    ¡°It came from deep inside the Tarrag Canyon. Something must had happened in there,¡± Karey blurted.

    ¡°Let¡¯s have a look!¡± Han Shuo said to Cecilia. His curiosity had been evoked, and he no longer had the desire to leave.

    ¡°Thank you!¡± Hearing this, Cecelia¡¯s heart was put at ease. ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it!¡± Han Shuo replied. He then turned his head and shot a nce at Elizabeth, and instructed, ¡°Follow me!¡±

    ¡°Yes, master!¡± Elizabeth answered eagerly.

 Chapter 449: Going in Alone

    GDK 449: Going in Alone

    Han Shuo, Elizabeth, Cecilia, and the rest were keen on finding out what was happening in the depths of the Tarrag Canyon. Even Han Shuo, who didn¡¯t tend to care much for misceneous matters like this, was interested and decided to join the investigation.

    With their minds set on the task, Han Shuo led the team of over a dozen into the depths of the Tarrag Canyon.

    Half an hourter, a herd of five or six hundred magical beasts of all kinds, with several vicious manticores taking the lead, hurtled towards the lot of them.

    Following at the back of the herd were some weaker rank four and five creatures, while at the front were hundred high level beasts, about ten manticores taking the lead. Compared to the first wave of magical creatures that attacked Cecilia and her party, this wave was overwhelminglyrger.

    The expression on Cecilia¡¯s beautiful face suddenly changed, and she ordered her subordinates to get into defense position at once, for the fear that the magical beasts would trample them into meat patty.

    ¡°No need for that. It seems that these magical beasts are fleeing for their lives. They¡¯re unlikely to attack us!¡± Han Shuo exined at ease. Through his mystical demons, he could see into the great distance. Three of those demons soared towards the depths of Tarrag Canyon, and discovered that they were not alone. Several other teams of explorers had made their ways past Han Shuo and Cecelia. He also observed that as the magical beasts dashed forward, they made no effort to attack the humans as they had previously done.

    After hearing Han Shuo¡¯s advice, Cecilia hesitated for a moment, and shouted, ¡°Alright then, let¡¯s stick together to avoid the beastsing our way!¡±

    At hermand, the group of Dark Mantle members rushed to gather up with her. Only Elizabeth turned a deaf ear to Cecilia¡¯s words, and stood firmly behind Han Shuo.

    The so-called heretic to the Church of Light very soon realized that Cecilia was not particrly strong at all. Even with the aid of her twelve subordinates, Elizabeth did not feel that they could be of any sort of assistance. Having witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s terrifying strength, Elizabeth, the lesser heretic, had for a long time considered Han Shuo a man who could keep her secure.

    Cecilia and her party soon discovered that Han Shuo was indeed correct. The herd of magical beasts that was charging over obviously had discovered the traces of the group of people when they arrived at the area. The beasts merely continued at their pace, passing by as though they had not noticed them.

    ¡°Huh? What¡¯s going on?¡± asked Cecilia as though she was talking to herself, but her eyes were on Han Shuo. One thing was for clear to Cecelia, Han Shuo definitely knew something.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo replied, ¡°I¡¯m not sure either. We¡¯ll find out when we get closer.¡±

    As soon as he finished those words, Han Shuo took charge and strode towards the depths of Tarrag Canyon, not at all concerned about the magical beasts zooming by. Elizabeth followed closely, lest she would fall behind.

    ¡°Let¡¯s move!¡± Cecilia ordered tactfully. Along the way, more and more herds of magical beasts ran out from the Tarrag Canyon, including some super-ranked magical creatures. Like the first batch of them, they did not waste any time attacking when they saw Han Shuo and the others, but were preupied solely with running away, as though they were running from some disaster.

    All of a sudden, Han Shuo¡¯s body stopped moving. His three mystical demons deepest into Tarrag Canyon seemed to be blocked by a peculiar energy simr to boundaries. The mystical demons came to a halt, unable to move an inch forward.

    ¡°Stop!¡± Han Shuo yelled. The rest were jolted, and froze beside Han Shuo.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± Elizabeth asked.

    Han Shuo¡¯s brows creased intensely. His powerful consciousness expanded outwards. An invisible field undted in the air, like ripples on the surface of water, with Han Shuo at the center. After his consciousness unfolded in all directions, every living thing around him was projected into Han Shuo¡¯s heart.

    When his consciousness arrived outside the region from which the three mystical demons were blocked, Han Shuo deployed his demonic arts; his consciousness changed into a form the energy could not detect, and easily broke in. He proceeded to venture deeper.

    Within this region, the elements that filled the space between heaven and earth were all strangely absent. He felt not a trace of the elements of light, fire, water, or wind. Even the air was gone. The ce truly felt like a vacuum, where one would be ovee by a dreadful sense of suffocation.

    As his consciousness continued forwards, he suddenly felt a few enormous presences. These presences were as enormous as that of Ancient Lizard King Dagassi, and brought Han Shuo a profound feeling of threat.

    Startled, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness no longer continued to explore deeper, and suddenly receded like a tide. Shortly after, he opened his eyes and said to Cecilia, ¡°It seems that this time you must give up on continuing to probe deeper!¡±

    ¡°Why?¡± When Cecilia heard Han Shuo¡¯s words, her heart grew apprehensive.

    ¡°I can feel that something peculiar happened in the deepest part of Tarrag Canyon. However, there are some beings of formidable strength present. Right, even for an expert like sacred knight Blount, there¡¯s no doubt that he would have died if he had entered. So, if you are not looking to die, I advise that all of you evacuate immediately, just like those magical creatures,¡± Han Shuo told them as it was.

    There wasn¡¯t just one mighty presence in the depths of Tarrag Canyon. Otherwise, Han Shuo would have still had the guts to bring them deeper. Given the fact that there were a few of those presences in there, Han Shuo could only ensure his own safety, and certainly couldn¡¯t attend to all of them.

    ¡°So you are saying that there are very powerful people in there?¡± Cecilia was greatly rmed, and again questioned closely.

    ¡°I can¡¯t be certain if they are human or not. But what¡¯s certain is that they are very powerful presences. You will not be able to handle them!¡± Han Shuo exined. He turned to Elizabeth and instructed, ¡°Go back to Tariq City. I will look for you after I take a look inside. I will be able to find you as long as you are in Tariq City. If you don¡¯t do as I say, you will be digging your own graves!¡±

    Elizabeth grew frightened at the sound of that and replied, ¡°Master, rest assured I shall be awaiting your return.¡± Elizabeth did not stay any longer, and left immediately without a second nce at Cecilia and the others.

    After Elizabeth left, Han Shuo shot a stare at Cecilia, and gave her a final warning, ¡°I¡¯ve said all that I ought to say. It¡¯s up to you to listen. But if you are to go in there, be forewarned that none of you wille out alive!¡±

    As soon as he finished his words, not waiting for a reply, Han Shuo transformed into a strobe of ck lighting, and faded towards the Tarrag Canyon.

    It was only when even Han Shuo¡¯s shadow could hardly be seen that Cecilia shouted, ¡°Hey! Can you bring us inside for a look,¡± but obviously Han Shuo did not hear that.

    ¡°Dame, what should we do?¡± Karey looked on as even more magical beasts rushed out. Among them was a magnificent silver dragon of over ten meters. He felt a sense of mild apprehension, as it was obvious to him that if a super-ranked magical creature like the huge silver dragon had to make an escape, then there must have been something truly dangerous in the depths of the Tarrag Canyon.

    ¡°Dame, why don¡¯t we go back as well. Bryan would never lie to us!¡± Bandits had the innate ability to sense danger. Although he couldn¡¯t clearly sense the powerful existences deep in the canyon like Han Shuo could, the stifling in his heart was too difficult to bear. With his many years of adventuring experience as a bandit, this sensation indicated the presence of some overpowering force.

    When the bandit opened his mouth, Cecilia, as a fellowrade for many years, finally turned around to look at the few, and finally her gazended on the bandit. In a solemn voice, she asked, ¡±You felt something didn¡¯t you? I know that after so many years, your senses have always been urate.¡±

    ¡°Yes, my Lady. It is very dangerous in there. Given our strength, it is not advisable for us to enter,¡± the bandit replied with haste.

    ¡°Alright then, we will retreat immediately!¡± By means of her many years of experience interacting with the bandit, Cecilia finally made a decision, and a wise one at that. She turned around and nned to return to Tariq City using their original route.

    A dashing young man appeared on the spot where Han Shuo had stood like a ghost. He had silvery-grey long hair and donned a matching elegant robe adorned withrge, embroidered lily flowers on its edges. He was empty-handed, and his feet hovered above the ground as he smiled and asked, ¡°Excuse me, the young man who left here just a moment ago, who is he?¡±

    ¡°Wh... Who are you?¡± Karey was shocked at the eerie arrival of the young man. He didn¡¯t even know how he had gotten there. It was as though he had materialized out of thin air in the wake of Han Shuo¡¯s absence.

    Cecilia took one look at the young man, and the tip of her brow twitched. ¡°Don¡¯t know,¡± she replied bluntly. ¡°Come on. We will leave here at once.¡±

    She began to march away, somewhat fric and hurried. Although Karey and the others felt that something wasn¡¯t quite right with Cecilia they, as mere subordinates, did not question her, nor did they respond to the young man, but immediately followed behind Cecilia and left.

    ¡°What a bunch of uncultured children. Kids these days know nothing about respect for their elders!¡± the bewitchingly handsome young man sighed grudgingly, as though he wasmenting the ways of the world. He then headed in the same direction as Han Shuo and into the depths of Tarrag Canyon like a ghost.

    ¡°My Lady, who was that person? It felt as though you knew him?¡± Only after sprinting into the distance, far away, and when Cecilia¡¯s slightly slowed down, did the clever bandit open his mouth to ask.

    ¡°He is the protector of the current seven grand duchies, State Preceptor of the former Verdun Dynasty ¡ª Stratholme the old monster!¡± Cecilia replied with a bitter smile.

 Chapter 450: Twelve Round Spheres

    GDK 450: Twelve Round Spheres

    Without the burden that was Cecilia and her gang, Han Shuo strided into the depths of the Tarrag Canyon. Along the way, he traipsed through throngs of magical beasts, mid- and high-level ones scattered throughout.

    But when Han Shuo arrived where his mystical demons hade to a halt, he no longer saw a single magical creature. A pungent scent waft in the air where Han Shuo sensed no magical elements. Something was very, very wrong.

    Surveying the scene surrounding him, all Han Shuo could see was the endless trails left by magical creatures all the way into an infinite distance, millions or billions of footprints. Apart from this, there wasn¡¯t much useful information. The few mighty presences he had sensed with his consciousness previously gave Han Shuo a sense of his own mortality.

    On the plus side, Han Shuo had only himself to worry about, and with his current strength, he believed that even if he didn¡¯t manage to defeat the forces inside, escaping unscathed wouldn¡¯t be too much of a task, so long as he wasn¡¯t surrounded. It was self-confidence that allowed Han Shuo to venture in alone.

    Wishing not to linger for extended periods, he entered the region. That strange energy that had thwarted the mystical demons did not have the same effect on an expert like Han Shuo. With a sway of his body, Han Shuo passed through the liquid-like defense effortlessly, and proceeded with his descent with the aid of the sensing capabilities of his consciousness.

    Not a momentter, the State Preceptor of the former Verdun Dynasty, Stratholme, arrived at the region where Han Shuo had just been standing. Along the way, Stratholme the old monster babbled what sounded like gibberish to himself, and only ceased his bbering as he paused outside the region. He let out a gentle gasp. The old monster had obviously discovered the energy field meant to hinder any average person. He waved his hand, and his left hand pressed on the empty air gracefully, as though he was pushing open an incorporeal door. His body then drifted in through the air like a ghost, and disappeared in the blink of an eye.

    Not long after Stratholme entered, another person arrived. The lightly-built old man had bushy, snowy brows so long that they flowed to his neck. From the outer perimeter of the region, lightning pierced through the invisible defense like a sword, allowing him to intrude.

    Then, yet another person, a delicate and dignified madame, whose body was wrapped inyers of mist, passed seamlessly through the defense.

    Soon afterwards, several more teams of adventurers, who regarded themselves with decent strength, arrived as well. Their curiositypelled them to delve into the area, but they were nevertheless forcibly prevented by the defensive shield. No matter how hard they tried, they could not break through the defense. All they could do was gaze into the air andment their inadequacies.

    Han Shuo, the first person to intrude, carefully concealed his presence, and his enormous consciousness went from overflowing to restrained. Instead of barging all the way forward like he had previously done, he first wrapped up his own body, and hid in the shadows of some colossally tall trees, pacing himself as he journeyed forward.

    Not only was any elemental energy absent in this region, but even oxygen in the atmosphere was extremely thin. Utilizing his exquisite ability to exercise control over his body, Han Shuo closed all the pores on his skin, stopped his breathing and heartbeat, and had his demonic yuan slowly revolve around the demonic infant. As a consequence, unless one caught sight of Han Shuo with their own eyes, even one with the most outstanding strength would not be able to detect Han Shuo¡¯s presence through their perception.

    Along the way, severed limbs of magical beast littered the grounds, which were further stained with various assortments of fresh, colourful blood from the magical creatures. It seemed that the mangled bodies lying around were all of high-ranking magical creatures levels two and above. Severed limbs of super-ranked creatures such as the dragon could be seen everywhere.

    Without needing much thought, Han Shuo understood that it was the tragic deaths of these high-ranking magical creatures that caused all the other magical beasts of Tarrag Canyon to flee. Indeed, if not for the countless dead high-ranking creatures, the other magical beasts which had lived their whole lives in the depths of Tarrag Canyon would never desert their home all so suddenly.

    What was actually going on in there? Han Shuo got even more curious.

    Doing his best to blend in with his surroundings, towering trees and thick shrubs, Han Shuo hiked for another ten minutes at a moderate pace, and finally reached the deepest part of Tarrag Canyon. Once inside, the scene of an endless, crystallineke caught Han Shuo¡¯s eyes.

    The water was so serene and pure that it looked like a huge mirrorid over thend, not even the teensiest ripple could be seen. This view of vast blue waters simply wasn¡¯t enough, however, to distract from the surroundingndscape of the countless carcasses of super-ranked magical creatures, all of which seemed to have died under the most inexplicably gruesome circumstances, and not a single one of which wasn¡¯t severely dismembered.

    The brilliant hue that filled this greatke at the heart of the canyon resembled that of a sapphire crystal, refracting a resplendent blue under the gentle illumination of sunlight. The encircling sea of remains of super-ranked magical creatures left an exceedingly unsettling atmosphere.

    Han Shuo concealed himself behind the lush leaves of a broad tree. His eyes squinted slightly as he looked over to theke in the distance.

    At the center of the huge mass of water was an isle of tnd. There stood dozens of humanoids whom Han Shuo did not recognize. They were densely packed on the ind, all with the same solemn looks on their faces as they worshipped in the direction of a tall, pointed building that resembled an altar, located at the center of the isle.

    If it weren¡¯t for their light-green skin, their python-like tail, and the pointy horns protruding from their foreheads to their napes, perhaps Han Shuo might have regarded them as human beings.

    However, with those three distinctive features, Han Shuo would never, ever view them as humans. The mouths of these humanoids let out peculiar buzzing sounds simr those of cicadas as they kowtowed to give worship to the altar.

    This altar was simr to magical towers often used by a magus. At the top of the pointed altarid the hearts of countless magical beasts, reeking of rotting fish alongside bright, clean magical cores. Four humanoids, likely the leaders of this troupe, each with a row of five pointed horns growing from their foreheads to their corbones, stood at the four corners of the altar. They spoke in a mysteriousnguage akin to the droning of insects as they threw hundreds upon hundreds of those hearts and cores into a giant, grotesque oral cavity filled with thick mucus at the center of the altar.

    The four figures were the powerful presences that Han Shuo had previously sensed. As they stood within close range, even without his consciousness to expand and actively probe, Han Shuo could sense the formidable aura emanating from them. Han Shuo reckoned he could handle one of those creatures alone. But if all four of them were to attack together, Han Shuo could only attempt to escape.

    After observing for a while, Han Shuo quickly discovered that the strengths of these creatures were entirely differentiable by the pointy horns on the top of their heads. Among the beings on the isle, the four at each corner wielded the most terrifying strength. Around the altar and below their feet, there were a dozen or more creatures with four horns on their heads, and they stood closest to the altar.

    One would find less and less pointed horns on the kowtowing creatures the further he looked around the altar. The creatures situated at the outermost perimeter donned merely a single horn.

    All of a sudden, an urrence familiar to Han Shuo captured his attention.

    At the peak of the pointed altar, suddenly, a wave of tentacles slowly hoisted twelve round spheres the size of fists. One of those spheres emanated a pure aura of death, which caused Han Shuo to palpitate. It had never crossed his mind that an aura of death could be so pure.

    In any ne where life was existent, there would naturally be such incidents as birth, senescence, illness, and death. As long as lives continued to end, the element of death would be present in that ne of existence. However, most creatures exhibited in addition a hideous mess of emotions like fear, rage, stubbornness, and resentment just before they met their ends.

    It was precisely due to the presence of these emotions that the element of death could not be pure and on any ne of existence. Even in theherworld where Little Skeleton resided, the element of death was always contaminated with chaotic impurities aplenty.

    However, within the sphere, Han Shuo felt only the element of death in its purest form, no impurities whatsoever. On top of that, it contained an overwhelming amount of the element of death, and therefore proved an irresistible temptation for a necromancer like Han Shuo.

    Instinctively, Han Shuo believed that the sphere could bring him immense benefits. If it wasn¡¯t for the exclusive control he held over his physical body, perhaps Han Shuo¡¯s heart would have begun beating faster from the excitement.

    Han Shuo was thrilled. While he concentrated his attention on the sphere of death, he began to study the other eleven spheres using his consciousness.

    After much surveying, Han Shuo was again shocked to the core. Of the other eleven spheres, seven of them contained elemental energy just as pure as the one containing death. These were namely light, darkness, wind, fire, water, electricity, and earth.

    As for the remaining four spheres, although they did not contain pure elemental energy, they still contained some bizarre energy, one of which was the extremely rare energy of destruction. Another seemed to be a condensed form of fighting aura, constantly emitting different shades of fighting aura from dark blue to golden. Thest two were even more baffling. Their insides were flowing like the revolution of celestial bodies, which, after great amount of contemtion, Han Shuo felt were somewhat simr to the umon aura found on certain space magus and summoners.

    Twelve round spheres in total. Generally dim and dull, brownish in colour. They looked rather unexceptional from a distance. Perhaps, only a figure at Han Shuo¡¯s level could understand just how mysterious, strange, and diverse the energies that these spheres contained were.

 Chapter 451: Origin Crystals

    GDK 451: Origin Crystals

    After the twelve round spheres had appeared in the middle of the altar, intense elemental energy of all sorts, suddenly filled up the area which was previously devoid of any energy.

    Concurrently, the four humanoids who were on the altar, each bearing five horns on their head, quickly sped up pouring the huge amount of magical creatures¡¯ hearts and crystal cores into that big mouth.

    There were thousands just like them worshipping the event under the altar. Their green eyes shone with excitement. They were not unlike the religious fanatics Han Shuo hade across, carrying a bigoted, unreasonably zealous attitude. Their bodies shivered slightly, whilst their droning sound gradually grew more and more energetic.

    Han Shuo, hiding within the thick branches and leaves of a big tree, had a clear observation of everything happening in the bigke ahead. His heart held an uncontroble desire to possess that ball which emitted the pure elemental aura of death, but still, Han Shuo was not one to behave rashly.

    The odd-looking creatures bearing the five horns, all emitted aura which could rival in its formidability to that of the Ancient Lizard King, a demi-god existence. If these four creatures were to join forces and circle around Han Shuo, Han Shuo was not certain that he could escape alive.

    With eyes full of greediness, Han Shuo¡¯s gaze remained unwavering at the round sphere filled with the rich element of death. His mind stated to quickly consider all the ways and consequences of obtaining the sphere.

    Suddenly, his senses projected three beings who were roughly simr in might. The appearance of these three beings who were slowly approaching gave Han Shuo an idea, his eyes light up with delight.

    Han Shuo who had been very carefully hiding his body since the beginning, gradually glided towards the direction of the three whiffs presences, while quietly releasing a wisp of his own, concealed to which any ordinary person would have no means to discover.

    Indeed, as he nned, the strand of presence Han Shuo had deliberately leaked out, immediately caused the approaching experts to sense it. With Han Shuo at the center, the three gathered together within a very short period of time. In the blink of an eye, one after the other, the three mighty beings, originating from the Profound Continent, suddenly assembled a short distance away from Han Shuo.

    ¡°Eh? It¡¯s you! The old monster!¡± As soon as the old man with his eyebrows encroaching his neck reached the ce, he let out a soft cry and stared somewhat astonished at the former State Preceptor of Verdun Dynasty, Stratholme.

    ¡°Reynold you little bastard! You¡¯re not dead yet! Hehe, good, good.¡± the handsome, bewitching Stratholme, teased at the lightning sacred magus of Brut Merchant Alliance as he smiled delightedly.

    Theposed upper-ss woman, enveloped in a faint hazy mist, was thest one to arrive. She shot a nce at Stratholme and greeted him in a gentle voice, ¡°Stratholme, long time no see!¡±

    ¡°Elder sister Tiana!¡± Stratholme the old monster said smilingly after he bowed towards the upper-ss woman wrapped in a mist in the distance.

    This upper-ss woman called Tiana nodded her head at the old monster in acknowledgement, and soon after turned to look at the smiling Han Shuo and asked in a puzzled face, ¡°This is..?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, I¡¯m a nobody. Erm, I came from the Lancelot Empire!¡± While Han Shuo was gracefully bowing at the three, his heart was filled with shock. He didn¡¯t expect that the old man with the long eyebrows was the lighting sacred magus Reynold D of the Brut Merchant Alliance.

    As a high ranking member of the Dark Mantle, Han Shuo was aware of just how renowned this old man was in the Brut Merchant Alliance. Even the leaders from the core merchant guilds that formed the Brut Merchant Alliance, had to be reverent and respectful towards this old man, and will absolutely not be unbridled in front of him.

    And yet, amongst the three, such a character was the one with the weakest strength.

    In contrast to Stratholme the old monster, and the upper-ss woman named Tiana, Reynold the lighting sacred magus was considerably more inferior. No matter how formidable Reynold was at the sacred grade, he was merely a sacred grade expert.

    But Han Shuo could feel the formidable aura of a demi-god level expert from the body of Tiana, the upper-ss woman, and Stratholme the old monster. Stratholme the old monster had a well-known reputation, and Han Shuo had heard of him time and time again. That this dirty old man who was the State Preceptor of Verdun Dynasty about a hundred years ago, could breakthrough to the demi-god realm, is sufficient to illustrate just how terrifying his strength must be.

    Stratholme the old monster whose appearance was inconsistent with his actual age addressed the upper-ss woman as ¡®Elder Sister Tiana¡¯. Although Han Shuo is one of the highest ranking members in the Dark Mantle, he had no idea who this upper-ss woman was. But by inferring on how Stratholme addressed her, Han Shuo reasoned that this woman must be somewhat older than Stratholme.

    ¡°Lancelot Empire? Since when did the Lancelot Empire possess an expert of such youth?¡± Tiana was somewhat bbergasted and she, in a puzzled face, looked towards the old monster Stratholme and lighting sacred magus Reynold.

    ¡°Bryan? Are you the city lord of Brettle City, that Bryan?¡± At first, Stratholme¡¯s brows were creased, but soon after he realized something and beam of glistering light shoot out from his eyes,nding on Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    ¡°That¡¯s right!¡± Han Shuo admitted.

    ¡°No wonder. It seems that rumors still possess some truth in them. I always thought that the Lancelot Empire exaggerated in saying that you forced two sacred-grade experts to retreat. Now it seems that there had indeed been such an incident!¡± the old monster said as he nodded.

    When lighting sacred magus Reynold heard Han Shuo admit his identity, he focused his attention on Han Shuo. After carefully sizing Han Shuo up, with a weird look on his face, he said, ¡°So it¡¯s you. Hmm, what a brazen young man. Interesting.¡±

    ¡°Alright, let¡¯s cut to the chase. I believe everyone is aware of the situation. For the time being, we don¡¯t have to worry about the whole sequence of events, but I presume that all of you know the nature of the twelve balls. The four fes with the five horns, each possessed demi-god like strength. None among the four of us have the chance to seed by going in alone. Are you all interested in cooperating?¡± Tiana the upper-ss woman interrupted.

    ¡°Of course! The sooner the better!¡± Stratholme the old monster was the first to concur.

    Lighting sacred magus Reynold of Brut Merchant Alliance, not only nodded in immediate response, but he added further, ¡±I¡¯m aware of my capabilities. Of the twelve balls, I¡¯m only asking for the Origin Crystal of Lightning. Moreover, I will be in charge of dealing with the aftermath!¡±

    ¡°Alright. After it¡¯s done, the Origin Crystal of Lightning will be yours. As for the both of you, we will divide the spoils ording to our contributions. Any objections?¡± Tiana said solemnly as she looked at the old monster and Han Shuo. Naturally, she expects Han Shuo to agree to the proposal.

    ¡°I don¡¯t have any objections. I trust that elder sister Tiana will be impartial!¡± Stratholme replied in a rxed manner as he shrugged. Immediately after that he turned to look at Han Shuo and asked, ¡°What about you?¡±

    Han Shuo saw fit to join forces with them. However, it seemed that all of them knew about the nature of the spheres, and only Han Shuo had no idea about their functions, even though he could sense the boundless energy within. Therefore, when Stratholme averted the question to him, Han Shuo replied awkwardly, ¡°I have no objection either. It¡¯s just that, erm, honorable elders, what exactly are those twelve round spheres?¡±

    All three of them simultaneously turned expressionless, as they took a double take at Han Shuo. Stratholme stared nkly for a while, and said smilingly, ¡°You don¡¯t know?¡±

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo honestly admitted, ¡°I really don¡¯t know.¡±

    ¡°Those are Origin Crystals of elements. After merging it with a magus¡¯ soul, it will morph the soul into a Soul of Element, causes the magus¡¯ affinity of the element to improve by a hundredfold, and reach a state where they will be mostpatible with their elemental energy ¨C a magus with Soul of Element could deploy magical spells instantaneously. Also, it will speed up a magus¡¯prehension towards the understanding of the energy of same origin. Erm, in short, itprises of a lengthy list of benefits!¡± Stratholme the old monster exined for Han Shuo forthright.

    ¡°The most important thing to note is that, only a magus that has formed a Soul of Element possesses the capabilities to be a god in their line of magic. Soul of Element and Body of Element are the foundations for a magus to be a god!¡± The upper-ss woman Tiana added on top of old monster Stratholme¡¯s exnation in a grave expression.

    After hearing what both of them had to say, brilliant rays shot out from lightning sacred magus Reynold¡¯s eyes like bite-sized lightning bolts were being discharged within his eyes. It was obvious that he was extremely thrilled.

    Han Shuo, who was just as shocked, let out a soft cry. He finally understood why they were so excited and restless. Shortly after, he turned his attention to the twelve round balls far in the distance. After a short pause, he asked, ¡°There are four balls without the presence of pure and intense elements. What about those?¡±

    ¡°Your are indeed attentive in your observations. Not all magic in this world is necessarily reliant on elements. Space magic and summoning magic are examples of that. Ok, the interior of those two spheres are in a neb state. Those are the principles and profoundprehension towards space magic and summoning, and they can fuse with a magus¡¯ soul to form Soul of Principles, which is somewhat simr to the Soul of Element. Soul of Principles could be used by a magus to further their understanding towards the mysteries of space or summoning, and it is only by having a certain level ofprehension towards the mysteries of those principles, that a magus could truly be a god, instead of demigod!¡± the upper-ss woman Tiana exined after she gazed at Han Shuo in an astonished manner, somewhat surprised at Han Shuo¡¯s remarkable sensory.

    ¡°Thest two balls. The one constantly radiating lights of fighting aura is suitable for swordsman and knights to use, and helps warriors like us, form a Soul of War. Again, it has different effectspared to the others, but in essence it is basically the same ¨C allowing us to save a hundred or even a few hundred years worth of time, in making our souls to possess the foundations of bing a god. As for thest sphere that carries the aura of destruction, er, only suitable for psychos. No sane person would ever touch that!¡± Stratholme continued.

    ¡°Let¡¯s move, there¡¯s no more time for chit-chat!¡± Tiana suddenly spoke. Right after she finished those words, an azure coloured staff appeared in her hand.

 Chapter 452: Demonic Blades

    GDK 452: Demonic des

    The azure staff materialized in Tiana¡¯s hand and immediately, the element of water came to life in the region, which had just regained a presence of elements. The dry air was now filled with moisture, while the nket of fog that lingered around Tiana grew thicker.

    ¡°Reynold, take care of those in the outermost perimeter. You two get close to retrieve the Origin Crystal. I will deploy magic from the sides to assist the two of you. Tiana bluntly elected herself to be the leader, as the staff in her hand began to rapidly absorb the rich element of water in the region.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± shouted the old monster Stratholme in a low voice. A simple and unadorned longsword the width of about two fingers fell into his hand. Immediately after he spoke, he flew off a hundred meters away, charging straight towards the aliens, who were holding some sort of wicked ceremony.

    Han Shuo was empty-handed. When he saw Stratholme suddenly on the move, Han Shuo reduced to a cloud of ck light and followed tightly behind Stratholme. While in the air, Han Shuo¡¯s ten fingernails started to grow rapidly. Within the blink of an eye, they were a meter long. His frightening fingernails twinkled with the incisive gloss of the edge of a knife.

    ¡®Demonic des¡¯ was a demonic art that could only be practiced by one who had reached the Carnal Realm, as the body of a demonic practitioner could only prompt the sudden growth of demonic ws within the realm. Naturally, those in the demonic sect would not simply call their own fingernails, however long they were, ¡®ws¡¯, therefore they were dubbed ¡®Demonic des¡¯.

    After the meter-long fingernails were perfused with demonic yuan, the Demonic des truly resembled sharp des, even somewhat sharper than some regr grade A weapons.

    When Stratholme the old monster finally found the time to take a nce behind, he was shocked by the bizarre changed on Han Shuo¡¯s two hands, wondering, is this kid even human? How are his nails sharper than the sharpest knives?

    Buzz... Buzz...

    The aliens in the midst of a procession immediately sensed some iing danger. They let out an ear-piercing noise that resonated through the sky. For one who was no real expert like Han Shuo and the three, one such as Cecilia, that buzzing alone would cause their eardrums to rupture.

    ¡°I¡¯ll go right and you take the left. Let¡¯s move!¡± Stratholme the old monster shouted loudly. An unhealthy light grey appeared on his handsome face. Before Han Shuo could answer, the old monster¡¯s speed multiplied abruptly, and he streaked across the surface of the vastke in an instant, heading into the isle covered with aliens.

    With one sweep of the longsword in Stratholme¡¯s hand, colourless and formless fighting aura erupted like a volcano. The bodies of a dozen or more aliens closest to Stratholme exploded violently, shattering into pieces just three meters from him.

    For swordsmen and knights, even though they possessed fighting aura, their fighting aura carried different colours. From the pale blue fighting aura of a swordsman apprentice to the gold fighting aura of a sacred swordmaster, they all varied in colours. Legend had it that only an expert who had broke through to divine swordmaster could possess colourless and formless fighting aura. This Stratholme before his eyes was evidently one of the said experts on the level of divine swordmaster.

    If not for Han Shuo¡¯s mighty consciousness, and his unwavering attention to Stratholme¡¯s attack movements, he perhaps wouldn¡¯t have had so easily noticed the intimidating colourless, formless fighting aura condensed in his longsword. Without any colour as indicators, the opponent would hardly be able to tell just how horrific the fighting aura was, and it would surely leave any opponent of his with a headache.

    Absolutely marvelous! Indeed a true, out-and-out demigod expert! No wonder sacred swordmaster Karel and Dempus suffered such a crestfallen defeat. Han Shuo thought inwardly, having witnessed Stratholme¡¯s attack.

    Even while observing Stratholme, Han Shuo¡¯s own movements weren¡¯t slowing a tad. By the time Stratholme swept out his longsword, Han Shuo hadnded in the middle of another side of the aliens. Hundreds of humanoids with green skin, python-like tails and one or two horns on their head, coldly fixed their green eyes on Han Shuo. A dozen or more of those aliens were already charging at him.

    ¡°Hmph, just in time to try my new demonic art Demonic des on you fools,¡± Han Shuo said to himself in a low voice, sneering. His two ded hands moved sinctly in a criss-cross motion. Dazzling lights shed one after another as Han Shuo made his way forward,ughing grimly.

    The few aliens that had tried to approach him were now sliced into shreds, their bodies reduced to the fleshy equivalent of julienned vegetables. Some of those aliens even maintained running position, but their heads and half of their bodies would fall apart cleanly.

    Even more aliens turned into severed limbs and corpses in a sh. Perhaps Han Shuo had waved his Demonic des too rapidly, or maybe the Demonic des themselves were excessively sharp, but there was not a single shriek from the aliens, not even an expression of pain on their faces.

    As if an incorporeal incisive weapon was being unceasingly whirled around his body at such high speeds it was impossible to see, Han Shuo advanced towards the center of the isle and the aliens who were charging towards him from all around simply split into pieces. Not one of them could get anywhere closer than three meters to Han Shuo.

    Lightning sacred magus Reynold who had just releasedrge-scale lightning magic, ¡®Omnipresent Lightning¡¯, revealed a rather ugly expression. Under his voice he eximed, ¡°What a terrifying young man. It¡¯s no wonder Brettel City was left so brazen!¡±

    Just then, a dense element of lightning converged from all around. The bright, clear sky turned into hundreds, maybe thousands of lightning bolts with the girth of an infant¡¯s arm. Apanied by the fierce rumbling of thunder, the lightning tangled in the air like dragons before striking the isle in the middle of theke.

    At longst, Han Shuo finally witnessed just the severity of a magical spell cast by a sacred grade magus!

    Hundreds of thousands of lightning bolts struck down like a thunderstorm in the bright, clear sky. Jolts of lightning of differing diameters filled the sky. Although Reynold¡¯s target was merely the isle in the middle of theke, the coverage area of this ¡®Omnipresent Lightning¡¯ spell was clearly far wider.

    As thunder and lightning bombarded the ground below, the deep blueke transformed into an ocean of electrical sparks. The tranquility of theke waspletely disrupted by the rumbling. One after another, jets of water mixed with the power of lightning shot to the sky. The water pirs were extremely muddy, obviously expelled from the bottom of theke by the thunder.

    Strands of electric currents flooded the bigke. Fish and shrimp, which weren¡¯t considered magical creatures, floated on the surface with their stomachs to the sky, dead beyond all doubt.

    If the mere boundary was such a horrific sight already, then surely those aliens on the isle, the true targets, were suffering even more devastation. Heavy lightning struck thend, densely packed. Each and everyone of those aliens copsed to the ground, letting off thick, ck smoke.

    Of the aliens with less than three horns on their heads, not one survived the attack of the lightning magic.

    Those with three horns were trembling to insanity, and must have suffered rather extensive injuries. Only the four-horned aliens emerged unscathed. Each of them had their eyes locked firmly on Stratholme and Han Shuo, ready to gang up and attack.

    The five-horned alien leaders had managed not only to deflect all lightning, but before the lightning even came close to them, they perished due to the energy they emitted, causing absolutely no harm. Of the four alien leaders, two remained in their posts to proceed with the ceremony, while the other two slowly rose up to the sky, and headed towards Stratholme and Han Shuo.

    For Stratholme and Han Shuo, as the main assault forces, this kind of high-coverage lightning magic had hardly any adverse effects on them. They continued to charge towards the altar.

    The aliens with one or two horns had had no chance of attacking Stratholme, and were massacred under the two¡¯s attacks. And while those with three horns could, with a higher moving speed and better bodily defense, they were barely enough to resist the two for a while, yet unable to hinder the pace of the two as they charged ahead.

    However, the four-horned aliens were flight-capable. Over a dozen of these aliens closed in on Stratholme and Han Shuo separately. Even with the incisive longsword and Demonic des wielded by Stratholme and Han Shuo respectively, they could only leave blood traces, and couldn¡¯t behead the aliens effortlessly like before.

    The four-horned aliens were, despite their strength, somewhat inferior to a sacred swordmaster, they weren¡¯t much of a gap apart. Surrounded by threateningly powerful four-horned aliens, even Han Shuo and Stratholme held back.

    But even more frightening was that two of the alien leaders with five horns were stepping down from the altar. Han Shuo had long appraised the strength of these two alien chiefs. Their cold green eyescked the emotion that any mortal being would disy. Even as they approached, a kind of destructive aura wildly converging on their bodies.

    ¡°Elder Sister Tiana, can you do it now?¡± Stratholme the old monster yelled.

    ¡°Hang in there for two minutes. It will be ready very soon!¡± Tiana replied from a great distance.

    Han Shuo felt the temperature was dropping rapidly in the area. The vastke, which was still spurting a moment before, had actually turned into thickyer of ice at some point. Lightning still thrashed now and then, but surprisingly, were unable to break the thickyer of ice. The even more terrifying fact was that the surrounding temperature was ever falling. There seemed not to be a hint of warmth between heaven and earth, only a spine-chilling coldness.

 Chapter 453: Icebound

    GDK 453: Icebound

    As the pair of five-horned aliens dove downwards, Han Shuo felt an enormous pressure crashing onto him. One of them was plunging towards Han Shuo from high up in the air. The five horns protruding from its head were ring with cold, dark green light, causing them to look like five jade batons from afar.

    Before Han Shuo could even react, he felt his consciousness being violently stung by five mysterious energy forces. The five rays of energy felt like sharp awls, dealing an enormous stabbing pain onto Han Shuo.

    His consciousness seemed to be thumped!

    The whirling motion Han Shuo was making with his two hands while wielding Demonic des abruptly halted. The seven four-horned aliens which had surrounded Han Shuo continued to close in on him, and the horns on their heads simrly shone with dark green radiance. Shortly after, twenty-eight mysterious energy forces came pouring into Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, and with that followed another twenty-eight weaker attacks on his soul.

    What a splitting headache!

    That was the most direct string of blows he had ever perceived. The acute pain even caused Han Shuo momentary vertigo and hallucination. Although an attack on the soul was a rather straightforward technique, it could give one an immense pain as though his brain was being rummaged with knife des.

    Countless years of cultivation in the demonic arts had caused Han Shuo to develop his ability to endure pain to an extraordinary stage. Not only did the demonic arts allow Han Shuo¡¯s soul to evolve into a high-level consciousness, it also made his consciousness more tenacious and miraculous than a normal human being could ever imagine.

    In all those days of the constant, perverted tempering of his body, he had endured pain and agony that no ordinary person could endure. Thus, when the stinging pain suddenly burst forth in his mind, the dizziness onlysted for two seconds!

    After those two seconds, the blood essence within Han Shuo¡¯s demonic infant red up, and instantaneously, his consciousness gained an inexhaustible energy.

    Unexpectedly, the lump of consciousness in his brain broke into millions of strands. The energy forces attacking Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness suddenly lost their target!

    A momentter, Han Shuo¡¯s scattered consciousness regrouped at the site of his demonic infant.

    The altogether thirty-three soul-attacking energy forces reacted as they sensed the reappearance of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. However, before they could attack again, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, which was fused with the demonic infant, suddenly released an absorption force of utmost ferocity!

    The ¡®Demonic Art of Assimtion¡¯, which represented the inherent attribute of demonic cultivators to devour everything, was deployed with the demonic infant as the root. A violent vortex formed.

    Of the mysterious energy forces aimed at attacking Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, twenty-eight were trapped by the absorption force before they could pull out from Han Shuo¡¯s body!

    Han Shuo tightened his consciousness. Like a giant whale inhaling, twenty-eight soul-attacking energy forces entered the tiny mouth of the demonic infant.

    The five mysterious energy forces that originated from the alien leader, however, seemed to be a step ahead. When Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness regathered in the demonic infant to form the ¡®Demonic Art of Assimtion¡¯, the five mysterious energies seemed to have sensed danger and escaped from Han Shuo¡¯s body in advance.

    ¡°ROAR!¡± Han Shuo shouted loudly after having sensed his demonic infant breaking down and absorbing the mysterious energy. The Demonic des in his two hands thawed and resumed their rapid whirling.

    When the five horns on the alien leader shone brightly it was already charging rapidly towards the seven quadrahorned alien experts. The green pupils that locked coldly on Han Shuo suddenly seemed to contain an extra trace of fear. The blueish-green lustered horns on their heads turned a bleak shade.

    Only the alien leader that descended from the top of the altar retained the tint of its five horns. It looked as if the five mysterious energy forces that left Han Shuo¡¯s body in advance had been recalled to its source, so as to not suffer further damage.

    Before reaching the Carnal Realm, Han Shuo already understood that the demonic arts, which benefits one to the detriment of others, possesses the miraculous ability to engulf energy. With Han Shuo¡¯s leveling up in demonic realm, the demonic infant¡¯s ability to engulf energy for its own use became increasingly prominent.

    However, perhaps it was because demonic cultivators belonged to an extremely wicked faction, the demon infant¡¯s engulfment seemed to reject all positive energy, including holy energy and fighting aura. It was as though the demon infant refused to absorb this energy in order to preserve the pure wickedness of the energy in Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    When it came to chaotic, negative energy that caused violence and corruption, no matter how strange or mysterious the origin, once it fell deep into Han Shuo¡¯s body, the demonic infant would always magically absorb it, and convert it into the purest, most suitable energy for the demon infant to continue growing and evolving.

    It was such with the wicked energy in Elizabeth¡¯s body, and with the energy contained in the bodies of these overtly unkind aliens.

    Subconsciously, Han Shuo realized that he himself was the big heretic of the evil faction. All kinds of evil energy was his to use!

    I am, indeed, a bad guy! Not only that, I¡¯m the also the bad guy that punishes other bad guys!

    As Han Shuo thought to himself andughed, the Demonic des in his two hands revolved rapidly, producing shes nearly invisible to the naked eye.

    As for the four-horned aliens nearest to Han Shuo that were unable to retreat in time; before, Han Shuo¡¯s Demonic des could leave only blood trails on their bodies. But now, after a round of Demonic des shes, Han Shuo discovered that the new wounds on the seven alien experts around him were deep to the bone!

    The trace of fear in the green pupils of the seven alien experts turned into shear dread. All of a sudden, the seven aliens that surrounded him stepped away from Han Shuo uniformly. Fresh, reeking green blood gushed uncontrobly from the new cuts on their bodies!

    Han Shuo, too, was dazed. He inspected the meter-long Demonic des, almost bbergasted, not understanding why his Demonic des could suddenly deal such extensive injury to the seven aliens.

    After some careful thinking, Han Shuo noticed that the only difference between this attack and previous attacks was that the demonic infant had now absorbed the mysterious energy that attacked his soul from the seven aliens. Could the reason have been his demon infant¡¯s absorption of the twenty-eight strands of mysterious energy from the aliens?

    ¡°Hey! Elder Sister Tiana, could you hurry up a little?¡± Stratholme¡¯s yell sounded a short distance away from Han Shuo as he was pondering.

    When Han Shuo turned his head, he discovered that Stratholme was swimming around a group of aliens. Wielding a longsword, his lily-embroidered robe was daubed with fresh green blood. Stratholme gave the impression that he was some sort of germaphobe as he appeared to be extremely ufortable with the green blood sttered on his robe.

    He attacked with his longsword, swerving around the group of aliens, and would sh off the corners of his bloodstained robe from time to time. Even at such a moment of life and death, he was concerned with the cleanliness of his robe. This simply left Han Shuo betweenughter and tears.

    Stratholme seemed slightly flustered. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but sigh at just how mighty and experienced Stratholme the old monster was. All throughout, he did not allow the five-horned alien leader a chance to get near to him, and rather moved around the four-horned aliens that surrounded him in a wonderful pattern. Again and again he would strike with his sword, and there would be another blood hole on an alien¡¯s body.

    Ginger gets spicier with age. This old monster is a cunning and seasoned adversary, Han Shuo thought as he formed an impression of Stratholme.

    ¡°Done!¡± yelled upper-ss woman Tiana from her distant hiding ce.

    Soon after, the temperature in the region plunged. Gusts of bone-chilling wind converged in an instant and slithered around like a giant anaconda. Even the four-horned aliens, once swept by the cold air, froze into ice sculptures. Among those formed were four columns of cold air of the greatest thickness, and they fiercely enveloped each and every one of the four alien leaders.

    The two on top at the altar and another two under the altar were shrouded by dense, frigid air, specifically prepared for them by Tiana. The four alien leaders, who were nearly a head taller than the rest of their species, did not immediately turn into ice even through the cold air, so cold it could freeze space-time itself.

    But still, they suffered some effects. Their bodies were visibly freezing. Crackling noises could be heard from the alien leader pursuing Stratholme, as its speed decreased gradually. And finally it was as slow as a snail, its bodily functionsrgelypromised by the cold air.

    After that one magical spell was deployed by Tiana, the space between the heaven and earth became a frozen realm. The entireke was frozen over. The cold air, the atmosphere, human shadows; everything seemed to have paused. Besides Stratholme the old monster, Han Shuo, and Tiana, nothing could leap or frisk about.

    Han Shuo, too, quivered and silently cursed about the crippling coldness! After a few nces at the five-horned alien moving sluggish, yet mechanically, Han Shuo was finally certain that Tiana was a water divine magus. Otherwise, her bone-chilling air would never have been able to freeze the demi-godlike aliens.

    ¡°Now is the time, go grab the things!¡±manded Tiana. A trace of unquestionable excitement could be heard in her voice.

    The Origin Crystal of Water!

    Despite having lived as long as she had, hiding in the shadows of the continent for however many years she had, it still proved an unrestrainable temptation for the water divine magus!

    ¡°Move!¡± yelled Stratholme the old monster suddenly. A new set of silvery-grey, lily-embroidered robes reced his previous frayed robe. His gaze was fervent as he watched the round sphere radiating lights of fighting aura. His body shot out like lightning.

    Of course, Han Shuo didn¡¯t want to fall behind. For the first time ever, he deployed ¡®Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens¡¯ to its fullest. Reynold and Tiana were blind to his flight path. By the time he had reached the top of the altar, his own shadow under the altar where he had just stood had yet to vanish.

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 Chapter 454: Plundering Treasures

    GDK 454: Plundering Treasures

    When Han Shuo and Stratholme the old monster arrived at the top of the altar, neither seemed to have any hesitation whatsoever. They immediately reached their hands out to grab the twelve balls hoisted by the fleshy tentacles.

    Needless to say, Stratholme the old monster first grabbed the sphere radiating lights of fighting aura, while Han Shuo aimed at the sphere emanating the pure aura of death. Out of some miracle, Han Shuo happened tond just where he needed to, near the orb that he had been eyeing so yearningly. As he extended his mighty hand, his meter-long fingernails shrunk and vanished bafflingly.

    Just before Han Shuo¡¯s mighty hand couldnd on the orb, an anomaly urred. The twelve tentacles, which had been static since they rose from the altar, suddenly began to writhe frantically. To his surprise, he managed to grasp nothing but the air.

    ¡°Huh?!¡± Stratholme cried out in surprise. His body shifted at high speed, andyers of phantom trails of his hands could be seen. His eyes were fixed on the Origin Crystal of Fighting Aura, not letting go for even a moment.

    The twelve fleshy tentacles wriggled about much like a monster. Clouds of heavy green mist began to drift from the middle of the altar which, in an instant, had spread all around the isle. A shiver ran down Han Shuo¡¯s spine and he was sure something was very wrong.

    Meanwhile, the four five-horned aliens icebound by Tiana¡¯s cold streams of air, let out popping sounds as their green skin made contact with the mist. Their stiff bodies began to tremble, apanied by creaking noises. Their sluggish movements became faster and faster. The two alien leaders on the altar shot cold stares at Han Shuo and Stratholme respectively.

    ¡°Quick! They have broken the seal,¡± warned Tiana anxiously, raising her voice from afar.

    Han Shuo recovered from his trance and his demonic yuan began to churn faster than ever. The alien on the altar charged at Han Shuo and thetter suddenly roared.

    Twelve mystical demons which had been hiding in the surroundings in an immaterial state suddenly solidified to form physical bodies. Each and everyone of them let out malevolent and horrifying shrieks as they stormed towards the twelve spheres.

    Han Shuo paid no heed to the alien headed straight at him but sped up to maximum capacity and stared fixedly at the sphere overflowing with the pure aura of death.

    Deep within his heart arose a sort of feeling of unwell. Although he had confidence in the speed of his twelve mystical demons, the leakage of strange scents from the altar along with the green mist gave Han Shuo a palpitating uneasiness.

    He therefore could not ce all his hope on his twelve mystical demons. He, too, made a move without the slightest hesitation.

    Buzz Buzz...

    An insufferable buzz sounded from the mucousy mouth at the center of the altar. An eerie sensation that would make one¡¯s hair to stand on end disseminated throughout the region in a second.

    This buzzing was as sharp as a sword and carried an unstoppable soul-attacking firepower. Compared to the soul attack that the five-horned alien leader unleashed just prior, this one was over ten times as strong!

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness took a hit before he was able topletely scatter it. The pricking pain that followed exceeded any sort of pain that Han Shuo had ever suffered in all his years.

    Unable to withstand the ache on his consciousness, Han Shuo almost fainted and his vision blurred. Within a split second, a fantasynd arose in Han Shuo¡¯s mind, his hands and feet turned cold and limp.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness sustained heavy damage. His body fell through the air involuntarily.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, still hallucinating, felt twelve small, consecutive stabs of pain. Of course, rtive to the sting loud buzzing on his consciousness, this kind of pain was totally negligible.

    However, it was precisely thanks to these twelve stabs of pain projected in his consciousness that Han Shuo, who had entered and of fantasy due to the fainting, promptly awoke. His body did not continue to plunge helplessly towards the ground.

    At the next moment, Han Shuo realized that the twelve mystical demons he had painstakingly refined had their souls allpletely annihted!

    The horrible buzzing was mixed with soul attacking energy. Given that even Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness could suffer serious damage, the twelve mystical demons refined from his blood essence clearly would never have survived!

    Upon regaining awareness, Han Shuo halted the fall of his body. He suddenly found that right beside him were three spheres emanating different energies.

    One was the Origin Crystal containing the pure element of death, another Origin Crystal contained the pure element of darkness. Thest sphere was brimming with the energy of destruction!

    Perhaps it was because the three balls were a ss of treasure that only an evil powerhouse would be willing to hold together. When the awful loud buzzing began, the twelve madly convulsing muscles ceased to move. Eventhough Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness had suffered a heavy blow and nearly fell off, by clinging onto his determination, he arrived at the three spheres.

    Of course, the twelve mystical demons had yed a role as well. Were it not for the deaths of the twelve mystical demons reflecting their pains onto their host, Han Shuo might regrettably have had fallen into the giant grotesque mouth at the center of the altar!

    Without any hesitation and with great difficulty, Han Shuo resisted the difort in his brain, took out the Demonyer Edge which was still in hibernation stage and made use of its incisiveness to cut off three of the tentacles. Subsequently, his space ring shed and the three orbs entered his space ring, along with the tentacles holding them.

    After sessfully collecting three Origin Crystals, Han Shuo felt somewhat more relieved of the sorrow of losing his twelve mystical demons. At a nce, Han Shuo¡¯s gaze locked on an Origin Crystal of Fire ten meters away from him. Just as he was about to make a move to collect it, he heard Stratholme the old monster¡¯s shout, ¡°Hurry! Get out of here!¡±

    This loud warning from Stratholme was meant specifically for Han Shuo. Han Shuo immediately turned his head to look at Stratholme, and suddenly discovered that his silvery-grey robe was stained with fresh blood, dark red in colour. His seven apertures flowed unceasingly with blood. It was apparent that the fresh blood on his new robe was his own.

    The bewitching, charming demeanor usually borne by Stratholme had vanished. His humiliating look made Han Shuo somewhat fearful. He did not even deal with the fresh blood on his body, but with a frightened look on his face, gazed down at that disgusting mouth that had been constantly fed with magical beasts¡¯ crystal cores and heart.

    Following along Stratholme¡¯s line of sight, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but look down at it as well.

    All he saw inside was arge, green head covered in thick pus, slowly forcing his way out. Han Shuo could tell that it was the head of another green-skinned alien. This one had a skull somewhatrger than those of the four alien leaders.

    Most significantly, however, was that there were six horns on its head!

    The five-horned aliens already possessed strength equivalent to a demigod¡¯s. As to just how powerful this six-horned alien must be, Han Shuo dared not imagine!

    Even with the sensing ability of his consciousness, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t sense the presence of this emerging alien. Based on Han Shuo¡¯s understanding of demonic arts, he was sure that this alien possessed strength far superior to anyone in the region!

    No wonder Stratholme the old monster was so frightened and wanted to leave. It was afraid that this alien who was about to arise could have the strength of a true god!

    ¡°Run!¡± Tiana screamed at the top of her lungs. Han Shuo could sense that she had immediately put her words into action. Her presence became further and further from this region!

    ¡°Run!¡± the old monster again shouted. He turned a blind eye to the remaining Origin Crystals which were almost within reach around him and flew away at speeds even faster than when he rushed over.

    Given that his body was currently seriously injured, and he was yet able to deploy that skill with speed faster than when he had entered, this was sufficient to illustrate that he overdrafted his energy to escape.

    ¡°My... my Origin Crystal of Lighting!¡± Reynold¡¯s unreconciling moan came from a distance. He was jumping up and down as though he had lost his mind. Stratholme the old monster, however, was none too concerned and would not pause for even a moment to help Reynold collect the Origin Crystal of Lightning not too far from him.

    At this stage, Han Shuo did not hesitate. Just as Stratholme the old monster made a move, Han Shuo too gathered all the energy within his body to escape. He took onest regretful look at the remaining spheres before finally turning away.

    Of the twelve spheres, Han Shuo had obtained three. The orbs containing fighting aura and pure element of water were, however, missing. Stratholme the old monster ought to have sessfully collected them. Seven Origin Crystals, including the Origin Crystal of Lightning, sat there motionless as before.

    However, neither Stratholme nor Han Shuo dared to stay any longer to collect more!

    Unusually, instead of chasing after the escaping Han Shuo and Stratholme, the five-horned aliens all gathered at the huge mouth where the terrifying six-horned alien was ripping it apart as it struggled free itself. They jointly teared the huge mouth, helping the formidable six-horned alien to break free from it.

    ¡°My... my... my Origin Crystal!¡± lightning sacred magus Reynold of Brut Merchant Alliance murmured rmed as he stared at the Origin Crystal of Lightning from afar, jumping up and down.

    ¡°If you are still not leaving, then you shall die here,¡± said Stratholme the old monster who was spitting up blood after he arrived beside Reynold. After serving him his final alert, he flurried towards the outside, not taking another look at Reynold.

    ¡°My... My... Origin Crystal...¡± Suddenly, Reynold was no longer jumping up and down in fury, but seemed to be dazed and gaped nkly at the Origin Crystal emitting the purest elemental aura. Han Shuo had travelled the distance of a kilometer and arrived beside Reynold. He shot a nce at Reynold, who wore a nk, stupefied expression, but did not say a word. He rapidly shot away following behind Stratholme.

    Reynold was a lightning sacred magus of the Brut Merchant Alliance. Han Shuo held an unfavorable impression towards the Brut Merchant Alliance. Reynold, who had actively participated in the governmental affairs of the Brut Merchant Alliance, might have had even secretly assaulted Brettel City in the past. On top of that, it was inevitable that the two would turn against each other in due time. At this point Han Shuo couldn¡¯t care less if Reynolds lived or died.

 Chapter 455: The Abandoned Sacred Magus

    GDK 455: The Abandoned Sacred Magus

    Soon enough, Han Shuo caught up with Stratholme the old monster and water divine magus Tiana.

    When they arrived at the defensive shield, a mortifying aura shrouded thend. A suffocating pressure pushed down against them.

    The three exchanged nces aghast, before Stratholme the old monster eximed, ¡°This can¡¯t be good. It has arisen!¡±

    Han Shuo and Tiana both knew who the old monster was referring to. Tiana¡¯s calm, frail face changed and she reached out her hand stick with utmost agility to the region defended by exotic energy. An ice awl sparkling with cold light suddenly materialized in her palm. The dense water element within was menacing. She directed the ice awl towards the space defending this area as it shot out.

    Creak!

    The ice awl of the water divine magus, seemed to be pricked on the toughest iron and stone in the world. The ice awl shattered into a million pieces!

    Their hearts sank in unison. Stratholme the old monster questioned, ¡°Elder sister Tiana, what¡¯s wrong?¡±

    ¡°The energy has been reinforced. I can¡¯t break this defense!¡± exined Tiana with a trace of panic in her voice. Her face grew ugly.

    Stratholme the old monster furrowed his brows. The longsword, which he had carried in his hand all along and never stored in the space ring, began to emit a fighting aura like fireworks, albeit colourless and formless. A dazzling white light shed.

    Stratholme gathered all the remaining energy he had and struck at the defense field.

    ng!

    Just as before, his bombardment seemed to havended on an immovable stone. He pulled back his slightly trembling right arm. In an expression of overwhelming shock, he growled, ¡°I can¡¯t break it either!¡±

    One magic attack and another physical attack, but neither worked!

    ¡°That thing got out. He must have reinforced the defense energy! We might not be able to break through it,¡± Han Shuo said heavily as he looked at the two bewildered demigod-like experts. It was clear to him that the six-horned alien race must have done just that.

    Buzz Buzz...

    A strange loud buzzing began in the distance. Unlike the previous buzzing that attacked Han Shuo¡¯s and the old monster¡¯s souls, this one came with some peculiar effects. It seemed to be able to rip apart the sky. Fine lines of space ripples appeared in the sky, bright, colorful chasms appeared beneath the cracks in the air.

    The old monster Stratholme and Tiana exchanged nces. They simultaneously exhaled breaths of cold air. Gaping at the rifts in the air radiating colourful light, their faces turned an ugly expression.

    Stratholme, who had just pulled out a scroll in his hand, turned to Tiana as though he would weep and said, ¡°The fluctuation of the space is too violent. The space magic scroll can¡¯t be deployed at all. This guy has cut off all of our escape routes!¡±

    At this point, even Tiana was at her wit¡¯s end. She shook her head and sighed, ¡°We¡¯re going to die here. Stratholme, this is my fault. I¡¯ve failed you. I never expected to face such a beast!¡±

    The two with their demigod strengths were unable to break through the defense that enclosed this region by means of their own strength. The next best thing they could do to survive was to utilize a space magic scroll, rip apart spacetime and escape through it. However, that shrill caused fissures in space. Within a chaotic space, a space magic scroll was of absolutely no use. There, indeed, seemed to be no hope of escaping.

    ¡°My turn!¡± Han Shuo, who had not said anything but remained calm all along, suddenly spoke.

    The reason Han Shuo managed to appear calm all the while was that he still had a few tricks up his sleeves!

    The gazes of the two demigod experts immediatelynded on Han Shuo¡¯s body. The old monster stared nkly for a while before he asked, ¡°You, you have a way?¡±

    Han Shuo did not answer, but chanted an incantation. The foolish-looking earth elite zombie suddenly appeared. Stratholme the old monster and Tiana both looked at each other with obvious doubt in their eyes. They seemed to have no idea what purpose this low-level zombie warrior could serve at such a moment.

    Suddenly, a most astonishing phenomenon ured before their eyes.

    When the mindless zombie warrior fell to the ground, its body melted into the earth, much to their surprise. The hard ground seemed to pose no resistance against it and its body rapidly disappeared.

    In this world, although an earth magus could utilize the power of the earth, they could only do so for offense or defense. They couldn¡¯t explicitly utilize the energy of the earth to bore through it at will, like the earth elite zombie, the favoured son of the earth, could.

    Therefore, when the body of earth elite zombie sank into the ground like quicksand, the divine magus and divine swordmaster both gawked in disbelief at the surreal sight before them and stood dumbfounded.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± called out Han Shuo, who was already deep inside the underground tunnel.

    The two demi-god existences turned from staggered to euphoric. They looked at each other and kept into the tunnel.

    ¡°Save... save me!¡± Just as the three entered the underground tunnel, the wailing of lightning sacred magus Reynold arrived from afar. His voice was riddled with fear.

    A choking pressure approached like a strong wind. Han Shuo and the others who had just entered the tunnel understood instantly what was going on ¨C the six-horned alien had emerged. Reynold attempted to flee towards the tunnel, presumably under the pursuit of alien experts.

    Han Shuo turned towards Stratholme and Tiana, and found the two with simrly creased brows, maintaining their silence with extreme rapport.

    They had given up on Reynold! Han Shuo understood this in his heart.

    Han Shuo knew what he needed to do next. He issued an order to the earth elite zombie. The thick, solid earth slowly filled up the opening to the underground tunnel.

    When Stratholme the old monster and Tiana saw thest trace of light vanished from above their heads, they exhaled. It was as though a boulder was relinquished from their hearts. Their appearances loosened up slightly as well.

    In the dark, Han Shuo had very clearly seen the expressions on their faces. He gained a deeper understanding towards human nature.

    It¡¯s every man for himself!

    ¡°Thank you, Bryan. You really are a lifesaver!¡± praised Stratholme the old monster, who was following behind Han Shuo.

    ¡°Don¡¯t fret it. We are partners. It¡¯s my duty!¡± Han Shuo replied in the darkness, although his heart could not ept that to be true.

    The real reason Han Shuo brought the two into the underground tunnel was that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t tell if he would run into any more terrifying dangerster on. Vaguely, through his instincts, Han Shuo felt that it wouldn¡¯t be so simple to escape alive this time. But with these two experienced fighters beside him, the three might have a greater chance of staying alive. It was only under such circumstances that Han Shuo was so willing to save the two.

    The three had obtained all the loot they seekers from the trip. There wasn¡¯t much discrepancy between their strengths, therefore they would have greater odds of escaping alive by working together. As for Reynold, he was a far stretch short of their strengths. At such drastic times, he would be of no use. It was the inevitable, logical move to abandon him.

    ¡°Elder Sister Tiana, this is your Origin Crystal of Water!¡± Stratholme drew out a ruby, which glowed a soft, warm red light in the darkness. Stratholme handed over the sphere.

    Turning his head to catch a glimpse, Han Shuo witnessed an unrestrainable excitement on Tiana¡¯s face. Her hand trembled as she caught and held onto the round sphere. With her eyes sparkling brightly, she murmured, ¡°Origin Crystal. I have an Origin Crystal!¡±

    Tiana was quite old. After the Origin Crystal was put into her space ring, having lived for so long , she learned quickly how to stabilize her emotions. After taking in a deep breath, she looked ahead towards Han Shuo who was leading the way and asked, ¡°How much longer until we get out?¡±

    ¡°Very soon! But I think you two can feel it too. Even here, deep underground, we can still feel that heavy pressure. I doubt we are truly safe yet!¡±

    Just two minutester, the earth elite zombie broke through the ground. The garish light of day peered through.

    The three lept out from the tunnel. Han Shuo took a quick scan through the surroundings. Before having a clear idea of where he was, his consciousness suddenly felt as though it was targeted. This feeling was anything but reassuring. Han Shuo immediately yelled, ¡°It knows where we are!¡±

    Although Stratholme the old monster and Tiana didn¡¯t have sensing capabilities as sharp as that of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, that stifling pressure they felt did not disappear. They understood right away that Han Shuo¡¯s words were true.

    ¡°Come with me. We¡¯ll walk and talk!¡± Tiana said with haste. The mist surrounding her turned once again thicker and she flew into the distance. Han Shuo and Stratholme followed behind her closely.

    ¡°The six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race has locked onto our souls. As long as we are within the Profound Continent, he will be able to find us. Their kind are innately good at understanding souls. They possess a profound understanding of souls, which I believe you have experienced for yourself. We simply can¡¯t break free from his soul targeting!¡± Tiana said to Han Shuo and Stratholme the old monster as she breezed past like the wind.

    ¡°Soul Race? What race is that? Why is it that I¡¯ve never heard of it?¡± Han Shuo asked, creasing his brows while trying to keep up.

    ¡°This is not a race from the Profound Continent. They appeared once in Profound Continent several thousand years ago, but then they disappeared and were never to be seen again. As to why they would suddenly show up in Tarrag Canyon this time, I have no idea either.

    ¡°The knowledge I have of this race, I¡¯ve only inadvertentlye across it in an ancient scroll. I have no way of knowing the specifics of what happened all those years ago. It was from their appearances that I surmised they are of the Soul Tribe,¡± Tiana exined.

    Tiana¡¯s eyes twinkled. Han Shuo did not expect Tiana to know nearly this much about the Soul Race. However, it¡¯ would have been inappropriate for Han Shuo to get to the heart of that matter.

    ¡°Elder Sister Tiana, could it be that once the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race recognizes our souls, we will have no option at all, but to merely wait for him to catch up and kill us?¡± Stratholme the old monster asked, concerned about his own safety.

    ¡°Not really. We have the Origin Crystals in our hands now. As long as we merge it with our souls and form Soul of Element, not even this six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race will be capable of sensing the locations of our souls. Once a Soul of Element is formed, we will fuse together and be one with the elements found everywhere between the heaven and earth. He will not be able to locate us,¡± Tiana exined.

    ¡°But the process of merging one¡¯s soul with an Origin Crystal takes time, during which he could possibly locate our souls, and kill us one by one. What are we to do?¡± Stratholme said with a bitter smile, as though he was ovee with sorrow having obtained a most valuable treasure that he would be unable to enjoy.

    A thought struck Han Shuo. He recalled that he could make use of the skeletal staff to have his consciousness descend into theherworld. Separated by boundless distance of different nes of existences, no matter how remarkable the abilities of this six-horned tribal king, there would be no way for him to detect the position of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. Han Shuo could simply fuse the Origin Crystal with his soul in theherworld and hide from the pursuit of this terrifying being.

    This would be the most dependable method. Furthermore, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was not like Tiana¡¯s or Stratholme¡¯s souls. Once one attained a certain realm in demonic arts, his soul underwent an evolution into an iparably superior consciousness. Han Shuo reckoned that, given a little bit of time, his consciousness would surely find a way to break free from the sensing of the six-horned creature.

    With that in mind, Han Shuo became at ease. But Han Shuo was still rather curious about this Soul Race, hence, he did not hasilty depart, but stayed to continue listening to the conversation between Tiana and Stratholme.

    ¡°There¡¯s still a way out for us,¡± Tiana said in a weird expression.

    ¡°What is it?¡± the old monster asked anxiously.

    ¡°By utilizing the transportation matrix facilities of various countries, we can travel faster than him. Then, if we bring him to a powerhouse with enough strength to contend against him, we could pit him against one of those few formidable existences within the Profound Continent. Then perhaps, we really will have a chance to escape this alive!¡± Tiana said to Stratholme after hesitating for a moment.

    The old monster¡¯s eyes lit up as he immediately understood what Tiana meant, and replied, ¡°Beings within Profound Continent that could resist the six-horned king of the Soul Race, you can count them with a single hand. Plus, the majority of them don¡¯t live in fixed locations. The only ones in fixed locations are those in the headquarters of the Church of Light and Cmity Church!¡±

    Han Shuo, who was nning to leave, was shocked, but continued to decide, ¡°Church of Light it is then!¡±

    Tiana and Stratholme the old monster both made a strange expression. The two exchanged nces, remained silent for a moment, and finally nodded in agreement with Han Shuo¡¯s proposal.

    For the Church of Light, who had always taken it upon themselves to exterminate heretics, to have such an obviously unkind race appearing at their headquarters ¨C Han Shuo thought this to be amusing.

 Chapter 456: Consciousness Healed

    GDK 456: Consciousness Healed

    With that decision made, the three set their individual agendas and they began executing their grand scheme with the objective of ensuring their own survival.

    Although Han Shuo had lost his twelve mystical demons, his consciousness could sense the vitalitying off from all kinds of life within range. However, he couldn¡¯t get a clear view of every nook and cranny like the mystical demons could.

    Luckily, Tiana and the old monster were rather familiar with the geography here, so Han Shuo need only follow their lead.

    Along the way, Tiana and Stratholme the old monster ceased to discuss anything meaningful, and Han Shuo could obtain little useful information from them. Of course, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t force them to talk if they didn¡¯t want to, although he was scheming in the back of his mind.

    The Profound Continent was vast and extensive. It housed numerous nations, countless tall mountains and deep oceans, and a whole variety of races, including the human race.

    No one could have fullyprehended just how many people there were on this continent with extraordinary talent and iprehensible power. Based on Tiana and Stratholme¡¯s previous conversation, Han Shuo was almost certain that even those like Tiana and Stratholme, both of whom possessed the strength of demigods, were not nearly the strongest of Profound Continent.

    However, from what he was hearing, Han Shuo also understood that there were only a few beings on the whole of Profound Continent with strength more formidable than theirs. It made perfect sense to Han Shuo the more he thought of it. Given that he had never even heard about certain demigod beings, it was hardly unexpected that he hadn¡¯t an inkling what they were up against.

    As the two richest and most powerful religious organizations on Profound Continent, the Church of Light and the Cmity Church, their capacity for spreading influence over every region across the continent was sufficient to illustrate just how mighty they were. To be able to stand tall and never fall for thousands of years, perhaps no one would have believed that there were no almighty beings backing them. It was a reasonable assumption that any being more powerful than Tiana or Stratholme would be present at the headquarters of the two religious organizations.

    Stratholme grew concerned. ¡°Elder Sister Tiana, whichever way I go about it, it still seems a bit inappropriate. When we arrive at the Church of Light¡¯s headquarters at Oden Empire, we will definitely cause immeasurable damages to the Church of Light. And of course, I don¡¯t expect that the Church of Light is going to let us get away with it. What then?¡± Three were arriving at a city of the Brut Merchant Alliance called Tjaba and began to slow down.

    ¡°There¡¯s nothing we can do about it. The Church of Light is closer to here. What¡¯s more, the Church of Light has always made it their business to deliver kindness to any living creature in suffering. Therefore I am confident that they will forgive us,¡± Tiana replied in a righteous tone. After thinking for a while, she added, ¡°No need to be too worried. The protector safeguarding the headquarters of the Church of Light cannot leave their post. So, provided that we leave as soon as we¡¯re done, there shouldn¡¯t be much of an issue.¡±

    ¡°Well then, if you say so, I can be at ease!¡± Stratholme the old monster nodded inprehension. Perhaps he felt relieved that the merciful Church of Light wouldn¡¯t seek revenge on them, or maybe he was reassured that the protector of the Church of Light wouldn¡¯t be able to leave the headquarters.

    The city of Tjaba isn¡¯t far from Tariq City, both are equally metropolis belonging to the Brut Merchant Alliance. The three hastily made their way to the transportation matrix facility at Tjaba City. Han Shuo furrowed his brows and said, ¡°What should we do? In every country, the guards regting their transportation matrixes don¡¯t allow any unauthorized personnel to use it. Only certain figures of great importance are granted ess to transportation matrixes that even a wealthy man would be denied admittance.¡±

    ¡°No worries!¡± Stratholme the old monster said, smiling slightly. Somehow there was a badge held in his hand. The old monster swaggered his way to the person in charge of this magical transportation matrix, held up his badge at those men, and said, ¡°We are going to Thea City!¡±

    Without any objection, this person in charge respectfully started up the transportation matrix, and allowed the three to enter it. After a sh of white light, they appeared at Brut Merchant Alliance¡¯s Thea City.

    Stratholme the old monster had lived for countless years and had witnessed the rise and fall of nations. It was no surprise at all that he would possess certain artifacts that allowed him to move freely between various countries. After arriving at Thea City, the three let out a sigh of relief, and continued their journey by flying to the Oden Empire.

    Thea City of the Brut Merchant Alliance was one of the closest cities to the Oden Empire. No transportation matrixes between two countries would ever be interconnected, therefore the three had to continue by flying. Fortunately, the three fugitives had temporarily shaken off the vigorous pursuit of the six-horned Soul Race tribal king when they used the transportation matrix. At that moment, they weren¡¯t as strained and anxious as they were previously.

    As the trio possessed demigod strength, their airspeeds were phenomenal. In less than half a day, they made it to the most powerful empire on Profound Continent ¨C Oden Empire.

    Upon arriving at Oden Empire, Stratholme the old monster pulled out another badge representing a different identity. And yet again, they were unimpededly granted ess to the magical transportation matrixes in Oden Empire. After three consecutive long-range teleportations, they finally arrived at the city closest to the Church of Light¡¯s headquarters.

    It was a city in Oden Empire named Sandro City. Right after exiting from the transportation matrix, they saw plenty of Temple Knights and Light Priests of the Church of Light walking on the street.

    The Church of Light held tremendous influence in the Oden Empire. As the closest city to the Sacred Mountain of the Church of Light, Sandro City was run by Oden Empire officials alongside followers of the Church of Light. Han Shuo took a quick look at the surroundings and discovered that the architecture had strong religious influence as churches of the Church of Light could be seen at every corner.

    An absolute majority of residents living in Sandro City were devout followers of the Church of Light. Many of them came from all over the continent, having travelled far and wide to migrate to this city, as they believed that this city was the closest to the God of Light and would allow them to better listen to the teachings of the God of Light.

    ¡°Alright. that beast will need at least a day¡¯s time to get here. In the meanwhile, we can have a little rest. I have suffered rather extensive injuries, but fortunately we were able to leave in time. Otherwise, I would be staying there forever!¡± Stratholme said to Han Shuo and Tiana after walking out from the transportation matrix and let out a sigh of relief.

    ¡°Sure! Let¡¯s find a ce and rest for a while!¡± Han Shuo agreed. His consciousness had, as well, sustained serious damage. The terrifying Soul Race could possibly be there in just a day. Furthermore, this location was at the base camp of the Church of Light. Once Han Shuo¡¯s identity was exposed, the Church of Light wouldn¡¯t let him off for sure. The more energy he recovered, the better his chances were to escape alive when the time came.

    The three no longer spoke superfluously and Han Shuo concealed the aura in his body. Soon after, the trio found a small, remote hotel, and requested for three rooms close to each other.

    The six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race had taken note of their souls, meaning that the three were all in the same boat in facing this enemy. But still, Han Shuo remained vignt. Immediately after entering his room, Han Shuo deployed a magical formation. He would immediately be alerted if there was the slightest disturbance in his surroundings.

    After everything was in ce, Han Shuo sat cross-legged and began activating the blood essence in his demonic infant to heal his heavily injured consciousness.

    The deafening buzz of the six-horned tribal king inflicted pain akin to millions of daggers dragging across his consciousness. If it wasn¡¯t for Han Shuo¡¯s prompt response of immediately concealing his consciousness by splitting it into millions of strands, there was a real possibility that his consciousness would have beenpletely wrecked.

    But, so long as his consciousness was not exterminated, he could activate the blood essence within his demon infant to release demonic yuan energy, and use it to rbine the scattered consciousness.

    In fact, Han Shuo had already started doing so along their journey to Sandro City. And now, with his attention fully concentrated on actuating his blood essence, the rate at which his consciousness recovered instantly increased.

    A human soul isprised of three ethereal souls and seven corporeal spirits, the three ethereal souls being Heaven, Earth, and Life, while the seven corporeal spirits are Mind, Intelligence, Impetus, Strength, Central Axis, Vitality, and Heroism.

    The seven corporeal spirits reside in the internals of one¡¯s body. As long as the three ethereal souls are present, the seven corporeal spirits can be reassembled, and one¡¯s soul will not fade away between heaven and earth.

    Han Shuo¡¯s demonic arts caused the three ethereal souls ¨C Heaven, Earth, and Life ¨C to fuse into one, forming a consciousness. This consciousness not only had remarkable abilities, it could even separate into millions of strands and hide arming the seven corporeal spirits. When the six-horned tribal king released the soul attack, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness did this without a second to spare, therefore it was able to escape the cmity.

    The three ethereal souls of an average person would require their seven corporeal spirits to survive, meaning that once his physical body perished, his three ethereal souls would dissipate. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, however, was bound by no such limitation. Even with his physical body turned into fine powder and his seven corporeal spirits totally destroyed, his consciousness would still be able to drift away, select a new body and be reborn. But in that case, he would need to spend a few hundred years to cultivate his new physical body in order to regain his original strength.

    Although his consciousness would not be destroyed with his physical body, he still required the energy of seven corporeal spirits to heal his consciousness once it was injured. Fortunately for Han Shuo, as a demonic arts practitioner, he possessed top-notch ability to control his body. Han Shuo used his blood essence to generate demonic yuan energy, which in turn induced the seven corporeal spirits residing in his seven chakras. Strands of energy from the seven corporeal spirits assimted into his consciousness, healing it bit by bit.

    The process of recovering his consciousness, with Han Shuo¡¯s all-out effort, did not take too much time. After his demonic infant consumed a dozen or more droplets of blood essence, the energy generated by his seven corporeal spirits was absorbed by his consciousness, thus, his heavily-injured consciousness waspletely healed.

    If the consciousness of a demonic practitioner was injured, as long as the person¡¯s physical body and demonic infant were not destroyed, it wouldn¡¯t be hard to recover. However, if the two were destroyed, the consciousness would have no choice but to select a new body, spend perhaps tens or even hundreds of years to cultivate a demonic infant in the new physical body. And only then may the healing process for the injured consciousness begin.

    As soon as his consciousness had recovered, Han Shuo awoke from his meditative state. His enormous consciousness began to spread out immediately to get a glimpse of the situation in Sandro City.

 Chapter 457: Ploy

    GDK 457: Ploy

    No living being less mighty than Han Shuo could elude his consciousness, allowing him aplete overview of the situation in Sandro City.

    This ce was indeed worthy of being the closest city to the Sacred Mountain of the Church of Light. Through his consciousness, Han Shuo discovered that there was an abundance of Church of Light followers carrying divine energy in their bodies, the whole Sandro City was brimming with churches, numerous magical towers had been erected, and holy energy permeated in every corner in the city.

    Everywhere his consciousness passed, each and every expert in its vicinity would appear in Han Shuo¡¯s perception. He sensed that a light sacred magus was present in Sandro City. Not only that, there were all sorts of followers of the Church of Light that upied every crevice in the city, amongst whom a staggering number were powerful experts.

    As Han Shuo was slowly expanded his sensing power, he felt ripples of divine energy crashing in from the Sacred Mountain not far from Sandro City. The divine energy was forcing people to their knees to bow, and induced a tranquility of the mind and even-temperedness that seemed to signify a readiness to serve.

    Even for the bloodthirsty Han Shuo, under the effect of this sacred energy, he felt as though he would surrender, repent and be absolved of his crimes. A wisp of energy that prated deep into the soul arrived thereupon. This soul-prating energy possessed a sort of intense seductive property, one that could turn people permanently into obedient ves.

    Han Shuo released a soft groan. Immediately, his consciousness, which was snooping through Sandro City, stopped expanding outward, receding instead. He also concealed the presenceing from his body.

    The divine energy transmitted from the top of the Sacred Mountain of the Church of Light, to certain devotees, perhaps granted heightened divine energy. However, to any ordinary man, this kind of divine energy carried an intense captivating power, pied-piping people to throw themselves into the embrace of the Church, offering their firm conviction to the God of Light.

    As the heretic that the Church of Light so wished to eliminate, Han Shuo undoubtedly understood what it meant for an ordinary person when they were exposed to this kind of divine energy with captivating power aimed at their souls. Such practices of the Church of Light obviously had no resemnce to the transparent practices they paraded.

    After withdrawing his consciousness, the suffocating pressure which had shrouded him all along did not disappear. Starting from Tarrag Canyon, the three had travelled across numerous cities. And yet, that soul targeting from the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race, had never ceased.

    And by now, this choking pressure had grown even stronger. Han Shuo could sense creatures of the Soul Race rapidly approaching.

    Ding!

    A sharp tinkling sounded in his ears. It was an early warning from the magical formation, only audible to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Bryan!¡± barked Stratholme the old monster. Judging from his voice, his body must have had sufficiently recovered.

    ¡°In a second!¡± cried Han Shuo, disengaging the magical formations around him. He then opened the door to Stratholme and Tiana outside.

    ¡°He¡¯s almost here!¡± There was a trace of undeniable distress on the old monster¡¯s face. Despite his preparations, when it came time to confront this terrifying six-horned tribal king, the old monster could not help his pessimism about his future outlook.

    ¡°We need to get in the vicinity of the Sacred Mountain of the Church of Light right away. When he¡¯s almost here, we will immediately intrude into the Sacred Mountain and await the six-horned tribal king¡¯s appearance. Only when both sides have fought and are wounded will we stand a chance.¡± Tiana remained ever so graceful and sumptuous, but the look on her face was growing heavy, indicating that, just like Stratholme, she too was riddled with apprehension.

    ¡°Alright then. Let¡¯s move,¡± Han Shuo replied sinctly.

    Neither Stratholme nor Tiana said anymore. With Tiana showing the way, the trio left Sandro City quietly.

    The Sacred Mountain of the Church of Light was so tall that it pierced through the clouds. The three arrived at the foot of the mountain. When they looked up, it seemed as though the blue dome of heaven was prodded through by the Sacred Mountain. A sense of peace and tranquility rose in their hearts.

    ¡°The Sacred Mountain is 9,763 meters tall, with the City of Light located at the top. Inside are the most powerful experts of the Church of Light protecting the ce. We can first sneak halfway up the mountain. Then, when the six-horned tribal king is almost here, we make a run for the summit of the Sacred Mountain,¡± Tiana exined to Han Shuo and Stratholme when they arrived at the foot of the mountain. She seemed very familiar with the Sacred Mountain of the Church of Light.

    Han Shuo and the old monster nodded simultaneously and Tiana did not need to exin any further. She proceeded in leading the two flying to the middle of the Sacred Mountain.

    ¡°Follow me. We must find a ce where we can hide. There are many experts of the Church of Light on the top of the mountain. Two of them are just as powerful as we are. One is a light divine magus and the other a divine knight. In addition to that, there¡¯s an ancient Saintess. God knows how long she¡¯s been around. If our whereabouts are exposed, we might be terminated by the Church of Light even before the six-horned tribal king arrives!¡± Tiana exined to Han Shuo and Stratholme as they flew up the Sacred Mountain.

    All three of them were beings of demigod strengths. Even when they arrived at nine thousand meters up the Sacred Mountain, the three still managed to soar up.

    Since arriving at the headquarters of the Church of Light, Han Shuo had reserved his consciousness and observed his surroundings solely with his naked eyes. From what he saw, he discovered that starting at the foot of the mountain, structures of the Church of Light covered every surface. Tens of thousands of followers of the Church of Light lived on this lofty, huge mountain.

    ¡°This way!¡± Tiana called out, leading towards a steep, projecting cliff at the middle of the Sacred Mountain.

    Behind this cliff was a dark cave. After Tiana lead Han Shuo and Stratholme tond at the precipice, they walked right into the dark cave.

    As soon as he entered the cave, Han Shuo found that the cave wasn¡¯t actually as dark as it seemed from the outside, on the contrary, there were a few magicalmps. The cavern was extremely spacious, no doubt excavated by men.

    ¡°Huh? Elder Sister Tiana, have you been here before?¡± Stratholme the old monster asked, astonished.

    ¡°No, but I sensed this ce to be uninhabited. Alright, we will stay here for the time being. Erm, let me deploy some spells and form boundaries to cover our presences!¡± Tiana replied almost impulsively.

    Neither Han Shuo nor Stratholme further questioned her. Tiana stood at the only entrance and exit to the cavern, took out her azure staff, and slowly recited magical incantations.

    Tiana abruptly paused her chanting and bolted from the cave like lightning. Just after her exit, she finallypleted the final phrase of her incantation. In an instant, water element of utmost intensity enveloped the only mouth of the cave. The energized water element solidified rapidly. Before Han Shuo or Stratholme could react, a chunk of ice a meter thick sealed off the exit.

    The expressions on Han Shuo and Stratholme the old monster¡¯s faces flipped. Stratholme was furious and shouted, ¡°Elder Sister Tiana, what is the meaning of this?¡±

    Two divine presences zoomed down from the summit of the Sacred Mountain indiscreetly. After a few breaths, they arrived beside Tiana right outside the cave. Separated by crystal-clear, solid ice, Han Shuo could see that one of them was dressed in a Light Priest outfit, and another in a divine knight outfit. They both looked very young.

    The duo who descended from the mountain top at great speeds made no effort in concealing the frightening presencesing from their bodies. Therefore, Han Shuo was immediately certain that they were the divine light magus and divine knight Tiana had previously mentioned. Both of them were simrly demigod beings!

    ¡°Tiana, you have done well. You may fuse with your Water Origin Crystal on the top of the Sacred Mountain at ease. Our Saintess will protect you from the persecution of that alien!¡± said the young looking divine knight with a tender smile on his face.

    ¡°Bergson, that young man Bryan is the big heretic you had all been hunting for all along. Do with him whatever you please. As for Stratholme, so long as he hands over that Origin Crystal of Fighting Aura, we shall let him walk. He has no conflicts with your Church of Light!¡± Tiana felt somewhat irked in her heart, and pleaded for the old monster.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I¡¯m not the one to decide on this matter. Let¡¯s put off the discussion until I¡¯ve reported to The Saintess,¡± the divine knight called Bergson shrugged, and afterwards smiled and said, ¡°However, if Stratholme is willing to vow loyalty and devotion to the God of Light, then that surely won¡¯t be a problem!¡±

    Suddenly, both Han Shuo and Stratholme sensed whiffs of intense divine energy which shrouded all around the cave at an unknown time. Add to the fact that Tiana had frozen off their only means of escape, the situation seemed like it could not get any worse.

    ¡°Elder Sister Tiana, I never expected this from you!¡± Stratholme the old monster who was trapped in the cave stared nkly at Tiana. His voice, although tranquil, carried a distinct wrath.

    ¡°Stratholme, I¡¯m so sorry, but Bergson and I are very good friends. As long as you hand over that crystal ball of fighting aura, I will find a way to let you walk out of this Sacred Mountain alive!¡± There was not a hint of remorse on Tiana¡¯s face, and she kept ever so graceful and poised.

    The frightening presence rapidly approached. Though they were separated byyers of boundaries, Han Shuo and Stratholme could still hear that weird buzzing noise.

    At the same time, a beautiful, tender melody waft from the summit of the Sacred Mountain. A surge of divine energy possessed only by the gods fell before the cliff in an instant.

 Chapter 458: Domain of the Divinity

    GDK 458: Domain of the Divinity

    Han Shuo and Stratholme the old monster nced at each other. They then realized that the Saintess, the one Tiana had mentioned, was standing before them.

    This expert who possessed the strength of a god. As soon as she arrived, Han Shuo and Stratholme seemed to be enveloped by a sludgy marsh-like energy. Simply wiggling their fingers was proving to be a challenge!

    Domain of the Divinity!

    A look of overwhelming shock appeared in both Han Shuo and Stratholme¡¯s eyes. The kind of energy that caused the desire to kneel and worship in their hearts, and difficulty to even budge from head to toe, was such power that only a true god could possess as legend has it, an energy which incapacitated mere mortals froming close to facing them!

    ¡°Saintess!¡± The two demigod existences of the Church of Light kowtowed simultaneously, wearing a respectful expression from their hearts¡¯ deepest pits.

    ¡°Your Holiness!¡± Even Tiana performed a solemn etiquette in a grave expression.

    However, Han Shuo and Stratholme were unable to clearly see the appearance of the being who had just arrived. But that omnipresent holy aura was nevertheless breathtaking. There seemed to be a beautiful song extolling the God of Light mixed with the holy aura as it reverberated in the depths of their souls.

    This voice carried an ult power, which could appeal to one¡¯s prejudices and emotions as it sang the praises. Han Shuo gradually lost the strength in his hands and feet, as though he was willing to throw himself into the embrace of the God of Light, and from then on, to forever serve Him with utmost dignity.

    Not good! Han Shuo¡¯s heart quivered and he came to his senses.

    By now, Han Shuo waspletely certain that the holy power he had previously sensed from the Sacred Mountain originated from this Saintess of the Church of Light. It was only due to the great distance and the wide dispersal of holy power of the Saintess to cover the whole of Sandro City that Han Shuo did not feel much difort thest time.

    Perhaps the holy aura was naturally released and was not aimed at Han Shuo and Stratholme, but because this mighty godlike existence was in such proximity to them, they found it particrly difficult to resist and gradually desired to surrender their hearts and souls.

    All these years of practicing the demonic arts had tempered his willpower, and granted Han Shuo a stubborn tenacity unlike any other¡¯s. He submerged his consciousness at the site of the Demonyer Edge, which was still hibernating in his body. He constantly stimted his consciousness using the inexhaustible ruthless desire to destroy that the Demonyer Edge emitted, therefore his consciousness had been unswervingly sober and calm all the while, and did not sink into the Domain of the Divinity.

    ¡°Scour!¡± Stratholme the old monster unsheathed his longsword. The formless fighting aura reverberated within the sword hilt and produced a peculiar sound, which he used for resisting the corrosive influence of this divine energy.

    Stratholme wore a grave expression never seen before. His brows were locked tightly together, and his breathing became irregr. He had exerted everyst bit of his strength to resist!

    Buzz Buzz...

    The resounding buzz that came from the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race, seemed all of a sudden to have enveloped the whole Sacred Mountain. An ice-cold, desting aura that carried not a trace of humanity, like indestructible ice des, filled every space in the region.

    The noise had been, at first, exceedingly unpleasant to the ear, but at once became iparably pleasant to Han Shuo and Stratholme. Thanks to the sudden emergence of this buzzing, the tempting divine power discharged by the Saintess, as though it had been shattered into pieces with a sharp sword, obliteratedpletely!

    ¡°What a terrifying energy!¡± Stratholme the old monster cried out in surprise with lingering fear in his heart after letting out a sigh of relief.

    A gentle, sweet voice instructed from outside the cave mouth separated by the thickyer of ice. ¡°Intercept the attackers first. As for these two, we shall deal with them after the Soul Race leaves!¡±

    ¡°Yes, Saintess!¡± the three demigod existences including Tiana responded simultaneously.

    Whoosh! The green skinned, python tailed, six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race was the first to arrive in front of the cave mouth. Immediately, the four pentahorned experts showed up and stood behind their king.

    Without any unnecessary exchanges, the five of the Soul Race made a prompt move to attack the few people blocking the cave upon descending to this region.

    A silhouette of a person in a dress as white as snow suddenly appeared. The Saintess, dding a White Priest gown, turned her focus to repulse the six-horned tribal king. Han Shuo and Stratholme could finally see the Saintess who they could previously only hear.

    She appeared to be a beautiful, young girl, wearing a sweet smile on her face. Solely from her appearance, she gave off a sort of wless, pure, holy quality. Add to the wholly refined temperament she naturally emitted, this young girl seemed to be the incarnation of the holiness of the God of Light.

    Beautiful, holy, and regal were the most intuitive descriptions Han Shuo had for her, which made him momentarily cast away all sense of disgust he had for the Church of Light. It was as though this girl had all the desirable traits of a woman. Only the word ¡®perfect¡¯ could adequately describe her wless appearance.

    This young girl flew out from the incline and gracefully arrived before the six-horned tribal king, holding the Holy Grail that reflected dazzlingly holy light. Holy water flowed within the Holy Grail.

    To proceed, she swirled the Holy Grail in her hand. An enormous force the mass of a mountain seemed to engulf the six-horned tribal king. From the looks of it, the body of this six-horned tribal king was swaying along with the Holy Grail.

    A devilish buzz soon sounded from the mouth of the six-horned tribal king. Akin to a celestial dragon ascending to heaven, his gargantuan tail shot towards the Holy Grail at lightning speed.

    Dong! A frightening sound seemed to envelop the whole of Sacred Mountain. Aftershocks invisible to the naked eye violently shot out in waves. As though they were being bombarded by high-yield explosives, an avnche of fist-sized pebbles rushed down from the cliff protruding from the mountain.

    The Sacred Mountain rumbled like an earthquake, a 9,000 meter tall mountain at its epicenter. Han Shuo and Stratholme, imprisoned in the cave, swayed along with the tremor.

    Meanwhile, the four Soul Race leaders who apanied their six-horned tribal king had their merciless green eyes locked on Tiana and the other two demigods. They began attacking the trio almost precisely as the six-horned tribal king made a move. The horns on their heads again started to radiate that nefarious green light. Han Shuo, who already had a taste of its unpleasantness, immediately understood that it was another attack on the soul.

    ¡°We have to find a way out of here. If we don¡¯t leave now, we will not have another chance!¡± Stratholme said to Han Shuo hastily, while his eyes closely followed the world-shaking battle from behind the thick ice.

    How could Han Shuo not realize just how unfavorable of a situation it was? This cave was defended with ayer of divine energy by that Saintess. Even the solid rocks were filled with divine energy. Tiana¡¯s ice boundary, too, was reinforced with divine energy from the Saintess. Even Han Shuo was at his wit¡¯s end.

    We have no choice. We must try the metal elite zombie! After arriving at that decision, Han Shuo summoned the metal elite zombie. The metal elite zombie sparkling with golden rays from head to toe appeared from theherworld. At Han Shuo¡¯smand, he attempted to dig open a tunnel using his ability to manipte metal and stone.

    Clink! nk! A sharp noise sounded under the foot. Han Shuo turned his attention and the metal elite zombie made a helpless shrug at him, and transmitted, ¡°The stones here are mixed with some strange impurities. Their attributes have changed. I cannot make an opening!¡±

    ¡°That damned Tiana!¡± Han Shuo cursed with an ugly look.

    It seemed that no matter the moment, he could not reveal his hidden trump. Thest time they escaped the Soul Race tribal king, Tiana witnessed Han Shuo make use of the earth elite zombie to dig open a tunnel in order to escape. This time, Tiana had certainly told the Church of Light about the miraculousness of Han Shuo, hence the Saintess of the Church of Light injected divine energy into the rocks.

    With this escape route blocked up, they obviously wouldn¡¯t give the two a chance to leave with space magic scrolls. Under the effects of this Domain of Divinity, even a sacred space magus wouldn¡¯t easily be able to leave using spacews, let alone Han Shuo and Stratholme, who merely had space magic scrolls.

    ¡°Can you do it?¡± When Stratholme saw that Han Shuo¡¯s zombie warrior had no effects and heard Han Shuo curse at Tiana, Stratholme understood what was going on. His heart sank and he had a feeling of helplessness.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo replied bitterly, ¡°Tiana sold us out. Even my trump card was blocked!¡±

    As he spoke, Han Shuo had a staunch expression in his eyes. He considered deploying the Demonic Blood Disassembly to escape. Doing could severely wound him, but it seemed like his only way out.

    ¡°Father, are you looking to break open this cave?¡± the metal elite zombie suddenly transmitted.

    ¡°Yes, but it seems that there¡¯s no hope now!¡± Han Shuo replied without thinking, still wondering if he should deploy the demonic escape technique.

    Right after Han Shuo finished those words, the metal elite zombie took out the metal attribute treasure he obtained from the ce of extreme metal ¨C the Golden Cudgel. While Han Shuo wasn¡¯t paying attention, this most precious treasure of metal attribute slowly grew an insane length, turning into a massive pir, sparkling gold!

 Chapter 459: Escaping Alive

    GDK 459: Escaping Alive

    The golden cudgel filled the cave with brilliant golden light as it grew. The dazzling golden rays finally caught Han Shuo¡¯s attention.

    He saw that under the maniption of the metal elite zombie, one end of the golden cudgel ¨C a treasure of the metal attribute ¨C was pushing against the solid ice on the cave mouth deployed by water divine magus Tiana and further strengthened by the Saintess. Naturally, the metal elite zombie couldn¡¯tpletely grip the golden cudgel as it had transformed to the size of a huge pir of great height. But with that said, the metal elite zombie could still manipte the golden cudgel with the energy of metal element in his body.

    The golden cudgel, purportedly capable of destroying any solid object, under the maniption of a metal elite zombie, a great force burst out from its one end that pushed against the iced cave mouth. Under the watchful eyes of Han Shuo and Stratholme, it broke the solid ice like a twig.

    The golden cudget weighed tonnes. Except for the metal elite zombie, whose body was filled with the energy of metal element, no one could move the golden cudgel, not even Han Shuo with the brute force of his physical body. It seemed that the metal elite zombie yielding the golden cudgel indeed deserved the reputation of possessing the greatest fighting strength. Even the shield of ice reinforced with divine energy from the Saintess could be forcefully broken open under the pounding of the golden cudgel.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Stratholme the old monster shouted. He was shocked and delighted at the same time.

    Han Shuo, who had been staring nkly at his metal elite zombie in disbelief, immediately returned to his senses when he heard Stratholme¡¯s yelling. With an incantation, the immensely proud metal elite zombie along with his golden cudgel were sent back to theherworld by Han Shuo.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Han Shuo replied and flew out at lightning speed through the broken cave mouth with Stratholme. Thebat between Tiana and those from the Church of Light, and those of the Soul Race continued like wildfire. Among it, the Saintess disyed truly terrifying strength. All along, under the protection of boundless divine energy enveloping her, and the Holy Grail bursting with holy light, the six-horned tribal king was forced to remain within bounds.

    ¡°This is not good, they have broken through the ice!¡± The solid ice boundary at the cave mouth was deployed by water divine magus Tiana. She sensed it the instance her ice boundary was destroyed.

    Han Shuo and Stratholme flew out from the cave just as Tiana finished speaking.

    However, at this moment, no matter the Saintess of the Church of Light or the three demigod beings, they were all busy fighting off those of the Soul Race. When battling against such a grade of experts, unless one¡¯s team possessed strength well above that of their opponents, one must not be distracted in the least.

    Tiana and the two others handled the four five-horned members of Soul Race, with the divine knight as the main fighter while Tiana and that light divine magus ceaselessly dealt frightening magic attacks. Although Tiana and the light divine magus deployedyers uponyers of defense boundaries, in a battle of three versus four, it was obvious that the three were in disadvantageous position.

    As Tiana let out a cry of surprise, her cold air attack against the few Soul nsmen be a tad slower. The pressure on the light divine magus and divine knight, which was already difficult to handle, instantly increased multiple times over. That caused the divine knight to be miserably swooped by three tails, nearly wounding him gravely.

    While their hands were all tied up, Han Shuo and Stratholme the old monster felt zero hesitation to avail themselves of the situation and flew right away into the distance. They dared not stay at this Sacred Mountain a moment longer.

    Han Shuo and the old monster were extraordinarily fast in their escape. Before the few were able to catch sight of the two, they had already rushed out from the region.

    The Saintess of the Church of Light ced all her attention on the six-horned Soul Race tribal king and dared not to distract herself in the slightest. All she could do was to look on helplessly at the departing duo, not having extra hands to intercept.

    ¡°Quick, run!¡± Stratholme shouted to Han Shuo as soon as he rushed out from the Sacred Mountain.

    It was, of course, clear to Han Shuo obviously just how dire the situation was at the moment and fled like lightning, following closely behind Stratholme. But in contrast to Stratholme, the expression on Han Shuo¡¯s face was much calmer and collected, unlike the panic on Stratholme¡¯s face.

    Once departed from the cave in the Sacred Mountain, countless means of escape opened up for Han Shuo. In terms of airspeed, Han Shuo believed that even a character with strength a grade higher than his would be incapable of chasing up to him. At the very least, he could still use the transportation matrix connecting to the Cemetery of Death to escape. Therefore, with such aces up his sleeves, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t as anxious as Stratholme the old monster.

    After the two escaped from the Sacred Mountain of the Church of Light, instead of returning to Sandro City close to the mountain, they took the longer route and flew to Ortley City.

    Once they entered Ortley City, Stratholme used the authority in his hands to gain ess to the transportation matrix. After travelling to a few transportation matrices, the two flew from the borders of the Oden Empire back to Brut Merchant Alliance. They then finally arrived at Tariq City.

    Upon arriving at Tariq City, Han Shuo immediately sensed the position of Elizabeth through the drop of blood essence in her brain.

    ¡°Bryan, it was all thanks to you that we could escape alive. Well, I owe you one!¡± Stratholme the old monster said to Han Shuo after arriving a Tariq City.

    ¡°You¡¯re wee!¡± Han Shuo replied with a slight grin. After a short pause, Han Shuo creased his brows and asked, ¡°The six-horned tribal king could sense our souls. What do you n to do next?¡±

    Stratholme the old monster revealed a worrisome expression at those words. He sighed before saying, ¡°I will immediately find a secluded ce to fuse my soul with my Origin Crystal. Only by fusing the soul can wepletely free ourselves from the pursuit of the Soul Race.¡±

    ¡°But we haven¡¯t the slightest detail about the situation at the Sacred Mountain of the Church of Light. If that six-horned tribal king did not suffer serious injuries in the battle with that Saintess, and gets to you when you are still fusing with the Origin Crystal, that will mean certain death for you,¡± Han Shuo eximed.

    ¡°There¡¯s no other way. I can only take a chance. If midway through it, the six-horned tribal kinges knocking at my door, it¡¯ll be my luck!¡± The old monster again sighed helplessly.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t know how to respond. There was indeed no better alternative.

    Han Shuo actually had a rather good impression with regards to Stratholme the old monster. Because of the existence of the seven grand duchies, Han Shuo could have be his enemy in the future. Yet, from their interactions during the prior few days, Stratholme¡¯s conducts could have been called straightforward, instead of harboring any evil intentions towards Han Shuo because he was the Lord of Brettel City as Han Shuo imagined.

    ¡°Well then, good luck!¡± Han Shuo said after shaking his head and sighed lightly.

    ¡°You too. I hope there is a chance that we see each other again. It sure was nice to meet you!¡± Stratholme the old monster said with a smile, as though heid down some worries in his heart. Afterwards, he seemed to suddenly recall something and hesitated for a while before saying, ¡°Bryan, after we part ways today, we may never see each other again. I need to discuss something with you. I hope that you will agree on the ount we have fought shoulder to shoulder.¡±

    ¡°Tell me about it first,¡± Han Shuo creased his brows and had a good guess of what Stratholme wanted to discuss.

    ¡°For many years, I have been the State Preceptor of the Verdun Imperial Court, which is no more, and has been split into the seven grand duchies today. I still have some feelings for the seven grand duchies. In the future, perhaps the six-horned tribal king will find us both and we shall both die. Or perhaps one of us will survive this cmity.

    ¡°If I do survive, I shall restrict the seven grand duchies to never again infringe on Brettel City. However, if I do not, and you so fortunately survived, I hope that, for my sake, you will not let the people of the seven grand duchies live in hell.

    ¡°Your Lancelot Empire and Brut Merchant Alliance have always coveted for the seven grand duchies. I know that once I die, the seven grand duchies will no doubt be conquered. If you live through this, all seven grand duchies will be swooped by Brettel City. I¡¯m not asking you to give it up, but I hope that you will treat the citizens of the seven grand duchies well,¡± Stratholme the old monster requested earnestly as he stared deeply into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes.

    It was only because Stratholme had calcted the likelihood of his death that he would say such things. No matter the perspective, Stratholme¡¯s request wasn¡¯t too arduous. Therefore, right after Stratholme finished, Han Shuo nodded and reassured, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I will treat the citizens of the seven grand duchies well.¡±

    Whether or not Stratholme would die, Han Shuo had no clue, but he knew that he himself would be able to escape this alive. He had long wanted to get his hands on the seven grand duchies. That decision wouldn¡¯t change even if Stratholme lived. Now, Stratholme merely asked Han Shuo to treat the citizens well, which was not inappropriate at all.

    ¡°Thank you. I will return to Stranglethorn Valley and make some arrangements. Then I shall find a spot that any average person would be unable to detect to merge with the Origin Crystal of Fighting Aura. I truly hope that there will be a day that we meet again!¡± Stratholme the old monster smiled and left cidly.

    After Stratholme left, Han Shuo muttered in a low voice, ¡°I hope you can escape this cmity!¡±

    Towards this demigod existence that had obstructed the Lancelot Empire¡¯s military expeditions for many years, Han Shuo now held only a feeling of sympathetic respect and reverence. He truly hoped that there woulde another chance to meet with the old monster again. After the old monster gradually vanished from Han Shuo¡¯s sight, he took a deep breath and flew away. He went searching for Elizabeth by relying on his senses.

    ¡°Come with me!¡± Han Shuo instructed when he saw Elizabeth, and he brought her back to Brettel City.

 Chapter 460: Peerless Murderous Soul

    GDK 460: Peerless Murderous Soul

    Upon arriving at Brettel City, Han Shuo introduced Elizabeth to Jack and others, gave a few instructions, and immediately headed to his secret chamber and activated his transportation array.

    Once he entered the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo was ovee with exhration. That terrifying pressure which had been trailing him ¨C as a shadow does a body ¨C vanished without a trace.

    ¡°It¡¯s gone!¡± Han Shuo cried out in surprise.

    Ever since leaving Tarrag Canyon, Han Shuo could feel a bone-deep pressureing from the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race. But upon entering the Cemetery of Death, that heavy pressure on his chest all could no longer be felt.

    He walked out from the hall, looked down at the snow-white bones under his feet, then raised his head to gaze at the dark, murky sky. Suddenly, Han Shuo realized what was going on.

    It seemed that the boundary that enveloped the whole Cemetery of Death was isting him from the six-horned tribal king¡¯s trace of his soul. As long as he was in the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo believed that the six-horned tribal king would never be able to locate him.

    Before arriving at the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo had worked out plenty of escape ns. He had even prepared to use the skeletal staff to send his soul down to theherworld for shelter once he entered the Cemetery of Death. But now it seemed that none of that would be necessary. The boundary of the mysterious Cemetery of Death, unexpectedly, solved Han Shuo¡¯s worries.

    ¡°Cemetery of Death, oh Cemetery of Death, how many more secrets are you hiding?¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help butment.

    To be able to block off the sensing power the six-horned tribal king on his soul, this alone adequately exined just how miraculous the boundary that shielded the Cemetery of Death was.

    Poor Stratholme. Perhaps you have already left Stranglethorn Valley for secluded cultivation. But even if you are still in Stranglethorn Valley, the Cemetery of Death isn¡¯t a ce you could enter. Han Shuo thought to himself.

    Without the menace of the six-horned tribal king breathing down his neck, Han Shuo¡¯s mood somewhat loosened up. Afterwards, he sat cross-legged at the spot where he had previously refined his mystical demons and from his space ring, he withdrew the three spheres he managed to plunder.

    Three spheres. One of the Origin Crystal containing the intense element of death, one containing the element of darkness, and thest one emanating the energy of destruction that could cause one to palpitate ¨C the Crystal of Destruction, one that only a maniac would want to fuse with, ording to Stratholme.

    Along the way as they ran away from the Sacred Mountain of the Church of Light, Han Shuo had asked Stratholme about the exact technique of utilizing the Origin Crystal. And now, everything was in its ce. Han Shuo aimed his eyes at the Origin Crystal emanating pure element of death.

    With the Origin Crystal dispersing pure element of death in hand, Han Shuo steadily entered into the Origin Crystal with his mental strength and felt the iparably enormous and pure elemental energy of death stored within. Next, Han Shuo tried to act ording to the methods that Stratholme had described. He opened up his consciousness for the Origin Crystal to fuse with his consciousness.

    All of a sudden, something Han Shuo had never anticipated happened. His mental strength could clearly sense the tremendous pure element of death. But when he tried the method Stratholme prescribed him, attempting to fuse his consciousness with this element of death, his consciousness immediately locked up, absolutely prohibiting any iota of the element of death from entering.

    His consciousness hadpletely rejected the energy of the Origin Crystal, thus leaving him unable to form the ¡®Soul of Element¡¯ that Stratholme and Tiana had mentioned.

    Han Shuo¡¯s demonic infant had the fantastic ability to absorb an array of evil energy and transforming them. However, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was nevertheless very selfish, not permitting one bit of energy ipatible with demonic arts to assimte with it. Han Shuo could clearly sense the rejection from his consciousness.

    Perhaps the Crystal of Destruction will produce better results!

    After putting away the Origin Crystal of Death, Han Shuo took out the sphere that emanated intense energy of destruction, and tried to fuse the energy of destruction into his consciousness again using the same methods.

    The consciousness once again rejected!

    As before, not a trace of that enormous energy of destruction could enter his consciousness, and naturally he unable to fuse with it.

    Han Shuo frowned. With one hand holding Origin Crystal of Death and another the Crystal of Destruction, he thought, I have spent a great deal of effort plundering these two spheres and yet, in spite of everything, I can¡¯t absorb any of it. It seems this endeavor was all for nothing.

    There were three importantponents in Han Shuo¡¯s body. One is the demonic infant located in his lower abdomen. The demonic infant was the source and root of demonic yuan, which was the basis for deploying demonic arts. The other twoponents were located in his brain. His consciousness, formed after his three ethereal souls fused together, was the basis for everything. Its importance was self-evident.

    Thest one, just like the demonic infant to a demonic arts cultivator, was the source and storage of energy. What was stored in this part of the brain was mental strength. It was the crux for Han Shuo, a necromancy grand magus, to release necromancy magic.

    Of the three, the most important was of course the consciousness, also known to the average human as the soul. The consciousness contained all the experiences and memories Han Shuo had, including all his realizations, all his knowledge of demonic arts andprehension of necromancy magic.

    The consciousness was the only evidence that Han Shuo was alive!

    With his demonic arts attaining such a stage, Han Shuo would never permit any mishap on his consciousness, the basis for his demonic arts to advance further.

    However, based on Stratholme¡¯s exnation, Han Shuo knew that if one wanted to be God in the domain of magic, one¡¯s soul had to form a Soul of Element. Only with that could his soul be perfectlypatible with the element, and possess the most profound realization towards that line of magic.

    But still, the Soul of Element was obviously also an evolution of one¡¯s soul, and evolving one¡¯s soul meant change. What a pity it was that his soul had previously been transformed into consciousness, most suitable for practicing demonic arts. Unless Han Shuo devolved his consciousness to its original state, the Origin Crystals would be of no use to him. No matter what the perspectives, the demonic arts,pared to necromancy magic, was always more valuable to Han Shuo. Hence, Han Shuo would never relinquish his attainments in demonic arts. Besides, he didn¡¯t believe that he couldn¡¯t be a God without forming a Soul of Element. After some consideration, Han Shuo gave up on merging with the crystals.

    Origin Crystal of Death, Destruction, and Darkness. Han Shuo could use neither of the three of them. He ced the three spheres before him, and started to ponder on how to maximize the utility of the three objects he had procured with all that effort.

    After some thinking, a light bulb lit over his head. He summoned little skeleton from theherworld.

    ¡°This is for you. Take it and fuse your soul with the energy within. This way, you can better utilize the element of death in theherworld.¡± Han Shuo handed the Origin Crystal of Death to little skeleton as he appeared and informed him of the process to fuse it with his soul.

    ¡°Thank you, thank you father. I can feel that this thing will bring me unimaginable gains. This must be the most valuable treasure for an undead creature. I don¡¯t know what it will transform me into, but I¡¯m certain that I will be stronger. That will surely be the case!¡± Little skeleton held the Origin Crystal emanating pure aura of death with blinding light exploding from his Purple Demon Eyes. Han Shuo could sense his immense excitement and delight.

    ¡°Good then. I believe that you will be stronger!¡± Han Shuo said with a faint smile as he felt the hard-to-restrain excitement from little skeleton.

    ¡°Father, with this, I will be able to subdue bone dragons. In my world, I reckon I will be stronger and stronger. My scope of influence will expand a hundredfold!¡± little skeleton said with exuberant ambition.

    ¡°Alright, go ahead. Immediately fuse with the Origin Crystal of Death like I taught you!¡± Han Shuo said smilingly and when little skeleton nodded, he sent him back to theherworld with another necromancy spell.

    As for the Origin Crystal of Darkness, of those beside Han Shuo, only Emily could exhibit its use to the greatest extent as no others practiced dark magic. It seemed that this time, Emily would surely go mad with joy. After fusing her soul with the Origin Crystal of Darkness, her strength would advance by leaps and bounds without a doubt.

    All that remained then was the Crystal of Destruction. After racking his brain, Han Shuo still couldn¡¯t figure out what to do with it. As he stared at the Crystal of Destruction, he found that the Crystal of Destruction was somewhat different from other Origin Crystals of elements. Once one¡¯s soul fused with this boundless energy of destruction, they would be deranged, only knowing to wreak havoc.

    He held the Crystal of Destruction, gazed at it for ages, and yet had no idea what to do with it.

    Suddenly, a boundless craving for ruthless massacre rushed from Han Shuo body. With a thought, the Demonyer Edge suddenly flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s nape andnded on his palm. Inexhaustible resentment and murderous intentions overflowed from the Demonyer Edge, flooding the whole Cemetery of Death.

    A stream of blood glistering bloody rays flowed from the Demonyer Edge as though it was alive.

    Han Shuo understood that the murder weapon that was the Demonyer Edge had evolved and formed a true main soul! From that day onwards, the Demonyer Edge would truly be an unparalleled demonic weapon!

    While Han Shuo was looking at the Demonyer Edge with excitement, the Demonyer Edge suddenly flew out from his right hand. Before Han Shuo could react, its edges had pierced through the sphere containing the energy of destruction.

    While Han Shuo was stupefied ¨C the main soul that had just formed within the Demonyer Edge had begun to fuse with the frightening energy of destruction in the crystal!

 Chapter 461: Concealing the Consciousness

    GDK 461: Concealing the Consciousness

    In a rather short time, the energy contained within the sphere of destructive aura had fused with the main soul in the Demonyer Edge. After the fusion of the main soul and the crystal of destruction, it flew back into Han Shuo¡¯s body and again sank into hibernation stage.

    The Demonyer Edge was a demonic weapon closely tied with Han Shuo. It had now formed a main soul, and therefore gained its own intelligence. As the Demonyer Edge was originally casted with Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence and demonic yuan, the main soul would eternally serve Han Shuo as its master. Unless Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness dissipated, the Demonyer Edge would always be a demonic weapon for Han Shuo alone to use.

    Han Shuo stared at his empty hand that had lost the sphere containing destructive energy, and thought to himself that this was a pretty good ending, and at least it wasn¡¯t used to benefit outsiders. After absorbing the destructive energy in the round sphere, the Demonyer Edge would no doubt only grow more terrifying. As a weapon that only he alone could use, the stronger the Demonyer Edge became, the more advantageous it would be for Han Shuo.

    Three Origin Crystals. One gifted to little skeleton, another fused with the main soul that just formed from Demonyer Edge, and thest one belonging to Emily the dark magus. All three of them were people that Han Shuo could trust the most. Although Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness could fuse with none of the three Origin Crystals, it could be said that his strength had improved indirectly.

    To Han Shuo, who had originally nned to fuse with the Origin Crystal containing intense element of death, the Origin Crystals didn¡¯t concern him anymore. The only thing that continued to worry Han Shuo was the threat of the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race.

    As long as Han Shuo remained inside the Cemetery of Death, the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race couldn¡¯t do anything to Han Shuo as he couldn¡¯t detect the presence from Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    But the problem was, it was impossible for Han Shuo to stay within the Cemetery of Death forever. The moment he left the Cemetery of Death, the six-horned king would sense the position of Han Shuo¡¯s soul. And when that happened, Han Shuo would have to confront this terrifying threat that he momentarily could not resist.

    It seems I still need to purge that guy¡¯s sense of my consciousness! Han Shuo thought and began sifting through the memory that Chu Cang Lan left to him for a way to tackle it.

    As Han Shuo carefully went through the memories, it suddenly urred to him that once he reached the next Nine changes realm in demonic arts, even if he didn¡¯t seek a deliberate way, his consciousness would be undetectable by the six-horned king.

    Once Han Shuo reached the Nine changes realm, not only could his physical body transform into any form he wished, his consciousness too could have a myriad different transformations. By then, that six-horned tribal king would never be able to detect Han Shuo again.

    Of course, after Han Shuo broke through to the Nine changes realm, if the six-horned tribal king came knocking at Han Shuo¡¯s door, he would be courting death.

    Currently, in the Carnal realm, although his consciousness could not alter as he wished, he could still conceal it with a concealment technique. As long as Han Shuo didn¡¯t intentionally use the wonderful energy of his consciousness, and remain in a state of nothingness under the effects of the concealment technique, no one could sense the position of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    In fact, the consciousness concealment technique was one of the many miraculous abilities that the consciousness had. Unfortunately. Han Shuo had not spent enough time and effort delving into the marvelousness of consciousness. Once he found out that the consciousness could remain in a state of nothingness as long as he didn¡¯t use it to explore, he began to practice this method of concealing the consciousness.

    Not only would this state not affect Han Shuo¡¯s thinking and memory, it would also help Han Shuo make more rational decisions, and not cause him to lose control of his emotions or do anything at odds with his character.

    Once Han Shuo thought that he mastered this technique of concealing his consciousness, he of course was eager to test if it was genuinely useful. He returned to the center of the Cemetery of Death and activated the transportation matrix, returning to the secret chamber in the city lord¡¯s mansion of Brettel City.

    Indeed, as expected, even after he left the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo did not feel that pressureing from that six-horned tribal king, indicating that the consciousness concealment method was definitely working. Han Shuo no longer needed to be concerned about the potential threat of the six-horned tribal king anymore.

    Immediately, he summoned Dorcas, Jack and the others for a meeting. When everyone was present, Han Shuo turned to Dorcas and said, ¡°From today onwards, you will be in charge of the invasion of the seven grand duchies. You will make preparations at once. I shall take a trip to Ossen City, and provide you with detailed instructions when I return!¡±

    ¡°I have been waiting for this day for so long!¡± Dorcas¡¯ eyes were sparkling with exuberant ambition. The excitement of this war-lover was inly visible.

    ¡°Master, what are you nning to do?¡± Dark dragon Gilbert asked Han Shuo, puzzled.

    Han Shuo did not answer, instead instructing, ¡°You stay by Dorcas. His strength is of no use. You will be in charge of protecting him and keeping him from assassination.¡±

    ¡°Alright then. Howe I¡¯ve be a bodyguard? Before this I was protecting Trunks, and now it¡¯s someone even weaker,¡± the dark dragon mumbled in unwillingness.

    ¡°Elizabeth, you stay in Brettel City. Guard against people ying tricks in the dark. There are a few with poor strength in Brettel City. You must protect them with your life.¡±

    ¡°Got it, master!¡± Elizabeth replied.

    Afterwards, the duo of Dorcas and Jack thoroughly exined the current situation in Brettel City to Han Shuo. From their words, Han Shuo understood that the current poption of Brettel City had increased over ten times over to around 530 thousand people. Under the leadership of Dorcas, Brettel¡¯s military had 50,000 elite troops, in addition to 30,000 guards defending the city.

    As the ever-expanding Brettel City possessed its own weaponry workshops and armour smiths, never short of all kinds of ore suppliesing from the five mines around it, everyst one of the altogether 80,000 soldiers of Brettel City were fully equipped. Compared to the imperial guards of Ossen City, their weapons and armour were in no respect inferior.

    With King Lawrence¡¯s vigorous backing, the convenience of magical transportation matrixes, and the unusual terrain of Brettel City, in the short span of a few years, Brettel City had transformed into a true major city that was invulnerable to attack, and with flourishing businesses. The city now had a powerful, well-trained army. In addition to theck of worry for future consequence, it was the best time to go on the offense at the seven grand duchies.

    ¡°Very well. I shall pay a visit to Ossen City. When I return, I shall set off with you all!¡± Han Shuo said and chuckled heartily as he felt entirely free from worry. With that, the meeting concluded. Han Shuo then headed towards the transportation matrix in Brettel City.

    Currently, of the things that threatened Han Shuo the most was the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race, and another was the Church of Light. The six-horned tribal king could not sense Han Shuo¡¯s location, and hence this threat could be disregarded. As for the Church of Light, although Han Shuo couldn¡¯t contend against them if the two demigod beings of the Church of Light were to act together, Han Shuo was confident that he could easily escape.

    As for the Saintess with her Domain of the Divinity, based on what Stratholme the old monster said, Han Shuo knew that she was bound to the Sacred Mountain of the Church of Light, and generally never left the mountain rashly. This seemed her hardly a threat to Han Shuo.

    With that, Han Shuo really didn¡¯t have much to worry about. Being in Carnal realm, Han Shuo longed to go all out with no restraints. Only bypletely satisfying his desires could he break through from Carnal realm and reach the next Nine changes realm. Therefore, Han Shuo hardly exercised restraint to the desires from his heart, ready to start punching and kicking towards significant undertakings.

    Historically, in the school of demonic arts, anyone who advanced to Nine changes realm would firstpletely set free all their longings while in Carnal realm. These people were more often than not ambitious and ruthless characters in their worlds. For dynasties, these elders of the school of demonic arts, all yed important roles, the trendsetters of their times.

    As Brettel City had its own transportation matrix, it was incredibly convenient to go back and forth to Ossen City. Han Shuo made use of the space magic transportation matrix and appeared in the capital city in the blink of an eye. Upon arriving at Ossen City, Han Shuo headed straight towards the Dark Mantle headquarters.

    Beforeing to Ossen City, Han Shuo learned from Dick that Emily now rarely executed missions herself. She was currently in charge of assigning and distributing tasks. The post was more rxed andcked a lot of dangers. It seemed that perhaps Emily had ridden on Han Shuo¡¯s coattails a little, and therefore she could be sofortable and rxed.

    Mount Ordas, Dark Mantle headquarters.

    In three years, Han Shuo had turned into a legendary character in the Dark Mantle. Ever since he first stepped into the headquarters, while on his way, the people would look at him with a most revered expression in their eyes.

    ¡°Where is Lady Emily?¡± Han Shuo asked the guide who was bringing him to the Candide¡¯s secret room.

    The guide then recalled of Han Shuo and Emily¡¯s rtionship. He revealed a meaningful smile and replied to Han Shuo, ¡°Lady Emily and Lord Candide¡¯s ce aren¡¯t separated far from each other. Lord Bryan, where do you intend to go to first?¡±

    ¡°Bring me to Lady Emily¡¯s secret chamber first,¡± Han Shuo instructed.

    ¡°Very well,¡± the guide answered respectfully. His gaze towards Han Shuo was filled with admirationing from the bottom of his heart.

    To these people, although the current Han Shuo was not the one of the three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle, he was a character more honored than them.

 Chapter 462: Of Course Itâ€™s for You

    GDK 462: Of Course It¡¯s for You

    In the stony room were a few wide bookcases and a ck wooden table where Emily was fully concentrated on an ancient personal letter held in her hands. Her brows were slightly knitted, puzzling over the dark magic knowledge recorded on the ancient letter.

    ¡°Reporting to Lady Emily, Lord Bryan requests an audience!¡± a voice came from a tubr hole on Emily¡¯s desk.

    A pleasantly surprised expression took over her face and she involuntarily let out a gentle cry. She put down the ancient letter with haste and took out a clear rounded mirror from her space ring, and touched up her tender, lovely cheeks.

    ¡°Lady Emily, can Lord Bryan enter?¡± when the guide heard her soft cry, he understood that Emily was in the secret chamber, but since she did not reply, the guide repeated his question.

    Emily, who was tidying up her appearance in a flustered manner, hastily replied with her lovable voice, ¡°Hold on, I will be ready in a second!¡±

    As she spoke, she double checked her face in the mirror, making sure that not the slightest blemish was visible. She then smoothed out her ck robe with magic. Finally, she said, ¡°Alright, Lord Bryan may enter!¡±

    With a sh of bright light, Han Shuo appeared in the stony room through a short-distance transportation matrix.

    ¡°Bryan!¡± Emily eximed delightedly when she saw the imposing stature that had been constantly in her mind standing in her presence. She threw herself into Han Shuo¡¯s broad chest and tightly embraced him with all her strength, as though Han Shuo would disappear at any moment.

    Han Shuo had a warm smile on his face as he looked down at Emily in his embrace.

    Not only hadn¡¯t her beautiful face aged after three years, but it had grown even more fascinating and charming. Her delicate face flushed with joy and excitement, making her already beautiful and alluring appearance even more mesmerizing.

    Han Shuo could feel the rapid climb in temperature of Emily¡¯s body. After three years of abstinence, an irrepressible fire surged up in his lower abdomen as he savored the wonderful feeling of having such a magnificent being in his embrace, with her supple skin as smooth as it looked and her slender neck, her curvaceous physique, bum and bosoms thick in all the right ces.

    Emily obviously felt the erection and heating from Han Shuo¡¯s lower abdomen. She became usually sensitive to such things after receiving much nourishment from Han Shuo. Her sight suddenly blurred, her voice and body, too, started to tremble lightly. Subconsciously, her two hands which were tightly wrapped around Han Shuo began unbridledly moving across his broad back.

    Han Shuo let out a gentle roar and swept Emily off the ground in one motion. In a sh, he sat her down on the office desk used to distribute assignments to members of the Dark Mantle, and their clothing tore into shreds...

    A long whileter, Emily couldn¡¯t make the slightest movement with her fingers, and curled up in anguid posture in thefy, wide chair.

    A thread of demonic yuan flowed into Emily¡¯s body, gradually nourishing her, restoring the lost physical power little by little.

    Some more time passed and Emily, who was in extremefort, took a deep breath and opened her bright eyes. With her gaze focused on Han Shuo, she asked, ¡°Bryan, when did you arrive at Ossen City?¡±

    ¡°Just now!¡± Han Shuo had thrown on a new set of clothes. He gently pulled out a soft nket andyed it over Emily¡¯s tender body.

    Her eyes suddenly lit up with excitement and the corners of her mouth curved with a trace of sweet joy. In a shy tone, she asked, ¡°Then does that mean I was the first person you visited when you arrived?¡±

    ¡°Yep,¡± Han Shuo replied smilingly.

    ¡°Very good!¡± Emily nodded, full of energy. She looked pleasantly at Han Shuo and held his big hands tight, guiding them to gently rub on her cheeks.

    ¡°This is an Origin Crystal of Darkness I obtained from Tarrag Canyon. Take it. Slowly fuse your soul with itl. It will make you form a Soul of Element, which is enormously beneficial to your practice of dark magic!¡± Han Shuo said with a warm smile as he revealed the Origin Crystal containing pure elemental energy of darkness and ced it in Emily¡¯s palm.

    As soon as Han Shuo removed the Origin Crystal of the purest of dark element from his space ring, Emily, who had been curled upzily in her chair, immediately sensed the pure element of darkness stored within.

    This element of darkness contained not the tiniest bit of impurity. Its uncontaminated energy carried an indescribable temptation power. Eventhough Emily did not use her mental strength to deliberately examine it, as a dark magus, she could deeply sense just how miraculous and mysterious what was contained within was.

    ¡°Such pure element of darkness. What, what is this thing?¡± Emily asked with her bright eyes on Han Shuo.

    ¡°This is called an Origin Crystal. It contains an enormous and pure element of darkness free of any impurities. Once your soul is fused with an Origin Crystal, it bes a Soul of Element. This will let you possess the most profound realization of dark magic, and your soul and dark element will reach the mostpatible state.

    For any magus practicing elemental magic to be God, the person must form Soul of Element and Body of Element. An ordinary magus may never get the knack of forming a Soul of Element. Even if they do, it can¡¯t be easily realized for any ordinary persons.

    With this Origin Crystal, so long as you fuse it with your soul, the enormous, pure element of darkness stored within can directly make you form a Soul of Element. With that, you will undoubtedly make rapid progress in your practice of dark magic. In addition, you will possess the foundation of bing a God in dark magic!¡± Han Shuo exined with a smile.

    Emily couldn¡¯t help but shiver slightly. Her eyes were gleaming with disbelief. She looked at Han Shuo, and with a trembling voice, she stuttered, ¡°Br...Bryan... this is for me? Are you sure this is for me?¡±

    ¡°Silly woman, of course it¡¯s for you!¡± Han Shuo said as he gently caressed Emily¡¯s face. Suddenly, Han Shuo recalled something and said solemnly, ¡°However, given your current realm attainment, you must absorb it carefully. I don¡¯t know if your soul can fully bear this enormous amount of dark element. In any case, be careful of all things!¡±

    ¡°I, I will!¡± Emily held the Origin Crystal of Darkness with both hands, she was so stirred up that she nearly fainted in euphoria. From Han Shuo¡¯s exnation, she realized what this Origin Crystal would mean for her. It was a most precious item that could make her a God. She could no longer express her gratitude and adoration towards Han Shuo with words.

    ¡°Lady Emily, is Bryan in there?¡± Candide¡¯s voice interrupted from a magical device on Emily¡¯s table.

    Candide¡¯s voice seemed somewhat unsteady and excited for some reason. Before Han Shuo could answer, Candide spoke again through the magical device, ¡°I sense an iparably pure and tremendous aura of dark elementing from your location. Are you both alright?¡±

    Han Shuo and Emily exchanged a nce and they both came to their senses. Candide was, too, a dark grand magus. He had immersed himself in dark magic much longer than Emily had. Hisprehension of dark magic had likewise presumably exceeded that of Emily¡¯s.

    As Han Shuo did not utilize any special technique to cover up the aura that the Origin Crystal of Darkness emited, Candide, as a dark grand magus, it was a matter of course that he would sense the presence of this enormous pure element of darkness.

    ¡°Quickly put it away!¡± With one hand covering the sound-transmitting magical device, Han Shuo hastily instructed Emily.

    Emily had alreadye to her senses when Candide¡¯s voice sounded, but the first thing she did was hurriedly get dressed. Only after Han Shuo¡¯s reminder did she put away the Origin Crystal. Shortly after, she said with panic, ¡°He knows, what do we do, what should we do?¡±

    As a figure of such high authority, Emily shouldn¡¯t have been so panic-stricken. The reason she was so out of her wits was purely that the Origin Crystal had overwhelmed her to the point of shock. She was so excited that she found it challenging to remain calm, hence her agitation.

    ¡°It¡¯s okay. Not only does he not have a clue about anything, plus, even if he knew that I handed the Origin Crystal to you, there¡¯s nothing he could do about it,¡± Han Shuo soothed Emily. He realized that the Emily was now too emotional, and it would be inappropriate for Candide to enter. He immediately added, ¡°You stay here and calm down yourself. Leave Candide to me!¡±

    Han Shuo then stood on the transportation matrix in Emily¡¯s room. After a sh of bright light, he appeared before Candide.

    ¡°Bryan, I¡¯ve just received reports, you indeed have returned. Oh right, I sensed an extremely pure aura of dark elementing from Emily¡¯s stone room a minute ago. For so many years, I have never perceived such pure dark elemental energy from anywhere. What¡¯s going on?¡± Candide asked.

    ¡°Nothing much. I was just using my martial arts to help Emily aggregate some dark element, so that she could more clearly sense the presence of dark element,¡± Han Shuo said smilingly as he tried to conceal the truth. Shortly after, he changed the subject, ¡°Lord, I have met Stratholme the old monster.¡±

    Perhaps the subject of Stratholme the old monster provoked Candide¡¯s interests, or perhaps Candide was astute and understood that Han Shuo was unwilling to discuss it thoroughly, Candide did not investigate any further about the enormous dark element, but asked in astonishment about the course of events that led to Han Shuo and Stratholme¡¯s meeting.

 Chapter 463: A Big Gift

    GDK 463: A Big Gift

    Except anything rted to the Origin Crystals, Han Shuo told the story of his encounter with the old monster and Tiana at Tarrag Canyon. Even the incident at the Sacred Mountain of Church of Light located in Oden Empire was disclosed.

    Candide was all ears as Han Shuo described his ount from the beginning ¡®til the end and his brows were tightly knitted together.

    ¡°Lord Candide, about those true powerhouses of Profound Continent and the Soul Race people, do you have any knowledge of them?¡± The reason Han Shuo revealed everything was to ask Candide if he was aware of their existences.

    ¡°Tiana is the protector of Kasi Empire. In Kasi Empire, Tiana is a godly being. She is a character of the same as era our Lancelot Empire¡¯s dark divine magus Ayermike Cotton. I genuinely did not expect her to still be alive!¡± Candide eximed.

    Ayermike Cotton? A character his era?! Han Shuo was startled.

    Ayermike Cotton is one of the most reputable characters in the history of Lancelot Empire. It was all thanks to his existence that Lancelot Empire was established and possessed such mighty power and influence these days.

    However, Ayermike Cotton the dark divine magus was a character from 500 years ago! Having found that out from Candide, Han Shuo then realized just how long Tiana had actually been alive. It was no wonder that even Stratholme the antediluvian old monster that lived through two dynasties would address her as ¡®Elder Sister Tiana¡¯!

    ¡°Besides Tiana, about those of the Church of Light and Soul Race, does your Lordship know of their origins?¡± Han Shuo asked as he stared nkly at Candide.

    ¡°That divine knight and light divine magus of the Church of Light you mentioned, I¡¯ve read a little about them from ancient records. They are both existences of the Church of Light famous for their strengths a few hundred years ago. Everyone assumed that they had both died of old age. They had unexpectedly lived on until the present day.

    ¡°As for that Saintess of the Church of Light, and that Soul Race of Tarrag Canyon, I have no idea. If not for you telling me this news, perhaps, I would have never learned of such characters on Profound Continent. These beings are far beyond anything I can imagine,¡± Candidemented as he repeatedly shook his head and sighed.

    Although Candide¡¯s knowledge was rather limited, Han Shuo learned, at least, of the origin of Tiana and that she was a protector of Kasi Empire.

    ¡°Bryan, do you mean that you already have the strength of Stratholme and Tiana?¡± After a long while, Candide suddenly asked as he stared nkly at Han Shuo.

    Just then, Han Shuo mentioned fighting shoulder to shoulder with Stratholme the old monster and revealed the encounter with the Soul Race. Candide soon realized one small detail ¡ª Han Shuo and Stratholme were beings of the same ss!

    There was nothing worth hiding here, so Han Shuo nodded and calmly admitted, ¡°I believe I now possess that so-called demigod strength.¡±

    ¡°Unbelievable, truly unbelievable!¡± Candide spoke somewhat incoherently and mumbled, ¡°Madam Grace¡¯s astrology is truly miraculous. No wonder she said that you can bring Lancelot Empire a new future. With the presence of an existence like yours, any nation can grow mighty.¡±

    ¡°Mighty or not, I don¡¯t know, but I do know that Stratholme will not be appearing in the seven grand duchies for the time being, and the Brut Merchant Alliance has just lost their sacred lightning magus Reynold. Given that the magical beasts from Tarrag Canyon roam all over their streets disturbing residents, in addition to the group of Soul Race of unknown origin, I reckon they won¡¯t have the capacity to deal with other matters.

    Now is the best chance for our Lancelot Empire to send troops and take down the seven grand duchies. It is now or never!¡± Han Shuo exined to Candide ambitiously.

    ¡°Bryan, go meet His Majesty. I believe that His Majesty will fully support you!¡± Candide urged. It seemed that he was itching to get on with it as well.

    Han Shuo nodded. After authenticating his identity as a Fourth Dark Sun envoy from Candide, and without notifying Emily, Han Shuo headed directly for the imperial pce by means of transportation arrays in Dark Mantle headquarters that only some highest level personnel could operate.

    ¡°Bryan, you joker, disappeared all of a sudden for three years. You have finally returned!¡±

    Lawrence, the king of the Lancelot Empire, personally came to greet Han Shuo when he heard that Han Shuo had requested to meet him andughed heartily as soon as he saw Han Shuo.

    Compared to three years prior, the Lawrence now had more of that imposing demeanor of a monarch weiding the power to dictate the lives and deaths of others. He appeared even more mature and experienced. He even deliberately kept a beard over his originally clean shaven upper lip. His eyes beamed wisdom and prudence.

    ¡°Your Majesty, long time no see!¡± Han Shuo stepped forward with a faint smile. Leaning over to Lawrence¡¯s side, he continued, ¡°Your Majesty, let¡¯s have a chat alone!¡±

    Lawrence waved his hand at his imperial bodyguards to send them away,¡°You are all dismissed!¡± Afterwards, he dragged Han Shuo back to the grand hall, chucklingly said, ¡°So we are actually still good friends away from the public eye. Howe you remember to visit me this time?¡±

    ¡°I came here with the intent of presenting you with a big gift!¡± Han Shuo smiled.

    ¡°Oh? A big gift?¡± Lawrence asked engrossing.

    ¡°The seven grand duchies!¡± Han Shuo proimed.

    Lawrence¡¯s body jolted. His eyes burst out cold rays that one wouldn¡¯t dare look at directly. With excitement in his voice, he asked, ¡°Bryan, are you confident about this now?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded, and again disclosed what he had to Candide.

    By the time Han Shuopleted his story, Lawrence was trembling from the head down. He held firmly onto Han Shuo with both hands, his fiery eyes ardently on Han Shuo, and in an astonished voice he asked, ¡°Bry...Bryan, you mean..... you mean you now possess demigod strength?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right!¡± Han Shuo affirmed.

    ¡°Good! Good! Good!¡± Lawrence howled withughter with his face to the sky. He then continued with a broad smile, ¡°After the honorable Ayermike Cotton, finally, our Lancelot Empire is once again blessed with a demigod being! Haha, from now on, no one will disregard the mighty existences of my Lancelot Empire!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t celebrate so soon. Like I just said, a demigod existence isn¡¯t the apex of strength on the continent. Besides, I¡¯m not the only one with demigod strength. Tiana of Kasi Empire is another. Over at the Church of Light headquarters in Oden Empire, there¡¯s far more than one demigod existence!¡± Han Shuo doused Lawrence with cold water when he saw that Lawrence was so excited he nearly went mad, and feared that Lawrence might rely on him too much.

    ¡°I know, I know!¡± Lawrence said in an ted voice. ¡°Of course I know. But with you in Lancelot Empire, I feel much more reassured in my heart. I have long thought of conquering Brut Merchant Alliance and Kasi Empire, but had always shelved it aside because of all sorts of apprehensions. But now, our Lancelot Empire can really flex our military muscles!¡±

    ¡°Alright. I knew you wouldn¡¯t do anything so ill-judged! Hmm, you can start with the seven grand duchies first. Of the seven, Helon Duchy and Boulet Duchy have secretly allied with me long ago. As long as we set about this covertly, without Stratholme the old monster appearing to upset the apple cart, swooping all seven grand duchies is definitely in the bag,¡± Han Shuo said in a deep voice.

    ¡°Very well, I will back your campaign fully. Whatever military resources or physical resources you require, speak, what do you need? Tell me, and I shall aid you with all the resources of my kingdom!¡± Lawrence cut straight to the point. He seemed determined to firmly tether up Han Shuo.

    ¡°Frankly, military strategizing isn¡¯t my strong suit,¡± Han Shuo replied with a bitter smile. After thinking for a moment, he continued, ¡°As for how to attack the seven grand duchies, it¡¯s better if I just leave you and your men to discuss and deal with it. Oh, by the way, it would be best that Dorcas is appointedmander for this matter. This chap has roamed about the seven grand duchies for the past several years, and is therefore totally familiar with the situation there. In addition, he has expertise in military strategy. I trust he will make a fittingmander!¡±

    ¡°No problem, I will make arrangements! Rest assured, without Stratholme¡¯s hindering this time, the seven grand duchies will surely give in to the military might of my Lancelot Empire!¡± Lawrence assured.

    ¡°Well then, I have said what I ought to have said. I believe you will need some time to prepare as well. I shall depart now! I, for one, have yet to make time to see mydies. If I don¡¯t look for them as soon as possible, they are going to start grumbling for sure!¡± Han Shuo said smilingly to Lawrence.

    After receiving a few meaningful winks from Han Shuo, Lawrence empathizingly said, ¡°I understand. Haha, go ahead and repay your ¡®debts¡¯! Oh, right, your mansion has been rebuilt and all the servants are still there. Every now and again Phoebe, Fanny and the others stay there for a few days. Don¡¯t forget that you still have a home in Ossen City!¡±

    Previously, during the upheaval at Ossen City, in one night, many mansions of the nobles were destroyed into puffs of smoke. The mansion he received as a count was no exception to this heavy damage. Originally, Han Shuo thought that the mansion had beenpletely ruined. It looked as if Lawrence did indeed care about Han Shuo very much, to go as far as topletely rebuild the house for him.

    ¡°Thank you, Your Majesty!¡± Han Shuo replied. Without saying any more, he left the pce.

    ¡°A demigod expert! Madam Grace is indeed an admirable astrologer. Bryan, oh Bryan, you truly are my lucky star!¡± Lawrence muttered softly after Han Shuo had left.

 Chapter 464: Days of Debauchery

    GDK 464: Days of Debauchery

    For days in a row, Han Shuo remained in his own mansion at Ossen City. Fanny and Pheobe came by when they received the news, and savored every rare moment they had with Han Shuo. In the meantime, whenever Emily hadpleted her work at the Dark Mantle, she too would head over. Of course, her lips were sealed about the Origin Crystal of Darkness that Han Shuo gave her.

    In those few days, Han Shuo had indeed lived a most pleasurable life. All three women in Han Shuo¡¯s life were lovelydies that an ordinary man would yearn for even in their dreams. Having not seen each other for three years, thedies would deliberately apanied Han Shuo for every second they had together. Phoebe and Emily, who long had especially close physical rtionships with Han Shuo, would even more persistently stick to Han Shuo.

    Being in Carnal realm, Han Shuo could hardly restrain his desires, and that was especially so when it came to sexual desires. During those couple of days, he would intemperately be with Phoebe and Emily all day long. Initially, they would make love to Han Shuo separately by themselves. Butter, Han Shuo found it hard to contain his sex drive and he couldn¡¯t have cared less if either of them had qualms about it.

    After the first asion of them sleeping together, the twodies gradually let go of their reluctance, and began cooperating to serve Han Shuo better. Phoebe and Emily, who originally had minor discord, improved their rapport as they pulled together, and their rtionship grew stronger and stronger.

    Han Shuo, being in Carnal realm, did not find such a preposterous thing distasteful. In fact, when he discovered that such behaviour actually helped the twodies bond with each other, he further ravaged the two by doing so even more frequently. Throughout the process, Han Shuo discovered that his mind would unwittingly grow calm and stable. Everytime his desires were set free, his demonic yuan would grow richer and stronger.

    The only thing that caused Han Shuo some distress was Fanny. Perhaps she was really shy, or perhaps it was Firenze¡¯s provision, but everytime Han Shuo attempted to break through herst defense and take down Fanny, she would always reject Han Shuo, telling him with flushed cheeks that Firenze wouldn¡¯t allow her to lose her virginity before she got married.

    ¡°That old fart! He meddles so much with other people¡¯s businesses!¡± Who knows how many times Han Shuo repeated those words and how many times he cursed Firenze in his heart. If Han Shuo had been studying the curses of dark magic, perhaps Firenze would have long been cursed to death by Han Shuo.

    ¡°Bryan, I forbid you from speaking of my father like that. Erm, in any case, you already have Emily and Phoebe, aren¡¯t the two of them enough to make you, make you.... ¡° Fanny murmured in a frail voice, panting, after she pushed Han Shuo away. Her upper garment was half-untied with her bosom slightly revealed. Amorous feelings drizzled in her eyes. As she was rather shy, she was unable toplete yet sentence.

    When Fanny rejected him at that crucial moment, Han Shuo was fumed with rage and rained curses on Firenze. Although Han Shuo¡¯s leaning tower was erect and ready for action, his face was flushed, panting heavily much like a wild animal during mating season, he had no choice but to pick up his pants and consider if he should immediately leave and look for Emily and Phoebe to satisfy his needs.

    It was at this moment, Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan began to react chaotically, causing Han Shuo to turn pale with fright. Such a situation had not ured for a very long time. This sudden urrence left Han Shuo somewhat bewildered. The more Han Shuo forcefully repressed his clear desires for Fanny, the more disorderly that demonic yuan energy became. Even the demonic infant felt unwell.

    Oh shit! Han Shuo cursed in his heart when he realize what was actually going on.

    In the Carnal realm, it was only when the desires in Han Shuo¡¯s heart werepletely liberated that he would make progress in the realm as well as deepening the demonic yuan. On the contrary, if Han Shuo exercised restraint against the cravings from his heart, he would not improve but instead deteriorate in the realm. For thest couple of days, Han Shuo had restrained himself from acting on Fanny more than a couple times. He had earlier on faintly felt that something was wrong. But now when the demonic yuan in his body sank into utter chaos, he immediately came to his senses.

    Han Shuo was very clear just how intense that desire to deflower Fanny was. The more Fanny rejected, the fiercer the craving to possess her got. Especially, time after time, when Han Shuo nearly had his way as even Fanny was struggling to contain herself, that desire in his heart would increase by folds.

    After this was repeated several times, Han Shuo finally suffered the consequences. He felt as though he was gradually losing control over the demonic yuan in his body.

    The more Han Shuo tried to give up and leave, the worse his body condition got. For a character like Han Shuo of such exceptional ss, it was really difficult for any average person to harm him. Apart from a certain secretive and mysterious character of godlike strength, only Han Shuo could really cause damage to himself.

    Feeling the overwhelming changes in his body and the intense struggle in his heart, Han Shuo was red-faced, with the veins on his forehead, and on the brink of a total meltdown as he hesitated on whether to deviate from his cultivation and sustain serious damages to his body, or to possess Fanny and calm down the disorder in his heart.

    ¡°Bryan? Bryan? What¡¯s wrong with you?¡± Fanny obviously also discovered that Han Shuo¡¯s condition was far from good. Not minding that her breasts were semi-revealed, she rushed to Han Shuo and reached out her hand to caress Han Shuo¡¯s forehead seeped with cold sweat, at a loss for what to do.

    Damn it! Fanny is my woman to begin with. I am going to do her sooner orter anyway. How can Firenzee in and meddle with my business! After thinking for a while, Han Shuo no longer beat about the bush and suddenly embraced Fanny. When Fanny found herself in a confused state of mind not knowing what to do, the gasping Han Shuo moved his mouth close to Fanny¡¯s ear and told her the current situation as it was.

    When Han Shuo finished his exnation, Fanny started to breath rapidly. Simrly panting, she asked, ¡°Bryan, are you for real? You aren¡¯t joking right? We must do that thing, only then you won¡¯t be in so much pain?¡±

    ¡°I really wasn¡¯t joking, such is the peculiarity of my martial arts!¡± Han Shuo exined with a bitter smile as he puffed hard.

    An amorous feeling gradually filled her bright eyes. Fanny no longer showed the slightest resistance. She took the initiative and undressed herself before Han Shuo, bit by bitid bare her body of ideal proportions. Her curvaceous, naked body, like fine jade, emitted enchanting rays that hooked onto one¡¯s soul. Han Shuo stared at Fanny right before his eyes, intoxicated.

    ¡°Bryan, what... what are you waiting for?¡± The corners of Fanny¡¯s mouth curved to form a faint smile, which in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, was ever so charming, ever so lovable, and ever so irresistible!

    Without any hesitation, Han Shuo made a move. Fanny¡¯s nymph-like bare bodypletely fell on Han Shuo¡¯s wide chest. At that moment, demonic yuan in Han Shuo¡¯s body was no longer chaotic while the demonic infant suddenly turned quiet.

    Fanny¡¯s look when she was embarrassed was drop-dead gorgeous. All of a sudden she wrapped her arms tightly around Han Shuo¡¯s back and cried somewhat nervously, ¡°Bryan, be gentle, I¡¯m afraid of pain!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, you won¡¯t feel the slightest bit of pain!¡± Han Shuo reassured her tenderly. Han Shuo, like a cheetah, carried Fanny onto arge, cozy bed.

    Shortly after, the enchanting moans that could sweep away a man¡¯s soul,bined with Han Shuo¡¯s beastly gasping, began reverberating from the room, which sounded like an iparably touching song of nature.

    ¡°This little wench, sumbed just the same in the end!¡± In another room, Phoebe who was practicing with a sword suddenly halted and mumbled after carefully listening for a while.

    ¡°Hehe, I knew she couldn¡¯t escape the malicious hands of that little lecher!¡± Emily said smilingly after walking into Phoebe¡¯s practicing room. She had just returned from a day¡¯s work at the Dark Mantle.

    ¡°That¡¯s true! It¡¯s just that I feel disdained at her persistence all this while. Humph! So pure and righteous, as though, as though she was imploring us, to be, to be so wanton!¡± Phoebe couldn¡¯t seem to voice the reason for her discontent.

    ¡°Hehe, sister Pheobe, don¡¯t be silly. You are the only person that was licentious, can you please not drag me into the same boat with you?¡± Emily rocked her body backward and forward, winked her eyes as she mocked Phoebe on purpose.

    ¡°Look who¡¯s talking!¡± Phoebe¡¯s cheeks blushed as though they were smeared with red dye. She flew into rage from humiliation, charged towards Emily, putting down the longsword, and tickled Emily. Striking back, she said, ¡°You aren¡¯t wanton? Then who¡¯s the one that used the mouth, and even very much enjoyed it!¡±

    ¡°Damned sister, I will tear up your mouth!¡± The originallycently smirking Emily turned so embarrassed that she nearly bore a burrow to hide herself. The two with blushing faces fought yfully. As it was just a jest, they did not actually exert much strength,

    ¡°Ohhh.....¡± Suddenly, the two heard an significantly sharper moan from Fanny.

    The hand movements of the twodies fighting with each other suddenly froze. The two were very clear that the loud moan meant Fanny had been utterly defeated. Soon after, the duo seemed to simultaneously recall something, and immediately their faces both flushed. They could unquestionably feel the rising temperatures of each other¡¯s bodies.

    Emily licked her rosy lips and suggested, ¡°I¡¯m certain that Bryan definitely has yet to finish. How about we look for him, and take Fanny in as well?¡±

    ¡°Hey! Who was the one that imed to be not licentious, but alwayses up with such ideas!¡± Phoebe cursed softly, but continued with an even softer voice, ¡°Good idea. I do want to get a look at Fanny¡¯s appearance now!¡±

    ¡°Well then, let¡¯s go find him!¡± Emily dragged Phoebe into Han Shuo¡¯s room.

    ¡°Hehe, just in time to keep me apanied!¡± Han Shuoughed heartily when he saw the twoe to him.

    Soon enough, the room was again filled with boundless ecstasy. That dissipated moaning sound that itched the heart once more reverberated.

 Chapter 465: The Dark Dragonâ€™s Plead

    GDK 465: The Dark Dragon¡¯s Plead

    Time just seemed to fly as Han Shuo revelled in the joy of having several partners at his full disposal. His innermost desires werepletely liberated. There was no longer any indication of cultivation deviation of his practice of demonic arts. Instead, it improved with each passing day.

    Regarding the matter for which Han Shuo returned to Ossen City, with the exception of King Lawrence and certain members of the Dark Mantle, nobody was given any information on it. Consequently, in the past few days, while Han Shuo was seeking pleasure with his three women in his mansion, no bigwigs came by to interrupt his indulgence.

    Good times evidently neverst. When Emily came by this time, she notified Han Shuo that Lawrence hadpleted arrangements to invade the seven grand duchies. Thus, Han Shuo had no choice but to, yet again, depart from Ossen City.

    Fortunately, the space magic transportation matrix connecting Ossen City and Brettel City had beenpleted. As all threedies were of honorable statuses, they could utilize the transportation matrix to effortlessly visit Han Shuo. Therefore, Han Shuo¡¯s departure did not cause intense mncholy to the threedies.

    After one final briefing with Lawrence and Candide, Han Shuo left Ossen City for Brettel City.

    Once Han Shuo arrived at Brettel City, he learned from Dorcas and the others that Brettel City was basically ready. As soon as the reinforcement troops from the empire arrived, they could head right over to the seven grand duchies.

    As military warfare was not Han Shuo¡¯s strong suit, he handed over all military power to Dorcas to do what he was best at. For so many years on the arena that was Brettel City, Dorcas had amply demonstrated his talents in military strategy. Each and every soldier of Brettel City epted his leadership willingly.

    ¡°Senior brother!¡± Bonds respectfully saluted Han Shuo at the doorstep when he returned to the city lord¡¯s mansion.

    ¡°Huh? Why are you here?¡± Han Shuo was startled when he saw Bonds and couldn¡¯t help but to size him up.

    After three years, the killing intent and reeking of blood that had always lingered around Bonds were all gone. Han Shuo understood that this wasn¡¯t a sign that Bonds had made no progress in God ying Devil Path, but the contrary. From the aura Han Shuo sensed emitting from Bonds, he figured out that Bonds had sessfully cultivated in the God ying Devil Path to the realm where he could conceal his killing intent.

    At this realm, Bonds could skillfully put his killing intent to use. Any time he was not engaging with enemybatants, not a trace of killing intent in his body would spill out. Compared to his former state of intense killing intent from head to foot, his well concealed killing intent indicated that he had made lightning-fast progress.

    ¡°Senior brother, for thest three years, I have constantlye and gone in various battlefields, secretly absorbing the killing intent that wafted through the air using the martial skill you taught me. After that, I digested the energy in ordance with the method you instructed me. As senior brother has been cultivating without leaving a trail for thest three years, I have not gotten the chance to meet you. It was sometime ago when I learned that senior brother made an appearance in Brettel City, therefore I specially rushed over here.¡± When Bonds came face to face with Han Shuo, he wore a most humble, deferential expression, even more diligent than when he served his former master Karel.

    Han Shuo knew that this was because he could give Bonds what Karel never could.

    After three years, based on the substantial yet reserved aura radiating from Bonds, Han Shuo could be certain that his cultivation of God ying Devil Path had been fruitful. Compared to the strength of a great swordmaster of the past, Bonds¡¯ must now have been considerably more formidable.

    ¡°Come on in with me!¡± Han Shuo nodded before instructing Bonds and marched straight into the city lord¡¯s mansion.

    After they arrived at a practice field in the mansion, Han Shuo stamped his feet and, with his eyes on Bonds, he instructed, ¡°Attack me with all your strength. I want to see how much you¡¯ve progressed in thest three years!¡±

    ¡°Yes!¡± Bonds gradually withdrew his longsword. Just as he unsheathed the fine sword, strong, concentrated killing intent was released. With every inch unsheathed, the killing intent congealed on his body grew sharper and stronger. Indistinctly, a wicked look of savagery emerged in Bonds¡¯ eyes.

    God ying Devil Path was a kind of demonic arts meant solely for massacre. The more a cultivator immersed into the field, the more frightening the killing intent of the cultivator became. So much so that it could even affect the body of the cultivator.

    Han Shuo had a deep understanding of the God ying Devil Path. The reason he taught Bonds this demonic art was so that Bonds would be an additional weapon of his own disposal. Therefore, when he saw the madness in his eyes, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t startled but delighted. He understood that Bonds almost reached the finest state in his cultivation of the God ying Devil Path.

    Under the watchful eyes of Han Shuo, that longsword that Bonds had been pulling out bit by bit suddenly unsheathed like lightning. At the same time, an incisive killing intent, which could seemingly rip the air apart, violently erupted from Bonds¡¯ body.

    Hundreds of thousands of phantom images of swords, like pythons breathing with ferocious killing intent, came slithering towards Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo opened his left hand, his demonic yuan circted and formed a ghostly face. Initially, it was only the size of a palm. But when the mass of sword phantom images propelled by killing intent arrived in front of him, the ghostly face had grown so big it blotted out the sky and hid the earth. Suddenly, it opened up a humongous bloody mouth, swallowing all of the phantom swords.

    The five fingers on Han Shuo¡¯s left hand then twisted to form a hook. It was as though his five fingers were connected to the ghostly face through millions of incorporeal strings, with the movements of his five fingers controlling the sinister ghostly face. Like a starved wolf, the ghostly faceunched itself towards Bonds. Before he could react, the enormous bloody orifice had swallowed Bonds.

    While Bonds was losing his mind from fear, the ghostly face suddenly exploded. In an instant, it vanished into thin air. It was as though all that had just happened was Bonds¡¯ own imagination, with the exception of Han Shuo still standing unruffled at the same ce, still disying a tranquil and calm smile.

    After awaking from the shock, the madness in Bonds¡¯ pupils faded way. He respectfully kowtowed towards Han Shuo, and said, ¡°Senior brother¡¯s martial arts sure enough have attained perfection!¡±

    ¡°You did very well. To be able to advance to such a stage in the duration of three years shows that you indeed have been very hardworking!¡± From the strike Bonds had just dealt, Han Shuo could tell that his strength had improved rapidly. Currently, with the benchmark of Profound Continent, he ought to have been able to pit against an expert who had advanced to sacred swordmaster.

    ¡°Master, you have returned!¡± Elizabeth¡¯s voice suddenly sounded from afar. A momentter, Elizabeth appeared right before Han Shuo.

    ¡°Senior brother, what was that martial skill back there? Was that sinister ghostly face real?¡± Bonds was astonished by the attack Han Shuo had just made on him. He paid no attention to Elizabeth but stared fixedly at Han Shuo as he questioned insistently.

    ¡°That is formed by congealing demonic yuan. Haha, as for whether it was real or not, you figure that out yourself. When you reach a certain realm in your maneuver of killing intent, you too can congeal it with killing intent. You will understand then!¡± Han Shuo exined with a faint smile. He paused for a moment, and suddenly moved to Bonds¡¯ side. Before Bonds could react, Han Shuo suddenly pressed his hand on Bonds¡¯ head.

    Certain knowledge pertaining to the basics of demonic arts flowed from Han Shuo¡¯s palm into Bonds¡¯ brain.

    Upon reaching the Separate demon realm, Han Shuo could portion and organize his memories. The knowledge that Han Shuo poured into Bonds¡¯ mind was just some of the most basic information for those cultivating in demonic arts, such as expound teachings on the topic of cultivation deviation, some bizarre remarkable abilities of demonic cultivators, and certain cultivation malpractices.

    This knowledge was information that every demonic arts cultivator should understand. Han Shuo worried that Bonds would be so anxious for quick results, not realizing the discipline required for practicing demonic arts, that he would sink into an irremediable state of madness. That was why Han Shuo passed down this foundational knowledge to him, lest he lost self-control and turned into a monster that only knew to ughter.

    ¡°Alright. Digest this knowledge thoroughly!¡± Han Shuo said looking at Bonds after he withdrew his hand.

    ¡°Thank you senior brother. I will never ever forget this great favor from you for the rest of my life!¡± Bonds was moved to tears and crawled towards Han Shuo with sincere gratitude.

    ¡°That¡¯s enough, you just have to practice well!¡± Han Shuo said with a grin.

    Out of nowhere, dark dragon Gilbert begged, ¡°Honorable master, help me, you must help me!¡± Gilbert disyed an unprecedented anxiousness.

    ¡°Dark dragon, what¡¯s the matter?¡± Han Shuo stared puzzled at dark dragon Gilbert as he scuttled their way, not knowing what would made him so nervous.

    ¡°Master! My most honorable, most admirable master! You must help me! Otherwise, my grandpa, and perhaps even the entire race of dark dragon will be done for!¡± Gilbert was fric. When he arrived before Han Shuo, he dropped to his knees, totally unlike his usual sloppy manner.

    Han Shuo furrowed his brows. With a heavy voice, he said, ¡°Get up. Tell me what¡¯s really the matter?¡±

    Gilbert had a resolute look. With his eyes looking deeply at Han Shuo, he pleaded, ¡°Master, if you don¡¯t agree to help me, I, I won¡¯t get up!¡±

    For so many years, dark dragon Gilbert had gone through fire and water with him and never imagined betraying him. Especially the time at the forbidden ground of Dark Forest, he nearly died for him.

    And now, dark dragon Gilbert must have been met with a truly distressing problem that he would behave so unusually. When Gilbert finally finished, Han Shuo did not hesitate and nodded, saying, ¡°Get up, I promise you! Whatever the matter, I will help you!¡±

    ¡°Thank you master!¡± the dark dragon cried gratefully and stood up. He then hastily exined, ¡°My grandfather left me Dragonspeech Bone made using a chunk of his own bone. Through this chunk of Dragonspeech Bone, even as I kneel before you, I can still hear my grandpa¡¯s instructions.

    For a long time, my grandpa told me that someday, my dark dragon race will face a great catastrophe and that if our race couldn¡¯t avert the disaster, we will forever be wiped out from the underground world. I always thought that my grandpa was just giving rmist talk. However, just this morning, my grandpa transmitted a message through Dragonspeech Bone, saying that this great cmity is approaching, asking me never to return to the underground world, and the further I stay away the better.

    Not only that, he even left me hisst words! I know that something very terrifying is on the verge of crashing down on our dark dragon race, or perhaps it already happened! Master, I beg you, please save our dark dragon race!¡±

    The dark dragon Gilbert again kneeled at Han Shuo¡¯s feet, his eyes gazing at Han Shuo, pleading.

    ¡°I already promised you!¡± Han Shuo helped dark dragon Gilbert up, and continued, ¡°I don¡¯t know if I could be of help, but I will take a trip to the underground world with you!¡±

    ¡°Thank you master! Thank you master! I know that with your help, our dark dragon race will surely turn peril into safety and avert the disaster!¡± Gilbert asserted.

    ¡°Bonds, you take Gilbert¡¯s ce temporarily, follow alongside Dorcas in the dark and protect him. Elizabeth, you stay in the city. Assist Dick in his job of keeping Brettel City safe!¡± Han Shuo instructed.

    With a war at nigh, logically speaking, Han Shuo shouldn¡¯t be wandering far. However, the rtionship between Han Shuo and dark dragon Gilbert wasn¡¯t simply that of master and servant. Given that the dark dragon race was possibly facing the threat of extinction, in addition to such pleading from Gilbert, Han Shuo really couldn¡¯t find an excuse to refuse.

    Fortunately, the protector of the seven grand duchies, Stratholme the old monster, was powerless to defend himself at the moment, and therefore would not appear in the seven grand duchies for some time toe. On such arge scale military campaign, the absence of Han Shuo, who wasn¡¯t exactly good at the art of war, wouldn¡¯t have done much to affect the general situation of the war.

    Therefore, with the decision made, Han Shuo once again summoned Dorcas, Jack, and the others, handing over a detailed overview of certain matters.

    ¡°My Lord, be at ease. With the full support of the empire, in addition to the Helon and Boulet Duchies¡¯ cooperation surreptitiously, I am certain that I can take down the seven grand duchies!¡± Dorcas said withplete confidence. In presence of Han Shuo, the wild ambition in his eyes was hardly concealed.

    ¡°You haven¡¯t been around Brettel City for years anyway. In fact, Brettel City would operate as usual even without you!¡± In Brettel City, there was none other than Jack who would be so daring to speak so bluntly to Han Shuo like that.

    Han Shuo was muted in shock. Soon after, he flew into rage out of humiliation, and said, ¡°You damned little fatty. If you can¡¯t make Brettel¡¯s economy grow, don¡¯t doubt for a second that you¡¯ll get just what you deserve!¡±

    ¡°Hahah, take a look at how glorious and flourishing Brettel City has be under my rule! You won¡¯t have the chance!¡± Jack burst intocentughter.

    ¡°Oh, right!¡± Han Shuo suddenly recalled something, and immediately instructed Dorcas, ¡°When you attack the seven grand duchies, treat every citizen well. Be wary not to kill indiscriminately!¡±

    ¡°Rest assured my Lord, I know what to do!¡± Dorcas pledged.

    ¡°Then I can be at ease!¡± Han Shuo shot a nce at the impatient dark dragon Gilbert, and said, ¡°Let¡¯s go to the underground world!¡±

 Chapter 466: Disastrous Turn of the Dark Dragons

    GDK 466: Disastrous Turn of the Dark Dragons

    There hadn¡¯t been much change in the underground world. Along the way, they still often saw ugly goblins and batmen looting all over the ce. The whole underground world was terrorized with chaos. The situation seemed like it would never change if it were given a few hundred years.

    ¡°Gilbert, do you know exactly the kind of disaster your dark dragon race will run into? You can¡¯t be totally clueless, can you?¡± Han Shuo questioned Gilbert as they headed towards the dwellings of the dark dragons.

    ¡°Master, I really don¡¯t know anything. That was all that my grandpa told me through Dragonspeech Bone. I have no idea at all!¡± the sullen Gilbert answered. He was not in a good mood.

    Throughout the journey, the very much anxious Gilbert constantly urged Han Shuo to pick up his pace. It seemed that although Gilbert was a runaway, he still held deep feelings for the dark dragon race. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have had entreated Han Shuo so piteously.

    Having followed alongside Han Shuo for so many years, although they had met some hazards, the two would always manage to escape the jaws of danger. Unknowingly, dark dragon Gilbert felt as though Han Shuo could handle any danger, as though there was nothing that could truly harm him.

    Especially when Han Shuo recently emerged from the Cemetery of Death, being a dark dragon that was linked to Han Shuo via contract, Gilbert knew more than anyone the terror of the strength possessed by Han Shuo! Therefore, when he received the message from his grandpa, he immediately thought of Han Shuo, and believed that only Han Shuo could help the dark dragon race safely ovee the cmity.

    When Han Shuo realized that he wouldn¡¯t get much more information from Gilbert, Han Shuo squandered not a second more asking. Gilbert had a far superior understanding of the underground worldpared to Han Shuo. Therefore, with Gilbert¡¯s guidance, they did not waste much time in the first undergroundyer where dark elves ran amuck. They descended through an arduous cliff-like cavern, arriving at the nextyer that was slightly darker.

    There was no absence of light upon thisyer of cliff rock, but it was rather weaker than in the previousyer. Tall, lofty, luminescent nts could be found everywhere, illuminating thisyer, yet clearly visible, though it required a little more effort.

    ¡°Come with me!¡± Gilbert hardly spoke as he lead Han Shuo directly to a narrow tunnel. He seemed very anxious.

    Along the way, Han Shuo roughly learned from the dragon about the geographic distribution of the underground world. There were threeyers in total. The topyer was where the dark elves and lizardmen resided. Rtive to the rest, the creatures on theyer were the weakest. Even for the ancient dark elves Han Shuo had met before, they were still weakerpared to the creatures in the two followingyers.

    Of course, an abnormal existence like the Ancient Lizard King was an exception. For beings like the Ancient Lizard King that climbed to the pinnacle of the five ranks by evolving, wherever he was ced on the Profound Continent, he remained a mighty existence.

    However, it was incredibly rare to find existences like his. The great majority of lizardmen were still that stupid, incapable of being so lucky as he was to evolve to the fifth stage, and possess such immense strength that he could leave this ne of existence.

    The dark dragons lived in the secondyer. The creatures found there were usually extremely strong. Other than the dark dragon race that lived together, there were some very formidable super-ranked magical beasts that lived in solitary. But in regr circumstances, these super-ranked magical beasts all inhabited their own territories, and everyone simply kept to their own businesses.

    The dark dragons were a kind that no one dared provoke. They were a formidable race to begin with, and they even lived in arge groupTherefore, despite being surrounded by a myriad of other formidable creatures in this secondyer of the underground world, not many were willing to provoke the dark dragons.

    Han Shuo took this to mean that he could basically eliminate any threat from the secondyer.

    The thirdyer of the underground world, however, now that was a region of great mystery. ording to Gilbert, there wasn¡¯t a creature alive who knew what dwelled in the nextyer.

    ording to legend, there indeed were tunnels connecting the secondyer to the thirdyer. However, it was incredibly rare to find a creature who knew where the tunnel was located. And of the super-ranked magical beasts that so fortunately found the tunnel and ventured into the thirdyer, not one returned!

    Therefore, pertaining to the situation in the bottom mostyer, no person, or perhaps no living being, was truly clear about it!

    After crossing the narrow tunnel, Gilbert again took Han Shuo walking for a long time, and they finally arrived at a region covered with mountain ridges. This was a huge canyon with unbroken ridges of irregr heights as far as the eye could see. From a distance, it looked as though enormously long dragons were entrenched there.

    As soon as they arrived at the region, HS¡¯s sensitive nose picked up a faint reeking of blood, ¡°I smell blood!¡±

    Gilbert¡¯s eyes turned red, on the brink of tears, he cried, ¡°Grandpa, I¡¯m home! Gilbert is home!¡±

    Gilbert¡¯s voice echoed without end in the great canyon. He was already rushing towards the canyon as he cried those words. Han Shuo hastily followed behind him.

    ¡°Get lost!¡± from the deepest part of the canyon, came an angry roar of an aged man, with terror in his voice.

    ¡°Grandpa, it¡¯s my grandpa¡¯s voice!¡± Gilbert was pleasantly surprised and turned to Han Shuo, ¡°My grandpa is still there. He is alright!¡±

    ¡°But I believe you have already lost some nsman!¡± Han Shuo shouted lightly and grabbed dark dragon Gilbert. He suddenly elerated and shot towards the canyon at lightning speed.

    Under their feet, a thirty meter long body of dark dragon was strewn bare at the back of a mountain ridge. As Han Shuo and Gilbert flew overhead, looking at the ground beneath them, they could make out that the body of this dark dragon was most likely cut by sharp weapons, with hideous wounds all over his magnificent body.

    ¡°Uncle Delix!¡± Gilbert obviously recognized the body of the dead dark dragon and snarled with his eyes popped out.

    However, this dark dragon wasn¡¯t the only carcass!

    As they continued flying towards the canyon, three additional dead bodies of dark dragons appeared under their feet one after another. These three dark dragons must have suffered cruel torment before they died. Every body were riddled with cuts and wounds. One was even dismembered into three pitiful chunks!

    Gilbert knew all four dark dragons that were killed, particrly the gigantic dark dragon that died in the most miserable state of being butchered into three. He nearly fainted in grief and indignation. No longer able to restrain himself, he wailed in tears.

    Because that was Gilbert¡¯s father!

    ¡°You scoundrel! Run! Run far, far away!¡± a frantic scream, as though weeping blood, came from the depths of the canyon, which was mixed with Gilbert¡¯s grief-stricken crying. Han Shuo¡¯s heart grew as cold as it could, giving him an impulse to slowly torture the offender to death by separating their skin and flesh into a thousand chunks.

    Even without actively using his consciousness to probe the situation inside, he could sense the few presences within, one of whom was especially powerful. Faintly, Han Shuo even felt that their aura bore some resemnce to that of water divine magus Tiana. When this feeling arose in his heart, his desire to kill grew even more vigorous.

    ¡°Move! Put it off until we get to the canyon!¡± In spite of Gilbert¡¯s bawling in loss of self-control, Han Shuo grasped him firmly and hurriedly flew into the canyon with a gloomy face.

    ¡°Herees another one, tut-tut, interesting!¡± Suddenly, a disdainful, ice-cold sneer could be hearding from the depths of the canyon.

    ¡°I will kill them, I will kill them! No matter who they are, I will kill them!¡± Gilbert the dark dragon constantly repeated those words as he wailed. His usual sloppy, happy-go-lucky attitude had long vanished.

    At this moment, other than grief, perhaps all that Gilbert felt was deep-rooted hatred.

    Finally, with Han Shuo pulling Gilbert along, they arrived at the biggest canyon.

    The first thing that entered Han Shuo¡¯s eyes was an enormous pure white cage made of some unknown materials. Inside the cage were about seventeen dark dragons that had transformed into human form with skin as dark as ink. There were elderlies as well as young ones. They all wore cors around their necks, not unlike dog cors. Bloody whip scars were visible on their faces. Not even a dark dragon with the appearance of an underage girl was spared. There were trails of open wounds on her cheeks still flowing with fresh blood, she seemed to have just received ashing.

    Around the cage were six people in d in matching attire that was as white as snow. They all wore an ice-cold expression, carrying a whiff of indifference and ruthlessness.

    Among them was a middle-aged man with a handsome face that could have been carved with de. He looked at Han Shuo and Gilbert with a cold and indifferent smile, hands sped behind his back. The presenceing from him was rather simr to that of Tiana. Furthermore, he was the being with the greatest strength in his group ¡ª a demigod being!

    ¡°Another puny reptile!¡± This handsome middle-age man looked at Gilbert as though he was looking at a pet, naturally causing a feeling of aloofness. He then turned to Han Shuo, ¡°Who are you?¡±

    ¡°You know Tiana, correct?¡± Han Shuo asked instead of answering.

    Including this handsome middle-aged man, all six of those in white slightly changed their expressions. The middle aged man that lead the group creased his brows before saying, ¡°You actually know of my junior sister. Who are you?¡±

    ¡°Who are you people?¡± Han Shuo was startled and yelled.

    ¡°We are from the Shrine of Ice. I¡¯m Corey the Ice Celestial. How did youe to know of my junior sister Tiana the Snow Celestial? Who are you? Are you a friend or a foe?¡± This man from the Shrine of Ice known as Corey, a so called Ice Celestial, questioned coldly with his eyes fixed on Han Shuo.

 Chapter 467: Ganging Up?

    GDK 467: Ganging Up?

    Like the Church of Light, the Shrine of Ice was one of those rather famous religious organizations on Profound Continent. The Shrine of Ice worshipped the Ice Goddess. Although its influence wasn¡¯t as extensive as the Church of Light, it was not to be belittled.

    The Shrine of Ice was the state religion of the Kasi Empire and their headquarters were also located at the top of the coldest mountain in Kasi Empire. Unexpectedly, Tiana was not only the protector of Kasi Empire, but also came from the Shrine of Ice, and was even their Snow Celestial.

    Han Shuo learned secrets from Corey that even Candide from the Dark Mantle knew nothing about. It seemed that this Shrine of Ice was rather mysterious.

    Atst, Han Shuo finally understood why Tiana would scheme against him. It was because the Church of Light and the Shrine of Ice had always co-operated closely. As the Snow Celestial for the Shrine of Ice, it was a matter of course that Tiana would entrap them for the Church of Light.

    The group from the Shine of Ice, led by Corey the Ice Celestial, were all on high alert as they looked at Han Shuo. Among them, Corey was the strongest, possessing strength approximately that of Han Shuo¡¯s. As for the other five, based on the ice-cold aura they emitted, they possessed about the strength of a sacred grade expert.

    The strength of this party was not, however, to be underestimated. No matter the nation, they represented forces that no one dared neglect. To be so daring to enter the secondyer of the underworld and massacre the dark dragons in their own territories, would certainly have had to possess a certain level of power to be sessful.

    It was also at this moment that Han Shuo began to understand why Lawrence was so happy to find out that Han Shuo possessed demigod strength. The Oden Empire had the Church of Light. Kasi Empire had the Shrine of Ice. Such religious organizations would generally possess terrifying experts. Perhaps the reason the Lancelot Empire had dared not to wage war for so many years was that it held misgivings for those existences.

    Soon after, another question arose in Han Shuo¡¯s heart. The strength that the Kasi Empire demonstratedpletely crushed that of the Lancelot Empire. But why was it that for so many years, the Kasi Empire hadn¡¯t yet infringed on the Lancelot Empire? By relying on their Ice Celestial and Snow Celestial, before Han Shuo became a demigod, who on Lancelot Empire could stop them?

    Apart from this, the Brut Merchant Alliance and Ang Empire were both supported by mighty experts. Even the seven grand duchies had Stratholme the old monster, another demigod existence. How was it that for so many years the Lancelot Empire remained safe and sound?

    ¡°What¡¯s your intention?¡± the Ice Celestial again shouted as Han Shuo indulged in his thoughts. He had unsheathed a bone-chilling longsword in his hand!

    Han Shuo immediately came to his senses, and turned his head to nce at dark dragon Gilbert. All he saw was that Gilbert was rained with curses from a small, tearful old man trapped in Corey¡¯s cage. The old man seemed likely to be Gilbert¡¯s grandfather, patriarch of the dark dragons ¨C Gilges. Although he spoke in a nasty, disgruntled tone, his anxious look showed that he was concerned.

    Gilbert turned a deaf ear to his grandfather¡¯s roundly abuse, but stared at Corey the Ice Celestial with his eyes full of sheer hatred. Even without practicing God ying Devil Path, the killing intenting from his body was still incredibly dense. It was a bloodthirsty desire to destroy everything regardless of the consequences.

    ¡°Nothing really!¡± Han Shuo groaned coldly. He opened up his hand. Five dark rays shot out from his fingertips straight towards the pure white cage imprisoning the whole n of dark dragons.

    Against Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, Corey, who stood right beside the cage, did not intercept the attack but sneered as he looked disdainfully at Han Shuo. The other five put on the same expression. This expression showing in their eyes irritated Han Shuo.

    However, very soon, Han Shuo found out why those people had such contemptuous faces. Without Corey or the other five obstructing, the five raysnded directly on the spotlessly white cage, making a few ¡°dong dong¡± sounds, but remained intact under Han Shuo¡¯s bombardment.

    Han Shuo was stunned. He was very clear as to just how terrifying the impacting force contained in those five rays was. Even iron and stone, no matter how hard, would be pulverized when met with those forces. Nevertheless, after taking a direct hit from Han Shuo, the cage managed toe out unscathed. This was obviously beyond Han Shuo¡¯s expectations.

    ¡°This cage was blessed by the Goddess of Ice. If you could damage it, we would have turned around and fled!¡± Ice Celestial Corey sneered incessantly at Han Shuo. Then, he turned the ice-cold longsword in his hand to point at Han Shuo, saying, ¡°A foe, it seems!¡±

    When Corey said those words, the other five of his party all left the cage simultaneously, seemingly unconcerned about it breaking. One after another, they dispersed cold, detached expressions, likely preparing to leave both Han Shuo and dark dragon Gilbert behind.

    Of this delegation of six, Ice Celestial Corey was the most powerful. From the presenceing off of him, he seemed to be a mage swordsman. The longsword in his hand contained enormous icy-cold aura, which was mixed together with pure, cold divine energy, bearing astonishing resemnce to the holy energy found on the temple knights from the Church of Light.

    All so-called religions were like this. They could always exchange piety towards their respective gods for some divine energy. Even just a mere share of divine energy was more than enough for them to transcend beyond their own limitations, and gain strength unimaginable to the ordinary man.

    When he noticed the six fellows of the Shrine of Ice attempting to surround him slowly, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but crease his brows. If it had just been Ice Celestial Corey alone, Han Shuo would not at all have been afraid, after all, Han Shuo had extreme confidence in himself. However, if those five sacred-grade experts were brought into the picture, Han Shuo would have felt somewhat vexed handling them all at once.

    Especially, among the five, two were water sacred magi. At that moment, they had already begun chanting their spells. All of a sudden, the entire secondyer of the underground world seemed to have transformed into a world of ice and snow. Bone-chilling coldness filled this entire region.

    ¡°Friend, no matter who you are, don¡¯t even think about leaving here today!¡± Corey advanced towards Han Shuo one step at a time as incantations from his subordinates hummed through the air. The longsword in his hand was gradually covered with ayer of frost glittering like diamonds, containing an iparably frosty aura.

    ¡°Ganging up? Hahah, being ganged up on is thest thing I¡¯m afraid of!¡± Han Shuo was suddenly no longer anxious. Laughing mischievously, he took out the skeletal staff from his hand and followed by chanting necromancy spells. Undead creatures appeared all around Han Shuo one after another.

    Before Corey could get close to Han Shuo, everyst empty space around Han Shuo had begun to close up until there was none left, all upied by numerous densely packed undead creatures.

    Starting from the lowest ranking skeletal warriors and ghouls, all the way up to evil knights, a bone devil and a mummy lord, aplete gamut of undeads were summoned. Above all, there was a bunch of totally uncanny zombies each d with oddly looking armour. Among them was the metal elite zombie wieding the golden cudgel sparkling with golden rays, while the fire elite zombie held the Fire Lotus pulsing zes.

    Among all the undead creatures, the elite zombies somehow appeared offbeat!

    ¡°You, you really are a damn necromancer!¡± Corey was shocked, somewhat shaken by the countless undead creatures Han Shuo summoned.

    ¡°Heheh. So what if you¡¯re a necromancer? We have even the entire tribe of dark dragons imprisoned in our hands. With merely a ragtag team of lowly undead creatures, what exactly do you think you can do to us?¡± Corey was very conceited, obviously not seeing these living deads as a threat.

    ¡°Lowly?¡± Han Shuo sneered. Soon after, he inwardly delivered an order to the five elite zombies: Find an opportunity to form the Penta-elemental Undead Formation.

    As the little skeleton was busy fusing his soul with the Origin Crystal containing pure death element, he did not make an appearance this time. But with the five elite zombies, in addition to the three evil knights and the mummy lord, Han Shuo was still certain they could withstand the six from the Shrine of Ice.

    But having said that, as a surefire guarantee, Han Shuo nevertheless had the elite zombies prepare to deploy the Penta-elemental Undead Formation. Although the five elite zombies still could notpletely fuse their energies, based little skeleton¡¯s previous statement, Han Shuo noted that even the currently halfplete Penta-elemental Undead Formation could still unleash formidable firepower.

    ¡°Master, I want to avenge, I want to kill them!¡± dark dragon Gilbert roared in rage.

    ¡°With what? Just you lot?¡± Corey sneered in the most pejorative tone possible. After that, with loathing in his eyes, he roared, ¡°Cleanse away these filthy necromancy creatures for me!¡±

    At Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s words, those behind him who had been chanting abruptly ceased. Shortly after, the entire region thoroughly transformed into a world of ice and snow. Frigid gusts of air engulfed the entire valley. Huge icicles and hailstones the size of quern shit down from the sky, directed at the undead that crowded the canyon.

    The magic released by a sacred grade magus was indeed terrifying, and even more so when deployed by two sacred magi simultaneously!

    The entire canyon turned into an awful scene of icicles and hail shooting in every direction. Of the tremendous count of undead creatures Han Shuo summoned, the low ranking skeletal warriors and skeletal warriors would be in one after another.

    In no time at all, several thousand undead creatures were pounded into ground meat by icicles and hail. But with undead creatures with the level of hate warriors and above, their tough bodies were capable of resisting the attack. Naturally, the bone devil and mummy lord, undeads of such high level, were left unscathed.

    The bone chilling aura extended to cover the whole great canyon, causing even the dark dragons imprisoned in the cage to shiver and creak. But as far as the undead were concerned, low temperatures would never be a threat to them. Under the torrent of icicles and hail, the remaining undead were all lined up tounch an attack at Corey and his party.

 Chapter 468: Corey the Ice Celestial

    GDK 468: Corey the Ice Celestial

    The three evil knights who had been reformed by Han Shuo all wore armour that gleamed like mirrors, wielding extremely long bone spur that carried an intense aura of death. Counterintuitively, the three charged at the front-most line.

    Mounted on massive fire-spitting warhorses and holding huge bone spurs in their hands, the kick-ass evil knights exuded inexhaustible aura of death as they charged head on at Corey and his party.

    Behind the three evil knights were five additional evil knights who were not reforged with demonic magic, and behind them were the mummy lord and bone devil. As for the five strange looking elite zombies of five elements: earth elite zombie and wood elite zombie utilized their innate skills, hiding deep beneath the earth and hiding in a oundish nts respectively. Fire, water, and metal elite zombies mixed themselves among remaining zombie warriors that survived by mere chance, and slowly dispersed to encircle Corey and his men.

    Corey, wielding a longsword coated with ayer of ice as tough as diamond that emanated bone-chilling cold air, before the three evil knights got near him, he suddenly let out a cold groan and brandished the longsword in his hand. Colorless fighting aura mixed with frosty cold auraunched out from the longsword and headed for the three evil knights on fire-spitting warhorses.

    Frigid air current found between heaven and earth that could freeze any ordinary living organism congregated immediately with the colourless fighting aura. The originally colourless and formless fighting aura exploded with bright light and assimted with the cold air current, forming a colossal icicle glittering with frosty light. The icicle mixed with indestructible fighting aura shot towards the three evil knights.

    Han Shuo, who was standing beside dark dragon Gilbert, smirked and vanished in the blink of an eye. When his body was again visible, he was standing tall in the air ahead of the evil knights, and threw a ferocious punch from above.

    As though a red dragon had shot out from Han Shuo¡¯s hand, under the propelling of Mystical cial Spellfire, red mes danced around his fist. Carrying scorching light and heat, it pounded right in the middle of the colossal icicle.

    Creak!

    A crisp shatter of ice rock resonated. Under the effect of Han Shuo¡¯s ferocious force, the slender and long demonic me first made a big hole on the icicle, only then from within the icicle it released the intense heat it carried, evaporated away the icicle that contained Corey¡¯s colorless fighting aura.

    ¡°Your opponent, is me!¡± Step by step, without touching the ground, Han Shuo marched towards this Ice Celestial from the Shrine of Ice. As raging mes burned in both his hands, the searing heat interweaved with cold air found all around, producing fine water droplets that rained down.

    ¡°Who, who the hell are you?¡± Corey shouted, his heart palpitating with fear. After that strike from Han Shuo, this Ice Celestial of the Shrine of Ice finally had a taste of just how daunting was Han Shuo¡¯s strength was.

    Even without actively probing Corey with his consciousness, over such short distances, Han Shuo could still sense Corey¡¯s actual strength. Corey however, despite possessing exceedingly formidable strength, didn¡¯t have such miraculous demonic arts as Han Shuo. Therefore, from the beginning, Corey failed to realize that Han Shuo was an opponent of the same grade.

    Afterall, it was exceedingly rare to find demigod existences in the whole of Profound Continent. In his defense, Corey hade prepared. Nearly every cream of the crop expert in the Shrine of Ice, apart from Tiana, was brought here. He did not think that somebody he randomly came across in the dark dragons¡¯ territory would possess such strength to contend against them.

    Most significantly, as the demonic arts which Han Shuo practiced was as different as it could be from the martial arts in this world, Corey did not feel any cirction of fighting aura in Han Shuo¡¯s body, thus dismissed the possibility that he was a martial arts practitioner. Only after Han Shuo withdrew his skeletal staff did Corey realize that Han Shuo was merely a necromancer. When he saw that Han Shuo did not summon bone dragon, he even further looked down upon Han Shuo.

    A mere grand magus was nothing in his eyes. Any one of his five subordinates could easily finish Han Shuo. Hence, he never would have expected Han Shuo to be of any threat!

    However, when he discovered that Han Shuo could smash his icicle in one strike, he knew he was gravely mistaken in his assessment. That was the reason he again interrogated about Han Shuo¡¯s origin gravely.

    ¡°You are about to be no more than a corpse anyway, why bother asking?¡± Han Shuo stared at Ice Celestial Corey with murder in his eyes. The two fireballs in his hands, formed by congealing demonic yuan energy, hurled at Corey as Han Shuo finished.

    Perhaps only characters the grade of this Ice Celestial could truly understand the power of the energy contained within these seemingly ordinary fireballs! He roared, and his longsword fluttered, sending sparking, translucent cold air towards the two demoniacal fireballs.

    Against Corey¡¯s expectations, the raging fireballs that were flying towards him in straight lines, evaded the dischargeing from his longsword with bizarre, sinuous maneuvers. Like two autonomous living beings, the fireballs with their unpredictable trajectory again came flying towards him.

    Behind the two diabolical fireballs stood Han Shuo, wearing a smile even colder than this world of ice and snow he was in. He sent amand to earth elite zombie, then told dark dragon Gilbert from a distance , ¡°You¡¯re just going to have to look after your grandpa in a moment!¡±

    The spell released simultaneously by two sacred grade magi filled the entire region with intensely frigid air, a mixture of snowkes and ice shards fluttering everywhere, as though there was a frozen mountain where the Shrine of Ice was located.

    Perhaps because their energy was confined, each and every one of the imprisoned dark dragons shivered in the cold. The dark skinned girl covered with cuts and bruises, possibly due to the freezing cold, or maybe it was the ice crumbs that fell on her. Her skin seemed to have paled a significant few shades.

    After Han Shuo spoke, the ground on which the cage rested suddenly crumbled into a dark cavern. As the imprisoned dark dragons screamed out in fear, the entire cage tumbled into the dark hole.

    At the same time, right under Gilbert¡¯s feet, an underground tunnel opened up. Gilbert came to his senses in an instant, and lept into the tunnel.

    After both the cage and dark dragon Gilbert descended, the two holes that appeared so bizarrely, in the attentive watch of the Shrine of Ice experts, again miraculously closed up. Before they realized what was happening, the two holes hadpletely disappeared. The ground restored to its former smooth surface.

    ¡°Lord, Lord Corey! The Jadefrost Cage disappeared!¡± Suddenly, one of the magi that had been chanting, cried out in shock.

    Corey, who was brandishing his sword to resist the tricky attacks of the diabolic fireballs, found time to take a nce behind him. His face turned an ugly expression. Corey the Ice Celestial had been on the defense against those diabolic fireballs all along when, all of a sudden, a dreadfully frigid gust of air gushed out from his body.

    All of a sudden, cold air gathered rapidly with Corey at the center, and the space around him started to freeze, producing an enormous blick of solid ice in midair.

    The two constantly whirling diabolic fireballs manipted by Han Shuo were frozen into the huge chunk of ice as well. Before Han Shuo could react, a dozen or so cold streams of air attached themselves to the solid ice and began to rapidly circle within the ice like silvery snakes, which then converged towards the fireballs trapped in the ice.

    Dense white smoke immediately emanated from where the two fireballs were confined. Han Shuo could feel the demonic yuan energy contained within the two diabolic fireball depleting little by little under the besiege of the streams of cold air.

    At the center of the huge chunk of ice sat Corey. As the caster, Corey wasn¡¯t affected by the cold ice. With his chilly eyes on Han Shuo, he suddenly flew towards him at high-speed. The enormous chunk of ice thatpletely froze the space around him, as though it was weightless, flew along with Corey and towards Han Shuo.

    Midway, thick white smoke stopped emanating from the surface of the solid ice. The dozen or so cold streams of air finally wore down thest bit of demonic yuan energy in the two frozen diabolic fireballs, and there was no longer a trace of their presences.

    At Han Shuo¡¯smand, the higher ranking undead creatures that suffered no effect under the previous wave of ice magic attack, circumvented Corey and charged at the five top experts from the Shrine of Ice. The five elite zombies too rapidly scattered around, preparing to release the Penta-elemental Undead Formation.

    Seeing Corey fly towards him in that big block of ice, Han Shuo¡¯s two hands began to rapidly whirl about, all kinds of uncanny demonic magic suddenly flew out with whooshing sounds. When the streams of unstoppable demonic light met with the solid ice, they produced beautiful nking sounds.

    However, this enormous chunk of solid ice that constantly absorbed the frosty air from the area seemed to be made of the toughest substance. When Han Shuo¡¯s unique demonic attacks bombarded the boulder of ice, the deepest dent they made was barely a meter deep, absolutely incapable of prating through the solid ice and touch a single hair on Corey¡¯s head.

    Ice Celestial is indeed a well justified nickname! Han Shuo praised in his heart. He had been, on the one hand, busy releasing all sorts of dazzling attacks on the ice, and on the other, rapidly dodging, pressingly turning over in his mind for ways to break the ice.

    As the Demonyer Edge had yet topletely fuse with the Crystal of Destruction, and was unable to find a way to break the ice at the time, Han Shuo had no choice but to evade at high-speed. Fortunately, when it came to speed, Han Shuo always had the upper hand. Chasing after Han Shuo in a colossal chunk of ice, although fast moving, Corey wasn¡¯t nearly as fast as Han Shuo and couldn¡¯t get anywhere near him.

    One couldn¡¯t break through the ice, one couldn¡¯t catch up to the other, the two were locked in a stalemate.

    ¡°Father, let me do it!¡±

    ¡°Father, let me do it!¡±

    It was at this moment that Han Shuo received messages from the fire elite zombie and metal elite zombie. The two were overflowing with self-confidence, and seemingly sent the telepathic messages to Han Shuo simultaneously. The two then began to charge at Corey.

    Metal elite zombie and fire elite zombie. One wielded the invincible treasure of metal attribute ¨C the golden cudgel, another wielded the destructive incendiary treasure of fire attribute ¨C the Fire Lotus. Han Shuo suddenly arrived at his senses. His mood loosened up and he started to plot on how to relentlessly hit Corey when he was down!

 Chapter 469: Ruptured

    GDK 469: Ruptured

    Fact proved that both the metal elite zombie and fire elite zombie, who obtained treasures of their respective attributes, could indeed release an incredible amount of energy.

    Under the metal elite zombie¡¯s maniption, the golden cudgel turned into a huge pir glittering with golden rays. Carrying the force of millions and millions of tonnes, it directly hammered down on the enormous Boulder of ice that enveloped Ice Celestial Corey. A terrifying splintering noise broke out. Being in the center, Corey suddenly felt an unparalleled vigorous energy rush forth, causing his body to violently quake and his aura to be unsteady.

    The fire elite zombie immediately followed. One after another, clouds of raging inferno continuously leapt out from the Fire Lotus in his hand and fell onto the solid ice that had yet topletely disintegrate. Thick smoke fiercely discharged from where the fire and ice made contact.

    Corey turned pale with fright. If it was just one of those miraculous martial techniques of Han Shuo¡¯s that destroyed his ice shield, he may not have been so appalled. However, it was merely two strange looking zombie warriors that defeated the ice boulder which contained divine energy of the Ice Goddess, something absolutely beyond his imagination.

    ¡°What the hell are they!¡± Corey was stunned in fear by the fire elite zombie and metal elite zombie. He held tight onto his longsword that was covered with ayer of diamond-hard ice as he stared at the two elite zombies somewhat flustered.

    It was at this moment that, like a ghoul, Han Shuo suddenly scudded out from the thick smoke. The Demonic des caused fingernails on both his hands to dramatically grow to a meter long. As he fluttered his hands in criss-cross motion, trails of demonic light violently shot out, seemingly weaving a huge intangible web to trap Corey.

    Corey was extremely flustered. It was already extremely difficult to handle Han Shuo alone. Now to add to that, there was the fire elite zombie refined with pure elemental energy of fire. Indistinctly, he felt as though the Fire Lotus was actually subduing him, making Corey extremely ufortable. When he saw Han Shuo charging over, Corey shot out shard after shard of ice as he inched backwards, retreating.

    Suddenly, right before Corey, Han Shuo gradually turned fainter and fainter until hepletely vanished! Yet, that sense of danger never diminished but instead swelled in magnitude. This caused Corey great distress.

    With him at the center, icicle after icicle fiercely shot out from the longsword in his hand in every direction. After losing Han Shuo¡¯s trail, that was the best idea Corey coulde up with to attack him.

    After Coreyunched the full coverage attack, the huge falling right over his head was seemingly destroyed and dissipated under the bombardment of the icicles.

    However, Corey did not feel any morefortable. On the contrary, that sense of danger that always shrouded his heart grew more and more intense. Corey had gathered all his concentration, rapidly revolved at the same spot on the ground in his attempt to locate the source of the danger, and yet, couldn¡¯t find anything.

    When that sense of danger amassed to the very brim, a stab of pain shot at his soles. Corey was visibly frightened, and hastily rose high up into the air, escaping from the sneak attack that had suddenlye from beneath his feet.

    Below Corey¡¯s feet, Han Shuo, who utilized the earth elite zombie to construct underground tunnels for him to mount a surprise attack, with a malicious grin, raised his head to look at Corey the Ice Celestial. As cold lights glistened from the Demonic des in his two hands, ten dark rays emitted from his fingertips like serpents, biting at Corey. Not only did they travel faster than lightning, their trajectories were even more tricky and unpredictable.

    Damn it! Corey cursed at his own negligence. In a flurry, he whirled his longsword downwards.

    Of the ten slithering rays, six were stopped in their paths by Corey¡¯s panicked defensive strike, while another four attached to his body as though they were his own shadows. Then, they exploded one by one at his hips and waist. A waterfall of fresh blood gushed from his wound and Corey¡¯s miserable howl sounded.

    While he¡¯s wounded, deal him the final blow!

    Han Shuo soared into the sky. There seemed to be demonic lights constantly circting inside the meter-long Demonic des in both hands. Another ten rays again umted at his fingertips, ready to take Corey¡¯s life at any moment.

    Out of Han Shuo¡¯s anticipation, this Ice Celestial Corey, one of even more honorable status than Tiana in the Shrine of Ice, when his lower body was burst open by those rays, he went as far as to hastily pull out a magic scroll. Before Han Shuo even came close to him, Corey had activated the scroll that was as white as snow.

    ¡°Retreat!¡± Corey shouted at the top of his lungs. The snowkes that filled the air suddenly rushed towards him. In just a split second, Corey the Ice Celestial vanished into the snowfall.

    When Corey¡¯s miserable howl reverberated, the snowkes that nketed the entire region all of a sudden wrapped around each of the few remaining experts of the Shrine of Ice. The five seemed to have melted into the snowkes, and miraculously disappeared before Han Shuo¡¯s eyes.

    Even though he could feel their presences in the snow with his outstanding consciousness, Han Shuo could not trace their exact locations. It was as though they had all melted into the snow. He could sense them, but had no way of attacking them!

    When the group of six disappeared, the snowstorm that shrouded the entire canyon ceased. Han Shuo could sense the presences of Corey and his party disappearing bit by bit. When Han Shuo could no longer feel any of their presences, although the frosty coldness that shrouded the entire canyon remained, there were no longer any snowkes wafting through the sky.

    The undead creatures who had lost their targets, not knowing what to do, stood their ground dumbfounded as they awaited furthermands from Han Shuo.

    ¡°Father, they have disappeared!¡± earth elite zombie transmitted naively after slowly emerging from the ground beside Han Shuo.

    ¡°They managed to escape! Their escape method was truly a miracle. It was actually achieved by blending into the ice and snow,¡± Han Shuo mumbled to himself. He instructed the earth elite zombie, ¡°Open the underground tunnel. Bring dark dragon Gilbert and the cage out!¡±

    ¡°Okay!¡± the earth elite zombie replied bluntly. Right after, the ground beside the two suddenly split open to form a cavern. Therefrom emerged dark dragon Gilbert and the cage imprisoning the dark dragon race.

    Gilberty on top of the cage, his tears constantly falling into it. He said nothing, but cried unceasingly at the patriarch of dark dragons, Gilges, who was right below him. His grandfather¡¯s eyes were red through and through as tears rolled down, choking with sobs as he consoled Gilbert.

    After ncing at Gilbert and the other dark dragons in the cage, Han Shuo quietly pulled open a distance with them. Han Shuo knew that it was best for them to have time together by themselves at such moments. Besides, perhaps Gilges might want to tell Gilbert about certain secrets of the dark dragons. It seemed inappropriate for him to remain there.

    As the temperature in this tract ofnd had returned to normal, the ice and snow that previously covered the earth gradually melted away. Han Shuo sent the undead creatures back to theherworld one after another, and then pondered the objective of the Shine of Ice making a presence.

    The Shrine of Ice and the Church of Light had very friendly rtions, and both possessed great influence over the continent. Although the two religions professed distinct doctrines, it was an open secret that they were allied with each other in private. Therefore, stemming from Han Shuo¡¯s loathing towards the Church of Light, and adding to Tiana¡¯s betrayal thest time, it seemed fitting that Han Shuo would view the Shrine of Ice as his enemy.

    Although Corey had sessfully fled through the snowkes that filled the sky, Han Shuo nevertheless left an eternally unforgettable mark on his body. On top of that, given the existence of Tiana, this enmity he had with the Shrine of Ice would be impossible to resolve peacefully. Han Shuo had even begun considering how to deal with the Shrine of Ice.

    As Han Shuo continued to ponder, he felt a message from Gilbert, asking him toe over. Without hesitation, Han Shuo arrived beside Gilbert. He saw that although Gilbert was still wearing the same sorrowful face as before, his mood had atst somewhat stabilized.

    With every one of the dozen dark dragons imprisoned in the cage looking at Han Shuo, Gilbert¡¯s grandfather, Gilges, leaned in towards Han Shuo from within the cage, and thanked him sincerely, ¡°Thest time Gilbert returned, I did hear of some of your past achievements. Never did I expect that it would be you who would end up saving our kind. On behalf of all dark dragons, thank you for your great favor!¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re wee. The rtionship between Gilbert and I isn¡¯t as simple as you would imagine. Assisting you was the right thing to do!¡± Han Shuo made a hand gesture, indicating to Gilges that he need not be so courteous.

    ¡°I do understand. No ordinary person would ever be willing to risk their life for their magic pets. To rush over here from distant parts in order to help us dark dragons, that alone has fully exined your affection for Gilbert. It was indeed his good fortune to have followed you!¡± Gilges was definitely a thoughtful person. Due solely to the fact that Han Shuo would head over to aid Gilbert, he reasoned that Gilbert had definitely followed the right master.

    ¡°Grandpa, stop discussing such pointless things!¡± Gilbertined. Afterwards, looking impatiently at Han Shuo, he asked, ¡°Master, can you open up this damned cage? I have tried countless methods, but nothing has worked!¡±

    ¡°Let me try again!¡± Han Shuo replied and proceeded to deploy several demonic martial skills. However, this cage was blessed by the Ice Goddess, as mentioned by Corey, and indeed contained an exotic divine energy. A multitude of attacks, no matter how powerful, we¡¯re all frozen and disarmed by the bone-prating frigid divine energy, unable to break open the cage.

    As the main soul of the Demonyer Edge was fusing with the energy of the Crystal of Destruction, it now needed to be absolutely cloistered. With the assistance of the inconceivably incisive Demonyer Edge, Han Shuo had absolute confidence that he could break this cage into pieces. However, as the Demonyer Edge was currently unavable, it remained a big headache.

    Although the golden cudgel that the metal elite zombie wielded could destroy anything, if the cudgel really were to bombard the cage, the dozen or so dark dragon already on the verge of death would most likely give out before the cage did.

    If this cage hadn¡¯t been enchanted with the divine energy of the Ice Goddess, Han Shuo would have been certain he could cut it open. But the situation at hand left him at his wit¡¯s end.

    While he racked his brain, he suddenly recalled someone who might be of use. He let out a soft cry at once, ¡°Perhaps there¡¯s still a way!¡±

 Chapter 470: Past Events Thousand Years Back

    GDK 470: Past Events Thousand Years Back

    ¡°What do you mean?¡± Gilbert asked insistently.

    ¡°Elizabeth is in Brettel City. I think she can help us!¡± Han Shuo exined.

    Elizabeth, a target on the Church of Light¡¯s hitlist, possessed a most bizarre Body of Divine Favor with the miraculous ability to absorb divine energy from followers of the Church of Light. Han Shuo had a feeling that she might be able to absorb and remove the divine energy contained in the cage. Without the protection of divine energy from the Ice Goddess, Han Shuo had a hundred percent certainty of breaking the Jadefrost Cage.

    ¡°She?¡± Gilbert wasn¡¯t fully convinced. But when he saw Han Shuo¡¯s confidence in the idea, he asked, ¡°Can she be trusted?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not too sure either. But there¡¯s no harm trying!¡± Han Shuo replied.

    ¡°You, you are called Bryan, right?¡± Gilges, the patriarch of dark dragons, raised his head and asked.

    ¡°Yep!¡± Han Shuo replied.

    ¡°Thank you for your rescue. My race of dark dragons will engrave your grace in our memory!¡± Gilges kowtowed at Han Shuo. Then, he raised his head and said, ¡°One of the reasons those of the Shrine of Ice came here, killed my tribesmen, and imprisoned us here was to turn the entire race of dark dragons into their saddle horses. The other was to find out the route to the thirdyer of the underground world from me!¡±

    The thirdyer of the underground world!

    Han Shuo was startled. Then, with glistering eyes on the patriarch of dark dragons, he asked, ¡°What exactly was the situation?¡±

    Since Gilges took the initiative to divulge the condition at the thirdyer of the underground world, it seemed that he intended to speak out candidly about the whole sequence of events to Han Shuo, something Han Shuo had not expected.

    ¡°Two years ago, when Gilbert returned, I learned from him that you were the owner of the skeletal staff. And from that moment on, I stopped advising Gilbert not to follow by your side. Because, the owner of the skeletal staff surely couldn¡¯t be an enemy to us dark dragons!¡± the patriarch of dark dragons said in a heavy voice as he looked deeply at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo grew even more bewildered. Gilges seemed to actually understand certain origins of the skeletal staff. He couldn¡¯t help but withdraw the skeletal staff and fiddle with. Looking at the patriarch of dark dragons in an odd manner, Han Shuo asked, ¡°Why do you say so?¡±

    ¡°Because, five thousand years ago, the race of dark dragons had been going to battles undermand of the original owner of the skeletal staff. The reason we dark dragons had always lived in the secondyer of the underground world, was also because the original owner of the skeletal staff hadmanded us to, so as to prevent anyone from intruding into the thirdyer of the underground world!

    ¡°I also heard a little from Gilbert about your encounter with Ancient Lizard King Dagassi. The Ancient Lizard King was his magical pet back then. Dagassi must have told you something, hasn¡¯t he?¡± Gilges asked.

    ¡°Nope, Dagassi hardly discussed his previous affairs. All he told me was that I can find out the truth from the skeletal staff. However, at the moment, I have yet topletely grasp the secrets of the skeletal staff. Therefore, for the time being, I¡¯m unclear as to what actually happened five thousand years ago. If you do happen to know, I hope that you can tell me,¡± Han Shuo requested as he looked at Gilges, his heart full of doubt.

    Gilges shook his head with a bitter smile. The thirst in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes forced him to gather his attention and say, ¡°I have only lived for a little over two thousand years. I only know of these things from ancient records my ancestors left behind. What I know is very, very limited!¡±

    ¡°What exactly do you know?¡± Han Shuo questioned closely.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s gaze, Gilges contemted for a while and said, ¡°Five thousand years ago, there was a great war that involved every powerhouse on Profound Continent. It was extremely intense and a great disaster. There seemed to even be experts from other nes of existence involved. The side with which the owner of the skeletal staff and us dark dragons stood likely lost in that great war. Some of the main leaders on our side escaped while some weren¡¯t as lucky. Our side suffered heavy damage. It is said that a few formidable races on our side were forever wiped out from Profound Continent! We dark dragons consider ourselves lucky. Although we¡¯ve been holed up in the secondyer of the underground world ever since, at least we weren¡¯t exterminated.¡±

    ¡°I have no idea about the situation of other races, but we dark dragons have, under the instructions of the original owner of the skeletal staff, remained in the secondyer of the underground world all this time. Firstly, it was to take shelter from the pursuit of the victors, and secondly, we had to stand guard at the path that connects to the thirdyer.¡±

    ¡°When the owner of the skeletal staff gave us thismand, he also told us that five thousand years from then, some mighty enemy would no doubte down here. He said that as long as we could survive this cmity, provided that we had hold fast for five thousand years, we can at longst leave the underground world, and we would no longer need to defend it.¡±

    ¡°That was all that I know. As to what really happened five thousand years ago, why we suffered such a crushing defeat, who the enemy was, whaty in the thirdyer, I¡¯m clueless!¡±

    Han Shuo fell into a deep contemtion. What was certain was that the original owner of the skeletal staff ought to be out of the leaders on this side five thousand years ago. Otherwise, he couldn¡¯t have left such instructions to the dark dragons. In addition, the original owner of the skeletal staff must have still been alive, otherwise he wouldn¡¯t have had left behind so many preparatory measures.

    It was also from that moment that Han Shuo felt that the legends that circted the outside world probably were nowhere near the truth. ording to folklore, the Cemetery of Death was originally created by a group of necromancers, who used the Cemetery of Death for research on the mysterious knowledge about necromancy. For they hadmitted a gross multitude of outrageously depraved acts, magi of every school of magic united to destroy them, and the Cemetery of Deathpletely vanished with them.

    As a necromancer, Han Shuo had heard much of such folklores. But when extrapting based on the events in these folk stories, he concluded that they were set less than a millennium before. Now when he heard Gilges mention matters from five thousand years ago, Han Shuo was almost certain that the Cemetery of Death ought to have existed for a longer period.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo recalled that Gilges had been alive for over two thousand years, and so he pestered, ¡°You have lived for more than two thousand years. Are you aware of the existence of the Cemetery of Death, and the legends about that ce?¡±

    ¡°Of course. I haven¡¯t beenpletely ignorant of all the events of the outside world for the past two millennia. When ites to certain major events, I still know a thing or two!¡± Gilges nodded, and soon continued, ¡°Which legends do you mean, exactly?¡±

    Han Shuo was delighted in his heart. He hastily depicted all the way through every legend the human world perpetuated pertaining to the Cemetery of Death. Then, with his bright eyes on Gilges, he asked, ¡°Are such the facts?¡±

    Shaking his head, Gilges replied, ¡°Thousand of years ago there was indeed a group of necromancers that gathered at the Cemetery of Death. They produced a lot of wicked necromancy magic in their research ¨C also true. And in the end they were hunted to death by every magus of every country, that is also correct. However, they surely did not build the Cemetery of Death. Like you, they possessed the Cemetery of Death, but were not the creators.

    Although I don¡¯t have any conclusive evidence, I¡¯ve always believed that the Cemetery of Death was constructed by the original owner of the skeletal staff. And just like our dark dragon race¡¯s constant defense of the tunnel five thousand years, for the original owner of the skeletal staff to have built the Cemetery of Death, there must be some profound meaning to it.¡±

    ¡°Then, do you know about the circumstances of the Cmity Church¡¯s origin? They don¡¯t seem to have appeared too long ago on Profound Continent. Why is it that they consider the Cemetery of Death to be their holynd? How did they know about the three miraculous abilities of the skeletal staff?¡± Han Shuo was anxious and asked Gilges in a hurried tone.

    ¡°I do know some things about the Cmity Church. That folklore you mentioned about the Cemetery of Death, except for the part where those necromancers constructed it, arge part of rest of the stories is true.

    ¡°The Cmity Church was actually founded by the same necromancers that formerly possessed the Cemetery of Death. At the time, they created countless terrifying magic in the Cemetery of Death. In particr, the appearance of this ¡®gue¡¯ spell. It caused people in countless cities to turn into undeads.

    ¡°Therefore, they became themon enemy of the entire continent, and were finally extirpated by experts of various countries. However, they were very hard to kill. They weren¡¯t totally wiped out under the besiege of every country on the continent. But those few who so luckily survived would never dare to show their faces in public like they used to, and forever live in the dark.

    ¡°I have to say, these people indeed were iparably mighty. Even with thebined effort of the entire continent to destroy them, they weren¡¯tpletely eradicated. Those who survived even grew stronger and stronger, while their knowledge in the field of necromancy became more and more refined. They even began to recruit various wicked experts of the Profound Continent.

    ¡°That was, until these powerful necromancers attained new heights in their delvings into the field of magic, possessing the capacity ofmunicating with demons and evil gods. They established the Cmity Church to worship the evil god, epting more and more evil entities in Profound Continent, and flourished to the point now where even the Church of Light can barely suppress them.

    ¡°The Cemetery of Death is their birthce, and also the ce where the first generation of high-level Cmity Church members researched necromancy magic. For them to take the Cemetery of Death as their sacred ground, it¡¯s a matter of course!¡± Gilges exined continuously as he looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°So that¡¯s how it is!¡± With Gilges¡¯ narration, Han Shuo finally understood what the Cemetery of Death had to do with the Cmity Church. As it turned out, the Cemetery of Death was basically theboratory of the evil necromancers that founded the Cmity Church. The founders of the Cmity Church would do research on producing that wicked magic in there. No wonder Wolf always said that Han Shuo was one of theirs.

 Chapter 471: Taking in a Scourge

    GDK 471: Taking in a Scourge

    ¡°Then, do you know why the Cemetery of Death and the skeletal staff disappeared altogether?¡± With Gilges¡¯s exnations, Han Shuo easily figured out the rest of the stories. Now the only thing that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t understand was how the skeletal staff could be lost from the hands of Cmity Church.

    ¡°I haven¡¯t a clue either. Ever since the encirclement and extirpation campaign against the ancient necromancers started, the Cemetery of Death disappeared along with them. Eventer when the Cmity Church was founded, the Cemetery of Death had never once reappeared. But now, with you obtaining the skeletal staff, gaining the ability to freely enter and exit, after thousands of years, did the Cemetery of Death once more emerge!¡± Patriarch of dark dragons Gilges shook his head. He didn¡¯t seem very clear about what happened behind the scenes.

    Han Shuo then continued to inquire a certain matter about Cmity Church and Cemetery of Death. But this time, Gilges couldn¡¯t seem to answer those questions either. That was all he knew.

    ¡°Oh right, do you all still want to stay here?¡± When Han Shuo could no longer get any more useful information from Gilges, he nned of leaving.

    ¡°We still need to discuss a few things. Furthermore, we want to bury our children¡¯s bodies!¡± when this topic was raised, Gilges again appeared very sorrowful.

    ¡°Master, I also need to bury my father. From today onwards, as long as I, Gilbert, am alive, I vow to wipe the Shine of Ice off the face of the continent!¡± Gilbert said with a staunch look. He seemed to have taken the Shine of Ice as his arch nemesis.

    Han Shuo creased his brows. He, on the contrary, was eager to leave as soon as possible. After all, there were still plenty of things to deal with in the world above ground. However, he couldn¡¯t be sure if those from the Shine of Ice would be returning. If by any chance, they dide back and he wasn¡¯t there, then the dark dragons would never be able to escape a tragedy.

    After thinking for a moment, Han Shuo said, ¡°Settle everything you need to here. After that, everyone leaves this ce.¡±

    Han Shuo summoned the earth elite zombie and a bunch of zombie warriors. After issuing amand to the earth elite zombie, Han Shuo said to Gilbert, ¡°Let them help you. Start by burying your father¡¯s corpse. I will wait here with you for a few days. Then, when it¡¯s all over and done with, you will carry the cage and we shall all leave!¡±

    ¡°Thank you, master!¡± Gilbert replied.

    Hence, Han Shuo temporarily stayed at this great canyon. With the instruction of Gilbert¡¯s grandpa, Gilbert buried the dead bodies in ordance with the rites of the dark dragon race. The dark dragons in the cage then discussed the paths they wished to take in the future.

    Han Shuo also remained there but kept some distance away from Gilbert and the others, assiduously researching the mysteries of the three necromancy boundaries that he obtained thest time. After Han Shuo sessfully released the Boundary of Weakness, he easily picked up the knack of deploying the Boundary of Fear. In the short span of two days, he could proficiently release the Boundary of Fear.

    The Boundary of Weakness and Boundary of Fear were virtually the same, therefore Han Shuo did need to spend much time to master thetter. But regarding the Boundary of Aging, he was rather perplexed. In the following three days, Han Shuo constantly bore into the method of releasing the Boundary of Aging. Although he attempted many times, not once could he form the Boundary of Aging.

    After five days, with the assistance of earth elite zombie, all the dead dark dragons had been properly buried. In those five days, Gilbert finally brought order to his chaotic frame of mind. His grandfather Gilges also decided to leave temporarily, as to open up the cage and so that they would be safe if those of the Shrine of Ice were to return.

    Perhaps it was because the dark dragons weighed as much as humans when they transformed into human form, or maybe it was the unique structure of the cage, but dark dragon Gilbert alone could carry that huge cage on his shoulder, totally disproportionate to his own size. Following behind Han Shuo, they went back to the firstyer through the same path that they came from.

    Before arriving at the firstyer, Han Shuo suddenly felt some aura fluctuations of several weak presences from the entrance above them. This set Han Shuo on edge. However, those presences couldn¡¯t possibly pose any threat to Han Shuo, so he wasn¡¯t too worried.

    When Han Shuo and dark dragon Gilbert walked out through the tunnel, he finally realized who was actually guarding the cave mouth.

    The five mature, sophisticated-looking female dark elves that once had an orgy with Han Shuo brought a group of dark elves to wait at the exit. Standing gracefully among them, Shin smiled as soon as she saw Han Shuo. In a most licentious tone, she eximed, ¡°Hey! It really was you! What a rare asion to have you here. Why didn¡¯t you visit our tribe? Is it that you despise us dark elves?¡± Ever since Han Shuo killed Adele, the five became her sessor as the new leaders of the dark elves. Initially, Han Shuo had maintained contact with the underground world. Butter, after Trunks gained control of the Valley of Sunshine, Trunks¡¯ men began to gradually trade certain things with the dark elves.

    The underground world is abundant with certain crystals and unusual ores. There were even some umon treasures that couldn¡¯t be found above ground. Being the transaction point between a few countries, in the Valley of Sunshine, goods for the function of enjoyment and pleasure could surely be found in excess. Incidentally, the dark elves was a race that constantly seeked the pleasures of life. Hence, during those few years, Trunks had gained more gold coins trading with the underground world than he ever could as a mercenary.

    ¡°How did you know I was here?¡± Han Shuo asked puzzled with creased brows as he looked at this dark elf.

    ¡°Hahah, ever since you entered the underground world, you have been constantly rushing all along the way. Therefore, plenty of batmen and goblins have spotted the two of you. Those filthy things now exchange food with us for any information about strangers that pass through. Right after you entered the tunnel to the secondyer, I was already informed of your whereabouts!¡± Shin exined. Shortly after, she giggled lovably and said, ¡°Although these years you rarelye down to the underground world, without your help, we wouldn¡¯t have been able to obtain so many rare ythings from Trunks. Since you have now came to the underground world, we as the hosts must show our hospitality!¡±

    ¡°So that exins it!¡± Han Shuoughed. He then politely said, ¡°I truly appreciate it, but this time I¡¯m rather busy and don¡¯t have much time. Next time I visit the underground world again, I will definitely pay you all a visit!¡±

    Gilbert, dragging such a huge cage in his human form, appeared monstrous and strange, looking as though he were carrying a mountain on his shoulder. His face expressed disgust at his first nce at the dark elves.

    If it wasn¡¯t for his father¡¯s recent passing, given the lewd personality of the dark dragon race, the dark elves would likely still have been his prey. However, Gilbert hadn¡¯t been in a good mood. And now that Shin and her party were dying the dark dragons break from their shackles, he naturally couldn¡¯t put on an amicable face.

    ¡°It¡¯s him, that dark dragon!¡± Behind Shin, a dark elf that had seen Gilbert before hastily whispered to Shin.

    Shin again gave Gilbert a once over before shifting her glittering eyes to the few caged dark dragons for several more nces, wearing a pensive expression.

    After a short while, a beautiful, pure, young dark elf beside Shin coughed lightly. Shin was startled. She couldn¡¯t help but turn to look at this young beautiful dark elf with ratherplicated emotions in her eyes. But she then returned to normal in an instant.

    ¡°Alright then. But since it¡¯s such a rare asion to have youe down to the underground world, we must not let you leave empty handed!¡± When Shin took a quick look at that young dark elf, she seemed to have received some kind of directive. All smiles, she pointed at the youngdy and said to Han Shuo, ¡°This is the most beautiful girl currently among our race. Hehe, she is still unsullied! As our best friend, I now give her to you as a present. How ever you wish to treat her, as servant or ve, it¡¯s all up to you, but you must ept this gift. Or else, you will be looking down upon the race of dark elves!¡±

    Beyond Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, after Shin took one nce at the beautiful, pure young dark elfdy, she insisted on giving her to Han Shuo.

    While Han Shuo was startled, he also couldn¡¯t help but carefully size up this beautiful dark elf. With just one quick look, he noticed that this dark elf was indeed extremely beautiful. Standing in the middle of Shin and the other four gorgeous women, the pure, youthful aura she emitted was even more alluring.

    Not alike the ordinary dark elves, there seemed to be some kind of very clean auraing off from her body. Indicating that she genuinely had not been tainted by thescivious culture of the dark elves. When she looked timidly at Han Shuo, she gave people a lovely, pitiful feeling for her.

    Han Shuo looked this youthful dark elf up and down deeply and, in his heart, a very familiar feeling struck him, as though he had long been acquainted with this youngdy. It was a wonderful feeling. Han Shuo thought carefully for a moment. He was certain that he had never met this youngdy during the many times he entered and exited the underground world. He was absolutely puzzled.

    Could there be such a thing as familiarity at first sight? Han Shuo thought to himself. He couldn¡¯t help but continue sizing up thisdy even more oddly.

    ¡°You must ept. If you don¡¯t, you re looking down upon us dark elves!¡± There was no telling what Shin¡¯s problem was, absolutely insisting on handing this youngdy to Han Shuo. It was as though if Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t receive this girl, he would thenceforth be treated as an enemy to her race.

    ¡°Okay. You,e with me!¡± If the worst came to worst, there would just be one more servant in the city lord¡¯s mansion in Brettel City. Furthermore, it was not worthwhile to cause Trunks trouble for such a matter, and so he inly agreed.

    With that, Shin and the others no longer obstructed Han Shuo but talked cheerfully and wittily with him, seeing him all the way to the exit.

 Chapter 472: In the Know

    GDK 472: In the Know

    In the underground world, the dark elves reigned supreme. But once they emerged to the surface of the Profound Continent, they became prey for humans.

    The beauty of the female elves, and the expertise of the male elves with enchanted weapons, made for a great temptation to humans. On the Profound Continent, never was there a shortage of hunters that specialized in capturing elves, especially female elves, which the nobility loved.

    This beautiful dark elf named Kroely actually remained a virgin among the dark elves that had an innate tendency to be wanton, which greatly aroused Han Shuo¡¯s interests. As soon as they left the underground world, Han Shuo asked, ¡°Kroely, why is it that Shin and the others wanted to give you as a present to me? Did they threaten you?¡±

    Kroely was terrified, and dropped to her knees for Han Shuo, saying, ¡°Master, you are a benefactor of the dark elves. It is my honor to be able to serve you.¡±

    Han Shuo gestured with his hand, and did not continue asking. However, throughout the journey, he nevertheless held doubts in his heart. He always felt as though he was already acquainted with Kroely. Yet, after long, careful thinking, he was still certain that he had never met her before.

    ¡°Bryan, I¡¯d like to have a few words with you alone!¡± After walking out from the underground world, the patriarch of dark dragons Gilges suddenly spoke.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a short while before nodding. He then said to Kroely, ¡°Leave us for a moment!¡±

    Kroely shot a nce at Gilges, then respectfully replied, ¡°Yes,¡± and distanced herself from the rest. After Kroely left to a long ways away, Gilbert put down the cage that imprisoned his grandfather. After shooting a nce into the distance at Kroely, Gilges creased his brows and said, ¡°Bryan, I feel that there¡¯s something wrong with this dark elf. I sense some kind of familiar smelling from her body.¡±

    When Gilges said so, Han Shuo jolted, and cried in surprise, ¡°You felt that too?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know why, but I noticed that while we were in the tunnel earlier, this dark elf repeatedly sized me up surreptitiously. It felt as though she wanted to harm me,¡± Gilges said in a low voice with his brows still furrowed. Soon after, he appeared rather embarrassed and admitted, ¡°But perhaps it¡¯s because I¡¯ve gotten old, overly sensitive!¡±

    Han Shuo, however, didn¡¯t feel this way. The older one got, the more particrs one would notice, possessing insights that young people usually did not. With regards to this Kroely, Han Shuo himself had felt that something was wrong with her to begin with. And now with Gilges¡¯ warning, he was on the alert.

    Gazing at the slender, elegant, lovely dark elf standing afar, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but carefully release his consciousness to slowly sense the aura on Kroely. There was indeed the absence of that lewd taste that female dark elves were usually tainted with.

    However, when Han Shuo really sensed with his consciousness, he nheless felt that Kroely truly was somewhat atypical. It was precisely because her aura was so vastly different from that of an ordinary dark elf that Han Shuo felt suspicious. If he were to shut his eyes, merely based on his other senses, Han Shuo would never consider her as a dark elf.

    As Han Shuo slowly observed Kroely with his consciousness, dark dragons patriarch Gilges mumbled to himself, ¡°It¡¯s rather baffling actually. Although I have lived many years in the underground world, I haven¡¯t made much contact with dark elves. It was only that Adele who we imprisoned that spent a rtively long time with us. Why is it that from this young dark elf, I sense a familiar taste?¡±

    ¡°Grandpa, you must have gotten that wrong. I also knew of that Adele. She had a promiscuous taste to her. You could immediately tell that she was a slut with just one nce. But this Kroely, however, feels pure and clean. If it were not for her dark elf appearances, I would¡¯ve taken her for a forest elf!¡± dark dragon Gilbert butted in.

    Han Shuo was startled. His eyes shone as he gazed deeply at Kroely standing a distance away. He put on a thoughtful expression.

    ¡°Alright, let¡¯s stop discussing this!¡± Han Shuo suddenly interrupted, and waved towards Kroely who was quietly standing far away. When Kroely came over, he said smilingly, ¡°We have some business to take care of and it¡¯s not suitable for you toe along. Here, take this coat of arms, and walk to Brettel City. With this, nothing will happen to you while you are in Lancelot Empire.¡±

    ¡°Master, but I don¡¯t know the way. What if someone captures me in the Dark Forest?¡± Kroely looked timidly at Han Shuo, seemingly losing her head out of fear.

    ¡°From here, just head north all the way. After two days you will reach Valley of Sunshine. Should any problem arise, take my coat of arms to Trunks and tell him you are my servant. You are a dark elf, so you don¡¯t need to worry about your life even if you are captured. With this badge, my friends will let you go, and my enemies will keep you alive to extort me. In short, you won¡¯t die! Be at ease!¡± Han Shuo reassured her.

    After Han Shuo was bestowed the title of Marquis, he naturally received aplete set of emblems that represented his identity as a nobility. This coat of arms, which had a beautiful escutcheon on it, was an identity mark exclusively for Han Shuo. It even contained a magical imprint, which no ordinary person could forge. And of course, those with the capacity to forge wouldn¡¯t do such things senselessly.

    Kroely anxiously looked towards Han Shuo. Although Han Shuo seemed polite and amiable on the surface, his manner of speaking was staunch. She knew that as a mere servant, she was in no position to discuss terms whatsoever. Even if Han Shuo were to kill her on the spot, that would be her fate. Hence, this sharp-witted Kroely could only take the badge. She replied weakly, ¡°Yes, master. Your humble servant wishes that there will be a chance to meet your Lordship again!¡±

    ¡°Certainly!¡± Han Shuo affirmed.

    After Kroely left, Han Shuo chuckled grimly, ¡°Wanna y this trick on me? Those dark elves must have been tired of living!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, what¡¯s the matter?¡± The patriarch of dark dragons Gilges could tell that something was up from the start, and by now he could not resist asking.

    ¡°On Kroely, I sensed the aura of those dark elves who worship the evil goddess Rose. Back then, I nearly got killed in a sneak attack, which I believe was the work of that so-called spider goddess Rose. It seems that this Kroely is yet another attempt to attack me,¡± Han Shuo exined to Gilges gloomily.

    Gilges was very shocked at Han Shuo¡¯s bitter experience, but did not question any further about it. He knew that if Han Shuo did not speak of certain things, it wouldn¡¯t be appropriate for him to ask about them.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Han Shuo instructed Gilbert and headed for the Cemetery of Death.

    But in the end, after carefully weighing in his heart, Han Shuo did not bring the dark dragons to the Cemetery of Death. Although Han Shuo believed in Gilges the patriarch of dark dragons, there wasn¡¯t just one dark dragon inside the cage. Han Shuo could not be sure that none of them, at any point in the future, would divulge the location of the Cemetery of Death.

    Although the Cemetery of Death was indeed enveloped in a mighty boundary, and there was absolutely no way to open it without the skeletal staff, nothing was always absolute. Han Shuo didn¡¯t believe that the Cemetery of Death¡¯s boundary was almighty. Otherwise, those wicked necromancers that did their research there all those year ago wouldn¡¯t have suffered such disastrous losses from the encirclement and extirpation campaign against them.

    Therefore, Han Shuo did not bring the entire race of dark dragons to the Cemetery of Death, but ced them in the forest trolls¡¯ vige, and returned to the Cemetery of Death alone.

    Over the previous several years, the forest trolls had always lived under the arrangements of dark dragon Gilbert. The forest trolls had long regarded Gilbert and Han Shuo as the messengers of their God, Datara.

    The Valley of Sunshine wasn¡¯t far from the Dark Forest. When Trunks was still fighting for power over Valley of Sunshine, he even utilized the forces of these forest trolls through Gilbert. After the event, the forest trolls and Trunks had established a good rtionship. There was even a portion of forest trolls that explicitly migrated to live in the canyons around the Valley of Sunshine to better cooperate with Trunks.

    After grasping authority over the Valley of Sunshine, Trunks¡¯ mercenary band grew richer and more powerful with each passing day. For the purpose of exacting revenge, Trunks had invested all his effort into strengthening himself. With Han Shuo¡¯s backing behind the scenes, Trunks also established a goodmerce rtionship with various races of the underground world, including the dark elves and lizardmen.

    Through the business transactions with the underground world all those years, Trunks had reaped impressive profits. With Han Shuo¡¯s introduction, Trunks became the second best friend of the dwarfs. By giftingrge quantities of goods and supplies, Trunks obtainedrge quantities of ded weapons from the dwarfs in exchange.

    With Gilbert¡¯s assistance, there existed a close cooperation between the Valley of Sunshine and the forest trolls. Trunks provided weapons, armor and foodstuff for the forest trolls. By making use of the strongwork of intelligence he had in the Valley of Sunshine, he provided the forest trolls with the trade routes of caravans that were either disloyal or disobey him for the forest trolls to carry out lootings.

    Having experienced a round of inhumane torment, Trunks, who was hardly a benevolent person to begin with, became even more ruthless and decisive. In the prior few years, with the help of Han Shuo, Brettel City, Phoebe, Emily and the others, Trunks hadpletely grasped power over Valley of Sunshine in his hand.

    Banding together the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band, forest trolls, the dwarfs, lizardmen, and even J¡¯s bandit group, Trunks, with the Valley of Sunshine and the edges of Dark Forest at the center, has be a powerhouse that no country would belittle!

 Chapter 473: Long-Distance Battle

    GDK 473: Long-Distance Battle

    One dayter: The forest trolls¡¯ vige.

    Han Shuo brought Elizabeth over. With his demonic blood essence imnted in Elizabeth¡¯s body, if Elizabeth were to make any action of betrayal, he could take Elizabeth¡¯s life with just a thought. Besides, the Church of Light had forced her to an impasse. With such a solid and dependable master to cling onto, so long as she had the slightestmon sense, she should have understood that there was nothing to gain in betraying Han Shuo.

    After arriving at the forest trolls¡¯ vige, Han Shuo saw dark dragon Gilbert keeping watch over the dark dragons imprisoned in the Jadefrost Cage. Right beside Gilbert, the old forest troll priest was directing some forest troll warriors to pass on huge chunks of cured meat to Gilges inside the cage.

    The dark dragons, having been tormented by Ice Celestial Corey of the Shrine of Ice, ravenously devoured the chunks of meat in their hands. They must have been starving.

    When Han Shuo arrived, a group of forest trolls, with the old priest taking the lead, bored down at Han Shuo, yelling the name ¡®Datara¡¯.

    With regards to the race of forest trolls, although Han Shuo¡¯s original intention was purely to exploit them, over time, he had grown somewhat sentimental toward them. Except for their innate tendency to plunder and loot, generally speaking, they mostly suited Han Shuo¡¯s taste. No matter how cruel they treated others, because of the little skeleton, these forest trolls would treat them with iparable dedication and good faith.

    ¡°Get up.¡± Han Shuo gestured with his hand. After the old priest and his party stood up, Han Shuo said smilingly, ¡°In the future, make sure to be in frequent contact with Trunks. He shall provide you all with wise instruction.¡±

    ¡°Rest assured, liaison. Under Lord Trunks¡¯ guidance, we have reaped great harvests these several years.¡± A gratified smile blossomed on the ugly face of the old priest.

    Han Shuo nodded. Then, he shot a nce at Elizabeth, encouraging her. ¡°Give it a try, see if you can absorb the divine energy of the Ice Goddess from the Jadefrost Cage.¡±

    ¡°Understood, master!¡± Elizabeth replied respectfully, wearing an excited look on her face.

    Elizabeth, who had been on the run for countless years, deeply realized the importance of her own strength. She understood that if she wanted to better protect herself and ensure her own survival, she had to possess great power. Thismand of Han Shuo¡¯s directed at her was undoubtedly beneficial to her. With her bewildering body structure, if she could absorb the divine energy in the Jadefrost Cage, her strength would definitely advance one step further.

    ¡°Be careful. Inside are all my n members,¡± Gilbert, unclear of Elizabeth¡¯s strength, warned when he saw her approaching the cage with excitement.

    Elizabeth nodded. When she got beside the Jadefrost Cage, without saying a word, she stretched her hands and grasped at the fences. She closed her eyes to start sensing the energy within the Jadefrost Cage with her Body of Divine Favor.

    Han Shuo squinted slightly. What seemed to be lightning shed through his eye slits as he locked his gaze on Elizabeth.

    All of a sudden, Han Shuo saw that Elizabeth turned to a look of exultation. Streams of green smoke began to drift out from her seven orifices. The green smoke,resembling seven earthworms, wrung about at her nostrils, eyes, ears, and mouth. Her already ugly old face looked even more sinister as the green smoke pulsated at her seven orifices.

    ¡°Mas...Master, can she do it?¡± Gilbert took a shock at those bizarre things on Elizabeth¡¯s face. As those imprisoned in the Jadefrost Cage were his grandfather and nsmen, he was terrified that Elizabeth might identally injure them.

    Han Shuo made a hush gesture at Gilbert, and slowly approached Elizabeth. His immaterial and formless consciousness began probing for any sign of activity in Elizabeth and the Jadefrost Cage.

    Han Shuo could sense that Elizabeth¡¯s unique Body of Divine Favor had discovered the reservoir of the Ice Goddess¡¯ divine energy in the Jadefrost Cage. That was also why Elizabeth was suddenly so excited. As the green smoke from her seven orifices curled up, the wrinkled skin on her two hands seemed to have turned severely shrunken and dried up, like two cyan iron hooks.

    Her two wizened hands, much like the hands of a thousand year old mummy, glowed with faint green nefarious light. Strands of frigid energy like fine thread flowed gracefully along her two bony hands and into her body. The unique structure of her Body of Divine Favor allowed her to digest the divine energy.

    The sinister looking Elizabeth disyed an excited and cheerful emotion in her eyes throughout the process. Strands of divine energy slowly flowed into her body through the conveying of her two hands. She could sense the benefits that the energy could offer her body.

    Han Shuo let out a sigh of relief, assured that it was definitely the right decision to take Elizabeth as his ve. Being able to absorb this kind of divine energy, Elizabeth would definitely be of great use to him. While sensing the flowing streams of divine energy, Han Shuo mulled over if he should take away some of the energy she digested for himself after she was done absorbing it.

    The frigid aura that constantly lingered around the Jadefrost Cage was disappearing bit by bit along with Elizabeth¡¯s actions. Gilbert who had been observing from the side obviously also felt the changes to the Jadefrost Cage and was pleasantly surprised. His mood turned much better. Now when he once more look at Elizabeth, that sinister face seemed much more pleasing to the eyes.

    Just as Han Shuo and Gilbert both sighed in relief, Elizabeth¡¯s face suddenly turned frightened and her body shivered. Intense frosty aura permeated the air. Elizabeth tried to take out her two hands grabbing at Jadefrost Cage with all her strength, but, as though her hands were attached to the cage with superglue, she couldn¡¯t part with the cage no matter how hard she tried.

    At the same time, the columns of the Jadefrost Cage suddenly overflowed with bone-chilling white smoke. The temperature in the surroundings began to plummet all the way down. The originally warm vige of the forest trolls had seemingly fallen into a world of ice and snow.

    Starting at an unknown time, under the caress of chilly cold wind, the entire vige of the forest trolls was shrouded in snowkes. The forest trolls immediately trembled in the cold. One after another, they started to shriek and shout in fear, with absolutely no idea of what was happening.

    Han Shuo was terrified. He could clearly sense that there seemed to be a few potent strands of energy being poured into the Jadefrost Cage. The energy came abruptly. Not only did they cause the entire region to all of a sudden be bone-chillingly cold, it even firmly held onto Elizabeth¡¯s hands, not letting them budge at the slightest.

    It was the dark dragons trapped in the Jadefrost Cage that suffered the most in the arctic atmosphere. Gilges¡¯ teeth chattered, the warm air exhaled from his mouth froze instantly. As for the younger dark dragons, the looks on their faces gradually stiffened, as if in just a moment, they would bepletely frozen.

    ¡°Damnit, what have you done? I will kill you!¡± Gilbert roared in wrath, his hand already pping towards Elizabeth. With Gilbert¡¯s strength, if he really proceeded, Elizabeth would be dead without a doubt.

    ¡°Stop it! It wasn¡¯t her!¡± Han Shuo shouted and raised his hand to stop Gilbert.

    Gilbert was jolted by that shout of Han Shuo¡¯s. When he once more looked at Elizabeth¡¯s face, and saw her frightened and in pain, he returned to his senses. However, as the dark dragons in the cage were gradually turning rigid, Gilbert sank into a state of irascible restlessness. He shouted anxiously, ¡°What should we do? What should we do?¡±

    ¡°Get everyone to evacuate!¡± Han Shuo shouted at the trembling old priest, and immediately summoned fire elite zombie. After issuing amand, he arrived behind Elizabeth in a split second and pressed his hand against her back at lightning speed.

    Meanwhile, far far away, in the territory of Kasi Empire, at the summit of a frozen mountain encrusted with ice and snow...

    On the top of the frozen mountain sat countless pces made of ice crystals. Among them was a conical shrine that reached through the blue dome of heaven. At the center of that structure were a few Shrine of Ice experts headed by Ice Celestial Corey. They sat cross-legged in a semi-circle at the center of a huge magical array. Their bodies were frozen in ice, causing them to look like ice sculptures with no clear sign of life.

    Each of them, Ice Celestial Corey and a few others, wore a solemn, respectful expression as they sat directly facing a huge ice sculpture of their Ice Goddess. Frozen still in ice, they maintained their posture and deployed magic from great distances. Strong and intense cold air filled the entire temple.

    ¡°He stepped in!¡± Suddenly, a shout came from Corey, now an ice sculpture.

    ¡°Frost the air, freeze the earth.....¡±

    Except for Corey, the other ice sculptures started to chant in a deep, synchronized chorus. Cold air radiated all around from the main hall, with a solemn aura emanating.

    Thousands of miles away, Han Shuo was pressing his two hands on Elizabeth¡¯s shoulders. Demonic yuan surged in from her shoulders to her hands, mixing together with the bone-chilling cold.

    Clouds of mes blossomed from the Fire Lotus held in fire elite zombie¡¯s hand and wafted far and near. After the zes flew out from the Fire Lotus, the interaction between the zing hot temperatures and the wintry cold air produced thick white vapor that suddenly covered this world of ice and snow.

    After the Fire Lotus was brought out and the clouds of mes fluttered about, the temperature in the entire vige finally halted its rapid fall. The forest trolls, whose movements were slowed down by the coldness, gradually grew somewhat faster in their escape.

    The entire family of dark dragons, whose bodies just froze in the Jadefrost cage, with the help of the mes from fire elite zombie¡¯s Fire Lotus, the ice rapidly melted into water. Only then, did the chattering noise of Gilges¡¯ teeth continue to sound.

    With Han Shuo¡¯s two hands pressed on Elizabeth¡¯s shoulders, demonic yuan rapidly surged into her palm. Han Shuo deployed the Mystical cial Spellfire to the fullest, producing a scorching temperature in order to help her withstand the assault of cold airing from the columns.

    Through the cold air erupting at Elizabeth¡¯s palm, Han Shuo sensed the divine energy activated by Ice Celestial Corey. He could be absolutely certain that the sudden changes happening to the Jadefrost Cage must have had something to do with Ice Celestial Corey.

    Han Shuo also understood that this Jadefrost Cage, blessed by the Ice Goddess, must have had some sort of fantastical ability that allowed direct linkage to Ice Celestial Corey and the others. It seems that this time Han Shuo had fallen into Corey¡¯s ruse. Perhaps, the reason Corey so rapidly departed the dark dragons¡¯ canyon, unconcerned with the disappearance of the Jadefrost Cage, was that he had nned to scheme against Han Shuo with it all along.

    While he cursed at Corey¡¯s viciousness and ruthlessness in his heart, a steady flow of demonic yuan in his body wildly transformed into scorching red hot mes by means of the Mystical cial Spellfire, helping Elizabeth to resist the assail of the cold airing from the Jadefrost Cage at all costs.

    It wasn¡¯t that Han Shuo cared if Elizabeth lived or died. It¡¯s just that even if Elizabeth died at this moment, the frigid aura in the Jadefrost Cage would not disappear. In addition, having Elizabeth standing in between was definitely safer than having Han Shuo himself be in direct contact with the cage to contain the cold air.

    ¡°Cold, so cold!¡± Elizabeth could finally speak despite her chattering chompers after Han Shuo poured in his demonic yuan.

    ¡°Hang in there!¡± Han Shuo groaned coldly. He cast away all distracting thoughts and strenuously persisted with furrowed brows.

    Under the effects of the rapidly plummeting temperatures, certain older and younger forest trolls, before the mes from fire elite zombie could warm them up, froze to death in the bone-chilling cold. The entire vige of forest trolls were shrouded in fear. With the old priest roaring, every forest troll still alive fled in panic towards the outside of the vige.

    The fire elite zombie was still tirelessly releasing zes with the Fire Lotus in his hand, strenuously persevering just like Han Shuo was. Although Gilbert¡¯s duty was the least tedious, he was also the most terrified and restless of them all. Standing beside the fire elite zombie, although Gilbert was shivering in the cold, he still managed to hang on.

    Looking at the gloomy faces of his nsmen trapped in the Jadefrost Cage, Gilbert understood that once fire elite zombie and Han Shuo could no longer hang on, his people would face the fate of being frozen to death. This made Gilbert very anxious, but unfortunately there was nothing that he could do to help. All he could do was to firmly observe the Jadefrost Cage by the side, and hate the Shrine of Ice with a burning passion.

    ¡°Father, it won¡¯t do if we stay like this!¡± Suddenly, the fire elite zombie transmitted.

    The cold airing from the Jadefrost Cage grew more and more vigorous. Han Shuo also gradually felt he was losing strength, and realized that the fire elite zombie was right. Just as Han Shuo was clueless as to what to do, the fire elite zombie continued, ¡°Father, let¡¯s take the battle to my birthce, then I will have a way to deal with this!¡±

    The ce of extreme fire! Han Shuo¡¯s eyes beamed when he heard fire elite zombie¡¯s words.

 Chapter 474: A Cruel Decision

    GDK 474: A Cruel Decision

    As both of them were located in the Dark Forest, the distance between the forest trolls¡¯ vige and the ce of extreme fire wasn¡¯t too long. Han Shuo immediately took action to implement fire elite zombie¡¯s suggestion.

    ¡°Gilbert, transform into dragon form!¡± Han Shuo instructed the anxious dark dragon.

    Without the slightest hesitation, Gilbert let out a roar and soared into the sky. His body extended and expanded rapidly. In the blink of an eye, his humanoid body transformed into a humongous thirty-meter-long dark dragon.

    With Elizabeth¡¯s two hands stuck to the Jadefrost Cage, Han Shuo grabbed Elizabeth by her shoulders and soared to the sky along with the Jadefrost Cage. Gilbert¡¯s meandering body dived downward, just in time to catch Han Shuo on his back.

    ¡°Wooo.....Cold! So cold!¡± When the Jadefrost Cage subsequently made contact with Gilbert¡¯s back, the freezing cold energy automatically flowed into his body, causing his dragon body to lightly shiver.

    Han Shuo creased his brows. Then, he flexed his muscles and lifted Elizabeth to the air, along with the Jadefrost Cage. Although doing so meant that Han Shuo would have to spend some more demonic yuan, he could ensure that the Jadefrost Cage wasn¡¯t in direct contact with Gilbert¡¯s body.

    ¡°Fly low and let fire elite zombie up. Then immediately fly towards the region where we came across the Lord of the mes!¡± Han Shuo instructed Gilbert as he held Elizabeth and the Jadefrost Cage high up.

    ¡°Understood!¡± The dark dragon made a loop and shot down, causing a turbulence of chilling wind and the snowkes thatyered the ground.

    Fire elite zombie, who had been on standby, suddenlyunched himself to the sky after a sprint, andnded steadily on the back of dark dragon Gilbert. He took another two steps to the Jadefrost Cage and continued releasing zes into the cage, warming up the dark dragons whose bodies were again beginning to freeze.

    With everything in ce, dark dragon Gilbert identified the directions, and flew towards the ce of extreme fire at the fastest he could.

    Standing on Gilbert, Han Shuo watched the ground below him as the forest trolls¡¯ vige filled with arctic atmosphere. The small ponds, which were their water source, froze into ice before their eyes. All the forest trolls were terrified, trembling as they fled this world of ice and snow with all their might.

    Many forest troll warriors carried their frozen children along, crying and mourning. Some of the older forest trollsy sprawled on the ground, their frail bodies now popsicles and without a trace of life. Before the fire elite zombie coulde to their rescue, they had left the world for the rest of eternity.

    Looking at the hundreds of dead forest trolls, Han Shuo¡¯s heart was filled with remorse. He realize that this catastrophe that struck the forest trolls was his fault. Of these faithful, true forest trolls who had served him over the years, a tragic portion of the old, young, sick and disabled lost their lives to the icy cold.

    Shrine of Ice! There will be no reconciliation between us!

    Han Shuo roared in his mind. The demonic yuan in his body unceasingly flowed towards Elizabeth¡¯s arm and transformed into heat energy to resist the onught of the cold.

    Although the distance from the forest troll vige to the ce of extreme fire wasn¡¯t toorge, Han Shuo and the fire elite zombie felt as though the journey was endless. As Han Shuo had tremendous reserves of demonic yuan, he could still struggle on.

    The fire elite zombie, however, started to reveal obvious symptoms of weariness and fatigue. Han Shuo could tell that from the flickering red light of the Fire Lotus.

    The Fire Lotus, a treasure of fire attribute nurtured from the ce of extreme fire, contained an iparably enormous energy of fire. So long as the fire elite zombie could support it with his strength, in theory, he could always make use of the energy stored in the Fire Lotus. However, it hadn¡¯t been long since fire elite zombie was born. It was already rather difficult for him to sustain until then given his current strength.

    Most significantly, it was the energy of extreme cold that the fire elite zombie was resisting this time! As the saying goes, fire and ice don¡¯t mix. Therefore, when resisting the icy energy, the antithesis of fire, the fire elite zombie needed to expend more energy than usual. To add to that, some of the Shrine of Ice experts jointly assaulted the Jadefrost Cage with cold air so that the fire elite zombie would more quickly reveal signs of weariness.

    Thousands of miles away in the Shrine of Ice...

    Meanwhile, a group of Shrine of Ice experts lead by Ice Celestial Corey appeared calm and unruffled. Corey the Ice Celestial, in particr, even revealed a cold smile as though victory was within grasp. He seemed absolutely contented with his operation this time.

    Humph! Merely a puny city lord. How dare he came head to head with us Shrine of Ice! Corey sneered in his heart while frozen in ice. He had already found out of Han Shuo¡¯s identity. Soon afterwards, with extreme confidence, he said, ¡°In just a short while, we will freeze them all to death. Everyone keep it up!¡±

    ¡°Rest assured Lord Corey. With our cooperation, they are certainly doomed!¡± said a sacred grade magus.

    ¡°Lord Corey is truly insightful. This time, that Bryan won¡¯t be able to escape the cmity. When he dies an ice sculpture, I¡¯m certain the Church of Light will be very grateful for our assistance!¡± Another sacred grade magus also found free time to speak and took the opportunity to praise Ice Celestial Corey.

    ¡°We don¡¯t want Church of Light¡¯s gratitude. Humph, we Shrine of Ice shall be the number one religion on the continent! By killing this Bryan, who they couldn¡¯t do anything about, we can incidentally prove them so!¡± Corey proimed.

    ¡°Lord Corey is right. We Shrine of Ice, as the messenger for the Ice Goddess on Profound Continent, should not be forever pressed under the Church of Light!¡± the magus immediately corrected his previous remark.

    ¡°Alright. Let us push harder, and freeze them all to death in one spurt of energy!¡± Corey softly shouted and did not continue to give more superfluous words.

    The other few who did not talk simultaneously responded in agreement. Soon after, cold air pervaded their bodies. Strands of exceedingly cold aura passed through a mysterious magical array, which were then transmitted to the Dark Forest thousands of miles away.

    ¡°Father, I, I can¡¯t hang on much longer!¡± fire elite zombie, who had been continuously sending out mes from the Fire Lotus, suddenly transmitted to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo could feel the sudden surge of cold air emanating from the Jadefrost Cage. He also felt that it was bing harder to resist as he ceaselessly infused demonic yuan to Elizabeth¡¯s two hands.

    At that moment, the mes in the Fire Lotus were no longer bright and radiant. With the yuan energy of fire in fire elite zombie being consumed bit by bit, over time, it was drained to the brink ofplete exhaustion. Elizabeth¡¯s two hands turned purple in the cold. Her Body of Divine Favor couldn¡¯t withstand the assault of such an enormous amount of cold energy. The few cyclones in her body gradually halted their conversion of energy.

    However, they had, at that point, only made it halfway to their destination. At dark dragon Gilbert¡¯s speed, they still needed over ten minutes to reach the ce of extreme fire. If the circumstances continued, Han Shuo reckoned that before reaching the ce of extreme fire, the fire elite zombie would sumb and be seriously injured, while Elizabeth and all the dark dragons in the cage would be frozen to death.

    Han Shuo grew extremely anxious. What a pity that he himself already found it exceptionally hard to soldier on, and absolutely did not have an extra hand to assist in any aspect. If Han Shuo were to deploy the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens to the fullest, he could have been much faster than dark dragon Gilbert. Unfortunately, at present, he needed to hold the Jadefrost Cage up high while unceasingly withstanding the assault of cold air with demonic yuan, so his hands were all tied.

    The innermost part of his heart was crammed with a dispirited emotion. Han Shuo racked every inch of his brain but couldn¡¯t find a way.

    ¡°Gilbert, speed up! If you don¡¯t get us to the ce of extreme fire in five minutes, your grandpa and all your nsmen will perish because of you!¡± Han Shuo was at his wit¡¯s end, and could only tell Gilbert the circumstances as they were.

    Han Shuo had made up his mind in secret that, by the time it all went south, he would cut off Elizabeth¡¯s two hands, and give up on the race of dark dragons. Although he was unwilling to abandon them, he really couldn¡¯t find a better alternative.

    When Han Shuo finished those words, Gilbert let out a miserable howl. As his wretched howl sounded, the veins and arteries on his dragon body suddenly ruptured, causing fresh blood to burst out from his body, which fell like fine rain droplets.

    At the same time, Gilbert¡¯s already lightning fast airspeed, suddenly doubled. Like ck lightning streaking across the sky, he flew directly towards the ce of extreme fire.

    ¡°No!¡± patriarch of dark dragons Gilbert bellowes himself hoarse. He made a great effort to move his shivering body, with his two hands grabbing at the arctic cold columns, and yelled, ¡°Little scoundrel, stop it now! Stop it! We are already hopeless. You are the only hope of the dark dragons, you must not die!¡±

    As Gilbert¡¯s master, Han Shuo could clearly sense Gilbert¡¯s life force slowly draining away. At Gilbert¡¯s grandfather¡¯s yell, he realized what Gilbert was doing ¨C activating his fullest potential in exchange for his vitality, as to save the race of dark dragons!

    ¡°Gilbert! Stop it!¡± Han Shuo suddenly yelled.

    Elizabeth and the race of dark dragons weren¡¯t nearly as close to Han Shuo as Gilbert was. Han Shuo could watch the dozen or so dark dragons freeze to death, or cut off Elizabeth¡¯s hands without the slightest hesitation, but he couldn¡¯t watch Gilbert die from overdrafting his vitality!

    Yet, towards Gilges and Han Shuo¡¯s shouting their heads off, dark dragon Gilbert turned a deaf ear, and flew towards the ce of extreme fire with all his strength. In Gilbert¡¯sntern-sized pupils, only a resolution to save his kind that even death couldn¡¯t stop could be seen.

    ¡°Gilbert, if you don¡¯t stop, I will immediately step aside!¡± Han Shuo shouted sorrowfully and angrily stamped his feet on Gilbert back. He could feel Gilbert¡¯s vitality washing away.

    Gilbert¡¯s enormous body trembled. ¡°Master, I beg you, please grant me this!¡± Sensing Han Shuo¡¯s fury, Gilbert finally talked. His simple, honest voice no longer contained a trace of his sloppy attitude, but was solemn and serious.

    After a short pause, he continued in a deep voice, ¡°Master, I¡¯m honored to have had the privilege of following you. For so many years, during my days with you, I was very happy! It¡¯s true! Goodbye master. Even in death, I will never forget all the joys and fun I had with you!¡±

    As Gilbert flew rapidly, his vitality too was draining away rapidly.

    Han Shuo understood that Gilbert was offering his life in exchange for saving the race of dark dragons.

    Even though Han Shuo felt indescribable grief in his heart as he sensed Gilbert losing his vitality, wishing to immediately sever Elizabeth¡¯s hands and abandon the dark dragons, Gilbert¡¯s plead was iparably staunch and resolute, with simply no room for Han Shuo to reject.

    He knew that he could not refuse this wish of Gilbert¡¯s. Therefore, he did not stop Gilbert anymore.

    As Gilbert¡¯s downcast tone of farewell sounded in his ears, scene after scene reyed in Han Shuo¡¯s mind...

    ¡°Don¡¯t hesitate, think about it. If I be your servant, I can help you kill people, burn things, and fly everywhere and take out your enemies. As my master, you only need to give me treasure and beauties to enjoy. What a good business deal this is.¡±

    ¡°I canpromise if you don¡¯t have treasure, but I must have beauties to sleep with, or I won¡¯t do it!¡±

    When he first met Gilbert, before bing Han Shuo¡¯s magical pet, Gilbert had some funny requests...

    ¡°Uh... my mighty, handsome, amazing, noble master, what... what do you want to do? Are you nning on hitting your cutest, most loyal, most honest, and most humble Gilbert? Um...¡±

    ¡°No! Absolutely not! I can¡¯t fight my master with you guys! Not even if I die!¡±

    In the forbidden ground, facing against Han Shuo who had entered demonic stupor, Gilbert stood foolishly, not knowing what to do, and stared nkly at Han Shuo, and waited for Han Shuo¡¯s hundred-meter-long sword radiance to hammer down on him like a fool...

    As those dribs and drabs of scenes of his past interactions with Gilbert reyed in the back of his mind over and over, tears began to inadvertently overflow from the rims of Han Shuo¡¯s eyes.

    ¡°Nooo!!¡± Gilges made a long bawl and copsed from the grief.

    Beside Gilges, each and every one of the remaining dark dragons stared at Gilbert below them in disbelief. They recalled that naughty little dragon that never ceased to stir trouble in the valley, always breaking the tranquility, and always nagged about leaving home. When they again looked at this Gilbert, who offered his life in exchange for theirs, they couldn¡¯t associate the two together no matter how.

    Finally, with the increased flying speed, the price being Gilbert¡¯s own life, before the fire elite zombiepletely exhausted all his energy, Gilbert¡¯s huge body, drenched with blood, descended into the ravine where the ce of extreme fire was located.

    It was also at this moment, Han Shuo understood that Gilbert¡¯s condition had passed the point of no return. All his life force had been drained away in the process.

    ¡°Grandpa, take care of yourself! Master, thank you. I will always remember you!¡± Gilbert said thosest words after falling into the ravine. His massive dragon head fell. Not a trace of life could be sensed in his body.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes were brimming with hot tears. Standing on his dragon body, Gilbert¡¯s veryst words echoed in his ears. His mind was filled with all the memories he had with Gilbert....

    ¡°Father, keep his soul!¡± At that moment, from the distantherworld, little skeleton¡¯s anxious message suddenly arrived.

 Chapter 475: Counter-Attack

    GDK 475: Counter-Attack

    At little skeleton¡¯s reminder, Han Shuo immediately came to his senses and stabilized his frame of mind. He focused up his consciousness, and sensed Gilbert¡¯s yet-to-dissipate soul in an instance.

    The Demonyer Edge suddenly flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s body and generated an intensely strong suction power. Gilbert¡¯s unscattered soul was drawn to it. In a split second, he flowed into the Demonyer Edge.

    Although the Demonyer Edge temporarily couldn¡¯t assist Han Shuo in battle, absorbing one soul wasn¡¯t a problem. As the master of Demonyer Edge, Han Shuo could even establish a region within the Demonyer Edge specially for Gilbert where he could take refuge.

    Han Shuo dispelled his sorrow. He suddenly recalled that the demonic arts and necromancy magic, his forte, were sinister arts the righteous despised. Whether it was demonic arts or necromancy magic, they provided the practitioner with extreme proficiency towards souls.

    Han Shuo only thought to himself for the shortest moment before realizing that, regardless of whether he utilized demonic arts or necromancy magic, by making use of Gilbert¡¯s mighty soul, he could rebuild his physical body and have him revived. As long as Gilbert¡¯s soul remained, he wasn¡¯tpletely gone.

    With that in mind, the grief which Gilbert brought to Han Shuo weakened a great deal. After the Demonyer Edge returned into Han Shuo¡¯s body, Han Shuo took one look at fire elite zombie and found fire elite zombie almost at the point ofplete exhaustion. He immediately knew that he could not hesitate a moment longer.

    The cold air in the Jadefrost Cage was as chilling as usual. At the moment, the demonic yuan that once filled Han Shuo¡¯s body from top to toe was drained to his knees. Yet, the energy being unleashed from the Jadefrost Cage still seemed infinite and evesting. This left Han Shuo with the realization that the opponent had definitely surpassed them in terms of endurance.

    ¡°Move!¡± Han Shuo shouted and descended straight towards a narrow slit in thevafall.

    Before Han Shuo made it near theva chink, the whole ravine suddenly started to tremble. zing high temperatures soared ever higher and higher. Fierce magma shot out like geysers.

    All of a sudden, a strong feeling of longing filled the entire ravine, like a grief-stricken mother bitterly awaiting her long lost child¡¯s return and finally finding him at the doorsteps.

    ¡°She, she knows I¡¯m back!¡± fire elite zombie was pleasantly surprised and transmitted to Han Shuo. He too seemed overjoyed.

    Han Shuo finally arrived at the gap in thevafall. He deployed a protection shield, enveloping Elizabeth and the cage, and descended further down.

    While climbing down, as the refiner of the fire elite zombie, Han Shuo could clearly feel that fire elite zombie wasmunicating with the Lord of the mes down below. Upon arriving in this region, along with the climbing temperatures, the exhausted fire elite zombie started to restore bit by bit.

    Fierce zes violently roared all around them. Fiery bubbles popped up from the ce of extreme fire. Terrifyingly high temperatures filled the area surrounding them.

    Suddenly, a thunderous roar came from the ce of extreme fire. When Han Shuo looked down, he discovered that the enormous body of the Lord of the mes was slowly emerging from there. On the cliffs nearby, countless Scorching Demon Warriors were raised at an unknown time. Their eyes trailed Han Shuo and his party, who were gradually descending.

    Upon sensing Han Shuo on the alert, fire elite zombie hastily transmitted to him, ¡°Father, don¡¯t be worried. She will help me!¡±

    ¡°Okay, it¡¯s all up to you now!¡± Han Shuo trusted the fire elite zombie very much. When the fire elite zombie reassured him that there wouldn¡¯t be a problem, he immediately let go of his worries.

    Right after Han Shuo said those words, fire elite zombie, holding his FIre Lotus,nded on the body of the Lord of the mes that just emerged from the ce of extreme fire. Fire elite zombie then sat on the wide shoulders of the Lord of the mes. Unending streams of energy were suddenly released from the Lord of the mes. A dozen or so streams of magma even spewed from her mouth. Like fiery silk, they all wrapped around the Jadefrost Cage.

    Simultaneously, the ce of extreme fire, which had existed for who knew how long, and that even nurtured the treasure of fire attribute ¨C the Fire Lotus ¨C suddenly seemed toe alive. Thousands and thousands of strands of yuan energy of fire flowed into fire elite zombie¡¯s body. In no time, the fire elite zombie was restored with all the energy he previously exhausted.

    The Fire Lotus suddenly exploded with magnificent rays. Under the maniption of fire elite zombie, it mobilized the enormous yuan energy of fire in the ce of extreme fire, sending out small clouds of mes that fluttered their way onto the Jadefrost Cage.

    Han Shuo immediately felt the pressure on him greatly reduce. After such actions by fire elite zombie and the Lord of the mes, the piercing cold of the Jadefrost Cage was all being used to resist the onught of the mes. Han Shuo no longer needed to continue resisting with excessive use of his demonic arts. Even Elizabeth and the dark dragons whose bodies were almost frozen stiff recovered in the heat of the ce of extreme fire.

    Thousands of miles away at the Shrine of Ice...

    ¡°Not good! There¡¯s an intense energy of fire pouring into it. What¡¯s going on?¡± that sacred grade magus that had been licking Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s ass, suddenly made a huge change in expression and cried out in surprise.

    The previously calm, unruffled faces of the experts of the Shine of Ice were reced with solemn expressions. Each and everyone of them casted their gazes on Ice Celestial Corey, their leader.

    Even Ice Celestial Corey took a shock. Through some kind of mysterious connection, he also felt the changes to the Jadefrost Cage located in the Dark Forest. That energy which deepened all of a sudden revealed itself to be the most scorching energy of mes. As far as the Shrine of Ice was concerned, such fiery energy was what they most loathed, and also the most thorny energy to handle.

    The sudden surge of this iparably mighty energypletely disrupted Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s calmness. Under the attentive gazes of his subordinates, Corey pressingly turned over in his mind toe up with a countermeasure while trying to determine the source of the fiery energy that suddenly appeared.

    After quite a while, Corey spoke again, ¡°It must be them making aeback at death¡¯s door. As long as we go all-out to withstand this wave of attack, they won¡¯t have any more energy to resist!¡±

    ¡°Lord Corey, if this turns out not to be their final push before they die, and we exert all our strength to resist this wave of attack, if, and this ispletely hypothetical, by any chance, their strength exceeds our¡¯sbined, it would be very difficult for us to retreat by then,¡± another sacred magus of the Shrine of Ice suddenly weighed in.

    After letting out a cold groan, Ice Celestial Corey said, ¡°There are no mistakes in my judgement. Even if another entity steps in, with so many experts from our Shrine of Ice cooperating, how many in the whole of Profound Continent can withstand us? Be at ease. This time I will be exerting all my strength, and undoubtedly will freeze them all to death in one go!¡±

    Seeing that Ice Celestial Corey was somewhat displeased, the others did not raise any more objections. Corey¡¯s ego was infamous in the Shine of Ice. He was a man who would never listen to others¡¯ opinions. Once he made his decision, all that one could do was wholeheartedly execute his ns with no questions asked about whether his decision was right or wrong.

    Under Corey¡¯smand, the strongest few of the Shine of Ice, using the mysterious magical array, began to release the divine energy from their bodies with all their strengths, intending to get rid of Han Shuo and the others located far in the ce of extreme fire once and for all through the Jadefrost Cage blessed by Ice Goddess.

    Back at the Dark Forest, in the ce of extreme fire...

    ¡°Master, what do we do? What should I do?¡± Elizabeth, who could finally talk, shouted frically.

    ¡°Maintain this state and hush. This time it won¡¯t be us that will have headache!¡± Han Shuo insisted before ceasing to respond to Elizabeth.

    The inexhaustible yuan energy of fire in the ce of extreme fire, through the two existences of fire elite zombie and the Lord of the mes, poured onto the Jadefrost Cage. Scorching heat filled the entire region. The patriarch of dark dragons, Gilges, finally awoke from his fainting due to the roasting heat.

    ¡°Foolish little one, where is Gilbert that silly thing? Where is my grandson?¡± After Gilges woke up, he anxiously looked everywhere for Gilbert.

    ¡°Patriarch, Gilbert is..... he¡¯s dead!¡± a dark dragon sighed sorrowfully with teary eyes.

    ¡°Ahhh.....¡±

    As grief attacked into his heart, Gilges let out a mournful bawl.

    At this moment, the party from the distant Shrine of Iceunched a ferocious counterattack. Cold, frosty air increased three folds and overflowed from the columns of the Jadefrost Cage and made contact with the high temperatures of the ce of extreme fire, which, in an instant, produced thick smoke that covered Gilges and the others.

    The extreme frigidity, like water in a copsed dam, violently gushed towards Elizabeth¡¯s body through her two hands. Han Shuo was startled, and hastily concentrated all his attention, wildly sending his remaining demonic yuan into Elizabeth¡¯s two hands.

    ¡°Arhhh... That hurts!¡±

    Elizabeth let out an agonizing shriek that sounded like a pig being ughtered. Red, white, and green lights radiated from her two hands. In a moment, it would be frigid cold, in another, it would be scorching hot. When these two opposing energy forces collided, she felt pain that she had never felt before.

    Previously, as Elizabeth¡¯s body was frozen stiff by the cold, the pain wasn¡¯t as difficult to bear as her body was numbed. But now, with the ice thawed, the pain became much more distinct and tormenting.

    At that moment, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t attend to Elizabeth at all. As he unceasingly deployed his demonic yuan to congeal and form mes on Elizabeth¡¯s two hands, his consciousness suddenly felt something faintly from the Jadefrost Cage. When he concentrated, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness seemed to sense a few presences from an extremely distant ce. It was as though some kind of miraculous connection bound together the Jadefrost Cage with some sort of energy from that distance ce.

    Suddenly, it became clear to Han Shuo. The presences that his consciousness felt on the Jadefrost Cage was a trace of the souls of Ice Celestial Corey and his party. If they were to transmit their energy onto the Jadefrost Cage through this mysterious method, their mental strength had to be highly concentrated. Therefore, through this mysterious connection, Han Shuo¡¯s mighty consciousness could faintly sense them.

    Just as Han Shuoprehended those thoughts, the Jadefrost Cage again burst out with ten times the coldness. Thick smoke enveloped the air of the entire ce of extreme fire. Even the fiery threads that the Lord of the mes had spat out were rapidly solidifying.

    The Lord of the mes seemed to have never met with such a thorny problem. Suddenly, irritated, she raised her head and let out a roar. The entire ravine, including the ce of extreme fire, seemed to reverberate with her roar.

    All of a sudden, the magma in the ce of extreme fire bubbled up. As a counterattack from the angered Lord of the mes, yuan energy of fire that were nurtured in this ce of extreme fire over tens of thousands years converged and travelled along the fiery line shooting from the mouth of the Lord of the mes to the Jadefrost Cage.

    Fire elite zombie leapt head-on into the ce of extreme fire. The Fire Lotus in his hand instantly mustered the terrifying energy within the ce of extreme fire. The Fire Lotus no longer let out clouds of mes, but with fire elite zombie¡¯s hurling, carrying boundless energy of fire, bashed towards the Jadefrost Cage. ¡°Father, be careful!¡± fire elite zombie¡¯s message arrived subsequently.

    Han Shuo understood that the battle had nowe to its most critical moment. He gathered all his attention. Even his mighty consciousness which had been meticulously hiding from the six-horned Soul Race tribal king, with no misgivings whatsoever, fully unfolded to firmly lock onto the souls attached to the Jadefrost Cage.

    ¡°Hang in there, they will be done for in no time!¡± within the Shine of Ice far far away, Ice Celestial Corey eximed.

    Everyone there put forth their greatest strength. The divine energy which they obtained from the Ice Goddess for their piousness, like runaway horses, rushed into the Jadefrost Cage a great distance away.

    Rumbles...

    When the Fire Lotus bombarded on the Jadefrost Cage, a terrifying sound could be heard. Clouds of mes hopped out from the Fire Lotus and attached themselves onto the columns.

    The dark dragons inside the Jadefrost Cage took a jolt. The youngdy even spat out a mouthful of blood. She seemed to be injured by the sudden jerk.

    When the Lord of the mes unleashed all her strength, the fiery threads attached to Jadefrost Cage gushed forth with seemingly inexhaustible energy. Even more white smoke spread in every direction.

    ¡°They¡¯re too powerful! Lord Corey, I can¡¯t resist anymore!¡± the sacred magus who had been praising Corey shouted, frightened.

    With fire elite zombie and Lord of the mes cooperating to harness the energy that had been in the ce of extreme fire for millions and millions of years, they utterly crushed all those of the Shrine of Ice. The Jadefrost Cage began to gradually melt under the scorching heat.

    Through Elizabeth¡¯s two hands, Han Shuo was able to see that Ice Celestial Corey and his party were incapable of enduring any longer. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness even felt that the few presences that had shrouded the Jadefrost Cage all along were fading away by the second.

    It was at this moment that Han Shuo, who had been waiting for the right moment, suddenly made a move. While they were all frantically resisting the counterattack of the mes, all of Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength, his consciousness included, pounded at that few souls like sharp sword.

    ¡°Pfff............¡±

    The group of experts in the Shrine of Ice, including Ice Celestial Corey, oozed streams of blood from their mouths. They felt as though their souls were hacked into pieces and sustained heavy damages.

    With that, they no longer had any energy to resist. The Jadefrost Cage shattered with a loud crash. Thereafter, not a trace of frigid energy could be sensed at this ce of extreme fire.

    Elizabeth¡¯s two hands were freed. Han Shuo arrested her fall without hassle. The entire race of dark dragons were just set free from their incarceration. Although they had yet to fully recover, they were still able to hover in mid air with minimal effort. Not one fell into the ce of extreme fire beneath them.

    Thousands of miles away at the Shine of Ice...

    Corey and the others, who were still frozen like ice sculptures, exploded from the ice and shot out. Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s body even flung into a distance, dripping with fresh blood all over.

    The Shrine of Ice, enveloped in arctic cold all year long, was suddenly assaulted with a puff of warm air. This lofty, majestic shrine constructed out of ice crystals was being reduced to a lifeless body of water.

    Disciples who were practicing martial arts and water magic in the Shine of Ice suddenly perceived high temperatures which they instinctively loathed and feared. Great frowns married their faces as they tried to look for the source of the heat in rm. Soon, they discovered that thergest shrine that housed the sculpture of their Ice Goddess for them to consecrate was also slowly thawing.

    Such a thing had never taken ce for thest millenniums. This phenomenon, to those in the Shine of Ice, was seen as more threatening than even demons ascending from the gates of hell. They were panic-stricken and terrified with no clue of what happened.

    Could it be that the Ice Goddess had abandoned them?

    While the Shrine of Ice fell into tumult it had never seen for thousands of years, Han Shuo let out a sigh of relief. But he soon took a shock, gazing at the Lord of the mes in the ce of extreme fire underneath him with an unimaginable expression.

    All he saw was that the gargantuan Lord of the mes, whose body was cast with magma, iron, and stones, was undergoing a shocking transformation. Chunk after chunk of stone as red as branding iron eroded from it in the thunderous roar of the Lord of the mes. An insurmountable amount of energy was erupting from her body.

    Gradually, as the titanic body of the Lord of the mes swayed, her body grew in size. Theva from all over the ce of extreme fire flooded into her like river rapids, seemingly supplying her with tremendous amounts of energy nourished by the ce of extreme fire wince the beginning of time.

    Right before Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, the Lord of the mes first grew wildly huge, her body almost filled the ce of extreme fire. But after a while, the rocks on her body were shaken out rapidly. Whileva watered down, her body then started to shrink bit by bit.

    Han Shuo looked towards the Lord of the mes without blinking. He sensed that as her body became smaller, the energy inside her grew even more powerful. Soon after, strands of fiery rays burst out from her body. She was like a miniature sun, radiating light so ring that one would be convinced their eyelids were transparent.

    ¡°Hahaha, I have finally evolved! Finally evolved!¡± With Han Shuo watching attentively, the Lord of the mes, dazzling with red light, released a bellyugh. Gradually, the red light faded, revealing a plump middle-aged woman with red skin before Han Shuo.

 Chapter 476: Not Born by Me and You!

    GDK 476: Not Born by Me and You!

    Looking at that plump woman dancing and gesticting for her joy, Han Shuo was momentarily dazed.

    In his eyes, no matter how he tried, he couldn¡¯t find a way to associate this ordinary looking, rotund, middle-aged woman with thoroughly rosy skin, with that tremendously bulky Lord of the mes. But having witnessed the whole transformational process with his very own eyes, Han Shuo knew that this woman was indeed the Lord of the mes.

    Most often than not, super-ranked magical beasts had the capability to transform into human forms. For mighty races like the dragons, they would already possess such transformation ability at just rank one. However, a subset of super-ranked creatures would be subjected to certain natural limitations for their rather unique body structures. For those creatures, In order to possess such morphing ability, they needed to evolve to an extremely high ranking.

    The Lord of the mes was one such magical creature. Her body was mainlyposed of magma and volcanic rocks instead of flesh and bones, entirely different from what a regr magical beast would have. Therefore, to transform into human form, for their kind, they needed to be of extremely high level.

    From the moment the Lord of the mes transformed into that fat woman, Han Shuo knew that she had broken through her shackles, and evolved to the fifth stage to be the Emperor of the mes. A fifth-stage Emperor of the mes is the same as a human demigod existence, a mighty existence that would surely cause anyone on the Profound Continent to be terror-stricken at just the mention of their name.

    After the Emperor of the mes morphed, she seemed to be quite intrigued with this new ability she just gained. She would pat on her chest in one moment, and rub her shoulders in another, all whileughing heartily.

    ¡°Little scoundrel, this was all thanks to you!¡± the Emperor of the mes chuckled and pointed at the fire elite zombie swimming inside the ce of extreme fire. By rolling theva to induce a current, she propelled the fire elite zombie in front of her, and grabbed him while chuckling heartily. With great delight, she then moved and danced with the fire elite zombie as though he were a toy.

    Han Shuo was shocked. He stared nkly at the Emperor of the mes ravaging the fire elite zombie, not knowing what would be the best course of action.

    After a long while, the fatdy seemed to have had enough of ying, and finally put down the fire elite zombie. Chuckingly, she said, ¡°Always looking for trouble for me. But luckily thanks to this trouble, I could break through this thousand-year shackle, and reach the level five realm!¡±

    Without the fatdy also known as the Emperor of the mes¡¯s viting, the fire elite zombie stood well on the magma of the ce of extreme fire. With his two hands gesticting, he used the energy of his soul tomunicate with the Emperor of the mes, ¡°Mother, that¡¯s awesome! You are now just as good-looking as I am!¡±

    Mother? Han Shuo was stupefied. With his jaw on the floor, he stared foolishly at the fire elite zombie and the fatdymunicating. For a moment, his heart felt iparably sullen.

    As early as the moment fire elite zombie was first nted at the ce of extreme fire, Han Shuo was aware that the Emperor of the mes treated fire elite zombie as her very own children. Because of the presence of yuan energy of fire, the fire elite zombie acknowledged the Emperor of the mes as his mother, and certainly regarded her as his mother.

    However, at the time, Han Shuo had yet to consider the fire elite zombie as his own son, and the fire elite zombie had yet to start addressing Han Shuo as father. But starting some time ago, unconsciously, Han Shuo did begin to regard fire elite zombie as his own son. He even grew ustomed to the fire elite zombie calling him father.

    However, now that the fire elite zombie addressed the Emperor of the mes as mother, and Han Shuo as father, looking at the obese middle aged woman before him, he suddenly felt a chill that made his hair to stand on end.

    Han Shuo¡¯s scalp went numb. Listening to their conversation, the fire elite zombie tly calling the Emperor of the mes his ¡®Mother¡¯, and referring to Han Shuo as ¡®Father¡¯, he couldn¡¯t help but visualize certain rather terrifying scenes in his mind.

    Too... too awful!! Han Shuo seemed to have thought of something, his expression turned incredibly ugly.

    ¡°Oi, young man over there, are you the father to my son?¡± Just as Han Shuo¡¯s imagination ran wild, the fat middle aged woman yelled at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Are you the father to my son?¡± Those words sent shivers down Han Shuo¡¯s spine. Putting on a smile even more unsightly than crying, he hastily replied, ¡°Not, not born by me and you!¡±

    When Han Shuo said those words, he really wished to p himself across his face. The more he panicked, the more incoherent his speech got. His look grew even uglier. He had never faced such an embarrassing situation for years.

    ¡°Nonsense, of course I know you and I did not give birth to him!¡± the Emperor of the mes carefreely berated Han Shuo. She seemed like a rather shrew woman, with no shame whatsoever. She then added, ¡°Moreover, I cannot give birth! Yah, and needless to say, you can¡¯t either no, can ya!¡±

    ¡°Father, my mother can now transform into human form. She wants to leave this ce and experience the outside world!¡± fire elite zombie transmitted to Han Shuo. Afterwards, fire elite zombie felt that Han Shuo¡¯s mind was in disorderly. Concerned, he asked, ¡°Father, what¡¯s wrong? Why are you so fric?¡±

    ¡°Noth- nothing!¡± Han Shuo replied hurriedly.

    ¡°Ever since I learned of this good ce, I have always remained here to umte more energy and evolve. It has been such a long time that I¡¯ve lost count of how many years have passed. And now, finally, I can transform into human form, good time to see and experience the outside world,¡± the fatdy cut in as she looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oh... That¡¯s good. The human world is indeed fascinating. With your appearance now, ordinary persons will definitely not look upon you as a non-human. Given your valiant strength, you can travel anywhere on this Profound Continent,¡± Han Shuo replied to the Emperor of the mes.

    All of a sudden, Han Shuo was startled. It was only now that the Emperor of the mes¡¯ formidable demigod strength crossed his mind. Notwithstanding the chills he got from fire elite zombie¡¯s addressing them as father and mother, this Emperor of the mes of demigod strength would not turn against him owing to fire elite zombie. If he could make use of Emperor of the mes¡¯ strength to assist himself, this would undoubtedly be an invaluable boost to him.

    Thus, right after he spoke those words, and before the Emperor of the mes could respond, Han Shuo hastily invited her, ¡°I¡¯m familiar with the human world. Why note over and visit our Lancelot Empire, and observe the differences between the world of mankind and the world of magical beasts.¡±

    ¡°Ah sure, I don¡¯t have any specific destination anyway. I was nning to wander around and go wherever that takes me,¡± the fatdy straightforwardly agreed to Han Shuo¡¯s proposal, much to Han Shuo¡¯s surprise. After thinking for a moment, she grabbed the fire elite zombie before saying to Han Shuo, ¡°Let¡¯s go up first.¡±

    ¡°Oh, Okay!¡± Han Shuo replied. He then turned his gaze to the dark dragons, who were also dumbstruck staring at the Emperor of the mes below them, and said, ¡°Let¡¯s go. Get to the top of the ravine first. We¡¯ll discuss everythingter.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, is Gilbert, is that naughty little one, is he dead?¡± Gilges, patriarch of dark dragons, recovered his energy little by little after escaping from the cage. At level four of the evolutionarydder, he couldpletely adapt to the high temperature over there without the slightest difort. However, from his face, it was obvious that he was in deep pain, pain that seemingly could never be unknotted.

    When Gilbert was mentioned, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but again feel sorrow in his heart. But in contrast to before, as he had found means to resolve this, the sadness was no longer as intense. With some difficulty, Han Shuo forced a smile, and consoled Gilges, ¡°Be at ease. Although Gilbert is dead, I have kept his soul. Give me some time, and I shall have him reborn and again stand before you.¡±

    After a short pause, with cold sparks shing in his eyes, in a deep voice he added, ¡°Plus, Gilbert¡¯s sacrifice will not be in vain. I will make the Shrine of Ice pay a hundred times for what they¡¯ve done!¡±

    ¡°Rea... really? You can resurrect Gilbert?¡± the patriarch of dark dragons said with a slightly trembling voice as he looked at Han Shuo in disbelief.

    Han Shuo nodded. Right when he intended to give him aplete guarantee, he had a second thought. It did not matter if he used demonic arts or necromancy magic, the resurrected Gilbert would never truly be the same as the one who had just perished. At his realization, he felt once again deeply saddened. He sighed, ¡°I can pledge that Gilbert will revive. However, there will be some changes to his new body.¡±

    Gilges was no ordinary being. He understood exactly what Han Shuo meant. He sighed and replied, ¡°As long as he can be resurrected, nothing else matters.¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, let¡¯s go. For someone of several thousand years old, you are as long-winded as a woman.¡± While Han Shuo and Gilges continued to sigh with sorrow, the Emperor of the mes couldn¡¯t help but hasten them. She had never yet taken a tour of the continent with the identity of a human. Now that she had finally evolved with great difficulty to the fifth stage, the Emperor grade, she became rather impatient.

    Without any more words, Han Shuo nodded at Gilges before flying out through the opening in thevafall. One by one, they all evacuated.

    Upon arriving at the ravine, Han Shuo gazed at the crowd of non-human living creatures. For a moment, he couldn¡¯t figure out where to put them.

    ¡°We wish to avenge Gilbert! From today onwards, the Shine of Ice will be the sworn enemy of us dark dragons!¡± A robust yet boorish-looking dark dragon, immediately let out a bellow of rage when he saw Gilbert¡¯s corpse on the ravine, bathing in his own blood.

    During the thrilling great battle in the valley, magma from the ce of extreme fire violently shot about everywhere, causing yet another volcanic eruption in the small ravine. Among them, the magma, enriched with a huge amount of yuan energy of fire, submerged Gilbert¡¯s dead body. Gilbert¡¯s once lifeless carcass, after boiling in the magma, was now reduced to a pitiful mass, his skin and flesh all vaporized. All that remained were a colossal skeleton, a magical beast crystal core, and two eyeballs.

    Looking at Gilbert¡¯s skeletal remains, even with the means to resurrect Gilbert, Han Shuo could not hold back his anger, and roared at the sky in burning fury, ¡°That¡¯s right! We must take revenge!¡±

    At this moment, dark dragon patriarch Gilges flew to Gilbert¡¯s remains and very carefully collected Gilbert¡¯s crystal core and his two eyes, stowing them away like treasure.

    After that furious cry, Han Shuo summoned the earth elite zombie. Using the earth elite zombie¡¯s gift, dark dragon Gilbert¡¯s colossal skeletal remains were buried deep underground so that someday in the future, it could be used to reconstruct Gilbert¡¯s physical body.

    ¡°I want to go the human society!¡± the Emperor of the mes said resolutely as she looked at Han Shuo.

    When Han Shuo was just about to agree, his consciousness suddenly felt an endless hatreding from Tarrag Canyon. He took a shock in his heart and immediately came to his senses. When hepletely released his consciousness to deal with the Shrine of Ice earlier, the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race had discovered his trails.

    Feeling apprehensive, Han Shuo quickly concealed his consciousness.

    Abruptly, an idea crossed Han Shuo¡¯s mind and his eyes glittered. After a short while, the corners of Han Shuo¡¯s lips curved and revealed a most sinister grin. He found a way to deal with the Shrine of Ice.

    ¡°Oi, you, young man, didn¡¯t you say you would bring me to the human world?¡± the fatdy again hastened Han Shuo without the slightest scruple.

    ¡°Elizabeth!¡± Han Shuo lightly yelled.

    ¡°Yes master, anymands?¡± Elizabeth¡¯s body had now recovered. After suffering a bout of unforgettable pain, Elizabeth¡¯s body was now abundant with divine energy that came from Ice Celestial Corey and the others. The divine energy, without Corey and the others interfering, could be slowly absorbed by Elizabeth¡¯s Body of Divine Favor.

    As the saying goes, what doesn¡¯t kill you makes you stronger. This time, not only did the fat woman evolve from Lord of the mes to be the Emperor of the mes, Elizabeth obtained a lot of gains as well. Once her bodypletely absorbed the divine energy, Elizabeth¡¯s strength was sure to be enhanced one step further.

    ¡°Show her around the Lancelot Empire. Erm, if she gets bored, just bring her to Brettel City. Do you understand?¡± Han Shuo instructed Elizabeth with his eyes squinted.

    Elizabeth understood Han Shuo¡¯s wishes. She respectfully nodded and replied, ¡°Rest assured, master. I will make her enjoy herself to the fullest.¡±

    ¡°Alright alright, let¡¯s go,¡± the fat woman said impatiently, wanting to depart and take fire elite zombie along.

    ¡°Hold on!¡± When Han Shuo saw that the Emperor of the mes was grabbing to fire elite zombie¡¯s hand and not letting go, he hastily shouted, ¡°He cannot leave with you!¡±

    ¡°Why not? This is my kid, why can¡¯t he leave with me?¡± The fatdy was somewhat displeased and groaned with her eyes ring at Han Shuo.

    ¡°He is also my kid!¡± Han Shuo hurriedly answered.

    Gilges included, the entire race of dark dragons, and Elizabeth, all had a strange look on their faces after Han Shuo said those words.

    After another shudder, Han Shuo forced a smile and said, ¡°It¡¯s better if he follows me.¡± That manner of expression, sounded just the same as a divorced couple fighting over custody rights of their children.

    The Emperor of the mes was angered. Just as she was about to say something, the fire elite zombie tugged on the corner of her clothes, andmunicated with her telepathically.

    The emotion on her face was indefinite, but turned relieved after a short while. She red at Han Shuo and said, ¡°Take good care of our kid for me!¡± She then immediately grabbed Elizabeth up and flew away from the Dark Forest.

    Han Shuo was speechless.

 Chapter 477: Six-Horned Tribal Kingâ€™s Abnormality

    GDK 477: Six-Horned Tribal King¡¯s Abnormality

    The Emperor of the mes left immediately, leaving behind Han Shuo who was speechlessly looking at fire elite zombie. In his heart, Han Shuo was astounded, not knowing what fire elite zombie told the Emperor of the mes. Han Shuo transmitted, ¡°What did you tell her?¡±

    ¡°Nothing much. I only said that theherworld is my real hometown, and I still have a lot of business to do there!¡± fire elite zombie answered honestly, he would never lie to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo knew that the Emperor of the mes had long realized fire elite zombie¡¯s origins. But because the two bore astonishingly simr auras, as they both had absorbed enormous amounts of fire yuan energy in the ce of extreme fire, she regarded fire elite zombie as her own son. Perhaps only fire elite zombie alone couldmunicate with and cate the Emperor of the mes when she was overstimted.

    ¡°Alright then, let me send you back!¡± After thinking for a moment, considering that fire elite zombie did not have anything else to do in that realm for the moment, and that he would certainly improve faster in theherworld, Han Shuo sang an incantation and sent fire elite zombie off.

    Uponpleting his incantation, a brief connection was formed between Han Shuo and theherworld. Han Shuo sensed a message from little skeleton from the region where the fire elite zombiended his feet.

    From the message he transmitted, Han Shuo understood that little skeleton was currently still fusing with the Origin Crystal of Death. This process seemed to have persisted for a really long time. The reason little skeleton previously transmitted a reminder to Han Shuo all of a sudden was because little skeleton could feel his boundless sadness. Therefore, he took a pause to remind Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo replied to little skeleton, telling him that he could be at ease while he continued fusing with the energy. After that, he took a deep breath and turned his sight to the crowd of dark dragons. He said in a deep voice, ¡°What do you all n to do next?¡±

    ¡°After we recover our strength, we dark dragons must exact revenge for our nsmen!¡± Gilges asserted. He seemed to have made a firm resolution to take retribution on the Shrine of Ice for GIlbert.

    However, even though Ice Celestial Corey and the others in the Shrine of Ice suffered serious injuries, merely with the race of dark dragon now, to contend against the Shrine of Ice would be like riding for a fall. At first, Han Shuo wanted to impart a few words of advice, but upon reconsideration that his words might bring down their spirits, Han Shuo only stammered before shutting his mouth.

    But the old and experienced Gilges understood Han Shuo¡¯s concerns from Han Shuo¡¯s expression of wanting to say something and hesitating. In a deep voice, he said, ¡°Worry not, nothing will happen to us. Besides, this time it was because we did not take any precaution that we could suddenly be captured. We dark dragons, having lived so many years, will not allow some lowlives to bully us.¡±

    When Han Shuo looked at Gilges, he felt as though Gilges still had a few tricks up his sleeves. This dark dragon who had lived for countless years ought to have better insights and foresight than Han Shuo. Therefore, Han Shuo nodded and said, ¡°Then you all be careful!¡±

    ¡°I hope to be able to see Gilbert again!¡± Gilges said with his eyes looking deep into Han Shuo¡¯s. His tone carried some pathos and a bit of pleading.

    ¡°That day wille, don¡¯t worry. Oh, right. This time those few from the Shrine of Ice received some rather heavy injuries. I believe that in this short period of time, those from the Shrine of Ice wouldn¡¯t dare visit your canyon,¡± said Han Shuo.

    ¡°Thank you, Bryan! We, the race of dark dragons, will forever be your friend!¡± Gilges thanked him sincerely.

    ¡°You¡¯re wee. Erm, goodbye!¡± Han Shuo did not continue exchanging words of courtesy with Gilges, but replied simply in a smile before deploying the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens and departed.

    In the snond Far North of Kasi Empire were unbroken chains of dove-white mountains. It is a world shrouded in harsh arctic climate throughout the year. No matter which direction or how far one looked, they would only see the monotonous white colour of snow.

    Located on the summits of these cloud-piercing mountains were glorious, serene shrines made of ice crystal piles. The frozen mountain in the center was particrly outstanding and towering. The headquarters of the Shrine of Ice was located at the summit of that mountain.

    The wind was bone chilling. The sky was covered with ice and snow. In this white, icy world lived numerous disciples of the Shrine of Ice. Majority of them are of Kasi Empire nationality. They were here to offer their most sincere conviction to the Ice Goddess.

    For many years, the main peak located in the center of the mountain range had always been a restricted area. Except for during certain special festivals and for some followers of the Shrine of Ice of grandeur status, an average person would never be allowed to step foot into the main peak.

    However, in the past two days, an unimaginable major event urred, forcing them to loosen up this rule. Numerous disciples on the surrounding mountain peaks ascended to the main peak. In fear and trepidation, they exerted the meager divine energy they had to re-solidify thergest shrine of ice on the main peak.

    Just two days prior, in this exact snond that blew bone chilling wind, situated on the main peak which had the lowest temperature in the region, this shrine of ice all of a sudden started melting. The few elders in the Shrine of Ice, and even Ice Celestial Corey ¨C one of their highest ranking leaders, all sustained injuries and had to recuperate. This grievous news spread throughout the entire religious organization like wildfire.

    Could it have been that the Ice Goddess was angered at their ipetence? Or perhaps demons were on the verge of invading the Shrine of Ice? Many of those disciples conjured to themselves as they were horrified of the changes happening to the Shrine of Ice, no idea of what was actually going on.

    Such a bewildering phenomenon which had previously not once urred for hundreds of thousands of years caused an incalcble negative impact on the Shrine of Ice. Gradually, fear started to spread among those followers of the Shrine of Ice in the snond. Even followers located in other regions learned of the tragic events at the headquarters of the Shrine of Ice.

    Far North of Kasi Empire, Icicle City.

    Icicle City was one of many cities around the snond of the Far North. An ordinary adventurer team would need only ten days to travel from Icicle City to the Shrine of Ice located in the depths of the snond.

    On this day, after a long and tiresome trek, Han Shuo finally arrived at Icicle City, and set to carry out his n of retaliating against the Shrine of Ice.

    Han Shuo¡¯s n was very simple. Just like how they dealt with the Church of Light, he would open up his consciousness, and draw the six-horned Soul Race tribal king toe and kill him. The only difference now was that Han Shuo could effortlessly conceal his consciousness. Therefore, when the six-horned tribal king came over, Han Shuo would need only to conceal his consciousness, and he would vanish from the senses of the six-horned tribal king.

    In addition, Han Shuo could be certain that in the Shrine of Ice, there were no godly existences like the Saintess from the Sacred Mountain of the Church of Light. Otherwise, during the battle days before through the Jadefrost Cage, they would have all frozen to death long before they could get to the ce of extreme fire.

    From the fact that Snow Celestial Tiana needed to escape to the Church of Light in order to take shelter from the six-horned Soul Race tribal king, Han Shuo reckoned that there were no characters in the Shrine of Ice who could rival the six-horned tribal king. Otherwise, Tiana would have returned straight to the Shrine of Ice instead of going to the Church of Light.

    Given the strength of the six-horned tribal king, once he arrived at the Shrine of Ice, by which Han Shuo had already concealed his consciousness, this six-horned tribal king would not hesitate to turn up every rock on this frozen mountain to search for Han Shuo. The Shrine of Ice, just like the Church of Light, was ustomed to being arrogant. Therefore, with almost no thinking required, one could safely assume that there would be a great battle between the two.

    Han Shuo was somewhat looking forward to counting the losses the six-horned tribal king would cause the Shrine of Ice as there would be no one of equal strength to stop him once the six-horned tribal king, a godly existence, arrived at the Shrine of Ice,

    Han Shuo fully let go of his consciousness. When the six-horned tribal king locked onto Han Shuo, he felt an unbounded, ice-cold intention to ruthlessly kill him. However, outside of Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, the six horned tribal king seemed not to have taken any immediate action!

    Han Shuo was somewhat amazed. He stayed an entire morning in Icicle City, but did not sense the six-horned tribal king approaching. This indicated that the six-horned tribal king still remained at Tarrag Canyon as before.

    This obviously ruined Han Shuo¡¯s scheme. Han Shuo spewed execrations in his heart. His consciousness could still sense the boundless desire to murder himing from the distant Tarrag Canyon. However, the six-horned tribal king¡¯s inaction left Han Shuo¡¯s n insurmountable.

    Thest time Han Shuo escaped from Tarrag Canyon, the six-horned Soul Race tribal king brought along four of his generals, and ascended to the top of the Sacred Mountain of the Church of Light almost immediately, exhibiting a ferocious demeanor of killing anyone who stood in his way. Who knew that after just such a short time had passed, when the six-horned tribal king sensed Han Shuo¡¯s presence, he would actually do nothing. This somewhat baffled Han Shuo.

    Could it be that the Soul Race had changed its temperament? Han Shuo immediately rejected that possibility as soon as it arose. From the first time Han Shuo met this race, he understood their heartless nature from their cold pitiless eyes. Besides, the tremendous desire to killing from the six-horned tribal king was still present. This proved that they definitely did not turn kind towards Han Shuo.

    There must have been some other reason, Han Shuo pressingly racked his head.

    Could it be that the six-horned tribal king was injured on the Sacred Mountain of the Church of Light thest time? Han Shuo felt that this was more likely to be the case. It was only possible that the six-horned tribal king was injured in the battle with the Saintess, and was currently recuperating from his injuries, that he would temporarily let him and Stratholme the old monster off.

    When Han Shuo thought so, he couldn¡¯t help but feel d for Stratholme. Thinking that as long as Stratholme took advantage of this period to merge his soul with the Crystal of Fighting Aura, he would not need to worry about the menace of this six-horned tribal king.

    Since the six-horned tribal king wasn¡¯ting for the time being, Han Shuo had no choice but to devise another n. Seeing that the snowy mountain was almost within reach, Han Shuo prepared to check out the headquarters of the Shrine of Ice. Without the presence of any godly expert, Han Shuo believed that he could freely enter and exit the Shrine of Ice, not at all concerned about his own safety.

    After he made up his mind, Han Shuo immediately set out on his own towards the snond where the Shrine of Ice was located. Wishing that the six-horned tribal king woulde looking for him, Han Shuopletely unleashed his consciousness. Not a grain of sand within a huge perimeter in his surrounding could escape his surveince. He had an unimpeded journey all the way to the Shrine of Ice.

 Chapter 478: A Strange Sight

    GDK 478: A Strange Sight

    This was a world of ice and snow. The coldest ce on Profound Continent was right here. All along the way, cold wind whizzed. Snow covered every nook and cranny. It was a vast expanse of whiteness as far as the eyes could see. Trees, stones, rivers, all were encrusted in ayer of ice. It was as though the world had lost its colour.

    However, within the coverage of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, he sensed a trace of the presence of ice bears, snow wolves and frost eagles in this bone-numbingly cold region. These magical creatures, who preferred cold regions as their natural dwellings, roamed about in this remote, deserted world of ice and snow, adding a hint of vitality to this world.

    Of the numerous mountain summits, Han Shuo had one specific target. His heart was as cold as ice, sterned to massacre as he flew at lightning speed.

    The most formidable characters in the Shrine of Ice were the duo of Ice Celestial Corey and Snow Celestial Tiana. The two were the true backbones of the Shrine of Ice. Of the two, Snow Celestial Tiana once schemed against Han Shuo on the Sacred Mountain, with Han Shuo nearly being captured alive by the Church of Light. On the other hand, there was Ice Celestial Corey. Not only did he abuse the entire race of dark dragon, his actions even resulted in Gilbert¡¯s death.

    On top of that, the Shrine of Ice and the Church of Light were the of best allies. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t find any reason not to retaliate against them.

    Before he got close to the frozen mountain in the center, Han Shuo slowed down his flying speed. While his consciousness was still fully unfolded, he concealed the presenceing from his body. Carefully observing each and every movement on the main peak, he seeked a way to intrude without being detected.

    Gathering up his attention, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness immediately sensed the existence of a frost and cold boundary all around the summit. The boundary enveloped the entire main peak of the mountain range with vigorously cold wind and ice. Within that cold wind and ice, Han Shuo sensed the presence of divine energy of the Ice Goddess.

    This discovery made Han Shuo even more cautious in his approach. He further slowed down his advance towards the shrine of ice on the main peak. In his heart, he rapidly turned over in his mind how to deal with the situation he was presented with.

    One after another, disciples of the Shrine of Ice entered and exited the frozen mountain. Yet, the huge boundary made no warning signals nor defensive responses.

    Han Shuo carefully examined for a moment, and found out that among these disciples that entered the main peak of the Shrine of Ice were in fact ones upon whom the Ice Goddess did not even bestow divine energy. However, their bodies were all ice-cold without exception. Much lower than the normal human body temperature.

    With a mere once-over, Han Shuo figured out a solution. Hovering in the sky at a height hard to catch sight of with the naked eye, Han Shuo slowly adjusted his body temperature. He even deployed the Mystical cial Spellfire to generate cold air in his body, at a finely-controlled intensity. In a heartbeat, Han Shuo¡¯s body temperature plunged to match the disciples of the Shrine of Ice down below.

    On Profound Continent, there were existences with greater strength than Han Shuo. However, Han Shuo was convinced that no one else surpassed him in terms of the ability to exercise control over physical body. This self-confidence came from the demonic arts¡¯ perverted forging of his physical body!

    After properly adjusting his body temperature, Han Shuo again surveyed the area for another while to be absolutely certain that in this way he would not trigger the boundary surrounding the frozen mountain. Only then did he begin searching for an opportunity to enter this main peak.

    Watching for a while, Han Shuo discovered that halfway up the frozen mountain there was a protruding steep cliff. There wasn¡¯t a single disciple of the Shrine of Ice manning the region. Having found a vulnerable spot, Han Shuo made use of a window of opportunity and noiselessly descended to that cliff from high altitude.

    His consciousness firmly locked onto the entire frozen mountain. While meticulously concealing the presence on his body, he had long discovered Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s exact location ¡ª in a conical building on the mountain top.

    At this point in time, Ice Celestial Corey ought to have still been in recovery period. Han Shuo could sense that his aura was smooth and steady, without any fluctuation of emotions. There was not a single person stationed around the conical building. As long as Han Shuo could stealthily get to that building and mount a sneak attack, Han Shuo was confident of seeding.

    However, to reach that structure from the precipice where Han Shuo was, and not be detected by anyone midway, would be quite the impossible feat.

    This was because, on the entire frozen mountain, other than steep mountain roads, there were no trees nor rocks that could provide concealment. In this ce where every inch of every surface was nketed with ice and snow, any slightest movement could cause others to catch one in sight.

    Moreover, from a magical tower on the apex of the mountain, Han Shuo sensed some kind of magical wave undtion simr that of Sky¡¯s Eye. This magic released by the magical tower seemed to be able to catch every movement on the mountain.

    Han Shuo thought for a moment with creased brows, and suddenly called to mind metal elite zombie. After thinking briefly, he felt that this method was feasible.

    Although a solidyer of ice covered the mountain, the inside was fundamentally still supported by hard rock. The thickyer of ice above it was naturally formed on one hand, while also deliberately thickened by the Shrine of Ice on the other hand. With metal elite zombie¡¯s abilities, Han Shuo could entirely bore through rocks and reach right to the bottom of the building that Corey was in.

    This is indeed feasible! Han Shuo immediately spread open his two hands. His fingernails suddenly grew madly long to form the incredibly incisive Demonic des that glimmered cold light. With his demonic skill, Han Shuo began to dig into the ice. After boring three meters deep into the ice, Han Shuo finally saw the foundational support of the frozen mountain ¨C rocks.

    Han Shuo issued hismand to metal elite zombie. Once he understood themand, golden lights radiated from his palm. Metal yuan energy steeped into the rocks like flowing water. Afterwards, under Han Shuo¡¯s attentive gaze, the hard, solid rock split open, creating a pathway.

    As Han Shuo gazed at the tunnel produced, he couldn¡¯t help butment in his heart how truly useful the five elite zombies had been to him, even without taking their strengths into consideration.

    Following his sense of Corey¡¯s location, with the assistance of metal elite zombie, from halfway up the mountain, Han Shuo unhurriedly headed towards the mountain summit where Ice Celestial Corey was located.

    The metal elite zombie himself could freely go in and out in rocks, as though he were swimming in water. But now, having to take Han Shuo along, metal elite zombie had no choice but to open up a tunnel. Using some methods that Han Shuo could not understand, while metal elite zombie¡¯s palms discharged brilliant golden rays, the hard rock was split up, rbined, and tamped to build a path growing upwards.

    As metal elite zombie¡¯s palms glowed golden, the tunnel didn¡¯t seem in the slightest bit dark. While he followed behind metal elite zombie up an inclined pathway, he considered the particrs on mounting a sneak attack on Ice Celestial Corey.

    All of a sudden, the metal elite zombie stopped. Caught off guard, Han Shuo almost bumped into metal elite zombie.

    They had walked just a few hundred meters. There was still a long way up the frozen mountain summit where Corey was. Why would metal elite zombie suddenly stop?

    Han Shuo was puzzled. Looking at the back of metal elite zombie, Han Shuo didn¡¯t hesitate to transmit, ¡°Why did you stop?¡¯

    ¡°Father, look!¡± metal elite zombie leaned to one side. The rocks around him pulled back a little, making enough space for Han Shuo and metal elite zombie to stand shoulder to shoulder.

    Han Shuo strode over to the empty spot that metal elite zombie specifically let out, and cast his sight following the upward direction that metal elite zombie pointed to with his right hand. He was immediately dumbstruck by what he saw.

    In front of Han Shuo was a big chamber made by hollowing out the mountain rocks. There stood a magnificent, approximately sixty meter tall statue of the Ice Goddess, within the emptied insides of the mountain.

    This grand, gargantuan statue of the Ice Goddess was made of ice as polished as perfect crystals. The carving was vivid and lifelike. She wore an expression as cold as ice, with her left hand holding firmly onto a crystal staff also carved from ice, appearing as though she was fighting against some wicked demon. Her look was solemn and dignified, giving off a sacred feeling of invibility.

    The Ice Goddess statue was dressed in a unusual striped robe. But as the entire graven image was made of the same block of solid ice, Han Shuo could clearly see her body interiors.

    Inside the body of the carving, there were no internal organs, but a mixture of iced water and some peculiar substances was circting within. It glistened like diamond as it slowly flowed through her body in some kind of strange pattern.

    However, in the lower abdomen of the statue of the Ice Goddess where the uterus should have been, stood a fully-naked, beautiful youngdy with jade-like skin. Her eyes were serenely shut, and emanated not an iota of the presence of life. She possessed such beauty that could give the Saintess of the Church of Light a run for her money ¨C so perfect it seemed impossible that it could exist in this world!

    Han Shuo stood below the statue. When he raised his head to look at this majestic carving of the Ice Goddess, a feeling of insignificance surfaced from the bottom of his heart. He was momentarily awestruck by this Ice Goddess statue in the center of the mountain that appeared out of nowhere.

    The only certainty was that this statue had been carved from just one massive chunk of ice. There must have been a justification for the Shrine of Ice to hollow out the insides of the mountain and ce in it such an enormous statue of the Ice Goddess. After Han Shuo came to his senses, he was shocked to the core, his eyes glittering.

    The naked youngdy situated in the womb of the Ice Goddess statue was ice cold and without any trace of life. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness also could not detect any soul fluctuation. No matter how, he could not understand why there would be such an odd scene in the interior of this mountain.

    While Han Shuo was still perplexed and pondering, rasping sounds suddenly came from the rock wall above the statue. WIth Han Shuo watching attentively, a huge tform slowly protruded from the wall. A few disciples of the Shrine of Ice stood on the tform.

    At the first rasping noise that sounded, Han Shuo instinctively stepped backward and hastily sent amand to metal elite zombie. Metal elite zombie made one sweep with his hand. The passageway opening in front of him rapidly shrunk. By the time the rock tform above the statue fully extended, the passageway before Han Shuo and metal elite zombie had shrunken to just one small fissure remaining.

 Chapter 479: Project God Making

    GDK 479: Project God Making

    Through that narrow fissure, Han Shuo¡¯s glittering eyes stared fixedly at the few standing on the tform above the Ice Goddess statue, cautiously eavesdropping on their conversation.

    ¡°When will the project really beplete. It¡¯s been more than a hundred years,¡± a disciple of the Shrine of Ice sighed.

    ¡°Ever since the start of Project God Making and up until now, our shrine has consumed incalcblebor and physical resources. And it has nowe to the most critical moment. We must, under no circumstances, be careless. The reason our Shrine of Ice has always been pushed under the Church of Light and Cmity Church is all because our Shrine of Ice does not have our own true God on Profound Continent, without which miracles could never be performed in this world. That is why we couldn¡¯t even recruit more followers. Once Project God Making seeds, our Shrine of Ice will be able to change the current situation once and for all, and be a shrine that the entire continent will look up at. No more acting in ordance with the will of others,¡± another disciple came over and exined in a cold voice.

    Project God Making?

    Han Shuo was stunned by what he heard.

    By now, Han Shuo had long epted that there were indeed gods in this world. Evil goddess Rose, who previously attacked Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness from across a few nes of existences; the Saintess that hid deep within the Sacred Mountain of the Church of Light; the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race with unmatched might. All these were attestations to Han Shuo that Gods were, without a doubt, real.

    However, from what Han Shuo knew, even the weakest God went through tens of millions of years of cultivation, and little by little came toprehend the elements in the world or the true essence of nature¡¯sws. Only then, with some good fortune, could they break through their own shackles and be a God.

    This really was the very first time Han Shuo had ever heard the term ¡°God-making¡±. That remark was the most egotistical, most shocking thing he had heard in years. At this point, the Shrine of Ice was, in essence, wrecking his most basic understanding about gods.

    Was a god really something that could be manufactured?

    ¡°This project is already in its final stages. In due time, we will be able toplete this venture, achieving the magnificent feat of directly evolving a Divinely Favored into a God in the span of only hundreds of years. What a grandeur endeavor this is! During this period, we cannot afford any slip-up,¡± one of the men said in a deep voice. His tone carried an inexplicable arrogance.

    A Divinely Favored? Han Shuo was again bewildered. After processing it for another while, he became fully convinced of the validity of this project.

    Those who possessed a Body of Divine Favor had body structures that were different to that of an average person and usually had special abilities. They could possess extraordinary strength like J did, or be like Elizabeth who had the ability to absorb divine energy.

    There were also many of those Divinely Favoured who could easily form connections with certain elements in the world. Once they began practicing in that line of magic, they would make astonishing, unimaginable progress. They could achieve what an ordinary person achieved, but in perhaps just a tenth or even a hundredth of the time.

    For what seemed an eternity, Han Shuo had been fascinated with those who possessed a Body of Divine Favor, and baffled by the special abilities that their unique bodies bestowed on them. After listening to the conversation between the few people above him, Han Shuo arrived at a simple realization.

    Could it have been that those Divinely Favoured were descendants of the Gods?

    ¡°That¡¯s enough. Let¡¯s hurry up. Pour those energy crystals and leave!¡± one of them was somewhat impatient and urged.

    After he finished his words, Han Shuo immediately started paying even closer attention to the tform above the statue. He saw that from their space rings, they took out crystal fragments containing intense water element, which they carefully held using magic, and then insert them into a small chink on the skull of the Ice Goddess statue.

    Once the crystal fragments containing water element fell into the statue, they rapidly dissolved with the iced waterposite within. Through the mixture, threads of water element gradually flowed into the naked youngdy located at the womb of the statue.

    In just a short amount of time, the men had deposited heaps energy crystals into the statue of the Ice Goddess. They carefully observed for a while and after making sure that the Ice Goddess statue was operating nominally, they finally retracted the tform that split open from the wall, disappearing from Han Shuo¡¯s sight.

    After the few had left, Han Shuo immediately turned all his attention back to this Ice Goddess statue. Gazing at this gigantic statue which the Shrine of Ice squandered for a hundred years to make, in his heart, he eximed in astonishment.

    That youngdy with cold, jade-like skin located inside the Ice Goddess statue showed no perceivable presence of life. She was like a unique receptacle, umting enormous amounts of energy from the iced water mixture in her body.

    After pondering for a moment while staring at this Ice Goddess statue, Han Shuo made up his mind right away. He had to destroy this Ice Goddess statue, including what was within it that might produce a ¡°true God¡±. Between the Shrine of Ice and Han Shuo, there existed only an absolutely irreconcble bad blood. It was because the Shrine of Ice currently possessed no godly existences that Han Shuo could be on the offensive in his war against the Shrine of Ice.

    However, once this god-grade expert was produced, Han Shuo believed that the Shrine of Ice would never let go of him, and when that moment arrived, this godly expert would be on his trail indefinitely. Therefore, Han Shuo decided to leave Ice Celestial Corey aside for the time being, and take advantage of the fact that the God making project had yet to bepleted to eradicate this enemy which could potentially pose the greatest threat to him.

    All around the Ice Goddess statue, intense water element was present. Han Shuo had discovered their enigmatic magical boundaries and traps deployed right when he entered the chamber. It was rather easy for Han Shuo to reach under the building where Ice Celestial Corey was by utilizing metal elite zombie¡¯s energy. But to arrive at the Ice Goddess statue without touching any magical boundaries or traps, that wasn¡¯t nearly as simple.

    His eyes sparkled. Han Shuo decided to break through the boundaries and traps, and to destroy this Ice Goddess statue by savage means. In his mind, he started to consider the procedures of his operation, weighing what would be the fastest way to destroy this possible threat in the future.

    At this moment, a light bulb went on over his head. He recalled water elite zombie. Water elite zombie, refined with the yuan energy of water, possessed the proficient ability to manipte ice and water. In this region, the boundaries and traps around the Ice Goddess statue were actually made with ice or water. With water elite zombie, perhaps he could get straight to the Ice Goddess statue without alerting anyone.

    When this idea floated into Han Shuo¡¯s mind, he immediately put it to action. After reciting an incantation, water elite zombie appeared beside Han Shuo. Metal elite zombie took the initiative and stepped backwards, making space for water elite zombie to stand shoulder to shoulder with Han Shuo.

    ¡°Do you have any means of taking me to that goddess statue without alerting anyone?¡± Han Shuo transmitted.

    Water elite zombie did not immediately reply. After some time had passed, water elite zombie still did not transmit any message. This left Han Shuo somewhat baffled.

    Of the five elite zombies, although water elite zombie came rtivelyte, and did not possess a treasure of water attribute, after evolving for such a long time, he should have had long possessed intelligence instead of being so sluggish!

    The puzzled Han Shuo furrowed his brows. He couldn¡¯t help but turn his head to look at water elite zombie to see what was wrong with him.

    Han Shuo was startled by what he saw.

    The water elite zombie¡¯s eyes were glittering with brilliant light, and out of his body floated puffs of misty water vapor. Standing beside him, Han Shuo could feel the humidity in the surroundings increase. Moreover, the water elite zombie seemed to be emotional, as though he suddenly came across something that caused him to be extremely excited.

    Following water elite zombie¡¯s gaze, Han Shuo discovered that he was staring nkly at the youngdy inside the Ice Goddess statue. His eyes did not blink at all, as though he had turned into a fool.

    Oh shoot! Han Shuo was rmed. He thought to himself, Don¡¯t tell me he¡¯s actually fallen in love with that girl in there?

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart turned into a mess, not knowing what was wrong with the rather sillylooking water elite zombie.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± Han Shuo shouted very loudly. He deliberately did so in order to rouse water elite zombie from his daze.

    Han Shuo¡¯s shouting was indeed effective. The water elite zombie jolted. He looked at Han Shuo somewhat at a loss but shortly after, rays of light glew magnificently in his eyes. He excitedly pointed at that youngdy, and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Father, I want!¡±

    This rascal definitely went wrong in his evolution! He could never fuse his energy into the Penta-elemental Undead Formation. So it turns out he evolved sexual desires, and even his eyes have grown malicious. Damn it! Little rascal, howe you¡¯ve evolved like this!

    Han Shuo incessantly cursed in his heart as he looked at water elite zombie with his imagination running wild. For a while, he didn¡¯t know what to do. With regards to the five elite zombies, Han Shuo held genuine feelings for them. Although this request of water elite zombie freaked Han Shuo out a little, looking at water elite zombie¡¯s excitement and impulsive urge, he couldn¡¯t bear to reject.

    After stomping his feet, Han Shuo clenched his teeth and said, ¡°Go ahead you little rascal. Do as you wish. But by all means, you must not alert anyone else. Damn it, even your brothers who came out much earlier than you aren¡¯t as early-maturing as you!¡±

    After getting the nod of approval from Han Shuo, the water elite zombie suddenly jumped with excitement. He directly passed through the water magic traps and boundaries, andnded at the feet of the Ice Goddess statue in a sh, all without triggering any boundaries or traps.

    While Han Shuo continued cursing in his heart, water elite zombie fused himself into the Ice Goddess statue. From within her lower leg, following the iced water mixtures, water elite zombie floated directly to where the youngdy was, and excitedly embraced the lifeless youngdy with perfect looks.

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 Chapter 480: I Want

    GDK 480: I Want

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t bear to watch such a perfect looking young girl being defiled by water elite zombie just like that. However, just as Han Shuo was about to turn around and look the other way, he suddenly sensed an unusual transformation happening to the youngdy inside the Ice Goddess statue.

    Han Shuo¡¯s observed that the energy within that young girl with smooth and fair skin was rapidly flowing into water elite zombie. Water elite zombie pressed his body against this bare youngdy not to perform some obscene act as Han Shuo had imagined, but to rapidly absorb the energy inside the youngdy through skin contact.

    Han Shuo stared nkly before he quickly came to his senses and became overjoyed. He ceased his silent profanities towards water elite zombie, and became just as excited at the water elite zombie.

    The youngdy was brimming with some sort of exotic icy water energy, but contained not the tiniest bit of divine energy conferred by the Ice Goddess. This was somewhat strange and contrary to what one might expect.

    When he had earlier tried to break apart the Jadefrost Cage, Han Shuo attempted to have water elite zombie absorb the divine energy within the cage. However, as water elite zombie could not secure a connection with the divine energy in the Jadefrost Cage, the n failed.

    Consequently, this time when Han Shuo saw that there was a youngdy inside the Ice Goddess statue, he did not think of sending water elite zombie to absorb the energy. But now it seemed that although water elite zombie could not absorb the divine energy that the Ice Goddess bestowed upon her believers, he nevertheless could absorb the water element and exotic energy from this icy water mixture.

    In water elite zombie¡¯s embrace, the youngdy was enveloped in a white cloud of water vapor. Energy within the body of the lifeless young girl, in tiny streams, flowed into water elite zombie¡¯s body.

    Han Shuo could feel the excitementing from water elite zombie, his eyes glowing with vigor. While he absorbed the energy from the youngdy, he transmitted to Han Shuo, ¡°Thank you father, thank you father!¡±

    ¡°Erm, you seem to be quite a lucky one!¡± Han Shuo remarked and felt somewhat embarrassed for his dirty thoughts.

    ¡°Father, I believe that after this, he will be able to fuse his energy into the formation!¡± transmitted metal elite zombie as he stood beside Han Shuo.

    When metal elite zombie reminded him so, Han Shuo was delighted. Fire, metal and earth elite zombies had sessfully fused their energies in the Penta-elemental Undead Formation. But as water elite zombie and wood elite zombie arose ratherte, in addition to the fact that they did not possess treasures of their respective attributes, they had never been able to fuse their energies with the other three elite zombies.

    Water elite zombie was now absorbing the energy meant for the Shrine of Ice to produce a god. Once water elite zombiepletely absorbed the energy, Han Shuo had no idea what realm he would reach, although he was certain that he would make one giant leap in his evolution. To sessfully fuse his energy into the Penta-elemental Undead Formation wouldn¡¯t be too challenging by then.

    While Han Shuo¡¯s heart was greatly ted, he suddenly felt abnormal activity among those of the Shrine of Ice. A group of experts who were nursing their injuries, headed by Ice Celestial Corey, all of a sudden converged in a helter skelter.

    The wall from which the disciples left again began to rasp and extend.

    Han Shuo immediately realized that his plot had been exposed. This statue of Ice Goddess manufactured by the Shrine of Ice must have had some sort of connection with them unbeknownst to Han Shuo. As the energy inside the youngdy rapidly drained away, the disciples had to have been rmed.

    Since it yed out like this, Han Shuo knew that a bloodshed was unavoidable. A callous thought emerged in his heart. Immediately, he headed a distance upwards with metal elite zombie creating the tunnel for him.

    At that moment, the energy inside the youngdy within the statue had yet to be fully absorbed by water elite zombie. Whether or not he would evolve to his fullest capacity was all up to Han Shuo now on how much time he could buy for water elite zombie.

    ¡°Father, I want, I want this energy!¡± Still hugging the youngdy and rapidly absorbing the energy from her body, water elite zombie greedily transmitted to Han Shuo like a child demanding candy.

    ¡°You hurry up and make every second count. Quickly absorb that energy and forget about everything else!¡± Han Shuo urged. He understood what that energy meant for water elite zombie and was prepared to fight with all his might to buy ample time for him.

    Finally, the tformpletely extended. The party of Shrine of Ice disciples cast their gazes at the magnificent carving of the Ice Goddess in the center of the mountain.

    Apart from the few Shrine of Ice disciples who were leaving, there was the troupe that Han Shuo had met thest time at the dark dragon¡¯s canyon. With just one look at the few, Han Shuo was certain that they had been involved in the long distance battle over at the ce of extreme fire the few days prior.

    When this party was atst utterly crushed, Han Shuo seized the opportunity and attacked their souls using his consciousness and mental strength. Having been caught off guard by his attack, they sustained heavy injuries. When they had previously met, although their bodies were ice cold, they appearedpletely normal. But now, their faces were as pale as the dead.

    In contrast to their unruffled manner during the great battle at the dark dragon¡¯s canyon, their bodies gave off incredible chaotic aura. This indicated that they had yet to fully recover from their injuries.

    ¡°Oh my Goddess! What, what is that thing?!¡± one of those disciples shrieked, trembling from head to toe, with one hand ced over his chest and the other pointed at water elite zombie tightly hugging the youngdy.

    When this disciple¡¯s shriek sounded, other Shrine of Ice disciples on the tform also witnessed the situation down below. All of those disciples, Ice Celestial Corey included, instantly burst into rage, fury, and shock. Their cries and bowls filled the entire chamber.

    ¡°How did that nasty thing enter the statue of the Goddess!¡± Ice Celestial Corey roared in wrath. A pnded on the face of a disciple standing on the sides. He spat a mouth full of blood and fell off the tform.

    Whoosh whoosh! Before the subordinate made contact with the ground below, the magical boundary around the Ice Goddess statue was suddenly triggered, sending out a few icicles which ran through his body. Before any blood could gush out from his wounds, his body was entirely frozen, and shattered into pieces when he fell on the ground.

    ¡°Lord Corey, please spare us. We really have no clue what happened. If you kill us all, it will be impossible toplete the God Making project!¡± one of the disciples cried out in fear, kneeling before Ice Celestial Corey.

    The ashen and furious Ice Celestial Corey, who was prepared to kill all those disciples that previously came down to replenish energy crystals, already grabbed another disciple by the neck and was ready to kill him for his dereliction. But after he heard that loud pleading, for the sake ofpleting the project, he restrained his impulsive urge in the end.

    ¡°Immediately enter the Goddess¡¯ statue with divine energy and put that nasty thing to death. I want his soul to suffer!¡± Ice Celestial Corey said angrily after flinging off the man in his hand. He seemed to be very angry.

    Of course he was. This God making project that the Shrine of Ice had been conducting for over a hundred years would have finally beenplete soon, and Ice Celestial¡¯s cherished desire to surpass the Church of Light and Cmity Church was on the brink of being aplished, and such misfortune had to arise at this pivotal moment. Having waited for years and years, he was as angry as anyone could imagine.

    ¡°Yes, yes my Lord!¡± Even those true experts who had strived to serve the Shrine of Ice for many years trembled with fear under the violent fury of Ice Celestial Corey. They hurriedly agreed and began taking care of water elite zombie.

    Whoosh Whoosh Whoosh!

    Suddenly, loud whooshing sounds could be heard. Multiple sharp bone spears flew up into the sky. Like scattered bamboo splinters, rows of bone spears shot towards Ice Celestial Corey and the others.

    ¡°Damn it!¡± Corey bawled in a stern voice. He hastily took out his ice-cold longsword. After sword rays shed through, sparking, translucent cold air solidified to form an ice wall, obstructing the bone spears.

    ¡°You useless fools, get lost!¡± after hastily blocking a wave of bone spears attack, Ice Celestial rained curses while kicking the disciple that knelt at his feet.

    The disciples who previously entered the chamber, despite being priests for the Shrine of Ice, studied mainly alchemy, drugs, magical arrays, and all sorts ofplicated, abstruse subjects. Only then could the God making project be realized. But they were not particrly strong.

    Under the high coverage attack of Han Shuo¡¯s, it was very possible that one or two might have been so careless and gotten themselves killed. If he were to lose the people who had meticulously studied the God making project for many years, it was very likely that the project would be doomed to fail. Thus, although Ice Celestial Corey yeared to kill them all at once, for the sake of the God making project, he had no other option but to put their safety on a podium.

    Ice Celestial Corey yelled abuse at them while pushing and kicking with his hands and legs, forcibly squeezing these disciples who possessed true expertise in their domains of study into the tunnel they came from. After that, like a lunatic, he loudly roared, ¡°Come out, Bryan. I know it¡¯s you, you filthy, wretched necromancer!¡±

    Full of rage, Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s usually calm and unruffled mannerisms were. In this moment, nearly resembled Han Shuo in his demonic stupor, no different from a lunatic. Even his few subordinates around him were bbergasted at his wildness.

    ¡°Go after those few who are escaping. Kill them all!¡± Han Shuo calmly transmitted an order to metal elite zombie to kill all those researches. After that, in a calm and collected manner, he walked out through a tunnel that was split open.

 Chapter 481: Ad hoc Approach

    GDK 481: Ad hoc Approach

    With the intention of buying more time for water elite zombie, after leaving metal elite zombie with instructions, Han Shuo emerged at an unhurried pace, and stood proudly next to the Ice Goddess statue.

    ¡°It sure enough was you!¡± Ice Celestial Corey shrieked in great fury. The icy cold longsword in his hand pointed towards Han Shuo as he charged downwards.

    Frosty aura overflowed from the longsword in his hand. Shapeless and formless fighting aura spurred up the cold air. Sharp icicles that could split space itself came down from the air with deadly force.

    When Corey made a move, the few experts also whooshed behind him. Possessing strengths of sacred swordmasters, those few were not to be belittled either. Their tremendous power firmly locked onto Han Shuo, causing the pressure on him to be multiplied.

    Another two remained motionless and stood tall on the tform at the top. Both wielded crystal staffs. As they rapidly chanted magical spells, the water element in this chamber which was already rich and intense to its fullest suddenly came alive. The entire region started to cool off. Multiple streams of hazy white cold air converged towards Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo realized that these people, headed by Ice Celestial Corey, intended to finish him in the shortest time possible, then put all their energy on water elite zombie, who was wrecking inside the Ice Goddess statue. Eventhough they had sustained some injuries, they were certainly still a formidable force when making moves simultaneously.

    This chamber in the center of the mountain, operated for hundreds of years by the Shrine of Ice, was not only filled with intense element of water. Owing to Project God Making, they had put upyers uponyers of magical boundaries and traps. Tobat in such a region was extremely unfavorable to Han Shuo.

    Therefore, under no circumstances could he confront them directly! If they were to lead Han Shuo by the nose, not only would he not be able to stall for water elite zombie, but escaping from this chamber would be a problem.

    Seeing that Ice Celestial Corey and his party were charging over, Han Shuo suddenly pulled back into the tunnel he walked out from. The rocky wall that was split open was well coordinated with Han Shuo. As Ice Celestial swooped down, the opening rapidly healed and restored to its smooth surface. It was so well performed that even Ice Celestial Corey doubted if the Han Shuo he saw was just an illusion.

    ¡°Damn it! What¡¯s going on!¡± Corey furiously shouted.

    ¡°Abra! Watch out!¡±

    A sacred swordmaster who was rapidly flying downwards behind Corey was ovee with fear by the warning from those above him, and looked in all directions at aplete loss.

    Suddenly, this sacred swordmaster called Abra felt a frightening change to the wall beside him. Crack! Halfway down his fall, the rocky wall beside him suddenly shattered. From the opening, a fierce-looking ghostly face ferociously rushed out, biting at him.

    Abra froze his downward fall. Golden rays erupted from his chilling crystal sword. In a split second, hundreds of golden lights bombarded the ghoulish face attacking him.

    Under Abra¡¯s attentive watch, that sinister ghostly face was riddled with holes by the bombardment of golden lights. He let out a sigh of relief in his heart, but remained very cautious and stared fixedly it.

    Having honed his martial skills to such a stage, he was not the kind to let his guard down duringbat. It was no easy task bing a sacred knight, and Abra was evidently not an exception. With battle experiences aplenty he had grown ustomed to staying alert and responsive and not underestimating any enemy.

    It was precisely such qualities that saved his life. Watching with all his attention, he saw that the malevolent ghostly face, although riddled with holes from the bombardment of his golden fighting aura, had yet to disappear. Even the speed at which it came biting at him did not slow down one bit, still charging at him with a loud hiss.

    Abra¡¯s expression turned frightened. His body, which was frozen still in midair, rapidly moved backwards all of a sudden. His chilling crystal sword was brandished in a criss-cross motion across his chest. Within the golden fighting aura, frosty cold divine energy was subsequently released. The divine energy conferred by the Ice Goddess interweaved with his fighting aura, formingyer uponyer of defensive shield.

    The sinister ghostly face advanced another three meters, but in the end dissipated into smoke and vanished. At this moment, after the ghostly face melted into thin air, an iron fist slowly erged in front of Abra. The unstoppable demeanor it carried caused him to be overwhelmed with shock.

    Whoosh Whoosh Whoosh

    One after another, the Shine of Ice experts above and below Abra brandished their swords, sending icicles and cold winds towards Han Shuo who had revealed himself.

    Letting out a cold grunt, Han Shuo¡¯s right fist pounding towards Abra remained unwavering. Demonic light burst out from his left hand wielding the Demonic des. Without even looking, the demonic lights urately pulverized any icicle shooting towards him.

    However, several streams of cold air randomly drifted about under the cover of the shattered icicles and suddenly attached onto Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    Once the streams of cold air deployed by sacred magi by congealing the enormous amount of water element found within the chambertched on to Han Shuo, bone-chilling coldness seeped into his consciousness and physical body in an instant. Han Shuo¡¯s body suddenly turned stiff with his lightning speed abruptly slowed down.

    However, Abra still could not evade in time!

    Dong! Han Shuo¡¯s fist came pounding right in the center of the sword hilt of the icy crystal sword that Abra thrust out.

    Energy which seemingly could topple mountains and overturn seas rushed towards sacred swordmaster Abra. All the fighting aura he used to resist was washed away in a split second. Only the frosty divine energy that came from the Ice Goddess barely withstood this vigorous force, which was wildly wrecking within his body as though a sword was stirring within.

    A bleak, miserable howl, paired with a big mouthful of blood, forced their way out of Abra¡¯s mouth. He lost his bnce. Just as he raised his head to look up at the sky, his body tilted to the back and started falling. He crashed against the rocky wall.

    ¡°Stop!¡± Ice Celestial Corey screamed as he charged over from below.

    After the cold air currents entered his body, Han Shuo¡¯s speed continued to grow sluggish. But as Abra was very near to him, he still managed tond his attack.

    Paying no mind to Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s shouting and charging, Han Shuo¡¯s right hand turned from a fist to a t and straight palm, ruthlessly smacking Abra¡¯s heart.

    ¡°Abra! Run!¡± the two magi, who caught sight of the ordeal, again reminded him in a flurry.

    Perhaps only Abra himself could see that there was no escape for him. Seeing the palm mming towards his chest as fast as lightning, he exerted all his strength for a counterattack. He thrusted his sword at Han Shuo¡¯s empty left hand, and clenched a fist with his left hand to throw at Han Shuo¡¯s palm that was mming down.

    Pow!

    Like a peacock spreading its feathers, as Han Shuo¡¯s palm was about to make contact with Abra¡¯s punch, his fingernails dramatically grew to take the shape of Demonic des.

    Before Abra could react, the Demonic des pierced through his fist with no difficulty, and continued their path through Abra¡¯s arm, finally piercing through his heart. Killed in one strike!

    Drawing out his right hand drenched with blood, Han Shuo put on a callous grin. His smile wasposed of three parts arrogance, one part calmness, and six parts ruthlessness.

    Abra, whose heart was shattered, with his dread-filled eyes wide open, fresh blood spurting from his chest, copsed to the ground.

    It was only now that Ice Celestial Corey made over to him. Looking at the unfeeling grin on Han Shuo¡¯s face, Corey¡¯s heart sank and began to pound. However, he knew that if Han Shuo wasn¡¯t dead by today, the Shrine of Ice would never have another peaceful day. The shrine¡¯s prestige and solemnity would be destroyed sooner orter.

    ¡°Kill him! He must die!¡± Ice Celestial Corey demanded. He would spare no effort in making Han Shuo remain there forever.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo who had just killed Abra, smilingly turned to Corey. With fullposure, he moved towards the wall that Abra had been leaning against. Under Corey¡¯s gaze, the stone wall again inconceivably opened to reveal a tunnel, and Han Shuo calmly receded back into it.

    Then, Han Shuo stood straight and tall in the tunnel inside the stone wall. Even as he directly faced Ice Celestial Corey who was about to mow him down, the smile on his face was as callous as before.

    Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s injuries had yet to recover, his subordinates had yet to arrive at his side, and the two magi at the top were hardly prepared. The frightened Ice Celestial Corey suddenly slowed down his charging. Surprisingly, he dared not to directly confront Han Shuo.

    In just two seconds, popping noises sounded from Han Shuo¡¯s body, and all the cold air currents that intruded his body was forced out using demonic arts.

    ¡°Hah, coward. Those cold streams were still in my body. You had your chance to kill me!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s body was no longer stiff. He grinned at Ice Celestial Corey and gave him a spiteful taunt.

    When Han Shuo finished those words, Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s assistants arrived in sessions, and the two magi at the top were finally fully ready.

    Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s expression was ashen. Gnashing his teeth and shouting the word ¡®Kill¡¯, he finally took the lead and charged at Han Shuo.

    It was exactly at this moment that Han Shuo took a step backward, and the wall in front of him again miraculously closed up. When Ice Celestial Corey closed the distance, all that was in front of him was a stone wall as smooth as a mirror, and Han Shuo was nowhere to be seen.

    ¡°Lord, my Lord, it won¡¯t do if we stay this way! If we continue exhausting time like this, the energy in the Ice Goddess¡¯ statue will all be gone!¡± when Ice Celestial Corey was again angrily cursing Han Shuo, one of the disciples finally voiced out to warn him.

    Ice Celestial Corey suddenly felt enlightened as he recalled that within the statue of the Ice Goddess, that ugly creature was still hugging his test subject and sucking on its energy.

    ¡°Forget that filthy necromancer, finish that ugly thing first!¡± Ice Celestial Corey was shivering as hemanded his subordinates around him.

    Ice Celestial Corey realized that he really had been driven mad by Han Shuo. It was only so that he would do something so unsensible. With his subordinate¡¯s reminder, Ice Celestial Corey was finally clear that he was being yed by Han Shuo.

    ¡°As you wish, my Lord!¡± The disciples immediately put their hands to dealing with water elite zombie who was joyously absorbing energy inside the Ice Goddess statue.

 Chapter 482: What in the World Are You?

    GDK 482: What in the World Are You?

    Just as Ice Celestial Corey and his party turned a blind eye to Han Shuo and instead turned their attentions to getting rid of water elite zombie, Han Shuo, who had just hidden himself within the stone wall using metal elite zombie¡¯s energy, suddenly shot out like a sharp sword.

    ¡°Watch out!¡± This time it was Ice Celestial Corey that shouted.

    The two magi who had been staying on the tform above the Ice Goddess statue suddenly felt an intense air of bloodlust assaulting their noses. A nauseating mist of vaporized blood instantly enveloped Han Shuo.

    Knowing that Ice Celestial Corey finally saw the situation clearly after being reminded, Han Shuo realized that his evasive hit-and-run tactic had be useless. However, Han Shuo still wanted to buy more time for water elite zombie to absorb the energy. He wanted to intercept them at this crucial moment, even if that meant the risk of sustaining injuries.

    Of the party, the two magi that stood motionless at the top were the weakest, and yet could pose the greatest threat to Han Shuo. Now that Han Shuo decided to confront them directly, the only target he could kill in the shortest amount of time was none other than these two magi.

    Therefore, Han Shuo carried not the slightest hesitation. He suddenly shot out from within the stone wall, and deliberately disyed an imposing demeanor so that Ice Celestial Corey would know what he nned to do, and that he had better temporarily give up on attacking water elite zombie.

    However, this time, Ice Celestial Corey paid no heed to Han Shuo. After loudly shouting a reminder, he continued on charging towards the Ice Goddess statue. It looked as if he had actually sobered up from his insanity, and realized that having one godly existence is much more important than having two sacred magi.

    This went against Han Shuo¡¯s expectations. When the two magi hastily evacuated in fear, Han Shuo gave up on chasing after the two. His body, high up in the air, suddenly changed course. Carrying a cloud of blood formed by raging killing intent, he charged downwards at Ice Celestial Corey and the others.

    As matters stood, Han Shuo had no choice but to fight head-on. He could no longer y hit-and-run guerri tactics or hide behind the stone walls.

    When Corey raised his head and saw the blood cloud arriving from above, he immediately understood that it contained energy within it that couldy waste to all things. His look changed. The situation became clear to him at once. He suddenly brandished his sword at the blood cloud and shrieked, ¡°Frost Nova!¡±

    As though it had long been premeditated, right after Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s shout of ¡®Frost Nova¡¯ sounded, cold lights shone magnificently in the eyes of the four sacred swordmasters beside him, and they brandished their swords to face the blood cloud¡¯s attack. Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s included, a total of five energies made of the mixture of fighting aura and divine energy granted by the Ice Goddess suddenly began converging at the blood cloud.

    These five energies collided with each other within the blood cloud, which instantly produced a terrifying explosion of ice within the blood cloud. The ice explosion formed by the five energies was extremely violent, andpletely covered the lump of blood cloud. It was simply toote for Han Shuo to escape. He sustained serious damage in the Ice Nova.

    ¡°Hahahah...¡± Corey howled withughter, full ofcent.

    ¡®Ice Nova¡¯ was a secret technique of the Shrine of Ice. It wasposed of a mixture of divine energy bestowed by the Ice Goddess and fighting aura. By colliding multiple of them together, it formed arge surface area ice st. Those shrouded by the Ice Nova would be afflicted by terrifying icicles that possessed an unstoppable force.

    After repeated rounds of defeat, Ice Celestial finally redeemed himself by using this secret technique. He was visibly delighted.

    ¡°Filthy necromancer. I want to see how you will escape this time,¡± Ice Celestial Corey cackled as he fixed his attention on the gradually dissipating blood cloud along with the four sacred swordmasters beside him.

    The bombardment of Ice Nova had dissipated the killing intent in the blood cloud. Han Shuo¡¯s body slowly revealed itself from the blood cloud.

    All they could see was that Han Shuo¡¯s body was riddled with thousands of holes. His body looked as though he had been stabbed with hundreds of thousands incorporeal arrows, big and small. His chest was split open into a big hole, and his internal organs were all out in the open.

    Han Shuo¡¯s appearance now was even more unsightly than a malicious spirit, with not a patch of intact skin on his body. The shelling of ¡®Ice Nova¡¯ left his body in destion, the most dire state it had ever been in.

    Without a doubt, Han Shuo was heavily injured by the ¡®Ice Nova¡¯. This secret technique of the Shrine of Ice, jointly deployed by one demigod expert and four sacred swordmasters, had injured Han Shuo gravely!

    Soon, Han Shuo¡¯s body waspletely exposed. All of a sudden, Ice Celestial Corey, who had beenughing his heart out, ceased tough anymore. Thecency on his face was reced with shock and inconceiveness as he stared at the morbid, mangled Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo¡¯s body was riddled with holes. His internal organs were visible through the massive wounds. Yet, not a drop of blood flowed from them!

    What was even more unimaginable to Corey was that the badly mangled flesh on Han Shuo¡¯s body was slowly wiggling, with each of the wounds healing at a speed visible to the naked eye!

    The sight was surreal!

    In all likelihood, anyone that had seen such an unearthly scene would have been just at appalled as Ice Celestial Corey and his men, stupefied and at aplete loss.

    This reaction originated in the instinctive fear of the unknown!

    ¡°What, what in the world are you?¡± Ice Celestial Corey, who had long subconsciously harbored an intense wariness towards Han Shuo, finally could not constrain the fear in his heart, and cried out, his voice trembling. He looked anxiously at Han Shuo who was standing in midair with thousands of wounds from head to toe that were strangely free of any blood, but instead rapidly healing up.

    Han Shuo forced a smile. He indeed suffered serious injuries from that Ice Nova. However, during the split second those icicles shot into his body, the extreme cold temporarily froze up his blood. This allowed Han Shuo, who possessed an abnormally valiant physical body, to contain his injuries within an extremely short amount of time.

    With the cirction of demonic yuan, his muscle fibers absorbed and held onto all his blood. Therefore, after the frosty aura dispersed, not an ounce of blood left his system. Making use of his tenacious body, he rapidly healed up his wounds.

    However, Han Shuo really had been injured! And his injuries were not insubstantial!

    As his body had suffered such considerable damage, the whole restoration process of his physical body was going to consume an enormous amount of blood essence and demonic yuan. The rapid recovery process of Han Shuo¡¯s body, although inconceivably grotesque in Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s eyes, lost Han Shuo a lot of his firepower in battle.

    However, this bitter smile on Han Shuo¡¯s sinister, hideous face that was still riddled with bloody cavities appeared to be a truly wicked smile that could make anyone numb to the scalp. In the eyes of Ice Celestial Corey and his party, that was absolutely the most terrifying scene they had ever seen in their lives.

    Han Shuo noticed the trembling in Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s voice. The smile on Han Shuo¡¯s face left Corey and his party scared witless. Looking at the inconceivable Han Shuo, no matter how hard they tried, Ice Celestial Corey and his men couldn¡¯t make any mental association between Han Shuo and a human being.

    Han Shuo seized the opportunity to rapidly heal the heavy wounds his body suffered and let out augh that oozes ruthlessness and savagery. He even took advantage of the situation and interpted hisughter with Demonic Siren, a demonic skill that could cause one¡¯s heart to be misled.

    As expected, the already gutless Ice Celestial Corey, under the effect of Han Shuo¡¯s Demonic Siren, grew more and more terrified. When he again looked at Han Shuo¡¯s hideous appearance, Han Shuo seemingly transformed into a demonic existence of ancient times, which unintentionally took a hit from him, ripping apart his everyday disguise, and revealing his demonic nomenon.

    ¡°Which, which ne of existence did youe from? The Shrine of Ice is a religion of the Ice Goddess. What, what do you want?¡± one of the four sacred swordmasters suddenly cried out in fear, frantically taking a step backwards. This was partially due to the effect of the Demonic Siren, while on the other it was also because they truly dreaded Han Shuo.

    ¡°Who, who the hell are you?¡± When he shouted, it seemed to serve as a reminder to the others, causing another sacred swordmaster to also cry out in fear.

    Ice Celestial Corey, looking at Han Shuo, who was still seriously injured, seemed to havee to a sudden realization. Thinking back on the brilliant skills of Han Shuo¡¯s that he had never seen before, he seriously thought that Han Shuo was not an existence originating from Profound Continent at all. With that, the fear in his heart flourished even more. His eyes already started flickering, rapidly considering his escape routes.

    ¡°We, we are the messengers of the Ice Goddess. You, don¡¯t you mess around!¡± Finally, under the effect of the Demonic Siren, on top of Han Shuo¡¯s strange behavior, Ice Celestial Corey began babbling nonsense with a shiver in his voice.

    At this moment, water elite zombie suddenly transmitted, ¡°Father, I am done!¡±

    Han Shuo, who was howling withughter, turned his head down and saw that the naked youngdy had dried out to a mummified state without any water content, and its former beauty was nowhere to be seen. The enormous statue of the Ice Goddess abruptly copsed as water elite zombiemunicated telepathically. Starting at its head, it crumbled and fell to ground.

    ¡°Hahaha... Hahaha...¡± Ice Celestial Corey and the others¡¯ foolishness left Han Shuo unable to stop himself fromughing his head off. This time, the Demonic Siren wasn¡¯t admixed.

    ¡°Boom!¡±

    Above Han Shuo, metal elite zombie appeared out of nowhere and smashed his golden cudgel on the two birdbrained sacred magi, also scared witless by Han Shuo. They were reduced to meat patties.

    ¡°Screw it! Whichever ne of existence he came from, we will fight him to death!¡± When the Ice Goddess statue copsed, Ice Celestial Corey once again went insane and charged recklessly into Han Shuo.

    But at this moment, Han Shuo, his body inflicted with heavy damage, did not tangle any longer with the desperate Ice Celestial Corey. While still loudlyughing as before, he entered a tunnel that suddenly split open in the stonewall with water elite zombie, and calmly left the Shrine of Ice.

 Chapter 483: I Just Want to Be Stronger

    GDK 483: I Just Want to Be Stronger

    With metal elite zombie paving the way, splitting up solid rock to make a long and narrow tunnel, those tight security measures of the Shrine of Ice were rendered useless. Han Shuo and water elite zombie followed behind metal elite zombie, quickly escaping.

    The statue of the Ice Goddess was key to Project God Making. Developed by numerous great masters of alchemy and chemistry, the Ice Goddess statue was where Ice Celestial Corey entrusted all his hopes and dreams. Her copse was like the stab of a sharp sword right through Corey¡¯s heart, causing him unbearable pain.

    Metal elite zombie transmitted a report to Han Shuo, informing him that the great masters who erected the statue of the Ice Goddess were all killed by him. After losing these great masters who had intensively studied the subject for many years, Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s God making project could no longer be reinstated.

    Although Han Shuo¡¯s body was heavily damaged by ¡®Ice Nova¡¯, he managed to sessfully intimidate Ice Celestial Corey and the others by exploiting their fears of him with the help of Demonic Siren. However, when Han Shuo saw that Ice Celestial Corey once again sank into madness because of the Ice Goddess statue¡¯s copse, knowing that the maddened Corey would not be easy to handle, he had no better option but to leave.

    Only after walking quite some distance in the tunnel away from the chamber did Han Shuo turn around to look at water elite zombie who had absorbed a tremendous amount of energy. When he looked, he was shocked albeit happy for water elite zombie¡¯s transformation.

    He saw that the water elite zombie, after absorbing the icy water energy within the Ice Goddess statue, underwent an earth-shattering transformation from his ordinary appearance. His thick brows turned slender and curved, his nose bridge raised, and his rough, dry skin became moist and as smooth as water. Even his dry hair turned glossy. The ordinary-looking water elite zombie, after absorbing that energy, now seemed an elegant, handsome young man. And because of the energy in his body, this handsome young man even exuded a kind of beautifully bewitching quality!

    A cloud of mist lingered around water elite zombie. Compared to his former self, the current water elite zombie was a world of difference in every way; appearance or demeanor.

    What particrly shocked Han Shuo was ¨C this transformation was still going on!

    Han Shuo understood that the energy absorbed by water elite zombie was enormous, and the digestion process was not a short one. However, Han Shuo believed that once water elite zombiepletely digested all that energy, he would bring Han Shuo even greater surprises.

    ¡°I shall send you back first. You need to quietly digest this energy!¡± After sensing the condition inside water elite zombie¡¯s body, Han Shuo softly sang an incantation and sent water elite zombie back to theherworld.

    Soon after water elite zombie left, with metal elite zombie opening the path, they went back to the cliff they entered from located halfway up the mountain.

    Standing outside the tunnel at the cliff, Han Shuo raised his head to gaze at the main peak covered with ice and snow. He said to himself, ¡°Shrine of Ice, this is only the beginning of my vengeance!¡±

    When he finished those words, Han Shuo sent metal elite zombie back to theherworld. Given the injuries on his body, it was not wise for Han Shuo to stay there any longer. He found a suitable opportunity and flew away, turning into a streak of light as he beamed away from the snowfield of the Shrine of Ice.

    Icicle City. Han Shuo lodged in a small and ordinary hotel.

    For days, Han Shuo had locked himself up in his room night and day. During this time, he managed to stabilize the injuries on his physical body that he sustained at the Shrine of Ice.

    This damage to Han Shuo¡¯s physical body required blood essence and demonic yuan to recover. This recovery process would not take much time at all. However, it would consume much of Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence and demonic yuan, which both required long periods of cultivation to umte to a sufficient amount. If too significant an amount was depleted, Han Shuo¡¯s strength would be harshly affected.

    In just a short few days of time, Han Shuo¡¯s internals that were riddled with holes had all healed. Unfortunately, it also cost him quite a lot of blood essence and demonic yuan. After meditating for a few days, he somewhat regained his demonic yuan. But he had to take care not to use up too much blood essence in such short bursts.

    It was only when Han Shuo¡¯s own injuries were stabilized that he recalled how Gilbert¡¯s soul was yet inside the Demonyer Edge. The insides of the Demonyer Edge was remotely a good ce to be in. Any soul that entered the Demonyer Edge would be corroded by it. Even though Han Shuo had specially vacated an area for Gilbert¡¯s soul, he still could not be kept inside for extended periods.

    Han Shuo made use of certain materials currently avable in his space ring. After spending another couple of days, he refined a Soul Depository Ring out of a translucent, shiny thumb ring. The main functionality of this Soul Deposity Ring was to store souls.

    In his room, he deployed a soundproofing magical boundary, and summoned a few wraths to guard outside the door. Only then did he withdraw the Demonyer Edge.

    With the Soul Depository Ring on his palm, Han Shuo slowly entered the Demonyer Edge with his consciousness. The first thing he sensed was the main soul within the Demonyer Edge fusing with the Crystal of Destruction. After that, based on his understanding of the interior of the Demonyer Edge, he wandered about in the massive vault of souls within the Demonyer Edge, seeking for Gilbert¡¯s aura that he was familiar with.

    When sucking in Gilbert¡¯s soul into the Demonyer Edge, Han Shuo spaced out a region within the Demonyer Edge specifically to ce Gilbert¡¯s soul. After Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness entered the Demonyer Edge, he quickly found that region based on his familiarity with Gilbert.

    Within the Demonyer Edge, there were all kinds of souls in addition to a ton of negative energy. Some of this energy was strong and some was weak, but they all possessed extremely corrosive powers. Even if it was dark dragon Gilbert, if Han Shuo had not specially divides a region for him, his soul would have been subjected to the corrosion of this energy, and might have even fuse with them, turning into a mighty force aiding in Demonyer Edge¡¯s evolution.

    When he found Gilbert¡¯s soul, Han Shuo rxed a little. He hastily wrapped up Gilbert¡¯s soul with his consciousness, so that Gilbert wouldn¡¯t receive any influence from all kinds of corrosive energy within the Demonyer Edge, and carried Gilbert out from the Demonyer Edge little by little.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness could clearly sense the delight from Gilbert¡¯s soul. Gilbert sensed the aura of his master, and was therefore so obedient. Without making the slightest resistance, he followed Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness and left the Demonyer Edge.

    A wisp of dim ghostly light suddenly drifted out from the sword hilt of the Demonyer Edge. When that wisp lightpletely parted from the Demonyer Edge, Han Shuo casted two spells, one on the Soul Depository Ring, and another on Gilbert¡¯s soul.

    Suddenly, the ghostly light turned into a fine thread and entered the Soul Depository Ring. The thumb ring was suddenly flowing with a faint green and lush light. That fine thread constantly twisted and wrapped into itself within the thumb ring. After a short period of time, a hazy, indistinct shadow was formed.

    ¡°Master, master is that you?¡± a very soft sound like an ant talking came from the thumb ring. The Soul Depository Ring could not only hold onto souls, with Han Shuo¡¯s refining, it could even transmit the thoughts of those souls.

    ¡°Gilbert you scoundrel! How can you be so disobedient!¡± When the familiar voice of Gilbert¡¯s sounded, Han Shuo¡¯s heart filled with sorrow.

    ¡°Master! My great master! I¡¯m so happy! I can see you again! This is incredible! Haha...¡± When he heard Han Shuo speaking, Gilbert shouted incoherently from the Soul Depository Ring. But as only his soul was present, even though his shouting was amplified by the ring, it still sounded as soft as an ant speaking.

    The familiar voice of Gilbert¡¯s immediately made Han Shuo once more recall those years they previously spent together. But at present, Han Shuo had aplete body and soul, Gilbert, however, possessed only his soul. If it weren¡¯t for Han Shuo using extraordinary means to keep Gilbert¡¯s soul, it would have slowly obscured between heaven and earth with time.

    ¡°Idiot! Enough, now shut up!¡± Han Shuo scolded him smilingly, his heart was nevertheless filled with warmth. Afterwards, when Gilbert stopped babbling in the thumb ring, Han Shuo sternly said, ¡°Gilbert, in theory, you are dead. But I¡¯ve used some special methods to preserve your soul.¡±

    ¡°Master, I understand,¡± Gilbert said after keeping silent for a while.

    Suddenly, Gilbert seemed to have recalled something. The shadow in the thumb ring was rapidly moving. Gilbert anxiously asked, ¡°Oh right master, what happened to my grandpa and the family of dark dragons? Did they manage to escape the vicious attack from the Shrine of Ice?¡±

    ¡°Be at ease. You grandpa and the dark dragons all broke free from the Jadefrost Cage. They should currently be in the dark dragon¡¯s canyon. Besides, ...¡± Han Shuo knew what Gilbert was worried about. Therefore, he exined once through what happened after his soul entered the Demonyer Edge.

    ¡°Wahaha... nice one, master! Kill everyone from the Shrine of Ice for me! Humph, if it weren¡¯t for the fact that I¡¯m now dead, I would have made them pay the price, and killed each and everyone in the Shrine of Ice!¡± dark dragon Gilbert shouted.

    ¡°Gilbert, the reason I put you in this Soul Depository Ring andmunicate with you is to give you a choice. With your soul now, I have two ways of making you reappear in this world. One is to use necromancy magic and turn you into a bone dragon. Another is to use demonic arts and refine you into a demon general. I¡¯m now letting you make your own choice!¡± exined Han Shuo.

    ¡°What¡¯s the difference?¡± Gilbert asked.

    ¡°If you choose bone dragon, you will only have a skeleton, but can still be considered as a dragon. But if you choose demon general, you won¡¯t be a dragon anymore,¡± Han Shuo continued.

    ¡°Erm... Which one is stronger?¡± Gilbert asked once again.

    ¡°I think, demon general might be stronger!¡± Han Shuo replied.

    ¡°Demon general then. I just want to be stronger!¡± Gilbert answered resolutely.

 Chapter 484: Running into Sophie

    GDK 484: Running into Sophie

    Kasi Empire, Ciro City.

    Ciro was the capital city of Kasi Empire, with a poption size ranging in the millions. It was a big city that enjoyed a great reputation. Ciro City possessed beautifulndscapes and represented the unique cultures of Kasi Empire. At the same time, it was a city that promoted martial spirit.

    Every three years, arge-scale auction sale would be held at Ciro city center. Over at the auction sale, one could buy truly rare and precious treasures. Everytime it was held, it never failed to attract all of the city bigwigs. So much so that even certain wealthy figures from surrounding countries would travel long distances to attend the sale.

    During past auctions at Ciro City, not only did all sorts of treasures frequently make appearances, even divine weapons showed up twice. Divine weapon ¡®Starry Sky¡¯, which was currently in Phoebe¡¯s possession after it was obtained from Celt, had previously appeared at such an auction. It was repeatedly resold before Celt managed to acquire it.

    This festival was a true spectacle. Other than just auction sales, there would also be all kinds of unusual items up for sale. Those who knew what was what could always be sure to walk away with whatever goods they desired.

    Everytime such arge-scale auction sale was held, it attracted people from all walks of life, and this time was no exception. Even when Han Shuo heard about the grand asion of the auction from Icicle City, he spent three thousands gold coins, and, through some illicit methods, managed to use the magical transportation array there to travel to Ciro City.

    Han Shuo, whose injuries had yet to fully recover, on one hand, needed not only some materials to forge Gilbert¡¯s body, but also to ask about the recent situation over at Lancelot Empire. That was why he came to the capital city of Kasi Empire, Ciro City.

    Compared to Ciro City, Icicle City was just a small town along the borders of Kasi Empire. Dark Mantle footholds had yet to extend to this area. Therefore, in order to get urate information about the Lancelot Empire, Han Shuo had to make a trip to a city of great significance to the empire, such as Ciro City.

    The previous day, soon after Han Shuo arrived at Ciro City, he managed to get in touch with Dark Mantle members in Ciro City, and through their messages, he found out about the current situation in Lancelot Empire.

    Just as Jack the little fatty said it would, Brettel City operated as usual then even without his presence. During this period, the army of Brettel Citymanded by Dorcas, in addition to elite troops dispatched by King Lawrence of Lancelot Empire, officiallyunched military operations against the seven grand duchies.

    Dorcas¡¯ outstanding talent, alongside the full backing of the empire, was a deadlybination.

    In just the short span of a little more than a month, under Dorcas¡¯mand of an iparably valiant army, and the seven grand duchies in the dark, they easily upied the Bavenden Duchy. Then, with Bavenden Duchy as their military base, they sessfully crushed the hastily united army of Bonton Duchy and Etman Duchy.

    As Bavenden Duchy was located far from Brettel City, and Dorcas gave no warning before attacking, Bavenden Duchy had never expected that the Lancelot Empire would first go after the further duchy instead of the closer ones, and go far afield to take them down first. Caught off guard, they were in no condition to organize any effective resistance. In just one week¡¯s time, the military force of Bavenden Duchy was swept away, with Grand Duke Alec Ambridge killed in action.

    Bonton Duchy and Etman Duchy in the surrounding areas, upon learning of the situation, immediately formed an alliance to resist, but nevertheless suffered a big defeat in their very first battle. And now, while the two duchies held fast to their city gates, they began making contact with the other few duchies at all costs, intending to join forces to deal with Lancelot Empire¡¯s ferocious invasion.

    Of the remaining four duchies, Helen¡¯s Helon Duchy and Burt Zili¡¯s Boulet Duchy were effectively allied with Han Shuo. After Nehem Beige was killed by Han Shuo, Bisli Duchy sank into a great mess, and suffered disastrous damages under Burt Zili¡¯s attack. They wouldn¡¯t be able to put up any measurable resistance.

    All that remained was Benedict Sackville¡¯s Narsen Duchy, which could be considered as having some military capability. However, with Helen and Burt Zili causing mischief in the dark, Han Shuo could be almost certain that this time, Benedict Sackville would not be able to escape from misfortune.

    After Han Shuo learned of the circumstances and progress made in the assault against the seven grand duchies, he truly put down the rock in his heart. With the full support of Lancelot Empire, without Stratholme the old monster¡¯s hinderance, and with Helon Duchy and Boulet Duchy secretly assisting, this time, there would be no escape for the seven grand duchies.

    Everything remained unchanged in Brettel City, and it became the supplier of weapons and foodstuffs to fuel Dorcas¡¯ war machine. When Dorcas prevailed over the enemy, he would utilize the powers in Brettel City to seize that country¡¯s resources and regime, simultaneously containing the situation and effectively administering the territory.

    The situation was absolutely fantastic. This was the moment that Lancelot Empire would begin soaring.

    While Lancelot Empire was carefreely invading, the Brut Merchant Alliance, however, was very much in a headache. As for lightning sacred magus Reynold, thete protector of Brut Merchant Alliance, his death brought the union losses beyond measure. What caused even greater headache for the Brut Merchant Alliance were the magical beasts flooding in from Tarrag Canyon. These beasts caused havoc in the cities surrounding Tarrag Canyon, destroying everything in their paths and attacking every human in sight.

    The Brut Merchant Alliance was a nation constituted of multiple major merchant guilds. Visiting and returning from all sorts of regions and countries, conductingmerce activities with them, those were the channels through which they reaped huge amount of profits. However, as magical beasts roamed throughout thend, all those merchants had no choice but to stay home. This caused insurmountable losses for the Brut Merchant Alliance, a country that relied mainly on trade.

    Therefore, although the Brut Merchant Alliance was aware that the Lancelot Empire was infringing upon the seven grand duchies like wildfire and enjoying the spoils of war to the fullest, due to domestic disorder, they were fully upied and had no time to deal with other matters. All they could do was to helplessly look on as Lancelot Empire constantly expanded its territory.

    Han Shuo understood that the problems Brut Merchant Alliance would be confronted with weren¡¯t merely so. For the time being, those of the Soul Race inside Tarrag Canyon had yet to make a move. But this was likely because their six-horned tribal king was injured during the battle with the Saintess of the Church of Light. Once this six-horned tribal king recovered, the Brut Merchant Alliance would undoubtedly weep at least a few tears.

    Standing on a harmonious street, Han Shuo stopped contemting and carried on examining vendors¡¯ booths for goods that fit his needs.

    It must be said that this so-called auction sale indeed owned a well-deserved reputation. Before the real auction sale had even started, among the various kinds of materials in the market, Han Shuo had procured two worthy items.

    Weeping Wood. A close look at this wood revealed grain patterns that looked like tear stains. By grinding the wood into fine sawdust and then refining it with a few medicinal herbs, he could manufacture medicinal pellets that pacify the heart.

    Vermiculite. When refining certain magical weapons that needed to be pliable but tough, Vermiculite could be utilized for constructing a weapon that possessed extreme toughness. In reforging Gilbert¡¯s body, this would have the same effect as well. If Gilbert¡¯s bones were mixed with Vermiculite, his bones would be tougher and more durable.

    Those were the two things Han Shuo got hold of in that morning. Vermiculite would prove especially useful for Gilbert.

    If Gilbert had chosen bone dragon as the way to reborn, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t have needed to spend as much time and effort. cing Gilbert¡¯s soul into theherworld and helping him reconstruct his skeleton with bones would suffice. However, since Gilbert had chosen to be a devil, Han Shuo had to spend a lot more energy. With his original skeleton as the foundation, he had to throw in all kinds of rare and precious materials to assemble him a new body.

    As Han Shuo felt guilty for Gilbert, he made a firm resolution to make it up to Gilbert by forging his new body perfectly. That was why he went over there to gather these umon materials. He wanted to forge a body that would not only give him strength and energy, but also possess a demonic body with unlimited possibilities in his evolution.

    ¡°Huh? What¡¯s this? Can I have a look?¡± Walking down the street, Han Shuo constantly looked in all directions, seeking materials suitable for Gilbert. At that moment, he saw a deep ck, unreflective stone the size of palm. From his consciousness, he felt faint traces of bizarre energy, and therefore inquired.

    At the helm of the stand was an aged woman. She looked on dreamily at the traffic of people walking past. When she heard Han Shuo¡¯s inquiry, her attention immediately fell onto Han Shuo. From his outstanding physique,bined with his out of ordinary clothing, at first nce, she could tell that Han Shuo was liberal with his money. Especially seeing the space ring on his hand, which further testified to his wealth.

    ¡°Of course!¡± The old woman put on a fawning smile, and took the initiative to respectfully hand the stone to Han Shuo.

    Holding onto the stone the size of a palm, his demonic yuan and consciousness entered the stone at the same time. After a round of analyzing with his eyes squinted, his eyes suddenly shone. Looking at the old woman with all smiles, he asked, ¡°Ma¡¯am, how much is this?¡±

    ¡°That, my grandpa identally obtained that thing. It¡¯s been quite a long time. Since you want it, five gold coins then,¡± the old woman answered after thinking for a while.

    Pa! A bag of gold coins flung out from Han Shuo¡¯s hand, and he bluntly said, ¡°Here¡¯s one hundred gold coins. I¡¯m taking this!¡±

    ¡°Thank you, thank you!¡± The old woman was pleasantly surprised and quickly grabbed onto that bag of gold coins. Looking left and right, seeing that no one was watching, she hurriedly put away this bag of gold coins, closed up her stand, and left.

    She had absolutely no idea of what use that stone was. The price of five gold coins was just a number she made up in her mind. One hundred gold coins was definitely a huge amount for her. It was for the fear that Han Shuo might renege on the deal that she so pressingly left.

    Holding the Yuan Storage Stone, Han Shuo¡¯s was rather satisfied. He carried on looking in all directions strolling randomly.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo was startled, and looked ahead somewhat astonished.

    He saw that a youthful, beautiful youngdy, wearing a faint, tranquil smile, was looking around full of zest in front of a vendor¡¯s booth. Shockingly, it was precisely the same beautiful youngdy that went through the misfortune with him in Dark Forest ¨C Sophie!

 Chapter 485: The Grand Disintegrator

    GDK 485: The Grand Disintegrator

    A few years earlier at the Dark Forest, Han Shuo, Sophie, and fire grand magus Marceau of Brut Merchant Alliance joined forces to explore the ce of extreme fire. However, when trouble came, Marceau tantly abandoned them. But in the end, with Han Shuo and Sophie working as one, they managed to get away from the danger.

    Sophie was of Kasi Empire nationality. Her father, Sulo, was a renowned sacred knight of Kasi Empire. Han Shuo had already known this from the start.

    Who would have imagined that after so many years, Han Shuo would so coincidentally bump into Sophie the first time he visited Kasi Empire. Back then, before Han Shuo and Sophie parted ways at the Dark Forest, Sophie urged Han Shuo to look for her if he ever visited Kasi Empire.

    Separated by seven or eight meters, staring at the beautiful Sophie, observing her as she picked out tiny, delicate ornaments full of zest, Han Shuo could not contain himself fromughing. All along this seemingly endless street, all sorts of items were up for sale. There was nock of genuinely priceless trinkets. Regardless, Sophie was not in the least interested in exquisite war machines, but lingered over at a booth selling small ornaments.

    It seemed that every woman had an innate desire to look beautiful. This sort of ornament that was garish and delicate but had no practical use whatsoever, unexpectedly, triggered tremendous temptation in Sophie.

    A few years had gone by in the blink of an eye. The already beautiful and moving Sophie, like a bud blooming into a flower, looked more beautiful than ever.

    Gazing at this beauty from a distance, Han Shuo did not advance forward to meet her although he desired to. Of this beautiful youngdy, Han Shuo held a pretty good impression. Previously at the ce of extreme fire, the grand fire magus wanted to entrap Han Shuo, but was stopped by this kind-heartedss.

    This time at Kasi Empire, the things Han Shuo had done at the Shrine of Ice would have made him a public enemy to the entire Kasi Empire. Once Han Shuo and Sophie intersected, it could very possibly spell trouble for Sophie. Although Sophie¡¯s father was a sacred knight of great influence on Kasi Empire, he was nowhere close whenpared to the Shrine of Ice, whether in terms of strength or influence.

    Therefore, Han Shuo only looked at Sophie for a short while before he silently left. He deliberately took a detour to make some distance with Sophie before carrying on his shopping at this harmonious street, continuing to seek material suitable for refining Gilbert¡¯s body.

    That Yuan Storage Stone that Han Shuo previously obtained from the old woman was very useful for demonic arts cultivators. As the name implies, the Yuan Storage Stone could store yuan essence and demonic yuan. Among its uses was refining certain extraordinary magical weapons. It could improve a weapon¡¯s tolerance to demonic yuan, in addition to speeding up the cirction of demonic yuan inside the weapon.

    When reforging Gilbert¡¯s body, as long as this Yuan Storage Stonepletely integrated into the skeleton, it would be of great service to Gilbert in making rapid progress in the future. Exchanged with merely one hundred gold coins was simply a steal.

    It was precisely because in just one morning Han Shuo had obtained three different umon goods that he was rather looking forward to this auction sale at Kasi Empire. With exuberant energy, Han Shuo did not pause to rest at all. After evading Sophie, he continued looking for things that suited him.

    Possessing a consciousness with wonderful sensory power, on top of his discerning eyes, this time, Han Shuo really reaped a considerably plentiful harvest. In the afternoon, he sessively obtained seven or eight exotic materials that could be mixed into the body and skeleton. It was not until dusk when the vendors began to close for the day that Han Shuo reluctantly left the area.

    Tomorrow, the action sale would officially begin. Compared to goods sold at those booths, the auction sale that went on three day in a row were the real deal. The items exhibited at the auction sale were, everyst one of them, precious treasures that had been authenticated. Some invaluable and unique treasures would also make appearances rather frequently.

    After returning to the small hotel where he currently stayed, Han Shuo closed the door,id out a soundproofing and an early warning magical formation. He then took out the Soul Depository Ring and beganmunicating with Gilbert¡¯s soul.

    Throughout the past several days, Han Shuo had be ustomed to talking nonsense with Gilbert. Inside the Soul Depository Ring, dark dragon Gilbert was extremely bored. All day long he would worry if his new physical body would cause him to lose certain capabilities and appetite for males. Even with Han Shuo assuring him in every way possible, his concerns remained undiminished.

    Gilbert¡¯s physical body had been destroyed. But even with just his soul left, those vile practices of dark dragons nevertheless remained deeply-rooted. It seemed that as long as his soul didn¡¯t perish, dark dragon Gilbert¡¯s nature was unlikely to change much.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I will look for the rarest and most precious materials, with your original skeleton as the foundation, and a human body structure as the standard, reconstruct you a body to your satisfaction. This body will be even mightier than the body of dark dragons, and possesses unlimited possibilities in evolving. Those desires and sexual ability you so worried about will only get stronger, and you definitely will not turn into a court eunuch,¡± Han Shuo got a headache from Gilbert¡¯s moring and had to again reassure him.

    ¡°That truly is fantastic. Luckily I did not choose bone dragon. A dragon with only bones but without that organ, that would rid me a lot of pleasure!¡± dark dragon Gilbert was churning inside the Soul Depository Ring as he shouted in excitement.

    ¡°Alright. You better behave yourself. Thoroughlyprehend those memories I gave you. It is a martial skill to make your soul even stronger. You better spend more effort on that,¡± Han Shuo exhorted.

    There were all kinds of secret martial techniques in the school of demonic arts. There were even secret techniques that specifically tempered one¡¯s soul. As long as dark dragon Gilbert cultivated in ordance to that secret technique, his soul would grow stronger and stronger. When he attained a certain amount of strength, he could appear in front of Han Shuo without using the Soul Depository Ring. Moreover, his soul would not gradually dissipate between heaven and earth as time passed.

    Certain malicious spirits in the world, under some extraordinary circumstances, came to master simr techniques. It was only so that their souls didn¡¯t disperse away with each day that passed but slowly strengthened instead. Then, up to a certain point, they could even wrest control of a human¡¯s body, and be reborn into the world.

    The technique that Han Shuo passed onto dark dragon Gilbert was precisely a technique found in demonic arts to refine ferocious spirits. Any ordinary soul, so long as they were willing to make painstaking efforts to cultivate, was capable of bing a dreadful, ferocious spirit, and being free from the constraints of thews of nature. Dark dragon Gilbert already possessed an exceedingly strong soul to begin with. As long as he practiced ording to Han Shuo¡¯s method, he would not need too much time before he couldpletely break away from the Soul Depository Ring. It would also continue to be extremely beneficial to him even after his soul had re-attached to his reforged physical body.

    ¡°Master, how you know so much about this random stuff? I have never ever heard of such martial arts for cultivating the soul. How did youe to learn of these?¡± After cultivating for a few days, Gilbert recognized just how effective the technique was as his soul grew more and more tenacious. In the beginning, after just few minutes of talking with Han Shuo, his soul would be drained of energy. But after cultivating this technique for a few days, he could persistently talk with Han Shuo for more than an hour.

    ¡°What for do you ask so much? Practice well. After some time, when you have a new body, you will know what benefits it has!¡± Han Shuo lectured.

    ¡°Alright, alright! You are so annoying!¡± Gilbert replied in a petnt manner, and only then, he unwillingly stopped talking. He quieted down in the Soul Depository Ring, and slowly tempered his soul.

    When Gilbert finally stopped talking, Han Shuo slowly sank into contemtion. During this period, Han Shuo did not continue to cultivate in demonic arts. Having reached Carnal Realm, Han Shuo did not deliberatelypel himself to advance further into demonic arts, but let it go with the flow.

    On the contrary, with regards to necromancy magic, Han Shuo did spend some effort. Of the three boundaries ¨C fear, weakness, and aging ¨C Han Shuo had mastered two, fear and weakness. In certainrge-scale battles, these two boundaries could substantially weaken the enemy¡¯s fighting strength, and could serve as a game-changer and situation reverser.

    It was only the most mysterious and most miraculous Boundary of Aging that was truly beyond Han Shuo¡¯s capacity for the time being. With no clue on how to set about and unable to grasp the solution, he did not continue on a wild goose chase, not squandering too much energy on studying this boundary. Rather, he spent time trying to master thest magic in the level of necromancy grand magus ¨C the Grand Disintegrator.

    This necromancy magic called Grand Disintegrator was the trademark magic of necromancers. It was also an extremely devastating magic. As the name implies, the Grand Disintegrator could disintegrate the enemy¡¯s body. Any expert on the receiving end would split up into pieces and die in no time.

    The only problem was that such terrifying magic was equally difficult to be executed. Even if sessfully done, the Grand Disintegrator required a certain probability to unleash that kind of power. Even for necromancers exceedingly proficient in this magic, of five Grand Disintegrator spells released in a row, only one would be a sess.

    For some necromancers who did not have a deep understanding of the essence of necromancy, their probabilities were even lower. Some would only pull off one in ten shots. There were also variations to the destructive power released in the Grand Disintegrator. On the high end, the receiver could be instantly killed. On the lower end, it would only leave cuts on the opponent¡¯s body like sharp weapons being traced across.

    It was during the two previous days when Han Shuo was recuperating from his injuries that he truly figured out the magic, although he had yet to be extremely proficient in it. Now that Gilbert stopped being so wordy, Han Shuo continued on studying this trademark magic of necromancers, in addition to reckoning when he should experiment the spell on a living person.

    Unwittingly, yet another night had passed. Starting early in the morning, boisterous moring came from outside of the hotel. Today was the first day of the auction sale. Han Shuo stopped his studying early on and hurried to the scene, hoping to obtain an even greater harvest today.

 Chapter 486: Being Pursued

    GDK 486: Being Pursued

    Han Shuo started the day by loitering about a dazzling lineup of booths selling all kinds of odds and ends. Luck seemed to be on his side. In just a short stroll, he had gotten his hands on two chunks of y rocks.

    As the sun gradually rose high up above the sky, the nobles appeared more and more frequently along the street. They wore luxurious clothing and travelled on either tall horses or chariots. They did not stop over at the bustling street, but headed directly towards the auction ce.

    All thanks to the appearance of these characters, the originally congested street was cleared an empty path by arge body of knights specifically dispatched by the city defense troops of Kasi Empire. On Profound Continent, the nobilities always got to enjoy certain privileges. Those who could gain entrance into the auction ce were definitely very wealthy and high-born. Naturally, Kasi Empire would treat these characters with special care.

    Thosemoners, abjected swordsmans, struggling merchants, poverty-stricken mages, they could only stand on the two sides of the street. While looking on with envy at those with their heads high and chests puffed as they headed towards the auction ce under the protection of knights, they spontaneously stepped aside to make a clear path, lest they be an obstruct and make a rod for their own back.

    One after another, sumptuous carriages passed by in the most pompous manner. There were even delicate drawings and coats of arms representing the passengers¡¯ identities on those carriages.

    There were all too many pedestrians on the street. And now, having to make way for these nobilities, pedestrians were shoulder to shoulder with each other. With that, the unavoidable bumping into each other further added to the already morous noises.

    Standing among the crowd, at this moment, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but furrow his brows. Stuck in the sardine can crowd, Han Shuo was unable to move an inch. At such a ce as an ounder, as not to riskmitting taboos and offend the locals, Han Shuo did not take off to the air to get ahead, as he usually would. It was also discourteous to shove people aside with brute force. All Han Shuo could do was blend in and wait it out.

    But the good things was that Han Shuo was tall, with wide shoulders. Standing amongst the crowd, he naturally appeared way above themon, manifestly superior. When Han Shuo creased his brows, that imposing demeanor was inadvertently divulged. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that they had no other ground to step on, those around Han Shuo would never draw so close to him.

    ¡°Eh? Miss Sophie! That¡¯s Miss Sophie!¡± a cry of surprise suddenly sounded from among the crowd.

    ¡°That can¡¯t be her. I¡¯ve met that beautifuldy right here just the day before yesterday. She bought a pendant at my stall, and even haggled half a day with me for two gold coins! How could that be Miss Sophie? Are you mistaken?¡± a stall owner standing beside the first person eximed his disbelief.

    ¡°Don¡¯t be silly, thisdy rides on a white pegasus, and looks like a damn angel, who else could it be other than Miss Sophie? Ha, you must have had her confused for someone else. Ady like that would never haggle half the day over two gold coins!¡± the other person replied disdainfully.

    Rounds and rounds of discussions about Sophie sounded again and again. Many of the remarks about Sophie fell into Han Shuo¡¯s ears incidentally. From the discussions of those people surrounding him, Han Shuo discovered that Sophie had an enormous reputation in Kasi Empire. And it was not simply because her father was a sacred knight.

    At such a young age, Sophie was already a sky rider, merely one rank below that of her father Sulo, a sacred knight. On top of that, Sophie was a summoner. Her strength was enigmatic and unpredictable to say the least. Other than being outstandingly gifted, what was most attractive about Sophie was her kind heart and amiable, approachable personality. There was nock of hearsays about her helping those impoverished and in need.

    In the hearts of the people of Kasi Empire, the pure and honest Sophie was simply the ideal woman. Especially in the hearts of many young ones, Sophie was without doubt their goddess.

    Standing in the middle of all the mor, Han Shuo passively received countless positive news about Sophie. Han Shuo, who already had a pretty good impression of Sophie in the first ce, felt somewhat touched in his heart as he gazed afar at Sophie slowly moving forward on her spotlessly white pegasus.

    Han Shuo had already seen Sophie yesterday along the congested street. Compared to her distanced style today, Han Shuo much preferred her amicable manner of yesterday.

    Riding on a hercules, Sophie wore a faint smile on her face. However, when she recalled of the person inside the carriage beside her, she could not contain a sigh. Even thoughts grumbling about her father somehow crossed her mind.

    The curtain was lifted open from the inside of the carriage moving alongside Sophie, revealing a handsome young face. When this young man foolishly looked at Sophie, the fervent heat in his gaze was hardly concealed. Although he did not utter a word, any fool could make out the intense desire to possess from his eyes.

    ¡°Fifi, the reason I¡¯m going to the auction sale this time, is to look for a treasure that fits you,¡± the young man looking at Sophie with all smiles, leaning out from the carriage, said in the corniest manner.

    Sophie reluctantly put on a smile and replied, ¡°No, no need. You know, I¡¯m not interested in those things!¡±

    ¡°How will that do! My House of Pillon is of royal blood. Your father has already agreed to our marriage. As the wife of I, Braque, you shall be the most beautiful, most graceful, and most magnificent woman. There must be treasure adorned on you!¡± Braque said decisively.

    These words of Broque¡¯s gave Sophie a great headache. Braque was the son of Prince Bradley Pillon, and the nephew of His Majesty the King, Brady Pillon. The Pillon royal family was the de facto ruler of Kasi Empire. Sophie¡¯s father, Sulo, without first asking for her consent, formally agreed to the marriage. This put Sophie at her wit¡¯s end.

    Braque, son of Prince Bradley Pillon, could still be considered a clean character in the nobility of Kasi Empire. There weren¡¯t too many negative rumors spreading around in recent years. The eloquent Braque was a rising star in the political arena of Kasi Empire. By means of his Pillon royal family and its influences, he rose higher and higher in his career. He was truly on a roll in Kasi Empire.

    Sulo agreed to the marriage proposal. It did not matter if Sophie was willing or not. In this world where men made the rules, Sophie was already considered to be Braque¡¯s fiance. Having been indoctrinated with etiquette since she was young, Sophie could not bring herself to disy any behaviour that would be deemed impolite in formal settings. Even this time, unable to defy her father¡¯s instruction, she reluctantly agreed to appear in public with Braque.

    Listening to Braque jabbering on and on about his unfettered imagination of their future, Sophie¡¯s heart sank deeper and deeper. As a sky rider with extraordinary strength, Sophie had not even a mildly favorable impression of Braque, an aristocrat who was no good at magic, and did not practice martial arts, but whom had a growing hunger for political power.

    If it weren¡¯t for the Pillon royal family being extremely powerful, if not for her father¡¯s forcing, Sophie would still be happily shopping the booths on the bustling street, instead of serving as Braque¡¯s prop, apanying him to that auction ce where the elite gathered.

    In her heart, Sophie was incredibly distressed. She simply closed her ears to Braque chattering beside her. Riding on her pegasus, she wore a peaceful, faint smile. Her gaze swept aimlessly across the packed crowd, trying to alleviate the loathing chatter in her ears by putting her attention on other things around her.

    All of a sudden, a tall, upright silhouette fell into Sophie¡¯s line of sight. Among the crowd of people standing at roughly 1.7 meters tall, Han Shuo¡¯s 1.9 meter tall magnificent physique was a crane in a flock of chickens.Besides, in the overcrowded stream of people, it appeared rather spacious around him, which further attracted the attention of onlookers.

    At first, Sophie only randomly shot a nce. From her point of view, she could only see Han Shuo¡¯steral side. However, the distinct outline of Han Shuo¡¯s half-face gave Sophie a familiar feeling. Her curiosity had gotten the better of her when she began to carefully observe Han Shuo, and the sense of familiarity only grew from there.

    As she slowly strode forward on her pegasus, Sophie¡¯s view of Han Shuo gradually changed. By the time she could clearly see Han Shuo¡¯s face, Sophie could not help but cover her mouth and cry out in surprise. Her eyes overflowed with a look of fondness. At this moment, Han Shuo, who had been looking in all directions and using his consciousness to look for goods, suddenly felt a gaze firmly locked on him. Han Shuo creased his brows, and instinctively turned to look towards its source. He immediately saw Sophie¡¯s pleasantly surprised eyes and her beautiful appearance.

    He took a shock and came to his senses. He recalled that because of his height, he would appear rather unusual in such a crowd of people. As not to bring about trouble for Sophie, Han Shuo gave up on searching this area for materials that could refine Gilbert, hurriedly turned around, forced others aside and left.

    With a push of his shoulders, all those strangers leaning close to him were knocked off bnce one after another. For a moment, profanities filled the air. However, when they saw that imposing silhouette, they shut their mouths at once.

    Sophie, staring fixedly from a distance, when she saw Han Shuo hurriedly departing, immediately let out a cry. Her slender, lily-white hand gently patted the white pegasus atop which she sat before pointing in the direction Han Shuo was leaving.

    The pure white pegasus which deliberately flew in low altitudes, sensing the eagerness of its master, immediately spread its wings and soared in ordance with themand received, searching for Han Shuo from above the sky.

    ¡°Huh? Miss Sophie, What, what¡¯s the matter?¡± a middle aged knight ahead of Braque queried.

    Braque, who had been staring fixedly at Sophie, suddenly found that his target was bing further and further from himself. He too spontaneously raised his head at Sophie and shouted, ¡°Where are you going? What¡¯s the matter with you?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, Braque. I suddenly met a friend I have not seen for many years!¡± Riding on a pegasus in the air, Sophie smiled apologetically at Braque before again extending her hand to pat the shoulder of her pegasus.

    Whoosh! Under Sophie¡¯s instructions, the pegasus had identified the direction and chased after Han Shuo a distance away.<

 Chapter 487: Mischievous Sophie

    GDK 487: Mischievous Sophie

    Han Shuo was very clear about the footing the Shrine of Ice had in Kasi Empire, and therefore he was most unwilling to bring Sophie any unnecessary troubles. Even though her father was a sacred knight, once implicated with Han Shuo, the probability of things ending well for her was slim.

    The only thing that Han Shuo did not quite anticipate was that Sophie would actually chase after him in the eyes of the public. Seeing Sophie charge at him on her pegasus, Han Shuo was betweenughter and tears.

    ¡°Hey! That¡¯s Miss Sophie!¡± The people always loved noise and excitement. As onlookers raised their heads one after another and saw the beautiful Sophie soaring over their heads on a pegasus, a hugemotion erupted.

    They looked ahead in the direction Sophie was flying. Han Shuo¡¯s rapidly departing figure immediately gathered the attention of the crowd. The pleasant surprise on Sophie¡¯s face made made it apparent that Han Shuo was running away not because he had done something bad. The scene of Han Shuo, who was exceptionally well-dressed, escaping with a bitter smile, with Sophie happily pursuing, could definitely bring about countless wild and fanciful thoughts. Consequently, the crowd got perhaps the wrong impression.

    Could it be that this man was, in fact, the one that the beautiful Sophie actually fancied?

    Momentarily, such a conjecture somehow arose in the minds of many as the scene yed out. They then turned to look at the son of the prince, Braque, and saw that he was anxiously reproaching from where he stood. Everymoner in sight seemed to take pleasure in Braque¡¯s misfortune, and began discussing in whispers without the slightest scruple while exchanging meaningful nces.

    ¡°Ha. Interesting. It seems that Miss Sophie already had a sweetheart.¡±

    ¡°Yah yah. It appears that Braque is showering affection on an uninterested party. I had long heard that it was a one-sided rtionship. He made oldman Sulo agree to the marriage by exploiting his father¡¯s influences. Now it seems that this was indeed the case.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Those amiable and approachable nobles like Miss Sophie are true nobles. Although Braque¡¯s family is wealthy, he pursues fame and profit a little too much to be a suitable match for Miss Sophie.¡±

    From time to time, such a conversation would ensue from among the crowd of people jam-packed on the morous street. One after another, these people who rejoiced in Braque¡¯s misfortune would cast looks of despise at Braque¡¯s luxurious carriage, as though mocking Braque for his inaptness.

    ¡°Damn it! What is the background of that asshole? Sophie is such a honorable character, how could she get acquainted with somebody muddled with those peasants?!¡± Braque saw Han Shuo¡¯s back distantly from inside his carriage. His ears unintentionally picked up a certain remarks that infuriated him, filling him with fury.

    ¡°Young master, never have I ever seen or heard of that man before. I believe that this was just an excuse Miss Sophie made up to keep away, young master. She wasn¡¯t willing to go to the auction sale with you and therefore did this on purpose!¡± a knight beside the carriage said in a low voice.

    Suddenly, a cry of amazement sounded from afar, ¡°Lift off! He lifted off! Damn, that¡¯s fast!¡±

    Braque was shocked and immediately gazed into the distance. He saw Han Shuo¡¯s outstanding body take off to the sky, leaving behind a streak of fine thread as he rapidly flew away. Behind Han Shuo, Sophie tightly pursued him on her spotlessly white pegasus. Her silhouette transformed into a white dot, and finally faded awaypletely from sight.

    ¡°Now that was impressive! He must be a honorable magus. Perhaps even a grand magus! No wonder, no wonder Miss Sophie would do such a thing. Ha, only such a young, outstandingly talented magus would be deserving of Miss Sophie.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Definitely a talented but modest chap! Oh yes, he is definitely a amiable nobleman just like Miss Sophie. He even bought a rock from me just a moment ago. Ha, only such a character could match Miss Sophie.¡±

    Sitting inside his carriage, Braque was, at first, only somewhat angry. But when Han Shuo streaked across the sky, Braque became truly furious. Immediately, in a deep voice, he said to the knight beside him, ¡°Thuram, get to the bottom of who the hell this guy is!¡±

    ¡°Understood, young master!¡± Thuram knew what it meant for a person with the ability to fly. As a servant, he was well-versed with what he had to do next given the emergence of this character who could threaten Braque.

    Han Shuo incessantly cried andughed in his heart as he sped away using the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens. He was absolutely unwilling to let Sophie catch him andnd herself in trouble. Otherwise, not only would Sophie be at stake, but her entire family could possibly be exterminated because of him. Who would have imagined that this woman would be so insistent. Even as she clearly saw Han Shuo avoiding her, she went as far as to actively chase after him. Han Shuo would have never expected such a thing.

    With one running and another pursuing, very soon, the two came to a fairly remote block. Seeing that there was no one around, Han Shuo intended to deploy his demonic arts to the fullest to shake Sophie off. But all of a sudden, he heard a shout with pauses in between gasping for breath, saying, ¡°Han! You stop right now!¡±

    Han Shuo was bemused. Seeing that he could not shake Sophie off, he decided to exin the situation to her instead. Looking left and right, he weaved through the deserted streets at a moderate speed. After a short while, he lead Sophie, who was vigorously running after him, to a silent, spacious public square.

    Han Shuo finally stopped, and stood still on a stone step in the square. He turned around to look at Sophie who had chased him all the way here, forced a smile and said, ¡°It¡¯s been a while!¡±

    ¡°You, why are you avoiding me?¡± Sophie¡¯s pegasus gently touched down. She looked at Han Shuo, confused. Her tone exuded a sense of grief.

    ¡°I don¡¯t want to cause you any trouble. You have been living fine and well here in Kasi Empire. But if you were to be implicated with me, you and your family will suffer.¡± For the fear that Sophie would persevere and continue her vigorous chasing, Han Shuo exined to her in a stern and deep voice.

    When Han Shuo said those words, there was no hiding Sophie¡¯s shock. The expression on her beautiful face immediately changed. After ncing around and seeing that no one else was around, she carefully asked in a very low voice, ¡°Have you done something bad? Are you in trouble?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo open-heartedly admitted, ¡°That¡¯s right. Something very bad!¡±

    ¡°Tell me about it. My father is rather powerful in Kasi Empire. Maybe I can help you!¡± Sophie was kind. She did not just want to stay and talk to Han Shuo, she wished to aid him however she could.

    ¡°Forget about it. Not even your father can help me,¡± Han Shuo tly declined. Then, looking unflinchingly at Sophie, he continued, ¡°I will stay in Kasi Empire for some days. You must note in any form of contact with me. Just act as though you don¡¯t know me.¡±

    ¡°How will that do!¡± Sophie wouldn¡¯t let off easily, and in a most conscientious voice, she said, ¡°Back in the Dark Forest, you once saved my life. And no matter what, we are friends. Now that you are in trouble, how could I pretend to not know? Besides, I promised you at that time that if you came to Kasi Empire, I would receive you well.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not in trouble. It is you that will be in trouble if you so insist,¡± Han Shuo exined. The more Sophie acted this way, the more unwilling Han Shuo was to let her attract troubles.

    But well, who knew that this woman was really quite the stubborn one. Sophie replied to Han Shuo in a righteous tone, ¡°What trouble could I get into?! Calm down, nothing will ever happen to me. Haha. It¡¯s such a rare asion to have you in Kasi Empire. Therefore, no matter what, I, as the host, must properly thank you for you saved my life.¡±

    ¡°Lady, the one I offended is the Shrine of Ice. Do you think you can handle them?¡± When Han Shuo saw that Sophie was being so persistent, for theck of better option, he revealed the identity of his enemy, the Shine of Ice.

    As expected, when the three words ¡®Shrine of Ice¡¯ were uttered, Sophie gasped. She stared at Han Shuo in appall for a while, before gently and cautiously asking, ¡°Han, what¡¯s going on? Why would you offend the Shrine? I know that you are a citizen of Lancelot Empire, but I don¡¯t know you particrly well. How did you get yourself into this?¡±

    Listening to Sophie¡¯s words, Han Shuo realized that Sophie likely hadn¡¯t been informed of his actual identity. Back then during their encounter at the Dark Forest, Han Shuo called himself ¡®Bryan Han¡¯ without thinking the matter through. Sophie had never heard of this name and assumed that the name Han Shuo informed was a false name. She probably had yet to associate Han Shuo with that city lord of Brettel City in Lancelot Empire.

    ¡°As for how or why we became enemies, that¡¯s none of your concern. In any case, the Shrine of Ice will never let me off. So you better not be associated with me,¡± Han Shuo replied.

    ¡°But as long a the Shrine doesn¡¯t find you, there won¡¯t be an issue, won¡¯t there?¡± Against Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, Sophie made a crafty smile and took out two round,brownish fruits from her space ring. She handed one of them to Han Shuo and confidently exined, ¡°My friend gave me these. After kneading it for a while and applying it to your face, you can alter your appearance. No one will be able to make it out.¡±

    As Sophie spoke, she demonstrated to Han Shuo. She slowly kneaded the round fruit between her hands until it formed a thick,sticky substance. Then, she pointed at her own charming face before slowly applying the substance to her face and massaging her cheek and edges in front of Han Shuo.

    From the looks of things, this as certainly not the first time Sophie had done this. Without using any mirrors, but merely relying on her practiced hands, after just a short moment, her face underwent an enormous transformation. Sophie¡¯s fair skin turned wheat-brown. Her cheeks and face contour transformed as well. From a beauty, she turned into a most ordinary-looking youngdy. Even the skin on her neck and hands altered. Certain pharmacist possessed remarkable skills in formting medicines. In fact, Han Shuo was also in possession of these drugs called Polyfruit, previously gifted by Cecilia. This time at Kasi Empire, as Han Shuo was emphatically not afraid of his identity being revealed, he did not use the Polyfruit.

    ¡°Ha! Magical isn¡¯t it? You definitely can¡¯t recognize me now!¡± Sophie proudly eximed after altering her appearance. Afterwards, she took out a small mirror and pointed it at Han Shuo. All smiles, she said, ¡°Hurry, you just gotta change your looks a little with the fruit, and no one will recognize you. If the Shrine of Ice can¡¯t find you, I cannot be implicated.¡±

    Well, even the materials were all prepared. Han Shuo truly could not find another reason to decline. With no choice, he forced a smile and began kneading the Polyfruit. When the medicine liquefied into a sticky substance, following Sophie¡¯s instructions, he slowly applied it to his face.

    But Han Shuo was obviously not skilled at this. More often than not, his unpolished hands would turn his appearance into something hideous and frightening. Even after fiddling for ages, Han Shuo could not shape a passable appearance. Considering that the effect would fade as time passed, Sophie hesitated for a moment before suggesting somewhat bashfully, ¡°Let me do it for you!¡±

    Without waiting for Han Shuo to answer, Sophie suddenly extended her slender jade-like hands and ced them on Han Shuo¡¯s cheeks. She began altering the outline of Han Shuo¡¯s face bit by bit in ordance with her familiarity and understanding of the Polyfruit.

    Although the skin colour on Sophie¡¯s two hands had changed, they were still gentle and smooth as they rested on Han Shuo¡¯s cheeks. Especially when Sophie rubbed with her palms, which looked like two lovers flirting with each other, giving Han Shuo a kind of peculiar sensation.

    Sophie was evidently also somewhat embarrassed. Although, due to the changes to her skin, her blushing was barely visible, Han Shuo nevertheless caught her uneasiness from her eyes.

    ¡°Done. What do you think?¡± As Han Shuo indulged in flights of fancy, Sophie suddenly stopped and said in a self-congrattory manner.

    In the mirror Sophie held up, an appearance unfamiliar to Han Shuo revealed itself. This person had a mellow chin and thick cheeks, a face only a morbidly obese man would have. Looking at the face in the mirror, Han Shuo involuntarily recalled Jack the little fatty.

    ¡°Hah! Exceptionally ordinary!¡± Han Shuo replied in a bitter smile as he looked into the mirror.

    From the mirror, when he made a smile in the simple and honest face, he saw a guileless and honest look from every angle. And yet again, Jack the little fatty came to mind. This further intensified his forced smile.

    ¡°Let me tell you, a fatty is the least eye-catching! Hehe, it¡¯s true. There are fatties all over the streets. No one will think of your original appearance,¡± Sophie exined with an air of professionalism before she giggled and added, ¡°Moreover, the edges of your face are too prominent. Not the best material to disguise. It is only with chubby face that they could be concealed. Ha, I didn¡¯t expect that after turning into a fatty, you would look quite so cute! Hehe!¡±

    Seeing Sophie in giggly manner, Han Shuo felt as though Sophie intentionally turned him into a fatty. It was as if she would be happier the uglier he became. ¡°Whatever. Do as you please,¡± Han Shuo said helplessly, not knowing whether tough or cry.

    ¡°Here, stuff this into your stomach!¡± Sophie took out a small pillow from her space ring and chuckingly handed it to Han Shuo. She rified, ¡°As you should know, a fatty should have a potbelly... Otherwise one can¡¯t be called a fatty!¡±

    When she said those words, a trace of mischievous glee shed in Sophie¡¯s eyes, which Han Shuo coincidentally caught sight of.

    With that, Han Shuo could be absolutely certain that Sophie did so on purpose. But Han Shuo knew that Sophie did not have any intentions of malice. In any case, his face was already plump. Without voicing any opinions, he took the small pillow that Sophie handed him and stuffed it under his robes. With that, a slightly rotund tummy took shape.

    ¡°Ha, not bad! Not bad at all! You take a look!¡± Seeing Han Shuo with a bulging stomach, Sophie let out a somewhat maliciousughter. She took multiple looks at Han Shuo¡¯s little belly with the mirror in her hand, and evencently patted it. Convulsing withughter, she said, ¡°I shall pardon you this time. Let¡¯s see if you dare turn on your heel and flee like a bat out of hell when you see me in the future!¡±

    It was only now that Han Shuo became aware why Sophie did so. As it turned out, this was to retaliate Han Shuo¡¯s evasion earlier. It seemed that women were indeed vengeful and unforgiving creatures. Even ady as kind Sophie was no exception, stubbornly punishing Han Shuo with this practical joke.

    Indeed, women must not be offended. Even beautiful, kind-hearted women are no exception! Han Shuomented as he forced a smile.

    ¡°Alright. Now you just need a change of clothes and to deliberately hunch your back. Then no one will recognize you for sure!¡± Sophie ceased herughter and looked at Han Shuo satisfyingly, putting forward suggestions to further polish up her work of art.

    Han Shuo grudgingly took out a new set of outer garments. Originally, he had nned to have Sophie look away but he immediately recalled her mischief. He decided to y tit-for-tat. Right before Sophie, as though she wasn¡¯t there, he took off his clothes.

    Han Shuo only had one item of sturdy, durable warrior¡¯s gown on his upper body. When this outeryer of clothing was removed, the majestic bare body of his waspletely revealed. His perfect physique, like the cutting edge of a sharp de, gave off a most piercing impression, while brimming with an extraordinary charisma unique to men.

    Sophie turned into a fool and stared nkly at Han Shuo¡¯s magnificent naked body. Other than amazement, there was even a thread of intoxication in her eyes. Perhaps she had never before seen a physique of such perfection, and therefore couldn¡¯t react momentarily.

    Suddenly, Sophie roused from her daze. She anxiously turned around. Stomping and panting with rage, she said, ¡°Hoodlum! How could you do that in front of me! You thug! How infuriating!¡±

    Seeing Sophie so fric, Han Shuo felt incredibly light-hearted, as though his bad luck waspletely washed away. He chucklingly said, ¡°Hehe, I¡¯m not concerned about it. Why are you concerned for my sake?¡±

    ¡°You, you wretch! I knew you weren¡¯t a good guy the first time I met you, and sure enough, I was right!¡± Sophie indignantly denounced Han Shuo. Shortly after, she softly talked to herself, ¡°This chap, he¡¯s really well built!¡±

    When Sophie said so, Han Shuo suddenly recalled the time back at Dark Forest, the two once had a good time together. Han Shuo¡¯s heart was inevitably swept away.

    ¡°Humph! Are you done yet? Hurry up, we are going back there!¡± Sophie angrily asked with her back facing Han Shuo.

    ¡°Done. Where to?¡± Han Shuo asked in astoundment.

    Sophie turned around and said, ¡°The auction ce of course. Where else would it be more lively than the auction ce today in Kasi Empire?¡±

    ¡°Sure!¡± Han Shuo dly agreed. It was exactly what he was hoping for.

 Chapter 488: The Joys of Being Ordinary

    GDK 488: The Joys of Being Ordinary

    The duo had only left for a while, but when they returned to the auction ce, they had transformed intopletely different persons. One was a big, tall, honest-looking fatty, and the other, an average-looking girl that seemingly came from rural area. Muddling along the bustling street, they looked very ordinary. No one could have thought that they were the center of attention just moments before.

    With the city¡¯s defense troops clearing the way, nobilities that came from every city in Kasi Empire, and even from other nations, entered the auction center one after another.

    ¡°This thing is only worth three gold coins at most!¡± Sophie said resolutely to a vendor while holding up a crystal button in her hand.

    The person manning the stand was a petite middle-aged man. Putting on a honest face, he replied in a professional manner, ¡°Miss, this is a Blue Dream Crystal from the southern part of Brut Merchant Alliance. There is absolutely nowhere where you could buy this for less than five gold coins!¡±

    ¡°Ha. Ha. Open your eyes and see. Its colours aren¡¯t particrly clear, the workmanship of the button is so crude, and you actually dare im that this is a Blue Dream Crystal from the southern area of Brut Merchant Alliance! You are truly daring in making such an unfounded im! There, look, these crystal fragments on my chain are genuine Blue Dream Crystal. See just how different they are in terms of luster!¡± Sophie took out a crystal ne from her pocket and swayed it in front of the vendor¡¯s face, forcing him to see what a genuine Blue Dream Crystal looked like.

    Those wearing space rings did not usually appear in such ces. Therefore, before re-entering the region, Sophie not only kept away her only space ring, but she also had Han Shuo put away his as well. With that, there would not be an item on them which would distinguish them from any ordinary person.

    When the vendor realized that he couldn¡¯t deceive Sophie, his face sank and he said, ¡°How about this, four gold coins. Take it or leave it!¡±

    ¡°Three gold coins! Only three gold coins! This button has coarse workmanship, and is only worth as much! Look here, the iy site between the button and the crystal, there¡¯s a fine scratch over here. Also, here...¡° Sophie was suddenly an expert and jabbered on and on,ying out each and every fault on this crystal button.

    Han Shuo nkly stared at Sophie, dumbstruck. Listening to her absolutely unrestrained criticism of the crystal button for the price difference of one gold coin, he simply could not understand what the point was.

    Finally, after a series of bombardments by Sophie, the vendor raised the white g. He put on a forced smile as he passed the crystal button to Sophie, and said, ¡°I will take three gold coins. But why would you insist on having it when everything is wrong with it as you mentioned?¡±

    ¡°Oh, its shape is nevertheless a little beautiful,¡± Sophie said a kind word for the very first time. After pleasingly attached the crystal button to the corner of her clothes, she turned to Han Shuo with a smile and asked, ¡°What do you think? Looks nice, doesn¡¯t it?¡±

    ¡°Not bad!¡± Han Shuo answered. After a short pause, he added, ¡°Given your appearance now, it fits you well!¡±

    This kind of forged jewel made of poor material and crude workmanship, other than the rather unique design, there really wasn¡¯t anything appealing about it. However, Sophie appeared rather mediocre as well at the time. Putting on such an ordinary and coarse ornament, they actuallyplemented each other well.

    Sophie obviously made out the meaning behind those words of Han Shuo¡¯s. She red at Han Shuo before turning to the vendor and said, ¡°Shopkeeper, you may get the payment from him. Hmph, nobody asked for your cutting remarks on me!¡±

    Three gold coins was peanuts to Han Shuo. It¡¯s just that he found Sophie¡¯s attitude to be somewhat funny and ridiculous. Without hesitation, he took out three gold coins and handed them to the vendor. He caught up to Sophie and asked, ¡°It¡¯s just a few gold coins. Given your wealth, there is no need for you to waste time haggling, is there?¡±

    Sophie was a sky rider, and her father was a renowned sacred knight in Kasi Empire. Whichever way one looked at it, Sophie was in no waycking in the wealth department. For such a character to engage in a debate with a hawker over a few gold coins, Han Shuo found that to be truly absurd.

    ¡°What do you know? It is only at such moments that I truly feel like a normal person!¡± Sophie shot a nce before she answered without thinking.

    Han Shuo stared nkly and thought for a moment. When he gave another look at Sophie and saw that the worries showing in her eyes were quickly vanishing, he immediately understood the meaning behind Sophie¡¯s words.

    As the daughter of sacred knight Sulo, Sophie ought to have been treasured and cherished to the most since her birth. Everyone had probably treated Sophie like a little princess all her life. Money, jewelry, treasures, whatever Sophie wanted, she could possess it with little to no effort. It was precisely because Sophie had never experienced life as an average civilian that she wasted no interest for the auction sale where the affluent and gentry gathered, but instead fancied loitering around these booths belonging to small merchants and traders.

    In his previous world, Han Shuo lived an ordinary life in an ordinary household. And when his soul first arrived at the Profound Continent, he went through even pettier, lower beginnings. He had long been used to such lifestyles, and therefore wouldn¡¯t be so passionate about such things. If it was not for the presence of certain unique items, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t have derived much pleasure in this kind of ce.

    ¡°Oh, right. What did youe here for?¡± Sophie suddenly recalled this question after walking some distance. Shortly after, somewhat surprised, she said, ¡°You itch for fun in ces like this too, don¡¯t you? Ha, I should have made it out earlier. From your clothing and space ring, you muste from a affluent family as well. It seems we have more inmon than I thought!¡±

    After listening to Sophie¡¯s opinionated exnation, Han Shuo smilingly shook his head and said, ¡°Unlike you, I wasn¡¯t born with a silver spoon in my mouth. I¡¯ve tasted all kinds of hardship since I was young. The reason I came to such a ce is that in such ces, one who knows what¡¯s what can obtain some real treasures!¡°

    ¡°What? That can¡¯t be true. How could there be any good stuff in such a ce?¡± Sophie obviously wasn¡¯t too convinced. She came to such ces purely for fun and games. Deep down in her heart, she most definitely did not feel that there would be anything truly valuable in such ces.

    ¡°You don¡¯t believe me?¡± Han Shuo looked at Sophie in all smiles, as though nning to prove it to her.

    ¡°I don¡¯t!¡± Sophie could not resist doubling down on her words upon seeing Han Shuo¡¯s assertiveness.

    ¡°Come with me!¡± Han Shuo gestured at Sophie to follow him, turned around, and headed for another area. It looked as if he was determined to prove Sophie wrong.

    Sophie was rather skeptical and hurriedly followed behind Han Shuo. She thought to herself, Let¡¯s see what tricks you will y this time!

    After squeezing seventy or eighty meters through the unending stream of crowd, Han Shuo stopped in front of an unremarkable booth. He conveniently picked up a gray, average-looking rock, and smilingly asked the seller, ¡°Sir, how many gold coins is this rock?¡±

    ¡°Oh, five gold coins. If you really want it, I can make it cheaper for you!¡± the seller replied without thinking the matter through.

    ¡°Five gold coins it is!¡± Han Shuo clearly did not share that unusual hobby of Sophie¡¯s. He unreluctantly withdrew five gold coins from the space ring in his pocket and handed it to the seller.

    As this point Sophie began to have some doubts in her heart, she did not ceaselessly haggle on the prices. Seeing Han Shuo leaving this vendor¡¯s booth, she hastily followed after him. As this was a rather deserted region, Han Shuo only walked a short distance before he reached a most secluded spot where he waited for Sophie to catch up.

    Looking at the grey rock held in Han Shuo¡¯s hand, Sophie astoundedly asked, ¡°This is the so-called good stuff you mentioned? You can go to any mine and there will be this kind of grey rock all over. Doesn¡¯t seem very valuable to me!¡±

    Smilingly shaking his head, Han Shuo said, ¡°Don¡¯t make up your mind so quickly. Give me your weapon!¡±

    Sophie was clueless, and yet she still did as Han Shuo instructed, taking out a longsword from her space ring and handed it to Han Shuo. With one nce at this delicate longsword, one could tell that it must be a priceless artifact.

    Han Shuo groped on the scabbard and touched the glossy smooth surface of gems embedded on it. He smiled at Sophie, ¡°Indeed a wealthy one! No wonder you get a kick out of impersonating the poor!¡±

    ¡°Cut the talk. I want to see just how will you prove that this stone is a good stuff!¡± Sophie chuckingly said and crossed her arms in front of her chest, waiting for Han Shuo¡¯s demonstration.

    Han Shuo smiled and did not say any more. Right before Sophie, he drew out the longsword from its sheath, and gently flicked the sharp end of the sword. Ding! A crisp and clear tone resonated from the longsword.

    Under Sophie¡¯s attentive gaze, the grey rock in Han Shuo¡¯s palm was pulverized into grey dust when Han Shuo exerted force with his five fingers. With his hand moving back and forth, he gently sprinkled the fine powder. Layers of grey rock powder were evenly deposited on the edges of Sophie¡¯s longsword. Puff! A ball of bewitching me kindled at Han Shuo¡¯s palm.

    Sophie gasped. She stared at the me in Han Shuo¡¯s palm in appal, and said, ¡°You even dual cultivated in fire magic? Something¡¯s amiss, there¡¯s no presence of fire element. What is going on?¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head at Sophie smilingly. He did not exin why he could ignite a me in his palm without using the fire element, but instead called attention, ¡°Watch carefully!¡±

    Sophie did not further question but focused, fixing her eyes on every movement Han Shuo made. Under the attentive gaze of Sophie¡¯s glistening eyes, Han Shuo directed the me in his palm towards the de edge of the longsword which was facing the ground. In the roasting of the me from Han Shuo¡¯s palm, Sophie¡¯s longsword slowly turned scorching hot.

    ¡°Be careful! This was a gift from my dad when I became a sky rider. Don¡¯t leave a scratch!¡± Sophie cautioned Han Shuo as her heart began to ache watching Han Shuo cook her sword with fire.

    Han Shuo signalled Sophie with his eyes, telling her to be at ease. Then, Han Shuo squinted, and his demonic yuan started operating in secret. Through his hand holding the sword hilt, demonic yuan flowed into the longsword. Under the double action of the ze and demonic yuan, the grey powder deposited on the sword edge astonishingly melted into the de.

    ¡°Wow!¡± Sophie was yet again shocked by the sight before her eyes. She eximed in disbelief, ¡°You are an alchemist too! I really did not make that out!¡±

    Han Shuo did not reply. He continued to focus on dissolving the Densinium into the sword, observing theyer of fine dust slowly vanishing into the sword edge.

    Han Shuo had already spotted this Densinium rock the day before. This was an unusual ore that could increase weapon density and allow greater cirction of energy. In the canonical text of weapons refinery for demonic arts practitioners, Densinium was known to be a very useful rock. However, in this world, Han Shuo discovered that hardly anyone knew of its utility.

    There was an awful lot of Densinium in the ce of extreme metal at Mount Silk. Han Shuo had long mixed an appropriate amount of Densinium into the Demonyer Edge. Therefore, when he saw the Densinium rock there the previous day, although intrigued, he did not purchase it. But to prove to Sophie that such a ce was truly a treasure trove, he specifically came back and bought a piece of it.

    By the time all of the Densinium powder was dissolved into the de, the sword edge had reached an extremely high temperature. It was at this moment that the me in Han Shuo¡¯s palm that was roasting the sword edge turned from red to purple. Other than creaking noises, light puffs of smoke were released from the longsword. It was a natural phenomenon when matter in high temperature was suddenly cooled off.

    ¡°Be careful! Don¡¯t tell me you are taking advantage of my longsword for some metallurgy experiment?¡± Sophie was still very worried about her longsword. As she reminded Han Shuo to be careful, she questioned if Han Shuo actually had malicious intentions.

    ¡°Take it. Inject fighting aura into it and see what difference it haspared to usual.¡± Han Shuo did not answer Sophie¡¯s question but tossed the longsword with its scabbard to Sophie.

    Sophie hastily reached out to catch the sword. When she caught it in her hand, she let out a cry in surprise at once, ¡°It grew a few kilograms heavier!¡±

    Looking at the rock around the size of a clenched fist, which was crushed into dust in Han Shuo¡¯s hand before dissolving into her longsword, she couldn¡¯t figure out how some finely pulverized rock could actually increase the weight of her longsword by kilograms. It was a miracle.

    ¡°Try with fighting aura,¡± Han Shuo reminded.

    Still in amazement, Sophie immediately infused fighting aura into the longsword in her hand. When Sophie poured fighting aura, the longsword suddenly glowed with silvery light of fighting aura at a speed beyond herprehension.

    ¡°Im... impossible!¡± Sophie cried out. Looking at Han Shuo with shock and bewilderment, she said, ¡°The longsword has greatly increased responsiveness towards fighting aura!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. This is the function of the rock! I think you should know, during crucial moments in battles, what it would mean to be able to release the power upon injecting fighting aura into the longsword,¡± Han Shuo said grimly.

    ¡°I understand. This means one could seize the decisive opportunity, and perhaps even gain the upper hand in an evenly matched battle!¡± Sophie realized. Shortly after her sparkling eyes turned to Han Shuo, and she said, ¡°This is incredible! How did you do that? That is truly unbelievable!¡±

 Chapter 489: Auction Place

    GDK 489: Auction ce

    ¡°Hehe, this is why I say, those who know what¡¯s what could obtain good stuff from a ce like this!¡± Han Shuo said smilingly.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go. Take me shopping with you. You seem like a person who does know what¡¯s what!¡± Sophie said in high spirits. She grasped firmly onto the corner of Han Shuo¡¯s shirt and pulled him towards an area bustling with activities.

    Han Shuo helplessly followed along. He thought to himself, Wasn¡¯t it you who first said that as the host, you must properly receive me? How did it be me that has to keep youpany instead? It seems that words thate out of a woman¡¯s mouth definitely cannot be trusted.

    Seeing that Sophie was in high spirits, Han Shuo did not throw cold water on her. He apanied her cramming through a congested crowd and visited various vendors¡¯ booths. By utilizing his urate senses for substances, Han Shuo found several worthy items suitable for her.

    ¡°Han, you are amazing! How do you know so much?¡± Sophie said excitedly to Han Shuo as she firmly held onto a jade bracelet of coarse workmanship.

    The jade bracelet was also one of the things that Han Shuo helped Sophie select. After wearing this jade bracelet, she could sense the effect of the jade bracelet in relieving fatigueness. After listening to an entire lecture about the efficacy of jade bracelets from Han Shuo once through, Sophie truly felt utmost admiration for Han Shuo, almost prostrating herself before Han Shuo in adtion.

    ¡°It¡¯s almost afternoon now. Let¡¯s visit the auction sale as well,¡± Han Shuo suggested as he smilingly looked at Sophie.

    ¡°There¡¯s nothing interesting about that ce, might as well stay here and continue strolling around,¡± Sophie replied with her lips curled. She clearly had no good opinion of the auction ce.

    ¡°Inside this auction which is held only once every three years in Kasi Empire, there will certainly be many interesting people and objects. Since I have alreadye to Kasi Empire, it is inexcusable to not experience it. And you, as the hostess, perhaps it is time for you to do the honors?¡± Although the stalls outside on the streets definitely proved useful, there must be even more precious treasures at the auction. Not only that, those items put up for auction had been well appraised. It was for these reasons that Han Shuo made such a proposal.

    ¡°Fine. Since you are being so insisting, I shall go there with you,¡± Sophie grudgingly agreed to Han Shuo¡¯s request. Following behind Han Shuo, they headed towards the auction ce.

    The auction was located in an enormous building with a squadron of knights in shining armour sturdily guarding the entrance. When Han Shuo and Sophie over, they witnessed these knights in the doorway standing refined and courteous. Although these knights could still be considered as friendly in attitude, they no doubt obstructed the two in their path.

    ¡°Lady, gentleman, no entrance without an invitation letter,¡± one of the knights reminded smilingly.

    Given Han Shuo and Sophie¡¯s current ordinary appearance, along with the very ordinary clothing on them, after putting away their space rings, there was not one exceptional feature on them. Obviously, characters inmoner¡¯s dressing should not be appearing in such a five-star premier venue where the privileged sses congregated.

    Han Shuo let out a cold scoff, inwardly thinking that this kind of people could definitely be found in whichever region. Don¡¯t get fooled by this knight¡¯s urbane manner on the surface, the ridicule and despise showing in his eye were hardly concealed. Han Shuo could tell the disdain in his heart with just one look.

    ¡°There, this is the invitation letter. Can we go in now?¡± Sophie casually took out two invitation letters and handed them to the knight with a light groan. The knight was astonished. He clearly never expected that someone like Han Shuo and Sophie actually had the qualifications to receive the invitation. He foolishly stared at Sophie and Han Shuo, and briefly forgot how to speak.

    ¡°Can we go in?¡± Sophie questioned once more in a slightly louder voice.

    ¡°Of course, of course!¡± the knight was suddenly roused and he hastily replied. He then stepped aside and executed a bow. In a courteous manner, he said, ¡°Pleasee inside!¡±

    ¡°Humph!¡± Han Shuo shot a cold nce at this knight before marching inside inrge strides along with Sophie.

    As soon as they crossed the entrance, they saw a splendidly decorated beautiful scene with glorious lightings. Further inside was an incredibly spacious hall, with rows and rows of gorgeous, glittering crystalnterns suspended high up above. The ground was oveid with soft red carpet. The hall had tiered seating simr to that of a luxurious movie theater. Exquisite pastries and fruits were neatlyid out on each table.

    Straight ahead, an auctioneer suited in evening dress was cheerfully giving a presentation about an item. Colourful stage lighting casted down on a delicate staff embedded with a rhombus-shaped gemstone water-blue in colour. Under the illumination of the lights, this staff appeared even more beautifully dazzling. For some water magi who took pleasure in beholding the beautiful, this magical staff possessed a deadly temptation.

    ¡°Ladies and Gentlemen, this delicate magical staff was assembled by Master Faler of the elf race. This reverie-blue magical staff can triple the power of water element magical spells, and allow for greater recovery speed of mental strength. As for its design, perhaps only the word ¡®perfection¡¯ could describe it. The pieces of Master Faler are all astonishingly refined with not one exception...¡± On stage, the presenter was promoting the magical staff in a most provocative manner.

    Han Shuo carefully observed for a moment. He discovered that this magical staff was indeed not bad, but what a shame that it was somewhat overly ornate. Its extremely artistic design was in fact not especially suitable for a magus to grasp it well. That Master Faler clearly cut down on practicality in his pursuit for perfection.

    Given Han Shuo¡¯s temperament, there was no way he would select a weapon like that. However, its beauty aroused the crazy pursuit of female magi. In Kasi Empire, thanks to the presence of the Shrine of Ice, most magi majored in water element magic. When the auctioneer finished his words, the crowd immediately started to re up.

    ¡°Ladies, gentlemen, pleasee with me!¡± while Han Shuo and Sophie stared fixedly at the stage, a male waiter said to them smilingly.

    ¡°Is there any private room that is still avable?¡± Sophie turned to this waiter and asked indifferently.

    The waiter stared nkly and looked Sophie up and down. Only then did he smilingly reply, ¡°I¡¯m sorry. They were all fully booked long ago.¡±

    Han Shuo understood that in this kind of high-ss auction sale, there were rooms specially prepared for those true bigwigs a few stories upstairs, away from the grand hall with tiered seating. Those characters with great status would usually book ahead a private room for themselves.

    If Sophie hade over together with Braque as originally nned, she would have been in one of those VIP rooms. But as she was currently with Han Shuo, all she could do was get over it.

    ¡°Nevermind then. Lead the way,¡± Sophie casually replied. With the waiter¡¯s guidance, Han Shuo and Sophie arrived at their seating near the back row. A magical console was arranged in front of the delicate pastries. One could input an exact amount of gold coins on that console.

 Chapter 490: Turmoil

    GDK 490: Turmoil

    The auction sale wasn¡¯t at all affected by the arrival of Han Shuo and Sophie. Under the most bewitching voice of the host, the bidding price for that magical staff climbed higher and higher.

    morous noise and never-ending sounds of discussions filled the entire hall. Some beautiful women wearing magnificent magical gowns, not in the least concealed their strong interests in that magical staff. This directly caused the auction sale to sink into a small scale chaos.

    ¡°What¡¯s your opinion of that magical staff?¡± After the two sat down, Sophie could not help but ask Han Shuo.

    ¡°Nothing particrly great about it! Han Shuo¡¯s lips pursed to the side. He then added, ¡°shy on the outside but hollow on the inside!¡±

    Against Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, Sophie most agreed with Han Shuo¡¯s evaluation. She said, ¡°Yep, this magical staff is overly ostentatious. If I were a magus, I would never choose this kind of overly shy magical staff.¡±

    Looking at Sophie with a surprised expression, Han Shuo smilingly said, ¡°I thought that you would be just like them, and only pursue beauty in all things.¡±

    Sophie pouted and gently groaned, ¡°I bought those small jewels from those booths purely to enjoy that kind of pleasure of shopping, not because I really particrly liked them.¡±

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo gave her a cheeky grin. He pointed at the crystal button on her chest, and mocked, ¡°Well then, how do you exin yourself wearing this crystal button, and even acting as though it were very precious?¡±

    Sophie dazed for a second before waving her small fist and somewhat wittily said, ¡°That¡¯s because I¡¯m giving you face! You bought this for me. If I were to conveniently throw this aside, how impolite would that be!¡±

    Han Shuoughed involuntarily. Although he understood that Sophie was purely joking with those words, he nevertheless felt really happy in his heart. For Sophie would wear a coarsely made button which was worth only three gold coins, regardless of whether she really was being considerate, as the benefactor, Han Shuo definitely felt that he received the proper respect he deserved.

    It had to be said that when chatting with Sophie, Han Shuo felt a mostfortable and rxed sensation. It was just like conversing with a confidante with no restrictions whatsoever. This made Han Shuo feel veryfortable.

    ¡°Huh? Why is he here? Suddenly, Sophie let out a soft cry and immediately lowered her head. She even grabbed Han Shuo and made him do the same.

    Han Shuo, being unexpectedly pulled by Sophie, nearly knocked his head against Sophie¡¯s. Leaning closely together, an air of wonderful fragrance rushed into Han Shuo¡¯s nose. The naturally refreshing fragrance caused Han Shuo to reminisce of a good time. Back then at the Dark Forest, the two had once leaned so closely together, encircled with the scent of each other¡¯s.

    A delegation walking at a steady pace gradually walked past Han Shuo and Sophie by the footpath on their left. With the servers respectfully weing them, they slowly ascended to the VIP room on the second floor.

    One of the men leading the party had a cordial smile. He wore a pithy, clean warrior gown as white as snow. He had broad shoulders and thick hands, disying an imposing demeanor. He was obviously an experienced swordsman or knight.

    ¡°Your father?¡± Han Shuo only took one nce, and through his consciousness, he sensed the energy contained in this person¡¯s body. It was extremely difficult for one to sense this energy without first reaching a certain realm. ¡°How, how did you know? You¡¯ve seen my dad before?¡± Sophie was in slight disbelief.

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo replied, ¡°You two looked rather simr in appearance and so I made a guess. I didn¡¯t think he would actually turn out to be your father.¡±

    Appearance was merely one aspect. The most significant thing was that the fighting aura that Sophie cultivated was homologous with that of this person. An ordinary person wouldn¡¯t have been able to sense it. But as Han Shuo possessed an extremely mighty consciousness, he could detect it after carefully probing it.

    ¡°He must have gone to the VIP room Braque is at. Humph! How could he, without asking for my consent, decide that on my behalf? I really hate him!¡± Sophie said furiously. It was apparent that Sophie held grievances towards Sulo.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t aware of the matter between Braque and Sophie. Therefore when he heard Sophie grumble so, his curiosity pushed him to ask, ¡°What¡¯s the matter about?¡±

    ¡°Not- nothing!¡± Sophie had turned somewhat flustered as she hastily replied.

    Han Shuo could not make heads or tails of it, but he did not question any further. He pointed at the stage and said, ¡°The next item is pretty good. I think it suits you quite well!¡±

    After Han Shuo finished those words, Sophie sneakily took a glimpse ahead. When she found out that there was not a trace of his father Sulo within sight, she let out a sigh of relief, and gazed at the stage with great interest.

    At this moment, with the auctioneer¡¯s guidance and light cast on it, an armour, deep green in colour, slowly descended from the dropped ceiling above. The deep green armour was glossy smooth and shiny. It sparkled brightly under the stage lighting.

    ¡°This piece of knight armour is a craftwork of a dwarf master artisan. Although there¡¯s no clue as to which dwarf artisan it actually came from, from the luster of the armour, ¡±... after the armour was revealed, the auctioneer began his enthusiastic promotion again.

    ¡°This piece of armour is very beautiful indeed. But is really as sturdy as he makes it out to be?¡± Sophie was somewhat unconvinced, and said to Han Shuo while observing the armour from afar.

    ¡°It should be passable. There are a few kinds of rare ores mixed into it, which includes ck iron, ck gold, and mithril. Those forged by the dwarves shouldn¡¯t be anything poor. You can consider getting this,¡± Han Shuo exined.

    ¡°Forget about it. My father is in the VIP room. Although we can¡¯t see him from here, he could see us from high up above. I have once used this face to prank him, and even still he could recognize me. If by any chance he catches me red-handed, I¡¯m done for!¡± Sophie adorably stuck out her tongue like a dead cow. But shortly after, as though she were afraid that Sulo would spot her from above, she lowered her head again.

    ¡°20 thousand gold coins! Young master Braque bids 20 thousand gold coins!¡± before the auctioneer even finished banging the drum for the armour, a loud voice called out from the crowd.

    Sophie lightly groaned, and uttered in disdain, ¡°Pff, scoundrel, I will not be grateful for that!¡±

    Although Sophie lowered her voice, Han Shuo could still hear her words clearly. Raising his head to gaze upstairs, in a surprised tone Han Shuo said, ¡°Who is this Braque? He threw out such a hefty price before the host evenpleted his speech!¡±

    ¡°He¡¯s Braque Pillon. You are in Kasi Empire, don¡¯t tell me that you don¡¯t even know who he is?¡± Sophie was somewhat startled, and asked Han Shuo with a strange look.

    Shrugging, Han Shuo frankly said, ¡°I really don¡¯t. Is he famous?¡±

    Sophie made a defeated expression, and only then did she osternly exin, ¡°In Kasi Empire, although the Shrine of Ice has great power, it is still the Pillon royal family that maintains absolute control of Kasi Empire. Braque is the son of Prince Bradley. He is not a benevolent type of person. It¡¯s troublesome enough for you to offend the Shrine of Ice, so by all means, don¡¯t offend this family n.¡±

    ¡°Thanks for the reminder!¡± Though Han Shuo wore a smile on his face, he didn¡¯t exactly take the advice to heart. On the Profound Continent, there weren¡¯t many who could threaten Han Shuo¡¯s life. This so-called royal family was nothing in his eyes.

    ¡°Bradley? Bradley Pillon of Cesar City?¡± Suddenly, Han Shuo seemed to have recalled something and questioned further.

    ¡°Yep! In the whole of Kasi Empire, there is only one Bradley Pillon.¡± Sophie creased her brows and added, ¡°You are already in Kasi Empire, how could you still be so unfamiliar with it?¡±

    The reason Trunks was currently painstakingly expanding and strengthening the Valley of Sunshine all that while was to get to this Bradley Pillon. Han Shuo realized that this was because Annie, a girl that Trunks regarded as her very own sister, had suffered an unthinkable tragedy, with one of the perpetrators being Bradley.

    Florida and Gustav both died in Trunks¡¯ hand during the struggle for authority over the Valley of Sunshine. Now, all that was left in Trunks¡¯ hitlist was Bradley who was enjoying overwhelming power in Kasi Empire. When Sophie mentioned this Bradley, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but sneer.

    Since Trunks had set his mind on this person, Han Shuo would rather not take matters into his own hands. However, if Bradley dared provoke Han Shuo, it would nheless still be an enjoyable thing for Han Shuo to teach him an unforgettable lifelong lesson.

    ¡°20 thousand! Can I get a 21 thousand, 21 thousand...?¡± the auctioneer continued, but the reaction below the stage was cold.

    ¡°In Kasi Empire, the House of Pillon wields the true power. No ordinary person would purposely make life difficult for any member of the family,¡± Sophie exined to Han Shuo, sighing.

    When Sophie uttered those words, she felt truly helpless about her own future. It was precisely because she clearly understood the influences of the House of Pillon in Kasi Empire that she would feel so powerless about her marriage to Bradley. Suddenly, a sense of dispiritment filled her heart. Sophie suddenly thought to herself that even though she possessed extraordinary strength, she could hardly oppose those politically powerful. So what was the use?

    ¡°Going once! Going twice! Sold, to young master Bradley!¡± the auctioneer rapped his gavel.

    With Sophie in a downcast mood, she paid no attention to what was going on in the auction. Another four pieces of precious items were bidded off separately at high prices. Of the four items, two were magical robes with unusual functionalities, one was a magical scroll that could release a forbidden spell, and thest was a ne encrusted with a hundred diamonds once wore by the empress of the former Verdun dynasty.

    Han Shuo was not interested in those four items. The first three items were separately acquired by three different magi. Thest ne was bought by Braque.

    Han Shuo observed for a moment, and saw that the more high and mighty Braque appeared in the limelight, the more gloomy Sophie became. This baffled Han Shuo somewhat, not knowing why would Sophie suddenly be in such mncholy.

    ¡°Ladies and gentlemen, the next item for bidding is rather extraordinary, even our experts could not determine what it is! However, this thing possesses a miraculous ability. When it is stuck on the ground, all the nts within a few kilometers around it grow healthier and taller,¡± the auctioneer on stage introduced.

    Along with this introduction, a sheet of tender green leaf the size of his palm, stored on a crystal tray, was presented on stage. This leaf had a shiny surface and looked as though it was made with fine dark green jade. As soon as it was disyed, the polluted air in the entire auction hall was immediately purified.

    It was as though they had all been teleported into the middle of a lush forest in an instant. Everyone¡¯s body and mind seemed to suddenly loosen up.

    Han Shuo, who had not been paying much attention suddenly jolted. Dazzling lights too bright to be stared into directly erupted from his eyes. Sophie, who was right beside Han Shuo, witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s eyes widen dramatically. Her gloomy mood seemed to have been diluted by her curiosity. Doubtfully looking at Han Shuo, she asked in a low voice, ¡°You want to get this?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right!¡± Han Shuo replied in a deep voice. ¡°What is this thing? I have never seen such a strange leaf before. Do you know what it is?¡± Sophie was somewhat surprised, and she questioned Han Shuo closely with her eyes fixed on him.

    Nodding, Han Shuo exined, ¡°It¡¯s hard to exin to you. In short, this thing is very useful to me!¡±

    ¡°Then go and bid it! If you don¡¯t have enough gold coins, I can lend you some, but you must repay me!¡± Sophie said gleamed at Han Shuo. Shortly after, she took a look at a VIP room above before saying to Han Shuo, ¡°I¡¯m going to keep my head down, lest I be noticed by my father when you are bidding.¡±

    ¡°It is rather inconvenient to say much about the origins of this piece of leaf. But still, I believe that those who are knowledgeable can feel how extraordinary it is. Alright, starting price is 10 thousand gold coins. May the best bidder win. The bidding starts now!¡± the auctioneer shouted.

    ¡°20 thousand!¡± ¡°25 thousand!¡± ¡°27 thousand!¡±

    It seemed there were many who could tell a good buy when they saw one. Right after the auctioneer finished his words, the bidding price soared higher and higher.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t at all in a hurry to show his hand, but observed the few contesters with his cold eyes. After a round of shouting and quarrelling, slowly, the price had inted to 40 thousand gold coins. At this moment, many nobilities who were genuinely curious about the functionality of this treasure gradually no longer continued to participate.

    There remained three people who were truly interested in the item. Of them, one was a hysterically rotund chap, another was an upper-ssdy in bright-coloured clothing, and thest was none other than Bradley of the Pillion family.

    Among the three, Braque was the most excited. Perhaps it was because he discovered that there were people who actually daredpete against him, but he appeared very irritated. Han Shuo could even hear his constantly quickening heartbeat due to the excitement.

    That big fatty seemed likely to be a wealthy, sessful merchant based on his attire, perhaps hailing from Brut Merchant Alliance. No wonder he dared fight over an item against Braque. As for the graceful upper-ss woman, although Han Shuo couldn¡¯t tell her origins, he could tell that her financial resources was probably the least sufficient of the three as her face gradually grew more and more displeased. Han Shuo reckoned that the price of the item had exceeded what she could bear.

    After observing for a while, when Han Shuo saw that the price had reached 50 thousand, he suddenly made a move. A string of digits suddenly came into appearance.

    ¡°A hundred... 100 thousand! Who, who is it?¡± the auctioneer shrieked and scanned his eyes through the crowd for the identifier number.

    The whole auction house sank into turmoil!

 Chapter 491: Wood Attribute Treasure

    GDK 491: Wood Attribute Treasure

    Throughout the years, by means of seizure and plundering, Han Shuo¡¯s pockets gradually grew deeper and deeper. So much so that by now, he had actually lost count of precisely how much wealth he had umted. In addition to the few million gold coins in Brettel City that he left under Jack¡¯s management, several million more were at Han Shuo¡¯s disposal in his crystal card alone.

    ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ was a treasure of wood attribute. Others may not have known of it, but Han Shuo was very clear about its application. Not only could ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ make barrennds thrive with life, it also possessed the miraculous ability to rejuvenate the undead. Most importantly, once this ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ was in the hands of wood elite zombie, not only was he able to evolve faster, his strength was substantially increased as well.

    At the moment, of the five elite zombies, water elite zombie and wood elite zombie were the weakest and of lowest intelligence. This was due in part to the fact that they were refined rtivelyter than the rest, but also because they had not acquired any treasures that could help them advance themselves.

    During the trip to the Shrine of Ice days prior, water elite zombie had absorbed the enormous amount of energy in the Ice Goddess¡¯ statue. His appearance immediately underwent an earth-shattering transformation. Han Shuo could be certain that by the time water elite zombie had finished digesting all the energy he absorbed, he would surely be able to make a huge leap forward in his evolution. With that, the water elite zombie would be able to add his energy to the Penta-elemental Undead Formation.

    Han Shuo was recently fretting for wood elite zombie, not knowing how to assist him. Who knew that he would find the treasure of wood attribute ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ at this auction sale. Han Shuo was convinced that once wood elite zombie obtained the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯, the Penta-elemental Undead Formation could definitely unleash its might to the fullest extent.

    Therefore, Han Shuo was determined to take this wood attribute treasure home! In m attempt to rid the other rivals of any hope of winning the item, Han Shuo bid a correspondingly intimidating price of 100 thousand gold coins.

    ¡°Number 83! Number 83 put forth 100 thousand gold coins! Oh? Looks like number 83 is a friend in the hall!¡± the auctioneer finally found Han Shuo¡¯s identifier number, and shrieked.

    Following the auctioneer¡¯s loud shout, the stage lighting swooshed and cast on Han Shuo. The crowd maintained their attention along with the lighting, and their eyes allnded on Han Shuo in an instant. Everyst pair of eyes was filled with astonishment and curiosity.

    The other three bidders for the wood attribute treasure ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ were in VIP rooms on the second and third floors. Those on the second and third floors were the true wealthy merchants and powerful nobilities. Other than a few publicly acknowledged treasures, the high price of 100 thousand gold coins did not appear very often. Thispletely shocked the crowd. And when they then found out that the bidder was actually someone sitting in the grand hall, they were even more astonished.

    This auction ce also had its own division of social sses. Usually, those inside the grand hall were lesser nobilities. They were not usually the biggest spenders and wouldn¡¯tpete for treasures that exceeded 50 thousand gold coins. It was only those in the second and third floors who would pursue any item they were keen on as though gold coins didn¡¯t matter. Therefore, the highest bidders in the auction sale would usually be bigwigs from the second and third floors.

    And now, an unprepossessing, honest-looking fatty, bid for an item with unknown functionality at a pricey 100 thousand gold coins. This obviously attracted the attention of everyone inside the room. Not just the guests in the grand hall, but even those bigwigs in the second and third floor craned their necks forward to see for themselves exactly who down below was being so grandiose.

    ¡°You goon, you are so damn rich!¡± Being at the center of attention of every person in the room, Sophie had to stoop her head even lower and bend down at her waist. She angrily said, ¡°If you cause my father to see me here, I will get even with you!¡±

    As not to bring the onlookers¡¯ attention to Sophie, Han Shuo did not reply her. Hezily sat in his seat with his eyes narrowed and with a smile, seemingly most leisure and carefree.

    ¡°110 thousand gold coins. Number 9 bids 110 thousand gold coins!¡± Suddenly, the auctioneer shrieked yet again.

    Han Shuo raised his head and shot a nce, and found that the bidder was that upper-ss woman of unknown identity. He noticed that after this woman bid that exorbitant price, her face grew even more unsightly.

    ¡°120 thousand! Mister Zofi of Brut Merchant Alliance bids 120 thousand gold coins!¡± the auctioneer hollered again. He had gotten somewhat excited. 120 thousand was the highest bidding price in the auction sale so far. Seeing that the crowd was very enthusiastic, the auctioneer was obviously very happy about it.

    So that big fatty is Zofi Han Shuo thought to himself. Han Shuo had heard of him before. He was an outstanding, well-known merchant in Brut Merchant Alliance. His core businesses were primarily selling magical crystal ores and somerge-scale war equipment. The six magic crystal cannons that Helen bought thest time, those came from Zofi. Sometimes if he received big orders, he could make a few hundred thousand gold coins from just one transaction deal. It was no surprise that he would be so extravagant.

    After Zofi¡¯s bid of 120 thousand gold coins was announced, the auction house turned somewhat silent. Everyone noticed that as the price of the item increased, it started counting in six digits. This obviously exceeded what most people could afford.

    ¡°150 thousand gold coins! Oh! It¡¯s young master Braque!¡± just as the crowd was silenced in amazement, Braque again showed his hand, and directly bid up the price to 150 thousand gold coins. This is truly an astronomic price! It seems that the House of Pillion indeed has deep pockets!

    Suddenly, a window to a VIP room on the third floor was opened. ¡°My friends, this item, along with the two I previously bought, I intend to give them to my fiance Sophie as presents. If all three of you would give me some face, I will be very grateful!¡± Braque said in an elegant manner with a smile on his face as he stood by the window.

    The price tag of 150 thousand deemed to be somewhat excessive even for Braque. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have taken the initiative to say so. Given his Pillion royal family¡¯s influences in Kasi Empire, when he opened his mouth, most people would never deliberately make things difficult for him.

    ¡°Since young master Braque said so, I naturally will not stand in his way!¡± Sure enough, even Zofi of Brut Merchant Alliance dared not to offend Braque. He stood up and bowed at Braque with all smiles.

    ¡°Thank you. If Mister Zofi found time to visit Cesar City, I will most certainly receive you well as a friend. I hope that at that time Mister Zofi will do me the honor,¡± Braque said invitingly.

    ¡°Certainly, certainly!¡± Zofi said as he smiled.

    For such a big merchant like Zofi whose businesses covered every country, although he need not have been afraid of Braque, it would be enormously beneficial to his businesses if he could make such a friend. With Braque taking the initiative and throwing him an olive branch, Zofi naturally knew what to do.

    After Braque yelled out that high price of 150 thousand gold coins, that upper-ss woman who was alsopeting for it wore a face as ashen as the dead. She seemed tock the financial capacity to continue bidding, and had to abandon this treasure which she very much wanted.

    It was only at this moment that Han Shuo actually understood the rtionship between Sophie and Braque. He thoughtfully took a look at Sophie who was burying her head down and in silence. From her grumbling, Han Shuo had a general idea of the situation.

    With a faint smile, Han Shuo raised his head to look at Braque over at the third floor. He discovered that at this moment, it just so happened that Braque was looking back at him. Braque obviously had realized that that upper-ss woman must have given up due to her limited financial ability. Zofi agreed to give him face, and not continue topete against him. With that, the only rival left was Han Shuo who all of a sudden appeared in the grand hall.

    His eyes meeting with Braque¡¯s, Han Shuo saw that Braque nodded with a smile on his face from a distance, and he seemed very friendly in attitude. However, in his eyes, there was a vor of loftiness and threat.

    Han Shuo made a naive smile and turned his head down to look at the number-disying device in front of him. At this moment, the constantly silent and head lowered Sophie suddenly softly shouted, ¡°Han, don¡¯t you remember what I said earlier? You already offended the Shrine of Ice. You must not offend the Pillon family altogether. If you really want that thing, I can pass it on to you after Braque gifts it to me. Don¡¯t fight with him over this thing.¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly at Sophie before he put on a smile. Then, he reached out to the input device and entered a series of numbers. Afterwards, Han Shuo replied in a low voice, ¡°A favor of a hundred thousand gold coins is too much. If you were to ept it, it would be extremely difficult for you to break away from the House of Pillion! Moreover, offending the Shrine of Ice is the same as offending the House of Pillon. The Shrine of Ice¡¯s Ice Celestial Corey is the oldest generation of the Pillion family, it¡¯s just you that didn¡¯t know!¡±

    ¡°200 thousand! Number 83 bid 200 thousand gold coins! Oh my! What a magical person!¡± the auctioneer suddenly yelled, his voice contained an inexplicable astonishment.

    The whole audience turned intomotion once more. Their eyes again gathered on Han Shuo, trying to get a good glimpse of him.

    ¡°Who is that guy? He¡¯s got guts!¡±

    ¡°Hell yeah! He still won¡¯t let go even after young master Braque has spoken. He is simply not giving face to the House of Pillon!¡±

    ¡°Ha, what a reckless fe. Even if you¡¯re rich you gotta be alive to use it man!¡±

    After the sky-high price of 200 thousand gold coins was announced, everyone present was once again in an uproar! Han Shuo¡¯s sharp ears could hear all the things that they were discussing. However, he was rather apathetic in his heart. Merely a puny little good-for-nothing young man from a wealthy family, how would Han Shuo even feel worried about it?

    ¡°I apud your boldness, my friend!¡± Braque over at the third floor did not spiral into a fit of rage out of humiliation, but on the contrary, he praised Han Shuo.

    ¡°This guy is infamous for his dagger hidden in his smiles. His expression now indicated that he is truly outraged! You, you really are, sigh, what for do you provoke him?¡± Sophie with her head lowered, exined softly to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Hm?¡± Suddenly, a soft cry sounded from beside Braque. Sacred knight Sulo had his vision focused on Sophie¡¯s earlobe.

    Sophie, someone of extraordinary strength, was shocked and grew frightened. Even without raising her head she could sense Sulo¡¯s gaze from above. She frantically covered her left ear with her hands, like she was trying to conceal something.

    When Sophie was covering it up, Han Shuo noticed a red birthmark the size of a grain of rice on her left earlobe. Seeing Sophie covering it in a flurry, he instantly understood in his heart why she wanted to cover the red birthmark.

    ¡°Shoot! I¡¯m way too careless! I totally forgot that with my dad¡¯s strength, he can see the birthmark on my earlobe from this distance away. Damn it, he must have found me!¡± Sophie anxiously said with her head down.

    ¡°Yep, I believe that he definitely saw you,¡± Han Shuo said calmly. Han Shuo noticed that after Sulo let out a gentle cry, his eyes started flickering, obviously he had realized that the ordinary-looking youngdy down there was precisely her treasured daughter in disguise.

    ¡°What should we do?¡± Sophie said frantically. She was rather out of her wits when it came to dealing with her own father.

    ¡°Just let it be. Your father did not tell Braque about what he discovered. Just continue burying your head,¡± Han Shuo said to Sophie. In his heart, he knew Sulo gave a lot of thought to Sophie. In any case, Sophie was the fiance to Braque. If Braque were to find out that she disguised herself to be with Han Shuo, Braque would be furious. Therefore even though Solu discovered this fact, he did not expose her.

    ¡°200 thousand gold coins going once!¡± while the audiences were in appal and Braque did not make a counterbid, the auctioneer¡¯s piercing voice sounded loudly.

    Perhaps the price tag of 200 thousand gold coins had exceeded Braque¡¯s expectations, or perhaps Braque had other intentions, he only gazed at Han Shuo from high up with a strange smile on his face but did notpete. It seemed that he did not intend on continuing to battle it out with Han Shuo in the auction house.

    ¡°Going twice!¡± the auctioneer paused for a long while before he shouted, ¡°If there is no higher bidder, if no one will raise the price, then this item belongs to this gentleman!¡±

    Everyone had their eyes scanning back and forth between Han Shuo and Braque. It was as though they were waiting for a more brilliant follow-up. However, to their disappointment, this time Braque did not satisfy the delights of the audience.

    ¡°250 thousand gold coins! Goodness me! Mister Zofi has raised the price again! It is now 250 thousand gold coins!¡± Suddenly, a red sign was revealed on the second floor. The sum of 250 thousand gold coins was announced. The auctioneer was about to go crazy!

    ¡°Young master Braque would like to give treasures to a beauty, such a spoony devotion is so rarely seen! Hehe, I¡¯m willing to use 250 thousand gold coins to help young master Braque aplish this, and could perhaps be considered as befriending young master Braque. Friend down there, do you mind giving some face? Consider it as helping to make a beautiful story!¡± Zofi the true big fatty, said in all smiles to Han Shuo the false fatty down below.

    ¡°Thank you Mister Zofi. Whether you win this item or not, I will definitely take you as a friend!¡± Braque sent his regards to Zofi with an unusual smile on his face.

    With that, the crowd became hyped once again. Every one of them looked at Zofi and Braque with inexplicable excitement, cheering, for things had taken a new turn.

    Old fox, so willing to part with your hard-earned capital! Han Shuo cursed in his heart. Then, his cold eyes turned to look at that big fatty Zofi who was beaming from ear to ear. He reckoned that the reason Zofi came over here was to seize an opportunity to build a rtionship with Braque. It seems that he had aplished that goal.

    ¡°My apologies, but I really need it!¡± Han Shuo said decisively. Without leaving any room for reply, Han Shuo pressed on his console and keyed in another string of numbers.

    ¡°300 thousand! Good gracious! Number 83 bids 300 thousand gold coins!¡± the auctioneer shouted at the top of his lungs. He was so excited he almost passed out.

    Perhaps it was because Han Shuo bid a really high price, or maybe because Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t give him the slightest bit of face at all, the big smile on Zofi face shrank. Awkwardly looking at Han Shuo, Zofi didn¡¯t know what to do for a moment.

    ¡°Mister Zofi, let it be. It appears that this friend truly needs it. Let¡¯s not seize what others favour. Oh right, if Mister Zofi has the timeter, pleasee over to my manor at Cesar City to some wine tasting. Hehe, I have a few bottles of truly fine wine over there. I hope that Mister Zofi would do me the honor,¡± as the entire auction house was in suspense in a stifling atmosphere, Braque all of a sudden smilingly made an invitation to Zofi.

    Zofi stared nkly for a while. After helplessly nodding, he delightedly replied, ¡°My pleasure!¡±

    At this moment, Zofi no longer continued fighting over it. The auctioneer knew that there wouldn¡¯t be more drama. He crazily shouted a few times, seeing that no one else was bidding, he rapped the gavel and announced, ¡°300 thousand gold coins. The item belongs to our friend at number 83!¡±

    ¡°Great, now you¡¯re in deep trouble. Let¡¯s leave quickly!¡± Sophie hastened.

    ¡°No worries, let¡¯s see if any more good stuff follows!¡± Han Shuo leisurely said to Sophie and brushed aside Sophie¡¯s concerns. He was not at all anxious.

    After securing the treasure of wood attribute ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ for 300 thousand gold coins, Han Shuo became much more at ease. However, with that, Han Shuo and Sophie became the focal point. When certain precious items appeared on stageter, everyone would cast their nces at Han Shuo from time to time.

    After the wood attribute treasure ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯, another three invaluable items were revealed one after another. A bottled medicine that could restore eighty percent of mental strength in a very brief time, a delicate enchanted bow forged by a great alchemist, and the right of ownership over a small town in the southern part of Kasi Empire. As none of these were of Han Shuo¡¯s interests, he did not make a move.

    Other than the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯, Han Shuo did not bid for anything else until the end of the auction for the day. In his heart, he was weighing over whether or not he should attend the second day of the three-day auction sale.

    After the auction on the first day had concluded, Han Shuo headed backstage. Under the admiring gazes of the crowd, he paid the 300 thousand gold coins, and received the treasure of wood attribute, ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯.

    However, when Han Shuo opened up the box containing ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯, his face immediately darkened, and he shouted, ¡°Are you kidding me?¡±

 Chapter 492: An Unforeseen Incident

    GDK 492: An Unforeseen Incident

    The ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ in the box looked just the same as the one on the auction stage, but the kind of energy and vitality was nowhere to be found. Han Shuo felt it with his hand, and immediately found that this thing was definitely not the wood attribute treasure ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯, but a counterfeit carved from a block of fine, dark green jade.

    Having spent 300 thousand gold coins, only to discover that what he received was just a counterfeit article carved from regr jade. No one would be in a very good mood, let alone Han Shuo.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± seeing that there seemed to be some sort of dispute, a high-level personnel wearing a dinner suit hastily came over and asked.

    ¡°Lord Zarya, the gentleman says the item is amiss!¡± an attendant in charge of receiving Han Shuo hastily replied.

    Zarya had carefully observed Han Shuo during the auction. Extravagant characters like Han Shuo tended to leavesting impressions on him. In any case, Han Shuo spent 300 thousand gold coins in purchasing the item. It was a matter of course for him to treat Han Shuo as a VIP.

    Zarya hurried over. After listening to the attendant¡¯s exnation, he anxiously said to Han Shuo, ¡°May I have a look?¡±

    Unimpressed, Han Shuo handed over the counterfeit Viride Leaf. In a deep voice, he said, ¡°Your auction house is very reputable in the whole of Kasi Empire. I suppose that you guys aren¡¯t deliberately ying a joke on me right?¡±

    ¡°Of course not! Of course not!¡± Zarya could make out the wrath between Han Shuo¡¯s words. He took out the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ and felt it with his hands, and his face fell. He asked the attendant, ¡°Who brought the item here earlier?¡± ¡°It was Galia, Sir!¡± the attendant replied.

    Zarya took a deep breath and respectfully executed a bow towards Han Shuo. He sternly said, ¡°My apologies, there is indeed something wrong with this item. Sir, we will first refund you the 300 thousand gold coins. Please give us some time, and we will quickly get the genuine item to you.¡±

    ¡°Han, it probably had nothing to do with the auction house. They wouldn¡¯t purposely do such things that would damage their own reputation!¡± whispered Sophie, who has been right beside Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo originally thought that the auction house was deliberately trying to dupe him. He was even prepared to give the auction house a bloodbath if they wouldn¡¯t admit to it. But now, Zarya, the person in charge, immediately acknowledged the matter while also being very friendly in attitude. Hence, Han Shuo immediately realized that there was more to the situation than met the eyes.

    ¡°Alright then. I hope that your auction house will give me an appropriate exnation. In addition, it is I who won the item fairly and aboveboard, I hope that you will not sell it to someone else!¡± Han Shuo said in a deep voice as he stared coldly at Zarya.

    Zarya looked at Han Shuo with fear and trepidation. He could suddenly feel this unprepossessing fatty be extremely frightening all of a sudden. From Han Shuo¡¯s body, he felt killing intent that was as though material. That kind of stifling pressure petrified him and he knew that Han Shuo was not a man to make enemies with.

    Zarya, being in the high position he was in, was no simple character. Just from that terrifying demeanoring from Han Shuo he understood that he was not a force to be reckoned with. He agreed with him like a yes-man as he turned over in his mind how to appropriately resolve this issue.

    ¡°Please leave us a contact method. Once we find the item, we will immediately look for you to make a new transaction!¡± Zarya, who was scared witless, said respectfully after refunding 300 thousand gold coins to Han Shuo.

    ¡°No need for that. I will be here for the next two days. You guys better shape up!¡± Han Shuo coldly groaned before signalling Sophie with his eyes and striding out.

    Sophie caught up to Han Shuo. When they were near the exit, seeing that no one was around, Sophie conjectured, ¡°I think the problem didn¡¯te from the auction house, it¡¯s more likely to be Braque, that two-faced guy!¡±

    Suddenly, Han Shuo firmly grasped onto Sophie¡¯s small hand, and before she could react, Han Shuo abruptly increased his pace, and rapidly vanished among the streets outside the auction house as he dragged her along.

    Just as the duo was rapidly leaving, sacred knight Sulo hurriedly approached from another passageway. All he saw was Han Shuo pulling Sophie by the hand as they disappeared into the bustling streets. On the busy street lined with vendor¡¯s booths and swamped with people, Sulo soon lost track of the two.

    Sulo wore a gloomy face. Gazing into the crowd as the duo disappeared from his sight, he softly mumbled, ¡°Who is this guy?¡±

    The silhouette of Han Shuo and Sophie holding hands was deeply imprinted in Sulo¡¯s heart. When he suddenly called to mind the influences of the Pillion family in Kasi Empire, Sulo had an instant headache. Shaking his head with a bitter smile on his face, he sighed, ¡°Fifi ah Fifi, you really know how to find troubles for dad!¡±

    ¡°Mister Sulo, what¡¯s the matter?¡± As Sulo was talking to himself, Thuram, a minion of Braque¡¯s, suddenly came over and asked.

    ¡°No, nothing!¡± Sulo replied sinctly. Seeing Braque walk out from behind Thuram, holding up all the treasures he gained from the auction sale with a glimmer in his eye, Sulo didn¡¯t feel the slightest bit of joy, but on the contrary, began worrying for his entire family.

    Sulo knew Braque even better than Sophie. Despite his rather good approval rating in Kasi Empire, his true temperament was not at all as good-natured as one could see on the outside. This person, once he had his eyes on something, would never let go. Once he settled on something, he would not stop until he got his way. As it happened, the House of Pillon was the royal family of Kasi Empire. Sulo realized that merely with him alone, he was incapable of helping Sophie find true happiness.

    He sighed. Sulo had decided that no matter what, he had to get Sophie and Braque together. Otherwise, it wasn¡¯t just a matter of Sulo and Sophie. Their coteral rtives would not need to bother thinking about having a foothold in Kasi Empire.

    ¡°Father-inw, Fifi really is a headstrong one. She didn¡¯t even tell us where she ran to. But still, I am sure that among these things, there will be a few that Sophie will like,¡± Braqueughed as he walked over, expressing his affection for Sophie.

    He must be truly in love with Fifi. Fifi ought to be even happier with him. It must be so! Sulo consoled himself before he smilingly said, ¡°How considerate of you. I think Fifi will surely see how much you care about her!¡±

    ¡°Of course, she is my fiance! How could I not treat her well!¡± Braque chuckled.

    While Sulo and Braque were conversing, Han Shuo dragged Sophie to the middle of the unending sea of people. It was only when Han Shuo found out that Sulo had lost track of the two that he let go of Sophie¡¯s delicate hand. He then exined, ¡°Your father was just looking for you.¡±

    ¡°Oh,¡± Sophie replied without much thought. Although she appeared nonchnt on the surface, her eyes were somewhat flickering. Han Shuo¡¯s subconsciously rubbing his left thumb on her forefinger left her somewhat absent-minded.

    Han Shuo too was somewhat embarrassed. As he was about to say something, he suddenly sensed a natural aura of vitality from the southwest. Immediately, he knew that that energy must have originated from the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯. He hastily said, ¡°I have some business to take care of, wait a moment.¡±

    As soon as he finished those words, Han Shuo weaved through the crowd. He followed his consciousness southwest to the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯. Sophie only stared nkly for a short while and before realizing that Han Shuo had made some distance with her. Sophie knew that the Shrine of Ice was Han Shuo¡¯s enemy in Kasi Empire. Fearing that something bad would happen to Han Shuo, she chased up to him.

    It was when Han Shuo had just left the crowd, before he took off to the air, that he found out that the energy of the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ had disappeared. Han Shuo was certain that the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ was being kept away by someone, which exined why that previously released energy disappeared again.

    When that happened, Han Shuo grew even more anxious. He immediately deployed the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens and rapidly flew, continuing in that direction. He had to locate the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ before the thief left the area.

    Han Shuo flew with all his strength. In just a few minutes, he made it to the region where he sensed the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯. It was exactly the same expansive public square at which Han Shuo and Sophie stopped over previously. He looked as far as his eyes could see, but discovered no one suspicious. When he concentrated his attention to sense with his consciousness, he could no longer feel the energy from the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯.

    Han Shuo nced all around him once more as he wracked his brain for another solution. Braque seemed the most obvious suspect of swapping Han Shuo¡¯s wood attribute treasure ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯. But of course, Zofi and that upper-ss woman were not to be ruled out.

    Han Shuo was absolutely determined to obtain the wood attribute treasure. Unable to smoothly procure it with 300 thousand gold coins, Han Shuo had started to consider other means of taking possession of it. Although Zofi was rich and overbearing, he did not hold much power within Kasi Empire. As for that upper-ss woman, she didn¡¯t seem to be a particrly politically powerful character either. Otherwise, she wouldn¡¯t have given up when the bidding price reached 250 thousand gold coins.

    Having identified his objectives, Han Shuo was prepared to take the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ by force. In any case, he had already established a hostile rtionship with the Shrine of Ice in Kasi Empire. Han Shuo was not about to be heedful of someone like Braque.

    ¡°Han, what¡¯s wrong?¡± Han Shuo was still mulling in his head when Sophie hurried over to him, gasping for breath. As she did not summon her pegasus, this time, Sophie was even shorter on breath when she came over. Her chest was rising and falling, and seemed much bigger than usual.

    ¡°You! You hoodlum! What are you looking at!¡± Sophie immediately discovered that Han Shuo was looking in a strange direction, and yelled at him.

    ¡°I¡¯m¨C nothing, not looking at anything!¡± Han Shuo replied in a flurry. After that, he exined, ¡°I just sensed the Viride Leaf appearing here. But it seems that I¡¯m still toote. Whoever took it probably hid it away and brought it to another region.¡±

    ¡°Stop thinking about it. Just leave it to the auction house. This auction house is one of thergest in Kasi Empire. Even His Majesty owns a share in it. They¡¯ll settle it for you!¡± Sophie consoled Han Shuo.

    ¡°What if it was Braque who was behind it? Will they be able to handle it then?¡± Han Shuo raised a brow.

    Sophie shrugged and somewhat helplessly said, ¡°In that case, I don¡¯t know,¡±

    ¡°Alright, alright, let¡¯s stop worrying about that! Hmm, it¡¯s gettingte. How about we meet again tomorrow?¡± Han Shuo said as he raised his head to look at the sky. He intended to send Sophie away and look for people from the Dark Mantle to ask about the location of Braque¡¯s manor. And afterwards, at night, he would make a trip there to snatch the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯.

    ¡°It¡¯s still early, what are you rushing for! Hahah,e. First, I will bring you around to taste some interesting food. Then when the night falls, we will have a look at the nightscape of the well-known Riverie City of Kasi Empire!¡± Sophie had no intention of letting Han Shuo off so easily. She grasped at the corner of Han Shuo¡¯s robes and giggled as she pulled Han Shuo with her. She then continued, ¡°I¡¯m only tugging on the corner of your shirt, so this can¡¯t be considered as taking advantage of you!¡±

    Being hauled by Sophie as she headed to their destination, Han Shuo immediately understood the meaning behind those insinuating words. He could do nothing but force a smile and exin, ¡°Miss, that was due to the special circumstances of that time. Must you really hold such grudges even until now?¡±

    Sophie shot a nce at Han Shuo and replied, ¡°It¡¯s true that the circumstances were special. But hasn¡¯t that someone been acting a little too indecent while holding my hand?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind went nk for a moment, and only then did he recall that when he held Sophie¡¯s delicate hand before, he had been subconsciously rubbing his thumb against the back of it. He was used to such intimacy with Emily, Fanny, and Phoebe, and therefore he instinctively did the same to Sophie earlier.

    At that time, when Han Shuo became aware of his indecency, he immediately stopped. He even surreptitiously nced at Sophie. When he saw Sophie acting as though nothing happened, he assumed that she didn¡¯t mind it. But who knew that Sophie would so deliberately expose him at this time.

    Han Shuo¡¯s thick-skinned face blushed, but it was not visible as his skin was concealed. He awkwardly smiled and said in embarrassment, ¡°I did not notice it. Ha ha, sorry!¡±

    ¡°Humph! Don¡¯t think I will ever believe your barefaced lie!¡± Sophie pouted and shot a re at Han Shuo. But then, she magnanimously said, ¡°But I¡¯m a benevolent gentlewoman. As long as you keep mepany and entertain me, I shall pardon you!¡±

    ¡°Umm, but, if I remember correctly, it is me who is the guest right?¡± Han Shuo said with a forced smile.

    ¡°That¡¯s irrelevant. If I¡¯m happy, then you will be happy too!¡± Sophie giggled yfully. She started running as she towed Han Shuo, as though she wanted to make Han Shuo stagger.

    Han Shuo had experienced first-hand just how unforgiving Sophie was. Nevertheless, he didn¡¯t think that this kind of harmless, petty practical joke of hers was excessive. He deliberately walked unsteadily, as though he really was staggering. However, in this situation, Han Shuo would suddenly lean closely to Sophie, and might ¡®identally¡¯ bump with her body.

    Han Shuo mischievouslyughed in his heart, awfully delighted in his exploit.

 Chapter 493: The Viride Leaf That Flew Away

    GDK 493: The Viride Leaf That Flew Away

    Han Shuo had a wonderful time that evening. He first apanied Sophie to eat some well-known delicacies in Kasi Empire. They then spent time admiring the renowned nightscape of Reverie City.

    It was only after halfway through the night that Sophie was finally content and let Han Shuo off. However, giving the excuse that she dared not go back home and face her father, she got herself a room right beside Han Shuo¡¯s at the small hotel where he was staying.

    Han Shuo waited until Sophie fell asleep. Afterwards,te in the night, he snuck out the window and headed to an operation base of Dark Mantle in Kasi Empire.

    Given Han Shuo¡¯s honorable status in those days, he was immediately given the most prudent treatment when he arrived at the Dark Mantle operation base. From those men there, Han Shuo soon got hold of the address of Braque¡¯s manor in Kasi Empire, in addition to some information about the auction sale not known to anyone else.

    In the dead of night, after obtaining the information he needed from a Dark Mantle operation base, he silently broke into the manor in which Braque lived. He intended to look for the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ there and seize it. Incidentally, that would save him 300 thousand gold coins.

    The manor upied a massive plot ofnd. Upon Han Shuo¡¯s arrival, he unfolded his consciousness, and sensed which area was most concentrated with people. After the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ was kept away, it became rather challenging for Han Shuo to sense it using his consciousness. Han Shuo considered whether or not to employ certain radical measures.

    Against Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, when he was about to make a move and emerge from his hiding ce, he suddenly spotted a few familiar faces ¨C great swordmaster Gabriel andmander Ascher of the Gryphon Legion.

    Ascher was originally the city lord of Lancelot Empire¡¯s Valen City and themander of Gryphon Legion. There was a time that he enjoyed exalted prestige in thend of Lancelot Empire. But unfortunately, Ascher had even greater ambitions. With Han Shuo, Lawrence, and those from the Dark Mantle working together, they found evidence in the end that he was conspiring to revolt against the empire. With his treason exposed and failed, he had no choice but to escape Lancelot Empire.

    Ascher had two precious sons who were once Han Shuo¡¯s greatest enemies, which in the end were killed by Han Shuo one after the other. Soon after his offsprings were all butchered, Ascher was forced to the end of his rope, and had no choice but to go to Kasi Empire. Back then at the Valley of Sunshine, Gabriel once cooperated with the Rainbow Sickle mercenary band and almost injured Emily, but afterwards was seriously injured and fled.

    Soon after the two arrived at Kasi Empire, they managed to gang up with Bradley of Cesar City. It was no secret that Ascher was indeed quite a capable person. Even in Kasi Empire, he was highly valued by the House of Pillon, and was currently prospering.

    Braque seemed to be holding a private banquet in his manor. It was only to be expected that Han Shuo was able to find Gabriel and Ascher there.

    After Ascher and Gabriel entered the manor, Han Shuo saw that even more big shots of Kasi Empire came arriving in their luxurious carriages one after another. That big merchant Zofi he met at the auction house was clearly one of the many invited guests. Han Shuo had long before discovered him talking with enthusiasm and wit in the house.

    Shockingly, even that upper-ssdy that once bid andpeted for the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ was among the guests invited. She wore a splendid evening dress. Although she appeared brilliant, she had a worried frown on her face, obviously feeling distressed.

    Surveying from afar on the rooftop, Han Shuo turned over in his mind where the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ could possibly be. His consciousness constantly lingered around the manor. As all those characters who were most likely to vie over the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ all gathered in this ce, Han Shuo was convinced that the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ was undoubtedly within the manor.

    All of a sudden, Han Shuo¡¯s eyebrows were in a knit. He forced a smile and looked behind him. ¡°How did you get here?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, I¡¯ve long noticed that you were absent-minded this evening. I knew you would be up to something bad tonight, so I left some scent on you, and followed the fragrance straight to you. Humph. Thought you could shake me off? Not a chance!¡± Sophie said with acent smile after arriving nimbly on her pegasus.

    Han Shuo was dazed, but immediately came to his senses. Earlier when jesting with Sophie, he did seize the opportunity to lean closely to Sophie, therefore he got the delicate fragrance from her. Han Shuo thought that it was idental and didn¡¯t give much thought to it. But as it turned out, it was in fact an act Sophie did on purpose.

    ¡°Miss High and Mighty, if you keep following me, you will suffer bitterly sooner orter!¡± Han Shuo said helplessly, not knowing how to treat Sophie.

    ¡°I¡¯m not concerned about it. Why are you concerned for my sake?¡± Sophie said in her sweet voice. Soon after, she continued in an excited tone, ¡°You suspect that Braque took that thing away, and so you came here to investigate right?¡±

    ¡°Nope!¡± Han Shuo replied sinctly. When Sophie made a puzzled expression, he continued, ¡°I came here to plunder. When I find that thing, I will have it by any means necessary, and kill anyone that stands in my way!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t try to intimidate me, I won¡¯t be frightened.¡± Sophie took Han Shuo¡¯s words as a joke, and she replied in a chuckling manner.

    Han Shuo shook his head and sighed. Hemented in his heart, Women are indeed strange creatures. They never believe us when we tell them the truth. But when we tell them a lie, they take it as fact.

    Han Shuo¡¯s glistening eyes were firmly fixed on the banquet a distance away. He was racking his brain on how to locate the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯. Abruptly, he recalled of wood elite zombie. As an exotic being that was refined from the ce of extreme wood, the wood elite zombie should have possessed an even greater ability to sense the Viride Leaf, an item of the same origin.

    When that came to his mind, Han Shuo immediately took a few steps backward, not concerned that Sophie was watching by the side, and summoned the wood elite zombie.

    ¡°Huh? What for do you summon a zombie warrior?¡± Sophie asked puzzled, very much surprised about Han Shuo¡¯s action.

    Han Shuo did not answer Sophie, but using his consciousness, he began exining to wood elite zombie about the extraordinary and miraculous power of ¡®Viride Leaf. As Han Shuo exined, he could sense wood elite zombie¡¯s happiness. Although it hadn¡¯t been a long time since wood elite zombie was refined, he understood what Fire Lotus and golden cudgel were to fire elite zombie and metal elite zombie.

    And now, he to had the chance to have his very own treasure. Naturally, wood elite zombie became very excited!

    After Han Shuo exined the matter once through, the wood elite zombie immediately began to gaze at the manor afar with such excitement. A kind of energy as fresh and clean as nature was gradually released from wood elite zombie. He seemed to be sensing the existence of ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ through this method.

    ¡°Huh? Is that thing on him? Why does it feel as though he is the item?¡± Sophie was shocked. She pointed at wood elite zombie and cried out in astonishment.

    ¡°Of course not. If it was on him, why would I havee here?¡± Han Shuo refuted. He then exined, ¡°That thing is very useful to him. The reason I¡¯m willing to put forth a high price to acquire it is to let him have it.¡±

    ¡°For him? A zombie warrior? You, you really are an amusing person!¡± Sophie cried out in surprise as she pointed at wood elite zombie in disbelief.

    ¡°You wouldn¡¯t understand!¡± Han Shuo did not exin further, but kept his attention on wood elite zombie.

    With wood elite zombie doing its thing, the nts that epassed the manor came into motion without wind blowing, which appearedpletely bizarre. The freshness of nature filled the entire manor, as though the manor was covered by the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo saw wood elite zombie jolt. His consciousness also sensed wood elite zombie¡¯s iparable excitement. That kind of natural aura grew more and more intense.

    Han Shuo was shocked, he immediately understood that wood elite zombie must have detected the presence of the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯. Pleasantly surprised, he quickly asked, ¡±You found it?¡±

    Wood elite zombie nodded like a chick pecking on rice and appeared exceedingly excited. He pointed at the lounge far away and transmitted, ¡°In there! In there!¡±

    ¡°Who has it? Point it to me!¡± Han Shuo instantly became amazed as well. Rather than using his consciousness tomunicate, he actually uttered those words.

    After Han Shuo¡¯s soft shout sounded, wood elite zombie pointed at all the powerful nobilities that gathered in the lounge, and hastily described for Han Shuo, ¡°That that.... very fat one..... a fatty..... in his ring!¡±

    Observing from the side, Sophie saw Han Shuo shouting at wood elite zombie, and then saw wood elite zombie anxiously pointing at those in the lounge, as though describing something to Han Shuo. At this moment, Sophie was somewhat dumbfounded. She cluelessly stared at Han Shuo and wood elite zombie, unable to make out what in the world was going on between the human and zombie duo.

    Pop! It was at this moment, far away, the space ring that was on Zofi¡¯s finger, as he happily chatted away with an elegant, beautifuldy, all of a sudden exploded. Zofi¡¯s left hand was instantly shredded into a lump of badly mangled flesh. As Zofi miserably shrieked, the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ slowly flew out from his space ring, and made its way towards wood elite zombie.

    Those nobilities that were originally talking andughing in the lounge suddenly heard a small explosion, followed by Zofi¡¯s miserable screech. Each and every one of them had their focus turned to Zofi and they clearly saw his messed up left hand as well as that leaf-shaped ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ gradually flying out from the lounge.

    Everyone in the lounge was dumbfounded. Sophie was dumbfounded. Even Han Shuo was dumbfounded. He had absolutely no idea how wood elite zombie aplished that.

    Crying miserably, he pointed his right hand at the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ slowly drifting away and yelled, ¡°Arghh! Catch it! Catch it!¡±

    Braque had been inside the lounge when his expression changed. Before he could instruct his subordinate to make a move, that upper-ssdy who participated in the auction suddenly rushed out. With her two hands holding onto her tripping hazard of a skirt, she chased after the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ without any regards for her deportment.

 Chapter 494: Mission Accomplished

    GDK 494: Mission Aplished

    The sudden changes that urred to Zofi had attracted the attention of every guest in the lounge. When that upper-ssdy from the auction house suddenly chased after the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯, the party was even more shocked.

    From the moment that ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ flew out from the exploded space ring on Zofi¡¯s left hand, everyone in the lounge was silenced by the miserable shriek Zofi unceasingly let out. Braque only dazed very briefly before he gave Thuram beside him an order. In a deep and low voice, he said, ¡°Go grab it!¡±

    Thuram, without saying a word, immediately chased the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ as it shot away. He was close behind the upper-ssdy.

    On one of the roofs outside the manor, Han Shuo was rather dazed for some time. He stared nkly at the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ as it flew towards him. Everyone in the manor had their sights cast in that direction. Without thinking, Han Shuo realized that Sophie and he were certainly exposed.

    ¡°What is going on?¡± Han Shuo questioned wood elite zombie. The abnormality of the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ was obviously single-handedly caused by wood elite zombie. Han Shuo did not anticipate that wood elite zombie had such a remarkable ability.

    ¡°It, it is flying over by itself!¡± wood elite zombie replied somewhat unsurely, as though he was very much innocent.

    Han Shuo was startled. But shortly after, he recalled of the legends of the five elemental treasures. In the interpretation pertaining to the five elemental treasures that Chu Cang Lan left behind, it did mention that there existed some incredible sensing power between the treasures of the five elements and elite zombies of the five elements. The treasures of the five elements, formed by the umtion of nourishment in ces of extremes for millions and millions of years, not only contained miraculous energies, but also had the ability to select their own masters.

    Once this wood attribute treasure, a treasure produced from the ce of extreme wood, sensed the homologous aura emanating from wood elite zombie, it took wood elite zombie as the most suitable master for itself. Therefore, it actively broke away from the binding of Zofi¡¯s space ring and flew towards wood elite zombie, the master it had chosen.

    ¡°Now I see! Quickly receive it then!¡± Han Shuo softly said after he figured out what really was happening.

    At this moment, the upper-ssdy and Thuram were very close to catching up to the wood attribute treasure ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯. Moreover, the experts stationed inside the manor noticed the hiding ce of Han Shuo and Sophie, and a few of them were gaining on them. The frontmost expert had an unruffled face. He was none other than Sophie¡¯s father, sacred knight Sulo.

    Sophie looked on as her father, Sulo, approached closer and closer. The anxiety in her heart was clearly reflected on her face. She pestered, ¡°Hurry! My dad is almost here!¡±

    Under Han Shuo¡¯smand, wood elite zombie was also rather flustered as well. As the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ had yet to acknowledge him as master, wood elite zombie couldn¡¯t manipte the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ when they were separated by such a great distance. The trio could only helplessly look on as that upper-ssdy and Thuram gradually pulled closer to the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯.

    However, when the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ flew near to a big tree, a most bizarre transformation took ce! The ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ darted and astonishingly, it vanished into the big tree. By the time the upper-ssdy and Thuram were finally in front of that big tree, there was not a trail of the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯.

    Thuram was startled, with absolutely no clue what was going on. He instinctively withdrew the longsword he wore on himself. It looked as if he was nning to destroy the tree in order to dig out the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯.

    ¡°Stop!¡± At this moment, the upper-ssdy reached out her hand and halted Thuram in the act. Under the astounded, puzzled gaze of Thuram, the upper-ssdy quickly withdrew a staff which looked like multiple tree roots intertwined with each other, and began reciting an incantation.

    As the upper-ssdy chanted, the big tree before her started to rustle and tremble as though it were animated. The tree branches constantly wiggled like the tentacles of an octopus, exotic energy filled the big tree in an instant, spurring it to move.

    Suddenly, a cry of surprise sounded from among the crowd, ¡°She¡¯s a druid!¡±

    It was only now that those people discovered the real identity of the upper-ssdy. Typically, druids of the Druidic Order rarely ever left the forests. It was obviously rare to see an upper-ssdy attend a gathering of the privileged ss in a sumptuous evening dress to possess the mysterious energy of nature. Hence, it was not until she showcased her ability that the crowd found out her true identity.

    The crowd stared with more astonishment in their eyes than ever before. When shepleted her incantation, the tree twitched vigorously, but it gradually stopped trembling and soon returned normal.

    The upper-ssdy let out a gentle sigh. Shaking her head, she said in a very dispirited manner, ¡°It seems that the Druidic Order won¡¯t be able to reim the Hand of Goddess!¡±

    While the upper-ssdy was helplessly sighing, wood elite zombie, on the contrary, was shivering from head to toe with excitement. After the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ vanished into the big tree, it inexplicably appeared in the palm of wood elite zombie¡¯s hand. He sped the wood attribute treasure ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ with his two hands, as though it was something tremendously precious.

    ¡°Father, I have it! I have it!¡± wood elite zombie repeated in excitement.

    ¡°Identify yourselves!¡± before sacred knight Sulo had even reached here, he shouted loudly from afar in a most intimidating tone.

    ¡°Quickly, leave!¡± As Sophie hastened Han Shuo, she turned around in preparation to escape.

    Now that he had gotten a hold of the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯, it was no longer necessary for Han Shuo to remain there. Regardless of wood elite zombie still being in an extremely excited frame of mind, Han Shuo chanted a necromancy incantation and sent wood elite zombie back to theherworld.

    Just as Han Shuo was about to take to the air and leave, he found out that Sulo had cut across the great distances between them. Sulo wanted to yell at Han Shuo and Sophie to freeze, but when he suddenly saw Sophie¡¯s white pegasus, not a sound came out from his wide-open mouth. Sulo opened his eyes wide and stared at Han Shuo and Sophie as he forcibly swallowed back the loud yell that almost came out from his mouth.

    ¡°Fifi, what the hell are you doing? Who is this person?¡± Sulo originally explosive shout turned into a faint berate. Right after, before neither Sophie nor Han Shuo could reply, Sulo again softly yelled, ¡°No matter what, leave here first. I will give you a piece of my mind sometimeter!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, dad!¡± Sophie replied with a forced smile. Seeing that others from the manor were catching up soon, she pulled Han Shuo and said, ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡±

    ¡°Sorry!¡± Han Shuo found the time to bow at Sulo before he rapidly left with Sophie.

    Upon returning to the small hotel, Han Shuo was entirely free from worry, not in the slightest concerned about the affair in Braque¡¯s manor. Having obtained the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ without spending 300 thousand gold coins, Han Shuo had no reason not to be happy. He wasn¡¯t concerned about all those people from the manor, not even Sulo. Therefore, even though Sulo did see him and Sophie together, Han Shuo was not at all worried.

    On the opposite end of the spectrum, Sophie was anxious and restless as soon as she returned. She unceasingly fretted andined. Han Shuo consoled Sophie in every way possible for quite a while, and only then, although still somewhat distraught, did she return to her room and sleep.

    There were still another two days of auction sale to go. Based on intelligence obtained by the Dark Mantle, there truly was a copious amount of invaluable goods up for bidding, especially on the final day. There reportedly would be certain exceedingly rare materials that would be auctioned. But as for exactly what material they were, even those from the Dark Mantle couldn¡¯t unravel it. However, Han Shuo was still very much looking forward to the third and final day of the auction sale.

    Seeing that it was still early, Han Shuo took out the Soul Depository Ring which stored the soul of dark dragon Gilbert and chatted with him for a while. The main reason he did so was to keep Gilbert¡¯s soul active so as to avoid too much lifeless aura polluting him. Otherwise, in the future, after his physical body was reforged, it would be hard for him to regain that vitality he originally had.

    Afterward, Gilbert continued on his cultivation, while Han Shuo again attentively studied some abstruse necromancy magic books with diligence, not cking for a moment. It was Han Shuo¡¯s belief that the reason he could not grasp the Boundary of Aging all that while was that he was stillcking in his understanding of the essence of necromancy magic. He was convinced that once he umted insights up to a certain level, he would surely be able to make giant leaps in necromancy magic.

    It was almost sunrise, Han Shuo was still meticulously studying, delving into abstruse necromancy magic books. All of a sudden, he felt a kind of palpitating feeling. Han Shuo furrowed his brows and immediately unfolded his consciousness. In an instant, he sensed a boundless killing intent that originated in the distant Tarrag Canyon.

    Han Shuo was shocked and immediately realized that the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race had re-established a link with him. It seemed that after such a long time, that six-horned tribal king must have recovered from the injuries he received during the battle with the Saintess of the Church of Light.

    After the initial surprise, Han Shuo felt delighted. Being able to conceal his consciousness, Han Shuo had no need to be afraid of the menace of this six-horned tribal king. Han Shuo was certain that if Stratholme the old monster and Tiana had yet to fuse their souls with their Origin Crystals, the six-horned tribal king could certainly sense their presences as well.

    All the while, Han Shuo had been brimming with regret for failing to draw the six-horned tribal king to the Shrine of Ice thest time. Now that the creature had made aeback, contrary to what one might expect, Han Shuo was getting excited.

    Thus, not only did Han Shuo wait to conceal his consciousness, instead, using the wonderful power of his consciousness, he transmitted a provocative vibe to the six-horned tribal king over at Tarrag Canyon of the Brut Merchant Alliance thousands of miles away. The transmission included Han Shuo¡¯s feeling of despise and disdain towards him.

    Sure enough, as soon as Han Shuo transmitted this provocative vibe, he could sense the fury of the six-horned tribal king. What made Han Shuo even happier was, he discovered that the six-horned tribal king was in motion, right towards where he was!

 Chapter 495: Braingorge Rakshas

    GDK 495: Braingorge Rakshas

    On the second day, Han Shuo did not attend the auction sale.

    He had learned some information from the Dark Mantle beforehand and was already aware that there were no more goods on auction that would be of interest to him. Sophie came looking for Han Shuo early at dawn. When she found out that Han Shuo was not attending the auction, she yet again became exhrated and pulled Han Shuo along for sightseeing around a couple of ces of interest.

    This time, Sophie was finally doing the honors as a host. She took Han Shuo to visit several well-known scenic spots around Kasi Empire¡¯s Cesar City.

    Throughout their trip, Han Shuo was somewhat absent-minded. He could sense the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race approaching. That constant killing intent originating from the six-horned tribal king assured that Han Shuo was always reminded of the threat, causing Han Shuo to find it hard to loosen up and savor the joy of sightseeing to the fullest.

    In the blink of an eye, another day had passed and suddenly, it was the third day. Han Shuo finally gathered enough energy to show up at the auction house.

    Very soon after Han Shuo arrived, the same person in charge, Zarya, very promptly appeared at Han Shuo¡¯s side, perhaps due to the experience the day prior, in a most apologetic manner he said, ¡°I am truly sorry, we have yet to locate the item for the moment. Please give us some time.¡±

    With Viride Leaf secretly in his possession, Han Shuo nodded and magnanimously replied, ¡°Fine!¡±

    ¡°Thank you! We will certainly do our best to locate the item as soon as possible!¡± Zarya appearedpletely embarrassed. He beckoned at a server and instructed, ¡°Treat our distinguished guest well!¡±

    Having made the impressive feat of bidding 300 thousand gold coins at the auction two days prior, people unquestionably saw Han Shuo in a new light. When the auction began, Han Shuo stopped talking. He unfurled his consciousness and first made a round of inspection of all those inside the auction house before he turned his attention to the items put up for auction.

    ¡°Sir, may I have the seat beside you?¡± at this moment, that upper-ssdy who had been at Braque¡¯s dinner party suddenly walked to Han Shuo before she gracefully asked with her eyes fixed on him.

    ¡°Oh, of course!¡± Han Shuo shot a nce at her and gave a perfunctory reply. In his heart, however, he was somewhat surprised, not knowing what was this woman¡¯s intention was ining over to him.

    At Braque¡¯s party the night before, Han Shuo learned that she was a druid. In Kasi Empire, the Shrine of Ice reigned supreme. It was awfully rare for any other religions to make appearances; even more so for those of the Druidic Order.

    Han Shuo previously had dealings with great druid Caspian of the Druidic Order. He knew that the doctrine of the Druidic Order was towards a natural and harmonious life. Among them, those truly great druids rarely ever showed up in bustling human societies. Even for those who proselytize the teachings of the Druidic Order in human societies, they would do so in regions where the nts grew lush.

    Han Shuo rarely, if ever, met a druid like her who came and went about in the high society. On the night before, thisdy referred to wood attribute treasure ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ as ¡®Hand of Goddess¡¯. It appeared that she had a certain understanding of the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯. The Druidic Order revered nature. Incidentally, the wood attribute treasure could make nts of the wood attribute grow with greater vitality while possessing some wonderful and miraculous abilities. It was rather interesting that thisdy regarded the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ as the hand of the Goddess of Nature.

    ¡°They call me Lilian. I¡¯m a druid of the Druidic Order,¡± she introduced herself to Han Shuo immediately after she sat down.

    Han Shuo nodded at her with a smile but did not say a word. There certainly must have been a reason that this woman came over. Based on Han Shuo¡¯s observation, the matter she wanted to talk about must have had something to do with the Viride Leaf.

    ¡°I hope that you can sell the Hand of Goddess to me. The Hand of Goddess belongs with our Druidic Order. I hope that you will grant us this goodwill,¡± Lilian said in a low voice with her eyes concentrated on Han Shuo.

    Thisdy looked to be around thirty years old. She had fair skin and a lithe figure. Her looks weren¡¯t particrly outstanding, and was only barely enough to be considered elegant. However, she exudes such dignity that only a true upperssman would have. With this quality of hers in y, her originally average looks turned to be rather attractive.

    Han Shuo swept his gaze one round at Lilian before he smilingly said, ¡°You know, that thing is not in my hands. I¡¯m very sorry!¡±

    Lilian looked at Han Shuo with her dewy eyes. After some hesitation, she said, ¡°What if that thing is in your hand?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyebrows were in a knit and his expression turned rather gloomy. He asked, ¡°What exactly do you mean?¡±

    Lilian¡¯s heart froze as though her whole body had been submerged under arctic waters. In spite of being inside the morous hall of the auction house, Lilian did not feel the slightest sense of security. As a druid of the Druidic Order, Lilian possessed sensing power much more sensitive than that of a regr person. So, she immediately knew what this sensation signified.

    If this simple, honest-looking fatty wanted to kill her, she would have absolutely no room for resisting!

    Lilian was overwhelmed with shock. She rified, ¡°What I meant was, in the case that the auction house found our Druidic Order¡¯s Hand of Goddess for you, would you please resell it to us? We are willing to acquire it for an even higher price!¡±

    At this moment, Sophie, who was sitting beside Han Shuo, yanked the corner of his shirt. It seemed that Sophie too had sensed the killing intenting from Han Shuo, and therefore reminded Han Shuo of the current settings.

    The cold gloom on his face was shed and reced with an ordinary smile. Heughed and said, ¡°Ah! So that¡¯s the case! Let¡¯s talk about thister when the timees. Perhaps when the auction house finds the item for me!¡±

    Two days prior, thisdy appeared as though she was rathercking in money. Who could have anticipated that after just such a short while, she would actually be willing to offer a higher price to purchase the item? Thisdy ought to have raised enough funds, otherwise, she definitely wouldn¡¯t have said so.

    ¡°Sir, that item is very important to our Druidic Order. If you are willing to resell it to us, our Druidic Order will be most grateful,¡± Lilian continued while looking at Han Shuo somewhat pleadingly after she made out the dismissive expression on Han Shuo¡¯s face.

    ¡°I don¡¯t expect to ever obtain the item myself. If you have time on your hand, you¡¯re better off getting in touch with the auction house. Perhaps they have another one for sale. Who knows?¡± Han Shuo was absolutely not about pass the Viride Leaf to another person. It was insurmountably beneficial to wood elite zombie. Moreover, Han Shuo depended on wood elite zombie to unleash the full might of the Penta-elemental Undead Formation.

    Staring at Han Shuo, Lilian opened her mouth and was about to say something, but hesitated. Perhaps it was because she recalled the frightening killing intent Han Shuo disyed just before, she did not continue her speech.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t know why but when he looked at Lilian¡¯s hesitative expression, in his heart, he would indistinctly feel as if she actually knew that the ¡®Viride Leaf¡¯ was in his possession. This feeling waspletely baffling. Han Shuo gave a couple of nces and carefully observed her. From her adamant eyes, he seemed to realize something.

    How did she know? No way! Han Shuo was baffled. He hesitated for a while before trying to probe her, ¡°How many gold coins can you put forth?¡±

    Immediately after Han Shuo uttered those words, Lilian was pleasantly surprised and said, ¡°You are willing to sell it to us?¡±

    This led Lilian to be unequivocally convinced that Han Shuo was in possession of the item. It was only so that she had reacted this way. Han Shuo noticed her reaction right away as he attentively observed her. He was sure that she had figured out that the Viride Leaf was in his hands, although he couldn¡¯t tell exactly how.

    ¡°Well, if you offer a reasonable bargain, when I finally receive the item, I will consider selling it to you!¡± Han Shuo casually replied.

    ¡°350 thousand gold coins. What say you?¡± Lilian hastily responded.

    Hmm, not as well-off as I thought. Merely an additional 50 thousand gold coins. Han Shuo thought to himself.

    ¡°400 thousand gold coins! That¡¯s as much as I can offer. I beg you, please, that is all that we coulde up with!¡± Seeing that Han Shuo was keeping silence, Lilian assumed that Han Shuo was not satisfied with the price of 350 thousand gold coins, and therefore said to Han Shuo almost pleadingly.

    With such a ssydy entreating him in such a soft and servile manner, if it weren¡¯t for the fact that the Viride Leaf was so important to wood elite zombie, Han Shuo would have actually agreed.

    ¡°Pretty good price. I will consider it!¡± Han Shuo helplessly sighed and replied Lilian with a courteous smile.

    ¡°The Brain-Eating Beast. It is an unusually strange magical creature. It doesn¡¯t have crystal cores and it survives by eating the brains of humans and magical creatures. It is said to only exist deep under the easternmost seas of Profound Continent. Very difficult to capture. Any children born with learning difficulties, as long as they consume the Brain-Eating Beast, will regain their intelligence and be even smarter than the average child. Additionally...,¡± the auctioneer¡¯s high spirited voice sounded.

    Han Shuo felt like he was on ecstasy. For the first time, he gathered his attention and cast his sights on the item on stage. He no longer attended to Lilian, who was jabbering beside him.

    In Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memory, the Brain-Eating Beast was called the Braingorge Rakshas ¨C a rare, unique creature. After reforging GIlbert¡¯s physical flesh and bones, Han Shuo was most concerned about the restoration of Gilbert¡¯s brain tissue. But if Han Shuo could get hold of a Braingorge Rakshas, he wouldn¡¯t need to worry about this issue. So long as he managed to resolve this final significant hurdle, and after collecting some more materials, Han Shuo could practically get down to reconstruct Gilbert a new physical body right away.

    Thus, just like the wood attribute treasure Viride Leaf, Han Shuo was determined to win home the Braingorge Rakshas.

 Chapter 496: Not Your Goddamn Business

    GDK 496: Not Your Goddamn Business

    The Braingorge Rakshas was a type of soft-bodied ocean creature that survived by feeding on the brains of humans and beasts. They gained ess to the brain by boring through the eyes, nostrils, or ears of their prey.

    They would only appear in the deepest parts of the seas. Their bodies of soft, flexible tissue could rapidly reconnect even if they had been chopped into multiple pieces. Besides setting it aze in a raging fire, most attacks hardly had any effect on them. As they lived in the depths of the ocean, it was not an easy task for an average person to injure them through arson.

    To Han Shuo¡¯s knowledge, this rare creature known as the Braingorge Rakshas was of all sorts of uses. If used as medicine, it could be refined into a cognitive-enhancing pill, severed limbs could be re-joined if applied externally. What¡¯s more, by utilizing demonic arts with a few special materials, it could even be refined into a demonic weapon which could shatter the brain of any creature with just sound waves.

    Of course, its most wondrous use is its ability to restore the brainpower of humans and beasts. Han Shuo suspected that the Braingorge Rakshas¡¯ consumption of the brains of other creatures granted their flesh wonderful healing property for the human brain. For a demonic art practitioner like Han Shuo, by making use of the amazing properties of a Braingorge Rakshas¡¯ body, Han Shuo could entirely construct himself a brain that was a carbon copy of his own. With that, even if his head were shattered during certain great battles, as long as his consciousness was not scattered, he could use the brain refined from Braingorge Rakshas to take the ce, and still live free and unfettered as before.

    In his undertaking of reconstructing Gilbert a new physical body, Han Shuo had the most headache when it came to reforging the brain. Braingorge Rakshas were ssified as those kinds of rare, precious creatures that one could onlye across in some fortuitous encounter. Han Shuo had never expected to ever obtain a Braingorge Rakshas. In fact, he even nned to use other material in its ce for structuring Gilbert¡¯s new brain. To his surprise, he managed to see such a precious good at the auction sale.

    It was for all these reasons that when the auctioneer screeched as he exined the wonderful uses of the Braingorge Rakshas that Han Shuo was so excited and no longer cared about Lilian¡¯s insistence for the Viride Leaf.

    ¡°Brain-Eating Beast. Starting price 10 thousand gold coins. May the highest bidder win!¡± After a round of shouting, the auctioneer announced the beginning bid in a manner which stoked the audience.

    There truly were quite a number of people interested in the item. Right after the auctioneer¡¯s shriek fell, from the second and third floors, rows of eye-catching red lights lit up as people triggered their bidding devices as though their lives depended on it. Perhaps unable to repress their excitement, sounds of people gasping for breath could even be heard from a few VIP rooms. Evidently, there were some who werepletely engrossed in this auction item.

    ¡°The Finance Minister¡¯s son, and the Defense Minister¡¯s grandson, Oh yea, and the Imperial Chief Magus¡¯s daughter, seemed to be somewhat mentally challenged!¡± Sophiemented in a low voice as though she was grieving for those pitiful fes.

    No wonder! Han Shuo thought to himself. Right away, he understood that it would be yet another brute battle today. He couldn¡¯t help but concentrate his attention on the Braingorge Rakshas disyed on stage as he listened to the ever-climbing valuation, waiting for a suitable timing to stick in.

    All of a sudden, Han Shuo had a feeling in his gut that something was amiss. This sensation had not originated from the gradually approaching six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race. Han Shuo carefully sensed for a moment, and suddenly realized that unconsciously, the temperature of the entire auction house had slowly decreased by a few degrees.

    Han Shuo creased his brows, and it was clear to him in a split second. Immediately, he spread out his consciousness far and wide like a spider web, bit by bit extending outwards with him at the center. In the entire region, not the tiniest movement could escape Han Shuo¡¯s perception.

    Water divine magus Tiana, a demi-god, wore a white magical gown from head to toe, appearing on the top of a building outside the auction ce at an unknown time. She wore a solemn expression and had water mists curling around her. Her silvery long hair was fluttering about in the wind. With a magical staff in her hand and her eyes closed, she softly chanted phrases of some magical spell.

    Over at the entrance outside the auction house was Ice Celestial Corey holding his sword, standing tall with a grave and stern look. His head was raised and gazing at Snow Celestial Tiana standing on top of the auction house. They appeared to bemunicating about something without using sound.

    The Shrine of Ice¡¯s Ice Celestial Corey and Snow Celestial Tiana, two demigods and the mightiest existences within Kasi Empire all of a sudden gathered at the auction house. What this meant was extremely obvious ¨C his trail had been exposed!

    Having experienced countless battles throughout the years, Han Shuo had been through all kinds of situations. Even as things hade to this stage, he didn¡¯t reveals any signs of anxiousness. He even put on a rather tranquil and calm smile on his face. He turned his head and looked deep into Sophie and said in a voice so low that only she could hear, ¡°Sophie, leave me now. Look for a washroom and restore your original appearance!¡±

    ¡°Why?¡± Sophie was somewhat puzzled.

    ¡°If you trust me, do as I say. Otherwise you will just be bringing me trouble!¡± Han Shuo knew that Sophie was one that would not simply look on if her friend was in trouble. If he told her that he would only cause her problems instead, Sophie would neverply.

    However, Han Shuo had underestimated Sophie¡¯s intelligence. ¡°Is your enemy here?¡± She only stared nkly for a short while before she realized what was going on and began to scout in all directions, as though she were trying to help Han Shuo ferret out his enemies.

    Sighing to himself, Han Shuo realized that if he didn¡¯t employ some radical means, it wouldn¡¯t be easy to make Sophie leave.

    While the audience was still persistently and extravagantly bidding up the price of the Braingorge Rakshas, Han Shuo, who had been silently sitting all the while, suddenly rose to his feet.

    ¡°Hey! Friend over at No.83, you have yet to show your hand today! Haha, are you going to make a move now?¡± when the auctioneer saw Han Shuo abruptly standing up, he thought that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t resist anymore and would finally make a move, and therefore he shouted with excitement.

    The auctioneer had witnessed for himself Han Shuo¡¯s courage just two days prior. He had presided over many of the past triennial auction sales and rarely encountered characters who would raise the price by 50 thousand gold coins with each bidding. Thus, when Han Shuo reappeared today, the auctioneer had been secretly keeping a close watch of Han Shuo. In fact, he was the first person to notice Han Shuo stand up, and he right away announced it in his distinctively sharp voice.

    ¡°That¡¯s right! I¡¯m going to make a move!¡± Han Shuo revealed a rather sinister smile.

    The auctioneer responded with a bellyugh. When he was about to add a few words to enliven the atmosphere, all of a sudden, his face turned rigid. He looked at Han Shuo confoundedly, and said, ¡°Wait, what are you doing?¡±

    With everyone watching, at a speedpletely disproportionate to his build, Han Shuo streaked across the hall andnded on the stage like lightning. Before anyone could even react, the Braingorge Rakshas stored in its special container was already in Han Shuo¡¯s hand. They watched as Han Shuo fiddled with it a while, nodded, and simply chucked it into his own space ring. It was as though the Braingorge Rakshas was something inside his house that fell off and he was just casually picking it up. His actions just seemed inexplicably smooth and natural.

    ¡°This is not to the rules! This is absolutely not in line with the rules!¡± Suddenly, from the second and third floors came flustered and exasperated loud shouts. Those whose sons or grandsons were institutionalized for insanity started babbling and making noise as though they themselves were headed for the asylum.

    ¡°How many gold coins is it at?¡± Han Shuo asked the auctioneer with a fantastical smile on his face while being watched by every person on and off stage.

    ¡°Friend, even if you are rolling in gold coins, it is still inappropriate to do whatever it is you¡¯re doing, don¡¯t you think?¡± Braque over at the third floor was standing by the window. Although his face was obviously somewhat displeased, his manner of speaking could still be regarded as restrained, all thanks to his many years of nobility etiquette education.

    Han Shuo raised his head to look at Braque up on the third floor. That arrogance of Braque¡¯s made Han Shuo very much irritated. Thereupon, Han Shuo stuck out his ¡®big belly¡¯, revealed a silly smile, and rudely said to Braque, ¡°Not your goddamn business!¡±

    The audience sank into turmoil!

    Compared to the bold and financially unconstrained way Han Shuo bid thest time, themotion he caused this time was far more intense. Much of the audience stared foolishly at Han Shuo, with absolutely no clue as to how this seemingly simple-minded fatty could behave in such a reckless manner.

    From among the audience, Sophie watched on as Han Shuo performed this deviant and unreasonable behavior, she simply didn¡¯t know what to do. She looked at that unsightly face of Braque¡¯s in absolute disbelief, and turned her sight to that insufferably arrogant Han Shuo. At this moment, Sophie was pleased, yet worried.

    Throughout his life, Braque had never, ever before been disgraced in such a way in any public ces. As one of the key descendants of the Pillon Royal Family, all those who met with Braque would deliberately fawn on him. Commoners, bandits, no matter how crude or unmannerly, would conceal theirmon day insolence before Braque.

    But unexpectedly, truly unexpectedly, right there in that auction house where the gentries gathered, an honest-looking fatty of unknown origin had actually just said the words ¡®not your goddamn business¡¯ to him in front of all these people. The graceful and gentle mask that Braque wore in his ordinary days vanished from the face of the earth. Even that dagger-disguised smile waspletely shredded. In an ashen face, he pointed at Han Shuo and said in a somewhat trembling voice, ¡°Wha- What did you say? You dare say it one more time?¡±

    ¡°Not your goddamn business! Not your goddamn business! Not your goddamn business!¡± Right after, he extended three fingers towards Braque and added, ¡°Three times!¡±

    The auctioneer looked towards Braque fearfully and said, ¡°Sir, even though two days ago a mishap happened with your item because of ourpses, you cannot simply do this to us!¡±

    ¡°Thuram! Finish him for me! No matter who he is, it is a capital offense to offend members of the House of Pillon!¡± Braque could no longer contain his anger. Pointing at Han Shuo, Braque gave the bodyguard beside him themand to kill.

    ¡°As you bid, Master!¡± Thuram replied sinctly, with a longsword in hand, he leapt down from the third floor. Silvery fighting aura began overflowing, leaving a spectacr brilliance.

    However, before Thuram¡¯s strike could do anything, Han Shuo, who was looking at Braque with all smiles, suddenly threw a punch from the stage. A streak of red radiance shed through and hit right in the middle of the silvery fighting aura striking downwards. In an instant, an intense sound of metals colliding rang out. Thuram, along with the longsword in his hand, was thrown high up into the air, directly flying back to the third-floor room where Braque was at.

    The speed at which Thuram flew upwards was even faster than when he was descending. Seeing that Thuram was going to collide with Braque, a human figure suddenly appeared and hastily reached out to catch Thuram in his path in order to avoid Braque being injured.

    The person who suddenly came forth and caught Thuram was none other than Sophie¡¯s father, sacred knight Sulo. When he got hold of Thuram, he discovered that Thuram had broken quite a few ribs, while a tremendous force came from Thuram¡¯s body which caused him to feel extremely unwell!

    Sulo¡¯s expression abruptly changed. He thought to himself, Who is this person? How could he possess such terrifying strength?

 Chapter 497: They Are Actually Looking For Me!

    GDK 497: They Are Actually Looking For Me!

    ¡°How many gold coins?¡± While every person in the room gazed at Han Shuo in shock, Han Shuo turned his sight to the auctioneer and repeated his question.

    The Shrine of Ice¡¯s Ice Celestial and Snow Celestial were right outside the auction house while even more experts unceasingly converged towards the area, gradually surrounding the entire building. It appeared that they were nning to keep Han Shuo in the auction house forever.

    ¡°A... A hundred fifteen thousand gold coins!¡± Faced with Han Shuo who was disying a most imposing demeanor, the auctioneer finally replied.

    After nodding his head, Han Shuo took out three magic crystal cards from his space ring, each with a denomination of 50 thousand gold coins. Tossing them to the auctioneer, he said, ¡°Here are 150 thousand gold coins. I¡¯m taking it home!¡±

    These magic crystal cards were the kind that did not require a password for transactions to proceed. As long as the benefactor had authorized it in advance, the beneficiary could take the magic crystal cards to any magic crystal tradingpany and instantly withdraw gold coins. Before leaving Brettel City, Han Shuo had Jack prepare these for him for his convenience. For races like the dwarfs, they did not have magic crystal instations for converting gold coins. If Han Shuo merely used his own crystal card, he wouldn¡¯t be able to hand over arge quantity of gold coins to the dwarves. Using these magic crystal cards would obviously be much more convenient.

    ¡°But, but....¡± the auctioneer was clearly aware that the Braingorge Rakshas could fetch a higher price. Hence, after sessfully catching the three magic crystal cards containing 150 thousand gold coins, he anxiously looked at Han Shuo and stuttered.

    ¡°It¡¯s about time, isn¡¯t it?¡± Han Shuo groaned before he shot a nce at Sophie far away in the hall, hinting her to leave as soon as possible as to avoid attracting trouble.

    Han Shuo¡¯s actions were simply robbing in the public. As a gifted sky rider who was rather reputable in Kasi Empire, although Sophie was rather delighted about how impolite Han Shuo was towards Braque, she dared not to say a thing to Han Shuo at this moment, especially when her father, sacred knight Sulo, was still present with Braque in his room.

    ¡°Father-inw!¡± Suddenly, from a VIP room on the third floor, the nervous Braque called out to sacred knight Sulo after staring at Thuram who copsed at his feet.

    Sulo¡¯s name was known to everyone in Kasi Empire. When Braque saw that Thuram was sent flying backward with one punch from Han Shuo, in an extremely frightened state of mind, he atst understood just how formidable this seemingly naive fatty was. Fortunately, Sulo was right beside him. Therefore, Braque remained rather calm even though Thuram was wounded. At this moment, he was looking at Sulo with anxious eyes, obviously hoping and pleading for Sulo to get involved.

    In any case, Sulo was a sacred knight! In Braque¡¯s mind, a sacred knight was the mightiest existence on the continent!

    Sulo understood in his heart that Han Shuo and Sophie must have been well acquainted, and the two might even have had some friendly rtions. However, with thingsing to this, with Braque beseeching, Sulo seemingly had no other option. Therefore, with a grave expression, Sulo nodded his head at Braque¡¯s earnest request.

    ¡°This mister over here, you have broken the established rules of the auction house. Please hand over the item, and participate in the regr manner!¡± standing by the window, Sulo said with a solemn face while looking at Han Shuo.

    Inside the auction hall, those gentries who had been stunned by Han Shuo¡¯s actions suddenly came to their senses. Some among them had previously met sacred knight Sulo. Now when sacred knight Sulo¡¯s voice sounded, every single member of the audience became even more amazed and began making a racket in their discussions.

    Had it been arge scale battle, those cowards would have immediately fled the battleground. However, as they observed that only Han Shuo and sacred knight Sulo were here, out of curiosity, they couldn¡¯t help but stay to watch from the sidelines.

    ¡°Sir, what do you mean by this?¡± Zarya, the person-in-charge, lead a group of servers and appeared out of nowhere. Zarya had a rather unsightly look as he asked Han Shuo while repressing the rage in his heart.

    Originally, Zarya still harbored regret towards Han Shuo. However, when he saw Han Shuo¡¯s reckless and outrageous actions from backstage, he was furious. This auction sale in Kasi Empire, which was held every three years, had never before born witness to such an incident. No matter how much someone wanted an item, they would, at most, covertly set about obtaining it using their powers after the auction sale was over.

    But as for Han Shuo¡¯s actions of snatching the item in the auction hall right before the crowd, that had never ever happened before!

    The situation was clear, Han Shuo had obtained the hostility of every person.

    ¡°My apologies. Actually, truth be told, I wished to participate andpete in ordance with the rules as well. However, due to some special circumstances, I really had no choice but to do this!¡± Han Shuo said as he shrugged at Zarya. Sensing that certain experts from the Shrine of Ice were approaching, Han Shuo yet again signaled Sophie with his eyes and intended to burst through a door and leave at once.

    Swoosh!

    All of a sudden, sacred knight Sulo leaped downwards, falling right for Han Shuo. Sulo did not withdraw a weapon, and yet, an extremely ferocious demeanor was automatically discharged from his body. In midair, Sulo extended his two hands, golden fighting aura as bright as the sun blossomed from his palms.

    ¡°No!¡± Sophie suddenly yelled from among the audience.

    Han Shuo noticed Sophie¡¯s yell and that Sulo¡¯s attack was not meant to be lethal. Han Shuo creased his brows and shot a nce at Sophie before he abruptly retreated. He did not bother about Sulo¡¯s offense but headed straight for the door.

    Thest time they met outside of Braque¡¯s manor, Sulo did not engage Han Shuo because of Sophie. Although this time Sulo did take up arms against Han Shuo as he had to give Braque face, the attack he made obviously was not intended to kill. Therefore, for these reasons, Han Shuo found it inappropriate to injure Sulo. All he could do was evade Sulo¡¯s attack and depart as soon as possible.

    ¡°Friend! Really, the person they are looking for is me!¡± when Han Shuo was about to kick apart a stone wall of the auction ce and leave, from not far behind Han Shuo, an old man who was past his prime suddenly spoke.

    This old man had a head full of messy green hair, which looked like rice straws growing on his head. From his appearance, he ought to have lived for a long, long time, evident from the deep traces time had left on his face.

    Right when Han Shuo first stepped into the auction house, he surveyed once through each and every person in there, which of course, included this old man. At that time, when Han Shuo examined this old man, he had not paid any particr attention to him, as he did not sense any overwhelming presenceing off from this old man. However, right when Han Shuo was about to make an escape before those from the Shrine of Icepletely deployed their forces all around, Han Shuo felt an exotic sensation, as though the gay wind of spring blew over him when this old man talked.

    Han Shuo was startled in his heart and immediately unfolded his consciousness beforepletely casting it onto this old man. He found out that although he appeared as though he might kick the bucket anytime soon, his body was in fact abundant and overfilled with exuberant life force.

    Inside this old man¡¯s body, Han Shuo felt the energy which brought him the feeling of vast green forests. This kind of energy brimming with vigorous vitality was more than ten times greater than that of the rapidly approaching sacred knight Sulo.

    Han Shuo understood that the mightier the strength of a being, the greater their life force became. This old man could possess such an enormous amount of life force and could even be concealed from Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. This indicated that he possessed strength at least equal to Han Shuo, otherwise Han Shuo would have detected it earlier.

    Having made such a discovery, Han Shuo was shocked. Soon after, he understood the true meaning of the old man¡¯s words. Looking at the old man with a startled face, Han Shuo asked, ¡°You mean those men from the Shrine of Ice outside are after you?¡±

    The old man nodded. Forcing a smile, he said, ¡°That¡¯s right! Me.¡±

    Bang!

    At this moment, a loud explosion sounded from the roof of the auction house. In shock, the crowd raised their heads and looked upwards. Arge crack busted open in the roof of the auction house, through which a woman obscured with faint mist gradually descended.

    Simultaneously, the entrance of the auction house was suddenly opened wide. With Ice Celestial Corey leading, a crowd of experts of the Shrine of Ice walked in with stern expressions on their faces. Just as Ice Celestial Corey walked in, he began to chuckle. ¡°Great Master Kelly, why didn¡¯t you look for your old friends to gather when you arrived in Kasi Empire? This isn¡¯t quite polite of you!¡±

    Han Shuo carefully took a quick look. He saw that although Ice Celestial Corey was very joyous in hisughter, his expression was thin and pallid. It seemed that for the recent period of time, Corey must have been sorely miserable. When Han Shuo came to think of it, it actually made perfect sense to him. The Shrine of Ice had exhausted great amount of resources in the God-Making Project, only to be sabotaged by Han Shuo at the most critical moment. Not only were all their specialists killed by metal elite zombie, they even lost sacred grade experts.

    Even in the Shrine of Ice, every single sacred grade expert counted. With each death of their sacred grade experts, the Shrine of Ice would suffer incalcble losses. As the highest leader of the Shrine of Ice, not only had Ice Celestial Corey not witnessed the Shrine increase in strength during his reign, but on the contrary, he saw it weaken bit by bit under his leadership. It would be strange to be able to feel happy.

    Indeed! They aren¡¯t after me at all! Han Shuo was astounded. Then, he further discovered that when Ice Celestial Corey made an entrance, Corey¡¯s gaze nevernded on Han Shuo. It appeared that after changing his looks and before he made an attack, Ice Celestial Corey actually couldn¡¯t recognize Han Shuo.

    ¡°Sage, what should we do?¡± druid Lilian, who had been jabbering on and on beside Han Shuo, actually went to the old man and asked in a respectful manner.

    When Lilian said those words, Han Shuo suddenly understood what was really going on. When he gave another look at this old man, sensing the energy full of vitality inside his aged body, Han Shuo immediately realized that he must be a prominent character in the Druidic Order. As to why such a big shot would appear at the auction house, Han Shuo also faintly apprehended that.

    It appeared that he was there for what the Druidic Order referred to as the ¡®Hand of Goddess¡¯!

 Chapter 498: Old Scores to Settle

    GDK 498: Old Scores to Settle

    ¡°Corey, long time no see indeed. But this time, we didn¡¯te to Kasi Empire to bother the Shrine of Ice, nor were we nning to publicize the doctrines of our Druidic Order in your Kasi Empire. It¡¯s not necessary to muster suchrge forces just to wee me, don¡¯t you think?¡± This elderly known as Kelly looked at Ice Celestial Corey with a spurious smile, seemingly unafraid of this character who presided over the Shrine of Ice.

    Han Shuo knew that Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s influences were not limited to just within the Shrine of Ice. If Corey let out a word, even His Majesty the King of Kasi Empire himself was obliged to listen carefully.

    That was because Ice Celestial Corey was precisely the oldest progenitor of the Pillon Royal Family!

    For so many years, the House of Pillon retained their firm grasp of authority over Kasi Empire. Any rebellion within Kasi Empire could be instantly quelled whenever there was one. The reason for this was directly connected with Ice Celestial Corey. Even the incumbent His Majesty the King of Kasi Empire was well aware of the significance of Ice Celestial Corey to their House of Pillon as well as their Kasi Empire.

    ¡°Oh well, you can¡¯t me me for that. You wouldn¡¯t easily leave the Druidic Order headquarters, but all of a sudden you¡¯ve stepped into the soil of our Kasi Empire. It is unavoidable that I would assume you intend to take revenge on us!¡± Corey disyed the proper respect towards Kelly in their discourse. Although Corey had an ostensible motive to kill, he nevertheless remained courteous on the surface.

    The Shrine of Ice possessed absolute autonomy within Kasi Empire. Ever since the establishment of Kasi Empire, the Shrine of Ice took the position of the state religion of the Empire. For many years, the Shrine of Ice had taken advantage of their unsurpassed influence in Kasi Empire and destroyed all other religious organizations with conflicting interest to its own.

    The Druidic Order, as a religious organization whose influences could be found throughout the Profound Continent, was among those who suffered a catastrophic blow within Kasi Empire. Even until this day, there was not a single shrine of the Druidic Order within thend of Kasi Empire. All the more, followers of the Druidic Order rarely ever appeared in Kasi Empire.

    These extremist practices of the Shrine of Ice had once greatly enraged mighty experts of the Druidic Order who had always been aloof from worldly affairs. Infuriated, they seemed to have fought against the Shrine of Ice in the dark. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t clear about the particrs of the struggle, although he did learn from a certain record in the Dark Mantle that the Druidic Order had the upper hand for a short period of time.

    However, as the elder of the Pillon Royal Family, Ice Celestial Corey had the backing of the entire Kasi Empire. The Druidic Order was without a doubt no match for the Shrine of Ice in the long run when the fight took ce within Kasi Empire. Although the Druidic Order was once briefly on the winning side of the fight, in the end, their influences were driven out from Kasi Empirepletely.

    Just from the fact that one could, at that point, find not a single church of the Druidic Order within Kasi Empire, one could clearly tell that the two religious organizations were having shings and as ipatible as fire and water.

    Ice Celestial Corey obviously had to rush over when he caught wind of the arrival of Kelly, a character from the Druidic Order who possessed at least demigod strength.

    All of a sudden, Snow Celestial Tiana, who had remained stationary on the rooftop of the auction house, announced with her tender voice, ¡°Citizens of Kasi Empire, please evacuate from the auction house immediately. Auction items and programs remaining for today may carry on on another day!¡±

    The mor inside the auction house suddenly hushed following the appearance of those from the Shrine of Ice. When they subsequently heard Corey¡¯s words, they managed to put the clues together and gradually realized what was going on. At the sound of Tiana¡¯s alert, each and every one these people wore terrified looks on their faces, immediately leaving the auction house without saying a word.

    Certain truly influential officials and big shots in Kasi Empire were very much aware of who was actually behind these fanatical devotees of the Shrine of Ice. They obviously wouldn¡¯t dare offend this most enormous institution in Kasi Empire. Those lesser nobilities, although they were not aware of Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s identity, they nevertheless dared not to offend the Shrine of Ice in the slightest, and hence obediently followed the instructions and left.

    Besides, the circumstances in the auction house hadpletely changed in those few short moments prior. The battle had earlier been between just Han Shuo and sacred knight Sulo, and Han Shuo had yet to really make a lethal strike. Wanting to see more, spectators merely remained in their seats.

    The moment these feverish disciples of the Shrine of Ice showed up, they realized that things were not as simple as they had guessed. Any citizen of Kasi Empire was vaguely familiar with the grudges between the Shrine of Ice and the Druidic Order. Many years back, the two religious organizations set off rains of blood and carnage in Kasi Empire. This information had been widely spread among many nobilities with the propaganda of a certain party.

    Thus, for all these reasons, right when the crowd discovered that the matter had something to do with the many years of grievances between the two religious organizations, they instantly understood that there would be a bloody battle in this auction house. These people, being as high status as they were, we¡¯re not about to risk sticking around in this ce to suffer unknown dangers that could strike at any moment. It was the wisest choice for them to distance themselves from the auction house as much as they could.

    The Druidic Order was a religion that professed faith in nature, and treasured all living beings. They would never, ever advocate to willfully ughter the innocent. Hence, although Kelly and Lilian knew that Snow Celestial Tiana evacuated everyone in order to deal with the two without any hindrance, they nheless did not capture anyone from the general public as hostages to threaten the Shrine of Ice.

    ¡°Great, Great ancestor!¡± Braque was once informed by his father about the rtionship between the Shrine of Ice and the House of Pillon. He had even seen the magical portrait of Ice Celestial Corey. When Braque just came down from the third floor, he suddenly discovered the person he saw was precisely the man that his father held in the same regard with a god, the legendary character of the House of Pillon ¨C Ice Celestial Corey. Braque could not contain his surprise and let out a shout.

    Although Ice Celestial Corey rarely ever left the Shrine of Ice, he was well informed about the births and deaths of the members of the House of Pillon. So much so that several of the major headcount changes were personally ordered by Corey himself, which was passed to the King of Kasi Empire to be executed.

    When Braque¡¯s yell in shock sounded, Ice Celestial Corey stared nkly at first, took a few looks at Braque shortly, and revealed a smile, saying, ¡°You are little Braque right? Haha, you did pretty well, little youngster. Keep it up!¡±

    ¡°Yes, great ancestor. Great ancestor, you actually recognize me?¡± When Braque, someone who had always been heavy-scheming, heard Ice Celestial Coreymending him, he had trouble restraining his emotions and gazed excitedly at Ice Celestial Corey,pletely forgetting who he was.

    Ice Celestial Corey nodded and smilingly said, ¡°Yes. You should depart as well. Don¡¯t stay any longer inside here!¡±

    If it had been anyone else, Braque¡¯s own father or even the King of Kasi Empire who said those words to him, Braque would have demonstrated his stubbornness for a moment. But facing this most legendary character of the House of Pillon, Braque showed not the slightest resistance. He respectfully performed a family etiquette towards Corey, yieldingly answered ¡®Yes¡¯, and headed out most obediently.

    From start to finish, Kelly and Lilian from the Druidic Order both helplessly looked on as the Shrine of Ice deployed their forces. Neither of the two interrupted the evacuation nor took anyone hostage to threaten the Shrine of Ice.

    Such were the teachings of the Druidic Order. They weren¡¯t the kind of people who would take any measure necessary to achieve their goals. Take, for example, when Lilian knew Han Shuo had Druidic Order¡¯s ¡®Hand of Goddess¡¯, and under the circumstances that she thought Han Shuo was just a regr fatty, with a demigod existence apanying her, yet, she earnestly made a gentle request to Han Shuo. She wanted to make an honorable transaction with Han Shuo to obtain the ¡®Hand of Goddess¡¯, instead of using Kelly¡¯s mighty force to coerce Han Shuo.

    The Druidic Order was a genuine religion on Profound Continent. They were kind, honest, not overly ambitious, impartial, and they revered nature.

    Han Shuo observed for a while. On top of his interactions with great druid Caspian in the past, the Druidic Order automatically left Han Shuo a favorable opinion in his heart. If it weren¡¯t for the fact that the Viride Leaf had an immeasurable effect for wood elite zombie, perhaps Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t have made things difficult for them.

    Sighing, Han Shuo took a look at Kelly, then turned to Ice Celestial Corey standing at the doorway, blocking the path. He suddenly came to a decision.

    At this moment, many had walked out from the auction house. Even Braque, under the indication of his elder, Ice Celestial Corey, had headed out as well. When sacred knight Sulo discovered Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s arrival, he made his salutations towards Corey from a distance. Soon after, when no one was watching, he signaled to Sophie, who was in disguise. That resoluteness in his ferocious gaze meant that he would not tolerate Sophie¡¯s nopliance.

    Sophie, having received Sulo¡¯s meaningful nces, understood that her father was truly enraged this time. She was well versed with her father¡¯s temperament and knew that if she were to not obey Sulo¡¯s instructions in such circumstances, she would face grave consequences.

    Therefore, when the crowd started rushing outside, Sophie covertly signaled Han Shuo with her eyes. Afterwards, regardless of whether Han Shuo did receive her message or not, she sighed before squeezing through the crowd and headed out.

    Needless to say, Han Shuo saw Sophie¡¯s meaningful nces. Yet, his head was lowered with not a word or movement. For fear that Ice Celestial Corey would discover him, an enemy of even greater enmity than the Druidic Order, Han Shuo had, beforehand, concealed the enormous energy of his consciousness and very carefully hidden away the energy emanating from his being.

    Having made up his mind, Han Shuo no longer remained on the same ground. While no one was paying attention to him, he put on a rather panicky expression and slowly paced outside like any other person.

    That iparably ferocious demeanor and that unreasonable, tyrannical appearance of his, all of a sudden vanished. It was as though he turned into the most ordinary fatty amongst the crowd, not the slightest bit of exceptionalism in sight.

    When Han Shuo blended himself in among the crowd, walking outside in a seemingly cowardly fashion, Lilian the female druid revealed a trace of disdain as she gazed at Han Shuo¡¯s figure from the back. She thought to herself, how could such a bossy and domineering character turn out to be such a coward when faced with the Shrine of Ice?

    Kelly, however, who had been paying attention to Han Shuo all along, at first revealed a bbergasted expression when he saw Han Shuo be so timid. But as Han Shuo inches towards the door step by step, the expression on Kelly¡¯s face turned into something of a smile, but not quite, and looked at Han Shuo somewhat amusedly.

 Chapter 499: You Friend-Selling Bitch!

    GDK 499: You Friend-Selling Bitch!

    As Han Shuo creeped out of the auction house, his eyes seemingly inadvertently nced at Ice Celestial Corey, while in his heart, he was prepared to make a sudden move.

    Unlike the Druidic Order, Han Shuo was the kind of person who would use means necessary to achieve his goals. This kind of sneak attack was a contemptible behavior which most people conducting themselves with dignity would not employ. But Han Shuo couldn¡¯t care less about those hideous messes of rules and customs. As long as he could inflict heavy blows on his enemy, he would not hesitate to do so.

    The reason Han Shuo was able to gain the upper hand in his battle against the Shrine of Ice, destroying their God-Making Project, killing their sacred-grade experts, all these achievements were credited to Han Shuo¡¯s practice of utilizing unscrupulous tactics.

    The Druidic Order, however, after many years of fighting against the Shrine of Ice, had not only beenpletely driven out of Kasi Empire, they also suffered devastating losses. All of this could be attributed to the fact that this religious organization known as the Druidic Order was way too prim in their conducts,cking the kind of savagery and ruthlessness of their nemeses.

    After concealing his presencepletely, all undtionsing from his physical body were indistinguishable from those of an ordinary person. His demonic yuan was silent and still inside the demonic infant. His consciousness waspletely retracted,cking the indication of a mighty presence. There was no longer any indication that Han Shuo was any different from any regr person.

    Kelly, who had been looking at Han Shuo with somewhat of a smile, witnessed Han Shuo inching towards Ice Celestial Corey, he seemed to have made out Han Shuo¡¯s intention. The corners of his mouth curved to reveal an odd smile. As though wanting to provide cover for Han Shuo, he said to Corey, ¡°Well then, how are you nning to take care of me this time?¡±

    ¡°Ha!¡± Ice Celestial Corey raised his head and let out a singleugh, as though he found Kelly¡¯s question to be very amusing. Corey signaled at Snow Celestial Tiana overhead the auction house with his eyes shortly before heughingly looked at Kelly. With a stern expression, he said, ¡°Although both our sides do not have any binding agreement written in ck and white, we both have had a tacit understanding for many years now that leaders of neither side would not set foot on the sphere of influence of the other side. And now, with youing to the capital city of Kasi Empire, you have vited the tacit understanding. It is rational and only to be expected that we havee after you.¡±

    ¡°Eh!¡± All of a sudden, Braque who was about to leave the auction house, suddenly turned back to take a nce at the foolish-looking Han Shuo. Afterward, he offered his words of caution, ¡°Great ancestor, that fatty is a very dangerous character!¡±

    Han Shuo originally nned to make an attack when he got closer to Ice Celestial Corey. However, right after those words of Braque¡¯s sounded, all of a sudden, like a blood sun, bloody rays violently shot out from all over Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    The marble floor Han Shuo was stepping on shattered in an instant. The bloody des sticking out from his body resembled the sharp and pointy thorns of a big, enraged hedgehog. All of a sudden, he charged towards Ice Celestial Corey.

    When the bloody radiance blossomed from Han Shuo, Ice Celestial Corey instantly knew who he was facing! After all, the demonic arts which Han Shuo practiced was far too extraordinary. Any expert who had been dealt blows by Han Shuo would never forget that unique energy of his.

    Once Ice Celestial Corey found out that the ambusher was Han Shuo, he immediately gathered all his focus to face this great enemy. He didn¡¯t even have time to ponder why Han Shuo would appear here.

    Wielding a longsword, Ice Celestial Corey deeply creased his brows, and was as grave he ever had been. The moment right before Han Shuo managed to crash into him, the pupil of Corey¡¯s eyes contracted and he abruptly rose into the air. Han Shuo, in the air of a savage super-ranked magical beast, rammed at Corey. Vigorous energy burst forth from every muscle in his body. His demeanor was as imposing as could be. All along the way, the marble floor he stepped on was crushed into crumbs, with strange popping noises throughout the air.

    Had it been a solid hit, Han Shuo was absolutely certain that Ice Celestial Corey would have been a dead man. What a pity, this sneak attack Han Shuo had been mounting, before he could get the perfect moment to strike, he had to mobilize ahead of time all thanks to that one warning from Braque. As the distance and time of the assault were not the most optimal, Ice Celestial Corey had room to dodge and escape. Given those conditions, Han Shuo reasoned that it was unlikely to get a direct hit on Ice Celestial Corey.

    In the decisive battle between top-notch experts, even the smallest negligence could mean the difference between life and death. Although Han Shuo missed the opportunity to kill Ice Celestial Corey in one strike, he still managed to catch Corey off guard. Taking into ount that Ice Celestial Corey had yet to fully recover from his injuries, Han Shuo still gained the upper hand.

    Like a big rubber ball bouncing high into the sky, Han Shuo suddenly soared into the air in his ferocious pursuit of Ice Celestial Corey. Hundreds of bloody rays fiercely shot out, relentlessly cutting at Ice Celestial Corey up in midair.

    By this time, Ice Celestial Corey had nowhere to hide. He knew that if he didn¡¯t make a counterattack now, Han Shuo would follow up to him incessantly, and a series of even more unbearable attacks would pound on him, and he would have to sustain even more devastating shellings. Hence, soon after he took off into the air, Ice Celestial Corey gathered all the divine energy and fighting aura in his body and suddenly made the most unsophisticated attack of shing downwards.

    For a moment, cold air filled every corner of the auction house. In tandem with the motion of Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s longsword, creaking noises filled the air, as though spacetime itself were frozen still and forcibly sliced by the longsword.

    Han Shuo very clearly sensed the effects that the sword strike had on spacetime. The attack which was originally cutting at Corey at lightning speed was obviously affected by it in terms of its velocity.

    ¡°Scour!¡± Han Shuo suddenly yelled. He deployed some unknown strange maneuver, causing those bloody, snake-like rays that filled the sky to gather all of a sudden, taking the form of a malevolent dragon.

    With that, the dispersed energy gathered and concentrated into one. This malevolent dragon figure of unstoppable force shot straight ahead. As the creaking noise grew even louder and more vigorous, the dragon figure violently crashed into Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s longsword as it struck down.

    An earth-shattering explosion erupted from within the auction house. Aftershocks of the battle between the two demigods violently spread in every direction. It was as though spacetime truly had been fractured. Even the auction building could not withstand the explosion and entirely copsed.

    Braque, standing in front of the door, only had fresh blood dripping from his mouth and nostrils as sacred knight Sulo hade forth and provided him some cover.

    Of those gentries who had yet to evacuate the auction house, in an instant, a dozen or so were dead from the blow. Some of them were undamaged on the surface, but all their internal organs had been reduced to a mushy puddle of flesh. Others suffered direct damage from the aftershock, their bodies split up into pieces.

    Just one blow, and the once-pristine auction building was a copsed mine, a wretched sight like hell on earth. Rubble the size of quern-stone fell ceaselessly from the sky. Several big shots who had a bit of strength and managed to stay alive. Each and every one of them ran as far as they could as they wailed like ghosts.

    Sacred knight Sulo was overwhelmed with shock. When he looked at Han Shuo, he looked like he had seen the devil. Without saying a word, he desperately dragged the still frozen Braque out to safety.

    Completely unlike the conservative work ethics of the Druidic Order, once Han Shuo saw the opportunity, he would grab it and take action with no concerns of how great the coteral damage would be. For those influential officials and bigwigs who perished in the st, Han Shuo could not care less. He would strike decisively, the deadlier the better.

    In this aspect, Han Shuo was more formidable than the Druidic Order!

    Of the two equally mighty experts, one had a good deal of scruples to abide by before acting, and the other would do anything necessary, no matter how contemptible, to achieve his goal. Which was more frightening? The answer was an absolute no brainer!

    Following that strike, ustomed to having a strong body, Ice Celestial Corey flew himself right through the roof of the auction house and high up into the sky. This was one of the main reasons that the auction house would copse in an instant.

    In contrast to Corey, Han Shuo¡¯s feet were firmly nted on the ground. He was looking up at the sky, his gaze firmly locked on Ice Celestial Corey, who was now just a white dot in the sky. Han Shuo seemed to be gathering his energy in order to make an even more vicious strike, ignoring the huge rocks raining down all around him. He was as steady as a boulder.

    At this moment, that mediocre, naive, and simple-minded demeanor was no more. Although he had yet to restore his original looks, he gave everyone who looked at him a shiver down their spines. Druid Lilian, who gazed at Han Shuo with abhorrence, could not believe what she had just seen and was covering her small mouth with her hand. She looked at Han Shuo as though she saw a monster. Her heart was overwhelmed with shock.

    Fortunately, so fortunately we did not try to force the Hand of Goddess from him. Otherwise, I¡¯m afraid that even Sage couldn¡¯t contain him. Who really is this person? How could he be so terrifying?

    As though he could tell what Lilian was thinking about, Kelly, an expert from the Druidic Order, wore a grave expression, turned to Han Shuo and said, ¡°City Lord Bryan of the Brettel City of Lancelot Empire. Indeed, your reputation is well-deserved!¡±

    ¡°Bryan? That¡¯s him? The young expert who defeated two sacred grade experts? ¡± Lilian cried out in shock. She seemed to know a thing or two about Han Shuo¡¯s identity.

    ¡°Other than City Lord Bryan, who, as rumors have it, possesses other-worldly martial techniques, I truly couldn¡¯t think of anyone else!¡± Kelly looked at Han Shuo with a grave expression and inquired, ¡°Am I right? City Lord Bryan?¡±

    With things having developed to this stage, Han Shuo knew that he could no longer conceal his identity. Thus, he squarely restored his original appearance. In an open and candid smile, he said, ¡°That¡¯s right, Sage Kelly. I have just given you a hand. Hehe, this time, that Ice Celestial Corey must have been injured upon his wounds!¡±

    ¡°Oh? In that case, many thanks, haha,¡± Kelly saidughingly as he looked at Han Shuo. Then, his eyes flickered as he gazed at Ice Celestial Corey slowly descending from the sky, as though he was thinking about something.

    ¡°It sure enough is you!¡± Over their heads, Snow Celestial Tiana, with mist lingering around her, wore an ice-cold expression as she stared fixedly at Han Shuo down below.

    ¡°Hehe, long time no see indeed, you friend selling bitch!¡± Han Shuo cursed as he viciously stared at Tiana.

 Chapter 500: Overwhelming Power

    GDK 500: Overwhelming Power

    When they werest at Tarrag Canyon, the four of them, Han Shuo, Stratholme the old monster, Tiana, and Reynold had been on the same side, sessfully snatching a couple of Origin Crystals from the hands of the Soul Race. In the aftermath, Tiana suggested to seek refuge at the Church of Light headquarters, and they fell into Tiana¡¯s secret scheme of selling them to the Church of Light. If not for metal elite zombie¡¯s invincible golden cudgel, Han Shuo and Stratholme the old monster might never have broken free from the shackles of the Church of Light.

    Han Shuo and Stratholme the old monster went through fire and water, risked their lives for those crystals, with Stratholme even seizing the Origin Crystal of Water for Tiana. On top of that, the old monster had many years of friendship with Tiana. In the end, Tiana nevertheless sold him out without the slightest hesitation. This woman was so despicable and shameless that even Han Shuo found her entire being repulsive.

    All along, Han Shuo treated his enemies with all sorts of savagery. But toward his friends, he treated them with heartfelt sincerity. Back then, Han Shuo and Stratholme the old monster still had a bit of ill-feeling. But at that moment Han Shuo had to admit that the old monster really was loyal to his friends. Han Shuo didn¡¯t expect that he would be sold out by this woman for her own interests.

    Hence, when met again with Tiana, this woman with not the slightest sense of shame, Han Shuo did not give her the slightest respect.

    When the druid Lilian and some disciples of the Shrine of Ice heard Han Shuo cursing Tiana as a ¡®Bitch¡¯, they simply couldn¡¯t believe their ears that such a foul word came out of Han Shuo¡¯s mouth.

    Generally, when mighty experts attained a certain level of strength, they would possess a nobility title or appetion. The Profound Continent was a world where people obsessively scrutinized etiquette. Characters of such prestige would never be so unkind and malicious in speech, even when faced with their greatest nemeses with bone-deep hatred. However, Han Shuo did not hail from this world, and wasn¡¯t one mindful of constraints. He would scold and curse however he liked, not showing the slightest respect and courtesy.

    This nasty, foul curse from Han Shuo was even more effective than the most terrible magic curse. It was visible to the naked eye that this supremely expert, so-called Snow Celestial by the Shrine of Ice, was angered to the point where she shivered from her head down. She wore a face as hostile as it could be.

    ¡°I shall let you taste the cruelest punishment from the Shrine of Ice and slowly torture your soul to your miserable death. You heretic, you should not exist on the face of the earth. Your miserable scream will always reverberate in my mind as the most pleasing melody.¡± Snow Celestial Tiana¡¯s gazes were sharp des that pierced through Han Shuo¡¯s body as she spoke in a weird and slow intonation, as though making a vow.

    ¡°Come at me, I¡¯m still waiting for your punishment!¡± Han Shuo wore a ferocious face, like a viin waiting to watch the world burn. His eyes were filled with baleful looks, obviously unafraid of Tiana¡¯s threat.

    At this moment, Ice Celestial Corey, who broke through the roof and flew high into the sky, slowly descended as he coughed.

    Corey whose face was originally ice-cold, now looked an unhealthy pale. He obviously had suffered quite a bit of damage from Han Shuo¡¯s strike, otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have looked the way he did.

    ¡°Hey!¡± Han Shuo suddenly turned to Kelly of the Druidic Order and called for his attention. When Kelly looked back at him somewhat puzzled, Han Shuo proposed, ¡°You take care of Corey, and I will take care of that bitch. Let us join hands and destroy the foundation of the Shrine of Ice today. What say you?¡±

    Although Han Shuo wasn¡¯t aware of Kelly¡¯s actual strength, the fact that the Shrine of Ice had mobilized suchrge forces to handle him clearly indicated that he was also an extremely mighty character with tyrannical strength.

    At first, Han Shuo nned to use the formidable menace of the six-horned tribal king, draw him to the Shrine of Ice headquarters and deal them a catastrophic blow. However, given the current situation, if Kelly, this mighty powerhouse from the Druidic Order with iprehensible strength, were to cooperate with Han Shuo, there would absolutely be no need to wait for the six-horned tribal king toe over for the chance to ughter the two most powerful existences of the Shrine of Ice.

    Ice Celestial Corey indeed possessed mighty strength. But after being heavily injured, his strength had sharply declined. Han Shuo was convinced that Kelly, this expert with unfathomable strength, was sure to get rid of or obstruct Ice Celestial Corey. As for this Snow Celestial Tiana, although she was a demigod, a divine magus, Han Shuo still had the confidence to defeat or even kill her.

    As for those puny, useless troops from the Shrine of Ice, as a grand necromancy magus, Han Shuo could utilize his five elite zombies and his enormous army of undead topletely overrun them.

    It was for all these reasons that Han Shuo would make that suggestion.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s watchful gaze, the leader of the Druidic Order, Kelly, had his eyes flickering. It was as though he was very much emotionally affected by Han Shuo¡¯s proposal. This great Sage who had lived for who knew how long, was obviously not a shallow person. He knew that this was a once in a blue moon great opportunity. Too many years of old grudges between him and the Shrine of Ice there had been. Perhaps it was time to settle the old scores.

    ¡°Okay!¡± after muttering to himself irresolutely, the great sage Kelly of the Druidic order nodded.

    Right after great sage Kelly uttered the word ¡®okay¡¯, his demeanor crazily swelled up. His body followed suit. In just the blink of an eye, great sage Kelly transformed into a dozen or so meters tall giant ape. Some structures of the auction house which were still standingpletely fell apart.

    A whiff of frightening energy with ultimate richness, suddenly erupted from this monster ape. It was as though an immensely mighty god who had existed since the beginning of time was overlooking the world with a most awe-inspiring demeanor.

    The art of morphing, which only the druids of the Druidic Order could master was indeed miraculous. Kelly, who suddenly morphed into a gigantic ape, not a hint of his doddering senility could be seen. When such a colossal battle-ready monster appeared, it left doubts in everyone¡¯s minds that they would stand a chance against Kelly.

    The Druidic Order was definitely not one to be looked down upon, even though they weren¡¯t as strong and solid in term of strength whenpared to the Cmity Church. When he saw the frightening might of Kelly¡¯s, Han Shuo even thought in his heart that perhaps, it was because the Druidic Order revered nature and peace that they were robbed by the Church of Light as the number one religion on the Profound Continent.

    Roar!

    In total ape form, Han Shuo could no longer associate that old man he had just met who was past his prime with this magnificent beast. Kelly beat his chest as he roared ferociously. His enormously huge hands the size of a small mountain suddenly came crashing down at those disciples of the Shrine of Ice in their white outfits.

    The whooshing wind spurred up the sand and stones, sending them flying in every direction. Before the terrifying energy evennded, the blowing wind itself caused pain to the skin and flesh of those underneath. Had it been a full scale blow, no one would be able to withstand it, and would instantly be reduced to a meat patty. Wielding a longsword in his hand, Corey charged towards Kelly. He seemed determined to fight Kelly until only one of them was left standing.

    All of a sudden, a massive, sparkling, translucent icicle wrapped around Ice Celestial Corey. Hiding in the center of the icicle, Ice Celestial Corey shot towards Kelly.

    ¡°Right about time. I want to see if you really have made progress after so many years!¡± Although Kelly was now a gigantic ape, he could still utter human words. However, his voice sounded like the rumbling of thunder, boasting a most bold and powerful demeanor.

    Dong!

    One of Kelly¡¯s gargantuan hands, which was smashing downwards, suddenly turned to swat Ice Celestial Corey away. The pin-sharp icicle, upon taking a strike from Kelly¡¯s mountain of a palm, instantly shattered into pieces. Following that, when the wind generated from the palm swooped on Ice Celestial Corey, it caused Corey to lose his bnce and he was nearly sent flying.

    Outside, those knights of the Shrine of Ice who had surrounded the auction house, ready and waiting to charge inside at any moment suddenly saw a colossal body reveal itself from within the auction house just as a huge palm unexpectedly came crashing down on them.

    When the palmnded, a dozen or so earth riders along with the warhorses they mounted on immediately turned into a bloody lump of meat! This p from Kelly carried extraordinary strength, so much so that their bodies were stuck together with the earth, ttened. It was truly as though a huge mountain had fallen and rolled onto these people. The meat patty was all smooth and leveled, not the slightest bit of unevenness.

    ¡°So powerful!¡± Han Shuo was amazed and cried out in surprise at once.

    It had to be said that Kelly, who had transformed into a gigantic ape, was simply terrifying. Han Shuo had never before witnessed such a powerful attack. This was truly an unstoppable force, bullying brute force of the first ss.

    ¡°Of course. Back then, it was because Kelly the great Sage had to handle both Snow Celestial and Ice Celestial alone that we had suffered a defeat. Hmph, if it weren¡¯t for our Druidic Order only having one demigod existence, we would have stopped the savageries the Shrine of Ice conducted in Kasi Empire back then!¡± Lilian the druid actually moved beside Han Shuo at an unknown time, and softly but proudly exined.

    One person against the duo of Ice and Snow Celestial! Han Shuo was appalled. It seemed that although all of them were in the demigod realm, this chief character of the Druidic Order obviously possessed strength exceeding that of Ice Celestial Corey and Snow Celestial Tiana. No wonder when Kelly appeared in Kasi Empire, Corey and Tiana both immediately rushed to the scene.

    But having said that, Snow Celestial Tiana had obviously fused her soul with the Origin Crystal of Water. Han Shuo felt Tiana¡¯s strength had greatly advanced. This time if it hadn¡¯t been for Han Shuo so coincidentally making an appearance in the auction house as well, Kelly was not likely to be able to handle the two demigods alone.

    Now that Han Shuo was here, he naturally would not let the Shrine of Ice achieve the results they desired. Seeing Snow Celestial Tiana fric as she chanted magical spells, Han Shuo suddenly saidughingly, ¡°Hey bitch, don¡¯t you forget about me!¡±

    ¡°Young friend, all you have to do is block Tiana from me for ten minutes. After this day, the Shrine of Ice will be of nothing to be afraid of!¡± Kelly, having transformed into a gigantic ape, let out a thunderous bellyugh. All those pike andnce attacks from the knights fired at Kelly were just like tickles on Kelly¡¯s body. He took big strides and walked one round around the dested auction building, his hand swatting every now and then. Those knight squadrons from the Shrine of Ice were mostly now nothing more than meat patties.

    ¡°No problem at all!¡± Han Shuo guaranteed and charged at Snow Celestial Tiana at lightning speed.

 Chapter 501: Role Reversal

    GDK 501: Role Reversal

    Tiana softly recited the incantations of water magic. All of a sudden snowkes were swirling through the air as ice formed in thend and sky, and everything became frozen.

    It was a widely known fact in the magical world that the more powerful the spell, the longer an incantation took. Seeing how long it took Snow Celestial Tiana to recite the incantation, and the changes taking ce as the space all around them was slowly transforming into a world of ice and snow, Han Shuo knew that this spell of Tiana¡¯s was unusually powerful.

    Unlike how he had to deal with Ice Celestial Corey, all Han Shuo needed to do was to get near Tiana at the fastest speed possible. Once he got into close proximity, she would either be dead, or be as good as dead!

    Magi were, after all, mere magi ¨C their fragile bodies were eternally their unalterable weakness!

    Cold wind whistled as all the water element betweennd and sky gathered rapidly. Before Han Shuo could get close to Tiana, five crystalline water dragons suddenly formed in the sky, each over ten meters in length and incredibly lifelike.

    Using water element to materialize objects, and using them to attack, were feats of water magic any journeyman mage could aplish. But to form dragons of water that were just like the real thing, as Tiana had done, and five of them at once, this was without a doubt a most astounding feat.

    As a necromancer, Han Shuo had a thorough understanding of magic ¨C be it water, fire, or earth magic, all were capable of using the elements of water, fire, or earth respectively to materialize and form objects. However, therger the object, the greater the elemental energy required. Thus controlling those objects would be increasingly challenging.

    If Tiana had been able to form five water dragons of such size thest time at Tarrag Canyon, Han Shuo was certain that he and Stratholme the old monster would have had a far easier time. From the looks of it, after fusing her soul with the Origin Crystal of Water, Tiana had greatly improved in strength.

    Once Tiana¡¯s soul had fused with the Origin Crystal of Water, her affinity for sensing and controlling the water element instantly rose to new heights. Not only was she able to create five incredibly lifelike dragons, but she was also able tomand them with her soul¡¯s energy and attack as she willed.

    Such an aplishment could more than hold a candle to Kelly in his ape form!

    As three of the dozen-meter-long water dragons rushed towards the transformed Kelly amidst the sts of icy wind, Kelly cried out in astonishment, ¡°Tiana, since when did you possess such powerful strength?¡±

    Even as Kelly said those words, his hands were already moving. Having just repelled Ice Celestial Corey, Kelly struck hard at the three water dragons with a palm the size of a small mountain.

    Kelly, well over ten meters tall, stood like a towering behemoth. The three water dragons, while matching his height with their length, did not appear nearly as massive due to their slithering movements andck of girth. Before him, they were like a trio ofrge pythons.

    However, the three water dragons were incredibly agile under Tiana¡¯s control. She could not deny that Kelly in his beastly transformation had astounding brute strength, and did not dare to make it a direct battle of raw power between him and her three water dragons. Instead, they glided around him in an orderly formation, acting in concert with Ice Celestial Corey as he fought Kelly.

    Orchestrating this required Tiana¡¯s full concentration, and with Han Shuo bearing down on her with an unholy glint in his eyes, she had no time at all for talking.

    Of Tiana¡¯s five water dragons, three were used in attacking Kelly, and the two others were sent straight for Han Shuo, their jaws snapping.

    Tiana seemed to know of Han Shuo¡¯s extreme speed, as when the two water dragons flew from her side to attack him, they moved so as to keep him at a distance. Their bodies coiled in such a way that Tiana was in the middle, and only struck at Han Shuo with stretching strikes, making sure to block the paths he could take to attack her.

    Those water dragons formed from water elemental may not have been the real deal, but their movements bore even greater agility than actual water dragons, with not a hint of stiffness ornguor.

    For elementally materialized objects to reach such a level was truly incredible!

    From the looks of it, with the fusion of her soul with the Origin Crystal of Water, Tiana¡¯s control over the water element had certainly entered the realm of perfection.

    Seeing how easily Tiana blocked off all paths of approach with only her two water dragons, such that she could hide inside their protection and continue to chant other magical incantations undisturbed, Han Shuo could not help but frown. In his mind, he pondered over the methods he could use to deal with her.

    If water elite zombie had finished digesting the power it had previously absorbed from the statue of the Ice Goddess, Han Shuo was certain that with him there, he could utilize his innate power topletely disintegrate the five water dragons. However, just like little skeleton, it was currently a crucial time for water elite zombie and he could not be disturbed.

    ¡°Hmph! Don¡¯t you think you can stop me with just a few water dragons!¡± Han Shuo snorted. He began moving his hands in circr motions in the air, as though he was doing Tai Chi.

    ck bolts of electricity exploded from between his hands, and a small vortex formed in front of Han Shuo¡¯s torso alongside his hand movements. A terrible, devouring force was generated swiftly, and the small vortex seemed as though it pulled on some strange force in the world, growing bigger and bigger until it formed a terrifying grey vortex.

    Han Shuo continued to channel energy into the giant vortex, and the all-consuming power of demonic arts fully revealed itself within. The air and the cold winds were all instantly drawn in by this terrible power, and forcibly sucked into the vortex.

    The sky, which had been frozen but clear, instantly changed, with sand and rock filling the air as it fell dark all over. The gigantic vortex was like a mythical beast that had waited for eons at the bottom of the abyss, finally emerging and opening its titanic mouth as though it intended to devour the entire world.

    Thend was in a state of destion, and it seemed as though nothing could stop this terrible devouring power. The air, the cold winds, and those stone pirs that reached for the sky ¨C all was pulled by the force and sent hurtling helplessly into the vortex.

    Even the bodies of the squadron of knights that Kelly had embedded into the earth were forcibly ripped out and sent high into the sky, flying into the gigantic vortex alongside their armour, weapons, and warhorses.

    The greater the size of the object, the greater the suction force upon them. The five water dragons were simrly affected by the pull of that power and could no longer maintain their agile states. All five of them were pulled away from their original positions and towards the gigantic vortex high up in the sky.

    At that time, even Tiana, who had the Origin Crystal of Water fused with her soul, could not maintain her control over her five water dragons. She could do nothing but watch helplessly as they flew into the center of the gargantuan vortex. The moment she tried to control them with her mental strength, she felt an unstoppable force surging towards her, and very nearly lost control of her own body to fall into the vortex as well.

    The towering form of Kelly¡¯s ape body was swaying unsteadily, but then he suddenly let out a great roar, stomped both feet on the ground with tremendous force, and his hairy legs sank deep into the earth. He was like an ancient, sky-reaching tree that had stood in the world for millions of years, unyielding in the face of all that raged around him.

    It was worth mentioning that Kelly¡¯s strength was indeed formidable. Allrge objects had been dragged into Han Shuo¡¯s vortex, all but the behemothian Kelly could remain unmoved simply by sinking his feet into the earth.

    Chaos had broken out in the blink of an eye. It was fortunate that the Shrine of Ice had previously evacuated everyone in the surrounding areas, so there were only a few casualties aside from those disciples of the Shrine of Ice who hade to capture Kelly.

    In the midst of the wildly raging winds, Han Shuo suddenly stopped and pressed his palms together. A loudly destructive boom was heard from the immeasurable vortex as ice and water, mingled with pulverized rock and human corpses, began raining down.

    At that moment, Han Shuo lunged forward, speeding lightning-fast towards Tiana. With a motion of his hands, the Demonic des unfurled like a peacock¡¯s tail. The coldest light shone out from within, striking awe in the hearts of those who saw it.

    Oh shit! Shocked, Tiana began swiftly retreating without another thought.

    As a mage, Tiana was well aware of her weaknesses. She knew that the moment she let Han Shuo get anywhere near herself, she would have little chance of escaping a gruesome death at his hand, and so she frantically sought to escape his attacks.

    As she ran, she also set upyer afteryer of defenses. Wall after wall of t, gleaming ice formed in the direct path between Han Shuo and herself.

    Crack crack crack!

    With just one strike from Han Shuo, the mirror-smooth ice walls gave up, as though they had been nothing more than dried leaves, and he continued in his relentless pursuit of Tiana without the slightest sign of slowing down.

    ¡°Retreat!¡± Tiana called out as she ran.

    The Shrine of Ice elites, lead by Ice Celestial Corey and Snow Celestial Tiana, had utterly failed in their joint attack on the Druidic Order¡¯s leader Kelly, all because of Han Shuo¡¯s sudden appearance.

    It had not only been a failure, in fact, there had been a reversal of roles. Kelly, who was supposed to be the hunted, had reversed his situation with Han Shuo¡¯s help, and became the hunter instead! Ice Celestial Corey of the Shrine of Ice, on the other hand, had been forced to flee on his own turf.

    They were all demigods, and while Kelly¡¯s power was greater than those of Ice Celestial Corey and Snow Celestial Tiana, fighting one against two was still very difficult. But with Han Shuo going after Tiana, the one with the greater threat, Ice Celestial Corey had to deal with Kelly all alone. With Corey having been previously injured by Han Shuo, Kelly had a definite advantage.

    Defeat hade so swiftly and suddenly, and the tables had turned in an instant. Han Shuo and Kelly, each with their eyes on the two highest leaders of the Shrine of Ice, began their deadly pursuit within the borders of the Kasi Empire!

 Chapter 502: Pushing Ice Celestial Corey to Death

    GDK 502: Pushing Ice Celestial Corey to Death

    Tiana had made her decision and retreated without any hesitation.

    As Han Shuo and co were having their epic battle right in the capital city of the Kasi Empire, the crowds around the auction site had all been evacuated. However, just slightly further away, the streets remained upied by all sorts of stalls. When Kelly transformed into a gigantic ape, his behemoth body could clearly be seen by the peddlers and merchants in the area. When Tiana¡¯s five water dragons appeared, their overwhelming disy of strength terrified the people to their cores, rousing such a rabble in the city centre that they caused an even greater panic.

    The armies of the Kasi Empire stationed nearest to the scene instantly mobilized to the city centre with great haste. As Tiana retreated, she saw a regiment of fully armoured knights hastily approaching, and she quickly flew towards them.

    The Shrine of Ice held a very unique ce in Kasi Empire as it was known throughout thend how highly regarded they were by His Majesty the King. Seeing Tiana¡¯s swift retreat to join the knight regiment, Han Shuo immediately stopped still halfway in his pursuit.

    After Snow Celestial Tiana¡¯s soul fused with the Origin Crystal of Water, her strength had risen dramatically. Now with Tiana cing herself within arge knight regiment, it was bing far less likely that he would be able to kill her.

    Her strength was not much different from Han Shuo¡¯s to begin with. As long as Han Shuo couldn¡¯t suddenly get close to her, he surely could not inflict any real damage on her.

    Just then, because the Shrine of Ice retreated in a flurry, Snow Celestial Tiana and Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s groups fled in two opposite directions, causing the two to be separated byrge distances. Not far away was Ice Celestial Corey with a group of Shrine of Ice disciples, retreating towards the magical transportation in Ciro City center.

    Kelly, still in ape form, was in hot pursuit of Ice Celestial Corey. Corey however was a wily one. He weaved in and out of the frantically escaping merchants and peddlers continuously. As Kelly was a stout believer in the Druidic Order¡¯s teachings, he could not bear to drag innocents into this conflict, and did not strike even though he had plenty of openings to do so.

    At that rate, neither Han Shuo nor Kelly would be able to seed. Han Shuo stopped for a brief moment in mid-air, made a snap decision, and did an about-face. Ignoring Tiana who was hiding in the middle of a knight regiment, he went after the craftily escaping Ice Celestial Corey.

    As long as Tiana did not make it there on time, with Han Shuo and Kellybining their efforts against Corey, who could not hold out for long with his injuries, Han Shuo was certain that he could kill him in a short amount of time.

    Kelly, who could not bear to harm the innocent, was letting the prime opportunity slip away right before his eyes. But Han Shuo was naturally not going to be so soft-hearted. Once he got closer to Ice Celestial Corey, he would give no heed for who else stood nearby, and strike with deadly force!

    Tiana panted as she caught her breath, holding her magical staff as she levitated in midair, she fixed her eye on Han Shuo and prepared to deal with any attack he would send at her.

    In the midst of the regiment of knights, Tiana was feeling much safer. As long as she could keep her distance from Han Shuo, she was sure that her magic would be able to deal with him. After her soul¡¯s fusion with the Origin Crystal of Water, she had discovered that all the deployment of water element magic came to her as easy as breathing.

    With the exception of some very deadly and very taxing water element magic, Tiana did not even need incantations for most middle-high tier spells. All she needed was a thought and vo, the magic was cast.

    That was how she had cast theyers of ice walls without incantations earlier when she had been running. It had slowed Han Shuo slightly from his great speed. With the leap in her strength, she was feeling more amply confident as well.

    However, just as she had all her attention fixed on Han Shuo, and prepared herself for everything, she suddenly realised that Han Shuo was retreating at lightning speed. For a moment she was frozen, thinking Han Shuo was ying some kind of crafty trick. It wasn¡¯t until Han Shuo drew closer and closer to Ice Celestial Corey that the realisation hit her. Tiana realized that Han Shuo had decided to concentrate forces and get rid of Ice Celestial Corey first.

    ¡°This is bad!¡± Tiana eximed, then quickly instructed, ¡°Charge forward, all-out! Kill that devil from our enemy country at any cost!¡±

    ¡°Yes!¡± came the thunderous response, and at hermand, the regiment of knights immediately rushed towards the gigantic ape.

    Tiana went on ahead of the others, her figure resembled a streak of white ribbon as she chased after Han Shuo¡¯s flight trail regardless of everything.

    ¡°Let¡¯s join forces, and kill Corey first!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s voice rang out next to Kelly, who had been tailing Ice Celestial Corey closely all the while without making a strike.

    ¡°No, there are too many innocent people around him, we cannot strike him here!¡± Kelly quickly stopped Han Shuo upon recovering from his momentary shock when he saw Han Shuo approach.

    Han Shuo cursed inwardly, thinking to himself that this Kelly really was pedantic. No wonder he had lost so spectacrly thest time in the Kasi Empire ¨C with how he was going about it, it would be beyond difficult to eliminate the enemy!

    Han Shuo, mentally throwing curses at the pedantic Kelly, wouldn¡¯t be so concerned about whether or not his actions would harm the innocent civilians. Besides, those ¡°innocents¡± weren¡¯t people of his Brettel City, which was less of a reason to care so much. Before he even drew near to Ice Celestial Corey, Han Shuo had already flung out a Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts.

    Ice Celestial Corey immediately knew things were bad when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s voice. He knew that Han Shuo was an entirely different kind from Kelly. Therefore, the moment Han Shuo¡¯s voice entered his ears, he no longer dared to hide among the crowds, and flew out with a great leap.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s maniption, the Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts followed Ice Celestial Corey in close pursuit. If it hadn¡¯t been for Corey¡¯s emergence instantly, he and the merchants around him would¡¯ve all died in that attack.

    ¡°I knew it, this deicide!¡± Ice Celestial Corey was faced with a great headache. Han Shuo, a man of few scruples, was clearly much harder to deal withpared to Kelly. Ice Celestial Corey was injured to begin with. Having received further injuries from Han Shuo¡¯s assault just before, and without Tiana around to assist him, Corey was sure to lose when put against either Han Shuo or Kelly alone. Now with both of them teaming up against him, he stood even less of a chance.

    ¡°ng!¡± As he escaped, Ice Celestial Corey had no choice but to make a defensive sword strike. A swarm of icicles rained down from the sky, and Han Shuo¡¯s Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts was broken with one strike from Ice Celestial Corey.

    Han Shuo made a slight gasp of surprise as he continued in close pursuit, feeling rather puzzled.

    As it turned out, when Ice Celestial Corey intercepted Han Shuo¡¯s Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts, he had deliberately expended a little more energy to obliterate Han Shuo¡¯s intense attacking power to avoid injuring the merchants and peddlers below.

    Connecting that action to Corey¡¯s sudden flight from within the crowds, Han Shuo suddenly realised that Ice Celestial Corey was not without redeeming qualities. Although he was cold and ruthless in how he handled his enemies and the race of dark dragon, he was still very protecting of his own countrymen. He was not, as Han Shuo had thought, without a care for the people of Kasi Empire.

    When Kelly had been chasing him earlier, his concealment amongst the civilians was done because he had a good grasp of Kelly¡¯s mindset, and knew that Kelly would never harm themoners. Hence, he overtly made use of Kelly¡¯s weakness to help himself escape unruffled.

    So you do have a bit of humanity after all, Han Shuo thought derisively, but he did not slow down. By this time, Ice Celestial Corey was already quite close. He recited an incantation, and rows of bone spears came whooshing towards Ice Celestial Corey.

    Having been dyed by the Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts, Ice Celestial Corey was already well within Han Shuo¡¯s range of attack. During that window of opportunity, Kelly in his gigantic ape-form finally caught up with Han Shuo after very carefully avoiding trampling any of the civilians underfoot.

    ¡°Don¡¯t allow him any time to do anything!¡± Han Shuo bellowed immediately after sending out the bone spears.

    Most people of demigod strength were sure to have some ways to save their own necks, a space-tearing scroll at the very least. That was something Han Shuo learned from his valuable experience after many years of battle.

    Thus, the moment he saw that his side held an overwhelming superiority, Han Shuo was certain that Ice Celestial Corey was about to take some desperate measures. At this stage, there would be no letting Corey escape, or all his efforts would have been for naught.

    Hence, Han Shuo immediately shouted a reminder to Kelly, otherwise Kelly would never have thought of it. The Druidic Order was, after all, not one that preached ruthless extermination. As the leader of the Druidic Order, Kelly did not have that ruthlessness and mercilessness that Han Shuo did.

    But with Han Shuo¡¯s yelling, Kelly instantly came to his senses. Suddenly, memories reyed in his mind. He recalled scenes of followers of the Druidic Order being brutally murdered by the Shrine of Ice in Kasi Empire many years back. Calling to mind how heartless and cruel Corey had treated his enemies, Kelly knew that his Druidic Order would certainly pay an enormous price if Corey did not die that day.

    Kelly took a huge stride. ¡°ROAR...¡± He had blocked off Corey¡¯s only path of escape. Han Shuo did not know what Kelly had actually done, for along with his sky-shaking howl,yer uponyer of ripples visibly undted in the sky. All the elements between heaven and earth turned into a state of disorder, the sky seemed like it had copsed.

    Ice Celestial Corey felt the changes in the sky after Kelly¡¯s howl, and instantly understood that his space scroll would be useless. Seeing Kelly block off the path behind him, and Han Shuo recklessly charging at him from the front, his face turned ashen. Corey knew that he atst had reached the end of his life.

    Suddenly, Kelly turned pale with fright and shouted in rm, ¡°Oh no!¡±

    Han Shuo, who had already rushed in front of Corey, heard the yell and saw the huge Kelly swiftly retreating back. He instinctively understood something and mmed on the brakes,ing to a sudden stop.

    A brilliant light, mixed with terrible energy, erupted from Ice Celestial Corey, bringing about the fluctuation of an annihtive energy wave of a ten-meter radius. A fracture in spacetime left a pattern like the grooves on a tortoise shell. As Ice Celestial Corey met his destruction, everything within that space was sucked vacuum in an instant.

    Under the deadly, relentless hounding of Han Shuo and Kelly, Ice Celestial Corey was forced to end his own life!

 Chapter 503: Misunderstandings

    GDK 503: Misunderstandings

    It has to be said that Ice Celestial Corey still had some conscience when it came to treating the citizens of Kasi Empire. Otherwise, he would not have limited his self-destruct st radius to just ten meters. It was also precisely so that Han Shuo, with Kelly¡¯s reminder, managed to act in the nick of time and did not get affected by Ice Celestial Corey¡¯s st at death¡¯s door.

    Ice Celestial Corey, as one of the highest leaders of the Shrine of Ice, jointly hounded on by Han Shuo and Kelly, was forced to the end of his rope, with no other option but to end his own life. Even that finalst-ditch strive of his as he faced death had failed to truly harm neither Han Shuo nor Kelly.

    After the brilliant rays faded away, the region of space where arge amount of energy had brought about some momentary fringe phenomenon, resumed to normal in the blink of an eye. Ice Celestial Corey, however, had eternally vanished from their sights.

    Han Shuo heaved a breath of relief. It was as though a heavy stone suspended over Han Shuo¡¯s heart was suddenly cast into the bottomless abyss. He felt an indescribable feeling of ease and contentment.

    ¡°He died, just like that, he died. Sigh...¡± Kelly softly sighed with sorrow. His colossal ape body began to shrink.

    Demigod existences, taking the whole Profound Continent in view, were beings at the top of the pyramid. Such beings were few and far between. Although Corey was an enemy, Kelly nevertheless felt that his death was quite a pity.

    Demigod, so what? They couldn¡¯t escape death all the same!

    ¡°Kelly, I think, we should, in a spurt of energy,pletely obliterate the foundation of the Shrine of Ice!¡± Han Shuo proposed with a sinister smile as he gazed at Snow Celestial Tiana who arrived in a streak of white light.

    In no time, Kelly had morphed back into his human form. Standing shoulder to shoulder with Han Shuo, Kelly looked deep into Snow Celestial Tiana floating in mid-air far away. He shook his head and sighed before staring at Tiana and said, ¡°In those days, your Shrine of Icepletely eradicated our Druidic Order from Kasi Empire, not leaving a single chapel behind for us to preach our teachings. Even I was forced to leave after being wounded by Corey and you. Who could have guessed it, what goes aroundes around!¡±

    ¡°The climate in Kasi Empire is cold and frigid. It is territory that the Ice Goddess bestowed upon us. The presences of heretics must not be tolerated in the territory of the Ice Goddess!¡± Tiana looked back at Kelly from a distance, cold and indifferent. She didn¡¯t seem to be immensely disturbed or emotional about Corey¡¯s death.

    ¡°There¡¯s no point talking to her. Great Sage Kelly, let¡¯s attack!¡± Han Shuo wasn¡¯t interested in the religious disputes between the two. All that was on his mind was to eliminate this enemy called Tiana.

    ¡°That would be futile. She is prepared to leave,¡± Kelly shook his head and replied stoically, without a hint of joy or woe.

    Han Shuo was startled, and immediately turned his gaze at Snow Celestial Tiana some distance away. He saw that Tiana¡¯s body was gradually vanishing, seemingly turning into snowkes, drifting along with the wind. Han Shuo looked on as he sensed her presence fusing and bing one with the water element found between the heaven and earth. He could undoubtedly see Tiana and yet could not sense her presence.

    Gradually, like snowkes melting into water, Tiana dissipated.

    Looking on as Tiana faded away bit by bit, Han Shuo did not make any attempt at stopping her. He knew that as Tiana was such a distance away, given the affinity of her soul for the water element, he surely could not stop her if she wanted to leave.

    It was only when Tiana hadpletely vanished from Han Shuo¡¯s sight that the squadron of knights following behind her arrived. Before these knights could open their mouths, Kelly of the Druidic Order looked at Han Shuo and said, ¡°Let¡¯s move and have a chat somewhere else. In Profound Continent, our kind of people have a tacit understanding not to get involved in worldly disputes. Let¡¯s not make things difficult for them.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and followed behind Kelly, easily escaping therge knight regiment that had heaved over with great difficulty. After travelling left and right for a while, they arrived at a valley where the nts grew lush.

    This small valley wasn¡¯t in Ciro City, but within a mid-sized forest on the outskirts of the city. Upon arrival, Han Shuo discovered druid Lilian, who had departed the scene ahead of the great battle, waiting.

    Surprisingly for Han Shuo, apart from Lilian, another familiar person stood abreast with her in the valley ¨C great druid Caspian!

    ¡°Sage¡± ¡°Teacher¡±

    When the duo saw Kelly and Han Shuo, they both greeted Kelly, although slightly different in how they each addressed Kelly.

    ¡°Caspian! Long time no see!¡± Han Shuo took the initiative to greet Caspian.

    Han Shuo understood in his heart that the reason this old fellow brought Han Shuo over here was undoubtedly to discuss the Druidic Order¡¯s Hand of Goddess.To date, Han Shuo was certain that the Druidic Order was an honorable and aboveboard religion. He could not be less worried that these people might plot against him or secretly lead him into a snare.

    Of course, it was rare to find an average person who could trap a being in the realm of Han Shuo¡¯s strength.

    ¡°Bryan! It¡¯s been a while! How unexpected, how truly unexpected, you have attained strength of such heights!¡± Caspianmented from the bottom of his heart as he looked at Han Shuo.

    A few years back when Han Shuo and Caspian first met in Valen City, although Han Shuo showed promise of budding talent, he was far, far short of his current might. In just a few short years, Han Shuo possessed demigod strength, the equivalent strength as his teacher. Caspian could not help but gasp with admiration for such progress!

    ¡°Haha, I just happen to be very lucky!¡± Han Shuo saidughingly.

    ¡°Excellent, we can now finally talk with ease!¡± Kelly, the Sage of the Druidic Order, said smilingly as he set his pair of eyes, through which one could see he had experienced the hardship of life, on Han Shuo¡¯s body. He sighed softly and helplessly said, ¡°Bryan, it was all thanks to your assistance this time. Otherwise, not only would Ice Celestial Corey not have been hounded to death, I¡¯m afraid I would have suffered some major injuries again under the duo¡¯s joint attack.¡±

    ¡°You are most wee, Sage. They are my enemies as well. For us to join hands is not a matter favors. You don¡¯t owe me anything!¡± Han Shuo knew what Kelly wanted to discuss, but nevertheless, he remained courteous in his words.

    Indeed, as expected, Kelly continued, ¡°You have assisted us, and have obtained the Hand of Goddess with your own abilities. On the basis of principles, we really should no longer care to retrieve the item. However, the Hand of Goddess is a magical artifact of our Druidic Order, and as followers of the Goddess of Nature, it is our duty to reim the Hand of Goddess. I haven¡¯t a clue what to do.¡±

    Han Shuo had long anticipated that they had figured out that the Hand of Goddess was in his possession. As things had reached this stage, Han Shuo no longer yed dumb. However, he could never surrender the Hand of Goddess readily. Looking deep into Kelly, Han Shuo replied, ¡°The artifact is indeed with me. I understand how much it means to you people. However, it is even more important to me. I apologize. No matter what, I cannot hand it to you.¡±

    When great druid Caspian heard Han Shuo¡¯s words, he opened his mouth and wanted to say something, but ended with a soft sigh as he shook his head, and did not utter his words of persuasion.

    In their rtionship, Han Shuo did not owe Caspian any favors. But on the contrary, Caspian had previously inconvenienced Han Shuo over and over again. Although the two had some friendly rtions, Caspian did not think that Han Shuo would change his mind on such a major issue for him. Therefore, he hesitated in his speech.

    ¡°Mister Bryan, I know that given your identity and status, you wouldn¡¯t care much about gold coins. Therefore, the proposal I previously gave in the auction house must have been worthless,¡± Lilian looked at Han Shuo with her glistening eyes and continued, ¡°However, could you please tell us, how did you know about the wonderful functions of the Hand of Goddess, and for what purpose will you use it for? For all I know, even the followers of our Druidic Order, few have ever seen the Hand of Goddess, so much less know about its wonderful uses.¡±

    Nodding his head, Sage Kelly of the Druidic Order was staring fixedly at Han Shuo as well. Not at all concealing the curiosity that stemmed from his heart, he said, ¡°That¡¯s right. Even as the most pious follower of the Druidic Order, I only knew about a small share of the uses of the Hand of Goddess, and absolutely wasn¡¯t capable of making it spontaneously fly. I still cannot understand how you could do that!¡±

    After Kelly uttered those words, Han Shuo immediately understood that back in Braque¡¯s manor, Kelly must have been hiding in ces where Han Shuo had not discovered, and saw a certain scene. It was no wonder that he would be so certain that the Hand of Goddess was in Han Shuo¡¯s possession.

    Han Shuo knitted his brows and hesitated for a while. He was considering if he should disclose the matter about the Hand of Goddess and wood elite zombie. There seemingly was no other way to exin it clearly.

    ¡°I know that this is a secret of yours. However, ever since I saw you so miraculously putting the Hand of Goddess to use, I have been wondering if you are a messenger that our Goddess sent to the human world. Maybe, just maybe, you were really someone of our Druidic Order,¡± Kelly said as he looked at Han Shuo with great expectations.

    Han Shuo involuntarily burst intoughter. He found the reasoning of these religious members to be rather baffling. He shook his head and said, ¡°I¡¯m definitely not a follower of your Druidic Order. But I indeed have some understanding of your so-called Hand of Goddess.¡±

    When the three druids of the Druidic Order gazed at him with eyes brimming with expectation, Han Shuo nodded, and began to thoroughly exin to them his distinct understanding of the Hand of Goddess.

    ¡°Viride Leaf? What is that? This is unimaginable. How is this possible?¡± Lilian absolutely could not believe Han Shuo, shaking her head all along as she mumbled in astonishment.

    Great druid Caspian too wore a face of disbelief. He quizzically looked at Han Shuo, but did not utter a word to question its validity.

    Great Sage Kelly, the head of the Druidic Order, looked at Han Shuo with a grave look on his face. In a half-doubting, deep voice, he asked, ¡°Could you let us have a look at the holder of the Hand of Goddess?¡±

 Chapter 504: Will You Take Me Away?

    GDK 504: Will You Take Me Away?

    Han Shuo shook his head firmly, and as Kelly stared at him in astonishment, he said, ¡°It¡¯s not time yet!¡±

    ¡°How so?¡± Kelly asked, puzzled. Just looking at the master of the Hand of Goddess shouldn¡¯t be that difficult, so he could not understand why Han Shuo would give such a t refusal.

    ¡°Just like how Tiana needed time to merge with the Origin Crystal of Water, the master of Viride Leaf is as yet slowly merging with it and requires absolute serenity. He must not be disturbed,¡± Han Shuo exined.

    But Han Shuo¡¯s exnation only made Kelly more curious, staring at Han Shuo in confusion as he continued to question, ¡°If I did not mishear you, you said earlier that the Hand of Goddess¡¯ master is a zombie warrior. Do you actually mean to say that a zombie warrior is capable of fusing with our Druidic Order¡¯s divine artifact, the Hand of Goddess?¡±

    ¡°Correct indeed!¡± Han Shuo replied confidently.

    Old Kelly, who had lived through countless seasons, grew unnaturally pale and wan. His right hand subconsciously moved over his chest, as though Han Shuo¡¯s exnation was too much to bear, then he said with his voice slightly trembling, ¡°I have a feeling he isn¡¯t really the emissary of our Goddess of Nature!¡±

    Ludicrous! How could a zombie warrior from theherworld be the Goddess of Nature¡¯s emissary to the mortal realm?

    ¡°Of course not!¡± Han Shuo smiled faintly, eyeing the visibly disturbed trio with some interest. His gaze finally locked on the quietly muttering Kelly, and said, ¡°He isn¡¯t your emissary of the Goddess of Nature. Once he has fully mastered the Viride Leaf, I can let you meet him.¡±

    ¡°Does that mean that the Hand of Goddess will be his weapon?¡± Kelly heaved a low sigh and asked most unwillingly.

    ¡°Well, forck of a better word, I can only say that this is indeed true,¡± Han Shuo looked at Kelly apologetically, raising his hands in a shrug. He felt a sudden surge of sympathy, and continued, ¡°How about I pay you all some gold aspensation? I¡¯m terribly sorry.¡±

    From Lilian¡¯s performance, Han Shuo could tell that the Druidic Order was not a religious organization that was good at managing finances. As Han Shuo had a rather favourable opinion of the Druidic Order, and with the intention to rope in Kelly, a demigod being with truly astonishing strength, Han Shuo attempted to make some materialpensation by offering them gold coins.

    ¡°Forget about it. This was a dereliction of duty on our part. We cannot let you shoulder the consequences for our failure,¡± Kelly waved his hand sluggishly, refusing Han Shuo¡¯s offer of marypensation. Looking at Kelly, then at Caspian and Lilian, Han Shuo understood that there was nothing much to say if he stuck around. With an awkwardugh, he said his goodbyes. ¡°I still have some matters to attend to, so I¡¯ll be taking my leave. If you are still interested in the master of the Hand of Goddess, you maye to find me in Brettel city, where you will be most wee.¡±

    The Viride Leaf ought to have been something that was circted out from within the Druidic Order. While Han Shuo had used his own abilities to snatch it out of Zofi¡¯s hands, that did not change the fact that he had taken something that belonged to them. Han Shuo understood the frustrations of the three, and knew that friendly chatter would be impossible if he stayed. Therefore, the best course of action was to leave as soon as possible and avoid the awkwardness.

    ¡°Very well, when I have the time I will certainly make a trip to Brettel City. Hmm, despite everything, it was a great pleasure to meet you,¡± Kelly did not ask him to stay, only disying a rather bitter smile as he bid Han Shuo farewell.

    ¡°Likewise. Goodbye,¡± Han Shuo replied politely, nodding at great druid Caspian before turning around and left the valley.

    After Han Shuo exited the valley, he did not immediately return to Ciro City, but instead, he pondered over his next recourses for taking care of the Shrine of Ice.

    In Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, the Shrine of Ice had greatly weakened with the death of Ice Celestial Corey. Snow Celestial Tiana could alone pose no threat to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo never forgot the hatred which stemmed from the betrayal he had suffered on the Church of Light¡¯s sacred mountain. It¡¯s just that Tiana had suddenly disappeared, and Han Shuo had no idea where she had escaped to. But he reckoned she was probably within the icy peaks of the Shrine of Ice.

    For the purpose of mounting the sneak attack on Ice Celestial Corey earlier, Han Shuo had concealed his consciousness. And now that he had left the valley, Han Shuo immediately unfolded his consciousness again. He nned to continue provoking the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race, lead him to the Shrine of Ice, and teach Tiana and her people a most painful lesson.

    However, when Han Shuo unfolded his consciousness, he discovered the six-horned tribal king still and inactive, not continuing his long, tiring journey of chasing Han Shuo. This caused Han Shuo some confusion, as he had no idea why the six-horned tribal king would suddenly stop.

    Could it be that old monster Stratholme had not yet fused his soul with the Crystal of Fighting Aura, and just happened to have hidden along the path of the six-horned tribal king¡¯s approach, and that thetter had sensed his presence, and dealt with him first?

    Han Shuo was shocked by the thought. He concentrated his attention and carefully sensed for a while, and approximated that the six-horned tribal king was somewhere within the borders of Angel Empire.

    Shaking his head with some frustration, Han Shuo felt concerned for Stratholme. However, he did not rush recklessly to Angel Empire to find out what exactly was going on. And, surely, if things had indeed gone that way, Stratholme the old monster would have been killed long before Han Shuo could even step foot on Angel Empire.

    Two days had passed. Han Shuo found that the six-horned tribal king was still within the Angel Empire¡¯s borders. No matter how Han Shuo taunted him, he would not budge.

    With that, Han Shuo was almost certain that the six-horned tribal king had not stopped over because of Stratholme the old monster. After all, Stratholme¡¯s strength was not nearly enough to hold him back for two full days.

    Although Han Shuo had no idea what was going on in Angel Empire, it was obvious to him that the six-horned tribal king had been tarried over there with no clue as to when he would leave Angel Empire. Although Han Shuo was very curious as to what business the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race met in Angel Empire, he made a wise decision not to go there and see for himself.

    Without the Soul Race¡¯s six-horned tribal king, even if Han Shuo ran into Snow Celestial Tiana, he did not haveplete certainty of being able to kill her. Thus, after weighing for a moment, Han Shuo decided to temporarily give up on hounding Tiana. He would wait until the little skeleton¡¯s fusion with the Origin Crystal of Death wasplete, and the water and earth elite zombies had progressed into being able to form the Penta-elemental Undead Formation, before he dealt with her properly.

    Having lost one of their two core pirs, the Shrine of Ice had sharply reduced in strength. Han Shuo believed that the Druidic Order would make good of the opportunity in one way or another, a thought which gave him a sense of schadenfreude.

    At a mansion in the northern district of Ciro city...

    It was noon, and the ming sun hung high in the sky. Han Shuo snuck in quietly, intending to check on Sophie¡¯s condition and bid her farewell before he left Kasi empire.

    After all, Sophie had entertained him for quite a number of days and had been a gracious host. Furthermore, Han Shuo had grown rather fond of Sophie, and was worried that she would be ruined by that good-for-nothing Braque, so he decided to visit before he left.

    Once Han Shuo arrived at the mansion, he unfolded his consciousness to seek for Sophie¡¯s presence, and in no time he had found her.

    However, his brow furrowed deeply when he arrived at her location. Three intricate, sturdy magical boundaries were set up within a vastly spacious room. One could tell that the person who had deployed them was rather proficient in it. Without altering the space and items in the room, they managed to trap Sophie inside.

    Even though they were separated by three magical boundaries, Han Shuo could still clearly see the expression on Sophie¡¯s face. Under house arrest, she wore a face full of misery and looked much wearier than she had two days ago. It was clear that she hadn¡¯t been well.

    Frowning as he looked at Sophie behind the three magical boundaries, Han Shuo gradually released his consciousness, and slowly detected where her father, sacred knight Sulo, was. At the moment, sacred knight Sulo was hard at work, training himself in his practice room. It appeared that it had not been by chance that he¡¯d been able to be a sacred knight.

    After some hesitation, Han Shuo ced a hand on the three magical boundaries, and demonic light radiated from his palm. There was a cracking noise, and the boundaries shattered like broken mirrors.

    ¡°Who¡¯s there?¡± Sophie cried out in shock and terror.

    ¡°It¡¯s me!¡± Han Shuo answered quietly, striding towards her. Looking at the rather pleasantly surprised Sophie, he asked, ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡±

    ¡°Nothing much. My father wouldn¡¯t let me run around, and is nning on marrying me to Braque in a few more days,¡± Sophie¡¯s smile was bitter and resigned.

    For some reason, Han Shuo actually felt a faint sense of difort in his heart upon hearing that Sulo was going to force Sophie to marry Braque. A tinge of fury shed across his eyes as he spoke, ¡°Your father¡¯s gone senile, how can he be so overbearing!¡±

    Sigh... Sophie shook her head and replied rather lethargically, ¡°He¡¯s not senile. It is precisely because he¡¯s too clever that he¡¯s doing so. Because, otherwise, it won¡¯t be just a matter of him and myself, but my entire family will no longer have a ce in Kasi empire.¡±

    Han Shuo went nk before exhaling heavily when he realized that Sophie was indeed correct.

    The might of a nation was not something that a single person could counterbnce. Well, unless that person was somebody like Han Shuo, who possessed strength so formidable that it allowed him to be above worldly rules. Otherwise, there was surely no way one could go against an entire nation.

    In Kasi empire, sacred knight Sulo had made quite a name for himself. But nevertheless, he could hardly counter the House of Pillon. Not to mention that there was also the existence of the Shrine of Ice in the Kasi Empire. Sulo could only scarcely save his own skin, let alone his entire family.

    Just as Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts were still in a jumble, Sophie looked deep into his eyes, and asked with mixed expressions on her face, ¡°Bryan, will you take me away?¡±.

 Chapter 505: I Canâ€™t Even Spoil Fifi Enough

    GDK 505: I Can¡¯t Even Spoil Fifi Enough

    Han Shuo was stunned. He was not entirely sure what Sophie was implying. He took a moment to think before saying, ¡°You mean take you away from Kasi Empire?¡±

    Sophie¡¯s bright eyes stared at Han Shuo, as glowing as she gazed at every minute detail of his face. She went on, ¡°You¡¯re the Lord of Brettel City in the Lancelot Empire! You¡¯re powerful enough even to contend against the shrine of ice! Of all my friends, you¡¯re the only person I know who could possibly help me, or at least I¡¯d hope you think me as a friend.¡±

    Sophie had said all Han Shuo needed to know. He understood that his identity was no more a secret than the fact of his being any longer. After a moment of hesitation, he smirked and said, ¡°Of course you and I are friends. Brettel City will very much wee your arrival.¡±

    Hearing that, Sophie revealed a faint smile of relief. However, before she could say anything else, Sulo eximed, ¡°What nonsense!¡±

    He revealed himself before Han Shuo and Sophie. His expression said it all, he was not pleased. He red at Sophie andshed out, ¡°Fifi, you are not a child anymore! You should know the consequences of your actions.¡±

    Sophie was clearly quailing under her father¡¯s re. However, she then remembered the suppressed frustration she had felt over her betrothal to Braque, and looked back at him with a stubborn gaze. ¡°Father, you have no right to make decisions on matters that will affect the rest of my life, especially without my consent!¡±

    When the furious Sulo looked at his unyielding daughter, a feeling of helpless dejection suddenly rose in his heart. He shook his head in helplessness and relented, ¡°Daddy has indeed acted brashly on this matter. However, everyone knows how fond Braque is of you. Given just how powerful the Pillon family is, there never was even a sliver of hope for refusal. I may be a sacred knight, and possess a certain extent of fame and power in Kasi Empire, but when ites to the Pillon royal family, my hands are tied.¡±

    Han Shuo had long known that Sulo woulde over. As he listened to the dispute, Han Shuo looked to Sophie, then to Sulo, who appeared to have aged considerably all of a sudden. ¡°Mister Sulo, if you don¡¯t mind I actually do have a solution to your problem.¡±

    Sacred knight Sulo had briefly traded blows with Han Shuo a few days prior. After being informed of Han Shuo¡¯s identity and strength through his own channels, Sulo was rather intimidated by the youth even though thetter was far younger than he was. Upon hearing Han Shuo speak, Sulo quivered slightly, and he looked at Han Shuo as he eximed, ¡°Youth breeds heroism, and that expression is most apt for one such as yourself. Sophie¡¯s imprisonment was, on one hand, to prevent her from getting into trouble, while on the other hand, to wait for you toe here.¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly. Unable to make head or tail of Sulo¡¯s words, he asked, ¡°What do you mean?¡±

    ¡°Bryan, I¡¯ll take the liberty of calling you Bryan, I more or less know of your rtionship with Sophie. As far as I know, nobody really knows about this thing between you two. Given your status and strength, you are more than capable of keeping us safe.¡± To Han Shuo¡¯s surprise, he could sense traces of a old fox-like cunningnessing from Sulo even through his rxed expression.

    Suddenly, and for no discernible reason, Sophie blushed. She seemed to know what Sulo was about to say next. Still red in the face, she quickly defended herself, ¡°Dad, it¡¯s not what you think, we¡¯re...¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s fine, you don¡¯t have to say anything, I know what you mean,¡± Sulo interrupted. With his usual self-assurance he said, ¡°Daddy has thought about it for several days, and has decided to respect your decision. You and Bryan seem suitable enough. I¡¯ve even made some arrangements for the reallocation of our family n members. Now that Bryan is here, we can talk things over. Then we¡¯ll be able to get out of Kasi Empire as soon as possible, and begin our new lives in Brettel City.¡±

    Sophie turned even redder and frantically waved her hands, crying out, ¡°No, no, that¡¯s not what this is, father, you have misunderstood.¡±

    ¡°Hmph!¡± Sulo red at Sophie, and said, ¡°Why do you even bother trying to hide it at this point in time? Our House is on the brink of destruction because of you. Stop fooling around already!¡±

    Then, Sulo turned to look at Han Shuo with the all the gaze of a father-inw, and smiled slightly as though in great satisfaction. Sulo nodded and said, ¡°Oh yeah, you certainly are much more pleasing to the eye than Braque in every aspect, that sly fellow. Fifi¡¯s indeed got decent taste.¡± Taking a deep breath, his expression grew serious as he said, ¡°Bryan, even though my Sophie can be rather self-willed at times, she¡¯s still very kind-hearted, you mustn¡¯t mistreat her under any circumstance.¡±

    Han Shuo was dumbstruck staring at Sulo, who had beenpletely indulging in his own assumptions. Han Shuo was simply at a loss for words.

    It had to be said that this sacred knight Sulo was indeed quite an amazing character. His mistaking the rtionship between Han Shuo and Sophie was nothing to write home about. After all, the two had been rather intimate in thest few days. Adding to the fact that Sophie had recently been responding to her betrothal to Braque with such vehement objection, it wasn¡¯t unfounded for her father to have arrived at such a conclusion.

    Sulo was, in spite of this, still a man of both amazing vigour and dastardly cunningness. By locking Sophie up, he had been able to prevent anyone from finding out about the rtionship between her and Han Shuo, while also testing Han Shuo¡¯s loyalty to Sophie. Without anyone noticing, he had also simultaneously been quietly moving around the forces within his n, making preparations to leave for Brettel City at any moment.

    Sulo might have mistaken the rtionship between Han Shuo and Sophie for something else, but nevertheless, he was yet quite a remarkable character!

    As a string of thoughts flushed through Han Shuo¡¯s mind, he observed Sulo with a sharp glint in his eyes. A sacred knight was no small power for any country to have. Even if Sulo left the Kasi Empire without relying on Han Shuo¡¯s help, he would have still been able to make a ce for himself, Sophie, and the rest of his family in some other country.

    A sacred knight! No empire would refuse someone like that, especially those who were at odds with the Kasi empire.

    This old fellow was no simpleton, indeed, he was quite something, Han Shuo thought to himself. He had originally intended to clear things up, but a thought suddenly struck him. Revealing a modest smile, he said to Sulo, ¡°How could I? I can¡¯t even spoil Fifi enough, how could I possibly wish to be mean?¡±

    Sophie, scarlet-faced and impatient to exin the truth to her father, looked as though she had been stricken a deep blow by Han Shuo¡¯s words. She shot a fierce re at Han Shuo, then said with even more panic than before, ¡°Father, father, don¡¯t listen to the drivel spilling from his mouth, we¡¯re...¡±

    With another wave of his hand, Sulo cut off her exnations yet again, and said, ¡°This is not drivel. I believe he will take good care of you. Bryan isn¡¯t like Braque, he¡¯s a warrior and not a politician. I can trust the word of a warrior, especially one who is stronger than me!¡±

    Sophie was quite beside herself with rage. All her attempts at exnations had been abruptly cut off by Sulo, only leading to even greater misunderstanding, and his tant self-assurance was leaving her dumbfounded. What angered her more was Han Shuo, who was wholeheartedly ying the part of a dutiful son-inw, nodding seriously over there as he vowed, ¡°Yes, I will.¡±

    Sophie was both embarrassed and angry, feeling as though she¡¯d been sold somehow without properly realising it, and her two traffickers carried on their merry discussion of the particrs right before her face. It was an indescribably strange feeling, but it seemed, somehow, that there was a slight feeling of joy. Only the tiny smidgeon of happiness was, in the face of all the rage and mortification, quickly overlooked by Sophie herself.

    How could this be? How could this be?! Sophie screamed internally over and over again. After Sulo finally finished talking, she cast another furious re at Han Shuo, schooled her expression, and got ready to properly exin the situation.

    ¡°Well, I¡¯ll let the two of you chat. I¡¯ll go arrange the n relocations right away, and get our forces transferred to Brettel City in the shortest time possible. Oh, when the timees I shall have to trouble my dutiful son-inw, since you are, after all, the Lord of Brettel City. We would be able to better depart Kasi Empire with your help.¡± Before Sophie could string her words together, Sulo had dropped yet another bombshell.

    ¡°Certainly, certainly,¡± Han Shuo said with a most amiable smile, pleased to have gotten a sacred knight on his side with no effort. As for what wouldeter, Han Shuo decided not to care for the time being, just so long as he could trick sacred knight Sulo to Brettel City first. Once he and his family had arrived there, even if the truth were toe out, Han Shuo was certain they would not be able to leave easily.

    Sulo seemed very satisfied with Han Shuo, beaming broadly as he walked up to him. He patted him on the shoulder, and nodded as though a great weight had been taken off his back. He strode away, taking far lighter steps than when he hade in, looking as though he really was going to make arrangements to leave the Kasi empire.

    Sophie had intended to stop Sulo and exin everything, but Han Shuo signalled her with his eyes not to do so. Once Sulo was gone, Sophie immediately ced both hands on her hips and, looking rather like a little hen about to pick a fight as she red, she cried furiously, ¡°Bryan, you jerk, what exactly did you mean by this?¡±

    Han Shuo shrugged and smiled. ¡°I¡¯m doing this for your sake, and for the sake of your family. If I don¡¯t y along, would your father leave to Brettel City so easily?¡± Han Shuo made a great show of ying innocent, as though he had done all that for Sophie¡¯s own good.

    Sophie, who had intended to give him a good talking-to, stopped at those words. She was no fool. After thinking it over, she knew that what Han Shuo said made sense.

    However, when Sophie thought about how Han Shuo had used such a matter as an excuse to her father, and saw his cheerful, punchable face, she remained infuriated. She ran at him in a fit of rage, scolding him, ¡°That doesn¡¯t mean you can joke about that kind of thing, I swear I¡¯m going to teach you a lesson!¡±

 Chapter 506: The Invincible Might of Little Skeleton

    GDK 506: The Invincible Might of Little Skeleton

    Needless to say, Sophie was no match for Han Shuo. She rushed over angrily, but Han Shuo simply stared at her with a smile across his face, he did not fight back nor resist, and just endured Sophie¡¯s pounding against his chest, ying along by making a few painful cries whileughing.

    When Sophie¡¯s tender hands collided with his body, Han Shuo didn¡¯t feel the slightest pain at all, but instead, felt very pleased. Sophie might have seemed ferocious rushing over, but she was no more than a cub when she actually struck Han Shuo. As Han Shuo was tougher than what was considered normal, he naturally didn¡¯t take even the slightest damage.

    After hitting him for a long while, Sophie finally realized that her attempts at hurting him had all been futile. Looking at Han Shuo¡¯s detestable face, she didn¡¯t know how to exact her fury on him. She could only squint her eyes at him so much.

    ¡°Alright, alright!¡± Han Shuoforted her with a few words, and continued smiling. ¡°I¡¯m only doing this so that your father would be at ease. It is only so that he will leave for Brettel City without any misgivings. After you father and daughter arrive at Brettel City, you can clear things up with him. By then, there will be nothing he can do even if he disapproves.¡±

    After unleashing her punitive forces on Han Shuo, Sophie¡¯s originally troubled emotions were vented out. After giving it a thought, Sophie couldn¡¯t help but remark, ¡°My family is quite extensive. It will be rather difficult to move them all to Brettel City without drawing any attention. But luckily Kasi Empire is in chaos these days thanks to you. As a sacred knight, my father has absolute authority in the family. I doubt there will be a problem as long as he spends enough time on it.¡±

    ¡°Hmm, you¡¯d better evacuate the people as soon as possible while Braque has no time to care about you. I willmunicate with the people on my side. There shouldn¡¯t be any issues,¡± said Han Shuo

    ¡°Oh, right, what actually happened that day? Why did the Shrine of Ice issue an Ice Goddess Decree all of a sudden, gathering bishops of all regions in Kasi Empire to return to the frozen mountains in the snond?¡± Sophie couldn¡¯t help but inquire Han Shuo with her brow furrowed when she recalled the abnormalities within the Shrine of Ice in recent days.

    The death of Ice Celestial Corey must have been covered up by the Shrine of Ice. Otherwise, it would have an immeasurable impact on both the Shrine of Ice and Kasi Empire. The reason why Tiana issued an Ice Goddess Decree, recalling bishops from all regions to gather at the main peak, was obviously to concentrate their power.

    ¡°Nothing much. Probably to deal with me properly,¡± Han Shuo answered casually.

    Sophie was a citizen of Kasi Empire after all and ought to hold a favorable opinion of the Shrine of Ice. If she were to find out that Han Shuo had hounded Ice Celestial Corey, one of the top leaders of the Shrine of Ice, to his death, who knew how she would react!

    ¡°Oh, alright.¡± Sophie stared at Han Shuo with a somewhatplex expression and sighed, saying, ¡°At the end of the day, I am a citizen of Kasi Empire. Perhaps, I may never be able to return here after I leave this time. Nevertheless, I hope that you do not harm the mundane citizens of Kasi Empire.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I won¡¯ty my hands on them. Alright, I¡¯ll go make some arrangements for you to leave Kasi Empire today. If all goes as nned, the next time we meet, we¡¯ll be in Brettel City.¡±

    ¡°We are leaving today? So soon?¡± Sophie suddenly felt a little reluctant, and her tone grew somewhat downcast.

    ¡°Yes, but I¡¯ll be making arrangements before you depart. With my instructions, it will be easier for your family to leave Kasi Empire without a hitch. Besides, Brettel City and the seven grand duchies are currently at war. I need to get thetest updates on that as well,¡± said Han Shuo.

    Parting was always a little sentimental, in order to prevent Sophie¡¯s emotions from bing even more gloomy, Han Shuo said giggly, ¡°Alright, alright, I¡¯ll be taking a leave first. I reckon that it won¡¯t be long before we meet again in Brettel City. Look, send my regards to your father. Tell him that Brettel City will wee you all with arms wide open.¡±

    Before Sophie could say anything, Han Shuo dashed away. He became a trace of faint light and disappeared under Sophie¡¯s watchful gaze.

    After leaving Sophie, Han Shuo travelled to a Dark Mantle operation base in Kasi Empire, and had an exchange with the person in charge. Through them, Han Shuo passed on his messages to the Dark Mantle operation base in Brettel City, instructing them to get in touch with Sulo and to assist his family in their relocation to Brettel City.

    The operation base of Dark Mantle in Ciro City had been in service for many years, and it had umted very secure, well-nned escape routes through the years. Han Shuo believed that the journey of Sulo¡¯s family would be even smoother with their assistance. Given the chaotic state that Kasi Empire was in these days, the power possessed by that old fox Sulo, as well as the assistance of the Dark Mantle, Han Shuo was confident that their relocation would run without a hitch.

    The six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race was still lingering around in Angel Empire. Han Shuo yet again concealed his consciousness as he headed towards Lancelot Empire. He arrived at the Dark Forest with a moderate traveling speed, intending to traverse the Dark Forest and return to the Cemetery of Death.

    Halfway through his journey, Han Shuo suddenly sensed the joy of Little Skeleton from theherworld. Han Shuo, who had just entered the Dark Forest from Cesar City, was overjoyed at the good news.

    Without thinking too much, Han Shuo knew that Little Skeleton must have fused his soul with the Origin Crystal of Death. Little Skeleton had possessed extraordinary strength from the beginning and would definitely bring Han Shuo an even greater surprise once he had fused with the Origin Crystal containing the pure element of death.

    The impatient Han Shuo had located a concealed cave and summoned metal elite zombie to open up a chamber within the stone. Then he took out the skeletal staff, and decorated the surroundings a little, and in the next second, his consciousness had traversed through the spacetime tunnel and arrived in theherworld where the aura of death was strongest.

    Deste, dead silence, drab white and gray, ubiquitous cold element of death, endless and brutal ughter, and the simple rule of the survival of the fittest; these were the unalterable principleponents of theherworld.

    At the top of the towering peak stood a pce that speared the heavens. Ashen skeletonsy scattered all around. Thousands and millions of different kinds of undead creatures began to kneel down on the ground halfway through the mountain, worshipping towards the apex of the magnificent mountain as though they were making a pilgrimage.

    A ghastly, sinister power swept across the entire several-thousand-meter high peak. The dense aura of death was attracted by the evil powers in the pce, all heading for the pce at the peak.

    For a moment, the aura of death that was hard to see with the naked eye had condensed into a thin trickle of fluid, flowing into the pce with thousands and millions of strands. The whole pce was like a monstrous creature, constantly absorbing the aura of death that surged through hundreds of miles.

    Centered on the magnificent peak, the aura of death in this region had converged frantically, rousing all kinds of mighty necromancy creatures within the hundred mile radius, and even from thousands of miles away. The hollow gazes of those powerful necromancy creatures aimed at the giant peak as they involuntarily walked towards it.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness hadnded in front of the Little Skeleton¡¯s pce. He had formed a ghostly body first by using the ubiquitous aura of death and unfolded his consciousness, taking in the changes of the entire giant peak into his eyes.

    Skeletal warriors, zombie warriors, ghouls, gargoyles, evil knights, mummy lords, old fey zombies, bone demons...

    All sorts of undead creatures had crowded at the hillside and the bottom of the hill, seemingly summoned by some sort of force, slowly walking towards the top of the great peak. Among them were some creatures that Han Shuo was familiar with, as well as some that Han Shuo knew little about.

    Gazing into the distance, within a dozen miles were more necromancy creatures rushing over. Among them were two Bone Dragons and also a Zombie King with an extremely robust figure. The Zombie King was roaring along the way, and some of the low-level necromancy creatures in his path were vaporised one by one in his roar.

    The two Bone Dragons and the Zombie King seemed to Han Shuo to be charging with hostility into the pce where the Little Skeleton sat as they arrived at the realization that their subjects were, all of a sudden, no longer abiding by their orders. They were slowly straying from them under the influence of some evil summoning power.

    What a disgrace it was, indeed, for the king of theherworld to suddenly lose grip of his subjects.

    Even though they could, themselves, feel the summoning force from the top of the peak, as king of theherworld who had reigned for what could have been an eternity, they had the capability to pull away from this kind of summoning power, and they were trying topletely destroy this bodacious existence.

    ¡°Father, you¡¯vee.¡± As Han Shuo gazed into the distance, earth elite zombie suddenly emerged from the middle of the pce. Behind him were fire elite zombie and metal elite zombie, appearing side by side, and Han Shuo could sense the joy in their hearts.

    ¡°Of course, I have,¡± Han Shuo replied.

    He could feel that at the bottom of the pce on the magnificent peak and deep in the mountain, the water elite zombie and wood elite zombie were painstakingly absorbing and digesting the power. It would seem that once they were done, the penta-elemental Undead Formation would be finallyplete.

    In the middle of the pce, the Little Skeleton that sat atop the Bone Throne was still madly absorbing the aura of death for hundreds of miles. Threads of dense aura of death slowly pervaded into the smooth bones of Little Skeleton that were as bright as jade, and his entire body was filled with the pure element of death.

    A startling realization suddenly urred to Han Shuo. After the soul of Little Skeleton fused with the Origin Crystal, he had not only formed the Soul of Element but was now also using the maniptive abilities of the element of death to form a Body of Element in a short time.

    Soul of Element and Body of Element were the basis of bing a god. Han Shuo didn¡¯t expect that an Origin Crystal of the element of death alone would allow Little Skeleton to own the Soul of Element and also magically let him possess the Body of Element.

    Once Soul of Element and Body of Element wereplete, he was only a step away from bing a god.

 Chapter 507: Do You Truly Wish to Die?

    GDK 507: Do You Truly Wish to Die?

    A never-ending sea of undead creatures, as though they were making a pilgrimage, blindly rushed towards the magnificent mountain. At present, Little Skeleton was the most renowned king of the undead within the hundred-mile radius.

    The aura of death gushed into the pce, being absorbed into Little Skeleton as he sat atop his Bone Throne. It was rapidly transforming Little Skeleton¡¯s already unyielding white skeletal body, forming a Body of Element thatplemented the element of death to perfection.

    Before the pce stood metal, earth, and fire elite zombies each in three different directions. Standing behind the three unusual-looking undeads were several evil knights, mummy lords, and bone devils. They all firmly defended the pce and their King of the Undead inside.

    Two bone dragons and one king zombie were rushing their way, furiously roaring to no end. Wherever they passed, all those low-level undead creatures who had betrayed them were crushed to nothing but mush under their mighty strength, with their souls annihted.

    Three extraordinarily mighty existences in theherworld, carrying their torrential rage and fury, rapidly strode towards the summit of the mountain. In the process, Little Skeleton hadpletely sucked away the aura of death he had gathered from within the hundred-mile radius, and formed a Body of Element.

    ¡°Father...¡± Little Skeleton finally walked out from the pce. He stood tall on the peak of the mountain, overlooking all the undead creatures beneath his feet.

    At the sight of Little Skeleton, Han Shuo could not resist taking a careful look at him up and down, examining his current appearance. A spotlessly white skeletal body giving off jade-like radiance with every inch of his bone containing an enormous amount of aura of death. A puff of light, dusky smoke constantly revolved at the center of his skull, which looked just as un-morous as the ever-dull and grayherworld. But Han Shuo knew that it was the Soul of Element that Little Skeleton had just formed.

    When Han Shuo looked at Little Skeleton, he sensed that the Soul of Element in the center of Little Skeleton¡¯s skull had merged and be one with the boundless aura of death found all throughout theherworld. In addition, this reforged body of Little Skeleton left Han Shuo with a bizarre sensation.

    It was as though this Little Skeleton before him had existed in thisherworld for thousands upon thousands of years, and that he had been the true Undead King of theherworld all along.

    ¡°There are two bone dragons and one king zombie heading here. They aren¡¯t affected by your energy,¡± warned Han Shuo.

    ¡°I drew them here on purpose. Father, stay and watch. They will soon crawl under my feet just the same,¡± Little Skeleton said with overwhelming self-confidence as he slowly walked to Han Shuo. His Purple Demon Eye suddenly began to glimmer with nefarious light. An marvelous energy radiated from it like a water ripple.

    As though an order, after Little Skeleton sent out this energy, the innumerable undead creatures who were rushing to the mountaintop like pilgrims began to grovel on the ground. Each and every one of them ceased to move an inch, instead burying their heads, seemingly awaiting Little Skeleton¡¯s nextmand.

    Han Shuo could tell that among these undead creatures that upied every surface of the mountain, only a small portion were original subordinates of Little Skeleton. A greater portion of them were outsiders who had only involuntarily approached after they heard that calling from the magnificent mountain. Of those creatures, the majority had previously been followers of the two bone dragons and the king zombie. It was only because they were attracted by that miraculous energy of Little Skeleton¡¯s that they instinctively gathered there.

    After Little Skeleton disyed his formidable might, everyst creature kneeled to the ground without making the slightest movement. Only the trio of bone dragons and king zombie were unaffected by Little Skeleton¡¯s energy. They arrived at the top of the mountain having roared the whole way through.

    ¡°Are you the one challenging my might?¡± After the three undead creatures, whose strengths were the cream of the crop in theherworld, arrived before Little Skeleton, one of the bone dragons disyed a powerful corrosive aura as he spurted out a long dragon breath. His body was hovering in the air above the mountain as he gazed at Little Skeleton down below with arrogance.

    ¡°Unruly existence, you will pay the price!¡± the king zombie who had an enormous body roared at the sky, releasing his overbearing aura which would cause inferior undead creatures to willingly serve him. He seemed to be extremely irritated and furious.

    ¡°Peculiar existence, I shall absorb your soul, and obliterate all evidence that you had ever existed,¡± the other bone dragon was wavering his tail as he came out from the sky behind Little Skeleton, greedily gazing at the soul inside Little Skeleton¡¯s skull.

    ¡°You three puny fellows, pledge your allegiance to me immediately. Otherwise, face your death!¡± Little Skeleton uttered hismanding speech to the three exceptionally formidable undead beings as though it were their destiny.

    Upon finishing those words, Little Skeleton let out an intense energy of death. Suddenly, the element of death all around them began to sizzle. Little Skeleton¡¯s originally stout body started to grow bigger and bigger. In no time, Little Skeleton had sprouted to seven to eight meters tall, with fierce-looking bone spurs from head to toe, giving him a sinister appearance.

    A five-meter long bone spur, emitting energy of death of the utmost ferocity, was effortlessly grasped by Little Skeleton in his hand. On his back, his seven bone spurs tripled in length to resemble the vicious fangs of a predator. Glittering with a bewitching and sinister luster, they left any observer with an intense feeling of shock.

    Little Skeleton, who had suddenly mammothed, released that energy of his as though looking down upon all beings as weak tiny ants. In all of a sudden, the three creatures who had made solemn vows to vent their fury on Little Skeleton, all instinctive grew fearful in their hearts. All three of them couldn¡¯t help but maintain a distance from him.

    ¡°Pledge your allegiance to me, or else, you lowly souls will surely be obliterated!¡± with a wicked tone of voice, Little Skeleton had yet again broken their willpower.

    The king zombie took a few steps backward but immediately took a few steps forward after Little Skeleton¡¯s arrogant speech. He raised his head and suggested to the bone dragons in the sky ahead and behind him, ¡°You two bone dragons, let the three of us work together, and behead this mighty being.¡±

    ¡°Will do,¡± the two bone dragons replied simultaneously. They then abruptly charged at Little Skeleton from his front and back. The attack which had been brewing inside their bodies for a long while burst out in an instant.

    The king zombie also fiercely charged over as he carried an unstoppable, terrifying energy. The death energy around him was far more incisive than the sharpest of swords.

    With one flick of his hand, Little Skeleton stopped metal, fire, earth elite zombies, who were tempted to help him, and said, ¡°I¡¯ve got this!¡± At the same time, Han Shuo, who originally intended to join forces with his three elite zombies, also received Little Skeleton¡¯s dissuasion. Little Skeleton simply oozes with absolute confidence. At this moment, he seemed to be the true king of theherworld since the beginning of time. There was seemingly not a single undead creature who could offend the dignity of this King of Undead.

    Han Shuo hesitated for a moment before stepping back beside wood, metal, fire elite zombies. As he kept an eye on that fierce battle that was on the verge of eruption, he gathered up his mental strength with the intention of jumping right into the battle when Little Skeleton revealed any signs of being on the losing side.

    Two bone dragons and one king zombie. These were mighty undead creatures that only sacred grade necromancers could summon. Even on Profound Continent, beings of this level would cause anyone a big headache. In theherworld, where the aura of death was at its utmost intensity, as Han Shuo only had his consciousness traversed to this ce, he had no certainty of handling any one existence of this level.

    ¡°Auu........¡±

    Little Skeleton let out an overbearing howlbined with the aura of death and it reverberated to a distance of over a dozen miles.

    Without using the seven bone spurs on his back to propel himself, Little Skeleton¡¯s enormous body floated loftily in midair. That five-meter long bone spur in his hand, after being lightly whirled, as though it were the most incisive weapon in theherworld, whooshed like lightning towards the bone dragon mounting a sneak attack from behind Little Skeleton.

    Dong! The bone spur was lightning fast. Leaving no time for that bone dragon to evade, it stabbed straight through and shattered several of his bones, sending his enormous body backwards through the air.

    Pow! After throwing out the bone spur, Little Skeleton didn¡¯t even turn back to look but suddenly descended towards the king zombie. As he threw a kick, an enormous amount of aura of death converged at the bottom of his white, bony feet, andnded on one of the shoulders of the king zombie.

    A crisp and a crackle echoed through the atmosphere just as the king zombie staggered and fell backward. Before the other bone dragon could get near him, Little Skeleton swatted the king zombie¡¯s head. Pop! The king zombie¡¯s big head was smashed to smithereens, and Little Skeleton simply yanked out a greenish ball of soul.

    ¡°My King, I¡¯m willing to serve you. From this day forth, I will serve you alone as my master!¡± dered the king zombie, whose soul was clutched in Little Skeleton hollow palms, without the slightest hesitation.

    ¡°Smart fe.¡±

    His sparkling bone w that held onto the king zombie¡¯s soul suddenly bombarded towards the bone dragon that charged straight ahead. A storm of corrosive fluid that was mixed with this bone dragon¡¯s dragon breath fell down like fine rain droplets. The king zombie¡¯s soul shrieked miserably as he hastily exerted all his strength to congeal the aura of death. That soulless body of his suddenly flew out and crashed into the bone dragon.

    Dong! As the king zombie¡¯s body collided with the bone dragon, Little Skeleton inserted the king zombie¡¯s soul back into his body with one punch. The king zombie wrapped himself in the bone dragon as though his life depended on it. Little Skeleton then bewitchinglynded on the back of the bone dragon.

    The bone dragon was greatly shocked and struggled with all his might. Tightly tangled and given no chance by the king zombie who was still an ally just moments ago, the bone dragon felt dejected in his heart as he bawled the king zombie out in all shamelessness.

    The king zombie who had been intimidated by Little Skeleton knew in his heart that Little Skeleton¡¯s strength was surely not something that he could contend against, therefore he made the wise decision to surrender and serve him. This was naturally the best moment for him to disy his loyalty to Little Skeleton.

    ¡°Bone dragon, do you truly wish to die?¡± As Little Skeleton stood on the back of the bone dragon, a bony w suddenly came into contact with the nape of bone dragon¡¯s neck.

 Chapter 508: King of Undead

    GDK 508: King of Undead

    The bone dragon, tightly held by the king zombie, knew that it was all over when he heard Little Skeleton¡¯s voice.

    A sense of fear permeated deep into his soul like it was being locked up in shackles. That kind of wicked energy left himpletely petrified, so much he could no longer defend himself.

    The monstrous body of the bone dragon trembled. A hand pressed down on his nape with the weight of a mountain, a force he could not dream of rivalling. Under this enormous force, his entire body sank downwards inch by inch helplessly.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was omnipresent, he could sense that it was the hand of Little Skeleton that was holding down the bone dragon. An overpowering aura of death gathered in his surroundings. Little Skeleton forced bone dragon down from the air, leaving not an inkling of leeway for the bone dragon to resist.

    Little Skeleton, having formed the Soul of Element and Body of Element, now possessed strength so valiant that even Han Shuo was in disbelief. Even with both his consciousness and physical body, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t be nearly as footloose as Little Skeleton was in theherworld.

    The aura of death was at its utmost intensity and richness in theherworld. Having formed a Soul of Element and a Body of Element, Little Skeleton could muster the aura of death to form all kinds of attacks when pushing his powers to the limit. In theherworld, such powers were simply too overwhelming for a single being to possess. It was for this reason that king zombie and the bone dragon hadn¡¯t even the slightest chance of defending themselves.

    Han Shuo never quite knew the upper limits of Little Skeleton¡¯s true strength, and now, all he could be certain of was that Little Skeleton possessed at least demigod strength. Having developed a Soul of Element and Body of Element, Little Skeleton was only one step away from bing an actual God. Suddenly, Han Shuo realized that he no longer had to worry about Little Skeleton in theherworld anymore.

    Rumbles... With Little Skeleton constantly pressing on his nape, the humongous body of the bone dragon suddenly fell to the ground.

    ¡°I, I yield, my King,¡± finally, the bone dragon tremblingly expressed the fear in his heart.

    ¡°Mighty existence, it is our true and final ce to be under your leadership,¡± the king zombie hastily grabbed the chance to express his devotion. After having his soul restored by Little Skeleton, utilizing the aura of death found all around, he restored his skulled that was smashed by Little Skeleton to its original state.

    ¡°Good. It would be quite a waste as you have all evolved to such a high stage already. If your soul were to be destroyed, you would cease to exist,¡± Little Skeleton said in a most imposing, dignified tone and let go of his bony hand pressing on the bone dragon¡¯s nape.

    Little Skeleton raced before the other bone dragon like a thunderbolt, arriving in front of him. This bone dragon was the first one attacked by Little Skeleton and had broken a few bones from that bone spur Little Skeleton wielded. Barely managing his escape thest time, the bone dragon knew how futile it was fighting Little Skeleton.

    What a pity. The mighty strength Little Skeleton newly possessed meant he wouldn¡¯t be able to leave easily, especially when the bone spur that Little Skeleton wielded was still lodged inside the body of the bone dragon.

    A bright radiance streaked across the sky. Little Skeleton had arrived ahead of where the bone dragon was escaping to. Before the bone dragon could even react, Little Skeleton had grabbed onto the bone spur stuck on the bone dragon. His Purple Demon Eye glittered with brilliant rays, and the bone spur in his hand began to slowly revolve. The skeleton of this bone dragon started disintegrating by the second as a creaking noise filled the air.

    The bone dragon started howling in misery. As he struggled in the air, he shouted, ¡°Master, my great master, forgive me!¡±

    Who would have guessed, yet another cowardly character!

    In theherworld, only the fittest survived. When lower ranking life forms met higher ranking beings, they had only two choices ¨C pledge their allegiance, or have their soul energy sucked out from them.

    Since the dawn of their existence in theherworld, low-ranking undead creatures had known how to survive in front of higher-ranking creatures. When the bone dragon realized that there was no escape, he knew in his heart the choice he would have to make.

    ¡°Very well. Offer up your soul and form contract with me. From today onwards, between us, I shall be your master, you shall be my ve, until one of our souls is destroyed...¡± Little Skeleton stood straight before this bone dragon. He stretched out his hands to produce a strange soul contract. An oval-shaped, bizarre magical brand instantly took shape between his hands.

    After this soul contract was sessfully deployed, this bone dragon only hesitated for a short moment before obediently handing out his soul, which slowly fell into the magical brand between Little Skeleton¡¯s two hands. The other bone dragon and the king zombie dutifully strode over from a short distance away. Without the need for instructions, they took the initiative and presented their souls, which also fell into the magical brand made by Little Skeleton.

    Three souls of extremely mighty undead creatures of theherworld fell into the magical brand made by Little Skeleton one after another. At this moment, multiple waves of wicked energy were suddenly discharging from Little Skeleton¡¯s palms, while the Soul of Element in Little Skeleton¡¯s skull slowly flew out and wrapped up the magical brand bit by bit.

    A kind of miraculous contract which even Han Shuo didn¡¯t know about materialized all of a sudden. Observing the interactions between the four souls, Han Shuo realized that Little Skeleton¡¯s soul hadpletely upied the position as the leader, not allowing the three creatures even the slightest bit of autonomy.

    Gradually, Little Skeleton¡¯s Soul of Element once more returned to his own skull. The souls of the three mighty beings in his two hands suddenly shot back into their own respective bodies in three straight lines.

    ¡°Master!¡± The two bone dragons and the king zombie suddenly kowtowed at Little Skeleton¡¯s feet as they respectfully saluted Little Skeleton in unison.

    The three mighty undead creatures that came with rage and fury, when pit against Little Skeleton who had evolved to a new realm, had no room to resist in any way. Just like that, they were all forced toplete a master and ve contract with Little Skeleton, vowing their eternal loyalty and devotion to Little Skeleton.

    It had to be said that Little Skeleton indeed had left Han Shuo in more and more disbelief. Recalling Little Skeleton¡¯s appearance back in the days when he helped Han Shuo take out the trash every morning, Han Shuo¡¯s feelings were indescribable.

    In just a short few years, from a nobody working odd jobs, Han Shuo became a City Lord in Lancelot Empire and possessed strength not in the least inferior to a demigod. From a petite and useless low-level skeletal warrior, after continuously evolving, Little Skeleton ascended to the point where he could force bone dragons and a king zombie to submit and ept him as their master.

    Sometimes, life is just so inconceivable, so transformative, and so magical!

    ¡°Very good. You three were rather tactful. Otherwise, by now, your souls would have scattered and vanished, with every mark of your existence thoroughly erased,¡± Little Skeleton narrated the truth as he gazed at the three ves he just received crouching on the ground as brilliant rays radiated from his Purple Demon Eye.

    ¡°Master, it is only by following behind you that we can advance further. An existence as great as Master will certainly provide us with even more expansive skies,¡± thest bone dragon was immediately boot-licking. He seemed to be a bright one.

    Compared to the abundant low-ranking undead creatures, these mighty beings belonged at the top of the pyramid. Not only did they possess terrifying strength, but even their intelligence levels were well over those lowly creatures. Given they had intelligently chosen to pledge allegiance, as well as giving these rather crude tteries, there could be no denying that they were of great potential.

    Awooo...

    A deafening howl mixed with a whiff of sinister energy was suddenly released from Little Skeleton.

    In an instant, all the undead creatures crouching on the ground as far as the eye could see stood up and gazed at Little Skeleton on the summit of the giant mountain. They looked like soldiers waiting for their general to issuemands.

    Undead creatures were very sensitive to rankings. They had all been informed through theirnguage of the fact that the three former Kings had suddenly all pledged allegiance to Little Skeleton. By now, Little Skeleton who summoned them over had testified his own unparalleled might to all of them. These undead creatures were instinctively fearful.

    ¡°You three will continue tomand your previous subordinates. From today forth, with this mountain at the center, expand my territories to all regions in the surrounding. If you meet with existences you cannot conquer, report back to me immediately.¡± Little Skeleton was akin to the general of a magnificent army of a thousands men and horses as he began to methodically givemands to the forces he obtained without breaking a sweat.

    ¡°As you bid, Master. We will spread Your prestige to every corner of theherworld,¡± the three powerful undead creatures replied in unison.

    ¡°Good. Take your own respective original subordinates and dismiss,¡± Little Skeleton instructed, full of mettle.

    At Little Skeleton¡¯smand, those undead creatures who had rushed over like pilgrims slowly retreated from the mountain. The three high-level undead creatures that came with rage yet again became the masters of those who had betrayed them, preparing to lead them through enemy lines, opening up even more expansive territories for Little Skeleton.

    The summoning that Little Skeleton issued this time made all the undead creatures within the several hundred miles recognize one fact ¨C Little Skeleton was the true King of Undead there.

    After hibernating a long while, this time when Little Skeleton reappeared, he returned with an astonishing demeanor. Han Shuo, who had observed the entire event, suddenly realized that Little Skeleton truly had changed. Unwittingly, he had turned into a mighty being that could no longer be overlooked.

    In theherworld, Little Skeleton was the true emperor. All undead creatures were expected to creep under his feet.

    Han Shuo believed that Little Skeleton¡¯s existence was tantamount to him having a monstrous-sized army of undead. The more powerful Little Skeleton became in theherworld, the more forces Han Shuo had at his disposal.

    Seeing that Little Skeleton, who had initially been aplete ident, had grown to this stage, Han Shuo felt a deep sense of awe.

 Chapter 509: Venturing Deep

    GDK 509: Venturing Deep

    The hordes of undead creatures that covered every inch of thend, left as quickly as they came. They returned from whence they came not long after Little Skeleton¡¯s orders.

    It was only when the mountain had transformed back to its regr state did Little Skeleton¡¯s enormous body wane returning to his original petite appearance. Looking at Han Shuo, he said, ¡°Father, why have youe?¡±

    ¡°I had sensed that you had fused your soul with the Origin Crystal of Death, I just had toe check on you. I must say you having attained such feats was quite unexpected. Well done,¡± Han Shuo rejoiced. He was sincerely happy for Little Skeleton.

    ¡°I very much owe my aplishments to father¡¯s assistance. Without father, I would not have aplished what I already have,¡± Little Skeleton replied.

    Han Shuo now truly knew he hadn¡¯t worry for Little Skeleton any longer. Little Skeleton subdued bone dragons and king zombie! As long as he doesn¡¯t run into any more mysterious and indomitable beings such as those told in the legends of theherworld, he would never be in any more real danger.

    ¡°Alright, alright. Now that you have obtained such strengths, I can truly be at ease. Hmm, for the time being, you should learn to get used to your new body and soul. You will also have to look after Little Water and Little Wood when they arrive, you will supervise them in their practice of Penta-elemental Undead Formation,¡± said Han Shuo.

    ¡°Be at ease father, I know what I ought to do,¡± affirmed Little Skeleton.

    Without wasting any more time, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness traversed through spacetime tunnel and returned to Profound Continent. He awoke in the hidden chamber in the Dark Forest.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t a clue of how much time had passed. He did some stretching before quickly leaving the chamber and into the depths of the Dark Forest.

    To get to the Valley of Sunshine from Kasi Empire, one had to traverse through the Dark Forest. Han Shuo had always been very interested in the Dark Forest, a ce full of wonders and mysteries. During his previous excursion to Kasi Empire, Han Shuo did not spend too much time in the Dark Forest. But seeing as there was no particr urgency for his return this time, Han Shuo took his time with the journey.

    Walking into the depths of the Dark Forest, Han Shuo paid close attention to the distinctive flora and fauna of the Dark Forest. He was fascinated by it all. He had even obtained several very precious materials along the way. As hemented at the wonders of the Dark Forest, he paid even more attention in his tour of the Dark Forest.

    Han Shuo stayed in the Dark Forest for several days as he gradually ventured towards the deepest part of the forest. Along his travel he attained many priceless items, as well as a few exotic super-ranking magical beasts that had sensibly attempted to keep their distance due to Han Shuo¡¯s sheer power.

    The Cemetery of Deathid at the edge of the Dark Forest. Han Shuo had lost count how many times he hade and gone to the Dark Forest, but he had never before ventured so deep into the Dark Forest like he did now.

    The deepest part of the vast and seemingly boundless Dark Forest, had always been synonymous with ¡®mystery¡¯. Those who dared set off into its deepest parts were in for a brutal journey. Countless adventurers had flocked to the Dark Forest over the years, yet none could ever dare im they had roamed it in its entirety.

    The right circumstances had never seemed toe to y for Han Shuo to thoroughly investigate the depths of the Dark Forest until that moment.

    Soon enough, Han Shuo found himself at the notorious, aptly-named ¡®forbidden zone¡¯. He remembered right ahead of this forbidden zone that he had once encountered a golden dragon and a cyclops. He had also discovered the personal notes of the expert who helped establish the Lancelot Empire, as well as the skeletons of many super-ranked magical beasts.

    Walking down memoryne, Han Shuo discovered that this ce no longer bore any resemnce to its former self. Itckedyers of obstructive energy, weeds had overtaken every inch of the soil, and all kinds of magical beasts now inhabited the grounds, living in a single ecosystem. Han Shuo sensed the presence of super-ranked magical beasts some distance away. They, however, were notplete savages and keptrgely to themselves.

    Han Shuo gasped. A couple miles to his left were two super-ranked magical beasts fighting in what seemed to be an intense battle.

    Curiosity took over and Han Shuo, who had visited with the pure intention of sightseeing, made his way over to observe themotion. It was marvelous, a majestic unicorn fighting a cyclops. At one nce he knew, it was him, it was the same Cyclops Han Shuo had crossed paths with in the forbidden zone.

    Unicorns were thought of to be the purest of magical beasts. Their horns possessed the miraculous ability to purify sinister energy and detoxify any poison. Unicorns moved as fast as lightning and could skillfully manipte lightning and wind magic. Under their gorgeous, snow-white exteriors was a strong physical body not in the least inferior to those of the dragons.

    This unicorn was likely an adult. Its horn radiated a dazzling array of rainbow-colored light, adding to its nimble and exceptional physique. It was simply a living work of art.

    Among the lush ancient trees it leapt and frisked about. With each tread of its hind legs, it would leap a dozen or so meters. Its horn glinted with a beautiful luster as strobes of lightning and wind des were unrestrainedly sent flying towards the cyclops.

    The cyclops, massive as he was, was unexpectedly on the losing end. Not even his insane strength could best the unicorn. Spell after spell hammered at the cyclops, and all this one-eyed giant could offer was an insufficient bid to defend himself. The unicorn was much too fast, too nimble. He couldn¡¯tnd one hit.

    It was all so fascinating to Han Shuo. He just did not expect this level of magical ability from the unicorn.

    What a strong, absolutely stunning unicorn. If I can capture and give it to Fanny, Phoebe, and the others, they would most certainly be overjoyed, Han Shuo thought. He remembered that among Phoebe, Emily and Fanny, only Fanny had yet to receive a precious treasure from him.

    Han Shuo had gifted Phoebe the divine weapon ¡®Starry Sky¡¯. While Emily not only received the personal notes and magical staff of demigod Ayermike Cotton, she was also gifted an Origin Crystal of Darkness. But despite his unfaltering favor for Fanny, she had yet to receive anything from him.

    A swell of guilt grew in Han Shuo. He was now determined to get the most valuable treasure he could find no matter what. Any failure to do so woulde off as prejudice.

    Unicorns possessed not only wless, unmatched beauty, but also miraculous powers. It would be irresistible woman. He made up his mind, he would by hook or by crook capture it and force it to form a contract with Fanny. This would be his way of making it up to Fanny.

    Unicorns were truly rather intelligent super-ranked magical creatures. A couple of bolts of lightning shot at Han Shuo even though he was three hundred meters away in hiding.

    Han Shuo was shocked, and thought to himself, he¡¯s a restless little guy, isn¡¯t he. He stretched his hands forward in a tearing motion, and the lightning bolts simply shattered and disappeared.

    Seeing that his presence had been found out, Han Shuo thought that he might as well stop hiding. Walking out from behind the ancient tree that tore through the sky, he smiled at the unicorn ahead of him, looking at him on the alert. Revealing what appeared to be an amiable smile, he greeted, ¡°Hi...¡±

    A couple more bolts of lightning and a wind de interrupted him from speaking. With a bitter smile, Han Shuo threw his hand to the sky, dissipating all the attacks the unicorn had unleashed.

    Suddenly, the cyclops cried out in surprise, ¡°Oh! It¡¯s you, great demigod existence!¡±

    In theirst encounter, Han Shuo had left quite an impression on the cyclops. Han Shuo had absorbed an enormous amount of energy and entered a demonic trance. The Cyclops presumed him to be a demigod after that point. Some time had past since then and Han Shuo no longer needed to derive his power from any external sources to attain demigod levels of strength.

    Han Shuo bluntly acknowledged the cyclops¡¯ appetion. He chuckled, ¡°It¡¯s been a while. What¡¯s up? What troubles have you run into?¡±

    ¡°This unicorn is really troublesome. All I did was take a few rocks from its territory, and it has been chasing after me since. He¡¯s trying to kill me. Just a real pain,¡± the cyclops snivelled.

    A pair of eyes flickered back and forth between Han Shuo and the cyclops as they carried on their conversation. The eyes looked much like gemstones, and moved between the two as if it thought them to be friends. It all of a sudden fled like a frightened chicken.

    Given that two of its strikes had missed, the unicorn could tell that Han Shuo was leagues above the cyclops in terms of power, therefore it dared not remain there any longer. A smart creature, indeed.

 Chapter 510: Subduing a Unicorn

    GDK 510: Subduing a Unicorn

    Unfortunately for the unicorn, its opponent this time was no longer a cyclops. Despite his enormity, the cyclops could never catch up to the unicorn. Han Shuo, however, was obviously much faster than the cyclops.

    Upon witnessing the unicorn flee him, Han Shuo ceased to mind the cyclops and immediately went after the unicorn. Without even going all-out, Han Shuo¡¯s speed had exceeded that of the unicorn. By the time it had galloped a few hundred meters, the lightning-fast Han Shuo had off blocked the unicorn in its escape path.

    Typically, if one wished to take a magical beast as their pet, they had to first possess enough strength to even face it. Only those who had disyed strength sufficient to gain their reverence were qualified tomunicate with them. Otherwise, any amount of talking would be futile.

    Thus, traveling far quicker than the unicorn, Han Shuo blocked off the path ahead of it with zero hesitation and immediately set about releasing two necromancy spells ¨C the Boundary of Weakness and Boundary of Fear. They were proficiently deployed by Han Shuo and enveloped whole miles in their surroundings.

    Against all expectations, after the Boundaries of Weakness and Fear were deployed, all sorts of magical beasts within the coverage area were affected, regardless of their ranks ¨C that is, except for the unicorn. It refused to give up running as fast as it was flying. With each hurdle it would cross more than a dozen meters. It made a sharp turn and prepared to escape in another direction.

    The unicorn¡¯s white horn sparkled with a bizarre luster. Pure, holy energy flowed from its horn, which seemed to purify the Boundaries of Weakness and Fear. It was not affected by the two boundaries in the slightest.

    Han Shuo was astonished, but returned to his senses soon after. Unicorns possessed fantastic horns with the ability to purify sinister energy. It appeared that the Boundary of Weakness and the Boundary of Fear fell within that scope.

    Despite the ineffectiveness of his measures, Han Shuo was not at all discouraged. In the blink of an eye, he yet again stood in the unicorn¡¯s way. This time, Han Shuo did not utilize necromancy magic, but positioned himself right beside the unicorn. Before it could react, his lightning-fast hands were wrapped around it.

    This unicorn had not been afraid of the cyclops. It had even used magic spells to trample him over. But faced against Han Shuo, it had not a glimmer of courage left. This clever creature could sense that Han Shuo was a formidable one, and knew that it did not stand a fighting chance. Therefore, it turned on its heel and ran.

    When Han Shuo reached his hands out to the unicorn, its bright, slender eyes rolled about their sockets. Its front hoof suddenly treaded, attempting to change direction yet again. The unicorn was determined to escape.

    ¡°Hahah, think you can escape me?¡± Han Shuo ridiculed with an evil smile. Just before the unicorn moved beyond his reach, his arms lengthened as though they were made of rubber, and pressed his quick hands on the lower back of the unicorn.

    The unicorn felt as though it were being locked tight by two iron manacles. The massive force was not something that it could simply resist. Its body was forcibly held back, unable to budge.

    Wind des and lightning bolts ceaselesslyunched towards Han Shuo. At such close range, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t evade the attacks, so he had no choice but to deploy a protection shield. A round of crackling and rattling rang through like popcorn over the stove. Under the protective shield, Han Shuo remained untouched, not at all affected by the wind de and lightning attacks. Soon enough, the unicorn gave up on its futile attacks. Its head drooped in dispiritment. Two trails of pitiful tears trickled from the pair of gemstone eyes as it turned its head to gaze at Han Shuo.

    ¡°I beg you, please let go of me,¡± the unicorn pleaded in a melodious female voice. Her beautiful voice was so pleasant to the ears, one could almost fall in love.

    Han Shuo was dazed for a moment. He did not anticipate that the voice of a unicorn would be so pleasant and beautiful. However, Han Shuo was resolute, and he surely would not let go of a unicorn just because it had the voice of an angel. With his hands still on the unicorn, he put on a big smile and said, ¡°I can let you go, but first, you must promise to be someone¡¯s magical pet.¡±

    She rejected at once, not a sliver of quandary in her lovely voice, ¡°Absolutely not! I would rather die. Just kill me!¡±

    ¡°Alrighty then, I will get rid of you right away and have your horns. Hmm, they must be very valuable,¡± Han Shuo threatened with a malevolent grin. He gestured at the unicorn¡¯s horn with one hand, seemingly deciding on how to set about the task.

    The unicorn turned out to be none so dauntless and unafraid of death as she had been just a moment before. As she watched Han Shuo gesticte at her horn, she shouted again, ¡°Wait! Wait! I can give you treasure, as long as you are willing to let me off.¡±

    ¡°Treasure? Haha, do you think that a person like me would fancy your treasure?¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help butugh out loud. He gave the unicorn a pat on the mane and demonic yuan began spreading throughout her body like spider webs, shackling her magical powers.

    Han Shuo let go of his hold. Beaming ear to ear, he walked in front of the unicorn. After looking at the miserable creature up and down, he started tempting her, ¡°To tell you the truth, it is quite a blessing to be my woman¡¯s magical pet. She will certainly take good care of you. Regardless, it would undoubtedly be better than living in this deste forest. Besides, the human world is truly a rich and colourful ce, filled with beautiful things that you couldn¡¯t even imagine. A being so pure and holy like yourself will only be appreciated by humans when you are in the human world. Those magical beasts in the Dark Forest will never know of your beauty. You should know that...¡±

    Looking at the unicorn, Han Shuo slowly exined with a tone full of temptation. He added the Demonic Siren to his voice and used the unicorn¡¯s own beauty to entice her, other than making repeated emphasis on how colourful and diverse the human world was.

    Facing the threat of life from Han Shuo on one hand, this naive unicorn, on the other hand, was bewitched by the lively and exciting aspects of the human world. Her eyes gradually turned from miserable to curious. Seemingly attracted to Han Shuo¡¯s proposal, she blinked at him slowly. After a long while, she finally opened her mouth, ¡°Is the human world, really as beautiful as you say?¡±

    ¡°Of course! I guarantee you!¡± Han Shuo said assuringly and continued, not unlike a conman, ¡°There are many beautiful things in the human world that you have never seen before. It is only when you are in the human world that your beauty can be appreciated by people. With my protection, no one would ever dare think about harming you. I could even help you evolve further. If you promise to be my woman¡¯s magical pet, you will discover that the human world is your true paradise.¡±

    The unicorn was, of course, clear that with her life in Han Shuo¡¯s hands, she hadn¡¯t really a better option. On one hand, she was frightened by Han Shuo¡¯s death threat, while on the other, she truly was curious about the human world. After a short moment of ceaseless blinking, she no longer hesitated and simply nodded.

    Before Han Shuo could feel happy about it, the unicorn suddenly dickered, ¡°But, I want to choose my master myself. And she must be a woman, not a filthy man like you.¡±

    ¡°You can be at ease about that. Your master is a beauty. You are going to like her,¡± Han Shuo reassured. He thought to himself, Once you arrived in the human society, there won¡¯t be any room left for you to bargain. It sure is diverse and colourful, but you will also soone to learn of the enmity of humans.

    ¡°Okay then. I have promised you. Now release me,¡± the unicorn said dispiritedly, epting her fate.

    ¡°I will remove and withhold a portion of energy from your body as well as leave something inside your body, so as to avoid you taking the opportunity to escape.¡± He patted the unicorn in the about and said, ¡°I left a trace inside your body, and I can find you wherever you hide. So you better behave yourself.¡±

    ¡°Okay,¡± the unicorn answered in a resigned manner before softly muttering, ¡°What a despicable guy. I hope my master isn¡¯t nearly as wicked. Otherwise, I would rather die than live my life like that.¡±

    Han Shuo heard all those words that the unicorn muttered to herself but did not say a word. At this moment, the sound of heavy, thumping footsteps grew louder and louder. A massive silhouette a distance away gradually revealed itself.

    The cyclops slowly approached and walked to Han Shuo¡¯s side. He was amazed to see the unicorn standing politely in front of Han Shuo and asked, ¡°How did you get it to be so obedient all of a sudden?¡±

    ¡°Well of course. What could it do otherwise?¡± Han Shuo smiled. He then began to size the cyclops up, internally weighing if the cyclops had any worthy uses for him to exploit.

    Rumbles... It sounded as though the sky had fallen in the distant depths of the Dark Forest. For it to have been heard so loudly in spite of the great distances, some major event must have taken ce.

    The unicorn and cyclops obviously heard this noise as well. They both revealed fearful looks in their eyes.

    ¡°Does any of you know what lies at the deepest part of the forest?¡± when Han Shuo saw the two revealed fearful looks, he furrowed his brows and asked.

    ¡°I don¡¯t. But several days ago I saw an enormous greater dragon enter. That powerful creature was just as mighty as you, it ought to have been a rank five greater dragon,¡± the unicorn replied with a quiver in her voice.

    The unicorn was only rank three. A fifth grade greater dragon was equivalent to a demigod in the human world. Her fear was not unreasonable.

    ¡°I dare not venture there either. However, there seems to be a lot of mighty beings that have entered recently, as if some sort of massive change was happening inside,¡± the cyclops added.

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo stared nkly before continuing with a pensive look, ¡°Then I shall go in to take a look. Unicorn, you stay here. I will be back for you.¡±

    Han Shuo instantly took off into the depths of the Dark Forest.

 Chapter 511: Primordius Dragon

    GDK 511: Primordius Dragon

    The depths of the Dark Forest was towered by with ancient trees of great heights,plementary to the fragrances of flowers and nts, streams, and hills. It was a beautiful scene overflowing with vitality.

    Rare, unusual nts sprouted everywhere as far as the eye could see. Any one of them could demand a high price in town. A sound of explosions thundered through from the depths of the forest. It was as though the sky had fallen.

    As Han Shuo ventured deeper, he discovered that countlessplex and mysterious boundaries had been deployed. These magical boundaries were not lethal. They were purely meant to prevent outsiders from entering.

    Spider web-like magical threads were arranged to form an enormous magical formation. This magical formation covered arge portion of the sky, producing waves of energy throughout the area, pushing any trespasser out.

    Needless to say, this enormous magical formation was man-made. Whoever deployed this magical formation of tremendous coverage area likely did not do so with intentions of malice. The waves weren¡¯t particrly fierce or turbulent, but fairly mild and slow.

    Han Shuo, standing within the formation himself, only felt waves of great force surging against him. It was as though he was being pushed by a few hundred orcs all at once. The magnitude of the force was beyond Han Shuo¡¯s imagination. Fortunately, Han Shuo was the strongest of the strong. His physical body constantly reforged by demonic arts throughout the years had fully proven itself to be valiant in this situation. Despite having tremendous forces pushing against his body, Han Shuo nheless pushed forward, inch by inch.

    Surprisingly, in such a ce, the range which Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness could envelope was not as extensive as it could elsewhere. He could only faintly sense that there were movements around a few miles from him. All these only made Han Shuo more curious about what was in the depths of the Dark Forest. He was determined to find out about the situation there.

    The force generated by the enormous spider web-shaped magical formation couldn¡¯t intercept Han Shuo. By means of his sturdy and strong body and the wonderful abilities of demonic arts, Han Shuo advanced step by step towards the deepest point.

    Suddenly, those powerful forces pushing against him just dissolved. It became clear to him that he had passed through the formation. He gazed into the distance as he marched onwards.

    A greenishke then entered Han Shuo¡¯s sight. Theke resembled a huge piece of fine jade that had been cut perfectly levelled. It was clear, pure, and beautiful.

    Han Shuo was awestruck. He did not expect to see such a vastke in the depths of the Dark Forest. However, what baffled Han Shuo even more was that there were no fish or shrimp in theke, not even seaweed. Very strange indeed.

    When Han Shuo stepped forward, he found himself yet again astounded. Having just walked out from the puzzling magical formation, when he took another step, the gravity around him felt at least a tenfold heavier. Even regr walking required all the energy in him.

    In such ces of increased gravitational pull, duels are tipped in the favor of the person with the stronger physique. If a magus wanted to fly using a levitation spell, their mental strength would be consumed at a rate more than ten times greater than they ordinarily would. With these conditions in ce even a sacred magus wouldn¡¯t be able to hold his levitation for an extended periods.

    The tenfold gravitational pull hadn¡¯t, however, had much of a effect on Han Shuo. All he had to do was utilize the Art of Demonic Ninth Heavens and fly through, albeit at a slower speed than usual. He made his way bit by bit towards the emerald greenke.

    Han Shuo still pushed through with ease. The increased gravity was more a nuisance than anything; Han Shuo merely had to exert more strength than usual.

    A gale of wind gushed from afar as Han Shuo arrived at greenke. Before Han Shuo could react, a silvery greater dragon appeared from the top of the greenke. It seemed unaffected by the increased gravitational pull, maybe a sign that it was the one that had established the circumstances of the environment. It stood effortlessly with cold arrogance before Han Shuo.

    ¡°Return! You have no business in this realm,¡± demanded the silvery dragon.

    It had a certain look in its eyes, full of this unswerving determination like nothing could deter it from what it had to do. He seemed very formidable and powerful.

    ¡°What might be in there? Pardon me, just a little curiosity,¡± Han Shuo inquired.

    ¡°It is of none of your concern human, now leave at once! I will not ask again,¡± he threatened, as his body hovered, twisting and turning above the greenke with pristine elegance. His words were filled with arrogance, like those of a noblemen¡¯s.

    Dragons had always been excessively haughty beings. They considered their own race to be supreme, the most noble and grandiose of all. Be it humans, elves, orcs, or any other race, all besides themselves would be treated as inferior. This behavior had existed since ancient times. Simr to how forest trolls were greedy beings and dark elves acted with a lewd behavior, these attributes were deeply-rooted in their subconsciousness.

    Han Shuo, of course, did not shudder. Being in this realm, Han Shuo¡¯s strength greatly surpassed the majority of greater dragons. He cracked a smirk and squinted at the silvery greater dragon until the ck of his eyes were barely visible. In a somewhat unyielding tone, he said, ¡°What if I insist on entering?¡±

    ¡°Just know that I can have you out by force if I so choose to,¡± the dragon snarled as his fist sized nostrils expanded and contracted.

    He slithered his enormous body and summoned a hurricane. The hurricane swept Han Shuo off the ground and flung him away instantly.

    The added burden from the increased gravitational pull was simply too much for a regr being to walk. The silvery greater dragon had concluded that Han Shuo was a magus using a levitation spell after seeing him hover above the greenke. From his many years of experience of guarding this ce, no magus could ever resist the suction of his hurricane.

    The silvery greater dragon closely inspected Han Shuo. In his eyes, Han Shuo was nothing more than a puppet waiting to be manipted by the hurricane¡¯s power. As the hurricane took shape, the silvery greater dragon could almost see Han Shuo helplessly fly out from the greenke and back to the spider web shaped magical formation.

    Han Shuo snickered, ¡°You really think that just because you¡¯veid out this gravitational boundary, you have the right to do whatever you please?!¡± Han Shuo fumed. When the hurricane struck, ck rays radiated from all around him as though his body had formed a thick, hefty cocoon.

    Han Shuo was swallowed whole by the hurricane. Enormous pulling forces tugged on his body. Han Shuo, however, was unperturbed by this, still standing tall. The silvery dragon was not expecting such strength.

    ¡°Impressive. An unusual human indeed!¡± the dragon praised. It then made a twist and a sway and its tremendous tail suddenly swept over. Seeing his hurricane have no effect on Han Shuo showed that this was indeed a worthy foe and he began to utilize his full strength to stop Han Shuo.

    ¡°Right about time!¡± Han Shuoughed. He stood his ground, preparing himself, then extended his two hands to make a peculiar hand seal.

    A vicious energy that could topple the mountains and overturn the seas suddenly erupted from between Han Shuo¡¯s two hands. Taking the form of a cylinder, it bombarded towards the tail of the greater dragon that was swooping over.

    The dragons were known for their sturdy, toughened physical bodies. Even a thousand year old tree would snap like a twig upon impact from a dragon tail strike. But before the dragon tail could get anywhere near Han Shuo, the enormous force that came from Han Shuo¡¯s hand sealnded on the dragon tail. Not only could the dragon not resist the immense weight on his tail, he was also aching as though his tail had been set on fire.

    Whenever Han Shuo fired an attack, he made sure to be unrelenting, leaving no window or a counterattack from his opponent, as well as to seize every opportunity he was presented with. As demonic yuan spread through his body, he felt a jolt in his flying speed. Before the silvery dragon could react from the acheing from his tail, he felt Han Shuo mount on his back, tiny inparison to himself.

    Dong! A punch was thrown andnded on the dragon¡¯s body. That frightening energy gushed forth yet again, and the dragon could hardly bear it.

    Such power! Is he really human? The silvery dragon was greatly shocked. He dared not to stay any longer. He fled the scene before Han Shuo could throw a second blow.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t obstruct him but followed behind unruffled, heading deeper into the forest.

    Once they were out of the greenke, the increased gravitational pull dissolved and everything returned to normal. Han Shuo spread his consciousness and was immediately overwhelmed. He looked out at the scene with a solemn gaze.

    Right ahead was a spectacle on disy. Bolts of lightning remained static in the sky, ripping it apart. Sparks flew as clouds of smoke emerged.

    The blue sky seemed to have truly been torn apart. As faint smoke rolled in with the lightning, remaining still and bizarre as it was, several mysterious doors formed in the sky.

    Many brightly colored lights illuminated the doors, which totalled to seven. Each was assigned to a demigod being, save for the doorway closest to the edge.

    There were two greater dragons of forty or fifty meters, one silver and one golden, and both rank five beings. Next on the list were two thirty meter tall titans, colossal to say the least, and possessing demigod strength as well. The remaining two were green skinned orcs d in some unusual clothing. They appeared to be an orc warrior and an orc shaman.

    Each of these six creatures of varying races guarded a separate doorway. They had this intent as though they were resisting some sort of unknown enemy. Han Shuo could clearly sense the incredible strengths they possessed because they all seemed to have unleashed their maximum power.

    Six demigods of different races. A truly formidable force!

    Below the sky was a vast canyon. A dozen or more titans appeared, as tall as the mountains, apanied by some twenty dragons. Each one wore grave, strained expressions as they observed the changes in the sky with their heads raised.

    ording to legends, the titans possessed the strength to match deities. These tales had been circted since antiquity, yet, ordinary humans had never even seen this race. Such beings like the mountain ridge giant and the cyclops pales inparison to a titan.

    The titans were said to be the favoured children of the earth and the most powerful creatures in the world. They possessed strength so tremendous that they could single-handedly confront the gods...

    All the legends pertaining to the titans shed through Han Shuo¡¯s mind. Back then, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t convinced that the legends about the titans were true. But now that he could see their enormous figures with his own two eyes, there was no sense in doubting their glory. He reckoned that just one of those titans alone couldy waste to an entire city.

    Roar! A bellow echoed from inside the canyon.

    The dazed Han Shuo hastily turned his gaze towards the canyon. He caught sight of a hundred meter long Primordius Dragon wound around the summit of a mountain. Han Shuo had never before seen a greater dragon of such enormity. His body radiated such energy which made even Han Shuo¡¯s heart race.

    Folklore about the Primordius Dragon was some of the most widespread on Profound Continent. Legend had it that the Primordius Dragon had been guarding Profound Continent since ancient times. He would maintain the order of the Continent in silence. Whenever events took ce that threatened the lives of all races, the Primordius Dragon would emerge to maintain the order and stability of the Profound Continent.

    With just one look, Han Shuo could be certain that this greater dragon, a hundred meters in length, was precisely the Primordius Dragon of legends. This greater dragon exuded a mighty presence, more overwhelming than that of the Saintess Han Shuo met on the sacred mountain of the Church of Light. Han Shuo believed that even the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race would be no match against the Primordius Dragon.

    Without a doubt, this Primordius Dragon possessed the terrifying strength of a true god!

 Chapter 512: Demons from the Abyss

    GDK 512: Demons from the Abyss

    The Primordius Dragon coiled the mountain high above, raising his neck as he exhaled his sparkling dragon breath into the sky. Power so terrifying radiated from its breath that it seemed enough to tear apart space itself.

    It had certainly been enough to make the seven doorways in the sky glow with spectacr rays of light, constantly fading through the spectrum, as though they were being suppressed by that power and were slowly healing.

    Of the seven doorways where light rays interweaved, six were guarded by a demigod being each. From their backs, Han Shuo could see their desperate struggles and their resilience, giving all they could to resist the arrival of some ferocious creatures.

    Only one door near the edge did not have a demigod existence of simr power to guard it. It was guarded by a level four golden dragon, who had encountered some sort of powerful creature. The golden dragons purportedly possessed the most robust body of all dragon-kind. Yet, this golden dragon was writhing at the doorway with blood spraying all over.

    It was clear that the level four golden dragon could, by no chance, withstand whatever creature was behind that door, and suffered brutal injury to his body in the struggle.

    Han Shuo looked closer, and saw that whatid beyond the seven spectacr doors in the sky appeared to be another unfamiliar world. It seemed that without entering the door, it would be impossible to know what was on the other side, for all he could see were long streaks of light streaking across like shooting stars.

    Seven doors, seven creatures, six of which were demigod existences. Each and every one of them were battling with all their might against some terrible threat.

    The Primordius Dragon, who could have been around since the beginning of time for all anyone knew, was using his divine power to suppress the changing and morphing of the seven doors in an attempt to slowly heal them as to prevent something that could threaten the entire Profound Continent from entering through the seven doors.

    Han Shuo observed the changes in the sky as his heart flooded with the most intense curiosity. He was engrossed in the scenery behind those seven doors, as his mind flickered through the endless possibilities of what could lie behind those doors that was so eager to barge through.

    After entering the Carnal Realm, Han Shuo had encountered some of the most powerful beings on Profound Continent, and gradually came to understand some of its secrets. From what he could see, Han Shuo was convinced that the seven doors lead to another ne of existence, and the Primordius Dragon and the other six demigod existences were giving their all to prevent some extranar being from tearing through the passageways.

    The titans and the Primordius Dragon were indeed silently serving Profound Continent! Han Shuo thought.

    ¡°Human, what is it that you want?¡± As Han Shuo observed his surroundings with a grave expression, a roar thundered from the mouth of the silver greater dragon that Han Shuo had been pursuing. It was evident that the silvery dragon was furious, his teeth borne and ws extended in frustration.

    Everyst titan and dragon in the great valley turned away from the battles in the sky, and cast their humongous eyes at Han Shuo.

    There were over ten titans and twice that amount of dragons. Combined, those beings formed a force so mighty that they could elevate any nation to greatness and glory. With so many powerful ancient beings staring right his way, Han Shuo felt an intangible pressure bearing down upon him, and left him with great difort.

    Unlike the six demigods in the sky, the titans and dragons in the valley were not so powerful. Even so, with well over fourty colossal beings suddenly ring at him, the pressure was still unusually frightening.

    ¡°Human, what exactly are you nning, barging in like this?¡±

    Han Shuo did not respond, to which the silver greater dragon roared again, looking rather impatient.

    The two titans closest to Han Shuo looked at him up and down as they slowly approached, as though prepared to smash him into meat paste at a moment¡¯s notice if he said something against their interests.

    ¡°Huh? Why are you here?¡± A sudden cry of surprise came from a golden dragon in the distance, and a dragon who had been positioned a long ways away from him quickly flew over, looking at Han Shuo with astonishment.

    ¡°You... you¡¯re Cedric?¡± Han Shuo asked, staring at the golden dragon with a simr expression, as it seemed like he was the same golden dragon Cedric he had met a few times previously.

    ¡°It¡¯s me, Cedric, don¡¯t you remember?¡± It really was Cedric. He gasped in surprise.

    There were more than twenty dragons in the valley, and none of them had taken human form as their giant bodies coiled. Of those, half were golden dragons. Cedric had not taken human form, and in the wave of dragons, there was nothing to distinguish him from the rest.

    At the realization, Han Shuo gazed around the valley once more, and finally recognized this ce as the Dragon Valley he had heard of in legends. Han Shuo heaved a sigh of relief running into this acquaintance of his, and said, ¡°So it¡¯s you, Cedric. Haha, it¡¯s been a while. I¡¯m here purely for exploration. I heard the explosions in the sky and was drawn to it out of curiosity. Never had I expected toe upon such an impressive sight. What exactly is going on here?¡±

    ¡°Cedric, you know this human?¡± the silver giant dragon who had had a taste of Han Shuo¡¯s wrath questioned in confusion as he looked oddly at Cedric.

    ¡°This is the person I mentioned before, the one who intervened when that thief stole my treasure and even injured me. He assisted me when I needed it. And the other time, in the forbidden ground, it was he who broke through the eternal barrier. We¡¯re friends, there won¡¯t be any issues,¡± Cedric exined to the silver greater dragon.

    At his words, the two titans who had warily crowded over as well as the silver dragon no longer looked at Han Shuo with animosity, although the silver dragon still let out a derisive snort, and said, ¡°Now that the battle has entered a critical stage, he¡¯s not allowed to enter the space-time discontinuum zone, no matter who he is.¡±

    ¡°I understand,¡± Cedric answered, then said to Han Shuo, ¡°We¡¯re fighting for the safety of Profound Continent. There are some evil extranar beings who are trying to enter our world through this special space-time discontinuum zone. My dragon race and the titan race are doing all they can to resist these evil creatures from another dimension.¡±

    After much close observation, Han Shuo knew the gist of what was going on even without Cedric borating on the matter. The self-proimed defenders of the Continent, the titans and the dragons were giving it their all to protect the realm. Han Shuo could tell the intensity of the battle even from afar.

    The look of each titan and dragon showed just how cruel and unrelenting this battle had been. Each appeared more solemn and subdued than the next, a look of anguish in their eyes.

    In such critical times, any external forces would be enough to tip the scale of the battle in favor of the other side. It was quite clear to them to have barricaded the area to prevent any unknown forces from interfering.

    ¡°This is bad, Valile can¡¯t hold up much longer,¡± a green dragon cried out.

    Following the gaze of the crowd, Han Shuo noticed that the the golden dragon, the only being guarding one of the seven doors that wasn¡¯t a demigod was swaying in a barrage of light and electricity. Blood poured from its body, and it was clearly on itsst legs.

    There was only sorrow in the eyes of all the dragons in the valley as they grieved over the impending death of their fellow brethren.

    ¡°Next one, get ready,¡± the aged voice of the Primordius Dragon sighed, his voice mncholic and resigned. He sounded as though he could not bear the sorrow of parting in death.

    ¡°I¡¯ll go!¡± cried the silver dragon that had been pursued all the way there by Han Shuo, with the air of one who was not afraid to meet death.

    Before the silver dragon could move, a titan standing over thirty meters tall called out, ¡°Your strength is not enough. You dragons have already sacrificed one of your own, now it is our turn.¡±

    That titan seemed the tallest and most powerful amongst them all. As his thunderous voice called out, he was already moving. With each stomp the ground trembled. He was fast, and bolted forward like a streak of lightning.

    The golden dragon¡¯s body finally gave in, segmented and snapping to pieces, showering upon the unknown space-time discontinuum. As quickly as the dragon fell, the titan rose to take its ce, finally reaching the door.

    At that very moment, an incredible turn of events unfolded. It was uncertain if the door had grownrger, or if the titan had simply shrunken, but the titan, who could not under normal circumstances fit through the door, looked as though his body was being stretched and twisted, blending into the door like a piece of abstract art.

    Right after the titan fell in, the door which had been constantly growingrger suddenly returned to its original size. From what Han Shuo could see, after the titan arrived at that world where rays of light constantly shone, he found himself locked in battle against some sort of being that waspletely invisible, throwing punches and kicks to try to hit it.

    Han Shuo tried to focus, but still could not see what exactly was going on. All he could see were the flying rays of light. His consciousness could not sense any trace of the strange creature¡¯s existence. He gathered that this region of space did not follow conventions of the naturalw.

    Cedric had told Han Shuo that this area was some kind of a space-time discontinuum zone, and bizarre phenomena often happened in such ces. Han Shuo began to understand.

    The titan remained, in reality, within Han Shuo¡¯s field of vision, but in the space-time discontinuum zone, he may have been an unbelievably great distance away from the Profound Continent. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness could only stretch out so far given the limit to its range, therefore there was no way he would have been able to sense what was going on there.

    ¡°The third one, who knows how many more we¡¯ll need...¡± A low sigh heaved from an elderly green dragon.

    Han Shuo felt pity as he watched the titan barge through the door knowing full well that there would be no return. There wasn¡¯t much of a difference between the titan and the golden dragon that had just perished. The titan, in fact, was slightly weaker. His fate had been sealed; the golden dragon had not held on for long before being torn apart and this titan would likely suffer the same.

    There was a great amount of respect Han Shuo had for the titans as this titan knowingly rushed forth to his death just as the rest of them were prepared to do, sacrificing themselves for the safety of the hundreds of millions of beings that lived on the Profound Continent. These titans and dragons alike gave their lives as a noble sacrifice or the people. Han Shuo was humbled by their spirit.

    Despite the proud and arrogant nature of the dragons, their most admirable aspects shone like the sun during this battle. Without their silent protection, it is unfathomable what would have be of Profound Continent.

    ¡°Cedric, what on earth is going on?!¡± questioned Han Shuo. A surge curiosity brushed through his mind, what could be behind those doors?

    ¡°This space-time discontinuum zone has existed in the depths of the Dark Forest for millenia. We don¡¯t know how or why it formed, but it is constantly changing along with time and space. It often forms passageways that connect Profound Continent to other nes of existence. The dragons and titans have always safeguarded this ce against any foreign threats.

    ¡°From the moment of my birth about two thousand over years ago, hundreds of space-time discontinuums have urred. Most of them formed internar passages that have led to harmless vast expanses of outer-space, but there were naturally also a couple of times when they connected to other material nes of existence, but those connections never caused too much conflict either. Only in three instances did we encounter attacks from powerful foreign being, but we easily fended them off.

    ¡°I am unsure of how this came to pass but this time, the space-time discontinuum formed right at the heart of the Abyss where the demons reside. These powerful demons sensed the formation of these passageways and found their way here. In the beginning only the weaker demons tried to force their way in but were quickly dispatched.

    ¡°We had originally thought this would be like our previous encounters and didn¡¯t think much of it. We surely did not expect more and more demons to start attacking, and yesterday we finally understood how bad the situation was when even stronger demons joined in. We immediately notified experts from all over the continent, hoping they would join in on the defence.

    ¡°However, due to ourcency earlier on, the messages were sent a little toote. Only two demigod existences from the orc race who happened to be training deep in the Dark Forest have joined the resistance. But this time, a total of seven internar passageways have been formed. These demons are so immensely powerful that only demigods stand a fighting chance of holding them off and we only have six. Thest door must be guarded in turns, and both sides have lost a total of three of our numbers in doing so.

    ¡°The Primordius Dragon needs to use its divine power to alter the formation of the space-time discontinuum zone and can¡¯t spare any energy dealing with that door, and because of the unique formation of each internar passageway, we can only send in one being at a time to defend. At this rate, we don¡¯t know how much more we¡¯ll have to sacrifice before we can settle this invasion.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t even speak of settling this, we don¡¯t even know if we can hold them off. Look, the demigods are showing signs of fatigue. If the Primordius Dragon isn¡¯t able to alter or seal the space-time discontinuum zone soon, then I¡¯m afraid the Profound Continent will be facing an apocalyptic attack from the demons of the abyss,¡± the silver dragon retorted. It shook its head with a grim expression on his face.

    Boom! A sound like the rumbling of thunder came from the passageway the titan had just entered.

    Inside the passageway, multi-coloured streaks of light shone through like the most stunning fireworksunching into the sky. There was a sublime beauty to it. The titan that had just entered the fray seemed to have been caught off-guard by this, and it was unclear what exactly had happened, but wound after would burst open in his flesh, and blood rained down as it had before.

    ¡°A high-level demon has joined in on the fight in the passageway. Damn it, it seems Profound Continent really won¡¯t be able to avoid this catastrophe.¡± The Primordius Dragon sighed bitterly. Rays of light interweaved as divine power enveloped the space-time discontinuum zone. It seemed like he was ready to make ast attempt.

    ¡°This is horrible, what do we do?!¡± Cedric was frantic, his giant head shaking in disbelief.

    Cedric suddenly yelled, and his fist-sized dragon eye fell upon Han Shuo as he cried out in delight, ¡°Great Primordius Dragon, he, he is a demigod expert!¡±

    At those words, the attention of every titan and dragon in the valley was fixed on Han Shuo.

    It seems I¡¯ll have the chance to be Profound Continent¡¯s saviour, Han Shuo thought. He had originally intended to ask for the Primordius Dragon¡¯s opinion, but suddenly heard another great boom. He turned to the source of the noise and saw the titan who had just entered the battle was covered with gashes across his flesh, and rivulets of blood spilling into the passageway to an unknown space.

    Han Shuo had already been curious about what sightsy beyond that door, and he also knew that, should the challenge be too great, he could always retreat. He leapt through the doorway at the speed of lightning and into the unknown foreign space.

    The moment he entered, he was blown away by the scene in his beholding.

 Chapter 513: One Man vs an Army

    GDK 513: One Man vs an Army

    There were strange and unfamiliar creatures that stretched as far as the eye could see. These monstrosities bore fangs and iling ws, as they threw themselves at him unrelentingly.

    Demons of all shapes and forms inhabited the abyss, thergest being tens of metres tall and the small ones only the size of a palm. They came in all colours, each grotesque and terrifying, and a pungent liquid flowed from their mouths lined with rows of razor teeth.

    Their breaths were equally putrid and on top of that, some of the demons oozes some sort of sticky pus from their bodies. It was the stuff of sci-fi movies, not real life. They were ugly, grotesque and disgusting. They evokes an instinctive hatred in him which made him itch to eradicate them all.

    An enormous abyssal demon of over ten meters in height stood before Han Shuo. It looked like a gigantic cyst. It¡¯s grotesque body oozed with pus and bulged as though tiny demon worms had been wriggling to get through to the open. It had a single green eye that gazed a rather sinister gaze.

    Thousands of smaller beetle-sized demons emitted a corrosive fog as they swarmed Han Shuo. Their sharp, tiny teeth squeaked as they grinded against each other. The sight, and especially that screeching sound, chilled to the bone as hordes of them descended like locusts during harvest season.

    The ce was bizarre, grey and empty; it was alien. It was unlike anything Han Shuo had ever imagined. He stood in the pathway that led to the Profound Continent. At his sides, shooting stars zoomed past leaving behind streamers of dazzling yellow light. He looked around but could not quite confirm his location. Up ahead was a swarm of innumerable any seal demons, and he could sense that even more were behind them in the door-shaped passageway. Aside from that, there were only blurry grey scenes, and beams of powerful, brilliant light shooting past.

    Squeak... screech... chatter...

    The abyssal demons let out strange cries that Han Shuo could not understand. They swarmed Han Shuo the moment he appeared, and showered the grounds with poison almost immediately. Their vibrant toxins were like paint and the demons the painters, attempting to depict a cruel image of rot and abstraction on Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    Han Shuo had confidence in his body¡¯s regenerative capabilities and his durability, but even so, he was unwilling to have a taste of the poison. It reeked of the strongest of acids and was able to cause paralysis.

    It then struck him why the golden dragon and the titan were so quickly reduced to nothing more than ruined corpses pooling in blood. In the face of so many abyssal demons producing as much poison as they did, it would have been impossible to dodge given their mammoth sizes.

    The colossal statures of the golden dragon and the titan were ultimately the impetus to their demise. They served as little more than a for any attacking their way.

    Only the demigods were able to form barriers strong enough to defend their bodies. Both the golden dragon and the titan had extremely tough bodies, but even the toughest of bodies were bound to be corroded and torn apart when drenched in hundreds of jets off poison.

    Even if Han Shuo had a body tougher than that he dared not take the risk of enduring the bursts of poison and activated a protective shield. A dark, hazy armor instantly wrapped Han Shuo.

    Hundreds of jets of poison sprayed forth, all of which were deflected by a shield as thin as an insect¡¯s wing. Faint traces of smoke rose off Han Shuo¡¯s barrier,plementing his figure and forming a sharp contrast against the foul abyssal demons surrounding him.

    ¡°What powerful poison!¡± Han Shuo eximed.

    With Han Shuo¡¯s prowess in the demonic arts, and the support of powerful demonic yuan, once his protective barrier was cast it would be imprable. As long as Han Shuo had enough demonic yuan to sustain the shield, it would, in theory, never falter in defending him from all physical and magical attacks.

    Of course, once the opponent¡¯s attack power exceeded what the protective shield could take, it would still break apart. Only, it seemed that these poisons did not have that much power in them. In that case, a protective shield formed entirely out of demonic yuan and extraordinary secret technique was the perfect defence against them.

    However, the smoke emitted showed just how powerful the poison really was having even affected the barrier. Han Shuo noted that when the poisoning into contact with his barrier, his demonic yuan drained at a significantly higher rate.

    Squeak... screech... chatter...

    The abyssal demons seemed rather intrigued. After a round of collectively spraying the toxins, they all stopped in unison, and began tomunicate with each other in a way that Han Shuo could notprehend.

    They had quickly finished off the golden dragon and the titan, greedy and cruel as they geared up to break through the internar passageway ahead. However, they once again found themselves detested by a new challenger. From his tiny stature they had presumed they could easily brush off the threat, yet their unbeaten poison attack had actually been deflected, clearly a surprise to them.

    The abyssal demons all stopped and entered a cacophonic round of discussions. Then, under the leadership of the huge cyst-like demon covered in pus standing opposite Han Shuo, they flew at him in a frenzy once more. This time, they not only continued to spew poison, but also made barbaric attempts to snap at Han Shuo¡¯s protective shield with their rows of razor teeth.

    If such crazed, savage beings were allowed to set foot on the Profound Continent, all its inhabitants would be devoured. Han Shuo looked at the abyssal demons swarming towards him and made a decision.

    The skeletal staff suddenly appeared in Han Shuo¡¯s hand, and he stared at the screeching demons lunging towards him with eyes aze. He quickly began chanting incantations. First, several rows of bone spears flew outwards, then the necromancers¡¯ signature Boundary of Fear and Boundary of Weakness suddenly enveloped the entire space.

    All physical worlds with living beings could not escape the fate of death, not even the cruel, vicious demons of the Abyss. As long as there was death in a physical world, there would be the element of death. As such, necromancy magic, which functioned on the element of death tounch attacks, continued to work at full power.

    The skeletal staff was, without a doubt, unstoppable. By using the it to cast necromancy spells, an ordinary necromancy spell would double in power. It was only with the help of the skeletal staff that the Boundaries of Fear and Weakness were able to contain all the abyssal demons.

    With the Boundaries of Fear and Weakness working as they should, all the abyssal demons suffered the effects. Their fierce attack speed at Han Shuo suddenly turned sluggish, and their minds became filled with fear of him, and their murderous eyes now showing some evidence of terror.

    The bone spears made whooshing noises as theyunched through the air, and many smaller, weaker abyssal demons were impaled. Green, red, beige, and brown blood sprayed from their bodies. Some of therger demons were covered in bone spears, letting out wails that would send shivers down any listener¡¯s spine.

    Row after row of bone spears shot out like rain, intercepting hundreds upon thousands of abyssal demons. In that window of time Han Shuo once again chanted necromancy incantations, preparing to summon a vast army of undead toe to his aid.

    And yet, as the incantation ended, there were no armies of undead creatures before Han Shuo. Not a single rotten limb.

    Han Shuo was stunned. At first he thought that he had made a mistake with the incantation, and chanted it again, waving his skeletal staff with precise movements.

    Yet it was the same. Not a single undead creature appeared!

    Han Shuo could not help but feel a chill in his heart. His first reaction was to use the connection he always had with Little Skeleton to contact him. Strangely enough, he could not sense the Little Skeleton¡¯s presence at all, and had no way of locating theherworld.

    Is it not possible to summon the undead in this space? Han Shuo eyed his surroundings carefully, and all he could see were streaks of light from shooting stars, and a dreary grey chasm.

    Beneath his feet was not physical ground, but white fog. In Profound Continent, a nket of water vapour could not possibly withstand any weight. Yet, Han Shuo was definitely standing upon it, and he could feel the solidity of the substance below him In front of him, dense swarms of abyssal demons had blocked his view. Behind him was an internar passageway connecting to the Profound Continent. Aside from that there was only the scene of greyness, as though he had been standing within the infinite space of the vast universe.

    It appeared that this space was also affected by the space-time discontinuum, time and space both beingpletely out of whack, with no exact coordinates to navigate this region. That was why he could not use necromancy tomunicate with theherworld, and it naturally meant he could not summon creatures from theherworld.

    Observing his surroundings, Han Shuo quickly arrived at a conclusion.

    Looking ahead once more, the tens of thousands of abyssal demons were rather sluggish under the effects of the Boundaries of Fear and Weakness. But after a while, they managed to adapt to it and resumed their movements, though much slower than before, and came charging determinedly towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°Hmph!¡± Han Shuo was unfazed. Even if he could not use any of his necromancy magic, he still had his actual life insurance ¨C demonic arts.

    Unlike necromancy, which required the presence of the element of death, with demonic arts, all of Han Shuo¡¯s power was contained within his body. Regardless of which ne he was on, regardless of whether the element of death was present, the demonic power existing within his body would never be affected the slightest bit by environmental factors.

    Han Shuo was rather satisfied with himself for his earlier decision. He had always firmly believed in making demonic arts his core and vital cultivation. Had he not done that, he would¡¯ve been at a great disadvantage in this space where he was unable to summonrge armies of the undead.

    ¡°Come at me, you putrid, filthy creatures of the Abyss!¡± He could be less bothered whether the demons could even understand him. Han Shuo smiled sinisterly as he slowly drew the Blood Seether from his space ring and, with a wave of his arm, floated out.

    The moment the Blood Seether was out, a thick blood mist began to flow from within, along with a strange, sinister energy, slowly being released from the Blood Seether via the blood mist. Everywhere it passed, the bodies of the abyssal demons obscured by the blood mist would suddenly bulge and their already-slow paces geven slower.

    Blood Seether was a demonic weapon made for massacre which Han Shuo had put a lot of effort in forging. As long as a creature had blood in its body, and was within the range of attack of the Blood Seether, it would be affected. These internar abyssal demons, despite the distinct colour of their blood, were still within the operational scope of the Blood Seether.

    Everywhere the Blood Seether passed, the path and speed of blood flow of the abyssal demons would go through drastic changes. He could see their blood writhing like tapeworms on their bodies, and their already grotesque appearance seemed even more hideous.

    The Blood Seether changed the speed and flow direction of blood in their bodies. Under the rapid shing and swirling of their own blood, their bones would begin to crackle and fracture until the swirling blood reached an rming velocity. Then, when the abyssal demons¡¯ bodies reached their limits, their bodies would violently give way.

    Once the first abyssal demon exploded, less and less could the rest withstand the power of the Blood Seether any longer. Their bodies would swell until they finally burst open, sending every shade of red spraying all over.

    Gradually, all the abyssal demons enveloped by the blood mist blew apart and died in the force of the rapid swirling of their own blood. As Han Shuo gazed upon the spectacr results achieved with the Blood Seether, he wondered if he should refine more of such unique demonic weapon. Han Shuo had to admit that the destructive power of such a unique demonic weapon was highly satisfying.

 Chapter 514: Boundless Resentment

    GDK 514: Boundless Resentment

    Once the Blood Seether was deployed, a few hundred abyssal demons were shrouded in a mist of blood, and subsequently, their bodies then exploding.

    Even that huge cyst-like demon could not resist the influence of the Blood Seether and exploded into pieces. Its wretched green blood permeated a nostril-assailing fishy stench, and was now sttered everywhere.

    As it turned out, its blood was rather corrosive as well. Any demon in its vicinity was sprinkled in the substance and subsequently melted down to liquid flesh. Everyst one surprisingly sumbed to the corrosion and fell six feet under.

    Indeed deserving of his title as leader. Even in death, it had to pull its underlings along to share its fate, Han Shuo thought to himself as he continued to control the Blood Seether, sending it to new oing abyssal demons.

    The ruthless, bloodthirsty abyssal demons seemed to now fear the Blood Seether ¨C they were unafraid of death, yet avoided the Blood Seether at all costs.

    The Blood Seether had opened up a path in front of Han Shuo. He took note of the sea of demon corpses that sank like stones instead of floating over the vast expanse of white cloud. Who knew what horrorsid beneath.

    The first thing Han Shuo noticed was that the bodies of the fallen titan and dragon were nowhere to be seen. He initially thought they had just been torn limb from limb and devoured, but now he knew they too had probably sunken through the clouds.

    This ce was truly mind-boggling. With space and time in disarray, strange other-worldly phenomena urred like a new normal. Bizarre events took ce that contradictedmon sense, challenging Han Shuo¡¯s most basic understanding of the naturalws. Han Shuo was convinced that a ce like this could not belong to any physical ne of existence.

    The internar gateway behind Han Shuo suddenly swelled up. Speckles of colourful light was cast from the centre of the door. Theyers of light and shadow interwove to reveal a stunning sight.

    Ahead of him, as the Blood Seether pushed forward, hundreds more abyssal demons withdrew in trepidation. The Blood Seether, dancing within the blood cloud, became the most terrified object in the eyes of the abyssal demons, as though it were a ck hole that could suck in and kill everything in its path.

    Dong Dong...Dong Dong...

    Sudden thuds boomed from behind the abyssal demons, each isted one bing louder and louder. The aim seemed to be to give the demons a spurt of courage, at which it was obviously sessful. Several long, slender, winged abyssal demons immediatelyunched themselves towards the Blood Seether like kamikaze pilots.

    The demons resembled giant falcons, and their wings like daggers, sharp and glistening. Their sudden appearance shocked Han Shuo. they were so fast he hadn¡¯t even time to withdraw his Blood Seether.

    ng ng...ng ng...

    The demons organized themselves into a long line, taking turns to sh at the weapon with their wings.

    One, two, three, ...

    There was a total of fifteen of these winged demons. In a heartbeat, each of them shed with utmost precision and force at precisely the same spot.

    As its master, Han Shuo was able to feel the impact left on the Blood Seether. It was an immense force, too much. A hole had been torn through the weapon, which, despite its minute size, meant that they had nheless prated it.

    After a round of battering, the abyssal creatures made a circle, took aim, and again charged at the Blood Seether. As they came into contact with the blood mist around the Blood Seether, the blood inside their bodies began to boil over.

    This tore their formation slightly but they were resolute and held on as tightly as they could. They once again shot themselves at the Blood Seether, determined to rip it apart even if it meant sacrificing their lives.

    Any creature willing to put their own lives at stake would release an inconceivable amount of energy. Even a puny little human, dauntless in face of death, would be extremely terrifying; even more so for the already savage and powerful abyssal creatures.

    Seeing the next wave about to strike Han Shuo quickly cast a demonic charm, causing the Blood Seether to return to him.

    It wasn¡¯t an easy task to refine the Blood Seether. It exhausted a lot of precious resources and took much time and energy. A torn opening could be slowly mended, but once it was shredded to bits by this group of deranged demons, Han Shuo could do nothing but reforge an entirely new one.

    Immediately after Han Shuo cast the demonic charm, the Blood Seether became erratic in its flight. The fifteen falcon-like abyssal creatures had no choice but to constantly alter their target as they closely pursued the Blood Seether.

    Pop Pop Pop....

    s, their bodies could no longer withstand the boiling blood coursing through their veins, and exploded one after before Han Shuo. Fragments of their dagger-like wings wereunched at Han Shuo.

    With a wave of his hand, a white bone shield blossomed from the dripping blood. The daggers targeting Han Shuo were intercepted by the white bone shield. Soon enough, the abyssal demons who had been cowering from the might of the Blood Seether rushed forth as Han Shuo finally retracted it. They charged ahead even fiercer than before, seemingly unafraid of death.

    Dong Dong...Dong Dong...

    From what seemed to be acres behind those creatures of the Abyss, strange thuds reverberated repeatedly. The sound was as though some sort of magical spell had bewitched the creatures of the Abyss, making them even more ruthless and savage.

    Could there have been an abyssal demon in the form of a magus behind this strange urrence?

    This preposterous hypothesis suddenly crossed Han Shuo¡¯s mind. Having been used to the warrior and magusbination of the Profound Continent, Han Shuo would of course conjecture that in a great battle, behind the frontlines of brave fighters there would always be priests and magi filling the role as necessary supporting units. Only by reinforcing magic could the fighters up their aggression and lose fear of death.

    However, this was a space-time discontinuum zone and he was facing abyssal demons that had only been heard of in folktales. No one had actually seen them. How could there be high-level beings as powerful as the magi among these filthy, otherworldly creatures?

    Han Shuo soon brushed off this absurd idea of his. He reinforced his protective shield with demonic yuan and continued to release bone spears row after row. It was certainly not the most precise method of attack but it covered the grounds.

    Without the army of undead at his disposal, the battle became a most challenging war of attrition. Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength was rapidly draining away as he wiped out hundreds upon thousands of abyssal demons. The sheer amount of these things was way beyond imagination. The hordes just seemed to never end.

    A long but undetermined amount of time passed as Han Shuo defended the internar gateway and he was gradually feeling rather numb. It was just repetition releasing all those spells like a machine.

    All of a sudden, Han Shuo felt an intense spacetime fluctuationing from the portal behind him. He was, for a moment, delighted. He quickly turned to it to find that the internar gateway was rapidly healing.

    It¡¯s finally over. I¡¯m the savior of Profound Continent! Han Shuo thought. At this point in time, Han Shuo had nearly exhausted his mental strength. He was even prepared to resume using demonic arts to resist the infinite wave of abyssal creatures.

    In a spurt, Han Shuo unleashed all his remaining mental strength. Under the amplification of the skeletal staff, rows after rows of densely packed bone spearsunched from in front of Han Shuo. Making use of this window of opportunity, Han Shuo turned around and prepared to cross that healing internar portal, and return to that lovely Profound Continent.

    When Han Shuo flew towards the internar door at the speed of light, and an unstoppable, gargantuan energy gushed from the internar tunnel. This invincible energy carried the dragon breath of the Primordius Dragon, disrupting Han Shuo¡¯s pace.

    Not only had the indomitable energy hindered Han Shuo in his path towards the internar tunnel, a portion of that energy rushed through Han Shuo¡¯s body. In just a fraction of a second, Han Shuo¡¯s mighty body, tempered through tremendous willpower, had suffered substantial damage.

    Han Shuo finally experienced the true godly strength of the Primordius Dragon!

    ¡°NOOO!¡± Han Shuo was in disbelief.

    He had never once thought that after going all out and risking his life to defend the titans, dragons, and all living things on Profound Continent, he would receive such mistreatment! This was an intolerable, disgraceful betrayal. Even Han Shuo, someone who was all too familiar with the spitefulness of people, could not believe what was happening to him.

    ¡°You are a necromancer of the Cmity Church. You are the fountainhead of evil. There is no room for your presence on the Profound Continent. The Abyss realm, where evil lurks at every turn, that is where you truly belong. I have shown you mercy...¡± a snippet of Primordius Dragon¡¯s thoughts fell to Han Shuo from the distant Profound Continent. Han Shuo, stopped right before the internar gateway, took onest gaze of the tunnel, and saw the two demigod existences from the Church of Light ¨C the same duo he had previously met at the sacred mountain of the Church of Light.

    The two demigod existences of the Church of Light gazed at the healing internar doorway with cold eyes. They had faint smiles on their faces and were calmly chatting with the Primordius Dragon below them. It was evident that the abyssal demons¡¯ ferocious attack against Profound Continent was settled.

    Gradually, the doorwaypletely sealed, his veryst view of the Profound Continent forever frozen on his mind. The two demigods of the Church of Light, who stared expressionless at the doorway; the hundred meter long Primordius Dragon that circled the summit; the scene remained still in Han Shuo¡¯s head.

    Han Shuo had never ever hated a living thing as much as he did at this moment, but the Primordius Dragon had seeded in changing that! Just because of the one-sided statement of the two demigod existences of the Church of Light, because of his identity as a necromancer, the fact that Han Shuo had lent a hand and risked his life meant nothing. The great and glorious Primordius Dragon heartlessly severed Han Shuo¡¯s way home and left unimaginable damage to his body!

    Drenched in blood, Han Shuo cackled. He wasughing at his own naive benevolence, his foolish kindness, his presumptuous opinions. Heughed so hard that tears started flowing...

    ¡°Farewell, Profound Continent. Farewell, my friends. Farewell, my lovers. There will be no going home from here on. I can only wander in this alien Abyss realm for the rest of my life...

    ¡°If, if I can again return to the Profound Continent, what Church of Light, what Primordius Dragon, what titans, all of them, all the traitors, I will make them pay...

    ¡°Hahahaha, I¡¯m a necromancer of Cmity Church. I¡¯m the fountainhead of evil in Profound Continent. The evil-filled Abyss realm is where I truly belong. Haha, he even showed me mercy, he chose not kill me on the spot, he only made it forever impossible for me to meet the ones I loved. How merciful! How merciful of the Primordius Dragon! Haha...

    Han Shuo paid no heed to his damaged body drenched with blood, butughed hysterically as hundreds upon thousands of abyssal demons surrounded him. Hisughter was filled with grief, sorrow, destion, and most of all, his boundless resentment...

 Chapter 515: Collapsing Spacetime

    GDK 515: Copsing Spacetime

    The abyssal demons, numerous as always, obviously had no intention of letting Han Shuo off. Even with the internar tunnel sealed, they could not shake off the desire to shred to pieces the man who had ughtered so many of their fellowrades, especially seeing as Han Shuo was drenched in sweet, sweet blood.

    Despite their ugly exteriors, the demons were no fools. On the contrary, these seemingly primitive, violent creatures were frighteningly cunning!

    The creatures knew a thing or two about maiming another being, and Han Shuo was most certainly injured, though, they weren¡¯t quite sure what creature had inflicted such harm on this butcher. Nevertheless they were set on reducing Han Shuo to nothing but a pile of ashes.

    Han Shuo, still howling withughter, was not in the least fearful in the face of the numerous abyssal creatures that surrounded him. His protective shield had shattered on the spot from that strike of the Primordius Dragon, leaving his body exposed.

    When the abyssal creatures began to spray their toxic cocktails, Han Shuo finally came to his senses and ceased his unproductive resentment. Using the demonic yuan in his body, he yet again deployed a shiny, dark protective shield.

    And once more, the shower of poisonous fluids was kept off from Han Shuo like an umbre. Numerous abyssal creatures who had dauntlessly charged over, under the Demonic des in Han Shuo¡¯s two hands, were ripped into meat slices before falling into the unknown space beneath.

    Where there is life, there is hope. Han Shuo made use of this time to inspect his body for injuries. He discovered that he had indeed suffered unimaginable damage from that blow by the Primordius Dragon. However, Han Shuo was d to find that his demonic infant was unscathed.

    For a demonic arts practitioner, consciousness was of the utmost significance. Second to that was the demonic infant, the source of energy in the body. As long as those two were in good shape, then no matter how much damage the body suffered, the damage would not be lethal. Therefore, when Han Shuo discovered that his demonic infant did not suffer any damage, at longst, he let out a sigh of relief.

    His body tissues werergely destroyed, with nearly all of his internal organs shattered. Even a portion of his meridians and bones were damaged. In spite of the severity of his injuries, he could rest assured that he would not die. In time, Han Shuo wouldpletely recover, and his body would be good as new.

    As long as Han Shuo lived, there would always be the opportunity for revenge. Thinking fondly of his lovers in Profound Continent, and with his deep-rooted hatred for the Primordius Dragon and the Church of Light in mind, Han Shuo did not hesitate to attack. He tore any abyssal demons who dared approach him into bacon bits.

    With the internar portal sealed shut behind him, Han Shuo need not worry about the possibility of attackersing from behind him. He utilized his tenacious demonic martial skill to resist the assault of the abyssal demons, transforming the hatred in his heart into savage attacks. Those abyssal demons were dismembered one after another by Han Shuo¡¯s Demonic des.

    What felt like forever passed by and Han Shuo gradually felt somewhat fatigued. It wasn¡¯t ack of demonic yuan that he was experiencing, rather the severe trauma on his body that was kicking in. A great deal of his meridians and bones had been damaged, hindering Han Shuo from adeptly deploying his demonic arts. Even the formidable power of the Demonic des gradually diminished.

    Most demonic skills were dependent on the unimpeded cirction of the meridians. It was only with robust and sound meridians and skeletal structure that Han Shuo could release demonic arts with certainty and without hindrance. Han Shuo had no choice but to figure out another way to escape, for he knew there was no wisdom in staying much longer at the mercy of the unending stream of abyssal creatures.

    Han Shuo had no clue how many more of these abyssal creatures there were, and he had no idea how much longer he could keep it up.

    It seems that in order to cut a bloody path out of the battlefield, I must first reverse the situation and stop ying the passive role, Han Shuo thought.

    As he continued to attack the abyssal creatures who dared approach him, Han Shuo surveyed the situation all around him. His gaze finally fixed on the world behind the abyssal creatures, thinking that was where he should make his breakthrough.

    Just then, he noticed his surroundings transform. This grey chasm suddenly produced extremely violent spacetime fluctuation, sending lightning bolts all across the sky. In a split second, the spacetime was quaking.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for half a moment before he realized what was going on. Although he had never before experienced such an event, he had heard a thing or two about this. This phenomenon urred when spacetime could not support the pressure of excessively chaotic energy, causing it to cave in or even copse.

    Uh oh, better leave here as soon as possible. Otherwise, when the spacetime crumbles, no one will escape it. Even in the best case scenario, if I don¡¯t die horribly after being crushed, I will have to live the rest of my life in the further uncertain spacetime crevice. There will be no returning to Profound Continent from there.

    Han Shuo turned pale with fright. He had decided to escape from this ce regardless of everything. But before he managed to, he discovered that the abyssal creatures who had been dauntlessly charging at him were stooped below their necks, terrified and retreating like tidewater, no longer paying heed to Han Shuo.

    Dong... Dong... An otherworldly banging reverberated through the ground from behind them, like a signal for retreat.

    Hmm, these creatures of the Abyss are have some intelligence after all, Han Shuo thought as his pupils traced the retreating abyssal creatures. Following behind the creatures, Han Shuo too was rapidly leaving this space as it was on the verge of copse.

    If these abyssal creatures knew how to get to this region, then they surely know where to retreat. As long as I stay on their trail there¡¯s no reason I could fail. Han Shuo headed in the direction of the creatures, gradually overtaking them in the process.

    The creatures were clearly aware that the threat of a copsing spacetime was of greater importance than even their greatest enemy. Even though Han Shuo was right beside them, they did not proceed with attacking him but instead turned a blind eye to his presence. They returned on the path they came from regardless of all things under the order to retreat.

    Rumbles...

    A most terrifying sound came from behind Han Shuo. Without even turning around to look and merely with his consciousness, he sensed that the spacetime behind him could no longer bear the stress of all kinds of chaotic energies and hence started to form fissures that could devour all things.

    Hiss...

    The strange calling of abyssal creatures constantly sounded from behind him. Although Han Shuo couldn¡¯t understand what exactly they were trying tomunicate, from the frightened tone, he spected that their frightened tones were meant to hurry the others.

    ording to lore, inside those spacetime fissures was apleteck of any element, even air, which meant that any being that was dependent on food or air would die by asphyxiation or starvation had they fallen in.

    However, for an unnatural being like Han Shuo who did not require food or air to survive, he wouldn¡¯t immediately die after falling into a spacetime fissure. However, he would have to endure an infinite loneliness, a thought that seemed to him more terrifying than death.

    More and more strange noises came from those abyssal demons behind him, those hurrying calls turning into shrieks of despair. Han Shuo realized that some abyssal demons must have been pulled into the fissures.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart palpitated. He had no choice but to put his body at stake in sustaining further damage. Disregarding all else, Han Shuo cranked his Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens all the way up, escaping the region as quickly as he could.

    Pfff... Han Shuo spat a mouthful of fresh hot blood. Another three meridians in his body ruptured.

    The demonic des in his two hands acted like his invincible Demonyer Edge, cutting away at thoserger abyssal demons in his way. At this moment, Han Shuo was not at all concerned with the stench of those abyssal demons and passed right through their bodies.

    In matters of life and death, Han Shuo¡¯s heart was resolute and cold. All ethics could be easily cast aside to ensure survival, let alone those filthy demon carcasses.

    It was precisely due to Han Shuo¡¯s decisiveness that he had no qualms drilling his way through the bodies of those abyssal demons in his path and was able to outrun the rapidly spreading spacetime fissure.

    The rumbling grew louder and louder, as loud as a volcanic eruption. Suddenly, a brand new scene appeared ahead of Han Shuo. There were sinister-looking nts, mountains, and rivers.

    Finally, Han Shuo escaped the region after bolting off at the fastest speed he ever had in his entire life.

    A frighteningly chaotic energy erupted from behind Han Shuo. It was safe for him to assume that those abyssal demons behind him werepletely wrecked in the copsed spacetime.

 Chapter 516: A Whole New World

    GDK 516: A Whole New World

    A strange, whole new world was present before Han Shuo¡¯s eyes. At a nce, all he saw was nts everywhere, so hideous that they very much looked like the fiends and devils. Their leaves and branches were lined with thorns that resembled the fangs of abyssal creatures. Such a view, however, did not disy a sense of wonder as in a lush, vibrant forest, rather a bloodthirsty aura.

    Stinking swamps scattered the ground that bubbled like boiling water, each bubble popping to release a kind of miasmic green smoke.

    The sky waspletely devoid of any clouds. There was no sun or moon in sight. There were only cyclones of varying colors and sizes spinning high up in the air. The thin atmosphere was filled with a rotten smell. More importantly, one could hear piercing hoots and screeches like those of bloodthirsty owls in the distance.

    Han Shuo was standing at the waist of a mountain saturated with abyssal creatures. Behind him was a dark cave with a fanged opening of about 12 feet.

    Observing his surroundings, Han Shuo noticed all kinds of bizarre abyssal creatures everywhere across the mountain. The scene was simr to what Han Shuo had seen in theherworld, where undead creatures within a hundred miles came forth to the magnificent mountain at Little Skeleton¡¯s summon. Each of these abyssal creatures had their cold, bloodthirsty eyes set on the giant cave behind Han Shuo.

    Deafening cries tore through the air from the cave. Turning his head to see what all the ruckus was about, Han Shuo discovered that the spatial fluctuations within this hideous cave were getting increasingly fierce, rocking the entire mountain with the tremors.

    Dong Dong... Dong Dong...

    Strange sounds rose from the foot of the mountain. Han Shuo¡¯s eyes swept through the mountain until he finally found the source of the noise.

    A six meter tall humanoid abyssal creature had been straining his neck, shouting aloud. Its knees, elbows, and shoulders were armored with hook-like protrusions. It had three eyes on its triangle-shaped head and a multicolored giant python coiled around its waist. Only upon further inspection did Han Shuo discover that the giant python coiled around its waist was fused with its body. It was a tail!

    The three-eyed creature was actively withdrawing to the outer ring. He seemed likely to be the true lord of these abyssal creatures. Following the church bell noises, all the tens of thousands of abyssal creatures roaming across the mountain immediately fled.

    Even when separated by hundreds of meters, when Han Shuo looked at this three-eyed humanoid abyssal creature, a dreary chill struck his heart. That alone was enough for Han Shuo to gauge its strength.

    Despite his uncertainty of exactly how strong a creature he was up against, he was sure of one thing: With his current injuries, he was no match for this humanoid abyssal creature.

    At themand of their true leader, the abyssal creatures all across the mountain followed after him, fleeing as the mountain could be destroyed by the copsing spacetime at any time. As the destructive power from the cave behind him grew stronger and stronger, Han Shuo did not dare stay a moment longer himself. And since he was none too confident that he could go after that humanoid abyssal creature, he flew away in the opposite direction.

    About five acrester, an earth-shattering thunderp rocked the ground from behind. Han Shuo discovered that the thousand meter peak had copsed to rubble. A great number of the abyssal creatures who had just descended to the foot of the mountain were buried alive.

    As the mountain copsed, rocks were sent soaring while clouds of dust rose to the sky. The explosive power was so strong that even giant boulders were raining like enormous hailstones. Even the abyssal creatures that had already escaped far away from the mountain did not leave unscathed. Hundreds of thousands of Abyssal creatures were smashed to bits.

    The abyssal creature in the forefront had not made any visible movement. However, its body was automatically surrounded by a defensive circle much like a barrier. When oing rocks, no matter how big or powerful, came in contact with the defensive circle around its body, they turned into dust.

    His power is unmistakable! So it seems there are high-level creatures in the Abyss after all, Han Shuo secretly marveled.

    One thing definite was that this high-ranking abyssal creature was just as intelligent as it was powerful. From the beginning to the end, it never stepped forward. All the while, it remained behind the battlefield as itmanded its subordinates to attack Han Shuo as well as the falcon-like abyssal creatures to tear his Blood Seether. Furthermore, the rate at which it sensed the spacetime was copsing and its prompt order of retreat were telltale signs of high intelligence lifeforms.

    Any intelligent species would generally be very cautious. This high-level abyssal creature was no exception. Otherwise, if it had decided to lead the charge at Han Shuo, Han Shuo surely would not have been able to hang on until now.

    Suddenly, the humanoid creature turned its head, staring in Han Shuo¡¯s direction. After the copse of the mountain between the two, there were not many obstacles between the two apart from the raging tide of abyssal creatures. Han Shuo could actually feel it watching himself, and the hatred bursting forth from those three eyes.

    Han Shuo was rmed yet again. His consciousness had not been affected by the injuries of his physical body. Very soon, using his consciousness, he came to find that the abyssal creature had been watching his every move, and with an undisguised enmity at that.

    What Han Shuo even more by surprise was that this high-level abyssal creature did not take any action, whatsoever. On the contrary, it turned around and ordered its subordinates to continue moving in the opposite direction to Han Shuo, leaving this scarred and battered area.

    Han Shuo was sure that it had its own n. This prudent, treacherous, cruel high-ranked abyssal creature was far tougher to deal with than those low-ranking creatures who only knew how to followmands.

    Han Shuo took a deep breath of relief. If he had to fight against such a powerful opponent with his injuries, Han Shuo was sure that it would be rather difficult for him to keep his demon infant unharmed. He made a beeline in the opposite direction of that abyssal creature.

    Han Shuo waspletely unfamiliar with this world. In order to survive in such a strange ce, Han Shuo had to first recover his strength. Hence, his highest priority was to locate a safe, secluded hiding ce, where he could recover from his injuries as soon as possible. Only then could he get on with slowly exploring and understanding this new world.

    All along the way, Han Shuo was shocked and rmed by the sight of hideous yet lush nts as well as the marshes and the oddly-shaped mountains and hills everywhere. The flora and fauna of this world were far more terrifying than those of Profound Continent. Even some mountains and swamps here discharged a horrible stench that could not be described.

    Apart from the tides of abyssal creatures he had seen earlier, Han Shuo saw creatures far more grotesque along the way. These creatures were rather aggressive in nature, as if most of their time was spent fighting. He even spotted a giant grotesque nt, forcibly dragging and swallowing a spider-like horned abyssal creature into the ground with its roots. Han Shuo was sure that these nts weren¡¯t just sinister on the surface!

    This world followed thew of the jungle to the extreme! In here, killing was a constant urrence. Whether it was the nts or the creatures, there was no telling when it wouldunch a sudden strike and swallow any living prey.

    The Profound Continent was simply an ideal, peaceful utopian world whenpared to this ce! If these abyssal creatures were allowed to step foot on the Profound Continent, Han Shuo was sure that not one species there would be able to stand against this kind of unimaginable brutality. He figured only beings like himself who had attained demigod strength would be strong enough to survive in such a brutal world.

    Even after having flown for a long time, Han Shuo had yet to escape the area. Perhaps that was simply the nature of this world. Having pondered a bit, Han Shuo decided to first find a ce to recuperate.

    Suddenly, a swamp with gurgling mist rising from it entered Han Shuo¡¯s eyes. Faint green miasma lingered over the wide-spanning swamp. Deploying a protective shield around himself, Han Shuo kept his body isted from the green, acidic miasma and slowly descended into the swamp, preparing to bore into the ground below and open up an underground chamber to recuperate.

    Sigh... it would be wonderful if earth elite zombie were here. I wouldn¡¯t need to squander the slightest bit of energy before a quiet, safe, and spacious chamber was ready deep underground,Han Shuo thought.

    Suddenly, a lightbulb shed in Han Shuo¡¯s mind. Right, in that spacetime discontinuum region earlier on, I was unable to establish contact with theherworld because of chaotic energy affecting the spacetime, But now, I have left that domain. It stands to reason that there should be no problem for me to contact theherworld.

    Above all, Han Shuo felt that the aura of death in this world was far richer than in the Profound Continent. In such a ce, casting necromancy magic should not pose any problem at all. And in theory, the power of those spells would be greater.

    Consumed by this misgiving, Han Shuo tried tomunicate with theherworld. By means of that abstruse connection he had with Little Skeleton, Han Shuo immediately sensed him.

    ¡°Father, what¡¯s the matter?¡± To his bewilderment, Little Skeleton¡¯s doubtful question finally reached him.

    Generally, whenever Han Shuomunicated with the Little Skeleton on Profound Continent, he could only vaguely sense the presence of the Little Skeleton due to them being separated by many nes of existence. It was impossible to establish direct contact between the two nes. It never crossed his mind that after arriving in this strange world, he could receive the Little Skeleton¡¯s message immediately after sensing his presence.

    Perhaps it was because he was in this new world, or perhaps the Little Skeleton had reached a new level; Han Shuo wasn¡¯t exactly sure what the reason was. Nheless, he was filled with joy.

    Because he could not find anyone tomunicate with or see any familiar scenery, as well as the fact that the road to the Profound Continent had been cut off, Han Shuo¡¯s heart had been consumed by an inexhaustible sense of loneliness ever sinceing to this world. Only now, when he received the Little Skeleton¡¯s message, did this terrible sense of loneliness dissolve.

    ¡°Father, where are you? It¡¯s not right, you aren¡¯t in that continent?!¡± While Han Shuo was filled with delight, a message from the Little Skeleton was transmitted once more. This message was somewhat urgent; it was apparent that the Little Skeleton was very concerned about Han Shuo¡¯s safety.

    ¡°Haha, because of my negligence, I arrived at a new ne. However, you didn¡¯t need to worry, I am alright for the time being. Wait until I have recuperated, I will exin it to you then,¡± Han Shuo, with ease of mind, assured Little Skeleton.

    In the next moment, Han Shuo sensed a sudden monstrous angering from the Little Skeleton. This anger came rather abruptly and was extremely fierce as if the Little Skeleton would cross the infinite distance and arrive before Han Shuo right away. Like he would smash Han Shuo¡¯s enemy, anyone who had dared to hurt Han Shuo, into dust.

    ¡°Father, who hurt you?¡± Little Skeleton in theherworld red up. A frightening aura erupted from his body. All the high-level undead creatures in the undead pce began to tremble. Feeling at a loss for a reaction, they knelt before Little Skeleton. They stayed put right where they were; they didn¡¯t dare move even an inch.

    An inexplicable warmth suddenly rushed into Han Shuo¡¯s heart. Feeling the Little Skeleton¡¯s towering fury, Han Shuo assured, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I will go back and make them pay. You just focus on your evolution. I know that with just one more step forward, you will be a true god. Then we, father and son, will fight side by side.¡±

    Han Shuo cut contact with Little Skeleton on his own initiative. He didn¡¯t even summon the earth elite zombie, worried that they would be too much worried about his injuries as well. Han Shuo¡¯s body slowly sank into the swamp. Only after having crossed another hundred meters deep into the swamp did Han Shuo dig up a ce to hide to recuperate from his physical injuries with demonic arts.

 Chapter 517: Girls of the Abyss

    GDK 517: Girls of the Abyss

    Deep underground where daylight could not prate, Han Shuo sat silently in the same spot, healing his damaged meridians and broken bones. Whenever Han Shuo settled down and focused solely on a single task, he would often be absorbed in the task.

    A healthy dose of restter, Han Shuo¡¯s eyes struggled to a squint and finally opened. He first inspected his body using his consciousness, and found that all his shattered meridians, bones and other internal organs, as well as all the damage he sustained from thest battle had fully recovered.

    At a thought, his demonic yuan began to course through his body. It was so smooth that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but shout in joy. It was clear to him that his good-as-new body would no longer affect his deployment of demonic arts.

    Wholly recuperated, Han Shuo acquired a connection with theherworld. Han Shuo understood that now, he wouldn¡¯t need to worry about his own safety at all. Even if he met that three-eyed humanoid abyssal creature, Han Shuo could go against it with hardly any worries.

    When he recalled of the three-eyed beast, Han Shuo suddenly had the strangest conjecture ¨C Could this three-eyed creature be rted to the three-eyed evil god Ansidesi?

    Back then at the Ascher¡¯s ve-trading house in Valen City, Han Shuo had met necromancer ude from the Cmity Church by coincidence. He was using an altar flooded with freshly dripped blood to summon the evil god Ansidesi. The evil god manifested himself at the center of the altar using fresh blood and bones. It had three eyes and a very long tail.

    This three-eyed humanoid abyssal creature he had just met in this unusual world, althoughcking the terrifying, wicked, and seemingly invulnerable aura of the evil god Ansidesi, and apart from a few pointed horns on its head, they both looked strikingly simr to each other.

    Could the three-eyed demon god Ansidesi have evolved from this species of three-eyed abyssal creature?

    Han Shuo had an ineffable epiphany. He had a feeling this hypothesis of his was very likely the truth. That humanoid three-eyed abyssal creature was of high-level intelligence and great strength. In ordance with the fact that any living thing could cultivate and evolve, could it be that, if this kind of humanoid three-eyed abyssal creature cultivated to its pinnacle, it would be an evil god?

    Very possibly so, Han Shuo thought! He then became even more curious about this usually cruel world, wanting to see if there were even more astonishing things waiting for him to discover.

    Han Shuo no longer needed to hole up so deep underground. Protected by his shield, Han Shuo burst through the ground and emerged from the swamp.

    He started unpacking his consciousness, taking into view all kinds of savage creatures within a great radius of him. The numbers, density, size, and strength of all nts and life forms were registered by Han Shuo down to the slightest detail. In this unfamiliar world Han Shuo no longer felt lonely, on the contrary, he felt some sort of noble aspiration brewing in him.

    During the time spent restoring his physical body, Han Shuo didn¡¯t ck in pondering certain matters. He had previously obtained some memories from the skeletal staff and understood that there were more secrets lying within. Once he couldpletely unlock all the secrets in the skeletal staff, Han Shuo would not only be able to traverse his soul to theherworld, but his physical body would be able to descend directly upon theherworld.

    The skeletal staff was miraculous. It was possibly even holding open a path for Han Shuo to return to Profound Continent. After all, the enormous magical transportation array at the center of the Cemetery of Death was very much a work of magic.

    Additionally, the Ancient Lizard King had once mentioned that there exists a nar guardian on Profound Continent, and he could use the nar transportation array to leave Profound Continent. In that case, there could also have been a so-called nar guardian present in this world, and perhaps, through the nar guardian, Han Shuo could return to Profound Continent.

    As Han Shuo pondered these problems with a calm mind, he realized that his conundrum might actually be solvable. With hope came motivation, motivation for Han Shuo to fight on. Han Shuo unfolded his consciousness and took every living thing in his surroundings to view. His n was first to understand this unfamiliar environment.

    Without staying in the region for too long, Han Shuo soared in the direction of the three-eyed creature. In order to understand the world as quickly as possible, he figured he had to pick a specific advanced native lifeform with which he couldmunicate.

    The unchanging scenery appeared over and over beneath Han Shuo¡¯s feet. He had flown for a long while but all he saw were sinister-looking nts and brutalbats. High-level beings like the three-eyed abyssal creature were nowhere to be found. There wasn¡¯t a single mighty abyssal creature in sight.

    However, Han Shuo was confident that he could find what he was looking for. He continued straight on. As there was no sun or moon rising and setting on the sky in the Abyss realm, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t be sure of how much time precisely had passed, but felt that he had been in the air for roughly three to four days.

    The Abyss realm was undeniably vast and expansive. Given Han Shuo¡¯s airspeed, the flightime of three to four days would have surely been more than enough to circle around any nation on Profound Continent. In this miraculous Abyss realm, however, Han Shuo seemed to have been hovering over the same location all along.

    Another two days had passed by Han Shuo¡¯s estimation. He was nearly disheartened when, finally, his consciousness sensed two powerful presences. Han Shuo lit up and shot towards the targets.

    Before he could get anywhere near, he felt thunderous tremors rumbling from the direction of the two mighty presences. Apanying the violent tremors were living things around them being shattered by the aftershocks. Some grotesquely shaped abyssal creatures were escaping from the fighting ground. Even abyssal nts that should have been immobile in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes were crawling away. Han Shuo suspected that their roots were leg-shaped.

    However, due to their nt morphology, they obviously couldn¡¯tpete with those abyssal creatures in terms of speed. Those nts unable to outrun the aftershocks were shattered as well. Fierce energy shot out, and their rhizomes even secreted a thick liquid simr to blood.

    What an odd ne of existence! Han Shuo thought. He did not halt for what he saw in his path, but continued towards the region where the great disturbance wasing from.

    By then, Han Shuo assumed, the two mighty creatures ought to have been fiercely fighting. Based on the sensing capabilities of his consciousness, Han Shuo determined that those mighty beings weren¡¯t as formidable as that three-eyed beast he met earlier. They seemed to be slightly more powerful than sacred grade experts of Profound Continent, but fell short of demigod experts.

    In other words, even if the two creatures were tobine forces, Han Shuo could handle them with the snap of his fingers. It was with such confidence that Han Shuo would approach them without the slightest apprehension in his attempt to locate high-level abyssal creatures and learn about this world.

    When Han Shuo arrived at the site where the two high-level abyssal creatures were fighting he was stupefied by what he saw. These weren¡¯t massive, fierce, and disgusting abyssal creatures, they were beautiful, youngdies!

    But Han Shuo quickly discovered that the two females were definitely not human. Although their skins were tender and white, their bodies were covered with pointy and fierce-looking armour. Han Shuo only took one careful look to find that those fierce armours were attached to their bodies.

    On their smooth shoulders, elbows and knees, those spikes had most certainly grown from under their supple skin.

    The young armoreddies were glowing with snow-white skin, naked and exposed. Particrly around the chest, thighs, arms, and neck, areas where twisting was required, those regions wereid out bare in the open. Light bounced off their springy flesh as they fought. From a distance, the twodies appeared almost violently seductive.

    One of them had deep purple eyes and the other had light green, with simrly stunning hair to match. They were both of that perfect model height, had straight slender thighs, and curves on their bodies that would make any men drool.

    The two inhumandies had extremely unique close-quarterbat techniques. They would frequently extend their tender hands and des that sparkled with cold evil rays would suddenly blossom from their palms. In addition to that, their spiked elbows and knees were their primary means of attack. Intense energy erupted whenever they collided.

    It was a scene ofplete disaster surrounding the twodies. The ground was covered with perished animals and nts who couldn¡¯t escape in time.

    What astounded Han Shuo the most was their attack energies. Their energy sources were somewhat simr to fighting aura, but seemingly mixed with elemental energy. They were like those mage swordsmen rarely found on Profound Continent, but not quite the same. But still, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t exin what exactly the differences were. In short, it was all outside of Han Shuo¡¯s knowledge at the moment.

    Han Shuo had been snooping on the twodies ever since he arrived. His heart was oozing with curiosity and he was bing even more interested in this strange world. From the appearances of the twodies, Han Shuo could be certain that the Abyss realm did indeed contain high-level life forms, and they might even be very mighty. Han Shuo believed that the more powerful they were, the easier it would be for him to find his way home.

    As Han Shuo observed the two with not a peep, he suddenly discovered them simultaneously turning to him and staring with unkind eyes. In the next moment, the two stopped fighting with each other and closed in on Han Shuo at lightning speed, wanting to gouge out his prying eyes on the spot.

    Han Shuo was expectedly unafraid of the twodies acting together. Although somewhat clueless as to what was going on, he didn¡¯t hesitate. Thereupon, he deployed Demonic des from his hands, which appeared just as majestic as those des that would suddenly thrust out from their palms.

    Two youngdies of high-level species in the Abyss realm. From their manner of attack, one clearly carried the element of lightning, and the other the element of fire. The elements, the most fundamental building blocks of everything that existed, were utilized by them in a peculiar manner. Elemental energy surges through every punch and kick, as well as through the thorns on their knees and elbows.

    They weren¡¯t magi, and yet, they had developed some other ingenious method for manipting to their advantage all the elements between heaven and earth. They were not in the least inferior to magi found on Profound Continent. Their attacks were even more terrifying for the elements were more concentrated and would suddenly erupt in every attack.

    Compared to magi on Profound Continent, their attacks covered much less ground. Yet, the tremendous destructive power concentrated on a small surface area could be even more disastrous than forbidden magic that covered arge area. Every magus on Profound Continent paid particr attention to the coverage area of magic. But they were obviously different, and seemed to pay more attention to the split second burst of power ¨C to concentrate a frightening amount of energy in a spot and unleash terrible wreckage upon a limited area.

    Han Shuo became familiar with the twodies¡¯ attack methods after battling them for just a while. Compared to mages of the Profound Continent, of the two worlds, it was hard to say that either one was better than the other. They each emphasized on different aspects and utilized the elements in different ways.

    One produced a more focused attack, limited to a small area, but with horrific destructive power. The other was more dispersed in their attacks, causing destruction in arge area. One absorbed elemental energy straight from the source and stored it within their bodies like fighting aura, the other required the use of spells to manipte elemental energy with mental strength.

    Both had obvious differences. But ultimately, both of them made use of the same elemental energy thatposed the world.

    The reason for their different ways of using the elementspared to a regr magus lied in their internal body structures which were different from those of humans. In ways which Han Shuo could not understand, they were able to store elemental energy inside their bodies. Then, when it was time to attack, they could suddenly discharge the elemental energy just like fighting aura. Han Shuo found this highly intriguing.

    The two alien females, unreasonably took Han Shuo as an enemy and attacked him. One shot thunder and lighting at him, while the other sent him a zing fire. They congealed their respective elemental energies before sending them instantly bursting. Although their attacks were exceedingly destructive, their opponent was the demigod in Han Shuo, and therefore couldn¡¯t pose any real danger to him.

    From start to finish, Han Shuo never lost his nerve even in the slightest while defending from their joint assault with just the Demonic des. Han Shuo didn¡¯t attack and was purely on the defensive. It wasn¡¯t that Han Shuo was afraid of them, he was just making use of this opportunity to properly learn about the fighting manner of this alien world.

    It was only after Han Shuo understood the energyponents and body structure of the two alien females using his mighty consciousness that he began fighting against thedies squarely. No longer on just the defensive, Han Shuo¡¯s Demonic des sparkled like a disco ball. He made a whirl with his hands and caused chilling energy to erupt from his Demonic des.

    The two aliendies immediately sensed the wicked energy originating from Han Shuo¡¯s Demonic des.

    It could not have been clearer to them that Han Shuo had not exerted his full strength. When Han Shuo suddenly fought back, they were shocked and pulled back a distance away from him before looking him up and down.

    ¡°Who are you people? Where is this ce? Is there a nar guardian for this world?¡± Han Shuo immediately asked as soon as the twodies stopped attacking.

    But just as Han Shuo opened his mouth, he knew that his questions would be in vain. Because why on earth would these two alien females know how to speak thenguage of humans on Profound Continent?

    The fact was indeed so. As soon as Han Shuo finished those words, the two seductive alien females stared at Han Shuo with absolute bewilderment. From their purple and green eyes, Han Shuo could tell that they could notprehend a word of what he was saying.

    ¡°Ash nazg durbatul?k... ash nazg gimbatul...¡±

    A melody flowed from the mouth of the purple-eyeddy, most pleasing to Han Shuo¡¯s ears. It waspletely out of character from her seductive body lined with spikes.

    ¡°Ash nazg thrakatul?k... agh burzum-ishi krimpatul...¡± the green-eyeddy replied. Her voice was just as sweet and pleasant.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t a clue what they were saying either. But when they started talking, Han Shuo let out a sigh of relief, as this showed that they at least were willing tomunicate with him instead of continuing to fight him.

    Han Shuo shrugged with a bitter smile on his face. He shook his head and made gestures to indicate that he did not understand. Thedies opened their eyes wide and looked at Han Shuo as though they were looking at a barbarian before even more anxiously conversing with each other with their melodious voices.

    Han Shuo then decided to gather his consciousness to its most optimal state to sense the mental wavesing from the two alien females. He attempted to associate their mental waves with the sounds of their speech, thereby secretly stealing memories pertaining to theirnguage from their souls.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was a miracle with boundless utilities. Stealing a small fragment of another¡¯s memories wasn¡¯t a particrly difficult thing to do. Other than necromancers who were proficient with the uses of soul energy, as well as beings more powerful than Han Shuo, no one was able to stop this marvelous use of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

 Chapter 518: The Incredible Power of Jewelries Towards Women!

    GDK 518: The Incredible Power of Jewelries Towards Women!

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness operated at its highest capacity as he secretly pried into their heads. Gradually, traces ofprehensions entered Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. Memories of the aliennguage they spoke were isted, cloned, and finally merged with Han Shuo¡¯s own memory.

    ¡°What¡¯s up with this guy? Does he not know how to talk?¡± the purple-eyeddy said as she looked at Han Shuo suspiciously.

    ¡°Could he be a spy for the Triops? But he doesn¡¯t seem to be one. His attack method is rather strange. What a strange fe,¡± the green-eyeddy too was very much puzzled as she cautiously kept her distance from Han Shuo.

    ¡°Yea, he¡¯s really weird. Who knows what race he belongs to. Baffling.¡±

    ¡°Ugh, whatever, I¡¯m leaving. We¡¯ll duel another time.¡±

    ¡°Wait!¡± Han Shuo yelled awkwardly after he had finallyprehended the two¡¯s memories pertaining to theirnguage.

    Thedies stared at Han Shuo with even greater suspicion. A chilling de suddenly shot out from the back of the fist of the green-eyeddy. She red Han Shuo with most displeased eyes and berated him with her sharp, sweet voice, ¡°What the hell? What exactly are your intentions pretending you couldn¡¯t speak ournguage?¡±

    The purple-eyeddy was visibly annoyed as well. In fact, she was more straightforward than the green-eyeddy in expressing her displeasement. Without any warning, twisted hooksunched from her fair shoulders like darts and shot towards Han Shuo¡¯s chest at high speed. Soon after, the green-eyeddy attacked as well. She turned into a streak of green lightning and charged at Han Shuo with two zing hands, as though to forcibly inject the me in her palm into Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    The elemental energy of lightning and fire around them were drawn out by thedies in a sudden second. They formed small-range attacks that never failed to deal great damage.

    By now Han Shuo had a good idea of their attack methods and actual strength. He understood that they both had held back their full strength. Seeing that the two had misunderstood him, Han Shuo chanted a spell, forming a white bone shield on his chest, as well as deploying the Mystical cial Spellfire to intercept mesing from the green-eyeddy.

    ¡°Wait... misunderstood... you have!¡± Han Shuo wasn¡¯t quite practiced at speaking the newnguage as he hurriedly expressed his apology.

    The white bone shield blocked the hook-like projectiles that came from the purple-eyeddy. The fire on the green-eyeddy¡¯s palms was extinguished by the Mystical cial Spellfire. The purple-eyeddy, on the verge of unleashing lightning attacks, said furiously, ¡°What is there to be exined, you wretched swindler!¡±

    ¡°You really have misunderstood me. I have just learned to speak this world¡¯snguage!¡± Han Shuo exined. He moved his hands around his chest, forming a bewitching dark shield from lustrous ck rays. It blocked the purple-eyeddy¡¯s close-range strike containing a huge amount of lightning element.

    Han Shuo could see that the twodies were truly furious. Their previous joint assault was mostly to test out Han Shuo¡¯s strength. This time, however, they truly were enraged.

    The charming figures of the two seductive aliens were only masked by the armor where needed be, with much of their supple, white skin exposed. As their attacks were of such close proximity, every jiggle of their well-rounded breasts was clearly visible, while their slender legs unavoidably made some contact with Han Shuo as they attacked with their knees. Han Shuo was rather enjoying the process, therefore he preferred not to press on with his inquiries.

    Han Shuo stood tall against the torrential attacks of thedies, even wearing a cheeky smile on his face. His gaze lingered around certain unclothed areas. Not only did he not sense the slightest danger, he even appeared fairly unhurried and pleased.

    Soon enough, the two aliendies found out that this repulsive enemy, this wretched swindler, not only possessed strength beyond their imagination, he was ogling at their bodies with his malicious eyes. This made them both angry and ashamed. However, they had already used up all their strength. As coordinated as they were, their attacks couldn¡¯t do the least bit of damage to this loathsome stranger.

    The purple-eyeddy who cultivated in lightning element, abruptly retreated. Staring at Han Shuo angrily and panting with rage, she scoffed, ¡°I¡¯m done.¡±

    Without the purple-eyeddy¡¯s help, the green-eyeddy had even less of a chance of dealing with Han Shuo. Seeing that Han Shuo was looking at herself with his teasing eyes, with his pupils deviously ncing back at forth around her breasts, although she was irritated, she couldn¡¯t do a thing to Han Shuo. In the end, she shot a deadly stare at Han Shuo and gave up fighting too.

    Seeing that the twodies had stopped their aggression while ring angrily at him at the same time, Han Shuo awkwardly gave two hollowughs, shrugged, and said, ¡°As you can see, I¡¯m not even fighting back. I have no evil intentions.¡±

    ¡°You did not fight back, but your shifty gazes are filled with filthy intentions,¡± the green-eyeddy red fiercely at Han Shuo as she exposed Han Shuo¡¯s dishonorable behaviour without hesitation.

    ¡°How could you me me? You wear so little, and you unt them willingly in front of me. I¡¯m a normal man. I¡¯d be a fool not to look!¡± Han Shuo exined. He gradually became more fluent in speaking the aliennguage.

    The purple-eyeddy let out a soft giggle. She looked up and down at Han Shuo amusingly and said in her lovable voice, ¡°The way you talk is quite interesting. But why did you lie to us before?¡±

    ¡°That excuse you made was extremely half-baked. How could you im to have just learned to speak ournguage? Say, who the hell are you? What are your intentions peeping our duel?¡± the green-eyeddy was still extremely unfriendly. Perhaps she still held grudges over Han Shuo¡¯s lecherous eyes.

    ¡°I had always lived in a remote, isted area. This is the first time I have ventured out of my hometown. Thenguage we speak isn¡¯t quite the same. I have only gradually understood after listening to how the two of you speak for a while. I wasn¡¯t trying to swindle you,¡± Han Shuo exined, but did not reveal the fact he actually came from another ne of existence.

    During his time within the spacetime discontinuum, Han Shuo had previously met with that three-eyed abyssal creature. He believed that that abyssal creature would remember him to thest detail. If he disclosed the fact that he was the one who had stopped their invasion towards Profound Continent, he would have likely be a public enemy. Therefore, he had to first carefully conceal his identity before he could fully understand this new world.

    ¡°Hmm, you look like you belong to a high-level race. There definitely were some ancient races that liked hiding in remote and unique regions. But still, you are repulsive,¡± although the purple-eyeddy had slightly improved her attitude, she wasn¡¯t polite in her speech and obviously held grievances towards Han Shuo.

    Perhaps they didn¡¯t quite buy into Han Shuo¡¯s words. Han Shuo could see their vignce and resentment from their eyes. The green-eyeddy red at Han Shuo with the most unkind eyes.

    It hasn¡¯t been easy to find beings of high-level races. In order to have a proper chat with them, Han Shuo must first eliminate their vignce, and stop them from treating him with such hostility.

    Han Shuo weighed in his heart and pondered what he could do to be on good terms with thedies. Suddenly, Han Shuo noticed the jewelry on their necks and wrists. They were just some bright, polished stones, and some rather weirdly shaped bones.

    On Profound Continent, only women of some low-level races would wear that kind of jewelry. No matter the design, quality, or workmanship, they couldn¡¯tpare to the gemstone nes, pearls, or fine jade found in the human world of Profound Continent. Everyone wanted to look beautiful, it was especially so for females. There seemed to be not a single high-level race with females who could escape this unbreakable naturalw.

    There was arge number of bright gems and ornaments stored inside Han Shuo¡¯s space ring. They were looted from the forest trolls and all sorts of big merchant guilds. The jewels and ornaments were never of much use to Han Shuo. Whenpared to the crude and unrefined jewelry worn by the two aliendies, the differences were poles apart.

    ¡°Hehe, as a small disy of courtesy, I¡¯d like to gift you this. Please ept this little present. Only such ornaments would be a suitable match for your elegance and beauty.¡± Han Shuo revealed a faint smile before withdrawing a heart-shaped purple gemstone ne and a sparkling dark green bracelet from his space ring. The purple gemstone was glittering with beautiful rays that could dazzle any woman¡¯s sight. The dark green bracelet was sparkling and translucent with a wave-like pattern, as though it contained a clear stream. Its soft, dark green light could immediately attract the attention of anydy.

    When the two finest pieces of jewelry Profound Continent could offer were revealed, Han Shuo¡¯s palms dazzled gorgeously. It was like the magic of moonlight.

    The two aliendies who had never before seen such a beautiful ornament were absolutely stupefied. Their purple and green eyes were fixed on the ornament in Han Shuo¡¯s hands.

    ¡°Please ept this little gift!¡± said Han Shuo.

    The two remained motionless and expressionless, still staring at the pieces of jewelry in Han Shuo¡¯s hands.

    ¡°Please ept this little gift!¡± Han Shuo repeated his words with a much louder tone .

    Their eyes remained on the jewelries. It was as though they had tried to take their eyes off of them but couldn¡¯t.

    ¡°Please ept this little gift!¡± Han Shuo shouted once more.

    The twodies were startled and nced at each other. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t sure if they were overly excited or if they resented themselves for not able to resist the temptation. Their cheeks blushed. They were too embarrassed to look at each other as though they were guilty of something.

    Without saying any more, Han Shuo walked up to the purple-eyeddy and hung the heart-shaped purple gemstone on a spike on her shoulder. He then proceeded to the green-eyeddy, and hung the bracelet on a protruding armour on her left shoulder.

    ¡°These gifts are for you. Please ept them!¡± Han Shuo chuckled.

    They instantly seemed to have forgotten how to speak. They carefully sped the jewels in their hands and drew the des around their arms and elbows back into their bodies, cautious not to damage the two ornaments.

    The moonstruckdies had extremely satisfied smiles stretched across their faces as they carefully held their ornaments with two hands. Their eyes sparkles even brighter than the ornaments. Their reactions confused Han Shuo. He wondered, Could it be that this type of ornament never before existed in this Abyss realm?

    ¡°So pretty, so beautiful, so mysterious, so...¡± the purple-eyeddy mumbled to herself before a thought interrupted her. She hastily put the ne into her waist purse. She said to Han Shuo, ¡°You have given it to me. It is mine now.¡±

    The green-eyeddy came to her senses and hid the bracelet deep between her cleavage. She dered, ¡°It is mine now. I will not return it to you.¡±

    Han Shuo was left betweenughter and tears. Although he was tempted to say that there were many more such jewels in his space ring, he knew the principle that the rarer something was, the greater its value. He promptly replied, ¡°Of course, of course. They are for you two beauties.¡±

    The two were at once more relieved. The purple-eyed one gave Han Shuo another once over before saying with a very soft and kind voice, ¡°I don¡¯t know why, but somehow you look very pleasing to the eye now that I¡¯ve taken another look at you.¡±

    ¡°Yea, he¡¯s a good person and definitely not a spy for the Triops. I¡¯m sure!¡± the green-eyeddy immediately dered.

    Han Shuo was delighted. He thought, Jewelry sure is powerful against women anywhere. It unleashes frightening power not just on Profound Continent, but also in this Abyss realm.

    There was nothing else they could do. They had never seen such beauty before!

 Chapter 519: The Five Great Demon Kings of the Abyss Realm

    GDK 519: The Five Great Demon Kings of the Abyss Realm

    The Abyss realm was ruled by five demon kings: Bechymos, Cecrops, Gnder, Leviathan, and Manticole. They possessed vast, expansive territories with millions of abyssal demons under their control. If the Abyss was a pyramid then these five beings wouldy right at the pyramidion.

    In the Abyss realm where the strong preyed on the weak, it seemed as though every high-level Abyssal creature had to rely on one of the five abyssal demon kings to survive. For countless years, the five great demon kings had been on their ceaseless campaign against each other to rule the whole of the Abyss.

    High-level races and existences were different from the ugly, filthy abyssal creatures. They held great power and exceptional intelligence. Outside ofbat they possessed the ability to transform into various forms, the human appearance being the mostmon.

    The constant warring between the five great demon kings was like aw unchanged since times immemorial. Everyday low-level abyssal creatures would march to battle and subsequently their deaths under themand of the higher level beings.

    The green-eyed and purple-eyeddies were known as Hemanna and Sylph respectively. They both came from War Demon Valley, of which master was called Crosius. He was one of the seven most capable generals serving under demon king Manticole.

    The War Demon Valley neighbored Venomfang Castle, run by general Yeki who served demon king Gnder. Yeki was an expert who belonged to a race of Triops. The two sides had been tangled in constant battle against each other.

    Hemanna and Sylph were both War Demon Guards under Crosius, the lord of War Demon Valley. The reasoning behind the duel they had was to decide who would get the position of sergeant major.

    For the price of two pieces of jewelry, Han Shuo gained some basic understanding of the Abyss realm from Hemanna and Sylph. Compared to the Profound Continent, thepetition here was exceptionally grueling. The strong would rule and the weak treated as nothing more than cannon fodder.

    Material nes upied by these high-level creatures never saw a dull moment with all kinds of events and affairs. With all the information the two aliendies had been briefing Han Shuo on, he learnt that in the Abyss realm, although brutal at times, as long as one possessed great strength, it was no task gaining respectable status and influence.

    This world had no sentiment for so-called royal families and nobles unlike the Profound Continent. Everyone in a position of power gained it through bloody battles andbat. Only the most vicious, most savage beings could rise up in the Abyss realm to gain the reverence of others.

    Hemanna and Sylph didn¡¯t know much about the endeavors of the higher levels of the Abyss realm. They both had never heard the term ¡®nar guardian¡¯. It was apparent that without a higher status or greater power one would have no chance of learning deeper secrets and knowledge in this ce.

    Hmm, I suppose I¡¯ll have to make a trip to War Demon Valley then, Han Shuo thought. He turned to the aliendies behind him and said smilingly, ¡°Do you two mind introducing me to the master of War Demon Valley?¡±

    The two aliendies appeared rather troubled. They stammered and acted like they didn¡¯t quite know how to reply.

    Han Shuo was puzzled by their reactions. ¡°Will that be a problem?¡±

    Hemanna looked at Han Shuo and said with a somewhat embarrassed tone, ¡°We are but puny war demon sergeants under Lord Crosius. Before rising to the rank of sergeant major, we would have no chance of speaking to Lord Crosius. We simply don¡¯t have the qualifications to introduce you to Lord Crosius.¡±

    When Hemanna finished, Sylph quickly followed and exined, ¡°She¡¯s right. War demon guards are divided into troopers, bombardiers, sergeants, and sergeant majors. Only sergeant majors are allowed to directly report news and information to Lord Crosius. Before we be sergeant majors, neither of us are qualified to meet him. It¡¯s not that we don¡¯t want to help, but we really are incapable.¡±

    After listening to their exnations, Han Shuo¡¯s expression turned grave. Both Hemanna and Sylph possessed strength even greater than sacred-grade experts on Profound Continent. That being said it was unbelievable that they were merely sergeants, not even sergeant majors!

    It was clear to Han Shuo that with thew of constant cruelpetition present in the Abyss trealm, it would be impossible to find a situation where somebody without adequate strength climbed into high positions relying solely on family rtionships, something quitemonce in Profound Continent. In other words, a sergeant major under Crosius would have to be stronger than Hemanna and Sylph. Using that same logic, to be the master of War Demon Valley, Crosius would be even more powerful.

    Subsequently, Manticole, master of Crosius and one of the five great demon kings of the Abyss realm, had to possess powers Han Shuo dared not even imagine.

    ¡°So that¡¯s the case,¡± Han Shuo said in a grave expression. After thinking for a while, he smiled slightly and said, ¡°If that¡¯s so, do you think I can return to War Demon Valley with the both of you? And if so, could you two get me a position there?¡±

    Having some idea of the state of affairs in Abyss realm, Han Shuo was certain that creatures in this world were much stronger than those in the Profound Continent. The more he thought about it, the more sense it made. With the Abyss world being such a cruel ce, every creature spent their entire lives killing each other. Those who survived would naturally be stronger than creatures on Profound Continent who lived a rtively peaceful existence.

    Han Shuo was positive that Crosius would possess strength on par with himself or even greater. As for the five great demon kings, they weren¡¯t beings that Han Shuo could possibly contend with at the moment. Han Shuo had to be somewhat cautious, lest he provokes a powerful enemy he couldn¡¯t face off against and gets himself killed before he even has time to familiarize himself with this new world.

    ¡°That would be easy, we can take you into War Demon Valley. Given your strength, you could definitely live well in the Valley. If you are so lucky to be a War demon guard under Lord Crosius, your prospects will be even brighter than ours,¡± said Sylph, the purple-eyeddy.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go then! This is the first time I¡¯ve left my native ce. I want to get to know this world better!¡± Han Shuo hurried thedies as he was somewhat enthusiastic.

    The twodies didn¡¯t say another word before lifting off into the air simultaneously, leading the way for Han Shuo.

    The way they flew was not quite the same as how one did on Profound Continent. They seemed to understand the gravitational characteristics of this world, forming some sort of harmonized resonance with gravity using a energy simr to the fighting aura in their bodies. As they flew, they would tread and kick on empty air as though there was a solid but invisible ground beneath their feet.

    When Han Shuo learned the rules of survival and the existence of mighty creatures in this world from Hemanna and Sylph, he felt somewhat grave, yet at the same time, had an untamable excitement in his heart. The crueler the world was, the stronger the existences would be, arousing Han Shuo¡¯s fervor for battle.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s strength progressed, there were less and less adversaries that could match him in Profound Continent. Profound Continent was a rtively easy-going andfortable ce, it was an unfavorable location for Han Shuo to make breakthroughs in demonic arts. In this savage new world however, as long as one possessed mighty enough strength, one could burn, kill, rob, and rule by force. This would truly allow Han Shuo to fulfill the desires in his heart.

    Perhaps, it was only in this world that Han Shuo could do as he wished to the greatest extent, allowing him to make breakthroughs from this Carnal Realm which a regr demonic arts practitioner would need hundreds of years to do, and allowing him to reach the next realm ¨C the Nine Changes Realm, with his strength increasing many folds yet again.

    Indeed, perhaps it is only in this world that I can truly do as my heart desires unrestrained, letting my cravings free. In any case, I¡¯m going to be taking my leave from this ne sooner orter, so I might as well enjoy myself and have a good time!

    At the idea, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but harbor some wicked thoughts and nced at the two aliendies beside him. The twodies of alien races carried entirely different and foreign miens from the females in Profound Continent. Their coquettish appearances matched the armour and the spikes all over their bodies had a rather wild, exotic, temptational power.

    ¡°What, what are you looking at?¡± Sylph immediately discovered that Han Shuo¡¯s malicious gazes were lingering around her breasts and thighs. She shot a re at Han Shuo said resentfully.

    Han Shuo shrugged his shoulders and mischievouslyughed, saying, ¡°Purely admiring, purely admiring, hehe...¡±

    ¡°Han Shuo, your smile is so lewd. Hehe, if you could give me another treasure, I will help you obtain Sylph. How about that?¡± Hemanna giggled. She looked at Han Shuo and provocatively nced at Sylph before instigating Han Shuo with obvious evil intentions.

    In thispletely unfamiliar world, Han Shuo told the two girls his actual name with the intention of making his way in this world and gaining a reputation with his real name. Perhaps, someday, there might even be a sixth great demon king in the Abyss realm.

    ¡°You, you little slut. You bet I¡¯ll finish you next time,¡± Sylph red fiercely at Hemanna and threatened her.

    ¡°Hah! If you really had the capability, I wouldn¡¯t be standing here right now,¡± Hemanna said with disdain. Soon after, she turned to Han Shuo, giggled and said, ¡°So, what do you think? How do you feel about my proposal?¡±

    ¡°Nope!¡± Han Shuo shook his head in a mischievous smile, rejecting Hemanna¡¯s proposal.

    ¡°I knew Han Shuo wasn¡¯t the type. Someone who possessed such immense strength must have staunch convictions,¡± Sylph grinned.

    ¡°I want both of you!¡± right after Sylph finished her words, Han Shuo continued in a mischievous smile.

    In the Abyss realm, as long as one was powerful enough, they could have as manypanions as they liked. Han Shuo hadpletely let go of himself in this unfamiliar world. On Profound Continent, there were some things that he wanted to do but wouldn¡¯t act on, or wanted to say but wouldn¡¯t say aloud. But over here, he could do all those things without any misgivings.

    Expressing his feelings seemed to put Han Shuo at ease as they had been lurking in his heart for a while. It was as though speaking his heart out was in ordance with the ideals of the Carnal Realm, and seemingly had a mysterious effect which could raise his realm.

    With that, Han Shuo came to a slow realization. If he did and spoke as he pleased in this world, giving his heart free rein, he believed that he could break through Carnal Realm in this world.

    Much to Han Shuo¡¯s surprise, Hemanna did not rebuke, ¡°You, you¡¯re, quite an ambitious one aren¡¯t you!¡± Instead, she chuckled and looked at him, as though considering if Han Shuo possessed the strength to match his ambition. After sizing Han Shuo up for a while, Hemanna said to herself, ¡°Hmm, perhaps, you really could. If you could gain enough status and prestige, it wouldn¡¯t be challenging to have the two of us.¡±

    ¡°Hmm, when he has that strength I might consider it.¡± Sylph, the purple-eyeddy, also sizing Han Shuo up, was much more engrossed with Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    If Han Shuo had said something like this on Profound Continent, no ordinarydy would be as open-minded as they were. After listening to the two discussing as if they were taking his words seriously, Han Shuo chuckled and arrogantly said, ¡°Interesting! If I can take you both down then leaving my hometown wouldn¡¯t have been in vain!¡±

    ¡°We are waiting for you!¡± the twodies exchanged nces and teased Han Shuo. This world couldn¡¯t have been more different from Profound Continent, the females being plenty more open-minded.

    After travelling a notable distance, Han Shuo¡¯s brows were suddenly in a knot and he stopped moving. He raised his hand and gestured to the twodies behind him to stop. Puzzled, they asked, ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡±

    ¡°Five miles ahead, there¡¯s a group of people fighting. One of the forces isposed of that race with three eyes. They seem to be your enemy?¡±

    ¡°How do their opponents look like?¡± Sylph questioned urgently.

    ¡°They are mounted on big and tall, eight-wed, one-eyed abyssal creatures. They look simr to you two. They also have armour attached to their bodies,¡± Han Shuo replied.

    ¡°It¡¯s the Shero Regiment! Our people!¡± Hemanna shouted before she charged towards the scene. Sylph followed after. They had grave expressions and disyed not an iota of fear.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mouth was hung wide open, about to warn them that those enemy Triops possessed decisively greater strength than those on their side, and the situation wouldn¡¯t be turned around even with both of them added. However, before he could say a word, Han Shuo found out that they had recklessly charged ahead.

    Han Shuo shook his head and let out a sigh. But shortly after, a thought crossed his mind and he revealed an evil smile. He thought, Isn¡¯t this a great opportunity for me? If I use it well, not only could I get a ce in the War Demon Valley, I could even subdue the both of them at once.

 Chapter 520: Iâ€™m not that kind of person!

    GDK 520: I¡¯m not that kind of person!

    Over a broad, marshy in, several thousand rtively high-level abyssal creatures battled their brains out. Among them were Triops standing nearly five meters tall, and high-level beings that looked just like Hemanna and Sylph, mounted on titanic, eight-wed, one-eyed abyssal demons. It was evident that the Triops¡¯ forces were dominating the other side, rapidly diminishing the numbers of their opponents.

    These abyssal creatures walked on the surface of the swamp as though treading on solid ground, not one of them sank through the crystallineyer into the swamp. Fresh blood of all colours sttered across the area. Fighting amongst abyssal creatures was extremely cruel, defeat usually a result of death from being ripped into pieces. It was a barbaric scene.

    There were only a dozen or so Triops but they all yed the role as leaders. Of these Triops, the strongest one had strength on par with Hemanna and Sylph. None of them was as powerful as the one Han Shuo had met in the spacetime discontinuum zone. Under themand of these Triops, big and small abyssal creatures swarmed at War Demon Valley¡¯s Shero regiment mounted on eight-wed abyssal demons.

    Hemanna and Sylph entered the battle and joined the few hundred men strong Shero regiment, resisting the attacks of the Triops with all their might.

    Death and injuries urred with each passing second. Han Shuo observed for a while and discovered that high-level beings, no matter whether they were Triops from Venomfang Castle or Hemanna and others from War Demon Valley, they were all able to skillfully utilize the elemental energy avable in the world. It was only those massive, ugly, filthy low-level abyssal creatures who would attack merely with their bodies. Han Shuo learned from Hemanna and Sylph some interesting facts of the Abyss realm. Creatures that took on human forms were all abyssal creatures that had evolved to very high levels, possessing extreme strength.

    Generally, big, ugly abyssal creatures were mostly lowly existences.

    This was the first time Han Shuo had actually witnessed a battle between two forces of the Abyss world. Each side would always have low-level abyssal creatures taking the charge right ahead. Those low-level existences were basically cannon fodders. In every attack, they would always be the first to die. Even those who so luckily survived the initial shing wouldn¡¯t be as lucky in the many assaults thate afterwards.

    Theirbat techniques were remarkable. Every part of their bodies could be used as lethal weapons. The tails of the Triops were chock-full of des. Every strike left gaping wounds or would even slice straight through.

    After a moment¡¯s worth of observation, Han Shuo noticed that even with Hemanna and Sylph added to the equation, the forces of the War Demon Valley were constantly dying and diminishing. After another while, all those eight-wed, one-eyed abyssal demons, along with those mounted on them, werepletely annihted. It was only now that the Shero regiment seemed to consider retreat.

    Severed limbs, broken arms, and internal organs were stripped off the bodies as the massacre continued. Some of the savage low-level creatures even began to feast on the organs of their enemies. Compared to battles on Profound Continent, this battle between abyssal creatures was just nauseatingly savage. However, these abyssal creatures were well-adjusted to such atrocities. Even Hemanna and Sylph, two beauties, revealed not the slightest trace of fear or disgust as they focused on fighting. Their attacks were no less vicious.

    When they struck, lightning and fire element energy would surge into the bodies of those abyssal creatures, unleashing horrendous destruction within their bodies in a split second and causing instant death.

    As the Shero regiment umted more and more losses, they finally decided it was time to break out of the enemy¡¯s enclosure. Han Shuo, who had been observing from the sidelines, felt that his time hade, and he marched step by step into the vicious battle.

    Rows and rows of bone spears streaked across the sky before carving big holes in several of the abyssal creatures fighting for Venomfang Castle. Right in the center stood Han Shuo, deploying the Boundary of Fear and Weakness. He added a necromancy acid bog spell all over the swamp.

    Han Shuo then used ¡®The Grand Disintegrator¡¯, a necromancy spell that Han Shuo had learned not too long before on these abyssal creatures as his practice targets. As the spell was deployed again and again, on sessful asions abyssal beings shrouded by the spell, regardless of whether they were filthy, low-level creatures, or humanoid Triops of high-level existences, would disintegrate into nothingness.

    Soon enough, the Triops noticed Han Shuo¡¯s presence behind them. One of them, perhaps the boss, pointed at another Triops expert behind it, indicating to it to finish Han Shuo.

    The expert then brought over two hundred abyssal creatures of assorted ranks and charged towards Han Shuo. But before they could get anywhere close, their bodies began to melt away when they came into contact with the acid bogs.

    However, a number of particrly mighty abyssal creatures, possibly able to spray corrosive toxins themselves, disyed extreme resistance to the corrosive substances. Several dozens of green-skinned, not-so-bulky abyssal creatures emerged from the acid bogs unscathed, still relentlessly charging at Han Shuo.

    Previously in the spacetime discontinuum zone, Han Shuo resisted the abyssal creatures for quite a while with only necromancy magic. These abyssal creatures were not much stronger than those Han Shuo had encountered in the spacetime discontinuum zone, and they naturally were no match against him. Limited to all forms and types of just necromancy magic, Han Shuo ughtered all two hundred something abyssal creatures that came at him.

    Not even that Triops expert who attacked after receiving amand could escape from Han Shuo¡¯s hand. It was in by the Demonic des.

    Somehow, in this Abyss realm, Han Shuo had a certain thirst for blood. Throughout his spirited killing spree, Han Shuo¡¯s mind was in tranquility. It was as though his actions were being influenced by the principles of the Carnal Realm.

    Having ughtered well over two hundred creatures of the Venomfang Castle in one go, Han Shuo feltpletely unrestrained. He chuckled as he charged around violently like a demon. He unleashed the demonic arts to their greatest extent. Any abyssal creature that got close to Han Shuo was sliced and julienned by his Demonic des, with not a single lucky survivor.

    In just the blink of an eye, Han Shuo had opened a path to the Shero regiment where Hemanna and Sylph were. Those of Shero regiment had obviously been taught by Hemanna and Sylph that Han Shuo was no foe but a friend as they all revealed cheerful looks when they saw Han Shuo¡¯s astonishing performance.

    Even then, Han Shuo had yet to reveal his full potential. Had he summoned the huge number of undead creatures, he could have even captured the entire force of Venomfang Castle. But he understood that in such an unfamiliar environment, some modesty was wise. Keeping at least a few aces up his sleeves would better ensure his own survival.

    ¡°All of you had better evacuate. I will hold them back!¡± Han Shuo said in a most heroic manner after making his way to Hemanna and Sylph.

    The two aliendies observed Han Shuo barging through the densely packed forces of Venomfang Castle and noticed the huge difference from when he previously fought with the two. The cruelty and savagery of his attacks caused them a tremendous shock. It was not until now that they realized that Han Shuo had clearly not taken them as his opponents.

    Thew of constant cruelpetition in the Abyss realm had directly resulted in the phenomenon where the females would worship the mighty and strong. Han Shuo¡¯s image had suddenly swollen in the eyes of Hemanna and Sylph when they saw him, insolent and callous, ughtering his way through as though nothing was stopping him It seemed that the more Han Shuo disyed his cruel, cold-blooded side, the more passionate they were for him.

    ¡°Brother, from this day onwards, I, Nambrough, shall be your friend,¡± a big, tusked man from the Shero regiment with python-like arms pledged to Han Shuo with heroic spirit.

    This bulky alien Nambrough was two meters tall. His back was covered with spikes simr to a hedgehog, and his huge palms packed with rows of teeth.

    He seemed to be cultivating in the element of darkness. With every strike he made, there would be minute dark element flickering. His snakehead hands with forked tongues flicking about could spitrge doses of destructive elemental energy of darkness.

    Compared to Hemanna and Sylph, Nambrough was much more powerful. The dark element had umted in his body to a level where even Han Shuo was somewhat astonished. There was no question on Han Shuo¡¯s mind that the element of darkness would fill every cell in his body if he went any closer, and he could form the Body of Dark Element once the impurities in his body were removed.

    After observing Nambrough¡¯s body using his consciousness, Han Shuo immediately came to a revtion. Magi on Profound Continent cultivated mental strength, and used that mental strength to appreciate and understand the elemental energies. Over time, as their souls grew stronger and stronger, they would form a Soul of Element. Subsequently, with the Soul of Element, they would try to form a connection with elemental energy to fuse them into their bodies in order to form a Body of Element.

    It was only when a magus had sessfully formed both Souls of Element and Body of Element that they could be considered as havingid the foundation to bing God. The way they did it in the Abyss realm, however, seemed to be the exact opposite. They paid more attention to fusing elemental energies with their bodies first. Based on Nambrough¡¯s body, Han Shuo concluded that their cultivation path was to first fuse their bodies with the elements and gradually form a Body of Element.

    Without the help of an Origin Crystal, an outstandingly skilled magus on Profound Continent would spend perhaps hundreds of years to gradually form a Soul of Element by carefully sensing the elemental energy with their souls toe to certainprehensions towards it. Although there were some magi on Profound Continent who could form a Soul of Element, very few could form a Body of Element.

    The reason being that right from the start, they mostly emphasized on the use of their souls and mental strength, manipting elemental energy through the soul. After tens or even hundreds of years of connecting to elemental energy with their souls, once theyprehended it to a profound level, they would then be able to form a Soul of Element without relying on an Origin Crystal.

    However, as they had not been cultivating their bodies right from the start, nearly every magus was clueless on how to form a Body of Element, not a clue on how to even set about the task. To Han Shuo¡¯s knowledge, magi on Profound Continent who could form a Soul of Element had a difficult time forming a Body of Element.

    On Profound Continent, it was practically an unsolvable problem for a magus to form a Body of Element. Even those few experts who became gods by mere luck would never disclose the secret of how they managed to aplish the feat. Well, perhaps they hadn¡¯t a clue themselves. This leap was just too difficult to cross, and many magi forever remained at this step without ever knowing how to be a god.

    Looking at Nambrough before him and thinking of Hemanna and Sylph, Han Shuo came to a startling realization that the cultivation path they took was opposite to those of Profound Continent, and therefore, they should know better how to form a Body of Element. However, as they ced particr emphasis on cultivating their physical bodies, it would likely be just as difficult for them to form a Soul of Element.

    Both worlds had apletely different approaches to putting elemental energies to use. Han Shuo actually had some understanding of the magus side of things. If he were to learn the ways of this world and how they cultivated the body to form a Body of Element, then wouldn¡¯t that mean Han Shuo had found the definitive answer to bing God?

    Abruptly, a thought crossed Han Shuo¡¯s mind. He recalled the secret waiting at the nextyer of the Cemetery of Death. Han Shuo learned from the skeletal staff that unlocking the secret would turn him into a god. This had to be the secret he had been waiting for; tobine the two different methods of the two worlds.

    If the fact was indeed so, then could the original owner of the Cemetery of Death have oncee to this Abyss realm? Did hee toprehend the true secret to bing God from the different ways the two worlds utilized the elements? The deeper Han Shuo thought, the more excited he became. Somehow, Han Shuo felt that this conjecture of his might actually be true. Perhaps the original owner of the Cemetery of Death truly hade to Abyss realm before, or perhaps a ne of existence simr to the Abyss realm, then, by gathering the wisdom of two worlds, came to understand the means of bing God.

    Hemanna grew slightly concerned as she watched Han Shuo gaze at Nambrough with a glimmer in his eyes, ¡°Han Shuo, Han Shuo, are you okay?¡±

    Nambrough¡¯s heart grew colder and colder after being stared down by Han Shuo with his sparkling eyes for a while. The two-meter-tall burly alien put on a smile uglier than cries and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Friend, sorry but I¡¯m not the kind of person you¡¯re imagining! If you really have such thoughts, I can introduce you to a few others with the same preference. But, please, don¡¯t look for me. I beg you, please stop looking at me like this!¡±

 Chapter 521: The Shadow Warriors

    GDK 521: The Shadow Warriors

    Han Shuo suddenly woke from his contemtion and said with a somewhat awkward smile, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m only interested in pretty girls like Hemanna and Sylph, I just had something on my mind earlier.

    Nambrough heaved a sigh of relief andughed. ¡°Thank you for your help.¡±

    ¡°No need for such formalities, we haven¡¯t broken out from the siege yet, have we?¡± Han Shuo turned back to look at the forces of Venomfang Castle pursuing him closely, and upon seeing some of the abyssal creatures at the perimeters of Shero regiment being ughtered helplessly, he had to withdraw his skeletal staff and chant more incantations. Bone spears and acid bogs appeared one after the other, creating a blockade in front of the Triops pursuers.

    He did not summon his sea of undead armies, nor did he tried to reverse the situation using demonic arts. All he did was exactly what he said earlier and held back the enemy for the Shero regiment.

    ¡°Very well. Hemanna, Sylph, the two of you will help our friend here. Take another hundred guards to bring up the rear, I¡¯ll take charge of breaking out the encirclement,¡± Nambrough gave the order and, without waiting for Hemanna and Sylph to say another word, he flew directly to the battlefront. His arms weaved around like pythons, and wisps of dark smoke came shooting out from within, forcing the enemies from the Venomfang Castle who stood in his way to retreat.

    Han Shuo was at the back, with the two pretty alien girls Hemanna and Sylph at his sides. The two youngdies stuck close to Han Shuo, working together with him to kill all their pursuers without mercy.

    Blood sttered and severed limbs flew all around. The fight became even more violent with Han Shuo¡¯s involvement. Each time he attacked, he would take the lives of several abyssal creatures at once. With the Demonic des in his two hands, HS wove a web of demonic light and sent them falling onto abyssal creatures. All those covered by it were chopped into bits.

    The two beautiful girls at his sides, Hemanna and Sylph, kept sneaking nces at Han Shuo while they assisted him. Han Shuo at that moment became extremely attractive in their eyes.

    Han Shuo looked pleased in the midst of the fierce battle, his attacks brutal and ruthless. Having two such lovelydies at his side put him in an excellent mood, and he traded coy nces with the girls as frequently as he could.

    With the addition of Han Shuo, Hemanna, and Sylph, the Shero regiment was sessful in their attempt to break out. Han Shuo¡¯s wide-area necromancy was a particrly great hindrance to the Venomfang Castle. After his Boundaries of Fear and Weakness were cast, the Venomfang Castle¡¯s attacks became collectively slower. Due to the fear brewing in their stomachs, they were also clearly less powerful than before.

    Rows of bone spears and acid bogs caused immediate destruction to the enemies from Venomfang Castle. The pursuing Venomfang Castle enemies had not even drawn near Han Shuo in all this time, and they had already lost six or seven hundred. That left the ones who had charged in front of him with great difficulty, but under the collective forces of Han Shuo and the two girls, they were very quickly reduced to bits. The hundred guards behind the trio didn¡¯t even have a chance to lend a hand.

    Things went on like that for a while, fighting and retreating. The party of Shero regiment guards led by Nambrough broke through the encirclement and left a path behind them. With that, everyone swiftly followed and cleared out of the area at top speed.

    After breaking out from the encirclement, the regiment did not stop, but kept moving until they had long shaken off their pursuers far behind.

    ¡°My friend, I must thank you for your assistance, without which we would not have been able to escape the encirclement so easily,¡± chuckled Nambrough, who had returned from the front of the regiment only after he was certain that they were indeed safe.

    His python-like arms had returned to their normal appearance, and only the hedgehog spines on his back remained. Although this alien race man cultivated in the element of darkness, he did not give off the gloomy and cold aura of dark magi like Candide. Instead, he was very bright and energized. Perhaps it was because his cultivation method was different.

    At this time, Han Shuo and the two girls, Hemanna and Sylph, were flirting heavily in broad daylight. In this world where the strong were idolized, Han Shuo had gained the acknowledgement of the two girls without them realizing it. The two alluring girls from the abyssal realm were quite unreserved, throwing Han Shuo all of their many coy nces.

    There was also the fact that Hemanna and Sylph were rivals, and the two of them seemed to havee to an unspoken agreement on treating Han Shuo as their new battleground, as though whoever won him over would have defeated the other. As such, both of them were extremely cordial and affectionate in how they treated Han Shuo. Han Shu was naturally living it up, chucking merrily the whole way.

    Only after Nambrough¡¯s voice was sounded did Han Shuo greeted him heartily, saying ¡°You¡¯re wee, you¡¯re wee.¡°

    Upon Nambrough¡¯s arrival, the two girls behaved themselves a bit more, and no longer continued in their flirtations. Han Shuo knew that Nambrough was the sergeant major for the Shero regiment, and someone who carried some weight in War Demon Valley.

    ¡°Once we reach War Demon Valley, my friend, I¡¯ll be treating you with the best hospitality. Hmm, also, if you¡¯re interested, I can help introduce you to Lord Crosius,¡± Nambrough said in a very friendly manner. He seemed to have learned certain things about Han Shuo from Hemanna and Sylph.

    ¡°Well then, many thanks!¡± Han Shuo said, well aware that Crosius was the real master of War Demon Valley. The only way to obtain useful information about the deeper secrets of the abyssal realm, such as nar guardians and the like, would be to ask someone like Crosius.

    ¡°My lord, how did you end up running into Venomfang Castle¡¯s forces over there?¡± Hemanna asked Nambrough with solemnity, no longer joking around or giggling.

    The two girls Hemanna and Sylph were both highly talented young fighters from the War Demon Valley. Given that one of the two could have the honour of rising to the rank of sergeant major, Nambrough regarded and treated them highly. With a bitter smile he exined, ¡°I was on an expedition to collect some medicine on Lord Crosius¡¯s orders. I had most likely been discovered by scouts from Venomfang Castle. On our way back, we encountered three regiments that came to round us up and exterminate us. Fortunately, we met you two and Han Shuo, or it certainly wouldn¡¯t have been so easy to break out from their encirclement.¡±

    ¡°So that¡¯s the case. Recently the Venomfang Castle seems to have gotten cockier. I heard that they discovered an internar portal within their territories, and so demon king Gnder sent several powerful fighters to Venomfang Castle just for that portal. Could it have been due to the arrival of those fighters that they would suddenly behave so boldly?¡± Sylph, the purple-eyeddy, suddenly remarked after thinking for a moment.

    At her words, Han Shuo was greatly shocked. He turned to look at Nambrough to see if he was aware of the news. Han Shuo was finally certain that the cave where the space-time discontinuum zone had appeared was within the Venomfang Castle¡¯s sphere of influence. As Han Shuo had arrived on this ne via the space-time discontinuum, he made sure to pay close attention to any information rting to it.

    ¡°Based on our information, that internar passageway has already beenpletely destroyed, and those powerful fighters sent by demon king Gnder have most likely gained nothing from it. This was precisely how they intended to take over War Demon Valley, so they would have something to answer the demon king Gnder with.

    ¡°Hmph, but our War Demon Valley has been under Lord Crosius¡¯ control for so many years, and we¡¯re not so easily taken care of. Don¡¯t you worry, Lord Crosius has been nning for this for a long timeing, and we are not afraid of the people of Venomfang Castle,¡± said Nambrough with firm conviction, as he seemed to be in great awe of the master of War Demon Valley.

    ¡°But, it¡¯s been said that this time the ones that have been sent here are demon king Gnder¡¯s Shadow Warriors!¡± Hemanna said with a rather concerned tone, frowning. ¡°Shadow Warriors! Are you sure it¡¯s Shadow Warriors?¡± Sylph was astounded, and the name seemed like a great taboo for her, as a sh of fear was visible in her eyes.

    Even Nambrough¡¯s face went purple and grew rather strained as he said, ¡°That¡¯s unlikely, Shadow Warriors are the trump card fighters of demon king Gnder. They wouldn¡¯t be sent all the way to Venomfang Castle for something so insubstantial?¡±

    ¡°I learned this from a high-level venomfang demon of Venomfang Castle I defeated and interrogated a few days ago. It can¡¯t be wrong!¡± Hemanna looked deeply troubled, as though she was also very concerned for War Demon Valley¡¯s safety. It seemed like these Shadow Warriors under demon king Gnder¡¯smand were extremely frightening to them.

    ¡°If that¡¯s the case, then we have to return to War Demon Valley as soon as possible. I must pass this news on to Lord Crosius. The Shadow Warriors are not only incredibly powerful, but every one of them is a demon of the most depraved order. If they havee to Venomfang Castle, then this time our War Demon Valley will be facing some real trouble.¡± Nambrough¡¯s face was just as grave, even somewhat fearful. It was evident that demon king Gnder¡¯s Shadow Warriors had a reputation which preceded them.

    ¡°Yes, we¡¯d best report to Lord Crosius as soon as possible. If it really is the Shadow Warriors, we have to prepare ourselves. At the very least, Crosius needs to report this to ck Jade City,¡± Hemanna¡¯s voice was heavy as she nodded.

    ck Jade City was where the great demon king Manticole lived, which Han Shuo was well aware of. Hemanna¡¯s words made it evident that she was not optimistic about the current strength of War Demon Valley, and hoped that Crosius could ask for assistance from his master Manticole.

    ¡°If it really is the Shadow Warriors, I¡¯m afraid we may be toote!¡± Nambrough sighed, and then quickly added, ¡°Head back to the valley at the fastest speed, I must report this to Lord Crosius immediately.¡±

 Chapter 522: City of Demons

    GDK 522: City of Demons

    There was no day or night in the abyssal world, but every few days the sky would turn pitch ck as though the abyssal world had been sheathed under a thick, dark cloak. At such times, it was impossible to see anything without another light source.

    The abyssal realm used this sudden nightfall as a measurement of time. The passage of time marked by this abrupt cover of darkness was equivalent to one day on Profound Continent, but for each day that passed in the abyssal realm, half a month would have gone by on Profound Continent.

    As of then about three days had passed in the abyssal realm since Han Shuo set off for War Demon Valley, lead by Nambrough, the battalion leader of Shero regiment. And it was then that they had finally arrived.

    Along the way, Nambrough, Hemanna and Sylph had shared with Han Shuo much more about War Demon Valley, but upon arrival, he discovered that it was rather different from what he had anticipated.

    The War Demon Valley wasrger than Han Shuo had expected. From a distance, it looked like a city of demons. Abyssal creatures of all shapes and sizes sat upon the hundreds of metres of city wall. Despite its name, War Demon Valley was in fact a city. The city gate with its sheer magnitude was just too grandiose for Han Shuo to take in. From the front it looked very much like arge demon brandishing its ws and fangs at them.

    Above them, many abyssal creatures circled the city gates. This ce, War Demon Valley just seemed to pass on a feeling of savagery to Han Shuo. This could have possibly been attributed to the fact that some of its inhabitants were particrly humongous, such that War Demon Valley had to be structured like a bald mountain.

    Following behind Nambrough, they arrived just before the enormous city gates. The gates guards recognized him and opened the gates once they noticed others from Shero regiment, allowing them entrance.

    As Han Shuo entered War Demon Valley he discovered the many different kinds of abyssal creatures living there. Therger ones were almost twenty metres tall while the smaller ones were the size of human babies.

    Of course, the mostmon were still humanoid beings like Sylph and Hemanna. War Demon Valley was a ce where higher beings congregated, and those who resided there were immensely powerful. Therge creatures were merely the higher beings¡¯ mounts, or their subordinates. They came in all shapes and forms, all hideous and menacing.

    Upon arriving at War Demon Valley, Nambrough immediately told Han Shuo, ¡°My friend, I must first go to see Lord Crosius, you¡¯ll have to stay with Hemanna and Sylph for the time being. I will also alert Lord Crosius of your presence. With the help you¡¯ve given us and your immense power, I¡¯m sure that Lord Crosius will treat you well.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and said, ¡°Sure, you go on ahead.¡±

    Nambrough said nothing more, and with an apologetic smile to Han Shuo, quickly left towards a big, ck stone building of three or four hundred metres tall in the centre of the city. This enormous structure was supported by tall pirs of ck stone covering an area of two thousand square metres. At first nce, it gave off a feeling of oppressive solemnity.

    Han Shuo had taken notice of the gigantic structure the moment he entered War Demon Valley, and not just because it was the tallest, grandest building, right at the centre of War Demon Valley, but also because there was a presence within it that was dripping with immense power.

    It took no effort to deduce that it was the master of War Demon Valley, Crosius, himself. Since the abyssal realm was ruled only by the strong, Crosius was naturally the strongest!

    Expanding his consciousness, Han Shuo took note of all of the most extraordinarily powerful beings in War Demon Valley. He was able to sense six presences on par with Profound Continent¡¯s demigod expert, but Crosius was by far the most powerful.

    As Han Shuo gauged Crosius¡¯ might, he became almost certain Crosius had divine powers. In War Demon Valley alone there were six demigod experts and one godly existence! The abyssal realm was indeed a terrifying ce!

    Up until this moment, Han Shuo had only a vague understanding of the overall power within the abyssal realm. He could not form an urate judgement of the ce from just the words of Hemanna and Sylph but now, he finally understood from the experts within War Demon Valley that the abyssal realm was in another leaguepared to Profound Continent.

    Back on Profound Continent, Han Shuo was at the top of the food chain, but from what he had gathered through his consciousness, at his current power level he stood slightly above average at best.

    Crosius possessing divine power meant that he had not only formed his body into a Body of Element, but his soul had also transformed into a Soul of Element. Seeing how abyssal creatures cultivated their bodies, to form one¡¯s soul into a Soul of Element seemed an incredibly difficult task. It was astounding that Crosius could have achieved such a feat.

    ¡°Hemanna, is Lord Crosius able to cultivate his soul to use elemental power?¡± With these suspicions, Han Shuo just had to ask the pretty girl next to him.

    ¡°Something like that. For people like us, even if we train to our limits, we would never be able to cultivate the power into our brains. Just look at Nambrough, his body has been refined to quite the vessel, but he still hasn¡¯t been able to infuse every bone and every cell of his body with dark power.¡±

    ¡°As for distributing the power to the brain...¡± she chuckled.

    ¡°That could only be done with the help of the demon king Manticore. Lord Crosius hit a wall after cultivating his power into every cell of his body, and was only able to achieve it with the help of demon king Manticore.

    ¡°In the entire abyssal realm, the only ones who have managed to infuse their brains with power on their own cultivation alone were the five abyssal demon kings. The others who have managed to do so all required help. Even with this power they¡¯ve acquired, they¡¯re still far from on par with the five demon kings. Therey many experts in the abyssal realm, but the only ones worthy of being called great demon kings are those five existences as they reached that stage entirely on their own training and cultivation, with no help or interference. If you achieve that, you could be the abyssal realm¡¯s sixth great demon king. Tens of thousands of higher beings will bow at your feet, willing to tend to your every wish,¡± Hemanna exined.

    Solely on their own power and without any outside assistance, they managed to infuse every bone, every cell and even their brains with elemental power to form the elemental body and elemental soul. To think that all five of the abyssal realm¡¯s great demon kings had done all that to get to where they were, it was no wonder that they were the top five experts!

    From Crosius¡¯s aura, Han Shou knew that he had simr godly strength to the six-horned tribal king and the Saintess of the Church of Light back at Profound Continent. As for the great demon king Manticore who was Crosius¡¯ master, the one who made him what he was, how much power could he possess? Han Shuo did not dare continue thinking about it.

    Han Shuo however, was not in the least bit discouraged, he instead felt a sense of lofty aspiration rise in his chest. Thest time he had been pushed past his limits to the Carnal Realm, his power underwent drastic change. Han Shuo was certain that once he reached the Nine-Changes Realm, regardless of whether his power was divine or not, he would be ten or even a hundred times stronger than he was now.

    By then, even the five great demon kings of the abyssal realm might not be too much stronger than him!

    ¡°Come, let¡¯s get a little rest at my ce,¡± said Hemanna as she giggled. Her smooth, pretty frame had somehow gotten extremely close to Han Shuo, and sheid her pale hand upon his arm as she made the invitation.

    Han Shuo nced at Hemanna and felt his heart skip a beat. He thenughed and said, ¡°Sure, but before this, you¡¯d best bring me around War Demon Valley. I¡¯m still very unfamiliar with this ce.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m most familiar with War Demon Valley, I¡¯ll show you around.¡± The purple-eyed Sylph snatched up Han Shuo¡¯s other arm the moment he finished his sentence, as though she was fighting over him, and began pulling him to leave.

    ¡°What¡¯s the meaning of this, Sylph. You¡¯re trying to steal him from me?¡± Hemanna was furious and red at Sylph as she snapped in her delicate voice.

    ¡°So?¡± Sylph showed no signs of weakness and stared at Hemanna as though she was challenging her.

    ¡°Hey!¡± Right at that moment, a light cry was heard. A man slowly approached them. He was as thin as a bamboo shoot, with sickly green skin and a rode with a gigantic demon-masked abyssal creature which resembled a spider on it.

    In the War Demon Valley, aside from Crosius, there were also six demigod beings. This sickly-looking man was one of them, Han Shuo could feel it.

    ¡°Hemanna, Sylph, have you forgotten what I said? The both of you are my intendeds, and now you¡¯re fighting over a man in such a ce. Do you wish to die a cruel death?¡± The strange, sickly man red at Hemanna and Sylph with a cold death stare.

    Hemanna and Sylph, both turned bone pale at the man¡¯s arrival and released Han Shuo¡¯s arms without a second to spare. They seemed terrified of the man, and stuttered but just could not speak.

 Chapter 523: Fight for Glory

    GDK 523: Fight for Glory

    As the man continued to approach, an instinctive feeling of loathing rose from the bottom of Han Shuo¡¯s heart. The air around him filled with a repulsive stench. After carefully sensing, Han Shuo was shocked to discover that the smell was disseminating from this sickly man.

    This man was mounted on a mammoth, demon-faced spider, and looked rather different from Hemanna and Sylph. He seemed to have no skeleton, and gave off a feeble aura. His waist was slimmer than that of a woman. His green face was covered with spots. Difficult on the eyes indeed.

    He wore a medal of ck iron embossed with a demon. It was holding two bloody skulls of monsters with its mouth, vivid, lifelike, and would give any observer goosebumps and a wicked vibe.

    Thanks to Hemanna and Sylph, Han Shuo now had some understanding of the division of strength in the Abyss realm. There were all kinds of abyssal creatures at various levels of strength. Those low-level ones would eternally be treated as cannon fodders and saddle horses, and would never be qualified to enjoy any privileges that high-level creatures received.

    Aside from the low-level creatures, average high-level creatures were divided into Abyssal troopers, Destroyers, Rakshas, and Demons, with each ss further divided into three levels. Advanced abyssal creatures with rights to live in a city or that were enlisted soldiers for a powerhouse were level one Abyssal troopers or higher.

    Every expert gradually advanced through constant massacre. The more enemies they killed, the higher they climbed. Both Hemanna and Sylph were level one Destroyers, while Nambrough was a level three Destroyer.

    Higher up thedder, experts who could possess their own territories within a city or a region were known as Rakshas. They were allowed their own guards. For example, this man before Han Shuo had a Raksha drawn onto the medallion on his chest. The two bloody skulls in the mouth of the Raksha indicated that he was a level-two Raksha!

    Above Rakshas were Demons. They were the true influential figures for those powerhouses. For example, Crosius of War Demon Valley and General Yeki of Venomfang Castle, they were level one Demons. Every Demon cultivated elemental energy to fill every cell in their bodies, even in the brain.

    Above the Demons were the mightiest of the whole of Abyss realm ¨C the five great demon kings. They were like mountains that could not be scaled. Billions of abyssal creatures had to bow and prostrate themselves before them. They were the true masters of the Abyss realm!

    As Hemanna and Sylph were just level one Destroyers, whenpared to this level two Raksha, whatever their strengths or positions were, they were far, far behind. In the Abyss realm where the strong preyed on the weak, the one with the biggest fists was king. If it weren¡¯t for the fact that Hemanna and Sylph were war demon sergeants under Crosius, they might have long been snatched by this ugly man.

    However, Crosius, being the master of War Demon Valley, thought highly of true experts and would give special treatment to Rakshas. There were only six Rakshas in this War Demon Valley. In every great battle, the six would be the main firepowers of War Demon Valley. In the Abyss Realm, experts were by leaps more important than mere women. Therefore, Crosius had long tacitly approved of certain words of this Raksha.

    ¡°Han Shuo, he is Brakyah,¡± Sylph reminded Han Shuo.

    By then, Han Shuo had learned of the names and positions of some experts in War Demon Valley. He knew about the past achievements of this Brakyah and that he was one of the six Rakshas in War Demon Valley. During the journey back, Nambrough had, by himself, told Han Shuo that Brakyah had been coveting for Hemanna and Sylph, and that he should be careful when he met with Brakyah at War Demon Valley.

    Nambrough told Han Shuo that this Brakyah had extraordinary strength, and he¡¯d better take the initiative to give up on Hemanna and Sylph if he had no confidence in dealing Brakyah, lest he got killed. But Nambrough also mentioned that if he had the confidence to take on Brakyah, he might as well duel with him. As long he didn¡¯t die in the battle, he would gain a ce in War Demon Valley immediately.

    The Abyss realm is a ce where only strength mattered. Regardless of age and experience, as long as one disyed the strength, he could easily and quickly gain wealth, women, or whatever he desired by fighting.

    ¡°You two women,e with me. As for that guy, finish him,¡± Brakyah said coldly after he gazed at the three of them for a while with his brows furrowed. Just as he finished, he turned around and left, not even considering Han Shuo as anything.

    Carried by a dozen meter wide demon-faced spider, Brakyah turned and left very gracefully. Just as he was leaving, a well-built expert with six arms suddenly shot out from behind him. This person was of slightly greater strength than Hemanna and Sylph. He was a grade two Destroyer.

    Being a Raksha, Brakyah could raise his own subordinates and personal servants independent of War Demon Valley. When he left, Han Shuo saw there were a dozen or more oddly shaped high-level abyssal creatures following behind him. They happened to be Destroyer-ss experts, probably Brakyah¡¯s own bodyguards.

    To reach instant sess in this world, Han Shuo was required to climb over the skulls of other experts. To Han Shuo, it was a wonderful gift that Brakyah had so willingly wandered into his midst.

    ¡°Hemanna, Sylph, stand right there. You two are going nowhere,¡± Han Shuo groaned when he saw Hemanna and Sylph cowering from Brakyah, considering leaving with him.

    The next moment, without waiting for the six-armed Destroyer to arrive, Han Shuo took the initiative and attacked. Mystical cial Spellfire erupted from his two hands as he shot out and turned into a streak of lightning, leaving two long trails of purple zes like the brilliant tail of a shooting star.

    Before the Destroyer could strike, Han Shuo had finished him, sparing him not even a chance to strike back. During the split second Han Shuo swooshed past him, two trails of bewitching spellfire entered his body.

    Soon after, a miserable cry broke from the mouth of this Destroyer. Han Shuo did not even turn back for a nce but headed directly towards the grade two Raksha who gave Han Shuo the cold-shoulder.

    ¡°What the?!¡± Brakyah couldn¡¯t help but let out a gently cry of surprise when he heard the miserable scream of his underling. He turned to look behind him and saw the charred body of his minion, as well as Han Shuo who disyed the qualities of an evil monster.

    Brakyah gently tapped on the back of the spider and it was docile in stopping and turning around. Brakyah turned his cold gaze onto the few personal bodyguards, licked his tongue, and instructed with a merciless smile, ¡°Go on, don¡¯t just stand there like trash cans!¡±

    Upon hearing those words, the six Destroyers, who had gone through countless butcherings in the Abyss realm, immediately made a move. Each of them possessed strength equivalent to a sacred-grade expert of Profound Continent. The six jointly unleashed their respective brilliant skills of spurting acidic poisons, shing with sharp des, and attacking with ws and bare fangs.

    ¡°Hehe, I can incidentally rise by stepping on your bodies. How delightful!¡± Han Shuoughed. For some reason, every time Han Shuo let go of his fetters and did as he pleased, he would get a most refreshing feeling as he unleashed his demonic ability.

    When the six Destroyer-ss experts came directly at Han Shuo all at once, this wonderful feeling became even more intense. His Demonic des suddenly erupted, sending out the Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts in a spiky ball made of bloody light. Thereupon, an intense reeking of blood spread out. The sinister killing intent was released with no holds barred.

    It was the gateway to the War Demon Valley. The crowds thate and went were all high-level abyssal experts, and therefore were none too nervous when they saw that there were people fighting. Instead, they revelled with excitement, some even moving closer to observe the fight. It appeared that in this realm death was not a thing to be feared.

    The Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts was stirring and roiling as it released killing intent seemingly made of pure evil. The six minions could sense the terrifying power of the Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts and hastily turned away from the direction of Han Shuo, dispersing.

    Like a flower blossoming, the Bloody Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts suddenly blew up, sending out hundreds upon thousands of hedgehog-like, spiky, bloody spears. The spines appeared to be sentient as they shot themselves towards the six Destroyer-ss experts of Brakyah¡¯s. The six strange-looking Destroyers had a hard time defending themselves. The four experts further away from the Bloody Radiance were barely able to resist the attack.

    The other two closer to the Bloody Radiance, however, were instantly punctured by tens of thousands of bloody awls, paving way for a rain of blood.

    Han Shuo let out a mischievousugh and approached the other four Destroyers like a ghost. He was so fast that one could only see a blurred trail of him. One of the four Destroyers seemed to have yet toe to his senses, and opened his mouth wide like he was preparing to spit poison.

    Han Shuo threw a punch that, like a momentous javelin, entered the Destroyer¡¯s open mouth and went right through its neck. His terror-filled eyes were wide open before he ultimately lost all sign of life.

    Han Shuo revealed a callous smile that would send chills down anyone¡¯s spine. With a jolt of his arm, the skull of the Destroyer hanging on his arm exploded. His juiced brain mixed with fresh blood sprayed all over.

    ¡°Delightful, how delightful!¡± Han Shuo let out a bellyugh. He felt that when he eased his mind, his demonic arts were more willing to elevate to a wonderful realm. Not only was the demonic yuan flowing extremely smoothly, but it also provided a seemingly unending supply of energy. Even his demonic infant seemed to be trembling with happiness.

    If I follow my heart¡¯s desires and do as I please, conducting myself with the ideal mental state of the Carnal Realm, then, I can definitely achieve a breakthrough while in this Abyss, Han Shuo suddenly had such a self-confidence.

    ¡°Brakyah, stop sending your minions to death. Come and fight me yourself!¡± Han Shuo no longer cared about the remaining Destroyers. With an evil grin, he charged straight at Brakyah.

    Han Shuo immediately obtained the approval of the all the observers after disying such brashness and ferocity. They nodded and praised and chanted, admiring Han Shuo¡¯s might. As for girls like Hemanna and Sylph, their eyes glimmered with infatuation at the demon-god-like Han Shuo, somewhat smitten by him.

    The Demonic des in Han Shuo¡¯s two hands reflected dazzling light. The Demonic des, made of fingernails, might have appeared rather bizarre for people back on Profound Continent. In this Abyss realm, however, it seemedpletely ordinary.

    The grade-two Raksha, Brakyah, atop the demon-faced spider, had water element in every cell of his body. He obviously had formed a Body of Water Element. As he witnessed Han Shuo charging at him while howling withughter, Brakyah¡¯s expression of disdain immediately vanished and was reced with a grave expression.

    After Han Shuo killed three of his underlings in session with terrifying methods, Brakyah had some idea as to how terrifying amount of strength Han Shuo must possess. As he puzzled over the sudden appearance of such an expert in War Demon Valley, he began to congeal the water element in his body. Han Shuo suddenly found Brakyah soaring into the sky like a water snake. Because every cell in Brakyah¡¯s humanoid body was filled with the water element, his body was exceptionally soft and flexible. He wriggled and twisted like a python before Han Shuo.

    The Demonic des, giving off brilliant spellfire, whooshed andnded directly on Brakyah¡¯s body. Much to Han Shuo¡¯s amazement, despite Brakyah¡¯s body having been sliced by the Demonic des, not a single limb had been severed.

    Brakyah took advantage of the time to stick himself closer to Han Shuo. He even had leisure time to tease Han Shuo. In a disdaining voice, he said, ¡°Where did this low-level racee from? To think he actually tried this silly method on me. How impossibly foolish!¡±

    The Demonic des¡¯ attack on Brakyah was akin to swords shing and stabbing at water. With water element filling every cell in his body, Brakyah had obtained the extreme flexibility of water. To be unafraid of such a physical attack waspletely unexpected by Han Shuo.

    ¡°Alright then, I shall deal you something painful!¡± Han Shuo chuckled, ignoring Brakyah¡¯s advances. He already had a countermeasure in mind.

 Chapter 524: Winning Respect

    GDK 524: Winning Respect

    Brakyah slithered towards Han Shuo with his flexible body like a boa. Having formed a Body of Water Element, Brakyah¡¯s body could not be sliced by des nor injured with physical strikes.

    However, the Body of Water Element was not invulnerable. When Han Shuo discovered the futility of his de attacks, he immediately knew where the problemid. Beaming ear to ear, he waited for Brakyah to slither over. His hands suddenly jolted. zing red demonic mes shot out, shing straight in Brakyah¡¯s direction.

    Brakyah cursed loudly. ¡°You cultivate in fire element?!¡±. As though he had been struck by lightning, he retracted his body in a flurry. He appeared to dread the wild demonic mes that poured out from Han Shuo¡¯s two hands.

    Every high-level abyssal creature cultivated in a different elemental energy. Hemanna and Sylph cultivated their powers in the element of lightning, Nambrough in darkness, and Brakyah in the element of water.

    Some elemental energies were direct antitheses to each other. Brakyah, who cultivated in the element of water and formed a Body of Element, was obviously fearful towards fires, including the intense, merciless mes formed using the Mystical cial Spellfire and fueled by demonic yuan.

    Therefore, when the two mes were produced, Brakyah immediately sensed the scorching temperatures. The mes seemed so powerful that they could simmer away all the water contained within his cells. He attempted his retreat, however, as he had charged at Han Shuo at an excessive speed, and Han Shuo¡¯s hands were as fast as lightning, he could notpletely escape from Han Shuo¡¯s two fiery strikes.

    Brakyah let out a peculiar owl-like whistle as he gathered water element in his body with haste. A thin, lustrous film of ice crystals formed on the surface of his body. After his body waspletely wrapped in it, he drew out more water elements into his two hands to form a water crystal ball that permeated with frosty aura in order to resist the scorching temperatures of Han Shuo¡¯s two mes.

    ¡°Who is this guy? He¡¯s sure cut Brakyah a sorry figure! Since when do we have another Raksha in War Demon Valley?¡± The onlookers observed the battle with increasing astonishment. With weird gazes, their pupils traced up and down, fixed on Han Shuo who was standing proudly in mid-air.

    Of all the observers, the most excited ones were none other than Hemanna and Sylph. In this realm, the strong were respected. As long as one possessed strength valiant enough, their words automatically carried weight.

    If Han Shuo could defeat Brakyah, he could without a doubt ascend from a nobody to a figure of the highest regard. By then, Lord Crosius would surely give Han Shuo the best treatment. Later in time, once Han Shuo had finally established himself the status as a Raksha, practically no one could stop him from taking the twodies home.

    The strong always ruled. Such was the unchangingw of the Abyss realm!

    From the interactions Hemanna and Sylph had with Han Shuo on the journey back, they had subconsciously generated a favorable impression of Han Shuo. His domineering and callous demeanor had been deeply imprinted in the hearts of the two beautifuldies. And now, watching as Han Shuo butchered like a demon-god, they had long fallen head over heels for Han Shuo. They were on the verge of losing their restraints and throwing themselves into Han Shuo¡¯s embrace, letting him unbridledly explore their bodies.

    ¡°Is this painful enough for you?¡± Han Shuo teased as he sent out wave after wave of attack from his hands, bombarding Brakyah uninterruptedly.

    Since reaching Carnal Realm, Han Shuo had been unable to do as he pleased whenever he pleased due to all kinds of restrictions and taboos on Profound Continent. As the inherent human cravings in himself couldn¡¯t bepletely set free, his strength remained stagnant. However, as soon as he reached the Abyss realm, Han Shuo¡¯s heart was untied. Although he did not deliberately cultivate, his realm state and strength had been improving and advancing by leaps and bounds.

    He clearly felt that in this abyssal realm, his strength had grown much stronger than it had been back on Profound Continent. This level-two demigod Raksha was in fact, by a mere margin, inferior when faced against Han Shuo, whose strength was advancing by leaps and bounds in the realm of the Abyss. Against Han Shuo¡¯s aggressive offenses, he could only parry and be on the defensive.

    Upon learning that Brakyah¡¯s body hadpletely fused with the water element, Han Shuo stopped attacking with simple incisive weapons. In every attack that came after, he would include the intense heat from the Mystical cial Spellfire or perhaps directly cause harm with his destructive demonic yuan. This caused Brakyah incredible misery. Even his Body of Element suffered damages.

    It was obvious to every observer that Han Shuo had the upper hand. This young man who popped out of nowhere was like an unsheathed weapon with unstoppable power. His might was so outstanding in the Abyss realm that many more abyssal women, with looks not in the least second-rate to Hemanna and Sylph, hollered on for Han Shuo. Some even threw him flirtatious gazes.

    People in the Abyss worshipped true experts, especially some youngdies; they would take pride in themselves for being able to have sexual rtions with such mighty experts. The open-minded popce of the Abyss realm was not in any way short of beautiful and exotic looking girls of all kinds and races. An expert as domineering as Han Shuo, however, wasn¡¯t something they coulde across easily. Han Shuo¡¯s powerful disy of strength had left an indestructible impression in the hearts of certain aliendies, itching to throw themselves into Han Shuo¡¯s bed to be dined upon.

    There was a diverse range of races in the Abyss, with pretty girls of all kinds of appearances. Apart from Sylph and Hemanna, who had armour and thorns attached to their bodies, there were some races with females that had exceedingly slender, long, and straight thighs. These girls had skin as white as snow and a pair of heavenly wings. They looked as pure as the angels that Han Shuo had heard of before.

    There were also aliens females with distractingly seductive bodies. Their high twin-peaks and slender waist could take any man¡¯s breath away. Their full buttocks, set off with wheat-colored skin and gorgeous looks, exuded a wild, soul-hooking taste...

    All these abyssaldies were either coquettish, pure-looking, or wild and sexy. They would have some distinctive features due to their varying body structures. Compared to the females back on Profound Continent who basically all looked the same, the girls over in this realm were simply a feast for Han Shuo¡¯s eyes.

    The Abyss realm is a truly remarkable ce! It seems that this trip has not been in vain! Han Shuo thought with great joy. He threw out another punch that had seven streams of fire energy bundled together, straight at Brakyah¡¯s chest.

    When the seven streams of fire energy entered Brakyah¡¯s body, they acted like little red snakes, slithering all around, wrecking their fiery devastation upon anywhere they slithered past. Brakyah let out a miserable howl of pain. When his body was sent flying high up into the sky, an unbearable stench like no other began to waft from him.

    At this moment, Hemanna and Sylph were looking at all the females around them with hostile eyes. It was as though Han Shuo had suddenly be their exclusive property, willing the otherdies from even having a single look at Han Shuo.

    Suddenly, a quick and sharp warning came from a tall, fair, winged woman, ¡°Watch out! Watch out for Brakyah¡¯s death strike!¡± Thedy fluttered in the air with grace. She appeared much like an angel of fairy tales. However, at this moment, her beautiful face was gued by worry and concern.

    When Sylph and Hemanna finally identified the source of the warning, they revealed looks of disdain. It was as though they felt inferior to this fantastically beautifuldy.

    This feeling made them feel helpless. The two stared nkly at each other before they both screamed, ¡°Han Shuo, be careful of Brakyah!¡±

    At this time, Brakyah, who had been sent flying high in the air after sustaining a blow from Han Shuo, gave off a most intense stench. When Han Shuo looked up, he saw that Brakyah hadpletely turned into a ball of thick green fluid. In the form of a giant pustule, Brakyah came sttering down on Han Shuo from the top. His originally thin body lengthened like liquid, with water element rapidly congealing around him.

    It was as though someone had dumped waste water from the top of a building, and it was raining down on Han Shuo. Han Shuo hurriedly deployed his protective shield. In an instant, a thin, ck shieldpletely sheathed Han Shuo.

    It had to be said that Brakyah¡¯s body was much more toxic than the abyssal creatures that Han Shuo had met before. As soon as his liquid-like body made contact with Han Shuo¡¯s protective shield, dense green gas formed. Han Shuo¡¯s protective shield was on the verge of copsing just as they made contact.

    Demonic yuan gushed towards the shield as Han Shuo sent forth zes from his two hands, roasting Brakyah who was trying to dissolve Han Shuo away.

    Had it been anyone else in Han Shuo¡¯s ce, and they couldn¡¯t form a protective shield around their bodies, they would certainly have been instantly disintegrated when Brakyah¡¯s poisonous form reached them, with no chance of escaping the attack alive. However, with the angelicdy¡¯s reminder, along with Han Shuo¡¯s brilliant skills of self-protection, he managed to block down Brakyah¡¯s attack.

    Brakyah dared no longer attack Han Shuo with the corrosive property of his body. Instead, he hastily reassembled his body in preparation to escape.

    Observing from a close-proximity, Han Shuo discovered that Brakyah¡¯s body was no different from a soft-bodied earthworm, except much more flexible. When he saw that Brakyah reassembling his body to escape, Han Shuo unrestrainedly fired rounds of zes at him. He also took the opportunity to unleash Soul Tremor, a necromancy magic, to attack Brakyah¡¯s soul.

    The souls of these high-level abyssal creatures would gradually grow stronger along with their strength. However, they had no understanding of the cultivation essentials of magi back on Profound Continent, they had no idea how to use this energy to protect their souls. When Han Shuo¡¯s Soul Tremor was sent, it caused even greater pain to Brakyah than those zes that entered his body. He copsed at once, letting out miserable howls.

    With a mischievous, grim smile pped across his face, Han Shuo sent out yet another Soul Tremor. Brakyah¡¯s already wretched body gradually spilled with green fluid. The fluids were no longer in Brakyah¡¯s control. They slowly flowed from him, and couldn¡¯t be gathered like before.

    ¡°Han Shuo, you are such an animal! You have seriously injured Brakyah!¡± Hemanna cried out in excitement. She ran towards Han Shuo from a distance away, seemingly hoping to throw herself at Han Shuo in the public¡¯s eyes.

    Han Shuo, although delighted to see Hemanna¡¯s reaction, did not open his arms wide to catch her. Instead, his glistening eyes were fixed on Brakyah as he limped across the dirt, intending to make good of the situation to kill Brakyah, lest he became a trouble in the future. In the Abyss realm where brawls were a constant urrence, it was perfectly normal to kill the opponent in a duel. It would be within the norms for Han Shuo to get rid of Brakyah at this moment.

    Right before Han Shuo was ready to put Brakyah to death, a shout sounded from afar, ¡°Friend, please show mercy!¡±

    Right after, an incredibly well-built bald man, walking on air, arrived before Han Shuo. An enormous presence naturally released from his body. This bald man had a simr build to Lawrence of Sunshine Valley, his body bulging with big muscles that resembled hills. They were filled with wild, explosive power.

    When this man arrived, all the onlookers revealed expressions of reverence. They instinctively took a few steps backwards, silently expressing their respect. Hemanna, who had been running at Han Shuo in high spirits, rigidly froze halfway before she greeted the burly chap in a respectful yet somewhat terrified manner, ¡°Lord Qunoa.¡±

    Qunoa, a level-three Raksha, head of the six Rakshas of War Demon Valley, was rmended by Crosius to ck Jade City. He would be among the next batch of experts qualified to have an audience with demon king Manticole and receive the demon baptism ceremony. If he could endure andplete the procedure, he would rise to the ranks of Demons, and be revered by tens of thousands.

    In War Demon Valley, Qunoa was the most powerful expert after Crosius. He was responsible for all kinds of trifling matters in War Demon Valley that needed someone to decide on. He was fair and impartial, hence was well-respected by the people.

    ¡°War Demon Valley might have to fight a great battle soon. By then, we might need Brakyah¡¯s help. Lord Crosius wishes that you, our friend, will let Brakyah off,¡± Quona requested in neither an overbearing nor servile manner after performing the proper abyssal etiquette to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo nodded in response. He looked at Brakyah at his foot with contempt and soon after, revealed a faint smile. He said to Quona, ¡°I wish to meet Lord Crosius.¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go then, I came here to specifically invite you actually,¡± Quona looked solemn as he answered in a deep voice.

    A capable person would be treated with importance no matter where they go. Now that Han Shuo had proved himself capable, the master of War Demon Valley, Crosius, immediately made his move.

 Chapter 525: Donâ€™t like Being Looked down At

    GDK 525: Don¡¯t like Being Looked down At

    As the crowd watched on, Qunoa led Han Shuo towards the most magnificent building in War Demon Valley. Hemanna and Sylph were flushed with happiness when they saw Han Shuo being invited to meet Crosius by Qunoa, a highly influential character in War Demon Valley.

    When Han Shuo walked past Sylph, he smirked and shot a somewhat amorous wink at her before saying, ¡°Remember, both you and Hemanna are my women. Wait for me!¡±

    Sylph was not upset by the fact that Han Shuo had said this in front of all those watching eyes. She bashfully nodded and replied in a soft voice, ¡°Okay.¡±

    Han Shuoughed with great satisfaction, ¡°Good, I like that!¡±

    ¡°Our friend here is indeed a romantic. As long as you are willing to stay in our War Demon Valley, you could easily obtain any woman you wanted, even Lord Crosius¡¯ beloved daughter would not be difficult.¡± Qunoaughed then teased, ¡°I think she already approves of it!¡±

    ¡°Uncle, cut it out! That¡¯s nonsense!¡± a youngdy with a pair of white wings and a face as beautiful as that of an angel¡¯s bashfully denied. She stood in the crowd behind Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before turning to look at the beautifuldy floating among the crowd. He was not expecting thedy to actually be the daughter of Crosius. He recalled the warning she had given earlier and tried performing the etiquette of the Abyss realm but did so in a very awkward manner, revealed a brilliant smile, and said, ¡°Thank you for the warning back there.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re wee. If you choose to stay in War Demon Valley, I do hope that you could give me some guidance in martial arts. From the battle just now, I witnessed many magical techniques. They truly were amazing!¡± said the angelicdy.

    ¡°Haha, War Demon Valley is a great ce. If nothing unexpectedes my way, I believe that I will be staying here. You may look for me whenever you have the time,¡± Han Shuo invited. He finally turned to look at Brakyah who was still paralyzed on the ground, as his expression turnedpletely grim in a split second, saying, ¡°Brakyah, you are no match against me. Let me suggest this ¨C know your ce, otherwise you will end up dead!¡±

    The moment he finished his sentence, he turned away from Brakyah¡¯s ugly looking face, and softly said to Qunoa, ¡°Sorry to keep you waiting. Let¡¯s go.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t fret it! Let¡¯s go!¡± Qunoa replied with a smile. He proceeded to lead Han Shuo towards the grandest structure within War Demon Valley.

    After a few steps, Qunoa turned his head and shot a nce at Brakyah who had finally reassembled his body. When their gazes meet, Qunoa faintly shook his head, seeming to indicate to Brakyah to give up any thoughts he had of retaliation against Han Shuo.

    Brakyah regained his footing, and stared at Han Shuo with his cold eyes as he drew further and further away, then nced at Hemanna and Sylph for a while. In a deep voice, he said to his underlings, ¡°We shall leave.¡±

    When Han Shuo left, Hemanna and Sylph, the twodies felt a sense of insecurity in their hearts. However, when they thought of Han Shuo¡¯s mighty disy earlier they, along with the many others that were watching, realized that Brakyah wouldn¡¯t do anything to them in this ce.

    Moreover, as long as Han Shuo remained alive, Brakyah wouldn¡¯t dare harm either of them. If Brakyah were to provoke Han Shuo any further, there would certainly be no way he would make it out alive with what little strength he had left. So, even though thedies felt difort when the sinister gaze of Brakyahnded on them, they weren¡¯t too afraid. They both put on arrogant faces and didn¡¯t look Brakyah in the eyes.

    ¡°Hmph! I¡¯m going to kill you two bitches sooner orter!¡± Brakyah shouted menacingly before turning around to leap on his giant demon-faced spider, leaving the area along with his few remaining underlings.

    All those in his path spontaneously stepped aside to make way. They didn¡¯t dare show gazes of despise or mockery, on the contrary, they somewhat fearfully bowed their heads in silence. They would only ridicule Brakyah¡¯s ipetence in their hearts but not aloud.

    A Raksha who had lost in a battle was still a Raksha! In the Abyss realm where life could be taken at the slightest pretext, without adequate strength, one must by all means not provoke the other. Otherwise, they would have just courted death!

    With all the action having dissipated, the crowd gradually dispersed. After such an affair, the hostility between Hemanna and Sylph was mostly gone. The two exchanged nces with somewhatplicated looks on their faces before mixing themselves in the crowd and leaving.

    Over on the upper level of the grandest building in the center of War Demon Valley, stood a muscr man with sharp thorns protruding from his head to toes, wearing a boorish but determined appearance. He had a pair of deep grey eyes, which were in contrast to his tough demeanor.

    This seemingly unshakable man was overlooking the popce down beneath him. Behind him, Nambrough, themander of Shero regiment, was kneeling on the ground on one knee, he dared not to move a muscle.

    ¡°Are you certain that he is not a spy of Venomfang Castle?¡± the brawny man said in a deep voice without turning his head. His voice was deep, powerful, and resounding.

    ¡°My Lord, he killed hundreds of men of Venomfang Castle. I believe him not to be a spy sent by Venomfang Castle. In addition, this man practices unique martial techniques, entirely foreign to all the known cultivation methods. Perhaps, as he said, he really hade out from some ancient race that had been shunned by the world,¡± Nambrough replied prudently with his head at the level of his knees. He dared not raise his head to look at this muscr man.

    ¡°Ancient race that has been shunned by the world? Haha, how many ancient and secluded races are there? With the sudden appearance of some miraculous spacetime tunnel at the Venomfang Castle, numerous experts went to catch a glimpse of it. Now, this person suddenly shows up, and even possesses extraordinary strength. It¡¯d be a wonder if nothing¡¯s wrong with him!¡± the brawny man coldly groaned. His deep eyes gradually turned towards Han Shuo who appeared from among the crowd, and revealed a pensive expression.

    ¡°Your Lordship, then, how about, we capture him first!¡± Nambrough, who had been very friendly to Han Shuo, suddenly suggested.

    ¡°Imbecile!¡± the burly man groaned before continuing in a deep voice, ¡°Other than the fact that I have yet to make clear of his origins, so what if he is a spy from Venomfang Castle? You think that he alone he can flip over War Demon Valley?¡±

    ¡°Your Lordship is indeed wiser! Much wiser!¡± the terrified Nambrough said with his heart thrashing like a storm at sea and his head down. He dared not make any more moronic proposals.

    ¡°Hmph, if he truly is a capable talent, and is willing to stay in War Demon Valley, then, I will not look into your failed expedition this time. If not, dismember one of your arms yourself for atonement!¡± The muscr man waved his hand and, without even turning his head, said, ¡°You¡¯re dismissed!¡±

    Nambrough again respectfully performed a bow. He stepped backwards with his head hung, and only turned around when he arrived right before the door. Immediately after he stepped out from the gigantic ck stone doors, Nambrough immediately exhaled. He discovered that his whole body was drenched in a cold sweat.

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, where does your race reside currently? Your martial techniques are exceptional. I truly wonder what kind of ce it is that could produce an expert as mighty as you are!¡± When they headed towards the building at the center of War Demon Valley shoulder to shoulder, Qunoa, a level-three Raksha, began to question Han Shuo with a smile.

    All throughout the way, Han Shuo only nced around smiling, never directly answering any of Qunoa¡¯s questions. He would only respond with excuses and beat around the bush. As he did that, his consciousness suddenly sensed an expert at the top of the magnificent building gazing at him.

    The master of War Demon Valley, Crosius, had sessfully molded a Body of Element. With the help of great demon king Manticole, he also managed to form a Soul of Element. This made his presence so incrediblyrge that even though there were a few thousand meters separating him and Han Shuo, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness could still clearly sense him.

    Han Shuo raised his head to look at Crosius inside the building before him. The arrogance which most demonic arts cultivators possessed suddenly erupted. For some reason, after entering the Carnal Realm, Han Shuo was extremely displeased when any living being looked at him with such a gaze.

    Even if the existence was mightier than he was!

    After sensing that belittling gazeing from Crosius, Han Shuo no longer responded to Qunoa¡¯s inquiries. Han Shuo abruptly activated the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens and shot into the sky. After a short moment, he had left Qunoa much farther behind him, and was standing proudly at the top of the building, face-to-face with that man with the muscr body and deep eyes.

    ¡°You are Han Shuo?¡± Crosius looked at Han Shuo somewhat strangely, seemingly surprised at his impudent and brazen conduct. Crosius then continued, ¡°Other than Lord Manticole himself, any expert who steps into my War Demon Valley, no matter their strength, is required to walk here all the way up, step by step. This is my rule, were you unaware?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t give a damn about your rules! I don¡¯t like having people stare me down from high above. I won¡¯t allow that, not even if you are stronger than I am!¡± Han Shuo said resolutely without the slightest sign of fear. Even though he would not be able to defeat Crosius in a battle, he had full confidence that he could at least escape unscathed, hence his cockiness.

    Crosius¡¯ stare was fixed on Han Shuo. His cold, detached, and arrogant gaze this time showed a trace of amusement. He nodded his head and revealed an awkward faint smile, and said, ¡°Courageous! A fine youngster!¡±

 Chapter 526: Visiting Advisor

    GDK 526: Visiting Advisor

    As Crosius and Han Shuo conversed, Qunoa, who was supposed to lead the way for Han Shuo, rushed in somewhat anxiously. All he could do was stare in awe when he saw that Han Shuo was standing face to face with Crosius in a unyielding manner. Soon after, Qunoa looked at Crosius curiously, seeming to seek his opinion.

    All of a sudden, a dozen level-three Destroyers appeared out of nowhere. Walking on empty air, they circled Han Shuo. Amongst them, a pale old man stared at Han Shuo with ice-cold eyes, as though looking at a dead man. Once Han Shuo waspletely surrounded, the old man turned and respectfully asked Crosius, ¡°My Lord, what punishment shall be handed to this unruly scum?¡±

    Crosius looked at Han Shuo with a pensive expression, and mumbled to himself. He then waved his hand and ordered, ¡°You all are dismissed.¡±

    The pale old man was stunned at Crosius¡¯ order. The old man¡¯s entire life in War Demon Valley, he had never before witnessed anyone trespass and leave the ce without at least a few dismembered limbs. Now that Crosius had suddenly be so magnanimous, the old man could not quite react.

    ¡°Yes, my Lord!¡± the old man replied with due respect, nodding his head. Even though his mind was clouding with questions, he did not question a word. The old man along with the group of guards returned to their concealment ce and vanished out of sight.

    Crosius looked at Han Shuo deeply. It was only when the guards disappeared did his attention move onto Qunoa who was standing behind Han Shuo. With an amiable expression, he said, ¡°Qunoa,e on in.¡± Qunoa returned a smile. Perhaps it was because the two had been through tough times together, and so Crosius had great trust in Qunoa, while Qunoa was not as terrified of Crosius as an average person was. Afterwards, Qunoa bowed and gestured towards Han Shuo, and said, ¡°This way please.¡±

    Han Shuo proceeded bluntly. Even though he understood that the master of War Demon Valley, Crosius, possessed uparable strength, Han Shuo had confidence that he could escape from Crosius unscathed. Without hesitation, Han Shuo epted Qunoa¡¯s invitation and entered the incredibly spacious room unruffled.

    From the room, one was able to view the entirety of War Demon Valley. Although the room upied an enormous amount of space, it wasn¡¯t well decorated. In it were only a few strange tables and chairs made of stone piled up. After Han Shuo and Qunoa entered the room, Crosius pointed to the few empty stone chairs ahead, indicating to Han Shuo and Qunoa to take a seat.

    When they all sat down, Crosius spoke, ¡°Brakyah is one of six Raksha of my War Demon Valley. In any other instance, I would not have gotten involved if you were to kill him in a battle. However, War Demon Valley is going through a crucial time and Brakyah could be useful to have. That is why I sent Qunoa to have you spare his life.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t really hold a grudge against Brakyah. It was nothing more than an issue with two women. I believe that after this lesson, he will know to act within hispetence,¡± Han Shuo said with calm smile. He conversed with Crosius as though chatting with an old friend.

    ¡°I will see to it that he knows his ce,¡± Crosius said, but afterwards, he creased his brows and said with his head lowered, as though he was talking to himself, ¡°In the beginning, I suspected you a spy sent by Venomfang Castle. However, your defiant behavior has dispelled that doubt. If you really were someone from the Venomfang Castle, you would not have met me in such a manner, and certainly would not be speaking to me as you are now.¡±

    At this moment, Crosius raised his head. With his deep eyes firmly locked on Han Shuo, he asked, ¡°If you didn¡¯te from Venomfang Castle, then where are you from? What brings you to me in War Demon Valley?¡±

    Han Shuo revealed a faint smile. With his eyes on Crosius, he calmly said, ¡°To be frank, I indeed came from the territory of Venomfang Castle, but not from Venomfang Castle. I ran into Sylph and Hemanna by coincidence, and rescued the Shero regiment in passing because I¡¯m somewhat fond of them. The reason I came to War Demon Valley is for you.¡±

    ¡°About Sylph and Hemanna, you may take them if you wish. Consider it your reward for bringing the Shero regiment out of the predicament it was in,¡± Crosius flicked his wrist, as though Sylph and Hemanna were justmodities of his. Then, in a somewhat puzzled expression, he asked, ¡°So you came to War Demon Valley to look for me, what reasoning do you have behind that?¡±

    ¡°I wanted to ask if you were aware of matters regarding the nar guardian of the Abyss realm. I came through the spacetime-discontinuum tunnel from Venomfang Castle. The tunnel, however, has nowpletely crumbled. I¡¯d like to return to my original ne through the nar guardian.¡± Han Shuo said knowing that there would be no point in hiding these facts from a godly expert like Crosius.

    Qunoa, who had been listening to the conversation with a faint smile, made a sudden appalled expression. Staring at Han Shuo in disbelief, Qunoa said with a trembling voice, ¡°What! You came from that chaotic spacetime tunnel? You don¡¯t originate from the Abyss? How is that possible! You¡¯re joking! Aren¡¯t you?¡±

    Crosius was indeed worthy of being called the master of War Demon Valley. Even after Han Shuo disclosed this earth-shattering revtion, his expression changed only slightly, still retaining his steady appearance. However, there were strange rays of light that were constantly shing in his pair of deep eyes, which indicated that in his head, he wasn¡¯t as unperturbed as his appearance made him out to be.

    Han Shuo shook his head with a bitter smile, and helplessly said, ¡°I really wish I was kidding, but this is not a joke at all! Besides, it would not even be funny to make light of such matters. I really havee to the Abyss realm from another ne of existence. I couldn¡¯t find my way back because I had been backstabbed by someone. My purpose for this trip to War Demon Valley was to ask Lord Crosius if he had a certain piece of information about nar guardian. To the best of my knowledge, any ne that possesses highly-intelligent races will have nar guardian present. I believe that an existence as mighty as Lord Crosius ought to be qualified to ess matters of such significance?¡±

    Unexpectedly, Crosius, who had seemed calm andposed all this time, pulled an embarrassed face before he shook his head and said, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I have never before heard of such things as a nar guardian.¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned. When he carefully observed Crosius¡¯ facial expression, he verified that Crosius indeed was unaware of the presence of nar guardian. This left Han Shuo bewildered. He couldn¡¯t help but shake his head and let out a sigh. In a most disappointed tone, he said, ¡°How could this be?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t be discouraged. If it was as you said and every ne with intelligent races has nar guardians, then there definitely would be one in the Abyss realm!¡± After a short pause, Crosius said with some reverence, ¡°I¡¯m unaware of matters rting to nar guardians, that might be because I¡¯m not yet qualified. But if there are nar guardians present in the Abyss realm, then, Lord Manticole would definitely know about it.¡±

    When Crosius said this, Han Shuo suddenly jolted, thinking Crosius¡¯ words actually did make sense. There were altogether five great demon kings in the Abyss realm, each with their own territories and cities. If there really was a nar guardian in the Abyss, it would be impossible for those abyssal demon kings to not know of their existence.

    But the problem was, these five great demon kings of the Abyss not only possessed true godly powers, but were actual Gods in the Abyss realm. How would Han Shuo, a rtively unknown character in the Abyss realm, be qualified to meet any of the great demon kings?

    Given that even Crosius possessed the strength of gods, as the one who brought Crosius up to who he was, Manticole must have possessed unimaginable strength. Pit against Crosius, Han Shuo was still confident that he could escape unscathed. But if faced off against demon king Manticole, even escaping might be an issue!

    Han Shuo believed that once his demonic attainments reached the next realm, he would possess even mightier strength. However, before he could achieve this breakthrough, he had to first avoid getting killed by the abyssal demon kings. Therefore, although he was pleasantly surprised at Crosius¡¯ words, he was also somewhat concerned.

    ¡°You don¡¯t have to worry. You can stay in War Demon Valley, and act as a visiting advisor for the time being. Once the crisis of War Demon Valley is resolved, I will report the matter to Lord Manticole. I can¡¯t say for sure, but by then, Lord Manticole might assist you,¡± Crosius suggested as he looked at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo bunched his brows. He knew this was a sound idea, but he also knew that Crosius would not be so altruistic to help him. Hence, Han Shuo did not rush in epting the proposal, but asked, ¡°What are your conditions?¡±

    ¡°Like I¡¯ve said, you will be a visiting advisor to my War Demon Valley. Although you are not personnel of War Demon Valley, you have an obligation to assist us when we encounter a against powerful enemy. Such is visiting advisor!¡± Crosius exined. His eyes sparkled as though he was hiding some other ulterior motives.

    If the situation ever turned bad, I could always let go and leave without the slightest fetters, instead of staying and fighting to my death, Han Shuo thought. Soon after, he smacked on a faint smile and said, ¡°Alright then, I will stay in War Demon Valley as a visiting advisor for now.¡±

    ¡°Good! Then you are one of us. Rest assured that once the matter is over, I will provide you with my assistance,¡± Crosius pledged as he revealed yet another rather gauche smile.

    Looking at Crosius¡¯ current appearance, Han Shuo was certain that the beautiful youngdy Han Shuo met earlier must have been born to a woman of a much different race from Crosius. There weren¡¯t many simrities between father and daughter.

 Chapter 527: Unraveling the Skeletal Staffâ€™s Secrets

    GDK 527: Unraveling the Skeletal Staff¡¯s Secrets

    A so-called ¡®visiting advisor¡¯ was someone who was well-fed during peaceful times, but during critical moments, would have to charge through enemy lines. In other words, they were high-level cannon fodders.

    Han Shuo was new to this world and didn¡¯t have a very thorough understanding of the situation in the Abyss realm. But Crosius made it clear to him what his role as a ¡®visiting advisor¡¯ entailed. Thinking that he could pack up and leave War Demon Valley if anything were to go south, Han Shuo epted Crosius¡¯ proposal right away, reaching an agreement with Crosius in feigned civility.

    Crosius was rather straightforward. When Han Shuo agreed to the proposal, he immediately ordered Qunoa to arrange a residency for Han Shuo in addition to presenting him with a medal made of lead-grey stone. On the back of the stone medal was carved a demon. It signified Han Shuo¡¯s identity as the visiting advisor of War Demon Valley.

    ¡°The three-storey building at the center will be yours. You now have absolute freedom in War Demon Valley. If there¡¯s anything that you need, you may let us know at anytime you wish. As long as it¡¯s not anything particrly inconveniencing to us, we shall assist you to the best of our ability,¡± Qunoa smiled said as he pointed at the building.

    The location of this manor was behind Crosius¡¯ magnificent building. The manor had about a dozen structures erected from it in a disordered but picturesque arrangement. All those who stayed in this ce were high-level cannon fodder, hired by War Demon Valley. The three-storey building allocated to Han Shuo was the tallest and most gorgeous of all those buildings.

    ¡°Thank you. Oh, and if it¡¯s not too troubling for you, please arrange to have Hemanna and Sylph over,¡± Han Shuo bluntly requested for his bounty from Qunoa. In any case, Crosius had already agreed to have Hemanna and Sylph given to Han Shuo.

    ¡°No problem. I will pass on those instructions. It won¡¯t take long before Hemanna and Sylph arrive,¡± Qunoa said in a very friendly manner and revealed a faint knowing smile.

    ¡°Thanks a lot then. Oh, and, if the enemies from Venomfang Castlee over, please don¡¯t hesitate to ask where my help is needed.¡± Since Han Shuo was getting ¡®paid¡¯, the least he could do was offer aid.

    ¡°All will y out ording to Lord Crosius¡¯ wishes. You have just gotten to War Demon Valley and have yet to have had a good rest. I shall not disturb you any further,¡± Qunoa did not continue exchanging courteous speech, and politely announced his departure.

    This area contained not just one visiting advisor. When Han Shuo unraveled his consciousness and began surveilling the surrounding region, he discovered that no one here could possibly threaten him. He headed straight for his three-story house. Along the way, Han Shuo caught glimpses of a few silhouettes in buildings beside him, seemingly peeping at him. However, Han Shuo didn¡¯t mind them.

    The structures in the Abyss realm were purely magnificent, albeit unrefined. The building Han Shuo resided in did not contain any fancy pieces of furniture, save for a few drab tables and chairs. The decoration was minimalistic and clean, which conformed to Han Shuo¡¯s aesthetic judgement.

    After putting up the ¡®do not disturb¡¯ sign outside of his door, Han Shuo closed all the doors and shut every window, then deployed a soundproof and early-warning magical formation. Right after, he summoned earth elite zombie to dig up a spacious secret chamber deep underground. Afterwards, Han Shuo withdrew his skeletal staff, ready to seriously dig into the secrets locked within it.

    Han Shuo knew that there were all kinds of bizarre messages within the skeletal staff. However, as the timing had never been right, and he did not have enough mental strength, Han Shuo had never spent much effort drilling into the secrets inside the skeletal staff. But now, he was trapped in the Abyss realm with his way home forcibly severed, and the skeletal staff turned into a pir of hope for Han Shuo.

    Holding the skeletal staff in his hand, Han Shuo narrowed his attention and gradually released his mental strength. He slowly wound them around the staff like fine thread.

    When his mental strength flowed into the skeletal staff, Han Shuo immediately noticed the tri-coloured skeletal staff giving off gentle halos of yellow, blue, and purple. He suddenly sensed three different types of strange energying from the skeletal staff. Even though Han Shuo could sense them, they felt extremely vague and faint. He hadn¡¯t a clue how to make use of the energy.

    The skeletal staff had three major functions, namely, doubling the power of necromancy spells, enabling one¡¯s soul to travel to theherworld and back, and the rejuvenation of one¡¯s youth. Han Shuo had long understood the three strange energies in the tri-coloured skulls of the skeletal staff. The first wonderful special ability of the skeletal staff didn¡¯t require any additional incantations to be dispelled. One only needed to hold the skeletal staff when releasing necromancy spells, and the function would automatically be activated.

    Han Shuo had also long mastered the art of traversing his soul to theherworld. As for the rejuvenation of youth, however, Han Shuo felt that he had only barely grasped it. The rejuvenation magic was only effective on a specific group of people, so Han Shuo had yet to properly test it.

    And now when Han Shuo slowly channeled his mental strength into the tri-coloured skeletal staff, he could clearly sense the presence of the three energies. However, he couldn¡¯t obtain any useful information from the energy, which was a huge source of frustration for Han Shuo.

    ording to the words of Cmity Church and Lizard King Dagassi, there were many secrets contained within the tri-coloured skeletal staff. These secrets even hid information about the great war of thousands of years before that involved every mighty existence ever to exist on the Profound Continent, as well as some secrets about the presence of the Cemetery of Death.

    As the Cmity Church¡¯s Wolf had exined, the veryplex and intricaterge-scale magical transportation array inside the Cemetery of Death seemed to be able to transmit to a different ne of existence. In light of this information, Han Shuo reckoned that the skeletal staff would contain certain information about nar teleportation. If he could learn about the secrets of internar transportation array from the skeletal staff, then he could forgo meeting this demon king Manticole.

    The tri-coloured skeletal staff shed three gentle lights of yellow, blue, and purple. He could sense the three energies from the tri-coloured skulls, but was clueless about how to obtain the secret locked within the skeletal staff.

    There was no way to proceed! Han Shuo was dismayed. He knew that there were astonishing secrets concealed within the skeletal staff. Yet, as the master of the staff, he hadn¡¯t ess to any of those secrets. This feeling bedevilled him to the core.

    into his mind. Secrets are usually hidden in a person¡¯s brain. There were three skulls with three different colours on this skeletal staff. Could the secret have been lying within these tri-coloured skulls?

    When Han Shuo thought of this, his eyes opened wide. He turned his gaze to the skeletal staff and carefully examined it yet again.

    The tri-coloured skeletal staff was around 1.3 meters in length. Its entire body was constructed of a green, jade-like material. The three skulls were non-human, taking the colours yellow, blue, and purple. The yellow skull had three eye sockets in it, the blue skull had a single horn on it, while the purple skull had its roof gued with little finger-sized holes.

    When Han Shuo examined more carefully, he discovered that the yellow skull with three eye sockets looked incredibly familiar. Besides being much smaller, the positions of the three eye sockets were practically synonymous to those of the Triops that Han Shuo had seen in the territories of Venomfang Castle.

    Recalling the three-eyed evil god Ansidesi he saw under the ve-trading house at Valen City, he discovered that, with the exception of being more massive and having horns on its head, the three-eyed evil god Ansidesi looked practically the same as the Triops and the yellow skull on the skeletal staff. Han Shuo determined that the three must have originated from the same race. Shortly after, Han Shuo carefully put all his mental strength into the three-eyed skull on the skeletal staff, especially the three eye sockets.

    Something wonderful urred. Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength very clearly sensed that inside the three eye sockets of the three-eyed skull, the energy contained was of the most intense. They even formed some sort of defensive energy simr to a barrier, preventing Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength from probing any further into the three eye sockets.

    This must be the point of my breakthrough! Han Shuo immediately thought and rejoiced. He concentrated his attention even more and his mental strength was no longer scattered but focused as he attacked the three bizarre defensive energies, attempting to unravel the secrets inside this three-eyed skull.

    Pop! Pop! Pop! Han Shuo¡¯s body jolted. He felt as though his mental strength had crashed into an unmovable mountain. The mental strength of a grand magus wasn¡¯t able to break apart three strange energies contained in three eye sockets. This gave Han Shuo quite a shock. He realized that the skeletal staff was indeed one of a kind.

    With a morbid expression, Han Shuo took a deep breath andpletely withdrew all his mental strength. He meditated for a while to recover his mental strength.

    Although Han Shuo could use the power of his consciousness, he dared not do anything too rash to the skeletal staff. This was because the energy of the consciousness came from demonic arts, and Han Shuo was concerned that the skeletal staff might be in conflict with the energy of his consciousness and cause irreversible damages to it. Hence, Han Shuo had only been utilizing his mental strength all this time.

    After a while, Han Shuo had fully recovered his mental strength. This time, he did not set about by attacking all three energies at once. Instead, he only attacked at a single eye socket. Ping! a high-pitched noise struck. The defensive energy inside that eye socket had been finally defeated. Han Shuo was overjoyed. He immediately repeated the action to the other two eye sockets and had sessfully removed all defensive energies.

    Soon after, Han Shuo learned of some extremely interesting information from the three eye sockets.

 Chapter 528: The Rankings Among Gods

    GDK 528: The Rankings Among Gods

    In the infinitely vast universe, there were innumerable nes of existence. There could have been as many existential nes as there were stars in the sky. Many of those nes were inhabited by advanced intelligent life forms. Profound Continent and the Abyss Realm were just a couple of those countless nes.

    An indeterminable time had passed since certain high-level creatures had learned to utilize the energy that was present between heaven and earth. By cultivating their bodies they gradually gained terrifying strength, powers that would allow them to transcend life and death, stand above the worldliness, and be called gods.

    They represented a small fraction of the poption who could manipte the elemental energy all around them, or perhaps mastered some profound naturalws. Through constant cultivation and evolution, they ced themselves far above the ordinary, gaining the admiration and adoration of everyone.

    One could be a god by mastering any kind of energy to the pinnacle, be it the energy of fear, hatred, desire, or any other. As long as one cultivated methods to put that energy to use to the extreme, they would gain miraculous powers, and be a so-called ¡®God¡¯.

    In the boundless universe, there were two types of fundamental energies that were omnipresent. Those energies had the most intense presence, and gods who mastered them were the most powerful. The first type consisted of eight elemental energies ¨C light, darkness, earth, fire, wind, water, lightning, and death. The second type consisted of four edictal forces ¨C fate, spacetime, destruction, and life.

    Elemental energies and edictal forces could be found at every corner of the universe. As these two types of energies were present in the majority of nes of existence, and were the most rudimentaryponents between heaven and earth, those who cultivated them had boundless potential, and were usually stronger than those who cultivated in other energies.

    Division of sses existed between the gods based on the magnitude of their strength. There were demigods, basegods, lowgods, midgods, highgods, overgods, and Creator. To be a demigod, one had to form at least one of the following ¨C Body of Element, Soul of Element, Edictal Body, or Edictal Soul. Those who united both their bodies and souls with elemental energy or edictal forces would possess strength greater than demigods, and be called basegods.

    Crosius, Little Skeleton, the six-horned Soul Race tribal king, the Saintess of the Church of Light, they were all basegods. They were existences whose souls and bodies hadpletely merged with elemental energies.

    Basegods had the foundations of a god, but although they were considered actual gods by the average, in the eyes of higher level gods, they had a long way to go. It was when they progressed one step further, possessing numerous followers, and were able to form the Domain of Divinity and possess divine powers, that they could be considered legitimate gods.

    To be worshipped, able to form the Domain of Divinity, and possess divine energy ¨C those were the three key prerequisites to being a true god.

    Of the three, divine energy was the key. When a basegod cultivated and came toprehend their domain of expertise to some kind of profound level, they would possess divine power. This was, of course, the most difficult step of all, as one would have no one else but themselves in figuring out how to form divine energy. One could only produce divine energy through their own realization and understanding of the maniption of elemental energy and edictal forces.

    When a practitioner finally managed to produce divine energy, they would be even more adept in manipting the energy they cultivated in. At that point, they would be able establish a religion or some simr organization to recruit plenty of intelligent lifeforms to worship them. Upon acquiring believers to a certain quantity, the principles of the faith would transform into some kind of extraordinary energy that the worshipped existence could utilize. By fusing the power of faith and divine energy, the Domain of Divinity could be formed.

    Self-cultivation was the most time-consuming method and produced the lowest yield.

    Apart from that there was absorption, which refers to the killing of another god cultivating in the same energy and the proceeding absorption of homologous divine energy from their body. This method was not without major risks. If one was not careful, they could turn from the hunter to the hunted.

    Another method was to absorb the energy of some of the wonderful creations of nature. Perpetual and boundless luck was the first condition for this method, which had a far lower probability of sess than killing another god and assimting their divine energy.

    umting faith to raise divine energy was plenty more troublesome, but it remained the favourite route for the majority of gods. As long as enough people believed in them, they could increase their divine energy through the millions of strands of the power of faith.

    Moreover, as the power of faith increased, the Domain of Divinity too would be more powerful. In a battle between gods, it was typically the strength of their Domain of Divinity that determined which side had the upper hand. For all these reasons, the power of faith was very useful.

    The Church of Light, the Cmity Church, the Druidic Order, the Shrine of Ice, even the dark elves and the forest trolls; each worshipped their own gods. These gods rued divine energy from the faith of their believers. The reality was that different religions fought each other for believers for the purpose of substance gains.

    Eight types of elemental energies, and four edictal forces. Of all the big and small gods that cultivated in either one these altogether twelve energies, a majority of them chose to gain divine energy through cultivation and taking in believers.

    But that was certainly not the rule for all gods. There lived some who raised their divine energy by other means.

    For example, gods who cultivated in the element of death could obtain divine energy through the deaths of living beings. Gods who cultivated in the edict of destruction could gain divine energy by destroying life. Gods who cultivated in the edict of life could gain divine energy from material nes full of vitality...

    However, these methods would, more often than not, be in conflict with the interests of other gods. For example, the gods of death and destruction could gain divine energy from death and perish. On the flip side, however, the gods of life couldn¡¯t obtain energy from the life forces of the millions of living things in existence.

    It was precisely due to such collision of interests that conflict was an inevitable constant between the gods.

    Just as Wolf of the Cmity Church had said before, the Cemetery of Death did not in fact originate from the Profound Continent. The most important feature of the Cemetery of Death was therge-scale transportation array at its center, which had the capability of navigating across different nes. A mighty overgod cultivated in the energy of death allied with an overgod who cultivated in the energy of destruction. They worked together to spread death and destruction to every material ne, and therefrom gained even greater strength. Meanwhile, an overgod of life joined forces with other gods to stop them in all those nes. Thereupon, wars erupted on every major ne of existence, with Profound Continent being one of the affected nes.

    The Cemetery of Death was a gateway for the two mighty overgods to travel between various material nes. Its avability was not limited to the Profound Continent ¨C it could also be found on some other material nes. Those Cemeteries of Death made it easier for their subordinates, lesser gods under their control, to bring death and destruction to other nes.

    When they first set foot on a new ne, they would establish a religious organization and coax organisms on the ne into worshipping them. All those beings who worshipped them were granted protection as they harvested an unending stream of the power of faith from them. However, if living beings on that ne were already worshiping other gods, they would rain death and destruction upon them, and gain energy from their deaths.

    The Profound Continent was just a small ne of existence. Five thousand years prior, a great war ravaged Profound Continent and it involved practically every mighty existence on it. The two overgods of destruction and death had only sent out a few lesser gods to participate for them. Although their forces were defeated in the end, they left behind a seed of evil on Profound Continent ¨C the Cmity Church. Those gods of death and destruction withdrew from the Profound Continent but left a Cemetery of Death behind, so that they could return someday in the future.

    The skeletal staff had been left behind by a midgod of death. That being was one of the main leaders of the great war. He left behind some pieces of information in the skeletal staff and the Cemetery of Death, with the hope that it would assist experts cultivating in necromancy. In addition, the skeletal staff was the key to essing the Cemetery of Death. He was convinced that, with it, believers on Profound Continent could grow stronger, which would allow them to obtain even more power of faith.

    However, the original master of the skeletal staff also left behind the God¡¯s Brand in the Cemetery of Death and the skeletal staff. Therefore, once the new master got hold of the powers of the skeletal staff or the Cemetery of Death, the spell would be activated, causing its new master to eternally serve them.

    No wonder! That exins why my soul was affected by some sort of energy in the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo thought inwardly. A colossal figure once appeared in his mind, pressuring Han Shuo to surrender his soul and be eternally faithful to it. However, it was stopped by Han Shuo¡¯s tremendous willpower and his mighty demonic arts, and therefore he did not get stamped by the brand and lose himself.

    After Han Shuo broke away from the barriers inside the three-eyed skull, he was so enlightened. Han Shuo¡¯s eyes were wide open. A world beyond his imagination was presented before him. It was only at this moment that Han Shuo realized just how magnificent and vast the universe truly was, and how many inconceivable and wonderful things were waiting for him to discover.

    For the first time, Han Shuo recognized the never-ending struggles between the gods and beings with strength beyond his own understanding.

    Han Shuo turned his sight to the other two skulls. He wondered if the information contained in them would be the secrets to setting up a magical transportation array same as the one in the Cemetery of Death.

    With such wishes on his mind, Han Shuo quieted down his heart again and tried to attack the boundaries in the two skulls with the same method. However, Han Shuo felt that his mental strength hadn¡¯t attained the level needed yet. He felt rather powerless towards the secrets within the skulls.

    Suddenly, a pure, melodious calling entered Han Shuo¡¯s ears through the magical formation he deployed earlier, ¡°Mister Han Shuo, is Mister Han Shuo in there?¡± Han Shuo could make out the voice to be Lord Crosius¡¯ daughter. After weighing for a while, considering the fact that he couldn¡¯t unravel more secrets from the skeletal staff for the moment, Han Shuo stood up and headed outside.

 Chapter 529: Mystical Demonic Yuan

    GDK 529: Mystical Demonic Yuan

    As Han Shuo emerged from his secret underground chamber, one thought circled in his mind like a fly. The eight elemental energies and the four edictal forces ¨C none of them seemed to include demonic yuan. And if they did, what exactly was demonic yuan?

    Fundamentally, one cultivated in the eight elemental energies and four edictal forces by learning how to utilize the energy present around them. They would absorb and manipte those energies to strengthen their body and soul.

    Whichever one of those eight elemental energies and four edictal forces one chose, they had all been present in the world since the beginning of time. Those who cultivated in them gradually grew stronger and became gods by uniting themselves with these energies.

    The demonic arts in which Han Shuo cultivated, however, had all the conditions needed for it be generated from within the body. Although he could advance himself by absorbing certain rare energy forms, Han Shuo had never ever sensed the presence of demonic yuan in the world. This realization left Han Shuo dumbfounded.

    Those who cultivated in the elemental energies and edictal forces relied upon external energies, while Han Shuo¡¯s demonic arts was the opposite. Demonic arts was simply a process that unleashed the hidden potential within oneself through constant tempering and evolution. This seemed to be entirely different from those energies identified by the skeletal staff.

    From the information Han Shuo had just obtained he also learned that within the boundless cosmos, there were some existences who became gods through other energies, for example, fear and desire. As long as one mastered how to absorb and manipte those energies through constant cultivation, one could be a god as well. However, they too relied on external energies. The demonic arts and demonic yuan which Han Shuo practiced were all naturally formed inside within the body, even from the start.

    What was more shocking to Han Shuo was that, by means of some secret demonic arts techniques, the demonic yuan could be catalyzed to form energy that resembled elemental energy.

    For example, by releasing the demonic yuan with Mystical cial Spellfire, a special technique which utilized the meridians and bones, purple-red demonic mes could be produced. The spellfire could produce extreme heat and extreme cold temperatures. In addition to that, Han Shuo could utilize the demonic yuan to heal injuries on his body, and even help others heal theirs. This feat could usually only be aplished by gods cultivating in the edict of life. Other than that, some special attacks formed using demonic yuan could make skies go dark, just like when the gods of the element of darkness attacked...

    Even more helpful was that, although demonic yuan couldn¡¯t naturally be found between heaven and earth, Han Shuo could still absorb some other energies and assimte them for his own use. For example, the energy of resentment, killing intent, and all kinds of negative energy, Han Shuo could absorb and convert them into demonic yuan, adding to his strength.

    This attribute was also distinct from the cultivation of elemental energies and edictal forces, as those cultivators could only absorb one of the twelve energies that they cultivated in. Even after bing god, they could only absorb divine energy from other gods cultivating in the same energy, unable to absorb divine energy of gods cultivating in another type of energy.

    When Han Shuo carefully thought about it, he noticed that the demonic yuan which was naturally formed within his body could not only absorb and assimte other sinister energies, but by utilizing the demonic yuan through various demonic techniques, he could even form energies simr to others. Just this fact alone wasrgely inconsistent with the eight elemental energies and edictal forces that had Han Shuo learned of.

    After sifting once through the knowledge contained within the tri-coloured skeletal staff, Han Shuo discovered that there wasn¡¯t an understanding of demonic yuan within those memories, none whatsoever. This meant that the original master of the skeletal staff, a midgod, was not aware of the existence of demonic yuan. He was bewildered.

    Han Shuo believed that the manner of dividing the gods by ss as understood by that midgod ought to have been the basis for all division of strength in this universe. From the fact that the demonic arts had entirely different divisions of strength and cultivation methods, Han Shuo arrived at a shocking conclusion ¨C the Earth where demonic arts cultivators inhabited likely wasn¡¯t part of this universe of numerous material nes.

    Only such an exnation would make sense! Otherwise, that midgod wouldn¡¯t have been so oblivious to the existence of demonic yuan. As a demonic arts cultivator himself, Han Shuo knew just how mighty a demonic yuan cultivator could be. Just finding his way to the Carnal Realm, he was already as powerful as a so-called demigod. If such a group of mighty cultivators were actually present in this universe, they would definitely not be such an obscure and unknown group of people, and would be well-known to the gods.

    To add to this, demonic yuan carried inherent and distinct differences in regards to the eight elemental energies and edictal forces. From this all this information, Han Shuo came to the conclusion that there was no way demonic arts cultivators belonged to this universe!

    Han Shuo let out a sigh and shook his head bitterly. He was speechless. However, given that he had cultivated in demonic arts this far, he clearly recognized just how mighty demonic arts could be. Therefore, his determination to focus in cultivating demonic arts never swayed.

    Han Shuo could even argue that demonic yuan was superior to the eight elemental energies and four edictal forces. This feeling came from the many years of his cultivation in demonic yuan. But Han Shuo just couldn¡¯t give specific reasons as to why.

    ¡°Mr. Han Shuo, Mr. Han Shuo, are you there?¡± There was a young girl with snow-white wings outside the door, her voice gentle and pleasant.

    ¡°I¡¯m here.¡± Han Shuo rposed himself from a chaotic state of mind. He shed a bright smile and removed the magical formations inside the house before slowly opening the door.

    The beautiful, young winged girl waited gracefully in the open space outside the door. A pair of intense, lively eyes sat on her delicate face. This young girl lookedpletely different from Crosius, but had inherited his deep eyes. Her eyes, along with her angelic looks and snow-white wings, made her so immensely beautiful that she did not even appear mortal.

    Upon seeing Han Shuo open the door, the beautiful young girl smiled and said. ¡°Turns out Mister Han Shuo is inside. My name is Jasper, and I¡¯m very d that Mister Han Shuo agreed to be a visiting advisor for War Demon Valley. I came to consult Mister Han Shuo regarding some martial skills.¡±

    Jasper cultivated in wind elemental instead of the earth element like her father Crosius. From the presence leaving her body, Han Shuo could tell that she probably had the strength of a level-three Destroyer, and was even a little more powerful than Hemanna and Sylph.

    In the Abyss realm, creatures were categorized by strength into abyssal troopers, Destroyers, Rakshas, and Demons. Rakshas had the strengths of demigods. Those who formed the Soul of Element and became Demons would be considered as basegods among the division of sses between the gods that Han Shuo had juste to know. As for what level the five abyssal demon kings were on, Han Shuo could note to a conclusion without having seen them.

    ¡°Martial arts? Hehe, Miss Jasper, the martial arts I practise isn¡¯t exactly the same as yours. But still, I can give you some pointers,¡± Han Shuo gazed at Jasper and said with a smile.

    ¡°What sort of pointers?¡± Jasper asked as she fixed her gaze on Han Shuo.

    ¡°Whenever you cultivate, spend more time meditating and sensing the presence of the wind element with your mental strength using your soul. By doing this, when you form a Body of Element in the future, you might not even need demon king Manticole¡¯s guidance to form a Soul of Element.¡±

    Cultivation with mental strength was a basic skill that every mage on Profound Continent knew. However, those in the Abyss realm probably did not know how to cultivate with their mental strength as they had set out upon cultivation with solely their physical bodies. Han Shuo told her this because he wanted to conduct an experiment on Jasper.

    As expected, upon hearing what Han Shuo had said, Jasper stared at Han Shuo in confusion. She said still fazed, ¡°Mental strength? Meditation? I don¡¯t understand.¡±

    ¡°You know what? Why don¡¯t youe in first, and I¡¯ll exin it to you.¡± Han Shuo stepped aside for Jasper to enter. Once Jasper was in and rather confused, Han Shuomanded her to sit with her legs crossed. He then started exining to Jasper, ¡°When ites to the training of elemental energies between heaven and earth, you all have only mastered using them through your physical bodies. In fact, you can also utilize them with your soul...¡±

    Han Shuo imbued Jasper with some of the general knowledge about magic from Profound Continent once through, but Jasper still wore a puzzled expression as she listened. So, Han Shuo began chanting a necromancy spell, forming a few bone spears in the space in front of Jasper, and said, ¡°By sensing the elemental energy with your mental strength, the soul can unleash another type of attack with the elements, just like this!¡±

    The moment he finished speaking, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, the bone spears flew outside.

    ¡°A miracle!¡± Jasper¡¯s eyes widened in awe. She continued impatiently, ¡°How did you do that?¡±

    ¡°You must empty your mind, let your soule down and slowly sense the elemental energy. Oh, and your body¡¯s assimtion of the wind element could help guide your soul¡¯s sense. Let me teach you how you should meditate...¡± Han Shuo ordered Jasper to sit down, and started teaching Jasper ording to the meditation method mostmonly used by the mages in Profound Continent.

    Helping Jasper with all his heart, Han Shuo also had other intentions. He wanted to confirm his spection of whaty ahead at thest level of the Cemetery of Death through Jasper, and figure out if the so-called secret to bing a god was just the assemge of cultivation fortes from two nes to form both the Soul and Body of Element.

    Besides, when Han Shuo asked Jasper to absorb and manipte the wind elemental energy with her body, his consciousness was peeping into Jasper¡¯s body, observing how the wind element circting through her body. He was trying to figure out the secret to how abyssal beings formed Bodies of Element.

    As long as Han Shuo figured out the secret to how beings from the Abyss Realm could cultivate their bodies to form Bodies of Element, that would tantamount to Han Shuo having mastered the secret to bing god. If so, once Han Shuo returned to Profound Continent, he would be able to help some of the mages at his side advance to god status.

 Chapter 530: Carnal Indulgence

    GDK 530: Carnal Indulgence

    The people of the Abyss Realm had rather different body structures from the people of Profound Continent. Their bones were denser, and their meridians were firm and tenacious. Paired with their tough bodies, it was no surprise that they could absorb and fuse raw elemental energy into their bodies.

    Han Shuo stood behind Jasper and unfolded his consciousness. He then extended his left hand and gently ced it on Jasper¡¯s pale left shoulder. Like cobwebs, a few wisps of demonic yuan entered Jasper¡¯s body. Led by Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, they slowly made a full cirction through Jasper¡¯s body. He immediately spotted some of the differences between Jasper¡¯s body and his own people¡¯s.

    While doing so, Han Shuo carefully observed the way Jasper¡¯s body gathered and made use of the wind element. He witnessed cyclones growing in her body. The wind element around them was drawn into the cyclones revolving in a mysterious pattern. After passing through the cyclones, the wind element was deposited bit by bit into the meridians and bones.

    This was simr to Elizabeth¡¯s unique body in its ability to absorb a certain divine energy. Han Shuo was amazed just thinking about Elizabeth. Back on Profound Continent, Elizabeth¡¯s unique Body of Divine Favor could absorb divine energy from followers of the two major religions ¨C the Church of Light and the Shrine of Ice. This ability contradicted allmon sense as Han Shuo knew it.

    Based on the information left behind in the skeletal staff by the midgod, Han Shuo learned that gods could not assimte energy from other gods cultivating in different energy. Yet, Elizabeth was obviously an exception. The cyclones in Elizabeth¡¯s body were rather simr to Jasper¡¯s, but she could absorb both the divine energies that the gods of Light and Ice bestowed upon their believers. This was very strange indeed.

    Han Shuo thought about it for a moment beforeing to a speedy enlightenment. He reckoned that the ¡®divine energy¡¯ that Elizabeth could absorb from the followers of the Shrine of Ice and the Church of Light wasn¡¯t actually divine. Divine energy was core and essential to all gods. They gained it through their own cultivation and the power of faith that came from their believers. Hence, it did not make sense at all to grant their followers their hard-earned divine energy.

    Having thought of it this way, Han Shuo felt that even though Elizabeth¡¯s body was peculiar, it was not peculiar to the point of speechlessness. He then continued to carefully observe the cyclones in Jasper¡¯s body and quietly wondered how those cyclones were formed.

    ¡°Han Shuo, are you in there Han Shuo?¡± Han Shuo was jolted out of his contemtion by the cries outside. Han Shuo could tell that it was the two young girls, Hemana and Sylph.

    Withdrawing his left hand from Jasper¡¯s shoulder, Han Shuo raised his head and answered, ¡°I¡¯m here.¡± He then said to Jasper, like a marble carving immersed in meditation, ¡°Mental strength cannot be gained overnight. You can try to meditate ording to the method I taught you. After some time, when your soul¡¯s ability to sense the wind element strengthens, you will naturally be able to sense the presence of that mental strength.¡±

    ¡°Thank you so much, Mister Han Shuo,¡± Jasper smiled sweetly, stood up from her crossed-legged position and said. ¡°After meditating like this for only a little while, it seems that my soul is already closer to the wind element. Your training method is miraculous! I¡¯ve not heard of such methods before this. Mister Han Shuo is truly a magical person.¡±

    Upon hearing this from Jasper, Han Shuo could not help but carefully tap into Jasper¡¯s soul with his consciousness. He noticed that her soul had be lighter and more fluid.

    He could not help but feel shocked, and thought to himself, the people of the Abyss realm have an outstanding ability to sense elemental energy. With proper guidance, their soul¡¯s affinity to elemental energy could grow exponentially. At this rate, it won¡¯t take long before Jasper senses the presence of mental strength through meditation.

    ¡°Uh, Miss Jasper, why are you here?¡± Hemanna asked in an awkward tone, clearly surprised as she walked in to find Jasper standing in front of the door and talking to Han Shuo.

    ¡°I was consulting Mister Han Shuo about a few things regarding martial arts,¡± Jasper answered tly. She shot a nce at Hemanna and Sylph, who also entered with a peculiar expression in her deep eyes, before she thoughtfully said, ¡°In Abyss Realm, the strongmand respect. Men, if capable enough, can get any kind of women they want. To be following Mister Han Shuo, both of you are very fortunate indeed!¡±

    Hemanna and Sylph knew not what to make of this, seemingly wanting to reply. But after stammering for a while, they did not utter a word but stared nkly at Jasper.

    ¡°Alright, Mister Han Shuo. I shall not bother you any longer. When I can sense the presence of mental strength, I will return with more questions. Hehe, both Hemanna and Sylph are well-known in War Demon Valley for their beauty. Enjoy them well,¡± Jasper teasingly winked at Han Shuo and left with a faint smile before he could even reply.

    Han Shuo was rather startled. He never expected that Jasper, a beauty of such elegance, would teasingly use the word ¡®enjoy¡¯ in that context. It appeared that the Abyss realm was indeed very different from Profound Continent. Society here was obviously much less sensitive to some matters which would be awkward and embarrassing back on Profound Continent.

    ¡°Han Shuo, she has taken a fancy to you,¡± Sylph, the purple-eyeddy said sourly after Jasper had long vanished out of sight but Han Shuo¡¯s startled expression still stuck on his face.

    ¡°You¡¯re kidding, right? That can¡¯t be. She only came over to ask questions about martial arts. It¡¯s not what you imagined,¡± Han Shuoughed involuntarily and shook his head, disagreeing with Sylph¡¯s conjecture. After a short pause, he continued, ¡°Have Qunoa told you both everything?¡±

    ¡°Yep, from today onwards, we no longer need to fight for the post of sergeant major. Lord Qunoa has just told us that the two of us belong to you. I heard that it was an order directly issued by Lord Crosius himself. Han Shuo, I see you have friends in high ces!¡± Hemanna said smilingly at Han Shuo, not in the least offended by Crosius giving them away to Han Shuo likemodities. Somehow, they were even secretly delighted. This left Han Shuo rather confused.

    ¡°Han Shuo, Jasper must have fallen for you! Each and every one of the six Rakshas of War Demon Valley is several times older than her, and a few have even taught Jasper martial arts since her childhood. Therefore, she definitely wouldn¡¯t adore any of the six Rakshas. But you are different. You are not just extremely miraculous, but sufficiently powerful. In addition to that distinct but indescribable trait, it would be a matter of course that she would fall in love with you at first sight,¡± Sylph was still thinking about Jasper, and stubbornly exined.

    ¡°There¡¯s no room to doubt that. We adore and revere the strong. Jasper¡¯s assistance during your battle with Brakyah indicated that she has feelings for you. Then, right after she learned that you are staying in War Demon Valley, she immediately came to consult you about martial arts. This has amply indicated her feelings for you,¡± Hemanna opined after hearing Sylph¡¯s.

    After listening to the twodies and recalling some unusual events he encountered in the Abyss realm, Han Shuo became of the same mind with the two. When he thought of Jasper¡¯s fair and tender skin, her beautiful white wings, and those deep, moving eyes, Han Shuo¡¯s heart was stirred.

    Han Shuo suddenly put on a mischievous smile and stared at Sylph and Hemanna. He said, ¡°Since Crosius has offered the two of you to me as gifts, does that mean I can do with you whatever I please?¡±

    Hemanna and Sylph exchanged a nce, and replied immoderately, ¡°Of course!¡±

    Han Shuo chuckled. He opened his arms and simultaneously lifted Hemanna and Sylph at their waists. As they let out their sweet gentle cries, in no time, theynded on the wide bed inside the room along with Han Shuo. Their limpid green and purple eyes revealed their amorous passion, with a submissive appearance as though to call their man to gorge them to his heart¡¯s content.

    The two alien females didn¡¯t have quite the same body structures as the average person. There were naturally formed armors and even spikes joining to their skins around parts of their breasts, abdomen, shoulders, and knees. However, when paired with the bare regions of healthy, wheat-colored skin, they gave off a sense of wild seductive beauty.

    After throwing thedies onto the bed, Han Shuo did not rush to consume them. Instead, he stroked on the spikes around their elbows and shoulders as he clicked his tongue in wonder, ¡°Gorgeous! Oh, and that naturally formed armor on your chest, the pattern is beautiful...¡±

    It appeared that those spikes and armor were sensitive areas fordies of their race. As Han Shuo admired them using his two unbridled hands, slowly moving around these ces, the two coquettishdies both began to pant, red spreading across their cheeks as though they were on fire.

    As the twodies gasped, they slowly withdrew the spikes on their shoulders, elbows, and knees back into their bodies. Those beautiful armors that covered the most important areas of their breast and abdomen also slowly turned into the same color as their skin under Han Shuo¡¯s watchful eyes. They gradually lost their firm, defensive power, causing their tender, upright twin peaks to copse on themselves. Even their hairy axe-wounds werepletely exposed.

    ¡°No, I prefer you with the spikes. In my eyes, you two were much more alluring and sexier that way,¡± Han Shuo said smilingly as he caressed the sensitive areas of the two aliendies with a secret demonic art technique.

    The twodies knew exactly what Han Shuo meant. Those spikes they had retracted fiercely extended once more. Even at the site around their breasts and abdomen, beautiful armors were yet again formed. However, the armor formed this time was rather different. Resembling flower blossoms, the most important part at the center stuck out like a pistil.

    ¡°Haha, what a magical picture of beauties!¡± Han Shuo was greatly pleased. His hands caressed thedies even more unbridledly. The two seemed to have no idea that Han Shuo was using his secret demonic arousal technique on them. After receiving gentle rubs from Han Shuo, their lustful desires broke out like water from a broken dam. They panted heavily, eyes watery, while their bewitching bodies began to twist and fling about like a snake.

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, is Mister Han Shuo in there?¡± For the third time, another person knocked on Han Shuo¡¯s door.

    During the most critical moment, Han Shuo heard a yell from the person he had just defeated. He was shocked. Upon unfolding his consciousness, Han Shuo discovered that Brakyah hade alone and was wearing a respectful and solemn expression. He did not appear to havee for revenge.

    Hemanna and Sylph were not deaf to Brakyah¡¯s voice outside either. A trace of uneasiness shed in their eyes. They seemed to be weighing if they should sit up on the bed.

    Brakyah had coveted for the two for a long time. He had left fears deep in their hearts, fears which would be hard topletely eliminate in a short period of time. Brakyah had long announced to the whole world that their bodies would be his to have. As Brakyah was one of the six Raksha of War Demon Valley, even the master of the Valley himself, Crosius, had epted those words tacitly. Had it not been for Han Shuo¡¯s sudden appearance, the twodies would have no other choice.

    Now that Han Shuo had prevailed over Brakyah, they finally could be considered as having escaped from Brakyah¡¯s clutches. However, Brakyah was right outside. Although they were aroused and teased by Han Shuo to an almost unrestrainable level, those deeply-rooted fears in their hearts still had some effect.

    This was uneptable to Han Shuo. As he listened to Brakyah¡¯s yelling and looked at the two beautiful young women who originally belonged to Brakyah, Han Shuo felt an additional intense desire to possess the two. The intensity of the desire was beyond Han Shuo¡¯s imagination. Instead of letting go of their chests, he pressed even more firmly, yet gently, leaving the two unable to move a muscle.

    ¡°Yes, I¡¯m here. But please wait for a moment, Mister Brakyah. I will be ready shortly,¡± Han Shuo replied by yelling loud from where he was. Then, as thedies looked at Han Shuo with gazes begging for forgiveness, Han Shuo pounced on Hemanna. Han Shuo¡¯s hard object fiercely entered Hemanna¡¯s wonderful realm covered with sparkling water droplets.

    ¡°Oohhh.....¡± Hemanna couldn¡¯t help but let out a loud moan which sounded as though she was sobbing. Under the constant stimtion of Han Shuo¡¯s secret demonic technique, Hemanna was unable to hold back her amorous feelings. When that hollow zone of hers waspletely filled in, she felt an intense pleasure that there was no way of keeping down.

    Outside the building, Brakyah, a level-two Raksha, was sitting on his huge demon-faced spider. The respectful face he had arrived in turned into great disgust. Hearing the beautiful Hemanna moan in ecstasy, it was no mystery to Brakyah what was going on inside. He was obviously in a sullen mood.

    Those beautiful, soul-hooking bodies were supposed to be his to enjoy. However, at this moment, he wasn¡¯t the one riding them, but the one listening from the outside, imagining how pleasured the man enjoying them must be.

    But without adequate strength, any amount of fury and wrath he had would be in vain, especially when his Lord Crosius had personally given him the order. He had no choice but toe over and apologize to this mighty existence.

    The rounds and rounds of beautiful melodies reverberated in Brakyah¡¯s ears, leaving him with an ashen face. It simply was much more suffering than killing him then and there. However, to be a grade-two Raksha, Brakyah¡¯s mind was also outstandingly steady. He firmly repressed the thought of recklessly charging in at the cost of his own life. He strenuously endured listening to those sounds that made him furious to the point of spitting blood.

    ¡°Hold back, I must hold back. There wille a chance to seek revenge. There will...¡± Brakyah¡¯s body was shivering as he constantly hypnotized himself so.

    Inside the house, while observing Brakyah using his consciousness, Han Shuo energetically conquered the wonderful body below him. This gave him an iparable sense of delight. The young aliendy under his crotch went beyond his expectations. It was as though hundreds of thousands of soft grasses winded around his sturdy object. It gave Han Shuo a rapture that he had never experienced before.

    Aliendies are indeed distinctive! This trip to the Abyss realm has not been in vain! Han Shuo delightedly thought to himself once again.

    The sense of delight not only came from under his crotch, but also from the heart. When Han Shuo thought of Brakyah standing right outside, the man who should have been the one possessing Hemanna and Sylph, with no choice but to look on helplessly as he enjoyed the two, he was overjoyed that he almostughed out loud.

    What made Han Shuo even more excited was that as he vigorously conquered Hemanna, he could sense his realm state reaching a fantastical heightened state. Without Han Shuo actively trying to manipte, the demonic yuan automatically and rhythmically circted from the demonic infant and flowed in the body in the trajectory of demonic arts cultivation.

    While Han Shuo felt the pleasure of a thousand daydreams, he also more deeply recognized the breakthrough point of Carnal Realm. As long as he did as he pleased, not only would the realm state rapidly progress, but his demonic yuan would grow deeper and denser.

    After an eternity, Hemanna fainted over from under his body. Han Shuo got up and pulled Sylph over, continuing his expedition with Sylph.

    ¡°Wait for a moment? Will be there shortly? How long has it been? This goddamn alien, he¡¯s humiliating me on purpose! Damn it, damn it! I might as well fight him to death...¡± outside the house, Brakyah was gnashing his teeth. In his heart, his curses had touched upon eighteen generations of Han Shuo¡¯s ancestors and greeted his family in different ways.

 Chapter 531: Nethervalley

    GDK 531: Nethervalley

    Brakyah had no idea how much time he had sat waiting but, eventually, the whole ordeal was over. Han Shuo casually put on a ck-green warrior gown. Wearing a satisfied and contented smile on his face, Han Shuo carried his loose pants and walked out of the house.

    Although Brakyah was furious to the point of almost spitting blood when he saw the carefree smile on Han Shuo¡¯s face, he had no choice but to put on an apologetic one. As much as he tried, his smile appeared unsightly and awkward. ¡°Mister Han Shuo, it was my blunder thatst time. I specially came here to apologize to you. Please forgive my reckless behavior.¡±

    Han Shuo stretched himself infort. As he looked at Brakyah with his squinted eyes, he had secretly prepared himself to handle any surprise attack from Brakyah. When the first thing that came out from Brakyah¡¯s mouth was an apology, his expression flipped. Soon after, Han Shuo¡¯s eyes suddenly glimmered as he stared nkly at Brakyah.

    Brakyah was obviously growing ufortable before that strange gaze of Han Shuo¡¯s. He bowed his head even lower as he was afraid of looking directly into Han Shuo¡¯s gaze. In an even softer voice, ¡°Please forgive me for my mistakes, Mister Han Shuo.¡±

    ¡°En,¡± Han Shuo simply replied with a nasal consonant before turning around and walk back into his residence.

    Brakyah furrowed his brows, and suddenly raised his head to look at Han Shuo¡¯s back. He softly cried, ¡°Mister Han Shuo, you have forgiven me?¡±

    ¡°Forgiven, all is forgiven. Just leave. As long as you don¡¯t offend me, I have better things to do than to mess with you,¡± with just one nce, Han Shuo could tell that Brakyah wasn¡¯t sincere in his apology. Yet, he had no interest in feigning civility with Brakyah. Han Shuo then coldly added, ¡°Anyhow, if you n to make reprisals, you might want to make the polt a careful and meticulous one. Otherwise, if I¡¯m not dead, you won¡¯t be seeing any mercy from this face, not even Crosius. I think you know what I mean,¡±

    Brakyah¡¯s pupils suddenly constricted, and gazed at Han Shuo¡¯s back ferociously. He seemed to have the desire to pounce on him, but was obviously hesitating. While Brakyah couldn¡¯t make up his mind whether or not to attack, Han Shuo had walked back into his residence.

    He took a deep breath as though forcibly swallowing down his grudges, before revealing a faint smile, saying, ¡°Mister Han Shuo is now a visiting advisor to my War Demon Valley. We are all on the same ship. It was just two women. I¡¯m not one who couldn¡¯t put up with such an insignificant thing.¡±

    ¡°It better be so!¡± Han Shuo replied coldly. Although Han Shuo looked indifferent on the surface, in his heart, he ced quite some significance on Brakyah. For a person to have silently endured until this stage, even if his strength wasn¡¯t enough to match Han Shuo¡¯s, his attacks were still incredibly fierce and not to be belittled.

    ¡°Oh right, other than to apologize, I¡¯m here to inform you that there will be a meeting in two days at the War Demon grand hall, to discuss how to deal with Demonfang Castle. Lord Crosius wishes that you will be there on time,¡± Brakyah shouted as he gazed at Han Shuo¡¯s back.

    ¡°Got it,¡± Han Shuo replied indifferently.

    With a hunched back, Brakyah appeared very humble in his manner. With his head bowed, he said, ¡°Then, I shall stop bothering Mister Han Shuo in your pleasurable affair.¡± Brakyah had taken the opportunity to steal a quick nce inside. His sharp eyes swept over the beautiful bodies of Hemanna and Sylphying tiredly and disorderly on Han Shuo¡¯s bed. He was so afraid that Han Shuo would see the killing intent in his eyes which he couldn¡¯tpletely conceal that he didn¡¯t dare raise his head to look at Han Shuo.

    However, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness had cultivated to this realm, so even without actively probing Brakyah with it, Han Shuo could still clearly sense the extreme hatred that came from Brakyah. That futile concealment of his only left Han Shuo with secondhand embarrassment and a bad taste in mouth.

    ¡°What a pitiful fe. I reckon he must be fuming with rage right now. Hehe, consider yourself unlucky for trying to snatch away my women!¡± Han Shuo talked to himself after looking at the two beautiful sirens on his bed and then at Brakyah whose shoulders had been twitching as he left. His voice was neither loud nor soft, but was certainly audible to Brakyah given his strength.

    Brakyah suddenly stumbled, and he shivered for a bit before regaining his footing. With his back turned to Han Shuo, Brakyah seemed to be hesitating on whether he should go ahead and charge at Han Shuo with his life. But in the end, Brakyah managed to restrain himself, and pathetically disappeared out of Han Shuo¡¯s callous gaze.

    ¡°He¡¯s actually quite an extraordinary character, but what a pity...¡± Han Shuo mumbled. Then with one thought, he activated a demonic art. m! The door was shut tight.

    Looking at the two beautiful youngdiesying disorderly on his bed, Han Shuo¡¯s mouth curved to make a contented smile. After he slightly fixed out the house, Han Shuo again returned to that secret underground chamber excavated by earth elite zombie. Withdrawing the skeletal staff, following his connection with Little Skeleton, Han Shuo¡¯s soul descended upon theherworld. He came to a valley made up of heaps of corpses. The aura of death was intense in this area. It was as though the entire region was wrapped up with the pure element of death. The ash gray aura of death lingered around the air. There were countless mighty undead creatures located in such a bizarre ce.

    Evil knights, mummy lords, old fey demons, bone devils ¨C these high-level undead creatures could be found everywhere in this great valley. They ced about like devoted guards, prudently and carefully defending the great canyon.

    A few mighty presences wereing off from the depths of the canyon. They seemed likely to be undead creatures even mightier than old fey demons and bone devils. For numerous high-level undead creatures to all gather there, something unusual must have been happening.

    From the Abyss realm, Han Shuo had sensed the intense mental fluctuation of Little Skeleton¡¯s. Therefore, after Brakyah had left, Han Shuo conveniently descended upon theherworld andnded at this strange ce following the location of Little Skeleton¡¯s soul.

    Han Shuo stood atop a bald mountain. All around him were densely packed undead creatures, among which was Little Skeleton, mounted on a bone dragon proudly hovering in mid-air. He had the demeanor of an overlord, overlooking the world. Underneath him, the five elite zombies were all present. There was also another bone dragon, one king zombie, and three evil knights that had been reformed by Han Shuo using demonic arts.

    After absorbing the tremendous energy from the Ice Goddess statue inside the frozen mountain of the Shrine of Ice, water elite zombie had a face with faint wrinkles and a pair of eyes which seemed to contain water ripples. He also had a water-blue, ripple-patterned armor that covered most parts of his body. He gave off a soft and unearthly quality, incoherent with the lifeless atmosphere of theherworld.

    After thenky wood elite zombie obtained the Viride Leaf, he made breakthroughs after breakthroughs in his evolutionary pathway. There was an exuberant vitality that naturally emanated from his body. Surprisingly, the exuberant aura perfectly blended with that aura of deathing off from wood elite zombie. Han Shuo was in awe of the miracle that was the penta-elemental elite zombies.

    ¡°Father, why have youe?¡± Little Skeleton, floating high in mid-air, suddenly asked as Han Shuo gazed at wood and water elite zombie. After a short pause, before Han Shuo could answer, Little Skelton continued, ¡°Father, who is it that harmed you thest time? I want to eternally imprison his soul here, and have him suffer never-ending torment.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, there will be a chance for that. When I return, we will fight shoulder to shoulder,¡± Han Shuo replied. His gaze soon turned to the great canyon ahead filled with high-level undeads, and asked, ¡°I sensed intense fluctuation from your soul, and so I came over to see what¡¯s the matter. You have gone all-out this time. Up to something big?¡±

    ¡°Yes, father. That is Nethervalley up ahead. I sensed the presence of an extremely mighty creature within the valley. This creature is more powerful than the bone dragons and the king zombie. He severely threatened the path of my territory expansion. Therefore, I came here to eliminate him and take over that Nethervalley. I want to see why that ce has nurtured so many high-level undead creatures,¡± Little Skeleton exined.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes widened to the great canyon. From the sensation he first felt, Han Shuo already understood that the great canyon was rather unusualpared to most ces in theherworld. This ce called Nethervalley had much, much more intense element of deathpared to other ces. Furthermore, the few mighty presences hiding inside caught Han Shuo¡¯s interest.

    After absorbing the Origin Crystal of Death, Little Skeleton¡¯s strength had been advancing at rates at which even Han Shuo felt astonished. After forming both the Body of Element and Soul of Element, based on the sses between the gods that Han Shuo had recently learned, he understood that Little Skeleton could already be considered a basegod of death. In this realm, Little Skeleton was, with no doubt, an extremely mighty existence. He really did not expect Little Skeleton to so quickly find another existence of the same grade in theherworld.

    After having stayed in the Abyss realm for some time, Han Shuo came to understand the cultivation method of that world. He also knew that in theherworld, Little Skeleton had been cultivating with the element of death through his skeleton, and his cultivation pathway was basically equivalent to that of abyssal creatures. However, as his soul had obtained a portion of Han Shuo¡¯s memories, in addition to having many fortuitous encounters, and the boost from an Origin Crystal, Little Skeleton had quickly formed a Soul of Element. As he had been using the element of death to forge his bones, he came to form a Body of Element soon after.

    It suddenly came to Han Shuo¡¯s mind that Little Skeleton ought to be extremely familiar with attacking using bones. With his soul now a Soul of Element after absorbing that Origin Crystal of Death, if he could proficiently deploy necromancy magic, then he would certainly be even mightier.

    Although Little Skeleton had previously obtained some of Han Shuo¡¯s memories, at that point in time, Han Shuo had little to null understanding of necromancy. Thus, the Little Skeleton now had no idea how to use high-level necromancy magic. Suddenly, as Han Shuo looked at Little Skeleton, he had the idea of transferring his memories pertaining to necromancy to Little Skeleton.

 Chapter 532: Memory Transfer

    GDK 532: Memory Transfer

    There existed a unique connection between Han Shuo and Little Skeleton, which started the moment Little Skeleton was refined using Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence together with the cocktails of some unknown junk materials. Afterward, through the Seal of Darkness Han Shuo left behind an eternal brand on Little Skeleton¡¯s soul. But in that process, a portion of his memories were somehow also transferred to Little Skeleton.

    With those refinements and the backing of some demonic arts, Little Skeleton had advanced his strength at a rate at which even Han Shuo would be bbergasted.

    And now, having formed the Body and Soul of Element, Little Skeleton was within the basegod realm. With more knowledge about the element of death and the essence of necromancy, Han Shuo believed that the Little Skeleton would be able to make even greater breakthroughs, and be a true ¡®God¡¯.

    ¡°Let me transfer you some memories. It might help you better understand the element of death, and subsequently improve your strength,¡± Han Shuo transmitted as he looked at Little Skeleton.

    Little Skeleton, riding on a bone dragon, appeared rather startled at Han Shuo¡¯s words. The Purple Demon Eye radiated glimmering lights. He looked at Han Shuo and asked, ¡°What memories, father?¡±

    ¡°Some skills pertaining to manipting the element of death using the soul. Given your body¡¯s affinity with the element of death, once youprehend how to use the element in this respect, your strength is bound to improve,¡± Han Shuo exined.

    Little Skeleton was fully deserving of being called the master of the crowd of undead creatures. In their presence, Little Skeleton possessed absolute dignity. But before Han Shuo, Little Skeleton would always be submissive, never acting in contrary to hismand. After listening to Han Shuo¡¯s words, Little Skeleton kept his docile silence and leapt down from the bone dragon. Standing before Han Shuo, he asked, ¡°How do we go about it, father?¡±

    Whilst in the Carnal Realm Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness possessed all kinds of wonderful abilities. And given his connection with Little Skeleton, to transfer some of his own memories of necromancy magic to Little Skeleton using the consciousness would be especially simple. Moreover, Little Skeleton had united his soul with the element of death. Han Shuo had full certainty of his ability to sessfullyplete the process.

    ¡°Is this ce safe for the moment?¡± Han Shuo did not immediately set about the task, but gazed at the Nethervalley some distance away filled with high-level undead creatures roaming everywhere.

    In thisherworld, as a basegod of death, Little Skeleton had a much deeper understanding of this worldpared to Han Shuo. Therefore he asked for Little Skeleton¡¯s opinion before setting about the task.

    Little Skeleton swept his purple demon eyes over the distant Nethervalley and nced at the five elite zombies beside him before he replied, ¡°Father, they have seeded in practicing the formation. With the five of them here, I believe it will be very safe.¡±

    Han Shuo was overjoyed and asked, ¡°Very good! The Penta-elemental Undead Formation is finally ready. And the five sses of energies can finally fuse together. How powerful is it?¡±

    All the five elite zombies could sense Han Shuo¡¯s glee. They felt just as well. The five little critters now each possessed high-intelligence, and even talked over each other in taking credit for the achievement, bragging to Han Shuo about how much effort they had dedicated to it and how remarkable their aplishment. This left Han Shuo betweenughter and tears.

    ¡°Rest assured, father. The formation is very powerful. Even I wouldn¡¯t be able to escape from the five of them,¡± Little Skeleton replied.

    As Little Skeleton continued to exin, Han Shuo grew even happier. His understanding of the might of the Penta-elemental Undead Formation from Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories was limited. As for whether or not the formation would bring him the help he needed, Han Shuo did not have too much certainty.

    And now, Little Skeleton, a being of basegod strength, said himself that not even he could escape from the Penta-elemental undead formation, Han Shuo was immediately reassured that the formation was not to be taken lightly.

    More importantly, the might released by the formation wasn¡¯t a constant value. As long as the five elite zombies continued to evolve, the power of the Penta-elemental Undead Formation would grow and strengthen in the same magnitude. Given Han Shuo¡¯s understanding of the five elite zombies, he believed that sooner orter, an enormous, pleasant surprise was destined toe his way.

    ¡°Alright then, let¡¯s begin right away!¡± Han Shuo stood firmly before Little Skeleton, extended his hand and gently put it on Little Skeleton¡¯s sparkling, jade-like white skull.

    His consciousness unfolded. ck lightning shed across his pupils as he narrowed his vision on Little Skeleton. The consciousness had drawn out memories pertaining to necromancy. Those memories assumed the state of speckles of starlight. Guided by the consciousness, they slowly moved into Little Skeleton¡¯s soul through that big hand of Han Shuo¡¯s gently ced on Little Skeleton¡¯s skull.

    This demonic technique of using consciousness to transfer memories required an extraordinarily high degree of skill and ir. It also required the practitioner to have proficient mastery and familiarity with the soul. Although the one on the receiving end did not require great skill and understanding, their soul needed to be extremely mighty.

    A fragile or weak soul wouldn¡¯t be able to withstand the invasion of the consciousness¡¯ energy, and before the memories could enter, the soul would disintegrate and scatter in an instant, with absolutely no chance of recovering.

    It was precisely because memory transfer was such a dangerous process that Han Shuo was so cautious. At first, his consciousness only carried the most minute and simple of memories, and was very gradual in transferring them into Little Skeleton¡¯s soul, lest Little Skeleton couldn¡¯t withstand it and an irreversible tragedy ured.

    The fact proved that the Soul of Element formed by Little Skeleton after absorbing the Origin Crystal of Death was much stronger than Han Shuo had expected. Knowledge about the basics of necromancy, without the slightest impediment, entered Little Skeleton¡¯s soul, and it was quickly absorbed and digested by Little Skeleton in a manner mysterious to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was neither sad nor delighted. He was fully engaged in the task. The pair of eyes on his face beamed brilliant rays like ck bolts of lightning. Using the most exquisite ability of his consciousness, he transferred his memories bit by bit to Little Skeleton through his right hand.

    Although memory transfer was a very dangerous procedure, it did not wear down much of Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan. The primary requirement for the procedure was that the executor had a refined realization and profound understanding of the soul.

    In this situation, the necromancy magic that Han Shuo had cultivated for many years, a field which required expertise study and deepprehension of the soul, gave him a clear advantage. Necromancy studies had a very high requirement for the cultivator in their knowledge of the soul. Thanks to his extensive knowledge and attainments on this subject, Han Shuo managed not to run into the slightest trouble on his very first attempt, and the memory transfer was carried out with extraordinary precision.

    In this region densely covered with high-level undead creatures, Han Shuo was performing a most exquisite and abstruse demonic arts maneuver on Little Skeleton with his consciousness. If it all went as nned, it wouldn¡¯t take too long before Han Shuo could export his many years of knowledge about necromancy into Little Skeleton¡¯s soul. Then, Little Skeleton woulde to gain a profound understanding of necromancy in the shortest time possible.

    However, as Murphy¡¯s Law has it, anything that can go wrong will go wrong. Midway, two waves of ferocious dangers arrived from their front and back.

    A kind of sinister soul energy suddenly erupted from within Little Skeleton¡¯s body!

    This sinister energy definitely had nothing at all to do with Little Skeleton. It carried a very obvious trait of plundering. Not only did it attempt to steal the memories that Han Shuo was transferring to Little Skeleton, but it also wouldn¡¯t let Han Shuo¡¯s and Little Skeleton¡¯s souls slip by. It began wildly plundering the moment it appeared.

    Han Shuo, whose eyes were radiating ck shes of lightning, could clearly see the sinister purple light circting from Little Skeleton¡¯s Purple Demon Eye. Han Shuo could sense that the sinister soul energy that suddenly erupted originated from that Purple Demon Eye worn on Little Skeleton¡¯s left eye socket.

    Back then, at the forest trolls¡¯ sacred ground, Little Skeleton forcibly dug out this Purple Demon Eye from the sculpture of Datara that the forest trolls enshrined. When Little Skeleton first wore the Purple Demon Eye, both Han Shuo and Little Skeleton simultaneously felt the invasion of a kind of wicked energy. But at the critical moment, Little Skeleton put on that unique eye-patch, averting the cmity.

    From that moment onwards, Little Skeleton continued to wear that peculiar eye-patch for a long time. It seemed to have the function of suppressing the wicked energy of the Purple Demon Eye, and Little Skeleton was unharmed all the while. Until one day, the eye-patch self-ignited. But from that time onwards the Purple Demon Eye did not continue giving out intense invasive energy. Han Shuo even assumed that Little Skeleton hadpletely familiarized himself with the bizarreness of the Purple Demon Eye, and thought that that unforgettable painful experience would not make its wrath known once more.

    But at the most critical moment of the memory transfer process, the Purple Demon Eye which had not behaved abnormally for a long time, saw an unwee eruption with intense looting energy. This energy was even quicker and more violent than the previous times. It was forcibly stealing that memories Han Shuo was transmitting to Little Skeleton, and attempted to seize both souls of Han Shuo¡¯s and Little Skeleton¡¯s at astonishing rates.

    At the same time, that mighty existence inside Nethervalley, perhaps it had sensed that Han Shuo and Little Skeleton abruptly ran into a trouble, let out a terrifying loud yell. All those mighty undead creatures inside Nethervalley seemed to have received the signal to attack. They stopped aimlessly and passively defending the Nethervalley and charged at the bald mountain atop which Han Shuo and Little Skeleton stood.

    An aura of death equally matched with that of Little Skeleton rushed out from that Nethervalley as unannounced and instantaneously as that chilling screech. It charged out with its elite army of undead, preparing to seize the opportunity to detain Han Shuo and Little Skeleton in Nethervalley, forever.

 Chapter 533: Three Souls As One

    GDK 533: Three Souls As One

    The situation was as good as hopeless. Han Shuo and Little Skeleton barely withstood the invasive energy of the Purple Demon Eye working together. This sinister energy was more powerful than Han Shuo could have imagined. The memories pertaining to necromancy that he was trying to transfer to Little Skeleton with his consciousness were gradually being stolen by the energy in little fragments.

    That was, however, the least of their worries. As it absorbed Han Shuo¡¯s memories of necromancy magic, it also unceasingly released sinister energy, forcibly looting Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness and Little Skeleton¡¯s soul with overwhelming power. It seemed unlikely to stop until itpletely upied both the souls of Han Shuo and Little Skeleton.

    In a battle between souls, bystanders could do absolutely nothing to help. Especially in this extremely unique state, Han Shuo and Little Skeleton simply couldn¡¯t receive any external assistance. All they could do was strenuously hold and defend against the invasion of this corrosive, sinister energy.

    Although Little Skeleton¡¯s soul had be one with the element of death and formed a Soul of Element,pared to Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, it was nevertheless much inferior. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was formed using a special method of demonic arts that elevated the soul. It was a cultivation method which waspletely distinct from the eight elemental energies and four edictal forces, with all kinds of inconceivably amazing abilities.

    It was when he faced soul invasion from such a degree of sinister energy, against which he had no chance to prepare himself, that Han Shuo fully unleashed the extensive catalogue of abilities of his consciousness. Mustering all his strength, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness constricted into a fine thread hardly visible to the naked eye. It had actually congealed into various bizarre formations in the mind, putting up hurdles to obstruct the invading energy.

    After forming a Soul of Element, Little Skeleton¡¯s soul had utmost familiarity and affinity to the element of death. However, during such a battle between souls, the Soul of Element that Little Skeleton cultivated could notpare to the resilience of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. It could only hardly act together with Han Shuo under the guidance of his consciousness.

    Right from the start, Little Skeleton¡¯s usage and maniption of the aura of death were limited to enhancing his body. The cultivation pathway taken was the same as abyssal creatures. By umting intense element of death on his white bones, he formed himself a sparking skeletal body of the most formidable fighting strength.

    For the same reason, once his soul had fused with an Origin Crystal and formed a Soul of Element, he quickly figured out the knack of forming a Body of Element for himself, reaching the basegod realm.

    Although he indeed had a Soul of Element, Little Skeleton didn¡¯t understand much about using the energy of the soul. The reason that Han Shuo wanted to transfer his knowledge of necromancy to Little Skeleton was precisely to make up for Little Skeleton¡¯s ignorance in this respect. Yet, it appeared that he was still one step toote.

    The sinister energy that erupted from the Purple Demon Eye was no longer confined to just the Purple Demon Eye. It had gushed towards Han Shuo and Little Skeleton with force that could move mountains. Not even Han Shuo¡¯s almighty consciousness, which had saved him time and time again in the past, could bail him out of this invasion. Han Shuo was out-ssed, and all he could resort to was further retreat into defeat.

    Just as Han Shuo and Little Skeleton¡¯s souls were to be conquered by the energy, a cloud of green mist began to emerge from Nethervalley, carrying with it the most severe aura of death. At its center glowed a faint green light.

    The terrifying screech appeared to originate from that very light within the green lump of smoke. Behind it, three king skeletons and two bone dragons followed, along with an army of high-level dark creatures the ranks of bone devils and old fey demons. They charged forward with tremendous momentum.

    The mighty existence within the green lump of smoke possessed strength well-matched against that of Little Skeleton. Along its path the terrifying aura of death ravaged like flood water, causing all the subordinates surrounding Little Skeleton to spontaneously explode.

    The creature within the green lump of smoke destroyed and obliterated every undead creature in his path as though he were breaking dried twigs. He had charged to the hillside with numerous high-level undead creatures behind him. He wasted no energy on superfluous speeches, instead roaring incessantly with every inch forward. The undead creatures by Little Skeleton¡¯s side could do little but recede in fear. Without the backbone that was Little Skeleton, their morale had weakened significantly.

    This undead creature of basegod strength definitely had a soul way stronger than Little Skeleton¡¯s, who had only just joined the league of basegods. His loud roars showed evidence of necromancy magic. It utilized the aura of death all around to form magic simr to Soul Tremor, destroying the willpower of the numerous dark creatures on Little Skeleton¡¯s side.

    Only the three evil knights that Han Shuo had reforged with demonic arts and the five elite zombies werepletely unaffected by the waves of loud roars.

    The five elite zombies disyed not the slightest fear, but more astonishingly still, began to assume their own positions in the Penta-elemental Undead Formation. They dispersed themselves from the top of the bald mountain. Except for water and earth elite zombies, all the elite zombies had taken out their respective attributal treasures. The energies of metal, wood, water, fire, and earth began to blend in ways that no others could understand.

    Suddenly, chill wind started blowing in the Penta-elemental Undead Formation, and cyclones of all colors took shape. Eerie, sinister, ruthless, cold ¨C all kinds of aura that could destroy a man¡¯s willpower began spreading from the formation. It was as though an ominous devil was inside, ready to wreck any creature that dared go forward and challenge its might.

    Remarkably, the undead creature that had barged his way in with seemingly unstoppable momentum suddenly halted in its tracks before entering the Penta-elemental Undead Formation. The puff of green smoke lingered outside the formation before letting out another one of its deafening roars, causing the skeletal kings and bone dragons to freeze. They dared not take another step forward.

    That green lump of smoke stood and waited outside the Penta-elemental Undead Formation. Its loud roars turned into orders to prevent its subordinates from attacking. It seemed to have sensed great hazard in the viciousness and ruthlessness concealed within the Penta-elemental Undead Formation.

    Still, Han Shuo and Little Skeleton were on the losing side. Theyers uponyers of defensive energies deployed by the consciousness had beenpletely shattered in the invasion of that sinister energy. They could no longer put up any effective defenses.

    Just as a feeling of dispiritment rose in Han Shuo¡¯s mind, enormous soul energy erupted from the green smoke. In an instant, it joined the fierce battle between Han Shuo and Little Skeleton, and the sinister soul energy of the Purple Demon Eye.

    This soul of basegod strength also had simrly wild ambition. Upon joining the battle, it was immediatelyunching attacks against Little Skeleton¡¯s soul. It seemed determined to possess Little Skeleton¡¯s soul. Although they both cultivated in the elemental energy of death, he was far superior to Little Skeleton in utilizing the soul.

    When the new soul energy appeared, Little Skeleton¡¯s soul, which had been sheltered by Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness all the while, suddenly felt an unbearable pressure. It was like candlelight in the wild wind that could extinguish at any moment...

    Han Shuo felt fear that he had never experienced before. He was terrified for Little Skeleton¡¯s soul, but couldn¡¯t do anything more. Han Shuo was on the verge of choking up blood.

    Suddenly, a window of opportunity opened in the seemingly dead-end situation. The Purple Demon Eye immediately diverted a portion of its overbearing energy away from Han Shuo and directed it towards the soul that had just made its entrance. The soul energy that came from the Purple Demon Eye was the strongest of the four. It ferried an intense attribute of looting, and gave the impression that it wanted to scoop up the whole lot of Little Skeleton, Han Shuo, and the soul which came after.

    After the soul energy suffocating him was cut in half, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was instantly less restricted. He hastily re-deployed the devastated defensive formations within the battlefield of souls. The neer, who joined the battle topletely absorb Little Skeleton¡¯s soul, turned its focus to withstand the soul energy from the Purple Demon Eye instead.

    For a moment, Han Shuo, Little Skeleton and that neer were passive defenders. However, with that new participant, the pressure on Han Shuo suddenly loosened a great deal. Although the battle was far from on his favor, he wasn¡¯t being crushed as rapidly as he had been just a moment ago.

    However, if this trend continued, the three of them would not stand a chance and their souls would bepletely erased in the end. They would forever be puppets to the soul of the Purple Demon Eye.

    At this moment, an absurd yetpletely bodacious idea crossed Han Shuo¡¯s mind. Han Shuo only hesitated for a short moment before executing the n right away.

    With some of the leftover energy in him, taking the risk of having his consciousness annihted in this truly life-threatening situation, Han Shuo performed the soul-shuttling procedure.

    Suddenly, something spectacr happened. After Han Shuo triggered the soul-shuttling mechanism, the four souls that were tangled together fell into a space-time tunnel that delivered them all towards the distant Abyss realm.

    Once they entered the space-time tunnel, the other three souls, including Little Skeleton¡¯s, weakened to their lowest levels. Only Han Shuo, as the caster of the spell and the master of the skeletal staff, was not affected by that space-time tunnel, and the power of his consciousness did not dwindle by the slightest.

    Han Shuo had nned well in advance for the sequence of actions to be performed within the fleeting period of a few seconds. First, he bombarded the weaker soul that cameter by simultaneously attacking using his consciousness and mental strength, and thumped it in an instant. After a short while, Han Shuounched a second attack. He gathered all his strength and bombarded with unbroken session at that sinister soul of the Purple Demon Eye, which had turned extremely weak inside the spacetime tunnel.

    At that same instant, the soul from the Purple Demon Eye was also giving its all. Its energy collided with Han Shuo¡¯s, causing a terrifying rumble to erupt from the three souls. Han Shuo felt as though his head had been smacked with a huge hammer. Blood started flowing from each of his seven apertures!

    Han Shuo¡¯s body was violently trembling. He felt an intense, splitting headache. It was as though thousands of tiny des were whirling inside his brain. The pain was unbearable.

    That sinister soul energy from the Purple Demon Eye had not in fact been eliminated, and had survived with its tenacity. Although it had be much weaker than before, it was still as ineffably fierce. It carried on upying Han Shuo¡¯s soul with utter persistence.

    Suddenly, a presence of boundless resentment, destruction, and massacre exploded from the Demonyer Edge that had been hibernating inside Han Shuo¡¯s body. This main soul of the Demonyer Edge, which possessed the umted negative energies of thousands upon thousands of souls, finallypleted its fusion with the Origin Crystal of Destruction at this most critical moment and came to the rescue.

    The main soul of the Demonyer Edge joined forces with Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness and ferociously attacked back at the soul that came from the Purple Demon Eye.

    Rumbles... It was as though a nuclear explosion had set off inside Han Shuo¡¯s brain. Seven arrows of blood spurted out from his seven apertures that had been bleeding like waterfalls. Han Shuo¡¯s magnificent body copsed to the ground, not a sign of life in sight. Forever had passed when he felt the rumble still reverberating inside his aching brain. For a moment, he even thought that he was dead.

    After a while, Han Shuo gradually sobered up. Suddenly, chains of disordered memories filled every corner of Han Shuo¡¯s jumbled up mind. He stared ahead with nothingness in his eyes and started mumbling, ¡°Who am I? I¡¯m Datara. I¡¯m Han Shuo. I¡¯m Lich Haley...¡±

    All sorts of memories suddenly shed through his head at once. Han Shuo seemed convinced he was three different people, with three different sets of memories in his brain. As he mindlessly mumbled to himself, his brain rapidly reorganized the chaos that was his memories.

    Han Shuo remained still in this state of empty mumbling for ages. Suddenly, after an undetermined but long amount of time had passed, Han Shuo began tough in the same vein as a cartoon hyena,pletely disregarding the stream of blood overflowing from his mouth. With the skeletal staff in his left hand and the Demonyer Edge in his right, he eximed, ¡°Lowgod Datara and basegod of death Lich Haley... Haha, all traces of their souls were wiped clean, and their empty vessels upied by my memories. Wakaka... The heavens favor me, the heavens favor me! ¡±

    As Han Shuo cackled, the skeletal staff and the Demonyer Edge in his hands began to transform. They melted into a liquefied state and rose again to form two humanoid figures. After a while, the skeletal staff and Demonyer Edge had turned into two carbon copies of Han Shuo¡¯s.

    Han Shuo pointed at the then-skeletal staff andughed maniacally, ¡°Basegod of death... is me!¡± Then his finger turned to point at his other weapon, and cried, ¡°Lowgod of destruction... is me as well!¡±

    ¡°Haha! All me! After separate demon, they are all me! This is what they call ¡®three souls in one¡¯ in demonic arts. Something that requires extreme luck toe by! They are all avatars of myself! Ahahahahah...¡±

 Chapter 534: Giant Leap in Strength

    GDK 534: Giant Leap in Strength

    Han Shuo racked his brain, yet he couldn¡¯t understand what had really happened during the short few seconds of soul shuttling that caused such a phenomenon. It was all so strange, but it also made him incredibly happy!

    Lowgod Datara and basegod of death Haley, everyst trace of their wicked souls had been banished to obscurity and reced with Han Shuo¡¯s memory and awareness.

    Simply put, lowgod Datara and basegod of death Haley may have just as well never existed at all. Their souls had been upied by Han Shuo¡¯s separate demons, and be attached to the Demonyer Edge and the skeletal staff in a way that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t yet understand, granting Han Shuo total control over the three souls, forming the so-called ¡®avatars¡¯ in demonic arts.

    Datara became a lowgod by cultivating in the energy of looting. However, as the energy of looting wasn¡¯t as widespread as the eight elemental energies and four edictal forces were among the material nes, after cultivating to the heights of lowgod, Datara progressed very slowly. He couldn¡¯t advance further even after tens of thousands of years had passed.

    Datara, this lowgod whose very nature it was to plunder, also participated in the great battle five thousand years ago on Profound Continent. However, he did not stand on either side of the battle but like a sneaky thief, he waited for opportunities for himself to plunder. In the end, his divine body was destroyed by a Druidic Order¡¯s midgod cultivating in the edict of life, sealing his soul in the Purple Demon Eye formed of what remained of his divine body.

    It was rarely heard of for a god cultivating in the edictal force of life tomit such acts as destroying a person¡¯s body and soul unless forced to thest resort. In spite of the fact that Datara did not mix well with those evil gods of death and destruction, he managed to escape death, and was only sealed and imprisoned. It was even returned to the forest trolls.

    Datara was a god after all. Although he was sealed by the eye-patch, he still wielded divine energy. During the endless days of five thousand years, the forest trolls remained faithful to their Datara. Hence, Datara still gained divine energy from the constant stream of faith that those forest trolls offered to him.

    Not a moment went by that Datara had not thought about breaking free from the seal. Back then, when Little Skeleton inadvertently removed the eye-patch, dug out the Purple Demon Eye and ced it in his empty eye socket, Datara was overjoyed and immediately attempted to upy Han Shuo and Little Skeleton¡¯s souls.

    When Little Skeleton and Han Shuo could no longer bear the pain, Han Shuo reminded Little Skeleton to put on the eye-patch that had kept Datara under. The eye-patch detected Datara¡¯s plundering nature, and released energy left behind by that midgod of life, immediately causing heavy injuries to Datara.

    Having suffered severely, Datara remained well-behaved for a long time. Gradually, as all the energy was released and exhausted, the eye-patch finally lost the ability to contain him. Having been injured once, Datara did not act impulsively for the fear that he might suffer yet another blowback. He silently waited for an appropriate opportunity to strike.

    The asion when Han Shuo utilized his consciousness to transfer memories to Little Skeleton was just the opportunity that this cunning Datara had patiently waited for all that time. He suddenly made his assault at the critical moment when both Han Shuo and Little Skeleton¡¯s souls were connected, intending to possess the two of them at once in a spurt of energy.

    Had it not been for the arrival of basegod of death Haley, Datara, who managed to remain concealed for so long, could have actually been sessful in taking over both the souls of Han Shuo and Little Skeleton.

    What a pity, he seemed to be an unlucky one. In the end, he had only benefited Han Shuo. The main soul of the Demonyer Edge and Han Shuo hadpletely wiped away his soul imprint. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness then formed a ¡®separate demon¡¯ with theplete set of Han Shuo¡¯s memories and took over his soul, fusing to be one with the main soul inside Demonyer Edge. The Demonyer Edge turned into the body of Han Shuo¡¯s avatar.

    Datara gained nothing. Worse still, he had lost everything he had. His memories, divine energy, soul, all was taken over by Han Shuo. The Demonyer Edge, forged and refined using demonic arts and an exceptional murder weapon that had fused with the element of destruction, most bizarrely, was now a lowgod of destruction!

    As for Haley, he cultivated from the soul of a necromancer. It was only after going through long, endless years of cultivation that Haley managed to be a basegod of death. The Nethervalley where he upied housed a massive gravestone of unknown origin. That gravestone had the function of gathering the element of death. After he discovered the wonderful ability of the gravestone, as he couldn¡¯t move it out from the Nethervalley, he stayed in there to speed up his cultivation and gathering of the element of death.

    Han Shuo obtained a ton of useful information from Haley¡¯s memories. As Haley was necromancer in the basegod realm, his knowledge of the element of death far exceeded that of Han Shuo¡¯s. After gaining Haley¡¯s memories, the Boundary of Aging that Han Shuo had been unable to deploy as well as some trouble he met in necromancy were suddenly so clear to him.

    This was the second time that had Han Shuo absorbed the soul of a necromancer. Thest time, that rendon directly made Han Shuo a grand magus while allowing him to understand things he previously couldn¡¯t. This basegod of death known as Haley had knowledge and understanding of necromancy far above the level of rendon¡¯s. Many of the cryptic, difficult to understand necromancy topics were in to Han Shuo in an instant.

    Inside the spacetime tunnel, Han Shuo had somehow managed to erase Haley¡¯s soul imprint, with his consciousness¡¯ separate demon forcibly upying Haley¡¯s thoughts and memories. With Haley¡¯s original soul and the skeletal staff for a body, it formed an avatar of Han Shuo with the strength of a basegod.

    Simultaneously, the secrets contained in the other two skulls of the skeletal staff hadpletely fused with Han Shuo¡¯s secondary soul. One of the skulls contained bits of knowledge and understanding of necromancy, while the other skull detailed the floor n of the Cemetery of Death and how to utilize all the secrets of the facility, including how to perform inter-nar transmission with the skeletal staff...

    The original owner of the skeletal staff was a midgod of death. The knowledge and understanding of necromancy that he had left behind was absolutely suitable for the cultivation of Han Shuo¡¯s death basegod avatar that inherited all memories and experiences of Haley. It couldn¡¯t have turned out any better.

    The only thing that was somewhat regrettable was that the Cemetery of Death wasn¡¯t created by the original owner of the skeletal staff. He only knew how to operate it, but couldn¡¯t rebuild one by himself.

    The Cemetery of Death was manufactured by the overgod of death. It was handed down to his subordinates as an instrument, allowing lesser gods under hismand to travel between different nes, spreading death and destruction to every corner of the universe, while recruiting more believers for the overgod, giving him greater and greater divine energy.

    As long as he could find another internar transportation array, or perhaps another Cemetery of Death, given the memories he currently obtained from the skeletal staff, he could, without a doubt, perform an internar teleportation. Although there was still quite some distance to go before he could return home, it would be a breeze once he found an internar transportation matrix.

    ¡°Father... Father...¡±

    Little Skeleton¡¯s thoughts entered into his mind. Han Shuo stared nkly beforeing to his senses soon after. He hastily and worriedly asked, ¡°Are you alright?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m fine, it¡¯s just that my soul is separated from my body,¡± Little Skeleton replied. After a short pause, Little Skeleton suddenly asked in an extremely puzzled tone, ¡°Father, why is it that my senses tell me you have three split personalities? What, what is going on? The other two energies, where, where did they go?¡±

    During the soul transfer, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness had only aimed at Datara and Haley. Little Skeleton did not participate in that gravely dangerous battle between souls after entering the spacetime tunnel. Once he emerged from the tunnel, Little Skeleton¡¯s soul had restored to normal, although he was slightly jolted by the aftershock generated from the final attack against Datara.

    ¡°Haha, there weren¡¯t three people, it was just me alone,¡± Han Shuo was greatly delighted. Without any further exnation, he continued, ¡°Come, let¡¯s return to theherworld and put your soul back in ce.

    This time, Han Shuo did not move a muscle in his main body, but he had the avatar fused with Haley¡¯s soul and the skeletal staff to perform the task. After a bright sh of light, his soul traversed across spacetime and descended upon theherworld. The big bony hand of the skeletal body he previously congealed still sat atop Little Skeleton¡¯s skull. However, without souls within, the two skeletons appeared rather strange.

    Once Han Shuo and Little Skeleton¡¯s souls fell inside, the two skeletal bodies regained their vitality. The Purple Demon Eye in the left eye socket of Little Skeleton hadpletely shattered. Speckles of purple starlight absorbed into the jade-like bones of Little Skeleton¡¯s.

    This soul of Han Shuo¡¯s was in the realm of basegod and had a tight affinity with the element of death. At a single thought, the element of death would gather, and release its might through all kinds of wonderful magic at Han Shuo¡¯s.

    Although this soul had all the memories, awareness, and ability to remember just like the consciousness of the main body, this soul was not the consciousness. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t transfer his own memories using this death basegod soul of his. The process of memory transfer could only be achieved using the consciousness refined using demonic arts.

    Han Shuo did not rush to anything. Using that skeletal body he congealed with the element of death, he cast his gaze at the army of undead that charged along with Haley.

    No changes took ce there either. Ahead of the Penta-elemental Undead Formation, the cloud of green smoke hovered still in the air. The three skeletal kings and two bone dragons behind it were silent and submissive as they waited for furthermands from their master.

    Han Shuo discarded the skeletal body he had congealed before turning into a shadow and entering the smoke. The green smoke lingering in the air gradually dissipated, revealing a rhombus-shaped green crystal.

    The crystal was precisely Haley¡¯s body. But after Han Shuo¡¯s soul fused with the skeletal staff, this piece of green crystal formed of the pure and highly concentrated element of death was no longer needed. It served now the same purpose as an Origin Crystal, the only difference being that the former was used to fuse with the body, while thetter was used to fuse with the soul. A being cultivating in the element of death could fuse their body with this green crystal to form a Body of Death Element.

    While Han Shuo had no need for it, he figured Fanny the necromancer would. As long as Han Shuo came to fully understand the method of cultivating the physical body in the Abyss realm, he would be able to assist Fanny in forming a Body of Element using the green crystal that was a Body of Element itself once he finally returned to Profound Continent.

    Using the soul that had upied the basegod soul of Haley¡¯s, Han Shuo entered the green crystal and emitted Haley¡¯s aura. The three skeletal kings and two bone dragons, as well as other high-level undead creatures, immediately kowtowed on the ground, and dared not twitch a muscle.

    In this moment, Han Shuo was Haley. Those undead creatures naturally grew silent in his formidable presence. Han Shuo pointed straight at Little Skeleton in the distance andmanded, ¡°From this day forth, you shall concede to this creature in addition to myself!¡±

    Those high-level undead creatures were intelligent lifeforms. When they heard Han Shuo¡¯s words, they revealed thoughts of confusion. However, the division of sses was deeply rooted among creatures of theherworld. Even though they were puzzled and doubtful at heart, they dared not to disobey Han Shuo¡¯smand. As they crept on the ground, the respectfully replied, ¡°Yes, master!¡±

    ¡°There is a rather peculiar gravestone in Nethervalley. It has an intricate cryptic pattern engraved on it. Cultivate there in the future, you will improve a little faster. Also, spend some time and see if you canprehend anything from it,¡± Han Shuo looked at Little Skeleton and transmitted in an amiable tone.

    ¡°Got it, father! Congrattions father! I now understand so much more. A remarkable transformation has befallen you. I know that father has be even mightier now!¡± said Little Skeleton.

    He¡¯s indeed the most intelligent of them, Han Shuo thought to himself. He replied, ¡°Alright, I need to leave for a while. Soon, when I have the time, I will transfer my memories of necromancy to you using my main body.¡±

    Shortly after, Han Shuo handed Haley¡¯s green crystal to earth elite zombie and did a soul transfer back to the Abyss realm. Afterwards, he summoned earth elite zombie, collected the green crystal, and sent the naive and simple-minded earth elite zombie back.

    Although Han Shuo¡¯s soul could freely travel back and forth between the two nes, he couldn¡¯t carry any material object with him. Therefore, he used earth elite zombie as the delivery man.

    Han Shuo still couldn¡¯t quite skillfully use two avatars of his that were just formed. Before hepletely understood the secrets of his avatars, he would not separate the three souls from each other, lest there be any irreversible ident.

    ¡°Oh dang... almost forgot about that meeting Brakyah mentioned. I don¡¯t even know how much time has passed. Hmm, I should go up and take a took.¡± The skeletal staff and the Demonyer Edge turned into two streaks of light and simultaneously disappeared into Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    Given that Han Shuo¡¯s strength had sharply increased at least ten fold, he no longer needed to pay any extra caution to Crosius. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t at all worried that he might bete to the meeting. Those who possessed greater strength could absolutely make others wait. Such is the rule of the Abyss realm!

 Chapter 535: A Rule Specially for You

    GDK 535: A Rule Specially for You

    ¡°Han Shuo, where have you been? Lord Crosius has dispatched messengers to hasten you, asking for your presence at the War Demon Grand Hall to discuss important matters.¡± Hemanna was the first to see Han Shuo after he ascended from his secret underground chamber. She began to yell anxiously at his sight.

    Hemanna obviously revered Crosius. Within War Demon Valley, Crosius was basically an overlord with absolute authority. Hemanna was afraid that Crosius might hold Han Shuo ountable for his tardiness, hence her concerned reaction.

    The passing of time wasn¡¯t quite the same as it was in the Profound Continent. A day in the Abyss realm was the same as approximately half-a-month on Profound Continent. Given that the meeting was to take ce two days from the day he went underground, Han Shuo figured that he must have stayed in his secret chamber for around a month.

    ¡°It¡¯s no big deal. I¡¯ll head over there right away,¡± Han Shuo said in an unruffled manner. After surveying the area with his consciousness, he smilingly asked, ¡°Where Sylph?¡±

    ¡°She is asking around to find out where you are. We tried looking for you but had absolutely no idea where you¡¯d gone, so we decided to have her asking all around outside while I wait for you here,¡± Hemanna replied.

    ¡°Hmm, I should have informed the two of you ahead of time. If I ever go missing again, don¡¯te looking for me. I will return eventually,¡± Han Shuo said somewhat embarrassedly. He then marched outside in big strides and said, ¡°Alright, let¡¯s go to that meeting then, see if it¡¯s ended.¡±

    ¡°The War Demon Grand Hall is the grandest building at the center there. I can show you the way, but I cannot apany you into the Grand Hall. I don¡¯t have the qualifications. I¡¯m deeply sorry!¡± Hemanna said apologetically as he followed behind Han Shuo towards the War Demon Grand Hall.

    The division of sses in the Abyss realm was every bit as strict and rigid as it was in theherworld. They weren¡¯t allowed to simply interact with characters of greater strength. Hemanna and Sylph only possessed strength the level of Destroyer, and were not qualified to participate in the meeting at War Demon Grand Hall.

    Such were the rules of the Abyss realm. Han Shuo did not insist on it either. They headed towards the War Demon Grand Hall very rapidly.

    Along the way, Han Shuo inspected his body using the consciousness a a found that his main body had suffered some damage. Even the demonic infant was injured. However, after his consciousness went through the extremely treacherous battle, his willpower became even more tenacious. Compared to the slight injuries to his demonic infant, the benefit he gained was simply incalcble.

    At this moment, Han Shuo¡¯s main body practicing demonic arts only had the strength of demigods. Of his avatars, on the other hand, one was a basegod of death, while another was an even more formidable lowgod of destruction.

    After gaining two additional souls, Han Shuo was far stronger than ever. If he were to return to Profound Continent right then, Han Shuo reckoned that even the six-horned Soul Race tribal king and the Saintess of the Church of Light would face certain death when pit against him. They might not even have the ability to flee from his presence alive.

    On the whole of Profound Continent, perhaps only that Primordius Dragon with unfathomable strength could evenly match Han Shuo. There wasn¡¯t a moment that Han Shuo was not thinking about his bone-deep enmity with the Primordius Dragon.

    ¡°Oh, captain Nambrough, so it turns out that you are in charge of guarding the door. Han Shuo iste for the meeting. Is the meeting still going on?¡± Hemanna hastily asked after she saw the captain of the Shero Regiment, Nambrough, standing tall and upright in front of the entrance upon arriving at the grandest building.

    Nambrough still appeared very cordial when he met Han Shuo again. With rather anxious eyes, he replied to Hemanna, ¡°Lord Crosius had informed Mister Han Shuo about the meeting long ago. He even sent men to invite Han Shuo over again. Why have you two onlye now?¡±

    ¡°Captain Nambrough, it¡¯s true that my master is a littlete to the meeting. But can he still enter now?¡± Hemanna asked anxiously.

    ¡°I will take Mister Han Shuo inside. You wait for a while outside,¡± Nambrough replied to Hemanna before he turned to Han Shuo and said, ¡°Mister Han Shuo, please follow me.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded with a faint smile, not at all anxious or embarrassed like someone who waste should be. He followed behind Nambrough unruffled, and asked nonchntly, ¡°How long ago did the meeting start? Who participated in it? What were they discussing?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s been some time. The six Rakshas and a few honorable visiting advisors are in attendance. The main topic was how to deal with Venomfang Castle¡¯s impending attack.¡± As Han Shuo had rescued Nambrough¡¯s Shero Regiment thest time, naturally, Nambrough would show special care towards Han Shuo. After a short pause, he added, ¡°The forces of Venomfang Castle are approaching our War Demon Valley as we speak. More and more scouts of ours ced around the Valley are being eliminated. It won¡¯t be long before Venomfang Castle carries out a full-scale invasion against our valley. This time, with demon king Gnder¡¯s Shadow Warriors assisting Venomfang Castle, the future of our War Demon Valley is bleak!¡±

    Han Shuo furrowed his brows. ¡°Shadow Warriors? Are they really that formidable? That terrifying?¡±

    It was as though a formless pressure would envelop Nambrough whenever the Shadow Warriors were mentioned. He forced a smile and nodded before replying, ¡°The Shadow Warriors are the mightiest fighters under the control of demon king Gnder. Every Shadow Warrior possesses the strength of Demon. Moreover, the most powerful fighter among them was even stronger than Lord Crosius. The devastation that a Demon could cause isn¡¯t something that you could imagine.¡± He sighed, ¡°Unfortunately for us, the message sent to ck Jade City was too little, toote. I¡¯m afraid that we cannot hold on until the reinforcement army dispatched by Lord Manticole arrives.¡±

    As they conversed, the two rapidly climbed up a hundred or so flights of stairs. When they finally arrived at a huge stone door being watched by an excessive number of guards, Nambrough indicated to Han Shuo to wait outside for a moment while he walked in alone to inform of his arrival. Shortly thereafter, Nambrough made a quick gesture and Han Shuo walked into the meeting room casually.

    The hall was extremely spacious. There was an enormous, oval-shaped table at the center, with broad stony chairs surrounding it. Right ahead was Crosius, proudly sitting in the chairperson¡¯s seat, disying a magnificent, imposing, and dignified demeanor of a person upying high-position.

    The seat next to Crosius was upied by the head of the six Rakshas of War Demon Valley, Qunoa. In the five seats after him were demigod experts wearing the decoration of Raksha. That level-two Raksha that Han Shuo had taught a fierce lesson, Brakyah, was among the five.

    Next to the six Rakshas was seating for the visiting advisors. Han Shuo had never met these visiting advisors before. Who knew where in the world they came from. There were five visiting advisors in total. Of those, three possessed demigod strength, and the other two were slightly weaker. They must have been summoned here to aid the crisis.

    These five visiting advisors resided in a different ce than the area that Han Shuo resided in. They seemed to receive slightly higher treatment. From the way that Crosius looked at them, Han Shuo could tell that he attached great importance to these five visiting advisors.

    Once Han Shuo made an appearance, all the eyes in the hall turned and cast on him. Qunoa forced a smile at Han Shuo as a gesture of greeting. Even Brakyah nodded at Han Shuo with a faint smile. However, his eyes carried the overtone of taking joy in Han Shuo¡¯s misfortune, seemingly ready to watch Han Shuo be roasted.

    Other experts of the War Demon Valley that were meeting Han Shuo for the first time all revealed expressions of amazement and astonishment. Who knew what impressions they were making as they secretly observed Han Shuo.

    At a corner far away was Crosius¡¯ daughter, Jasper, standing straight atop her slender legs. She was writing on the b of documents she held in her hand. When she saw Han Shuo entering the hall, she snuck a few nces at him, indicating to him to be careful, before burying her head down and continuing to write.

    Han Shuo learned from Hemanna that Jasper had been acting as a recorder all the while. She would attend every meeting of great significance to War Demon Valley by using this role she yed. However, as the Abyss realm was a ce where the mighty were honored, although she was Crosius¡¯ daughter and had a reasonable excuse to stay in the meeting room, she could only record from a distance away, and was not even given a seat.

    To be fair, to have been standing in this room with an insufficient level of strength itself could already be considered as having taken a ride on her father¡¯s coattails. She simply did not have the qualifications to sit!

    Right ahead, Crosius was looking at Han Shuo with a somewhat cold expression. In a displeased tone, he said, ¡°I had asked Brakyah to inform you of the meeting ahead of time in addition to dispatching people to invite you before it started. Who knew Mister Han Shuo could so disdainful to only join us just as our meeting was to adjourn!¡±

    Han Shuo actually felt a slight trace of embarrassment. After all, Crosius truly had acted fairly and given adequate reminders. His tardinessbined with that arrogance disyed when he first met Crosius obviously had left Crosius with a totally dissatisfactory impression.

    The Abyss realm was a ce where the mighty were respected, including the rules they set. Despite the insolence Han Shuo disyed in their first ever encounter, Crosius could still make an exception and let him off. But this time, Crosius had notified Han Shuo ahead of time, twice, and yet Han Shuo waste in the end. From this perspective, Han Shuo was just intentionally breaking the rules. This wasn¡¯t something that Crosius could forgive.

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, as a visiting advisor to War Demon Valley, you should learn to y by our rules. Lord Crosius has treated you well. Screwing up at a critical moment isn¡¯t something that a visiting advisor should do. Oh right, I almost forgot to tell you, I¡¯m the chief of visiting advisors to War Demon Valley. In the future, you will answer to me. Understood?¡± said an alien with two faces and four arms to Han Shuo in a mystifying voice.

    It looked like a conjoined twin. It appeared from the front like a tall and sturdy man, while on the back of the head was the face of an enchanting woman, with all the characteristics of a female, including a pair of tall twin peaks. When it spoke, there were two voices, male and female, talking in unison, giving any listener inexplicable goosebumps and difort.

    It had the greatest strength among the visiting advisors. Its strength wouldn¡¯t pale inparison with the second-inmand of War Demon Valley, Qunoa. As it spoke, it would twist its body and neck to allow both the male and female faces on its head to look at Han Shuo. It was a beast.

    ¡°My apologies, I was just off the boat, and haven¡¯t quite adapted to the time in Abyss realm yet. I wasn¡¯t careful and identally forgotten the time during cultivation,¡± Han Shuo only looked at Crosius and exined as though it was no big deal. As he spoke, he walked towards the oval table as though he had not heard the words of the chief of visiting advisors.

    ¡°Fine. I will let this pass. You have just be a visiting advisor to War Demon Valley and might not be clear about the rules of my Valley. I will forget about it this time. But the next time this happens, I won¡¯t be so kind,¡± Crosius looked deeply at Han Shuo and let out a gentle groan. He did not hand any punishment to Han Shuo at this critical moment. But if it was in ordinary times, this master of War Demon Valley, who had gained his seat through bloodshed, definitely wouldn¡¯t be so forgiving and merciful.

    ¡°Thanks!¡± Han Shuo casually replied. As he walked to the table to get himself a seat, he looked at the seat of the meanest status and deeply creased his brows. Then, a thought seemed to have ran through his mind and he revealed a faint smile of satisfaction. He walked to the chief of visiting advisors that had male and female faces on the same head, and said, ¡°Hey cuntboy, get off my seat!¡±

    The few Rakshas and a few other visiting advisors that were softly discussing why Crosius¡¯ temper had taken a 180-degree turn this time stopped talking as soon as Han Shuo spoke. The grand hall suddenly heard pin-drop silence.

    ¡°What... what did you say?¡± the chief of visiting advisors were somewhat stunned. The male face facing Han Shuo revealed an expression of astonishment.

    ¡°You cuntboy, get off my seat. Do you not understand my words?¡± When he finished, Han Shuo¡¯s gently ced his left hand on the shoulder of this chief of visiting advisors. The aura of destruction that came from the Demonyer Edge instantly overflowed to his body. Every expert in the meeting hall immediately sensed a destructive, ruthless, and terrifying sinister energy.

    The soul within the Demonyer Edge possessed the strength of a lowgod. However, Han Shuo had not fully revealed his true strength. At first, he released the aura of a demigod and gradually raised the strength. When the aura released approached that of a basegod, the chief of visiting advisors could no longer bear the overwhelming pressure. It stood up shuddering. In a squeaky, quivering tone, as though he had been at fault, the creature said, ¡°It¡¯s, it¡¯s just a seat... no need to be so fierce with me... you scared me...¡±

    This time, only the female talked. The mouth on the male¡¯s face waspletely shut. However, the face of the male had the odd expression of a bashful, dainty, and delicate girl.

    The strangeness of this chief of visiting advisors gave Han Shuo a chill down his spine. He sat on the seat that he had just forcibly taken as he nkly looked at the bewitching woman on the back of that alien. Somehow, he was left betweenughter and tears.

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, from today onwards, you are allowed to bete to any meeting. This is a new rule of War Demon Valley, specially set for you!¡± Crosius said decisively as he looked at Han Shuo with a pleasantly surprised expression.

 Chapter 536: Preferential Treatment

    GDK 536: Preferential Treatment

    In the Abyss realm, might was always right. When Crosius sensed the basegod strength aura exhibited by Han Shuo, all feelings of annoyance at Han Shuo for his tardiness werepletely vacuumed away. His immediate expression of his stance had amply proven that Crosius¡¯ ce as master of War Demon Valley wasn¡¯t solely a result of his outstanding strength!

    The meeting hall remained in pin-drop silence even after Crosius uttered hisst words. Every gaze from the six Rakshas and five visiting advisors was potent with appall. Of those, the feeling of dispiritment from powerlessness was obvious from the eyes of Brakyah. He was silently sighing in disappointment when he thought that he might not even have the opportunity to exact his revenge on Han Shuo.

    Jasper the beauty, meanwhile, suddenly stopped her rapid scribbling and gazed at Han Shuo with glimmering eyes. She was pleasantly surprised.

    In the realm of the Abyss, as long as one harbored great strength, gaining anyone¡¯s respect was no task, not even an enemy¡¯s!

    Han Shuo had long clearly understood thisw of the Abyss realm, hence he decided to do a little experiment on that chief of visiting advisors. Who knew that there would be such a sudden change and world of difference in Crosius¡¯ attitude towards Han Shuo.

    With a calm, unruffled smile on his face, Han Shuo unhurriedly imed his spot on the seat of the chief of visiting advisors. Just as he was about to open his mouth for a few words, the hermaphrodite creature, who sat opposite Han Shuo with its female side eyeing Han Shuo bitterly, said in a tone as though having been wronged, ¡°Happy now? You can have the chief of visiting advisors¡¯ seat from me... Hehe, a powerful man like you is very attractive to me...¡±

    Goosebumps exploded on every inch of Han Shuo¡¯s skin likend mines. Before he could reply, he seemed to recall something and immediately stood to his feet.

    Crosius thought that Han Shuo was upset, and hastily asked, ¡°Mister Han Shuo, is there something about the War Demon Valley not up to your satisfaction? No worries, when the meeting is over, I will arrange an expansive and secluded space for your residence, in addition to providing you with beauties of all races. I can guarantee your total satisfaction.¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned but soon after, he replied, all smiles, ¡°In that case, many thanks to your Lordship,¡± He then lowered his head and looked at the chair that the hermaphrodite had previously upied, revealing a look of antipathy, and said, ¡°Erm, please rece this chair with another one.¡±

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, you, you are such an unlikeable person. Me hate you. Hmph...,¡± the two-faced being denounced Han Shuo in humiliation and anger.

    When Crosius saw the unsightly look on Han Shuo¡¯s face, finding it somewhatughable, he tried to hold back a cough before saying, ¡°Alright alright, Brayshaw, stop provoking Mister Han Shuo!¡±

    Brayshaw, the hermaphrodite, again revealed a bitter expression and resentfully looked at Han Shuo in silence. It was seemingly using its disgusting eyes to make reprisals for Han Shuo¡¯s threatening disy of might.

    ¡°Nambrough,e in and get Mister Han Shuo a new chair!¡± Nambrough ran into the hall as fast as he could and had reced the chair in no time. However, he became noticeably startled when he saw where Han Shuo was standing.

    Nambrough stared nkly for a moment before snapping out of it at Crosius¡¯ hastening nces. Afterwards, when he was respectfully retreating himself, Crosius suddenly said in a calm voice, ¡°Nambrough, I will no longer look into the matter about Shero regiment from three days ago.¡±

    Nambrough was stunned for a moment. Shortly after, he hastily turned around and kowtowed. With his head touching the ground, he said, ¡°Thank you Lord Crosius!¡±

    When he raised his head, he took a glimpse at Crosius before revealing a pair of grateful eyes towards Han Shuo. He then respectfully backed out from the meeting hall. He understood in his heart the reason that Crosius decided not to look into the incident, was certainly owing to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t quite clear about the rules in this War Demon Valley. Therefore, he found it rather strange when Nambrough looked at him so gratefully after he sat down. However, he did not dwell on it any further. When he was about to ask Crosius what they had been discussing, he again saw that disgusting gaze from that bitter Brayshaw sitting opposite. At once, Han Shuo shouted as he red at Brayshaw, ¡°Look at me like that one more time, and I will finish you right away!¡±

    Brayshaw was rmed, her ¡®lovable¡¯ expression suddenly changed, and her eyes immediately turned to Crosius. She no longer dared to look at Han Shuo for the fear that Han Shuo might suddenly attack and get rid of her right inside that meeting hall. Brayshaw had been in War Demon Valley for some time, and was very clear how much Crosius valued a mighty expert. An expert of Demon strength was definitely iparable to an expert in the realm of Raksha like herself.

    In the case where she was in conflict with Han Shuo, Crosius would not think twice to stand on Han Shuo¡¯s side and sacrifice Brayshaw. Such a strategic move couldn¡¯t be less trivial in the Abyss realm. If one wished to live a little longer, they were not to, by any means, provoke characters that they could not afford to provoke. This word to the wise was long well understood by Brayshaw.

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, I must say, I did not expect you to have concealed your true strength all this time. Hehe, had I known earlier that Mister Han Shuo was this powerful, I would have given you the very best treatment from the start!¡± Crosius openly acknowledged Han Shuo¡¯s snobbish behavior days prior. Then, looking at Brayshaw and co., he continued, ¡°You have all witnessed Mister Han Shuo¡¯s strength. I believe none of you will have any objection to his appointment to the position of chief of visiting advisors?¡±

    ¡°Absolutely not,¡± ¡°Agreed, agreed,¡± the few visiting advisors responded in unison. Even Brayshaw, the former chief of visiting advisors, coyly dered, ¡°Rules are rules. It is only natural that the strongest stand at the highest ce. I won¡¯t have any objection to that.¡±

    ¡°Very well then,¡± Crosius turned to gaze at Jasper standing far, far away, and instructed, ¡°Let the records show that from this day forth, Mister Han Shuo will be the chief of visiting advisors to War Demon Valley. He shall receive the best of all treatments. The seven hundred meter manor in the south will be allocated to Mister Han Shuo as his new residence. In addition, select one young and beautifuldy from each and every race in War Demon Valley, and send them to the manor. It is their honor to be given the opportunity to serve Mister Han Shuo.¡±

    ¡°Yes, father,¡± Jasper replied and sneaked a peek at Han Shuo before hastily lowering her head to carry on with her note-taking.

    ¡°This time, War Demon Valley has run into a major crisis. Experts from Venomfang Castle are on their way here as we speak. Some of our defensive measures in the surrounding territory have been removed by experts from Venomfang Castle. They might mobilize andunch the full attack on War Demon Valley perhaps just a few days from now. Not only is the size of the invading enemy was the greatest we will have ever encountered, they even have at least two Shadow Warriors participating. That¡¯s what I¡¯m most concerned about. Strength in the ss of Demons. On top of the master of Venomfang Castle, Yeki, there would be at least three demons. That won¡¯t be easy for our War Demon Valley to deal with...¡±

    Crosius exined the situation once through for Han Shuo. He revealed a rather awkward amiable smile, and said, ¡°Luckily, we now have Mister Han Shuo on our side. With Mister Han Shuo here, our odds have now increased. As long as we can hold it until the reinforcement army arrives, our War Demon Valley will then be able to teach Venomfang Castle a good lesson.¡±

    ¡°Lord Crosius, which level of Demon is Yeki? And the other two known Shadow Warriors, what level of Demon are they?¡± Han Shuo asked with slightly bunched brows.

    ¡°Yeki¡¯s is the same as mine, we are both level-one Demons. As for the two Shadow Warriors, their strengths are undetermined,¡± Crosius replied.

    As he nodded his head, Han Shuo thought to himself that given his current strength, merely with the destruction lowgod avatar of his, he would be able to keep all three demons under control. The crisis didn¡¯t seem particrly difficult to manage.

    ¡°These are just the known forces of Venomfang Castle. As for whether they might employ additional fighters, we have no clue. Besides, after news of the explosion of the internar portal became widespread, some other experts from smaller forces had secretly crossed over. Some of them were from the other three demon kings, and some were experts with small influence. They left no clue as to what their intentions were and if they would participate in the battle,¡± Crosius said with a deep voice as he recalled those unknown and possible threats.

    ¡°I see...¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment before suddenly putting on a straight face and saying to Crosius, ¡°I know a magical matrix. As long as it is deployed outside War Demon Valley, it will surely cause enormous casualties to the enemy. However, this formation requires plenty of unique materials. I don¡¯t know if War Demon Valley can gather them.¡±

    Han Shuo was especially allured by a certain material unique to the Abyss realm. However, as he possessed not a dime of this world¡¯s currency, it was none too feasible for him to obtain great quantities of those materials. However, with such a reason, he could easily justify harvesting arge amount of those substances.

    ¡°Magical matrix? What is a magical matrix?¡± Crosius didn¡¯t understand the term that Han Shuo had referred.

    ¡°Erm, just like this,¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t quite know how to put in it words, and so he casually pulled out a few magic crystal ores and arranged a hexagram necromancy matrix on the floor. Under the effects of Han Shuo¡¯s mental strength, the intense aura of death in the surroundings gathered towards the center of the star. Finally, with one thought, the magic crystal ores all exploded. The aura of death that had umted in the center instantly erupted with multiple folds in magnitude, rays of death soaring across the room.

    After absorbing the memories of Haley the basegod, Han Shuo knew how to deploy some necromancy magic formations. The one he was demonstrating was just the most basic radiance of death. He utilized a few magic crystal ores to condense the element of death by several folds in a split second, causing them to explode to release intense death rays.

    Han Shuo had deliberately arranged it so that none of the experts in the grand hall would be injured. Those stones that made up the hall were as hard as steel, but by the end of it, were left with holes big and small after the sh of light.

    As the dumbstruck Crosius continued to stare at Han Shuo, he put on a smile and said, ¡°This is just a more basic magical matrix. With sufficient materials, of the finest quality of course, its power can be further optimized to deal hundreds or thousands of times more damage!¡±

    Crosius had shock written all over his face. He was in a daze as he looked at the holes all over the grand hall. After a long while, he suddenly turned to Jasper and solemnly instructed, ¡°Take Mister Han Shuo to the weaponry material warehouse. Let Mister Han Shuo select and gather any goods or material he requires. If it is insufficient, I shall find a way to get more!¡±

 Chapter 537: Canâ€™t Help Myself

    GDK 537: Can¡¯t Help Myself

    Throughout their walk towards the warehouse of War Demon Valley, Jasper¡¯s dazzling eyes lingered on Han Shuo¡¯s body. She asked Han Shuo with the utmost interest, ¡°Mister Han Shuo, have you reallye from outside of our Abyss realm?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded with chagrin and helplessly replied, ¡°You have asked that same question three times already. I am not of this realm. What more must I say to make you believe me?¡±

    ¡°I believe you!¡± Jasper said as she smiled and quickly continued, ¡°I¡¯m just curious. Hehe, never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined that there are other material nes out there. It¡¯s truly remarkable to think that you havee from another ne!¡±

    ¡°Oh, right, have you been meditating during these past few days using the method I taught you?¡± Han Shuo was afraid that Jasper would ask the same question again, and so he tried to change the topic.

    ¡°Of course! I have been meditating this whole time. And yet, I have not been able to sense the presence of mental strength,¡± Jasper replied with knitted brows on her beautiful face, appearing rather vexed.

    ¡°It¡¯s okay, this is not to be rushed. As long as you keep meditating, with the wind element in your body as the fundamental, you will definitely be able to sense it sooner orter,¡± Han Shuo consoled her. After thinking for a short while, from his space ring, he withdrew a delicate silver chain that had a green crystal the size of palm strung on it, and handed it to Jasper.

    The green crystal was dug out from the staff of a wind magus that Han Shuo had previously murdered. The green crystal had the ability to store the wind element and amplify wind magic spells. An average magus who used the green crystal during their cultivation would be able to sense wind elemental energy quicker.

    The chain made from mithril sparkled glorious and silver,plementing the glimmer and translucence of the green crystal that was emitting faint light. Even without all the advantages it had for a wind magus, it would still be a fine piece of jewelry.

    In the same fashion that Hemanna and Sylph had reacted, when Han Shuo revealed the jewel, Jasper¡¯s eyes sprung wide open and glowed as her gaze fixed onto the green crystal ne. In a pleasantly surprised manner, she said, ¡°What a beautiful ne! Is this for me?¡±

    ¡°Take it. Put it on when you meditate. Perhaps it will let you sense the presence of mental strength even quicker,¡± Han Shuo said dully as he generously handed the ne to Jasper. He wouldn¡¯t at all mourn parting with a magic crystal of such grade.

    ¡°Thank you! Thank you Mister Han Shuo! You truly are remarkable! Cute too!¡± Jasper was delighted as she gently and carefully received the crystal ne from Han Shuo. Then, out of nowhere, she tipped her toes and leaned into Han Shuo. Her fragrant, cherry-red lips met with Han Shuo¡¯s left cheek for a brief moment.

    The fresh and sweet fragrance immediately entered Han Shuo¡¯s nose. The sensation of her soft, moist lips traveled from his face into his heart. He touched where Jasper kissed him with his left hand, and subconsciously put it over his nose. He whispered to himself, ¡°You smell gorgeous...¡±

    Jasper¡¯s charming face was still radiating the luster of joy and excitement. She wasn¡¯t bashful about her actions at all. She admiringly fondled the magic crystal ne in her hand, and did not seem bothered one bit by what she had just done.

    Crude thoughts began to flood Han Shuo¡¯s mind as his eyes traced Jasper¡¯s body...

    Her tender white skin, slender, willowy body, the pair of swan-like wings as white as snow...

    Whichever angle he looked, Jasper was breathtaking. Especially those wings; they made Han Shuo¡¯s intense desire to possess her burn even more vigorously.

    At this moment, the two were walking towards a rather uninhabited region of the valley. Not a living soul wished to call that ce home as it wasn¡¯t too far from the War Demon Valley warehouse, a heavily guarded ce. Only a rare few strangely-shaped nts and tall rocks arranged in a disordered manner filled thend.

    Smelling the faint fragrance that still remained on his fingertips and gazing at Jasper right ahead with angelic beauty, an unrestrainable desire rose from Han Shuo¡¯s heart. Conforming to the cultivation philosophy of doing as the heart wished, Han Shuo did not restrain from taking action almost as soon as the thought arose. He suddenly stretched his big hand forward and ced it on Jasper¡¯s wings.

    Jasper, who was admiring that green crystal, immediately felt a big hand was caressing her wing. For people of her kind, the wings were one of the most sensitive areas of the body. When Han Shuo suddenly stroked them like that, her body went limp and numb. Looking at Han Shuo with astonishment in her eyes and blushing cheeks, she somewhat timidly said, ¡°Mister Han Shuo, what are you... oh...¡±

    Before Jasper could finish the sentence, Han Shuo lost his patience and turned from stroking her soft wings to pulling Jasper into his embrace. One of his hands was fondling Jasper¡¯s snow-white wings while the othernded on her straight and slender leg, unrestrainedly assaulting the most beautiful woman in War Demon Valley.

    ¡°Oh... Mister Han Shuo, don¡¯t do this, don¡¯t...¡± Jasper began to grow anxious, her face flushing not only from the sensation, but also out of shyness. Although she had some feelings for Han Shuo, she had never before experienced such a thing. Above all, in such an area where someone might pass by at any moment, she instinctively resisted Han Shuo¡¯s sudden vition.

    ¡°What¡¯s that noise? Who¡¯s there? Identify yourself!¡± Jasper¡¯s squealing in her struggle had alerted the War Demon Guards stationed at the depot not far away. A dozen War Demon Guards began to march their way.

    As the timing wasn¡¯t right, that lustful desire of Han Shuo¡¯s slowly receded upon hearing the guard. He knew that if he were to forcibly possess Jasper at this moment, he would, in fact, be untrue to the realm state. He awkwardly withdrew his hands, put on a somewhat embarrassed face, and let out a light dry cough. He forced a smile and said, ¡°This... erm... Miss Jasper is too beautiful... I wasn¡¯t able to restrain myself...¡±

    Jasper¡¯s tender, white cheeks turnedpletely red. She looked at the embarrassed Han Shuo with her watery eyes and said in an ashamed but delighted tone, ¡°You, how could you be so lewd?¡±

    ¡°Because you are too beautiful! It¡¯s true! Erm, you gave me a kiss just now, and so I thought you were...¡± Han Shuo exined embarrassedly as he scratched his head. He had yet to cultivate the thickness of his face to the legendary realm of invulnerability.

    ¡°Hehe!¡± When Jasper recalled Han Shuo¡¯s domineering performance at War Demon Grand Hall along with his unstoppable momentum when he fought Brakyah, and saw his embarrassed face at this moment, she simply couldn¡¯t help herself but to giggle. She bit her lips in restraining herughter and softly scolded, ¡°Lies! You scoundrel!¡±

    ¡°Oh, it¡¯s Miss Jasper. What¡¯s the matter? Is this man taking advantage of you?¡± A towering man mounted on a flying abyssal creature simr to a giant eagle shouted from afar. He seemed to be of the same race as Crosius and Hemanna.

    Behind him were a dozen or so War Demon Guards with the same strength as himself. Each one rode on a simr eagle-like abyssal creature as well, and each watched Han Shuo with unkind eyes, as, if Jasper were to say so, they would immediately charge over to shred Han Shuo into pieces.

    ¡°Even if he was taking advantage of me, it would be none of your business. Besides, do you think you have the strength to avenge me when even Brakyah and Brayshaw couldn¡¯t handle him?¡± Jasper said indifferently.

    The dozen or so War Demon Guards were no fools. Upon hearing Jasper¡¯s words, they immediately realized Han Shuo¡¯s identity. They dared not try to be brave and offend him. The leader of the group revealed a rather awkward smile and said, ¡°So it turns out to be Mister Han Shuo. Miss Jasper, why have youe here with Mister Han Shuo? Is there anything we can help you with?¡±

    ¡°This is the authorization token my father issued. I brought Mister Han Shuo here to browse through the materials inside the depot. My father hasmanded that Mister Han Shuo be allowed to take anything he desires from the depot. You people just have to stand guard outside the depot. Matters inside are none of your concern.¡± Jasper held up a piece of token and flipped it before the dozen or so people, then proceeding to escort Han Shuo into the depot.

    When the War Demon Guards saw Jasper raise the token, their mannerisms became respectful and every muscle in their bodies froze. It was not until both Han Shuo and Jasper had left and entered the depot that the group leader let out a sigh of relief and said, ¡°That is in fact an authorization token of the highest level from Lord Crosius. What¡¯s the background of this Han Shuo? He has actually been permitted to take anything he wanted from the depot. Truly inconceivable,¡±

    ¡±Whatever. I reckon that Miss Jasper had most likely fallen for him. Perhaps Lord Crosius has the mind to marry Miss Jasper off to him and therefore handed the token to Miss Jasper. This fellow is really lucky. He managed to deflower both Hemanna and Sylph as soon as he arrived in War Demon Valley. And now he managed to take Miss Jasper. What a lucky guy...¡± another person said with ire.

    ¡°As a person who could defeat Lord Brakyah, there¡¯s nothing unexpected for him to receive the best treatment from Lord Crosius. From the youngdy¡¯s words, it appears that even the monster, the chief of visiting advisors, was defeated by him. If his Lordship doesn¡¯t provide some truly good stuff, how would he be able to make this mighty expert stay?

    While the War Demon Guards gossiped behind Han Shuo and Jasper, the duo came to a small ravine. After that assault on Jasper, the atmosphere between Han Shuo and Jasper became much more intimate. Although neither of them said a word, when Jasper turned back to take a look at Han Shuo, her beautiful eyes would fade through different hues that would almost certainly provoke Han Shuo to repeat his crime.

    ¡°We have arrived!¡± Jasper said as her footsteps came to a halt, with her eyes gazing at the humongous metal door before her.

    Han Shuo was about to open his mouth when suddenly, that soul attached to the skeletal staff stored inside his body sensed a very familiar auraing from a chamber behind the door. Han Shuo¡¯s heart jolted. He impatiently shouted, ¡°Open the door! Quickly!¡±

 Chapter 538: Harvesting

    GDK 538: Harvesting

    It was a feeling that could not be exined with words. As Han Shuo stood before the door, his death basegod soul attached to the skeletal staff had definitely sensed an unsettlingly familiar auraing from an item inside. It felt almost unreal.

    From the pressing tone of Han Shuo¡¯s words, Jasper could tell that he was very excited. Although she was somewhat puzzled, she did not say a word before proceeding to the stone door with the authorization token Crosius ced in her hand. When she inserted the token into one of the grooves, the stone door started to rise slowly.

    A wide, well-lit tunnel was revealed. There were lighted torches ced on the wall made of stone. There were four chambers connected to the tunnel, and two on each side of the tunnel. At Jasper¡¯s indication, Han Shuo walked into the tunnel with her. She pointed at the stone chambers and exined, ¡°This is War Demon Valley¡¯s weaponry depot. There are also some unique and rare materials stored in here. You may have anything you wish.¡±

    From the moment he entered the tunnel, Han Shuo only had eyes for one of the stone chambers. He rushed straight in as Jasper talked.

    A round of nking reverberated through the tunnel as Han Shuo rummaged through a bunch of curiously-shaped weapons. From a notch in the dust-coated stone wall, he dug out a bone tablet. The tablet wasn¡¯t big, shaped like a brick, and it wasn¡¯t obvious which creature¡¯s bone it was created from. On the front side of the tablet was the pattern of a skull, while the back side was a Canopy of Necromancy magical matrix, emanating faint element of death.

    Havingpletely unlocked all the secrets inside the skeletal staff, Han Shuo recognized that this bone tablet was the key to opening and operating a Cemetery of Death. The original owner of the skeletal staff had once received a bone tablet simr to the one Han Shuo was holding. It was given to him along with the Cemetery of Death. Later on in his career he had managed to memorize the imprint inside his bone tablet and transferred the imprint onto his own weapon ¨C the skeletal staff. This had effectively rendered the bone tablet useless.

    The fact that Han Shuo had found the bone tablet suggested to him that another Cemetery of Death was present in the Abyss Realm. Han Shuo gradually released his mental strength using his death basegod soul, allowing it to flow into the bone tablet. He discovered that the imprint within this bone tablet had been stripped off as well.

    ¡°Han Shuo, what are you doing?¡± Jasper approached, puzzled, as Han Shuo contemted while fiddling with the bone tablet in his hand.

    ¡°This thing, where did ite from?¡± Han Shuo raised the bone tablet at Jasper and asked with a grave expression.

    ¡°I have no idea, but it looks like it¡¯s been here for a while now. Probably some tribute offered ages ago. The thing is wrapped in a thickyer of dust, I doubt there¡¯s anything special about it. Han Shuo, does it serve any sort of function?¡± Jasper was perplexed.

    ¡°Help me figure out the origins of this item. I need to know.¡± Han Shuo knew that Jasper was in charge of the arrangement and ssification of some items inside the warehouse. This was also the reason that Crosius had appointed her to lead the way for Han Shuo.

    ¡°Sure. However, this thing is rather old and was certainly put here long before I was in charge of managing the warehouse records. It might take some time,¡± Jasper replied with a big smile. She seemed absolutely thrilled to be able to assist Han Shuo.

    ¡°Thank you,¡± Han Shuo answered. Finding this bone tablet had disentangled a big stone in his heart. The presence of this bone tablet indicated that a subordinate of the overgod of death must have, at some point, made a presence in this Abyss realm, and therefore a Cemetery of Death must also exist in this world.

    After verifying his beliefs and finding its location, Han Shuo would finally be able to return to Profound Continent via the Cemetery of Death. Seeing that his chances of getting home were growing more and more promising, his heart flipped like a pancake.

    ¡°Rx! Give me some time and I will find out for you. For now, you may select the materials you require from the four stone chambers,¡± Jasper said with a graceful smile. After taking a nce around this musty room, Jasper continued, ¡°This room is of the most ancient period and most things inside are of antiquity. I don¡¯t think you will find many goods that would fit your needs. Perhaps you should start by looking at the other three rooms first.¡±

    It was only after listening to Jasper¡¯s words that Han Shuo remembered the reason he was there. After looking all around, Han Shuo discovered that the stone room was bigger than he imagined. The whole room upied the size of a basketball court, and the goods were orderly and densely ced. There were some oddly-shaped weapons and armor, with all kinds of stone, bone and wooden materials of all colors, textures, and shapes. Han Shuo had never even seen the majority of items in the room.

    Han Shuo was rathercking in a certain knowledge of the Abyss realm. Most goods there were distinct to those on Profound Continent. However, Han Shuo believed that he could certainly find some shockingly good material in this miraculous Abyss realm given the power of his consciousness. He unhurriedly inquired Jasper about the properties and specific functions of the items and materials inside the room one by one.

    Jasper¡¯s extensive knowledge as a manager caught Han Shuo by surprise. She could describe the properties and specific uses of most materials in the room as though an expert. As Han Shuo listened to Jasper¡¯s description, he examined each and every piece using his eyes and consciousness, not letting a single item slip by.

    Over time, strange rays of light shed across Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, and his lips curved, revealing a pleasantly surprised smile. One after another, Han Shuo collected the items into his space ring. After just a short while, a hundred or so items inside the room disappeared out of sight.

    Jasper was shocked at what she saw. ¡°Han Shuo, what, what is that thing? A pocket? How can it store so many things? That¡¯s, that¡¯s unbelievable!¡±

    ¡°Oh, this is a space ring. It¡¯s exactly like a pocket and is used to store things,¡± Han Shuo exined. He suddenly recalled that as cultivators of the eight elemental energies and four edictal forces in the Abyss realm had only been training the body, they did not have adequate knowledge about the soul and couldn¡¯t sense the presence of mental strength. For this reason, it would be impossible for them to construct an item like the space ring.

    ¡°Space ring?¡± Jasper was at a loss. Soon after she turned extremely interested and asked, ¡°How many things can it store?¡±

    Han Shuo nced at this stone chamber around the size of a basketball court before he replied, ¡°Its capacity is around five times this stone chamber¡¯s. That much.¡±

    ¡°...Han Shuo, you truly are magical. Why are there so many mysterious objects in your possession?¡± Jasper opened her little mouth wide for a long while before she finally said with shock.

    ¡°Here, I¡¯ll give you one. This space ring is only one stone chamber big, but still it¡¯s enough for you to store a lot of stuff,¡± Han Shuo casually withdrew a low-quality space ring and handed it to Jasper before he continued, ¡°However, it will only be functional after you managed to sense the presence of mental strength.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s precious!¡± Jasper was delighted and quickly slid light-purple space ring onto one of her slender fingers.

    ¡°But nothing could be more beautiful than those two hands of yours!¡± Han Shuo said candidly as he reached out to grope her fingers. He thought, I¡¯m going to take this girl down slowly. It wouldn¡¯t be as much fun if I were to rush it.

    Jasper¡¯s pretty face blushed. She looked at Han Shuo with her bright eyes before clenching her teeth and whispering, ¡°Naughty boy! You really know how to tter a woman, don¡¯t you!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s true. Who can deny that you are the most beautiful woman in War Demon Valley?¡± Han Shuo grinned. He was ted, but that happiness came from all the good stuff he had discovered in this Abyss realm. With Jasper¡¯s exnations and his own examination, merely in this stone room, he had struck a goldmine of artifacts that Profound Continentcked, many of them treasured materials that could refine demonic weapons.

    Apart from that, some strange materials that were exceedingly difficult to obtain on Profound Continent and Earth were stored inrge quantities in this warehouse. For example, ck iron ore and ck gold ore of the highest purity, and an assortment of blue-gold sand that was more precious than diamonds.

    Hundreds of rare materials, as long as Han Shuo found them useful, were swallowed into his space ring with no trace of modesty. With so much good stuff on his hands, in addition to the Braingorge Raksha he had plundered before, Han Shuo could immediately set about refining dark dragon Gilbert a new body.

    Furthermore, with these materials at hand, along with some extra time, he could refine demonic weapons just as useful as the Blood Seether. It would be a wonder not to be overjoyed by that.

    ¡°Have Hemanna and Sylph been deceived by you like this? Hmph, you lustful animal!¡± Jasper feigned anger coquettishly. But soon after, she let out an adorable giggle and whispered, ¡°But still, in this Abyss realm, there hasn¡¯t been a man who could talk so amiably and be so approachable withdies like you. You are quite interesting!¡±

    Any fool could tell that Jasper had feelings for Han Shuo. However, as he had proper business toplete, he did not rush to set about upying her. He let out a mischievousugh and said, ¡°Alright, alright, let¡¯s move on to the other three rooms... Hehe...¡±

    As he spoke, Han Shuo deliberately got near to Jasper to sniff the refreshing fragrance from her body, putting on a punchable face as he relished her scent. As Jasper had feelings for Han Shuo to begin with, she only berated Han Shuo with a smile. She appeared most willing to be teased by Han Shuo. Later, she proceeded to introduce the materials in the other three stone chambers.

    Han Shuo found even more materials that were extremely useful in the other chambers, not to mention equally rare on Profound Continent. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t have been more thrilled harvesting those goods and continuously repeated, ¡°This is good, this is useful, oh, this is useful too...¡±

    Jasper was just speechless.

 Chapter 539: Deploying the Formation

    GDK 539: Deploying the Formation

    Han Shuo, Hemanna, and Sylph were moved into a manor in the southern part of War Demon Valley. This new mansion was far more luxuriouspared to that three-storey building. Abyssal beauties of all races, at Crosius¡¯mand, were arranged to serve and attend to Han Shuo¡¯s every need.

    For so many years, Han Shuo had never before been so rxed and enjoyed life so much. Not even his high position in Brettel City could excuse him from painstakingly studying magic and demonic arts, not a waking minute spared on such luxuries as joie de vivre. However, Han Shuo took advantage of his time in this Abyss realm topletely let himself go in conformance with the principle of the Carnal realm to live an unrestrained and hedonistic life.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s stature in War Demon Valley grewrger andrger, Hemanna and Sylph¡¯s admiration and adoration for Han Shuo had raised to the point where they could not bear to take one step away from him. They would feel as though something wascking if Han Shuo went out of their sights for even a moment.

    It is also worth mentioning that Han Shuo was rather astonished by just how long the aliendies could endure when ites to doing a certain activity. Perhaps it had something to do with their distinctive internal body structures. Back on Profound Continent, even Phoebe, someone who had cultivated to the heights of a great swordmaster, could not endure Han Shuo¡¯s conquest in the room for any lengthy period of time. Yet, these two coquettishdies were much more outstanding than Phoebe when ites to endurance. Their outstanding bodies could more often than not bring Han Shuo unimaginable indulgence, pleasure, and joy.

    However, Han Shuo¡¯s stamina and endurance were far, far mightier than the twodies¡¯ imagination. Every time they pleased Han Shuo, even when they joined forces and went as wild as they possibly could, they would always be beaten by Han Shuo in the end. They would always be tormented by him until everyst bit of their strength was exhausted.

    Each time he was finished with the two, Han Shuo would still have spare time to head outside War Demon Valley with Jasper. Using the material he found in War Demon Valley, he spent the time setting up a Shura Soul Formation just like the one he once deployed at the ce of extreme water in Sunshine Valley. Compared to then, his strength now was more than a cut above. As the materials Crosius supplied were plentiful, Han Shuo even had excess to deploy some other additional magical matrixes.

    The two avatars of Han Shuo¡¯s possessed an outstanding understanding of the element of death and the edict of destruction. During the past several days, Han Shuo had even fused some necromancy magical matrices and some essence of the edict of destruction within this Shura Soul Formation.

    Just how powerful would the final result of this ¡®Shura Soul Formation¡¯ be? Even Han Shuo himself got somewhat excited and was looking forward to finding out. During the several days, Jasper had always been helping Han Shuo with all of her heart, helping Han Shuo to acquire the materials he needed, as well as organizing the War Demon Guards to help deploy the magical formation...

    During the few days, Han Shuo did not ck in taking advantage of Jasper, either. The two were like lovebirds, openly teasing each other. As the master of War Demon Valley, Crosius had clearly seen how the two interacted. He did not obstruct Han Shuo¡¯s invasion of his treasured daughter, but on the contrary, he deliberately provided opportunities for the two, as though he was itching to shove Jasper into Han Shuo¡¯s embrace.

    Just as that War Demon Guard had gossiped, given the strength that Han Shuo disyed right now, he could snatch an honorable and high position from any of the five great demon kings. What¡¯s more, War Demon Valley was currently in a critical period. Crosius of course had to spend some effort and money if he wanted to make Han Shuo stay.

    Han Shuo had disyed outstanding performances since he first stepped into War Demon Valley. Crosius was going to have to do better than just material incentives if he hoped to keep Han Shuo in his valley. Jasper, the most beautifuldy of War Demon Valley, was precisely the biggest chip Crosius had.

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, so this is a magical matrix? Could you please teach me? So magical...¡± Brayshaw the two-faced person, as Han Shuo¡¯s assistant, had been following Han Shuo all the while with who knew what intentions. She kept talking with that coy and disgusting tone of his, jabbering on and on beside Han Shuo¡¯s ear, causing Han Shuo annoyance.

    As soon as he heard Brayshaw¡¯s voice, Han Shuo¡¯s face turned unsightly. He shot a warning re at Brayshaw and threatened, ¡°Cut out the chatter. Have youpleted your task today?¡±

    ¡°Of course. How would me dare to not earnestlyplete tasks that you have assigned me?¡± In her interaction with Han Shuo during the past two days, she discovered that Han Shuo really wasn¡¯t as fierce as she imagined. As long as she refrained from intentionally provoking Han Shuo, he wouldn¡¯t take anything too far.

    This two-faced being, whose position and limelight was robbed away by Han Shuo, did not resent Han Shuo for it. On the contrary, she was rather too passionate and worked very hard to help Han Shuo in manpower and physical resources. Although Han Shuo couldn¡¯t make out what intentions this fe was actually harboring, her actions had indeed saved Han Shuo quite some time and effort. Therefore, although Han Shuo felt extremely irritated by her constant coy talk, he did not do anything to her.

    ¡°Ugh forget about it. Freakingdyboy, I don¡¯t feel like talking to you,¡± Han Shuo said impatiently. He then turned to Jasper beside him who was secretlyughing, and said, ¡°Alright! The project can bepleted by tomorrow. After that, all we¡¯ve got to do is wait for the Venomfang Castle to make their way over so we can try it out on them.¡±

    ¡°Han Shuo, Uncle Brayshaw is actually a good person. He is, at least, much more upfront than that Brakyah,¡± during the journey back to War Demon Valley, Jasper suddenly started to talk to Han Shuo. There were some faint traces of worry in her eyes.

    Han Shuo was slightly bothered by the statement and asked, ¡°What¡¯s the matter with that Brayshaw, anyway?¡±

    ¡°Uncle Brayshaw came from a entric race that lived far from civilization. People of their kind all looked like that. When he first came to War Demon Valley, Uncle Brayshaw was discriminated by many. However, under my father¡¯s protection, and his own powerful strength, he gradually gained a footing in War Demon Valley.

    Uncle Brayshaw even regrly yed with me when I was little. He¡¯s a modest and approachable person. It¡¯s just that his voice sometimes alternates between male and female. He¡¯s certainly not someone like Brakyah who would seek revenge for the smallest grievance. I truly hope you do no harm to Uncle Brayshaw over some small matter,¡± Jasper said those words of persuasion to Han Shuo for fear that he would dispose of Brayshaw with any random excuse that arose. She seemed to care a lot for Brayshaw.

    Han Shuo nodded with creased brows and replied, ¡°I see. Not to worry. As long as he doesn¡¯t try to provoke me, I wouldn¡¯t do a thing to him.¡±

    With Han Shuo¡¯s reassurance, Jasper¡¯s heart loosened up. She put on a smile and mentioned the task that Han Shuo had given her two days prior, ¡°Oh, by the way, about that bone tablet you asked me to check, I have found its origins. ¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s look jolted. He hastily asked, ¡°So what did you find?¡±

    ¡°You might really need to take a trip to ck Jade City. This bone tablet was obtained from Lord Manticole. Back then at ck Jade City, my father managed to advance to the level of Demon with the assistance of Great Demon King Manticole. Lord Manticole was delighted with him and let my father choose anything he liked from his weaponry depot. This bone tablet was one of the items that he selected. My fatherter found out that this bone tablet served no function and just threw it into the depot,¡± exined Jasper.

    ¡°Manticole... From the looks of it, he definitely knows about it...¡± Han Shuo mumbled to himself and turned to Jasper, ¡°Alright. Why don¡¯t you go home and continue meditating? I reckon that in just a few days, you will be able to sense the presence of mental strength.¡±

    After having interacted with Han Shuo for the days now, Jasper had grown the utmost respect for the mysterious Han Shuo. Therefore, upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, she put on a smile, nodded, and left without saying another word. However, she mumbled to herself as she left, ¡°Hmph, I know he¡¯s rushing back to his manor for Hemanna and Sylph, those the two little vixens...¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s sharp ears managed to pick up with total rity those soft mutterings of Jasper¡¯s. He couldn¡¯t help butugh, and thought to himself, It seems that it¡¯s time to find a chance and pluck down Jasper. Otherwise she¡¯ll just keep cursing me behind my back.

    Han Shuo was weed back to his own manor by the two tender and beautifuldies, none other than Hemanna and Sylph. All smiles, they each took one of Han Shuo¡¯s arms and lead Han Shuo straight to the room. Their eyes revealed strong indications of love.

    ¡°We will postpone it for today. I need to cultivate for a while in the secret chamber,¡± Han Shuo apologetically exined to the two as they walked inside. Afterwards, he entered the secret chamber exclusively found in this manor all alone. Once inside, he went deep underground, and finally withdrew the ring that contained Gilbert¡¯s soul.

    Han Shuo had beenmunicating with Gilbert these days and Gilbert was aware of the environment they were in. Now that Han Shuo had sufficient materials and Gilbert¡¯s soul was mighty enough, he said to Gilbert, ¡°Gilbert, I have gathered all the materials needed to refine you a body. Even without your original skeleton, I can forge you a pretty good physical body. Would you like to try?¡±

    ¡°Nevermind, master. I can wait a little longer and I much prefer my original body. I¡¯d rather wait until we have returned to Profound Continent, and forge a new one with my original body as the foundation.¡± After having cultivated his soul for so long, Gilbert now possessed an extremely tenacious soul. Han Shuo believed that if Gilbert had a new physical body, he would be able to make leaps and bounds.

    ¡°Alright, then. We shall wait a little longer. But don¡¯t you worry, it won¡¯t be too long. I have already made some progress. After the matter of these two days are over, we will head to ck Jade City right away and look for an internar transportation array.¡± Han Shuo knew that Gilbert had gotten somewhat anxious, especially when he informed Gilbert the little lewd dragon of the brilliance of alien abyssaldies. He was beginning to grow restless.

    After consoling Gilbert, Han Shuo chanted an incantation and summoned the Little Skeleton with the intention of transferring necromancy memories to him.

    But when Little Skeleton traveled across nes from theherworld and stepped onto the Abyss realm, Han Shuo was immediately shocked by the Little Skeleton he saw.

 Chapter 540: Two Demonic Weapons

    GDK 540: Two Demonic Weapons

    A piece of grey-white gravestone was embedded on Little Skeleton¡¯s chest. The gravestone bore intricate and cryptic inscriptions on it and gave off an intense aura of death. It had formed some kind of connection with Little Skeleton¡¯s soul, giving him an unconventional air of might.

    After forcibly upying all of Haley¡¯s memories, although Han Shuo had yet to personally visit the Nethervalley, he waspletely familiar with each and every stone inside the valley. He took only one look at the gravestone inside Little Skeleton¡¯s chest and immediately cried out in surprise, ¡°That gravestone in your chest, is it the one inside Nethervalley?¡±

    The reason that Haley the basegod of death remained in Nethervalley for so long was that the valley contained a gravestone that possessed an unusual ability. That gravestone also had the miraculous ability to cause the element of death to converge. Therefore, Haley¡¯s strength would increase more rapidly in the Nethervalley than anywhere else. He also stayed there as the gravestone could not be moved.

    Overlooking its far smaller size and higher level of intricacy, that gravestone on Little Skeleton¡¯s chest looked very much the same as the one in Nethervalley that Han Shuo remembered. Han Shuo asked so for that reason.

    ¡°Yes, father. As you have asked me to investigate the gravestone, I surveyed it using my soul for a while. Someway and somehow, this thing entered my body. It could help me absorb the energy of death around me faster. It¡¯s very useful,¡± Little Skeleton replied.

    Han Shuo was shocked. He recalled that Haley had spent nearly forever on it, and yet he couldn¡¯t move it even an inch, hence he stayed in Nethervalley. Who could have predicted that in just that little while Little Skeleton was in Nethervalley, he would manage to miniaturize that elephantine gravestone and put it into his body, and even turn it into a wonderful treasure that could grow his strength. These facts were far from Han Shuo had anticipated.

    ¡°Hmm, did you sense anything wrong with it? Could it turn out like the Purple Demon Eye where some mighty soul will suddenly emerge from it with the intention of upying your soul?¡± Han Shuo questioned after thinking for a short while. He became instinctively alert of any peculiarity on Little Skeleton¡¯s body after having encountered the sneak attack from the Purple Demon Eye.

    ¡°No. I even seem to understand some things through this gravestone. But as it wasn¡¯t too long ago that I managed to put it into my body, I have yet to truly figure out the full story,¡± Little Skeleton replied.

    After staring at Little Skeleton for a long while, Han Shuo put on a bitter smile and shook his head, saying, ¡°Fine. Just be careful. There better not be any problems. Otherwise, we are going to be in deep trouble again.¡±

    ¡°Got it, father. I will be careful.¡±

    Han Shuo did not continue with an borate speech. He repeated the same steps he made at theherworld before in preparation to inculcate his memories of necromancy to Little Skeleton using his consciousness. Although Han Shuo¡¯s main soul was distinctive from his other two avatars, his memories were shared andmon between all three souls.

    In other words, all three souls, may it be the main body or the avatars, could ess each other¡¯s memories and knew each other¡¯s experiences. Thus, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness waspletely aware of the death basegod avatar¡¯sprehension of necromancy. Subsequently, the consciousness would have no problem transferring those memories into Little Skeleton¡¯s soul.

    However, this time, Han Shuo still wasn¡¯t able to have his wish fulfilled. This time, it was the gravestone on Little Skeleton¡¯s chest that was the source of interruption.

    That gravestone Little Skeleton had recently obtained, seemed to contain some kind of miraculous energy, protecting Little Skeleton¡¯s soul from any foreign intrusion. Even Han Shuo, as Little Skeleton¡¯s master and someone who shared a special connection with him, couldn¡¯t make it through the shield for the purpose of instilling memories into Little Skeleton¡¯s soul.

    What surprised Han Shuo the most was that the energy was not subjected to Little Skeleton¡¯s control. Whenever Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness attempted to enter, that energy would automatically emerge and form a safeguard, forcibly blocking down Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness and those memories.

    This energy carried an intense element of death. Han Shuo dared not to make any shing with Little Skeleton¡¯s soul rashly. Otherwise, he could very possibly bring on the destruction of Little Skeleton¡¯s soul. Therefore, Han Shuo only attempted for a while before disappointedly giving up and exining the issue to Little Skeleton.

    ¡°Father, I sense the energy too. However, it feels as though it¡¯s just protecting me and has no intention of causing me harm,¡± Little Skeleton finally replied after a long breath of silence.

    ¡°Yes, the energy was definitely trying to protect you. I can feel it,¡± Han Shuo then continued with furrowed brows, ¡°But then, I won¡¯t be able to teach you a certainprehension for necromancy through this method. Sigh, let¡¯s forget about it for now. Perhaps we¡¯ll try again when you learn to control this energy and the secrets of the gravestone in the future.¡±

    ¡°Agreed, father. I have been sensing and learning about the energy inside the gravestone recently. Through this gravestone, I¡¯ve even made some inexplicable progress with the maniption of the element of death. Perhaps, this gravestone could help me advance faster as well,¡± Little Skeleton exined.

    Han Shuo appeared rather shocked. After thinking for a while, he said, ¡°Alright, then. During this period just focus on studying the abilities of the gravestone. I shall transfer all those memories I gained after you¡¯ve learned its secretster in time.¡±

    With an incantation, Han Shuo delivered Little Skeleton back to theherworld.

    What wille, wille. The enormous threat that was Venomfang Castle had gradually been closing in on War Demon Valley. Within just two days time, all the scouts stationed within a hundred-mile radius of War Demon Valley had been eliminated.

    After discovering that the enemy forces of Venomfang Castle were close by, Crosius immediately issued the order to have all scouts return to War Demon Valley, as not to waste away that manpower.

    Those of the Venomfang Castle seemed to be waiting for something; they did not immediately attack after they arrived outside War Demon Valley. Meanwhile, the citizens of War Demon Valley, who were strictly prohibited from exiting the city, gradually realized that the threat they were facing this time wasn¡¯t quite the threat they were used to.

    As time went by, news of the astounding strength that Venomfang Castle brought over spread among the popce. ¡®Shadow Warriors¡¯ became the most discussed topic of conversation among everyone in War Demon Valley. Whenever those two words were mentioned, their faces would pale.

    In those few days, the whole War Demon Valley was shrouded in the atmosphere of an oing storm. All those War Demon Guards who came and went about the Valley, the experts at the six Rakshas¡¯ sides, and a few visiting advisors widely and well known to most, all wore a worried look, seemingly concerned about the unordinary battle this time.

    Crosius, the six Rakshas, the five main visiting advisors, and Han Shuo gathered and stood shoulder to shoulder before War Demon Valley¡¯s city gate.

    A few days¡¯ time in the Abyss realm was equivalent to around a month on Profound Continent. Making good use of this time, as well as the abundant and varied materials Crosius provided, Han Shuo had not only sessfully deployed a Shura Soul Formation outside War Demon Valley, but even seeded in refining two kinds of demonic weapons.

    Of them, one type was the Pearls of Annihtion. Each would befall a wide-range explosion upon activation. And from those explosions, Soulpiercers as sharp as katanas wouldunch. Anyone hit by the Soulpiercers shot out from the Pearls of Annihtion would be instantly annihted if their souls were not strong enough.

    Even those with sufficiently powerful souls had to immediately seek a safe harbor to clear away the toxins of the Soulpiercer within a small window of time. The longer they left it untreated, the greater the injury in their souls. Even for godly experts whose souls had fused to be one with the elements, once hit by the soul-piercing spikes, would instantly and temporarily lose their ability to fight. Left long enough, their souls would be annihted.

    The Cyano Demonze was a weapon that could set vast areas aze with a cyan me. It was a vicious demonic weapon that would cause anyone who made contact with the slightest speck of it to start burning from within.

    These two types of demonic weapon were painstakingly refined after spending some materials found in the Abyss realm as well as some of Han Shuo¡¯s time and effort. Pearls of Destruction were consumable and Han Shuo only had sixteen of them. Although they had tremendous power in the instant they exploded, they would be gone once used up. The Cyano Demonze, on the other hand, was activated using the Mystical cial Spellfire. Just like the Blood Seether, it required Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan as the power source.

    With these two types of demonic weapons, in addition to the two avatars he had, Han Shuo had ample confidence. He didn¡¯t take those invaders to heart. Compared to Crosius and his people, Han Shuo appeared most calm and unruffled.

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, is your so-called magical matrixpletely deployed? Can it really bring out immense power just as you described?¡± Brakyah asked somewhat disdainfully, with his lips curled and his eyes narrowed on the dense stone forest, erect and decorated with colourful yet oddly-shaped banners outside War Demon Valley.

    ¡°Powerful or not, Mister Brakyah may step in there and try it for yourself. However, if you were to identally lose your life in there, I won¡¯t be taking any responsibility,¡± Han Shuo giggled with ample confidence.

    ¡°I believe that Mister Han Shuo will surprise us!¡± From the looks of it, Crosius appeared to have full confidence in Han Shuo. However, his eyes looking at those densely gathered pirs of rocks told a different story. As Crosius didn¡¯t have much of an idea as to how mighty magical matrices could be, what mattered the most to him was Han Shuo¡¯s strength itself. He thought that Han Shuo was just taking advantage of the situation to plunder his weaponry resources and did not actually ce his hopes on the magical matrix.

    ¡°Venomfang Castle will attack after half a day,¡± Han Shuo said confidently. When the party looked at him with puzzled eyes, he revealed a faint smile and said like a mystical seer, ¡°I can feel it.¡±

 Chapter 541: Wait a Little Longer!

    GDK 541: Wait a Little Longer!

    Before the great war erupted, War Demon Valley was shrouded in a suffocating atmosphere. Practically every citizen was mustered to fight and defend War Demon Valley.

    The Abyss realm was truly a ce where everyone was a soldier. Through constant struggle, every high-level abyssal being would certainly be a fighter that had been through military campaigns. Although the offense Venomfang Castle brought over this time wasn¡¯t quite the same as it was before, and everyone in the valley was fearful, with things having developed to this stage, not one of them cowered.

    Indeed, as Han Shuo had predicted, after half a day, more and more oddly-shaped abyssal creatures appeared before the stone forest Han Shuo had ced outside War Demon Valley. The forces of Venomfang Castle were numbered in the tens of thousands, with a majority being massive but low-intelligence abyssal creatures.

    Those mighty abyssal creatures with humanoid figures ounted for merely one tenth of the army. Their leaders were the race of Triops that Han Shuo had met before. Under their guidance, more and more abyssal creatures assembled outside the tallest city wall of War Demon Valley.

    The defensive measures of War Demon Valley remained at a rather primitive stage. The best they had was fences covered with sharp knives, some gigantic bows and arrows on the city wall, as well as boulders scattered all around the Abyss realm.

    A Triops wearing pitch-ck armour that covered his rather enormous body held a two-meter long trident in his hand, mounted on a warhawk with five python-like tails, majestically hovering in the sky before War Demon Valley. His eyes were cold and ruthless. His body boasted an imposing demeanor.

    Behind him was a group of Triops mounted on warhawks who wore the same pitch-ck armour. Those Triops were the true trump cards of Venomfang Castle. Each possessed at least the strength of level-three Destroyer.

    Beneath them were densely packed abyssal experts with inhuman bodies. Han Shuo easily sensed the source of the six to seven Raksha-grade aura being unreservedly discharged.

    ¡°Lord Yeki, why is there a stone forest covering the front of War Demon Valley? In our previous rounds of attacks, this stone forest didn¡¯t exist. Will it be an issue?¡± asked an abyssal creature whose face was covered in wrinkles and appeared much like a bulldog, gazing at Yeki up above.

    At his words, the invaders turned their attention towards thend between the two opposing forces. Hundreds of thousands of ste had been erected, disorderly dispersed on the center of the battlefield. There were alsorge, multi-coloured banners, on them painted some kind of monster making threatening gestures. Lush green and deep blue miasma gently lingered around the rock forest, giving it an air of mystery...

    ¡°What in the world is that? There are intense element of death in there and it seems to contain the aura of destruction. What sort of nasty tricks is War Demon Valley up to?¡± a Triops said quizzically with one of its eyes glowing a strange light as bright as a torch, casted onto the stone forest ahead.

    ¡°Second brother, with General Zajya here, no matter what tricks War Demon Valley have up their sleeves, they won¡¯t be able to escape their final fate. We have nothing to worry about. All we have to do is act in concert with Lord Zajya and take down War Demon Valley once and for all,¡± Yeki said with a cold smile after he nced at the Triops beside him.

    ¡°Sure...¡± The Triops nodded his head and also revealed a confident smile. He conveniently turned to gaze at the the legendary general of the Shadow Warriors, a level three Demon ¨C Zajya.

    This man measured over four meters tall. He had bewitching purple-coloured skin and criss-crossed scars from head to toe. His eyes were of the same purple hue and made feverish gazes that one would expect from a lunatic. A kind of intense aura of destruction faintly emanated from his body.

    Some of those abyssal creatures beside him would deliberately keep a distance from him. Even though they were all on the same side, they seemed to be most unwilling to go anywhere near him and instinctively feared him.

    ¡°It is only once wepletely take down War Demon Valley and crush Crosius into pieces that we can return to meet Lord Gnder!¡± Gazing at the broad, towering city wall of War Demon Valley, Zajya slowly said with an ear-piercing voice, ¡°Yeki, you better take this opportunity to finish Crosius once and for all. After taking down War Demon Valley, your Venomfang Castle can then be named Venomfang City. It is only so that the Lord would put you in an important position.¡±

    ¡°Lord general, let me assure you that after this day, Venomfang Castle will be known as Venomfang City. I have operated Venomfang Castle for many years and now is the time take it higher!¡± Yeki licked the corner of his lips .

    ¡°Hmph! The time has note to be excessively cheerful. You have not adequatelypleted the matter about the internar portal within the territory of your Venomfang Castle. His Lordship will not be so eager to let you off the hook. Taking down War Demon Valley can only be considered as making up for your mistakes. Don¡¯t even think that you are going to escape the Lord¡¯s punishment,¡± Zajya said after shooting a deadly nce at Yeki.

    Yeki¡¯s face suddenly turned rigid. Revealing a trace of fear and a humble expression, he said, ¡°Would Lord General please put in a good word for me before the Demon Lord?

    ¡°I will,¡± Zajya replied indifferently before he continued, ¡°Considering that thosedies with tender bodies you prepared were absolutely delicious to eat, prepare me another thirty!¡±

    Yeki revealed a painful look, but nheless nodded in a servile manner. He pledged, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Lord General, you will have all thirty of them.¡±

    Zajya nodded in satisfaction and did not say another word. He proceeded by grabbing a tender and white arm that was still warm to the touch and began munching away as though no one was watching.

    ¡°Other than the experts that Venomfang Castle originally had, there were Demons who ought to be the Shadow Warriors you earlier mentioned. The one who lead them is called Zajya. He seemed to have a very literal taste for women. Truly a sickening thing!¡± standing on top of the city wall, Han Shuo slowly exined with a face full of loathe and disgust.

    ¡°What?! Zajya? Why does it have to be him?!¡± Brakyah cried, unable to hold back his shock. He wore an unconceble fear on his face.

    Brakyah, however, was not alone in his concern. The six Rakshas and five main visiting advisors all wore simrly terrified faces. Among them, even a few beautifuldies began to pale paper-white, with ice-cold despair in their eyes.

    Even the master of War Demon Valley, Crosius, couldn¡¯t conceal the feelings of shock in his pair of deep eyes. He let out a sigh, helplessly shook his head, and said, ¡°General Zajya, the head of Shadow Warriors! Who knew that this insane demon who is know to be fond of eating women woulde. I really don¡¯t know if we will be able to resist them until the assisting army arrives...¡± He sighed.

    Crosius suddenly turned to Jasper, as though he had just made a stunning recollection. With a pain in his heart he bellowed, ¡°If War Demon Valley is breached, destroy your body andmit suicide. Zajya the lunatic fond of eating beauties alive. In that process, the victim does not immediately die and will suffer unimaginable pain. It is a cruel and unbearable way to die.¡±

    ¡°Un... understood...¡± A shiver travelled down Jasper¡¯s spine. She couldn¡¯t even beat to think of that scalp-tinglingly terrifying scene.

    ¡°Here, take this. If he dares approach you, throw this at him. However, you must take note that this thing has enormous coverage. You will need to toss it at least fifty meters away from you. Or else you yourself shall suffer the same fate as your oppressors,¡± Han Shuo exined after handing her a Pearl of Annihtion when he noticed her frightened to the point of hyperventting.

    Jasper held onto the Pearl of Annihtion as if her life depended on it. She resolutely said, ¡°I know what to do now,¡±

    ¡°However, you have nothing to worry about. With me here, he would have no chance of getting anywhere near you, ¡° Han Shuo winked.

    After Han Shuo had uttered Zajya¡¯s name, the expressions on all the experts of War Demon Valley around him flipped. It was as though a magnanimous, incorporeal rmountain was pressing down on everyone¡¯s chests. The atmosphere was stifling to the pinnacle.

    Han Shuo¡¯s unruffled demeanor did not make anyone feel better. They all assumed that as Han Shuo was a foreigner, he had no idea at all how terrifying General Zajya was, and therefore would be so at ease.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes gave off a hard to perceive feeling of despise as he looked at those people around him. Zajya, an expert with the strength of a level-three Demon, could at best, be considered as being in thete stage of basegod realm. Han Shuo could easily settle him merely with his lowgod of destruction avatar. The one who should be afraid was Zajya, not the other way round.

    However, that Zajya couldn¡¯t sense Han Shuo¡¯s mighty presence. It is only when during battle that he would truly understand how terrifying this enemy of his was.

    ¡°All of you on the front lines, take down that Valley!¡± under the repressive atmosphere, the master of Venomfang Castle, Yeki, suddenly raised his head and yelled in a voice as sharp as that of a banshee.

    Abyssal creatures covering almost every inch of soil, with high-level expert propelling them, bravely marched forward and charged at War Demon Valley.

    The densely packed stone forest seemed fill with these abyssal creatures in just split second. However, that so-called ¡®magical matrix¡¯, which Han Shuo had asserted to be extremely powerful, did not erupt with shocking killing power. All that it did was obstruct the steps of those invaders.

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, so this is the formidable power of the magical matrix you have spent enormous resources and several days devising?¡± Brakyah said in an ashen expression. He was a little incoherent in his speech, perhaps because of his fear towards Zajya or something else.

    Crosius¡¯ face grew equally grim. Although he did not say a word or move a muscle as he looked at Han Shuo, his eyes had clearly expressed his discontent. As the one whose resources were greatly expended, to have not immediately burst out with rage amply proved his self-cultivation was of the top most.

    ¡°I have yet to activate it. What are you rushing for? Wait a little longer. When more of their people have entered, I will activate it,¡± Han Shuo remained calm and unperturbed, disregarding everyone¡¯s bludgeoning stares.

 Chapter 542: You Will Call Me Daddy!

    GDK 542: You Will Call Me Daddy!

    ¡°It indeed is useless. Scared me for a second there, I actually thought that there was something to it!¡± Yeki sneered as he looked on at his troops pouring into the rock forest.

    ¡°Third and Fourth squadron, advance and take down War Demon Valley in one blow! After this day, War Demon Valley will be ours!¡± the Triops shouted excitedly, licking the corners of his lips.

    At his order, the numerous forces of Venomfang Castle, some mounted on giant, oddly-shaped abyssal creatures and arranged in neat, tidy lines, marched right into the stone forest.

    Zajya, themander of Shadow Warriors, kept his cold eyes fixed upon the frontmost forces of Venomfang Castle charging at War Demon Valley as he munched on an arm coated in fair, white skin. Blood overflowed from his mouth. It was a horrific scene.

    The stone forest, situated between the two opposing forces, upied a vast area. It didn¡¯t appear to have caused any congestion even with thousands of enemiesbatants pouring in. Watching as more and more enemies had entered the stone forest, those in the frontline almost arriving at the city wall, Crosius repressed the fury in his heart and red at Han Shuo. When the enemy was almost within reach, he gnashed his teeth andmanded, ¡°Get ready! Once the enemy is within range, hit them with all you got.¡±

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, the enemy has already reached the city gates. Isn¡¯t this the time to activate it?¡± Brayshaw, the entric alien, could be considered as having kept hisposure, seeing as he still found the time to ask Han Shuo when Crosius, Brakyah, and those people no longer harbored any hope in Han Shuo.

    ¡°Yeah Han Shuo, perhaps it¡¯s time to activate the magical matrix?¡± Jasper reasoned anxiously as she looked at him with ever-growing eyes.

    Of all the people in War Demon Valley, Jasper was likely the only one who truly cared for Han Shuo. It was precisely because she cared for Han Shuo that she held onto the hope that Han Shuo could make some contribution and truly prove himself useful, make all those people question how they could have ever taken Han Shuo as worthless and as a scoundrel who availed himself of the situation to plunder through the resources of War Demon Valley!

    ¡°Forget about it. I will not count on this so-called magical matrix. I only hope that when those Shadow Warriors charge over, Mister Han Shuo will help me take one of them down. I would be content with just that,¡± Crosius shook his head and gently sighed with disappointment scribbled all over his face.

    Even now, Han Shuo still had on that infuriatingly punchable, unruffled expression. He put on a smile, gazed at the party, and exined, ¡°Those who have entered the stone forest are low-level existences ying the role of pawns, cannon fodder. There may be a lot of them, but I believe they can be taken care of without breaking a sweat given War Demon Valley¡¯s current defense capabilities. The energy of my magical matrix will not be wasted on this garbage!¡±

    ¡°I want to see just how much power your so-called magical matrix can actually exhibit!¡± Faced against enemy forces with practically undefeatable strength, Brakyah no longer had any hope toe out of the battle alive. As he thought that he would die in the end anyway, he was no longer afraid of Han Shuo and openly revealed his resentment and anger towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°You will see!¡± Han Shuo replied with a tranquil smile. Han Shuo found it unnecessary to bicker with anyone who already considered himself a dead person.

    As they conversed, the very first batch ofbatants sent into the stone forest by Venomfang Castle as expendables had made it past the stone forest and reached the fore of War Demon Valley¡¯s city walls. These enemies who carried no climbing tools with them whatsoever, suddenly began secreting sticky substances on their hands and feet. Under Han Shuo¡¯s surprised gaze, those forces of Venomfang Castle rapidly scaled the walls.

    ¡°Wow. Abyss realm truly is remarkable. No wonder they we don¡¯t see them with anydders or hooks!¡± Han Shuo eximed in astonishment as he watched those low-level abyssal creatures climb up the walls with nothing but their limbs, much like primates climbing up trees.

    ¡°Kill!¡± yelled Crosius, wearing a gloomy face.

    Thousands of soldiers simultaneously took action at hismand! Large boulders, arrows,s tied with hooks, and other simple and crude but extremely destructive defensive measures, were abruptly activated, falling on enemybatants below as they tried to scale the city wall.

    Blood spurts, broken bones, and dismembered corpses. There would be hundreds of low-level abyssal creatures that fell off the wall as a result of the shower of boulders and arrows, with their lives eternally washed away between heaven and earth at any given moment.

    A backwards and barbaric world would usually be a cruel and bloody world. And the Abyss realm was no exception!

    In the Abyss realm technological advances were few and far between. The popce had spent their days in massacres since the dawn of their existence. In every great battle, a great number of precious lives would be squandered. As lives were lost, more and more warriors would grow even more savage and ruthless.

    Such a cruel scene was unfolding right below Han Shuo. Thosebatants at the frontline attacking War Demon Valley were well aware that they would be the first to throw their lives away for those behind them. And yet, they advanced dauntlessly in face of certain death, as if the word ¡®cowardice¡¯ had no ce in their vocabry.

    The popce of War Demon Valley who knew that they couldn¡¯t defeat the invaders, as well as the pawns up front, were both the same in this regard! The Abyss realm was truly cruel!

    ¡°Kill!¡± Yeki of Venomfang Castle ordered and took a short pause before he continued, ¡°Crosius! After today, War Demon Valley will be mine! And I will personally take your precious skull from your spine!¡±

    Yeki¡¯s voice reverberated throughout the battlefield, greatly boosting the morale of the invading forces of Venomfang Castle. All the trump card experts who had been stationary until this point finally prepared to make a move. In the wake of Yeki¡¯s roar, they charged ahead like swarms of locusts.

    Zajya the mad, bloodthirsty demon appeared unperturbed at this moment. His eyes revealed unrestrained excitement. With his mouth still munching on fragments of bone and tissue, he soared into the air,nding by Yeki¡¯s side in an instant. Histe-stage destruction basegod aura instantly spread to cover the entire area.

    When Zajya rose, the other two Shadow Warriors finallypletely revealed themselves. One of them was a dark-skinned man who looked as tough as a rock. His enormous presence was out in the open as he charged at War Demon Valley like an unstoppable bulldozer. The other was a bewitchingly beautiful woman. She had a curvaceous body and a sharp, seductive smile. Her long scarlet hair that grazed her shoulders danced in the wind as she flitted forwards like a beautiful butterfly.

    The three Shadow Warriors took the lead and all the experts of Venomfang Castle followed suit, charging over empty air. Each and everyone of thempletely revealed the mighty presencesing off their bodies, as though they aimed to crush the willpower of everyone in War Demon Valley as soon as the battle began.

    ¡°Ironstone Warrior, Scarletfiend Warrior, and General Zajya. I am afraid that this time, we won¡¯t be able to escape the cmity!¡± Crosius mumbled to himself with an ashen and dejected face. He shot a nce at Han Shuo, shook his head, and let out another soft sigh.

    The grand reveal of the other two Shadow Warriors sent chills down the spines of many experts on War Demon Valley¡¯s side familiar with their strength. A sense of dispiritment and helplessness rose in each of their hearts. Even their willpower to put up a resistance seemed to have weakened all of a sudden.

    Although Han Shuo didn¡¯t know how infamous and prominent Ironstone Warrior and Scarletfiend Warrior were, just from how everyone looked at them, he could tell that these two were characters so terrifying that people in the Abyss realm would be scared at the mere mention of their names. Han Shuo gazed into the distance to observe the two. When he saw that full-bosomed woman with big buttocks, a slender waist, and a pretty and flirtatious face, he couldn¡¯t help but reveal a smirk and said, ¡°Interesting, interesting! This kind of woman ought to be wonderful to dally with!¡±

    ¡°If you can toy with this woman, I will crawl at your feet and lick the bottom of your shoes and call you daddy!¡± Brakyah sneered after shooting a nce of despise at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo shot a nce at Brakyah in a half-smile and nonchntly said, ¡°Well then, just you wait. You will call me daddy.¡±

    ¡°Hmph! I¡¯m waiting!¡± Brakyah coldly groaned and no longer batted an eye at Han Shuo. He turned to fully focus his attention on the enemy flocking over among the swarm. Knowing full well that he would have no chance of returning alive, Brakyah threw caution to the wind and charged ahead!

    ¡°Han Shuo, that Scarletfiend is fond of toying with women and is hateful towards all men. Her methods are vixen. You, you already have Hemanna and Sylph... no point in messing with her...¡± Jasper said with deeply knitted brows as she was sincerely worried for Han Shuo.

    ¡°Hmm, almost there. It¡¯s about time to activate the magical matrix,¡± Han Shuo obviously didn¡¯t care for Jasper¡¯s kind words of persuasion. He simply interrupted her before she could finish. Momentster, looking down towards the enemy forces charging over like swarms of locusts, dark cold demonic lights abruptly began shooting out from between his two hands and flew towards the towering ste ahead.

    Just like sparks falling on grounds drenched with gasoline, the few rays of demonic light were enough to ignite a bbergasting transformation of the forest of stone pirs that had been tranquil and sleepy. In just a split second, a thick and denseyer of dark cloud covered the stone forest. When the Canopy of Necromancy was activated, its negative energies immediately spread to cover the entire battlefield.

    Immediately, the three trump card boundaries of necromancy ¨C the Boundaries of Fear, Weakness, and Aging ¨C werepletely deployed to cover all those that entered the stone forest. Chaotic energy of destruction flung back and forth throughout the stone forest like thousands of swords in an out-of-hand duel. Any abyssal creature hit by the energy was left with a gaping hole in its body.

    Finally, the Shura Soul Formation was activated. The stone forest started to glow with magnificent light in the shade of blood. Terrifying energies of ruthlessness and viciousness erupted from it!

    Judgment day seemed to have abruptly befallen the stone forest. Various kinds of energies interweaved and tens of thousands of abyssal creatures werepletely annihted almost instantly. Some had been prated by the energy of destruction, some turned into rotten corpses under the Boundary of Aging, some were enveloped by bloody light, their boiling blood exploding from their bodies, while some sank into and of fantasy, stabbing themselves uncontrobly, again and again... activated. The stone forest started to glow with splendid and magnificent light with the colour of blood. Terrifying energies of ruthlessness and viciousness erupted from it!

    Judgment day seemed to had abruptly befallen the stone forest. Various kinds of energies interweaved and tens of thousands of abyssal creatures werepletely annihted almost instantly. Some had been prated by the energy of destruction, some turned into rotten bodies under the Boundary of Aging, some were enveloped by bloody light and their boiling blood explode out from their bodies, some sank into thend of fantasy, bizarrely stabbing themselves again and again......

 Chapter 543: Iâ€™m Taking Them All!

    GDK 543: I¡¯m Taking Them All!

    Rubble swirled through the air. Bloody light rays pierced the skies. Remnant explosions continued without end. In just an instant, the stone forest had turned into an entirely different ce.

    Tens of thousands of abyssal creatures, at practically the same instance the magical matrix was activated, we¡¯re stopped of their lives. Under the cover of the Canopy of Necromancy, those bloody rays remained as violent and berserk as before. As it split bodies apart, it also reduced the victims¡¯ bones into shrapnel, stabbing through anyone in its immediate surroundings.

    It was hell on earth,plete with dead bodies and skeletal remains piled up in the stone forest. The scent of blood reeked. Resilient souls that carried irreconcble hatred did not dissipate but lingered within the stone forest. Some sort of peculiar transformation was urring with those souls...

    The souls of the dead, under the effects of the formation, did not immediately dissipate from between the heaven and earth after losing vitality. Instead, they turned into blood-red shadows that drifted about. Carrying boundless resentment, they would nip those who had yet to die into shreds, causing the already terrifying scene to turn even more dreadful...

    In just a brief period of time, the originally static and inert stone forest turned to a machine of massacre, a perfect trifecta of demonic arts, necromancy magic, edict of destruction. They all turned into blood-red shadows that shrieked as they roamed the stone forest, ready to reap the lives of those who entered it.

    The originally morous party around Han Shuo hushed momentarily, lips sealed shut. The crowd on top of the wide War Demon Valley city wall turned unusually silent while the war raged on!

    Crosius, Brakyah, Brayshaw, the six Rakshas, five visiting advisors, Jasper, and everyone else wore stupefied faces as they foolishly gazed at the hellhole ahead. They witnessed as tens of thousands of living beings were destroyed in those few moments. Fear, shock and disbelief tranted into chills down their spines... Umon for the likes of such folk.

    ¡°I¡¯ll be damned... I didn¡¯t expect it to be this powerful. Hehe, well you can¡¯t say I¡¯ve wasted any of those materials now, can you?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s jaws dropped too as he was slightly shocked by the terrifying scene caused by the matrix he had architected. The frightening devastation caused by thebination of necromancy magic, the edicts of destruction, and demonic arts formations ¨C three martial arts which did not all originate from the same universe but were just as vicious and cruel. Han Shuo could hardly breathe for a moment.

    Tens of thousands of those so-called elite experts from Venomfang Castle, in just an instant, were consumed by Han Shuo¡¯s stone forest, with not a single survivor! Such formidable power was simply horrifying!

    ¡°Mis... Mister Han Shuo, this, this is the ruin caused by the magical matrix?¡± Crosius was choking up in his speech. His deep eyes were empty and at a loss, seemingly still unable to process the scene before him.

    ¡°Erm, it should be. So, Lord Crosius, are the results up to your satisfaction?¡± Han Shuo asked with fullposure, before curving his lips to make a bantering smile and winking.

    Crosius was speechless.

    ¡°You have won my respect,¡± Brayshaw stared at Han Shuo with zing, glittering eyes, sending more chills down Han Shuo¡¯s spine. Meanwhile, Brakyah¡¯s body, which was as flexible as that of a snake, turned as stiff as a corpse that had been embalmed for a thousand years. His body was stuck in a bizarre posture of advancing towards the battlefield. He wore a terrified expression of disbelief as he stared nkly at those wildly dancing bloody shadows within the stone forest.

    After a long while, Brakyah revealed an ugly smile and mumbled to himself, ¡°It seems that I really will call him daddy. This man, is he even mortal?¡±

    The whole War Demon Valley suddenly turned silent. Each and every one of them wore stupefied faces. Their gazes towards Han Shuo were filled with reverence and respect. A character who could destroy tens of thousands of lives in just a moment was much, much more terrifyingpared to those devilish Shadow Warriors!

    ¡°Retreat, retreat! Dammit, don¡¯t enter that stone forest! What the hell is going on?!¡± said Yeki as he flew over aboard a warhawk. At this moment, his tenacious heart turned heavy as though it had been it filled with lead. It was obvious that he felt an unrestrainable fright from his shivering voice of anxiousness and helplessness. There even seemed to be a hint of sobbing to it.

    ¡°Yeki, what is going on? Didn¡¯t you tell me that War Demon Valley only had this tiny bit of strength? And that we could very easily take down the Valley?¡± As the head of the Shadow Warriors, he had seen and experienced all kinds of situations throughout his career for so many years. The scene where tens of thousands of experts were massacred in just a moment, that was the first time he had encountered anything like that ¡ª he, too, lost his head!

    Even for this blood-soaked butcher who treated life with insignificance, when he saw the appalling scene of devastation below him, he felt a scalp-numbing, flustered feeling.

    A human silhouette soared into the sky. The body was badly mangled. Large chunks of flesh loosely hung onto its skeleton, as though they would fall off at any moment...

    Squinting for a better view of the person who suddenly rushed out from the stone forest, those inhuman bs of flesh, that nightmare-inducing body drenched in blood, Zajya was horrified. Repressing his wrath, he asked, ¡°Ironstone, is that you?¡±

    ¡°Lord General, yes... it¡¯s me... What a dreadful attack! All dead... Everyone! I alone managed to escape. My goodness, what happened back there?! Yeki you cursed fellow, who in the world did you piss off?¡± Ironstone Warrior, whose appearance wasn¡¯t visible, said incoherently as he trembled.

    ¡°Who did you actually offended?¡± The Scarletfiend Warrior was angered to the point that her charming body trembled and her towering bosoms along with it, attracting wild and fanciful thoughts to any observer...

    ¡°I... I have no idea myself. What do we do? What should we do now?¡± After being questioned by the three Shadow Warriors, this master of Venomfang Castle was at his wit¡¯s end. The scene below was just too terrifying and brutal. Yeki was terrified at the bloody turn of events.

    ¡°We cannot do anything about what has past. No one will enter the stone forest again. Luckily, nothing happened to the few of us. The hatred this time must be immediately repaid with drawing blood. Otherwise, we Shadow Warriors will have failed our king,¡± Zajya coldly shouted like a deranged man. He then turned to the thousands of Yeki¡¯s trump card warriors mounted on flying creatures and said with a murderous voice, ¡°We will take down War Demon Valley, or we shall all die in the Valley. You all should be very clear with the king¡¯s methods. There is no third option!¡±

    Everyone in Venomfang Castle could feel their hairs standing on end when Zajya mentioned the Great Demon King Gnder. Their gazes suddenly turned resolute and steady, determined to not provoke Gnder¡¯s fury even if it meant they would fight to their cruel deaths right in this ce.

    ¡°Well then, let¡¯s get killing. Either all those men inside War Demon Valley perish, or we do!¡± Yeki licked the corners of his lips and revealed a merciless and malevolent appearance. Before Zajya could say another word, he waved his hand and shouted, ¡°For the brothers we have lost, today, we will kill everyst living soul inside War Demon Valley! Attack!¡±

    On his mark, the thousands of elites of Venomfang Castle that remained stopped looking at the bloody scene of the stone forest below and charged forward at War Demon Valley in defiance of death.

    ¡°Everyone be careful. Those who remain are the most powerful experts of Venomfang Castle, with three Demons among them. Do not let them enter the valley by all means. We must resist!¡± After being shocked and awed by Han Shuo, Crosius came to gain some optimism. When he saw Venomfang Castleunch the final wave of assault, he hastily yelled.

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, please do us another favor by stopping one of the Demons!¡± Crosius lowered his voice for Han Shuo in a never-before seen show of respect. His manner of speaking carried the tone of reverence.

    In an instant, all the gazes of War Demon Valley¡¯s experts fell on Han Shuo. At this moment, Han Shuo seemed to have reced Crosius position, and became the new spiritual leader of War Demon Valley!

    How could one behave otherwise? After all, the feat that Han Shuo had just aplished was simply too stunning and appalling. An existence who could kill tens of thousands of enemies in an instant? Even Crosius, the valley master, paled an entire spectrum inparison!

    ¡°Han Shuo, you, you truly are inconceivably awesome!¡± Jasper jumped for joy. It was only now that she came to her senses from the shock that Han Shuo brought her. Her lovable face was radiating with a bizarre luster that would throw a man¡¯s heart into disarray. She did not at all conceal her feeling towards Han Shuo, so clear in her precious eyes.

    Unlike the astonished expression on everyone else¡¯s faces, Han Shuo still maintained that punchable expression on his. In response to the humble Crosius, Han Shuo said mischievously, ¡°Since I¡¯m getting paid, it is my duty to offer a hand in aid. Don¡¯t worry, I know what I ought to do.¡±

    ¡°Many thanks, Mister Han Shuo. As long War Demon Valley can escape from the cmity today, you may take anything in the Valley you wish.¡± Crosius turned his excited eyes towards Jasper, and continued, ¡°Even the most precious thing to me, I¡¯m willing to let Mister Han Shuo take away!¡±

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help butugh. He thought to himself that the Abyss realm was indeed very much to his liking. He had merely demonstrated an ounce of his strength, and Crosius started to fawn over him regardless of the cost. He was surely a character worth keeping around!

    ¡°You¡¯ve just got to concentrate on taking down Yeki. I will help you settle the three Shadow Warriors. Just make sure you will stand by your promise,¡± Han Shuo said with a light cackle after shooting a nce at the blushing Jasper.

    ¡°Three... Three Shadow Warriors? Han, Mister Han Shuo, you will handle three Shadow Warriors alone?¡± Crosius couldn¡¯t hold back and cried out in great rm.

    Han Shuo nodded and replied with the utmost assurance, ¡°That¡¯s right, I¡¯m taking them all!¡±

 Chapter 544: Hey Pretty, Wanna Live?

    Crosius was not alone. Everyone was stunned upon hearing Han Shuo proim that he would take on the three Shadow Warriors by himself.

    Every abyssal demon king had fighters ready at theirmand. The three were Shadow Warriors that directly answered to Demon King Gnder, with all three possessing Demon strength. Their formidable power and the mercilessness in their conducts had long struck terror into people¡¯s hearts. Although Han Shuo had indeed used that so-called magical matrix to obliterate tens of thousands of enemies in an instant, he was merely a man who had yet to demonstrate sufficiently powerful strength.

    In the Abyss realm where ss was distinguished by strength, there were only a few beings who could handle three Shadow Warriors alone, and each one of those existences was a well-known expert with extraordinary power! Therefore, when Han Shuo said that he could take care of those three Shadow Warriors by himself, these people were beyond belief.

    Looking all around, Han Shuo saw the expressions on all those around him. Han Shuo shook his head and grinned, ¡°All of you just mind your own matters. Meh, it¡¯s merely three Shadow Warriors, I doubt that they can put up much resistance against me!¡±

    Then, Han Shuo turned his gaze to Brakyah and added, ¡°Anyway, I¡¯m still waiting for someone to lick my soles and call me daddy!¡±

    Brakyah¡¯s face turned ashen. However, he did not dare to retort. Instead, he forced an incredibly ugly smile. He did not say a word as bitterness suffused his heart.

    ¡°Kill them all!¡± The roar that thundered from a distance away was travelling closer and closer before it finally arrived right ahead of the towering city wall of War Demon Valley. All those remaining experts of Venomfang Castle had flown over on warhawks with thick and long python-like tails. Only certain true experts like Zajya streaked across the sky on their own. Crosius ceased to attend to Han Shuo and immediately shouted in a deep voice, ¡°Kill!¡±

    Thanks to the destructive blow dealt by Han Shuo¡¯s stone forest, the defensive measures on the city wall of War Demon Valley were mostly left unused. And now, with the arrival of the final wave of Venomfang Castle¡¯s trump card experts, they were all fired away, filling the sky with stones and arrows that shot towards the crowd like massive hailstones.

    ¡°Pff, puny tricks!¡± Zajya sneered. At the next moment, his eyes burst out with lights of the deranged and the aura of destruction erupted from his body. He charged forwards, and the edictal force of destruction shot out from his palms. Unexpectedly, a big portion of the attacks were intercepted by him alone.

    Behind him, that Ironstone Warrior, whose body was so badly mangled that it was hard to distinguish his humanoid appearance, shielded his hole-riddled body with an earth armorposed using earth elemental energy. He wrecked towards War Demon Valley with the momentum of a mountain, not in the least afraid of the hurricane of arrows and stones.

    The Scarletfiend Warrior, a cultivator in the element of fire, shot out intense element of fire from between her two hands. When it made contact with the ground, raging mes were produced. In a split second, the towering city wall of War Demon Valley was enveloped in an ocean of fire. Meanwhile, the master of Venomfang Castle, Yeki, had his eyes glued on Crosius while charging at him, yelling. He was prepared to fight to his death.

    A great battle erupted in just a few moments. With the three Shadow Warriors paving the way, not one of those early-stage defensive attacksunched by War Demon Valley was actually effective. Those remaining experts of Venomfang Castle breached all the way to War Demon Valley with almost no hindrances, causing massive casualties upon their arrival.

    After the two sides began fighting in full swing, Han Shuo, under Jasper¡¯s gaze of astonishment, finally soared into the sky with the skeletal staff in one hand and the Demonyer Edge in the other. He entered the battle ring unruffled.

    After flying high up into the sky, Han Shuo let go of his skeletal staff and Demonyer Edge. To avoid any unnecessary shock, he did not transform his two avatars into human figures and only had them hover in mid air.

    The basegod soul within that skeletal staff continuously released necromancy magic. Barrages of bone arrows wereunched along with all kinds of remarkable necromancy boundaries deployed. The Grand Disintegrator, a destructive and deadly necromancy magic, fell upon those invaders one after another, shredding them into pieces.

    As soon as the head of the Shadow Warriors, General Zajya, made contact with forces of War Demon Valley, he was like a hot knife cutting through butter. Not a single one of those fighters of War Demon Valley surrounding him could escape his brutal attack using the edictal force of destruction. At every instant, nearly a hundred people were stripped of their lives and reduced to pitiful masses of flesh.

    In his unhindered massacre, this chief of Shadow Warriors was still gnawing on the thigh of a tender, beautiful War Demon Guard he had just murdered. The scalp-numbing crunch of her bones crackled continuously. This mad Demon was clearly deranged. He shouted like a maniac with the edicts of destruction mixed into his voice, giving all the War Demon Guards around him intense headaches and causing them to totter.

    The Scarletfiend Warrior and Ironstone Warrior were just as undefeatable. Wherever they passed, they would bring demise to War Demon Guards in the area. Not a single one of the War Demon Guards could escape their carnage. In the Abyss Realm, it was practically hopeless to fight against someone a ss above in strength. More and more War Demon Guards perished at the butchery of the three Shadow Warriors.

    Suddenly, loud shrieks like the howling of tens of thousands of ghouls rang through the air from the Demonyer Edge. The Demonyer Edge turned from merely hovering into a ck shooting star, falling towards Zajya at lightning speed.

    An enormous aura of destruction erupted from the Demonyer Edge in an instant. Within the aura of destruction, negative energies of ruthlessness, looting, and boundless resentment could also be found. It was as though it wouldn¡¯t rest until all things in the world were reduced to ashes!

    The head of Shadow Warriors, Zajya, who had obviously sunken into madness, suddenly felt a chill all over his body. Then, at the next moment, he saw a ck shooting star crashing down at him. The sinister energies that thing above contained was terrifying and massive beyond his imagination. He didn¡¯t even have time to ponder where did this ck shooting star originated before he was prated by it.

    The Demonyer Edge shot straight through Zajya¡¯s body and made a clean exit out the other side. Faced against the sudden attack of this avatar of Han Shuo¡¯s that possessed a destruction lowgod soul and the looting energy of Datara, in addition to the negative energies of thousands of resentful souls contained within the Demonyer Edge, this feeble Zajya, outssed, would of course be dead without a doubt.

    The Demonyer Edge suddenly made a 180 and gentlytched itself onto the back of Zajya¡¯s head. Zajya¡¯s soul, which he had painstakingly cultivated to the strength of basegod over countless years, was absorbed into the Demonyer Edge in an instant. Even hisprehension of the edict of destruction and the remaining energy inside his body waspletely sucked dry.

    After the Demonyer Edge flew away from the back of Zajya¡¯s head, Zajya¡¯s body was just an empty shell that no longer had an iota of useful energy.

    That avatar of Han Shuo¡¯s cultivating in the edict of destruction was one of the most peculiar existences. It not only had the characteristics of demonic arts, but it also contained the looting nature of Datara. After the main soul of Demonyer Edge had fused with an Origin Crystal of Destruction, it merged with Datara¡¯s soul to somehow form an avatar of Han Shuo¡¯s, with the Demonyer Edge being the physical body to the avatar. Even Han Shuo himself wasn¡¯t quite sure how to categorize this avatar of his.

    Although this avatar had fused with an Origin Crystal of Destruction, it didn¡¯t have deepprehension of the edict of destruction. But after ying Zajya andpletely absorbing his soul into the Demonyer Edge, Han Shuo managed to gain some of that knowledge of the edict of destruction that Zajya had. Although they were merely theprehensions of ate-stage basegod, it could still be considered as having made amends for some of his deficiencies in this aspect.

    The news that Zajya, the chief of Shadow Warriors, had been in by Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge in just a split second, immediately caused a great turmoil across the battlefield. Experts of War Demon Valley under Zajya¡¯s pursuit only observed a streak of ck light sh through before Zajya suddenly turned powerless and copsed. It was when the crowd saw the Demonyer Edge hovering in midair that they subconsciously realized who was responsible.

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo has killed Zajya! Zajya the lunatic is dead!¡± After staring nkly for a while, all those War Demon Guards who witnessed the scene suddenly began howling and hollering as if they had gone mad. Any listener would easily feel their excitement and exhration.

    ¡°No, impossible, that¡¯s impossible!¡± Feelings of astonishment and disbelief rose in the hearts of the other two Shadow Warriors. Both began squealing and flew towards the lifeless body that had copsed on the ground, wanting to verify the validity of the news!

    ¡°He¡¯s dead, that level-three Demon was killed! Holy moly, Mister Han Shuo is truly more than mighty!¡±

    ¡°Haha, this time Venomfang Castle is doomed!¡±

    ¡°We are saved! We are saved! General Zajya is dead!¡±

    For a brief moment, the chaotic scene of war was filled with such morous noises of extreme excitement. As this joyous cheering crowded the air, the morale of fighters on War Demon Valley¡¯s side surged to an all-time high, with their fighting power climbing to their peak. In the meantime, those invaders from Venomfang Castle were on the opposite side of the spectrum, with faces as ashen as the dead. After being repeatedly hammered with significant setbacks, they started to show signs of breaking down and crumbling.

    ¡°Haha, Yeki, why don¡¯t you stay behind for today, and forever!¡± Crosius felt as rxed as he ever had. He had initially worried about whether or not War Demon Valley could withstand enemy forces until the reinforcement army arrived. But now, he was thinking about how to maximize the final yield of the battle. Mad and high-spirited he attacked Yeki, all the while in his hearting to the decision to shove Jasper into Han Shuo¡¯s arms by all means necessary...

    The Abyss realm worshipped the strong. Having resolved War Demon Valley¡¯s crisis with merely his own strength, in an instant, Han Shuo became the new leader of War Demon Valley spiritually. Some pretty, young aliendies even looked at Han Shuo with inviting gazes filled with amorous feelings, as though wishing they could squeeze themselves into Han Shuo¡¯s chest and let Han Shuo devour them...

    ¡°Kazaam!¡± Han Shuo shouted. The Demonyer Edge turned into ck lightning and vanished in mid air. In the next moment, Ironstone Warrior¡¯s obsidian body suddenly exploded.

    Han Shuo smirked. His gazended on the Scarletfiend Warrior with the plump bosoms,rge buttocks, and an unbelievably seductive body. He teased, ¡°Hey pretty, wanna live?¡±

 Chapter 545: Iâ€™m Convinced!

    ¡°I do!¡± the pretty and flirtatious-looking Scarletfiend Warrior, gazed at Han Shuo, the main culprit who performed two game-changing feats, and said calmly, abnormally calm in fact.

    Afterwards, this Scarletfiend Warrior put on a sweet smile. Just as a fireball, she flew towards Han Shuo, taking the initiative to throw herself at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo wore a tempted smile on his face as he gazed at this arousing beauty. However, when this woman arrived inches before Han Shuo, he suddenly extended his hand and clenched her pale, tender neck. Under the appalled eyes of this Scarletfiend Warrior, Han Shuo¡¯s big hand suddenly twitched. Crack! Scarletfiend¡¯s neck was broken.

    ¡°Wh... Why?¡± The Scarletfiend Warrior¡¯s eyes wavered as she stared at Han Shuo in disbelief, her supple body stained with red blood. She did not immediately die and kept her eyes pointed on Han Shuo with hatred.

    ¡°Oops, were you about to kill me? I¡¯m afraid your methods have been a little too botched!¡± Han Shuo snickered. Before the fiercely burning element of fire in her bodypletely imploded, Han Shuo injected a great force into her body, tossing the charming beauty far and high into the air.

    Rumbles...

    A deafening explosion suddenly resonated throughout the entire battlefield. Scarletfiend Warrior was enveloped from head to toe by the roaring ze. It was as though the Abyss realm had suddenly gained an additional sun, burning and giving off intense heat.

    Having cultivated in demonic arts to the level he had, Han Shuo could sense the elemental energies between heaven and earth with great sensitivity. When this Scarletfiend Warrior flew over to Han Shuo in all smiles with the finest agility, she was, at the same time, rapidly gathering and concentrating the element of fire within her body beyond its limits. Having observed all that, her intentions were a no-brainer to Han Shuo. Han Shuo would of course not let her have her way. ¡°Such a beautiful woman... what a pity... Hmm, I guess Brakyah won¡¯t be calling me daddy after all. What a shame...¡± Han Shuo shook his head as hemented and gently sighed.

    ughtering the three Shadow Warriors had a decisive impact on the entire battle. After those ten thousand experts were annihted by that magical matrix, and the three Demon-grade experts were eliminated, the overall strength of Venomfang Castle had fallen far behind that of War Demon Valley.

    It was by relying on the terrifying might of the three Shadow Warriors that Venomfang Castle could charge all the way and dauntlessly fight War Demon Valley. However, with the death of the three Shadow Warriors, those remaining experts of Venomfang Castle obviously couldn¡¯t rival War Demon Valley. Where War Demon Valley held the superiority in terms of numbers and morale, Venomfang Castle was in a state of free fall, with more and more their forces being consumed and exhausted.

    ¡°It¡¯s him! That¡¯s the monster that came out from the internar portal when it exploded!¡± shouted the Triops expert that Yeki referred to as his second brother all of a sudden, gazing at the high-spirited Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo, who was still grieving about having to exterminate Scarletfiend Warrior, immediately turned to gaze at this Triops from a distance after hearing his cry of surprise. He revealed a bone-chilling grin and said, ¡°Hey hey! So it¡¯s you. Didn¡¯t expect me, did you?¡±

    ¡°You, that monster from another ne! Why, why are you helping War Demon Valley?¡± This high-level leader of the Triops race, who once directed arge number of abyssal creatures to attack Han Shuo inside the internar portal, questioned angrily as he pointed at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo shrugged and said inly, ¡°Well, they pay well! There¡¯s pretty girls, wealth, riches... Why would I not assist them? What, do you think I would assist your race who has tried to kill me from the beginning? Haha, sorry, but I don¡¯t think so!¡±

    ¡°We, we can pay you even better! As long as you agree to help us, whatever War Demon Valley has given you, we can give you double!¡± Yeki, the master of Venomfang Castle, insisted as he had obviously recognized the true value of Han Shuo.

    ¡°Don¡¯t listen to him!¡± Crosius, the master of War Demon Valley, grew somewhat nervous. He added, ¡°I will do all that I have promised you. In addition, my daughter, Jasper, will be yours. Sir Han Shuo, War Demon Valley will not fail you, I can guarantee that!¡±

    ¡°A man must be content with what he has. About your offer, Yeki, my apologies, but I¡¯m a man of stringent principles. In any case, the only person you should me is yourself for not showing me any of your hospitality from the start,¡± Han Shuo said with a faint smile. He didn¡¯t bat an eye at Yeki who had despair scribbled all over his face, but turned to gaze at the bashful Jasper distance away, and winked at her with his viinous eyes.

    When Jasper, who was observing the area with all her attention, immediately panicked when she caught the meaningful nces of Han Shuo¡¯s. She coyly turned her head away and dared not look at those piercing eyes.

    With his own strength, Han Shuo had ughtered three Shadow Warriors, establishing War Demon Valley¡¯s victory in one move. After Crosius received the answer from Han Shuo, he let out a breath of relief and sneered, ¡°Keep it up, my fellow warriors! After we kill these people, we will upy Venomfang Castle in one go! Our countless years of war with Venomfang Castle is nearly at an end!¡±

    Tens of thousands cheered at Crosius¡¯ call. The spirits of all those men at War Demon Valley surged. By relying on their safety in numbers, as well as the presence of this ultra-powerful expert called Han Shuo, theyunched their final wave of counterattack. One had sky-high morale, while the other was inplete despair. The final oue requires no thinking. The sporadic forces of Venomfang Castle, which couldn¡¯t put up much of a resistance, only grew weaker and weaker as they were being drowned and swarmed by those of War Demon Valley.

    Han Shuo walked directly to Jasper. The gazes of the popce of War Demon Valley all around him were filled with respect and admiration. Among them, some good-looking youngdies, especially those aware of Han Shuo¡¯s womanizing ways, unbridledly threw coquettish nces at Han Shuo while wearing the seductive appearances of waiting on Han Shuo hand and foot.

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, when are you free? I can take you on a stroll around War Demon Valley...¡±

    ¡°Lord Han Shuo, can you please coach me on martial arts? I will follow all your instructions...¡±

    ¡°Yeah, give us a chance, please...¡±

    Thedies of the Abyss realm are open-minded and straightforward. All those women who thought of themselves as being rather beautiful and attractive, openly cast their fiery gazes at Han Shuo. Other than youngdies with extremely beautiful looks that put forward their invitations in public¡¯s eyes, there were even several mature and attractive married women. Those men standing beside them were actually chuckling, as though they saw no problem with their women being so wanton...

    Hehehe... the Abyss realm is truly fascinating... Fascinating indeed..... Han Shuo inwardly remarked. He even revealed an amiable smile towards a fewdies with breathtaking looks and swept his eyes over their enchanting curvaceous bodies, causing the beauties to shriek incessantly, almost losing their restraints and throwing themselves into Han Shuo¡¯s arms.

    ¡°You sure are a big lecher!¡± Jasper couldn¡¯t help but criticize. That lustful appearance Han Shuo disyed, drooling at the wonders of the women all around him, caused Jasper both happiness and great despair at the same time.

    In the Abyss realm, it was proper and to be expected for powerful men to have multiple women. All females in the Abyss realm would feel that such a thing was appropriate, and Jasper was no exception. Therefore, back when Han Shuo first came to Abyss realm, he did not cause a great uproar when he dered both Hemanna and Sylph to be rightfully his. Jasper very naturally epted this fact as well.

    To Jasper, Han Shuo, being as mighty as he was, in fact, deserved to have more than one remarkably beautiful woman. Having grown up in the Abyss realm, she not only felt not an ounce of disgust at Han Shuo¡¯s debaucheries, but on the contrary, she actually thought that such was the behavior of a true man. Therefore, when she saw Han Shuoe all way to her so lecherously, a natural sense of slight jealousy arose in her, but she did not find anything inappropriate with his behavior.

    Finally, when Han Shuo arrived beside Jasper, he leaned close to her and ced his big mouth next to her ear. He whispered, ¡°Well, since your father has personally bestowed you upon me, hehe, I¡¯m not gonna be polite!¡±

    Among all thedies in the Abyss, Jasper was aparably shy one. When Han Shuo made such an intimate act in a public ce filled with watching eyes, it made Jasper both joyous and somewhat bashful. Her charming eyes shot a nce at Han Shuo before she lightly grumbled, ¡°You bad boy, what ever could you mean by ¡®impolite¡¯?¡±

    It was more of an entication than beratement. Jasper¡¯s lovely eyes carried the charm that could hook a man¡¯s heart and soul. Han Shuo¡¯s heart was captivated. Laughing mischievously, Han Shuo swooped and carried Jasper by her waist. In spite of Jasper¡¯s yful shrieking, and without regard for the fact that Crosius was leading a group of men in pursuing Yeki, Han Shuo flew straight towards the back of the valley with Jasper in his arm.

    The crowd of War Demon Valley who had seen it all revealed suggestive smirks. Meanwhile, those beautifuldies who so badly wished that Han Shuo would vite them, revealed emotions of envy. Their hearts were restless as well!

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo!¡± When Han Shuo had almost left the line of sight, Brakyah, who had just killed an enemy Raksha, suddenly called out to him.

    Han Shuo, impatient to conquer the angel in his arms, shot a cold nce of displeasement at Brakyah far away. He snorted and said, ¡°Brakyah, do you intend on mocking me now because I did not toy with Scarletfiend Warrior?¡±

    Brakyah¡¯s face immediately changed and, without hesitating, he answered, ¡°No, of course not!¡± Under Han Shuo¡¯s cold watch, Brakyah continued sullenly, ¡°I just want to tell you that, I¡¯m convinced!¡±

    It was apparent that when Brakyah said those words, his heart was filled with fear. He was genuine and sincere in making it known to Han Shuo that he no longer dared treating Han Shuo with hostility! That made sense. Han Shuo was a character who could ughter three Shadow Warriors by himself. What qualifications does a mere Raksha have to challenge someone like Han Shuo?

    After Han Shuo took a good look at Brakyah and verified that he was sincere in his admission of defeat, he coldly said, ¡°Good, at least you are starting to be sensible!¡± He no longer batted an eye at Brakyah. Carrying Jasper in his arms, he howled withughter and flew into the horizon in spirits higher than the clouds!

 Chapter 546: Breakthrough

    Jasper¡¯s cheeks were blushing, her alluring lips as red as cherry, her thick eyebrows bashfully knit together, and her arms tightly wrapped around Han Shuo. Her heart drummed not only with anticipation, but also some fear.

    Mischievouslyughing all his way, in just a short while, Han Shuo led Jasper to a stone forest near the manor allotted to him. After setting her back down on her feet, Han Shuo curved his lips to reveal a smirk. With his fiery eyes staring fixedly at the timid Jasper, he whispered, ¡°Hehe, do you know what I¡¯m about to do to you?¡±

    Jasper was flushing red hot. She buried her head into Han Shuo¡¯s broad chest and then fiercely thumped at Han Shuo¡¯s waist with her small hand. In her soft and lovable voice and breath as fragrant as orchid, she said, ¡°Bad boy, I¡¯ve known for a while that I wouldn¡¯t be able to escape from your naughty hands!¡±

    ¡°Oh? Wasn¡¯t it you who voluntarily delivered yourself to my doorstep?¡± Han Shuo said with an evil grin. He proceeded with stroking his impolite hands on Jasper¡¯s snow white wings and remarked, ¡°Such beauty!¡±

    Jasper was long aware that Han Shuo had an unusual fetish for her wings. With her sensitive spot being unbridledly vited by Han Shuo, her heart grew itchy and titited. Her lovable body started to tremble slightly and her body temperature climbed rapidly. After a short while, she was heavily panting, gasping like a fish out of water.

    Thisdy with the looks of an angel was pale and tender, tall and charming, and perfectly curvaceous, blessed with slender long legs, and plump bosoms. She was captivating in every aspect. Her magnificent white wings filled Han Shuo with an even greater desire to possess.

    As he admired and praised Jasper¡¯s beauty, Jasper feigning resistance, Han Shuo¡¯s big hands impolitely intruded and fell onto the snow-white skin around Jasper¡¯s breasts. Once Han Shuo deployed his demonic arousal technique, Jasper¡¯s mind immediately flourished with amorous feelings and her body began to burn up.

    All of a sudden, Han Shuo picked Jasper up and ced her on top of a smooth and level rock. He lifted the light muslin covering Jasper¡¯s beautiful legs and unbridledly stroked her around her thigh and buttocks. As Jasper panted more and more heavily, Han Shuo suddenly groaned and thrust hisnce and got into action.

    After a long, long while, when Jasper was stillnguid, Han Shuo again gently caressed Jasper¡¯s snow-white wings and softly whispered into her ears, ¡°Jasper, Jasper...¡±

    She was on cloud nine, lingering and drifting in a dream so beautiful she couldn¡¯t wake up from it. Jasper was basking in an inexpressible happiness, resting in the wonderful realm achieved after the body and mind were satisfied to the core. That gentle voice of Han Shuo¡¯s was like music to her ears, causing her heart to sink deeper and deeper into the dream, and the more she wouldn¡¯t want to wake.

    Suddenly, Jasper, ustomed to meditating all day for the past few days, automatically and subconsciously started to concentrate her attention and sank into the bizarre realm of meditation. After being satisfied mentally and physically until she could take no more, she clearly felt that her soul¡¯s senses had be much more sensitive than in the past. The wind element in her body was like a gentle breeze, and her soul seemed to be drifting about in the sound of the wind. A wonderful realization abruptly entered into the depths of her soul.

    Jasper could suddenly sense something growing inside here that was surely not her soul. It was some form of energy that was strange and foreign. It was like fine silky threads that tangled all around. When she carefully felt it, she discovered that this thread-like energy seemed to be able to form a connection with the wind element in a way that she couldn¡¯t understand.

    Han Shuo had intended to wake Jasper from her dream when suddenly his consciousness sensed an anomaly in Jasper¡¯s brain waves. Han Shuo was rmed at first, but soon after began to smile. He thought to himself, Jasper has been meditating for many days but unexpectedly, after just one round of drippingly great pleasure, she is so rapidly sensing the mental strength. It seems that sometimes, indulgence really does have a miraculous effect on cultivation.

    Afterwards, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness turned away from observing the unusual fluctuation deep in Jasper¡¯s soul. Instead, he concentrated his attention and slowly discharged a few strands of demonic yuan from his screw that was still tightly interlocked with its corresponding counterpart. He continued thoroughly exploring the wonders within Jasper¡¯s body, seeking for the means by which her body gathered the wind element.

    Time quietly passed. After observing the cirction of the wind element inside Jasper¡¯s body for an undetermined amount of time using the demonic yuan, Han Shuo suddenly came to a realization. He gradually gained some insight on the few cyclones in her body. He also came to realize how a regr person from Profound Continent could cultivate in elemental energies using their physical body.

    Han Shuo gently exhaled. His eyes were glowing with vigor. There seemed to be some transformation of his realm state, but when this urred, he could only guess. His heart, which had been constantly filled with desires and cravings, seemed to have gradually returned to tranquility. He seemed to have suddenlye to some sort ofprehension. His heart was as tranquil, serene, and unperturbed as an old monk.

    But behind this serenity, there seemed to be some kind of unknown transformation waiting to happen. It wasn¡¯t just his mind; even his physical body seemed to want to transform. At first, this feeling caused Han Shuo some rm. However, after pondering for a short moment, a pleasant surprise smothered him. He couldn¡¯t help but chuckle.

    Jasper, who was in the middle of meditating, trying her best to appreciate the presence of mental strength, was roused by Han Shuo¡¯s suddenly loudughter. She looked at Han Shuo puzzled and said, ¡°Han Shuo, what¡¯s the matter?¡±

    The madlyughing Han Shuo was in a state of absolute delight. He shook his head and did not exin it to Jasper, ¡°Nothing, nothing!¡±

    Han Shuo could feel that after unrestrainedly releasing his heart¡¯s desires during this period, the Carnal state realm, which he couldn¡¯t break through for a long time, seemed to no longer be a bottleneck. As subtle changes happened to his body and mind, Han Shuo realized that as he umted more energy over time, he would metamorphosize and break through to the next realm ¨C the Nine Changes Realm.

    When the Carnal realm state was no longer a factor holding him back, all that was left to do was to umte more energy in his body. At a certain level of energy, Han Shuo¡¯s attainments in demonic arts would heighten to the next level, reaching the Nine Changes Realm that Chu Cang Lan had achieved back then. Han Shuo was already thrilled with what pleasant surprises this new realm would bring him!

    It was only after asking the question that Jasper suddenly noticed that they were still connected. Her face immediately turned red in shyness and she hastily shielded her half-bare beautiful body. When she tried to gently move her long and slender legs, a burst of aching that was at once tormenting and wonderful spread from the lower part of her body, causing her to let out a gentle cry and her body to abruptly warm up.

    When Jasper started to move, Han Shuo started reacting as well. He lowered his head to look at the lower part of their bodies, he noticed that there was some blood that stained Jasper¡¯s slender white legs. He creased his brows and said, ¡°Sorry, I was too rough there. Let¡¯s not have a second round now, you won¡¯t be able to handle it!¡±

    After gently withdrawing his rod, Han Shuo tenderly took out a set of white clothes and covered Jasper¡¯s wonderful body with it. Jasper¡¯s heart grew calm as Han Shuo gently attended to her. For some reason, watching Han Shuo treat her with tenderness, Jasper got very emotional and her heart overflowed with an indescribable warmth.

    In the Abyss realm where the strong ruled, women were systematically marginalized. Females, unless they possessed extreme might, would only be treated as objects and toys by the male kind. Although Jasper was Crosius¡¯s daughter, as she merely had the strength of a Destroyer, she was still bound by the norms of the Abyss realm.

    Aspetition was fierce and cruel in this world, with only the fittest surviving, men would usually treat women crudely and roughly. Tender and warm treatments were rare urrences. For an expert as mighty and formidable as Han Shuo to treat his women with such warmth without the slightest arrogance was something absolutely unheard of in the Abyss realm.

    Therefore, when Han Shuo showered her with warmth and care by helping her with clothes, her heart simply melted. As much as she tried, she couldn¡¯t hold back her emotions and began sobbing.

    Han Shuo was startled. Not understanding why Jasper suddenly started sobbing, he hurriedly soothed Jasper with sweet and romantic words that he frequently used back in Profound Continent.

    To Han Shuo¡¯s surprise, Jasper turned even more emotional and tears gushed from her eyes like water from a copsed dam. Han Shuo was at aplete loss.

    ¡°Thank you, thank you, Han Shuo. You really are a good man. I¡¯m just feeling really happy and fortunate that I could be your woman!¡± the weeping Jasper softly exined, revealing a smile as beautiful as a sunflower.

    Han Shuo scratched his head in bewilderment and wore a confused face as he looked at Jasper. He simply didn¡¯t know what to say.

    ¡°Oh, I, I think I felt the mental strength! Is it that thread-like energy in the brain?¡± Suddenly, Jasper who was crying tears of joy, turned pleasantly surprised. She asked Han Shuo hurriedly, as though she wanted Han Shuo to give her an answer immediately.

    Nodding his head with a smile, Han Shuo affirmed, ¡°That¡¯s right, that energy you felt is precisely the mental strength that I¡¯ve told you about. In the future, as long as you work hard on meditating, for your soul to fuse together with the element of wind won¡¯t be something impossible!¡±

    Jasper was exhrated at the thought. Suddenly recalling something, she excitedly asked, ¡°Then, does that mean that I can use the space ring now?¡±

    ¡°Of course. Try to enter the space ring using that faint mental strength of yours. Therein, your own mental imprint will be formed. By relying on that mental imprint, you will finally be able to freely deposit and withdraw any material!¡±

    ¡°Thank you! Hehe, I now have a space ring as well, what a wonderful feeling...¡± It didn¡¯t take long for her to learn how to operate the space ring. A small pebble in Jasper¡¯s hand would suddenly disappear, then re-emerge in the next moment. She was awfully amused ying with it.

    Han Shuo silently watched with a faint smile as Jasper fiddled with the space ring. But after a while, he suddenly creased his brows and said, ¡°Those men dispatched by Lord Manticole have arrived. Let¡¯s go take a look!¡±

 Chapter 547: Triumphant

    Inside the War Demon Grand Hall, a middle-aged married couple, a husband and a wife, wore solemn expressions as they listened to Crosius depict the battle that went on.

    ¡°Just as your Lordships can see, Venomfang Castle is absolutely doomed this time. As we speak, a group of our fighters led by Qunoa is heading for Venomfang Castle. If it all goes to n, Venomfang Castle will be captured by our forces in no time!¡±

    The middle-aged married couple wore a reserved and grave expression as they listened. After Crosius finally finished with the course of events, the man asked in a deep voice, ¡°The one called Han Shuo, did you say that he killed three Shadow Warriors, including Zajya, all by himself?¡±

    Crosius nodded. He seemed to have yet to calm down. He took a deep breath and reaffirmed, ¡°You heard me right. He killed General Zajya, Scarletfiend Warrior, and Ironstone Warrior, alone. What¡¯s even more terrifying is, that so-called magical matrix he constructed in front of our city wall, exterminated nearly ten thousand experts of Venomfang Castle in just an instant!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s truly frightening!¡± the charming woman gasped, shock written on her face.

    The man also wore a face of disbelief. He questioned Crosius eagerly, ¡°That chap, what¡¯re his origins? Since when has the Abyss had such a terrifying existence?¡±

    ¡°Lord Bord, Lord Zinia, truth be told, Han Shuo ims that he came from that destroyed internar portal within Venomfang Castle¡¯s territory!¡± Crosius said unflinchingly.

    ¡°What?¡± the duo cried out in surprise simultaneously. They nced at each other, ¡°He¡¯s from another ne??¡±

    Crosius nodded in affirmation. He forced a smile and exined, ¡°I believe that his words are true. During the great battle, the second brother of Venomfang Castle¡¯s Yeki, Yeti, verified this information in his own words!¡±

    Bord and Zinia stared nkly for a while. But soon after, their gazes turned to glisten as they stared at Crosius. Bord said, ¡°Crosius, you have made a great achievement!¡±

    Crosius already knew that long ago. He turned a delighted expression and grinned, ¡°Right from the beginning when he first came to War Demon Valley, I could tell there was something extraordinary about him. Therefore, I¡¯ve been meticulously ingratiating him all along. It was all thanks to his existence that the army of Venomfang Castle could bepletely wiped out, saving our War Demon Valley and turning around the crisis. He is now requesting to meet Lord Manticole. I believe that as long as His Lordship satisfies some of his harmless demands, our side will definitely have the upper hand in the five-way war!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Therefore, the Lord will definitely reward you well this time,¡± Bord said with a gratified look on his face. He continued, ¡°I heard that you have even bestowed your daughter Jasper upon him? Very well done. The guidance that the Lord has provided you has not been in vain!¡±

    ¡°Lord Bord is overpraising me,¡± Crosius tried to y down his delight. He was d about his very wise decision days before.

    ¡°Alright. Crosius, how about you bring us for a look at that so-called magical matrix? We are very interested in that matrix which can exterminate ten of thousands of lives in an instant!¡± Zinia smilingly suggested to Crosius.

    When Han Shuo and Jasper returned to the battlefield together, they found out that the battle was over. All along the way, they would find strangely-shaped, massive, and low-intelligence abyssal creatures peacefully munching on carcasses that covered every inch of thend.

    Looking ahead, Han Shuo discovered everyone in War Demon Valley wearing the happiest faces. They were inspired by the bloody round of battle. When those people then saw Han Shuo emerging with Jasper, they began to chant Han Shuo¡¯s name. They cheered with reverence that came from the bottom of their hearts, and for a moment, his name echoed through the entire valley.

    Those forces that remained in War Demon Valley were not the main firepowers. They were merely some low-level War Demon Guards in charge of guarding the safety of the Valley and cleaning up the battlefield. However, the cheering that simultaneously came from every direction was still an extremely impressive scene, and it gave Han Shuo a shock.

    ¡°Han Shuo, look, they adore you!¡± Jasper eximed, pointing at the War Demon Guards scattered everywhere.

    Han Shuo scanned through the crowd and could immediately tell from their eyes that Jasper was indeed right. These fighters who respected the mighty would only adore true experts. Although that Great Demon King Manticole was their actual spiritual leader, it was a shame that not many had personally seen him with their own eyes. But Han Shuo, a new outsider to War Demon Valley, turned the entire battlefield around with merely his own strength right before their very eyes!

    Han Shuo repeatedly nodded his head as he towed Jasper alongside him, flying straight towards the outer circle of War Demon Valley. When Han Shuo saw that Jasper seemed to very much enjoy this feeling, finding it funny, he asked, ¡°What are you relishing about?¡±

    ¡°Every woman in the Abyss would feel happy that their man is worshipped and adored! Hehe, when I see them looking at you with veneration, as though they saw a Demon God, I feel that my choice was right. In the Abyss, beautiful women would rather be toys to a Demon than to be worshipped like a goddess by a low-level Abyssal Trooper!¡± Jasper exined.

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo found that exnation of Jasper to be fresh and extremely interesting. When he recalled the cruelty of the Abyss realm, he had to admit that such a practice was correct. They would at least be able to safely live on by bing toys to a Demon. But as the goddess of an Abyssal Trooper, however, they might very well be killed at any moment for perhaps no reason. Only death was the most terrifying thing in the Abyss realm. When he thought of it this way, he found Jasper¡¯s saying to be quite logical.

    Han Shuo did not remain motionless as he pondered the meaning in Jasper¡¯s words. In the blink of an eye, they had arrived at the city wall of War Demon Valley. Han Shuo looked ahead into the distance at those bloody shadows fluttering about in the stone forest, and gazed at the three demon-grade experts hovering above the stone forest. The corners of his lips curved to reveal a yful smile. Then, with one thought, the Demonyer Edge suddenly whizzed out from within his body.

    A sh of ck lightning struck the stone forest like a whish. Suddenly, the ten of thousands of bloody shadows that wandered across the stone forest seemed to have picked up on a distinctive scent as they began to gravitate towards the Demonyer Edge floating there in the middle. The Demonyer Edge, a weapon forged and refined with demonic arts, was designed to draw and absorb millions of souls from the start. Even though it had now turned into a destruction lowgod avatar, that characteristic remained the same as before.

    The bloody shadows streaked into the Demonyer Edge in the tens of thousands. It was just like a demon gobbling up wicked beings. Each and every bloody shadow within the stone forest that craved to devour all living things were sucked into the weapon. The scene of bloody shadows entering the Demonyer Edge appeared exceptionally sinister, causing a great scare to the three demons up above that were examining the stone forest with gaping holes in what little hearts they had.

    Within a short period of time, those wicked bloody shadows were vacuumed into this exceptional murder weapon. All of a sudden, dense bloody mist began emanating from within the Demonyer Edge. By the time it spread to the point where the three above couldn¡¯t see a thing in the space below, the Demonyer Edge had transformed into Han Shuo¡¯s avatar. Under the cover of the bloody mist, it began to dart about in the stone forest at lightning speed.

    This great formation that Han Shuo had spent so much effort in building had now sessfully served its purpose. Although a certain st that was extremely wide couldn¡¯t be easily withdrawn, those smaller formations that Han Shuo deployed had in fact been altered in some ways beforehand. Wherever the Demonyer Edge avatar passed by, all kinds of scattered objects, especially those big and colourful banners, would vanish into thin air.

    It didn¡¯t take long before the stone forest that had initially been decorated with all kinds of strange and exotic objects turned into nothing more than just a stone forest. Those materials used for the magical matrices, especially those useful for other demonic applications, were all collected away by the Demonyer Edge avatar. Gradually, the blood mist began to dilute. From what the three demons above saw, the Demonyer Edge had nted itself firmly on the same spot the whole time. Later, when the blood mistpletely vanished, the Demonyer Edge flew out from the stone forest as if it had a mind of its own. It whizzed back to Han Shuo who was standing on the city wall with a smile.

    ¡°What a miraculous weapon!¡± Zinia shouted. Brilliant rays burst out from her eyes that were firmly fixed to the Demonyer Edge.

    Seeing that all kinds of strange energies within the stone forest under him had vanished soon after Han Shuo¡¯s weapon had fallen into it, Crosius forced a smile and softly said, ¡°Well, it appears that this so-called magical matrix has been stripped of any magical power!¡±

    Bord nodded and said, ¡°Yea, that Han Shuo must have done something to it. It seems that we won¡¯t be able to learn anything from the stone forest.¡±

    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter. As long as the person is here, all other things are secondary!¡± Zinia was a rather intelligent one. She gazed at Han Shuo standing in the distance and continued, ¡°What we really should do now, is to try every means possible to rope him in. As long as he is with us, we will have everything!¡±

    ¡°You are right!¡± Bord immediate agreed and indicated to Crosius, ¡°Let¡¯s go, it¡¯s time to have a good chat with him!¡±

    Crosius nodded and without saying another word, the trio began flying towards Han Shuo. Before they got close, looking at Jasper from a distance, from that infinitely bashful appearance of Jasper¡¯s, Crosius knew that his treasured daughter had transformed from a girl to a woman!

    ¡°Those bloody shadows could harm our foes but it could also harm our friends, therefore I kept them away. Lord Crosius, would you take offense to that?¡± Han Shuo exined inly.

    ¡°No! Of course not!¡± Crosius immediately replied with a smile. Crosius now needed to curry favor with Han Shuo, so how would he dare offend Han Shuo?

 Chapter 548: Wherever You Go, Iâ€™ll Follow!

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, I, on behalf of Lord Manticole, thank you for assisting War Demon Valley!¡± As soon as Bord met Han Shuo, he performed the proper abyssal etiquette in extending his gratitude towards Han Shuo. He was extremely friendly in his approach.

    With the intention of locating the internar portal of this realm through Manticole, a Demon King of the Abyss realm, Han Shuo returned the pleasure with a smile and said, ¡°You¡¯re wee. For Lord Crosius to have provided me with such warm hospitality, as a Visiting Advisor to War Demon Valley, it was only fair that I resolved the crisis faced by War Demon Valley!¡±

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo is too polite,¡± Zinia said with a smile. She shot a re at Crosius before she continued to Han Shuo, ¡°Given Mister Han Shuo¡¯s strength, to be merely a Visiting Advisor in War Demon Valley is a great insult to your extraordinary talent. Therefore, Bord and I will immediately rmend Mister Han Shuo to the Lord. With the Lord¡¯s generosity towards his friends, I believe that he will certainly provide you the answers to all the questions you have about the internar portal.¡±

    ¡°Many thanks then. Hmm, now that War Demon Valley¡¯s crisis has pretty much been resolved, I see no point in sticking around in War Demon Valley any longer. Lord Crosius, if you don¡¯t mind, I¡¯m heading to ck Jade City with the two Lords,¡± announced Han Shuo.

    ¡°Of course I wouldn¡¯t mind. For a being like Mister Han Shuo to stay in my War Demon Valley as a Visiting Advisor really is an injustice to you. Besides, Mister Han Shuo still has important matters to attend to. As your friend, I must not hold you back from doing greater things.¡± Crosius clearly understood that War Demon Valley couldn¡¯t possibly offer enough for an existence who could y three Shadow Warriors without breaking a sweat. When such a character arrived at ck Jade City, glory, honor, riches and beauties would all be within an arm¡¯s reach. Perhaps, he could even need to rely on Han Shuo¡¯s help in the future. As the one that wielded War Demon Valley, Crosius was not oblivious to the importance of maintaining a good rtionship with Han Shuo.

    ¡°Then, many thanks to Lord Crosius,¡± Han Shuo grinned. But soon enough, the brows on his face bunched towards the center when the thought of Jasper flooded his memory. He turned to her and asked, ¡°Jasper, erm, about this, what are you going to do?¡±

    Han Shuo suddenly recalled that Jasper, Hemanna, and Sylph, all threedies had had sexual rtions with him, and were all his women. When Han Shuo was still in the Carnal Realm, he was rash with his actions and paid little regards to possible consequences in the future. But now that his heart had been pacified, he had no choice but to take the threedies into consideration.

    In any case, this Abyss realm would never be Han Shuo¡¯s home. He would return to Profound Continent sooner orter. Han Shuo didn¡¯t mind taking the three aliendies back to Profound Continent. However, as the threedies were born and bred in the Abyss realm, as to whether or not they would even think about leaving their nativend and follow Han Shuo to apletely unfamiliar world, he really wasn¡¯t so sure.

    ¡°You are my man! Wherever you go, I¡¯ll follow!¡± Jasper said with utmost resolution and not a second of hesitation, shattering Han Shuo¡¯s expectations.

    ¡°Jasper, you need to think about this carefully. I did not originate from the Abyss realm. The reason I am departing to ck Jade City is to find a way to leave the Abyss realm. If you were to follow me, you might never to return here. Are you sure that you will follow beside me?¡± Han Shuo asked, astonished at Jasper¡¯s conviction.

    ¡°Jass!¡± Before Jasper could open her mouth, Crosius, who had been thinking of how to curry favor with Han Shuo all the while, suddenly turned dull and called out Jasper¡¯s pet name. He was visibly reluctant to part with Jasper, but he stammered and couldn¡¯t say a word as he stared at her.

    Although he had entrusted Jasper to Han Shuo, as her father, Crosius was in no way keen on never being able to see his daughter ever again. In the beginning, Crosius had only been thinking about fawning on Han Shuo and did not actually think of this as a potential issue. But now, having heard Han Shuo¡¯s words and recalling Han Shuo¡¯s miraculousness, Crosius suddenly felt as though he was about to lose his only daughter, setting his heart in great disarray.

    ¡°My honored father, please forgive me. I choose to follow him. It is only with him that I can truly know what happiness is. Father, please forgive your daughter for being unfilial!¡± Jasper was no fool. From the moment she learned of Han Shuo¡¯s identity and his intention of entering War Demon Valley, she knew that once she got together with Han Shuo, she would need to decide sooner orter. In fact, she had made up her mind right when she epted Han Shuo. Therefore, Jasper did not hesitate for long before she said these words. Her eyes, however, we¡¯re still wet with the sadness and sorrow of parting.

    Crosius shook his head and let out a sigh before squeezing out an unsightly smile. He looked at his child, who had just transformed from a girl to a woman, and said, ¡°I understand. It¡¯s okay. Daddy won¡¯t stop you. I only hope that, if you really leave for Han Shuo¡¯s world, you will find some time toe back and pay your old man a visit!¡±

    ¡°Understood. As long as the possibility exists, I wille back to see you, father.¡± At these words, her eyes reddened. Although she had made this decision long ago, when it came time to actually leave the only family member she had, she couldn¡¯t quite maintain a peaceful heart.

    Just like Jasper, the white of Crosius¡¯ eyes were tinted pink. He stared deeply and fixedly at Jasper with a helpless smile, as though he was trying to imprint the image of Jasper¡¯s face deep within his memory forever.

    ¡°If I can find the way back to my world, then I should be able toe back here as well. Don¡¯t worry, if it¡¯s possible, I will return to this Abyss realm. This ce seems to suit me alot,¡± Han Shuo soothed the two when he suddenly thought of his Cemetery of Death.

    ¡°Alright, alright, if Mister Han Shuo does not mind, please set off with us right away. The journey from here to ck Jade City will require some time. I believe that the Lord will definitely be very interested in Mister Han Shuo,¡± Bord said smilingly.

    ¡°Hang on, there are two more women. I will take a trip to my manor and ask for their opinions,¡± Han Shuo said apologetically. When he thought of Hemanna and Sylph, his heart instantly filled with some warmth. The two gifteddies could bring Han Shuo pleasure and joy that he had never experienced before. Han Shuo really was rather reluctant to part with them.

    ¡°No problem. We will just go there with you. Once you have settled the matter, we will set out together right there,¡± Zinia said smilingly. She thought to herself, This chap is quite the womanizer. He has only been in War Demon Valley for several days, and he has already fooled around with three beautifuldies. It seems that I must inform the Lord at ck Jade City about this personality of his. If we were to put some effort into this aspect, this guy might be so indulged in pleasure that he would stay in ck Jade City forever.

    Han Shuo could tell how much Bord and Zinia valued him just from their attitude. He nodded with a smile on his face and turned to look at Crosius. After thinking for a moment, he took out a space ring, handed it Crosius, and said, ¡°This space ring is for you. It can hold a lot of items. Also, inside the space ring, there¡¯s a staff that can amplify earth element. As you are cultivating the earth element energy, you can try using it. It might even provide you with some revtion in your cultivation.¡±

    Afterward, Han Shuo gave a short once through on how to operate the space ring. As an expert in the realm of basegod, Crosius¡¯ body and soul hadpletely be one with the element of earth, and he only needed a slight bit of reminder from Han Shuo before immediately sensing the faint mental strength he had. With that, he very easily unlocked the space ring.

    ¡°What arge space! This ring is truly miraculous!¡± Although Crosius¡¯ mental strength was feeble, but once it entered the space ring, he immediately understood the wonderful ability of the space ring. He gasped.

    ¡°That mental strength you felt, as long as you take the time and effort to carefully meditate andprehend it, it will form wonderful bond with your soul, allowing you to use the element of earth in a special way,¡± Han Shuo reminded Crosius.

    Crosius had been, afterall, very generous andvish during the days Han Shuo stayed at War Demon Valley, giving Han Shuo the best treatment. In the end, even his only daughter, Jasper, was gifted to Han Shuo so willingly ¨C as willingly as anyone could have let go of their prized daughter, anyway. Hence, Han Shuo felt somewhat apologetic, and decided to return a bit of the favor.

    ¡°Magical ring! That¡¯s a magical ring!¡± Bord cried out as he stared at Crosius¡¯s space ring in disbelief.

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo stared impressed for a moment before asking, ¡°You know about the functions of a space ring?¡±

    ¡°Of course. Lord Manticole has a magical ring as well. It can store many things. His Lordship would always wear it and treat it like a precious treasure. There¡¯s no mistake about it!¡± Bord exined as he looked at Crosius with envy.

    Although Bord referred to it differently, Han Shuo could tell that he indeed understood the uses of a space ring. Manufacturing a space ring required not just a deep understanding of the edict of space but also some knowledge of alchemy as well as some unique materials.

    Although the Abyss realm was huge, the term ¡®alchemy¡¯ had never been heard there before. In addition, those materials required to construct a space ring did not seem to exist in this world. Thus, even if there were existences in the Abyss realm that cultivated in the edict of space, it would be extremely difficult or even impossible to fabricate a space ring. To hear that Manticole, this Demon King, was actually in possession of a space ring, immediately gave Han Shuo some ideas.

    ¡°Thank you!¡± Crosius hastily expressed his gratitude after learning of the wonderful abilities of a space ring.

    ¡°You¡¯re wee!¡± Han Shuo looked at Crosius onest time, nodded his head, and left with Bord, Zinia, and Jasper.

    Hemanna and Sylph, just like Jasper, were absolutely determined to follow beside Han Shuo and leave War Demon Valley with him.

 Chapter 549: Son, Do You Want Power?

    Three dayster, at ck Jade City.

    Skyscrapers that more than brushed the clouds crowded every corner of the grid. The streets were bustling with activity, all kinds of abyssal beingsing and going. War Demon Valley really was just a small vigepared to ck Jade City where Demon King Manticole resided.

    All around were buildings like the giants¡¯ beanstalk. Among them, structures ranging in the hundreds of meters in height were a regrity. Along his journey, Han Shuo had seen at least a dozen abyssal creatures with bodies even more enormous than that of the Primordius Dragon.

    Anyone in this ce would feel insignificant and minute. Hemanna, Sylph, and even Jasper, someone who enjoyed a rather high status in War Demon Valley, all appeared rather reserved and cautious once they arrived at ck Jade City. They also appeared to be more revering,ing from their small hill vige.

    When thesedies arrived at ck Jade City, they were not unlike girls back on Earth who came to the city from the countryside for the first time. They were obviously ufortable and awkward, deeply afraid that any of their actions could negatively affect Han Shuo in some way. However, apart from reverence, the trio ofdies carried faint excitement in their eyes.

    ck Jade City was one of the five major capital cities of the Abyss realm. Manticole, one of the five overlords of the Abyss lived in this city. ck Jade City was definitely considered to be an extremely prosperous city within the Abyss realm. For Jasper, Hemanna, and Sylph,ing to such a ce had filled their hearts with not just veneration but also expectation.

    ¡°Wee to ck Jade City, haha. Mister Han Shuo, how do you feel about the big city?¡± Bord beamed at Han Shuo. Bord had been extremely friendly towards Han Shuo throughout the journey.

    ¡°Huge! Everything is huge!¡± The environment all around, from the buildings to their inhabitants, gave Han Shuo precisely this impression. Perhaps it was due to the sheer sizes of the beings of the Abyss that the structures were so gargantuan. If not for all those abyssal creatures moving all around the city, Han Shuo would have mistaken the area for a mountain range.

    ¡°Precisely. ck Jade City is that magnificent. Look, that¡¯s Demon King¡¯s Pce, thousand of meters tall ¨C that is where Lord Manticole lives. Hehe, the people of the Abyss are fond of rough and simple structures. Therefore, the taller and bigger the building, the more befitting it is in manifesting the status of our Lord,¡± Bord exined proudly.

    Han Shuo raised his head and gazed at the grand scene presented to him. He discovered that the Demon King¡¯s Pce was indeed the tallest building in ck Jade City. The majestic and magnificent Demon King¡¯s Pce looked like a malevolent Demon God proudly standing over the world. The structure gave off a disdainful demeanor on all forms of life, suffocating any observer with an indescribable pressure and feeling of reverence in the heart.

    ¡°Oh!¡± Han Shuo gasped. His brows were deeply furrowed. This magnificent Demon King¡¯s Pce had a natural fierce air to it. Piercing the blue dome of the heavens, the structure had lumps of incredibly dense ck mist lingering all around it. The dark mist was congealed using the element of darkness and contained defensive energies.

    With just one look, Han Shuo was certain that this Demon King¡¯s Pce wasn¡¯t as simple as it seemed. That energy it contained must have been for defensive attacks. Those clouds of mist as dark as ink congealed from the element of darkness. Merely from the outer appearance of the Demon King¡¯s Pce, Han Shuo could ascertain that of the eight elements, Demon King Manticole had to be cultivating the element of darkness.

    ¡°Every time I look at the Demon King¡¯s Pce, I get a feeling of reverence from the bottom of my heart. The pressure justes about on its own. Truly mystical!¡± Zinia mumbled as she raised her head, gazing at the Demon King¡¯s Pce.

    Han Shuo¡¯s lips curved to reveal a hard to discern smirk, thinking to himself that this pce had actually been altered by Demon King Manticole using divine energy. Those without a certain level of strength wouldn¡¯t be able to understand the effect of that mysterious energy around the Demon King¡¯s Pce. Perhaps Manticole, as the spiritual leader they believed in, used this method to will the popce into handing their convictions to him.

    ¡°Han Shuo, this ce truly is grandiose!¡± Hemanna eximed in admiration.

    ¡°It really is. We finally got the chance to visit the Demon King¡¯s City. Hehe, it indeed enjoys a well-deserved reputation!¡± Hemanna agreed.

    In the Abyss realm, one could not simply leave and relocate to another district without good reason. In particr, moving from a low level town to a big city, was absolutely impermissible. As it was the first time Hemanna, Sylph, and Jasper, thesedies who had grown up in War Demon Valley, had visited ck Jade City, it was only natural that they would feel excited and thrilled.

    ¡°Alright Mister Han Shuo, the two of us shall make a move now to have an audience with the Lord. You and yourdies may explore the surrounding areas for the moment. Later, as soon as the Lordmands, we wille over and take you to meet Him!¡± Bord exined.

    ¡°Sure, go about your business,¡± Bord and Zinia had been fawning all over Han Shuo throughout the journey, and Han Shuo actually found the couple quite agreeable. Besides, this ck Jade City indeed was very magnificent and Han Shuo was interested in finding out what the city had in store. Therefore, he immediately agreed to the duo.

    Just as the couple was leaving, a question popped up in Hemanna¡¯s head, ¡°But ck Jade City is huge, what if you can¡¯t find us?¡±

    Zinia immediately let out a condescending chuckle and said, ¡°Don¡¯t worry about that, little girl. It couldn¡¯t be any simpler for us ck Jade Guards to locate a person within ck Jade City, especially since you are all strangers to this city!¡±

    ck Jade Guards, under themand of Manticole, were simr to Gnder¡¯s trump card Shadow Warriors in that they directly answered to their respective Demon Kings. Every one of them was a demon-grade expert wielding tremendous power and influence. Although there weren¡¯t many ck Jade Guards, each and every one of them possessed countless subordinates. The ck Jade Guards were responsible for the safety of the entire ck Jade City, so not even an ant could evade their eyes and ears.

    ¡°Oh, I see!¡± Hemanna did not have any more questions after listening to Zinia¡¯s exnation. There were a few traces of fear in thedies¡¯ eyes. They had long heard of the ck Jade Guards¡¯ reputation. Just like the Shadow Warriors, the ck Jade Guards was an extremely formidable organization. The ck Jade Guards were not in the least inferior to the Shadow Warriors in terms of ruthlessness, something well known by the popce under the rule of other Demon Kings.

    ¡°Ok, Mister Han Shuo,dies, please enjoy yourselves around ck Jade City. The two of us must report back to the Lord as soon as possible,¡± Bord bid his goodbye to Han Shuo before scurrying off with Zinia towards the Demon King¡¯s Pce that was wrapped in divine energy.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go. We shall roam around this ck Jade City,¡± after Bord and Zinia left, Han Shuo along with the threedies started their unhurried loaf about the incredibly wide streets.

    The ck Jade City was huge, far bigger than Han Shuo had imagined! After Han Shuo unfolded his consciousness, he discovered that the ck Jade City was at least ten times bigger than Ossen City of Lancelot Empire back on Profound Continent. All kinds of rare goods that he had never seen before could be found in its various regions. There were all kinds of alien creatures walking about the streets of ck Jade City. Some of them were indistinguishable from rocks, and some even looked like trees. It waspletely foreign to him.

    The threedies were very intrigued as well and had been chattering continuously along the way. As Hemanna and Sylph had taken themselves as ve servants to begin with, the two did not feel upset when Jasper stepped into the picture. On the contrary, they got along well with her.

    As the group of them had not an inkling about ck Jade City, their curiosities were churning. Whenever they saw anything interesting, they would linger on and investigate. Voices of awe and amazement never stopped echoing from their mouths.

    A spiteful screech suddenly stung Han Shuo¡¯s ears. ¡°Half-breed, how dare youe out of your cave and loiter on the streets! Courting death!¡±

    Shooting a nce in the direction of that voice, Han Shuo discovered that five or six alien teenagers had forced another teenager to a corner. They were punching and kicking at him, all the while spitting bloody insults at this youth.

    The boy wore a numbed expression, his body curled up, hands over his head, and uttered not a word as he let the few others beat him up. The heavy thuds of the kicks left red marks on his body, soon to turn purple and puffy. Although he was letting himself suffer their beating, nheless, the rancor showing in his pair of eyes was bone-chillingly cold.

    From the looks of it, this teenager ought to have developed an ingrained hatred towards the few alien teenagers. However, as he didn¡¯t possess much strength, all he could do was to let them pound him without giving the slightest resistance, firmly holding onto his skull to avoid brain damage.

    There were bound to be many of such scenes of bullying in any material ne. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t one who was fond of meddling in other people¡¯s business. Besides, they were in the Abyss where only the fittest survived. It was adapt or die.

    Gradually, this youth, bitter resentment showing in his eyes, seemed to no longer be able to withstand the unending rounds of beating. Even his two hands had none left in them to shield his head anymore. It seemed as though in just another moment, he would be beaten to death.

    Han Shuo was about to pull the threedies away, but suddenly, he saw something ¨C the dark red blood within this youth¡¯s body seemed as though it wanted to seep out through his pores. Han Shuo made no effort in masking his astonishment. Then, as though he suddenly remembered something, Han Shuo examined the youth¡¯s body with his consciousness. He was jolted and blurted out, ¡°Body of Sanguis!¡±

    ¡°What?¡± Jasper stared puzzled at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo did not reply. His body transformed into a bolt, passed throughyers of people, and appeared before that curled up youngster in an instant. He extended his big hand, grasped, and lifted this scrawny young one. The boy¡¯s eyes were filled with stubborn resentment even on the verge of death. In a deep voice, Han Shuo asked, ¡°Son, do you want power?¡±

 Chapter 550: Taking In an Apprentice

    ¡°Power... power...¡± the youngster stammered, his pair of red pupils full of thirst.

    Han Shuo¡¯s abrupt intrusion caught his abusers off guard. After they came to their senses, the ring leader questioned Han Shuo, ¡°Who, who are you?¡±

    In Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, the few teenagers were characters so puny that he could annihte them with just a wave of his hand. He did not respond to their questioning but merely focused on that youngster he held up with his arms.

    Jaspernded, along with Hemanna and Sylph. ¡°Han Shuo, what¡¯s the matter?¡± She looked at Han Shuo gravely, and was rather clueless about his actions.

    Such things couldn¡¯t have been moremon in the Abyss realm. Some people began gathering around to watch when they discovered the unusual change in this area. While some found it interesting that anyone would interfere, some were mesmerized by the beauty of Jasper, Hemanna, and Sylph.

    ¡°Ay! Three beautifuldies!¡± The ringleader teenager turned to a delighted expression and impudently catcalled them. With his indecent and frivolous appearance, he began scanning the stunning bodies of the threedies with his eyes.

    ¡°Son, do you want power?¡± Han Shuo ignored the disturbances around him and continued to question the stubborn youngster.

    ¡°Of course, of course I want power. But, can you give me that?¡± the youngster said after he gradually recovered some strength with his deep red eyes staring nkly at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo smiled and put down the kid. He then extended his hand and ced it over the youngster¡¯s nape. A few strands of demonic yuan shot out and entered the youngster¡¯s body and they started circting in mysterious orbits.

    After Han Shuo injected his demonic yuan, the youngster¡¯s blood red body suddenly turned even more blood red. A faints stench of blood began overspilling from his body, as though his fresh blood were overflowing from every pore in his skin.

    There¡¯s no mistake, this is indeed a Body of Sanguis, Han Shuo thought. It was amon of those who were Sanguis bodied that, when they were furious and their emotions were out of control, the blood in their bodies would circte rapidly, making them look as though they were sprinkled with blood. People with this kind of unique body were the best choice of people to cultivate in Bloodgod Mantra. They could cultivate Bloodgod Mantra to an extremely high realm within a short period of time.

    Han Shuo understood the details and particrs of Bloodgod Mantra from Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories. Back then, standing at the pinnacle of demonic arts, Chu Cang Lan once had a subordinate expert that cultivated in Bloodgod Mantra. That subordinate of his possessed great strength. However, as the person was not Sanguis bodied, no matter how assiduously he cultivated, he couldn¡¯t cultivate Bloodgod Mantra to the ultimate level.

    The legends had it that only those with a Body of Sanguis could attain the pinnacle in Bloodgod Mantra to be a ¡®Blood Demon¡¯. However, it was very hard to find anyone with a Body of Sanguis. Back then, Chu Cang Lan had actually tried to seek one with a Body of Sanguis so that he could teach the Bloodgod Mantra, thereby raising a mighty overlord that would be under his control. But unfortunately for him, he never could find any.

    Who would have expected that in this Abyss realm, Han Shuo would actuallye across a teenager with the Body of Sanguis. This youngster was firm and determined by nature. He was like a rough diamond, waiting to be refined and polished. If he cultivated in Bloodgod Mantra, given the Body of Sanguis he possessed, he definitely could progress at lightning speed and be an expert not to be belittled.

    Han Shuo suddenly withdrew his hand. This youngster was on the verge of full recovery. His originally powerless eyes were filled with excitement as he stared fixedly at Han Shuo and asked, ¡°Can, can you really give me power?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded endearingly, ¡°Be my apprentice, and I shall give you power ¨C power beyond your imagination!¡±

    ¡°But, I have tried each and every one of the eight elemental energies, but I couldn¡¯t cultivate in any of them. Can I really possess power?¡± The youngster still had some doubts. No matter how hard he tried, that peculiar body of his could not possess strength powerful enough for him to exact vengeance.

    This teenager was just fifteen or sixteen years old, but already possessed such unyielding willpower. In Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, he truly was a diamond in the rough. Once he imparted the Bloodgod Mantra unto this youngster, he would undoubtedly soar and excel in the world. Han Shuo looked at the boy and smiled. ¡°Your unusual body is definitely not suitable for cultivating in any of the eight elemental forces. But with your natural endowments, even wider skies await you. The eight elemental energies and four edictal forces weren¡¯t all that there was in this world. Be my apprentice, and you will understand!¡±

    ¡°Oi! You over there, keep your nose out of our business!¡± the teenage ringleader suddenly threatened.

    Han Shuo groaned and turned back to nce at the teenagers, with killing intent spreading from his body like smoke. In an instant, the surrounding area was shrouded by a most terrifying sinister energy.

    The eyes on those arrogant teenagers grew with ineffable dread. That sinister energy spreading from Han Shuo¡¯s body shocked them to the point of quivering and they dared not to utter a word.

    It wasn¡¯t just the few bullies. Those bystanders who had looked on with excitement, weak or strong, were all frightened stiff. Under the cold, attentive gaze of Han Shuo¡¯s, not one of them had the nerve to leave the area, but looked at Han Shuo with begging eyes, hoping that he would spare their frail and feeble lives.

    ¡°Get lost!¡± Han Shuo shouted.

    Having heard Han Shuo¡¯s words, the few teenagers dared not to stay in that ce a moment longer and left, drenched in cold sweat. As did the onlookers. No matter their strengths, they were too threatened to remain there and continue watching, and swiftly evacuated.

    ¡°Who is that guy? What a frightening aura!¡±

    ¡°No idea. But he wasn¡¯t a familiar face, so he must be a foreign expert. Even I, as a level-three Destroyer, dared not to move a muscle. He is a true expert!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s get a move on... I don¡¯t even have the courage to talk when I look at him!¡±

    After those people fled in panic, Han Shuo turned to the scrawny boy and said, ¡°Those guys who bullied you ought to be killed at your very own hands, and I will give you the opportunity to do just that!¡±

    Thud! The boy dropped to his knees and bowed to Han Shuo at once. He eximed in a deep voice, ¡°Thank you, master!¡±

    The kid may have been weak, but he was no dimwit. The strength that Han Shuo suddenly revealed was terrifying beyond his imagination. Especially, when he noticed characters that were usually high up were shocked frozen by that energy Han Shuo demonstrated. He no longer hesitated and promptly decided to kowtow and ept this sinisterly powerful stranger as his master.

    ¡°Get up. I don¡¯t care what your name was before, but from this day forth, you will be called Sanguis!¡± Han Shuo nodded satisfyingly and pointed to his three mistresses beside him, and said, ¡°They are your masters as well!¡±

    Thud! Thud! Thud! Sanguis bowed another three times before he stood back up and respectfully saluted towards Jasper, Hemanna, and Sylph. He greeted thedies one by one, yelling, ¡°Master.¡±

    Jasper, Hemanna, and Sylph calmly acknowledged Sanguis¡¯ appetion. But soon after, the three exchanged nces with each other and cast their puzzled gazes towards Han Shuo, clueless why Han Shuo would so suddenly want to take in an apprentice.

    ¡°Sanguis, do you have any close rtives?¡± Han Shuo knew next to nothing about this apprentice of his. Now that Sanguis had formally be an apprentice to Han Shuo, it was time to ask about Sanguis¡¯ origins.

    Sanguis¡¯ face turned sad, with eyes turning deep red. In a low voice, he said, ¡°No I don¡¯t. My mother had recently died of illness, and I had yet to bury her body.¡±

    Sanguis then raised his head and to look at Han Shuo before he continued, ¡°My father was once a mighty warrior, but he died in battle long ago. My parents were of two different races. Since birth, my body has been innately different from that of a regr person, and I couldn¡¯t cultivate in any elemental energy. For many years, my mother and I had been relying upon each other for survival. Our days were filled with hardship and suffering. Because I cannot cultivate in any elemental energy, others called me garbage, cripple, half-breed, and so on. I had long gotten used to being bullied and humiliated.

    Those guys earlier, their families used to be troops under my father¡¯smand. Before my father died, they would even deliberately fawn on me, and would never dare say a thing about me. But once my father died, they all turned extremely unkind and mean. Even my mother suffered some very horrible treatment. In fact, her death had everything to do with those bastards.¡±

    At this point, Sanguis¡¯ eyes turned blood red again. His body seemed to be concealing a ruthless and savage beast. Although the beast was ferocious and vigorous, it was firmly tied down and restrained, unable to unleash its savagery.

    ¡°Be at ease. From my hand, I will let you obtain great strength. It wouldn¡¯t take long before every one of those people who once oppressed you and your mother suffer a hundred times the price for what they did!¡± Han Shuo reassured to this new apprentice of his.

    ¡°Master, give me strength! I want strength! I want strength mighty enough to kill them all!¡± Sanguis shouted with extreme thirst for power as he looked deeply at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Calm down, do not think of anything, open up your soul,¡± Han Shuo said with a low voice. He suddenly extended his left hand and gently ced it on Sanguis¡¯ forehead. The most fundamental cultivation method of Bloodgod Mantra was branded on Sanguis¡¯ memories.

    ¡°These are the fundamentals of Bloodgod Mantra. Practice them carefully. As soon as you grasp all the basic cultivation methods, you will be able to take retribution to your arch enemies!¡± Han Shuo smiled after he withdrew his hand. As for the moment, Han Shuo didn¡¯t know if he could really be at ease with this newly taken apprentice of his, in addition to not wanting him to get too greedy, as a precaution, he did not impart Sanguis with theplete set of Bloodgod Mantra.

    Sanguis¡¯ eyes sparkled with excitement. Immediately, he kneeled on the ground, still quivering. After giving Han Shuo three resounding bows, he said emotionally, ¡°Master, this cultivation method seems as though it was specially created for me. It¡¯s magical!¡±

    Han Shuo smiled and nodded, but did not speak.

 Chapter 551: Kill These Clowns for Me!

    Kill These Clowns for Me!

    ck Jade City, Thalia District.

    The party came to a small and dpidated house made of stone that contained little more than a few items of crude furniture; a table, a chair, a bed, and an iron cooking pot. On that bed of stone, a woman that had long gone without a trace of life silentlyy.

    Sanguis took light steps into the room and knelt before his mother¡¯s stone bed. After a heartfelt round of prayer, Sanguis stood up emotionless, turned to Han Shuo, and said, ¡°Master, I wish to bury my mother¡¯s body!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded. Without saying another word, he took out a few pieces of pitch-ck ¡®ck stone coins¡¯ from his space ring and ced it on the crack-lined table at the center of the room.

    Whichever material ne one was on, burying the dead was not for the penniless. The Abyss realm was no exception. The reason Sanguis had left home for the streets was precisely to find the funds to properly bury his mother. But he chanced upon his ¡®old friends¡¯ and was nearly beaten to death.

    Had he not met Han Shuo, this impoverished child wouldn¡¯t have gathered enough money for a burial even when his mother¡¯s body had rotten. Towards this newly known master of his, Sanguis did not behave overly humble. After he saw the enormous sum of ck stone coins Han Shuo ced on the stone table, Sanguis only said in a dull voice, ¡°Thank you master.¡±

    In the Abyss realm, ck stone coins were of the greatest denomination in cirction. One coin could be exchanged for ten blue stone coins, or for a hundred pieces of yellow stone coin. In normal circumstances, just a few blue stone coins were enough for a basic ceremony. Those pieces of ck stone coin Han Shuo put down were definitely more than enough for Sanguis to squander.

    ¡°Alright, you go take care of your matters.¡± Han Shuo nodded, looked at his threedies standing outside the door, and apathetically exited.

    ¡°With ck stone coins, it wouldn¡¯t take long toplete,¡± Sanguis replied. After he followed Han Shuo out of the room and said, ¡°Master, masters, please wait here for a while. I need to leave for a moment and will be back very soon,¡±

    ¡°Go ahead,¡± Han Shuo agreed.

    With the few pieces of ck stone coins, Sanguis bolted off. This youngster had a strong and even morbid thirst for power. Even since obtaining the foundation cultivation methods of Bloodgod Mantra, he had been persistently thinking about the cultivation methods. Han Shuo could make that out from his constantly knitted brows and abnormalities of the blood inside his body.

    ¡°Han Shuo, this kid, he does have very tenacious willpower. But, can he really be the powerful expert to match your expectations?¡± Jasper asked with gently creased brows as she watched Sanguis leaving.

    ¡°Yeah, he said that he couldn¡¯t cultivate in any of the eight elemental energies or four edictal forces. In the Abyss, those would can¡¯t cultivate in any of these twelve energies definitely are, just like he said himself, rubbish. How could such a person also possess mighty strength?¡± Sylph too was skeptical. Having grown up in the Abyss realm, they did not seem too optimistic about this youngster.

    Han Shuo put on the smile of an insightful man, turned his eyes to the threedies, and said, ¡°The eight elemental energies and four edictal forces are not the universal cultivation pathways for everyone. Some are gifted and different from birth, and destined for the unbeaten path. If Sanguis hadn¡¯te across me, he might remain mediocre his whole life. But, since he was so fortunate for us to have met, it is a matter of course that he would be an outstanding expert in the future.¡±

    The threedies were astonished at Han Shuo¡¯s exnation. After exchanging nces with each other, Jasper gave a smile and said, ¡°I believe you. Hehe, there are indeed many magical things about you. Perhaps it is true that only by meeting you could Sanguis ever expect to excel in life.¡±

    Han Shuo was actually quite satisfied with this newly adopted apprentice of his. As he didn¡¯t have any business to deal with, Han Shuo decided to stay there with his three women. He watched on as Sanguis got busy arranging his mother¡¯s funeral.

    Han Shuo and his threedies had actually offered to help Sanguis with the burial. However, that was tactfully declined by Sanguis. He insisted on doing it alone and finishing his mother¡¯s funeral by himself. From this, it was reasonable to say that Sanguis was a filial son.

    The Abyss realm wasn¡¯t one for overly borate ceremonies when burying the deceased. Thanks to the few pieces of ck stone coins, Sanguis had properlypleted his mother¡¯s burial in less than half a day. Afterpleting all the matters and a round of griefful weeping, Sanguis¡¯ heart finally regained tranquility. He returned to that tiny stone house.

    ¡°Master, thank you!¡± Sanguis gave Han Shuo another bow as an expression of his gratitude.

    ¡°Get up. Don¡¯t be so courteous with me in the future,¡± Han Shuo replied calmly. After Sanguis stood up, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness inspected his body once through. With his brows in a knit, he said, ¡°About the cultivation of the Bloodgod Mantra, if there¡¯s anything you are not clear about, you must ask me. Do not ever attempt to cultivate before you are absolutely clear about a technique. The cultivation of demonic arts is very dangerous. Any misstep might cause you to sink into an irreversible state with no hope of salvation. I do not wish to lose an apprentice right after receiving one.¡±

    Other than being tenacious in character, Sanguis was also somewhat umunicative. Having observed him all this while, Han Shuo noticed that Sanguis didn¡¯t seem to like asking others for guidance. In fact, as he silently deciphered the Bloodgod Mantra that Han Shuo left in his soul, he had even started with practicing some of those simpler techniques.

    Although Han Shuo did not personally cultivate in Bloodgod Mantra himself, nor would he be able to like Sanguis, Han Shuo¡¯s mind contained all theprehension and memories about demonic arts, which he obtained from Chu Cang Lan. As Sanguis did not have any experience with demonic arts, Han Shuo was afraid that something might go wrong with Sanguis exploring the techniques on his own.

    After hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, Sanguis revealed a somewhat embarrassed expression, and said, ¡°Oh, so that¡¯s the case. Erm, master, there indeed are many things that I¡¯m not clear about.¡±

    ¡°This type of martial arts ispletely distinct from those twelve energies that you know of. If you could cultivate without one bit of hindrance knowing merely the cultivation methods, you would have my salute. Speak. Whatever questions you have, I will exin to you in detail,¡± Han Shuo said smilingly. Having cultivated his demonic arts to this realm, in addition to the memories left by Chu Cang Lan, even if Han Shuo didn¡¯t cultivate in Bloodgod Mantra, he would be able to help Sanguis in resolving the problems he faced in his cultivation.

    Bloodgod Mantra and God ying Devil Path were the same in that they were branches of demonic arts. These branching martial arts would allow one to obtain substantial progress within a short amount of time. Especially Sanguis, someone of Sanguis kind would make even faster progress. However, even if Sanguis hade to master Bloodgod Mantra and be a so-called Blood Demon, it would still be hard for him to surpass Han Shuo who cultivated in the mainstream demonic arts.

    With Han Shuo¡¯s reminder, Sanguis no longer kept the troubles he faced to himself and sought rification from Han Shuo on all the things he did not understand one by one. Han Shuo generously answered all the question Sanguis had and illuminated for him a bright pathway for his cultivation.

    Sanguis had proved himself to be the most suitable candidate for practicing Bloodgod Mantra. After he figured out the cultivation methods under Han Shuo¡¯s guidance, it didn¡¯t take long before he could truly control the blood within his body and operate the energy in his body in ordance with the unique cultivation technique of Bloodgod Mantra.

    The power that Sanguis had been so longing for had in fact always been inside of himself. More precisely, his own blood. However, he previously did not know how to utilize this type of energy, and therefore the energy in his body could not be released. When Sanguis cultivates in ordance with Bloodgod Mantra, the blood within his body circting, he would look blood red on every inch of his skin.

    When Han Shuo saw that Sanguis seemed to have sunken into the wonderful meditative-state in his cultivation, he nodded, feeling satisfied with his apprentice¡¯s wits and effort. As not to disturb Sanguis, Han Shuo silently indicated to his threedies and walked out of the little stone house with them. Apart from chit-chatting, Han Shuo would educate Jasper on some of her misconceptions on the cultivation of mental strength.

    With the help of Han Shuo, a godly existence, both Hemanna and Sylph had started to meditate using the same method that Jasper had used to gain mental strength, attempting to sense the presence of this mysterious energy within the brain. Of the two, Sylph had even managed to sense the presence of mental strength ahead of Hemanna, but Hemanna wasn¡¯t far behind and was on the verge of a breakthrough.

    ¡°My Lord, that enemy spy is in there. I¡¯m certain,¡± a familiar voice suddenly entered Han Shuo¡¯s ears. After a short while, those few youngsters that were previously drenched with cold sweat after receiving a great shock from Han Shuo now carried a heavy air of arrogance as well as an expert of level-one Demon strength to Han Shuo.

    Before this Demon, the few teenagers were full of respect and reverence. They obviously intended on using this Demon to take care of Han Shuo. Sanguis, who had entered a meditative state not long ago, walked out from his house after hearing the voice.

    The youngster turned somewhat cowardly when he saw Han Shuo. But when he recalled the origins of the person standing beside him, he suddenly regained his confidence, and daringly pointed at Han Shuo as he shouted, ¡°My Lord, there they are!¡±

    The other few kids that came with him all had their heads high and chests out. As they thought they had found someone they could rely on, all of them started to berate Han Shuo at the top of their tiny voices, as though they had forgotten their humiliating looks not long before.

    ¡°My apprentice, use that energy you justprehended to kill these clowns for me!¡± Han Shuo unenthusiastically instructed after giving them a disdainful cold smile.

    ¡°Yes, master!¡± Sanguis replied naturally. At the next moment, his lips curved to reveal a ruthless and evil grin, while his eyes began to redden crimson. He marched step by step towards those arch enemies of his as they continued to mock him.

 Chapter 552: A Real Man Ought to Kill!

    ¡°Freeze!¡± shouted the level one Demon. He shot an icy stare at Sanguis with askant eyes before turning to Han Shuo, saying, ¡°Who are you?¡±

    From the moment the Demon appeared, Han Shuo could recognize his identity from that insignia proudly woven on the front of his garb ¨C a ck Jade Guard!

    Only within the ck Jade City would a ck Jade Guard be so arrogant and cold! Although he didn¡¯t possess a high ranking among the ck Jade Guards, he could still strut around before others.

    ¡°Who am I? You will find out soon. But let me advise you this: do not to meddle with my business,¡± Han Shuo ignored the ck Jade Guard¡¯s instruction. He put on an unruffled smile and turned his gaze towards Sanguis, who had suddenly stopped following the Demon¡¯s threats. In a deep voice, he instructed, ¡°Kill these clowns. You don¡¯t have to worry about anything else.¡±

    It was obvious that Sanguis recognized the identity of this level-one Demon. In ck Jade City, the ck Jade Guards were tantamount to the arms of Demon King Manticole. Their strengths and influences could strike terror into anyone¡¯s heart, let alone Sanguis, who was at the very bottom of the abyssal society. That kind of fear and dread towards the ck Jade Guards was deeply rooted in his soul, and it definitely wasn¡¯t something that could be reversed in just a moment.

    Sanguis hesitantly looked at that ck Jade Guard whose face was grim and sinister, and turned his head to look at his most mysterious master, who was in no rush. After silently turning over in his mind, that stubborn spirit of his red up and his heart toughened like steel. Sanguis no longer batted an eye at that boisterous ck Jade Guard, but concentrated his resentful gaze at the ringleader of the group of teenagers. Once again, he marched forward, staunch and steady, making towards the answering bully with the disdainful expression.

    The Demon was obviously annoyed at Sanguis¡¯ utter disregard for him. ¡°You better not do anything stupid!¡± he threatened, eyebrows furrowed and angered by this rubbish living at the very bottom of society, but who, as he felt, couldn¡¯t tell chalk from cheese. His mind was thereby flooded with murderous thoughts. But before he could take action, a voiced statoed into his ears.

    In the next moment, a sinister, eerie sensation rushed into his body like tidewater, which made his blood run cold. This level-one Demon¡¯s body suddenly turned as stiff as frozen. His creased brows began to crumple. Traces of timidity could even be seen in his pair of ice-cold, merciless eyes. He looked at Han Shuo, eyes droopy at the outer corners and forehead crinkled, yet still wearing a smile, and said in a deep voice, ¡°A mighty expert indeed. Nevertheless, to offend us ck Jade Guards in ck Jade City, are you really itching to taste death?¡±

    That sinister energy restraining the level-one Demon did not wane to any degree as that mild and unruffled smile on Han Shuo¡¯s face suddenly disappeared and was reced with a rather evil and cunning smile. ¡°You are merely a little level-one Demon. You, in no way, stand for the whole body of ck Jade Guards. Hehe, I¡¯d advise you not to act blindly without first using that small brain of yours. Because even if I were to kill you, your death would be in vain. The ck Jade Guards will not choose to go to war against me over a small character like yourself!

    The look on this Demon¡¯s face flipped. He had discerned the meaning of Han Shuo¡¯s words. He demanded in a deep voice, ¡°Who exactly are you?¡±

    ¡°You will find out! But for now, you better behave yourself and be a good spectator!¡± Han Shuo said coldly as he red at the ck Jade Guard. Right after, he turned his attention to that new apprentice of his.

    Those teenagers, who had pit a significant amount of effort into inviting a level-one Demon to retaliate against Han Shuo, looked confounded at that ck Jade Guard who had remained motionless all the while. They couldn¡¯t understand why a ck Jade Guard whose authority was unchallenged in ck Jade City would suddenly be so restrained. Ant-like existences like them obviously couldn¡¯t sense that terrifying pressure that Han Shuo exerted on the ck Jade Guard.

    ¡°My... my Lord...¡± that leading youngster stammered, as though wanting to say something.

    He coldly and indifferently turned the other way. With his actions, this level-one Demon had dered his stance. They were merely a few low-level Abyssal Guards with no promising prospects, absolutely unworthy of a level-one Demon risking his own life just to protect them. Besides, that Sanguis kid might not have the strength to defeat them.

    This level-one Demon couldn¡¯t sense one bit of elemental energies or edictal forces from Sanguis¡¯ body. To say that a youngster who possessed not a single one of the twelve energies could kill those Abyssal Guard who possessed that little bit of strength would be an absolute pipe dream! This guy was brimming with curiosity at heart. Therefore, he wisely decided to step aside and be a spectator, and see for himself how Sanguis would attack.

    It was apparent that those teenagers weren¡¯t afraid of Sanguis, but of the person standing behind him. Therefore, when they were frightened gutless and knew not what to do, Han Shuo smilingly assured them, ¡°You kids don¡¯t have to worry about me. Things between you and my apprentice should be left to be resolved between yourselves. I will not get involved, not even if you killed him!¡±

    It was true that Han Shuo was extremely satisfied and fond of this new apprentice of his. However, demonic arts cultivators had to undergo cruel battles andbats in order to grow rapidly. The more fond Han Shuo grew of this apprentice, the less he could spoil him.

    A man, to survive, would surely need to face all kinds of danger by himself. For Sanguis to gain domineering strength and a ce above a world of experts, he had to pave his own road through bloodshed! This was a fact that not even Han Shuo could change!

    ¡°Really? You¡¯re not getting involved?¡± that youngster gleefully asked. He looked like a drowning man who suddenly grabbed onto a floating log.

    Han Shuo nodded and said affirmatively, ¡°I won¡¯t! If you guys manage to kill him, I will turn on my heels and walk away, right away!¡±

    ¡°Awesome!¡± the youngster was overjoyed. He raised his arms as a barricade, stopping the eager posse behind him, and heroically said, ¡°I don¡¯t need your help. I will finish this half-breed by myself!¡±

    ¡°Kiluya, I hate people calling a half-breed the most. From today onwards, all those who dare call me a half-breed will die in my hands ¨C and you, you shall be the first!¡± Sanguis¡¯ eyes were bloodshot. A faint reeking of blood began to seep from his body. After finallypleting his speech with his teeth gnashed, Sanguis suddenly stomped and leapt ahead like a savage leopard that had escaped from its cage!

    A pair of deep footprints were left on the ground where Sanguis had stepped. A streak of bloody shadows shot straight towards Kuliya. Sanguis¡¯ two hands, like weapons, reached the space before Kuliya¡¯s chest in the blink of an eye. The stench of blooding from Sanguis¡¯ body suddenly intensified to the point of stinging!

    Kuliya hastily lifted his two arms to his chest in an attempt at defending against the unexpected attack. Creak! In an instant, Kuliya felt intense paining from his arms. Pow! An enormous force struck his body. As though he had been rammed into by a ferocious beast, Kuliya was thrown high into the air. He made a loud thud when his body kissed the ground. Fresh blood began gushing from his mouth like a river while his curled body convulsed and twitched.

    That Demon¡¯s pupils constricted the moment Sanguis stomped his feet. His jaw fell to his knees like weights on a rubber band as he looked at Sanguis in disbelief, astonished by that burst of energy that erupted in Sanguis.

    That mysterious energy did not spring from any of the twelve types of energies, but it possessed an extremely vicious and terrifying impacting force; one thing that level-one Demon could clearly sense!

    He even discovered that, when Sanguis¡¯ two hands ruthlessly struck Kuliya¡¯s arms, blood within Sanguis¡¯ body seemed to have suddenly boiled over, rapidly circted and converged in his palms. Sanguis¡¯ palms that were originally white now looked as though they were drenched in blood, while the lines on his palms were more like bloody trenches.

    ¡°What, what martial art is this?¡± The level-one Demon had a head full of question marks. The glimmer in his eyes wave red on Sanguis with amazement and wonder.

    ¡°How, how is this possible?¡± said Kuliya after spitting yet another mouthful of blood. He stared at Sanguis with disbelief and fear smacked across his face as his body twitched all over the ground.

    ¡°Energy has always been within your body. You simply did not know how to make use of it!¡± said Sanguis when he suddenly recalled the words once uttered by Han Shuo. He couldn¡¯t help but turned to give Han Shuo a nod of gratitude.

    Grinning at Sanguis, Han Shuo said, ¡°A real man ought to kill! And even more so for my apprentices! If there¡¯s hatred in your heart, release it all! Do it in whatever way that would bring you the most satisfaction! Forget about how others would look at you. Even if everyone thought of you as a homicidal maniac, what then?¡±

    Before Sanguis¡¯ mother fell ill and die, she had been rather attractive. The elders of these teenagers standing before Sanguis had previously vited his mother. Following their in their parents¡¯ footsteps, these delinquents had even desecrated Sanguis¡¯ mother themselves. This hatred had always been buried deep in Sanguis¡¯ heart. The reason that Sanguis craved so much for strength was precisely for the purpose of making reprisals.

    After having received an encouragement from Han Shuo, Sanguis closed his eyes and took a deep breath. When he opened his eyes again, his bloodshot eyes were mad with the cruel intention to ughter. He flew to Kuliya as he struggled in pain, sat on him, and used his sharp fingernails to tear Kuliya¡¯s body into shreds while howling withughter.

    This Kuliya, who had disparaged Sanguis as a lowlife half-breed, now could only let out ear-numbing wails as Sanguis tortured him to his slow and painful death.

    After Sanguis finally got up, he turned his gaze to those teenagers who were frightened speechless, and said with a psychotic smile, ¡°Your turn!¡±

    ¡°I beg you, please, please spare us,¡± the few teenagers mechanically repeated those words as they were scared witless by Sanguis¡¯ brutal performance.

    ¡°These exact words, all the countless times I repeated them, but have you ever spared me?¡± Sanguisughed like a lunatic. In the same fashion as a terrible beast, he pounced on those few teenagers attempting to escape. Using his newly obtained energy, Sanguis killed them all one by one with sheer resolution.

 Chapter 553: I Will Shoulder the Consequences!

    I Will Shoulder the Consequences!

    The ughter ended uneventfully in just a short while. Not a single one of the altogether six teenagers, Kuliya included, could escape from Sanguis¡¯ hands. They were all coldly ughtered, their bodies left in horrific states!

    In the Abyss realm, such a matter could not be moremon. Neither Jasper, Hemanna, nor Sylph revealed the tiniest bit of disgust or distraught, especially when they learned of a certain affliction on Sanguis¡¯ mother. They saw nothing inappropriate about Sanguis¡¯ actions.

    Soon after killing all his enemies, Sanguis¡¯ bright red skin returned to normal. That intense reeking of blood also dissipated. Sanguis, heavily gasping for air, after seeing the wreckage of his doing, lowered his head and began to weep. Compared to his terrifying figure just before, the Sanguis of this moment appeared weak and helpless.

    As the master, Han Shuo sprung himself andnded behind Sanguis. He reached out to pat Sanguis¡¯ shoulder gently, and said in a soft voice, ¡°Debt of blood, paid in blood. There is nothing wrong with what you did. You might feel perturbed as this is the first time you killed someone. But I believe that in the future, you will gradually grow numb to it. You will be just like me and not feel the slightest disturbance for murdering someone.¡±

    ¡°Master, I did not feel perturbed for them, I was crying for my mom. I was thinking that, if mom could see that I have avenged her, she would be gratified...¡± the tearful Sanguis raised his head and exined to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was startled. He nodded and smiled, ¡°Very good. My good apprentice, I see I was right about you after all!¡±

    Sanguis gradually turned staunch. As Han Shuo looked at him, he said in a deep and low voice, ¡°Kuliya¡¯s father as well as the rest of theirs were even more abominable. I will not let a single one of them slip by!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about that. Soon enough, they shall all perish in your hands!¡± Han Shuo understood thatpared to Kuliya, those adults must have caused even greater pain and misery to Sanguis¡¯ family, especially when those men were previously subordinates under his father.

    ¡°Ahem...¡± coughed the level-one Demon who had been watching coldly from the sidelines. When Han Shuo turned to look at him with a questioning face, he creased his brows and said, ¡°Although ck Jade City isn¡¯t a city that prohibits fighting, this kid, nheless, has definitely exceeded certain legal limits in his actions. As his master, you should be thinking for his future, instead of continuing to instigate him to repeat his crime.¡±

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo nced at this level-one Demon with a smirk, and ridiculed, ¡°Since when would a ck Jade Guard be so attentive towards others? Hehe, as far as I know, a ck Jade Guard should have more important matters than this?¡±

    This level-one Demon fumbled. He looked at Sanguis and quibbled, ¡°It¡¯s just, I can see that the kid has got potential. That¡¯s the only reason I would give any thought to him.¡±

    ¡°Haha, you don¡¯t have to worry about my apprentice,¡± Han Shuo stared at this level-one Demon and said resolutely, ¡°No matter what offenses or wrongdoings he has or willmit, I will shoulder all the consequences. You have nothing to concern for him!¡±

    ¡°Thank you master!¡± Sanguis¡¯ heart was at ease. He was convinced by that domineering air of this mysterious master of his. Having lived for so many years in ck Jade City, he had never before seen anybody who dared to speak to a ck Jade Guard in such an unyielding manner!

    The ck Jade Guard coldly groaned. Unwilling to lose face, he said with a rigid expression, ¡°Anyone can tell lies. Although you are very powerful, you have no authority here. I don¡¯t believe that you can do just anything you want in ck Jade City!¡±

    ¡°He sure can!¡± an assured shout suddenly sounded. The married couple, Bord and Zinia, showed up before Han Shuo.

    ¡°Lord Bord, Lord Zinia, what are you doing here?¡± that level-one Demon jolted. He hurriedly performed a respectful salute towards the duo. He appeared extremely humbled.

    ¡°Definitely not for you!¡± Bord said disdainfully. Bord arrived before Han Shuo, using the same fawning attitude that level-one Demon treated him, Bord said in a cordial manner, ¡°Mister Han Shuo, Lord Manticole has formally invited for your presence. Pleasee to the Demon King¡¯s Pce with us.¡±

    When that level-one Demon saw that this immediate superior of his, who was usually aloof and remote, had so courteously and respectfully invited Han Shuo, on behalf of that almighty being even, he was immediately stupefied. He stared nkly at Han Shuo, his mind suddenly turningpletely nk.

    Sanguis too had a look of astonishment across his whole face. Staring at this mysterious master who hade to him out of the blue, hearing that Han Shuo was invited by a character so high and above, Sanguis¡¯ heart pounded like Chinese drums. In this moment, his master appeared exalted to a level he had never even had the chance to catch a glimpse of. He felt as though meeting this master of his was a godsend. It felt almost unreal.

    Under the attentive gazes of disbeliefing from the level-one Demon and Sanguis, Han Shuo unenthusiastically nodded and smiled in acknowledgement, ¡°No rush. I have just taken in an apprentice. There are some things that must be done as soon as possible. I will go meet Lord Manticole after settling my apprentice¡¯s matters.¡±

    The level-one Demon and Sanguis, who were staring nkly at Han Shuo, received an even greater shock upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s reply! In their hearts, Manticole was an existence as high and unreachable as the stars in the sky. He was also the God they put their faith in. In their minds, no one would dare to defy Manticole¡¯smand. Hence, when they heard Han Shuo say ¡®no rush¡¯, they were greatly rmed.

    To these people, Manticole possessed absolute power and authority. His cruelty and savagery had long prated deeply into their hearts. There were all kinds of widespread folklores about Manticole. But not once in those stories was it told that someone who disobeyed Manticole¡¯s words would live on. Therefore, at this moment, these two citizens of ck Jade City who were well aware of Manticole¡¯s callousness were greatly rmed.

    But in the next moment, they felt as though their hearts had missed a beat. Bord had replied with a smile, ¡°No problem. The Lord has instructed us that, if Mister Han Shuo wanted to have fun in ck Jade City for a little longer, the two of us will keep Mister Han Shuo apanied. His Lordship would wait for Mister Han Shuo!¡±

    Who was Manticole? One of the five Great Demon Kings of the Abyss realm! An overlord with absolute power in ck Jade City! A character who could kill the entire popce with one thought!

    Such an awe-inspiring character of the Abyss realm who wielded true power should wait for no man. How would anyone be worthy enough of His time?

    At first, that level-one Demon thought that Bord must be lying, believing that this superior of his must had betrayed their faith. However, upon careful reconsideration, he quickly realized that this would be absolutely impossible. Given how loyal their ck Jade Guards were towards Manticole, it would be absolutely preposterous for any of them to go against the will of their master.

    Arriving at this conclusion, this level-one Demon was thoroughly stunned. Looking at Han Shuo with his unruffled smile, he thought to himself, Who in the world is this guy? Why would KingManticole be willing to dy his matters and wait for him? He rejoiced at his wise decision earlier of not hot-headedly attacking Han Shuo.

    At some point, hispels became saturated with cold-sweat, which overflowed to his back...

    Meanwhile, Sanguis was basking in extreme happiness for his master, Han Shuo, had actually postponed Demon King Manticole¡¯s invitation for his personal matters. To Sanguis, this was an enormous favor. Sanguis felt as though he was floating in the sweetest dream.

    ¡°Well then. With the two of you present, I can definitely save a lot of trouble,¡± Han Shuo eximed. Shortly after, he turned to that level-one Demon and said, ¡°Now, tell me, am I capable of assuming all risks for my apprentice?¡±

    Thud! The level-one Demon immediately kneeled on one knee and said in a trembling voice, ¡°I am deeply sorry Mister Han Shuo. I did not know of your identity. Please forgive any indignation this ignoble servant might have caused!¡±

    ¡°Oh?¡± Bord¡¯s expression suddenly turned cold. He turned to Han Shuo and said, ¡°This impudent fellow, has he done anything to offend you? I am in the position to administer the appropriate discipline and correction.¡±

    Han Shuo waved his hand and replied smilingly, ¡°It¡¯s nothing. He¡¯s not bad actually. He knows to adapt to circumstances. He did not offend me, no need to make life difficult for him.¡±

    ¡°Alright then, I will let this pass. Now get lost! You are not needed here,¡± Bord scoffed andmanded impatiently.

    ¡°Thank you Mister Han Shuo, thank you Lord Bord. I will get lost immediately!¡± this level-one Demon dared not say another superfluous word. With his back arched, he quickly disappeared out of their sights.

    ¡°Sanguis, let¡¯s go. I must watch you resolve all matters. This kind of hatred must be straightened out as soon as possible!¡± Han Shuo said to his apprentice.

    ¡°Thank you master. Master, Sanguis will engrave your favor and grace on my heart forever,¡± Sanguis said solemnly. His eyes were thoroughly red, the emotionally touched type of red.

    ¡°Alright, alright. It is only by releasing all those grudges in your heart that you will be able to focus yourself entirely on your cultivation,¡± Han Shuo said. He lowered his head, nced at the bodies around him, crinkled his brows, and asked Bord, ¡°About these bodies, what do you...¡±

    ¡°My inferiors will handle these trivial matters. Let¡¯s make a move,¡± Bord interjected. He then raised his head and whistled. After a short while, several guards dressed in cold ck uniforms arrived before him. ¡°Clean up these bodies,¡± Bord instructed.

    ¡°Yes, my Lord,¡± the person leading the group of guards replied in a stern voice. ¡°Let¡¯s go,¡± Han Shuo said to Sanguis as he took the lead, leaving the scene.

    Sanguis turned his head and took onest look at that house he had resided in for many years. He clenched his fists, looked forward, and marched behind Han Shuo with unshakeable resolution.

 Chapter 554: Exterminating Several Families

    Exterminating Several Families

    With thepany of Bord and Zinia, this ck Jade Guard couple who had unchallengeable authority within ck Jade City, Han Shuo and Sanguis did not meet with any hindrance during their journey to their first stop. They arrived at a tall building.

    ¡°This is Kuliya¡¯s home. His father used to be under my father¡¯smand,¡± Sanguis said in a deep voice after he arrived at Kuliya¡¯s house and took a deep breath.

    Han Shuo opened up his consciousness and evaluated the presences of those inside the building. He nodded and said to Sanguis, ¡°Okay, I won¡¯t be going in. As long as you put the energy inside your body to use, not one of those people inside can escape from your palms. Master will watch from outside. If anyone manages to escape, I will just finish them for you.¡±

    ¡°Okay!¡± Sanguis wasn¡¯t verbose in his reply. Right after, as though he had just recalled all the wrongs those muts inside inflicted upon his mother and himself, Sanguis¡¯ eyes became once again bloodshot as he charged ahead with murderous aura.

    Thanks to his unique body, Sanguis¡¯ blood contained a great amount of energy to begin with. Upon mastering the fundamental cultivation methods of Bloodgod Mantra, by releasing the energy inside his body, Sanguis would possess a strength that was not to be belittled. With such an advantage, if he would only focus on his cultivation of Bloodgod Mantra, the blood that ran through his body would flush with more and more energy, and he would attain the heights that Han Shuo hoped for sooner orter.

    ¡°Dongb, you old rat! Show yourself!¡± demanded Sanguis in a tone that could be heard for miles. A round of nking apanied.

    ¡°Oh? You little bastard, have you gone mad? Came here to throw away your own life?¡± the furious screeching of a middle-aged woman came from the house.

    ¡°Ha, yea, I have gone nuts, while your son Kuliya has gone to hell. And now it¡¯s your turn!¡± Sanguis howled withughter. A round of explosions went off like fireworks.

    A most wretched screech suddenly drilled from the woman¡¯s mouth. The grievous news of Kuliya¡¯s death had caused her to turnpletely insane and she charged head first at Sanguis. Sanguis, who had long intended to bathe the ce with blood, did not show the slightest hint of hesitation. Right after delivering the news of Kuliya¡¯s death, he immediately set about the massacre.

    Miserable screams rang from within the house one after another. Han Shuo grinned as he listened to the activities inside the house and said to Jasper standing beside him, ¡°This kid is courageous to kill and ughter. Someday in the future, he will definitely be a great helper for me.¡±

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, what martial art is he cultivating? Why is there such an intense reeking of blooding from his body?¡± Bord and Zinia, who had long sensed some unusual quality in Sanguis, finally couldn¡¯t restrain their curiosity and asked.

    ¡°Let¡¯s just say that it is not from any of the twelve energies that you know of. The martial art I teach is different from what you cultivate in,¡± Han Shuo giggled, seeming quite proud of himself.

    Immediately after he uttered those words, the couple put on a pair of solemn faces. Zinia questioned, ¡°Mister Han Shuo, as you havee from another ne of existence, naturally, you would know certain rather unusual martial arts. About the martial art that we cultivate, in your opinion, is there any aspect that we could improve upon?¡±

    Han Shuo was dazed for a moment and stared at Bord and Zinia in astonishment. He saw that the pair appeared solemn and very humble. After weighing in his mind for a while, Han Shuo smiled and said, ¡°I actually do know a thing or two about the twelve energies that you cultivate in. If you were to put more effort into cultivating your soul, you will find yourself with a greater understanding of your elemental energy.¡±

    In a most sincere voice Bord and Zinia said to him, ¡°Please spare us some advice, Mister Han Shuo!¡±

    Both of them were in the realm of basegod. However, as the fusion of their souls with elemental energy was done only with Demon King Manticole¡¯s assistance, instead of through their own careful realization, they were definitely far behind those who level led up to gods by their own means when it came to putting elemental energies to use. The duo clearly understood that the strength Han Shuo possessed was a ss above theirs, and therefore were so humble in seeking Han Shuo¡¯s guidance.

    Cultivating in the elements of death and destruction simultaneously, and thanks to his deep and profound understanding of soul cultivation using elemental energies he learned on Profound Continent, Han Shuo possessed a ton of useful knowledge that he could impart on these two ck Jade Guards. But naturally, Han Shuo was not about to tell the two about certain preciousprehensions. Instead, he gave the two some rather ambiguous lecture about the soul.

    Having attained considerably high realms in their cultivation, although Han Shuo stopped short of the nitty-gritty, the couple was nevertheless deeply enlightened. After thinking over Han Shuo¡¯s words for a while with pensive looks in their eyes, they seemed to have understood a thing or two, and happily expressed their gratitude, ¡°Many thanks, Mister Han Shuo! Mister Han Shuo is indeed a true expert.¡±

    Han Shuo responded with a forced smile as he thought to himself, These fes of the Abyss certainly have an unimaginably stubborn persistence in pursuing strength. If these people were toe to Profound Continent and observed the difference in our cultivation methods, they would be even more terrifying for sure!

    Inhuman howls continued to echo in session. When Han Shuo gathered his concentration and checked on the situation inside, he found that the battle was almost at an end.

    As expected, not a momentter, the house turned to pin-drop silence. Sanguis, drenched in blood, slowly emerged from inside the house. That fresh blood running down his skin obviously did not originate from his own body. However, Sanguis¡¯ skin seemed to be absorbing it while giving off faint glimmer, causing the stench of the blood to grow increasingly pungent.

    Those cultivating in Bloodgod Mantra could obtain energy from the blood of another organism. The stronger the being, the greater the energy contained in their blood. Naturally, Sanguis, someone innately gifted with this strange but brilliant body, would be able to obtain a greater portion of that energy.

    Han Shuo observed that the blood spattered on Sanguis gradually faded until it disappeared, and knew that Sanguis had grasped a certain understanding. He was very happy with Sanguis¡¯prehension skills.

    Sanguis walked silently up to Han Shuo and appeared to be in a normal mood. He wasn¡¯t as emotional as he had been after his first kill. After taking a few breaths to calm down his mind, he said calmly, ¡°There were twelve in total. I killed them all.¡±

    Nodding his head, Han Shuo smiled and said, ¡°Good then. Let¡¯s move on to the next house!¡± Without spending too much time, the altogether seven families that had deep grudges with Sanguis, under Han Shuo¡¯s instigation, were personally exterminated by Sanguis who had bitterly waited countless years for revenge.

    As he imed more victims, Sanguis started to grow somewhat numb tomitting murder. Later in time, that intense reeking of blood could be sensed even from a dozen meters away. It was just like what Han Shuo had said, after racking up more kills, one would not feel the slightest disturbance for murdering someone. When the veryst casualty was forcibly ripped apart, their fresh blood sttered on the predator.

    Sanguis, drenched in blood, looked like he had received a baptize and reborned. Not a trace of weakness could be seen in his eyes anymore. There was only the tranquility and indifference towards death that the devil possessed. Han Shuo believed that after Sanguis had released all the hatred that had brewed deep in his heart through this campaign, he would no longer be cowardly or timid towards anything. With that impedance of the mind purged, Sanguis would make even more rapid progress in his cultivation of Bloodgod Mantra.

    After he settled Sanguis¡¯ matters, Han Shuo did not linger any longer. He headed to the Demon King¡¯s Pce along with Bord and Zinia, who had waited for a long time.

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, I need to make another notification. It will take just a short while,¡± Bord said apologetically after they arrived before the pce¡¯s grand gates.

    ¡°Sure,¡± Han Shuo replied smilingly.

    After Bord bowed and left, Zinia, who remained with Han Shuo and his party, looked up at the towering, majestic, and wonderful structure, and exined, ¡°The pce is where Lord Manticole cultivates. It is also the administrative center and religious center of ck Jade City. The Lord would always cultivate inside on his own. Apart from some extraordinary circumstances, He rarely leaves His pce.¡±

    Han Shuo raised his head to gaze at the towering Demon King¡¯s Pce as well. Sensing the aura of darkness that constantly lingered on the summit of the pce, it became clear to Han Shuo that the being residing in it was a superb one. Manticole had to, at the very least, possess the strength of a lowgod!

    Only a lowgod would require the power of faith. He would obtain strands of the power of faith from all those people under his jurisdiction enshrining him, providing him with energy that he could add to his divine energy little by little, thereby giving his unique Domain of Divinity an even greater power supply.

    When Han Shuo thought of the Domain of Divinity, he couldn¡¯t help but reveal a bitter smile. Although that Demonyer Edge avatar of his had cultivated to be a lowgod of destruction, perhaps because hecked a solid foundation and did not understand how to put the edict of destruction to use, the avatar couldn¡¯tprehend how to form a Domain of Divinity even though there definitely was cirction of divine power within the Demonyer Edge. From this aspect, although this avatar had be a lowgod of destruction, for all kinds of reasons, it was still not perfect.

    It seems I need some time for this avatar to properlyprehend the profound mysteries of the edict of destruction, Han Shuo thought to himself.

    Han Shuo¡¯s threedies as well as Sanguis standing beside Han Shuo all showed obvious reverence when they looked up at the Demon King¡¯s Pce that pierced the blue dome of the heavens. Having grown up in territories administered by Manticole, ever since their births, they took Manticole as the only God they ced their conviction in. And now, standing before their Lord¡¯s pce, that deeply rooted effect became even more intense.

    After a short while, Bord returned with a smile. He bowed and said, ¡°Mister Han Shuo, pleasee with me. Erm, about Jasper and the rest, Zinia will take them to rest for the moment. There is some strange energy on top of the Demon King¡¯s Pce. Those without adequate strength must not recklessly go up there. It wouldn¡¯t do them any good.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and smilingly said, ¡°You will all follow after Zinia. Don¡¯t go anywhere you shouldn¡¯t. He is right, the Demon King¡¯s Pce isn¡¯t a ce an average person can enter.¡±

    Han Shuo followed after Bord and headed towards the apex of the Demon King¡¯s Pce to meet one of the five Great Demon Kings of the Abyss realm.

 Chapter 555: Domain of Divinity

    When Han Shuo ascended to around 800 meters, suddenly, he felt as though he had fallen into a new dimension.

    Other than the intense element of darkness, all other elements were nowhere to be found. In that new region of space, the pure element of darkness seemed to possess the energy to alter anything. Even the four edictal forces were affected in this region.

    The Domain of Divinity! These were the effects of the Domain of Divinity!

    Only those of lowgod strength and above could deploy a Domain of Divinity. For example, within this Domain of Divinity that this Demon King Manticole had deployed, only the pure element of darkness remained. Experts that relied on the presence of elemental energy, would have none to feed off when they stepped into his Domain of Divinity. They were no different from a tiger without ws or teeth.

    Only true gods that possessed divine power in their bodies could stop relying on elemental energy entirely. But nheless, even for gods who possessed divine energy, when fighting inside an enemy¡¯s Domain of Divinity without elemental energy avable to them, they would still be at a great disadvantage.

    When two experts who were both in a Domain of Divinity got into conflict, they would form a region of space around themselves that was beneficial to them. In closebat, their Domains of Divinity would interact with each other, and the domains would recklessly gather the elements that the caster cultivated in. The one with the mightier Domain of Divinity would have their element found in that space with greater intensity.

    Divine power, Domain of Divinity, their understandings of their elemental energies or edictal forces, and how strong their bodies were, would all be crucial factors in determining the victor in a battle between two gods. The recovery of divine power would usually require utilizing the elements. The one with the stronger Domain of Divinity would have more elements at their disposal, and therefore, they could better recover themselves using the excess of elements avable, thereby taking the higher ground in a battle.

    In short, the presence of Domain of Divinity was not only extremely useful for a god, but it would also give this god the advantage in a battle. But, of course, the Domain of Divinity wasn¡¯t the only deciding factor of the oue of a battle between gods. Their understanding andprehension towards the maniption of their elements or edicts; the strength of their divine energy; the strength of their body; these were all crucial factors as well. However, if both sides were basically on the same level on these aspects, then the one with the mightier Domain of Divinity would naturally have a greater chance of winning.

    Besides that, the presence of the Domain of Divinity had the ability to overwhelm people¡¯s heart with shock. Even a basegod, without having truly formed their own divine power would, upon stepping into the Domain of Divinity of a lowgod, immediately notice that the elements around them had disappeared. They would have no elements that they could use. As they did not have divine power in their body, if they were attacked, they would have no power to resist, but stand and wait to be ughtered.

    When Han Shuo entered the Domain of Divinity released by Demon King Manticole, he discovered Bord sweating profusely while showing unconceble fear. Han Shuo understood why in just one nce. Although Bord, a basegod cultivating in the element of lightning, could be considered an overlord anywhere else, once he stepped into this Domain of Divinity, he was nothing more than a peasant. Without the ability to utilize lightning elemental energy, he did not have any ability to resist.

    Anyone ustomed to having mighty energy would feel a simr dread and sense of powerlessness bearing down on them like the weight of the world if they lost the energy they relied upon for survival. Every time Bord came to the summit of the Demon King¡¯s Pce to meet Demon King Manticole, he would turn into an unarmed and defenselessmoner. If Manticole wanted to, within his Domain of Divinity, he could finish Bord in no time with the twitch of his finger.

    Compared to Bord¡¯s sweat-drenched, cowardly appearance, Han Shuo appeared much more unruffled. Han Shuo¡¯s main body cultivating in demonic arts had the source of energy stored right within the demonic infant in his body. This Domain of Divinity didn¡¯t have much of an effect on Han Shuo, a demonic arts cultivator. If Han Shuo wanted to, he could escape from this Domain of Divinity in no time.

    But Han Shuo wasn¡¯tpletely immune to its effects. His two avatars, cultivating in two of the twelve fundamental forces, were affected by this Domain of Divinity. Among them, the avatar cultivating in the element of death, received the greatest effect. In this Domain of Divinity that was void of the element of death, the avatar would be just as weak as Bord.

    As for the avatar cultivating in the edict of destruction, due to the unique circumstances of its formation, it would only receive a limited effect. Although the edict of destruction was somewhat altered in this Manticole¡¯s Domain of Divinity, as this avatar of Han Shuo¡¯s hadn¡¯t delved much into the edict of destruction to begin with, and as the avatar¡¯s body was the Demonyer Edge, with most of the strengthing from the Demonyer Edge itself, the effects were limited.

    Although Han Shuo appeared very passive inside Manticole¡¯s Domain of Divinity, this in fact wasn¡¯t the case. If Han Shuo wanted to, he could use his demonic arts to leave this region at high speed. After leaving the Domain of Divinity, his two avatars would not receive the slightest effect. If Han Shuo¡¯s three souls attacked at the same time, with his two avatars attacking from a distance, the power released would not be forgiving.

    The Domain of Divinity would be different in its might and coverage area following the rank of the god as well as their strength. This Domain of Divinity deployed by Manticole only covered the radius of a dozen or so meters. From the standard that Han Shuo knew of, he reckoned that this Manticole was merely a lowgod.

    The Domain of Divinity of a lowgod could only extend as far around their body. A midgod could cover ten times the range, while a highgod could do even greater. Their Domain of Divinity would normally extend thousands of meters. Needless to say, an overgod was able to cover well beyond necessary. ording to legends, the Domain of Divinity of an overgod could reach every corner of a material ne!

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo is a magical person indeed. Pleasee up alone,¡± called out a gentle voice from the summit of the Demon King¡¯s Pce.

    Bord, who had been in great trepidation, suddenly let out a sigh of relief. In a most respectful manner, he said, ¡°Your humble servant will dismiss himself!¡±

    ¡°Right, you may leave. Make sure to receive Mister Han Shuo¡¯s friends properly. They are not to be treated with neglect,¡± Manticole¡¯s mild voice sounded once again.

    ¡°Yes, my Lord,¡± Bord replied. He gave Han Shuo a fawning smile and left the region that the Domain of Divinity covered, cowering and speedy. Inside Manticole¡¯s Domain of Divinity, absent of the energy he was familiar with, Bord felt like a newborn baby, and his heart never ceases to feel unease. When Manticole said those words, it was as though he had been pardoned, and he immediately left the region.

    As Bord departed, Han Shuo put on a faint smile and walked unruffled, step by step towards the apex of the Demon King¡¯s Pce along the ck stone steps.

    It was an empty and spacious room made of stone. At the center of the room was a middle-aged man sitting cross-legged. He had short hair and an unextraordinary face. He was wearing a gentle and innocent smile as he curiously looked up and down at Han Shuo who was walking inside.

    Han Shuo looked all around in a peculiar manner, then turned to Great Demon King Manticole sitting cross-legged before him, and smilingly said, ¡°Your dwelling is noticeably in and undecorated.¡±

    ¡°Those whoe here do not have the qualifications to sit. Besides, I cultivate here and sit year-in-year-out. What for would I install worldly possessions here?¡± Manticole was much easier to deal with than Han Shuo had imagined. He always had a soft smile on his face, much like an amiable elder.

    However, Han Shuo understood that this was just how he appeared on the outside. Each and every one of the five Great Demon Kings of the Abyss realm was a despot with blood all over their hands. In this Abyss realm wherepetition was cruel, if this Demon King had truly been this gentle in every aspect, it would be absolutely impossible to make ck Jade Guards like Bord and Zinia respect him. Besides, Han Shuo could sense that concealed ferocity in Manticole¡¯s body.

    ¡°That is true indeed,¡± Han Shuo smiled after thinking for a short while. Han Shuo, who was no saint either, and whose hands were no less daubed in blood, wasn¡¯t at all reserved before this Manticole.

    ¡°I sensed a lot of wonderful things on you. If I have not guessed it wrong, apart from some energy I am unfamiliar with, you also cultivate in the energy of death and destruction. I am able to sense the aura of these two energies on you. This is truly strange. I never thought that anyone could simultaneously cultivate in two different energies. Truly inconceivable!¡± Manticole eximed in admiration as he squinted at Han Shuo.

    Practically every character standing at the pinnacle of strength specialized and absorbed themselves in one of the eight elemental energies and four edictal forces. The universe was incredibly vast. There were also some beings who could divide their souls, use other substances as their physical body, and thereby cultivate in two different types of energies simultaneously.

    However, the souls of these existences weren¡¯t as independent as the avatars formed using demonic arts. They had often too many fatal ws and weaknesses. More frequently than not, they couldn¡¯t simultaneously attend to two cultivations because of ack in mental strength or a cluttered mind. They would get nowhere and forever be incapable of climbing to the pinnacle of strength.

    Hence, although there were all kinds of talented characters from various nes of existence, they all solely cultivated in and studied one type of energy with practically not one exception. An existence like Han Shuo who cultivated in three different energies at the same time, one of them being the mysterious demonic arts, was something incredibly rare!

    The two avatars achieved through demonic arts were miraculous, allowing Han Shuo¡¯s cultivation to break free from the binding of the twelve fundamental forces while smashing conventional understanding. Although Han Shuo¡¯s three souls had a single shared andmon memory, the integrity of each soul was notpromised. From this aspect, although Han Shuo was just one person, he had the memories and mental capacities of three people, therefore he wouldn¡¯t face the issue of having insufficient mental strength to cultivate different energies simultaneously; three bodies and three souls, each specializing in one type of energy.

    When Manticole noticed that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t talking and revealed a pensive expression, he waited until Han Shuo turned his gaze towards him, and smilingly said, ¡°I know that you want to leave the Abyss realm. However, the internar portal of our Abyss realm is inside the Void. The Void is the most terrifying and mysterious ce on our material ne. Even we, the five Great Demon Kings, need to wait until it is opened before we may carefully and cautiously enter. Are you sure that you wish to enter the Void?¡±

 Chapter 556: Divine Weapon, Divine Essence, Divine Soul

    Divine Weapon, Divine Essence, Divine Soul

    ¡°The Void? What kind of a ce is that?¡± Han Shuo was bbergasted. What kind of terrible dangers and threats could lurk in a ce that even the five Great Demon Kings had to enter with fear?

    ¡°It is the root of our material ne. There are all kinds of devastating chaotic energies inside, as well as all kinds of naturally formed offensive boundaries and peculiar scenes. It is extraordinarily frightening,¡± Manticole wore a grave expression when he mentioned this ¡®Void¡¯, seemingly uneasy about this unusual location.

    Han Shuo really didn¡¯t care if the ¡®Void¡¯ was frightening or not. He did not have any desire or n to explore the ce. All that he wanted was to leave the Abyss realm. After thinking for a moment, from his space ring Han Shuo withdrew the bone tablet he obtained from War Demon Valley¡¯s weaponry depot. He raised it in his hand and asked Manticole, ¡°This bone tablet, Crosius told me that he obtained this from your ce. Can you tell me where you procured this bone tablet?¡±

    A bone tablet that still had its imprint on it was the key to activating a Cemetery of Death. If a bone tablet showed up in such a ce, then a Cemetery of Death has to be close by as well. If Han Shuo could figure out the origins of the bone tablet from Manticole, he might very well find the location of an another Cemetery of Death. In that case, Han Shuo could then use the nar coordinates and teleport directly to the transportation matrix at the center of his Cemetery of Death back at Profound Continent. He could skip finding another internar transportation matrix inside this ne.

    ¡°Oh! This thing!¡± Manticole smiled, looking deeply at Han Shuo, and said, ¡°That little tablet, I obtained from the Void thest time I entered. This magical ring of mine included, it all came from inside the Void. Hehe, honestly speaking, it is only in that ce that you may obtain certain unusual items that the Abyss realmcks.¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned at those words. He stared fixedly at Manticole with glistening eyes and thought, Could this Manticole be deliberately making up things to deceive me? From Manticole¡¯s manner of speaking, Han Shuo noticed that Manticole seemed to be luring him into the Void to check things out for himself. Perhaps Manticole made out that he wasn¡¯t quite interested in that ce, and therefore told him an untruth?

    After carefully observing Manticole¡¯s expression for quite a while, Han Shuo saw that he had on only aposed expression and he couldn¡¯t find any clues from his face. He couldn¡¯t help but question puzzlingly, ¡°Could it be that the Void is a hub that connects to another ne? Otherwise, how would there be so many unusual things present there?¡±

    Manticole shook his head with a bitter smile and said, ¡°How did the Void form? Is it a hub that connects to other nes? I have no idea. But what I do know is that the Void is the most mysterious ce of our material ne. ording to legends, the internar transportation array is at the center of the Void. I have only been to the Void twice, and have definitely picked up my fair share of enigmatic finds. I personally think that it was a battlefield. Because, in there, I have discovered Divine Weapon, Divine Essence, and Divine Soul that was without consciousness and left with purely the memories.¡±

    ¡°Divine Weapon! Divine Essence! Divine Soul!¡± Han Shuo was jolted. With his jaw to the floor, he shrieked, ¡°How is that possible?!¡±

    Divine weapons are weapons forged by gods that they could pour their divine energy directly into. Gods of different grades would forge divine weapons of their corresponding grades. A high-grade divine weapon could fully bring out the divine energy of its owner, and might even have the miraculous ability to amplify their divine energy. The Divine Essence was also an extremely miraculous item. They were exotic substances and no one knew how they were formed. There were twelve different types of Divine Essences for each and every one of the twelve fundamental forces. Gods could absorb the energy inside Divine Essence to advance their divine power, provided that they were of the same energy type.

    Therefore, Divine Essences were extremely precious!

    Divine Essence was precious on any material ne where there were gods. They were so rare and scarce that no one would carry the hope of finding any. Han Shuo had never ever expected that Divine Essence would actually present inside the Void.

    Divine Soul, made up purely of memories that were ridden of consciousness, was formed when a god dies in an unusual way. After death, their souls would enter a mysterious state and would not dissipate between heaven and earth for some time. They were harmless. All that was left of them was their understanding andprehension of the elemental energy or edictal force they cultivated in. They were stranded in a strange state of matter that contained all the memories of a being while it was still alive, minus any autonomy or awareness. The most important thing was that they could be assimted by the soul.

    Compared to a divine weapon and Divine Essence, a Divine Soul without a consciousness was much rarer and more precious. The reason being that, to gods, the most elementary determinant of their strength was rank. Just imagine, if a lowgod were to obtain the memories of a midgod cultivating in the same energy, gaining a whole new level of cultivation experiences, just how many winding roads would he have saved himself?

    In fact, every god had a Divine Soul. However, one that was without awareness and consciousness, instead only their memories andprehension of their elemental energy or edictal force, that would be rare and wasn¡¯t something that could be created artificially. ording to legends, it was only in an extremely bizarre, chaotic space ¨C a god dying of all kinds of unnatural causes, perhaps ¨C that even the slightest probability would arise for a soul to transform into a Divine Soul left with only memories.

    Divine weapon, Divine Essence, and Divine Soul. Three Treasures. Each more precious than thest. When Han Shuo heard Manticole say that the Void actually contained these three items, he was dumbstruck. He lost self-control and let out a cry of surprise in front of Manticole!

    ¡°I didn¡¯t believe it at first. But between the two times that I entered the Void, I have seen all three of these divine objects. Those things inside there obviously did not originate from our Abyss realm. Yes, this magical ring, for example, there are no materials in the Abyss that could forge this,¡± Manticole exined gravely.

    Upon hearing Manticole¡¯s words, Han Shuo¡¯s heart turned greedy. Divine weapon, Divine Essence, and Divine Soul, these three treasures had great, vital uses to a god. For Han Shuo, a god who was without solid foundation in his cultivation to say the least, if he could obtain a Divine Essence or a Divine Soul, then he would immediately gain a giant leap in strength. How could he be anything but aroused?

    ¡°Erm, what did you mean when you said you have to wait for it to be opened?¡± Han Shuo asked the important question with a heart bloated with desire.

    ¡°Around the Void, there is ayer of naturally formed stardust current. That thing can corrode our Divine Souls just like that. As long as the stardust current flows, we have absolutely no way to enter! However, ever so often, that stardust current will change its direction and flow elsewhere. Then, we will have the opportunity to enter the Void. Based on the regr rhythm, it would take another two hundred years before the stardust current flows to another ce. However, several spacetime discontinuum regions that suddenly appeared in the Abyss some time before seemed to have stirred up the flow of the stardust current and altered its course. I¡¯ve received news just a few days ago that based on the current trajectory, it won¡¯t take long before the Void is essible once again.¡± Manticole was excited as well. It seemed that he too was extremely thirsty for those three divine items inside the Void!

    ¡°So, you mean to have me enter there with you?¡± Han Shuo asked as he looked at Demon King Manticole.

    Manticole nodded with a smile and tly admitted, ¡°Yep. Of the five Great Demon Kings of the Abyss, Leviathan and I are in a close rtionship. Gnder and Cecrops have rather friendly rtions that run deep. While Bechymos, he¡¯s a lone wolf. Whenever the Void is open, the five of us usually wind up there together. We would frequently engage inbat over the prizes. With you on board, I believe that we would have a greater certainty on our side this time.¡±

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment. After thinking for just a short while, he had more or less understood the whole story. He smilingly said, ¡°All five of you are lowgods, mighty experts possessing Domains of Divinity. If I were to take part in it, will there be a chance for me to survive?¡±

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo must be joking,¡± Manticole said mildly. ¡°To be able to ughter three Shadow Warriors in no time, this has amply proven that your strength far exceeds that of a Demon. Besides, I sensed an intense aura of destruction from your body. Although you cannot form a Domain of Divinity yet, you definitely must have attained to the realm of lowgod in your cultivation of the edict of destruction. Hehe, merely on this basis, you have the strength to defend yourself. What¡¯s more, with Leviathan and me in the same group with you, we can look after one another. So there shouldn¡¯t be any big issues. Divine weapon, Divine Essence, and Divine Soul ¨C I believe you would be very clear as to just how significant those things mean to us. Let alone that the internar portal is also inside there. There¡¯s only one chance. I believe you know what¡¯s best for yourself.¡±

    Han Shuo basically had no second option. To say nothing of Han Shuo¡¯s covet for those three treasures, merely the fact that the internar transportation matrix was inside the Void would mean that Han Shuo had no choice but to venture within.

    Nodding with a forced smile, Han Shuo said, ¡°It appears that I have no reason to decline.¡±

    ¡°Alright. Let¡¯s not talk about other matters for the moment. I will arrange for Mister Han Shuo to take a good rest. You may make do with your time to digest what I¡¯ve told you. Indeed, I myself need to look for Leviathan to begin discussions. I will contact you again when the Void is about to open,¡± Manticole knew that Han Shuo had basically agreed to his proposal, and he no longer continued to be verbose.

    ¡°Alright. I really need to think about this carefully,¡± Han Shuo replied. Subsequently, as per Manticole¡¯s arrangement, he stayed at ck Jade City for the time being.

    The news that the three divine objects could be found inside the most mysterious Void gave Han Shuo a tremendous shock. He really needed time to carefully think through the matter, as well as to get to understand the rtionships between the five Great Demon Kings, lest he be used by Manticole as a tool after entering the Void.

 Chapter 557: Father, You Are Prejudiced!

    GDK 557: Father, You Are Prejudiced!

    ck Jade City. Inside a sumptuous castle in the east.

    Han Shuo, his threedies, and Sanguis temporarily took residence in this castle in ck Jade City. It was regarded as one of the best and most luxurious residences for the most honorable guests of Manticole¡¯s. Although it wasn¡¯t as magnificent as the Demon King¡¯s Pce, it didn¡¯t pale much inparison.

    For a few days in a row, Han Shuo and hisdies had been staying in this castle. There was an abundance of servants and maids who would help with their everyday lives. They were enjoying life to the greatest extent.

    Sanguis, this demonic arts apprentice who finally possessed power, skipped on sleep and meals to cultivate Bloodgod Mantra. With Han Shuo¡¯s guidance, Sanguis made rapid progress in his understanding of the Bloodgod Mantra. He had been progressing at a rate that had astounded Han Shuo.

    During the days he spent with Jasper, Hemanna, Sylph, and even Bord and Zinia, Han Shuo gradually came to understand the rtionships between the Great Demon Kings of the Abyss realm. The five of them were divided into three sides: Leviathan and Manticole on one team, and Cecrops and Gnder on another. Bechymos, however, was a lone operator. He hardly made dealings with other Demon Kings.

    Manticole¡¯s and Gnder¡¯s respective sides had practically never stopped warring with each other. The battle between the four Great Demon Kings had spread to their territories, which represented eighty percent of thend on the Abyss realm. War Demon Valley and Venomfang Castle were testaments to their constant conflict.

    Of the five Great Demon Kings, the most mysterious one was Bechymos. The legends of this Demon King had spread through the Abyss realm since the beginning of time. Among the five, Bechymos had been present in this ne for the longest and he had the deepest understanding of the Abyss realm. He was also the most low-profile and quiet Demon King, and seemed to be happy with the status quo. He would never send expeditions to conquer the territories of the other four Demon Kings in the quest for more power of faith.

    However, the other four Great Demon Kings wouldn¡¯t take the initiative to provoke this Demon King who was the first to be a god. This was because it was Bechymos who told them about the existence of the Void. Besides, in the process of exploring the Void, the four had long learned of the terror that Bechymos was!

    It was undeniable that Han Shuo had an intense covet for the Divine Weapon, Divine Essence, and Divine Soul inside the Void. In addition to the fact that the internar transportation matrix and secrets to the Cemetery of Death might be inside, Han Shuo was determined to make an excursion to the Void. Having made up his mind, Han Shuo began collecting information about the Void through all kinds of channels and methods.

    Every time the Void was open, it wasn¡¯t just the five Great Demon Kings who would enter. High-level Demons like Bord and Zinia too would follow behind their master into the Void. It was precisely thanks to this that Han Shuo managed to learn a thing or two about the situation inside the Void from Bord and Zinia. He came to understand that the Void indeed was an extremely horrible and chaotic ce.

    Time went by like calm winds as Han Shuo tried to understand the connection between the five Great Demon Kings of the Abyss through all means and methods. After studying the condition in the Void as much as he could, he started to make his own preparations for the expedition. He separated his three souls and began to cultivate inside one of the numerous secret chambers found within this castle.

    One day, while Han Shuo was cultivating in seclusion, carefullyprehending all the wonderful uses of his consciousness, he suddenly sensed a joyous message that came from Little Skeleton who was in the Netherworld. With one thought, that soul of his attached to the skeletal staff, through the wonderful ability of the skeletal staff, immediately descended to the Netherworld. Inside the magnificent Pce of Undead, a continuous horrible, loud roar filled the boundless sky.

    Intense element of death from every direction converged towards that pce. Little Skeleton, on his tall white-bone throne at the center of his pce, gave off an astonishing demeanor. That eye socket where the Purple Demon Eye used to be, now glowed with sinister green light. That miniaturized gravestone on his chest was like a whirlpool that could consume everything in its path as it condensed the element of death all around.

    Clean and pure element of death covered the grounds. There seemed to be some kind of mysterious maic field in the space, which constantly drew in more and more element of death, causing it to be more and more intense. Sitting on that white-bone throne at the center of his pce, Little Skeleton gave off the imposing grandeur of the king of undead. Within his sparkling jade skeleton, there seemed to be some sort of bizarre fluid circting rapidly.

    Before the Little Skeleton, a crowd of undead creaturesy prostrate on the ground. They included Bone Dragon, Skeletal King, and King Zombie. They seemed to be waiting for something as they crouched on the ground in fear and trepidation.

    Little Skeleton, proudly sitting tall on his white-bone throne while some kind of liquid flowed within his body, suddenly opened his mouth and spit up a lump of faint green mist. The mist seemed to contain some extremely abstruse necromancy brand. As though tiny snakes, they bored themselves into the bodies of those mighty undead creatures in front of Little Skeleton.

    Then, all of a sudden, strands of thread-like energy began streaming from those mighty undead creatures back into Little Skeleton¡¯s body. As Little Skeleton¡¯s master, Han Shuo could sense a bit of Little Skeleton¡¯sprehension. He discovered that those strands of energy were like the fine threads of a spiderweb. They flowed into Little Skeleton¡¯s body in a way that could not be understood visually.

    This kind of energy was extremely weak and minute. However, gradually, the entire mountain was enveloped in that green mist. Thousands upon thousands of undead creatures discharged that kind of faint energy which then fell into Little Skeleton¡¯s body, sitting upright on his throne.

    Han Shuo¡¯s death basegod soul happened tond inside the pce. He found that tempting and bewitching energy within the green mist to be extremely familiar. In the next moment, Han Shuo had a startling realization. This energy was simr to the one that enticed him to surrender his soul back when he was absorbing mental strength at the undergroundyer of the Cemetery of Death.

    ¡°Father, you havee?¡± Little Skeleton¡¯s voice suddenly sounded. The green mist around Han Shuo cleared up.

    ¡°You, you have truly be a god?¡± Han Shuo finally woke up from his stupefaction.

    That space around Little Skeleton where pure element of death converged, Han Shuo understood that to be the Domain of Divinity that only a lowgod could possess. That liquid circting within Little Skeleton¡¯s sparkling white bones was likely to be divine power. As for that silky minute energy streaming from the thousands upon thousands of undead into Little Skeleton, those were precisely the power of faith that these undead creatures were offering to Little Skeleton!

    Divine energy, power of faith, and Domain of Divinity ¨C these three hallmarks of a lowgod, Little Skeleton had possessed thempletely. From that, Han Shuo was absolutely certain that Little Skeleton had actually be a lowgod of death. It was an undeniable fact.

    ¡°I have, father,¡± Little Skeleton replied in great delight.

    ¡°How can you do that so soon?¡± Han Shuo was puzzled. Logically speaking, given that Little Skeleton¡¯s soul did not possess deepprehension of the element of death, without spending a long time to slowly understand it, it was simply impossible to be a true god in such a short time by relying on his own strength.

    ¡°Erm, it¡¯s all thanks to this,¡± Little Skeleton pointed at the gravestone on his chest and cheerfully exined, ¡°Father wanted me to carefully look into what¡¯s inside this thing. I discovered many mysteries. Then, unconsciously, I came to possess divine energy and Domain of Divinity. This is truly a wonderful treasure. Thank you, father!¡±

    Han Shuo was amazed. With a face of pure shock, he stared at that gravestone on Little Skeleton¡¯s chest, which seemed to serve the role of Little Skeleton¡¯s source of energy. Never had Han Shuo anticipated that this stone engraved with cryptic patterns could bring such a huge transformation to Little Skeleton! After it integrated into Little Skeleton¡¯s chest, it allowed Little Skeleton to advance to be a lowgod of death in such a short amount of time!

    ¡°Inconceivable, truly inconceivable!¡± Han Shuo eximed in as he rejoiced for Little Skeleton¡¯s fortunate encounter.

    ¡°This is all thanks to father¡¯s favor,¡± Little Skeleton said as he scratched his head, finding it somewhat embarrassing. He still behaved very much like a child before Han Shuo.

    Among the sea of undead creatures, only the five elite zombies were not affected by Little Skeleton¡¯s energy. The five zombies, who were not just distinguished in their appearances, all possessed wonderful energies. Their origins were simr to Little Skeleton¡¯s. They were all primed using Han Shuo¡¯s blood and took shape after absorbing the five elements. Among them, wood, fire, and metal elite zombies possessed treasures of their respective attributes. As they developed sufficient strength, just like Han Shuo, they wouldn¡¯t be affected by that energy of Little Skeleton¡¯s.

    As Han Shuo and Little Skeleton talked, the five elite zombies walked to Han Shuo. That simple and honest looking earth elite zombie tugged on the corner of Han Shuo¡¯s garb, pointed at the attributal treasures that wood, fire, and metal elite zombies wielded, and with a sullen face and a pitiful voice, said to Han Shuo, ¡°Father, the three of them have that, even Little Water obtained a lot of energy. But I don¡¯t have anything even though I have been with father for the longest time. Father, you are prejudiced!¡±

    Han Shuo was speechless.

    For a while now, the five elite zombies had attained robust intelligence. After listening to earth elite zombiein, Han Shuo was left betweenughter and tears. From this, it was obvious that earth elite zombie already possessed an extraordinarily high intelligence. However, to his protest, Han Shuo truly did not know how to reply.

    ¡°Me too, I don¡¯t have a toy,¡± the water elite zombie, gentle and reserved in temperament, coyly demanded from Han Shuo upon seeing his brother take the lead.

    Han Shuo suddenly felt somewhat of a headache. Looking at the hopeful faces of earth and water elite zombies, Han Shuo had no choice but to pledge, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, father promises, father will find treasures suitable for you two.¡±

    Earth elite zombie and water elite zombie were pleased. They squealed, ¡°Yay! Thank you father!¡±

    The head-aching Han Shuo had no choice but to force a smile and make them a promise. He thought to himself, When these little fes gain higher intelligence, problems follow. And now, they¡¯ve even learned to make invidiousparisons... Really making my head swim...

 Chapter 558: Demons â€“ Nothing More Than Glorified Cannon Fodders!

    GDK 558: Demons ¨C Nothing More Than Glorified Cannon Fodders!

    After Han Shuo withdrew his soul from the Netherworld, he had been staying inside a secret chamber, constantly cultivating. He did not indulge in sensual pleasures.

    As his realm state had been trending to be stable, he seemed to have gotten the inexhaustible cravings in his heart under control. Han Shuo faintly understood that he was on the verge of a breakthrough. However, even though he made it past this hurdle that was his realm state, the demonic yuan inside his body wasn¡¯t plenty enough to reach the critical mass for the breakthrough transformation to ur. In this aspect, he needed to umte demonic yuan bit by bit through painstaking cultivation day by day.

    Han Shuo knew that raising the amount of demonic yuan purely through cultivation would take an enormous amount of time. However, he couldn¡¯t think of an alternative for the moment.

    Then, one day, while assiduously cultivating in his secret chamber, Han Shuo suddenly sensed the arrival of Bord and Zinia. From the couple¡¯s abnormal expressions, Han Shuo surmised that perhaps Manticole hadpleted his preparations. With one thought, his two avatars, one on his left and another on his right, transformed back to their original forms of skeletal staff and Demonyer Edge. Whoosh Whoosh They concealed themselves inside Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    After doing some stretching, Han Shuo unhurriedly walked out from the secret chamber that earth elite zombie excavated deep underground, and headed towards the parlor where Bord and Zinia stood.

    At the parlor, a few maids were carrying light refreshments and fruits andying them on the table before Bord and Zinia. Jasper, who could be considered a mistress, was smilingly discussing something with the two ck Jade Guards with an adorably giggly voice.

    Upon arriving at ck Jade City, riding on Han Shuo¡¯s coattails, Jasper had received the hospitality of a distinguished guest. During those days, Jasper, Hemanna, and Sylph did not miss out on sightseeing around this city which was one of the most flourishing cities in the Abyss realm. With several ck Jade Guards arranged by Bord to keep them upied, thedies enjoyed all the gazes of envy and admiration, giving them great satisfaction.

    It was also precisely so that the threedies became more and more reliant on Han Shuo. During the many days that Han Shuo cultivated in seclusion and ceased engagement in any debaucheries, the threedies were restless, as though they were missing something in themselves.

    ¡°Ahem...¡± Han Shuo walked to the parlor and saw Jasper chatting with Bord and Zinia tenderly. As he carefully observed Jasper, he discovered that the mental strength within Jasper¡¯s brain had grown more powerful. It appeared that during his days of secluded cultivation, Jasper did not ck off in her cultivation either.

    ¡°Huh? Han, you havee out!¡± Jasper immediately turned around to look when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s gentle cough. Her beautiful eyes were filled with longing and joyousness. After having received Han Shuo¡¯s nourishment for a period of time, Jasper¡¯s skin was as beautiful as jade. Faint fragrance would float off her body. She appeared extremely attractive.

    ¡°It appears you have not been goofing off!¡± Han Shuo said smilingly as he looked at Jasper. Shortly after, he got in front of Bord and Zinia, and asked, ¡°Has Demon King Manticole made all the appropriate preparations, and have you twoe here to invite me over?¡±

    The couple nodded simultaneously. Bord respectfully replied, ¡°That¡¯s right. The Void is about to open. The Lord has made arrangements for ck Jade City. He has asked the two of us to notify Mister Han Shuo, and to head towards the Void with Him.¡±

    ¡°Very well. I need a short moment for my own preparations. Then I will leave with you two right away,¡± Han Shuo answered casually. He then unfolded his consciousness. Sanguis, Hemanna, and Sylph, who were cultivating in seclusion, simultaneously received Han Shuo¡¯s message within their minds.

    During the time Han Shuo spent cultivating, he learned to more skillfully put his consciousness to use. Affecting the minds of those without a mighty enough soul using his consciousness from a short distance away was one of the wonderful abilities of his consciousness.

    When Sanguis, Hemanna, and Sylph, suddenly sensed a chunk of message in their minds that they could clearly feel originated from Han Shuo, they were aghast. The three of them immediately awoke from their cultivation and gathered at the parlor in ordance with the message Han Shuo sent.

    ¡°Master, is it you who transmitted into our brains?¡± Sanguis immediately asked in amazement upon arriving.

    Han Shuo smiled and answered, ¡°Yep. I¡¯m going to leave ck Jade City very soon and head to the Void. I called you all here to inform you about that. Additionally, if you are met with any difficult challenges in your cultivation, better take this opportunity to seek rification from me. It might take some time before I can return.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s, that¡¯s amazing! Even from so far away, you can leave messages in our brains. Truly inconceivable!¡± Sylph cried out in astonishment after arriving and hearing Han Shuo¡¯s affirmation.

    Bord and Zinia turned to look at each other and simultaneously forced a smile and shook their heads, gasping in admiration of the mysterious capabilities of Han Shuo¡¯s.

    ¡°Master, why don¡¯t you bring us to the Void with you?¡± Sanguis asked.

    ¡°None of you possess enough strength for the moment. That includes you, Sanguis. Although you have been making progress at an incredible pace, you currently only possess the strength of a Destroyer. From my understanding of the Void, without the strength of a Demon, it is not only pointless, but you will also be a burden. You all just stay here for the time being, cultivate well, and wait for my return from the Void. If I find a transportation array, we shall all leave for my world,¡± Han Shuo exined.

    After listening to Han Shuo¡¯s words, Sanguis sustained a great blow to his ego. Dispirited, he mumbled, ¡°So in master¡¯s eyes, I¡¯m still a burden...¡±

    Han Shuo smiled and consoled, ¡°Although you are very gifted, just how long ago did you start your cultivation? Having risen to the rank of a Destroyer from a feeble and frail nobody within such a short time, that is more than enough to prove your potential. If you could be a Demon in just that time, then master can retire in no time. Haha, don¡¯t feel discouraged. Give yourself a little more time. It won¡¯t take long before you be an expert with the strength of Demon.¡±

    Sanguis felt a little better after listening to Han Shuo. He thought for a moment and quickly inquired with Han Shuo about some difficult problems he had met in his cultivation in the past few days.

    When Bord and Zinia saw Sanguis consulting Han Shuo, they began to awkwardly step away. No matter what world they were in, when a master was teaching his apprentice, outsiders were not allowed to listen in. Bord and Zinia obviously understood this and consciously withdrew themselves.

    Han Shuo held up his hand and said with a smile, ¡°No need to keep away from us. You may stay,¡± Bord and Zinia were pleasantly surprised. They exchanged nces and respectfully stood aside, listening to Han Shuo¡¯s teachings with all ears. However, the demonic arts that Han Shuo was teaching was entirely different from the cultivation methods of this world. What¡¯s more, the Bloodgod Mantra was a particrly strange cultivation technique. It would be a wonder if Bord and Zinia could understand it.

    Han Shuo, unconcerned with the couple standing near him, began answering the issues that Sanguis put forth. Sanguis would frequently nod his head enthusiastically as he listened, having grasped the concepts intuitively. Bord and Zinia, however, were bewildered. They were incredibly confused with unfamiliar terms such as meridians and chakras, and had absolutely not a clue what Han Shuo was talking about.

    After Han Shuo was done with his exnation, Sanguis said excitedly, ¡°Thank you master. After listening to master¡¯s exnation, all those things that I was confused about have all be clear to me.¡±

    Bord and Zinia gazed at each other in speechless dismay. They were disappointed and disheartened by Sanguis¡¯ words. Bord forced a smile and eximed in admiration, ¡°Mister Han Shuo is indeed a master of his art. Even your words are so profound. Unfortunately for us, we don¡¯t have enough aptitude. It seems that we won¡¯t be able to understand anything.¡±

    Han Shuo inwardlyughed and thought, It¡¯d be a wonder if you could understand me! Without exining to the duo, Han Shuo turned to Jasper, Hemanna, and Sylph, instructing them on a certain matter that they should pay attention to, and told them to stay back there and cultivate well. After that, he followed Bord and Zinia to the Demon King¡¯s Pce.

    When Demon King Manticole, at the summit of the Demon King¡¯s Pce, saw that Han Shuo had arrived, he said with a warm smile, ¡°We have been waiting for you for a while. It won¡¯t be long before the Void opens. I have made all the necessary preparations on my side. If Mister Han Shuo have is ready, we may set out right away.¡±

    In this unadorned stone chamber, besides Manticole, there were fifteen experts all of Demon strength without exception. Based on their attires, they were clearly ck Jade Guards directly answering to Manticole. It seemed that Manticole was taking the group of ck Jade Guards along to the Void.

    From the words of Bord and Zinia, Han Shuo guessed that during critical moments, these ck Jade Guards would be used as cannon fodders. If faced with unknown danger, Manticole would send these ck Jade Guards forward to figure out the situation, and only personally proceed after making sure they were out of harm¡¯s way.

    In the Abyss realm, demon-grade experts were second only to the five Great Demon Kings. Every Demon King had guards directly under theirmand. These men were all infamous and had outstanding reputations. However, when it came to the moment that the Void opened, these dazzling and glorious Demons were merely pawns for the five Great Demon Kings, absolutely expendable for the purpose of achieving their own goals.

    It wasn¡¯t easy bringing up a Demon, but still, it wasn¡¯t that difficult of a thing to do for the five Great Demon Kings. In their eyes, these Demons that they brought about with their own hands were nothing more than servant dogs. To sacrifice their lives for them when the moment arrived was really their honor.

    The Abyss realm was just this cruel. Although those Demons were aware of the destiny thaty before them in their hearts, having handed over their faith, they followed behind their masters without taking a nce back as before, ready to offer their all to their masters at any moment.

    Han Shuo, knowing this open secret, had other thoughts in his mind. There was no chance he was about to serve as a cannon fodder for Manticole at any moment, regardless of how critical.

    ¡°Eh? Where¡¯s the other Demon King? Didn¡¯t you say that the two of you were allied?¡± Han Shuo asked after looking all around him.

    ¡°We will join him at the entrance of the Void. By now, he should be on his way. We should set off too,¡± Manticole exined.

    ¡°Oh. I have no issues. Let¡¯s go then,¡± Han Shuo replied.

    Manticole nodded smilingly and without another word, took to the sky, leading the way for the party. Han Shuo, along with the group of ck Jade Guards, closely followed behind Manticole. Their destination: the Void!

 Chapter 559: Invincible Consciousness

    GDK 559: Invincible Consciousness

    Five dayster. At the entrance to the most mysterious ce on the Abyss realm: the Void.

    Han Shuo and the fifteen Demons that followed closely behind Demon King Manticole, finally arrived at their destination.

    It was a peculiar region filled with enormous, menacing nts. Each one of those strange towering trees would ferociously assault at Han Shuo and the party. There were marshes and swamps all over, with colorful miasma that constantly lingered in the air. Roaming about were also some huge and oddly-shaped abyssal creatures.

    Manticole must have been totally familiar with this region. He led Han Shuo and the party flying crisscrossed, and only stopped when they arrived before a magnificent scene of colourful, ze-like stardust current that ascended to the sky.

    Han Shuo briefly surveyed his surroundings. He discovered that after Manticole had unfolded his Domain of Divinity, not a single nt or living thing was so unintelligent to dare approach them. The intense element of darkness gathered towards Manticole from all directions. After just a short time, the element of darkness within Manticole¡¯s Domain of Divinity grew ten times more concentrated. All other elemental energies that were usually present between heaven and earth were nowhere to be found within the space it covered. Even the four edictal forces became twisted.

    The fifteen ck Jade Guards that chaperoned Manticole immediately gained a great sense of difort. Without any elemental energies avable that they could rely on, and having yet to truly be gods, a burst of dejection out of powerlessness and unease filled their hearts.

    Fortunately for them, Manticole did not keep his Domain of Divinity deployed for too long. It didn¡¯t take long after he unfolded his Domain of Divinity for Han Shuo to sense that in another region not far away, the element of lightning suddenly began to rapidly congeal. A long rumble reverberated through the sky. A party of men was rapidly approaching Manticole.

    Manticole withdrew his Domain of Divinity right after the rumble. He said to Han Shuo in a warm voice, ¡°Leviathan is here.¡±

    Leviathan, one of the five Great Demon Kings of the Abyss realm, cultivated in the elemental energy of lightning and maintained a rather deep-rooted friendship with Manticole. Soon after Manticole withdrew his Domain of Divinity, an overbearing silhouette of interwoven lightning boltsnded before Manticole in the blink of an eye.

    Leviathan was three meters tall. Two huge horns curled out from his head. Luscious body hair coated his skin. His powerful body radiated with electrical sparks. At first nce, Han Shuo thought Leviathan rather resembled a wild bull, if not for his human face.

    Upon arriving, Leviathan chuckled and said, ¡°Manticole, I have already been here for a few days. What took you so long?¡±

    ¡°Better toe on time than prematurely,¡± Manticole said in a mild manner. He raised his head to look at the gorgeous, colourful space, and continued, ¡°The stardust current has yet topletely vanish, hasn¡¯t it?¡±

    Whoosh Whoosh Whoosh... A dozen or so shadows arrived andnded still behind Manticole. Each and every one of them was of Demon strength; they were the Thunder Guards, direct subordinates of Leviathan.

    A pair of silvery pupils spewing lighting bolts suddenly turned to Han Shuo. With an interested tone, Leviathan asked, ¡°This unfamiliar-looking friend must be the one who exterminated three Shadow Warriors in an instant, Mister Han Shuo?¡±

    Han Shuo faintly smiled and nodded. In a neither overbearing, nor servile manner, he greeted, ¡°Hehe, hello.¡± Just like Manticole, Leviathan was a lowgod. Even without activating his consciousness, Han Shuo could sense the terrifying energy on Leviathan¡¯s body. He reckoned that the other three Demon Kings had to possess lowgod strength as well.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help butpare. With his three souls, Han Shuo currently possessed enough strength to contend against any single Demon King. Given that Little Skeleton had be a lowgod of death, in addition to the Penta-elemental Undead Formation formed by five magical elite zombies, Han Shuo was confident that he had sufficient strength for self-preservation. Therefore, he inwardly began scheming some things that would be advantageous to him.

    Leviathan looked deeply into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, with bolts of lightning brightly shing throughout his silver pupils. After a long while, he chuckled, nodded and said, ¡°Not bad, qualified enough!¡±

    Han Shuo understood that Leviathan must have sensed the strength of the destruction lowgod from his body. Such was the Abyss realm. Without sufficient strength, one would not receive the proper respect. It was because Leviathan sensed the destruction energy of Han Shuo¡¯s lowgod avatar that he truly took Han Shuo as a friend of equal status.

    ¡°Since you have been here for so long, have you discovered the trails of the other three?¡± Manticole smilingly asked after waiting for Leviathan to approve of Han Shuo¡¯s strength.

    ¡°Those three arrived long ago. They are taking three positions at the moment, and are all waiting for the moment that the stardust current around the void disappears,¡± Leviathan turned to a serious look and replied with a deep voice.

    Han Shuo raised his head and looked up at the sky. The colourful stardust current resembled the vast ocean of gxies, mysterious and enigmatic. Streak after streak of brilliant light beams appeared and faded like shooting stars. Emerald green, sapphire blue, amethyst purple, and halos of everything in between waft gently past them.

    Han Shuo knew that behind the stardust current was the entrance to the Void. He opened up his consciousness very slightly, and secretly sent a strand of it drifting towards that stardust current. He attempted to explore the stardust current very subtly and carefully.

    Stardust currents had an intense corrosive and destructive effect on the soul. Any lifeform with a soul, upon entering the stardust current, would immediately receive its effects. Their souls would be corroded and broken down in a quick instant, with their consciousness shattered and all traces of their souls vanished between heaven and earth.

    Even experts like Manticole and Leviathan, who were true gods, were powerless against this stardust current. All they could do was to patiently wait for the time when the stardust current naturally disappeared, and only then would they dare enter the Void. It was thus clear just how threatening this stardust current was!

    When a strand of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness sank into it, those bizarre sand-like energies suddenly reacted. The splendid sky of the Void blossomed with dazzling colours and rapidly gathered towards the region where that strand of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness probed. The soul-corroding energy within that exotic stardust current immediately entered the strand of consciousness, trying to dissolve and shatter the sample of Han Shuo¡¯s soul.

    The consciousness formed using demonic arts was incredible. Han Shuo knew that the stardust current had the terrifying power to corrode souls, but nevertheless, he remained fearless in sending a fraction of his consciousness to venture inside. This was precisely because, during the period that he carefully researched the abilities of his consciousness, he learned that the consciousness could split into a myriad of parts and still rbine into one again. That was the reason behind his seemingly reckless attempt.

    That strand of his consciousness was being rapidly corroded away. However, it could regrow itself at an even greater speed. With that, strange light shimmered on that region. Although the energy of the stardust current was eating away that strand of consciousness, it was not at all being shattered.

    ¡°Haha, some idiot recklessly charged in without waiting for the stardust current to fade away. From the looks of it, some smaller forces who know nothing of the dangers are participating as well,¡± Leviathan said with a face of rejoice in others¡¯ misfortune as he looked up at the region that was suddenly blossoming with its own fireworks.

    ¡°Yep, it¡¯s only those neers who know nothing about the treacherousness of the Void who would act so recklessly,¡± Manticole seconded as he raised his head and looked to the sky.

    Listening in on the conversation of these two Demon Kings, Han Shuo, as the culprit behind the firework of lights, unhurriedly withdrew that strand of consciousness which was still pristine and sound. He thought to himself, Although the stardust current is indeed terrifying, my consciousness seems to be invulnerable to it. From this aspect, the consciousness formed using demonic arts is definitely much more magnificent and powerful than the Soul of Element or Soul of Edict formed using the twelve fundamental forces.

    Manticole and Leviathan were standing right beside Han Shuo. These two lowgod Demon Kings, however, couldn¡¯t detect that little maneuver of Han Shuo¡¯s wonderful consciousness. This gave Han Shuo the feeling that demonic arts were superior to other cultivation techniques, while also further solidifying his staunch conviction to cultivate in demonic arts.

    After Han Shuo withdrew his consciousness, that piece of sky no longer dazzled with brilliant lights. Leviathan turned around and solemnly exined to the group of Thunder Guards behind him, ¡°Each and every one of you, especially those who came here for the first time, remember this by all means: do not charge ahead before the stardust currentpletely disappears. You all have seen the sight just now, when the stardust current stopped glowing with light, it meant that the soul of the trespasser had perished and annihted.

    After Leviathanpleted his speech, Manticole too turned to his fifteen ck Jade Guards, put on a solemn face, cleared his throat, and said, ¡°You all better listen carefully. Inside the Void, without mymand, none of you must act out of your own initiative. If you act on any delinquency and cause me trouble, I will let you taste what is worse than death. Understood?¡± It was obvious that in Manticole¡¯s mind, the lives of these minions that he brought up himself were of little value to him.

    ¡°Yes my Lord!¡± the altogether fifteen ck Jade Guards, including Bord and Zinia, answered in trepidation. Each one of them revealed dread on their faces, as though recalling the terrible methods of this usually mild-looking Demon King.

    Han Shuo was somewhat astonished and thought to himself, A Demon King is indeed a Demon King. No matter how gentle and harmless he appears in usual times, that was nothing more than a mask for his bloody and cruel ways.

    ¡°So what should we do now?¡± After all, it was Han Shuo¡¯s first time here. Although he had learned certain things about the Void from Bord and Zinia, there were still many things that he didn¡¯t understand.

    Towards Han Shuo, this existence of the same ss, whether it was Manticole or Leviathan, both behaved rather friendly. The two simultaneously answered, ¡°We wait!¡± After a short pause, Manticole exined, ¡°We wait for the moment that the stardust disappears!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and said no more. He patiently joined others in waiting for the moment that the stardust current vanished.

 Chapter 560: The Fountainhead of Evil

    GDK 560: The Fountainhead of Evil

    The stardust current that covered the entire sky was like a gigantic, moving, colorful oil painting. Han Shuo¡¯s heart grew calm. He raised his head, and slowly expanded his consciousness outwards...

    There was a lowgod that cultivated in the edict of destruction just like himself. This aura of destruction that originated from the northwest part was extremely frightening. Even the slightest contact with his consciousness would immediately trigger the corrosive power of the energy of destruction. Han Shuo hastily avoided him. He understood that the Demon King taking that position ought to be Bechymos.

    Han Shuo continued to expand his consciousness outwards after keeping a distance from Bechymos. He then came to discover an area where the element of water and fire gathered in high concentration. With just one thought, Han Shuo immediately knew that the person ought to be Cecrops and Gnder. The duo of Cecrops and Gnder cultivated in the element of water and the element of fire respectively. Themon saying goes that fire and water don¡¯t mix. But these two Demon Kings got along surprisingly well and enjoyed great friendly rtions.

    Over on Cecrops and Gnder¡¯s side, Han Shuo sensed the presence of a ton of Demons. He was certain that Cecrops and Gnder had brought their personal guards along.

    After stealthily withdrawing his consciousness, Han Shuo took a deep breath. His consciousness sank into a state of emptiness, as he calmly and patiently waited for the moment that the stardust current disappears.

    After an unknown amount of time, the colourful and brightly coloured space, like a pond that had a huge boulder thrown into it, an immense ripple suddenly surged through it. Magnificent and splendid colours shot out, interweaving. Brilliant rays of all colours streaked through the space like shooting stars.

    After a round of that dazzling disy of radiance, the stardust current drifted into the distance. Abruptly, in midair, a taupe-coloured entrance taking the form of a whirlpool made up of all kinds of energies came into view. That whirlpool was gargantuan and seemed to be sucking in and engulfing matter with tremendous force. It would leave any observer pondering its unfathomable mysteriousness.

    While Han Shuo was staring at the whirlpool in amazement, contemting its profound mysteries, Manticole suddenly put on a delighted expression and lightly yelled, ¡°The stardust current has passed. We can go inside now.¡±

    ¡°Get ready,¡± Leviathan, in a grave expression and a deep voice, instructed, ¡°Stick closely behind us. Do not leave one step away from us.¡±

    Whoosh Whoosh Whoosh...

    While Manticole and Leviathan were talking, a few dozen shadows suddenly entered the whirlpool. Based on their aura and location, Han Shuo made out that those ought to be Cecrops, Gnder, and their forces.

    ¡°Hey hey, those two fes must really be rushing huh,¡± Leviathan chuckled. He signaled with his hand to temporarily halt the party¡¯s movement. It was only after Gnder and his faction had all entered into the Void that he finally said, ¡°Let¡¯s move.¡±

    ¡°Bechymos has yet to enter,¡± Han Shuo, following behind Leviathan as they flew directly towards the whirlpool, uttered as though by ident.

    Leviathan, who was flying towards the Void, looked at Han Shuo with a somewhat astonished expression on his face. As thoughpletely astounded that Han Shuo could figure out Bechymos¡¯ tracks, he said, ¡°Bechymos has always been a lone wolf. Every time he enters the Void, he doesn¡¯t bring a single subordinate along. Even the four of us Demon Kingsbined would be less familiar with the Void than he is. Plus, his whereabouts are the hardest to spot. Do you know where he is?¡±

    Han Shuo pointed at a piece ofnd in the northwest that grew with lush shrubbery, and said in a natural voice, ¡°Right underneath there. He cultivates in the edict of destruction just as I do. I can sense it.¡±

    When Han Shuo said this, Manticole too took a small shock. He said in a rather amazed manner, ¡°Mister Han Shuo is indeed out of the ordinary. Even the two of us couldn¡¯t detect Bechymos¡¯s location. But you could.¡±

    Leviathan nodded. He was rather amazed by it as well. However, the two did not mind too much about this. As they spoke, the entrance to the Void entered their sights. With one thought, a protective shield as thin as a cicada¡¯s wing moulded around Han Shuo¡¯s entire body. With a sh of ck light, Han Shuo¡¯s body fell into the Void.

    It was as though he had suddenly fallen into a strange dimension. Pure elemental energies of extreme intensity could be found in every corner. When he inhaled, the elements would naturally enter his body through his breath, giving him a wonderfully refreshing sensation.

    There was a turbulent, grayish air blowing all around. When Han Shuo concentrated his attention to look all around, he discovered that he had indeed entered another dimension. Huge, colourful rocks were suspended in midair as far as the eye could see. They looked like meteorites floating in the air that constantly sparkled with splendid lights. This enchanting lightshow gave its observers a feeling that they were inside an absurd dreamscape.

    Right ahead was a system of tunnels made of air streams, constantly radiating strange lights. Gust after gust of violent wind whooshed from their sides. The wind blew so violently that even the giant rocks were swaying.

    ¡°Follow us! Move!¡± Manticole yelled at the top of his lungs. The sound that reached Han Shuo¡¯s ears, however, was as though it had been muffled throughyers of concrete, and was as soft as the voice of an ant.

    Han Shuo creased his brows and turned to look at Manticole who was within an arm¡¯s reach. He realized that the Void really was miraculous. Manticole, a being with the strength of a lowgod, shouted at the top of his lungs from such a short distance away, yet the voice propagated was only this faint.

    Han Shuo activated his consciousness. Immediately, he sensed the presence of all kinds of energies at this entrance into the Void, namely, the eight elemental energies, four edictal forces, as well as some rather umon energies like fear and hatred.

    ¡°These energies were left by those experts whose souls perished inside the Void, formed from the remnant energies inside their bodies. Do not ever attempt to absorb these energies. They have drifted about in the Void for countless years, and are contaminated with some kind of unknown aura. Just like the stardust current, it had an intense corrosive power on the soul,¡± Leviathan hastily said.

    Both Manticole and Leviathan appeared apprehensive and uneasy after arriving outside the Void. They constantly passed on words of caution to their minions beside them. After saying those words, Leviathan proceeded forward cautiously. A spiderweb-like structure made of the energy of lightning rapidly took shape in their path ahead. Itpletely cleansed off intense energies at the front of the party. Meanwhile, Manticole took charge of the rear, and formed a zone of absolute darkness in the area behind them. With the two Demon Kings working together, utilizing the energies of darkness and lightning, every inch of the space within their protections was isted and invulnerable to the plethora of energies around them. Not a single one of those Demons received the slightest harm.

    Han Shuo, who stood between Manticole and Leviathan, unfolded his consciousness after entering. He immediately sensed the chaotic mixture of all kinds of energies. Arge part of that energy was left behind by experts who had yet to possess divine energy that previously entered the Void. They were mixed together with some terrifying and strange energies inside the Void, causing them to adopt extremely corrosive properties towards the soul. Perhaps it was due to the strangeness of the Void that they did not dissipate and vanish between heaven and earth!

    All of a sudden, Han Shuo¡¯s demonic infant became restless. Towards the various sorts of chaotic energies found in this ce, the demonic infant was like a hungry and thirsty child, and it instinctively craved to devour them. With one thought, the demonic infant began revolving at high speed. ck electrical sparks suddenly covered the space between Han Shuo and his protective shield. Demonic yuan attached to his protective shield like sinister fluids.

    In an instant, Han Shuo seemed to turn into a giant ma. All kinds of negative energies that flooded the entrance to the Void such as death, destruction, hatred, fear, and so on, abruptly and wildly gravitated towards Han Shuo like runaway horses.

    ¡°Mis- Mister Han Shuo, what is this are you doing?¡± Leviathan¡¯s face jolted. When he discovered that the abnormalities with the energies around him were caused by Han Shuo, his heart turned furious, and so he scolded.

    ¡°Han Shuo, stop this right now! Do you want to kill us all?¡± Manticole was greatly shocked as well. He began to grow anxious of Han Shuo¡¯s actions.

    This entrance to the Void had always been filled with all kinds of energies. Had it been just a cluster or even a few clusters of these energies that were rushing to them, Leviathan and Manticole wouldn¡¯t have minded. But there were a few hundred clusters of them simultaneously gushing towards them, and even with their strength, it would be a pain in the ass. Although they could purge those energies with their divine energy, that however would exhaust a great amount of their divine energy.

    They were merely at the entrance to the Void. There were still various unknown dangers waiting for them inside. If they wasted a big portion of their divine energy before even entering the Void, then, when they actually entered the Void, they would have to be extremely passive. Hence, when they saw a few hundred clusters of negative energy simultaneously converging towards them, the duo urgently shrieked at once.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I will handle them!¡± Han Shuo calmly shouted in a deep voice. The demonic infant became a bottomless ck hole, emanating the sinister and terrifying power of absorption.

    The few hundred clusters of negative energies that suddenly rushed over, when elerating to great speeds, turned into colorful and dazzling light rays, whichpletely cast onto Han Shuo¡¯s body. Han Shuo revealed a pleasantly surprised expression and operated the demonic yuan to its maximum. It was at this moment that he realized what those shooting-star-like rays that he saw before entering were ¨C they were actually formed as the energies flowed at high speeds.

    All kinds of negative energy, drawn by the suction of the demonic infant, rapidly shone on Han Shuo¡¯s body before they dissolved into Han Shuo¡¯s body at an even greater speed. Han Shuo¡¯s demonic infant had basically turned into extremely sophisticated machinery, rapidly operating, converting the negative energy into demonic yuan that flowed into every one of Han Shuo¡¯s limbs, bones, and organs...

    The duo of Leviathan and Manticole was about to shout and quarrel, until they suddenly discovered the abnormality inside Han Shuo¡¯s body, and immediately shut their mouths. Their faces were aghast as they stared at Han Shuo, who had seemingly transformed into the fountainhead of evil!

 Chapter 561: Strengthening

    GDK 561: Strengthening

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo is truly a terrifying character!¡± Bord remarked to Zinia beside him as he stared at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Lord Leviathan, didn¡¯t you say that these energies would corrode the soul? Why is it that Mister Han Shuo appears to be just fine, and even seems to very much enjoying it?¡± Zinia too looked up and down at Han Shuo astonished, not understanding how he did that.

    Leviathan and Manticole turned to exchange nces with each other with eyes flickering with amazement. After a long while, Leviathan finally forced a smile and said to Manticole, ¡°It seems that he is invulnerable to this soul-corroding energy.¡±

    Manticole nodded and replied, ¡°Yep. Let¡¯s wait here for a while.¡±

    The demonic infant was at full force. Therge amount of negative energy all around him was drawn to Han Shuo and entered his body. They were then converted by the demonic infant into demonic yuan, which subsequently trickled into every part of Han Shuo¡¯s body like tiny streams.

    At this point, Han Shuo¡¯s realm state had been trending towards stability, and he was on the verge of making a breakthrough in his cultivation of demonic arts. For days he had worried about the issue of having insufficient demonic yuan. Who could have guessed that before entering the Void, before even seeing the mysterious Void with his own eyes, he would be so fortunate to obtain a considerable amount of energy.

    Strands and strands of demonic yuan flowed into his cells and bones, which then strengthened Han Shuo¡¯s body bit by bit through some kind of bizarre method. Every time Han Shuo made a breakthrough, his physical body was the first to transform and strengthen. This time was no exception. When that demonic yuan circted, Han Shuo could clearly sense his body bing even mightier and more robust.

    There seemed to be no concept of time inside the Void. After an undetermined amount of time had passed, Han Shuo discovered that not the slightest bit of energy around him was converging towards his body.

    Although there were a few hundred clusters of that negative energy around the Void, individually, they weren¡¯t actually that powerful. After the demonic infant removed the dross out of the energy, what truly was converted into demonic yuan and absorbed by him was merely 10 percent. Moreover, achieving the Nine Changes realm seemed to require an extraordinary amount of energy. Han Shuo felt that there wasn¡¯t enough energy around him when the forging of his physical body was only halfway done. Therefore, he had no choice but to stop.

    Han Shuo reluctantly stopped and thought to himself, It appeared that although there were a few hundred clusters of that energy, it wasn¡¯t enough to support the metamorphosis of the physical body.

    Han Shuo took a deep breath and looked at Manticole, Leviathan was very much amazed. He looked deep into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes. Nobody knew what was on his mind.

    Looking all around, Han Shuo discovered that those streaks of shing light rays had suddenly reduced. He knew it had to have something to do with him absorbing the energy. This absorption of energy was very useful for advancing his attainments in demonic arts. Han Shuo had grown somewhat impatient with whaty waiting at the depths of the Void, so he smilingly said, ¡°Guys, can we continue forward now?¡±

    ¡°Of course. Let¡¯s go,¡± Manticole hastily replied. He looked ahead and continued, ¡°Let¡¯s hurry up. We¡¯ve been standing here for far too long.¡±

    With Leviathan and Manticole paving the way, and Han Shuo and a few dozen Demons sandwiched between them, the party continued with their journey. Brilliant rays would fly past from all around them. The meteorite-like rocks would sway about in the blowing of the hurricanes.

    As the two Demon Kings put up defenses against the energy around them, they very carefully maneuvered to avoid the giant rocks all around them. Everything went smoothly in their gradual flight towards the Void.

    Suddenly, a zone of boundless darkness appeared ahead of them. At first nce, the area looked like a bottomless dark pit.

    Rounds and rounds of faintly discernible blood-curdling screeches came from that zone of boundless darkness a great distance away. Manticole exined with graveness across his whole face, ¡°Those miserable shrieksing from the zone of boundless darkness, those must be the subordinates of the other two Demon Kings. To enter the Void, we will need to make it past this hurdle. During the dive, our sight will be greatly affected and none of you will be able to view your surroundings. Everyone will be affected by it with no exception. As you dive, you will find violent air streams with terrifying impacting force. Those air streams might even contain some rocks, or perhaps weapons left behind by those who previously perished in there. Be exceedingly cautious.¡±

    In reality, these Demons would be extremely cautious even without Manticole¡¯s verbose warning. All those with the capacity to be Demons weren¡¯t of low intelligence. Before the two Demon Kings started the expedition, they must have described the dangers to these Demons. They knew that not all of them would be able to make it past the danger ahead.

    In other words, some among them would die in the process ofnding in the Void. Even though Leviathan and Manticole did not say it explicitly, everyone there knew what was going on.

    ¡°Let¡¯s move.¡± When Mancole saw the grimness on everyone¡¯s faces, he was sure that all these Demons were aware of the fact. Without exining any further, Manticole and Leviathan nodded at each other and took the lead to jump into it.

    ¡°Bord, Zinia, let¡¯s go in together so that we can look after each other,¡± Han Shuo smilingly said to Bord and Zinia in an unruffled manner, instead of rushing to jump inside.

    ¡°Thank you Mister Han Shuo,¡± Bord and Zinia were pleasantly surprised and took the courtesy of performing a big bow towards Han Shuo.

    Look after each other? With their tiny bit of strength, what could they look after for Han Shuo? The couple naturally understood that ¡®look after each other¡¯, actually meant that Han Shuo would be guarding the two. From the admiring gazesing from some Demons beside them, the couple realized just how fortunate they were. Their eager and attentive service to Han Shuo and his people sure earned them well.

    Han Shuo smiled and did not say a word. He knew that as long as the two lived on, they would still hold a high ce in ck Jade City and therefore would still have some value to him.

    One after another, the Demons leapt down to the zone of boundless darkness following Leviathan and Manticole. Bord and Zinia only jumped after they received the indication from Han Shuo. Right after, Han Shuo¡¯s figure turned into a shadow and followed behind Bord and Zinia who were holding each other¡¯s hands.

    Upon entering, Han Shuo discovered that this zone of absolute darkness did not contain a single photon. Even his remarkable eyesight couldn¡¯t get him a good view of his surroundings. In this ce where light could not propagate, lighting up a torch would do nothing.

    But for Han Shuo, the consciousness was much more useful than the eyes. As soon as he unfolded his consciousness, every single movement within its coverage area registered in his mind. After Han Shuo had locked onto Bord and Zinia¡¯s presences, there was absolutely no way that they could escape from Han Shuo¡¯s watch. Even Leviathan and Manticole, who were further ahead, were under the surveince of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    Just like Manticole had said it, this ce was pitch-dark and concealed terrifying dangers. Streams of air blowed without a fixed direction. Propelled by some unknown energy, they would flutter all over the ce in silence, wreaking havoc under the cover of the absolute darkness. These air streams were filled with sharp objects. Although the body of a Demon-grade expert was formidable in defensive power, it still wasn¡¯t tough enough to withstand the pration of those sharp objects.

    The Void was a peculiar ce, and this area was especially so. Han Shuo could hear loud shrieks echoing beside him. But when he unfolded his consciousness, he discovered that the sound actually came from some region far below. On the contrary, those loud howls of pain close to him sounded as small as a mosquitoes.

    It seemed inside this ce that, the further away the sound originated, the clearer it became. The closer one got to the source, the softer it was. This would be very deadly to an expert as they would have no way of detecting those air streams that were so dangerously close to them.

    More and more cries sounded loud and clear from around Han Shuo. He knew that some of those Demons that entered together had perished. Suddenly, he saw a rapidly whirling air stream silently shooting towards Bord and Zinia. There was an incisive conical object within that air stream. If it came into contact with Bord and Zinia, Han Shuo was certain that neither of them would make it out alive.

    Han Shuo, who had been closely following Bord and Zinia, suddenly reached out with his hand, grabbed onto Zinia¡¯s supple shoulder, and pulled backward. The downward trajectory of the couple suddenly changed, and they very easily avoided a collision path with that air stream.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness covered a huge area. The couple managed to avoid one danger after another by being pushed and pulled like toys by Han Shuo again and again. The party finally touched down and arrived in a huge valley with mist lingering in the air. Bord and Zinia, whose heads were spinning, looked all around and suddenly discovered that of the thirty-something Demons that came down, one third had died. Those that remained were battered and exhausted. Even Manticole and Leviathan weren¡¯t in their best shapes.

    ¡°Thank you Mister Han Shuo,¡± the couple suddenly realized just how fortunate they were and most respectfully expressed their gratitude towards Han Shuo.

 Chapter 562: Walking on Thin Ice

    GDK 562: Walking on Thin Ice

    They found themselves in a valley meant for giants, obscured by a nket of thick mist. Han Shuo had no clue why there would be such a valley inside the Void. But from the expressions of Manticole and Leviathan, they seemed to have be very excited upon arriving at this ce.

    Han Shuo unfolded his consciousness and very easily discovered the locations of the other two Demon Kings. It appeared that although their opposers had arrived before them, they weren¡¯t too far ahead.

    As Han Shuo silently observed the surroundings using his consciousness, he suddenly discovered an aura of destruction emerging from the darkness overhead. However, the aura disappeared right after Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness caught wind of it.

    ¡°Bechymos has descended,¡± Han Shuo confirmed in a deep voice.

    Leviathan and Manticole suddenly exchanged nces with each other and silently nodded, indicating that they understood Han Shuo¡¯s words. Han Shuo looked at them with a puzzled expression when he saw the two Demon Kings pondering with creased brows. He couldn¡¯t help but ask, ¡°So, where should we go now?¡±

    Their eyes gathered on Han Shuo¡¯s face at the same time. Leviathan thought for a moment before he forced a smile and exined, ¡°This ce that we are in, it is technically inside the Void. However, if we want to discover more secrets of the Void, we must explore it ourselves. The center of this great valley contains too many dangers and secrets. During our two previous explorations, we only trailed around the perimeter. My magical ring was discovered here as well.¡±

    Han Shuo took a deep breath. He discovered that in this valley, elements of all kinds were abundant. The thick hazy mist covered the valley like ayer of cloud. Although it wasn¡¯tpletely dark like the dark tunnel they hade from, the sight was nevertheless greatly affected. For some reason, the coverage area of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was greatly limited in this ce. The thick mist that lingered in the valley seemed to possess some bizarre resistance properties that caused Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness to be unable to deploy to the fullest.

    It was precisely for this reason that after Bechymos entered the Void, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness had merely sensed for a moment before losing track on him. Besides, Bechymos was flying at great speeds and flew to another ce in just an instant.

    ¡°Based on my many years of experience, I reckon that this ce used to be a battlefield between gods. Based on what I observed on the two asions I came here, I discovered that this ce upied an area so huge it was beyond my imagination. The great battle that must have taken ce between powerful gods back then had left behind too many boundaries and dangers. We need to be cautious and prudent. If we recklessly charge into some chaotic boundaries, we could all perish,¡± Manticole said with his brows furrowed.

    ¡°Erm, you previously mentioned that the internar transportation array was in the Void. Could it be here as well?¡± Han Shuo asked Manticole while he used his consciousness to sense the changes in his surroundings as best as he could.

    ¡°The internar portal is indeed in this ce. However, as to its precise location, I have no clue. I have only learned of it from Bechymos. He said that he had previously seen the internar transportation array, but because he didn¡¯t have the nar coordinates and had no knowledge on how to operate it, he dared not to touch it,¡± Manticole exined.

    At those words, Han Shuo silently cursed him in his heart, and thought, If you had told me the truth about Bechymos knowing where the array is located earlier, I would be able to find andmunicate with Bechymos. Now that he is outside of my detection, it¡¯s gonna be a big trouble to find him again.

    Han Shuo knew in his heart that although Manticole and Leviathan appeared to value him a lot, they in fact, from the very start, didn¡¯t give a damn about the fact that he needed an internar transportation array to leave this world. The duo probably took Han Shuo as one of their own Demons, someone that they could take advantage of. Perhaps the only trait setting him apart from their Demons was that this target of exploit could trouble the other two Demon Kings. During critical moments, the three joining forces would give them the upper hand.

    Ever since he obtained the information about internar transportation array from the skeletal staff, Han Shuo knew that to operate one of those arrays, one had to not only know how to activate the machine, but one also needed the proper set of coordinates of the destination. If the procedure wasn¡¯t done right, they could be teleported to some empty space within the vast and boundless universe, and they would be trapped there for the rest of their lives, condemned to solitary deaths.

    Han Shuo swallowed his grief. He did not say anything but continued to look at Manticole and Leviathan with a smile on his face, waiting for the two to devise the n.

    ¡°We need to explore around ourselves. We not only have to constantly be on the lookout for any danger that mighte, but also pay extra attention to the surroundings. I can¡¯t say for sure, but maybe, somewhere beside you, there could be a divine weapon or divine soul left by some perished gods. So, pay attention to that,¡± Leviathan was obviously very excited. He then pointed at that dark tunnel that they had alle through, and continued, ¡°Remember, always pay attention to this tunnel that we came from. If it begins to sparkle, that means the stardust current ising back. At that time, we must immediately drop whatever we are doing and leave this ce as quickly as possible.¡±

    Before entering, Han Shuo had learned from Bord and Zinia that this Void was not only hard to enter, leaving was no less of a challenge. After the stardust current began flowing from around the entrance, it would travel in a particr trajectory that surrounded the entire Void. When the tunnel began to glitter, the stardust current would start to fill from underneath. It would first rinse the valley once through, then travel up the path from which they came, and finally return to the entrance and block up the Void once again.

    The stardust current could cover an enormous surface area of the Void, and spread at speeds that would far surpass any of them. If they did not leave as soon as the stardust current began to sweep the Void, it wouldn¡¯t take long before they were buried by the stardust current and their consciousness annihted. They would join those mighty gods that had somehow made their ways there, and perhaps transform into divine souls that were without any awareness.

    Manticole and Leviathan repeated once again the dangers and what they need to pay attention to inside the Void. They then led the group of Demon guards and cautiously made their way towards an area shrouded with dense fog.

    Han Shuo unfolded his consciousness. He could sense some awfully messy and extremely frightening boundaries and scattered magical matrices all around him. They contained twelve fundamental energies as well as some lesser known energies. Together, they formed an enormous system, no lessplex than a giant spider web. Danger lurked in every corner. No one knew just how formidable the destructive power contained within was. It was no wonder Manticole and Leviathan were apprehensive and dared not advance without careful consideration.

    ¡°I have walked this path twice with Manticole. We have defused some of the dangers along this path. There, Manticole¡¯s magical ring was picked up from right over there,¡± Leviathan pointed at a strange projecting rock and exined as they walked.

    From the two, Han Shuo understood that the whole exploration process would be extremely challenging due to the dangers everywhere. Manticole and Leviathan had visited twice, but still had not managed to explore the whole valley. Furthermore, they even encountered the other two Demon Kings in the area, and fought over a divine weapon. In the end, because a seal near them suddenly shattered, all four of them lost many of their subordinates, giving them no choice but to end the fight.

    All five Demon Kings of the Abyss realm gathered in this region. They grouped themselves into three factions, and explored the valley on their own. As it wasn¡¯t the first time that they had entered the valley, they had naturally exhausted tremendous strength and lives before figuring out their own paths inside the valley. To follow on the path that Manticole and Leviathan made, Han Shuo could be considered as riding on their coattails.

    The party walked instead of boldly zooming through the air. After walking for a while, Manticole and Leviathan abruptly stopped. They had surveyed their surroundings when Leviathan said in a low-pitched voice, ¡°We made it this far thest time. We have yet to undo a boundary in front of us before we saw the tunnel glowing and had no choice but to immediately pull out.¡±

    ¡°Our journey on this path so far has been smooth because we had cleared away all sorts of obstacles before this for a high price. However, from this point onwards, we will face the true terror of this ce. Over here, all of you could die. Even the three of us might die. Therefore, we need to be very, very careful,¡± Manticole added.

    A round of speechless silence followed. Everyone seemed to have a high boulder pressing down on their hearts. Even Han Shuo was being very cautious. Han Shuo could sense all kinds of unknown boundaries around him, but had no idea just how dangerous they were.

    Lub Dub... Lub Dub... Han Shuo¡¯s ears were sharp. He suddenly heard a strange noiseing from a seal not far from himself.

    He was confused. He did not understand why the seal was suddenly beating to a faint ¡®Lub-Dub¡¯. While Han Shuo puzzled over it, a Thunder Guard, whose first time it was there, suddenly covered his chest with his hand and in a terrified face, shrieked madly and miserably.

    All the gazes immediately gathered on this Thunder Guard. When Han Shuo carefully looked at the Thunder Guard, he discovered that his heart was beating at the same frequency as the sounding from that seal!

    Han Shuo, who discovered this abnormality, was jolted, and hastily said, ¡°That Thunder Guard¡¯s elerated heartbeat out of nervousness seemed to have triggered that seal. Tranquilize him immediately.¡±

    ¡°Damnit Bohr, calm the fuck down,¡± Leviathan hastily said. He was both furious and anxious.

    Bang! That Thunder Guard¡¯s body exploded. The few standing around him were sttered with his flesh and broken bones. The powerful explosion caused the few immediate injuries.

 Chapter 563: Depraved

    GDK 563: Depraved

    Lub Dub... Lub Dub... Another three Demon guards whose first times it was in the Void could not contain the fear in their hearts. Their heartbeats suddenly elerated and seemed to be beating at the same rate as that seal after a short while. Leviathan furiously demanded them to calm themselves down, but it was toote. One after another, the three self-exploded, with their flesh and bones sttering all over their fellow men.

    Fortunately, everyone was on guard after witnessing the first explosion. When they noticed the three Demon Guards about to explode, they hastily put up their own defensive measures and managed to block the impact of the flying flesh and shattered bones. They did not sustain greater damage.

    All those characters who had cultivated to the heights of Demon sure possessed a steady heart and mind. However, in such an intense environment, facing enormous pressure repeatedly exerted by the two Demon Kings, some of them freaked out. It was only so that their heartbeats would rocket and trigger the seal.

    Thanks to Han Shuo and Leviathan¡¯s reminder, as well as the fact that those who remained were a more unflustered group of people, not a single one of them revealed a tiny bit of fear or worry. Every one of them wore a face as steady as a boulder, with their heartbeats so t that Han Shuo almost thought they were dead.

    After this round of danger, all those men truly understood just how treacherous the Void was without needing any more words from Leviathan and Manticole. It was no wonder that the two Demon Kings would be so cautious. Even an elerated heartbeat could cause death by spontaneousbustion. They knew the dangers of the Void by heart.

    ¡°You all have seen it just now. In this ce, even the tiniest mistake could result in death. Hmph, we could be considered lucky this time as it wasn¡¯t arge-scale boundary attack. Otherwise, we would all probably be dead by now. You had all better be more careful,¡± Leviathan wasn¡¯t emotionally affected at all by the death of his minions, instead, he began reprimanding in a stiff face.

    ¡°Alright. Kohler, that boundary, try to enter it,¡± Manticole pointed at the path ahead that was blocked by a boundary without any special visual characteristics, and nonchntly instructed his minion with the weakest strength among the ck Jade Guards.

    That ck Jade Guard whose name was called had fear scribbled across his face in splotchy red ink by a tourettes patient. There was no doubt in his mind that Manticole was only using him as cannon fodder to test the boundary ahead. Kohler, who had ced his firm conviction in Manticole as the one true god, realized that he had no second option no matter how afraid he was. He kneeled down on one knee at Manticole and said in a deep voice, ¡°My Lord, if this humble servant is so unfortunate to lose his life, please take care of my son.¡±

    Manticole nodded and unenthusiastically said, ¡°Go ahead. I know what to do.¡±

    Without another word, Kohler charged ahead with unswerving determination. A burst of dazzling light suddenly erupted from that formless boundary. In the next moment, Han Shuo sensed an extreme energy of lighting from it. After the sh of bright light, Kohler¡¯s body and soul vanished without a trace.

    This Kohler had spent a ton of effort and meticulously cultivated for who knew how long to finally be a Demon. In the end, however, he simply vanished in just a sh of light...

    Manticole was indifferent and did not reveal any trace of sorrow because of Kohler¡¯s death. He nodded to Leviathan standing beside him and said, ¡°Your guards, there¡¯s one cultivating in the energy of light.¡±

    ¡°Nn, go,¡± Leviathan instructed without a second of hesitation, not even turning back for a peep.

    This Nn who cultivated in the element of light was a beautiful and alluring woman. After hearing the instruction, she only stared nkly for a fraction of a second before shooting directly into that light element boundary without uttering a word.

    ¡°So this is how you have been advancing the path from the very beginning?¡± Han Shuo was stunned and asked in appall.

    Manticole put on a faint smile and answered, ¡°That¡¯s right. We could sense the energy type in some of those seals, but in some, we couldn¡¯t. It¡¯s usually not a problem if one enters a boundary or seal that is made of the same energy the person cultivates in. As long as the person doesn¡¯t die in there, he or she might even obtain great rewards.¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head slightly and breathed a soft sigh. Although the two Demon Kings couldn¡¯t detect that this boundary was made of the element of light, Han Shuo¡¯s wonderful consciousness, however, had long sensed it. However, before Han Shuo could say anything, that pitiful Kohler was sent to his death. Han Shuo didn¡¯t know what to think of the duo¡¯s practice. As he sighed, he couldn¡¯t help but throw a nce at Bord and Zinia.

    The couple wore numb faces, as though they were all too familiar with this method. Han Shuo understood in his heart that their loyalty to Demon King Manticole could not be doubted. Even if Manticole wanted them to kill themselves, they would do so in a heartbeat.

    Han Shuo shook his head again but did not say any more.

    That boundary of light glittered blindingly. After a long time, the light finally faded beforepletely vanishing. A pleasantly surprised expression on that beautiful woman called Nn was revealed. Han Shuo clearly sensed the element of light intensely gathered inside her body. It was clear to him that Nn must have obtained some marvelous rewards inside the boundary of light.

    ¡°Move, onwards!¡± Leviathan cheerfully smiled, threw a praising nce at Nn, and took the lead with Manticole to advance forward.

    The two Demon Kings had a glimmer in their eyes as they scanned the area before them. The space from this point onwards was unexplored. There could be some magical treasures quietlyying at some corner, waiting for the two to discover!

    ¡°Eh!¡± Manticole cried out in surprise. He was very emotional as he took a few careful steps to his left. His left hand shot out like lightning. A cup glistening with golden rays fell into his grasp.

    Han Shuo¡¯s sharp eyes and consciousness firmly fixed onto that cup. From it, he sensed an intense divine energy as well as the energy of light that lingered around it.

    ¡°Fucking hell, this is an item of the energy of light. Give me a break!¡± Manticole cursed in a low voice without regards to his deportment. His face was full of loathing as he threw that cup to Nn, who had yet to awake from the surprise she received moments before. He said, ¡°Take it. It¡¯s suitable for you to use. It¡¯s probably a divine weapon previously used by a lowgod.¡±

    Manticole who cultivated in the element of darkness, instinctively loathed the divine energy of the element of light. He was very pleasantly surprised at first, thinking that he had just found some treasure for himself. But he didn¡¯t expect that it would turn out to be a divine weapon for the element of light that he despised. It was no wonder that he would be so annoyed and lose the gentle side he maintained in usual times.

    Nn, who was in an unexinably lucky streak, received the divine weapon with ecstasy. She repeated over and over, ¡°Thank you, thank you Lord Manticole!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s move on. Manticole, don¡¯t be frustrated. Perhaps, just ahead, you will find a divine soul of a midgod of darkness that you¡¯ve looked forward to for many years, haha,¡± Leviathan smilingly soothed.

    Manticole¡¯s mood seemed to be slightly better after listening to those words. He replied with a smile, ¡°That could be. We have only just started with our exploration. Perhaps we really will find some extraordinary treasures. About that divine soul, we have only heard about it from Bechymos and have never seen such an umon thing with our eyes. Hopefully this time we will have that luck.¡±

    The party continued along their path with Manticole and Leviathan leading the way. Although they had been very observant, however, they came across no more valuable treasures as they went along. A few hundred meterster, a dpidated magical matrix appeared ahead of them. It was filled with intense energy of lightning.

    Those buzzing electrical sparks were obvious to the eyes. Everyone there naturally understood that the magical matrix belonged to the energy of lightning. At this point, Leviathan was being rather straightforward. Instead of having others take the risk, he reminded the party to be careful before covering his body with lightning bolts and charged ahead.

    For a moment, bolts of lightning swam around the matrix like snakes while the sound of thunder reverberated. Leviathan¡¯s figure had disappeared inside the matrix where sand and stones whirled all around. As more and more frightening roars of thunder struck, those lightning bolts seemed to be less and less contained within the matrix. Suddenly, it came showering down where Han Shuo and the others stood.

    Everyone took a shock and immediately seeked cover from it. Those lightning bolts weren¡¯t just terrifying in power, but also terrifyingly fast. Several Demons couldn¡¯t escape in time. Their twitching bodies were charred and fuming with smoke. Their vitality gradually faded out.

    That Nn who had received a divine weapon, had she safely exited from the Void, would have grown substantially stronger for sure with the help of that fortuitous encounter and the divine weapon. What a pity that her lucky streak didn¡¯t seem tost ¡®til the end of the journey. After those energies of lightning fell upon Nn, her charred body soon copsed on the ground.

    Han Shuo was greatly shocked. Among the party, no one else could sense the changes in the surrounding better than he could. Through the observation of his consciousness, Han Shuo was overwhelmed with shock when he discovered that among those bolts of lightning, although a great portion of them was out of control and shot all around, those lightning bolts that struck Nn actually came from Leviathan himself.

    In other words, when the dpidated magical matrix went out of control, this master of Nn¡¯s took advantage of the chaotic situation to electrocute Nn who had recently obtained a divine weapon!

    The thunderstormsted for another while. Besides Nn, two more Demons were killed. After the dpidated magical matrix¡¯s energy was exhausted, Leviathan came out from it with an apathetic expression. With a slightly astonished gaze, he looked at Nn¡¯s body that was scorched from head to toe, sighed, and said, ¡°What a pity. If she could return to the surface and cultivate for a period of time, she might very well have be the sixth Demon King of the Abyss.¡±

    Leviathan then walked to Nn¡¯s side, bluntly expropriated that divine weapon she obtained just a moment ago, and shook his head while sighing. Manticole, who was beside him, looked the other way as if nothing had happened.

    Han Shuo looked at the charred remains of Nn as he recalled of her non-hesitant charge ahead for Leviathan. A chill traveled down his spine. From that sentence ¡®you might very well have been the sixth Demon King¡¯, Han Shuo grasped what was on Leviathan¡¯s mind.

    Han Shuo coldly groaned in his heart and began taking precautions silently. He acquired a connection with Little Skeleton who was in the distant Netherworld andmanded Little Skeleton as well as the five elite zombies to get ready and standby for any sudden change in the situation!

 Chapter 564: Chaos Imminent

    GDK 564: Chaos Imminent

    The troop advanced for a few hundred meters without running into any hindrance. Manticole and Leviathan scanned every inch of visible ground around him, but couldn¡¯t find any truly valuable treasures.

    Later, they found their path forward blocked by a boundary. Following their usual standard procedure, when the Demon Kings couldn¡¯t detect what type of energy the boundary was made of, Leviathan instructed at once, ¡°Anro, go and try.¡±

    Although Leviathan and Manticole were both lowgods, they could only detect boundaries concealing the same energies that they cultivated in. If the elemental energy of the boundary was well concealed within the boundary, and the energy didn¡¯t belong to lightning or darkness, then Leviathan and Manticole could only resort to employing the most primitive method ever ¨C finding it out with lives!

    The two couldn¡¯t sense which energy it belonged to, but that didn¡¯t mean Han Shuo couldn¡¯t. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but furrow his eyebrows when he saw that the boundary concealed the elemental energy of wind, but Anro, the Demon sent forward by Leviathan, cultivated in the element of water. He raised his hand to stop it, saying, ¡°Hang on!¡±

    Leviathan stared nkly for a second before revealing a beaming smile and politely said, ¡°Yes Mister Han Shuo? Is there anything you¡¯d like to share with us?¡±

    Ever since the moment Han Shuo learned how this character would never even let his own follower off, Han Shuo lost every bit of friendly opinion towards him. But nheless, on the surface, Han Shuo still feigned civility and smiled, saying, ¡°If you trust me, let that friend over there try it instead.¡±

    Han Shuo held out a hand and pointed at a Demon under Manticole who cultivated in the element of wind. Han Shuo actually wasn¡¯t that merciful. He didn¡¯t care much about the lives and deaths of those Demons under Leviathan and Manticole. It¡¯s just that, to push on with their approach would truly exhaust a lot of manpower. Han Shuo was only worried that with their trial and error it wouldn¡¯t be long before all those Demons were dead. If that happened, they wouldn¡¯t be able to venture deeper, thus affecting his own progress as well. It was solely for this reason that he would be so kind to give his opinion.

    The face of that Demon cultivating in the element of wind pointed by Han Shuo suddenly turned deadly white. He shot a hateful re at Han Shuo as he turned over in his mind ¡®when did he offend Han Shuo and why would Han Shuo want to send him to his death at this critical moment¡¯.

    By contrast, Anro was clearly delighted. Although he couldn¡¯t reject Leviathan¡¯s order, he still knew how to treasure his own precious life. If that boundary ahead was made of the elemental energy of water, he would charge into it with sheer enthusiasm. But looking at Leviathan¡¯s bearing, he didn¡¯t seem to know which type of energy was inside the boundary. The chances of him dying while breaking into the boundary were truly too great, and thus, he couldn¡¯t help but fear for his life.

    It was also for the same reason that this Demon called Anro very obscurely expressed his gratitude towards Han Shuo with his eyes, although he had no idea why Han Shuo would help him.

    Leviathan and Manticole were slightly stunned and looked at Han Shuo with puzzled eyes. After a short pause, Manticole finally couldn¡¯t help but ask, ¡°What is the meaning of this?¡±

    ¡°To reduce everybody¡¯s losses. This way we can venture even deeper,¡± Han Shuo said unenthusiastically after putting on an enigmatic smile.

    ¡°Alright then,¡± Manticole was pretty blunt, or perhaps he felt that sacrificing one of his Demons was no big deal. He waved his hand at that Demon who cultivated in the wind element and currently wearing a frightened face, andmanded, ¡°Yadi, go!¡±

    His Lord hadmanded. No matter how terrified or unwilling, Yadi had no second option. Right before entering the boundary, he shot a spiteful re at Han Shuo, as though he was saying, ¡°If I don¡¯t get killed, I will straighten this out with you sooner orter!¡±

    Han Shuo shrugged. He did not take the threat of this existence to his heart.

    Yadi let out a cold, irritated groan. Then, with no nonsense, he leaped and threw himself into the boundary that was blocking everybody¡¯s path. Loud whistling and whooshing sounds suddenly came from within. Sharp, shiny daggers were formed from the intense element of wind and began to slosh about within the boundary as it made nking sounds.

    The expressions on Leviathan¡¯s and Manticole¡¯s faces suddenly changed. Their eyes simultaneously turned to Han Shuo. They were full of amazement!

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, how did you know that the boundary was made of the wind element?¡± Leviathan was simply astonished.

    Han Shuo put on a faint smile and replied, ¡°As I¡¯ve said it before, the main martial art that I cultivate in, isn¡¯t quite the same as those you know of. Hehe, therefore, this bit of mysteriousness about me, actually isn¡¯t all that strange!¡±

    The two did not answer Han Shuo¡¯s deliberately mystifying exnation. However, they exchanged subtle suggestive nces. No one knew what they were thinking behind those twinkling eyes.

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo is truly a magical person! With this, we can greatly cut our losses!¡± one of the Demon remarked. The party seconded at once.

    When Manticole and Leviathan saw that their subordinates seemed to be extremely approving of Han Shuo, the strange light radiating in their eyes glowed even more vigorously.

    Ting! That boundary of wind suddenly ruptured.

    Out of the crowd¡¯s expectations, Yadi did not smoothly obtain the wind elemental energy contained within. This Demon who entered the boundary while harboring hatred towards Han Shuo seemed to be an extremely unlucky one. His hole-riddled body came into view before the crowd. He was long without a trace of life.

    Although it would be much safer for one to enter a boundary made of the same energy the person cultivated in, it wasn¡¯tpletely risk-free. This Demon named Yadi obviously had really bad luck. Not only could he not obtain any energy from within, he even lost his life.

    A loud whooshing fell through from the ruptured boundary. A gush of powerful wind, as though it could separate flesh from bone rushed in . The duo of Manticole and Leviathan bore the brunt. Their faces immediately turned grave and they hastily deployed their Domains of Divinity. The elements of lightning and darkness all around them gathered. The duo defended with all their might. It was only after spending a great deal of effort that they managed to resist the powerful wind that erupted from the boundary.

    ¡°That was a close call. It was probably deployed by a midgod of wind. Must¡¯ve been ages, and yet the power that¡¯s remained in it is still so menacing!¡± Leviathan still had lingering fear on his face. His forehead bore trails of sweat. It seemed that the wind that blew out from that ruptured wind element boundary had definitely exhausted quite a lot of his divine energy.

    ¡°Fortunately, so fortunately. Had it been Anro instead of Yadi who went in there, the wind that blew at us would surely have been a few times stronger,¡± Manticole said cheerfully after he turned to look at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo choked up a hollowugh and did not utter a word. Neither of the two Demon Kings was dependable. Han Shuo was most definitely not about to let his guard down around the two just because of the gratitude they expressed.

    ¡°Huh? Divine Essence of Fire!¡± Leviathan let out a cry of surprise. His body, like lightning, charged straight at the unobstructednd ahead. He extended his hand, reached deep into the rocks, and grabbed onto a fist-sized crystal bedazzled by the light of a fire. He was overjoyed!

    That fist-sized crystal contained some intensely fiery liquid. An iparably scorching and frightening energy was emitted from it without restraint. From a distance, that little piece of crystal looked like a miniature sun. It was mesmerizing!

    Divine essence, this rare treasure that could be directly absorbed by a god and converted into divine energy, actually existed in this ce known as the Void!

    ¡°This is wonderful!¡± Manticole was exalted as well. He scrambled beside Leviathan and hastily said, ¡°With this divine essence of fire, if the other two fes discovered divine essence of lightning or darkness, then we will have the means of exchanging with them!¡±

    Leviathan continuously nodded and heaved a long chuckle. It appeared that obtaining this piece of divine essence had very well roused him.

    The two were definitely very friendly with each other. However, they clearly did not care about their partner cultivating in the energy of death and destruction called Han Shuo, for example. They had only been thinking for themselves all along. Han Shuo put a smile on his face as though to appease them as he looked at the duo who were somewhat beside themselves with joy. Although he was smiling, his heart, however, was as cold as ice. He became even more deeply convinced that the two had only thought of exploiting him.

    Hehe, well then, we shall see who will reap the greatest rewards at this Void in the end, Han Shuo thought to himself.

    As Han Shuo thought, two energies that had disappeared for a long time suddenly emerged inside Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness ¨C Cecrops and Gnder, who cultivated in the element of fire and water respectively, were rapidly approaching the area.

    Creak!

    A few sharp and clear noises suddenly intruded from not far away. The tranquility of the surrounding was broken in an instant. Abruptly, the ground seemed to quiver, whooshing noises sounded, and ironstones came crashing down in the dark. Several Spatial Edges, which Han Shuo was very familiar with, in the fashion of the Reaper¡¯s scythe, flew in an erratic and unpredictable trajectory and chopped mercilessly at anything in its path.

    ¡°Cecrops and Gnder sensed the aura of the divine essence and are at full speed towards us. They¡¯re so eager that they¡¯ve demolished a few boundaries in their way. The two of you should get ready to face the enemy now!¡± Han Shuo described the truth in an incredibly calm and collected manner. Soon after, he raised his head and looked at the meteorite shower that was about to fall from the sky, and said, ¡°Meteor shower and Spatial Edge is about to break out inrge scale. While guarding against Cecrops and Gnder, keep an eye on the energy erupting from those boundaries.¡±

    At Han Shuo¡¯s words, Manticole and Leviathan¡¯s faces jolted. Leviathan hastily and carefully kept away the divine essence of fire before he rained curses in a flustered and exasperated manner, ¡°Cecrops and Gnder, those two imbeciles, how dare they rashly charge around this region! Have they forgotten about our agreement with Bechymos?¡±

    Manticole let out a light groan and said, ¡°When the agreement was made, they probably had never truly seen divine essence. Now that this kind of temptation is right in front of them, a fire divine essence that will allow Cecrops¡¯ strength to greatly advance, you can¡¯t seriously expect Cecrops not to lose his grip!¡±

    ¡°Cut the rubbish, get ready to face the enemy!¡± Han Shuo interrupted their conversation in a blunt and discourteous manner.

    Displeasure simultaneously appeared on the Demon Kings¡¯ faces. However, they did not re up at this moment, but deployed their Domain of Divinity, getting ready for battle.

    At this moment by the brink of a great battle, Han Shuo drew a sneer and pulled back. He quietly left the coverage of their Domain of Divinity, retreating far back towards that broken lightning magical matrix which previously exploded. No one but himself knew his intentions...

 Chapter 565: Fishing in Troubled Waters

    GDK 565: Fishing in Troubled Waters

    After Leviathan and Manticole deployed their Domains of Divinity, save for the elements of lightning and darkness, no other energy could be found within the space. Han Shuo had yet to breakthrough to the Nine Changes Realm in his cultivation of demonic arts. Therefore, he would be at a disadvantage to stay within their Domains of Divinity. Regardless of his intentions, Han Shuo had to first make sure that he was able topletely deploy his strength to its fullest.

    Therefore, without much hesitation, Han Shuo decisively evacuated from the coverage area of the two Domains of Divinity at this critical moment.

    Those remaining Demons following the two Demon Kings all revealed the same astonished expression when they saw Han Shuo retreating instead of advancing. Before they could say a thing, Leviathan, whose body was surrounded by lightning bolts, coldly shouted, ¡°Scat! Go back and stay with Mister Han Shuo. What are you all still standing here for? Waiting to get killed?¡±

    The party, as though having received a pardon, hastily hurried towards Han Shuo. In a battle between the four Great Demon Kings of the Abyss, with even just the tiniest fraction of their divine power identallynding on any one of those Demons, without any elemental energy avable, they would all be dead in one hit without the possibility of survival. Needless to say, they were all terrified.

    Only an exceptional existence like Han Shuo would be able to keep himself safe inside the Domain of Divinity of the four Demon Kings relying on his body and avatar cultivating in demonic arts and the edict of destruction respectively. However, Han Shuo obviously had some other ns and therefore left that fighting stage.

    ¡°Arhhhhh...¡± miserable shrieks suddenly resounded through the valley. A few Demons running towards Han Shuo, were most unfortunately struck by the meteor shower. They only managed to let out a few wails in pain before being crushed into meat patties by the meteorites.

    Those pitiful people had yet to leave Manticole¡¯s and Leviathan¡¯s Domains of Divinity. Without any elemental energies to use, their bodies were fragile to the utmost. In addition to the fact that the meteor shower really was frightening, it was only to be expected that they violently die on the spot.

    Dammit, these fools indeed know only to look after their own asses! Han Shuo cursed in his heart. Suddenly, his body, which had retreated very far away, turned into a streak of ck brilliance. In the next moment, he was back in the space enveloped by the Domains of Divinity.

    Bord and Zinia looked on helplessly at a Spatial Edge cutting over to them. With no ess to the elemental energies that they relied upon for survival, they were noticeably sluggish. They had absolutely no way of dodging that Spatial Edge flying towards them. Their eyes were dropping with despair.

    At this moment, Han Shuo¡¯s figure appeared between the couple in a sh. His two arms stretched forward as fast as lightning. He made a forceful fling after demonic yuan poured into his arms. The couple was sent flying in a beautifully parabolic trajectory. They sessfully escaped from being sliced by that Spatial Edge.

    Han Shuo still had some friendly regard towards Bord and Zinia, especially since the couple had been very attentive towards Jasper and the rest back at ck Jade City. They also had been diligent and tireless in attending to his needs. Although Han Shuo knew that the two were so solicitous because of the excellent strength he possessed, nheless, he was a sentimental person. He was most willing to perform this favor that needed only a slight flex of his muscles.

    After pulling Bord and Zinia out of harm¡¯s way, Han Shuo did not n on remaining within the Domains of Divinity. Just as he was about to leave the coverage area of the Spatial Edges, all of a sudden, Han Shuo¡¯s death basegod soul sensed a burst of iparably rich elemental energy of death.

    He immediately determined that the strong elemental energy of death must have originated from a boundary that the two Demon Kings had bluntly destroyed.

    The great battle between the four Great Demon Kings would inevitably break out any moment now. Logic would have it that Han Shuo wanted no part in it. However, that elemental energy of death was intense. Han Shuo was certain that there was at least one piece of divine essence of death. After bing a god, raising divine energy would be an extremely difficult thing to do. That piece of divine essence of death carried irresistible temptation power on Han Shuo¡¯s avatar.

    No great rewardses without risks. Screw it, I will take a shot! Han Shuo rapidly weighed in his mind. When he noticed that the Spatial Edge was about to strike him, he finally ceased to hesitate. In his shadow form he streaked towards the area where the divine essence of death was located in an instant.

    Cecrops and Gnder, the two Demon Kings had to have sensed the presence of the divine essence of fire, and therefore recklessly charged over. One of them cultivated in the element of fire, while the other cultivated in the element of water. They were incredibly impatient and excited about the presence of the fire element divine essence and therefore had no patience or regard for anything in their paths.

    In the next moment, Han Shuo came to find that the four Domains of Divinity had formally intersected with each other. The region that was previously devoid of all elements but lightning and darkness had again been filled with the element of water and fire. The two factions of Demon Kings of the Abyss realm, with their Domains of Divinitypletely deployed, had begun engaging in hand-to-handbat while the meteor shower and Spatial Edge bombarded thends.

    While rapidly flying towards the divine essence of death, Han Shuo found the spare time to observe his surrounding. He suddenly discovered that both Cecrops and Gnder had very strange looks. Cecrops¡¯ true form as he cultivated in the element of fire couldn¡¯t be clearly seen. His body was simr to that of Ironstone Warrior whom Han Shuo had killed. His body was as tough as steel, and it was even glowing red hot.

    Meanwhile, Gnder looked as though a big sea monster. There were feelers the thickness of fingers densely grown on his body. His body would twist and wrap as he wildly fought Manticole.

    All four of them had strengths of around the same par. Leviathan fought Cecrops while Gnder fought Manticole. All four of them were Great Demon Kings of the Abyss realm, and were all lowgods. As they had been waging war against each other for many years, they were very familiar with each other¡¯s fighting movements. Even though they were fighting with all their strength, nevertheless, the fight appeared boring in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes.

    All four Demon Kings concealed their divine energies within their bodies, and would only send out bursts of their divine energies through direct body contact to deal blows unto their opponents. Unexpectedly, not an iota of their divine energy spilled over. Perhaps it was for this reason that thebat between them appeared so in, unimpressive, and did not give off a brilliant, colourful show of light.

    Han Shuo only took one nce before it became clear as to why they would be so cautious and prudent in maintaining this tacit agreement, not daring to leak a tiny bit of their divine energy. This was because, there were boundaries, ancient seals, and dpidated magical matrixes all around them. One misstep and they could possibly activate even greater dangers and cause everyone to perish!

    Although the four Great Demon Kings were now fighting over the divine essence of fire, they were very cautious and fought as prudent as they could. They dared not to have one wee bit of their divine energy overspill as to avoid causing great disturbances to the environment. Otherwise, no one would be able to walk out of it alive.

    Whoosh! Han Shuo, with his protective shield on, relying on the energying from the demonic infant inside his body, shot towards the location of the elemental energy of death at high speed.

    Three translucent, sparkling pieces, pure white and as bright as jade,y closely together inside a magical robe of twilight ck. That deep ck magical robe didn¡¯t seem to be any ordinary item either. The sinister and wicked energy of death was emanating from it.

    Han Shuo was delighted. Without demur, he reached out with his hand and grabbed at it. Jingle A strange noise suddenly came from that piece of deep ck magical robe. Right after Han Shuo¡¯s hand made contact with the magical robe, a bizarre boundary of death was suddenly deployed from it. The three trademark necromancy boundaries ¨C the Boundary of Weakness, Fear, and Aging ¨C simultaneously erupted from it. The power was more than tenfold what Han Shuo could deploy. In addition, an energy firmly grasped at Han Shuo, not allowing him to put down that deep ck magical robe.

    Han Shuo was appalled. He instinctively activated the demonic yuan inside his body, erupting like a torrent, frantically attacking that energy that grasped him firmly. He attempted to release himself from that deep ck magical robe before thinking anything else.

    ¡°Who¡¯s that kid?¡± Gnder gasped, his voice as cold as ice.

    ¡°Haha, how funny. The Mister Han Shuo that killed three of your Shadow Warriors is standing right before you, yet you have no idea who he is!¡± Manticole said calmly with an arrogant smirk on his face.

    Han Shuo, who was resisting the energy of the ck robe with all his might, almost jumped up to curse at Manticole. It was a no-brainer to him as to what kind of troubles those words of Manticole¡¯s would cause him.

    Indeed, just as expected, Gnder¡¯s ugly monstrosity of a face, which barely resembled anything close to a human¡¯s, grew incredibly cold. He put on a disgraced smile and said, ¡°Good, I¡¯ve been looking for you for a long time. Kiddo, face your death!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Gnder ceased all hand-to-handbat with Manticole. His sea-monster body shot into the air with extreme agility. He charged at Han Shuo at a breathtaking speed.

    Han Shuo sphemed upon eighteen generations of Manticole¡¯s ancestors, and furiously raised his demonic yuan to its maximum capacity to ward off the winding energy that was attacking him. However, shrouded by the boundary of Fear, Weakness, and Aging, which released all too formidable power, Han Shuo found himself in an extremely weak state.

    Gnder¡¯s flight had caused his Domain of Divinity to move with him. An ice-cold energy hundreds of times colder than what was released by Ice Celestial Corey locked onto Han Shuo and rushed into his consciousness, causing his defensive power to reduce even more greatly.

    Ice Celestial Corey was just a demigod, and was not even a basegod. Compared to Gnder, a lowgod two sses above him, in terms of the maniption of the elemental energy of water, Ice Celestial Corey was simply like a mound before the Alps. The gap between them was simply insurmountable!

    Gnder, as a lowgod, could seep his divine energy into his enemy¡¯s soul. If it wasn¡¯t for Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness being so uniquely versatile, by now it would have been frozen and have no way to think!

    On the verge of death, that death basegod soul of Han Shuo¡¯s seemed to gain a feeling of familiarity when it vaguely sensed the energy that tangled around Han Shuo. In this life and death situation, Han Shuo made a decision. With one thought, that death basegod soul released a strand of faint energy. Suddenly, a desirable change happened to that deep dark magical robe in his hand...

 Chapter 566: Divine Soul

    GDK 566: Divine Soul

    After Han Shuo¡¯s death basegod soul made contact with it, the energying from the deep ck magical robe that had restrained him turned back into the magical robe all of a sudden.

    Subsequently, that bizarre boundary of death originating from the magical robe vanished in an instant. The deep ck magical robe was still in Han Shuo¡¯s hand, but at this moment, it did not pose him one bit of threat. With one thought, all three pieces of divine essence, as well as that deep ck magical robe, fell into Han Shuo¡¯s space ring without any hindrance.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t have the luxury of time to ponder about the strange phenomenon that had just urred. After he kept those items away, he did not continue to linger around the same spot as he did not want to brew up a confrontation against Gnder, who was soaring over. Upon identifying an empty spot, he retreated.

    ¡°Boy, to kill three of my Shadow Warriors, you are a brave one aren¡¯t you?¡± Gnder shouted with his ice-cold voice. His sea-monster body breezed over. Two flexible feelers, like arrows, suddenly shot out from his two gills, aiming straight for Han Shuo¡¯s spine. As the distance between the two pulled closer, the frosty cold aura that prated into Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness became even more potent!

    Han Shuo, who was rapidly retreating, let out a cold groan. His consciousness flexibly transformed. Without the deep ck magical robe distracting him, Han Shuo evaded Gnder¡¯s attack on his consciousness with no difficulty.

    When Han Shuo saw that he couldn¡¯t evade those feelers, he did not reveal any signs of panic. After a sh of strange light, the Demonyer Edge shot out from his palm. An energy of destruction mixed with all kinds of energiespletely enveloped Gnder¡¯s feelers without a moment to spare.

    After the sh of light, ear-piercing noises quickly followed. Those feelers that shot out from Gnder¡¯s two gills were effectively amputated!

    Gnder was between a gasp and a cry. His ice-cold eyes flipped through with question marks, seemingly baffled at how Han Shuo could possess such power.

    As an avatar of Han Shuo¡¯s, the Demonyer Edge in its un-transformed original form could still be used as a weapon as before. Han Shuo could even pour his demonic yuan into it. The Demonyer Edge currently also possessed the divine energy of the edict of destruction, the plunder energy Datara had left, as well as the hundreds upon thousands of souls that Han Shuo had absorbed in all those years behind him. When the three energies within the Demonyer Edge were mixed together, although it was only barely enough to reach the realm of lowgod, the Demonyer Edge remained to be extremely terrifying.

    Although the Demonyer Edge had cut those feelers off Gnder¡¯s gills, a strand of the frosty energy nheless managed to enter the Demonyer Edge. It had to be hammered three times with the divine energy of destruction within the Demonyer Edge before it waspletely neutralized!

    After exchanging blows, Han Shuo and Gnder had a rough idea of where each other stood. Han Shuo recognized that Gnder was a formidable opponent. Within his Domain of Divinity, Han Shuo¡¯s death basegod avatar was useless. It would be difficult to defeat Gnder by merely relying on that avatar mixed with all kinds of energies while having no clear understanding of the edict of destruction.

    Gnder, after having been struck by the Demonyer Edge wielded by Han Shuo, clearly recognized that this ¡®kid¡¯ who appeared out of nowhere, was no feeble existence that he could simply trample over. Gnder was bbergasted from the bottom of his heart. His icy-cold eyes were filled with doubt, seemingly unable to understand how Han Shuo could possess such strength. Whoosh! A shadow suddenly arrived. Gnder, whose mind seemed to be somewhere else, suddenly discovered himself within absolute darkness. He rained curses in his heart as he immediately understood that Manticole, who instigated him to attack Han Shuo, had taken advantage of the opportunity tounch an attack on him while he continued to think about his next move.

    After quickly weighing it over in his mind, Gnder immediately abandoned his pursuit of Han Shuo, and instead put all his strength into dealing with Manticole¡¯s sneak attack. He could tell that Han Shuo was seemingly unwilling to fight with him. When he discovered that Han Shuo was a formidable enemy, he immediately made a wise decision ¨C give up!

    Han Shuo, who was fully prepared to face Gnder head-on, stood tall on his ground with a callous face. He gripped firmly onto the Demonyer Edge and was even ready to summon Little Skeleton to the battlefield at any time. However, at this moment, he discovered that Gnder was suddenly shrouded byplete darkness. Manticole smiled and nodded at Han Shuo from a distance before whooshing into the darkness.

    Han Shuo was stunned, but soon after, his lips pulled a sneer. He found Manticole¡¯s disy of goodwill to be despicable. Han Shuo turned his head and took a look at Cecrops and Leviathan who were tangled in a fight. After weighing in his mind for a moment, Han Shuo unhurriedly flew towards where Cecrops and Gnder hade from.

    ¡°Mister Han Shuo, join us, let¡¯s deal with them together,¡± when Leviathan noticed that Han Shuo wanted to leave, he became anxious and loudly called out even though he was in the middle of a fierce battle.

    As though he did not hear Leviathan behind him, Han Shuo did not slow down by the slightest and left without even turning his head back. As soon as he left the region, he immediately concealed all the aura on his body, and used his consciousness to probe the surroundings. Han Shuo discovered that ahead of him, a few dozen or so Demons were cautiously holing up in an area while dealing with the bombardment of the meteor shower and Spatial Edges as they wailed like ghosts.

    After making a round of inspection with his consciousness, Han Shuo quickly discovered that those Demons were brought over by Cecrops and Gnder. The reckless behavior of the two Demon Kings had brought their minions a catastrophic blow. While the four Demon Kings of lowgod strengths were fighting each other terribly, these followers of theirs weren¡¯t sitting idly either. Simultaneously pounded by meteor shower and Spatial Edges, these Demons spared no effort fending for their lives.

    The meteor shower and Spatial Edges formed by the boundaries triggered by Cecrops and Gnder were a lot more powerful than those forbidden spells back on Profound Continent. The piece ofnd they were in was rather narrow. There were all kinds of visible and invisible boundaries all around them. No one dared to make any big movements. All they could do was to try their best to evade the bombardment within the small piece ofnd. Needless to say, death was unavoidable.

    Han Shuo silently observed for a moment and discovered that the region that Cecrops and Gnder¡¯s minions were in had a pathway as well. It was obvious that Cecrops and Gnder had been exploring the area. But when Cecrops coincidentally sensed the energy of the fire divine essence, he couldn¡¯t resist the temptation and recklessly charged over.

    Due to the destruction of a few boundaries, the two pathways suddenly became conjoined. The four Demon Kings, whose grudges ran so deep into the Earth¡¯s core and who had warred far longer than their people had been alive, immediately erupted into a fight as soon as they met each other.

    With his presence concealed, Han Shuo temporarily hid in a region where no one could detect him. He observed the battle between the four Demon Kings with indifference. The four Demon Kings of the Abyss realm possessed strength roughly simr to each other. They had been locked in a stalemate for many years. Therefore, it was obvious that the victor of the battle wouldn¡¯t emerge anytime soon.

    After just a short observation, Han Shuo briefly understood theirbat methods. Not daring to have their divine energies leak into the surroundings, these Demon Kings would only send out bursts of them through physical contact between limbs. Although the battle appeared intense, it was uninteresting in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes.

    At this rate, will the battle ever end? This is an absolute waste of time. Each second spent inside this Void is precious. There will have been no conclusion to this even when the stardust current returns. And by then, what would have been achieved? Han Shuo thought to himself. He quickly realized that his original n of reaping benefit while they had their disputes clearly wouldn¡¯t work for long.

    He began weighing it out rapidly and silently turning over his mind for some malicious stratagem. Then, all of a sudden, his death basegod soul sensed a familiar aura.

    Earlier, as Han Shuo did not have any time, he did not perform an in-depth investigation of where that familiar sensation came from. Now that he had broken away from the Domains of Divinity of the four Demon Kings, he finally had time to think the matter through. Outside of those Domains of Divinity, the soul energy of his death basegod had be much stronger. He withdrew that deep ck magical robe that he had stored in his space ring not long ago. The mental strength of his basegod soul slowly flowed into the magical robe in his hand. A loud bang sounded from that deep ck magical robe in Han Shuo¡¯s hand. In an instant, the mental strength of Han Shuo¡¯s death basegod soul had formed some kind of connection with the magical robe. Suddenly, a kind of clearprehension, like the most refreshing water, flowed into the death basegod soul...

    Han Shuo¡¯s main body that was holding the piece of deep ck magical robe clearly saw a greyish gaseous substance entering the skeletal staff. At the same time, all kinds of realization and understanding of the energy of death slowly merged with the soul within the skeletal staff...

    Seeing all this happen right before him and sensing the apprehensions that soul was gaining, Han Shuo¡¯s heart was suddenly crowded with an intense feeling of pleasant surprise. He almost couldn¡¯t restrain himself from shrieking in excitement.

    Divine Soul! A midgod of death! That deep ck magical robe not only bundled three pieces of divine essences of death, but it also hid a Divine Soul of a midgod of death!

    Furthermore, in this moment, the death midgod¡¯s divine soul within the magical robe was fusing with his soul in a way that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t understand...

    The original owner of the skeletal staff was a midgod. From the skeletal staff, Han Shuo had received a lot of memories ¨C memories pertaining to the cultivation of the elemental energy of death!

    However, it was only at this moment that Han Shuo understood that those memories which the original owner of the skeletal staff had left for him were merely the cultivation methods ¨C with many important points omitted!

    That Divine Soul inside the deep ck magical robe, however, not only provided Han Shuo with the methods of cultivating in the energy of death, but more importantly, profound realization towards the energy of death, realizations that would allow him to reach the realm of midgod, which included knowledge about the Domain of Divinity, divine energy, and the power of faith.

    It was also at this moment that Han Shuo abruptly discovered that the familiar feeling that came from the deep ck magical robe vaguely reminded him of the energy contained in the skeletal staff.

    That¡¯s right! Just like the original owner of the skeletal staff, the original owner of this divine soul must be an underling of that overgod of death. Both of them were sent to bring death and destruction to various material nes. The magical robe and skeletal staff, seemed to contain hints of that person¡¯s imprint! Han Shuo concluded.

 Chapter 567: Alliance Dissolved!

    Alliance Dissolved!

    Compared to the cultivation methods that the original owner of the skeletal staff had left behind, this whole new level of realization towards elemental energy he now obtained was much more precious. While those cultivation methods would only allow Han Shuo to learn how to form attacks using the energy of death, the higher level of realization would allow Han Shuo to make leaps and bounds in his cultivation, obtaining even more terrifying energy of death!

    All those cultivation methods were, in the end, merely different ways of putting the elemental energy of death to use. No amount of them could make Han Shuo rise from the realm of basegod to the realm lowgod. Those profound realizations, however, could! It would allow Han Shuo to grasp the true essence of the energy of death, and turn him into a lowgod. And with sufficient divine energy, Han Shuo could even continue to make breakthroughs without the slightest stagnation, all the way to be a midgod.

    The apprehensions of greater gods, that was the most precious thing to a lesser god! The methods of putting the energy to use and acquiring divine energy could both be slowly mastered through practice and cultivation. However, it was their profound realizations that were the most valuable. This was because a god might nevere to possess those realizations even after acquiring a tremendous amount of energy.

    But now, Han Shuo directly came to possess those realizations! What¡¯s more, it was the divine realization of a midgod!

    In other words, from this moment onwards, in Han Shuo¡¯s cultivation of the element of death, all the challenging problems he needed toprehend before advancing to the next realm would no longer be an impediment. As long as he could acquire sufficient divine energy, he would progress at light speed and be a lowgod, and even a midgod!

    While the fusion of souls proceeded, the skeletal staff in Han Shuo¡¯s hand gradually transformed without Han Shuo¡¯s control. It turned into a carbon copy of Han Shuo filled with the aura of death. Then, without any indication, that piece of deep ck magical robe spontaneously flew and wrapped tightly around Han Shuo.

    Evil, gloom, destion, loneliness ¨C all those aurae that could be felt in theherworld ¨C started emanating from this avatar of Han Shuo¡¯s.

    Han Shuo did not foresee that the souls would so suddenly begin fusing together. They were in the Void. A great battle was going on not far from him. The fusion of souls meant he was exposed to great vulnerability as the process could not be disturbed in the slightest.

    Therefore, when Han Shuo¡¯s soul began fusing with the divine soul of the midgod, he started tomunicate silently with the Netherworld. His consciousness was on full alert. His main body grasping onto the Demonyer Edge was ready to handle any threat that coulde at any moment.

    The bombardment of the meteor shower and Spatial Edge covered an extremely vast area. Although Han Shuo was hiding in a concealed area, he was still under the battering of these two attacks. In this situation, having three souls gave Han Shuo an absolute advantage. While that death basegod was rapidly merging with that Divine Soul, Han Shuo¡¯s main body and one of his avatars were actively containing the disturbances of the meteor shower and Spatial Edges, keeping them far away from the avatar that cultivated in the element of death.

    The minutes passed by quietly as this continued for a long, but undetermined amount of time. Even Han Shuo¡¯s other two souls felt a little fatigued...

    Suddenly, the element of death began to converge in a chaos towards Han Shuo¡¯s avatar. Han Shuo¡¯s body, as though a blue whale gorging in seawater, was rapidly absorbing a huge amount of the element of death. At the same time, all those profound realizations that originated from the Divine Soul of the midgod were being evoked...

    A bizarre and fantastic transformation was simultaneously happening to the body and soul of the skeletal staff avatar. The soul, body, element of death, and realizations, were converging, fusing, splitting, and rbining in a way that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t understand...

    All of a sudden, Han Shuo¡¯s main body that had been every vigntly observing the surroundings suddenly discovered that in the space of a few dozen meters around his avatar, other than the intense element of death, no other element was present.

    Domain of Divinity! These were the effects of the Domain of Divinity!

    The overjoyed Han Shuo looked at the element of death converging from all around, and then observed the element of death being condensed to high concentrations before turning into divine energy for his avatar in a way that he couldn¡¯t understand. Having experienced the scene of Little Skeleton bing god, Han Shuo clearly understood that a wonderful transformation was happening to his avatar cultivating the element of death!

    ¡°Huh?¡± Back at the battleground of the four Demon Kings, Manticole suddenly murmured.

    While Gnder turned absent-minded for a brief moment after being shocked by Han Shuo, Manticole, who was of simr strength, managed to catch the precise timing and enveloped Gnder within absolute darkness. It was precisely for this reason that Manticole held the upper hand and had time for talking.

    The other three Demon Kings also felt the element of death wildly gathering not far from them. The four Demon Kings, who had been through the exact same process, only needed to think for a second before they each realized what was happening there.

    All four of them, who were in the middle of a fierce battle, ceased fighting at the same time with great rapport. The four exchanged nces and flew to the region simultaneously.

    Han Shuo, who harbored malicious intentions, did not stray too far from them. In the process of bing god, the gathering of the element of death was not something that could be controlled. Therefore, Han Shuo could no longer hide his tracks. The four Demon Kings discovered Han Shuo¡¯s hiding ce in just an instant.

    ¡°Two... two of him... What is going on?¡± Cecrops cried out in surprise as soon as he arrived and saw the scene.

    Han Shuo¡¯s main body, wielding the Demonyer Edge, and his avatar, wearing a deep ck magical robe ¨C except for clothing, they both appeared exactly the same!

    Cecrops rapidly calmed himself down from the initial shock. He nced at Manticole and Leviathan as he said, ¡°Better kill him, lest he bes a trouble in the future,¡±

    It was followed by utter silence. At this crucial moment, Manticole and Leviathan, who were supposed to be Han Shuo¡¯s allies, both kept their silence!

    One Han Shuo with the strength of lowgod in the edict of destruction had already forced them to be on alert. And now, out of nowhere, came a second Han Shuo. What¡¯s more, this Han Shuo was on the verge of bing a lowgod of death. This kind of horror hadpletely exceeded any of their expectations. These two allies who harbored ulterior motives to begin with, kept their silence as light flickered from their eyes.

    Cecrops and Gnder suddenly turned to look at each other. Gnder nodded and said in an ice-cold voice, ¡°Let¡¯s do it together. This guy is rather hard to deal with. I don¡¯t have the certainty of finishing him within a short time if I were to do it alone.¡±

    ¡°Sure!¡± Cecrops said smilingly. He again nced at the silent Manticole and Leviathan, and soon after, shot a meaningful nce at Gnder. They marched step by step towards Han Shuo callously standing with the Demonyer Edge in his hand.

    The two were on guard towards Manticole and Leviathan as they had no idea if the duo would take this opportunity to attack the two. For this reason, they did not immediately charge towards Han Shuo, but slowly approached him to find out how Manticole and Leviathan would react.

    What followed surely did not go against their expectations. Cecrops,pletely familiar with the personality of the Demon Kings in the other faction, discovered that during this critical moment, neither Manticole nor Leviathan showed any wish of interrupting, and stood there motionless.

    Han Shuo, wielding the Demonyer Edge, looked at the four Demon Kings before him with a callous face. He did not say a word all along. It was as though he had turned into a spectator.

    Cecrops and Gnder continued to march step by step towards Han Shuo. When they were about 50 meters away, their Domains of Divinity made contact with the Domain of Divinity formed a moment ago by his avatar. Manticole and Leviathan, as Han Shuo¡¯s allies, remained indifferent and kept their silence as before. At this moment, Han Shuo put on a smile, looked at the two, and said, ¡°Manticole, Leviathan. From this second on, we are no longer allies!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart felt neither sorrow nor happiness. From the moment he witnessed Leviathan mercilessly murder his own follower, Nn, and from the moment Manticole informed Gnder of his identity when he was collecting that deep ck magical robe, he understood that his alliance with these two ruthless bastards was as frail as a thin dried leaf. It would shatter with one gentle poke.

    In fact, Han Shuo knew this would happen when the four flew over to him. Having foreseen how they would react, Han Shuo did not feel one bit of surprise. And naturally, he did not feel sad or happy. His heart was undisturbed as he silently guarded against the turn of events.

    ¡°My sincerest apologies, but the Abyss is not big enough for a sixth Demon King ¨C especially a Demon King who possesses two fundamental energies! This must not be allowed! Although you have said that you will leave the Abyss, the temptation of the power of faith isn¡¯t something one may simply resist ¨C just like how tempted we are to go to your world to acquire the power of faith!¡± Manticole wore the same expression. He smiled at Han Shuo, and continued to talk to Han Shuo in that mild voice of his.

    The Abyss was only so big. The appearance of a new Demon King meant another existencepeting to subjugate the people of the Abyss realm in order to gain their power of faith. Subsequently, they would have to further partition the world and that therefore meant a smaller piece of the pie for each of them. What¡¯s more, Han Shuo¡¯s strength was rapidly growing along with an energy unknown to them. The appearance of this lowgod of death caused them to feel even more threatened.

    Therefore, they desperately wished for Han Shuo to die! This desperation exceeded the four Kings¡¯ hatred for the each other!

 Chapter 568: Direct Confrontation

    Direct Confrontation

    The duo of Cecrops and Gnder marched towards Han Shuo at slow but steady paces. They would peer at Manticole and Leviathan out of the corner of their eyes once in a while, carefully on guard against any unforeseen danger.

    Things havinge to this, Han Shuo could no longer cower. The only choice left for him was to go all out and fight. As to whether or not he could preserve his avatar cultivating the element of death, that would depend on whether he could resist the attacks of the two Demon Kings.

    Meteor shower and Spatial Edges were wreaking havoc all around him, causing bursts of splendid light to blossom incessantly. Han Shuo was on full alert. His mind was as sharp as it could have been. He held onto the Demonyer Edge and calmly waited for the two Demon Kings tounch their attacks.

    On the contrary, the two Demon Kings, Cecrops and Gnder, who were closing in on Han Shuo step by step, appeared rxed and at ease, as though they weren¡¯t taking Han Shuo seriously at all. Han Shuo knew that the reason these two Demon Kings came over at such sluggish speeds was that they were wary of Manticole and Leviathan. They weren¡¯t actually all that heedful towards the enemy they were about to strike.

    When the two got very near to Han Shuo, Cecrops sent a signal to Gnder with his eyes. At the next instance, the two went from slowly walking to charging at Han Shuo at high-speed.

    These existences in the realm of lowgod concentrated their divine energy to their limbs. After two streaks of light shed, they arrived right in front of Han Shuo.

    The Demonyer Edge gave off brilliant rays and turned into another Han Shuo within a split second. A ruthless energy wishing to annihte the world erupted. A ball of sinister light with boundless darknesspletely enveloped the immediate region.

    The two Demon Kings were moving too fast. Therefore, right after the Demonyer Edge produced that ball of dark light, they fell into it.

    In fact, the Demon King duo who possessed absolute confidence in their own strength did not make any effort to the evade darkness but continued to advance bravely, shooting at Han Shuo by relying on their senses.

    Rumbles...

    A great explosion, as though the heavens fell and earth rent, broke loose from the center of the darkness. Electrical sparks like needles shot all around through the darkness.

    Two loud shrieks simultaneously came from the mouths of the two Demon Kings. As the enormous rumble sounded, the duo, who dauntlessly charged at Han Shuo, retreated with their burning asses at an even greater speed.

    Hundreds upon thousands of light rays followed the two as though their very own shadows. Under the inconceivable gazes of Manticole and Leviathan, those whooshing light rays shot into the retreating Demon Kings.

    ¡°Arhhhh... What in the world?! This bastard just put his own life at stake and triggered boundaries that releaserge-scale destructive power. Damn it!¡± Gnder loudly cursed.

    The rumble of the explosion left as quickly as it came. The light rays faded and the darkness dispersed to reveal the ground that had caved in to form arge pit with numerous potholes surrounding it. Standing behind therge pit was Han Shuo, wielding the Demonyer Edge with a callous expression. The corners of his lips curved to make a ridiculing smirk as he looked coldly at the two Demon Kings hollering.

    Those Pearls of Annihtion he had refined back at War Demon Valley were indeed wonderfully effective weapons. As soon as he saw the two Demon Kings in a flurry to retreat, he knew that both of them had been hit.

    A Pearl of Annihtion could produce arge-scale explosion, and therefore a very effective weapon to be used against enemies in great numbers. However, as both the Demon Kings were lowgods, the explosion of the Pearl of Annihtion would only cause them limited injuries. But, of course, the Pearls didn¡¯t justunch physical attacks. Its most significant damaging effects actually came from those Soulpiercers that would shoot out during therge-scale explosion.

    The Soulpiercer was a bizarre demonic weapon that specifically targeted the soul. Just one Soulpiercer would be enough to annihte those who did not possess a mighty enough soul. Even for a godly existence whose soul had fused with the elements between heaven and earth, once hit, had to immediately drop everything and focus on eliminating the sinister energy of the Soulpiercer as soon as possible before it corroded the soul. The longer they left it, the greater the harm they would receive.

    It was because Cecrops and Leviathan had not truly taken Han Shuo to heart, in addition to their false assumption that Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t dare to break the rule of the Void, that they had decided to attack Han Shuo so bluntly. Unfortunately for them, Han Shuo, a demonic arts cultivator, had countless tricks up his sleeves. Han Shuo¡¯s far-sighted preparation also contributed to him being able to unleash the full formidable might of the Pearl of Annihtion, teaching the duo a lesson they would never forget.

    As for the rules of the Void and the boundaries that densely covered all around, Han Shuo had absolutely no reservations in breaking them. Given the present circumstances that he could lose his life at any moment, he had no time to worry about these trivial matters.

    The st of a Pearl of Annihtion covered a tremendous area. As Han Shuo was located in a ce surrounded with boundaries, after the deafening explosion, several boundaries were unavoidably triggered.

    At the next moment, the wind started blowing wildly, sand and stones were sent flying, and thunder rolled in the sky. The attacks formed by several boundaries came pounding at all those men.

    Demon Kings Cecrops and Gnder, who were doing their utmost to purge the Soulpiercers from within their souls, had no choice but to split their focus and defend themselves from iing the attacks. They inwardly cursed Han Shuo for his deceptiveness and viciousness.

    Idly observing with cold eyes, Leviathan and Manticole furrowed their brows dramatically. The duo obviously made out that Cecrops and Gnder had suffered injuries. Given their usual temperament, they would certainly seize this opportunity to finish the other two Demon Kings without the slightest hesitation. But now, with the appearance of this existence called Han Shuo, they did note to the same decision that they otherwise would.

    The two exchanged nces. Leviathan nodded with a gloomy and cold expression before he said in a low voice, ¡°Although Cecrops and Gnder have been warring with us for many years, we are very clear of their strengths. Indeed, not killing them means that they will continue to pose a threat to us, but the stalemate will still be preserved as before,¡± he took a short pause, shot a nce at Han Shuo in the distance, and continued, ¡°That person, however, will not be so easy to take care of. This fe has boundless potential. Not only does he cultivate in a mysterious martial art, but soon, he wille to possess two lowgods of different energies. If he were to be left alive in the Abyss, it is only a matter of time before we lose our footing!¡±

    Manticole nodded in agreement. With intense murderous desire in his eyes, he shouted, ¡°This person has boundless potential. He must not be allowed to live!¡±

    Without another word, the two Demon Kings who were supposed to be mortal enemies with Cecrops and Gnder, and allies to Han Shuo, suddenly charged towards Han Shuo.

    Having witnessed Cecrops and Gnder¡¯s mistake, and taking into consideration the fact that the boundaries around them had been destroyed, they no longer kept their divine energy within only their bodies. A dozen or more thunderbolts as thick as the Colosseum pirs, along with several long, narrow rays of darkness, like the Grim Reaper¡¯s scythe, started cutting towards Han Shuo before the two Demon Kings had even gotten close.

    Some energies that originated from boundaries were cleansed to nothingness by the might disyed by the two gods. With a dozen or more lightning bolts and several scythes paving their way, Han Shuo simply had no way of repeating the same trick on the two.

    ¡°Forgive me, Mister Han Shuo,¡± Leviathan said with a grin. He may have appeared cheerful at times, but in this moment, he looked absolutely diabolical.

    Meanwhile, Manticole, the very first Demon King that made contact with Han Shuo, did not utter a word. He deployed his Domain of Divinity with all his strength, closing in on Han Shuo inch by inch.

    ¡°I knew you two would attack,¡± Han Shuo said grimly. He wore an ordinary expression as he watched the lightning bolts and darkness inch closer and closer.

    Strange light rippled through the Demonyer Edge. It flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s hand and in an instant, transformed into another Han Shuo!

    Simultaneously, Han Shuo¡¯s two hands on his main body made a hand seal. Thousands upon thousands of what looked like demons and ghosts emerged from Han Shuo¡¯s palms. Then, suddenly, towering stone pirs started to rise from the originally t and smooth ground. Huge, colourful banners, which seemed to be as light as feathers, flew out from his space ring, and stuck themselves on the ground in ordance with some mysterious principles.

    If Bord and Zinia were here, they would certainly recognize that these huge banners and ste that abruptly appeared before Han Shuo once stood before War Demon Valley. They were that so-called ¡®magical matrix¡¯ that could extinguish tens of thousands of lives in an instant!

    Unfortunately, neither Bord nor Zinia were there. Manticole and Leviathan had no idea what sorts of powersy within those towering ste and banners embellished with drawings of fierce monsters. Therefore, they did not halt their attacks, nor did they alter their headings. They stuck to their original n of following behind their thick lightning bolts and scythes, and ran straight for Han Shuo.

    Rumbles...

    The very moment that the two entered the magical formation, an explosion sound as though the earth had shattered sounded from within. At that instance, bloody shadows began fluttering all around. Colourful demonic light radiated from those huge banners and interwove. An inexhaustible sinister energy spread out from the formation in an instant.

    In the blink of an eye, the dozen or more extremely thick thunderbolts and the Reaper¡¯s scythe materialized from the element of darkness, which, like a stone falling into the sea, elicited no response. They were fragmented and dissolved bit by bit within the thousands upon thousands of bizarre lights.

    The two Demon Kings fell into the formation. One of them transformed into a person enveloped with lightning and thunder, his body shining gloriously from head to toe, while the other shrouded himselfpletely under absolute darkness. If not for Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness locking onto Manticole, it really would have been a challenge to discover that he was hiding among the shadows of the formations.

    The two Demon Kings had not only extraordinary strength, but were also sinister and cunning. By this point, they had thrown caution to the wind and were no longer reserved about the boundaries and seals all around. That agreement they made with Bechymos had long been cast far out from their minds. Inside Han Shuo¡¯s formation, by relying on the miraculousness of their Domains of Divinity, they did not suffer any serious damage and could in fact still soar through the air. Lowgods were, after all, lowgods. They definitely weren¡¯t existences that those Rakshas and Destroyers couldpare to. Most of the magical matrices of necromancy and destruction mixed within the formation lost their effects after the two deployed their Domains of Divinity.

    When Han Shuo saw that it was impossible to eliminate or severely injure the two by solely relying on the energy of the formation, after weighing for a while, he finally summoned Little Skeleton. Han Shuo¡¯s main body, his avatar, and Little Skeleton entered the formation together. They were ready to muster all their strengths and utilize the favorable environmental conditions to deal these double-crossing Demon Kings heavy thumps!

 Chapter 569: Father and Son Fighting Shoulder to Shoulder

    Father and Son Fighting Shoulder to Shoulder

    No one else besides Han Shuo, he who made and deployed the formation, could be more familiar with the mechanisms within. As Little Skeleton and Han Shuo were mentally connected with each other, by following Han Shuo¡¯s instructions, Little Skeleton naturally wouldn¡¯t receive the negative effects of the formation. As soon as they entered the formation, they flew towards Leviathan¡¯s location. Leviathan, lightning bolts sparking from his head to toe and the sound of thunder rumbling from his body, was circling ten or so towering ste, resisting the disorderly attacksing from the surroundings using his divine energy.

    He was inside a small-scale formation of hallucination. Any uninformed, reckless intruder would sink deep into and of fantasy. Although Leviathan was a lowgod, he knew nothing about the demonic arts that originated from another dimension. Inside thend of fantasy, all kinds of scenes and scenarios yed on repeat in his mind.

    Illusions could cause confusion to the mind. Leviathan saw countless characters that he had previously murdered charging towards him with threatening gestures. Those events that were etched in his memory, as well as frightening events he deliberately tried to forget, at this moment, reyed in his mind with incredible rity. It was constant torment, ravaging his mind.

    All those existences who could be a Demon King were cold-blooded, merciless characters with incredibly staunch hearts. Had it been an ordinary person who repeatedly experienced such negative scenes yed and reyed, they would have lost their minds long ago. Leviathan, however, had countless experiences under his belt and wasn¡¯t as feeble as an ordinary person. He could still hold firmly on to his mind. As long as there was divine energy in his body, he felt as though he had boundless energy. With his own willpower, he forcibly shattered scene after scene.

    Leviathan, a lowgod, obviously wasn¡¯t particrly affected by the formation. Should this trend continue, as long as he walked through all those scenes and continued to shatter them rapidly, he would be able to walk out from thend of fantasy unharmed very soon.

    Han Shuo inwardlymented the might of lowgods. Then, he dove into the formation together with Little Skeleton. Through the mental connection between him and Little Skeleton, Little Skeleton managed topletely avoid the effects of the formation.

    The two with perfect rapport unhurriedly approached towards Leviathan. Han Shuo¡¯s avatar transformed back into the Demonyer Edge and was once again in Han Shuo¡¯s hands. Little Skeleton wielded an enormous bone spur and concealed his Domain of Divinity. He stealthily surrounded Leviathan along with Han Shuo.

    As the distance between them slowly grew closer and closer, Leviathan was sending out bursts of undirected divine energy while facing against his hallucinations. Before both Han Shuo and Little Skeleton even got close, he suddenly sensed an intense aura of death approaching him. Out of nowhere, a scene abruptly reyed in his mind: An Abyssal expert possessing enormous elemental energy of death that he had in many years ago was recklesslyunching a final finishing blow at him. That battle had a profound influence on Leviathan. Therefore, when the aura of death appeared, his mind very naturally reyed this scene of what happened back then. Although Leviathan was unaware that he was deep inside a hallucination, he still had one thought on his mind ¨C I shall kill anyone that gets in my way!

    This was the principle he had based his life on for countless years!

    Leviathan skillfully deployed a lightning bolt around a dozen meters in length with the girth of an arm. This lightning that shot out from his palm looked akin to a crystal dragon. It gave off dazzling and glistening radiance. Although its tail was connected to Leviathan¡¯s palm, this dragon was nheless extremely agile. With divine energy pouring into the lightning bolt, the dragon soared into the sky before it violently charged at Little Skeleton.

    Han Shuo was shocked as he did not expect that Leviathan would discover Little Skeleton¡¯s tracks so quickly. He remarked, Little Skeleton may have cultivated to be a lowgod of death and possess a Domain of Divinity, but hisck of focus in cultivating demonic arts has rendered him vulnerable when ites to hiding his own tracks and concealing his presence. He is nowhere near as good as I am.

    While thinking to himself, Han Shuo¡¯s movement did not slow down one bit. When Little Skeleton began assailing with his long and narrow bone spur, Han Shuo quickly got near to Leviathan. Ominous glint radiated from the Demonyer Edge. The energy of destruction that he had been concealing was sent erupting outwards.

    Although Leviathan was inside thend of fantasy and wasn¡¯t clear-headed, he still kept the instinct to strike back. At that instance, yet another scene began to take form in his brain. He traveled back to the time when he had ventured alone to the extreme north of the Abyss realm to challenge the first Demon King of the Abyss ¨C Bechymos. The scene of the battle reyed in his head.

    He suffered a crushing defeat in this battle!

    Never, ever had Leviathan felt so helpless and cowardly in a battle. This challenger was full of confidence at first. But when the confrontation against the oldest Demon King of the Abyss actually started, Leviathan did not even have enough strength to strike back once throughout the battle. Using the edict of destruction and wearing a sinister mask, Bechymos most straightforwardly and easily defeated Leviathan.

    Of all those scenes that shed before his eyes, this was the only one in which Leviathan ended up in a defeat. It was buried in the depths of his heart as he deliberately tried to forget this painful memory. This was the scene that he was most unwilling to recall!

    When the energy suddenly erupted from the lowgod of destruction within the Demonyer Edge, the delirious Leviathan once more returned to the middle of that humiliating battle.

    The feeling of helplessness and dispiritment once again prated Leviathan¡¯s heart after many years. Even after so many years had passed, that feeling was still impossible to get rid of. When this image of the past reemerged, Leviathan, who managed to advance bravely and smash all the illusions so far, finally had his determinationpromised. For a split second, his strength and divine energy were weakened.

    Han Shuo, whose attention was fully focused on the battle, immediately discovered the abnormality on Leviathan through the mighty consciousness he possessed. Although Han Shuo didn¡¯t know why it would have such a drastic effect on Leviathan so suddenly, it was in to see based on his observations and his confidence in the formation he deployed that Leviathan¡¯s strength was waning severely.

    In other words, at this very moment, Leviathan¡¯s strength and divine energy were at their weakest!

    Without the slightest hesitation, Han Shuo injected even more energy into that strike shooting towards Leviathan. At this moment, Han Shuo abandoned all thoughts and ignored all distractions, not even paying heed to whether or not Little Skeleton would be in any danger. He locked firmly on Leviathan with his consciousness and erupted the energy within Demonyer Edge to the fullest. Together with his main body, Han Shuo threw a forceful strike.

    Dong... The sound of thunder and explosions rumbled. Divine energies shot all around violently.

    The unstoppable Demonyer Edge made contact with Leviathan¡¯s right hand that was raised up. He wore a boxing glove on that hand. It was made of some unknown material and contained iparably formidable energy of lighting. In just an instant, those energies collided with several bursts of energies that came from Demonyer Edge.

    Crack! Crack!

    The boxing glove, which Leviathan had obtained during hisst excursion to the Void, couldn¡¯t withstand Han Shuo¡¯s all-out strike. It pulverized and vanished within the bursts of electrical sparks.

    After destroying the boxing glove, the incisive edge of Demonyer Edge chopped through Leviathan¡¯s fist using its remaining energy. Fresh blood gushed out in an instant.

    The shock wave formed when the terrifying energies collided spread out with the point between the two as the center. Several stone pirs in the surrounding couldn¡¯t withstand the st and shattered in the blink of an eye. At this moment, this small-scale formation of illusion that surrounded Leviathan finally lost its miraculous ability to inflict hallucinations upon those trapped within.

    At the next moment, lightning bolts again shone in Leviathan¡¯s perplexed eyes. He regained his soberness in seemingly just an instant and immediately realized what had just happened. With miserable pain spreading from his right fist, Leviathan, who had not suffered an injury in years, suddenly flew into a fit of rage. The divine energy within his body wildly converged towards his right fist.

    Han Shuo immediately sensed the sudden increase in divine energy from the Demonyer Edge. When he raised his head and saw that Leviathan¡¯s eyes were filled with fury, Han Shuo right away concluded that Leviathan was awake.

    At this moment, Han Shuo did not bother to inspect the surrounding conditions. He pressed his unupied left hand on the hilt of the Demonyer Edge. His powerful physical strength, the enigmatic demonic yuan, the violent divine energy of destruction, the eerie and sinister energies of fierce souls within the Demonyer Edge simultaneously erupted in that instance.

    Before Leviathan could gather his divine energy, a crisp creak sounded. Leviathan¡¯s fist was chopped into two with his fingerspletely fragmented. After that strike, Han Shuo¡¯s proceeded with making an upward stroke. The Demonyer Edge traveled in an arc and shed Leviathan¡¯s neck.

    Arhh... Leviathan shrieked in unbearable pain. The emotion of fear suddenly appeared in his eyes. He hastily flew backward to retreat.

    Suddenly, an intense energy of death creeped up from behind him. Judging by how frightening the energy was, Leviathan understood that a lowgod cultivating in the element of death was present behind him.

    Leviathan was unaware of Little Skeleton¡¯s existence. Therefore, it wasn¡¯t surprising that he would take Little Skeleton mounting an attack from behind to be another Han Shuo who was on the verge of bing a lowgod. His heart trembled. He knew that everything in this battle pointed to a disaster befalling him. Perhaps he had again recalled that dream in which he faced Bechymos, as his scar and post-traumatic stress seemed to affect him yet again instilling in him a feeling of timidity and helplessness.

    With Little Skeleton mounting a sneak attack from behind and Han Shuo¡¯s assault from the front, Leviathan¡¯s front and rear had been blocked out. He could only retreat by moving sideways. Leviathan leaned to one side. When he nearly transformed into a lighting bolt and ran out from Han Shuo¡¯s range of attack, Han Shuo¡¯s two arms bizarrely extended at high-speed. The Demonyer Edge that was already whooshing towards his neck at high speed moved ever faster thanks to Han Shuo¡¯s arms rapidly extending. Leviathan simply could not dodge it.

    When horror had finally filled Leviathan¡¯s mind, the Demonyer Edgeshed at Leviathan¡¯s neck with precision. Swish! The Demonyer Edge proceeded to skewer straight through Leviathan¡¯s neck. Crack! Immediately after, as Leviathan¡¯s energy declined in a split second, Little Skeleton¡¯s sneak attack with his bone spur managed to pierce through Leviathan¡¯s body.

    ¡°What does it taste like?¡± Han Shuo had an undisturbed face but his eyes were filled with chilling emotions. In the terrified gaze of Leviathan, Han Shuo flexed the muscles on his right arm and cast Leviathan¡¯s blood-drenched torso far into the distance.

 Chapter 570: Fearless

    GDK 570: Fearless

    Han Shuo had underestimated the true strength of a lowgod, or maybe he had underestimated the resilience of abyssal creatures as, even though Leviathan¡¯s neck was cut open by Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge and his body prated from behind by Little Skeleton¡¯s bonence, Leviathan did not die as a result of the traumatic injuries.

    Manticole somehow managed to make contact with Leviathan. Manticole, who had been in hiding all the while, resisted the attack of bloody shadows around him and zoomed towards where Leviathan was tossed.

    Leviathan, who was supposed to be powerless, stubbornly pulled himself together. The cut on his neck and puncture wound on his back afflicted by Han Shuo and Little Skeleton started to fill with lightning bolts. The brilliant sparkling bolts of thunder, as though tenacious meridians, reconnected his severed body tissue.

    Han Shuo was jolted as his consciousness that was firmly locked onto Leviathan sensed that his vitality was being rapidly rejuvenated. Not only did Leviathan¡¯s soul did not sustain the slightest harm, it was tenaciously activating the divine energy inside his body. However, the coverage area of his Domain of Divinity was rapidly shrinking.

    A shadow suddenly flew to Leviathan¡¯s side. A Domain of Divinity of Darkness immediately intersected with Leviathan¡¯s Domain of Divinity perfectly like a lock and key.

    Manticole was gobsmacked. Staring at Leviathan, whose divine body had suffered serious injuries, he anxiously said, ¡°How were you wounded?¡±

    ¡°Better watch out, his lowgod of death isplete,¡± as Leviathan¡¯s neck was seriously injured, his voice was like an air blower droning.

    With a wave of his hand, Manticole moved his Domain of Divinity. With Manticole at the center, an absolute darkness consumed everything. A dozen or so bloody shadows flew over but were stopped by the energy of absolute darkness.

    ¡°Impossible!¡± Manticole had astonishment painted across his face. He proimed, ¡°He has just started to absorb the element of death. It¡¯s impossible for him to form a divine soul and divine body so rapidly. We have gone through this process ourselves. You should understand that the time required for the process toplete cannot be this short!¡±

    ¡°If I¡¯ve said that there¡¯s another lowgod of death, then there¡¯s definitely one out there! Otherwise, how would it be possible for that kid to maim me so?¡± Leviathan said coldly as he covered his neck with his hand to stop the blood from gushing out. He was rather annoyed with Manticole for being skeptical.

    Upon hearing Leviathan¡¯s words, Manticole carefully recalled of the circumstances and sensed the turmoil of all kinds of energies all around. When he was about to give a few words to soothe Leviathan, his face suddenly turned grave, and said, ¡°Sorry for doubting you. It appears that there really is another lowgod of death, and he¡¯sing our way!¡±

    ¡°Of course there is!¡± Leviathan coldly groaned. With his left hand holding his neck, divine energy was released from his palm as electrical sparks. He seemed to be healing the injuries on his body using this method.

    With Han Shuo leading Little Skeleton, the father and son slowly marched ahead to the two Demon Kings. Han Shuo gazed into the absolute darkness, deathly and still, and sensed theyers andyers of defensive powers set up using Manticole¡¯s energy of darkness. He realized that the instinctive idea of forcibly breaking away those defensive energies wouldn¡¯t work.

    ¡°Father, let¡¯s charge in. One of them is seriously injured. Our powersbined is sufficient to take care of them!¡± Little Skeleton transmitted.

    Han Shuo forced a smile, shook his head, and transmitted, ¡°If we were to do that, both sides would suffer great losses. Moreover, outside the formation, there are two more of them about to recover. If we don¡¯t get rid of these two before the other twopletely eliminate the corrosive energy of the Soulpiercers, we won¡¯t stand a chance.¡±

    After listening to Han Shuo¡¯s exnation, Little Skeleton remained silent for a moment before he transmitted, ¡°Summon my five brothers and ask them to deploy that formation. We still have a chance.¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned at those words. He looked at Little Skeleton with astonishment in his eyes and asked in a somewhat unconvinced manner, ¡°The Penta-elemental Undead Formation that the five of them shaped, is it really useful against these experts of lowgod strength?¡±

    ¡°I believe there won¡¯t be a problem. Back then, even with just three out of five energiesbined, I had great trouble defending against it. Although my strength has advanced further since, the other two energies can nowpletely fuse with the rest. The formidable might of the formation can now be released to the fullest. It ought to be able to pose a threat to them,¡± Little Skeleton exined.

    ¡°Really?¡± Han Shuo gently cried in disbelief.

    ¡°Really!¡± Little Skeleton replied bluntly.

    Han Shuo understood that Little Skeleton was not one for nonsense or untrue words. With Little Skeleton¡¯s assurance, Han Shuo looked forward to the Penta-elemental Undead Formation even more. He took a few steps backward and retreated to another region before summoning the five elite zombies.

    Han Shuo¡¯s main body that focused on cultivating demonic arts could release necromancy magic as well. But, of course, as most of the energy of death in his main body had been transferred to his avatar, he couldn¡¯t deploy necromancy magic as smoothly and skillfully as that avatar cultivating in the element of death. But a few simple summoning incantations wouldn¡¯t be a problem.

    Following the incantation, the five elite zombies appeared before Han Shuo. Now that he was in this critical moment, he wasted no time on unnecessary words. As soon as the five elite zombies appeared, Han Shuomanded them to arrange themselves in ordance with the Penta-elemental Undead Formation.

    In fact, Han Shuo had secured a connection with the Netherworld as early as when he discovered that Leviathan had ruthlessly killed that follower of his. Therefore, Little Skeleton had prepared a countermeasure strategy ahead of time. The five elite zombies were obviously aware of the situation long ago too.

    Without another word, the five zombies dispersed in a well-coordinated manner. They assumed their own positions in the Penta-elemental Undead Formation, taking the shape of a circr arc, and concealed themselves.

    With the five elite zombies ready, all that Han Shuo needed to do was bait the two Demon Kings into the formation. Hemunicated with Little Skeleton before heading to thatnd of absolute darkness by himself. He nned on using the superior speed of his demonic arts and his familiarity with the formation to rope these two Demon Kings into his trap.

    Han Shuo had only started moving before he suddenly heard an explosion sound off in the distance. Immediately, the Domains of Divinity of fire and water registered in Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    Han Shuo was stunned. He hastily turned his attention and consciousness to probe into that area, and sensed the auras of Gnder and Cecrops. This time, he really was rather flustered.

    From their aurae, Han Shuo could be certain that Cecrops and Gnder had recovered. Indeed, lowgods were not to be belittled. Han Shuo had a clear understanding of the corrosiveness of a Soulpiercer. Although Han Shuo had a premonition, he truly did not anticipate that the two would recover so rapidly.

    With this, Han Shuo could very possibly need to face off against all four Great Demon Kings as they inevitably joined forces. Han Shuo did not even haveplete certainty of victory by joining forces with Little Skeleton against Leviathan and Manticole. Now that Cecrops and Gnder had regained their fighting capabilities, Han Shuo was in even greater danger.

    The situation was developing in the direction that was thest thing Han Shuo wished to see. He saw that the duo who had eliminated the Soulpiercers from their souls were charging over with their hearts filled with fury. As the boundaries on that region had been destroyed, the duo had no more reservations with their divine energies. Scorching hot and ice-cold divine energies assumed the shape of swords and bombarded the formation that Han Shuo was located in.

    In just a short moment, towering ste exploded and shattered, while colourful banners, unable to withstand the heat of the divine energy, started to ignite and burn.

    Han Shuo, who was preparing to draw Leviathan and Manticole towards the center of the Penta-elemental Undead Formation, understood the intentions of those two Demon Kings fiercely bombarding the formation from the outside ¨C they wished topletely destroy the formation! At this moment, without thinking much, instead of baiting Leviathan and Manticole, Han Shuo rushed to put away the most fundamental but costly item of the formation ¨C the banners.

    All those banners were manufactured piece by piece by Han Shuo, a process which consumed a ton of precious materials, countless hours of effort and sweat. Those banners were the basis for the entire formation. They weren¡¯t easy to obtain. Therefore, when he saw that the fruits of his hard work were being destroyed by fire, Han Shuo didn¡¯t stop to think. He immediately collected as many of those banners as he could to reduce his losses.

    The bloody shadows and all kinds of chaotic energies turned into threads and flew back into those huge banners. It didn¡¯t take long before Han Shuo had withdrawn all those banners into his space ring. With the most fundamental piece of the formation taken out of the equation, the Shura Soul Formationpletely lost its functions.

    Finally, Leviathan and Manticole, who didn¡¯t dare step an inch away from each other, suddenly sensed that the strange energy around them had disappeared. Cecrops and Gnder discovered that the hazy stone forest was gradually clearing up.

    In the center of a few isted ste, Han Shuo and Little Skeleton were wielding their weapons and vigntly observing their surroundings.

    ¡°What is that thing?¡± Cecrops asked in bewilderment as he looked at Little Skeleton and sensed the lowgod energy of death on him.

    ¡°Could something have gone wrong in his process of bing god?¡± Gnder was very much puzzled as well. As the two had been busy clearing away the Soulpiercers in their souls, in addition to the formation blocking their sights, they failed to understand what was going on.

    ¡°Whatever it is, to kill the both of them is the right choice,¡± Cecrops coldly groaned. He suddenly shot a nce at Leviathan. Seeing the injuries clearly visible on Leviathan immediately made Cecrops¡¯ mood slightly better. Rejoicing in others¡¯ misfortunes, Cecropsughed out loud and said, ¡°Leviathan, really didn¡¯t expect you to injure so easily, plus, your injuries weren¡¯t minor either. Haha, very good! Very good!¡±

    ¡°Hmph! I will slowly straighten things out with you in the future,¡± Leviathan had an unsightly expression. Without paying further attention at Cecrops, Leviathan red at Han Shuo with resentful eyes, saying, ¡°So, what malicious ruse are you going to y this time?¡±

    The corners of Han Shuo¡¯s lips pulled to make a sneer. He did not utter a word but raised his Demonyer Edge at Leviathan and made an upward stroke motion. It was the same move Han Shuo used to cut open Leviathan¡¯s neck.

    Leviathan was infuriated. He let out a wild roar and charged recklessly at Han Shuo. At the same time, as though having reached an agreement in silence, the other three Demon Kings almost simultaneously took action and flew towards Han Shuo.

 Chapter 571: Donâ€™t Even Think About Leaving!

    GDK 571: Don¡¯t Even Think About Leaving!

    The Domains of Divinity of water, fire, lightning, and darkness were simultaneously deployed. All four Demon Kings charged at Han Shuo together with their Domains of Divinity fused.

    When they finally got near to Han Shuo and Little Skeleton, the Domain of Divinity of death released by Little Skeletonbined with the mixture of the four Domains. All of a sudden, energies of five different elements converged together, forming a terrifying burst of air that spread in every direction.

    A deafening explosion suddenly rumbled around Han Shuo and Little Skeleton.

    In just a short while, the remnants of magical matrices around the duo were obliteratedpletely in this explosion! All those towering ste were pulverized into dust that filled the air. Sparkling and translucent magical crystal ores that couldn¡¯t withstand the tremendous pressure melted into liquid. The mounds deployed in ordance with the principles of Shura Soul Formation turned into potholes in the loud explosion...

    Everything on this piece ofnd, at the moment the five Domains of Divinity intersected, was cleansed to emptiness!

    After the rumble, not a single piece of stone within the hundred meter radius around Han Shuo and Little Skeleton were intact. It was a scene of destion and devastation. Other than Han Shuo and Little Skeleton standing proudly in the center, everything around them was razed to the ground, leaving not a trace of the magical matrices that had stood there.

    With four Demon Kings of the Abyss realm attacking together, the formation which had lost its function was now reduced to the point where not even an ounce of debris could be found. Little Skeleton and Han Shuo, one wielding a bone spur and the other tightly clenching the Demonyer Edge, waited for the arrival of the ultimate great battle.

    Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

    Four figures flew over. All four of Demon Kings concurrently sent forth their attacks without any reservations. Thunderbolts rolled. Darkness enveloped the sky. Ice covered the surroundings and fire scorched the earth.

    The scene at this moment looked as one might expect to see on Doomsday. Thebined assault of the four Demon Kings was like a final judgment handed to this unpardonable sinner known as Han Shuo.

    ¡°Die!!!¡± the heavily injured Leviathan sternly and loudly shouted. The bolts of thunder wriggled towards Han Shuo as rumbling sounds apanied.

    Leviathan hated Han Shuo to the extreme. For many years, after Bechymos, this was only the second time he had been injured by anyone. These injuries caused him a great psychological impact. The energy of destruction and the elemental energy of death that originated from Han Shuo and Little Skeleton continued to wreak havoc inside his body. It was impossible for him to regain his former might without spending a long period of time to recuperate from his injuries.

    The Abyss realm was filled with selfish people. It goes without saying that the four Demon Kings were among those. Leviathan, who could murder his most loyal and devoted subordinates without the slightest hesitation, would not allow Han Shuo to be yet another psychological trauma in his brain. This was because it was very clear to him as to the kind of impact this trauma of failure would do to his cultivation in the future.

    It was only by killing Han Shuo that this psychological trauma previously caused by Han Shuo could be forever concealed. Otherwise, in his cultivation of the elemental energy of lightning, he might very possibly be unable to make an inch of progress! Therefore, Leviathan had every reason to ughter Han Shuo!

    The other three Demon Kings also had every reason to kill Han Shuo. The emergence of a new mighty existence meant that their territories and hence their benefits would be further divided. When this new existence eventually surpassed their strength, this kind of territory redistribution could even mean that they would have no significant standing anymore.

    What was the power of faith? It was a wonderful thing that could deepen a god¡¯s divine energy and allow their Domain of Divinity to grow even mightier. The countless years of war on this Abyss realm had all been for this thing called the power of faith. Therefore, when Han Shuo¡¯s strength severely threatened everyone¡¯s interests, it was a matter of course that this previously impossible alliance took shape!

    The might of four Demon Kings attacking at the same time indeed wasn¡¯t something that any regr person could handle. This especially ferocious and vigorous force made even Han Shuo and Little Skeleton feel an extreme pressure.

    However, Han Shuo and Little Skeleton did not have the intention of directly confronting the four all along. The corners of Han Shuo¡¯s lips curled into a smile as though he had his way. It should have been thest expression on his face given that Han Shuo and Little Skeleton could have been in at any moment.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo and Little Skeleton, who were loftily standing on the same ground, sank into the earth without the slightest prior indication. If was like the ground had liquefied as they gradually descended without the slightest impediment.

    The four Demon Kings had the same expression of shock in their faces, disdain slowly creeping up after. They thought Han Shuo¡¯s actions to be silly. To have four Demon Kings attacking at the same time, what good would burying oneself into the ground do?

    Hence, with cold smiles on their faces, the four Demon Kings simultaneously attacked, sending all their divine energies shooting towards where Han Shuo and Little Skeleton had stood. Their terrifying energies threatened to rip the earth apart.

    ng!

    Against all expectations, that bombardment the four hadunched with all their might seemed to fall on the hardest stone. Those strikes which could destroy all rocks managed to produce only metallic sparks when they fell to the ground. At this moment, the ground seemed to have turned into the strongest material in existence. The ground was blemished with not even a dent despite four Demon Kings attacking with their divine energies!

    ¡°How can this be?!¡± four appalled voices simultaneously sounded. The four Demon Kings, overwhelmed with shock, wore faces of bewilderment and disbelief. Their eyes carried extreme puzzlement as they looked at the ground they were stepping on, no clue as to what in the world had just happened.

    The understanding that these Demon Kings had of this valley far exceeded that of Han Shuo¡¯s. They knew that the ground of this valley was rather hard. But they, as lowgods, by stomping their feet, would still be able to leave a crater the depth of their ankles. Lowgods were already real gods, so how could their might be belittled?

    Moreover, it was just a moment ago that Han Shuo had clearly sunken into the ground as though sinking into water. All four Demon Kings clearly observed that with their own eyes. Of course, they thought that Han Shuo had utilized divine energy to sink himself into the ground.

    If Han Shuo could insert himself into the ground without difficulty, how could their all-out strike not at least tear a big hole in the ground?

    Their minds were scrambled. However, the truth was right before their eyes ¨C that strike they threw out with all their strength really did not shake up the earth and produced only some metallic sparks on the ground!

    Strange! Unbelievably strange!

    All four Demon Kings were stupefied momentarily by this situation formed by earth and metal elite zombiesbining their energy of earth and metal.

    ¡°Something¡¯s not right!¡± Manticole cried out in rm. He somehow withdrew a broadsword with boundless darkness lingering around it. Right before the other three Demon Kings, Manticole demonstrated his divine might, and stabbed at the ground without hesitation. Cling! Sparks flew. He had left a tiny little dent on the ground.

    All four of the Demon Kings were jolted at once. No one understood better just how incisive that broadsword of Manticole¡¯s was. Yet, that strike left only one tiny dent on the ground.

    What did this mean? It meant that the earth was solid beyond measure!

    ¡°This is crazy!¡± Gnder¡¯s ice-cold voice was filled with horror and puzzlement. His brain was in a great mess as he looked at the unimaginable transformation of the ground he was stepping on.

    ¡°Space, the space is changing!¡± Cecrops suddenly opened his closed eyes and shouted.

    Upon hearing those words, the other three frightened Demon Kings simultaneously raised their heads and looked at the sky.

    The dense smog that had constantly lingered in this valley of the Void was rapidly converging on this piece of sky. The empty space suddenly gave them a bizarre feeling of contraction. It was as though the sky had turned into a cage which was powered by some kind of energy that the four Demon Kings did not understand. It was turning up the pressure bit by bit while contracting just as much...

    The Demon Kings were most sensitive towards elemental energies. Their Domains of Divinity could constantly absorb the elemental energy present all around between heaven and earth for themselves to use. Whenever they used up their divine energy, it could help them with replenishing the divine energy they exhausted.

    However, at this moment, the four elements between heaven and earth that constantly gathered towards them abruptly came to a halt!

    This was a situation that had never ever happened before. It was as though, in an instant, all the elements in the world hadpletely vanished without a trace!

    ¡°Impossible!¡± All four of them simultaneously discovered the unusual change and shrieked. They looked at each other in astonishment.

    ¡°What in the world is fucking going on?!¡± Leviathan, who suffered serious injuries, finally couldn¡¯t restrain himself and cursed. The unnatural scene around him had set his mind in turbulence and caused him to lose his cool.

    ¡°Elemental energies no longer gather towards our Domains of Divinity. Some kind of energy must have affected the flow of the elements, or perhaps, severed the connection of elemental energies from this region!¡± Cecrops shouted in a deep voice.

    ¡°This ce is really strange, we should leave first,¡± A flustered feeling that had disappeared from Gnder¡¯s heart for many years suddenly reemerged. This strange feeling that suddenly arose made him extremely ufortable, so much so that his voice grew hoarse.

    ¡°This must be Han Shuo¡¯s doing. Gnder is right, we should leave this ce at once. All other matters can wait!¡± Manticole and Gnder were arch-enemies. But at this moment, Manticole agreed to Gnder¡¯s suggestion.

    The four suddenly exchanged nces. In each pair of eyes they looked into, they saw an emotion unfamiliar to them ¨C fear!

    Who were they? The Great Demon Kings of the Abyss! They possessed absolute power and authority in the Abyss. They were the mightiest beings of the Abyss that no other ever dared to challenge. And yet, at this moment, they actually felt frightened!

    ¡°Don¡¯t even think about leaving!¡± suddenly, Han Shuo¡¯s cold and stern voice, sounded from an unknown ce.

    In a moment, it would be from the sky. In another, it felt as though it came from the abyss. The voice seemed to be right beside their ears, but then, it would feel as though it was extremely far away...

 Chapter 572: Trapped in a Hopeless Situation

    GDK 572: Trapped in a Hopeless Situation

    From the sky over their heads to the ground under their feet, when this restricting force suddenly contracted, all four Demon Kings immediately noticed the unusual change with the surrounding. Their hearts grew even more appalled.

    After Han Shuo¡¯s voice sounded, the four had no uncertainty that the changes to this region of space were of Han Shuo¡¯s doing. After having experiencing a round of battle, all four Demon Kings became well aware that Han Shuo practiced some kind of unfathomable martial art. The transformation to the space around them caused them to be flustered ¨C an emotion they were very unfamiliar with.

    There were no longer elemental energies pouring into their Domains of Divinity. The ground beneath their feet was tough beyond measure. Even Manticole¡¯s incredibly incisive broadsword couldn¡¯t split it. The pressure that gripped their hearts gradually grew heavier and heavier.

    ¡°Ridiculous! Merely with your powers alone, you want to contain the four of us? Even Bechymos doesn¡¯t have that kind of strength, let alone you!¡± Gnder¡¯s ice-cold voice was filled with utter disdain. However, his eyes were flickering with uncertainty. No one knew what exactly he was thinking.

    ¡°You have all seen how tough the earth is. It is rather difficult for us to split it apart. However, the empty sky is the hardest to defend against. I believe that we should try to escape from above,¡± Manticole suggested as he raised his head and looked to the sky.

    ¡°Alright!¡± Gnder agreed.

    Having made up their minds, the four Demon Kings no longer wasted their divine energy on attacking the ground. The raised their heads and looked at the clear sky with dense smog lingering. They again demonstrated their divine might, sending another round of attacks bombarding towards the sky.

    Rumbles...

    Thunder and strange noises reverberated from all directions. It was a though the heavens were falling, with ear-splitting noises shooting from everywhere.

    However, the empty sky seemed to be filled with the most pliable but tough cotton. The terrifying joint attack of the four Demon Kings aimed at the sky felt like a rock that fell into the sea. They hadunched two strikes but, to their bemusement, their resistance had been futile.

    At this moment, the four Demon Kings really began to panic. The feeling of dread simultaneously revealed itself in their eyes. As they sensed themselves being isted from the outside world, a feeling of dispiritment out of helplessness suddenly rose from the bottom of their hearts.

    What should we do? What should we do?! all four of them had been asking this very same question in their minds. They looked at each other in dismay, out of their wits for a moment.

    They could neither fly up nor bore through the ground. The situation was just disastrous for them. Even with the four of them cooperating, they couldn¡¯t find a way to leave this strange ce. They were finally frightened.

    Outside the Penta-elemental Undead Formation, Han Shuo was wearing an iparably nervous expression as he gazed at the misty region. His consciousness, connected to the five elite zombies on a deeper level, saw that the five elite zombies showed signs of fatigue.

    Lowgods were, after all, true gods. What¡¯s more, they had to deal with four of them at the same time. For the Penta-elemental Undead Formation to have firmly defended the two waves of attacks jointly made by the four Demon Kings, Han Shuo genuinely felt proud of his five elite zombies.

    However, the Penta-elemental Undead Formation formed by the five elite zombies needed to block a total of eight strikesing from four divine entities attacking with all their strength. Although the burden was shared among the five elite zombies, it was still rather difficult to manage.

    The defensive energy of the earth was formed by fusing the energy of metal and earth. Meanwhile, the soft and flexible defensive power of the sky was formed by fusing the energy of water and wood. Although the five elite zombies, through the formation, shared the burden and managed to neutralize the joint attacks of the four Demon Kings, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness connected to the five clearly sensed the energies in their bodies had diminished substantially.

    The Penta-elemental Undead Formation possessed not merely the energy for defensive and binding purposes. Its main energy was in attacking. However, as these four existences possessed terrifying strengths of lowgods, in addition to the fact that the interval between the two attacks had been rather short, the five elite zombies had no choice but to be on the defense with all their strength. They simply did not have energy left over to organize and deploy the offensive properties of this formation or the moment.

    Han Shuo understood that if the four Demon Kings were to madly continue with bombarding the sky or the earth, it wouldn¡¯t take long before the Penta-elemental Undead Formation was destroyed. After all, the five elite zombies only had finite strength. There was no way they would withstand repeated bombardment without exhausting their energy.

    It wasn¡¯t just the four Demon Kings who were flustered. Han Shuo, attentively and nervously observing the battle, was also out of his wits for a moment. The Penta-elemental Undead Formation was deployed by the five elite zombies and he couldn¡¯t intervene. If he were to get inside, Han Shuo himself would receive some the effects of the formation, and wouldn¡¯t be able topletely bring out his strength.

    The five elite zombies were currently digesting the two waves of energy sent out by the four Demon Kings. As soon as they eliminated the effects of those energies, they would be able to go all-out and release the full firepower of the Penta-elemental Undead Formation. By then, the four Demon Kings would bepletely upied with defending themselves and would have no time for continuing their incessant attacks towards the Penta-elemental Undead Formation.

    Each and every Great Demon King of the Abyss realm was a seasoned expert with an extremely steady heart and mind. Even though they were somewhat panicky at this moment, they weren¡¯t about to go mad and send out reckless attacks. The way they thought was ¨C if the first strike didn¡¯t do it, then the second strike would be just as ineffective. It was thanks to theirplete ignorance towards the formation that they had given the five elite zombies a chance to catch their breaths.

    Just as the four Demon Kings were creasing their brows, turning over in their minds on how to destroy the Penta-elemental Undead Formation from within, the five elite zombies finally recovered from the damage they had sustained. Without any hesitation, the five elite zombies abandoned all defensive energies and began fusing with each other¡¯s energies bit by bit, unleashing the firepower of the Penta-elemental Undead Formation to the fullest.

    ¡°Look! The sky, something¡¯s not right!¡± Manticole, who was rapidly racking his mind, pondering how to break from this region, suddenly raised his head and cried out in rm.

    Upon hearing the cry, the other three Demon Kings simultaneously raised their heads and looked at the sky. The originally misty sky suddenly became upied by arge field of fiery clouds. Fierce zes of scorching heat would burst out as those clouds pressed downwards bit by bit.

    At the same time, a horrific energy shrouded the Demon Kings from above their heads. Like the burning clouds, it was slowing pressing down onto the four Demon Kings.

    The previously tranquilnd was rocked like an earthquake. It tore to make fissures, which allowed sharp cones as tough as steel to suddenlye thrusting up from underground. They shot towards the four Demon Kings like guided missiles.

    The barren piece ofnd, unknowingly, had grown to overfill with vines. They were slithering like vipers, creeping their way towards the four Demon Kings.

    Other than the burning clouds pressing down on them, metal elite zombie¡¯s golden cudgel had turned into a great mountain. The great momentum and loftiness of the mountain allowed it to envelop the entire region as it came pounding at the four Great Demon Kings, apanied by monstrous rumbling.

    The golden cudgel constantly grew in size until it filled the whole sky. Apart from burying themselves underground, the four would have no way of avoiding it. However, concealing themselves in the earth was none too viable either as countless spikes as hard as steel were ruthlessly piercing up from their feet. With the fusions of energies, all kinds of attacks wereunched at them one after another. It was as though there wasn¡¯t an inch of space where they could hide. Within this region, all they could do was exert their divine energies to defend themselves.

    ¡°Father, what do you think?¡± Little Skeleton who was mounted on a bone dragon transmitted to Han Shuo from a little ways away.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was filled with astonishment. That foggy region ahead couldn¡¯t escape from the surveince of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. Sensing the ruthless offensive forces within as the formation initiated its actual offense, Han Shuo was dumbfounded by its formidable power. He discovered that he had underestimated the true might of the Penta-elemental Undead Formation by a wide margin. No matter if it was the sky or the ground, any direction, any region of space, any corner, there was nowhere the preys could hide. The attacks woulde from every grain of soil, every gust of air, and every drop of water...

    Once the energy of the five attributes fused together, it would also give rise to some other energies of which characteristics not even Han Shuo could make sense of. These energies were extremely bizarre and mysterious. More often than not, they could ovee the defenses put up by the Demon Kings using their divine energies, putting them in a tight corner.

    The five elite zombies were life forms refined from five ordinary zombie warriors using demonic arts and the five ces of extremes. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t too clear as to what kind of strengths they currently possessed, but he was certain that of the five elite zombies, even fire, metal, and wood elite zombies, who had obtained attributal treasures, definitely weren¡¯t as mighty as Little Skeleton. They would, at most, possess merely the strength of basegod.

    And yet, it was exactly the same five elite zombies, through forming the Penta-elemental Undead Formation and fusing their five energies together, who could unleash frightening firepower. Even these four Demon Kings of the Abyss realm were weary in dealing with it!

    The Penta-elemental Undead Formation indeed did not disappoint Han Shuo!

    The golden cudgel which had filled the entire space contained the attribute of metal. However, when they pounded on the four Demon Kings, clouds of dancing zes leapt out from it...

    The four groaned. Under the pounding of the unstoppable golden cudgel, the four Demon Kings were dizzy with blurred vision. Among them, Leviathan, who was heavily injured to begin with, couldn¡¯t bear the hammering. His wounds that he had forcibly reconnected suddenly burst. Fresh blood gushed out like water from a broken dam.

    His knee gave way. Leviathan, the first to receive serious injuries, knelt to the ground with one knee. Blood flowed from his mouth like a river stream.

    As though knowing it was wise to eliminate the weakest the first, the numerous energies within the Penta-elemental Undead Formation gathered on Leviathan in an instant. Hundreds upon thousands of light rays bombarded at Leviathan.

    ¡°Save me, save me!¡± Leviathan was petrified. He begged and cried out in pain as he looked at the other three Demon Kings.

    Bang! Just like fireworks exploding, Leviathan¡¯s divine soul and divine energy were abruptly annihted. This lowgod was now dead, once and for all.

 Chapter 573: You Are No Match Against Me!

    GDK 573: You Are No Match Against Me!

    A small crack appeared in the smog-filled sky over the Penta-elemental Undead Formation, perhaps a result of the shattering of Leviathan¡¯s divine soul and divine body, or maybe the five elite zombies were exhausted from the all-out strike.

    Manticole, who was exerting himself to defend against the attacks of the formation, noted with his sharp senses this change to the sky. From a strand of the element of darkness that abruptly spilled over, he knew that finally, the Penta-elemental Undead Formation had revealed its w!

    Without any hesitation, after that fissure was produced, Manticole turned into a puff of ck smoke and escaped from the Penta-elemental Undead Formation at the fastest speed in his entire life. As to Leviathan, who had exploded beside him, he didn¡¯t even bother batting an eye.

    Outside the formation, Han Shuo, who was sensing the changes to the Penta-elemental Undead Formation with full attention, learned via his connection with the five elite zombies that the all-out attack to exterminate Leviathan had exhausted a lot of their energy.

    Whoosh! Manticole suddenly escaped through the fissure.

    Both Han Shuo and Little Skeleton sensed the Domain of Divinity of Darkness. They simultaneously cast their gazes on Manticole.

    The Domain of Divinity naturally formed on Little Skeleton was easily noticeable. Manticole caught sight of Little Skeleton and Han Shuo after flying out from the formation.

    Without uttering any nonsense, Manticole did not spare a thought before raising that broadsword of his that had aura of darkness coiled around it and charged at Han Shuo,

    Naturally, Manticole thought that the bizarre space was entirely produced by Han Shuo using some unknown energy. In his mind, as long as he could distract Han Shuo and keep him preupied with his attacks, that strange scene which was imprisoning the other two Demon Kings would simply disappear just like the Shura Soul Formation before it.

    It wasn¡¯t out of kindness that Manticole would attempt to save Cecrops and Gnder. Leviathan¡¯s death was suffice to prove to Manticole that Han Shuo was a major threat. He knew that if they didn¡¯t kill Han Shuo now, none of those who ventured into the Void would walk out alive.

    At this moment, Manticole no longer seeked the riches and treasures of the Void, rather, he wanted to safeguard his interests by all means necessary. Han Shuo was the only real source of danger here. He believed that if he were to attack with all his strength, Han Shuo would inevitably be unable to maintain that space restricting Cecrops and Gnder.

    ¡°Courting death!¡± When Han Shuo saw Manticole recklessly charging at him, he cackled instead of showing any signs of fright. The Demonyer Edge was revealed. Just then, an aura of destruction mixed with bloody rays instantlyunched out a dozen meters forward. Killing intent was also rolling within the energy.

    Little Skeleton, who had been riding on a bone dragon, expanded his Domain of Divinity. An intense element of death was sent gushing towards Manticole. Simultaneously, as Little Skeleton hurled the long and narrow bone spear in his hand, an enormous amount of the element of death gathered and divine energy in his body flowed into his bone spur. Then, the bone spur was deployed through the Law of Activating Magic. A streak of chilling white light shot towards Manticole.

    All of a sudden, Manticole had the energies of destruction and death locked onto him with two attacks arriving in an instant. The situation was far from encouraging to Manticole. However, as he assumed that if he could disturb Han Shuo¡¯s concentration and leave him unable to cause mischief in the space behind him, Cecrops and Gnder would also be able to escape ande to his assistance.

    It was with this thought in mind that Manticole did not retreat when faced against Han Shuo and Little Skeleton¡¯s attacks. He stubbornly pressed forward. Absolute darkness would flood in wherever his broadsword passed. Even Manticole himself disappeared into the darkness.

    But what a pity, Han Shuo¡¯s miraculous consciousness had firmly locked onto Manticole long ago. Perhaps, this kind of concealment method might be useful against other gods. But in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, it was justughable.

    The Demonyer Edge and Little Skeleton¡¯s bone spur, guided by Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, sliced and stabbed at Manticole with incredible precision and speed.

    ¡°How is this possible?!¡± Manticole suddenly let out a despondent cry from behind the twilight. Soon after, nks sounded from the absolute darkness.

    ¡°Hehe, you think your little stealth tricks can work on me? Don¡¯t me me for this, you¡¯re practically asking for it!¡± Han Shuo ridiculed with an arrogant smile.

    Han Shuo and Little Skeleton stood still on their grounds as they controlled their respective weapons, Demonyer Edge and bone spur, through thoughts. The weapons rapidly flew and maneuvered through the darkness. Sharp noises of metal being struck together would repeatedly tremor from within.

    It agonized Manticole to take on the precise, bizarre attacks. Especially since every strike of the Demonyer Edge containing multiple types of energies would leave nicks on the broadsword that he took pride in very much.

    This obviously meant that the Demonyer Edge was even more terrifyingly incisive than his broadsword!

    Manticole was just sullen. No matter how much he pondered, he couldn¡¯t make sense of how these two weapons among the absolute darkness he created by activating his Domain of Divinity to its extreme could aim and shoot at him with such incredible uracy! With this, Manticole, who was supposed to take the offense to Han Shuo and Little Skeleton by means of concealing his body, was now thepletely on the defensive side. He was helpless and at his wit¡¯s end against Han Shuo and Little Skeleton¡¯s attacks.

    ¡°Manticole, didn¡¯t expect this, did ya? Hahah, at first, I really had no interest in your Abyss realm. However, given that you all will forever disappear very soon, well, I guess I¡¯ll have to volunteer myself to fill the vacant seat and take down this world for myself!¡± the Demonyer Edge avatar that possessed an independent soul suddenly uttered a distinctly human voice as it attacked Manticole

    Manticole was greatly flustered and frightened. He could no longer restrain the appall in his heart. His movements were affected as his heart was in disorder. He managed to barely block a strike of the Demonyer Edge, but was prated by the bone spur, allowing the divine energy of death to flow into his body.

    His eyes were filled with fright. In a flurry, he diverted a portion of his divine energy to resist the energy of death invading his body. The bizarre scene of Demonyer Edge talking while ferociously slicing at him caused Manticole even more rm.

    ¡°Are you afraid? Hehe, don¡¯t be. You¡¯ll be dead soon anyway!¡± the Demonyer Edge jabbered on and on to perturb Manticole¡¯s mind. Those sarcasticments that fell in Manticole¡¯s ears were like a voodoo hastening his death, causing him to feel even more flustered and helpless.

    Outside of the absolute darkness, wearing a sinister smile, Han Shuo very slowly withdrew a Pearl of Annihtion from his space ring. After he delivered a message to Little Skeleton, a strange light streaked across the space. The Pearl of Annihtion was suddenly shooting at Manticole as he did his utmost to fend for his life.

    Simultaneously, the Demonyer Edge and the bone spur that gued Manticole like a ghost demanding vengeance for its unjustly death suddenly disappeared without a trace!

    The pressure on Manticole was suddenly released. However, he was rather puzzled. He couldn¡¯t understand why the two most annoying weapons would suddenly vanish at this most critical moment.

    Oh shit! Manticole shrieked when he saw a ball flying at him! Having clearly witnessed Gnder and Cecrops¡¯ previous bitter experience, he understood just how much of a headache that ordinary looking sphere would cause once it exploded.

    Manticole tried to escape, but unfortunately, before he even moved an inch, the Pearl of Annihtion detonated.

    The earth-shattering bang was quickly followed by a wretched shriek of misery...

    After the rumble subsided, Manticole suffered cuts and bruises from head to toe. Blood flowed out from his body in tiny streams. Furthermore, the most formidable Soulpiercers left a terrifying amount of corrosive energy within his soul!

    Manticole knew that by now, he would have no chance of prevailing. Looking at Han Shuo and Little Skeleton closing in on him step by step, Manticole forced an ugly smile with great effort. With a hoarse voice, he said, ¡°Mister Han Shuo, Leviathan is dead. We can work together to take over Leviathan¡¯s territories. Youcked understanding of the Abyss, but I can help you with that. It¡¯s true, you need me!¡±

    Manticole needed time to purge the corrosive energy dealt by the Soulpiercers. Against Han Shuo and Little Skeleton approaching step by step, Manticole felt truly frightened. At this moment, he knew that even escaping from the two would be very difficult. This person who had always been proud, arrogant, and treated Han Shuo as a high-level cannon-fodder, at this very moment, had no choice but to fawn and curry favor. In fact, he did not hesitate to cast away that demeanor of a divine and sovereign existence just to survive.

    Han Shuo gave him a smile full of despise and disdain before shaking his head and said, ¡°This is not a good proposal! There are all too many who understand the Abyss well. For example, Bord and Zinia. I believe that once you¡¯re dead, they would be most willing to serve me. By the way, truth be told, my only intention was originally to leave the Abyss realm as soon as possible. It is you four who pushed the situation to this stage.¡±

    ¡°Han Shuo, you really won¡¯t give me one bit of opportunity to live?¡± Manticole pleaded with bitter agony. However, after a short pause, he put on a sinister face and before Han Shuo could reply, he said, ¡°Don¡¯t you forget, your women and your apprentice are still in ck Jade City. I¡¯m a lowgod. Even though we are separated so far away, I can still acquire a connection with my believers. I can turn them into shredded meat with just one thought. Don¡¯t you regret!¡±

    ¡°I personally manufactured the Pearls of Annihtion myself, and I¡¯m extremely clear about the effects of the Soulpiercers. Your soul is now in great chaos. There¡¯s absolutely no way that you canmunicate with your believers. No need to bluff!¡± Han Shuo said after having a bellyugh.

    The Demonyer Edge had stealthily snuck behind Manticole. While he was rattled, the Demonyer Edge pierced through Manticole from his back.

    ¡°When ites to concealing presence, you truly are no match against me!¡± Han Shuo shook his head andmented. Right after, Han Shuo and Little Skeleton jointly ughtered Manticole by ruthlessly destroying his divine soul and divine body altogether!

 Chapter 574: Reaching Heaven in a Single Bound

    GDK 574: Reaching Heaven in a Single Bound

    With Manticole and Leviathan dead, all that remained were Cecrops and Gnder. Even without the help of Penta-elemental Undead Formation, the duo of Han Shuo and Little Skeleton could handle the two.

    At that moment, a sudden strange realization surfaced from Han Shuo¡¯s soul.

    It took Han Shuo a split second to realize that his avatar cultivating in the element of death had finally evolved into a lowgod. Uponpletion of the molding of its divine body and divine soul, a Domain of Divinity of death naturally took shape around it.

    Whoosh! That avatar draped in a dark ck magical robe, carrying along an intense element of death, zoomed over and stood still beside the other Han Shuo.

    Bizarre divine energy was slowly circting within the body of this avatar. Afterpletely absorbing the Divine Soul of that midgod, this avatar now possessed unbounded potential. Possessing three pieces of Divine Essence that he could absorb somedayter, Han Shuo carried even greater expectations for this avatar of his.

    ¡°Congrattions, father!¡± said Little Skeleton sincerely when he saw that Han Shuo had formed a lowgod of death.

    Han Shuo smiled and nodded. Just as he was about to say something, he sensed an unusual change happening within the Penta-elemental Undead Formation. Raging mes and arctic cold bizarrely coexisted at this moment. The Domains of Divinity of Gnder and Cecrops were squeezing against each other, causing their terrifying might to constantly expand outwards.

    The Penta-elemental Undead Formation that had been pushing them to a tight corner, for some reason, turned back to employing defensive measures. Water and fire elite zombie transmitted an extremely greedy aura.

    ¡°Father, we can reap everything they own. All we need to do is wipe out the awarenesses within their souls!¡± fire elite zombie hastily transmitted.

    Han Shuo was astonished and pleasantly surprised upon receiving fire elite zombie¡¯s message. He asked, ¡°Are you saying, you can take over everything they have, including their divine energy and divine soul?¡±

    ¡°Yes father. As long as the self-awareness within their divine souls is gone, we will be able to obtain their everything,¡± water elite zombie answered impatiently.

    ¡°Good, very good!¡± Han Shuo eximed. ¡°Withdraw the defensive energy of the Penta-elemental Undead Formation. We will attack them together!¡±

    As soon as his thought was delivered, Han Shuo¡¯s main body, his two avatars, and Little Skeleton struck at the same time. They sent their wild attacks with all their strength at Gnder and Cecrops trying to retrieve lost ground. The three lowgods, in addition to Han Shuo¡¯s main body, umted their powers to the maximum and while the two Demon Kings were still confused and in disarray, they pounded at their Domains of Divinity.

    The utterly exhausted Gnder and Cecrops had consumed more than half of their divine energies inside the Penta-elemental Undead Formation. The sudden ferocious strike extinguished the scene of fire and ice they had created in an instant.

    As light rays shone brilliantly, Gnder and Cecrops¡¯ Domains of Divinity unexpectedly began to crack. They could no longer iste and stop energies of other elements flowing into the Domains. The two Demon Kings had exhausted a great amount of their divine energies to defend against this wave of attack.

    After the round of attack, Han Shuo and Little Skeleton did not pause for a moment before sending even fiercer attacks that continuously pounded on Gnder and Cecrops. At the same time, that avatar belonging to Han Shuo which had recently became a lowgod of death released the necromancy magic ¡®Soul Tremor¡¯ with all its strength, which thumped the divine souls of Gnder and Cecrops furiously.

    The consciousness of Han Shuo¡¯s main body wasn¡¯t idling either. Attacking jointly with the release of ¡®Soul Tremor¡¯, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness pierced into the Demon Kings¡¯ divine souls, causing heavy injuries in an instant.

    Whoosh! Whoosh! Two trails of shadows rapidly shot towards Gnder and Cecrops while they were at their weakest. Han Shuo¡¯s sharp eyes recognized the two shadows as fire and water elite zombies.

    The scene that followed was peculiar, to say the least. When water elite zombie shot onto Gnder¡¯s body, the former abruptly turned into liquid and bore into Gnder¡¯s brain through his seven apertures. Fire elite zombie simrly transformed into clouds of fire. It first set Cecrops¡¯ body on me before making its way into his skull.

    Gnder and Cecrops struggled agonizingly at first, then finally stopped moving. Hammered by the Soul Tremor spell and Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, the divine souls of the two turned extremely weak. Following that, they suffered destructive blows from water and fire elite zombies which caused their awarenesses to gradually scatter and wither.

    Some miraculous transformation started happening to water and fire elite zombie. As they were both refined from Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence, he very clearly sensed that the two were taking over everything that the Demon Kings had by force, although he had no clue as to precisely how they did it. Their divine energies, divine souls, and even their divine bodies, were being assimted by the two elite zombies as that astonishing transformation continued.

    ¡°Father, give us a hand! They still have awarenesses that have yet to disperse!¡± water elite zombie suddenly transmitted.

    Han Shuo, who had his attention focused on the astonishing transformation, suddenly sensed that both Gnder¡¯s and Cecrops¡¯ awarenesses were trying tounch their final counterattacks. When the two Demon Kings discovered that their awarenesses were gradually crumbling, both of them made supreme effort to reassemble their souls with the intention of transmitting the self-destructmand to their bodies, intending to cause mutual destruction.

    These two Demon Kings were first barraged with a Pearl of Annihtion and suffered agonizing pain from the Soulpiercers. Soon after, they were trapped and tormented inside the Penta-elemental Undead Formation. With all that battering, their divine energy, body, and soul, were all in extremely weak conditions. Using all their might, Little Skeleton, Han Shuo, and his two avatars jointly attacked the Demon Kings¡¯ bodies and souls.

    To be able to persevere and keep their awarenesses from scattering even after receiving these strings of attacks, this proved just how terrifyingly strong their will to survive was!

    After quickly processing those thoughts, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness and his avatar cultivating in the energy of death simultaneouslyunched violent attacks towards Gnder¡¯s and Cecrops¡¯ soul the very next moment, doing their utmost in not letting their awarenesses to reassemble.

    Han Shuo understood that if Gnder and Cecrops weren¡¯t stopped, and if they were to reassemble their awarenesses and deliver the self-destructmand to their bodies, water and fire elite zombies would not only fail in gaining an advantage but even lose their lives. Moreover, as the two Demon Kings were located near Han Shuo and Little Skeleton, they would likely bear the effects.

    Therefore, Han Shuo had no choice. He exerted all his strength to attack the awarenesses inside their divine souls trying to reassemble, frantically stopping their suicidal counterattack in the face of death.

    Gradually, the two Demon Kings gave weaker and weaker resistance. Under the all-out attacks of Han Shuo¡¯s souls, followed relentlessly by the invasion from water and fire elite zombies, their awarenesses in theirst strive to reassemble started to weaken bit by bit...

    ¡°Thank you father, this is great! They are both done for! Haha, wonderful, wonderful...¡± fire elite zombie transmitted incoherently. His level of excitement was just a scream away from unreasonable.

    ¡°Focus on the task! Take over everything they have!¡± Han Shuo berated. He knew just how dangerous it was to forcibly upy another¡¯s soul and was deeply afraid that the two might invite cmity by celebrating too soon.

    Even Han Shuo himself dared not to rx by the slightest. His consciousness and the soul of his lowgod of death avatar locked onto Cecrops and Gnder, on guard and ready to defend if the two were to try to counterattack once more.

    Time passed unassumingly. After a long but undetermined amount of time, Han Shuo discovered that Gnder and Cecrops¡¯ awarenesses were gradually vanishing and the souls he locked on gave him an extremely familiar feeling.

    Han Shuo finally loosened up as he realized that their joint attack hadpletely scattered Gnder and Cecrops¡¯ awarenesses. All that was left of their divine souls were their memories and realizations of the elemental energies of water and fire, which were slowly fusing with water and fire elite zombies.

    ¡°These two fes really are extremely lucky! Father, with this, both of them are going to grow even stronger. Huhu, when is it going to be my turn?¡± earth elite zombie grumbled andined to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was speechless. He knew that earth elite zombie did not have an earth attribute treasure. And now, seeing his brothers gain even more benefits while he had still gotten nothing, it was unavoidable that he would feel upset. All that Han Shuo could do at that moment was to console him.

    Han Shuo remained very much astonished even at this point in time. He inwardly remarked, personal gain at the detriment of others ¨C this characteristic of demonic arts is indeed powerful. I¡¯m not the only one who can take over another¡¯s soul by force using demonic arts, the five elite zombies can do that as well! I sure did not expect that!

    If this trend continued, if earth and wood elite zombie were so fortunate to have the opportunity, perhaps they too could forcibly upy other souls and be gods in a single leap!

    If water and fire elite zombies could take over the lowgod souls of Gnder and Cecrops that cultivated in the element of water and fire respectively, did that mean earth and wood elite zombies be able to take over the divine energy, divine body and soul of gods cultivating in the element of earth and the edict of life?

    The yuan energy of earth that earth elite zombie cultivated seemed to be parallel to the earth elemental energy in this universe. Although there were some differences, the energies seemed to be homologous. Simrly, would the yuan energy of wood that wood elite zombie cultivated be able to merge with that strange energy full of vitality of the edict of life?

    Of metal, wood, water, fire, and earth, with the exception of yuan energy of metal, all other energies seemed to have a corresponding elemental energy. Could there have been a god out there cultivating in the rare energy of metal? Would metal elite zombie be so fortunate toe across one?

    Gazing ahead as water and fire elite zombies transformed, strings of questions rose from the bottom of Han Shuo¡¯s heart. He seemed to see the scene of his five elite zombies bing gods one after another, and operated the Penta-elemental Undead Formation to produce power so terrifying that even the Creator couldn¡¯t imagine!

 Chapter 575: Obey or Die

    Water and fire elite zombies continued to absorb Gnder and Cecrops¡¯ energies. Their divine bodies, divine souls, and divine energies were being assimted with the two elite zombies thought the process.

    After a long while, water and fire elite zombies finally emerged from Gnder and Cecrops¡¯ bodies. Their enormous elemental energies had all been transferred to water and fire elite zombies, with their bodies now turned into mortal flesh without any vitality or a trace of life!

    Han Shuo knew that water and fire elite zombies would require a long period of time topletely digest the energies they absorbed from Gnder and Cecrops. It was just as crucial that they were not disturbed during that process. Sensing how chaotic the energies inside water and fire elite zombies were, Han Shuo thought for a moment, gave some instructions, and performed incantations to deliver the five elite zombies back to the Netherworld one by one.

    Of the five Abyssal Great Demon Kings, four had been ughtered by Han Shuo. Now, in the whole of Abyss realm, there was no longer any being that could threaten Han Shuo.

    ¡°Take good care of fire and water elite zombies. Let them digest those energies quietly,¡± Han Shuo turned to Little Skeleton and instructed after the five elite zombies left.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, father. I know what I ought to do,¡± Little Skeleton replied.

    With the crisis now resolved, there was no need for Little Skeleton to stay behind. After a sh of light, Little Skeleton vanished before Han Shuo¡¯s eyes.

    Following Little Skeleton¡¯s departure, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death and destruction transformed back into the skeletal staff and the Demonyer Edge before concealing themselves within Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    All those chaotic energies that had erupted from the shattered boundaries faded away and vanished. With the Domains of Divinity all gone, Han Shuo immediately sensed the presences of those Demons around him upon expanding his consciousness. After thinking for a moment, Han Shuo yelled, ¡°All the Demons in the area,e to me!¡±

    Before the two factions of Demon Kings shed, there were over forty Demons in total. However, only thirty or so survived the chaotic bombardment of the meteor shower and Spatial Edges that came from the triggered boundaries around them.

    The four Demon Kings originally thought that their opponent would be each other and therefore had ordered their Demons to get far out of the way. After all, these Demons would be dead without a doubt if they were to remain in their Domains of Divinity. Besides, at that point in time, as the Demon Kings counted on them to serve as cannon fodders for opening up new paths, they let the Demons evacuate.

    After Han Shuo summoned them, the thirty-something Demons around him gathered towards him. It didn¡¯t take long before all the remaining Demons under the four former Demon Kings had arrived beside Han Shuo.

    ¡°Mis.. Mister Han Shuo, what happened?¡± Bord and Zinia, who survived yet another round of cmity, hastily questioned as soon as they arrived and saw the deste environment around them.

    Han Shuo scanned the crowd gathered around him with his bright eyes. He could see the puzzlement and astonishment written across their faces. ¡°What¡¯s going on? Why has the Baptismal Radiance that Lord Gnder bestowed upon me disappeared?¡± an astounded Demon on Gnder¡¯s side impatiently questioned Han Shuo.

    When those words were spoken, everyone¡¯s puzzled gazes gathered on Han Shuo.

    The Baptismal Radiance was a type of master and ve contract that a lowgod could apply on their disciples. This kind of branding would allow the god to receive an unending stream of the power of faith from their believers. Their disciples could even apply this brand to weakermoners on behalf of their master, allowing their masters to obtain the power of faith frommoners.

    Every lowgod could deploy an altar for Baptismal Radiance ceremony using their divine energy and divine soul. Once it was sprinkled over those whose happily opened up their souls, a contract would immediately take shape in their souls. Those who epted the contract would, from that point onwards, be a believer of that god. They would enshrine and worship that god, offering their selfless power of faith.

    Faith wasn¡¯t something material. It didn¡¯t cost much to those people to offer their faith. The very same thing, however, when offered to a god, would be extremely useful for advancing their divine energy and Domain of Divinity.

    Generally, the Baptismal Radiance inside those believers who had epted the contract, would forever remain in their bodies unless they converted to another faith to worship another god. Of course, if the god they believed in were to die, the Baptismal Radiance in them would naturally vanish as well.

    Once one epted the blessing of Baptismal Radiance, no matter how many material nes away they were from the god they believe in, their Baptismal Radiance would not fade!

    Therefore when the Baptismal Radiance vanished from the souls of these Demons who consecrated the four Demon Kings as their gods, with them converting their faith to another god out of the question, there was only one possible exnation left ¨C the gods they believed in were all dead!

    Perhaps the Demon Kings of the Abyss were too mighty and ferocious in their minds, or maybe their faith was deep-rooted, or possibly because they had entrusted their spirits for too long, although they knew that this was extremely likely to be the case, they did not think in that direction. Instead, they looked at Han Shuo, bewildered and awaiting his answer.

    Looking at these people who could be considered as characters of great power and influence in the Abyss realm, Han Shuo truly felt pitiful for these people. These beings had dedicated their entire existences for the four Demon Kings. And yet, all that they got in return was being valued as mere cannon fodders. Moreover, under the deliberate acts of the Demon Kings, they would never ever have the chance of bing real gods!

    After giving the crowd a nce with his cold eyes, Han Shuo callously said, ¡°I believe that each and every one of you must have sensed the Baptismal Radiance inside you had extinguished. It is with great sadness to inform you that all four of your Demon Kings are dead.¡±

    A great ruckus surged through the crowd of Demons at once. Although they weren¡¯tpletely convinced, their faces nevertheless turned pale upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words. Their hearts were crammed with despair and shock. Their eyes were filled with disbelief.

    ¡°How could this be? How could this be? How could Lord Gnder be dead?¡±

    ¡°Impossible, you be have mistaken. Our Lord will not die. He will not!¡±

    ¡°The Lord is dead. What should we do?¡±

    ¡°We are done for. We are all done for.¡±

    All kinds of noises came from those Demons. The news of the death of their four Demon Kings had shocked them all. ustomed to act at their master¡¯s bid, these demons werepletely at a loss for a moment. Their minds and emotions were jumbled in a hideous mess. Their hearts were in a chaos that could seemingly never be calmed.

    ¡°How did my Lord die?¡± that Demon under Gnder suddenly glowered at Han Shuo and shouted.

    ¡°I killed him!¡± Han Shuo said callously.

    ¡°How did my Lord die?¡± a Demon under Leviathan yelled.

    ¡°I killed him too!¡± Han Shuo again answered.

    When Bord and Zinia opened their mouths to say something, Han Shuo waved his hand, looked around, and proudly announced, ¡°No need for more questions. I killed all four of them!¡±

    Upon hearing those words, all the Demons shut their mouths. The scene momentarily sank into an dreadful silence. Each and every one of them stared at Han Shuo in disbelief and absolutely couldn¡¯t ept the fact.

    ¡°Impossible! Just you? You can¡¯t even kill one. How could you say you¡¯ve killed all four Lords all of a sudden?¡± one of the Demons cried.

    Two streaks of light flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s body and rapidly appeared beside him. His two avatars transformed into two additional Han Shuos. The lowgod aura in the energy of death and destruction was abruptly released. Han Shuo¡¯s three pairs of cold eyes scanned another round through the crowd. Afterwards, that avatar of death started to arrange an altar before the crowd.

    ¡°Your four Demon Kings wanted to get rid of me and joined hands in assaulting me. Naturally, I wouldn¡¯t let them have their way. In the end, they are all dead, while I have survived,¡° Han Shuo exined in neither a hurry nor slow manner. When he saw that the crowd was still stunned and unconvinced, he again started to talk, ¡°Such are the facts. It doesn¡¯t matter if you believe it or not, because facts won¡¯t change with your beliefs! Right now, the Baptismal Radiance inside your souls has vanished. The popce previously under the rule of the four Demon Kings have all lost their faiths. Hehe, the Abyss realm shall not see a day without a ruler. I shall reluctantly volunteer myself to act as your new god!¡±

    ¡°No! You are not worthy! I will not ept! Never!¡± that Demon under Gnder was extremely resentful towards Han Shuo and immediately rejected him.

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death, who was in the middle of deploying an altar, pointed at the Demon from a distance away. The energy of death densely covered the Demon¡¯s body in the blink of an eye. In the next instance, every bone in his body began to protrude and finally pierce through his flesh. And with one swoop of attack, his soul was annihted in no time. He was cleanly and effortlessly killed.

    ¡°What a noisy one. Since you would not offer me your power of faith, your existence is no longer required,¡± Han Shuo said indifferently. After that, the avatar deploying an altar coldly continued, ¡°I will bepleting the deployment of my altar very soon. By then I will activate my Baptismal Radiance. You either obey, or you die. Choose wisely.¡±

    In the Abyss realm, the one with the biggest fist had the most efficacious words. Han Shuo knew this rule well. Skipping any rubbish talk, he directly made known his absolute though overbearing power.

    ¡°We are willing,¡± just as Han Shuo had expected, Bord and Zinia who Han Shuo had looked after throughout the journey, after a short moment of hesitation, became the first to ept Han Shuo as their Lord.

 Chapter 576: I Killed Them All!

    I Killed Them All!

    Demons previously under Leviathan and Manticole had made some interaction with Han Shuo along the journey, therefore they had a pretty good impression of him. Having witnessed what happened to that close-minded Demon, they quickly got hold of the actual situation.

    ¡°We are also willing!¡± dered the Demons without letting Han Shuo wait for too long.

    Han Shuo remained silent as he upied himself with getting the altar ready, not even batting an eye at those Demons previously under Gnder and Cecrops. After obtaining that midgod¡¯s Divine Soul, deploying such an altar posed no challenge to him.

    This so-called altar was in fact just a type of unique magical matrix. By leaving a bit of his divine energy and his Divine Brand, the altar could be energized to release Baptismal Radiance. Once a believer opened up his spirit and epted the radiance as it touched his soul, a contract would be formed and his power of faith would be offered to the god.

    Han Shuo unhurriedly deployed the altar. All those Demons under Cecrops and Gnder had hesitant looks even when the situation was very clear to them. No matter how the four Demons King lost their lives, Han Shuo¡¯s might was not to be questioned. Given the current situation, they had only two choices ¨C obey, or die!

    The Abyss worshipped the strong. Only characters truly at the pinnacle of strength and whom were practically undefeatable could keep these Demons under control ¨C and Han Shuo was obviously such a character! After the Baptismal Radiance of the four Demon Kings vanished from their souls, their reliance on the four Demon Kings also greatly diminished. Although even at this moment, they were still rather skeptical about the im that Han Shuo had killed all four Demon Kings by himself, they could sense the lowgod energy of destruction and death from the avatars of Han Shuo¡¯s. They came to realize one simple fact ¨C Han Shuo indeed was stronger than any single one of the four Demon Kings!

    Confronted with the threat of death, and abiding by the Abyssalw that the mighty were to be respected, they didn¡¯t have a long time to hesitate. A rather cowardly Demon took the lead and dered, ¡°I, I¡¯m willing!¡±

    No one would denounce this Demon for being a coward. On the contrary, some of those Demons previously ruled by Cecrops and Gnder who had been on the fence let out an obvious sigh of relief to see someone else take the lead. They dered their positions in session, wearing humble and respectful looks.

    At this moment, Han Shuo had finally finished deploying the altar. His lowgod of death avatar raised his head and looked around before smiling to say, ¡°A wise man submits to circumstances. Not bad, you guys are rather tactful. You know, it really is a thousand times better to follow me than to follow those four bastards that are now dead. What could those selfish and narrow-minded fellow provide you with? Nn was murdered by Leviathan merely because she had been bestowed a piece of Divine Weapon of Light, all because he wanted to prevent the possibility of her bing a god independently. To serve under those four, you were nothing more than puppets and pawns!¡±

    He paused for a moment, then stared at the Demons and uttered word by word, ¡°Truth be told, you lot are rather pathetic!¡±

    At Han Shuo¡¯s words, the faces of the Demons turned dim. Taking the whole of Abyss into consideration, these people possessed great power and influence; they were lords of cities. To be able to cultivate to the realm of Demons, these people were surely no fools. They were more aware of the truths that Han Shuo had spoken of than anyone else. This would be the third time they ventured into the Void. Some previous and recent events made them understand that the four Demon Kings had simply never treated them like people.

    However, the Abyss realm was such. The four Demon Kings high up above possessed absolute authority. Having handed over their faiths, they did not make aint even when they came to understand that fact. But now that the Baptismal Radiance was extinguished and the four Demon Kings were dead, for the first time, these Demons could finally consider what Han Shuo spewed carefully.

    Seeing the Demons pensive to the eyes, Han Shuo said coldly, ¡°I¡¯m not a good guy either. I¡¯m just as selfish and savage against my enemies! However, towards my own people, I will not be mean and cruel as they were. Let me pledge to you all right here ¨C I will not be so petty to scheme against my own people. And, if any of you have the capacity to advance to be a real god, I will not stop you in any way!¡±

    ¡°Rea, really?¡± a Demon looking at Han Shuo with disbelief asked, his voice trembling.

    ¡°You all will see!¡± Han Shuo said in a deep voice.

    ¡°We believe Mister Han Shuo. From our interactions with Mister Han Shuo these days, we know that Mister Han Shuo indeed takes care of his own people very much!¡± stated Bord and Zinia.

    Saving you two definitely hasn¡¯t ended in vain, Han Shuo thought. Although people of the Abyss realm were savage and used to conflict, from another point of view, they were very easy to tame. Moreover, once tamed, there usually weren¡¯t a problem in matters of loyalty.

    ¡°I will now begin activating the energy inside the altar. You all get ready!¡± Soon after, Han Shuo¡¯s lowgod of death avatar energized the altar arranged in front of him. The next moment, brilliant, yet gentle rays radiated from the altar, shining down on those Demons like water sprinkles.

    Those Demons in the minds to submit to Han Shuo gradually opened up their souls and weed the Baptismal Radiance into their spirits...

    A wonderful feeling suddenly emerged from Han Shuo¡¯s heart. It was as though a dozen or so incorporeal threads had somehow connected him to the Demons before him. Some faintly discernible energies very slowly and gently flowed from the Demons to Han Shuo¡¯s energy of death avatar. These energies were extremely weak, so weak that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t even detect them without trying to feel it. Compared to the divine energy within Han Shuo¡¯s body, those strands of energies were insignificant and disregardable.

    However, Han Shuo understood that the dozens of strands of the power of faith were indeed adding to his divine energy that tiny bit, allowing his Domain of Divinity to grow ever so slightly more powerful.

    These were just a dozen or so Demons. The popce previously under the rule of the four Demon Kings was numbered in the millions. If every one of them offered their faith, as many a mickle makes a muckle, and it would surely provide a considerable amount of energy. Han Shuo¡¯s direct disciples bowing before him could utilize the Baptismal Radiance left in their minds to preach Han Shuo¡¯s good news, converting more people to be his believers.

    Han Shuo stored the altar into his space ring after he withdrew his divine energy and dismantled it. All the Demons before him epted the contract and became Han Shuo¡¯s disciples.

    With the presence of this handful of Demons, all the power of faith of the citizens living in the four Demon Kings¡¯ territories wouldn¡¯t be able to escape from Han Shuo¡¯s grasp. In addition, Han Shuo had a different idea in mind. He had some extreme resentment against a certain people back on Profound Continent. He had not originally wanted these abyssal creatures to set foot on the Profound Continent. But if these abyssal creatures were to be all under his control, well, that would be a different story.

    The Saintess of the Church of Light and the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race back on Profound Continent, who had previously made him scuttle in defeat, were now not even worthy opponents in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes. Perhaps because the Saintess of the Church of Light and the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race had cultivated to their height of basegod independently, they were a little stronger than these Demons under Han Shuo¡¯s control. Moreover, the Saintess seemed to even be able to deploy the Domain of Divinity.

    However, Han Shuo, now a lowgod, when recalling the battle back at the Church of Light¡¯s sacred mountain, noticed that the ¡®Domain of Divinity¡¯ the Saintess deployed was actually made through clever maniption of aura and elemental energy. Although it had some effects of the Domain of Divinity, it wasn¡¯t a true Domain of Divinity.

    The Saintess of the Church of Light and the Soul Race tribal king possessed merely the strength of basegod. At present, they truly were no match against Han Shuo.

    When I return, I don¡¯t care if it¡¯s the Saintess, Snow Celestial, or that Primordius Dragon, I¡¯m going to finish them all! Han Shuo¡¯s face turned gloomy when he thought of the hatred towards those loathsome characters carved in his bones and engraved on his heart.

    ¡°My Lord, what should we do now?¡± asked Bord and Zinia suddenly.

    Han Shuo noticed the changes in how the two addressed him and understood the ce he now took in their hearts. The time they had in the Void before the stardust current was to return was limited. It was a matter of course that Bord and Zinia would give thought to Han Shuo after bing Han Shuo¡¯s disciples, hoping that Han Shuo could settle the matter here as soon as possible.

    Han Shuo furrowed his brows and was about to say something when he suddenly sensed an aura of destruction approaching. Without thinking, Han Shuo understood that thest Abyssal Demon King, Bechymos, wasing his way.

    Sure enough, shortly after, Bechymos, thest Great Demon King of the Abyss realm, wearing a green malevolent mask, suddenlynded before Han Shuo¡¯s eyes.

    This Bechymos was covered in a strange-looking green armor and the terrifying aura of destruction from head to toe. His face waspletely hidden behind that sinister green mask.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter? You all have promised me not to fight in this ce as not to trigger too many boundaries. Why didn¡¯t you all listen?¡± Bechymos said coldly in his hoarse voice while looking at the crowd with his green eyes. After finishing those words, Bechymos seemed to be rather puzzled. He asked, ¡°Where are the four Demon Kings?¡±

    ¡°Dead!¡± Han Shuo said calmly. He continued after a short pause, ¡°They are all dead! I killed them all!¡±

 Chapter 577: Another Cemetery of Death

    GDK 577: Another Cemetery of Death

    ¡°Dead?¡± Bechymos¡¯s unmasked deep green eyes shone with stunned disbelief. Staring intently at Han Shuo, he asked, ¡°You killed them?¡±

    Han Shuo looked at him suggestively and replied, ¡°That¡¯s right! I killed them all!¡±

    Han Shuo had previously learned from Leviathan and Manticole that Bechymos was the first Demon King of the Abyss realm to attain godhood. Bechymos was enigmatic and mysterious. He would rank top among the five Abyssal Great Demon Kings, possessing strength that far outstripped the other four. However, the most puzzling thing about Bechymos was that he kept a much lower profile than the other four Demon Kings. Given his strength, he could easily snatch up the most believers through struggles and conflict, yet, he did not do so.

    The four Demon Kings had actually learned of this ce called the Void from Bechymos. He would venture alone by himself, not taking a single Demon along. All these actions left an impression on Han Shuo that this man was very mysterious and strange.

    As such, the moment Bechymos hadnded in front of him, Han Shuo concentrated his full attention on sensing the presence emanating from Bechymos, sensing his might through the aura of destruction enveloping him.

    Although they were all in the realm of lowgod, they could still possess different levels of strength. Bechymos, who cultivated in the edict of destruction, must have stayed in the realm of lowgod for quite some time. From his body, Han Shuo sensed power much mightier than any single one of the four Demon Kings.

    It was at this moment that Han Shuo finally understood why the four greedy Demon Kings had never dared trespass upon Bechymos¡¯ territory and respected his wish to be left alone.

    Power had decided it all!

    As Han Shuo was sizing up Bechymos, the strongest and most ancient Demon King of the Abyss realm, Bechymos¡¯ astonished green eyes were gathered on Han Shuo as well, secretly trying to get a glimpse of where Han Shuo¡¯s strength stood.

    At that moment, Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars had yet to return and conceal themselves in his body. Therefore, the lowgod energies of death and destruction were instantly and very clearly detected by Bechymos.

    What a shock! Demon King Bechymos, who rarely, if ever, had any fluctuation in emotion, in utmost astonishment as he looked at three carbon copies of Han Shuos standing before him.

    After a while...

    The surprise in Bechymos¡¯ green eyes gradually faded. He drew in a deep breath, and spoke slowly in his raspy voice, ¡°I believe what you have said. It appears that Manticore and the other three really have died at your hand!¡±

    Bechymos came to this conclusion partly because he could not sense the presences of the other four Demon Kings, and partly because he had noticed that the target of worship of Bord, Zinia and the other Demons had changed.

    Han Shuo had limited knowledge regarding Bechymos and had no idea if he would be a friend or a foe. But Han Shuo did not fear him. After a brief thought, he smilingly said, ¡°Actually, I had no ill will against the four Demon Kings. It was only because they would not let me live, that I had no choice but to fight.¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s nothing you need to exin!¡± Bechymos stared through Han Shuo and said with little emotion, ¡°There is no right or wrong in the Abyss. All that matters is your strength! If they are dead, so be it. If you have the strength the kill them, then you may, regardless of your reasons!¡±

    At those words, Han Shuo was rather taken aback. After a pause, he asked in confusion, ¡°Then, why did youe here?¡±

    ¡°Because you all made such a racket over here, that even the boundaries over at my side were affected. I only came here to advise them to stop fighting. If too many boundaries are triggered, it could cause a chain reaction and by then, no one will be leaving the Void alive,¡± Bechymos exined, paused for a moment, and continued, ¡°It looks like I have no need for concern now. Perhaps it¡¯s better this way. Those four¡¯s constant struggle against each other has turned the Abyss to such a havoc. It may be a good thing that they¡¯re all dead.¡±

    Seeing Bechymos¡¯ indifferent attitude towards the lives and deaths of the four Demon Kings, Han Shuo was rather puzzled, but did not question it.

    ¡°Well, seeing as there will no longer be major disturbances here, I can be at ease. Right, good luck to you, may we meet again!¡± To Han Shuo¡¯sck of speech, Bechymos asked no more and, with an indifferent nod, prepared to leave.

    ¡°Wait!¡± Han Shuo hurriedly yelled to stop him.

    Bechymos froze for a moment, before his gaze again fell on Han Shuo, and asked, ¡°Is there any other matter?¡±

    ¡°I want to ask for a favor!¡± Han Shuo chose not to beat around the bush and, staring fixedly at Bechymos, got straight to the point.

    ¡°What is it? Tell me about it,¡± Bechymos neither epted or refused, retaining his aloof demeanor.

    ¡°I would like to know where the transportation matrix is located in the Void. I heard from Manticole that your Lordship is the only one who knows its precise location,¡± Han Shuo asked seriously.

    ¡°Oh?¡± Bechymos looked at Han Shuo with surprise and replied, ¡°I¡¯ve heard a little about you, hmm, you are nning to use the transportation matrix to leave the Abyss?¡±

    ¡°That is correct, Sir, I humbly request your assistance.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s attitude was always very amiable when he sought others¡¯ help, and he smiled as he spoke with sincerity.

    Bechymos was silent for a while, with green eyes staring at Han Shuo for a long time, as though trying to see through him. Finally, he nodded and said, ¡°Follow me.¡± The moment he said those words, he took into the air and flew by the same path he came from.

    ¡°Right, you guys follow too,¡± Han Shuo turned around to give his orders to his Demons and returned his two avatars to his body. With his consciousness locked firmly onto Bechymos, Han Shuo took into the air.

    Bechymos had far greater familiarity with the Void than the other Demon Kings. In the fog-heavy valleys, he carefully avoided many boundaries, flying towards his destination along a path he had carved out himself.

    After flying for a short while, Han Shuo noticed that the path that Bechymos had carved out was much longer than those of the two factions of Demon Kingsbined. He was a little surprised, but then remembered that it was Bechymos who revealed the Void to the other four Demon Kings. Those four had been to the Void three times. As the oldest Demon King, Bechymos must have ventured to this ce many times more. As he thought of that, Han Shuo grew even more curious about Bechymos.

    Just as Han Shuo was internally marveling at Bechymos¡¯ mysteriousness, he suddenly sensed Bechymosing to a stop. His figure shed through the dense mist, and Han Shuo stood shoulder to shoulder with Bechymos.

    ¡°Watch out! Not a step forward!¡± Bechymos¡¯ voice suddenly sounded. When he saw that Han Shuo made no other movements, he pointed his finger at the area before them and said, ¡°This is the internar transportation matrix of the Abyss realm. It is in great disrepair. Due to the death of the nar guardian, no one knows how to use it.¡± When Han Shuo did not reply, Bechymos couldn¡¯t help but look at him in curiosity, and immediately saw that Han Shuo¡¯s expression was full of shock and disbelief. Bechymos then said, ¡°This is the internar transportation matrix you are looking for!¡±

    Bechymos hesitated for a moment. When he saw the unusual change in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, he suddenly became rather emotional. His voice was mild and gentle as he asked shakily, ¡°You... you know this transportation matrix?¡±

    The ground was covered with white bones, strange drawings of high-level undead creatures all over the ancient, broken walls. Destion, silence, and darkness filled the structure before them, more than half of which were destroyed.

    This was another Cemetery of Death!

    How could Han Shuo not recognize it? Although this Cemetery of Death only had one wall left and did not have the mysterious chamber that led a few levels below ground, it still had a mostly intact enormous transportation matrix.

    Han Shuo, whose heart was crammed with astonishment, did not notice the change in Bechymos¡¯ voice and nodded, saying with certainty, ¡°Of course I recognize it. Hah, didn¡¯t expect this, but this really is a Cemetery of Death!¡±

    At those words, Bechymos¡¯ green eyes were full of strong emotions and he hastily asked, ¡°Then, do you know how to activate this internar transportation matrix?¡±

    Han Shuo was rather surprised, as this time he had detected something else in Bechymos¡¯ voice. The powerful emotions had made Bechymos¡¯ voice be less hoarse, even elegant, as though... that was the voice of a woman.

    ¡°You... you¡¯re female?¡± After staring nkly for a while, Han Shuo asked with some disbelief.

    ¡°No!¡± Bechymos resolutely denied with his voice restoring its original raspiness. He stared coldly at Han Shuo and again asked, ¡°You, can you activate this transportation matrix?¡±

    ¡°I won¡¯t know until I try,¡± Han Shuo answered after thinking for a moment.

    ¡°Then go ahead and try, I¡¯ll wait here!¡± Bechymos seemed impatient.

    Han Shuo was rather puzzled. He noticed that from the moment he showed recognition of the dpidated Cemetery of Death, Bechymos started to act rather strangely. Not only did Bechymos¡¯ hoarse voice suddenly be more refined as a result of that agitation, but even his aloofness, his apparent indifference to everything, had greatly changed.

    Han Shuo understood that Bechymos was greatly concerned with that transportation matrix before them!

    He hesitated for a moment and asked, ¡°You need to use this transportation matrix?¡±

    Bechymos kept silent for a long long while. His green eyes full ofplicated emotions. Finally, he nodded coldly and answered in that hoarse voice, ¡°Yes, I want to go home!¡±

 Chapter 578: Interplanar Transportation Array

    GDK 578: Internar Transportation Array

    ¡°Go home?¡± Han Shuo cried out in surprise. He stared at Bechymos with glowing eyes and asked, ¡°You¡¯re a foreigner to the Abyss realm as well?¡±

    After giving a faint sigh, Bechymos¡¯ green eyes were filled with sadness that recalled fondly of the past. In a deep and low voice, he replied, ¡°That¡¯s right. Just like you, I wasn¡¯t born in the Abyss realm. I have stayed in this ce for countless years. I have no friends or rtives here. You have only arrived in the Abyss realm for a short while and might have yet to know such unending loneliness. Sigh...¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s grew curious upon hearing this. After thinking for a moment, Han Shuo nodded and said, ¡°I understand how you feel. Separated from the world you are familiar with ¨C that kind of loneliness and solitude is indeed very painful.¡±

    The distance between Bechymos and Han Shuo seemed to suddenly pull closer after Han Shuo said those words. Bechymos looked at Han Shuo and continued, ¡°It is. My friends, families, and everything I¡¯m familiar with, is in another world. In this world, however, everyone and everything is strange and unfamiliar. Our worshippers, these ant-like existences are absolutely not ones that gods like us could pour our hearts to. The Abyss realm really is a little too small. Staying for one or ten years in this ce could still be tolerable. But thousands of years, that kind of loneliness and constant torment, try to imagine that.¡±

    Trapped alone in this unfamiliar country along with Abyssal creatures as backward and primitive as ants, for thousands of years...

    Han Shuo began to imagine that for a moment and faintly understood how Bechymos felt. He nodded with creased brows and suddenly became extremely sympathetic towards Bechymos. After thinking for a moment, Han Shuo said in a deep voice, ¡°I¡¯m indeed familiar with this internar transportation matrix. But as to if it could be activated, I need to try it before I can be sure.¡±

    ¡°To help me is to help yourself. You should try it as soon as possible. The Void is not a ce one can stay for long,¡± Bechymos said hurriedly. He became rather anxious and impatient when the internar transportation matrix was mentioned.

    The clock is ticking. The stardust current will return sooner orter and the Void along with this valley will again be filled with it. Han Shuo naturally understood Bechymos¡¯ worries. With Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness as mighty as it was, he had no fear towards the corrosiveness of the stardust current on his soul ¨C although this may not have been the case for his two lowgods of death and destruction avatars, who didn¡¯t cultivate demonic arts as his main body did.

    His consciousness was invulnerable towards the stardust current, but that didn¡¯t mean it was the same for the divine souls of his two avatars. Although they could be concealed in Han Shuo¡¯s body, Han Shuo had no absolute certainty and dared not to take chances with his two avatars that were formed with great difficulty.

    Therefore, Han Shuo only hesitated for a quick moment before getting ready to attempt activating the internar transportation matrix inside the dpidated Cemetery of Death.

    Whoosh Whoosh Whoosh! Just then, over a dozen shadows arrived andnded behind Han Shuo. They were the Demons that Han Shuo had just tamed. As their speeds were too slow, they had been trailing far behind and they only finally caught up to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Stand right there, don¡¯t move!¡± Han Shuo lightly yelled with his main body. After finishing those words, a shadow slowly floated out from his chest, which twisted in mid-air before turning into another Han Shuo walking step by step towards the Cemetery of Death ahead.

    There was an invisible boundary present around this dpidated Cemetery of Death as well. Perhaps because it had been too long, or maybe it had previously sustained damage,pared to the boundary around the Cemetery of Death back on Profound Continent, this one was much, much weaker.

    When Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death started to approach that invisible boundary, a sudden feeling of extreme familiarity rose in Han Shuo¡¯s heart. Before Han Shuo had time to think about it, that deep ck magical robe draped over his body suddenly glowed a faint green. The boundary that enveloped the internar transportation matrix, most kindly split open to make an opening that allowed Han Shuo to pass through.

    Han Shuo was stunned for a moment but quickly returned to his senses. Delighted, he eximed, ¡°It turns out to be this fe! I surely did not expect this. Haha, things are going to be much more convenient with this!¡±

    From the sh of green light on the deep ck magical robe, having the experience of opening the Cemetery of Death on Profound Continent using the skeletal staff, Han Shuo immediately understood that the previous owner of that deep ck magical robe, the midgod whose divine soul was fused with Han Shuo, had also been the owner of this abyssal Cemetery of Death!

    When Bechymos watched Han Shuo stepping into the structure without having to forcibly bombard the boundary like he himself had previously done, his pupils suddenly constricted and he hastily asked, ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡±

    ¡°As I¡¯ve said, I have some understanding of this ce. Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ve got this,¡± that lowgod of death avatar continued stepping forward while Han Shuo¡¯s main body standing beside Bechymos opened his mouth and talked.

    Bechymos was stunned for a moment. As though suddenly recalling something, he stared at Han Shuo and asked, ¡°You are also a Lich?¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned. He turned to look at Bechymos and asked, ¡°How is it you know of this appetion?¡±

    From the memories left by the original owner of the skeletal staff, Han Shuo learned that characters who cultivated in the elemental energy of death were called Liches, while the overgods that cultivated in this energy were called Lich King. Bechymos¡¯ knowledge of this appetion, must mean that he originated from a material ne where the concept of godhood was extremely clear and unambiguous.

    ¡°Of course I would know that. Back then, I was sent here by my family and came along with these Liches. This internar transportation matrix was procured by that midgod Lich. All of us came through that transportation matrix,¡± Bechymos exined.

    After hearing those words, Han Shuo¡¯s curiosity was provoked beyond restraint. He looked at Bechymos with great interest and asked, ¡°Could you please briefly exin what happened back then?

    ¡°There¡¯s really nothing to say about it,¡± Bechymos sighed, thinking for a moment before slowly continuing, ¡°As you are also a Lich, you must havee from a high-level material ne, and should know about some wishes of the overgods of death and destruction. In order to gain more energy, the overgods of death and destruction dispatched their subordinates to spread death and destruction over all major material nes ¨C I¡¯m one of them. My family, as to temper me, sent me to join the mission. These Liches are among our allies. Our objective here is to gainplete control over the Abyss realm.

    However, when we arrived, we discovered that there already were mighty existences in the Abyss. We people could be considered as invaders. Right here in this unique valley, we fought a great battle with them. Although our side possessed slightly greater strength, no one had anticipated that there was such a peculiar thing as stardust current. In the end, as neither sides were aware of this danger, they were all engulfed by the stardust current. Other than me, not a single god escaped.¡±

    ¡°You were really lucky!¡± Han Shuo said as he looked up and down at Bechymos in a strange manner.

    A trace of sorrow shed in Bechymos¡¯ green eyes. He shook his head, sighed and said, ¡°It wasn¡¯t luck. It¡¯s merely because my identity is rather special and the strength I possessed is of no use. My family n utilized their influences to ce me in the expedition, so that I could im some contribution. I had always stood far away as I observed the course of events and did not directly participate in that great battle. As an observer, I could clearly see the changes to the valley. I didn¡¯t even know how terrifying the stardust current was at first. It was only when I saw that people were dying one after another that I realized the situation. Unfortunately, as I was too far from them, my warning came a little toote. Everyone was covered by the stardust current and there was nothing I could do, but to escape from the Void.¡±

    ¡°I see!¡± Han Shuo nodded. His gazes at Bechymos became even more bizarre. From his words, Han Shuo understood that Bechymos¡¯ original identity ought to be rather noble and his family n must have possessed quite some power. Otherwise, he sure wouldn¡¯t be able to sit idly in such an expedition and reap the credits without being actually involved.

    ¡°After I escaped from this ce, I kept waiting outside and observing silently. Gradually, I figured out the rhythm of the stardust current, and even came back here several times. For some reason, all sorts of boundaries formed inside this battlefield. That internar transportation matrix that the most powerful Lich had deployed was sealed.

    ¡°I do not possess much knowledge about the internar transportation matrix and couldn¡¯t use this dpidated internar transportation matrix to leave the Abyss realm. For many years, I have tried looking in this ce for ways to leave, but have yielded no results. The reason I told those four about the presence of the Void, is because I hoped that they would make more discoveries in this ce. However, they did not seem to care about matters of this aspect. All that was on their minds were divine weapons in this ce and whatever that could upgrade their strength. After so many years, I have be utterly disappointed with them. Even if you hadn¡¯t killed them this time, before I try to leave, I will have gotten rid of them one by one,¡± Bechymos said in a ferocious voice.

    ¡°Why?¡± Han Shuo was startled.

    ¡°If I could not leave the Abyss realm through an internar transportation matrix, then, the only option left would be to directly fly out from the Abyss realm, or by doing internar travel, and seeking for another material ne with advanced lifeforms that has an internar transportation matrix. However, internar travel is extremely dangerous. Only those of highgod strength could do it. I¡¯m merely a lowgod. The journey from a lowgod to highgod is truly lengthy, so lengthy that I wasn¡¯t even willing to think about it.

    However, after wasting thousands of years, I truly have no other way but to do so. Previously, I had cared not about the power of faith, because I hoped that the four Demon Kings would be able to help me. But since they couldn¡¯t, for me to progress faster, it¡¯s only natural that I would take back all the things that belonged to me,¡± Bechymos coldly exined. It was as though the four Demon Kings were merely puppets he fostered, with their life or death fully controlled by him!

    ¡°I think you wouldn¡¯t need to wait much longer,¡± Han Shuo suddenly said. Upon finishing those words, the ancient internar transportation matrix inside the dpidated Cemetery of Death before him suddenly began to shine and twinkle.

 Chapter 579: The Return of the Stardust Curren

    GDK 579: The Return of the Stardust Current

    Bechymos, who had agonizingly waited who knew how many years for this moment, had dazzling lights radiating from his pair of green eyes. His mouth opened wide as his body trembled subconsciously. For a moment, he was so emotional that he couldn¡¯t say a word but heavily panted as he stared ahead.

    In those memories left behind by the original owner of the skeletal staff contained the instructions for starting and operating an internar transportation matrix. This internar transportation array that he found was basically the same model as the one in Han Shuo¡¯s Cemetery of Death, with absolutely no distinction. Moreover, the midgod divine soul that Han Shuo had assimted was precisely the former owner of this abyssal internar transportation array.

    With all this, Han Shuo had all the credentials needed. Having a good understanding of an internar transportation array, Han Shuo would naturally be able to activate one with ease.

    It was after a long, long while that Bechymos recovered from that enormous shock. As he gazed at the sparkling internar transportation matrix ahead, he mumbled, ¡°It¡¯s activated... It¡¯s really activated...¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart too was stuffed with ecstasy. Han Shuo clearly understood that the changes to this dpidated internar transportation matrix ahead signified that he actually stood a chance of going home. Profound Continent had everything he knew and was familiar with. There lived not just those he loved, but also those he hated to the bone.

    Now, gaining ess to this abyssal internar transportation matrix was tantamount to establishing a path between Profound Continent and the Abyss realm. Not only could Han Shuo return to Profound Continent, butter on, through the Cemetery of Death in the Dark Forest, he could even return to the Abyss realm. What a wonderful thing!

    Bechymos, who couldn¡¯t be any more emotional, looking at the internar transportation matrix twinkling with light, he said with unrestrainable joy, ¡°I have enough energy ores. After inserting energy ores and putting things in order, the internar transportation matrix can then be operated. We should do that quickly.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and replied with a grin, ¡°It seems that both of us will have our wishes granted!¡±

    ¡°Thank you so much. I will remember this favor of yours,¡± Bechymos was in a really good mood. A trace of elegance was again revealed in his voice.

    ¡°You¡¯re wee!¡± Although Han Shuo found the softness revealed in Bechymos¡¯ voice to be strange and had no idea if this person was actually a male or female, having stayed for such a long time in the Abyss realm, Han Shuo had encountered much stranger characters. He couldn¡¯t be certain of Bechymos¡¯ true gender, or perhaps genders.

    ¡°Not good! My Lord, look up!¡± Bord suddenly shouted at the top of his voice.

    Both Han Shuo and Bechymos were jolted. When they looked up, they saw that gleams of light had suddenly appeared in the foggy sky over their heads. Immediately, they knew that the situation was about to go south. Han Shuo hastily asked, ¡°Is the stardust current returning?¡±

    Bechymos was fric. He anxiously replied, ¡°Yes, it will return very rapidly in an extremely short amount of time. But I¡¯ve waited for too long and I can wait no longer. What should I do?!¡±

    ¡°How long does it take to return?¡± Han Shuo immediately asked with an unperturbed mind.

    ¡°Very soon, faster than you can imagine and certainly before you can refill all the energy ores!¡± Bechymos¡¯ heart was in utter chaos and he spoke in an extremely anxious manner.

    ¡°Then what are you waiting for, leave this ce immediately!¡± Han Shuo yelled. He instructed Bord, Zinia, and the rest of his Demons, ¡°Forget everything else, evacuate immediately!¡±

    ¡°I, I cannot ept this!¡± Bechymos said in a furious, emotionally stirred up manner.

    While Han Shuo¡¯s avatars of death and destruction were withdrawing towards Bechymos, Han Shuo¡¯s main body entered the Cemetery of Death. The avatars that cultivated in the energy of death and destruction each grabbed one of Bechymos¡¯ arms and dragged him flying outside, saying, ¡°We must leave this ce immediately. In any case, you have already waited for so long. Why can¡¯t you wait a little longer now?¡±

    Bechymos¡¯ arms covered with green armor felt soft and tender to the two Han Shuos. It was as though the green armor wasn¡¯t present at all. This gave Han Shuo a strange sensation.

    Bechymos¡¯ mind in chaos. He shook off Han Shuo¡¯s hands and impatiently asked, ¡°Is there any possibility of making the matrix operational before the stardust current returns?¡±

    ¡°You yourself have said that it¡¯s impossible. Let¡¯s go, we can¡¯t stay here any longer,¡± Han Shuo rapidly answered. When most of the Demons had started evacuating, Han Shuo shouted to Bord and Zinia, ¡°What you are standing around for? Do you want to die here? Quickly leave through the path we came from!¡±

    ¡°Your humble servants dare not to leave before your Lordship does!¡± Bord and Zinia simultaneously answered.

    ¡°There are no pesky rules that my followers need adhere to. The most important thing is self-preservation!¡± Han Shuo berated before he shouted, ¡°Leave!¡±

    After hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words and seeing the resoluteness in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, the couple no longer insisted on staying. They bowed towards Han Shuo before flying away behind the other Demons.

    ¡°Come with me, we leave the Void for the time being. But we will be able to return soon after. I promise you that!¡± the two avatars of Han Shuo¡¯s again dragged Bechymos flying outside.

    Bechymos had finally nowe to his senses. He understood that staying in the Void would mean certain death. Precisely for this reason, he thought of Han Shuo¡¯s guarantee as merelyforting words and did not take it seriously.

    However, as Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars were dragging him outside, he saw that the other Han Shuo remained in the internar transportation matrix with a calm face. Bechymos was rather stunned. He pointed at Han Shuo¡¯s main body further and further away from them and said with an rmed voice, ¡°That, that you, why isn¡¯t he leaving yet?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about him, although that version of me is currently in poor strength; although this stardust current can kill so many gods, it has no effects on that me!¡±

    ¡°Impossible!¡± Bechymos shrieked. He red at Han Shuo and shouted, ¡°Not a single god has ever escaped from the corrosion of the stardust current, no one! If that body of yours remains, he will surely die!¡±

    ¡°I know what I¡¯m doing, don¡¯t you worry!¡± Han Shuo did not give a lengthy exnation. He ceased to drag Bechymos by the arms when he began to fly outwards as well.

    Gradually, the stardust current appeared from a distance. Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars, Bechymos, and Han Shuo¡¯s newfound disciples all hastily exited through the original path from whence they came.

    The only living thing that remained in the Void was Han Shuo¡¯s main body, inside the Cemetery of Death at the center of the foggy valley. This Han Shuo cultivating in demonic arts had an infinitely wonderful consciousness which was absolutely invulnerable to the effects of the stardust current.

    After everyone else disappeared, Han Shuo calmly and unhurriedly withdrew arge number of magic crystal ores from his space ring. The energy ores that Bechymos mentioned were, in fact, magic crystal ores. They could provide the energy required by the internar transportation array to be operational. Those magic crystal ores he took out were of the highest quality, containing a considerable amount of energy.

    There wererge and small notches all around the transportation matrix meant to be filled with magic crystal ores. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was unafraid of the corrosion of the stardust current. Unhurriedly and very carefully, Han Shuo ced the ores into those notches. After that, he slowly adjusted the internar transportation array with the memories in his consciousness.

    Just as Bechymos had said, the speed at which the stardust current returned was extremely fast. Not long after Bechymos and the rest had left, the quick and violent stardust filled this valley of the Void.

    Naturally, those soul-corroding energies started to attack Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. However, Han Shuo¡¯s wonderful consciousness constantly regenerated what was disintegrated. He wasn¡¯t harmed even by the slightest degree!

    It was after a while of Han Shuo¡¯s careful and concentrated effort that suddenly, a piece of the magical console at the internar transportation matrix suddenly started to sh with glorious light. Han Shuo was greatly delighted as he knew that the magical console was specially used to input the coordinates of the destination material ne. It lighting up signified that there was enough energy filling those notches to conduct internar transmissions.

    In other words, this internar transportation matrix was now truly, fully operational!

    Every internar transportation matrix had its own coordinates. Han Shuo had learned long ago of the general knowledge that teleporting to another material ne would require the coordinates of the destination.

    Back then on Profound Continent, when Han Shuo learned from the Cmity Church that the huge transportation matrix could conduct internar teleportation, he put some effort into studying that transportation matrix and therefore knew the coordinates of the Cemetery of Death back on Profound Continent. Seeing with his own eyes that the magical console of this internar transportation matrix was shining, Han Shuo felt extremely exalted at heart. He was ready to input the coordinates of his Cemetery of Death back on Profound Continent using his mental strength.

    When Han Shuo thought of the fact that he would be able to return to Profound Continent through the internar transportation array very soon, he became overwhelmed with emotion. Even his two hands holding a few pieces of magic crystal ores were trembling.

    However, at this moment, the entire valley underwent a transformation.

    For some unknown reason, energies from the countless ancient seals and magical matrices found throughout the valley that was once the battlefield of gods began to shoot out in disarray. Beams of light were formed and violently shot towards the only living thing in the valley ¨C Han Shuo!

 Chapter 580: Destroy to Rebuild

    GDK 580: Destroy to Rebuild

    Han Shuo was startled. Due to the unusual environmental conditions, of those gods who lost their lives to the stardust current, some lost their self-awareness and left behind their divine souls which retained only their memories. There were also some whose divine energies were somehow miraculously transformed into divine essences of various energy types. However, the majority of them had their divine energies attached to those seals and boundaries, which slowly changed under the effects of the stardust current.

    Back then, at death¡¯s door, these gods deployed boundaries and magical matrixes in order to stop the soul-corroding energy of the stardust current. Unfortunately, theirst-ditch efforts were futile. Their boundaries and seals which covered the entire valley remained and stood even after their deaths. However, the stardust current caused some kind of mysterious transformation to the divine energies that they had left behind.

    Perhaps it was the return of the stardust current, or maybe it was Han Shuo¡¯s initiating of the internar transportation matrix, the energies remaining inside the boundaries and seals throughout the entire valley suddenly formed energetic beams that shot ferociously at Han Shuo!

    Han Shuo was greatly rmed as he understood just how terrifying these energies were. He no longer paid attention to the internar transportation matrix beside him but sat cross-legged at once and deployed a protective shield in an instant, enveloping his entire body.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness could resist the corrosion of the stardust current, but his body might not be able to withstand the power of these terrifying attacks. Especially, as these energies consisted of various different energy types, they could possibly bring about some unknown effects. This left Han Shuo no choice but to defend with all his might. He concentrated his attention, and adjusted the rhythms of his breathing, heartbeat, and even blood flow. The demonic yuan in his body, operating at peak performance, turned into sparkling ck lights and gushed into the protective shield.

    Pop pop... Pop pop...

    These beams, which resembled shooting stars, violently bombarded on Han Shuo¡¯s protective shield. These energies that had degraded substantially remained to be extremely formidable even after countless years. Perhaps one or two beams were tolerable. But several dozens of energetic beamsing all at once ¨C that kind of bombarding power was so fierce and unbearable that Han Shuo nearly choked up blood.

    Not good! Han Shuo cried out in his heart. From the fierce shelling on his protective shield, through the consciousness sensing of the tens of thousands of energies all around, Han Shuo knew that this time, he was in deep trouble.

    The protective shield that Han Shuo was painfully holding up looked as though it might rupture at any moment. He was consuming the demonic yuan in his body at an rming rate. If this situation continued, Han Shuo knew in his heart that he wouldn¡¯t be able to persist for long!

    When those beams of bizarre energies in the form of intense beams made contact with Han Shuo¡¯s protective shield, splendid rays of light would blossom. Han Shuo, sitting quietly in front of the internar transportation matrix, was doing his utmost to activate all the usable energies in his body, unceasingly injecting them into his protective shield, forcibly resisting the strike of the numerous energetic beams.

    Gradually, Han Shuo sensed the reserves of demonic yuan in his body were on the brink of exhaustion. Exhausting at such a rapid rate, even the demonic infant, this fountainhead of energy, seemed to grow powerless and couldn¡¯t persevere much longer...

    For a moment, Han Shuo was at a loss. He thought to himself, Will this main body which I rely on for survival be destroyed like this? This is uneptable!

    Even at this stage, Han Shuo had not lost hisposure. At the very least, there was one thing that Han Shuo could be certain of ¨C even if his body was destroyed, his consciousness would not be obliterated!

    With this premise, in this critical moment Han Shuo racked his brain for any possibility of preserving his body and tried to find a way out of this most dangerous situation.

    All kinds of demonic techniques shed through Han Shuo¡¯s mind one after another. His countless realizations towards demonic arts were evoked one by one.

    Han Shuo¡¯s pair of eyes that were closed shut suddenly opened. A bizarre luster shone from their depths!

    The most innovative of idease in a time ofck!

    A mad idea suddenly crossed his mind. Based on some vagueprehension he had about the Nine Changes realm, his trust and understanding of demonic arts, Han Shuo came to a bold decision!

    The unending streams of demonic yuan pouring into his protective shield were severed by Han Shuo in an instant. The very next moment, the protective shield that had been withstanding those intense rays shattered into speckles of light and vanished.

    Without the protection of his protective shield, the tens of thousands of energetic raysnded directly on Han Shuo¡¯s physical body as he sat cross-legged.

    As expected, Han Shuo¡¯s flesh wascerated. The numerous streams of energy simultaneously assailing at him immediately caused severe damage to his body. His limbs, bones, and organs, every inch of his body was drenched in blood in a sh. Some weaker parts were even prated to reveal a hole. Chunks and chunks of flesh fell off his body...

    All the remaining demonic yuan was diverted to firmly defending Han Shuo¡¯s demonic infant at the expense of all other parts of his body. The pain as though being hacked by a thousand knives came from his head to his toes!

    Han Shuo clenched his teeth and persevered in spite of the pain. His demonic yuan was unwaveringly protecting his demonic infant. He did not let out a single shriek even as the injuries on his body multiplied every second.

    As the hundreds upon thousands of energetic beams that fell onto Han Shuo¡¯s deste body were not homologous, they started to sh against each other when they met inside his body. This caused all kinds of strange noises to thunder from within. Every inch of Han Shuo¡¯s body began to tremble. The pain became ten times greater as all kinds of energies started shing against each other at full force right inside his body!

    Han Shuo, who had persistently endured with his teeth clenched, could no longer bear the pain. Right in this most mysterious valley of the Abyss realm, Han Shuo suddenly stood up, his body dripping with blood and riddled with holes, and his flesh falling off piece after piece. His inhuman body raised its head towards the sky and started to roar.

    The Han Shuo at this moment looked nothing like a man. He looked much more like a bloodthirsty demon ¨C a mentally deranged demon!

    More and more of his fresh blood sprayed out. Even his extremely tough meridians started to burst one after another. Having been in the business for so long, Han Shuo had suffered severe injuries to his body a few times before, but never ever had the injuries been so thorough.

    It could be said that besides the demonic infant which Han Shuo was guarding with all his strength, every single cell in this vessel of his was destroyed by the barrage of hundreds of thousands of energy beams.

    Loud shrieks of pain erupted from Han Shuo¡¯s hideous and terrifying mouth, but no one could hear him...

    Gradually, the altered energies remaining inside the boundaries, seals and magical matrices shooting at Han Shuo grew weaker and weaker and Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan was exhausted more and more.

    After an undetermined period, the stardust current that enveloped the entire valley subsided.

    The vast expanse of fog that lingered around the valley throughout the year had somehow dissipated. Not a single one of the boundaries and seals that densely covered every corner of the valley remained. While some magical matrices remained standing, they had depleted all their energies!

    The valley at this moment seemed to have lost its strange powers and no longer contained any danger. At the center of the valley, in front of the internar transportation array, a body drenched in blood that looked nothing like a human was lightly squirming...

    After some time, it slowly turned motionless. It was as though this person who had been struggling his utmost to survive had finally lost its life.

    However, the pool of blood all over the floor, for some reason, most bizarrely began to flow in reverse!

    As though drawn by incorporeal energy, drop by drop the blood flowed back into that mangled figure... The blood seemed to havee back to life. It dragged and moved the chunks of minced flesh and severed meridians back towards the horrendous body...

    Then, they slowly reattached to the body!

    Energy around the countless holes inside the body was slowly broken up, rbined and gradually twisted into a new type of energy that circted the body in mysterious orbits, which ultimately gathered in the lower abdomen.

    The peculiar transformation was still happening. The bloody holes were rapidly healing at a speed visible to the naked eye. His blood, flesh, meridians, cells ¨C all those that were previously destroyed ¨C started to grow back inside his body. Those energies that were newly rbined, poured into his blood, flesh, meridians, and cells bit by bit.

    These fundamental blocks that made up the body, became unprecedentedly powerful and tough!

    This process, however, was rather slow and hadsted for a long, long time. It might have been a day, or perhaps a year...

    But in the end, the process wasplete.

    Not a trace of blood could be found around or on him and not a piece of severed flesh or wound could be seen. It was as though the brutal and bloody scene that had taken ce in the valley was merely an illusion. But when Han Shuo expanded his consciousness, the entire valley appeared within Han Shuo¡¯s mind without the slightest obstruction. Although Han Shuo looked calm in the eyes, he was greatly pleasantly surprised at heart.

    ¡°Nine changes, oh, nine changes. Sure enough, a wild transformation is required for the metamorphosis to happen!¡± Han Shuo lowered his head to look at the internar transportation matrix, and raised his head to look at the sky. After weighing for a while, he circled the valley once at high speed. His space ring kept shing as though he was collecting certain things.

    After a while, he suddenly turned into a streak of light. At a speed hard to catch with the untrained eye, he cut across the sky and flew out from the Void.

 Chapter 581: Iâ€™m Thy God!

    Outside the Void, Bechymos, with confliction in his eyes, gazed at the stardust current that was blocking the entrance. Standing beside him were Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars, wearing a normal expression as though not having the slightest worry.

    Bechymos heaved yet another long sigh.

    Han Shuo¡¯s lowgod of death avatar shot a nce at the sighing Bechymos and advised with a smile, ¡°You have waited for so many years, why have you lost your patience now?¡±

    ¡°You are not me. You won¡¯tpletely understand how I feel.¡±

    ¡°I have told you, I have ways to take you into the Void safely without having to wait for the next time it opens.¡±

    ¡°I really can¡¯t imagine that.¡±

    ¡°You will see!¡±

    The empty conversation did not continue for long. Han Shuo kept silent for a while before he suddenly asked, ¡°What kind of a world is the material ne you came from?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s a high-level material ne. There lived many mighty characters ¨C experts powerful beyond your imagination,¡± after a short pause, Bechymos turned to Han Shuo and continued, ¡°My hometown is a ne flooded with gods. If you want to advance your strength, you will be there sooner orter.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded thoughtfully. Soon after, he smilingly replied, ¡°Perhaps after I have taken care of certain matters, I will have a tour of your hometown.¡±

    Han Shuo and Bechymos had been conversing a lot during this time. Through Bechymos, Han Shuo learned certain things he never knew. He also understood that Bechymos¡¯ hometown was a high-level material ne where gods gathered.

    The more Han Shuo learned of that ne, the most astonished he became. Compared to Profound Continent and the Abyss realm, the existences of Bechymos¡¯ homeworld were, without a doubt, far mightier and had much moreplicated rtionships. To an expert like Han Shuo, whose insights and strength were gradually advancing, that world carried an enormous attraction. However, Han Shuo would absolutely not pay attention to other things before resolving the issues back on Profound Continent.

    ¡°If youe over, I will exin it all to you,¡± Bechymos looked at Han Shuo and added, ¡°My family n actually holds quite a status. So long as I return, my words carry some weight.¡±

    Han Shuo smiled and nodded. He thought, If I really were to go to that material ne in the future, with Bechymos¡¯ assistance, I will be able to blend in there faster. It appears that giving Bechymos a hand does have its benefits.

    ¡°Right, how much longer must we wait?¡± Bechymos asked.

    ¡°It won¡¯t be long. I have ordered my subordinates to gather the materials. Most matters have basically been resolved.¡± During this period, Han Shuo¡¯s lowgod of death avatar sensed that tens of thousands of strands of the power of faith were gently flowing into his divine body bit by bit. From this, he understood that after Bord, Zinia, and the rest of the Demons had left, they indeed had faithfully executed hismand in recapturing the citizens formerly under the four Demon Kings.

    With the death of the four Demon Kings, those Demons inside the Void that had epted Han Shuo¡¯s Baptismal Radiance became the mightiest group of people within the territories of the four Demon Kings. These existences were formerly the Lords of cities, or direct guards of the four Demon Kings. With these people running all things necessary for Han Shuo, he could effortlessly reap the fruits without having to worry about sowing them himself.

    ¡°After I leave this ce, you can take over the cities and popce that were previously mine. I wouldn¡¯t mind at all,¡± Bechymos said in a deep voice as he looked at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was stunned. He creased his brows and asked, ¡°That¡¯s the power of faith, it¡¯s useful for your cultivation. Why would you give me that?¡±

    ¡°Consider it as my gratitude for you activating the internar transportation matrix and helping me find a way home!¡± Bechymos exined. When he saw that Han Shuo was still doubtful, Bechymos continued, ¡°In the past, as to make the four Demon Kings help me, I gave them four-fifths of the Abyss realm. So why would I care about merely one-fifth of the Abyss now?¡±

    Bechymos continued after a short pause, ¡°Besides, war will always erupt if there is more than one religion on a material ne. It¡¯s better that I just hand it all to you.¡±

    ¡°Back then, when you all traversed great distances toe to this realm, wasn¡¯t it for the purpose of obtaining all the faith in this material ne?¡± Han Shuo asked with his eyes staring fixedly at Bechymos.

    ¡°Haven¡¯t we obtained it all?¡± Bechymos answered with another question.

    Han Shuo was stunned yet again. He asked, ¡°Why would you say so?¡±

    ¡°You are a Lich cultivating in the elemental energy of death and knows how to use that internar transportation matrix. You gaining everything in this world is, in fact, more or less the same thing,¡± after a short pause, Bechymos looked at Han Shuo and said with certainty, ¡°Your two bodies, one cultivates in the elemental energy of death, another cultivates in the edict of destruction. You will be one of us sooner orter!¡±

    ¡°Oh? It might not necessarily turn out so!¡± Han Shuo was shocked for a moment but soon shrugged off the prediction.

    ¡°Once this internar portal is activated, this ce will be re-discovered. And when I return, naturally, I will have to report back everything that happened in the Abyss realm. At that time, certain characters high above will dispatch people to make contact with you. The two of your bodies are on our side. You have no way to avoid that!¡± Bechymos exined as glistening lights came from his green eyes. When he saw that Han Shuo graduallyprehend his words, he sighed, and added, ¡°The reason I¡¯m telling you this is so you get an idea of the situation. When the moment eventuallyes, you will have to choose which side to stand with.¡±

    Han Shuo apathetically nodded and said calmly, ¡°This ce is mine. No one will take it from me. As for which side I will stand with, I¡¯ll cross that bridge when ites.¡±

    From the information that Bechymos revealed, Han Shuo vaguely understood certain things. Furthermore, from certain insider stories he learned from the skeletal staff long ago, he naturally understood what the overgods of death and destruction had done. As he was cultivating in the element of death and the edict of destruction, it seemed as though his standpoint was destined from the very beginning.

    However, apart from these two energies, his primary cultivation was still demonic arts ¨C which he had attained to the Nine Changes realm!

    The conversation continued. Han Shuo gradually learned even more from Bechymos. He gained some idea as to what might happen in the future. He also understood that if he were to make good use of the powers of the two overgods, it would be extremely beneficial to himself in the future. He couldn¡¯t help but begin to inwardly scheme a little.

    Time flew. A few more days flew by in the blink of an eye.

    On this day, Han Shuo and Bechymos were exchanging and discussing their realizations towards the edict of destruction. Most of the time, it was Bechymos doing the talking while Han Shuo was being the listener. asionally, Han Shuo, who cultivated in several types of sinister energies at once, would give some original and fresh understanding, causing Bechymos to feel very much amazed with Han Shuo¡¯s unique perspective.

    ¡°They are arriving soon,¡± Han Shuo¡¯s lowgod of death avatar suddenly spoke.

    ¡°Atst,¡± Bechymos was visibly emotional. He looked at Han Shuo and impatiently asked, ¡°The other you, when is heing?¡±

    ¡°Right now!¡± Han Shuo said with a mysterious smile. Upon finishing those words, a human figure suddenly shot out from the stardust current ahead of them. When Han Shuo¡¯s main body arrived, his two avatars simultaneously got into motion. After two streaks of light shed, they became concealed within Han Shuo¡¯s main body.

    ¡°It¡¯s been several days. You have been staying in the stardust current all this time?¡± Bechymos asked in an amazed and astonished tone.

    Han Shuo nodded and smilingly answered, ¡°Some changes have urred to my main body. I needed some time alone to adapt to the new changes,¡±

    ¡°I could sense thatpared to before, you are now much, much stronger!¡± Bechymos suddenly remarked after looking at Han Shuo silently for a while.

    Han Shuo put a smile on his face but did not reply. This breakthrough from Carnal realm to the Nine Changes realm meant his strength had multiplied several folds without doubt. For the time being, Han Shuo had no idea what kind of strength his main body in the Nine Changes Realm actually possessed. However, the terrifying destructive power of the few demonic arts techniques he was currently trying to master made him full of self-confidence.

    A short whileter, a light whoosh suddenly came from the distance. Rustles sounded from far to near. Finally, a group of people revealed themselves from the lush vegetation.

    The party was headed by Bord and Zinia. Following behind them were Jasper, Hemanna, Sylph, and Sanguis. The few people in the Abyss realm that Han Shuo cared about were all present.

    Bord and Zinia wore a solemn and respectful expression, and had been very humble towards the four throughout the journey. Jasper, Hemanna, Sylph, and Sanguis all looked ineffably emotional. When they arrived before Han Shuo, Jasper, with her bright eyes staring fixedly at Han Shuo, asked as her voice trembled slightly, ¡°That thing... Is... is it true?¡±

    ¡°Master, the matter that Lord Bord ryed to us, is it, is it true?¡± Sanguis was incredibly emotional as well. He immediately asked upon arriving.

    Hemanna and Sylph did not say a word but their intense appall was visible through their eyes. Their bodies were lightly trembling, as though they couldn¡¯t believe something had actually happened.

    Han Shuo stared nkly at first. After looking at the few¡¯s expressions, he immediately came to understand exactly what they were asking about. He smilingly nodded and affirmed, ¡°From today onwards, I will be your god! The four Demon Kings are dead. Their all, their everything, now belongs to me!¡±

    After a short pause, Han Shuo grinned and nced at Bechymos before he continued, ¡°Soon enough, even Lord Bechymos¡¯ territories will be mine. That is to say, the entire Abyss realm, everyone and everything in it will be mine!¡±

 Chapter 582: Are you a male or a female?

    GDK 582: Are you a male or a female?

    Outside the Void, on an expansive piece of emptynd, banners of all colors were erected.

    Ditches were drawn on the ground, formingplicated, abstruse and irregr patterns, with bloody shadows fluttering about. Han Shuo was at the center of it with his eyes closed. He did not say a word but kept sending off beams of light from his hands to the disorderly banners.

    A gloomy, chilling aura slowly overflowed from the banners. Some bizarre energy attached to the bloody shadows caused them to gradually gather at the ditch in front.

    All of a sudden, miserable and horrifying shrieks came from the ditches as sinister lights shone brilliantly. It was as though some transformation was happening to certain items within...

    A distance away, Bechymos, Bord, Zinia and the rest all looked at the scene puzzled and had absolutely no idea what was happening in there. Only Han Shuo¡¯s apprentice, Sanguis, who had gained some general knowledge of demonic arts, vaguely knew of the situation.

    ¡°What is Han Shuo doing?¡± Jasper mumbled with her brows deeply furrowed.

    ¡°Master is refining tools,¡± Sanguis answered softly.

    Everyone including Bechymos cast their curious gazes on him. Jasper asked, ¡°Refining tools? What are those?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s simr to forging weapons, but much moreplicated. In addition to requiring certain unique materials, it also takes demonic yuan and blood essence. It¡¯s very wonderful,¡± Sanguis exined subconsciously as he observed Han Shuo shooting out a stream of blood from his finger.

    The party remained confused even with Sanguis¡¯ exnation. Even thest Demon King of the Abyss realm, Bechymos, couldn¡¯t understand what Han Shuo was up to. Their brows were deeply creased.

    Sanguis did not exin any further but with glistening eyes, concentrated his attention on observing how Han Shuo refined a demonic tool. Every gesture and mantra Han Shuo made was deeply engraved in his mind.

    Can I really get through the stardust current? Bechymos doubted in his heart. His green eyes gathered on this mysterious and enigmatic Han Shuo, cing all his hope on Han Shuo.

    ¡°Han Shuo is truly magical. He always achieves inconceivable things.¡± Ever since Hemanna and Sylph learned that Han Shuo had be the master of the Abyss realm, their adoration for Han Shuo reached even greater heights. In their hearts, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t just omnipotent, but also the mightiest existence in the world.

    Suddenly, a few strange dazzling lights erupted from Han Shuo¡¯s body which, one after another, fell into the ditches beside him. In the next instance, those ditches seemed to be connected with lights. From within, a few gleaming objects, radiated splendid lights that shot at Han Shuo from all around him. The bloody shadows surrounding him fell into those items one after another.

    After a short while, the items flew into Han Shuo¡¯s hand. Han Shuo, who had his eyes shut and kept silent all the while, suddenly opened his eyes. He drew a smile on his face and flew about with a blurred figure. The colorful banners of all sizes around him all vanished into his space ring.

    Next, with his silhouette barely visible, Han Shuo arrived beside Bechymos. He took out a sparkling, translucent bracelet and handed it to Bechymos, saying, ¡±With this, you can get through the stardust current without a hitch.¡±

    Bechymos was confused and baffled. He received this seemingly ordinary widget, and skeptically asked, ¡°This little thing will let me pass through the stardust current?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and said with confidence, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, it surely can! This is called a Soul Bracelet. It can protect your soul from external corrosive energy. However, it¡¯s time limited so you need to cross through it quickly.¡±

    ¡°Why should I believe you?¡± Bechymos did not simply ept Han Shuo¡¯s words to be true. His fingers were gently stroking the Soul Bracelet as he looked Han Shuo up and down with uncertainty.

    ¡°Believe it or not, it¡¯s up to you. The rest of us will take the lead while you slowly ponder about it here,¡± Han Shuo said smilingly as he exined to Bechymos how to use the Soul Bracelet.

    It wasn¡¯t that hard to refine this little demonic widget. If Han Shuo wanted to, he could refine one that was reusable and inexhaustible. However, Han Shuo had now considered the Abyss realm as his private property and wasn¡¯t willing to let any god easily trespass upon it. As it just so happened that the stardust current ¨C this natural barrier ¨C sat right around the only internar transportation matrix on this material ne, Han Shuo would of course know how to make good use of it.

    While Bechymos held the Soul Bracelet in silence, Han Shuo withdrew a few more and handed them to Sanguis, Jasper, Hemanna and Sylph. He proceeded with exining how to use the Soul Bracelet once through.

    ¡°My Lord, we are willing to leave this world with you,¡± Bord stepped forward, knelt on one knee before Han Shuo, and petitioned.

    Han Shuo shook his head and replied, ¡°That¡¯s not necessary for the time being. The two of you have the closest rtionship with me. It¡¯s better if you stay here in the Abyss to spread my religion to every corner of this world and manage things here for me. Don¡¯t worry, perhaps I will return soon and take you two with me, and help me eradicate my enemies.¡±

    As Han Shuo had no idea of the current situation on Profound Continent, he did not rush in having Bord and Zinia leave with him. If he could return to Profound Continent sessfully, the Abyss realm would be the same as a gargantuan holiday home of Han Shuo¡¯s. By then, he could do whatever he wished. Besides, at the moment, the most crucial matter for the two was to convert the entire popce of the Abyss realm to worship Han Shuo.

    ¡°As you bid, my Lord!¡± Bord did not have any objection to Han Shuo¡¯s exnation.

    ¡°You two may leave first. Sweep away all the remaining forces of the Abyss. I hope that when I return, there will be no resisting forces left in the Abyss,¡± Han Shuo nodded and instructed.

    Bord and Zinia did not say anything, instead respectfully performing a salute towards Han Shuo and silently flying away.

    Han Shuo raised his head and looked at the stardust current hanging in midair. Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars suddenly floated out from his body and each of them grabbed onto one Soul Bracelet with their hands. When Han Shuo was prepared to step into it, he saw that Bechymos was still hesitant. Han Shuo thought about it for a moment before he suddenly asked, ¡°Are you going or not?¡±

    Bechymos did not answer. He gazed at the stardust current with his green flickering eyes.

    Han Shuo understood that Bechymos probably wasn¡¯t afraid that he might deliberately harm him, but he was truly too terrified of the might of the stardust current. That was why he did not have full confidence in the Soul Bracelet he refined.

    ¡°Master, if he isn¡¯t leaving, let¡¯s make a move first ourselves.¡± Ever since Sanguis followed after Han Shuo, having gone through one round of bloody massacre, his guts grew bigger and bigger. Sanguis wasn¡¯t that afraid even when facing Bechymos, a Demon King.

    Han Shuo inwardly remarked, A Sanguis Body in indeed remarkable. His tenacious will and confidence have developed a lot. Compared to Jasper, Hemanna, and Sylph who have followed me for a longer time, they were still fearful when faced with Bechymos.

    The threedies, Jasper, Hemanna and Sylph, carefully held onto their Soul Bracelets. Some timidity was still visible in their eyes as they gazed at the stardust current with their heads raised.

    After weighing in his mind for a moment, Han Shuo instructed Sanguis, ¡°Activate your Soul Bracelet. I will take you to circle one round in that stardust.¡±

    ¡°Yes, master!¡± Sanguis was indeed extremely daring. In spite of being fully aware of the frightening power of the stardust current, he immediately agreed.

    With the party watching attentively, Sanguis bit his finger and dripped a drop of his blood into the Soul Bracelet. After a sh of bloody light, the Soul Bracelet whooshed and concealed itself within Sanguis¡¯ body. Soon after, a faint halo appeared over Sanguis¡¯ head.

    Han Shuo grabbed onto Sanguis with his main body and flew into the stardust current. As soon as the two entered, the halo above Sanguis¡¯ head started glowing vigorously. The glittering halo seemed to be blocking the corrosion from some sort of energy.

    ¡°I¡¯m just fine in here, see?¡± the corners of Sanguis¡¯ lips curled to make a faint smirk before he sneered at Bechymos.

    Bechymos¡¯ green eyes were filled with shock. He eximed, ¡°You are actually alright! Inconceivable, inconceivable!¡±

    ¡°What are you waiting for!¡± Han Shuo lightly shouted.

    Bechymos no longer hesitated. He activated the Soul Bracelet in ordance with the method exined by Han Shuo and shot into the stardust current.

    The threedies stopped hesitating as well. Along with Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars, they activated their Soul Bracelets and flew into the stardust current.

    The party headed towards the Void with Han Shuo¡¯s main body leading the way. After some time, the group, clicking their tongues in wonder, safely arrived at the entrance blocked up by the stardust current. After taking some more time, they returned to the valley inside the Void where the internar transportation matrix was located.

    ¡°How could this be? What happened?¡± Bechymos inquired Han Shuo with an astonished look on his face when he saw the that the fog, boundaries and seals had all vanished from the valley.

    ¡°Nothing much. Perhaps the energy temporarily disappeared after being swooped by the stardust current,¡± Han Shuo exined without thinking the matter through. He re-initiated the internar transportation matrix, and said to Bechymos, ¡°Give me the nar coordinates of your homeworld.¡±

    An extremely long string of numbers was hastily reported by Bechymos, with him then impatient stepped into the matrix. Before the transmission began, Bechymos reminded, ¡°Han Shuo, if you were toe to my homeworld, remember to look for me using the method I told you.¡±

    ¡°Understood!¡± Han Shuo said as he waved his hand. Right before he was going to send him off, Han Shuo smilingly asked, ¡°Onest question, are you actually a male or a female?¡±

    ¡°What do you think?¡± Bechymos said in sweet-sounding and refined voice. She seemed to be smiling with her green eyes and appeared to be in a great mood.

    ¡°I knew it!¡± Han Shuo said smilingly and energized the internar transportation matrix for Bechymos. The spacetime in the surroundings wrapped as it gave off a splendid sh of light.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go.¡± After refilling the magic crystal ore, Han Shuo, Sanguis, Jasper, Hemanna and Sylph stepped into the matrix. Soon after, the internar transportation matrix was energized.

 Chapter 583: Iâ€™m Back!

    GDK 583: I¡¯m Back!

    After a bright sh of light, the scene around them transformed.

    Although he tried to be mentally prepared, nheless, when Han Shuo saw the surrounding which he knew so well, he couldn¡¯t suppress the excitement in his heart. At once, he howled withughter at the top of his lungs and shouted, ¡°I¡¯m back!¡±

    Right underneath his feet was an internar transportation matrix. To the sides were several storerooms. Outside the wide open doors was a sky that stayed murky dark all throughout the year. The air was filled with an intense element of death, the ground covered in bones as white as snow.

    There¡¯s no doubt about it, this is the Cemetery of Death!

    Sanguis, Jasper, Hemanna, and Sylph, walked down from the internar transportation matrix. They marveled and nced all around curiously.

    ¡°Master, this is your homeworld?¡± Sanguis asked as he looked at the floor of bones while tasting the scent in the air.

    ¡°Yep. It¡¯s just that this ce ispletely enveloped inside a boundary. The true appearance of this world lies outside of the boundary,¡± Han Shuo replied. After weighing over in his mind, he instructed, ¡°I have no idea how long I have been away from this world. I need to find out the current situation of Profound Continent. The few of you stay in here for the time being. I wille back for you all when I have familiarized myself with this ce.¡±

    The few did not have anyint about Han Shuo¡¯s words. They had long noticed that Han Shuo was excited and knew that he desperately wanted to understand the changes after he left.

    After informing Jasper and the others about the things they needed to pay attention to, Han Shuo had them step away from the internar transportation matrix. He returned to the center of the transportation matrix and activated it in short-range mode. With a sh of light, Han Shuo vanished from the Cemetery of Death and arrived at the secret underground chamber excavated by earth elite zombie deep below the City Lord¡¯s manor at Brettel City.

    Han Shuo stepped out from the chamber and expanded his consciousness. The full scene of the entire Brettel City projected into his mind.

    Although Han Shuo hadn¡¯t a clue how long he had been away, based on his preliminary observation,pared to the time when he left, Brettel City had obviously grown even more prosperous and wealthy.

    With one thought, Han Shuo suddenly appeared in the meeting hall at the center of the City Lord¡¯s manor.

    Dorcas, Jack, Dick, Faulke, Helen Tina and others were in the middle of a heated discussion inside the meeting hall when a streak of strange light suddenly shed through. A majestic figure then materialized at the center of the meeting hall.

    These leadership figures of Brettel City were startled andpletely dumbfounded. Each and every one of those people stared at Han Shuo standing in the middle of the room with disbelief. The heated sounds of discussion abruptly halted.

    ¡°An assassin! Seize him!¡± a young guard standing near the doorway suddenly shrieked as he courageously charged at Han Shuo.

    Two shadows suddenly shot out of nowhere. They were none other than Elizabeth and Bonds. The two had been concealing themselves all that while. When they sensed a mighty energy wasing from the meeting hall, they immediately flew out from hiding and ferociously charged at Han Shuo.

    However, halfway into their assault, they clearly recognized who the ¡®assassin¡¯ was and pulled hard on their brakes. They kowtowed before Han Shuo emotionally. For a moment, Han Shuo did not know what to say as he watched the two tremble to their toes.

    When that guard, who Han Shuo didn¡¯t recognize, saw that both Elizabeth and Bonds suddenly kneel before Han Shuo, he thought they had been killed. His heart quivered. However, even when he knew that he would most likely die, he did not withdraw but continued to race towards Han Shuo with his sword that shone with silvery light.

    ¡°Stop!¡± Suddenly, all the leaders of Brettel City inside the hall came to their senses and simultaneously shouted.

    This guard was jolted by their suddenmand. Before he could even react, Elizabeth¡¯s lightning fast hands had seized him and pushed him down to his knees before Han Shuo together.

    ¡°Are you blind or something? How dare you attack the City Lord? Don¡¯t wanna live anymore?¡± Elizabeth red and chided this guard.

    The guard, however, seemed to have his brain short-circuited for a moment. At a loss, he said, ¡°The City Lord? I thought that Brettel City didn¡¯t have a City Lord?¡± But when he saw the revere showing in Elizabeth and Bonds¡¯ eyes, as though having been struck by a sudden recollection, his body quivered. His voice slightly trembling, he pleaded, ¡°Please forgive me, my Lord! Please forgive me, my Lord!¡±

    Han Shuo waved his hand without speaking. He scanned each and every one of those inside the meeting hall, starting from Jack and ending with Faulke. He discovered that there indeed had been some changes to these people, but not too much.

    Jack the big fatty now wore a moustache. He looked much more mature than before, with the demeanor of a person upying high position naturally emanating from him. Dorcas still looked as grave and solemn as ever. The unswerving determination written across his face showed the long and numerous hardships he endured. Helen Tina still looked gorgeous and charming. She gazed at Han Shuo with fiery eyes as though wanting to melt him...

    After flicking through each of them, Han Shuo heaved a sigh of relief to know that he hadn¡¯t left for too long a time.

    Truth be told, ever since returning to Profound Continent, Han Shuo had been rather afraid. Back then in the space-time discontinuum zone, Han Shuo felt as though space-time was in disarray and he had no sense of the passing of time. In addition, he was deeply afraid that time in the Abyss realm would run much slower than on Profound Continent.

    If there was a great discrepancy in the speed of time between the two material nes, there was a possibility that when he returned to Profound Continent, he would find all those people that he knew had died of old age. That would have dealt him an unimaginable blow.

    Based on the appearances of these people, although there were some changes, it appeared that not too much time had passed. His heart was genuinely relieved.

    ¡°How long have I been gone?¡± Han Shuo took the lead to talk as the party looked at him emotionally and excitedly.

    ¡°Five years! Yet another five years! You joker, where in the world have you been?!¡± Jack shrieked. His plump body ran towards Han Shuo before fiercely beating Han Shuo¡¯s chest with his fists. He seemed to be expressing his excitement of meeting Han Shuo again after such a long time in this way.

    Although the others were also incredibly emotional, they merely conveyed it through their eyes and expressions. They did not vent their feelings physically as Jack did. After all, Jack and Han Shuo had known each other all the way back since Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. Their rtionship was much deeper and more specialpared to the rest.

    Helen Tina, this beautiful magus who already considered herself as Han Shuo¡¯s woman, although she too was close with Han Shuo, she was too shy to throw herself into Han Shuo¡¯s embrace before the crowd. Therefore, she only expressed her emotions to Han Shuo with her bright, fiery eyes.

    ¡°Five years, luckily it¡¯s just five years. Haha,¡± Han Shuo saidughingly as he let Jack hammered his chest.

    ¡°¡®Just five years?¡¯ How many five years are there in a lifetime? You scoundrel, how could you throw this big responsibility to us, while you yourself couldn¡¯t be less bothered and went missing ¨C several years at that! How outrageous!¡± After a short while, Jack had no choice but to abandon venting his emotions by pounding on Han Shuo as his chubby hands were starting to ache. He grumbled while ring fiercely at Han Shuo.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo noticed that two figures were flying over from a distance at high speeds.

    The two figures arrived at the meeting hall in just a blink of an eye. Unexpectedly, they were the Emperor of the mes and Stratholme the old monster. Upon seeing Han Shuo, the two appeared more astonished than Han Shuo. Both of them gazed at Han Shuo in disbelief.

    ¡°I thought you were killed by that Soul Race tribal king?¡± Han Shuo and Stratholme said the same words at the same time while staring at each other. Soon after, they both broke intoughter.

    ¡°Where is my son? Where have you put my son?¡± the Emperor of the mes started asking Han Shuo using that shrewish voice of hers.

    Han Shuo was stunned. He forced a smile, looked at the no-nonsense Emperor of the mes and the handsome-looking Stratholme, and asked, ¡°Howe the two of you are here? What happened after I left?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s a long story,¡± Stratholme the old monster said smilingly. He nced at the crowd gathered in the meeting hall before continuing, ¡°Three years ago, a war that spanned throughout the whole of Profound Continent broke out. Some very interesting things happened during these few years. With certain forces behind the scenes fanning the mes, the entire continent is now engulfed in war. It¡¯s hard to exin it all sinctly.¡±

    ¡°Oi, youngster, hurry and tell me, where is my son?¡± the Emperor of the mes, concerned about fire elite zombie, noisily shouted again.

    Given the fact that this brutish Emperor of the mes was inside Brettel City, Han Shuo deduced that she must have provided ample assistance to Brettel City. Five years earlier, the Emperor of the mes was a demigod existence. Five years after, nothing had changed. However, this wouldn¡¯t be the same case for fire elite zombie who was currently digesting the fire element energy of a lowgod. Once he sessfully digested Cecrops¡¯ energy, his strength would surely exceed that of the fifth-stage Emperor of the mes.

    ¡°He is cultivating. It will take some time before he can see you,¡± after a short pause, Han Shuo looked at this shrewish middle-aged woman in all smiles and continued, ¡°The next time you meet him, you will see just how much he has transformed. It will surely be beyond your imagination!¡±

    ¡°Hmph! Deliberately mystifying. I¡¯m going back first. Take good care of that kid for me.¡± The Emperor of the mes rushed to the meeting hall to protect these leadership figures. When she saw that the intruder was Han Shuo, she lost her interest and left at high speed after finishing those words.

    From Elizabeth and Bonds¡¯ performance as well as the arrival of Stratholme and the Emperor of the mes, seemingly guarding against something, Han Shuo knew that Brettel City probably wasn¡¯t as secure and steady as he imagined.

    ¡°Stratholme, tell me about the current situation,¡± Han Shuo creased his brows and asked the old monster.

 Chapter 584: A New Situation

    A New Situation

    During those five years, Profound Continent was engulfed in war. Lancelot Empire, Kasi Empire, the Brut Merchant Alliance, Ang Empire, Oden Empire ¨C all nations big or small participated in the war.

    With Helen Tina and Burt Zili cooperating in the dark, Lancelot Empire¡¯s military campaign to invade the seven grand duchies was a sess.

    Oden Empire ¨C the mightiest nation on the continent, formed an alliance with Kasi Empire to constantly expand their territories. Countless smaller nations that bordered the two were annexed. Ang Empire even lost more than half of its territories to them. Brut Merchant Alliance too was in a perilous situation, hardly resisting Oden Empire¡¯s stronger and stronger assaults.

    Soon after upying the seven grand duchies, Lancelot Empire faced the invasioning from the kingdom of orcs. This round of military offense from the orcs was much fiercer and more violentpared to previous times. Even Firenze, themander of the Howling Legion, had great difficulty defending the southern border. With the majority of Lancelot Empire¡¯s troops allotted to the southern border, the military strength of the entire nation was basically held up by the southern border.

    While the southern border faced constant assault from the Orc Kingdom, Kasi Empire took advantage of the situation tounch their attacks on Lancelot Empire. After taking down the seven duchies with great difficulty, Lancelot Empire wasn¡¯t given the time to digest its repercussions before having to suffer heavy blows from enemies.

    The orcs¡¯ reckless invasion made citizens of the empire live in fear. But things over in Brettel City were unexpectedly smooth and steady. Under the management of Jack, Dorcas, and the others, the city had even grown more prosperous.

    The territories that formerly belonged to the seven grand duchies were now managed by Jack, Dorcas and co. Among them, Dorcas had obtained everyone¡¯s acknowledgment for his outstanding talent in military strategy and shared the title of military genius with Firenze.

    Brettel City and the seven grand duchies on the east of Lancelot Empire, were natural barriers to the Empire. During the past few years, as the mighty Oden Empire had been constantly pressing hard on the Brut Merchant Alliance, not only had Brettel City been living peacefully with the Brut Merchant Alliance, the two even secretly joined hands in resisting the greater threat that was Oden Empire.

    Through Stratholme the old monster¡¯s description, Han Shuo gradually gained an understanding of the present situation on Profound Continent as well as the rtionships between various nations.

    After Stratholme exined the situation of the continent, Han Shuo squinted and started to carefully examine the old monster.

    Back then, Stratholme the old monster had managed topletely digest the Origin Crystal of fighting aura and fused his soul with it. Although he had yet to attain the realm of basegod, it may be assumed that he was close to achieving it.

    Being in the realm he was, Han Shuo understood that the fighting aura cultivated by some on Profound Continent didn¡¯t belong to any of the twelve mainstream energies.

    Of the eight elemental energies ¨C light, darkness, earth, fire, wind, water, lightning, death ¨C and four edictal forces ¨C fate, space, life, and destruction ¨C fighting aura didn¡¯t fit into any of the twelve fundamental forces.

    Fighting aura was a type of energy formed by mixing the elements of light and air. Just like summoning and the loot energy Datara cultivated, it was categorized as non-mainstream energy. However, as fighting aura was partly the element of light, while air was one of the most abundant elements, there was quite a number of people who cultivated in the energy of fighting aura in various material nes. In fact, this non-mainstream energy had one of the highest numbers of cultivators after the twelve fundamental energies.

    Back in Tarrag Canyon where Han Shuo ran into the Soul Race, he found twelve orbs containing energies that could be fused with one¡¯s soul. However, the twelve spheres did notpletely correspond to the twelve major fundamental forces. For example, the rather special energy of life and fate was not among the twelve. On the contrary, the fighting aura in which Stratholme cultivated was in one of those spheres. The Origin Crystal of Summoning which had an even smaller count of cultivators was amongst the twelve orbs.

    Although fighting aura wasn¡¯t one of the twelve mainstream energies, it had nheless a sizable following on various major material nes. This indicated that fighting aura had its own uniqueness. Stratholme the old monster seemed to be a truly lucky one. Not only since he managed to escape from the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race, but he had also sessfully fused his soul with the Origin Crystal of fighting aura.

    ¡°Any big movement from the Church of Light and Cmity Church during these few years? How did you escape from the six-horned tribal king? Also, why are you here?¡± Han Shuo questioned Stratholme after thinking about his words for a moment.

    Stratholme put on a smile, casually pulled a chair, and sat down. He turned Han Shuo, who was still standing tall at the same ce and indicated to him to sit down as well. He continued to exin, ¡°Back then, at the Church of Light¡¯s sacred mountain, the six-horned tribal king was probably injured in that battle with that Saintess. After the two of us separated, I immediately went to the extreme north of the continent and sought a ce to cultivate. As for what happened when I cultivated, I have no idea. In any case, the six-horned tribal king did note knocking at my door.¡±

    Stratholme took a short pause, looked at Han Shuo, and continued, ¡°Things after that point were rtively simpler. After my soul had fused with the Origin Crystal of fighting aura, the six-horned tribal king could no longer locate me. By then, the seven grand duchies were already upied by Lancelot Empire. There was nothing much that I could do about it. But, after all, I¡¯m the State Preceptor of the former Verdun Dynasty. The people of the seven grand duchies are also my people. Therefore, I decided to stay in the seven grand duchies, perhaps this could be considered as having kept to my duty.¡±

    After listening to Stratholme, Han Shuo nodded to show that he understood. Stratholme was the protector of the seven grand duchies. Even though the seven grand duchies were now captured by Lancelot Empire, with Stratholme within them, Lancelot Empire and Brettel City would surely take him into consideration and not do anything they shouldn¡¯t to the people of the duchies.

    ¡°The Cmity Church and the Church of Light, have they been quiet these few years?¡± Han Shuo again asked.

    The old monster forced a smile and shook his head. He answered, ¡°The ceaseless war that swamped Profound Continent had very strong religious influences. The four major religions on Profound Continent ¨C Cmity Church, Church of Light, Shrine of Ice, and the Druidic Order ¨C all participated in the war. Even some of the smaller religions took part in it as well.

    ¡°Oden Empire, the strongest nation on the continent, has the Church of Light vigorously backing them. The citizens living in nations that Oden Empire has invaded will be converted to be followers of the Church of Light. Kasi Empire has the backing of the Shrine of Ice. Ang Empire has the Cmity Church. While your Lancelot Empire is currently backed by the Druidic Order.

    ¡°From what I see, the whole reason that Profound Continent is in this state of war has absolutely everything to do with the four major religions!¡±

    After taking a tour of the Abyss realm and bing a god himself, Han Shuo was naturally well aware of the struggle between the four religions. It was inevitably linked to their fight over the power of faith. Han Shuo reckoned that among them, Cmity Church would be even more ruthless. To constantly kill and ughter, causing destruction and death, that ought to be precisely what they wanted to see.

    ¡°It appears that behind every country is a religious influence. Hmm, what about the Kingdom of Orcs and the Brut Merchant Alliance? Do they have the backing of any religion?¡± Han Shuo bunched his brows and asked.

    ¡°They are just the same. The orcs have their orc god. Meanwhile, the Brut Merchant Alliance has the Soul Race behind them. That Tarrag Canyon, from merely a restricted area, has now turned into the Brut Merchant Alliance¡¯s holynd. Isn¡¯t this world an interesting ce?¡± Stratholme exined with a bitter smile. He found the situation to be rather silly.

    ¡°So it seems. Haha, although I¡¯m a little surprised, it¡¯s not that hard to swallow,¡± Han Shuo understood what those people were fighting for. The Brut Merchant Alliance could be considered as one of the significant powers. As the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race possessed outstanding strength, it was not hard for him to obtain the trust of the merchants of the Brut Merchant Alliance.

    ¡°In that case, what about my Brettel City?¡± Han Shuo stared fixedly at Stratholme with his glistening eyes and said, ¡°Although your strength has improved a great extent, you have yet to be a god, and cannot receive the power of faith yet.¡±

    Stratholme the old monster shrugged and replied in a helpless voice, ¡°Of course I don¡¯t have the qualification of obtaining the power of faith. However, that beautiful woman you brought out from the underground world then has been preaching for the spider goddess Rose like a mad woman. She even established a couple of her shrines. Currently, in Brettel City and the seven grand duchies, there really are lot of followers that worship spider goddess Rose.¡±

    Upon hearing those words, Han Shuo¡¯s face turned cold. He groaned, ¡°Although she has changed her body, name, and identity, she is still Adele. How dare she cause trouble right on my turf. She must be tired of living.¡± After a short pause, Han Shuo creased his brows, looked at Stratholme the old monster, and asked, ¡°Others might not know of her intentions, but you should. Why didn¡¯t you kill her?¡±

    Stratholme forced a smile and shook his head. He answered, ¡°Although I could kill her, I would have to give you face, wouldn¡¯t I?¡±

    ¡°What do you mean?¡± Han Shuo was puzzled.

    ¡°She imed herself to be your woman, and have close rtionships with several of your other women. What¡¯s more, she has obtained the trust of His Majesty the King. What position am I in to harm her?¡± After a short pause, Stratholme furrowed his eyebrows dramatically and added, ¡°Besides, this woman is not simple. She seems to have experts secretly protecting her. Even I would have some reservations.¡±

    ¡°She sure has some capability, but this would be the end of her,¡± Han Shuo sneered.

    There were quite a lot of people who live in Brettel City and the seven grand duchies. All that power of faith added up would make a considerable amount of energy. Han Shuo, as the master of Brettel City, would absolutely not allow others to take what belonged to him.

 Chapter 585: Die Once More!

    GDK 585: Die Once More!

    If it wasn¡¯t for the Primordius Dragon cutting Han Shuo off the internar portal, he would have killed Adele five years ago. Who knew that in just five years, that Adele who looked nothing remarkable would be able to cause such a huge disturbance in Brettel City. This was indeed nothing Han Shuo had foreseen.

    From the narration of Stratholme, Jack, and others, Han Shuo quickly got a look at the current situation. His strength having soared to such a level, Han Shuo basically took no threat in Profound Continent to heart.

    Han Shuo expanded his consciousness and took a tour around Brettel City. He sensed the shrine of the spider goddess Rose almost immediately.

    At the summit of Mount Silk was a temple. A number of believers were worshipping a mysterious carved statue of the spider goddess Rose at the center of the temple.

    Some of the believers wearing ck gowns were piously prostrating themselves before this statue of spider goddess Rose, offering their devout faith. An exquisite and elegantdy with purple hair stood coldly before the spider goddess¡¯ statue. She was sprinkling specks of sinister light onto those believers kowtowing ahead with her hand.

    During the time of war, ordinary people at the bottommost strata of the society needed someone to put their faith in. Adele, who imed herself to be Han Shuo¡¯s woman, gained the trust of Emily, Phoebe and the others through extraordinary means. Even Lawrence held her in high regard. Under her publicizing, spider goddess Rose became the one that many citizens of Brettel City surrendered their faith to.

    This temple on the summit of Mount Silk was currently thergest house of worship within the borders of Brettel City. As spider goddess Rose had revealed her miracles several times in recent years, each and every one of her believers became most willing and motivated to preach her religion, taking their own initiatives to persuade themoners around them to ce their faith in spider goddess Rose.

    Inside the restricted area at the back of the temple, Adele, who had changed her identity, was sitting cross-legged at the center of a spiderweb-shaped magical matrix. There was an intense element of darkness around her. She wore a solemn expression, indistinct dark radiances glimmering off her.

    Suddenly, an intense palpitation rose from her heart. It was as though a terrible danger was descending from the sky.

    After five years, through her own great effort and the generosity of the spider goddess, Adele was now a demigod expert. Inside Brettel City, by relying on her special identity, she acquired close rtions with important characters at Han Shuo¡¯s side, hence bing an extraordinary existence. She believed that within Brettel City, no one could threaten her.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± puzzled, Adele gently opened her eyes and mumbled to herself.

    As soon as she opened her eyes, the spider webs around her disappeared into her body. There was an enormous spider web that enveloped the empty temple hall. A few shadows that had been lingering at the top of the spider web slid down effortlessly. Fivedies with nk, empty eyes appeared.

    ¡°Your Holiness, any instructions?¡± one of thedies inquired in a dull, lifeless tone.

    ¡°Nothing. I just feel somewhat uneasy,¡± Adele calmly replied with a frown. Every time she saw these wooden faces, she got a feeling of fright and unease. However, she understood deep in her heart that she needed these assistants who seemed to have appeared out of thin air.

    ¡°With us here, no one can harm you. You just need to do the things that you should do, and nothing will happen to you,¡± that leadingdy said in a lifeless voice.

    ¡°When will the Goddess bestow me with more energy?¡±

    ¡°When each and every citizen of Brettel City wholly acknowledges the existence of the Goddess; when all their power of faith belongs to the Goddess, you will be bestowed with more energy,¡± thedy replied in the same dull tone.

    A cold voice suddenly sounded from outside the temple, ¡°You will never ever get that chance!¡± The next moment, a majestic figure could be seen walking in step by step.

    ¡°Bryan! It¡¯s you! It¡¯s really you!¡± Adele cried out in surprise. With resentment filling her eyes, she started to shriek rather hysterically, ¡°You are alive, you¡¯re actually still alive! Good, very good! Hahaha!¡±

    Watching Adele chuckle, Han Shuo replied with a heart of ice, ¡°What? Why have you stopped your masquerading all so suddenly?¡±

    ¡°Back then, I concealed my real identity only because I couldn¡¯t kill you. But now, you will be dead without a doubt. So what for should I continue pretendin¡¯?¡± Adele resentfully red at Han Shuo. A familiar aura reappeared from her body. She continued word by word, ¡°Everything I have done is to make you pay the price!¡±

    ¡°Merely by yourself?¡± Han Shuo sneered while looking coldly at Adele.

    ¡°Not me,¡± Adele took in a deep breath before pointing at thedies around him and said, ¡°It¡¯s them!¡±

    While Adele was talking, the fivedies with pale faces and vacant eyes had unknowingly surrounded Han Shuo. The aura of darkness started to emanate from their bodies.

    All five of thesedies cultivated in the element of darkness, possessing at least demi-god strength. Han Shuo could sense a trace of the sinister divine energy that came from spider goddess Rose on the five of them.

    Han Shuo nodded and callously said, ¡°No wonder even Stratholme the old monster has misgivings. So it turns out it¡¯s these few fes who are present by your side.¡±

    ¡°Are you frightened? Haha!¡± Adele sure looked beautiful when sheughed, but her eyes were filled with rancor as she stared fixedly at Han Shuo and continued, ¡°How wonderful it is that you are still alive. Now I get to watch you die a slow death!¡±

    Five years ago, Han Shuo came to possess demigod strength when he cultivated his demonic arts to the Carnal Realm. With each rise of realm in demonic arts, one¡¯s strength would increase by tens or even hundreds of times. Han Shuo who was at Nine Changes realm currently didn¡¯t have a clear understanding as to where his actual strength stood. But clearly, Han Shuo did not feel the slightest danger from being encircled by the fivedies.

    In Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, those seemingly lifelessdies were just the same as ants. He could pinch them to death at will.

    ¡°Well, let¡¯s not waste time, shall we?¡± Han Shuo said coldly. At the next moment, ruthless, sinister energy suddenly erupted from his body. The five expressionlessdies that surrounded Han Shuo in the middle gently trembled.

    It was absolutely smooth and easy to ughter existences with strength sses lower. When the ruthless, sinister energy was released from Han Shuo¡¯s two hands, exploding noises sounded from around him and a few trails of bloody lights shed in the gloomy hall. The fivedies, who couldn¡¯t even react to the attack, had truly turned into lifeless bodies.

    After spreading the Demonic des, the cold, incisive des arrived next to the smooth skin on Adele¡¯s neck. Han Shuo looked coldly at the appalled Adele and said, ¡°Five years ago, I could easily finish you. Five yearster, you still have not the slightest chance against me. All the effort you have put in has been for a foreordained ending ¨C die once more!¡±

    ¡°No! I cannot ept this!¡± Adele started to shriek as though she had gone mad. Her pair of resentful eyes red at Han Shuo as she said, ¡°How? How did you be so strong? How is it that the servants meticulously cultivated by the Goddess have no ability to resist whatsoever?¡±

    Perhaps Adele had taken too much shock, she paid no attention to the Demonic des ced next to her neck. As she hollered, she shook her head so much and came into contact with the des, causing her neck to be bloodstained.

    Han Shuo did not kill Adele immediately. This woman who had been recruiting followers for the spider goddess using his own name had onest important task toplete.

    The Demonic des were suddenly withdrawn and Han Shuo¡¯s left hand regained its smoothness. Grabbing her by the hair, Han Shuo dragged the pathetic looking Adele straight towards the main hall ahead.

    ¡°What are you doing? What are you doing?¡± Adele continued to yell.

    Han Shuo paid no attention to that. He dragged this deranged woman all the way to the altar of thisrgest spider goddess shrine in Brettel City. At this moment, some believers of the spider goddess were still humbly crouching, worshiping at the towering altar ahead.

    ¡°Saintess!¡± the elegantdy who presided over the ceremony shrieked at the top of her voice when she saw the master of the shrine being dragged like a beaten dog. She couldn¡¯t hold back the fear in her heart.

    ¡°Heretic, let go of the Saintess!¡± When the worshippers discovered the scene, they gasped and screamed.

    With one wave of his hand, a bright, formless boundary obstructed all those people. Paying no heeds to their fury, Han Shuo cast Adele straight to the center of the altar tform and activated the altar routinely and with ease.

    Hundreds and thousands of spider webs shot like little snakes and wrapped up Adele immediately. Dazzling rays of light appeared on Adele¡¯s body wrapped by spider silks at the center of the altar along with the descending of a mysterious energy. At the next moment, Adele¡¯s eyes opened wide and turned to Han Shuo. Her gazes were foreign and sinister.

    ¡°Who are you? How dare you meddle with my business?¡± Adele was suddenly speaking with an unfamiliar voice unlike her own.

    ¡°I¡¯m the master of Brettel City. If you want to steal the power of faith that belongs to me,e here and take it yourself,¡± Han Shuo said calmly as he looked coldly at Adele who was channeling the divine soul separated countless material nes away.

    Adele¡¯s eyes stared deeply at Han Shuo for a while. After a moment of silence, she suddenly said, ¡°I will go there in person!¡±

    ¡°Very well. It¡¯s about time to straighten things out!¡± Han Shuo shouted.

    Adele¡¯s eyes began to shut slowly. Blood gushed from her seven apertures. Seeing that Adele hadpleted her mission, Han Shuo gave a gentle tap on her forehead,pletely erasing her soul.

 Chapter 586: Iâ€™ve Become a God!

    GDK 586: I¡¯ve Be a God!

    Years before, when Han Shuo was assassinating a grand duke, he suddenly lost self-control with his mind upied by lust. When Han Shuo came to his senses, he resisted this powerful energy forcibly altering his temperament and paid a huge price for it.

    After many years, with Han Shuo now having be a god, he realized that the energy he previously felt came from spider goddess Rose. However, as they were separated by many material nes, Rose¡¯s energy was greatly diminished and therefore she did not manage to subvert Han Shuo.

    This debt of blood had always been on Han Shuo¡¯s mind and he long had the intention of killing spider goddess Rose. When he returned to Brettel City to learn from Stratholme that Adele had actually established shrines within his territories and appropriated his power of faith from the citizens of Brettel City, naturally, Han Shuo was outraged.

    By using the altar at the center of the temple and with Adele as the medium, Han Shuo had sessfully conveyed his wrath to spider goddess Rose. After obliterating Adele¡¯s soul, she had absolutely no possibility of another resurrection.

    All signs of life on herpletely vanished. After casually letting go of her, Adele¡¯s powerless body copsed onto the pool of blood. Han Shuo ced one finger on the center of the altar. Ruthless energy was suddenly released, shattering the altar into pieces.

    After his avatars cultivating in the energy death and destruction became gods, Han Shuo gained some understanding as to how gods collected the power of faith. The altar Han Shuo shattered had the function of converging the power of faith and was the keymunication link between spider goddess Rose and her disciples. Now that this altar was destroyed, without a mighty follower of hers rebuilding one, Rose would not be able tomunicate with the souls of her disciples.

    Take, for example, Han Shuo¡¯s lowgod of death avatar; although separated material nes away, he could still receive the power of faith from the Abyss realm. Han Shuo could even vaguely sense the thoughts of those disciples that received Han Shuo¡¯s Baptismal Radiance back in the Void.

    Faith was an unusual matter which was incorporeal and yet clearly detectable. Through faith, Han Shuo could form some kind of mysterious connection with his disciples. What¡¯s more, if those disciples of Han Shuo¡¯s constructed an altar at the Abyss realm, they could even acquire a direct connection with Han Shuo even if they were separated innumerable material nes away. Han Shuo could also bestow upon his disciples some of his energy through it.

    Back then at the ve trading house of Valen City, Han Shuo once saw the scene where the three-eyed evil god manifested himself through bones and flesh in a pond of blood when a necromancer had sessfully acquired a connection with the god using the bloody altar. These worked on the same principle.

    Han Shuo killed Adele and destroyed the altar, removing the roots of all evil altogether. However, those believers who were blocked outside of his invisible boundary still looked hatefully at him. They seemed to be ready to charge forward at any moment and dismember Han Shuo¡¯s body into a million pieces.

    ¡°I¡¯m the City Lord of Brettel City. This woman was the root cause of rebellion and I¡¯ve given her the death penalty. I now dere that from this moment onwards, within Brettel City and its territories, the practice of worshipping spider goddess Rose is ouwed,¡± Han Shuo announced inly as he gazed at the people of Brettel City with cold eyes.

    However, even as Han Shuo finished those words, he discovered that the animosity in these people¡¯s eyes was still showing as before. It appeared that they did not abandon their faith towards spider goddess Rose just because he was the City Lord of Brettel City.

    Once amoner handed over their faith, it would usually be very difficult for them to walk out from this kind of influence. Although Han Shuo had an outstanding reputationpared to Rose who they had worshipped as their goddess for several years, Han Shuo fell far behind in terms of influence.

    Seeing the hostility in their eyes, Han Shuo realized how thorny the problem was. Unless spider goddess Rose somehow died or these people somehow realized just how impotent their religion was by themselves, Han Shuo had no way of immediately making these people leave from this kind of influence.

    These people were citizens of Brettel City. Although their minds were deeply poisoned by Adele¡¯s brainwashing, they mustn¡¯t be killed. It appeared that all Han Shuo could do was to give it time and slowly purge the influence from their souls.

    ¡°From today onwards, all temples of the spider goddess within Brettel City will be destroyed. No one shall pray and worship in her temples anymore,¡± Han Shuo bluntlymanded.

    Every time a believer piously worshipped at a shrine or temple, their dependence towards the god they believed in would deepen, increasing the influence on their soul. Due to reasons such as how staunch one¡¯s willpower was and the length of time one had practiced the faith, different believers would be dependent on their faith to different degrees.

    For example, the zealots of the Church of Light were some of the most extreme and fanatical believers. For these people, the god they believed in was their everything. Unless the god they believed in was killed, there would be no way to convert them. Additionally, this sort of people would kill others practicing any other religion without a care for their own lives!

    For their kind, it was only through killing that all sins could be ridden!

    When it came to Rose¡¯s followers in Brettel City, as the indoctrination had been rather brief and not as intense, they have yet to sink to that level of fanaticism and zealotry. As long as they were slowly rehabilitated and guided step by step, they would walk out from the influence of spider goddess Rose sooner orter.

    After the trip to Mount Silk, Han Shuo met with Jack, Dorcas, and the others one by one to gain a better understanding of their current situations.

    ¡°Five years! How could you leave for five years just like that, you heartless bastard!¡± Helen Tina said in her soft voice as she fixed her fiery eyes on Han Shuo.

    Even after five years, Helen still looked seductive and beautiful. Her immense longing for Han Shuo had tormented her for half a decade. Now that the two finally got to see each other alone, Helen finally couldn¡¯t restrain her excitement and threw herself into Han Shuo¡¯s broad chest.

    Wrapping Helen in his arms, taking in the faint, delicate fragranceing from this beauty in his embrace, and sensing her emotions run as deep as the sea, Han Shuo put on a tender smile and said, ¡°I¡¯ve returned, haven¡¯t I?¡±

    Helen¡¯s lovable body had unwittingly rose boiling hot while a kind of passionate feeling was brewing inside the badly lit room. After the long period of separation, Helen could no longer contain herself. With her hands on Han Shuo¡¯s back, she took the initiative to stand on the tips of her toes, trying to give Han Shuo a peck.

    When their lips touched, as though a runaway reaction, the two lost control with themselves. With one arm, Han Shuo lifted Helen by the waist. As she puffed and blew, Han Shuo impolitely ripped apart her fiery red magical gown and scaled her towering, smooth, tender peaks with his big hand.

    ¡°Oh... Five years, I have waited for five years! Bryan, give me, give it to me, I don¡¯t want to wait any longer,¡± Helen said as she cried tears of joy while firmly hugging Han Shuo with all her strength.

    The romantic memories they had in Helon City, the various beautiful sceneries they had visited as they traveled hand in hand ¨C shbacks as though it was just yesterday came back into Han Shuo¡¯s mind one after another...

    Feeling the passion of the beauty in his arms, Han Shuo¡¯s hands became more and more unbridled. He tore off Helen¡¯s silken undergarments, removed her weaker and weaker resistance, and finally, she sumbed...

    For the next few days in session, all temples of the spider goddess in Brettel City and the former seven grand duchies were demolished. Those who were still stubborn and obstinate were beheaded without the slightest mercy. The followers of the spider goddess were banned from carrying on with their worshipping and praying. They were also not allowed to set up an altar in private.

    At the same time, at Han Shuo¡¯s instructions, the City Lord¡¯s statue was to be erected on previous sites of the spider goddess¡¯ temple. The glorious achievements of the City Lord would be publicized and broadcast throughout the city. Then, drawing from the reverence and admiration the people of Brettel City had towards him, through some simple ceremonies, he would reorganize their faith to make them willingly offer their everything.

    Han Shuo used his lowgod of destruction avatar to receive the power of faith from the citizens of Brettel City and the former seven grand duchies. Having the experience from the lowgod of death avatar and having received guidance from Bechymos about the edict of destruction when they were outside of the Void, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar cultivating in the energy of destruction could now deploy its own Domain of Divinity and receive the power of faith.

    The series of thunderous operations Han Shuo conducted in Brettel City during the past few days had caused a tremendous transformation on the city. When Stratholme the old monster became aware of Han Shuo¡¯s conduct and deeds, he finally came looking for Han Shuo by himself. Strange lights glowed from his eyes as he asked in a deep voice, ¡°You have be a god?¡±

    For the past several days, Han Shuo razed everything that Adele built in the past five years to the ground as though he was breaking dried twigs. Moreover, he started to publicize his own great acts within Brettel City and its territories. By revealing his powerful might through certain methods, some of those citizens who had long adored him willingly offered him their faith.

    Although Stratholme had yet to be a god, he understood that only a true god could use the power of faith. It was after pondering about Han Shuo¡¯s recent series of actions that Stratholme came to an extremely shocking conclusion ¨C Han Shuo had be a god!

    Therefore, he had so impatiently sought for Han Shuo, eager to verify if his judgment was correct.

    Looking at the Stratholme keen to seek confirmation, Han Shuo put on a smile and openly admitted, ¡°That¡¯s right, I¡¯ve be a god!¡±

    Although he knew in his heart that this would be the answer, Stratholme nheless was ineffably shocked to hear Han Shuo¡¯s affirmation. Stratholme stood silent for a long while before he looked at Han Shuo with a somewhat embarrassed face and asked, ¡°Do you mind giving me some advice?¡±

    Han Shuo involuntarilyughed before he answered frankly, ¡°No problem.¡± He added after a short pause, ¡°However, you will still need to rely on yourself for the most important breakthrough!¡±

    Han Shuo had long had a favorable impression towards Stratholme. Currently, he was just one step away from the realm of basegod. Contrary to what one might expect, Han Shuo was most willing to assist him.

 Chapter 587: Multitasking

    Multitasking

    ¡°Are you really willing to help me?¡± Stratholme was actually rather shocked to see Han Shuo agree so simply. Even he himself felt absurd when he said those words as in his heart he didn¡¯t think that Han Shuo would ever help him. After all, he was very clear as to what it meant to be a god. He felt that the friendship they had with each other didn¡¯t run deep enough and therefore such a heavenly favor was not to be expected.

    Meanwhile, Han Shuo found the old monster¡¯s amazement to be funny. From Han Shuo¡¯s point of view, Stratholme was just a demigod who was about to break through as a basegod. He still had an insurmountable distance to go to be a lowgod. In Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, one basegod could certainly pose no threat to him, given that of the Demons he had in the Abyss realm, a great majority of them were in the realm of basegod ¨C even though they did not make that breakthrough by themselves!

    A mere basegod was nothing to Han Shuo who possessed two lowgod avatars. Back then in Tarrag Canyon, Han Shuo had once coborated with Stratholme in fighting enemies. From their interactions, Han Shuo knew that the old monster was one worth making friends with. Moreover, Stratholme had been serving as a protector in the vicinity of Brettel City years by then. This made Han Shuo¡¯s opinion about him rise even higher.

    ¡°You have formed a Soul of Element after fusing your soul with the crystal of fighting aura. To advance further, you need to concentrate your efforts on your body. You are a swordsman to begin with. The fighting aura you have been cultivating has been in your body all along. In this aspect, you have exceptional advantages. It¡¯s very easy for you to cultivate a Body of Element,¡± Han Shuo slowly exined while looking at Stratholme.

    After the trip to the Abyss realm, Han Shuo came to understand the cultivation methods of the two worlds. Based on his knowledge on the cultivation techniques, Han Shuo discovered that Stratholme, who cultivated in fighting aura, contrary to expectations had simr cultivation methods to those of the Abyss realm. He too would focus on training the fighting aura in his body and neglect the soul aspect just the same.

    Logically speaking, after forming a Soul of Element, it shouldn¡¯t be that hard for Stratholme to form a Body of Element. While thinking why he had yet to do so, Han Shuo slowly probed the old monster¡¯s body condition using his consciousness. Immediately, he discovered that the old monster was indeed filled with abundant fighting aura. However, the fighting aura was concentrated in his chest and did not spread to cover his skin and skeleton.

    With just one look, Han Shuo immediately came to understand where the problem lied. Stratholme was long ustomed to the fighting aura cultivation method on Profound Continent. Although he had the unique advantage of forming a Body of Elementpared to an average magus, he was locked in this rigid line of thought, unable to think outside the box and see this problem in a different light.

    Stratholme felt flustered when he saw Han Shuo staring at him with strange, glistening eyes without saying a word. Even though the old monster knew that Han Shuo¡¯s certainly did so out of good will, the pressure that came from Han Shuo nheless made him ufortable. Stratholme awkwardly smiled and asked, ¡°Is there a problem?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded with a slight grin and hit the nail on the head, saying, ¡°All along, you have been cultivating fighting aura using the region around your heart as the power source and would only erupt them through your limbs. However, to form a Body of Element, you need to spread that fighting aura to every cell in your body. When your whole body is filled with fighting aura, that is roughly the time your Body of Element will take shape.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s that simple?¡± The old monster was stunned.

    ¡°It¡¯s that simple!¡± Han Shuo affirmed. But after thinking for a while, he furrowed his eyebrows and continued, ¡°However, it¡¯s not entirely an easy thing to spread fighting aura all throughout the body. First of all, you need to make sure that your body can bear it. You need to figure this out yourself. I¡¯m not in the position to help you with that.¡±

    Stratholme seemed to drift into deep thought. After a short moment, Stratholme looked rather puzzled at Han Shuo and asked, ¡°You said that you have be a god, but why is it that from you, I can¡¯t sense the aura a god should emanate? What¡¯s the thing with that?¡±

    ¡°This is simple,¡± Han Shuo replied pithily. With one thought, Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars suddenly flew out from his body and their Domains of Divinity were deployed. All that was left around them were the elemental energy of death and a strange form of edictal energy of destruction. A formidable and stifling energy enveloped Stratholme in an instant.

    Stratholme became drenched with cold sweat. He was more frightened than he was amazed. Inside the Domains of Divinity Han Shuo deliberately deployed, he felt powerless and defeated as though facing against a towering mountain. Although not mainstream, closely rted to the element of light and the air, the fighting aura could be considered as a type of elemental energy. When Han Shuo¡¯s two Domains of Divinity were deployed, Stratholme immediately ceased to sense the presence of fighting aura between heaven and earth which he had been relying upon for survival. This feeling made Stratholme palpitate greatly.

    ¡°So this is the power of a god! Merely this domain of a divine being alone would be all too overwhelming for any ordinary person to resist! Truly terrifying!¡± after striving to withstand the feeling of helplessness for a long while, Stratholme finally remarked with a stifled-red face.

    Han Shuo withdrew the Domains of Divinity and his two avatars no longer released their immense pressure on purpose. With his main body, he smiled and asked, ¡°Do you believe me now?¡±

    Stratholme nodded. Fervent lights again appeared in his eyes. He looked deeply into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes and curiously asked, ¡°But how is it that you have three bodies? Could it be that one can have additional bodies after bing a god?¡±

    ¡°No, only I can do this. You mustn¡¯t attempt that or you will be dead without a doubt!¡± Han Shuo shrugged and further exined, ¡°As you know, I cultivate in another type of martial art. This martial art will bring me some rather unimaginable transformations. These transformations will happen only to me and only I can master them.¡±

    ¡°You are so lucky!¡± Stratholme looked admiringly at Han Shuo. Soon after, his gaze stiffened with resolution and he said, ¡°Alright, I now know what I must do to make a breakthrough. Right, with you here in Brettel City, I suppose I have nothing to worry about. I will head back to Stranglethorn Valley to cultivate immediately. I hope that there wille a day when I reach your realm!¡±

    After witnessing the terrifying power of Han Shuo¡¯s Domains of Divinity, Stratholme had indescribable anticipation towards this realm. He was one that had an assiduous desire to seek and gain greater and greater strength to begin with. After this meeting with Han Shuo, having been shown the path, Stratholme grew rather impatient.

    Han Shuo understood how the old monster felt and therefore did not stop him, letting him leave Brettel City for Stranglethorn Valley for a proper round of cultivation.

    ¡°What a shame that not one of those gods who had died in the Void cultivated in fighting aura, and I had not obtained anything suitable for you. Otherwise, I might have gifted it to you!¡± Han Shuo gently sighed and soliloquized after Stratholme had left.

    In his expedition to the Void, his main body made a breakthrough to the Nine Changes realm after sessfully absorbing the energy inside the countless boundaries, seals, and matrices. He proceeded to carefully explore the valley which had be virtually harmless, and collected some useful artefacts that got Han Shuo extremely excited.

    However, there wasn¡¯t anything suitable for Stratholme.

    After Stratholme the old monster had left, Han Shuo did not have his avatars return to his main body. After weighing in his mind for a bit, he decided to leave the avatar cultivating in the energy of death underground, deep beneath Brettel City. This was so that he could silently digest the divine essence of death he had obtained in the Void. That divine essence contained a considerable amount of divine energy. For that lowgod of death avatar who had recently joined the realm lowgod, they were the most effective tonics.

    Compared to slowly collecting the power of faith from the Abyss realm, it was way faster to obtain divine energy from divine essences. By Han Shuo¡¯s estimations, the divine energy contained in one piece of divine essence was more than the power of faith he would collect from his followers in the Abyss realm over a twenty year period. Moreover, it didn¡¯t take much time to be absorbed and digested. It was no wonder the four Demon Kings would forgo their agreement with Bechymos and get into a fight for one piece of divine essence.

    Indeed, the divine essence was an extremely precious item, especially for a god. Absorbing one was the most direct and fastest way to raise one¡¯s strength. One tiny little piece of divine essence could contain over twenty years of the power of faith from the entire Abyss realm. How frightening is that!

    While the avatar of death stayed in Brettel City, the avatar of destruction would head to Lancelot Empire¡¯s Ossen City via the transportation matrix in Brettel City. Emily, Phoebe, and Fanny had been in Ossen City for thest five years. If Han Shuo didn¡¯t hurry up and head to Ossen City before his threedies found out, they would surely run amok. Besides, he had to meet Lawrence.

    However, Han Shuo was not about to use this body of his avatar to get intimate with his threedies. Although his avatars could transform into clones of himself, as they were notposed of flesh and bones. Han Shuo could not get over himself mentally. He had only thought of his two avatars as two of his mightiest weapons and nothing more. When he came to the thought of this, Han Shuo knew that he had a ton of exining to do when he saw his threedies who would devour him bestially otherwise.

    Meantime, Han Shuo¡¯s main body returned to the Cemetery of Death using the transportation matrix under his City Lord¡¯s manor. After returning there, Han Shuo quickly briefed Jasper and others before leaving them again in haste. He headed for the Dark Forest where the skeleton of dark dragon Gilbert was buried.

    After countless years of waiting, it was finally the time to rebuild Gilbert a new body! Only the main body of Han Shuo¡¯s that cultivated in demonic arts could perform this operation and two lowgod avatars could do nothing to help. This time, not only did Han Shuo possess the best materials, he had even obtained some divine materials from the Void. Han Shuo believed that the resurrected dark dragon Gilbert would be more powerful than ever!

 Chapter 588: Rebuilding the Dragonâ€™s Body

    GDK 588: Rebuilding the Dragon¡¯s Body

    ***Dark Forest. Inside the valley of the ce of extreme fire where the Emperor of mes once stayed.

    This valley that had once suffered a volcanic eruption had an unchanging reddish-brown color. The coolness of the Dark Forest could not be felt at the center of the valley. No verdant and lush nts covering the ground, only barren red soil and an abnormally high temperature.

    A few traces of the great battle that had once taken ce here remained. The fractured walls and broken ravines seemed to describe the story of what once happened here.

    On this day, the valley was no longer silent still. Rumbles came from the depths of its ground, as though an ancient beast was about to emerge from it. Long fissures were torn wider and wider by seemingly incorporeal hands. Even the yuan of fire underneath this ce of extreme fire seemed to have been ignited as the temperature inside the valley rapidly soared.

    A blurry streak of a human figure was rapidly moving inside the valley. Brilliant rays would constantly erupted from this figure, pulverizing steel-hard rocks to leave imprints after imprints on the ground.

    The shadow trail was as though an artist painting his masterpiece. As he rapidly moved about, a bizarre transformation had unwittingly ured to the valley. If someone were to look down from mid-air, they would discover that the channels, holes, and rocks inside the valley had pieced together to form an astonishing, gigantic painting of a soaring dragon!

    As electrical sparks shot out, some unknown substances became part of the gigantic artwork, turning into pigments for the painting.

    The ground was still rumbling at this moment. After executing a series of maneuvers, that blurry figure that had been shuttling crisscrossed in the valley finally stomped on a boulder at the center with great momentum.

    A rumble reverberated through the valley as though a volcano had erupted.

    Apanying the deafening rumbling, the skeleton of an enormous dragon as white as snow slowly emerged from the fissures that tore the ground of the valley. Its dragon head, body and tail all perfectly fitted in into that drawing of a dragon. As the dragon skeleton floated up, an even louder rumbling came from deep underground. The ce of extreme fire, which had existed for who-knew-how-long and nurtured the treasure of fire attribute, boiled over in an instant. Scorching magma overflowed and immersed that dragon skeleton.

    All of a sudden, that human figure standing proudly in mid-air started pouring an unending stream of assorted substances into the magma. Among them were some colorful bright rocks, pungent, viscous fluids, and many more light rays containing exotic energies.

    The magma that oozed from the ce of extreme fire was iparably hot. It melted substances of all sorts and dissolved them into the skeleton. That huge skeleton of dragon at the center of the valley actually started to glimmer with a dazzling luster, as though the bones of varied thickness possessed the toughness of diamonds.

    Buckets and buckets of fresh blood were then copiously poured down by the mysterious figure. When the reeking fresh blood fell on the dragon, fizzing sounds could immediately be heard, apanied by thick smoke.

    The next moment, a bizarre scene unfolded. Those buckets of blood began to wiggle and wrap around the dragon skeleton as though they gained a life of their own. Blood vessels seemed to reconstruct themselves.

    After pouring down numerous buckets of fresh blood, the figure suddenly flew over to the head of the dragon and injected a lump of bizarre misty gas into the dragon¡¯s skull.

    A bloody light veiled that originally lifeless skeleton and it slowly began to wriggle about!

    However, after just a short while, the dragon skeleton stopped wriggling and the squirming bloody lines stopped growing. A huge bloody cocoon wrapped the skeletonpletely as it awaited rebirth.

    It was only at this moment that the figure who had been busying all the while heaved a long sigh of relief. He shot out a stream of blood from his finger to the bloody cocoon.

    The stream of blood that fell on the bloody cocoon was like water droplets falling into the sea, yet it caused not the slightest ripple. At the same time, the lifeforce of the dragon wrapped in bloody cocoon grew more and more vigorous. It started sinking deep into the ground bit by bit to silently undergo metamorphosis.

    Even as hepleted all the necessary procedures, Han Shuo did not rx by the slightest. He calmly observed the transformation to Gilbert¡¯s body while trying tomunicate with Gilbert¡¯s soul using his consciousness and the connection between the two.

    ¡°Gilbert, are you awake?¡± Han Shuo transmitted with the energy of his consciousness firmly locked onto that soul inside the skeleton.

    Han Shuo waited and waited for some sort of acknowledgement until suddenly, a weak response carrying some amazement came inquiring from the soul, ¡°Master, is that you?¡±

    Han Shuo drew a smile on his face. When he received the response from Gilbert¡¯s soul, he was genuinely relieved. As long as the soul could respond, everything would be in Han Shuo¡¯s control. This also meant that Gilbert¡¯s soul had acquired a connection with the new body that was still iplete. With this, the steps toe would be much easier to carry out.

    ¡°It¡¯s me! Fortunately, fortunately, my hard work has not been in vain. It appears that there¡¯s no problem overall,¡± although Han Shuo was gratified in his heart, his consciousness simply could not rx.

    ¡°Wahaha... I¡¯m alive... I¡¯m alive again... This is brilliant!¡± although the message was still weak, Gilbert¡¯s excitement nheless tranted very clearly. ¡°Master, what should I do next?¡±

    ¡°Make the most of your time. In this period, rapidly adapt and familiarize your soul with the feeling and senses of your new body. Before the cocoon breaks, you mustprehend the energy contained in every piece of your bones in ordance with the memories I left for you. Most importantly, you need to employ all your intelligence to attempt to dissipate the divine energy inside the fragments of divine essence of darkness scattered in your skeleton. If you can do that, your body will contain the divine energy of darkness. Although not a lot, if you are to carefullyprehend it, you wille to understand its presence and how to obtain it. This will build a solid foundation for you to be a god of darkness!¡± Han Shuo calmlymanded.

    ¡°Understood, master. To be stronger, I, Gilbert, will surely make good use of this opportunity!¡±

    ¡°Very good. I¡¯ve investigated intensively beforeing to this clever idea of forcing small bits of the divine essence of darkness into your body. I hope that you will live up to my expectations. As long as you grasp onto this opportunity andprehend the presence and methods of using the divine energy, your path to bing a god will certainly not be too far away!¡±

    ¡°I will try it immediately,¡± Gilbert obviously understood just how great and special an opportunity it was toe by. After finishing those words, Gilbert took the initiative to cut offmunication with Han Shuo. As his body slowly sank deeper into the ground, he concentrated hisplete attention onto his new body.

    Han Shuo felt gratified to see Gilbert being so assiduous. Gilbert must have deeply recognized the importance of strength. Back then, in order to rescue his grandfather and the race of dark dragon, Gilbert and Han Shuo had to hurry to this ce of extreme fire to obtain the scorching energy contained here. However, as Gilbert did not have sufficient strength, he burned his life force in exchange for a boost in his flying speed beyond what his body could endure. He ended up losing his life in precisely this valley of mes.

    For the past few years, Gilbert, with only his soul left, had truly tasted the bitterness of being in solitude. He had stayed inside the perpetually dark Soul Ring all that while, constantly tempering his soul using the method imparted by Han Shuo. Through his tenacious willpower, he had cultivated his soul to the degree where he could possess another body.

    It was precisely because of this that he understood what greater strength would mean for him. He had abandoned his vainglorious attitude and pressed ahead in pursuing greater strength! As this was the most critical moment for Gilbert, Han Shuo dared not to be anywhere far from him. He found a boulder nearby and sat cross-legged on it, silently protecting Gilbert while resting to regain the demonic yuan he had exhausted.

    At this time, his avatar had arrived at Lancelot Empire¡¯s Ossen City from Brettel City via transportation matrix.

    There weren¡¯t many changes to Ossen City¡¯sndscapespared to five years ago. The only difference was in the crowd that came and went. No matter if it wasmoners or soldiers, they seemed tock the usual cheerfulness and gaiety. In fact, their faces were dark, solemn, and heavy.

    Lancelot Empire wasn¡¯t in an encouraging situation. It had to face the reckless assault from the kingdom of orcs on the southern border while Kasi Empire, backed by the Shrine of Ice, came pushing in from its west. There had been countless big and small battles during the past several years. The people of Lancelot Empire hade to recognize the cruelty of war. In addition to Lancelot Empire not being the victor of those battles, it was only natural that the popce would feel terrified and scared.

    After five years, Han Shuo¡¯s three women had be the most attention-catching women in the whole of Lancelot Empire, owing to their unordinary backgrounds and their position on the correct side during the civil war.

    Emily became a high-level leader of the Dark Mantle, wielding control over Lancelot Empire¡¯s covert forces. She was the youngest dark sacred magus in Lancelot Empire.

    Phoebe too had be the youngest sacred swordmaster in the empire. As the owner of the Boozt Merchant Guild, she possessed the greatest wealth in the empire.

    Fanny, the Dean of Necromancy at Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, was herself a necromancy grand magus. She had a terrifying father behind her back.

    These three women had always been in the limelight throughout the Lancelot Empire. During the five years that Han Shuo had disappeared, an innumerable amount of young, handsome, talented men had tried pursuing them. They didn¡¯t at all mind the obvious fact that the three already belonged to Han Shuo. They would even gue the three through various means with the pretext that Han Shuo had died.

    But in fact, all these were because of thedies¡¯ current positions and power, not to forget their unusually close friendship with Lawrence, the King of Lancelot Empire!

 Chapter 589: He Has Returned!

    GDK 589: He Has Returned!

    Lancelot Empire. Inside Bootz Merchant Guild.

    In a region of artificial mountains overgrown with vinesid an elegant pavilion,plete with a small bridge over a stream of flowing water. The fragrances of flowers and nts filled the air. It was a serene and beautiful scene.

    Phoebe, in a in white gown, was sitting and swaying on a swing. Her beautiful face was downcast with sorrow. After five years, time had not left any traces on her face. On the contrary, she seemed to have only grown more beautiful and distinctive.

    Whenever shepleted her tedious work, she would routinely stare nkly at the small crack in the artificial mountain, with her mind unwittingly recalling the scene a few years back.

    In that narrow crevasse, two persons once squeezed through skin to skin, so close that each other¡¯s scents whiffed into their noses and they could even feel each other¡¯s hearts beating...

    Even after all those years, the scene was still as vivid in her mind as it had been in the moment!

    A round of rapid footsteps approached. When Fabian saw the dazed Phoebe lost in thought, he sighed to himself before asking gently, ¡°Miss, thinking about him again?¡±

    ¡°Oh, you¡¯re here,¡± Phoebe put on an apologetic smile after waking up from her trance. She then pointed at a chair beside her and said, ¡°Have a seat.¡±

    Fabian casually sat down at Phoebe¡¯s gesture. He felt somewhat worried to see the weariness lightly visible on Phoebe. After some hesitation, he carefully said, ¡°That crown prince of Ang Empire came over again.¡±

    Phoebe, who was still gazing at the artificial mountain ahead, showed vexation on her charming face as soon as she heard those words. She bunched her brows and impatiently said, ¡°Can this guy be any more irritating? How many times have I said it to him, why is he stilling?¡±

    Fabian frowned, thinking that Phoebe ought to know his purpose foring here. After another moment¡¯s hesitation, Fabian exined, ¡°Beforeing over, Prince Hagrid visited the imperial pce and met with Lord Karel.¡±

    Phoebe¡¯s face turned cold. She groaned and said, ¡°I¡¯ve made up my mind. No one can influence my decision, that includes those two.¡±

    Fabian¡¯s expression contorted even more even though he was somewhat admiring in his heart. He looked deeply at Phoebe and said, ¡°But, Lord Bryan hasn¡¯t shown up for five years. There are rumors out there that...¡± Fabian did notplete his sentence.

    ¡°That Bryan is dead?¡± Phoebe sneered and disdainfully continued, ¡°How could Bryan be dead? He only went cultivating. Don¡¯t listen to their nonsense!¡±

    ¡°But, it¡¯s the Church of Light that put out the information. Even the Pope of the Church of Light himself authenticated it...¡± Although unwilling, Fabian said it as it was.

    ¡°So what? The Pope of the Church of Light can¡¯t tell lies?¡± Phoebe, having cultivated to the realm of sacred swordmaster, became much more refined in her conducts. However, every time anyone raised this subject to her, she would behave rather abnormally.

    Disarrayed footsteps pattered outside. Soon, a party of people came into view. The party was headed by a man around the age of thirty. He looked outstanding, mature, and dependable. There was an intense air of nobilitying from his body. Obviously, he was one of eminent status.

    Following behind him were two grand magi, one great swordmaster, three archmages, and two earth riders. They were all in sumptuous clothing and looked at this man withplicated emotions.

    Phoebe, however, revealed an obvious feeling of loathing in her eyes as soon as she saw him. In a cold voice, she said, ¡°Prince Hagrid, why are you here again?¡±

    ¡°We will return to our home country soon. I specifically came to you to discuss some of the details of the bteral trade agreement between our two countries. I truly can¡¯t be at ease without straightening out the details!¡± Hagrid said as he looked at Phoebe, not concealing the fervent ze in his eyes by the slightest.

    ¡°We will talk about this after meeting with His Majesty tomorrow. I don¡¯t like people disturbing me in my personal time,¡± Phoebe replied impatiently as she was aware of his true intentions. She leaped down from the swing and a fierce aura naturally emanated from her.

    The crowd behind Hagrid clearly sensed the auraing from Phoebe and instinctively assumed their positions to protect their master.

    Hagrid stared at Phoebe¡¯s back like a fool. It was when Phoebe was about to disappear from his view that he cleared his throat and said hastily, ¡°I¡¯ve already discussed with the king of your distinguished country. Miss Phoebe will need only deal with some of the minor particrs.¡±

    Paying no attention to whether Phoebe was listening or not, Hagrid stated the details of the trade agreement in rapid session.

    After listening to Hagrid¡¯s machine gun lines, Phoebe¡¯s face suddenly jolted. She stopped walking, dazed for a moment, looked at Hagrid with puzzled eyes, and asked, ¡°Have you lost your mind?¡±

    It wasn¡¯t just Phoebe. Even Fabian beside her and the few bodyguards beside Hagrid were in disbelief.

    ¡°Your Highness, are you mistaken? To charge the Bootz Merchant Guild only ten percent tariff on that harbor, how could it be so low?! Your Highness, if we are to be so rxed with Bootz, other merchant guilds will surely be discontented. It¡¯s very hard for us to justify for this arrangement!¡± one of the swordsmen rebutted.

    Fabian the senior businessman of Bootz Merchant Guild, could not contain the excitement in his heart. He cried, ¡°This is great! Prince Hagrid is truly generous!¡±

    Phoebe let out a soft sigh as he looked at Hagrid, whose eyes were glowing with fire. She did not expect that to win her over, this man would actually te up the interests of his own country. If the trade agreement were to be carried out as such, although Hagrid was the crown prince of Ang Empire, the king of Ang Empire would be furious just the same. To think that he would take things to this end just to woo her, even Phoebe was somewhat touched.

    However, Phoebe remained cold and unkind towards Hagrid. Contrary to Fabian¡¯s expectations, she bluntly rejected, ¡°No. Our Bootz Merchant Guild has no intention of taking that kind of advantage. Charge us the same tariff you charge other merchant guilds.¡±

    ¡°Miss!¡± Fabian was rmed and hastily tried to persuade Phoebe otherwise.

    ¡°Cut it out. Out Bootz Merchant Guild has and will always do things fair and square,¡± without letting Fabian finish his words of persuasion, in a somewhat exhausted expression, Phoebe turned to Hagrid. She sighed before saying, ¡°Your Highness, let me advise you to stop wasting your time. I will categorically reject all your advances. It¡¯s been rather unpeacefultely. Take care and have a safe journey home.¡±

    Hagrid was disheartened upon hearing those words. In a grimace, he questioned, ¡°Why? Why do you have to do this to me? This person has been dead for five years, and the matter has persisted for far longer. Why can you still not forget him? What¡¯s so good about him? How can a mere city lordpare to me? Ang Empire will be mine in the near future. I can provide you with everything he could and more. Just give me one chance!¡±

    ¡°This has nothing to do with benefits!¡± Phoebe said as she looked at Hagrid somewhat pitifully. After a short pause, she coldly continued, ¡°You will never understand!¡±

    ¡°I understand! How could I not understand?¡± Hagrid seemed to have forgotten his manners and made a racket as he stared fixedly at Phoebe. His voice gradually grew higher and higher as he said, ¡°Even though you love him, he is already dead. It¡¯s been five years. You should have walked out from his shadows right? Even if you haven¡¯t yet, I can wait for you. One year, or even ten years, I¡¯m willing to wait for the day you approve of me.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, but if you really want to wait, you can wait till your death!¡± Phoebe knew that this man was unredeemable. Although she was somewhat touched by his actions, she remained staunch in her position and expressed it clearly.

    ¡°It doesn¡¯t make sense! Don¡¯t tell me that you want to live the rest of your life alone for a dead man?!¡±

    ¡°This has nothing to do with you,¡± Phoebe¡¯s face only grew colder. She was rather irritated and so she waved her hand and said to Fabian beside her, ¡°Please send His Highness out.¡± Afterward, Fabian bowed ceremoniously, pointed at the exit in a manner conforming to etiquette, and coldly said, ¡°Your Highness, honored guests, that way to the exit.¡±

    Deep in Fabian¡¯s heart, he too wished not to see his miss perform any action of betrayal to a person, even when the person seemed to be dead.

    Hagrid looked furiously at Phoebe, but in the end, he helplessly sighed. Looking at Phoebe¡¯s ice-cold back, in a deep and low voice, he said, ¡°I will still wait for you, I will wait until you forget him.¡± Upon finishing those words, Hagrid waved his hand feebly and started walking out with his men.

    It was at this moment, yet again, that a sound of hurried footstep arrived. After just a short while, wearing a ck gown, Chester the bandit came into appearance. He first performed a bow at Phoebe and respectfully said, ¡°Miss Phoebe, Lord Emily has mail for you.¡±

    ¡°Hand it over,¡± Phoebe demanded as she held out a hand. Meanwhile, she muttered in a low voice, ¡°Ugh, it¡¯s been almost half a month since she came to visit me. What in the world could she be so busy with? What a heartless fe...¡±

    Phoebe casually tore open the envelope. Her lovable body quivered at first nce of its contents. Her fair white face was incredibly emotional and inconceivably rosy. The emotion on her face was sixty percent surprised, thirty percent hopeful, and ten percent shy. The Phoebe at this moment sent alluring beams of beauty all over, appearing to be beautiful beyond allprehension.

    Hagrid was immediately stupefied and his heart was crammed with question marks. Having pestered her for such a long time, Hagrid had never seen this kind of emotion on Phoebe¡¯s face. He was astounded with not a clue of what happened to Phoebe.

    Fabian stood very closely next to Phoebe. Out of curiosity, he turned his head to take a look. He discovered that there were only big three words beautifully written on the letter held in Phoebe¡¯s hand ¨C ¡®He has returned!¡¯

 Chapter 590: When Iâ€™m free, I will destroy the Church of Light!

    GDK 590: When I¡¯m free, I will destroy the Church of Light!

    Fabian was somewhat puzzled at first. But after a while, he was jolted by a sudden recollection. He seemed to be pleasantly surprised.

    ¡°Where is Emily?¡± Phoebe inquired with an urgent, quivering voice as she fixed her eyes on Chester. Anyone could tell that she was emotionally stirred up.

    ¡°Her Lordship has just returned from duty and is likely to be briefing certain matters at the headquarters at this moment,¡± Chester answered respectfully.

    ¡°Erm Hagrid, the matter is concluded as such. Please leave. I have some matters to attend to and will be making a move,¡± Phoebe said rapidly to Hagrid, nodding, and then no longer batting an eye at Hagrid or his men. She scurried towards the exit as though not willing to stay there for a moment longer. Then, as soon as she walked out the door, she yelled, ¡°Get me a horse!¡±

    Phoebe became hurried and anxious to leave immediately after receiving the letter from Emily, leaving behind the group of people to look at each other in dismay.

    Hagrid looked crushed. The shock and bewilderment could be seen in his eyes as he stared nkly at Phoebe¡¯s figure running further and further away.

    ¡°Goodbye,¡± Chester, having delivered the letter, said to Fabian. He bowed at Hagrid and silently left.

    Fabian remained deeply immersed in an unrestrainable feeling of delight long after Phoebe and Chester had left. The smile on his face could not be any brighter. It was obvious from his eyes that he was very emotional.

    ¡°Mister Fabian, what is actually going on?¡± Hagrid had obviously discovered the big smile on Fabian¡¯s face. He was incredibly puzzled and couldn¡¯t help but ask. After taking a deep breath to calm down his emotional mind, Fabian looked at Hagrid somewhat pitifully and smilingly said, ¡°If I guessed it right, the person that our miss has been waiting for all these years has returned!¡±

    ¡°Impossible, didn¡¯t he die long ago?¡± Hagrid¡¯s face suddenly transformed. Soon after, somewhat disappointed, he said, ¡°Information given by the Pope of the Church of Light cannot be wrong!¡±

    Fabian smiled and said rather proudly, ¡°Lord Bryan has a blessed life. It must be that the despicable scheme of the Church of Light against him had failed.¡±

    His face became as ashen as the dead. At this point, Hagrid knew that his stubborn pursuit of Phoebe had not one iota of hope. Phoebe had rejected him so resolutely when Han Shuo was still missing. And now that Han Shuo had returned, how would there be a chance for him to seed?

    Everyone was shocked to learn the news of Han Shuo¡¯s sudden reappearance. As Han Shuo walked down the path, all the members of Dark Mantle who know of his identity expressed their amazement and respect through their eyes. They passed on this astonishing information with each other through word-of-mouth.

    ¡°The legendary character of Dark Mantle has returned!¡±

    ¡°The pride of our empire has returned!¡±

    ¡°The mighty guardian has returned!¡±

    All those members of the Dark Mantle who had received the information were instantly filled with hope and expectation in their hearts. They were sincerely proud of Han Shuo.

    Five years ago, Han Shuo was the most eye-catching expert of Lancelot Empire. He defeated two sacred-grade experts at once, assisted His Majesty the King to his throne, brought order to Brettel City, and neutralized Stratholme the old monster from the seven grand duchies...

    Those widely spread but gradually forgotten folklores started making the rounds again due to Han Shuo¡¯s reappearance. All those people who knew of Han Shuo¡¯s return felt that his reappearance would bring new changes to the empire which had been going downhill for thest few years.

    Walking through the gazes of adoration and amazement, Han Shuo went to Candide, one of the three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle.

    Candide¡¯s sinister face was filled with disbelief and astonishment. Candide, who had be a dark sacred magus after five years, gaped at Han Shuo for a long, long while before he finally said in a deep voice, ¡°I thought you were dead!¡±

    Han Shuo chuckled before bluntly pulling a chair and sitting down. He looked giggly at Candide who was trying to hold back the excitement in his heart and said confidently, ¡°It¡¯s not so easy to kill me!¡±

    Candide nodded in agreement. This Candide who always gave off a sinister, cunning air revealed a hard toe by gratified smile on his face as he said, ¡°It¡¯s good that you¡¯ve returned. That¡¯s all that matters.¡±

    ¡°I have a rough understanding of the current situation within the empire. However, as for some of the more hidden matters, I still need to learn them from you,¡± Han Shuo said smilingly at Candide. He asked casually, ¡°Other than some the more obvious matters of the empire, is there anything rtively important to know?¡±

    ¡°You should be aware of the general situation of the continent,¡± Candide no longer regarded Han Shuo as one of his subordinates. He looked at Han Shuo and slowly exined, ¡°Our empire could be considered as rather stable. It¡¯s just that the people are rather terrified. On one hand, it¡¯s because of the crisis on the southern border. On the other hand, Kasi Empire is closing in. During the five years you disappeared, our empire reached an agreement with the Druidic Order to cooperate. They had yed a rather significant role in the battle.

    Anyway, your three women are dazzling characters in Lancelot Empire nowadays. Their pursuers could be found everywhere. Even when the Church of Light stated clearly that you were eliminated, the three wouldn¡¯t ept their words and persistently awaited your return. Young man, what kind of spell did you cast on them huh?¡±

    Candide tirelessly exined some of the things that happened in the past five years to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo felt rather guilty towards Emily, Phoebe, and Fanny. He was touched when he heard those words from Candide. Five years was quite a long time, especially when the Church of Light had been publicizing his own death. The bonds between them were stronger than Han Shuo had expected given that the threedies had been waiting for him from start to finish.

    ¡°Congrattions, you have be a sacred magus,¡± Han Shuo smilingly and sincerely congratted Candide aftermenting in his heart.

    ¡°This was all thanks to you. If it wasn¡¯t for that notebook you gifted me back then, how could I possibly havee toprehend the true essence of the elemental energy of darkness, attaining this new realm in just a short few years?¡± Candide open-heartedly admitted that it was all because of Han Shuo¡¯s assistance as he grinned at Han Shuo.

    ¡°These are the fruits of your own hard work,¡± Han Shuo did not im credit for himself. Heughed, ¡°However, a dark sacred magus is merely the starting point up thedder of strength. There¡¯s still a long path ahead.¡±

    Candide put away his smile, took a quick nce at Han Shuo, and said gravely, ¡°Why isn¡¯t there the aura of a necromancering from your body, but an intense killing intent? What actually happened back there?¡±

    ¡°Nothing much. The Church of Light schemed against me with their shameless methods. Hehe, they thought I was dead long ago. But I¡¯m lucky. Not only did I not die, I had a fortuitous encounter,¡± Han Shuoughed deceptively as the desire tomit massacre glowed brightly from his eyes.

    ¡°What realm are you currently at?¡± Candide solemnly asked after staring at Han Shuo for a long while.

    Han Shuo shrugged and said rxedly, ¡°When I¡¯m free, I will destroy the Church of Light! By then you will know what realm I¡¯m at!¡±

    That confidence that Han Shuo emanated as these incredibly arrogant words came out from his mouth left Candide bbergasted. After staring nkly for a long while, Candide finally forced a smile and shook his head. He advised, ¡°From the boldness of your words, I know your strength must have soared. However, the Church of Light is the most influential religious organization on Profound Continent. No matter how mighty you are, that is impossible to aplish with the strength of just one man. The days ahead are long. Take it step by step.¡±

    Han Shuo smiled nonchntly and did not reply. It was as though wrecking the number one religious organization on Profound Continent was an insignificant, trivial matter.

    After the two chatted for a while, Han Shuo smilingly said, ¡°Emily has just returned,¡±

    ¡°Go see her then.¡± When Han Shuo got up, Candide thought for a moment and said, ¡°After you talk with Emily, you should go meet His Majesty. I believe he will be very delighted.¡±

    ¡°Got it,¡± Han Shuo said in a dashing smile and was ready to leave.

    ¡°Hold on,¡± Candide suddenly interrupted. He hesitated for a moment under Han Shuo¡¯s gaze before saying somewhat awkwardly, ¡°That, erm, although you have been away for five years, Brettel City has grown richer and more powerful. Even the former seven grand duchies could be considered as territories of Brettel City. Jack, Dorcas, and the rest of them are all your people, and will only listen to yourmand. It appears Brettel City has transformed into another country. Erm, His Majesty, after all, is the King. The empire hasn¡¯t been in a prosperous state these years. About that approach where your subordinates independently govern Brettel City, erm, that...¡±

    Han Shuo gestured with his hand to stop Candide¡¯s gibbering. He looked deeply at Candide and said kindly, ¡°Say no more. I know what to do.¡±

    Candide was relieved. He nodded and said, ¡°Very well. His Majesty the King could not be fully at ease when you were gone. But as you have now returned, he won¡¯t have to worry about that anymore. Yeah, His Majesty seemed to have be more and more convinced of the prophecy of Grace the astrologer. Simply put, the empire just doesn¡¯t thrive without you.¡±

    Han Shuo was dazed and thought about it for a moment. He truly admired the deceased astrologer. The prophecy she made right before her death was exceptionally urate.

    By now, Han Shuo had long been aware that the astrology that Grace cultivated was, in fact, the most mysterious energy among the four major edictal forces ¨C the edict of fate. However, Grace obviously did not gain a deep understanding of the subject. She could only predict a certain fate and did not even know the most fundamental method of utilizing the edictal energy of fate.

    Of the four major edictal forces ¨C fate, space, destruction, and life, it was rather rare to find people cultivating in the edict of destruction and life. The cultivators of the edictal forces of space and fate were even lessmon toe by. The reason for that was because these two edictal forces were simply too mysterious. Without the guidance of an expert, one would have no way of figuring out the cultivation method.

    ¡°Alright, Emily is here. I should go,¡± Han Shuo briskly left and headed towards Emily¡¯s room.

 Chapter 591: Reunion

    GDK 591: Reunion

    ¡°How could you leave me for such a long time?¡± Emily said emotionally as she tightly embraced Han Shuo with all her strength after throwing herself into his arms.

    Having received Han Shuo¡¯s nourishment and transformed by the Rebirth Pill, Emily¡¯s skin became fairer and more tender. It was as though she had grown younger in those five years. She had risen to be a dark sacred magus. A mysterious, charming quality naturally emanated from her body. Her fiery eyes that gazed at Han Shuo were radiating soul-hooking beauty.

    Gently patting on Emily¡¯s back, Han Shuo too was feeling very emotional. He put on a tender face and softly consoled her.

    ¡°Where have you been all these years? The Church of Light said you were dead. We were very worried for so long, no clue if you were alive or dead...¡± Although Emily, Phoebe, and Fanny scoffed at the Church of Light¡¯s statement in the public, in their hearts, however, they were extremely distressed. Now that she was in Han Shuo¡¯s arms, she finally stopped feigning grit and revealed her weak side.

    ¡°Don¡¯t cry, don¡¯t cry!¡± Han Shuo tenderly soothed Emily in his embrace. His heart was crammed with remorse.

    While Han Shuo consoled her, hasty, disordered footsteps approached, as though unwilling to wait a second longer.

    Two charming faces stained with tears simultaneously fell into Han Shuo¡¯s sight. Phoebe and Fanny arrived hand in hand. When their eyes saw the tall silhouette, they couldn¡¯t move their gazes away.

    At the next moment, the two were in the air and soaring towards Han Shuo, throwing themselves at Han Shuo¡¯s chest. Fanny hugged Han Shuo by the crook of his arm and softly sobbed. Meanwhile, Phoebe hammered on Han Shuo¡¯s chest with her fists. She seemed to be relieving her emotions of seeing Han Shuo again in this way.

    Just like Emily, Phoebe and Fanny had somehow be more and more beautiful. Owing to their great leap in strength, a stern and imposing quality naturally emanated from their bodies.

    The three women who received the most public attention in Lancelot Empire were all weeping before Han Shuo at this moment, expressing the excitement in their hearts through their own unique ways.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart ached a little as he looked at his three women. The scenes of their past activities vividly reyed in his mind. He was inexplicably sorrowful...

    ¡°Alright alright, I have returned, haven¡¯t I?¡± Han Shuo wiped away the tears on their faces, flustered. He smiled and said, ¡°If those handsome, young, talented men of Lancelot Empire knew that the three of you invible goddesses actually have such a weak side as you do now, who knows what would be running through their minds!¡±

    After fiercely pounding Han Shuo, Phoebe resentfully red at Han Shuo and furiously said, ¡°What have you been doing thest five years? Why there hasn¡¯t been a peep of news from you? Didn¡¯t you know how worried we were?¡±

    Han Shuo forced a smile and nodded. He reached out to straighten out the messy hair above Phoebe¡¯s forehead and helplessly said, ¡°There¡¯s nothing I could do about it. I was countless material nes away. It¡¯s impossible to transmit any message to any of you!¡±

    Upon hearing those words, thedies were shocked more than they were sentimental. Their bright eyes lit up as they simultaneously cried out, ¡°What?!¡±

    ¡°Five years ago, I was schemed against and fell into another material ne. In that material ne, I had to go through many trials and tribtions before finally finding a way home,¡± Han Shuo slowly exined.

    ¡°What exactly happened?¡± Even the experienced and knowledgeable Emily couldn¡¯t be more astonished by Han Shuo¡¯s words. Her umber brows were slightly trembling as she anxiously asked.

    ¡°It¡¯s a long story!¡± Han Shuo began to narrate a brief course of events to these three women who were in such intimate proximity to him.

    As his experiences were overwhelmingly thrilling and exciting, and all threedies cared deeply about him, even though Han Shuo wasn¡¯t a storyteller with marvelous y of words, the three listeners were taken on an emotional roller coaster. They would be exhrated at one moment but absolutely frightened the next. Myriads of emotions appeared on their faces.

    ¡°The Church of Light is just shameless and despicable!¡± Phoebe was enraged. She clenched her teeth and said fiercely, ¡°We want revenge!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, their days are numbered,¡± when recalling the past events, Han Shuo too found it hard to repress the wrath in his heart. He said coldly, ¡°Not just the Church of Light, but even that Primordius Dragon will suffer the price for his conducts and deeds!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, you, you said you have be a god?¡± Emily was stunned by thatst sentence of Han Shuo¡¯s and gazed at him, shivering.

    Han Shuo put on a dashing smile and proudly answered, ¡°That¡¯s right. Profound Continent may be big, but I reckon that there aren¡¯t many existences here who could stop me.¡±

    Han Shuo had in fact been rather modest in his remarks. Given his current strength, he was basically unchallengeable on Profound Continent. Be it the Church of Light or the Shrine of Ice, those organizations were nothing in his eyes. Based on his understanding of the Profound Continent, that Primordius Dragon he once met in the depths of the Dark Forest ought to be the mightiest being on Profound Continent.

    However, the Primordius Dragon was merely a lowgod cultivating in earth elemental energy. Han Shuo, who owned three souls, could easily prevail against him with just the two of his lowgod avatars.

    Although the Profound Continent was big, it was yet extremely difficult to find an expert who could fight Han Shuo on equal footing!

    ¡°A god? What, what kind of a realm is that?!¡± Phoebe murmured and looked at Han Shuo in disbelief after recovering herself from rage.

    ¡°I, I can¡¯t believe it!¡± Fanny, tightly holding to Han Shuo¡¯s arm, had her beautiful eyes filled with intense amazement. She simply did not know what to do but to stare at Han Shuo.

    The reactions of the threedies were in fact within Han Shuo¡¯s expectations. With one thought, the Domain of Divinity was deployed. In an instant, the surrounding space around them was distorted by the edictal force of destruction and all elemental energies disappeared without a trace.

    ¡°What¡¯s happening, what¡¯s happening?!¡±

    ¡°Oh my god! My energy! I have no energy!¡±

    Before the threedies even reacted, loud shouts of panic rang outside. Those members of the Dark Mantle affected by the Domain all wore terrified faces, shouted without restraint, and made a racket.

    To all those who had any aplishment in their cultivation, the experience of discovering the energy they relied upon for survival had suddenly disappeared was beyond frightening. Even the Abyssal Demons who had frequently entered the Domains of Divinity of their former Demon Kings would still feel frightened to find themselves in one again, let alone these people who had only experienced this for the first time.

    ¡°This is the distinctive property of a Domain of Divinity. Against a god, those who haven¡¯t attained godhood, no matter their strength, would be dead without a doubt!¡± Han Shuo exined dly as he looked at thedies who were all extremely ufortable.

    ¡°That¡¯s terrifying!¡± the threedies were aghast. They had enjoyed powerful and prominent statuses in Lancelot Empire and felt as though they had suddenly turned intombs waiting to be ughtered, not an ounce of strength left. The feeling of helplessness and defeat rose in their hearts when they were inside the Domain.

    Han Shuo smiled and withdrew his Domain of Divinity. The elemental energy around them returned to normal.

    Immediately, the threedies sensed their energies had returned. They couldn¡¯t help but let out a sigh of relief. Their uneasy minds were calmed. The morous crowd of Dark Mantle members outside was rowdy with shock and astonishment, spiritedly discussing the strange phenomenon. Although some hypothesized that it was merely an illusion, the great majority of them understood it was nothing imaginary. Their boisterous discussions had led them nowhere near the actual answer.

    The threedies¡¯ gazes towards Han Shuo were filled with admiration and were greatly awed by the power Han Shuo demonstrated.

    Han Shuo put on a faint smile before withdrawing a piece of green crystal from his space ring. He took Fanny¡¯s hand and ced the crystal in her hand before saying in a deep voice, ¡°This piece of crystal contains a great amount of the element of death. I will teach you a method that will allow you to absorb the element of death from the crystal into your body. This will make you form the body of element and cause your strength to advance greatly.¡±

    This piece of death element crystal was what Han Shuo had previously obtained from the divine body of a basegod in Netherworld. That person¡¯s soul was stolen by Han Shuo and transformed into his avatar cultivating the energy of death. The essence of that basegod¡¯s physical body congealed to form this death element crystal.

    Back then, Han Shuo had gifted Phoebe with the divine weapon ¡®Starry Sky¡¯ and Emily with the Origin Crystal of Darkness. After five years, both Emily and Phoebe became sacred-grade experts. Among them, as Emily had repeatedly received wonderful treasures from Han Shuo, her strength advanced at an even more astonishing rate. Based on Han Shuo¡¯s observations, she was on the verge of breaking through to the realm of demigod.

    But Fanny did not receive any treasures from Han Shuo. Even the Origin Crystal of Death was given to Little Skeleton who also cultivated in the elemental energy of death. Therefore, she was still a mere necromancy grand magus at present.

    ¡°For, for me?¡± Fanny was extremely surprised. Her two hands were trembling as she held the green crystal, sensing the enormous amount of the elemental energy of death contained within. She was so happy and overjoyed at the unexpected gift that she was at a loss for words.

    Every cultivator would want to advance further. During these years, Fanny had always felt rather inferior when she saw Phoebe and Emily grow stronger and stronger but she couldn¡¯t catch up to them no matter how hard she tried. This made her very much frustrated.

    She is Han Shuo¡¯s woman too! She did not want to be any inferior to the others!

    However, as her aptitude in necromancy was limited,cking the guidance of a good mentor and not obtaining much benefit from Han Shuo, she hadn¡¯t been making significant progress.

    ¡°Of course it¡¯s for you!¡± Han Shuo affirmed. He then extended a hand and pressed it gently on her back. With his mouth ced next to Fanny¡¯s ear, he whispered, ¡°Listen and feel very carefully. This is a cultivation method for the body that originated in the Abyss realm. Try to master it. Once you¡¯ve absorbed the element of death in that piece of crystal, you will be able to form a body of element!¡±

 Chapter 592: I came back to help you take down this world in one go!

    GDK 592: I came back to help you take down this world in one go!

    It¡¯s very difficult for one to calm down once they have suddenly gotten the one thing they had been wishing for for a long time ¨C Fanny was in this position that very moment. First there was Han Shuo¡¯s return, then, it was the joy of learning that her strength would soon advance by leap and bounds. These made it absolutely impossible for Fanny to calm down.

    After trying for a while, Han Shuo discovered that Fanny¡¯s soul had been in an excited state all along and had no way of carefully sensing his actions. For theck of a better option, Han Shuo gave up. When he noticed Fanny growing more anxious, he said soothingly, ¡°It¡¯s okay. There¡¯s no need to rush this.¡±

    ¡°Yeah, just leave it for today. This wretch has returned in any case. There¡¯s plenty of time in the future,¡± Phoebe smilingly consoled Fanny.

    Something suddenly came to Han Shuo¡¯s mind and he took a quick nce at Phoebe and Emily. He noticed an unfeigned happiness on their faces. They were feeling happy for Fanny instead of being envious and discontented as he imagined.

    When he left Profound Continent, he knew that there were still some barriers between his threedies. He had even thought of excuses to cate his other twodies. To his surprise, the three actually got along very well. He certainly did not expect such behaviour.

    Emily¡¯s round eyes circled on Han Shuo¡¯s face and seemed to understand what was on his mind. She put on an adorable smile and said, ¡°You must be thinking that we would be jealous?¡±

    ¡°A little. I did not anticipate that your rtionships have be so close,¡± Han Shuo admitted with a doubtful face.

    ¡°You were gone for five years. During those long days, it was only by getting together and sharing with each other about our previous interactions with you that the three of us could feel your presence. In those five years, the three of us had to gather and meet every other day to get by. There were no longer any barriers or divisions between us,¡± Emily exined to Han Shuo, giggling.

    Phoebe too scowled at Han Shuo. As though wanting to demonstrate just how close she was to Fanny, she wrapped Fanny by her arm and red at Han Shuo as she said, ¡°Our rtionship is even more intimate than what we share with you!¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned for a moment before he cried out in surprise, ¡°Even more intimate? Could it be that you three have been doing a certain kind of activity while I¡¯ve been away?¡±

    Blushes immediately appeared on thedies¡¯ faces and they refuted at the same time, ¡°Of course not!¡±

    ¡°You wretch, what are you thinking?¡± Phoebe gave Han Shuo a fierce p. She blushed as she furiously said, ¡°We aren¡¯t as licentious as you are. However, that dark elf that you brought back did propose that to us.¡±

    ¡°Adele?¡± Han Shuo was rmed and angrily said, ¡°You did not let her have her way, did you?¡±

    ¡°Who is Adele?¡± Phoebe asked.

    ¡°She¡¯s that dark elf you mentioned. Her real name was Adele,¡± Han Shuo quickly exined before he hurriedly said, ¡°That woman is nothing good. Hell, the three of you are my women and no one other than me can touch you! Not even for another woman!¡±

    Emily creased her brows and solemnly replied, ¡°We did not do that! Although she imed to be your woman, her origins were vague and unknown. We have always been on guard against her,¡± after taking a short pause, Emily continued, ¡°She is an overly scheming person and would even do so towards her own people. We didn¡¯t like that and had only been feigning civility with her.¡±

    ¡°You definitely have a shrewd judge of character,¡± Han Shuo let out a sigh of relief and exined, ¡°That woman came to Brettel City with atrocious objectives and mucked around in my territory. The very first thing I did after returning was to kill her!¡±

    ¡°You killed her? How would you be so willing to kill such a beautifuldy?¡± Phoebe looked at Han Shuo up and down in a strange manner and doubted, ¡°You raped her before murdering her, didn¡¯t you?¡±

    Han Shuo was speechless.

    Han Shuo stared at Phoebe with a look on his face that was so clearly agitated by herments. He noticed that she had grown smarter and smarter. She actually made out what he had done back there in no time. As to cover up his acts, Han Shuo pretended to grieve bitterly and said, ¡°My God, Phoebe, how could your mind be so perverted? You might as well ask if I killed her before raping her. It took her a lot of effort just to kill me. Of course I cannot give her any chance of seeding.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, what really happened?¡± when Fanny heard that Adele had actively plotted to kill her man, she had not the slightest bit of sympathy towards Adele and even became rather angry.

    Naturally, Han Shuo would not divulge his crime of raping and murdering Adele. Instead, he used Adele of some vicious deed and dodged the matter.

    ¡°Alright alright, let¡¯s not talk about this anymore. That, erm, I¡¯ll take a trip to the pce to talk to Lawrence. I wille back for you all right after.¡± Han Shuo had proper businesses yet toplete. Even if it wasn¡¯t for Lancelot Empire, for all those people that he cared deeply about, Han Shuo would still lend Lawrence a helping hand.

    At this point in time, Han Shuo felt that Grace¡¯s prophecy truly was incredibly urate. It was because of his appearance that Lawrence could ascend to the throne and conquer the seven grand duchies. Later, when he disappeared, Lancelot Empire sank into a predicament. Now that he had returned, the Lancelot Empire was soon to see the return of its glory days.

    All signs had indicated that as long as he stayed in the Lancelot Empire, the empire would thrive and flourish! This was true to Grace¡¯s prediction word for word!

    The edict of fate is indeed a miraculous energy, Han Shuomented.

    ¡°Erm, we had waited for you to return for such a long time and it hasn¡¯t been easy. Can¡¯t you keep uspany for just a little longer?¡± All three of thedies had bitterness showing in their eyes when Emily said those words.

    ¡°We will have plenty of time in the future!¡± Han Shuo smilingly exined. Soon, after giving it a quick thought, he seemed to realize something from that bitterness shown by Emily. He forced a smile as he shook his head and said, ¡°I have exined already. This is not my original body. When ites to that matter... it¡¯s just not convenient!¡±

    Upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s reminder, the three immediately came to their senses. Knowing that Han Shuo had figured out the urge they had in their hearts, the three suddenly exchanged nces and immediately blushed. They bashfully shouted, ¡°Fine, off you go!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it. When my main body returns, I will feed you all until you are fully contented. We shall have an orgy again!¡± Han Shuoughed heartily andcently. His body then turned into a sh of light and disappeared from their sights.

    ¡°This wretch, such indecency!¡± Phoebe said furiously with rosy cheeks.

    After a short while, when she noticed that the other twodies were not talking, she couldn¡¯t help but gaze at Fanny and Emily in confusion. She noticed the two blushing, their bright eyes filled with amorous feelings, their tender bodies soft and powerless ¨C it was as though they were imagining some wonderful activity.

    ¡°You two little bitches in heat, just look at your aroused appearances right now. If those admirers were to see you right now, they would surely be so shocked that they get heart attacks,¡± with just one look, Phoebe knew what was on their minds and rebuked with a smile.

    ¡°Aren¡¯t you just the same? Look in the mirror before criticizing us. You aren¡¯t looking any better than we are!¡± Fanny rebuked as she giggled uncontrobly. The room was filled with joyous giggles. The worries that burdened them for thest five years ceased to exist any longer.

    ¡°Lord Bryan, you truly are a role model for us. You managed to subdue the three great goddesses of the empire and make them so docile!¡±

    ¡°You don¡¯t say? Lord Bryan is the legend of our Dark Mantle ¨C the pride of our empire! Only a character like his Lordship have the means of making the three goddesses of our empire capitte and willingly wait five long years for his return!¡±

    ¡°He must be a god!¡±

    Those members of the Dark Mantle who heard the melodiousughter were simply in awe of Han Shuo, worshipping him like the Almighty.

    Han Shuo effortlessly made it through theyers of defenses around the imperial pce of Lancelot Empire. He arrived at Lawrence¡¯s personal office room unimpeded and noiselessly.

    Compared to his former self, the Lawrence of that day appeared even more reliable. Although it was obvious from his face that he was exhausted, he still read and examined the documents with all his attention. He appeared so focused that it seemed he could do it continuously for years if no one disturbed him.

    Through Jack, Dorcas, and the enormous engine of the empire that was the Dark Mantle, Han Shuo learned that Lawrence was indeed a good emperor. For the past few years, Lawrence had deployed all his wisdom on the internal affairs of the country that returned spectacr results. Not a single citizen of the empire would dare deny Lawrence¡¯s contribution towards Lancelot Empire.

    Even as Lancelot Empire was confronted with violent assaults from the Kingdom of Orcs and Kasi Empire, under his guidance, the territories of his empire were still well defended and fortified. For this reason, even as the people of Lancelot Empire were rather fearful, they still had great confidence in the nation. The empire was astonishingly cohesive. Not even a single bout of civil unrest had broken out during his reign.

    These great feats were all of Lawrence¡¯s aplishments!

    After silently observing from a concealed spot, Han Shuo noticed a few strands of white hair near the back of Lawrence¡¯s head. He sighed, knowing that Lawrence must have been both mentally and physically exhausted these years in serving his empire.

    Standing in silence for a long while, Han Shuo gently cleared his throat.

    ¡°Who?¡± Lawrence said in a deep voice without raising his head.

    ¡°Long time no see,¡± Han Shuo said as he walked out from behind with a fat smile pped across his face. Lawrence¡¯s first reaction to that voice was to bunch his brows as though he was puzzled with hearing this voice that felt both familiar and unfamiliar. After pondering for a while with his brows knitted, his eyes widened and his jaw dropped halfway down his neck. He suddenly raised his head, turned around, and cried out in great delight, ¡°Bryan? Is that you?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s me! I¡¯m back!¡± Han Shuo replied, grinning. He took a short pause and put on a solemn face before he continued, ¡°Back to help you take down this world in one go!¡±

 Chapter 593:

    ¡®Came back to help you take down this world in one swoop!¡¯

    Although it was just one sentence, it had instantly lifted the King of Lancelot Empire from the immense worries that gued him for the past few years. Lawrence, gazing at Han Shuo who looked almost the same as he had when theyst met felt, for some reason, an indescribable confidence and trust towards him.

    It was as though as long as Han Shuo was in Lancelot Empire, there would be nothing that he and his country had to worry about!

    Even Lawrence had no idea what really made him feel this way; perhaps Han Shuo¡¯s actions a few years back, which authenticated the words of Grace the astrologer, or maybe the surprises Han Shuo brought him before he had even be a King!

    Confronted with the invasions from two powerful enemies that were the Empire of Orcs and Kasi Empire, Lawrence, as the ruler of his nation, had been racking his brain for a way to turn around this unfavorable situation. Unfortunately, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn¡¯t find an appropriate solution to neutralize these two significant menaces.

    It was at this moment that Han Shuo returned!

    Lawrence¡¯s face was instantly one in awe of what stood before him. Lawrence, who had always shown a mature and steady demeanor in the public, became so emotional that he was rather incoherent in his speech, ¡°You returned! This is wonderful! This is brilliant! That damned Pope of Light is indeed a despicable, vile character! Bryan, I have not failed you, I have not failed the people of my empire. Other than foreign threats, there¡¯s nothing that the Empire has to worry about!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded with a smile on his face. As his strength rapidly soars, his mind grew even more steady. With the realm he was currently at, naturally, he could tell that Lawrence had indeed said those words from the bottom of his heart. ¡°No need for these unnecessary words. I have clearly understood the great effort you have put in during these years beforeing to see you. I¡¯m here with the intention of helping you resolve your current troubles,¡± Han Shuo said in a deep voice.

    ¡°Good! Good! Good!¡± Lawrence shouted three times in a row before he heartilyughed, ¡°After five years, you have grown to be even more domineering! This is great! With you in Lancelot Empire, I can truly be at ease!¡±

    With one wave of HS¡¯s big hand, a chair distance away flew up and steadilynded behind him. He sat down in an unruffled manner. Then, looking at the emotional Lawrence, Han Shuo reclined to the back of his chair to getfortable before he indolently said, ¡°Although the current situation of the Continent appearsplicated, it was in fact, nothing more than struggles between those few major religions. The Church of Light and Shrine of Ice has enormous influences. Therefore, Oden Empire and Kasi Empire backed by the two had all the superiority.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right!¡± Before Han Shuo, not only that Lawrence did not disy that high and noble air that a monarch should have, he had even deliberately humbled himself in attitude. He furious said, ¡°At first, I did not believe that something as enormous as a nation could be swayed by a religious organization. But I was sadly mistaken. The presence of just one overwhelmingly powerful expert has an immeasurable effect on a religious organization as well as a country!¡±

    Han Shuo put on a smile after hearing Lawrence¡¯s words. He understood that Lawrence must have realized certain things during these few years. It appeared that the two demigod existences of the Church of Light and six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race allowed him to deeply understand the threat that an overwhelmingly powerful expert would pose to a nation.

    ¡°Ease up. From today onwards, those experts will not be able to pose us any threat, not anymore. Meanwhile, just like our previous conquest for the seven grand duchies, our Lancelot Empire will capture the entire Profound Continent in one swoop!¡±

    These words of Han Shuo¡¯s were not just resolute and decisive, they were incredibly bold! However, not only was Lawrence confident that Han Shuo was not just being ludicrous, he also felt an ineffable peace of mind and excitement.

    Han Shuo held up a finger and egotistically said, ¡°One month. In one month, I will sweep away all the experts of hostile religions for you!¡±

    Those words, even for Lawrence who hadplete confidence in Han Shuo, were just too much to swallow. It¡¯s not that he didn¡¯t believe Han Shuo was mighty, but he understood the terror in the strength possessed by those enemies Han Shuo would be up against, and one month¡¯s time was just too short!

    Han Shuo¡¯s assertion that he would sweep all the experts working for religions hostile towards Lancelot Empire off the Profound Continent, in the short time of just one month was pure madness, absolute insanity!

    Lawrence looked at Han Shuo rather doubtfully and said, ¡°Bryan, isn¡¯t one month a little too short? There¡¯s the Soul Race behind Brut Merchant Alliance, the sacred mountain of the Church of Light, the Ice...¡±

    ¡°No need for more words!¡± Han Shuo interrupted Lawrence¡¯s description. In a bossy and domineering manner, he exined, ¡°All you need to do is mobilize the full military might of the entire empire and pick up the pieces after me. In the future, there will only be one Empire on the Profound Continent, and it will be our Lancelot Empire!¡±

    When he was done, Han Shuo stood up from the chair and in spite of noticing that Lawrence wanted to speak, he said with a half-smile, ¡°If you trust me, get them ready!¡±

    ¡°Of course I trust you, but...¡± Lawrence was betweenughter and tears. He thought to himself, He hasn¡¯t changed much in appearance, but how has he be so insolent and domineering in character?

    ¡°Good then! We will execute this project in tandem. I will be the main assault force, you will be the auxiliary force. These will suffice!¡± Han Shuo delineated the mastern. With an unruffled smile, he said, ¡°Well, I should make a move now. I shall start with the Empire of Orcs at the southern border. Our Lancelot Empire¡¯s conquest for world domination has officially begun!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s body shot into a dark spot in the room like an erratic ghostly shadow and disappeared without a trace. Lawrence, who was looking at Han Shuo with his eyes wide open, felt as though he had simply fused into the darkness, not leaving a trace.

    ***The southern border of Lancelot Empire. South Border City.

    War and conflict had shrouded the South Border City. Ever since the Orcs Empire first started their violent assault two years back, it had endured a few dozen big and small attacks. Compared to the dabbles previously attempted by the Orc Empire, the orcs seemed to have all gone insane during thest two years. They hadn¡¯t simply gone insane, but they were unprecedentedly united and dedicated.

    During those two years, Firenze, known as the greatest military strategist of the empire,manding the Howling Legion ¨C the mightiest legion in the empire ¨C had been unyieldingly defending South Border City without cking for a moment. At the start of the war, not only could Firenze easily and skillfully secure the South Border City, he could also initiate offensive strikes, scoring a few victories.

    However, over time, the battalion of orcs assembled outside the South City Border grew everrger. They upied the wide expanse of in outside the city like densely packed locusts. They wouldunch round after round of wild attacks at South Border City in defiance of death.

    It was Firenze¡¯s military strategy against the Orc Empire, whose army outnumbered his greatly. As they were in ins, even Firenze dared not to venture out of the city walls to meet the orcs head-on. The army stationed to defend South Border City were slowly being exhausted in the rounds and rounds of vicious enemy bombardment.

    Simultaneously, Kasi Empire, over from the west, begun their ferocious invasion towards Lancelot Empire. The Imperial Army that had yet to recover from invading the seven grand duchies had a majority of them deployed to defend against Kasi Empire and therefore unable to replenish the South Border City with the troops it needed.

    The advantage isn¡¯t on Firenze¡¯s side. No matter how wonderful Firenze¡¯s military strategy was, without sufficient manpower resources, against the unending stream of attack from the Orc Empire, the South Border City had gradually grown weaker and weaker in strength.

    The military strength of South Border City was being shredded away in every battle. But fortunately, as the people at the south was as tough as nails, as Firenze have a majestic status in the southern border, as the virtuousness of King Lawrence had spread far and wide, many able-bodied males had taken the initiative to abandon their original career and dutifully enrolled to the army to defend their homnd from the invasion of Orc Empire.

    It was precisely for this reason that the South Border City could withstand two years!

    However, in the end, there would be a day that their limited manpower ispletely exhausted. A great portion of their able-bodied poption had been wiped out during the two years of resistant. Against the seemingly never-ending stream of orcs, as the innumerable casualties continued to climb, most people were in low spirits.

    Moreover, just the day before yesterday, the city gate was nearly breached. The South Border City was enveloped in an unprecedented panic!

    ¡°We are done for. No matter how brilliant Lord Firenze was, what could he do without military resources?!¡±

    He sighed, ¡°What should we do? His Lordship has been very good to us. His Majesty the King has been wise. I truly don¡¯t want to leave this ce I¡¯ve lived in since I was born! But, but I don¡¯t want to die either!¡±

    ¡°Go to Brettel City. It is said that in the whole of Lancelot Empire, only that city is safe! After all, that is Lord Bryan¡¯s city. Although Lord Bryan had disappeared for five years, His Lordship has a group of miraculous experts over there. It should be safe!¡±

    ¡°Sigh, I wish not to leave my hometown except at thest resort! Let¡¯s see how things go first. If it goes horribly wrong, to stay alive, we would have no choice but to travel thousands of miles and migrate!¡±

    Conversations simr to this had been floating around frequently during the recent period of hardship. With their lives in danger, they surely would make ns for themselves. Brettel City, which had been rtively peaceful and tranquil for thest few years and enjoyed rapid growth in military and financial resources, became the first choice for themoners to seek refuge.

    On this day, at a time when the people of the South Border City were frightened, the magical transportation matrix in the city that had not lit up for a very long time suddenly blossomed splendid brilliance.

    ¡°Eh? It¡¯s the youngdy, the youngdy has returned!¡± the chief of guards cried out in surprise and was extremely excited when he saw Fanny.

    ¡°Where¡¯s my father?¡± the no-nonsense Fanny straightforwardly asked with her brows knitted.

    ¡°His Lordship is on the city wall, reinforcing it along with themoners. Sigh, he¡¯s been up there for a full day and night!¡± The chief of guards seemed worried for Firenze.

    ¡°Come, let¡¯s go to my father!¡± Fanny pulled Han Shuo and flew straight towards the city wall.

    ¡°Who¡¯s that guy?¡± the chief of guards asked after staring nkly for a moment.

    ¡°No idea. I thought that Miss Fanny would reject all advances no matter how talented or handsome? Why would she change her mind all so suddenly?¡± Another knight was just as shocked.

    ¡°Lord Bryan disappeared for so many years. It appeared that even the youngdy had forgotten about His Lordship!¡±

    ¡°Sigh. Let it be. We are mere lowly troops, what for do we worry about this? However, the youngdy doesn¡¯t seem to be as loyal as we imagined,¡± he sighed again, ¡°no one stays good in this world... no one...¡±

    Their conversation gradually turned into silence.

 Chapter 594: Do you think of yourself as a god?

    GDK 594: Do you think of yourself as a god?

    South Border City. Its border wall was ravaged and riddled with holes.

    Smoke rose over a segment of the wall where a haggardly Firenze, military genius of the Empire, was directing the army-civilians to work. Sometimes he would even participate in the work directly, helping to move the massive rocks to repair the section of damaged wall.

    Firenze, busying himself in the crowd, was no longer as neat and tidy as he looked back in those years. His hair was messy. His armor covered in ayer of grayish sand andcking the usual gloss. If it wasn¡¯t for Han Shuo¡¯s extraordinary memory, it would have been very difficult to recognize him from the crowd and he be taken as somemoner who had passed his prime.

    The hard battle had brought on greater and greater pressure on the popce of the Southern Border. As the protector of the Southern Border, Firenze had endured far greater pressure than the rest!

    ¡°Father! Howe you have turned to this?!¡± a cry filled with sadness came from Fanny. She flew to Firenze¡¯s side in the blink of an eye. Tears started to umte in the rims of her eyes. It was as though they would overflow at any moment.

    ¡°Fanny, what are you doing at southern border?¡¯ Firenze was shocked in the best way possible to see his daughter. He shouted loudly in a smile and spread his arms to give Fanny a hug.

    However, Firenze suddenly froze rigid in his tracks as if he remembered something, wiped away the surprised smile on his face, and said gravely, ¡°What are you doing here? Didn¡¯t I send you letters telling you not toe? It¡¯s very dangerous here at the southern border. I don¡¯t want you to take unnecessary risks!¡±

    ¡°You are barely holding up, what do you worry about me for?¡± Fanny angrily shouted in her small voice. The tears flooding the rims of her eyes could finally no longer be contained. Two long trails of tears streamed down her fair, delicate face as she said, ¡°I know that you are concerned about me, but didn¡¯t you know that your daughter is just as worried for her father?¡±

    A trace of happiness andfort shed across Firenze¡¯s eyes, but he had concealed the feelings well. He pointed at Fanny and raised his voice, ¡°As the head of the Southern Border army, I must perform my duty even if I were to die fighting in this ce. But you are different. You are one of the most outstanding magi of the empire and also the Dean of Necromancy at the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, with the responsibility of teaching a lot of students. How could youe here to take unnecessary risks?¡±

    ¡°I came here as no one else but your daughter. I came to visit you because I¡¯m worried about you, that¡¯s all!¡± Fanny walked beside Firenze and in spite of Firenze¡¯s resistance, she helped to tidy up his messy hair. Then, before he burst into rage, she softly said, ¡°Besides, I didn¡¯te here alone.¡±

    ¡°Who did youe with?¡± Firenze stared nkly for a moment before turning his eyes to follow the direction of Fanny¡¯s gaze. Suddenly, his ghostly face jolted and he started to rain curses, ¡°You brat! It¡¯s really you! There hasn¡¯t been one single word of news about you for five years straight! Have you any idea just how difficult it¡¯s been for my daughter to wait for you? Wretch, how did you promise me at that time? How could you treat those women that loved you with such...¡±

    A torrent of curses gushed out from Firenze¡¯s mouth. His fiery temper immediately went out of control as soon as he saw Han Shuo. There was no sign that the bawling would stop.

    Han Shuo forced a smile. He felt both admiration and helplessness in the face of his father-inw¡¯s temperament. As his words were all facts, there was no way Han Shuo could find a single ground to refute. All he could do was let him vent the fury in his heart as much as he liked.

    ¡°?#?#$?!!...¡± string after string of explosive savagery fired from Firenze¡¯s mouth. Its might was indeed terrifying. After a while, seeing that there was still no indication that the bombardment would stop, Han Shuo formed a sound-istion field around him using his divine energy.

    Han Shuo had a smile on his face as he repeatedly nodded. He seemed to be conscientiously listening to Firenze¡¯s chiding and was exceptionally good in attitude.

    ¡°Brat! Don¡¯t think that you are off the hook just because of your good attitude!¡± after a lengthy round of verbal abuse, Firenze finally had no strength left. He red fiercely at Han Shuo and even made it clear that he wasn¡¯t done with Han Shuo just yet.

    Han Shuo, who had only smiled at Firenze despite being unable to hear his cursing, could sense from the fluctuation of Firenze¡¯s soul that the immense pressure in his heart had sessfully been vented through this round of verbal abuse. Although he appeared to be utterly exhausted from the bawling, Han Shuo knew that his mental state had indeed improved.

    After Firenze was done venting, Han Shuo first gave a fairly sincere apology before he unruffledly said, ¡°Let¡¯s not talk about personal matters for the time being. I havee here to lend you a hand ¨C to eliminate the threat of the Empire of Orcs!¡±

    ¡°What? Eliminate the threat of the Empire of Orcs? Have you be mentally-handicapped from being missing for too long?¡± After finally beginning to calm down, Firenze again started to jump up and down like ignited dynamite. His face reddened as he started to shout at Han Shuo and he looked at him as though looking at a lunatic.

    ¡°You heard me right!¡± Han Shuo said confidently, ¡°As I¡¯m here, the crisis faced by the Southern Border is as good as over.¡±

    ¡°Brat, you truly have gone mad. You think you are going up against one or two orcs? You think that merely with your powers alone, you could defeat an army of a few hundred thousands orcs? Do you think yourself a god?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s words had almost driven Firenze mad. Han Shuo¡¯s words were to him pure absurdity.

    ¡°Well actually, to most people, I am indeed a god!¡± Han Shuo said proudly.

    Firenze jumped as he fumed with rage. His face flushed with anger and pointed a finger at Han Shuo. His mouth gaped but before he could say anything, Han Shuo waved his hand to stop him from speaking and arrogantly chimed, ¡°No need for more words. Seeing is believing. You will soon witness with your very own eyes.¡±

    Not giving Firenze a chance to throw anymore insults, as soon as he said those words, Han Shuo swaggeringly climbed the air like steps and headed away from the city. In the puzzled gazes of the many army-civilians of South Border City, he flew towards the dense mass of orcs encampment ahead.

    ¡°Who¡¯s that guy? How dare he speak to Lord Firenze like that?¡± a muscr civilian asked in amazement.

    ¡°Lord Bryan! He is Lord Bryan! I have had the fortune to meet him when I served in Ossen City. There¡¯s no doubt about it!¡± imed a military officer who once participated in Lancelot Empire¡¯s civil war many years ago.

    The crowd was startled!

    All those army-civilians on the city wall who heard the cry of the military officer suddenly boil over. Cheers of pleasant surprise erupted from every corner of the city wall.

    ¡°Lord Bryan has appeared! The one who had challenged foreign experts and has never been defeated hase!¡±

    ¡°The South Border is redeemed! The situation at the Southern Border will surely take a turn for the better. Lord Bryan is the City Lord of Brettel City. If he is here, the Brettel City¡¯s Ironblood Legion must also be here!¡±

    ¡°Yea, that¡¯s right! The Ironblood is currently the strongest legion after the Howling Legion! Moreover, the legion hasn¡¯t been losing their fighters to wars. His emergence here will surely bring new hope to South Border City. Ha, we don¡¯t have to leave our hometown. Fantastic! This is fantastic!¡±

    Enthusiastic voices of discussion reverberated all around the city wall. Everyone who heard of Han Shuo¡¯s arrival was brimming excitement and joy and, for the first time in years, relief.

    ¡°This brat who is arrogant beyond cure actually makes all these people feel safe. Heh, let¡¯s see what they think when they see him being torn to pieces by the orcs. This wretch really doesn¡¯t know the limit to his abilities. He really thinks that he can save the situation just by himself? Resolving the crisis that we couldn¡¯t defuse for two years?¡± in a low voice, Firenze said to his daughter with his teeth gnashed.

    ¡°Perhaps? Nothing is absolute in this world!¡± Fannyughed with one hand covering her mouth. Soon after, as she rocked Firenze¡¯s shoulder, she lovably pleaded, ¡°Father, Bryan had been held up until now because he fell the Church of Light¡¯s scheme. Can you forgive him, please?¡±

    ¡°Of course not!¡± Firenze, in a straight face, red at Fanny furiously and chided her in a low voice, ¡°Did that wretch go mad as well? Why didn¡¯t you stop him from his reckless act? You little girl, how could you be so insensible?¡±

    Fanny groaned when she received that line of criticism from Firenze out of nowhere. Knowing that no words would convince him, Fanny decided not to exin any further but gazed at Han Shuo with glimmering eyes, waiting for Han Shuo to strike.

    ¡°Lord Bryan, Lord Bryan is actually charging at the Empire of Orcs!¡± Oh my god! Is Lord Bryan insane? That¡¯s an army of over hundreds of thousands of orcs!¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s going on with him? How could Lord Bryan be so senseless? Oh god, what should we do?¡±

    When the army-civilians on the city wall finally discovered the objective of Han Shuo¡¯s actions, they began to squirm. The mor on the city wall became ever louder and more chaotic.

    Just as everyone was being concerned for Han Shuo either secretly or overtly, a streak of bright light suddenly shed across the sky. An enormous bone dragon tore through the sky at the next moment. Riding on the bone dragon was an overlord of death with a demeanor of superiority over the entire world.

    Little Skeleton, wielding a long and narrow bone spur, quietly recited summoning chants. The little lowgod cultivating in the elemental energy of death had shown enormous improvement in necromancy magic.

    In the attentive gazes of the crowd, thousands upon thousands of undead creatures appeared from the bright shes in the sky. They arranged themselves into neat and tidy lines before marching towards to Empire of Orcs in an organized fashion.

    Bright shes continued to light up the sky. The element of death was intense. Summoned by Little Skeleton, hordes of undead creatures gushed from the Netherworld and theypletely upied several expansive fields in just a short moment!

 Chapter 595: Shock and Awe

    GDK 595: Shock and Awe

    In just a brief while, a swarm of undead creatures appeared outside of South Border City. After bing a god, Little Skeleton obviously saw a rapid improvement in strength. Unwittingly, he had be extremely adept in manipting the elemental energy of death. Perhaps the gravestone on his chest had somehow enlightened him.

    An enormous number of undead creatures crossed-over from the Netherworld one after another. At Little Skeleton¡¯smand, they arranged themselves into orderly lines and charged to the orc army encampment. The field outside of the South Border City seemed to have turned into the unholynd of the Netherworld in just a few moments. The element of death gathered intensely at this ce under the effect Little Skeleton¡¯s Domain of Divinity, providing the enormous number of undead creatures with an unending stream of energy.

    Those army-civilians observing from the top of the border wall were allpletely thunderstruck. These people knew that Han Shuo was a mighty necromancer, but nheless, they were shocked to see the scene of such a terrifying army of undead appearing before their own eyes.

    There were densely packed undead creatures as far as the eye could see. Even the sky seemed to be shaded by these unholy creatures. Their momentum was bloodcurdling as they fiercely charged at the orc army encampment.

    ¡°Unbelievable! How could Lord Bryan be so terrifying!¡±

    ¡°Good gracious! So many undead creatures! So it turns out that necromancy magic can actually be incredibly powerful when cultivated to such great heights!¡±

    ¡°We are redeemed! Haha, now these damned orcs will suffer for their actions!¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s going on? He¡¯s so powerful!¡± Firenze was obviously also shocked and rather hastily inquired Fanny beside him.

    ¡°I, I am not too sure either. I did not expect the realm he¡¯s in to be so terrifying!¡± Fanny, as someone who also cultivated in necromancy magic, naturally understood the fact that each undead creature consumed some mental strength of its summoner. She simply could not imagine just how much mental strength was needed in order to summon the thousands upon thousands of undead creatures assembled outside the South Border City.

    ¡°Fanny, how is it that this kid has suddenly reappeared? Do you know where he¡¯s been these five years?¡± Firenze was suddenly extremely interested with Han Shuo¡¯s previous disappearance. He indeed was awed when he witnessed Han Shuo had yet again obtained an inconceivable increase in strength.

    ¡°I¡¯m not too sure. But I do know that he came to assist the Southern Border as soon as he returned,¡± Han Shuo¡¯s journey at the Abyss realm was simply too unimaginable. Those ordinary people whose strength had yet to reach a certain realm might not even believe the story. Therefore, Fanny decided not to disclose it to her father.

    ¡°Hmph, at least he still has some conscience!¡± Firenze groaned after listening to Fanny¡¯s words. His tone had obviously be much more moderate.

    ¡°Look! The fight has begun!¡± a joyous shriek sounded from the top of the border wall.

    When the crowd looked ahead, they discovered that the army of undead creatures which had covered all visible ground had finally made physical contact with the orcs. Dark clouds made up of gargoyles dove downwards along with several wingless bone dragons that carried an enormous amount of the element of death. On the ground were legions of undead creaturesprised of old fey zombies, bone demons, mummies, evil knights, hate warriors, and zombie warriors headed by Skeleton Kings and King Zombies.

    At this moment, there was still a steady stream of undead creatures appearing along with bright shes in the sky, adding to the already enormous army of undead.

    Therge scale invasion of the sinister undead creatures immediately caused the army of orcs great surprise. After a long, ring battle horn sounded, all the orcs were roused. The orcs at the frontline were already fighting with the undead creatures rapidly charging over. Those orcs further back had no idea what was actually happening. They grabbed their weapons and asked those around them what was actually happening in their oguage.

    Several mighty orc shamans, upon seeing the gargoyles pouring down, hastily took into the sky. Riding on strange beasts they formed contracts with, they recited the unfathomable ancient oguage, forming all sorts of barriers that would defend their fellow orcs.

    It was at this moment, Han Shuo, who was motionless after summoning Little Skeleton from the Netherworld, suddenly transformed into a gigantic bloody awl that shot towards the army of orcs.

    Midway through his flight, this avatar of Han Shuo¡¯s transformed to its original form. A longsword glistening with bloody light was drifting along with bloody waves. Energy simr to the energy of destruction enveloped the entire battlefield in an instant. At this moment, no matter if it was from the orc encampment or the South Border City¡¯s city wall, everyone could sense the apocalyptically destructive energy.

    Awed by the enormity of this energy of destruction, everybody¡¯s gazes turned on that longsword emanating a most vicious aura.

    ¡°That¡¯s Bryan!¡± Fanny cried out in surprise. A feeling of pride rose from the bottom of her heart when she sensed the inexhaustible energy of destruction spreading from it.

    ¡°Oh god, what terrifying power!¡± Firenze was finally unable to restrain the shock in his heart any longer.

    The undead creatures were still attacking the Orcs Empire as if they could not get tired. The battle for South Border City was now in full swing. However, standing atop the border wall, the army-civilians who had been ying defense all these years were all inplete silence. They held their breaths as they concentrated their full attention on that longsword billowing in waves of blood outside of South Border City.

    Although none of them knew where Han Shuo was located, they were all fully aware that Han Shuo had been controlling that longsword which was constantly emanated the energy of destruction.

    The next moment, with the longsword at the epicenter, an energy of destruction erupted like a nuclear bomb explosion. Energy hardly visible to the naked eye violently shot out from the Demonyer Edge, bombarding towards the orcs far and near.

    Miserable, blood-curdling screeches came from the mouths of those orcs. The crowd attentively observing suddenly came to discover that all orcs within a 300-meter radius from the longsword seemed to have been baptized with blood. As they let out inhuman shrieks in extreme pain, their bodies disintegrated and dissipated into bloody mist.

    Of the thousands of orc warriors in the area, not a single remained.

    Those people above the border wall had been observing the longsword with all their attention, but not one of them had a clue what just happened. It seemed as though thousands of orc warriors had suddenly vanished into mists of blood right before their eyes, without one piece of bone or dregs left behind!

    The South Border City which had been filled with the morous noise of discussion was strangely quiet and in pin-drop silence. All those army-civilians who witnessed the scene were stupefied by the dreadful destructive power. In just split second, thousands of fierce, barbaric orc warriors were effortlessly reduced to blood mist right before their eyes. Such a scene was overwhelmingly horrifying!

    Fanny¡¯s eyes were glowing. Although she felt the scene to be rather gory, as Han Shuo¡¯s woman, to see her man disying such unstoppable might, that feeling of pride had far exceeded her sympathy for the orcs. Moreover, considering the greatly dwindling poption of South Border City, she felt that the orcs deserved no mercy.

    Firenze¡¯s mouth was wide open, wearing a shell-shocked face, with his eyes staring nkly ahead. Complementing the dirty and worn clothing on him, Firenze at this moment was indistinguishable from a fool.

    The vast majority of the people on the southern border wall had the same expression as Firenze. Some of them were so startled that they seemed to have turned into sculptures. These people were merely ordinary army-civilians who had never before seen anything too spectacr. However, as that strike Han Shuo made truly was too mind-boggling, the scene caused them a rather tremendous shock. It was impossible that they woulde to their senses within a short period of time.

    The Demonyer Edge did not take a break after making that strike. It rapidly absorbed the negative energy inside the bloody mist extracted from those who had recently lost their lives. The battle between armies of orc and undead were still going on. The bloody cruel battle was on full swing.

    After ages, the South Border City which had been in silence suddenly erupted with extremely loud cheers.

    Thanks to the loud cheering, those who still had yet toe to their senses were all suddenly awoken from their stupefied state. The mor grew even more enthusiastic and resounding as the emotionally excited expressed their feelings. That unforgettable scene was still repeatedly reying in their minds. They loudly and passionately cheered. Their spirits had never been so high.

    Firenze forced a smile and shook his head. Strange expressions filled his face as he said to the excited Fanny beside him, ¡°Is this guy even mortal? How did he be so terrifying after disappearing for five years?¡±

    ¡°Without such overwhelming might, how would he dare charge at the army of a few hundred thousand orcs alone?¡± Fanny raised her head and proudly cheered as though it was herself who unleashed that strike. She appeared to be even more excited and prouder than Han Shuo himself. As Han Shuo¡¯s woman, Fanny couldn¡¯t feel more gratified to see Han Shuo demonstrate his might before everyone.

    The battle carried on. After absorbing those negative energies, the Demonyer Edge suddenly streaked across the sky and charged at those orc shamans hovering in midair. After some shes of bloody light, the few orc shamans were shredded into fine blood droplets which rained down on the orc warriors below.

    Little Skeleton, mounted on a bone dragon, was wheeled about in the sky. The energy of death would erupt wherever his passed, causing vast stretches of orc warriors to die at every turn.

    Throughout this process, Little Skeleton was still continuously summoning more undead creatures. An innumerable amount of dark creatures came from the Netherworld and densely upied every corner of the battlefield, forcing onto the orc warriors greater and greater pressure.

    These undead had no fear of death. Under Little Skeleton¡¯smand, they dauntlessly advanced and charged at the army of orcs, stepping into the breach to rece their fallenrades.

    Death rampaged every second of the way...

 Chapter 596: With you, the Empire is invincible!

    GDK 596: With you, the Empire is invincible!

    The swarm of gargoyles formed dark clouds as they dove downwards. The sea of undead creatures blindly charged ahead. Little Skeleton, mounted on a bone dragon, skillfully released waves after waves of necromancy magic covering arge area against those orc warriors.

    When a godly existence descended onto the mortal world, without any expert of the same ss of strength, the god was practically unstoppable!

    Although Little Skeleton was just a lowgod, necromancy magic was suitable forrge scale battle. The flood of necromancy creatures had actually drowned the orc warriors.

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatar transformed into a longsword that traveled with a long trail of radiance and he meandered about above the battlefield. Anywhere he passed, he would leave the orc warriors reduced to pieces, not one of them left in one piece.

    This battle was a total imbnce to one side in terms of strength. Against Han Shuo and Little Skeleton, two lowgod existences, these orc warriors who had been acting like overlords for the past few years, all turned into sitting ducks waiting to be ughtered. They had no capacity to put up any resistance.

    Even the shamans dispatched by the orc warriors were ughtered on the spot by Han Shuo and Little Skeleton like breaking dried twigs. The strength possessed by the duo had far, far exceeded these experts. Their deaths caused the orc warriors a tremendous psychological blow.

    Cruel ughtering continued to happen at the battlefield. The undead creatures found all over the battlefield did not feel fear and did not perceive pain. In these aspects, they were undoubtedly the most terrifying soldiers. As long as their souls remained, they could continue to attack even when their bodies were destroyed.

    With all kinds of aiding boundaries deployed, the strength and speed of the undead creatures were boosted substantially. They continued to wildly attack the orc warriors...

    Unwittingly, the army of orcs that had been eyeing the South Border City covetously for thest few years had suffered disastrous losses under the joint assault of Han Shuo and Little Skeleton. Not a single one of those orc experts dispatched to obstruct the duo could make it out alive and were all cleanly eliminated. Faced against the undead creatures that seemed not to know pain nor tiredness, more and more orcs of this enormous army shrieked like ghosts and copsed into their own pool of blood...

    Whoosh!

    A bloody light harboring an apocalyptic power that trailed more than one hundred meters long suddenly pounded at the camps at the center of the orc encampment.

    Rumbles...

    The earth trembled. Sand and rocks were sent flying in all directions. A dozen or so military tents burst apart in the deafening explosion. A mixture of blood, minced meat and camping structure was propelled into the air.

    A dozen or so tents along with the tens of leaders of the Orc Empire housed within werepletely wrecked just like that!

    ¡°The orcs are done for!¡± Firenze, observing from the top of the southern border wall, shouted in a deep, excited voice.

    ¡°Without any leaders or experts, leaving just the soldiers, they are destined for doom.¡± Fanny nodded in agreement. Gazing ahead at the orc warriors being massacred, she shook her head and gently sighed, ¡°Why were these orcs so determined to invade ournd? Now that they¡¯ve been wrecked by Han Shuo, how many of them will be left?¡±

    ¡°Such is the cruelty between countries. You don¡¯t have to sympathize with them. South Border City has lost a lot of men in the past few years. Their weapons are stained with the blood of the people of South Border City. Perhaps Bryan¡¯s arrival is the punishment they deserved for their transgression,¡± as a general, Firenze was not a naturally merciful character. Having lived through so many battles, death was just all too normal to him. His heart did not feel the slightest difort for the deaths of these orc warriors.

    Without the leadership of their leaders, without the protection from their experts, these orc warriors, who had been on the defense throughout the battle, werepletely crushed as expected. As blood spurted in all directions, more and more orc warriors copsed to the ground for good, bing just another body lining the ground...

    Two towering altars were erected at the center of the battlefield at some point. The energy stones on the altar emitted a dazzling radiance. Two cyclones of constantly changing shapes collected the strands of energy drifting about above the battlefield, supplementing divine energy for the two deployers of the altars.

    Of the two altars, one was shrouded with an intense aura of death, while the other had strange, indistinct light, which appeared toe from the edict of destruction. The two altars emanating auras of different energies were simultaneously operating at the center of the battlefield. Bit by bit, they sucked in and absorbed the unique energies formed due to death and destruction.

    As the energy of death and destruction on the battlefield increased, the number of orc warriors decreased. Along the passage of time, the miserable cries continuously reduced in frequency to be intermittent before theypletely ended.

    Han Shuo transformed back into his human form and hovered loftily in midair. He looked below and discovered that every inch of the ground was hidden beneath the bodies of orc warriors. It became exceedingly difficult to find any orc who had yet to perish. Other than the carcasses of orcs, there was the undead creature mechanically scavenging for any living targets.

    It appeared that the battle was at an end.

    As he floated above, Han Shuo could sense that strands and strands of energy were flowing into his body a little at a time via the altar in the center of the battlefield. The energies then fused with the divine energy in his body. He watched closely as his divine energy increased.

    Han Shuo gradually came toprehend the motive of the two overgods of death and destruction. Through some unique means involving altars and soul brands, even if separated by multiple material nes, the two overgods could acquire energy from death and destruction. The higher the death toll, the greater the energy they would obtain.

    As Han Shuo absorbed the energy of destruction on the battlefield made avable with the deaths of the several hundred thousand orc warriors using the altar he deployed, he clearly felt his divine energy rapidly increasing. After running some calctions in his head, Han Shuo discovered that the umted energy of destruction was equivalent to the power of faith he could collect from a few hundred thousand people over a few dozen years, or equivalent to several dozen years of self-cultivation.

    It was no wonder that the overgods of death and destruction were so desperate to dispatch lesser gods under their control to bring on death on other material nes. It was much easier to harvest energy using this methodpared to painstaking cultivation. Of the innumerable material nes, if countless living beings were to be destroyed on every one, then the overgods of death and destruction would certainly gain a considerable amount of energy which would greatly deepen their divine energies.

    ¡°Father, they are of no threat anymore. I must return and digest the energy I just obtained,¡± Little Skeleton transmitted while Han Shuo was thinking to himself.

    Han Shuo raised his head and saw Little Skeleton silently hovering over the altar of death on his bone dragon. The gravestone on his chest looked as though a small whirlpool that was rapidly whirling. The altar below him seemed to have exhausted all its energy and no longer sparkled with light.

    ¡°Ok,¡± Han Shuo replied. He noticed that the gravestone on Little Skeleton¡¯s chest seemed to have the function of elerating his gathering and absorption of the energy of death. Han Shuo had deployed his altar at nearly the same time as Little Skeleton did, but at this moment, not only had Little Skeleton vacuumed away all the energy of death around the altar, he had evenpleted the energy conversion inside his body, while Han Shuo was only halfway there.

    Naturally, Little Skeleton would not be courteous with Han Shuo. After he recited some miraculous incantation, the altar beneath him, which was originally used for gathering the energy of death, suddenly glowed with a hazy neon green light. The swarms of undead creatures rushed to the center of the altar and faded away among the light.

    The undead creatures went as quickly as they came. It took only a short while before the enormous amount of undead creatures returned to the Netherworld via the altar below Little Skeleton.

    After seeing that all the undead creatures had orderly entered the altar, Little Skeleton turned to Han Shuo and transmitted, ¡°Alright. Please send me home, father.¡±

    Although Han Shuo felt somewhat astonished, he did not voice it out. After reciting a simple necromancy incantation, Little Skeleton seemed to be grabbed by spacetime and disappeared in a bright sh of light.

    ¡°This kid is getting more and more miraculous,¡± Han Shuomented with a smile. Instead of rushing to leave, Han Shuo hovered at the same ce and silently absorbed the energy of destruction above the battlefield using the altar below him.

    The energy of destruction produced by the death of a few hundred thousand orcs was considerable. Without a miraculous treasure like the Little Skeleton¡¯s gravestone, Han Shuo needed to spend more time and effort to absorb the energy.

    Han Shuo was in no hurry. He hovered in midair as he linked his soul to the altar below him. His Domain of Divinity deployed to form a barrier simr to spiderweb and absorbed the energy of destruction collected inside the altar bit by bit. Han Shuo took a deep breath before flying downwards with the palm of his hand facing at his altar. It seemed to be shrouded by an incorporeal canvas as it disappeared inch by inch.

    Han Shuo gazed all around at the battlefield. He looked at the dead bodies, weapons, and armor scattered all about, shook his head, and flew towards South Border City.

    Before, Han Shuo would surely have stayed over to collect the weapons and armors. However, times had changed. Those weapons and armors were no longer worth anything in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes and therefore he wouldn¡¯t waste his time on this junk.

    After a streak of light shed through, a majestic figure appeared beside Firenze who was still gaping at the battlefield.

    ¡°South Border City will not be confronted by any threats from the Orc Empire for a while. Right, do clean up the battlefield. Some of the items might be worth some money,¡± Han Shuo smilingly said as he looked at Firenze beside him.

    Firenze was suddenly awakened and turned to look at Han Shuo. This tough man who had been unrestrained and crude all that time was now fumbling for words. He stared nkly for a while before forcing a smile and nodding as he said, ¡°Hundreds of thousand of orcs ¨C all gone ¨C just like that. Even if the Orc Empire still has troops left, they will never dare infringe on our South Border City again until they figure out the matter.¡±

    Han Shuo grinned and calmly said, ¡°Oh, good then. After I take care of the big menace that is Kasi Empire, we can reassemble our military and invade them instead!¡±

    Firenze listened, then kept silent again for a long while as he looked deeply into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes. After ages, he finally proimed, ¡°With you, the Empire is invincible!¡±

 Chapter 597: Becoming a Legend

    GDK 597: Bing a Legend

    In just one day within the South Border City, Han Shuo¡¯s prestige had risen far above that of Firenze¡¯s, who was the Lord of the Southern Border.

    For thest three years, Firenze had been strenuously defending South Border City with the Howling Legion ¨C the mightiest legion of the Empire. But against the army of several hundred thousand orcs, they were steadily losing ground.

    Han Shuo, however, managed to exterminate the few hundred thousand barbarous orc warriors in less than a day as soon as he emerged from his five year disappearance, all using his own power. Such an incredible aplishment was unprecedented in Lancelot Empire even since its founding!

    Many of the army-civilians of South Border City had witnessed the feat with their own eyes. Having been oppressed by orc warriors for many long years, the excitement of the people of South Border City to see the thousands of orc warriors being annihted was absolutely insuppressible.

    Unexpectedly, even with no one orchestrating, the people of South Border City flooded towards Han Shuo to express their gratitude through all kinds of means.

    Some of them offerings of home-cooked food, some presented armor and weaponry handed down through their families for generations, and some even offered their own daughters, hoping that Han Shuo would keep them as his servants. But most of them just cheered for Han Shuo over and over again, screaming his name at the top of their lungs.

    Han Shuo¡¯s deeds that day were bound be legend among the people of South Border City!

    With the threat of the Orc Empire neutralized, the people of South Border City gathered on the streets and cheered. They eagerly passed along the remarkable story of how Han Shuo wiped out hundreds of thousands of orc warriors all by himself. The atmosphere of fear that had shrouded South Border City had been dispersed by Han Shuo.

    The people of South Border City began treating Han Shuo as a god before he even acknowledged it. Many of themoners who had been suffering without mental support even carved Han Shuo¡¯s name on tablets, kneeling and bowing at it.

    To y several hundred thousand savage orcs in the short span of an hour with his powers alone, other than a god, who could achieve that?

    As it should be, Han Shuo received the most honorable treatment in South Border City. As he walked with Firenze to his mansion, the people he met en route were falling over each other in their eagerness to kneel and kowtow. They were most willing to worship Han Shuo as their god.

    Han Shuo did not feel much when he saw the people of the city swarm to kowtow at him. After weighing in his mind for a short moment, he erected a divine altar in the city. He thennded at the center of the altar and unfolded his Domain of Divinity. A dignified, divine aura as imposing as towering mountains unfurled and gently extended in all directions.

    The people of South Border City, as well as the soldiers of the Howling Legion who fell into the Domain of Divinity, couldn¡¯t help themselves but feel most obliged to pledge their allegiance to Han Shuo and wished to worship him for eternity.

    ¡°Offer your faith to this altar, and I will ensure that your South Border City is safe and sound!¡± the voice Han Shuo made using his divine energy echoed on and on in his Domain of Divinity. The voice carried a bewitching power that hooked the soul, causing these people who were already most delighted to worship Han Shuo to be even more passionate.

    After being shocked by the unequaled might Han Shuo just disyed and now further affected by his Domain of Divinity, the people of South Border City, whose passion were raised to the ultimate, absolutely did not hesitate before respectfully offering their souls to the divine altar, bing Han Shuo¡¯s pious believers.

    After he finished decorating his divine altar, Han Shuo gave a few more resounding speeches. Once he was assured that the ceremonies were carried out in ordance with his instructions, he left with Firenze and Fanny, returning to Firenze¡¯s mansion in South Border City.

    ¡°I have worked very hard for three years straight to keep South Border City safe. The most that those people would do is to pray for my safety. But you have only been in this city for one day and they have started treating you like a god. Sigh...¡± Firenzemented as he shook his head bitterly after they entered the mansion.

    Fanny put on a sweet smile and held onto Firenze¡¯s arm. She said in a soothing voice, ¡°Father, if you could neutralize a few hundred thousand warriors of the orcs by yourself, it wouldn¡¯t just be South Border City, the entire Southern Border would treat you as an actual god.¡±

    Firenze forced a smile, shot a nce at Fanny and said, ¡°Do you think everyone is as wild as that kid? If I had that kind of strength, Lancelot Empire would have long be the hegemon in Profound Continent instead of having to take defensive measures all this while.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s what I¡¯m trying to say. We are just ordinary people, but Bryan is a talented one. It is nothing surprising that he would climb to high ces and be worshipped. You don¡¯t have to feel any grievances about it!¡± Fanny giggled as she consoled Firenze. A sense of pride naturally rose from the bottom of her heart.

    ¡°I will stay in South Border City for three days. You father and daughter should catch up with each other. Right, if there are any problems in South Border City or the Southern Border that you need me to solve, let me know and I¡¯ll take care of them for you.¡± Han Shuo¡¯s lowgod of destruction avatar needed some time to digest the energy of destruction formed by the deaths of all those orc warriors. Besides, Fanny and Firenze had not seen each other in forever and they should be given some time to spend with each other.

    Having witnessed the terrifyingly magnificent feat, the Firenze now showed much more reverence and reservation when talking to Han Shuo. Not only had he cut back on his reckless vulgar remarks, he even felt a little uneasiness.

    On one hand, it was because Han Shuo¡¯s strength had utterly overwhelmed Firenze. On the other, it was the noble and divine demeanor naturally given off from Han Shuo after he became a god. Under these two kinds of pressure, Firenze, who had paid no heed to any taboo all along, seemed to be apletely different person when facing Han Shuo.

    ¡°Alright. I¡¯ll be sure to arrange things and make good use of this opportunity. If any problem arises that requires brute power to resolve, I will definitely not be courteous in asking for your help,¡± Firenze mischievouslyughed, ¡°No matter how powerful you are, you are still my son-inw!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded with a smile and did not continue with a response. After leaving Fanny some words, he got into the room that Firenze had specially prepared for him to silently digest the energy of destruction formed by the deaths of those orc warriors.

    ***Back at the ce of extreme fire, outside the valley of fire.

    Han Shuo¡¯s main body that had been sitting cross-legged with eyes closed on a fiery-red boulder, abruptly opened his eyes. They glistened as he looked at the bumpy ground right ahead.

    Suddenly, a dense, heavy sound came from the depths of the earth. The valley that had been silent and still began to quiver all of a sudden. The ground full of ditches started to shake with increasing magnitude.

    The loud roar of a dragon abruptly sounded from the deep underground. The ditches tore bigger and bigger as the ground trembled.

    Dark dragon Gilbert¡¯s body gradually emerged...

    Yet another dragon¡¯s roar sounded. The ground continued to quiver and rumble. As the earth quaked and the mountains shook, the meandering figure of a dragon soared into the sky. It disappeared high into the clouds in an instant.

    ¡°Ahahahah...¡± dark dragon Gilbert howled withughter. He could not restrain the excitement in his heart after having been reborn. He roamed the skies as much as he liked while shouting himself hoarse to release the thrill in his heart.

    ¡°Cut that noise out. Get down here!¡± Han Shuo chided while watching dark dragon Gilbert streak left and right in the sky.

    ¡°Coming!¡± Gilbert answered as he chuckled. His enormous dragon body shook and ck light shone from it. His enormous body gradually shrunk in the ck light and transformed back into that familiar dark-skinned youth when he arrived and stopped right in front of Han Shuo.

    ¡°Master, I have returned, Gilbert has returned! Hahaha...¡± Gilbert danced in joy. He patted all over his new body and appeared to be very contented.

    ¡°You died here, and were resurrected here. I have finally fulfilled my promise to you!¡± Han Shuo smiled at Gilbert and asked, ¡°What do you think about your new body?¡±

    ¡°Good! Very good!¡± Gilbert answered immediately. He stretched his neck and threaded and kicked with his two legs before he added, ¡°My body is packed with energy. Although it¡¯s not quite the same as the original energy, it feels much more powerful!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness took a tour and the corners of his mouth curved to reveal a satisfied smile. He nodded as he praised, ¡°Not bad, you have actually melted that small piece of divine essence. Very good. As long as you carefully feel andprehend it, it will not be a challenge for you to be a god!¡±

    ¡°Thank you master, haha, thank you master!¡± After listening to Han Shuo¡¯spliment, Gilbert couldn¡¯t help butugh out loud in happiness. His voice spread far into the distance, prompting many low-level magical creatures to retreat.

    ¡°This is what you deserve. Right, your new body has some special abilities. I believe you can feel them already. Take some time to understand some of those special abilities. This will be greatly beneficial to you in the future,¡± Han Shuo said sternly.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, master. Having experienced death once, I will treasure this second opportunity at life,¡± Gilbert assured to Han Shuo after withdrawing that smile off his face.

    ¡°Good. I believe you ought to know the importance of strength much better now,¡± Han Shuo said as he nodded.

    ¡°Master, I want to return and visit my grandpa,¡± Gilbert suddenly said in a saddened voice, ¡°My father is dead and many of my fellow dark dragons were lost. I want to see how they are doing now.¡±

    ¡°Of course. And one more thing, do check out how those lizardmen are doing while you are in the underground world. Help them with any troubles they may have,¡± Han Shuo had once promised the Ancient Lizard King to look after the lizardmen. There could be changes to the underground world due to Adele¡¯s revival. This resurrected Gilbert possessed far greater strength than before. Perhaps there were things that Gilbert could do to help the lizardmen living in the underground world.

    ¡°Understood, master. I shall make a move,¡± Gilbert had been missing his fellow dark dragons. He was worried that the Shrine of Ice went back to give the dark dragons trouble while he was gone for the past few years. Therefore, he hastily left after telling Han Shuo.

    ¡°This chap is still as impatient as always,¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help butugh when he saw Gilbert scurry off quickly. However, after a short while, his face turned cold. He recalled that hatred carved into his bones and engraved on his heart when he gazed at the depths of the Dark Forest.

 Chapter 598: An Angel?

    GDK 598: An Angel?

    Five years ago, right there in Dragon Valley at the depths of the Dark Forest, Han Shuo was grievously wronged.

    The Primordius Dragon was the mightiest existence Han Shuo had met on Profound Continent. This Primordius Dragon who had been guarding the Profound Continent possessed the strength of a lowgod. However, Han Shuo did not know how long he had remained in this stage.

    Han Shuo had not forgotten of this debt of blood. However, as his avatar of death was still absorbing the divine essence under Brettel City, while his avatar of destruction was still digesting the energy of destruction formed by the deaths of several hundred thousand orcs, Han Shuo did not haveplete certainty of defeating the Primordius Dragon with merely his main body that had recently attained the Nine Changes realm in demonic arts.

    Han Shuo stood on the valley above the ce of extreme fire and coldly gazed at Dragon Valley close within reach. However, he did not impulsively charge over.

    He pacified the fury in his heart and coldly groaned, ¡°I¡¯ll let you live for a few more days. When all three souls of mine are finally reunited, I will surely destroy your Dragon Valley and your dragon soul!¡±

    Han Shuo took a deep breath, repressed his urge, and returned to the Cemetery of Death.

    It took Han Shuo a matter of minutes to return to the Cemetery of Death. Sanguis, Jasper, Hemanna and Sylph, who had been staying in the Cemetery of Death, grumbled when they saw Han Shuo, wanting to go out to see and experience this new world.

    They were bored to death as Han Shuo had held up the four in this ce ever since they arrived on Profound Continent.

    As they had originated from another material ce that was the Abyss realm, they were very curious about how another ne would look like. Now that Han Shuo had finally returned, of course, they wouldn¡¯t want to stay any longer inside the Cemetery of Death.

    Han Shuo did not reject the four¡¯s pressing demand. He thought about it for a moment and smilingly said, ¡°Alright, I will take you to learn and familiarize yourselves with this world. Hehe, the Profound Continent ispletely different from your Abyss realm. The nts and animals are rtively friendly. They wouldn¡¯t attack strangers out of the blue.¡±

    ¡°Okay, let¡¯s make a move now, Han Shuo. Staying in this ce feels like being imprisoned. Let¡¯s go!¡± Jasper smilingly hastened while pulling Han Shuo by his arm.

    ¡°Alright, let¡¯s go,¡± Han Shuo opened up the boundary and lead the four out from the Cemetery of Death.

    The verdant and lush Dark Forest had wildflowers and grass covering every inch of the ground. The air was refreshing and the sky was bright and beautiful, totally unlike the dark, gloomy Abyss realm. That sun hanging high up in the sky was especially unique as there was no such thing in the Abyss realm.

    They cried out in surprise as soon as they walked out from the Cemetery of Death. They would curiously nce all around, touch this, pinch that, and click their tongues in wonder.

    ¡°What a beautiful world!¡± Hemanna plucked a flower and sniffed after putting it before her beautiful nose. She remarked as she looked happily at Han Shuo.

    ¡°The environment here is so beautiful! It indeed is just the same as you described ¨C a magically beautiful world!¡± Sylph took a deep breath and looked all around. There was verdant greenery wherever she looked.

    ¡°At first I was worried if I could adapt to this ce, but I can finally be at ease now. Whee... I like this world!¡± Jasper said in excitement as she gently pped her spotless white wings and happily made a circle as she flew in the air.

    Sanguis kept silent and carefully sensed the new world. He obviously had much more acute senses to the surroundingspared to the threedies. The only thing he had on his mind was how to increase his strength as quickly as possible. When he discovered that this new world would not cause him any adverse effects, he quickly became at ease.

    ¡°Come, I¡¯ll take you all to a city,¡± Han Shuo smilingly said after seeing that the few had quickly adapted to Profound Continent.

    ¡°Yay! Sure! We really want to know how a city in this world looks like!¡± Sylph cheered and appeared to be in great delight.

    With Han Shuo¡¯s pointing the way, the party headed towards the Sunshine Valley from the Cemetery of Death. As their powers could be considered to be rather impressive on Profound Continent, the four who followed behind Han Shuo while chattering excitedly very soon arrived at the entrance to Sunshine Valley.

    After five years, Sunshine Valley became firmly and fully under the control of the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band. Trunks, after a near death experience, became even more malicious and cruel. With the Lancelot Empire secretly backing him, Trunks had quickly consolidated his position in Sunshine Valley, growing the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band to be thergest power in Sunshine Valley.

    ¡°Wow! What a beautiful and refined building! Truly wonderful!¡± Sylph again cried out in surprise right after arriving at the entrance to Sunshine Valley.

    Buildings in the Abyss realm were simple and coarse in design. The more grandeur the status of its inhabitant, therger the building. However, the Abyssal beings would never spend much effort on the fine details and sophistication. Therefore, other than being huge, there weren¡¯t many distinguishing characteristics about Abyssal architecture. Practically all the buildings were crude in style.

    Profound Continent was obviously different. The literature and arts in this world were very well developed. Its people¡¯s attention to the pleasures in life were fully disyed in all aspects. The houses they resided in were not merely for sleeping. Various styles of intricacies were almost always painted into their buildings and matched with many a fine ornamentation; a world of difference from Abyssal architecture.

    ¡°Eh? An angel! There¡¯s an angel! What a beautiful angel!¡± Around the time Sylph cried out in surprise, another yell of shock came from among a group of Sunshine Valley guards.

    The snow-white wings on Jasper¡¯s back were identical to those of an angel publicized by the Church of Light as a symbol of purity and beauty. It was no wonder those members of the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band would cry out in surprise.

    ¡°You fool, that¡¯s the enemy! Everyone be on the alert! The Church of Light is about tounch arge-scale attack!¡± Suddenly, those members of the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band were on the alert as though about to face a powerful enemy. They pointed their crossbows at Han Shuo and his party.

    An angel is a symbol of purity and beauty. However, under the Church of Light¡¯s propaganda, an angel was also synonymous with a powerful expert.

    In Sunshine Valley, Trunks had long conveyed his loathing for the Church of Light. During these years, he had been in conflict with the Church of Light, even more so when the Pope of the Church of Light proimed that they had eradicated their biggest heretic ¨C Han Shuo. Sunshine Valley, under Trunks¡¯ control, had long been antagonistic to the Church of Light.

    Under such circumstances, it was a no brainer these people would misunderstand the situation when they saw Jasper who looked just like a mighty angel warrior as told in the legends of the Church of Light suddenly appearing outside of Sunshine Valley.

    After the shouting, members of the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band everywhere aimed their weapons at Han Shuo and his party from a distance, ready to attack at any moment.

    ¡°What business do you Church of Light folks haveing here? Didn¡¯t you know that Sunshine Valley doesn¡¯t wee you people?¡± questioned one of the guards furiously. He gestured with his hand and lead a few dozen men to slowly approach and surround Han Shuo.

    Looking at these members of the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help butugh. He did not expect that he would find himself in this situation before he even walked into Sunshine Valley.

    He forced a smile and shook his head. He felt that the situation was rather ridiculous. He was the founder of the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band, but who could guess that the members of his band would point their swords at himself. He truly was betweenughter and tears.

    ¡°Han Shuo, who are these people?¡± Jasper was startled.

    ¡°Master, these people seem to think us as their enemy. They don¡¯t possess much power. Should I finish them on behalf of Master?¡± Sanguis callously suggested with a cold face. Killing intenting from his body had suddenly grown intense.

    Han Shuo gestured with his hand as he rejected Sanguis¡¯ proposal, ¡°No. We are all on the same side. It¡¯s only because I have been gone for too long that these people cannot recognize me.¡±

    ¡°Put down your weapons and state your intentions, or we will attack!¡± ordered that guard loudly. He appeared rather nervous.

    ¡°We are all on the same side! Calm down!¡± Han Shuo helplessly exined. He forced a smile and held up his hands for fear that these people might do something unwise and identally be killed by him.

    ¡°Hmph! Since when have the Church of Light and the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band been on the same side? Ourmander instructed that no one from the Church of Light may be allowed to enter Sunshine Valley. If you have any business you better speak now, otherwise, don¡¯t me us for being impolite!¡± that guard replied in an angry voice.

    ¡°Ask Trunks to see me. Is that wretch in Sunshine Valley?¡± Han Shuo shouted in a rather annoyed tone with his hands up.

    ¡°How dare you insult ourmander, you sure enough are from the Church of Light! Everyone, get ready to attack! Capture first, talkter!¡± The party marched forward to attack.

    ¡°Master, what now?¡± Sanguis asked.

    It seems that we have to restrain these ignorant fes. I suppose that¡¯s the only option now. Han Shuo thought to himself. He too was prepared to capture these aggressors and exin the situationter to Trunks when he arrived.

    ¡°Stop! You idiots!¡± a loud voice suddenly rang when the battle was on the verge of breaking out. At the next moment, a fiery red figure rapidly shot out from Sunshine Valley and arrived before Han Shuo in the blink of an eye.

    ¡°Lord Candice, why are you here?!¡± Those men of the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band immediately put on a ttering and fawning smile as soon as they saw theer.

    ¡°Barking idiots with no eyes, you would all have attacked had I not shown up in time, wouldn¡¯t you?¡± Candice very fiercely reprimanded as she red at those people.

    There weren¡¯t too many changes to the fiery-tempered Candice. She was still equipped with sexy armor and carried a fire sword on her back. However, she now appeared much more feminine than before.

    ¡°Candice, it¡¯s you!¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help butugh when he saw who theer was.

    ¡°I learned the news of your return from Phoebe and I couldn¡¯t believe it at first. Didn¡¯t expect that you would turn up unscathed. This is great! Trunks has been very concerned for you,¡± Candice said with heartfelt joy as she looked at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo knew that Candice was an excellent mercenary the very day he came to know her. When he left Profound Continent, Candice and Trunks¡¯ Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band did not make any interaction. Han Shuo did not expect to meet her again in Sunshine Valley. More unexpectedly, when she mentioned Trunks, her tone obviously became rather strange.

    After looking at Candice up and down a few times, Han Shuo suddenly put on a strange smile and said, ¡°Candice, don¡¯t tell me that you are in a rtionship with Trunks?¡±

    Candice¡¯s usually rude and bold face unexpectedly blushed. Right then, she raised her head and confidently announced, ¡°That is exactly the case. Is that a problem? Let¡¯s go. Trunks will be overjoyed to see you.¡±

    With Candice leading them, none of those guards from Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band dared to obstruct their path. They allowed Han Shuo and his party smooth and unimpeded entrance. However, their hearts were filled with doubts ¨C Who exactly was Han Shuo? Why would Candice be so cordial to him?

 Chapter 599: Old Friends

    GDK 599: Old Friends

    Candice chuckled and smiled as she conversed with Han Shuo while leading him and his party into Sunshine Valley. However, inadvertently or otherwise, her gaze would veer towards Jasper. Confusion was showing in her eyes.

    Han Shuo noticed that secretive back and forth nce of Candice¡¯s. Seeing that she only grew more and more puzzled, Han Shuo smilingly exined, ¡°You can stop looking. She¡¯s not an angel of the Church of Light as you are imagining. She was born with that pair of snow-white wings. That¡¯s all.¡±

    Candice finally rxed. She inquired Han Shuo in a low and inquisitive voice, ¡°If she¡¯s not an angel as told by the Church of Light, then what is she? I have served as a mercenary at every corner of the Profound Continent and yet I have never seen or heard of this kind of human.¡±

    ¡°She is my woman,¡± Han Shuo did not exin Jasper¡¯s origin and instead highlighted his rtionship with her.

    Upon hearing those words, Candice shot a hateful re at Han Shuo and lowered her voice as she said, ¡°You womanizer, you already have three beauties in Lancelot Empire, how could you still keep fooling around!¡±

    Han Shuo smiled and did not reply to Candice¡¯s criticism. He maintained his leisurely demeanor as they headed to the depths of Sunshine Valley.

    All along the way, many merchants and businessmen in Sunshine Valley gazed at Han Shuo and his party with astonishment. Their attention did not focus on just Jasper and her wings, but also on Hemanna and Sylph who had sharp thorns growing densely out of their shoulders, elbows, and knees.

    ¡°What kind of people are they? How peculiar!¡±

    ¡°Isn¡¯t that an angel warrior as told in the legends of the Church of Light? Why would an angel warrior appear in Sunshine Valley? I remember that themander of the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band had expressly stipted in writing that no one from the Church of Light is allowed entry to Sunshine Valley?¡±

    ¡°Didn¡¯t you see that it¡¯s Candice who is leading the way for them? This is very questionable!¡±

    Discussions about the identity of Han Shuo and his party constantly rang out from the merchants around them. However, due to Candice¡¯s presence, these people had deliberately lowered their voices.

    As the crowd discussed andmented about Han Shuo and his party, hisdies too were whispering about the crowd.

    ¡°Their clothes are so beautiful! There are beautiful decorative designs on the clothes of these people, how interesting!¡± Sylph cried out in surprise.

    ¡°Yea, that¡¯s right. Look at those stones on their necks, so dazzling to the eye as they sparkle and shine!¡± Hemanna softly eximed.

    ¡°This world is indeed different from ours! Undeniably, their clothing, food, housing, and transport are far superior to ours,¡± Jasper remarked.

    ¡°Meh, those things are useless. Haven¡¯t you noticed that these people possess much weaker strength than themoners of our world? They have put too much of their attention into enjoying life instead of constantly fighting like our people!¡± These words of Sanguis had clearly highlighted his mindset apart from thedies. The threedies were so deeply engrossed in the alluring material constructs of this world but Sanguis, however, merely scoffed at them.

    With Candice leading the way, Han Shuo and his party finally arrived at the back of Sunshine Valley. This area was previously a territory specially for the use of the Cairo Mercenary Band. Naturally, it now belonged to the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band. At its front was a huge training ground. Some of the mercenaries were topless with their massive solid muscles fully revealed as they practiced their martial arts skills withplete attention.

    ¡°Lord Candice!¡± those people amicably greeted when they saw Candice entering.

    Han Shuo took a quick nce and noticed that these people looked unfamiliar to him. It appeared that as the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band rapidly developed, it had recruited more and more members.

    ¡°Candice, what are these people doing here? A new batch of mercenaries? Haha, mind if I borrow these fresh cuts for some games?¡± a two-meter tall bald, brawny man jokingly provoked while holding up a battle-axe.

    ¡°Hmph, idiot, with your wee bit of capacity, you will be gamed to death.¡± Candice red at him disdainfully and shot back at him without the slightest mercy for his feelings.

    That bald, brawny man was discontented upon hearing those words. He red with his big copper eyes and replied in a low muffled voice, ¡°I¡¯m not buying it!¡±

    Whoosh! A figure suddenly shot into the training ground. Sanguis squinted at this brawny man, sized him up, and gave his impartial assessment, ¡°His four limbs are developed, but the energy in his body is weak. He cannot withstand a single blow!¡±

    ¡°Erm... Bryan...?¡± Candice said to Han Shuo after staring nkly for a moment.

    ¡°Sanguis, do not harm him. Just knock him down!¡± Han Shuo raised his voice to instruct Sanguis. After that, he turned to Candice and smilingly said, ¡°He¡¯s my apprentice. Just let them have some fun, there¡¯s no harm in doing it.¡± In the world of mercenaries, the one with the biggest fist is always right. If you could defeat them squarely, you will win their respect.

    The bald man was obviously infuriated by Sanguis¡¯ words. He hung down the battle-axe in his hand, stuck out his chest muscles that were like two lumps of iron, and unyieldingly issued a challenge, ¡°Arrogant kid,e, I¡¯ll let you make three strikes on me!¡±

    ¡°Not just weak, but also simple-minded!¡± Sanguis shook his head as he gave further assessments.

    ¡°Kid, cut out the nonsense, knock me down if you can!¡± the bald, brawny man furiously roared like a bear after listening to Sanguis mock him over and over again. As Sanguis was only around 1.7 meters in height and minus the thick and bulky muscles, the brawny man did not consider Sanguis a threat at all.

    ¡°That can¡¯t be easier!¡± Sanguis sneered and threw a lightning fast punch. His fist turned blood red and shot right at the center of that unmoving brawny man.

    Pow!

    The enormous physique of over a hundred kilograms was sent flying away as though it was weightless and made a thud when his butt kissed the ground. The man sat up and stared nkly at Sanguis who was standing more than ten steps away. He seemed to have no idea what just happened.

    Those mercenaries in the training ground who were giggling as they watched, thinking that Sanguis will make a fool of himself, all looked at Sanguis as though they had seen a ghost. Every one of them was stupefied and couldn¡¯t fathom how Sanguis could possess such a terrifying power.

    These mercenaries weren¡¯t clueless muscleheads. Of course, they knew that strength didn¡¯t have much to do with body build. However, when they carefully observed, they discovered that Sanguis did not utilize any fighting aura.

    For a youngster to send a massive body of more than a hundred kilograms flying with one punch without using any fighting aura, that was shocking!

    Sanguis shrugged at the bald bulky man before saying to Han Shuo, ¡°Master, I did not cause him injury.¡±

    The oue did note as a surprise to Han Shuo. He nodded at Sanguis and hastened Candice, ¡°Alright, let¡¯s go.¡±

    ¡°Oh, oh. Okay. Okay!¡± Candice was suddenly roused. She took a quick look at Sanguis in a strange manner before turning her gaze to Han Shuo and shook her head as she sighed, ¡°You really are getting more and more unfathomable. Who could expect that even your apprentice would be so miraculously powerful? Sigh, no wonder...¡±

    ¡°No wonder what?¡± Han Shuo said with a dashing smile as he thought to himself, That brawny man was merely a journeyman swordsman. If he could withstand one punch from Sanguis, then a Body of Sanguis doesn¡¯t live up to its name.

    ¡°No wonder during the five years you were gone, every time the people of Lancelot Empire met with predicament, they would always think of you, how great it would be if you weren¡¯t gone; No wonder Brettel City hase to possess such formidable strength in just a few short years that not even the Brut Merchant Alliance dared infringe upon,¡± Candice exined.

    Han Shuo let out a hollowugh and did not reply. He walked towards the restricted area at the back of the valley.

    As he ventured farther into the valley, Han Shuo saw more familiar faces. Grant, who was exining the rules of the mercenary band to a new group of mercenaries, was immediately stupefied when Han Shuo suddenly appeared. He stared nkly at Han Shuo without a word.

    ¡°Lord Grant, are you alright?¡± the newly recruited mercenaries didn¡¯t know what was going on. They couldn¡¯t help but question when Grant suddenly became silent halfway through his exnation.

    ¡°Ahhh!!!¡± an ear-piercing scream rang from Grant. Those mercenaries attentively listening to his lecture were jolted.

    Under the watching eyes of those newly hired guns, Grant shot towards Han Shuo at lightning speed and cried out in surprise, ¡°Lord Bryan! You are still alive!¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t die very easily, hehe,¡± Han Shuo nodded and smiled. His heart was filled with warmth to see Grant being so pleasantly surprised from the bottom of his heart.

    ¡°Bryan? Who called Bryan?¡± a cry of shock sounded from a stone chamber. Shortly after, a person stumbled out in a flurry and turned his gaze towards the source of the voice. Yet another shout that reverberated through the entire valley, ¡°Ahh!! Holy shit! It¡¯s really Bryan!¡±

    Odysseus was wild with joy. Just like Grant, he rushed to Han Shuo¡¯s side,ughed heartily and gave Han Shuo a firm hug.

    Odysseus and hispany had a closer rtionship with Han Shuo and had joined the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band because of him. Nowadays, Odysseus and those few had all risen through the ranks of the mercenary band. They were still as outspoken and uninhibited as before.

    ¡°You guys are still here, haha, this is great. It seems that the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band is getting better and better,¡± Han Shuo too was very happy to see his old friends.

    ¡°Come, let¡¯s go get Trunks and drink away! That chap has been locking himself inside for cultivation all the time, he¡¯s getting more and more hardworking!¡± As Odysseus joined the mercenary band at Han Shuo¡¯s invitation, he knew that the real owner of the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band was Han Shuo. Although everyone had immense reverence towards Trunks, Odysseus, on the other, treated him as a partner just as before.

    The party chatted andughed as they walked to the back of the valley. Trunks came out from his cultivation after having heard the news. As soon as he saw Han Shuo, Trunks rushed to him and they shared a firm man-hug. Soon after, he yelled, ¡°Brothers! Bring out the booze. Today we will empty them all!¡± After finishing those words, Trunks firmly hugged Han Shuo and eximed, ¡°I knew it wouldn¡¯t be that easy to kill you!¡±

    ¡°No kidding! They need to scheme much harder!¡± Han Shuoughed.

    After a short while, all of Han Shuo¡¯s old friends gathered together. Soon after Trunks gave the instructions,rge bowls of liquor and big chunks of meat were served. Mercenaries paid no regards to table manners to begin with. Upon hearing their leaders¡¯ words, these people did not restrain themselves and started to drink and chomp loudly and rowdily.

    After those mercenaries who had recently joined the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band realized Han Shuo¡¯s identity, they were ineffably excited. They took the opportunity to toast to their idol and expressed their veneration by drinking to the limits of their capacity.

    Back then, Han Shuo was truly an idol in Sunshine Valley. He also had a record of never being defeated in Lancelot Empire. These mercenaries had the utmost admiration for such characters. Therefore, as soon as they heard that the legendary expert had arrived, each and every one of them was thrilled.

    In an instant, Sunshine Valley was brimming with joyous atmosphere.

 Chapter 600: Nine Changes

    GDK 600: Nine Changes

    After the feast of liquor and meat, everyone started to get tipsy. Han Shuo and Trunks left for the back of the valley by themselves. They came to a secluded cliff.

    The refreshing mountain breezes blew onto their faces. The two were in great moods to see each other again.

    Trunks still had the strength of a great swordmaster. Having remained in the same realm for five years, Trunks¡¯ fighting aura became purer and purer. However, perhaps because he had yet to encounter a fortuitous opportunity, he had not made a breakthrough.

    Five years felt almost as if it were a lifetime ago. Especially for Han Shuo, who had turned from a mortal to an actual god during that time. Although he did not deliberately demonstrate his power, Trunks could still vaguely sense the mighty presenceing from his soul.

    ¡°Bryan, what realm are you currently at? Why is it that I couldn¡¯t sense any aura of magic or fighting auraing from you?¡± Even after carefully observing Han Shuo for a long while, squinting, Trunks still couldn¡¯t make out what martial art Han Shuo cultivated in.

    The demonic arts that Han Shuo¡¯s main body was cultivating in gave no auras of death nor destruction. All the energy was concealed deep within his body. Therefore, it was nothing surprising that Trunks couldn¡¯t see a clue.

    Han Shuo put on a smile. He did not give any exnation to Trunk¡¯s question and he questioned Trunks instead, ¡°By the way, have you settled that grievance of yours with Cesar City?¡±

    Trunks shook his head and gently sighed before he answered, ¡°Not yet. Bradley Pillon¡¯s Cesar City is bordered by tight security. Kasi Empire has been pressing in on us harder and harder during these years while Valen City, however, has been very passive. Although my Sunshine Valley has been growing rapidly, we are fundamentally merchants and mercenaries. Compared to a body of governance, we are still some ways behind.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and understood the facts. Sunshine Valley was wedged between three countries, right in the middle of a mountain range. This geography had provided them with both advantages and disadvantages. It was already a difficult feat for Trunks to grow Sunshine Valley to such scales. But to move one step further, to gain the capacity to contend against a country, that challenge would be beyond difficult.

    Before Han Shuo could ry to Trunks a few words offort, Trunks¡¯ expression turned eerie cold and he said in a sinister tone, ¡°Sunshine Valley cannot contend against Cesar City. That is a fact. However, for the past five years, I have personally murdered dozens of Bradley Pillon¡¯s next of kin. His uncle, nephew, even his wife and sons were all assassinated by me. I want him to taste and suffer the pain of losing all his family members.¡±

    A chill traveled through Han Shuo¡¯s heart. He took a nce at the sinister looking Trunks and thought that Bradley Pillon must have great difficulties falling asleep every night with such an enemy out there.

    Bradley Pillon¡¯s family members all died one after another. Even his woman and children he treasured the most were all killed. This kind of torment must have caused Bradley Pillon immense pain.

    Han Shuo, who originally thought of consoling Trunks, knew now that Trunks definitely needed no consoling words. Looking at his face, he could see that Trunks must be very enjoying this approach of slowly hounding Bradley Pillon to his death instead of rushing to kill him right away.

    ¡°So that¡¯s the case. You murderer, you are getting crueler and crueler!¡± Han Shuoughed and ridiculed Trunks.

    ¡°That region around Dark Forest and the lizardmen of the underground world are all under the control of our Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band. You were gone for five years and might not be aware of the current situation. Let me introduce to you the current distribution of strength in our Sunshine Valley,¡± Trunks grinned as he exined.

    ¡°No need for that,¡± Han Shuo interrupted Trunks¡¯ presentation. He looked deeply into Trunks¡¯ eyes and said, ¡°I have full confidence that you will handle these things well. In the future, I will not get involved with matters of the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band.¡±

    With his strength having reached this level, even entire countries were insignificant to him, so let alone a small power that was Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band?

    If Han Shuo wanted to, he could destroy the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band with a snap of his finger, or perhaps reestablish an influence of equal scale. As he stood higher, he saw further. The whole of the Abyss realm belonged to him, what would a mere Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band be to him?

    Trunks had obviously made out from Han Shuo¡¯s words that he intended to fully let go of his post. He silently thought for a moment and suddenly pledged to Han Shuo, ¡°No matter what, the Soul Destroyer Mercenary Band will always be yours! Even if you won¡¯t remember it, I will never forget!¡±

    Han Shuoughed his lungs out as he patted on Trunks¡¯ shoulder and said, ¡°No need for such words between us. Come, let us get on with drinking. Cheers!¡±

    ¡°Fine, tonight we will drink until we are both dead drunk!¡± Trunks said with a dashing smile.

    Naturally, Han Shuo could not get intoxicated. On that night, most of the people were drunk. Even Trunks, whose strength had been attained to the realm of a great swordmaster, without neutralizing the alcohol using his fighting aura, was drunk. Han Shuo¡¯s unique body, however, even without any active measures, could not sink into that kind of tipsy, muddle-headed state.

    On the following day, as Trunks and the others had yet to sober up, Han Shuo located Sanguis and his women. He left them with a few instructions ¨C to stay and enjoy themselves in Sunshine Valley for a period of time ¨C then left Sunshine Valley by himself.

    **In the depths of the Dark Forest. Outside Dragon Valley.

    Han Shuo silently arrived and concealed himself outside Dragon Valley. After waiting half a day, his two avatars arrived one after another.

    After absorbing the energy of destruction formed from the deaths of the several hundred thousand orc warriors at South Border City, his avatar of destruction had gained an increase in divine energy. He also gained a deeper understanding of the use of divine energy and the maniption of the edict of destruction,ying the foundation for this avatar of Han Shuo¡¯s to make a breakthrough.

    Raising realms of godhood was an extremely long journey. A god might have to stay in each stage for tens of thousands of years or even longer before getting to the next one. A god who had stayed in a realm for long periods could, more often than not, be far ahead in the use of elemental energies or edictal forcespared to another god who had recently stepped into the same realm. Therefore, precisely for this reason, each realm of godhood was further divided into three stages ¨C early-stage, mid-stage, andte-stage.

    Of two gods in the same realm, the one who had cultivated to the apex ¨C thete-stage ¨C would have much greater strength than one who had just joined the realm.

    Although Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars were both lowgods, as they had only recently entered the realm, their divine energies were rtively weak, and theirprehension towards divine energy and their respective fundamental forces were not profound enough; they were early-stage lowgods. They were far from achieving the middle stage.

    The reason that Han Shuo did not rush in seeking the Primordius Dragon for vengeance was that he had no clue which of those stages the Primordius Dragon was actually in. Ate-stage lowgod had absolute certainty of defeating an early-stage lowgod. There was no doubt about it.

    After his two avatars arrived, Han Shuo carefully inspected them for a while. It must be said that the process of upgrading to the next realm of godhood was definitely very slow. Although the avatar of destruction had assimted the energy of destruction from the deaths of several hundred thousands orcs, although his avatar of death had absorbed the divine energy from one piece of divine essence, they were still far from attaining the level of mid-stage.

    The two avatars again concealed themselves within Han Shuo¡¯s body. Looking at Dragon Valley close at hand, Han Shuo muttered to himself irresolutely for a moment and finally made up his mind. He decided to step in there to look for the Primordius Dragon as to settle his grudges.

    Although it was currently unknown to Han Shuo which stage of lowgod the Primordius Dragon was currently at, Han Shuo¡¯s demonic arts had reached the Nine Changes realm, so he had a few special techniques up his sleeves. Even if that Primordius Dragon was in thete-stage of lowgod and Han Shuo really had no way of defeating him, he would still be able to escape easily. Han Shuo who had three souls was confident of overpowering a mid-stage lowgod. However, if the Primordius Dragon was actually in thete-stage, Han Shuo did not have full certainty of the oue. And yet, with his demonic arts, he wasn¡¯t at all worried about not being able to escape.

    With everything thought out, Han Shuo no longer hesitated. Scrapping the low-profile, he raised his head and roared. His body turned into a streak of light that shot right towards Dragon Valley.

    That boundary in the way couldn¡¯t stop Han Shuo at all. With one stroke of the Demonic des on Han Shuo¡¯s hand, the boundary was undone. It caused not the slightest obstruction to him.

    Dragon Valley was alerted of the presence of a forceful intruder the very moment that Han Shuo cut open the boundary. While Han Shuo roared and charged inside, a loud dragon roar suddenly came from Dragon Valley. A silvery third-stage greater dragon meandered its enormous body threateningly towards Han Shuo. It let out a thunderous snarl, ¡°Puny human, how dare you trespass upon Dragon Valley. Courting death!¡±

    ¡°Haha, lizard, let¡¯s see who is actually puny!¡± Han Shuo sneered and grabbed towards that silvery greater dragon.

    As Han Shuo attempted to get a hold of the silvery greater dragon, his body flying rapidly higher began to grow bigger and bigger. When his big hand finally reached the silvery greater dragon, Han Shuo had be a fifty-meter tall giant. Before the silvery greater dragon could even react, Han Shuo the giant had grabbed its head in one hand and its tail in the other.

    The twenty-something-meter long silvery greater dragon,pared to the giant Han Shuo, looked nothing more than a slightly big reptile. As Han Shuo howled withughter, he made a gentle tug. The body of the silvery greater dragon immediately ripped apart into multiple segments. Its flesh and blood sprayed all over the ce.

    For a demonic art practitioner, other than immense power, the Nine Changes realm also meant countless permutation. There were nine techniques to master in the Nine Changes realm ¨C Speed Change, Body Change, Heart Change, Consciousness Change, Bloodthirst Change, Space Change, Earth Change, Heavenly Change, and Omen Change.

    Each of the nine changes had their own unique uses. Han Shuo had only recently mastered Speed Change and Body Change. As for the remaining seven changes, Han Shuo was still trying toprehend them.

 Chapter 601: Blood Bathing the Dragon Valley

    GDK 601: Blood Bathing the Dragon Valley

    Of the nine changes, Speed Change was the escape route that Han Shuo counted on if this campaign went south. Speed Change could, in an instant, elerate him to speeds so extreme that his enemy would have no hope of catching up to him. However, while Speed Change was activated, he would not be able to deploy any other demonic technique orunch attacks. It seemed that this demonic technique was meant only for escaping.

    Body Change, as the name implies, was the transformation of the body. This was precisely the technique Han Shuo used to transform himself into a giant of fifty meters. Heart Change was for changing the mental state. It would allow Han Shuo¡¯s mind to maintain calm and be at its most optimal state no matter the situation of a battle. Consciousness Change would allow Han Shuo to observe the finest detail without loss. He would be able to instinctively perceive unknown dangers and have the full view of his opponent¡¯s condition during battle.

    Bloodthirst Change would allow Han Shuo to fall into a demonic trance in a snap, turning him into an unfeeling, deranged demon thirsty for blood. Bloodthirst Change could only be deployed after mastering Body Change, Heart Change, and Consciousness Change.

    Space Change, Earth Change, and Heavenly Change were three killing maneuvers that utilized heaven and earth. Omen Change was another change that must be mastered before advancing to the Omen realm. Even Chu Cang Lan back then hadn¡¯t been able to grasp it.

    With his demonic arts attained to the Nine Changes realm, Han Shuo could start cultivating the nine changes. As soon as he mastered all nine of them, he would break through to the next level, reaching the Omen realm.

    The gargantuan Han Shuo who stood at fifty meters was akin to a demon god that had existed since ancient times that descended upon the Dragon Valley. A long and thunderous roar sounded. It was as though an earthquake struck the Dragon Valley. The quaking never ceased to end.

    ¡°Who is it?¡± a furious roar sounded from the depths of the Dragon Valley. A rank five golden dragon turned into a streak of golden light and soared into the air from a mountain hill. As soon as this golden dragon emerged, all other greater dragons on the mountain ranges of the valley also flew out. Each and every one of them glowered at the intruding Han Shuo, itching to tear this person who disturbed their tranquility into pieces.

    ¡°You are of the race of titans?¡± that rank five golden dragon cried out in surprise. Its look of wrath turned into one of shock as soon as he flew out and saw the enormous Han Shuo.

    The race of titans once enjoyed a period of glory on Profound Continent. Their gigantic figures of immense strength meant the titans enjoyed the reputation of being the race of ancient gods. Even the race of greater dragons dared not to belittle the titans. When the rank five golden dragon saw the immensity of Han Shuo, he immediately connected him to the race of titans that had disappeared for ages.

    ¡°False!¡± Han Shuo looked fiercely at the rank five golden dragon and said, ¡°Five years ago, there was a spacetime discontinuum in this region and I had kindly provided assistance to you all. But in the end, the treatment I got was to be severed from the internar portal by your Primordius Dragon. Do you remember me now?¡±

    All those dragons were shocked at his words. Some of those dragons who had experienced the ordeal carefully looked up and down at Han Shuo before finally recognizing him, ¡°You are actually that wicked necromancer?¡±

    ¡°Hahaha... Yes, it¡¯s me. Didn¡¯t expect this did you? I¡¯m still alive and damn fine!¡± Han Shuo raised his head and cackled. He continued ferociously, ¡°Where is that Primordius Dragon who unts himself as the guardian of Profound Continent? Get him out here. Let¡¯s see if he can seal me up in some alien world this time!¡±

    ¡°Wicked heretic, Dragon Valley will not tolerate your reckless provocation!¡± The rank five golden dragon furiously roared and suddenly charged at Han Shuo.

    When the dragon learned that Han Shuo was not in fact a titan, it had no more misgivings and furiously sped towards Han Shuo, wishing to rip him into shreds.

    ¡°Lizard, courting death!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face turned cold. His enormous body rapidly flew towards this golden dragon and arrived right in front of him in the blink of an eye.

    He unfurled his demonic des and the sharp ws on his two hands erupted with glorious light. He rampantly stabbed at the golden dragon. Shluck! Han Shuo¡¯s nails had nowpletely prated the golden dragon¡¯s body, ruthlessly wriggling, giving its organs a good blending.

    This rank five golden dragon could be considered as one of the top experts on Profound Continent and possessed demigod strength. What a pity that Han Shuo¡¯s strength had far surpassed his. The body of the golden dragon was purportedly the mightiest among races of dragons and yet, it simply could not resist the piercing from Han Shuo¡¯s unimaginably sharp Demonic des. The dragon¡¯s body became badly mangled and its blood flowed down the valley like a waterfall cascade.

    ¡°Arrgh...¡± the golden dragon howled miserably. It wrung and wrapped itself around Han Shuo¡¯s enormous body and exerted all its strength in trying to constrict Han Shuo to death.

    ¡°Hehe...¡± Han Shuoughed grimly and ignored the golden dragon¡¯s struggle. He suddenly lifted his hands and pulled out the Demonic des from the dragon¡¯s body along with a few chunks of minced meat. His hands paused in midair for a moment before they skewered the dragon once again and whirled around inside of it, all while maintaining an evil grin on his face.

    ¡°Aaargh...¡± the golden let out a blood-curdling screech as it staked its life to wring and squeeze Han Shuo.

    Again, unfortunately for the golden dragon, at the Nine Changes realm, Han Shuo¡¯s body was extraordinarily tough. Although the twisting and squeezing of the golden dragon appeared powerful, it left not one bit of impact on Han Shuo.

    At this point, all the greater dragons in Dragon Valley were fuming with bloodshot eyes. One after another, they decided they had seen enough and soared into the air to charge at Han Shuo. ¡°Kill him! Kill this heretic!¡±

    The dragonsunched barrages of magic attacks. All of a sudden, thunderous bolts of lightning, zes and icicles were being propelled towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°After today, the Dragon Valley shall be called the Dragon Cemetery!¡± Han Shuo sneered. He lifted the demonic des on his right hand and ruthlessly stabbed into the skull of that golden dragon. After giving it a little mixing, the golden dragon¡¯s brain was turned into mush. His vitality was slowly fading away.

    Han Shuo then flung the golden dragon far into the distance. It made a rumble when its body smashed into a mountain hill. An awful amount of blood gushed from its body. Obviously, it had no chance of surviving the injuries.

    With one whoosh, Han Shuo¡¯s enormous body evaded the torrent of magic attacks. Suddenly, he was beside a green dragon. He stepped on the dragon with one foot and pressed down on it with all his might, sending the green dragon flying down right into the Dragon Valley below. When theynded, Han Shuo gave it a series of stomping, turning the green dragon into bloody meat paste. It was dead as fuck.

    ¡°Finish him!¡± All those greater dragons had gone mad. They all gathered together andunched their wildest attack at Han Shuo.

    What a pity. The strength of these greater dragons was more than a few sses lower than that of Han Shuo¡¯s. Their advantage in numbers would absolutely not make up for such an enormous disparity in strength. Han Shuo, who had the intention of bathing the Dragon Valley in blood, did not show them the slightest mercy. In order to save himself some time, he finally let out his two lowgod avatars and massacred these dragons of Dragon Valley in three separate directions.

    Of these greater dragons, the mightiest he faced was merely rank five. Against the butchery of three Han Shuos, they did not even have the ability to escape. In just a short few minutes, an altogether seventeen greater dragons were terminated by Han Shuo in atrocious ways. Dragon Valley had literally turned into a Dragon Cemetery.

    ¡°Hm? The Primordius Dragon really isn¡¯t here?¡± Han Shuo started to suspect so when all the greater dragons in Dragon Valley were butchered and yet the Primordius Dragon hadn¡¯t showed up.

    As soon as he entered Dragon Valley, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness had made a tour around the Dragon Valley and did not discover the presence of the Primordius Dragon. At first, Han Shuo thought that the Primordius Dragon¡¯s strength was so powerful that his consciousness could not detect his presence. Therefore, he decided to ughter all the way in order to force the Primordius Dragon to show himself.

    Unexpectedly, the Primordius Dragon still hadn¡¯t shown up even when all the greater dragons were dead. It seems that the Primordius Dragon really wasn¡¯t in Dragon Valley.

    After considering for a while with his brows in a knit, Han Shuo collected all those magical cores, the dragon eye, the dragon meridians, and any valuable objects on these greater dragons. Next, he expanded his consciousness and carefully sensed for any activity under Dragon Valley.

    Just a moment ago, Han Shuo sensed some presencesing from under Dragon Valley which he originally thought was the Primordius Dragon. But given the circumstances now, he knew that it could not be him. Otherwise, with all the carnage he had inflicted upon Dragon Valley, the Primordius Dragon would have long surfaced from underground to attack him.

    After a necromancy spell was performed, the naive looking earth elite zombie appeared. Pointing at the ground, Han Shuo instructed earth elite zombie to split open Dragon Valley.

    After Han Shuo gave themand, earth elite zombie sank into the ground. After that, the earth suddenly tore to reveal a huge opening. Han Shuo descended along the opening. It didn¡¯t take long before he sensed the presence of a divine boundary of the earth element.

    Earth elite zombie shrugged and looked at Han Shuo powerlessly as he transmitted, ¡°I can go in there myself but I can¡¯t break it open.¡±

    Earth elite zombie, as the favored child of earth, enjoyed exceptional advantages in manipting the yuan energy of earth. Although this boundary deployed by the Primordius Dragon had extremely formidable power, it posed no obstacle to earth elite zombie. However, the earth elite zombie he had no way of dismantling the boundary even if he could freely enter and exit.

    ¡°What¡¯s the situation inside?¡± Han Shuo inquired earth elite zombie with bunched brows.

    ¡°There are three persons,¡± earth elite zombie answered.

    Han Shuo was dazed for a moment as he thought to himself, these beings imprisoned by the Primordius Dragon must also be very formidable existences. Han Shuo¡¯s curiosity was evoked when he thought so. He started to probe the earth magic boundary using his consciousness and weighed in his mind if he should spend his divine energy to destroy the boundary.

    ¡°Hmm, what people are they?¡± Han Shuo asked earth elite zombie with another question after a short moment of hesitation.

    Han Shuo could break open the boundary below but doing so would consume some of his divine energy. If those three inside turned out to be insignificant characters, freeing them would be an effort worth nothing for him to gain. It was for this reason that Han Shuo would ask this question.

    ¡°No idea,¡± earth elite zombie straightforwardly replied.

    ¡°Go inside and ask them for their names.¡± Earth elite zombie possessed the ability to directlymunicate with the soul. Han Shuo reckoned that those sealed inside the boundary would certainly not be ordinary persons and ought to also have the ability tomunicate with the soul.

    As soon as Han Shuo gave his instruction, the earth elite zombie descended into the boundary. Very soon, earth elite zombie returned and looked at Han Shuo as he transmitted, ¡°Three of them. Their names are Pegasus, Graeae, and Ayermike Cotton.¡±

    ¡°Ayermike Cotton?!!¡± Han Shuo shrieked, ¡°The expert key to the founding of Lancelot Empire ¨C dark divine magus Ayermike Cotton. It¡¯s actually him!¡±

 Chapter 602: Submission

    GDK 602: Submission

    Ever since Han Shuo was still a magic apprentice, he had heard a constant stream of people mentioning Ayermike Cotton¡¯s name. The reason that Lancelot Empire managed to be founded and be a great nation on Profound Continent that endured the trial of time was solely Ayermike Cotton.

    It wouldn¡¯t be an overstatement to say that without this person called Ayermike Cotton, the Lancelot Empire would not have existed.

    Five hundred years ago, when Lancelot Empire was sharpening their swords, preparing to stampede through the other countries, the protector of the empire, Ayermike Cotton, abruptly went missing.

    After Ayermike Cotton mysteriously disappeared, so did the qualms of all other nations. They joined forces to thwart the Lancelot Empire¡¯s conquest. Since then, the Lancelot Empire had basically stopped expanding its territories.

    No citizen of the Lancelot Empire would not know of the glorious days the empire enjoyed when Ayermike Cotton was still around. Ayermike Cotton was a magnificent character that the citizens of Lancelot Empire reminisced the most.

    Who would had guessed that one of those imprisoned in a boundary deep under Dragon Valley would be the pride of Lancelot Empire ¨C the demigod existence ¨C dark divine magus Ayermike Cotton.

    From the moment earth elite zombie informed Han Shuo that one of the prisoners were Ayermike Cotton, Han Shuo made up his mind to unmake the boundary. There would finally be a real answer to Ayermike Cotton¡¯s disappearance five hundred years ago which certainly had something to do with the Primordius Dragon.

    As Ayermike Cotton had already attained the strength of demigod five hundred years ago, perhaps only the guardian of Profound Continent, the Primordius Dragon, had the capability of imprisoning him.

    After learning the identities of the captives, Han Shuo sent earth elite zombie back to the Netherworld. His avatar of destruction transformed back into the Demonyer Edge which was then tightly grasped by Han Shuo in his hand. The energy of destruction in his destruction lowgod avatar and demonic yuan in his main body suddenly erupted from the Demonyer Edge and mmed against the boundary.

    Dong!

    The barrier resonated. Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death suddenly deployed necromancy magic. Thousands upon thousands of bone arrows bombarded the barrier.

    The Demonyer Edge that had delivered a blow with its greatest power, erupted with energy and struck the barrier again.

    Han Shuo¡¯s three bodies continuously bombarded the earth element barrier deployed by Primordius Dragon. The session of attacks had quickly consumed all the divine energy contained in the barrier.

    Ting! Finally, the earth element barrier could no longer withstand the attacks from three Han Shuos and gave way with a crisp sound.

    Based on the round of boring brute-force attack and the time and energy he needed to destroy the barrier, Han Shuo had estimated that the Primordius Dragon was of mid-stage lowgod strength. As long as the Primordius Dragon had not made any breakthrough since he deployed the barrier, Han Shuo had full confidence of killing him when they next met.

    After taking a quick breath of air, Han Shuo expanded his consciousness and immediately detected three very mighty presences from the destroyed underground barrier.

    Before Han Shuo could take a good look, a wild mor sounded from below. Three shadowy trails shed through and soared into the air.

    ¡°Damned dragons, I will scale and kill you all!¡± a strong-looking old man roared at the sky.

    He was around two meters tall, messy fiery-red long hair on his head, and had big muscles from head to toe. Cruel, sinister lights would glitter from his pair of eyes. One could tell that this person was a wicked one at first nce.

    ¡°Pegasus, be quiet,¡± a sweet-looking little girl said in a soft voice.

    This girl had emerald green hair that trailed over her shoulders and appeared to be only twelve or thirteen years old. Her pointy ears looked like those of an elf. However, the auraing from her wasn¡¯t as peaceful and natural as that of an elf, but strangely fiendish.

    ¡°Who opened the barrier?¡± thest person was a sinister looking elderly man. He wore an old and ragged magical robe. His voice was soft and low. His body seemed to absorb light. He appeared very gloomy.

    All three of them looked like humans but when Han Shuo probed them with his consciousness, he quickly discovered that besides the gloomy old man, the rest were not human. The elderly wearing old and ragged magical robe ought to be the legend of Lancelot Empire ¨C Ayermike Cotton. Han Shuo could easily tell that from the design of his magical robe.

    Han Shuo detected the presence of a magic crystal core inside the body of that strong old man called Pegasus. He seemed to be a very powerful magical beast.

    As for that sweet looking little girl with emerald green long hair, Han Shuo surmised that she ought to be a banshee, a race extremely rare on Profound Continent.

    One human, one magical beast, and one banshee. These three experts trapped in the boundary by the Primordius Dragon possessed astonishing strength. After five hundred years, Ayermike Cotton had advanced in strength and broke through the demigod realm to be a basegod. That banshee must have cultivated in wind element energy. She also possessed basegod strength. As for that powerful magical beast, however, the magical core in his body appeared rather odd, therefore Han Shuo couldn¡¯t make out his actual strength from it.

    ¡°Young man, are you the one who destroyed the barrier and saved us?¡± Ayermike Cotton nced around and saw Han Shuo standing tall underneath the boundary. He asked in amazement.

    Han Shuo smiled and urbanely replied, ¡°That is correct. You three are free.¡±

    ¡°Oh handsome man, thank you for your rescue. How ever can we repay you?¡± the banshee named Graeae said smilingly as she looked at Han Shuo. She appeared just like an innocent, naive little girl.

    ¡°It¡¯s simple. As I have given you all freedom, you will serve me,¡± Han Shuo smiled and saidposedly to the three.

    ¡°What do you mean?¡± Pegasus the magical beast opened his round eyes wide as the sun.

    Han Shuo swept a nce at the three and smiled, saying, ¡°Follow me and I guarantee that none of you will be imprisoned by the Primordius Dragon ever again.¡±

    ¡°Are you worthy?¡± Pegasus sized Han Shuo up and down in distrust. He made a grin and sneered, ¡°Do you think that we will be your ves just because you saved us by mere luck?¡±

    ¡°By mere luck?¡± Han Shuo smiled and soon after, turned a pensive look, muttering to himself for a while. When he saw the three looking at him with flickering gazes, Han Shuo giggled, ¡°As Ayermike Cotton is our Lancelot Empire¡¯s hero who helped with the founding of the country, I will give him the proper respect.¡± After a short pause, Han Shuo¡¯s face turned cold and he stared at Pegasus and the banshee as he said, ¡°How about you two, would you like to earnestly follow me and do my bidding, or would you like to go to hell?¡±

    ¡°Hee hee, what an overbearing character. I like that,¡± Graeae the banshee giggled, looked up and down at Han Shuo with fascination, and curiously asked, ¡°Is it really you who broke that stubborn greater dragon¡¯s seal?¡±

    ¡°You are a citizen of Lancelot Empire?¡± The originally displeased Ayermike Cotton suddenly turned pleasantly surprised and asked when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s words.

    Han Shuo did not answer the banshee¡¯s question but said smilingly to Ayermike Cotton, ¡°That¡¯s right. I have now inherited the undertaking you have yet toplete ¨C to make Lancelot Empire rule the whole of Profound Continent!

    ¡°Arrogant youngster, do you think that old dragon will let you do as you wish?¡± Pegasus asked as he red at Han Shuo.

    ¡°I¡¯m going to kill him. I believe that a dead dragon won¡¯t be able to obstruct me, right?¡± Han Shuo said with confidence.

    ¡°Good one, youngster. Well, regardless of whether you actually have the capacity to do that, to have the guts to have such an imagination is extraordinary in itself,¡± Ayermike Cotton said as heughed. His attitude towards Han Shuo greatly changed as soon as he learned that Han Shuo came from the Lancelot Empire.

    ¡°Ayermike Cotton, you old thing, don¡¯t tell me that you are nning to help him take care of us? We were locked in the same cell together for so many years!¡± Pegasus glowered at Ayermike Cotton and shouted.

    ¡°Excuse me? I don¡¯t need anyone¡¯s help, it will take me no effort at all to kill the two of you,¡± Han Shuo looked at the two firmly and groaned, ¡°That Primordius Dragon is a little soft-hearted and had only imprisoned you all. But if the two of you dare provoke me, I will kill the two of you without the slightest hesitation.¡±

    Upon finishing those words, by using the energy of his avatars inside his body, Han Shuo suddenly deployed a Domain of Divinity of death and followed by a Domain of Divinity of destruction.

    Pegasus, who was just opening his mouth to speak, felt the sudden bizarre transformation to the surrounding space. His face instantly turned into stone. Graeae was jolted and cried out in surprise, ¡°The Domain of Divinity!¡±

    ¡°Double Domains of Divinity... Who, who are you? Where do youe from?¡± Even Ayermike Cotton was frightened. He stared at Han Shuo.

    ¡°I really am a citizen of Lancelot Empire. You will know this after we leave the Dragon Valley.¡± Han Shuo had great respect for this expert who had disappeared five hundred years ago. He immediately exined after hearing his question.

    Ayermike Cotton stared nkly for a while, and turned to look at the banshee and Pegasus withplicated emotions in his eyes, ¡°What say you? I¡¯m no match against him. There¡¯s no use in resisting.¡±

    ¡°Old thing, do we have a second option?¡± Graeae the banshee put on a long face, made a cute shrug, and asked in helplessness.

    ¡°If we don¡¯t want to die, there is only one option left for us,¡± Ayermike Cotton said in a deep voice.

    The three looked at each other, hesitated for a moment, and simultaneously performed a respectful bow at Han Shuo, lowering their high heads. They might have been all-powerful experts of Profound Continent five hundred years ago. However, after five hundred years, the much younger Han Shuo had greatly seeded them in might. Therefore, they had no option but to submit and serve.

    Han Shuo took a step forward and helped Ayermike Cotton up. He said sincerely, ¡°As citizens of Lancelot Empire, we walk the same path and share the same enemy. You don¡¯t need to be courteous with me.¡±

 Chapter 603: Shrieks at the snowland

    GDK 603: Shrieks at the snond

    Many powerful characters had once upon a time appeared on Profound Continent. Ayermike Cotton, Pegasus, and Graeae were originally figures ahead of their times. On the stage of Profound Continent, the three had once yed extremely important roles. However, the Primordius Dragon deemed that their existences had disrupted the natural order of Profound Continent and therefore he took it upon himself to sentence the three to imprisonment under the Dragon Valley.

    Although the three possessed mighty strength,pared to the Primordius Dragon, the guardian of Profound Continent, they fell far behind. Before the Primordus Dragon took action, they could stir up havoc with no repercussions. But when the Primordius Dragon took action, their hands were tied and they could only stand waiting to be captured.

    The guardian of Profound Continent did not exterminate the three. After capturing them, he only incarcerated them, never putting their lives in danger.

    From Ayermike Cotton¡¯s narration, Han Shuo learned that the forbiddennd inside Dark Forest was where the three were apprehended. There were many unruly magical beasts that were sentenced to death in the forbiddennd for the heresy of challenging Primordius Dragon¡¯s might.

    ¡°I will exact my vengeance against the old dragon!¡± Pegasus said angrily after listening to Ayermike Cotton¡¯s simplified recount of the course of events.

    Han Shuo looked at Pegasus disdainfully and said, ¡°Even with ten clones of yourself, you are no match against the Primordius Dragon.¡±

    Pegasus was a manticore who had repeatedly had fortuitous encounters. Although he wasn¡¯t a super-ranked magical beast, he was a really lucky one. He managed to obtain two crystal cores from super-ranked magical beasts that died in a fight. After absorbing the two crystal cores of the super-ranked magical beasts, he began to mutate. Then, through many years of cultivation, he managed to make multiple breakthroughs in one go, giving him strength that transcended beyond the five ranks.

    The Ancient Lizard King Dagassi that Han Shuo had earlier met at the underground world was merely a rank five magical beast. Based on the division of ranks of magical beasts, this Pegasus was likely a rank six with the strength of basegod.

    However, no matter how powerful a basegod was, against the Primordius Dragon who was in the lowgod realm, the basegod would be dead without a doubt. They had absolutely no chance, not even in escaping.

    ¡°Damn it! Am I supposed to just swallow the grudge for the countless years of imprisonment?¡± when Pegasus learned that to exact vengeance on Primordius Dragon would be a fantasy given his strength, he angrily eximed, ¡°I don¡¯t care! I must take revenge! Right, even if I can¡¯t kill that Primordius Dragon, I must at least ughter his descendants!¡±

    ¡°You won¡¯t have a chance for that either,¡± Han Shuo said smilingly. He pointed at the Dragon Valley, and continued in a deep voice, ¡°Look around carefully. Is there any opportunity left for you?¡±

    Pegasus¡¯ eyes trailed along the direction in which Han Shuo pointed and discovered the dragon bodies everywhere. A dozen or more gory carcasses of greater dragons lied disorderly all around the Dragon Valley. They had long been without a trace of life.

    ¡°You, you killed them all? the banshee was frightened and let out a gentle cry.

    Han Shuo nodded and calmly replied, ¡°Yep. Other than the Primordius Dragon who had left the Dragon Valley, all the dragons of the Dragon Valley are here ¨C all dead.¡±

    ¡°This is bad. That Primordius Dragon surely won¡¯t let go of you. Back then, it¡¯s because wemitted no offense against the dragon race that we were only locked under the Dragon Valley. At that time, all those experts who hunted their dragons weren¡¯t as lucky as we were. Every one of them was killed by the Primordius Dragon. I believe that if the Primordius Dragon knew you did this, he will kill you by all means necessary!¡± Graeae the banshee said with her brows knitted. She seemed to be worrying for Han Shuo.

    ¡°It¡¯s no big deal. If the Primordius Dragon has not made any progress in the years after he deployed that divine boundary, the next time I meet him, that will be the time of his death!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face turned cold.

    If the Primordius Dragon was still a mid-stage lowgod, then with Han Shuo¡¯s two early-stage lowgod avatars, his main body, and Little Skeleton working together, he had the certainty of killing the Primordius Dragon. Therefore, these words of his were not a baseless assertion.

    ¡°If you really could kill the Primordius Dragon, then Profound Continent will really be under the rule of our Lancelot Empire!¡± Ayermike Cotton put on a delighted expression. He appeared extremely excited.

    ¡°You will see that day!¡± Han Shuo put on a confident smile. Soon after, he looked all around, and continued, ¡°But before that, we must first get rid of the current threats that Lancelot Empire is facing.¡±

    ¡°What should we do?¡± Ayermike Cotton, as the forefather of Lancelot Empire, had not put down his noble aspirations even after five hundred years. He immediately asked after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words.

    ¡°First of all, we need to destroy two religions. Follow me!¡± Han Shuo said with a murderous-looking face as he gazed in the direction to Kasi Empire where the Shine of Ice was based in.

    Pegasus and Graeae exchanged nces and appeared somewhat excited as though they were looking forward to barbaric acts of murdering and plundering. Perhaps it was because they were ustomed to their arrogant and savage ways that they would be imprisoned by the Primordius Dragon. It seemed the few hundred years of incarceration had worn down not the slightest bit of their temperament. They remained thirsty for blood just as before.

    Han Shuo hovered loftily above the Dragon Valley and expanded his consciousness to sense for a moment. Once he was sure that there was nothing left behind, he took the three fes who had been imprisoned for many years flying straight for the snond of Kasi Empire.

    As all three of them possessed basegod strength, after going through a series of transmissions via magical transportation matrices, the party wasted no time arriving at the arctic snond where the Shine of Ice was located.

    The group of four, Han Shuo included, made no effort to conceal their tracks. They rampantly descended upon the numerous snowy peaks of the Shrine of Ice.

    ¡°There are basically no experts. There¡¯s only one woman who could barely be considered as an opponent,¡± Pegasus silently observed the surrounding situation and said to Han Shuo rather enthusiastically, proudly hovering over the numerous snowy peaks of the Shrine of Ice.

    ¡°Pegasus, Graeae, get into action. Liquefy the sacred summits of the Shrine of Ice.¡± Immediately after Han Shuo expanded his consciousness, he detected Snow Celestial Tiana¡¯s location. When he recalled of the betrayal he received back at the sacred mountain of the Church of Light, his heart became as frigid as the weather around him.

    ¡°This is not a challenging thing at all. Hehe, I like doing demolition jobs!¡± Pegasus had a round of savageughter and shot downwards before waiting for Graeae to make her move.

    Manticore was a type of carnivorous magical beast that was cruel by nature. Even as Pegasus evolved to rank six, the inborn qualities of a manticore were still unchanged as before. He was innately fond of killing.

    However, Graeae the banshee seemed to be one step ahead. She did not need to rely on physical contact tounch attacks. She screamed at the top of her lungs. Her ear-piercing voice tore through the air and spread to every frozen summit of the snond as frigid cold air blew wildly.

    Graeae the banshee cultivated in the elemental energy of wind. This race was born with special abilities to attack and cause confusion through their voices. By fusing her voice with the wind element, the shriek produced by Graeae the banshee possessed extraordinary firepower.

    As she let out ear-piercing shrieks, avnches suddenly broke out in many parts of the snond. Her piercing shrieks constantly reverberated through the snond. Many disciples of the Shine of Ice on the frozen peaks couldn¡¯t stand the nuisance of the sharp noise and walked out from the shrines they lived in one after another, glowering at Graeae.

    ¡°Who are you? How dare you monkey around in our Shrine of Ice!¡± a great swordmaster with a stone-cold face yelled and glowered at Graeae while raising a longsword that sent out a chilling aura.

    Pow!

    Right after that swordmaster shouted those words, Pegasus fell from the sky andnded on him. This swordmaster was given no chance at all to react and was stomped deep into the snond alive by Pegasus¡¯ muscr body. He could no longer make a sound.

    Graeae the banshee was still shrieking loudly. The element of wind wildly converged on the snond as her voice reverberated through the area. As the voice of Graeae the banshee grew louder and louder, many of the weaker Shrine of Ice disciples began to bleed from their ears. They had evidently suffered severe injuries.

    The avnches were still going on. As rumbles sounded, several frozen peaks of the Shrine of Ice gradually started to shake.

    After Pegasusnded on the tallest frozen summit, he transformed into his original form of a savage and tough-bodied manticore and ughtered all the Shrine of Ice disciples who charged at him. Being much greater in strength, Pegasus had met with zero resistance. He pranced and mauled around uninhibitedly, shredding the disciples of the Shrine of Ice into pieces one after another. Not a single one of them was a worthy opponent.

    ¡°Back then, Pegasus and Graeae were ferocious beings that every expert on Profound Continent was afraid of. Now that the two are liberated, other than you and the Primordius Dragon, I¡¯m afraid there is no existence that could stop the two,¡± Ayermike Cotton indifferently exined to Han Shuo standing beside him as they watched Pegasus and Graeae ughter away.

    ¡°Hehe, the Primordius Dragon was a little too merciful after all. If it were me, I would surely have finished these obviously restless fes if they didn¡¯t obey me, lest they cause any trouble in the future,¡± Han Shuo smirked. Something came to his mind and he thought for a moment before he said, ¡°Oh, by the way, your personal notes on the cultivation of the element of darkness as well as the magical staff you left in the forbiddennd were obtained by me. Hehe, perhaps we were brought together by fate. However, I don¡¯t think that I can return the items to you as I have gifted them away.¡±

    Contrary to expectations, Ayermike Cotton seemed pleasantly surprised at Han Shuo¡¯s words. He looked deeply into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes andmented, ¡°It really does seems that fate has brought us together. Back then, I thought that I would be dead without a doubt and therefore left these things behind, hoping that someone would inherit my cultivation experiences and approaches. Who knew that they woulde to be in your possession. Perhaps we are destined to meet.¡±

    As they conversed, a powerful voice came from the tallest frozen peak, ¡°Cease!¡± The voice was abruptly followed by a human figure darting out. It was Snow Celestial Tiana who had once plotted against Han Shuo.

 Chapter 604: Whipping

    GDK 604: Whipping

    Back at Tarrag Canyon where Han Shuo and his gang had plundered from the Soul Race, all those who made it out alive obtained great bounties, including Tiana, who gained an Origin Crystal of Water. By fusing her soul with the Origin Crystal, Tiana formed a soul of element and saw a substantial increase in her strength. For the past few years, she had been delving herself into the cultivation of the water element, attempting to form herself a body of element.

    Although Tiana had gotten stronger, before forming a body of element, she remained a demigod. A mere demigod was no match for Pegasus or Graeae, let alone Han Shuo.

    Tiana, dressed in clothing as white as winter and wore a cold expression on her face as snowkes fluttered around her. After shouting her presence, she shot high into the air and glowered at Graeae the banshee who was letting out loud shrieks.

    Graeae the banshee did not even look at Tiana. She continued to screech above the mountains using her sharp voice that could rip the sky apart. Many of the Shrine of Ice disciples with poor strength gradually started to copse. Some of them sank into a dazzled, head spinning state, while some broke their eardrums. They sustained rather significant injuries.

    Pegasus, who was in his original form, also paid no heed to Tiana¡¯s bawling. He too carried on with what he was doing at the frozen summit, cutting left and right and very wildly splitting into pieces all those who dared charge at him.

    ¡°Who are you people? What great grudges or grievances do you have with our Shrine of Ice?¡± Tiana shouted as she glowered at Graeae.

    Both Pegasus and Graeae turned a blind eye to Tiana¡¯s questioning. They ruthlessly attacked the Shrine of Ice disciples below as before. Just as Tiana was about to make a strike, Han Shuo descended from the clouds overhead,ughing mischievously.

    ¡°Snow Celestial Tiana, long time no see. Still recognize me?¡± After Han Shuo got down, he first gestured at Graeae and Pegasus to stop with their massacre before turning to Tiana.

    Tiana truly was too familiar with Han Shuo. As soon as Han Shuo¡¯s figure appeared, her face immediately turned to a frightened look as she cried out in surprise, ¡°It¡¯s you? You are actually still alive?¡±

    Like most people, Tiana thought that matters announced by the Pope of Light could not be false. Therefore, she had long considered Han Shuo to be dead. She truly was astonished to suddenly meet Han Shuo again at the Shrine of Ice.

    ¡°Hehe, you really thought that I was a dead man just because the Pope of Light said so?¡± Han Shuo looked up and down at Tiana with a half-smile as he recounted the hatred in the past. As he walked on empty air towards Tiana step by step, his face gradually grew colder and colder. He fixed his eyes on Tiana and continued in an icy tone, ¡°How would I let myself be killed so easily without putting you fucking contemptible fes to death?¡±

    Han Shuo did not deliberately disy the mighty auraing from his body. However, Tiana, whose soul had fused with an Origin Crystal, could instinctively sense the terrifying energy concealed in him. Tiana had absolutely no idea what realm Han Shuo had attained, but it was clear to her that Han Shuo was extremely powerful. The feeling of fear, which she had not known for many years, rose from the bottom of her heart.

    Tiana had never felt so deeply terrified, not even when she was facing the Saintess of the Church of Light. This kind of feeling caused her heart to sink. The closer Han Shuo got to her, the more frightened she was.

    ¡°Scared?¡± Han Shuo sneered as he looked at Tiana. He felt the thrill of retaliation as he made cutting remarks at Tiana.

    ¡°No, I¡¯m not...¡± Tiana¡¯s voice was quivering.

    ¡°After this day, the Shrine of Ice will disappear from Profound Continent. Your countless years of painstaking work will be undone. While you, friend-selling, treacherous old bitch, will vanish along with it,¡± as Han Shuo walked towards Tiana, he did not forget to constantly crush her with unfeeling words, disgracing her with all kinds of insults right before her death.

    ¡°Shut your mouth! I¡¯m not afraid of you!¡± Tiana was furious. As the Snow Celestial of the Shrine of Ice, she finally couldn¡¯t bear it when she was cursed in front of the crowd as an ¡®old bitch¡¯.

    ¡°Pegasus, Graeae, you two carry on with the butchering. Kill every single one of these men in the Shrine of Ice and destroy their foundation,¡± Han Shuo grinned and instructed Pegasus and Graeae.

    ¡°Rest assured, we will purge everyst one of them!¡± Pegasus, in his manticore appearance, with his paws drenched in blood, pledged in a merciless voice.

    ¡°Very good. You may proceed!¡± Han Shuoughed triumphantly as he flew towards Tiana. It wasn¡¯t clear if Han Shuo had deployed some special spell or martial technique but he formed a whip using incorporeal energy. It made a loud crack when Han Shuoshed it on Tiana.

    As an expert who was on the verge of breakthrough to bing a basegod, Tiana was unexpectedly incapable of evading Han Shuo¡¯s attack. She had retreated in panic when she sensed incorporeal energy clearly shooting at her, and yet, she could not escape from the whip.

    Tiana, who had always bore the image of a grandeur upper-ss woman, received ash to a side of her waist. The foggy mist that constantly surrounded her seemed scatter after that whip and it miraculously dissipated. After that strike, a small hole was torn in the silky white gown, revealing skin as fair as milk underneath. The red bruise from being whipped was in and clearly visible on her white skin.

    Han Shuo had exerted an extremely controlled and precise power when he flogged ¨C It wasn¡¯t enough to instantly kill Tiana, but sufficient to cause her immense pain. The whip that tore away her clothing had caused her an especially unbearable humiliation.

    Tiana had always been a goddess-like, esteemed character at the Shrine of Ice and obviously had never suffered such treatment of being whipped like a ve. The pain that Han Shuo brought on her was not at all limited to just the flesh.

    ¡°Hehe, interesting, interesting! I believe that those disciples of your Shrine of Ice down there surely have never seen you like this,¡± Han Shuoughed grimly. As soon as he finished those words, before Tiana could fly away, Han Shuo gave her another fewshes in a row. While leaving several deep red whip scars on her body, her white gown was further ripped open.

    Tiana tried to run, but she could not escape.

    Somehow,yers of air walls appeared in her path, causing her to be slower and slower in her escape. Meanwhile, Han Shuo was sneering as he unhurriedly pursued and attacked from behind her. Every strike of the formless attacksnded on Tiana, leaving more and moresh marks on her body. As that happened, some exotic energies intruded her body. They were akin to hundreds upon thousands of little worms gnawing on her flesh.

    Right beneath Tiana was a crowd of Shrine of Ice disciples. Pegasus and Graeae had, at some point, ceased their hunting and killing, allowing them to raise their heads up and stare foolishly at the pathetic, miserable character that they so revered. Never ever had they imagined Ice Celestial Tiana, the noblest character of the Shrine of Ice, would beshed just like a ve.

    ¡°You, you demon, just kill me! I won¡¯t let go of you even in death!¡± The humiliation Tiana received had pushed her to the brink of a mental breakdown.

 Chapter 605: Prayer

    GDK 605: Prayer

    ¡°You want to die?¡± Han Shuo looked askance at Tiana and sneered, ¡°I¡¯m not gonna let that happen easily!¡± Incorporeal whipsnded on Tiana, causing her enormous blows to both her body and mind.

    Tiana could neither escape nor evade Han Shuo¡¯s whipping. All she could do was bear the double whammy humiliation. Below Tiana was a crowd of Shrine of Ice disciples. They were not being massacred by Pegasus and Graeae at this moment and were looking up to the sky, painfully watching Tiana being tormented like a caged bird.

    Many of the disciples started to pray, praying for the god they believed in to provide assistance.

    To these disciples, Snow Celestial Tiana was the mightiest existence of the Shrine of Ice. However, that very same person was being humiliated without even the capacity of escaping. This scene had truly caused them enormous wound to their spirituality.

    If even Snow Celestial Tiana was too powerless to do anything, what exactly could these people do?

    As disciples of the Shrine of Ice, for these pilgrims to be in this snowy holynd was proof in itself the staunch conviction that they had in their faith. And now that they were in utter andplete helplessness, their dependence towards the seemingly illusionary god was suddenly magnified by infinity.

    Han Shuo¡¯s whipping had left Snow Celestial Tiana¡¯s snow-white gown tattered and ragged, revealing the wonderfully curvaceous body underneath. She looked no different from a degenerate servant being heavily punished for faults.

    Pegasus and Graeae the banshee who came with Han Shuo had paused with their butchering. With their cold eyes, they gazed at Han Shuo who was taking his time in flogging Tiana in midair as they awaited further instructions.

    It wasn¡¯t clear who took the lead but at this moment, the powerless Shrine of Ice disciples on the frozen summits suddenly started to kneel and piously chanted, calling for the Ice Goddess¡¯ blessing. The voice grew from low to high as everyone started singing it in unison. Some of those disciples even temporarily gave up on escaping to participate in this impressive scene.

    Even Tiana, who knew that she had no way of escaping, harboring the most sincere belief towards the Ice Goddess, began to pray even when she had no idea if it would be answered.

    The frozen mountains were located at the center of the snond where cold wind and snow blew the wildest. The frozen mountain summits were like longswords piercing into the blue dome of heaven. It was rumored that the Ice Goddess had specifically selected this location to be the base of the Shrine of Ice. No one knew if there was anything profound about the choice, but the Shrine of Ice disciples had always felt that they could get closer to the Goddess and better receive her guidance in this ce.

    In reality, there really was something unique about these frozen mountains at the center of the snond. Those disciples back at that time had actually altered the few frozen peaks in ordance with the instructions of the Ice Goddess.

    The sound of prayers resounded throughout the whole snowy peaks. Towards the seemingly futile effort of these Shrine of Ice disciples, Graeae and Pegasus said nothing, only smearing their faces with ridiculing, contemptuous smiles. They felt that these people must have turned into fools after being intimidated by Han Shuo.

    Even the basegod of darkness, Ayermike Cotton, thought the actions of these disciples to be absolutely senseless. He leisurely hovered amongst the clouds, beaming ear to ear as he watched Han Shuo beating up Tiana.

    However, Han Shuo, whose strength was in a godly realm, could clearly sense some gradual changes to water elemental energy inside this snowfield as these Shrine of Ice disciples recited their prayers. A field simr to the Domain of Divinity was miraculously being produced at the center of the few frozen mountains.

    ¡°You demon, just kill me, I won¡¯t let go you even in death!¡± Tiana¡¯s shriek was mournful and even carried a weeping tone. After being repeatedly shamed by Han Shuo, with the double torment of her body and soul, Tiana was clearly on the brink of a breakdown.

    Han Shuo did not pay attention to her crying, nor did he continue with the flogging. Glistening radiance shone from his two eyes as he observed the peculiar changes around the snowy mountains and thought about the abnormality of this holynd.

    Suddenly, the element of water started to rapidly revolve at the center of these snowy mountains. Intensely frigid beams erupted from the tall and pointy structures at the summits of those snowy mountains. The powerful light beams radiating from those structures intersected with each other. Frosty aura abruptly burst forth, causing the temperatures in the surroundings to rapidly decline.

    The snond where the Shrine of Ice was located was a frozen mass to begin with. However, when the temperature suddenly plunged further, not only were these pious believers of the Ice Goddess not affected, every one of them started to cheer, ¡°The Goddess is manifesting! The Ice Goddess has heard our prayers!¡±

    All the aggressors, including Han Shuo, were affected by the cold air. The weather threatened to hamper them if they didn¡¯t act fast. The air walls that Han Shuo used to keep Snow Celestial Tiana imprisoned started to creak. After streams of freezing cold air seeped through the air walls Han Shuo deployed, the air walls lost all of its original power.

    Snow Celestial Tiana who was beaten ck and blue clenched her teeth as she red at Han Shuo. Her half-bare smooth, fair breasts bounced rapidly up and down. She screamed in a voice as cold as ice, ¡°The Ice Goddess must have heard our prayers. None of you will be leaving this snond alive!¡±

    ¡°What in Lord¡¯s name? It¡¯s not fucking working, is it?!¡± even the rank-six manticore Pegasus sensed the peculiarity with the surrounding atmosphere. He couldn¡¯t help but cry out in surprise after listening to Tiana¡¯s words.

    ¡°Bryan, can the Ice Goddess really make an appearance?¡± Ayermike Cotton inquired Han Shuo. He was rather unflustered.

    After experiencing the double Domain of Divinity from Han Shuo, Ayermike Cotton knew that Han Shuo was an actual god. He had no idea what would happen following the unusual transformation to this snond, but he believed that Han Shuo should at least know a thing or two.

    Han Shuo nodded, calm and collected as he exined, ¡°When the power of faith of these believers miraculously converges with the help of altars, magical matrices, offerings, or other vectors as they feverishly call for the worshipped, that god can indeed sense it. Then, through altars or other mediums, that god could even manifest itself from across countless material nes for a short duration.¡±

    Han Shuo paused, looked around, made a gloomy face and groaned, ¡°From the terrain, it appears that these ice-bound mountains of the snond are naturally-suited for the Shrine of Ice to form a giant magical matrix. Using some unique arrangements and applying the power of faith, if that Ice Goddess has serious strength, she indeed could hear the thoughts of her believers at this ce. There is a chance of manifestation.¡±

    ¡°What should we do?¡± Pegasus, who was massacring without restraint just a moment ago, screamed in panic.

    He had a clear understanding of the strength he possessed. It was absolutely impossible for him to deal with a god. It hadn¡¯t been easy to escape from the Primordius Dragon¡¯s boundary and he had no wish of returning there or getting killed.

    ¡°What are you losing your head for?¡± Han Shuo shot a cold nce at Pegasus before he calmly exined, ¡°Any god, as long as they have not traversed across material nes and arrived with their divine body and divine soul, would not be able to unleash their full strength. Even if they used an intermediary, by assembling a new body using substances, or manifesting through their believer¡¯s body, they just could not unleash much strength. No matter how powerful the Ice Goddess is, she is still bound by the universalw just the same!¡±

    ¡°Arrogant chap, the Ice Goddess possesses a countless amount of believers in every major material ne. As a mighty goddess that has existed since ancient times, even with just a hundredth of Her power, she could still kill you all,¡± Tiana hastily put on a new gown. She mocked them, hatefully ring at Han Shuo with gritted teeth.

    ¡°You are indeed correct. If the Ice Goddess were to do this herself, even by descending that way, we would be dead without a doubt!¡± Against Tiana¡¯s expectations, Han Shuo did not refute but calmly admitted to the fact.

    While Tiana was astounded and puzzled, Han Shuo simply sneered loudly and ridiculed, ¡°But, do you really think that the Ice Goddess wille here in person just to deal with me? Just for petty matters like you guys? The Ice Goddess has countless believers in all major material nes. If she were to perform every single task in person, wouldn¡¯t she work herself to death?¡±

    ¡°We are the most devout believers of the Goddess. The Goddess will definitely take pity on us. Besides, this is the territory of the Ice Goddess. She would absolutely not allow anyone to damage it,¡± although Tiana thought that Han Shuo¡¯s words made sense, nheless, she was reluctant to admit the fact and disputed it.

    Han Shuo sneered disdainfully and did not further defend his exnation. There was still onest thing that he hadn¡¯t told Tiana ¨C a god would have to undertake many additional risks in having their soul traverse to a different material ne to fight for their believers using mediums. In addition to that, doing so would exhaust some of their divine energy. Generally, unlesspelled by circumstances, they would surely not do so rashly.

    The Ice Goddess was different from spider goddess Rose. From what Han Shuo knew, the Ice Goddess was an overgod. An iparably mighty overgod would never concern itself for a smidgen of believers from a small material ne called Profound Continent.

    As a god himself, Han Shuo was sure that these gods did not give a single hang about the believers that worshipped them. They only considered their believers as objects that provided them the power of faith. There was no chance that they would do the job personally for such a trivial matter.

    It was thanks to this rationale that Han Shuo did not immediately flee in panic when he observed the abnormal changes produced in this snond. Rather, he nned on staying to see it through.

    ¡°Lord Bryan, what should we do?¡± Graeae the banshee stammered.

    Han Shuo bunched his brows and thought for a moment. He knew that no matter the rank of the god dispatched by the Ice Goddess, Graeae and hispany would have no way of defending themselves.

    ¡°You three leave for the time being and wait in the distance until it is time. I will stay here to greet those sent by the Shrine of Ice,¡± Han Shuo took a quick nce at the three, nodded, and advised them not to let their lives be sacrificed unnecessarily.

    As soon as Pegasus and Graeae heard those words, they rushed into the distance as though they had received a pardon. Ayermike Cotton, however, looked deeply into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes and said, ¡°Be careful!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, nothing will happen to me,¡± Han Shuo replied smilingly and cordially. It was obvious that Ayermike Cotton was truly concerned about him, unlike Pegasus and Graeae.

    Ayermike Cotton nodded and said no more. He then flew in the direction Pegasus and Graeae had fled.

 Chapter 606: Consequences

    GDK 606: Consequences

    As soon as Ayermike Cotton left, Han Shuo directed his attentionpletely on the intersecting frosty beams on the frozen summits.

    The reason that the Shrine of Ice had based itself here was due to its unique geography. It was very easy to gather cold aura in this ce. With the Shrine of Ice disciples¡¯ meticulous arrangement as per the instructions of the Ice Goddess, these frozen mountains had turned into a most bizarre magical matrix. Not only did it have the ability to gather cold aura, but it could also act as an altar to receive any energy the Goddess bestowed.

    On Profound Continent, there truly was no one apart from the Primordius Dragon that Han Shuo had to worry about. However, the bizarre transformation currently taking ce on these frozen mountains were ample indications that the participant to the impending battle originated from another high-level material ne.

    Han Shuo could pay no regards to experts on Profound Continent, but the same couldn¡¯t be said for those outside of it. Based on what he had long gathered from Bechymos, it was clear to Han Shuo the terrifying might of gods from high-level material nes. Additionally, from the memories left by the original owner of the skeletal staff, he had a clear picture of just how formidable the Ice Goddess was. Although he had some idea of who theer would be, he could not lower his guard.

    Ever since the strange transformation was produced from the frozen summits and the shackles confining Tiana were removed, she seemed to have obtained an inexhaustible amount of energy. Her pair of bright eyes brushed up and down at Han Shuo like a viper, as if she were waiting to see how Han Shuo would perish.

    Frigid, chilling aura epassed the snowy mountain. Multiple frosty light beams intersected with each other. The water elemental energy in the entire snond was converted into extreme coldness. The snond had begun to fill with severe snowfall. Every ke of snow seemed to disperse an enormous amount of chilling power.

    Han Shuo remained motionless as he observed the surrounding conditions with cold eyes. He paid extra attention to that Snow Celestial Tiana who was gnashing her teeth while ring at him.

    Han Shuo had a premonition that the god from an alien material ne would descend upon this ne through Tiana, just like how Spider Goddess Rose used Adele as a medium to talk to Han Shuo.

    However, Han Shuo knew that the situation this time was different from Adele¡¯s. Whichever aspect he looked from, the religious organization that Adele formed was far behind the Shrine of Ice. Moreover, there were several thousand Shrine of Ice disciples praying simultaneously this time. That energy formed from their prayer was enough to allow the existence from another material ne to manifest itself by attaching to a body.

    ¡°You are going to die,¡± Han Shuo said smilingly while looking at Snow Celestial Tiana as she glowered at him with extreme hatred, although she had no idea of the actual circumstances.

    ¡°Haha, it is you who is going to die. What¡¯s the matter? Are you afraid? You must be afraid. But there¡¯s no use in being afraid. You will still be dead without a doubt!¡± After tasting the unforgettable disgrace that Han Shuo had forced upon her, Tiana¡¯s usually steady mind hadpletely turned into chaos. She no longer appeared graceful, poised and refined. Instead, her conducts were rather hysterical.

    ¡°Can you feel it? The changes to the elemental energy around us? The abnormalities with those who were praying just now?¡± Han Shuo had calm look as he slowly said to Tiana.

    ¡°What?¡± Tiana stared nkly for a little while before she shouted in a rather irascible manner, ¡°Enough with your trickeries. One way or another, you must and will die today!¡±

    ¡°What a pathetic thing. Do you think that it¡¯s an easy task for a god to manifest itself on a distant material ne?¡± Han Shuo sneered and pointed at the Shrine of Ice disciples underneath them on the frozen mountains before he ridiculed, ¡°Look around you. Look at these pious disciples. Look at what these thousands of disciples ended up with in return for their fanatical devotion towards the Ice Goddess.¡±

    Tiana turned her gaze. She abruptly came to discover that all those disciples kneeling and praying to the Ice Goddess were bleeding from the seven apertures and had lost all trace of life some time ago.

    ¡°Ahh!!!¡± Despite how staunch Tiana looked, she immediately shrieked when she caught sight of the many thousands of her fellow devout disciples dead in horrible states. She blurted out rather madly, ¡°How could this be? How could this be?!¡±

    She pointed and shouted threateningly at Han Shuo like a triggered, wild shrew, ¡°It¡¯s you! This must be your vicious act!¡± Either Tiana could not ept the truth or her faith in the Ice Goddess had reached the point of lunacy.

    Han Shuo shook his head. He knew that Tiana was basically done for. Even if she somehow survived this day, there was no way that she could walk away from this trauma.

    It was at this moment that the intense lightsing from those frozen mountains suddenly changed direction and simultaneously cast on Snow Celestial Tiana hovering in midair.

    A wretched, miserable howl suddenly came from Tiana¡¯s mouth. The sound was horrible beyondpare. Under the salvo of multiple frosty beams, Tiana glowed so brightly that she looked like a miniaturized sun.

    An enormous aura of absolute coldness gradually started to spread from Tiana¡¯s brilliantly glowing body. In an instant, elemental energies that filled the snond disappeared without a trace, except for the element of water that gathered more and more intensely. The thickyer of snow above the ground was rapidly turning into solid ice.

    These were the telltale signs that a Domain of Divinity of water element was about to form. When Han Shuo saw the scene, he was confident that Snow Celestial Tiana was finished. Just as he had expected, theer had adopted the most effective method ¨C forcibly upying Snow Celestial Tiana¡¯s body,pletely erasing her soul.

    The intense light cast on Tiana¡¯s body for just a short while before it waspletely absorbed into her body.

    The brilliant rays faded away to reveal Tiana, still standing on the same ground undamaged. However, she appeared to be apletely different person. The eyes were still Tiana¡¯s but what had reced her mad and rancor gazes was a world of difference ¨C they were stone-cold andpletely unfeeling.

    ¡°Who are you? How dare you challenge the immense might of our Ice Goddess?¡± the cold male voice uttered from Tiana¡¯s mouth. As the listener, Han Shuo was left with a rather ufortable feeling.

    From the very moment that masculine voice left Tiana¡¯s mouth, there was no doubt in Han Shuo¡¯s mind that Tiana was dead. The being now upying her body had to be an envoy in charge of upholding the dignity of the Ice Goddess.

    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter who I am. In short, the destruction of the Shrine of Ice on Profound Continent is certainly of my doing,¡± Han Shuo replied in a voice just as cold while he sized up theer with all his focus. His consciousness was deployed, trying to figure out the actual strength of this person.

    Unfathomably powerful. That was the assessment Han Shuo had made of this being.

    This person who had overtaken Tiana¡¯s body gently nodded and said coldly and indifferently, ¡°Very well. Since you have destroyed the foundation of this ce, no matter what, you must die.¡±

    He sounded as though he was reading the verdict of a trial. As if killing Han Shuo was not just right and proper, but also no different from pinching an ant to death.

    As soon as he finished those words, the entity steering Tiana¡¯s body began to charge straight at Han Shuo. He made no garnish nor showy movements, instead throwing a single agile punch.

    Suddenly, the water element within the entire snowfieldpletely concentrated in his body. The surrounding sub-zero temperatures resumed to normal in a second, like the blossom of springtime.

    A shiver traveled through Han Shuo¡¯s heart. He clearly sensed the water elemental energy all around the frozen mountains concentrated in this punch. Furthermore, the divine energy contained was extremely frigid, so much so that it affected Han Shuo¡¯s tactile sensations. He was ovee by a feeling of powerlessness as though there was no room for him to escape.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was unable to detect precisely which realm this person was on. However, from the enormous changes produced in the Water Domain of Divinity, Han Shuo was immediately certain that theer had exceeded the lowgod realm. As he had no idea how powerful this person really was, Han Shuo dared not to rashly take this punch.

    All of a sudden, transformations simultaneously took ce within his body, heart, and soul. Han Shuo was bing a pool of stagnant water with not the slightest fluctuation in his heart. His consciousness was modted to enter a state of tranquility as he sensed the trajectory of the punch and the energy contained in it.

    Speed Change was suddenly deployed. When that person had thrown the punch, Han Shuo¡¯s figure was thousands of meters away. A terrifying explosion erupted from the space where the punchnded. Those frozen mountains that had just defrosted suddenly started to quake violently. Enormous boulders tumbled down one after another.

    ¡°Huh?¡± the being let out a gentle cry of astonishment as though he had never anticipated Han Shuo to evade from his punch.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind was calm without a ripple, and he had recorded the power of that punch. After rapidly weighing for a moment, Han Shuo discovered that theer was most certainly a midgod. However, as his divine body could not descend to this material ne, the power he could unleash through the medium that was Tiana was limited and simply not enough to kill him.

    Having arrived at this judgment, Han Shuo sneered mischievously. His body swayed, then two carbon copies of Han Shuo suddenly appeared.

    ¡°Huh??¡± The being cried out in surprise yet again. He was rather startled by the scene. A few traces of puzzlement appeared in his undisturbed eyes.

    Before he could ask any questions or strike again, Han Shuo¡¯s three bodies got into motion. They rapidly pounced on him from three different directions. Two Domains of Divinity were deployed together. The element of death and the edict of destruction barged into his Domain of Divinity. His avatars were constantly swaying and their figures were indistinct.

    Ever since Han Shuo had formed himself those three bodies, never before he had all three of them joined forces to attack one person. Although the energy avable to this midgod manifesting himself by using Tiana¡¯s body was just a small portion of his actual strength, he was nheless a midgod. There was an insurmountable distance between a lowgod and a midgod. Therefore, Han Shuo had no choice but to attack with all his strength.

    Bump! Bump! Bump! Halfway into their charging, the three Han Shuos hit a wall. They were obstructed by an invisible barrier.

    The words ¡°oh shit¡± yed shouted in Han Shuo¡¯s mind as he immediately realized that theer, being in a higher realm, had a Domain of Divinity more powerful than he imagined.

    ¡°Having many doesn¡¯t always mean having the upper hand!¡± that man said coldly before throwing yet another punch, aiming at Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction.

    At this moment, all three bodies of Han Shuo¡¯s that were stopped in their paths were intruded by an icy aura. He withdrew while dispelling the chilling aura from his bodies. The situation had be extremely dangerous.

 Chapter 607: Tactics

    GDK 607: Tactics

    Seeing the punch shoot towards him, his three bodies werepromised by a chilling aura, Han Shuo¡¯s heart remained unwavering as he calmly sought for a way to neutralize the dangers.

    All three bodies simultaneously retreated in three different directions. The spaces between them grew ever vaster. When that extraterrestrial fist, which had seemingly congealed the coldness of an entire winter, was close to arriving on Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction, an idea suddenly popped into his mind.

    The avatar of death rapidly retreated and was instantly transported far from the ice-cold barrier. Meanwhile, Han Shuo¡¯s main body stopped retreating, returned, and whooshed towards the being from behind him. The space ring on his finger gave a faint sh and three beads shot towards the being that upied Tiana¡¯s body at lightning speed.

    Rumbles...

    Deafening explosions erupted from the three beads. The ice barrier was instantly shattered by the intense sts.

    The simultaneous detonations of the three Pearls of Annihtion sent shockwaves that were more than enough to reduce the barrier to shards. The formless, dense swarm of Soulpiercers contained within the Pearls of Annihtion wereunched at the entity.

    Demonic Arts were distinct from any elemental energy or edictal forces of this world. Even this midgod found himself rather diposed at the attack. He was unable topletely dodge the dense drove of Soulpiercers and caught at least a couple of them.

    The Soulpiercer was vicious. As soon as it entered a victim¡¯s body, it would immediately attack his soul like an unforgiving evil spirit. The victim would already be ripped to bits before he could catch the slightest gasp of breath.

    ¡°Huh?¡± The being cried out in surprise for the third time. He was obviously astonished by the fancy attack methods of Han Shuo¡¯s.

    The man sensed the threat to his soul as soon as the Soulpiercers entered his body. That punch which was supposed tond on Han Shuo was halted just an inch away. He had no choice but to put all his attention into eliminating the Soulpiercers¡¯ threat.

    The Soulpiercer could easily serve any average expert with extraordinarily destructive power. Those weaker ones would even be annihted by the corrosion of the Soulpiercers. However, from the experiences Han Shuo gained in the Abyss realm, the soul of a godly expert was truly powerful. A soul that had fused as one with the elements was not something that the Soulpiercers could annihte.

    The mightier the soul, the greater the affinity andpatibility to the element. Thus, the less time it would take to get rid of the Soulpiercers.

    Han Shuo was well aware of this principle. Therefore, as soon as he saw that the man had abandoned attacking his avatar of destruction and retreated, all three of Han Shuo¡¯s bodies again got into motion and charged at the man while he was in the middle of purging the threat of the Soulpiercers.

    ¡°Despicable!¡± shouted the man coldly. He did not dare to confront the attacks of the three Han Shuos directly and hastily withdrew, much to Han Shuo¡¯s surprise.

    ¡°Despicable? Hehe, these are called tactics. Not that you would know anything about that!¡±

    ¡°You are the despicable one. As a midgod who¡¯s been around forever, just to kill a small little lowgod, you have absorbed the power of faith from all the disciples here and possessed the body of the most devout one. Are you not despicable?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s why you don¡¯t call others despicable when you are unworthy of calling others despicable!¡±

    The three Han Shuos rushed towards him in attack, each of their mouths spewing words of ridicule. The continuous barrage of insults had left the man speechless.

    The three Han Shuos finally arrived beside him. Showing no trace of politeness, that man had absolutely no way of unleashing his full power, especially not with Han Shuo¡¯s main body and his avatar of destruction as the main assault forces and his avatar of death releasing auxiliary necromancy magic and boundaries without end.

    Originating on a distant material ne, he could only unleash a small portion of his energy by manifesting through Tiana¡¯s body. And now with the Soulpiercers attacking his soul, and the constant disturbances from the necromancy magic, in addition to being besieged by the other two Han Shuo clones, this being began to appear somewhat weary dealing with all this at the same time.

    Han Shuo had never cared for established standards and was most fond of delivering heavy blows when his enemy was in their most helpless state. Obviously, there was no exception in this battle. The three Han Shuos were fixed on the man in their midst, overwhelmed by the uninterrupted assault from demonic arts, necromancy boundaries, and edicts of destruction.

    The being who had appeared calm and cold ever since he manifested finally showed signs of weariness. His two hands that constantly wove ice barriers started to grow feeble.

    It was not possible for a soul to manifest on a distant material ne via a medium for extended periods. And the longer it dragged on, the more disadvantageous it was. Han Shuo was very clear about this fact after obtaining certain memories from the original owner of the skeletal staff.

    Once it was clear the man was utterly exhausted, he pressed harder with his attacks, absolutely not giving him a chance to hit back. He nned on using this opportunity topletely exhaust the man¡¯s divine energy.

    The man was sullen. He had truly never met anyone with attacking tactics as despicable and relentless as Han Shuo. Had it not been for the exotic energy still stirring up his soul, he may not have been so passive. Unfortunately, after Han Shuo¡¯s sneak attack, he was left without the luxury of time and could only look on helplessly as he was turned into a rifle target with no opportunity for a punchback.

    However, what agitated him more than anything else was the never-ending mockery and snarky remarks. Three Han Shuos, three mouths. His superiority in numbers had not only reflected in his attack methods, but also in his ability to perturb the enemy¡¯s mind.

    As heunched attacks, his three mouths continued to spew their venom uninterrupted ¨C greeting his ancestors, mocking him for his incapabilities, and telling him how he¡¯d look after his death, attacking him psychologically over and over again. This kind of torment was simply unbearable to most people.

    With his demonic arts up to the Nine Changes realm, Han Shuo¡¯s body, heart and consciousness had achieved a state of absolute peace. He spoke calmly. His verbal attacks were increasingly varied and creative.

    ¡°Silence!¡± The being red at Han Shuo in agony and yelled, ¡°You are a lowgod yourself. How could you be so abhorrent?¡±

    The three Han Shuos were taken aback and kept silent for a while. But soon after, the three bbering lips continued with even more malignity. They totally disregarded the being.

    I have two more mouths than you. I¡¯d be a fool not to take this to my advantage! Han Shuo sneered. Based on that man¡¯s reaction, it did seem that his tactics were effective.

    Bump! Bump! Bump! Han Shuo¡¯s attacksnded on an ice barrier.

    Suddenly, blinding lights began to burst from Tiana¡¯s body. Her body rapidly shrunk as it glowed. It was as though all the energy in her body was being absorbed by her bones.

    Boom! The sound of an explosion came from Tiana¡¯s body. Several hundred ice-cold arrows violently emerged in all directions. Some of them fell on the three Han Shuos, who were caught off guard.

    The hundreds of frosty arrows were fast and ferocious. They also contained a harrowing amount of divine energy. As the three Han Shuos had surrounded the being, pressing in hard, all three Han Shuos were struck by the frosty arrows, resulting in varied extents of damage to his three bodies.

    Han Shuo¡¯s three bodies soon felt the frosty aura. That frosty aura was not just targeting his bodies but also attacking his soul as though wanting to freeze Han Shuo to death.

    Creak... Creak...

    The unsettling sound of freezing emerged from all three of Han Shuo¡¯s bodies. Solid ice covered them in an instant and they quickly became sparkling ice sculptures. His faces of taunting, cursing, and sneering was frozen in ce, making him appear ratherical.

    By then Tiana had diminished into nothing more than a bloody bundle of bones. It was as though her skin and flesh had been absorbed by her skeleton. It was a gory scene.

    A pair of stone-cold, pitiless eyes ferociously stared at the three Han Shuos as the entity said in a fidgety manner, ¡°I have had enough of your voice, now shut up forever!¡±

    With a wave of his hand, three icicles of the width of a broadsword appeared out of thin air and separately shot at the three Han Shuos at lightning speed. They pierced through the ice on Han Shuo¡¯s bodies and ran straight through their chests.

    ¡°Huff... Puff... Huff... Puff...¡± The being in his inhuman body was heavily panting for air. It seemed that the three Han Shuos had consumed too much of his divine energy and he felt rather fatigued.

    ¡°What is this thing? How could he have three bodies? He also uses energy of unknown origin. This guy is truly entric!¡± the man talked to himself as he panted, staring at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Luckily he will be done for soon enough and this mission will soonplete. However, a lot of divine energy has been exhausted. Not much was gained on this trip,¡± he continued mumbling to himself in a low voice. The remaining flesh on the bloody skeletal body was slowly freezing. He seemed to be recovering some divine energy before dealing Han Shuo¡¯s souls the fatal blows.

    All three bodies of Han Shuo¡¯s were stuck by the frosty arrows. The frosty aura of incredible might had instantly frozen his limbs and body. Following that, three icicles pierced through all three bodies, causing different degrees of injuries to his three bodies.

    Although his bodies were frozen still, his consciousness remained intact and his mind calm.

    Had it been another god, it would surely have been very difficult to make aeback after receiving such repeated attacks. After all, their divine body was the root for them and it would be very difficult to budge after such heavy injuries.

    However, not one of Han Shuo¡¯s three bodies were anything ordinary. The destruction avatar was formed from the Demonyer Edge. The death avatar was formed using the skeletal staff. Han Shuo¡¯s main body cultivating in demonic arts had a physical body that was basically indestructible. How could they bepared to an ordinary body?

    Therefore, although all three bodies of Han Shuos werepletely frozen, he had not lost the ability to counterstrike.

    Just as the man thought that Han Shuo was powerless and was silently recovering his divine energy in preparation of dealing Han Shuo¡¯s souls the final blow, a creaking soul came from Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction.

    The man was rmed and hastily turned his head to look. He immediately cried out in shock of the scene before him.

 Chapter 608: I dare not!

    GDK 608: I dare not!

    ¡°You, you, what in the world are you?!¡± The man¡¯s cold voice was trembling slightly as he looked at Han Shuo, who had abruptly turned into a longsword.

    Having fought alongside the Ice Goddess on various material nes for many years, he had seen and met all kinds of characters and races. However, never before had anything he witnessed caused him as much shock as this one. The scene before him waspletely beyond his understanding of the natural world. A feeling of utter absurdity rose from the bottom of his heart.

    Man was not the only species that was afraid of the unknown, gods were just the same. The envoy, who had not felt any nervousness since he descended to this ne, was rather fearful watching Han Shuo transform into a longsword.

    Creak... Creak... The Demonyer Edge made a few swings and caused the solid ice around him to start cracking. The envoy grew even more terrified.

    ¡°I¡¯m a nobody. Oh, you think you can trap me with merely this ice of yours?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s avatar, in his Demonyer Edge form, ridiculed and sneered from within the ice. Bloody red radiances repeatedly shed from the edges of the sword before the ice that had frozen him in ce shattered.

    The Demonyer Edge was forged by Han Shuo to be sharper than anything in existence. It was also extremely difficult to trap it thanks to its usualposition. As it glistened, the Demonyer Edge shot towards Han Shuo¡¯s main body still frozen in ce. The ice that trapped Han Shuo¡¯s main bodypletely shattered with a crisp. Han Shuo cracked a grin and looked the envoy up and down. He opened his palm and the Demonyer Edge flew into his grasp. Then, he pointed at his avatar of death a distance away and smilingly said, ¡°Look at that body. Isn¡¯t it very strange as well?¡±

    The man turned to look and suddenly discovered that the third Han Shuo had turned into a skeletal staff. He was yet again shocked and his heart trembled. He really had no idea what kind of a monster he was up against.

    ¡°What, what race do you belong to?¡± the envoy who was in a frightened state shouted as he pointed at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo could tell that the envoy was terrified after experiencing the series of surprises. The envoy, deeply affected by the fear towards the unknown, in addition to having yet to regather his divine energy for the time being, immediately had the idea of retreating.

    Han Shuo who was observing the envoy saw that the divine light in his eyes was gradually routing. He coldly groaned, raised the Demonyer Edge and stabbed at him. Plop! The Demonyer Edge pierced through his skull.

    The negative energy from millions of souls and the divine energy from the edict of destruction contained in the Demonyer Edge erupted simultaneously. While the envoy¡¯s soul had yet topletely vacate, through the thread of connection left, Han Shuo dealt the envoy a ferocious blow.

    ¡°I don¡¯t care who you are ¨C I will find you, and I will kill you!¡± a short chunk of thought was repeatedly transmitted from the envoy.

    St! Tiana¡¯s body burst into bits after a bright sh of light. Her body was drained of any divine energy after the midgod¡¯s divine soul escaped.

    ¡°He runs fast!¡± Han Shuo groaned. With a twist of his wrist, the Demonyer Edge flung towards his other avatar, still trapped in ice and annihted the divine energy contained in the ice.

    Han Shuo, hovering in midair, looked down beneath him. He discovered the bodies of these pious disciples frozen into ice sculptures. The element of water that had momentarily disappeared returned to fill this ce once more, causing the suddenly defrosted region to be arctic cold again.

    The midgod, in order to manifest himself, had taken away several thousand lives of pious disciples and upied Tiana¡¯s body. After the round of great battle, all three bodies of Han Shuo¡¯s had sustained injuries. Meanwhile, the midgod had his soul severely damaged by Han Shuo. The injuries to the midgod¡¯s soul were much more severepared to the injuries on Han Shuo¡¯s physical body.

    Even after having paid such a steep price, not only had the envoy still failed to kill Han Shuo, he had to escape with his tail between his legs. There was no doubt that Han Shuo was the victor of this battle. Although the victory didn¡¯te easy and he too had paid a huge price, when Han Shuo recalled the fact that his opponent was a midgod, he was filled with an intense sense of satisfaction.

    His three bodies rbined. After taking a deep breath, Han Shuo suddenly gave a loud whistle. The sound spread far into the distance and towards the three basegods who had retreated prior to the battle.

    Han Shuo sat cross-legged on the ground to carefully examine the injuries to his three bodies. The puncture wound on the chest of Han Shuo¡¯s main body hadpletely healed by now. Most of the frigid aura had also been purged from his body.

    His two avatars, however, as their divine bodies were uniquely formed using special objects, couldn¡¯t recover from the blows in that short period and had to slowly nurse their injuries.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars were formed using unique materials, after transformation, not a scratch could be seen on its surface. Although they appeared alright from the outside, the internal was done. Recovery would require an enormous amount of elemental and edictal energy over a period of time.

    On the contrary, when it came to Han Shuo¡¯s main body that cultivated in demonic arts, although the injuries appeared severe, thanks to his extraordinary build that had the ability to rejuvenate, the wound was mostly healed before long with just some demonic yuan.

    From this aspect, the main body cultivating in demonic arts was indeed remarkable. It had absolutely no fear of tremendous trauma to the physical body.

    This battle had taught Han Shuo a lot of valuable lessons. While silently examining his injuries, Han Shuo carefully reyed the battle in his head. Han Shuo learned that as the envoy possessed a Domain of Divinity that was a realm greater, he was in a practically invincible position. While inside that envoy¡¯s Domain of Divinity, Han Shuo appeared to be constrained and his strength was greatly affected.

    The envoy, however, was calm and unruffled. He had drawn out all the elemental energy in his Domain of Divinity and concentrated it in his fist in just an instant. The power dispelled in this punch was enough to send any mere mortal flying halfway across the. Had Han Shuo not utilized Speed Change to escape, he would have likely beenpletely battered at the envoy¡¯s very first strike.

    As the envoy couldn¡¯t have his divine body descend along with his divine soul, the amount of divine energy he could use wasn¡¯t that much greater than that of Han Shuo¡¯s. But even so, by relying on the superiority of his Domain of Divinity and his more skilled maniption of elemental energy, he did not perish from being encircled by three Han Shuos. If it weren¡¯t for Han Shuo¡¯s stealthy use of the Pearls of Annihtion that caught the envoy off guard, followed by his tactic of constant mockery, he probably wouldn¡¯t have emerged as the victor in the end.

    On that note, the promotion of a god to a higher realm wasn¡¯t merely a matter of gaining divine energy. This battle opened Han Shuo¡¯s eyes to just how dangerous a battle between gods was, and even shone some light on certain situations he had not previously understood.

    A loud whooshing blew over the horizon. Han Shuo raised his head and nced into the distance. He immediately realized that the three basegods had heard his whistle and were heading his way.

    ¡°How are things?¡± Ayermike Cotton hastily asked after arriving before Han Shuo.

    ¡°I¡¯m injured. Figures sent by the Shrine of Ice are indeed hard to deal with. But luckily, he escaped,¡± Han Shuo forced a smile as he exined to Ayermike Cotton.

    ¡°Is it severe? Do you need to rest immediately?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s pretty severe. Damn, these age-old religions are such a chore to deal with!¡±

    The moment Han Shuo began to divulge the severity of his injuries, light bulbs shed in Pegasus¡¯ and Graeae¡¯s eyes.

    Han Shuo immediately knew what was going on. He grinned at the two and stood right up. Han Shuo shed before Pegasus with his big hand covering Pegasus¡¯ head. He asked in an eerie tone, ¡°What is it? Thinking about getting rid of me while I¡¯m severely injured?¡±

    ¡°I wouldn¡¯t dare! Your humble servant would never dare!¡± Pegasus was horrified. He immediately knelt at Han Shuo¡¯s feet and was too scared to move a muscle.

    ¡°Even if my injuries were far harsher, killing you would still be as easy as snapping a finger. Before you even have the remotest idea of overpowering me, you¡¯d better conceal your clever thoughts in front of me,¡± Han Shuo said slowly with a mischievous grin.

    ¡°Your humble servant will never do it again!¡± Pegasus entreated piteously for Han Shuo¡¯s forgiveness. When he saw the ground covered in bodies, he thought that all of them had been killed by Han Shuo and was terrified of ending up the same way.

    ¡°It appears that there is ack of discipline amongst your kind. I believe some binding would be in order ¨C I doubt you¡¯ll behave yourselves otherwise,¡± Han Shuo revealed an evil grin. A drop of blood squirted from his index finger. He mixed some divine energy into it and sealed it within Pegasus¡¯ brain.

    ¡°Before you gain enough strength, you better not have any thoughts of rebelling. Otherwise, with one thought of mine, your head will tear apart like a firecracker!¡± Han Shuo cackled, beaming ear to ear as Pegasus shivered in fear.

    ¡°Graeae, if you think that you can escape, go ahead and try,¡± Han Shuo removed his big hand from Pegasus¡¯ head and shot a cold nce at the timid Graeae thinking about escaping.

    ¡°Your Lordship has misunderstood me. I would have no such thoughts,¡± Graeae exined with an awkward smile.

    ¡°You are a smart one and should know what you ought to do. Get over here,¡± Han Shuo said calmly as he smiled at Graeae.

    ¡°Yes, Master!¡± Graeae sighed and thought to herself, How could I be so unfortunate to run into this demon? Now I¡¯m really done for.

    Graeae obediently walked to Han Shuo with a smile forced onto her face. When she arrived, she lowered her head and said, ¡°My Lord, please bestow me the seal.¡±

    ¡°Mmm, good girl,¡± Han Shuo said with an extremely wicked smile and repeated his actions to Graeae.

    ¡°Bryan, what about me?¡± Ayermike Cotton walked to Han Shuo and smilingly asked.

    ¡°What on earth are you talking about? How could I treat you so?¡± Han Shuo feigned anger and red at Ayermike Cotton before saying cordially, ¡°You are not like them. I can distinguish the sincere from the insincere ones.¡±

    Pegasus and Graeae both wore the same sour expression on their faces. They exchanged nces and sighed inwardly. They thought, How did I get so unlucky? Now I don¡¯t even have a chance to escape.

 Chapter 609: Potential Threats

    GDK 609: Potential Threats

    After subduing Pegasus and Graeae, Han Shuo gave them a task: to loot all the valuable goods inside the Shrine of Ice.

    Pegasus and Graeae had naturally adapted discerning eyes for valuable treasures over the years. After imnting seals in their brains, Han Shuo gained absolute authority over their lives or deaths and therefore had no worries that they would be disloyal.

    The two were truly afraid of Han Shuo. They wore sour faces as they flew about the frozen mountains in search of valuable goods for Han Shuo.

    If they hadn¡¯t run into Han Shuo, they would have remained untouchable characters on Profound Continent ¨C that was the biter. Perhaps this was the treatment they deserved for their errant intentions when Han Shuo exined he was heavily injured.

    Ayermike Cotton, the expert who helped found Lancelot Empire, had truly taken Han Shuo as one of his own and worked for him sincerely after learning of his ambitions to unify the entire Profound Continent under Lancelot Empire. Han Shuo had always maintained proper respect towards Ayermike Cotton, totally unlike how he treated Pegasus and Graeae, yelling orders without giving thought to their feelings.

    While the two hung their heads dispiritedly and bustled around for Han Shuo, Han Shuo and Ayermike Cotton chatted to day¡¯s end like two old friends.

    ¡°You mentioned earlier that a god from the Shrine of Ice had manifested here. What kind of strength did he wield?¡± Ayermike Cotton was extremely curious about theer from the Shrine of Ice. He had lived on Profound Continent for a long time and had long been aware of how formidable the Shrine of Ice was.

    ¡°He¡¯s a midgod. Very powerful. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that he was unable to utilize his full strength and was hit by my sneak attack, I¡¯m afraid I wouldn¡¯t be here talking to you now,¡± Han Shuo exined, smiling slightly.

    ¡°Really didn¡¯t expect that theer would be a midgod. What a horror.¡± Ayermike Cotton was daunted. He, too, was familiar with the ranking between gods and what it meant to be a ss lower.

    ¡°He had underestimated his enemy. Serves him right that he lost,¡± Han Shuo giggled.

    ¡°You have destroyed the foundation of the Shrine of Ice on Profound Continent. Surely they aren¡¯t going to leave the matter at that. Have you thought of a fallback for if those people were to traverse across material nes ande here in person?¡± Ayermike Cotton wasn¡¯t clueless. He had been around for centuries after all.

    Han Shuo kept silent although the question had long irked him. Han Shuo had learned a lot from Bechymos, including the fact that it was possible for gods from high-level material nes toe to him via an internar transportation matrix. In thest battle, the only reason that Han Shuo could mount a sneak attack on that midgod envoy, injuring his soul and forcing him to retreat was that the envoy manifested by using Tiana as the medium. If the midgod envoy were to personally make the journey to this ne using an internar transportation matrix, Han Shuo knew that based on his current strength, he wouldn¡¯t have the slightest chance of a victory.

    ¡°I haven¡¯t found a solution yet. This problem is really giving me a big headache.¡± After some time, Han Shuo finally shook his head and sighed helplessly.

    ¡°Sigh, I suppose that¡¯s a bridge you can only cross when youe to it. Let¡¯s hope he doesn¡¯t actuallye here physically,¡± Ayermike Cotton was just as helpless. His strength was limited and he couldn¡¯t think of a solution to solve Han Shuo¡¯s problem. All he could do wasfort him verbally.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, there is always a solution,¡± Han Shuo said while pretending to be rxed. His mood, however, was getting heavier and heavier.

    As far as Han Shuo was aware, there really was no one else on Profound Continent that could pose him any serious threat, that was, besides the Primordius Dragon serving its role as the nar guardian. In fact, he wasn¡¯t even afraid of the Primordius Dragon. However, there were countless experts on other material nes. Should a midgod from another ne have descended on Profound Continent, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t likely have lived to breathe another whiff of the atmosphere. Han Shuo had offended spider goddess Rose thest time. And now, he had injured a midgod of the Shrine of Ice. There could very well be a day that they decide to straighten out their grudges. This pressure was really weighing down on Han Shuo.

    ¡°So what do we do next? Do we proceed with going to the Church of Light¡¯s sacred mountain?¡± Ayermike Cotton, who knew Han Shuo¡¯s n, couldn¡¯t help but ask.

    After a moment of hesitation, Han Shuo shook his head, forced a smile and said, ¡°Let¡¯s postpone that for a while. I have suffered injuries from this expedition. Who knows what sort of secret weapon might await us on the sacred mountain. I really have no confidence in handling the situation if the same thing over here were to repeat over there. Hmm, let¡¯s go home first. When I have recovered from my injuries, we will wipe out the Church of Light. I can make use of this period to properly think about how to deal with the potential crisis in the future.¡±

    ¡°Sure, I¡¯ve been missing Lancelot Empire a whole lot. Surely, a lot must have happened in the empire during the past five hundred years while I was incarcerated by the Primordius Dragon. I wonder if the people and royal kin of Lancelot Empire still remember me?¡± When speaking of Lancelot Empire that he had helped build, Ayermike Cotton would always feel a sense of gratification and satisfaction. This was also one of the reasons he was so amiable and sincere towards Han Shuo after learning that Han Shuo was executing his unfinished undertaking.

    Ayermike Cotton considered Han Shuo as one of his peoplergely for the fact that he had originated from Lancelot Empire. Furthermore, Han Shuo was an expert with sufficient strength to make great contributions to the empire. Both of them hadmon interests. To top it all off, Han Shuo¡¯s temperament was very much to his liking, so it was only natural that Ayermike Cotton¡¯s attitude towards Han Shuo had improved so drastically.

    Pegasus and Graeae did not ck as Han Shuo and Ayermike Cotton conversed. Before long, the two had finally collected every item of value to the Shrine of Ice. Pegasus took the lead as the two approached and stood before Han Shuo. He cupped a few space rings in his two hands and respectfully presented them to Han Shuo, ¡°It¡¯s all inside these. Some of the items are really good. Please inspect them, my Lord.¡±

    Han Shuo did not take the space ring. Instead, he smiled at Ayermike Cotton and said, ¡°The Shrine of Ice has operated for many years and naturally they would possess some interesting objects. But, you know, at my level of strength, most material artefacts are just junk in my eye. Besides, I have injuries that I need to treat. I will have to trouble you to process these for me.¡±

    ¡°That won¡¯t be a problem. I¡¯m rather skilled when ites to matters of this aspect. Hehe, back during the years of military campaign, I had destroyed many small nations and did this quite often,¡± Ayermike Cotton said as he put on a rather sinister and mischievous smile.

    ¡°Thanks a lot then. Alright, let¡¯s leave this ce. I reckon that news of the destruction of the Shrine of Ice will soon spread throughout the entire continent. The Shrine of Ice has always been the most fundamental power of Kasi Empire. Its destruction will definitely deal Kasi Empire a severe blow. I believe that they will be powerless against our Lancelot Empire from now on.¡± Although injured, Han Shuo was nheless in a great mood as he had exacted his vengeance against the Shrine of Ice.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Without the Shrine of Ice, Kasi Empire will surely sink into great chaos. The only reason that this nation had been so firmly under the control of the House of Pillon all along was that the Shrine of Ice had been acting as the deterrent force. Now that the Shrine has perished, the House of Pillion will face a bumpy road ahead in maintaining their wield over Kasi Empire,¡± Ayermike Cotton was very familiar with Kasi Empire. It was immediately apparent to him that a power struggle would soon take ce in Kasi Empire.

    ¡°Let¡¯s move,¡± said Han Shuo. The group of four departed from the Shrine of Ice unruffled and returned to Lancelot Empire along the path they came from.

    As they passed through the Dragon Valley in the depths of the Dark Forest, Han Shuo hesitated for a moment and decided not to scout for the Primordius Dragon in case it had returned to the Dragon Valley. He kept his cool and steered clear of any reckless stunts.

    As they approached the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars separated from his main body. Both of them then entered the Cemetery of Death to recuperate from the injuries done to their bodies. Han Shuo¡¯s main body, since it cultivated in demonic arts, had recovery speeds that far exceeded his two avatars. By the time they passed the Cemetery of Death, his injuries had basically healed. Therefore, he did not need to enter the Cemetery of Death and instead brought Ayermike Cotton, Pegasus, and Graeae to Sunshine Valley.

    This time, Han Shuo did not stay in Sunshine Valley for long. He went to talk to Jasper and the others, letting them stay in Sunshine Valley for the time being and continue to familiarize themselves with Profound Continent. He then had a brief discussion privately with Trunks before taking the trio of basegods to Lancelot Empire¡¯s Ossen City.

    Ayermike Cotton had left Lancelot Empire for too long and was very longing of his country. As not to cause any disturbances in Lancelot Empire, Han Shuo did not reveal Ayermike Cotton¡¯s identity to anyone. Besides, Ayermike Cotton wasn¡¯t one for vanity. He had obtained everything he needed five hundred years ago. He was even worshipped like a god back then.

    The reason for Han Shuo¡¯s decision to return to Ossen City was to greet Lawrence in person and further discuss the n of all-out assaults on other nations while allowing Ayermike Cotton to revisit the capital city.

    After arriving in Ossen City, Han Shuo slotted Pegasus and Graeae into the Dark Mantle, turning them into the two most terrifying trump cards of the covert organization. They would be in charge of handling some of the most dangerous and difficult missions of the Dark Mantle. The presences of these two basegods in the Dark Mantle would ensure that any shady businesses of Lancelot Empire could be carried out sessfully.

    For example, during a war, the two could be deployed to get rid of the opposing forces¡¯manders and leaders, or perhaps to cast a formidable magical matrix ¨C things that would fix the final oue of a battle in no time. It was impossible for Han Shuo to do all these things personally. Their presence could save Han Shuo a lot of time and effort.

    Han Shuo would not bring experts from the Abyss realm to this world except in thest resort. After all, Abyssal creatures didn¡¯t resemble humans on Profound Continent. The arrival of Abyssal experts on this ne would surely cause an unimaginable panic among the people of Profound Continent. Han Shuo had no wish of bing a public enemy to the whole of Profound Continent.

    But in any case, given the power Han Shuo currently possessed, not to mention the mighty experts under his control, even without utilizing his Abyssal experts, it wouldn¡¯t be of much difficulty for him to achieve world domination.

    Soon after Han Shuo had settled Pegasus and Graeae into the Dark Mantle, and Ayermike Cotton had sorted through the great number of goods obtained from the Shrine of Ice, people from the Cmity Church who had traveled great distances paid a visit to Han Shuo.

 Chapter 610: How could you be so promiscuous?

    GDK 610: How could you be so promiscuous?

    Han Shuo was very familiar with the visitors: Wolf the necromancer, and Burt Zili the former Duke of Boulet Duchy. After Boulet Duchy was annexed by Brettel City, Burt Zili disappeared out of the blue. It was said that this sinister summoner had returned to the headquarters of the Cmity Church.

    The two had been waiting for Han Shuo at his Ossen City mansion for a long time and now, they finally got to meet Han Shuo as he returned from Phoebe¡¯s Bootz Merchant Guild.

    Their attitude was as respectful as ever. As soon as they saw Han Shuo, they performed the most courteous kowtow at Han Shuo. Their behavior had actually left Han Shuo shocked.

    ¡°Hey guys, what is this about?¡± Han Shuo was bbergasted. The two seemed to consider him as a senior member of the Cmity Church. This was rather puzzling to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Lord Bryan, we havee under orders to invite you to the headquarters of the Cmity Church. We truly hope that your Lordship will formally make a trip back with us,¡± said Wolf.

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo gasped and asked puzzlingly, ¡°Why have you invited me?¡±

    The secretive Cmity Church had never publicly announced where their headquarters was located. Those countries and religions that were hostile towards Cmity Church had tried everything they could but still came nowhere close to pinpointing its headquarters. To be suddenly visited by Wolf and Burt Zili and beckoned there came as quite a shock, even for Han Shuo.

    ¡°Lord Bryan, your magnificent feat outside the South Border City and noble deed of destroying the Shrine of Ice has spread to our Pope¡¯s ears. As soon as His Holiness learned of your return, he instructed us to do our best in inviting your Lordship to the Cmity Church in order to discuss important matters with you. We really hope that Lord Bryan will not reject the invitation.¡± There was an undeniable reverence in Wolf¡¯s eyes. It appeared that Han Shuo¡¯s thunderous actions after returning to Profound Continent had indeed astonished the Cmity Church.

    ¡°Why is it I who has to travel to Cmity Church? If your Pope is sincere, he shoulde to meet me personally,¡± given Han Shuo¡¯s strength, the Cmity Church on Profound Continent did not strike him as anything spectacr. It was justified for Han Shuo to speak so arrogantly.

    Wolf must have been thoroughly briefed before making his way over, as he did not get angry when Han Shuo said those words. On the contrary, he feigned hospitality and exined, ¡°Actually, His Holiness the Pope has intended to personally seek and have a chat with you for five years now. This time was no exception. When he learned the news of your return, he was genuinely prepared toe here personally.¡±

    ¡°Then? Why didn¡¯t he? Why has he insisted on me going to him instead?¡± Han Shuo said in a deep voice with his brows in a knit.

    Han Shuo was not at all afraid that the Cmity Church would backstab him, not with all that power he held. Even with his two injured avatars, Han Shuo had full confidence of self-preservation. It¡¯s just that during these recent days he was upied with affairs about Lancelot Empire. He had no ns of leaving there anytime soon.

    ¡°Before His Holiness came over, he had utilized an altar tomunicate with our God. We members of lowly status do not know the specifics of the conversation. However, His Holiness did tell us that it was our God who had personally given the instruction to earnestly invite you to the Cmity Church headquarters. It is only through the altar at our headquarters that you canmunicate with the God we pray to,¡± Wolf exined in an extremely deferential manner.

    Some thoughts suddenly crossed Han Shuo¡¯s mind.

    For days Han Shuo had been worrying about the matter with the Shrine of Ice and spider goddess Rose. It was clear to him that neither spider goddess Rose nor the Shrine of Ice was anything that he could contend against alone. If either one of them traversed to this ce in person, Han Shuo knew that he had absolutely no chance of winning in a fight. He had clear understanding of the strength he possessed and knew he simply could not contend against either one of those powerhouses at this point in time.

    After immersing in his head for ages, an idea came to Han Shuo¡¯s mind, which was to adhere himself to a major powerhouse for the time being; while he had yet to possess his desired level of strength, he would use someone else¡¯s power to contend against the Shrine of Ice, the spider goddess, and the Church of Light, which he would soonmit offense against.

    His two avatars cultivated in the element of death and the edict of destruction. What¡¯s more, the physical body of his avatar of death was formed from the skeletal staff. After turning over in his mind, Han Shuo felt that it would be much easier tomunicate with powers on the side of the two overgods of death and destruction. The establishment that the two overgods had on Profound Continent was precisely the Cmity Church.

    Han Shuo was practically certain when Wolf spoke that he wasn¡¯t the only one thinking about this. It appeared that the powers of the two overgods had the same intention. They were probably throwing him an olive branch formally via the Cmity Church.

    After much thought, Han Shuo put on a smile and rxedly said, ¡°So it seems. Alright, I will ept your invitation. However, you will have to have some patience. As soon as Iplete matters on my end, I will head to the Cmity Church headquarters with the two of you right away.¡±

    ¡°Thank you so much, Lord Bryan!¡± Wolf had obviously loosened up when Han Shuo agreed to the invitation. Right after, he fawned on Han Shuo, ¡°Lord Bryan, to tell you the truth, I knew that we were both on the same side from the very first time we met. Your Lordship has performed two great deeds as soon as you reappeared. All the cardinals high up in the church were jolted by the reports that spread far and wide. And now, there are gods that have asked for your presence directly. Lord Bryan is indeed beyond outstanding! If possible, we really hope that Lord Bryan will provide the two of us with your guidance.¡±

    ¡°Please provide us with your guidance, Lord Bryan,¡± Burt Zili who had been silent all along said in a fawning smile.

    The duo had done their utmost to assist Han Shuo ever since five years ago and had invested plenty of their capital into Han Shuo, for example, helping Han Shuo¡¯s Brettel City annex all seven grand duchies. The two were more excited than anyone in the world to see Han Shuo make a magnificenteback and the Cmity Church attaching unprecedented importance to him.

    Han Shuo smiled as he sized up the duo and nodded. He patted on Wolf¡¯s shoulder and smilingly said, ¡°Smart people usually have good luck. Rest assured, if opportunities present themselves in the future, I will not forget the favors you two have done for me in the past.¡±

    ¡°Thank you! Thank you Lord Bryan!¡± Wolf and Burt Zili were overjoyed at Han Shuo¡¯s words and thanked Han Shuo at once.

    Han Shuo had yet to formally join the Cmity Church but his actions had shaken all the high-level members of the church, including the Pope himself. The duo knew that once Han Shuo formally joined the church, as the master of the skeletal staff, Han Shuo would surelye to rain immense influence over the organization. With this reassurance from Han Shuo, the two could almost see the scene of their meteoric sess in their careers. Even though they were old aged, they couldn¡¯t calm their minds and were very much excited.

    ¡°Alright, you two may leave first. When I¡¯m done here, I will immediately depart for the Cmity Church headquarters with the two of you,¡± Han Shuo calmly instructed the two who were beaming ear to ear.

    ¡°Understood, Lord Bryan. Just get in touch with us when your Lordship is ready,¡± Wolf and Burt Zili respectfully bowed and left.

    Wolf had revealed the Cmity Church¡¯smunication method to Han Shuo long ago. He totally did not treat Han Shuo as an outsider.

    That made sense. The Cmity Church¡¯s sacred weapon, the skeletal staff, was in Han Shuo¡¯s possession. On top of that, Han Shuo was a necromancer. Not to mention that he was an arch-enemy of the Church of Light. His conduct and deeds for the past many years were, in fact, in line with Cmity Church¡¯s goals. It was only natural that the Cmity Church had long taken him as one of their own.

    After Wolf and Burt Zili left, Han Shuo continued to ponder for a while. He thought of the bitter experience of having his soul invaded in an underground chamber of the Cemetery of Death. He realized that the god back then wanted his faith, making him wholeheartedly serve under his Cmity Church. But now, by this point in time, Han Shuo too had be a god. Han Shuo believed that as long as that evil god wasn¡¯t a fool, he would not use such a method on him again.

    Different situations call for different actions. Well, I guess Cmity Church and I are going to exploit each other. But when my strength has attained certain heights, no one can tell who will have control over the other, Han Shuo told himself in his mind

    For the next few days, Han Shuo properlypensated his threedies at Ossen City, setting free the desire that they had repressed for the past five years all at once. His deeds at the South Border City and his conducts at Kasi Empire¡¯s Shrine of Ice were intentionally propagated via the Dark Mantle, causing yet another wave of sensation through Lancelot Empire.

    It seemed as though Han Shuo had be the new god that the people of Lancelot Empire worshipped overnight. The number of followers that the Druidic Order converted over their many years of operation in Lancelot Empire paled inparison to the numbers Han Shuo had obtained within thest few days. Through Han Shuo¡¯s meticulous guidance, countless citizens of Lancelot Empire had truly worshipped Han Shuo as their god, providing him their power of faith.

    Some things might have been pleasant and enjoyable for Han Shuo, but some things were just particrly thorny. For example, the other day after he fornicated Emily, she questioned him about Jasper, Hemanna, and Sylph.

    As Emily was a high ranking member of the Dark Mantle, in addition to the Abyssaldies being too attention-grabbing when they appeared in Sunshine Valley, it would only be strange for her not to be aware of this.

    Issues like these caused Han Shuo the biggest headaches. He had no choice but to summon up his courage and exin to Emily, emphasizing the peculiarity of demonic arts cultivation and that he waspelled by the circumstances.

    But evidently, Emily didn¡¯t buy into Han Shuo¡¯s exnation at all. She said angrily, ¡°The whole empire knows that you are lecherous, so don¡¯t tell me that you are forced to do that. Also, you better exin this to Fanny and Phoebe as well. They too have learned about this.¡±

    Han Shuo put on a bitter smile when he heard Emily¡¯s words. He knew that it was easier to pacify Emily, but not so much when ites to Fanny and Phoebe.

    ¡°Don¡¯t forget, there¡¯s that former Duchess of Helon Duchy, Helen, and sacred knight Sulo¡¯s daughter, Sophie. What are you going to do about the two of them?¡± Emily pressed further charges as she panted with rage.

    ¡°What does Sophie have to do with me?¡± Han Shuo pleaded innocently.

    ¡°Hmph, she traveled thousands of miles from Kasi Empire toe to your Brettel City and their family has made many generous contributions to your city. They now specialize in raising battlesteads at the former Bonton Duchy for Brettel City. Who in the world can¡¯t see that she is interested in you?¡± Emily let out a gentle sigh and beat on Han Shuo¡¯s chest before she grudgingly said, ¡°How could you be so promiscuous?¡±

    Han Shuo put on a bitter smile. He didn¡¯t know what to say and had nothing to say, so he exercised his right to remain silent.

 Chapter 611: Bryan â€“ Guardian of the Empire â€“ School of Necromancy Graduate

    GDK 611: Bryan ¨C Guardian of the Empire ¨C School of Necromancy Graduate

    During his stay in Ossen City, Han Shuo had indulged in sensual pleasures to the greatest extent with his threedies. He also had no choice but to put on a bold face and exin himself to the threedies about Jasper, Hemanna, Sylph, and Helen.

    Naturally and unavoidably, Phoebe and Fanny were angry at Han Shuo. However, through constant cajoling and sweet talking, Han Shuo managed to gradually pacify their fury.

    Afterall, all three of them knew that Han Shuo was no gentleman since the very first day they met. His sexual deprivation in his previous life had made lecherous after his rebirth. As the threedies had made the choice to stay with Han Shuo even after learning of his disposition, such were the consequences they had to endure.

    What was done, could not be undone. After a bout of wrath, in the end, all three of them epted the fact. However, they exhorted and demanded Han Shuo be more restraining of himself, to which, of course, Han Shuo readily conceded.

    Having sessfully made it through the Carnal realm, Han Shuo was no longer as lustful as before. The reassurance he gave this time was from the bottom of his heart. He thought that with his mind fully in his control, this would be a non-issue.

    During his stay in Ossen City, other than fornicating his threedies, Han Shuo spent time and effort in helping to develop their strengths. With Han Shuo¡¯s guidance, Fanny gradually came to master the method of converging the element of death into her body. With that crystal congealed from the body of a basegod, in addition to Han Shuo¡¯s attentive guidance, Fanny made rapid progress in strength and advanced to the realm of a sacred necromancer.

    Meanwhile, Emily was wholly handed to be taught by Ayermike Cotton, who also cultivated in the elemental energy of darkness. As Ayermike Cotton was two realms above Emily and she had previously studied the personal notes about the element of darkness that Ayermike had left behind, the teaching process was very smooth and her strength had begun to advance rapidly.

    Ayermike Cotton liked Emily very much and had truly taken her as his apprentice. His understanding of dark magic which he gained from his many years of experience was imparted on Emily without the slightest reservations, allowing Emily¡¯s strength to soar.

    Like Fanny, Phoebe too was tutored by Han Shuo. However, as Phoebe cultivated in fighting aura, Han Shuo could only provide her withprehension from his own cultivation and couldn¡¯t give much help on the partictes. Stratholme the old monster was miles more qualified to assist her in this aspect. But unfortunately, Stratholme was upied with his own cultivation at Stranglethorn Valley and wasn¡¯t avable at the time.

    Once Han Shuo had settled all the big and small matters he had in Ossen City and was nning to head to the Cmity Church headquarters with Wolf and Burt Zili, Fanny rushed home from Babylon Academy of Magic and Force excitedly, and announced to Han Shuo, ¡°Chancellor Emma is going to retire. She has informed me that she would let me take her position as the chancellor in the next few days.¡±

    ¡°Really? Congrattions honey!¡± Han Shuoughed heartily and gave Fanny a tight hug.

    ¡°But, I¡¯m still very young. Would there be any problem with that?¡± Fanny was extremely excited but also rather worried.

    ¡°Don¡¯t you worry about a thing, let me handle matters of this aspect. I will make sure that you have a solid seat on the position. Hehe, it¡¯s about time some readjustments were made to the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. Alright, I will be sure to take part in your inauguration ceremony before leaving Ossen City,¡± Han Shuo said with an unruffled smile.

    The Babylon Academy of Magic and Force was filled with talents. Grasping the power of the chancellor of Babylon Academy of Magic and Force was tantamount to grasping the future of Lancelot Empire. There sure were a lot who coveted for the position. However, Han Shuo believed that with the influence he currently held over the Lancelot Empire, he would easily fulfill this wish of Fanny¡¯s.

    ¡°But am I going to do the job well?¡± Fanny was aware of just how influential Han Shuo was in Lancelot Empire. She knew that with Han Shuo¡¯s reassurance, the position of the chancellor of Babylon Academy of Magic and Force would be no one else¡¯s but hers. But nheless, she was worried that she might not be up to the task and couldn¡¯t administrate the institution well.

    ¡°How would you know without trying? Don¡¯t worry, I have full confidence in your capabilities! Okay, you should start preparing. Get ready to take the position in the next few days!¡± Han Shuo smilingly soothed Fanny.

    Immediately after, Han Shuo looked for King Lawrence and spoke to him. At present, Lawrence would basically take Han Shuo at his word. Without even giving it a thought, Lawrence agreed to endorse Fanny to the position and even pledged to attend the ceremony himself in support.

    Behind Fanny were Firenze, a figure of overwhelming influence over the southern border, and most importantly, Han Shuo, a supernatural existence. Lawrence obviously understood Fanny¡¯s value and it was to be expected that he would show due respect towards them.

    Taking full advantage of his immense influence over Lancelot Empire, andmunicating with Emma and a few other influential existences of the empire, Han Shuo had nailed the matter right on its head. No one dared to fight over that position with Fanny.

    While Han Shuo exercised his authority and connections, all the bigwigs of Lancelot Empire expressed their well wishes and congratted Fanny. Many gifts of considerable value were sent her way, begging to be received. Fanny was expectedly overwhelmed by this.

    Fanny, Emily, Phoebe ¨C each and every one of them were in charge of enormous resources of the empire. They even had Han Shuo backing them. Anyone in Lancelot Empire, as long as they were sane, would never dare to set themselves against the three.

    With all the needed preparations in order, the grandiose inauguration ceremony was set to take ce at Babylon Academy of Magic and Force in three days.

    Han Shuo went to visit the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force ahead of time. He arrived at the warehouse at the necromancy school where he had stayed for a long time and recalled memories of the past. At the Nine Changes realm, Han Shuo could alter his looks and air at will. With an effortless transformation, Han Shuo concealed his true identity from everyone.

    Han Shuo remembered some interesting stories he had with Jack back in this ce. He also recalled the bizarre rtionship built with Little Skeleton, as well as the big and small things with the students and errand workers.

    Han Shuo had not been in this ce for many years. He discovered that there had been enormous changes to the scenes around here. Originally, the study of necromancy magic was merely a subdivision of the school of dark magic. It had now be a school by itself and had even exceeded the school of dark magic in the number of students enrolled. The students of necromancy school now had their own independent ssrooms and practice field, no longer limited to using the spare resources that the school of dark magic had.

    The board path with valedictorian statues erected on both sides of the walk was still in existence. However, one thing had changed ¨C the tallest and biggest statue was a figure of himself. This statue was decorated to appear much more magnificent and glorious than all other statues around it, but only a few words were inscribed on it:

    Bryan ¨C Guardian of the Empire ¨C School of Necromancy Graduate

    When he gazed at this statue of himself,plicated emotions rose from his heart. Never had he himself back then expected that he would actually be the greatest pride of the academy in such a short time. He fondly recalled the time when he told Jack that one day, they would have statues of themselves among those ced here. It was as vivid as though it had been only yesterday.

    ¡°Br... Bryan? Is that you?¡± Suddenly, an emotional, shaken voice sounded from behind him.

    Han Shuo was stunned. He could tell that this familiar voice came from Lisa. Even as he had altered his appearance and had his back facing her, she was still able to recognize him with little effort. Han Shuo was rather indecisive in this moment, unsure if he should reveal his identity to her.

 Chapter 612: Are you Bryan?

    GDK 612: Are you Bryan?

    Lisa was absolutely astonished. But when Han Shuo turned around to look at her, Lisa¡¯s expression quickly turned to pure bewilderment. Her slender eyebrows creased slightly as she examined Han Shuo.

    Lisa has grown up, was the first impression that crossed Han Shuo mind when he turned around and saw her.

    That crafty and unruly girl back then had now grown into a slender, graceful, and elegantdy. The tragic disaster that struck her family had made her much more mature and taught her to be strong and diligent.

    When he looked at Lisa who was standing right before him, his mind automatically wandered into the past. He recalled of his failed attempt at scaring Lisa by pretending to be a corpse soon after he arrived in this world. He also thought of the incident where Lisa conducted that necromancy experiment on him. Unwittingly, the corners of his lip curled up slightly.

    Suddenly, a bright light shed from Lisa¡¯s eyes that traced Han Shuo up and down. She asked, with a tremor in her lips, ¡°Are you Bryan?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not!¡± Han Shuo replied without thinking.

    The happiness radiating from her eyes was quickly reced by sadness. She did nothing but stare nkly at Han Shuo. Tears had filled the rims of her eyes to their very brim.

    After staring at each other for a few seconds, Han Shuo gently sighed, forced a smile, and said, ¡°How did you recognize me?¡±

    As soon as Han Shuo said those words, the teardrops collecting in Lisa¡¯s eyes finally rolled down her smooth cheeks. At that very moment, the strong and stalwart Lisa turned weak and fragile. She cried out like a child as she dashed ahead and fell into Han Shuo¡¯s chest in a split second. She then tightly embraced Han Shuo with all her strength, as though fearing that Han Shuo would disappear at any moment.

    ¡°You are back¡­ You are finally back¡­ Do you know how worried I was? Do you know how much pain my heart felt when I heard that you were killed by the Church of Light?¡± Lisa was sobbing as she wrapped Han Shuo in her arms, helpless and miserable.

    Han Shuo felt her body trembling as he listened to her tearfulints. His heart gradually softened like butter. From her words, Han Shuo could tell just how deep her affection for him was. It was him or no one else ¨C that was how staunch and unswerving her feelings were.

    ¡°Is it worth the pain?¡± Han Shuo softly sighed and his heart ached. He truly had no idea why had Lisa been so persistent. For all this time, Han Shuo thought that the feelings Lisa had for him was merely infatuation out of immaturity and he would gradually be forgotten with the passing of time. He truly had not anticipated that her love for him would be so deep.

    ¡°It is only when I¡¯m with you that I can truly feel happy. Other than you, no one can give me that kind of sensation. Bryan, I beg you, please, can you not be so heartless to me?¡± the teary Lisa helplessly pleaded as she grabbed firmly onto Han Shuo¡¯s shirt.

    Han Shuo let out yet another sigh. His heart melted,pletely forgetting what he pledged to his threedies. As he looked at the tearful Lisa, he nodded subconsciously.

    A wildness suddenly blossomed from Lisa¡¯s cheeks that were stained with tears. She hugged Han Shuo firmly. She embraced him tighter and tighter as though wanting to fuse herself into Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    Han Shuo appeared to understand now. He leaned in and ced his mouth next to Lisa¡¯s ear and softly said, ¡°Alright, alright. Don¡¯t cry. Others might think that I¡¯m bullying you if they see this.¡±

    ¡°You are bullying me! And you have bullied me for many years¡­¡± This time, Lisa couldn¡¯t seem to stop venting her feeling. She sobbed and tearfullyined with her head tucked in Han Shuo¡¯s chest. It was as though she wanted to vent all the bitterness and grudges that had stifled her heart for many years all at once.

    Han Shuo forced a smile and no longer told her to stop crying. Han Shuo knew that these words must have restrained her heart for more than a few years. A chance like this was difficult toe by and there was no way she would give up on this opportunity.

    Han Shuo was aware that if she didn¡¯t get her point across and instead bottled them inside her heart, it would affect both her body and her cultivation. It was only by unburdening herself of those words that she couldpletely walk out from the torment ande to possess a healthy and stable mind again.

    For this reason, Han Shuo did not persuade her to stop but patiently listened to her bitter quibbles while gently stroking her shoulder. He did not interrupt her for even a second and quietly sensed Lisa¡¯s feelings for him that were as deep as the sea.

    After a long, long while, Lisa¡¯s weeping protests slowly came to an end. And when her lovable body was no longer trembling, Han Shuo asked, baffled, ¡°How did you identify me so easily?¡±

    Lisa shot a resentful re at Han Shuo, wrinkled her nose, and said ¡°When you were looking at your statue, you did not conceal the air that drifted from your body. I know you too well. Your figure from behind, your demeanor, and the trace of vileness in your eyes ¨C your makeup may fool others, but it can¡¯t fool me!¡± Lisa said with full confidence.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was even more deeply moved. Even after so many years, Lisa could still recognize him from behind at first nce. This had sufficiently indicated just how deep her feelings for him ran.

    However moved he was, though, Han Shuo was rmed. He knew that as he had only recently entered the Nine Changes realm, his mastery of some of the changes was not refined enough. Otherwise, it wouldn¡¯t have been so easy for Lisa to recognize him.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong with your face anyway? It doesn¡¯t look good.¡± When Lisa saw that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t replying, she looked panicked and interrogated him, ¡°Were you disfigured by your enemy?¡±

    Han Shuoughed and shook his head. Then, as Lisa attentively watched, the skin on Han Shuo¡¯s face started to undte like water ripples. Before Lisa could even gasp, Han Shuo had restored his original look.

    ¡°Like magic!¡± Lisa finally cried out in surprise. She could not be more enthralled.

    Han Shuo smiled, nced at Lisa, who had now turned into a finedy, and sped her small hands. With one pulsation of his consciousness, he gained a clear measurement of Lisa¡¯s mental strength. Heplimented her in a soft voice, ¡°Not bad, didn¡¯t expect for you to have already advanced to be an archmage now! This kind of progress is really astonishing!¡±

    ¡°This is nothing. Compared to Teacher Fanny and your women, I¡¯m still far behind!¡± Lisa softly giggled and couldn¡¯t help her modesty. She indeed had became much more mature.

    ¡°They have received aid from me in one way or the other. But for you to attain your current strength with just your own hard work, is truly incredible!¡± Han Shuo shook his head and again gave recognition to Lisa¡¯s great effort.

    ¡°Hehe, well I was afraid that you would look down on me for being too far behind you. But it seems that no matter how hard I try, I still have no way of catching up to you!¡± Lisa rubbed her little nose and blushed as she divulged her thoughts.

    Suddenly, a thought popped into Han Shuo¡¯s mind. He softly said, ¡°Close your eyes, calm down your mind.¡±

    Lisa had unquestioning trust in Han Shuo. Although she had no idea what Han Shuo wanted to do next, she closed her eyes as Han Shuo had instructed. However, for some reason, she couldn¡¯t calm herself down. Her mind would automatically gravitate towards some wishful fantasy.

    The two were standing very close to each other as Han Shuo held onto her delicate hands. They could smell the scenting from each other¡¯s bodies. Lisa was no youngdy any more. Lisa¡¯s heartrate was climbing higher and higher. She was filled with both hopeful excitement and nervousness.

    When Han Shuo sensed that Lisa¡¯s mind was in disorder, her cheeks flushed, and her breathing rate heightened, he couldn¡¯t swallow augh. He gently tapped on her forehead andughingly said, ¡°What¡¯s going on in your imagination? I¡¯m only going to transfer some understanding about necromancy magic to you, not nning to take advantage of you.¡±

    ¡°I, I wasn¡¯t imagining anything!¡± Lisa turned bashful and hastily denied. Her heart, however, felt a faint tinge of disappointment.

    ¡°Alright, alright. I don¡¯t care what you were thinking about, just calm down for me.¡± Han Shuo felt as though she had returned to the past and reverted back to be that adorable, yet hateful little witch. For some reason, Han Shuo was very delighted.

    At longst, Lisa gradually calmed her mind. She closed her eyes, cast all distracting thoughts from her mind, and took deep, steady breaths.

    Han Shuo, who was observing Lisa closely, pressed a finger between her eyebrows when he noticed that her soul was adjusted to its most optimal state. His consciousness, akin to millions of fine threads, slowly entwined with her soul.

    It wasn¡¯t the first time that Han Shuo did things like this and he had even be more adept at it after reaching the Nine Changes realm. His consciousness was like data cables that linked up to Lisa¡¯s soul. Some of Han Shuo¡¯s understanding of necromancy magic before he became a sacred magus slowly flowed into Lisa¡¯s mind.

    As Lisa was merely an archmage, her soul was simply too weak, therefore the transmission process was rather slow. Han Shuo was afraid that her soul might not be able to handle too much so he was extremely careful, keeping the procedure as safe as possible for her.

    Gradually, Lisa hadpletely rxed,pletely handing her soul to be directed by Han Shuo. This was a disy of absolute trust in Han Shuo. With this, the memory transfer had obviously sped up, and Han Shuo¡¯s heart was even more touched. This made him even more cautious and careful.

    The two stood there for approximately half an hour. Passerbys walked to and fro and hadn¡¯t the slightest idea of their presence as Han Shuo had obscured Lisa and himself using boundary.

    Han Shuo gently pulled back his hand and smiled. He whispered, ¡°Alright. You can open your eyes now!¡±

    Lisa slowly opened her bright eyes. They were filled with pleasantly surprised emotions and amazement. After taking in a deep breath, Lisa suddenly realized, ¡°No wonder, no wonder Teacher Fanny could be a grand magus so quickly. It was because of this. I¡¯ve finally figured it out! Bryan! You heartless guy, you didn¡¯t help me all this time!¡±

    Han Shuo forced a smile and pledged, ¡°In the future, I will definitely treat all of you equally favorably!¡±

 Chapter 613: I will eat it no matter the side effects!

    GDK 613: I will eat it no matter the side effects!

    Ever since its inception, the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force had supplied Lancelot Empire with innumerable talents. It truly was the nurturing ground for young prospects. This very day was the inauguration ceremony of the thirteenth chancellor of the academy. From early at dawn, an endless stream of horses and carriages lined up outside the academy as influential officials and moguls of the empire swarmed the ce.

    The influence that the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force had over the empire was immense. It was no surprise that every term of the inauguration of its chancellor would attract the attendance of the privileged sses. But it was even more so for this term¡¯s inauguration ceremony. Due to Fanny¡¯s rtionship to Han Shuo, practically any character with true power was present. Even the King of Lancelot Empire was there.

    While the nobles arrived in droves, Han Shuo, who was there in advance, temporarily separated from Lisa to meet Candide.

    Of course, as Fanny¡¯s father, Firenze had taken time off from the southern border to attend his daughter¡¯s inauguration. As the most significant characters of Lancelot Empire had all gathered at the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, security was of the greatest priority.

    Han Shuo found the gloomy Candide looking rather worried. He let out a gentle sigh of relief when he saw Han Shuo and said in a deep voice, ¡°I¡¯ve received intelligence that someone might attempt to assassinate His Majesty the King.¡±

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo raised his eyebrows and quickly asked, ¡°Who are they?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s currently unknown. But I¡¯m pretty sure it has something to do with those few hostile nations. There are a lot of high-ranking characters of our empire at Babylon Academy of Magic and Force today. If these people were to be struck, our empire will suffer a catastrophic loss.¡± Candide was rather anxious. It was difficult to protect against sneak attacks. If anything really were to happen to such a dignified congregation, it would surely have an immeasurable impact on the reputation of the Empire and the Dark Mantle.

    ¡°I see. Alright, summon my butler from my residence. Also, tell Pegasus and Graeae toe over if they aren¡¯t currently upied with assignments. I don¡¯t believe that there is any nation that could crash our party,¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face turned cold as he said to Candide.

    Today was a momentous day for Fanny and Han Shuo would certainly not allow anyone to sabotage her inauguration ceremony. If there really was an enemy who was either daring or foolish to cause trouble, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t hesitate to finish the person without the slightest mercy.

    Candide nodded and said to Han Shuo, ¡°You be more attentive too. I¡¯m going to move an additional squadron here as backup.¡±

    Candide was used to talking with Han Shuo as one of equal rank and would never disy the slightest air of superiority when interacting with Han Shuo. In addition, after Han Shuo¡¯s return to Lancelot Empire, unlike most others, Candide could tell that Han Shuo¡¯s strength was well beyond mortal. Therefore, he was much less inclined to put on airs before Han Shuo and had even started getting used to following Han Shuo¡¯smand.

    ¡°Got it. Be at ease. No matter who they are, anyone who dares look for trouble in this ce will only find their own doom,¡± Han Shuo said confidently.

    Candide put on a sinister smile and did not say any more. He seemed to fuse into the shadows as he headed to a clocktower to get into position.

    Han Shuo unfolded his consciousness and inspected each and every character within the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. It was as though the entire academy had shrunken into his brain. Not even a fly could escape from his reconnaissance.

    The news of Fanny¡¯s inauguration had spread like wildfire through the Lancelot Empire for days. Those antagonists with intentions of causing havoc would surely have gotten the news. Although Han Shuo was confident in his own strength, he didn¡¯t share the same opinion about others. A surprise attack could take ce in a matter of milliseconds. Even though he was immensely powerful, he had no choice but to be cautious and careful.

    Han Shuo silently observed all activities at every nook and cranny of the academy. After informing Candide, he went into Chancellor Emma¡¯s spacious secret chamber. There he saw Fanny carefully listening to Emma¡¯s guidance.

    Fanny had spent the past few days with Emma, receiving lectures about the various machinery of the academy and things that she should pay special attention to. Fanny, who had been apprehensive all along, made the most of the time to learn about managing the institution from the experienced Emma and tried to understand the critical aspects as quickly as possible.

    Prior to this, Fanny had only immersed herself in teaching necromancy magic and her own cultivation. She had rarely involved herself with administrative affairs. However, now that she would soon assume the position as the chancellor of the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, naturally, she had to learn all these things well. Otherwise, even with Han Shuo backing her, without actual capacity, she would not be able to convince the masses.

    ¡°How¡¯s it going?¡± Han Shuo asked after entering the room, grinning.

    ¡°Fanny is pretty good at it. Haha, don¡¯t worry, I don¡¯t think that there will be any issue. She¡¯ll manage the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force well for sure,¡± the grizzly-haired Emma replied as she looked at Han Shuo with her benevolent eyes.

    ¡°That¡¯s great. Chancellor Emma, you aren¡¯t that old yet, why are you rushing to retire?¡± Han Shuo was rather puzzled. Emma could easily hold onto the position for a couple more years,

    ¡°I¡¯m old. Haha. I¡¯m still a mere grand magus at my age and couldn¡¯t make any breakthrough. But Fanny was already a grand necromancer at such a young age. What¡¯s more, I believe that she will advance even farther very soon. Emily and Phoebe, these two young ones are even more prodigious. Since the young ones have all grown up, it¡¯s about time we older generations step aside and hand over the seats,¡± Emma smiled and exined in a gentle voice.

    ¡°Thank you, Madam Chancellor. You have been very considerate of me through all these years. Without you, it would be impossible for Bryan and I to be together so smoothly,¡± Fanny sincerely thanked Emma.

    ¡°Thank you!¡± Han Shuo, too, bowed respectfully at Emma and thanked her.

    Back when Han Shuo had yet to climb to such a high realm and Fanny¡¯s identity had yet to be widely known in the empire, Han Shuo and Fanny had nearly impulsively courted in public. If it weren¡¯t for Emma dissuasion, the two would have made public of their rtionship prematurely and they would surely be penalized by some damned regtions. After all, the two were teacher and student in a rtionship, something in breach of the empire¡¯s statute.

    It was thanks to Emma¡¯s advice of acute foresight that Han Shuo and Fanny had concealed the fact. Later, when Han Shuo had attained great prestige in the Empire by aiding Lawrence to the throne, with a grandeur status and mighty strength, no one dared to object to the two¡¯s rtionship and they could finally be together without a hitch.

    ¡°Oh, no need to thank me. I¡¯ve known for a while now that you two would end up together. I¡¯ve lived some years longer than you and therefore I¡¯ve got a bit more foresight than you. Fortunately, you two good kids did listen to me,¡± Emma told Han Shuo and Fanny amicably.

    ¡°Hmm, Lawrence should be arriving any minute now. Fanny, you are the host today and you should go out and greet those people outside and get ready for the ceremony,¡± Han Shuo advised.

    ¡°But, there¡¯s still a lot that I don¡¯t know. There¡¯s a lot more that I still need to learn from Chancellor Emma!¡± Fanny appeared rather nervous.

    ¡°Haha, although I won¡¯t be a chancellor, I will always be close by in the academy. You can look for me anytime should you be met with any problems in the future. Girl, march ahead, there¡¯s nothing to be afraid of,¡± Emma encouraged. The wrinkles on her face were bunched together. She really did look way past her time.

    A thought crossed Han Shuo¡¯s mind. ¡°Chancellor Emma, take this medicinal pellet. Perhaps after you consume this pellet, you won¡¯t look as old.¡± He took out a Pellet of Rejuvenation that he had recently refined and handed it to Emma.

    These days, Han Shuo was in possession of all kinds of bizarre and umon substances. As to assist Lisa and other allies of his, he had invested some time into refining a whole range of medicinal pellets of different functions. The Pellet of Rejuvenation was a medicinal pellet that could eliminate impurities inside the body and fill an aged body and its cells with vigor once again. Han Shuo felt touched when he recalled that Emma had taken care of Fanny and him back in those years. Therefore, when he saw the wrinkles across Emma¡¯s face, he decided to give her a medicinal pellet.

    Emma received the Pellet of Rejuvenation with excitement. She pinched the pellet curiously, examined it, and giddily asked, ¡°Just one medicinal pellet could have such a miraculous effect?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded with a smile and said, ¡°Try it and you will find out. Medicinal pellets that I have personally refined should be pretty effective.¡±

    ¡°Haha, I believe you. Candide had told me about your miraculous abilities. Anything you prescribe me will surely be anything but ordinary.¡± Emma was overjoyed. Every woman would wish themselves to appear a little younger. Naturally, Emma was no exception.

    ¡°After consuming this medicinal pellet, you might perspire for several days in a row. The sweat might be ck in color. However, you don¡¯t need to worry about that. That is the body eliminating its impurities. It¡¯s perfectly normal,¡± Han Shuo exined as not to cause any unnecessary distress.

    ¡°Haha, got it. I do remember that one time when Fanny had diarrhea for three whole days,¡± Emma said teasingly as she looked at Fanny and chuckled.

    Emma, acting as the chancellor, was very mindful of big and small events in her academy. As Fanny had always stayed inside the academy, Emma had noticed what happened during those few days. In fact, she was rather worried at that time and had even visited Fanny. Later in time, she discovered that after three days of bowel movements, Fanny appeared radiant and gorgeous as though she had been reborn. With her great insight, she naturally knew what must have happened to Fanny.

    Fanny blushed at Emma¡¯s words. She shot a re at Han Shuo and rebuked, ¡°What are your medicinal pellets made of? Why must they always have such embarrassing side effects?¡±

    ¡°Oh? I was going to give you a medicinal pellet I have recently refined that can help maintain a youthful appearance. Since you are afraid of those side effects, well, I¡¯ll forget about it then,¡± Han Shuo said as he shrugged.

    As soon as she heard that the medicinal pellet could help maintain a youthful appearance, a brilliant glimmer immediately shone from her eyes. She rushed towards Han Shuo and said full of joy and excitement, ¡°Give it to me! I will eat it no matter the side effects!¡±

    Han Shuo knew exactly what she would say. Heughed heartily, grabbed Fanny, and swept her outside after throwing Emma a triumphant wink.

 Chapter 614: Sunny Day

    GDK 614: Sunny Day

    The Babylon Academy of Magic and Force had long been packed full of crowd. Nearly every influential figure of the empire had congregated there. Representatives and students from all schools under the academy were amok, making preparations for the grandiose ceremony.

    At thergest za of the academy, there stationed a squadron of knights in ck armor. They were protecting Lawrence who was dressed in a ceremonial robe and stood with a big smile as he chatted away with his ministers.

    The two greatest threats that had persistently gued the Lancelot Empire ¨C the Empire of Orcs and Kasi Empire ¨C were both neutralized by Han Shuo in the short period of a dozen or so days via devastating methods. These ministers hadn¡¯t had a good night¡¯s sleep in ages, but now, they could finally rx. Their faces were once again pped with shining smiles.

    Before Han Shuo¡¯s return, there was a possibility that the hundreds of thousands of orc warriors from the Empire of Orcs could breach the South Border City any day and grant themselves an unimpeded march straight to the capital city of Lancelot Empire, Ossen City. The presence of this enormous threat kept all these aristocrats up at night and robbed them of their appetites. They were afraid that someday they would wake up to uncivilized and savage orc warriors standing around them.

    The privileged sses of the empire had been constantly bedeviled by this kind of mental torment ¨C up until the day Han Shuo decided to traverse into South Border City. For this, they were sincerely grateful towards Han Shuo.

    Proudly standing beside King Lawrence was Firenze, the Lord of Southern Border. Today was an important day for Fanny and naturally, Firenze had taken time off to attend.

    By this point, the story of how Han Shuo massacred several hundred thousand orcs had spread like blight to every corner of Lancelot Empire. The story was known to everyone!

    Although there was no deliberate exaggeration in the story, the magnificent feat of delivering carnage to several hundred thousand orcs all by himself couldn¡¯t sound more unbelievable. Therefore, most people who had heard of the hearsay weren¡¯tpletely convinced that Han Shuo had such capabilities.

    For this reason, as soon as Firenze appeared, those nobles and dignitaries of the empire who had friendly rtions with him immediately surrounded and pestered him to hear his ount. King Lawrence was no exception.

    Although Lawrence had full confidence in Han Shuo, the tale that came from South Border City was just all too overwhelming to believe, even for Lawrence. After Han Shuo became a god, a majestic air naturally emanated from him. Lawrence felt a rather ufortable pressure bearing down on him when he faced Han Shuo and was therefore disinclined to seek confirmation about the validity of this news directly from Han Shuo. Now that he came to this hard toe by opportunity to meet Firenze, he attentively listened in to the ministers throwing questions at Firenze.

    ¡°Old madman, are you sure you got that right? Bryan, that youngster, really drowned the hundreds of thousands of orc warriors using necromancy creatures?¡± Old Hahn of the Betteridge family had a rtively good rtionship with Firenze owing to the intimacy between Emily and Fanny. He shouted his question at Firenze.

    When old Hahn asked the question, all around him, the patriarchs of all family ns, the ministers of the empire, and even King Lawrence himself, pricked up their ears and revealed wide eyes and gaping jaws. It appeared that everyone wanted to know.

    ¡°Fuck it! Believe it or not, it¡¯s up to yourselves! What are you bunch unseasoned fools so stirred up for? Even if I¡¯m telling lies, do you think that all the citizens of South Border City would be lying at the same time?¡± Firenze rolled his eyes and yelled. He was bombarded with the very same question over and over again and couldn¡¯t be more annoyed by it.

    ¡°About that, themoners have an immense ability for over-exaggerating and distorting the true story. We wouldn¡¯t be so half-baked to believe every word they say,¡± old Hahn gave a short, deviousugh before putting on a solemn face. He fixed his eyes on Firenze, and questioned yet again, ¡°So you are telling the truth? That kid actually single-handedly got rid of several hundred thousand orc warriors by deploying necromancy magic?¡±

    Old Hahn knew that although Firenze was a fiery-tempered person, he would never talk nonsense. He was even more certain that Firenze was telling the truth when he started to show annoyance.

    This tale was simply all too much to believe at face value. Even Ayermike Cotton, the expert key to the founding of the empire, had not made any achievement nearly as phenomenal as Han Shuo¡¯s.

    To eliminate several hundred thousand orc warriors all by himself; what magnitude of power was that?

    ¡°Believe it or not, I¡¯m tired of talking to you guys!¡± Firenze coldly groaned and shot a re at Lawrence who was eavesdropping on the conversation. He raised his voice and said, ¡°Your Majesty, quit eavesdropping already. I¡¯m still waiting for the two legions of men that you promised me. When will they arrive? I need to have them in order to conquer the Empire of Orcs! Hmph, the orcs have assaulted the Southern Border for three years. It¡¯s about time we give them a taste of their own medicine!¡±

    Lawrence put on an embarrassed, awkward smile and pledged to Firenze, ¡°Do not worry. In a month, the two legions will be right there at your southern border. By then, please be mindful with them.¡±

    ¡°After the round of carnage that Bryan made, the Empire of Orcs have basically lost all their nerves. He¡¯s now even more prestigious than I am in the southern border. All the orcs thought that he was a real diabolic demon and absolutely dared not to pick a fight with us anymore. The southern border is now safe and sound. There is nothing for you to worry about,¡± Firenze said offhandedly. He appeared very confident.

    Lawrence nodded with a smile and did not say any more. However, his heart at this moment was chocked full with astonishment. Never had he anticipated that Han Shuo was this frightening. Even the whole Empire of Orcs was so scared of his might that they now wouldn¡¯t mess with Lancelot Empire. Having confirmed the validity of that incident outside South Border City from Firenze, Lawrence was even more determined to give Han Shuo the best treatment at all costs.

    The dignitaries of the empire all had shock in their eyes. They were still slowly reying and digesting the words that Firenze had said in their minds. They, too, had made a firm resolution ¨C to never stand against Han Shuo.

    ¡°What are you guys talking about?¡± it was at this moment that Han Shuo¡¯s gentle voice sounded. He walked over with the meticulously adorned Fanny.

    The light makeup and faint smile on Fanny¡¯s face further enhanced her already charming and gorgeous appearance. The dark, flowy magical robe gave her a solemn and dignified look, but at the same time, it didn¡¯tpletely mask her graceful, alluring figure. The air of elegance surrounding her made every person that encountered her nod their heads in their hearts. For some reason, they just felt that the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force would ascend to even greater heights with her serving as the chancellor.

    ¡°It¡¯s nothing. We were just wondering why you weren¡¯t here yet,¡± Lawrence rushed to provide a cover-up before Firenze¡¯s loose lips divulged what they were really talking about earlier.

    ¡°Fanny, you look very beautiful today, just as beautiful as your mother!¡± However, soon after saying those words, a memory seemed to pop into Firenze¡¯s mind as he softly sighed. His smiling lips slowly drew into a frown.

    ¡°Thank you for thepliment, father. Father, today is a happy day. Don¡¯t think about some unhappy memories,¡± Fanny hastily said with a smile when he saw Firenze¡¯s face turn mournful. She had long forgiven Firenze of failing to take care of his family in serving his nation all those years ago.

    Firenze nodded and kept silent. He seemed to have gotten a little better.

    As soon as Han Shuo and Fanny made an appearance, the dignitaries of the empire swarmed over to congratte Fanny.

    ¡°Alright. Let¡¯s begin,¡± Lawrence nodded at the guard of honor from a distance away.

    The guard of honor who had been ready on standby started ying musical instruments of all sorts as soon as he saw Lawrence nod. Teachers and students of all schools started to gather towards the ce when they heard the cheerful and lighthearted music. Emily, Phoebe, Emma, Candide, Amyes, and many more characters that Han Shuo was familiar with, all appeared at the za. To proceed, Emma stepped up to the stage and, with an amiable smile on her face, narrated the glorious history of the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. Fanny wore a solemn and respectful face as she attentively listened to Emma¡¯s speech.

    The dignitaries of the empire and the members of the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force also attentively listened from under the stage. The inauguration ceremony was being conducted orderly and ording to n.

    Of Ayermike Cotton and Graeae, one stood among the crowd while the other hid on the top of the highest clocktower, steadily observing the situation around them.

    Han Shuo unfolded his consciousness. He too was being careful and on the alert. He was terribly afraid that a malicious actor would sabotage the ceremony.

    Gathered on the za were King Lawrence, most of the nobilities of the empire, as well as the future of the empire ¨C the students of Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. A sessful assassination attempt would cause immeasurable losses to Lancelot Empire. They had no other option but to be very cautious to prevent the most uneptable scenario.

    After some time, Chancellor Emma concluded her speech and the actual handover and inauguration ceremony had begun. Everything was underway in good order and nothing happened that wasn¡¯t already in the works.

    I guess there probably won¡¯t be a problem. I doubt that anyone that knows I¡¯m here would dare cause trouble, Han Shuo thought to himself when he discovered no unusual activity with the ceremonying to an end. However, some people truly have no fear of death. Just as Han Shuo thought that there were no more surprises, he suddenly sensed something peculiar about the elements of light in the surroundings. The scorching sunlight that came from the clear sky above seemed to grow more and more luminous.

    An incorporeal pressure enveloped the za from the sky. It was so heavy that some people felt stifled.

    Han Shuo was on guard. He immediately unfolded his consciousness and hinted at Graeae and Ayermike Cotton.

    Ayermike Cotton and Graeae had felt the abnormality too. There were both on high alert as though a great enemy was about to strike.

    After carefully sensing for a moment, Han Shuo¡¯s heart turned cold and frosty light burst from his eyes. His body vanished into the air like a ghost and materialized on the clocktower at the next instance, standing beside Ayermike Cotton.

    ¡°This is the forbidden light magic of mass destruction ¨C ¡®Radiant st¡¯. There was more than one person casting the magic. They intend to kill every single person in the za. Must be people from the Church of Light!¡± Ayermike Cotton said to Han Shuo in a deep tone as soon as Han Shuo arrived next to him.

    ¡°Hmph, so they knocked on my door before I got to knock on theirs¡¯!¡± Han Shuo coldly groaned as murderous thoughts rose in his heart.

 Chapter 615: Blind Faith

    GDK 615: Blind Faith

    ¡°Forget about finding the attackers for the time being. The most crucial thing right now is to protect the pirs of the empire below us.¡± From that murderous face of Han Shuo¡¯s, Ayermike Cotton could tell that he was about to seek those aggressors deploying the forbidden light magic and finish them all.

    However, if Han Shuo were to leave in search of the casters right away, then there would be one less powerful shield to protect those at the za down below. From all the signs he gathered, the forbidden magic ¡®Radiant st¡¯ ought to be jointly deployed by several experts of the Church of Light. Even Ayermike Cotton did not haveplete certainty of protecting every person below on his own.

    ¡°Right. Let¡¯s shield the people below from the power of the Radiant st.¡± Han Shuo snapped out of his fantasy after hearing the reminder. He did not rush to seek and destroy the Church of Light aggressors.

    On this subject, something was really baffling Han Shuo. His consciousness had an extremely expansive coverage area. Logically speaking, under normal circumstances, he should be able to locate at least a trail of those aggressors. He had fully concentrated his attention into tracking the havoc makers as soon as he spotted abnormalities with the element of light above the za. However, most unexpectedly, he couldn¡¯t detect the whereabouts of those aggressors. This situation was obviously rather odd.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter? Why has the sun suddenly be so ring? It¡¯s making me dizzy and ufortable.¡±

    ¡°Yeah, for some reason, I¡¯m absolutely stifled. Could it be that a rainstorm will pour down soon?¡±

    On the za, those clueless nobilities raised their heads and looked all around with their hands shielding their eyes from the sun. Although most of these people of high positions had little to no experience in magic or martial art, nheless, they could sense that something was wrong.

    As for those experts with unordinary achievements in their cultivation, they could faintly sense danger from the abnormality of the elemental energy of light. However, as it was the top-notch experts of the Church of Light who were deploying the ¡®Radiant st¡¯ magic, most of these people couldn¡¯t give a precise exnation for the irregrity they sensed.

    ¡°Something isn¡¯t quite right,¡± Lawrence, the King of Lancelot Empire, although poor in martial arts, was able to sense danger in the stifling atmosphere around him.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know why but for some reason, the element of light has suddenly be very active,¡± Amyes, one of the three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle, cultivated in the elemental energy of light and was a light grand magus. His brows were tightly creased. From the cirction of the element of light he was most familiar with, he perceived a hint of peril.

    ¡°Your Majesty, there could be danger. Shall we evacuate Your Highness from the area?¡± Candide walked to Lawrence and proposed the idea with his body bowed.

    Lawrence raised his head up at the bright sky and hesitated for a short while. His gaze started to scan through the crowd for Han Shuo¡¯s figure. When he turned a full circle and discovered that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t among the dense crowd of people, he came to a decision. His many years of seemingly blind faith in Han Shuo seemed to have an effect at this moment. Lawrence simply put on a smile and replied in an unperturbed voice, ¡°It¡¯s alright. With Bryan here, we shouldn¡¯t be in any danger. The ceremony has yet to formally conclude. As the most important guest, how could I leave in advance?¡±

    Candide was rather astonished to see Lawrence smiling, totally unafraid. But at the same time, Candide inwardly nodded in admiration. He thought that this king of his was indeed out of the ordinary. Prior to the event, Candide had seen Ayermike Cotton and Graeae arrive at the za. He was feeling fairly at ease as he had a rough understanding of the strength the two possessed. Besides, as there was no clear indication as to what was happening, he did not continue with urging Lawrence to leave.

    When Han Shuo rmended Pegasus and Graeae to Candide, he had faintly indicated to him the level of strength that the two possessed. With Han Shuo¡¯s guarantee, he believed that the two ought to be as powerful as he said. Although Candide did not know of Ayermike Cotton¡¯s real identity, he had heard Han Shuo describe that Ayermike Cotton possessed strength a little above that of Graeae and Pegasus. Therefore, he felt rather confident in their safety.

    ¡®Radiant st¡¯ was a forbidden magic that covered a vast area. It utilized the element of light to produce intense radiance that rained down from the sky, vaporizing any living thing in its path.

    Usually, the more destructive the magic, the longer it¡¯d take to deploy. This forbidden magic known as the Radiant st was especially that way. Perhaps the attackers were mindful of how formidable Han Shuo was, as they had intentionally brewed the spell much longer than any ordinary spell. The radiance beaming down from the sky grew more luminous with each passing second. It had gradually grown so intense that the people at the za almost couldn¡¯t open their eyes.

    When every inch of the surface was covered with zing light and the za seemed to be receiving direct sting from the sun, those nobilities who had been rather unperturbed, all revealed looks of nervousness.

    Students of all schools of the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force who came along with their teachers were panicking. They couldn¡¯t help but make a racket.

    ¡°Goodness gracious! These, these seem to be the signs you would see prior to the release of the forbidden light magic, Radiant st!¡± Voignder, the dean of light magic school, had been feeling suspicious from the very start. It was only now that he suddenly recalled some information pertaining to the ¡®Radiant st¡¯ recorded on an ancient scroll he had recently studied. He shrieked.

    A great majority of the crowd was terrified out of their wits by that shriek of Voignder¡¯s. Not all of them were experts with staunch minds who could stare at death in the face. Everyone knew what forbidden magic would mean. Voignder, as the dean of light magic school at Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, would certainly not talk drivel at such a setting. Therefore, most people had utterly lost their heads when they heard those words.

    ¡°Oh my gosh... Oh my gosh... Forbidden magic...¡±

    ¡°So I¡¯m going to die here? Damn it! I shouldn¡¯t havee here. Now I¡¯m so dead!¡±

    ¡°Your Majesty, please evacuate now. This really appears to be the forbidden light magic Radiant st...¡±

    At the za, all kinds of voices of panic and hysteria rang out. Some of the students whocked real-world experiences and some of those cowardly nobilities hollered and squawked. They were terrified to the point of losing their minds.

    However, Lancelot Empire was a nation with an extremely rigid social order. Given that their King Lawrence was present and had not left the ce yet, although some of them were wailing like ghosts and terrified to death, they would only stare at Lawrence impatiently and dared not to make an escape before he did.

    ¡°Your Majesty, given all the signs and changes to the environment, this is likely to be the forbidden magic Radiant st. This forbidden magic has been brewing for such a long time and its power must be exceptionally destructive. Doesn¡¯t Your Majesty think that it¡¯s time to leave and take shelter?¡± Amyes, one of the three heavyweights of the Dark Mantle, walked to Lawrence with a calm and collected face and gave him his advice.

    By now, Lawrence too was feeling somewhat afraid. However, with so many of his ministers watching, Lawrence did not reveal his fear and kept his cool. He asked Amyes, ¡°If this really is the forbidden light magic Radiant st, then, it should have an enormous coverage area. Do you think that we can escape from the st zone in such little time?¡±

    Amyes was stunned. He forced a smile, shook his head, and replied, ¡°If this really is the Radiant st, I have strong doubts we will be able to escape even if we flee right now.¡±

    ¡°Well, nevermind then. Since escaping would be futile anyway, let¡¯s just stand and wait here.¡± Lawrence pretended to be calm and smiled.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. With Bryan here, not a thing will happen to us,¡± Fanny, who had just imed her position as chancellor announced, standing on stage confident and smiling. It was as though she wasn¡¯t worried at all.

    ¡°Yep. If that brat is here, this ce will definitely be safe. You bunch of cowards, what are you all afraid about? Perhaps you will actually get killed if you run away from this area where Bryan could watch over.¡± After witnessing Han Shuo¡¯s might, Firenze now had blind faith in Han Shuo, just as Fanny had. He looked at the cowardly ones disdainfully and ridiculed them.

    After hearing from Lawrence, Fanny, and Firenze, those who intended on making an escape turned hesitant. Then, when they saw the three standing their ground so calmly, after weighing in their minds for a while, they decided to stay behind as well. However, they were still shivering and had no certainty of their fate.

    They gasped, ¡°The sky is turning dark!¡± As those adults considered their choices, a tender cry of surprise rose through the air.

    When the crowd raised their heads and looked, they found the bright sky to be suddenly covered byyers of dark clouds. Those dark clouds looked like they were formed out of squid ink, and had blocked off the gaudy, brilliant radianceing from the sky.

    The view was as though a giant painting of the night sky had been rolled open, turning the sunny afternoon into pitch-ck midnight.

    While this unusual phenomenon urred in the sky, a sinister, eerie aura enveloped the za. Multiple bloody radiancesunched and fused with the dark clouds. They seemed to be altering the properties of theyers of dark clouds, making them even thicker and firmer.

    ¡°Bryan has made a move. Don¡¯t worry, we will be alright.¡± Lawrence was so relieved when he saw the bloody radiances in the sky that he simply had to shout it out.

    Having befriended Han Shuo for many years, Lawrence was long aware that aside from necromancy magic, Han Shuo also cultivated in an extremely mysterious martial art. Lawrence was one of those few who had seen him deploy his demonic arts. Therefore, as soon as Lawrence saw the bloody radiance, he became certain of his conjecture and knew that Han Shuo had taken action in protecting them from the Radiant st.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Bryan has taken action,¡± Candide calmed the crowd. He too let out an obvious sigh of relief.

    Those with deep rtions with Han Shuo and those who had seen Han Shuo strike were all greatly relieved. They blindly believed that Han Shuo could neutralize the threat of the forbidden magic that was targeting them. However, most of the nobilities and students who didn¡¯t know Han Shuo that well were not as confident. They looked all around anxiously and were ready to flee for their lives at any moment.

    Han Shuo, who had been putting on defenses with Ayermike Cotton and Graeae on the clocktower, sensed that the ¡®Radiant st¡¯ spell had ripened. ¡°It¡¯sing! Get ready!¡±

 Chapter 616: Giving Protection

    GDK 616: Giving Protection

    Han Shuo¡¯s shouting had alerted Ayermike Cotton and Graeae. They gathered their attentions to the very peak and braced for the impact of the Radiant st.

    With his consciousness unfolded, Han Shuo had a clear and detailed picture of the Radiant st at every instance. He sensed the elements of light rapidly converging, fissioning, and rbining as he calmly prepared to take the st.

    ¡®Radiant st¡¯ was a forbidden magic that worked by concentrating an enormous amount of the element of light to produce energetic lights that bombarded a vast area. Based on his observation and probing of the ring radiance in the sky, Han Shuo understood that the power of this Radiant st was not to be belittled.

    The canopy of light in the sky above the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force grew bigger and bigger while the element of light continued to bunch. Millions of gaudy light rays suddenly poured downward. They looked like millions of swords made of light that had only one objective ¨C to annihte every living thing underneath it.

    As the Radiant st unleashed its full might, a dignified and holy aura flooded into it, boosting the already formidable power of the forbidden spell.

    Han Shuo¡¯s staunch eyes were sparkling. His heart was as still as stone as he looked up at the Radiant st bombarding downward.

    The Radiant st had enveloped not just the entirety of Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, but also more than half of the northern city district. When the canopy of radiance suddenly came crashing down, it appeared just as though the sun was falling. The scene was extremely frightening.

    The citizens of the northern city district had all halted whatever they were doing at that moment. Every one of them raised their heads to look up at the sky above overwhelmingly aghast. In an instant, an intense feeling of horror flooded their hearts. A chaos of shrieks and cries erupted from every corner.

    The scene was nothing unlike the end of the world. All those people underneath the radiance were petrified as they thought about the miserable deaths they would soon suffer.

    While the inhabitants of Ossen City¡¯s northern district shouted and screamed in horror, they suddenly discovered that lumps of dark clouds had floated over their heads seemingly out of nowhere. The blinding radiance that came smothering downwards was intercepted by theyer of pitch-ck cloud.

    In an instant, the northern district of Ossen City turned from day into night. Following the appearance of the dark clouds, strobes of red light soared through the air and loud screeches echoed. All kinds of spectacr sights decorated the sky.

    Rumbles... A deafening explosion suddenly roared from the sky. It was as though a nuclear bomb had detonated. The extremely loud burst of sound caused ringing in their ears.

    Colorful lights painted the sky with all kinds of strange patterns following the explosion. They formed the most magnificent firework disy.

    Although the dark clouds were thick and clustered, it had nheless missed out a few spots. Several beams of intense light managed to prate through the clouds. Everything irradiated by the powerful light burst apart, and especially so with living things ¨C they were instantly vaporized.

    Tens of innocent civilians were killed and a few hundred structures copsed. Han Shuo was sitting cross-legged on top of a clocktower at the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. With his eyes closed, he formed two hand-seals to manipte the Blood Seether rummaging through the dark clouds. He injected demonic yuan into the Blood Seether for it to produce thick mist of blood. Graeae the banshee then used wind magic to summon hurricanes that would revolve at high speeds, mixing the blood mist with the dark clouds conjured by Ayermike Cotton¡¯s dark magic ¡®Endless Night¡¯. Together, they made up a gigantic boundary in the sky over the northern city district.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t know how many attackers there were. However, he was certain that there was at least one basegod existence among them. Otherwise, they wouldn¡¯t have been able to unleash a Radiant st that had such catastrophic power.

    Han Shuo adjusted his body, heart, and consciousness to their most optimal states as he propelled the Blood Seether to constantly produce blood mist. He strived to mend every opening, preventing any of the Radiant st from casting down on the ground.

    Located near Han Shuo was Ayermike Cotton, who was cloaked within absolute darkness. He rapidly recited incantations with a grave expression. On the rooftop of the library, Graeae the banshee was whinnying at the top of her lungs. Hurricane after hurricane drifted by through the stormy sky.

    ¡°Bryan, I can¡¯t hold it much longer!¡± shouted Ayermike Cotton.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyebrows were in a bunch and his forehead creased. He hurriedly chanted a necromancy spell. Little Skeleton, on his bone dragon, appeared after a sh of light.

    Little Skeleton had a sinister, exotic, icy glint in his eyes. The tombstone on his chest glowed misty green. As soon as Little Skeleton arrived from the Netherworld, a constant stream of wraiths and gargoyles rushed out. They fluttered all about in the whizzing wind and formed the second barrier on the sky.

    As soon as the second took shape, the pressure on Han Shuo, Ayermike Cotton, and Graeae immediately reduced. They no longer needed to exert so much energy on patching every single gap in their barrier.

    The area involved was vast and the three only had limited mental strength and energy, hence the first barrier they formed was not closely sealed and seamless. They simply couldn¡¯t handle the issues that came with a barrier of that magnitude and therefore more and more gaps appeared in it.

    But as soon as Little Skeleton appeared, he used his divine energy to summon a secondyer. This had immediately reduced the pressure on the three as they didn¡¯t need to worry too much about the imperfections in their firstyer of barrier.

    Little Skeleton was Han Shuo¡¯s secret weapon. That secondyer of barrier he formed by using low-level wraiths and gargoyles as sacrificial shields had truly andpletely protected the civilians and aristocrats on the ground, safeguarding them from all effects of the Radiant st.

    The Radiant st which the attackers had taken great pains to deploy had tremendously catastrophic power. However, it was also precisely because the power released was so great that the energy consumed in conjuring the spell was just as astonishing. There was no way that the st couldst for long.

    As expected, it didn¡¯t take long after Little Skeleton summoned wraith and gargoyles and formed the secondyer of barrier that the Radiant st reached its finale. Sporadic bits of radiance sprinkled over before the sky above Ossen City northern district finally returned to normal.

    Seeing that the Radiant st hadpletely exhausted its power, Han Shuo calmly transmitted amand to Little Skeleton and gave Ayermike Cotton an instruction, asking him not to lower his guard yet. Immediately after, sitting on the same ground, he closed his eyes and looked for trails of the attackers with all his power.

    With the threat of the Radiant st neutralized, after receiving themand from Han Shuo, Little Skeleton sent the wraiths and gargoyles back to the Netherworld. He, however, stayed behind and concealed himself in a hidden ce.

    Ayermike Cotton was no longer chanting dark magic spells. With his mental strength rxed and with Graeae¡¯s hurricanes blowing, the dark clouds that shrouded over the crowds¡¯ heads rapidly dissipated.

    A clear sky reappeared above the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force.

    ¡°What actually happened just now? I couldn¡¯t see anything but I could hear densely-packed explosions. I thought that I was dead from being boomed!¡±

    ¡°Huh? That blinding light is gone. The dark clouds have disappeared as well. We are now out of danger, aren¡¯t we?¡±

    ¡°I guess that¡¯s the case. I can¡¯t sense that stifling pressure anymore.¡±

    The crowd discussed spiritedly. Their faces of fright turned into bewilderment. Every one of them curiously looked all around, as though wanting to find the answer to their doubts from the surrounding environment.

    ¡°Jeez, what¡¯s happened to those houses?! They are all in ruins!¡± After the dark clouds dissipated, an archmage of the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force took to the sky using his levitation skills. After scanning thendscape with his eyes, he immediately shouted.

    ¡°That is the scene produced by a Radiant st. Any living thing struck by the intense radiance will be instantly vaporized. It appears that the Radiant st did cast down but 99 percent of its power was intercepted. Otherwise, the condition of the northern city district would certainly be far worse,¡± Amyes respectfully reported back to King Lawrence after he took into the air and surveyed the surroundings.

    ¡°That damned Church of Light, so much for advocatingpassion!¡± Lawrence gnashed his teeth and was fuming with rage.

    On the whole of Profound Continent, only the Church of Light which possessed the mightiest and the most abundant light magi could deploy a Radiant st of such formidable might. On top of that, as the Church of Light hadn¡¯t gotten along well with Lancelot Empire all that time, it was a no brainer that the attackers must be associated with the Church of Light.

    ¡°How shameless and despicable. The Church of Light sure is the biggest evil cult in the world to actually do such a thing so devoid of conscience.¡± Old Hahn too was shivering with rage. Never did he anticipate that the Church of Light would actually be so savage in their conduct to release forbidden magic of mass destruction with such indifference to so manymoner lives in Ossen City.

    This action had vited the tacit agreement between the countries of Profound Continent. This behavior of the Church of Light could not be described with just the word ¡®mad¡¯.

    ¡°Amyes, immediately deploy troops to calm the civilians. Candide, investigate this and find all those who conducted this wicked, conscienceless act!¡± Lawrence could not be more enraged.

    After the event, Firenze let out a light sigh of relief, disdainfully looked at those cowards who were thinking about escaping, and mocked them, ¡°See, told y¡¯all so. It¡¯s safest to stay in this ce. Had you not listened to me and rashly left the academy earlier, you could have turned into a puff of ashes!¡±

    Those people still had fear lingering in their hearts after narrowly escaping death. They forced a smile and kept silent, not replying to Firenze¡¯s mockery.

    Firenze lost interest in those cowards when they did not make any retort. He then nced all around and asked, ¡°Where¡¯s that chap Bryan? It¡¯s all over now. Where did he go?¡±

    Anyone who was aware that Han Shuo had saved their lives started to look high and low for Han Shuo¡¯s figure. However, they couldn¡¯t find him anywhere they searched.

    Faint bloody threads at an unseen hidden spot gradually drifted away. They were heading away from the northern city district.

    Come join GDK¡¯s very own discord server! Invitation link: https://discord.gg/nrCnBnj

 Chapter 617: Unrestrained verbal abuse

    GDK 617: Unrestrained verbal abuse

    ¡®Shrunken Sky Shadow Seeker¡¯ was a demonic art techniquemonly used for detecting unusual objects. When using this special technique, Han Shuo identified that a state of vacuum had taken shape in a region outside of the city. Finding it rather odd, he decided to travel to the area to have a look.

    Under normal circumstances, atmospheric air should fill every corner of every ce and there should not be a naturally-existing region of vacuum on the continent. Therefore, the region of vacuum must have been artificially created.

    Besides, Han Shuo was familiar with the environment around Ossen City and he had never discovered any field of vacuum around the northern city district. Hence, he deduced that the peculiarity in that region was most likely man-made.

    Fanny¡¯s inauguration ceremony as the new chancellor of Babylon Academy of Magic and Force was over. With Ayermike Cotton, Graeae, and Little Skeleton there standing guard, Han Shuo believed that those aristocrats of the empire staying at the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force wouldn¡¯t be in any further danger.

    Without having to worry about those people¡¯s safety, Han Shuo transformed into faint bloody threads that were hardly visible to the naked eye and zoomed off to the fringe of the northern city district.

    The Babylon Academy of Magic and Force and the outer part of the city were a few dozen miles apart. It took Han Shuo only a few minutes to arrive at that vacuum region.

    Han Shuo silently observed the surroundings as soon as he arrived. Right away, he was certain that those whounched that assault on Babylon Academy of Magic and Force were right here.

    Up ahead was a space barrier with concentrated energy that opened up a small-scale force field. That blinding light that glowed from within the barrier had obstructed Han Shuo¡¯s view into what was behind it. A holy aura converged into the shape of a huge grail that filled the inside of the barrier, forming a thinyer of protective film that blocked Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness from probing further.

    Han Shuo squinted his eyes. He could clearly tell that the grail of holy aura was sustained by the Church of Light¡¯s divine weapon ¨C the Holy Grail. On the Holy Grail were several olive branches shining bright gold. It constantly released holy energy that maintained the protective shield in this area.

    The Church of Light¡¯s divine weapon had the ability to amplify light magic. The holy energy contained within could even give out miraculous protective power. The reason that Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness couldn¡¯t detect the presence of those attackers from the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force was likely due to the energy of this holy energy.

    Looking ahead of him at the region of vacuum formed using all kinds of strange energies, the corners of Han Shuo¡¯s lips curled up to make a cold grin. He did not rush in making his attack. Hiding in the dark, Han Shuo believed that those people within the bubble couldn¡¯t detect his trail easily.

    Han Shuo expanded his consciousness and gradually expanded it all around him, carefully searching for any unexpected danger lurking in the surroundings. Simultaneously, he recited a few incantations. Wood elite zombie, metal elite zombie, and earth elite zombie crossed from the Netherworld. At Han Shuo¡¯s indication, they surrounded the region of vacuum in a triangr formation.

    Fire elite zombie and water elite zombie had gained enormous benefits in the Abyss realm. They were still slowly digesting the energies they had acquired from the two former Abyssal demon kings and weren¡¯t able to assist Han Shuo for the time being. Thus, the full power of the Penta-elemental Undead Formation could not be fully deployed. As Han Shuo wasn¡¯t sure what kind of powers those attackers inside the field possessed and his two avatars were still rehabilitating at the Cemetery of Death, he decided to be cautious. He very carefully summoned three of the five operational elite zombies and put the iplete Penta-Elemental Undead Formation into order, just in case he was met with some unexpected situation.

    With everything in order, Han Shuo transmitted amand to Little Skeleton who remained at the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force to quickly teleport over. He then sneered and took out a Pearl of Annihtion, hurling it at the region of vacuum without the slightest hesitation.

    Rumbles... The Pearl of Annihtion suddenly exploded and the space immediately crumbled and became distorted. It tore open several small cracks, through which the Soulpiercers could conveniently enter.

    After casting the Pearl of Annihtion, Han Shuo leered at the region of vacuum ahead with cold eyes, ready to set it aze at any moment.

    A hurried voice slipped through the fissures around the region of vacuum and traveled into Han Shuo¡¯s ears, ¡°Ahem Ahem Ahem, what¡¯s going on? Why has there been an explosion?¡±

    ¡°No idea. Could mixing several different spells have produced an adverse effect?¡± a frosty voice replied.

    A voice then yelled out, ¡°There¡¯s the enemy!¡± The people inside were suddenly thrown into disorder.

    Han Shuo, who could not peer into the condition within the region of vacuum, was able to gain a clear view into the strength those attackers possessed the instant those fissures appeared.

    As all kinds of energy was mixed among the boundary, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t make out the appearances of those attackers. However, by relying on the acute senses of his consciousness, he was able to determine their identities from their auras.

    There were an altogether six attackers. Among them, three had the holy aura characteristic to the disciples of Church of Light; two had bodies and auras as cold as ice, probably Shrine of Ice experts who weren¡¯t at the snond thest time; and thest one had a body filled with chaotic and explosive energy. His soul was as strange as that of a shaman. It appeared that after several hundred thousand orcs of the Empire of Orcs perished, some true experts decided to participate.

    Of the three Church of Light disciples, two were demigods, and one of them, astonishingly, was a basegod. The two Shrine of Ice experts were merely sacred-grade magi. The two were the weakest of the team. It appeared that after losing the demigod duo of Ice Celestial Corey and Snow Celestial Tiana, the Shrine of Ice was indeedpletely done for.

    As for that orc shaman, since his cultivation could be considered non-mainstream energy of summoning, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t precisely determine his level of strength, although he did felt the orc shaman was mightier than a demigod and was a small distance away from the realm of basegod.

    Six people. One basegod, three demigods, and two sacred magi that presented no threat. This band didn¡¯t appear that formidable in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes given his current level of strength.

    Therefore, Han Shuo did not continue to conceal himself but stood out in the open. He coldly gazed at the region ahead of him and waited for the six to emerge from it.

    Even alone with just his main body, Han Shuo believed that he would have no trouble in taking care of these six. Besides, Little Skeleton, a lowgod of death, would soon be by his side.

    ¡°Reveal yourselves!¡± Han Shuo coldly groaned.

    Those within the boundary of vacuum immediately turned quiet, causing Han Shuo tough grimly in his heart. He could even feel the fear of the two sacred magi from the Shrine of Ice.

    With Han Shuo attentively watching, the barrier ahead of him was finally withdrawn. Bundles of holy energy returned to the center of the Holy Grail. The space barrier gradually lost the source of power that maintained it.

    When thest bundle of golden light returned to the Holy Grail, the space ahead of him shattered like ss and the original scene reappeared.

    A thin, middle-aged man grasping a Holy Grail that had olive branches on it, and wearing the papal tiara, looked at Han Shuo in a grieving and pained manner. Standing beside him were a demigod knight and a demigod light magus. They were precisely the duo that Han Shuo had met at the Church of Light¡¯s sacred mountain ¨C the two who instigated the Primordius Dragon to cast Han Shuo to the Abyss realm back at the Dragon Valley.

    The old orc with crude animal skin draped over his shoulders was staring at Han Shuo with hostility. He seemed to be itching to pounce on Han Shuo and gnaw his flesh off.

    Thest two sacred magi from the Shrine of Ice were also eyeballing Han Shuo hatefully. However, their eyes were flickering. Their fear towards Han Shuo, however, appeared greater than their resolution to avenge.

    ¡°You must be Bryan?¡± asked the thin middle-aged man wearing the papal tiara amiably.

    Han Shuo smiled and even performed a friendly bow at him before replying, ¡°Indeed, I am, Your Holiness the Pope! Hehe, you must be very disappointed to see me standing here?¡± He snickered.

    Han Shuo was in fact quite amazed when he said those words. He did not expect the Pope of the Church of Light to go through the trouble of personally traveling thousands of miles from Oden Empire to Lancelot Empire for himself and, even more surprisingly, chosen to mount a sneak attack. It seemed that this Pope of the Church of Light was definitely a madman who would do anything, by hook or by crook, to achieve his goals. It was no mystery how he climbed his way up to be the leader of the most powerful religion on the Profound Continent.

    The Pope of the Church of Light nodded and calmly admitted, ¡°I¡¯m indeed very disappointed to see you stand before me safe and sound ¨C but what grieves me even more is the dark ages that will soon befall Profound Continent.¡±

    ¡°Oh? From your words, you are suggesting that I¡¯m the root cause of devastating disorder to Profound Continent. Haha. Well then, are the hundreds of thousands of civilian lives in the northern city district not worthy of your consideration?¡± Han Shuoughed at the Light Pope¡¯s shameless interpretation.

    ¡°For the safety of everyone on Profound Continent, some sacrifices are necessary!¡± the Light Pope yelled in a righteous voice as he looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°You and your inbred whore of a mother can go fuck each other till you bleed!¡± Han Shuo cursed without restraint as he fed his middle finger right at the Light Pope¡¯s face. He knew that this Pope had to be the most zealous disciple of the Church of Light. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t sense much emotions that a normal human should have from this person. He was just like a robot manufactured by the Church of Light. All his conducts and moralpass were based on the interests of the Church of Light. Therefore, it was an absolute waste of time to debate with him.

    ¡°I will make you pay for the lives of the hundreds of thousands of my fellow orcs!¡± That orc shaman couldn¡¯t hold himself and violently shouted when he saw Han Shuo being so provocative. From his posture, he looked like he would charge ahead at any moment.

    Of course, Han Shuo had no fear towards him. He sneered while sizing up the orc shaman and ridiculed, ¡°So your orcs are people, but the citizens of my Lancelot Empire aren¡¯t people? For ages, your orcs have been assaulting my Lancelot Empire without end. Tell me, who should pay for the deaths of the countless citizens of Lancelot Empire?¡±

    The territories of the orcs were barren and therefore they had always attacked Lancelot Empire for its rich soil. Through all those countless years, citizens of Lancelot Empire who had died at the hands of orc warriors must have amounted to at least a few hundred thousand men!

    ¡°I don¡¯t care! You have killed hundreds of thousands of my people, so you must die!¡± the orc shaman bellowed like a wild beast and right after, he threw himself at Han Shuo.

 Chapter 618: Worse than death

    GDK 618: Worse than death

    As soon as the old shaman charged forward, the berserk energy contained in his body red up, enhancing his power and speed, and allowing him to arrive before Han Shuo in a split second. His calloused, palm leaf-sized hand bolted out along with it, aiming at Han Shuo¡¯s neck.

    The old shaman did not summon mighty beasts as he routinely would, nor did he utilize special shamanic techniques. Rather, he simply activated the explosive energy stored within his body and suddenlyunched melee attacks. Han Shuo had not foreseen this.

    The three experts of the Church of Light, the Light Pope and two demigod experts, appeared to be waiting for the old shaman to strike first. Splendid radiance shone from the trio¡¯s eyes when the old shaman suddenly rushed towards Han Shuo and they followed suit.

    The divine knight was just one step behind the old shaman and was charging at Han Shuo from an angle. After a sh of light, out of nowhere, a pike glistening with holy radiances appeared in his grasp. The pike was around three and a half meters long and gave off golden rays. It contained a terrifying amount of holy energy.

    Meanwhile, the Light Pope and that light divine magus lowered their heads at the same time and mumbled some cryptic incantations. The Pope was sping the Holy Grail and the olive branches. The papal tiara that he wore on his head also contained an astonishing amount of divine energy. Amazingly, by relying on the Holy Grail and olive branches in his hands and the Light Papal Tiara on his head, more and more energy umted inside his body. The element of light continuously converged on those three divine weapons and they steadily flowed into his body, raising the energy in his body.

    The light divine magus held on tightly to a cross and kept it close to his chest. Golden rays shone from the cross and a pair of wings made of light suddenly grew from his back. The pair of glowing wings coupled with him hovering in mid-air made him look as though he was a non-mortal. It seemed that the cross this demigod light magus was holding so dearly must be another divine weapon of the Church of Light. The church had really utilized plenty of their assets on this operation.

    As for thest two attackers, the two sacred magi, due to their overwhelming fear of Han Shuo, they couldn¡¯t seem to react when the rest of their teammates attacked. They foolishly stared ahead and forgot to act in tandem with their Church of Light and orc teammates. It appeared that Han Shuo¡¯s conduct at the Shrine of Ice headquarters had struck fear deep into their hearts, causing them to hesitate to strike in this situation.

    Although all this had taken ce in just a fraction of a second, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was so utilitarian that it could peer all around and give Han Shuo a clear and detailed picture of everyone¡¯s actions.

    Han Shuo looked calmly at that old shaman¡¯s big hand covered with calluses. He squinted his eyes slightly as ruthless, murderous and ominous glints glittered from them. He remained still and stood tall on the same ground like a deeply rooted tree.

    As Han Shuo did not move a muscle, naturally, that old shaman managed to grab Han Shuo¡¯s neck. The old shaman¡¯s fierce hand that shacked Han Shuo¡¯s neck had visible veins popping out of it that looked akin to small slithering snakes. His eyes filled with rancor suddenly had a trace of pleasant surprise. He had never expected that his attack woulde off so easily.

    Creak... The moment that the old shaman¡¯s big hand buckled Han Shuo¡¯s neck, he strained every muscle in his hand and squeezed. The berserk energy in his body erupted like a bomb. Immediately after he had exerted all his strength in tightening his grip, a clear and crisp noise sounded.

    He was surprised yet again, and in the best way possible. At this moment, the old shaman thought that Han Shuo in reality was absolutely far from being as formidable as was told in hearsay. With the resentment from the deaths of his several hundred thousand orc brothers in mind, the old shaman¡¯s hand clenched tighter and tighter. It seemed as though Han Shuo¡¯s neck would snap cleanly into two at any moment.

    Whoosh... The noise of the divine knight dashing at him suddenly passed through Han Shuo¡¯s ears. That pike giving off glorious golden radiance was like a venomous viper as it suddenly appeared beside Han Shuo, piercing at his waist.

    The divine knight was greatly relieved when he saw the old shaman tightly strangling Han Shuo and was therefore unreserved and upfront in his attack, giving no thought for an escape route. He assumed that because Han Shuo couldn¡¯t budge a muscle, it was a matter of course that the battle would be over in no time.

    So it turns out that this fe isn¡¯t as valiant as they say after all. It seems that the destruction of the Shrine of Ice must have happened because their disciples were just too weak, the divine knight thought as he ferociously thrusted his pike.

    Chak! The distinctive sound of the pike piercing through intestines fell into the divine knight¡¯s ears. That wonderful noise made the corners of his lips curl to reveal a contented smile. His heart was filled with satisfaction and delight. However, that feeling of joy did notst for long. The loud shriek of pain that followed had interrupted his little happy moment.

    ¡°Ow! O... It¡¯s... It¡¯s me you stabbed!¡± the old shaman was exasperated as he cried out in pain.

    The divine knight was startled and he immediately wiped that satisfied smile cleanly off his face. He looked at the old shaman who was pierced by his pike, puzzled and crammed with disbelief. He had absolutely no clue how that strike clearly aimed at Han Shuo would ultimatelynd on the old shaman.

    Creak... Creak... As that old shaman miserably shrieked in pain, he continued to apply excessive grip on Han Shuo¡¯s neck.

    Strangely enough, even through the powerful squeezing and constraining, Han Shuo, who should have been dead by now from having his neck snapped, still had a pair of calm and cold eyes. There was even the slight hint of a sneer on his face. It was as though he did not feel one bit of pain; as though the neck being constricted by the old shaman wasn¡¯t even his.

    The divine knight was astounded and decided to withdraw. But right at that moment, a monstrous hand suddenly prated the old shaman¡¯s right lung and whooshed at his chest as blood squirted everywhere. That holy armor glistening with golden rays which even his own pike could not puncture appeared to be as fragile as a thin sheet of paper before the big bloody hand. The armor did not put up the slightest bit of resistance before it was prated by the hand. The hand then entered his right chest and came out the other side. A palm was revealed on his back.

    It was only now that the divine knight slowly turned his head and looked. He discovered that Han Shuo¡¯s arm had pierced through the old shaman¡¯s chest before getting to his.

    At this moment, the divine knight was even more appalled to discover that the old shaman¡¯s hand extended straight out was still sping onto Han Shuo¡¯s neck. There was at least an arm¡¯s length of distance between Han Shuo and the old shaman. The distance between the divine knight and the old shaman was at least two meters. To add to the depth of the shaman¡¯s body, he was at least four meters away from Han Shuo.

    Given how long that arm which ran through his and the old shaman¡¯s body had to be, he really wondered if Han Shuo was human.

    The divine knight suddenly felt his blood run cold. His scalp tingled as he looked at that arm connecting him and the old shaman. Immense fear rose in his heart. He had long cast his contemptuous view of Han Shuo¡¯s strength far, far away. Ignoring the sharp pain surging through his chest, he pointed at Han Shuo and shouted, ¡°What, what monster are you?¡±

    Han Shuo cracked a cold grin and replied, ¡°You can find out about that from your Light God soon!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, that long arm that pierced through the two demigods suddenly hacked downwards. The arm seemed to have turned into a de at this moment and sliced through their organs like a hot knife cutting through butter. Their bodies were torn from chest down. A mixture of blood and organs sttered on the ground.

    But Han Shuo wasn¡¯t done yet. He proceeded with chopping his arm upwards and turned the demi-gods into demi-bodies. Two lively demigods had turned into four very dead half-bodies in no time. The scene was extremely gory and cruel. The reeking of blood started to spread. The battle on Han Shuo¡¯s side was over before the Light Pope and the divine magus hadpleted their cryptic incantations. The two revealed expressions of unwillingness to witness the bloody deaths of their partners.

    The swell of confidence that the two sacred magi of the Shrine of Ice gained shortly after the battle began had nowpletely crumbled. They were struck by an even more immense fear in an instant. They were now heavily panting. Their willpower hadpletely copsed, no longer daring to even have any thoughts of seeking revenge.

    ¡°Oh? You hope to flee with your soul? Hmm, that¡¯s a good idea, but my sincerest apologies, I¡¯m afraid that won¡¯t be possible!¡± After Han Shuo split the two bodies into four, when he was about to turn his attention to deal with the remaining two from the Church of Light, his consciousness suddenly detected that the old shaman¡¯s soul did not dissipate between the heaven and earth but was drifting away with the wind.

    More often than not, those with mighty souls while alive, could be reborn by relying on a medium using special techniques, just as long as their souls were not scattered in death. That Church of Light¡¯s divine knight must have been poor in the cultivation of his soul and therefore it had gradually scattered between heaven and earth after his physical body was destroyed. He definitely had no hope for a second life.

    Seeing the old shaman¡¯s soul drift further and further with the wind, Han Shuo gave a snort and flicked a finger. A dark radiance shot right at the old shaman¡¯s soul and was pulled right back to Han Shuo. It was then confined within the ring, which had previously sheltered Gilbert¡¯s soul.

    For the old shaman¡¯s soul to not dissipate after death meant that his soul energy was rather decent. It was most suitable for Han Shuo to refine some demonic weapons that required mighty souls as primers. Of course Han Shuo would capture it.

    After the old shaman¡¯s soul fell into the Soul Depository Ring, through the wonderful effect of the ring, Han Shuo heard the old shaman¡¯s soul bellow in irreconciliation, ¡°Let go of me! I will kill you! You despicable thing!¡±

    ¡°What a poor soul. How are you going to kill me when you are already dead? Hehe, after some time, I will use your soul to refine tools. At that time, you will be without one bit of awareness and your soul will be under my control ¨C forever. That will be simply delightful, don¡¯t you think?¡± Han Shuo gave a loud and sinister snort. His consciousness entered the ring and transmitted a malicious message, making the old shaman irascible and furious, yet he was powerless to do anything.

    The old shaman, with his soul trapped inside the ring, could do nothing to alter his tragic fate. This was unquestionably worse than death.

 Chapter 619: The voice inside the Holy Grail

    GDK 619: The voice inside the Holy Grail

    After he got rid of the divine knight and old shaman, Han Shuo turned his gaze onto the Light Pope and the divine magus. As to those sacred magi from the Shrine of Ice, they were just too weak to be regarded at all by Han Shuo.

    Their meager strengths was only one of the factors. But what more crucial was that they were frightened of him. There was basically no will left in them to put up a fight. Even their thoughts of exacting revenge were crumbled. Without that, Han Shuo refused to even consider them a threat even if their powers were on par with Han Shuo¡¯s.

    From the moment the divine knight and old shaman began to storm towards Han Shuo, the Light Pope and divine magus had never stopped monotonously reciting their incantations. It was only when Han Shuo skewered the divine knight and old shaman with his hand that the duo raised their heads and took a grieving nce at their partners.

    However, a nce was all they gave.

    The Light Pope and the divine magus lowered their heads again right after, carrying on with their chanting. The spell was long, verbose, and abstruse. Their tones were heavy and stifling, as though brewing some spell of extremely destructive firepower.

    Once the divine knight and old shaman were dead, Han Shuo turned his cold eyes to the Light Pope and the divine magus. He discovered that the two had carried on with their incantations as though nothing had happened. It was as though they didn¡¯t realize that Han Shuo was eyeing them like a ravening tiger and could kill them at any moment.

    This kind of intense concentration gave Han Shuo a feeling of unease, as though something wasn¡¯t quite right. The arrival of this feeling was sudden and baffling. Therefore, Han Shuo did not recklessly charge ahead but became much more prudent.

    The Light Pope and the divine magus could remain calm andposed in the face of death. However, the same could not be said about the two Shrine of Ice sacred magi that came with them.

    Although Han Shuo¡¯s cold, fierce eyes cared not to even linger on the two, because of their immense fear of Han Shuo, they felt as though Han Shuo¡¯s target was themselves. After their Shrine of Ice was destroyed, the two had aspired to avenge their shrine. They had transformed their wishes into acts in this operation. But when they finally stood before the fearsome Han Shuo, seeing how he had callously, cruelly, and simply finished the divine knight and old shaman, the fear that they had tried so hard to repress broke loose from the depths of their hearts and shattered them to bits in the process. Their not-so-staunch determination to avenge had been demolished.

    ¡°Ahhh!!! ¡° The terror in their hearts grew ever more unbearable. They finally broke down and bawled hysterically.

    The two sacred magi had lost their minds and taken nuts and bolts to be the next best alternative. A series of water magic was sent shelling and wheezing at Han Shuo. Broadswords glistening with the cold radiance of ice ferociously shot towards Han Shuo.

    The two sacred magi had simultaneously gone mad and were now retreating instead of charging ahead. Their faces were thered with aplex mixture of fear and resentment.

    ¡°Ha.¡± Han Shuo knew that these sacred magi of the Shrine of Ice had too much fear in their hearts. With their minds melded with so many chaotic emotions, they could simply pose no threat.

    However, as they had taken part in the assault on the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, in addition to being top-notch experts of the Shrine of Ice, there was no way that Han Shuo would let them walk away alive.

    Under the sky of hail, Han Shuo suddenly vanished. But the next moment, out of thin air, he appeared at the only evacuation path the sacred magi had.

    The Demonic des suddenly blossomed from his two hands like two enormous, enchanted flower buds blossoming from his hands. With a flick of his wrists, the clean and cold flower buds were stained with fresh red blood.

    The flower buds burst out from the backs of the two sacred magi, leaving two grisly openings constantly gushing with blood.

    After two quick stifled groans, the two sacred magi whose minds was overtaken by fear were cleanly ended. They copsed and beautifully dyed the ground red.

    Han Shuo withdrew his fingernails and casually flung away the blood dripping off his hands.

    Of the six attackers, four were finished off by Han Shuo. He turned to look at the two remaining experts and said unhurriedly, ¡°Hey, enough with the tricks already.¡±

    Han Shuo did not expect that these two experts from the Shrine of Ice would be indifferent to Han Shuo¡¯s words. They kept silent and still as though having fallen into a meditative state.

    An uneasy feeling surged through Han Shuo¡¯s heart. When he looked at the two from behind, for some reason, he felt rather apprehensive and fidgety. Even since attaining Nine Changes realm in demonic arts, Han Shuo had rarely ever felt his mind in disorder during a battle. He became even more cautious towards the duo.

    He carefully scanned the duo for a while and coldly groaned. He then took a few steps back, revealed a gloomy and sinister smile, withdrew a Pearl of Annihtion, and flicked his index finger. The Pearl of Annihtion was sent flying at the duo.

    When the Pearl of Annihtion was about to reach the two and explode, strangely, the space right ahead of them undted with ripples, like the surface of still water disrupted by the falling of a small rock. The Pearl of Annihtion disappeared in an instant before it could explode. It looked as though it had sunken to the depths of the sea.

    Then, yet another peculiar distortion and wrapping of space urred in the region. Under Han Shuo¡¯s attentive observation, this contortion of space onlysted for a brief moment before the space returned to normal.

    Because of the connection he had with the Pearl of Annihtion, Han Shuo clearly sensed that the contortion of space in that region was caused by the explosion of the Pearl. He also discovered that they were a vast distance apart from where the Pearl exploded.

    In other words, the Pearl of Annihtion had somehow been pulled into a spacetime fissure and exploded in some other unknown dimension.

    After thinking it through, Han Shuo quickly came to recognize the situation. He was jolted but also d of his prudent decision earlier not to rashly stampede at the two. Otherwise, he would likely have been pulled into that bizarre spacetime fissure, and very possibly be trapped in there for eternity.

    How did they know about the abstruse edict of space? Han Shuo was absolutely puzzled as he stared at the Pope and the divine knight.

    To use the edict of space, tearing space apart and forming fissures, drawing the enemy¡¯s attacks or even the enemy itself into the spacetime fissure that was without any elemental energy, this was something that could only be done by a god cultivating in the edict of space.

    The Light Pope and that divine magus should have both been cultivating the elemental energy of light. Logically speaking, they shouldn¡¯t be able to produce such a miraculous andplex spacetime fissure. However, Han Shuo had seen it happen right before his very eyes; there indeed was a sphere of spacetime fissure. If he were to heedlessly charge ahead, he could very possibly fall into a trap formed using some advanced edictalw of space where no elemental energy could be found.

    Therefore, without first getting a clear understanding of the situation, Han Shuo truly dared not to charge in. Of the eight elemental energies and four edictal forces, the most mysterious were the edict of space and the edict of fate. There was the least number of gods that cultivated in these two energies and it was rare to find experts aplished in the cultivation of those energies. An average person would be wary when dealing with these two edictal energies, so was Han Shuo.

    Completely baffled, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but take a few steps backward. He silently observed the Light Pope and divine magus before him and expanded his consciousness. He spent all his attention on probing every inch of space around the duo and attempted to learn the secret to them forming the space edict trap around themselves.

    There was nothing abnormal with the Pope. The elemental energy of light mixed with holy energy in his body flowed to the Holy Grail and olive branches in his hand. The Light Papal Tiara on his head was linked to his vast mental strength. All of the energy belonged to the elemental energy of light. Nothing questionable there.

    Simrly, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t detect any traces of the edictal force of space on that divine light magus tightly sping the cross. Moreover, he had a weaker strength. There was no way that he could have formed the space edict trap around them.

    What is actually going on? Han Shuo was at a loss. His heart that was as calm as still water now had a small ripple propagating through it.

    Han Shuo¡¯s brows were locked in ce. He had yet to give up on figuring out the abnormality happening right before his eyes. His consciousness turned from centralized to distributed, turning into tiny threads hardly visible to the naked eye and wrapping around the Light Pope and the divine magus. The consciousness was a most mysterious energy. It was immaterial, incorporeal, and intangible. Han Shuo first tried to probe by slowly sending out one single strand of his consciousness towards the Light Pope.

    He suddenly perceived a wonderful sensation.

    A deste ck hole suddenly leaped into the perception of that strand of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. That ck hole was shooting out strange colorful lights. It was warping and throbbing, giving off a chaotic edictal energy of space.

    Han Shuo was aware that that was a fissure torn in the spacetime. After carefully sensing through that strand of consciousness, he discovered that the strand of consciousness was indeed not affected by the spacetime fissure. It was not subjected to any attraction or distortion from any forces.

    Han Shuo inwardly praised the wonders of demonic arts and his heart was greatly relieved. With the majority of his consciousness remaining behind in this mind, he sent that single strand of consciousness slowly forward. He carefully avoided the spacetime fissures in his path and made his way to the Light Pope bit by bit. Although the Pope was standing right before him, the path felt long and endless.

    Han Shuo put his full andplete attention on the task. He could not distract himself by the slightest bit. His strand of consciousness was like a slippery mudfish that gracefully waded through obstacles in a swamp. He was very patient in approaching the Light Pope.

    Gradually, with Han Shuo¡¯s careful navigation, the iparable consciousness managed to avoid and slip through those spacetime fissures and arrived in the cramped space where the Light Pope and divine magus were standing.

    Han Shuo¡¯s head was drenched in cold sweat. He repressed the great joy in his heart and tirelessly wandered about on the Light Pope¡¯s body using that tiny strand of consciousness. He meticulously examined every inch of his body.

    When that single strand of his consciousness arrived at the mouth of the Holy Grail and was about to enter it for further probing, he suddenly heard a voiceing from inside the Holy Grail, ¡°Who are you?¡±

 Chapter 620: Interplanar Traveler

    GDK 620: Internar Traveler

    Who are you?

    These three simple words had given Han Shuo a good fright. Never did he expect that the Holy Grail in the hand of the Pope could actually talk.

    ¡°Who are you?¡± after recovering from the startle, Han Shuo immediately transmitted a message. It was the very same question that the Holy Grail had asked him.

    ¡°You are not the master of the Grail. I can tell. In that case, are you a friend or a foe to the Grail¡¯s master?¡± the awareness inside the soul kept silent for a short moment before replying with a question instead of divulging its identity.

    ¡°A foe!¡± Han Shuo hesitated for a moment and replied sinctly.

    Han Shuo had no reason to lie. No matter who was inside the Holy Grail, no matter how mighty it was, Han Shuo had full certainty of escaping unscathed. Since that awareness was inside the Holy Grail, it was most likely being imprisoned in there using special methods. Hence, Han Shuo was frank in his response.

    ¡°Very good!¡± shouted that awareness inside the Holy Grail bluntly. Then, as Han Shuo carefully listened, he hurriedly informed, ¡°Just as you have expected, I¡¯m imprisoned inside this Holy Grail. Although it wasn¡¯t the current master of the Grail that put me in here, he could activate some of my ability using the unique seal of this Grail. The spacetime fissures currently deployed around him were released using my energy. Right, since you are not the master of the Holy Grail, then I must let you know that the master of the Grail is still borrowing my energy. In approximately two minutes, time in this region will be suspended. If you remain, you will not be able to budge and the master of the Grail can capture or kill you as he wishes. There will be no possibility of escaping.¡±

    Han Shuo was shocked. He knew that gods who cultivated in the edict of space indeed had the miraculous ability to suspend time momentarily. The mightier their divine energy, the vaster the range and the longer the duration.

    During a duel, especially in a battle between gods, in many cases, one second of negligence could mean the conclusion of the battle. A god with this ability could easily escape from attacks inches away by freezing time and then maiming or ughtering their enemy before their enemy even knew what happened. This was indeed terrifying.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart sank when he heard those words from the person inside the Holy Grail. From his hurried manner of speaking, Han Shuo could tell that the person definitely wasn¡¯t joking. He immediately asked, ¡°How far does the effect reach?¡±

    ¡°A fifty kilometer radius.¡±

    Han Shuo let out a sigh of relief. ¡°If you have a way of undoing it then hurry and tell me. Otherwise I will leave this ce momentarily.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know how your soul could pass through the space barrier, but since your soul coulde in here, you should be able to see the spacetime fissures all around. You¡¯ll need to strike the hardest you can at one specific point of vulnerability on the fissure; the spacetime barrier will break and you can walk to the master of the Grail without any obstruction. I¡¯ll walk you through it. Given that the master has utilized the Grail to deal with you, he is surely not your opponent without the power of the Grail. This means that if you could enter here, he will be a sitting duck.¡±

    Han Shuo kept silent for a while and suddenly transmitted, ¡°Why should I trust you?¡±

    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter if you trust me or not. If you are not here when the time is frozen, the master of the Grail will use my energy to conduct a short distance hyperspace-jump and make an easy retreat.¡±

    Another short while had passed unwittingly as the two conversed. Han Shuo quickly weighed his options. He knew that he had toe to a decision immediately to escape or to attempt to break the space barrier. Otherwise, when the time ran out, he would be frozen there and easily be finished off by the Light Pope.

    Han Shuo hesitated for a very short while before making up his mind. ¡°Fine, point me to the location of that spacetime fissure!¡±

    ¡°That fissure you need to find has rare, trademark jade-green stripes. They revolve around in a circle. Strike a blow at the center of the circle and the space barrier will be wide open for you!¡± The voice was urgent.

    Having made up his mind, Han Shuo did not hesitate one bit. Immediately, he let out another strand of his consciousness and started to move about the spacetime fissures as instructed.

    The consciousness was incorporeal but very real. Following the instructions of the voice inside the Holy Grail, Han Shuo did not waste a single second before he found that spacetime fissure.

    Right ahead of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was a dark hole emanating beautiful, bright, multi-colored light. The gentle and soft rays looked no different from the revolving, vast ocean of stars. It was enigmatic.

    On an inconspicuous spot of the crack, streamer-like jade-green stripes revolved in a circr arc.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness paused there for a short moment. After verifying that it was indeed what he was looking for, with his main body standing still and tall, the consciousness in his mind suddenly unfolded. It turned into a point of energy that shot straight at the center of the circle orbited by those jade-green stripes.

    Rrrip! A very faint and strange noise from that spot shattered the silence. The destruction of the fulcrum spread through the entire space barrier. A fierce undtion of ripples traveled across the barrier formed using the edict of space that was covering the Light Pope and divine magus.

    In an instant, all the consciousness that Han Shuo had let out returned to his body.

    Han Shuo did not show the slightest hesitation when he detected that the space edict barrier had vanished. He fiercely shot towards the Light Pope and whacked him with a cloud of cial spellfire in his palm. The Light Pope immediately turned stiff. His body was frozen still in running position but he couldn¡¯t make a budge.

    The divine light magus, cross still in hand, just like the divine knight, was an enemy that Han Shuo had been keen to get rid of. After restraining the Light Pope, Han Shuo¡¯s big hand gave a light swat at the demigod magus.

    Unlike the Light Pope who had quickly detected that something was amiss, the demigod magus was still chanting as usual. He had absolutely no idea that Han Shuo¡¯s fatal strike was about tond on him.

    St! The skull of this demigod magus was smashed like a watermelon catapulted against a brick wall. Brain mush and running blood sttered everywhere before his body softly copsed, maintaining the same posture.

    Unlike that divine knight, this divine light magus had achieved some level of attainment in the cultivation of the soul. After his skull burst apart, just like the old shaman, his soul did not dissipate but tried to struggle free at all costs.

    Han Shuo had always been very fond of fes whose souls didn¡¯t crumble after their physical bodies were dead. This kind of mighty soul was very useful to him. Not only could he refine some demonic weapons with them, but he could also turn them into puppets with wonderful uses, for example, a mystical demon.

    There were four levels of demon generals, ranked as follow from the weakest to the strongest ¨C original demon, yin demon, mystical demon, and spirit demon. After the deaths of Han Shuo¡¯s twelve mystical demons, Han Shuo did not refine any new demon general because he wanted to refine the demon general of the highest grade ¨C spirit demon. However, as this grade of demon general possessed an infinite potential to evolve, it had very demanding refining prerequisites.

    The most basic ingredient required was a mighty soul. It was impossible to refine a spirit demon even with tens of millions of low-level wraiths. A so-called ¡®mighty soul¡¯ was a soul that didn¡¯t disintegrate following the death of their physical body.

    Han Shuo was delighted to collect that old shaman¡¯s soul to begin with. Unexpectedly learning that this demigod magus also boasted a mighty soul had further added to his delightment. He smiled sinisterly and flicked a finger. A dark radiance shot out from his fingertip and firmly secured itself to this demigod magus¡¯ soul before pulling it into his Soul Depository Ring.

    ¡°You want to escape? Sorry, but I won¡¯t let that happen easily!¡± Han Shuo chuckled heartily and put away his ring. He was in a very good mood.

    After sorting him out, all that was left was the Light Pope in front of him restrained by the Mystical cial Spellfire. Han Shuo nced at the Pope whose brows and hair were covered with frost and unhesitantly snatched that Holy Grail from his hands.

    With one pulsation of his consciousness, Han Shuo regained contact with that awareness inside the Holy Grail. He transmitted, ¡°With your help, I have now taken down the master of the Grail. Although I don¡¯t know who you are or where you¡¯re from, in any case, you have been a great help. I say we try to treat each other with sincerity. Who knows what unexpected rewards we could find ourselves gaining from each other. What say you?¡±

    Just by utilizing the power inside the Holy Grail, the Light Pope had formed spacetime fissures around him and was about to suspend time temporarily. From these clues, Han Shuo inferred that the awareness inside the Holy Grail had to be very mighty. Although he had assisted Han Shuo, until he fully grasped the situation, there was no way that Han Shuo would just let him out. In the event that this person harbored malicious intentions, Han Shuo had no certainty of escaping his attacks if he were to be freed.

    ¡°Where is this ce?¡± the awareness inside the Holy Grail did not answer Han Shuo¡¯s question but took the initiative to ask about the current situation.

    ¡°Ossen City of Lancelot Empire,¡± Han Shuo was startled for a moment before he answered.

    That person inside the Holy Grail kept silent for a moment before asking in a bewildered voice, ¡°I¡¯m asking what material ne this ce is on.¡±

    ¡°Profound Continent!¡± Han Shuo gave a clear-cut answer.

    ¡°Never heard of it!¡± the voice replied sinctly. After that, they both went silent.

    After rapidly turning about in his mind, Han Shuo tried asking, ¡°Where do youe from?¡±

    ¡°People who cultivate in the edictal force of space are usually without a fixed residence. We are usually internar travelers.¡±

    Han Shuo was speechless. After yet another round of silence, he helplessly asked, ¡°Well then, how did you get imprisoned inside the Holy Grail?¡±

    ¡°I was sealed here by the Gy¨¢l, one of the three Keepers of the Light.¡±

    ¡°Keepers of the Light? Guards directly under the Light God?¡± Han Shuo was shocked.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Gy¨¢l is one of the Keepers of the Light, the mightiest subordinates of the Light God. He possesses the strength ofte-stage highgod!¡± the awareness inside the voice replied fiercely. It appeared that he carried an immense grudge towards this Gy¨¢l.

 Chapter 621 advertisemen

    Ate-stage highgod! Han Shuo was greatly rmed. After his two avatars had cultivated to be lowgods, he finally recognized just how mighty a god really was. Ate-stage highgod expert was to the present-day Han Shuo simply unimaginably powerful.

    Han Shuo knew none of his avatars could handle a duel against a mid-stage lowgod alone. Only with all three soulsbined did Han Shuo have the confidence to attain victory.

    Highgods were genuinely terrifying existences, and even more so werete-stage highgods. They were the mightiest beings below the Overgods and were practically invincible.

    If Gy¨¢l was ate-stage highgod, then this soul that he had personally set about to seal in this Holy Grail couldn¡¯t be much lower in strength.

    As Han Shuo thought about it, he became even more wary about helping this person to free this soul. If by any chance this person was an ingrate and coveted for the power of faith of Profound Continent, Han Shuo would have no way of even defending it and could only look on helplessly as what was his was upied and taken away.

    ¡°Why did he stow you away you?¡± Han Shuo carefully asked. His heart was apprehensive.

    ¡°During the great battle between gods, I, as a cultivator of the edict of space, helped an old friend and opened up an internar tunnel that connected two battlefields together, which ultimately resulted in Gy¨¢l¡¯s forces losing the battle. After the event, Gy¨¢l learned of my involvement and he despicably mounted a sneak attack on me, separating my divine soul from my divine body. He cast my soul into this Holy Grail. But I have no idea where my divine body is kept.¡± His words were increasingly sparse and his voice breathy.

    Han Shuo had no idea if he was telling the truth or just lying. He maintained scruples about this being and kept silent as he digested his words.

    ¡°Your divine soul and divine body are separated. How is it that you can still deploy the edictal force of space?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s eyebrows were raised and his forehead creased.

    As this cultivator of the edict of space of unknown origins possessed the ability to pause time, Han Shuo could not neglect the danger of his existence. Han Shuo was always vignt and cautious towards anyone who wasn¡¯t an ally and had the strength to pose him threat. He would never do something out of impulse only to deeply regret itter.

    ¡°This is thanks to the unique property of this Holy Grail. Gy¨¢l didn¡¯t want me to die, so he extracted a very minute portion of the divine energy from my divine body and ced it in this Grail. This way my soul is preserved and the master of the Grail can take control of my power by activating the light element magical matrix on the Grail.¡±

    Just a minute portion of his divine energy could form a spacetime barrier and suspend time as far as a fifty kilometer radius. If this person¡¯s divine body and soul were to be reunited, just how mighty would he be?

    The more he exined, the more Han Shuo was appalled. In turn, the more apprehensive Han Shuo was in making him any promises.

    ¡°You are sealed in this Holy Grail by Gy¨¢l, and this Grail was in turn handed to this Light Pope. In that case, can that highgod Gy¨¢l sense your presence through the Grail? Will Gy¨¢l travel across material nes to look for you if the Light Pope loses the Grail?¡± Han Shuo carefully inquired. He was well aware that if that Gy¨¢l were to descend on this ne for this Holy Grail, even with just his soul, no one on Profound Continent would be a match against him. By then, even Han Shuo himself, the biggest heretic, would be hard pressed to escape. Han Shuo needed to be sure.

    ¡°Haha, I know what you are worried about.¡± Perhaps he had been shut in there for too long, as the being seemed to be very interested in making conversation. The more he talked with Han Shuo, the more rxed his intonation became. ¡°Gy¨¢l putting me here has indicated that this ne must be extremely remote from high-level material nes. I reckon that this ce is merely a low-level material ne.¡±

    The gods ssified material nes into barren, low-level, mid-level, and high-level. A barren material ne had sparse poptions with limitednds. Living beings on those nescked in development. Elements of all sorts were thin and energy ores were scant. No real gods had ever arisen from those nes. A low-level material ne had its own culture and civilization. The total poption would reach around one billion, since they were usually blessed with rtively expansivend, an adequate amount of elements all around, and sufficient energy ore. Lowgods tended to inhabit those nes. Mid-level material nes were popted with much more developed civilizations, their total poptions often bordering on about ten billion. They were privileged to have vast expanses ofnd, soils rich with elements, and energy ore deposits in gross excess. nes like this were crowded with midgods; and high-level material nes were all the more so. The total poption of most high-level material nes would be at least ten billion. Theirnds were boundlessly vast. Elements of all sorts could be found in rich and intense concentrations. There were plenty of strange and miraculous ores to be found. Numerous lowgods and midgods lived there. Highgods were also present on those nes.

    Han Shuo had learned this information from Bechymos back at the Abyss realm. After returning to Profound Continent, based on that method of ssifying material nes, Han Shuo knew that the Profound Continent was barely considered a low-level material ne. Profound Continent was home to rather vastnds but the total poption it hosted was just short of two hundred million. There indeed were lowgods present, but so far, other than himself, the only lowgod that Han Shuo knew of was the Primordius Dragon.

    The Abyss realm, however, since it hosted a poption of more than a billion, had much greaternd mass, and was once home to the five Abyssal Demon Kings, it was by definition regarded as a true low-level material ne.

    Upon hearing the soul inside the Holy Grail suggesting that Profound Continent was a low-level material ne, Han Shuo helplessly replied, ¡°You are indeed correct. Based on the division of material nes known to gods, this ne is barely in the ss of low-level material ne.¡± Han Shuo continued to exin the situation on his ne.

    ¡°Oh? You know about the ssification of material nes? You aren¡¯t so uninformed after all!¡± the soul inside the Grail was rather shocked but did not question Han Shuo any further about that. He reasoned, ¡°I know you are worried that Gy¨¢l mighte to this ne, but you shan¡¯t fret about that. Given his status and identity as ate-stage highgod, there is no way he would turn any attention to such a low-level material ne. Even if he has business here, the most he would do is to send his subordinates over. Gy¨¢l knows that I¡¯m on this material ne as he put me here. But he had done so in order to prevent anyone from finding me. Therefore, unless he was met with a major event concerning me, he would never order anyone toe down here to retrieve the Grail. So you can be at ease. Even if somebody does arrive, it will definitely not be Gy¨¢l.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart loosened up after hearing his exnation. He turned to look at that frozen Light Pope with a sneer and inquired the Grail, ¡°Will me killing the master of the Grail cause you any adverse effect?¡±

    ¡°None whatsoever. Be my guest. That fool is simply the most annoying little snitch I have evere across. All these years he has been trying to obtain the essence of the edict of space from me. Mostughably, he even offered me ¡®great rewards¡¯ in exchange. Haha, what ¡®great rewards¡¯ could a puny basegod provide?¡±

    Upon hearing those words, Han Shuo extended his hand and pressed it on the Pope¡¯s head. A burst of energy erupted from his palm and the Pope¡¯s brain was well-cooked.

    Just like the old shaman, the Light Pope also has a mighty soul that doesn¡¯t dissipate with his physical body¡¯s death. His soul was easily collected away by Han Shuo.

    The Holy Grail, the olive branches, the papal tiara, the cross, their clothing, space rings, a ne made of bones that the old shaman wore, and some other things that Han Shuo thought could be useful, were all plundered away.

    Not a single person from the party who carried out an assault on the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force remained. They were all killed by Han Shuo.

    Other than that so-called Saintess who couldn¡¯t seem to leave that sacred mountain of the Church of Light, all the true world¡¯s best experts had all been murdered by Han Shuo. It appeared that on the whole of Profound Continent, the Primordius Dragon was the only being that could contend against him.

    ¡°Erm, what should I do about you?¡± after putting away all his spoils of war, Han Shuo held the Holy Grail and transmitted to the person inside it.

    The soul inside the Holy Grail kept silent for a long, long while, faintly sighed, and transmitted, ¡°I know what you are worried about. Truth be told, your worries are totally unfounded. In fact, you guarding against me seems absolutely preposterous to me. A mere low-level material ne really isn¡¯t worth anything to me. Besides, we people who cultivate in the edict of space couldn¡¯t care less about the power of faith of such a low-level material ne. Plus, being inside this cup, without anyone operating it through incantation, I couldn¡¯t deploy an edictal force of space if I tried. The divine energy I now possess is too weak to break myself free from the binding of the Grail. Even in the case that I¡¯m free from the Grail, without my divine body, I cannot pose you any threat. You really don¡¯t have to be so wary towards me.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m really sorry but it¡¯s not safe for me to trust you. I have no clue what you¡¯d do after you¡¯re free. At the present moment, I have no wish of helping to set you free, although I might not possess that capability yet. For the time being, I will have to trouble you to stay inside there. After I fully understand some things, or perhaps when I¡¯ve gained enough strength to the point where you will not be a threat, then, I will return the favor you did me today and free you from this Grail.¡± Han Shuo was sincere in his words.

    ¡°Haha, well I don¡¯t count on you setting me free immediately. It is my firm belief that it takes time for two people to understand and be familiar with each other, and time is the most of what I have. I hope that you will keep the Grail yourself and talk to me when you have the time. I have been lonely for too long and being able to talk to someone from time to time, to me, is something of a luxury. Hmm, I believe that I have far greater knowledge about the affairs between the gods in all the major material nes than you do. If you have any questions, asking me could be the fastest way to get the answer.¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment and turned delighted. He transmitted, ¡°Then I shall thank you in advance. There are indeed many things that I don¡¯t yet know about high-level material nes. You, as an expert cultivating in the edict of space, could definitely assist me greatly in that aspect. Right, be at ease. As soon as I ensure that you have no bad inclinations, or better still, when I¡¯m confident that there is no possibility that you would cause me a threat, I will spare no effort in getting you out from the Grail. And if I feel that you are friendly enough, I might even find ways to locate your divine body and assist you to truly resurrect so you can get your revenge.¡±

    ¡°Well then, it¡¯s a deal!¡± The being softlyughed. He seemed to be in a great mood.

    ¡°It¡¯s a deal!¡± Han Shuo too was in a fine mood and dly promised.

 Chapter 622: Invincible! A true god!

    GDK 622: Invincible! A true god!

    All six of those whounched an attack on Lancelot Empire were brutally murdered. Not a single one of them had managed to escape. Han Shuo could be considered as having avenged themoners of Ossen City who lost their lives to the Radiant st.

    More than half of the divine weapons possessed by the Church of Light had thus been plundered away by Han Shuo. The soul of the Light Pope was imprisoned by Han Shuo. Henceforth, other than that Saintess on the sacred mountain of the Church of Light, there was no significant expert left standing in the entire religious organization.

    But what pleased Han Shuo the most was the soul inside the Holy Grail. As an internar wanderer cultivating in the edict of space, this being must have been very familiar with the characters and affairs of all major material nes. With his assistance, Han Shuo would gain a much deeper understanding of the infinitely vast universe instead of his originally narrow view.

    The six corpses were destroyed by Han Shuo without extra trouble. He then expanded his consciousness and carefully examined the surrounding conditions, making sure that there were no anomalies in the surroundings.

    After putting away the Holy Grail, Han Shuo set into motion and faded into the trace of his own faint shadow, returning to the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force at Ossen City.

    But soon after Han Shuo made a move, before he had even traveled a kilometer ahead, he saw Little Skeleton in a scurry over to him with his bone dragon. Previously, when he heard the warning from the being of the Grail, Han Shuo was afraid that Little Skeleton might suffer a cmity if time there were to be suspended. Therefore, by using the connection he had with Little Skeleton, he ordered Little Skeleton to temporarily remain at the city gate.

    After restraining the Light Pope, Han Shuo did not transmit another message to Little Skeleton and so he stayed where he was until further instruction. But after even more waiting, Little Skeleton began to worry for Han Shuo. At some point Little Skeleton had decided the waiting had to end and rushed over to Han Shuo against his orders.

    After bing a god, Little Skeleton could no longer be bounded by Han Shuo using necromancy magic. The reason that Little Skeleton continued to obey Han Shuo unquestioningly even after he became a god was that the duo had unwittingly built a bond that was even stronger than the energy of contract.

    No longer were Han Shuo¡¯smands absolute to Little Skeleton. In the case that Little Skeleton felt that Han Shuo was in danger, out of concern for Han Shuo¡¯s safety, he would ignore his orders.

    ¡°Father, are you alright?¡± Little Skeleton, who arrived right in front of Han Shuo, immediately transmitted when he saw that Han Shuo was safe and sound.

    ¡°Haha, I¡¯m fine. I forgot to inform you. Alright, there¡¯s nothing to worry about now. I have settled matters over here. Let me send you back.¡± Han Shuo smiled and sent Little Skeleton back to the Netherworld using a necromancy spell.

    Little Skeleton still had a ton of matters to attend to at the Netherworld. Not only did he have to establish territories at the Netherworld, he also had to subdue all the power of faith of all those undead creatures. In addition to that, there were many secrets in the gravestone that Little Skeleton had yet to understand. Therefore, unless more important matters arose, Han Shuo did not wish to waste Little Skeleton¡¯s time.

    Little Skeleton disappeared after a bright sh of light. Han Shuo then continued to soar to the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force. After a few minutes, Han Shuo had returned to the za at the academy. Ayermike Cotton and Graeae were silently watching over the influential figures from above the za. At just one nce, Han Shuo could tell that no further attack had taken ce during the time he was away.

    The reason that these influential figures of the empire had not immediately left was that they were scared witless by that Radiant st over their heads. They thought that Han Shuo would be nearby and therefore they stayed inside the za, hoping to receive Han Shuo¡¯s protection. The wretched sight outside the field caused by the Radiant st was still fresh. Many of themoners who could do nothing but watch as their family and friends vanished in a puff of smoke after being struck by the Radiant st were still weeping loudly. These aristocrats dared not to walk out from this field.

    King Lawrence had an unperturbed look on his face as if he had forgotten about that perilous event he and his subjects had just been put through. He was wearing an awkward smile as he listened to Firenze¡¯sints.

    Fanny, who was in a formal dress, looked equally calm. The corners of her lips curved to make a faint smile as, with much amusement, she watched her fatherin at the top of his voice about hardships the people at the southern border were facing and insisted that Lawrence give those fighters and soldiers greaterpensation.

    After having repeatedly endured numerous wars during the past few years, the coffers of Lancelot Empire were basically emptied. Lawrence could only squeeze out so many gold coins from it. But at the same time, he could easily sympathize with Firenze¡¯s sorrows. He understood that as a barrier for the empire, many lives of warriors at the southern border had indeed been sacrificed. In response to Firenze¡¯s grumbling and demands, Lawrence had no choice but to feign a smile and exin the difficult situation that Lancelot Empire was in.

    ¡°I don¡¯t care! The people of the southern border have paid with tens of thousands of lives for the safety of the empire. After so many years of battle, there are orphans and widows everywhere. There are many who don¡¯t even have enough to eat. It¡¯s unthinkable that the empire can¡¯t even fulfill the most basic needs of its people!¡± Firenze fumed at Lawrence. He did not show the slightest timidity before his king.

    In the whole of Lancelot Empire, perhaps only Firenze had the guts to shout at Lawrence like that. Han Shuo could use his own influences to make Lawrence alter his decision, but would never howl at him so unmannerly.

    Despite being screamed at, Lawrence did not get angry. He understood better than anyone Firenze¡¯s role in Lancelot Empire and knew of his devotion towards the empire. Firenze had acted like this to his father back when the former king was still alive. This temperament of his was simply unchangeable. And now, due to Fanny¡¯s rtionship with Han Shuo, Lawrence had even more reasons to please Firenze. Besides, Firenze¡¯s demand was reasonable and fair. If the national exchequer were abundant, Lawrence would have given thepensation even without him demanding it.

    However, he really was penniless. No matter how loud Firenze shouted, Lawrence had no way of producing the gold coins.

    ¡°Enough shouting already, Lawrence has no money for you. He will give you the same answer even if you shout your throat hoarse!¡± Han Shuo¡¯szy voice suddenly interrupted. Upon finishing those words, Han Shuo appeared out of thin air, standing still beside Fanny. No one saw how he had arrived.

    ¡°Bryan, what is really going on? Are you alright?¡± Lawrence hastily asked.

    Han Shuo smiled and replied rxedly, ¡°I¡¯m fine. I went for a walk outside the city to take care of some crooks.¡±

    ¡°Are they from the Church of Light?¡± Candide said with a gloomy voice aftering out from some corner.

    At his words, everybody¡¯s gazes suddenly gathered on Han Shuo, waiting for his exnation as to what happened.

    Han Shuo nodded and replied in hiszy voice, ¡°Yeah. Even the Light Pope himself personally came down. Haha, he must have gotten too anxious. He knew after the annihtion of the Shrine of Ice that their Church of Light would be the next. Therefore he beat me to it and attacked us.¡±

    ¡°Do you know where he is? How dare he infringe on our Lancelot Empire. We must not let him get away so easily!¡± Candide¡¯s eyes were filled with murderous intentions as he demanded in a sinister voice.

    The attack on Babylon Academy of Magic and Force made Candide feel extremely humiliated. Even as he had received intelligence about this beforehand, even with all his preparation, he had failed to prevent the attack. Candide med this on himself and he was eager to make up for it by catching the assaulter.

    Han Shuo shrugged. Then, wearing a mischievous smile, he withdrew that papal tiara that the Light Pope always wore, a cross, the Holy Grail, and olive branches. With the crowd bbergasted and staring nkly, Han Shuo unhurriedly said, ¡°There were six attackers in total. Two sacred magi from the Shrine of Ice, one old shaman with demigod strength from the Empire of Orcs, and three from the Church of Light. Of the three, there was one divine knight, one demigod magus, and the Light Pope with terrifying strength. However, they are now all dead. Not one escaped. So don¡¯t waste your time trying to find them!¡±

    The whole za went pin-drop silent.

    Everyone gaped and stared at Han Shuo like a fool. They seemed to have even stopped breathing.

    They knew that Han Shuo was a mighty one from the news of him killing several hundred thousand orcs using undead creatures at South Border City and destroying the Shrine of Ice.

    But, they never realized just how mighty Han Shuo really was.

    However, at this moment, from these unhurried words of Han Shuo, everyone could tell just how truly great Han Shuo really was.

    Two sacred magi, three demigod experts and the Light Pope, who was practically unequaled on Profound Continent, almost every one of them were legendary characters. Some of those demigods were even experts that were invincible ording to legend.

    These incredibly powerful existences had all been finished off by Han Shuo alone in the short span of half an hour. What did that mean?

    Invincible! A true god! That was the impression they arrived at!

    ¡°What? Why are you all silent?¡± Han Shuoughed involuntarily, shook his head, and said to Lawrence, ¡°I¡¯ve told you that I will help you unify the entire continent. How would I dare speak such words without having this bit of strength?¡±

    The dumbfounded Lawrence finally came to his senses. He forced a smile at Han Shuo and said, ¡°Bryan, you know, there are times when I feel that you are not even a mortal. Things that happen to you are always so unimaginable!¡±

    ¡°You madd, doesn¡¯t this mean you are now even mightier than the great founding father Ayermike Cotton?¡± perhaps old Hahn was too excited, or maybe he was awed by the fact he conjectured, his body was quivering as though he was having a seizure. He pinched his thigh tight and had a strange, paining look on his face.

    Han Shuo again smiled. He raised his head to take a nce at Ayermike Cotton hiding in the shadows of a clocktower, who could definitely hear their conversation down below. He thought Old Hahn¡¯s words to be very amusing.

    ¡°You can say that. But you better be careful, founding father Ayermike Cotton might take offense if he hears you!¡±

    ¡°The founding father has disappeared for five hundred odd years. He must definitely have passed away. Haha, he can¡¯t hear me,¡± Old Hahn said carefreely.

    Don¡¯t be so sure! Han Shuo said in his mind,ughing. Shortly after, he tossed all the divine weapons of the Church of Light, except for the Holy Grail, at Firenze and said smilingly, ¡°Haven¡¯t you been bemoaning about being poor? Sell off these items. You¡¯ll have more than enough to rebuild two legions for the southern border!¡±

    These so-called divine weapons of light were useless to Han Shuo. Han Shuo himself couldn¡¯t utilize them and he had no allies who cultivated in the elemental energy of light. They would just be collecting dust in his space ring, so he thought he might as well hand them over to Firenze who could use the proceeds from selling these items to help the poverty-stricken at the southern border.

    Cling ng! Firenze caught the Light Papal Tiara with his body. He shuddered as he carried the holy objects of the Church of Light only heard of in legends right in his arms. He was utterly speechless.

 Chapter 623: Not interested in it anymore!

    GDK 623: Not interested in it anymore!

    These so-called divine weapons might have been useless to Han Shuo, but there would surely be flocks of people on Profound Continent who would do anything to get their hands on these items.

    Firenze stared foolishly as he carried the few objects sacred to the Church of Light in his arms. He did not know how to react for a period of time.

    Firenze knew just how much he could earn by auctioning off these items. However, as these holy objects were of Church of Light origin, the Church would certainly be very eager to regain possession of these items and would surely do everything in its power to do so. As Han Shuo had killed the Light Pope, the rtionship between the Lancelot Empire and the Church of Light had worsened to the point where reconciliation was impossible. The Church of Light regaining these divine weapons would be tantamount to them regaining enormous powers.

    Lawrence suddenly opened his mouth, ¡°Bryan, forget about it. Let¡¯s not sell off these divine weapons.¡±

    Han Shuo shot a nce at Lawrence in a half-smile and leisurely said, ¡°You can be at ease. There¡¯s nothing to be afraid of even if the Church of Light were to reim these items with gold coins. The Light Pope was just using these weapons, but in the end, he was still ended by me. If the Light Pope could do nothing, what could others do?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s not what I mean.¡± Lawrence pointed to Amyes standing beside him and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Take a look at Amyes.¡±

    Han Shuo was startled and immediately turned his gaze.

    Amyes¡¯ eyes were fixed on the divine weapons in Firenze arms, flickering with brilliant rays. His jaws were moving, as though wanting to say something, but he was too hesitant to make a sound.

    With just only look, Han Shuo immediately understood what Lawrence meant. He inwardly reprimanded himself for neglecting one thing ¨C Amyes cultivated in the elemental energy of light.

    Amyes was Han Shuo¡¯s brother-inw. Although he did not have much interaction with Han Shuo in the past, he was, after all, Emily¡¯s brother. Besides, before Han Shuo rose in prestige, Amyes had provided Han Shuo with plenty of assistance. These divine weapons of the Church of Light might be nothing in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, but they carried an unimaginable appeal for Amyes.

    ¡°Oh! Silly me, almost forgot that Mister Amyes cultivates in light magic,¡± Han Shuo said as he put his hand on his forehead as though suddenly realizing that he had made a mistake. He then said to Firenze apologetically, ¡°These, erm, goodies should be kept within the family. Let¡¯s give these things to Mister Amyes!¡±

    Amyes was instantly stirred when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s words. He said in an embarrassed manner as he waved his hands, ¡°It¡¯s too precious! It¡¯s too precious! I can¡¯t take it!¡±

    Firenze, carrying the few divine weapons, thinking that he would be able to exchange them for a great sum of money for his southern border, indecisively nced back and forth between Amyes and Han Shuo.

    ¡°Father!¡± Fanny, standing beside Firenze, softly cleared her throat.

    Firenze sighed and most unwillingly handed the items to Amyes. He groaned, ¡°You lucky bastard, these are riches enough to establish two legions of armies, and it¡¯s all being given to you so gratuitously!¡±

    ¡°How could I take these... It¡¯s too much... ¡° Amyes rubbed his hands in excitement. His handsome and erudite-looking face was fully written with unrestrainable thrill. Although he was saying that it was too much to ept, his two arms were spread wide open.

    ¡°Too much? Great, nevermind then!¡± Firenze detested hypocrites the most and he was annoyed to begin with. When the few divine weapons almost fell into Amyes¡¯ wide open arms, Firenze suddenly put on a serious face and pulled them back.

    Amyes looked humiliated as he mumbled, ¡°That... ermm... this...¡± No one knew what he was trying to convey.

    ¡°Hehe!¡± Fanny couldn¡¯t help butugh when she saw Firenze deliberately teasing Amyes out of annoyance. Others, too, found the scene funny and couldn¡¯t hold back theirughter.

    ¡°Alright, alright, I will ask Jack to get you some gold coins. Stop being so stingy!¡± Han Shuo raised his voice and said to Firenze smilingly.

    ¡°Should have told me so earlier!¡± Firenze muttered and handed those treasures to Amyes. He groaned, ¡°Hypocritical fes like you are the most annoying of all. You obviously wanted the items but kept on acting like you don¡¯t. Pfft!¡±

    Amyes put on an awkward smile and remained silent. The treasures in his arms had washed away any unhappiness in his heart. He knew of Firenze¡¯s temperament and naturally would not hold a grudge for a matter so trivial.

    ¡°Bryan, you must get me at least one and a half million gold coins. Otherwise, I will not allow Fanny to tie the knot with you!¡± Firenze gave Amyes a supercilious look, let out a short, sinisterugh, and coerced Han Shuo.

    ¡°Father!¡± Fanny shouted angrily and red Firenze upon hearing his words.

    There was nothing and no one in the world that Firenze was afraid of, with the exception of Fanny. He immediately cowered his head when Fanny shouted at him. However, his gaze remained fixed on Han Shuo. He was ready to sacrifice his self-respect for the millions of citizens of his southern border.

    ¡°No problem!¡± Han Shuo straightforwardly agreed as he was well aware of Firenze¡¯s concern for the people of the southern border and he was rather touched by it.

    Although Han Shuo had not been in Brettel City for a long time, he still had a clear understanding of its financial circumstance. For the past five years, Brettel City had not been burdened by wars. The city had been actively engaging in all kinds of high-profit-margin businesses and had umted substantial wealth. Due to the unique political circumstances, Lawrence had no way of taking money from Brettel City and using it elsewhere. Only Han Shuo himself could do that.

    A mere one and a half million gold coins would pose absolutely no issue for Brettel City. Besides, among the bounties that Graeae and Pegasus had plundered from the Shrine of Ice, there were more than two million in gold coins. If the rest of the goods plundered were to be liquidated through the Bootz Merchant Guild, he would gain more than three million gold coins.

    ¡°My good son-inw, what a straightforward man! Haha, I¡¯m liking you more and more!¡± Firenze shouted andughed heartily when Han Shuo dly agreed to his terms.

    ¡°Alright, things should be alright now. Ladies, gentlemen, you may dismiss,¡± Han Shuo looked all around and warmly announced.

    Most of the aristocrats and bigwigs at the za had yet to sober up from their astonishment even till now. Their minds were still incredibly roused as they constantly reyed the conversation between Han Shuo and Lawrence.

    For these people, sacred-grade experts were beings at the pinnacle of strength over the whole of Profound Continent. Demigod beings ¨C those who transcended above the sacred realm ¨C had only been heard of in the legends. Existences that exceeded the demigod realm were unheard of to these people.

    When they learned that Han Shuo might have attained a realm so terrifying that an average person would have difficulty imagining, they werepletely staggered. However, most of them felt excited more than anything else, because Han Shuo was a citizen of Lancelot Empire.

    To their astonishment, they could vaguely picture the scene where Lancelot Empire ruled over the whole of Profound Continent. It filled their hearts with a new excitement for the future. Some even started to scheme on how to gain the greatest benefit from the soon-to-change situation on Profound Continent.

    Before leaving, Lawrence said sincerely as he tightly held onto Han Shuo¡¯s hand, ¡°I won¡¯t say anything superfluous, but, it truly is a blessing for the empire to have you!¡±

    ¡°It is the people of the empire who are blessed to have you!¡± Han Shuo smilingly exchanged pleasantries and watched Lawrence leave with his imperial guards.

    Candide stood beside Han Shuo with a gloomy face. After everyone had left, he softly sighed and said, ¡°The Dark Mantle has indeed failed to fulfill its duty in failing to prevent the attack!¡±

    ¡°You shouldn¡¯t me yourself for this. The attackers were powerful beyond your imagination. Even if it was someone else in charge of Lancelot Empire¡¯s safety, they too would have no way of preventing it,¡± Han Shuoforted him. He smilingly continued, ¡°Besides, hasn¡¯t the Dark Mantle reduced the damages to the minimum and punished the perpetrators?

    ¡°When?¡± Candide put on a puzzled face and said in a bewildered manner, ¡°These things were aplished by you!¡±

    ¡°And I have always been a member of the Dark Mantle. The things I aplished are also Dark Mantle¡¯s aplishments, are they not?¡± Han Shuo smilingly reminded Candide.

    After hearing those words from Han Shuo, Candide¡¯s mood lightened. However, he still shook his head, forced a smile, and said, ¡°It¡¯s not exactly the same.¡± After a short pause, Candide suddenly put on a solemn expression and said to Han Shuo very seriously, ¡°Right, Bryan, given your contributions to the Empire, you could definitely be the new master of the Dark Mantle, one with the power to issuemands to three Dark Mantle heavyweights. Bryan, do you want to take over the Dark Mantle?¡±

    Han Shuo rejected with a smile, ¡°Nope. The Dark Mantle is now doing great under the three of you. Had it been in the past, I might have been interested. But now, meh.¡±

    ¡°Why so?¡± Candide asked amazedly.

    Han Shuo looked at Candide beaming ear to ear and answered his question with a question, ¡°Don¡¯t you think that the Dark Mantle is a little too small for me now?¡±

    Candide kept silent for a moment before he nodded in agreement. ¡°Yes, it is. With your strength now, putting the whole Profound Continent into perspective, the Dark Mantle is indeed a little small for you. Sigh, I have watched you grow every step along the way, but never had I expected that you would progress so fast and so high beyond reach. Compared to the time when you were an errand drudge at this academy, it simply has been a world of transformation,¡± Candidemented.

    At his words, Han Shuo¡¯s mind couldn¡¯t help but travel back in time again. He recalled the time when Candide concealed himself in the dark and enticed him to join the Dark Mantle. He unconsciously started tough. He asked, ¡°Right, there¡¯s something I don¡¯t quite understand ¨C back then, why did you personallye to recruit me into the Dark Mantle? Given your identity and my meager strength back then, you shouldn¡¯t have even given me a thought, right?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s because even back then, I could see the wild aspiration in your eyes that would not resign to be anything ordinary. The most important requirement for achieving greatness is one¡¯s aspirations! You definitely possessed that. In addition, I saw in you the perseverance and willpower to turn your aspirations into actions. Just these traits alone are very rare toe by. On top of that, there was an air of mystery to you at that time. As to better understand you, I decided to show up and recruit you into the Dark Mantle,¡± Candide replied solemnly.

    ¡°So that¡¯s the case!¡± Han Shuo nodded. He began stroking his chin andcently said, ¡°It appears that I do have plenty of plusses! Hehe!¡±

 Chapter 624: If you canâ€™t stand me, then you may leave!

    GDK 624: If you can¡¯t stand me, then you may leave!

    Candide¡¯s spirits were slowly lifted after Han Shuo gave him a round of constion. Emma, the former chancellor, had a brief conversation with him before returning to take care of various chores.

    Han Shuo gestured at Graeae the banshee from a distance. She immediately understood and left with Candide. Graeae and Pegasus were the trump card experts that Han Shuo had slotted into the Dark Mantle. With the duo working for the Dark Mantle, missions that had previously been impossible were now a walk in the park. This allowed the Dark Mantle to better serve the Lancelot Empire.

    The aristocrats and influential figures of the empire started leaving following Lawrence¡¯s departure. But before they left, they had gone to Han Shuo to convey their sincere gratitudes one after another. They had even ambiguously expressed that they would stand on Han Shuo¡¯s side no matter the circumstances.

    Although Han Shuo was very clear as to what was actually on their minds, he only went with the flow, feigned civility, and exchanged pleasantries with them until they all left.

    Amyes had left the za along with Firenze. But before leaving, he gazed at Han Shuo from a distance. Han Shuo could discern the excitement and gratitude showing in his eyes. It was not until Han Shuo smilingly nodded at Amyes that he actually left.

    Han Shuo understood that after the near-catastrophe event on this day, there was surely not be a single soul on the whole of Lancelot Empire who would stand against him or his allies. For each day he was in the Lancelot Empire, not just the aristocrats of the Empire, but even King Lawrence would have to act by his wishes.

    After the crowd slowly vanished, Han Shuo returned to that warehouse at the school of necromancy where he had stayed for some time. Apanying him were the three goddesses of Lancelot Empire. They had calm expressions as they listened to Han Shuo telling stories of the days he lived there. Sometimes they would frown, and asionally they wouldugh.

    ¡°Hehe, my wildly ambitious nature was fostered long ago. Power, wealth, and women were the goals I sought after. And today, I have all of it. I still find all those interesting incidents and thoughts I had back then to be very interesting. It all feels as though it was just yesterday.¡± The warehouse hadn¡¯t changed much since hest set foot in it. That narrow wooden bed was still there. There were still worthless materials from necromancy experiments piled up all around. It was messy and in disarray.

    The three goddesses that all men of Lancelot Empire yearned for even in their dreams were standing shoulder to shoulder behind Han Shuo, gazing at the wide open wooden door of the warehouse as they listened to Han Shuo describing the memories he had in this ce. Their minds were tranquil and they each had rxed looks on their faces.

    ¡°You have been a naughty boy, Bryan! Now that I think of it, much of that turmoil that happened at the necromancy school back then must have been of your doing!¡± Fanny giggled. She then recalled an incident from a long time ago in which Lisa was assaulted by a little skeleton at midnight. Fanny¡¯s expression suddenly changed before she asked, ¡°Oh, by the way, have you met Lisa since arriving at the academy? She has been missing you a lot and had frequently reminisced about you all these years. Right, howe I haven¡¯t caught sight of Lisa in thest two days? Logically speaking, she wouldn¡¯t have left school as she knew that you woulde here. That¡¯s odd...¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve met her.¡± When Han Shuo gazed at the warehouse ahead of him, he recalled of all the entertaining incidents he had witnessed with Lisa. Those events had all turned into unforgettable memories that filled his heart with joy upon recollection.

    ¡°You¡¯ve met her?¡± Fanny slightly gasped and appeared to be rather surprised.

    Han Shuo gently cleared his throat and turned around to look at his threedies somewhat embarrassedly. Wearing a silly smile, he said, ¡°There is something that I need to tell you all!¡±

    An ominous feeling rose thedies¡¯ hearts when they saw that expression on Han Shuo¡¯s face. Phoebe¡¯s look had immediately turned gloomy. She red at Han Shuo ferociously and asked, ¡°What is it?¡±

    Fanny stared nkly for a moment and revealed a pensive expression. Before the bitterly smiling Han Shuo could exin, she started to talk, ¡°Sigh... Lisa, this girl, is really quite pitiful. She has been silently waiting for you all these years. Even though you have clearly rejected her, she has never given up. Besides, during that trip to the Dark Forest back then, when Lisa and I were attacked by a Deepwater Venom Python in that pond, you groped her naked body all over. Not to mention you stole her first kiss. Also there...¡±

    ¡°Enough. That¡¯s enough,¡± Phoebe interrupted before Fanny could finish. She looked at Han Shuo with creased brows and pressured, ¡°Say it. What¡¯s the matter?¡±

    ¡°Erm... It¡¯s... precisely what you are thinking.¡± Han Shuo forced a smile and shrugged.

    ¡°You! Why can¡¯t you quit adding more girls to the pile?¡± Phoebe was enraged. It had just been a few days prior that Han Shuo exined that the preposterous matter was all caused by the peculiarity of the martial art he cultivated in and he made a promise to the three that he would stop his womanizing ways. But they failed to anticipate that, just a couple dayster, yet another matter of such took ce. Of course Phoebe was furious.

    Emily too sighed but she did not say anything. She was one who couldpletely yield to Han Shuo. Although she too did not feel well in her heart, she wouldn¡¯t show that in front of Han Shuo.

    ¡°This, erm, Bryan, did Ie at a wrong time?¡± It was at this moment that a timid voice sounded from behind the threedies.

    ¡°It¡¯s okay. I had asked you toe here at this time because I wanted you to meet them,¡± Han Shuo gently assured. For some reason, his heart ached when he saw Lisa¡¯s timid appearance.

    Lisa¡¯s mind had been in a big mess as Han Shuo had recently left memories in her soul. In the past few days, she had locked herself in her room to silently digest all those enormous and jumbled chunks of memories. She even had to skip Fanny¡¯s inauguration ceremony.

    Before she went on to sort out and digest the memories, Han Shuo had instructed her to look for him at this ce uponpleting the memory cleanup. Han Shuo had calcted ahead of time and knew that Lisa would havepletely digested the memories by then. He had taken Fanny, Phoebe, and Emily to this ce at this particr time to resolve the matter.

    Lisa still appeared rather timid even after Han Shuo soothed her in a soft voice. This was because, on one hand, she was aware that she wasn¡¯t in an honorable position at this moment, and on the other hand, Fanny, Phoebe and Emily were well-known and awe-inspiring women who were sessful their careers. Not only did each and every one of them possess valiant strength, they even had elite family backgrounds.

    After the decline of her family, Lisa had always felt inferior in her heart. Besides, it was perfectly normal to feel somewhat inferior before the three most dazzling women in Lancelot Empire.

    ¡°So this is the girl?¡± Phoebe grew even more enraged when she saw how tenderly Han Shuo treated Lisa. She looked at Lisa with cold eyes and groaned, ¡°Little girl, pretty skilled, aren¡¯t you? Managed to enchant him in just a short few days. You sure are remarkable,¡±

    Lisa panicked. She hastily waved her hands and exined, ¡°It¡¯s not what you think! I already knew Bryan from an earlier time, long before you!¡±

    ¡°So what if you knew him first? Don¡¯t you think that I know nothing. I know that it is you who had nearly killed him back then. But now that Bryan has be sessful, you decided to tangle around him and not let him go. Is it not so?¡± Having experienced all kinds of despicable matters in the business world, Phoebe viewed all matters subjectively and therefore believed that to be the case.

    ¡°Phoebe, what are you talking about? Lisa is my student. I know better than anyone what kind of a person she is. If she really was someone like you said she was, I would have told Bryan about that long ago. Can you not hurt others¡¯ feelings when you know nothing?¡± Fanny felt that Phoebe¡¯s words were rather mean. Although they were on the same battlefront, she couldn¡¯t bear to listen and do nothing.

    Phoebe and Fanny had be very close and without hostility since a long time ago. The threedies had frequently met up to reminisce about the interactions they had with Han Shuo to lessen their intense longing for Han Shuo during his years of absence. Over time, the three had built up a close rtionship.

    Phoebe did not refute Fanny¡¯s criticism but sized Lisa up with her brows furrowed. Perhaps it was because Han Shuo was being so gentle to Lisa, since no matter what, Lisa was just displeasing to her eyes. She continued with a cold voice, ¡°As you can see, Bryan already has the three of us. Regardless of what is actually on your mind, you should know when it is time to retreat. Whichever angle I try to look, you just don¡¯t fit in next to Bryan.¡±

    Lisa¡¯s eyes were instantly filled with tears when Phoebe told her so. ¡°I, I love him!¡± she cried out as she stubbornly looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Love? Do you know what love is?¡± Phoebe sneered. The more she thought of Han Shuo repeatedly getting into love affairs, the more her heart was filled with hatred. She furiously groaned, ¡°Any kind of rtionship mixed with benefits is not love!¡±

    She did not acknowledge Fanny¡¯s words from earlier. She still believed that Lisa had seduced Han Shuo for his position and power.

    ¡°I love him,pletely and unconditionally!¡± Lisa tearfully shrieked. After finishing those words, she looked at Han Shuo helplessly, as though he was her everything.

    ¡°I don¡¯t believe you!¡± Phoebe coldy scoffed.

    ¡°I believe you!¡± Unexpectedly, Emily, who had kept silent all along, and Fanny suddenly voiced at the same time.

    ¡°You, you two... ¡° Phoebe was stunned for a moment before she turned to squint at Fanny and Emily angrily. She had no idea why the two would prop up an outsider.

    ¡°Enough!¡± Han Shuo coldly groaned. He then looked at Phoebe in a rather displeased manner and said, ¡°Enough of talking about this. From now on Lisa will be your younger sister. As elder sisters, you should look after her and show her consideration. Don¡¯t make things so unpleasant for her.¡±

    ¡°I will not admit her as my sister!¡± Phoebe said coldly. The more Han Shuo sheltered Lisa, the angrier Phoebe got.

    Compared to Emily and Fanny, Phoebe was much more possessive. She had been repressing her grievance for Han Shuo¡¯s unfaithfulness for too long. And now, she finally detonated.

    Han Shuo had limited patience. Seeing Phoebe continue to be so menacing even as Lisa was crying her eyes out, Han Shuo was incensed from the heart. He fumed, ¡°I don¡¯t care if you admit or not, if you can¡¯t stand me, then you may leave me. You don¡¯t get to veto over my decisions!¡±

    ¡°What, what did you say?¡± Phoebe who had been icily arrogant all along, suddenly pointed at Han Shuo in disbelief and said in a trembling voice.

    ¡°If you can¡¯t stand me, then you may leave!¡± Han Shuo repeated coldly out of anger. He then pulled Lisa away as she cried uncontrobly and left without giving Phoebe another look.

    Phoebe cried out bitterly as soon as Han Shuo left, ¡°Ah!!! How could he be so heartless, how could he say that!¡±

 Chapter 625: Refining Spirit Demons

    GDK 625: Refining Spirit Demons

    Han Shuo could hear Phoebe¡¯s painful crying loud and clear. His heart ached. However, Phoebe was just too possessive and her actions just too harsh, which also made him very ufortable.

    ¡°Is, is she alright?¡± seeing Han Shuo¡¯s gloomy appearance, Lisa hung her head down as though she had done something wrong and asked Han Shuo in a low voice.

    Han Shuo forced an unsightly smile, sighed, and consoled Lisa, ¡°It¡¯s okay. She will be fine after crying.¡±

    Fanny and Emily did not catch up with them. The thought that the two were now trying to calm Phoebe made Han Shuo feel much more relieved.

    Having been in a rtionship with the three for so long, this was the very first time that Han Shuo had gotten angry. Although he knew that he was the one at fault, he just could not contain his own temper.

    Phoebe had always posed the greatest resistance. She had in fact reacted rather violently when his rtionship with Emily and Fanny was first revealed to her. Reacting obnoxiously seemed to have be a usual practice for her. Whenever Han Shuo had an affair with somedy, Phoebe would always fly into a terrible rage out of jealousy. Han Shuo would then have to constantly tter and soothe her with kind words and beg for her understanding.

    Han Shuo understood in his heart that the root cause for all this was that Phoebe¡¯s love for him was simply too deep.

    However, Phoebe had spiralled into a fit of rage over and over again; it was getting to be too much. Besides, the die was cast. It was impossible for Han Shuo to side with Phoebe alone. If she were allowed to be a troublemaker, in the future, not only would it vex Han Shuo to the tips of his nerves, she might go on to take an extra mile after being given an inch.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t a man who would let his women saddle on his head for forever. Perhaps blowing up once in a while would allow him better control over the situation. If not for Phoebe¡¯s overly harsh and unkindnguage, Han Shuo would most likely have exhorted her with kind words like he always had and slowly dispelled the discontentment in Phoebe¡¯s heart.

    ¡°How about, I go back there and exin to her?¡± Lisa timidly said to Han Shuo. She was very considerate of Han Shuo and she felt ashamed of herself.

    Han Shuo shook his head, forced a smile, and replied, ¡°Forget about it. Right now, she¡¯ll only find you irritating, I¡¯m sure. I¡¯m very clear about Phoebe¡¯s stubborn temper. It¡¯s better to just let her calm down for the time being.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, I¡¯m sorry!¡± Lisa stared nkly for a brief while before she said in a guilt-ridden face. She was on the verge of tearing up again.

    Han Shuo caressed Lisa smooth, long hair, and reassured her, ¡°It¡¯s not your fault. Phoebe has held that back for a long time. It was just a matter of time before she erupted. This isn¡¯t all that bad. Alright alright, stop thinking too much. For now, just keep your mind on understanding the stuff in your head. Coincidentally, I have some matters to attend to and will be leaving for a period of time. When I return, I will look for Phoebe and have a chat with her. I believe that she would have calmed down by then and will actually be open to logical conversation.¡±

    ¡°Okay. Please return as soon as you can. I¡¯m going to miss you,¡± Lisa raised her head to look at Han Shuo and said in a lovable voice.

    After talking to Han Shuo for a while, Lisa returned to the school of necromancy. Han Shuo circled around Phoebe using his consciousness and saw that she was no longer weeping with Emily and Fanny consoling. His was slightly more relieved and silently left the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force.

    Han Shuo looked for Ayermike Cotton andmunicated with him briefly before leaving Ossen City.

    By using the magical transportation matrices found in major cities, Han Shuo rapidly made his way to the Cemetery of Death at the Dark Forest. Inside, his two avatars were still slowly and silently recovering from the injuries they received from thest battle. As there was an intense presence of the element of death inside the Cemetery of Death, his avatar that cultivated in the element of death was recovering faster. He sufficed that it wouldn¡¯t be long before he would be as good as new.

    The avatar of destruction was recovering at a slower rate butplete recovery wasn¡¯t too far away.

    Han Shuo had returned to the Cemetery of Death to uncover what was at the bottom-mostyer of the structure, as well as to refine spirit demons, the highest level of demon general, using the three souls that he had recently collected.

    As his avatar of death was still recovering, Han Shuo did not rush to explore the so-called secret of bing a god at thestyer of the Cemetery of Death. Instead, he started out by deploying the formation to refine a spirit demon.

    After his twelve mystical demons perished, Han Shuo had been keeping an eye out for the materials required to refine spirit demons. In the Abyss realm, Han Shuo had acquiredrge quantities of rare and umon materials. To add to what he had plundered on the Profound Continent over the many years, he had gathered all the needed material for refining a spirit demon.

    ¨Cthat is except for the most crucial part of the equation. He hadn¡¯t set about doing so earlier because he had note to possess mighty souls. But now that he had collected the souls of the Light Pope, the old shaman, and the demigod magus, he could finally get started.

    Han Shuo first etched on the empty ground ahead of the Cemetery of Death in ordance with the memory in his head. He carved out aplex diagram of a formation. To proceed, he summoned earth elite zombie and asked him to carefully and neatly cut the ground ordingly. After the initial decoration was in order, Han Shuo started to pour inrge quantities of the required materials. The uneven surface of the earth was densely covered with all kinds of bizarre materials.

    There were three oval holes at three sides of the formation. They would form a triangle if connected by lines. The holes were filled with bloody fluids that bubbled off. They filled the air with a nostril-assailing scent.

    After Han Shuo walked to the first hole, the skin on the tip of his middle finger ruptured and three drops of his blood essence fell into the hole. As soon as that happened, the bubbling bloody liquid in the hole suddenly boiled over. Colorful vapors rose in spirals. But strangely, the vapor gathered above the hole and didn¡¯t seem to dissipate.

    One after another, Han Shuo dropped three of his blood essences into the other two holes. Again, the mysterious, un-dissipating vapors took shape.

    Subsequently, Han Shuo sat on a protruded tform at the center of the formation. He pressed both his hands on the glossy smooth and crystal clear magical stone on the tform. An enormous amount of demonic yuan suddenly gushed out and pinholed right into the magical stone.

    In an instant, the magical stone burst out with gaudy magical lights. The dozen or so fine ditches that were connected to the magical stone, surprisingly, started to slither as though glowing serpents.

    If one were to look down directly from the top, one would see the fine ditches form a drifting spider web that was gently swaying and twisting. One could easily find beauty in its peculiarity. Those ditches seemed to be channels for transporting some kind of fluid propelled by demonic yuan that gathered all kinds of energies before ultimately flowing into the three holes that contained Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence.

    Neither moonlight nor sunlight could prate the Cemetery of Death and therefore the passage of time became indistinct once one was inside. After an undetermined period of time, the magical stone gradually glowed less and less brilliantly. On the contrary, above the three holes where energies converged, the vapors that continued to cloud up began to blossom with intense, colorful lights. The scene appeared demonic, even.

    Han Shuo, who had been sitting atop the magical stone, suddenly got up and flew over the first hole. He carefully withdrew his Soul Depository Ring and grabbed the weakest soul in it ¨C the soul of the demigod magus. It wasunched into the vapor umted above the first hole at lightning speed.

    In an instant, the thick vapor appeared to be boiling and it started to glow magnificently. A miserable wail started to y from it.

    Han Shuo had an unfeeling expression on his face. In a sh, his body came to hover above the next hole. He proceeded by pulling out the old shaman¡¯s soul and cast it into the thick vapor.

    When Han Shuo then threw the Light Pope¡¯s soul into the vapor above thest hole, the patterns on the entire formation seemed toe alive. It now took on the appearance of a three-eyed monster. The fine ditches were like scars on the monster¡¯s face that wriggled like earthworms. The scene was terrifying.

    Inhuman, blood-curdling shrieks continuously echoed from the vapor congealed over the three holes.

    With the same look on his face, Han Shuo flew back to that tform at the center and sat cross-legged on it. He again pressed his two hands on the magical stone and sent forth the demonic yuan in his body, providing the three spirit demons the energy needed for their first round of evolution.

    Yet another long and undetermined period of time unwittingly passed, along with perhaps another few million rounds of persistent shouting, when finally, the terrifying voices stopped.

    Han Shuo, still sitting on the tform revealed a few traces of tiredness. He gently opened his eyes, nced at the three spirit demons that had sunken into a hibernation phase, and slowly stood up from the tform.

    Han Shuo took a deep breath and shifted his attention away from the slowly evolving spirit demons. He flew to the center of the Cemetery of Death, casually withdrew several thumb-sized medicinal pellets from his space ring and swallowed them without chewing. He sat next to the enormous internar transportation matrix to rest.

    Sitting close to Han Shuo¡¯s main body was his avatar cultivating in the elemental energy of death. It was at this moment that its eyes, having been shut for a long time, suddenly opened. He stretched his body, exercised his somewhat stiff neck and joints, and revealed a satisfied smile. Soon after, he walked towards the bottom of the Cemetery of Death.

    After taking some time off to recuperate, this avatar of his had finally fully recovered from its injuries. What¡¯s more, he even felt better than he did before the battle at the Shrine of Ice and he had gained a deeper understanding of the energy he cultivated in. This soul of his possessed the memories of a midgod who had a profound understanding of the elemental energy of death. However, knowledge was not exactly the same as actually putting them into use.

    The valuable experiences he gained from fighting that god who descended at the Shrine of Ice had significantly improved his maniption of the elemental energy.

    Although this avatar had suffered heavy damage from the battle, what he gained had far outweighed the damages. After that battle, based on his familiarity with the elemental energy, Han Shuo had a feeling that he was close to making a breakthrough to be a mid-stage lowgod. This filled Han Shuo with great excitement.

    Although he would still be a lowgod, a mid-stage lowgod would be much mightier than an early-stage lowgod. When that happened, not only will hisprehension of elemental energy improve, his divine energy and Domain of Divinity would also be enhanced by a wide margin.

 Chapter 626: As Expected

    GDK 626: As Expected

    Step by step, Han Shuo made his way to the bottom of the Cemetery of Death. The barriers that used to pose Han Shuo some resistance no longer had any effect on him. He descended through theyers unimpededly but halted right before crossing the barrier at the finalyer.

    Though Han Shuo knew that thisyer of barrier would not cause him any obstruction, he had merely gotten ustomed to stopping and examining the barriers. He fixed his eyes on the barrier ahead of him and carefully examined it with his soul.

    After bing a lowgod, Han Shuo in fact no longer had much expectations for the so-called secret to bing a god that was stashed away at the bottom-mostyer.

    After spending time in the Abyss realm, Han Shuo had a rough idea of the contents he would discover within. He had, after all, achieved the realm of lowgod with two of his souls. Of course this information about how to be a god did not intrigue him. The reason he was so keen on investigating it nheless was that entering the finalyer of the Cemetery of Death had always been a wish of his all along. Moreover, he wanted to see if there were any materials stored there that would be useful to him.

    The barrier ahead of him was formed with pure mental strength. After obtaining the divine soul of a midgod, Han Shuo recognized the function and deployment method of the barrier with one look. Instead of forcibly breaking through the barrier as he had been doing Han Shuo merely extended his hands andid them against the invisible barrier. His mental strength made one pulsation and the barrier seemed to have turned into liquid, allowing him to cross without any intense resistance.

    Han Shuo walked into thest and finalyer of the Cemetery of Death. After looking all around, Han Shuo discovered a rhombus-shaped lens at the center. Behind the lens was a simple magical matrix for storing mental strength. There was nothing of value around the chamber, which disappointed Han Shuo somewhat.

    With just one nce at the rhombus lens, Han Shuo immediately recognized that it was a special mechanism for leaving messages. Han Shuo walked to the front of the rhombus lens and ced his hand on it. The aura of the skeletal staff inside his body flowed into it. At the next instance, the rhombus lens started to glow.

    An indistinct figure appeared inside the rhombus lens and thereupon, that familiar voice sounded from the middle of the lens, ¡°My child, I¡¯m very happy that you havee to this stage. Being here also means that you are now a sacred magus. Very well done. However, I must tell you this, in our eyes, bing a sacred magus is just the very first baby step. Now, let me tell you the secrets to bing a god. Remember this carefully... ¡°

    It was just what Han Shuo anticipated. The so-called secret to bing a god was precisely through the method of fusing one¡¯s body and soul with the element, something Han Shuoprehended long ago. However, the exnations contained in the lens were very detailed. The person had a deeper understanding of this matter than Han Shuo did and Han Shuo learned a thing or two.

    The lens was set up to y the recorded message when activated. Han Shuo stood there without moving and silently listened to the message.

    After describing the secrets to bing god once through, the message did not immediately stop. It continued, ¡°As long as you have memorized all these and trulyprehend them, bing god will not be that difficult to aplish. But after that, if you want to progress even further and obtain even greater strength, look for the dark dragons of the underground world and show them my skeletal staff. Ask them for the path to the bottommostyer of the underground world. There you will find great rewards!¡±

    ¡°The Cemetery of Death isn¡¯t merely a ce to hide. It also has a attack mechanisms. First of all... ¡°

    ¡°Inside the skeletal staff, you will find a deeper level of the understanding I have of the energy of death as well as basic knowledge about material nes. If you can master them, we might even have a chance to meet in person...¡±

    ¡°Finally, best of luck!¡±

    The figure within the rhombus lens started shing until the lens fractured and disintegrated.

    As Han Shuo was already a god, the information inside the lens wasn¡¯t particrly exciting to him. After listening to the message left behind by that person, Han Shuo forced a smile and shook his head. He truly hadn¡¯t found anything particrly special or useful.

    The only thing that baffled Han Shuo was his mention of thestyer of the underground world. ording to him, at the very bottom of the underground worldid the way for gods to progress even further.

    Han Shuo still recalled that back then, the dark dragons were assaulted and interrogated by a group of experts from the Shrine of Ice lead by Ice Celestial Corey. They were in search of the path to thestyer of the underground world. He had previously learned from Gilges, the patriarch of dark dragons, that the race of dark dragons had been living at the underground world to guard and protect the pathway leading to thestyer in ordance to themand of the original master of the skeletal staff.

    Upon reflection, he reckoned that there really could be something miraculous at the deepestyer of the underground world. Otherwise, those from the Shine of Ice wouldn¡¯t have traveled thousands of miles just for some subterranean exploration, and the owner of the skeletal staff wouldn¡¯t have been so concerned about it for so long.

    Perhaps it was because his strength had been advancing by leaps and bounds, Han Shuo grew tock expectation and excitement towards many things. After thinking through about the message, Han Shuo was sure that he hadn¡¯t learned anything new.

    His avatar of death walked back to the internar transportation matrix and sat cross-legged again on the same spot. He withdrew a divine essence of death he obtained from the Void and silently digested the elemental energy of death contained inside.

    This divine essence of death was extremely precious and it hadn¡¯t been easy for Han Shuo toe by. It could provide him with enormous benefit in growing his divine energy. Han Shuo treasure the item very much.

    Han Shuo nned on rbining all three souls before heading to the Cmity Church headquarters. However, his avatar of destruction had yet to fully recover while his main body that had exhausted a great amount of demonic yuan in refining the spirit demons also needed some time to recover. Hence, Han Shuo decided to have his avatar of death absorb the piece of divine essence during that period as well as to properly digest the experience previously obtained from the great battle.

    Inside the Cemetery of Death, all three of Han Shuo¡¯s bodies were sitting cross-legged in silence. They were either recovering their energy or absorbing more.

    Time flew by swiftly and unnoticed. After an undetermined period of time, when all three of his bodies had fully recovered, Han Shuo finally left the Cemetery of Death.

    The three spirit demons were still in hibernation stages. Han Shuo knew that as spirit demons possessed the ability to constantly evolve, they would take a much longer time to refinepared to other types of demon generals. Uponpletion, the spirit demons would be patiently waiting for Han Shuo to collect them. Han Shuo didn¡¯t need to keep watch at all times and so he wasfortable with separating from the spirit demons.

    Han Shuo had no idea precisely how long he had stayed inside the Cemetery of Death. After leaving the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo silently returned to Ossen City. As soon as he reached there, he left a trace that would get him in touch with Wolf. Wolf had probably been waiting for information about Han Shuo all along as very soon after Han Shuo produced the trace, Wolf was at Han Shuo¡¯s door.

    ¡°Lord Bryan, where have you been? Why have you disappeared again all of a sudden for a whole month?¡±

    ¡°Oh, nothing much. I went cultivating for a while,¡± Han Shuo answered smilingly.

    ¡°Wow, I truly did not expect that your Lordship would still be so hard at cultivation even when you have be so mighty. This is truly admirable,¡± Burt Zili, who came along with Wolf, said sincerely as he looked at Han Shuo full of reverence.

    ¡°Lord Bryan, His Highness the Pope has hastened us several times already. If your Lordship doesn¡¯t head to the headquarters soon, I have reason to believe that His Highness might actuallye down here in person,¡± Wolf said hastily.

    ¡°Oh? Why so anxious all so suddenly?¡± thest time they met, Wolf had said that the Pope of the Cmity Church told them not to rush things. Therefore, Han Shuo was puzzled to see that Wolf had now suddenly begun pressing.

    ¡°Your Lordship¡¯s noble act of killing the Light Pope and the two demigods has caused an enormous shock at the headquarters. His Highness the Pope and all the cardinals are wild with joy. They are desperate to thank your Lordship in person. After all, your Lordship¡¯s conduct and deeds are all just too brilliant!¡± Burt Zili rushed to answer before Wolf could open his mouth.

    Han Shuo was at a loss of words. He grinned at Burt Zili, who was wearing a revering face, and the excited Wolf before asking, ¡°Well then, did you guys take advantage of the situation to carry out strikes against the Church of Light?¡±

    ¡°Of course!¡± Wolf couldn¡¯t conceal the excitement in his heart when this matter was brought up. He cheerfully said, ¡°Thanks to your Lordship¡¯s magnificent feat, in addition to Lancelot Empire¡¯s strong denouncement of the Church of Light, the Church of Light¡¯s reputation on the continent has suffered a devastating dive. As your Lordship had killed the Light Pope, the morale at the Church of Light was bottomed. Of course we wouldn¡¯t let go of this opportunity to hit them when they were down. In just a short one month¡¯s time, we destroyed more than a hundred churches of the Church of Light all over the continent and killed several thousand of their followers. Haha, this is truly delightful. If this trend continues, it won¡¯t be long before our Cmity Church cane out from hiding and operating in the dark, and openly disseminate our religion in every country!¡±

    Han Shuo, too, was delighted by the news. Perhaps because Han Shuo cultivated in the energy of death and destruction, he had all along disliked the Church of Light very much. The Church of Light also viewed him as the biggest heretic on Profound Continent and had spared no effort in eliminating him. When Han Shuo was trapped in the Abyss realm, he vowed topletely destroy the Church of Light. It was only natural that Han Shuo would feel happy when he heard from Wolf just how miserable the condition at the Church of Light was.

    ¡°This is all your Lordship¡¯s meritorious achievement. Without your Lordship ughtering the Light Pope and the two demigods, our Cmity Church would certainly not be able to attack the Church of Light so effortlessly. Only a being like your Lordship would be able to beat a powerhouse like the Church of Light into decline all by yourself. This lowly servant simply doesn¡¯t know how to express his admiration towards your Lordship in words!¡± Burt Zili dly licked Han Shuo¡¯s boots with no sense of shame.

    ¡°Okay, enough!¡± Han Shuo had an ego to fulfil too. He chuckled at the great feeling of being praised like that. Shortly after, he happily said, ¡°Let¡¯s go. I¡¯ll head to the headquarters with you.¡±

 Chapter 627: Deep inside the deser

    GDK 627: Deep inside the desert

    Ang Empire, in the northwest ins of the expansive Tu Desert.

    Yellowish sand littered and piled thends to the edge of the horizon and back. Bald eagles that survived by feeding on carcasses had not had a thing to eat for a very long time. They were starved to skin and bones. Their eyes gave off a glint of insane starvation as they constantly circled around in the sky.

    A sand storm whizzed by like a yellow fog, shrouding arge tract of region in fine dust.

    Just as numerous as the sand grains around them were massive lumps of ants. They would move inrge numbers and devour any living thing in their path. Some of the magical beasts that roamed in the deserts couldn¡¯t escape from those ants and were stripped to the bones.

    All throughout the journey, strange and rare skeletons of ferocious beasts could be seen all over the ce. There were unknown dangers lurking everywhere.

    It was the Cmity Church¡¯s rule that every member and visitor had to walk on foot at the desert. As a friendly visitor, Han Shuo observed the Church¡¯s rule. He followed behind Wolf and Burt Zili who chose not to fly but walk as well as they headed deep into the desert.

    There were starving bald eagles constantly circling over their heads. On several asions during their journey some bald eagles that couldn¡¯t endure their hunger any longer took to diving down towards them, but were immediately reduced to ashes by a sh of light.

    However, even so, the remaining starving bald eagles did not disperse. They must have been insanely hungry, as they continued to closely follow after the three.

    ¡°These bald eagles are really annoying. You two have killed seven of them in the journey so far. And yet, they still haven¡¯t learned to be tactful,¡± Han Shuo said indifferently as he raised his head to look at the sky.

    ¡°For your Lordship¡¯s information, in Tu Desert, the primary source of food for these bald eagles are corpses of merchants. However, as the environment in Tu Desert has grown worse and worse over these past few years, with all too many dangers, even the greediest of merchants dare not to traverse the Tu Desert. Hence, these bald eagles did not have anything to eat for a long time and are starving like crazy. It¡¯s very difficult toe by another living soul in this ce. It¡¯d be a wonder if they would leave us alone,¡± Burt Zili smiled and exined to Han Shuo in a fawning manner.

    ¡°I truly never expected your Cmity Church headquarters to actually be at the depths of this deste Tu Desert. Haha, no wonder so many powerhouses on the continent haven¡¯t been able to locate you,¡± Han Shuomented. Since he first stepped into the Tu Desert, he had faced unceasing attacks of all sorts. By now he of course recognized how treacherous the desert was. He felt that Cmity Church had indeed chosen an excellent strategic location.

    ¡°The Tu Desert always has undoubtedly been a mysterious ce, however it was never packed with as many dangers in the past as it is now. As our Church has set up headquarters here, naturally, we wouldn¡¯t want any critters with ulterior motives to learn its location. Of those man-eating ants, bloodsucking bees, and the mutated venomous desert scorpions your Lordship saw along the way, a great majority of them were intentionally produced by us after we established ourselves in the desert.

    With so many dangers lurking in every corner, even the greediest merchant band wouldn¡¯t dare to take the risk toe in. Even if some countriese to learn of our position, due to the hostile environment, they would have no way of assembling armies to encircle and annihte us. After all, the Tu Desert is just too vast. When armies enter the desert, they simply cannot obtain sufficient supplies to sustain themselves. Besides, with so many terrifying animals and nts in the desert, many of them would simply give up on the thought,¡± Wolf smilingly exined.

    Han Shuo nodded in understanding after listening to his words. As the master of the skeletal staff, Han Shuo was aware of a certain point in history from several hundred years ago. He knew that the Cmity Church had done a certain demented thing and turned itself to be the public enemy of the entire Profound Continent. Back then, every country on the continent joined forces to destroy the Cmity Church for good. The Church had no choice but to change its operation mode from open to secretive.

    As the public enemy of the entire Profound Continent, if the Cmity Church¡¯s headquarters were to be discovered, what they would face was likely to be the allied armies of all countries on Profound Continent. Their very careful choice of establishing their headquarters deep in the Tu Desert and taking so much effort to make the desert more dangerous were necessary measures. Otherwise, they would likely have beenpletely eradicated long ago.

    ¡°But the situation on the continent is different now. During these years, some of the countries have be inseparably linked with us. Even if the location of our Cmity Church headquarters was to be revealed, there wouldn¡¯t be too many countries that would participate in crusading against us, except for countries that profess faith in the Light God and are secretly supported by the Church of Light,¡± Wolf said with pride.

    ¡°The Church of Light must know your location, right?¡± asked Han Shuo. The two religious organizations were mortal enemies. Given the influence the Church of Light had on Profound Continent, there was no way that they wouldn¡¯t know where the Cmity Church headquarters was located.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. The Church of Light indeed knows that we are in the Tu Desert. However, just like us not daring to attack the sacred mountain of the Church of Light, they too have never dared tounch major offenses into the Tu Desert. This stalemate hassted for several hundred years,¡± Burt Zili answered. Wolf exined further, ¡°We have managed the Tu Desert for many years and have filled it with untold numbers of all kinds of dangers. Themunchingrge-scale attacks would only be making a rod for their own backs. But if only a few experts attacked, we wouldn¡¯t be afraid of that given our Church¡¯s strength.¡±

    ¡°So that¡¯s the case. It appears that your Cmity Church is mighty indeed. Perhaps the only power on the whole of Profound Continent that could make the Church of Light feel apprehensive is your Church,¡± Han Shuo nodded and praised.

    ¡°Haha, my Lord, you have misspoken. You mean ¡®our¡¯ Cmity Church. Ever since the skeletal staff reappeared with you, the Cmity Church has considered your Lordship as one of our own. It doesn¡¯t matter if you acknowledge that or not, but your Lordship is always one of us. Even the Church of Light considers you so,¡± Burt Ziliughed and said to Han Shuo in a cunning manner. He seemed very proud of himself.

    Han Shuo smiled and did not make anyment on Burt Zili¡¯s words.

    As most of the perils on the Tu Desert were arranged there by the Cmity Church, they had the means of defusing them. Some of the most terrifying creatures such as man-eating ants and bloodsucking bees they met along the way were repelled by Wolf and Burt Zili using a type of exotic incense. While magical beasts that suddenly emerge from sand dunes which would be a nightmare for merchants were effortlessly taken care of by Wolf.

    Although they faced many dangers in their journey, the trio was unimpeded. Enduring the scorching sun hanging over their heads and the searing sand beneath their feet, step by step they walked into the depths of Tu Desert.

    Although the three walked on foot, their moving speed was faster than that of an ordinary person sprinting. They would appreciate the bleak yet majestic scenery of the desert as they walked, or perhaps discuss certain insider matters of the Cmity Church. At a time where the chilling wind of nighttime was blowing wildly, Burt Zili and Wolf suddenly stopped at an enormous field of uneven sand dunes.

    ¡°Why are we stopping?¡± Han Shuo asked confusedly as Wolf and Burt halted in their tracks. There were only big and small uneven sand dunes all around him with no man-made features visible.

    ¡°We have arrived,¡± Wolf smiled and exined.

    Han Shuo raised his eyebrows. Han Shuo, who had been breathing in the beautiful scenery, suddenly unfolded his consciousness. He suddenly began to chuckle. He nodded and said, ¡°So, it¡¯s underground. Oh, I sensed numerous presences of life underground. The facility under there appears to be massive.¡±

    ¡°Your Lordship is indeed extraordinary to be able to sense the situation underground through all those barriers around the headquarters!¡± Burt Zili eximed in admiration. He was aware of just how many concealment boundaries were oveid from the sand dune to the Cmity Church headquarters. Although the Church of Light knew that the Cmity Church headquarters was in the desert, they clearly didn¡¯t think to dig deeper. There had been experts who secretly scouted the desert but they just couldn¡¯t find anything. But amazingly, Han Shuo could immediately detect the situation under meters of sand and barriers the moment he arrived. Burt Zili found this to be highly admirable.

    Han Shuo smiled and closed his eyes to carefully sense for a while. He was shocked and blurted out, ¡°There are several thousand people living down there! It upies such an enormous space! No wonder the Cmity Church could contend against the Church of Light for so long!¡±

    ¡°Your Lordship is impressive!¡± Wolf too was very astonished that Han Shuo could tell the poption number down below when he was still separated byyers uponyers of barriers.

    ¡°Oh? A few people areing up. They have pretty decent strength,¡± Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness sensed that a group of people was ascending from several hundred meters underground. Of the group, there was actually a mighty basegod and a demigod. He knew that the Cmity Church must have some unique method of surveilling the scene on the surface from below.

    ¡°It must be one of the cardinalsing to receive us. Haha, the deeds that your Lordship has conducted these years have just been too sensational. Although your Lordship has never visited our headquarters, many youngsters over here view your Lordship as an idol. You have no idea how much they adore you!¡± Burt Zili eximed in sincere admiration. From his appearance, it was as though he was one among Han Shuo¡¯s fans.

    As Burt Zili fawningly exined, a rumbling came from the sand the three were stepping on. A type of energy spread from underground and a sand dune suddenly flowed outwards before the three. It didn¡¯t take long before the sand dune disappeared to reveal an elevator with the capacity to hold ten people rising to the surface. A big fatty with an extremely robust build upied more than half of the space in the elevator. His small eyes swelled and sparkled as he drooled at Han Shuo and the party beaming ear to ear.

    Han Shuo sensed a mighty energy of destruction from this big fatty¡¯s body. With just one look, Han Shuo was certain that this big fatty was a mighty basegod cultivating in the edict of destruction. Standing behind the big fatty was a skinny, almost ghoulish old man. His body carried an intense element of darkness. Han Shuo knew that he was the demigod that his consciousness picked up on.

    ¡°Your Holiness!¡± Before Han Shuo could move a muscle, Wolf and Burt Zili suddenly kneeled and respectfully saluted.

    Han Shuo was stunned. He did not expect the Pope of the Cmity Church to personally wee him in. It appeared that the Cmity Church definitely took him very seriously.

 Chapter 628: Long time no see

    GDK 628: Long time no see

    ¡°Get up, get up!¡± called out the mountain of a man to the two enthusiastically. Shortly after, he walked off from the elevator and said to Han Shuo with a big cordial smile, ¡°Bryan, you have finallye. We have waited for this day for nearly ten years!¡±

    The big fatty was extremely weing. Although this was his very first time meeting Han Shuo, he behaved as though he had known Han Shuo for ages. He did not disy the default reservation that one normally would when meeting a stranger. This caught Han Shuo by surprise.

    Han Shuo returned the attitude in kind. He too giggled as he said, ¡°I was hunted for a few years, andter fell into Church of Light¡¯s despicable, sneaky trap, therefore I couldn¡¯t find time till now. But hey, here I am!¡±

    ¡°Haha, youth indeed breeds heroism! Ever since the day I first sat in this position, I have wanted to finish off those three old things of the Church of Light. However, I have failed to aplish that goal all through the passing of a few hundred years. But unexpectedly, you, in just the short time of ten or so years, have managed to fulfill our goal. I have no choice but to concede that I¡¯m getting old!¡± When he and his bright face stepped before Han Shuo, it was as though an enormous meaty mountain had shifted to block the scorching sun, leaving a vast shadow on the sand.

    ¡°Then, our goals are identical,¡± Han Shuo said dly.

    ¡°Of course! We are all on the same side. That has been true since the start!¡± the big fatty emphasized,ying down the standpoint for both parties.

    Han Shuo smiled and did not speak. He had never considered himself to be one of the Cmity Church. The Cmity Church, however, for reasons pertaining to the skeletal staff, had recognized him as one of their own since a long time ago. Han Shuo was again left betweenughter and tears.

    ¡°Come, let¡¯s go down. As this is the first time you are visiting our headquarters, I¡¯ll have someone bring you for a stroll around the facility. It¡¯s been a long journeying here and you must be tired. Go take a bath and have a rest. We can talk about businesster when you have gotten yourselffortable,¡± the Pope of the Cmity Church said as he led Han Shuo to the elevator smilingly. Next, he raised his voice and instructed one of the people inside the elevator, ¡°Belinda, you¡¯ve had the chance to get acquainted with Bryan. I will hand this task to you. Serve Bryan well and attend to any need he may have.¡±

    ¡°Understood, your Holiness!¡± thedy that came to the surface along with the big fatty replied respectfully.

    Oval cheeks, a tall, straight nose, and small, rosy red lips. Under her slender, curved brows were a pair of blue eyes as bright as sapphire. She had fair white skin and a graceful and voluptuous figure ¨C all the characteristics that a beauty should have. Unfortunately, the greenish-ck birthmark on her left cheek was just too conspicuous, which greatly impaired her overall attractiveness. She was Belinda, the first member from the Cmity Church that Han Shuo had met.

    Han Shuo felt giggly in his heart to meet this female alchemist again after many years. He still remembered that when he first met Belinda, he was deeply shocked by that golem she produced, as well as many of the previous interactions he had with her.

    The Belinda now appeared to be in fear and reverence when she faced Han Shuo. Back then, she had tried to kill Han Shuo and was subsequently held captive by him for a period of time. But when they met again this time, Han Shuo had be a character that she could not afford to offend. This worried her that Han Shuo might still hold a grudge towards her and therefore take some form of retribution.

    Standing beside Belinda was dark grand magus Edwin. He looked at Han Shuo in an obviously fawning manner, bowed, and cordially said, ¡°Lord Bryan, Belinda and I will take your Lordship to tour and familiarize with the headquarter.¡±

    Just like Belinda, Edwin was one of the first few experts of the Cmity Church that Han Shuo crossed paths with. Back at Sunshine Valley, this dark grand magus used to go great lengths to hunt Han Shuo. He was once reviled by Han Shuo with malicious words.

    Han Shuo looked at the duo who he had not met for many years, nodded at him with a smile, and said, ¡°Long time no see!¡±

    ¡°Long time, indeed. Haha, I thought that your Lordship would have forgotten about nonentities like us!¡± Edwin replied somewhat bitterly.

    ¡°How could I! You two are the first few people I ever met from the Cmity Church. Not so easy to forget something like that.¡±

    ¡°Edwin, serve Bryan well. It is an honor given to you. Do you understand?¡± the ghoulish old man cultivating in the elemental energy of darkness instructed Edwin in a brooding tone. As he possessed demigod strength, his ring had given Edwin a good scare.

    ¡°Understood, master!¡± Edwin replied hastily.

    ¡°Bryan, please,e inside. Make yourself at home. You have always belonged here,¡± after giving Edwin an intimidating reminder, that skinny old man let out a hollowugh, respectfully turned his body to the side and indicated for Han Shuo to enter the elevator. Han Shuo took note of Edwin¡¯s master¡¯s reverent and respectful attitude towards him and walked in there as he nodded smilingly.

    With the Pope of the Cmity Church apanying him in person, Han Shuo and the party slowly descended towards the underground headquarters using the elevator. As he observed the surroundings with his eyes, he used his consciousness to sense the miraculous energies in the boundaries that enclosed the underground structure.

    ¡°This facility was first established a few hundred years ago. During the lowest point of our Church, we faced the onught from every country on Profound Continent lead by the Church of Light. During that time, we had to relocate every so often like a stray dog. For theck of a better option, we finally established ourselves here, and have been staying underground ever since. Haha, but thanks to you, I believe that is going to change very soon. You, as the master of the skeletal staff, are the hope our Church needs,¡± the Pope exined the brief history of this facility as they descended into the ground.

    ¡°The Church of Light¡¯s reputation and fame have fallen disastrously these days. Their grasp on Profound Continent is steadily deteriorating. Other than that so-called ¡®Saintess¡¯ on their sacred mountain, they likely do not have any outstanding expert to use. I believe that it won¡¯t be long before they are finished,¡± Han Shuo calmly conversed with the Pope. They looked like two old friends.

    ¡°Yes, all thanks to you!¡± The big fatty tactfully praised Han Shuo. As the Pope of the Cmity Church, this big fatty was outstanding in his conducts and ways of dealing with people. He was very discerning in his speech. ¡°You are wee!¡± Han Shuo replied.

    Han Shuo and the Pope happily chatted as the elevator they were in descended hundreds of meters. It finally arrived before a majestic doorway to an underground pce.

    Upon arrival, the big fatty did not continue chatting with Han Shuo. He told him, ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll let Belinda and Edwin take you on a tour to familiarize yourself with this ce. I¡¯m going to inform the cardinals of your arrival. We can talk proper business tomorrow after you have properly rested.¡±

    ¡°Sure!¡± Han Shuo nodded. He was indifferent towards the arrangement.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness covered an extensive area, he already had some idea of the scale of the headquarters. Even the distribution of members inside the facility was clear to him under the probing of his consciousness. Although he had not surveyed thepound with his own eyes, he felt like he already know this ce.

    When the Pope and the slightly-built old man left, Wolf and Burt Zili followed after. They were probably going to report to the fatty about some of the things that happened outside. Edwin and Belinda appeared rather reserved when all these people disappeared. Their gazes towards Han Shuo were somewhat anxious and panicky. They were nervous and seemed to be at a loss for how they should interact with Han Shuo.

    Before, the duo wouldn¡¯t have been so uneasy when facing Han Shuo. However, the gap of identity and status between them now was just too great. They had no choice but to be very careful.

    ¡°This... Erm... Lord Bryan, where would you like to visit first?¡± Edwin said with a flustered smile as he looked at Han Shuo withplicated emotions in his eyes.

    Han Shuo easily discerned that Edwin was in an awkward position and knew Edwin was worried about him still holding grudges for what he did back in those years. Belinda was the same. All along, she didn¡¯t even have the courage to look Han Shuo in the eyes. In recent years, she had unavoidably heard about the glorious achievements of Han Shuo¡¯s. She felt bitter as she watched Han Shuo stride giant step by giant step towards the pinnacle of glory.

    ¡°Guys, do you really have to be so overcautious with me? After all, we could be considered acquaintances. Those things you did back then weren¡¯t that serious. Besides, I did not get injured or lose a hair because of that. What are you guys so afraid of?¡± Han Shuo asked as he smirked.

    Upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, the two forced smiles on their faces. Edwin again respectfully bowed at Han Shuo and earnestly said, ¡°Lord Bryan, what we each did before was indeed wrong. But when weter learned that your Lordship is in possession of the skeletal staff, we no longer dared to have any intentions of causing you harm. The Church of Light is our mortal enemy, and I had an immense blood debt with that Ferguson your Lordship killed. I couldn¡¯t be more grateful to your Lordship for killing Ferguson, not to mention all those experts of the Church of Light you ughtered. If your Lordship wishes to pursue matters we did back then, we will raise no objection.¡±

    ¡°Yes, you are the hope for the Church, a character that even his Holiness the Pope would personally wee. We will not resist, nor could we resist. Just do whatever you want to do to us,¡± Belinda said with a low voice, asking Han Shuo to mete out the punishment like a sheep waiting to be ughtered.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but burst intoughter. He shook his head and smilingly said, ¡°I have long forgotten about those trivial matters. I didn¡¯t expect that you would still be haunted by them, and so deeply at that. Be at ease. Given my identity and strength now, how could I put you two to trouble for something so insignificant? You have been worrying for nothing!¡±

    Upon hearing those words, their faces lit up. They carefully lifted their eyes onto Han Shuo and noticed that Han Shuo didn¡¯t look like he was joking. They let out a sigh of relief before hastily expressing their gratitude. ¡°Thank you, my Lord. Thank you, my Lord!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go. I want to have a good look at this ce. This is my first time in the Cmity Church and I¡¯m rather curious,¡± Han Shuo said, smiling as to dispel the nervousness of the two.

    All three of them knew that their attitudes towards each other had obviously changed because of their majorly contrasting identities. The two who used to behave arrogantly before Han Shuo now carried fawning smiles on their faces. They exined the circumstances of this ce in detail and did everything they could to avoid Han Shuo¡¯s displeasure in any aspect.

 Chapter 629: Itâ€™d be too easy for me to just off you like tha

    GDK 629: It¡¯d be too easy for me to just off you like that

    The Cmity Church headquarters was several hundred meters under the desert. Itspound was as vast as the sands. Compared to the Dark Mantle headquarters, not only was this facility infinitely bigger, it also had much tighter security. It was much like a mini city.

    Although they were underground, the space did not appear eerie dark as Han Shuo had imagined. Bright magical illumination balls could be found at every corner, lighting up every inch of the surface. The facility was separated into several units. There were cksmith workshops for refining all kinds of weapons and magical instruments, temples for consecrating and worshipping the evil god, training grounds for meditation and martial arts training, libraries where all kinds of ancient magical tomes could be found, storerooms containing precious and rare materials on magical beasts umted over hundreds of years...

    This ce had everything that a solid religious organization should have. Other than those essential facilities, there were amenities for rxation and resting. For instance, there was a bathhouse with pools of hot groundwater where people could rx their muscles, and an expansive promenadeplete with patterns of countless unnamed evil gods carved into the walls where people could socialize and discuss their cultivation.

    Although the Cmity Church was a stringent organization, the people in this ce did not appear heavy and down. Han Shuo, with a formal smile on his face, followed behind Belinda and Edwin who lead him through every region. He even tried out the hot bath and got a change of clothes. He was absolutely unwound.

    As those members of the Cmity Church that Han Shuo met along the way were not aware of his identity, they did not make a mor.

    Han Shuo carefully observed around for a moment. He noticed that all those members of the Cmity Church he came across all seemedpletelycent, almost to the point of delight. It was as though they had met with something happy. This got Han Shuo curious. He didn¡¯t hesitate to ask Belinda beside him, ¡°Did something joyous recently happen to the Cmity Church? Why is it that all those people we passed by appear quite happy?¡±

    Belinda was somewhat stunned. She gave Han Shuo a meaningful look and made a rather awkward smile before exining in her sweet voice, ¡°The reason they are all so happy, is you!¡±

    ¡°Me?¡± Han Shuo was shocked. He asked, ¡°What has that got to do with me?¡±

    ¡°Because of you, not only is the Church of Light now far weaker than ever before, they are trending towardsplete and utter destruction. To us members of the Cmity Church who view the Church of Light as a mortal enemy, nothing can get more exciting than this news. In addition, they caught wind of your ns toe here. You are an idol to everyone here; all of them want to meet you. Naturally, they grew even more excited when they learned of the news,¡± Belinda earnestly exined to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Furthermore, because of the Church of Light¡¯s existence, we have been forced to live in the dark all this while. Generally, we wouldn¡¯t dare to openly state our identity before themoners. But now, as the Church of Light¡¯s grip has sharply declined, ording to His Holiness the Pope, it won¡¯t be long before our Cmity Church will truly emerge from the shadows and can honorably walk on the surface of the continent.

    People like us may have surrendered everything we had to the Church, but we still have family and friends. Normally, we would deliberately conceal our identities from them and live an exhausting double life. There are some who don¡¯t have the courage to see their family for years, while some have even been disowned by their family. But the situation this time is truly different. For these people, the sooner the Church can walk out from the shadows, the sooner they can return to their homes and families. That¡¯s why everyone looks so happy,¡± Edwin added to the exnation while wearing a satisfied smile before thanking Han Shuo sincerely.

    After giving those words a thought, Han Shuo finally understood. Because of the Church of Light¡¯s defamation, the Cmity Church became the public enemy of the continent. These disciples who devoted their all to Cmity Church also had parents and family. However, as the public was swayed to oppose the Cmity Church, these members of the Church were afraid of revealing their identities to the people close to them. Meanwhile, those whose identities had been exposed dared not to make contact with their loved ones and had to spend their days away from them. This was surely a painful experience.

    ¡°Huh? What is this ce?¡± Following behind Edwin and Belinda, Han Shuo came to a region with a coarse architectural style which was sealed off by a big, dark door made of iron.

    The reason he asked was he could sense the presence of a basegod and two demigods behind that dark iron door. Han Shuo had only noticed the presences of these experts when he got close. For some reason, the presences even felt rather familiar. Han Shuo¡¯s curiosity was piqued.

    Ka Ka! Before Edwin or Belinda replied, that heavy iron door swung open. A gloomy, cold and unfeeling aura roared directly in his face. An alien that Han Shuo was most familiar with walked out from behind that door ¨C it was the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race!

    During an excursion to Tarrag Canyon a while back, Han Shuo, Stratholme the old monster and Snow Celestial Tiana ganged up and plundered several elemental Origin Crystals from the Soul Race. They were being pursued by the six-horned tribal king who suddenly emerged in the middle of their heist. They were chased all the way to the sacred mountain of the Church of Light but managed to make an escape thanks to the sudden appearance of Saintess of the Church of Light. Han Shuo and Stratholme spent the following days in fear, deeply afraid that they would be caught before they could fuse their souls with the Origin Crystals.

    However, having an extraordinary consciousness, Han Shuoter found a method of concealing his soul from the tribal king¡¯s tracking. Furthermore, he had even deliberately broadcasted his soul energy to bait the six-horned tribal king to the Shrine of Ice. However, en-route, when this six-horned tribal king arrived at the territories of Ang Empire, he had, for whatever reason, ceased to chase Han Shuo, who was waiting for him at the Shrine of Ice.

    After Han Shuo took care of things at the Shrine of Ice, he decided to return to Lancelot Empire, on his journey which he encountered the Primordius Dragon at Dragon Valley right in the lush of the Dark Forest. There, he was betrayed by the Primordius Dragon and the Church of Light and was cast to the Abyss realm. After returning to Profound Continent, he was busied with matters rted to Lancelot Empire and exacting vengeance, and neglected this enemy. Never would he have expected to bump into this six-horned tribal king at the Cmity Church headquarters. Han Shuo thought about the unique position of this facility within Ang Empire and traced back the position where he sensed the six-horned tribal king to be those five years prior. Just like that, everything became clear to him. He blurted out, ¡°Ah-hah! It appears that five years ago, either you fought with the Pope or something happened here!¡±

    When the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race walked out, his two five-horned subordinates followed behind. At the sound of Han Shuo¡¯s voice, the tribal king showed a sense of befuddlement behind the fa?ade of his ice-cold unfeeling eyes. He looked at Han Shuo up and down for a long while before asking Han Shuo using themonnguage he wasn¡¯t quite fluent with, ¡°Who are you? Do I know you?¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned for a moment but soon came to his senses. As his strength had been advanced by leap and bounds in the recent years, especially as his consciousness transformed after he entered the Nine Changes realm, his soul profile must have changed dramatically since theirst encounter. This six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race must not have been good at distinguishing human faces, simr to how Han Shuo couldn¡¯t see much differences in magical beasts of the same species.

    Han Shuo recalled how sullen he was when facing the tribal king back then. He slowly altered his consciousness and transformed his soul profile to mimic the strength and condition he used to be in. He smiled mischievously as he gazed at the six-horned tribal king, ¡°Recognize me now?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s you! That petty thief who stole my stuff!¡± the six-horned tribal king coldly shouted. He was all too familiar with that soul profile of Han Shuo¡¯s.

    Petty thief? Han Shuo shook his head and involuntarilyughed. For all these years, he had received numerous appetions. For example, ¡®demon king¡¯, ¡®devil¡¯, and ¡®the biggest heretic on Profound Continent¡¯. But this was the first time anyone had called him a ¡®petty thief¡¯. Han Shuo was truly betweenughter and tears.

    However, the more he thought about it, it wasn¡¯t that surprising that this tribal king would call him so. Back then, Han Shuo and his party had indeed behaved like petty thieves. They went in and stole several origin crystals that belonged to the six-horned tribal king before he could emerge. What else should they be called other than petty little thieves?

    After letting out that cold shout, before Han Shuo could say another word, the six-horned tribal king that flew into rage suddenly charged over. His python-like tail that gave off that loud buzzing ferociously whipped at Han Shuo as he directlyunched the same old piercing soul attack at Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    However, after so many years had passed, Han Shuo was no longer the same person who had to flee in panic. Against the six-horned tribal king who hadn¡¯t evolved much, not only was Han Shuo not afraid, he appearedpletely unruffled. With a raise of his hand, he caught the six-horned tribal king¡¯s tail as it flung at him. There he stood, as stable as a boulder. His consciousness too remained intact and unharmed by the six-horned tribal king¡¯s attack.

    Even till this day, Han Shuo had no idea what energy this six-horned tribal king of Soul Race cultivated in. All he knew was that his strength could be approximated by counting the number of horns on his head. Han Shuo reckoned that the energy likely had something to do with the special ability of his race.

    ¡°How, how did you get so strong so suddenly?¡± The six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race was startled when the dual attack on the body and soul was easily intercepted by Han Shuo. He stammered as he cried out in surprise.

    Han Shuoughed mischievously. The demonic yuan in his body suddenly erupted. His other free hand shot out at lightning speed and dug into the tribal king¡¯s neck in an instant. He sent his enormous body straight against the dark ironstone wall right behind him and locked him firmly in ce.

    Cling! The Demonic des were unfurled and stuck into the wall next to the six-horned tribal king¡¯s neck. The frosty aura that the des gave off made the six-horned tribal king afraid of budging even by a hair¡¯s breadth.

    ¡°As of now, it¡¯d be too easy for me to just off you like that. Do you understand?¡± Han Shuo said indifferently as he looked at the six-horned tribal king with a smirk.

    The fear showing in the tribal king¡¯s eyes grew more and more intense. He stared straight into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes for a few seconds before nodding in a stupefied manner.

    ¡°Good. Then you better behave yourself. Let¡¯s have a chat!¡± Han Shuo saidposedly, letting go of his big hand pressing against his neck.

 Chapter 630: Petty Thief

    GDK 630: Petty Thief

    All this took ce in just the fraction of a second. Belinda and Edwin didn¡¯t even realize what was happening until it was well over. All they saw was that the six-horned tribal king was suddenly pinned down by Han Shuo and unable to move a muscle!

    After letting go of the tribal king, Han Shuo calmly looked at the tribal king still nailed to the wall and maintaining the same posture. Strange lights were flickering from the six-horned tribal king¡¯s eyes. He looked to be in deep thought.

    ¡°Lord Bryan, this is our honored guest!¡± Edwin suddenly came to his senses and stuttered to Han Shuo.

    Belinda looked deeply and attentively at Han Shuo withplicated emotions in her eyes. Her heart was filled with bitterness as she came to witness just how different Han Shuo had be. When this six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race caused havoc to the Cmity Church headquarters five years ago, Belinda just so happened to be there. She had witnessed with her very own eyes the scene in which this six-horned tribal king stood high and tall even as he faced the Pope and several other cardinals. She was very clear as to just how mighty this six-horned tribal king was.

    However, it was precisely this very same alien race expert who was being held down by Han Shuo so suddenly. Furthermore, this alien expert had even calmly admitted to the fact that he was inferior to Han Shuo. Belinda was appalled.

    It had merely been a dozen or so years. How could this person be so inconceivably mighty?

    Belinda felt even more fearful the more she thought about it. She was further humbled for the fear she might do something inappropriate and cause Han Shuo¡¯s displeasure.

    ¡°Honored guest?¡± Han Shuo looked at the six-horned tribal king smilingly, kept silent for a moment, and nodded as he said, ¡°That makes sense. You wouldn¡¯t be here unless you have built a rtionship with the church.¡±

    The six-horned tribal king maintained a pondering posture for a long time before turning his gaze on Han Shuo again and asked him in that slightly inarticte voice, ¡°You, how did you get so powerful so quickly? Why do you have three souls?¡±

    Han Shuo was shocked. He also appeared rather surprised as he asked, ¡°How did you know I have three souls?¡±

    The two souls of Han Shuo¡¯s avatars were stored inside Han Shuo¡¯s body. Supposedly, when his avatars were still inside his body, no one was able to detect their presences. However, it only took this six-horned tribal king a moment of careful observation before he managed to discern that Han Shuo had three souls living as one. He could not believe it!

    ¡°People of my race are born with remarkable sensitivity towards the soul. The reason that I could sense your position anywhere on the continent back then was thanks to this unique ability,¡± the six-horned tribal king kept silent for a moment before he looked coldly at Han Shuo and replied.

    The two five-horned aliens of the Soul Race standing behind Han Shuo constantly sent meaningful nces at their tribal king. They seemed to be suggesting that the three of them join forces and attack Han Shuo.

    ¡°No need for that. We cannot harm him even if we cooperate!¡± The six-horned tribal king obviously understood what his two subordinates were hinting at and coldly said to the two. The two penta-horned aliens with eager faces immediately stopped making signals with their eyes and revealed looks of disappointment and helplessness.

    ¡°Don¡¯t you try anything stupid. No matter what the agreement you may have reached with the Church, it will pose me no issue to kill you all!¡± Han Shuo may have looked rxed but his tone alone could kill. He then nced at the anxious-looking Edwin and smilingly said, ¡°As long as they behave themselves and answer a few of my questions, I wouldn¡¯t do a thing to them!¡±

    ¡°My Lord, this, this... ¡° Edwin didn¡¯t know what to do. He was terrified to offend Han Shuo. But at the same time, the six-horned tribal king was an honored guest and could not be neglected either. Han Shuo was very infamous on Profound Continent for his atrocities. Given his identity, the Pope would definitely not put the me on him. However, a grand magus as puny as himself would likely have to suffer the consequences if anything bad happened. He had every reason to be worried.

    ¡°If I say it¡¯s alright then it¡¯s alright!¡± Han Shuo stiffened up when Edwin reacted so faint-heartedly. He coldly instructed, ¡°Just stand and watch from the side, I don¡¯t need any of your advice!¡±

    Edwin and Belinda who were about to give words of persuasion were simultaneously startled when they saw Han Shuo suddenly grow cold. They felt as though they could lose their lives at any moment and so they immediately shut their mouths tight and tactfully said not another word.

    ¡°Okay. We can have a proper talk now,¡± Han Shuo smiled at the six-horned tribal king and walked to the wide open iron doorposedly. As though he was walking into his own home, Han Shuo showed not the slightest reservation.

    The two experts of the Soul Race standing in the doorway automatically turned their bodies to the side and made way for the imposing Han Shuo, granting Han Shuo an unimpeded entry into the spacious stone chamber.

    This chamber was inly decorated and did not house any fancy ornaments. There were only one magical illumination sphere and several big, smooth, and leveled stones. The room appeared very crude and rudimentary. This ought to have something to do with the preferences of these aliens. Otherwise, given the financial and physical resources of the Cmity Church, this ce wouldn¡¯t have needed to be so simple and crude.

    After walking into the chamber in a grandiose manner, Han Shuo took a nce around the chamber, sat on arge stone at the center, and looked at the aliens in all smiles. The six-horned tribal king looked at Han Shuo, nodded at his two penta-horned subordinates, and entered the chamber with them. The six-horned tribal king then sat on another stone opposite to Han Shuo with his tail curled around his waist.

    Meanwhile, the two penta-horned experts of the Soul Race, Edwin, and Belinda, stood aside while watching the two silently.

    ¡°Even if you are mightier than I am, I¡¯m not afraid of you!¡± the six-horned tribal king looked at Han Shuo coldly and said mechanically. He appeared apathetic and did not disy much emotion that a human normally would.

    Han Shuo actually believed his words because even as he had demonstrated his overwhelming strength, this six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race did not reveal the slightest bit of fear. They were cold-blooded in nature and unemotional towards everyone. After going to the Abyss realm, Han Shuo gained some understanding of certain alien races. He understood that they weren¡¯t as afraid of death as humans were.

    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter if you are afraid of me or not. What matters is that I have the power to kill you! Hehe, I believe that you must have your own business to aplish. You possess high-level intelligence and shouldn¡¯t actively seek death,¡± Han Shuo replied.

    ¡°What is it that you want? You should know, it is you who first stole our stuff that I went after you!¡± the six-horned tribal king had a t, smooth, and cold tone. He would have the same voice no matter what he was saying. He did not disy much changes in mood.

    ¡°I just want to ask you a few questions, nothing more.¡± Han Shuo took a short pause before asking, ¡°What energy do you people cultivate in?¡±

    ¡°It doesn¡¯t belong to any of the twelve fundamental forces. Our body is innately gifted in that we have great sensitivity towards the soul and are born physically mighty. We do not need to meticulously cultivate but have to evolve through certain unique energies. As we evolve, the number of horns on our heads increases. Each round of sessful evolution will let us form one additional horn and our strength and soul subsequently be mightier.¡± The six-horned tribal king kept silent for a short while as though weighing if he should answer Han Shuo¡¯s questions. But soon after, as though he hade to a decision, he answered.

    Upon hearing those words, Han Shuo seemed to have suddenly seen the light. He softly cried, ¡°So that¡¯s the case! Those Origin Crystals that we acquired back at Tarrag Canyon, are those the energies you people need to evolve?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s ¡®stole¡¯! You all stole!¡± the six-horned tribal king corrected Han Shuo. His gazes towards Han Shuo had a few traces of humanly resentment. Only then did he answer, ¡°That¡¯s right. Those are the energies we can absorb. I had finally found them after searching for many years. I was preparing to use that energy to let another of my people evolve a sixth horn. But you guys wrecked it.¡±

    Han Shuo was shocked. He had no knowledge that the people of this race only evolved by absorbing energy. Han Shuo felt rather amused when he saw this tribal king, who rarely revealed any emotion, showed grievance. He said, ¡°It¡¯s just a few elemental Origin Crystals, not anything particrly valuable. It¡¯s been so many years, do you have to constantly keep it in mind?¡±

    ¡°We have only managed to collect those after searching for many years. But you petty thieves stole it from us during the critical moment. You people are scum among scum!¡± the six-horned tribal king looked eyes with Han Shuo. He didn¡¯t seem to understand the situation as he bluntly revealed his murderous intention to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo actually felt embarrassed to hear the tribal king being so mindful of those Origin Crystal and constantlyining that he stole his things. When Han Shuo thought about it now, he and his gang had indeed conducted the raid out of greed. They went in to snatch their possessions while the six-horned tribal king was busy deploying something, stealing away the chance for his people to evolve. Whichever way one spun it, Han Shuo and his gang were in the wrong. The six-horned tribal king was right in calling them petty thieves.

    But nheless, Han Shuo felt displeased to be called a petty thief. He coldly groaned, saying, ¡°Can you not say ¡®petty thief¡¯ every time you open your mouth? It¡¯s just a few broken crystals. Is it even worth remembering for all these years?¡±

    ¡°If you return them, then I will stop calling you that!¡± The six-horned tribal king was quite an amusing one. He wasn¡¯t afraid of death but persisted in taking back what was rightfully his.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment and a thought crossed his mind. He silently checked the items inside his space ring. Afterward, the space ring gave off a sh and several crystals of different colors materialized in his hand. Among them were an Origin Crystal of Water and a divine essence of fire. Han Shuo collected these crystals from that valley inside the Void and had no use for them.

    ¡°Here, see if there¡¯s anything you can use. I will give it to you aspensation,¡± Han Shuo opened his palm and revealed the crystal to the six-horned tribal king.

    The six-horned tribal king turned his expressionless gaze at it and immediately froze in ce. For the first time ever, strange lights appeared in his cruel and merciless eyes. Han Shuo knew that those radiances screamed exhration and excitement!

 Chapter 631: Value

    GDK 631: Value

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t alone on this; even Edwin and Belinda standing not far away could tell the obvious change on the six-horned tribal king¡¯s face. They were puzzled on how those few colorful rocks in Han Shuo¡¯s hand could make the usually emotionless six-horned tribal king so excited all so suddenly.

    Han Shuo observed the glint flickering off the six-horned tribal king¡¯s eyes in all smiles. He was rather amused by the tribal king at this moment. ¡°So, what do you say? Is there anything of use to you?¡± Han Shuo asked in a teasing manner.

    ¡°It would seem!¡± the six-horned tribal king bluntly answered. Right after that, with great difficulty, the six-horned tribal king shifted his gaze from Han Shuo¡¯s palm, and stared at his face for a few seconds in silence before he asked, ¡°Those, those words you said just now, are they for real?¡±

    ¡°What words?¡± Han Shuo tried to rify even though he already knew the answer.

    ¡°Words aboutpensating me!¡± the six-horned tribal king said as he looked at Han Shuo in a deadly earnest manner. His voice sounded somewhat pressing. His behavior at this moment seemed greatly inconsistent with how he had behaved in the past.

    ¡°Of course. Tell me, which one of these could bestpensate the losses you incurred thest time?¡± The crystals in his hand all originated from the Void. Han Shuo could recognize some of them, but some, Han Shuo didn¡¯t even know what function they served. However, as these crystals were acquired from the Void, they had to be items left behind by those deceased gods. Items carried around by gods were hardly ever anything mediocre; Han Shuo was certain of it.

    Normally quick to respond, the six-horned tribal king became hesitant as Han Shuo spoke. There were tiny speckles that leapt about in his eyes, deeply focused on Han Shuo¡¯s palm. He seemed to be contemting a major problem. From his performance so far, Han Shuo was certain that there were at least a few crystals that greatly piqued the interest of the six-horned tribal king.

    The two penta-horned aliens standing behind the six-horned tribal king were motionless. They seemed to have sunken into a daze with their gazes tightly fixed on Han Shuo¡¯s palm. It appeared that they too were deeply shaken. After a long, long while, the six-horned tribal king finally came to a decision. He extended his hand, pointed at a stone the size of goose egg that sparkled with a green shimmer, and said resolutely, ¡°Well, this one it is!¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment and carefully observed the greenish stone. Each and every stone in his palm had some fluctuation of energy waves within them, which Han Shuo could detect. And yet, Han Shuo had no idea as to specifically what function the misty green stone had. Han Shuo was intrigued to observe that the six-horned tribal king appeared to be very excited when he pointed at that stone.

    ¡°If you can tell me the function of this stone, I will give it to you,¡± Han Shuo said after thinking for a moment.

    ¡°Green Oceandew Crystal. For people of my race, this crystal could extend the reach of our souls. It¡¯s very precious!¡± the six-horned tribal king hesitated for a moment before answering.

    ¡°Take it. Whatever debt between us is now written off. If I hear you shout ¡®petty thief¡¯ once more, I will happily beat the crap out of you!¡± Han Shuo kept the name of the stone in his mind. He simply handed over the stone, which he had no use for.

    The six-horned tribal king was trembling slightly when he received the misty-green stone from Han Shuo. After carefully putting it away, he closed his eyes for a moment. Then, as soon as he opened his eyes, he assured Han Shuo, ¡°Fine! I will make no mention of that anymore!¡±

    Edwin and Belinda, who appeared rather nervous all along, finally heaved a sigh of relief at this moment. As long as there was no conflict between Han Shuo and the six-horned tribal king, the Pope of Cmity Church would noty any me on them. Their objective was to make Han Shuofortable and at home. Seeing that the tension between Han Shuo and the six-horned tribal king had greatly reduced, their moods naturally loosened up.

    ¡°Good, we will never talk about it again. Now I want to know, back then, why is it that you did note to me when I provoked you?¡± Han Shuo asked because he had always felt that the six-horned tribal king¡¯s absence at the Shrine of Ice before was truly regrettable.

    ¡°As I stumbled through this ce, I was attacked by these people. That¡¯s why I was stuck here.¡± The six-horned tribal king¡¯s exnation had confirmed Han Shuo¡¯s hypothesis.

    ¡°So that was indeed the case,¡± Han Shuo nodded and muttered.

    Han Shuo had learned everything he wanted to know from the six-horned tribal king. Given this tribal king¡¯s presence at this facility, he surely must have reached some sort of agreement with the Cmity Church. To Han Shuo, the six-horned tribal king at present was merely another character that he could beat to a pulp if he wanted to and Han Shuo didn¡¯t take him as a threat at all.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, take me to my quarters. I want to rest,¡± after stretching his body, Han Shuo nced and calmly instructed at the extremely deferential Edwin and Belinda standing beside him.

    They were deeply afraid that a conflict may arise between Han Shuo and the six-horned tribal king. They couldn¡¯t be more eager for Han Shuo to leave from this ce. They humbly bowed and hastily showed him the way.

    Han Shuo did not find out what the Cmity Church had arranged for him next. Edwin and Belinda led him to a spacious chamber located not far from the six-horned tribal king. Unlike the six-horned tribal king¡¯s crude chamber, Han Shuo¡¯s chamber wasvish andplete with any amenity he could need. Han Shuo even got the impression that he was staying inside a glorious pce.

    After dismissing Edwin and Belinda, Han Shuo did not indulge himself in thefortable environment. Instead, he sat cross-legged on the bed, conveniently deploying an istion barrier that would give him absolute privacy, and withdrew the Holy Grail that he obtained from the Light Pope.

    ¡°You finally thought to look for me,¡± right after Han Shuo grasped the Holy Grail, that very unlucky cultivator of the edict of space trapped inside transmitted a message to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oh, I have been somewhat busy recently. Nearly forgot about your existence,¡± Han Shuo replied apologetically and got straight to the point, ¡°Were you aware of the Overgod of Destruction and Overgod of Death joining hands?¡±

    ¡°Of course. To obtain even mightier divine energies, the two Overgods mobilized their subordinates to unleash havoc on every material ne they could get their hands on. That has never stopped. Everyone knows about this. Why are you asking me this?¡± the soul inside the Holy Grail questioned, clearly puzzled.

    ¡°How much do you understand about the Overgods of Death and Destruction?¡± Han Shuo continued to ask.

    The soul inside the Holy Grail kept silent for a moment before it transmitted, ¡°I cannot assess the Overgods based on my feelings. Beings of such level are beyond ourprehension. But based on the rumors, these two Overgods are extremely wild and selfish. They have no misgivings about doing anything that would benefit themselves. They also seek revenge for the smallest grievances and are very protective of their subjects, even if they are in the wrong. They possess extensive influence over all major material nes. Apart from the other few Overgods, no one would dare to provoke them.¡±

    Han Shuo thought for a moment and finally decided to tell him the current circumstances. As this soul was trapped in the Holy Grail, Han Shuo believed that he wouldn¡¯t be able to y any tricks. As a god cultivating in the edict of space, having roamed about all major material nes, Han Shuo reckoned that he ought to possess extraordinary foresight. Hence, Han Shuo asked for his opinion.

    After keeping silent for a short while, Han Shuo exined his current situation to the soul inside the Holy Grail. After Han Shuo finished, the being inside the Grail kept silent as if to think about what Han Shuo had told him. But after some time, he replied, ¡°Well, from your words, you basically have no second option. There are always grievances between the Overgods, therefore the high-level material nes have never seen peace. Given your current strength, not only are you incapable of protecting this continent by yourself, you might even be in great danger. Your decision can be considered wise. To temporarily attach yourself to a greater power before you havee to possess sufficient strength is definitely a way out. In addition, the Overgods of Death and Destruction are infamous for defending their subordinates even when they are in the wrong. If you could obtain their trust and favor, not only is your safety mostly ensured, you might even gain a myriad of benefits!¡±

    ¡°So, you mean to say that there won¡¯t be a problem with my method?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    ¡°There¡¯s no problem with the method, but there¡¯s one thing that you must pay attention to ¨C although the two Overgods are extremely protective of their subordinates, they only behave so towards those showing potential or capacity. The experts under them have the same mentality. No matter who you reach an agreement with, you must demonstrate your value within a short period of time, make them feel that you are worthy of being taken under their wing. If they consider you to be of no value, they will not look after you and you will just be dispensable cannon fodder,¡± the soul inside the Holy Grail paused for a short moment before warning Han Shuo, giving him a clue about how those in high in power worked.

    Han Shuo nodded his head heavily after listening to him. Having taken his time to slowly digest those words, Han Shuo smiled and transmitted, ¡°I think I understand what you mean now. On another note, we have known each other for so long but I don¡¯t know your name yet.¡±

    ¡°McKinley,¡± the voice inside the Grail replied.

    ¡°Pleasure. I¡¯m Han Shuo. Alright, I need some time to properly digest all this. Goodbye for now. I will look for you if I run into something.¡± Before McKinley could reply, Han Shuo put away the Holy Grail and spent a long time reflecting on his decision.

    Just like the Cemetery of Death, neither sunlight nor moonlight could enter the underground facility. Time didn¡¯t seem to exist down there. Han Shuo felt that he had only been in his head for a short while before Wolf and Burt Zili came to invite him away.

    ¡°His Holiness the Pope has informed the cardinals of your arrival. They are currently waiting for you in the main hall. We are here to invite and lead your Lordship over,¡± Wolf said as he walked. After a short pause, seeing that no one was around them, Wolf hesitated for a moment before he snitched to Han Shuo, ¡°The eldest cardinal in the Church seems to be displeased about your arrival. He was the only other existence in the Church as powerful as the Pope. He cultivates in necromancy magic. He is advocating the cardinals to demand that you hand over the skeletal staff or else have it stripped from you, saying that your aplishments were all dependent on the skeletal staff.¡±

    ¡°Oh? Interesting. Well, we¡¯ll see about that!¡± Han Shuo sneered.

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 Chapter 632: Cunning

    GDK 632: Cunning

    As Han Shuo headed for the Cardinals¡¯ Hall, Wolf described everything about the eldest cardinal to Han Shuo in great detail. Han Shuo felt sick to the stomach just hearing about the cardinal, having not even met him.

    This cardinal named Kironlo had not just helped establish the Cmity Church. In fact, the whole reason that the entire Profound Continent joined forces in cracking down on the Cmity Church several hundred years ago was entirely thanks to this very person!

    Why? Because back then, he had indiscriminately released the ¡®gue¡¯ all over the Profound Continent, turningmoners of many countries into undead creatures overnight. The gue was a type of infectious necromancy disease. Those who were infected by the gue would turn into zombies, and they would subsequently spread the disease further by biting other people.

    Thanks to that nutjob Kironlo, who released the gue in each country, turning a great number of the popce into creatures of the undead, every single nation on the Continent was outraged. Before that deranged act of Kironlo¡¯s, although the Cmity Church¡¯s reputation on Profound Continent wasn¡¯t as great as that of the Church of Light, it was still highly respected. Members of the Cmity Church back then could stand with much pride among the rest of the continent.

    However, after the gue went viral, every country was panic-stricken and their attitudes towards the Cmity Church turned hostile. Consequently, the Cmity Church became the public enemy of the whole of Profound Continent.

    During the battle against the gue, the Church of Light mobilized all of their white priests and toured each and every country. They exhausted a great amount of energy in purifying the masses of undead creatures infected with the gue.

    It was also during that period that the Church of Light, which was then just a small religious organization, seized the once in a blue moon opportunity and climbed to the top spot as the number one religion on Profound Continent. Meanwhile, the Cmity Church became loathed and despised by all countries and had to flee into constant hiding. It was also around that period that this underground headquarters of the Cmity Church was established.

    Kironlo, the main culprit of the catastrophe, was very lucky not to lose his life. Although some of those in the Church held grievances about his actions, as Kironlo was one of the eldest seniors of the Church and the Church¡¯s existence was critically threatened at that time, they decided to exercise patience. In the aftermath, Kironlo, too, had recognized the detrimental effects his unspeakable actions alone had brought on the Cmity Church. In the following hundreds of years, he lived a reclusive life and stayed far away from affairs about the Church.

    Kironlo was incredibly mighty to begin with. His painstaking cultivation during his hundreds of years of seclusion had allowed him to progress even further. He became one of the mightiest ancient existences of the Church. Kironlo¡¯s current influence within the Church was second only to the Pope as many core members of the Church had previously received coaching from Kironlo. The lengthy passing of time had effectively pushed any memory of his grave mistake into the deep, dark annals of history. After keeping low-profile for many years, when he saw that the Church of Light was on the brink of destruction, he decided to emerge and stir up havoc yet again.

    The Cardinals¡¯ Hall was located at the center of Cmity Church headquarters. The hall had a solemn and heavy atmosphere. There was a bright magicalmp hanging from the ceiling made of dark stone and patterns of various evil gods carved onto every inch of the walls around them. Comfortable hides of some magical beasts wereid over the hard stone seats. White bones arranged into bizarre shapes were ced at the four corners of the Cardinals¡¯ Hall.

    When Han Shuo entered the hall, the dozen or so cardinals and that big fatty Pope had their gazes focused on Han Shuo. They were all of varying strengths. The mightiest was a basegod, while the weakest were sacred grades. They all looked extremely old and gave off an intense aura of wickedness while their eyes glittered either cruel, sinister, or unfeeling radiances.

    Apart from the big fat Pope, there were altogether thirteen cardinals. Among them, one was a basegod, three were demigods, and the rest were all sacred-grade experts. Most of them cultivated in the energy of death, darkness, destruction, and summoning.

    Wolf had described Kironlo¡¯s appearance to Han Shuo beforehand. But without even deliberately sensing using his consciousness, at first nce, Han Shuo could tell that the tall and thin Kironlo with devilish green light radiating off his eyes was the guy. His body gave off so much aura of death that almost no presence of life could be felt from him. He had more simrities with an undead than a human.

    While Han Shuo was scanning the crowd gathered in the hall, the crowd too were sizing Han Shuo up ¨C especially Kironlo. Not only did he not care to conceal the hostility in his eyes, he would not stop examining Han Shuo with a gaze that would make an ordinary person feel their blood run cold.

    Suddenly, a pulse of soul-probing energy from Kironlo came wrapping at Han Shuo. The corners of Kironlo¡¯s mouth had even curved to make an eerie sneer when that soul energy wasunched. It appeared that he wanted to humiliate Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo, who came in with a stratagem, wore a genial smile all along and sized Kironlo up with a big smile on his face. Then, his consciousness struck. A soul energy much more powerful than that of Kironlo¡¯s suddenly pulsated and fiercely pounded on Kironlo.

    ¡°Oww... ¡° Kironlo cried out in pain and held his head sorely. That inhuman appearance of his became even more malevolent and horrifying.

    ¡°How, how dare you attack me!¡± Kironlo who was smitten, after the pain in his head slightly eased, shouted and red at Han Shuo with his gloomy and cold eyes.

    Han Shuo did not respond. Instead, he looked at the big fatty in all smiles and said in an innocent manner, ¡°Your Holiness, who is this person? I have just entered and haven¡¯t even taken a seat. Why is he trying to nder me?¡±

    All those present there were of decent strength. Although most of them were incapable of knowing what actually happened, they could faintly sense with their souls that the two had a confrontation. That innocent face of Han Shuo¡¯s appeared very genuine. He had obviously gotten the better of Kironlo and yet he could pretend as though he was wrongly used, and appeared so genuine at that. He immediately won the unanimous approval of everyone present for his skills in deception.

    Truly a terribly despicable and malicious one. Indeed one of our own. No wonder the Church of Light couldn¡¯t prevail over him! many of the cardinals in the hall inwardlymented.

    As sinister, cunning, and wicked people themselves, these people found Han Shuo¡¯s practice to be admirable.

    The plump Pope was left betweenughter and tears when Han Shuo had obviously pained Kironlo and yet pretended to be innocent. The Pope forced two hollowughs and tried to mediate, ¡°This is just a misunderstanding...¡± But before either of the two could say a thing, he hastily raised his voice and announced, ¡°Hey Hey! Let me introduce you to everyone. This handsome young man is the most outstanding member of our Church ¨C Bryan! Haha, I believe I don¡¯t have to narrate his past achievements to you all!¡±

    ¡°Courageous one. I could tell that you are one of us at the very sight!¡±

    ¡°Although you haven¡¯t been at the Church all these years, we have never considered you as an outsider!¡±

    Some of those in the room started praising Han Shuo in seemingly sincere and cordial lights.

    It was at this moment that yet another party entered the hall. When Han Shuo turned around, he discovered that the new attendees were actually the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race and his two penta-horned subordinates. Han Shuo was rather astonished as he didn¡¯t understand why these aliens would be invited to such a high-level meeting of the Church of Light.

    ¡°Bryan, let me introduce you. These are people on the same side as us. In that great war five thousand years ago, one of the leaders that lead our fight originated from their race!¡± the fat man quickly exined as though he knew of the grudges between the two.

    Meanwhile, for some reason, that Kironlo suddenly turned silent. He was looking at Han Shuo and the six-horned tribal king as if he was waiting to see a joke unfold. He seemed to be waiting for the six-horned tribal king to attack Han Shuo.

    It appeared that all the cardinals sitting inside this room were aware of the grudges between Han Shuo and the six-horned tribal king. These people had only heard of Han Shuo¡¯s strength from hearsay and had never truly witnessed his power. Some were even skeptical of those reports. However, when it came to this six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race, a great majority of them had ingrained, first-hand impressions of his extremely terrifying strength. When they saw the two cross paths, they had amused looks in their eyes.

    So it turns out that those of the Soul Race had participated in that great war involving the whole of Profound Continent five thousand years ago. No wonder! Han Shuo was greatly enlightened by the Pope¡¯s words.

    Han Shuo only took one nce around the hall before he realized what was in those cardinals¡¯ minds from the emotions showing in their eyes. He sneered. But after carefully observing, Han Shuo noticed that only the big fat Pope had an unperturbed and calm look.

    From this observation, Han Shuo inferred that Edwin and Belinda ought to have been so loyal to the Pope to report about what had happened between him and the six-horned tribal king on the day before. The Pope wouldn¡¯t have handled it so calmly otherwise.

    The rest of the cardinals had their gazes going back and forth between Han Shuo and the six-horned tribal king as though anticipating some form of drama. Kironlo was somewhat anxious when the two did not get into conflict. Then, as though suddenly recalling something, he put on an evil smile and said, ¡°Aren¡¯t the two of you acquainted? From our understanding, the two of you had previously met each other inside Tarrag Canyon. There had even been some misunderstandings between you two. Am I right?¡±

    Kironlo also thought that the six-horned tribal king wasn¡¯t good at distinguishing human appearances and therefore spoke his malignant reminder. He couldn¡¯t wait to see Han Shuo be humiliated.

    However, how was it possible Han Shuo wasn¡¯t aware of this?

    ¡°Haha, that¡¯s right. Back at Tarrag Canyon, we did indeed run into some misunderstandings,¡± Han Shuo inly acknowledged the fact.

    Everyone in the room tensed up as though they were all expecting something to happen at the next instance. Their gazes werepletely concentrated on the six-horned tribal king, waiting for him to strike. They knew that people of their race were cruel, ruthless, and did not have as much misgivings as a human would. It was only natural that they would expect that the tribal king would attack Han Shuo at once.

    Kironlo was sneering in his heart. As he had previously personally fought with the six-horned tribal king along with the Pope, he knew better than anyone just how formidable the six-horned tribal king was. Seeing that a showdown was about to y out before them, the excitement in his heart had ballooned so much that he nearly couldn¡¯t contain himself!

    However, contrary to what the crowd had anticipated, the six-horned tribal king did not strike. The whole room waspletely puzzled and they couldn¡¯t understand what the six-horned tribal king was waiting for.

    ¡°It was Bryan who took your belongings, wasn¡¯t it? Back then you even told me that you would kill him instantly if you saw him. What¡¯s wrong?¡± Kironlo couldn¡¯t wait any longer and explicitly reminded.

 Chapter 633: Are you worthy?

    GDK 633: Are you worthy?

    ¡°Cardinal, mind your words!¡± the plump Pope chided in a displeased tone.

    Within the Cmity Church, only the Pope could make Kironlo feel apprehensive because, in the whole religious organization, he was the only person on his level in terms of strength. Therefore, when Kironlo was scolded, he immediately realized that he had spoken inappropriately and needed to exercise some restraint.

    ¡°He is stronger than I¡¯m!¡± the six-horned tribal king said in an indifferent voice after he nced at Han Shuo.

    ¡°What? He is stronger than you?¡± Kironlo was deeply shocked and at a loss. He found the six-horned tribal king¡¯s words very difficult to believe.

    Except for the big fat Pope, many of the cardinals in the hall couldn¡¯t conceal the appall in their hearts and stared at Han Shuo with wide open eyes that flickered like strobe lights. They were rapidly turning over in their minds, perhaps recalcting their schemes.

    ¡°Yes. He is stronger than I and stronger than every single person in this room!¡± the six-horned tribal king gave recognition to Han Shuo¡¯s valiant strength, leaving the cardinals no room for doubt.

    The crowd in the room knew that the six-horned tribal king was definitely not one to talk nonsense. Their unanimous instinctive response was to be more mindful towards Han Shuo. Some of those cardinals who had reached an agreement with Kironlo in private beforehand even started to reconsider if they should actually honor the agreement.

    ¡°Impossible... Impossible... ¡° Kironlo murmured to himself in disbelief. His heart was in confusion and disarray. Although the two were in the basegod realm, their actual strengths were not precisely equivalent. Having previously fought the six-horned tribal king along with the Pope, Kironlo recognized that as the six-horned tribal king possessed a unique method of attacking the soul, his true strength was slightly above that of himself and the Pope¡¯s.

    As the only remaining original cardinal of the Cmity Church, Kironlo had previously dealt blows with the Pope of the Church of Light. He knew that most of the Light Pope¡¯s great power was dependent on his use of divine weapons. However, even in that case, the strength that the Light Pope possessed was around the same level as his and there wasn¡¯t much of a gap between them.

    Based on that understanding, Kironlo surmised that Han Shuo could finish off the Light Pope by mere luck, but likely wouldn¡¯t be able to defeat the six-horned tribal king. That was the reason behind his unceasing provocation. He wasn¡¯t just hoping for the six-horned tribal king to humiliate Han Shuo, he wanted to get rid of him.

    Never did he expect, however, that the six-horned tribal king had encountered Han Shuo earlier and that the strength Han Shuo possessed was leagues above what he had anticipated. With that, Kironlo realized that snatching the skeletal staff from Han Shuo would be very difficult to aplish.

    ¡°Bryan,e have a seat!¡± the Pope of the Cmity Church said to Han Shuo, beaming ear to ear. He was greatly pleased in his heart to see Kironlo¡¯s ghastly expression.

    No person in a high position would wish to have a backseat driver around them ¨C the Cmity Pope was no exception. But unfortunately for the Pope, as Kironlo was very popr in the Cmity Church and possessed terrifying strength, he managed to forge a rather significant influence over the Church. This influence that Kironlo possessed even sometimes affected his policies and decisions. This made the Pope extremely discontented.

    However, given Kironlo¡¯s identity, no matter how resentful he felt, there was nothing that he could do about him. It was only natural that the big man rejoiced to see Kironlo overwhelmed by Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was not overly courteous. He bluntly walked to the big fatty and sat on an empty seat straightforwardly. He showed no reservation.

    Meanwhile, as the Pope greeted Han Shuo, Kironlo put on a friendly smile and yelled at the six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race in a cordial manner, ¡°Come, our honored six-horned guest,e sit with me.¡±

    During this period of time, Kironlo had deliberately and constantly tried to rope in the six-horned tribal king, at which he had certainly seeded. It was his belief that the six-horned tribal king would surely go to him after hearing his shout.

    However, in life, not everything goes as expected. Not only did the six-horned tribal king not acknowledge his call, but contrary to everybody¡¯s expectations, the six-horned tribal king walked directly towards Han Shuo as though he didn¡¯t hear Kironlo at all.

    Kironlo¡¯s face turned even more unsightly. His cold, gloomy eyes scanned Han Shuo and the six-horned tribal king. No one knew what was on his mind.

    After taking a seat next to Han Shuo, the six-horned tribal king looked at Han Shuo impatiently, and hesitated for a moment before he finally asked, ¡°Those energy stones, can you tell me where you found them?¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s no point in looking there. I have taken all the energy stones that ce had to offer,¡± Han Shuo candidly replied so that the six-horned tribal king would give up on that n.

    The tribal king was limp with disappointment. Indifferently, he remarked, ¡°What a pity! Truly a pity!¡±

    The two did not deliberately lower their voices when they conversed. As each and every cardinal in the hall was an expert of extraordinary power, they obviously overheard the two¡¯s conversation loud and clear. By this point, every head in that room understood that Han Shuo and the six-horned tribal king must have met each other beforehand and ought to have fought ande to an agreement. Otherwise, in light of the six-horned tribal king¡¯s savagery and mercilessness, there was no way that he would be so well-behaved.

    ¡°Alright. Since everyone¡¯s here, let¡¯s start talking business!¡± when the fat man raised his voice, all the cardinals stopped whispering with each other.

    After all those who had no business in the room had exited the grand hall, the Pope nodded at someone outside the hall, and the doors to the Cardinals¡¯ Hall were slowly shut. Then, when the grand hall waspletely and tightly sealed, a barrier was triggered to envelop the entire Cardinals¡¯ Hall, ensuring that no one could listen in to their conversation from the outside.

    After the doors were shut, the big fatty looked all around and said smilingly. ¡°Each and every one of you present are core members of the Church. I believe that none of you object to recognizing Bryan and Sixhorn as one of us?¡±

    ¡°Perhaps not!¡± Kironlo¡¯s sinister voice suddenly sounded. He looked at Han Shuo up and down with unkind eyes as he said, ¡°Sixhorn¡¯s ancestor participated in the great war five thousand years ago. There are records in the Church that could prove this matter. There were even carvings of the Soul Race etched to some of the walls here. Therefore, it¡¯s without a doubt that Sixhorn is one of us. However, Bryan was merely someone who came to possess our Church¡¯s sacred weapon, the skeletal staff, by mere fluke. The Church has tried searching for him multiple times to seek confirmation with him, but all along, he firmly refused to admit that he was one of us. If he himself did not consider himself as one with the Church, why do we have to be so eager to acknowledge him?¡±

    ¡°Agreed. Bryan had not made his stance clear this whole time. Perhaps he was repelled to our Church?¡± a sacred grade magus that also cultivated in the elemental energy of death hastily echoed after Kironlo. As a cultivator of the elemental energy of death, he had received guidance from Kironlo and therefore stood with him.

    ¡°He is the master of the skeletal staff, of course he is one of us. There is nothing to dispute! The reason that he did not acknowledge his identity sooner was because he wasn¡¯t clear about the inseparable rtionship that the skeletal staff has with our Church. Bryan has nowe here in person. Isn¡¯t this proof enough of his sincerity?¡± The big fatty always wore a big smile on his face by default. But when his stern face came to light, the overbearing demeanor of one who upied a high position for a long period of time was instantly unleashed, giving those who were in opposition to him immense pressure.

    Han Shuo observed that when the Pope disyed his disgruntlement, many of the cardinals in the hall immediately forced smiles onto their faces and were afraid of voicing their opinion. From this, Han Shuo immediately determined that the Pope indeed possessed absolute, unchallenged influence over the Cmity Church. His stern image at this moment was very much unlike how he usually carried himself. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but give a few more nces at him out of amazement.

    When the rotund Pope saw that the crowd was too intimidated to speak, he coldly groaned, put on a smile, and asked Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan, isn¡¯t that the case?¡±

    ¡°Of course. The skeletal staff isn¡¯t simply in my possession, I cultivate in necromancy magic. I havee here to make my stance clear to everyone,¡± Han Shuo said in an honest and guileless manner.

    Truly despicable! Many of the cardinals had the same thought in their heads. As they themselves were also the crafty and deceptive kind, how could they not discern Han Shuo¡¯s true intentions behind that seemingly sincere bearing?

    ¡°See? Bryan definitely is one of us. There is no reason to suspect otherwise,¡± the big fatty was in all smiles yet again. It was as though that person glowering just a moment ago wasn¡¯t even him.

    ¡°I can¡¯t see any of his sincerity. Who knows if he is coveting for the influence our Church has over the Profound Continent, or perhaps he harbors some other intention ining here. Hmph, the skeletal staff is a holy artifact of our Church. It is a disgrace to the skeletal staff that it came into the possession of a kid as young as he is. In my opinion, we should ask him to hand over the skeletal staff, and then slowly put him to the test and see if he is sincere in serving the Church.¡± Kironlo was determined to make life difficult for Han Shuo. When he saw no one dared to speak as they were intimidated by the Pope, he had no choice but to voice his resistance himself.

    The Cmity Pope¡¯s face immediately turned ck upon hearing those words. He felt truly furious as he gave Kironlo a death stare. He seemed to be considering shedding all pretense of cordiality with Kironlo.

    The big fatty knew exactly what his true intentions were. In the end, all that he wanted was Han Shuo¡¯s skeletal staff. He thought that the reason behind Han Shuoing to possess such formidable strength in the short span of tens or so years was all due to the skeletal staff. Kironlo, as someone who could unleash pandemic disease all over the continent without thinking, was a crazy one to begin with. In addition to the fact that the skeletal staff carried tremendous temptation to him, he just couldn¡¯t restrain his greed.

    ¡°Old fart, are you bloody done yet?¡± Han Shuo impatiently shouted before the Cmity Pope said a word.

    Given Han Shuo¡¯s current strength, a mere basegod was nothing in his eyes. The reason that Han Shuo had acted kindly in coordination with the Pope was that he was interested inmunicating with the Church¡¯s evil god. Han Shuo was truly sick of this basegod being so rowdy in front of him again and again.

    ¡°How disrespectful! As a member of the Church, one must at least behave respectfully towards the cardinals. If you don¡¯t even know this, how are you even qualified to be one of us?¡± Kironlo said mockingly while heughed grimly as though he had found something to use against Han Shuo.

    ¡°Respect a half-witted fool like you?! A sinner who made a mistake so terrible that it nearly destroyed the entire church ¨C such a person is worthy of my respect? Are you worthy?¡± Han Shuo looked coldly at Kironlo and reminded everyone of his history without the slightest regard for his feelings.

 Chapter 634: I have the capability to be insolent!

    GDK 634: I have the capability to be insolent!

    ¡°How... how dare you talk about me like that!¡± Kironlo was quivering to his knees. His aged face was ashen. He pointed and roared at Han Shuo like a crazed ghoul.

    The matter that Han Shuo brought up was Kironlo¡¯s sore point. No one ever dared to speak of it in front of him because of his identity. Given Kironlo¡¯s temperament, it would be a wonder if he didn¡¯t fly into a fit rage after Han Shuo spoke of the incident so harshly in front of all the cardinals.

    But, of course, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t afraid of him.

    ¡°Ahahah, what¡¯s wrong? Do you feel humiliated? Serves you right!¡± Han Shuo sneered and turned a blind eye to Kironlo¡¯s bellow of rage. He carried on with his cutting remarks, ¡°If it wasn¡¯t for that disastrous mistake you made then, the Church wouldn¡¯t have to operate in the dark for all those hundreds of years, and most certainly wouldn¡¯t have be a target of scorn, detested by everyone on the continent. With the mental capacity that you have, you are only going to bring the Church even more ruins by staying. If I were you, I would surely be too embarrassed to see anyone or even show my face in the public.¡±

    ¡°You, you...¡° Kironlo pointed at Han Shuo. He was so enraged by those words that he couldn¡¯t even form a sentence.

    Han Shuo took a nce at the Cmity Pope and saw that he had no intention of stopping him. Han Shuo deduced that the Pope wanted him to take this opportunity to disgrace Kironlo. This boldened Han Shuo even further, ¡°I don¡¯t like people pointing their fingers at me. Try pointing at me again. I dare you,¡±

    ¡°Young man, you are too insolent!¡± Kironlo was flustered and exasperated. But as he still held misgivings towards Han Shuo, he restrained himself as best he could from attacking Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo squinted his eyes and let out a cold groan before he whooshed towards Kironlo. The Domain of Divinity of the avatar of destruction inside his body suddenly unfolded. In an instant, the entire Cardinals¡¯ Hall turned into a hair-raising region where only a disordered edict of destruction was left. Elements that were normally present everywhere were suddenly all gone.

    The cardinals of the Cmity Church who cultivated in all kinds of elemental energies suddenly found themselves in a region devoid of the energies they were most familiar with. All of them started to panic as they stared at Han Shuo standing at the center with aghast.

    All they saw was Han Shuo suddenly standing before Kironlo. Then, one of his big hands grabbed Kironlo¡¯s neck and lifted him high in the air. He wore a frigid cold face as he stared at Kironlo struggling to free himself.

    Han Shuo¡¯s straightforward and blunt conduct of immediately attacking once someone showed nopliance to him caused the crowd¡¯s hearts to shiver.

    Kironlo, whose face was red through and through, looked no different from a clown. His frail legs as thin as bamboo were kicking and his two hands were desperately beating Han Shuo¡¯s hand. He tried all he could to free himself from this humiliating and demeaning posture, but his actions were futile.

    As a mere basegod, once Han Shuo unfolded his Domain of Divinity, Kironlo would have absolutely no way of attacking Han Shuo using elemental energy.

    After losing ess to the elemental energy of death that he had been relying upon for survival, all the strength left in him was the raw power of his frail physical body. Against Han Shuo¡¯s physical body which was in the Nine Changes realm, Kironlo was like a mantis trying to stop a chariot. He had exerted all his energy and yet was unable to free himself from Han Shuo who was binding him with just one hand. Suspended in midair, Kironlo found it more and more strenuous to breathe. His face reddened and looked as though it was smeared with blood.

    Kironlo, this grand cardinal of the Cmity Church had been revered by most for hundreds of years. He was struggling like a bird on a leash without any power to resist. A few of those cardinals who had good rtions with Kironlo had intended to assist him, but were now frozen in terror. Everyst one of them had flickering eyes that could not turn away from the cruel scene. They timidly lowered their heads as they didn¡¯t have to courage to look at Kironlo in the face while he slowly wilted away, as though he might die from suffocation at any moment.

    The bizarre atmosphere devoid of any elemental energy to use all so suddenly left those in the room in panic. They gaped at Han Shuo at the center, who was callously grabbing Kironlo by the neck, like fools. Their lips were dry and their hands were cold. They thought they would lose their feeble lives at any moment.

    ¡°I have the capability to be insolent!¡± Han Shuo said to Kironlo arrogantly as he stared at him. This was also a warning to the rest of the cardinals in the hall, telling them that they had better behave themselves.

    Many of the high-level members of the Cmity Church had horrified expressions on their faces and were at aplete loss. They were afraid that Han Shuo would take his anger out on them too. Thoughts rushed through their minds on how best to draw a clear dividing line between themselves and Kironlo.

    The plump Pope meanwhile appeared rather unperturbed although his heart was pounding. The Pope was unlike Kironlo in that he wasn¡¯t as arrogant. From the rumors that Han Shuo had finished off the Light Pope along with several experts and the fact that heid waste to several hundred thousand orc warriors, the Cmity Pope had a rough idea of Han Shuo¡¯s power.

    However, even in that case, the Pope was rather shocked to see Han Shuo restrain Kironlo so starkly, allowing him not the slightest ability to resist. If Han Shuo could do this so effortlessly, this also meant that Han Shuo could finish him off just as easily. This fact left him very uneasy but he did not reveal it.

    The fat man saw Kironlo¡¯s face getting redder and redder and figured he might stop breathing at any moment. Seeing that he had nearly aplished his goal, he finally voiced out to mediate the situation,

    ¡°Erm, Bryan, we are all on the same side. Kironlo had merely talked a little too much. That crime wasn¡¯t severe enough for the death penalty. Why don¡¯t you let him off this time?¡±

    Han Shuo nced all around. Wherever his cold eyes passed, the cardinals would lower their heads in timidity. They dared not to look Han Shuo in the eyes.

    Han Shuo nodded contently and said in a cold voice, ¡°Fine. I will give you face and spare his lowly life this time, but his middle finger that kept on pointing at me still has to go!¡±

    Snap! As soon as Han Shuo finished those words, a clear snap and crackle sounded from that middle finger which Kironlo had used to point at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo then casually flung him away and sent Kironlo flying. He made a loud thud when his body smashed into the solid wall. Kironlo, who could finally breathe properly again, let out a stifled groan then a blood-curdling screech as he held on to his severed middle finger.

    After doing so, Han Shuo¡¯s figure suddenly blurred. He flew in reverse and returned to his seat as though he had never moved an inch at all. Simultaneously, the Domain of Divinity that shrouded the entire hall abruptly disappeared. That pressure that had made people so frightened felt as though nothing more than an illusion.

    ¡°You... You... ¡° After shrieking miserably, Kironlo red at Han Shuo with his resentful eyes but remained stationary.

    Han Shuo¡¯s performance just then was too terrifying. From the ordeal, Kironlo came to realize that even if everyone in the hall joined forces against Han Shuo, it would take Han Shuo less than a minute to finish all of them. It was also at this point that he was truly convinced of the words of the six-horned tribal king. He finally figured out why the merciless and cruel six-horned tribal king would be so well-behaved before Han Shuo.

    ¡°You don¡¯t even have the qualifications to take vengeance on me. You better give up on that thought. Otherwise, you are merely digging your own grave!¡± Han Shuo said disdainfully as he looked at Kironlo arrogantly.

    Kironlo fixed his resentful eyes at Han Shuo without saying a word even as his heart was brimming over with agony. This was all that he could do in showing that he had yet to yield. He understood that against such a powerful enemy, he truly wasn¡¯t even fit to exact vengeance. He felt utterly helpless.

    ¡°Alright, alright, how about we forget whatever happened here and just let it pass. We are all on the same side. Let¡¯s not make it like we are opposing forces on the battlefield!¡± the big fatty hastily mediated. He could foresee that after this incident, there wouldn¡¯t be a single opposition to be found in the whole of the Cmity Church and Han Shuo would be a member of the Church without the slightest resistance. Even if there were objections, they would just keep it in their hearts and not speak out.

    ¡°I have shown you courtesy, but you insisted on not taking it. What for?¡± the corners of Han Shuo¡¯s mouth pulled to make a grin as he talked to himself. However, all those in the room could hear his ¡®soliloquy¡¯. They all forced smiles and did not say a word as they inwardly thought that Kironlo was truly unfortunate to have met his nemesis.

    Of all the remaining matters to discuss, Han Shuo indeed was met with absolutely no resistance whatsoever. Whenever the Pope brought up anything remotely rted to Han Shuo, the cardinals, who would usually engage in constant debate and stalemate, all had identically favorable views during this meeting. Furthermore, they even scrambled to express their stance of endorsing Han Shuo, fearing that Han Shuo would be displeased otherwise.

    The big fatty, having observed it all, was taken aback and in awe. For all the years he presided over the meetings, every time he raised any matter, those cardinals would always stand by their own positions and argue with each other dismissively. It would always be heated and chaotic, just short of having a brawl on the spot. Who would have expected that after Han Shuo¡¯s arrival, these cardinals would transform into different people altogether. Not only did they all share unanimous views and opinions, but they also dered their positions quicker than thest.

    Indeed, sometimes, brute force is the best tool in resolving disorder and chaos! the Cmity Pope thought to himself.

    Han Shuo, at the young age that he was, became one of the honorable cardinals of the Cmity Church without meeting the slightest resistance, and took up an important role in the Cmity Church. Every single operation of the Cmity Church within Lancelot Empire and Brettel City was now being transferred fully under Han Shuo¡¯s management. Information about every member of the Cmity Church in those locations and the distribution of power were delivered to Han Shuo by the Pope.

    Wolf and Burt Zili, members of the Cmity Church who originally operated in the Lancelot Empire, were reassigned to be Han Shuo¡¯s direct subordinates and they would report solely to Han Shuo.

    In addition to this, all the agreements that the Cmity Church had discreetly reached with countries on Profound Continent, the contact locations and methods, as well as the methods of activating the military forces, were all revealed to Han Shuo by the big fatty as Han Shuo had gained the privilege to utilize those forces. After briefing Han Shuo about some other minor matters, the fat Pope finally told Han Shuo about the most important affair of this meeting ¨C in five days, they would begin the ceremony to pray to their evil god, and Han Shuo needed be present at that time.

    Paying particr attention to the offerings required was the least of their problems; the ceremony had to also take ce during suitable timings. Five days was enough time for the Cmity Church to make all the necessary preparations and Han Shuo could rest during this time.

    After the meeting was over, all the cardinals rushed to exit the hall in fear and trepidation. It was after they got far away from Han Shuo that those cardinals, Kironlo included, heaved a heavy sigh of relief. That six-horned tribal king of the Soul Race, however, remained cold and indifferent all along. But before he left, he took a nce at Han Shuo. It appeared that he still felt sorrow about those energy stones.

    When only the big, fat Pope and Han Shuo were left in the hall, the Pope suddenly burst into a tumultuousughter. The fats in his cheeks were bouncing up and down from theughter. He then said in a cheerful tone, ¡°Bryan, you really are quite something! For so many years, I¡¯ve never seen that expression on Kironlo¡¯s face before! That is truly amusing!¡±

    It was apparent that the Pope was in a great mood.

 Chapter 635: Cheering Crowd

    GDK 635: Cheering Crowd

    Inside the Cardinals¡¯ Hall, the plump Pope of the Cmity Church very sincerely asked Han Shuo for guidance regarding the edict of destruction. Previously, all the Pope knew was that Han Shuo cultivated in necromancy magic as well as an unusual martial art. He had no idea that Han Shuo had such high attainment in the edict of destruction.

    When Han Shuo deployed his Domain of Divinity made of the energy of destruction inside the Cardinals¡¯ Hall, the entire room was filled with chaotic energy that distorted the normal cirction of elemental energies, depriving the cardinals of elemental energies they could use. His magnificent performance of turning all those powerful experts into sitting ducks had not only filled the big fatty¡¯s heart with reverence, but he also saw the hope of making a breakthrough in his cultivation.

    One of Han Shuo¡¯s avatars was a lowgod of destruction who had a much more profound understanding of the edict of destructionpared to the Pope. There was an insurmountable gap between a basegod and a lowgod. Han Shuo only needed to speak a few sentences before the big fatty soon felt as though every problem he had became clear at once. This made him behave even more respectfully towards Han Shuo.

    After giving the Pope some guidance, Han Shuo thought for a moment and expressed his stance while no one was around, ¡°Just so you know, you don¡¯t have worry about me. I have no interest in the Cmity Church! I won¡¯t be like that old thing, Kironlo, and constantly interfere with your decisions. I havee here just tomunicate with those higher-level existences, not to wrest power from you!¡±

    ¡°I know. You are very different from Kironlo. You have an unrivaled prestige in Lancelot Empire and yet you have never shown any inclination of meddling with or overtaking the throne. Just from this, I can tell that you¡¯re not as power-hungry as Kironlo. Therefore, I¡¯m very much at ease about you!¡± the fat man respectfully dered. It appeared to have made his own in-depth analysis of Han Shuo¡¯s character long beforehand.

    ¡°To tell you the truth, I¡¯m quite azy person. I really have no interest in managing those messy affairs,¡± Han Shuo said with a smirk as he shrugged.

    The two did not continue to converse further after that. The big fatty seemed suddenly rxed when Han Shuo assured that he would not engage in some power struggle with him. From Han Shuo¡¯s attitude and manner of speaking, the Pope could tell that Han Shuo was telling of his true intentions, unlike Kironlo who spoke one way but thought another. With his mind at ease, the big fatty led Han Shuo out from the hall with a big smile.

    The grand ceremony of praying to their evil god was just a few days from initiation. During that time, Han Shuo stayed in the room that the Cmity Church had specifically prepared for him. He found the constant stream of cardinals trying to fawn over him in the following days to be very annoying.

    But after all, Han Shuo¡¯s performance back at the Cardinals¡¯ Hall had been too shocking. Each and every one of those cardinals was an old, scheming fox. They knew that it was in their best interest to build a good rtionship with Han Shuo as soon as possible. Otherwise, if they were to identally offend Han Shuo, they might be finished off cleanly.

    For the next few days in a row, those cardinals paid visits to Han Shuo with their subordinates, carrying batches after batches of rare treasures that they had plundered over many years. Their attitudes were more humble and amiable than before.

    Wolf and Burt Zili, as direct subordinates under Han Shuo, riding on Han Shuo¡¯s coattails, watched as their identities and statuses rose higher and higher. At present, wherever they went, all those that the two came across would wear mixed expressions of envy and admiration. Some of the bigwigs in the Church who previously wouldn¡¯t even notice them started treating them cordially. This left them overwhelmingly ttered.

    ¡°Hey, Burt, now can you see just how wise that decision of mine back in those years had been?¡± Wolf had acent grin on his face as he stared at the gifts that piled up like mountains on the table. He felt very proud of his distinct foresight.

    Han Shuo was annoyed but thought that it would be a waste to reject the gifts, so he left the task of sorting out the items to Wolf and Burt Zili. He even told the two that if there was anything they liked, they could take it for their own use without reporting to him.

    ¡°You indeed have great foresight! Hahahah, this is indeed the best decision you have made in your life!¡± Burt Zili said in a smile so wide that his eyes were mere slits below his forehead. When he recalled he had obtained a summoning ring of the highest quality from these gifts, his heart was all the more cheerful and delighted.

    Wolfughed mischievously and said in a low voice, ¡°I heard that Lord Bryan nearly killed Cardinal Kironlo back at the Cardinals¡¯ Hall. Ha, that arrogant old thing has been meddling with affairs of the Church for a long time. Who knew that such a day woulde to him!¡±

    ¡°Really?¡± Burt Zili cried out in surprise and hastily pursued, ¡°The grand cardinal has tremendous influence within the Church and he himself possesses terrifying strength. Did he strike back?¡±

    ¡°How would he dare? You should know the ferocious ways of Lord Bryan!¡± After a short pause, Wolf sneered, ¡°I heard that the grand cardinal did not even have the power to resist. He was restrained by Lord Bryan in an instant and couldn¡¯t even budge! If it wasn¡¯t for the Pope¡¯s plea for leniency, Lord Bryan might have killed that old thing already. Although his life was spared, Lord Bryan broke off one of his fingers as a lesson for him. Ha!¡±

    ¡°Lord Bryan could possess such strength at such a young age. With such conviction and his systematic way of working, his Lordship truly has boundless prospects!¡± Burt Zili eximed in admiration.

    ¡°Of course!¡±ughed Wolf heartily. ¡°And naturally, the two of us, as followers of his Lordship, will be climbing higher and higher up that samedder of position and power!¡±

    The two looked at each other and chuckled. They felt extremely proud of their wise decisions.

    The altar, which the Cmity Church used to worship their evil gods, was erected high and tall at the center of a solemn, dignified shrine. All the major characters of the church entered the shrine one after another. They came to participate in the ceremony.

    Meanwhile, Han Shuo was personally guided by the Cmity Pope to the shrine. Along the way, all those young disciples who had heard of Han Shuo¡¯s name watched him attentively without concealing the admiration in their eyes.

    There were even some of the young and pretty disciples watching Han Shuo with their beautiful and fiery eyes. They brazenly cast coquettish nces at him as though wishing they could throw themselves into Han Shuo¡¯s embrace, surrounding themselves in the scent of such an overwhelmingly powerful man.

    Unlike the Church of Light, the Cmity Church held a much more liberal attitude about rtionships. Besides, the Cmity Church was a religious organization that didn¡¯t give much scruples about their conducts. Han Shuo¡¯s conduct and deeds throughout the years, deliberately publicized by the Pope and others, had simply be the behavioral norm for these church members.

    The crowd of young disciples was suddenly swept by an atmosphere to worship Han Shuo. It was more intense than anyone had imagined.

    The podgy Pope led Han Shuo into the colossal shrine. After hailing their Pope, the crowd began to chant the name ¡°Lord Bryan¡± over and over. Most of these were youngsters aware of Han Shuo¡¯s glorious achievements. They were zing with passion.

    The Pope, who originally intended to give a brief speech, was struck that, everywhere in the shrine, people were losing their voices for ¡°Lord Bryan¡±. An awkward look stretched across his face and he was left momentarily speechless.

    He understood in his heart that the reason these disciples were all so passionate was because of Han Shuo¡¯s thunderous actions. He first destroyed the Shrine of Ice and then proceeded by killing the Light Pope and their two demigods. Under the publicity of the Cmity Church, these deeds had left an extremely deep impression on these people¡¯s hearts. They were like gasoline-soaked rags that would burn vigorously with one small spark.

    After all, since the day these people joined the Church, they were brainwashed to take the Church of Light as their mortal enemy. The longer they spent living in the dark trying to hide their identities, the more deeply they recognized the inconvenience and threat that the Church of Light caused them, and subsequently, the deeper their hatred flowed.

    It goes without saying what Han Shuo¡¯s deed of annihting the top three leaders of the Church of Light meant for these people!

    Surrounded by the morous cheers, the Cmity Pope forced a smile through his awkwardness and said to Han Shuo, ¡°I honestly did not expect that you would be so well-received. Why don¡¯t give a few words and satisfy their enthusiasm!¡±

    Han Shuo, too, was in great difort. He did not foresee that just by walking into the shrine, he would snatch all the limelight from the fatty, overshadowing the host as a guest.

    After thinking for a moment, Han Shuo lifted his two hands and made a gesture for silence.

    As Han Shuo stood at nearly two meters in height, among the crowd of disciples, his magnificent body was as noticeable as a crane in a flock of chicken. In addition to the fact that everyone had been attentively watching him, when he made that ¡®hush¡¯ gesture, the crowd turned silent in no time. It appeared that although Han Shuo hadn¡¯t previously been part of the Cmity Church, as his deeds were just so astounding, he had long umted great prestige within the Church.

    After raising his hands high for a few seconds, the shrine packed with people went from being as noisy as a food market to being so silent that one could hear any odd footstep. Everyone was looking at Han Shuo with excitement. They gazed at this terrible demon who had, by himself, killed several hundred thousand orcs, destroyed the Shrine of Ice, and killed the Light Pope, as they waited for him to give a speech.

    ¡°I must say that aftering to this ce, I realize that the Cmity Church is very different from what I had imagined. This ce is like a small city. It has almost everything and life here seemsfortable.¡±

    ¡°However, no matter howfortable this ce is, it is still buried miles beneath the ground, hidden, never to see the light of day; just like the identity of our church members on the surface of the continent ¨C it must always be hidden!¡± Han Shuo suddenly changed his tone and raised his cold voice. The crowd turned to put onplicated emotions and sighed incessantly.

    ¡°But, it¡¯s about time we rise from the dead and walk among the world, out in the open!¡± Han Shuo looked all around, took a short pause, and continued sternly, ¡°We deserve to live on the surface, and to not be holed up under the earth! And we will kill anyone who dares obstruct us!¡±

    ¡°It will not be long before we can openly tell people that we are members of the Cmity Church and be respected for it! All of you will see that day!¡± Han Shuo shouted with confidence.

    Afterpleting the speech, the crowd kept silent for a few seconds before they collectively erupted like a volcano and started cheering as though they had won a war.

    ¡°Bryan, you seem to be more suitable to be a leader than I am. I would never have expected you to be so good at giving motivational speeches!¡± the Pope said frankly as he looked at Han Shuo.

    These words were from the bottom of his heart. The big fatty was truly in awe to see Han Shuo make those already fanatical church members even crazier with just a few sentences. He didn¡¯t think Han Shuo would have such skills, despite his outstanding strength.

    Han Shuo let out a hollowugh and shrugged, but did not reply.

 Chapter 636: Conversing with a highgod of destruction

    After that invigorating speech from Han Shuo, the shrine remained in a hubbub for a period of time. It was when the crowd¡¯s emotion gradually dampened that the big fat Pope announced the beginning of the worshipping ceremony.

    Some living magical beasts were ced on the altar and then sacrificed. Their fresh red blood flowed to the pool of blood at the center of the altar. All the cardinals and followers of the Cmity Church started to respectfully kowtow as they softly chanted in an ancientnguage.

    Even the Pope prostrated himself. Han Shuo swept his eyes across the hall. He bent his legs slightly to crouch but did not actually kneel down.

    During this solemn and sacred moment, everyone was focused on muttering their prayers. No one noticed Han Shuo¡¯s disrespectful manner towards their god. Han Shuo attentively watched the center of the altar with his cold eyes and carefully observed the patterns on the magical matrix. As a lowgod himself, Han Shuo recognized that this altar for summoning the evil god was simr to one that he had previously deployed.

    With all those offerings they sacrificed and their devout prayers passing through the abstruse patterns on the altar, the evil god that the Cmity Church worshipped, located on another material ne unknown lightyears away, could indeed hear the call from Profound Continent. It was now up to the evil god to decide if it was willing to answer the call, manifesting itself tomunicate with them.

    The ceremony was held in a solemn and grave atmosphere. Everything went along as nned.

    Midway into the ceremony, the pool of blood on the altar suddenly started whirling. A most bizarre atmosphere started to slowly spread throughout the shine.

    Han Shuo looked around with furrowed brows. As he closely watched the changes happening to the blood pool with his eyes, he sensed that a god from a great distance away was slowly injecting his energy into the blood pool by some bizarre miracle.

    The pool that was filled with the blood of magical beasts gradually whirled faster and faster. A kind of dignified and imposing atmosphere started emanating from the blood pool to fill the entire shrine. After some time had passed, the blood began to gather and took the shape of a humanoid with an indistinct face.

    A pair of eyes abruptly popped open. It turned immediately to Han Shuo who was attentively gazing at it from below. When that pair of eyesnded on Han Shuo, a feeling of powerlessness and inability to resist rose from his heart, taking him by surprise. It was as though that blood figure could take his life at any time if it wanted to.

    ¡°I am Terokk. Highgod of destruction. Affairs of the Cmity Church within the Profound Continent are under my jurisdiction. I havee here to discuss with you the issues facing Profound Continent,¡± a voice sounded in Han Shuo¡¯s mind as the man made of blood looked at him.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t find that surprising at all. He already knew what to expect beforeing to this ce. When the voice sounded in his mind, not the slightest ripple undted across his heart. Han Shuo remained silent.

    ¡°You¡¯re quite extraordinary to have cultivated to be a lowgod on this low-level material ne. You cultivate in the energy of death and destruction. You were destined to be on our side from the very beginning,¡± Terokk continued.

    ¡°You have offended the Shrine of Ice and the Church of Light, and have even rmed those in the high levels. They will not allow a god like you to exist on this low-level material ne called Profound Continent. But we can protect and guide you on a new path!¡±

    ¡°What do I need to do?¡± Han Shuo who had kept his silence all along finally asked.

    ¡°Join us, and do some things for us on Profound Continent. We need you, and you need us too!¡± Terokk, in the form of a bloody man, said apathetically.

    ¡°I get it. You want me to expand the Cmity Church¡¯s influence on Profound Continent and make all living thing here worship you.¡±.

    ¡°Hm, I thought a man as powerful as you would be wiser!¡± Terokk¡¯s response defied Han Shuo¡¯s expectations. He continued, ¡°If it¡¯s just for getting all the power of faith from this continent, do you really think I would take the trouble to appear here personally? A mere low-level material ne is not worthy of my time and effort. On another note, if you join us and be one of us, all the power of faith of this Profound Continent will be yours to have,¡±

    Han Shuo was startled by those words. He asked, ¡°If it¡¯s not for the power of faith of Profound Continent, then what is this about? What can I help you with?¡±

    ¡°The poption on Profound Continent is sparse. The power of faith of your people simply isn¡¯t worthy of our time! I havee here to discuss something else; it¡¯s about the bottommostyer of the Profound underground world!¡±

    The bottommostyer of the underground world! Han Shuo was jolted yet again. Back when Han Shuo explored the deepestyer of the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo learned from the original owner of the skeletal staff that there were some mysteries that stilly in thestyer of the underground world. He did not expect that this high-level member of Cmity Church who possessed highgod strength would suddenly mention this twilight zone.

    What was actually hidden at the end of this tunnel? Why would the Shrine of Ice want to enter it? Why did the original owner of the skeletal staff bring it up? Why was this expert of highgod strength located from such a distant material ne be so concerned about it?

    ¡°What¡¯s in there?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    ¡°Some very strange things. As to what exactly they are, save that question forter. I have summoned you here because I need your help with certain matters. So, you are in possession of the Cemetery of Death. There is a magical transportation matrix that could conduct internar transmission. I need you to bring the internar transportation matrix online and fill it with sufficient energy. In a fortnight, a few of our own will travel there and make the journey to the deepestyer of the underground world with you. From now till then, we are tasking you with finding the path to the thirdyer of the underground world, and ensure that nothing happens to the Cemetery of Death. If the internar transportation matrix is destroyed, we will have real trouble entering and you will face certain death!¡±

    Internar transmission requires both the transmitting and receiving matrices to be online. If Han Shuo failed to either activate the internar transportation matrix on his end or fill it with sufficient energy stones, even with the nar coordinates, those gods from the other material ne would not be able to teleport to Profound Continent ¨C Terokk made that very clear.

    ¡°You must be very careful from now on. There could be other gods who will enter your continent using another internar transportation matrix. Some of them could be your enemies from the Shrine of Ice and the Church of Light.¡±

    ¡°How many internar transportation matrixes are there on Profound Continent?¡± Han Shuo asked with creased brows.

    ¡°Besides the Cemetery of Death that you possess, there is still one more, and it can only be activated by the nar guardian of your continent. As we had lost in thatst great battle, we did not manage to upy the other transportation matrix. Luckily we have left a Cemetery of Death there as backup. Otherwise, we possibly would not even be able to participate in thising battle!¡±

    Upon hearing those words, Han Shuo suddenly recalled that in the battle five thousand years back, fighting on the side of the Cmity Church were the evil gods, the original owner of the skeletal staff, and the ancestors of the Soul Race. But in the end, they suffered a crushing defeat and had to flee from Profound Continent.

    The nar guardian of Profound Continent was none other than the Primordius Dragon ¨C Han Shuo¡¯s mortal enemy. He ought to have been one of those in the opposing faction to the Cmity Church back then, and he certainly would allow experts from the Church of Light or the Shrine of Ice to use his internar transportation matrix. By then, Han Shuo would be confronted with truly might gods. This was unavoidable!

    ¡°What if I could kill that nar guardian and destroy the other internar transportation matrix before that happens? Then it would be very hard for them to enter, wouldn¡¯t it?¡± Han Shuo asked suggestively.

    ¡°The enemy might be thinking of doing the exact same thing to you. However, you should know that the internar transportation matrix isn¡¯t set rigidly in one ce, and it can move just like the Cemetery of Death. Not only that, it would have unique barriers to prevent others from discovering it. It wouldn¡¯t be easy for them to locate yours, and it would be just as difficult for you to locate theirs! Under the unique circumstances now, I believe that the nar guardian will conceal himself and his transportation matrix until their allies arrive. I really doubt that you¡¯ll find it!¡±

    Han Shuo was rmed ¨C this was news to him. After learning the secrets of the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo knew that he indeed could move the Cemetery of Death anywhere that he wanted to. In addition to that, that mysterious boundary around the structure was indeed marvelous. Before, he had managed to escape from the soul tracking of the Soul Race¡¯s six-horned tribal king by hiding in the Cemetery of Death. That was proof that the Cemetery of Death really could block detection by other.

    When Han Shuo first returned to Profound Continent, he bathed the Dragon Valley with dragon blood. However, when he conducted even more massacre on Profound Continent, the Primordius Dragon did note looking for him. It appeared that he was keeping himself veiled until his allies arrived.

    ¡°Alright. As the offering is limited, so is the length of our conversation. This is as much as I can tell you. Remember, at this point in time, to help us is to help yourself. You have no choice. But as long as you can handle the matter on Profound Continent well, I will make sure that you are rewarded well!¡± Terokk¡¯s voice in Han Shuo¡¯s mind gradually grew weaker and weaker as the pool of blood that was rapidly whirling turned slower and slower.

    The conversation between Han Shuo and highgod Terokk, that started halfway into the ceremony, ended just as the ceremony came to an end.

    Inside the shrine, all those followers of the Cmity Church were still maintaining their pious kowtowing posture while silently reciting words of prayer.

    Meanwhile, great waves surged through Han Shuo¡¯s heart. After conversing with Terokk, Han Shuo knew that there had to be some great secrets in thestyer of the underground world. Otherwise, all those gods and powerhouses from distant high-level material nes would nevere to a material ne as insignificant as Profound Continent.

    Upon learning this fact, Han Shuo¡¯s mood was iparably heavy. By that point, the only well-matched adversary Han Shuo had on Profound Continent was the Primordius Dragon. However, once those experts from alien material nes inevitably descended, Han Shuo feared he would not have sufficient strength to even survive.

    Profound Continent may have seemed beautiful and pleasant. However, if what was about to happen next was not properly handled, not just Han Shuo, but all those close to him, and perhaps even everyone in Lancelot Empire would have to pay an unimaginable price.

    Han Shuo took a deep breath. He knew that even if not for himself, for all those that he cared about, he had to pull himself together and give those experts from the distant material nes hell!

    This was a crisis, but wasn¡¯t this also a turning point? Demonic arts cultivators rose above the others through constant, cruel bloodshed. Why would this crisis be an exception? Han Shuo mind grew more and more resolute as he thought to himself.

 Chapter 637: Here he comes!

    GDK 637: Here hees!

    The lengthy ceremony was finally over. Every church member on the floor who had been crouching on the ground raised their heads and gathered their gazes on Han Shuo at the center.

    Although the crowd couldn¡¯t hear the dialogue between Han Shuo and the highgod, the unnatural atmosphere inside the shrine gave them the sense that something must have happened during the ceremony.

    The Pope, too, cast his gaze towards Han Shuo. There was an overtone of inquiry showing in his eyes. Han Shuo knew what the Pope wanted to ask and nodded his head to affirm that he indeed hadmunicated with an evil god ¨C they were above words here.

    He had a rough understanding of the will of some evil gods of the Cmity Church. As, in the end, he was merely a basegod, too puny to be regarded by actual gods, Han Shuo saw no point in revealing any more details of the matter to him.

    The next realm after basegod was lowgod. Although the divide between mortals and gods was just the difference of one realm, the chasm was very, very difficult to cross. Even the mightiest of basegods would be dead without a doubt when pit against the weakest of lowgods. To the gods, basegods weren¡¯t characters worthy enough for them to talk to directly. Without divine energy, a divine soul, or a Domain of Divinity, basegods were as puny as ants to the actual gods. They may have been the strongest among the ants, but ants nheless.

    Han Shuo did not exin to the fat man, nor did the fat man ask about it. As the Pope of the Cmity Church, he could discern exactly what questions he should and shouldn¡¯t ask as well as what information he should and shouldn¡¯t know. That was the reason he was able to fill the position he was in.

    As the ceremony had concluded, at themand of several cardinals, the Cmity Church members dispersed orderly.

    These people who had participated in the ceremony made out that, from the peculiar atmosphere in the shrine as well as Han Shuo¡¯s behavior, the evil gods they worshipped hadmunicated with Han Shuo alone. This made them revere Han Shuo even more than they already did.

    Those who used to have close rtionships with Kironlo, after attending the ceremony where Han Shuomunicated with their gods, managed to open their eyes to the true state of matters and they very straightforwardly burned the bridges with Kironlo. They were afraid that any ties with Kironlo might affect their rtionship with Han Shuo.

    Aftermunicating with that highgod, Han Shuo did not linger around at the Cmity Church any longer. He left the headquarters after a brief chat with the big fatty.

    Han Shuo had to traverse the vast desert on foot toe to this ce. But when it came time to depart, he merely used a magical transportation matrix and arrived at a secret base of the Cmity Church in Lancelot Empire.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s identity in the Cmity Church had changed, and so had the treatment he received. Wolf and Burt Zili, who apanied Han Shuo to headquarters were previously in charge of the issues in this region. However, they now answered only to Han Shuo.

    It was thergest secret operation base of the Cmity Church within Lancelot Empire. It was located in the Ken Valley near the Sunshine Valley. It was situated in between a group of mini mountains. Thick mist obscured the air and the terrain seemed aplexbination.

    After walking out from the transportation matrix, Han Shuo left Wolf and Burt Zili with a few instructions and departed the valley. He returned to the Cemetery of Death right away. The three spirit demons he refined had entered their final stages. Han Shuo observed for a moment and made sure that there wouldn¡¯t be a problem with them before he walked to thatrge-scale internar transportation matrix at the center of the Cemetery of Death.

    After learning all the secrets of the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo knew how to use and operate thisrge-scale internar transportation matrix. To ensure that nothing could go wrong, Han Shuo carefully inspected the transportation matrix and replenished it with energy that could sustain internar transmission. Only then was he at ease.

    As he returned to the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo went over and over in his mind about the words of that highgod of destruction. He knew that he really didn¡¯t have a choice. Once the Primordius Dragon weed experts from foreign material nes, then he wouldn¡¯t have only the Primordius Dragon to face, but very possibly mightier gods of greater realms.

    Han Shuo was confident but not conceited. He understood that given his current strength, he would certainly win against an expert of his realm. However, if theer exceeded his realm, even ate-stage lowgod could very possibly kill him, let alone a midgod.

    Therefore, Han Shuo knew that he did not have a second option nor a way out. All he could do was gang up with the Cmity Church and strive his best in this ineffable battle. Moreover, he could only emerge victorious ¨C there was no room for failure of any degree.

    After the conversation, the ever-unyielding Han Shuo let his mood grow much heavier.

    It is only by bing strong and mighty to the point where no one can cause me threat that I can preserve myself! After contemting for a long time, Han Shuo decided that he had to further his strength without dy.

    Of his three souls, those that could make the most rapid advancement were his avatar of death and his main body. His avatar of death could make use of thest piece of the divine essence of death he scavenged from the Void to advance his strength. Meanwhile, his main body could speed up in trying toprehend and master the nine changes of demonic arts.

    As his avatar of destruction was formed with the help of the energy within the Demonyer Edge, Datara¡¯s divine energy, as well as the origin crystal of destruction, it never had a solid foundation on the edict of destruction. Therefore it really wasn¡¯t easy for it to advance one step further.

    Han Shuo, of course, was not discouraged. Inside this Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo started to digest the third and final piece of the divine essence of death with his avatar of death while his main body strenuously and meticulously studied how to use the nine changes in the Nine Changes realm.

    Time soared. Han Shuo stayed in the Cemetery of Death like a fool. His three bodies all sank intoplete stillness. It was as though they had been fossilized.

    One day, while Han Shuo was sitting quietly inside the Cemetery of Death, he suddenly sensed that there were multiple lifeforms approaching the Cemetery of Death.

    All three souls of his were roused from their cultivations. Han Shuo, who was greatly startled, hastily expanded his consciousness to get a glimpse of the situation outside the Cemetery of Death.

    Aftermunicating with highgod Terokk at the Cmity Church headquarters, Han Shuo was stricken by the realization that perhaps his status wasn¡¯t as safe as he had imagined. From Terokk¡¯s words, the Primordius Dragon could receive his allies ahead of time. This also meant that if the Primordius Dragon were to detect his location now, he would possibly be confronted with grave danger.

    Especially worrying was that the Cemetery of Death was also located in the Dark Forest and wasn¡¯t that far away from the Dragon Valley that the Primordius Dragon presided most of the time.

    After a pulsation of his consciousness, Han Shuo heaved a sigh of relief. Theers had weak auras which obviously didn¡¯t belong to the ss of existence as powerful as the Primordius Dragon.

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction, the most leisurely of the three, got up and went outside.

    After exiting the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo saw the faces of Emily, Phoebe and Fanny. Emily and Fanny wore normal expressions while Phoebe, whosest encounter with Han Shuo ended in a big quarrel, looked somewhat ufortable.

    ¡°Bryan! I knew you¡¯d be here!¡± Emily said with a sweet grin on her face. She then grabbed Phoebe¡¯s lily-white hands, walked towards Han Shuo, and said, ¡°Whatever happened before, just let it pass. Phoebe has gotten over it now. You should shake off that temper of yours too!

    It appeared that during the time Han Shuo was away, Phoebe finally yielded to Emily and Fanny¡¯s persuasion. Perhaps they thought that the reason behind Han Shuo¡¯s disappearance was that he was still ming her for being selfish and overly possessive.

    Phoebe looked at Han Shuo, abashed and embarrassed, yet red with anger. She could hardly look him in the face as teardrops formed below her eyes. She bit her lip and said in a hateful tone, ¡°How could you be away for such a long time and not even think of consoling me!¡±

    Guilt was thest thing Han Shuo expected to feel that day, but that was just what he felt when she said those words. As Han Shuo thought about it, it dawned on him that it was he who was in the wrong. He had only lost his temper when Phoebe reacted with a bad attitude. But now when he saw Phoebe on the verge of tearing up, apletely different person from her usual icy arrogance and undeserving self, Han Shuo¡¯s heart ached.

    After the trip to the Cmity Church, Han Shuo came to recognize the dangerous situation that he was in and felt as though he could lose his feeble life at any moment. His mind wasn¡¯t as rxed as before. Now, after hearing Phoebe¡¯s words, his heart had sunken so far that he feared it would never see the sun again. He forced a smile, gently wiped away the tear on the corner of Phoebe¡¯s eye, and said, ¡°I¡¯m sorry for being so over the top that day. How about we put it behind us?¡±

    ¡°Huhu... ¡° contrary to expectations, Phoebe couldn¡¯t hold back her tears when Han Shuo treated her so tenderly. She cried louder and louder as though wanting to vent all the grievances umted during the many days prior through her tears all at once.

    Emily and Fanny had indeed built a genuinely close rtionship with Phoebe as ofte. When they saw that torrents of tears coursing down her face, they rushed over to console her. They were a little flustered.

    With that, Han Shuo too was a little flustered. He tried his best to calm Phoebe.

    After a long, long while, Phoebe got tired of weeping into his chest and finally stopped crying. Han Shuo heaved a gentle sigh of relief. It was at this moment that he recalled the possible threat he faced and he said in a deep voice, ¡°You all must return without dy. Do note back unless I tell you to. This ce just too dangerous right now!¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong? Fanny was startled. But soon after, she smiled and said, ¡°Bryan, you are not weing us to your secret hideout, are you? Ha, the Profound Continent may be big, but who could possibly harm you? It sounds like you don¡¯t want us here! Hmph!¡±

    Obviously, Fanny thought that Han Shuo was joking with her. She absolutely did not believe that anyone on Profound Continent couldy a finger on him. Emily and Phoebe had the same thought, thinking that Han Shuo didn¡¯t want them to disturb him. They all put on the same disgruntled appearance.

    The threedies had blind faith in Han Shuo all along and were ignorant of the situation. Han Shuo didn¡¯t know if he shouldugh or feel proud of it. However, the situation wouldn¡¯t allow for any cking. Han Shuo put on a stern face and said solemnly, ¡°This is not a joke. Profound Continent is huge and there indeed are people who can pose me a threat!¡±

    ¡°Who? We aren¡¯t buying your lies!¡± Fanny said, giggling and not taking him seriously at all.

    Han Shuo wanted to sigh, he wanted to roll his eyes; s he stopped himself short. Just before he could reply, his eyes widened and his lips stiffened. He sighed and said in a low voice, ¡°Here hees!¡±

    An ancient dragon aura came gushing without one bit of concealment. Han Shuo could tell that the Primordius Dragon had sunken into a fury. He was charging straight at the barrier of the Cemetery of Death with terrifying momentum. Han Shuo nced at the threedies who were at a loss and realized that the Primordius Dragon must have found his way there through the three unsuspecting dames.

 Chapter 638: After killing you, I will be the new Planar Guardian!

    GDK 638: After killing you, I will be the new nar Guardian!

    ¡°Wait right here, do not go anywhere!¡± Han Shuo, wearing a grave expression, shouted at thedies.

    ¡°Bryan, what is going on?¡± Emily demanded. She could tell that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t joking around. The unprecedented nervousness showing on Han Shuo¡¯s face told her that something major was about to happen.

    ¡°There¡¯s no time to exin. Just stay inside and don¡¯t go anywhere!¡± Han Shuo repeated before he charged in the direction of the dragon aura that his senses picked up.

    When this avatar flew out, the avatar of death and the main body also shot out from the Cemetery of Death, turning into two trails of light shadows that streaked across the sky.

    ¡°What¡¯s happening? What¡¯s actually happening?¡± Phoebe asked flusteredly.

    ¡°He must have run into great trouble. Given his strength now, this enemy that he has to treat with such graveness is certainly not one that we could touch. We should just stay inside as he said lest we be a burden to him!¡± Emily, who had seen and experienced all kinds of situations, said to the other twodies calmly.

    ¡°Emily, his enemy came to his door soon after we came over. Is it because of... of us?¡± Fanny wore a culpable face as she said hesitantly.

    ¡°Possibly. Forget about it. Now is not the time to me ourselves. But if there¡¯s anyone to me, it has to be me. I shouldn¡¯t have brought you all here to look for him!¡± Emily said, sighing. Her delicate face was filled with regret. She contradicted herself by suggesting that she was at fault after saying that it wasn¡¯t time for ming.

    ¡°It¡¯s not your fault. It¡¯s all because of me that this is happening!¡± Phoebe imed responsibility.

    ¡°Alright, alright. Let¡¯s stop talking about this. We just have to stay inside and wait. I know Bryan will safely emerge from the jaws of danger. He will be fine!¡± Emily forced a smile on her face and pulled the twodies towards the center of the Cemetery of Death.

    As soon as Han Shuo exited the barrier, he saw the enormous Primordius Dragon charging over at a terrifying momentum, wrecking the towering trees in his path as though they were twigs.

    The ancient Primordius Dragon unfurled his Domain of Divinity of Earth. An enormous amount of the element of earth gathered around his tremendous dragon body and formed a thickyer of earth armor, making his already tremendous body appear even more colossal.

    Han Shuo expanded his consciousness and examined the Primordius Dragon¡¯s path in clear detail. He saw that the Primordius Dragon would soon ram into the barrier around the Cemetery of Death. With one thought, his two avatars suddenly appeared on his left and right. The avatar of destruction transformed back into the Demonyer Edge. Carrying a trail of bloody radiance, the Demonyer Edge shot straight at the Primordius Dragon rapidly charging over.

    Meanwhile, the avatar of death, using the divine energy in its body, assembled the elemental energy of death. He formed an enormous bone shield in front of the barrier of the Cemetery of Death. The white bone shield was like arge field of clouds that gave off gaudy white light as it reflected the sunlight.

    The Demonyer Edge shot at the Primordius Dragon at lightning speed. It was aimed at the Primordius Dragon¡¯sntern-sized eyes.

    However, before the Demonyer Edge got close to the dragon eyes, the Primordius Dragon spurted out his dragon breath. The dragon breath was concentrated with the elemental energy of earth found in his Domain of Divinity and congealed to form a ten-meter long earth dragon that hammered down on the Demonyer Edge. This neutralized the Demonyer Edge¡¯s attack aiming at his dragon eye.

    Immediately after that, the monstrous body of the Primordius Dragon violently rammed into the enormous white bone shield deployed by Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death. Thereupon, a deafening explosion that resonated through heaven and earth erupted.

    The super-sized white bone shield formed using the element of death and divine energy could not withstand the hit and suddenly shattered, sending bone fragments all over the ce. Han Shuo let out a stifled groan. His avatar of death had a pale look.

    That strike managed topletely shatter the super-sized white bone shield of Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death. His body was merely halted for a moment before he continued to ram into the barrier surrounding the Cemetery of Death.

    At this very moment, Han Shuo¡¯s main body of almost two meters tall suddenly grew to be a giant more than thirty meters in height. Before the Primordius Dragon could reach the barrier, Han Shuo¡¯s hands grabbed the Primordius Dragon¡¯s enormous body, lifting him into the air. The demonic yuan rapidly spurred, fueling Han Shuo¡¯s mighty physical body with energy. He flung the big dragon away with all his might.

    A loud rumble rocked the earth when his body smashed into the ground two hundred meters away. Rocks were shattered, the earth trembled, and sand went sent flying through the clouds. A row of ancient trees of all sizes were either snapped or uprooted.

    Han Shuo first used his avatar of destruction to force the Primordius Dragon to spurt out his dragon breath as he charged towards him, then followed by using the white bone shield with his avatar of death to block his quick and violent strike. Taking advantage of the instant the Primordius Dragon was stopped, he let the energy in his main body detonate, transforming Han Shuo¡¯s main body into a giant before tossing the dragon far into the distance. This series of actions took ce within fractions of a second. All three bodies of Han Shuo¡¯s struck with perfect synchronization and precision. Thanks to their excellent nning they managed to block down the Primordius Dragon¡¯s devastating strike, stopping him from destroying the boundary around the Cemetery of Death.

    After just a short few seconds of battle, much of Han Shuo¡¯s energy had been drained; it was as though he had fought a long war.

    The Primordius Dragon was indeed worthy of being the nar Guardian of Profound Continent for several thousand years. Han Shuo had to exert all the strength of his three bodies just to take one fierce strike of his. He was indeed thest well-matched adversary of Han Shuo¡¯s on the continent!

    After hurling the big dragon away, Han Shuo¡¯s gigantic main body heavily panted before his breathing resumed to normal. He took one giant leap andnded in the region where he had flung the Primordius Dragon.

    By now, the Primordius Dragon had regained his footing. Standing his ground, he raised his head up and looked all around with eyes red with fury.

    After making that strike, Han Shuo understood that the Primordius Dragon was covered in ayer of earth armor that gave him immense defensive power. Besides, by this point, Han Shuo still couldn¡¯t bepletely certain that the Primordius Dragon hade alone. He had to be cautious in his attacks.

    ¡°It¡¯s you! Are you also the one who bathed my Dragon Valley in blood?¡± the Primordius Dragon roared furiously when he saw the carefully approaching Han Shuo. He appeared extremely enraged.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. All those greater dragons in the Dragon Valley died at my hands!¡± Han Shuo nodded and admitted nonchntly.

    ¡°You wretched sinner! The Church of Light is right - you are the root cause of chaos on Profound Continent! I shouldn¡¯t have merely imprisoned you in the Abyss realm back then. I should¡¯ve killed you without the slightest mercy!¡± the Primordius Dragon was even more furious to hear Han Shuo admit his crimes so calmly. He raised his head and roared in rage.

    ¡°You had brought it all upon yourself. I was so kind to assist you in resisting the invasion of the Abyssal creatures. But in the end, not only were you so ungrateful for my assistance, you cut me off from the internar portal while I was inside the spacetime discontinuum and trapped me in the Abyss realm for five long years. I was almost stuck in the Abyss realm forever because of you. You¡¯re the only reason I painted your precious Dragon Valley bright red. Those offsprings of yours all died because of you!¡± Han Shuo reminded.

    ¡°No need to quibble. You have killed my people, so you must pay with your life!¡± the Primordius Dragon seemed to be unwilling to discuss it any further. He was constantly twisting his neck and it appeared that he was about to get into motion again.

    ¡°Have youe alone?¡± Han Shuo asked before the Primordius Dragon attacked.

    While talking to the Primordius Dragon, Han Shuo also took the liberty to survey the surroundings with his consciousness and did not pick up on any other expert lifeforms. However, Han Shuo dared not toy his full faith in his findings because, if the hidden attacker was in a realm that exceeded his, their soul might be able to hide from the consciousness detection. Therefore, Han Shuo could not bepletely certain that there wasn¡¯t any mightier expert around.

    After dealing blows with him, Han Shuo could be certain that the Primordius Dragon had yet to attainte-stage lowgod realm. Although Han Shuo did not have absolute certainty of securing victory against the Primordius Dragon, he believed that with three souls fighting against one, there wouldn¡¯t be much discrepancy in their strengths. However, if there was more than one attacker, unquestionably, Han Shuo would have no way of prevailing. In that case, all that he could do was return to the Cemetery of Death and run as far as he could with his threedies.

    ¡°So what if I¡¯m alone? I¡¯m more than enough to kill you!¡± the Primordius Dragon was slightly stunned in his rage when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s question. But soon after, as though he felt that he was being insulted, he roared, ¡°Petty human, don¡¯t you think that my race of greater dragon would be just as despicable as yours!¡±

    ¡°Oh. It appears that those experts from the other material nes have yet to descend,¡± Han Shuo mumbled to himself, ignoring the Primordius Dragon¡¯s bellow.

    ¡°Back then, I showed you mercy and spared your life. I will not repeat the same mistake now! After I kill you, I will destroy the Cemetery of Death. Then, those evil gods will have troubleing here. Profound Continent will regain its tranquility. You are the biggest element of instability on this continent. You must die!¡± It appeared that the Primordius Dragon knew of Han Shuo¡¯s role in the Cmity Church. The two masters of the only two internar transportation matrices belonged in different factions and were destined to be arch-enemies.

    ¡°Thest time, you harmed me but didn¡¯t kill me. That shall be the biggest mistake you will have made in all your life, because it¡¯s toote to kill me now!¡± Han Shuo sneered. From the moment Han Shuo learned that the Primordius Dragon was there alone, his heart was at ease. Han Shuo had a taste of the Primordius Dragon¡¯s strength and knew that he indeed was very mighty. But Han Shuo also had confidence in himself and did not consider himself to be weaker than the Primordius Dragon.

    Those words of Han Shuo¡¯s made the Primordius Dragon burst into a peal of loud, crazedughter. The giant figure of the Primordius Dragon rose into the sky as he cackled, blocking the sun¡¯s radiance. His shadow shrouded Han Shuo¡¯s below.

    Suddenly, the earth under Han Shuo¡¯s feet started to quake, its magnitude quickly bing more extreme. The level ground was undting up and down like ocean waves in a storm. Terrifying energy was rumbling towards Han Shuo through the earth. It was as though the thick surface of the earth wanted to bury Han Shuo under its mass.

    Han Shuo knew that once he was covered under the earth, the Primordius Dragon would certainly have ways of bombarding him using the earth¡¯s energy. Therefore, as soon as he felt the earth quiver, he soared into the air. He was high up in the sky before the ocean wave-like ground could cover and crush him.

    ¡°After killing you, I will be the new nar Guardian of Profound Continent!¡± after soaring into the sky, Han Shuo said as he red at the Primordius Dragon. His body hovering before the dragon gradually turned more and more blurry until hepletely disappeared with not even a trace of his aura detectable.

    Strangely, the Primordius Dragon suddenly ceased his roaring and became bizarrely silent. He could sense that Han Shuo was in the vicinity because an intense threat locked on him all along was still present.

 Chapter 639: Explosions

    GDK 639: Explosions

    This hidden threat left the Primordius Dragon feeling very uneasy. He stopped roaring and suddenly went silent.

    Although he appeared disdainful towards Han Shuo on the surface, from that most recent blow, he recognized that Han Shuo indeed possessed the strength to contend against him. The fact that Han Shuo could simultaneously cultivate in the energy of death and destruction especially shocked him.

    Han Shuo had bizarrely vanished without a trace right in his sight. He couldn¡¯t detect the slightest iota of Han Shuo¡¯s presence. The peculiar situation forced the Primordius Dragon to truly take Han Shuo¡¯s threat seriously.

    After attentively surveying his surroundings for some time, he still failed to detect Han Shuo¡¯s location. However, that indescribable energy that shrouded his soul since the beginning had not disappeared. He understood that Han Shuo was somewhere, right around the corner, preparing tounch a thunderous strike.

    His dragon eyes were likenterns radiating its burning light. He silently weighed in his mind for a moment and thought that it was hard to fully defend himself given the sheer size of his body.

    Hence, the Primordius Dragon started to shrink himself. After just a short few seconds, that colossal Primordius Dragon transformed into an elderly man standing just under six feet tall. The elderly man who was past his prime had a benign and peaceful look. He looked around in all directions vigntly under the scorching sun.

    ¡°Come out!¡± the Primordius Dragon coldly called out after he transformed into an old man. He was looking all around him with a steady face.

    There was no response. The surroundings were as silent as a cemetery. The only voice that answered him was his own echoes.

    After waiting for a moment, seeing that Han Shuo was still concealing himself in the dark, the Primordius Dragon got rather impatient. He turned over in his mind for a moment, and suddenly, he walked towards the Cemetery of Death step by step.

    The distance between him and the Cemetery of Death was merely a thousand meters. He was closing the distance to the Cemetery of Death at rapid speed.

    Inside the Cemetery of Death was an internar transportation matrix that could connect to distant material nes. As long as that internar transportation matrix was destroyed, those evil gods worshipped by the Cmity Church wouldn¡¯t be able to descend on Profound Continent. Subsequently, when those experts of the Shrine of Ice and Church of Light descended, Han Shuo who was only a lowgod would be dead without a doubt.

    The Cemetery of Death was one of the key facilities to the imminent battle over Profound Continent. Therefore, the Primordius Dragon believed that Han Shuo would attack him before he reached the Cemetery of Death.

    He was unmistaken in his judgment. The Cemetery of Death was housing not just an internar transportation matrix, but also threedies that had deep bonds with Han Shuo. Therefore, Han Shuo who had been waiting for optimal timing to strike had no choice but to attack in advance.

    Suddenly, a giant, spiky ball made of hundreds of interwoven bloody rays rolled out from the shade of a towering tree. It was shooting at extreme speed towards the Primordius Dragon as he marched towards the Cemetery of Death.

    Simultaneously, swarms of bone spears materialized out of thin air in waves, each more intimidating than thest. They shot towards the Primordius Dragon in an orderly manner.

    ¡°Ha, what use would such attacks even have!?¡± the Primordius Dragon, in the form of an elderly man, coldly groaned. He did not make any apparent movement but the rich element of earth in the ground gathered and formed a thick earth wall in front of him. All the bone spears were intercepted and none could prate his wall.

    Surprisingly, the bloody sphere covered with spikes continued to shoot at the Primordius Dragon with terrifying momentum right after defeating the earth wall with a loud rumble.

    ¡°Huh?¡± the Primordius Dragon was somewhat astonished and let out a soft cry of surprise. He took a baffled look at the bloody sphere and suddenly opened his mouth to spurt out a stream of dragon breath at it.

    The bloody sphere that shot towards him in a straight line seemed to have its own intelligence. When the Primordius Dragon spouted his dragon breath, the sphere abruptly maneuvered away from it. It flew in strange, curved paths with unpredictable trajectories.

    The Primordius Dragon actually wasn¡¯t astonished at the firepower of the bloody sphere; he was shocked that the energy in the bloody sphere didn¡¯t belong to any of the twelve mostmonly known fundamental forces. Then, when he saw that the bloody sphere had actually altered its course to avoid his dragon breath, his heart was even more startled and he took Han Shuo¡¯s threat much more seriously.

    All of a sudden, dark clouds overtook the bright clear sky. Bloody rays pierced out the thick, dark clouds like lightning bolts. A sinister and gloomy aura was faintly discharged from that dark cloud. It punished its beholders with intense pressure.

    Rumbles... The dark clouds overhead rapidly gathered and formed an enormous dark canopy that directly came covering down. In an instant, the entire region plunged intoplete darkness.

    The Primordius Dragon was stunned. He raised his head to look at the abnormal sky. He simply could not make out the kind of energy that Han Shuo deployed inside those dark clouds. He sensed the presence of the element of death, the edict of destruction, and also an unknown but extremely ruthless, sinister energy.

    Those three energies were mixed together and materialized as the dark cloud. The terrifying energy contained within felt as though it could annihte the world. Even the Primordius Dragon felt an extreme sense of threat.

    Seeing that the dark cloud was bearing down from above his head, the Primordius Dragon knew that he had absolutely no time for hesitation. He stomped on the ground and sent the divine energy in his body coursing through the earth. Under the effects of his divine energy, a terrifying earthquake was suddenly triggered under his feet. As the rumbling continued, the earth was torn to form several bottomless ravines before multiple hills rose from the ground and shot at the dark cloud.

    The scene at this moment was exactly like one would envision hell on earth, with the heavens falling and the earth rending. The energies gathered by the two mighty beings converged in a duel of powers and created an incredibly violent reaction. The tnd that was originally covered with verdant, lush nts was now an enraged wild beast. That dark cloud in the sky was like a weeping ghost. Beams after beams of bloody rays struck down like lightning bolts. The ruthless energy harbored the intention to destroy all things.

    The Primordius Dragon, taking the form of an amiable old man, started to roar furiously yet again. He activated some kind of energy and forcibly altered the flight trajectory of an unidentified meteorite falling from the sky. He elerated the meteorite to ten times its speed and bombarded downwards. The meteorite dragged a red trail several hundred meters long.

    That meteorite came down at an extreme speed and arrived at its target in the blink of an eye. It mmed against the thick dark cloud and pressed it straight into the ground. An impact crater several hundred meters in diameter was produced. zes were sent flying in all directions. Towering ancient trees that touched the sky were scattered and copsed before they caught fire.

    The boundary that enveloped the Cemetery of Death only a thousand meters away from this region warped for a moment to counteract the shock wave produced from that terrifying attack.

    The dark cloud that was meant to be floating in the sky was suddenly knocked down into the ground. However, not only did the dark cloud not scatter, it was rapidly warping and twisting, much alive a living demon.

    ¡°You are so screwed!¡± groaned the Primordius Dragon as he shot towards the lump of dark cloud.

    The moment that the meteorite pushed the lump of dark cloud into the ground, the Primordius Dragon, who hadn¡¯t been able to detect one bit of Han Shuo¡¯s aura all along, suddenly sensed his auraing from within the dark cloud. The Primordius Dragon was overjoyed at the discovery and prepared to give Han Shuo the fatal blow.

    Midway into his charging at the dark cloud, the Primordius Dragon transformed back into his dragon form. After taking a fraction of a second to arrive at the dark cloud, he pounced on it, determined to rip apart the dark cloud with brute force and therefrom, uncover and tear Han Shuo limb from limb.

    ¡°Haha! Let¡¯s see where you escape to this time!¡± the enormous body of the Primordius Dragon suddenly pushed down on the lump of dark cloud. His enormous ws were tearing the dark cloud ferociously.

    ¡°I¡¯m not nning to escape!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s unfeeling voice actually sounded from within the lump of dense dark cloud.

    The Primordius Dragon howled withughter, causing heaven and earth to shake with it. It was as though he had seen Han Shuocerated into pieces in his ws. He had first shelled the lump of dense dark cloud byunching hills into the sky. Shortly after, he proceeded by using his divine energy to alter the flight course of a meteor and sent it in the direction of the dark cloud. He was fully confident that Han Shuo had been seriously injured after receiving the two waves of attack.

    The Primordius Dragon again grew furious when he recalled the scene of the dozen or more carcasses of greater dragons. Taking into consideration that Han Shuo had threatened his position as the mightiest being on this continent, especially since Han Shuo was in possession of the Cemetery of Death, there was absolutely no way that the Primordius Dragon would tolerate Han Shuo¡¯s existence and allow him to live.

    However, the Primordius Dragon who was indulged in the excitement did not notice from Han Shuo¡¯s unfeeling voice that he was still ever so calm and unperturbed.

    Just as his dragon ws that resembled giant iron anchors grasped the lump of dark clouds and started to wildly scratch and tear, strange yet colorful radiances sparkled from within the lump of dark cloud. Soon after, extremely terrifying energies erupted from the dark cloud which engulfed the colossal body of the Primordius Dragon all of a sudden.

    During the sessions of rumbling explosions, the Soulpiercers fiercely shot into the Primordius Dragon¡¯s soul. Green zes violently surged out from the dark cloud and swamped the Primordius Dragon abruptly. Even that earth armor of formidable defensive power seemed to bebustible in the green me. It turned dry and brittle and made popping noises as it started to crack.

    All the remaining Pearls of Annihtion he had as well as the Cyano Demonze which Han Shuo had refined using all sorts of rare materials in the Abyss realm were all packed into the dark cloud. All those demonic treasures that Han Shuo had meticulously refined were set to erupt all at once while the Primordius Dragon recklessly tore the dark cloud, overwhelming the Primordius Dragon without warning.

    It was also at this moment that the thick dark cloud started dissipating into bloody radiances. After the dark cloud totally dispersed, the Blood Seether was revealed. The weapon that gave off that intense, nostril-assailing reek of blood suddenly flew at the giant skull of the Primordius Dragon. Malevolent and mournful ghostly faces appeared and disappeared on the Blood Seether. They were shrieking without sound and appeared to be struggling to free themselves.

    The Primordius Dragon waspletely overwhelmed; his body and soul had sustained that hideous mess of attacks. All kinds of pain swarmed at him, causing him to let out a deafening, blood-curdling screech. His voice traveled far into the distance. All the magical beasts within a hundred-mile radius heard the voice and ran as far as they could in the opposite direction.

 Chapter 640: Fossilize

    GDK 640: Fossilize

    For almost every living thing on the Profound Continent, the might of the Primordius Dragon, the nar Guardian of Profound Continent simply wasn¡¯t anything that they could resist. All the magical beasts in the Dark Forest who heard the miserable shriek of the Primordius Dragon instinctively felt frightened and kept away from the region from which the voice originated.

    The explosions from the Pearls of Annihtion could not break away the earth armor that covered the body of the Primordius Dragon. The Soulpiercers that came with the explosions, however, could pass through material defenses. Even all that earth armor of astonishing defensive power simply could not obstruct the Soulpiercers¡¯ attack against the soul.

    The green mes formed by the Cyano Demonze could burn the body and soul without direct contact. It was a treasured demonic weapon that was even more malicious than the Soulpiercers. The Blood Seether didn¡¯t just do damage to the outer skin. As soon as the Blood Seether reached the Primordius Dragon, the blood cirction in his body started to be abnormal and he felt as though his arteries and veins were slowly going to burst.

    These three treasured demonic weapons were concealed in the dark cloud by Han Shuo and were detonated all at once during the right moment. The attackspletelynded on the Primordius Dragon and immediately caused him immense injuries and unbearable pain.

    Demonic arts and demonic weapons did not originate from this universe. This was the first time that the Primordius Dragon had ever encountered an attack so bizarre. When his earth armor turned ineffective and his body and soul suffered the barrages of attacks, he felt flustered for the first time ever and started to howl in pain.

    ¡°As I¡¯ve said, I¡¯m not nning to escape!¡± The dark cloudspletely dissipated to reveal three identical Han Shuos. All three of them were covered with cuts and bruises after having received the Primordius Dragon¡¯s bombardment of hill-missiles and meteorite impact. They appeared extremely beaten up.

    But at this moment, the Primordius Dragon was deaf to Han Shuo¡¯s words. He was constantly howling in pain. The earth armor that covered his enormous dragon body was cracking and falling off while burning with green mes. His body was scorched and charred.

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction transformed into the Demonyer Edge form and flew into his main body¡¯s grasp. Han Shuo¡¯s main body wielding the Demonyer Edge, at neither a hurried nor slow pace, flew towards the Primordius Dragon, who had sunken into madness. Meanwhile, his avatar of death hovered in the air, silently assembling his divine energy tounch the next wave of attack.

    Both the Primordius Dragon¡¯s body and soul suffered constant damages under the assault of the three demonic weapons. Under such circumstances, the Primordius Dragon at this moment was most powerless in defending against Han Shuo. Hence, this was the golden opportunity for Han Shuo to take advantage of in dealing his final blow.

    However, the Primordius Dragon as one in the realm of mid-stage lowgod was indeed much strongerpared to the four Great Demon Kings that Han Shuo previously met in the Abyss realm. Even though affected by the detrimental energies of the three demonic weapons, the Primordius Dragon had yet topletely copse. The divine energy and divine soul in his body were notpletely incapacitated from making aeback.

    A transformation took ce in an instant. Just as Han Shuo was about to thrust the Demonyer Edge into the Primordius Dragon¡¯s neck, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness detected that the Primordius Dragon¡¯s divine soul and divine body was forming an extraordinary connection. Strange changes also urred in the Domain of Divinity of Earth that enveloped the Primordius Dragon during that instance.

    Right before Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, the massive dragon body of the Primordius Dragon rapidly fossilized at a speed visible to the naked eye. The process was so quick that the nearly mountain-sized Primordius Dragon¡¯s body hadpletely fossilized during the brief instance that Han Shuo was distracted. A thickyer of rock covered his entire body while his physical body sucked in all the elements of earth from his Domain of Divinity. Those elements of earth that filled every cell in his body to the brim assisted in fossilizing his body.

    The fossilized Primordius Dragon could still circte his divine energy throughout his body without impediment. His divine soul was still tough and strong. Han Shuo soon realized that although the Primordius Dragon had lost mobility, his awareness was still present as before.

    The Cyano Demonze and Blood Seether had immense destructive power towards the physical body and blood. However, after the Primordius Dragon fossilized his own body, therge quantities of the element of earth that filled his flesh and blood altered their original properties, nullifying the incredibly damaging power of the Cyano Demonze and Blood Seether.

    In regard to the Soulpiercers, as they targeted only the soul, although the fossilization avoided him the harms of the Cyano Demonze and Blood Seether, it did nothing to stop the Soulpiercers¡¯ attack. He still had to give all-out effort in eliminating the soul-corrosive energy of the Soulpiercers from his soul.

    If it wasn¡¯t for the Primordius Dragon suddenly making this masterstroke, Han Shuo believed that under the attacks of his three treasured demonic weapons, with a thrust of his incisive Demonyer Edge, the Primordius Dragon who had guarded the Profound Continent for many years would have perished on that day.

    However, in life, not all things go exactly as nned. The battle seemed as though it would be over in a moment, but who knew that the Primordius Dragon would suddenly fossilize himself and escape from the effects of the Cyano Demonze and Blood Seether in an instant. What¡¯s more, he was currently making an all-out effort in eliminating the attack of the Soulpiercers towards his soul.

    The process had taken ce so rapidly that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t deal him the final blow in time. Seeing that the Primordius Dragon hadpleted the fossilization process, Han Shuo knew that he had to deal him devastating strikes before hepletely eliminated the Soulpiercers¡¯ corrosion from his soul.

    Of the eight elemental energies, the element of earth was famous for its robust defensive power. For Primordius Dragon to undergo fossilization during such a critical moment was ample proof of his confidence in this fossilized state of his. He would never have done so otherwise.

    Without much hesitation, Han Shuo raised and injected all his demonic yuan into the Demonyer Edge. Combining it with the chaotic energy of destruction within, the Demonyer Edge towed a trail of dark radiance as it shot down at the Primordius Dragon¡¯s fossilized back.

    The reason that Han Shuo struck at the dragon back instead of the dragon head was that before the Primordius Dragon fossilized himself, he had buried his head under his dragon body. He had nned to use other parts of his body to take Han Shuo¡¯s punishing attacks, not giving Han Shuo the chance to directly finish him off by bombarding at his vital dragon head.

    This exceptional murder weapon that had absorbed the negative energies from hundreds of thousands of souls, when fully catalyzed by Han Shuo¡¯s demonic arts, definitely could be counted as an unstopped divine weapon. When it struck on the Primordius Dragon¡¯s fossilized back, bright sparks were given off.

    The Demonyer Edge indeed did not disappoint Han Shuo. Fossilization, one of the ultimate forms in the elemental energy of earth, elemental energy that purportedly had the best defensive power, possessed defensive power so immense that it made his body tougher than the hardest rock. However, under the all-out attack of Han Shuo and the Demonyer Edge, this fossilized body nheless gave off sparks and allowed the half the length of the Demonyer Edge to enter. Han Shuo¡¯s sensitive consciousness picked up that as the Demonyer Edge thrust into the fossilized body, the Primordius Dragon¡¯s soul trembled at the same time. This made Han Shuo realize that although the Primordius Dragon had fossilized, making injuries to his body would still cause him pain.

    Han Shuo¡¯s face jolted. He tightly grasped at the sword hilt of the Demonyer Edge with both hands and pulled it out. The jingling of metals sounded. It was simr to pulling out from a rock fissure.

    Seeing that this kind of attack was effective, Han Shuo did not hesitate. He soared into the sky in the same manner and imbued all his energy in the Demonyer Edge. He made yet another strike and very precisely struck at the same wound he just made on the Primordius Dragon.

    This time, the Demonyer Edge entered into his body up to the sword hilt. Han Shuo clearly sensed the Primordius Dragon¡¯s soul that was focused on eliminating the corrosive energy of the Soulpiercers shivered even more violently.

    Han Shuoughed grimly in his heart and repeated the same action. He soared into the sky and bombarded on the Primordius Dragon¡¯s body, again and again, making deep wounds on his body. The Primordius Dragon looked as though a giant rock that was covered with fissures. It appeared extremely dreadful.

    Perhaps because of Han Shuo¡¯s unceasing bombardment, the Primordius Dragon took a much longer time to eliminate the Soulpiercerspared to those Abyssal Demon Kings. His soul constantly shuddered and was in unbearable pain.

    Han Shuo did not speak a word but callously repeated the same action: soar high into the air, rapidly dive, strike, and repeat.

    He made sure to give three strikes to every cut, ensuring that the Demonyer Edge prated deep into his body and injured his organs.

    Han Shuo repeated the same attack more than thirty times. Other than his dragon head, most vitals of the dragon body were deeply wounded by Han Shuo through that method, severely injuring him.

    Finally, all the energy of the Soulpierces in the Primordius Dragon¡¯s soul waspletely eliminated.

    A world-shaking dragon roar sounded from his head that was wrapped under his dragon body. After the roar sounded, the fossilized body of the Primordius Dragon rapidly transformed. In the blink of an eye, it turned into a charred, heavily wounded, and badly mangled state.

    Han Shuo was diving from high in the sky yet again. This time, as the Primordius Dragon¡¯s head was revealed, Han Shuo altered his target midway in flight and bombarded his dragon head. He attempted to finish the Primordius Dragon once and for all!

    Roar... the Primordius Dragon furiously roared at the sky. His iron anchor-like dragon ws shot out at lightning speed and blocked down Han Shuo¡¯s fatal strike.

    Following that, the Primordius Dragon began to roar like a creature of the wild. Just as Han Shuo thought that the Primordius Dragon would lose rationality and make a counterattack, the Primordius Dragon swung his tail and miserably escaped in the direction of Kasi Empire.

    On the Primordius Dragon¡¯s back, there were ghastly sights of enormous wounds still gushing with fresh blood like a broken faucet. His enormous dragon body was badly mangled and charred in various parts all over his body. He appeared to be gravely injured.

    It appeared that although the Primordius Dragon fossilized his body, all those fissures formed by the bombardment of Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge would still be present after the fossilized state was undone. Each and every one of the dozen or more deep wounds had pierced deep into the Primordius Dragon¡¯s body. Han Shuo knew that he must have sustained extremely severe injuries. Otherwise, instead of trying to make an escape, the Primordius Dragon would surely have fought Han Shuo to his death after being humiliated like that.

    Han Shuo heaved a sigh of relief. He coldly watched the Primordius Dragon transform into human form as he ran until he disappeared out of sight. He did not get up to pursue him but took a rest for a moment on the same ground.

    The Primordius Dragon could still move very rapidly even though he had suffered severe injuries. However, Han Shuo believed that as long as he pursued him with all his strength, he could definitely catch up to him. But by then, Han Shuo had exhausted a great amount of his energy and needed to take a break. Otherwise, even when he caught up to the Primordius Dragon, he might not necessarily have the energy to kill him.

    Besides, Han Shuo hade up with a much better idea. Hence he decided to sacrifice this opportunity to further pursue the Primordius Dragon.

 Chapter 641: Boundless Sea

    GDK 641: Boundless Sea

    After the battle was over, everything within a ten mile radius was torn to the ground, ttened, or burned, with one exception; the Cemetery of Death was left unscathed thanks to the boundary around it. The earth was filled with holes and craters, pits of fire every step of the way.

    Han Shuo rested for a moment on the same ground. His two avatars returned into his main body and he flew back into the Cemetery of Death.

    The threedies taking shelter inside the Cemetery of Death had worried expressions. When they suddenly saw that Han Shuo had returned, they immediately rushed to him and asked, ¡°How are you? Are you alright? Are you wounded?¡±

    The threedies had felt the terrifying movements out there from within the Cemetery of Death. It was as though doomsday had arrived. They were panicking and deeply afraid that something might happen to Han Shuo.

    When Han Shuo walked into the Cemetery of Death, his clothing was ragged and his face was dirtied with dust evident of having fought a great battle. He appeared exhausted and had obviously experienced a hard battle. The threedies were even more worried.

    Looking at the distressed looks on their faces, Han Shuo smiled and said in a soft voice, ¡°Don¡¯t worry. Everything is alright.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, this is all my fault. I shouldn¡¯t havee here. If I hadn¡¯t, your enemy would not have found you,¡± Emily said conscientiously.

    ¡°This has nothing to do with you. It¡¯s all me. If it wasn¡¯t for my impatience, you surely wouldn¡¯t havee here to look for him,¡± Phoebe rushed to take on the responsibility herself. Her heart was filled with remorse.

    Seeing his women so guilty of themselves, Han Shuo said, ¡°Alright alright, I¡¯m just fine now, aren¡¯t I!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, who were you fighting with? How could there be anyone on the continent that could get you so tense?¡±

    All along, Fanny had blind confidence in Han Shuo¡¯s undefeatable strength. She was surprised that Han Shuo could have a well-matched adversary especially since Han Shuo possessed godly strength.

    Fanny had left Han Shuo betweenughter and tears. He exined in a deep voice, ¡°There has been a Guardian of Profound Continent since ancient times. My existence had severely threatened the position of that Guardian. That was why he wanted to eliminate me by hook or by crook. He is a mighty fe. This time, he had to retreat with serious injuries as he fell into my trap. There are numerous material nes out there in the universe, and an uncountable number of experts, especially on high-level material nes. You must not assume that I¡¯m invincible. At the realm I¡¯m in, against most experts from other material nes, I could only expect to retreat.¡±

    The threedies were shocked and terrified at Han Shuo¡¯s words. Up until that day, the threedies actually thought that Han Shuo was invincible. However, seeing how grave and prudent Han Shuo was, they understood that Han Shuo was beingpletely serious.

    ¡°Then are you going to be in any danger?¡± Emily asked worriedly after keeping silent for a moment.

    ¡°There will always be dangers, but I have ways of evading them. You don¡¯t have to worry about this,¡± Han Shuo consoled hisdies. After thinking for a moment, he put on a stern face and said, ¡°However, the three of you must not look for me during this time. Leave this ce as soon as possible. That nar guardian considers himself merciful and he shouldn¡¯t cause any of you trouble. As long as youdies don¡¯t look for me, it won¡¯t be easy for them to find me.¡±

    ¡°Understood!¡± the threedies simultaneously replied. Puzzled, Fanny asked, ¡°But hasn¡¯t the location of this ce already been exposed?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s no big deal. After seeing you three off, I will relocate this building to somewhere else. Once this matter has been resolved, I will look for you, so don¡¯t some searching for me till then. In addition, after you returned, tell Lawrence not to go on the offensive against other countries for the time being lest he provokes the anger of certain existences,¡± Han Shuo instructed.

    ¡°Alright, then we won¡¯t disturb you any longer!¡± the considerate Emily said as she nodded. She then turned to Fanny and Phoebe and said, ¡°Ladies, shall we go now?¡±

    Fanny and Phoebe were tactful people. Although they were reluctant to part with Han Shuo, they agreed with Emily.

    As soon as they exited the Cemetery of Death, they discovered everything around them had beenid waste. Thend was devastated with fire burning all around. It was as though a major disaster had struck the area. They couldn¡¯t begin to fathom just how fierce that battle must have been.

    After giving the three a few more consoling words, thedies tactfully left in a group. As their strengths could be considered excellent on Profound Continent, they could travel at decent speeds. It only took a few seconds before they disappeared from Han Shuo¡¯s sight.

    After seeing the threedies off, Han Shuo immediately returned to the Cemetery of Death and came upon a hall where the internar transportation matrix was located. He closed his eyes for a moment to recall some information pertaining to the Cemetery of Death. When he opened his eyes, he directly headed to the bottom-mostyer and located a magical console. He filled the magical console with energy crystals, transformed his avatar of death into the skeletal staff, and ced it into a slot at the center of the magical console.

    As soon as the skeletal staff was inserted, his avatar of death seemed to have formed a wonderful connection with the Cemetery of Death. In all of a sudden, rich amount of the element of death from all directions started gathering towards the Cemetery of Death and attached to the boundary that enveloped it. The element of death inside the Cemetery of Death also grew richer as time passed.

    If one were to observe from a distance, the Cemetery of Death which was usually undetectable with the naked eyes, currently transformed into a giant sphere that gave of faint greenish shimmers. It appeared extremely strange and mysterious.

    The earth started to shake as the Cemetery of Death rumbled like a rocket engine. With plenty supply of energy, the Cemetery of Death which took the shape of a giant greenish sphere slowly lifted off from the ground and soared high into the sky.

    The element of death continued to gather towards the Cemetery of Death from all directions. Han Shuo, whose soul had formed a bizarre connection with the Cemetery of Death, flew the structure high into the sky. After identifying the direction, he flew it above the clouds and away from the Dark Forest.

    As the Cemetery of Death was high in the sky, the faint green light that it gave off was unnoticeable during flight. Separated by such great height, no one on the ground would discover the abnormal flying object in the sky. Besides, the boundary around the Cemetery of Death had the ability to block the soul sensing power from experts. Therefore, Han Shuo was confident that no one would notice that big flying building of his.

    Han Shuo charted a course and piloted the Cemetery of Death straight to his destination. Through the magical console in the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo could see the view outside. After flying at full speed for a day, Han Shuo and the Cemetery of Death arrived at the Boundless Sea at the western shore of Profound Continent.

    The Boundless Sea was a vast ocean. It was told in the legends that the ocean was the edge of the world. It was vast, remote, and uninhabited. Only ocean creatures could survive there.

    After flying over the Boundless Sea for some time, Han Shuo discovered a region scattered with big and small uninhabited atolls. He noticed an ind that resembled the shape of a gourd below him. When he unfolded his consciousness, he discovered that there were only sporadic weak and small wild beasts that inhabited the ind. Hence he piloted the Cemetery of Death to slowly descend from the sky.

    The earth shook more and more violently as he descended. Finally, the building plowed into the ground like an asteroid. Itnded in the middle of a jungle and its underground section was buried just like it had been back at the Dark Forest. That boundary around the structure was still intact and functioning well. Not a human nor beast could detect the presence of the Cemetery of Death.

    When the Cemetery of Death first lifted off from the Dark Forest, Han Shuo had taken certain meticulous measures so that the piece ofnd where his spirit demons were being refined would be carried along. Hence, when the Cemetery of Death nownded on this ce, the formation that was refining his spirit demon remained in good condition and was supplying the three spirit demons with an unending stream of energy as before.

    As there were an awful lot of trails and marks in the dense forest made by the Cemetery of Death¡¯s descent, after exiting the Cemetery of Death, Han Shuo summoned earth elite zombie and wood elite zombie. The two of them worked together to rapidly reforest and patch up the area. Broken tree branches were reconnected and bumpy grounds were leveled.

    Han Shuo hovered loftily in the sky. When he gazed at the surroundings, all he saw was a dark blue sky and an azure ocean that stretched beyond the horizon.

    The warm ocean wind blew on his face. Ocean waves sshed at the coarse, rugged, and ancient cliff rocks. There were some seabirds and sea creatures resting and sunbathing on the cliff rocks. It was a serene scene.

    There were also some huge fruits naturally growing on the gourd ind. They were bright red and green in color and could be found everywhere on the ind.

    Merely gazing into the boundless ocean made Han Shuo feel rejuvenated. A feeling of heroism suddenly soared in his heart. The exceptionally beautiful scenery of the gourd ind was able to lift his heavy mood from the ground. He thought that if the threedies were there, they would surely fall in love with the ce.

    Han Shuo, who was in a great mood, unfolded his consciousness and spread it across his surroundings with the gourd ind as the center. He wanted to see if he had any interesting neighbors.

    The consciousness at the Nine Changes realm had an extensive coverage area. Han Shuo kept hush and focused on the task. The area covered by the consciousness grew wider and wider. Fishes, shrimp and magical sea creatures swam in the ocean, seabirds circled around in the air, and all kinds of life aura of sea creatures were registered by Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    When the consciousness covered several dozen miles in radius, he suddenly detected a decently strong soul. When the soul detected Han Shuo¡¯s probing, it became belligerent and transmitted an unfriendly message, ¡°Get lost from my territory! This piece of the ocean is mine! Leave now or pay with your life!¡±

    Han Shuo left out a soft cry of surprise and thought that the warning wasughable. From what Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness sensed, he could tell that the soul wasn¡¯t that of a human¡¯s. Based on his mastery towards souls, Han Shuo was certain that the creature¡¯s strength was about the same as Pegasus¡¯. Although the creature could be considered a top-notch expert on Profound Continent, in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, it was as puny as an ant.

    An expert of that level perhaps had nevere across any existence as formidable as Han Shuo all its life on Profound Continent and therefore thought of itself as unequaled. The message transmitted by its soul also sounded extremely egotistical and brassy. Han Shuo merely ignored him. He continued to unfold his consciousness and spread it further into the distance.

    ¡°Huh?!¡± Han Shuo gasped as his consciousness was startled. Surprisingly, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was met with an obstruction at a spot underneath an isted ind. There seemed to be a boundary present at that location that was obstructing his consciousness¡¯ probing. Curiosity struck Han Shuo once more.

    (Next chapter will be released on 21st March, around 2am GMT +8, but you can read it right now by bing my patron!)

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 Chapter 642: Track and kill

    GDK 642: Track and kill

    The mysteriousness of the isted ind had caught Han Shuo¡¯s attention but he was not there to investigate it. There were more pressing matters at hand.

    Firstly, he had some errands to run. But more crucially, Han Shuo had yet to regain all his strength. He did not want to waste any of his time or energy.

    Han Shuo was startled by the sight of some sort of projectile hurtling into the air. It was that mighty sea creature that his consciousness hade across, flying in rage when it saw Han Shuo, not showing any fear. It emerged from the ind that it upied and approached Han Shuo.

    An existence of such strength was indeed considered to be mighty on Profound Continent. But in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, it wasn¡¯t worthy of being taken seriously. Han Shuo had important matters to attend to and therefore did not want to deal with the creature. He walked right back into the Cemetery of Death.

    Although the setting of the Cemetery of Death was now very different, everything was still the same inside. The enormous internar transportation matrix at the center would still have no trouble conducting short range transmissions.

    By using the jumbo transportation matrix, Han Shuo returned to the underground chamber at his City Lord¡¯s mansion at Brettel City. Shortly after, using transportation matrix facilities, Han Shuo teleported from Brettel City to the Southern Border. Subsequently, he departed from the Southern Border and flew towards the Empire of Orcs.

    During that great battle at the Dark Forest, Han Shuo had left not just severe injuries on the Primordius Dragon, but also a tracer inside the Primordius Dragon¡¯s badly mangled body using a special demonic technique. Through that, Han Shuo could determine the dragon¡¯s exact location.

    The Primordius Dragon, to have been seriously injured at this critical juncture, would surely recuperate from his injuries at the most secluded and the safest ce he knew. Han Shuo reasoned that the Primordius Dragon would return to where his internar transportation matrix was. The internar transportation matrix was the key to everything. As long as Han Shuo could locate it and destroy it once and for all, then those from the Church of Light and Shrine of Ice would have trouble entering Profound Continent. In that case, the forces on Han Shuo¡¯s side would face no resistance in the impending battle revolving around thestyer of the underground world.

    It was with this thought in mind that Han Shuo did not pursue and kill the Primordius Dragon when he tried to escape. He also did not start following the Primordius Dragon immediately as he knew that the dragon would be most vignt during that moment. Wounded, Han Shuo did not have full certainty that he would not be discovered by the dragon if Han Shuo were to stalk him.

    Through the tracker imnted within the Primordius Dragon¡¯s flesh, using a special technique of the demonic arts that was as stealthy as one¡¯s own shadow, Han Shuo determined that the Primordius Dragon was at the barrennd where the orcs lived. Han Shuo saved himself the trouble of traveling long distances by using the transportation matrix facilities in Lancelot Empire. He managed to arrive at the Southern Border with no effort and infiltrate the territories of the Empire of Orcs from there.

    Being at the Nine Changes realm, Han Shuo could alter his physical body to any form he wished. After entering thend of orcs, Han Shuo assumed the form of an ordinary orc. He even took some rather minor roads when heading deep into the Empire of Orcs.

    Thends of the Empire of Orcs was indeed barren. All along the way, all he saw was dry and cracked earth. The sparse nts had an unhealthy yellow tinge. It was rare to find any verdant greenery.

    The ground was made of yellow soil which seemed unsuitable for growing crops. Coupled with the dry and hot weather where rain was rare, even the most resilient nt that managed to sprout would ultimately wither.

    It was not surprising that the orcs would have such a voracious covet for the fertilends of the Lancelot Empire, traveling great distances to initiate invasions at every opportunity. The soil that they lived on was just too infertile.

    Han Shuo had merely nced around as he ventured deep into the Empire of Orcs. He did not waste time in further examining the environment.

    After half a day¡¯s worth of time, Han Shuo passed right through the Empire of Orcs and came to an even more deste, bleak in with yellow soil. This region was only slightly better than a desert. There were no nts and the only fauna were some fierce magical beasts that roamed the in in arge group. They seemed to be hunting for solo travelers.

    The in was expansive and Han Shuo spent quite some more time traversing it.

    After crossing the ins, Han Shuo had unexpectedlye upon a mountain range which his senses detected to be brimming with vitality, magical beasts running amuck. The sky was drizzling when he arrived. The surface was muddy and hard to pass. Ash gray swamps could be found everywhere. It was apletely different scene from what he saw inside the Empire of Orcs.

    The environment around this ce was simr to the Dark Forest, ignoring its excessive precipitation. It was as though all the rainwater that was supposed to fall on the Empire of Orcs had fallen on this ce instead. All along the way, he would find pools of water that ranged from deep to shallow. The magical beasts that inhabited the ce were extremely strong. The cruelw of the jungle was closely observed.

    Han Shuo truly didn¡¯t know that after traversing the Empire of Orcs and a piece of vast field, he would find such a peculiar ce. The Primordius Dragon was coincidentally staying in this region.

    As soon as Han Shuo arrived, he slowed down his pace and concealed the aura of life on his body lest he aroused the Primordius Dragon¡¯s attention. He cautiously walked towards where the Primordius Dragon was located.

    Han Shuo again traveled for some time and evaded many powerful magical beasts en route. He slowly approached the spot that his consciousness sensed.

    The overcast sky continued to drizzle, Han Shuo sighted a forest of vines chaotically banded together. When he stepped inside, he noticed that the element of earth in this area was much more intensepared to anywhere he had ever been. Han Shuo was certain that the Primordius Dragon was just nearby.

    Han Shuo decided to hover and avoid touching the ground with his feet. He was afraid that the Primordius Dragon who cultivated in the elemental energy of earth might have ways of detecting his presence through the earth. Han Shuo was extremely cautious as he progressed, so cautious that he did not even push aside the vines in his path but to took winding detours around them instead.

    After moving in that manner for ten or so minutes, Han Shuo suddenly stopped. He sensed the presence of a barrier right ahead of him. The person who deployed the barrier ought to cultivate in the elemental energy of water. Han Shuo could sense the softness of the barrier as well as a trace of chillness that it gave off.

    Han Shuo did not rush to destroy the barrier. He stopped for a moment and unfolded his consciousness to carefully probe for any signs of activity inside the barrier. One of the functions of the barrier was to block and cut off the sensing power of the soul. However, as Han Shuo had left a certain tracer inside the Primordius Dragon¡¯s body beforehand, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness could induce resonance with the tracer on the other side of the barrier. With that, Han Shuo could bypass the obstruction of this water element barrier and sense the auras of living beings within.

    Besides not wanting to alert the Primordius Dragon inside, the reason that Han Shuo behaved so cautiously was to make sure that those experts from alien material nes had yet to arrive. If there was just one expert from an alien material ne that had arrived and Han Shuo were so reckless to barge in, he could very wellnd in a predicament with no hope of reprieve. Han Shuo had no choice but to be very cautious in guarding against the unexpected.

    Through the tracer he left inside the Primordius Dragon¡¯s body, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness slowly expanded and spread inside the barrier. He could detect the Primordius Dragon hiding underground. His soul was smooth and tranquil as though having sunken deep into a slumber. It appeared that the Primordius Dragon was recovering from the injuries to his body and soul this way.

    After attentively inspecting each and every corner inside the barrier, Han Shuo was pleasantly surprised as he discovered no trace of any soul other than the Primordius Dragon¡¯s. Han Shuo took a breath of relief. He couldn¡¯t help but draw a merciless sneer on his face.

    As long as he made use of this opportunity to break through the barrier, kill the Primordius Dragon, and destroy the internar transportation matrix inside, then Han Shuo could at least enjoy a good duration of time in peace and need not to be on edge about the arrival of hostile experts from alien material nes.

    Han Shuo stopped probing with consciousness. He calmed himself and adjusted his body and consciousness to their most optimal state. One of his avatars transformed into the Demonyer Edge and flew into his hand.

    Once his avatar transformed to be the Demonyer Edge, the ruthless energy would soon surely emanate from it like steam from a hot bath. As not to draw the Primordius Dragon¡¯s awareness of the threat until a littleter, Han Shuo spent some time forming a protectiveyer around the Demonyer Edge using demonic arts, temporarily concealing the ruthless aura that it gave off.

    The demonic yuan in his body gushed into the Demonyer Edge. Whenbined with the violent, chaotic negative energies contained within, the Demonyer Edge blossomed with sinister light. Theyer of protective membrane looked as though it might disintegrate at any moment.

    More and more energy gathered. The moment that the protectiveyer finally lost all its effect, ruthless and sinister energy erupted from the tip of the Demonyer Edge. The millions of souls inside the Demonyer Edge could almost be heard shrieking miserably. A trail of chilling demonic light streaked across the sky and smashed onto the boundary deployed by the god who cultivated in the element of water.

    As Han Shuo knew that the barrier contained an enormous amount of energy, he did not withhold his strength. He concentrated his energy on the peak and erupted it in an instant.

    Swash!

    The barrier of water element tore as it was shed by the Demonyer Edge. A crack of two meters long and half a meter wide was produced. Han Shuo¡¯s body blurred and shot through the crack at lighting speed, crossing to the other side of the barrier.

    As soon as Han Shuo breached the barrier, he sensed extremely intense yuan energy of earth. The yuan energy of earth in this ce was in fact much richer and more intensepared to at the Dark Forest where the Cemetery of Death was previously nted. Han Shuo was astounded as he right away realized that this must be a ce of extreme earth even more ancient than the one in the Dark Forest.

    After bing a god, Han Shuo understood that of the five ces of extremes, the yuan energies of earth and fire were somewhat different from the elements of earth and fire that experts in this universe could absorb raw. However, with the insight that Han Shuo had now, he reckoned that the yuan energies of earth and fire found in the respective ces of extremes were actually a new state of element after the elements of earth and fire were condensed by several dozen folds. Due to the unique presence of the ces of extreme earth and fire, the elements of earth and fire in those ces would be more and more condensed until the yuan energies of earth and fire were formed. These yuan energies were different from their elemental energies counterpart but there was no difference in energyposition. It even had greater energy density after being condensed.

    The reason that the Lord of mes who upied the ce of extreme fire could cultivate to be an Emperor of mes so rapidly was because she had mastered the method of absorbing the yuan energy of fire, a condensed form of the element of fire. As Primordius Dragon had upied this ancient ce of extreme earth, he surely must also have figured out the method of absorbing the yuan energy of earth. No wonder he would escape to this ce after being injured.

    A series of thoughts crossed Han Shuo¡¯s mind at lightspeed. He knew that he had to finish the Primordius Dragon as soon as possible because the Primordius Dragon would recover at a speed beyond his imagination while staying in such a strategic ce. Hence, after quickly thinking, Han Shuo shot directly towards where the Primordius Dragon was located.

    An appeal from the trantor: Dear readers, as you may understand, tranting is no easy task, especially when trying to maintain a certain level of quality at such a pace. Recently, my patreon pledges have fallen by around 1/4 for no apparent reason. This coincidentally happened at a time where the chapter length will soon increase by around 30%, which means Emily and I will have to spend more time working on each chapter. Therefore, here I ask that you, my beloved readers, to consider supporting the project on my patreon. If you choose not to, I¡¯d be happy to know why and if there is anything I could do to change your mind. Thank you. -Hedonist

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 Chapter 643: Killing an Archenemy

    GDK 643: Killing an Archenemy

    The ce of extreme earth which took millions of years to form was deep underground. The colossal body of the Primordius Dragon was buried within the ce of extreme earth.

    Under the boundary was a giant magical matrix on the ground taking the form of a six-pointed star. At the center of the hexagram was a fissure. Han Shuo shot into the fissure at lightning speed. After diving several hundred meters, Han Shuo saw the Primordius Dragon who had entrenched himself within the ce of extreme earth.

    The enormous amount of the yuan energy of earth found in the ce of extreme earth was converging into the Primordius Dragon¡¯s body from all directions, making his body glow with a faint yellowish shimmer. On the Primordius Dragon¡¯s head was an object there to absorb the yuan energy of earth. It was also obviously filled with a substantial amount of the yuan energy of earth.

    The Primordius Dragon became aware that Han Shuo had arrived the moment he tore open the water element boundary. However, as to better absorb the rich yuan energy of earth in the ce of extreme earth, the Primordius Dragon had sunken himself into a hibernation state. It would take him a while to wake up from that state.

    Although he had made a supreme effort in waking up from hibernation, it still took him several seconds worth of time. It was also during these several seconds that the lightning-fast Han Shuo arrived before him.

    Han Shuo showed no hesitation and said not a word. As soon as he saw the Primordius Dragon, heunched torrents of attacks and bombarded the slowly-awakening Primordius Dragon.

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death suddenly shot out from the main body and unleashed the three trump card boundaries of necromancy - the Boundaries of Weakness, Fear, and Aging. The boundaries sessfully enveloped the colossal body of the Primordius Dragon. Then, using his divine energy, he assembled the element of death to form ¡®Death¡¯s Wither¡¯. The spell, with a dazzling disy that looked like a flower blossoming, burst open from underneath the Primordius Dragon.

    ¡®Death¡¯s Wither¡¯ was an attack method that Han Shuo learned from that midgod divine soul. Under the effect of ¡®Death¡¯s Wither¡¯, the element of death would rapidly intrude the enemy¡¯s body and cause their physical body to rapidly rot and decay.

    The ¡®Death¡¯s Wither¡¯ spell was like an enigmatic man-eating flower. When it blossomed underneath the Primordius Dragon, a most vicious energy gushed into his body in an instant. Although it had merely been an instance, the part of the Primordius Dragon¡¯s body that came into contact with ¡®Death¡¯s Wither¡¯ started to emit thick green smoke that reeked of rotting corpses in hell.

    Meanwhile, Han Shuo¡¯s main body, wielding his avatar of death in the form of the Demonyer Edge, hacked at the dragon¡¯s head that was starting to move. The Demonyer Edge that was slicing down with astonishing momentum glowed with glorious bloody radiances. Ferocious souls could be heard shrieking from within.

    Energy with the desire to destroy the world erupted from the edges of the Demonyer Edge. As the ruthless and sinister energy was mixed with the negative energy from millions of souls, it carried immense intimidation power towards any soul. Even the Primordius Dragon who possessed mighty willpower was affected by that energy. He nearly failed to raise the energy to defend himself.

    Under the effects of the three trump card necromancy boundaries and the invasion of the corrosive energy of the ¡®Death¡¯s Wither¡¯, the Primordius Dragon was in immense pain and roared at the top of his lungs.

    The formidable might of the Boundaries of Weakness, Fear, and Aging deployed by Han Shuo, who was now in the lowgod realm, simply could notpare to what he previously deployed while still a basegod. The Primordius Dragon who was heavily injured to begin with, under the effects of the three great boundaries, had both his body and soul substantially weakened. On top of the ¡®Death¡¯s Wither¡¯ constantly putrefying his body injured body, all kinds of pain gushed at him at once. The Primordius Dragon felt he was almost copsing.

    After howling in pain, the Primordius Dragon repeatedly swung his dragon head. Then, his divine soul suddenly pulsated. A strange spherical object that converged the yuan energy of earth wildly absorbed the yuan energy of earth all around the ce of extreme earth and assembled them on his dragon head. It made his dragon head looked as though it had suddenly crystallized.

    ng! When the sword struck, bright sparks were sent flying all around. It seemed as though the sword had stricken the hardest material in the world. Not even a crack was produced.

    Roar... The Primordius Dragon furiously roared yet again. The strike made his head ring. He had the worst headache.

    Han Shuo¡¯s face froze and his heart pumped twice as hard when he saw that his sword did not even leave a gash on the Primordius Dragon¡¯s head. He suddenly realized that the Primordius Dragon must have obtained the extreme treasure of earth attribute, the Earthsoul Pearl, from this ce of extreme earth. His soul must have integrated with the Earthsoul Pearl. That strange object earlier that absorbed the yuan energy of earth must have been that very object.

    Being able to utilize Earthsoul Pearl, a treasure of earth attribute, and being inside the ce of extreme earth, the Primordius Dragon would surely achieve peak physical defensive power. It would definitely be no easy feat to destroy the Primordius Dragon¡¯s body using physical attacks.

    Han Shuo rapidly weighed in his mind and immediately, he gave up on the idea of chopping up the Primordius Dragon using his Demonyer Edge.

    The Demonyer Edge suddenly hovered still in midair. The sinister, negative energy from the millions of souls it devoured suddenly congealed to form a giant, malevolent ghostly face. This immaterial ghostly face drenched with blood pounced towards the Primordius Dragon¡¯s soul.

    The avatar of death also gave up on his original n of using the energy of death to attack the dragon¡¯s physical body. He gathered all his energy and hammered the Primordius Dragon¡¯s soul using the ¡®Soul Chafe¡¯ spell that Han Shuo had yet to adeptly grasp.

    The ¡®Soul Chafe¡¯ was just like ¡®Death¡¯s Wither¡¯. They were godly attack methods that Han Shuo had recently learned. The ¡®Soul Chafe¡¯ could be considered as the upgraded version of ¡®Soul Tremor¡¯ magic. It worked by assembling one¡¯s soul energy using divine energy in order to cut and break down the opponent¡¯s soul bit by bit.

    Han Shuo¡¯s main body wasn¡¯t idling either. He abandoned all physical attacks and locked firmly onto the Primordius Dragon¡¯s soul with his consciousness. He formed a vortex that produced immense suction power at the depths of his soul, causing the Primordius Dragon¡¯s soul to have great difficulty to even budge.

    To begin with, the Primordius Dragon was a mid-stage lowgod. Being inside the ce of extreme earth and able to utilize the miraculous power of the Earthsoul Pearl, he could make use of the energy found in the ce of extreme earth, giving him insanely powerful physical defensive power.

    Against another lowgod who didn¡¯t know how to attack the soul, the Primordius Dragon would undoubtedly be able to firmly defend his body and even prevail over gods who were slightly more powerful.

    But unfortunately for the Primordius Dragon, all three bodies of Han Shuo knew how to attack the soul; even his avatar of destruction couldunch direct assault against the soul. Although it shouldn¡¯t have been able to attack the soul, as it was formed from the Demonyer Edge which contained the negative energies from millions of dead souls, it was more than capable.

    All three bodies of Han Shuo¡¯s simultaneously gave up on attacking the physical body but joined forces in attacking the Primordius Dragon¡¯s soul. The Primordius Dragon¡¯s strategy failed and his circumstances were greatly worsening.

    Han Shuo was determined to finish the Primordius Dragon once and for all. He deployed the energy of his souls to the maximum. The consciousness of his main body formed a vortex that burdened his soul, while the negative energy formed by the Demonyer Edge wrapped around it, preventing him from escaping.

    Meanwhile, his avatar of death would rip and break down his soul using the Soul Chafe spell. The Primordius Dragon whose soul was recently severely injured by the Soulpiercers finally gave in to thebined soul attacks of Han Shuo¡¯s three souls. No matter how strong his physical defensive power was, there was no way he could use it to defend his soul.

    Under the joint attack of Han Shuo¡¯s three souls, this ancient nar guardian of the Profound Continent started losing his soul energy bit by bit.

    Han Shuo held his guard every step of the way. He tangled the Primordius Dragon¡¯s soul tenaciously and kept the soul attacks at peak performance.

    Gradually, the Primordius Dragon¡¯s divine soul grew weaker and weaker as it tore apart. His aura too was growing weaker.

    When Han Shuo sensed that the Primordius Dragon¡¯s divine soul was slowly bing unconscious, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness pulsated. The wonderful consciousnessunched an all-out attack on the Primordius Dragon¡¯s awareness, shattering all the self-awareness that he had.

    It was at during this fortunate timing that Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death hastily summoned earth elite zombie. After giving an order, the earth elite zombie rushed towards the Primordius Dragon¡¯s head. Entering through the dragon¡¯s wide open bloody mouth, earth elite zombie burrowed into the Primordius Dragon¡¯s brain at top speed.

    The awareness inside the Primordius Dragon¡¯s skull had dissipated. The treasure of earth attribute, the Earthsoul Pearl, became a treasure without a master. As the favorite child of the earth, earth elite zombie naturally took over as the new master of the Earthsoul Pearl.

    Although the awareness inside the Primordius Dragon¡¯s divine soul had dissipated, Han Shuo did not allow his divine soul topletely dissipate just yet. Inside that divine soul without awareness contained theprehension towards the elemental energy of earth from the Primordius Dragon¡¯s painstaking cultivation over the tens of thousands of years of his life. This was a great gift that Han Shuo painstakingly fought to give the earth elite zombie.

    The earth elite zombie bluntly and greedily upied the divine soul thatcked awareness like a wild beast starved for thousands of years. He utilized the energy of the Earthsoul Pearl to help him absorb the tremendous amount of divine energy of earth inside the Primordius Dragon¡¯s body.

    Although Han Shuo was wild with joy when he knew that the result was certain, he did not let his guard down. His avatar of death and his consciousness continued to lock firmly onto the Primordius Dragon¡¯s soul lest the tiniest negligence turn everything into an unimaginable disaster.

    The process went on for an undetermined period of time. It was when Han Shuo was fully certain that all of the Primordius Dragon¡¯s awareness had been eliminated and that earth elite zombie had taken over the Primordius Dragon¡¯s divine soul that Han Shuo finally heaved a sigh of relief. Han Shuo disengaged his three souls and started to look around for that internar transportation matrix.

    Without the Earthsoul Pearl¡¯s protection, and without the support of divine energy, the Primordius Dragon had truly be just a body. It no longer had any real physical defensive power.

    Han Shuo had merely observed for a short while before he discovered the existence of an internar transportation matrix right underneath the Primordius Dragon¡¯s massive body.

    The Primordius Dragon had covered the entire internar transportation matrix under his weight. Had the dragon not lost his awareness, Han Shuo knew that even if he had found out the location of the internar transportation matrix earlier, he wouldn¡¯t be able to break through the dragon¡¯s body to destroy it.

    It was an enormous internar transportation matrix simr to the one inside the Cemetery of Death. However, as they had been constructed by different people, this internar transportation matrix wasn¡¯t exactly the same as the one in the Cemetery. But this was none of Han Shuo¡¯s concern. After forcibly pushing the dragon body aside, Han Shuo raised the Demonyer Edge, unfolded the divine energy within, and struck it with the energy of destruction.

    After being repeatedly bombarded by Han Shuo, that internar transportation matrix was shattered into fine powder. There was absolutely no chance that it could be repaired.

    ¡°Wahaha... Let¡¯s see how you people are going to get here now! I have won this battle!¡± Han Shuo raised his head andughed. He was ecstatic.

    An appeal from the trantor: Dear readers, as you may understand, tranting is no easy task, especially when trying to maintain a certain level of quality at such a pace. Recently, my patreon pledges have fallen by around 1/4 for no apparent reason. This coincidentally happened at a time where the chapter length will soon increase by around 30%, which means Emily and I will have to spend more time working on each chapter. Therefore, here I ask that you, my beloved readers, to consider supporting the project on my patreon. If you choose not to, I¡¯d be happy to know why and if there is anything I could do to change your mind. Thank you. -Hedonist

    (Next chapter will be released on 25th March, around 2am GMT +8)

    Patreon: https://.patreon/gdkhedonist

    Discord: https://discord.gg/nrCnBnj

 Chapter 644: Demonic Blood Disassembly

    GDK 644: Demonic Blood Disassembly

    An unfriendly voice of mischief chimed in as Han Shuo chuckled gleefully, ¡°That might not necessarily be the case. I¡¯m afraid you are a little toote. We arrived two days ago and we¡¯ve only been out looking for you! But who knew that you would show up here before we found you. Little friend, do you remember my voice?¡±.

    The voice came abruptly and Han Shuo did not detect anything out of ce beforehand. In fact, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t detect the person¡¯s location even as he spoke.

    Han Shuo was greatly rmed. He remembered where he heard that voice -- back at the Shine of Ice.

    Not long ago, while Han Shuo was bathing the Shrine of Ice with blood, the pious prayers of several thousands of Shrine of Ice disciples caused a midgod from an alien material ne to manifest through Snow Celestial Tiana¡¯s body. Han Shuo then fought with that midgod in the snowfield. Han Shuo had to use all his strength in fighting that expert who couldn¡¯t even make use of one-tenth of his actual strength. He ultimately injured the expert¡¯s divine soul.

    The icy voice was that of the midgod of water whose divine soul previously took over Tiana¡¯s body!

    ¡°Not bad at all, you actually managed to break through this barrier. But I have now reinforced it with my divine energy. Let¡¯s see how you¡¯re going to escape this time. ¡®Bird in a cage¡¯ - that should best describe a situation like this,¡° that contemptuous voice sneered.

    Although Han Shuo had always had confidence in himself, he was no fool. He knew that against a midgod who descended with both his divine body and divine soul, he didn¡¯t have the slightest odds of prevailing.

    Without the slightest hesitation, his two avatars returned to his main body the instant that the voice sounded. Han Shuo hastily transmitted to earth elite zombie,manding him to exit from the skull of the Primordius Dragon.

    ¡°Father, there is still a bit of energy left to absorb!¡± earth elite zombie grumbled rather reluctantly. He hadn¡¯t a clue just how nightmarish this enemy was.

    ¡°If you don¡¯t get out now, the two of us will die here in no time!¡± Han Shuo knew that the situation wouldn¡¯t allow a second of stalling and he rapidly transmitted.

    Earth elite zombie was shocked at Han Shuo¡¯s words. He did not waste time asking why and gave up on absorbing the little remaining bit of divine energy in the Primordius Dragon¡¯s body and rushed out from the wide open bloody mouth of the Primordius Dragon.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was locked on earth elite zombie. Han Shuo discovered that he had taken over Primordius Dragon¡¯s divine soul that was without awareness as well as the Earthsoul Pearl. He knew that at least eighty percent of the profound understanding and energy that the Primordius Dragon gained over tens of thousands of years had been absorbed by earth elite zombie.

    The instance earth elite zombie emerged from the Primordius Dragon¡¯s bloody mouth, Han Shuo sessfully deployed necromancy magic. After a bright sh of light, earth elite zombie disappeared without a trace.

    As soon as earth elite zombie returned to theherworld, Han Shuo sensed a terrifying energy entering the boundary. Spacetime seemed to have frozen still. The pressure was so immense that Han Shuo felt stifled and suffocated.

    It was at this moment that Han Shuo realized that the person talking had been outside the barrier all that time. It was only now that he actually crossed into the barrier.

    The opponent was a midgod. As he had reinforced the barrier with his divine energy, Han Shuo reckoned that it would be very difficult, if not impossible, to break through the barrier even with the Demonyer Edge. He scanned through his brain for a countermeasure.

    ¡°When we exchanged blows at the snond before, you were very, very arrogant. I have traversed across worlds to get here. My main objective is to cut you up piece by piece until you finally die a slow and painful death. I hope you don¡¯t disappoint me!¡± that midgod expert who just entered the boundary seemed rather unhurried. He had reinforced the boundary with his own divine energy. He believed it was absolutely impossible for Han Shuo to break through the barrier given the realm that Han Shuo was currently on. He intended to slowly torture Han Shuo to death.

    Even during moments like this where it was possible he could die at any second, Han Shuo did not lose his head but remained perfectly calm. After rapidly weighing in his mind, he came to a resolute decision.

    Before that midgod got close to him, frightening bloody radiances suddenly erupted from Han Shuo¡¯s body. Bang Bang Bang! All the meridians in Han Shuo¡¯s body ruptured. His bones creaked and shattered.

    A canopy of splendid light enveloped Han Shuo from head to toe. His body was pushed to its fullest potential, causing an iparably massive energy field to erupt in an instant.

    A bright, resplendent sh of light was produced. When the lightpletely diminished, there was nothing.

    Han Shuo had disappeared into thin air!

    A streak of icy radiance shed and a gloomy and cold middle-age man suddenly upied the space where Han Shuo had disappeared.

    ¡°How, how could this be?!¡± His mouth was wide open and his face was frozen with disbelief. His icy-cold eyes were glistening with light. He appeared astonished.

    ¡°How is this possible? How could he escape? He¡¯s just a lowgod, there¡¯s no way he could break through my barrier. What, what is actually going on?¡± the man mumbled to himself. He repeatedly examined the area where Han Shuo just stood, trying to find a clue as to what was going on.

    After some time, a wave of distortions rippled the water element boundary. A group of five entered the boundary. A sunny young man who led the party, wearing the outfit of a Church of Light white priest, raised his voice andughed, ¡°Eriksson, what is taking you so long? What are you fooling about?¡± After a short pause, he raised his brows and eximed, ¡°He killed the dragon!¡±

    ¡°The internar transportation matrix was destroyed!¡± an even louder astonished exmation sounded from a female who looked like a young married woman. She appeared extremely shocked.

    ¡°Damnit, that kid was so daringing here. He even destroyed the internar transportation matrix. Things are going to be rather troublesome now. We did not bring anyone who cultivates in the edict of space with us!¡± That sunny young man furrowed his brows and pondered for a moment before he hastily asked that midgod from the Shrine of Ice who was mumbling to himself, ¡°Eriksson, where is that kid¡¯s dead body? Have you searched it? The internar transportation matrix here is destroyed. We need to find his Cemetery of Death through him. Otherwise, when the matter concludes, it won¡¯t be easy for us to return!¡±

    ¡°Impossible, absolutely impossible!¡± Eriksson was still mumbling to himself in disbelief.

    ¡°Eriksson, what in the world is wrong with you? The internar transportation matrix here is wrecked. If you don¡¯t want to return home on foot, hurry up and search his body!¡± the sunny young man softly shouted.

    Erikson was jolted and suddenly came to his senses. He put on a stern expression and exined, ¡°Kaiser, I didn¡¯t get to kill that kid. He escaped.¡±

    ¡°What?! What did you say?¡± Kaiser was not the only one in disbelief, all those experts from the alien material nes cried out at the same time.

    Eriksson was a midgod. He had reinforced the barrier beforehand. It should have been a turkey shoot. Even if pitted against ten lowgods, not only should a midgod have no difficulty prevailing, it would be worthless for the lowgods to think of escaping.

    But Eriksson says his prey actually escaped?

    ¡°I don¡¯t know how he got out but he did! Till now I have not been able to figure out how he managed to do that!¡± Eriksson put on a gloomy, cold face and said in a deep voice when each and every one of his colleagues was dumbstruck.

    At this point in time, those people understood that Eriksson definitely wasn¡¯t ying a joke with them. They appeared to be in disbelief just as Erikson was just a moment ago. They were all mumbling, ¡°Impossible, absolutely impossible!¡±

    ¡°Is he in possession of a spacetime-ripping divine weapon?¡± after the initial surprised reaction, Kaiser quickly calmed down himself and asked in a deep voice.

    ¡°He doesn¡¯t! I¡¯m certain of it!¡± Eriksson said resolutely, ¡°I have been observing each and every movement he made after entering the barrier. I did not sense him using any single energy of the twelve fundamental forces. I did not detect any abnormality that a spacetime-ripping divine weapon would produce. There was no abnormality with the spacetime. He vanished into thin air just like that!¡±

    ¡°How... How is this possible?¡± Kaiser was again shocked. He pondered in silence.

    Eriksson recalled of the scene and further exined, ¡°Before he disappeared, something happened to his body. His arteries and veins ruptured and his skeleton shattered. It was as though he was severely injured. I have no idea what actually happened there!¡±

    ¡°Whatever happened, we must locate him as soon as possible. This person is too important. He is in possession of the only internar transportation matrix in this world and he knew that we havee here in advance. It won¡¯t be long before those fes arrive here. If we can¡¯t locate that kid and seize the other internar transportation matrix before they arrive, then this mission will again be very thorny!¡± Kaiser said in a deep voice after thinking in silence for a while.

    The other five heads, including Eriksson¡¯s, nodded gloomily at the same time.

    ¡°We¡¯ll split up and go all out in searching the entire continent. We mustn¡¯t overlook any one spot, especially those ces where he will most likely hide. Remember, if you find him, don¡¯t rush in killing him. Change the settings of his internar transportation matrix first. We must not let those fes get here!¡± Kaiser instructed.

    ¡°If any of you find him, please do me a favor: capture him alive if possible. I want to skin him alive!¡± Eriksson said in a ruthless voice.

    The group of six said not another word. Before leaving, Kaiser raised his big hand. A streak of zing radiance enveloped the Primordius Dragon¡¯s carcass. His body gradually dissolved in the bright light until itpletely vanished.

    ***On a barren hill. The bloodstained Han Shuo was miserably hanging on a dried tree. He was in a most awkward predicament!

    By using ¡®Demonic Blood Disassembly¡¯, Han Shuo activated the full hidden potential of his body. The moment his skeleton and meridians shattered, he escaped thousands of miles away, away from Eriksson¡¯s vicious entrapment.

    ¡®Demonic Blood Disassembly¡¯ was a demonic art technique for escaping. Once deployed, the caster would exhaust a great amount of energy as well as sustain serious injuries to their body.

    With the meridians and bones shattered, Han Shuo did not have one ounce of strength left in his body. As luck would have it, he just so happened to fall on a big tree and was stuck hanging. Han Shuo felt very unfortunate indeed.

    Han Shuo had to spend at least one full day to reconnect his bones and meridians to the point where he could move his hands and legs. On top of that, under such circumstances, Han Shuo had no way of gathering the energy in his body and therefore couldn¡¯t summon necromancy creatures to protect him. All he could do was dangle there.

    Being in the recovery process meant that Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t be able to move an inch for at least a period of time. If an enemy were to find him, Han Shuo would be as powerless as a sitting duck. His enemy would be able to do whatever they wanted to him.

    But fortunately, Han Shuo identified a direction when he escaped using ¡®Demonic Blood Disassembly¡¯ andnded himself on this deste and uninhabited barren mountain. Had he fallen into an orc settlement instead, to be discovered by those barbarous orcs, well, let¡¯s just say it wasn¡¯t going to be a pleasant experience.

    Han Shuo maintained that miserable posture of hanging from that big tree. From dusk till dawn, not a single living being approached him.

    Han Shuo felt nothing but d. He was d that the Empire of Orcs was infertile, and d that there were no ferocious magical beasts living near the area, thereby allowing him to recover his body without any disturbance.

    But Han Shuo¡¯s lucky streak did notst for long. Not long after the sun rose into the sky, Han Shuo could hear sounds of footsteps slowly approaching. It made him rather nervous.

    This was the moment when Han Shuo was at his weakest. Even a child with a sharp stone could severely injure Han Shuo in this state.

    Theer was an orc early in his youth. He wore a hide wrapped around him, and carried a big basket on his back, wandering around barefoot. It appeared that he came to this barren mountain to cut firewood.

    At first, he hadn¡¯t notice Han Shuo hanging from high above. He had been cutting down dried up trees in a depressed manner with his head down. But when a drop of Han Shuo¡¯s blood fell off the three, the young orc was surprised as he thought that the sky would soon pour. Automatically, he raised his head to look at the sky.

    He immediately noticed Han Shuo and pointed at him while crying out in surprise.

    Having killed so many orcs and absorbed so many orc souls, it wouldn¡¯t be surprising that Han Shuo could understand the oguage. Therefore, when Han Shuo concentrated, he quickly came to understand what the young orc was saying.

    ¡°Ah! A dead body! And it¡¯s a human! What an unlucky day. Why do I have toe across something like this the first thing in the morning?!¡±

    Han Shuo was left betweenughter and tears. His shattered tongues and vocal cord were still being healed at this moment and he wasn¡¯t able to speak for the time being. He could only stare at that youngster below helplessly.

    ¡°I haven¡¯t even had breakfast!¡± the young orc muttered.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart pounded. He had rarelye into contact with orcs but had heard from rumors that the barbarous orcs seemed to be fond of eating human flesh. When he heard this young orc say that he hadn¡¯t had breakfast, Han Shuo¡¯s heart, which had not been used to being thrown into disorder for many years, leapt straight into panic mode.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s physical body was on the Nine Changes realm, even if this young orc were to pound him into mush using a mortar and pestle, with time, Han Shuo would still be able to recover. But if this young orc were to eat his flesh, the experience that Han Shuo would have to endure would be all too nasty!

    ¡°To see such a nauseating scene first thing in the morning, how am I going to have breakfastter!¡± the young orc groaned and cursed while Han Shuo was worried that he would be eaten alive.

    The flustered Han Shuo greatly rejoiced to hear those words. So he wasn¡¯t thinking about eating my flesh after all. It seems that all that hearsay out there about orcs aren¡¯t entirely true!

    ¡°Mom said that dead people should go under the ground. This fe is really unlucky to die on top of a tree. Sigh, I feel sad just looking at it. Maybe I should help it!¡± the young orc muttered to himself. He then started chopping down the tree where Han Shuo was suspended using an axe that was not particrly incisive. It did not take long before the big tree copsed with a rumble. Han Shuo crashed and made a small crater in the ground.

    ¡°Gee! This human sure is heavy!¡± the young orc cried out in surprise. He ran towards Han Shuo out of curiosity. He appeared somewhat excited.

    Han Shuo¡¯s body was indeed much heavier than an ordinary person. He broke off many of the branches when he first fell on the tree but was stopped and suspended on thergest trunk.

    The little orc walked to Han Shuo in quick steps. When he arrived, he merely looked at Han Shuo in amazement. This young orc didn¡¯t seem to be as evil as Han Shuo had imagined. He did not think of plundering from corpses. All he did was to look up and down at Han Shuo curiously.

    ¡°Ah! The heart is still beating!¡± the young orc suddenly loudly cried out in surprise. He took a few steps backward in shock.

    In the healing process of the physical body, the most important organs were always the first to be repaired. The heart was a vital organ in the human body. At this point in time, Han Shuo¡¯s heart was fully repaired. It was normal for it to be beating by now.

    However, for this young orc, it truly was freakish that a blood-soaked body with wounds on every inch of its skin that should have left him as dead as any rotten corpse to still have a beating heart.

 Chapter 645: Lucky Little Orc

    Han Shuoid silently on the ground as he listened to the teenage orc¡¯s hollering.

    Although this young orc had a strong and vigorous body, he could hardly pose Han Shuo any threat. Even if the young orc were to chop him with his axe, Han Shuo would still recover from it eventually.

    Therefore, Han Shuo was none too concerned about what the young orc might do next. He silently waited for his physical body to recover while the young orc screamed and shouted.

    After some time, Han Shuo¡¯s opened his eyes. The gazes of his deep ck eyes fell on the young orc.

    The young orc became even more frightened and took a dozen steps backward when Han Shuo suddenly looked at him. He stared at Han Shuo, shaking to his knees, and blurted out, ¡°Are you dead or are you not?¡±

    As Han Shuo¡¯s vocal cords had yet to recover, he wasn¡¯t able to talk for the time being. He responded by blinking his eyes at the little orc.

    The young orc continued to stare in horror. As Han Shuo stared back but did not move an inch, the young orc gradually regained his guts and walked back over to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Then, is there anything that I can help you with?¡± the young orc thought for a moment before he cautiously asked, his eyes locking with Han Shuo¡¯s.

    A kindhearted orc, I see. He looked at the young orc with calm eyes as he waited for his vocal cords to recover.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong with you? Are you dying? How can I help you?¡± the unsophisticated young orc repeatedly asked in a sincere manner. He wasn¡¯t polluted by the vile practice of looting the helpless.

    After a while, two streams of foamy blood overflowed from the corners of Han Shuo¡¯s lips. His mouth squirmed for a moment before he suddenly spoke the oguage in a weak voice, ¡°No need, thanks!¡±

    The demonic infant within his body was almost fully reconstructed. Han Shuo could sense that under the effects of the blood essence and demonic yuan, his cells were being regenerated inside his demonic infant.

    The demonic infant was fundamental to Han Shuo¡¯s main body that cultivated in demonic arts. As soon as the demonic infant was rebuilt, he would be able to operate his fountainhead of energy - the demonic yuan. With that, the recovery speed of his physical body would also rapidly elerate and his two avatars concealed within the demonic infant would be able to emerge.

    Although Han Shuo was anxious and impatient to recover, he knew that there wasn¡¯t a thing that this young orc could do to help him, hence his sweet and short decline. This ce where Han Shuonded was only about a thousand miles from where the Primordius Dragon perished. One thousand miles was neither distant nor close. Godly experts wouldn¡¯t need much time to traverse the distance of a thousand miles even without a transportation matrix.

    Han Shuo was certain that the midgod from the Shrine of Ice who watched him vanish into thin air wouldn¡¯t reconcile easily. Those godly experts might have already started looking all around for his trails.

    This young orc naturally wouldn¡¯t be able to harm Han Shuo. However, if that midgod from the Shrine of Ice were to find Han Shuo in such a state, Han Shuo believed that he truly would be dead without a doubt.

    ¡°No need? Your injuries are severe. If it¡¯s not treated in time, you will surely bleed to death!¡± the young orc shouted.

    ¡°I have stopped bleeding already. Don¡¯t worry, I cannot die. Just go and get on with whatever you were doing, don¡¯t mind me!¡± as the demonic infant was gradually rebuilt, Han Shuo¡¯s weak voice grew a little stronger.

    ¡°I will help you treat your wounds. In any case, I¡¯m won¡¯t ask you to reciprocate anything. You humans are always so strange. My mom has told me before that you humans emphasizepensations, wouldn¡¯t want to be indebted to others and things like that!¡± The teenage orc did not leave as Han Shuo thought he would. Instead, he mumbled to himself, grabbed a small leather pouch from around his waist, and withdrew a crude looking bottle containing medicine. Not allowing any exnation, he proceeded to apply the powdered medicine on Han Shuo¡¯s wound-riddled body.

    Han Shuo could sense that that powdered medicine was the most ordinary antiseptic. It had little to no effect on Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    ¡°Thanks, but I really don¡¯t need it!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s voice slowly regained its smoothness while his eyes were no longer as powerless.

    ¡°You are so badly injured. If you don¡¯t need it, then nobody will! Enough, you can be at ease, I won¡¯t ask you topensate me, okay? You are so frustrating to deal with!¡± the young orc muttered impatiently. He totally ignored Han Shuo¡¯s words, poured out the entire bottle of medicinal powder, and applied it to Han Shuo¡¯s wounds.

    It was in to see that the orc was a very kind-hearted youngster. Although the medicinal powder produced slight chills when it made contact with his skin, Han Shuo felt warm in his heart.

    ¡°Fine. As you wish.¡± Han Shuo stopped dissuading the young orc and looked up and down at the orc as he carefully applied the medicine to his wounds. The young orc even helped him dress his wounds without worrying that it might stain him. Han Shuo, who was rather worried about being found by those from the Shrine of Ice at any moment, gradually calmed down his mind as he watched the young orc¡¯s attentive appearance.

    When Han Shuo¡¯s mind was calmed, he felt his body¡¯s recovery process be a little faster. Han Shuo was shocked by this phenomenon and so he tried to further rx.

    ¡°What is your name? What are you doing here?¡± Han Shuo stopped being so mindful of his body¡¯s condition and started to ask about the young orc very rxedly.

    ¡°They call me Tuaf. To cut timber!¡± the orc replied without thinking. Soon after, he asked in a peculiar fashion, ¡°You really are a strange human. You are wounded to the point of near death, but not only do you not show one bit of pain, you even have the mood to talk with me.¡±

    After the conversation started, the two gradually became less and less awkward. During the conversation with Tuaf, Han Shuo learned about his family circumstances. He also found out about the hardships that the orcs were facing.

    As the soil was barren, they were not able to farm or grow any crops. There were always orcs who would die of starvation every day. Those rumors about orcs eating human meat were indeed true. Those who wish to survive must find a way to do so. They frequently looted the southern border because they had no better choice.

    In thest two years, the Empire of Orc was hit by a dry spell that was the worst it had seen in the past hundreds of years. Arge number of orcs were starved to death. Some of the elderly orcs, in hope of giving the younger ones a better chance of surviving, banded together inrge groups andmitted mass suicide. Many of orc viges were shrouded under the shadows of death.

    Under such dire circumstances, all major tribes of the orcs became unprecedentedly united. They had no hesitation in sacrificing arge number of orc warriors to invade the southern border, wanting to upy a piece of the fertilend in order to alleviate the crisis and the miserable situation their country was in.

    The situation in the vige that Tuaf lived could be considered as being slightly better than average. As there were several barren hills located nearby where wild animals of small poption sizes could still be found, they managed to barely survive by hunting those wild animals. However, the wild animals living in the hills were very limited. For example, in this ce where Han Shuonded, there used to be wolves, pythons, and the like, before they were all hunted to extermination. All that was left now were dried trees that could be used as firewood.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was filled with sympathy as he listened to Tuaf describing the situation in the Empire of Orc. This was the first time that he recognized how difficult life was for the orcs. When he recalled that he had personally murdered several hundred thousand orc warriors who went to the southern border out of ack of choice, an ineffable sense of remorse arose in his heart.

    The conversation had made Han Shuo recognize that not all orcs were barbarous. There were also kindhearted and frank ones among them. He also learned that sometimes, it may be useful to look at a subject from various points of view.

    Unwittingly, during the conversation, Han Shuo¡¯s demonic infant was finally fully reconstructed.

    With one thought, his avatar of death concealed within his demonic infant suddenly emerged, appearing as a carbon copy of Han Shuo right in front of the young orc.

    ¡°Ah! What... What..¡± the little orc was greatly rmed and took a few steps backwards. He pointed at Han Shuo¡¯s skeletal staff avatar and was so terrified that he couldn¡¯t even form aplete sentence.

    ¡°You are a pretty goodd. Yes, perhaps it is fate that we have met. Take this and don¡¯t let anyone know about it. This thing wille quite useful to you. As long as youprehend it with your heart, perhaps someday, you will be an amazing shaman!¡± Han Shuo withdrew a ne made of beast bones and hung it on the young orc¡¯s neck. A pin-like chilling radiance punctured the young orc¡¯s fingertip before a few drops of his blood flowed into the center of the ne.

    In an instant, the young orc seemed to have suffered a severe blow. His face appearedpletely lifeless while his body was trembling as though it was being battered by violent ocean waves.

    Han Shuo had actually obtained the beast bone ne from that old orc shaman he killed outside Ossen City. The old shaman was about to advance to possess the strength of basegod. That beast bone ne was simr to a space ring and had the ability to pass on shamanic energy to the new bearer.

    Han Shuo had no use for the ne as only an orc who had never been in contact with any kind of cultivation could receive the energy of the beast bone ne. Although Tuaf did not actually assist Han Shuo, Han Shuo nheless epted his kind intentions and wanted to return the favor. Furthermore, taking into ount that Tuaf was a kindhearted, frank, and honest orc, Han Shuo decided that he should inherit the power of the beast bone ne.

    But, of course, Tuaf wouldn¡¯t be able to reach instant sess after inheriting the energy. The most he could do at the moment was acquire a mental connection with those mighty magical beasts that the old shaman previously subdued. However, even Han Shuo had no idea as to whether Tuaf could also subdue those mighty magical beasts and cultivate in shamanism to the realm that the old shaman achieved using this energy he inherited.

    All that Han Shuo did was to show him a bright path. It was still all up to Tuaf if he could walk till the end of the path.

    Tuaf¡¯s body shivering meant that he had sessfully inherited the energy. While Tuaf was still clenching his teeth, enduring the energy passing into his body, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death carried his injured main body and silently left.

    Tuaf felt as though he was being attacked by a turbulence. Some strange things were gushing into his body and brain, causing him great difort and pain.

    After some time had passed, Tuaf¡¯s body finally stopped trembling. He felt muddle-headed and that his head was filled with things that weren¡¯t his.

    ¡°Eh! Where is that weird human?!¡± Tuaf cried out in surprise after he woke up from the agony. When he lowered his head and looked, he discovered that no one was in the spot where Han Shuo previouslyid. Not even a trace of him could be found. However, he found that someone had drawn some words deep into the smooth yellow ground using their finger.

    Tuaf slowly read the writing on the ground. Tuaf, I don¡¯t know if it¡¯s right or wrong to do this to you, but I feel that the orcs need someone like you as their leader. The essence of shamanism has been passed into your body. If you choose to, you can slowly cultivate further in the energy. In the future, when you became a great shaman, possess certain authority among the orcs, and wish to find a way out for your people, look for me at Lancelot Empire¡¯s Brettel City. I¡¯m Lord Bryan of Brettel City. Remember my words!

    ¡°Essence of shamanism passed to me? What does that mean? What a baffling human!¡± the dizzy Tuaf mumbled to himself after he read the handwriting under his feet.

    Suddenly, it was as though a divine light streaked across his mind. The muddleheaded young orc seemed to have realized something in an instant and suddenly jumped. He started to chuckle as though he had gone mad, ¡°Haha! I can be an amazing shaman now! Truly unbelievable! I must have met the Beast God, the Beast God is giving me guidance!¡±

    The young orc was wild with joy upon learning of the fact. However, this young orc had never anticipated that many yearster, he himself would be one of the most revered shamans among the orc and genuinely resolve the problem that had always bothered the orcs.

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death carried his main body and flew along some remote paths. He finally returned to South Border City when the sky was about to get dark.

    Over at South Border City, Han Shuo was a god that every person worshipped. He did not openly show his face in this ce lest he caused a huge mor.

    Draped in a pitch-ck magical robe, through repeated transmissions via transportation matrixes, Han Shuo returned to Brettel City. Without notifying anyone, using the magical transportation matrix at Brettel City, he returned to the Cemetery on Death located in the Boundless Sea.

    To guard against the unexpected, Han Shuo relocated the small magical transportation matrix from deep under the Brettel City City Lord Mansion to under a filthy quagmire outside the city. He also concealed the magical aura that the magical matrix emanated using a demonic art technique.

    Those godly experts from distant material nes ought to be extremely familiar with elemental energies. However, the energy of demonic arts was unlike any kind of energy that they knew of. Therefore, Han Shuo believed that the mini transportation matrix would be best concealed using demonic arts.

    As soon as Han Shuo returned to the Cemetery of Death on the gourd ind, he immediately continued with the process of recovering his main body.

    Of his two avatars, the one that cultivated in the energy of destruction remained inside the Cemetery of Death while his avatar of death went outside to check out the surroundings for any kind of abnormality. He wanted to make sure that nothing could go wrong.

    But who knew that as soon as Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death walked out from the Cemetery of Death, he sensed that a decently powerful existence was upying an ind not far from his gourd ind.

    That existence also immediately sensed Han Shuo¡¯s presence and transmitted with its soul, ¡°I finally found you! If you don¡¯t get lost from my territory, I will go there and kill you!¡±

    Han Shuo knew that this existence was the same one that his consciousness detected thest time - the super-ranked magical sea creature with simr strength to Pegasus.

    ¡°You¡¯re courting death!¡± As Han Shuo¡¯s wasn¡¯t in a good mood and didn¡¯t want to have any living thing around him that could potentially expose his trails, he immediately transmitted his murderous intentions to that creature!

 Chapter 646: The energy of life

    GDK 646: The energy of life

    That creature living in the Boundless Sea had been searching for Han Shuo around that region. It was, without doubt, the mightiest existence to dwell in this expanse of the ocean and was ustomed to having all other beings kneel under its appendages.

    Through its long years of existence, the sea monster had finished off countless creatures who dared challenge its might. ustomed to victory, the creature thought of itself as the mightiest expert on Profound Continent. If not for the fact that it couldn¡¯t leave the sea for extended periods, it might have long stepped onnd and stirred up havoc.

    As soon as it received the message Han Shuo transmitted, the creature flew into a rage and charged straight towards the ind on which Han Shuo stood.

    From the gourd ind, Han Shuo could sense that enormous waves were being generated at sea. He reasoned that the sea creature ought to have been as massive as the Primordius Dragon. Otherwise, it wouldn¡¯t have been able to generate such enormous discement to the sea water.

    As the Cemetery of Death was on the gourd ind, Han Shuo didn¡¯t want to leave any trace of battle on the ind. He immediately took off when he sensed that the creature was approaching.

    Over on a stretch of ocean between the two inds, Han Shuo, hovering loftily in mid-air, came into contact with that massive sea creature.

    The sea was turbulent and choppy as though a typhoon was raging. Seawater was sent high up into the sky before raining back down.

    An enormous figure gradually emerged from the depths of the sea, creating tumultuous billows. After a loud and long ssh sounded, the figure waspletely revealed from the sea. It transmitted a furious message to Han Shuo, ¡°Damned human! How dare you question my might in this sea where you do not belong. You want to stay? Fine, I shall grant you an eternal slumber on the seabed!¡±

    Han Shuo had made out the creature¡¯s appearance the moment it surfaced from the ocean. It was a sea monster simr to an octopus. It had an enormous body and a number of tentacles that would extend and flutter in all directions when it was furious. It appeared to possess an astonishing amount of power.

    The sea monster also possessed ayer of shell-like armor as tough as steel which provided protection to its abdomen and vital parts of its body.

    The sea monster gradually flew into the sky making threatening gestures. Han Shuo had anticipated that a creature of its level ought to be able to fly.

    ¡°Big octopus, eager to lose your life, aren¡¯t you?¡± Han Shuo sneered at the sea monster.

    Some alien races were innately gifted with unique body structures. These races need not cultivate in any of the twelve fundamental forces but could still be incredibly mighty. The six-horned tribal king, Pegasus the manticore, and the ancient lizard king, were examples of such unique races. People of their races either possessed god-like might or some kind of unique ability. They grew stronger by evolving.

    This sea monster that resembled a giant octopus must have belonged to one of those races. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t sense the presence of any of the twelve fundamental energies in its body, yet its soul was extremely mighty. From this, Han Shuo understood that this big sea monster ought had evolved to this stage through some kind of innate talent.

    ¡°Big... Big octopus? How dare you think of me as such a primitive organism! Damned human, you will pay for your insolence!¡± the sea monster hovering above the sea said angrily.

    ¡°Look at yourself. What are you if not an octopus?¡± Han Shuo was stunned. He found the big octopus¡¯ reaction to be rather amusing.

    ¡°I¡¯m not an octopus! Never was!¡± the big octopus flew into a violent rage as though someone had dug up a scar buried deep within its heart. It charged at Han Shuo furiously with its enormous tentacles swinging about.

    The Domain of Divinity wouldn¡¯t have much of an effect on existences like this sea creature that didn¡¯t rely on elemental energies for strength. When Han Shuo saw the sea monster charging at him while waving its tentacles in the sky, a sneer still on his face, he deployed multiple necromancy boundaries around the monster and proceeded with a session of the Grand Disintegrator spell.

    Under the effect of multiple trump card necromancy boundaries, the sea monster who sprung into action with terrifying momentum gradually became sluggish and powerless. Its flying speed grew slower and slower.

    The boundaries deployed by the lowgod Han Shuo were obviously very effective against the sea monster.

    With each Grand Disintegrator spell thatnded on him, big chunks of his fluttering tentacles would abruptly shatter, break off, and fall into the sea, staining the seawater with blood.

    Stuck at the center of those boundaries, the sea monster could not even get close to Han Shuo. It was very much enraged to see its tentacles fall off one after another, and yet, there was nothing that it could do about it.

    ¡°Damned human, you heinous creature!¡± the sea monster whined with a weak voice even though it was very much enraged. Its body was growing weaker and weaker.

    ¡°Ha. You see yourself as unbeatable with this wee bit of strength?¡± Han Shuo sneered while casting disdainful gazes at the sea monster that was struggling.

    Yet another necromancy magic was deployed. Out of thin air, an enormous cage made of bone materialized under the sea monster. Bones as white as snow assembled to forcefully trap and restrain the enormous sea creature.

    Without moving a muscle, Han Shuo sent row after row of bone spears ferociously shooting at the sea monster. The sea monster reacted by repeatedly shrieking. It seemed to be in great pain.

    ¡°Nice acting!¡± Han Shuo sneered.

    When those bone spearsnded on the sea monster¡¯s body, all they did was leave blood stains on its tentacles. Thanks to theyer of shell-like armor around its vital parts such as the abdomen, Han Shuo¡¯s bone spears had merely been deflected and did not cause it any serious injuries.

    As those tough armors had not been prated and injuring the tentacles wouldn¡¯t threaten the sea monster¡¯s life, Han Shuo easily made out that the sea monster was actually faking those shouts.

    Having had the experience of fighting against the Primordius Dragon, Han Shuo was no longer intimidated by beings that possessed astonishing defensive power but were poorly skilled at attacking and defending with the soul.

    Han Shuo focused his mental strength. Instead of using the ¡®Soul Chafe¡¯ spell he had recently mastered, he bombarded the sea monster with the ¡®Soul Tremor¡¯ spell.

    Naturally, the power that a spell would unleash differed with the realm of the castor. This ¡®Soul Tremor¡¯ spell conjured by Han Shuo, who was now a lowgod, was beyond anything the sea monster could endure.

    Right after the Soul Tremor spell was cast, a ghostly wail echoed from that enormous mouth that was lined with rows after rows of white teeth. This intense shriek was filled with pain and misery. It was obviously not faked. The screech started loud and grew weaker over time. It sounded like the sea monster was heavily injured.

    ¡°Come on, keep shouting! I want to hear you scream!¡± Han Shuo looked down at the sea monster under his feet. He struck a posture of making yet another wave of soul attack.

    ¡°Spare me, please spare my life!¡± contrary to what one might expect, the sea monster was quick to adapt to circumstances. As soon as it realized that Han Shuo possessed the strength to kill it, the sea monster admitted defeat and begged for mercy.

    Han Shuo was stunned. He had not anticipated that a creature as mighty as this would immediately give in the moment it met a superior being.

    ¡°Please spare my life, this will not happen again in the future. From today onwards, these waters shall be your territory. I will stay far out of your way!¡± the sea monster hastily added. He thought that Han Shuo was being indecisive when he remained silent.

    Han Shuo was at a loss of words. When he looked at this sea monster, who was raging just a moment ago, suddenly bowing its shoulders and begging for its life to be spared, he was somehow reminded of dark dragon Gilbert who was currently in the underground world.

    This sea monster and dark dragon Gilbert were two absolutely distinct beings, and yet, Han Shuo saw many simrities between the two.

    Han Shuo suddenly felt rather worried for dark dragon Gilbert. The secret of how to enter the finalyer of the underground world was within the grasp of the dark dragons. By this point in time, all those experts from all major material nes seemed to be interested with whatid at the depths of the underground world. Han Shuo was worried that Gilbert might be affected if those godly experts were to head down there.

    ¡°Please spare me. I¡¯m just a puny little octopus. There is nothing to gain in killing me, it¡¯ll just be a waste of your energy... ¡° the sea monster jabbered on and on when Han Shuo remained silent. It even conceded to being a puny octopus.

    ¡°Give me a reason not to kill you!¡± Perhaps because this sea monster was simr to Gilbert in certain aspects, as Han Shuo chose not immediately finish it off.

    ¡°I know a secret location. There might be great treasure buried inside. I can show you the way if you spare me!¡± the sea monster thought for a moment before it hastily replied.

    ¡°Oh? What treasure?¡± Han Shuo casually asked. He didn¡¯t appear all that interested.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know either. It¡¯s a magical ce. Even I could not enter it. But I believe that an existence as mighty as you should be able to enter. I¡¯m willing to show you the way, right away, as long as you don¡¯t kill me!¡± The sea monster appeared very anxious when it saw Han Shuo show little interest.

    ¡°Alright then. Take me there. If that ce really is interesting, I might consider letting you walk free!¡± Han Shuo said indifferently.

    As though having found thest straw to grasp at, the sea monster promptly tried moving forward to show the way. But immediately, it noticed its awkward circumstances and asked in a pitiful voice, ¡°Can you release me from this?¡±

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t worried that the creature would escape. He withdrew the boundaries around it and removed the enormous white bone cage that trapped it.

    ¡°If you try to escape, I promise you will die an excruciating death!¡± Han Shuo warned with a sneer on his face.

    The sea monster was terrified and repeatedly affirmed that that would not happen. Its enormous body suddenly plunged into the sea.

    It turned out that those tentacles that Han Shuo had severed off the sea monster did not sink down after they fell into the sea. When the enormous sea monster submerged under the sea water, those detached tentacles swam back to where they had snapped away and stuck right back on like glue.

    It seemed routine for the sea monster to recover those severed tentacles, like they would be fully healed before long. After a moment of observation, Han Shuo became rather amazed by the rejuvenation ability of this sea monster. He inwardly conjectured that perhaps the founder of demonic arts was inspired by the remarkable ability of this species to rejuvenate so quickly - even more remarkably than an octopus, in fact.

    Han Shuo followed behind the sea monster unhurriedly. He noticed that the sea monster was indeed very well-behaved. It did not even dare to move any faster. It appeared that the sea monster was scared to death by Han Shuo¡¯s power!

    Soon enough, they arrived at their destination. It wasn¡¯t far from where the sea monster settled. It was the same exact area that Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness could not enter.

    ¡°So this is the ce. I should have figured!¡± Han Shuo mumbled to himself upon arrival.

    ¡°How, how do you know this ce? It¡¯s impossible, it¡¯s a lost secret. I discovered it first and have never seen youe over. There¡¯s no way that you would know!¡± the sea monster eximed when it overheard Han Shuo¡¯s mumbling.

    ¡°Stop shouting. I had inadvertently discovered this ce when I sensed your location thest time. What are you making a fuss about?¡± Han Shuo groaned impatiently. The sea monster immediately recalled its position and quickly shut up.

    When the sea monster was finally silent, Han Shuo entered into the sea and followed the creature to the bottom of the ind. Deep under the water, among a thick cluster of seaweed, Han Shuo sensed the presence of the boundary that previously blocked the probing of his consciousness.

    ¡°This is the ce, right?¡± Han Shuo asked indifferently.

    ¡°Yes. There seems to be an invisible obstruction around it. I can¡¯t enter it,¡± the sea monster exined. After a short pause, it added, ¡°However, sometimes, some kind of unique energy overflows from it. Long ago, I was just a small octopus feeding here. By mere chance, I was struck by that energy. That¡¯s how I am what I am now.¡±

    ¡°Wha... What?¡± Han Shuo was shocked. He looked at the enormous sea monster and cried out in disbelief, ¡°The energy that overflowed from that ce made you this powerful?¡±

    ¡°Yes! I¡¯m certain!¡± the sea monster hastily answered.

    Now that really was a miracle! Han Shuo became extremely astonished. To hear that the energy that overflowed from the boundary would turn a small octopus into a powerful sea monster was inconceivable.

    Huge waves surged inside Han Shuo¡¯s heart. He pondered for a moment as he stared at the invisible boundary up ahead. He finally came to the conclusion that it was only by touching it with his hand that he could truly understand what energy the boundary was made of. Hence, Han Shuo slowly marched ahead with his hand held out, trying to push against the boundary.

    Before he got close to the boundary, however, a burst of strange energy suddenly shot towards Han Shuo¡¯s hand that was extended forward. It was a powerful energy. Even Han Shuo had to evade it with great haste.

    A lump of green light brimming with vitality shed across the boundary before it immediately resumed to normal.

    Han Shuo, who managed to withdraw at extreme speed, would be drenched with cold sweat if he wasn¡¯t underwater. He sensed that the firepower was aimed at him alone!

    After carefully turning over in his mind, Han Shuo finally understood what it was. He cried out in surprise, ¡°The edictal energy of life! I get it now!¡±

    The mysterious edictal energy of life may well have been the only energy that could transform the morphology of the octopus from meager to monster. The edictal energy of life and the elemental energy of death were at repelling polls from each other. Therefore, it was nothing unusual for this avatar of Han Shuo¡¯s that cultivated in the energy of death to have such a violent reaction to the boundary.

    Han Shuo thought about it through and through for a moment. He believed that his current strength was insufficient in fighting against the boundary. Then, suddenly, he recalled of wood elite zombie. His heart was filled with delight and he quickly summoned wood elite zombie.

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    Next Chapter will be released on 28 Mar, around 4am, GMT+8

 Chapter 647: Tree of Life

    GDK 647: Tree of Life

    The energy brimming with vitality inside wood elite zombie was consistent with the edictal energy of life. After gaining the extreme treasure of wood, the Viride Leaf, he managed to evolve even further. Hence, it shouldn¡¯t be a problem for him to cross this barrier.

    Right after the wood elite zombie was summoned, he started looking all around in astonishment before he pointed towards the barrier and transmitted to Han Shuo, ¡°Father, there¡¯s something strange inside there!¡±

    Han Shuo could sense the abnormality within and therefore was not surprised by the exmation. He nodded and said, ¡°That¡¯s right, there¡¯s something strange in there. It could be useful to you. Can you enter the barrier?¡±

    "I don¡¯t know!" wood elite zombie transmitted. He paused for a second, then continued, "But I can try."

    ¡°Well, try your best to open it and see what is actually inside,¡± Han Shuo instructed.

    "This... That... What is really going on?" the sea monster cried out in surprise seeing another person suddenly appear out of nowhere.

    As the five elite zombies gradually evolved, they less and less resembled stiff, lifeless zombies. As their strengths rapidly soared, the aura of death on their bodies gradually vanished and they began to look like normal human beings.

    This was especially the case for wood elite zombie. After having obtained the Viride Leaf, the wood elite zombie managed to evolve one step further with not a trace of the aura of death to be found on his body. One could even sense that his body was filled with vitality. He even looked rather different from his normal self. Hisplexion paled pinked to a more humanly one.

    ¡°It¡¯s none of your business. Stay right in ce and don¡¯t move an inch!¡± Han Shuo coldly instructed after shooting a nce at the sea monster.

    After the previous round of battle, the sea monster became deeply terrified of Han Shuo and dared not to disobey any of his words. His heart felt like an unsolved puzzle, but he did not ask any more questions and fell dead silent. He narrowed his attention on wood elite zombie in an attempt to figure out what he was up to.

    After walking to the front of the barrier, wood elite zombie put his hand forward. An energy of sheer vitality flowed into the barrier through his hand.

    The same barrier that was hostile towards Han Shuo and spontaneously attacked him when he approached, responded with calmness towards wood elite zombie.

    ¡°Father, I can enter it. This energy makes me feel veryfortable and it¡¯s not hostile towards me at all,¡± wood elite zombie transmitted to Han Shuo cheerfully.

    Han Shuo had of course anticipated this. After listening to wood elite zombie¡¯s words, Han Shuo thought for a moment and replied, ¡°Alright, enter it and see what is actually in there. If you can, try and remove the barrier.¡±

    "Okay!¡± wood elite zombie replied in an excited and impatient tone. He seemed to be very interested in what was across the barrier.

    Wood elite zombie, whose palm was pressed against the barrier, crossed into it as though his body had melted into it. He did not trigger the slightest reaction from the barrier.

    "He, he disappeared? He disappeared inside! How is this possible?!" the sea monster who had been carefully watching wood elite zombie all along cried out in surprise when wood elite zombie entered the area with no resistance right before its eyes, something which the sea monster had failed to aplish in all his time there.

    ¡°Shut your damn mouth and watch!¡± Han Shuo lightly groaned.

    The sea monster was again silenced. Its soul became extremely unsettled. Many of the tentacles on its body were osciting subconsciously. They were an obvious sign of its amazement and disbelief.

    Although Han Shuo could still detect wood elite zombie¡¯s position inside the barrier, he wasn¡¯t able to sense what was going on in there through wood elite zombie. Just like the sea monster, Han Shuo maintained his silence and watched from outside the barrier, waiting to see any kind of changes that might happen to the barrier.

    Not long after, the invisible barrier once again gave off a soft, green glow that was as weak as the bioluminescence of a firefly. That soft green glow seemed to be gradually pulled and withdrawn by some kind of energy along with the barrier. Han Shuo could sense that the energy of the barrier that had been obstructing him was being eliminated.

    The sea monster had also noticed the phenomenon. Its tentacles were osciting at an even greater magnitude but it did not dare make a noise.

    Soon enough, the soft green lightpletely receded. The scene that was blocked by the boundary all along was finally revealed to Han Shuo¡¯s and the sea monster¡¯s eyes.

    A small but luscious tree with verdant leaves was revealed under the ind. Although the tree appeared small, each and every one of its leaves was as green as emerald and even gave off a faint green light. The small tree was thriving, its branches intertwined. The aura of life was extremely exuberant.

    Standing beside the small tree was wood elite zombie, staring at it as though he had been enchanted.

    ¡°How is this possible! How could any tree survive under the sea?¡± the sea monster again couldn¡¯t restrain its amazement as it eximed.

    ¡°Nothing is impossible!¡± Han Shuo replied. Immediately, he transmitted to wood elite zombie, ¡°Try to absorb the energy in the tree.¡±

    By now, Han Shuo was no longer ignorant and ill-informed. Through the memories left by the original owner of the skeletal staff as well as certain knowledge from Bechymos and the person trapped inside the Holy Grail, Han Shuo knew a thing or two about those living in major material nes.

    That little tree with intense aura of life ought to have been a Tree of Life as told in the legends. It was said that those who cultivate in the edict of life, right before their death, under some unique circumstances, could pass on their energy of life by transforming into a Tree of Life.

    There likely was an existence eons ago who cultivated in the edict of life that, knowing that his life was near its end, through certain unique means, transformed himself into the Tree of Life standing before their eyes. In some sense, this godly existence who had transformed into a Tree of Life did not actually die but lived on in another way.

    The Tree of Life not only contained an immense amount of the energy of life, but might even retained the knowledge that the god had. A Tree of Life was beyond precious. However, Han Shuo had merely heard of the legend that those who cultivated in the edict of life could transform themselves into a Tree of Life and that the Trees were very miraculous. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t particrly clear about the specifics.

    Han Shuo believed that the Tree of Life would be extremely useful for wood elite zombie. From Han Shuo¡¯s point of view, it would be by taking over the Tree of Life that wood elite zombie could maximize his gain. There was no better way of doing that than absorbing all the energy of life inside the Tree of Life.

    Wood elite zombie stood before the Tree of Life and stared nkly for quite a while. He remained silent and did not immediately respond to Han Shuo¡¯smand.

    After a while, wood elite zombie seemed to finally grasp Han Shuo¡¯s instruction as he withdrew his extreme treasure of wood attribute, the Viride Leaf. He then pressed his hand on the Tree of Life with the Viride Leaf in between.

    In an instant, both the Tree of Life and the Viride Leaf blossomed with a captivating green radiance. A vigorous energy suddenly erupted from the Tree of Life and flowed into wood elite zombie through the Viride Leaf.

    ¡°It can actually be done!¡± Han Shuo was bbergasted.

    Although Han Shuo had indeed given wood elite zombie the order, he wasn¡¯tpletely certain if wood elite zombie could actually absorb the energy of life within the Tree of Life. Therefore, when the exuberant energy within the Tree started to rush into wood elite zombie¡¯s body, Han Shuo was in awe.

    "Wha... What is he doing?" Again, the sea monster couldn¡¯t help himself but ask.

    ¡°He¡¯s absorbing the energy within - the same energy that turned you from a small octopus to the humongous monster that you are now!¡± Han Shuo said ecstatically as heughed loudly.

    ¡°I, I want some!¡± the sea monster uttered after staring nkly for a long while.

    ¡°You? Haha, that will kill you!¡± Han Shuo looked at the sea monster as though looking at a clown and continued disdainfully, ¡°There is absolutely no way that your body could support much of that type of energy, so give up on the thought.¡±

    Han Shuo was speaking the truth. Wood elite zombie could absorb the energy because the energy he cultivated in was analogous to the energy in the Tree. On top of that, wood elite zombie was born with a unique body structure that allowed him to absorb and store the energy found in the Tree of Life.

    It was indeed true that the energy of life from the Tree of Life gave rise to the sea monster transformation. However, Han Shuo reckoned that the transformation must have urred a long, long time ago. The strength that the sea monster now possessed did not originate directly from the bit of the energy of life that struck it, but from the sea monster¡¯s slow and gradual evolution. That bit energy of life that strayed off to it had merely opened a door for the sea monster and it should have been its own effort in further evolving after that point.

    If one were topulsively absorb an excessive amount of energy that one did not cultivate in, one would end up dead. The sea monster was fortunate that it was merely hit by one wee bit of the energy of life back then. Had it been hit by an excessive amount of that energy, it likely wouldn¡¯t have endured and would have died on the spot, never getting the chance to evolve to this stage.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s attentive gaze, the energy within the Tree of Life rapidly gushed into wood elite zombie while the brilliant radiance of the Tree gradually faded.

    Soon enough, the Tree of Life started to wither. The leaves browned and dried before they fell off one after another. The exuberant energy was no more. In contrast, the pale face of wood elite zombie turned rosy and looked more youthful and healthy. The Viride Leaf in his hand too looked verdant and filled with plenty of energy.

    In the end, the Tree of Life waspletely drained of energy. Surprisingly, right before Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, the base of the Tree of Life turned into skeletal remains with no trace of any wooden quality. It appeared that after the energy of life was drained, the original appearance of the god who had transformed into the Tree of Life would be revealed.

    While wood elite zombie indulged himself in the massive amount of energy that he had just obtained out of the blue, Han Shuo focused on observing the area around the skeletal remains. He found nothing that would indicate or reveal his identity.

    After a long while, when Han Shuo was still checking all around for any traces, wood elite zombie suddenly said to him, ¡°Father, I know that you are injured. I can help you!¡±

    Han Shuo, who had sunken deep into contemtion, was immediately roused. He asked in a rather startled manner, ¡°Help me? What do you mean?¡±

    "I don¡¯t know why, but I believe that I can use this new energy to elerate your body¡¯s recovery process!" wood elite zombie transmitted.

    Han Shuo was startled. He thought for a moment and felt that perhaps the energy of life really could help him in rejuvenating his body. Hence, he nodded happily and said, "Well then, let¡¯s try that out!"

    Upon finishing those words, Han Shuo again carefully examined the base of the Tree of Life that had turned into skeletal remains after losing all its energy of life. With a raise of his big hand, the soil stirred up. The remains of that god who had died however long ago were buried deep underground.

    So what if one cultivates in the edict of life? One will still face death just the same. Such are thews of nature. Who could actually escape that? Does altering the form of life truly mean getting to live again? Han Shuo thought to himself as he ascended to the surface.

    The sea monster pitifully followed behind Han Shuo back to the surface of the ocean. Seeing that Han Shuo was leaving, the sea monster carefully asked, ¡°Erm, have you forgiven me?¡±

    ¡°Yes, I have forgiven you. But I need you to stay in a ce for a while,¡± Han Shuo replied indifferently after thinking for a while.

    If those from the Church of Light or the Shrine of Ice were to find the sea monster, they could possibly crack it open enough to discover Han Shuo¡¯s hiding ce. Therefore, Han Shuo decided to take the sea monster into the Cemetery of Death until the matter was over.

    "But, but I can¡¯t leave the water for too long." the sea monster replied anxiously.

    ¡°In this realm, can¡¯t you alter your body size?¡± Han Shuo asked smilingly after thinking for a short while.

    "I can, actually." the sea monster answered honestly.

    ¡°That¡¯ll do, then. Alright, get yourself a little smaller. I will make sure you have water,¡± Han Shuo said beaming ear to ear.

    The sea monster had a bad feeling about this, but nhelessplied and shrunk, in fear that Han Shuo might kill it. By the end of it, it had transformed itself into a strange-looking octopus with shell-like armor just slightly smaller than an adult human.

    Arge container made of ss suddenly enveloped it. After filling the ss container with water, Han Shuo said with a sinister smile, ¡°See? This will do just fine. There¡¯s no way you could run out of water.¡±

    ¡°Ahh! No! I don¡¯t want to be like this. This is too humiliating!¡± the sea monster loudlyined. It seemed to be on the verge of tearing up.

    ¡°You don¡¯t have a choice!¡± Han Shuo said with a mischievous smile. After applying several boundaries around the big ss container, Han Shuo carried it back to the gourd ind and returned to the Cemetery of Death.

    After casually cing the sea monster somewhere, Han Shuo and wood elite zombie walked to where his main body was. The injuries on Han Shuo¡¯s main body were extremely severe. Even with remarkable healing ability, it wouldn¡¯t be an easy task to recover within a short period of time.

    When wood elite zombie arrived, he ced the Viride Leaf above the chest of Han Shuo¡¯s main body. The energy of life was slowly injected into Han Shuo¡¯s heavily injured main body via the Viride Leaf.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s main body did not contain one bit of the elemental energy of death, the exuberant energy of life did not repel his main body. Under wood elite zombie¡¯s control, an amazing transformation immediately took ce.

    The slow recovery process of the main body was elerated by several dozen folds under the effect of the energy of life. His organs, meridians and bones were all healing up at speeds noticeable by the naked eye. It was a miracle.

    Pretty soon, all the essential organs and parts within Han Shuo¡¯s body could operate as normal. Not a wound could be found on his skin. His demonic yuan could rapidly and unimpededly circte throughout his body. Most of the injuries that Han Shuo suffered from activating the ¡®Demonic Blood Disassembly¡¯ technique were healed all at once.

    ¡°A miracle! The energy of life is absolutely astonishing!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s main body stood up and eximed with a chuckle.

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 Chapter 648: Sudden changes

    GDK 648: Sudden changes

    ¡°How is it? Pretty good, isn¡¯t it?¡± Wood elite zombie smugly sought Han Shuo¡¯s approval right after helping to rejuvenate Han Shuo¡¯s main body.

    "Wonderful!" Han Shuo praised from the bottom of his heart.

    ¡°Hehe! The energy I received is immense. I need to return and digest it for a period of time. After this, I can be just as strong as they are!¡± wood elite zombie ryed.

    Han Shuo understood what wood elite zombie meant and nodded. Without wasting more words, he sent him back to the Netherworld.

    During the next few days, Han Shuo remained indoors within the Cemetery of Death. As the recovery speed of his main body had been elerated using the energy from wood elite zombie, he managed to fully recover from all the injuries sustained in just a few days. In addition, his main body became even tougher and mightier than ever.

    The repaired body would always be stronger than before it was damaged. Such was the terrifying characteristic of the body of a demonic arts practitioner.

    After the main body was fully healed, the demonic yuan could circte unimpededly throughout his body. Han Shuo had consumed some of his demonic yuan in repairing and healing his main body. But now that it had fully healed, he would be able to replenish all the exhausted demonic yuan by spending a little bit of time.

    His two avatars also remained inside the Cemetery of Death, silentlyprehending the elemental energy of death and the edictal energy of destruction. After experiencing two rounds of battle against the Primordius Dragon, the avatar of death managed to gain a deeper understanding of the elemental energy of death. He seemed to be on the verge of bing a mid-stage lowgod.

    For gods, every slightest increase in realm meant a lengthy process. If an ordinary god were to learn that Han Shuo was able to advance his avatar of death from early-stage to mid-stage lowgod realm within such a short period of time, they would surely be astonished.

    As the destruction avatar did not have much battle experience rted to the edict of destruction that he could digest, he did not advance as rapidly as the death avatar. Han Shuo, however, was not discouraged. He carefully reflected the method of using the edict of destruction after every battle and silently contemted the true essence of the edict of destruction.

    During this period, Han Shuo did not take one step outside of the Cemetery of Death and paid no heed to the circumstances out there. His mind was at peace as he silently cultivated.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo¡¯s heart jolted. He noticed that three souls had suddenly formed miraculous connections with him.

    Han Shuo was bewildered at first but became delighted soon after. His body blurred and abruptly materialized on the piece ofnd at the front of the Cemetery of Death.

    The demonic formation for refining spirit demons which Han Shuo had relocated along with the Cemetery of Death no longer disyed any sign of activity. Although the three spots in the matrix which contained the spirit demons appeared to be lifeless, Han Shuo could sense the presence of the three spirit demons.

    ¡°Aha! Sure enough, they are sessfully refined!¡± Han Shuo cheered. He walked to the location of the first spirit demon and extended his big hand. Demonic radiance glistered from his palm and illuminated the spirit demon. Han Shuo then closed his eyes and managed to acquire a connection with the spirit demon within. He proceeded by freeing the soul from the matrix.

    Gradually, Han Shuo¡¯s palm was covered with dark radiance. When the spirit demon that was in hibernation state sensed Han Shuo¡¯s presence, it became very excited and active. As though a butterfly breaking from its cocoon, the mists that enveloped the spirit demon dispersed in the air.

    A hazy and indistinct shadow that was twisting and wrapping within the mist suddenly shot out and disappeared into Han Shuo¡¯s body in a sh. A strange energy entrenched itself in the demonic infant like a worm burrowing into an apple. It seemed still and contented.

    The newborn spirit demons had a very heavy reliance on Han Shuo. They also needed the nourishment of Han Shuo¡¯s energy to continue to grow.

    Han Shuo repeated the same actions with the other two spirit demons. They were turned into the size of a grain of rice and kept in his demonic infant.

    Unlike the mystical demons and yin demons Han Shuo had previously refined, the spirit demons were the real deal. Although the mystical demon and yin demon were also considered demon generals, in most circumstances, they could only act as Han Shuo¡¯s scouts for surveying the perimeters and did not possess much ability to attack.

    But this could not be said for spirit demons. Not only did the spirit demons inherit all the miraculous abilities of those lower ranking demon generals, but it also possessed great firepower. On top of that, perhaps the most important of all, the spirit demons could evolve an indefinite number of times. A spirit demon would be stronger each time it evolved. Their attacking power would be even more formidable.

    Han Shuo withdrew the spirit demons one after another. After deeply contemting for a while, Han Shuo destroyed the formation for refining spirit demons.

    Han Shuo did not leave the Cemetery of Death during this critical juncture. He stored his two avatars back into his main body and sat cross-legged next to the humongous internar transportation matrix, waiting for the arrival of experts from the distant material ne.

    *** On a mountain peak neighboring Brettel City, a party of gods gathered.

    Kaiser, Eriksson, and their partners, all wore grave expressions on their faces. They seemed extremely vexed and deeply bothered by something.

    ¡°Have we searched the entire continent?¡± Kaiser kept silent for a long while before he suddenly asked.

    ¡°We have practically searched the entire continent but there is still not a trail of him,¡± Eriksson from the Shrine of Ice replied in a cold and steady manner when he saw that the others were silent.

    ¡°Where in heaven¡¯s name did that kid ce his internar transportation matrix? How could he have been so careful not to leave the slightest trail?¡± Kaiser sighed, before continuing, ¡°Although this kid has mediocre strength, he is nheless an adversary that must not be taken lightly!¡± He scratched his head, which was red with rage.

    Eriksson who had the experience of fighting with Han Shuo nodded and agreed, ¡°That¡¯s true. I have fought with that kid before. Not only is he very cunning, but he also has a staunch heart and will. He definitely is not one who would easily give in. There isn¡¯t much time left before those fes arrive, but we still couldn¡¯t locate that kid or his transportation matrix. The matter is going to be pretty troublesome this time.¡±

    ¡°How about... we find that kid¡¯s friends, capture all of them, spread the message, and wait for him to take the bait?¡± suggested that married woman.

    Kaiser bunched his brows and said in a displeased manner, ¡°Mary, we are after all, gods. We shouldn¡¯t do such despicable things if not necessary. Besides, I don¡¯t think that it would be effective against him. So, no, we are not doing that!¡±

    That beautiful woman was stunned for a moment before she put on a respectful face and concurred. But at the same time, she silently cursed in her heart, What are you pretending to be honorable about? It¡¯s not like the Church of Light has never done that before!

    ¡°I don¡¯t think we will find that kid in time. Why don¡¯t we destroy the Cmity Church here first?¡± Eriksson suggested.

    Kaiser again shook his head and disagreed, ¡°The Cmity Church on a mere low-level material ne like this is absolutely not worthy of our time. Hmm, how about this, as we still have some time, let¡¯s figure out the path to the deepestyer of the underground world. And, if it¡¯s possible, deny them the pathway of entry. How does that sound?¡±

    Entering and exploring the deepestyer of the underground world was indeed much more important than destroying the Cmity Church establishment on this material ne. Hence, after a short moment of thinking, the party agreed to Kaiser¡¯s proposal.

    Havinge to a resolution, the party wasted not a second. They soared into the sky and headed to the entrance to the underground world at the Dark Forest.

    There was a quagmire not far from the mountain where those gods gathered. Deep under the quagmire was the mini transportation matrix that linked to the Cemetery of Death in the Boundless Sea. However, as the mini transportation matrix was concealed by Han Shuo using special demonic arts technique, these gods from high-level material nes failed to detect it.

    Han Shuo was really fortunate to have been scrupulous in obscuring the energy in the mini transportation matrix using demonic arts. Otherwise, given the mighty strength of these godly beings, they would likely have found the mini transportation matrix and located Han Shuo though it. That would be absolutely catastrophic to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Grandpa, it¡¯s about time for me to go back. I have been away for such a long time and Bryan will start to worry about me. He is going to shred me if I don¡¯t go and look for him soon.¡± Gilbert had been staying in the underground world for a while, to spend some quality family time with his grandpa, Gilges. He also paid his respects to his deceased father.

    Gilges was very happy to be able to see his grandson again. Gilges the old dark dragon had spent a long time in heartache and sorrow after Gilbert exhausted all his lifeforce in saving the race of dark dragons. Although Han Shuo had previously promised Gilges that he could resurrect him as a healthy and active little dark dragon, Gilges had always taken that as just aforting word.

    Especially, during the time Han Shuo was trapped in the Abyss realm, there was not one bit of news from Han Shuo for five years and therefore Gilges thought that Han Shuo really had been killed by those from the Church of Light. He had given up all hope at that point.

    But suddenly, during his most despaired days, dark dragon Gilbert sudden returned to him. Even his strength had greatly advanced. This simply was unbelievable for Gilges and therefore he had been urging Gilbert to spend more time with him.

    Those days were the happiest days that Gilges, the patriarch of the dark dragons, had lived. He made his little dark dragon listen to him talk about the old affairs of the dark dragons as well as many of their secrets.

    As the old dark dragon had the intention of letting Gilbert take over his position as the patriarch of the dark dragons, he let Gilbert in on these secrets that the dark dragons had been guarding for ages without an ounce of reservation. He also informed him on how to deal with affairs among the dark dragons. Although Gilbert wasn¡¯t particrly interested in assuming control over the dark dragons, he couldn¡¯t douse the old dragon¡¯s enthusiasm and very patiently listened to what he had to say.

    ¡°Brat, you mention Bryan so often that it¡¯s making your grandpa feel somewhat envious,¡± the old dark dragon feigned annoyance as he spoke.

    The old dark dragon was in fact very grateful towards Han Shuo. This was not only because Han Shuo had resurrected Gilbert, but also because Han Shuo had previously rescued their race of dark dragon from the Shrine of Ice. The old dark dragon had also learned from Gilbert that Han Shuo was growing stronger and stronger. He was actually very pleased and relieved that Gilbert was following Han Shuo.

    ¡°Err... Bryan won¡¯t be as wordy as you are. I¡¯m getting bored listening to your stories about the past every single day. This ce is really too dull. It¡¯s much more fun to be with Bryan. Right, if I was with him, I could have helped him when he destroyed the Shrine of Ice and avenge my nsmen,¡± Gilbert said in a sloppy manner.

    ¡°Alright, alright. In any case, I have told you what you need to know. Go and look for your Bryan. But remember, as soon as you have the time,e back to visit this old man here. Otherwise, I will go to the surface and give you a round of beating!¡±

    ¡°OK, OK, I got it! You really are long-winded!¡± Gilbert answered before quickly flying away. He was afraid that the old dark dragon would further recount to him the stories about the dark dragons.

    Gilges forced a smile and sighed. He thought to himself, This little one, your grandpa has raised you all these years and yet all you know is to run to Bryan!

    Soon after dark dragon Gilbert departed, Kaiser and his party arrived.

    Eriksson had previously learned from Ice Celestial Corey that the race of dark dragons held the secrets to entering thestyer of the underground world. These mighty gods needed only to make the slightest effort before they found out where the dark dragons hid.

    The ice-cold auraing from Eriksson¡¯s body left Gilges instinctively frightened. He immediately raised his voice and shouted, ¡°Who are you people?¡±

    All the dark dragons in the vicinity heard the yelling and gathered. They looked at the unexpected guests as though facing their worst enemy.

    ¡°You are the patriarch of dark dragons?¡± Kaiser put on a faint smile and asked in a cordial manner.

    ¡°That¡¯s correct. What exactly do you all want? How did you find this ce?¡± The old dark dragon was flustered. Before these people, he somehow feltpletely powerless and had no energy to even resist.

    ¡°Great!¡± Kaiser gentlyughed before putting on a stern face and said to Gilges, ¡°Little lizard, tell me the secret that you all have been guarding all along, the path to the bottommostyer of the underground world. If I¡¯m pleased, perhaps I might let your race live on!¡±

    The old dark dragon was terrified and he immediately shrieked, ¡°Everyone run! Run as far as you can!¡±

    ¡°You are too unamenable to circumstances!¡± Kaiser creased his brows and shook his head before instructing those behind him, ¡°Other than this old one, kill them all.¡±

    Kaiser and Eriksson remained motionless while the rest of those weaker gods got into action. Those dark dragons did not even have a chance of escaping. Before these godly beings, they were just like powerless lizards without any ability to resist. The poption was rapidly decimated.

    After just a short few seconds, the ground was covered with the dead bodies of dark dragons. Not one managed to escape.

    ¡°My mouth stays shut even if I die. Someday, our deaths will be avenged!¡± the old dragon that was filled with grief immediately attempted suicide.

    ¡°Dian, dig up the secret from his soul before he is dead,¡± Kaiser casually instructed. He then smiled disdainfully and said to himself, ¡°Who on this continent could avenge your death? What a naive lizard!¡±

    In an instant, an even younger-looking god arrived next to Gilges. A ring of light enveloped the old dark dragon¡¯s head and he suddenly started making a miserable, blood-curdling screech. His vitality gradually faded away.

    ¡°Found it! I will lead the way.¡± When the young god Dian withdrew his hand, Gilges copsed onto the ground with his eyes wide open.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go,¡± Kaiser instructed. The party left without second thought for those who remained.

    It was at this moment that magnificent rays suddenly blossomed from the internar transportation matrix in the Cemetery of Death, rousing Han Shuo who was silently cultivating beside it!

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 Chapter 649 - Professional Bulshitter

    Chapter 649: Professional Bulshitter

    Han Shuo, who had been sitting in silence for a long time, immediately stood up when the enormous internar transportation matrix next to him blossomed with dazzling white light. He ced his full attention on the internar transportation matrix.

    Han Shuo had waited for this moment for a very long time. He understood that the glowing of the internar transportation matrix indicated that those Cmity Church experts from the distant material ne would soon arrive.

    ¡°Oh¡­? ¡± A gentle voice sounded from within the internar transportation matrix. The bright light dwindled to reveal two women and three men.

    The one standing at the forefront of the party was a lovely and beautiful woman in a navy blue dress. She had bright eyes and white teeth. Her body was bursting with an intense element of darkness that shone with alluring negative rays. From the terrifying aura that Han Shuo sensed on her body, he determined that she must be a midgod expert.

    Right behind the beautiful woman was a youngdy in a short, purple skirt. Her fine arms were as white as snow, her face was delicate and pretty, but her eyes appeared abnormally crafty. She cultivated in the element of death and possessed mid-stage lowgod strength. Standing behind the youngdy were two young men who cultivated in the edict of destruction. They had Herculean jawlines and possessedte-stage lowgod power as well.

    Thest person was a skinny old man who looked like he couldn¡¯t lift a muscle. He cultivated in the elemental energy of death and roughly possessed the strength ofte-stage lowgod.

    The party of five consisted of a beautiful woman, a youngdy, an old man, and two youngsters. The woman was the only midgod of the lot, while the rest of them were lowgods. This filled Han Shuo¡¯s heart with shock.

    The youngdy nced around before her gaze quickly fell on Han Shuo. ¡°Tall guy, so you are the one who is supposed to wee us? Ha, why do you look so sluggish?!¡±

    ¡°Li Wei, mind your words!¡± warned the woman, before walking out from the internar transportation matrix. She then said to Han Shuo, ¡°Li Wei is a little mischievous, please don¡¯t take offense.¡±

    By this point, Han Shuo had finally calmed down from the shock he received from their arrival. He put on a bright smile and said rxedly, ¡°Wee to Profound Continent!¡±

    ¡°A low-level material ne? Well this is going to be a bore!¡± Li Wei wrinkled her nose, stretched her body, and started looking all around. She seemed to be scanning for anything that might arouse her interest.

    ¡°Li Wei, why don¡¯t we go roam around and see if there¡¯s anything fun on this low-level ne?¡± one of the youngsters cultivating in the edict of destruction suggested.

    ¡°Sure! Let¡¯s go!¡± Li Wei was delighted and immediately agreed.

    The beautiful woman furrowed her brows. ¡°No one will separate from the group before we understand the circumstances.¡±

    Upon hearing those words, Li Wei shrugged at the young man and replied in azy voice, ¡°Okay, I understand. Big sister Donna, you are so strict to us!¡±

    Donna smiled and replied, ¡°We did note here for sightseeing or to have fun. Those fes might have arrived here long ago. Besides, if you were toe across them by yourself on this unfamiliar continent, you will surely be in great danger. We should first find out about the circumstances here before deciding our next course of action.¡±

    After sizing up the five and listening to their conversation for a while, Han Shuo could tell that the beautiful woman they called Donna ought to be the leader of the party. Han Shuo also noticed that the old man who cultivated in the element of death was staying silent the whole way through. His gazes towards Li Wei were filled with respect, as though he was her sworn servant. As for the two young men who cultivated in the edict of destruction, one of them was talkative while the other was taciturn.

    Donna hinted the party to hush before asking Han Shuo politely, ¡°We don¡¯t know that much about the circumstances on this continent. Do you mind giving us a brief introduction?¡±

    As Donna began to talk proper business, the other four stopped themselves being a nuisance. Their gazes simultaneously gathered on Han Shuo and silently waited for his insight.

    Facing the observative gazes of the five godly existences, Han Shuo put on a calm smile and said in an unruffled manner, ¡°There is nothing special about the circumstances on this continent that warrant an introduction, not that you people would be interested anyway. But let me brief you on matters rted to the mission. The entrance to the underground world is located in a forest. The path to the bottommostyer is possessed by the race of Dark Dragons. I have very close rtions with the Dark Dragons and therefore it will not be a problem to figure out the path.

    Your enemies have arrived on this continent in advance. As to protect this internar transportation matrix, I currently have no clue of their position or actions. All I know is that one of them was from the Shrine of Ice, midgod realm¡­ ¡°

    Han Shuo skipped some of the trivial points and briefly described the most basic circumstances on the Profound Continent to the party.

    ¡°Okay, that¡¯s pretty detailed. Not bad,¡± Donna smilingly nodded. Right after, she changed her topic and asked, ¡°Oh, right, what do I call you?¡±

    ¡°Bryan,¡± replied Han Shuo.

    ¡°Bryan, let me introduce you,¡± Donna smiling said as she turned her body to the side and pointed at the youngdy behind her, ¡°This is Li Wei,te-stage lowgod of death. She is from the Kiaran family. That old man is a servant from her family who also possesseste-stage lowgod strength. His name is Colbert. The two brothers there are Bolten and Bowen. They are from the Brook family. As for me, I¡¯m Donna. We will have to inconvenience you during our stay on this material ne.¡±

    Every time their names were mentioned by Donna, they would each nod at Han Shuo as a gesture of greeting. However, Han Shuo could tell that the party of five did not genuinely take Han Shuo as a matter. Their greetings were superficial and did note from their hearts.

    In their eyes, Han Shuo was a little god on a low-level material ne who didn¡¯t carry much weight - a nonentity, a mere tour guide who was too inferior to make any great aplishment. It was only natural for them not to genuinely respect Han Shuo.

    Donna had made sure to note the family names of the other four but had missed out her own. This left Han Shuo somewhat puzzled. From what Han Shuo learned from Bechymos and the memories passed down by the original owner of the skeletal staff, he knew that the Overgods of Death and Destruction had close rtionships. There was nothing strange about Li Wei and the Brook brothers¡¯ arrival.

    However, Donna, who obviously cultivated in the elemental energy of darkness, came here as the leader of the party. That had somewhat astonished Han Shuo. He thought to himself, <i><i>Could it be that the Overgod of Darkness is now mingling with the two evil Overgods?</i></i>

    While Han Shuo was in astonishment, Li Wei suddenly let out a gentle cry and arrived next to that ss container holding that sea monster. Excitedly, she looked at the sea monster in the form of a small octopus swimming lightheartedly about andughingly remarked, ¡°Ha, what an ugly little fish! Intriguing!¡±

    As she spoke, she started getting rid of the boundaries Han Shuo deployed around it and attempted to take out and toy with that little octopus without the slightest scruple.

    ¡°Do not touch it! It is not a pet!¡± Han Shuo furrowed his brows and lightly yelled out.

    It¡¯s not that Han Shuo cared about the life or death of that sea monster. In any case, this ce was his turf and the sea monster could be considered as his property. For Li Wei to mess with his stuff without first seeking his consent was impudent behavior which rather displeased Han Shuo.

    ¡°Just an ugly little fish, nothing valuable about it. Let me y with it!¡± Li Wei ignored Han Shuo¡¯s words and was ready to remove the boundaries and pull out the sea monster.

    A shadow streaked through the room and arrived next to Li Wei in an instant. Before she could react, the ss container was already in Han Shuo¡¯s hand. Han Shuo waved his hand and the boundary around the Cemetery of Death automatically opened a small seam. Immediately, he hurled the ss container outside. The ss broke apart halfway in its trajectory, freeing the sea monster who hastily scuttled to the sea.

    ¡°Holy cow, what are they?! What a bunch of terrifying people!¡± the sea monster was trembling in fear as it sensed extremely formidable auras from Li Wei and the party. It rapidly sliced through the water and swam away.

    ¡°Get lost! Go as far as you can. If you don¡¯t want to die, you better leave this part of the ocean forever,¡± Han Shuo transmitted to the sea monster.

    Han Shuo had promised the sea monster that he would spare its life and he did not want to break that promise for Li Wei, especially when Li Wei showed no regards to him as the owner the property.

    ¡°You¡­ You grabbed my stuff?¡± Li Wei couldn¡¯t react for a moment and murmured while looking at Han Shuo puzzlingly.

    ¡°That thing was mine to begin with. It¡¯s none of your business that I freed it,¡± Han Shuo said indifferently.

    Before Li Wei said a thing, that skinny old man had fixed his gloomy eyes on Han Shuo. He looked displeased.

    Meanwhile, Donna was looking at Han Shuo somewhat astonished. She was taken aback by his inhuman speed; he was so fast that even she momentarily couldn¡¯t react. But what was even more shocking to her was - she did not sense Han Shuo utilize the energies of death or destruction!

    Donna¡¯s curiosity for Han Shuo was officially piqued. When she saw Colbert¡¯s gloomy gaze, she smilingly mediated, ¡°It¡¯s just a small fish, so what if it¡¯s set free! Li Wei, as guests, we should act within the norms and not be rude!¡±

    Li Wei was originally in a bad mood. But after hearing Donna¡¯s words, she acted as though nothing had happened and smilingly groaned, ¡°What a stingy guy, hmph!¡±

    After Li Wei had spoken, Colbert again lowered his head and wore that lifeless appearance again.

    Bolten, the one who previously invited Li Wei to take a stroll around this world, mumbled to himself in a low voice, ¡°Didn¡¯t expect that someone from a low-level material ne would be this interesting!¡±

    ¡°If you don¡¯t mind, we can set off for the underground world right away,¡± Han Shuo said in aposed manner as though he did not hear what those people said and did not see the disdain in their eyes.

    ¡°That would be great,¡± Donna dly agreed.

    ¡°I shall lead the way.¡± Han Shuo must have been rather displeased on the inside, as he took them trekking from the Boundless Sea instead of using transportation matrices to get to the Dark Forest.

    Donna and her party naturally had no idea that Han Shuo had a much faster shortcut for reaching the Dark Forest by teleporting from the Cemetery of Death to Brettel City and Brettel City to Valen City. Therefore, they did not say much but followed behind him in flying straight for the Dark Forest.

    As they flew through the clouds en route to the Dark Forest, Donna seemed to be interested in getting to know Han Shuo better because of his peculiarity. She thought for a moment and asked, ¡°By the way, how did you know that there was a midgod from the Shrine of Ice here?¡±

    ¡°I have met him!¡± Han Shuo turned his head and smilingly answered. He was still polite towards Donna.

    ¡°What a shameless lie. How could you still be alive if you met a midgod opponent? Especially when they know that you are in possession of that internar transportation matrix!¡± Li Wei disdainfully ridiculed. She seemed to be making reprisals for Han Shuo grabbing that sea monster from her just before.

    Despite Li Wei¡¯s annoyance, however, she wasn¡¯t as impulsive as she appeared on the surface. As she had to give Donna face, she did not burst into a rage on the spot but schemed on slowly taking her revenge.

    But Han Shuo¡¯s tant im that he had met that midgod was just too ridiculous to believe!

    ¡°Believe it or not!¡± Han Shuo smiled and gave a sinct reply. He had no intention of bickering with thatdy.

    Donna¡¯s heart was also filled with amazement but she did not question the validity of Han Shuo¡¯s words. Instead, she asked, ¡°Where did you meet him? What exactly happened?¡±

    ¡°I killed the nar Guardian of this ne and destroyed his internar transportation matrix. Then, as I was about to leave the boundary, I was trapped by that midgod. I nearly died from serious injuries while escaping from that boundary. It¡¯s a pity that I was one step toote. If I had been there a few days earlier, they probably wouldn¡¯t have made it there in the first ce!¡± Han Shuo said in a regretful manner.

    ¡°Wha¡­ What? You killed the nar Guardian here, and even destroyed his internar transportation matrix?¡± Even Donna couldn¡¯t help but cry out in surprise and looked at Han Shuo up and down weirdly.

    ¡°Haha, you managed to escape from the boundary of a midgod. You, sir, are a professional bullshitter! Hats off to you!¡± Bolten burst intoughter and said in an entric, condescending tone.

    Han Shuo forced a smile and shook his head. He did not exin any further.

    ¡°Bryan, have you really destroyed the other internar transportation matrix? Are you absolutely certain of it?¡± Donna had a grave expression as she asked.

    ¡°Of course!¡± Han Shuo said confidently, ¡°If you don¡¯t believe me, just ask one of them to go over there and take a look.¡±

    ¡°No matter how you destroyed the other internar transportation matrix, if it¡¯s true, then we will have the upper hand in this battle. Right, I will take note of this aplishment. Don¡¯t worry, you will be rewarded well,¡± Donna was overjoyed at the unexpected good news. She did not expect to receive such wonderful news so soon after she arrived on this continent.

    This news meant that if anyone on Donna¡¯s team was injured, they could quickly return home and even muster more experts over for assistance using the internar transportation matrix while those on the opposing team could not replenish their forces. They might even have to go through great difficulty in the return trip.

    Han Shuo shrugged and gave a bright smile. He did not boast about it or fawn over them. He appeared extremely rxed.

    Donna nodded in approval and immediately came to a much more favorable opinion of Han Shuo. She felt that although Han Shuo¡¯s strength might be weak, his aspirations and bearings were out of the ordinary. With her beautiful eyes, she cast a re at Colbert who was beside Li Wei.

    Donna knew that although Li Wei was an insolent girl, she wasn¡¯t one to hold grudges for long. Her house servant, Colbert, however, wasn¡¯t as magnanimous. Donna felt that given Colbert¡¯s strength, he could easily hand Han Shuo a painful lesson. Hence, Donna red at the old man to make sure that he wouldn¡¯t do that.

 Chapter 650 - Showing off a little

    GDK 650: Showing off a little

    Han Shuo and the party possessed immense strength. It took them only half a day¡¯s worth of time to fly from the Boundless Sea to the Dark Forest.

    Bolten, Li Wei and the rest whispered amongst each other after they heard Han Shuo im that he managed to escape from a midgod. They thought that Han Shuo was simply talking big and their stares at Han Shuo were filled with even more disdain. But on the contrary, Donna, the leader of the party, seemed to grow much more interested in Han Shuo. She kept on discussing with Han Shuo about the circumstances and life on Profound Continent in high spirits.

    Having attained such heights in demonic arts, there was no way that Han Shuo would deliberately humble himself before Donna or anyone for their superior strength or identity. All along, his attitude had been neither overbearing nor servile but was always casual and rxed. Donna, who had observed it all, nodded in approval.

    In Han Shuo¡¯s observations, whenever he and Donna were having any sort of cheerful chat, there seemed to be a few traces of hostility in Bowen¡¯s gazes towards him.

    By now, Han Shuo had managed to figure out the rtionships between the five. Between the Brook brothers, Bolten was obviously interested in Li Wei. His actions had said it all. As for that mute Bowen, his gazes towards Donna were filled with respect. This was rather surprising to Han Shuo.

    The ever-observant Han Shuo could detect the slight hostility in Bowen¡¯s eyes, but did not mind it.

    After arriving at the Dark Forest, Han Shuo suddenly detected dark dragon Gilbert¡¯s presence. With one pulsation of his consciousness, he discovered Gilbert pacing back and forth over and over again over the plot ofnd where the Cemetery of Death was previously located.

    ¡°Please excuse me for a moment, there¡¯s something that I need to take care of,¡± Han Shuo apologetically informed Donna before he suddenly turned into a streak of dark radiance and flew towards Gilbert.

    Gilbert¡¯s heart was a muddled mess. He had paced back and forth multiple times around the area and yet he couldn¡¯t detect the presence of any boundary. In addition to the deste wreck around him, Gilbert thought that he gotten the wrong location and started searching further around.

    It was obvious that a great battle had previously taken ce here and Gilbert could guess what that was. However, just like Emily, Fanny and Phoebe, Gilbert had blind confidence in Han Shuo. He had no idea that the enemy was so formidable that Han Shuo had to relocate the Cemetery of Death and temporarily go into hiding.

    While Gilbert was still scratching his head, he suddenly sensed Han Shuo¡¯s presence. His heart was at ease and he hastily raised his head at the sky.

    Han Shuonded beside Gilbert and chirpily asked, ¡°Just came out from the underground world?¡±

    ¡°My admirable master, why is it that I cannot sense the boundary around the Cemetery of Death? What happened?¡± Gilbert asked loudly as soon as he saw Han Shuo.

    ¡°The Cemetery of Death isn¡¯t here anymore. To prevent certain people from finding it, I have relocated it,¡± Han Shuo exined. He continued, ¡°I don¡¯t have time to fill you in with all the details for the time being. You have just exited from the underground world, do you know about the secret that your race of dark dragons has been guarding? Tell me now if you know ¨C that¡¯ll save me a visit to your grandfatherter.¡±

    Seeing that Han Shuo was rather impatient, Gilbert told him the secret which his grandpa had recently revealed to him without thinking. It was after he told Han Shuo everything that he asked puzzlingly, ¡°What¡¯s wrong? What do you look so anxious?¡±

    ¡°I will exin it when I return. In the meantime, take refuge in the Sunshine Valley or Brettel City until further notice. When I¡¯m done with my business, I will look for you,¡± Han Shuo instructed.

    ¡°Have you met with some sort of trouble? Master, I can help you!¡± Gilbert said excitedly. He was delighted instead of astonished.

    ¡°The trouble is too great, you couldn¡¯t be of any help! The battle involves godly experts. At your current level of strength, you cannot participate!¡± Han Shuo told Gilbert the brutal truth.

    Gilbert¡¯s his excitement was immediately doused and he was now terrified after listening to Han Shuo¡¯s words. Seeing that Han Shuo appeared hurried, he did not ask any more questions but simply said, ¡°Be careful,¡± before taking off in the direction of Sunshine Valley.

    After Han Shuo left the group of godly experts, theynded on a tall, luscious ancient tree. Bolten creased his brows and asked Donna in a deep voice, ¡°Big sister Donna, do you actually believe that fe?¡±

    Li Wei and Bowen turned to listen in on Donna response.

    ¡°His words sounded somewhat mysterious. I don¡¯t really know why, but I think he can be trusted!¡± Donna replied smilingly after thinking for a moment.

    ¡°Sister Donna, are you for real? That fe is obviously full of shit. How could you trust him? The way I see it, that guy has meager strength, but is very bold and could tantly tell lies. I really have no idea how a tiny god from a low-level material ne could be so impudent!¡± Li Wei said angrily. Bolten immediately agreed to her words. Even the taciturn Bowen nodded his head.

    Donna tried to contain herughter when she saw that angry appearance on Li Wei. She smilingly asked, ¡°He should speak humbly, submissively, be ttering and fawning in his attitude. Is that how you think he should carry himself?¡±

    ¡°Of course! When we head to other low-level material nes, isn¡¯t that how the local experts treat us?¡± Li Wei felt that it was only right that they received the highest treatment from Han Shuo.

    Donna smilingly shook her head and said, ¡°People like that have an ulterior motive towards you. They might want you to give them a promotion, or they might intend to feed off you for benefits from your family. These characters, even if they are gods, are destined not to seed!¡±

    ¡°So that fe will be sessful?¡± Bolten said somewhat disdainfully.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know. But in any case, from my perspective, he¡¯s much better than those kinds of people!¡± Donna thought for a moment before she looked at the bunch of youngsters and said, ¡°There is a lot that you people have to learn from that young man Bryan.¡±

    The three youngsters looked around dismissively and seemed to have turned a deaf ear to Donna¡¯s words. In fact, Donna had stirred up their arrogance. In their heads, they thought, <i>He¡¯s just a small character with no power nor authority from a low-level material ne. How is he qualified to be someone to learn from?</i>

    Donna noticed the expressions on their faces. She sighed softly and ceased to exin any further.

    These youngsters all grew up in families of enormous influence. They were pampered and privileged from childbirth and possessed astonishing strengths at such young ages as they were cultivated by their families with great care. Back in their worlds, they were always shielded by their elders and families, hence their pride and arrogance. It wasn¡¯t aplete surprise that they would look down upon someone on such a low-level material ne.

    Han Shuo returned just as hurriedly as he went. After flying back to Donna and the party, he straightforwardly said, ¡°Come with me!¡±

    Like spotlights being turned on for the first time, several figures streaked through the air and arrived at the entrance to the underground worlds in the blink of an eye. With Han Shuo taking the lead, they headed to the secondyer of the underground world without meeting any obstruction.

    ¡°Hang on, who is it that guards the entrance to thestyer?¡± Donna suddenly asked.

    ¡°It is guarded by the race of dark dragons on this continent. But we don¡¯t have to go through them, I have already found out where the path is,¡± Han Shuo replied.

    ¡°Then, does that mean that apart from you, only the race of dark dragons knows of this secret?¡± Donna asked after thinking for a moment.

    Han Shuo nodded.

    ¡°Oh? Then, just in case, you should ask the dark dragons to get as far as possible. Otherwise, the enemy could locate the entrance to that ce by finding the dark dragons here,¡± Donna advised Han Shuo after a second of silence.

    ¡°Big sister Donna, I think the best method is to execute all those dark dragons,¡± Bolten suddenly suggested.

    Han Shuo was immediately enraged at those words. He groaned, ¡°The dark dragons have paid so much in guarding this secret for you all. Is that how you treat those who have done nothing but give to you?¡±

    Donna, too, bunched her brows and shot a rather displeased re at Bolten. She berated, ¡°Bryan is right. These dragons don¡¯t need just be spared, they deserve to be preserved. Otherwise, who would dare work with us in the future?¡±

    Bolten could disregard Han Shuo, but not Donna. As soon as he heard Donna, Bolten put on an awkward smile and said, ¡°Don¡¯t be angry, big sister Donna. I wasn¡¯t serious.¡±

    Donna nodded and thought for a moment. She suddenly said, ¡°Bryan, I think we should go inform those dark dragons first. Otherwise, if those fese looking here, they might exterminate the entire race!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart stopped. He suddenly had an ominous premonition. He realized that if those from the Shrine of Ice couldn¡¯t find him, then they surely would proceed by figuring out the path to the bottommostyer of the underground world and execute the entire race of the dark dragons so that Han Shuo and his party wouldn¡¯t be able to enter.

    When Han Shuo thought so, he became somewhat worried and hastily headed to the home of the dark dragons. As Donna and her party needed Han Shuo to lead the way, they went along with him.

    When Han Shuo arrived at the dark dragon habitat, he saw the ground tainted with dead bodies. The patriarch of dark dragons, Gilges, died with his enormous dragon eyes wide open!

    ¡°It seems that we are toote!¡± Donna said in a deep voice.

    Han Shuo walked to the body of dark dragon patriarch Gilges in a stupefied manner. A torrent of fury surged in his heart when he saw the manner in which Gilges had died. He extended his hand to close Gilges¡¯ dragon eyes. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness pulsated. Through Gilges¡¯ soul that had yet topletely dissipate, using a special demonic technique, he obtained the scenes that Gilges saw in his final moments.

    A drop of his blood essence spilled out from his middle finger. Then, using thest strand of Gilges¡¯ soul that had yet to dissipate as the primer, the massacre that happened in this ce not long ago was projected in midair like a film.

    Donna could tell that Han Shuo¡¯s heart was filled with wrath from his cold and murderous appearance. When she was about to give Han Shuo a few consoling words, she suddenly saw the picture projected into midair and immediately cried out in surprise. She stared at Han Shuo in disbelief.

    Donna wasn¡¯t alone; Li Wei, the Brook brothers, and even that lifeless Colbert were all stupefied!

    ¡°That¡¯s Kaiser! And Eriksson! How, how did you do that?¡± Li Wei shrieked after foolishly watching the images. She wore a face of disbelief.

    Han Shuo raised his hand and sent out a hand seal. The drop of blood essence that dispersed into the air gathered before returning to Han Shuo¡¯s body. With that, thest remaining trace of Gilges¡¯ soulpletely dispersed between heaven and earth.

    <i>Dark dragon Gilges, I will avenge your death!</i> Han Shuo said in his mind.

    From those images, Han Shuo understood who was responsible for the massacre. He also heard the old dark dragon¡¯sst shout that was filled with boundless hatred. Unfortunately, as the old dark dragon¡¯s soul was too severely tormented and he came toote, he couldn¡¯t reassemble the old dark dragon¡¯s soul.

    ¡°I believe you all saw what happened as well,¡± Han Shuo said in a deep voice as he repressed the fury in his heart.

    Perhaps Han Shuo¡¯s performance was just too astonishing, even the arrogant Brook brothers did not pick fault with him. They all had bewildered expressions and their eyes were filled with doubts.

    ¡°Colbert, in our advanced techniques of the energy of death, is there a method to disy what a soul had seen? Li Wei was foolishly staring at Han Shuo but her words were directed at Colbert behind her.

    ¡°For Your Grace¡¯s information, we indeed can obtain some information from deceased souls. However, this usually cannot be mastered for one below the realm of highgod. That¡¯s not all, even highgods who have mastered that skill couldn¡¯t possibly re-project the scenes so clearly!¡± Colbert, who was staring at Han Shuo with astonishment, thought for a moment with his eyes closed before replying in a grave voice.

    Those gods from the high-level material nes were all thunderstruck.

    ¡°Bryan, that energy you just used doesn¡¯t seem to be the elemental energy of death. Moreover, having visited numerous material nes, I truly have never seen anything as miraculous as what you did just now. What was actually going on there?¡± The more mysteries that Donna discovered about Han Shuo, the more her heart was filled with doubts.

    ¡°We people on low-level material nes have our low-level techniques. The energy I use doesn¡¯t belong to any one of the twelve fundamental forces, and it is non-mainstream and extremely rare. It¡¯s normal that you have never seen it.¡± Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a good mood and replied monotonously.

    ¡°Can you tell us more?¡± Li Wei was greatly engrossed. Magnificent radiance glowed from her eyes that were fixed on Han Shuo.

    ¡°Sorry. No,¡± Han Shuo coldly and straightforwardly declined.

    ¡°Li Wei, everyone has their own cultivation methods. It¡¯s not courteous to ask that kind of question!¡± Donna criticized Li Wei before she softly chuckled and said, ¡°I have only be more and more curious about you!¡± She then shot a meaningful nce at the Brook brothers and said, ¡°I think by now you two should believe what Bryan has said.¡±

    After having witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s miraculousness, the Brook brothers were astonished. However, they remained skeptical about Han Shuo¡¯s previous im. They gently cleared their throats and did not reply.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go. I think those people have started their operation,¡± Han Shuo said in a cold voice as he grieved.

    ¡°Bryan, these things happen all the time. You can remember this hatred, but when you see Eriksson and Kaiser, by all means, don¡¯t do anything impulsive!¡± Donna took a pause to sigh before she continued, ¡°In my opinion, even if you have some miraculous skills, you are still no match against them!¡±

    Han Shuo knew that Donna was telling the truth. He nodded and said in a deep voice, ¡°I realize that.¡± After thinking for a moment, he said to Donna sincerely, ¡°Thanks.¡±

    He could feel that Donna was genuine with those words!

 Chapter 651 - Mischief in the dark

    GDK 651: Mischief in the dark

    Gilbert was fortunate to have left ahead of time, otherwise, he would surely have suffered the same fate as his grandfather. It was also because of Gilbert¡¯s lucky escape that Han Shuo managed to learn the path to the thirdyer of the underground world.

    With Han Shuo leading the way, Donna and the party followed behind him in silence. They all had strange looks on their faces and simply stared at Han Shuo bemused.

    The party of experts from the high-level material nes had grown rather interested in Han Shuo as they were surprised that a lowgod from such a low-level material ne could perform something so miraculous.

    Li Wei, who had been crafty all along the way, made endless indirect inquiries at Han Shuo, trying to pry out some clues from him. She had suddenly shown great interest in Han Shuo. However, with the dark dragons massacred, Han Shuo was in a terrible mood and did not respond to her at all. He wore a straight face and kept his mouth shut no matter how many questions she asked.

    Later when Li Wei finally lost interest, she stopped her relentless nagging around Han Shuo and went to Donna to exchange whispers. They would cast puzzled gazes towards Han Shuo from time to time. It was apparent that the topic of their discussion was rted to Han Shuo.

    This trantion is hosted on Veratales and I don¡¯t post GDK on anywhere else.

    After the Brook brothers recovered from their astonishment, their gazes towards Han Shuo still carried a thin trace of hostility. Perhaps these spoiled youngsters were not happy to see the twodies show so much interest in Han Shuo.

    Along the way, Han Shuo slowly readjusted himself. He managed to regain his calmness after a while. In the Nine Changes realm, Han Shuo¡¯s control over his heart and mind had significantly improved. Gilbert¡¯s chance escape from the cmity also contributed to the rapid recovery.

    In ordance with the information provided by Gilbert, Han Shuo led the five experts around the countless dangers found in the secondyer of the underground world. They headed towards a dark and damp region.

    On thisyer of the underground world, aside from the former dark dragons, there lived many super-ranked magical beasts with advanced intelligence. All along the way, not a single super-ranked magical beast dared approach them as they sensed the abnormality in the space around them.

    As they ventured deeper and got closer to the secret path, Han Shuo discovered that there was no longer any presence of life around them. After they entered a narrow ravine with humid air, there were no more glowing stones above their heads that would illuminate their surroundings.

    Han Shuo, who had been moving forward rapidly, suddenly slowed down his pace. Those following behind him immediately adjusted their paces to match Han Shuo¡¯s.

    ¡°Is there something wrong?¡± Donna stepped forward and asked in a whisper.

    ¡°We are near our destination. Those from the Shrine of Ice must be ahead of us. I think we need to be vignt from this point onwards, lest we step into their ambush,¡± Han Shuo replied without turning around. He was focused only on his surroundings and was carefully advancing forward.

    ¡°Everyone be careful!¡± Donna immediately understood Han Shuo¡¯s words and hastily instructed the rest of them sternly.

    ¡°What are you so afraid of? Eriksson and his party had ughtered the entire race of dark dragons. Perhaps they are thinking that we won¡¯t find the way in!¡± Bolten said as he trudged along. He didn¡¯t appear worried at all.

    ¡°Yeah, don¡¯t get all stirred up over nothing. They would¡¯ve surely rushed inside. Why would they waste any time in mounting any sneak attack against us?¡± Li Wei agreed. She was rather annoyed that Han Shuo hadpletely ignored her on the way here.

    ¡°The three of you, get behind!¡± Donna, as the leader, instructed at this critical moment.

    When Li Wei, Bolten, and Bowen dared not to rebuke Donna¡¯s orders. They slowed down their paces and followed behind Donna, Han Shuo, and Colbert.

    Donna and Han Shuo were at the front, marching ahead shoulder to shoulder. Behind them was Li Wei. Colbert was beside but slightly behind Li Wei. At the rear of the party were the Brook brothers.

    ¡°You need to be careful as well. Those fes might not try to ambush us, but they likely will deploy some hidden seals and boundaries. Kaiser and Eriksson are midgods. Traps that they deploy aren¡¯t ones that you¡¯d want to fall into,¡± Donna softly said to Han Shuo with her slender brows gently creased.

    The two were walking in close proximity, so close that Han Shuo could even sniff her faint but sweet fragrance, which was simr to the scent of orchids. It was a delight to his olfactory. However, at such moments, Han Shuo did not let his thoughts wander. His attention was fully gathered on observing the environment.

    Suddenly, Donna reached out with one hand and grabbed at Han Shuo¡¯s right arm. She forcibly pulled Han Shuo back from stepping forward.

    Han Shuo staggered. He quickly turned his head to look at Donna with puzzled eyes.

    ¡°Don¡¯t take another step. That fe has sure enough deployed traps just in case we found the path. They certainly were at an advantage by being ahead of us!¡± Donna lightly shouted. She hinted Han Shuo to take a few steps backward. To proceed, she extended a hand forward with her palm facing outwards. Absolute darkness suddenly enveloped the entire ravine.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t see what was going on in the surroundings with his naked eyes. But with his other senses, he detected that the temperature on the ground where he was about to step had abruptly dropped to absolute zero. It appeared that a boundary of water deployed by Eriksson was triggered.

    The absolute darkness dispersed as quickly as it emerged. In just an instant, the ravine returned to normal.

    ¡°Alright. For the remaining journey, you will tell me the directions and I will take the lead,¡± Donna gave Han Shuo a sweet smile and walked ahead of him.

    ¡°Ok!¡± With the experience of nearly walking into Eriksson¡¯s trap, and recognizing that Donna had superior strength and was therefore a better expert in this aspect, he immediately agreed to the suggestion.

    Han Shuoter noticed that Donna was holding a crystalpass that was covered with magical symbols. She would point the crystalpass around as she stepped forward. She seemed to be measuring something using the instrument.

    Donna did not turn her head around but she seemed to have noticed Han Shuo¡¯s interest in the crystalpass. As she continued marching forward, she exined to Han Shuo, ¡°This crystalpass in my hand is a device for detecting elemental energy. It can detect fluctuations of elemental energy within a certain range. Many seals and boundaries require the use of elemental energy, which always results in fluctuation. With this crystalpass, I can detect dangers concealed in the surroundings.¡±

    ¡°Surees in handy,¡± Han Shuo replied softly.

    ¡°Hmph, unenlightened one, you have no idea just how valuable this crystalpass is!¡± Li Wei said disdainfully.

    Han Shuo was toozy to quarrel with her. He silently followed behind Donna without even turning to look at Li Wei.

    ¡°This crystalpass is indeed very valuable. It is made of very rare materials and there aren¡¯t many who know how to make one,¡± Donna said smilingly while keeping her focus forward.

    Han Shuo and his party were only several thousand meters from the entrance to the thirdyer of the underground world but they were very careful in their approach. Thanks to Donna¡¯s crystalpass, they managed to find three more traps deployed by Kaiser and Eriksson within that short distance.

    After half an hour, those gods finally arrived at the entrance.

    The secret entrance was in fact a cave mouth covered by a denseyer of vines. Without knowing the specific location, one would have great difficulty in finding out that there was a cave mouth behind the denseyer of vine that connected to thestyer of the underground world.

    Upon arrival, Han Shuo made a slight observation and noticed that some of the vines had been snapped off. He guessed that Eriksson and his party must have entered the cave ahead of them.

    ¡°It¡¯s right here. See if there are any traps at the entrance,¡± Han Shuo pointed at the cave mouth and said to Donna.

    Donna scanned the area with her crystalpass and exined to Han Shuo, ¡°Nope. They didn¡¯t ce any trap at the entrance probably because they don¡¯t want us to find out the location of the entrance through the trap.¡±

    Han Shuo immediately pushed the vines aside, revealing the cave that seemed to be bottomless.

    Han Shuo turned around to nce at the party and indicated them to follow suit before he stepped into the cave.

    ¡°Thest person that enters the cave, make sure to put the vines back in ce!¡± Donna instructed before her lovable figure shot into the cave.

    Bolten and Bowen went into the cave right after with Li Wei closely following behind them. Colbert deliberately entered the cavest and meticulously returned the vines back in ce.

    The moment that the denseyer of vine sealed off the cave mouth, the already dim cavern immediately turned pitch-dark.

    In this lightless cave, only Donna and Han Shuo who cultivated in the elemental energy of darkness and the miraculous demonic arts respectively could clearly see their surroundings without any external light source.

    Donna, who was holding the crystalpass in her hand, suddenly looked at it in astonishment. As Han Shuo was just behind her, he noticed an indicator on the crystalpass jittering off the scale. He immediately froze every muscle on his body.

    Sure enough, Donna suddenly warned, ¡°There is a boundary of light deployed by Kaiser right ahead. As the cave is impossibly narrow, I worry that getting rid of the trap will cause the cave to copse and block our way forward. We will have to walk past it in darkness. Do not use any illumination devices. Even a single ray of light will trigger that boundary.¡±

    At her words, those who were about to withdraw their illumination devices to light up the path immediately stopped what they were doing. They carefully advanced forward inplete darkness.

    Han Shuo turned around and shot a nce. He discovered that in this kind ofplete darkness, except for Donna, the rest of the party had their sights affected. They all appear disorientated and advanced cautiously.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it too much. As long as there is no light, the boundary will not be triggered. Right, just walk forward and try not to get tripped by rocks,¡± Donna couldn¡¯t help but advise when she saw her party be overly cautious.

    ¡°Oi, you ahead, don¡¯t block the path,¡± Li Wei who was following behind Han Shuo deliberately said.

    When Han Shuo saw Li Wei continue to behave obnoxiously towards him even as she was disorientated and trying to feel her way in the dark, heughed grimly in his heart. He moved to the side and, with his feet, pushed a decently sized stone right before Li Wei¡¯s foot.

    In theplete darkness without a trace of light and unable to see, there was no way that the disadvantaged Li Wei would escape Han Shuo¡¯s mischief. Every few steps, she would surely trip over a stone in her path. Flustered by the constant staggering, she cursed in a low voice, ¡°Ugh, why are there so many stones in the way!¡±

    The others walking behind Li Wei would more often than not repeat the same misfortune after Li Wei. They would stagger and stumble every few steps, forcing them to swear throughout the trek.

    Donna, who was walking right ahead of them, was baffled to hear those behind her curse and swear. All along the way, although there indeed were stones around them, most of the stones were on the sides. Logically speaking, they shouldn¡¯t have tripped so frequently.

    Wondering what was wrong, Donna turned around for a nce. She discovered that Han Shuo walking behind her had aposed look and disyed not a trace of disorientation. Then, as she carefully observed, Donna saw that ridiculing smile on Han Shuo¡¯s lips. She immediately understood what was happening.

    In fact, Han Shuo did not try to conceal it from Donna. When he saw Donna turn around in bewilderment, he even grinned at her ¨C that smirk that one would make after pulling a sessful prank.

    Donna immediately came to her senses and shook her head with a grin. She inwardly thought that Han Shuo had sure gotten his retaliation against Li Wei and the rest. Mischief as petty as cing stumbling rocks in their paths wouldn¡¯t cause them any real damage. Donna thought that it wasn¡¯t outrageous to let them taste a little pain. She may as well have even tacitly approved of Han Shuo¡¯s actions.

    Suddenly, a realization struck Donna. She herself cultivated in the elemental energy of darkness and it was perfectly normal that she could see in the dark. But how was it that Han Shuo could do the same? As if it were even possible to, Donna grew even more curious towards Han Shuo.

    Noting Donna¡¯s approval of his actions, Han Shuo grew even more brazen. With a malicious smile on his face, he ced even more stumbling rocks in their path, causing them to wail and whine in utter misery!

    ¡°Eh? Bryan, how is it that you are doing just fine?¡± Bolten suddenly cried out when he discovered the abnormality.

    ¡°I don¡¯t get tripped less than you do, but they feel more like tickles to me, not painful enough for me to make so much noise,¡± Han Shuo replied. As he walked, he turned around to shoot a nce at them with a big smile.

    ¡°Ouch!¡± Han Shuo stumbled and even subconsciously gave a light cry. He became embarrassed when he recalled what he had said just a second ago.

    ¡°Hehe! Who is it that cried out in pain just now? Did I hear that right?¡± Li Wei obviously heard that soft cry from Han Shuo and immediately ridiculed him. With that, the youngsters put down their suspicions that it was Han Shuo who was giving them hell.

    Han Shuo, who managed to humiliate himself, was rather puzzled. <i>I¡¯m sure I didn¡¯t see any rock in front of me, how did I stumble over one?</i>

    A thought crossed his mind. He raised his head to look at Donna who was walking ahead of him. When turning a corner, with a side of her face visible, Han Shuo discovered that the corner of her lips slightly was pursed up to make a smile one would make after seeding in a prank.

    Han Shuo was at a loss for words. He did not expect Donna who appeared to be serious and dignified was actually one who would pull a prank on others. Han Shuo was left betweenughter and tears.

 Chapter 652 - Man-made Features

    GDK 652: Man-made Features

    Han Shuo and his party made their way in theplete darkness for about half an hour before Donna, who was guiding the way, suddenly said, ¡°Alright, we have made it past the light element boundary. Everyone can take out their illumination devices now!¡±

    Upon hearing those words, the few youngsters who were battered by Han Shuo¡¯s mischief immediately withdrew gemstones that glowed brightly in the dark. Darkness was dispelled and the setting became clearly visible.

    After traveling for some time, Donna suddenly halted her footsteps when she saw that there were multiple branches of paths up ahead. She turned to cast an inquisitive gaze at Han Shuo.

    This was the critical point to the secret that the dark dragons had been guarding for so long. As soon as Han Shuo saw the forks, he immediately stepped forward and exined in a grave manner, ¡°From this point onwards, there will be many more branches. Make one misstep and you will end up anywhere but the thirdyer of the underground world, so you all better follow closely behind me.¡±

    At this critical moment, those who had been fooling around along the way turned solemn and expressed their approval.

    Han Shuo again took the lead of the party. Starting from the first fork, they were confronted with countless choices. There were countless narrow and wide paths for them to choose from. Han Shuo silently advanced forward ording to Gilbert¡¯s directions.

    After much twisting and turning through thoseplicated tunnels, finally, Han Shuo led them to an enormous, dark hole.

    That dark hole ahead of them which appeared bottomless was connected directly to the finalyer of the underground world. ¡°Alright. Descend from here. This will take some time. Everyone be careful and good luck!¡± Han Shuo said in a calm voice. He turned around to give a look at Donna before taking the lead and leap into the hole.

    ¡°There probably won¡¯t be any danger, but it¡¯s always good to be cautious,¡± Donna smilingly said to the party and jumped in after Han Shuo.

    After entering the deep hole, Han Shuo again found himself in pitch-ck darkness. He wasn¡¯t at all disorientated or nervous. The surroundings were visible to him after he unfolded his consciousness.

    As he looked around, he suddenly recalled that back in the Abyss realm, he had a simr experience when entering the Void. But unlike when he was descending into the Void, Han Shuo did not encounter countless dangers in this ce. It was a smooth and uninteresting fall.

    Although he was descending rapidly, nheless, Han Shuo was able to take in the surrounding scene. All he saw weremon rocks; nothing to catch Han Shuo¡¯s interest.

    After the rest of them jumped into the hole, using his consciousness, Han Shuo could clearly perceive the location of Donna and the others falling from over his head.

    The process of descending took yet another half an hour. When Han Shuo finallynded on the ground, before he even observed the scene around him with his eyes, a shiver ran down his spine.

    A wicked and sinister aura filled every corner, giving Han Shuo an extremely familiar, fuzzy feeling.

    After carefully sensing for a moment, Han Shuo suddenly discovered a faint presence of mystical yin aura in the air. This filled Han Shuo with both doubts and delight.

    The mystical yin aura was some of the purest energy left behind by deceased souls. Under normal circumstances, the energy would, over time, gradually dissipate between heaven and earth. It was only in some unique natural environment or in a mystical yin formation deployed by a demonic arts practitioner that the energy would assemble.

    Han Shuo was delighted at the discovery because the mystical yin aura could be converted into demonic yuan. It had an unimaginably beneficial effect on his cultivation.

    The mystical yin aura was as useful to Han Shuo as the yuan energies of five attributes were to the five elite zombies. It was a most wonderful energy that could elerate the speed at which Han Shuo generated demonic yuan by more than ten fold.

    Therefore, Han Shuo was very pleasantly surprised to discover that the mysterious yin aura filled every inch of the air right after hended.

    Without needing much thought, Han Shuo became absolutely certain that there was a naturally-formed ce of mystical yin that gathered mystical yin aura. His heart was filled with unrestrainable excitement.

    After reaching the Nine Changes realm, Han Shuo needed to cultivate for a long period of time to slowly umte and deepen his demonic yuan. He didn¡¯t even know how much more time he would have to sacrifice to reach the Omen realm. Although Han Shuo had the memories left behind by Chu Cang Lan as guidance, there was still no way to avoid the slow umtion of demonic yuan that required a lengthy period of time.

    However, by cultivating in this ce of mysterious yin umtor and utilizing the mysterious yin aura that umted here, Han Shuo could shorten that time by at least ten fold!

    Han Shuo was so wild with joy that he nearly couldn¡¯t restrain himself and cried out in surprise. But when he detected that the rest of the party was about tond, he suppressed his excitement as best he could.

    ¡°Oh? This ce is peculiar indeed. There is a strange type of energy that doesn¡¯t seem to belong to any of the eight elemental energies!¡± Donna immediately sensed the strange energy that was all around her and cried out in surprise.

    <i>Whoosh Whoosh Whoosh!</i> Several figuresnded beside Han Shuo. They were all greatly astonished and looked all around in curiosity.

    After concealing his delight, Han Shuo ced his attention on other aspects. He discovered that there weren¡¯t too many differences between thisyer and thest twoyers of the underground world. As there were rocks high above their heads that gave off lights, thisyer did not appear all that dark.

    Han Shuo cast his gaze into the distance. Thendscape seemed mostly identical to thest twoyers. The only difference he could make out was that when he unfolded his consciousness in all directions, he could not detect a trace of life ¨C not even a small bug. It was so deste and empty that it might agitate some.

    Donna closed her eyes and sensed for a moment before she suddenly asked Han Shuo, ¡°How do we proceed?¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head and exined, ¡°I have no idea. This is as far as the dark dragons know. They know how to get to the thirdyer but have no idea how to navigate through here!¡±

    Donna furrowed her brows. She seemed to be considering what path to take next.

    ¡°Sister Donna, I have my grandpa¡¯s notebook. Let me take a look at it,¡± it was at this moment that Li Wei suddenly spoke. She immediately took out an old notebook and flipped through it.

    The moment that Li Wei took out the notebook, Han Shuo turned his attention to her. With one thought, an invisible and formless spirit demon gently flew out from his body. Han Shuo secretly observed Donna¡¯s expression and noticed that there weren¡¯t any unusual changes on her face. Han Shuo was greatly relieved and directed the spirit demon slowly to Li Wei¡¯s side.

    Compared to other demon generals, spirit demons, being the highest grade of them, had an even more extraordinary way of concealing its aura. They could alter their own form to blend in with their surroundings. It was extremely hard to be detected. Although Han Shuo had great confidence in the spirit demon that he personally refined, he was still rather worried as Donna possessed extraordinary strength. But seeing that Donna did not react to the emergence of his spirit demon, Han Shuo believed that she did not discover its presence.

    Observing through his spirit demon, Han Shuo discovered that there was a crude sketch on the notebook in Li Wei¡¯s hand. There were also some symbols etched into it. After carefully reading the drawing for a moment, Li Wei suddenly pointed with her hand and said, ¡°Go in that direction!¡±

    Donna and the others were very trusting in Li Wei and no one raised any objection. They walked in the direction that Li Wei pointed.

    Han Shuo was stunned. The direction in which Li Wei was pointing was precisely where the mystical yin aura was most intense. Although the others couldn¡¯t sense it, Han Shuo, as a demonic art cultivator, could with great sensitivity.

    What was for sure was that the direction Li Wei pointed had to be the center of the naturally formed environment that gathered the mysterious yin aura, where the mysterious yin aura was the strongest.

    Han Shuo did not show any kind of abnormal behavior. When the party made their way in that direction, he silently followed along.

    ¡°Look! It¡¯s Kaiser, Eriksson, and their party!¡± Li Wei cried softly.

    Han Shuo abruptly raised his speed and approached Li Wei in a streak of faint dark radiance. When he carefully observed, he discovered that Eriksson, whom he had met at the Primordius Dragon¡¯s internar transportation matrix, was indeed straight ahead. Other than Eriksson, all those gods Gilges saw in hisst moments were all present.

    ¡°They seem to have met some trouble!¡± Donna gasped.

    Surrounding Eriksson and his party were a dozen or so grayish shadows rapidly streaking about. They seemed to be attacking the party. Those mighty gods seemed to be resisting attacks from the shadowy figures and actually appeared to be overwhelmed by them!

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness pulsated. He noticed that the shadowy figures felt very familiar. After carefully sensing for a moment, Han Shuo was startled!

    Mystical demons! They were mystical demons!

    Han Shuo was extremely astonished and he rapidly turned over in his mind. Immediately, he realized that the dozen or so mystical demons must have been mighty beings that lost their lives in this ce of mystical yin. After their deaths, affected by the energy, their souls transformed into mystical demons.

    Demon generals were divided into original demon, yin demon, mystical demon, and spirit demon. Although mystical demons could not further evolve, nor were they the most remarkable, it was more than enough to cause these mighty gods from distant material nes immense agony. The dozens of mystical demons shing about with faint shadows were many times mightier than those previously refined by Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo came to a conclusion: those mystical demons must have possessed extremely powerful souls before their deaths. Otherwise, there was no way they would have transformed into such formidable mystical demons. Perhaps those souls had previously fought here and were gods from distant high-level material nes.

    That was the only possibility!

    Han Shuo was even more shocked when he arrived at that conclusion. His eyes glistened and were fixed on those fluttering shadows. After carefully sensing with his consciousness, Han Shuo was finally certain of his conclusion.

    ¡°Those grayish shadows, what the hell are they? How could Kaiser and his group have such difficulty resisting them?¡± Li Wei cried out in shock.

    ¡°Don¡¯t do anything for the moment. Let¡¯s just see what happens!¡± Donna instructed in a soft, yet abrupt tone.

    ¡°It¡¯s toote. Get ready to defend!¡± cried Han Shuo.

    ¡°What? What do you mean?¡± Donna was rmed and looked at Han Shuo puzzled.

    Those mystical demons were extremely sensitive. They could detect the aura of any living being from several miles away. Han Shuo knew this better than any of them but he did not provide any exnation.

    In fact, Han Shuo didn¡¯t have to exin. As soon as he finished those words, a portion of the dozen mystical demons several thousand meters away rapidly shot towards Han Shuo and his party. Those faintly discernible shadows arrived in the blink of an eye and pounced on them.

    In just an instant, Donna and her party sank into a flustered state. The mystical demons were unique lifeforms that did not possess physical bodies. Most physical attacks against them were totally ineffective. As Donna and her people did not yet understand the properties of the mystical demons, they had great difficulty resisting them. Some of those mystical demons immediately entered their bodies and attacked their flesh while some attacked their souls.

    ¡°Ah! What is this thing!¡± When a mystical demon entered Li Wei¡¯s body, she lost her head out of fear and loudly shrieked. She couldn¡¯t be more terrified.

    Even Donna, who had thus far remained unperturbed, appeared incredibly flustered. She tried using her energy in all possible ways to resist the invasion of the mystical demons.

    Han Shuo had the calmest mind among the crowd. No one better understood the characteristics of mystical demons than he did. He was very clear about the strengths and weaknesses of mystical demons. In fact, by using a certain demonic art technique, Han Shuo could even deploy a formation to capture these mystical demons and allow the spirit demons that he had refined to assimte their energies.

    However, Han Shuo could not do so at this moment. Still, he was having a much better time facing the mystical demonspared to the rest of them.

    Mystical demons could not further evolve as spirit demons could. They were afraid of high temperatures and could suffer fatal blows when subjected to certain attacks using the soul.

    Although Han Shuo wasn¡¯t as strong as Donna and the others, by relying on his understanding of the properties of mystical demons, Han Shuo secretly utilized Mystical cial Spellfire to raise his body temperature while using his consciousness to form unique attacks, beating back a mystical demon with the undtion of his soul. It was almost effortless to him.

    Han Shuo did not exin anything about the strengths and weaknesses of mystical demons to these allies of his because he didn¡¯t know if these people would turn into his enemies in the future. On top of that, the spirit demons he refined shared certain characteristics with mystical demons. Hence, it was in his best interest not to reveal the slightest bit of information about mystical demons.

    Han Shuo was indifferent to see Li Wei in fear and helplessness against the mystical demons. In fact, he was secretly ted.

    If Li Wei had put her necromancy magic to good use and fought the mystical demons using soul attack methods, she would have no difficulty in defending herself. But what a pity it was that she waspletely ignorant of the characteristics of these mystical demons that were mutated by this ce of mystical yin. All her attack methods produced no results. All she could do was use her divine energy in painfully resisting the onught.

    ¡°Ah... Ah... ¡° Han Shuo pretend to cry out in pain while stealthily directing one of his spirit demons towards where the mystical yin aura was most intense.

    Although the spirit demon was of a superior ss, not having sufficient energy, it wasn¡¯t as mighty as those mystical demons. However, as spirit demons were simr to mystical demons in terms of life form, although those mystical demons could sense Han Shuo¡¯s spirit demon, they considered it as one of their own and did not pay any attention to it.

    While continuing to put on an act, Han Shuo continued to maneuver his spirit demon.

    After a while, Han Shuo¡¯s eyes suddenly blossomed with a radiance of disbelief. As he was so astonished that his body jolted uncontrobly. Even his soul was nearly injured by that mystical demon.

    Han Shuo was overwhelmed with shock because he had discovered through his spirit demon that the so-called ce of mystical yin was not naturally formed after all; rather, it was a super-sized Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester!

 Chapter 653 - Suspense

    GDK 653: Suspense

    A Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester was a wonderful formation for assembling the mystical yin aura. Han Shuo only had a basic description of this formation in his memories and had no idea how to assemble one.

    This Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester was obviously made by forcibly altering and reshaping the naturalndscape and environment. The scale of the undertaking had simply left Han Shuo stupefied.

    Could there have been a second demonic arts cultivator on Profound Continent?

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was filled with appall. Immediately, he recalled Chu Cang Lan. Could Chu Cang Lan have still been alive, and had he, too,e to this universe?

    But after some careful thinking, Han Shuo immediately rejected that possibility. On the basis of the scale and abstrusity of this super-sized Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester Han Shuo observed, he reasoned that this formation could not have been deployed by a demonic arts cultivator at the Nine Changes realm. Based on Han Shuo¡¯s knowledge, Chu Cang Lan was merely at the Nine Changes realm before his death. Moreover, there was no information pertaining to the method of deploying a Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester found in his memory.

    All the memory that Chu Cang Lan had about the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvesterposed merely a brief description of the formation. This kind of abstruse formation that required forcibly altering nature¡¯sws and changing heaven and earth could only be deployed by mightier demonic arts cultivator who had ascended.

    <i>What the hell is going on here?</i>

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was filled with utter astonishment and disbelief. It was akin to the wild ocean waves in a monsoon. As his consciousness constantly twisted and warped to beat back the mystical demon that constantly gued him, he rapidly turned over in his mind in silence.

    That spirit demon of his hovered back and forth outside the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester and dared not to venture any deeper.

    The Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester could not only alter thews of heaven and earth, but it had a myriad of other miraculous functions. Han Shuo was aware of a few of those from Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memories. Han Shuo had spent a great deal of effort in refining that spirit demon. Han Shuo would grieve and mourn if he were to lose that spirit demon to this Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester.

    The spirit demon kept on hovering around the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester and silently observed the legendary formation while Han Shuo carefully defended himself against the mystical demon assaulting him.

    ¡°Ah!!¡± Li Wei suddenly cried out loudly. Her voice was filled with immense horror.

    Han Shuo was jolted by that scream. When he gathered his attention and looked, he discovered that Li Wei had on an expression extreme dread. Her eyes were filled with helplessness.

    Han Shuo sent out a strand of his consciousness and with one quick observation, he discovered that the mystical demon attacking her had prated her body¡¯s defenses and were corroding her soul.

    ¡°Idiot!¡± Han Shuo remarked in a low voice. He inwardly thought, You are <i>a lowgod that cultivates in the elemental energy of death but doesn¡¯t know to utilize soul attacking method that you should be an expert in. Serves you right.</i>

    Perhaps Li Wei had never experienced a situation like this, when she sensed that a mystical demon had intruded her body, she became utterly panicked and had absolutely no idea what she should do. She lost her usual craftiness and wittiness.

    ¡°My Lady, attack with your soul!¡± when Li Wei shrieked in panic and horror, Colbert yelled from a few steps away.

    Colbert and Li Wei possessed identical strengths but he surely had much more battle experience than Li Wei did. When confronted with the crisis, Colbert managed to find an effective way of defending against the mystical demon at the most critical moment and he immediately informed Li Wei about it.

    In such a critical situation, Li Wei followed Colbert¡¯s instruction without even thinking. She gathered all her energy of death and started attacking the mystical demon with her soul.

    With that, the mystical demon that was devastating her body was immediately forced out. Li Wei was overjoyed to see that the manner of attack was very effective. Hence, she sent more and more soul attacks at that mystical demon.

    As long as the correct method was found, one would have no difficulty in self-preservation against a mystical demon. Under repeated soul attacks from Li Wei, that mystical demon could no longer invade her body. It could only streak around her and had to resort to other manners of attack.

    Although Han Shuo was screaming and shouting like the rest, he actually had the easiest time dealing with the attacks. He silently raised his body temperature and restricted that mystical demon with his wonderful consciousness. It didn¡¯t take much effort from Han Shuo topletely neutralize the mystical demon¡¯s attack.

    Donna who cultivated in the elemental energy of darkness didn¡¯t spend too much effort either. She merely enveloped herself within absolute darkness andpletely concealed her aura within the darkness. When a mystical demon flew into her absolute darkness, it was unable to urately sense her location and had to throw attacks in all directions. The Brook brothers were just as terrified as Li Wei was in the beginning. But before mystical demons attacked their souls, the Brook brothers permeated their bodies with the edictal energy of destruction. Perhaps because the energy that threatened to destroy everything was too powerful, the mystical demons felt a sense of danger and did not linger in their bodies for long.

    The party of six, including Han Shuo, by deploying their own unique skills, managed to stand firm and resist attacks from mystical demons.

    Kaiser and Eriksson¡¯s party who were just a short distance away heard Li Wei¡¯s loud shouts and discovered her party¡¯s presence.

    Kaiser and Eriksson who were in the realm of midgod were obviously able to deal with those mystical demons much more easily than their teammates. The pressure on them was also greatly reduced when a portion of the dozen mystical demons besieging them went on to attack Han Shuo and his party.

    Han Shuo had destroyed the Shrine of Ice and had injured Eriksson¡¯s soul when he manifested on this continent with his soul. There was no way that Eriksson would forget this hatred. He immediately charged over when he discovered Han Shuo.

    During those few days, Kaiser had learned from the Church of Light establishment on this continent about Han Shuo¡¯s deeds and grievances with the church. After learning that Han Shuo had killed the Light Pope on this continent along with the two demigods, he too was resolute inpletely eradicating Han Shuo.

    So, when Kaiser saw that Eriksson started charging at Han Shuo, for the purpose of taking vengeance as well as to make sure that Eriksson seeded, he hastily followed suit.

    ¡°I have let you escape from your doom for thest time. Let¡¯s see if you¡¯ll still be as lucky this time!¡± Eriksson taunted in a ferocious, icy voice.

    All those youngsters who were strenuously resisting the onught of mystical demons were shocked to their cores by those words. Having just heard Eriksson himself authenticate the story, these people finally realized that Han Shuo¡¯s im was not untrue.

    All of them originally thought that Han Shuo was merely bullshitting. After all, it truly was unimaginable that a lowgod could escape from the boundary of a midgod. It was understandable that they might not be convinced of its genuineness. But now that Eriksson himself had validated the im, there simply was no room left for doubt. With that, they became even more astonished.

    Han Shuo was appalled when he saw Eriksson charging at him with such hatred. He knew that he had no chance of winning against Eriksson who was a midgod. He immediately began considering his countermeasures.

    Suddenly, darknesspletely shrouded the region with rich and intense element of darkness flooding every corner. Donna who was within absolute darkness let out a soft chuckle, ¡°Eriksson, you seem to have forgotten that I¡¯m here. Do you really think I¡¯ll let you do anything to him?¡±

    The phenomenon was an ¡®Absolute Darkness¡¯, which can be deployed by a god of darkness through their Domain of Divinity. Within the absolute darkness, other than the caster itself, no one else would be able to see with their naked eyes. Those within the absolute darkness would also find their ability to sense soul greatly diminish in sensitivity and would be vulnerable to sneak attacks. Both Eriksson and Kaiser¡¯s jaws dropped when Donna¡¯s voice sounded.

    ¡°So it¡¯s you that they send here!¡± Eriksson¡¯s face suddenly sank and he shouted, ¡°Don¡¯t you think that I would be afraid of you just because you have a mighty divine weapon to rely on. You¡¯d still get beaten against both Kaiser and me!¡±

    ¡°Really?¡± Donna giggled and said calmly, ¡°Well then, why don¡¯t youe in here and prove it!¡±

    However, instead of advancing further, Eriksson halted halfway in his path after hearing Donna¡¯s dare. When Kaiser caught up to Eriksson, he gazed ahead at those shrouded within absolute darkness and deeply pondered for a moment before advising Eriksson beside him, ¡°We have more important business to attend to. There¡¯s no point in being hasty. We can have an all-out fight with her when the time is right!¡±

    After hearing Kaiser¡¯s advice, Eriksson kept silent for a moment. Then, instead of rashly charging forward, he groaned, turned on his heels, and left!

    Both Kaiser and Eriksson returned to their four teammates and continued to cooperate with each other in resisting the mystical demons¡¯ attacks. They had no intention of fighting a battle on two fronts. After the midgod duo returned, Donna withdrew her Domain of Divinity of Darkness. The space around Han Shuo and the others resumed to normal.

    Han Shuo sincerely thanked Donna.

    ¡°We are all on the same side. You are wee!¡± Donna replied smilingly.

    From the fact that just Donna alone could cause Eriksson and Kaiser, two midgods, to feel intimidated and worry about their actions, Han Shuo was certain that Donna¡¯s overall strength surpassed Kaiser and Eriksson¡¯sbined! This realization again filled Han Shuo¡¯s heart with awe. When he again looked at Donna, there were a few additional traces of respect showing in his eyes!

    ¡°The reason that they did not immediately attack was that they had exhausted too much of their divine energy in dealing with these bizarre creatures. We have just arrived and have not suffered many injuries. That was why they were so cautious with their attacks!¡± Donna softly exined after ncing at Kaiser and his party.

    Han Shuo did not reply but nodded his head.

    Donna gazed at Kaiser and his party and contemted in silence. After a while, as though having suddenly recalled something, she looked at Han Shuo in amazement, and said, ¡°Howe you seem so rxed?¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly and immediately came to his senses. During and after that daunting but harmless experience, the mystical demons never ceased their attacks. Although their lowgod teammates could finally firmly defend themselves against the mystical demons, they were fully upied in doing so and could not afford any distractions. The situation was simr over on Kaiser¡¯s side. Other than Kaiser and Eriksson, those lowgods were allpletely battered and appeared to be under great pressure.

    Aside from Donna, Kaiser, and Eriksson, the three with midgod strengths, Han Shuo was the only one who could maintain hisposure at this moment. He seemed to have no worries about the strange creature that was constantly bombarding him with attacks and had no trouble talking to Donna calmly. Han Shuo was merely a weak lowgod. It was not surprising that Donna would be shocked by her observation.

    <i>What a careful and observant woman!</i> Han Shuo thought. He forced a smile and hastily exined, ¡°The strange thing that is attacking me is weaker than the others!¡±

    Donna was stunned. She squinted to sense that mystical demon assaulting Han Shuo. Her heart was again filled with shock.

    When those mystical demons first charged over, Donna had made a round of examination with her soul and discovered that those mystical demons had simr energy profiles. She also noticed that the mystical demon that attacked Han Shuo was actually slightly stronger than the rest. Donna was certain that her senses could not be wrong. However, now when Donna again probed with her soul, she suddenly discovered that the mystical demon attacking Han Shuo has somehow bing the weakest among them.

    This secret discovery made Donna¡¯s heart even more crammed with doubts. She couldn¡¯t understand how it was that none of those mysterious creatures attacking them had tired out but the one attacking Han Shuo was significantly weakened.

    Donna again carefully observed Han Shuo for a moment. She discovered that Han Shuo had now resumed his screaming and looked frantic. But having witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s performance just a moment ago, there was no way that Donna would believe that Han Shuo was afraid of those mysterious creatures!

    Donna found it both funny and infuriating to see Han Shuo acting like he was being strained. After thinking for a while, she came to yet another shocking conclusion.

    <i>Could he have injured that strange creature? Impossible, I must be mistaken. He¡¯s only a lowgod. If I couldn¡¯t find a way to diminish the strange creature¡¯s energy, how is it possible that he has? But, how could I be mistaken in my senses? It can¡¯t be. I have never made a mistake like this!</i>

    Donna¡¯s heart at this moment was like a tumultuous sea. She stared at Han Shuo absolutely perplexed. It was as if Han Shuo was hiding a great secret that she had no clue about.

    But there was one thing that she knew ¨C Han Shuo did not want anyone to learn of the secret. Donna shook her head vigorously as though wanting to fling off the messy thoughts from her head.

    ¡°Huh? What¡¯s going on? They ran! They are running away!¡± Li Wei screamed.

    Those strange creatures that persistently attacked the party like lunatics whizzed away all of a sudden. Streaks of grayish shadows flew into the distance and disappeared without a trail.

    <i>The mystical demons are returning to the Ninth Heaven Mystical Yin Harvester,</i> Han Shuo said in his mind.

    Kaiser and his party too had heaved a deep sigh of relief. Among them, a beautiful woman even grumbled, ¡°Those wretched creatures finally got away again!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s receptive ears heard the conversation on the other side. From the words of that beautiful woman, Han Shuo determined that those on the opposing side ought to have encountered this situation before. After thinking for a bit, based on his limited understanding of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester, Han Shuo managed to infer some of the conditions of those mystical demons.

    ¡°They have exhausted much more divine energy than we have. This is the golden opportunity for us to strike!¡± Donna said softly but sternly. The next moment, she suddenlymanded, ¡°Each of you find your own target, I will hold up Kaiser and Eriksson. Attack!¡±

 Chapter 654 - Two Demonic Formations

    GDK 654: Two Demonic Formations

    Han Shuo did not expect Donna to be so courageous to deliver such amand the instant that the mystical demons left. But after a short moment of thinking, Han Shuo discovered that this was indeed a great opportunity.

    This, however, would only be the case with the prerequisite that Donna could hold back both Eriksson and Kaiser alone. If just one of them could get their hands free, those on Donna¡¯s team could possibly be destroyed.

    Both sides were made up of forces of simr strengths. Except for the three midgods, the rest were all of lowgod strength. As those on Donna¡¯s side had only been harassed by the mystical demons for a much shorter period of time, they had exhausted less divine energy than the opposing side and therefore held an obvious advantage against their opponent. Donna¡¯s decision ofunching a strike at this moment could not have been wiser!

    As soon as she finished her words, she took the lead and charged ahead like the manifestation of darkness. Kaiser and Eriksson exchanged a nce. Although they appeared somewhat unwilling, they forged ahead without hesitation.

    With Eriksson following a few steps behind, Kaiser charged ahead to meet Donna¡¯s attack. His body began to rupture with radiance from a violently strong element of light.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Bolten shouted in a deep voice. A war hammer glistening with dark radiance appeared in his hand. It wasn¡¯t clear what material was used in smelting the weapon that made it appear extremely heavy.

    Meanwhile, an exquisite bow appeared in Li Wei¡¯s hand. The habitually silent Bowen did not use any weapon but had put on a piece of armor on his body. Meanwhile, Colbert wielded an eerie white bone spear in his right hand. It had strange symbols etched on every surface.

    The Brook brothers, Li Wei, and Colbert all charged ahead. They appeared very much excited and seemed to be ustomed to this kind of situation.

    With Donna handling both Eriksson and Kaiser, there would be four enemy lowgods left to deal with. Over on Donna¡¯s side, excluding Han Shuo, there were Bolten, Bowen, Li Wei, and Colbert ¨C exactly four lowgods. Their number precisely matched the enemies¡¯.

    Han Shuo did not charge recklessly forward and join the battle. Given that Li Wei, the youngest of them, possessedte-stage lowgod strength, and that most of the experts were of simr strength to Li Wei, Han Shuo would just be bringing trouble on himself if he were to participate in thebat.

    Therefore, Han Shuo remained stationary when his allies charged ahead at their opponents. He merely stood still and observed the battle with his cold eyes.

    Donna and her experts were actually not disgruntled by Han Shuo¡¯s behavior. In their minds, Han Shuo was merely a rookie who had just recently stepped into the godly ranks, and that Han Shuo would surely perish if he were to participate in such a battle.

    And so Han Shuo stood still on the same ground leisurely. As he watched the godly experts battle with each other, he observed the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester though his spirit demon.

    In an instant, the region was filled with flying sand and rocks. Multiple Domains of Divinity collided with each other, producing unending rumbles and explosions.

    All these godly experts had traveled from distant material nes to seek the secrets of this ce. For Han Shuo, no matter if they were his allies or enemies, they were all outsiders. He secretly wished that all of them would perish in this ce.

    Perhaps the only exception was Donna. To say the least, she had been very weing of Han Shuo from the beginning.

    Most of Han Shuo¡¯s focus was ced on Donna. Within her Domain of Divinity of Darkness, the intense light produced by Kaiser could only extend to cover a very limited area. Kaiser and Eriksson were standing closely beside each other within that limited area ofnd. They were dealing with attacks from Donna with graveness.

    Donna seemed to be in possession of a remarkable divine weapon. Thanks to the miraculous energy in that divine weapon, Donna¡¯s energy of darkness was greatly amplified. Although all three of them were in the midgod realm, Han Shuo surmised that Donna had to be slightly stronger than both Kaiser and Eriksson. Otherwise, she wouldn¡¯t have appeared so unperturbed about dealing with the two of them at the same time.

    Han Shuo watched from afar the battle between gods, all the while keeping an eye out for any changes to the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester through the spirit demon. He pondered for ways to get rid of Kaiser and his party.

    Even disregarding their crime of exterminating the race of dark dragons, there would still be no way Han Shuo would let go of Kaiser and his party. Han Shuo had offended the Church of Light and Shrine of Ice establishments on this continent beyond redemption. In addition to the fact that he had once injured Eriksson¡¯s soul, Han Shuo understood that the grudges between him and the duo would only ever be resolved when one of them was dead. Naturally, Han Shuo had no wish of dying. Therefore, he was determined to kill Kaiser and Eriksson.

    With this intention in mind, Han Shuo rummaged through his mind for ways to kill the duo. He discovered that it would be far from adequate to kill both Kaiser and Eriksson with his own power alone.

    But suddenly, an idea struck him. Through that spirit demon pacing back and forth around the Ninth Heaven Mystical Yin Harvester, Han Shuo discovered that neighboring to the formation, there were several rather concealed demonic formations with out-of-the-ordinary destructiveness. Those demonic formations seemed to have been masked by some kind of energy before. It was only after the dozen or so mystical demons returned to the Ninth Heaven Mystical Yin Harvester that they were gradually revealed.

    Among them were two demonic formations whose functions Han Shuo was clear with. He also understood how to avoid being attacked by the formations.

    One was called Pentacloud Miasma while the other was ck Gust of Doom. They were demonic formations with immense destructive powers. Han Shuo knew the demonic formations in great detail and therefore was confident that he could preserve his life within those formations. The two formations were extraordinarily powerful to begin with. If they were also deployed by the same person who deployed the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester, they would surely be even deadlier.

    Han Shuo strategized in his head a way to draw Eriksson and his party into the two demonic formations.

    But before Han Shuo coulde up with a way of doing so, a sense of great danger suddenly rose from within his consciousness. Han Shuo immediately turned his focus to locating the source of threat that his consciousness felt.

    Han Shuo was stunned. He turned around and discovered that yet another batch of people had descended to the thirdyer of the underground world and were heading towards them. This discovery left Han Shuo greatly rmed. He did not expect anyone other than his own party and Eriksson¡¯s to have figured out how to get here, especially with the race of dark dragons exterminated.

    ¡°Donna, there are more peopleing down!¡± Han Shuo yelled.

    Donna, who was within absolute darkness and giving Kaiser and Eriksson a hard time, also took a shock when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s shout.

    Donna had trust in Han Shuo¡¯s words and immediately ceased her attacks and retreated. She did not forget to instruct her teammates to fall back.

    The two groups of people who suddenly got into conflict came to a truce just as sudden. Perhaps the battle was too brief, there weren¡¯t any casualties on either side. Only Bolten and an enemy sustained minor injuries.

    Bolten appeared angry, even ravenous, after he was injured. After returning to Han Shuo along with Donna, he repressed the anger in his heart and asked, ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡±

    ¡°There are more peopleing our way!¡± Han Shuo replied in a deep voice after shooting a cold nce at him.

    ¡°I couldn¡¯t sense anything! What is going on?!¡± Bolten red at Han Shuo and furiously said, ¡°I¡¯m injured and that right there was my critical moment to make a counterattack. Now I¡¯m injured for nothing because of your nonsense!¡±

    ¡°Bolten, shut up!¡± Donna chided Bolten in a gravely before softly muttering to herself with her brows creased as though trying to tap into the condition in the distance. Suddenly, Donna¡¯s eyes glistened with amazement and she said, ¡°He¡¯s right. There are more people headed this way!¡±

    Donna calmed down her team members and gazed at the path behind her in silence.

    Those on Kaiser and Eriksson¡¯s side also sensed an anomaly at this point. They all looked in that direction with caution on their faces. They began to grow jittery.

    That internar transportation matrix possessed by the Primordius Dragon had been destroyed by Han Shuo. Therefore, there shouldn¡¯t have been any additional people from their side who coulde over. They reasoned that theer was likely a reinforcement from Donna¡¯s gang as the internar transportation matrix possessed by Han Shuo was still in one piece.

    Donna was feeling just as nervous. By then, neither party was stronger than the other, although Donna did have a slight upper hand. However, if theer was an enemy, this equilibrium would most likely be broken and her team would be put at a disadvantage. As the leader, Donna knew that those on her side wouldn¡¯t have delivered additional forces before she made such a request. She was therefore shocked and even started to question the validity of Han Shuo¡¯s im that he had destroyed the opponent¡¯s internar transportation matrix.

    ¡°Didn¡¯t you say that you¡¯d destroyed their internar transportation matrix? You didn¡¯t lie, did you?¡± unlike Donna, Bolten didn¡¯t hold a favorable impression towards Han Shuo and immediately voiced out his doubts.

    Han Shuo, wearing a gloomy face, shot a re at Bolten with his cold eyes and did not reply.

    ¡°Hmph, if it¡¯s your lying that cost us this battle, you will be finished!¡± Bolten huffed when he saw Han Shuo scowl at him.

    Donna did not say a word. She gathered her attention in observing the neers approaching. Two silhouettes gradually grew from vague to clear. One of them was an old man Han Shuo was familiar with. He was demigod Kelly from the Druidic Order who had once fought alongside Han Shuo back at Kasi Empire.

    Beside Kelly was a middle-aged man with a gentle temperament and an approachable smile. That middle-aged man appeared rxed and was smiling while mumbling something to Kelly. Kelly, who looked old enough to be that middle-aged man¡¯s father, behaved extremely respectfully towards that man.

    The ever-calm Donna¡¯s eyes suddenly widened. She stared at that middle-aged man as though facing a great enemy.

    Kaiser and Eriksson had strange andplicated expressions on their faces when the man appeared. The duo exchanged nces and smiled bitterly.

    ¡°Hey! Kaiser, Eriksson! Something tells me you didn¡¯t want me here. Going so far so as to destroy the internar transportation matrix! Do you know how much hardship I went through, how many material nes I had to detour? I even had no choice but to conduct a stressful internar voyage just to get here!¡± eximed that middle-aged man as he looked at Kaiser and Eriksson with a half smile.

    Kaiser and Eriksson made their salutations from a distance and gave him an awkward smile.

 Chapter 655 - Come with me!

    GDK 655: Come with me!

    ¡°What? Young man, what are you doing here?¡± Kelly cried out in surprise when he finally discovered Han Shuo¡¯s presence.

    Back on Kasi Empire, Han Shuo had once joined forces with Kelly to bring down the Shrine of Ice. The two were never best friends by any measure, but they had once fought shoulder to shoulder and were at least friendly with each other.

    ¡°I was going to ask you the same question!¡± Han Shuo too had an awkward smile on his face. After Kelly and that middle-aged man emerged, Donna seemed rmed. Without needing much thought, Han Shuo could tell that the middle-aged man was not a friend but a foe. The fact that they were in opposing factions meant that they might have to fight each other.

    Han Shuo had a pretty good impression of Kelly. The Druidic Order was a major partner of Lancelot Empire. Han Shuo had no wish of bing Kelly¡¯s enemy. However, just from Donna¡¯s expression, Han Shuo knew that he did not have much choice. He felt rather helpless.

    Kelly let out a sigh. He too was aware of the situation and didn¡¯t seem too willing to make an enemy of Han Shuo. He felt just as helpless about it.

    ¡°What are you all standing here for? Don¡¯t tell me that you traveled from distantnds across the universe just to gaze at me?¡± that middle-aged man who came with Kelly said smilingly to the crowd when everyone gazed at him foolishly.

    ¡°I truly did not expect that Lord Olde would be here. This is getting more and more interesting!¡± Donna rxed and smiled.

    ¡°My main objective ining to this world is to locate the remains of my ancestor. And naturally, I have to visit here in passing to see the miraculousness of this ce. After all, my ancestor¡¯s death seemed to be associated with the strangeness of this ce!¡± that middle-aged man they called Olde smilingly nodded and exined to Donna.

    Immediately after hearing Olde¡¯s words, a thought crossed Han Shuo¡¯s mind ¨C Could that Tree of Life under the barren ind of the Boundless Sea be the ancestor that Olde wanted to locate?

    The moment that Olde appeared, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar that cultivated in the elemental energy of death felt somewhat ufortable. Simr to how gods who cultivated in the element of darkness would be especially sensitive to the presence of gods who cultivated in the element of light, that avatar of Han Shuo¡¯s who cultivated in the element of death was sensitive towards gods who cultivated in the edict of life.

    That Tree of Life at the bottom of that barren ind was obviously transformed from a very mighty god who cultivated in the edict of life before his death. The quick-witted Han Shuo immediately made the association and surmised that the remains which he buried could likely be the person that Olde seeked.

    However, Han Shuo would only bury this information deep inside his heart and would never speak of it at such a moment because the remains were located rather close to the Cemetery of Death. If Olde was to learn of the location, he could possibly also discover the Cemetery of Death¡¯s presence.

    Olde, as one who cultivated in the edict of life, ought to be very sensitive to the energy of death. Han Shuo was a prudent man and naturally kept his silence over the matter. Donna and her party, on the other hand, and not to mention Eriksson and the others, were not fully convinced of Olde¡¯s words.

    ¡°Lord Olde, if you don¡¯t mind, we can probe this ce together!¡± Kaiser put on a sunny smile and invited.

    ¡°That¡¯d be great. Haha, I was quite worried about not having enough understanding of the situation in this ce!¡± Olde dly obliged and hopped along towards Kaiser and his party.

    As Olde was getting closer to Han Shuo¡¯s group, he discovered that Donna was staring vigntly at Olde as though she was ready to deal with Olde¡¯s attack at any moment.

    As Olde walked past Donna, he stopped in his tracks right in front of her. He chuckled and smilingly said, ¡°Miss Donna, please, don¡¯t be so strained. I have only stopped by to tour around this site. As long as you have no intention of destroying all life on this continent, I will not do a thing to you!¡±

    ¡°Well, if that¡¯s the case, that¡¯d be great!¡± Donna said in a phony calmness. She was still on guard against him.

    ¡°We people who cultivate in the edict of life are all lovers of life. We will not be taking any lives except in thest resort! Haha, thest time the situation between our factions escted to the point of war was all because they wanted to destroy all life on the continent. That was why my ancestors were forced toe forward. As long as your people have no such intentions, I believe that both of us will have a very pleasant excursion!¡± Olde said in all smiles. Despite his cordial demeanor, there was a deeper meaning to his speech.

    Donna did not reply, but silently nodded. No one knew what intention she had in mind.

    ¡°Hi there! You must be Bryan?¡± Olde suddenly turned towards Han Shuo and put on a rather fascinated face.

    Han Shuo was startled. He had no idea how would this Olde character recognized him. He looked at Olde puzzled and nodded while side-eyeing the people around him.

    ¡°I have heard a thing or two about you from Kelly. Haha, you seem interesting; a pretty goodd. But what a pity you have chosen to cultivate in the element of death!¡± Olde joked as he looked deeply into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes.

    Han Shuo was stunned and failed to understand what Olde actually meant. He did not y smart in replying like he actually understood those words.

    Donna, Bolten and the others looked back and forth between Olde and Han Shuo with astonished and baffled eyes. They couldn¡¯t understand why Olde would be interested in a being as small as Han Shuo.

    ¡°Well, I wish you nothing but the best!¡± Olde did not express any more of his thoughts. He smiled and nodded at Han Shuo before taking off with Kaiser and his party.

    At this moment, Kelly, who was following behind Olde, gazed at Han Shuo and forced a smile but then sighed and shook his head before leaving with Olde.

    Over on the other side, when Eriksson saw Olde approaching, he suddenly put on an irritated look and let out a soft groan. However, he did not voice out any of his discontents.

    On Profound Continent, the Shrine of Ice and the Druidic Order had been in conflict for a long time in fighting for more followers. The dispute over in this mortal world sure had some effects on these gods who oversaw the operations of their religious organizations. It was nothing surprising that some might feel discontented to meet those on the other side.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, we will head deeper into it!¡± Kaiser softly eximed. He shot a nce at Donna a distance away, turned to Olde and solicitously proposed, ¡°Lord Olde, do you mind leading our party?¡±

    ¡°Nope, I¡¯m just touring the ce alongside you people. Please, don¡¯t mind me!¡± Olde rejected Kaiser¡¯s proposal and chuckled.

    ¡°Alrighty then, let¡¯s go!¡± Kaiser did not insist. He took the initiative to lead the way and secretly sent meaningful nces at Eriksson who was wearing a sour face, hinting to him not to sabotage the rtionship.

    They headed straight towards the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester as though they had simply forgotten about the presence of Donna and her party.

    Han Shuo, who was standing beside Donna, could tell that she was obviously relieved when Olde rejected Kaiser¡¯s proposal. After Kaiser and the others had made more distance, Donna turned to the youngsters behind her and solemnly instructed, ¡°Try not to provoke that Olde fe as much as you can. He is infamous for being a pestering one. As long as he is not hostile towards us, we don¡¯t have to mind him!¡±

    It was obvious from her words that Donna was very much concerned about this man. After she finished her words, the team of arrogant youngsters expressed their agreement. It appeared that they were familiar with Olde¡¯s history.

    ¡°This Olde character, is he very hard to deal with?¡± among the party, Han Shuo was the only person who knew nothing about Olde.

    Donna forced a smile, nodded, and exined, ¡°Olde is infamous for being a nosy little bastard. He also happens to be remarkably strong. Where we¡¯re from, Elysium, the ne of Gods, Olde is known to be a very peculiar fe. He¡¯s not usually interested in most things. But once something catches his interest, he will never let go until he gets what he wants. A real headache, that guy!¡±

    Elysium, the ne of Gods! This was the first time that Donna mentioned her origins to Han Shuo. He was rather shocked.

    Han Shuo had heard about Elysium from various sources. Bechymos and that McKinley trapped inside the Holy Grail had mentioned Elysium more than once.

    Based on Han Shuo¡¯s understanding, Elysium, the ne of Gods, ought to have been the highest level material ne of all. Legend had it that the Elysium was where the supreme Creator lived. The elemental energies there were more intense than on any other material ne. That material ne was suitable for the cultivation of all elemental energies and edictal forces.

    The Elysium also housed the most energy ores, the mightiest of gods, the most ancient of family ns, and countless enigmatic mysteries. It was said to be infinitely vast, the center of the universe, and where gods congregated and inhabited.

    By ount of Bechymos and McKinley, Elysium was the birthce of gods and also the ce where gods from numerous material nes gathered. Practically all the Overgods lived on the Elysium.

    Just like anywhere else, there were numerous powerhouses on Elysium. The mightiest of which were naturally the twelve Overgods who cultivated in the twelve fundamental forces. Many of the ancient family ns aligned their allegiance to either one of the twelve Overgods. Not only did these family ns constantly wage war on the Elysium, they never ceased fighting for control over all major material nes.

    In this infinitely vast universe, perhaps ny percent of all low, medium, and high-level material nes were under the control of those ancient families and the twelve Overgods living on Elysium.

    Having heard so many stories about Elysium, Han Shuo knew just how significant the ne of Gods was. Now having learned from Donna that she and her team hailed from that very ne, Han Shuo finally understood why these people would think of themselves as superior beings after arriving on Profound Continent.

    <i>Elysium, the ne of Gods. Afterpleting all my matters on Profound Continent, I will make sure to personally make a trip there and have a look!</i> Han Shuo thought to himself.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, we¡¯ll catch up to them!¡± Donna instructed her team as Han Shuo came to a decision.

    Kaiser, Olde and the others had all travelled out of sight. Donna, Han Shuo, and their partners hastened ahead. They were not met with any abnormality or peril during their approach to the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester where the mystical yin aura was thickest and most dense.

    Sensing the intense aura of mystical yin around him, Han Shuo took a few deep breaths greedily. He indulged in the wonderful sensation of having the aura of mystical yin entering his chest, gently crossing through the meridians and bones in his body before they were converted by his demonic infant into energy as slight as threads that deposited throughout his body.

    Gazing into the distance, Han Shuo discovered that the several towering mountains up ahead seemed to have been relocated to this ce using an immense amount of supernatural power, altering nature to form this miraculous Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester. He could not have been more astonished.

    After actually arriving at the formation and observing the breathtaking scenery around him, Han Shuo was in such great awe of the person who deployed the demonic formation that he could not express it in words. A project of such a magnificent scale was not nearly as simple as moving the mountains and draining the seas. Thews of nature were exceedingly diverse and intricate. Han Shuo simply dared not to imagine just how terrifying the strength of the person who managed to aplish such a feat.

    ¡°Incredible! This seems to be man-made! But who would have such a resolution to make such a magnificent structure?¡± Olde cried out in amazement.

    ¡°Could one of the Overgods have incidentallye to this material ne and produced this masterpiece with their divine energy?¡± Kaiser mumbled his guess. He was extremely astonished as well.

    ¡°That¡¯s impossible. All this definitely could not have been aplished using just one type of elemental energy or edictal energy! It would take at least several Overgods to produce this spectacle!¡± Eriksson remarked in a deep voice.

    Upon hearing those words, the party shook and scratched their heads. They knew better than to think that those Overgods would be so bored to do such a thing. On top of that, there was bad blood between the Overgods and therefore they wouldn¡¯t have cooperated to work on such an undertaking. However, everything that they saw here showed indistinct clues that these were man-made. With that, they couldn¡¯te up with any conceivable exnation no matter how hard they racked their brains.

    ¡°In- Incredible!¡± Donna couldn¡¯t help herself and cried out in surprise when she saw that the towering mountains seemed to have been twisted and arranged to form a monstrous design.

    Han Shuo¡¯s first impression of the warped mountains was that they were altered using a type of demonic arts technique. There were some marks on them that gave Han Shuo a familiar feeling. However, the more he thought about it, he found himself having not a clue what was going on.

    The scene on this thirdyer of the underground world hadpletely exceeded Han Shuo¡¯s imagination. He became speechless when he saw how the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester was formed using the mountains as the formation crux and the earth tore to make the formation lines.

    ¡°I think, we will only fully understand what is really going on here when we arrive at the deepest part of it!¡± Olde suddenly chimed in excitedly.

    However, upon hearing those words, even Donna and her party showed some hesitation. Before making their way over, they had vaguely learned from their ancestors about the dangers of this ce. Therefore, when they heard Olde suggest that they should venture deeper, they began to grow concerned about their own safety.

    Before they had even arrived at this formation, they suffered a round of painful battering from over a dozen mystical demons. It didn¡¯t take much brain power to be able to draw the inference that the most mysterious region would house the greatest danger. They were now having second thoughts about advancing forward.

    ¡°What are you guys afraid of? Isn¡¯t exploring the area your purpose ofing to this ce? Why is it that you have all turned hesitant when you are right at the front door?!¡± Olde ridiculed.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Han Shuo suddenly said before taking the lead in entering. After he went in, he turned around and looked at Donna with a bright smile. He said, ¡°Come with me, I don¡¯t think we¡¯ll have too much of an issue!¡±

    (next chapter will be released on 10th Apr, around 4 am, GMT+8)

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 Chapter 656 - Surrounded by goddesses

    GDK 656: Surrounded by goddesses

    Surrounding the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester were several dozen big and small demonic formations, but Han Shuo could recognize just two of them: Pentacloud Miasma and ck Gust of Doom. These two demonic formations were linked with each other and formed one of the paths to the center of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heroic spirit had won Olde¡¯s great admiration and repeated praise.

    Donna was rather hesitant at first and could not immediately gather the resolution to enter. But when she saw Han Shuo step into the entrance before everyone else, she finally made up her mind. Donna nodded at Bolten, Li Wei, and the rest of her teammates before they caught up to Han Shuo in quick steps.

    Just as Olde said, the main reason they had traveled from all the way across the universe was to explore that mysterious site, to study and investigate what wonders were lying there. They could hesitate all they wanted but in the end, they would still have to step inside.

    Han Shuo closed his eyes and took a deep breath of the marginally corrosive air around him to get a sense of the poison¡¯s properties and toxicity. He processed it in silence.

    Donna and her party who arrived beside Han Shuo looked up and down at him in confusion. They found Han Shuo¡¯s appearance of thinking with his eyes closed to be very strange.

    Donna questioned, ¡°Bryan, are you alright?¡±

    Han Shuo opened his eyes and nodded. ¡°Let¡¯s move!¡±

    Han Shuo had originally nned on somehow inciting Kaiser and Eriksson¡¯s anger so that they would follow him into this Pentacloud Miasma. But after thinking, he knew that in order to get to the center of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester, even if they did not walk into this Pentacloud Miasma, they would still have to go through other demonic formations.

    Han Shuo understood that those demonic formations around the Ninth Realm Demonic Yin Harvester should have roughly the same destructive power. As there was no way to avoid entering a demonic formation, Han Shuo thought that his original n was unnecessary and it¡¯d be better if he just did nothing.

    ¡°Okay, everyone be extra careful. This ce is very strange. Don¡¯t let your caution slip even for an instant!¡± Donna reminded.

    Han Shuo understood that no matter how cautious one got, one would still have no way of avoiding being inside the formation, and therefore he was less inclined to keep Donna¡¯s reminder in mind. He took note his surroundings and tried to find a way out from the Pentacloud Miasma based on his understanding of the formation.

    Before even their tenth step into the formation, an enormous transformation took ce over the scene around them. Colorful but deadly gasses started filling the air from all directions in split second. Those deadly gasses must have been produced using special methods as they were extremely corrosive. Strange hissing noises polluted the air as soon as those gasses appeared.

    ¡°Watch out! Don¡¯t let the gas touch your skin!¡± Han Shuo cried out in rm.

    If there weren¡¯t enemies such as Olde and Kaiser around him, Han Shuo perhaps wouldn¡¯t have minded about the life or death of Bolten and those youngsters. However, since they had thismon enemy, he had to preserve as many ally lives as possible. This would give his allies an advantage over their opponents if a battle were to break out between the two opposing forces ¨C thus ensuring his own safety.

    Han Shuo¡¯s warning put everyone in a manic frenzy. As though facing a great enemy, they deployed protective shields around themselves with their own unique methods in dismay. Li Wei, Donna, and Bowen were using divine weapons to shelter their bodies. Meanwhile, Bolten and Colbert formed ayer of protective shield around themselves using their divine energies. They managed to prevent the corrosive gasses froming into contact with their bodies.

    When the misleadingly colorful gasses made contact with their protective shields, they began to emit smoke.

    Bolten shrieked as the protectiveyer he formed out of divine energy was slowly weakened.

    ¡°This is a nightmare. Even my divine weapon is corroding. We need to get out of here as soon as possible!¡± Li Weiined.

    Those miasmic gasses were refined using special methods that allowed them to corrode basically anything, especially physical bodies. Had they not insted their bodies using such methods, their flesh and bones would have begun to melt away until they were finally reduced to puddles of blood and gunk.

    Han Shuo too was swift in his reaction and hastily deployed his protective shield. A dark, oval-shaped screen as thin as a cicada¡¯s wingpletely enveloped him. Han Shuo was as steady as a mountain after the shield was deployed. That shield, which was powered using demonic yuan, was invulnerable to the corrosion of the colorful miasmic gasses.

    Han Shuo was shocked to discover that. Based on the description of the Pentacloud Miasma found in Chu Cang Lan¡¯s memory, the deadly gasses here could corrode away anything it touches. Matters that were invulnerable to it were extremely rare and his protective shield should not have been one of them.

    However, for some reason, the gas could not prate his protective shield at all. Even Han Shuo was taken aback by the fact as he had no idea what caused it.

    After racking his brain hard, Han Shuo suddenly thought of a possibility ¨C what if the person who deployed the Pentacloud Miasma had altered the gasses in some ways that granted his protective shield immunity?

    ¡°What? How is his shield holding up so well?¡± Li Wei cried out in surprise yet again as she pointed at Han Shuo in confusion.

    The rest of the party turned to look at him as well, each one as stunned as the next. Although they had divine weapons or divine energies around their bodies actively protecting them, their protective shields were nheless being corroded away by those miasmic gasses. Light smoke was coiling up and around them as though they had just walked out from a hot bath.

    Theyer of dark, translucent shield that enveloped Han Shuo, however, was not subjected to the corrosion of the miasmic gasses, making him stand out from the party.

    ¡°Bryan, how, how is this possible?¡± Donna asked.

    ¡°Well, I cultivate in a type of rare energy. Frankly, I have no idea why these gasses have had no effect on me!¡± Han Shuo knew that these people would not be satisfied if he didn¡¯t provide an exnation.

    ¡°Oh wow!¡± Li Wei giggled and right after, she continued in a very natural manner, ¡°You clearly have some extra room. Let me get under there as well. My Precious must not be ruined by these hateful gasses!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, without any concern for Han Shuo¡¯s approval or consent, she cheerfully walked over to Han Shuo, wanting to squeeze herself into his shield.

    ¡°There isn¡¯t enough room, sorry!¡± Han Shuo disliked Li Wei. As she rapidly flew over, Han Shuo shrunk the spacious protective shield with his thoughts until it was only enough for himself to stand under.

    ¡°There obviously was enough space just a moment ago!¡± Li Wei knew that Han Shuo did that on purpose and said angrily while ring at Han Shuo.

    ¡°No there wasn¡¯t,¡± Han Shuo replied with a straight face.

    ¡°Enough with that. We have to leave as soon as we can. There is nothing to gain from staying here for extended periods. These corrosive gasses are truly a little too frightening,¡± Donna chided with creased brows. She then led the party off into the air.

    All those people understood that Donna¡¯s words could not be truer. Bolten and Colbert, who did not have body-shielding divine weapons, were exhausting the divine energy stored in their bodies with each counting second. They couldn¡¯t wish more to immediately exit this terrifying ce and therefore flew close behind Donna.

    ***After ten minutes.

    There were droplets of sweat on Donna¡¯s forehead. She was obviously getting anxious, ¡°What¡¯s going on here? Why is it that we haven¡¯t gotten out of this ce? We have been traveling at such rapid speed; we must have traversed at least a few hundred miles. Why are we still inside this ce?¡±

    The Pentacloud Miasma was actuallyprised of twoponents ¨C the corrosive miasmic gasses and the formation of illusions. The corrosive gasses were the attackingponent that corroded those who entered it. Meanwhile, the formation of illusions was an exquisite formation that would trap those who didn¡¯t understand the formation inside.

    The corrosive power of the miasmic gasses was extremely formidable and was wearing down the tools or energy of those who entered the area at everyst second. No matter how powerful the divine weapon or divine energy, it was not infinite and there woulde a day that they wouldpletely exhaust. If one couldn¡¯t exit the formation before then, in the end, they would be nothing more than a puddle of blood!

    Donna was very clear about this, and therefore she was very anxious about leaving.

    However, even after traveling for ten minutes at such rapid speed, they still couldn¡¯t exit the region, which looked less than several kilometers wide from the outside. It was simply illogical! Donna was able to recognize that something was wrong but unfortunately, she couldn¡¯t tell what it was as she knew nothing about the wonderful formation. She could only worry about it helplessly and feel defeated. In addition to the dreaded pressure that only increased with the passing of time, there was no way that Donna could remain cool-headed.

    ¡°Bryan, please, I beg you, please let me in! My divine weapon cannot suffer any more corrosion. ¡± Li Wei was flustered. Even her usually spiteful tone vanished and she started to entreat Han Shuo piteously.

    Han Shuo was indifferent as though he did not even hear Li Wei¡¯s cry.

    Although Donna was distraught with anxiety, thanks to her excellent self-cultivation, she did not lose her rationality and pleaded to Han Shuo on behalf of Li Wei, ¡°Bryan, if it¡¯s possible, just let her in.¡±

    Ever since she arrived on Profound Continent, she had shown Han Shuo the proper courtesy and respect. She had even defended Han Shuo with her words all along. There was no way that Han Shuo could reject her if she asked for a favor. Therefore, Han Shuo who had been turning a blind eye to Li Wei all along finally nodded his head, expanding his protective shield slightly. Then, with his two hands, he cut a fissure into his shield that would allow Li Wei to enter.

    Li Wei was extremely happy. With one lithe movement, she propelled herself through that fissure and stuck close beside Han Shuo.

    ¡°Hmm, there is still some room left!¡± Donna softly cried out. With a delighted grin on her face, she said to Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan, I don¡¯t think it would be a problem to add one more person!¡±

    Han Shuo was speechless.

    ¡°I will take your silence as consent. Many thanks!¡± Donna pursed her lips and smiled. After Li Wei, she walked into Han Shuo¡¯s protective shield and leaned in to him as well.

    ¡°No more, there¡¯s no more space left!¡± When Han Shuo saw the fiery gazes of Bolten, Bowen, and Colbert cast on him, he hastily contracted his protective shield and tried to put a stop to their thoughts of also entering his shield.

    When Han Shuo pulled back his shield, Li Wei panicked and therefore leaned closer to Han Shuo. Donna followed suit to avoid being exposed to the corrosive gas.

    With that, by basically doing nothing, Han Shuo had two goddesses throwing themselves at him like opposite poles on a ma.

    Meanwhile, Bolten, Bowen, and Colbert outside his protective shield had to constantly resist the assault of the corrosive gasses. Bolten and Colbert who were exhausting their divine energy to defend themselves seemed especially strained and tired.

    The contrast was stark; one part of the crew was in paradise and the other was in hell!

    ¡°This ce is rather bizarre. I don¡¯t know if I will be able to find an exit for now. Bolten, Bowen, Colbert, since you all may have trouble staying under the corrosive gas, why don¡¯t you return to the entrance from whence we came and wait for our signal once we find the exit?¡± Donna appeared very apologetic and said so out of consideration for the three.

    The three, whose faces were filled with agony as they eyeballed Han Shuo, were about to go in the other direction when Han Shuo suddenly yelled, ¡°No!¡±

    ¡°You little wretch, who do you think you are? Do you want to watch us die in this gas? Will that satisfy you?!¡± Bolten was enraged to see Han Shuo closely surrounded by beauties while they were suffering. If Donna wasn¡¯t in there, he might have pulled Han Shuo out from his shield to make him go through the same agony!

    Donna too was rather shocked. She turned to Han Shuo in a slightly awkward manner and with her rosy lips close to his ears. She said, ¡°Bryan, they will surely die if they remain here!¡±

    ¡°No, they will surely die if they try to go back! Didn¡¯t you notice that we have been walking in circles around this same area this whole time? The way I see it, there is no going back once we¡¯ve entered. I dare guarantee that if they travel in the other direction, they will never find the entrance or exit!¡± Han Shuo was fuming. He knew that these people had absolutely no understanding of the strangeness of a demonic formation and were so naive to think that they could always retreat to the entrance once the situation went south.

    ¡°Wha- what? We have been walking in circles all along?!¡± Li Wei shrieked next to Han Shuo¡¯s ear. Her voice was sharp and caused Han Shuo to quiver, which subsequently made the protective shield shake along with him. Li Wei and Donna each grabbed onto either one of Han Shuo¡¯s arms and leaned even closer into him for the fear that they would leave the coverage area of his protective shield.

    After being reminded by Han Shuo, Donna, the mightiest of the team, carefully recalled for a moment and muttered, ¡°That, that seems to be the case!¡±

    ¡°After entering here, there is no path of return! We could either find the exit or we will die!¡± Han Shuo said coldly.

    After listening to those words, the Brook brothers and Colbert who held hopes of leaving had faces as ashen as the dead.

    Everyst one of the gang was exceptionally flustered, and Han Shuo could see their desperation. He smiled and dered with his chest puffed, ¡°If you look closely enough, you will see that there are some unique, but regr patterns in this ce of colorful corrosive gasses. I think that as long as we find the proper pattern, we will make it out of here!¡±

 Chapter 657 - Youâ€™re invited!

    GDK 657: You¡¯re invited!

    ¡°What pattern? Howe I don¡¯t see any?¡± Li Wei was astounded. She turned her head and looked all around. However, save for the colorful miasmic gasses that filled every inch of the air, she did not notice anything unusual.

    ¡°There are only colorful miasmas in here and nothing else is clearly visible. What pattern are you talking about?¡± Donna was startled and mumbled to herself in a pensive manner.

    ¡°Did any of you notice that these miasmic gasses circte in a certain repeating pattern?¡± Han Shuo said smilingly and pointed at the air.

    Upon hearing those words, the party was dazed for a moment before they gathered their full attention on the flow of miasmic gasses around them and observed the motion of the gasses.

    When they looked closer, they noticed that there really was something unusual about the cirction of those colorful miasmic gasses.

    The gasses took on five different colors ¨C red, blue, green, purple, and ck. They did not interfere with each other or be mixed together and seemed to be well coordinated as they circted through the atmosphere. The miasmic gasses would take turns in corroding the party one after another.

    ¡°Oh! There really seems to be a rhythm!¡± Li Wei was greatly excited. She then gazed at Han Shuo who was right beside her and questioned eagerly, ¡°Could these miasmic gasses be the key to leaving this ce?¡±

    ¡°I suppose so!¡± Han Shuo calmly replied. The Pentacloud illusionary formation made use of the miasmic gasses of five colors. As long as one managed to grasp the rhythm of cirction of the gasses, one would be able to figure out how to escape from this formation.

    ¡°Alright then, let¡¯s focus and try to learn the pattern!¡± Donna instructed her teammates. She had confidence in Han Shuo.

    After hearing those words, the crowd who had stayed inside the Pentacloud Miasma for ages cared about nothing more than observing the rhythm of the five-colored miasmic gasses in hopes of figuring the way out of this dangerous ce.

    Some time had passed before they even made out a few cirction rhythms of the miasmic gasses. They still, unfortunately, had absolutely no understanding of the Pentacloud illusionary formation and therefore couldn¡¯t find the method of exiting it.

    ¡°I, I can¡¯t hold on much longer!¡± Bolten¡¯s face was swelling deep red. He had exhausted a great portion of his divine energy and was rather terrified.

    Meanwhile, Li Wei¡¯s servant, Colbert, who did not utter a word, showed a pale and weak face. It appeared that he wouldpletely exhaust his divine energy soon.

    ¡°Li Wei, let¡¯s get out and let Colbert and Bolten take our ces!¡± Donna decisively instructed Li Wei at this critical moment. She then looked at Han Shuo sternly and said, ¡°Bryan, we need to work together as one at moments like this!¡±

    Han Shuo took a deep breath and put on a smile before saying, ¡°You need not get out!¡±

    ¡°Why? Colbert is nearly dying. Even if my divine weapon will be destroyed, I can¡¯t just do nothing and watch him die! I¡¯m getting out, don¡¯t stop me!¡± Li Wei said anxiously when she saw Colbert¡¯s face turn paler and paler.

    After hearing Li Wei¡¯s words, a glimpse of gratitude was revealed in Colbert¡¯s powerless eyes. He hastily said, ¡°My Lady, don¡¯t worry about your old servant. My life is meant to be given to your Grace, not the other way round!¡±

    ¡°What are you talking about? No one will lose their life today!¡± Donna berated.

    ¡°I said, there¡¯s no need to get out!¡± When Han Shuo saw that Li Wei would actually be so considerate at such moments, he thought that she did have some redeeming quality. With everyone¡¯s gazes yet again gathered on him, Han Shuo said confidently, ¡°I have found the pattern. Follow after me, I will lead you all out of here!¡±

    ¡°Are, are you sure?¡± Bolten was pleasantly surprised to hear those words of Han Shuo¡¯s at such a moment of despair.

    ¡°There shouldn¡¯t be any problem!¡± Han Shuo affirmed before he instructed, ¡°Make a line behind me and follow my steps closely. If I run, you run. If I crawl, you crawl. Don¡¯t be a step behind. Otherwise, don¡¯t me me if you don¡¯t make it out of here!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, are you sure we will walk out from here before theypletely exhaust their divine energy?¡± Donna was worried for her teammates and therefore sought for reaffirmation.

    ¡°Trust me!¡± Han Shuo said with the confidence of a conman.

    At this desperate time, as none of them had any better idea and seeing that Han Shuo was being so assertive, they understandably lined up behind him as instructed.

    With the crowd fully ready, Han Shuo wasted no words. Radiances glistened off his eyes as he attentively observed the movement of the miasmic air around him. Suddenly, when the red miasma dispersed and a cloud of purple miasma was about fill in the void, Han Shuo took five quick steps to his left. Bolten and the others who had been carefully watching Han Shuo from behind him immediately copied his movements.

    After taking five steps, they discovered that the red miasma that had previously dispersed had magically returned to their side and continued to corrode them.

    After keeping still for ten or so seconds, the red miasma again dispersed and Han Shuo started to move again. This time, he moved very slowly to his right. After ten steps, Han Shuo and his party again came to where the red miasma gathered.

    It was then that the party realized that Han Shuo had actually managed to follow the cloud of red miasma and their confidence in him grew. Prior to this, the miasmic gases had only been drifting about in an erratic pattern and definitely wouldn¡¯t appear around them repeatedly. Having walked in circles for so long, they had never been corroded by miasmic gas of the same color more than once.

    ¡°You found it!¡± Li Wei who was leaning closely beside Han Shuo suddenly turned her fragrant lips to Han Shuo¡¯s ear and whispered.

    Han Shuo was not distracted by the slightest. He watched for changes ahead of him calmly. Lining behind him, Bolten and the others observed Han Shuo with rapt attention, waiting for his next move.

    ¡°Everyone get ready to step backwards at mymand!¡± Han Shuo calmly shouted.

    Bolten and the others appear startled when they heard Han Shuo¡¯s words. They had no idea why Han Shuo would suddenly want to them to step back when they were just fine advancing forward. But by then, they had ced all their hopes on Han Shuo. They remained silent and had staunch eyes as they waited for further instructions.

    After ten seconds, Han Shuo suddenly shouted, ¡°Take eight quick steps backwards!¡±

    None of them dared hesitate. They hastily took eight steps in reverse as Han Shuo had instructed. When they again stopped, they discovered that the red miasmic gas was again lingering beside them and corroding their shields.

    ¡°Wow! It¡¯s a miracle!¡± Bolten cheered. He was no longer skeptical of Han Shuo and knew that he had grasped the rhythm of the miasmic gas cirction.

    Donna, who was right next to Han Shuo, couldn¡¯t help but grab at Han Shuo¡¯s arm and cry out in amazement, ¡°You actually found the pattern!¡±

    Han Shuo took three steps forward yet again. Although he appeared to be pacing back and forth in vain, the red miasmic gas had never slipped away from them.

    Finally, Han Shuo took five slow butrge strides to his right. The scene around them suddenly transformed and there was no longer a single puff of the corrosive gasses around them. After a quick look, they discovered that they really had exited that mysterious ce filled with miasmic gasses.

    The Brook brothers and Colbert following closely behind Han Shuo were startled when they walked out from the Pentacloud Miasma but became overjoyed soon after. Colbert and Bowen still remained silent but their eyes were filled with relief and joy for having escaped. Bolten chuckled, then walked to Han Shuo somewhat unwillingly, hesitated for a moment before he stammered, ¡°That, erm, about my previous conduct, please don¡¯t take offense. Erm, about this, thank you!¡±

    For this proud and arrogant youngster born into an aristocratic family to express his gratitude to Han Shuo before Donna and the others indicated that Bolten had indeed made some adjustments to his attitude after the bitter experience of nearly losing his life.

    Han Shuo nodded. Instead of being arrogant about his achievement, Han Shuo had the standard expression as he calmly replied, ¡°You¡¯re wee. We are all on the same front and are tied together for good or for worse. Helping each other is what we ought to do!¡±

    Seeing that Han Shuo did not take the opportunity to say anything that would humiliate him, Bolten felt even more grateful and put away his spiteful and unkind gazes towards Han Shuo. When he looked at Han Shuo with a grateful heart, he suddenly discovered that just as Donna had said, there were indeed many things about him that were worth learning from.

    For example, his will and perseverance in never losing his calm in the face of danger were definitely gradually fostered through constantly confronting death for a long period of time.

    When he looked at Han Shuo from this new perspective, Bolten discovered that although Han Shuo wasn¡¯t particrly valiant, a certain quality possessed by Han Shuo had foreordained that in the future, Han Shuo would definitely not be a nobody. To be qualified for this mission, Bolten was no mediocre person either. After having arrived at a second opinion of Han Shuo, his attitude towards Han Shuo instantly made a full 180-degree swing.

    ¡°Haha, we are fortunate to have you around. If not for you, I¡¯m afraid that both Bowen and I wouldn¡¯t have escaped from tragedy. Bryan, I hope that after this mission is over, you will be guest to our family. We Brook brothers will make sure to give you the best treatment as gratitude!¡± the sudden transformation of Bolten¡¯s attitude towards Han Shuo had everyone startled. Even the taciturn Bowen was mystified, not understanding why his brother would be so polite so abruptly.

    Donna inwardly nodded in his heart and thought that perhaps Bolten wasn¡¯t all that unredeemable.

    After hearing Bolten¡¯s invitation, Han Shuo looked deeply into his eyes and saw that he was actually being sincere. With just one thought, Han Shuo roughly made out what was on Bolten¡¯s mind and so he smiled mischievously and replied, ¡°Sure!¡±

    ¡°And my family as well. Bryan, you have also saved us. On behalf of my family, I¡¯m also formally inviting you to be our guest!¡± Li Wei giggled and made an invitation.

    Han Shuo was stunned to discover that he was suddenly in great demand. Han Shuo actually found it rather difficult to get ustomed to the situation when these two fes who had been contemptuous towards him all along turned so cordial all of a sudden. With Li Wei¡¯s big eyes fixed on him, he replied, ¡°Hehe, sure, sure!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, you are quite reputable aren¡¯t you! These two fes are infamous for their arrogance. Who would¡¯ve thought they would invite you as their guest simultaneously! Haha,¡± Donna giggled and teased Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo appeared very rxed. With a smile on his face, he said, ¡°Alright, alright, let¡¯s all rest and recover. We have more obstacles waiting for us up ahead!¡±

    After the Pentacloud Miasma, there was the ck Gust of Doom. They were currently at the connecting point between the two demonic formations and were not affected by any of the formations. During the round of battering, the party had consumed at least some of their divine energy. Now was not the time to ck.

    ¡°Bryan is right. Let¡¯s stop talking and instead use the time to recover our energy, ¡° Donna agreed and instructed.

    Knowing that they still had challenges to face up ahead, the party stopped chit-chatting and started gathering the elements between heaven and earth to recover the energy they lost.

    Of the party, only Han Shuo was unupied. As those miasmic gases did not corrode his protective shield, the demonic yuan he consumed was extremely limited and therefore he need not put effort into recovering energy. He started to observe the Brook brothers in silence.

    Bolten and Bowen both cultivated in the edict of destruction and they both possessedte-stage lowgod strength. Han Shuo had very poor knowledge of the edict of destruction. As one who would never give up on any opportunity to improve his strength, of course Han Shuo would seize this opportunity to observe the two.

    Both Bolten and Bowen unfurled their Domains of Divinity that were filled with the wish of destroying all things. Their Domains of Divinity caused the space to distort and destroy the stones and even the air around them. Under the effects of the edict of destruction, they recovered the divine energy in their bodies bit by bit.

    One of Han Shuo¡¯s avatars also cultivated in the edict of destruction. Han Shuo watched carefully and noted the cirction trajectory of the edict of destruction inside Bolten and Bowen¡¯s Domains of Divinity. He nned on attempting it himself someday in the future.

    Meanwhile, Donna finally managed to fully recover. When Han Shuo noticed that, he hastily withdrew his gaze towards the Brook brothers.

    What he did was a taboo and Han Shuo had no wish of letting Donna discover this rude behavior. No one would wish to be peeped at while cultivating because it could possibly expose the weakness of one¡¯s energy and it couldnd one in a disadvantaged situation.

    Han Shuo put on a normal look and smiled at Donna. Before he could say anything, he suddenly heard a blood-curdling shriek in the distance. That voice sounded exceptionally bleak, like the final cry one would make before sumbing to death.

    Han Shuo creased his brows but soon after, he put on a bitter frown and said, ¡°It seems that someone has run into trouble. But for us, this is great fortune!¡±

    ¡°It is you who is our fortune. Without you, some of us would likely have fallen!¡± Donna said, giggling. It was obvious that Donna was happy about the death of one of her opponents.

 Chapter 658

    GDK 658: Immune to All Demonic Formations

    Deployed all around the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester were intricate demonic formations of all sizes. Based on his insight, Han Shuo reckoned that those demonic formations were all rather powerful. The Pentacloud Miasma had almost ended Donna and her party. In all likelihood, those on the opposing forces must have run into a demonic formation just as deadly.

    The constant inhuman shrieks were a great source of distress for those who were recovering their energy. Bolten and Bowen were roused and had shock smeared across their faces.

    As though the Grim Reaper was being extra hardworking that day, yet another loud, ear-piercing screech sounded from a distance. It was the voice of a female. They all knew immediately knew that the young married woman on the other team had perished.

    ¡°What a nightmare! That¡¯s two deaths!¡± Li Wei was flustered. She had a fearful expression when she looked at the ck Gust of Doom up ahead.

    Donna watched as Li Wei gazed ahead with dread, the schadenfreude smile on her face gradually faded to be reced by a grave expression. Donna creased her brows and kept silent for a moment before she said, ¡°You all have heard those shrieks and should know what that meant. Having gone through that previous obstacle, I believe that all of you should now clearly understand that this mysterious ce is packed with danger. What¡¯s for certain is, the next obstacle will be even more challenging.¡±

    Everyone listened quietly to Donna¡¯s speech. She took a deep breath before she continued, ¡°Perhaps, at the next obstacle, some of us might perish as they have. If any of you want to retreat, now is the time to do so. Although it will not be something to be proud of, it is at least much easier to be epted than death. Given the influences of your families, this is an option you can afford to take. Take a moment to consider it!¡±

    After hearing Donna¡¯s words, the three youngsters keptpletely silent. Their faces were filled with indecision and they couldn¡¯t seem to decide.

    Colbert and Han Shuo, on the other hand, were not burdened with indecision. Colbert had no care in his life and was determined to follow after Li Wei. Han Shuo was determined to enter and get to the bottom of it. He wanted to figure out what was actually going on inside and was naturally not about to retreat.

    Additionally, Han Shuo had a brief understanding of the ck Gust of Doom. He was confident in

    coping with its attacks and therefore wasn¡¯t worried about it.

    ¡°I will not make any new breakthroughs if I stay within myfort zone. I want to venture further!¡± Bolten was the first toe to a decision and he dered it resolutely.

    ¡°If someone as cowardly as Bolten dares venture inside, then I can do it as well!¡± Li Wei clenched her teeth and dered in a staunch manner.

    Bowen was a man who would follow his elder brother¡¯s decision and this time was no exception. Colbert, who ced Li Wei above everything, including his own life, would naturally follow her into the next formation. Donna understood that even if he did not utter a word.

    ¡°Fine then. I will give you all a little more time before we advance together. Should any of you lose your life, I shall inform your family of your bravery. They will be proud of you!¡± Donna praised.

    Without wasting more words, Bolten and the others made full use of the time to replenish their divine energies.

    ¡°Bryan, I have suddenly be very curious about you. You must have experienced countless life-or-death situations on this continent?¡± Donna suddenly smiled and looked at Han Shuo with interest. She seemed to want to understand what kind of a person Han Shuo actually was.

    Han Shuo stared nkly and pretended to be in deep thought about the question for a moment before he smirked and nodded, telling her, ¡°I guess you can say so. Low-level material nes are just as violent. You must fight for anything that you want. Staring death in the face is quite amon urrence!¡±

    ¡°No wonder,¡± Donna replied. She then suddenly turned the topic of discussion by asking, ¡°What is the energy that you cultivate in? What makes it so peculiar? In all my times venturing through various material nes, I have never seen anything remotely simr!¡±

    Han Shuo kept silent for a moment, smiled, and calmly answered, ¡°It¡¯s just a minor, non-mainstream energy that is too inferior to be shown in public. It¡¯s quite normal that you have never seen it. Haha, it really is mediocre and not worthy of your curiosity.¡±

    Han Shuo had no wish of discussing anything rting to the cultivation of demonic arts and Donna could see that. After hesitating for a moment, she smilingly nodded and did not press on with her questions.

    ¡°Actually, I¡¯m curious to know more about the Elysium. Do you mind?¡± while the others were cultivating, Han Shuo and Donna who were unupied had a chat with each other. As he was very curious about the Elysium and that was the material ne that Donna came from, he figured he could learn more about that world from Donna.

    Bechymos and McKinley had depicted a little about the Elysium to Han Shuo. But as both of them had been trapped in distant worlds for many years, any description they had for Han Shuo was from ages ago and the circumstances there must have changed at least somewhat. Elysium, the ne of Gods, was Han Shuo¡¯s next destination. He wanted to have a detailed understanding of the ce before heading there.

    ¡°It¡¯s hard to tell you everything briefly. You will understand the ce after going there. It is the center of all material nes. The twelve Overgods all seem to be cultivating in hiding over there. I believe you can tell just how special Elysius is from just those two sentences.¡± Donna answered smilingly.

    Han Shuo nodded and did not ask any further questions. He became even more determined to leave for Elysium, the ne of Gods.

    Time flew by. After what seemed to be just a short while, Bolten and the others were awakened from recovering their divine energy when Donna called out to them.

    ¡°It¡¯s about time. We can¡¯t stay here for too long, otherwise, when we reach our destination, we may just find that Kaiser and the others have salvaged everything there!¡± Seeing that the party understood her, Donna took a deep breath and marched ahead.

    ¡°Everyone be careful. You better hold your guard up from the beginning,¡± Han Shuo reminded his allies. He had carefully recalled once though the information that Chu Cang Lan had about the ck Gust of Doom while the people were recovering their energy.

    After having the bitter experience prior, they no longer looked down on this small god from a low-level material ne. With Han Shuo¡¯s reminder, they all started deploying full-body defenses before even entering the formation.

    Han Shuo nodded and was very pleased with their prudent behavior. He too deployed his protective shield and stepped into the ck Gust of Doom after Donna.

    As soon as they entered, a powerful, chilling wind came sting at them. There were grayish, low-hanging clouds hovering above their heads all around. No one could see their surroundings clearly.

    Han Shuo scanned the area through whizzing, chilling wind that carried devastating power but he simply couldn¡¯t see a hint of Donna¡¯s figure.

    Han Shuo stopped advancing and noticed that he had lost track of Bolten and the party. He knew then that the ck Gust of Doom had been triggered the moment they stepped inside. With the transformation that swept the environment, it was not possible to locate the others¡¯ trails.

    Han Shuo, of course, was none too distressed because when he stepped inside, he discovered that those terrifying whizzing winds had all miraculously avoided him, travelling around instead of at him.

    The situation was just the same as the Pentacloud Miasma!

    With a sense of relief in his heart, Han Shuo observed his surroundings for a while. He could obviously tell that those powerful, chilling winds were everywhere. They did not change their direction for anything but when they reached his shield congealed using demonic yuan, they would simply detour around him.

    This meant that Han Shuo was also safe and sound within the ck Gust of Doom. He didn¡¯t need to worry about being attacked.

    A thought suddenly crossed his mind, <i>Could it be my cultivation in demonic arts that makes me immune to all the formations here?</i>

    To test this hypothesis, Han Shuo deployed his two avatars and put them beyond the protection of his shield.

    In an instant, the terrifying wind stormed at Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars. That power was filled with ruthlessness and the wind felt as though it could prate his bodies. It caused Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars immense pain.

    Han Shuo immediately realized something. Then, with one thought, the avatar of destruction concealed the energy of destruction within its body, transformed into the Demonyer Edge form, and started circting a small bit of demonic yuan that originated from his main body within. An astonishing transformation urred once again. All the chilling winds suddenly started changing direction and blew around the Demonyer Edge.

    Meanwhile, that avatar of death transformed from the skeletal staff only contained the divine energy of death and was constantly being devastated by the chilling wind. The situation was far from good.

    It was now clear to Han Shuo. As his two avatars were connected with his consciousness, they managed to easily return to Han Shuo¡¯s main body even under the adverse effects of the ck Gust of Doom.

    After the experiment, Han Shuo was convinced that he, a cultivator of demonic arts, waspletely immune to attack from all the demonic formations in this ce. Even the demonic weapon that had transformed into his avatar of destruction was not subjected to the effects of the demonic formations as it contained a small bit of demonic yuan.

    Based on Han Shuo¡¯s understanding of the Pentacloud Miasma and the ck Gust of Doom, he knew that these two formations in their normal setup would absolutely not discriminate based on the energy one cultivated in. The only exnation to his immunity was, <i>that terrifying existence who deployed these demonic formations had forcibly altered the demonic formations so that they would not attack any demonic arts cultivator!</i>

    Without needing much thought, Han Shuo understood that the existence who had deployed everything in this ce must also have originated from Earth. Perhaps he too knew that no one in this universe knew a thing about demonic arts when he made this masterpiece that prevented all those who cultivated in other energies from entering but left the door wide open to any demonic arts cultivators.

    <i>Why would he do so? What were his intentions?</i> Han Shuo was very puzzled and grew increasingly curious.

    However, even after turning over in his mind, he still couldn¡¯t figure out a thing. In the end, he decided to put down all thought, and venture deeper to investigate.

    With one pulse of his consciousness, Han Shuo discovered the positions of Donna and the other four. In this strange ce, his sight and the souls of his two avatars that cultivated in the edict of destruction and element of death could not get a glimpse of the environment. His consciousness formed using demonic arts, however, were not hindered at all and could clearly sense the surroundings.

    After unfolding his consciousness, Han Shuo suddenly discovered that Donna and the others had incredibly unstable souls and they all appeared extremely emotional.

    They were stuck in a daydream!

    Han Shuo immediately came to that diagnosis. The ck Gust of Doom didn¡¯t just contain powerful chilling wind. If one were to stay inside the formation for an extended period, they would sink into a terrifyingnd of fantasy where one would repeatedly revisit the most heartbreaking and the most terrifying events one had encountered in their lives. Furthermore, the formation would amplify the effects that the painful ordeals had, crushing their hearts and souls.

    In thisnd of fantasy, if they could not maintain a strong will, they could possibly even sink into madness ¨C forever. Besides having to face the attack of the powerful wind, they would also have to face their worst nightmares simultaneously. Even an expert with formidable strength could be mentally crushed and spiral into a madman in a short period of time!

    Unlike the Pentacloud Miasma, one did not need to look for some abstruse pattern to find the way out from the ck Gust of Doom. That was because, the moment that a person entered the formation, they would immediately be assaulted by powerful wind while simultaneously being confronted with the most horrible scenes of their lives. If one could not walk away from the anguish stored at the bottom of their hearts, they wouldn¡¯t be able to make a step forward. Hence, having additional mazes to solve would be superfluous.

    After slowly expanding his consciousness, Han Shuo soon discovered that Li Wei and Bolten were in the most critical condition. Who knew what terrifying events the two had experienced but their souls were in utter chaos. It was as though they could be mentally crushed and sunken into madness at any moment.

    The situation was critical and there wasn¡¯t much time left. He knew that if he didn¡¯t take action right away, Li Wei and Bolten would be the first two to die in this ce.

    With Li Wei and Bolten having apologized to him, Han Shuo no longer felt animosity towards the two. Besides, he knew that given the present conditions, he would have a much better chance of survival if Li Wei and Bolten lived on. Hence, he disregarded the former hatred and immediately took action.

    When he arrived beside Li Wei, he discovered that she was screaming and shouting hysterically. Any grace that she held herself up with was now gone!

    Han Shuo did not know what Li Wei was experiencing but when he tried to hold her, Li Wei started wing wildly and tried to bite him. She had absolutely no clue of the surrounding conditions and it appeared that she wouldn¡¯t be able to recover within a short period of time.

    Seeing that this situation persisted and he had to get her out as soon as possible, Han Shuo decided to more forceful. Taking advantage of the fact that Li Wei could not organize an effective resistance, Han Shuo gave her a swat and knocked her out. With one hand, he held Li Wei by her waist and rapidly flew to Bolten following the senses of his consciousness. He saw a hysterical Bolten heavily panting, trying to defend against the attacks of some invisible threats.

    Having dealt with Li Wei, Han Shuo knew he could not be polite and knocked Bolten out the same. He buckled him by his shoulder and managed to carry the two out from the ck Gust of Doom very quickly. He then returned to the ck Gust of Doom and repeated the same thing to the weeping Bowen and the frantic Colbert ¨C knocking them out and then carrying them out from the formation.

    Han Shuo again returned to Donna, thest of his teammates trapped in the formation. Although she too was trapped in a fantasy, her situation wasn¡¯t as dire as the others¡¯ ¨C perhaps a testament to her strength. When Han Shuo approached Donna, he saw that Donna was wearing a grievous face and screaming in desperation, ¡°Don¡¯t leave me, I beg you, please don¡¯t go!¡±

    When Han Shuo arrived beside Donna, about to knock her down, Donna seemed to sense something and suddenly embraced Han Shuo. Her rosy lips suddenly nted themselves onto Han Shuo¡¯s before he could react.

 Chapter 659 - Taking Charge

    GDK 659: Taking Charge

    Han Shuo was caught off guard and in an instant, felt his lips fill with warmth and fragrance. Donna was incredibly fervent and had no resemnce to her usual solemn air.

    Drawing connection with Donna shouting in desperation just a moment earlier, Han Shuo understood that Donna must have taken him as someone else in her hallucination, exining her misbehavior.

    Han Shuo did not indulge in being passionately canoodled by Donna as he clearly understood that her soul would grow increasingly unstable the longer she did so. If this trend were allowed to continue, Donna could end up in a disastrous state.

    The detrimental effects of these hallucinations actually had no connection with a person¡¯s strength. The hallucination merely reproduced the scene that had gnawed at the person¡¯s mind ¨C sore points that were buried deep within one¡¯s heart but not ovee. It would make the victim fall deeper and deeper into the abyss of despondency before they finallypletely lost their mind.

    Given Donna¡¯s performance, her mind was likely being perturbed by a past rtionship that was deeply etched in her memory. She ought to be hallucinating about it and had mistaken Han Shuo as that person who she couldn¡¯t part with ¨C thus her rather ludicrous actions.

    After being startled for a short moment, Han Shuo soon came to his senses. He maintained the same posture and did not resist Donna¡¯s forceful, hot-blooded kissing. Han Shuo slowly raised his hand to the back of her head and suddenly gave it a pat, turning her unconscious.

    Before her well-rounded body fell to the ground, Han Shuo held her by her soft waist. Without being distracted by any fanciful thoughts, Han Shuo identified the direction and whisked Donna away from the formation.

    As soon as they escaped the formation, Han Shuo saw Li Wei, Bolten, and the others all looking at him with rather perplexed and bewildered eyes.

    Although Han Shuo had knocked all of them out in order, as Han Shuo did not use his demonic yuan, and since these people were lowgods with extraordinary strengths, they managed to regain consciousness soon after they escaped from the influence of the formation. Having just woken up, these people were still somewhat at a loss. They couldn¡¯t tell if they were still hallucinating momentarily.

    But when they saw Han Shuo carrying Donna by her slender waist away from that terrifying formation, some rity was restored to their perplexed eyes. After staring nkly for a moment, Li Wei suddenly asked, ¡°Bryan, did you just save us again?¡±

    ¡°Yea. I found you all hallucinating and in dire circumstances, so I knocked you out and carried you away from that ce one by one!¡± Han Shuo exined as he had no need to conceal that fact. Before he couldy Donna down, she began to burble something and he saw that she was sobering up.

    Donna cried out in surprise when he saw Han Shuo was carrying her by her waist. She looked around frazzled and recognized the situation. She asked, ¡°Bryan, you saved me?¡±

    Seeing that Donna had awoken, Han Shuo put on a smile and ced her down before he apologetically exined, ¡°You were hallucinating. As your mind was in a very unstable state, I had to knock you out.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s alright! Thank you!¡± Donna replied with a sweet smile. Then, suddenly, as though having recalled something, her tender and beautiful cheeks blushed and her watery eyes started ncing around Han Shuo¡¯s lips.

    ¡°Ahem!¡± Han Shuo immediately realized something from the direction of Donna¡¯s gazes and hastily wiped his lips with his sleeve. When he looked down, he noticed that there indeed were red marks on his sleeve. Some of the lipstick that Donna applied to her lips hade off onto Han Shuo¡¯s lips.

    ¡°Oh... You... You two...¡± When Li Wei¡¯s sharp eyes discovered the abnormal expressions on Han Shuo and Donna¡¯s faces, she covered her mouth in shock and put on an expression of disbelief.

    Having heard Li Wei¡¯s light cry, the crowd turned their attention to the two and seemed to have made the connection. They all put on peculiar expressions. Among them, Bowen¡¯s face turned rather gloomy and his eyes were again filled with traces of hostility.

    ¡°This... that... It¡¯s not what you¡¯re imagining!¡± Donna¡¯s cheeks turned even redder as she hastily exined.

    Han Shuo too was rather embarrassed. When everyone again had their gazes gathered on him, he lightly cleared his throat and exined, ¡°Miss Donna was hallucinating and had mistaken me for someone else. I was in a rush to rescue her and did not anticipate that she would... ¡°

    ¡°Stop talking!¡± Donna interrupted Han Shuo¡¯s words, nced at Bolten and the others and smilingly scolded, ¡°You bunch of mischievous kids, how could your minds all be so dirty?¡±

    ¡°Oh? We didn¡¯t say a thing, did we?¡± Li Wei replied with a mischievous smirk.

    ¡°Alright! Alright!¡± Donna shot a smiling re at Li Wei and soon turned to Han Shuo and said somewhat apologetically, ¡°In any case, thank you. I apologize for any transgression I may have made! Please don¡¯t keep it in mind!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it,¡± Han Shuo replied, though he thought to himself, <i>What else can I do about it? Make redress by returning the kisses back to you?</i>

    ¡°We all have Bryan to thank yet again. It seems that Bryan really is our lucky star!¡± Bolten started to express his gratitude passionately. His gazes towards Han Shuo zed even brighter. If Han Shuo was not aware of his sexual orientation, he might have mistaken Bolten as a homosexual.

    ¡°Truly a mysterious fe. He¡¯s saved us once again!¡± Li Wei muttered as she gleamed at Han Shuo.

    The first time he helped them out of trouble could be discounted as mere luck, but not the second time.

    Han Shuo was calm and unruffled. He did not behave conceitedly but merely smiled without saying a word. He knew that these people must have been very curious about him and how he could repeatedly rescue them from the dangers found in this mysterious ce; it was puzzling, how a god as small as himself from a low-level material ne could perform such miraculous actions.

    Donna looked at the path ahead and mumbled to herself, ¡°How should we proceed next?¡±

    There was no other demonic formation ahead of them other than the colossal Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester surrounded by several mountains. Gazing at the majestic mountains up ahead and sensing the extremely intense mystical yin aura, Han Shuo felt as though he saw that ancient senior from the school of demonic arts with powers that could topple mountains and overturn the seas performing the magnificent feat of altering thews of heaven at this ce.

    Han Shuo was absent-minded for a brief moment as he let his imagination run wild. His head was filled with absolute admiration for that existence.

    ¡°Bryan, do you think we should proceed further?¡± seeing that Han Shuo did not put forth any suggestion, Donna mentioned him by name and asked.

    Han Shuo was dazed for a moment and looked at Donna with astonishment. He smiled awkwardly and said, ¡°Why are you asking me? You are our leader. You should be the one calling the shots!¡±

    Donna was actually rather stunned at herself after hearing those words. She thought, <i>Yeah, why am I asking him? I should be the one making decisions!</i> After thinking carefully about it, Donna suddenly discovered that with Han Shuo having rescued her twice, unwittingly, her impression of Han Shuo had changed. Although Han Shuo did not possess much strength, for some reason, she had taken Han Shuo as an expert of equal ranking who could truly assist her.

    Li Wei, however, did not feel that anything was inappropriate. ¡°You always astonish people with miraculous feats and have excellent observation power. It¡¯s normal that big sister Donna would ask for your opinion!¡± Perhaps she herself had failed notice it but her attitude towards Han Shuo had also unwittingly flipped.

    ¡°Just tell us what you think. I think by now, no one would dare disregard your opinion!¡± Donna said with a sweet smile and looked at Han Shuo with anticipation.

    Han Shuo looked all around and discovered that just as Donna had said, each and every member of the party was looking at him with expectation. Even that Bowen who revealed a trace of hostility at him was waiting for his opinion. None of them felt that anything was inappropriate about it.

    <i>Ha! These fes sure are pragmatic!</i> Han Shuo remarked to himself. He then put on a grave expression and said in a deep voice, ¡°We havee so far and I don¡¯t think anyone here would wish to turn back right now. None of us knows the situation up ahead. But I think it is only by venturing further that we could understand everything that is in this ce. What do you all think?¡±

    Han Shuo himself had no fear of any danger thatid in this ce and was absolutely not worried about being confronted with greater danger. Therefore, he remained very calm and did not take into ount the dangers that might await up ahead in his decision.

    The party nodded. Donna voiced her agreement, ¡°In that case, let¡¯s press forward and find out what this ce is made of!¡±

    The party agreed and was about to advance forward when Han Shuo suddenly raised his hand and gestured the party to halt. He turned his head around and gazed at a demonic formation he wasn¡¯t familiar with located not far away. He appeared very vignt.

    When Donna and the party saw Han Shuo¡¯s hand gesture, they all ceased their motion and turned their gazes towards where Han Shuo was looking.

    Heavy gasps could be hearding from that direction. A group of four in iparably battered state walked into their sights.

    Olde, Kelly, Kaiser, and Eriksson, all had injuries from head to toe. The wounds were either bone-deep, severely charred, or rotting and flowing with pus. No one knew what nightmare they had experienced. They wore faces lingering with fear and heavily panting for air. They seemed to have trouble even walking. It appeared that they had exhausted a great amount of their divine energy.

    ¡°Oh! It¡¯s them!¡± Li Wei softly eximed and looked at Donna with inquisitive gazes.

    Bolten, Bowen, and the others were all very tempted. They looked at Donna and hoped that she would issue themand to attack.

    It was obvious that Kaiser and the others had all suffered severe injuries. Every one of those people had exhausted most of their divine energies. Under such circumstances, if Donna and her party were tounch an all-out attack, it was very likely that all four of them could be finished off.

    Donna¡¯s eyes flickered with indecision and subconsciously cast inquisitive gazes at Han Shuo. He immediately responded by shaking his head gravely.

    ¡°No!¡± Donna hissed after keeping silent for a few seconds.

    Li Wei and the others put on disappointed expressions but did not try to refute her decision and instead cast puzzled looks at Han Shuo. It was obvious that Donna had given up on the thought of attacking because of Han Shuo¡¯s influence.

    ¡°That Olde character isn¡¯t as weak as he appears on the surface! At this moment, Miss Donna could possibly finish off both Kaiser and Eriksson by herself but, even with all of usbined, we are no match against Olde. Therefore, it¡¯s better if we just stay put!¡± Han Shuo exined in a low voice.

    That Kelly from the Druidic Order was not even taken as a threat. Kelly used to fight alongside Han Shuo back when both of them were merely demigods. However, Han Shuo¡¯s strength had greatly soared while Kelly remained in the same realm. Demigod strength was no longer anything that was worthy of being taken seriously by Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was certain that the reason Kelly could stay alive all the way to this stage was entirely because Olde had provided him shelter. Otherwise, Kelly, who was merely a demigod wouldn¡¯t have made it half as far as he had, given that all four lowgods that came with Kaiser and Eriksson did not make it.

    To have the strength to preserve himself and carry the burden of preserving Kelly¡¯s life through all those dangers made Han Shuo wary. He wouldn¡¯tunch an attack without having absolute certainty of the oue.

    ¡°How, how is it that none of you are injured?¡± the panting Kaiser raised his head and was astonished by what he saw. He stared at Donna and the party and asked.

    The Donna and her experts all subconsciously turned to Han Shuo. These experts had witnessed the dire condition of their opponents and rejoiced even more that they had Han Shuo on their team. Without needing much thought, and having personally tasted the perils themselves, they understood that if Han Shuo wasn¡¯t around, they might have ended up in a much more disastrous state than Kaiser and his party.

    Those four on the other side were all characters with incredibly acute eyes and immediately discovered the focus of their gazes. They were greatly shocked and rather baffled, not knowing what this weak lowgod who was Han Shuo had to do with them not getting injured.

    ¡°Let¡¯s just ignore them and continue forward!¡± Han Shuo shouted and repeatedly winked at Donna. He could tell that those on the other side were trying their best to recover their energy after walking out from the demonic formation.

    Donna thought for a quick minute and immediately understood Han Shuo¡¯s intentions. She then instructed Bolten and the others to follow Han Shuo into the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester.

    Just as expected, as soon as Kaiser and the others saw Donna and her party march forward, they dared not to pause but hurriedly tried to catch up to them.

    The more time the four spent in recovering their divine energy, the better they could fend off Donna and the others. However, as Donna headed deeper into the formation, those on the other side naturally dared not to stay for much longer as they were afraid that Donna and her team would obtain whatever treasure that may be lying within. Under such circumstances, these people had no time to recover their divine energy which meant a better chance of survival for Donna and her party.

    ¡°Oh!¡± Han Shuo let out a soft cry as soon as he stepped into the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± Donna asked.

    ¡°Nothing!¡± Han Shuo hurriedly replied before he turned around and said gravely, ¡°Follow right behind me. Don¡¯t lose me from your sight!¡±

    Donna and the others did not say a word and did as they were told. The very next moment, they discovered themselves within a strange forest made of stone. It was at this moment that Olde and his party also entered the formation. For some reason, they all had astounded expressions on their faces while gazing ahead. They were discussing something in astonishment.

    ¡°They couldn¡¯t see us. Everyone get ready. Now is the best time to get rid of them!¡± Han Shuo decisively instructed when his teammates looked at him in utter confusion.

    Donna and the others were astonished and stared at Han Shuo in a bewildered manner as they thought to themselves, <i>How did you know they couldn¡¯t see us over here? How are you so sure this would be the best time to kill them?</i>

 Chapter 660 - I donâ€™t like to kill and murder

    GDK 660: I don¡¯t like to kill and murder

    Other than gathering mystical yin aura, the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester could also act as a demonic formation with immense destructive power. When Han Shuo stepped into the center of the mystical yin harvester, he discovered that this ce was also packed with deadly dangers. It appeared that the person who deployed the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester really didn¡¯t want any non-demonic art practitioners to enter.

    The region that Han Shuo brought his teammates to was a gap in the formation that could be used for taking refuge. Those who had no understanding of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester¡¯syout would never be able to discover this spot. Han Shuo was very particr of every step he made and they had to walk in a seemingly random and fruitless trajectory before they could finally arrive.

    Han Shuo and his teammates¡¯ abrupt disappearance had caused Olde and his party to be scared. They gazed into the direction Han Shuo and the others headed but dared not to take another step forward.

    After their prior painful experience, Olde and his party truly came to recognize just how frightening this ce was. All four lowgods that came with them had perished. The four that had made it thus far had exerted themselves trying to survive the constant menace. These experiences made them understand that they could possiblynd in great danger with each step they took. Therefore, it wasn¡¯t unreasonable for them to think that Han Shuo and the others had perished the instant that they disappeared out of sight.

    ¡°Bryan, they really can¡¯t see us! What is going on here?¡± Li Wei softly eximed. She was amazed.

    Donna and the others also stared at Han Shuo with puzzled faces, waiting for his answer.

    ¡°This ce has patterns. If you pay attention to the surroundings, you will discover that there are patterns all around you!¡± Han Shuo exined without thinking the matter through, his eyes locked on Olde and his men.

    ¡°What pattern? It¡¯s just a few mountains. I don¡¯t see any pattern to that!¡± Li Wei said somewhat skeptically.

    Han Shuo turned around and put on a calm smile. He pointed in Olde¡¯s direction and exined, ¡°If you look carefully, you¡¯ll see that the fog floating through the air has actually been drifting around the mountains rhythmically, and there¡¯s...¡±

    Han Shuo knew a few things about the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester and randomly described the hidden patterns found around them.

    ¡°My gosh! They really are!¡± when Li Wei again carefully observed her surrounding after listening to Han Shuo¡¯s words, she discovered that every single word Han Shuo said was true. With that, when Li Wei looked at Han Shuo again, a few traces of admiration could be seen in her eyes. In a voice brimming with reverence, she said, ¡°What, what exactly are you? How could you see the most subtle detail in the surrounding so clearly!¡±

    Li Wei was not the only one wondering ¨C the rest of his teammates, Donna included, were equally shocked. Their stares were filled with respect.

    Those patterns that Han Shuo had just described were extremely difficult to discover by any ordinary person. Even characters extremely sensitive to their environment wouldn¡¯t be able to find all of them. However, Han Shuo was able to describe patterns as arbitrary as the arrangement of trees so casually. This was way beyond their understanding of what a person could possibly achieve in making observations.

    <i>What is this person? How could he know the surroundings inside out down to the finest detail?</i>

    ¡°What has this pattern got to do with this spot? Why is it that they can¡¯t see us?¡± the more time Donna spent with Han Shuo, the less she understood him. She had memorized all those patterns that Han Shuo described but she still couldn¡¯t understand how those things rted to them being unseen.

    ¡°Oh, this is so abstruse. This has got to do with quantum entanglement, wave-particle duality, special rtivity, photosynthesis and... ¡° Han Shuo exined ambiguously while maintaining an earnest face, not unlike a professional conman. Using profound-sounding scientific terms found in the universe he originated from, he started talking gibberish to Donna and the others like an intellectual.

    Donna, Li Wei, the Brook brothers, and Colbert had faced filled with puzzlement were, once again, absolutely bewildered as they carefully listened to Han Shuo¡¯s exnation. The more they listened, the more confused they were.

    <i>Of course you don¡¯t understand a thing, even I have no idea what I¡¯m talking about!</i> Han Shuo found their reaction to be amusing and exined to them even more earnestly.

    Donna and her teammates all stared foolishly at Han Shuo. They were speechless.

    If Han Shuo had not performed so many miraculous actions, taken them to this mind-boggling spot, or described the hidden patterns all around them, then they might have discovered that Han Shuo was actually talking drivel to them.

    However, not only did none of them realize that Han Shuo was spewing nonsense, they felt ashamed of themselves for not understanding Han Shuo¡¯s ¡®abstruse¡¯ exnation. They thought they were simply not smart enough.

    Even after half a day of listening to his lectures, none of them understood even a smidgen of what he was exining. These people started to question their own intelligence after watching Han Shuo make a conscientious effort to try to make themprehend. Even Donna thought that perhaps her ability to grasp ideas was too poor.

    <i>This guy must be a genius!</i>

    Bolten and Li Wei¡¯s gazes towards Han Shuo were filled with admiration. They became even more determined to rope Han Shuo in.

    ¡°So, are they clear to you now?¡± Han Shuo asked his teammates while looking at them earnestly.

    ¡°I, I understand a little, but not fully!¡± Li Wei hastily nodded as not to make herself appear particrly foolish while not wanting to disappoint Han Shuo for the effort he made in exining.

    When Bolten heard Li Wei¡¯s reply and saw Han Shuo¡¯s gaze that was filled with anticipation, not wanting Han Shuo to take him as a fool, he put on a contemtive posture and nodded.

    In his mind, Han Shuo was rolling on the floorughing. He then turned his eyes filled with even greater anticipation to Donna.

    Donna took a quick look at Li Wei and Bolten and saw that the two seemed toprehend something. She rapidly weighed in her mind and thought that if she acknowledged she actually understood nothing, that would imply she was not as smart as Li Wei and Bolten. Therefore, she put on a sweet smile, nodded reservedly, and said, ¡°That¡¯s pretty abstruse but I could still understand some of it!¡±

    ¡°Ahem... Ahem... ¡°Han Shuo repeatedly coughed to mask his urge tough out loud. Looking these three who pretended to be smart, Han Shuo suddenly felt like these godly experts from the ne of Gods were just as, if not more, vain as the mortals.

    ¡°What about you guys?¡± Han Shuo resisted his great urge to burst intoughter and directed his gazes towards Bowen and Colbert.

    The two exchanged nces and awkwardly shook their heads. They looked ashamed to indicate that they did not understand and dared not even look at Han Shuo in the eyes.

    ¡°You guys are too dumb!¡± Li Wei said disdainfully. Bolten nodded in agreement but was secretly feeling quite proud of his intelligence.

    ¡°Ahahaha... ¡° Han Shuo could no longer restrain himself andughed his head off.

    ¡°Bryan, how could youugh at them?¡± Donna thought that Han Shuo wasughing at Bowen and Colbert for being ¡®stupid¡¯. She pursed her lips and bunched her brows and chided.

    ¡°I, I wasn¡¯tughing at them!¡± Seeing Bowen and Colbert grow much more awkward, Han Shuo hastily exined, ¡°I just feel it¡¯s very funny that we can see Olde and the others but they can¡¯t see us. Haha, don¡¯t you think so?¡±

    The party agreed and gave a few seconds of forcedughter.

    Han Shuo was left betweenughter and tears. He thought to himself, <i>It is indeed a disadvantage to be honest. The guileless are somehow regarded as the witless. This is an interesting bunch!</i>

    ¡°Alright alright, now tell us how we should take care of Olde and the others. Our sudden disappearance has rmed them so much that they have dared not to take another step forward. It seems that they are scared out of their wits by the bizarreness of this ce!¡± Donna asked Han Shuo after stopping Li Wei and Bolten¡¯s mockery.

    ¡°It¡¯s simple. Justunch ranged attacks at them right from this ce. I can guarantee they will never figure out where the attack originated from and they cannot discover our tracks!¡± Han Shuo exined after finally toning down.

    ¡°That simple?¡± Donna asked.

    ¡°It¡¯s that simple!¡± Han Shuo assured.

    ¡°Alright then, what are we waiting for? Hehe, an opportunity tounch an attack like this doesn¡¯te by often!¡± Donna said as she grinned. She seemed delighted and immediately started to prepare herself.

    Bolten, Li Wei, and the others, also started to brew their own attacking spells that they were most proficient with and aimed them at Olde and the others who were still looking all around foolishly.

    Donna suddenly flipped her two hands. An aura of boundless darkness bound for Kaiser streaked through ayer of obstructing boundary around her which was undetectable to the naked eye. Meanwhile, Li Wei and Colbert, using the elemental energy of death, sent out a vortex and a blizzard made of the energy of death. Bolten and Bowen assembled their energy of destruction into incisive edges andunched them away.

    Of the party, only Han Shuo remained motionless. He looked at his five teammates indifferently as theyunched attacks and did not think of joining them.

    ¡°Oh no!¡± Over on the other side, Kaiser immediately cried out in surprise when he sensed the ferocious attacks racing towards them. He hastily braced himself.

    Eriksson did not waste a word. He drew a line in empty air with his left hand and a sparkling ice-shield took shape around him. The sparkling and gleaming light from the ice shield shone on him, making him appear rather spectacr.

    ¡°Don¡¯t move an inch!¡± the calm andposed Olde quickly turned around to instruct Kelly. Without making any apparent movement, he somehow managed topletely block off the energy of destruction that the Brook brothers sent at him.

    Kelly ought to be used to being under the safeguard of Olde. He had absolute confidence in Olde and was not nervous by the slightest. He silently cowered behind Olde without exerting one bit of energy.

    ¡°Bolten, Bowen, stop attacking Olde. Your attacks have no effect on him!¡± Donna hastily instructed after she observed how effortlessly Olde handled the Brook brothers¡¯ attacks.

    Bolten and Bowen responded affirmatively. They abandoned all offense on Olde and instead turned their crosshairs to the duo of Kaiser and Eriksson.

    All five of themunched a myriad of dazzling attacks which traveled through the formless barrier ahead of them without obstruction beforending on Kaiser and Eriksson.

    The attacks deployed by Han Shuo¡¯s teammates were rather strange and bizarre. They would use the energy within their weapons or draw on the elemental energy found all around them and mix it with their own divine energy before sending them out to attack. Donna could also utilize unique energy found in her Domain of Divinity and attack using a method that Han Shuo couldn¡¯tprehend.

    After a moment of attacking, Han Shuo discovered that although Kaiser and Eriksson had exhausted a great amount of their divine energy, since they were both midgods, the attacks that the four lowgodsunched at them did not have much of an effect.

    Only Donna¡¯s attacks gave Eriksson and Kaiser big headaches and a hard time resisting. Bolten and the others soon became aware that they could not harm Kaiser and Eriksson on their own. Hence, they timed their attacks tounch precisely after Donna¡¯s. This way, after Donna tore apart the duo¡¯s defenses, their attacks would be able to gain entry and actually cause the duo harm.

    After some fierce bombardment, Kaiser and Eriksson were both at theirst gasp. They were so battered that they nearly fled in disarray.

    All along, Olde did not step forward to help Kaiser and Eriksson defend against the attacks. He had merely squinted and observed his surroundings carefully, as though wanting to figure out where these attacks wereing from.

    The being who deployed this colossal Ninth Heaven Mystical Yin Harvester was realms above Olde. Cultivation techniques that originated from other universes were not something that Olde could understand. Therefore, although he had gathered his full attention in observing the environment, he still couldn¡¯t locate the source of those attacks. His effort had been in vain.

    ¡°Huff... Puff... Goddamnit, those two are a pain to kill!¡± Bolten panted and cursed in a low voice. He had exhausted a significant amount of his divine energy after the series of bombardment.

    ¡°Oh? Bryan, why aren¡¯t you attacking?¡± While gasping for air, Bolten suddenly noticed that Han Shuo was doing nothing but gaze ahead with cold eyes. His partners all found the time to take a nce at Han Shuo after hearing his cry.

    Han Shuo did not feel awkward with all eyes on him. He smiled mischievously and exined, ¡°Well, my strength is feeble. I don¡¯t want to humiliate myself!¡±

    By this point in time, even if Han Shuo said that he was as weak as a kitten, these people wouldn¡¯t dare look down on him. In fact, not only would not rebuke Han Shuo, Bolten even spontaneously exculpated him, ¡°You don¡¯t have to attack. Just keeping your brain clear and awake would be more than enough. We could save so much trouble and effort with your big brain here.¡±

    Every one of them agreed!

    ¡°Bryan, you¡¯ve just got to continue analyzing the surroundings. We need your expertise on this subject. You can leave theborious work of killing to the likes of us!¡± Bolten continued.

    ¡°That¡¯d be wonderful. To be frank, I don¡¯t like to kill and murder!¡± Han Shuo said in a pretentious face. He then pointed at Kaiser and Eriksson and suggested, ¡°You all should focus your attacks on Eriksson alone. As Olde and Kaiser have some friendly rtions, he might assist Kaiser in the end. However, Olde sure did not have many friendly rtions with Eriksson and wouldn¡¯t provide assistance to him. Besides, during such critical moments, Kaiser would likely only look after himself and wouldn¡¯t risk his life for Eriksson. Therefore I think it¡¯ll be more efficient to fix all your attacks on Eriksson!¡±

    The crowd was stunned but soon became overjoyed. They immediately prepared to focus their attacks on Eriksson alone as Han Shuo suggested.

    ¡°Don¡¯t like to kill and murder? The way I see it, you¡¯re theplete opposite of that!¡± Li Wei said and giggled.

 Chapter 661 - A mysterious calling

    GDK 661: A mysterious calling

    Han Shuo remained calm and did notment on Li Wei¡¯s assessment. He carefully observed Eriksson and his party.

    At Han Shuo¡¯s suggestion, Donna and her experts focused all their firepower on Eriksson alone. In an instant, interweaved radiances and divine energies bombarded Eriksson.

    Just as Han Shuo had predicted, Oldepletely disregarded Eriksson. He looked all around the demonic formation, doing his futile work.

    Meanwhile, Kaiser heaved a sigh of relief when he was no longer being attacked. He seized the opportunity to recover his divine energy and ignored Eriksson beside him, who was on the verge of death.

    Everyone has a selfish side to themselves. It was foreseeable that such a rtionship founded on mutual benefits would start to crack when tested with the lightest trial and tribtion.

    The burden that should have been shared among Olde, Kaiser, and Eriksson was now zeroing in on Eriksson alone. The pressure that he needed to endure was magnified several folds. Eriksson was utterly exhausted and had consumed a great portion of his divine energy to begin with. And now, having to suffer the shelling, Eriksson was on the verge of copse.

    ¡°Keep up the pressure! Eriksson can¡¯t seem to hold on much longer!¡± Bolten smiled excitedly. Seeing that this midgod called Eriksson was about to be bombarded to death by their attacks, an ineffable sense of pride rose from his heart.

    ¡°Lord Olde, Lord Olde, please help us!¡± when Kaiser saw Eriksson being hammered harder and harder, while he carried on restoring his own divine energy, he cried at Olde for assistance. Olde, however, simply observed his surroundings with his brows furrowed as though he did not hear Kaiser¡¯s voice at all.

    The conflicts between the Druidic Order and the Shrine of Ice over on Profound Continent had obviously affected the rtionship between these two high-level members of the two religious organizations. Olde was definitely not a magnanimous one who would disregard former hatred and put his life on the line for an adversary.

    Kaiser sighed seeing Olde treat his pleas so indifferently. He knew he wouldn¡¯t be getting any assistance from Olde in this battle. Feeling the scant amount of divine energy in his body, and witnessing the seemingly unending streams of attacks that came from this unknown source, Kaiser weighed in his mind and determined that he had no certainty of self-preservation.

    With that in mind, Kaiser merely looked on as his partner suffered torrential attacks. He pretended to have exhausted a severe amount of his divine energy and acted preupied with his recovery. He did not show any interest in intervening to help Eriksson defend against the attacks.

    ¡°It¡¯s not feasible to stay in this spot for extended periods. You all just stay here while I will go outside to try to locate a pathway to the center!¡± Han Shuo suddenly suggested.

    Donna was stunned. She looked at Han Shuo in a perplexed and puzzled manner before she asked, ¡°But if you step out of here at this moment, Olde could discover you and kill you in an instant!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I have my ways!¡± Han Shuo replied confidently. After thinking briefly, Han Shuo instructed Donna, ¡°Be careful and don¡¯t leave this ce until I return. As long as you stay right here, I can guarantee that none of you will face any sort of issues in terms of safety. But if you walk out of here, you are on your own.¡±

    Donna was shocked and at a loss for words. After keeping silent for a short while, she nodded her head in a heavy manner.

    ¡°Bryan, where are you going?¡± Li Wei softly cried out and volunteered, ¡°How about, you bring me along with you! I can be of assistance!¡±

    ¡°No, you can¡¯t,¡± Han Shuo immediately declined. But before Li Wei got disappointed, he added, ¡°But if you can finish off Eriksson and the others, you will have done a great deal to assist me.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded at his teammates and walked out from this stone forest.

    While Donna and her experts attacked Eriksson with all their strength, Han Shuo extended the coverage of his consciousness far and wide. He used the senses of his consciousness to probe for the secrets lying at the depths of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester. While extending the reach of his consciousness, Han Shuo sensed an inexplicable calling from the center of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester.

    There seemed to him to be something at the center of the colossal demonic formation that was softly and repeatedly calling for him, waiting for his arrival.

    It was a bizarre feeling for him, so bizarre Han Shuo thought that it was merely a misperception at first. But when he concentrated his attention to carefully sense it, he discovered that the calling was being directed at his expanding consciousness. It was attempting to attract the attention of his consciousness.

    By this point in time, Han Shuo could be certain that the existence who deployed the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester had to be a senior of the school of demonic arts with transcendental powers. Although Han Shuo had no idea how this terrifying senior made it to Profound Continent, he knew that everything the formidable existence deployed in this ce was made to target against otherworldly experts who had nil understanding of demonic arts.

    As Han Shuo was a demonic arts cultivator, he was not affected by the demonic formations in this ce at all. This meant that even as Donna, Olde, and the others faced danger with each step they took, Han Shuo had an unimpeded path and need not worry about any possible dangering from the formations.

    Having made such an observation, Han Shuo concluded that he had no reason to stress.

    Although Donna, Li Wei, and the Brook brothers were Han Shuo¡¯s allies, as a cultivator of demonic arts, Han Shuo had no wish of letting anyone know of his secret and he wanted to keep to himself alone whatever rewards that may lie within. It was with this thought in mind that Han Shuo left Donna and the rest of the party. He even had his allies stay in the stone forest to hinder Olde, Eriksson, and Kaiser¡¯s progress while he ventured further alone to seek for the rewards at this Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester.

    After Han Shuo walked out from the stone forest, Olde, who had been carefully observing his surroundings, immediately discovered Han Shuo. As one who cultivated in the edict of life, Olde possessed extraordinary sensitivity towards all living things. Han Shuo cultivated in demonic arts and formed a consciousness which made his life signature rather distinctive. There was no hiding from Olde like this.

    ¡°Youngster, where were you?¡± Olde¡¯s heart was suddenly at ease when he saw Han Shuo reappear. He grabbed Kelly with one hand and flew towards Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was not at all shocked that Olde could discover him. He was not even worried when Olde began to approach him. He merely walked towards the center of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvesterposedly.

    Under Olde¡¯s pursuit, not only was Han Shuo¡¯s figure bing further and further away from his sight, even his life signature seemed to be concealed byyers of formless boundaries. Han Shuo was gradually disappearing from both his sight and the senses of his soul.

    Olde was extremely taken aback. He was absolutely positive that he was traveling much, much faster than Han Shuo was. However, he didn¡¯t just have a hard time catching up to Han Shuo ¨C Han Shuo had vanished from his tracking. This bizarre phenomenon made Olde extremely frustrated and perplexed despite much thought.

    Of course, Olde had no idea that while Han Shuo was leaving, a distance-altering demonic formation was triggered. The demonic formation had forcibly re-written the naturalw of space, causing the distance between him and Han Shuo to abruptly lengthen. Having no understanding of the miracles of the demonic formation, the more desperately Olde tried to catch up, the further behind he got.

    Donna and her experts who were watching the chase scene from the stone forest had amazement across their faces. They witnessed a bizarre phenomenon from their point of view. Han Shuo was unhurriedly walking towards the center of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester while Olde was chasing after him at light speed. Although Olde had obviously exerted all his strength in pursuing him, the gap between them only increased. Olde even looked as though he was flying in reverse. The scene could not have been more peculiar.

    ¡°The edict of space here seems to be forcibly twisted. Truly, truly baffling! Who could it be that deployed everything here? It¡¯s as though this person is omnipotent!¡± Donna mumbled to herself. She was appalled.

    ¡°Is anything going to happen to Bryan?¡± Li Wei felt a little anxious in her heart when she saw Han Shuo step into the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester. She always felt that something wasn¡¯t quite right but couldn¡¯t tell what it was even after thinking it through.

    ¡°Why, why do I feel like Bryan is very at one with the environment here? He doesn¡¯t get flustered even a bit and is always calm. It¡¯s as though, as though this ce is his own home?¡± Bolten subconsciously expressed his own thoughts after deeply pondering for a moment.

    Upon hearing those words, Li Wei loudly cried out, ¡°That¡¯s right! That¡¯s exactly how I feel! His familiarity with this ce and his performance here, it all feels like he¡¯s in his own home!¡±

    Donna was astounded after hearing Bolten and Li Wei¡¯s words. Thinking about it, the doubts in her heart grew even greater.

    ¡°Don¡¯t mind Bryan for now. Let¡¯s put it off until we¡¯ve finished Eriksson!¡± Donna instructed.

    The party wasted no words. They continued with their relentless bombardment towards the dying Eriksson.

    At the depths of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester, Han Shuo slowed down his footsteps as he turned his focus on examining everything spectacr along his path.

    The deeper that Han Shuo ventured, the more amazed he became. That calling towards his consciousness from the depths of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester grew more frequent.

    All along the way, Han Shuo observed the presence of grotesque demonic formations everywhere. Although Han Shuo could recognize most of the demonic formations around him, they were way beyond his currentprehension. Naturally, the deadly demonic formations in this ce had absolutely no whatsoever intention of attacking Han Shuo, granting him a smooth and unimpeded entry.

    However, among these strange and bizarre demonic formations, Han Shuo discovered a dozen or more skeletal remains as white as ash. Some of them belonged to humans, while some were great magical beasts. Han Shuo even found two frames that belonged to the Soul Race.

    A great war had taken ce on this material ne five thousand years before, which involved the original owner of the skeletal staff, the ancestors of the Soul Race, gods from the Church of Light, as well as Olde¡¯s ancestor who cultivated in the edict of life.

    The war resulted in a victory for those of the Druidic Order, as well as the Church of Light. From the hints surrounding him, Han Shuo surmised that those forces hade to this ce and had lost many of their godly experts to these demonic formations.

    Han Shuo¡¯s insights regarding this colossal Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester, and his rough understanding of the numerous demonic formations in this ce, led him to believe that of all those who had tried to seek the secrets of this ce before him, not a single one of them managed to arrive at the center of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester.

    It was for the simple reason that the demonic formations in this ce were just too abundant and too lethal!

    The calling originating from the center of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester grew clearer and clearer. That intense calling hadpletely filled Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. It carried a sinister and exotic power that tempted the heart to hurry forward.

    The impact of this seduction on Han Shuo grew more and more intense, so intense that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t maintain a mindposed enough to observe his surroundings.

    Finally, Han Shuo abandoned all careful observation towards his surrounding. He followed the senses of his consciousness and hurried towards the calling.

    Soon enough, Han Shuo arrived precisely at the source ¨C the formation crux of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester.

    The formation crux was covered with abstruse andplicated symbols as well as carvings of all sorts of demons whom Han Shuo knew nothing about. The curvy, meandering lines that resembled tadpoles seemed extremely profound and mysterious. Even Han Shuo had not a clue what they were about.

    That mysterious thing that was calling out to Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was located under the formation crux.

    Han Shuo understood in his heart that in addition to these unfathomable patterns and symbols, this terrifying Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester needed to be supported by a treasure ¨C a treasure that was valuable beyond imagination.

    When Han Shuo was about to step towards that formation crux, it suddenly crumbled in on itself to reveal a hole the diameter of a well. The dozen or so mystical demons that had vanished all that time whizzed out from the opening.

    Han Shuo was jolted and jumped a few steps back.

    Han Shuo reckoned that all those mystical demons ought to have been the same ones he saw when he first descended to the thirdyer of the underground world. They must have mutated from the souls of those who perished within and around the demonic formation. As some of them were divine souls, they were all extremely formidable after they were turned into mystical demons in this most enigmatic Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester.

    Han Shuo had witnessed just how formidable these mystical demons were earlier. Most importantly, he knew that these mystical demons were unlike the demonic formations in this ce in that they would attack him. Han Shuo knew that he would absolutely not be able to withstand the several dozen mystical demons swarming at him all at once. Hence, he immediately prepared to withdraw once they emerged.

    Han Shuo had expected the dozen something mystical demons to charge at him when he stepped backward to keep a distance, so he was rather surprised when they didn¡¯t. They merely circled around the hole on the formation crux.

    He kept his distance as he carefully observed them for a moment. When he was sure that the mystical demons had no intention of recklessly attacking him, he again started to approach the formation crux.

    Suddenly, the energy that was summoning his consciousness from inside the hole undted slightly. As though having received amand, the mystical demons orbiting around the hole flew high up into the air and circled from a distance. They seemed to be opening a pathway for Han Shuo.

    After a moment of hesitation, with his brows creased, Han Shuo stepped towards the hole apprehensively. He had no idea what would happen to him next.

    When Han Shuo arrived right beside it, before he could extend his head out to look, an energy was suddenly released from the hole. It tangled Han Shuo¡¯s body in an instant and sucked him into the hole.

 Chapter 662 - Cauldron of Myriad Demon

    GDK 662: Cauldron of Myriad Demon

    Han Shuo felt giddy; his head was spinning like a top. He had difficulty standing still for a moment.

    When Han Shuo raised his head up and looked, he found himself within what seemed to be a container. Mysterious scripture lined the wall, bloodied and glowing, moving as though they were alive.

    The ground beneath his feet was greenish-brown in color. It was solid and uneven to the touch.

    This ce was filled with unimaginably intense mystical yin aura. The aura that lingered all around the container looked like faint fog that would never dissipate and could be directly inhaled by Han Shuo. Han Shuo believed that if he were to cultivate in such an environment, the rate at which he umted demonic yuan would be at least several hundred times faster!

    With his heart crammed with astonishment, Han Shuo continued to observe his surroundings carefully. He discovered a hazy region above his head. There were humongous shadows circling over the hazy spot.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness pulsated. He was aghast to discover that those shadows circling high up above his head were precisely the same mystical demons that he had previously seen.

    <i>Since when did those mystical demons be so huge?!</i> Han Shuo was astounded. An idea crossed his mind and he started observing his surroundings with his consciousness even more carefully.

    ¡°Sure enough, those mystical demons have not grownrger, it¡¯s my body that has shrunken!¡± Han Shuo cried out in surprise.

    Han Shuo suddenly noticed that those scripts constantly glittering with bloody radiances started to move rapidly in a mysterious trajectory. A vague and surreal energy emerged out of nowhere.

    Before Han Shuo could figure out what was happening, that faintly discernible energy suddenly formed a bizarre connection with his consciousness. Then, a message was delivered to Han Shuo, ¡°Hello, I¡¯m Cauldron Spirit. Pleased to meet you, my new master!¡±

    Han Shuo jumped. He had absolutely no idea what the hell was going on and replied without thinking, ¡°Who are you? Where is this ce? Who deployed the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m the cauldron spirit of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. You are inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. The person who deployed everything here was my original master ¨C Gu Tian Xie, the Exalted Demonlord!¡± that voice who called itself Cauldron Spirit slowly exined to Han Shuo.

    <i>Cauldron of Myriad Demon? Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord? What is going on?</i> Han Shuo was still totally lost and his mind was in a great frenzy.

    Han Shuo thought, then again cried out in surprise, ¡°I¡¯m the new master of the Cauldron of the Myriad Demon? How did that happen? What about your original master?¡±

    ¡°My original master, Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord, had a great battle with an expert in this universe. It resulted in both sides suffering severe losses. That opponent ambushed the Exalted Demonlord soon after he had lost a great amount of his energy traversing between universes and therefore he suffered devastating injuries. Before his death, he escaped to this material ne and deployed everything here before his consciousnesspletely dissipated.

    The Exalted Demonlord had perished long ago. You are perhaps the only demonic arts cultivator in this universe, and I was the one who brought you here. From now onwards, you are my new master!¡± the Cauldron Spirit exined.

    Han Shuo was so shocked that he nearly jumped. <i>Just how mighty Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord must have been in order to deploy all this from his deathbed! That godly expert of this universe who battled against the Exalted Demonlord and had yet to perish, is that existence even more powerful than him?</i>

    As though it could read Han Shuo¡¯s mind, the Cauldron Spirit said resentfully, ¡°That enemy had chosen to attack the Exalted Demonlord soon after he exhausted a great amount of his energy traversing between universes, and therefore his consciousnesspletely vanished. Otherwise, it surely would have been the attacker that perished!¡±

    The Cauldron Spirit¡¯s exnation shocked Han Shuo. His heart suddenly quivered and he questioned, ¡°You said that you brought me here. What exactly did you mean?¡±

    ¡°To be precise, it was the Exalted Demonlord and I who brought you here. The Exalted Demonlord deployed everything in here and I have merely followed through with his n!¡± The Cauldron Spirit kept silent for a moment before it continued to exin, ¡°There are thousands upon thousands of material nes in this universe. Didn¡¯t you find it odd that your soul descended on this material ne instead of the others?¡±

    ¡°A fair point,¡± Han Shuo replied.

    ¡°Did you not discover the numerous marks that the Exalted Demonlord left on this material ne? The five ces of extremes, do you really think that they were naturally formed? How could there be so many ces of extremes here without the Exalted Demonlord deploying them before his death!¡± Cauldron Spirit exined.

    Han Shuo was startled. Soon after, he cried out in surprise, ¡°I knew it! I knew there was a reason I did not discover the tiniest ces of extremes when I was in the Abyss realm which was so much more expansive!¡±

    ¡°The Exalted Demonlord knew that he did not have much time left. He was losing energy in his body and his consciousness was diminishing with each passing second. With the energy that he had left, he could not pull someone straight from another universe to this material ne. Hence, he deployed five enormous ces of extremes as well as these formations around us and waited for the right set of circumstances to take ce, which was ¨C to have an intense fluctuation on a person¡¯s soul in the other universe that matched with the undtion needed to traverse to this universe. When that happened, the facilities here would resonate with the soul and snatch the soul to this material ne in this universe.

    Afterpleting the whole setup, the Exalted Demonlord patiently waited while his consciousness slowly disintegrated. Unfortunately, he did not survive long enough to witness thepletion of his project. Hence I, the Cauldron Spirit of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, inherited the final wishes of the Exalted Demonlord and waited for that day toe. After aeons, the violent undtion of your soul produced resonance with that ripple left by the Exalted Demonlord. By using the energy that the Exalted Demonlord left in these formations, I pulled your soul to this universe and carried you precisely to this material ne.¡±

    Han Shuo was astounded. It was only after hearing the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s exnation that Han Shuo realized his soul had not been transferred to this world by chance. It was allid out by Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord and carried out by this Cauldron Spirit of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon.

    ¡°As your soul was too feeble, I consumed an excess amount of energy in making sure you would be safe in traversing to this universe and in safely attaching to a physical body. The overconsumption of energy here meant that I had no choice but to remain in a dormant state and recharge myself using the mystical yin aura that constantly assembled in the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester.

    I lost track of your location during the period I spent in dormancy. As soon as I was awoke some time ago, I immediately tried to call for you. However, as we were too far apart and I was still rather weak, you couldn¡¯t sense my calling.

    But who knew that just as I was preparing to risk flying out from the Cauldron of Myriad Demon to look for you, that you would miraculously arrive at the underground world and evene all the way here. It appears that as the person chosen by the Exalted Demonlord, you were destined to be here sooner orter,¡± Cauldron Spirit said thankfully.

    Han Shuo felt a strange feeling in his heart after hearing the exnation. He had never anticipated that there would be such a unique cauldron spirit deep underground, silently watching and waiting for his arrival. Han Shuo actually felt touched.

    ¡°Why is it that Gu Tian Xie wanted to go through all this effort to bring someone from the universe he came from? Couldn¡¯t he just look for somebody on this material ne to inherit everything he had? He could have saved a ton of effort by doing that instead, right?¡± Han Shuo was understandably puzzled.

    ¡°First of all, back then, this material ne did not have any advanced intelligent life-forms! But more importantly, the Exalted Demonlord considered all living beings in this universe as aliens. He was very firm that his protege must be someone from his native ce and never in a million years an alien from this universe. He¡¯d rather take all this trouble getting you to this ce than to have those aliens easily inherit everything he had!¡± Cauldron Spirit exined.

    Han Shuo silently nodded his head after listening to Caldron Spirit¡¯s words. He knew that some of the of old-aged were impervious to reason in their adhering to certain old-fashioned practices. Han Shuo could vaguely understand Gu Tian Xie¡¯s way of thinking. He also became aware that the matters happened to Gu Tian Xie had been extremely distant in the past.

    ¡°So, I¡¯m your new master?¡± Han Shuo suddenly asked after keeping silent for a while.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. You are the person selected by both the Exalted Demonlord and I. You will inherit everything he had as well as this demon-intimidating Cauldron of Myriad Demon ¨C me!¡± Cauldron Spirit affirmed.

    Han Shuo was overjoyed. He asked, ¡°What did Gu Tian Xie leave for me? Also, what are the uses of this Cauldron of Myriad Demon?¡±

    ¡°The Exalted Demonlord had left hisprehension for you. As long as you follow along that path, you will also be an Exalted Demonlord with apocalyptic powers. However, this journey will be very long and you need to stay cautious. As for me, in the universe youe from, I can intimidate and subdue any demonic arts practitioner ¨C which is obviously not very useful in this universe. And as for what I can provide you with, you are going to feel it soon,¡± Cauldron Spirit transmitted.

    ¡°Feel what?¡± Han Shuo was stunned.

    ¡°Power!¡± Cauldron Spirit replied.

    After receiving the transmission from Cauldron Spirit, Han Shuo discovered that the enormous amount of mystical yin aura inside this Cauldron of Myriad Demon had suddenly transformed. Under Han Shuo¡¯s gaze, the mystical yin aura started to assemble and gradually transform into even purer energy under the effects of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon.

    ¡°You are too weak! I had exhausted a lot of mystical yin aura when I transported you over. Although the mystical yin aura gathered by the Harvester over all these years isn¡¯t much, it¡¯s still more than enough to allow your strength to make a giant leap! In addition to this, you will receive a portion of the Exalted Demonlord¡¯sprehension and knowledge. As your consciousness is still too weak, you cannot take too much at once. I will gradually pass it on to you in the future. Now, open up your mind, ept the energy, and let it transform your body,¡± Cauldron Spirit exined before an enlightening voice of pure wisdom reverberated throughout his consciousness.

    At this moment, Han Shuo¡¯s mind was so excited that he found it somewhat difficult to keep it under control. It would usually take him just one deep breath to pacify his mind but this time around Han Shuo had to put in ten times the effort to achieve that.

 Chapter 663 - Omen Realm

    GDK 663: Omen Realm

    The enormous quantity of mystical yin aura inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon was condensed into a gaseous state before it gently flowed into Han Shuo through his mouth and nose.

    The mystical yin aura gathered by the enormous Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester all these years rapidly passed through the countless meridians from his head to toe before flowing into his demonic infant.

    Following the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s instructions, Han Shuo opened up his soul and set his consciousness go nk. He stopped thinking about anything. Han Shuo had discovered some time ago that his demonic infant could work better if he didn¡¯t actively micromanage it. Therefore, after opening up his soul, Han Shuo merely performed every action with his subconscious mind and did not actively control them.

    This was the most optimal state that would allow Han Shuo¡¯s demonic infant to operate at its fullest capacity. Needless to say, the Cauldron Spirit also yed an important role at this moment. It gathered the mystical yin aura in the air, condensed the energy, and fed it to Han Shuo¡¯s demonic infant.

    Han Shuo felt as though his consciousness was floating, fluttering in the breeze. Without him being fully aware, the demonic infant inside his body automatically assembled the enormous amount of mystical yin aura to replenish itself and converted it into demonic yuan before subsequently depositing it into each and every cell of his body.

    Time passed rapidly and noiselessly. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was in a vacant state. Under the stimtion of demonic yuan, his body started to crackle and rattle. It was undergoing metamorphosis yet again. The same gradual process of transformation also began on the demonic infant inside his body. The demonic infant was no longer blurry and indistinct, butpletely visible as a carbon-copy of Han Shuo.

    While the metamorphosis continued, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness suddenly trembled as a wave of disordered information surged into his consciousness.

    Han Shuo was instantly awoken from that vacant and unthinking state. The piercing pain from the transformation overhauling his body and demonic infant immediately rushed to his head. He almost couldn¡¯t restrain himself from loudly howling in pain.

    ¡°I believe you should know that transformation is always apanied by pain. Not only must you continue to endure this pain, but you must also carefullyprehend those things in your consciousness which the Exalted Demonlord left for you. Should your realm state fail to progress in tandem with the growing energy inside your body, it will be disadvantageous to you in the future,¡± Cauldron Spirit transmitted to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo understood what was happening to him in an instant. The moment that his consciousness was awoken, he very clearly sensed the transformation happening to his body and demonic infant. He could feel that the enormous amount of mystical yin aura was still madly rushing into his body, flowing through his demonic infant, being converted into demonic yuan, and subsequently nourishing his body.

    The immense amount of demonic yuan he gained by absorbing and converting those mystical yin aura could not just metamorphosize Han Shuo¡¯s physical body and demonic infant, but it could also assist Han Shuo in making a breakthrough to the next realm; with one prerequisite ¨C Han Shuo¡¯s realm state had to be in coherence with the energy his body possessed.

    This meant that Han Shuo had to carefully decipher andprehend the Exalted Demonlord¡¯s understandings that were injected into his consciousness. He had to raise his realm state to the advanced degree his physical body and demonic infant required. Only then could he reap the benefits of these energies to the greatest extent. On the contrary, if too much energy was injected into him while his realm state was not sufficiently advanced to support the energy, it could backfire and cause him harm.

    Having understood this, Han Shuo took the initiative to cutmunication with the Cauldron Spirit, ignored the pain and transformation to his body and demonic infant, and ced his full attention on carefullyprehending the enigma that was inserted into his consciousness.

    The knowledge that Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord had of demonic arts was many levels above that of Chu Cang Lan. They were absolutely different sses of existences.

    The enigma that filled Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was like a lump of violently warping cloud which contained not a word or letter. Han Shuo had to sense and observe the changes to the cloud in order to find theprehension of demonhood that Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord left for him.

    Initially, Han Shuo had absolutely no idea how he should proceed. He tried to sense everything inside the cloud using the energy of his consciousness but he quickly realized that this method was ineffective. However, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t feeling anxious at all as he knew that the transformation to his body and demonic infant definitely would not beplete within a short period of time. He calmly but fully focused his mind on unraveling the puzzle.

    After an undetermined amount of time, Han Shuo tried opening up his soul and discarded all distracting thoughts. He sank into some kind of transcendental state. An abstruse connection was formed between him and that erratically twisting cloud.

    A whirlwind of disordered thoughts shot from the cloud in all directions. Like needles cutting across his mind, they caused his consciousness immense pain and injury.

    When the piercing pain struck his consciousness, the pain from his metamorphosing body and demonic infant simultaneously increased tenfold. Han Shuo nearly passed out from the pain.

    While enduring and resisting the torment to his body and mind, Han Shuo started to reassemble his consciousness. He was astonished to discover that those jumbled-up thoughts that wereunched all around his consciousness started to rbine rhythmically. His consciousness started toprehend ¨C <i>something</i>.

    Han Shuo, whose face was twitching because of the immense pain, suddenly turned quiet and peaceful. He became as still as a boulder as he sat cross-legged. It was as though he had turned into stone.

    Han Shuo¡¯s body burst with magnificent radiance all throughout the process.

    After an undetermined amount of time, the extremely rich mystical yin aura inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon started to grow thin and flowed into Han Shuo at a slower rate. After some more time, all the mystical yin aura within the Cauldron of Myriad Demon seemed to have been washed away by a burst of strong breeze and Han Shuo¡¯s body stopped glowing.

    Han Shuo, who had remainedpletely still for who-knew-how-long, started moving his finger. Momentster, his eyebrows started to twitch, and finally he opened his eyes and woke up from that hypnotic state.

    ¡°Congrattions, master. You have directly broken through a whole realm!¡± the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s voice sounded in Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes were filled with nkness. He felt as though he had just awoken from a long, long dream and was unclear about his current condition. Han Shuo¡¯s eyebrows were furrowed and he started to slowly recall everything that happened to him.

    Gradually, Han Shuo smoothened his brows. It was as though he had grabbed onto something and fallen into contemtion along that trail.

    After some time, Han Shuo gently heaved a breath. He stood up from sitting cross-legged, stretched his body, clenched his fists, and sensed his transformation.

    ¡°Your body has metamorphosed yet again, and so has your demonic infant. You are now much more powerful than before!¡± Cauldron Spirit transmitted to Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    Without needing Cauldron Spirit¡¯s exnation, Han Shuo could sense his newfound power. The demonic yuan circting throughout his body seemed to have transformed into a different state. They gradually flowed through his limbs and bones like tiny water streams. Every cell and bone in his body felt like they were brimming with boundless energy which could instantly gush out with one thought.

    The demonic infant didn¡¯t seem to have transformed much. However, when Han Shuo carefully inspected it, he saw that the demonic infant, his fountainhead of energy, had turned from blurry to iparably distinctive. It looked just like a newborn infant!

    Han Shuo had yet topletely adapt to the sudden changes. There were significant changes that he couldn¡¯t fully familiarize himself with within a short period of time.

    ¡°Master, you have now attained the Omen Realm. I believe you should now know how to further cultivate in this realm!¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment and eximed, ¡°Huh?¡±

    ¡°Carefullyprehend things that the Exalted Demonlord left in your consciousness, and you will understand,¡± the Cauldron Spirit reminded.

    When Han Shuo focused, he discovered that there was indeed some indescribableprehension within his consciousness that he never had before. The next instance, Han Shuo suddenly recalled some of the insight about the Nine Changes realm which he gained in that wonderful state just moments ago.

    ¡°I got it! Haha, I have actually attained Omen realm! That Chu Cang Lan had painstakingly sought to break through the Nine Changes realm and attain Omen realm, but he never did manage to advance. I truly did not expect to simply cross that great barrier in one giant leap! They say that it is only in the Omen realm that one can ascend. Doesn¡¯t that mean I¡¯m now a so-called god back on the world from whence we came?¡± upon returning to his senses, Han Shuo chortled withughter and loudly cheered inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon.

    Of course, Han Shuo was excited. Back then, Chu Cang Lan had fought a monk and a Taoist priest precisely because he was trying to make a breakthrough in his stagnated cultivation and reach ascension. But in the end, Chu Cang Lan lost everything and instead of having to use Han Shuo, whom he captured as his lifeboat, what resulted was Han Shuo arriving in this parallel-universe.

    It was as though the heavens had been foreordained all along. Han Shuo was now on a realm that even Chu Cang Lan did not have a chance to touch, surpassing him in strength. He had finally walked out from the shadows of Chu Cang Lan.

    ¡°I have just used up the mystical yin aura that the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester gathered all these years on you. I¡¯m afraid that this ce cannot be kept up for much longer,¡± Cauldron Spirit suddenly said after Han Shuo gradually calmed down from the excitement.

    ¡°What do you mean?¡± Han Shuo was jolted.

    ¡°Everything here can be destroyed and must be destroyed. Otherwise, there will be a constant flow of expertsing to investigate. Right, those who came with you are probably just the scouting units. If this ce doesn¡¯t get destroyed, more will continue toe and investigate after them. I have been maintaining this ce for a long time and know their work ethics,¡± Cauldron Spirit calmly exined.

    Han Shuo was immediately enlightened by the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s words. He was indeed correct. The Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester was a mysterious ce. Many experts from high-level material nes had disappeared in this ce without any apparent cause or reason. Surely, their interests in this ce would do anything but subside.

    Donna and the others ought to be the first batch of experts sent to probe this ce. If they did not hear back from Donna, Kaiser, and the others, they would surely dispatch more experts. Even if Han Shuo were to destroy the only remaining internar transportation matrix on Profound Continent, they would just find their way by some other means, just as Olde had. The only surefire way was to destroy everything there and not leave a single vestige that could marvel them. Only then would those experts abandon further missions to probe this ce, and Profound Continent would truly see peace, no longer interfered by experts from distant material nes.

    ¡°Luckily you havee over and made contact with me. In fact, the existence of this ce is no longer necessary. With the two of us, we can rebuild anything here. And when you have sufficiently mighty strength, you can deploy anything and everything here, anywhere you¡¯d like, with just your own power.

    ¡°However, before youe to possess that strength, you must conceal the fact that you cultivate in demonic arts as much as possible. That existence who battled the Exalted Demonlord is extremely mighty. If the person was to learn of your existence, you would surely be terminated. Even if that existence had yet to recover from its injuries, it could still kill you with a snap. Therefore, from now onwards, you better not reveal to anyone the fact that you practice demonic arts, lest that it finds out,¡± the Cauldron Spirit reminded Han Shuo. It seemed very apprehensive of that expert who battled Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord.

    After hearing those words, Han Shuo solemnly nodded, and said, ¡°Understood. From now onwards, I will not perform demonic arts before others as much as possible. But if I were to use demonic arts, I will make sure my opponents don¡¯t live to tell anyone about it!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s good that you understand. Additionally, now that your body has metamorphosed, you could use the energies of your two avatars to conceal the fact that your main body cultivates in demonic arts. You may give it a try.¡±

    Han Shuo was pleasantly surprised to hear that. He immediately experimented with moving the energy of his avatar of death. At the next instance, Han Shuo cried out in surprise, ¡°You¡¯re right! It flows smoothly!¡±

    Han Shuo sensed that the energy of death inside his skeletal staff avatar could circte throughout his main body unimpeded. Han Shuo¡¯s aura transformed in the blink of an eye and his main body seemed to have turned into his avatar that cultivated in the energy of death. But Han Shuo clearly recognized that this energy all came from the skeletal staff inside his body and his main body had merely borrowed the energy inside the skeletal staff.

    ¡°You can use both energies of your two avatars. As long as you do not use demonic arts, no one will be able to tell that you cultivate in it. Also, that avatar you formed using that demonic weapon contains too many impure souls and even carries demonic aura. I will help you remove the negative energy and those weak deceased souls. Otherwise, it will affect your avatar¡¯sprehension of the energy in this world!¡± Cauldron Spirit continued.

    Han Shuo suddenly recalled that the Demonyer Edge had absorbed some negative energy and deceased souls. After hearing Cauldron Spirit¡¯s reminder, Han Shuo suddenly realized the reason that his avatar of destruction couldn¡¯t make much progress in its cultivation of the edict of destruction could be because it contained too many impurities and the energy wasn¡¯t pure enough!

    However, all that negative energy and those dead souls were also a form of energy. Han Shuo was rather reluctant to have them erased by Cauldron Spirit.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, the three spirit demons you refined couldpletely take over those energies. I will help you finish everything. With that, your spirit demon will grow, and your avatar won¡¯t have any hindrance inprehending the energy it cultivates. Everyone¡¯s satisfied!¡± as though it could read Han Shuo¡¯s mind, Cauldron Spirit exined.

    ¡°That would be wonderful!¡± Han Shuo was overjoyed and heughed out loud. He figured that with this Cauldron Spirit as his assistant, he could really save a great deal of effort.

 Chapter 664 - Take you out

    GDK 664: Take you out

    The Cauldron Spirit was autonomous and self-aware. As the primary soul of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, it knew the demonic weapon inside out and could indeed assist Han Shuo in many aspects.

    Following the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s instructions, Han Shuo sent his avatar of destruction out from his body and itnded inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon in its Demonyer Edge form. Subsequently, he withdrew the three spirit demons he refined and had them drifting about inside the Cauldron.

    ¡°What are you going to do next?¡± Han Shuo asked the Cauldron Spirit.

    ¡°I will transfer negative energy and those weak souls inside your demonic weapon to the spirit demons. Don¡¯t worry, nothing can go wrong,¡± the Cauldron Spirit replied.

    ¡°Is there anything else that you need me to do?¡± Han Shuo inquired.

    ¡°You just have to exit the cauldron andter, when I instruct you to, insert a few drops of your blood into the cauldron to officially be my master. After that procedure isplete, I can stay inside your body and we canmunicate anytime using the samemunication method!¡± Cauldron Spirit replied.

    ¡°How do I get out of here?¡± Han Shuo asked when he recalled that he was forcibly sucked into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon by the energying from it.

    ¡°Just fly out. The energy that was binding you is now all gone.¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before giving it a try. Immediately, he discovered that the energy covering down from above his head had indeed disappeared. With one thought, Han Shuo started flying towards the exit. The demonic yuan that had condensed into liquid form erupted like mini-explosions in every cell in his body. As he had not fully adapted to his recently increased flight speed, he flew far past the opening of the cauldron.

    Han Shuo was astonished to find himself high above the formation crux of the colossal Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester. When he peered down into the hole, he saw a big, green copper cauldron around a meter in height. Bizarre scripts glowing with green radiance covered every surface of the cauldron. The center of the cauldron waspacted with dense mist.

    With Han Shuo attentively watching, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon gradually rose through the hole and came to a halt as it hovered before Han Shuo. It then gradually shrank to a size which perfectly fit in Han Shuo¡¯s palm.

    ¡°Drop your blood into the cauldron and you shall be the new master of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon!¡± the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s voice physically sounded from the mouth of the cauldron.

    Han Shuo immediately did as Cauldron Spirit instructed. He pricked the tip of his middle finger of his right hand and squirted his blood into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon.

    ¡°That¡¯s enough!¡± shouted the Cauldron Spirit of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon.

    The instant that Han Shuo¡¯s blood entered the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, it started to burst with magnificent radiance. The scripts on the surface of the cauldron appeared as though they hade alive as they twisted and squirmed like earthworms. From a distance, those squiggling ancient scriptures formed multiple hideous and terrifying patterns. It appeared extremely sinister and mysterious.

    Momentster, an abstruse connection between Han Shuo and the Cauldron Spirit was formed.

    Han Shuo gazed attentively at the Cauldron of Myriad Demon with glistening eyes and without moving a muscle for a few seconds before, all of a sudden, he again received a transmission from the Cauldron Spirit within his consciousness, ¡°It¡¯s done. From now onwards, you are officially my new master!¡±

    After transmitting the message, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon glowing with hazy green light slipped from Han Shuo¡¯s palm and flew into his body. When Han Shuo examined his internal organs using his consciousness, he discovered that the Cauldron of Myriad Demon had taken a spot above his underbelly like it was one of his organs.

    ¡°Master, everything here will crumble and copse following my departure. The Exalted Demonlord has nned for this long ago. An earth-shattering transformation is on the horizon. You should leave this ce immediately lest that you suffer any injuries when the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester is destructed,¡± the Cauldron Spirit warned.

    Han Shuo was astonished by the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s words. He started to carefully sense for changes in the environment around him and discovered that just as the Cauldron Spirit had said, everything in this ce seemed to be slowly transforming. The mountains barricading it were giving off dull, muffled sounds at their interiors. When Han Shuo looked at them from a distance, he felt as though the mountains were drunken.

    ¡°How much time before this cepletely self-destructs? Also, how much time has passed since I started absorbing the mystical yin aura in the cauldron?¡± Han Shuo hastily asked.

    ¡°Everything in here will be destroyed in under two hours. There will not be a trail left. After that, no being in this universe will even have a clue that the Exalted Demonlord had deployed anything here in the first ce. You may rx about that. You have stayed inside the cauldron for nine days,¡± Cauldron Spirit replied.

    Han Shuo was shocked ¨C shocked at just how little time he had actually spent inside the cauldron!

    Han Shuo knew from his experience that making breakthroughs would take ever longer as he advanced through the realms. The process of strengthening his physical body at the juncture of a breakthrough could possibly even take months, and even longer for the entire process to beplete. He originally thought that he had stayed in there for at least several years or even tens of years, not merely nine short days!

    When Han Shuo remained silent, the Cauldron Spirit seemed to know what Han Shuo was thinking and it transmitted, ¡°The Exalted Demonlord had personally deployed this ce and it¡¯s nothing strange that it would be remarkable. Not to forget the effects that I have. So, don¡¯t be so baffled that duration was shortened to just nine days!¡±

    Han Shuo was immediately enlightened by the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s exnation. It was not unreasonable that the formations deployed by a character as powerful Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord at the helm of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon could shorten the entire process to just nine days.

    ¡°What happened to those who were at the formations? Are they all dead?¡± Han Shuo asked when a thought suddenly crossed his mind.

    ¡°Not yet. But if you want them dead, they will be dead. If you want them to live, then they will live!¡±

    ¡°Care to rify?¡±

    ¡°Before the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester ispletely destroyed, I will still have control over everything in here. When you entered the cauldron, I isted and trapped every one of them using the formations here. They are still trapped. If you want, I can kill them at any time,¡± Cauldron Spirit calmly answered. Han Shuo understood it meant that using the demonic formations here that had yet to self-destruct, Cauldron Spirit could y gods the level of Kaiser, Eriksson, and Olde, as easily as snapping a finger.

    ¡°That¡¯s great. But there are some of them that I want to finish off personally with my own hand, while some could be useful to me in the future and must not be allowed to die!¡± Han Shuo replied.

    ¡°No problem!¡± Cauldron Spirit answered.

    The dozen or so mystical demons that had been circling all along gave Han Shuo a shock by suddenly whooshing at him when he was about to leave. But before Han Shuo could make any defensive measures, he sensed a slight tremble that came from the Cauldron Spirit in his body. The mouth of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon became exposed on his lower abdomen and sucked clean the dozens of mystical demons.

    ¡°Master, I can transform mighty souls directly into demon generals using the cauldron. The Cauldron of Myriad Demons can also store a myriad of demons within it. In fact, my strength and energy originated from the quantity and strength of the demons stored inside the cauldron.

    ¡°Before the Exalted Demonlord battled with that existence in this universe, the cauldron contained an uncountable myriad of demon generals. Among them were approximately a thousand demon generals as powerful as these twelve mystical demons, and over two hundred demon generals even more formidable than these mystical demons. Most the time, the Exalted Demonlord did not need to personally take care of his enemies ¨C I could directly annihte them merely with the myriad of demons in my body!

    ¡°However, during that battle against that existence, I exhausted nearly all those demon generals I had. That is why I have be so weak. Even this dozen of demon generals were gathered when they ventured into this ce while the consciousness of the Exalted Demonlord had yet to perish,¡± the Cauldron Spirit exined.

    ¡°So you¡¯re saying that as long as you can capture an expert¡¯s soul as they are dying, it can be refined into a demon general inside your cauldron? The more and the mightier demon generals there are in your cauldron, the more powerful you¡¯ll be?¡± Han Shuo was astonished.

    The Demonyer Edge also contained a myriad of souls. Butparing them to the demon generals inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon was likeparing ants to mountains ¨C they were in no way of the same ss. The demon generals formed inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon such as these mystical demons were powerful enough to easily cause immense pain to godly existences. Perhaps even that main soul previously formed in the Demonyer Edge by assembling numerous souls had no chance against just one of the twelve mystical demons formed in the cauldron.

    From those words of the Cauldron Spirit, Han Shuo also learned that these mystical demons were not even the mightiest demon generals. Han Shuo simply dared not imagine just how formidable the Cauldron of Myriad Demon must have been back in its glory days.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. The more demon generals there are in the cauldron, the mightier their strengths, the more energy and ability I have. However, there is a criterion for souls that can be turned into a demon generals using the cauldron. They need to possess at least the strength of those souls you used in refining your spirit demons. But even then, they would turn into demon generals of the lowest grade. Souls any weaker than that cannot be turned into demon generals. Those can only be used as feeding material for other demon generals,¡± the Cauldron Spirit delivered Han Shuo the mind-blowing truth.

    Han Shuo smiled bitterly. He did not expect that souls with demigod strength were the bare minimum requirement for forming a demon general in the cauldron. Those so-called spirit demons he refined using that orc shaman¡¯s soul had seemed rather subpar.

    ¡°Erm, those spirit demons I refined can further evolve. Are they considered any good?¡± Han Shuo asked the Cauldron Spirit rather disappointedly.

    ¡°The foundational materials you used in refining those spirit demons were too low-grade. Therefore, there won¡¯t be much room for them to develop. The mystical demons I refined are better than them. When you can finally collect mighty souls, I will refine a spirit demon for you. By then you will see just how much of a difference it makes!¡± the Cauldron Spirit continued to drop his high-yield bombshell on Han Shuo.

    <i>Lowgod and midgod souls are merely refined into mystical demons by the cauldron. Then, what would it require to refine a spirit demon, a higher ss demon general? A highgod soul?</i>

    Han Shuo simply did not dare imagine!

    When Han Shuo recalled of Cauldron Spirit¡¯s words a moment ago, he reckoned that those two hundred something demon generals mightier than its mystical demons, had to be spirit demons. What did that mean? The cauldron used to hold more than two hundred souls of highgod strength! Han Shuo was simply dumbstruck.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo felt that the three spirit demons he went through a lot of trouble to refine were totally insignificant and not even worthy of mentioningpared to those refined by the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. Han Shuo shook his head and sighed.

    ¡°You are my master. You can choose how to allocate the demon generals in the cauldron. How about putting those three small spirit demons in the cauldron? In the future, if you gather some weaker souls that can¡¯t be turned into demon generals, they can be turned into demonic aura that the three can absorb. What do you think?¡± the Cauldron Spirit sought Han Shuo¡¯s opinion.

    ¡°Just do as you see fit. Alright, let¡¯s go already. I want to look for Eriksson and put him to death!¡± Han Shuo hastened. He was no longer that interested in his three spirit demons after listening to the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s words.

    The Cauldron Spirit showed Han Shuo where he wanted to go and became silent.

    Before the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester waspletely destroyed, everything in this ce was under the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s control. This meant that Han Shuo was the de facto master of this facility. Han Shuo suddenly discovered that the coverage area of his consciousness increased by several folds when he expanded his consciousness through the Cauldron Spirit. In just a few moments, he had gained aplete grasp of the entire situation in this ce.

    He discovered that Donna, Li Wei and the others were still staying at the same spot. However, one thing was different ¨C the method of leaving the area had changed. As none of them understood the miraculousness of the formations, they were all trapped and unable to leave the area.

    Eriksson and Kaiser were together in another area. They were trapped inside a disorientating formation filled with dense fog and they had drained themselves constantly traveling in circles.

    Olde and Kelly were somewhere much further away. Olde seemed to have given up and just lied down on the ground as though he had fallen asleep. Meanwhile, Kelly was looking all around and anxiously trying to find an exit.

    From Cauldron Spirit¡¯s description, Han Shuo learned that Olde possessed the mightiest strength of them. Cauldron Spirit had trapped Olde inside a series of demonic formations that were connected with each other. He had tried everything but he couldn¡¯t leave thebination of demonic formations, and so a few days before Han Shuo woke up, he decided to just quiet down.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know what your rtionship with them is like so I didn¡¯t kill a single one of them ¨C I simply trapped them all,¡± Cauldron Spirit transmitted.

    ¡°Well done. There are a few of them that are still useful to have, two that I¡¯m going to finish off immediately, and another two ¨C I have note to a decision about them yet,¡± Han Shuo transmitted to Cauldron Spirit as he walked towards where Kaiser and Eriksson were located.

    Han Shuo could travel across this entire facility unimpededly before he obtained the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. And now, being in control of that treasure, it was a walk in the park to him.

    Soon enough, Han Shuo arrived at the exact spot Kaiser and Eriksson were located. While the two were wearily searching for the way out, Han Shuo¡¯s figure abruptly emerged from the hazy mist.

    ¡°Hello guys! Are you looking for the way out?¡± Han Shuo put on a bright smile and greeted Eriksson and Kaiser wearing haggard and despaired faces.

    Anyone would look exhausted as they were if they were to keep circling in the same area for nine days straight.

    Han Shuo¡¯s emergence was like a glimmer of hope. The faces of the two who were battered and exhausted suddenly jolted. They looked at Han Shuo in amazement and simultaneously cried out, ¡°How did you get here? Where did youe from?¡±

    ¡°From outside, of course. Hehe, your faces now look pretty ¡®outstanding¡¯!¡± Han Shuo said in a calm and bright smile.

    ¡°Kid, I may not be able to get out, but I¡¯ll at least get to put you out!¡± Eriksson put on a gloomy face and coldly snickered after being ridiculed by Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oh, wonderful! Ie here with the same intention of personally taking you out! Let¡¯s see who will actually be wiped out!¡± Han Shuo chuckled. He intended to try out the power of this Omen realm he had recently acquired on this duo!

 Chapter 665 - Killing two gods

    GDK 665: Killing two gods

    The strength of a demonic art cultivator would increase by a wide margin with each advancement in demonic arts realm. Having broken through to the Nine Changes realm and attained the Omen Realm, Han Shuo could hardly imagine how different his main body must must have be.

    For thest nine days, Kaiser and Eriksson had worn down their energy trying to find a way out from this disorientating formation. This was a great opportunity for Han Shuo to defeat them.

    Han Shuo had backup ns in order if he couldn¡¯t defeat them. Thanks to the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s existence, not only could Han Shuo make use of the mystical demons inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, but he could also operate the demonic formations all around him through the Cauldron Spirit. Therefore, from whatever aspect, Han Shuo was fully prepared to take the lives of Kaiser and Eriksson.

    Although Han Shuo possessed absolute confidence in the final oue, Kaiser and Eriksson had no idea just how powerful Han Shuo had be. In fact, they both thought that Han Shuo must have gone nuts when they overheard that he would kill the two of them. Even a fool would know that a mere lowgod would be dead without a doubt when pitted against two midgods. How would the lowgod stand a chance?

    ¡°Hahaha.... ¡° Eriksson looked at Han Shuo as though he was looking at a dead man. With a face filled with contempt, he said, ¡°Go ahead. I will stand right here and wait for you to kill me! Hmph, even if we have exhausted a ton of our divine energy, a puny lowgod like you still wouldn¡¯t be able to touch us.¡±

    ¡°Eriksson, don¡¯t kill him too quickly. Make sure to find out how he entered this ce before killing him.¡± Without even batting an eye at Han Shuo, Kaiser closed his eyes to recover his divine energy and casually reminded Eriksson.

    The duo was trapped in the formation for so long time and still couldn¡¯t find a way out but Han Shuo¡¯s sudden arrival had brought them a glimmer a hope. Perhaps Eriksson only wanted to take Han Shuo¡¯s life but not Kaiser. His only wish was to depart this troublesome ce as soon as possible.

    Eriksson coldly groaned, ¡°I don¡¯t need you to remind me. I know what I have to do!¡±

    Kaiser, whose eyes were closed, pulled a straight face and did not make any attempt to reply. He knew that Eriksson was still angry at him for doing nothing but watch when Eriksson was bombarded by attacks. That matter had torn a crack in their friendship and perhaps it would never heal.

    The trantion is hosted only on veratales. If you are reading this anywhere else, you are reading it from a pirate.

    ¡°Oh? So confident with yourself?¡± Han Shuo said calmly as he looked at Eriksson with a big grin.

    Before obtaining the Cauldron of Myriad Demon and before attaining Omen realm, against Eriksson, Han Shuo would have had no choice but to flee for his life. But things had changed now. Han Shuo had absolute certainty of the oue to stand before Eriksson so fearlessly.

    Eriksson was stunned at Han Shuo¡¯s words and felt rather puzzled. He couldn¡¯t understand why would Han Shuo be so daring to stand before him instead of running.

    Eriksson ced his focus on Han Shuo and sensed the elemental energy of death in his body. The energy was merely lowgod strength and there wasn¡¯t a thing that was unusual about him. Immediately, Eriksson heaved a sigh of relief. While gazing at Han Shuo with his ice-cold eyes, he said, ¡°Cut the nonsense. Tell me how you got in and perhaps I will grant you a less painful death!¡±

    Han Shuo chuckled. He started walking towards Eriksson step by step and said arrogantly, ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it, you will be out from this ce very soon!¡± When Eriksson raised an eyebrow, Han Shuo¡¯s face turned cold and he continued in a grave voice, ¡°But it will just be your deceased divine soul that will exit with me!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Han Shuo¡¯s hand shot out, piercing straight towards Eriksson¡¯s chest.

    Eriksson¡¯s face was filled with disdain. He coldly watched Han Shuo¡¯s hand inching closer towards him but did nothing. He sensed the divine energy of death contained in Han Shuo¡¯s hand very clearly. The energy was so weak that he wasn¡¯t worried about it at all.

    Eriksson stood tall and as still as a mountain. Unknowingly, ayer of solid ice had covered his body, turning him into an ice-sculpture without a trace of life. Theyer of icy armor formed over his chest gleamed brightly. Even though he was inside ayer of ice, Eriksson¡¯s expression was not affected and he still had on a disdainful face.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was peaceful and calm with his eyes firmly locked on Eriksson. All of a sudden, Han Shuo deployed the Demonic des, causing his fingernails to rapidly grow into long, incisive des as they came piercing towards Eriksson¡¯s chest.

    Suddenly, Eriksson felt an enormous amount of unknown energy from Han Shuo¡¯s giant hand. This energy which didn¡¯t belong to any of the twelve fundamental forces gave Eriksson intense palpitations.

    Kaiser was restoring his divine energy with his eyes closed when he suddenly sensed the peculiar energy from Han Shuo¡¯s hand. He immediately cried out, ¡°Eriksson, watch out!¡±

    Unfortunately, Eriksson¡¯s ego was so big it blocked his view; he let Han Shuoe close to him and therefore allowed Han Shuo¡¯s Demonic des tond right on his chest. Kaiser¡¯s warning hade toote.

    <i>Creak!</i> The ice armor that coated Eriksson from head to toe shattered into pieces when Han Shuo¡¯s Demonic des pierced through it.

    Eriksson couldn¡¯t escape it in time. Han Shuo¡¯s demonic des pierced through his heart and lungs and emerged on his back.

    Han Shuo¡¯s arm prated straight through Eriksson¡¯s body. He pulled the distance between them closer and while staring straight into Eriksson¡¯s frightened eyes, Han Shuo made an evil grin and asked in a sinister, ruthless voice, ¡°How does it feel?¡±

    Han Shuo pulled his arm backward, ced the Demonic des back into Eriksson¡¯s organs, and proceeded by giving it a quick stirring. While a round of eerie, goosebump-inducing noises of bones and organs being shattered yed on, bright red blood sprayed out from the hole in Eriksson¡¯s torso. His blood sttered like a ruptured pipe.

    Eriksson was frightened beyondpare. He wanted to struggle free but was tightly buckled by Han Shuo with one hand and couldn¡¯t budge.

    ¡°Stop!¡± Kaiser suddenly roared and spurted out a beam of powerful light from his mouth, shooting straight towards Han Shuo¡¯s back.

    ¡°Hehe... ¡° Han Shuoughed sinisterly in a low voice. As though he knew that Kaiser wouldunch an attack, his big hand that was buckling Eriksson¡¯s blood-spraying body suddenly swung into the path of that powerful light beam.

    ¡°Ahh... ¡° Eriksson was struck by the light beam and cried out in pain.

    ¡°See that? He is trying to kill you as well!¡± Han Shuo said with mild schadenfreude in his smile. He even raised his arm that was lodged in Eriksson¡¯s body high up so that the dying Eriksson could see Kaiser.

    Perhaps he had lost too much blood, or perhaps he had lost his mind; Eriksson who was suspended high in the air looked resentfully at a guilty-looking Kaiser up ahead.

    The pair of resentful eyes were actually meant for Han Shuo, but they were directed at Kaiser instead. Kaiser, now flustered, hastily exined, ¡°Eriksson, don¡¯t listen to his nonsense, I was trying to give you a hand!¡±

    Eriksson began to make threatening gestures at Kaiser and tried to pounce on him. ¡°Kaiser you bastard, I will finish you!¡±

    Kaiser was abnormally panicked and evaded him in a flurry while trying to exin, ¡°I really was trying to help you! Eriksson, are you crazy? Our enemy is behind you!¡±

    <i>Pow!</i> Kaiser managed to withdraw and avoid Eriksson pouncing on him, but suddenly felt an enormous amount of energy gush into him from his back. He immediately spat a mouthful of blood. His footsteps were thrown into disorder and his heart was pounding out of his chest.

    ¡°Kaiser you bastard, how are you feeling?¡± When Kaiser turned around, he saw Han Shuo standing erect, wearing a mischievous,cent smile.

    ¡°That voice, that was you?¡± When Kaiser suddenly discovered that Han Shuo was speaking using Eriksson¡¯s voice, he suddenly came to his senses. When he turned to look at Eriksson, he saw that Eriksson was limping feebly on the ground and was hardly able to move. It was only now that he realized that Han Shuo had been controlling Eriksson¡¯s speech and actions like a puppet.

    ¡°Of course it was me. Eriksson is basically done for. How would he have the energy to make so much noise. You are such a fool!¡± Han Shuo ridiculed Kaiser. A smirk of satisfaction crept onto his face as he watched Kaiser with a mouthful of blood after being struck by his sneak attack.

    ¡°Master, his soul energy, it¡¯s not to be reckoned with. It can be turned into a demon general,¡± the Cauldron Spirit transmitted to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Very well, how do I proceed?¡± Han Shuo immediately asked.

    ¡°It¡¯s simple, just let me out and I¡¯ll handle it!¡± Cauldron Spirit replied.

    With one thought, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon whizzed out from Han Shuo¡¯s abdomen and arrived beside Eriksson, who had copsed in a pool of his own blood. The Cauldron of Myriad Demontched itself onto Eriksson¡¯s skull. Misty green light glowed from the cauldron as the scripts on it started wriggling.

    As the master of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, Han Shuo clearly sensed that Eriksson¡¯s divine soul had been sucked into the cauldron. The green light suddenly faded and the Cauldron of Myriad Demon flew back into Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    The Eriksson copsed in a pool of blood was now without his divine soul. It was merely a lifeless body.

    ¡°You, you killed him?!¡± Blood continued to flow from the corners of Kaiser¡¯s lips. His voice was trembling as he couldn¡¯t quite believe what he had just witnessed.

    Han Shuo shrugged and with a rather sinister smile, he said, ¡°Don¡¯t be so astonished. You will soon follow in Eriksson¡¯s footsteps. You two will even continue to be each other¡¯spanion inside my cauldron, you won¡¯t be lonely!¡±

    ¡°Kill me? Can you?¡± It appeared that Kaiser had yet to recognize the situation. He thought the reason that Han Shuo could kill Eriksson was his sneak attack and that Eriksson was too severely injured to begin with.

    Han Shuo did not answer Kaiser but howled withughter. Then, he starting moving his hands about and shot out demonic radiances from his palms. They allnded and vanished on the space around Kaiser.

    At first, Kaiser thought that those radiances would fall on him. When he noticed that all those streaks of demonic radiances werending in empty spaces, he grinned and asked, ¡°What? Having a problem with your aim?¡±

    Han Shuo did not answer with words but simply chuckled. The demonic radiances continued to shoot out from his palm and they allnded in the empty space around Kaiser before they faded with resplendent shes.

    ¡°Can you feel it?¡± Suddenly, Han Shuo stopped the strange, aimless attack and asked Kaiser in a mischievous smile.

    ¡°Feel what?¡± Kaiser was startled and baffled.

    ¡°The trembling of the space! You fool!¡± Han Shuo replied, beaming ear to ear. As he approached Kaiser step by step, he unfurled the Demonic des on his two hands.

    Kaiser¡¯s face froze after hearing those words. It was only now that he could feel the tremblinging from the space around him that started weak but quickly increased in magnitude. The trembling had affected both his body and soul, making him feel powerless and drowsy from head to toe.

    Space Change was one of the attack methods of the Nine Changes realm. Han Shuo came toprehend how to use the attack when he was inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon and wanted to try it out on Kaiser.

    Intense distortions were produced in the space. From outside, it resembled water ripples propagating through a suspended sphere. Han Shuo observed as Kaiser¡¯s body was being twisted and distorted. Blood gushed out from his seven apertures. He was powerless against the attack.

    Soon enough, under the effects of the Space Change, the distortion of space tore open bloody holes all around Kaiser¡¯s body. His blood drizzled all around like awn sprinkler.

    The Cauldron of Myriad Demon that had withdrawn into Han Shuo¡¯s body flew out yet again. It erged in flight and covered down on Kaiser who was at hisst gasp. With a bright sh of green light, Kaiser¡¯s divine soul was captured by the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. His body, without the support of his divine soul, turned into a puddle of bodily fluids. His bones were ground into bone meal and scattered.

    ¡°Master, there will be two additional mystical demonsing soon!¡± the Cauldron Spirit transmitted after returning into Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    ¡°Fantastic! Fantastic!¡± Han Shuo praised. Then, after considering it for a while, he asked the Cauldron Spirit, ¡°In your opinion, if I had fought the two head-on instead of sneaking up on them, what were my chances of winning?¡±

    Although Han Shuo had tested his strength in this new realm, as he had inflicted most of the injuries on them with sneak attacks, and with Kaiser and Eriksson having exhausted a great portion of their divine energy, not being at the top of their game, Han Shuo could not precisely determine the actual strength of his main body from that recent battle.

    The Cauldron Spirit kept silent for a while to carefully think about it. After some time, it replied, ¡°Master, had they not been injured nor frenzied by the demonic formations, in a solo battle, without using the energies of your avatars or mine, you could easily have finished off either one of them.

    ¡°But if they were to join forces, it will be rather difficult to secure a victory without any external energy. But by being good at using stratagem as you did just now, it¡¯s still possible to win. If you hold up one of them using my mystical demons, then you can easily finish them off one by one!

    ¡°Of all the experts in this ce, the only one you cannot defeat for the time being is the one resting with his eyes closed. You need topletely familiarize yourself with the Omen realm before you have a chance of defeating him.

    ¡°In the meantime, although you would have a slight upper hand against him by borrowing some of my energy, it¡¯s still unlikely that you could kill him. This is because I do not have mighty demon generals to utilize and your present strength is unable to unleash my power to its fullest potential. If you want to kill him now, you¡¯ll need to utilize the demonic formations that the Exalted Demonlord deployed during his life.¡±

    The one resting with eyes closed that the Cauldron Spirit was referring to seemed to be Olde. Based on Han Shuo¡¯s understanding, Olde ought to have possessedte-stage midgod strength. From the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s exnation, Han Shuo arrived at a conclusion ¨C his main body currently at the Omen realm probably possessed strength simr to Donna¡¯s ¨C mid-stage midgod power.

    After learning of his actual strength, Han Shuo was incredibly pleased!

    In just nine short days, he had managed to attain such a giant leap in demonic arts and attain such power. There was no way for Han Shuo not to feel excited!

 Chapter 666 - New insight into the edict of destruction

    GDK 666: New insight into the edict of destruction

    After Cauldron Spirit collected Eriksson and Kaiser¡¯s divine souls, Han Shuo did not immediately depart. Instead, he did the one thing he was best at ¨C plundering the dead bodies for the valuables on them.

    As his strength soared, Han Shuo had not plundered the dead for a long time as most of his opponents were much weaker and wouldn¡¯t have carried items valuable enough to be worthy of his time. But of course, this was not the case with Kaiser and Eriksson. As the two used to be midgod existences, Han Shuo believed that surely they carried precious goods on them.

    Han Shuo fished out two pieces of space rings from among the mangled bodies and casually stowed the rings away.

    Cauldron Spirit had warned Han Shuo that the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester located in thisyer of the underground world wouldpletely self-destruct within a short period of time. When the time came, an earth-shattering transformation would take ce. Han Shuo had to leave the st zone as soon as possible lest he suffered the effects while it all crumbled.

    Donna, Bolten, and the others would all y crucial roles in guiding Han Shuo¡¯s way in Elysium, the ne of Gods, and therefore he would not allow these people to die there. Otherwise, without having any connection to anyone living on Elysium, Han Shuo would undoubtedly face great difficulties setting his foot on that unfamiliar material ne.

    With Cauldron Spirit¡¯s guidance, Han Shuo took off towards where Donna and her experts were trapped. While flying over, he weighed in his mind on whether or not he should get rid of Olde.

    Han Shuo understood deep down that if he didn¡¯t get rid of Olde inside the demonic formation, it would be hard, if not impossible, to get rid of Olde when he was outside the demonic formation.

    However, Han Shuo was hesitant about it because there wasn¡¯t much animosity between him and Olde. In addition, Kelly of the Druidic Order had some friendly rtions with him, while the Druidic Order was one of the closest allies to Lancelot Empire. On top of all that, Olde did not show any kind of hostility towards him after his abrupt arrival. For all these reasons, Han Shuo was stuck in indecision.

    With the Cauldron Spirit in control of the demonic formations in this ce, Han Shuo was not worried about how difficult it would be to kill Olde. He was worried about the consequences.

    What was certain was, if Olde died in this ce, then those from the Church of Light and the Druidic Order wouldn¡¯t learn a thing about the soon-to-happen destruction of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester. In that case, those powerhouses would certainly make yet another attempt at traversing to Profound Continent to explore it. Who knew what havoc they would stir up on this material ne by then.

    As though being able to read Han Shuo¡¯s mind, the Cauldron Spirit suggested, ¡°Perhaps this person should be left alive. With him rying news that everything in this ce is destroyed, those from his forces will stop thinking about exploring this ce and there won¡¯t be a constant stream of alien experts making their way over.¡±

    After contemting it for a moment, Han Shuo silently nodded. He too thought that now was not the time to get rid of Olde. Him being alive was more useful than being dead.

    Hence, Han Shuo decided to let Olde off.

    Following Cauldron Spirit¡¯s guidance, Han Shuo arrived at the stone forest that Donna and her experts had stayed in all the while.

    After Han Shuo broke from the party, Cauldron Spirit trapped them in the stone forest and they couldn¡¯t leave the area for all nine days.

    The moment that Han Shuo emerged from the dense fog, Donna and her experts who were trapped for nine days all became incredibly excited and their eyes zed. Li Wei even started screaming and squealing out of excitement.

    ¡°Bryan! You have finally returned! Did you know that we were all trapped here after you left? We couldn¡¯t leave this ce even when we tried your method. Good gracious, we nearly went mad from the boredom!¡± Li Wei shouted as soon as she saw Han Shuo.

    ¡°Come with me, I will lead you all out of here. Soon after I left, this ce started to change. I was trapped for days before I could figure out the new patterns!¡± Han Shuo said with mild agitation. He had an expression that looked as though he had just escaped danger.

    Cauldron Spirit undid the barriers that sealed off the area. With Han Shuo leading the way, Donna and her experts hastily left the stone forest.

    ¡°Bryan, you said you were trapped for a few days as well?¡± Donna asked Han Shuo as soon as they walked out from the predicament.

    ¡°For some reason, many of the patterns in this ce have been altered. Things that I was initially familiar with were suddenly unrecognizable. It took me a long time before I could once again recognize some of the patterns,¡± Han Shuo exined anxiously.

    Han Shuo then gazed at the towering mountains that made up the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester and said gravely to Donna, ¡°Look at those mountains, they seem to be tottering and on the verge of copse. I suggest that we stop venturing further and exit the area until we have a clear view of the situation. What do you think?¡±

    Having heard Han Shuo¡¯s reminder, Donna and her experts started to nce all around hastily. They obviously saw that the mountains were swaying and heavy rumbling noises wereing from the depths of the earth.

    Donna¡¯s eyes widened and she cried out in surprise, ¡°This ce is about to copse!¡±

    ¡°This doesn¡¯t look good. We should get away as soon as we can!¡± Bolten was truly terrified by the strangeness of this ce.

    ¡°Sister Donna, let¡¯s keep away from the area at least temporarily!¡± Li Wei too felt a sense of dread.

    Donna gazed at the mountains in the distance and thought for a moment before she shouted, ¡°Alright, we will seek cover for now!¡±

    Having personally experienced critical circumstances in this ce, Donna understood that this ce was packed with deadly dangers. Given that even Han Shuo had exined he couldn¡¯t proceed deeper, and that she and her party wouldn¡¯t be able to preserve themselves without Han Shuo¡¯s assistance, she resolutelymanded the team to retreat.

    The heavy rumbling became clearly audible from all directions. From what the Cauldron Spirit had ryed to him, Han Shuo knew that the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester was on the very brink of copse. He ordered, ¡°Fall back in the direction we came from. Everything here is about to crumble and those danger zones appear to be harmless now. I can guarantee that all of you will be safe and sound as long as you follow right behind me,¡±

    Donna and her experts did not raise a single objection and chased behind Han Shuo, rapidly returning to where they entered. With Cauldron Spirit¡¯s help, the demonic formations in Han Shuo¡¯s path were all disabled, allowing Han Shuo and his party an unimpeded withdrawal.

    Meanwhile, with the Cauldron Spirit controlling the demonic formation in the dark, the set of demonic formations that had trapped Olde all along were also switched off.

    The heavy and dull rumbling caused Olde to jump up in fright. He could not maintain that unruffled frame of mind any longer and started to look all around anxiously. The reason that Olde could previously remain calm and rest to recover his divine energy was that he understood that the peculiar environment around him was merely trapping them and was not threatening their lives.

    However, those rumbling noises apanied by the intense quaking of the earth gave Olde a feeling that everything around him would soon be destroyed. He truly had lost his head and could no longer keep a peaceful mind. He struggled to locate a way out.

    Kelly standing beside him had despair smeared all over his face. He had given up all hope and was silently waiting for death to befall him.

    Suddenly, Olde noticed a beam of gaudy light shining in the distance and began to probe it with his soul. Immediately, he discovered that it was a way out. Olde was overjoyed. Without thinking, he instantly grabbed Kelly beside him and bolted towards the exit.

    As soon as Olde exited thebination of demonic formations, he found himself in an environment formed with uniquely arranged mountains. Big and small boulders were tumbling down with loud rumbles. The surface of the earth was torn to form ravines. It was akin to an enraged monster being awoken from its slumber and was thrashing the ce furiously.

    Olde was rmed. Given the circumstances, he had no time to record or observe the miraculousness of his environment. While carrying Kelly, he flew towards where Han Shuo and the others escaped.

    As Olde and Kelly were a littlete in departing the area, rocks, boulders and sand were crashing down towards Olde and Kelly. The properties of the falling debris were altered by Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord. They were so violent and erratic that Olde had a hard time handling them.

    <i>Pow! Pow!</i> Several enormous rocks traveling in trajectories which Olde could not predict crashed down on him. The rocks seemed to contain some bizarre energy for it was almost too much for a midgod such as Olde to bear. Every time Olde was struck by one, his body would shudder and his steps would stagger.

    ¡°Lord Olde, leave me behind, leave this ce without me!¡± Kelly had been under Olde¡¯s protection all along and he was very touched. He felt honored to have a such a distinguished god from a high-level material ne who served the Goddess of Nature being so caring towards him. Seeing that Olde was having difficulties withstanding the impacts, during such critical moments, Kelly offered to be left behind.

    ¡°If I could bring you in alive, then I can sure bring you out alive! A follower of the Goddess as pious as you are must live on!¡± Olde spat out blood that was mixed with crushed bones and flesh. When he discovered that he could not dodge those bizarre rocks that were falling down, he came to a bold decision. He clenched his teeth and ceased to avoid those falling rocks, instead flying up towards the exit at his top speed.

    Olde had no other choice! At this point in time, the mountains all around him were on the verge of copse and coulde down at any moment. Given that just these falling rocks were almost too much for Olde to endure, Olde believed that once those mountains copse, his fate would be sealed.

    While recklessly charging ahead, Olde was mercilessly rained down on by more boulders. His divine body was heavily injured and exhausted.

    Olde had never imagined that these normal looking falling rocks found in this low-level material ne called Profound Continent could actually cause him such immense injuries and agony. He finally understood how it was possible that his ancestor disappeared in such a ce.

    At longst, Olde managed toe out from the crumbling Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester with Kelly. When they appeared before Han Shuo, Donna, and the others, Kelly looked utterly miserable and wretched. Even his body was swaying and staggering.

    The faces of Bolten, Li Wei, and the others suddenly jolted. They put on an eager appearance, thinking that this would be the best opportunity to get rid of Olde.

    But before Bolten or Li Wei could do a thing, Han Shuo suddenly stepped forward and asked in an amicable manner, ¡°Are you alright?¡± With his back towards Bolten and Li Wei, Han Shuo made gestures at them with a hand on his back.

    Donna, who saw that Olde was heavily injured and was hesitating about going offensive, curbed Li Wei and Bolten with her eyes as soon as she saw Han Shuo¡¯s hand gestures. She even spontaneously took Li Wei and the others a few steps backward to make some distance with Olde as though signaling to Olde their non-aggression.

    Olde may have been heavily injured but he was prepared to fight to his death. When he saw Han Shuo suddenly step forward and Donna and her team immediately step down, his heart that was on guard loosened up slightly. He drew back the divine energy he had prepared to use in an all-out fight and silently recovered the divine energy in his body.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry! We carry no hostile intention!¡± through Cauldron Spirit¡¯s observation, Han Shuo knew that Olde¡¯s mind was perturbed and his body injured but he still had the power to fight. Besides, as Han Shuo needed Olde to stay alive to deliver the information about the impending utter destruction of this unique ce to his faction, Han Shuo had no hope of causing him death.

    ¡°That¡¯d be the best. I really was afraid of that happening,¡± Olde replied with a faint smile. He then gazed at Han Shuo pensively as he felt rather baffled. He couldn¡¯t understand why Han Shuo would interrupt his teammates or his intentions behind doing so. <i>Could he have made it out that I still have the strength for self-preservation? Impossible! Then, did he do that because he wanted to save me? That¡¯s even more unbelievable!</i> Olde waspletely puzzled.

    <i>Rumbles...</i> A terrifying explosion sounded from behind Olde.

    Immediately, the crowd turned around and ced theirplete attention on the source of the sound. They were appalled to find that within such a short time, the several mountains surrounding them hadpletely crumbled into the earth that was rent. Dust and sand wereunched into the sky. Universe-shaking rumbles continued to roar from that region.

    The destruction went on before their attentive gazes. Dust filled the air, sand and stone were sent flying, the mountains were crumbling, and the earth was tearing. Everything and everything was being obliterated!

    All of a sudden, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon seemed to haveprehended something through the visual observation of Han Shuo¡¯s main body. It immediately quieted down inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon.

    Han Shuomunicated with the Cauldron Spirit using his consciousness and discovered that the Cauldron Spirit hadpletely removed all the negative energy and deceased souls from his avatar of destruction formed from the Demonyer Edge. All that was left in the avatar was the purest divine energy of destruction.

    Han Shuo immediately recognized that the scene of destruction he was watching using his main body had given his avatar that cultivated in the edict of destruction some sort of inspiration and insight.

    Ever since his avatar of destruction was formed, it had nevere to gain such unusual insight just from observing the changes to his surroundings. Han Shuo was overjoyed to discover this phenomenon. He knew that the Cauldron Spirit was indeed correct. It was only after removing the impurities in his avatar of destruction that he could gain such new insights into the edict of destruction.

    Pleasantly surprised by the discovery, Han Shuo attentively watched theplete destruction of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester and did not rx by the slightest.

    This Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester personally deployed by Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord was a marvelous masterpiece that took Han Shuo here from another universe. Even as it hadpleted its mission and was being destructed, it brought Han Shuo a final gift.

    As Han Shuo watched the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester ahead of him being destroyed, he somehow felt that its end signified the beginning of his new life!

 Chapter 667 - Not a trace left

    GDK 667: Not a trace left

    Finally, the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester hadpletely turned into ruins right before the silently gazing crowd.

    After the dust settled, no noteworthy features were to be seen on the site. Han Shuo stood tall on the horizon and continued to observe the environment ahead.

    ¡°Go over and have a look at the situation in there. Given that it has turned into ruins, I doubt that there would be any dangers to be found!¡± Han Shuo suddenly suggested to his teammates.

    After having experienced the trials and hardships, Donna and her experts were very trusting towards Han Shuo. After hearing Han Shuo¡¯s suggestion, they thought it through for a moment and started moving towards the wreckage of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester.

    After taking a few steps, Li Wei stopped to find Han Shuo motionless. She turned around and asked confusedly, ¡°Aren¡¯t youing?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t think there will be anything interesting left to be examined. Besides, with all of you probing the ce, it¡¯s not necessary for me to be there,¡± Han Shuo smiled and calmly replied.

    Li Wei creased her brows and thought for a moment before she softly giggled and said, ¡°Oh, that makes sense. Well, since sister Donna is going to probe the ce, I guess it¡¯s redundant for me to do the same.¡±

    After finishing those words, Li Wei walked back and stood still beside Han Shuo. She was looking at Han Shuo up and down with eyes that were glowing with interest and captivation.

    Han Shuo however, ignored Li Wei and cast his gazes on Olde instead. Olde put on a brilliant smile and said in a candid manner, ¡°Many thanks for your help just then. Otherwise, perhaps I would have lost my life to them by now!¡±

    During the period of time they spent watching the copse, Olde managed to recover some divine energy. His pale cheeks were yet again tinged with a healthy shade of red. Olde must have regained his confidence, Han Shuo figured.

    Previously, using the energy absorbed from the Tree of Life, wood elite zombie managed to increase the rejuvenation speed of Han Shuo¡¯s heavily injured body ten times over. From this experience, it became apparent to him that those who cultivated in the edict of life could rejuvenate much fasterpared to a cultivator of other energies. For Olde to be able to restore some of his divine energy within such a short period of time was all within Han Shuo¡¯s anticipation.

    ¡°You¡¯re wee. I believe that had theyunched an attack earlier, everyone would be done for by now!¡± Han Shuo replied with a smirk.

    Olde stared into his eyes for a moment and nodded. He praised in a deep voice, ¡°You, young man, are an excellentd.¡± Olde seemed to admire Han Shuo.

    ¡°I¡¯m ttered,¡± Han Shuo replied while smiling mischievously. At this point in time, having possessed the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, Han Shuo was no longer afraid of Olde as a potential threat. After his confidence swelled, he too became much more rxed in his speech.

    Olde suddenly pointed at Kelly and asked Han Shuo for a favor, ¡°Do you mind looking after Kelly for me for a moment? I heard that you have been friendly in the past.¡±

    Han Shuo was astounded. He couldn¡¯t understand why would Olde be so at ease to ce Kelly under his care as Li Wei was still hanging around him. The fact stood that he was still on the same front with Donna and her experts, and they surely did not have any friendly rtions with Olde. In that case, what was the purpose behind him doing so? Was Olde trying to test him?

    A series of thoughts rapidly shed through Han Shuo¡¯s mind. Then, under Olde¡¯s gaze, Han Shuo put on a bright smile. ¡°No problem!¡±

    Kelly was merely a demigod. That kind of strength was nothing in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, let alone to Li Wei and the others. For them, Kelly was merely a puny little character. His fate would have no influence on the overall situation. Han Shuo did not think that Li Wei and the others would even be interested in harming Kelly.

    ¡°I owe you one!¡± Olde smiled, nodded at Kelly, and took off into the air towards the destroyed Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester.

    Donna and her experts were interested in the region and so was Olde. He was certainly not about to give up until he fully understood the situation there.

    After Olde flew off into the distance, Li Wei, who was standing beside Han Shuo, put on a pensive expression. Her eyes nced back and forth between Han Shuo and Kelly but she did not utter a word or do anything harmful towards Kelly.

    ¡°It¡¯s been a while!¡± Han Shuo tried to initiate a conversation with Kelly. His voice was soft and amiable as though he was oblivious to the situation.

    Kelly, however, did not share the same feeling. Ever since he discovered that Han Shuo was a gang with this bunch from the Cmity Church, he felt somewhat ufortable whenever he saw Han Shuo. He had an awkward expression and did not know how to reply.

    Seeing that Kelly couldn¡¯t open up his heart, Han Shuo sighed softly. He shook his head and ceased his attempts at trying to talk to Kelly. He understood that it would be very difficult for them to interact as they had been in the past.

    Han Shuo stopped talking and stared nkly ahead. His avatar of destruction within the Cauldron of Myriad Demon was digesting the catastrophic scene which his main body witnessed. The scene of total annihtion gave his avatar deeper insight into the edict of destruction and caused him to sink into contemtion.

    Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord who had deployed everything in this ce made this site self-destruct in a way that was in conformance with a certain naturalw.

    This avatar that was recently shed of all impurities was connected with Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness who witnessed the destruction. He seemed to haveprehended a certain true essence of destruction from the apocalyptic scene. While constantly reying the terrifying scene in his mind, he attempted to imitate the condition when those mountains were destroyed using the divine energy in his body.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness possessed countless miraculous uses. Although he could not share most of its wonderful uses with his other two souls, his two other souls could still benefit from his consciousness as they were connected with each other.

    By using the mighty ability of his consciousness to recall, Han Shuo slowed down the yback of the destructive scene down to each frame, clearly resolved every crack in the mountains and every piece of falling rock down to the finest detail before transmitting it to his avatar that cultivated in the edict of destruction.

    Those images would then be projected into the divine soul of his destruction avatar. The divine energy of destruction in his body would then slowly circte in a certain trajectory that was harmonious with the scene of destruction. By doing so, he gradually came to realize a certain essence of the edict of destruction.

    Han Shuo possessed three souls and they did not interfere with each other. While his avatar contemted on the edict of destruction inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, Han Shuo¡¯s main body could still converse with Olde and function as usual.

    As the avatar continued with its contemtion, Han Shuo gazed ahead at the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester in the distance that was now inplete ruin while conversing with Li Wei.

    Li Wei¡¯s attitude towards him which was contemptuous at the beginning had now transformed into admiration ¨C a change that caught Han Shuo well off guard.

    Han Shuo was not willing to answer or share most of the questions that Li Wei had for him. Therefore, Han Shuo had unenthusiastically replied to her questions with gibberish and nonsense. As Li Wei hailed Han Shuo as a genius, she considered all his unintelligible exnations as profound words. She would spend a great deal of time pondering Han Shuo¡¯s mumbo jumbo each time he answered, leaving Han Shuo betweenughter and tears.

    Meanwhile, Kelly shut his eyes and kept silent as though he was half-asleep. He seemed to be doing do to keep a suitable distance from Han Shuo.

    The situation continued that way for some time before Olde, who was thest to leave, returned to them.

    Han Shuo, in his half-hearted chatter with Li Wei, immediately turned his attention to Olde. With just one look, Han Shuo could tell that Olde was very disappointed. He definitely did not find anything valuable in that ce.

    Olde nodded at Han Shuo, thanked him, and said to Kelly, ¡°Let¡¯s go.¡±

    Kelly was feeling very awkward around Han Shuo. He scurried back to Olde. The two then made their way towards the exit.

    ¡°They left? Just like that?¡± Li Wei was astonished and puzzled.

    ¡°What else could he do? He went inside to probe the ce but did not discover anything. There is nothing else for him to do here,¡± Han Shuo said calmly. He understood that this self-destruct mechanism left by Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord must have destroyed all evidence in this ce. Even if there were more who came to examine, they would not discover a single unusual thing about this site.

    From that point onwards, everything that took ce there would forever remain an unresolved mystery to those people. With the passage of time, those gods from high-level material nes who could no longer find anything extraordinary about this ce would gradually forget or even misinterpret what happened there. They might think of everything that once happened here as some exaggerated tales.

    ¡°We all know just how extraordinary this ce is. How could he give up so willingly?¡± Li Wei still couldn¡¯t understand and had a puzzled face.

    Han Shuo smiled and did not reply. He was convinced that no one would ever again find anything unique about this site. With that, everyone would forget about this ce very quickly.

    Soon enough, Donna, Bolten, and the others returned with disappointed looks on their faces.

    ¡°This is so strange! Besides the copsed mountains and the torn earth, there wasn¡¯t a single astonishing thing that could be found. What is actually going on here?!¡± Bolten muttered while scratching his head. He had racked his brain hard and yet was no closer to having a clue.

    ¡°Bryan, do you know what¡¯s going on inside? Why is it that everything has changed and there are no longer any unusual marks?¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head and put on a perplexed appearance before he sighed and said, ¡°I¡¯m not sure either. I personally think that that strangeness was formed by nature, and now these spectacr sights are being destroyed by nature. That¡¯s why everything strange about this ce no longer exists!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s impossible!¡± Li Wei shouted, ¡°There are obvious traces that this ce was artificially made. There¡¯s nothing natural about it!¡±

    If even Li Wei could tell that, surely Donna wouldn¡¯t buy his attempt at distorting the truth. However, with everything here destroyed, Han Shuo didn¡¯t feel worried about that suspicion at all. He shrugged, shook his head again and said, ¡°Well, I have no idea!¡±

    ¡°Forget about it, I highly doubt that we will discover any more over here. Let¡¯s go. We¡¯ll return to the surface and then decide what to do next,¡± Donna said. She was having a headache, not knowing what to report back to her superiors.

    Donna and her experts who had discovered basically nothing in the underground world, with Han Shuo¡¯s guidance, returned to the surface with puzzled minds.

    ¡°Sister Donna, what do we do now?¡± Li Wei asked as soon as they exited the underground world.

    Donna let out a sigh and scoffed helplessly, ¡°What else? Report back the situation here to our higher ups, of course!¡±

    ¡°Do we return directly or use an altar?¡± Bolten asked.

    Donna bunched her brows and thought for a moment before she answered, ¡°Let¡¯s go to the Cmity Church establishment here to submit our mission reports. Kaiser and Eriksson have yet toe out of there even now. They are probably all dead. I guess that can be counted as a small achievement. To add to the fact that the opponent¡¯s internar transportation matrix is destroyed, I suppose we are the victor of this muddled battle.¡±

    ¡°Although the matter was rather muddled, one thing was clear ¨C without Bryan, the few of us wouldn¡¯t have left the underground world alive!¡± Bolten suddenly said smilingly.

    Upon hearing those words, the party simultaneously nodded their heads. Donna turned to look at that smiling but silent Han Shuo and sternly promised, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I will make sure to include your contributions in my report. In all likelihood, they are going to hand this material ne over to you!¡±

    ¡°Those from the Church of Light and Shrine of Ice, are they going toe back?¡± Han Shuo was most concerned about this potential threat.

    ¡°Before those in the higher ups hand the material ne to you, they will definitely negotiate with those powerhouses. Actually, you are worrying too much. If the circumstances were anything but ordinary, they wouldn¡¯t have done such a thing. Now that the ce is destroyed, those powerhouses will not take interest in such a low-level material ne,¡± Donna said Han Shuo in an attempt to reassure him.

    Han Shuo regained hisposure. The poption of Profound Continent was small and the power of faith they could provide was limited. Material nes as low-level as this were plenty in the boundless universe. Material nes that were much more expansive and valuable than Profound Continent could be found in excess. There was simply no reason those powerhouses would waste their time and effort on such a low-level material ne.

    ¡°That¡¯d be wonderful!¡± Han Shuo could finally be at ease. ¡°Well, I won¡¯t be going to the Cmity Church with the rest of you. The matters in this material ne that require my attention are too abundant!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, there¡¯s something I need to tell you but I don¡¯t know if it¡¯s appropriate!¡± Donna suddenly said in a serious tone.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a second before asking, ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡±

    ¡°Profound Continent is just a low-level material ne, it¡¯s too small for you. Someone as talented as you ought to live on material nes of a much higher level. It is only in those material nes that you can grow more powerful and gain more energy much more rapidly. I personally feel that it¡¯s not suitable for you to stay in this world for extended periods!¡± Donna said in a deadly earnest manner.

    ¡°Thank you for your reminder. I know what you mean. My view has definitely broadened aftering into contact with you all. I can¡¯t say for sure but perhaps after I havepleted my matters over here, I might leave for your homeworld, Elysium. I¡¯m counting on you to prop me up by then!¡±

    ¡°Hehe, no problem! It¡¯s rare to find people who are calm, steady, and decisive like yourself on Elysium. I believe that after youe to the ne of Gods, you will soar ande to gain a piece of the sky!¡± Donna dly promised.

    ¡°Bryan, when you arrive at Elysium, remember toe to our family where you¡¯ll find yourself most weed by us Brook brothers!¡± Bolten reminded Han Shuo about his invitation.

    ¡°Don¡¯t forget me, I also invited you. Don¡¯t forget me when youe to Elysium!¡± Li Wei said smilingly.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I will remember!¡± Han Shuo promised.

    Soon after, Donna and her experts left Han Shuo and began their journey to the Cmity Church. After thinking for a moment, Han Shuo flew in the direction of Sunshine Valley.

 Chapter 668 - This material plane is yours!

    GDK 668: This material ne is yours!

    Donna¡¯s words made Han Shuo resolute on leaving for Elysium. However, there were some people on Profound Continent that he just couldn¡¯t leave behind ¨C his women.

    Although Emily, Phoebe, and others were considered to have outstanding strength on the Profound Continent, their strengths were unfortunately far below necessary to leave with him.

    On the ounts of Donna and the others, Han Shuo learned that Elysium was a material ne packed with godly experts who were in possession of an uncountable number of material nes in this universe. Those withte-stage lowgod strengths like the Brook brothers and Li Wei were plenty to be found and were nothing extraordinary on Elysium. Therefore, if Emily, Phoebe, and the others were to venture there along with him, nothing could guarantee their safeties.

    Han Shuo¡¯s ken had increased along with his vastly improved strength. At this point in time, Han Shuo had no opponent on the Profound Continent that could threaten his life. In addition to Han Shuo having no wish to silently guard the Profound Continent for the rest of his life as the Primordius Dragon did, naturally, Han Shuo would advance to a higher-level material ne.

    While Han Shuo pondered over how he should tell his women about this issue, unwittingly, he found himself at the doorstep of Sunshine Valley.

    Jasper, Hemanna, Sylph, and Sanguis had been waiting for Han Shuo at Sunshine Valley and were exceedingly excited about his arrival. They demanded that Han Shuo bring them sightseeing.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart ached when he saw Jasper and the others so excited. These people had traversed across material nes toe to Profound Continent with him but he had left them in this valley all along. And now, he would have to heartlessly leave them to venture to a higher-level material ne alone. It appeared that being in a rtionship had its inconveniences.

    <i>I may only bring them along once I have gained a footing on Elysium. For now, I have no choice but to toughen my heart,</i> Han Shuo thought to himself as he watched the beautiful smiles of hisdies.

    Han Shuo spent a few days in Sunshine Valley and kept Jasper, Hemanna, and Sylph apanied. He did not forget to attentively guide Sanguis in his cultivation of Bloodgod Mantra.

    For several days, Han Shuo brought Jasper and the others around famous mountains and great rivers in Sunshine Valley. He also bought themrge quantities of jewelry at Valen City.

    Those days were the happiest days for Jasper, Hemanna, and Sylph. Han Shuo was soft and tender and fulfilled all their long-cherished wishes. Every day felt to them more beautiful than thest.

    However, good days are always so brief and short. After allowing Jasper and the others to understand Profound Continent as much as did, on this fateful day, Han Shuo finally revealed his intentions to the Abyssians.

    Jasper, Hemanna, and Sylph were terrified when they learned of Han Shuo¡¯s wish to leave the continent. They even thought that they had somehow made Han Shuo unhappy. But after a round of exnation, they finally understood the reason behind Han Shuo¡¯s decision.

    After a moment of silence, while looking at Han Shuo with eyes of sorrowful bitterness, Jasper asked, ¡°Then, after you leave, are youing back?¡±

    ¡°Of course! Once I have stable footing there, I wille back to bring you all over!¡± Han Shuo pledged resolutely. He continued to console them softly, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m not abandoning you. If not for the fact that that world is just too dangerous, I wouldn¡¯t ask you to stay away from me a second longer than necessary!¡±

    The sole internar transportation matrix on Profound Continent was in Han Shuo¡¯s possession. He could leave and return with ease if he wanted to.

    With Han Shuo¡¯s assurance, Jasper grudgingly agreed, ¡°Fine. I¡¯ll be waiting for you!¡± Hemanna and Sylph nodded despondently with Jasper.

    Han Shuo spent more time to furtherfort Jasper before he went to meet Trunks briefly and left Sunshine Valley.

    As soon as he arrived at Ossen City, Han Shuo searched for Emily, Phoebe, and Fanny. The contents of their conversation was simr to what he said to the Abyssiandies.

    The reactions of the three were just like Jasper and the others¡¯ when they heard that Han Shuo wanted to leave Profound Continent yet again. Han Shuo could do nothing but repeat the same persuasion, telling them that as soon as he established himself on the Elysium, he would return to Profound Continent and bring them with him.

    After trying his very best to persuade the mournful, weepingdies, although he too was feeling reluctant at heart, Han Shuo managed to make it past this barrier.

    In Lancelot Empire, Emily, Phoebe, and Fanny were basically Han Shuo¡¯s spokespeople. His threedies could convey the information to Lawrence instead of having to meet him personally.

    Han Shuo spent the next couple of days in Ossen City. He did not forget to look for Lisa and talk to her about it. Just as with his otherdies, it took Han Shuo a bit of effort to convince her.

    During those days, Han Shuo had carefully and detailedly exined and lectured once through his own understanding of bing a god. He hoped that this would help grow stronger even faster.

    On the day that Han Shuo was prepared to depart Ossen City and head to Brettel City, Olde, whom he had met at the thirdyer of the underground world just days prior, unexpectedly came to Han Shuo.

    ¡°How did you find me here?¡± Han Shuo was rather astonished at Olde. After meeting him again several dayster, Olde seemed to have mostly recovered and looked to have great vitality. That miserable and battered appearance he was dealt in the underground world was nowhere to be seen.

    ¡°I just happened to pass by here. Your life signature is very strong and you did not deliberately conceal it. Ordinary persons may not have been able to discover your presence, but I knew it was you once we got close!¡± Olde exined in a warm voice while looking at Han Shuo with a subtle smile.

    Olde was a cultivator of the edict of life. Han Shuo knew that Olde¡¯s words were true. Within a certain range, Olde could indeed sense the presence of other mighty life signatures.

    This was especially so on this material ne. The only godly existence to be found, other than Donna and her Elysians, was Han Shuo. Such an abnormally strong life signature among the crowd of weak life signatures was just too conspicuous to Olde. Therefore, it wasn¡¯t surprising that Olde could find him through his senses.

    ¡°I see. What can I help you with?¡± Han Shuo creased his brows and asked. He wasn¡¯t quite sure about Olde¡¯s intentions.

    ¡°Congrattions, this material ne is yours!¡±

    Han Shuo thought for a moment, then asked, ¡°Did those on the high-level reach some kind of agreement?¡±

    ¡°Smart one!¡± Olde praised Han Shuo before exining, ¡°With that underground ce destroyed, this material ne has basically lost its appeal. But still, our forces have yed a not so honorable role by giving you a hand. Otherwise, those on the Church of Light and Shrine of Ice wouldn¡¯t have been so willing to back down.¡±

    ¡°Why?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    ¡°Our Order has an agreement with Lancelot Empire in which we are free to practice and disseminate our teaching in its territories. Given the current trend, it¡¯s only a matter of time before Lancelot Empire bes the mightiest nation on this material ne. We have our own interests to safeguard.

    ¡°I believe you will officially receive the information very soon. Consider this heads-up as a courtesy from me. The agreement also states that you may not further ughter the followers of the Shrine of Ice and Church of Light, while they will stop recruiting more followers. After some time, following the natural death of their remaining followers, those two religions willpletely disappear from the face of Profound Continent. As for those new lives that will be born, our Druidic Order and those on your side will just try to win them over through our own respective efforts.¡±

    Han Shuo thought for a while after listening to Olde¡¯s words. He understood that the Church of Light and Shrine of Ice were merely trying to preserve the lives of the followers they had left, who would eventually die of old age. With time, their influences wouldpletely vanish from the face of Profound Continent. It appeared that the two religious organizations had basically given up on this material ne.

    The reason that the Druidic Order had yed the role as an arbitrator was likely because they had something to gain out of it, albeit small and insignificant.

    ¡°Well, I¡¯m fine with that. Is there anything else I need to pay special attention to?¡± Han Shuo asked after keeping silent for a moment.

    ¡°Just onest thing, I hope that Lancelot Empire will avoid bloodshed as much as possible in its world conquest! The Church of Light and Shrine of Ice will no longer get involved in any more affairs on this continent. Lancelot Empire, with the support of our Druidic Order and your forces, will inevitably unify the entire Profound Continent under its rule. But we do not wish to see this world be filled with rivers of blood and hope to avoid casualties as much as possible,¡± Olde shook his head and sighed before he said to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo silently nodded and agreed. He then looked at Olde in a puzzled manner and asked, ¡°Is that all you have to say to me after taking the trouble to see me in person?¡±

    ¡°I heard from Kelly that you cultivate in a type of miraculous energy which he praises ceaselessly. May I have the honor to take a look at it in person?¡± Olde asked while he looked deeply into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes.

    Han Shuo was startled. He thought, <i>don¡¯t tell me that Olde has discovered something?</i>He considered it for a while, but did not feel that he had revealed any smoking gun. His expression remained unchanged while a series of thoughts rapidly shed through his mind. Suddenly, he shook his head and said, ¡°Previously I did indeed develop a type of martial technique by ident. However, I hadpletely forgotten about the martial technique the moment I became a god. The twelve fundamental energies are the most promising and prevailing paths. If I were to distract myself with other martial arts, I will only end up getting nowhere. I¡¯m very sorry!¡±

    Olde stared nkly after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s exnation. He looked Han Shuo up and down and even secretly probed Han Shuo using his soul.

    Olde was foolish to think that Han Shuo had no way of detecting his secret probing because of his much more advanced realm, but not only did Han Shuo possess a most miraculous consciousness, he also had the Cauldron Spirit inside his body. Therefore, Han Shuo managed to clearly see and evade Olde¡¯s soul probing.

    After the breakthrough of his main body to the Omen realm, he could transfer and allocate the energies of his avatars as he wished. On top of having the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s assistance, even as Olde spent half the day surveying Han Shuo¡¯s life signature using his soul, he couldn¡¯t find anything unusual on Han Shuo.

    ¡°I see. Nevermind then!¡± Olde gave up after he discovered nothing.

    ¡°Oh, by the way, at the depths of the Boundless Sea of this continent, someone had once seen a pile of miraculous remains underneath an ind. Perhaps that might interest you?¡± Han Shuo suddenly said after thinking for a while. As there was a tacit agreement between the Druidic Order and the Cmity Church, Han Shuo was not afraid that Olde might discover the Cemetery of Death he hid over there. Besides, perhaps someday in the future, Olde might return this favor to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Is there anything particrly unique about it?¡± Olde asked casually.

    ¡°The nts that grew around the pile of bones are rather strange and unique. It was said that someone sank there after being seriously injured. But not only did the person not perish, but its wounded organs were also magically healed. Don¡¯t you find that somewhat baffling?¡± Han Shuo smilingly said.

    ¡°Where is that ind located?¡± Olde¡¯s eyes widened and he anxiously asked.

    Han Shuo smilingly informed him of its location. When Olde was about to depart in haste, Han Shuo hurriedly shouted, ¡°If I find the thing you seek, don¡¯t forget that this will be a favor you will owe me! You will have to repay it someday in the future!¡±

    ¡°If what you say is true, I will make sure to return this favor to you in the future!¡± Olde promised Han Shuo without even turning his head.

 Chapter 669 - Hand me whatever punishment you like!

    GDK 669: Hand me whatever punishment you like!

    ***Lancelot Empire, Brettel City.

    Han Shuo wanted to leave some instructions before leaving the continent. But the good thing was, Jack and the others had long been used to Han Shuo disappearing mysteriously. Therefore, there really was nothing that he needed to worry about in Brettel City.

    After leaving some instructions, he looked for Helen and repeated the same conversation he had with Jasper and the others. After making Helen the same promises, Han Shuo finally managed to appease her.

    Sophie, who originated from Kasi Empire, had moved to Brettel City with her entire family. He learned from certain people that Sophie¡¯s father had the intention of matchmaking him with Sophie. However, Han Shuo was already finding it difficult to handle the number ofpanions he already had. After breaking through the Carnal realm, Han Shuo had no wish of getting more partners. Therefore, he kept away from Sophie as much as possible.

    Gilbert too was in Brettel City. Although the resurrected Gilbert had much-improved strength, Han Shuo did not let Gilbert follow him to Elysium.

    At this point in time, Gilbert was still oblivious to the massacre of the race of dark dragons, but Han Shuo knew that he would find out eventually. Therefore, before he left, he told Gilbert the tragedy that befell the dark dragons.

    Gilbert couldn¡¯t restrain himself, howling and whimpering grievously when he learned that his grandpa, Gilges, his only close rtive was murdered.

    Han Shuo did not know what to do as he watched Gilbert in all his agony. He could not even utter aforting word. The death of the dark dragons who had been faithfully guarding the path to the thirdyer of the underground world, directly or indirectly, had something to do with Han Shuo. He med himself for not being more cautious, otherwise, he could have prevented the tragedy.

    Although he had personally killed both Kaiser and Eriksson, Han Shuo¡¯s heart was still remorseful and he could notpletely get over it.

    When Gilbert learned that the main culprits of the crime, Kaiser and Eriksson, were both killed by Han Shuo, he suddenly felt very powerless. Without a target for his revenge, he couldn¡¯t find anything to vent his hatred on.

    Han Shuo¡¯s departure was rather easy for Gilbert to ept. Perhaps his grandfather¡¯s death had diluted his reluctance to part with Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo knew that Gilbert wouldn¡¯t be able to walk out from the sorrow so soon. After imparting to Gilbert a few pieces of advice, he let Gilbert take his time to mourn and left.

    After dealing with all those things, Han Shuo headed to the Cmity Church headquarters.

    With his status as a Cardinal, this time, Han Shuo no longer needed to traverse across the desert on foot. He directly arrived at the Cmity Church headquarters using a magical transportation matrix.

    He had received messages from Cmity Church members in Lancelot Empire a few days earlier asking him to return to headquarters as soon as possible.

    Han Shuo made a fair assumption that Donna wanted to meet him and brief him on certain things rted to this continent.

    After arriving at the Cmity Church, through the Cmity Pope, he soon met Donna and the others at a secret shrine.

    The matter about alien experts arriving on Profound Continent was only revealed to the plump Pope and certain cardinals of the Cmity Church. Other ordinary church members were left in the dark.

    When Han Shuo arrived at the secret shine, he was surprised to find that Kironlo, who had animosity with him, was also present.

    As the oldest member of the Cmity Church on Profound Continent, Kironlo was one of the few who knew of Donna and her experts¡¯ identities. But unfortunately for him, Kironlo was unaware of Han Shuo¡¯s rtionship with those godly experts. As soon as Han Shuo stepped into the shrine, Kironlo, who had once been humiliated and punished by Han Shuo, thinking that his own safety was guaranteed with their presences, immediately began to heavily denounce Han Shuo.

    When Han Shuo stepped into the shrine, Kironlo immediately stood up from his seat and denounced Han Shuo in a righteous manner. ¡°Revered Divine Envoys, this chap called Bryan is certainly not a pious believer. His strength has only managed to advance this greatly because he relied on the divine weapon, the skeletal staff, which he obtained out of coincidence. All these years he had been arrogant and condescending. He shows us elders no due respect. He has vited the rules of the Church!¡±

    The Cmity Pope had no idea about the previous interactions between Han Shuo and Donna. He only knew that Han Shuo yed the role of a guide for the party and had absolutely no idea that Han Shuo had saved these eminent gods from potential death. The pope was beginning to worry when he heard Kironlo distort the facts so firmly, not knowing if Donna and the others would listen to Kironlo¡¯s usations.

    The Cmity Church was indeed a religious organization that ced emphasis on seniority. Kironlo was well aware of this. It was also clear to him that his own strength was far beneath Han Shuo¡¯s and therefore he seized this once in a blue moon opportunity to nder Han Shuo. He was determined to have Han Shuo suffer the rage of Donna and her experts before they departed from this continent.

    ¡°Skeletal staff. Hehe, that¡¯s the divine weapon my grandfather previously used!¡± Li Wei giggled and shot Han Shuo a nce.

    <i>Well well!</i> Han Shuo was astonished. His gazes towards Li Wei turned slightly more cordial.

    ¡°Revered Divine Envoys, this person will only break the rules and practices of the Cmity Church. This will be unfavorable to the growth of the Church. But regrettably, his power is great and no one in the Church could restrain him. Even I was severely injured by him. It is fortunate that Your Holinesses hase. Otherwise, who knows what more havoc this person will make!¡± Kironlo said with righteous indignation. Those who don¡¯t know otherwise might have actually thought that he had invested and contributed a lot to the Cmity Church.

    ¡°Bryan, how do you plead?¡± Donna smiled sweetly and asked Han Shuo amusingly.

    Han Shuo had gone through life and death situations with Donna and her experts, not to mention that he had saved them multiple times. The intimacy of their rtionships simply wasn¡¯t something that Kironlo could imagine.

    Before Donna¡¯s amused gazes, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help butugh out loud. He giggled, ¡°Oh that¡¯s absolutely correct. I¡¯m condescending and love to throw my weight around. I will kill whoever I don¡¯t like! I¡¯m much worse than he describes me to be. Hand me whatever punishment you like!¡±

    Han Shuo had learned from Olde the decision made by those in the high-levels ¨C the whole Profound Continent was to be given to him. This meant that Han Shuo was the rightful owner of every inch ofnd, every speckle of dust, and every living being on this material ne. He was the true overlord of this world. On top of his friendly rtionship with Donna and her experts, what was there for Han Shuo to be afraid of?

    However, those mere mortals around them were not aware of that information. When they heard Han Shuo utter such outrageous and disgraceful words to their Divine Envoys, even the big fatty pope waspletely bbergasted. He gaped foolishly at Han Shuo, not knowing why the usually prudent Han Shuo would be making such a blunder at such a critical juncture.

    The other cardinals too were staring open-mouthed at Han Shuo in disbelief, while some looked at Han Shuo as though he was already dead. They thought, <i>Though you may have valiant strength on Profound Continent, before these Divine Envoys, you are as weak as a baby. You are courting death by being so unbridled before these existences!</i>

    Kironlo was overjoyed at heart to hear those wordsing from Han Shuo and he immediately made a big fuss out of it. ¡°See that? Revered Divine Envoys, this person even dares to be condescending and disrespectful before your Lordships! He¡¯s outrageously arrogant! How could the Church properly grow and expand as long as this person remains on Profound Continent?!¡±

    ¡°Oh? What about you? Heh, don¡¯t forget that for all those years under your leadership, the Cmity Church came underneath the Church of Light. It is also you who caused the Cmity Church to be despised by the masses and resulted in the church members having to spend their days in hiding all these years. I really doubt that I could perform worse than that!¡± Han Shuo said calmly, smiling at Kironlo.

    ¡°Shut up! I, I was just being flexible! If it wasn¡¯t for my decision, the Church wouldn¡¯t have preserved itself till this day!¡± Kironlo said unyieldingly with his face flushed with anger. Those words of Han Shuo had precisely struck his sore point.

    ¡°Old bastard, who are you telling to shut up?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face suddenly turned cold and he said in a chilly voice.

    ¡°You son of a bitch, how dare you behave so unbridledly before the Revered Divine Envoys!¡± Kironlo replied furiously.

    Han Shuo decided to cut the nonsense and suddenly shot towards Kironlo. His left hand shot forward at lightning speed, instantly buckled Kironlo¡¯s neck, and raised him high in the air. Han Shuo then deployed a Demonic de on the middle finger of his right hand and proceeded to ruthlessly poke the incisive edge into Kironlo¡¯s wide open mouth. After giving it a moment of good stirring, Kironlo¡¯s tongue was torn and blended with his teeth, gums, and blood. He whimpered miserably with a frightened face while blood gushed out from his mutted mouth.

    Now, Kironlo could not utter a single word. His legs that were suspended in the air were kicking about. His terrified and begging eyes were looking at Donna and her experts, waiting for them to strike Han Shuo.

    All those mortals in the shrine thought that Han Shuo must have gone mad to treat Kironlo with such bloody means right before Donna and her experts. Those cardinals who were aligned to Han Shuo sighed and lowered their heads. They couldn¡¯t bear to witness the horrifying scene that Han Shuo would soon suffer.

    One second, two seconds, three seconds...

    Even after they counted to five, strangely, other than Kironlo¡¯s miserable grunting that was growing audibly louder, those with their heads lowered did not hear any sign of activity.

    Puzzled, they raised their heads to look. They saw that Kironlo¡¯s face was badly mangled and nearly unrecognizable. Even his cheeks were pierced by the sharp de.

    Meanwhile, not only did those godly entities from the distant material ne not look bothered, they were smiling as they watched Han Shuo in his violent ways. They showed not the slightest intention of stepping in.

    Kironlo¡¯s fear turned into despair. He looked on at Donna and her experts with helpless eyes while his hands and legs were throwing about disorderly, as though he was trying to express something. But soon enough, even his kicking and swinging limbs were broken by Han Shuo and they drooped down powerlessly, just like his mood.

    Those cardinals who wanted to see Han Shuo be humiliated and those who were worried for him were all dumbstruck. They stopped looking at Kironlo but ced all their focus on Donna and her experts to try to figure out what was actually going on.

    Gradually, from their gazes at Han Shuo, those cardinals vaguely understood something.

    In the eyes of Donna and her experts, they discovered admiration, the lightness of watching aedy unfold, the harmony between friends...

    ¡°Bryan, that¡¯s enough. Just put this tactless fe to death right away. Don¡¯t make it too bloody!¡± Donna finally voiced out when she saw that Han Shuo¡¯s intentions of skinning Kironlo alive.

    Upon hearing those words, those cardinals turned pale with fright. Their eyes were filled with fear and reverence that could not be concealed!

    ¡°Okay!¡± Han Shuo stopped tormenting the minds of those people and gave Kironlo a pat on his forehead. <i>St!</i> Kironlo¡¯s head exploded like an egg in a microwave.

    While those cardinals were panic-stricken, Donna leisurely announced, ¡°From today onwards, Profound Continent shall belong to Bryan. Anything and everything will be under his authority. You will all obey hismands, and he is entitled to punish those who go against his wishes. Do you understand?¡±

    ¡°Un.. understood...¡± those cardinals whose faces were filled with dread hastily answered.

    ¡°Good. You are all dismissed!¡± Donna nodded her head in satisfaction and casually instructed.

    To Donna and her experts, these cardinals of meager strengths were as insignificant as ants. They were not even qualified to speak to them.

    Following Donna¡¯smand, even the big fat pope got up to make a hasty exit.

    ¡°Pope, you have nothing to worry about. Everything rted to the Cmity Church on Profound Continent will still be under your control. You will even soon find that your power over others grows stronger and broader!¡± Han Shuo said to the Cmity Pope.

    ¡°I understand!¡± By now, the Cmity Pope had recognized the true situation. He performed a respectful bow towards Han Shuo and solemnly retreated.

    ¡°This is one tactful fe. Looks like you are going to save a ton of work!¡± after the pope left, Donna thoughtfully gave her assessment.

    ¡°He has to be discerning in order to uphold his position!¡± Han Shuo said smilingly. He wasn¡¯t afraid that the big fat Pope would have other intentions. This was because the big fatty was aware of his superior strength, in addition to having made it out that the decision came from those higher up inmand. With that, he definitely dared not to have any deviant thoughts.

    The reason that Han Shuo consoled him was that Han Shuo needed him to administer the Cmity Church well. He did not want the big fatty to face everything pessimistically and no longer serve the Cmity Church wholeheartedly.

    ¡°Alright. Let me brief you about the current circumstances. There are some stiptions that you have to follow!¡± Donna exined the exact same information that Olde previously informed him.

    ¡°Congrattions, Bryan! Hehe, so it turns out that my grandpa¡¯s skeletal staff is in your possession. That¡¯s even more reason for you to visit my family when you are at Elysium. Which reminds me, are you acquainted with that old lizard? He¡¯s at my family too!¡± Li Wei giggled.

    ¡°I do know him. I will make sure to pay you a visit sooner orter!¡± Han Shuo immediately made a promise after hearing that Ancient Lizard King Dagassi was there.

    ¡°Bryan, we will begin our journey home very soon. Would you like to tag along?¡± asked Donna.

    ¡°I still need to cultivate for a period of time. But right after that, I will head to Elysium to look for you all,¡± Han Shuo politely refused Donna¡¯s proposal after thinking for a moment. He felt that he needed to familiarize himself with his current realm and forge a few demonic treasures before leaving for the ne of Gods.

 Chapter 670 - Aquarius Jade

    GDK 670: Aquarius Jade

    ***On a remote ind in the Boundless Sea.

    Han Shuo was sitting cross-legged atop a bald hill. The ground all around him was marked with gulches as well as seemingly bottomless pits. Several enormous stone pirs were circling around him in the air.

    Han Shuo sat as still as a boulder with his eyes closed while the sound of explosions constantly erupted from all around him.

    After a long while, Han Shuo suddenly opened his eyes, revealing his pupils that seemed to contain the darkness of the night.

    The explosions that constantly rang around him stopped the instant that he opened his eyes. Those gigantic stone pirs suspended in mid-air also ceased to revolve.

    Seemingly appearing out of thin air, a giant above the stone pirs flew downwards and floated into Han Shuo¡¯s palm.

    The giant was called Toxic Dragon Net, and the main ingredients used in refining this weapon were the dragon veins he collected from those Greater Dragons he killed at Dragon Valley, the most poisonous miasmic gas he gathered at the Southern Border, soft silks harvested from the depths of the Boundless Sea, as well as nine other rare materials. Han Shuo managed to collect them with difficulty with the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s guidance.

    Upon deployment of the Toxic Dragon Net, poisonous miasmic gas would gush out from the dragon veins to form a cloud of poisonous gas. Simr to the miasmic gasses inside the Pentacloud Miasma, the cloud of poisonous gas possessed intense corrosive power.

    Once someone was entangled in the Toxic Dragon Net, the miasmic gas would be activated. The gigantic that Han Shuo had personally crafted using dragon veins as the base material was extremely tough and durable. Without outstanding divine weapons or strength that far exceeded Han Shuo¡¯s, it would be basically impossible for one to break free from the. This assured that the victim was constantly subjected to the corrosion of the poisonous gas.

    Half-a-year had unwittingly passed since Donna and her experts departed Profound Continent. During the six-month period, Han Shuo had been stabilizing his current Omen realm and, with Cauldron Spirit¡¯s guidance, refined several demonic weapons using some valuable materials in his possession.

    Other than the Toxic Dragon Net, Han Shuo also refined Green Hypergolic Dust and Banner of Hallucination. The Green Hypergolic Dust was made by gathering ghosefire from thousands of corpses and mixing them with a few types of rare blood. Once one came into contact with the Green Hypergolic Dust, they would spontaneouslybust with mes that are extremely difficult to distinguish. The Banner of Hallucination was made by imprinting an intricate hallucination-inducing formation on arge banner. Those covered by the banner would be trapped and, unless they understood the miraculousness of the formation, they wouldn¡¯t be able to get out easily.

    Han Shuo, with the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s help, had exhausted many of his precious materials and around three months¡¯ time to craft the three demonic weapons.

    Other than having sessfully crafted the three demonic weapons, during the six month, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction that had been trying toprehend new insights into the edict of destruction had attained mid-stage lowgod realm ¨C the same realm as his avatar of death.

    His avatar of destruction could make use of the power of faith of his believers on Profound Continent. In addition to having absorbed the energy of destruction from the ughtering of hundreds of thousands of orc warriors, he wasn¡¯tcking in divine energy. The reason that he couldn¡¯t make improvements in his cultivation for such a long time was that his body contained too many impurities which prevented him fromprehending the edict of destruction.

    From peeking at the Brook brothers as they restored their divine energy, and thanks to Cauldron Spirit purging the impurities from his avatar, Han Shuo managed to grasp some new understanding on how to utilize the edict of destruction. On top of the new insights gained from watching the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester being destroyed, his avatar finally made a breakthrough.

    Perhaps the only thing that Han Shuo felt disappointed about was that he had yet to trulyprehend the Omen realm. ording to the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s exnation, demonic cultivators grew by going through bloodshed. It wouldn¡¯t be easy to advance by relying purely on secluded cultivation. Besides, half a year¡¯s time was nothing but a heartbeat for demonic art cultivators. It came as no surprise to him that he wouldn¡¯t be able to gain much progress within that time.

    During this period of time, using the Cmity Church as his eyes and ears, Han Shuo became aware of the paradigm shift that happened to Profound Continent.

    Those from the Church of Light and Shrine of Ice had abruptly be well-behaved. They withdrew themselves from the politics and affairs of Profound Continent and relocated to remote and destends.

    Without the backing of the Church of Light and the Shrine of Ice, Oden Empire and Kasi Empire, against the unstoppable forces of Lancelot Empire, Ang Empire, and Brut Merchant Alliance, could only retreat further and further. It was only a matter of time before they surrendered or werepletely defeated.

    The situation on Profound Continent was moving in an ideal path for Han Shuo. That big fat Pope of the Cmity Church who recognized the new situation served Han Shuo with all his heart. He did an excellent job helping Han Shuo manage everything about this continent, and for this Han Shuo was very grateful.

    Han Shuo¡¯s women, perhaps long ustomed to him mysteriously going missing, or maybe because Han Shuo had made them promises in advance, although they missed Han Shuo very much, they remained in a rather stable state of mind.

    Seeing that the Profound Continent was on the right track, Han Shuo could finally feel at ease about this world. After refining the three demonic weapons, he headed to the extreme depths of the Boundless Sea.

    Following the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s instructions, Han Shuo sank to the extreme depths of the sea and located a region where sharks circled back and forth constantly. After crossing through multiple water vortexes, he arrived at a ce of extreme water with iparably intense yuan energy of water.

    ording to the Cauldron Spirit, back then, in order to maximize the wonderful functions of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester, Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord, using his supernatural power that could alter the heaven¡¯s and earth¡¯sw, deployed the fivergest ces of extremes on Profound Continent.

    Those five ces of extremes formed a giant circle around the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester previously located at the bottom-mostyer of the underground world. Their presences were meant to allow the Harvester to gather mystical yin aura more rapidly.

    The five ces of extremes deployed using his terrifying energy assembled the yuan energies of five attributes on Profound Continent at an astonishing rate and even formed the extreme treasures of five attributes. Among the five, the Fire Lotus from the ce of extreme fire, the Golden Cudgel from the ce of extreme metal, the Earthsoul Pearl from the ce of extreme earth, and the Viride Leaf from the ce of extreme wood had been obtained by Han Shuo.

    The only remaining treasure that Han Shuo had yet to obtain was the Aquarius Jade of the ce of extreme water.

    The Penta-elemental Undead Formation could only unleash its fullest destructive power when all five of the elite zombies were in possession of extreme treasures of their respective attributes. Perhaps on the whole of the Profound Continent, only the Cauldron Spirit knew of the precise location of the final extreme treasure. With its guidance, Han Shuo easily found the ce of extreme water.

    Of the five elite zombies, except for metal elite zombie, all of them had absorbed the energy of godly experts and assimted divine souls. Based on his observations, Han Shuo reckoned that the four were on the verge of bing gods and they could make a breakthrough at any moment.

    Cauldron Spirit was very impressed and found Han Shuo¡¯s innovative thinking to be admirable when it learned that Han Shuo had amalgamated two energies of the two universes and produced the five elite zombies. It was also curious how the elite zombies would turn out after absorbing the energy of gods in this universe and bing gods themselves.

    ¡°This is the ce of extreme water that nurtures an Aquarius Jade. When the Exalted Demonlord deployed these ces of extremes, he surely did not anticipate that the whole thing would take such a long time that these ces would have nurtured the extreme treasures of five attributes!¡± the Cauldron Spirit sighed with sorrow after leading Han Shuo to this ce.

    When Han Shuo looked all around him, he thought that he was inside a pce made of sparkling and translucent crystals. All that he saw were water beads whirling and spinning about. These water beads did not mix with the seawater but rolled about disorderly.

    Han Shuo could sense the intense yuan energy of water within the water beads. He also detected water vortexes that formedyers of boundaries in the perimeter that seemed topletely seal off the ce. Without Cauldron Spirit showing the way, it was very unlikely that Han Shuo would have discovered this ce of extreme water in the depths of the Boundless Sea.

    ¡°Where is the Aquarius Jade?¡± Han Shuo asked Cauldron Spirit in astonishment after looking all around, unable to sense the Aquarius Jade.

    ¡°It¡¯s in one of those disorderly whirling water beads. You can¡¯t detect its location because you don¡¯t cultivate in this energy!¡± Cauldron Spirit answered.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment and nodded his head. Immediately, he summoned water elite zombie.

    ¡°Father, what is this ce? It¡¯s wonderful,fortable!¡± water elite zombie cried out in surprise as soon as he emerged.

    ¡°There is something hidden here that will be very significant to you. Try to find it! Hehe, if you want your own toy just like your brothers, then you better make sure to seize this opportunity well!¡± Han Shuo said smilingly.

    ¡°You might have no way of locating the Aquarius Jade, but for him, it¡¯s as easy as pie!¡± the Cauldron Spirit suddenly transmitted.

    And the fact proved the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s words true. Han Shuo thought that it would take water elite zombie some effort before he could locate the extreme treasure but he didn¡¯t foresee that soon after he arrived from the Netherworld, all except for one of those water beads whirling about would suddenly stand stationary. At the next moment, that water bead started rolling towards water elite zombie.

    ¡°This is great! Thank you, father! Thank you!¡± Water elite zombie was ted. He merely stood still on the same ground while that water bead shot rapidly towards him. Then, before Han Shuo¡¯s attentive eyes, it disappeared inside water elite zombie¡¯s body.

    After the Aquarius Jade flew into his body, water elite zombie seemed to grow into a giant whirlpool in an instant, producing an intense suction power upon all those stationary water beads that contained intense yuan energy of water. They all started rolling and flowing into water elite zombie.

    ¡°After taking over the Aquarius Jade, he could make use of the treasure to collect these water beads that contained the most yuan energy of water,¡± the Cauldron Spirit exined.

    ¡°Thank you, father! What wonderful and pure energy!¡± water elite zombie constantly cheered.

    After some time, when there were no longer any water beads to be found, the whirlpool on water elite zombie vanished.

    By now, Han Shuo had collected all five extreme treasures on Profound Continent. All five of his elite zombies had weapons of their own attributes. This wouldy a strong foundation for the strength of the Penta-elemental Undead Formation in the future.

    ¡°Go back and properly learn your new weapon!¡± Han Shuo smilingly transmitted to water elite zombie and sent him back to Netherworld. Han Shuo then proceeded by flying straight back to the gourd ind. After entering the Cemetery of Death, he walked to the enormous internar transportation matrix and inserted a sufficient amount of magical crystal ores. He then stood on the matrix, fed in the coordinates given by Donna, and energized the internar transportation matrix.

    <i>Elysium, the ne of Gods, here Ie!</i>

 Chapter 671 - Elysium, The Plane of Gods

    GDK 671: Elysium, The ne of Gods

    The distance of an internar transmission directly corrted with the amount of energy crystal ores the transmission would consume.

    The distance between Profound Continent and Elysium must have been unthinkably far. Compared to transmitting from the Abyss realm to Profound Continent, this journey took a much longer time.

    Finally, when Han Shuo was about to feel nauseated, he sensed the constant distortion of spacetime around him had ceased.

    The next instant, Han Shuo sensed extremely intense elemental energy of death around him ¨C even more intense than what was found in the Netherworld that his consciousness had visited. Han Shuo was greatly surprised and immediately expanded his consciousness. After carefully sensing with his eyes closed, he discovered that the atmosphere wasn¡¯t just rich with the element of death, but the seven other elements were just as intense.

    Before venturing to this world, Han Shuo had learned from Donna and her experts that among the numerous material nes found in this universe, Elysium was most suitable for gods to cultivate. Han Shuo wasn¡¯tpletely convinced when he first heard that im. But now that he had personally sensed the richness and intensity of the elements that filled this world, he couldn¡¯t agree more with that statement. His heart was overwhelmed with astonishment.

    ¡°Oi! Don¡¯t hold up the line, hurry up and move!¡± a boorish shout assaulted Han Shuo¡¯s ears.

    Han Shuo was jolted. When he opened his eyes, he discovered that underneath his feet was an internar transportation matrix. This internar transportation matrix was even more enormous than the one inside the Cemetery of Death. It seemed to be divided into multiple smaller sections, like the one he was standing on.

    Not far ahead of him was a three-storey-high observation deck. There were three persons wearing pitch-ck armor atop the deck. They each wielded an ink-ck pike decorated with an intricate design. When Han Shuo probed with his consciousness, he discovered that all three of them were cultivators of the element of darkness with approximately early-mid stage lowgod strengths.

    When he looked to the side, he discovered that this facility was in a valley filled will all kinds of grass-like, alien nts. At the center of the valley was the internar transportation matrix he was standing on.

    ¡°Move! Don¡¯t hinder others from using the transportation matrix!¡± One of the lowgods in ck armor on the tform pointed his pike at Han Shuo and scowled.

    Han Shuo put on a smile and leapt into the air. His body swayed before he could float into the air in a rather awkward manner.

    After almost stumbling, Han Shuo immediately realized that the gravitational eleration in this material ne was different from that of Profound Continent. Gravity there was, in fact, twenty-seven times greater than on Profound Continent!

    Due to the disparity in gravitational eleration, Han Shuo had to exhaust more energy than usual when deploying levitational spells using the elemental energy of death. He almost stumbled because he wasn¡¯t adapted to the new gravity.

    But soon enough, Han Shuo managed to adapt to it. He flew from the internar transportation matrix at a speed slower than usual.

    Anyone¡¯s flying speed would be affected in such an enormous gravitational field. Han Shuo may have been able to fly around like a fighter jet on Profound Continent. But on Elysium, he would face difficulty taking into the air.

    ¡°He¡¯s a lowgod of death. Seems to be a neer as well. Otherwise, he probably wouldn¡¯t be using the internar transportation matrix over here!¡± that lowgod of darkness that berated Han Shuo whispered to the other two beside him.

    After Han Shuo exited from the internar transportation matrix, the person shouted with a lower voice, ¡°Head outside and you will find the immigration officer!¡±

    When Han Shuo gradually expanded his consciousness, he came to discover the incredible vastness of the valley. There were gods of varied strengths distributed in different regions.

    Following that lowgod¡¯s instructions, Han Shuo walked straight to the exit. It didn¡¯t take long before he found severalrge and tall structures around him.

    In front of one of the buildings was an old man sitting behind a ck wooden desk. He seemed to be preupied as he asked without even raising his head, ¡°New here?¡±

    ¡°Yes.¡±

    The old man raised his pallid face topped with messy hair to take a quick nce at Han Shuo before he indifferently asked, ¡°Do you have a divine tablet?¡±

    ¡°No, I don¡¯t. I intend to get one,¡± Han Shuo smiled. He could tell that this old man was ate-stage lowgod cultivating in the elemental energy of death.

    The divine tablet was like a passport on Elysium. Every being on Elysium, as long as they were gods, would have a divine tablet. If one were to venture through Elysium without a divine tablet, not only would they be denied entry to most regions ¨C if one unfortunately perished, there would be no easy way to identify one¡¯s body.

    Beforeing to the Elysium, Han Shuo had learned general knowledge of this aspect from Donna and the others. He knew that those who first came to Elysium could get their divine tablets on-site. However, this service was notplimentary ¨C crystal coins were the only eptable currency!

    ¡°Oh? You are aware of the procedure. Well, eighty blue crystal coins then. I will handle it for you!¡± the old man smiled sinisterly and extended his hand to demand from Han Shuo.

    As with Elysium, in most high-level material nes and ces where gods weremonly found, the currency in cirction was not gold coins, but crystal coins! For gods, gold was just amon metal. It didn¡¯t contain any energy and wasn¡¯t all that valuable.

    Crystal coins were a form of currency made by purifying energy ores. Every piece of crystal coin contained a certain amount of energy. This energy could be used for energizing internar transportation matrices, smelting divine weapons, and deploy all kinds of mysterious boundaries and seals. In short, they were very useful and had a vast range of practical uses.

    However, the energy in crystal coins could not be absorbed by gods to form divine energy. Crystals that could be absorbed by gods were called divine essence which was far rarer. Back in the Void, Han Shuo had onlye by a few pieces of them. He had long used up all the divine essence of death that he could absorb.

    Although gods were unequipped to absorb the energy in crystal coins, as they had a wide range of application, it was easy to find use for them. Therefore it became the currency in cirction among the gods.

    Just like the gold coin system on Profound Continent, crystal coins were divided into grades, namely, blue, purple, and ck. The energy in one piece of purple crystal coin was equivalent to a hundred blue crystal coins, while one ck crystal coin contained the same energy as a hundred purple crystal coins.

    ¡°Eighty pieces?¡± Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before he asked in an unconvinced voice, ¡°I remember from the rules that it¡¯s fifty pieces!¡±

    The old man¡¯s eyes flickered. He coldly groaned and replied, ¡°It used to be fifty pieces but that was long ago. Now it¡¯s eighty pieces. If you don¡¯t have enough crystal coins, do a few years of mining in this valley. You can get the divine tablet done and leave this valley when you have earned enough crystal coins.¡±

    Han Shuo immediately understood when he saw that split second flickering of that old man¡¯s eyes.

    Donna and her experts were definitely not misinformed about the fee for a divine tablet. This old man only asked for eighty blue crystal coins because he was trying to defraud Han Shuo just because he was a neer.

    Most gods who arrived at high-level material nes such as Elysium for the first time, due tock of experience, unfamiliarity to the foreignnd, or perhaps obliviousness to the existence of crystal coins, had to take out any valuables they may carry in exchange for sufficient crystal coins. If one did not carry sufficient valuables, the only option left was to stay in the valley and work as a miner to gather enough crystal coins for a divine tablet.

    Certainly, this old man wouldn¡¯t dare con gods with the backing ofrge family ns. He would only target neers such as Han Shuo.

    ¡°Are you sure it¡¯s eighty blue crystal coins?¡± Han Shuo put on a faint smile and sought reconfirmation.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯tck those thirty blue crystal coins. Before leaving, Donna and her experts had provided Han Shuo with several purple crystal coins each. Besides, after breaking into Kaiser and Eriksson¡¯s space rings with the Cauldron Spirit, Han Shuo had obtained three divine weapons as well as several hundred purple crystal coins. Those thirty additional blue crystal coins was a negligible amount for him.

    However, Han Shuo was very unhappy to find that someone would try to swindle him right after he arrived at Elysium!

    ¡°Eighty blue crystal coins. Not a piece short!¡± the old man got rather impatient. He thought, <i><i>You are just a neer with no backing. You are such a fool to dawdle with me.</i></i>

    <i><i>Karkh... Karkh...</i></i> Suddenly, a young man covered in cuts and bruises staggered towards Han Shuo. He was barely conscious and would cough out a mouthful of blood every few steps. He seemed to be severely injured. There was an obvious aura of destruction on his body.

    The silvery hair of the young man was scorched and his blue eyes were powerless. After limping to the table with great difficulty, he immediately murmured in his weak voice, ¡°I want a divine tablet!¡±

    ¡°Eighty blue crystal coins. Not a piece short!¡± the old man shot a nce at the young man and said mechanically.

    ¡°Whatever that was, I¡¯ll buy it on credit. I wille back to repay you when I have the money!¡± the young man said powerlessly.

    ¡°Buy on credit?¡± As though he had heard the joke of the year, the old man burst intoughter. ¡°Youngster, I assume you were hunted by someone and only managed to escape to this ce with great difficulty? It seems that you definitely are heavily injured. Did your brain get beaten out as well? There never was any precedent of buying on credit in this ce!¡±

    ¡°I can buy on credit at anywhere else. Why can¡¯t I do so here?!¡± although the young man was weak, he nheless remained overbearing in his speech. The aura of destruction on him grew more and more intense as though it would explode at any moment.

    ¡°Kid, this is Elysium. You may be a respectable individual on low-level material nes. But when you arrive at Elysium, hmph, you better know your ce. I have seen people like you a lot. You are ustomed to being domineering and take offense at having to readjust your temper. But that¡¯s okay ¨C we specialize in wearing down bad tempers!¡± the old man said with an eerie smile. He shot nces at Han Shuo with his cold eyes ever so often as he spoke, as though those words were meant for Han Shuo as well.

    The old man cleared his throat and suddenly made a loud and long whistle.

    Ten or so gods wearing ink-ck armor and wielding pikes with delicate decorative patterns suddenly stormed out from the surrounding buildings. The one taking the lead was an early-stage midgod with a grave and stern expression. Upon arriving, he shot a nce at the three and said sternly, ¡°Who is making trouble?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, this one wants to buy on credit!¡± the old man scoffed.

    Upon hearing those words, while the one leading remained grave and stern, all other divine guards began to cackle.

 Chapter 672 - Friend, wanna get filthy rich?

    GDK 672: Friend, wanna get filthy rich?

    When the tens of lowgods of varied strengths and that mid-stage highgod divine guard arrived, an austere and deste aura instantly filled the area. That grave and stern divine guard who took the lead was especially frightening. Even though he did not unleash his Domain of Divinity or demonstrate his wrath, just the act of furrowing his brows was enough to intimidate even the toughest of men.

    Han Shuo¡¯s unfolded consciousness discovered that it wasn¡¯t just the tens of divine guards who came out following that old man¡¯s loud whistle. There were males and females of both young and old that walked out from several other buildings. Some of them were lowgods, some were basegods, while a few of them were merely demigods.

    After taking a few nces around, Han Shuo concluded that those people had arrived from other material nes just recently. They were inside other buildings and came to watch when they heard the noises.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong with buying on credit? Never seen that before?¡± out of Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, even when confronted against such a formidable group of experts, the young man, only a mid-stage lowgod, even covered in cuts and bruises, did not back down in fear. On the contrary, there was a murderous look in his eyes like he wanted to fight to his death.

    The old man shook his head and sighed. He feigned pity as he said, ¡°What a pitiful fe. His brain really has been beaten out of his skull!¡±

    ¡°Seize him!¡± that leading divine guard said coldly and gestured with his hand.

    The two lowgods standing behind him dashed forward like lightning bolts. Dark radiances gushed out from the pikes in their hands.

    The blue eyes of that young man who wanted to buy on credit were suddenly filled with madness as he shouted loudly like an infuriated beast. The energy of destruction burst out from his body as he charged at the divine guardsing to apprehend him. He ran wild.

    Han Shuo found people with this kind of zeal and fearlessness in the face of death to be very admirable. But unfortunately, as this person was very severely injured, exerting so much power under such conditions would only cause his injuries to worsen.

    Suddenly, midway forward, that young man stumbled and fell to the ground. Just like that, he was unconscious.

    Gods were not invulnerable to injuries. Given the injuries he sustained, it was already incredible that he was still able to walk. And now, to suddenly exert himself, it would be a wonder if he didn¡¯t copse!

    The two divine guards, who were about to punish the young man as a lesson to the observing crowd, stared nkly when the young man unexpectedly passed out. They turned their gazes to that midgod, seeking for his instruction.

    ¡°Seize him. Those who are not well-behaved must be locked up and given a lesson on the rules!¡± the leading divine guard coldly groaned.

    The two divine guards who heard themand did not show a bit of hesitation. They walked straight up to that copsed young man, pulled him up and dragged him away.

    ¡°Hold on!¡± Han Shuo yelled.

    The two divine guards were startled yet again and their gazes turned to back theirmander. Theirmander, however, did not utter a word, simply gazing at Han Shuo with his cold eyes, as though waiting for Han Shuo¡¯s exnation.

    ¡°You must be the local chief of divine guards, Lord Dolores?¡± Han Shuo smiled and asked in an urbane manner.

    The chief was astonished. It was only now that he started sizing Han Shuo up carefully and asked, ¡°Aren¡¯t you a neer? How did you know my name?¡±

    ¡°Elder sister Donna mentioned to me that if I ran into any trouble over here, I could look for you for help!¡± Han Shuo said unhurriedly.

    Dolores¡¯ expression softened as soon as Han Shuo mentioned Donna. He asked, ¡°What¡¯s your name? Where did youe from?¡±

    ¡°Bryan, of Profound Continent!¡± Han Shuo answered smilingly. Beforeing over, Donna had told him that Dolores was a younger generation of her family n who was assigned to this ce to be tempered and gain experiences. She also told Han Shuo that she would notify Dolores in advance and he would have nothing to worry about.

    After hearing Han Shuo¡¯s answer, Dolores nodded his head. It appeared that Donna definitely did notify him about Han Shuo. To proceed, Dolores looked all around him and coldly instructed, ¡°Those who have nothing to do here, dismiss!¡±

    The crowd who gathered all around to watch the drama rapidly dispersed. A few momentster, those who remained were the divine guards, that old man in charge of processing divine tablets, Han Shuo, and that cked out young man.

    ¡°My elder cousin told me about you. If you need anything, don¡¯t hesitate to ask. I will help you with everything within my means!¡± Dolores said to Han Shuo after the spectators dispersed.

    ¡°That fe is quite courageous. If you could avoid making things difficult for him, please do so!¡± Han Shuo proposed to Dolores in an appropriate manner while pointing at that young edict of destruction cultivator on the ground. That young man¡¯s behavior of recklessly charging ahead even though the odds werepletely against him had rather impressed Han Shuo.

    ¡°No worries!¡± Dolores put on a rather strange expression as though he couldn¡¯t understand why Han Shuo would plea leniency for this random neer who didn¡¯t know how to follow the rules. But as Donna had instructed him to assist Han Shuo and such a matter was less than trivial, he casually agreed to the request.

    Han Shuo put on a smile, pointed at the old man, and asked, ¡°There¡¯s one more thing, I heard from elder sister Donna that getting a divine tablet done takes only fifty blue crystal coins. But why is it that he¡¯s asking eighty pieces from me?¡±

    ¡°Erm, I didn¡¯t know that you were on the same side. My apologies! My apologies!¡± the old man bowed and apologized humbly. His attitude was inplete reverse. However, when Han Shuo looked at him carefully, he noticed that the old man did not reveal a trace of fear.

    ¡°About this, different people get different prices!¡± for some reason, Dolores¡¯ grave and stern face appeared somewhat awkward. Soon after, he shot a re at that old man and instructed, ¡°Jeff, exempt the processing fees for his divine tablet!¡±

    ¡°Yes! Yes!¡± that old man called Jeff hastily agreed. However, he did not appear nervous at all.

    Meanwhile, the divine guards beside Dolores all had strange expressions. A few of them were even secretlyughing.

    Han Shuo had clearly taken in the expressions of each and everyone around him. He finally understood what was going on ¨C Dolores had to be the mastermind of the scam. Otherwise, that old man would have shown at least a trace of fear. This also exined why after Han Shuo uttered those words, Dolores appeared even more awkward than Jeff!

    ¡°No need for an exemption. It¡¯s just fifty blue crystal coins. I can afford it!¡± After having figured it out, Han Shuo did not show any intention of delving further into it. He withdrew one purple crystal coin and passed it to Jeff. He then pointed at that young man copsed on the ground and said, ¡°One piece of purple crystal coin. I¡¯m also paying for that guy¡¯s divine te!¡±

    Jeff did not immediately ept the purple crystal coin. He secretly looked towards Dolores as though asking him for instruction. It was only when he saw Dolores nod that he epted the coin and answered affirmatively.

    ¡°After your divine tablet isplete, you may head north. After traveling for approximately half a month, you will arrive at the City of Shadows. The City of Shadows is one of the seven major cities of the Domain of Darkness. Our House of Lavers is in the City of Shadows. If no unexpected business pops up, my elder cousin will be in the city. Make sure to look for her when you arrive at the City of Shadows. She will help you settle down,¡± after hinting at Jeff, Dolores thought for a moment and said to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo nodded after hearing Dolores¡¯ words.

    ¡°Ease up. As the local chief of divine guards, I¡¯m rather influential in this valley. You may leave once your divine tablet is done. No one will give you any sort of trouble!¡± Dolores continued.

    ¡°Thanks a lot!¡± Han Shuo knew that those neers who arrived at this valley would be defrauded and harassed. Without crystal coins, those who wished to obtain a divine tablet would have to serve in the mine inside a valley for a few years. Even those who came from mid and high-level material nes who might be in possession of crystal coins would be confronted with all kinds of trickeries until a portion of their possessions were squeezed out.

    Han Shuo was very fortunate that Donna had given Dolores instructions in advance. Otherwise, it would have been almost impossible for him to leave the valley, especially with such ease.

    Finally, before he left, Dolores said to Han Shuo, ¡°If you face any issues within the valley, just look for me. I will help you resolve everything that is within my means!¡± Dolores led his men away.

    As Dolores and his group left, the old Jeff bowed and respectfully invited Han Shuo into the building. He said, ¡°Pleasee inside. I willplete your divine tablet as soon as possible. Haha, why didn¡¯t you tell me you were acquainted with Lord Dolores? If I had known earlier that you were one of us, we could have avoided all the misunderstandings!¡±

    ¡°I was about to tell you but that fe beaten ck and blue popped out of nowhere. I wasn¡¯t able to do so in time!¡± Han Shuo smiled insincerely and feigned civility with Jeff. Han Shuo understood that a character like Jeff was hard to deal with and it would be very hard to guard against any trickeries that this old and cunning fe might do behind his back. As Han Shuo was just off the boat and unwilling to bicker with him, he merely yed along instead of mocking him.

    The procedure for obtaining a divine tablet required a test of the applicant¡¯s realm, the applicant¡¯s origins, and a series ofplicated procedures. However, with Jeff¡¯s cordial assistance, Han Shuopleted the procedures very soon and made off with his divine tablet.

    That young man that lost consciousness was also woken up by Jeff. When he woke up, although muddle-headed, he still intended on putting up a fight. But when he heard Jeff say that he would help him get a divine tablet, he quickly calmed down.

    Akley. Mid-stage lowgod of destruction. Originating from Blue Ocean Continent. Han Shuo learned some information about him when they were in the process of getting a divine tablet.

    ¡°Akley, this is your divine tablet. Keep it well and don¡¯t lose it by any means. No matter where you go, a divine tablet is your identification. Without one, you will find yourself in a ton of headache!¡± Jeff warned when he handed the divine tablet to Akley.

    ¡°Pff, I don¡¯t need your reminder. I will pay you back when I have the money!¡± Akley took his divine tablet impatiently. It appeared that he was still oblivious that Han Shuo had paid for him.

    ¡°No need for that. He paid the crystal coins for you and even plead leniency for you. Otherwise, you would be locked up by now!¡± Jeff lightly groaned and said. If it wasn¡¯t for Han Shuo, perhaps Akley wouldn¡¯t have been able to enter the building.

    Akley was stunned after hearing Jeff¡¯s words and started sizing Han Shuo up carefully. After a long while, he mumbled, ¡°What a coincidence, I¡¯mcking an assistant!¡± Akley¡¯s eyes shone brightly as he gazed at Han Shuo. He asked excitedly, ¡°Friend, wanna get filthy rich?¡±

    ¡°Not interested!¡± Han Shuo replied sinctly.

    ¡°Erm... I know that my appearance now doesn¡¯t look very convincing, but I know a ce where we can get very rich. It¡¯s true. I¡¯m short of an assistant. I¡¯m now officially inviting you to join me!¡±

 Chapter 673 - Divine Essence Mine

    GDK 673: Divine Essence Mine

    ¡°Not interested!¡± Han Shuo declined without wasting another moment. That wretched appearance of Akley¡¯s had made Han Shuo very skeptical that Akley could show him a path to riches. Besides, unlike Akley, Han Shuo was in no shortage of money.

    ¡°I¡¯m dead serious. You do know that it¡¯s very difficult to get by on Elysium without an abundance of crystal coins, right?¡± Akley tried to persuade Han Shuo.

    ¡°I rmend that you put it off until you have recuperated from your injuries. About that matter you propose, thanks but I really am not interested,¡± Han Shuo shrugged and smiled.

    As Akley had just woken from a briefa, he wasn¡¯t in a stable state of mind. Jeff, who was in charge of handling their divine tablets was unweing towards Akley and hasted him on leaving the premise, lest that the wounds on Akley sully his ce.

    Akley didn¡¯t bother staying and dragged himself out while cursing and swearing. He did not seem to mind that his body was in a terrible state and did not immediately seek a safe location to heal from his injuries. Instead, he waited outside at the front door.

    ¡°I truly couldn¡¯t figure, how could a person be as obnoxious as he is!¡± Jeff remarked scornfully while shaking his head. He then turned to Han Shuo. ¡°Bryan, I would advise you to cease contact with him. Otherwise, given his temper, he will encumber you sooner orter!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll take note of that. Alright, thank you. Goodbye!¡± Although Han Shuo did not hold a favorable impression towards Jeff, he did not hold much hostility either. A character like Jeff could be found almost everywhere in the universe. Besides, as Jeff did not truly jeopardize Han Shuo¡¯s interest and he had given his humble apology, Han Shuo was not motivated to bicker with him.

    ¡°You are most wee. I¡¯ve merely been doing my duty of carrying out Lord Dolores¡¯ orders!¡± Jeff did not forget to tter Dolores in front of Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo did not engage in any further conversation with Jeff and walked out from the premise with the intention of leaving the valley right away for the City of Shadows. He smilingly nodded at Akley when he walked past him at the front door.

    ¡°Wait!¡± Akley shouted with his weak voice when he saw that Han Shuo was leaving.

    Han Shuo creased his brows as he really was getting somewhat annoyed. ¡°I have said that I¡¯m not interested. Besides, the injuries to your body are very severe. It will affect your development in the future if you do not treat them soon. From how I see it, you better forget about your mega-project for the time being and properly treat your injuries.¡±

    ¡°Let me show you something. If you remain uninterested after seeing it, I will not bother you anymore. What say you?¡± Akley took a few effortful deep breaths before saying to Han Shuo in a solemn manner.

    After thinking for a moment, Han Shuo nodded and said, ¡°Fine. Let¡¯s have a look at it. I hope it will be as convincing as you expect.¡±

    ¡°Can we go to somewhere with more privacy?¡± Akley nced all around and felt that it wasn¡¯t quite safe to reveal his secret object at the location.

    Han Shuo expanded his consciousness and immediately found a rather secluded spot near a waterfall some distance away.

    ¡°Please carry me along. I really can¡¯t move!¡± Akley put on an awkward smile and asked.

    Han Shuo wasted not a word. He walked over to Akley, picked him up, rose him into the air with a levitation spell, and flew to that waterfall.

    This journey took Han Shuo half an hour. He had taken so much time because of the very high gravitational eleration on Elysium, having to fly using the energy of his avatar of death, and having to carry Akley on his back.

    When they finally arrived at the waterfall, Han Shuo put Akley down. He vigntly observed all around him before he carefully took out an ancient scroll from his chest. He handed the scroll to Han Shuo and exined, ¡°I obtained this from a ce on my homeworld. Because I¡¯m in possession of it, I was hunted for a long time until I escaped here using an internar transportation matrix. Be very gentle with it!¡±

    After hearing those words, Han Shuo got a little intrigued. It was obvious from the excessive yellowing that the scroll was exceedingly ancient. The characters inscribed on them resembled earthworms. There were also several fuzzy drawings on it. However, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t understand a thing.

    ¡°So? Piqued your interest, have I?¡± Akley asked excitedly in a big smile.

    ¡°Err... Whatnguage is this? I have never seen anything like this,¡± Han Shuo said while looking at Akley. He was thinking, You aren¡¯t trying to scam me, are you?

    ¡°It¡¯s Voyniscript, one of the earliestnguages. Ancient godsmonly use this in speaking and writing. Don¡¯t you recognize it?¡± Akley put on an expression as though he had suffered a major blow. While looking at Han Shuo with rather strange gazes, he asked, ¡°How could you not be familiar with Voyniscript? Have youe from an even lower level material ne?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s correct. I hail from a very low-level material ne and know nothing about whatever ancientnguage this is,¡± Han Shuo calmly admitted. After thinking for a bit, he continued, ¡°Alright, why don¡¯t you tell me about what is written on this thing?¡±

    ¡°It describes a divine essence mine! In case you don¡¯t know what divine essence is, they are crystals containing energy that can be directly absorbed to form divine energy. They are extremely valuable in every material ne and they can only be found in very few ces. This scroll suggests there exists a small divine essence mine!¡± Akley reported excitedly.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes opened wide. He was instantly tempted. Back then, Han Shuo had discovered three pieces of those miraculous crystals back at the Void of the Abyss realm. Those divine essences of death allowed Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death to greatly advance in divine energy. His speedy advancement to the mid-stage lowgod realm was mostly thanks to the boost from those three pieces of divine essences.

    Han Shuo had long been aware of the fact that divine essences were a raremodity. In any material ne where gods weremonly found, there were items that everyone would vigorously seek to procure. Many of the big family ns would spare none of their financial resources to acquire divine essences as to allow members of their family n to rapidly improve in strength. Discovery of high-purity divine essences mines would more often than not lead to bloody battles betweenrge family ns.

    ¡°Are you certain that it¡¯s a divine essence mine?¡± Han Shuo asked in a deep voice.

    ¡°I¡¯m sure that the words written on the scroll cannot be wrong. The original owner of the scroll discovered that divine essence mine but he was dispatched to my Blue Ocean Continent before he could take possession of it. He had unfortunately suffered serious injuries while carrying out his mission at my homeworld and wrote this scroll right before his death, describing the location of the divine essence mine,¡± Akley exined.

    ¡°It must have been ages ago. Perhaps that divine essence mine was long discovered by others and all of its crystals have been extracted!¡± It was obvious from the scroll that it was ancient. Anything could have happened during the long years that had passed.

    ¡°That is indeed possible!¡± Akley nodded in agreement before he continued, ¡°But based on what is described on the scroll, that ce is very remote. The one who wrote this had only stumbled upon the mine by mere chance and mentioned that it was very possible that it may have otherwise remained undiscovered. Therefore I think that it¡¯s worth surveying it. Who knows, it could thus far remain unexplored!¡±

    A divine essence mine could induce a carnage of blood on the ne of Gods. They were valuable beyond measure.

    As Han Shuo was fresh off the boat and did not have any particrly urgent matters to attend to, seeing that Akley appeared serious and rather confident about the matter, he said, ¡°Fine then. I will go there with you. I don¡¯t have anything of importance to do anyway,¡±

    ¡°About that divine essence mine, let me remind you that only I alone know of the way of entering the ce. If you decide to kill me halfway through the journey, you will have no way of finding it!¡± Akley hastily cautioned Han Shuo.

    ¡°Thanks for the reminder. I reckon that when we are at the divine essence mine, your injuries will be mostly healed. And by then you will not need to worry about any potential backstabbing from my end?¡± Han Shuo asked, giggling. He surmised that this was Akley¡¯s intention.

    ¡°That¡¯s correct. If there is no divine essence mine, then we will say goodbye. If there really is one, I¡¯ll take sixty percent and you will have the rest. What say you?¡± Akley put forward his terms as soon as Han Shuo agreed to join him. He seemed to have thought about this long ago and was very quick with his words.

    Akley was the one who discovered the scroll and therefore the divine essence mine. His method of dividing the prize could be considered generous. Therefore, Han Shuo nodded and said, ¡°Let¡¯s do it.¡±

    ¡°Good. But first, I must stabilize my injuries. Please look after me during this period. When I have stabilized my condition, we will set off immediately!¡± Akley suddenly became rxed when Han Shuo agreed to it.

    ¡°I¡¯m not good at taking care of others. You look after yourself,¡± Han Shuo creased his brows and said.

    ¡°I¡¯m not asking you to serve me, you just need to ensure my safety. I¡¯m afraid that my foes from Blue Ocean Continent will have chased me all the way here,¡± Akley forced a smiled and said.

    ¡°I¡¯ll try my best,¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment before he replied. He didn¡¯t know how formidable Akley¡¯s enemies were. Akley ought to havee from a material ne where gods weremonce. If those godly experts that pursued Akley were too much for Han Shuo to handle, he was willing to abandon Akley. He would always choose to preserve his life over a divine essence mine.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, none of those who pursue me could take our lives. Hmph, if I weren¡¯t outnumbered, I would have killed them all!¡± Akley assured Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo nodded calmly but he wasn¡¯tpletely convinced of those words. Akley was a mid-stage lowgod who cultivated in the edict of destruction and yet, he received such enormous injuries and had to flee to Elysium from the Blue Ocean Continent. This had amply demonstrated that those who were hunting him could not be taken as lightly as he described.

    ¡°This ce is reasonably quiet. I will attend to my injuries and stabilize my conditions right here!¡± Akley jumped into the pond under the waterfall to wash off the bloodstains on him.

    ¡°Here, swallow this. It will help stabilize your injuries!¡± Han Shuo casually threw Akley a pellet of rejuvenation. Before making his way to Elysium, Han Shuo had refined some medicinal pellets for personal use during a time of need. He had a ton of these pellet of rejuvenation for stabilizing injuries.

    ¡°What is this stuff? Smells pretty good!¡± Akley, whose body was half submerged into the pool, asked puzzlingly while pinching the medicinal pellet Han Shuo passed to him.

    ¡°It¡¯s a medicine. Happens to be suitable for your condition. Swallow it and you will feel its effect!¡± Han Shuo answered casually.

    Akley wasn¡¯t afraid that Han Shuo would cause him harm and swallowed the pellet right after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s reply. He proceeded to wash the wounds on his body.

    He did not notice anything at first but a short momentter, Akley let out a soft cry of surprise. He looked at Han Shuo in astonishment and asked, ¡°What is this medicine that you fed me? It¡¯s taken effect almost immediately! The bleeding haspletely stopped and I feel much better already! Seriously, what medicine is this and where can I buy it? If I had this earlier, perhaps I wouldn¡¯t be in such a horrible state!¡± Akley was obviously astonished by the effectiveness of the pellet of rejuvenation as he clicked his tongue in wonder.

    ¡°It¡¯s not for sale. An old pharmacist friend of mine specially made it for me!¡± Han Shuo replied. It was he himself who had personally refined the pellet of rejuvenation and he knew the effects it had. It was in fact within his expectations to see Akley react with such amazement.

    ¡°Alright, alright. You better stop talking and stabilize your injuries. Now is the best opportunity for you to recover your divine energy. Don¡¯t waste my medicine!¡± Han Shuo said impatiently when Akley again opened his mouth to speak.

    After hearing Han Shuo¡¯s beratement, Akley finally turned quiet. He wasted not another word and quieted down in the pool. Multiple small vortices formed around Akley. Those small vortices rotated around him in rhythmic trajectories.

    Han Shuo stood above the pond and carefully observed the anomaly surrounding Akley. He could tell that Akle was using a trajectory of the edict of destruction to stabilize his injuries. There were all kind of different methods of using the edict of destruction. This method that Akley utilized was obviously different from the method used by the Brook brothers.

    After looking for a long while, while secretly probing Akley using his consciousness and analyzing it using his powerful consciousness, he tried to circte the divine energy of his avatar inside his body.

    His avatar of destruction was sitting inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. With one thought, several vortices formed around his avatar and revolved rhythmically. They were moving in trajectories identical to the water vortices around Akley. Han Shuo was trying toprehend the brilliance of this method of using the edict of destruction.

    However, before Han Shuo could learn anything, he suddenly sensed several people flying from which valley they came.

    ¡°Akley is here ¨C I can sense him. Truly did not expect that he would dare run to Elysium. We must hurry. Otherwise, if this information was to be known to experts on Elysium, none of us will need to think about getting the rewards!¡± an unsophisticated voice sounded from the direction. Although the being had lowered his voice, by utilizing Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, it nheless remained audible to Han Shuo.

    Ugh, this guy is trouble. There are people catching up to him already! It appears that this divine essence mine will note to us easily! Han Shuo sensed that the enemy partyprised of ate-stage lowgod of destruction and two mid-stage lowgods of darkness.

    Although Han Shuo could obstruct them though Dolores, doing so might expose the information about that divine essence mine. After thinking for a while, ignoring that Akley was in the midst of recovery, Han Shuo grabbed him and started flying away from the valley.

 Chapter 674 - Godhunter

    <h4>Godhunter</h4>

    GDK 674: Godhunter

    ¡°Oi! Oi! What do you think you¡¯re doing?!¡± Akley was being dragged by his cor, struggling in midair. He seemed to be mortified.

    ¡°Those foes of yours have arrived. I¡¯m taking you away from them. If we remain here, we will be discovered!¡± Han Shuo reasoned.

    ¡°So soon? Damn it, they actually chased all the way to Elysium!¡± Akley cursed. He stopped struggling when he heard that his enemies hade.

    Han Shuo¡¯s flying speed increased substantially after Akley calmed himself down. He traveled towards remote regions where an unbroken chain of uninhibited mountains was found. There wasn¡¯t another soul they could run into.

    After flying several hundred miles, Han Shuo casually threw Akley onto the top of a barren hill and said, ¡°We should have shaken them off. You continue to rest!¡±

    Akley had not put his recovery on hold while being dragged in the air by Han Shuo. Thanks to the efficacy of the pellet of rejuvenation, the wounds on his body had started to form scabs. Even his face regained a slight bit of a healthy shade of red.

    The pellet of rejuvenation was very beneficial for healing injuries. Akley, as a god cultivating in the edict of destruction, possessed a divine body that could soak up the benefits of a pellet of rejuvenation to the fullest. Hence, his condition had vastly improved within a short period of time.

    ¡°You be careful as well and make use of this opportunity to regain some energy ¨C keep yourself at your most optimal state. Although this is the first time I¡¯vee to Elysium, I believe that this world isn¡¯t all that peaceful either. If we were to run into anything unexpected, we would have the best chance of survival if we are at our bests!¡± Akley suggested to Han Shuo as he sat down of the barren hill.

    After having experienced countless great battles where the difference between life and death was only a hair¡¯s breadth apart, Han Shuo had long formed this good habit. The moment that he touched down, his avatar of death flew into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon and immediately started to rest.

    With the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars could sink into cultivation at any time. At present, both of his avatars were ced inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon and they would be sent to Han Shuo¡¯s demonic infant when Han Shuo needed to use their energies.

    After giving that advice, Akley immediately resumed his recovery and paid no attention to Han Shuo. While Han Shuo¡¯s avatars cultivated inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, he stared nkly into the distance, pondering about his future.

    Compared to Profound Continent, Elysium wasn¡¯t just bigger, but the rtionships and politics were even more tangled andplicated. The twelve Overgods had divided the infinitely wide Elysium into twelve dominions, one for each Overgod.

    Naturally, no Overgod would let opposing forces into their dominions. Any trespasser discovered would be mercilessly executed.

    Gods who cultivated in the energy of death, destruction, and darkness were strictly prohibited from entering the dominions under the Overgods of Life and Light, and vice versa.

    The Dominions of Earth, Fire, Wind, Water, and Thunder belonged in rather unstable neutrality. There would often be a mixture of gods cultivating in various energies, along with a minority of godly cultivators of the energy of death, destruction and darkness found in the dominions. Those gods would usually reside around regions with special characteristics. For example, if a region had particrly intense elements of death and darkness, it would attract gods that cultivated in those energies to live there.

    The dominions under the Overgod of Destiny and Space allowed entry to all gods. The two Overgods were basically permanently neutral. They had never participated or took sides in any of the fierce conflicts on Elysium.

    The twelve Overgods were divided into several factions. The Overgod of Light and Life were a gang. The Overgods of Earth, Fire, Wind, Water, and Thunder could be said as being in one band, but they were the least cohesive faction and the most unstable. For example, in recent years, the Overgod of Water had been growing closer to the Overgod of Light and was slowing drifting away from that band.

    The Overgods of Death, Destruction, and Darkness too had formed an alliance, the product of which was the Cmity Church. The Overgod of Darkness had only ganged up with the Overgods of Death and Destruction in recent years. Those in the camp had severely threatened the interests of the Overgods of Life and Light for advancing on their own. It was practically impossible for the two camps to interact peacefully. Most wars on Elysium involved these two camps.

    The Overgod of Space, as well as most cultivators of the edict of space, wandered all about the universe. They were the most dispersed gods around Elysium and were almost always neutral towards belligerents. As they were the only people who could deploy internar transportation matrices, practically no forces would give them any kind of trouble.

    The Overgod of Destiny was the most mysterious and usually paid no heed to worldly affairs. No matter if the powerhouses were shing with each other, or if the whole material ne was on fire, the Overgod of Destiny wouldn¡¯t show concern by the slightest.

    However, when the fight escted to the point where one faction would not stop until the other perished, the Overgod of Destiny would emerge as the conflict resolver. More often than not, those factions wouldply with the opinion of the Overgod of Destiny and reconcile, reaching a truce and perhaps even cease the conflict altogether.

    The reason that all the forces would listen to the Overgod of Destiny was ¨C it was said that the Overgod of Destiny was the spokesperson for The Creator. Its words reflected the wishes of The Creator.

    Han Shuo had learned of this information through all sorts of channels beforeing to Elysium. In this world where all kinds of powerhouses could be found and all sorts of family ns dominated the expansivend, without understanding the disputes and the bigger picture, standing with the wrong faction could mean one¡¯s doom.

    Due to the enmity he had with the Church of Light and Shrine of Ice, it was basically impossible for Han Shuo to remain neutral. He was a nobody with no authority and no influence on Elysium, wanting to ensure his own safety, so he chose to stand in the Cmity Church camp. That was the only sensible act.

    Although Han Shuo had long wished of visiting this material ne, now when he truly stood on the soil of Elysium, he felt rather lost about his future. He had no idea where he would stand on this high-level material ne where mighty godly experts could be found at every turn or where he would go.

    ¡°You must constantly fight and continue to grow stronger. A demonic arts cultivator is never afraid of challenges ¨C they look forward to them. When you be just as mighty as the Exalted Demonlord, you may go anywhere you want. You could even return to your homeworld!¡± as though it sensed Han Shuo¡¯s insecurities about the future, Cauldron Spirit suddenly startedmunicating with Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    ¡°When I truly reach that stage, everything at my homeworld will havepletely changed. Everyone I knew would have died of old age,¡± when Han Shuo thought of Earth, he was reminded of his parents. His heart suddenly ached with sorrow.

    The Cauldron Spirit turned silent.

    After a long while, when Han Shuo was still immersed in heartache, the Cauldron Spirit suddenly transmitted, ¡°There are people approaching. Decent strength. Do you wish to flee?¡±

    Han Shuo immediately came to his senses. After casting all the jumbled thoughts off his mind, he instructed, ¡°Dispatch a mystical demon. I will decide after determining the situation!¡±

    ¡°Alright!¡± The Cauldron Spirit sent a formless, incorporeal mystical demon flying towards the approaching party.

    The mystical demons refined by the Cauldron Spirit were made from lowgod or midgod souls. Han Shuo had long experienced the might of the mystical demons and knew that the ones Cauldron Spirit refined were much more valiant than the spirit demons he meticulously refined. The incorporeal mystical demons had practically no life signature when they weren¡¯t attacking. Without extremely mighty strength, it would be nearly impossible to detect the presences of the mystical demons.

    A mystical demon rapidly flew towards its destination. Being immaterial, the mystical demon wasn¡¯t affected by gravity and could fly at high speed. The mystical demon took just a few moments to reach its target.

    It saw an eerie-looking old woman with gray hair and a body that appeared no different from a dried corpse. She wasughing sinisterly in a low voice while weaving death rays andunching them in all directions.

    Ahead of the old woman was a group of five. They looked terrified and were fleeing in five different directions.

    The old woman cultivated in the elemental energy of death. She appeared to be a midgod. All five of those fleeing in disarray were lowgods. There were three males and two females. Two of them cultivated in the element of death, another two in the element of darkness, while one more in the edict of destruction.

    ¡°Run towards the valley. There is an internar transportation facility over there with proper divine guards. As long as we reach the valley, this godhunter will surely retreat!¡± a woman that cultivated in the element of darkness shouted to the two middle-aged men who cultivated in the element of death.

    A godhunter! Han Shuo was shocked. He did not expect to run into a notorious godhunter so soon after he arrived at the Elysium.

    A so-called godhunter was a god who would hunt and kill other gods cultivating in the same energy in order to raise their own divine energy.

    A god could absorb the divine energy of another god as long as both of them cultivated in the same elemental energy or edictal force. Those who were tired of long and endless cultivation or toozy to travel to lower-level material nes to gather the power of faith would usually sneak up in some remote countryside to hunt for other gods of weaker strengths cultivating in the same energy and absorb their divine energy to rapidly raise their own.

    No matter in any Overgod domains, godhunters were despised and heavily cracked down upon. There would be a department of divine guards specially tasked with hunting the godhunters in each of the twelve dominions. Once caught, they would be killed on the spot without trial! In most circumstances, godhunters did not hunt in cities or towns where powerful gods were present. They would usually choose to strike in sparsely popted regions where divine guards would have difficulty attending to. They preferred to set their hands on weaker gods traveling alone.

    These types of existences were willing to take enormous risks to quench their greed and thirst for divine energy. Many of those who were new to Elysium might be finished off by a godhunter before they could truly experience the wonders of this world.

    Although there would be divine guards tasked with cracking down on this bunch of lunatics, the divine guards were limited in strength and number. They could neverpletely put an end to the existence of godhunters.

    Beforeing to Elysium, Donna had repeatedly stressed and cautioned Han Shuo about the godhunters. She once mentioned that some of those godhunters possessed extremely valiant power. There were even godhunters that were high-level members of some influential family ns. They would remain to be well-regarded by the public as long as they did not get caught.

    The greed and thirst for divine energy, in the right circumstances, could turn a normal person into a deranged godhunter. Even one¡¯s closest friend could be the next godhunter if one were severely injured.

    While these pieces of information flew through Han Shuo¡¯s brain, before he could carefully ponder about it, his face froze ¨C he discovered that for whatever reason, one of the cultivators of the element of death was fleeing towards him while that eerie and sinister old woman pursued.

 Chapter 675 - There are no doors to hell, you just have to barge into it!

    GDK 675: There are no doors to hell, you just have to barge into it!

    <i>Fuck! How could I be so unlucky!</i> Han Shuo cursed lowly. He had just escaped from the bunch that came from Blue Ocean Continent hunting for Akley and did not even have proper rest before he had to flee from yet another threat. This aggravated Han Shuo very much.

    That person cultivating in the elemental energy of death fleeing towards Han Shuo saw him from a distance and hastily cried out for help, ¡°Save me! There¡¯s a godhunter!¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re nuts!¡± Han Shuo muttered to himself. Without paying any attention to the person fleeing towards him, he grabbed Akley and started flying away.

    ¡°Oh? Another littlemb cultivating in the energy of death. I¡¯m in luck today!¡± that godhunter giggled with her chilling and eerie voice.

    ¡°Stupid! Don¡¯t run towards me! Escape in another direction!¡± When that man trying to escape saw that Han Shuo could fly so nimbly even while carrying a person, he immediately thought of Han Shuo as an expert who could save his life and therefore kept on following Han Shuo. This infuriated Han Shuo and made him rain curses on the person.

    ¡°Save me, I will give you all the crystal coins I have!¡± the person cried out again.

    ¡°I can¡¯t save my own life, let alone yours!¡± Han Shuo shouted. He yet again elerated his flying speed and even secretly utilized a small amount of demonic yuan!

    ¡°Bryan, what¡¯s wrong now?¡± the muddle-headed Akley asked in a rather annoyed voice.

    ¡°We ran into a godhunter. She¡¯s a midgod cultivating in the elemental energy of death. This is going to be troublesome!¡± Han Shuo replied.

    Akley¡¯s eyes sprung wide when Han Shuo uttered the word ¡®godhunter¡¯. Just as Han Shuo had expected, Akley didn¡¯t seem to know how to spell the word ¡®death¡¯ and immediately suggested to Han Shuo, ¡°Then let¡¯s fight her to her death. There is no way we can escape from the pursuit of a midgod!¡±

    ¡°Not necessarily!¡± Han Shuo replied coldly as a murderous desire rose in his heart. He asked, ¡°Akley, can you move on your own now?¡±

    ¡°Yes, I can run onnd but I can¡¯t take to the air yet!¡± Akley replied. He appeared puzzled.

    ¡°Good. You keep running in this direction and I will catch up to youter! That godhunter cultivates in the element of death. Her main target is me. I will draw her away and look for you when it¡¯s safe!¡± Han Shuo suddenly dove down from high above the sky and dropped Akley on the ground.

    Thend was a bewildering forest with a rocky terrain. Although one would travel much slower by running on suchnd, it was less conspicuouspared to flying in the sky.

    ¡°You¡¯re mad! There¡¯s no way you can draw her away! It¡¯s suicide! There might still be a small chance of survival if both of us go all out against her!¡± Akley shouted.

    ¡°Just keep running forward and don¡¯t stop! I can guarantee that I will be just fine!¡± Han Shuo calmly shouted. Soon after, he took to the air in another direction.

    Meanwhile, not far behind Han Shuo, a bleak and miserable scream pierced through the sky. From the sound of it, the figure chasing behind Han Shuo ought to have perished.

    ¡°That little bitch died fast!¡± Han Shuo abruptly slowed down his flying speed and even intentionally unfurled the aura of death on his body. He also released several mystical demons in the Cauldron of Myriad Demon and sent them all around.

    Han Shuo stood tall atop a steep cliff. With his cold eyes, he gazed at that godhunter as she emerged from a cloud of thin smoke.

    That old woman was carrying the body of her most recent victim. Her five w-like fingers clutched deep into the person¡¯s back. It appeared that she was still sucking away the divine energy in that person¡¯s body.

    ¡°Littlemb, why have you stopped running?¡± the old woman said with an eerie, malevolent smile. She slowly walked towards Han Shuo while her hands dripped with blood.

    ¡°I know I cannot run from you. So I figured I might as well save some energy in going all out against you. Who knows, I might have a tiny chance of sess!¡± Han Shuo replied calmly as he stared at her with his cold eyes.

    ¡°You are very smart in knowing that all effort to try to escape will be in vain. But what a pity, you¡¯re just a little too weak. In this deste area, away from the popce, you, a lowgod, have not the slightest chance against me. However, considering that you have saved me a fair bit of effort, I will let you die an easy death!¡± said the old woman with a cruel smile. Her ws in the back of her victim were vibrating, rapidly draining away the wee bit of divine energy still left in his body.

    They were located above a steep cliff. Han Shuo had probed the surrounding condition through the Cauldron Spirit beforehand and made sure that there was no presence of any advanced lifeforms within the several mile radius.

    ¡°Oh? Then I shall thank you in advance!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s eyes tracked her closely and did not appear panicked by the slightest. He was frighteningly calm.

    ¡°Aren¡¯t you afraid of me?¡± the old woman was still sucking away the divine energy from herst victim. She did not haste in attacking Han Shuo but asked him amusedly.

    ¡°As matters stand, fear is absolutely futile. It will only make me die even faster. So there¡¯s no point in feeling afraid of you!¡± Han Shuo said with an apathetic face as his heart grew colder and colder.

    ¡°You are quite special. It¡¯s marvellous that you could have this frame of mind at such a young age! But what a pity, such a pity ¨C you encountered me too soon. Truly a pity!¡± The old woman had finally sucked clean the divine energy of death from that person¡¯s body. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath as though she was bathing her mind in a wonderful and contenting feeling.

    Through the Cauldron Spirit, several mystical demons circled and patrolled the perimeter, ensuring that no one wasing over.

    ¡°Can you make your move already?¡± Han Shuo suddenly said smilingly. His smile appeared somewhat strange, evil, and elusive!

    ¡°Oh?¡± the godhunter softly cried and started looking Han Shuo up and down. She shook her head,ughed in her cruel voice, and said, ¡°This littlemb can¡¯t want to meet his doom. Very interesting!¡±

    As soon as she finished those words, death rays burst out from her ten fingers, fast and ferocious. They filled the space with strangely beautiful arcs as they streaked across the air.

    A tremble that came from the depths of the soul suddenly gushed towards Han Shuo. All of a sudden, Han Shuo¡¯s hand and feet turned stiff.

    Under such conditions, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t deploy many defensive measures. Several popping noises were heard as his ankles and shoulders were pierced by those death rays. Divine energy of death rushed into Han Shuo¡¯s body through those rays and froze him in ce in almost an instant.

    It was only after the attack that the old woman suddenly deployed her Domain of Divinity. All the elemental energy of death around them rapidly gathered around her body, rendering Han Shuo powerless!

    ¡°What a pitifulmb. I thought I would have to waste a little more strength. Didn¡¯t expect that it would be so easy!¡± the old woman said while pretending to feel sorry for Han Shuo.

    At the next instance, Han Shuo suddenly sensed that the divine energy from his avatar of death which he had deliberately filled his main body with, started to rapidly flow through those death rays and into the old woman¡¯s body.

    ¡°What a wonderful feeling. Now, I just need to kill a hundred more and I¡¯ll be able to attainte-stage midgod realm!¡± the old woman remarked satisfyingly in an appearance of sheer enjoyment.

    ¡°Now I see. This is indeed a shortcut. No wonder so many were willing to take the risk!¡± With his hands spread out, Han Shuo looked like a piece of meat nailed to the chopping board. Although he appearedpletely powerless to her assault, he did not reveal the slightest trace of fear in his speech.

    The old woman grew more and more puzzled. In her experience, at this stage, all those lesser gods whose bodies were restrained and their divine energy absorbed would be recklessly struggling in fear, loudly crying out for help, or perhaps tearfully begging to be spared...

    Not once had she seen any of her victims remain so calm and unruffled when their divine energy was being drained away like this youngster before her!

    ¡°You, you truly aren¡¯t afraid?¡± the old woman appeared rather puzzled. She looked at Han Shuo strangely and asked, ¡°As far as I know, the whole process of having your divine energy being sucked away should be extremely painful. But why is it that you don¡¯t seem to feel that way?¡±

    Han Shuo put on a bright smile and said, ¡°I have experienced pain far more severe than this many times before. To me, this kind of pain is just a tingle!¡± He somehow appeared even more rxed than she was. He appeared more like the actual perpetrator rather than a powerlessmb waiting to be ughtered.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo cracked a sinister, merciless grin and said, ¡°Perhaps you have never experienced being on the other side of the process. But don¡¯t worry, you will soon have the opportunity to taste this sensation!¡±

    ¡°Huh?!¡± the old woman suddenly cried out in surprise when she discovered that she couldn¡¯t absorb any more divine energy from Han Shuo. This was very unlike the conditions she had met many times before and she couldn¡¯t help but cry out in surprise, ¡°There¡¯s only this bit of divine energy in your body? How is that even possible? You are a lowgod. You can¡¯t possess just this bit of divine energy! What is happening?!¡±

    ¡°Of course this isn¡¯t all the divine energy in my body!¡± The evil grin was now on Han Shuo¡¯s face instead of the old woman¡¯s. With his cruel eyes fixed on her, he said in a gloomy and cold voice, ¡°But what a pity, this will be thest bit of energy you will take!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatar cultivating in the energy of death was sent into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. As the supreme demonic weapon left by Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord, even though itcked demon generals to utilize, it wasn¡¯t anything that a mere midgod could touch.

    ¡°Don¡¯t you dare y tricks with me. Otherwise, I can guarantee that you will die horribly!¡± the old woman said coldly to Han Shuo when she sensed that the situation was rather bizarre and something wasn¡¯t right.

    ¡°Oh, don¡¯t worry about it. I just want to take back what is mine!¡± Han Shuo shrugged his shoulders as though wanting to show her that the death rays she produced could not actually restrain his movements.

    ¡°When you borrow something, you should pay it back with some interest. Since you have borrowed what is mine, you should pay some interest on it, don¡¯t you think?¡±

    ¡°How, how could you still be able to move? Im... impossible!¡± the old woman, who looked like a dried corpse, started to screech neurotically. She found Han Shuo more and more baffling.

    ¡°Nothing is impossible. I have experienced that painful process, and now, it¡¯s your turn!¡± Han Shuo grinned and burst intoughter before her eyes. With one thought, his demonic infant started to operate. The demonic yuan in every cell of his body was activated.

    ¡°Arghhh...¡± the old woman suddenly let out a miserable, bloodcurdling screech. She was shivering from her head down while her face constantly twitched. She appeared to be in immense pain.

    ¡°The doors to paradise are wide open for you while the doors to hell are nowhere to be found, but you just have to barge into thetter! Now suffer and die!¡± Han Shuo said with a malevolent smile.

 Chapter 676 - The prey became the predator

    GDK 676: The prey became the predator

    Had Han Shuo¡¯s demonic arts not advanced by leap and bounds, or had he not the Cauldron of Myriad Demon to utilize, against this godhunter, Han Shuo¡¯s only viable option would have been to flee for his life.

    But clearly, this godhunter wasn¡¯t particrly lucky as she had run into Han Shuo soon after his strength soared.

    The action of engulfing another¡¯s energy, personal gain at the detriment of others, had always been the defining characteristic of a demonic arts cultivator. With both his avatars sheltered inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, not only were they not subjected to the effects of that old woman¡¯s death rays, by using this defining characteristic of demonic arts, the roles of prey and predator were switched. From amb waiting to be ughtered, Han Shuo became the butcherer!

    All of a sudden, the divine energy inside the old woman¡¯s body became like a water reservoir in a copsed dam, rapidly gushing into Han Shuo¡¯s body through the death rays that connected her to Han Shuo. The immense pain that came all too suddenly caught her unprepared and she started shrieking in misery.

    ¡°How... how is this possible?¡± the old woman performed far worsepared to Han Shuo when subjected to the painful procedure. She was even stammering in her speech. Her grimace in pain made her appearance all the more ugly and horrifying.

    Han Shuo kept silent as he stared at her with his cold and harsh eyes. When she spoke, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon suddenly flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s body and covered on the top of her skull in split second.

    Immediately, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon formed a soul-affecting energy field. The old woman, who was trying to severe those death rays and escape, started shrieking even louder and more painfully under the influence of the energy field. Her voice spread far and wide. Her grayish eyes filled with confusion as she started to grow oblivious to the situation.

    Han Shuo suddenly closed his eyes and concentrated on the effort. After the Cauldron of Myriad Demon left his body, he started circting the demonic yuan even faster, rapidly draining the old woman of her divine energy through those death rays.

    All the divine energy that Han Shuo had lost to her very quickly flowed back into his body. His avatar of death that exited the Cauldron of Myriad Demon took no time in recapturing the portion of energy lost.

    Han Shuo sneered grimly in his heart. He did not expect that he would run into such a fierce godhunter so soon after he arrived on Elysium. But fortunately, as he had concealed his true strength, the tragedy turned into a fortune. This old woman was a midgod cultivating in the elemental energy of death. As long as Han Shuo assimted all the divine energy in her, his avatar of death would surely rocket in strength.

    Unlike his avatar that cultivated in the edict of destruction, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death had previously fused with the divine soul of a midgod back in the Void. Being in possession of all the former understanding about the element of death of that midgod, once Han Shuo came to possess sufficient divine energy, he would advance further within an extremely short period of time!

    The Cauldron of Myriad Demon that enveloped the top of the old woman¡¯s head, using the power of the demon generals contained in the Cauldron, formed an energy field that caused her soul to sink into oblivion. At this moment, she waspletely at a loss and senseless to the situation. She was under Han Shuo¡¯s full control.

    ¡°What immense divine energy of death. Indeed worthy of being called a midgod!¡± Han Shuo relished in glory as his victim¡¯s divine energy surged into his body.

    ¡°Bryan, that friend of yours is in trouble. Also, there are peopleing this way!¡± the Cauldron Spirit suddenly transmitted while Han Shuo was indulging in the wonderful sensation.

    Suddenly, through the mystical demons deployed by the Cauldron Spirit, Han Shuo discovered that a group of people were vigorously pursuing Akley. The one taking the lead of the party was a well-built middle-aged man cultivating in the edict of destruction, ate-stage lowgod. Behind him were two godly experts cultivating in the element of darkness, as well as several inferior gods. They all wore simr clothing.

    With just one look, Han Shuo recognized the bunch as the ones pursuing Akley. Han Shuo had no idea how they managed to locate Akley so quickly.

    On the other hand, those who escaped from the godhunter along with Dolores were rapidly approaching Han Shuo by following the miserable howl of the old woman beside him.

    Either side, Akley or Dolores, would hinder Han Shuo¡¯s scheme of engulfing the old woman¡¯s divine energy. This was especially so when it came to Dolores. Godhunters were the public targets of despise. Han Shuo¡¯s current deeds had no difference to that of a godhunter, even if he was sucking the divine energy of a godhunter!

    If Dolores was to catch Han Shuo red-handed in the act, then, no matter how close Han Shuo was with Donna, with so many spectators, Dolores would have no choice but to attack Han Shuo. In addition to that, from that moment onwards, Han Shuo¡¯s name would be tarnished. He would forever be branded as a godhunter.

    This would definitely be very disadvantageous to Han Shuo¡¯s future development and he was most unwilling to see that happen!

    ¡°Kill. You take her soul while I destroy her body!¡± Han Shuo decisively transmitted his intentions to the Cauldron Spirit.

    ¡°Yes, sir!¡± The Cauldron Spirit immediately agreed and took action. The Cauldron of Myriad Demon that was buckled to the upper part of her head suddenly moved downwards and covered her entire skull.

    Meanwhile, Han Shuo ceased sucking away the divine energy in the old woman¡¯s body. Demonic mes violently gushed out from his palms and ravaged her body.

    The unique patterns on the Cauldron of Myriad Demon again started to glow with beautiful green light. Strange ripples traveled up the old woman¡¯s neck and entered the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. Han Shuo could clearly sense that the old woman¡¯s soul was being drawn away.

    Within the red mes of the Mystical cial Spellfire, this godhunter¡¯s body waspletely charred. Her original appearance was no longer distinguishable. After the Cauldron Spirit had pulled her divine soul into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, Han Shuo flung her burnt body into and down the cliff ahead.

    Han Shuo did not linger there for a second longer. He deployed demonic arts in full throttle and zoomed towards Akley, leaving behind a trail of formless shadow.

    Minutes after Han Shuo left, Dolores and a group of divine guards arrived at the area. After scanning the surroundings with his cold eyes, Dolores creased his brows and said in puzzlement, ¡°The voice obviously came from here. Where could that godhunter have gone?!¡±

    ¡°Kira!¡± a young woman suddenly shrieked. She ran to that lowgod of death murdered by that old woman and started wailing.

    ¡°My Lord, that godhunter knows you havee and therefore fled in advance!¡± one of the divine guards said to Dolores.

    ¡°Group yourselves in threes and search every inch of these grounds! Signal as soon as you make visual contact. Do not stray too far from here!¡±manded Dolores.

    These divine guards were all well-trained. They immediately organized themselves into parties of three and progressively searched the area.

    Soon enough, a long whistle sounded from the bottom of the cliff. Dolores¡¯ was taken aback and suddenly jumped down the cliff. He took no time in arriving at the bottom where he saw the old woman¡¯s body Han Shuo discarded.

    After walking to the charred body, Dolores crouched and poked it few times with the pike in his hand. His expression suddenly changed and he eximed in a deep voice, ¡°It¡¯s her! The godhunter is dead! How is this possible? Who killed her?¡±

    ¡°Wha¨C what?¡± that wailing woman walked over and said in disbelief.

    ¡°Based on your description, this is definitely the body of that godhunter that pursued you. Unbelievable. Someone managed to kill her!¡± Dolores was very astonished by his finding. A thought suddenly crossed his mind and he asked, ¡°You people mentioned there was a third person in Kira¡¯s path?¡±

    ¡°We did. We heard the voice of a third man. But because we were upied with escaping, we could not catch what he said!¡± the woman replied.

    ¡°My Lord, what should we do now?¡± one of the divine guards asked while obviously appearing somewhat worried.

    ¡°Drag her body back. As for the one that killed her, we will investigate it slowly. He might not necessarily be our enemy!¡± Dolores said. After hesitating for a moment, he added, ¡°Everyone stick together and stay alert!¡±

    Just how mighty did this character have to be in order to finish off a mid-stage midgod within such a short period of time? When Dolores came up with an approximate answer, he actually felt rather frightened! He did not dare to search the area any further as to avoid any unnecessary casualties. He did not wish that any mishap happen to these men under hismand.

    ¡°Lord Dolores, wouldn¡¯t that mean that Kira died in vain?¡± the girlfriend of the deceasedined while sobbing.

    ¡°What exactly do you have to protest about?¡± Dolores¡¯ face turned cold and he said impatiently, ¡°Isn¡¯t the godhunter now dead? Doesn¡¯t it really matter who killed this godhunter? Absolutely not! So what more do you want?¡± Dolores nced at the divine guards beside him and shouted, ¡°Return!¡±

    Those youngsters who lost their friend looked at each other and sighed in helplessness. Lest they be targets of other godhunters, they had no choice but hasten up behind Dolores and his party.

    Over on the other side, that well-built cultivator of the destruction edict led a group of five that surrounded Akley. After ensuring that Akley had no way of escaping, he said in a deep voice, ¡°Akley, hand us everything and we will let you live!¡±

    ¡°Oh, Bonnie, when have you ever honored your words? Let me live if I hand you everything? Hehe, who do you think you are trying to swindle!¡± Although Akley stood not a chance against these opponents, not only did he not appear flustered, he even sneered and ridiculed his opponent.

    ¡°Elder brother, you should know Akley¡¯s temperament. There¡¯s no point in talking to him. Let¡¯s just kill him and take the stuff. Death ends all troubles!¡± another of Akley¡¯s opponents suggested ferociously.

    ¡°Dum-Dum, if I didn¡¯t memorize a portion of the scroll¡¯s content and destroy the portion, do you think your elder brother would dangle with me for so long?¡± Akley said tauntingly.

    ¡°You! I will kill you!¡± the person couldn¡¯t restrain himself and flew into a fit of rage. He must have previously been wounded by Akley.

    ¡°Silence!¡± Bonnie put that person in check and took a deep breath as his face grew colder and colder. He stared at Akley and asked one more time, ¡°Akley, are you sure you won¡¯t spill a bean till your death?¡±

    ¡°If I don¡¯t divulge the information, I¡¯ll die. If I do divulge, I¡¯ll still die. So what for would I let you have your way?!¡± Akley said, smiling mischievously. The look of insanity gradually filled his eyes as he continued, ¡°But, believe it or not, before I die, I will drag at least one of you to share the same fate!¡±

    ¡°Everyone be careful. We must capture him alive. As long as we can take him back to Blue Ocean Continent, the patriarch will have ways of extracting everything in his soul!¡± Bonnie said as he gestured with his hands. The party notably did not close in on Akley, and in fact started walking backwards and away from him.

    <i>It seems that that fe must be finished. Otherwise, he would havee here long ago!</i>Akley thought to himself while he could still reason. He did not think that Han Shuo could really escape from the hands of a midgod.

    ¡°I will be the main assault while you all will restrain him. Akley is a lunatic so you all had better be careful!¡± instructed Bonnie. He was turning over in his mind how in the world he could capture Akley alive. Having pursued Akley for so long, he had long known that Akley was one who would stop at nothing to find ways to cause maximum casualties before his own death. Although Bonnie was far more powerful than Akley, it was still nheless a big headache to capture Akley alive.

    Being surrounded at the center, given that his body was still heavily injured, Akley knew there wasn¡¯t a chance of survival. Under such conditions, Akley no longer held any hopes of surviving. All he wished was to kill at least one or two of his opponents with his death. He secretly started deploying a self-destruct maneuver and was prepared to inflict his opponents with severe damage the moment they exchange blows.

    Han Shuo¡¯s voice suddenly sounded next to his ears, ¡°Akley, don¡¯t do anything stupid. I can still save you!¡±

    Akley, who was about to give in to self-sacrifice, froze. He cried out in surprise, ¡°You¡¯re not dead?¡±

    ¡°How would we die? The person who will die is you!¡± that opponent who had previously been injured by Akley sneered.

    ¡°Don¡¯t talk and don¡¯t move an inch. Just maintain this exact posture!¡± Han Shuo instructed and asked Akley to calm down.

    ¡°Attack!¡± Bonnie shouted, as he deployed his domain of divinity. The elemental energy around him were all affected by his domain of divinity.

    It was at this moment that a huge, colorful banner, like a dark cloud drifting out of nowhere, suddenly came covering down from the sky.

    ¡°Elder brother, what is that thing?!¡±

    ¡°Take Akley down, quick! Someone else is meddling with us. Akley must have found a helper!¡± Bonnie eximed, charging at the motionless Akley.

    The Banner of Hallucination covered down on them quicker than they imagined. While Bonnie continued to charge, he suddenly felt giddy as though the world was spinning. He suddenly failed to distinguish the directions. Thin mist had filled the air around them, blocking their sights from the surrounding situation.

    Akley, at the center of it, suddenly discovered that he was being coarsely dragged by his cor. After having been dragged multiple times, Akley immediately knew that Han Shuo hade to his rescue.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Han Shuo called, rapidly escaping into the fog. He disappeared from the region very rapidly. The Banner of Hallucination followed along with him and was kept away.

    ¡°Huh? Where did he go? Where is Akley?¡± after the fog slowly dispersed, Bonnie and his gang suddenly discovered that their target had long disappeared without a trace.

    ¡°We left a tracker on him. He can run but he can¡¯t hide!¡± Bonnie took out a horn-shaped object and blew several deep breaths to one end of the object. He then pointed in the direction Han Shuo escaped and shouted, ¡°Pursue him!¡±

    ¡°So it turns out that they left a tracker on you. No wonder. I was quite puzzled how they could locate you so quickly!¡± Han Shuo said smilingly to Akley that was being dragged.

    ¡°What tracker?¡± Akley was shocked. He too realized that something wasn¡¯t right after listening to Han Shuo¡¯s words.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, we will find out soon.¡± Han Shuo was trying to decide whether he should seize an opportunity to finish off those people or not. But after thinking for a while, he felt that Akley would be more dependent on him if they remained alive. Therefore, he gave up on the thought of turning back and ughtering them all.

 Chapter 677 - A village

    GDK 677: A vige

    After Han Shuo boosted his flight speed with the demonic yuan in his main body, Bonnie and his party had no way of catching up to Han Shuo and Akley. The distance between the two parties gradually grew further and further apart.

    Akley was very curious and kept on asking how Han Shuo managed to escape from the godhunter and how he rescued him from Bonnie. Han Shuo came up with an excuse by saying that Dolores had hurried over and scared the godhunter away.

    As to the matter about rescuing him from Bonnie, Han Shuo exined that he used a type of hallucinogen. As Akley, at the center of themotion, only saw that their surroundings were covered with fog before they managed to escape, he did not question Han Shuo¡¯s exnation.

    Akley had an approximate idea of the location of the divine essence mine but unfortunately, both of them were unfamiliar with Elysium and they didn¡¯t even know where they were. They wouldn¡¯t be able to locate the treasure without first finding their own location.

    ¡°We need to find a settlement and ask the locals there!¡± Akley said.

    ¡°Of course we will. But before that, we must first remove that tracker on you. Otherwise, Bonnie and his bunch will get to you eventually,¡± Han Shuo nodded and suggested.

    ¡°Sure. You find a safe ce tond and we will carefully search for it,¡± after having been saved by Han Shuo twice, in addition to still being wounded, Akley was receptive to Han Shuo¡¯s suggestion.

    Han Shuo boosted the coverage area of his consciousness using the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, allowing him to detect activities even further away from him.

    Han Shuo yet again selected a barren hill and soon, hended on top of it with Akley.

    ¡°I¡¯ll start examining myself!¡± Akley said softly after he sat down on a rock deep green in color. He closed his eyes and started searching for the tracker on himself.

    Being heavily injured and having recovered just a small amount of his energy, Akley wasn¡¯t at his best condition and therefore failed to locate the tracker on his body.

    Seeing that Akley was facing some trouble locating the tracker, Han Shuo pulsated his consciousness, concentrating his full attention on Akley. He started carefully probing for anomalies within Akley¡¯s body. The consciousness was formless, incorporeal, and all the more elusive after it reached Omen realm. Akley could not detect Han Shuo¡¯s actions.

    After a while, Han Shuo finally said, ¡°At the back of your chest, on a section of bone near your heart! It seems that you have previously received a heavy blow to your back. The tracker must have been nted there at that time!¡±

    ¡°That wretched Bonnie, he could have easily finished me off but he didn¡¯t because he was waiting for me to slowly exhaust all my energy so that he can capture me alive. What a bloody brilliant idea!¡± Akley slowly became aware of Bonnie¡¯s intention.

    For Bonnie to be able to strike Akley on the back and leave a tracker near his heart meant that Bonnie was totally capable of killing Akley by shattering his heart! However, Bonnie was more interested in iming everything in Akley¡¯s soul.

    A god who was slightly knowledgeable about souls could very easily obtain any information it wanted from the soul of any mortal. However, as one¡¯s strength increases, one¡¯s soul would grow moreplex. An ordinary lowgod may be able to obtain every little piece of information from the soul of demigod, but to extract information from the divine soul of another god of the same ss, that would be an impossible feat.

    Bonnie obviously had no way of obtaining the information he wanted from Akley¡¯s divine soul and therefore didn¡¯t dare kill him. Instead, he schemed on capturing Akley alive, bringing him back to Blue Ocean Continent, and having someone with even mightier strength pull the information off Akley¡¯s brain.

    ¡°Quickly remove that tracker. Otherwise, it won¡¯t be long till they find their way here!¡± Han Shuo hastened.

    Akley wasted not a word and started mustering the energy of destruction within his body at the back of his chest. After locating the tracker in ordance with Han Shuo¡¯s instruction, Akley suddenly pushed. A loud, high-pitched ringing sound was heard. Thereafter, Akley stopped straining himself and heaved a few heavy breaths.

    After carefully sensing for a moment to verify that the tracker on Akley was destroyed, Han Shuo nodded and remarked, ¡°That¡¯s one problem solved. We can try going around this area and asking for our current location as well as the direction to our destination!¡±

    ¡°The divine essence mine is located inside the Dominion of the Overgod of Darkness. Based on the description on the scroll, the divine essence mine isn¡¯t all that far away from the internar transportation facility where we came from. That¡¯s why I escaped there!¡± Akley revealed to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, we¡¯ll find someone to ask!¡± Han Shuo again grabbed Akley and took to the air.

    ¡°Can you not do that next time? It¡¯s very ufortable being dragged like this ¨C feels like I¡¯m being taken hostage!¡± Akley rolled his eyes andined to Han Shuo.

    ¡°I¡¯ll take note of that,¡± Han Shuo casually replied. He obviously did not take Akley¡¯s words to heart.

    It was only after arriving on Elysium that Han Shuo recognized just how expansive the material ne was. The two had to spend a long time just to fly out from a valley that housed an internar transportation facility. This would simply be inconceivable on Profound Continent.

    ording to Donna¡¯s description, Elysium was thousands of timesrger than Profound Continent and was perhaps the most vast material ne in the universe. Han Shuo wasn¡¯tpletely convinced of those ims but he finally understood that Donna¡¯s words were true after arriving at this material ne.

    Throughout Han Shuo¡¯s entire flight in the valley, he did not discover any trails of animals. He only observed the presence of bizarre looking nts. Han Shuo was puzzled with the finding.

    Finally, they exited the valley. All that appeared before their eyes was and with yellowish soil that stretched beyond the horizon.

    Han Shuo had learned from Dolores that after traversing the in of yellow soil, he would find vige settlements where he could ask the vigers for directions to the City of Shadows. Although Han Shuo wasn¡¯t nning on heading to the City of Shadows just yet, he still had to find some locals for help. Therefore, he spent two days traversing the in with Akley in his hands. Soon after crossing the in, he discovered presences of life.

    Han Shuo did not discover a single lifeform while flying across the barren in. He immediately sped up when he discovered the presence of other humans.

    Soon enough, a small vige simr to one Han Shuo found on Profound Continent appeared in his sight. Before entering the vige, Han Shuo probed the ce with his consciousness and discovered that those human souls wereprised of an assortment of strengths, contrary to Han Shuo¡¯s expectation of finding a poption fullyprised of godly existences.

    ¡°I¡¯ve found a vige with people. But don¡¯t worry, they aren¡¯t all that powerful. It should be very safe!¡± Han Shuo put Akley on the ground and the two started walking to the vige.

    Han Shuo could hearughter and cheerful voices in there before he got close to the vige. By using a mystical demon, Han Shuo discovered that the vige was holding a religious ceremony. Based on his understanding of the Cmity Church, Han Shuo immediately recognized that those vigers were praying to the three Overgods of the Cmity Church.

    Themoners in this world were much more formidable than those on Profound Continent, perhaps because elemental energies were abundant in the atmosphere of Elysium. After a short observation, Han Shuo discovered that most of the vigers were demigods along with a handful of basegods. Even children of young ages possessed strength equivalent to archmages and swordmasters on Profound Continent.

    ¡°Perhaps you don¡¯t understand the more detailed situation on Elysium, but usually when one cultivates to lowgod strength, they will not remain in small viges like this. Instead, they will head to big cities and attempt to join the forces ofrge family ns in order to obtain power and wealth, advancing further in life.

    ¡°Most of these people that remain in viges are the mediocrity, or perhaps children who have yet to mature. Therefore, it¡¯s without a doubt that there isn¡¯t any real expert to be found in the vige. Even the godhunters will note to viges like this because they won¡¯t find any gods!¡± Akley exined after Han Shuo put him back on the ground.

    ¡°This is your first time on Elysium, but why do you sound like you know a lot about this world?¡± Han Shuo asked, tilting his head.

    ¡°This may be my first time, but my master hade to Elysium many times before. Every time he returned from Elysium, he would recount with great detail what he encountered in his venture. That¡¯s why I¡¯m more knowledgeable than you in this aspect!¡± Akley exined.

    ¡°Where¡¯s your master now? Why isn¡¯t heing with you given the situation?¡± Han Shuo was amazed and asked the logical follow-up question.

    Alley began to frown slightly, pursing his lips to one side and bunching his brows. He let out a sigh and answered, ¡°He was heavily injured on Elysium and soon after he returned to Blue Ocean Continent, those from Bonnie¡¯s family n encircled him... and killed him.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry for your loss.¡± Han Shuo felt bad for reminding Akley of the painful event.

    Akley forced a smile and replied, ¡°It¡¯s okay. I havee to Elysium not just to obtain the divine essence mine, but also to find the man that injured my master. Once I find out who he is, I will avenge my master!¡±

    Han Shuo silently doubted Akley¡¯s oath. If his master was severely injured against that assant, then what exactly could Akley alone do to that person?

    ¡°What do you mean with those eyes?¡± Akley furiously red at Han Shuo and said in an irritated voice, ¡°Yes, my strength now is indeed very weak. But after I found the divine essence mine and obtain sufficient divine essence containing the energy of destruction, the situation will bepletely different!¡±

    Han Shuo inwardly nodded after hearing Akley¡¯s exnation. It turned out that the reason Akley sought that divine essence mine wasn¡¯t simply for the goal of getting rich.

    ¡°We are here!¡± Han Shuo and Akley had unwittingly entered the vige as they conversed. Some of the children who were happily ying went to the two and surrounded them, asking where they came from in their childish voice.

    ¡°A ce far, far away!¡± Akley answered impatiently.

    Han Shuo, however, wasn¡¯t as unfriendly. He pulled out some random small toys from his space ring and gave one to each of them in all smiles. The children were very happy to receive the toys. They cheered and jumped about while pulling on the corners of Han Shuo¡¯s shirt.

    Several adults in the distance saw how friendly Han Shuo treated the kids which left them a good first impression. They greeted Han Shuo from a distance, indicating Han Shuo toe to them.

    ¡°Rx man! We are here to ask for assistance, not to pick a fight. Quit scowling!¡± Han Shuo advised Akley as they walked deeper into the vige. However, it appeared that Akley did not heed the advice.

 Chapter 678 - Overcoming Oneself

    GDK 678: Oveing Oneself

    ¡°Hello, my friends. Where do youe from?¡± a hunchbacked old man with grizzled hair greeted Han Shuo and Akley enthusiastically. Many of the vigers standing behind the old man too were looking at them with amiable smiles.

    Their worship of the three Overgods of the Cmity Church was still going on not far in the distance. The ceremony did not seem particrly grave nor did the vigers behave solemnly. In fact, they appeared very much at ease.

    ¡°We came from the internar transportation facility on that valley. We actually originated from another material ne. There is a ce that we want to go but we don¡¯t know the direction or where exactly we are. We were hoping you could help us find our way,¡± Han Shuo replied smilingly and rxedly as though he was conversing with an old friend.

    ¡°Ah, so that¡¯s the case. That¡¯s no problem at all. We have internar travelers pass by this vige quite frequently. Haha, I could tell from first nce that both of you are followers of the Cmity Overgods. We are most willing to provide you assistance,¡± that old man said smilingly. He did not appear shocked at all and seemed toe across such a matter frequently.

    ¡°Akley, why don¡¯t you describe the ce where we are going?¡± Han Shuo turned around and said to Akley.

    Akley, who had been walking behind Han Shuo, stepped forward and started describing to the elderly man their destination. As all the information about the divine essence mine recorded on the ancient scroll was archaic, so was Akley¡¯s knowledge about their destination. Perhaps some variations had taken ce to the destination recorded on the scroll, the elderly man appeared rather puzzled and had to keep on asking Akley for more details.

    After exchanging words back and forth for some time, the elderly man pondered in silence for a long while before he suddenly came to himself and said, ¡°Head south from this ce. The journey will take around half a month. There you will find an isted mountain range. There is a small mountain among the mountain range called the Demon Mountain. I¡¯m not exactly sure that that is the ce you are looking for, but your words seem to be describing that ce.¡±

    ¡°Thanks!¡± Akley¡¯s voice was stifled. He immediately turned to Han Shuo and said, ¡°Let¡¯s go, that should be the ce!¡±

    ¡°Hold on!¡± the elderly man suddenly cried out. When Han Shuo turned around and looked at him with a puzzled gaze, the elderly man exined, ¡°You lot are new to Elysium. Maybe you have yet to understand how things work around here. Besides the human race, this ne of Gods also hosts all sorts of intelligent species. That mountain range I just mentioned is considered off-limits. A group of non-humans is living there and the mountain range is partitioned to them. If you trespass upon their territory without their approval, this could invite a lot of unnecessary trouble.¡±

    ¡°Understood, we will be careful. Thank you!¡± Han Shuo nodded and thanked the elderly man politely.

    ¡°You are wee. Just be sure to pay attention to that. Their allegiance also lies with the three Overgods and they are subjected to certain constraints. As long as you do not actively provoke them, you should be alright,¡± the elderly man gave hisst advice.

    Han Shuo expressed his understanding and thanked him again before leaving the vige with Akley.

    ¡°It goes without saying that humans hold the leading role on Elysium. As for the other races, some cultivate in the twelve fundamental forces, and others are innately gifted with strength. These non-human races would usually pledge allegiance to and serve the twelve Overgods, thereby receiving their divine protection. Since most of them do not like living in crowded human cities and prefer remote mountains andkes, they would only be summoned when war breaks out. The residents of the mountain range should be one such group,¡± Akley exined to Han Shuo after leaving the vige.

    There were more than a few non-human races to be found on a material ne as small as Profound Continent, therefore, there would obviously be even more of them to be found on this expansive ne of Gods. Back then, ude, a necromancer of the Cmity Church, had summoned the three-eyed evil god Ansidesi. From Han Shuo¡¯s current understanding, he inferred that the three-eyed Ansidesi could be a leader of its race.

    After thinking for a while, Han Shuo asked the important question, ¡°How could you be so sure that the Demon Mountain is our destination?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not fully certain that Demon Mountain is what we are looking for, although I do strongly suspect that it is. Based on the descriptions in the scroll, we seek a mountain that looks fierce and sinister from a distance, like a demon baring its fangs and brandishing its ws. I exined once to that old man and the first thing he came up with was the Demon Mountain,¡± Akley exined.

    Han Shuo agreed with his judgment. It seemed very likely that Demon Mountain was their target.

    Although that elderly man Han Shuo and Akley encountered said that the journey to the mountain range from the vige would take around half a month, the duo took less than half of that duration. Han Shuo, carrying Akley, required just three days to arrive at the mountain range.

    Han Shuo and Akley came into many more viges along their journey. They discovered more and more humans ever since they left that barren field. Midway into the journey, Han Shuo discovered two well-concealed godhunters. As both of them cultivated in the elemental energy of darkness, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t gain much from them and therefore abandoned all thoughts of ambushing them. Instead, he evaded them.

    For some reason, ever since Han Shuo had the most pleasurable experience of engulfing the old godhunter¡¯s divine energy of death, this temptation of having his strength rapidly soar started nibbling away his willpower. It gave Han Shuo an irresistible urge ¨C an impulse to seek and suck away another¡¯s divine energy!

    This intense desire to act was like a voice that persistently seduced him at every moment, reminding him just how easy, how swift the method was. Even Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but think about it ever so briefly.

    ¡°Master, this will not do, you cannot go on like this. I¡¯ve noticed that your heart and mind have grown more chaotic in recent days!¡± the Cauldron Spirit suddenly transmitted when they arrived at the mountain range.

    ¡°I know. I know where the problem lies, but I have no way of resolving it for the time being!¡± Han Shuo took a deep breath and transmitted to the Cauldron Spirit.

    ¡°That temptation power is indeed quite something but you should not let it take over you. Demonic arts cultivators also do so asionally but they must not recklessly hunt others just to raise their own strength. More often than not, demonic arts cultivators who boost their own strengths purely by relying on absorbing another¡¯s energy would find themselves losing more and more of their self-control and end up sinking into insanity. This type of cultivator who deviates from the essences of demonic arts will never attain the ultimate realm!¡± the Cauldron Spirit exined.

    Han Shuo trusted Cauldron Spirit¡¯s judgment and questioned, ¡°What should I do?¡±

    ¡°This kind of temptation is like a drug addiction. It¡¯s deviant and corrupt, not something that you should have, and it¡¯s certainly entirely different from the cravings at the bottom of your heart during normal conditions! What you need to do is control that dependence and have a clear idea of what you are doing, instead of thinking about how to hunt others to raise your own strength!¡± Cauldron Spirit solemnly advised Han Shuo.

    ¡°I understand what I should do now!¡± Han Shuo was no fool and quickly came to his senses after a brief moment of thinking. He turned to Akley and said, ¡°Let¡¯s not enter that mountain range yet. You need time to recover from some of your injuries so that you will stop being a burden on me!¡±

    ¡°Isn¡¯t it easier for you to keep me under your grip if I remain in this state?¡± Akley asked astoundedly.

    ¡°We are in a coborative rtionship, I have no wish of fully controlling you in my palms, nor am I worried that you will turn against me during critical moments. Therefore, give yourself some time, at least a period that will allow you to fly again!¡± Han Shuo replied, but he inwardly thought, <i>if I were to use the strength of my main body against a lowgod of destruction like you, you would be dead without a doubt. What is there about you that I have to worry about?</i>

    ¡°Alright then. Let¡¯s find a ce and do so.¡± All this while, thinking that their rtionship was merely one of mutual exploitation, Akley was always on the guard against Han Shuo. It was only after this point that Akley began to look at Han Shuo with some amount of trust.

    The intention behind Han Shuo giving Akley time to recover actually wasn¡¯t all out of his benevolence. In fact, he needed this more than Akley, to ovee the greed andpulsion in his heart and stabilize his mental state.

    After locating a quiet cave, Han Shuo sealed Akley in and opened up a separate cave for himself.

    He calmed his mind and immediately, following the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s instructions, started his attempt to conquer that insatiable addiction at the bottom of his heart that was slowly growing more and more intense.

    Han Shuo had learned from Donna that the godhunters were a bunch of perverted lunatics. Once a person had the experience of absorbing another¡¯s divine energy, they would no longer be able to exercise control over their craving. Just as the Cauldron Spirit had said, those people were pretty much drug addicts. They would constantly hunt and kill to satisfy the unquenchable greed in their heart. There was rarely anyone who could ovee such an addiction.

    The reason why godhunters would immediately be killed without trial in every single Overgod Dominion was that they knew the godhunters would never recover. They would hunt for others cultivating in the same energy for the rest of their lives. They were beyond redemption and the only cure seemed to be death.

    After having absorbed that old woman¡¯s divine energy, Han Shuo too had experienced that wonderful feeling. The thrilling sensation of everything that another person gained by arduously cultivating for hundreds or even thousands of years gushing into one¡¯s body within a short few minutes, fueling one¡¯s rapid advancement in strength, for these gods serving the Cmity Church who were evil to begin with, this was indeed a very profound temptation that could not be ovee.

    Inside the cave, Han Shuo opened up his soul with only his tenacious willpower left. He emptied his mind and exerted himself in resisting those corrupting thoughts that swam through his mind incessantly.

    The whole process of demonic arts cultivation had always been a struggle against oneself. Since the day that Han Shuo started cultivating in demonic arts, he had constantly challenged the limits of his endurance to bear all kinds of inhuman pain. The tenacity of his willpower was beyond anything that an average person could imagine. Every time a demonic arts cultivator went through metamorphosis, they would have to endure a lengthy period of inhuman pain. Having withstood the transformative processes over and over again, Han Shuo had amply demonstrated his strength of will.

    Inside the cave, Han Shuo held back the waves of warped desires that surged through his mind over and over again by using his extraordinary willpower. He would tremble from head to toe or perhaps beat against his chest every now and then. However, over time, he managed to gradually calm down.

    After five days, Han Shuo¡¯s mind was like the surface of a quietke, tranquil and still without the slightest ripple. He had sessfully conquered that abnormal desire.

    ¡°Congrattions, master! I sense that you have also made some breakthroughs in the Omen realm! On another note, you can continue to engulf other¡¯s energy using demonic arts in the future. Because you havepletely controlled and contained that perverted desire, it will no longer tempt you at the depths of your soul. You have prevailed over yourself once again!¡±

    ¡°Understood!¡± Han Shuo stood up cheerfully. He was rxed and at ease.

 Chapter 679 - This is my son!

    <h4>This is my son!</h4>

    GDK 679: This is my son!

    After exiting his cave, Han Shuo went to the cave where Akley was restoring his divine energy. Although Akley now appeared much betterpared to a few days before, it was impossible for him topletely recover within the span of a few days.

    Akley immediately awoke as soon as Han Shuo arrived. He opened his eyes, adjusted himself, and did a little stretching before standing up and asking, ¡°What¡¯s up?¡±

    ¡°How are you doing? How are your injuries?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    ¡°It would take years to fully recover. Of course, if we find the divine essence mine, that will be a whole nother story!¡± Akley sighed and forced a smile.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, as long as the divine essence mine is inside the mountain range, we will be able to locate it,¡± Han Shuo said, full of confidence.

    ¡°Even I do not have such enormous confidence. Where is thising from?¡± Akley asked with a smile.

    ¡°I found a good friend. With his assistance, as long as the divine essence mine is in the mountain range, we will find it without a doubt!¡± Han Shuo was very confident because he had trust in earth elite zombie and metal elite zombie¡¯s abilities. It was also at this moment that Han Shuo realized that he no longer needed Akley. Having grasped the general location, that divine essence mine would be a sure gain for Han Shuo.

    ¡°What? You have brought in another person? What friend would you have on this material ne?¡± Akley was shocked. He appeared very worried and looked all around vigntly before he said, ¡°Why did you not seek my approval before you made that reckless decision? Dodn¡¯t you know what those divine essences signify? If that friend of yours has other thoughts, we will all be finished! Your actions are preposterous!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, he will not. Besides, we will still divide the spoils as per the original agreement. I will share my portion of the spoils with my friend, so you don¡¯t have to worry about your share being diluted!¡± Naturally, earth elite zombie and metal elite zombie will not demand the rewards from Han Shuo. There will be no dilution to their shares.

    ¡°The issue now isn¡¯t how we will divide the spoils; that friend of yours could very possibly ruin everything! Where is he anyway?¡± Akley was very anxious and was exasperated that Han Shuo had made the decision without consulting him.

    Han Shuo smiled, gently stomped on the ground, and said, ¡°Come out!¡± Right then, the naive looking earth elite zombie emerged from the ground.

    ¡°He, he cultivates in the elemental energy of earth!¡± Akley cried out in surprise yet again. He pointed at Han Shuo and shouted, ¡°Are you insane? How could you trust this person? I thought he would at least cultivate in either the energy of death, destruction, or darkness. Perhaps then there might be a possibility of partnership. One that cultivates in the energy of earth obviously cannot be part of our gang. How could you be so silly?¡±

    After absorbing the divine soul and divine energy of the Primordius Dragon, earth elite zombie gave off an obvious earth element aura. Through the connection between their souls, Han Shuo sensed that earth elite zombie¡¯s divine soul was slowly taking shape. Even the extreme treasure of earth attribute, Earthsoul Pearl, had fused with his soul. It appeared that it wouldn¡¯t be long before earth elite zombiepletely supnted the Primordius Dragon and became a god of earth element himself.

    Akley had disyed obvious hostility towards earth elite zombie. All five elite zombies possessed acute senses and earth elite zombie returned the hostile gazes to Akley. He transmitted to Han Shuo, ¡°Father, he wants to kill me. Should we attack him?¡±

    <script>console.log(¡°Hello wooorld¡±)</script>

    ¡°No, it¡¯s okay. Just give me a moment,¡± Han Shuo cated earth elite zombie. He suddenly put on a stern face and said to Akley, ¡°Look, you just have to set your mind at ease and stay here calmly while my friend finishes the rest of the business ¨C put off the discussion until you see the divine essences. Take it easy for now. Soon you will see just how right my decision is.¡±

    ¡°He is just a god cultivating in the elemental energy of earth. How can he settle everything alone all by himself? You must understand that everyone in the mountain range serves the Cmity Overgods. Once those people discover that an outsider, one that doesn¡¯t cultivate in the energy of death, destruction, or darkness, has trespassed on theirnd, they will finish him off immediately with no questions asked. What makes you think that he can evade the senses and detection of those people?¡± Akley said to Han Shuo as though he was exining to a fool. He continued in a furious voice, ¡°Prior to this, I actually thought that you were quite smart. How is it that you have suddenly turned into such an idiot at this moment!¡±

    ¡°I understand your concerns! But you don¡¯t have to worry, I would never do such a thing withoutplete certainty of the oue! Also, there is no action required on your part other than to wait right here with me. Just wait and watch the divine essence minee to us!¡± Han Shuo exined. After finishing those words, he instructed earth elite zombie smilingly, ¡°Proceed!¡±

    ¡°How, how dare you talk to my father so rudely! If it wasn¡¯t for my father¡¯smand, I, I will kill you!¡± out of Han Shuo¡¯s expectations, earth elite zombie, who had alwaysmunicated by transmitting thoughts, red fiercely at Akley and spoke the threatening words.

    Han Shuo was instantly stunned when earth elite zombie uttered those words. He never imagined that there woulde a day that earth elite zombie could truly speak, much less in such a threatening tone!

    Akley too was dumbfounded. His face was filled with astonishment as he gazed foolishly at earth elite zombie. After a long while, he turned to Han Shuo and looked up and down at him with strange gazes before asking, ¡°He¡¯s... He¡¯s your son?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. This is my son!¡± Han Shuo replied in an indifferent tone. Then, instead of transmitting instructions with his soul, he said to earth elite zombie with his mouth, ¡°Enough of these angry words. Hurry up and go!¡±

    ¡°Understood, father!¡± earth elite zombie smiled naively at Han Shuo, turned to shoot a re at Akley, and sank deep into the ground again. He reunited with metal elite zombie waiting underground and together, they advanced towards the Demon Mountain.

    <i>He, he can speak! He¡¯s talking with his mouth instead of transmitting messages with his soul. This, this is just too... </i> Han Shuo went on mumbling to himself. He was both astounded and overjoyed to hear earth elite zombie speak.

    ¡°The few of them are now an entirely new type of lifeform. Although they are different from humans, undeniably, they possess advanced intelligence! If they continue to grow at this rate, these kids will sure go ces!¡± Cauldron Spirit transmitted to Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    ¡°Yes, that¡¯s true. They have indeed be a new type of life. I can sense it!¡± Han Shuo replied to the Cauldron Spirit. He became prouder and prouder of his decision to refine the five elite zombies back in those years. With Little Skeleton and the five elite zombies just a summoning spell away, although Han Shuo came to Elysium by himself, he did not feel lonely.

    ¡°You, you never cease to baffle me!¡± Akley eximed and asked Han Shuo puzzlingly, ¡°You cultivate in the elemental energy of death. Why is it that you let your son cultivate in the elemental energy of earth? Don¡¯t you understand that in the future, you two might be enemies?¡±

    ¡°My son will never betray me. I¡¯m a hundred percent certain of it!¡± although the five elite zombies were not truly Han Shuo¡¯s kids, the bond between them was closer than that of actual father and sons. His confidence was not unfounded.

    Akley lowered and shook his head. He sighed, ¡°Forget about it. I don¡¯t think I will evere close to understanding your ways. But since he is your son, I think there is still room for discussion about this matter. At least he likely will not think of selling us out.¡±

    By this point in time, Han Shuo was no longer concerned about what Akley had to say. With the help of a mystical demon following earth elite zombie and metal elite zombie, Han Shuo could observe their situation remotely.

    With earth elite zombie paving the way, the duo traveling deep under the ground advanced towards the Demon Mountain. As they had carefully concealed the aura on their bodies and they were very far beneath the surface, Han Shuo believed that those living in the mountain range wouldn¡¯t detect their presences.

    Earth elite zombie could bring metal elite zombie to the underbelly of the Demon Mountain. Although earth elite zombie could not prate the hard rock that made up the mountain, it would pose no trouble to metal elite zombie. Additionally, metal elite zombie had the ability to detect any kind of metals or ores. Once metal elite zombie entered the Demon Mountain, no matter how concealed the divine essence mine was, with his extraordinary innately gifted senses, metal elite zombie would find them.

    A divine essence mine naturally concealed the aura of the precious crystals within. This was the reason why a god, no matter how mighty, could not discover divine essence mines just by utilizing their senses.

    Han Shuo believed that as long as the person who originally discovered the divine essence mine was not mentally handicapped, they would not try to deploy a boundary around the mine to conceal it. This was because the mightier a godly existence was, the more sensitive they were to elemental energy. And since elemental or edictal energy were ever-present on boundaries and seals, in such a mountain range, having a concealment boundary around the mine would be self-defeating.

    Without any boundary or seal, what could stop the innately gifted metal elite zombie from detecting the divine essence mine?

    ¡°Father, we found the ce. Should we go up now?¡± earth elite zombie suddenly transmitted. He sounded rather enthusiastic.

    ¡°Don¡¯t rush. Wait for a moment,¡± Han Shuo immediately replied. Next, hemunicated with the Cauldron Spirit, ¡°It¡¯s your turn for action!¡±

    ¡°No problem, master,¡± the Cauldron Spirit answered. By using the underground tunnel that earth elite zombie constructed, all the demon generals within the Cauldron of Myriad Demon rapidly flew towards earth elite zombie and metal elite zombie. They transformed into multiple dark threads that stick to the elite zombies¡¯ bodies.

    The Cauldron of Myriad Demon was the mightiest demonic weapon previously possessed by Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord. Certain ancient demonic formations could be easily deployed using the demon generals contained in the Cauldron. Those dark lines stuck to the bodies of metal and earth elite zombies made up a demonic formation for concealing aura formed using the energy of the demon generals. The Cauldron Spirit very confidently assured Han Shuo that with those demonic formations wrapping metal and earth elite zombies, not a single being could detect the duo¡¯s aura.

    Han Shuo had confidence in Cauldron Spirit. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have let earth and metal elite zombies venture there by themselves. With the duo¡¯s remarkable innate skills, in addition to having the energy of this mighty demonic weapon called the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, Han Shuo felt that this operation of excavating the divine essence mine was a walk in the park.

    ¡°You may now ascend the mountain!¡± after getting confirmation from the Cauldron Spirit, Han Shuo immediately transmitted to earth and metal elite zombies.

 Chapter 680 - Strange Spiders

    <h4>Strange Spiders</h4>

    GDK 680: Strange Spiders

    The Demon Mountain eerily resembled a malevolent demon from a distance ¨C identical to the descriptions recorded on Akley¡¯s scroll. As long as the divine essence mine was inside the Demon Mountain, Han Shuo believed that metal elite zombie would be able to locate it and extract all its precious crystals.

    After getting Han Shuo¡¯s approval, earth elite zombie and metal elite zombie proceeded further. It was now metal elite zombie¡¯s turn to pave the way. The hard rock above their heads would turn as loose as sand, posing not the slightest resistance to the duo, allowing them a gradual ascent up the Demon Mountain.

    Metal elite zombie¡¯s body sparkled with glorious golden rays as soon as he entered the Demon Mountain. They were like golden threads that spread in all directions before disappearing into the solid rock.

    Soon enough, metal elite zombie reported back to Han Shuo, ¡°Father, there are all kinds of ores in this mountain. Which type are you looking for?¡±

    Han Shuo first praised metal elite zombie before describing to him, ¡°The ores that I want contain energy simr to those on Little Water and Little Fire. Carefully sense your surrounding and see if there¡¯s any.¡±

    Divine essence mines were extremely unique. Although there were divine essences containing divine energies of all assortments in divine essence mines, they were undetectable to the probing using the soul. Not even mighty gods could detect anything from the outside. This, however, would not be a problem to metal elite zombie. As long as there were ores, metal elite zombie would be able to find and detect the energy contained within.

    ¡°Father, I did not sense any ore that contains energy simr to Little Water and Little Fire. There isn¡¯t a piece of ore of that kind inside the mountain!¡± metal elite zombie kept silent for some time before he reported to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Not one?¡± Han Shuo was stunned. He was thinking if they got the wrong location or perhaps someone else had extracted the ores.

    ¡°None at all!¡± metal elite zombie replied. He continued after a short moment of hesitation, ¡°But, there are some ores containing energy simr to those found on Little Earth and father! There are also some with energies that I don¡¯t recognize!¡±

    Han Shuo stared foolishly before immediatelying to himself. His face was stunned in ce and he hastily instructed, ¡°Those are the ores I¡¯m looking for. Collect those types of ores and bring them to me!¡±

    The absence of water and fire element divine essences did not mean that there were no divine essences of other energies. After hearing metal elite zombie¡¯s reply, Han Shuo immediately realized that his previous description was inadequate. It seemed that Akley¡¯s judgment was correct. There was indeed a divine essence mine in the Demon Mountain that had yet to be discovered.

    ¡°Okay, father!¡± metal elite zombie replied cheerfully. By observing through a mystical demon, Han Shuo discovered that metal elite zombie was like a ghost that could travel through solid rocks without hindrance. He carried a big gunny sack that Han Shuo prepared for him and constantly stuffed ores of various colors into the sack.

    Meanwhile, earth elite zombie waited at the tunnel metal elite zombie dug for him, quietly waiting for metal elite zombie to finish his work.

    ¡°Akley, it won¡¯t be long before we get what we have been looking for!¡± Han Shuo was in a great mood and said with a big grin to Akley, who was looking at him in a strange daze.

    ¡°Bryan, you¡¯re kidding, aren¡¯t you? How could you expect a god of the element of earth toplete everything in the Demon Mountain by himself?¡± Akley forced a smile. He obviously did not believe Han Shuo¡¯s im.

    If a god that cultivated in the elemental energy of earth could locate divine essence mines using their power, all the divine essence mines on Elysium would have all been extracted by now! Although this was also the first time that Akley came to Elysium, he too was aware of the mysteries of divine essence mines and that gods cultivating in the element of earth definitely did not have an advantage in finding one. Therefore, he was very skeptical about Han Shuo¡¯s im.

    ¡°Just give it some time. Soon enough, you will know if this son of mine can actually aplish our goal!¡± Akley had no idea that earth elite zombie was not alone, nor was he aware of the remarkable abilities of metal elite zombie.

    ¡°I will wait and see!¡± Akley shook his head. He felt that the situation was rather absurd.

    Suddenly, Cauldron Spirit transmitted to Han Shuo, ¡°Master, something¡¯s not right!¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± Han Shuo, who was conversing with Akley, did not pay too much attention to the situation on the Demon Mountain as he assumed that metal elite zombie was on track to have everything settled. After hearing the cautioning cry, Han Shuo again put his full concentration on the mountain, overseeing everything using mystical demons.

    ¡°There are some dark caves inside the mountain. Little Metal has passed through some of the caves while traveling around the mountain. Did you notice that those spiders are found on all the scattered spiderwebs in those caves? Although these spiders are very small in size, they all have human faces. They also seem to have intelligence and are watching every action of Little Metal.¡±

    Hearing Cauldron Spirit¡¯s description, Han Shuomanded metal elite zombie who was moving around in a cave to stop. Then, by using the mystical demons on metal elite zombie, Han Shuo discovered that there was a broken spider web that had a dozen or so thumb-sized spiders on it. He further noticed that those spiders indeed possessed human faces. Their eyeballs as small as speckles of sand were observing metal elite zombie cautiously.

    ¡°Oh?¡± Even Han Shuo was rather surprised. The situation he saw was just the same as Cauldron Spirit had described. Those small spiders were indeed watching metal elite zombie.

    ¡°Continue collecting the ores. Start returning as soon as you get them all. Don¡¯t stay there a moment longer than necessary!¡± Han Shuomanded metal elite zombie. His mind continued to think about the strange scene he witnessed.

    ¡°Understood, father!¡± metal elite zombie responded. He traveled back and forth within the Demon Mountain, searching for and collecting divine essences in every corner.

    The divine essences were scattered all around the Demon Mountain. The distances between two divine essences could be quite a stretch. After working for so long, metal elite zombie had harvested a few hundred pieces of divine essences. Those made up about ny percent of the divine essences in the mountain.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was very puzzled. He couldn¡¯t understand how there were so many little spiders in the Demon Mountain. Those little spiders appeared very strange. They even made Han Shuo feel a hint of familiarity. He was baffled and confused.

    ¡°This is bad! Ask Little Metal to return immediately!¡± Cauldron Spirit screamed in Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, ¡°There is a mighty being within the mountain that is waking up. It was in a unique dormant state before ¨C even I did not sense it. It is very dangerous. He must fall back immediately!¡±

    Han Shuo turned pale with fright. In fact, through the mystical demons on metal elite zombie¡¯s body, he saw the thing that made Cauldron Spirit so rmed.

    At the center of the mountain was a very spacious cave which took about a quarter of the mountain¡¯s volume. An enormous spider web upied the cave. On top of the spider web was an enormous spider with a body of thirty meters in length and sharp legs that stretched ten meters. The spider had a human face of a beautiful female. Its long eyshes were gently fluttering as though it was waking up from a sweet dream.

    Right below her was a rtivelyrge ck colored divine essence deposit. She seemed to be absorbing the divine energy of darkness contained within and therefore did not give off any aura.

    As her eyshes moved, up and down, a gush of extremely terrifying energy of darkness emanated from her body. Even though separated by such a distance, Han Shuo could feel the terrifying pressure from outside the mountain range!

    Meanwhile, at this moment, metal elite zombie had his eyes fixed on the darkness divine essence deposit under her. He was preparing to collect it for Han Shuo and seemed to be unaware that he was facing a terrifying creature that was awakening.

    ¡°Return! Quickly return!¡± Han Shuomanded metal elite zombie, yelling vigorously. Perhaps he was too shocked ¨C as he transmitted the message with his consciousness, he was shouting out loud with his mouth.

    ¡°Bryan, what¡¯s wrong?¡± Akley questioned.

    ¡°Father, there¡¯s onest piece. Let me take that before leaving!¡± metal elite zombie wished toplete the task Han Shuo assigned to him to perfection.

    ¡°Ignore that goddamn divine essence,e back here! Immediately! ¡° Han Shuo shouted. It was so loud that it jolted Akley again.

    ¡°Bryan, are you mad? Have you forgotten what we are here for?¡± Akley stepped forward as though thinking that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in his right mind and wanting to help him recover.

    ¡°Fuck off!¡± But before Akley could get close, Han Shuo threw a kick and sent Akley crashing onto the wall behind him.

    ¡°The hell are you doing?¡± Akley was enraged. He stood up while resisting the pain and shouted at Han Shuo, ¡°Do you intend to keep all the spoils to yourself?¡±

    Han Shuo had no time for Akley and ced all his attention on metal elite zombie. After hearing Han Shuo¡¯smand, metal elite zombie recognized how pressing Han Shuo was. He took onest look at the ck divine essence deposit before immediately retreating to the path he came from.

    Soon after metal elite zombie started returning, that enormous spider with a human face was finally fully awake from her slumber. A wave of terrifying energy of darkness suddenly burst out from her body. It passed through the spider web beneath her and spread throughout the mountain.

    ¡°Brazen creature, how dare you steal from me, Rose!¡± the piercing voice of the enormous human-faced spider spread far and wide and reverberated through most of the mountain range.

    ¡°Ah!!! ¡° metal elite zombie, who had yet to exit the Demon Mountain, cried out loudly when a wave of divine energy of darkness struck him.

    ¡°Tell him to ignore everything and return as quickly as possible! I will sacrifice a few demon generals to protect him!¡± Cauldron Spirit hastily transmitted.

    ¡°It¡¯s Rose! The spider goddess Rose! It¡¯s actually her!¡± Han Shuo, who heard the human-faced spider¡¯s furious shriek, mumbled to himself in astonishment.

 Chapter 681 - Spider Goddess Rose

    GDK 681: Spider Goddess Rose

    Spider goddess Rose was the being that the dark elves of the Profound Continent underground world worshipped. Back on Profound Continent, by using Adell as the medium, Han Shuo had brieflymunicated with Rose through an altar.

    Back then, separated by innumerable material nes, Han Shuo had no clue how mighty Rose was. But now, having truly felt Rose¡¯s wrath, Han Shuo finally realized that Rose actually possessed highgod strength.

    Although Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness could figure out the exact strength of a midgod, the same could not be said for a highgod like Rose. But what¡¯s for sure was that a highgod was not an existence that Han Shuo could handle just yet. He had to evacuate the area immediately, lest the spider goddess sensed his presence.

    ¡°Master, ask Little Metal and Little Earth to escape underground and go as deep as they can!¡± Cauldron Spirit again shouted in Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. Cauldron Spirit too was very much concerned about the five elite zombies and Little Skeleton.

    Han Shuo immediately woke up from the astonishment and hastily transmitted hismands to metal and earth elite zombies. After being struck by a wave of divine energy of darkness, metal elite zombie started falling disorientated down the mountain. Two puffs of dark smoke gave off from his body.

    As the master of the Cauldron Spirit, Han Shuo immediately knew that two demon generals that adhered on metal elite zombie¡¯s body had vanished in the two puff of smoke. They had been annihted.

    The muddle-headed and spinning metal elite zombie, following Han Shuo¡¯smand, steered himself as he dove downwards. The solid rock beneath him seemed to have turned into air, allowing him to dive down without any resistance.

    ¡°Wretched puny creature, you will not escape!¡± spider goddess Rose shrieked with an ear-piercing voice.

    ¡°What¡¯s, what¡¯s going on?¡± Akley finally heard the terrifying shrieksing from the Demon Mountain inside the mountain range. He immediately understood that things might not be as he imagined and hastily asked.

    ¡°We provoked a highgod. We will leave here immediately. If she discovers our presence, we will never be able to leave!¡± Han Shuo said with his brows deeply creased. He suddenly flew to Akley, again grabbed him by the cor behind his neck, and started flying outside recklessly.

    At such a moment, Akley too had forgotten the grievance he felt towards Han Shuo. He did not even care how Han Shuo was carrying him. He said in a frightened and panicked voice, ¡°What? How could there be a highgod in there?¡±

    ¡°You should be asking yourself that question!¡± Han Shuo said furiously. He continued to roar at Akley, ¡°If anything happens to my son, don¡¯t even think about those divine essences because I will bury you next to my son!¡±

    Akley was speechless to being berated by Han Shuo. It was also at this moment that he realized why Han Shuo would suddenly fly into a rage. Before heading here, Akley had sworn that those divine essences were unowned. It was precisely for this reason that Han Shuo was so at ease with having metal elite zombie and earth elite zombie enter by themselves to collect the ores. Akley indeed was mostly responsible for their sudden run-in with that highgod. Therefore, he chose to silently endure Han Shuo¡¯s shouting.

    ¡°Master, leave this ce at full speed! Little Metal and Little Earth are protected by the formation I made using demon generals. Once they are deep underground, that spider goddess won¡¯t be able to sense their location. But you, you are not protected by any concealment formation. You will be in big trouble if she discovers you!¡±

    ¡°Understood!¡± Han Shuo cut the superfluous words with Akley and stopped concealing his practice of demonic arts. With demonic yuan wildly circting throughout his body, his airspeed abruptly increased by five folds. He was a mere trail of faint radiance as he flew in the direction of the City of Shadows.

    Akley, being carried by Han Shuo, clearly sensed the rapid increase in Han Shuo¡¯s flight speed. Aghast, he raised his head to look at Han Shuo. However, except for Han Shuo¡¯s irritated appearance, Akley saw nothing unusual. He could not understand how Han Shuo managed to suddenly increase his airspeed by so much.

    Han Shuo would have a view of metal elite zombie and earth elite zombie¡¯s situation as long as the mystical demons on them were notpletely annihted. When spider goddess Rose¡¯s divine energy of darkness flowed through the Demon Mountain, all the little spiders inside the mountain suddenly went mad, leaving cracks in the mountain. Those little spiders seemed to know metal and earth elite zombies¡¯ locations as they were flocking towards them.

    Yet another two demon generals vanished into ashes. nking noises sounded on metal elite zombies and his body became less stable. However, he was still on course in descending towards earth elite zombie.

    Metal elite zombie, formed by absorbing the yuan energy of metal in the ce of extreme metal, although his body wasn¡¯t as nimble and agile as Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body, wasparable in terms of toughness. Of the five elite zombies, the one with the highest defensive power was metal elite zombie. One could even say that his body was made of steel.

    As the spider goddess¡¯s attack was scattered all over the Demon Mountain, the terrifying power was diluted several hundred times over. On top of that, the demon generals adhering to metal elite zombie took most of the punishing energy thatnded on him. Therefore, the attacks that metal elite zombie had to actually bear was only enough to make nking noises and not enough to shatter his body.

    After losing four demon generals, metal elite zombie finally returned to the bottom of the Demon Mountain where earth elite zombie had been waiting. Earth elite zombie was long on standby to carry out Han Shuo¡¯smand. Earth elite zombie grabbed metal elite zombie the very instant he appeared and started traveling underground as fast as possible.

    Hundreds of thousands of little spiders traveled through the fissures in the mountain and swarmed at them like a vast drove of locusts. These human-faced little spiders seemed to have intercepted the spider goddess¡¯mand and turned from quiet and calm to restless and violent.

    They spurted sticky, dark silk at the descending earth and metal elite zombies. The dark silk was enhanced with the energy of darkness found all around the Demon Mountain and were therefore very fast and relentless. Even earth elite zombie had trouble dealing with it.

    Earth elite zombie, who was carrying metal elite zombie, rapidly escaped by diving deep underground. His back that was facing the innumerable little spiders collected a wave of sticky silk.

    Earth elite zombie¡¯s downward motion was suddenly slowed down when the silk shot andnded on his back. Then, when the several hundred little spiders pulled back, surprisingly, earth elite zombie could not move an inch further!

    ¡°We will consume you alive little by little, you damned lowly creatures!¡± Spider goddess Rose stayed at the center of the Demon Mountain all along. It was after those little spiders had stopped earth elite zombie with their silk that she shrieked and started moving towards earth elite zombie.

    ¡°What do we do?¡± Han Shuo suddenly dropped out of his rapid flight and halted in his path. He was irascible and seemed as though he could lose his mind at any instance.

    ¡°Keep on running. I will make sure that they are alright!¡± Cauldron Spirit replied. Then, at the next instance, Han Shuo discovered that the back of earth elite zombie was also giving off dark smoke. A demon general wasbusting itself, causing the silk that those little spiders spurted to snap off.

    Earth elite zombie was free. He twisted his body and suddenly shot deep into the ground. The hole behind him was rapidly refilled with dirt, obstructing the second wave of silkunched by those little spiders.

    As soon as earth elite zombie was submerged in the ground, he was no longer met with any resistance. Following Han Shuo¡¯s instructions, he carried metal elite zombie and bore deeper and deeper into the earth. He was several thousand meters underground before long.

    ¡°They escaped! They actually managed to escape!¡± spider goddess Rose flew into a rage, causing the entire Demon Mountain to quiver. ¡°Those lowly lifeforms have exploited my divine essence deposit. Unforgivable! They must all die!¡±

    The Demon Mountain was trembling fiercely as rumbling sounds reverberated. Suddenly, several long and sharp spider feet which appeared more like ws with incisive edges, pierced through the rocks and pried open an enormous hole at the center of the Demon Mountain. The enormous body of spider goddess Rose emerged from the Demon Mountain.

    Spider goddess Rose immediately leapt and charged in Han Shuo¡¯s direction as soon as she came out from the Demon Mountain. Han Shuo was overwhelmed with shock.

    <i>Shit! We still got discovered!</i> Han Shuo¡¯s heart was thrown into chaos. He started weighing if he should abandon Akley and again deploy the Demonic Blood Disassembly to escape the cmity.

    ¡°Don¡¯t do anything in confusion, master. Calm down your mind and observe the situation at Demon Mountain again with a mystical demon!¡± Cauldron Spirit hastily transmitted to Han Shuo, stopping him from doing anything irrational.

    After hearing Cauldron Spirit¡¯s shout, Han Shuo took a few deep breaths to rapidly re-adjust his heart and mind.

    After calming himself down, Han Shuo observed through a mystical demon that Cauldron Spirit ced on top of another mountain. He suddenly discovered that spider goddess Rose was in fact stationary on the hole she tore open. Several dark phantoms flew out from her and spread in all directions.

    ¡°She hasn¡¯t moved at all, nor did she charge in your direction. She was merely searching for a target using phantoms. You can ignore it and continue running. Those phantom images cannot catch up to you!¡± Cauldron Spirit exined to Han Shuo.

    Thanks to Cauldron Spirit¡¯s reminder, Han Shuo calmed down and readjusted himself to the most optimal state. He ignored the phantom images flying over and continued in the direction of the City of Shadows as fast as he could.

    After flying for half a day, he stopped near a mountain vige. Based on Akley¡¯s understanding of Elysium, those non-human races had to abide by constraints that the Cmity Overgods imposed. They definitely would not attack human viges. At this moment, Han Shuo was certain that he had escaped from the spider goddess¡¯ pursuit.

    Han Shuo did not enter the mountain vige but stayed beside a river in its vicinity. Ignoring Akley¡¯s puzzlement, Han Shuo attended to himself in recovering his energy.

    Finally, at midnight, Han Shuo suddenly opened his eyes. With a gloomy face and a deep voice, he said to Akley, who was still feeling uneasy, ¡°Time to divide the spoils! The previous agreement is canceled. I will decide the new allocation!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, earth elite zombie emerged from the ground. <i>Thud.</i>Earth elite zombie threw a sack filled with divine essence on the ground and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Father, don¡¯t worry, Little Metal is alright!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s face was a little less frightening after hearing earth elite zombie¡¯s words.

 Chapter 682 - Dividing the spoils

    <h4>GDK 682: Dividing the spoils</h4>

    Akley stared foolishly and gaped at the divine essences poured on the ground. He was absolutely stupefied.

    Earth elite zombie, who emptied the gunny sack filled with divine essences on the ground, looked at Akley with a hostile gaze. It was as though he would pounce on Akley and tear him into pieces as soon as Han Shuo gave him the signal.

    Han Shuo heaved a sigh of relief when he learned from earth elite zombie that metal elite zombie was alright. He crouched to sort out the divine essences piece by piece before he reported, ¡°Earth divine essence ¨C nine pieces. Wind ¨C thirty-two pieces. Death ¨C twelve pieces. Lightning ¨C twenty-eight pieces. Destruction ¨C sixteen pieces. Light ¨C five pieces. Life ¨C four pieces. Altogether that¡¯s a hundred and six pieces of divine essence!¡±

    ¡°They, they really are divine essences! You actually did it!¡± after a long while, Akley wore an overjoyed expression and cried out in surprise.

    ¡°Of the one hundred and six divine essences, my son and I will take seventy percent and you will take thirty percent, which is about thirty pieces. I¡¯ll let you have ten divine essences for each of the energy of destruction, wind, and lightning.¡± Han Shuo raised his head before he continued to Akley, ¡°Any objections?¡±

    Akley understood that Han Shuo and his son gave the most work andbor in obtaining these divine essences. Aside from providing an address, he had practically contributed nothing to the sess. On top of that, all along the journey, he had been relying on and troubled Han Shuo to preserve his life. He was lucky to have even taken thirty percent in the end.

    Besides, given the current circumstances, even if Han Shuo wanted to take all the divine essence for himself, there was nothing that Akley could do to stop him.

    ¡°I don¡¯t have any objection with the allocation, but, since you don¡¯t cultivate in the edict of destruction, why don¡¯t you give all sixteen of the destruction divine essence to me? You can have all the wind and lightning divine essence. How about that?¡± Akley hesitated before he came up with a counter-proposal.

    ¡°That won¡¯t do. I need a few destruction divine essences as well. I have use for them!¡± Han Shuo rejected the counter-proposal resolutely and suggested, ¡°You can exchange the twenty wind and lightning divine essences for crystal coins that would give you a footing on Elysium, or exchange them for more destruction divine essences. In short, you cannot have them all!¡±

    ¡°What use do you have for destruction divine essences?¡± Akley asked as he forced a smile. He had no clue why Han Shuo was so insistent on taking a portion of the destruction divine essences.

    ¡°Other than the element of death, I also cultivate in the edict of destruction. That¡¯s why I need those crystals as well!¡± Han Shuo calmly admitted as he exercised the energy of destruction in his avatar and released a destruction domain of divinity through his main body.

    Akley was jolted as soon as the domain of divinity of destruction emerged. He again cried out in surprise, ¡°You simultaneously cultivate in two energies?! If you do so, you will not attain the true pinnacle in any of the energies! How could you be so silly!¡±

    Han Shuo had three souls that were connected but independent of each other, therefore he was immune to the issue that Akley described. Han Shuo smiled and shook his head before he replied, ¡°You don¡¯t have to worry about this for me. I know what I¡¯m doing!¡±

    As he spoke, Han Shuo took the initiative to help Akley divide his portion of the divine essence. Han Shuo was rather generous and did not select just the smallest pieces of divine essence for Akley.

    Han Shuo selected thirty pieces of divine essence of destruction, wind, and lightning out from the bunch and pushed them to Akley, ¡°This is the share that you deserve. With these ten pieces of destruction divine essence, I believe you could at least attainte-stage lowgod realm. I wish you the best of luck in your quest of avenging your master¡¯s death!¡± Han Shuo said to Akley in a deep voice.

    Akley forced a smile and put away the thirty divine essences. He sighed, ¡°What a pity, what a pity that it¡¯s not a hundred and six destruction divine essences. Just ten pieces of it isn¡¯t nearly enough for a substantial breakthrough!¡±

    ¡°Be content with what you have. The consumption of divine essence is the safest way of increasing the divine energy you have. Ten pieces of divine essence is considered very precious treasure on Elysium. Keep it safe and find a safe ce to absorb the energy in them,¡± Han Shuo reminded.

    ¡°Where are you heading?¡± Akley could tell that the two would soon part ways. After having interacted with Han Shuo for some days, Akley had a pretty positive feeling about Han Shuo. That was why he asked where Han Shuo nned to go.

    After all, had it been another person, at this point in time, the person would likely have attempted to murder Akley in order to hog all the divine essence. After carefully thinking, Akley felt that although Han Shuo was a little overbearing, at least he wasn¡¯t hypocritical in his conducts and was a trustworthy friend.

    ¡°I¡¯m going to the City of Shadows. But it¡¯s hard to say if I will remain in that city in the future.¡± Han Shuo too found Akley somewhat admirable. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have helped Akley shoulder the fees of fifty blue crystal coins for his divine tablet in the beginning.

    ¡°Take care. I will find somewhere nearby to recover my strength and absorb the destruction divine essences. Perhaps I might search for you at the City of Shadows once I¡¯m through!¡±

    ¡°No problem. Here¡¯s five purple crystal coins. Use it well. Do not reveal your divine essences unless you have absolute trust in the buyer. You¡¯ll put yourself in jeopardy otherwise!¡± Han Shuo was concerned that without some crystal coins to use, Akley might attempt to sell the wind and lightning divine essences for crystal coins, arouse the greed of people around him, and end up being murdered.

    ¡°Thanks a lot. I know what to do ¨C I won¡¯t attract danger to myself. If I choose to sell the divine essence, I will only do so at the Dominion of Space or Destiny. I wouldn¡¯t be so reckless to reveal the crystals and take the chance of being murdered,¡± Akley knew what Han Shuo was worried about and smilingly assured.

    ¡°Well if you say so, I can be at ease. So long!¡± Han Shuo pointed Akley to a concealed area before waving his hand and bidding him farewell.

    After going a few miles away from Akley, earth elite zombie and metal elite zombie both stood still before Han Shuo. After somemunication, Han Shuo learned that metal elite zombie was unscathed. Only then was he at ease with sending the two back to the Netherworld.

    ¡°Father, this world is more suitable for our cultivation!¡± earth elite zombie suddenly said to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before he asked, ¡°What do you mean?¡±

    ¡°The elements in this world are more intense than anywhere else, and it is suitable for any high-level lifeforms to live in. The Netherworld is only rich in the element of death while other elements were not even near the levels of father¡¯s former world. The five of us cannot grow at the fastest rate if we stay in the Netherworld,¡± earth elite zombie exined.

    Han Shuo began to contemte in silence for a long while before he said, ¡°Except for Little Metal, the four of you are on the verge of bing gods. You will all stay in the Netherworld before actually bing gods. We will discuss this in detail after you have all formed divine souls.¡±

    ¡°Understood!¡± Earth elite zombie nodded his head in a docile manner. Then, he looked at Han Shuo with pleading eyes and asked, ¡°Father, please keep those earth divine essences for me! I will be able to absorb them after I form a divine soul and a divine body!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m saving it all for you!¡± Han Shuo was amused as he inwardly thought, <i><i>These little ones are getting greedier and greedier!</i></i>

    ¡°You must keep it for me. I will fullyprehend that old dragon¡¯s divine soul very soon!¡± earth elite zombie exhorted Han Shuo yet again as though he was afraid that Han Shuo would lose those earth divine essences somehow.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, they¡¯re in safe hands!¡± Han Shuo assured him smilingly and proceeded to send both earth and metal elite zombies back to the Netherworld.

    After earth and metal elite zombies returned, Han Shuo flew towards the City of Shadows following the directions indicated by a viger.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind was rather burdened with indecision during the journey there. Based on earth elite zombie¡¯s words, the five elite zombies could grow better on Elysium. However, of the five, four of them cultivated in the energy of earth, life, fire, and water. These energies were ipatible with the Dominions of the Cmity Overgods where Han Shuo was. Were they to stay with Han Shuo, they would attract trouble sooner orter.

    However, Han Shuo could not bepletely at ease letting them off to the four respective Dominions separately. This ne was, after all, the ne of Gods. There were all kinds of mighty gods all around. Han Shuo was concerned about their safety.

    With that, Han Shuo was at a total loss for what to do. He had chosen to stand in the camp of the Cmity Overgods. If others were to discover his rtionship with earth and wood elite zombie who cultivated in the earth element and life edict, he would be in great danger and might even be taken as a traitor by the Cmity Church.

    <i><i>Ugh, forget about it. I¡¯ll cross that bridge when Ie to it. I¡¯ll just worry about itter in time!</i></i> When Han Shuo could not make up his mind, he decided to just stop thinking about it. He hurried on with his journey to the City of Shadows.

    The Dominion of Darkness was many timesrger than Profound Continent. The City of Shadows was one of the five major cities in the Dominion of Darkness. Although it was called a city, it in fact contained several dozen smaller cities and forts of various sizes. A fort there could be bigger than the territories of the Lancelot Empire.

    When Han Shuo entered the sphere of influence of the City of Shadows, he discovered that there was still a long journey ahead to the actual City of Shadows.

    There were small viges all around its perimeter. After passing through thirteen or so viges, Han Shuo arrived at a fort in the perimeter of the City of Shadows.

    But before Han Shuo even got close to the fort, six tall boundary towers that reached through the clouds entered his eyes. The apex of the barrier towers was glowing with deep dark radiance. They took the shape of a six-tipped star which constantly spread a powerful boundary around the fort.

    Without a divine tablet and crystal coins, it was impossible to enter the fort.

    Divine guards could be found stationed in the gaps between the boundary towers. Their figures were blended with darkness and their appearances indistinguishable as they coldly observed the movements of all those walking into the fort.

    Han Shuo found himself mixed among a crowd of gods cultivating in the energy of darkness, death, and destruction heading to the fort. After carefully observing his surroundings, Han Shuo discovered the presence of gods who cultivated in other energy like space, earth, and fire. It appeared that the Dominion of Darkness actually did allow gods of other energies to enter.

    After a moment of careful observation and listening, Han Shuo learned that, with the exception of gods who cultivated in the edict of life and element of light, all other gods were allowed entry. This was because the Cmity Overgods were eternal opponents of the Overgods of Light and Life.

 Chapter 683 - Divine Scrolls

    GDK 683: Divine Scrolls

    After arriving at the fort, Han Shuo surrendered his divine tablet and fifty blue crystal coins to an officer. The officer scanned Han Shuo¡¯s divine tablet by cing it on a pentagonal magical device, then nodded his head and returned the divine tablet to Han Shuo, indicating that he may enter.

    The divine tablet was like a travel pass on Elysium. Without a divine tablet, a person¡¯s identity could not be identified and therefore they would not be allowed entry to the fort. One would also need fifty blue crystal coins for the entry fees.

    After carefully observing for a while, Han Shuo noticed that of the endless stream of people entering the fort, the weakest of them possessed demigod strength. A great majority of them were basegods and lowgods. Only a few of them were midgods and not a single one of them was a highgod.

    Han Shuo followed the crowd and entered the fort in order. It was after he arrived at the gates that he learned that this ce was called Fort Verka.

    The first thing that entered Han Shuo¡¯s eyes after he entered Fort Verka was a row of divine guards suited in dark armor. They were vigntly observing the arriving crowd and maintaining order.

    After carefully eavesdropping for some time, Han Shuo learned that Fort Verka was administered by the House of Croton. They were in charge of implementing taxes and ensuring the safety of Fort Verka, maintaining order in the fort.

    Donna had previously exined to Han Shuo that there were myriads of families ns that filled every corner of Elysium. They pledged their lives andplete devotion to the twelve Overgods and served as viceroys to their respective Overgods. Some ancient family ns, possessing immense strength, might even administer more than one city. While some family ns were weaker and could only be in charge of some fortresses or towns. The House of Croton that was in charge of Fort Verka was a small, third-rate family n.

    However, after entering Fort Verka, Han Shuo discovered that this fortress was at least five times the size of Brettel City. Its poption numbered merely in the thousands with a great majority of the popce being demigods and basegods. Only approximately three hundred of them were truly in the ranks of godhood with merely a dozen or more midgods.

    Han Shuo did not rush in departing Fort Verka. Instead, he wandered through the streets and alleys of the fort to experience the differences between Profound Continent and Elysium. With no expert in Fort Verka who could threaten his life, Han Shuo boldly had Cauldron Spirit release a few demon generals. With the demon generals flying all around Fort Verka, Han Shuo very quickly came to figure out the overall situation of the fort.

    There wasn¡¯t too much of a difference between Fort Verka and those cities on Profound Continent. All the residents of the fort were subjected to the governance of the House of Croton and had to pay them certain taxes annually. In exchange, the House of Croton would ensure their safety, allowing them to cultivate with peace of mind.

    After a round of probing using the mystical demons, Han Shuo noticed a major dissimrity ¨C every single person made it their main purpose to cultivate and raise their strengths. From hisprehensive survey of Fort Verka, Han Shuo discovered all kinds of big and small stores. Most of the items sold were various types of low-level divine weapons, materials for refining divine weapons, as well as divine scrolls which recorded basic knowledge about energies of various types.

    There were also a lot of divine gyms. In those facilities, gods could exchange their insights into cultivation as well as have friendly matches with each other safely inside arge-scale defensive barrier for the purpose of strengthening themselves.

    As soon as Han Shuo found that divine scrolls of all elements were being traded, he was tempted. He immediately headed to thergest divine scroll store in the fort.

    Ever since he parted with Akley, Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars had been absorbing the divine essences of death and destruction inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. His avatar of death that had engulfed a portion of that old godhunter¡¯s divine energy reachedte-stage lowgod realm right after absorbing two pieces of death divine essences.

    This avatar of Han Shuo¡¯s had previously assimted the divine soul of a midgod, obtaining all his insight and understanding about the element of death. With this advantage, Han Shuo was able to easily advance tote-stage lowgod realm by umting and deepening his divine energy of death to a certain level.

    During the recent period of time, instead of continuing to absorb more divine essences, Han Shuo had his avatar of death familiarize with and stabilize its new realm. His avatar of death would spend time learning to appreciate the true essence of the energy of death and attempt to master a few new attack methods.

    As to the avatar of destruction, Han Shuo was feeling rather worried. After absorbing two pieces of destruction divine essence, Han Shuo felt that the divine energy in his avatar had reached its critical point. At this stage, Han Shuo had to deepen his knowledge and understanding of the energy of destruction or he would not make a breakthrough to thete-stage realm no matter how much more divine essence he absorbed. Unfortunately, unlike his avatar of death, his avatar of destruction had not assimted any divine soul of a higher realm. Every little advancement in godhood would be a lengthy process. The insight he gained from the destruction of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester and from peeping at others putting the edict of destruction into use seemed to be insufficient in allowing him to advance from his current realm.

    Han Shuo had worried about this during the recent period of time. Therefore, when he learned that there were divine scrolls for sale in this Fort Verka, his interest was immediately aroused. He was hoping that the divine scrolls would contain something useful.

    After walking into the divine scroll store, Han Shuo started looking all around. He discovered all kinds of scrolls on disy. However, most of these scrolls were only useful to demigods and basegods. Scrolls that described the process of breaking through basegod realm to lowgod realm were especially abundant.

    If any single one of the scrolls here found its way to Profound Continent, Han Shuo believed that it would be an invaluable treasure that all magi and swordsman would scramble for. Given the clearlybeled price of the scrolls in this store, it was in to tell that scrolls of this sort were rather ordinary and nothing umon on this ne.

    The number of gods on Elysium was uncountable. Some gods who were fresh off the boat and had no crystal coins might decide to write down their own knowledge, tips, and insights about bing god into scrolls and try selling them to demigods and basegods to earn some crystal coins.

    Hence, for this reason, scrolls such as those were plenty to be found. But as the stepsid out and experiences on the scrolls were different depending on the authors, some of them being poor writers, the scrolls were not equally useful and effective.

    Those of midgod strength and above would have practically no worry for livelihood on Elysium. Even if a midgod arrived on Elysium without a single penny, they would find envoys from all major family ns trying to recruit them. They had absolutely no need to worry about getting crystal coins.

    It was precisely for this reason that scrolls containing the cultivation experiences of midgods were almostpletely absent in the market. Those midgods wouldn¡¯t be willing to spend effort and energy just to earn that small amount of extra crystal coins. Naturally, highgods, who were basically at the pinnacle of strength, would never do such a thing. Other than their own offsprings and descendants, they will not divulge their insights to anyone, not even their friends.

    Han Shuo did not know if the cultivation experiences recorded on the scroll would actually be useful to him. Therefore, he wanted to examine a few of them first. After arriving at the energy of destruction category, Han Shuo lowered his head and found a bunch of scrolls underneath a barrier. The prices ranged from three to ten purple crystal coins.

    ¡°Can I have a look before buying?¡± Han Shuo raised his head, turned to a youngdy with a sweet look and asked. She cultivated in the elemental energy of darkness and possessed merely basegod strength.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, divine scrolls are unlike other goods. The contents of a scroll could be just a few sentences in length. If you were to memorize the content without buying, then we will lose money!¡± the youngdy put on a professional smile and exined in a courteous manner.

    ¡°Well then, give me that scroll worth three purple crystal coins!¡± Han Shuo withdrew three purple crystal coins and handed them to the youngdy smilingly.

    ¡°Why, of course!¡± the youngdy withdrew a piece of blue stone and aimed it at the scroll. Right after that, the divine scroll with the price of three purple crystal coins flew out from the boundary and stuck to the stone in her hand.

    ¡°Thank you for your purchase!¡± the youngdy handed the scroll to Han Shuo. She seemed to be in a pretty great mood.

    Han Shuo unrolled the scroll, flipped through a few pages, and started reading the scroll right before the youngdy. After a few minutes, Han Shuo was obviously deeply disappointed.

    The contents on the scroll merely recorded the understanding of a lowgod of destruction who had just stepped into godhood. That person¡¯s strength probably wasn¡¯t even on Han Shuo¡¯s level. Nothing written on the scroll was substantive and it did not help Han Shuo one bit. Three purple crystal coins were wasted just like that.

    ¡°Would you like to purchase more scrolls? I believe that the divine scroll which costs ten purple crystal coins will be more suitable for you,¡± the youngdy wearing a big smile asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°Let¡¯s have a look!¡± Han Shuo looted a hundred or more purple crystal coins from the bodies of Kaiser and Eriksson and therefore he wasn¡¯t particrly short on purple crystal coins. As he spoke, he withdrew ten purple crystal coins and handed them to her.

    ¡°Alright!¡± the youngdy smiled sweetly and received Han Shuo¡¯s purple crystal coins. After handing Han Shuo that divine scroll he purchased, she smilingly said, ¡°Different prices contain information of different levels. Perhaps this will have what you are looking for!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s hope so!¡± Han Shuo replied casually. He unrolled the divine scroll and started reading in front of her again.

    Han Shuo gasped in surprise. Although this divine scroll also did not record any usable realizations, it described an attack method called the Orb of Destruction. It worked by rapidly condensing divine energy into a sphere and whirling it in the Domain of Divinity in a manner conforming to the edict of destruction.

    The scroll described in detail the method of condensing divine energy into an orb but was rather vague in the exnation about how to whirl the orb correctly in the Domain of Divinity. It appeared that the author was purposefully hiding it. From the looks of it, the author ought to havee toprehend this attack method by himself and was pushed by circumstances to write a scroll and sell it for crystal coins. However, at the same time, the author was reluctant to have others fully understand his attack method, therefore deliberately writing about it in the most confusing manner.

    ¡°This one is not bad!¡± Han Shuo nodded smilingly. He turned to look at the remaining few scrolls underneath the boundary and was prepared to buy all of them. But before he could, the youngdy suddenly smiled and said, ¡°I have a special scroll about the edict of destruction. I believe you will definitely be interested in it!¡±

 Chapter 684 - The Godhunter Alliance

    GDK 684: The Godhunter Alliance

    ¡°Hm.¡± Han Shuo looked at the shop assistant in a rather intrigued manner. Rather puzzled about her intentions, he asked with a charming smile, ¡°What makes you think that I will be interested in something like this?¡±

    ¡°You have enough crystal coins and care a lot about the energy of destruction. You seem like you would surely spare arge sum of money on scrolls with real content. I dare assure you that that scroll of mine is more useful than any other scroll here!¡± The youngdy wasposed and answered with a wide grin.

    ¡°What¡¯s the price? I should tell you in advance that if it¡¯s not worth what I pay for, I¡¯m going to ask for a refund!¡±

    ¡°No problem. If you think that it¡¯s not worth it, I will refund you all the crystal coins!¡± the youngdy said with confidence. She looked left and right, made sure that no one else was watching her, and carefully withdrew a yellowish divine scroll. This scroll seemed to have been repeatedly used.

    ¡°Forty purple crystal coins. Not a piece short!¡± the youngdy swayed the scroll in front of Han Shuo and said unflinchingly.

    ¡°Here, forty purple crystal coins. Take it,¡± Han Shuo withdrew forty purple crystal coins and handed it to her. He thought that the price of the scroll was really high. One could buy a lot more with forty purple crystal coins.

    ¡°Here¡¯s your scroll. You will not be disappointed. I can assure you that!¡± the youngdy handed the yellowish scroll into Han Shuo¡¯s hand with great confidence.

    Han Shuo found it intriguing that the youngdy would be so confident and so he unfurled the scroll and had a look. He hastilymitted the contents on the scroll to memory and immediately after that, the yellowish divine scroll abruptly ignited and turned into ashes.

    ¡°There will be no refunds now!¡± the youngdy hastily voiced as Han Shuo burned the divine scroll to ashes before her very eyes.

    ¡°Those forty purple crystal coins are yours,¡± Han Shuo said in a deep voice.

    ¡°Would you like to read more scrolls?¡± the youngdy asked, pointing at the other scrolls under the boundary.

    ¡°No, thanks,¡± Han Shuo shook his head. After muttering to himself irresolutely, he asked, ¡°This scroll you sold me, how did you obtain it?¡±

    ¡°My apologies, I have noment about this.¡± The youngdy seemed to grow anxious. She then continued, ¡°It matters not the scroll¡¯s origins. I have no idea what is specifically written on it. There¡¯s no point asking me any questions!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded, sized her up for a moment, and said goodbye.

    The scroll that the youngdy sold him had in fact recorded the method of absorbing divine energy from another godly cultivator of the edict of destruction. Han Shuo could not understand why she would sell such a scroll.

    For those who cultivated in the elemental energies, the method of engulfing another god¡¯s divine energy was very easy to grasp even without any guidance. But when it came to the four edictal forces, this was not as straightforward.

    The methods of engulfing edictal divine energies were only possessed by the godhunters. In most ces on Elysium, this type of people was hunted and cracked down on. The average being usually had no way ofing into contact with them.

    Shockingly, however, that divine scroll that the youngdy sold Han Shuo actually recorded the method of engulfing other¡¯s divine energy of destruction in detail. Han Shuo reduced it to ashes immediately after reading it through as these things were very illegal and prohibited.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t tell if the youngdy actually knew anything about the contents of the scroll. She cultivated in the energy of darkness and her strength was puny. Logically speaking, she should not have been able to understand what was described on the scroll. However, when she sold the scroll to Han Shuo, she appeared to be full of confidence, as though she knew exactly what was written in there. Han Shuo grew suspicious.

    Though Han Shuo had left the divine scroll store, he also left behind a mystical demon to spy on her.

    Han Shuo learned that in the short span of half a day, the youngdy had sold the same scroll to others by repeating the same modus operandi. The purchasers were all cultivators of the edict of destruction. From the reconnaissance of the mystical demon, Han Shuo saw that those scrolls she sold were exactly the same as the one he purchased with forty purple crystal coins. She seemed to have an unlimited copy of the scroll about how to engulf the divine energy of destruction.

    Feeling that something shady was going on, Han Shuo continued to closely observe the youngdy using a mystical demon. Finally, when the sky got dark, she met with a sinister old man in the back room of the store. The old man was sitting on a rocking chair that swayed back and forth atempo. He was a mid-stage midgod of darkness. His smiling eyes were glued to the youngdy.

    This youngdy who had a big smile when facing Han Shuo wore a frightened face when she faced the old man. She respectfully reported, ¡°Lord Rahman, I have sold seven copies today.¡±

    That old man called Rahman smiled sinisterly and said, ¡°Not bad. Hehe, make a guess, of the seven, how many of them will fall to temptation and turn into new members of our Godhunter Alliance?¡±

    ¡°Your humble servant has no idea,¡± the youngdy shook her head.

    ¡°Haha, neither do I. But I¡¯m very much looking forward to finding out the answer! If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that it¡¯s rather hard to grasp the method of engulfing the energy of destruction, we wouldn¡¯t need toe to this. There are too few members in the Alliance who cultivate in the energy of destruction. We have no choice but to recruit new members this way. Those who are oppressed in their daily lives have abided by the rules and conventions only because they do not know the method of engulfing divine energy. Once they learn how to engulf the divine energy of other destruction edict cultivators, that temptation will slowly nibble away their willpower. They will fall to our side inch by inch.¡±

    ¡°My Lord, some of them have became suspicious of me after reading the scroll. If they were to report this to the House of Croton, we could be in trouble!¡± the youngdy hesitated for a moment before she said worriedly.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I have taken care of those people. There won¡¯t be an issue. Besides, there aren¡¯t many true experts in this small little Fort Verka. Even if we are actually discovered, we could easily escape,¡± Rahman was unruffled. After finishing those words, he let out a soft,sciviousugh. In one swoop, he grabbed the youngdy in his embrace andpletely stripped her down in no time. He then had the youngdy open her legs wide and saddled her on his crotch. The rocking chair rocked vigorously.

    Having understood the ins and outs of the scheme, Han Shuo withdrew his mystical demon.

    He was somewhat surprised ¨C even the godhunters had formed an alliance of their own. What Rahman did was to secretly recruit new members for the Godhunter Alliance. It was rather straightforward to consume another¡¯s divine energy for cultivators of the eight elemental energies. This, however, wasn¡¯t as straightforward for cultivators of the four edictal forces. For the purpose of recruiting more cultivators of the edict of destruction, Rahman revealed the method of engulfing another¡¯s divine energy to gods who cultivated in the edict of destruction. Then, when some of them sumbed to the temptation, they would voluntarily join as new members of the Godhunter Alliance.

    This was the first time Han Shuo learned about the Godhunter Alliance. Even Donna did not mention this to him. Godhunters could be said as the public enemy of the Elysium. This bunch of unique lunatics was heavily hunted in every single Overgod Dominion. If one of them were to make the slightest blunder in a major city, they would suffer a catastrophic blow.

    Every city had sufficient divine guards and formidable leaders. These godhunters surely wouldn¡¯t be so bold to recruit new members in big cities. They would only do so in fortresses like Fort Verka where defenses and surveince were inadequate. Even if they were exposed, they could easily leave and escape without much harm.

    Rahman was clearly one of the members of the Godhunter Alliance but Han Shuo had no idea about his position level in the organization. As Rahman cultivated in the elemental energy of darkness, he wasn¡¯t all that interested in him.

    Although the Godhunter Alliance was extremely repulsive and vile, they had not truly harmed Han Shuo. Therefore, even though he was aware of the scheme, he decided to ignore the matter.

    That mystical demon crossed through Rahman¡¯s boundary of darkness noiselessly and returned to Han Shuo. Instead of immediately proceeding to the City of Shadows, Han Shuo went to a gym and nned to stay there for some time. He intended to spend time researching and mastering the Orb of Destruction.

    There was an abundance of gyms and training fields avable for use in Fort Verka, as long as one had sufficient crystal coins. With three purple crystal coins, Han Shuo rented a training field of several million square feet that came with an istion barrier for half a year.

    By following the method of condensing an Orb of Destruction recorded in the scroll, in two months, Han Shuo had sessfullypressed his destruction divine energy into an orb that emanated an intense aura of destruction. The orb was dark in color and approximately the size of a palm. Divine energy seemed to be whirling in the orb like liquid.

    When an Orb of Destruction took shape, one-fifth of Han Shuo¡¯s destruction divine energy was diverted and gathered on the Orb. To proceed, Han Shuo tried to manipte the Orb of Destruction in a trajectory recorded on the scroll. However, he was unable to get the knack of it. He knew that the author of the scroll had deliberately distorted or left out certain information so that the readers could not truly unleash the full power of the Orb of Destruction.

    However, Han Shuo had a mighty consciousness and a great deal of patience. He believed that if he would continue to experiment perfecting the Orb of Destruction with the help of his miraculous consciousness, he would be able to truly master the attack method.

    One day, while Han Shuo was still attempting to figure out the correct way of manipting the Orb of Destruction in his training field, jingling bells suddenly rang at his front door.

    Immediately, Han Shuo returned his avatar of destruction into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. Puzzled, he walked to the front door of his training field and asked, ¡°Zoya, did I not mention that I do not wish to be disturbed by anyone?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry but there are officers that wish to see you,¡± Zoya replied in a helpless voice. He was the person in charge of the training field. ording to the rules, as long as the patron had paid sufficient fees for their duration of use, the patron should not be disturbed.

    ¡°Are you Bryan? An energy of destruction cultivator?¡± a young woman with a graceful physique and scattered red hair that looked like a waterfall sized Han Shuo up before she asked.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. How can I help you?¡± Han Shuo asked confusedly. He could tell that this woman also cultivated in the energy of destruction and attainedte-stage lowgod strength. She was in a slightly higher realmpared to Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction.

    ¡°During the recent days, many cultivators of the edict of destruction have been found dead in Fort Verka with their divine energies drained. They must have fallen prey to other cultivators of the same energy. I¡¯m acting under orders to interrogate every suspicious person. Come take a walk with us!¡± the young woman gave a short exnation before turning around and walking away. She gestured at Han Shuo and the divine guards behind her, indicating them to keep pace with her.

 Chapter 685 - Too dumb to be a godhunter

    GDK 685: Too dumb to be a godhunter

    Han Shuo could roughly figure out what was going on right after listening to the woman¡¯s exnation. Those scrolls that Rahman distributed in secret had to be producing results. Surely, a few of them weren¡¯t able to resist the temptation and engulfed the divine energy of other destruction edict cultivators.

    Han Shuo had been staying in his training field all this while and he did not release mystical demons to survey the situation in Fort Verka. However, from the fact that the House of Croton had mobilizedrge forces to investigate everyone who cultivated in the edict of destruction, Han Shuo could tell that the situation must have gone sour.

    Han Shuo pondered about it in silence for a moment. As he was rather curious about how they would investigate, he decided to leave the training field with that woman.

    Han Shuo then discovered several other energy of destruction cultivators waiting right outside. They were not wearing the unique armor of divine guards, so he figured they must have been suspects to be investigated like himself.

    ¡°Come with us. We just want to ask you a few questions. This will not take too much of your time,¡± the woman with fiery red long hair said after taking Han Shuo to the rest of the suspects.

    ¡°Miss Eunice, what is actually going on in Fort Verka? Why is it that recently, strange miserable shrieks can often be heard at night? Are the godhuntersunchingrge-scale invasions?¡± a boorish, bulky man asked that red-haired woman concernedly.

    That red-haired Eunice swooped a nce across the few lowgods of destruction and replied in a cold voice, ¡°This is Fort Verka. Under the guardianship of my House of Croton, how would godhunters have the audacity to attack this ce so openly? Hmph, but I can tell you that there are indeed a few godhunters in the fort, and they could be standing beside you right now!¡±

    Han Shuo sneered in his heart after hearing Eunice¡¯s reply. Having previously eavesdropped on Rahman¡¯s conversation, he knew that Rahman did not take the House of Croton as a threat at all. In fact, that was the reason why Rahman had chosen to strike in Fort Verka. Eunice should be a member of the House of Croton. It appeared that she had no idea just how big of a trouble they were actually up against.

    ¡°Miss Eunice is right. The godhunters definitely wouldn¡¯t be so brazen to assault this fort openly!¡± a third person voiced his opinion. He proimed in a righteous tone, ¡°Those godhunters are truly repulsive, horrible beings. They better hope they don¡¯te across me because otherwise, I, Lexis, will surely give them hell.¡±

    ¡°Stop boasting already, you¡¯d be lucky if you could stay alive against one. Of the deceased, one of them was ate-stage lowgod. You have merely advanced to mid-stage lowgod realm recently. You are nothing more than a prey to them,¡± Eunice ridiculed him disdainfully. Lexis let out a hollowugh rather embarrassingly. He did not make any retort and seemed afraid of Eunice.

    ¡°What?!¡± that burly man cried out in surprise, ¡±Even ate-stage lowgod got murdered?!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Each and every one of you better be very cautious. Don¡¯t be so arrogant to think that you could handle one all by yourself. If you run into any suspicious person, your best choice is to shout at the top of your voice. The divine guards are on heavy patrol and cane to your assistance very quickly,¡± Eunice replied. After taking a short pause, she added, ¡°But before that, I must make sure that you people are all innocent. If anyone of you is found to be a godhunter, no matter who you are, I will kill you with my own hands!¡±

    After hearing those words, those who knew of Eunice¡¯s identity and strength becamepletely silent as though they were very afraid of this red-haired woman.

    ¡°Miss Eunice, the other team haspleted their investigation. We should proceed there now!¡± a divine guard standing beside Eunice poked a miniaturepass-like device on his left wrist and said to her.

    ¡°Everyonee with me. If any of you try to leave midway, I will consider the person as a godhunter and they will be killed on the spot. You all better behave yourself!¡± Eunice waved her hand and lead the party towards the center of Fort Verka. The few suspects including Han Shuo followed behind Eunice without making a noise.

    Soon enough, Eunice and the party arrived at thergest practice field in Fort Verka. This practice field was under the management of the House of Croton. It was expansive and contained aplete set of facilities.

    After walking into the practice field, Han Shuo discovered that there were around seventy people in this ce. A majority of them cultivated in the edict of destruction. Most of those who did not cultivate in the energy of destruction were divine guards under the House of Croton.

    ¡°Uncle Bat, how are things?¡± upon arrival, Eunice walked to a thin and tall middle-aged man with a face overgrown with a thick beard.

    ¡°We haven¡¯t found anything. Truly strange,¡± Bat sighed. His eyes nced back and forth at Han Shuo and the others.

    ¡°Let¡¯s test this bunch and see how it goes,¡± Eunice too softly sighed and replied. She turned to Han Shuo and the others and shouted, ¡°Line up and perform the test one by one. This device can test if the divine energy in your body is pure. Once you have demonstrated that there is no impurity in your divine energy, you may leave!¡±

    The divine energy absorbed from another person did not immediately fuse with the beneficiary¡¯s divine energy; it took a period of time to fully amalgamate. Before that could take ce, the person¡¯s divine energy would contain impurities. Han Shuo was aware of this fact. He looked at that miniature energy tower of Bat¡¯s ced on top of a table and after a moment of sensing, he understood that the device could directly absorb divine energy and indicate its purity.

    One after another, the party pressed their hands on the energy tower and injected a strand of their divine energy. Once it received divine energy, the energy tower would glow with faint white light if the divine energy was clean and did not contain any impurities.

    The few people that took the test before Han Shuo all passed the test with the energy tower giving off faint white light. When it was Han Shuo¡¯s turn, he proceeded calmly and unhurriedly. With a faint smile on his face, he ced a hand on the energy tower and inserted a strand of his divine energy.

    The energy tower which had been glowing with faint white light all along suddenly flickered. The white light also gradually turned gray in color.

    Han Shuo was astounded. Before he could exin a thing, Bat and Eunice simultaneously shouted, ¡°Godhunter!¡±

    Their shouts were ear-piercing in the quiet training field. Every pair of eyes in the training field gathered on Han Shuo in an instant. Bat and Eunice surrounded Han Shuo in a well-coordinated manner. The divine guards in the distance rapidly gathered towards him as well. Han Shuo suddenly found himself heavily surrounded.

    ¡°How did thate about? Didn¡¯t you tell me that all impurities in the avatar of destruction have been removed?¡± Han Shuo hastily transmitted to Cauldron Spirit to figure out what was going on.

    After two seconds, Cauldron Spirit replied, ¡°That avatar of yours definitely does not have any impurities. Your avatar is formed using Demonyer Edge and the weapon still contains your blood essences. It must be because of the blood essence that the crappy stone would glow.¡±

    Han Shuo immediately came to his senses after hearing Cauldron Spirit¡¯s exnation. That avatar of his was indeed formed from the Demonyer Edge. The blood essence of a demonic arts cultivator, which the Demonyer Edge contained, was extremely unique. Therefore, it was to be expected that the energy tower would detect Han Shuo¡¯s divine energy to be impure.

    Han Shuo had not anticipated this situation at all and therefore he was so at ease with inserting a strand of his divine energy into the testing device. Who knew that he would end up in such a huge blunder.

    After the conversation with Cauldron Spirit, Han Shuo found himself heavily encircled. Bat and Eunice wore gloomy faces as they stared fixedly at Han Shuo. Bat proceeded to ask in a cold voice, ¡°How many aplices do you have? As long as you cooperate with us, I will grant you a morefortable death.¡±

    ¡°This is a misunderstanding, a big misunderstanding!¡± Han Shuo forced a smiled and exined. He did not know if he shouldugh or cry as he looked at those divine guards that formed a fewyers around him.

    ¡°The evidence is undeniable. This cannot be a mistake!¡± Eunice coldly shouted. ¡°For thest few months, there were altogether thirteen destruction edict cultivators killed by having their divine energy drained. The tower has shown that your destruction divine energy is not pure. How could this be a misunderstanding?¡±

    ¡°Kill him! Kill this damned godhunter!¡±

    ¡°Miss Eunice, kill him in the cruelest way possible. It is his bunch who murdered my wife!¡±

    ¡°My brother died to them!¡±

    Everyone in the training field red furiously at Han Shuo. Some of those people who had lost their family and friends to godhunters were even charging towards Han Shuo with sheer vengeance. If the divine guards were not holding them back, they would have tried to kill Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo could sense the fury of all those around him. It was now that he truly recognized why godhunters would always do things surreptitiously and refrain from big cities. He knew that if he doesn¡¯t give a good exnation and exonerate himself immediately, he might not be able to walk out from this training field. Even if he were to escape using demonic arts, with the presence of divine tablets, he wouldn¡¯t need to think about having a foothold on Elysium.

    ¡°I can assure you, this is a misunderstanding!¡± facing the furious crowd, Han Shuo exined with a bitter smile.

    ¡°Youngster, you have been exposed and there is nothing to be disputed. If you would like to do it the hard way, I can slowly kill you and extract every little secret from your soul!¡± Bat, a midgod cultivating in the energy of death, said as he sneered grimly.

    ¡°I¡¯m not a godhunter!¡± Han Shuo said with a bitter smile.

    ¡°Then how do you exin the anomaly on the energy tower?¡± Eunice was starting to get impatient and seemed like she could strike at any moment.

    ¡°I cultivate in two energies and my body contains two types of divine energy. That¡¯s why it gave a false rm!¡± Han Shuo hastily exined. Immediately, he transferred the divine energy of his avatar of death to form a domain of divinity around him. Then, after a short while, he turned the domain of divinity from the energy of death to the energy of destruction.

    Everyst person in the crowd gasped and looked at Han Shuo up and down with strange gazes. Bat too gestured at his divine guards to disperse.

    ¡°I really did not expect that someone could be as foolish as you to simultaneously cultivate in two energies. Not only will you go nowhere with your cultivation, if you slip up, the two energies will sh with each other and you will die in no time,¡± Eunice said to Han Shuo while looking at him like an idiot. Shortly after, she turned to Bat and said, ¡°Uncle, someone as dumb as him cannot be a godhunter, right?¡±

    ¡°He¡¯s definitely not one!¡± Bat nodded and agreed with Eunice. He then said to Han Shuo, ¡°Alright, you may leave!¡±

    Han Shuo smiled speechlessly. He was prepared to return to his training field and continue to research the Orb of Destruction when he suddenly discovered that Rahman had brought some people over. Just like Han Shuo, those people had previously read that special scroll from his store.

 Chapter 686 - Bidirectional Portals

    GDK 686: Bidirectional Portals

    Rahman was the most terrifying leading member of the Godhunter Alliance that Han Shuo was currently aware of. For such a character to suddenly appear at this ce specially set up to find godhunters, something must have been very wrong!

    After Bat allowed him to leave, Han Shuo did not immediately take off, instead standing aside to observe Rahman and his gang¡¯s actions. He wanted to see what those godhunters were up to.

    By this point in time, the training field had gathered eighty-seven people. Discounting twenty-one divine guards of the House of Croton, the remaining were all cultivators of the edict of destruction. Most of those people had taken and passed the test. They did not leave the training field either, and observed the energy tower in front of Bat.

    These cultivators of the edict of destruction did not immediately leave because the presence of godhunters in Fort Verka had severely threatened their safety. They wanted to watch the House of Croton catch and punish those godhunters.

    After all, if those godhunters were not caught and eliminated, as cultivators of the energy of destruction, they would remain targets to those hunters. Naturally, none of them feltfortable being preyed upon!

    Practically every destruction edict cultivator in Fort Verka with at least lowgod strength was gathered in this training field. Han Shuo was certain that there had to be at least a few godhunters among these people. The energy tower did not detect them merely because they hadpletely assimted the divine energy of their victims with their own. Han Shuo¡¯s sharp senses picked up that the eyes of a dozen or more lowgods of destruction flickered as soon as they saw Rahman and his bunch enter the training field. They were exchanging meaningful nces with Rahman and those who came in with him as though they were up to something.

    With one thought, Han Shuo deduced that something major was about to happen in this training field. He was even less motivated to leave.

    ¡°Rahman, why have youe? You cultivate in the energy of darkness. You should be in the clear.¡± Bat could recognize Rahman and loudly greeted him from a distance.

    ¡°Haha, I¡¯m bringing my friends here to be tested. We want to cooperate with your efforts,¡± Rahman replied with a cordial smile on his face. His sinister and cold appearance back at his store was nowhere to be seen.

    ¡°I know I can count on you!¡± Bat thanked him before he instructed to those lined up behind the tower, ¡°Step aside, let Rahman and his friend take the test first.¡±

    Rahman was a midgod. One could point to any location on a map of the universe but one fact would remain standing ¨C the mighty always enjoy special privileges. There were only a few midgods to be found in Fort Verka. As a member of the House of Croton, it was to be expected that Bat was familiar with Rahman.

    Rahman, leading his bunch who cultivated in the energy of destruction, passed through the crowd and walked directly to Bat. These people who had read the scroll that Rahman deliberately distributed inserted their divine energy into the energy tower one after another. The energy tower was not triggered. Every one of them passed the test.

    However, Han Shuo was almost certain that those with Rahman were the perpetrators responsible for the murders in Fort Verka in the recent days. They likely passed the test because they had fully assimted the divine energy of their victims.

    ¡°They are all clean. I don¡¯t believe that Rahman¡¯s friends would do such despicable things,¡± Bat said while nodding his head. He seemed to be very close to Rahman.

    ¡°Of course!¡± Rahman replied andughed heartily. His eyes, however, were wandering all around Eunice. Grinning cheekily, he asked, ¡°Miss Eunice, you must have worked hard these days. You¡¯re exhausted, aren¡¯t you?¡± His gazes towards Eunice contained a trace of depravity. An average person without senses as acute as Han Shuo¡¯s wouldn¡¯t have discovered it.

    ¡°As a member of the House of Croton, this is what I should do ¨C it doesn¡¯t matter if it¡¯s exhausting or not,¡± Eunice replied coldly. For some reason, she was instinctively disgusted with Rahman and felt ill every time he was in her presence.

    ¡°If there¡¯s anything that I can help Miss Eunice with, please don¡¯t hesitate to ask.¡± Rahman¡¯s gaze constantly traveled all across Eunice¡¯s body and lingered particrly long around her chest.

    ¡°No, thank you!¡± Eunice refused straightforwardly. Women possess extraordinary senses on such things. She had long known that Rahman lusted for her as well as that filthy matter he did with the salesgirl in his shop. Therefore, no matter how Rahman fawned on her, she never responded kindly.

    Rahman did not take offense and gave a hollowugh. However, when he slumped his head, a vicious and sinister light shed across his eyes.

    ¡°Alright. Rahman, you may leave with your friends,¡± Bat said smilingly. He knew Rahman¡¯s intentions but wasn¡¯t afraid that Rahman would do anything transgressing towards Eunice as the House of Croton held overwhelming power in Fort Verka.

    Rahman nodded his head and started heading outside. However, along the way, his eyes were constantly exchanging nces with certain people in the crowd. Those whose gazes met with Rahman¡¯s nodded their heads ever so slightly as though informing Rahman that their preparations were ready.

    Han Shuo had seen every single little movement these people made. He was being very careful and on high alert as he knew that a show would soon take ce right here. As his true strength was on par to ate-stage midgod, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t at all concerned about his own safety. Instead, he wanted to stay and watch what Rahman was about to do.

    Rahman, who was being closely watched by Han Shuo, had walked all the way to the doorway and would soon leave the training field. Han Shuo was astounded and thought, <i>Could I have been mistaken in my judgment? Could Rahman not even have been thinking about making a move here?</i>

    When a great majority of the crowd had ced their attention back on Bat¡¯s energy tower, Rahman, who was a few steps from leaving the training field, suddenly withdrew a dark-golden sphere. Bat, Eunice, and the others from the House of Croton had resumed with testing other people and did not notice Rahman¡¯s actions at all.

    Rahman did not let Han Shuo wait for a second longer and immediately hurled that dark-gold sphere into the air.

    Suddenly, a terrifying aura of destruction gushed out from the sphere which flooded every inch of the air, forming a domain of divinity that enveloped the entire training field!

    ¡°What¡¯s happening?¡± the crowd cried out in surprise. The terrifying energy of destruction that suddenly erupted in the training field had caused somemotion in the crowd.

    ¡°Goddamnit, who just unfurled their domain of divinity?¡± some of those who were oblivious cursed out loudly.

    Bat, who was next to his testing device, was stunned. He cried out in rm, ¡°Who is it? This is Fort Verka of the City of Shadows! Who is being so unbridled?¡± Bat could sense that the aura of destruction that suddenly erupted in the training field wasn¡¯t something that he could resist.

    ¡°Uncle, we have a formidable enemy in our presence. I have never sensed such terrifying energy of destruction!¡± Eunice remarked to Bat. She was considered rather calm to the threat and was on the alert.

    That dark gold sphere hovering high above the training field was ever releasing the aura of destruction and maintaining that Domain of Divinity which enveloped the entire space. When the crowd finally discovered that dark gold sphere over their heads, multiple glowing dark orbs suddenly flew out from the dark gold sphere one after another and flew upwards at the training field¡¯s boundary.

    Those glowing dark orbs all adhered to the boundary on the top of the training field and started to circte rapidly. Those orbs would leave behind a trail of sparks behind their path. They altered the structure of the boundary and caused the aura of destruction to grow more intense.

    Han Shuo was extremely shocked. His glistening eyes watched the boundary attentively, not even stopping to take the shortest blink. The energy of destruction and the density of the glowing dark orbs were all too obvious to him. As soon as they flew out from the dark golden sphere, Han Shuo recognized that those were the Orbs of Destruction that he had been trying to learn!

    Han Shuo was rather puzzled as to why those Orbs of Destruction were flying about, altering the structure of the training field boundary as well as the fact that he had learned about the Orb of Destruction from a scroll he bought from the scroll store operated by Rahman.

    ¡°Who is doing this? Come out!¡± Bat shouted at the top of his lungs and his voice had tremendous pration power. It appeared that he intended to raise the attention of the divine guards outside the training field.

    ¡°That¡¯s useless. No one will hear a thing inside here. Even if you shout your throat hoarse, your voice still won¡¯t prate through the barrier!¡± Rahman started walking back to them with an evil smile. He appeared unruffled.

    ¡°It¡¯s you?¡± Eunice cried out in surprise. She asked in a stone-cold voice, ¡°Who do you work with? How dare you stir trouble in our Fort Verka!¡±

    ¡°Miss Eunice, darling, you will soon learn everything about me! I will slowly exin everything to you while pressing you down under my crotch and ying with you!¡± Rahman no longer concealed his lustful desires towards Eunice and answered impudently.

    ¡°Despicable!¡± Eunice gnashed her teeth and shouted furiously at Rahman¡¯s obscene gazes and shameless words.

    ¡°Rahman, do you know how those who stand against the House of Croton end up?¡± Bat took a deep breath to slightly calm his anger and asked Rahman with a calm but threatening voice.

    Rahman shrugged indifferently andughed a sinisterugh. ¡°Do you really think that we would give a damn about a small little House of Croton? Oh poor Bat, you actually think that your House of Croton carries any weight!¡±

    While they were talking, some twenty or so destruction edict cultivators in the crowd walked out and stood beside Rahman, clearly stating their positions.

    ¡°Godhunters! They are all godhunters!¡± Eunice finally came to realize what was going on and pointed at the bunch furiously. She was so angry that her lovable body was trembling while she inwardly faulted herself for not discovering their identities earlier.

    All those people who stood beside Rahman were indifferent to Eunice¡¯s finger pointing.

    ¡°Kill them all, kill these damned godhunters! Their existences are our nightmare!¡± Lexis who was brought to this ce along with Han Shuo by Eunice shouted righteously. He had always fawned over Eunice and was obviously trying to win her heart. He took this as an opportunity to woo her. The crowd immediately responded in agreement and was stirred up by his shout.

    Although Rahman had twenty or so godhunters who cultivated in the energy of destruction on his side, just the divine guards that Bat and Eunice had could match that number. To add on to those bystanders who were not godhunters, Lexis seemed to be on the winning side.

    When Eunice saw Lexis take the lead in helping her, she responded by smiling at him, perhaps as to express her gratitude. Lexis, having seen that smile on her face, became even more excited and took the lead in marching towards Rahman, as if he wanted to win Eunice¡¯s approval by ying the hero.

    <i>Idiot!</i> Han Shuo scolded in his heart. Rahman and his gang so daringly stating their identities in the open had amply indicated that Rahman had absolute certainty of victory. But the stunt that Lexis was pulling, he must have been tired of living.

    And the fact was indeed as Han Shuo had expected. Before that Lexis, whose blood was pumping with hormones could get anywhere close to Rahman, three Orbs of Annihtion flew downwards in crisscrosses and bombarded him. He shrieked loudly and miserably. Before the crowd¡¯s eyes, Lexis¡¯ thin body began to swell and grew to three times its volume in no time.

    <i>Pop!</i> Lexis¡¯ body that rapidly swelled to beyond its limits shrunk at an even faster rate. He copsed powerlessly on the ground while blood spilled from every pore on his body.

    ¡°Kids that are impulsive don¡¯t usually end up well!¡± Rahman remarked softly. Shortly after, he put on a mischievous, evil smile and said, ¡°Do you think that we would havee here and shown ourselves without any preparations?¡±

    After hearing those words, the small party who followed Lexis in attacking Rahman and his bunch, suddenly halted in their paths. They no longer acted blindly without thinking.

    ¡°It hasn¡¯t been easy for us to create such an asion where all the destruction edict cultivators are gathered together. We do thispletely out of good intentions. As long as everyone cooperates with me, I believe that a great majority of you will be alright!¡± Rahman nodded in satisfaction when those people stopped advancing further.

    ¡°Rahman, we will note to your terms! Godhunters are a bunch of scoundrels wallowing in a cesspool. Don¡¯t think that we will join you in your evildoings!¡± Bat coldly shouted and took the lead in walking towards Rahman. The House of Croton divine guards and Eunice immediately followed along.

    ¡°To join me in evildoing or not, that¡¯s not up to you to say,¡± Rahman sneered. He pointed at the destruction edict godhunters behind him and said, ¡°Look at them. Before, they knew nothing about engulfing another¡¯s divine energy. But after I told them how, they became the same kind of people as I am. Bat, you would only say so because you have never tried that wonderful sensation. Only once you have taken the energy of death of another person, you would know just the kind of ecstacy it is. Would you like to have a taste of it?¡±

    ¡°I want to taste how it feels to kill you!¡± Bat was not wavered by Rahman¡¯s words and continued to march towards him.

    ¡°Bat, do be so impetuous. Aren¡¯t you curious what am I actually up to?¡± seeing that persuasion was ineffective, Rahman switch to another approach ¨C to evoke his curiosity.

    Very obviously, Rahman¡¯s new approach was effective. Bat stopped walking, stared at him and asked, ¡°What do you actually want to do?¡±

    ¡°You will find out very soon!¡± Rahman proudly pointed at the barrier that enveloped them and shouted to the crowd, ¡°The barrier is now shrinking. If you don¡¯t want to die, you better gather towards the center. I will take you all to a ce where you can escape from being killed by the energy of destruction on the barrier!¡±

    After hearing those words, the crowd raised their heads and looked up. Sure enough, they discovered that the enormous barrier thatpletely sealed the entire training field was shrinking little by little under the propel of the Orbs of Annihtion. Sparks filled with the aura of destruction were leaping about on the barrier.

    By now, that dark gold sphere that hovered still above their heads had stopped spewing Orbs of Destruction. It felt like an eye that was looking down, giving the crowd a dreadful pressure.

    Han Shuo, who was standing among the crowd, was certain that the dark gold sphere was a very formidable divine weapon whose owner was a highgod cultivating in the energy of destruction. Only a divine weapon in the hands of a highgod could create such terrifying results.

    There were approximately three hundred Orbs of Annihtion that came out from the dark gold sphere. They all adhered to the barrier and were revolving. Based on the limited knowledge Han Shuo had, he reckoned that the master of the dark gold sphere could be the person who first came out with the attack method and authored the scroll he bought.

    It was precisely because of this reason that Han Shuo, who could escape by going underground using earth elite zombie, did not take avail of the chaos and flee. Instead, he boldly chose to remain among the crowd, coldly and silently watching as the situation developed.

    While the barrier around the training field was still contracting, Rahman, who was already standing at the center deployed a Bidirectional Portal out of nowhere.

    Bidirectional Portals were a special divine device used for short-distance transportation. They were all manufactured by mighty gods cultivating in the edict of space and were very precious. By having a pair of Bidirectional Portals set up, a person could travel freely from one portal to another. The mighty space god who first invented the Bidirectional Portals originally made it to allow a pair of lovers living in different ces to meet more conveniently.

    That couple did not cultivate in the same type of energy. One of them cultivated at the northern part of Elysium while the other cultivated at the southern part where the elemental energy they cultivated in respectively was the densest. Therefore, if they wanted to meet, they had to travel long journeys to cross at least half of the vast material ne. Bidirectional Portals would obviously save them a lot of time. Although a Bidirectional Portal could not conduct internar transmissions, they were portable and very convenient. But as Bidirectional Portals required rtively precious materials and only highgods cultivating in the edict of space could refine one, they were extremely costly and theyman would never be able to possess one.

    Rahman was just a midgod of darkness. Logically speaking, it was impossible that he could possess such a valuable Bidirectional Portal. Therefore, right after he erected a Bidirectional Portal, Han Shuo knew that it too belonged to the master of the dark gold sphere.

    Rahmanughed heartily while Han Shuo was pondering in his mind. Rahman pointed at the open portal and announced smilingly, ¡°All those who don¡¯t want to die, enter! Bat, if you want to figure out the situation, you too must enter! I should tell you that the barrier around you was made using the divine weapon of a highgod. If you don¡¯t cross in there, you will die!¡±

    ¡°Hmph, let¡¯s see what you are up to!¡± Bat groaned coldly and stepped into the portal. His confidence, however, seemed to have be somewhatcking. Han Shuo knew that Bat was out of any other option.

    ¡°After you, my sweet darling. I will be with you shortly!¡± Rahman said beaming ear to ear when it was Eunice¡¯s turn.

    <i>Pooh!</i> Eunice could no longer restrain the loathing in her heart and spat a mouthful of saliva at Rahman¡¯s face.

    However, Eunice was getting nervous about her actions. Her Uncle Bat had stepped into the Bidirectional Portal and most of those left were on Rahman¡¯s side. She was afraid that Rahman would turn violent.

    Rahman, strangely, did not flip out. Instead, he extended his index finger to swipe a bit of Eunice¡¯s saliva from his cheek and ced it in his mouth. He even began to suck passionately on it right in front of Eunice. His appearance was obscene!

    ¡°Disgusting!¡± Eunice panicked and no longer dared to look at Rahman. She crossed the Bidirectional Portal with humiliation and abhorrence!

    ¡°Hahaha... Hahaha... ¡° Rahman howled withughter and appeared very pleased with himself. Then, when Eunice hadpletely disappeared in the portal, he suddenly turned cold. With an evil grin, he mumbled to himself, ¡°Eunice, you cannot escape from my palms! Soon, I will let you taste something worse than death!¡±

    The boundary around the training field shrunk smaller and smaller. The frightened crowd made their way quickly into the portal one after another. Soon enough, it was Han Shuo¡¯s turn.

    Rahman gasped, staring at Han Shuo for a moment before he asked puzzlingly, ¡°I know you. You read my scroll but did not seem repulsed. This indicates that you have thought about utilizing the method of engulfing written on the scroll. But why is it that you did not take any action after that?¡±

    Han Shuo had long known that Rahman was observing everything in his store using some special device. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have been able to tell apart those which would expose him and those which would eventually join him. Therefore, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t at all surprised that Rahman would ask so. He replied smilingly, ¡°That¡¯s right, I have read the scroll and am interested in doing it. However, certain things have dyed my journey and I have not found a target to act on!¡± He giggled.

    ¡°Haha, a kindred spirit! Once you enter, you will have a target for sure!¡± Rahmanughed evilly and patted on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulder. He ought to have taken Han Shuo as one of his kind.

    ¡°I hope so as well!¡± Han Shuo replied cheerfully and marched into the portal. In his mind, however, he was cursing, <i>fucking hell, don¡¯t touch me with that filthy hand of yours that you¡¯ve put into your mouth!</i>

    Hey guys, I caught flu and couldn¡¯t work as productively. I¡¯ll try my best but the next chapter release will probably be dyed by a few days. Will keep you updated on discord. -Hedonist

 Chapter 687 - Share some with me

    GDK 687: Share some with me

    After Han Shuo exited from the other side of the portal, he discovered that he had arrived in a valley shrouded by clouds and fog. There were cliff walls in every direction, filled with deep caverns that lead somewhere new. The ground seemed solid, a mixture of rock fragments.

    Those who came through the portal before Han Shuo wandered all around the valley while Eunice and Bat were whispering to each other in a corner, trying toe up with a countermeasure for the situation they were in.

    Han Shuo expanded his consciousness. As soon as he started surveying the situation around him, he sensed the presence of a boundary high amongst the nket of cloud overhead. That boundary giving off an obvious aura of destruction suddenly reacted. It was able to detect that Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was probing around. The mist and clouds in the area where Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was traveling started to billow.

    Han Shuo was astounded and immediately drew back his consciousness. He did not know if his consciousness could prate the boundary but seeing that the boundary was so sensitive that it could detect his consciousness, he decided not to take any chances to avoid attracting the attention of the master of this ce.

    At this point in time, those who were exiting from the portal behind Han Shuo were godhunters who had certainly be depraved and beyond salvation. The excitement in their eyes zed even brighter after they walked out from the portal. They were staring fixedly at Han Shuo and the crowd like predators stalking their prey.

    Rahman was thest to cross the portal. He ought to have withdrawn the dark gold sphere which dispensed the Orbs of Annihtion and the bidirectional portal in the training field. With that, the Croton Family of Fort Verka wouldn¡¯t find a clue about their abrupt disappearance.

    Right after exiting the portal, Rahman started looking all around for Eunice. When her figure entered his eyes, he started smirking sinisterly and pervertedly. Who knew what filthy ideas he had in mind.

    ¡°Ladies and gentlemen, wee to this hideout of our Godhunter Alliance. Let me introduce you to the leader of the destruction energy division, Lord Brovst!¡± Rahman shouted towards a veryrge cave while wearing a respectful look.

    ¡°Rahman, thank you for your great work!¡± a voice suddenly sounded from the cave.

    ¡°It is my honor to be of service, Lord Brovst!¡± Rahman dared not to be conceited. He continued with a loud voice, ¡°My Lord, I have brought over practically every person who cultivates in the energy of destruction in Fort Verka. Does your Lordship have any furthermand?¡±

    ¡°Well done! Come in here and receive the rewards you deserve. Also, return me the two divine weapons I lent you,¡± Brovst shouted in a deep voice from within the cave without revealing his true form.

    Rahman was overjoyed. He withdrew the other pair of bidirectional portals and leapt into the cave.

    Although Han Shuo could not see Brovst, nor could he sense the aura on him, nheless, Han Shuo was absolutely certain that he was a terrifying highgod. Han Shuo could be certain of it just from the fact that he was the master of the dark gold sphere.

    This was because there was absolutely no way that a midgod could assemble so many Orbs of Destruction that contained such powerful destruction divine energy!

    Soon enough, Rahman returned from the cave. He appeared to have obtained something that he had desired and he seemed even more excited.

    ¡°Lord Brovst said that you bunch who cultivate in the energy of destruction just have to engulf the divine energy of any one person around you to be considered as one of our own. Then, you may leave this valley alive. But if you don¡¯t, you are destined to die!¡± Rahman stood at the cave entrance and announced when he reappeared.

    The non-godhunter crowd was jolted when they heard those words. They vigntly kept some distance with those around them, lest that they were sneaked up upon.

    Han Shuo had long foreseen that this would be their course of action ¨C that Brovst had taken great pains to gather all destruction edict cultivators in Fort Verka at this ce. Therefore, it was obvious that his n did not involve simply killing them all. ording to the words Rahman spoke in his store, the number of godhunters cultivating in the edict of destruction was the lowest of all. Brovst must have had no subordinates avable and therefore asked someone cultivating in the energy of darkness toplete the conspiracy. From this aspect, Han Shuo could tell that Brovst was severelycking in manpower.

    Han Shuo had in fact previously personally experienced that wonderful sensation when he engulfed that old woman¡¯s divine energy with his avatar of death. He knew more than anyone else that once a person took this first step, they usually wouldn¡¯t be able to resist the terrifying cravings that would constantly swarm their minds. They would drift closer and closer to the Godhunter Alliance and ultimately be a part of them.

    After all, not many out there were like Han Shuo who had started tempering his willpower ever since he started cultivating demonic arts. Unlike Han Shuo, it was almost impossible for them to break free from that powerful addiction.

    Brovst gave his instructions because he knew this very well. He too believed that once these people had had a taste, they would never be able to withdraw and would finally sumb and serve him.

    Rahman¡¯s words had undoubtedly set off turbulence in the hearts of those people in the valley. Soon after Rahman delivered the ultimatum, an enormous scroll suddenly unfurled from the sky of cloud and mist. It depicted the method of absorbing another person¡¯s destruction divine energy in great detail.

    Those non-godhunters in the valley had not visited Rahman¡¯s scroll store and practically had no idea on how to absorb the destruction divine energy of another person. Most of them reacted to the enormous scroll with bewildered faces.

    After carefully observing for a moment, Han Shuo discovered that under the threat of death and temptation of instant power, a portion of the people had secretly started to memorize the contents of the scroll. The method wasn¡¯t hard to learn. With proper guidance, practically anyone could master it.

    Those whose eyes were cast on the scroll and were silently memorizing its contents would definitely turn into godhunters in the future. Meanwhile, those with staunch stances had their willpower nibbled away by the great fear in their hearts.

    Without the threat of death, a great majority of these people would likely have ignored the scrollpletely. After all, godhunters were public enemies of the entire Elysium that everyone held in contempt. However, now with their lives under threat, resistance would mean that they would forever be gone. Therefore, they were pushed to carefully reconsider their choices.

    ¡°I will be watching every move you make. Be at ease. Those who dare take action, even if your opponent is stronger than yourself, I will help you subdue him! I can even guarantee that as long as you join us, not only will you not be killed, you will grow stronger at an even faster rate!¡± Brovst pledge from inside his cave, helping those who were on the fence to make up their mind.

    ¡°Divine essences are as scarce as hen¡¯s teeth, but cultivators of the same energy could be found everywhere. These people are just living divine essences. Just try and imagine that wonderful sensation of absorbing another man¡¯s energy to gain power. What a most pleasurable feeling...¡± Rahman gabbled on and on, tempting the non-godhunters with his words.

    With Brovst and Rahman persuading at the same time, Han Shuo discovered that those who were on the fence were obviously swayed. They too started to memorize the scripture and secretly circted their divine energy as described.

    The atmosphere in the valley suddenly turned very eerie with everyone consciously keeping a distance away from each other. Even the best of friends would be cautious of each other. At this moment, no one could be trusted, anyone could be an enemy.

    The crowd that originally gathered in one big group gradually spread further and further apart from each other. Meanwhile, on the contrary, the godhunters gathered into a group, coldly smirking and observing the crowd as though watching an entertaining y.

    ¡°What, what are you all doing?!¡± Eunice who was with Bat noticed the crowd was bing divided and shouted in a somewhat panicked voice.

    Everyone ignored her!

    Even the guards under the House of Croton were silently dispersing from the duo. Their eyes were flickering with indecision. No one but themselves knew what they had in mind.

    By now, even Han Shuo was feeling rather uneasy. He wasn¡¯t afraid that someone among the crowd might attack him. He was worried about how to escape from this valley.

    With the presence of Brovst, a terrifying highgod, there was no practical way for Han Shuo to simply charge out from the canyon. Even if he summoned earth and metal elite zombies, they would be in great trouble once Brovst spotted them.

    Perhaps the only viable means of escaping was to deploy the Demonic Blood Disassembly. However, using this demonic technique would consume a great amount of his demonic yuan. Han Shuo was most unwilling to deploy this method except in thest resort.

    <i>Curiosity kills!</i> Han Shuo inwardly med himself for staying despite knowing that there would be danger. Had he summoned earth elite zombie back at the training field and escaped through an underground tunnel, Han Shuo believed that no one could have stopped him. But now, he could not employ this method here, not if Brovst was in the valley.

    <i>What about engulfing some other person¡¯s divine energy? No, that won¡¯t work! Other than somehow killing everyone here, the godhunters could leak my identity and I will forever be framed as a godhunter!</i> Han Shuo was stuck in a dilemma. He racked his brain trying to find a way out of the situation.

    A stifled groan clearly resounded through the valley. Han Shuo, who was heavily pondering, turned to look at the source of noise. He saw a man swaying to and fro. He seemed to have suffered a sneak attack.

    ¡°Who? Who is it?¡± the man turned and looked all around with furious gazes. When he turned his body, a little green arrow protruding from his back came into Han Shuo¡¯s view. The wound was flowing with fouling blood. It appeared that the little arrow wasced with a powerful venom.

    ¡°My apologies, Anli. I know you loathed the godhunters and would never be one of them. Since you will die in any case, you might as well use it to give me a chance to live!¡± a youngster as thin as bamboo with a scar on his face was pointing a delicate crossbow at him. He replenished the crossbow with his destruction divine energy.

    ¡°Lager, how, how could you? I have saved your life once, and this is how you return the favor?¡± Anli who caught a venomous arrow stared at his assaulter in disbelief. His bloodshot eyes were bulging out, obviously extremely enraged.

    ¡°Yes, I¡¯ve always been grateful for it. That is why I let you rescue me once more. I believe you would be most willing to do so! Goodbye, Anli. I will always remember you for saving my life twice! ¡± That thin youngster called Lager then fired another three small arrows containing destruction divine energy in rapid sessions.

    Anli was obviously no longer as agile. When Lager attacked Anli with all his strength in such short range, of the three small arrows, Anli only managed to deflect two. He caught another arrow to his chest.

    Then, taking advantage of an opening, Lager suddenly charged at Anli and threw him two punches. Destructive energy surged into Anli¡¯s body and he copsed to the ground.

    ¡°People, this one is mine. Do as you please but please don¡¯t rob him from me!¡± Lager ced his two hands on Anli¡¯s back, raised his head, and said to the crowd with a bright smile. But for some reason, everyone in the valley was disgusted.

    For a person to ruthlessly and decisively attack his rescuer and not show the least bit of guilt from start to finish, this person must be severely demented. It was no wonder he was the first to take action!

    People were usually most wary of this kind of character. Before his splendid smile, the crowd subconsciously took a few steps backward.

    ¡°Fucking hell, how do people like this exist!¡± even those who had be godhunters couldn¡¯t help but loudly voice out their disgust. Godhunters couldn¡¯t help themselves but hunt and absorb the energy of others. Other than going out to hunt other cultivators of the same energy, godhunters were not all that different from average cultivators. They too had their own circles of friends and felt the same emotions. Therefore, they were just as disgusted with someone as abhorrent as Lager.

    The crowd had subconsciously opened up an even wider space around Lager. He started absorbing his savior¡¯s divine energy as though no one else was present. As Anli shrieked like a banshee, Lager seemed more and more malevolent to the crowd!

    Suddenly, an ill-timedughter sounded from a corner. ¡°Do you mind sharing some with me? That would save me from finding a prey!¡±

    The crowd was shocked to hear those words. They were wondering who would be so daring to provoke Lager. Hence, they turned to look in the direction from whence the voice came.

    With the crowd attentively watching, Han Shuo stepped forward with confident strides. The smile on his face appeared even more sincere than the one on Lager¡¯s face. As he looked at Lager from a distance, he said, ¡°I believe that a person with as much sense of gratitude as you have surely will not take offense!¡±

    ¡°Interesting, interesting!¡± Lager gave a slow p as heughed out loud. He then beamed at Han Shuo and said, ¡°Sure, but you better hurry. Otherwise, I¡¯m going to take your share!¡±

    ¡°Then I shall dly take it!¡± Han Shuoughed and suddenly sped up. He charged straight for Lager.

    ¡°I¡¯m waiting!¡± Anli who was at hisst gasp when Lager ceased to engulf his divine energy and suddenly stood up. He rapidly took aim at Han Shuo with his crossbow. Lager was a mid-stage lowgod. For most spectators, he was a dangerous character. His vicious temperament was especially feared.

    Han Shuo did not reply but charged at Lager at lightning speed. He obviously knew that Lager wouldn¡¯t have responded in kind.

 Chapter 688 - Cruel Competition

    GDK 688: Cruel Competition

    The crossbow in Lager¡¯s hand was decorated with an intricate design. Two gemstones, one red and one blue, were embedded in the two ends of its prods. When the crossbow¡¯s string was fully pulled into locking position, multiple dark threads that seemed to be made of light flowed from Lager¡¯s two hands and into the crossbow. The pair of red and blue gemstones seemed to have the ability to amplify divine energy as the aura of destruction emanating from the crossbow grew more and more intense.

    <i>Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!</i> Yet another three sessions of arrows wereunched. After leaving the bowstring, the little arrows seemed to turn into three slender ck snakes that slithered towards Han Shuo to viciously bite him.

    Although Han Shuo couldn¡¯t reveal his practice of demonic arts, his sensitive consciousness and acute senses remained extremely useful. Although the three small arrows traveled in rather elusive trajectories, they were easily tracked and discerned by Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    Han Shuo altered his posture immediately after the three small arrows wereunched at him. He dodged the arrows by suddenly flying close to the ground and managed close his distance with Lager.

    Lager let out a soft and brief chuckle as though he wasn¡¯t afraid of Han Shuo¡¯s proximity to him. As soon as he saw that the three arrows failed to hit Han Shuo, he rapidly put away his crossbow and flung his right hand, revealing a double-edged battle-ax in his hand. The entire battle-ax was deep red in color and emanated an intense reeking of blood. Clearly, it was no ordinary weapon either.

    Both of them cultivated in the energy of destruction and both were in the same realm. Lager did not unfurl his domain of divinity. Heughed loudly as he tightly grasped the battle-ax with both hands, imbuing it with his divine energy, and swinging it at Han Shuo¡¯s skull. If the ax were to strike Han Shuo, his brain would surely crack and split.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes squinted slightly and again elerated while charging at Lager. His avatar of destruction transformed back into Demonyer Edge form and was tightly held in his hand. The Demonyer Edge filled with the energy of destruction was sent straight for Lager.

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction was formed using the Demonyer Edge. All the destruction divine energy and energy of destruction was stored inside the Demonyer Edge. With Han Shuo¡¯s main body still able to draw the destruction divine energy in the Demonyer Edge for use, everything appeared absolutely normal for an outside observer.

    Han Shuo secretly introduced a few strands of demonic yuan into the Demonyer Edge and kept it deactivated until the instant that it came into contact with Lager. Han Shuo believed that with that, no one but himself could tell that he had utilized demonic arts; not even Lager would be able to detect the small amount of demonic yuan mixed among the energy of destruction.

    <i>You are dead!</i> Lager sneered in his heart. The battle-ax which he tightly grasped with his two hands, imbued with destruction divine energy, suddenly burst with red radiance. In an instant, an aura ofplete and utter devastation burst out from Lager.

    Han Shuo, in contrast, had a calm and undisturbed expression. The Demonyer Edge in his hand did not glow but was faintly giving off an aura of destruction. From this, the observing crowd understood that Han Shuo must have concentrated his energy.

    <i>ng!</i> a sharp, metallic sound resonated throughout the valley. A shockwave of destruction spread from where the two shed. It caused the enormous scroll suspended in the sky to gently sway and the mixture of cloud and mist floating overhead to drift slightly.

    The mixture of demonic yuan and destruction divine energy violently gushed into Lager¡¯s battle-ax through the Demonyer Edge. As there wasn¡¯t too much discrepancy between the two in terms of strength, after Han Shuo secretly added the energy of demonic arts into his attack, he overpowered Lager!

    Han Shuo felt a slight numbing sensation in his right hand wielding the Demonyer Edge. Lager, however, had to take multiple steps backwards as though being pushed by an unstoppable force. Even his steps seemed to be unsteady.

    Not giving Lager the opportunity to recover and make aeback, Han Shuo moved even closer towards Lager andunched several hundred attacks using the Demonyer Edge within the blink of an eye. They were all aiming for Lager¡¯s head, chest, heart, and all his vital organs. Lager had no choice but to keep withdrawing and exert himself swaying his battle-ax back and forth to resist Han Shuo¡¯s torrential attacks with great difficulty.

    The battle-ax was known for being heavy and for its ability to carry enormous momentum. Clearly, however, it was rathercking in terms of maneuverability. Although Lager could use his double-edged battle-ax as an effective main assault weapon, it was clearly unsuitable as a defensive weapon. Han Shuo¡¯s sword attacks filled with the energy of destruction were like dark raindrops pouring down on Lager, giving him immense pain. He had to strain every nerve to defend himself.

    <i>Chkk! Chuck!</i> Lager¡¯s body was being audibly stabbed and punctured. Fresh blood flowed from around his stomach and wrists. He was clearly losing the battle and only had enough strength left to resist the attacks.

    ¡°How, how is it that he had so much energy in his first strike?!¡± Lager was frightened to the core. He knew that the reason his situation had degraded to such a state was the first strike, an enormous force had breached into his body via his battle-ax, throwing his divine energy to chaos. With that, he was unable to organize an effective divine energy attack.

    ¡°It seems that I don¡¯t need to do it to Anli. I will just absorb your energy instead!¡° Han Shuo said as he stared fixedly at Lager. His appearance was frighteningly calm.

    Lager, who was flustered and diposed, could feel that the number of wounds on his body was rapidly increasing. The more movements he made in defending himself, the faster he would lose blood. He even felt a little dizzy from losing too much blood. He appeared even more terrified when Han Shuo¡¯s voice that seemed to carry strange energy constantly revolved around his divine soul.

    Han Shuo raised the Demonyer Edge that gave off a glimmer of dark radiance. He had overwhelmed Lager and was prepared to deal him thest strike that would take his life.

    Suddenly, in the windless valley, that enormous scroll moved by itself andnded between Han Shuo and Lager, blocking Han Shuo from giving Lager the fatal blow. The piercing strike of the Demonyer Edge hit the enormous scroll that recorded the method of stealing destruction energy. The mighty barrier overhead gushed to cover the surface of the scroll like water. Blocked by the barrier, Han Shuo¡¯s Demonyer Edge failed to deliver the final blow to Lager who had lost his head out of fear.

    ¡°That¡¯s enough. You two will be on the same ship in the future, don¡¯t fight to your death!¡± Brovst¡¯s deep voice suddenly emerged from the pitch-ck cave. As soon as he finished his words, the enormous scroll swayed and rose back into the sky.

    Lager took the opportunity to retreat far away while being shielded by the scroll and made arge distance from Han Shuo. He looked at Han Shuo with an overt grin, bowed courteously, and asked, ¡°Thank you, my friend. What is your name?¡±

    Han Shuo could sense that bone-deep hatred behind Lager¡¯s smile. However, Han Shuo did not feel the slightest bit of fear. He shrugged and replied smilingly, ¡°For me, it is an insult for a bastard who could strike his savior treacherously to know my name!¡± Han Shuo lost interest in feigning civility with this kind of scheming, heartless brute without any sense of shame and cursed him unrestrainedly.

    Despite being called a bastard before the crowd, for some reason, Lager did not tumble into a fit of rage. He merely let out a few hollowughs and kept silent.

    Han Shuo was greatly disappointed that Lager did not lose his rationality and recklessly charge at him. Han Shuo knew that with Brovst¡¯s presence, if Lager did not actively attack him, he would have no reasonable excuse to finish Lager off.

    ¡°I will give you all one hour to prove to me your devotion. Don¡¯t waste the chance!¡± Brovst¡¯s voice again sounded from that dark cave.

    After hearing those words, the crowd who had recently witnessed the drama started to show indecision in their eyes. Han Shuo secretly observed the people around him as he walked to Anli, copsed on the ground, step by step. Anli was obviously at hisst gasp and when Han Shuo was about to ce his hand on Anli, he had exhausted all of his vitality and was utterly dead.

    The remaining divine energy in Anli¡¯s body waspletely exhausted and therefore, Han Shuo could not absorb any divine energy in his body. Han Shuo pressed his hand on Anli and using the energy of Cauldron Spirit inside his body, he sucked Anli¡¯s divine soul into the Cauldron so that Cauldron Spirit could turn him into a demon general. Even if Han Shuo didn¡¯t take his divine soul into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, it would just gradually dissipate between heaven and earth over time.

    Han Shuo ced one hand on Anli and put on the appearance of sucking in his divine energy.

    <i>Ahh!!! </i> A loud cry of pain sounded from the distance. Han Shuo turned to the source of the sound.

    In just a short few moments, the entire valley turned into a cruel scene. Everyone seemed to have gone mad to attack the people beside them. Those who had secretly practiced the method of engulfing divine energy wanted to kill a person to prove their determination. Meanwhile, Eunice and others who would never resign to performing such a heinous act had no choice but to do their utmost in defending themselves.

    Han Shuo sighed. He knew that under the threat of death and the temptation of having their strength rapidly soar, not many would remain unmoved. It was within Han Shuo¡¯s expectations that those in the valley would turn into a bloody battle for survival.

    In Brovst¡¯s presence, Han Shuo had no way of preventing or stopping the cruelpetition ahead of him. He could only watch on indifferently, putting his own safety before matters of principle. There was nothing that he could do about it.

    It was fortunate that Han Shuo had chosen to act on Lager, a most thorny opponent, and demonstrated his strength and ferocity to the crowd. Therefore, at this point in time that Han Shuo, who had his hand pressed on Anli was as rxed and leisurely as Lager who was fiddling with his crossbow. No one in the valley woulde to provoke them.

    Wretched shrieks repeatedly reverberated through the valley. Han Shuo maintained the posture of crouching on Anli while he secretly observed the bloody battle around him.

    Those who were unwilling to join the godhunters had to face enemies that seemed to have be deranged in trying to devour their divine energy. Gradually, even they themselves showed signs of madness. Some of those lightly wounded, unexpectedly, cast their gazes on the enormous scroll while escaping.

    In the entire valley, there were merely a dozen or so who truly remained unmoved until now. Eunice, ofte-stage lowgod strength, was one of those headstrong ones. Her uncle, Bat, facing the attacks of several divine guards that cultivated in the energy of death who previously worked for him, seemed to be infuriated and looked as though he could go mad at any moment.

    The valley was in utter violence and chaos! Everyone seemed to have gone insane. As things developed, even those who wanted to be godhunters were shing and fighting each other. They had all lost their rationality!

    Brovst who was observing the situation silently from within his cave had to repeatedly use his enormous scroll to separate and stop fights between those who wanted to be godhunters as to avoid those who would be his followers being killed.

    ¡°Lord Brovst, could you bestow Miss Eunice to me? In any case, he will not be one of us. When I¡¯m done ying with her, I will hand her to your subordinates. By then I wouldn¡¯t care less if they wanted to toy with her or kill her!¡± Rahman, who had been giggling as he watched the situation from aside, asked as he bowed at the cave where Brovst was.

    ¡°You have done me a huge service. If you are interested in that woman, go ahead and do whatever you want!¡± Brovst did not hesitate at all in approving Rahman¡¯s request. Having observed every action of everyone in the valley, he had long realized that Eunice would not sumb to hismand. Letting Rahman toy with someone who would die sooner orter was merely reusing waste material. On top of wanting Rahman to continue to serve him in the future, it was only natural that Brovst would approve the request.

    ¡°Thank you, Lord Brovst!¡± Rahman cheered and walked towards Eunice excitedly. He had an expression of sheer depravity on his face.

    Rahman was a midgod cultivating in the element of darkness and practically no one in the valley could pose a threat to him. On top of being Brovst¡¯s spokesman, those who wished to survive by bing a godhunter automatically moved aside and gave him an unimpeded path to Eunice.

    At this point in time, Eunice, who was forced to withdraw further and further by the deranged crowd, no longer had that bigwig, distinguished demeanor she always had. Her hair was messy and specks of dust stained her face. She appeared to be in a miserable state. Her heart was filled with despair when she heard Rahman¡¯s request and seeing him walk towards her. However, she was determined to fight Rahman till her death.

    ¡°How dare you!¡± Bat who was on the verge of losing his sanity roared when he saw Rahman approach Eunice with ascivious smile. He sent out death rays in all directions and came charging at Rahman. Those who were jointly attacking him were thrown unsteady by enormous bone flowers when he unfurled his domain of divinity.

    ¡°Lord Brovst, please give me a hand!¡± Rahman had the same expression on his face as he raised his voice and asked.

    The enormous scroll hanging in midair came descending yet again. But this time, it did not merely block an attack like how it prevented Han Shuo from killing Lager. Instead, it came crashing down on Bat. Terrifying energy of destruction then erupted from the scroll. Bat fell to the ground at once and started twitching violently from head to toe.

    ¡°Miss Eunice, who is going to save you now? Hahah, all this time I¡¯ve been in Fort Verka, you are the only person I have fancied. But what a pity, you have always been so cold towards me and made me long for you every day. Finally, finally now, I will get to taste your sweet, juicy body. Are you feeling just as excited as I? Hehehe...¡° Rahmanughed as he approached Eunice. His body turned into multiple dark shadows and no one could distinguish which one was actually him.

    Eunice who originally thought of ferociously fighting and injuring Rahman with her death, suddenly discovered that she did not even have a target to attack. Grief rose from her heart as she sighed and thought to herself, <i>Forget about it. I will just kill myself so I don¡¯t have to bear being defiled by such a disgusting being.</i>

 Chapter 689 - Savior from above

    GDK 689: Savior from above

    The ughtering in the valley had reached its most brutal stage. Of the tens of people who came from Fort Verka, more than a third were killed within a short period of time. Most of those who were still alive were those determined to be godhunters. Those who were determined to not read the enormous scroll in the sky had to strenuously deal with the attacks of those trying to consume their divine energy. It was only a matter of time before they would be killed.

    Han Shuo continued to pretend to devour Anli¡¯s divine energy as he coldly observed those who had gone mad. He carefully assembled the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy in preparation of sucking the divine souls of those perished gods into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon.

    However, once everything was in order, Han Shuo was feeling rather hesitant and indecisive. The valley was in utter chaos and under such circumstances, it was definitely very difficult for most people to detect this subtle maneuver of his. However, Brovst, who had been hiding deep in his cave, must have been observing every movement and activity in the valley. If Han Shuo was to set about collecting those divine souls that had yet to dissipate between heaven and earth, Brovst, as a highgod, would very likely discover it.

    It was precisely because of this qualm that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t make up his mind. But at the same time, he felt extremely sorrowful to do nothing but watch the several dozen divine soulsid out right in front of him. After turning over in his mind for some time, Han Shuo decided to take the risk. He thought that people wouldn¡¯t notice his actions if he got close to the deceased bodies and was more careful when collecting their souls using Cauldron Spirit.

    As long as he couldpletely collect the several dozen divine souls inside the valley, Han Shuo believed that even if he was discovered by Brovst and had to flee the valley using Demonic Blood Disassembly, the gain would outweigh the loss.

    Having made up his mind, Han Shuo cast away all his misgivings. He slowly let go of his hands pressed against Anli and started setting about the task.

    ¡°Haha, Miss Eunice, today I will let you experience ecstasy to the fullest and send you straight to the pinnacle of bliss!¡± at this moment, Rahman said as heughed out loudly. He turned into multiple shadows and shot towards Eunice.

    Eunice¡¯s face was filled with grief, indignation and humiliation. She was downhearted to see Rahman shooting over in multiple shadows and she was ready to end her life.

    Out of the blue, everything sank intoplete darkness. A terrifying aura of darkness came covering down from above the clouds. Creaking sounds were heard as the boundary of destruction was being torn apart.

    After the absolute darkness abruptly shrouded the entire valley, a chilling roar pierced through the sky, ¡°Brovst! Come out to meet your doom!¡±

    When the domain of divinity of darkness enveloped the valley, the atmosphere was filled with dark mist that would not disperse. Other than a few who cultivated in the elemental energy of darkness, practically everyone in the valley lost their ability to clearly see the situation around them.

    Eunice, prepared to end her own life, sensed the terrifying energy and heard the loud roar that came from above the clouds. Immediately, she realized that Brovst¡¯s nemesis must have arrived. With this, her will to live was rekindled. She hastily started escaping while Rahman turned pale with fright.

    Han Shuo was among the few in the valley who could still clearly see his surroundings. After the roar he discovered a menacing dark figure suddenly storming out from the cave from which Brovst¡¯s voice echoed. It shot up into the sky.

    A series of explosions thundered through the sky. The rumbles caused the entire valley to quiver. Large chunks of rocks tumbled down the cliff walls surrounding the valley with astonishing power. They contained the divine energies of destruction and darkness. Of the several people who were struck by the falling stones, all of them spat mouthfuls of blood and copsed to the ground.

    The explosions that came from the sky grew louder and louder. Han Shuo could sense with his consciousness that two terrifying existences were tangled in an intense fight. The aftershock from their fighting fell into the surrounding cliff walls and causedrge chunks of rocks to fall off which subsequently caused some of the lowgods with inadequate strength to suffer severe injuries.

    By now, those whose hearts were filled with despair had that feeling reced with the will to survive and they furiously made their counterattacks. Meanwhile, those who wanted to be godhunters in order to survive, upon discovering that they could possibly be saved even if they chose not to partake, became hesitant. Their determination wavered.

    But unfortunately, the absolute darkness caused them all greatplications.

    When darkness shrouded the entire valley, nearly everyone was blinded. Though they tried their best to avoid each other in the pitch-ck darkness, whenever they felt that someone was approaching them, for the purpose of self-preservation, they would recklessly attack.

    With that, the crowd that was supposed to cease ughtering each other when help arrived, not only continued to fight, but the fighting became even more intense and fierce!

    Inside the pitch-ck, intentionally or not, those who couldn¡¯t see their surroundings were trapped in a perpetual ughterfest. Han Shuo was like a fish as he weaved through thepletely deranged crowd. The Cauldron of Myriad Demon in his hand gave off faint green shes as he seized the opportunity to collect the divine souls that had yet to dissipate between heaven and earth.

    ¡°Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen... This is wonderful! These souls are all very decent. They can all be refined into demon generals. This will make up for the demon generals we lost thest time!¡± Cauldron Spirit cheered excitedly in Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    Han Shuo felt not the slightest iota of empathy for those who were madly ughtering each other. In fact, he wished that all of them would die in the valley so that he could take their divine souls.

    Soon enough, Han Shuo had collected a total of forty-three divine souls in the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. The darkness had receded unwittingly. When Han Shuo again checked the situation in the valley, he discovered that the madened ones had gradually regained their rationality.

    Searching all around him, he suddenly discovered that Rahman had disappeared without a trace. Even that Lager whom Han Shuo wanted to murder during the chaos had also disappeared while he was busy collecting divine souls.

    Eunice arrived beside Bat¡¯s body that was without any sign of vitality. His divine soul has also been collected by Han Shuo. She appeared mournful. As Bat was killed by Brovst because he tried to protect her from being injured and that Bat was her uncle, it was only natural that she would feel so deeply hurt by his death.

    The rumbling sound above the sky gradually moved into the distance. It appeared that the fight between the two terrifying highgods had moved away from this small valley. With the barrier overhead being directly destroyed by Brovst¡¯s nemesis, those godhunters who had been eyeing the crowd covetously escaped through the opening. Without the presence of this terrifying threat called Brovst, the crowd inside the valley was safe for the time being.

    When the darkness retreated, a few more figures whooshed away with it. Those figures had in fact been part of the crowd that came to the valley with Han Shuo. They couldn¡¯t resist the temptation and had actually consumed the destruction energy of other cultivators. The moment that they devoured another person¡¯s divine energy in front of others, they were branded as godhunters for the rest of their lives. From that moment onwards, they were public enemies of the entire Elysium. It was the only sensible move for them to depart.

    Han Shuo, however, did not choose to leave. He quickly discovered that the dozen or more survivors were all ring at him furiously. By now, all the godhunters, including the most recent members, had all vanished. Han Shuo who had previously pretended to devour Anli¡¯s divine energy immediately became amon enemy among all those survivors.

    Had Han Shuo not demonstrated his immense strength before, perhaps by now, these people would have lost their restraint and attacked Han Shuo murderously instead of merely glowering at him. Eunice, who cried and grieved beside Bat¡¯s body, suddenly stood up. She fixed her ice-cold eyes on Han Shuo and said in a chilling voice, ¡°You are also a godhunter, a participant of this bloody ughtering. I shall take your life and offer it to my uncle!¡±

    While others might have been wary of attacking Han Shuo for his terrifying strength, Eunice, however, was a small level above Han Shuo when it came to attainment in the energy of destruction and she naturally wasn¡¯t afraid of Han Shuo. Therefore, Han Shuo became the ideal target for her to vent the hatred in her heart.

    Before Han Shuo had the chance to exin, Eunice had turned her grief and sorrow into the energy of destruction. She swooped away all her feelings of helplessness and despair when previously facing Rahman. Radiances of destruction burst out from her tender palm and interweaved to form a giant that came covering down on Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo inwardly cursed her in his mind and hastily retreat as he shouted, ¡°This is all a big misunderstanding!¡±

    Eunice kept silent and red at Han Shuo furiously. She had watched Han Shuo consume Anli¡¯s divine energy with her own eyes and didn¡¯t care what Han Shuo had to say. She thought that he was merely quibbling.

    Although Han Shuo wasn¡¯t afraid of Eunice, he had to prove his innocence to the crowd especially as Eunice had seen his divine tablet. If he doesn¡¯t vindicate himself now, it will be extremely difficult for him to prove he was not a godhunter in the future.

    Eunice pursued Han Shuo vigorously. With a few bits of demonic yuan in his main body, Han Shuo was incredibly fast and agile. Eunice couldn¡¯t catch up to Han Shuo no matter how hard she tried.

    ¡°Anli was already dead when I got beside him. Although I did ce my hands on him, I was merely acting. I did not actually take his divine energy. I couldn¡¯t bear with Lager¡¯s actions and deliberately came forward to oppose Lager. I have no thoughts of actually devouring Anli. Besides, if I actually did that, how would I dare to stay here when all the godhunters have escaped? Woman, can you please just use your brain for a moment?¡± Han Shuo exined while evading Eunice¡¯s pursuit.

    After hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, the other remaining survivors revealed puzzled expressions. Two of them even approached Anli¡¯s body and examined it. They discovered that other than the little arrow stuck behind his heart, there weren¡¯t many injuries on him. He did not appear to had been devoured by Han Shuo.

    Normally speaking, only some godhunters with extremely powerful strength who frequently engulfed other¡¯s divine energy could do so simply through body contact. Most gods would need both hands inside the victim¡¯s body in order to consume their divine energy.

    The puncture holes that Lager left on Anli¡¯s chest with his hands were very distinctive. However, there weren¡¯t any simr wounds on Anli¡¯s back. This was sufficient evidence to back Han Shuo¡¯s im.

    ¡°Miss Eunice, you must be mistaken. His words are indeed true. He did not do a thing to Anli!¡± one of the people who examined Anli¡¯s wounds suddenly shouted.

    Eunice finally stopped chasing Han Shuo vigorously after hearing those words. She shot a very fierce re at Han Shuo and let out a cold groan.

    Han Shuo inwardly cursed, <i>What? You refuse to apologize for wrongfully attacking me, yet you continue to stare so fiercely at me. How unreasonable!</i>

    ¡°You have been acting very strange. Even if you did not consume Anli¡¯s divine energy, you must have thought of doing it. Otherwise, you wouldn¡¯t have stayed beside him for such a long time!¡± Eunice said resentfully while glowering at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Madwoman, I¡¯m done arguing with you. All that you know is to misunderstand the situation and throw tantrums!¡± Han Shuo replied impatiently.

    ¡°What, what did you say?¡± Eunice¡¯s eyes were furiously red as she shouted at Han Shuo. Her mind was affected by Bat¡¯s tragic death and was like gunpowder inches away from fire.

    Han Shuo rolled his eyes and ignored her.

    Suddenly, a party of eight descended from the clouds. These men all wore dark divine armors and were midgods.

    ¡°Lord Erebus has chased Brovst away. Are you people alright?¡± a young man with short but straight green hair looked all around the valley and asked.

    ¡°Is it really him? <i>The</i> Lord Erebus?! One of the seven chief divine guards of the City of Shadows? No wonder Brovst had to retreat!¡± The survivors cried out in surprise when they heard Erebus¡¯ name and heaved a heavy sigh of relief.

    ¡°I¡¯m a member of the Croton Family of Fort Verka. May I know where we are?¡± Eunice may be full of fury when talking to Han Shuo but towards these divine guards from the City of Shadows, she was obviously less imposing in tone and slightly more respectful.

    ¡°Beautiful miss, this is the Chicoro mountain range. You are a long way from Fort Verka!¡± that green haired man bowed towards Eunice very slightly and exined in a cordial smile. His gazes towards Eunice obviously carried a certain instinctive interest usually seen in men.

    ¡°Chicoro mountain range! Those godhunters are really daring to set up a base in the Chicoro mountain range. This ce is very close to the City of Shadows!¡± someone gently cried out.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, the situation is under our control now. Most of the godhunters who tried to escape were killed. You people are safe now!¡± the green haired man said smilingly. After taking a short pause, he turned to his colleagues behind him and instructed, ¡°Let¡¯s examine the valley and see if there are any that slipped through the. In addition, gather up the valuables from the dead as our spoils of war!¡±

    After hearing the instruction, the divine guards immediately got into action and examined every cavern in the valley. When they returned, they asked, ¡°Who is so despicable to have taken away all the valuables on the deceased? Is it you people?¡±

    ¡°It wasn¡¯t us. Just now when Lord Erebus unfurled his domain of divinity, this valley was pitch ck. It must be someone who cultivates in the energy of darkness who did it. None of us cultivate in the energy of darkness so it definitely cannot be us!¡± one of the survivors hastily exined.

    Han Shuo creased his brows but the corner of his lips obscurely curved to make a contented smile. He joined the crowd loudly cursing the unknown person who plundered the dead.

 Chapter 690 - Arrival at the City of Shadows

    GDK 690: Arrival at the City of Shadows

    Erebus, one of the seven chief divine guards of the City of Shadows, had beaten back Brovst, a leader of the Godhunter Alliance. The crisis in this valley had been resolved.

    When those survivors in the valley learned from that green-haired man that it was Erebus who hade to their rescue, they all cheered. All those midgod level divine guards left the valley as soon as they discovered that there weren¡¯t any remaining godhunters and there were no spoils of war to be harvested.

    Following their departure, Han Shuo and the other survivors dispersed from the valley.

    After flying out from the valley, Han Shuo hovered high in the air and cast his gaze into the distance. He noted that this bumpy Chicoro mountain range housed unbroken chains of mountains that stretched beyond the horizon. After unfolding his consciousness, Han Shuo sensed the countless presence of life in the mountain range. Through the visions of several demon generals in the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, Han Shuo discovered that those lifeforms took on all kind of strange and unique shapes.

    He saw a lion the size of a small hill, a python several hundred meters in length that had a sharp ck horn on its head, an enormous eagle spitting raging inferno as it battled a giant python curled up on the ground.

    Observing the ground, Han Shuo discovered that the magical beasts on Elysium, perhaps affected by their environment extremely abundant in elemental energy, grew to be extremely formidable. Not only were they colossal, but some were also innately gifted with the ability to utilize the elemental energy found between heaven and earth. Their life aura was extremely massive and some were more frightening than lowgods.

    As Han Shuo continued to survey the scene, he discovered that starting from the valley and extending towards the north, the ground was filled with deep craters. Theserge craters ought to have only taken shape recently as some the of cracks were growingrger while several small mountains were still swaying. Enormous rocks would tumble down the mountains from time to time.

    Immediately, Han Shuo realized that the scene he witnessed was caused by the great battle between Erebus and Brovst. Han Shuo slowly traveled along the trail of devastation. Ever so often he would nce all around as he tried to approximate their true strengths from the vestiges of their battle.

    All along the journey, Han Shuo saw scenes ofplete ruin caused by the two exchanging blows. He had walked past multiple copsed small mountains and enormous trees with a girth that would take ten people to wrap their arms around, uprooted. The earth was also torn into multiple deep ravines. Han Shuo arrived at a vague estimation from the scenes he saw.

    Once he arrived at a copsed mountain, Han Shuo discovered that the scars left on the ground did not extend any further. It appeared that when they battled to this mountain, they took the fight into the sky or perhaps one of them chose to escape. That would exin why Han Shuo did not discover more remains.

    Han Shuo learned from the green-haired man that the Chicoro mountain range was not far away from the City of Shadows. From that copsed mountain, Han Shuo traveled north on foot and took three days to exit the Chicoro mountain range. It was obvious that this mountain range was vast.

    After three days, Han Shuo found even more strange and bizarre magical beasts. Some of the magical beasts were so mighty that even Han Shuo dared not to provoke them, staying far, far away. From the ssification of magical beasts that Han Shuo was aware of, those mighty creatures would have far exceeded rank five and were around rank eight or nine.

    Other than some bizarre magical beasts, Han Shuo also discovered some natural treasures containing immense spirit energy, namely Emerald Grass, Fire Fruits, and Blueheart Stone. Some of these natural treasures could simply be devoured to raise Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan while some could be turned into pills with wonderful uses after some simple refining processes.

    These things were all unimed. A great majority of people on Elysium had no understanding of the wonderful uses of these valuable natural treasures. Naturally, Han Shuo would not be modest in helping himself. He bluntly collected everyst one of those natural treasures he discovered along his journey. When Han Shuo finally exited the Chicoro mountain range, the demonic yuan in his body had increased considerably.

    Han Shuo did not waste any more time after walking out from the Chicoro mountain range. He spent half a month traversing severalrge and small viges and forts before finally, on an early morning, he arrived at one of the seven major cities of the Darkness Dominion, the City of Shadows. Standing before the magnificent gate made of ck rock that touched the sky, strangely, Han Shuo felt a feeling of tininess and insignificance.

    When Han Shuo raised his head to look at the towering dark gates, he could sense an awe-inspiring, majestic demeanor. Even though it was early in the morning, there was arge stream of people lining up to enter the city like Han Shuo.

    Unlike Fort Verka, most of those entering the City of Shadows were lowgods and midgods. There were even one or two highgods entering the city with VIP treatment. Those with basegod and demigod strengths were incredibly rare to be seen. The few beings with such strength were minors and children.

    When Han Shuo came to stand before the city gates, he truly came to recognize that thanks to the intensity of elemental energies in the atmosphere and the openness in martial art cultivation, beings in Elysium were indeed pervertedly mighty and powerful. Back on Profound Continent, a demigod or basegod would either be an overlord or an engine that propels an entire nation. However, at this City of Shadows of the Elysium, even children who had yet to reach adulthood were already that powerful. The differences between the two worlds could not be more obvious.

    After observing for a moment, Han Shuo too started walking into the city. After handing his divine tablet and a piece of purple crystal coin, he was finally inside the City of Shadows.

    The first things that entered his eyes were densely packed boundary towers and magical towers erected behind the city gate. They were filled with sparkling energy stones that seemed to provide the city with an endless supply of energy required to sustain their luxurious lifestyles.

    ¡°Hello, excuse me, may I know how to get to the House of Lavers?¡± Han Shuo approached a divine guard stationed at the city gate and asked urbanely.

    The disdainful look on that divine guard¡¯s face diminished when he heard ¡°House of Lavers¡± from Han Shuo. He gave Han Shuo a careful look before he pointed southwest and answered, ¡°Head in that direction for approximately half a day and you will be in its vicinity. The House of Lavers is one of the five major families in the City of Shadows. Once you get there, pretty much anyone there can point you to the exact location.¡±

    Han Shuo thanked him smilingly and started heading southwest.

    Compared to Fort Verka, the City of Shadows was more than ten times the size. Each and every building here was so tall they could touch the sky. For some reason, while traveling in the City of Shadows, Han Shuo felt as though he had yet to leave the Chicoro mountain range. He also realized those mighty beings preferred living in lofty and tall buildings. From his senses, he detected that the elemental energy was slightly denser in high ces. Although it was just one tiny bit denser, it was more than enough reason for these beings who sought ever greater strengths to build their houses high and tall.

    If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that the buildings would copse under their own weight if built too tall, perhaps these godly existences living on Elysium would have built their houses all the way to the heavens. Their desire for strength was only a fine line away from insanity.

    As Han Shuo walked through the buildings as magnificent as mountains, a feeling of insignificance yet again rose from his heart. There were energy towers, magical towers, and boundary towers glittering with gentle light all around him. Some of those energy towers seemed to have the function of gathering elemental energy. After walking into the City of Shadows, Han Shuo clearly sensed the elemental energy of darkness and death grow more intense.

    Along the way, Han Shuo saw dazzling lineups of gymnasiums and shops of all kinds. They were all targeted in serving godly beings. Most of the goods being sold were divine armor, divine weapons, divine scrolls, and crystals of different functions.

    For some reason, perhaps affected by the various and numerous energy towers and boundaries in the city, the coverage area of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness had significantly reduced. Although they did not pose a hindrance to other gods who were ustomed to having the presence of all kinds of energies, the probing ability of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was adversely affected.

    Puzzled, Han Shuo tried to boost his senses by using Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy. He discovered that even with Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, he could only take in the situation of everything within a one-mile radius. Compared to the vast City of Shadows, a circle of one-mile radius was tiny.

    While surveying his surroundings, Han Shuo had unwittingly traveled for half a day. When a new block appeared before him, he immediately realized that he was very close to his destination. Just as that divine guard had said, the Lavers Family was known to every person in this region. Han Shuo found out the precise location of the House of Lavers after going to some random shop to ask.

    After twenty minutes, Han Shuo was standing right in front of the House of Lavers. There were towering buildings as far as the eye could see. There were many energy towers, boundary towers, and magical towers between the structures, supplying the House of Lavers with any kind of energy they required.

    The sky and the space around him were sealed by powerful boundaries. Without strolling around, Han Shuo arrived at the main gate. He gently cleared his throat to attract the attention of the two divine guards stationed at the front.

    Unlike other divine guards in the City of Shadows, those divine guards under the House of Lavers wore green colored armor. At the center of their chest piece was a design of a dark sun which Han Shuo had seen embroidered on Donna¡¯s clothing. Therefore, Han Shuo knew that he had arrived at his destination when he saw that design on the divine guards¡¯ armor.

    ¡°Youngster, what are you sneaking about?¡± one of the divine guards red at Han Shuo vigntly. He was a lowgod cultivating in the element of darkness and possessed early-stage strength.

    ¡°I¡¯m looking for Miss Donna of Lavers. Please inform of my request!¡± Han Shuo said in a cordial manner as he handed over a few purple crystal coins smilingly.

    The expressions on the two divine guards simultaneously rxed when they saw Han Shuo¡¯s courtesy. The man put on a faint smile, took Han Shuo¡¯s purple crystal coins, and asked, ¡°You do know Miss Donna?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and replied, ¡°My name is Bryan. Please inform Miss Donna that I¡¯vee.¡±

    ¡°Just a moment!¡± the two divine guards became much more polite after they received Han Shuo¡¯s purple crystal coins. One of them rapidly headed into the house.

    ¡°Where do youe from? How did you get to know Miss Donna?¡± The other divine guard was unupied. Seeing that Han Shuo was an agreeable person, he started conversing with him.

    ¡°I acted as her guide in herst mission. That was how I came to know her. I¡¯vee here to look for her because she invited me,¡± Han Shuo replied smilingly.

    ¡°In the Lavers Family, Miss Donna can be considered as a rtively pleasant Master. You really are lucky to know Miss Donna. However, you still need to be careful inside the Lavers Family. There are some young master and youngdy who wouldn¡¯t be as tolerant,¡± the divine guard felt that Han Shuo was a person he could get along well with and therefore seeing that no one was around, he gave Han Shuo a word of warning.

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo cried out in surprise and asked, ¡°Do you mind telling me who is in the Lavers Family?¡±

    ¡°Lord patriarch has a younger brother and a younger sister. Miss Donna is the second child of Lord patriarch. She has an elder brother called Diwei. Lord patriarch¡¯s brother has two sons and one daughter. The Lord patriarch¡¯s sister has married to the Bruce Family at the Destruction Dominion. She no longer lives here. There are also a dozen or more coteral rtives living here. Some of them are like Miss Donna and the Lord Patriarch ¨C they are easy to get along with; but some, not so. After going in, you should be careful not to provoke those people by all means,¡± the divine guard cautioned.

    Beforeing over, Han Shuo had not heard Donna mention anything about her Lavers Family. He hade to the Lavers Family merely to look for Donna and learn a few things from her. He had no thoughts of working for the Lavers Family. Therefore, Han Shuo did notpletely take that divine guard¡¯s warning to heart.

    After exchanging a few casual sentences with that divine guard, Han Shuo sensed Donna¡¯s aura. Soon enough, Donna, wearing an emerald green long skirt and a big smile, came into Han Shuo¡¯s view. ¡°Bryan, what took you so long?¡± Donna¡¯s smile became even more cheerful when she saw Han Shuo.

    That divine guard that chatted with Han Shuo immediately viewed Han Shuo in a new light when he saw that Donna had personallye to wee him. He originally thought that Han Shuo was merely trying to get a job under the Lavers Family by utilizing his rtionship with Donna. Han Shuo, after all, was merely a lowgod. They ran into this kind of situation practically every day.

    ¡°There were some things that needed time to resolve. I couldn¡¯t just leave without making proper arrangements. That world is my territory after all!¡± Han Shuo exined smilingly, pausing for a moment before he continued, ¡°Miss Donna, you seem to have be even more beautiful after all this time!¡±

    ¡°You are such a sweet talker!¡± Donna scolded yfully before she pulled Han Shuo inside by his sleeves, ¡°What are you standing here for? Come on in!¡±

    The two divine guards were amazed that Donna appeared to be trying to pull Han Shuo closer to the Lavers Family. When Han Shuo¡¯s figurepletely disappeared, that divine guard who had been chatting with Han Shuo murmured, ¡°Although Miss Donna is an amiable person, she never was cordial to this level, right?¡±

    The other divine guard nodded and remarked, ¡°This youngster is nothing simple!¡±

 Chapter 691 - The five families

    GDK 691: The five families

    Han Shuo stepped into the House of Lavers following Donna. After walking through a bunch of boundaries and energy towers, they arrived inside a tall building where Donna lived.

    Illuminated by magicalmps, the interior was showcased gloriously. They stepped into a big lounge, where Donna invited Han Shuo to have a seat. She then asked with bright eyes about his journey to this ce.

    Han Shuo briefly described some of the events he encountered ever since arriving at the internar transportation facility. Donna very patiently listened to Han Shuo narrate his story before she sighed, ¡°It seems that I wasn¡¯t thoughtful enough. I did not anticipate that you would run into godhunters and multiple times at that. It¡¯s such a fortunate coincidence that Lord Erebus found Brovst. Otherwise, it would have been disastrous for you!¡±

    ¡°I heard that Erebus is one of the seven chiefs of divine guard in the City of Shadows. When he descended upon the valley, I could sense the terrifying aura on him. What kind of strength does he have?¡± Han Shuo creased his brows and asked. He was very interested in this being they called Erebus although he had never actually seen his face. He had previously examined the vestiges of the great battle between Erebus and Brovst. He wanted to verify his estimation of their strengths through Donna.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Lord Erebus is one of the seven chief divine guards. Possessing mid-stage highgod strength, of the seven, his strength numbers in third ce. He is a well-known expert in the City of Shadows!¡± Donna further exined, ¡°All seven chief divine guards came from the five major families of the City of Shadows. My uncle, Avery, is also one of the seven. But he ranks merely in the fifth ce. He possesses early-stage highgod strength.¡±

    ¡°Other than your House of Lavers, who are the four major families in the City of Shadows? Which is the strongest?¡± Han Shuo suddenly got interested in hearing Donna introduce the distribution of strength in the City of Shadows. Aftering to an alien environment, the first thing that one should do was to familiarize with oneself with the surroundings. Han Shuo knew from experience that it would be useful to know who could be dangerous and which people he could not afford to offend for the time being.

    Donna smiled and immediately began to exin the distribution of strength in the City of Shadows to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo quickly came to understand that in the City of Shadows, other than the Lavers Family where Donna belonged, there were the Sainte Family, Kinson Family, Kisa Family, and Buller Family. Of them, the Sainte Family was the strongest as the patriarch of the Sainte Family, Tracy, was the City Lord of the City of Shadows. The chief divine guards that ranked in the top three all belonged to the Sainte Family. Therefore, the Sainte Family had the greatest influence in the entire City of Shadows.

    The other four families, including the Lavers Family, obviously fell short in terms of influencepared to the Sainte Family. There wasn¡¯t too much of a discrepancy between the four in terms of strength. Their family members also enjoyed prestige and took on high positions in the City of Shadows. They had their own divine guards and were in control of many of the shops and gyms in the city.

    The Sainte Family was the dominant power in the City of Shadows with no other influence or family n able to threaten their authority in the city. The other four families aligned themselves closely to the policies of the Sainte Family and followed their lead. It was needless to say that the four families were very respectful towards the Sainte Family. However, the four families would fight and maneuver against each other openly in recruiting experts into their own families. They would also fight over deposits containing energy ores and rare metals.

    In short, the family ns would do whatever it took to raise and improve their strengths, including taking over all kinds of materials and resources. They were afraid of fighting over things with the Sainte Family but were not afraid of any openpetition with other families.

    After exining the situation in the City of Shadows to Han Shuo briefly, Han Shuo remained silent in contemtion. Donna did not interrupt his thoughts but patiently waited for Han Shuo to digest her words.

    After a while, Han Shuo put on a smile and nodded. He said, ¡°I would have expected the Lavers Family to be the strongest in the City of Shadows!¡±

    ¡°We have been working hard to achieve that. But unfortunately, my Lavers Family are really young in development, far short of the Sainte Family who have over tens of thousands of years of history. These ancient families would usually have a fewte-stage highgods in their family. Those families can be considered as the front ranking. My Lavers Family is second-rate at best!¡± Donna exined smilingly, mocking herself. Afterwards, she smiled at Han Shuo and asked, ¡°Do you feel disappointed after hearing my ount?¡±

    ¡°DIsappointed about?¡± Han Shuo was confused.

    ¡°Disappointed that my family isn¡¯t the mightiest influence and therefore might limit your growth in the future,¡± Donna smiled.

    ¡°Well, this has nothing to do me with,¡± Han Shuo shrugged and continued with a grin, ¡°I have no ns to work for your family. In fact, I have no intention of bing a divine guard under some family on Elysium for now. There¡¯s really nothing for me to feel disappointed about.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, I think I should exin something about Elysium,¡± Donna put on a faint smile and continued, ¡°If you want to gain a footing on this ne of Gods, unless you are a highgod of mighty strength, you must adhere yourself to a mighty family. When ites to the Dominions of Darkness, Death, and Destruction, the most powerful organization here is none other than the Cmity Church. Other than the three Overgods with transcendental statuses, all the Cardinals of the Cmity Church are filled with patriarchs from those ancient families. Even the core members of the church are upied by the elites of those families. It is practically impossible for those with no connections and ties to join the inner circles of the church. You will find that without adhering to a family, especially since you have arrived on Elysium only recently, doing things will be rather meddlesome.¡±

    After listening to Donna¡¯s exnation, Han Shuo forced a smile and nodded. He replied, ¡°I understand. But for now, I really have no desire tomit to any undertakings. At present, I only want to learn more about Elysium and travel everywhere to improve my strength.¡±

    ¡°Nevermind, let¡¯s not talk about this for now. You arrived at the City of Shadows just today. I will take you to roam all around. If you ever change your mindter, our Lavers Family will wee you with open arms!¡± Donna did not force Han Shuo to immediately agree to join her Lavers Family.

    ¡°Sure, I really want to get to know the City of Shadows,¡± Han Shuo said as he got up his seat smilingly.

    ¡°Come, I will first take you on a tour around my house. Just live here for the time being. You may leave for a new ce of dwelling when you find a better opportunity,¡± Donna got up and lead Han Shuo to the highest level of the building. She then started pointing at the towering structures and introduced each one, right down to the gymnasiums, smelting rooms, and living quarters of some special characters. Han Shuo only needed to listen once to remember all the information using his most amazing consciousness

    ¡°Sis, who¡¯s that you are with?¡± suddenly, a deep and resounding voice came from the top level of a building opposite them. Subsequently, a majestic figure entered Han Shuo¡¯s line of sight. The man had simr facial features with Donna and looked like someone in his thirties. However, after learning about the life span of these godly existences on Elysium, Han Shuo knew that this man was far, far older than that. That man cultivated in the energy of destruction and possessed approximatelyte-stage midgod strength.

    ¡°Elder brother, this is a friend of mine. I have mentioned him to you thest time, his name is Bryan. Hees from a material ne called Profound Continent,¡± from several hundred meters away, Donna introduced Han Shuo to that person she called elder brother.

    ¡°I see. We will head to the Space Dominion soon, make sure you have made the proper preparations,¡± Donna¡¯s elder brother replied indifferently and returned to his room on the top floor without giving Han Shuo a second look.

    ¡°He¡¯s my elder brother, Diwei. That¡¯s just his natural temperament ¨C he doesn¡¯t like talking with people. Please don¡¯t take offense!¡± Donna exined to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo smiled and did not make any remarks. From the early performance of Bolten and Li Wei when they first arrived on Profound Continent, Han Shuo knew that inhabitants of Elysium had a natural disposition to feel a sense of superiority over those living on other material nes. It was within his expectations that Diwen would react so indifferently. In fact, Han Shuo would feel strange if Diwei had reacted with enthusiasm knowing he came from a low-level material ne.

    ¡°Come, I¡¯ll now take you outside to roam the streets. I don¡¯t remember seeing you use any powerful divine weapons thest time. Since you have given me the honor as your very first host on Elysium, I shall reward you with a decent divine weapon!¡± Donna dered righteously and started pulling Han Shuo outside.

    The Lavers¡¯ house was argeplex of buildings and naturally had more exits than just the front door. Donna lead Han Shuo away from thepound using a side door and towards the most bustling streets. Han Shuo was dazzled by the variety of goods sold by those shops.

    ¡°Actually, I don¡¯t need any divine weapons. In fact, I have so much in excess that I need to get rid of some!¡± Han Shuo said to Donna smilingly as they walked along a street lined with shops.

    ¡°What?¡± Donna stared nkly for a moment before she giggled, ¡°When we left Profound Continent, we only left you a dozen something purple crystal coins. Those were enough for you toe and locate me but to purchase suitable divine weapons, that amount is far from adequate. Divine weapons selling at that price are no good. You must have been scammed.¡±

    ¡°Well, take a look at these. Are they any good?¡± Han Shuo handed a space ring to Donna. It contained the divine weapons and divine devices he collected in the Void, items he plundered from the dead bodies of Kaiser, Eriksson, and those who perished in the godhunter¡¯s valley. He had kept his invaluable divine essences and some divine weapons potentially useful to him in another space ring.

    As Han Shuo had removed the seal on the space ring, Donna knew what was contained inside as soon as she came into contact with the space ring.

    Donna stared at Han Shuo with astonishment. After scanning through each and every item in the space ring, she forced a smile and remarked, ¡°I think, I should sell these divine weapons for you instead of getting you one. Bryan, I truly cannot understand how in the world you got your hands on these things. Truly did not make out that you are actually fairly wealthy!¡±

 Chapter 692 - Little Tycoon

    GDK 692: Little Tycoon

    Donna took Han Shuo to thergest divine weapon shop of the region. The store was divided into five levels. The lowest level sold tools and devices for demigods and basegods. The second level was shelved with divine weapons for lowgods. The third level catered divine weapons to midgods. The fourth level was specially for customers who wished to order custom-made divine weapons. Finally, the fifth level was reserved for the shopkeepers to rest.

    Divine weapons for highgods were only on sale in the fewrgest shops in Elysium. This street did not have shops of that scale that sold divine weapons of such supreme ss.

    Han Shuo followed Donna into the shop and walked directly to the third level. After browsing through some magnificent armor, staffs, and all kinds of divine weapons, Han Shuo had to admit thatpared to all the great masters of Profound Continent, the Elysian were much, much more skilled in smelting tools and weapons.

    Not only did the tools have remarkable functions, but they were also extraordinarily designed. The armor would be etched with mysterious patterns and diagrams for boundaries and seals. The divine weapons would usually be embedded with special gemstones that were both functional and beautiful.

    Even ignoring their abilities and powers andparing just their aesthetics, the weapons and devices on disy here were several sses superior to those made by the elves of Profound Continent.

    All the shopkeepers in the shop recognized Donna. They bowed and greeted her in an unctuous manner as soon as Donna entered their sight.

    ¡°Stop looking. We will head straight for the fourth level. You can check these outter after we are done at the fourth level,¡± Donna hastened when she saw how invested Han Shuo was in every item he saw, takingprehensive mental notes of everything on disy.

    ¡°I really must say that these objects are really fine and delicate. They are even more beautiful than those made by the most skilled elves back on my continent!¡± Han Shuo eximed in admiration after moving his gaze away from a glorious sapphire crown.

    ¡°The race of elf you mention are also present on Elysium. However, when ites to arts and smelting, they are nowhere close to the proficiency of the race of Divinesmelter. The elves would usually work as assistants for the Divinesmelters. Those elves on your continent likely had inherited some of the knowledge of smelting from those ancient elves on Elysium. Therefore, it is to be expected that what they produced cannotpare to those of the Divinesmelters,¡± Donna exined smilingly.

    The Divinesmelters was one of the myriads of races living on Elysium. People of this race were fixated towards arts and obsessed with attaining aesthetic perfection. Traditionally, whenever a weapon or tool had been smelted on Elysium, it was sent to this race to be decorated and refined, transforming the tool from a crude piece of metal into a work of art so delicate that anyone would fall in love with it at first sight.

    The two arrived at the fourth level as they conversed. There, they saw an old man sitting with his eyes closed, resting. He wore a robe that was covered with a pattern of squares, rather entric in style. When he opened his eyes and saw Donna walking over, his eyes shone brightly and he said smilingly, ¡°Miss Donna! Of the House of Lavers! We are honored by your presence. Are you here to order some special divine weapons to be custom made?¡±

    Donna shook her head and said in her lovable smile, ¡°Grandpa Domo, you¡¯ve got it wrong this time. I¡¯vee here today not to purchase but to sell you some extra divine weapons.¡±

    That old man called Domo cultivated in the element of death and he only had basegod strength. He had spent most of his time and effort smelting divine weapons. He was a professional who specialized in this field. ¡°Haha, you must be kidding me, Donna. Your Lavers Family are prosperous and wealthy. There¡¯s no way you would need to sell the surplus divine weapons to gather some small change,¡± Domo appeared very happy when he heard Donna address him as ¡®Grandpa¡¯ and he stopped calling Donna ¡®Miss¡¯.

    ¡°Of course it¡¯s not me; it¡¯s my friend. He came to this material ne recently and has some divine weapons that he likely will never use. Rather than letting them sit and mold, he might as well exchange them for crystal coins that he could use!¡± Donna exined as she smiled sweetly. She sat in an empty chair that seemed to be made of wood in front of Domo and then gestured at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Is this our friend who has something to sell?¡± Domo sized Han Shuo up with some astonishment before he nodded and said reassuringly, ¡°Don¡¯t worry ¨C for Donna¡¯s sake, I won¡¯t rip you off. You may feel at ease with taking out all the goods you want to sell. I will assess them and give you a price. We will make a deal if you then agree to the price.¡±

    ¡°Alright!¡± Han Shuo pulled out his space ring and emptied it of each and every object, which included swords, armors, and misceneous devices. Heid them all out before Domo.

    Domo looked at the twenty-something objectsid on his table with calm eyes. He waited until Han Shuo had taken out every item before he fiddled with those items one by one. Domo¡¯s eyes glinted slightly when he saw the three divine weapons previously used by Eriksson and Kaiser.

    ¡°Those belonged to Kaiser and Eriksson, didn¡¯t they?¡± Donna¡¯s discovered the anomaly when she noticed that Domo was inspecting the three objects attentively. She looked at Han Shuo with astonishment as she asked, ¡°How did they end up in your possession?¡±

    ¡°The two died in that strange ce. I lost my way and stumbled upon their bodies, so I took their belongings,¡± Han Shuo appeared very rxed as he made up an excuse without thinking.

    ¡°You lucky bastard!¡± Donnaughed. When Han Shuo looked back at her, she rolled her eyes and remarked, ¡°Why is it that you would always run into all the most fortunate situations?¡±

    But when Donna recalled the situation back before, the more she thought about it, the more puzzled she was. She was certain Han Shuo said that he was trapped and only managed to escape with great difficulty. How did he manage to collect Kaiser and Eriksson¡¯s divine weapons?

    ¡°Oh I have my ways. Hahah...,¡± Han Shuo shrugged and said nonchntly.

    ¡°Hm, these few pieces of midgod divine weapons are rather valuable, but the rest, not so,¡± after some time, Domo finallypleted finished evaluating the divine weapons. He raised his head to look at Han Shuo and Donna and offered, ¡°All these for three hundred ck crystal coins. Fair enough?¡±

    Although the words were said to Han Shuo, Domo had only taken a quick nce at him before turning to Donna and remain fixed on her. Obviously, for Domo, Donna of the Lavers Family was the character that he truly attached importance to. As to Han Shuo, well, he was merely an insignificant nonentity.

    ¡°Bryan, what do you think?¡± Donna looked at Han Shuo with widened eyes.

    ¡°Sure.¡± In Donna¡¯s presence, Han Shuo believed that Domo would not think of offering him a dishonest price. Furthermore, based on the limited knowledge that Han Shuo currently had, he knew three hundred ck crystal coins was a good price. Therefore, he agreed to the offer without hesitating.

    But Domo was even more straightforward than Han Shuo. Without even keeping away the divine weapons on his table, he called for an assistant to withdraw three hundred ck crystal coins and handed them to Han Shuo. The transaction wasplete.

    On Elysium, one purple crystal coin was equivalent to a hundred blue crystal coins and one ck crystal coin was equivalent to a hundred purple crystal coins. When Han Shuo first came to the Elysium, he had spent merely fifty blue crystal coins inpleting his divine tablet. Renting a training field would cost only a few purple crystal coins and entering the City of Shadows cost just one purple crystal coin.

    Taking that into consideration, three hundred ck crystal coins was actually a small fortune. As long as Han Shuo didn¡¯t spend extravagantly and remained mindful in purchasing high-level divine weapons and scrolls, he couldst a long time on those three hundred ck crystal coins.

    ¡°Not bad at all, you are now a little tycoon! One of the forts of my Lavers Family outside the City of Shadows collects about five hundred ck crystal coins in revenue per month. Of thosepletely new to Elysium, only some midgod and highgod experts could gather three hundred ck crystal coins so soon after arriving on this material ne. You as a lowgod should feel proud of this aplishment!¡± Donnaplimented sincerely. She had previously considered enticing Han Shuo into the Lavers Family using crystal coins, but who knew that Han Shuo would be so resourceful that he made a small fortune soon after he arrived on Elysium. With that, it would be much more difficult to lure him with crystal coins.

    ¡°Compared to a big tycoon like yourself, this small amount of coins that I have is beyond trifle,¡± Han Shuo was modest in his reply.

    ¡°Grandpa Domo, we shall stop troubling you. We will go shop around downstairs. Perhaps these crystal coins will be going back to youter!¡± Donna got up from her seat.

    ¡°Haha, go ahead. I won¡¯t be apanying you as I still need to sort out these goods. Alright, I will give you both a twenty percent discount on all purchases. Happy shopping!¡±

    Han Shuo and Donna traveled three levels down. Then, Han Shuo picked tens of origin crystals which he had wanted to purchase as soon as he walked into the store and saw them. They were precisely the same type of crystal that Han Shuo had previously obtained from the six-horned tribal king of Soul Race in Tarrag Canyon. These were wonderful treasures that would allow demigods to form a Soul of Element and be basegods. Origin crystals, which were incredibly rare treasures on Profound Continent, were only sold for five purple crystal coins in this shop. It was priced so low that Han Shuo simply couldn¡¯t believe it.

    ¡°Origin crystals can be found in a lot of energy mines on Elysium, they aren¡¯t particrly precious. Moreover, it¡¯s only useful for a demigod trying to form a Soul of Element. You have long ovee this barrier. What are you buying so many of these for?¡± Donna asked Han Shuo in a confused manner.

    ¡°Of course I don¡¯t need these. But I still have a lot of friends back on Profound Continent who could use these. To them, these origin essences are invaluable treasures that will allow them to make giant leaps! Sigh, because the Elysium is abundant with elemental energies, it has all kinds of wonderful and miraculous goods which the Profound Continent doesn¡¯t have. No wonder you guys call Profound Continent a low-level material ne!¡± Han Shuomented.

    ¡°Do you have sweethearts on that continent of yours? Look at your longing appearance now, Hehe!¡± Donnaughed.

    Donna¡¯s words had suddenly reminded Han Shuo of Emily, Fanny, and the others. His heart really was yearning for them and he wondered how they were doing at this moment. He forgot to reply to Donna.

    As soon as she saw Han Shuo¡¯s reaction, Donna knew that she had guessed correctly. But unexpectedly, for no apparent reason, seeing Han Shuo¡¯s sad and longing appearance caused an ufortable feeling to rise in Donna¡¯s heart. Donna was shocked to discover that subconscious feeling.

    <i>What¡¯s wrong with me? I shouldn¡¯t be having these kinds of emotions. I should have long forgotten about what happened while I was hallucinating back there. Why did thate back into my mind so suddenly?</i>

 Chapter 693 - Invitation to battle

    GDK 693: Invitation to battle

    Han Shuo spent some crystal coins on goods suitable for mortal cultivators. In this shop, those so-called ¡°divine weapons¡± rarely seen on Profound Continent not only had clearly marked prices, but they also weren¡¯t all that expensive.

    Han Shuo managed to acquire the materials and tools he needed from the shop by spending merely five ck crystal coins. Without buying any divine weapons for himself, Han Shuo left the store with Donna.

    Soon after Han Shuo walked out of the shop, a skinny middle-aged man with purple hair walked into the room that Domo was in. He asked, ¡°Mister Domo, should we investigate the origins of these divine weapons that the youngster sold us?¡±

    Domo, whose body was crammed in his chair,zily shot a nce at that man and said in a contemptuous manner, ¡°That youngster was escorted here by Miss Donna of the Lavers Family. Even if there is a problem, we must shoulder it. Master has previously instructed us that we should, by no means, offend anyone from the five major families. Do you wish to go against the words of our Master, Jackson?¡±

    ¡°Of course not!¡± Jackson lowered his head and promptly replied. However, a hint of fury was showing in his eyes as he thought to himself, <i>we are both cksmiths working in this shop, but why is it that your words weigh more than mine?</i> ¡°But if, by any chance, there really was a problem rting to the origins of these divine weapons and we had not handled it well, who shall take the me when someone looks into it?¡±

    ¡°What problem can there be with a few low-level divine weapons?¡± Domo wore a disdainful face and said impatiently to Jackson, ¡°The only few valuables here are three midgod divine weapons. They belong to the light and water elements. I can¡¯t foresee any problems that could arise. Fine, just put my name on this transaction. If there¡¯s any problem, I will take full responsibility. Are you satisfied now?¡±

    ¡°Well, if you say so, of course I have no objection. Alright, I shall stop bothering and get back to work!¡± Jackson walked out from Domo¡¯s room and smiled mischievously. He then went to the third floor, gathered a few storekeepers in a corner, and instructed in a low voice, ¡°Investigate the origins of those divine weapons, do not miss out the slightest detail. If you find anything fishy, report back to me immediately.¡±

    ¡°Understood, Mister Jackson,¡± the few storekeepers on Jackson¡¯s faction nodded their heads in affirmation.

    Han Shuo and Donna had no idea that they were being dragged into trouble because of personal disputes between two workers in that shop. At that moment, Han Shuo was still strolling around the streets with Donna. With Donna as his guide, Han Shuo gained further understanding of the City of Shadows.

    When the two returned to the Lavers¡¯ house, the two doorkeepers looked at Han Shuo with astonishment, thinking that it was a big deal for Donna to keep Han Shuo apanied.

    ¡°Your Ladyship, young master Diwei asked for your Ladyship to be present at Master Avery¡¯s residence as soon as possible.¡±

    ¡°Got it,¡± Donna replied amiably. After walking into thepound, she pointed at the towering building she lived in and said to Han Shuo, ¡°I¡¯m going to see my uncle. He must be wanting to discuss the mission to the Space Dominion that will take ce soon. Go in there and rest in the meantime, feel at home. There is also a gymnasium at the back, should you be interested. Usually, some members of the house, guests, and divine guards have friendly matches in that ce. Go over and have a look if you feel bored.¡±

    Han Shuo was rather intrigued by the Lavers Family¡¯s gymnasium. After Donna departed, he started walking in that direction.

    The gymnasium was open to anyone who could step into the Lavers residences. Han Shuo arrived in the gymnasium without meeting any obstacle.

    As soon as Han Shuo entered the gymnasium, he saw four boundary towers which held up fouryers of boundaries around the two thousand square meter space. The quadruple boundaries were set up to prevent the gymnasium from copsing under immense shing of divine energies.

    The gravitational eleration on Elysium was much greater than that on Profound Continent. On top of that, this gymnasium had further raised its gravity. Therefore, Han Shuo immediately noticed that even walking had be much harder as soon as he stepped inside.

    The gymnasium with a squareyout was crowded with bystanders around the few regions where several figures were fiercely fighting. Domains of divinity ovepped and divine radiances sparkled.

    Most of the people there donned clothing embroidered with the pattern of a dark sun, likely members of the Lavers Family. There were also a few among the crowd who were like Han Shuo, wearing no symbol or pattern on their clothing. They were quietly discussing something as they pointed at those who were having friendly matches.

    Han Shuo¡¯s arrival did not invoke anyone¡¯s attention. Most of the people were conversing in groups of three to five or sitting cross-legged on the ground in deep thought. They seemed to have realized something from battling and no one would disturb them.

    After observing for a while, Han Shuo discovered that there were five midgods inside. The rest of the dozen or so people were just like him; lowgods. Not all of them cultivated either one of the energies of death, darkness, or destruction. There were a few who cultivated in the energy of lightning, wind and earth.

    The most magnificent person in the gymnasium was a midgod cultivating in the energy of lightning. The man possessed mid-stage midgod strength at such a young age. Lightning and sparks covered every inch of his body. He handled the attacks of two midgods of the same ss smoothly while remaining as steady as a boulder. Every punch he threw was apanied by rolling thunder and bright shes.

    ¡°Young master Teng Fei is truly extraordinary. He is indeed worthy of being called the prodigy of the Thunder King Family. His thunder divine energy is truly shocking!¡±

    ¡°Yeah, even thebined powers of young master Cage and Zico couldn¡¯t break through his Lightningwall. They need to constantly be on the alert. He is truly formidable!¡±

    The lowgods observing from aside were eximing in low voices. Their faces were filled with reverence.

    The battle between the three midgods at the center of the gymnasium became more and more intense. Even the few lowgods dueling all around them had to further and further restrict their battle areas before they were ultimately forced by the immensely powerful lightning energy field to halt their battles. They joined the crowd in silently observing the fierce battle between the three.

    Teng Fei was like a nimble dragon covered with thunderbolts as he flew crisscrossed through the gymnasium. He did not seem to be affected by the powerful gravitational field at all. The lightning bolts that covered his body grew brighter and brighter as the rumbling of the thunder grew ever more frequent. Cage, the second son to Donna¡¯s uncle Avery, as well as that divine guard named Zico, were constantly beaten back under Teng Fei¡¯s counterattacks.

    <i>Boom Boom Boom!</i> three most energetic thunderbolts suddenly erupted with zing radiances. Cage and Zico were bombarded into taking multiple steps in reverse.

    ¡°Wow, impressive, Teng Fei. Your thunder divine energy is indeed a force to be reckoned with. We are all mid-stage midgods but still, the two of us have trouble defending!¡± Cage immediately eximed in admiration after managing to stabilize himself.

    The sparks that wound all around his body like little snakes slowly returned into his body. Standing bolt upright, Teng Fei put on a warm smile and replied to Cage, ¡°If this were a real battle where life is on the line, where both of you stake it all, there¡¯s no telling which side would win.¡±

    ¡°Young master Teng Fei is too modest. In a one versus one battle, I would surely have to retreat,¡± Zico, a divine guard of the Lavers Family, echoed Cage¡¯s words after taking a deep breath. He was a tactful divine guard.

    ¡°Teng Fei, during this period that you stay with my family as a guest, don¡¯t forget to give my little sister some guidance. After all, she looks up to you!¡± Cage said with a smile as he pointed at Eve standing not far away. Eve was Avery¡¯s daughter, an early-stage midgod. Although she resembled Donna somewhat and looked a little prettier, shecked that graceful, refined, and regal quality. At this moment, her cheeks were slightly blushing and she was looking at Teng Fei and the ground back and forth rather bashfully. She was obviously very keen on Teng Fei.

    ¡°Haha, of course,¡± Teng Fei said cordially. However, he had merely thrown a nce at Eve casually. He didn¡¯t seem to be as interested with Eve as she was with him.

    ¡°Alright, let¡¯s take a break and watch other people fight,¡± Cage said, pulling Teng Fei towards the area where Eve was resting.

    ¡°Huh? Friend, you don¡¯t look familiar. Are you a member of the family?¡± Zico knew just about every person in this ce. Therefore, when he saw the unfamiliar Han Shuo, he couldn¡¯t help but ask when he walked past him.

    After Zico uttered those words, the crowd in the gymnasium noticed the unfamiliar face. Their attention turned to Han Shuo.

    ¡°No, I¡¯m a friend of Donna¡¯s. I heard the sound here so I came to have a look,¡± Han Shuo replied.

    ¡°Oh, I see. Haha, our friend is cultivating in the energy of death, if you are interested, you may go look for a suitable opponent for a friendly match. It is only in real battles that one makes real progress. It is very beneficial for you!¡±

    ¡°Haha, perhaps not. I¡¯m here just to take a look. Besides, my powers are meager. I best not show my ineptitude,¡± Han Shuo declined tactfully.

    ¡°Hi, friend, you are also a lowgod ofte-stage strength, which is just right for me. Come on, let¡¯s have some fun! Don¡¯t be a bore!¡± a bald young man standing in the gymnasium waved at Han Shuo. He appeared rather simr to Dolores but slightly shorter andcking the grave and stern air.

    ¡°Miss Donna¡¯s friend definitely won¡¯t be anyone unordinary. Please do not decline ¨C just have a little fun with Doloxes. There won¡¯t be a problem,¡± Teng Fei who was having tea with Cage in the resting area, kindly advised. A strange light shone in Teng Fei¡¯s eyes as soon as he heard that Han Shuo was Donna¡¯s friend.

    ¡°Even young master Teng Fei has spoken. Friend, please don¡¯t decline. Consider it as giving us face ande down to have fun!¡± Cage advised right after. He seemed to be very friendly with Teng Fei.

    ¡°Alright then. We will have a light y. Nothing serious,¡± Han Shuo nodded with a defeated smile when he saw that he could not refuse. He walked towards Doloxes inrge strides, thinking that given Donna¡¯s status, these people wouldn¡¯t be too serious.

 Chapter 694 - Drawing a line

    GDK 694: Drawing a line

    Doloxes cultivated in the energy of darkness and possessedte-stage lowgod strength. After Han Shuo agreed to a duel, his smiling expression was suddenly reced with grimness. An austere, somber aura immediately emanated from his body.

    Han Shuo walked to the center of the gymnasium step by step. He transferred and assembled the energy of death from his avatar to his main body. Soon enough, an aura of death that treated life with contempt started exuding from him.

    The energies of death and darkness were known for their sinister characteristics. Han Shuo and Doloxes showed no intention of engaging in meleebat. Doloxes took the lead and gently swayed his body, turning himself into a shadowy figure. At the next moment, the shadowy figure split into five duplicates. They were all filled withplete darkness and intense divine energy of darkness.

    As soon as the five shadowy figures appeared, they began to hover towards Han Shuo. They would produce even more blurry shadowy figures in the gymnasium as they made their way. It was a bizarre scene.

    Those who cultivated in the energy of darkness were best at hiding their bodies and presence. In a battle, they would usually impede their opponent¡¯s vision using darkness and hide among the darkness. Next, they would take advantage of the fact that their opponents had no way of urately detecting an iing threat tounch the fatal strike. Their opponents wouldn¡¯t know what wasing until it was toote.

    Doloxes seemed to be very good at employing this technique. Multiple dark, blurry figures constantly circled around Han Shuo and closed in on him inch by inch.

    Han Shuo remained on the same ground and stood as straight as a ramrod. He stared at the blurry phantom images that constantly went across in front of him with calm eyes, not at all disturbed by the phantom images. It was when the dark figures started getting closer that he deployed the three trump card boundaries of the energy of death. Clearly, he was employing defensive measures.

    Doloxes produced more and more phantoms that would fly and wander all around the gymnasium. They moved faster and faster before suddenly, the phantoms that numbered nearly in the hundreds bombarded Han Shuo all at once from every direction.

    Han Shuo remained stationary and on the same ground as before. He observed the phantom figures with cold eyes. Then, when the first dark figure was about to strike him, like a tree snake springing at its prey, Han Shuo suddenly made a move. His two hands crafted several tides of green waves that drowned a dozen or more phantom figures before throwing a punch right at a phantom figure floating about in the air.

    <i>Thud!</i>

    That punch of Han Shuo¡¯snded directly on Doloxes¡¯ chest. All the phantom figures instantly vanished without a trace. As it was a friendly match, Han Shuo held back a little. It was just enough to stop Doloxes¡¯ body and cause his phantom images to fail. His strike did not injure Doloxes.

    ¡°Huh?!¡±

    ¡°How is that possible? They are on the same realm, but how did he manage to locate Doloxes¡¯ real body so urately?!¡±

    ¡°Remarkable. His sight was not confused even with so many phantom shadows. Truly remarkable!¡±

    The spectators around the gymnasiummented in low cries. They were all eximing in admiration of that inconceivable punch Han Shuo made.

    Often in a battle between two experts of the same ss, phantom figures produced by the expert cultivating in the energy of darkness should be very elusive to their opponent. As the phantom figures could hold some divine energy of darkness, they could also be used to cause harm. When confronted with this kind of situation where nearly a hundred phantom figurese attacking all at once, one would usually have no choice but to take proper, solid defensive measures.

    Han Shuo and Doloxes were both in the same realm ofte-stage lowgodhood. He shouldn¡¯t have been able to discover Doloxes¡¯ real body. The scene that the crowd saw had contradicted theirmon understanding. That was why these observers reacted with such astonishment.

    Doloxes waspletely stunned. He slowly lowered his head to look at Han Shuo¡¯s fist that was sticking to his chest and stared at it as though he could not believe the factid before his eyes. As Han Shuo did not add too much divine energy of death into his punch, Doloxes wasn¡¯t injured by the slightest. After he stared nkly for a moment, the radiance of irreconciliation blossomed from his eyes.

    Unexpectedly, Doloxes erupted the divine energy of darkness from his chest and sent it gushing into Han Shuo¡¯s fist. This caused Han Shuo to suddenly let out a stifled groan.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was instantly filled with rage. Logically speaking, the battle should have concluded with Han Shuo victorious after his attempt at Doloxes¡¯ chest. Doloxes at this moment should have gracefully admitted his defeat instead of seizing the opportunity tounch a sneak attack.

    Fortunately, Han Shuo¡¯s main body tempered with demonic arts was incredibly tough and resilient. Otherwise, against this sudden burst of darkness divine energy, he would have been injured.

    Han Shuo coldly groaned and sent the energy of death in his body bursting out, forcibly suppressing and pushing back the darkness divine energy that Doloxes was sending into his demonic body. Then, with one thought, using a wee bit of demonic yuan, the incisive Demonic des violently grew out from Han Shuo¡¯s fingernails. The chilling de glistened with threatening radiances.

    <i>Whoosh!</i> Han Shuo drew aplicated drawing with his left hand. Doloxes was stumped and confused. He couldn¡¯t even make out Han Shuo¡¯s movements before he suddenly discovered a chilling sensation on his neck. When he rolled his eyes downward, Doloxes discovered five ice-cold des pressing against the main arteries on his neck. It was as though the slightest movement would cut them apart.

    Doloxes, who intended to beat down Han Shuo in one spurt of energy, immediately discovered that Han Shuo was staring at him coldly. His eyes were just as cold and callous as those des pressed against his neck. A tremble traveled through Doloxes¡¯ heart. He felt as though he could be minced into pieces by Han Shuo at any moment. Therefore, he quickly raised both his hands and yelled, ¡°I have lost. You, friend, are indeed formidable!¡±

    ¡°Friend there, you have already struck Doloxes with your punch just now. Why do you have to escte it further? Don¡¯t you think that your actions are undue?¡± Cage said in a deep voice as he slowly walked over. He seemed to be very displeased.

    ¡°My actions are undue?¡± Han Shuo cracked a sneer. While maintaining the position of his hand, he turned his head to shoot a cold nce at Cage and said, ¡°You are a midgod. If you were observing carefully, you surely couldn¡¯t have missed out Doloxes¡¯ petty maneuver. It is he who did not y by the rules the first. But not only did you mention nothing about it, you are using me of acting unduly? Ah, so this is how your Lavers Family treats your guests?¡±

    ¡°Look, put your hand down first. We can slowly talk out any misunderstandings we may have!¡± When Cage saw that callous face of Han Shuo¡¯s, he thought that Han Shuo would actually murder Doloxes in rage. Therefore, he hastily tried to reconcile.

    ¡°Hey, friend, there¡¯s no need to be like this. It¡¯s just a friendly match, why so serious!¡± Zico also immediately stepped forward to resolve the situation when he saw the situation turn sour.

    ¡°What are you all so nervous about? I¡¯m not thinking about that. I just want to rify the situation to you all!¡± Han Shuo sneered grimly. While staring at Doloxes whose hands were raised in the air, Han Shuo slowly pulled back his Demonic des without letting his guard down.

    When the Demonic des werepletely removed from his neck, Doloxes abruptly took several rapid steps backward. The expression on his face changed instantly as he shouted hatefully, ¡°How dare you point sharp weapons towards me like that!¡±

    ¡°What is your rtionship with Elder Sister? What is your business here in our Lavers Family?¡± Cage¡¯s face quickly turned dark when Doloxes¡¯ life was no longer threatened by Han Shuo. He stared at Han Shuo and asked.

    ¡°He¡¯s merely a lowgod. Probably one of those who want to get a job under our family through Elder Sister. To be so daring to use such violence against Doloxes, he must be tired of living!¡± that attractive looking Eve stood up from her seat and remarked as she looked at Han Shuo with hatred.

    ¡°What about that?¡± Han Shuo took in the expressions of all those in the gymnasium with one nce. Looking at Eve with a disdainful face, he ridiculed, ¡°If I told you that I¡¯m not Donna¡¯s friend, would you immediately charge at me to teach me a lesson? Heh, you all may have the same family name butpared to Donna, you bunch have absolutely no ss!¡±

    ¡°What, what did you say?¡± Eve was enraged. She pointed at Han Shuo and shouted furiously, ¡°Say it again, I dare you!¡±

    ¡°Ha, if you would like to humiliate yourself, I really don¡¯t mind repeating it for you!¡± Han Shuo wasn¡¯t afraid of her and repeated his words with a sneer. Then, when Eve flew into a rage and was about to attack him, Han Shuo suddenly pointed at Teng Fei who was beside her and chuckled, ¡°Miss Eve, your appearance right now deviates from the proper bearing of ady born in a noble family. Did you not notice that disdain and sneer young master Teng Fei is showing?¡±

    Eve was taken aback when she heard Han Shuo¡¯s words. It was only now that she remembered Teng Fei was right beside her. She panicked and hastily turned to look at Teng Fei who was wearing an awkward expression because Han Shuo had read out his thoughts.

    ¡°No, that is not what I thought!¡± Teng Fei forced a smile and exined when he saw Eve looking at him. He then turned to Han Shuo and said with a forced smile, ¡°Friend, please don¡¯t drag me into this. I have not offended you!¡±

    ¡°Zico, please seize this suspicious fe. I will personally ask my Elder Sister about him and find out what in the world this fe is doing in our house!¡± seeing that Han Shuo was able to defuse Eve¡¯s attack and even create a small rift between her and Teng Fei with just words, Cage immediately felt that he could not continue to let Han Shuo act willfully and make a scene.

    ¡°This... this...,¡± Zico did not know what to do. He dared not to offend Donna¡¯s friend but at the same time, he couldn¡¯t disobey Cage¡¯smand. He was stuck in indecision.

    ¡°I will seize him for young master Cage!¡± a divine guard with early-stage midgod strength cultivating in the energy of destruction, seemingly wanting to curry favor with Cage, loudly answered hismand. He charged straight for Han Shuo as though determined to capture Han Shuo at all costs.

    An early-stage midgod expert wasn¡¯t one that Han Shuo could contend against with merely the energy of his two avatars. Forced to this situation, Han Shuo started to consider if he should utilize demonic arts.

    It was at this moment that suddenly, Donna¡¯s aura came into Han Shuo¡¯s senses. He immediately realized that Donna must havee over. But strangely, Han Shuo noticed that Donna did not immediately step forward to assist him, as though having some other intention. With one thought, Han Shuo immediately understood that Donna was having doubts about his actual strength and she wanted to use this opportunity to verify her suspicion.

    Han Shuo immediately abandoned his thought of deploying demonic arts. He remained where he stood as the divine guard approached. He did nothing but defend himself using the energy of his avatar of death. That divine guard did not dare to harm Han Shuo and had merely followed Cage¡¯s instruction of capturing Han Shuo as he had no idea exactly how close Han Shuo was to Donna.

    With Han Shuo deliberately concealing his true strength, in merely a few seconds, before that midgod, Han Shuo was brought still and immobile.

    But when the divine guard was about to actually capture Han Shuo, Donna, who had been observing in the dark, finally took action. A streak of shadow suddenly descended in the gymnasium. <i>Pow!</i> That divine guard was sent flying.

    Donna, standing before Han Shuo, had a furious expression on her lovable face. She red at the divine guard thatnded on his buttocks and coldly groaned, ¡°You really have balls to dare to touch my friend. Tell me, who emboldened you?¡± that divine guard was shocked at Donna¡¯s sudden appearance and he subconsciously cast his gaze at Cage.

    When Cage saw that Donna was helping Han Shuo out of trouble furiously, he immediately realized that he had underestimated how close the two were. Cage tried to avoid eye contact with that divine guard before he chuckled and said, ¡°Elder Sister, why have youe? They are just ying with your friend, what are you so angry about?¡±

    Donna obviously held a high position in the Lavers Family. Her sudden appearance caused many of the divine guards who thought of attacking Han Shuo to abandon that idea. They were even afraid that Donna could make out their intention.

    ¡°Bryan is a friend that I managed to invite here with great difficulty. I believe he should have mentioned this to you all. But who knew that you bunch would actually dare to apprehend him. Have I be a character of no importance to you all?¡± Donna said furiously. Her round eyes were wide open as she stared down everyst person in the gymnasium.

    ¡°This has nothing to do with me, can you not re at me like that please?¡± Teng Fei put up his hands and hastily indicated his innocence in a forced smile. His gazes towards Donna contained unconceble feelings of affection.

    ¡°You are nothing good either. All you know is to watch andugh at others!¡± Donna scolded Teng Fei before she turned around and apologized to Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan, sorry about this. I didn¡¯t expect such a thing to happen.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s alright, I have learned about the arrogance of kids born in elite families long ago,¡± Han Shuo shrugged and continued with a smile, ¡°You know what, forget about it. I think it¡¯s better if I live outside. Honestly, I really can¡¯t get used to staying in your Lavers Family!¡±

    ¡°Ah?!¡± Donna began to panic. She knew how miraculous and capable Han Shuo was and sincerely wanted to rope him into the Lavers Family. Therefore, when she heard those words, she hastily entreated, ¡°Don¡¯t be like this, Bryan. I can assure you that nothing like this will ever happen again in the future! You havee here only recently and I haven¡¯t gotten the chance to properly receive you. How could you leave so soon!¡±

    ¡°My apologies, I really cannot bear to see the faces of certain people. Staying in this ce will affect my mood and cultivation. I have enough ck crystal coins to livefortably even in the City of Shadows. Besides, we would have just as many opportunities to meet in the future. So don¡¯t urge me to stay anymore!¡± Han Shuo said to Donna resolutely. He was determined to draw a line with the Lavers Family.

    ¡°He¡¯s merely a lowgod. They are everywhere to be found in the city. Pfft. What¡¯s so extraordinary about him!¡± Eve couldn¡¯t help but sneer quietly when she saw that Han Shuo so indifferent to Donna¡¯s pleading.

    ¡°Shut up!¡± Donna was already feeling vexed and thest thing she needed was Eve¡¯s scornful remark. She shouted at Eve, ¡°You know absolutely nothing but to create trouble for the family. When will you stop being so unruly and immature and grow up?!¡±

    ¡°Sister, you, how could you be so fierce towards me for this scum! You, you... ¡° Eve put on a wronged expression after being shouted at by Donna. Tears were rolling at the rims of her eyes.

    ¡°I know the way out, elder sister Donna. Please don¡¯t see me out!¡± Han Shuo had started to walk away from the gymnasium while Donna was berating Eve. He turned back to tell Donna before rapidly disappearing from their sights.

    ¡°In the future, when he reveals his talent and makes a name for himself in the City of Shadows, you will all realize just how terrible a mistake you have made on this day! You bunch are...¡± Donna sighed as she looked at Cage and the bunch resentfully before she ran out to pursue Han Shuo. But after exiting from the gymnasium, she discovered that Han Shuo had long disappeared without a trace.

    Donna knew that after this incident, after this day, Han Shuo would never consider joining the Lavers Family. Her heart was filled with remorse as she knew that the House of Lavers had missed out on this great talent.

 Chapter 695 - Invincible Omen Body

    GDK 695: Invincible Omen Body

    Han Shuo rapidly departed from the House of Lavers, went to some other block, and spent five purple crystal coins renting a gymnasium. This gymnasium was only five hundred square meters in size. It was encircled by a defensive boundary that was supported by two boundary towers.

    After sealing off the gymnasium, Han Shuo let both his avatarse out from the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. His avatar of death continued to absorb the death divine essence he obtained from hisst mining expedition. His avatar of destruction continued condensing the Orb of Destruction and slowly fumbled around with the method of making the Orb of Destructionpliment with the domain of divinity.

    During the incident at the Fort Verka gymnasium, Han Shuo had ced his attention on the Orbs of Destruction released by Brovst¡¯s dark gold sphere. Using his consciousness, Han Shuo did his utmost in memorizing the trajectories of those Orbs of Destruction and how they traveled on the surface of the gymnasium boundary.

    With this, Han Shuo now at least had a general direction in conducting his experiments of figuring out how to use the Orbs of Destruction. With the help of his consciousness¡¯ powerful ability to recall, Han Shuo reenacted the trajectories taken by those Orbs of Destructions back in Fort Verka, sending his Orbs of Destruction flying all around his domain of divinity.

    Whenever Han Shuo concentrated on a task, he would lose track of passing of time, especially in a closed space such as the gymnasium he was in. He repeatedly experimented with finding the proper trajectory for the Orbs of Destruction. Gradually, Han Shuo discovered that the Orbs of Destruction were bing more agile under his maniption and that the trajectories seemed to be in conformity with the edict of destruction.

    Han Shuo¡¯s main body and avatar of death were also hard at work. Unknowingly, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death had absorbed all the divine essence of death that metal elite zombie and earth elite zombie obtained. As his avatar of death had previously absorbed a midgod soul without self-awareness, his understanding of the energy of death would increase in tandem as his divine energy deepened.

    After absorbing all the divine essence, Han Shuo had a vague feeling that the divine energy in his avatar of death was on the verge of another breakthrough. This meant that his avatar of death could advance to the midgod realm soon.

    Advancing from lowgodhood to midgodhood was an enormous hurdle. But once Han Shuo overcame this barrier, his standing on Elysium would escte a ss higher. For example, in the City of Shadows was an uncountable number of lowgods like Han Shuo. However, the count of midgods was steeply below that of lowgods. Practically every midgod would be invited and recruited by at least one of the family ns and im some decent position in the City of Shadows.

    While Han Shuo¡¯s avatars cultivated to improve themselves, Han Shuo¡¯s main body constantly investigated some demonic arts techniques with the Cauldron Spirit. He started practicing ¡°Invincible Omen Body¡±, a demonic technique that could only be mastered by those in the Omen realm. The demonic technique could strengthen the body and increase its physical defense power by a significant magnitude.

    Based on the demonic knowledge that Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord had left, Invincible Omen Body could instantly flood every cell and bone with demonic yuan, increasing their defensive power by several hundred folds and forming something simr to a defensive shield in the body. Once attacked, the demonic body would automatically activate to form an Invincible Omen Body, rendering the enemy¡¯s attack ineffective.

    As the demonic yuan of the demonic arts cultivator grew, the defensive power of the Invincible Omen Body would grow stronger as well. In the ultimate stage of the demonic skill, not only would one have a body invincible to any physical attack, the body itself could automatically strike back. Once attacked, the Invincible Omen Body would automatically assemble the energy inside the body and deliver a burst of terrifying energy, instantly injuring the attacker.

    It could be said that once a person seeded in forming an Invincible Omen Body, the person need not worry about any sneak attack. In fact, to attack someone who hadpletely formed an Invincible Omen Body was to hoist with one¡¯s own petard.

    It was said that back in the antiquity when Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord was refining a demonic weapon, he was located by three of his enemies. When the three saw that the Exalted Demonlord wasn¡¯t awake, they immediately attempted to murder him. However, with the extraordinary protection of the Invincible Omen Body, Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord had merely spat a small squirt of blood. Two of the attackers were killed on the spot by that spontaneous counterattack of the Invincible Omen Body and one was severely injured. The attacker who survived the counterattack eventually sumbed to their injuries while escaping.

    For all these years, Han Shuo ced a lot of emphasis on tempering and forging his body. Once he obtained the cultivation method of Invincible Omen Body, he started practicing it day and night. If he ran into anything that he wasn¡¯t too sure about, he would immediately inquire with Cauldron Spirit. Cauldron Spirit was indeed worthy of being called the ultimate demonic weapon. Its understanding of demonhood was much more profound than Han Shuo¡¯s. It was able to answer all of Han Shuo¡¯s questions in detail.

    Han Shuo assiduously practiced Invincible Omen Body with Cauldron Spirit¡¯s guidance. The cultivation of Invincible Omen Body required the destruction and rebuilding of the body. Therefore, when practicing the demonic technique, Han Shuo¡¯s blood vessels would often burst and his organs would shatter. Having been ustomed to the cultivation of the demonic arts which resembled self-harm, Han Shuo endured and persevered through the inhuman pain, strengthening his body over and over again...

    An unknown amount of time had passed. The first body of Han Shuo¡¯s that woke up was his avatar cultivating in the energy of death. Afterpletely absorbing all the divine essence containing the energy of death, it would no longer be as effortless to further improve his strength.

    When Han Shuo raised his head to look at the energy clock at the top of the gymnasium, he realized that half a year had unknowingly passed. During that time, Han Shuo had merely absorbed all the divine essence. His other two bodies were still cultivating.

    Yet another three months passed by. Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction too had ceased to delve into the edict of destruction. After countless trial and error in emting the scene that his powerful consciousness memorized, Han Shuo had mastered a portion of the method of manipting the Orb of Destruction. At this point in time, Han Shuo could have five Orbs of Annihtion revolve around himself in trajectories conforming to the edict of destruction just by thinking. He could also maneuver the Orb of Destruction to attack any spot around him.

    Han Shuo knew that his ability to put the Orb of Annihtion into use could only be gradually increased as his understanding andprehension of the edict of destruction increased. This avatar of his was also on the verge of a breakthrough. Han Shuo believed that as long as he came to yet another moment of enlightenment, he would advance one step forward and attainte-stage lowgod realm.

    Yet another two months had passed. Han Shuo¡¯s main body too had stopped his intensive study of the Invincible Omen Body. The near insane cultivation and self-torture had rewarded Han Shuo with some slight progress in the Invincible Omen Body. He merely needed one thought and the Invincible Omen Body would take shape, flooding every cell of his body with demonic yuan in an instant.

    This, however, was merely a baby step, Han Shuo was still a long distance away from being able to spontaneously activate the skill when attacked. As for that ultimate stage where the Invincible Omen Body would automatically strike back, that was currently still far out of Han Shuo¡¯s reach.

    All three of Han Shuo¡¯s bodies had made the maximum progress they could make through cultivation. If Han Shuo wanted to advance even further and make breakthroughs, he had to do more than merely cultivating. Han Shuo knew that there was no point for him to stay inside the gymnasium any longer. He sent his avatars back into his main body, took a proper shower in the gymnasium, put on new clothes, and left the gymnasium.

    Han Shuo had stayed in the gymnasium for nearly a year, which had exceeded the rental period he got for five purple crystal coins. Therefore, he paid an extra six purple crystal coins to make up for the overstay. After Han Shuo handed the purple crystal coins to the old man in charge of the gymnasium, he inquired, ¡°Where is thergest scroll shop around here?¡±

    ¡°Travel north. It won¡¯t be long before you find a scroll shop named God-Given. They should have what you need!¡± the old man kept away the six purple crystal coins and enthusiastically pointed Han Shuo in the right direction.

    Han Shuo thanked him and started heading to that scroll shop. After walking for about twenty minutes, he entered the scroll shop named God-Given.

    Han Shuo hade here because he needed some real insight into the edict of destruction.

    Compared to that scroll shop at Fort Verka operated by Rahman the godhunter, this scroll shop was much, much bigger. Although it was only a storey tall, it was divided into many regions. Other than the energies of life and light, all remaining ten major energies had their own section in the store. There was even a special region dedicated to scrolls about all kinds of non-mainstream energies, namely, fighting aura, the energy of fear, and even the energy of lust. Han Shuo could not be more amazed.

    When Han Shuo arrived at the region for destruction energy, he discovered that it was further divided into three subsections. The first was for scrolls about the understanding of destruction edict, the second was for methods of attack, and the third was about using divine weapons of destruction energy.

    There were shopkeepers keeping watch at all three sections. They were in charge of selling and exining the few hundred scrolls on disy. From the big smiles on their faces and their friendly attitudes, it was obvious that they had all received professional training.

    After entering the shop, Han Shuo had to admit that this was genuinely a big shop. After walking to the section for advanced understanding about the edict of destruction, Han Shuo had to get a second take at the price tags as his eyes flickered. All the scrolls were denominated in ck crystal coins. They were so expensive that even Han Shuo felt a little dizzy looking at them.

    The cheapest scroll was priced at three ck crystal coins and the most expensive scroll, targeted for midgods, was priced at nine thousand ck crystal coins, far exceeding Han Shuo¡¯s current worth.

    ¡°Every scroll for sale in our shop has been examined by professionals to make sure that what you buy is worth what you pay for. To advance in realm is to fundamentally advance in strength. Therefore, it¡¯s to be expected that these are slightly more expensive,¡± a young and handsome looking shopkeeper exined to Han Shuo in a very polite manner. Shortly after, he asked, ¡°Have youe across any difficulties in your cultivation? I can select a suitable scroll specifically for you.¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned for a moment before he answered, ¡°I¡¯m at midstage lowgod realm. I have a vague feeling that I will break through tote-stage but unfortunately, I couldn¡¯t seem to grasp the key to it and have no idea which aspect I amcking in. I want to see if there¡¯s any scroll here that could help.¡±

    The shopkeeper flipped through a small booklet and after a while, lifted his head, withdrew a scroll from underneath the sales counter, and said to Han Shuo with confidence, ¡°This scroll! This contains the realizations of a person who has attainedte-stage lowgod realm. The selling price is forty-seven ck crystal coins. I believe this should be useful for you!¡±

    <i>Wow! A professional!</i> Han Shuo was impressed and his confidence in this shop grew a little. Without any hesitation, Han Shuo forked out forty-seven ck crystal coins and handed it to the shopkeeper, saying, ¡°Alright, I¡¯m buying it!¡±

    ¡°Before selling, as per the shop¡¯s policy, I must give you a word of warning. Although this scroll contains the understanding of a person who seeded in progressing in their cultivation, everyone has different paths in their cultivation. Their experience may or may not be suitable for you. This scroll could give you some new insight, but it does not guarantee that you will make a breakthrough,¡± the shopkeeper exined to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Alright, I understand. I¡¯m buying it,¡± Han Shuo naturally knew that scrolls might not be a hundred percent useful and he didn¡¯t need the reminder.

    ¡°Please hand me your divine tablet. We need to keep a detailed record of all sales of scrolls,¡± the shopkeeper said apologetically.

    Han Shuo handed his divine tablet along with the forty-seven ck crystal coins. After a smooth checkout process, Han Shuo received the scroll. But after impatiently reading the scroll once through, Han Shuo had a big, bitter smile on his face. The author of the scroll was very poor at conveying his thoughts. The contents and descriptions were absolute mumbo-jumbo and so confusing that Han Shuo had no idea what the heck was he actually writing about.

    Perhaps the only thing that was useful was his experience with hatred. He said that hatred begets the impulse to destroy all things. Under immense hatred, the author¡¯s mind was only filled with the thought of utterly destroying his enemy. Then, on the instant that he killed this enemy of his that he hated with his heart and soul, he made a breakthrough.

    ¡°As we have agreed upon earlier, we cannot refund even if you found your purchase unsatisfactory,¡± the shopkeeper hastily reminded Han Shuo as he immediately realized from his bitter smile that he did not gain the enlightenment he sought.

    ¡°Forget about it. I should have known better. Every person¡¯s cultivation experience is different. If divine scrolls were actually useful, there wouldn¡¯t be so many out there who are stuck in the same realm,¡± Han Shuo sighed helplessly. No longer cing his hopes on divine scrolls, Han Shuo turned around and left the scroll shop.

    ¡°Hatred... Hatred begets impulse to destroy all things... Hatred... Hatred...¡± Han Shuo kept thinking about the phrase after walking out from the scroll shop. He felt that this could be something.

    However, Han Shuo had long murdered off all his enemies with bone-deep hatred. Currently, Han Shuo did not hate anyone deeply enough. Even if he wanted to try, he had no target to put his hand on.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo raised an eyebrow. He stopped his footsteps and turned around to look behind his back.

    Soon enough, a group of City of Shadows divine guards hurried over to Han Shuo and surrounded him, pulling a cloud of dust behind them. The man leading the group was that green-haired man Han Shuo met at that godhunter¡¯s valley. He coldly shouted as soon as he saw Han Shuo, ¡°Are you Bryan?¡±

    ¡°That would be me. What¡¯s the matter?¡± Han Shuo was dazed for a moment and looked at him in a confused manner.

    ¡°You should know best about your own deeds. Come with us!¡± the green haired divine guard shouted angrily, ¡°Such a shameless fe to snatch us of our spoils of war. We will make you spill it all out from your stomach!¡±

 Chapter 696 - A Gifted Ugly

    GDK 696: A Gifted Ugly

    Han Shuo immediately understood what the matter was after hearing the words of that green-haired man in a towering rage. However, Han Shuo refused to confess to his crimes. He forced a smile and said, ¡°What are you talking about? I couldn¡¯t catch what you are saying.¡±

    ¡°Despicable fe, you plundered all the valuables from those deceased. You had the guts to do it but why don¡¯t you have the guts to admit it?¡±

    ¡°I didn¡¯t do it. What is there for me to admit?¡±

    ¡°Those things you sold to that divine weapon shop obviously came from the deceased inside the valley. Someone from the shop tipped it off to me. Just admit it already.¡±

    Han Shuo suddenly went silent after hearing those words. He did not expect that those divine weapons would still get him into trouble even though Donna had personally apanied him to broker the transaction. Seeing that there was no room for denial, Han Shuo creased his brows and contemted for a moment before he asked, ¡°So what do you want?¡± This wasn¡¯t that big of a crime and Han Shuo did not think that they could do much about it.

    ¡°Nothing much. Those things were sold for a total of three hundred ck crystal coins. You muste with us to sort out everything. In addition, in ordance with the rules, a portion of the crystal coins will be forfeited. After that, this will be over,¡± said the green haired man with a smirk after Han Shuo admitted to his crimes.

    There were around ten divine guards with midgod strengths surrounding Han Shuo. These divine guards were directly under themand of Erebus, one of the seven chief divine guards of the City of Shadows. As Erebus was a member of the Sainte Family, the most powerful family n in the City of Shadows, while Han Shuo was still new to the city and possessed no influence, he had no choice but to follow the green haired man to the Third Corps of City of Shadows Divine Guards which was under themand of Erebus.

    Naturally, Erebus would not bother himself with a matter as trivial as this. After arriving at the Third Corps, that green haired man took Han Shuo to a hall filled with books and scrolls. There, a middle-aged man with white hair and a solemn face interrogated Han Shuo about the matter. After Han Shuo described his ount once through, that white-haired middle-aged man said, ¡°As per the rules, you must pay two-thirds of the crystal coins to them, which is two hundred ck crystal coins.¡±

    ¡°Of those divine weapons sold, the three midgod divine weapons belonged to me. I did not plunder them from that ce. The three midgod divine weapons were worth two hundred fifty ck crystal coins. Please take that into ount,¡± Han Shuo immediately raised an objection.

    ¡°Mister Kayton, don¡¯t listen to his nonsense. This kid is merely a lowgod who only recently arrived on Elysium. There¡¯s no way he could be in possession of three midgod divine weapons except through unjust means. All the divine weapons he sold were plundered from the valley. It must be so!¡± the green-haired man rebuked. Two hundred ck crystal coins was also a small fortune for them. Of course they wouldn¡¯t be willing to let Han Shuo have it for nothing.

    Obviously, Kayton was partial towards the green-haired man and nodded after hearing his argument, saying, ¡°Anito¡¯s words make sense. There is no way that you coulde to possess not only one but three midgod divine weapons through proper channels, therefore they must have been acquired from that valley. Enough, just take out two hundred ck crystal coins and you may leave. There¡¯s no need to quibble!¡±

    ¡°You are being prejudiced!¡± Han Shuo coldly groaned. He continued, ¡°Please be impartial. When I sold those divine weapons, I was with Miss Donna of the House of Lavers. You can ask her about the specific details and find out if I¡¯m telling the truth!¡±

    ¡°Miss Donna of the House of Lavers?¡± that person named Kayton was stunned. He soon turned to look at Anito with puzzled gazes and asked, ¡°Was Miss Donna there as well?¡±

    ¡°I, I¡¯m not sure,¡± Anito was somewhat hesitant. He had merely received a tip-off from a shopkeeper working in the weapon shop and he had not investigated the matter thoroughly. Now when he heard that Donna of the Lavers Family was involved, he immediately realized that Han Shuo might not be such an easy target.

    The Sainte Family was, without a doubt, the most influential family in the City of Shadows. Although Anito and Kayton were pretty much members of the House of Sainte, their positions were far short of the real members of the family. If even Erebus would need to give some face to the Lavers Family, as mere subordinates of Erebus, of course they had to be careful and take precautions in dealing with their associates.

    ¡°Alright, I will decide on your case after further investigation,¡± after hearing Han Shuo mention Donna¡¯s name and seeing that Anito appeared hesitant, Kayton thought for a moment and decided not to rush in handing his judgment before fully understanding the case.

    It was at this point that Han Shuo truly came to understand Donna¡¯s words. Useless was it to even be a highgod of great power; without authority, influence, or backing of a major family n, you would run into all kinds of troubles or inconveniences when performing most tasks. Han Shuo came to recognize just how much of a deterrence a big family had from dealing with this officer. If Donna wasn¡¯t there to be his witness, Han Shuo would likely have to suffer a big financial loss.

    ¡°You stay here. We will ascertain the situation very soon,¡± Anito stood up and walked towards the door irritatedly. He was feeling extremely annoyed as he originally thought that Han Shuo was a nonentity with no connection. He did not expect that Han Shuo would be close to someone as influential as Donna, which had certainly thrown off his n.

    Pow! But before Anito could walk out from the hall, suddenly he was sent flying in reverse and crashnded beside Han Shuo.

    ¡°Who are you? How dare you make trouble at the Third Corps. Are you impatient to seek death?¡± Kayton was enraged. He pped his table and stood up. Immediately, twenty or so divine guards rushed from every corner of the hall. All of the divine guards were midgods.

    ¡°Yeah I¡¯m here to seek death. Come and kill me you bunch of fools!¡± the piercing voice of a young female sounded. As soon as she finished those words, a young and ugly woman with messy light-purple colored hair entered through the door. She had a face shaped like an irregr square, a small nose, thick lips, a pair of triangr eyes, and dark green pigmentation on her skin. She was ugly, even borderline frightening, no matter which way one spun it.

    However, if one were to ignore her face and merely focus their eyes on her body, they would find a graceful, curvaceous, and wonderful figure that only an extraordinary beauty should possess.

    Her strength, on the contrary, was astonishing. Even though she did not release any energy deliberately, she gave Han Shuo a sense of pressure as soon as she walked into the hall. This powerful aura should only be possessed by a highgod. Han Shuo secretly let off a strand of his consciousness to probe this woman¡¯s strength. But before Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness got close, her triangr eyes suddenly took aim at Han Shuo. Astonished, Han Shuo immediately pulled back his strand of consciousness.

    ¡°Oh, it¡¯s Miss Carmelita. What brings Your Ladyship to the Third Corps?¡± Kayton who furiously roared just a moment ago immediately shriveled up his attitude as soon as he saw the ugly youngdy. He even put on a smile and bowed humbly.

    Anito, who was sent flying in reverse, hurriedly took a knee and said, ¡°My apologies, Miss Carmelita. I did not know it was Your Ladyship,¡±

    This trantion is hosted on Veratales and Veratales only. . I usually spend 4-6 hours just to trante a single chapter. Please don¡¯t give your views(and hence ad revenue) to those pirates who steal my work in 4-6 seconds. Come to veratales. Thanks. -Hedonist

    Carmelita! Han Shuo gave a careful look at that uglydy as soon as he heard the name Kayton addressed her as. Right away, Han Shuo discovered a very small emblem on the left shoulder-piece of her skintight, purple-colored armor. The emblem had three triangles with three ck holes that seemed to be absorbing every energy.

    This design was unique to the Sainte Family, the most powerful family n in the City of Shadows. Just like the dark sun of the Lavers Family, this emblem was exclusive to their family. After finding the emblem of three ck holes, Han Shuo immediately knew that thisdy was indeed the legendary, gifteddy of the Sainte Family ¨C Carmelita.

    It was said that Carmelita caught a strange disease when she was young which caused her to be uglier as she grew up. All attempts at treating the disease had failed. Although Carmelita was cursed with ugly looks, she was blessed with extraordinary talent on the cultivation of the energy of destruction, bing a highgod in the short span of just three hundred years. Henceforth, she became an astonishing legend in the City of Shadows.

    Perhaps because of her ugly appearance, Carmelita had an extremely strange temperament and was very hard to get along with. But since she possessed valiant strength, and her father was the patriarch of the Sainte Family, and since she was highly regarded by the Sainte Family, no one in the City of Shadows dared to mess with her. She was an exceedingly unique character in the City of Shadows.

    ¡°Where is Erebus? I¡¯m looking for him!¡± Carmelita shot a re at the divine guards with her triangr eyes before asking impatiently.

    ¡°His Lordship is still pursuing Brovst, one of the leaders of the godhunters. He will not be at the Third Corps for a while,¡± Kayton replied solemnly and respectfully.

    ¡°Goddamnit, he¡¯s not around whenever I¡¯m looking for him. He must be avoiding me!¡± Carmelita cursed loudly. When she was about to leave, she suddenly turned to Han Shuo and said in an amused manner, ¡°Is it you who tried to observe me with your soul a moment ago? You are merely a lowgod but your soul energy is rather strange. I¡¯m quite surprised that you managed to escape from my soul capturing. What is your name? What are you doing here?¡±

    Han Shuo was astonished and did not anticipate that Carmelita was so powerful that she was able to detect the probing of his consciousness in an instant. He remarked to himself that highgod souls were indeed very mighty and that he had to be more cautious and less reckless the next time.

    Before Han Shuo could open his mouth, Kayton described the whole story once through to Carmelita in a fawning manner, ¡°His name is Bryan. He¡¯s here to assist with our investigation. Here¡¯s the story...¡±

    ¡°Bryan... Bryan... Hmm, this name sounds quite familiar. I think someone mentioned this name to me recently... Thats right! Donna! It was Donna! I remember it now, Donna told me about you!¡± Carmelita cried out softly and she started to size up Han Shuo with her pair of triangr eyes, causing Han Shuo¡¯s hair to stand on end.

    After a while, Carmelita¡¯s eyes lit up as though she recalled something. She suddenly invited, ¡°Youe with me. I want your help for a task.¡±

    ¡°Huh? What would you need me for?¡± Han Shuo asked, stunned at the unexpected request.

    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter. You will find out by then!¡± Carmelita was a person who acted as she said. She grabbed Han Shuo and started pulling him towards the exit. She seemed to have long forgotten that she was a youngdy.

    ¡°Your Ladyship, this person is still under investigation!¡± Kayton hastily said with a bitter smile when he saw Carmelita pulling Han Shuo away.

    ¡°It¡¯s just a minor case. What is there to bother for that bit of spoils? Erase the case for me. Any problem?¡± Carmelita did not bother to look at Kayton when replying to him.

    ¡°Er, no, no problem!¡± Karton hastily replied.

    After Carmelita left with Han Shuo, Kayton turned to Anito and said, ¡°Well, stop looking into it and forget about it!¡±

    Anito forced a smile and sighed, ¡°Of course, I have no other choice. Why am I so unlucky!¡±

 Chapter 697 - Chap, you indeed have the skills!

    GDK 697: Chap, you indeed have the skills!

    Carmelita grabbed hold of Han Shuo and pulled him right out of the Third Corps. As soon as he stepped outside, Han Shuo saw an enormous airship hovering in the sky with a dozen or so figures standing on top. They were wearing the divine guard armor of the Sainte Family and all of them possessed midgod strength.

    Without giving any exnation, Carmelita proceeded to drag Han Shuo into the airship and as soon as they boarded, instructed her extremely deferential divine guards, ¡°Refill the energy crystals and set off!¡±

    The airship is the mostmonly used transportation vehicle on Elysium. Produced using advanced alchemy technology, this type ofrge flying machine used energy crystals as its energy source. The airship that Han Shuo found himself in was around a hundred meters long. It was lined with seats that hadfortable cushions.

    ¡°My Lady, who is this young man?¡± a plump, one-eyed woman with no eyebrows asked as she sized up Han Shuo peculiarly.

    ¡°Erebus isn¡¯t at the Third Corps, he went hunting for Brovst. I¡¯m sure he brought along those two fes who are good at tracking,¡± Carmelita said somewhat angrily before she looked at Han Shuo with nted eyes and said, ¡°This is Bryan. He¡¯s from a low-level material ne. I have heard from Donna that not only is this person very observant, his insights and abilities in making judgments are remarkable. Donna isn¡¯t one to talk drivel. Her words and assessments have a remarkably high level of reliability. Since I couldn¡¯t borrow experts from Erebus, this guy will have to do,¡±

    ¡°This... this...¡± The plump, one-eyed woman was stunned. She stammered as though wanting to persuade Carmelita to give up on Han Shuo.

    ¡°This what? Even if he can¡¯t make a difference, you really think that we can¡¯t find those who snuck into our City of Shadows by ourselves?¡± Carmelita was annoyed and shot a re at that plump woman.

    Carmelita was very powerful in the House of Sainte. Although the plump woman wasn¡¯t happy with the decision, she dared not to voice her objection. She merely sighed and looked at Han Shuo up and down with gazes of suspicion.

    ¡°I need your help to find some people. You rest for a bit, I will inform you when we arrive. You can be at ease, I¡¯m a friend of Donna¡¯s. You will be just fine,¡± Carmelita said to Han Shuo before she walked to the front of the airship and sat down on a seat meant for her alone.

    Han Shuo was in a daze. He looked at the dozen or so divine guards under the House of Sainte wearing cold and stern faces as well as that plump woman, now looking rather unsatisfied. Without a word, he proceeded to find a seat.

    Elysium seemed infinitely vast. Even a small mountain range was around the size of Lancelot Empire¡¯s territories. On this material ne, even the divine soul of a highgod wouldn¡¯t be able to cover too much of a distance. If on top of that, the opponent was carefully concealing their aura, it would be even more difficult to detect and locate them.

    Carmelita and her party were probably after a certain infiltrator. She went to the Third Corps looking for Erebus because she needed unique talents who understood geography and were able to infer clues from tiny details. Unfortunately, Erebus and his subordinates who had those special skills were not avable. But not to give up for lost, she took Han Shuo into her search party. Han Shuo managed to understand the whole sequence of events after thinking for a moment.

    Everyone on the airship was silently cultivating. Han Shuo, ustomed to loneliness and solitude, did not feel bored. He secretly observed how those midgods with outstanding strengths cultivated, hoping to learn and gain something.

    Time flew by. Half a month had passed in the blink of an eye. On this day, Han Shuo suddenly discovered that the airship had abruptly decreased in airspeed. When he lowered his head, he found that the airship was travelling over a mountain range filled with colorful miasmic gasses. Those miasmic gasses carried a sour, rotting smell. They should be toxic.

    Gradually, the airship stopped above the mountain range. Carmelita who had been silently cultivating all along finally stood up from her seat at the front of the airship. After lowering her head to take a look at the mountain range, she softly instructed, ¡°Alright, we have finally arrived at the Miasmic Cloud Mountain Range. Everyone get ready and disembark from the airship. Based on the information we received, those fes are inside this mountain range. Be aware, the strange miasmic gasses in the mountain range are very troublesome. Not only do they contain all kinds of toxicity, those gasses can also restrict the observation power of your divine soul. Be extra careful.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it, my Lady. They are all prepared for this!¡± the plumpdy said smilingly as she withdrew a delicate medicinal bottle. She poured some lotion and applied it to her skin. The lotion formed a thinyer of membrane thatpletely covered her plump body.

    The divine guards on the airship all did the same thing. They all applied medicinal lotion to their themselves, leaving a thin membrane on their skin. Only Carmelita did not do so as there was a naturally formed force field of destruction barely visible to the naked eye around her. The force field produced constant undtions to prevent any gas or particles froming into contact with her skin.

    Carmelita took the lead in descending into the mountain range. She suddenly called to mind about Han Shuo when she was in midair and casually instructed, ¡°Get Bryan a bottle, lest he falls to the toxic gasses after taking just a few steps.¡±

    It was when Carmelita¡¯s purple figure submerged into the toxic miasmic gas below that the plumpdy threw Han Shuo a medicinal bottle most unwillingly. She said, ¡°Apply this medicine to your body. A bottle of this costs ten ck crystal coins. What a steal.¡±

    Han Shuo thanked her. He opened his hand and the medicinal bottle being thrown over flew into his palm. Soon after applying the medicinal lotion, he too had a very thin membrane formed on his skin, enveloping his body in a kind of unique barrier.

    Even without using the Invincible Omen Body, Han Shuo had no fear of being assaulted by the toxic miasmic gasses. Having cultivated demonic arts to the stage that he had, Han Shuo could shut off every pore on his skin with only his mind, making him impervious to the toxic atmosphere. Even if Han Shuo was to takerge, deep breaths of the toxic air, he could easily expel the toxins from his body through his pores. He only used that medicinal lotion because he did not want to attract that plump woman¡¯s attention.

    ¡°I cannot begin to understand why her Ladyship would bring a lowgod here. Let me be clear, we will not care about the life or death of a burden like yourself. If we run into any danger, the best you can do is to run as far as you can ¨C don¡¯t even count on us to protect or rescue you!¡± the plump woman warned resentfully before descending into the mountain range. She cultivated in the energy of darkness and possessedte-stage midgod strength. It was only natural that she would look down on a puny little lowgod like Han Shuo.

    One after another, the divine guards of the Sainte Family descended into the mountain range after Carmelita and that plump woman. The airship then gradually shrunk under the control of a divine guard.

    Han Shuo let out a softughter. He became rather interested with the situation of the miasmic mountain range beneath him. Han Shuo too descended into the mountain range before the airship started to shrink. When hended, he discovered that all the divine guards were sticking closely behind Carmelita. They looked cautious and were carefully observing their surroundings.

    As the miasmic gas was everywhere, their visions were limited. The farthest any of them could see was less than a hundred meters. Anything further than that was hardly visible. Even Han Shuo who had cultivated in demonic arts for so many years could only clearly take in things three hundred meters away from him.

    ¡°Kid, now is the time for you to be useful. Can you locate any trails of those fes?¡± that plump woman shot a cold nce at Han Shuo as though she had absolutely no confidence in Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo shook his head indifferently, saying, ¡°There¡¯s no sign or tracks of any humans around here. By the way, who exactly are you looking for? What energy do they cultivate in? Do they have any distinctive features?¡± Han Shuo replied to that plump woman and asked Carmelita, the leader of the party.

    ¡°They are a bunch from the Life Dominion, our arch enemies. ording to the unwritten rule, any person who cultivates in the energy of life or light, once discovered within our Darkness Dominion, will be killed without exception. They must have a secret agenda to be so daring to trespass upon the territory of our City of Shadows. We must figure out their objectives and then kill them all. Otherwise, if those in other Darkness Dominion Cities were to learn of this, they will mock us City of Shadows for our ipetence!¡± Carmelita exined to Han Shuo with a fierce look.

    Both sides were arch-enemies. Without some very unique reason, the other side surely wouldn¡¯t had bear the risk of being ughtered in infiltrating the Darkness Dominion. It was no wonder that Carmelita would musterrge forces in hunting these infiltrators cultivating in the edict of life.

    Han Shuo had a measure of the difficulty of the challenge after learning about who they were after. Cultivators of the energy of life shared an extraordinary connection with nature. Once they entered the mountain range filled with ancient trees and arge number of nts, they would be a most difficult group of people to locate. It was no wonder that Carmelita would think of borrowing talents from Erebus.

    Those who cultivated in the energy of life were not only good at concealing their aura using the natural environment, they also avoided destroying the natural environment. Therefore, they wouldn¡¯t leave many trails behind when traveling about in the mountain range. On top of that, as this mountain range was covered with miasmic gas, it wouldn¡¯t be an easy task to locate them, not even for Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo had released a dozen or so demon generals through Cauldron Spirit in advance lest that Carmelita would discover them. At this very moment, these demon generals were surveying in every direction, carefully inspecting for any abnormal scene and clues.

    Suddenly, one of his demon generals discovered traces of magical beasts having battled fifteen kilometers to the right of Han Shuo. There were a few broken trees there reconnected using some kind of energy, clearly an act of man, not nature. It begged the question, who would be willing to waste time on these natural nts? Well, other than cultivators of the edict of life, who could it have been?

    ¡°Come with me,¡± Han Shuo gently cried out as he took the lead in that direction. But after traveling merely thirty meters, Han Shuo halted in his footsteps. He turned around to look at the divine guards wearing confused faces and Carmelita who was obviously puzzled. He said smilingly, ¡°Why? Don¡¯t believe me?¡±

    ¡°Ermm... Did you really discover something? How is that possible? Even those two under Erebus couldn¡¯t discover the trails of those who cultivate in the energy of life inside a mountain range so easily. How did you do that?¡± Carmelita¡¯s triangr eyes glistened brightly as she softly questioned with skepticism.

    ¡°My Lady, this kid must be making a show. He is only a lowgod. How could he discover their trails so quickly?¡± the plump woman was distrustful towards Han Shuo and she was straightforward in expressing her thoughts.

    ¡°If tracking people has something to do with strength, then Miss Carmelita wouldn¡¯t have brought me here. Don¡¯t be so narrow-minded,¡± Han Shuo smirked.

    ¡°Jackass, how dare you talk to me like that! I can make you vanish from this world forever with just the snap of my finger! Believe me, I can and I will!¡± The plump woman was enraged.

    ¡°Silence, Karina!¡± Carmelita berated her in displeasure before creasing her sparse brows and asked Han Shuo suspiciously, ¡°You really found their trails?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s only fifteen kilometers out. It won¡¯t take long to travel there. Juste with me and see it for yourself,¡± Han Shuo shrugged and answered. Without further exining himself, he took the lead.

    When Han Shuo was about to disappear from their line of sight, Carmelita ordered, ¡°Move, let¡¯s keep pace with him. I don¡¯t think this guy has the guts to deceive me! But if he really dares waste my time, even if he is Donna¡¯s friend, I¡¯m going to make him pay!¡±

    After hearing her instructions, the crowd quickly caught up to Han Shuo and followed behind him. Karina stared at Han Shuo¡¯s back with scorn.

    Soon enough, the party arrived at the region behind Han Shuo. Han Shuo was already crouching on the ground pretending to observe something. When Carmelita walked to his side, he stood up with a calm face, pointed at the ancient trees that had been reconnected, and said, ¡°Other than those who cultivate in the energy of life, I don¡¯t think anyone would be so kind towards these big trees. What do you think?¡±

    Carmelita gave just one nce at those big trees before she cried out in surprise, ¡°There are indeed signs of the energy of life on these trees. You are correct, that bunch must have been here!¡±

    With the factsid out right before their eyes, Karina, the plump woman who originally thought of giving Han Shuo hell, covered her mouth and gasped. The look in her eyes as she stared at Han Shuo hadpletely changed. Karina hesitated for a moment before she said rather awkwardly, ¡°My apologies, that was petty of me. It appears that you really could be helpful!¡±

    This woman was frank and outspoken. Although she doesn¡¯t give face, she dared openly admit her mistakes when she learned that she was wrong. A character like her was difficult toe by. In addition, after carefully observing for a moment, Han Shuo discovered that Kalina was sincere in her apology. He nodded and assured her, ¡°It¡¯s alright, I did not take it to heart.¡±

    Those House of Sainte divine guards in Carmelita¡¯s party also gasped in wonder. They had a newfound respect for Han Shuo.

    ¡°Chap, you really do have the skills. Haha, I knew I could trust Donna¡¯s word! Very good. If we can locate that bunch and get rid of them, I will make sure you get rewarded. Everyone in the City of Shadows knows that I¡¯m most liberal with money!¡± Carmelita was in a cheerful mood and praised Han Shuo highly.

    ¡°Alright, we will all follow your lead until we find those people. How do we proceed next?¡± Carmelita asked.

    Han Shuo was stunned. He was bitterlyughing in his heart because this was the only clue he had found yet through his demon generals and he had absolutely no idea where those people were. Contrary to expectations, Han Shuo had no idea how to respond to Carmelita¡¯s absolute confidence in him.

 Chapter 698 - Heavenâ€™s Gift

    GDK 698: Heaven¡¯s Gift

    Faced with the intensely trusting eyes of these people, Han Shuo hesitated for a moment before he decided to tell the truth. ¡°Those who cultivate in the edict of life have enormous advantages and convenience when surrounded by nature. Currently, this is the only clue I have discovered. We have no better option but to fumble around while keeping our eyes wide open.¡±

    ¡°I see. Well then, let¡¯s move forward and head into the depths of the mountain range,¡± Carmelita understood that it was very difficult to deal with those who cultivated in the edict of life. In addition to Han Shuo having proven his capabilities, she did not feel that Han Shuo was ipetent and agreed with him.

    The party proceeded by heading into the depths of the Miasma Cloud Mountain Range. Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals constantly surveyed the area and spread out evenly around him. They were very careful in making observations and left no stone unturned.

    The party had entered several hundred kilometers into the mountain range and they came across many powerful magical beasts along the way. However, all those powerful magical beasts kept a distance away from the party of gods, foreboding as they were.

    Although the demon generals had been flying all around through the mountain range, they no longer found any more traces of those infiltrators. Carmelita, seeing that they had arrived at the center of the mountain range and that the miasmic gases were growing more concentrated, couldn¡¯t help but begin to feel agitated.

    ¡°Any further discoveries?¡± Kalina the plump woman asked Han Shuo yet again. She too had gradually grown impatient and was obviously rather anxious when none of them could find the slightest trail of those infiltrators.

    ¡°The mountain range is just too vast. There¡¯s no way we¡¯ll find any clues so quickly,¡± Han Shuo replied with his brows tightly bunched. He too felt very helpless about finding nothing new despite having the help of his demon general. However, there wasn¡¯t a better solution that he could take.

    ¡°My Lady, how about if we spread out? We could cover more ground,¡± Kalina hesitated for a moment before she suggested to Carmelita.

    ¡°That won¡¯t do. We would have better chances of finding them by dispersing but this is too risky. Whoever is so fortunate to run into them will be done for before they can even spread the news,¡± Carmelita rejected resolutely. After giving a helpless sigh, she continued, ¡°Let¡¯s continue searching. Perhaps we will find something soon.¡±

    Kalina did not insist. She too let out a sigh before joining the rest of the party in wandering aimlessly through the mountain range.

    Unknowingly, five days had passed. Although Han Shuo did not travel through the entire mountain range, his demon generals, however, had visited basically every region in the mountain range. But even then, his demon general did not discover any more signs left by those who cultivated in the edict of life. They only saw some magical beasts roaming around as well as some rare natural treasures.

    Gradually, not just Kalina, but even Han Shuo felt bored. He even started to harbor suspicions about the reliability of Carmelita¡¯s information. Suspecting that that bunch had left the mountain range long ago, Carmelita even lost her patience and started to randomly bombard the ancient trees around her. This disturbed Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals observation power.

    ¡°Perhaps they¡¯ve have left. Let¡¯s go, we will leave,¡± after yet another day, Carmelita had lost thest bit of her patience and officially gave themand to retreat. The crowd let out a sigh of relief upon hearing those words. They were all too bored to continue their futile efforts any longer.

    With Carmelita having made the decision, no one had any objection and everyone got ready to retreat from the mountain range.

    ¡°Hold on!¡± Han Shuo who had been silent all along suddenly cried out when the party was prepared to board the airship.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± Carmelita¡¯s triangr eyes turned to look at Han Shuo puzzled as she asked, ¡°We haven¡¯te up on anything in thest ten or so days. Don¡¯t tell me you¡¯ve discovered something just as we are leaving?¡±

    ¡°Up ahead, there¡¯s a mountain with lush, verdant trees. It houses a pretty decently sized cave where magical beasts are constantly departing from. I didn¡¯t pay much attention to it earlier but now that I think of it, something seems odd about it.¡± Using a demon general, Han Shuo noticed that the number of magical beasts running out from that cave had grown, immediately drawing his suspicion. From the behavior of those magical beasts, they appeared to have been forced out of their dwellings.

    ¡°Yes, I remember it now. Most nts on the mountains are sparse and fragmentary, but that mountain is an unusual one ¨C the nts there are very lush. Is that the mountain you are referring to?¡± the plump, one-eyed woman Karina asked. She appeared somewhat astonished.

    ¡°Yes! That¡¯s the mountain!¡± Han Shuo said with suspicion, ¡°The mountain isn¡¯t just strange because of its thriving flora, the magical beasts there seemed to have been forced out from their cave. We have visited so many ces over the Miasma Cloud Mountain Range but discovered nothing. Perhaps that was because the bunch has been hiding in that mountain cave?¡±

    After hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, Carmelita who had instructed the party to withdraw, suddenly had her hopes reignited. After thinking for a bit, she nodded and said, ¡°Your words make sense. Let¡¯s go, we will check it out. Perhaps we might find something in the cave.¡±

    At Carmelita¡¯s instruction, the party returned to that mountain that they had previously passed by. When they arrived at the cave entrance, they saw herds of magical beasts storming out from the cave in session. Some of the magical beasts appeared panicked and rmed. They dispersed as soon as they saw Carmelita and her party.

    Although the magical beasts on Elysium were much, much mightier than those on Profound Continent, their intelligence, for some reason, seemed to hardly grow on par with their strength. Although they had obviously evolved way past rank five, six, and or even seven, Han Shuo did not discover any that could take on a human appearance.

    When the magical beasts dispersed in all directions, Han Shuo sent a few of his demon generals into the cave. After entering the cave, his demon generals soon discovered that there were even more magical beasts trying to make their way out. There were also a lot of branches and paths inside the cave.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go inside and have a look. This ce really seems quite strange.¡± Carmelita took the lead. The rest of the party, including Han Shuo, immediately followed after.

    The cave was extremely wide and big. Soon after entering, they encountered a fork. Carmelita, thinking that they wouldn¡¯t run into any danger, agreed to let the party split into smaller groups and investigate following Kalina¡¯s proposal. They were instructed to yell as loud as they could as soon as they discovered anything unusual.

    At the fork, Kalina volunteered to lead the team of divine guards split off from the main group. Han Shuo, naturally, followed Carmelita¡¯s group. And soon enough, yet another fork appeared before Carmelita and her party. She instructed a few others from her team to separate.

    After repeatedly encountering fork after fork, the divine guards apanying Han Shuo were reduced over and over again. In the end, only two divine guards were left with Han Shuo and Carmelita. They did not run into any more forks after that.

    Those demon generals that had been traveling through the mountain range earlier had also entered the cave by this point in time. Some wandered aimlessly through the caverns, some followed Kalina, some followed other divine guards, while two demon generals scouted the path ahead of Han Shuo.

    Those magical beasts that they met along the wayunched attacks crazily when they saw strangers approach. However, against those mighty divine guards, those magical beasts didn¡¯t stand a chance. One after another, the magical beasts were butchered in the spacious cavern.

    Suddenly, through one of the demon generals scouting the way ahead, Han Shuo discovered the presence of an enormousva pool at the end of the cave. The rock around it was astonishingly hot and glowing bright red. Those rocks were even dripping withva-like red fluid that would shizzle and smoke when it touched the ground.

    As demon generals preferred cold and dark ces and were afraid of high temperatures, it did not venture any further. However, through the observation of the demon general, Han Shuo discovered that there were some unique auras behind theva pool. It was as though someone had formed cold air to expel the scorching temperature of theva.

    Since no one in Carmelita¡¯s party cultivated in the energy of water, Han Shuo was certain that the person whomever produced the cold air in theva cave definitely wasn¡¯t one of his own. Having made the discovery, Han Shuomanded his demon general to retreat slightly and he hastily said to Carmelita, ¡°Up ahead there¡¯s ava cave. The temperature in there is extremely high. However, it is cold and refreshing deep inside the cave, perhaps a god cultivating in the energy of water is over there. Either way, I¡¯m certain that something very suspicious is going on up ahead! Should we gather the divine guards before going in there to find out?¡±

    Carmelita cried out in joy. She revealed heartfelt happiness on her haggard face and hastily said, ¡°Well what are we waiting for?! There¡¯s no need to notify the rest of them. None of them are as strong as I am. Even if they are here, there isn¡¯t really much that they could help with.¡±

    Han Shuo, thinking that her words made sense, did not try to persuade otherwise. He hastily headed to theva cave with Carmelita and the two divine guards.

    With a precise destination, they soon arrived where Han Shuo¡¯s demon general was located. As soon as Carmelita stepped inside, she coldly groaned and said, ¡°Indeed, Bryan, you are correct. There is indeed a group here that cultivates in water energy! During recent times, the Ice Goddess has been getting very close with the Goddess of Nature and the God of Light. It¡¯s not surprising that there would be cultivators of water energy in their team. Alright, Bryan, you may retreat for the time being while I go in there and finish them all!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s strength was meager in Carmelita¡¯s eyes. In a situation like this, a lowgod couldn¡¯t even act as cannon fodder. Han Shuo, in fact, felt somewhat touched that Carmelita would give thoughts about his safety at this moment. He inwardly nodded and said, ¡°Understood!¡±

    Instead of advancing, Han Shuo stepped backwards and made way.

    As Carmelita had been hunting for this bunch of enemies for so long, she was impatient when she finally discovered their hiding ce. Immediately, she charged into the depths of theva cave. As she was a highgod, there was a naturally formed force field of destruction around her. Itpletely isted her from the scorching hot red liquid dripping down from theva cave.

    The two divine guards that came with Carmelita dutifully followed behind her. They unfurled their domains of divinities and used their divine energies in blocking themselves from the dangers in theva cave. The trio rapidly disappeared from Han Shuo¡¯s sight.

    After the three hadpletely entered into theva cave, Han Shuo summoned metal elite zombie unhurriedly. To proceed, he opened up a separate tunnel at a concealed spot and extended it to the depths of theva cave. Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body, as durable as it was, was invulnerable to the high temperatures of the rock around him. He then asked metal elite zombie to make a small hole so he could check on the situation inside theva cave.

    When he looked through the small hole, he discovered that a fierce battle was happening inside theva cave. Unexpectedly, the two divine guards that came with Carmelita were already dead. Their bodies were located nearby the small hole that Han Shuo was peeping through. The ugly-looking Carmelita at this moment was facing the joint attack from two experts. Although she was crazily making offenses, it was clear to Han Shuo that she showed signs of fatigue.

    Of the duo who besieged Carmelita, one was an old man with great vitality. He held a staff made of dried wooden stick, obviously a cultivator of the edict of life. That wooden staff constantly released greenish, gaseous threads that winded around Carmelita as though pliable and tough vines.

    The other attacker was a cold and elegant beauty. She had a tall figure and an ice-cold face as perfect as an ice-sculpture. Her white, tender hands were constantly bursting with chilling divine radiance. She managed to reduce the high temperature of theva cave all by herself.

    Both of the attackers possessed highgod strengths while Carmelita was only an early-stage highgod. Even if the duo was in the same realm as she was, it would still be a matter of time before she would be defeated. Moreover, around the duo were six midgods with extraordinary power. They were standing in the arrangement of a hexagon as though preparing to assist the two highgods using some kind of magical formation. Carmelita seemed to have be mentally deranged. While handling the thunderous attacks of the two highgods, she was constantly advancing towards an enormous rock as though wanting to destroy it.

    Looking in the direction of Carmelita¡¯s gaze, Han Shuo discovered a piece of azure-colored rock. The rock had resplendent speckles on it as dazzling as the stars. Those bright speckles were even moving slowly and rhythmically. It constantly emanated fascinating rays. It was beautiful and awe-inspiring!

    ¡°A Heaven¡¯s Gift!¡± Han Shuo softly cried out in surprise. His face was filled with unconceble appall. Looking at that beautiful and dazzling azure rock, Han Shuo finally understood why that old man cultivating in the edict of life would go through the trouble of traveling such long distances and risk his life infiltrating the Darkness Dominion. It was for the same reason that Carmelita was trying to destroy thatrge and beautiful rock so desperately.

    The reason was, all those speckles moving about like celestial bodies on that dazzling rock were traveling in trajectories conforming to the edict of life. Anyone who cultivated in the edict of life could gain a profoundprehension into the real essence of the edict of life by observing the trajectories of those speckles!

 Chapter 699 - You will have my backing!

    GDK 699: You will have my backing!

    Han Shuo, having been on Elysium for some time now, had heard a few things about the Heaven¡¯s Gift. It was said that this miraculous stone, naturally formed in the rarest of conditions, usually contained the profound wisdom of all kinds of energies. Any god could learn the true essence of the energy they cultivated in from the rock and make breakthroughs.

    Heaven¡¯s Gift was even rarer than divine essences. Their value and preciousness were beyond measure. Divine essence would deepen a person¡¯s divine energy while Heaven¡¯s Gift could deepen a person¡¯s understanding of the energy they cultivated in. In addition, it was suitable for cultivators of various types of energies. It goes without saying that this natural treasure was very much coveted.

    That azure Heaven¡¯s Gift was glistening with misty blue shimmer. The dazzling speckles that slowly moved following some kind of miraculous trajectory would leave any observer with an abstruse, and dreamy sensation. It was as though the stone contained a whole universe in itself.

    A god who cultivated in the edict of life, as long as they cultivated while looking at the Heaven¡¯s Gift attentively, truly making sense of the trajectories of those speckles, they would infallibly make enormous growth in their understanding of the edict of life.

    There were two types of Heaven¡¯s Gift ¨C one could be moved while the other could only be used stationary in its ce. Obviously, this stone found in thisva cave belonged to the second type ¨C it was unmovable. Otherwise, this bunch would have towed the enormous rock away long ago instead of staying.

    When Carmelita saw the Heaven¡¯s Gift, she tried to destroy it at all costs lest the person who cultivated in the edict of life could continue to learn from it and grow even stronger.

    The battle in theva cave had reached the critical juncture. With the two highgods attacking with their full strengths, Carmelita, a legend of the City of Shadows, found herself trapped in dire circumstances. Not only that she wasn¡¯t able to get close to that piece of Heaven¡¯s Gift, but she also had to keep on retreating in defeat. She was even wounded.

    <i>Stupid, you should be trying to leave instead of fighting! After leaving this mountain range alive, you could just bring in a few more highgods from the City of Shadows back to this ce. Victory will be in your hand that way!</i> Han Shuo cursed in his heart when he saw that Carmelita was trying to destroy that Heaven¡¯s Gift even when obstructed by two highgods of the same ss.

    Soon enough, the six midgods all of whom cultivated in the edict of life connected their formation of a six-tipped star to form a boundary, blocking Carmelita from the only exit behind her back, preventing her from leaving theva cave.

    ¡°Mister Disca, what are you still hesitating for? If we don¡¯t kill her now, once this mad woman escapes, you can give up all thoughts ofprehending the energy of life in this ce. Moreover, it could make our escape from the Darkness Dominion very difficult!¡± that beautiful woman coldly cried out with her ice-cold voice while her silvery white hair fluttered about.

    That old man who had been fighting with one hand behind his back, after hearing that shout, finally came to his senses and stopped being reluctant. Perhaps the temptation of the Heaven¡¯s Gift was just too much, even as a cultivator of the edict of life who usually wouldn¡¯t hand anyone the death penalty, he decided to suspend his love for all living things and kill. He unleashed his full strength.

    With that, Carmelita who was beaten and utterly exhausted sank into an even more dire and critical situation. Tangled by that greenish vine-like threads, the callous white-haired beauty managed to prate Carmelita¡¯s destruction force field, sending her chilling divine energy into Carmelita¡¯s body. Her steps started to be unsteady.

    The six midgods who created the boundary had firmly sealed off the only entrance and exit. Theva cave wall was incredibly hard. It was absolutely impossible to escape by breaking through the thickyers of hard rocks. Carmelita soon sank into a real crisis. At this point in time, not only that she wasn¡¯t able to destroy that Heaven¡¯s Gift, escaping alive was an issue.

    It was only at this moment that Han Shuo discovered the remorse and anxiety shing in Carmelita¡¯s eyes. Unfortunately, this mad woman came to her senses a little toote.

    Seeing that Carmelita will soon fall to the two highgods, Han Shuo hesitated for a moment and decided to rescue her. Having made up his mind, he immediately used metal elite zombie¡¯s energy to secretly carve several pathways behind the walls of theva cave. Those pathways were only a thinyer of rock behind theva cave and could easily be broken. Metal elite zombie was innately gifted in such aspect. Even the two highgods were not able to detect his maneuver. Soon enough, he had everything set up in ce for Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo constantly flew through the tunnels around theva cave that metal elite zombie paved for him, searching for a suitable spot for him to step in and rescue Carmelita.

    <i>Chuck!</i> The white-haired beauty sent a slender, long icicle piercing into Carmelita¡¯s stomach.

    Carmelita screamed miserably. Her body was sent crashing towards one of the walls that metal elite zombie had altered. Han Shuo was overjoyed and immediately scuttled to that area. <i>Boom!</i>That thinyer of rock copsed when her body crashed into it. Han Shuo had arrived right on time. He immediately grabbed Carmelita by the armor on her back and pulled her deep into the tunnel as quickly as possible.

    Simultaneously, metal elite zombie who was well coordinated with Han Shuo used his innate talent to heal up the tunnel behind Han Shuo. Those tunnels that metal elite zombie previously made were being magically refilled with rocks.

    The two highgods in theva cave were obviously stunned for a moment, clueless as to why theva cave wall would suddenly be so fragile. When they finally came to their senses, they discovered that the broken hole was healing up on its own. That white haired beauty suddenly shouted, ¡°Stop her!¡±

    <i>Rumbles...</i> She immediately bombarded the tunnel that metal elite zombie was fusing up. However, the rock that made up theva cave was astonishingly resilient. Despite the loud rumbling of her efforts at the cave wall, the rock did notpletely shatter into pieces. It appeared that after being constantly baked in scorching high-temperature, the rock had somehow transformed.

    ¡°Go outside and find her. That woman did note here alone, not a chance. We have to get rid of all the others too to prevent anyone else from discovering the Heaven¡¯s Gift!¡± that callous beauty cultivating in the elemental energy of water relentlessly altered her n when she saw that she could not destroy the cave rocks. She was definitely a cool-headed and ruthless highgod.

    With things having developed to this stage, Disca had no choice but to agree to her. He nodded and said, ¡°I will stay here and guard the Heaven¡¯s Gift alone. I¡¯ll leave the rest to you!¡±

    The tinum beauty nodded apathetically. She then instructed the six midgods cultivating in the edict of life, ¡°You lote with me. All you need to do is to stop them from escaping. Leave the killing part to me!¡± She knew that this group of edict of life cultivators had a problem with bluntlymitting murder.

    This vicious and merciless white-haired beauty lead the six midgods from theva cave and immediately began her killing spree. These divine guards from the House of Sainte were merely midgods, and now they were also dispersed and separated. They stood no chance against this staunch highgod. Miserable shrieks echoed from the mountain cave.

    Carmelita who was being carried away by Han Shuo was seriously injured by that white-haired beauty¡¯s sharp icicle that prated her stomach. She had actually fallen into a semi-conscious state during this critical moment and couldn¡¯t even walk, let alone help Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo could do nothing but watch the divine guards being ughtered one after another. With metal elite zombie¡¯s power, he continuously extended and contracted the tunnel that had no entrance or exit as he moved towards the surface of the mountain.

    Midway into his escape, Han Shuo suddenly came upon Karina the one-eyed woman escaping in a flurry. She obviously realized that something bad was happening in the cave. However, as the tunnels there were filled with curves and junctions, being in a panic, she couldn¡¯t figure the way out and was traveling in circles.

    Based on the probing of Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals, he knew that once that highgod of water got rid of all those House of Sainte divine guards, Kalina would inevitably suffer the same fate!

    <i>Carrying two burdens is almost the same as carrying one burden. Ugh damn it!</i> After contemting for a moment, Han Shuo decided to rescue Kalina as well. He ordered metal elite zombie to split open a tunnel near her. Then, Han Shuo suddenly popped out from the tunnel and shouted, ¡°Come with me!¡±

    Kalina was jolted when she first saw a head pop up from the ground and she instinctively prepared to attack it. Luckily, she promptly realized that it was Han Shuo and stopped just in time. Kalina waspletely flustered at this moment and bore into Han Shuo¡¯s tunnel without thinking.

    As soon as Kalina entered the tunnel, Han Shuo continued to wildly charge forward. Kalina, giving no thought and not a word, followed closely behind Han Shuo. Metal elite zombie who was hiding behind the cave wall took this opportunity to fuse up the hole in the cave wall.

    Having previously used his demon generals to survey the situation in the mountain cave, on top of having metal elite zombie¡¯s help, Han Shuo managed to arrive at the surface of the mountain through the shortcut tunnel very quickly. Carrying the muddleheaded Carmelita in his hands, Han Shuo continued to run for his life, flying straight ahead.

    Kalina, who was following closely behind Han Shuo, discovered Carmelita as soon as they walked out from the dim tunnel. She was greatly rmed and immediately cried out, ¡°What¡¯s wrong with her Ladyship? What¡¯s happened to her?¡± Her voice carried sincere concern and she was obviously very anxious.

    As a midgod, Kalina¡¯s speed wouldn¡¯t be any slower than Han Shuo. She bolted shoulder to shoulder to Han Shuo as he briefly exined the sequence of events to Kalina. Han Shuo continued, ¡°There¡¯s no time for words now. Here, you carry Carmelita. We must leave the mountain range as quickly as possible. There are two powerful highgods in this ce as well as a Heaven¡¯s Gift. We must enlist the help of experts to have any chance of winning.¡±

    After taking Carmelita from Han Shuo, the plump woman flew towards the sky. She wanted to carry Carmelita away from the dangerous mountain range as quickly as possible.

    ¡°Stop! Get down!¡± Han Shuo yelled. He hurriedly exined to the puzzled Kalina, ¡°The mountain range filled with miasmic air is a natural hiding ce for us. The unusual miasmic air here even has the miraculous ability to hinder soul probing. Therefore, our best option is to escape within the miasmic air. If you fly high into the air, you will lose the protection of the miasmic air and will be more likely to be discovered!¡± Kalina¡¯s mind was focused on saving Carmelita and did not pay much thought for possible dangers. Having heard Han Shuo¡¯s exnation, she realized that Han Shuo was right and hastily came back to the ground. She cast Han Shuo a thankful look and continued running.

    At this moment, using the surveince of his demon generals, Han Shuo discovered that the white-haired beauty with blood-stained hands rushed out from the cave with six midgods of life. She sensed around using her divine soul and nced all around before immediately charging towards Han Shuo and Kalina. Her speed obviously exceeded theirs.

    ¡°She¡¯s headed this way!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face jolted. He then hastily said to the flurried Kalina, ¡°Follow my footsteps, do not destroy any vegetation. Otherwise, she will be able to track us!¡± That white-haired beauty was able to determine the right direction because she discovered the trails left by Kalina¡¯s hurried footsteps.

    ¡°I will hand the Lady to you, bring her to safety. I will draw them away!¡± After repeatedlymitting multiple near-fatal mistakes, perhaps she came to realize that she couldn¡¯t bring Carmelita away from the mountain range alive and seeing that Han Shuo remained calm and rational under such terrifying circumstances, she thought that Carmelita would have the best chance of survival in Han Shuo¡¯s hands as she drew the pursuers away.

    Without seeking Han Shuo¡¯s opinion, she shoved Carmelita back into Han Shuo¡¯s arms and proceeded to run in another direction while deliberately leaving some trails behind. Her robust figure had disappeared before Han Shuo could even stop her from taking that foolish action. A feeling of respect suddenly rose in Han Shuo¡¯s heart as he watched Kalina leave so resolutely. He thought that although this person was cutting and blunt in her remarks, she was dependable during critical moments.

    Watching her back disappear into the mist, Han Shuo knew that she probably wouldn¡¯t make it out alive. However, this was her decision. Without spending much time in admiration, Han Shuo sent a demon general to track her and proceeded, flying in a direction opposite to hers.

    With Kalina braving death to draw the pursuers away, Han Shuo found that the ice-cold woman had indeed gone chasing in Kalina¡¯s direction. With the miasmic gas present everywhere and the visibility extremely low, the sensing power of her divine soul was greatly reduced. After separating from Han Shuo and determined to sacrifice herself, Kalina unexpectedly grew calm. She no longer made a single rudimentary mistake and using the special terrain of the mountain range to her advantage, she managed to keep a suitable distance from the pursuing army.

    After three days, as the distance between the two grew everrger, Han Shuo arrived near the perimeter of the Miasma Cloud Mountain Range. As those demon generals in the mountain range could not be too far away from the Cauldron Spirit, Han Shuo had no choice but tomand his demon general following Kalina to retreat. With that, Han Shuo could no longer keep track of Kalina¡¯s whereabouts.

    Soon after exiting the Miasma Cloud Mountain Range, a vast river appeared before Han Shuo. Without much hesitation, Han Shuo took the still half-conscious Carmelita across the river. While no one was watching, Han Shuo used demonic yuan and activated the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens, increasing his airspeed to the maximum. He managed to cross therge river in just half a day, upon which he arrived at a swamp.

    ¡°Uhh... Uhh...¡± At this point in time, Carmelita who had been half-conscious for the past few days gradually awoke.

    rity slowly started to rece the oblivion in her eyes. Seeing that her divine soul was recovering, Han Shuo ced Carmelita on a mud mound at the center of a swamp and kept a few steps away from her, waiting for her to sober up.

    Carmelita was in a semi-conscious state because Disca¡¯s energy of life had affected her divine soul, binding Carmelita¡¯s life force. As she had also sustained serious injuries to her divine body from that cold and elegant beauty, it took her a long time to awaken.

    Finally, Carmelita opened her triangr eyes. When she saw Han Shuo a little ways away, she bunched her eyebrows and asked in a rather weak voice, ¡°Where... where is this ce? Why are you alone? Where are the others?¡±

    Han Shuo softly sighed and said, ¡°They are probably all dead. I¡¯m afraid that Kalina likely won¡¯t make it...¡± Han Shuo sighed and described what happened inside the Miasma Cloud Mountain Range while she was unconscious.

    Carmelita earnestly listened to Han Shuo¡¯s ount of the events. Although she had on a stupefied face, Han Shuo discovered feelings of dismal sorrow in her triangr eyes. ¡°They all perished... all dead... Even Kalina is dead... This is all my fault. I did not anticipate that there would be two highgods. If I had not acted so recklessly, they wouldn¡¯t have died...¡± After being dazed for some time, Carmelita started mumbling to herself. Her triangr eyes were overflowing with tears.

    Although she was not very attractive by any standards, Han Shuo thought that she was a good leader when he saw her sincerely grieve for her deceased troops. Han Shuo figured he had to do something in this moment and after thinking for a while, he said in a deep voice, ¡°This isn¡¯t your fault, don¡¯t me yourself. Besides, now isn¡¯t the time for self-ming. We must hurry to the City of Shadows as quickly as possible, assemble experts in the city, eliminate those experts in the Miasma Cloud Mountain Range and destroy that Heaven¡¯s Gift!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right, blood calls for blood. We will not let them leave the mountain range alive!¡± Carmelita roared in rage. She suddenly stood up and was prepared to return to the City of Shadows faster than imaginable. However, it was at this moment that she discovered the wound on her abdomen had been bandaged.

    ¡°Did you bandage this? Are you the one who pulled me out from the cave?¡± Carmelita subconsciously felt her abdomen with her hand before turning to look at Han Shuo and asked, puzzled.

    ¡°Yes. You are heavily injured, perhaps you shouldn¡¯t use your divine energy for now. I will carry you back to the City of Shadows as quickly as possible!¡± Han Shuo nodded and said.

    Carmelita started sizing Han Shuo up with strange gazes. After a long while, she resolutely pledged, ¡°From this day onwards, in the City of Shadows, you will have my protection. No matter who you offend in the city, I will be there to help you! Even if it¡¯s Donna that you are in conflict with, I¡¯ll back you!¡±

    ¡°Then I shall thank you in advance!¡± Han Shuo smiled. He then went over, grabbed Carmelita by her arm and flew towards the City of Shadows with all his strength.

 Chapter 700 - It is time

    GDK 700: It is time

    All throughout the journey, Han Shuo was left to tend to the seriously injured Carmelita. After taking medicinal pellets that Han Shuo had personally refined, Carmelita¡¯s injuries started recovering rapidly. Even the aura of coldness in her body had been diluted.

    When Carmelita learned that Han Shuo could produce medicine even more miraculous than any medical practitioner could even though he was not a physician, she thought that Han Shuo was definitely a treasure chest. She had personally experienced the magic of Han Shuo¡¯s medicinal pellets on her wounds. She repeatedly inquired with Han Shuo about topics of this aspect all along the journey home.

    The art of refining medicinal pellets wasn¡¯t solely a scope of demonic arts and therefore Han Shuo wasn¡¯t afraid that Gu Tian Xie the Exalted Demonlord¡¯s formidable enemy might find him through learning this. He concocted a mystifying story, saying that it was an old pharmacist on Profound Continent who had imparted the knowledge to him. Carmelita took his story to be true and she was amazed to learn that people of extraordinary talent could also be found on low-level material nes.

    The distance between the Miasma Cloud Mountain Range and the City of Shadows was enormous. Han Shuo, carrying Carmelita, took around half a month toplete the trip. During this period of time, the two managed to bond rather easily. Carmelita would click her tongue in wonder when Han Shuo told her some interesting stories about Profound Continent, asionally mixed with a few bits of his experiences back on Earth. Her disconste mood from losing all her troops gradually improved.

    After conversing with Carmelita, Han Shuo learned that because of her unattractiveness and her irascible temper, she had almost no friends. The few friends she had were all females, one of whom was Donna. Most males would either keep a distance from her or merely regard her as somewhat of a master figure.

    Han Shuo also learned that Carmelita, being very self-aware about her appearance, spent all her time and effort on cultivation. Then, perhaps due to prolonged social istion, she became more and more short-tempered and entric. On top of her extraordinary strength and outstanding status, not many would dare to make contact with her. Hence, she slowly became an alien in the City of Shadows ¨C an ugly woman that everyone feared.

    But during this period of time, having interacted with the injured Carmelita, Han Shuo discovered that she was actually a decent character.

    During their journey back to the City of Shadows, during the short few weeks, the two had be good friends who could talk about anything with each other. While attending to Carmelita¡¯s injuries, Han Shuo would often take the opportunity to consult her about the energy of destruction. Carmelita did not know that Han Shuo also cultivated in the energy of destruction. Although she found it strange that Han Shuo would ask her questions about it, she exined her cultivation experiences to Han Shuo in detail.

    It was during this time that Han Shuo came to realize why Carmelita was known to be a prodigy in the cultivation of the energy of destruction. During the short few weeks time, from this highgod of destruction, Han Shuo gained a higher level of understanding towards the energy of destruction. Many things that previously confused him suddenly became clear to him.

    On one of those days, during a discussion with Carmelita, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction that had been stuck in mid-stage lowgod realm came to a sudden enlightenment. It immediately sank into a meditative state inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon.

    Time seemed to be speeding by for the two of them. On the seventeenth day, Han Shuo and Carmelita arrived at the City of Shadows without even realizing it.

    In Carmelita¡¯s presence, Han Shuo did not meet any resistance throughout the journey. He went directly into the Sainte Residence with her.

    The Sainte Residence was located at the center of the City of Shadows. It was the official residence of the City Lord. As the most ancient family n in the City of Shadows, the Sainte Residence was even more expansive than the Lavers¡¯. A huge ruckus was immediately set off in the House of Sainte when the divine guards saw Han Shuo carrying the injured Carmelita inside by her arm.

    All of a sudden, the entire House of Sainte was packed. Those elders of the House of Sainte and some divine guards hurried to surround Carmelita and anxiously asked about her condition.

    Carmelita was not a beautiful woman, but her extraordinary strength and high position in her family n, on top of the fact that she is the daughter of the City Lord, meant she was highly regarded by her family members. When they saw that she was heavily injured, the house was in a frenzy.

    That was all until the patriarch of the House of Sainte, the incumbent City Lord of the City of Shadows, Wace Sainte arrived hurriedly. Only then did they quiet down.

    Wace Sainte was Carmelita¡¯s father. As ate-stage highgod cultivating in the energy of darkness, Wace carried an imposing, majestic demeanor. He had lustrous ck hair around an inch long. His eyes, deep gray in color, glistened with divine radiance. He stood more than two meters in height and had a robust build. When he stepped into the room, it was as though a mountain had entered there with him.

    ¡°What happened?¡± As soon as he came over, Wace held Carmelita with his big hands and asked in a deep voice.

    ¡°There is a piece of Heaven¡¯s Gift in the Miasma Cloud Mountain Range, our intel knew nothing about this. When I brought men there, we ran into two highgods...¡± Carmelita anxiously gave an ount of the whole event to her father.

    After Carmelita finished her recount, Wace put on a grave expression and said, ¡°You stay at home to treat your injuries. Leave the rest to me, I will send men to take care of it!¡±

    ¡°No, I want to be there, I want to watch them die before my eyes!¡± Carmelita replied with a stern voice. It was obvious that she felt responsible for the death of her men.

    ¡°I have said that you will stay at home to treat your injuries, don¡¯t make me repeat myself. You are not to go anywhere until you are back in good health!¡± Wace straightforwardly denied the request. He turned around to instruct a gentle looking middle-aged man, ¡°Brother, keep a close eye on her!¡±

    ¡°Understood, Elder Brother,¡± Wace¡¯s brother Andre nodded and continued, acent smile on his face, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I will make sure that she recovers at the fastest speed possible. You may remain focused on your tasks.¡±

    Wace became much more at ease and nodded after hearing his brother¡¯s words. When he was about to leave and start taking care of the matter, he suddenly saw Han Shuo who was standing in a corner, ncing all around in boredom. Wace stared nkly for a moment and after a brief moment of thinking, he asked in an amicable manner, ¡°You must be Bryan?¡±

    ¡°Pleasure to meet you,¡± Han Shuo felt rather overwhelmed and excited to have Wace, the most powerful person in the City of Shadows initiating a conversation with him. However, he did not reveal any signs of panic. He nodded calmly and replied in a manner neither servile nor overbearing.

    Wace was rather astonished with Han Shuo¡¯s coolness. After nodding at Han Shuo, Wace continued with a smile, ¡°Thank you for rescuing Carmelita. Keep this emblem. If you run into any sort of trouble in the future, take this emblem to my House of Sainte and you will have our assistance,¡±

    ¡°Thank you,¡± Han Shuo replied casually as he received the emblem from Wace. The emblem that had the symbol of the House of Sainte carved on it was made of some unknown material. It was deep-ck, heavy, and appeared extremely refined.

    ¡°Alright, I have some matters to attend to and will be leaving. My daughter doesn¡¯t have many friends. If you have the time, feel free to frequent our residence. I believe she will be most weing of your presence,¡± Wace said before he rapidly disappeared from Han Shuo¡¯s sight with a group of solemn-looking divine guards.

    As the man wielding the most power in the City of Shadows, Wace was infamous for his vicious and merciless ways. Against his enemies, he would usually not stop until they and their associates werepletely exterminated. He had eradicated no less than tens of family ns, if not hundreds. It could even be said that he had risen above others by climbing a mountain made of the bodies of his adversaries. He was definitely no benevolent character.

    However, towards his friends, Wace was generous and anything but stingy. He would be very friendly towards his allies who had no conflicting interest with him. This was also the factor contributing to his steady grip over the City of Shadows for so many years.

    After Wace left the party, Andre started to repeatedly persuade Carmelita with a smile. Carmelita too knew that although her father usually pampered her, once he came to a decision, no one could change his mind. Seeing that her father Wace had left, Carmelita resigned to the decree after loudly grumbling for a while. Andre then started arranging for medical practitioners to examine Carmelita.

    ¡°No need to invite any physicians. Bryan has already stabilized my injuries. I just need to recover using divine essences and within one year, I will fully recover!¡± Carmelita said impatiently, telling Andre not to waste time on the unnecessary arrangement.

    Han Shuoughed bitterly in his mind when he heard Carmelita say that she wanted to use divine essences to heal her injuries. He thought to himself howvish the life of arge family n was, so much so that they could afford to use divine essences to heal their strength and injuries.

    But little did Han Shuo know that that was only because Carmelita was a special character in the House of Sainte. A person who could cultivate to highgod realm within such a short time, even with a face uglier than the devil, would receive the most exceptional treatment. Other members of her family, however, might not even get the opportunity to increase their strength using divine essences.

    Andre obviously wasn¡¯t too confident about her im. He advised Carmelita, ¡°It doesn¡¯t hurt to have a physician examine your condition. After all, that friend of yours isn¡¯t a professional medical practitioner.¡±

    ¡°Uncle, you are so annoying. I came back here with Bryan and I know him better than you do,¡± Carmelita then impatiently showed Andre the wound on her abdomen and said, ¡°Look. Using Bryan¡¯s medicine, my wound haspletely healed in just ten or so days! Can any regr physician aplish this?¡±

    The mightier a god was, the longer it would take them to recover from injuries. Carmelita, as a highgod, would need at least one month to heal from the puncture wound on her divine body, even when treated by the best physician. The medicinal pellet that Han Shuo made took just half the time.

    ¡°What?!¡± Andre immediately cried out in surprise when he saw that wound that was now a scar on Carmelita¡¯s stomach. He looked up and down at Han Shuo in disbelief before he asked, ¡°Er, Bryan, you are Bryan, right? Did you treat this wound?¡±

    ¡°Stop being so wordy, uncle. Quickly get me the divine essence. I want to recover from my internal injuries right now!¡± Carmelita impatiently hastened. Andre gave Han Shuo a couple more looks in silence before he nodded and left.

    Han Shuo discovered that when Carmelita asked Andre to fetch divine essences for her, some of the members of the Sainte Family standing around her revealed looks of envy. It appeared that these people who were not born gifted didn¡¯t receive the same treatment as Carmelita.

    ¡°Bryan, why don¡¯t you stay in my Sainte Residence for some time? I will properly thank you after I have recovered from my injuries,¡± Carmelita invited.

    ¡°I think not. I¡¯m not used to living in a big family n. However, I will be among the City of Shadows for some time. I will look for you when you have fully recovered.¡± There would surely be all kinds of troubles to be met inside a family n as ancient and influential as this. Han Shuo was most afraid of any conflict now and therefore rejected the invitation.

    ¡°You rascal, don¡¯t wait until I have fully recovered. Come visit me every one or two months. Juste and chat with me. I don¡¯t really have any friends in the City of Shadows that I can truly talk to. Even the few friends that I have seemed to have some other intentions when interacting with me. You, however, are definitely an exception! Remember toe to visit me frequently ¨C don¡¯t make me look for you!¡± Carmelita did not insist that Han Shuo stay but demanded that he visit while looking at him with threatening eyes.

    Han Shuo forced a smile and nodded, agreeing to her demand. Carmelita responded with satisfied, mischievousughter and let Han Shuo leave.

    After having interacted with her for some time, Han Shuo realized that she treated him without any ulterior motive and sincerely as her friend. This made Han Shuo feel veryfortable around her.

    Although Donna could also be considered as Han Shuo¡¯s friend and the two were quite close, Han Shuo knew that Donna did so because she wanted to rope him into the Lavers Family. Her passionate and friendly treatment was mostly out of his own value, unlike Carmelita who seemed to have no underlying objective.

    Han Shuo sighed thinking about this. He thought it was no wonder even the few friends that Carmelita had did not befriend her without any other goal. She was the prodigy of the House of Sainte and the daughter of the City Lord. It was impossible for her friends not to think about taking advantage of her at all.

    With Carmelita¡¯s instruction, no one in the Sainte Family obstructed Han Shuo from leaving. Letting his thoughts run wild, Han Shuo had unknowingly walked onto the broad streets of the City of Shadows. Suddenly, as he started wondering what he would do next, he sensed that he was being hailed by Little Skeleton.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t heard from Little Skeleton for a long time and he felt very happy to receive the hailing. He went to an average gymnasium, rented a field, and summoned Little Skeleton.

    ¡°Father, we have conquered the entire Netherworld. We have discussed for a short while and we all feel that it is time for us to progress to this world!¡± As soon as Little Skeleton stood still before Han Shuo, he started talking in the sharp and clear voice of a boy, leaving Han Shuo shocked.

 Chapter 701 - Letting Go

    GDK 701: Letting Go

    Little Skeleton, metal elite zombie, wood elite zombie, earth elite zombie, water elite zombie, and fire elite zombie stood in a row. These six who now possessed advanced intelligence and life, all looked at Han Shuo with expectation and excitement in their eyes.

    Of the six, Little Skeleton was already a godly expert cultivating in the elemental energy of death. He was already in the midstage lowgod realm. Wood elite zombie, fire elite zombie, earth elite zombie, and water elite zombie, having met all kinds of fortuitous encounters, had also be lowgods. Wood elite zombie who had obtained the energy from the Tree of Life was even in the same midstage lowgod realm as Little Skeleton. Apart from metal elite zombie, all six of them gained an astonishing increase in strength.

    The Elysium was saturated with elemental energies of all types and was indeed suitable for their cultivation. However, Elysium was also filled with all kinds of influences, powerhouses, and dangers. Although the six possessed intelligence, Han Shuo still couldn¡¯t feel reassured. Besides, Han Shuo could not be living with them, or else it surely wouldn¡¯t end well for Han Shuo or any of them.

    Han Shuo was stuck in indecision. He had no idea how to decide on where they would go.

    ¡°Father, we have thought about it. We will make our way in this world by ourselves, alone. Don¡¯t worry, we have stayed in the Netherworld for a long time and we know how to deal with dangers. We also know some state of affairs of this material ne. Let go of us, Father,¡± Little Skeleton proposed. Of the six, he had been around with Han Shuo for the longest time.

    ¡°How would that do? This world is nothing like the Netherworld. Experts of tremendous strength can be found everywhere in Elysium. If you live on your own, how are you going to handle unexpected threats more dangerous than what you could imagine? How can I be at ease?!¡± Han Shuo was reluctant. He had attached too much of his affection to these six new lifeforms. When he thought of the dangers they could possibly run into, he wanted to keep them in the Netherworld forever.

    ¡°Father, it¡¯s only by oveing dangers that we can grow further! Calm down, Father. We all have our own special abilities. As long as we live in suitable ces, we can escape from any kind of danger. Father, the Netherworld is only barely plentiful in the aura of death, it is not suitable for the five of us to develop. We do not want to solely rely on Father¡¯s power; we too want to be stronger by ourselves. After all, we have all grown up!¡± earth elite zombie said with his chest puffed high.

    However, in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, all six of them were still young children. Although Han Shuo knew that they could stay rtively safe in special environments with their special talents, nheless, he did not have the courage to let them leave his side.

    ¡°Father, we know about the general circumstances of this material ne. We n to head to different Dominions. Little Water will head to the Water Dominion, Little Wood will head to the Life Dominion, and et cetera. Since the people there all cultivate in the same type of energy, as long as we do not act out of line and invite trouble, I doubt we¡¯ll run into too much danger. Besides, it is only bying into contact with those mighty high-level lifeforms that we can evolve even faster and grow even stronger,¡± Little Skeleton continued trying to persuade Han Shuo while looking at him.

    All six of them gave their own words of persuasion one after another as though they had nned everything while in the Netherworld. They gave their reasons and how they nned to handle their enemies. Some words sounded childish while some were feasible. But nothing was done on impulse ¨C they had clearly thought it through over and over again.

    Han Shuo listened to the six little kids¡¯ justifications with a big bitter smile on his face. He suddenly felt as though his children had all grown up and could see their desire to make decisions for themselves. Although he felt gratified, he felt a much stronger feeling of reluctance.

    However, deep inside, Han Shuo knew that their arguments made sense. They had conquered the entire Netherworld and there was nothing in that world that could threaten them. This was simr to the situation back when Han Shuo wanted to leave Profound Continent for Elysium. He knew that it was a very boring and painful thing to stay in a world without any well-matched adversary ¨C especially with the knowledge that an even bigger sky was out there waiting to be conquered!

    After thinking about it from different angles and having listened to the endless pleading from the six little fes, rationality finally prevailed over his emotions. In the end, Han Shuo unwillingly nodded, saying, ¡°Fine. You¡¯ve convinced me. Going to separate Dominions could indeed be most suitable for your growths. However, you must promise me one thing.¡±

    ¡°We promise!¡± the six little guys said in unison.

    ¡°No matter what or how you must preserve your own lives!¡± Han Shuo was serious about the matter and warned yet again, ¡°It is only by staying alive that you will keep on getting stronger. Do not ever forget this!¡±

    ¡°Understood, Father. We will keep ourselves alive!¡± Little Skeleton nodded and replied. The other five also nodded.

    ¡°One more thing, we must stay in touch. Every fifty years, all seven of us will gather at Ethereal City, the main city of the Space Dominion. No matter the situation, every one of you must be present at the city every fifty years. The clock starts ticking from this day. Understand?¡±

    All six of them immediately agreed. They were overjoyed that they were allowed to roam the world by themselves.

    Seeing their excited faces, Han Shuo realized that his children had all grown up. They no longer wished to be bound by a small little Netherworld. There was nothing that he could do about this.

    Han Shuo then proceeded by exining everything he knew about the ne of Gods to the six little fes to help them quickly adapt to this new world, especially in identifying the dangers around them. He exined what they should pay attention to, what kind of people they must not trust, and every personal experience and insight he had. Regardless of whether or not they couldprehend everything, he imparted to them all his wisdom in life.

    After lecturing for two months straight, having exhausted all the topics that he could talk about and seeing that the six little fes were bored out of their minds, reluctantly, he came to a wastnd far from the City of Shadows and summoned the six from the Netherworld.

    At the time of their parting, Han Shuo reminded them yet again, ¡°Preserve your own lives. Make sure of that!¡± Even Han Shuo himself felt as though he had be a wordy old man.

    Having listened to Han Shuo talk for two months straight, the six little fes put on sour expressions when it seemed as though Han Shuo was going to give yet another lecture. They looked at Han Shuo with pitiful eyes, begging him to stop talking.

    ¡°In short, remember every word I said. Keep every single word in mind. Protect yourselves well, don¡¯t stir up trouble...¡± After a while, Han Shuo finally stopped the superfluous words. In a somewhat saddened manner, he said, ¡°Go ahead and don¡¯t embarrass yourselves. I won¡¯t be sending you off!¡±

    ¡°Father, we will make you proud of us!¡± the six little fes pledged. Although they too felt sad, it was tiny to the joy they felt. After saying goodbye to Han Shuo, they hastily left from his sight as though afraid that Han Shuo would continue to lecture them.

    After they turned into six small little dots andpletely disappeared from his sight, Han Shuo let out a sigh. He knew that this time after they left, they wouldn¡¯t be just a necromancy spell away from his side. Han Shuo felt both worried and excited for them. As he sighed over the separation, he wondered what his innately gifted kids would be in the future.

    Han Shuo had yet to recover from that saddened state when returning to the City of Shadows. At a checkpoint, Han Shuo again handed his divine tablet and a piece of purple crystal coin. An arrogant looking divine guard who received Han Shuo¡¯s divine tablet, after examining it, had a sudden change of attitude and expression.

    ¡°You are Bryan?¡± that arrogant divine guard suddenly became very polite as he asked Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo nodded and in a rather baffled manner, he asked, ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± Han Shuo did not use this checkpoint when entering the City of Shadows with Carmelita thest time. The divine guard couldn¡¯t have known him.

    ¡°That... Erm... Miss Carmelita is looking for you. If you are that Bryan, you should look for Miss Carmelita as soon as possible,¡± the divine guard returned Han Shuo¡¯s divine tablet with both hands. That piece of purple crystal coin was on his divine tablet. He didn¡¯t dare to take Han Shuo¡¯s money!

    Han Shuo put on a bitter smile after hearing those words. It was only now that he recalled the promise he made to Carmelita and that two months had indeed passed. It was also at this moment that Han Shuo realized just how influential Carmelita was in the City of Shadows. Even a divine guard at entry checkpoint would receive the information.

    ¡°Understood,¡± Han Shuo nodded. After casually taking back his divine tablet and the purple crystal coin, he proceeded to enter the city.

    ¡°Hey! Why doesn¡¯t that fe have to pay the entrance fee? He doesn¡¯t seem to be a member of the Sainte Family!¡± the few people who lined up behind Han Shuoined.

    ¡°Shut up! Don¡¯t you teach us how we should do our jobs. One more word and you will all be barred from entering the city!¡± that divine guard who was most polite and amiable towards Han Shuo abruptly turned austere and shouted in an irritated manner.

    Those few whoined immediately lowered their heads and shut their mouths when the divine guard chided.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mood suddenly lightened a little after seeing the faces of those people being chided and silenced. He inwardly remarked that it definitely felt pretty awesome to have special privileges.

    After having previously carried the injured Carmelita back to the Sainte Residence, those divine guards manning the front door recognized Han Shuo. Carmelita had given instructions beforehand, and a divine guard respectfully led Han Shuo all the way to the ce where Carmelita was cultivating.

    ¡°You scoundrel, where have you gone for so long? Quickly get up here now!¡± soon after Han Shuo walked into the Sainte Residence, Carmelita¡¯s voice sounded from a protruding tform at the top of a fifty-meter tall building.

    There were defensive barriers inside the Sainte Residence. Those whose strengths were below midgod realm wouldn¡¯t be able to ovee the power of the barrier to take to the air. Although Han Shuo could use his demonic arts to fly to Carmelita, doing so would expose his true strength. Therefore, he went up to the building by the stairs, step by step.

    ¡°Elder sister Kalina? You¡¯re here!¡± Han Shuo greeted in a friendly manner when he saw Kalina the one-eyed plump woman. He was rather surprised that she managed to survive and return to this ce.

    ¡°Hello, Bryan. It was all thanks to your rescue that the Lady and I could escape from that cave! I have not properly thanked you. Now that you havee, let me do so formally!¡± Kalina stood up as she said. She started performing the full formal Elysian etiquette towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°You are wee. I did what I had to to help. After all, we are partners!¡± Han Shuo said with a smile as he rushed over to Kalina, stopping her frompleting the entire ceremony.

    ¡°Alright, that¡¯s enough, Kalina. Go work on the things I have instructed,¡± Carmelita waved her hand and indicated to Kalina that she was dismissed. Kalina put on a smile and only left after she bowed at Han Shuo.

    After Kalina was gone, Carmelita said furiously, ¡°Goddamnit, those fes disappeared without a trace. When our men reached there, all that was left was a destroyed Heaven¡¯s Gift. How infuriating!¡±

    Han Shuo had in fact long expected this to be the ending. As Carmelita managed to escape with Han Shuo, the location of the Heaven¡¯s Gift would have surely been exposed. The party who intruded into the Darkness Dominion, had no other option than to escape as soon as possible. It would be a wonder if they had stayed behind to await their doom.

    ¡°So what if they escaped? You have memorized their faces. As long as you continue to investigate, you will eventually discover their trails. Then in the future when you be even mightier, you could even go into the Water Dominion and Life Dominion to finish them off. You will exact this vengeance!¡± Han Shuo consoled smilingly.

    ¡°It is always so delightful to talk to you! Hmph, I will soon find out the identities of those people. When I have healed from my injuries and if I learn of their positions, I¡¯m going to make them pay for the debt of blood!¡± Carmelita said ferociously.

    <i>You won¡¯t actually be that crazy to go into the Life and Water Dominion, right? You should know that if they discover your trails, you are going to die a very quick death!</i>Han Shuo suddenly felt that he shouldn¡¯t further provoke Carmelita¡¯s hatred.

    ¡°Right, where have you been hiding all this time? Why didn¡¯t youe to see me for so long?¡± Carmelita squinted her eyes and started interrogating Han Shuo.

    ¡°I learned a lot about the energy of destruction from you thest time. I have spent this time digesting and understanding the new information,¡± Han Shuo exined.

    Carmelita rolled her eyes and replied, ¡°You obviously cultivate in the energy of death. What does the knowledge about the energy of destruction have to do with you? Hell, you even went thinking about it blindly. This way of yours is not right at all. How are you going to seed in your cultivation of the energy of death?¡±

    Han Shuo smiled and did not exin. Carmelita didn¡¯t seem to be too concerned about Han Shuo¡¯s strength. She continued casually, ¡°Forget about it. Since you havee to visit me, I¡¯m going to present to you a great business opportunity.¡±

    ¡°What great business?¡± Han Shuo was stunned.

    ¡°Those medicinal pellets you gave me thest time were a miracle! I have spoken to my uncle and he too was very interested in that medicine of yours. Many of the members of our Sainte Family are assigned missions and dispatched to various ces from youth. And, of course, some inevitably get injured. But if we have that medicinal pellets of yours, we can greatly improve their likelihood of survival. I have discussed with my uncle, we want to formally invite you to work as the trump card pharmacist in our House of Sainte!¡± Carmelita said smilingly.

    ¡°Not interested. I don¡¯t want to be bound by any big family, not even your House of Sainte,¡± Han Shuo shrugged and declined this great opportunity that who knew how many others yearned for even in their dreams.

    ¡°Aha! I knew you would decline!¡± Carmelitaughed and said, ¡°Isn¡¯t that right? There are so many rules to follow once you join a big family n. But there are still fools out there who want to squeeze inside! Haha, actually, my intention is to have my uncle order that type of medicine from you while you set up a shop of this kind in the City of Shadows. Then, with me doing some promotions, you will surely make big money. In the City of Shadows, as long as you have money and influence, by umting some contributions, you can form your own little family n. Under my shield, no one will dare do anything to you. You can make money and still make up your own rules!¡± It appeared that Carmelita had nned out every step for Han Shuo long ago. She truly wanted to repay Han Shuo for saving hers and Kalina¡¯s lives.

    After hearing Carmelita¡¯s words, Han Shuo¡¯s eyes shone. He was getting somewhat tempted. By engaging in the business of selling medicinal pellets, not only could he umte wealth, but he also wouldn¡¯t risk exposing his identity or his true strength. ording to Carmelita¡¯s words, he might even have the opportunity to form his own family n. The prospect of this was indeed appealing to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo had promised Emily and the others that as soon as he gained a footing on Elysium, he would return to bring them over. Han Shuo had a lot of friends on Profound Continent. After learning about the exceptional advantage of cultivating on Elysium, Han Shuo was even more desperate to improve the strength of his friends.

    If Han Shuo could truly gain a footing in the City of Shadows, umte wealth, power, influence, and with the protection of the Sainte Family, his people¡¯s safety would be assured. With that, Emily and the others could move to Elysium much sooner.

    Seeing Han Shuo¡¯s glistening eyes, Carmelita knew that he couldn¡¯t resist. With the intention of repaying Han Shuo¡¯s favor, Carmelita struck while the iron was hot, saying, ¡°You can be assured that with your miraculous medicinal pills, you have bright prospects in the City of Shadows! After you have umted enough wealth and some contributions, I will plead to my father so that you can establish your own family n. By then, you can bring your friends from your homeworld over and use your wealth to recruit experts. The other four major family ns became what they are today by climbing up step by step the same way. If they could, so can you!¡±

    After listening to Carmelita¡¯s motivating and instigating words, Han Shuo finally made up his mind. He nodded and shouted, ¡°Alright! I shall work and im a piece of the City of Shadows for myself! Let¡¯s do this!¡±

 Chapter 702 - Celestial Pearl Pharmacy

    GDK 702: Celestial Pearl Pharmacy

    Inside one of the meeting rooms in the Sainte Residence, Carmelita and Andre were engaging in a discussion with Han Shuo sitting opposite to them, listening to their conversation intently.

    ¡°Uncle, those medicinal pellets should be at least a hundred ck crystal coins per pellet for it is just too efficacious and miraculous!¡± Carmelita argued.

    ¡°You girl, do you know how much a hundred ck crystal coins are worth? At least give some thought to the expenditures of your own family!¡± Andre shook his aching head while wearing a bitter smile.

    ¡°If I say that it¡¯s worth a hundred ck crystal coin, then it is worth that much. Uncle, do you not believe me?¡± Carmelita said, displeased.

    ¡°Well, I would at least have to try and find out if the medicinal pellet is so efficient first, right? I know you have a pretty good rtionship with Bryan, but still, you should keep private and public interests separated!¡± Andre sighed incessantly. He thought to himself, You have never taken charge of family n matters, how would you know about the struggles and constraints we face? If those medicinal pellets aren¡¯t worth the price, the first person your father will hold ountable is me, not you.

    ¡°Bryan, give him a pellet, let him test it on someone,¡± Carmelita casually instructed.

    Han Shuo casually handed a medicinal pellet to Andre and exined the method of using it. Han Shuo knew that Carmelita did all this for the purpose of helping himself and he was rather touched by her efforts.

    ¡°Bryan, you can rx. As long as the medicinal pellet is worth its price, with this girl by your side, we will not force down the price. We will talk about our cooperation in detail after I have tried this medicine,¡± Andre was very polite towards Han Shuo due to his rtionship with Carmelita.

    ¡°Of course!¡± Han Shuo nodded smilingly.

    Andre left with the medicinal pellet in his hand, probably on his way to put it to the test. Han Shuo was very confident in the Pill of Rejuvenation he had personally refined. He wasn¡¯t worried about the results at all.

    ¡°Alright, next, you should get a shop of your own. Only then can you grow the business,¡± Carmelita then continued with her brows furrowed, ¡°However, you only have less than three hundred ck crystal coins. That is far from enough to buy a shop lot. Although you could rent one, it¡¯ll be very troublesome. How about this, I will buy a shop lot for you first and you pay it back when you have enough crystal coins?¡±

    In the City of Shadows, Han Shuo could be considered as a wanderer. He usually rented and stayed inside a gymnasium. He knew that every inch of the soil of the City of Shadows cost money. Even a small shop lot was priced at at least several thousand ck crystal coins. The ck crystal coins currently in his possession were far from enough for him to purchase a shop lot.

    However, Han Shuo did not want to owe Carmelita too many favors. After thinking for a while, Han Shuo took out a piece of lightning element divine essence and handed it to Carmelita, saying, ¡°How many crystal coins is this divine essence worth?¡±

    Carmelita gasped. She looked at Han Shuo with astonishment and asked, ¡°How did youe to possess this divine essence?¡±

    Han Shuo casually fabricated a story about its origin. ¡°Last time in that valley, I discovered and picked up this piece from someone. How many crystal coins is it worth?¡±

    ¡°Divine essence is pretty valuable stuff. Hmm, this one should cost at least five thousand ck crystal coins. Damn, you really are a lucky one aren¡¯t you?¡± Carmelita received the divine essence from Han Shuo¡¯s hand and said, ¡°Alright, I know your intentions. I will exchange this divine essence for the shop you need. Rest assured, I can get anything done and settled.¡±

    Carmelita did not take much time to get things done especially when she was devoted to helping Han Shuo. Han Shuo saw that in just three days, she had gotten Han Shuo a shop located not too far from the Sainte Residence using that piece of divine essence. It was a three-storey shop around forty meters in height. Although it could only be considered a small shop in the City of Shadows, it couldn¡¯t have cost as little as five thousand ck crystal coins. Carmelita must have used her influence and identity to obtain this shop with just one piece of lightning energy divine essence.

    Carmelita¡¯s presence in itself had saved Han Shuo a ton of work and effort. Carmelita evenpleted all the procedures and paperwork on Han Shuo¡¯s behalf. On the fifth day, Han Shuo had officially moved into the small shop lot.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t hurried in filling the empty racks and counter with goods. Although the shop was small, he was extremely contented with it. At least, finally, he now had his own ce on Elysium. In the future, he no longer had to live in the gymnasiums around the City of Shadows.

    Of the three floors, Han Shuo left the bottom two floors empty and converted the topyer into a small gymnasium. Although it was merely two hundred square meters in size, it was more than enough for Han Shuo to y with. As with all things, getting started was always the hardest part. Han Shuo was incredibly busy with all kinds of work. He purchased some boundary towers and ced them on the third floor. Then, Carmelita, a highgod, helped Han Shuo deploy twoyers of barriers that would keep the third-floor stable, saving Han Shuo even more work.

    It was after the boundaries were deployed that the gymnasium on the third floor was finally usable. Following that, Han Shuo personally arranged the second floor by himself. He ced multiple enormous cabs filled with small boxy drawers, which he packed with the myriad of medicinal ingredients he had collected since arriving on Elysium. Other than that, he also purchased aplete set of bottles that pharmacists used. The ce appeared to be a properb for producing medicine.

    The second floor was merely deployed with barriers to prevent outsiders from eavesdropping and prying. Han Shuo could deploy those boundaries by himself and did not need Carmelita¡¯s help.

    Han Shuo did not refine medicine using tools and methodsmonly used by Elysian pharmacists. Instead, using some rare materials, he smelted his custom cooking cauldron specially used for refining medicines ¨C the Nine Tessetion Cauldron. Refining medicinal pellets would be much faster with this specialized tool. With those medicinal ingredients he had collected on Elysium, Han Shuo managed to produce three hundred Rejuvenation Pills.

    Elysium was the material ne with the most intense spirit aura, so the medicinal ingredients collected from this world were extraordinary. Han Shuo believed that the three hundred Pills of Rejuvenation would, therefore, have very obvious effects.

    Refining the three hundred Pills of Rejuvenation took Han Shuo yet another five days. Then, using the remaining medicinal ingredients he had, he refined several other types of pelleted medicines such as the Rebirth Pill, most suitable for children born in this world, as well as some Pill of Tranquility which promoted calmness, emptying a person¡¯s heart and mind, allowing one to betterprehend the true essence of their energy during cultivation.

    By the time Han Shuopletely used up all the medicinal ingredients he had, he umted over three hundred Rejuvenation Pills and two hundred medicinal pills of various functions. He packed them into dazzling and colorful medicinal bottles. It was only now that Han Shuo started to decorate the first floor of his shop meticulously. The medicinal bottles of different functions were put on disy.

    As Han Shuo had told Carmelita beforehand that he did not wish to be disturbed while he refined his medicines, during this period of time, Carmelita did note by to look for him.

    It was only two days after Han Shuo put the medicines on disy on the first floor and opened the tightly closed front doors that Carmelita and Andre came by to pay him a visit.

    Compared to the polite etiquette Andre previously disyed, the Andre who came by this time was much, much more cordial. Before he walked into the shop, he raised his head and chuckled when he read the name. ¡°Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. Haha, the name may be somewhat odd but in the future, this name will be known by all.¡±

    When Han Shuo, who was arranging his medicines on the first floor, heard Andre¡¯s cheerfulughter, he knew that Andre must have recognized the efficacy of the Rejuvenation Pellet he was given to try.

    Indeed, before Han Shuo could step outside to greet him, Andre and Carmelita had entered the shop smilingly. Andre did not beat about the bush and immediately said, ¡°Young man, we have tried that medicinal pellet that you made. Very good, very good indeed. The price of one hundred ck crystal coins per bottle is very reasonable!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, we havee here to purchase those medicinal pills. Oh, it¡¯s that one, Rejuvenation Pill!¡± Carmelita pointed at the rack disying purple colored medicinal bottles. She continued, ¡°Pack them all up, we are taking all three hundred bottles. Uncle, give him thirty thousand ck crystal coins!¡±

    But when Andre was about to take out his ck crystal coins, Han Shuo put on a bitter smile and said to Carmelita, ¡°I have only three hundred bottles for now. If you bought them all, I would have none left to sell. How about if you buy two hundred bottles first?¡±

    Andre stared nkly for a moment before quickly saying with an amiable smile, ¡°Of course, of course. In any case, your shop is just right over here. We will juste by again when you have produced more pills,¡±

    ¡°That would be best,¡± Han Shuo packed up two hundred bottles of Rejuvenation Pills and dly handed them to Andre. Simultaneously, Han Shuo was handed twenty thousand ck crystal coins.

    Twenty thousand ck crystal coins! That, on Elysium, was no small riches. Generally, a midgod could only earn around three thousand ck crystal coins after working for big family ns for ten years. Even a family n as big as the House of Sainte only paid around five thousand ck crystal coins to a midgod over the course of ten years.

    Those ingredients and herbs which Han Shuo had used in refining the Rejuvenation Pills were all collected from the mountain range in the surroundings. Even the process of refining them took just ten or so days. However, he had exchanged them for twenty thousand ck crystal coins just like that. Twenty thousand ck crystal coins were more than enough for Han Shuo to purchase a decent gymnasium in the City of Shadows!

    After collecting the heavy twenty thousand ck crystal coins, Han Shuo suddenly realized that it was indeed very profitable to rake in money by producing and selling medicinal pellets. If this trend continued, it wouldn¡¯t take too many years before he would umte wealth that only a small family n could possess. The sudden riches that fell into his pockets caused his imagination to roam. Even his heart started to fly.

    ¡°Oi, rascal!¡± Carmelita gently patted on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulder, startling Han Shuo out of his daydream, and continued, ¡°It¡¯s just twenty thousand ck crystal coins! How could you be so awed by that amount?! You need to think bigger if you¡¯re gonna get big!¡±

    Han Shuo put on a bright smile and replied, ¡°Haha, I know just how important it is to have crystal coins. I only had around three hundred ck crystal coins before this. To gain twenty thousand ck crystal coins all so suddenly and so soon after I set foot on Elysium, it is only natural that I would be absent-minded!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, this medicine of yours is magnificent! All the family ns in the City of Shadows would dispatch their members to various ces be steeled and tempered. Not only is it inevitable that they sustain injuries, but they also repeatedly get injured. Therefore, there will always be a demand for your medicinal pills. As long as you continue to supply it, it is only a matter of time before you be a very wealthy man here. There¡¯s no need to be too startled about this. In the future, we the House of Sainte will be here every day to order medicinal pellets for use during emergencies. You are going to get very busy!¡± Andre said as he chuckled.

    ¡°Well, I¡¯m most willing to ept crystal coins!¡± Han Shuo said jokingly. Then, after thinking for a moment, he took out three brilliant red pills from his space ring which immediately filled the air with sweet fragrances.

    ¡°They smell so good! What pills are those? What do they do?¡± Carmelita cried out in surprise.

    ¡°They are for you!¡± Han Shuo handed them to Carmelita and exined in a serious manner, ¡°This is a type of medicine I have specially refined to expel toxins. The strange disease you caught when you were young has left a small amount of toxins in your body. After you sessfully cultivated in the edict of destruction, naturally, those toxins could no longer do anything to your divine body. However, as they still remain inside your body, your skin has be coarse and... erm... not so good in appearance. I think these medicines will help improve your condition. Give it a try.¡±

    ¡°Wha- What?!¡± Carmelita was absent-minded while holding to those medicinal pills emanating fragrant scents. She murmured, ¡°It¡¯s been so many years. Is, is it still going to work?¡± Although Carmelita had been acting as though she did not mind her own appearance, she was still a woman. No woman would truly be unconcerned about this aspect of themselves.

    ¡°If Carmelita¡¯s condition improves, your shop will be the biggest shop in the City of Shadows. I will assure you of that!¡± Their House of Sainte had made many efforts to resolve this problem that had gued Carmelita for many years. They had invited countless pharmacists and tried every medicine. However, everyone told her that the divine energy in her body was just too powerful and therefore no medicine would produce any result. Unless she was willing to give up all the terrifying energy she had, they were powerless to do anything.

    Carmelita knew well the importance of being powerful, so why would she abandon all her strength? Therefore, she never was able to get rid of this sore point. With time, even she herself hadpletely given up on it. She had long epted her fate and no longer carried any hope.

    ¡°Bry- Bryan, is it really going to work?¡± Carmelita said, her voice quivering. She couldn¡¯t douse the hope rekindling in her heart.

    ¡°I can¡¯t promise that it will cure you but I¡¯m sure that it will have some effect! Just give it a shot!¡± Han Shuo replied. The medicine could certainly not turn Carmelita into a beauty overnight. However, if the toxins in her body were removed, at the very least, Carmelita wouldn¡¯t appear as hideous as she was.

    ¡°Huh? What¡¯s this new shop over here? Celestial Pearl Pharmacy? What a funny name! Teng Fei, do you think we should check it out?¡± a familiar voice sounded from outside. Not a momentter, Teng Fei, Cage, and his sister Eve walked into the shop.

    Andre¡¯s and Carmelita¡¯s backs were facing the trio. As soon as they saw Han Shuo standing in the middle, they tookrge strides and coldly groaned, ¡°Indeed, enemies are bound to cross paths!¡±

 Chapter 703 - Beaten black and blue

    GDK 703: Beaten ck and blue

    Han Shuo did not expect that so coincidentally, just a few days after his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy opened its doors for business his first few customers besides Carmelita and Andre would be this bunch from the House of Lavers.

    Cage, Teng Fei and Eve, who were walking into the shop, did not pay much attention to Andre and Carmelita whose backs they were facing. They thought that the two were just random, ordinary customers.

    A thought crossed Han Shuo¡¯s mind when he saw the three enter. He put on a mischievous smile and said, ¡°Sorry, the shop is closed for business right now. Please leave!¡±

    ¡°How could a shop be closed for business when the front doors are wide open?!¡± Teng Fei said with a warm smile. They did not leave as Han Shuo had instructed but walked further into the shop.

    ¡°You scum, don¡¯t you assume that because you and elder sister Donna have gotten friendly that you can think so highly of yourself. Let me tell you this, as long as you are not in our House of Lavers, not even elder sister Donna can protect you!¡± Cage was born arrogant and naturally did not care about Han Shuo¡¯s instructions. He continued to march inside withrge strides.

    Andre who was facing Han Shuo revealed feelings of displeasure on his face. However, he did not turn around. Carmelita¡¯s face, meanwhile, was filled with loathing. With her back facing the three, she coldly groaned, ¡°Uncultured bunch, he has said that the shop is not open for business. What are you still walking inside for?¡±

    ¡°And who might you be? Don¡¯t bother intervening in the business of our House of Lavers!¡± That pretty, youngdy Eve did not forget to once again announce her family name.

    But unfortunately for her, she did not know that she was, in fact, talking to the infamous woman of the House of Sainte ¨C the demon that no sane person in the City of Shadows would dare offend. The power and influence that Eve had were nothingpared to that which Carmelita possessed,

    ¡°Little whore, so what if you are from the Lavers? Has the City of Shadows be a territory of your House of Lavers?¡± Carmelita turned around and stared at Eve with her eerie, cold triangr eyes. The terrifying energy on her body faintly overflowed, inducing an immense feeling of intimidation.

    That terrifying demeanor that suddenly erupted from Carmelita, coupled with her malevolent and hideous face with ferocious eyes ring at Eve had frightened her so much that she shrieked, ¡°Monster!¡±

    Nothing could have enraged Carmelita more than that word!

    Carmelita¡¯s original intention was merely to intimidate Eve but this word that came out of her mouth hadpletely infuriated her. It was as though Eve had stabbed her at a sore point deep in her chest.

    A shadow shed through. Nobody saw how it happened but in an instant, Carmelita was buckling Eve by her fair neck. She was raised high into the air. Carmelita stared at Eve with her triangr eyes and questioned coldly, ¡°What did you say? Say it again. I dare you!¡±

    Eve was kicking at the empty air with her legs. Her face was filled with unrestrainable fear. With her neck tightly buckled by Carmelita, she couldn¡¯t utter a word even if she wanted to talk. It was only at this moment that the terrified Eve knew who she was facing. Her heart was even more crammed with terror.

    Eve¡¯s older brother, Cage, was perspiring profusely. Seeing that his sister¡¯s life could be taken at any moment, he hastily knelt down on one knee and pleaded piteously, ¡°Miss Carmelita, my little sister is silly and immature. Please forgive her slip of the tongue. We the House of Lavers have been loyal and devoted to assisting the House of Sainte in all kinds of governmental affairs for many years. Your Merciful Ladyship, please spare her for the sake of our Lavers Family!¡±

    Teng Fei who came along with the siblings was long aware of the reputation of this devilish woman. He too was growing anxious. But as he wasn¡¯t an inhabitant of the City of Shadows, his words carried no weight here. He could only stare at Carmelita in shock and silence.

    ¡°Ahem...¡± Andre gently cleared his throat after turning around. He first bunched his brows and looked at Cage drenched in cold sweat. Shortly after, he turned to the maddened Carmelita and advised, ¡°The House of Lavers has indeed performed well all these years. Although this youngdy is wrong to have spoken so offensively and should be taught a lesson, she is not to be killed.¡±

    ¡°I know I¡¯m ugly, but for so many years, never has anyone had the guts to say those words right to my face. Today, however, I could not have foreseen that I would run into someone so unafraid of death. Hehe... good... very good. You said I look like a monster? Well then, let¡¯s make you look like one as well!¡± Carmelita said with an evil grin smeared across her face. A knife appeared in her grasp out of nowhere as she threatened to disfigure Eve.

    It was only at this moment that Han Shuo recognized just how domineering and menacing Carmelita was. He used to be rather skeptical about some of the hearsay regarding Carmelita because, in all this while, Han Shuo had only seen the good side of Carmelita. After witnessing Carmelita having no qualms about disfiguring Eve of the Lavers Family, Han Shuo finally realized why every person in the City of Shadows was so terrified of her.

    Han Shuo sighed. He knew that he had to step in. No matter the offense that Evemitted, for the sake of Donna, he could not sit and watch. Otherwise, this might bring about an irreparable crack in their friendly rtions.

    Han Shuo appeared beside Carmelita in a sh. Before her knife could pierce Eve¡¯s tender skin, Han Shuo unrestrainedly fanned his big hand on Eve¡¯s cheeks. <i>PapPapPap... PapPapPap... </i>A rhythmic pping noises started to y. After some time, Eve¡¯s cheeks became as swollen a pig¡¯s head. Anyone wouldugh at her appearance.

    ¡°Look at her, does that look like the face of a pig?¡± said Han Shuo to an astonished Carmelita, who was still holding a knife in her hand.

    Carmelita¡¯s rage greatly diminished after watching Han Shuo p this beautifuldy into a pigdy. She couldn¡¯t help butugh wickedly, saying, ¡°Indeed, she looks just like a gilt! Bryan, you really are quite skillful to make both sides equally swollen. Hehe...¡±

    The terrified Eve was beaten half-conscious by Han Shuo¡¯s pping. She was in a daze and had absolutely no idea what just happened. Her eyes were filled with confusion.

    ¡°Alright, alright, let¡¯s not waste any more of our time and energy on this type of people. I will drive them out!¡± Han Shuo said to Carmelita smilingly while casually grabbing Eve from her hands. After the round of pping, Carmelita¡¯s mood improved a little. She did not continue with her n of disfiguring Eve but loosened her grasp for Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo heaved a sigh of relief. After taking the muddle-headed Eve from Carmelita, he pushed her at the startled Cage. While winking at Cage, he shouted furiously, ¡°This shop has yet to officially open for business! Go away!¡±

    Cage was jolted by Han Shuo¡¯s loud shout and he hastily caught the staggering Eve. After giving Han Shuo a strange look, he started exiting the shop with Eve and did not look back. Teng Fei stared nkly for a moment before he gave Han Shuo an amiable smile and left with the siblings.

    Soon after the three left the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, Eve atst sobered up from the daze. She shrieked and cried loudly at once, perhaps because she discovered her new pig-like face. She was blurting out something as she cried mournfully. After focusing his attention to listen in for a while, Han Shuo heard something about wanting to kill him. Han Shuo sneered and inwardly remarked that Eve was indeed so brainless to not realize that she was rescued.

    After the trio left some distance away, Andre turned to Han Shuo and gave him a look of praise. It was only natural that a character as influential and powerful as him could make out the true intentions behind Han Shuo¡¯s assault on Eve. The House of Lavers was a considerably big family n in the City of Shadows. If Carmelita was to disfigure Eve for a matter as small as this, it would appear as though the House of Sainte was overly oppressive. Han Shuo¡¯s sudden intervention had indirectly helped him. This improved the favorable impression Andre had towards Han Shuo. He noted that although Han Shuo¡¯s strength was poor, his conduct and judgment was worthy of praise.

    ¡°Count her unlucky. If you did not turn her into a pig head, I would have turned her into a real monster!¡± Carmelita said angrily.

    ¡°Alright, I believe that¡¯s all the business we will do for today. And you, you have a medicine to try so I¡¯ll let you go!¡± Han Shuo said in all smiles. He was very casual when talking with Carmelita.

    Carmelita was dying to know the efficacy of Han Shuo¡¯s medicine. Therefore, after hearing those words, she nodded and replied, ¡°I will go try it immediately!¡± Carmelita thanked Han Shuo and returned to the Sainte Residence excitedly, leaving her uncle Andre behind.

    Andre was very understanding of his niece¡¯s temperament and naturally wouldn¡¯t take offense about it. After watching Carmelita hastily leave Han Shuo¡¯s Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, Andre turned around and smiled at Han Shuo. He nodded and said, ¡°Young man, I owe you thanks. If it wasn¡¯t for your quick-witted response, that youngdy would likely have been disfigured. Although my House of Sainte isn¡¯t afraid if that happens, it nheless will trouble us. We might even be used of bullying the House of Lavers.¡±

    ¡°When I first arrived on Elysium, Miss Donna of the Lavers Family was very caring of me. Although the few of them might be prejudiced against me, for Donna¡¯s sake, I cannot stand and do nothing. You don¡¯t have to thank me. I only did it because I don¡¯t want to go against my conscience,¡± Han Shuo told the truth as it was. He did not intervene to help Andre and the Sainte Family.

    However, after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s exnation, Andre became even more admiring of Han Shuo. He praised, ¡°Very good! Repaying kindness is a virtue. It¡¯s excellent that you adhere to this virtue! Carmelita has indeed found a worthy friend. Right, don¡¯t worry, I will go say hello to the patriarch of the Lavers Family. That young guy named Cage is no fool either and he should know you did so out of good intentions. They likely won¡¯t give you trouble for it.¡±

    ¡°I hope so!¡± while Eve was leaving, Han Shuo had heard her repeatedly shout about killing him while weeping grievously. Although he had saved her from being disfigured, if she was not wise enough to see that and instead selectively remember being pped, well, it was really hard to say if she would give him trouble!

    ¡°Alright, no matter what, I owe you one for this favor of yours. I should make a move now. Goodbye,¡± Andre said smilingly and waved his hand as he departed from the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    There were many more who entered the shop after Andre and Carmelita left. However, as the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy did not have a reputation yet, with the described effects of the medicinal pellet sounding exaggerated to most people, on top of the expensive price tag, although there had been much human traffic, no one was willing to spend so many ck crystal coins to make a purchase, not even the cheapest Pill of Rejuvenation.

    However, Han Shuo did not feel anxious about it. He believed that with Carmelita¡¯s promotion and with Andre¡¯s assistance, those medicinal pellets he refined with utmost care would one day sell like cupcakes. He even believed that the day wouldn¡¯t be too distant.

    As to express his gratitude for Carmelita¡¯s assistance, Han Shuo refined a few medicinal pellets for eliminating toxins from her body. Once those medicines took effect, Carmelita¡¯s unsightly skin would see some improvement. Given how active and involved she was in the City of Shadows, it wouldn¡¯t take long before the entire city learned of his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    Most of those gods who entered Han Shuo¡¯s shop would be shocked by the astronomical prices. Even some of those gods with sufficient purchasing power were unwilling to risk their money, as they had no idea if they would be that efficacious. Therefore, for five days straight, although many had walked into Han Shuo¡¯s shop, not a single one of them purchased a thing.

    Han Shuo would sit on the first floor and rest his eyes when it was empty. Sometimes, he would be silently watching the people walking around his shop or exin to the potential customers every now and then. He lived in leisure during those initial days.

    Then one day, a beautiful woman walked into the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. She had long brown hair that trailed over her shoulders, dark, luscious eyebrows, bright eyes, a tall nose, and bright red lips. She had a pair of beautiful slender legs. She carried a modest but elegant and refined quality. In that sky-blue skin-tight battle suit, the wonderful curves and contours of her body were clearly emphasized.

    Having lived in the City of Shadows for some time, Han Shuo hade across a lot of women. However, he had only seen a few who were as beautiful as she was. Perhaps only Donna¡¯s appearance couldpare to hers. Although Han Shuo was rather surprised to see such a beautiful woman walk into his pharmacy, he did not behave particrly passionately. He merely continued to sit leisurely and carefreely in his seat while looking over his shop.

    After the beauty entered the shop, a party of young men who seemed to be her suitors followed and dispersed around her as though she was the center of the universe. Those men too were wearing battle suits. They seemed to have juste out from a gymnasium.

    ¡°Miss Jiya, why would youe into a shop like this? The way I see it, this shop isplete bullshit. I truly can¡¯t understand how they would have the guts to sell all these medicines at such an ungodly price!¡± a golden-haired young man with a handsome appearance and a tall and straight body scornfully remarked after seeing the price tags.

    However, that beauty named Jiya did not pay attention to the words of that golden-haired young man. She looked around with her beautiful eyes before resting her gaze on Han Shuo. She faintly smiled and asked in a rather interested manner, ¡°Excuse me, are you the owner of this pharmacy?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded but did not stand up to wee her. He replied in a casual manner, ¡°Yes, I am. The medicines all have clearly marked prices and the functions are clearly written on them so I will not waste words exining. Please help yourself. If you¡¯d like to purchase, you may do so with crystal coins. But if you are skeptical of their efficacy, you may leave the pharmacy silently. Thank you for your cooperation,¡± Han Shuo had tried being enthusiastic to his potential customers a few days before. However, in the end, not a single person was willing to spend money. Therefore, he has now bing toozy to make any unnecessary exnation. He had decided to count on Carmelita to promote his pharmacy instead.

    However, Han Shuo¡¯s indifferent and arrogant attitude seemed rather strange to these people. In every shop, the owner would try to sell as many things in their shop as quickly as possible and they would be very enthusiastic towards any potential customer. Han Shuo¡¯s apathetic and inattentive attitude, in fact, seemed rather insulting to these people.

    ¡°Are you actually doing business?¡± That beauty named Jiya obviously did not anticipate that there would be a shop owner like Han Shuo and never thought that he would be so impolite. She immediately called him out with baffled eyes.

    <i>Merely in lowgod realm, weak, no symbol of any big family n. He should be an outsider as I have never seen him before. Is he trying to do business or not?</i> Jiya thought as she looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oi, you there, do you do business or do you not? The City of Shadows is big but I have never met any shop owner as arrogant as you. You are new to the city, aren¡¯t you? You obviously are, because you did not even recognize Miss Jiya! Have you not heard of the House of Kinson?¡± that golden-haired man was displeased by Han Shuo¡¯s arrogance.

    <i>Kinson Family, one of the five major family ns. Oh, no wonder... So this is her... </i> After being reminded by the golden-haired man, Han Shuo immediately recalled about Jiya¡¯s identity.

    She was the daughter of the patriarch of the Kinson Family. She cultivated in the energy of fighting aura and possessedte-stage midgod strength. She was one of the well-known youngsters in the City of Shadows.

    Jiya wasn¡¯t just famous for her beauty. She was also known for going against the wishes of her family for her to cultivate in either the energy of death, destruction, or darkness. Instead, she cultivated in the energy of fighting aura which was not as mainstream on Elysium. But nheless, her cultivation of fighting aura was fruitful, exceeding many others of her age.

    Jiya who had cultivated tote-stage midgod realm was more powerful than Donna who was at midstage midgod realm although being younger than Donna. This alone was very impressive. In the City of Shadows, Jiya was only second to Carmelita in terms of talent.

    ¡°Of course I have heard of the Kinson Family. But still, such is the practice of my shop. The price and uses are written very clearly so I don¡¯t think that there is anything that I need to exin. If you wish to buy something, go ahead. If you don¡¯t, just leave the shop, lest you get in the way of other customers,¡± Han Shuo said unhurriedly. He was calm and unperturbed.

    ¡°How, how dare you talk to me like that! Say that again and I¡¯ll tear your shop down!¡± that golden-haired young man, not wanting to appear weak before Jiya, suddenly shouted furiously. He thought that Han Shuo was a neer to the city and has no one to back him.

    Han Shuo squinted his eyes. In an eerie and cold expression, he replied, ¡°Do it. I dare you.¡±

 Chapter 704 - Take my money!

    GDK 704: Take my money!

    ¡°You asked for it!¡± After being incited by Han Shuo, the golden-haired youngster rolled up his sleeves and was prepared to demolish the shop.

    ¡°Edmund!¡± Jiya shouted in her lovable voice before she continued, ¡°This ce is just around the Sainte Residence. You really want to pick a quarrel here?¡±

    The golden-haired young man stared nkly for a moment. He sized Han Shuo up with contemptuous eyes before replying, ¡°Being in close proximity to the Sainte Residence doesn¡¯t necessarily mean the business is associated with the Sainte Family. Besides, this fe is obviously a neer. What is there about him that I have to be afraid of?¡±

    Jiya, however, did not share the same opinion. She observed that Han Shuo had not revealed the slightest bit of fear and sat in a confident posture, giving her a hunch that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t as helpless as he appeared on the surface. Seeing that Edmund wouldn¡¯t listen to her advice, Jiya hastily distanced herself, saying, ¡°Well then, that will be your own choice. I¡¯m not going to help you if the matter esctes.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, what can happen to me? It¡¯d be a wonder if I can¡¯t handle this fe,¡± Edmund reached out to grab at a cab. He seemed determined to mess with Han Shuo.

    ¡°Stop!¡± A shout that could not be more timely suddenly sounded from the outside. In the blink of an eye, Anito, the green-haired young man who had previously detained Han Shuo, entered the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy along with a team of divine guards.

    The first thing that Anito did after entering the shop was greet Han Shuo in a friendly manner. Quickly after that, he turned to Edmund and looked at him with cold eyes, saying, ¡°Young master Edmund, what do you intend on doing?¡±

    Edmund, who nearly destroyed a cab, did not expect that divine guards from the Third Corps would appear all so suddenly. He stared nkly for a moment before forcing augh and said, ¡°Nothing, just taking a closer look!¡±

    ¡°The City of Shadows has its rules. Even if you are born in a big family n, that doesn¡¯t mean you can take advantage of your position to bully others. Please behave yourself with some sense of propriety and don¡¯t make things difficult for us,¡± Anito lectured righteously while looking at him rather unhappily.

    ¡°Of course!¡± Edmund reaffirmed over and over.

    ¡°I hope that¡¯s the case!¡± Anito nodded. Right after, he said to Han Shuo with a courteous smile, ¡°We won¡¯t be far. If any of your customers are acting inappropriately, we are only one call away.¡± After finishing those words, Anito swept a cold nce at Edmund, bowed slightly towards Jiya, and left the pharmacy with his divine guards.

    Anito was a leader of one of the subgroups in the Third Corps. He could be considered part of the House of Sainte. After learning about the friendly rtions between Han Shuo and Carmelita, fearing that Han Shuo would hold grudges for events in the past, he had visited Han Shuo just to apologize to him. Although Han Shuo had told him that it was no big deal, Anito nheless did not feelpletely reassured. Therefore, during the recent period of time, out of his own initiative, he closely guarded this area along with a group of divine guards.

    Han Shuo was long aware that Anito was just around the corner and understood that he purposely did so to curry favor with him. That was the reason behind Han Shuo not having the slightest fear about Edmund¡¯s threat. And indeed, Anito had ¡®coincidentally¡¯e by to interrupt him at the most critical moment.

    ¡°You may be lucky today, but you won¡¯t stay lucky forever!¡± Edmund said grudgingly after Anito left.

    ¡°If you aren¡¯t buying anything, get out of here and don¡¯t interfere with my business,¡± Han Shuo again sneered at him, asking him to leave in a not-so-polite manner.

    Edmund knew that he couldn¡¯t do anything to Han Shuo on that day. Therefore, he red ravenously at Han Shuo for a moment and left the pharmacy. A few of his close friends followed him out.

    Jiya, however, was not one of them. Instead, she was beginning to take a keen interest in Han Shuo. She was even more observant than Edmund was. From Anito¡¯s performance and Han Shuo¡¯s calmness, she had a feeling that Han Shuo was not as simple as he appeared. Her original intention was merely to look around the shop. However, because of this incident, an idea crossed her mind.

    After casually strolling around the first floor, Jiya pointed at a Pill of Tranquility priced at five hundred ck crystal coins and said to Han Shuo smilingly, ¡°Give me a bottle of this!¡±

    ¡°Miss Jiya, how, how could you believe this guy? It¡¯s five hundred ck crystal coins! He¡¯s robbing you!¡± the few young men who did not leave the pharmacy were appalled and immediately protested Jiya.

    Han Shuo looked at Jiya somewhat astonished before he finally got up from his chair. He came to Jiya¡¯s side, removed the boundary on the shelf, took out a medicinal bottle containing a Pill of Tranquility, and handed it to Jiya calmly. He said, ¡°To reap the greatest benefit, use this when you are contemting the true essence of your energy. You will find the correct method of using the medicine clearly described on the bottle.¡±

    ¡°Here¡¯s five hundred ck crystal coins,¡± Jiya received the medicine bottle from Han Shuo¡¯s hand with a faint smile and ced the five hundred ck crystal coins on the shelf. Then, with her bright eyes fixed on Han Shuo, she said smilingly, ¡°I will remember your words. Thank you.¡±

    Jiya put on yet another sweet smile. She walked outside while twirling the delicate medicine bottle with her dainty, long fingers. But right before she stepped outside of the shop, she turned around to look at Han Shuo and said, ¡°If it doesn¡¯t work, I wille back here to get you. I won¡¯t let you off if you have deceived me, not even if you are a member of the Sainte Family.¡±

    Han Shuo put on an indifferent face and shrugged. He thought to himself, <i>The Celestial Pearl Pharmacy has found another backer.</i>

    For the next few days after that, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy still had zero sales. Therefore, Han Shuo decided to temporarily close the shop for business and stay on the third floor to cultivate. He thought that after Carmelita saw the benefits from her medicine, she would definitely help Han Shuo in promoting his shop. By then, instead of him waiting for customers, it would be the customers that were waiting for him.

    It had been nearly half a year since the incident at Miasma Cloud Mountain. His avatar of destruction that stayed inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon had finally advanced one step further and reached thete-stage lowgod realm. Those divine essences of destruction he obtained thest time could finally be useful again and therefore Han Shuo continued absorbing them.

    During the time Han Shuo closed his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy for business and cultivated, he had no idea that amotion in the City of Shadows about his pharmacy was rapidly brewing.

    On this day, Donna, who had been preparing to depart for the Space Dominion, returned from a fort under the control of her Lavers Family. Soon after she returned to the Lavers Residence, her cousin, Eve, wentining to her weepingly, ¡°Elder sister Donna, I, I was beaten!¡±

    The swelling and bruises on her face had yet to fully subside and she still appeared horrible. Although Donna was stern towards her younger cousins, they knew that Donna was actually very caring of them.

    ¡°What happened? Who did this? Why didn¡¯t your father give you justice?¡± Donna hastily asked after seeing Eve¡¯s appearance.

    ¡°Father does not allow me to retaliate, my brother wouldn¡¯t help me either. I was beaten for nothing!¡± Eve wept ceaselessly.

    ¡°What did that? There aren¡¯t many in our City of Shadows who darey their hands on you... Could it be... someone from the Sainte Family?¡± Donna furrowed her eyebrows and continued angrily, ¡°How unbridled! Tell me who did this. I¡¯m acquainted with Carmelita. Tell me and I¡¯ll ask Carmelita to teach them a lesson!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s... it¡¯s that friend you brought over thest time... I think... I think his name is Brian...¡± Eve muttered as she sobbed, her face filled with grief.

    ¡°Wha... what?¡± Donna was taken aback. She softly cried out, ¡°How is this possible? Even if you had offended him, he would have given me face and wouldn¡¯t have beaten you into this. Have you mistaken him for someone else?¡± Donna felt that something wasn¡¯t right about Eve¡¯s ount. From her experiences with Han Shuo, she did not feel that he was a person who would do such a thing.

    ¡°Really! It really was him!¡± Eve shrieked, ¡°My brother was there, he can bear witness. Oh, Teng Fei was there too!¡±

    ¡°I will go ask your brother,¡± Donna was very skeptical of the im. Soon enough, she located Cage in a friendly match with Teng Fei in the gymnasium. Cage held grievances towards Han Shuo. Although he knew that Han Shuo did that out of good intention, he nheless remained prejudiced against Han Shuo. Hoping to damage the rtionship between Donna and Han Shuo, Cage told Donna a distorted version of what happened.

    Han Shuo, instead of rescuing Eve from being disfigured, became a big bully who exploited his friendly rtions with Carmelita. He did not dare to make Carmelita the antagonist and therefore pushed all the me on Han Shuo. If Cage¡¯s ount was true, Han Shuo would be a despicable, unredeemable viin who repaid kindness with cruelty.

    ¡°Teng Fei, is that the case?¡± Donna knew the temperaments of her cousins and therefore was still rather skeptical. Thus, she turned to Teng Fei who was looking at her attentively to seek verification. She thought that Teng Fei would tell the truth as he was not directly involved with the matter.

    Unfortunately, as Teng Fei had subconsciously taken Han Shuo as apeting suitor for Donna, in addition to his friendly rtions with Cage, he chose to back Cage¡¯s lie. Teng Fei did not rebuke the story but nodded affirmatively.

    Donna only became somewhat convinced of the story when Teng Fei affirmed it. She revealed a trace of anger on her face as she murmured, ¡°I did not expect him to be this kind of person! He hurt Eve for such a trivial matter in the gymnasium. He didn¡¯t even consider showing a littlepassion for my sake...¡±

    Seeing the anger on Donna¡¯s face, Cage and Teng Fei exchanged a suggestive nce. They almost looked oddly satisfied with themselves. Even their fighting powers were significantly raised in the following friendly match.

    ***At the Kinson Residence.

    Jiya, who was carefully contemting about the energy of fighting aura in her secret chamber suddenly woke up from her meditative state. With a brandish of the silvery longsword in her hand, the entire chamber was filled with magnificent radiances, as dazzling and blinding as the brightness of a thousand stars.

    After withdrawing the radiances off her sword, Jiya stood up with a big smile. Then, after carefully putting the longsword away, her bright eyes suddenly turned to a medicine bottle lying on the floor of the secret chamber. With a wave of her hand, the medicine bottle marked ¡®Pill of Tranquility¡¯ flew into her palm. Her eyes were filled with an intense feeling of awe as she muttered, ¡°Pill of Tranquility, what a miraculous medicine. It actually helped me condense my fighting aura one whole level higher. The price of five hundred ck crystal coins is such a bargain!¡±

    Very quickly, Jiya exited her secret chamber and energetically came to a quiet and peaceful courtyard. As soon as she entered, she loudly yelled, ¡°Mom, give me one hundred thousand ck crystal coins. I need it urgently!¡±

    Beth, a beauty just like Jiya, albeit a little more mature and graceful, looked at Jiya with an astonished gaze. She then knitted her brows and criticized, ¡°Don¡¯t you remember what I have always taught you? We, the House of Kinson, are a big and prestigious family n in the City of Shadows. You must always keep a certain basic etiquette in mind...¡±

    ¡°Yes I know, Mother. Hurry and give me a hundred thousand ck crystal coins, I have urgent use for it!¡± Jiya asked as she pulled Beth¡¯s arm like a spoiled child.

    ¡°My girl, haven¡¯t I given you plenty of allowance for your daily use? A hundred thousand ck crystal coin is no small figure. This will need to be recorded on the family ounts. Exin to me what you intend to do with the money,¡± Beth replied in a somewhat annoyed manner as she straightened out Jiya¡¯s hair.

    ¡°It¡¯s like this, there¡¯s a new shop in the city called the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy...¡± Jiya knew that she had to clearly exin everything or her mother wouldn¡¯t hand her the money.

    After a long while...

    Beth cried out in surprise, ¡°Is it really that miraculous?¡±

    ¡°Of course, mother. Do you not trust your own daughter? I have used it myself and I¡¯m very clear just how much the medicine has helped me. It¡¯s true! Five hundred ck crystal coins is an absolute bargain! We must act now and buy it over while the other family ns are still unaware of the pharmacy. This is not merely about the value of crystal coins...¡± Jiya said hurriedly.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, I will head there with you.¡± After listening to Jiya¡¯s exnation, Beth understood that those medicines could potentially be an opportunity to increase the overall strength of her family n. She immediately made this her top priority and right away, she took some crystal coins and left the Kinson Residence with Jiya.

    ***At the Sainte Residence. Carmelita walked out from her gymnasium.

    ¡°Woah! My Lady, your, your face! Your face!¡± Kalina immediately put on an expression of disbelief and cried out in surprise when she saw Carmelita.

    Carmelita¡¯s skin that was originally bumpy and abnormally pigmented had obviously be much fairer and smoother. It was the same with her arms. This transformation was enough to make her appear much less malevolent and sinister. Although she still looked ugly, her new look was much more eptable to the eye.

    ¡°I know, I know,¡± Carmelita replied in a somewhat annoyed manner. But after taking out a small mirror to look at herself, she startedughing loudly as though very pleased with herself.

    ¡°Miss Carmelita, you have changed, a lot!¡± the divine guards and maids she met along the way gently cried out.

    ¡°Eh? Girl, why do you seem to look different now... Eh? You look fairer! How, how is this possible?!¡± a few of her aunts and rtives she met along her way cried out.

    ¡°Wahaha... Wahaha... I¡¯m not dreaming, I¡¯m definitely not dreaming...¡± Carmelita eximed andughed in a strange manner as she headed outside of the Sainte Residence.

    Andre who was working on family n matters on the top of a building had his attention caught by Carmelita¡¯s yelling. When he looked down, he froze. With an appalled face, he uttered, ¡°It... it actually worked!¡± Andre immediatelyid down the work in his hands and flew towards Carmelita.

    Han Shuo, who was cultivating on the third floor of his shop suddenly heard morous noises outside his building. After expanding his consciousness, Han Shuo discovered that nearly a hundred people had gathered outside his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. They were all chanting, ¡°Open up! Open the door! We want to buy your celestial medicine!¡±

 Chapter 705 - Hustle and bustle

    GDK 705: Hustle and bustle

    Han Shuo was startled that a rowdy crowd had gathered in front of his shop all so suddenly. It took him no time to realize what these people were there for. He came down from the gymnasium cheerfully and opened the front door of his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy that had been shut for some time.

    Han Shuo could recognize many characters from among those gathered in front of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, namely, Carmelita whose skin had be whiter, Andre who was wearing a big smile, Jiya who had previously purchased a bottle of Pill of Tranquility, Donna and a few youngsters from the Lavers Family.

    However, Han Shuo did not recognize the majority of the people there. Each and every one of them sinned the most gorgeous garments. There were young, old, and all ages in between. They were chatting with each other as they blocked up the front door of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. There were also a few gods who were obviously if meager status surrounding those people. Many of them chanted, ¡°Open up! Open the door!¡±

    ¡°Damnit, why are so many people suddenly gathered here?!¡± Jiya, standing among the crowd, grumbled in a low voice.

    ¡°We did not want the news to disperse but Carmelita caught too much attention. Everyone in the City of Shadows knows how she used to look. The sudden transformation to her skin was simply the greatest advertisement possible for Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. Besides, she raved about this pharmacy to everyone she saw. You can¡¯t expect this ce not to be packed with people.¡± Beth the upper-ss woman standing beside Jiya also felt rather disappointed when she realized her ns to monopolize the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy likely wouldn¡¯t work.

    After opening the front doors, Han Shuo swept his eyes across the crowd and asked a question he already knew the answer to. ¡°Hello, people. How can I help you?¡±

    Carmelita jumped, stepped on the heads of a few others andnded right before Han Shuo before she said excitedly, ¡°Rascal, look at me! Notice anything different?¡± Those people that were stepped on groaned but tactfully shut their mouths right after seeing it was Carmelita.

    ¡°What is there to see? I long knew that the medicine will work,¡± Han Shuo replied smilingly.

    ¡°Bryan, make a few more bottles of those medicines for me. Make sure you hurry!¡± Carmelita smiled mischievously and immediately demanded from Han Shuo with no reservations.

    ¡°Here are five bottles. I got these ready for you long ago,¡± Han Shuo carefully withdrew five small bottles and handed them to Carmelita before the crowd. He could not be more delighted about Carmelita¡¯s publicly endorsing and promoting his pharmacy.

    Carmelita stuck out her hand and grabbed the bottles, stowing them away like treasure. She carefreely patted on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulder and said, ¡°Thanks, Bryan. You are truly an unimaginably amazing fe!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, name a price for those medicines. I will pay youter,¡± Andre gently shouted from among the crowd. His voice wasn¡¯t too loud but was enough to ovee the morous noise and for everyone to hear it.

    Andre was standing by himself not too far away. Those people standing around him maintained a distance from him. After they heard Andre speak, the originally morous crowd suddenly turned quiet.

    Andre was the person in charge of the finances of the House of Sainte and he indirectly controlled the economy of the City of Shadows. As most businesses required Andre¡¯s nod of approval to be able to prosper, in addition to the fact that his strength was extraordinary, Andre held an extremely high status in the City of Shadows.

    Given his identity, for fear that their voices might block Andre¡¯s and therefore make him unhappy, it was only natural that the crowd would turn silent. For most businessmen in the City of Shadows, Andre was a figure even more important than Wace, the City Lord.

    ¡°These medicines are meant to be given out. They are not for sale and cannot be bought. It is a gift from me to my friend, so don¡¯t pay me for it!¡± Han Shuo put on a bright smile and refused to be reimbursed.

    Andre was stunned for a bit but he did not force Han Shuo to ept his money. He nodded, smiled and said, ¡°Well then, erm, I will buy every medicine that is for sale in your shop at any price you quote. Will that do?¡±

    ¡°How will that do? We have waited here for so long, how could you buy everything just like that!¡±

    ¡°You can¡¯t just buy everything! That is not fair to us!!!¡±

    ¡°Have you ever heard of firste first serve? We have been standing here for ages, you can¡¯t just cut the queue and buy everything!¡±

    The crowd yet again became morous and nearly every person there was protesting. It appeared that Han Shuo¡¯s medicines were indeed the subject of much temptation, so much so that it gave these people the courage to loudly object to the proposal of the powerful Andre.

    Andre did not foresee that his suggestion would invite the unanimous opposition of everyone gathered. He stared nkly for a moment before he forced a smile and said, ¡°Bryan, you decide.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded. While forcefully repressing the ecstasy in his heart, he announced, ¡°Since everyone has been so supportive and waited so patiently, of course I cannot let any of you leave empty-handed. Alright, how about this, everyone is limited to three bottles regardless of your identity or status. This will ensure that everyone will get to enjoy the benefits of my medicines!¡±

    ¡°Yay! Hurray!¡± those among the crowd who knew that their status was not prestigious enough cheered loudly. Beth from the Kinson Family who was about to put forward her suggestion sighed helplessly. She said to the disgruntled Jiya beside her, ¡°There¡¯s nothing we can do now. It appears that he won¡¯t be dividing the medicines by families.¡±

    ¡°We are so unlucky. We were the first to get here but that scoundrel just so happened to have his doors closed. Otherwise, all those medicines would belong to the House of Kinson now,¡± Jiya said in a dissatisfied manner before saying regretfully, ¡°If I had known earlier, I would have at least brought over a group of our divine guards. Then we could take advantage of the per head quota.¡±

    ¡°Alright, alright, stop grumbling. What¡¯s important now is that this talent remains here. As long as he stays in the city, there will be an unending supply of his medicines. What we should do now is to be more attentive to him.¡±

    ¡°You are right,¡± Jiya nodded at her mother¡¯s words. When she looked carefully at Han Shuo who was standing among the crowd, she suddenly and somehow felt that Han Shuo had be much more pleasing to the eye. Previously she found Han Shuo to be arrogant and vain. But after learning about the miraculousness of Han Shuo¡¯s medicines, she convinced herself that it was only natural that a person of such extraordinary talent would be a little entric in temperament and personality.

    ¡°Form a line and enter one by one. Every person can buy a maximum of three bottles. Please carefully read the function and price marked on the medicine bottles. Make sure to choose the medicine most suitable for yourself!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s cordial voice repeatedly sounded at the front door of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    The crowd that gathered in front of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy suddenly started to cram and push, forcing others aside to get to the front of the queue. They wanted to be the first to enter the pharmacy and get medicines most suitable for themselves before they ran out.

    <i>ThumpThumpThump... </i>

    Some of the weaker members of the crowd were thrown flying from the line. Several oligarchs from influential family ns most impolitely came to stand in front of Han Shuo. They all stared at Han Shuo urbanely as though asking Han Shuo to begin the sale.

    ¡°Ermm....¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face went nk for a moment. He originally wanted to berate them but couldn¡¯t do so after seeing the amiable smiles on the faces of those experts ofrge family ns. He leaned sideways for the first few to enter and then casually shouted, ¡°Miss Carmelita, please help me with keeping the crowd in order!¡±

    ¡°No problem!¡±

    ¡°Just a small pharmaceutical shop. What is so terrific about it? Look at that vile fe¡¯scent face! Pfft,¡± Cage, standing behind the crowd, sneered.

    Donna, however, was rather stunned and her mind was suddenly thrown into chaos. Initially nning to condemn Han Shuo for his actions, Donna suddenly became clueless as to what she should do.

    Of the first few people who entered the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, although they were not the patriarchs of thoserge family ns, they were nheless prestigious characters in the City of Shadows. Just like Andre, those people were powerful and highly regarded in their respective families. From how they had behaved so far, Donna believed that those people would not hesitate to side against her House of Lavers in order to establish a good rtionship with Han Shuo.

    If that wasn¡¯t enough, the infamous Carmelita was present among the crowd. Han Shuo was able to improve and possibly even cure the disease that had troubled Carmelita for many years. After observing her behavior for a while, Donna even started to suspect that if she were to condemn Han Shuo right then, Carmelita might side with Han Shuo instead of her!

    On top of all that, after hearing thements from those around her as well as Carmelita¡¯s promotional words, Donna too thought that the medicines inside Han Shuo¡¯s shop could be beneficial to the House of Lavers. If she were to be hostile towards Han Shuo, then the House of Lavers would likely miss out.

    Donna felt awfully sick when she thought of all these. She nced at her cousins standing beside her and inwardly resented them for their immaturity ¨C all that they knew was to create trouble for her family. With that thought in mind, not only did Eve¡¯s face, still swollen from the abuse, stop arousing her pity, she even seemed uglier in her eyes.

    ¡°Elder sister, are you going to reproach him?¡± Eve hastily asked when she saw Donna¡¯s eyes flickering with lights of indecision.

    Feeling somewhat disgusted at heart, Donna shot a re at Eve and said with a cold face, ¡°Look at the situation now. Is the condition suitable for us to do so?¡±

    ¡°Why not?¡± Eve could not read the situation. All that was in her mind was revenge.

    Donna was very disappointed. She ignored the anxious Eve and instead asked her brother Cage, ¡°Cage, tell me, do you think we should put Bryan to trouble today?¡±

    Cage wasn¡¯t as foolish as his sister. He sighed helplessly and replied, ¡°We should forget about it for today. If we actually proceed with condemning him right now, we could possibly offend everyone here who came to purchase his medicines. This seems... This indeed seems rather inappropriate...¡±

    ¡°Then what are you all standing around for? Go home,¡± Donna instructed resentfully and turned around to leave. However, she was feeling regretful and bitter in her heart, <i>Bryan, oh Bryan, you truly are a capable person. Within the short span of half a year, not only have you managed to associate yourself with the most intimidating family n in the City of Shadows, but you even produced such miraculous medicines... Sigh... </i>

    ¡°Teng Fei, aren¡¯t, aren¡¯t you leaving?¡± Cage asked Teng Fei in a puzzled manner when he saw Teng Fei with his two feet stiff on the ground, remaining motionless.

    Teng Fei put on a faint smile and gently replied, ¡°You guys leave without me. I want to buy a few bottles of medicine to see if they really do hold up to the chatter!¡±

    Although Teng Fei too held an unfavorable opinion towards Han Shuo, as a member of arge family n, he never neglected his duty and always strived to improve the strength of his own family n. If he found that those medicines in Han Shuo¡¯s pharmacy were actually effective, Teng Fei would surely give up and ignore his personal opinions and do everything he could to acquire those medicines.

    ¡°If you lot were as sensible as Teng Fei, this talent wouldn¡¯t have slipped away from our House of Lavers for nothing. Think about it, just how beneficial it would be for the House of Lavers if those medicines were exclusively provided for our family!¡± Donna sighed and left disappointedly.

    ¡°You, you actually believe in what that guy sells?!¡± Eve yelled at Teng Fei. She was angry.

    ¡°All these people gathered here for his medicines. They aren¡¯t just ordinary people but experts from all big family ns in the city. I don¡¯t think that their judgments could be wrong. I may not like that fe one bit, but for the interests of my family, I must stay behind. I¡¯m sorry!¡± Teng Fei replied. He looked down upon this brainless girl.

    ¡°How, how could you say that... you are such a disappointment! Brother, let¡¯s leave!¡± Eve left furiously while pulling her brother Cage.

    ¡°What a retard! If you had half the intelligence Donna has, perhaps that fe would have be a pharmacist working for the Lavers Family! Idiot woman, don¡¯t make the mistake of thinking I can¡¯t lose you!¡± Teng Fei put on a sneer and softly said to himself after Eve left.

    Right after that, Teng Fei proceeded to cram himself into the queue excitedly. He weighed in his mind if he should spare no effort in establishing a good rtionship with Han Shuo and draw a line with Cage and Eve to avoid Han Shuo¡¯s hatred.

    The morous noise continued. But thanks to Carmelita, the people stopped cutting in line.

    All those who entered the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy would leave with both happiness and regret; happiness for obtaining the medicines, and regret for leaving with no more than three bottles of the medicine. Before they left, they would exhort Han Shuo to reserve some for them if he had produced a new batch of medicines.

    Han Shuoughed and smiled courteously but did not give any guarantees. He watched excitedly as the medicine bottles on his shelves became lesser and lesser while the crystal coins in his hand grew more and more.

    ¡°Miss Jiya, I¡¯m really d that you are not here to cause any trouble!¡± Han Shuo greeted Jiya with all smiles when he saw Jiya enter his pharmacy with another beautiful woman.

    ¡°Haha, you really know how to joke around,¡± Jiya wore a big smile on her beautiful, glowing face as she said pleadingly, ¡°In any case, I¡¯m one of your first supporters. Couldn¡¯t you spare me a little preferential treatment?¡±

    ¡°Of course. I will give you a twenty percent discount on any three medicines you chose. What do you think?¡± Han Shuo nodded and replied.

    ¡°You rascal!¡± Jiya scolded smilingly before she continued with her bright eyes looking straight into Han Shuo¡¯s, ¡°You know that¡¯s not what I mean! I don¡¯t need discounts, in fact, I¡¯m willing to pay a premium. You just have to sell all the remaining medicines to us. What say you?¡±

    Han Shuo knew that members of theserge family ns cared little about this bit of crystal coins. He was purposefully teasing Jiya. But after hearing her proposal, Han Shuo immediately declined righteously, ¡°How will that do? If I sell everything to you, those lining up behind you will get nothing. Look, every person is equal in my eyes no matter how grandiose their status!¡±

    ¡°Stop pretending to be so righteous before us. If everyone is equal, why didn¡¯t you take crystal coins for Carmelita¡¯s medicine?¡± Jiya argued. She was both amused and irritated.

    ¡°That¡¯s not the same. Carmelita and I are friends. Those medicines are gifts!¡± Han Shuo replied.

    ¡°We are friends too. Sell them to me. I am willing to pay big money for them!¡± Jiya continued to pester Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oi, can the person inside hurry up please? We are still waiting!¡± a few people outside the store waiting for their turns shouted impatiently when Jiya nagged Han Shuo.

    ¡°Five bottles, each of you gets five bottles. That¡¯s the most that I can give!¡± Han Shuo had no choice but to raise the white g and give preferential treatment to the insisting Jiya when those waiting outside grew more and more impatient.

    ¡°Alright then. I will take that for today. When you have produced new medicines, make sure to save some for the House of Kinson. Crystal coins are no issue!¡± Jiya knew that she might actually irritate Han Shuo if she pestered him any further. She chose ten bottles of medicines with her mother and casually dropped Han Shuo a bag of ck crystal coins. She smiled at Han Shuo before swiftly leaving hand in hand with her mother.

    ¡°Three thousand ck crystal coins and... a tip of two thousand ck crystal coins?!¡± after thinking for a moment, Han Shuo realized that Jiya didn¡¯t care about those couple thousand extra ck crystal coins she handed and therefore he kept his gratuity away smilingly.

    ¡°Hello, Bryan! We meet again!¡± After the tens of customers entered and exited the shop, Teng Fei entered with a big smile. He immediately greeted Han Shuo in a friendly manner.

    Han Shuo withdrew the smile on his face as soon as he saw Teng Fei. With a dispassionate look on his face, Han Shuo said, ¡°Ah, it¡¯s young master Teng Fei. Are you here to buy medicine?¡±

    ¡°Of course I am. I did not know you were a talented pharmacist. I really made an error of judgment thest time!¡± Teng Fei did not fuss about Han Shuo¡¯s attitude towards him. He continued with a big smile, ¡°You know, I¡¯m just a guest at the Lavers Residence. What happened thest time was merely a quarrel between you and Cage and Eve. Please don¡¯t count me in. You should know that I¡¯m very admiring of you...¡±

    ¡°Choose three bottles. I don¡¯t have time for you,¡± Han Shuo was disinclined to talk with him and impatiently hastened.

    ¡°Don¡¯t be so cold, man. Haha, I was indeed wrong thest time, let me now formally apologize to you...¡± Han Shuo¡¯s impolite attitude did not cause Teng Fei to flip out. Instead, he jabbered on and on to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but admit that Teng Fei had indeed a knack for talking. After listening for some time, Han Shuo forced a smile and said, ¡°I did not hear you being so talkative thest time. Enough, hurry up and pick your poison. Many are still waiting behind you, don¡¯t obstruct me from doing business.¡±

    ¡°That bastard inside there, are you done yet? If I hear any more of your rubbish talk I will throw you out the door!¡± Carmelita suddenly threatened from outside the shop. She had seen Teng Fei together with Eve and therefore had a bad impression of Teng Fei.

    ¡°I¡¯m leaving, I¡¯m leaving!¡± Obviously afraid of Carmelita, Teng Fei gave a hollowugh, randomly choose three bottles of medicines, left eight hundred ck crystal coins and hastily left.

 Chapter 706 - Becoming rich

    GDK 706: Bing rich

    All the medicinal pellets that Han Shuo had on the shelves were sold out on that day. He pocketed a total of ny-six thousand ck crystal coins. Han Shuo was overjoyed as he knew that with this amount of ck crystal coins, he wouldn¡¯t need to worry about money for at least tens of years.

    Before leaving the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, all his customers would exhort Han Shuo to reserve them a portion of the next batch of medicines he would produce. Carmelita, after seeing that Han Shuo had sold out all the medicines, hastily returned to the Sainte Residence to continue consuming the medicine that Han Shuo had specially made for her.

    It was after everyone was gone that Han Shuo remembered about Donna and the few youngsters from her Lavers Family. He thought that Donna came with Cage and Eve to thank him. It never crossed his mind that Donna intended to denounce him.

    Han Shuo was rather puzzled that Donna did not enter his pharmacy. He had in fact kept some medicines reserved for her and did not expect her to disappear like that. Han Shuo assumed that Donna had left because it was too crowded and she woulde by another day.

    After shutting the front door of his pharmacy, Han Shuo indulged himself in counting the ck crystal coins in his space ring again and again. He wouldugh foolishly as he muttered, ¡°Ny-six thousand ck crystal coins... this is enough to buy a manor in the City of Shadows ¨C not just any manor, but a fully-furnished oneplete with facilities... how amazing!¡±

    All the medicinal ingredients he had collected since arriving on Elysium were used on those medicinal pills he sold. Although Han Shuo already had gained ny-six thousand ck crystal coins, if he wanted to make even more money, he had to go out to gather more medicinal ingredients.

    As only Han Shuo himself knew the ingredients needed to make his medicinal pills, he could not delegate the task and had toplete it himself. He once again put on signs on the front door of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy informing that it was temporarily closed for business. Then, he left the City of Shadows and headed towards the mountains in its perimeter.

    There were long stretches of mountain range all along the City of Shadows where the herbs and ingredients Han Shuo needed grew. Having had the experience of selling out all his medicines, Han Shuo decided to collect even more medicinal ingredients than before.

    By releasing the demon generals in the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, Han Shuo had an additional dozen pair of eyes. With that, his speed of collecting medicinal ingredients was increased by ten or more folds. Within just a month¡¯s time, Han Shuo had traveled across all the big mountains surrounding the city. He had filled two space rings with medicinal ingredients alone ¨C enough for Han Shuo to refine medicinal pills for one whole year.

    As the mountains were just around the City of Shadows, they were about as safe as a walk through town. No enemy forces or godhunters dared to lurk in there. During the one month¡¯s time that Han Shuo was collecting medicinal ingredients, he hade across divine guards from the City of Shadows fifty-seven times. They frequently patrolled the mountains in small teams, guarding the city againstrge-scale invasions.

    Most of those divine guards did not recognize Han Shuo. They would find Han Shuo very suspicious at first. But after Han Shuo shed the emblem that City Lord Wace gave him, all those divine guards would greet Han Shuo with utmost respect. Not only would they apologize to Han Shuo, but they would even give him an ount of any abnormal activities they discovered in the surroundings. They assumed that Han Shuo was part the Sainte Family.

    A month passed in the blink of an eye. When Han Shuo returned to his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, he was stunned by what he saw.

    Han Shuo did not anticipate to see his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy in utter wreckage. All the containers and tools on the first and second floor were broken. Those special pharmacist bottles and pots Han Shuo bought were all shattered. Not a single tool remained intact.

    Even the energy stones in the boundary towers on the third floor were broken into pieces. From the first floor to the third, the entire Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was in aplete mess. Han Shuo grew more furious the more he saw. He had no clue who would do such a despicable thing while he was away.

    With a gloomy face, Han Shuo trudged from the first floor to the third and then back. He turned over in his mind as to who was most likely to do such a thing.

    The first that crossed his mind were the siblings from the Lavers Family, Cage and Eve. Those two were the first two characters Han Shuo had offended after arriving on Elysium. The other person he suspected was the golden-haired young man called Edmund who first visited his shop with Jiya. Back then Edmund intended to destroy his shop but was stopped by Anito¡¯s prompt arrival.

    Other than those few, Han Shuo could not think of anyone else who would want to hurt him like this. He had not stayed in the City of Shadows for long and had made enemy with merely a few people in the city.

    Han Shuo¡¯s return very quickly attracted Anito¡¯s arrival. He hurried to the shop with a group of divine guards. When he entered, he saw Han Shuo, wearing a dark face, silently sitting on a chair that was missing a leg. Anito¡¯s heart stopped. He forced a smile and hastily exined, ¡°It happened seven days ago at around midnight. We only return to the Third Corps at night and therefore didn¡¯t see it happen. The shop was like this when we returned on the second day!¡±

    ¡°Found any hints or clues?¡± Han Shuo leaned back on the broken chair and gently swayed it while questioning Anito with a cold face.

    Anito shook his head bitterly, saying, ¡°We have been investigating for days but have discovered absolutely no clue left by the criminal. We have no idea who did it. Er... Miss Carmelita has yet toe out from cultivation, and Lord Andre has instructed that the crime scene is to be preserved until your return. That¡¯s why we did not clean up the shop and it is also why those who want to win your favor have not touched anything here.¡±

    Han Shuo believed that without Andre¡¯s insistence, those nobilities fromrge family ns who spared no crystal coins to buy his medicines would have started refurbishing the ce. They might have even built the ce to be even more gorgeous than what it was before the damage.

    ¡°Do you know about Edmund¡¯s background?¡± after a moment of silence, Han Shuo creased his eyebrows and asked Anito.

    ¡°He is from the House of Buller. However, he isn¡¯t directly rted to the Buller Family bloodline and doesn¡¯t hold much status in the family. That kid was the first toe to my mind after I learned what happened here and I have carefully investigated him. During that period of time, he wasn¡¯t even in the City of Shadows. Besides, that kid isn¡¯t as bold as you imagine. I believe that after he learned about your rtionship with Miss Carmelita, he wouldn¡¯t dare to have thoughts of messing with you,¡± Anito gave Han Shuo a detailed analysis.

    ¡°Alright, thank you,¡± after deeply pondering for a moment, Han Shuo finally thanked Anito.

    ¡°You are most wee... It¡¯s my duty...¡± Anito bowed humbly. He then took the initiative to suggest, ¡°Would you like me to help with redecorating the shop? I know some people in the city who specialize in such work.¡±

    ¡°I will trouble you then. Here are five hundred ck crystal coins. If it¡¯s not enough, juste to me for more.¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t find any clues from the debris. As Han Shuo intended to continue using the shop for business, he casually handed Anito five hundred ck crystal coins for him to fix up the ce.

    Anito beat his chest and pledged after receiving Han Shuo¡¯s crystal coins, ¡°Rest assured, I will get everything sorted for you nice and clean!¡±

    ¡°Alright then, I will leave this mess to you. See you soon.¡± Han Shuo was confident that Anito would get the ce fixed properly and so he left the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    Han Shuo had offended no more than a few people in the City of Shadows. If it wasn¡¯t Edmund, it had to be Cage and Eve. When Han Shuo thought of these two, he became even more furious. He thought to himself, <i>If it wasn¡¯t for me, Eve would have been disfigured. So this is how you thank me? By wrecking my shop while I¡¯m away? Have I be a target of bullying for you?</i>

    Han Shuo decided to make a visit to the Lavers Residence.

    The divine guards guarding at the front door of the Lavers Residence still remembered Han Shuo. His rising fame in the City of Shadows was the topic of discussion for many House of Lavers members. The two recognized Han Shuo immediately and greeted him from far away. They were very friendly.

    ¡°Haha, I did not know that you, sir, were an amazing pharmacist. Everyone in the city has been fighting over your medicines!¡± that divine guard who had previously introduced Han Shuo to the Lavers Family members said excitedly.

    ¡°As a gesture of gratitude for the warning you gave me thest time, here is a small bottle of medicine,¡± Han Shuo naturally remembered the two cordial divine guards and gifted them two bottles of his Pill of Rejuvenation.

    ¡°Many thanks, many thanks,¡± the smiles on their faces grew even bigger. They knew just how much a Pill of Rejuvenation currently valued in the City of Shadows. Just one small bottle of it was equivalent to three years of their sries. It would be strange if they were anything but overjoyed!

    ¡°Are you here to look for Miss Donna? That¡¯s unfortunate. Miss Donna has set off for the Space Dominion. She definitely will not return for at least a year!¡± a divine guard exined to Han Shuo somewhat regretfully after carefully keeping away Han Shuo¡¯s Pill of Rejuvenation.

    Han Shuo did not know that during the time he was collecting medicinal ingredients in the surrounding mountains, Donna had tried to look for him at Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. She wanted to ask Han Shuo about what actually happened to Eve and to stay in touch with him. She also intended to purchase some medicines on behalf of the House of Lavers.

    ¡°Oh... Donna isn¡¯t around...¡± Han Shuo began to hesitate, wondering if he should still enter. After all, of the entire Lavers Family, Donna was the only person that Han Shuo was familiar with.

    ¡°Hey... Isn¡¯t this Bryan? Why are you just standing at the front door? Come,e, let¡¯s go inside,¡± a voice sounded from a distance at the most untimely moment. In an instant, Teng Fei arrived before Han Shuo and pulled him into the Lavers Residence as though he had been friends with Han Shuo for a long time.

    Han Shuo was being forced into the Lavers Residence by Teng Fei. Having missed the opportunity to leave, he had to put on a bold face and enter.

    ¡°Donna and her brother went to the Space Dominion and will only be back after some time. Donna and I have actually tried to look for you but you weren¡¯t at the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy...¡± Teng Fei exined while escorting Han Shuo to that gymnasium where they first met.

    ¡°Since Donna isn¡¯t around, I guess I¡¯ll leave. I havee here just to look for her. I¡¯m not familiar with any member of the Lavers Family other than Donna. I had better not stay here any longer,¡± Han Shuo suddenly stopped walking and no longer let Teng Fei pull him any further.

    ¡°Come on, you are already here, might as well stay and chat with me. My stay in this Lavers Residence has recently be more and more unpleasant. <i>That</i> brother and sister pair, well they aren¡¯t exactly people who aplish things. I just can¡¯t get along with them!¡± ever since the time Teng Fei decided to buy Han Shuo¡¯s medicine, his rtionship with Cage and Eve began to grow ever less harmonious. As Teng Fei actually secretly looked down upon the two, he naturally did not put effort into easing the tension. In fact, he even used this opportunity to distance himself from the siblings and was determined to improve his rtionship with Han Shuo and Donna.

    Teng Fei, who was talking and talking, suddenly froze. When he raised his head, he saw Cage and Eve¡¯s angry faces that were dripping with sweat. Their eyes were filled with resentment and fury as they red at Teng Fei and Han Shuo.

    ¡°How dare you step into our Lavers Residence!¡± Eve shouted. Anger boiled to her head as soon as she saw Han Shuo.

    Eve¡¯s undiscriminating attitude made Han Shuo even more furious. ¡°I came here to look for Donna and it¡¯s none of your goddamn business!¡± There was no way he would be polite to this brainless woman.

    ¡°I haven¡¯t settled the score with you for beating me thest time and you still have the guts to bring trouble to our Lavers Residence? You are courting death, aren¡¯t you?¡± Eve shouted furiously.

    ¡°I¡¯m not going to bicker with a mentally-handicapped person. Forget about it, it appears that this House of Lavers is indeed not weing of me. I¡¯m leaving,¡± Han Shuo waved his hand and turned around to leave. He felt that it was meaningless to argue with this kind of people, notwithstanding the fact that doing so inside the Lavers Residence was disadvantageous to him.

    ¡°Since when could a mere lowgod who just so happens to know how to make a few drugs act so arrogantly in the City of Shadows? Pfft, serves you right that your shop got wrecked. That¡¯s what you get for not knowing your ce! Hahaha...¡± Cage said as he cackled in an invigorated manner.

    Han Shuo who was walking out the Lavers Residence immediately stopped in his footsteps when he heard Cage¡¯s words. He stared at the bellyughing Cage with cold eyes and asked, ¡°Is it you who did it?¡±

    Cage was startled for a moment before he sneered, ¡°None of your business... Who cares if I did it or not, you deserve it!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and walked out without speaking another word, ignoring Teng Fei¡¯s yelling.

    On that night, three energy crystal shops nominally owned by Avery Lavers, but in reality managed by Cage and Eve, exploded. A total of seven divine guards of the House of Lavers were injured and energy crystals valued at thirty thousand ck crystal coins were destroyed in the explosions.

    On the early morning of the second day, Cage was enraged by the news. He was jumping up and down, fuming. ¡°It¡¯s him, it must be him! I¡¯m going to get him!¡± Upon finishing those words, Cage, without informing his father Avery, took a group of divine guards under hismand and headed straight for Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

 Chapter 707 - Hidden danger

    GDK 707: Hidden danger

    When Cage arrived at Celestial Pearl Pharmacy with a group of divine guards, all he saw was that the ce was bustling with construction work.

    Anito who was overseeing the reconstruction of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, upon observing that Cage was charging forward as though he had eaten gunpowder, stepped to the front door and blocked Cage¡¯s path. With a cold and displeased face, he asked, ¡°Young master Cage, what is this you are doing?¡±

    ¡°Where is he? Where is the owner of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy? Where is Bryan? Tell him to show himself!¡± Cage, standing at the front door, yelled into the pharmacy.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, the shop owner isn¡¯t around. Pleasee backter,¡± Anito was unperturbed. With just a whistle, a group of divine guards from the Third Corps rushed over and formed a line outside the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. Their cold eyes were fixed on Cage and his troops.

    Cage¡¯s heart that was filled with wrath slowly cooled off when the divine guards from the Third Corps drew their swords and held up their bows. Cage was a little smarter than his sister Eve. He knew that if he were to start a physical conflict with Anito, the person who would lose out was himself. He would aplish nothing if he were to escte the hostility further.

    Cage had no choice but to repress the anger in his heart and give up. After yelling a few nasty words, he left with his Lavers Family divine guards. He pondered where Han Shuo would be whilst wearing a gloomy face.

    ¡°Young master, are you going to let it pass just like that?¡± a divine guard said. He felt angry for Cage.

    ¡°Of course I won¡¯t let him off so easily. But we don¡¯t know where that scoundrel is hiding now. We can¡¯t do anything without first finding him,¡± Cage was still flushed with anger. He turned around and gazed at the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy before instructing, ¡°Come with me, I¡¯ll go look for my father.¡±

    Cage made a beeline for the Fifth Corps of City of Shadows Divine Guards.

    Inside a secret chamber in the Fifth Corps, Avery¡¯s expression grew darker and darker as he listened to Cage exin the whole story to him. Then, when Cage finally finished giving his ount, Avery stood up and gave Cage a big p which caused him to stagger a few steps backward.

    Cage covered his red, swollen cheek without uttering a word. He merely looked at his enraged father with a wronged expression.

    ¡°How many times have I told you not to provoke that man? Why must you be so stubborn? Look what happened now. Three of our shops have been destroyed and we have lost so many crystal coins. And now again I have to clean up the mess for you. Can¡¯t the two of you learn from Donna and her brother and be less of a nuisance to me?¡± Avery yelled at his son who knew nothing but to stir up conflict while mming his table.

    ¡°Father, I¡¯m telling you, we did not actively provoke him after you told us not to. This time it is he who provoked us. I had merely shouted a few words at him but I couldn¡¯t have guessed that he would be so barbaric to destroy three of our shops in one night. He obviously thinks that he can ride on our heads because he has the backing of the House of Sainte!¡± Cage said with a voice choking with sobs as though he was wronged.

    ¡°Did you or did you not order men to wreck his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy?¡± Avery bunched his brows and sternly questioned.

    ¡°No, I did not do it. I dare not disobey father¡¯s words!¡± said Cage.

    ¡°Then, are you sure that it was this fe who destroyed three of our shops?¡± Avery continued to question.

    ¡°It¡¯s definitely him. I merely incited him with a few words back at our family residence before he left angrily without saying a word. Then on that very night, all this happened to our energy stone stores. Who could it be if not him?¡± Cage answered in a hateful tone.

    Avery nodded and waved his hand. He instructed, ¡°Go home and look after your good-for-nothing sister. Do not leave our family residence for the moment. I will handle the matter. You shall not intervene!¡± After a short pause, seeing that Cage was still standing there with his gaping mouth, he shouted furiously, ¡°Did you hear me?¡±

    Cage was thrown off bnce. He had rarely seen Avery so furious. He hastily nodded and replied in a low voice, ¡°Understood!¡±

    ¡°Get lost! Now!¡± Avery grew more furious in his heart to see that appearance of Cage¡¯s and he roared at Cage yet again. Cage, covering his cheek with one hand, scurried out of the secret chamber.

    After Cage left the room, Avery vented his anger by loudly cursing over and over. He finally calmed down after some time.

    After thinking for some time, Avery suddenly uttered, ¡°Number Three, investigate the ins and outs of that kid. Find out if he really had something to do with the explosion of the three shops!¡±

    ¡°Yes, my Lord,¡± an emotionless reply sounded from the darkness behind Avery. A shadow distorted for a short time before suddenly disappearing.

    ***

    Han Shuo, on the third floor of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, asked as he watched Anitoing up, ¡°Has he left?¡±

    ¡°Yep, he¡¯s gone. Don¡¯t worry, with us watching over this ce, no danger will befall you,¡± Anito replied respectfully. After a short pause, he asked in a fawning manner, ¡°Is the renovation of this gymnasium of the third floor up to your satisfaction?¡±

    ¡°Yes, I quite like it. I will have to trouble you for the next two days to decline every visitor. I need some time to refine more medicines,¡± Han Shuo instructed.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Sir, that¡¯s no trouble at all!¡± Anito immediately promised with his chest puffed. Shortly after, he put on a smile and started to talk yet again, ¡°Our Lord Erebus is also very interested in your medicines. His Lordship has instructed me to purchase some medicines on his behalf. Prices are negotiable. Will Mister Bryan please be so kind?¡±

    Han Shuo long knew that Anito must have gained Erebus¡¯ approval, tacitly or expressly, to be stationed in the vicinity of his shop for such a long time. As Erebus had taken the initiative to actively express his goodwill, Han Shuo naturally knew how to respond appropriately. Immediately, he nodded smilingly and said, ¡°I know what I ought to do. Please thank Lord Erebus for me and send his Lordship my kindest regards.¡±

    ¡°Haha, thank you, thank you. Definitely!¡± Anito knew that these words of Han Shuo¡¯s meant that he couldplete the task that Erebus assigned him without any issue and immediately dismissed himself with a big smile. He then started yelling at the workers renovating the second and third floors, ¡°Be more attentive in your work or none of you will get a single crystal coin!¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head andughed at Anito¡¯s actions from the third floor. Such action of Anito did not make Han Shuo feel more favorable of him. However, Han Shuo did not say anything about it as Anito had been very helpful all this time.

    <i>Who is it that destroyed the other two shops?</i> Han Shuo wondered.

    Of the three energy stone shops owned by Avery Lavers, Han Shuo had merely destroyed the smallest shop to retaliate against Cage wrecking his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. However, Han Shuo heard that soon after he left, the two other shops were destroyed in a simr fashion. Han Shuo¡¯s heart was filled with doubt. He had no idea who was behind it.

    <i>Perhaps there¡¯s another enemy of the Lavers Family?</i> Han Shuo thought. Although he was rather puzzled about the matter, he did not truly take it to heart. As Han Shuo was in a hurry to produce more medicinal pellets, he did not think too deeply about it.

    *** At a pharmacy called ¡®Godswamp¡¯, inside a secret underground chamber surrounded by boundaries.

    An elderly man with white hair and a face as translucent as jade was softly inquiring a man crouching before him. That crouching man was merely a meter tall and looked like an elderly dwarf. His face was covered with wrinkles and he had a pair of eyes glistening with infernal rays.

    ¡°How¡¯s the scheme doing so far, Steiss?¡± that elderly man whose head was covered white hair asked softly.

    ¡°Rest assured, master, everything is happening as nned. Avery has dispatched his men to investigate what happened yesterday. I believe he definitely will discover evidence pointing to that kid Bryan! Master, should we add fuel to the fire?¡± that dwarf Steiss replied respectfully.

    ¡°That won¡¯t be necessary. With things having progressed to this stage, we can now do nothing at all. I know Avery. He¡¯s the kind of person who won¡¯t easily strike but once he does, he wouldn¡¯t let anyone live. He had restrained himself thest time and he definitely will not continue to tolerate this time around. We just have to sit and watch. Perhaps by tomorrow, both Celestial Pearl and the youngster will disappear from the City of Shadows without a trail. Hehe...¡±

    ¡°About the medicines that the youngster makes, should we...¡± Steiss asked suggestively.

    The elderly man shook his head. He smiled warmly and replied softly, ¡°Now is the time to be patient. Once Avery strikes, not only will the youngster forever be gone, Avery will also learn about all the secrets of his medicines. Hehe, the House of Lavers isn¡¯t good at producing medicine. After Avery obtains those memories, in order to reap the greatest benefit for his House of Lavers, he will look for us sooner orter. After all, not only have we maintained a good rtionship with the House of Lavers, we are thergest pharmacy chain in the City of Shadows. Who is he going to look for if not us?¡±

    ¡°Master is indeed the most brilliant!¡± Steiss no longer made any more suggestions but praised sincerely.

    The white-haired old man then waved his hand, indicating that Steiss was dismissed. After Steiss left, the old man muttered to himself while fondling a chunk of bone in his hand, ¡°If the House of Sainte takes their anger on Avery for this matter, ultimately provoking a war between the two family ns, that would be perfect!¡± The old man gently caressed that chunk of bone with love as he uttered, ¡°Chris, my child, your death will not be in vain...¡±

    ***

    At nightfall, Avery was sitting on the rooftop of the tallest building in the Fifth Corps. He squinted his eyes as he gazed at the colorful glow of sunset. Holding a wine cup in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other, he would refill the wine cup for himself and happily chug it down. He did not seem to be bothered by the explosions of his shops by the slightest.

    ¡°Something bad is going to happen. Lord Avery always does something crazy after he drinks!¡± A few divine guards of the Fifth Corps underneath the building could vaguely see what Avery was doing at the top of the towering skyscraper. They gossiped under their voices.

    ¡°I wonder who will be the unlucky fe this time. We better be more careful and not make his Lordship unhappy, lest we suffer his wrath,¡± another divine guard said very softly in an anxious and scared manner.

    The beautiful, soft glowing light of the sky was gradually covered by the curtain of night. Eventually, the sky waspletely shrouded by darkness. By now, there were eight empty wine bottles around Avery. He was reclining on his chair, gazing into the dark sky with half-open, dizzied eyes. It was as though he had fallen asleep.

    After a long time, a voice suddenly sounded from behind him, ¡°My Lord, I have discovered a medicine bottle inside one of the exploded shops. There were unique markings on the bottle and I¡¯m sure it originated from the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.¡±

    The disoriented Avery straightened himself up on the chair with difficulty. He casually gave an ¡°Oh¡± before asking nonchntly, ¡°Where¡¯s the guy?¡±

    ¡°He is still at the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy,¡± the man inside the darkness replied.

    Avery nodded, waved his hand at the person behind him, and instructed, ¡°Go to the Lavers Residence and keep an eye on those two good-for-nothings. Do not let them take a single step outside the residence without my instruction!¡±

    ¡°Understood!¡± the dark shadow replied immediately before dismissing himself without a sound.

    Avery rubbed his eye, downed thest cup of wine in front of him, and fell asleep in his chair. When it was deep in the night, a dark, phantom-like figure, as though a strand of soul, floated out from his body still reclined on the chair and flew in the direction of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    ***

    At the third floor of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, Han Shuo was using the gymnasium as his temporary pharmacyb. The Nine Tessetion Cauldron was like a throbbing ze, performing its dance before Han Shuo. Fragrant and refreshing scents overflowed from the tessetions on the cauldron.

    <i>Whoosh!</i> A lump of red fireball in Han Shuo¡¯s palm was sent into the Nine Tessetion Cauldron, causing the sweet smell of medicine inside the gymnasium to grow more intense and the Nine Tessetion Cauldron to revolve faster and faster, so much that the shape of the cauldron appeared blurry.

    <i>Chink! ng!</i> Tinkling sounds of things knocking against the metallic surface rang from the rapidly revolving Nine Tessetion Cauldron. Han Shuo was ted as he knew that the Pills of Rejuvenation would soon beplete.

    During the period of time Han Shuo focused on refining medicinal pellets, he discovered that somehow, his mind was bing more and more stable. Although he would exhaust a great amount of demonic yuan in the process, his demonic yuan would grow slightly after recovery. Even his realm state seemed to be rapidly stabilizing.

    When Han Shuo discovered that refining medicinal pellets would not hinder him but also end up helping him advance in demonic arts through some bizarre ways, he became even more passionate and engrossed with refining medicinal pellets. Cauldron Spirit exined to Han Shuo that as long as he was fully concentrated on performing a task with a sober and calm mind, his realm state would improve.

    <i>Ting... Ting...</i>

    Tens of medicine bottles suddenly flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s space ring. Those delicate medicine bottles gave off pleasant jingling sounds when they bumped into each other.

    One after another, the medicine bottles flew towards the Nine Tessetion Cauldron in an orderly fashion. Each time Han Shuo flicked his index finger, a single pellet of medicine would fly off from the Nine Tessetion Cauldron and into the beautiful medicine bottle most urately. Next, the medicine bottle containing medicinal pellet would gentlynd on the ground beside Han Shuo. The intense fragrance of medicine would be slightly reduced with each medicine bottled. Han Shuo had be very practiced with bottling the medicines. He had forty-nine medicine bottles filled and lined up beside him in no time.

    After having bottled all the medicines, the Nine Tessetion Cauldron hovered and flew into Han Shuo¡¯s palm. It shrunk little by little and disappeared when it was the size of a palm.

    Next, Han Shuo wiggled his five fingers. His space ring shed as the forty-nine medicine bottles beside him disappeared one after another.

    Han Shuo heaved a deep breath, calmed down his heart and started recovering the demonic yuan he lost. This was the most recent method of raising the demonic yuan reserves Han Shuo had discovered and therefore he was very attentive.

    While calmly recovering the demonic yuan in his body, all of a sudden, Han Shuo had a most frightening feeling. This sensation came extremely abruptly and it caused every hair on Han Shuo¡¯s body to stand on end.

    Han Shuo immediately started to probe around with his consciousness but did not discover any abnormality. He also rapidly dispatched two demon generals from the Cauldron of Myriad Demon to survey the situation outside the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    Anito and a group of divine guards were inside a building not far from the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. Han Shuo saw that the magicalmp was still lit, indicating that Anito and his people were still active. This made Han Shuo very slightly relieved.

    The demon generals continued to examine the surrounding and they too did not discover an anomaly. However, the sense of danger he felt never diminished.

    After a while, suddenly, Cauldron Spirit transmitted anxiously, ¡°Enemy! It¡¯s not all that powerful but it is still much more powerful than you. Here ites!¡±

    A shadow appeared noiselessly. By the time Han Shuo sensed the presence of the shadow, it was already toote to do anything. The darkness around him seemed to have turned into substance and they gushed towards Han Shuo¡¯s body. Han Shuo suddenly found himself unable to budge.

    ¡°Deploy the Invincible Omen Body NOW!¡± Cauldron Spirit shouted into Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    Without a second thought, the greatly rmed Han Shuo deployed the Invincible Omen Body which he had been practicing a lot in recent days. At the next instance, a most energetic and overwhelming force rushed into Han Shuo¡¯s body. An explosion sounded off from his body. Intense pain flooded every nerve of Han Shuo¡¯s.

    When subjected to such immense pain, an average person would have immediately be unconscious. To Han Shuo, however, it only made him more awake.

    That shadowy figure was very confident that Han Shuo was dead after delivering Han Shuo a single hit. The shadowy figure with darkness around it gradually went to the front of Han Shuo and softly murmured to itself, ¡°What a pity, could have served for my family...¡±

    Han Shuo sensed the strong smell of alcohol. After that, he saw the shadowy figure raise its hand, slowly covering down on his skull...

    Memory Capture!

    Han Shuo immediately realized what the person was trying to do. The strength of the shadowy figure was powerful beyond Han Shuo¡¯s imagination and he did not have the slightest certainty of victory against it. Besides, Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body was now severely injured even though he was defended by the Invincible Omen Body. Han Shuo simply wasn¡¯t on the same level with that being yet.

    Seeing that the hand would soon press down on his skull, Han Shuo stopped hesitating. Immediately, he activated the blood essence inside his demonic infant. His meridians and veins were snapped, causing mists of blood to rapidly flow out from his body, enveloping him entirely.

    ¡°Huh?!¡± the shadowy figure softly cried out in surprise when it suddenly discovered that Han Shuo had disappeared. It started to be anxious. It rapidly flew through every room inside the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy and when it discovered nothing, it started searching the perimeter of the pharmacy.

 Chapter 708 - Search and Investigation

    GDK 708: Search and Investigation

    ***It was the dead of the night, outside the City of Shadows.

    At the core of a man-eating shrub appeared a dark shadow apanied by a thud. The dark figure crashed onto a swaying man-eating flower, instantly snapping it.

    An intense reeking of blood was emitted from the dark figure. The smell seemed to carry the most intense temptation power, arousing the excitement of all the man-eating nts in the shrub.

    Tough, thick vines covered with thorns andrge leaves oozing strong corrosive liquid which had been stationary rapidly moved towards the dark figure. In just an instant, the dark figure waspletely wrapped with leaves and vines.

    The man-eating nts that had enveloped the dark figure were wriggling, tearing and tightening their grip with all their strengths. It was obvious that the nts wanted to strangle, grind and swallow the trapped living thing alive.

    <i>Creak... Creak...</i> Strange noises came from the wrapped figure. The tenacious vines that strangled hard gradually started to loosen up and even started retreating.

    <i>St!</i> The leaves and vines that did not retreat in time disintegrated into pieces and sttered all around, revealing Han Shuo at the center.

    After some time, Han Shuo began to move his arms and legs. He felt that every action had be ten times more difficult and exhausting than usual. Even his eyelids felt much heavier and extremely difficult to open and close.

    Finally, with great difficulty, Han Shuo managed to sit cross-legged on the ground. After recovering a little bit of his energy, Han Shuo had both his avatars emerge from his body. One of them stood on his left while the other stood on his right, carefully observing the surroundings and vigntly protecting him.

    Han Shuo decided not to return to the City of Shadows. Instead, with his two avatars carrying his main body, he located and hid in a well-concealed underground cave in one of the many mountains surrounding the City of Shadows. His two avatars then fixed up the outside of the cave and made sure to conceal and erase all his trails. His avatar of death then left silently.

    Late in the night, the City of Shadowscked the mor and activity seen during the daytime. Instead, the city was quiet and still.

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatar traveled to the city wall closest to the Lavers Residence and silently released a few demon generals. Multiple boundary towers surrounded the city which would relentlessly attack any trespassers. Han Shuo had no confidence in evading the boundary towers and therefore decided to stay outside the city walls.

    The formless demon generals, however, could evade the detection of those boundary towers. Han Shuo hid in the dark and observed the condition inside using several demon generals.

    The demon generals, easily evading the defensive barriers in their paths, headed straight for their destination ¨C the Lavers Residence.

    The boundaries found in the Lavers Residence were even more advanced but still, they could not prevent demon generals from entering. After circling through the Lavers Residence, the demon generals located the room where Cage and Eve were staying and proceeded with surveying each and every move they made.

    ¡°Brother, why is father not letting us out of the house?¡± The gods on Elysium didn¡¯t need much sleep and most of them would be silently cultivating at night. Eve obviously wasn¡¯t one of those people. Instead of cultivating, she wasining to her brother, Cage.

    ¡°Father has his own reasons behind his decisions. All we need to do is listen,¡± Cage appeared very calm. He shot a nce at the agitated Eve and said solemnly, ¡°Father is truly angered this time, I¡¯m very certain of this. We had better be very obedient and not make any trouble for the moment. Understood?¡±

    ¡°But, but that fool has destroyed three of our shops. He is stepping over our heads. Don¡¯t tell me that we aren¡¯t going to retaliate?¡± Eve replied in a slightly softer voice. She had rarely seen Cage being so well-behaved and knew that there had to be a reason.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it, father has said that he will take care of it!¡± Cage then put on a sinister, cold smile and continued, ¡°I have heard divine guards told me that father has drunk a lot tonight. Do you know what happens after father drinks?¡±

    Eve was puzzled for a quick moment before her eyes lit up and she stammered, ¡°You mean... You mean...¡±

    Cage nodded and affirmed, ¡°That someone is going to run out of luck!¡±

    ¡°Fantastic! I knew that father wouldn¡¯t just stand by and watch us get bullied. Haha! I guess we will never see that fe ever again!¡± Eve said as she put on a cheerful smile. Her mood had suddenly improved a whole lot.

    Han Shuomanded the two demon generals spying on Cage and Eve to return. They started noiselessly retreating back to Han Shuo¡¯s avatar hiding outside the city wall.

    Han Shuo did not continue to probe using his demon generals as it had be obvious to him who was the person that attempted to assassinate him. The strong smell of alcohol on his attacker matched the person discussed in Cage and Eve¡¯s conversation. Han Shuo could not be more certain of the identity of his attacker ¨C Chief of the Fifth Corps, Avery Lavers!

    He understood that if Avery had seeded in ughtering him, even if the Sainte Family made it out that Avery hadmitted the murder, they likely wouldn¡¯t denounce and go to war with Avery over his death as after all, Avery was the Chief of the Fifth Corps and he would have the backing of the entire House of Lavers.

    Han Shuo thought to himself, <i>I might have some importance while alive. But in death, I would be absolutely worthless. A dead man who could not produce any medicine can never be worthy enough for the House of Sainte to go to war over. I guess if ites to that, perhaps only Carmelita would take revenge for me?</i>

    <i>However, if Carmelita doesn¡¯t know who did it, how is she going to avenge me?</i>

    A series of thoughts rapidly shed through Han Shuo¡¯s mind. Although Avery¡¯s assassination attempt on his intoxication seemed impulsive, after carefully reflecting on it, Han Shuo discovered that it was actually a very hefty decision. Avery definitely did not do so without thinking. He must have thought about it thoroughly before he pretended to be drunk and attacked.

    After all, how is it even possible that a highgod be affected by alcohol?

    As the realization dawned on him, Han Shuo suddenly felt a cold shiver run through his heart. He no longer dared to underestimate any highgod in the City of Shadows. If a mere Avery was this formidable, then the other chiefs of divine guards and patriarchs ofrge family ns who were mightier than Avery¡¯s must be even more terrifying.

    After Han Shuo calmed his mind and thought about the situation carefully, he came to realize that because everything had been going smoothly with his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, he had underestimated the experts in the City of Shadows. Especially, he had misjudged just how terrifying Avery and the House of Lavers were, thereby bringing about his near death!

    Han Shuo gasped in surprise. The demon generals that were retreating from the Lavers Residence suddenly discovered a shadow outside Cage and Eve¡¯s room. The shadow hadpletely fused with darkness and it was moving about as though trying to look for something...

    ¡°Where is it? I¡¯m sure there must be something nearby. But what is it...¡± The shadowy figure that Avery referred to as ¡®Number Three¡¯ was looking all around from within the darkness, attempting to locate an unknown threat.

    Han Shuo ordered his demon generals to retreat rapidly. He was certain that the shadow hiding in the dark must be a midgod of excellent strength who was expert in concealing himself.

    On that night, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death silently returned to the cave where his main body was hiding. Han Shuo intended not to return to the City of Shadows for the time being.

    ***Two monthster...

    Thanks to Anito¡¯s efforts, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy hadpleted its renovation and it looked brand new. During the two months, many fromrge family ns woulde to visit and ask Anito about Han Shuo¡¯s whereabouts, desperate to buy more of his medicines.

    Most of those who lined up and bought medicines from the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy had personally tried them themselves. They would praise highly of the pharmacy and tell others about the brilliance of the medications. More and more of the rich and powerful members of the city started to pay attention to this inconspicuous shop called the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    Anito knew nothing about what happened that night. Naturally, he wasn¡¯t able to provide the crowd with a good exnation for Han Shuo¡¯s mysterious disappearance. Erebus, the Chief of the Third Corps, had called on Anito a few times during those months but as Han Shuo wasn¡¯t around, Anito couldn¡¯t get his hands on any medicine.

    Yet another month had passed. The reputation of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy grew even greater in the City of Shadows. Therge family ns started to grow suspicious about Han Shuo¡¯s abrupt and rather lengthy disappearance. Some of the family ns even dispatched their men to search the mountain ranges around the city for Han Shuo.

    It was during this time that Carmelita finally emerged from her secluded cultivation. Her skin tone had be more and more normal. Although her appearance was still far from being called a beauty, her looks now were merely ordinarily ugly.

    The excited Carmelita, who had even thought of how to repay Han Shuo¡¯s favor, was disappointed about Han Shuo¡¯s mysterious disappearance. She began to worry after learning from Anito that Han Shuo had returned with all the medicinal ingredients he needed the day before he disappeared.

    The fourth month into his disappearance, not just Carmelita but by any ount all the members ofrge family ns wanting to purchase Han Shuo¡¯s medicine were convinced that something sinister must have happened to Han Shuo. Many even believed that Han Shuo was murdered.

    Carmelita, however, did not!

    Having returned from the Miasma Cloud Mountain Range with Han Shuo, Carmelita knew just how skillful Han Shuo was at preserving his own life. Being able to escape from the extremely dangerous situation at the Miasma Cloud Mountain Range while carrying a wounded person had left Carmelita with a deep impression.

    Feeling anxious, Carmelitamanded the divine guards under his House of Sainte to look for Han Shuo. Not just the City of Shadows, but even the towns and forts under the sphere of influence received Carmelita¡¯s order. A most thorough search for Han Shuo began.

    Simultaneously, Andre, another significant character of the House of Sainte, started his own investigation into Han Shuo¡¯s disappearance.

    ¡°What did you find?¡± Andre asked with squinted eyes. His left pupil turned a dark violet shade, shimmering with ice-cold murder. If Han Shuo was present, he would surely discover that Andre at that moment was nothing like his polite and amiable self in usual times!

    A person whose face was covered by a white mask was crouching before Andre. Its pair of eyes, not covered by the mask, was as lifeless and empty as the dead. It would give any observer a most ufortable feeling.

    ¡°Avery of the House of Lavers drank heavily that night,¡± a toneless voice that seemed to be devoid of all emotions sounded from behind that white mask.

    ¡°Continue,¡± Andre gently closed his dark purple eye and looked at the character with only his right eye.

    ¡°On that day, Avery¡¯s son, Cage, had been to the Fifth Corps. The two had a discussion in a secret chamber with Cage returning to the Lavers Residence soon after that. He has not taken a step outside the Lavers Residence even till this day,¡± the emotionless voice took a short pause and continued, ¡°However, there are eyewitnesses iming that Avery did not leave that building of the Fifth Corps all night. He had fallen asleep on top of the building after drinking and only woke up at daybreak.¡±

    ¡°He who excuses himself uses himself. Since there are people who saw him remain out in the open at the top of the building, he must be the one who did it. It seems I have to pay him a visit!¡± Andre stood up and opened his left eye. It returned to its original dark gray color, the same as his right eye. His entire demeanor also transformed and he was again that gentlemanly and beaming Andre.

    Out of nowhere, Andre appeared at the top of the tower where Avery drank. He satposedly on that chair which belonged solely to Avery, calmly looking at the blue sky, as he rocked the chair.

    Avery, who was below the building and in the middle of something, suddenly creased his brows. He said to the few people before him, ¡°This will be it for the time being. You are all dismissed.¡±

    ¡°My Lord, there are a few more things that need your...¡±

    ¡°I said dismissed!¡± Avery groaned in a cold voice before the person could finish.

    The few were astonished. They hastily withdrew from the room without giving another word.

    Avery¡¯s figure became blurred and he appeared before Andre at the next instance.

    ¡°I did not expect your arrival, Lord Andre. How may I help you?¡± Avery opened and poured a bottle of wine as he said to Andre. He then handed Andre a crystal goblet filled with amber-colored liquid, saying, ¡°Fruit wine from the northwest forest of the Life Dominion. Have a taste.¡±

    Andre received the crystal goblet smilingly, took a sip, and praised, ¡°Mmm... Not bad, not bad at all... You really know how to enjoy life, don¡¯t you!¡±

    Avery said nothing but smiled modestly.

    Andre downed the goblet of wine. As he gently swayed and stared into the empty goblet in his hand, in a most natural manner, he asked, ¡°So, is Bryan dead or is he still alive?¡±

    The smile on Avery¡¯s face turned stiff and froze in the middle of pouring a cup of wine for himself. After a long while, he resumed the act. He put on a rather bitter smile, shook his head, and replied, ¡°I don¡¯t know...¡±

 Chapter 709 - Han Shuoâ€™s Counterattack

    GDK 709: Han Shuo¡¯s Counterattack

    Andre suddenly raised his head. He stared straight at Avery with piercing eyes and said, ¡°You aren¡¯t going to tell me that you¡¯ve got nothing to do with his disappearance, are you?¡±

    ¡°No, I¡¯m not denying it. It was indeed me who did it!¡± Avery calmly admitted. He knew that Andre did not show up at this ce simply to taste his wine. Besides, he knew that the House of Sainte, given their power and influence, would eventually find out the truth after conducting a thorough investigation.

    ¡°Then what exactly do you mean by you don¡¯t know?¡± Andre was rather puzzled by Avery¡¯s admission.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know if that fe is dead or alive because he escaped!¡± Avery said bitterly before downing a cup of wine.

    ¡°Wha... what?¡± Andre suddenly raised his voice. He stared fixedly at Avery and said, ¡°Are you kidding me? You are the Chief of the Fifth Corps. We all know how strong you are. Bryan is just a small lowgod. If you did the job personally, he would either be captured alive or be killed. How could there be a third option?¡±

    Facing Andre¡¯s questioning, the look on Avery¡¯s face became even more bitter. He shook his head and replied, ¡°Believe it or not, he really did manage to escape. I couldn¡¯t make out precisely what kind of energy he used. Before he escaped, I dealt him a blow that he shouldn¡¯t have survived. But despite that, I couldn¡¯t find his corpse... That¡¯s why I said... I don¡¯t know...¡±

    Andre had a doubtful expression as he stared fixedly at Avery as though trying to make out if Avery was telling an untruth. After a long while, Andre cracked a grin and said, ¡°I really couldn¡¯t imagine that he managed to escape from your hands. But even if you are lying, I doubt you woulde up with something as fantastical and ridiculous as this. Well, if that¡¯s the case, the investigation is going to be rather difficult...¡±

    ¡°Lord Andre, don¡¯t tell me you¡¯re actually going to continue to investigate if this small little pharmacist is dead or alive?¡± Avery shrugged and said nonchntly. He poured himself yet another cup of spirit and drank it.

    ¡°If he had not helped Carmelita, I wouldn¡¯t raise an eyebrow even if you killed him a hundred times!¡± Andre coldly groaned and continued, ¡°However, this fe is the best shot we have at improving Carmelita¡¯s current condition ¨C not just her looks, but even her queer temperament! I have previously discussed him with you and told you not to aggravate the matter. I¡¯d expected that you¡¯d at least do me this honor. Avery, has your House of Lavers be mighty enough to contend against our Sainte Family?¡±

    ¡°Of course not!¡± Avery lowered his head and answered. He continued with a deep voice, ¡°I have told my kids not to cause that fe trouble. But nheless, he blew up three of my shops. If it wasn¡¯t for that, I wouldn¡¯t have taken such drastic measures! This is not entirely our fault!¡±

    Andre stared at the humbled Avery and gently creased his brows as he said, ¡°You did not go to get him in person just for the vengeance of destroying three energy stone stores, did you? I know Bryan is a very talented pharmacist. I believe the only reason that will motivate you to do the job yourself is for the things inside Bryan¡¯s head. You did not want anyone but yourself to have those things. That was why you did it in person, isn¡¯t that right?¡±

    Avery became utterly silent after hearing those words.

    Both of them were acquainted for a long time and knew each other¡¯s temperaments well. Just like how Avery knew what Andre came to him for, Andre knew that Avery would only need to nod his head and someone wouldplete the task of finishing a mere lowgod cleanly for him.

    As the Chief of the Fifth Corps and a highgod, Avery¡¯s intention behind personally attacking a lowgod definitely wasn¡¯t simply to murder!

    After staring at Avery for a while, Andre softly sighed and said, ¡°Forget about it. With things havinge to this, I will not pursue the case against you any further.¡±

    But suddenly, Andre¡¯s right eye grew dark purple again and he transformed into an ice-cold and merciless version of himself. He stared at Avery and warned, ¡°If Bryan is dead, then this whole incident is over. But if he is still alive and if you dare touch him again, don¡¯t me me for showing no mercy!¡±

    Avery¡¯s heart skipped a beat when he saw Andre¡¯s eye change. He immediately understood that Andre¡¯s warning this time was no trivial matter, and definitely nothing as simple as the casual greeting he gave thest time. After weighing his potential gains and losses, Avery nodded and replied, ¡°Understood!¡±

    ¡°Good. Oh, right, even if Bryan is still alive, he cannot pose any threat to your Lavers Family. The small bit of strength he had wasn¡¯t enough to harm any of your family members, so you may rx about that,¡± Andre said as he got up from Avery¡¯s chair.

    ¡°Alright, it¡¯s gettingte already. So long!¡± Andre stepped on empty air and left.

    When Andre disappeared into the horizon, the corners of Avery¡¯s lips curved to make a slight smile. His figure became fuzzy and at the next instant, he appeared inside a secret chamber at the Fifth Corps. He instructed, ¡°Number Four, go to my residence and inform the two good-for-nothings that their house confinement is over.¡±

    ¡°Yes, my Lord!¡± a cold voice in the shadows answered his bidding and disappeared just like Number Three.

    Cage and Eve, who had been confined to the Lavers Residence for four long months, cheered when they learned that they had finally regained their freedom of movement. For Cage and Eve, this pair of siblings who were ustomed to traveling everywhere, not being able to take a step outside the Lavers Residence for four months had nearly bored them to death.

    ¡°Brother, that fe has disappeared for four months. He is probably done for. Since father said that we are free, this means that he has sorted out the matter with the House of Sainte. Haha, I knew it, those who set themselves against the House of Lavers never end up well!¡± Eve said to her brother Cage gleefully.

    ¡°That¡¯s enough. From today onwards, we must be careful not to discuss anything about him in front of outsiders. Otherwise, if people overhear it, we could bring father some unnecessary trouble,¡± Cage chided. He then stretched his bodyfortably and said, ¡°It¡¯s been such a long time. Why don¡¯t we visit Fort Hassell? The Sea Fruits found there happen to mature this season. I have not tasted that delicacy for a long time...¡±

    ¡°Oh yeah, Fort Hassell has the most beautiful scenery during this season. Let¡¯s take a trip there!¡± Eve immediately agreed.

    Having decided on their vacation destination, the siblings immediately packed up their luggage and with a small group of family n divine guards, they left the City of Shadows for Fort Hassell that was under the control of the House of Lavers. Han Shuo who was meditating inside his cave suddenly opened his eyes. With an eerily cold face, he muttered, ¡°Finally leaving the Lavers Residence...? Avery, I might not be able to get rid of you for now, but your son and daughter who know nothing but to stir up trouble, I¡¯ll do you a service and release you of those burdens! You are going to be so grateful of me... Hehehe...¡±

    Han Shuo had been staying in the underground cave for four whole months. After going through immense pain during the first seven days, Han Shuo managed to stabilize the injuries on his main body. Han Shuo spent the following month nursing his injuries. With the help of his medicinal pellets, Han Shuo managed to reconnect the meridians and bones in his main body.

    Thanks to his cultivation of Indestructible Omen Body, his demonic body became much more tenacious and was forged to be even more abnormally resilient. That was the reason why Han Shuo could recoverpletely from his injuries in just three months after deploying Demonic Blood Disassembly.

    After his recovery, Han Shuo did not rush to leave the underground cave. He dared not to show himself in the City of Shadows as he was afraid that Avery might try to assassinate him yet again.

    After failing thest time, Han Shuo believed that if Avery was to strike again, he would be even more unrelenting. Perhaps Han Shuo might not even be given the chance to deploy Demonic Blood Disassembly. Hence, Han Shuo stayed in hiding all along, silently observing the activities of the Lavers Family. He was like a viper curled in the dark, waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike.

    On this day, when Han Shuo saw that Cage and Eve had left the City of Shadows, he knew the opportunity he had been patiently waiting for hade.

    The journey from the City of Shadows to Fort Hassell took approximately seven days. Cage, Eve, and a group of their House of Lavers divine guards rode in an airship to get to their destination. Han Shuo knew that this was not the moment to strike. He tracked the airship using a demon general while he exited his underground cave and headed into Fort Hassell.

    By using the demon generals in the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, Han Shuo had eyes on every single activity within ten miles radius. He easily avoided all those divine guards that were searching for him and exited the mountain range without meeting any resistance. He secretly intruded into Fort Hassell.

    On the morning of the eighth day, Han Shuo appeared at a vast ocean at the north of Fort Hassell. This piece of the ocean called ¡°Poseidon¡¯s Tears¡± was one of the most beautiful ces to be found near the City of Shadows. At this time of the year, the nts at the depths of the ocean would be blooming with strange but beautiful flowers. Some of the flowers and petals would fall off and drift with the current. The ocean scene would not just appear exceptionally beautiful, but it would also be filled with enchanting scents.

    Of the flowering sea nts, there was a species withrge petals that would produce sweet and delicious fruits. The Sea Fruit was a seasonal delicacy that foodies would never miss. Therefore at this time of the year, this ce called Poseidon¡¯s Tears would attractrge crowds of tourists from the City of Shadows, especially youngsters.

    This year was no exception. When Han Shuo arrived at the sea and spread out his demon generals, he discovered that the tiny inds all over the sea were filled with young men and women. Cage and Eve were on a small ind with verdant, lush greenery and small but beautiful vacation houses. Colorful sea flowers were blooming in the water all around the small ind. It was a beautiful scene.

    Fort Hassell was a territory of the Lavers Family. As scions of their family n, they got the ind with the best scenery and views.

    For the first three days, Cage and Eve had been staying on the ind and were never far from the divine guards that came with them. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t find any opportunity to strike.

    But on this day, Cage and Eve got bored with staying on the ind. They decided to swim and dive around the ind as well as gather some ripen Sea Fruits. As the ocean was a territory of the House of Lavers, the two did not think that danger would befall them. They did not allow divine guards to follow behind them.

    ¡°Brother, let¡¯s go in separate ways and see who gets the biggest Sea Fruit!¡± Eve very much enjoyed her vacation here. She had forgotten about all the pain that Han Shuo had brought her following his apparent death. She threw herself into the embrace of the ocean.

    Cage agreed enthusiastically. He was thinking about collecting some extra Sea Fruits so that he could give them some to someone he fancied after returning to the City of Shadows.

    The young master and youngdy of the Lavers Family went in two different directions, towards the regions where the Sea Flowers bloomed brightest...

    When Evended among a field of sea flowers, for no apparent reason, she thought about Teng Fei who she used to adore. When she remembered Teng Fei¡¯s handsomeness and tenderness, she felt rather nostalgic. She remarked resentfully, ¡°That wretched rascal. He¡¯s not reliable at important times. Why am I still thinking about him!¡±

    Then, yet another person floated into Eve¡¯s mind. Her mood suddenly soured and she cursed, ¡°Ever since I was born, no one has ever dared p me in the face. Serves you right that you are dead!¡±

    ¡°Eh?¡± Eve rubbed her eyes and looked at the person in front of her somewhat puzzlingly. She mumbled to herself, ¡°Why am I thinking about him, and why hasn¡¯t he disappeared from my mind?¡±

    ¡°Miss Eve, I¡¯m d I¡¯m still on your mind... Hehe...¡± Han Shuo said to Eve with a suspicious grin. He had covered the surrounding sea with Banner of Hallucination beforehand.

    ¡°He even talks? Hallucinating... I¡¯m hallucinating... It seems that he really has left a big impact on me... That wretched thing...¡± Eve mumbled to herself as she looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Yes, this is all a hallucination. When you dieter, you won¡¯t be feeling any pain!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s smile turned stone cold and the scene around them suddenly transformed. The Banner of Hallucination was activated.

    The countless gods that were killed by Eve¡¯s bad temper were all revived in an instant. They were dragging their own intestines, rotten from head to toe, oozing with fouling blood, or munching their broken arms...

    ¡°Don¡¯te... Don¡¯te any closer,¡± Eve screamed at the top of her lungs. The terrifying scene around her caused her to tremble, shout and cry.

    ¡°Oh... killed quite a lot haven¡¯t you? Hehe, perhaps even death cannot expiate your evil deeds!¡± Han Shuo sneered. He did not rush in immediately taking Eve¡¯s life. Instead, he coldly watched as Eve cried miserably in her hallucination, slowly being tormented!

    Han Shuo waited until Eve waspletely terrified ¨C when she hadpletely lost her mind and kept on crying andughing ¨C before he finally attacked. With a sh of the Demonic des, Eve¡¯s head detached and rolled off her body. Blood spurted from her severed neck and sprinkled on the blossoming sea flowers, giving them an exotic retouch.

    Eve¡¯s divine soul was collected away by Han Shuo. She would soon be one of the demon generals inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon who would forever be bound by Han Shuo.

    ¡°Decent strength but unfortunately, she never truly experienced big setbacks. Her mind was too weak. Can¡¯t even resist the hallucination of the Banner of Hallucination. It appears that although these members ofrge family ns have great strength, theyck the strength of mind...¡± Han Shuo mumbled to himself and kept away his Banner of Hallucination. He proceeded by silently diving towards Cage.

    Back when Han Shuo was in the underground world of Profound Continent, Donna, Bolten and the others used to fall into hallucinations. All of them, even Donna who had terrifying power, were affected by their hallucinations. From then on, Han Shuo understood that although thoserge family n members on Elysium could have greater strength than he does, their hearts and minds were not as unswerving as his. A heart not tempered by constantly facing the possibility of death was weak and would easily be affected by hallucinations.

    Eve was only thetest person to confirm Han Shuo¡¯s hypothesis. Soon enough, Han Shuo arrived on Cage¡¯s side. Compared to his sister Eve, Cage mind was slightly more tenacious. He did not try to run from his hallucinations in a flurry. Instead, he attacked them madman.

    It was obvious that Cage too was very much affected by the hallucination. He could not determine what was real and what was a product of his own imagination. Han Shuo knew he could finish off this hallucinating Cage using just the energy of his avatars.

    Hallucinations were, after all, imaginary. No matter how rapid or ferocious Cage¡¯s attacks were, the hallucination would remain. It is only with a heart as firm and resilient as a boulder that one could break free from what only exists in their minds. Obviously, Cage was far from being able to do so.

    Hence, Han Shuo merely sat and watched as Cage wasted his divine energy to the hallucination. Cage was trying to conceal the fear in his heart by wildlyunching attacks. But clearly, it was futile.

    ¡°Shoo! Get lost! I can kill you all again!¡± Cage shouted sternly to embolden himself as he continued to mount attacks. Gradually, Cage felt that his movements were getting heavier and heavier while his head was getting dizzy. It was only at this point in time that Cage seemed to realize something.

    But it was toote because Han Shuo had finally made a move!

    Han Shuo suddenly got beside Cage and threw a punch containing the most ferocious force aimed at his head. Han Shuo ignored this and took thirty bursts of Cage¡¯s powerless attacks before his punchnded in Cage¡¯s skull.

    <i>St!</i> Cage¡¯s head burst apart, spraying his blood and brain matter everywhere.

    Han Shuo then collected Cage¡¯s divine soul, removed all evidence that might incriminate him, and left satisfyingly. He did not forget to put away his Banner of Hallucination.

    With that, both the son and daughter of Avery Lavers died to Han Shuo!

    Although Han Shuo didn¡¯t know if Avery would figure out that it was he who murdered his children, he was not afraid. Han Shuo had taken Avery as his most formidable enemy and nned on having a prolonged fight against Avery.

    But still, there was one thing that Han Shuo regretted. From that day onwards, his rtionship with Donna wouldn¡¯t be as friendly and there might evene a day that they became enemies. Han Shuo had always tried to avoid this situation but in the end, regrettably, he could not.

 Chapter 710 - Greenfire Swamp

    GDK 710: Greenfire Swamp

    ***City of Shadows. Fifth Corps.

    A divine guard wearing a panic-stricken face rushed into a room where Avery was doing paperwork and immediately crouched on the ground. Anxiously panting, he said, ¡°My... My Lord... It¡¯s bad...¡±

    ¡°Oh,¡± Avery acknowledged. He did not move his head and kept his eyes focused on the scroll in his hand. ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡±

    ¡°Cage and Eve, they, they...¡± the divine guard stammered. He couldn¡¯t seem toplete the sentence.

    Avery bunched his brows and put down the document in his hand. He lightly groaned and asked assumingly, ¡°The two are out making a mess, aren¡¯t they? Who did they offend this time? Is it someone from the House of Sainte?¡±

    ¡°No...¡±

    Avery was obviously relieved to hear that. He softly exhaled and replied, ¡°That¡¯s fortunate. As long as it¡¯s not the House of Sainte, it¡¯s not that big of a deal. If the two good-for-nothings offended someone from the Sainte Family again, the matter is going to be a tough one to deal with.¡±

    ¡°No... Cage and Eve did not offend anyone. At Fort Hassell... they... they were...¡± the divine guard just could not garner enough courage to speak that word in front of Avery.

    ¡°They were what? Did they get beaten by someone? Hmph, Fort Hassell belongs to our House of Lavers. Quite daring they are to do so in our territory!¡± Avery coldly groaned.

    ¡°No... the two of them... were killed at Fort Hassell!¡± the divine guard clenched his teeth and finally spoke of the bloody news.

    Avery was suddenly stupefied. His eyes were hollow. He seemed unable to process this grievous news momentarily. When he finally came to himself, he grabbed the divine guard by his neck, and furiously screamed, ¡°What did you say? Say it again!¡±

    ¡°Spare... Spare me my Lord. News arrived from Fort Hassell that Cage and Eve were murdered while collecting Sea Fruits at Poseidon¡¯s Tears... Spare me my Lord!¡± the divine guard pleaded and exined.

    ¡°NOO......¡± Avery roared at the sky. His voice spread throughout the entire Fifth Corps.

    A streak of shadow suddenly flew out from the Fifth Corps. It was heading away from the City of Shadows. When it passed through the city gates, it did not even stop to register.

    ***Two dayster, on the ind that Cage and Eve used to stay.

    Avery was dumbfounded as he stared nkly at Cage and Eve¡¯s bodiesid out in front of him. Cage¡¯s skull waspletely shattered and he could only be identified by his build. Eve¡¯s head was severed from her body. It was sewn back in ce with thread...

    Avery¡¯s wife had passed away long ago, leaving him with their only son and daughter. He was very pampering of Cage and Eve. Although they had always made mistakes and caused him trouble, he would always forgive and tolerate them. If any of them were bullied, he would do everything he could to make retribution.

    To Avery, the two were his world. The pain he felt from seeing their bodiesid lifelessly in front of him was so much that he felt suffocated.

    ¡°Did you not discover a trace of evidence?¡± Avery asked very calmly as he looked at the two bodies.

    ¡°Forgive us, my Lord... Forgive us...¡± a group of divine guards knelt in a line begged for mercy.

    ¡°Well then, there is no point for any of you to continue living,¡± Avery said in a calm voice. Upon hearing those words, the faces of those divine guards became as ashen as the dead. A few even immediately took into the air and tried to escape.

    Multiple shadows shot out from Avery¡¯s body and they each targeted a person. A series of eerie, miserable shrieks rang as it rained blood and severed body parts around Avery.

    Not a single one of these divine guards who came to Fort Hassell with Cage and Eve escaped Avery¡¯s brutal ughtering. None of themnded with an intact corpse!

    ¡°Who, who could it be?¡± Avery mumbled to himself,pletely ignoring the intense reeking of blood and body parts scattered all around him.

    ¡°Could it be him? But he is only a lowgod. Even if he staged a sneak attack, he still could not have been able to evenly match Eve and Cage, especially Cage ¨C he couldn¡¯t fall to the sneak attack of a lowgod. Who could it be? Who have I offended recently?¡±

    After thinking for a while, he suddenly furrowed his brows and put on a malevolent face, and muttered, ¡°Carmelita has been searching for that runt. If Andre knew it was me, then perhaps she learned of it as well. This foul oaf is absolutely mad and has a close friendship with that fe. Eve had previously insulted her. Could she have done this? Should be... has to be her...¡±

    ¡°Number Three!¡± Avery shouted.

    ¡°Yes!¡± a response sounded from Avery¡¯s shadow that was cast under the hot sun.

    ¡°Investigate the recent activities of Carmelita and keep a close eye on her. Report back to me as soon as you discover anything!¡± Avery instructed.

    ¡°Understood!¡± a straightforward replied was heard. Soon after, a shadow separated from Avery and disappeared into the beautiful ocean.

    At the northwest of Fort Hassell was Greenfire Swamp. There, Han Shuo was hiding among the leaves of an overgrown tree.

    The Greenfire Swamp was an enormous swamp several thousand square miles in size. There would be faint, green mes burning on the swamp throughout the year, hence the name Greenfire.

    After making observations, Han Shuo concluded that the source of the green mes was in fact natural gas found inside the swamp being released andbusted. He also noted that the ¡®natural gas¡¯ in this ce was not quite the same as the kind he was familiar with. Besides the different color, this gas could burn for much longer. Perhaps this was the reason that green mes could be found in this swamp all throughout the year.

    The Greenfire Swamp housed all kinds of magical beasts with astonishing strengths but poor intelligence. There were also a few non-human, high-intelligence species living there such as the Triops Han Shuo had seen back at the Abyss realm, and humanoids with eagle-like wings sprouting from their backs.

    Other than the green mes and swamps present everywhere, this ce also contained some mountains and rivers containing beautiful energy crystals with unique functions. In addition to energy crystals, the Greenfire Swamp also yielded all kinds of medicinal ingredients that pharmacists needed.

    Thus, for this reason, the Greenfire swamp was no quiet ce. The energy crystals and medicinal ingredients within had attracted many gods from small towns and forts around the swamp toe to extract the natural resources and gain profit. The presence of these gods, subsequently, attracted a special group of people. They were there neither to extract ores, nor to collect medicinal ingredients, but to prey and hunt for other gods ¨C they were godhunters!

    Han Shuo hade to Greenfire Swamp purely by coincidence. After murdering Cage and Eve, Han Shuo discovered that the divine guards on the ind had basically lost their minds. They were all activated and dispatched to search and question every person on the ind who might be remotely rted to the murder.

    If the divine guards were to discover him, Han Shuo believed that it would take no time for Avery to connect his son and daughter¡¯s deaths to him. The Greenfire Swamp was some distance away from Fort Hassell and was sparsely popted. It was a most suitable ce for him to hide.

    Soon after he arrived at Greenfire Swamp, through his demon generals, Han Shuo was shocked to discover that a pharmacist collecting medicinal ingredients there had been murdered by a godhunter. But after carefully observing, he became much more at ease as he learned that the godhunters were not particrly powerful and did not hunt inrge packs.

    Not only was Han Shuo at ease, but he was also ted because he got the chance to be a hunter himself ¨C to hunt the godhunters.

    The incident of nearly being assassinated by Avery was a wake-up call for Han Shuo. He understood that the scheme of forming his own family n in the City of Shadows merely by umting wealth and to fully rely on Carmelita and House of Sainte for protection was a deluded pipe-dream. If he wanted to truly gain a foothold in the City of Shadows, he had to do much more than that.

    It was only by bing mightier and gaining strength that no family n would dare look down upon that he could protect himself and his wealth and stand firmly in the City of Shadows. Otherwise, all he had would be as insubstantial as a house of cards.

    After Han Shuo came to realize this, he made it his highest priority to raise his strength. Increasing the realm of demonic arts usually required running into some sort of fortunate encounter. It was very difficult to ascend through the realms merely through a short burst of effort and cultivation.

    However, this was not the case for Han Shuo¡¯s avatars ¨C especially his avatar of death. As it had previously absorbed the divine soul of a midgod, this avatar of his needed only to gain sufficient divine energy and making breakthroughs woulde with ease. After having exhausted all his divine essences of death, the fastest way to continue advancing his divine energy was to engulf that of another cultivator.

    Han Shuo had previously ovee the negative effects of engulfing divine energy and therefore wasn¡¯t afraid of bing addicted again. Although Han Shuo couldn¡¯t just ughter any random person he met as his conscience wouldn¡¯t allow him to, he certainly didn¡¯t feel the same way about other godhunters. This was why Han Shuo did not immediately leave after discovering the presence of a few godhunters in Greenfire Swamp and became rejoiced.

    With his senses extended by the use of demon generals, Han Shuo became one of the most terrifying hunters in the Greenfire Swamp. Two midgod godhunters cultivating in the energy of death became Han Shuo¡¯s first target.

    His prey were a man and a woman. The man looked to be in his thirties while the woman looked around forty years old. Needless to say, this was in reference to the mortals on Earth and Profound Continent. Their actual ages were certainly far, far higher than that.

    The man and woman were hiding in the dark, silently observing a cave made of rocks that were cooked by the green mes to glow bright red, waiting to ambush on random, innocent passersby who walked into their view. Funnily enough, they were not aware that they were being stalked by Han Shuo!

    Han Shuo had eyes on the pair for three days. The female was a mid-stage midgod while the male was an early-stage midgod. They had attacked twice during the three days and managed to engulf the divine energies of an early-stage lowgod and a mid-stage lowgod who went to extract energy ores in the cave.

    ¡°Faria, are you sure about that?¡± the man softly asked.

    ¡°Do not question my observations. The energy undtion on that little girl is abnormally intense. She must be carrying a highgod divine weapon with her. If we can get the divine weapon, we will be rich!¡± that woman named Faria said, licking her lips. Her eyes were bursting with lights of greed and cruelty.

    ¡°Highgod divine weapon? Hehe... That would be wonderful!¡± the manughed and suddenly asked, ¡°And how old is the girl? What does she look like? You should know about my... fetish... hehe...¡±

    ¡°God¡¯s sake, Grussie. I don¡¯t care what you want to do but put it off until we get the highgod divine weapon. If you interfere with my business in any way, you won¡¯t see any mercy from me!¡± Faria softly cursed.

    After waiting for a long while, a beautiful little girl who appeared to be around ten years old suddenly walked out from the cave. She had fair skin, purple hair that trailed over her shoulders, and a pair of purple eyes that were filled with frigid coldness. Although she looked like a doll, she did not appear adorable as the air of coldness she carried was too intense. In fact, she appeared rather unkind.

    Grussie suddenly began to heave heavy breaths when he saw the girl. His face was flushed with excitement as he softly squealed, ¡°A beauty! An absolute beauty! I like!¡±

    ¡°Her bodyguards haven¡¯t caught up to her yet. Now is the best time to nab her. Move!¡± Faria too was clearly very excited, but her interest was only on the divine weapon possessed by that little girl.

    Two trails of sinister radiances suddenly shot out from a spot of darkness. A domain of divinity of death abruptly shrouded that little girl. They went grabbing at her excitedly.

    ¡°Oh no! This is way too soon!¡± During the three days that Han Shuo stalked the pair, he did not interfere with their assaults but used those opportunities to observe and get a clear understanding of their strengths. But this time, when he saw that this beautiful little girl about to fall into their treacherous attack, he finally decided to step forward to rescue her. Han Shuo did not expect that the two would be so hasty in attacking her.

    However, at the very next instance, somethingpletely unexpected happened...

    A splendid and dazzling curtain of light bursts from the little girl with the eerieplexion. A most bizarre energy field was emitted spontaneously. The light curtain was like a nuclear sma grinder that could pulverize all matter. Faria and Grussie were transformed into bloody mist and fine bloody particles that were sprinkling everywhere before Han Shuo could even tell what happened.

    ¡°What a beautiful scene!¡± a warm smile blossomed from the little girl¡¯s cold face as blood sprinkled down and drenched her petite figure. She then mumbled to herself, ¡°There seems to be one more person...¡±

 Chapter 711 - Mysterious little girl

    GDK 711: Mysterious little girl

    At the next instance, Han Shuo who was hiding in the dark suddenly felt that his body was being restrained by some kind of unique energy field. A certain revolving energy winded around him, making him feel as though he was trapped in the most viscous mud.

    It was also at this time that the little girl drenched in blood cast her ice-cold purple eyes at the lush tree he was hiding in.

    The little girl¡¯s cute dress appeared as beautiful as red roses after being stained by fresh blood. That, however, was overshadowed by the chilling aura that she emanated. Instead of adorable, she appeared extremely terrifying.

    Han Shuo, who had been silently observing the situation beneath him couldn¡¯t make out exactly what energy that little girl used but was certain that the energy did not belong to any of the twelve fundamental forces. Han Shuo found the girl to be extremely unique when he saw her shred two midgods into bits in an instant and even appeared to enjoy it.

    ¡°Mister, you do know that there are caterpirs crawling on the tree, right?¡± the little girl said in a teasing voice. Her purple eyes shone as though she could see through all the obstacles before them.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart sank. He knew that his location was fully exposed to the little girl. Han Shuo turned over in his mind for a moment before he forced a smile and flew down from the tree. Maintaining a distance from her, he immediately exined, ¡°I¡¯m not with them, please don¡¯t misunderstand!¡±

    ¡°Not with them? Hmm... but that doesn¡¯t make much of a difference, you have witnessed memit murder!¡± she looked at Han Shuo with an innocent pout but her voice was colder than liquid nitrogen.

    ¡°You... intend to kill me?¡± Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before he asked with a slight grin.

    ¡°Well, yes. Terribly sorry about this!¡± the little girl apologized and bowed at Han Shuo slightly. Next, she started to float in his direction. A most bizarre energy field suddenly shrouded the space around him. This energy field waspletely different from a domain of divinity. It doesn¡¯t alter the distribution or amount of elemental energy in the space but fills it with countless vortexes that were hardly visible to the naked eye. Those vortexes contained strange energies that seemed to be able to twist and shred all that entered.

    Han Shuo¡¯s acute consciousness immediately detected the changes to the surrounding space when the energy field took shape. The numerous and densely packed vortexes may have been hardly visible to the naked eye, but Han Shuo could clearly detect their precise locations as well as their motions by using his wonderfully sensitive consciousness.

    The little girl was not affected by the vortexes in any way. Her body had passed through many of those vortexes unharmed as she glided towards Han Shuo. However, Han Shuo knew that those vortexes contained terrifying energy, which was evident by how brutally the two midgods were killed.

    The vortexes in the energy field started to move and revolve as they constricted towards Han Shuo...

    Han Shuo calmly stared at the little girl slowly approaching him. As the area he could move about became smaller and smaller, Han Shuo suddenly turned into a shadow. He escaped from a small open region at high speed while elongating and shrinking his body. By deploying ¡®Body Change¡¯ to the ultimate, Han Shuo managed to bore out from the constantly constricting swarm of vortexes.

    Han Shuo took a gentle breath and adjusted his mind to the most optimal stand. Hended in the blood pool where the little girl previously stood and casually took the two yet-to-dissipate midgod souls into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. He then turned to look at the rather astonished little girl and said coldly, ¡°We have no quarrel with each other. But if you attack again, I will fight you until one of us die!¡±

    That little girl did not anticipate that Han Shuo could easily escape from the energy field she created and she seemed to see a mysterious veil draped over Han Shuo. She gently bunched her brows as though considering if she should attack again. A momentter, she gently nodded her head, and said in a cold voice, ¡°There is an unknown type of energy on you, one that I have never seen before. We indeed have no quarrel with each other. You may leave!¡±

    Han Shuo was even more shocked to hear those words as he did not expect that this little girl could make out the demonic arts that he had been concealing. With that, Han Shuo grew even more cautious about her.

    ¡°Master, leave this little girl. She is much more terrifying than the one who attacked you thest time!¡± Cauldron Spirit warned in Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    Although Han Shuo wore the same expression on his face, his heart was as tumultuous as the sea during a storm after hearing Cauldron Spirit¡¯s words. He looked deep into the girl¡¯s eyes, nodded, and disappeared from the ce without saying a word.

    ¡°That little girl, are you sure she is more formidable than Avery?¡± Han Shuo asked Cauldron Spirit. He remained astonished about the fact even after leaving the ce.

    ¡°Yes, I have deduced that from her life force. In addition to that, she has something strange inside her. It should be a so-called divine weapon in this universe. That divine weapon contains strange energy but it is pretty decent,¡± Cauldron Spirit exined to Han Shuo.

    The Cauldron of Myriad Demon, as the ultimate weapon of demonic arts, even as it had exhausted the millions of demon generals it used to possess during its glory days, was not one to be easily impressed. If it said that the divine weapon the little girl possessed was decent, then the divine weapon would be truly extraordinary.

    Han Shuo became even more resolved not to provoke the little girl. An expert with strength beyond fathom and a divine weapon beyond terrifying wasn¡¯t someone that he should meddle with at this point in time. Especially as they were not enemies, Han Shuo thought that there was no point in making trouble for himself.

    After Han Shuo¡¯s first targets were ughtered by that little girl, Han Shuo had no choice but to look for another target.

    After two days, Han Shuo found a godhunter cultivating in the energy of death with early-stage midgod strength. This time, Han Shuo¡¯s hunting went without a hitch. Given the current strength of Han Shuo¡¯s demonic arts and the enormous coverage area of his demon generals, there was no way that the godhunter could resist Han Shuo¡¯s sneak attack. Han Shuo again had the chance of experiencing the wonderful sensation of having another¡¯s divine energy flowing into his body.

    Although it was possible to consume the divine energy of another person cultivating in the same energy, the beneficiary could not obtain all the divine energy that the benefactor possessed. In reality, the beneficiary would only inherit approximately ten percent of the benefactor¡¯s divine energy, if not less.

    The divine energy that others had gained through arduous cultivation, after all, belonged to themselves. A portion of their divine energy would always remain in the cultivator¡¯s skin, flesh, organs, and bones. Those could not be taken.

    On top of that, the process of consuming another¡¯s divine energy was very inefficient. It didn¡¯t matter how skilled the godhunter was at devouring divine energy. When the prey was being devoured, he would not be able to control the divine energy in his body. Although this allowed the predator to absorb and take the prey¡¯s divine energy, a greater portion of the prey¡¯s divine energy would be lost to heaven and earth through his eyes, ears, nostrils, mouth, hair, and every pore on his body. This loss wasn¡¯t something that could be prevented.

    And finally, after soaking in all of his prey¡¯s divine energy, the predator would have to purify it before he could fully assimte it with his own divine energy. This process meant further losses of divine energy. After ounting for all the inefficiencies, the effective divine energy that a predator could gain from a prey was one-tenth of the prey¡¯s divine energy.

    Therefore, Han Shuo had merely obtained effectively one-tenth of the divine energy of that early-stage midgod.

    However, as his prey was a midgod, just one-tenth of the divine energy was enough for Han Shuo¡¯s lowgod avatar to make a breakthrough!

    When the divine energy that Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death possessed was intense to the stage that a transformation was imminent, it immediately entered the Cauldron of Myriad Demon and sank into a meditative state.

    Meanwhile, Han Shuo, using his main body, started searching for his next target ¨C godhunters cultivating in the edict of destruction!

    For seven days straight, Han Shuo traveled around the Greenfire Swamp in search of suitable prey for his avatar of destruction to deepen its destruction divine energy. However, his findings were rather unexpected ¨C he came across not a single godhunter!

    Unresigned, Han Shuo went searching around the Greenfire Swamp for another three days. By chance, one of his demon generals saw that mysterious little girl ughter a godhunter cultivating in the energy of darkness and uttered: ¡°Should be clean now.¡± Immediately, Han Shuo understood why he couldn¡¯t find anymore godhunters.

    As that little girl had finished off all the godhunters, Han Shuo had no reason left to stay in Greenfire Swamp. Besides, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t betray his conscience to ughter those gods who came to this ce for the energy stones and medicinal ingredients.

    Should I return to the City of Shadows? Han Shuo pondered.

    It hadn¡¯t been long since the deaths of Cage and Eve. If Han Shuo was to return to the City of Shadows during this sensitive period, he would likely be a target of Avery¡¯s. The likelihood of getting assassinated by him was just too high to risk.

    Beforeing to Elysium, Han Shuo had promised his girlfriends back on Profound Continent that once he gained a foothold on Elysium, he would bring them over. In the City of Shadows, Han Shuo had befriended Carmelita, associated himself with the House of Sainte, and even established the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy which had be very popr. The City of Shadows was the ce where he could establish himself in the shortest amount of time. But due to his animosity with Avery Lavers, he would be in great danger if he were to live in the city. Han Shuo was troubled with this dilemma.

    After turning over in his mind again and again, Han Shuo still could note to a decision. However, he was already on the way out of Greenfire Swamp while thinking.

    Han Shuo exited the Greenfire Swamp after half a day. He slowly traveled in the direction towards the City of Shadows. He decided to stay outside the City of Shadows and enter the city after the incident died down.

    Whoosh... Han Shuo suddenly heard something from behind him.

    Han Shuo was shocked and immediately turned around to discover a small white dot rapidly approaching. Just a few secondster, the small white dot revealed itself to be none other than that mysterious little girl. She was clenching her teeth and charging in Han Shuo¡¯s direction. There was a rather sinister expression on her face. Han Shuo grew wary.

    The little girl possessed extremely acute senses. Given their current distance, Han Shuo believe that she had discovered him and might be trying to kill him. Having witnessed her wrath, Han Shuo hastily turned to face her and got ready for an all-out fight.

    But the situation wasn¡¯t as Han Shuo had anticipated. That little girl suddenly became unstable in her flight and she revealed an expression of pain. Suddenly, she let out a cry and started plummeting from the sky.

    Soon enough, a ssh sounded from the sea below Han Shuo¡¯s feet. A pair of small hands were constantly paddling and pping. She seemed to be trying to say something.

    ¡°That little girl is heavily injured, I can sense it!¡± Cauldron Spirit transmitted to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo looked all around suspiciously and released a few demon generals.

    If that little girl was already ridiculously powerful, then just how frightening did the person who harmed her have to be?

    Havinge to that realization, Han Shuo immediately thought of leaving. That little girl under the sea wasn¡¯t adorable at all. Han Shuo had seen her murder effortlessly and happily. He did not feel any sympathy for her. All he wanted was to leave this trouble as soon as he could.

    ¡°Save... Save me...¡± The girl managed to barely lift her head above the water and shouted at Han Shuo as he looked on coldly. She gazed at him with pitiable eyes. At this moment, all that was on her face was weakness and powerlessness. The fury she disyed during her rampage was nowhere to be seen.

    Han Shuo, aspassionate and tenderhearted as he was, let out a gentle sigh. He flew into the sea, grabbed the little girl, and rapidly flew away.

    Rumbles... Suddenly, an enormous explosion came from the direction of Greenfire Swamp. Han Shuo could hear it even though it was a great distance away.

    That little girl who was at herst gasp was jolted. She said hastily, ¡°Hurry up, hurry! They have broken through the boundary!¡±

    Han Shuo did not know who was after her but he did not waste time in wondering. Immediately, he started flying away from this dangerous ce at his fastest speed. He passed through the ¡®Poseidon¡¯s Tears¡¯ of Fort Hassell and a vige before stopping inside a mountain range.

    ¡°I think... I think we are safe for now...¡± The little girl was holding Han Shuo by the corner of his shirt and could barely manage to speak in short breaths.

    ¡°Who¡¯s after you?¡± Han Shuo creased his brows and asked the powerless girl. ¡°And what is your name?¡±

    After a moment of hesitation, she softly answered, ¡°Andrina.¡± She revealed nothing about who was pursuing her.

    ¡°Are you feeling any better? Can you leave by yourself?¡± The little girl was just too dangerous. Han Shuo didn¡¯t want to be around such a person with unidentified origin and could threaten his life.

    ¡°Are you going to abandon me?¡± Andrina asked as she blinked her big, purple eyes.

    ¡°Your powers are just too terrifying and I know nothing about your origin or identity. If I were to stay beside you, I might turn into a pile of bones before I know it. Either way, you have already escaped from the pursuit of your enemy. I believe now is the time for us to go on our ways. No need to thank me. Farewell.¡±

    ¡°If you abandon me now, I will surely die in less than three days!¡± Andrina then looked at Han Shuo calmly and continued, ¡°If you continue to help me escape, after I have healed from my injuries, I swear not only that I won¡¯t harm you, I will repay the favor!¡±

    Han Shuo kept silent for a moment before he suddenly asked, ¡°Who was actually after you?¡±

    ¡°Godhunters, the mightiest few!¡± Andrina was somewhat hesitant to answer but seeing that cautious expression on Han Shuo¡¯s face, she knew that Han Shuo would immediately dump her and leave if she didn¡¯t give an answer.

    ¡°Oh? Haven¡¯t you killed all the godhunters in Greenfire Swamp? How could there be more?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    ¡°They arrived recently specifically to get me. They are the leaders of the godhunters!¡± Andrina seemed somewhat astonished that Han Shuo was actually aware of her deeds back at Greenfire Swamp.

    ¡°Are they on the level of Brovst?¡± Han Shuo asked with a deep voice.

    ¡°How do you know Brovst?¡± Andrina cried out in surprise.

    ¡°That guy nearly got me killed, of course I would know his name,¡± Han Shuo answered.

    ¡°Do you have crystal coins on you?¡± Andrina did not continue to talk about godhunters and suddenly changed the topic.

    Han Shuo, however, wanted to stay on the topic, ¡°You have not answered my question.¡±

    ¡°I will tell you after I have healed from my injuries. I¡¯m now a critically injured and ill person!¡± Andrina replied with a weak voice as she looked at Han Shuo, begging for his pity.

    Han Shuo casually took out a medicinal bottle and handed a Pill of Rejuvenation to Andrina, ¡°Eat this, it will help your injuries.¡±

    Andrina shook her head and said, ¡°It won¡¯t. My body is unique. No medicine can have an effect on me. That, erm, do you have crystal coins?¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before he casually took out a dozen or so ck crystal coins to Andrina, ¡°Look at your injuries, what would you need crystal coins for? E... what... what the...¡±

    Before Han Shuo could finish talking, he saw Andrina quickly receive the ck crystal coins, put them into her mouth, and start munching them. Han Shuo discovered that her illplexion seemed to have improved slightly after eating those crystal coins.

    ¡°Do you... have more?¡± Andrina wiped the corner of her mouth and asked in a low voice.

    ¡°E... yes... Yes!¡± Han Shuo was startled for a moment before he hastily pulled out a bag of ck crystal coin from his space ring and handed it to her. Han Shuo was astonished. He did not expect that Andrina asked for crystal coins not to spend them but to consume them!

 Chapter 712 - I will protect you!

    GDK 712: I will protect you!

    ¡°Do... Do you have more?¡± It only took a few minutes for the sack of five thousand ck crystal coins to disappear into Andrina¡¯s stomach. After consuming the coins, she asked for more.

    Han Shuo¡¯s appearance started to grow unsightly. He handed yet another big sack of ck crystal coins. His heart was shedding tears, grieving for those ck crystal coins that were being consumed...

    ¡°Do you have more?¡±

    ¡°... Do you have more?¡±

    ¡°... More?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s face turned ashen. Finally, he looked at Andrina fiercely and eximed, ¡°You have eaten ny thousand ck crystal coins already. Hasn¡¯t that filled your stomach yet? Han Shuo started to show signs of anger.

    Han Shuo had earned a total of ny-six thousand ck crystal coins by selling the medicines he worked hard to produce. These crystal coins were more than enough for Han Shuo to spend years if not decades infort. However, Andrina managed to finish all the ck crystal coins for him in just half an hour. It would be a wonder if he didn¡¯t feel angry.

    Andrina appeared somewhat ashamed after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s bellow. She did not have the courage to look at Han Shuo and kept her head low as she softly replied, ¡°It¡¯s far from filling my stomach but my injuries have gotten better. Oh, I feel a little sleepy. I shall take a nap...¡± Upon finishing those words, ignoring Han Shuo¡¯s murderous stares, Andrina grabbed onto Han Shuo¡¯s arm and fell asleep on it. She even started snoring heavily.

    ¡°My crystal coins!!!¡± Han Shuo cried. He looked at Andrina who was fast asleep and yelled furiously, ¡°What kind of a monster are you?! How could you eat ny thousand ck crystal coins just like that?!¡± Unfortunately, Andrina could no longer hear Han Shuo¡¯sining.

    Han Shuo discovered that after Andrina swallowed the crystal coins, her originally severe injuries was rapidly improving in a most miraculous manner. Although she appeared inactive on the outside, the internals of her body were hard at work ¨C it was like aplex machine that broke down the energy within those ck crystal coins before distributing them to every injured spot on her body.

    Crystal coins, used as currency on Elysium, was itself a type of energy stone. ck crystal coin was one of the energy stones that contained the most energy. But to Han Shuo¡¯s current knowledge, although the energy inside crystal coins had a variety of uses, it was usually limited to powering internar transportation matrices, energy towers, boundary towers, refinement of divine weapons, and other simr devices. Han Shuo had never heard that it could be directly used or consumed by living things as Andrina had done.

    <i>What is her origin?</i> Han Shuo doubted.

    Andrina had fallen dead-asleep,pletely unconcerned with the dangers around her. She hadpletely entrusted her safety to Han Shuo. Knowing that the godhunters from Greenfire Swamp were still pursuing her, Han Shuo dared not remain in this region for too long. Han Shuo was determined to take Andrina along after she ate ny thousand of his ck crystal coins so that he could get his money back after she eventually woke up.

    After half a month, Han Shuo arrived at a mountain range near the City of Shadows. He was very familiar with this region. Without much effort, he located the underground cave where he had previously stayed for a few months and burrowed into the cave with Andrina.

    During the half a month Andrina spent in hibernation, her body had been extremely busy with energies flowing all around. A healthy tinge of redness began to return to her pale face and her heavily injured body appeared to have healed significantly.

    However, Han Shuo was rather annoyed that Andrina showed no sign of waking up even after sleeping for half a month. The City of Shadows was right before them but it didn¡¯t seem appropriate for Han Shuo to enter the city with a little girl who was deep asleep and unconscious. However, if Han Shuo was to leave her alone in this ce and if someone else was to discover her, her fate would be grim. Besides, Andrina still owed Han Shuo ny thousand ck crystal coins and Han Shuo wasn¡¯t going to leave her before she reimbursed this enormous sum.

    For theck of a better option, Han Shuo stayed in the underground cave with Andrina. All three of his bodies would cultivate while waiting for Andrina to awaken.

    During this time, Han Shuo had been monitoring things happening above the ground using his demon generals. From the chatter of those divine guards who patrolled the mountain range, Han Shuo learned a little about the current climate in the City of Shadows.

    Avery who lost his only son and daughter used the influence and power of his Fifth Corps and the House of Lavers to the fullest. He started investigating every person with the remotest possibility of murdering his children. During this period of time, there wasn¡¯t a night that those who had animosity with the House of Lavers and Avery himself could sleep soundly. They had to live in constant fear.

    A few of those who used to have grudges with Avery and were coincidentally in the vicinity of Fort Hassell during the days Cage and Eve were murdered, abruptly disappeared without a trace...

    The patriarchs of all big family ns in the City of Shadows understood that Avery was growing somewhat psychotic during this period of time. They would warn members of their family n not to provoke Avery, who had lost all rationality. Those family ns that held grudges with Avery heightened the defenses of their family residences.

    After learning about Avery¡¯s recent wild acts, Han Shuo inferred that Avery probably did not consider him as a suspect. After all, his strength was all too weak in their eyes and logically speaking, there was no way that he could sessfully assassinate Cage and Eve.

    With that, Han Shuo became slightly more at ease. He knew that even if he returned to the City of Shadows right then, Avery¡¯s crosshair likely wouldn¡¯t aim at him.

    ***

    Inside a secret chamber, Steiss crouched on the ground and reported in a deep voice, ¡°Master, Avery is now investigating Carmelita. It appears that Avery is suspicious of her.¡±

    The elderly man with white hair but a face as translucent as jade smiled gently and said, ¡°Avery is distrustful and paranoid in character. In addition to the fact that the incident was indeed very strange, he wouldn¡¯t just be suspicious of Carmelita, but every one of his enemies. But naturally, we have to make him think that Carmelita did it so that the two sides will fight each other. Hehe...¡±

    ¡°Master, about that youngster, hepletely disappeared and I still can¡¯t find a trail of him,¡± Steiss reported in a low voice.

    The white-haired elderly man subconsciously tapped on his chair with his index finger. Wearing a somewhat puzzled face, he said, ¡°That youngster is really quite astonishing. It¡¯s really hard to believe that even Avery failed to kill him. Forget about it, at least he is no longer in the City of Shadows. You can stop looking for him. So many big family ns have tried but they have all failed. It is to be expected that you won¡¯t find him either. But still, it¡¯s quite a pity that we did not get his medicine forms.¡±

    ¡°Master, how do we proceed?¡± Steiss asked respectfully.

    After spending a moment in contemtion, the elderly man answered, ¡°Utilize our pawn in the House of Sainte. Get him to divulge a message, one that will make Avery certain that Carmelita sent men to Fort Hassell!¡±

    ¡°Understood!¡± Steiss smirked sinisterly and dismissed himself.

    ***

    ¡°Are you sure of this?¡± Avery asked with a face as cold as ice.

    ¡°Last night, a divine guard of the House of Sainte divulged the information unintentionally after an evening imbibing. He said that Carmelita had sent a person to Fort Hassell eight days before Cage and Eve were murdered. Based on the journey time, this ispletely in line with the timeline,¡± a shadow in the darkness replied indifferently.

    ¡°That malicious, ugly woman, it was her, it indeed was her! Eve had merely said that she looked ugly, but she actually went as far to treacherously murder her. What a heartless bitch. I¡¯m gonna finish her!¡± Avery cursed with his teeth clenched. His body was shivering in rage.

    ¡°My Lord, it is the House of Sainte we are talking about!¡± the shadow gently reminded.

    ¡°So what if it¡¯s the House of Sainte? If worstes to worst, I will just leave the City of Shadows. Given my strength, I can make a living for myself anywhere in the Darkness Dominion. She killed my son and daughter. How could I let her off easily?!¡± Avery roared hysterically. He appeared borderline insane.

    The shadow did not dare to give any more advice. He knew that after Avery made a decision, he would stick to it even if he knew that it was a bad one. No advice would have an effect on Avery.

    After a long while, gradually, Avery calmed down. He said calmly, ¡°But still, this needs to be nned and prepared properly. That ugly bitch has extraordinary strength. Even I myself do not have certainty of defeating her by myself.¡± Carmelita possessed about as much strength as he did. Avery did not haveplete confidence in defeating Carmelita by himself and therefore wouldn¡¯t attack her rashly.

    ***

    A few months had passed. On this day, Han Shuo, who was in the middle of cultivation, suddenly detected movement near him. At once, he opened his eyes and looked straight at Andrina, whose long eyshes were trembling.

    Andrina who had been sleeping for nearly four months no longer appeared as pale as paper with her fair skin containing a tinge of healthy redness. Her eyshes trembled for a while before she opened her pair of beautiful purple eyes. She then stretched her body in anguid manner and put on a contented,fortable smile on her face before saying in her melodious voice, ¡°How long have I slept? Mmm... I feel much better already. Even the aches in my body have greatly diminished!¡±

    ¡°I want my money back!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s handsome face immediately turned dark as soon as he saw Andrina wake up. He shamelessly asked to be reimbursed.

    ¡°Erm...¡± Andrina forced a smile before she looked at Han Shuo pitifully, ¡°How could you ask me to pay you money right after I woke up? That¡¯s not very courteous of you.¡±

    ¡°It was ny thousand ck crystal coins! It was all the money I had! Do you have any idea how much money that was? Do you know how hard I worked to earn it? How much time it took to save that amount of money? Do you know just how many things ny thousand ck crystal coins can buy? Do you know...¡± Han Shuo grumbled grievously on and on and on.

    ¡°I don¡¯t have a single crystal coin on me!¡± Andrina replied concisely after she patiently listened to Han Shuo finish grumbling.

    Han Shuo was speechless.

    The long speech was all for nothing. Han Shuo hung his head down dispiritedly. But suddenly, Han Shuo seemed to recall something and his eyes lit up. He looked at Andrina smilingly like a big bad wolf looking at a rabbit as he asked, ¡°Do you have anything valuable on you? Perhaps something like a... a divine weapon... I can ept that to reimburse my crystal coins...¡±

    ¡°No!¡± Andrina suddenly wrapped her hands around herself as though wanting to protect the item on her body. She took a step backwards and said, ¡°I don¡¯t have a thing on me that could be exchanged for crystal coins. Don¡¯t even think about it!¡±

    ¡°Then how are you going topensate me for my ny thousand ck crystal coins?¡± Seeing that the method was ineffective, Han Shuo discarded his false-benevolent face and put on an angry one. During this period of time, Andrina had been very quiet and frequently made pitiful faces at Han Shuo, so much so that Han Shuo had forgotten how ferocious she was when they first met.

    Obviously, Andrina was not afraid of Han Shuo. She pulled the corners of Han Shuo¡¯s lips and giggled, ¡°Don¡¯t pretend to be so fierce! I know that you are actually a good person. You are not like those godhunters and definitely did not hide in that tree with evil intentions. Hehe, and when I was heavily injured, you saved me and have been very nice to me. I know you won¡¯t harm me,¡± Andrina added after taking a short pause, ¡°Besides, you cannot harm me now!¡±

    Han Shuo put on a dejected face after hearing those words. The fury in his face disappeared as he asked dispiritedly, ¡°Have you healed from your injuries? If you have, go find a job, make money, and return my crystal coins to me. After that, you may get on with whatever the heck you were up to!¡±

    ¡°Notpletely healed yet but more than enough for self-preservation,¡± Andrina replied smilingly. She then spun in a circle before Han Shuo to tten out the wrinkles on her little dress and nodded in a pleased manner. After that, she proposed in her lovable voice, ¡°I don¡¯t know how to make money but I¡¯m willing to protect you for a period of time aspensation for eating your crystal coins!¡±

    ¡°You? Protect me?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s immediate response was to groan disdainfully. But immediately after, he shut his mouth tight as he recalled Andrina¡¯s terrifying methods as well as Cauldron Spirit¡¯s assessment of her. After rapidly weighing in his mind, he asked, ¡°With your current strength, can you obstruct the sneak attack of an early-stage highgod expert?¡±

    ¡°Shouldn¡¯t be a problem. Although I can¡¯t win for now, I have more than enough strength to carry you and escape. But if you can get me another ny thousand ck crystal coins, we might not even need to escape!¡± Andrina replied after thinking for a moment.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was jolted when he saw that Andrina didn¡¯t seem to be bluffing. He knew that for this little girl to have the confidence of resisting the attack of an early-stage highgod even under such conditions, her true strength at full health ought to be beyond terrifying.

    ¡°One year for every ten thousand ck crystal coins. As you have eaten ny thousand of my ck crystals coins, you will have to protect me for nine years,¡± Han Shuo said.

    The fee for employing a highgod as a bodyguard was much, much more than merely ten thousand ck crystal coins per year. Han Shuo was prepared to haggle with Andrina and keep her around for at least a year.

    Han Shuo had expected Andrina to object to his tender but instead, she agreed to it immediately, ¡°Okay! In any case, you seem like a decent character, and I have nothing to do for the moment.¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned to hear those words. One definitely could not obtain nine years of services of a highgod for a mere ny thousand ck crystal coins anywhere on the material ne. In fact, Han Shuo felt rather suspicious of Andrina agreeing to his terms so readily. He inwardly thought, <i>Is she plotting something against me? This little girl definitely isn¡¯t as innocent and naive as she appears on the surface. She¡¯s a little freak who has no qualms about killing. Is it going to be a fortunate thing or a catastrophe to keep her around for so long?</i>

    ¡°What are you worried about?¡± Andrina asked in a concerned manner. It was as though she knew what Han Shuo was thinking.

    ¡°Noth¨C Nothing...¡± Han Shuo then put on a straight face and said, ¡°Let¡¯s go, we will enter the City of Shadows.¡±

    Han Shuo decided to stop hiding from the public. With Andrina around, Han Shuo would have no fear about the possibility of Avery trying to assassinate him again. Therefore, he openly returned to the City of Shadows with Andrina.

    Most of therge family ns learned of Han Shuo¡¯s return after he had taken merely a few steps into the City of Shadows. Immediately, they activated their forces and started rushing towards the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy!

 Chapter 713 - Crack

    Chapter 713: Crack

    Arge crowd had gathered at Celestial Pearl Pharmacy within a short time.

    Han Shuo was shocked to discover that the street outside Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was packed with so many people that the road waspletely blocked. After looking around, Han Shuo estimated that there were roughly five hundred people gathered before his small little shop called the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    Anito and his bunch who were in charge of guarding the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy were standing at the front doors. They were rather clueless about how to receive all the prestigious persons from big family ns.

    Anito was meant to allow these people to enter the premises for a seat. But unfortunately, the first floor of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was too small to amodate so many people at once while the second and third floors of the building were Han Shuo¡¯sb and private gymnasium. Outsiders were not allowed into those areas.

    It was for this reason that Anito was at a loss about what he should do, especially when Andre from the House of Sainte was among those people. If Anito was to let Andre into the pharmacy, the others would surelyin if they were not also allowed entry. However, there wasn¡¯t enough room for everyone to enter at once. Anito was forced to apologize continuously as he denied entry to everyone.

    Fortunately, these people did not take offense about it. They cheerfully and lighthearted chatted with each other as they waited for Han Shuo¡¯s arrival.

    Having learned from the per person quota Han Shuo imposed during thest sale, these people who learned the news of Han Shuo¡¯s return rushed to the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy with a few squadrons of their family divine guards. That was the real reason why the street outside the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy waspletely jammed with people.

    ¡°What¡­ what the¡­¡± Han Shuo was left betweenughter and tears when he arrived at the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy and saw the scene.

    ¡°Hey, Bryan, you¡¯re back! Just in time¡­¡±

    ¡°... Hey bro, I have been waiting for you here for quite a while. How you doing mate?¡±

    ¡°... Great to see you in one piece, Bryan!¡±

    Before Han Shuo could react, the people there started greeting him as though they had been acquainted with Han Shuo for a long time. Han Shuo had only met some of them just once while others wereplete strangers.

    The dense crowd took the initiative to part a small path for Han Shuo to reach the entrance. Prestigious members of severalrge family ns were standing near the front door. They were all waving at Han Shuo smilingly.

    ¡°So, you¡¯re pretty popr in this city, huh,¡± Andrina who was walking beside Han Shuo softly remarked.

    Andrina¡¯s face return to that ice-cold expression seen when Han Shuo first met her. She appeared inharmonious to the cheerful and lively surroundings.

    Han Shuo forced a smile and walked to the front door of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. He cast a nce at Anito who was drenched in cold sweat, Andre who was standing smilingly, and the crowd before he bowed his body slightly and said, ¡°My apologies, you must all have been waiting here for me for a long time!¡±

    ¡°Not at all, it¡¯s no bother at all!¡± the crowd replied.

    Han Shuo stepped to the front of the crowd, nced at the powerful people fromrge family ns as well as those who came along with them and announced, ¡°I know your intentions ining here with so many of your people so this time around, instead of setting a quota for each person, I will divide the medicines by family ns.¡±

    Those who had gathered at the front of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy were all high-ranking members and divine guards ofrge family ns. In the City of Shadows, only these ancient and influential family ns could receive word of Han Shuo¡¯s return almost immediately.

    Upon hearing the announcement, the smile on Rugersey of the Kisa Family immediately turned rather awkward. Of the family ns, Rugersey had brought over the highest number of divine guards. He thought that he had an advantage over the others until Han Shuo most unexpectedly abandoned his previous quota altogether.

    ¡°Rugersey, any objections?¡± Beth from the House of Kinson covered his lips to giggle before she asked teasingly.

    ¡°No, no objection,¡± Regersy forced a smile and immediately denied.

    ¡°Alright, family n representatives may enter the pharmacy while the divine guards will remain outside for the time being,¡± Han Shuo instructed.

    Everyone nodded and agreed. Thereafter, Andre from the House of Sainte, Beth and her daughter from the House of Kinson, Rugersey from the House of Kisa, and Tuyas from the House of Buller entered the pharmacy. However, no one from the House of Lavers, the family n that Han Shuo came to know the first, hade.

    Rugersey was a younger patrilineal cousin of the patriarch of the Kisa Family. He was one of the seven chiefs of the City of Shadows¡¯ divine guards in charge of the Sixth Corps. He cultivated in the energy of death and was in early-stage highgod realm.

    Tuyas were the uncle of the patriarch of Buller Family. As his talent in the cultivation of the energy of darkness was limited, even after having lived for ages, he remained stuck atte-stage midgod realm. This man, however, was very capable when it came down to business. Most of the finances of the Buller Family were given to him to handle.

    ¡°Bryan, where have you disappeared to for so long? We were so worried about you that we sent men to search for you everywhere,¡± Jiya asked smilingly.

    ¡°I traveled outside to meet with a friend but ran into some trouble midway and was held up by it. That¡¯s why it took me so long to return. Haha, thank you for all your concerns. I will definitely keep them in my heart!¡± Han Shuo continued smilingly, ¡°Alright, this time I have refined over a thousand bottles of various medicines. I will distribute one thousand bottles equally among the four family ns here, this means each family n gets two hundred and fifty bottles. Agreed?¡±

    ¡°Agreed!¡± the party replied in unison.

    To proceed, Han Shuo took out a thousand medicinal bottles, ced them on the table, and arranged them by their types and functions.

    Then, with the party attentively watching, Han Shuo divided the thousand medicine bottles into four equal parts. There were around six hundred Pills of Rejuvenation valued at one hundred ck crystal coins per bottle, with the remaining being Pills of Tranquility and Rebirth Pills valued at five to three hundred ck crystal coins per bottle. Han Shuo gave every family n the equal number of bottles of the same type. He did not show favoritism toward the House of Sainte.

    Right after Han Shuo divided the medicines into four, each representative pulled out their ck crystal coins quicker than thest and threw the sacks right before Han Shuo. Without even counting, Han Shuo knew he would earn roughly a hundred and fifty thousand ck crystal coins in this round of sales.

    Andrina, who was standing beside Han Shuo, suddenly looked at the four heavy sacks of ck crystal coins with zing eyes as though she saw the most delicious dishesid on the table. She even subconsciously licked the corners of her lips.

    Han Shuo immediately saw through Andrina¡¯s intentions as soon as he saw her avaricious gazes. Han Shuo did not know this mysterious little girl well and was worried that she would give in to the temptation and eat the crystal coins right in front of the party.

    Han Shuo gently cleared his throat and waved his hand. His space ring gave off four shes before the four sacks of ck crystal coins disappeared.

    Immediately after storing the sacks of crystal coins into his space ring, using his consciousness, Han Shuo read the number marked on the sacks. Every bag contained exactly forty thousand ck crystal coins, giving him a total revenue of a hundred and sixty thousand ck crystal coins, which was more than what he had made in thest sale.

    ¡°I hope you all have had a pleasant transaction!¡± Han Shuo said, beaming ear to ear. His mood was lifted.

    Those representatives from the four family ns kept away their medicines and had a brief and delightful chat with Han Shuo. Then, with Han Shuo¡¯s indication, they all left the pharmacy perfectly contented, with the exception of Andre from the House of Sainte.

    After the representatives from the three family ns left, Andre asked Han Shuo with a gentle smile, ¡°Carmelita isn¡¯t in the City of Shadows. Do you happen to know where she is and what she is up to?¡±

    Han Shuo did not immediately reply to Andre¡¯s question. He took out a bag of ck crystal coins and handed it to Andrina who had been looking at him with miserable and pity-evoking eyes, and instructed. ¡°Go upstairs. No matter what, don¡¯t fall asleep like thest time!¡±

    Andrina nodded excitedly. Carrying the big sack of ck crystal coins containing forty thousand ck crystal coins, she hastily headed upstairs as though unwilling to wait for a second longer.

    After Andrina left, Han Shuo softly sighed and replied to Andre, ¡°I don¡¯t know where she has gone but I do know that she has been looking for me all this time. I believe she likely has left the city for matters rted to finding me, right?¡± Han Shuo wasn¡¯tpletely clueless about the situation in the City of Shadows. From the conversations between those divine guards looking for him, Han Shuo knew that Carmelita had spared no effort to search for him. Her actions had deeply touched Han Shuo and he understood that Carmelita had sincerely taken him as a friend.

    Andre, who had been observing Han Shuo¡¯s reaction all along, nodded. He was very pleased with Han Shuo¡¯s response - unpretentious and genuine. ¡°That¡¯s right, she has indeed traveled away from the city to look for you. Carmelita has truly taken you as a friend. She doesn¡¯t want anything bad to happen to you and therefore I, myself, also hope that nothing will happen to you again. Understood?¡± Andre said enigmatically.

    Han Shuo stared nkly before he looked at Andre in a puzzled manner. He didn¡¯t quite understand what Andre was trying to tell him, so he asked, ¡°What you mean is¡­?¡±

    ¡°I want you to be alive and well!¡± Andre¡¯s face suddenly turned solemn. In graveness that Han Shuo had rarely witnessed, Andre said in a deep voice, ¡°I have thoroughly investigated the matter. You can be at ease - Avery will not touch you again.¡±

    Han Shuo jolted and gawked for a moment. He couldn¡¯t understand why Avery had suddenly be so supportive of him. This sudden goodwill shown by Andre left Han Shuo somewhat at a loss.

    ¡°But, of course, the most that I can offer is the assurance that Avery won¡¯t attack you again. About the injustice you suffered thest time, for the stability of the City of Shadows, as a member of the House of Sainte, there isn¡¯t much that I can do to Avery. I hope you can understand,¡± Andre exined in a soft voice. Then, after thinking for a bit, he quickly added, ¡°One more thing, please do not mention this to Carmelita. I know her temperament well. If she were to learn that Avery injured you, she would undoubtedly try to take revenge for you. She could stir up big trouble if she attempts that. It¡¯s even possible that the House of Lavers will think of rebelling against us - something we definitely do not wish to see.¡±

    After keeping silent for a moment, Han Shuo nodded his head and said, ¡°I understand. Someday in the future, I will exact this vengeance myself!¡±

    ¡°I naturally will not stop you from doing that when you have the strength. Who knows, perhaps when the dayes, I might even help you! However, before that, you need to be more prudent. Alright, I better not be too wordy, but do keep my words in your heart,¡± Andre said before leaving the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy smilingly.

    Han Shuo understood Andre¡¯s position. In fact, Andre¡¯s willingness to help ensure his safety had exceeded Han Shuo¡¯s expectations. He was not about to demand Andre to make reprisals to Avery for his sake.

    One could only obtain respect and status in proportion to their strength and value. Han Shuo knew that his current value now was far from enough for the House of Sainte to risk falling out with the Lavers Family. Although Han Shuo did not like it, he knew how to be patient. He believed that there woulde a day when he would have enough value that the House of Sainte would eliminate Avery for him.

    With sufficient strength, nothing is impossible!

    ¡°Did that guy leave?¡± Andrina¡¯s voice sounded as soon as Han Shuo stepped on the third floor of his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. ¡°He¡¯s strong. He nearly discovered the power that I¡¯m concealing!¡± she said while chewing ck crystal coins in her mouth.

    ¡°There are forty thousand ck crystal coins in that bag so that adds four more years to your service!¡± after a short pause, he continued, ¡°Remember, don¡¯t fall into a deep sleep for months like thest time!¡±

    ¡°I know, that¡¯s why I¡¯m eating one piece at a time. By digesting it slowly, nothing like that will happen again. Alright, alright, stop bothering me. Go and get on with whatever you ought to be doing!¡± Andrina answered impatiently before turning her glowing eyes back to the crystal coins in her hand.

    Han Shuo climbed down to the second floor. After having been refurbished, his pharmacyb was even more glorious than before it was wrecked. There were bright, sparkling pharmaceutical utensils and containers strewn everywhere. But no one knew that those tools were merely for decoration. The only tool that Han Shuo actually used for refining medicine was the Nine Tessetion Cauldron.

    Anito who had been conscientiously guarding outside the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy entered the shop after everyone had left. He said to Han Shuo in a fawning smile, ¡°That umm¡­ umm¡­ did you save some for us Third Corps?¡±

    ¡°One hundred bottles for just twenty thousand ck crystal coins - special discount for your Lord Erebus!¡± Han Shuo had long prepared pelleted medicines for Erebus and he put the medicines on the table.

    Anito too hade prepared and immediately took out a sack of ck crystal coins with a wide grin. To proceed, Anito carefully counted and pulled out twenty thousand ck crystal coins from the sack of coins which obviously contained more than that number. He respectfully handed Han Shuo twenty thousand ck crystal coins and said, ¡°Bryan, I¡¯m merely carrying out orders on behalf of His Lordship and therefore cannot be as generous as those members ofrge family ns. These coins technically belong to the public and any extras need to be returned to the higher authorities, that¡¯s why¡­¡±

    ¡°No worries, I get it. Take the medicines and go ahead with your errands. Also, thank you for the efforts you spent on my shop,¡± Han Shuo naturally understood that those ck crystal coins did not belong to Anito and didn¡¯t mind not receiving tips.

    ¡°You¡¯re wee¡­ You¡¯re most wee¡­¡± Anito replied smilingly. After keeping away the medicines, he instructed his fellow divine guards, ¡°I¡¯m returning to the Third Corps to run an errand. You guys remain in the vicinity of the shop. If any fool causes trouble here, you all know your duties!¡± Anito then left hastily.

    Suddenly, when Han Shuo was about to step back into his shop, a familiar voice sounded, ¡°It¡¯s been a while, Bryan.¡±

    When Han Shuo turned around, he saw the charming Donna standing right outside his pharmacy. She was still as beautiful and lovely as always. However, Han Shuo could see the traces of sorrow in her eyes. Although she was still wearing a smile, it felt somewhat unnatural¡­

    Han Shuo had never regretted getting rid of Cage and Eve, nor did he feel that he had betrayed his conscience. After all, it was Avery who made the first strike against him.

    However, when facing Donna, Han Shuo nheless still felt somewhat ufortable, as though he had done something unfaithful behind her back. He softly chuckled and said, ¡°Hello Donna, it really has been a while. I¡¯ve been to the residence to look for you but unfortunately you weren''t around at that time. I heard you went to the Space Dominion?¡±

    Donna smiled and replied, ¡°Yes, I have. However, I did not expect that after returning from the distant ce, I would find my good-for-nothing cousins murdered.¡±

    Did she discover something? Is she suspecting me? That¡¯s impossible. Even Avery did not suspect me. How would Donna? Han Shuo¡¯s heart skipped a beat but he did not reveal a thing on his face. He invited Donna into his shop cordially before he sighed, ¡°Donna, I have heard a thing or two about your cousins¡¯ unfortunate fates. Please have my condolences.¡±

    Perhaps he didn¡¯t do it? Donna thought to herself. She had been silently observing each any every change to Han Shuo¡¯s expression but did not see one bit of abnormality.

    No one in the House of Lavers had suspected a thing about Han Shuo because in their eyes, Han Shuo did not have that strength nor did he have the nerves!

    But Donna, who had previously traveled to Profound Continent and fought shoulder to shoulder with Han Shuo, did not feel the same way. Donna understood how ruthless and decisive Han Shuo could be and suspected that Han Shuo had been concealing his strength. Therefore, after making some inquiries into Cage and Eve¡¯s deaths, the first person she suspected was Han Shuo!

    There were many who had animosity with Cage and Avery but Donna did not know any who would strike so decisively. Avery suspected Carmelita. But Donna, who had befriended Carmelita for some time, knew that Carmelita wasn¡¯t one to seek revenge for the smallest grievances. She was certain that the murderer could not be Carmelita.

    Donna did not exactly have a concrete reason to suspect Han Shuo but when she thought of him, she felt that Han Shuo was the most likely to do so, especially after Han Shuo managed to return to the City of Shadows safely. She had arrived at Celestial Pearl Pharmacy long ago but did not hurry in entering. She only showed herself after everyone left.

    ¡°Thest time Eve came to this pharmacy, you saved her from being disfigured. But she was too insensible and even bore grudges towards you. I haven¡¯t thanked you for that yet so, thank you!¡± Donna said with a trace of sadness on her face. She had learned about what actually happened in that incident.

    Han Shuo figured out Donna¡¯s intentions after hearing her repeatedly mention Cage and Eve. Her suspicious gazes also gave it up.

    A deep fissure had unknowingly separated the two who used to be best of friends. Neither Donna nor Han Shuo had expected this oue.

    After figuring out Donna¡¯s real intention in visiting him, the smile on Han Shuo¡¯s face grew bigger but softened in sincerity. After exchanging a round of empty dialogue, Donna, seeing that she could not elicit any information from Han Shuo, left a bag of crystal coins and silently left with a hundred bottles of medicine.

    After walking outside the shop, as she rolled a medicine bottle in her hand, Donna mumbled to herself, ¡°I¡¯ve known for a while now that you would climb to high ces, but I did not anticipate that you would do so by stepping on the bodies of my family members¡­¡± She softly sighed and left quietly.

    From within the pharmacy, Han Shuo gazed at her back as her figure slowly disappeared into the distance. When she waspletely out of sight, he softly remarked, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, but it had to be done!¡±

 Chapter 714 - Pharmaceutical Conference

    GDK 714: Pharmaceutical Conference

    Han Shuo had leisure time for months after that sale. Andrina had been spending all her time eating crystal coins one piece at a time on the third floor as though eating biscuits. She appeared much healthier and it was obvious that most of her injuries had healed.

    Han Shuo did not leave the city to collect medicinal ingredients nor did he continue to refine medicines. Instead, he simply meditated on the second floor.

    He understood that inside the City of Shadows, those who would purchase his medicines regardless of the exorbitant prices were members ofrge family ns. His customer base made up only a small percentage of the poption. If he were to produce too many medicines at once, his medicines might appear less rare and precious to his customers.

    Therefore, instead of continuing to produce medicines, Han Shuo told the world that hecked medicinal ingredients and needed to rest, therefore unable to supply them with more medicines.

    Three months passed noiselessly. Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death that had been persistently cultivating inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon finally made a breakthrough and advanced to early-stage midgod realm. It was familiarizing itself with its new realm and was focused on mastering several new techniques.

    Meanwhile, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction had be more and more skilled in the use of Orb of Destruction. It could manipte an orb to move in any direction and anywhere he liked at just the thought of it.

    Meanwhile, after being destroyed and reconstructed yet again, Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body became even stronger. His body could now sustain a portion of the demon general¡¯s energy contained inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. In other words, Han Shuo could borrow Cauldron Spirit¡¯s power to boost his own strength temporarily.

    However, doing so was very risky as he was pushing his body beyond its limits. If his body was injured in the process, recovering from the injuries wouldn¡¯t be as simple. This was because Han Shuo needed to utilize his demon infant to boost his strength using Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy. Injuries sustained by the demon infant would need far longer to healpared to injuries to his body.

    Therefore Han Shuo could only boost his strength using Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy for a very short period of time. If he were to exceed that time limit, both his body and demonic infant would pay the price.

    Han Shuo was very happy to learn about this from Cauldron Spirit. Being able to boost his strength, even for a very short period of time, coulde in very handy during emergencies, such as if Avery attacked him again.

    Donna never came to visit Han Shuo again. Although she did not say it out loud, Han Shuo knew that Donna suspected him. He also knew that there was no way that they could again interact as friendly as in the past. Although Han Shuo was unwilling to see their rtionship turn into what it had be, there wasn¡¯t anything that he could do about it. From the moment that Avery took him as his enemy, he knew that there woulde a day that he and Donna would part ways.

    During the period of time, Andre came to visit Han Shuo once again. Peculiarly, he came to ask if Han Shuo had any information about Carmelita as she still hadn¡¯t returned to the City of Shadows and had stopped transmitting news to the House of Sainte for a month. This left Andre rather worried about Carmelita¡¯s safety.

    Han Shuo, naturally, wasn¡¯t able to provide Andre with any kind of assistance and could only admit that he knew nothing. He too was getting somewhat worried about Carmelita¡¯s safety.

    Avery of the Fifth Corps seemed to be busy with some foreign affairs and hadn¡¯t been in the City of Shadows for more than two months. During the days he was away from the City of Shadows, Han Shuo felt rxed as he didn¡¯t need to be constantly on the alert for any surprise attack from Avery.

    One day, while meditating on the second floor, Han Shuo received an invitation card.

    This invitation came from the Godswamp Pharmacy of the City of Shadows, saying that the Godswamp Pharmacy was holding a conference for pharmacists and Han Shuo was among those invited. Han Shuo originally wanted to decline the invitation but after reading that the pharmacy also intended to discuss cooperation between the two businesses, he hesitated for a bit and decided to go take a look.

    Two dayster, at nightfall.

    ¡°Where are you going?¡± Andrina asked from the third floor as soon as Han Shuo stepped to the exit.

    ¡°There¡¯s a pharmaceutical conference, I¡¯m going there to have a look. You can stay here,¡± Han Shuo casually replied as he started leaving.

    ¡°I will go with you!¡± Andrina replied in her lovable voice and gently floated down from the third floor. She lightly stepped on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulders with her small feet, giggled, and hopped down.

    ¡°My enemy isn¡¯t inside the City of Shadows at the moment so you don¡¯t have to follow me. I¡¯ll be fine.¡± Han Shuo had inquired Cauldron Spirit and was reassured that even if he was suddenly attacked by a highgod, by instantly borrowing Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, he would at least have the chance to deploy Demonic Blood Disassembly to escape.

    ¡°That won¡¯t do. I¡¯m your bodyguard and so I must always be around you!¡± Andrina disagreed and shortly after, she let out a very softugh and said quietly, ¡°Are you going to do something bad like... fornicating a woman? Hehe... even if you are, I must still follow you!¡±

    ¡°Suit yourself,¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t mind if Andrina was to follow behind him.

    But suddenly, Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment as though he recalled something. He turned to Andrina and asked, ¡°Now that your injuries are mostly healed, will it be a problem for you to get rid of an early-stage highgod?¡±

    Andrina did not immediately answer Han Shuo¡¯s question. She carefully thought about it for a moment and replied, ¡°I have notpletely recovered. If that fe doesn¡¯t run away and stay in the fight, I can definitely finish him. But if he immediately tries to escape after getting injured, then I cannot kill him.¡±

    ¡°In that case...¡± Han Shuo groped his chin before he put on a mischievous smile and asked, ¡°Little Andrina, there¡¯s a man who wants me dead. How about if we join forces and get rid of him together? If you are injured from the fight, I will provide crystal coins for you to heal free of charge. What say you?¡±

    Rather than staying defensive, Han Shuo thought he might as well get on the offensive. After learning from Cauldron Spirit that he could boost his strength temporarily, a bold idea came to his mind, which was to sneak up on Avery and assassinate his greatest enemy of the hour with the help of Andrina.

    Han Shuo had a rough idea of Andrina¡¯s strength. He reckoned that bybining her strength with the instant boost Cauldron Spirit could provide him, they would have an eighty percent chance of sessfully assassinating Avery.

    ¡°That won¡¯t do. My job is only to protect you, not help you kill people!¡± Andrina declined straightforwardly. When Han Shuo¡¯s expression turned sour, she giggled and said, ¡°However, I can be there to cheer for you when you carry out the act yourself. If you then fail in the attempt, I can carry you away safely. How about that?¡±

    Han Shuo rolled his eyes and did not say another word. He headed in the direction of the Godswamp Pharmacy,pletely ignoring Andrina. Han Shuo did not have the confidence of killing Avery even with his strength boosted by Cauldron Spirit. Without Andrina¡¯s promise to help, Han Shuo definitely will not attempt such a dangerous act.

    Andrina softly giggled after seeing that Han Shuo was annoyed. She did not take offense but vivaciously caught up to Han Shuo and continued to chatter and talk nonsense with Han Shuo.

    Then, when they arrived at the front gate of the Godswamp Pharmacy, the vitalized and lively Andrina became cold as ice all of a sudden. She stared at strangers uninvitingly. Her rosy little face no longer appeared adorable but would give people an uneasy feeling.

    Godswamp was the biggest pharmacy in the City of Shadows. Han Shuo had learned a little about the pharmacy beforeing over. He found out that Godswamp was renowned not just in the City of Shadows, but in the entire Dominion of Darkness. They had shops in every otherrge city in the dominion.

    Han Shuo also heard that the overall power that Godswamp Pharmacy possessed throughout the Darkness Dominion could give the family ns in the City of Shadows a run for their money, with the House of Sainte being an exception. Han Shuo was rather surprised by what he learned as he did not anticipate that a small pharmacy business could have such a hold.

    It was also thanks to this information that Han Shuo felt as though the Godswamp Pharmacy had disyed an ideal to strive towards. He grew even more curious about the Godswamp Pharmacy.

    The pharmacy was huge and included multiple buildings. Each and every one of the structures was much taller, bigger, and wider than Han Shuo¡¯s Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. The decorations were also much more magnificent.

    Han Shuo handed his invitation card to the servant. The servant behaved very politely after learning that Han Shuo was a pharmacist from the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. He even personally lead Han Shuo to a tall building at the back of the campus for receiving guests, all the way to the top floor.

    It was a banquet hall around one thousand square meters in size. There were some aesthetically pleasing drawings hung on the wall, soft, colorless carpet on the floor, as well as all kinds of zed containers. There were numerous pharmacists with grizzled hair cheerfully chatting with each other with wine in their hands.

    Pharmacists do not need to be exceedingly powerful in their cultivation. In fact, most of them only considered cultivation as supplementary to their practice. Most of them cultivated in the elemental energy of fire and water as the energy of fire could better allow them to dissolve medicines while the energy of water could aid in extracting thepounds in medicines.

    They could do nearly every procedure in refining medicines after reaching lowgod realm. Therefore, nearly every pharmacist remained in that realm. They would spend all the time they had studying and researching about refining medicines.

    After sweeping a nce across the pharmacist crowd in the hall, that servant who led Han Shuo over announced his name. The originally morous hall went silent all of a sudden. The pharmacists who were in the midst of their own chatter all simultaneously cast their gazes at Han Shuo. Their eyes were filled with curiosity and shock.

    During the period of time, Han Shuo¡¯s Celestial Pearl Pharmacy had been in the limelight of the City of Shadows. The name ¡®Celestial Pearl Pharmacy¡¯ had a frequent presence in conversations among practically every member ofrge family ns in various conventions. As fellow pharmacists, they could not avoid hearing Han Shuo¡¯s name.

    Therefore, when the young Han Shuo suddenly showed up and stood before these aged pharmacists, everyone gathered their gazes at him. They wanted to see the person behind the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy whose fame was so rapidly rising.

    ¡°This youngster is the owner of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy?¡± an old woman with green hair and a paper-pale face, and dressed in brightly colored clothes cried out in surprise.

    ¡°Master Gu Li, he is precisely the owner of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy ¨C Bryan!¡± That servant who led Han Shuo to the hall then pointed at the old woman wearing quaint and colorful clothes and introduced her to Han Shuo, ¡°This is the famous Master Gu Li of our City of Shadows. In the City of Shadows, Master Gu Li¡¯s talent in refining medicines is second to none. Evenrge family ns wouldn¡¯t get a bottle of her medicine if she wasn¡¯t in the mood!¡±

    Gu Li sized Han Shuo up with arrogant eyes. After a long while, she coldly groaned, ¡°Mix Heavenly Flower with Green-Silver Fruit and cook it at five hundred degrees for three hours. Whatpound do you get?¡±

    Han Shuo smiled and ignored Gu Li. He actually had no idea what the product of the reaction was because he wasn¡¯t a pharmacist at all.

    ¡°Right, where is your owner? My invitation card says that he wants to talk business with me,¡± Han Shuo said unhurriedly to the servant.

    ¡°Hmph, just a pharmacist who is outdated and only knows how to take crystal coins. From the looks of it, he seems to have no solid foundation,¡± Gu Li sneered, ¡°Who knows, perhaps he had merely stolen the medicine forms from elsewhere.¡±

    ¡°Firecloud Grass, Frost Jade, and Boundless Aqua. Mixed at high speed and then frozen to negative one hundred and thirty degrees. Whatpound do you get?¡± Han Shuo shot a cold nce at Gu Li and asked her in a just as arrogant attitude.

    ¡°Wha, what? I have never heard of those ingredients before! You are talking drivel, aren¡¯t you?¡± Gu Li stared nkly for a moment before she sneered.

    With a contemptuous face, Han Shuo said coldly, ¡°Never even heard of these ingredients? How shameless you are to call yourself a pharmacist second to none in the City of Shadows. In fact, I think you have wasted your time living to this age. If I were you, I would be too ashamed to show my face at a pharmacist conference!¡± Han Shuo mocked her relentlessly. Then,pletely ignoring Gu Li who was so fumed she nearly fainted, Han Shuo said to the servant, ¡°Please take me to your business owner or I will leave this ce right away. I feel that it is an insult to my dignity to be around such mediocre people.¡±

    ¡°Yes... Yes...¡± The servant hastily lead Han Shuo across the hall and towards a dwarf. ¡°He is the owner of our Godswamp Pharmacy ¨C Steiss!¡± the servant introduced the dwarf to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was stunned. He did not expect that the owner of thergest pharmacy in the City of Shadows would be this unprepossessing, and even a somewhat abnormally shaped person. Han Shuo cast away the doubt in his heart, smiled, and asked urbanely, ¡°Hello, Mister Steiss. Are you the one looking to discuss business with me?¡±

    Steiss, with a warm smile on his face, nodded and replied, ¡°That¡¯s me. d to meet such a young pharmacist from the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. If you don¡¯t mind, let¡¯s move to a quieter ce for discussion!¡±

    ¡°Of course!¡± Han Shuo dly agreed.

    ¡°This way please!¡± Steiss lead Han Shuo to a room behind the banquet hall.

 Chapter 715 - Everybody, Out!

    GDK 715: Everybody, Out!

    ¡°Master Gu Li, please stop!¡± the servant hastily halted the furious Gu Li from entering the room Han Shuo and Steiss had entered. Right after, the door was shut.

    ¡°Get that kid outta here. I must straighten things out with him today! He does not know how to respect his elders. I must teach him a lesson!¡± Gu Li was infamous in Mirage City for her bad temper. However, everyone, including powerful members of the society, had always tolerated her for her excellent skills in refining medicine. This was the very first time that she had been so brutally insulted by a person.

    ¡°My apologies, Mister Bryan is currently having a discussion with our owner. If you wish to speak to him, please wait until hees out of the room,¡± exined the servant smilingly.

    ¡°Alright, I will wait for him right here until he steps out of that door!¡± Gu Li said stubbornly. She stood as still as a mountain in front of that door with an angry face, silently waiting. Shepletely ignored whatever was happening in the banquet hall.

    The servant, seeing that she was no longer causing trouble, did not do anything to her. He stood face to face with Gu Li, wearing a smile.

    Some of the pharmacists in the hall were secretly delighted to see Gu Li humiliated. There were also some who disapproved of Han Shuo¡¯s attitude, thinking that Han Shuo did not know how to respect elders at all. All those pharmacists stopped exchanging their knowledge about medicines and instead, started discussing Han Shuo softly.

    The room that Steiss and Han Shuo had entered was a drawing room of about thirty square meters in size, much smallerpared to the banquet hall outside the door. However, the decorations in the room were much more magnificent and gorgeous. sswares containing rare medicines highlighted the owner¡¯s identity as a pharmacist.

    Steiss the dwarf personally served Han Shuo a cup of fine wine after they entered the room. The conversation started with talks about the weather and some recent happenings in the City of Shadows. Then, when Steiss noticed that Han Shuo appeared somewhat impatient, he finally started talking about the main point. He said with a faint smile, ¡°The Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, under your leadership, has really been in the limelight these days. Basically every rich and powerful in the City of Shadows has been talking about your pharmacy. They are proud to be in possession of the medicines you produced. Haha, it is really impressive that you could bring about such aplishment at such a young age...¡±

    ¡°Haha... You tter me...¡± Han Shuo replied with a slight smile.

    ¡°But...¡± After a round of praise, Steiss suddenly turned the topic of discussion. ¡°The Celestial Pearl Pharmacy has started out a little toote. If you want the entire Darkness Dominion or even the Death and Destruction Dominions to know about your medicines, it will take tens, if not hundreds of years. However, if you are willing to partner up with us, we can guarantee that people will learn about your medicines at the fastest rate possible. Subsequently, your profits will be even ampler,¡± Steiss said earnestly.

    ¡°Is that so?¡± Han Shuo put on a bright smile. He took a sip of the fine wine and asked, ¡°How exactly will this partnership work?¡±

    ¡°You will share the form of your medicines with our Godswamp. Then, we will sell the medicines produced using your form in every branch we have throughout the entire Darkness Dominion. We will divide the profits in the ratio of twenty-eighty. What do you think?¡± Steiss proposed with a warm smile on his face.

    ¡°Twenty-eighty? You take twenty and I get eighty?¡± Han Shuo thought to himself that this allotment method was rather generous. However, Han Shuo still wouldn¡¯t be willing to share his forms. The most he would do was to provide the medicines to Godswamp for them to resell.

    ¡°No no no, you have misunderstood!¡± the expression on Steiss¡¯ face changed slightly. He hastily said, ¡°You get twenty and we take eighty!¡±

    The smile on Han Shuo¡¯s face immediately turned stiff. Right away, he stood up from his seat, nodded at Steiss and said, ¡°Sorry, there is something that I need to attend to. I¡¯ll be on my way!¡±

    The profit allocation proposed was uneptable, if not sufficiently ludicrous to Han Shuo. He was disinclined to talk to someone who was not even sincere in forming a partnership.

    ¡°Hold on! It¡¯s negotiable...¡± Steiss forced a smile and shouted when Han Shuo immediately got up and headed for the exit.

    ¡°There is nothing to negotiate. I have no interest whatsoever in cooperating with your Godswamp Pharmacy. Goodbye!¡± Han Shuo replied without even turning around, and left the room.

    ¡°Unruly fe, I must debate you right here right now! I want to see what is so outstanding about your knowledge in medicine-refinement!¡± Gu Li who had been guarding at the door immediately and belligerently stepped into Han Shuo¡¯s path after seeing that he had exited the room.

    ¡°I have no time for your nonsense!¡± Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in no mood for further discussion, feeling as though he had been fooled by the Godswamp Pharmacy. He coldly shouted at her and pushed her aside. Then, ignoring the stumbling Gu Li, Han Shuo walked through the hall inrge strides and headed straight for the exit.

    Gu Li had never been treated so coarsely. With great difficulty, after she managed to save herself from falling, she discovered that Han Shuo was gone and people around her were looking at her as though deriving pleasure from her pitiful state. She could not be more infuriated and shrieked loudly, ¡°It¡¯s not over, you damned brat!¡±

    After Han Shuo left the room, the door was yet again shut. Right after that, a side door in the room suddenly opened. An elderly man with white hair and translucent skin walked inside with a calm face. He looked at Steiss the dwarf and said indifferently, ¡°This young one is extremely ambitious. He will not share his form for a small speck of gain. It seems that this method isn¡¯t going to work.¡±

    ¡°Master, how about if we eliminate him directly and capture the memory in his soul?¡± Steiss proposed with a dark face. He was furious that Han Shuo had walked out on him.

    The elderly man shook his head and replied calmly, ¡°Although I don¡¯t know how he managed to escape from Avery, this youngster is obviously nothing simple. We should not use brute strength against him except as ast resort. The Godswamp Pharmacy has been operating in the City of Shadows for so many years. Surely we can take care of this small character who¡¯s popped out of nowhere. Since he failed to appreciate our kindness, we shall show him who¡¯s boss.¡±

    ¡°Master, you mean...¡±

    ¡°Just like how we took care of Hannah Pharmacy. First, we tarnish the reputation of his medicines. When people lose confidence in his drugs, he won¡¯t be able to continue doing business in the City of Shadows. Hmph, thoserge family ns have been so supportive of him only for the medicines he produced. But if they were to learn that there are issues with those medicines, he will surely be driven away from the city,¡± the elderly man exined.

    ¡°Right, you are...¡± Steissughed sinisterly.

    ***

    ¡°What did you guys talk about? What did he say to make you so angry?!¡± Andrina immediately inquired Han Shuo after he came out from the Godswamp Pharmacy.

    Andrina had tactfully withdrawn somewhere secluded before Han Shuo entered the room for discussion. As Andrina was just a little girl, basically no one paid attention to her. Then, after Han Shuo got out from the room, she emerged out of nowhere and went back to following Han Shuo.

    ¡°This Godswamp Pharmacy wants to rob my pharmacy. Twenty-eighty? And I even have to share my medicine form? Ha. They are either daydreaming or they think they can take advantage of me!¡± Han Shuo said furiously. After storming out from thepound, Han Shuo turned around to gaze at the tall buildings and inwardly thought, One day, your Godswamp Pharmacy is going to be driven out from the City of Shadows! Fuck you!

    ¡°Bryan!¡± Anito hurried over anxiously.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± Han Shuo asked hastily. Seeing how hurried Anito was, he knew that something bad must have happened.

    Anito gasped for breath and replied, ¡°Carmelita has returned to the city but is severely injured! She is unconscious even until now and she might not make it. Lord Andre knows that your medicines are miraculous and wants your help!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s face froze when he heard that Carmelita was injured. He knew that Carmelita had been traveling through various forts around the City of Shadows to look for him. He immediately held himself ountable for Carmelita getting injured.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Han Shuo immediately rushed in the direction of the House of Sainte with Anito. He had a gloomy expression.

    Although Han Shuo did not have romantic feelings for Carmelita, the two had gone through enough trials and tribtions together. He also knew that Carmelita had truly taken him as his friend. Now that Carmelita was critically injured, Han Shuo immediately took the attacker, whoever it was, as his own enemy.

    Carmelita is immensely powerful. The House of Sainte has an overwhelming hold on the City of Shadows. Who would attack her? Godhunters? Han Shuo pondered while traveling to the Sainte Residence.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind was in a mess as he was worrying about Carmelita¡¯s condition and his speed had increased unknowingly, outpacing Anito. Anito looked at Han Shuo and Andrina¡¯s backs befuddled, unable to understand how they could travel at such speeds!

    When they were about to reach the Sainte Residence, Andrina suddenly said: ¡°I¡¯ll wait for you outside!¡± and disappeared.

    Upon arrival, Han Shuo saw that Andre was personally waiting for him at the front door. The Andre at this moment had a dark purple pupil in his left eye. He gave off an intense eerie and gloomy aura;pletely different from his mild demeanor in the usual days.

    Andre clearly had something on his mind. His expression loosened up when he saw Han Shuo arrive and he said hastily, ¡°Come with me!¡±

    They entered a room filled with an intense scent of medicines. There were several medics whose hands were glowing with radiances which would fall on Carmelita¡¯s terrifying injured body. She had cuts from head to toe. Her skin was torn and her flesh was split. She appeared almost inhuman.

    Inside the small room, other than Carmelita and the medics, there were City Lord Wace and a few of the most important members of the Sainte Family. Han Shuo took just one took at Carmelita who was lying inside a treatment vessel and knew just how badly injured she was.

    ¡°Elder Brother, I have brought him here!¡± Andre quietly told City Lord Wace after showing Han Shuo into the room.

    Wace nodded and then said to Han Shuo, ¡°She is severely injured and has yet to gain consciousness. We don¡¯t know if she will make it.¡±

    ¡°I need everyone to leave the room!¡± Han Shuo suddenly said in a deep voice.

    ¡°Young- youngster, who do you think you are? You are merely a pharmacist; not a medical expert. What exactly can you do in this situation?¡± The few who were attending to Carmelita¡¯s injuries were the best medics in the City of Shadows. They stared at Han Shuo with wrath when he tried to chase them away as soon as he arrived.

    Andre, the person who escorted Han Shuo here, was also shocked. He did not expect that Han Shuo would be so daring. Usually, injuries as critical as this would be treated by professional medics. Pharmacists would usually be there to provide special medicines. Andre brought Han Shuo here merely for him to y a supporting role. He never expected that Han Shuo would want to handle the whole thing by himself.

    ¡°Let me do it. I have confidence in making Carmelita fully recover. I have no intention of talking bullshit or fooling around at a moment as critical as this,¡± Han Shuo looked at City Lord Wace fixedly and said solemnly.

    Wace had been wearing a dark face but his eyes suddenly lit up after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words. He raised a hand to stop the medics¡¯ protest and said in a deep voice, ¡°All of you, leave!¡±

    He was the most powerful man in the City of Shadows. The prestige he umted over so many years definitely wasn¡¯t anything that these medics would dare defy. Obeying hismand, they put down the medical equipment in their hands and left the small medical room.

    ¡°And you too, leave!¡± Wace nced at the few members of Sainte Family in the room and instructed.

    Those people too lowered their heads and left. But when they were walking out, they each looked at Han Shuo with dismissive nces as though telling him, ¡°Youngster, if something bad happens to Carmelita, you won¡¯t be leaving here alive!¡±

    ¡°Do your best. We¡¯re counting on you!¡± Wace softly encouraged as he patted on Han Shuo¡¯s back before he turned to Andre and said, ¡°Brother, let¡¯s leave the room as well.¡± Upon finishing those words, both Wace and Andre walked out from the medical room.

    ¡°Elder Brother, you trust Bryan?¡± Andre hesitated for a moment and asked after they exited the medical room.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know, but it¡¯s worth a shot. Those medics have spent half the day but Carmelita has shown no signs of improving. I don¡¯t think they can be counted on. This young man, however, has a very bright glimmer in his eyes ¨C something that I couldn¡¯t find in any of the dispirited medics. That¡¯s why I think it¡¯s worth giving him a shot,¡± Wace said in a deep voice.

    ¡°You mean... confidence!¡± Andre stared nkly for a moment and replied.

    ¡°That¡¯s right, it¡¯s confidence. That confidence in his eyes made me feel that Carmelita could still be saved! But those medics, they were all flustered and frightened, and constantly transmitting us the powerlessness they felt. How am I going to count on them?¡± said Wace.

    Andre thought for a while and nodded in agreement. But soon after, he sighed and said softly, ¡°Hopefully she will make it through.¡±

    ¡°Have you discovered any clues or evidence?¡± Wace asked after taking in a deep breath. His face appeared frighteningly malevolent. He looked like a savage beast that could tear apart any human that entered its sight.

    ¡°We are still investigating. It will take time,¡± Andre replied. He felt a chilling sensation down to his toes.

    ¡°When you find the attacker, no matter who the person is, kill him! This is a direct provocation against our House of Sainte. Perhaps we have been too silent for too many years that people have started to forget what our family name implies!¡± Sainte said as his right hand trembled subconsciously.

    Andre did not reply in words but nodded his head heavily.

    Inside the medical room, both Carmelita and Han Shuo sat cross-legged with Han Shuo¡¯s two hands pressed against Carmelita¡¯s back. There was faint dark smoke lingering around their bodies. Strands of thick ck smoke were wriggling around inside the room. The scene appeared wicked and sinister. One who didn¡¯t know better might even think that some sort of dark ceremony was being conducted.

    Carmelita¡¯s body contained the divine energies of death, darkness, and destruction which didn¡¯t belong to her. Those energies had permeated deep into even the cells and bones in her body, nearly destroying her vitalitypletely. It was obvious that several people had joined forces in an attempt to end her life!

    The destruction divine energy that belonged to Carmelita had been mostly exhausted. What was left in her body was not enough to resist the onught of those foreign energies. As she was in aa, her divine soul could not understand or react to the dire condition of her body.

    Han Shuo¡¯s daring im that he could save Carmelita was not unfounded. His confidence was based on the miraculousness of demonic arts. Demonic yuan could be said as one of the most miraculous energies in the universe. By using demonic yuan, Han Shuo managed to get a clear andplete understanding of Carmelita¡¯s condition. He immediately realized that the most threatening power in her body was arge amount of darkness divine energy. Han Shuo had no way of eliminating this powerful darkness energy using demonic yuan and could only remove the destruction and death divine energies.

    The energies of destruction and death that were constantly dealing injuries to her body didn¡¯t belong to Carmelita. The characteristics of these divine energy had been altered and they could only cause harm. After Han Shuo sucked them out using demonic arts, he immediately purged them into the ground. These kinds of divine energies could not be absorbed by his avatars ¨C they would only cause them harm.

    After exhausting some of his demonic yuan, Han Shuo managed to remove the foreign divine energies of destruction and death from her body. As for the darkness divine energy which was the most powerful energy inside her, even Han Shuo was powerless against it.

    After boosting the power of his consciousness by ten folds using Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, Han Shuo carefully infiltrated Carmelita¡¯s divine soul. Then, inside her half-conscious soul, he left an adamant thought ¨C to resist that darkness energy in her body with all her might.

    Carmelita was after all, a highgod. Although she had yet to awaken, thanks to that resolute thought Han Shuo left in her divine soul, she started reassembling the destruction divine energy in her body. After that, Han Shuo fed Carmelita a few pellets of medicine. When Han Shuo discovered that the destruction divine energy in her body had started re-umting bit by bit, Han Shuo finally heaved a sigh a relief.

    After resting for a while, Han Shuo erased all traces of demonic arts he employed, and opened the door with a weary face.

    Wace and the others had been waiting outside. As soon as Han Shuo came out from the door, Wace asked hastily, ¡°How is she doing?¡±

    ¡°She is out of danger. But she will need a very long time to fully recover.¡± Han Shuo wiped off the sweat on his forehead and continued, ¡°There were quite a number of divine energies in her body. The most powerful of which was a darkness divine energy. The attacker must be a highgod. Also, that divine energy somehow feels familiar.¡±

    Andre¡¯s left eye suddenly turned dark purple. His face turned murderous.

 Chapter 716 - I want to work for you!

    GDK 716: I want to work for you!

    Wace nodded and entered the medical room without another word. He was clearly very worried about Carmelita.

    Andre did not follow Wace into the room. Wearing a gloomy face, Andre kept silent for a moment before he suddenly turned to look deeply into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes and asked, ¡°You said that the darkness divine energy felt somewhat familiar. What exactly did you mean by that?¡±

    Han Shuo did not initially think about it too much. But when he saw that grave expression on Andre¡¯s face, he immediately knew what Andre was suspecting. When Han Shuo then thought about it carefully, that vague sensation immediately became clear and distinctive. The weariness on Han Shuo¡¯s face was suddenly reced with grim expression. He replied, ¡°It¡¯s him! It¡¯s definitely him!¡±

    Naturally, Andre knew who Han Shuo was referring to. His face turned even darker. He then spent a long period of time in silence as though weighing the proper course of action before he said to Han Shuo in a low voice, ¡°Do not disclose anything about this incident. I will investigate this thoroughly. If it really was him, this time, he will not escape death!¡±

    Han Shuo knew that Wace and Andre were no benevolent characters for the House of Sainte to be the most powerful family n in the City of Shadows. He knew that once Andrepleted his investigation and verified that Avery was the perpetrator, Avery would be finished.

    Soon after, Wace exited from the medical room. The look on his face became much more rxed after she checked on Carmelita¡¯s condition. He first nodded at Andre, indicating that Carmelita was truly out of danger. Then, he said to Han Shuo, ¡°You have saved Carmelita¡¯s life twice. I won¡¯t make you any more superfluous promises but I want you to know that you, Bryan, have my gratitude.¡±

    With these words of Wace, Han Shuo reckoned that after this day, he could do basically anything he wanted in the City of Shadows, provided that it didn¡¯t harm the interests of the House of Sainte.

    ¡°Elder Brother, there is something that I need to discuss with you alone,¡± Andre said in a deep voice.

    ¡°Bryan, thank you for your hard work today. Go home and have a good rest,¡± Wace said to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo, being a tactful person, nodded his head and turned on his heels. Some members of the Sainte Family started approaching Han Shuo right after he started walking away. They wanted to know about Carmelita¡¯s condition.

    These members of the Sainte Family had been waiting further outside due to their rtively low statuses. After informing them that Carmelita was out of danger, Han Shuo walked past a group of medics and left the Sainte Residence.

    Those medics had been waiting on standby to immediately take over the rescue whenever Han Shuo gave up. These people revealed mixed emotions to hear that Han Shuo had stabilized Carmelita¡¯s injuries. There was no longer the slightest trace of disdain showing in their eyes.

    After exiting the Sainte Residence, Han Shuo started walking back to the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. Andrina emerged out of nowhere and continued to follow Han Shuo.

    ¡°Why didn¡¯t youe in with me earlier?¡± Han Shuo shot a nce at Andrina and asked in a puzzled manner.

    ¡°I heard that the City of Shadows¡¯ City Lord is in there. I fear that he could make out the actual strength that I¡¯m hiding, so I¡¯ve tried to avoid him,¡± Andrina replied.

    Han Shuo was stunned for a moment. He continued to question Andrina, ¡°Why would you be afraid of Wace learning about your actual strength? And, what energy exactly do you cultivate in? How is it that you can heal by eating crystal coins?¡±

    ¡°Hehe... I cannot reveal this for now but I¡¯ll tell you about it in the future,¡± Andrina smiled and declined to answer Han Shuo¡¯s question.

    What was for certain was that Andrina was hiding certain secrets and Han Shuo could do nothing if Andrina was unwilling to divulge them. After all, at this point in time, most of her injuries had healed and Han Shuo was in no position to insist on an answer. Although he wasn¡¯t happy about it, he had no choice but to drop the subject.

    It did not take much time for the two to return to Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. Han Shuo did not expect that he would find Gu Li, the pharmacist he humiliated at Godswamp Pharmacy, waiting at the front door of his shop, blocking his path.

    As soon as Han Shuo appeared, Gu Li shouted angrily, ¡°Young one, I don¡¯t believe you¡¯re that great in the art of refining medicines. I won¡¯t be leaving until you prove to me that you did not make those medicines by stealing forms!¡±

    Han Shuo was rather annoyed with Gu Li but he mostly just ignored her. He shoved her aside yet again and said, ¡°I have nothing to prove to you. Don¡¯t think that because you have an ounce of status in the City of Shadows that everyone ought to bow and fawn over you. We don¡¯t wee you here. Go away and stop being an irksome presence.¡±

    Han Shuo and Andrina entered Celestial Pearl Pharmacy and locked the door,pletely ignoring Gu Li who was hysterically shouting.

    After shouting outside the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy like a deranged lunatic for a period of time, seeing that she received no response from Han Shuo, in the end, she left.

    At midnight, three dayster, Han Shuo was in the middle of cultivating when he suddenly sensed a person approaching.

    Han Shuo had been on guard as he was afraid that someone mighte to cause trouble at his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. He had demon generals stationed outside his shop and therefore was able to quickly learn that someone was approaching his shop. But before Han Shuo did a thing, those divine guards under Anito stationed around his pharmacy had gotten into action.

    ¡°What are you sneaking about in the dead of night for? Show us your divine tablet!¡± one of the divine guards instructed. They had surrounded theer.

    ¡°I¡¯m here to look for Bryan. What do you want? Wanna fight?¡± The person did not reveal the slightest trace of fear and looked at the divine guards with an angry face.

    ¡°Apprehend him!¡± these House of Sainte divine guards were used to being domineering. Upon seeing that this man was not being cooperative, they decided to capture him without demur.

    It was also at this moment that Han Shuo¡¯s demon general finally made out the appearance of the person. Although his clothes were ragged and his appearance was not unlike a miserable beggar, Han Shuo could still make out that it was Akley. He was one of the first people Han Shuo got acquainted with after arriving on Elysium. He was still as stubborn and provocative as always, wanting to start a fight for the most trivial of matters.

    After learning that it was Akley, Han Shuo immediately got down from the second floor. He managed to arrive before the battle began and hastily exined, ¡°He¡¯s a friend of mine.¡±

    ¡°Mister Bryan, how did you make such a friend?¡± Although the divine guards were puzzled, they immediately pointed their weapons away from Akley after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s exnation.

    At this point in time, Han Shuo was a popr person in the City of Shadows while Akley looked like a poor derelict. It wasn¡¯t surprising that the divine guards would be suspicious of Akley.

    ¡°How did you turn into such a mess?¡± Han Shuo questioned Akley in a rather confused manner.

    Before the two went their own ways, Han Shuo had provided Akley with some crystal coins. In addition to the fact that Akley was in possession of some divine essences, it seemed a mystery how he ended up in such a poor condition.

    Akley face turned unsightly. As though unwilling to discuss the matter before the divine guards, he forced a smile and replied, ¡°It¡¯s a long story...¡±

    ¡°Come inside and tell me about it, ¡° Han Shuo greeted the divine guards and entered Celestial Pearl Pharmacy with Akley. The divine guards withdrew silently.

    After not seeing each other for some time, Han Shuo had be a celebrity in the City of Shadows that every family n would try to fawn on. All the while, Akley had not only failed to prosper using the divine essences he possessed, he had degraded into such a pathetic state.

    ¡°You are really good at making money, aren¡¯t you? It didn¡¯t take long at all for all the divine guards in this city to know your name. When I first asked around, I thought the Bryan they told me of must be another person of the same name. Only after learning of your pharmacy was I certain the Bryan they were talking about was indeed you! Man, you are truly unbelievable!¡± Akley said to Han Shuo in admiration. He had once consumed the medicine Han Shuo handed him and knew just what a miracle his medicines were. If it wasn¡¯t for the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, Akley wouldn¡¯t have believed that the famous Bryan he heard all over the city of was the Bryan he knew.

    ¡°Haha, it¡¯s a long story!¡± Han Shuo too never expected to prosper so rapidly. He asked with a wide grin, ¡°RIght, let¡¯s talk about you instead. When we separated, I left you some crystal coins. You also had divine essences in your hands. How could you possibly have fallen into such a sad state?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t mention those divine essences. It was because of those divine essences that I¡¯ve been so unlucky...¡±

    After the two went their separate ways, the first thing Akley did was to locate a secluded ce and absorb all the divine essence of destruction he possessed. It was worth noting that Akley was gifted in cultivation. He managed to break through tote-stage lowgod realm merely by absorbing the divine essences he had.

    After absorbing all the divine essences of destruction, as he felt that his strength was progressing too slowly, he tried to purchase several divine weapons to raise his strength. However, those crystal coins that Han Shuo had provided him were not enough to buy the divine weapons he fancied. Being the reckless person that he was, Akley took out a few divine essences of wind to try to exchange for the divine weapons. It was because he revealed the divine essences that he got himself into big trouble. As soon as he walked out of the shop with his divine weapons, he was targeted by robbers.

    What followed next was a lengthy period of being hunted and escaping. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that Akley was experienced in such aspects and had vastly improved in strength, perhaps he would have been murdered by those who coveted his divine essences. After an extended period of exhausting running and hiding, Akley managed to escape from those greedy bandits. He learned his lesson and no longer dared to reveal his divine essences.

    As the number of divine guards and defenses of those satellite forts and towns of the City of Shadows were not as good as the city itself, thinking that he could safely sell off divine essences in his possession in the city, in addition to Han Shuo having previously mentioned that he would be in this city, Akley then decided toe to the City of Shadows.

    But then, as Akley was afraid that he might be spotted by the bandits again, he went to the City of Shadows by traveling through remote mountains and swamps, therefore he encountered multiple waves of godhunters in the journey. He was in this rugged, abysmal appearance when he finally arrived at the City of Shadows.

    ¡°... I did not expect that that bunch would be so fucking nuts that they started attacking me as soon as I was alone and it was quite a few at the same time. If it wasn¡¯t for my proficiency in escaping, I would have been killed by those bastards!¡± Akley said furiously.

    ¡°Before I left, I reminded you not to rashly reveal your divine essences. Why are you so impervious to reason? It would be a wonder if no one tried to rob you. But then again, you are a rather persistent one to be able to arrive at the City of Shadows in one piece. Truly, I must say that I¡¯m very impressed!¡±

    ¡°Yea yea, keep those cynical remarksing, rich man.¡±

    ¡°And what was going on in your head earlier when you set yourself against the divine guards? You should know that you are no match against them.¡±

    ¡°Hehe... This is the City of Shadows, what do I have to be afraid of? What, are they going to kill me on the spot?¡± Akley replied smilingly and took a short pause before hemented, ¡°But, I think I have now atst understood the way things are on Elysium. It does seem unsuitable for me to behave as though I¡¯m still on Blue Ocean Continent. Perhaps I should be more scrupulous and modest in the future.¡±

    After hearing those words, Han Shuo knew that Akley had finallye to terms with the state of affairs on Elysium and had started changing his ways ordingly. Han Shuo was happy for Akley that he could recognize the fact that Elysium was nothing like his homeworld, the Blue Ocean Continent.

    ¡°So what are your ns for the future?¡± asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°I didn¡¯t have ns before but now, I want to work for you! You will take me in for old time¡¯s sake, right?¡± Akley and Han Shuo had braved through dangers together. He knew that although Han Shuo was savage towards his enemies, he treated his friends well. He was determined to work for Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before he forced a smile and said, ¡°I only operate a small pharmacy. What exactly can you help me with in this small shop?¡±

    ¡°Ohe on, Bryan! I have heard all the news about you. You are doing very well in the City of Shadows and surely you can afford to hire this good friend of yours, who has gone through many hardships with you and currently has no ce to stay, as a helper?¡± Akley said in a mischievous smile. He then looked for afortable ce, casually lied down, and said, ¡°Damn it, man, your ce is pretty decent. It¡¯s been a while since thest time I rested without worries. Right, how about if you hire me as a doorkeeper? How does that sound?¡±

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t really concerned about the headcount of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy workers at the moment. If Akley was still as hot-headed as before, Han Shuo would be disinclined to hire him. But luckily for Akley, he seemed to havee to terms with the circumstances on Elysium. On top of that, as Han Shuo had a favorable impression of Akley, after thinking for a while, Han Shuo nodded, ¡°Alright, fine, if you don¡¯t mind the small size of my shop, you can stay as a helper.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s wonderful! Haha, I knew you were a man who was faithful to his friends!¡± Akley was delighted.

    ¡°Okay, you will stay here in the shop for now. I don¡¯t have work for you now but there sure will be plenty in the future.¡± Han Shuo would feel much more at ease to have someone to watch over the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy for him while he wasn¡¯t around. Besides, Han Shuo¡¯s goal was not as simple as a small Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. He had aspirations of forming his own family n sooner orter, and by then he would have his own divine guards. Akley would be a good warrior to have among his divine guards.

    ¡°Sure. If you were able to establish yourself so quickly in the City of Shadows, then I¡¯m sure that you will grow even more prosperous in the future. And at that time, I, as your worker, will also prosper with you!¡± Akley chuckled.

    And so, after the mysterious and powerful Andrina, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy gained this somewhat erratic person called Akley.

 Chapter 717 - Troubles

    chapter 717: Troubles

    ***At the House of Sainte.

    City Lord Wace wasn¡¯t in a good mood during the recent days. He changed his ways of doing things and became much more intervening and aggressive when it came to affairs rted to the seven Divine Guard Corps of the City of Shadows.

    There were seven chiefs of divine guards in the City of Shadows in total. Those chiefs ranked in the top three spots were filled by members of the House of Sainte while the bottom four were each members from the other four major family ns. Wace faulted the seven chiefs of divine guards for the incidents where the City of Shadows were intruded by gods from the Life and Water Dominions and Carmelita was assaulted. He reorganized all seven Divine Guards Corps with the excuse that they had been in dereliction of their duties.

    Everyone in the city knew that he was very angry about Carmelita having been severely injured. During this sensitive period, no one dared to defy or question Wace¡¯s orders; they merely followed. A few squadrons were allotted into Avery¡¯s Fifth Corps with the justification that since Avery wasn¡¯t in the City of Shadows, his Fifth Corps might need some helping hands.

    It had been an established custom that City Lord Wace would not directly intervene with the affairs of the four Divine Guard Corps under the control of the four family ns. His actions this time had caused great controversy, but Wace managed to keep them under control with his iron fist.

    The captains in the Fifth Corps of Divine Guards and the House of Lavers were not happy about the maneuver. However, they dared not toin and risk further provoking Wace¡¯s anger. They merely wished that Wace¡¯s mood would improve after Carmelita recovered.

    But Andre knew exactly what his elder brother was up to. He secretly cooperated with Wace to investigate Avery¡¯s actions.

    The House of Sainte was the strongest power in the City of Shadows. If they were to put their mind into investigating a matter, rarely any plots or machinations could stay hidden from them.

    Having received a tip off from Han Shuo, Wace and Avery, this pair of cruel and merciless brothers gradually learned of even more clues and hints. They conducted schemes and operations in secret, gaining more and more intel and evidence.

    One day, Wace, who had been shrouded in a bad mood for a long time, regained a few traces of softness on his face. Looking at Carmelita who had finally regained consciousness, he said in a tender manner, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, you are safe now.¡±

    Owing to her strong willpower, the divine energy of darkness in Carmelita¡¯s body had been brought under control. However, at this point in time, Carmelita¡¯s body was still very weak and the destruction divine energy she had had mostly been exhausted. Fortunately for her, the House of Sainte was filthy rich. Being an extraordinary talent, her family n held high hopes for her and was never sparing with feeding her with divine essences. The moment that she opened her eyes, she was greeted with a heavy sack of destruction divine essences in her father¡¯s hand.

    ¡°Dad...¡± Carmelita softly called.

    ¡°It¡¯s alright, don¡¯t talk, just keep resting. Take this bag of divine essences and get well as soon as possible. I did not expect that you would be heavily injured again in such a short time and our supply of destruction divine essence is running low. But don¡¯t worry about it, I have sent men to contact other cities and will exchange for more divine essence of destruction energy using the other divine essences we have. You can keep your mind on recuperating from the injury,¡± Wace said softly.

    ¡°I feel much better already...¡± Carmelita replied as she tried to sit up on her bed. Wace hastily helped her up. She then softly bunched her brows and asked, ¡°Did anyone else survive?¡±

    Wace softly sighed and shook his head.

    ¡°Kalina... She died... to protect me...¡± Tears started to spill over from her eyes.

    ¡°I know. Don¡¯t worry, we already have a suspect of the main culprit. Those who dared attack you, whoever they are, will not escape death!¡± Wace pledged.

    Not a single person from the two small squadrons of the House of Sainte divine guards who traveled with Carmelita survived the attack. Carmelita only barely managed to survive by escaping to the Skyorchid Fort where the most powerful chief of divine guards, Aobashi, was temporarily stationed. Kalina sacrificed her life to give Carmelita a little more time to escape.

    Carmelita closed her eyes to recall the scene and narrated it to Wace. ¡°They covered themselves inside the ¡®Canopy of Darkness¡¯. I could not see their faces and have no clue who was attacking. But most of them cultivated in the energy of death, destruction, and darkness...¡±

    ¡°They hid their auras and appearances using the Canopy of Darkness because they did not want you to identify them. But it¡¯s alright, you don¡¯t have to think too much about it because I will find each and every one of them, ¡° Wace assured Carmelita warmly.

    ¡°Oh, by the way, it was all thanks to that young chap Bryan that your injuries were stabilized.¡± Wace did not want Carmelita to wallow in the sorrow of losing Kalina and therefore mentioned Han Shuo to turn her mind to something else.

    ¡°He¡¯s alright? Well, I should have known that this fe would be fine... He is more crafty than anyone!¡± Carmelita smiled with difficulty and shortly after, asked Wace, ¡°Is he in the City of Shadows? I want to see him!¡±

    Wace hesitated for a moment before he replied, ¡°He is in the city, but your condition now is still poor. Use the time to heal yourself. It¡¯s not toote to see him after you eliminate the darkness divine energy in your body.¡±

    Carmelita knew that Wace said so because he was concerned about her health and therefore she nodded and softly replied, ¡°Okay.¡±

    ¡°The most important thing for you now is to heal from your injuries. Alright, I should stop bothering you. Rest well.¡± Wace got up in a gentle manner and walked out the room with a smile on his face.

    He entered a secret chamber in the House of Sainte. There, he asked Andre who was sitting quietly, ¡°How are things?¡±

    ¡°No conclusive evidence. But based on Bryan¡¯s words, the darkness divine energy in Carmelita, that guy being away from the city for such a long time, and a few hints we found, I surmise that he is the one!¡± Andre replied softly with a calm and collected face.

    ¡°No need for evidence and no need to continue investigating the whole event. I trust your judgment,¡± Wace said decisively. After taking a short pause, he continued, ¡°Tell the trio of Aobashi to go on an all-out search for Avery and immediately inform us once he is located. We will apprehend him directly.¡±

    ¡°Elder Brother, if we do so without any concrete evidence, will it...?¡± Andre was thrilled at first but soon creased his brows after the thought of the potential outcry from the House of Lavers dawned on him.

    ¡°It¡¯s no bother. If we strike, we strike decisively without any scruple. Keep a close watch over each and every action of the House of Lavers. Once it is verified that the patriarch and Avery have something to do with the incident, exterminate the entire Lavers Family directly!¡± Wace said in a merciless voice.

    ¡°Currently, we have discovered no indication that the patriarch of the House of Lavers, Felder, participated in the matter. However, I will do as Elder Brother has instructed. And if Felder really had no idea about the attack, what should we do?¡± asked Andre.

    ¡°If he really had not an inkling about it, then we capture all of Avery¡¯s confidants in the Fifth Corps. By then, I will personally talk about the matter with Felder. If he isn¡¯t tactful, the House of Lavers shall disappear from the City of Shadows!¡± Wace said in a deep voice.

    ¡°Got it!¡± Andre nodded. He knew that his elder brother was one who would show no mercy once he truly strikes. The House of Sainte managed to stand tall in the City of Shadows for countless years precisely because they had a patriarch that was this ruthless and headstrong!

    ¡°Alright, before doing anything to the House of Lavers, you will personally meet the patriarchs of the other three families to exin the whole sequence of events. We cannot let them feel frightened. Let them know that the Lavers Family was fully deserving of the punishment,¡± Wace added after thinking for a bit.

    Andre nodded. When he was about to leave, something popped into Andre¡¯s mind. He asked, ¡°On that note, Elder Brother, that youngster named Bryan has saved Carmelita¡¯s life twice. Perhaps we should show him our gratitude?¡±

    ¡°That youngster is a decent one!¡± Wace praised Han Shuo as soon as Andre spoke of him. After thinking for a while, Wace said in a somewhat vexed manner, ¡°This youngster has a staunch mind, a whiff of drive, and he is excellent in producing medicines. He is no doubt a hard talent toe by! However, this youngster¡¯s strength is a little too weak. If we give him too much too quickly, I¡¯m worried that he won¡¯t be able to bear it all. Otherwise, I really don¡¯t mind handing the Fifth Corps for him to manage.¡±

    Andre¡¯s heart jolted after hearing that Wace had the intention of handing the Fifth Corps to Han Shuo because he knew just how great of an opportunity this would be. Having the position as one of the chiefs of divine guards in the City of Shadows would be a giant leap for one to form one¡¯s own family n. This would be a gargantuan favor.

    But after thinking a little further, Andre shook his head lightly. He forced a smile and said, ¡°What a pity that the youngster is a little too weak. Even if he was given the Fifth Corps, he wouldn¡¯t be able to win over the masses.¡±

    ¡°Yes, I thought of that as well. This youngster has good rtions with Carmelita. We would have one less thing to worry about if he could assume control of the Fifth Corps. What a pity, such a pity that his strength is just too poor. Sigh, forget about it. We will discuss this when the timees,¡± Wace too shook his head helplessly and decided to drop the topic.

    Han Shuo had no idea that Wace had considered giving this highly coveted position, the Chief of the Fifth Corps, to him. Otherwise, Han Shuo might take the risk of revealing his actual strength to hold onto this opportunity.

    This was because, if Han Shuo was to assume control of the Fifth Corps, that would mean that he was free to hire and assemble his own divine guards. With mighty forces in his hands, on top of the wealth from his pharmacy, and by umting some contributions, he would be able to form his own family n in the City of Shadows.

    Perhaps he might even supersede the House of Lavers and be one of the five major families in the City of Shadows!

    But this was not the time to discuss the fine days waiting in the future for him. At this point in time, Han Shuo had run into a big crisis which, if not handled and resolved properly, he might not even be able to continue to prosper in the City of Shadows, much less to form his own family n.

    ¡°How is that possible?¡± Han Shuo cried while looking at Anito who was wearing a prudent expression.

    ¡°I have no idea, but one of the family members of the House of Kisa has not just failed to stabilize his current realm but also suffered adverse effects after taking your Pill of Tranquility. Not only could he not advance, but his realm also regressed. I have rushed here just to inform you about this,¡± said Anito.

    ¡°Medicines I make cannot produce that kind of effect. Something else must have gone wrong. Perhaps that fe did not take the medicine following the proper procedure I specified?¡± Han Shuo had absolute confidence in the medicines he personally refined and did not believe his medicines would cause problems.

    ¡°I have received this info only recently and have no idea about the specifics. How about if you go to the Kisa Residence to have a look?¡± proposed Anito.

    Han Shuo nodded and right away, with Anito showing the way, he headed towards the Kisa Residence. Andrina, who was eating crystal coins, swiftly glided down from the third floor andnded beside Anito, causing him an enormous shock.

    With abundant crystal coins to consume, Andrina¡¯s injuries were healing rapidly. At the same time, that mysterious and unfathomable aura on her grew lighter and lighter. Han Shuo knew that as her injuries recovered, her ability to conceal her true strength also increased. Andrina was unlike Akley and Han Shuo could do nothing if she wanted to follow him around.

    Anito sized up Andrina who appeared noiselessly with strange gazes and was shocked by that chilling, unfriendly expression on her face. He judged Han Shuo in his mind, <i>so he has a fetish of this sort. No wonder he does not municate¡¯ well with the pretty and youngdies in the city even after being in the city for such a long time, but has gotten along so well with Miss Carmelita. Extraordinary people sure have extraordinary appetites!</i>

    Anito, who was having filthy thoughts, suddenly discovered that the little girl was gazing back at him with her cold eyes. For some reason, Anito felt a chill travel down his spine. His subconscious mind reacted by giving a couple of hollowughs and no longer dared to look at her.

    ¡°If you dare have any kind of dirty thoughts again, I will kill you!¡± Andrina coldly groaned and warned.

    ¡°I won¡¯t, I won¡¯t!¡± Anito hastily replied. But after uttering those words, he realized that something wasn¡¯t right. He asked himself, <i>Wait a second, why am I afraid of this little girl? That doesn¡¯t make sense!</i>

    Han Shuo did not pay attention to the short exchange between Anito and Andrina as his mind was upied by the matter about his medicine. Soon enough, they arrived at the Kisa Residence. After he announced his name, the servant at the Kisa Residence led him inside coldly. They all looked at Han Shuo as though he was a conman, which made Han Shuo very ufortable.

    ¡°What happened?¡± Han Shuo knitted his brows and asked Rugersey after arriving in a gymnasium in the Kisa Family.

    Rugersey was in charge of the Sixth Corps and he too was an influential figure in the City of Shadows. Thest time he met Han Shuo, he had been very respectful. This time, however, he was giving Han Shuo theplete opposite treatment. He gave a cold nce at Han Shuo, lightly groaned, and said, ¡°Oh, you sure got here early.¡±

    Rugersey then pointed at a young man on the floor who was spasming on the ground and said furiously, ¡°Look at what your medicine did to him! My nephew became like this after taking your poison called the Pill of Tranquillity! Why didn¡¯t you mention that your drug is so unstable and has such a terrifying side effect that caused his realm to regress?¡±

    ¡°I have sold a lot of that medicine and many have taken it. This is the first time that this sort of situation has appeared. I believe that the fault doesn¡¯t lie with my medicine. Perhaps he did not use the medicine properly. There must be a misunderstanding somewhere!¡± Han Shuo said after he looked at the person on the floor and furrowed his brows.

    ¡°There is no misunderstanding. I have asked him, he took your medicinepletely in ordance with the method described with no mistake. Therefore, it must be your medicine that caused this situation. Are you still going to disavow all responsibility?¡± Rugersey took a deep breath and restrained the fury in his heart. He said with a dark face, ¡°I know you have good rtions with Carmelita and saved her life again a few days ago. That is the only reason I¡¯m still talking with you so politely now. Otherwise, you wouldn¡¯t still be standing in front of me!¡±

    His disrespectful attitude had greatly irritated Han Shuo. Han Shuo red at the person wriggling and curling on the ground and raised his head to speak to Rugersey. ¡°Many have taken my medicines. Why is that they are all fine but he is the only one with a problem?¡±

    ¡°How would I know? Perhaps they have yet to feel the side effects! How dare you behave so arrogantly when there is a problem with your medicine? Very well, I shall arrest you right here right now!¡± Rugersey could no longer suppress the fury in his heart and roared. A few divine guards from the Sixth Corps beside him started to surround Han Shuo.

    Rugersey had behaved politely to Han Shuo prior to the incident because of his medicine. Now when he thought that the medicine had negative side effects, he immediately felt that he had been cheated. With that, seeing that Han Shuo was just a small lowgod, his attitude immediately changed.

    Anito jumped in before Rugersey could seize Han Shuo. ¡°Lord Rugersey, please do not take presumptuous actions before the situation is fully understood. I have received orders from Lord Erebus and Lord Andre to ensure Mister Bryan¡¯s safety. Please do not make things difficult for us in the Third Corps!¡±

    It was also at this moment that Andrina who had been standing beside Han Shuo suddenly stepped forward and stood in between Han Shuo and Rugersey with a hostile face.

    Han Shuo reached out, grabbed Andrina¡¯s small hand, and pulled her back. If Andrina were to cause trouble while the issue was still unresolved, the reputation of his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy could possibly be ruined. Han Shuo counted on the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy to generate him big profits and knew that he could not do anything reckless at this point in time.

    ¡°No matter what, my House of Kisa wants justice!¡± Rugersey shouted angrily. He stopped acting impulsively after Anito mentioned Erebus and Andre.

    Rugersey had obviously seen Andrina when she stepped forward and his heart jolted. He vaguely felt a menacing aura emanating from Andrina that gave him the impression that she would be an extremely terrifying opponent, but that feeling disappeared when Han Shuo pulled her back. Rugersey thought that it was merely a temporary figment of his imagination. Besides, as he was in a fit of anger, he did not think too much about it.

    ¡°Let me check on his condition,¡± Han Shuo said as he came to a decision in his mind that after the incident was over, he would not sell any more of his medicines to the House of Kisa because Rugersey¡¯s attitude right then had greatly displeased him.

 Chapter 718 - Touch him and I will kill you!

    <h4>GDK 718: Touch him and I will kill you!</h4>

    Han Shuo crouched and pressed his hand on the victim¡¯s back to probe his body conditions. The news of Han Shuo saving Carmelita¡¯s life two days earlier had spread throughout the entire City of Shadows. Had Rugersey not been aware of it, he likely wouldn¡¯t have allowed Han Shuo anywhere near his nephew.

    The victim was in between Han Shuo and Rugersey and therefore he couldn¡¯t clearly observe what Han Shuo was doing.

    Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan moved into the person¡¯s body like multiple formless little snakes, attempting to locate the root cause of the problem. Han Shuo was very clear about theposition and effects of his Pill of Tranquility. And with the help of his miraculous demonic yuan, he quickly figured out the situation.

    ¡°This is not right!¡± Han Shuo creased his brows and eximed in a deep voice, ¡°There is apound in his body which is causing his body to spasm. I¡¯m sure that thispound will never appear in any Pill of Tranquility I refine. Did he take some other medicine with it?¡±

    ¡°I¡­ I didn¡±t¡­¡± The boy on the floor spoke in a very weak voice and had difficulty speaking.

    ¡°You are trying to shift the me, aren¡¯t you?¡± Rugersey shouted as soon as his nephew denied taking another medicine. Obviously, he had no trust in Han Shuo.

    ¡°Impossible!¡± Han Shuo coldly shouted, ¡°It is absolutely impossible that my medicine contained thispound. There must be something wrong elsewhere!¡±

    ¡°My, My Lord!¡± it was at this moment that a divine guard suddenly rushed into the building.

    Rugersey was about to explode. He gave the flustered divine guard a p across his face before asking, ¡°What is it?!¡±

    After stopping himself from stumbling with difficulty, ignoring the drop of blood flowing from the corner of his mouth, the divine guard anxiously answered, ¡°A divine guard suffered injuries at a gymnasium. After he consumed a Pill of Rejuvenation that belonged to Gilco, not only did he fail to stabilize his injuries, he died on the spot!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s face went cold as soon as he heard those words.

    Rugersey became exceptionally enraged. He red at Han Shuo and shouted, ¡°Tell me again how this isn¡¯t a problem with your medicine! This has happened not just once, but twice! There is no room for you to disavow your responsibility. Men, seize him!¡±

    ¡°Lord Rugersey!¡± Anito immediately cried out softly and intended to remind him that Han Shuo was under the protection of Erebus and Andre.

    ¡°No need to warn me! Even if Erebus and Andre are here, I will still proceed with capturing him and I will handle all the me. Seize this youngster immediately and for a start, break his arms and legs. I will personally look for Erebus and Andreter. I want to see how they will defend this big conman!¡± Rugersey was so angry that he could no longer be reasoned with.

    After hearing Rugersey¡¯s instructions, those divine guards of the Sixth Corps no longer hesitated. Immediately, they surrounded Han Shuo and pointed their divine weapons at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was infuriated to hear Rugersey wanting to break his arms and legs. It was obvious to him that there was something fishy about the matter and yet, not only did Rugersey refuse to listen to all exnation, he jumped straight to condemning Han Shuo as a conman and wanted to punish him. His actions had vited certain regtions of the City of Shadows.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t afraid of Rugersey¡¯s threats. Using the insane rejuvenation ability of his body, Han Shuo could even regrow his organs if they werepletely obliterated. Clearly, reconnecting broken bones could not be more effortless for Han Shuo. Besides, Han Shuo was curious if the attacks of those midgod divine guards could make a ding to his Invincible Omen Body.

    Even though breaking his arms and legs would do him nearly no harm, Han Shuo could not put up with being insulted like that. Immediately and secretly, he assembled the energy in his body in preparation to resist those divine guards. He inwardly thought that in the worst possible scenario ¨C if the matter escted to the point where even the House of Sainte could not shield him, he would just leave the City of Shadows. Han Shuo believed that he would still be able to prosper outside the City of Shadows, even though it may take some time to rebuild his reputation.

    But before Han Shuo could do a thing, Andrina, who had been watching coldly all along, suddenly sprang into action. A splendid radiance circled around Han Shuo. All the divine weapons pointing at Han Shuo suddenly exploded, throwing those divine guards of the Sixth Corps holding the weapons flying into the distance.

    The ice-cold Andrina stood proudly before Han Shuo. She kept silent as she stared fixedly at Rugersey with her pair of murderous eyes.

    ¡°Er¡­¡± Anito, who was about to persuade Rugersey not to use force, stared and gaped just as Han Shuo did. Neither of them knew how to react to the sudden and unforeseen turn of events.

    ¡°Who¡­ who are you? How dare you hurt my Sixth Corps! Rebel, you are making enemies with the City of Shadows!¡± Rugersey, as the Chief the Sixth Corps, wasn¡¯t one to admit defeat easily. Although he too was momentarily startled by the strength disyed by Andrina, he soon came to his senses and assigned guilt to Andrina in a practiced manner.

    ¡°If you touch him, I will kill you!¡± Andrina said with a bone-chilling voice as she stared coldly at Rugersey.

    Rugersey, who was prepared to strike, felt as though he was affected by a bizarre energy field in an instant. The next moment, an immense sense of danger surged into his mind. It was so intense that he thought of taking a few steps backward. A shiver traveled through his heart.

    After keeping silent for some time, Han Shuo finally said, ¡°We will leave!¡± He nced coldly at the indecisive Rugersey and said, ¡°Give me some time, I will get to the bottom of this matter. I dare assure you that there is no issue with my medicine at all!¡±

    ¡°He has injured so many of our divine guards, don¡¯t let him escape!¡± a member of the Kisa Family appeared out of nowhere and shouted from a distance.

    No one answered the shout. All the divine guards of the Sixth Corps gazed at Rugersey, waiting for him to make a decision.

    At this moment, Han Shuo had started walking towards the exit with Andrina. However, they were on high alert, ready to deal with any sudden attack from the House of Kisa.

    Rugersey who had been staring at Andrina silently for a long time suddenly sprung into action. This early-stage highgod of death charged at her like a savage beast.

    In midair, Rugersey¡¯s face suddenly turned as pale as paper and his entire figure shrank and thinned. A piece of bone appeared in his hand with a sh. A domain of divinity of death enveloped the area and following that, the bone shot towards Andrina with a trail of ghostly light.

    Chilling rays glistened from Andrina¡¯s eyes as though she was scorning on Rugersey. Her body and even her little dress suddenly became as sparkling and translucent as gemstones. Before the crowd could see what was happening, an intense energy fluctuation erupted from her body. Something that seemed to be a vortex whirled out from her body and violently struck Rugersey¡¯s body.

    Rumbles¡­ The sound of an explosion apanied the burst of blinding light.

    Rugersey withdrew at a speed even faster than he had charged forward. He returned to the same ce where he originally stood with an expression of disbelief.

    The radiance in Andrina¡¯s eyes grew even more chilling. She took several deep breaths while staring fixedly at Rugersey and suddenly, dazzling light yet again glowed from her body. She had charged towards Rugersey.

    Andrina acted too fast. At this point in time, even if Han Shuo wanted to, he was powerless in stopping the fight. Seeing that a battle to the death was unavoidable, Han Shuo started to consider which path he should take to leave the City of Shadows.

    Suddenly, out of the blue, a pair of shadows descended beside Rugersey.

    An enormous explosion sounded from the intense darkness. Then, when the darkness scattered, two people were revealed to be standing beside Rugersey. One of them was Andre, whom Han Shuo was familiar with. Han Shuo did not expect that Andre would show up here at this time. The other person beside Rugersey was a gentleman in pitch-dark armor who then cried out in surprise, ¡°So powerful! Who is this little girl?¡± He stared at Andrina appalled.

    Andrina gasped for air and withdrew back to Han Shuo in an instant. She grabbed onto Han Shuo¡¯s hand and said softly, ¡°My injuries have notpletely recovered. I cannot defeat all three at once!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s okay, they are not here to fight,¡± Han Shuo soothed Andrina and from a distance, he respectfully bowed, ¡°Greetings, Lord Andre, Lord Erebus,¡± Han Shuo figured out the identity of that gentleman as soon as he heard his voice. Back when he had been trapped by Brovst, Han Shuo had heard Erebus¡¯ voice. As one who was mindful of powerful figures, Han Shuo remembered the voice by heart.

    Andre and Erebus snapped out from their dazes after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s greeting. They nodded to Han Shuo in response. Erebus then put on an amicable and fascinated smile and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Thank you for your medicines. They are truly miraculous!¡±

    ¡°Miraculous?! Two people in my family have fallen victim to his poison! Erebus, Lord Andre, even if this youngster is under your protection, you must be fair and uphold justice for me!¡± Rugersey yelled angrily.

    ¡°Bryan, what is going on exactly?¡± Andre held an extremely favorable impression towards Han Shuo. And now, after discovering that the little girl beside Han Shuo was an expert with unfathomable strength, Han Shuo¡¯s importance in his mind increased yet another level higher.

    ¡°Two from the House of Kisa took my medicines and had adverse reactions. I have examined this guy and discovered that there is another type ofpound present in his body, which I¡¯m certain did not originate from my Pill of Tranquility. Before I could exin the situation, a second person was reported dead after taking my medicine. Rugersey arbitrarily asserted that it must be my medicine that caused it. He refused to listen to any reasoning and wanted to break my arms and legs¡­¡± Han Shuo briefly exined.

    Throughout the exnation, the gazes of Andre, Erebus, Rugersey and even the divine guards of the House of Kisa, lingered on Andrina who was holding Han Shuo¡¯s hand.

    After a while, Andre gently cleared his throat and said to the furious Rugersey, ¡°Something is fishy about this. I don¡¯t think that it had to do with Bryan. Many in the city have taken his medicines and they are all doing just fine. The Sainte Family and divine guards under Erebus have all been safe and sound ¨C two of us can confirm this. Thus, it is much more likely that something is wrong with those two in your family n.¡±

    ¡°How is that possible?¡± Rugersey shouted. However, his voice started tock confidence.

    Rugersey, after seeing the exchange of nces between Han Shuo and Andre, suddenly realized that he had miscalcted on one thing. He originally assumed that the friendship between Han Shuo and the House of Sainte was shallow. He thought that Andre and Erebus would favor him over a small little lowgod. However, it was now obvious to him that the two were protective of Han Shuo and were on Han Shuo¡¯s side. This forced Rugersey to reconsider his approach.

    ¡°We should investigate the matter further before any discussion of upholding justice,¡± said Erebus.

    ¡°Bryan, you said that this person has apound in his body which doesn¡¯t belong to your Pill of Tranquility, right?¡± Andre asked Han Shuo smilingly. He could see that Rugersey was slowlycking in confidence.

    ¡°It definitely doesn¡¯t belong in my medicine. I am certain that the Pill of Tranquility he consumed was either tampered with, or he is lying, or he had taken some other medicine!¡± Han Shuo said confidently.

    ¡°There is someone else, isn¡¯t there? Why don¡¯t we check his condition as well?¡± Andre was trusting in Han Shuo and turned to ask Rugersey.

    ¡°Get his body over here!¡± Rugersey, under Andre¡¯s watchful eye, instructed unwillingly.

    Soon enough, a body was carried to the scene by divine guards from the Sixth Corps. Han Shuo leaned forward and carefully examined the body before he said assuredly, ¡°This person also has anotherpound in his body which definitely isn¡¯t inside my Pill of Rejuvenation!¡±

    ¡°Oi, can you still talk? Try to recall, other than yourself, did anyone touch the medicine you consumed?¡± the gentlemanly Erebus suddenly crouched beside the person who was twitching on the floor and asked while looking at him with cold eyes.

    Rugersey¡¯s nephew was obviously rather flustered to be stared at by Erebus. His body trembled for a moment before he seemed to recall something and said, ¡°Gilco, Gilco wanted my Pill of Rejuvenation in exchange for this Pill of Tranquility. I heard from uncle that the Pill of Tranquility is much more expensive than the Pill of Rejuvenation and so I agreed to exchange it!¡±

    ¡°The Pill of Rejuvenation this deceased divine guard ate was also given by Gilco, wasn¡¯t it?¡± Han Shuo suddenly grinned and asked.

    ¡°Where is this Gilco?¡± Erebus stood up and asked Rugersey.

    ¡°I heard his voice just now. Where is he?¡± Rugersey looked around puzzlingly before he turned to a divine guard beside him and instructed, ¡°Go look around and bring him in. It probably has nothing to do with him. He is a member of our House of Kisa.¡± Rugersey¡¯s heart was feeling unsure when he said those words as the clues were not pointing in his favor.

    A dozen or more minutester, several divine guards, wearing anxious expressions, rushed back to the party. The leader hastily reported, ¡°My Lord, Gilco has disappeared, so have the crystal coins in his room!¡±

    Rugersey wasn¡¯t aplete idiot. The expression on his face immediately became anxious after he heard those words. He angrily said, ¡°What is Gilco doing?! How could he disappear at this moment?! Find him!¡±

    ¡°Rugersey, I believe it is now obvious that the problem is with your House of Kisa, not Bryan¡¯s medicines!¡± Andre raised an eyebrow as he lightly groaned.

    ¡°This¡­ this is¡­¡± with things having developed to this stage, even Rugersey was clear about what exactly was happening. He seemed embarrassed as he said to Han Shuo, ¡°That¡­ this¡­ Bryan¡­ I¡¯m sorry¡­ very sorry¡­¡±

    ¡°Fret not!¡± Han Shuo replied with a faint smile as though he wasn¡¯t bothered about the matter at all. He got up from his seat, bowed at Andre and Erebus, and announced, ¡°From this day onwards, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy will conduct no business with your House of Kisa!¡± upon finishing those words, Han Shuo marched resolutely towards the exit with Andrina.

    ¡°Noo¡­¡± Rugersey could not feel more remorseful. He realized just how grave his mistake was!

 Chapter 719 - Three Secret Chambers

    GDK 719: Three Secret Chambers

    Andre and Erebus seemed quite amused as they followed Han Shuo out, leaving Rugersey behind.

    The two were very curious with Andrina who came with Han Shuo. They could not understand how this little girl could possess such tremendous strength. They were even more clueless as to why she would follow around Han Shuo so docilely. They were eager to learn the answers.

    Outside the Kisa Residence, Andre and Erebus caught up to Han Shuo.

    After having noticed Andre and Erebus, Han Shuo slowed down his footsteps and said smilingly, ¡°Thank you for your Lordships¡¯ assistance. Otherwise, I¡¯m afraid I would have had trouble leaving the Kisa Residence!¡±

    ¡°Haha, with such a powerful expert by your side, even in an all-out fight, I doubt the House of Kisa would be able to do much!¡± Erebus said to Han Shuo and right away, his attention turned to Andrina who was wearing an unfriendly face. He asked puzzlingly, ¡°Hello little girl, what energy was it that you use? I have never seen it before!¡±

    Andrina shot a re at Erebus and replied coldly, ¡°None of your business!¡±

    ¡°Ahem, ahem...¡± Erebus felt rather embarrassed and forced a dryugh.

    Andre, who also intended to question Andrina, most sensibly chose not to ask after seeing how she responded to Erebus. Andre merely looked at Andrina with astonishment. Meanwhile, Andrina followed behind Han Shuo silently,pletely ignoring the duo.

    ¡°Erm... Bryan, what happened today at the House of Kisa was strange, to say the least. That Gilco fe might have been employed by someone to tarnish your Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. You need to be careful,¡± Andre said in a grave manner after keeping silent for a moment.

    ¡°Yes, the incident was obviously schemed to harm me. But I have no idea who could be trying to get me,¡± Han Shuo nodded and replied. He too understood that this Gilco character would not have that much audacity tomit the act without some strong motivation. Besides, there were no grudges or animosity between them. It was impossible that Gilco would suddenly decide to set Han Shuo up for no reason.

    ¡°Have you offended anyone recently? Other than Avery, of course. Avery hasn¡¯t been in the City of Shadows during the recent days and I have been monitoring the Fifth Corps. He likely has nothing to do with this matter,¡± Andre asked with his brows furrowed.

    Han Shuo was startled and suddenly stopped walking. After carefully thinking for a while, someone popped into his mind. ¡°I have been to the Godswamp Pharmacy to discuss doing business with their owner, Steiss, but we parted on bad terms. While inside their banquet hall filled with pharmacists, I had a quarrel with a pharmacist from Mirage City named Gu Li. Could it be her?¡±

    ¡°Gu Li of Mirage City?¡± Erebus softly cried out and shook his head. He exined, ¡°Gu Li is rather queer in temperament and she is famous in Mirage City. However, I doubt shemands much of an influence over the City of Shadows.¡±

    ¡°Someone wants to tarnish the reputation of my Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. If that had seeded, who would gain the most benefit in the City of Shadows?¡± Han Shuo creased his brows and softly mumbled to himself. He started to suspect Steiss of the Godswamp Pharmacy. Han Shuo did not have a favorable impression towards that person and felt that he was a scheming one.

    ¡°If something goes wrong with your medicines, the greatest beneficiaries ought to be other pharmacies in the city. Perhaps you haven¡¯t been noticing but the appearance of your Celestial Pearl Pharmacy has affected business in other pharmacies, the Godswamp Pharmacy being the most severely hit!¡± Andre seemed to realize after listening to Han Shuo soliloquize.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was filled with even greater suspicion after hearing Andre¡¯s words. After thinking for a bit, Han Shuo suddenly said smiled. ¡°I guess I will have to trouble your Lordships. I believe someone as influential your Lordships will surely be able to find the person behind this.¡±

    ¡°Stop cajoling us, brat. I will pay attention to it!¡± Andre replied smilingly.

    ¡°Alright, now that this shenanigan is over, I shall return to my pharmacy,¡± Han Shuo knew that Andre would help him. But before departing, he asked, ¡°By the way, how is Carmelita doing?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, she has awoken and is recovering well,¡± seeing that Han Shuo was concerned about Carmelita, the smile on Andre¡¯s face became even warmer.

    ¡°Then I can truly be at ease, ¡° Han Shuo waved at the two and left with Andrina.

    Andre and Erebus did not continue to walk with Han Shuo. After both Han Shuo and Andrina disappeared from their sights, Erebus remarked in a low voice, ¡°Damn, that little girl is nothing simple. In a solo battle, even I do not have the certainty of defeating her!¡±

    Andre nodded in agreement. ¡°I did not discover her actual strength until today. Had the two of us not arrived there at the right time, Rugersey would have suffered a painful bashing!¡±

    ¡°What has me curious is this youngster called Bryan. Why would this little girl, as powerful as she is, be so meek to him? It even appeared as though the little girl only listens to him and no one else. Very strange indeed!¡± remarked the puzzled Erebus.

    ¡°The days ahead are long. We have all the time in the world to figure that out in the future. Fortunately, Bryan is leaning to our family n. It¡¯s probably not a bad thing to us if that little girl listens only to his instructions.¡± Andre thought for a moment and asked Erebus, ¡°Have you discovered Avery¡¯s whereabouts yet?¡±

    ¡°Not yet,¡± Erebus shook his head.

    ¡°Pay attention to the Godswamp Pharmacy. This incident rting to Bryan is very unusual,¡± said Andre.

    ¡°Understood, I will have my men keep on eye on the Godswamp Pharmacy... Have I mentioned that the medicines Bryan made are absolutely miraculous?¡± Erebus said smilingly. He seemed to be very invested in Han Shuo.

    ***

    Han Shuo did not return to the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. Instead, he went on a trip to verify his suspicion.

    Hearing Andre¡¯s reminder, Han Shuo suddenly realized that the emergence and rise of his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy had severely threatened the bottom lines of other pharmacies in the city. The Godswamp Pharmacy, as thergest pharmacy in the City of Shadows, was the most severely affected. It was only natural that they would take countermeasures.

    Han Shuo thought that Steiss¡¯ proposal to cooperate with him could be one of the countermeasures taken by the Godswamp Pharmacy. However, as he had declined the proposal right from the start, it was only to be expected that they might use tougher methods after the softer one had failed.

    Han Shuo had an exceptional advantage when it came to doing detective work. Soon enough, he arrived near the Godswamp Pharmacy with Andrina. After locating a dark and hidden spot to conceal themselves, Han Shuo released demon generals to fly towards the Godswamp Pharmacy.

    ¡°What is that?¡± Andrina gasped. Her eyes glistened brightly and the incorporeal figures of the few demon generals were reflected in her eyes.

    These demon generals that Cauldron Spirit refined could transform between material and immaterial states. Those demon generals were in an immaterial state when Han Shuo released them and only Han Shuo, who possessed a consciousness with extraordinary sensing power, could discover the presence of those demon generals in their incorporeal state. He was careless and forgot that Andrina beside him had mysterious strength.

    The demon general rapidly flew away from the two. Andrina stared fixedly at Han Shuo and remarked with astonishment, ¡°Those things came from inside your body, didn¡¯t they? Don¡¯t deny it, I have seen everything!¡±

    ¡°Erm....¡± Andrina¡¯s questioning and piercing eyes gave Han Shuo a headache.

    ¡°What exactly are those things? They look spectacr! If it wasn¡¯t for our close proximity, even I would have failed to notice it! How interesting. What exactly are they?¡± Andrina¡¯s curiosity was greatly aroused. She questioned Han Shuo excitedly while constantly rocking his arm.

    ¡°They... they are a strange type of lifeform found on Profound Continent. They are used for scouting and spying,¡± Han Shuo exined. He thought to himself, <i>I¡¯ve got to be more careful around her next time. Her senses are so sharp! </i>

    ¡°What a miraculous lifeform! They seem to be non-physical, as though made up purely of soul energy, and the energy even seemed quite strong! How is it that they were inside your body? Are you a strange lifeform as well?¡± Andrina pressed on with her questions.

    ¡°No, I¡¯m just housing them using a type of container. When there¡¯s trouble, I can draw them out to scout out for information. It¡¯s that simple. No more questions, I¡¯m in the middle of something!¡± Han Shuo hastily answered and closed his eyes and lips as though he was upied.

    The potential use of demon generals was not merely for scouting out information. They could be used in deploying formations, attack, assassination, and so on. The demon generals that Cauldron Spirit refined were all especially powerful and were primary helpers to Han Shuo. Of course, these were the secrets that Han Shuo kept to himself and would never divulge to Andrina.

    Andrina, who wanted to ask even more questions, had no choice but to keep silent as she understood that Han Shuo did not want to exin any further. However, her curiosity grew even stronger and her gazes at Han Shuo were filled with amazement.

    The Godswamp Pharmacy was the biggest pharmacy in the City of Shadows and naturally, they had set up boundaries around their premises. However, as the Godswamp Pharmacy was merely a pharmacy, even though they possessed extraordinary influence and power, they dared not to show it off in the City of Shadows. Hence, the boundaries around the structures were not particrly strong or powerful. The demon generals managed to intrude with ease.

    The demon general moved around the Godswamp campus. They discovered rooms withplete sets of pharmaceutical tools and devices, countless busy pharmacists refining strange and exotic medicines, as well as some pharmacists in higher positions involved in heated discussions and debates.

    Using the auditory senses of his demon generals, Han Shuo discovered that the pharmacists were merely discussing the arts of refining medicine. They did not talk about anything rted to the incident at the House of Kisa. One of the demon generals discovered Gu Li of Mirage City. She was temporarily lodging in Godswamp Pharmacy to attend the pharmacist conference.

    Having taken Gu Li as a suspect, Han Shuo carefully observed Gu Li¡¯s every action using a demon general. He saw that Gu Li had a vexed face while flipping through a thick and heavy pharmacopeia while softly mumbling. After the demon general leaned closer to listen, Han Shuo nearlyughed out loud.

    It turned out that Gu Li was flipping through the pharmacopeia to find the names of the medicinal ingredients Han Shuo mentioned to her at the banquet hall. These medicinal ingredients were not materials that people in this universe should know of. Even if they had discovered these ingredients, people in this universe would have different names for them. Han Shuo had spat those names out just to annoy Gu Li and did not expect that she would actually be so persistent.

    From the number of books scattered all over the floor and her messy hair, Han Shuo knew that Gu Li had been searching for those ingredients for a long time.

    ¡°Grrhh!!!¡± Gu Li pulled her own hair out like a crazy woman. She screeched furiously, ¡°He must have made it up! Impossible, If those ingredients exist, it¡¯s impossible that I¡¯ve never heard of them! Liar, he must be a liar!¡±

    Han Shuo thought that after Gu Li was done with shouting, she would give up on her vain effort. But unexpectedly, after ranting for a while, she went on and grabbed an even thicker book and continued to flip through the book. She cursed Han Shuo in a low voice as she searched through the book.

    Han Shuo was actually impressed and even admiring of her assiduous spirit. Although she may have issues in her character and personality, Han Shuo had to admit that her tireless dedication towards the art of refining medicine was admirable. It was no wonder that she was a pharmacist second to none in Mirage City.

    It was also for this reason that Han Shuo immediately removed Gu Li from his list of suspects. A person like her who was madly immersed in refining medicine wouldn¡¯t give that much thought in plotting and scheming. Besides, from the looks of it, Han Shuo reckoned that Gu Li had not left the room for a long time and therefore was most unlikely to execute crafty plots.

    After eliminating Gu Li from his list, Han Shuo¡¯s main suspect was now Steiss. However, after searching through the Godswamp Pharmacy with his demon generals, he still couldn¡¯t find Steiss¡¯ figure. Han Shuo found it strange.

    After thinking for a moment, Han Shuo ordered his demon general to scatter further apart. This time, instead of searching in obvious ces, they specifically looked in secluded regions where boundaries may be hidden.

    Then, his demon generals detected three secret chambers with powerful boundaries around them. Of them, two of the boundaries had rtively weaker defensive power. After hesitating for a moment, Han Shuo carefully controlled the two most powerful demon generals to intrude the two barriers.

    The intrusion went smoothly. They did not trigger any rms or counterattacks from the boundaries. After the two demon generals silently entered the two secret chambers, Han Shuo was shocked by the scene he witnessed.

    One of the secret chambers contained countless frozen organs. Most of the organs belonged to humans. They were all well-preserved. In the other secret chamber, Han Shuo found numerous basegods and a few lowgods imprisoned. There, several sinister pharmacists were forcing the prisoners to drink a medicine that was steaming with green smoke. One of the basegods transformed into a bloody puddle of green fluid after drinking it.

    Han Shuo heart¡¯s flipped and he was shaken by what he saw in those rooms. It was clear that what they were doing in those secret chambers was illegal. Forcefully experimenting with drugs, especially poisons on gods were prohibited in all dominions. Han Shuo did not expect that the Godswamp Pharmacy would actually disregard thew andmit such atrocious acts in the City of Shadows.

    Having uncovered such enormous bombshells behind the two secret chambers, Han Shuo became very curious about what he would find in the secret chamber protected under boundaries that were even more powerful. In addition, Han Shuo started to suspect that the two from the House of Kisa had taken the poison made by the Godswamp Pharmacy which caused the adverse and fatal effects.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± Andrina¡¯s voice suddenly sounded beside his ear.

    Han Shuo opened his eyes and looked at Andrina beside him. After taking a deep breath, he forced a smile and said, ¡°Noth- nothing...¡±

    ¡°You seem disgusted. You found something, didn¡¯t you?¡± Andrina asked in a concerned manner.

    ¡°I will tell youter but don¡¯t talk to me for now, ¡° Han Shuo replied and closed his eyes.

    Han Shuo had no interest in getting involved with whatever illegal stuff the Godswamp Pharmacy was conducting. However, from the looks of it, it seemed very likely that the Godswamp Pharmacy had plotted the incident at the House of Kisa. Therefore, Han Shuo was determined to get to the bottom of it.

    The most powerful demon general Han Shuo had arrived before thest secret chamber. The walls of the secret chamber were made using special materials and it had several types of boundaries that Han Shuo was not familiar with. Han Shuo did not have confidence in breaking through the boundaries and he was therefore hesitant.

    <i>We¡¯ll probably be found out, but still, it¡¯s worth a shot. Even if the break-in attempt is discovered, they won¡¯t find me hiding here, </i> Han Shuo reasoned in his mind.

    Therefore, Han Shuo concentrated his attention andmanded the demon general to cross the boundary. The demon general proceeded forward through the wall carefully, slowly inching across the barrier.

    After making his way two-thirds into the wall, a pulse of energy suddenly shot towards the demon general. Han Shuo¡¯s heart jolted as he immediately realized that his demon general had been detected by the boundary. However, Han Shuo did not order it to retreat but on the contrary,manded it to break through the barrier at the fastest speed possible, as noisy as it may.

    <i>Pop Pop Pop! </i> a series of sharp and clear noise sounded from the ceiling of the secret chamber. The demon general had sessfully broken through the barrier and arrived in the secret chamber.

    That elderly man with a head of white hair and face as translucent as jade was giving instructions to Steiss who was crouching on the ground. Before he could finish his sentence, he detected the anomaly to the barrier and yelled right away, ¡°¨Cthat Bryan fe must... Who is it?!¡±

    Although the demon general did not hear the full sentence, just from the few words alone Han Shuo could be certain that the incident at the House of Kisa must be rted to the two inside the secret chamber. Han Shuo did not have the demon general stay inside the room butmanded it to leave as the elderly man seemed to have detected the location of his demon general.

    The demon general, having received Han Shuo¡¯smand, rapidly retreated as soon as it entered the room. It retreated without fear of triggering the warning rms of the barriers as it was already exposed.

    Yet another round of ringing sounded from the barriers. The demon general sessfully exited the barriers. The elderly man immediately got up from his seat to search for the intruder.

    ¡°Let¡¯s leave!¡± Han Shuo grabbed Andrina and left while the Godswamp Pharmacy was in chaos.

    The demon general flew towards the sky as soon as it exited the barriers. The elderly man seemed to have qualms and did not continue pursuing the demon general. He merely raised his head to look at the sky. His expression was unsightly.

 Chapter 720 - Adapting

    GDK 720: Adapting

    ¡°Master, have we been discovered?¡± Steiss immediately asked after the elderly man returned to the secret chamber.

    ¡°Not sure. But someone did break through the barrier here just moments ago. I don¡¯t know if it had discovered what is in the other two secret chambers,¡± the elderly man replied with a gloomy face.

    ¡°What should we do?¡± Steiss was obviously panicking. ¡°If the House of Sainte was to learn that we are doing this behind their backs, they will surely kill us all!¡±

    ¡°What are you worried about!¡± the elderly man berated. He sat unhurriedly and after thinking for a moment, instructed, ¡°Remove anything suspicious from this ce right away. I shall have to stay away from this ce temporarily. Don¡¯t worry, if the House of Sainte can¡¯t find any incriminating evidence, they won¡¯t do a thing. Besides, I reckon that the intruder wasn¡¯t from the House of Sainte. Otherwise, given how the House of Sainte usually conducts themselves, they would have charged in here by now.¡±

    ¡°You are right, master. I will get those things moving immediately,¡± Steiss heaved a sigh of relief after listening to the elderly man¡¯s exnation.

    ¡°Go. Move the unclean things from the secret chambers as quickly as possible. Also make sure you do not startle those pharmacists here for the conference,¡± the elderly man instructed.

    Steiss knew that the situation was critical. He rushed out of the room and started arranging the matter.

    Gu Li from Mirage City tossed yet another thick pharmacopeia to the side and cursed loudly, ¡°That son of a bitch must be full of rubbish, there are no medical ingredients with those names! He must have made it up! Liar, this wretched liar, I must find him and get to the bottom of it!¡±

    Gu Li then walked out from her VIP lounge and started leaving the pharmacy even though it was veryte at night.

    ¡°Huh?¡± Gu Li was surprised to discover that in the dead of the night, there were blurry figures rapidly moving back and forth within several restricted areas in the Godswamp Pharmacy. She thought that enemies had intruded the pharmacy and her heart skipped a beat. She was merely a pharmacist. Not only had she very limited strength, but she was also very much afraid of death.

    After observing for a moment, she discovered that the figures seemed to be moving something from several rooms. They appeared anxious and hurried.

    Gu Li did not find it all that suspicious at first. She thought that perhaps the Godswamp Pharmacy had purchased some new medical ingredients. When she was about to proceed to the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy to look for Han Shuo, she suddenly heard a loud ng like the shattering of some kind of ss container.

    ¡°Stupid, be more careful! If someone was to discover this, all of you are gonna die!¡± a berating voice deliberately kept low sounded off from the region.

    Gu Li was shocked and started to get suspicious. She carefully moved closer to the area and immediately noticed an intensely sour taste that filled the air. Gu Li creased her eyebrows and took two deep breaths. Her expression suddenly turned aghast and she hastily took out a bottle and consumed the medicine within.

    <i>It¡¯s a poison!</i> Gu Li managed to quickly determine what was contained in that broken ss container. As an experienced pharmacist who had been immersed in the art of medicine refinement for countless years, although Gu Li had not extensively studied about poisons, she nheless could easily make out the distinctive scent of poisons.

    Gu Li¡¯s curiosity was aroused but she dared not to approach directly. She took out several types of exquisite medicines that she had personally refined and carefully applied them on herself. She concealed all the scent on her body and even the fluctuation of energy in her body was stabilized.

    After doing so, Gu Li gained some confidence and proceeded with approaching the ce surreptitiously.

    As it was the dead of the night, most people¡¯s visions were affected. Those people busy moving the incriminating pieces of evidence were in a hurry and were not paying too much attention to their surroundings. On top of that, as Gu Li had concealed her aura using special medicines, none of those people discovered Gu Li who shrouded herself in darkness and was observing not too far away.

    After Gu Li clearly discerned the items that those people were moving, she was so appalled that she nearly cried out. She covered her own lips tightly with her hands. Having lost the nerve to witness any more of those objects, she slowly retreated.

    Organ trafficking and refinement of poison were prohibited in all Divine Dominions. After having seen what those people were moving, Gu Li immediately realized what evil deeds the Godswamp Pharmacy had been doing. Those who dared to dip their hands into illegal trades while masquerading as awful business usually possessed extraordinary power and wouldn¡¯t let any outsider who discovered their wrongdoings leave alive. Gu Li understood this well and therefore she most sensibly retreated as soon as she learned of their crimes.

    <i>I can¡¯t stay here any longer. I can¡¯t believe the Godswamp Pharmacy, one of thergest pharmacies in the Darkness Dominion, would be so daring tomit such atrocious acts. I must expose them!</i> Gu Li thought to herself and came to a firm resolution. She started heading outside the Godswamp Pharmacy.

    One of the divine guards stationed at the front gate of Godswamp Pharmacy recognized Gu Li, who had a queer temper. ¡°Master Gu Li, why are you going out sote at night?¡±

    ¡°I... I have something to do!¡± Gu Li wouldn¡¯t be so flustered had she not witnessed the scene just then. She might even have behaved arrogantly,pletely ignored the divine guard and left with her head raised high. But at this moment, being panic-stricken, her behavior waspletely different from usual. Even the divine guards stationed there found it rather strange.

    ¡°Oh, be careful then, Master Gu Li. Although the City of Shadows has been peaceful and safe, at this time of night, there could be criminals stalking the streets!¡± the divine guard had no idea what Gu Li had seen but he did not suspect a thing. He even kindly reminded her to be careful.

    ¡°Got... got it... I will...¡± Gu Li got so afraid that she started to stutter. After replying the divine guard, Gu Li left hastily.

    Godswamp Pharmacy did not impose too many constraints on this odd-tempered visiting pharmacist and the divine guards did not stop her from leaving but happily chatted with each other while watching her leave. They were rather bewildered as to why Gu Li was so polite and talkative that night when she usually wouldn¡¯t even bat an eye.

    Gu Li, whose heart was rattled, started running madly as soon as she walked out from the Godswamp Pharmacy. This left the divine guards even more baffled.

    Soon after she left, a divine guard wearing a dark face walked out from the pharmacy and arrived at the front gate. He asked the divine guards, ¡°Did someone just leave?¡±

    ¡°Yea, it¡¯s that Gu Li of Mirage City. She appeared hurried and flustered as though she had seen a ghost!¡± the divine guards keeping watch of the front gate replied casually.

    After hearing those words, the person asking seemed to have suddenly recalled something and his face stiffened. He asked hastily, ¡°Which direction has she headed?¡±

    ¡°In the general direction of the Sainte residence. What¡¯s the matter?¡± one of the divine guards asked in a puzzled manner.

    ¡°N- nothing!¡± The asker was an insider. Without another word, he rapidly flew out from the Godswamp Pharmacy and ran in Gu Li¡¯s direction. He thought, <i>Shit, that old woman must have seen something and is now trying to inform the House of Sainte!</i>

    His judgment was correct ¨C that was indeed Gu Li¡¯s intention. Although queer and arrogant in character, she was an ethical pharmacist. She was very much against such practices of experimenting with poisons on living persons. Therefore, without much thought, she ran in the direction of the House of Sainte.

    However, Gu Li was merely a pharmacist and had not truly put much effort into her cultivation. Soon after she ran from the Godswamp Pharmacy, she heard a deep and low-pitched voice from behind her, ¡°Stop running! I urge you not to leave the Godswamp Pharmacy!¡±

    <i>Shoot! I¡¯ve been found out! They¡¯reing to kill me!</i>

    Gu Li was greatly rmed. Not only did she not stop, she started running even faster.

    The divine guard immediately knew that Gu Li had learned of their dirt when she did not stop but ran even faster. It was then that the divine guard knew her life must be taken and a murderous thought spread through his head. He flew to the top of a lofty building, took out a strange looking crossbow, and aimed it at Gu Li. But after thinking for a bit, he lowered his bow to apply a little bit of poison on the arrow before taking aim again.

    <i>Whoosh!</i> A streak of chilling radiance streaked across the silent night sky. Gu Li, as a pharmacist, was a god poor inbat. Even though she heard the arrow streaking across the skying from behind her, she merely continued running forward in a straight line.

    <i>Chuck!</i> The arrow hit her in the left shoulder and sent her tumbling. When shended, her head was dizzy and she felt numbness in her shoulder. She froze, <i>There¡¯s poison on the arrow! I¡¯m done, I am going to die without a doubt!</i>

    That divine guard heaved a sigh of relief as soon as the arrow struck Gu Li. He felt d that he had applied poison on the arrow as this type of injury wouldn¡¯t have been fatal. He did not stay still any longer and flew down the building and toward Gu Li. He was ready to kill her and destroy her body lest this secret of the Godswamp Pharmacy be divulged.

    At this moment, Andrina and Han Shuo, who were flying towards the Sainte Residence, heard the arrow bolting across the sky behind them. Han Shuo was stunned as he thought that the Godswamp Pharmacy had discovered them. A demon general in the vicinity quickly arrived at the scene and discovered Gu Li.

    ¡°Poison... poisonous...¡± Gu Li murmured in a weak voice. She was only half conscious and her body had grown so numb and stiff that she could no longer move.

    Han Shuo was startled. By using that demon general, he saw that a divine guard from the Godswamp Pharmacy was rushing towards Gu Li as though prepared to finish her.

    Based on Gu Li¡¯s words as well as that murderous look on that divine guard, after quickly thinking, Han Shuo immediately realized that Gu Li must have also realized something. Otherwise, this man from the Godswamp Pharmacy wouldn¡¯t have taken such a radical measure.

    Han Shuo had actually been wondering how to exin the crimes of the Godswamp Pharmacy to Andre and the others. After all, it was his demon generals who discovered and witnessed the scenes hidden behind those secret chambers. If Andre and the others asked how he had learned of it, Han Shuo would have to make up a convincing alternative exnation. But if it was Gu Li who informed of the crimes, Han Shuo would be spared from those questions.

    Although Han Shuo did not like Gu Li at all, he immediately decided to save her life as she was very useful at this moment. It was also at this time that the divine guard from the Godswamp Pharmacy arrived beside Gu Li. He took out a bottle of liquid giving off green smoke and was about to pour it on Gu Li.

    Through the demon general¡¯s observations back in the secret chamber, Han Shuo knew that the liquid giving off green smoke could melt a divine body into a puddle of green fluid. It was an extremely corrosive poison. If just a few dropsnded on Gu Li, no matter how skillful Han Shuo was, he would have no way of saving her.

    Although Han Shuo was still a distance away from the region, it didn¡¯t mean that Han Shou waspletely helpless as he had a demon general right there!

    ¡°Old fart, you have quite a temper, don¡¯t you? Hmph, not only have you thrown a tantrum at me before, you now want to inform the House of Sainte of our crimes? Let¡¯s see how you are going to talk when you have turned into a puddle of blood!¡± this divine guard groused, recalling back to all the times he had been treated poorly by Gu Li. He slowly tilted the bottle in his hand...

    But suddenly, a bizarre shadow miraculously appeared. It was as though a demon hade out of the blue and struck the bottle containing the green poison. The bottle slipped out of his hand and fell to the ground. The man was shocked by the abrupt appearance of the demon general and hastily took a few steps backward.

    Then, before he could draw his weapon, the demon general, baring its fangs and brandishing its ws, pounced on him. If Donna was somehow there to witness the scene, perhaps she would suspect Han Shuo knew something about this strange lifeform that once appeared at the Ninth Heaven Mystical Yin Harvester. This man was clueless about the properties of demon generals. When he saw that his physical attacks against the demon general had no effect, he became flustered.

    ¡°What, what are you? What the hell are you?¡± the man shouted in a low voice as he resisted the attacks.

    Most of the demon generals refined by Cauldron Spirit were made using lowgod souls. They all possessed strengths not to be belittled. As this man waspletely clueless about the proper method to attack demon generals, he was forced to withdraw further and further. Meanwhile, Han Shuo was rushing to this ce rapidly.

    This man from the Godswamp Pharmacy was thrown into confusion and failed to destroy Gu Li¡¯s divine body. Worried that divine guards could be patrolling nearby and suddenly show up, the man dared not to stay any longer and hastily left before Han Shuo arrived. He thought, <i>Gu Li has been poisoned. Given the potency of the poison, no one should be able to save her now. There wouldn¡¯t be a problem once she¡¯s dead, I suppose?</i>

    With that thought, the person rapidly disappeared. Although the demon general could keep him upied, it would have trouble killing him. Therefore, Han Shuo let him retreat.

    A few minutester, Han Shuo arrived beside Gu Li. Naturally, Andrina was there as well.

    Gu Li had copsed on the ground. Her face was green. The poison had invaded the cells in her body. Han Shuo inserted demonic yuan into Gu Li¡¯s body to get a glimpse of her condition. Right away, he knew that it was the Godswamp Pharmacy that had schemed that incident at the House of Kisa because he discovered that the poisonouspound in her body was exactly the same as that found in the deceased House of Kisa divine guard who had reportedly taken his Pill of Rejuvenation.

    Han Shuo withdrew a pelleted detoxifying medicine and stuffed it into Gu Li¡¯s mouth. Then, he grabbed Gu Li and rushed towards the Sainte Residence.

    Han Shuo could not rescue that House of Kisa divine guard because he was dead before Han Shuo could get to him. Gu Li, however, was discovered in time. Just one pellet of his detoxifying medicine would allow her topletely recover. Han Shuo believed that once the Godswamp Pharmacy found out that their dark secrets were exposed, they would actively try to cover them up. Therefore, Andre needed to be informed of the situation as soon as possible before the evidence was all removed.

    Han Shuo did not do so for the Sainte Family but for himself. Given the current situation, Han Shuo knew that as long as the Godswamp Pharmacy remained in the City of Shadows, his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy would face constantpetition and trouble. Besides, from the looks of it, they wouldn¡¯t let Han Shuo off until he was forced out of business.

    As the Godswamp Pharmacy had fired the first shot and had threatened his interests, of course Han Shuo would try to eliminate andpletely destroy them.

    After taking the pill of detoxification, Gu Li, who was moments away from certain death, gradually became better. After probing her condition using demonic yuan, Han Shuo discovered that the toxin in her body was slowly being expelled from the pores on her skin. With that, Han Shuo was truly at ease.

    ¡°Why are you saving her?¡± Andrina seemed puzzled. She creased her brows and asked, ¡°This woman has been vicious and abusive towards you with her words. Based on my understanding of you, it was already a miracle that you did not take avail of the opportunity to kill her. Why would you be willing to save her?¡±

    ¡°To me right now, she is more useful alive than not. Because if she¡¯s dead, not only would I have to waste a lot of words to exin what I saw inside the Godswamp Pharmacy to Andre, but he would also doubt how I discovered the situation in there. But if she lives, all that will be easily solved. If she wasn¡¯t of any use to me, I wouldn¡¯t have batted an eye!¡± Han Shuo exined.

    ¡°You are indeed a bad person!¡± Andrina giggled and said while pointing at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Good people die young,¡± Han Shuo casually replied while rushing to the Sainte Residence.

    ¡°Identify yourselves!¡± the divine guards outside the Sainte Residence were rmed when they saw that Han Shuo was rapidly approaching in the dead of night.

    ¡°I¡¯m Bryan of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. I¡¯m looking for Lord Andre for an urgent matter!¡± Han Shuo hastily exined.

    The divine guards had all heard of Han Shuo. They were most admiring of this young man who saved Carmelita¡¯s life twice. As soon as they heard that Han Shuo had an urgent matter, one of the divine guards replied at once, ¡°Come with me, I will lead you to Lord Andre!¡±

    That divine guard could tell that the matter must be umon and pressing from the fact that it was in the middle of the night and that Han Shuo was carrying a dying person. He dared not to hold up Han Shuo.

    ¡°Poison... poison refinement...¡± Gu Li, after consuming a pill of detoxification, began to awaken. She started mumbling ambiguously while being carried to Andre.

    <i>Good! You are up just in time. We won¡¯t need to waste too much time. Fantastic, </i>thought Han Shuo.

 Chapter 721 - Throat Slitting

    GDK 721: Throat Slitting

    Inside a spacious lounge, Andre, with a puzzled look, asked Han Shuo who came to him in the dead of the night, ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡±

    Han Shuo casually threw Gu Li on the ground. By then, she was slowly waking, murmuring softly.

    ¡°I was on my way to the Godswamp Pharmacy to ask about a few things, but on the way there, I stumbled across people from the pharmacy chasing and trying to kill her. I hear her repeatedly mumbling that the Godswamp Pharmacy was testing poison on living beings, and something about organs. On top of that, I discovered that the poison in her body was the same as that in the deceased House of Kisa divine guard. I find the event very baffling and therefore brought her to you,¡± Han Shuo exined.

    ¡°What?!¡± Andre cried out in surprise, ¡°You are saying that the Godswamp Pharmacy is brazenly viting thew?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. I¡¯m not too sure about the specific details but Gu Li will soon wake. You can ask her.¡± Han Shuo first distanced himself from the matter lest that Andre felt that he was trying to frame the Godswamp Pharmacy.

    Andre suddenly got beside Gu Li and ced his big hand on Gu Li¡¯s skull. Two strands of dark smoke slowly came out from her nostrils and right away, she regained consciousness and cried out, ¡°Godswamp Pharmacy, poison, poison!¡±

    Gu Li was startled at first and couldn¡¯t understand why she was in this ce. When she then saw Han Shuo, she squealed, ¡°You lied! No medical ingredient records contained the names of those ingredients you mentioned. Did you lie to me?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m Andre of the House of Sainte. What did you see in the Godswamp Pharmacy?¡± Andre questioned her sternly. He had no time for the dispute between Han Shuo and Gu Li.

    Gu Li was shocked and finally understood the situation. She yelled even louder, ¡°Yes! This night I identally discovered that the Godswamp Pharmacy was moving things. I saw them...¡± Gu Li exined what she saw sinctly. She then asked in a rather puzzled manner, ¡°That person who chased me hit me with a poisonous arrow. How did I end up here?¡±

    ¡°Bryan saved you!¡± Andre replied impatiently and asked in a deep voice, ¡°Are you telling the truth?¡±

    ¡°Why would I lie? I¡¯m telling the truth! I saw them with my own eyes!¡± Gu Li asserted.

    ¡°Very well. I did not expect that the Godswamp Pharmacy would do such things right under our noses!¡± Andre paced back and forth in the room with a dark face before he said to Han Shuo, ¡°Thank you, Bryan. I will get things clear right away. If it is true that the Godswamp Pharmacy did those things, after tonight, Godswamp will cease to exist in the City of Shadows!¡±

    ¡°Lord Andre, I can head there with you. It¡¯s possible that the Godswamp Pharmacy has moved any possible evidence away. I¡¯m good at locating things and could help you with that!¡± Before leaving, Han Shuo ced a few demon generals on top of several buildings nearby to keep an eye on their activities. Han Shuo knew exactly where they had moved those pieces of evidence.

    ¡°Well, they can¡¯t be that fast. Nevertheless, it won¡¯t hurt to have you tag along. Let¡¯s go!¡± Andre had heard from Carmelita that Han Shuo was good in this aspect and did not decline. He also didn¡¯t expect much out of a pharmacy. It appeared that he intended to head there as soon as possible.

    ¡°Oi, brat, you saved me? How did you save me? I remember being severely poisoned. How am I still alive?¡± Gu Li shouted.

    Han Shuo replied arrogantly, ¡°A poison as weak as that cannot stump me. Pff, how ironic that you call yourself a pharmacist when you can¡¯t even handle something as trivial as this!¡±

    ¡°I, I...¡± Han Shuo had walked out of the room before Gu Li could say a thing. Andrina followed behind him.

    Immediately, Andre mobilized his army. It took him no time to assemble approximately a hundred family n divine guards, all of whom were midgods. Andre also contacted Erebus using a magical device, asking him to mobilize his troops at the Third Corps as well.

    Han Shuo, Andre and the rest of the party rapidly rushed towards the Godswamp Pharmacy and when they reached their destination, they discovered that Erebus was already there with nearly a hundred midgods. They hadpletely surrounded the Godswamp Pharmacy.

    ¡°My Lords, what is the matter? Why are you surrounding our pharmacy in the middle of the night? Is there something wrong with the conference participants?¡± Most of the Godswamp Pharmacy¡¯s gatekeepers were not aware of Godswamp Pharmacy¡¯s illegal dealings. They were scared witless.

    In the City of Shadows, the House of Sainte was authority. It had been a long time since theyst mobilized several hundred divine guards at once and it was clear that something major was happening. These doorkeepers dared not to obstruct the House of Sainte.

    ¡°No one may leave the Godswamp Pharmacy without my orders. Kill all those who try to escape!¡± Andre, whose left eye had turned dark purple, instructed the few divine guards behind him in a cold voice. Then, without even giving the gatekeepers a look, Andre and Erebus stepped into the premise with their men. None of the gatekeepers dared obstruct them.

    ¡°Secure each and every building, block the pathways. Do not let a single person leave,¡± after entering the campus, Erebus, the Chief of the Third Corps, immediately instructed his divine guards to disperse and secure the area. They resembled ghostly shadows as they flew all around the Godswamp Pharmacy.

    Andre and Erebus, each leading a team of divine guards, headed for the biggest building in the campus. Han Shuo and Andrina followed them silently.

    Steiss the dwarf rushed out from the building and stood in a flustered manner. Then, as though confused, he asked, ¡°Lord Andre, Lord Erebus, what is going on? Why have your Lordshipse to our Godswamp Pharmacy with so many men? Has our Godswamp Pharmacy done something wrong?¡±

    Steiss was indeed a convincing actor, so much so that even Han Shuo could not find a single w with it. He had disyed a look of panic and confusion on his face but did not reveal one bit of guilt. After sizing Steiss up with his cold eyes, Han Shuo immediately knew that this character was no simpleton.

    ¡°Your Godswamp Pharmacy tried to murder Gu Li, a visiting pharmacist. Gu Li also ims that your pharmacy harvests divine organs and tests poisons on living people. This is a serious usation and we are here to investigate the matter!¡± Erebus replied in a deep voice.

    ¡°We are being wronged!¡± Steiss screamed, ¡°How could we do such a thing?! We have been faithfully abiding by thew during our many years of operations in the City of Shadows. How would we do such a despicable thing?! That Gu Li must be angry that we Godswamp Pharmacy had declined to make troubles for Mister Bryan from the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy and is, therefore, trying nder us. Please investigate the matter thoroughly, my Lord!¡±

    He is definitely not an easy person to take care of! Andre thought to himself. He observed that Steiss seemed to be prepared. The exnation he gave was very believable. He had even deliberately replied loudly as to wake up those pharmacists from various cities that hade to attend the conference. Having heard the mor, they exited their rooms and came to watch puzzlingly.

    These visiting pharmacists, just like Gu Li, came from various major cities in the Darkness Dominion. There were even a few who came from the Dominion of Death and Destruction.

    All these pharmacists enjoyed outstanding status. If Andre was to arrest people without sufficient evidence, then the reputation of the City of Shadows would surely suffer. If the gods in other cities got the impression that the rulers of the City of Shadows were oppressive and did whatever they wanted, it would have an adverse effect on their trade rtions with the City of Shadows and various aspects.

    Although Steiss¡¯ shriek may have seemed innocent, this action had in fact put Andre, Erebus, and their party in a very bad position. If they could not locate the incriminating evidence inside the Godswamp Pharmacy, not only would they not be able to do a thing to the Godswamp Pharmacy, they might even be heavily criticized by various parties.

    Andre and Erebus grew cautious. They inwardly remarked that this Steiss was indeed a cunning one.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. If it is proven that Godswamp Pharmacy is innocent, we will punish Gu Li severely. However, this usation is very serious and it is our duty to investigate it right away. Please cooperate with our effort!¡± Andre, as the second highest ranking member of the House of Sainte, was also a sharp-witted person. He pushed the responsibility onto Gu Li as though his actions were nothing inappropriate.

    ¡°As citizens of the City of Shadows, of course we would fully cooperate with your Lordships¡¯ effort. Please, go ahead and search the premises. If anything hical is found to be conducted within the Godswamp Pharmacy, I, as the owner of the Godswamp Pharmacy branch in the City of Shadows, shall cut my own throat on the spot as an apology for the offense!¡± Steiss dered most righteously. Those who didn¡¯t know better would surely think that Steiss was an innocent businessman.

    Oh shoot, they must be done moving everything away! Andre and Erebus exchanged a nce. Their hearts sank. Both of them were cunning and sly characters. They knew that for Steiss had made such a bold pledge, their search in the Godswamp Pharmacy would yield no result. They understood that they had miscalcted the power of the Godswamp Pharmacy. They certainly did not anticipate that they could have moved everything so quickly in such a short time.

    ¡°Search the ce!¡± with things havinge to this, Andre and Erebus had no other choice but to press on with the search.

    As soon as Andre gave themand, multiple shadows flew out from the darkness. They traveled around each and every building in the Godswamp Pharmacy like spirits.

    ¡°My Lord, I did not discover anything unusual!¡±

    ¡°... My Lord, everything is clear on my side!¡±

    ¡°... My Lord, I found no abnormal activity!¡±

    The shadows returned to Erebus and Andre. All of them reported no findings.

    Steiss suddenly kowtowed while wearing a wronged expression and said, ¡°My Lords, our Godswamp Pharmacy has always conducted strictlywful business. We would never dare to do anything illegal, much less something as contemptible as Gu Li has used! Please investigate the matter thoroughly, my Lords!¡± Upon finishing those words, Steiss took off his space rings and said loudly, ¡°If your Lordships are still not convinced, you may check our space rings as well. If you discover a single inappropriate item, we workers of the Godswamp Pharmacy will slit our throats in apology!¡±

    Those divine organs needed to be kept in icy conditions while those poisons had to be kept in certain specific temperatures. It was not possible to maintain regions of different temperatures inside a space ring and therefore, they surely would not store those things in their space rings. Steiss only did that to further push the notion that he was innocent and had nothing to hide.

    ¡°How would the Godswamp Pharmacy do those things? They have an outstanding reputation in the Darkness Dominion. The City of Shadows must have made a blunder and mobilized their forces recklessly! Ugh, I did not expect that the divine guards of the City of Shadows would be so impudent and treat innocent people so unjustly. Why would anyone sell medicines in the City of Shadows?¡±

    ¡°It was obvious that there would be nothing. What are they making a scene for?¡°

    ¡°The way I see it, that old woman must be trying to nder Godswamp Pharmacy as revenge for not backing her after she was humiliated!¡±

    These pharmacists from various major cities that were watching the story unfold gossiped with each other. These people had rather influential statuses in the cities they came from. Their negativements could produce negative impacts on the City of Shadows.

    Both Andre and Erebus were stumped and embarrassed. They had greatly underestimated the Godswamp Pharmacy and did not expect that they would have that much power to remove all the evidence in the short span of less than an hour. They were rather at a loss on how to proceed.

    ¡°Your Lordships must have misunderstood. Gu Li harbors a grudge against us and therefore has spread such malicious lies to defame us. She has even deliberately misled your Lordships. She must be severely punished for her crimes! My Lords, please uphold justice for us!¡± Steiss shouted as though he had been treated unjustly. But at the same time Steiss was sneering in his heart, Hehe, you really think that my Godswamp Pharmacy is just a small shop?

    ¡°This...¡± Andre forced a smile. He no longer dared to look down upon this dwarf. He intended to find a way out of this embarrassing situation and return to secretly and slowly investigate the matter.

    Just as Andre and Erebus were prepared to disentangle themselves from the embarrassing situation, Han Shuo, who had been silent all along, suddenly spoke. ¡°Lord Andre, I sniffed out a very strange odor in the air. This odor contained a minuscule amount of poison. I believe that Gu Li has told the truth. If Lord Andre trusts me, let me continue your Lordship¡¯s search by following the scent. I believe we can find something!¡±

    ¡°Impossible! What nonsense are you talking about! There is no scent of poison in the air. Otherwise, we would have smelled it as well! If we lot of pharmacists present did not detect it, how could you?¡± one of the pharmacists jumped out and shouted at Han Shuo.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Youngster, don¡¯t talk nonsense during critical moments like this just for the sake of seeking fame!¡± yet another pharmacist shouted angrily.

    Han Shuo¡¯s im that he could sniff out the scent of poison in the air when none of the pharmacists present detected a thing was simply an insult to all those pharmacists as he was basically suggesting that he was better than all of them. Therefore, it was only natural that those pharmacists would feel disgruntled and immediately step forward to use Han Shuo of talking drivel.

    And Han Shuo was, in fact, talking drivel!

    Han Shuo knew where the Godswamp Pharmacy had hidden the evidence using his demon generals. He imed that there was scent in the air merely as an excuse for him to lead the search in the right direction.

    ¡°Alright, if you can find anything incriminating, I will honor my pledge I made just now and slit my throat on the spot!¡± Steiss obviously was unwilling to believe Han Shuo¡¯s im. He rejoiced that Han Shuo would suddenly give him an opportunity to get rid of him but he kept his joy concealed. In a furious expression, he shouted, ¡°But how do we know that you aren¡¯t trying to nder us? What are you going to do if you couldn¡¯t find a thing?¡±

    ¡°I will also slit my throat as an apology!¡± Han Shuo sneered and said decisively.

    ¡°Bryan?¡± Andre was a little shocked to hear those words from Han Shuo. He held a very favorable opinion towards Han Shuo and did not want anything bad to happen to him.

    ¡°Bryan, don¡¯t be so reckless!¡± Erebus too was concerned. He hinted at Han Shuo with his anxious eyes.

    Promising to slit one¡¯s own throat as an apology isn¡¯t a pledge that can be made as a joke. With so many pharmacists present, with Andre and Erebus there to bear witness, if Han Shuo couldn¡¯t find the incriminating evidence, no one could change his fate.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo felt his left hand being squeezed. When he lowered his head, he saw that Andrina was looking at him. She shook her head, indicating to Han Shuo that he should not act recklessly.

    ¡°Good. We Godswamp Pharmacy have always done things by thew. We are not afraid of being ndered by you! Search as much as you like. We will all follow you along. If you can prove that the Godswamp Pharmacy did those things, I will definitely not avoid responsibility!¡± Steiss said heroically and openly as though he had nothing to hide.

    ¡°This...¡± Andre started to hesitate after seeing the absolute confidence Steiss showed. He did not expect that the matter would have escted to this stage and started to worry for Han Shuo.

    But when he turned to look at Han Shuo with concerned gazes, he saw a smile filled with self-confidence on his face. Han Shuo even nodded his head very discreetly to indicate his certainty.

    Andre, who was originally stuck in indecision, suddenly remembered that back in the medical room inside the Sainte Residence, Han Shuo had this almost-egotistical confidence on his face when he asked everyone to leave the room and let him rescue Carmelita.

    Perhaps having recalled the fact that Carmelita was now safe and sound, Andre seemingly inexplicably chose to trust Han Shuo. Under the observation of the crowd, he nodded his head and said in a deep voice, ¡°Alright then, show us the way, Bryan. If we find that you are actually babbling nonsense, I won¡¯t let you off easily!¡±

    It was obvious that Andre was protective of Han Shuo from the fact that he did not mention anything about slitting throats.

    Steissughed grimly in his mind. He could see that Andre was protecting Han Shuo. However, with Han Shuo having made this pledge before such arge crowd, if it waster proved that Han Shuo was wrong, Steiss believed that even if Andre didn¡¯t take his life, he would be too ashamed to continue living.

    Steiss¡¯ mind was filled with excitement when he thought that this great rival called the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy would be eliminated after that night. Fantastic! After the event, I just need to provide a little encouragement and these pharmacists will spread rumors that the House of Sainte is unreasonable and oppressive. This is in line with master¡¯s ambition to weaken and destroy the House of Sainte. Master will surely be overjoyed!

    ¡°Everybodye with me!¡± shouted Han Shuo. Your Godswamp Pharmacy is so dead! After tonight, not only will your Godswamp Pharmacy be expelled from the City of Shadows, everyone will know that I¡¯m a better pharmacist than everyone present!

    And so, therge and majestic party began falling Han Shuo, taking them on a path that would lead to the doom of certain people.

 Chapter 722 - Mediocrities

    GDK 722: Mediocrities

    The significant military activity made by the House of Sainte in the middle of the night had attracted the attention of divine guards who patrolled around the city. Some of these divine guards came from the other major family ns. They knew that a major event was taking ce in the City of Shadows after seeing that Andre and Erebus took several hundred divine guards to raid the Godswamp Pharmacy.

    Multiple shadows streaked across the streets, heading towards the residences of the major family ns. The patriarchs of the other four major family ns were soon informed of the news. Being vignt and prudent people, they dispatched experts from their families to head there and observe.

    Soon enough, the experts from the other four major family ns arrived at the scene and mixed among the observing crowd by giving all kinds of excuses. They intended to stay and observe until the whole event was over. It appeared that the family ns paid a lot of attention to the oue of the matter.

    At this point in time, both Andre and Erebus were having enormous headaches. They had greatly underestimated the power possessed by the Godswamp Pharmacy and therefore did not anticipate that things would develop this way. Now that observers from the other four major family ns were following how things developed, if Han Shuo could not discover any evidence, perhaps even Andre would be powerless to save Han Shuo from fulfilling the guarantee he made.

    Steiss, after seeing that observers from the other four major family ns had joined in, instead of being appalled, he was delighted. He inwardly thought that with so many eyewitnesses, Andre and Erebus would be much less likely to do him harm.

    ¡°Bryan, how much longer do we have to walk, if I may ask?¡± Steiss asked Han Shuo with a big smile on his face.

    They had just arrived at a crossroad. Han Shuo did not rush in advancing forward but knitted his brows and put on a pondering expression.

    Everybody¡¯s gazes were gathered on Han Shuo, waiting for his next move.

    Han Shuo sniffed around for a while and acted as though he had picked up something. He pointed at one of the streets, shouted ¡°This way!¡±, and continued marching.

    The sneer ever-present on Steiss¡¯ face jolted very slightly. The dirty things hidden were indeed in that direction. This made Steiss somewhat ufortable. <i>He was blindly guessing and got lucky. I have nothing to worry about,</i> Steiss consoled himself.

    ¡°Eh? Mister Steiss, you don¡¯t look too good. Are you starting to feel afraid?¡± Han Shuo who had been secretly observing Steiss immediately mocked him.

    Steissughed and replied, ¡°Me? Afraid? What do I have to be afraid of? You are the one who should be feeling afraid!¡±

    Han Shuo smiled and nodded. He stopped looking at Steiss, turned to Andre and Erebus and said, ¡°I¡¯m going to move faster. It¡¯s almost daybreak. It¡¯s better to settle this issue as soon as possible!¡±

    ¡°Ok!¡± Andre did not know where Han Shuo got that confidence from, but he straightforwardly agreed and nodded.

    Han Shuo suddenly elerated and headed towards one of the most filthy and chaotic regions in the City of Shadows. Andre, Erebus, and the rest of the party hastily followed.

    Rugersey from the House of Kisa was among the observing party. He had been gazing at Steiss with gloomy and cold eyes after being informed that the poison on Gu Li was exactly the same as that found on his deceased divine guard.

    Jiya from the House of Kinson was there with her uncle, Finley. From the House of Buller was Tuyas, with a small squadron of Buller Family divine guards. They would chat with each other while observing the story unfold.

    The observers dispatched by the Lavers Family were Donna and her brother, Diwei. Donna had in fact volunteered toe to follow the situation when she heard that Han Shuo was involved in it.

    ¡°Is that youngster courting death? None of the pharmacists smelled a rat, but he ims that he could? With so many experts from all major family ns gathered here, if he can¡¯t find the evidence, not even Andre will be able to save him. Sister, you are acquainted with this guy. Do you know if he has any issues with mental faculty?¡± Diwei who was wearing a disdainful face whispered to Donna beside him.

    Members from all five major family ns of the City of Shadows were there. This incident was destined to be the most talked about topic in the city. Of all those people present, not many had confidence in Han Shuo. Even Andre was feeling somewhat nervous and he was turning over in his mind what to do if Han Shuo couldn¡¯t find the evidence.

    Of all these people, perhaps Donna was the only person who had full andplete confidence in Han Shuo¡¯s ability.

    ¡°This guy? Issues with mental faculty?¡± Donna sneered and shook her head. ¡°If Bryan has issues with mental faculties, then everyone here is retarded, including me!¡±

    Seeing the shocked expression on Diwei¡¯s face, Donna let out a sigh, and said, ¡°I have known Bryan longer and better than any of you. He would only be this confident if he has absolute certainty. Brother, the Godswamp Pharmacy is finished! They are really daring tomit such acts. No one could save them now. I have reminded Uncle Avery long ago not to get too close with the Godswamp Pharmacy. Hopefully, this won¡¯t implicate our family n.¡±

    ¡°How could you be so certain? So convinced in him?¡± Diwei was surprised and puzzled. He softly cried out, ¡°This youngster is only a lowgod. Even though he is a pharmacist, he cannot be all that skillful at such a young age. Sister, you sure you didn¡¯t get it wrong?¡±

    ¡°This isn¡¯t directly rted to strength. Just keep on watching,¡± Donna knew that Diwei wouldn¡¯t be convinced no matter how much she exined. She took a short pause and softly mumbled to herself, ¡°Perhaps his actual strength isn¡¯t what we know of. This is no ordinary man... Sigh, how did we turn to this...¡±

    ¡°Alright! Let¡¯s see where in the world he will find the poison!¡± Diwei sneered.

    ***A few momentster...

    The veins on Steiss¡¯ forehead were popped out and could be seen throbbing lightly. Hispel had unknowingly be soaked in cold sweat. The closer they were to the region, the more his heart was crammed with fear.

    <i>How? How is it possible? How would he know? Impossible. It¡¯s just a coincidence. It must be a coincidence! </i>Steiss consoled himself over and over again. However, he couldn¡¯t stop himself from umting cold sweats on his face. He even felt a little weak at the knees.

    ¡°Alright. Should be over here!¡± Han Shuo announced after arriving before several dpidated buildings.

    Steiss trembled and nearly stumbled. The dread in his heart rocketed when he looked at the buildings which appeared to have been abandoned for ages.

    ¡°Mister Steiss, you seem to be perspiring! Are you feeling a little warm in this cold and refreshing weather? But you are a lowgod too, how could you be affected by the weather?¡± Han Shuo cried out in astonishment as though he had discovered the New World.

    Immediately, the crowd¡¯s attention gathered on Steiss and they too discovered the peculiarity with him. They wore dark faces as they observed in silence.

    ¡°Haha, I have been immersing myself in the art of medicine refinement and neglected my cultivation for a long time. It is ratherborious for me to keep up at such speed. It¡¯s nothing unusual to sweat a little...¡± Steiss hastily exined. His smile appeared rather awkward.

    They arrived at one of the poorest regions in the City of Shadows. Those living around the neighborhood were some of the poorest of gods. Most of them were basegods and demigods. Those with the slightest bit of financial ability wouldn¡¯te near this ce because there was nothing appealing about it.

    The buildings and structures all around were broken and dpidated. There were piles of trash and puddles of filthy water all around. The air was filled with intense repulsive stenches.

    ¡°Bryan, do you mind hurrying up a little? We are waiting for you,¡± Jiya hastened with a smile while covering her nose with one hand. From the way she said those words, those who didn¡¯t know might think that she was in a rtionship with Han Shuo. This made several members from big family ns who admired Jiya re at Han Shuo ferociously.

    ¡°That¡¯s right, I¡¯m waiting for you too!¡± Steiss forced himself to smile and hastened. He held his nose with one hand in an attempt to cover the fear on his face. ¡°How did you find such a ce? So damn filthy. Hurry up and admit defeat so we can all go home. I don¡¯t think the people who came with us can wait any longer!¡±

    <i>So what if you found the ce? It hasyers uponyers of concealment boundaries and is buried deep underground. You definitely won¡¯t find the entrance!</i> Steiss said to himself to boost his own morale because it was wearing thin!

    ¡°No, we are in no hurry at all. Hehe... even if the environment is ten times filthier, I¡¯m willing to wait!¡± Erebus spoke in a sinister manner. He could see that something was not quite right with Steiss¡¯ performance.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. We will wait until the end!¡± Rugersey said in an ice-cold voice. His gazes towards Steiss were filled with ferocity.

    After arriving at this ce, more and more noticed that Steiss was behaving abnormally. They wore dark faces as they waited patiently.

    ¡°Mister Steiss, do you think that I wouldn¡¯t be able to find the thing if you hide them underground?¡± Han Shuo waspletely rxed after they arrived at this ce. He looked at Steiss teasingly and slowly tortured him with words.

    ¡°Non¨C Nonsense!¡± Steiss¡¯ heart skipped a beat. He feigned courage and used, ¡°Are you trying to stall for time?¡±

    Han Shuo let out a sigh and uttered in a dramatic, righteous manner, ¡°As a pharmacist, instead of cing your efforts in helping people, you put it into harming people. You shall be punished for your abominable deeds!¡±

    ¡°You, you...¡± Steiss pointed at Han Shuo and couldn¡¯t quite speak. No one knew if he was furious or just feeling frightened.

    ¡°There is arge medical warehouse thirty meters underground. Lord Andre, Lord Erebus, I will have to trouble your Lordships to unearth it,¡± Han Shuo turned to Andre and Erebus, bowed slightly, and said with a smile.

    <i>Plop!</i> Steiss¡¯ legs gave way and he fell to the ground, buttocks first. After hearing Han Shuo precisely report that it was thirty meters underground, Steiss knew it was all over. His spirit waspletely crushed after knowing that his doom was sealed.

    At this point in time, it was no longer necessary to investigate any further ¨C it was clear from the fear and powerlessness Steiss disyed at this moment that he was guilty.

    ¡°Arrest him!¡± Andre shouted. Several divine guards immediately swarmed and held Steiss firmly.

    ¡°No employee of the Godswamp Pharmacy will leave this ce. Those who try will be killed on the spot!¡± Erebusmanded in a merciless voice.

    ¡°Im... impossible... You cannot sniff it out with your nose. I have definitely treated everything cleanly. So many pharmacists are here and none of them could do it!¡± Steiss shouted as he looked at Han Shuo in despair after knowing that his appointment with death was confirmed.

    ¡°You mean them?¡± Han Shuo pointed at the pharmacists who followed along with the intention of watching Han Shuo make a joke of himself. ¡°They are all mediocrities! Your so-called conference of pharmacists had gathered a bunch of pharmacists with undeserved fame!¡±

    ¡°You... you...¡± Those pharmacist being insulted by Han Shuo were so furious that they nearly spat blood. They pointed at Han Shuo but couldn¡¯t seem to speak.

    Han Shuo had proved that he could locate poison such a great distance away just by sniffing with his nose. He had amply demonstrated that his ability was superior to every one of them. For this reason, even though Han Shuo insulted them right in front of them, there was no room for them to make retorts.

    At this time, those members fromrge family ns of the City of Shadows revealed feelings of disdain when they looked at the pharmacists. Some even gossiped, ¡°Pfff, this bunch is so unskilled yet still so shameless to attend such a pharmacist conference. People these days don¡¯t know shame.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right, they definitely aren¡¯t thatpetent. In the future, we will only buy medicines from the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. As for the other pharmacies... we better not frequent them. Who knows if they too sell poisons just like the Godswamp Pharmacy!¡±

    <i>Done, we are so done! The Godswamp Pharmacy has screwed us!</i> All the pharmacists were panicking and rmed. Seeing the disdain disyed by those members ofrge family ns, they knew that they wouldn¡¯t be able to continue doing business in the City of Shadows.

    The pharmacists in the City of Shadows and pharmacists who came from other cities to attend the conference, subjected to the scornful gazes of the crowd, turned on their heels and left with feelings of shame. They disappeared in no time as they had been humiliated enough.

    ¡°Told ya,¡± Donna said softly to Diwei who had his jaw t on the ground.

    ¡°How... how is this possible? How did he do it?¡± Diwei¡¯s gazes at Han Shuo were filled with astonishment. There was no longer the slightest feeling of contempt visible.

    ¡°I have tried to rope him into our family n from the beginning. You all thought that he was trying to ingratiate me instead of the other way around. Now you know his value, don¡¯t you? But it¡¯s toote now. Had he joined our family n, our House of Lavers would surely be more powerful than the other three family ns... Sigh...¡±

    Diwei was a little embarrassed. He previously assumed that Han Shuo had been fawning over Donna and was trying to get employed by the House of Lavers. He had met too many characters of this sort and was therefore cold towards Han Shuo when they first met. It was only now that he realized how gravely mistaken he was!

    Unfortunately, Han Shuo did not refine medicine to cure regret. Otherwise, Diwei would be buying them by the shiploads!

 Chapter 723 - Taking over Godswamp

    GDK 723: Taking over Godswamp

    At dawn, Andre and Erebus joined forces and broke through sevenyers of barriers in one spurt of energy, allowing them to locate the pathway to the underground warehouse. Those divine guards brought by the two then rushed underground like starving wolves and returned to the surface with fifteen pharmacists who specialized in producing poisons. And, of course, the filthy and illegal materials were found and seized.

    Having been caught red-handed, there was no room left for Steiss to dispute about his innocence. He drooped his head low in silence after realizing that his fate was sealed.

    ¡°So it is you and your pharmacy who did it! You have damaged the friendship between Mister Bryan and I. You deserve to die a thousand times for your heinous crime!¡± Rugersey shouted at Steiss. He was fuming with rage.

    It was thanks to the set up made by the Godswamp Pharmacy that Han Shuo had a poor impression of the House of Kisa. At this point in time, Han Shuo had proved that he was better than any other pharmacist. With that, no one would dare question the efficacy of the medicines he produced. Everyone was fighting to get their hands on Han Shuo¡¯s medicine but Rugersey¡¯s family ns had been denied ess. For this, Rugersey could not be more furious towards Steiss and would have finished Steiss right then if Andre and Erebus were not there.

    Those members ofrge family ns who came to follow the event felt that their trip had been worthwhile. They all wore unsightly, dark faces when they saw icy ss containers with human organs in them being taken out from the underground. Godswamp Pharmacy had been conducting such atrocious act right under the noses of the five major family ns. Seeing the frozen organs being unearthed was tantamount to pping them on their faces.

    ¡°What excuse are you going to give now, Steiss?¡± Andre coldly groaned while staring at Steiss gloomily.

    ¡°As things stand, I have nothing to say!¡± Steiss knew that his doom was certain. He took out a dagger glistening with icy light in his trembling hand, ready to slit his own throat and end it there and then.

    <i>Ting!</i> Andre flicked his index finger. A ghostly ray streaked across the air and sent the dagger far away from Steiss¡¯ hand.

    ¡°Don¡¯t think about dying before we havepleted our investigation!¡± Andre groaned. He then instructed, ¡°Restrain him and throw him in prison!¡±

    Erebus waved his hand and his divine guards from his Third Corps got into action. All the poison-producing pharmacists and employees of the Godswamp Pharmacy were restrained and captured.

    ¡°Bryan, I owe you yet another favor!¡± Andre said to Han Shuo smilingly after all those associated with the Godswamp Pharmacy were restrained. He was visibly rxed.

    ¡°I only did what I was supposed to!¡± Han Shuo was ted. Not only was the Godswamp Pharmacy done for, but he also managed to raise his reputation yet again. It was clear which pharmacy therge family ns would frequent from that day onwards.

    ¡°Folks, this will be it for now. Please disperse,¡± Andre informed the civilians before saying to Han Shuo in a low voice, ¡°Don¡¯t leave yet, there¡¯s something I need to discuss with you,¡±

    Han Shuo nodded, puzzled. He did not know what Andre would want to talk about.

    After hearing Andre¡¯s instruction, those members ofrge family ns said their goodbyes to him. These people became even more revering of Han Shuo¡¯s skills in medicine refinement. Before they left, they would approach Han Shuo with smiles from ear to ear and attempt to be closer to Han Shuo. They only left contented after Han Shuo promised to produce more medicine for them.

    ¡°That... erm... Bryan, it was indeed my fault for not investigating the matter properly. I¡¯m very sorry. Please don¡¯t hold grudges for my past transgression...¡± Rugersey went to Han Shuo in an embarrassed manner and apologized with a flustered smile while kneading his own hands.

    ¡°I¡¯m not one to hold grudges but, given how unpleasant the experience was, I¡¯m still not in a good mood. I¡¯m sorry but for now, I have no interest in doing business with your family!¡± Han Shuo shrugged and replied in an arrogant and impolite manner.

    Rugersey understood that such things would take time. It was just yesterday that he had offended Han Shuo and it was only natural that Han Shuo would still be offended. Knowing that he must not rush things, he tried to persuade him gently before leaving with his men.

    Donna and Diwen were thest few among the crowd to leave. She looked at Han Shuo for a while as though wanting to talk to him but hesitated. After mulling about something for a few minutes, she did not talk to him but merely let out a gentle sigh before leaving with Diwei.

    Han Shuo understood that Donna suspected that he was the person who murdered Cage and Eve. He too sighed in his heart but did not say a thing. But strangely, that Diwei who used to be dismissive and cold towards him, nodded cordially when their gazes met. It was as though Diwei was trying to be friendly. This was rather astonishing to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Erebus, take these people back to the Third Corps and lock them in prison. I will be there after having a few words with Bryan,¡± Andre said to Erebus.

    Erebus nodded, walked to Han Shuo, patted his shoulder, and said in a gentle voice, ¡°Young man, well done!¡± Erebus then left with his divine guards and those he detained.

    Although Erebus could be considered as a member of the House of Sainte, he did not originate from the Sainte Family and wasn¡¯t rted to Wace or Andre in blood. He was an expert Wace managed to recruit with his own strength and methods. And though Erebus could be considered as one of the top experts within the City of Shadows, at the end of the day, he was just a high-level divine guard under the House of Sainte. Wace may have been the only person he had to report to but nheless, he would still have to take orders from Andre.

    Soon enough, Erebus and his grandiose party were gone. A portion of the House of Sainte divine guards who came with Andre also left. Only around thirty divine guards dispersed around the area to protect Andre.

    ¡°Lord Andre, what¡¯s the matter?¡± asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°You saved Carmelita¡¯s life twice and just then, helped us to locate the evidence that would incriminate Godswamp Pharmacy. I couldn¡¯t find the opportunity to thank you all these while, but at longst, I will have the chance!¡± Andre smiled and said in a cordial manner.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before he shook his head and said, ¡°Lord Andre, that is not true. I could establish the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy in this city so quickly only with the help of your Lordship and Miss Carmelita. You don¡¯t have to thank me!¡±

    ¡°No, I must!¡± Andre insisted with a grin. He thought for a moment, then continued, ¡°After this incident, the Godswamp Pharmacy is utterly doomed. In ordance with the rules, all those buildings and assets owned by the Godswamp will be confiscated. Although the Godswamp Pharmacy¡¯s business in the City of Shadows ispletely ruined, their buildings and equipment would still be very valuable. In those buildings were hundreds, if not thousands of tools and equipment for medicine refinement, not to mention the libraries of books. These things would be a tremendous resource for any pharmacy!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes brightened. He could not contain his excitement and cried out, ¡°Lord Andre, you mean... you mean...¡±

    Andre nodded and said, ¡°The House of Sainte doesn¡¯t know how to refine medicine and we have no use for those resources after seizing them. They will only be auctioned off sooner orter. However, rather than benefiting others, we might as well benefit you. Besides, your Celestial Pearl Pharmacy has be reputable in the city. I believe that if you take over the resources the Godswamp Pharmacy previously owned, it would only be a matter of time before the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy bes thergest pharmacy in the City of Shadows. What say you?¡±

    Han Shuo finally got to understand the benefit of being close to influential and powerful people. Although the Godswamp Pharmacy had gone to the dogs, they possessed enormous resources in the City of Shadows. Other than in the city itself, they even had branches in the satellite forts and towns. If Han Shuo was to switch the signboards with his own, his Celestial Pearl would be the biggest pharmacy in the City of Shadows overnight.

    Taking over all the properties of Godswamp Pharmacy would be like giving an adrenaline shot to his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy!

    Han Shuo would have to take tens if not hundreds of years to slowly advance his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy to the scale of operation the Godswamp Pharmacy had in the City of Shadows. But with this favor done by Andre, Han Shuo could cut down the effort and time needed by several hundred folds. How could Han Shuo not be excited?

    ¡°This... this... too precious...¡± Han Shuo stammered while kneading his hands.

    ¡°You have proved yourself to be better than every other pharmacist! Those fes will surely spread what happenedst night all over the city. It will be a great promotion for your pharmacy. You are most suited to take over the Godswamp Pharmacy¡¯s resources!¡±

    ¡°If Lord Andre says so, I shall not decline the offer. Thank you!¡± Han Shuo said as he bowed to Andre.

    ¡°I will have a word with my elder brother and notify you when it¡¯s settled. So, prepare a number of crystal coins. We still have to take some crystal coins in exchange lest that some of those inside my familyins.¡± Andre thought for a moment and continued, ¡°It doesn¡¯t need to be too much, several ten thousand will do. Alright, we will talk about this in detail soon!¡±

    Thatpound owned by the Godswamp Pharmacy was worth at least a million ck crystal coins. To add on the medical ingredients, tools, and their branches all over the City of Shadows, the total valuation would be at least five million ck crystal coins! But from Andre¡¯s words, it appeared that Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t need to shell out much crystal coins at all. Money really did seem to fall from the sky!

    ¡°Understood!¡± Han Shuo nodded, beaming ear to ear.

    ¡°Alright, don¡¯t forget, you have offended probably all the pharmacists in the City of Shadows and those pharmacists from the Godswamp would hate you to their bones. I don¡¯t believe those pharmacists who were originally employed by Godswamp, even after they are found innocent and released, would work for you. The assets possessed by the Godswamp are enormous ¨C you definitely cannot run the entire business alone and it is necessary for you to hire talents. You will have to solve this problem somehow!¡± Andre reminded.

    After hearing the reminder, the smile on Han Shuo¡¯s face immediately died down. He even started to feel a headache.

    What happened on that night would surely spread to the entire City of Shadows. Most of those employed by the Godswamp Pharmacy did not participate in producing poisons and would not be imprisoned by the House of Sainte. However, to most of them, Han Shuo was the Godswamp¡¯s enemy. It was unlikely that they would work for Han Shuo.

    The assets of the Godswamp Pharmacy were enormous and Han Shuo would need to hire arge number of pharmacists and all kinds of talents to operate them. If Han Shuo couldn¡¯t solve this issue, even if he received all the resources for free, they wouldn¡¯t be making him crystal coins.

    <i>What a big headache!</i> Han Shuo started racking his brain for a solution.

    Andre patted on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulder and said smilingly, ¡°This you will have to figure out by yourself, I cannot help you with that. Haha, nobody asked you to offend all the pharmacists for a moment of glory!¡±

    ¡°Nobody told me that you would hand me Godswamp¡¯s assets to be managed. Had I known this earlier, I wouldn¡¯t have said a thing about them,¡± Han Shuo forced a smile and sighed.

    ¡°Alright, I better get going. About hiring pharmacists, I really couldn¡¯t help you with that. After all, we cannot force them to work. In the worst case, you could just take it slowly and train your own pharmacists instead of recruiting. I¡¯m sure many would want to learn from you!¡± Andreughed and left with his divine guards.

    <i>That¡¯d work if I were an actual pharmacist!</i> Han Shuo replied in his mind. He started to fret over the issue of hiring.

    ¡°Now you are going to get really rich!¡± Andrina had been silent all the while but as soon as all the strangers had left them, she chuckled and congratted Han Shuo.

    ¡°Yes, I¡¯m going to be rich. But there is plenty of work to do and problems to solve before I¡¯d be truly rich. The great amount of resources would just be sitting idle if there was no one to operate them,¡± Han Shuo said with a big smile on his face. Even though he had a big challenge up ahead, he was nheless very excited about taking over the enormous assets.

    ¡°Now that you are going to earn a big fortune, does that mean that in the future, I won¡¯t have to worry about not having enough crystal coins to eat?¡± Andrina giggled and asked excitedly.

    The smile immediately disappeared from Han Shuo¡¯s face. ¡°You will still have to exercise control. Otherwise, no amount of crystal coins would be enough! But I¡¯m sure that in the future, you will have more crystal coins to eat than you do now!¡±

    ¡°Hehe, I believe in you. It seems that following you was indeed the right choice!¡± Andrina said cheerfully.

    The sky hadpletely lit up. Han Shuo and Andrina chatted as they traveled back to the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. For some reason, upon returning to his pharmacy, Han Shuo suddenly felt how small it was byparison. When he called to mind that he would soon be in possession of enormous resources, he felt both excited and vexed.

    For the next five days, the main topic of discussion of the popce of the City of Shadows was what happened on that night. As expected, Han Shuo¡¯s reputation surpassed all the pharmacists¡¯ and he was known to be the best pharmacist in the City of Shadows.

    The Godswamp Pharmacy was shut down to be investigated. All the pharmacists employed by Godswamp were checked and interrogated. Some were freed while some were not. Those pharmacists who came to the City of Shadows to attend the pharmaceutical conference returned to their ces of origin.

    At this point in time, Han Shuo started to get himself busy with recruiting pharmacists. With Anito¡¯s assistance, he ced recruitment scrolls in eye-catching ces around the city.

    But as Han Shuo had impulsively insulted basically all the pharmacists in the City of Shadows on that night, even though it had been many days after Han Shuo posted the recruitment scrolls, not a single person showed up. Naturally, those pharmacists who were previously employed by the Godswamp Pharmacy hated Han Shuo. They would tell everyone that Han Shuo was condescending and vain, which further impeded Han Shuo¡¯s recruitment effort.

    Interestingly, however, there were many non-pharmacists who were interested in learning the art of medicine refinement from Han Shuo and wanted to be his apprentice. However, Han Shuo knew nothing about non-demonic medicine refinement and could not teach those people a thing. He therefore rejected every one of them.

    A few more days had passed and still, not a single proficient pharmacist hade. Han Shuo was truly getting a headache.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it and just wait a little longer. Someone wille in the end,¡± Andrina consoled the fretful Han Shuo. She had taken a lot of interest in the matter because it could mean having more crystal coins to devour. She even helped Anito with putting up the recruitment scrolls all around the city.

    ¡°This was all my fault for having a loose tongue. Otherwise, there was no way I could have offended so many pharmacists all at once.¡± Han Shuo sighed as he expressed his regrets. He felt as though he had stumbled upon a mountain of treasure but did not have space rings to bring them home. Han Shuo was incredibly sullen as he knew that Andre wouldplete his investigation into the Godswamp Pharmacy soon and the enormous resources would lie in his hand, dormant.

    Akley too took interest in the matter. Unfortunately, he couldn¡¯t be of any help other than suggesting nonsense like kidnapping pharmacists and forcing them to work. He stopped spitting rubbish after being chided by Han Shuo.

    ¡°I¡¯ve gotta figure something out!¡± Han Shuo sighed yet again.

    Han Shuo only knew how to refine pelleted medicine. They were high-value items that not many could afford. Producing the lower value, normal medicines were the key to making more money and for that, he could not do without practicing pharmacists.

    ¡°Ahem ahem...¡± a voice suddenly sounded from the entrance and that Gu Li with her strange temperament slowly walked into his shop.

    Han Shuo was delighted to hear a voice but his face immediately sank after seeing that it was Gu Li. Coldly, he asked, ¡°What are you here for?¡±

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t been in a good mood during the recent days. He had no wish of bickering with Gu Li and was ready to send her away.

    Gu Li pointed at the recruitment scroll hung on the front of the door, and asked puzzlingly, ¡°Aren¡¯t you recruiting pharmacists?¡±

    ¡°Yes, I am. But what has that got to do with you?¡± replied Han Shuo, unmannerly.

    ¡°Am I up for the task?¡± Gu Li asked in a probing manner.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before he asked, ¡°You mean, you want to join my Celestial Pearl Pharmacy?¡±

    ¡°Yes. I have heard about what happened that night. You are indeed a great pharmacist. I want to apologize for having been rude to you and thank you for saving my life. I really want to learn the art of refining medicine from you. Please take me in!¡± Gu Li bowed and said solemnly.

    ¡°Erm, don¡¯t you have a business in Mirage City? I heard that you have a lot of apprentices over there. You sure you want to stay in the City of Shadows?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s heart jolted as he asked.

    ¡°As long as I can learn more about refining medicine, I will do it, whatever it may cost! As for my apprentices, if you don¡¯t mind, can they join the Celestial Pearl as well?¡± asked Gu Li.

    ¡°Sure, definitely, of course!¡± Han Shuo replied hastily. He was worried about where to employ pharmacists and was overjoyed to hear that. Although he didn¡¯t know how or what to teach Gu Li, at this point in time, he couldn¡¯t be bothered to think about it carefully and immediately agreed.

 Chapter 724 - Becoming Famous

    GDK 724: Bing Famous

    Time ticked on until yet another half a year had gone.

    The Godswamp Pharmacy was rather influential in the Darkness Dominion. Even though its businesses in the City of Shadows waspletely done for, the damage was limited and didn¡¯t extend beyond the territories possessed by the House of Sainte.

    In the Dominion of Darkness, there was a total of seven cities of the same magnitude as the City of Shadows. The headquarters of Godswamp was in Hushveil City. The power and influence possessed by the House of Sainte had yet to extend to any other cities.

    Following the incident, the true master of the Godswamp Pharmacy pushed all the responsibilities on Steiss. He imed that Steissmitted those crimes on his own without his approval or knowledge and that the crime was an isted incident which had nothing to do with the rest of the Godswamp group. In addition to that, he strongly condemned the House of Sainte¡¯s actions, saying that the House of Sainte had no right to confiscate their resources in the City of Shadows and demanded they be handed back.

    But needless to say, Andre did not buy his excuse. He put up announcements all over the City of Shadows describing crimesmitted by the Godswamp Pharmacy as well as Steiss¡¯ testament admitting that he had been doing those crimes with the full awareness of the master of Godswamp Pharmacy.

    Andre had not just confiscated the resources and properties Godswamp Pharmacy owned in the City of Shadows, he had also requested the City Lord of Hushveil City to apprehend the master of Godswamp Pharmacy.

    All kinds of rumors rapidly spread throughout the Dominion of Darkness. The heated dispute between the House of Sainte and the Godswamp Pharmacy was widely discussed all over the Darkness Dominion. During those periods, the Godswamp Pharmacy suffered a tremendous drop in sales in their shops all across the Darkness Dominion.

    However, the master of the Godswamp Pharmacy was hard to kill. Thanks to his prompt damage-control, he managed to distance himself from the incident in the City of Shadows and escaped from being persecuted by the rulers in other big cities. His pharmacy managed to remain in business despite their reputation having been harmed and their bottom line severely affected.

    From this aspect, it was clear that the Godswamp Pharmacy held a considerable amount of influence in the Darkness Dominion. It was also in to see that although the House of Sainte was powerful, their power was limited to within the City of Shadows and they couldn¡¯t do much in the other cities.

    As time passed, the shouting match between the House of Sainte and Godswamp gradually quieted down. The House of Sainte, naturally, refused to return those assets. They also stated that the key figures of the Godswamp Pharmacy were banned from entering the City of Shadows and they would be arrested if discovered within their territory.

    Meanwhile, the master of Godswamp spread malicious rumors about the House of Sainte, iming that they were bossy, imperious, and that their im over the Godswamp¡¯s assets in the City of Shadows was unjustified.

    All kinds of rumors spread all around the Darkness Dominion. Of all the names involved in the rumors, there was one notable character that stayed in the minds of many ¨C Bryan the genius pharmacist!

    Among the shouting match between the House of Sainte and Godswamp Pharmacy, the biggest beneficiary was undoubtedly Han Shuo. As rumors about what happened that night spread, Han Shuo, a quack who knew nothing about pharmaceuticals, became known to many as a gifted, genius pharmacist.

    The City of Shadows was never short of rumors about how miraculous Han Shuo¡¯s pelleted medicines were. With this wave of rumors, the reputations of Han Shuo and his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was pushed to a whole new level. Han Shuo was known to be the best pharmacist in the City of Shadows while many in the Darkness Dominion came to know Han Shuo. Many considered him a young and talented pharmacist.

    With that, the issue that had been perplexing Han Shuo was solved by itself.

    Due to the deliberate efforts of a certain party, the news that Han Shuo wanted to hire proficient pharmacists spread throughout the Darkness Dominion like wildfire. Although those pharmacists previously insulted by Han Shuo did their utmost to vilify Han Shuo, there remained many more pharmacists who were just as obsessed with the art of medicine refinement. They did not mind Han Shuo¡¯s character and traveled thousands of miles to the City of Shadows for a chance to join the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    These pharmacists who made nothing of hardships and were willing to endure and suffer Han Shuo¡¯s irascible and outrageous temper were mostly very talented and good at what they did. With Gu Li, a skilled pharmacist experienced in the business of pharmacy performing the interviews and selecting the candidates, the number of pharmacists under the Godswamp Pharmacy grew.

    Gradually, Han Shuo¡¯s three-story shop was not big enough to hold therge number of pharmacists. Han Shuo had been waiting for Andre to contact him. He had made all the preparations necessary to take over the Godswamp Pharmacy.

    A few dayster, the battle of words between the House of Sainte and Godswamppletely died down. It was at this time that Andre finally dispatched men to invite Han Shuo over to the Sainte Residence. Han Shuo was overjoyed. He immediately headed to the Sainte Residence with Andrina.

    When Han Shuo arrived and saw that Andre was wearing a worried look, his heart sank. He forced a smile and said, ¡°Lord Andre, why do you look so troubled? Please don¡¯t tell me that the arrangement has busted. I have already recruited a lot of pharmacists. I really don¡¯t know what to do with them if I cannot take over Godswamp Pharmacy.¡±

    Andre¡¯s look loosened up slightly after he saw that Han Shuo had arrived. He forced a smile, shook his head, and replied, ¡°It¡¯s not as bad as you imagine, but there is indeed some trouble. You should know that the Sainte Family is big and has lots of noisy, talking mouths. Sometimes, even my brother and I must bow to their will.

    ¡°The assets previously owned by the Godswamp Pharmacy are worth around five million ck crystal coins. My original n was for you to pay some crystal coins and slowly reimburse the rest after your pharmacy starts turning a profit. However, during the recent period of time, there have been some in my family that are very noisy. They feel that the terms are too charitable to you and proposed all sorts of conditions. Sigh, even I can¡¯t do much about it!¡±

    ¡°What conditions exactly?¡± Han Shuo creased his brows and asked. He could understand the tough spot Andre was in.

    ¡°ounting for the fact that you have saved Carmelita¡¯s life twice, they want you to eithere up with three million ck crystal coins or, to jointly operate the Godswamp Pharmacy with the House of Sainte ¨C which, in reality, will be you running the business while the House of Sainte sits there and takes a portion of the profits!¡± Andre had an embarrassed smile on his face as he said, ¡°Bryan, I have a few paternal cousins in the family. Although their strengths are nothing remarkable, they still have some status and say in the family. I can¡¯t do much without unanimous approval of the family n.¡±

    It wasn¡¯t the first day that Han Shuo had arrived in the City of Shadows and he knew a thing or two about howrge family ns functioned. In the House of Sainte, although the brothers of Wace and Andre held the highest status, they were not the definitive authority. Although the strengths of their paternal cousins were nothing impressive, given their seniority, sometimes even Wace and Andre had to bow to their wills.

    However, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t believe that Wace and Andre had not the slightest selfish motives at all! The assets of the Godswamp Pharmacy in the City of Shadows were no small sum. Han Shuo knew that Wace and Andre would want something in return for handing the assets to him.

    Han Shuo knew that it was unrealistic to take over the assets of five million ck crystal coins for basically nothing and he had the intention of slowly reimbursing the House of Sainte in the future. However, this unexpected hurdle showed up at thest minute.

    ¡°How exactly will the profit sharing they proposed work?¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment and asked.

    ¡°Thirty-Seventy. You take thirty percent and the House of Sainte takes seventy percent of future profits. You don¡¯t have to reimburse any crystal coins if you agree to this,¡± Andre hesitated for a moment before saying in a rather embarrassed manner.

    Han Shuo furrowed his brows. If Han Shuo agreed to this proposal, a great portion of future profits would go to the House of Sainte. This was obviously inconsistent with Han Shuo¡¯s n.

    ¡°Lord Andre, can you help me sell some divine essence?¡± Han Shuo asked after weighing over in his mind for a moment.

    ¡°Divine essence? You have divine essence?¡± Andre was stunned. He wasn¡¯t sure he heard it right.

    ¡°I discovered a divine essence deposit and mined it soon after I arrived on Elysium. I know that divine essences are precious and valuable. I never had the courage to reveal them because I know I am weak. But now that I¡¯m in urgent need of arge sum of crystal coins, I have to liquidate them. Would Lord Andre be so kind as to help?¡± If it wasn¡¯t for the unique circumstances, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t be willing to let go of his divine essences. But as to prevent the House of Sainte from taking a huge cut of his profits, Han Shuo had no better option.

    ¡°No problem. No matter how or where you get those things from, as long as you cane up with three million ck crystal coins to stuff those people¡¯s mouths, the Godswamp Pharmacy will be yours. Actually, my original intention was for you to pay several ten thousand ck crystal coins upfront and for you to slowly repay two million ck crystal coins in the future. However, those old codgers just wouldn¡¯t trust you. I feel very helpless about it as well. My apologies, Bryan!¡± said Andre.

    ¡°It¡¯s alright!¡± Han Shuo replied smilingly. Right after, he took out the divine essences in his possession andid them all out before Andre.

    Of the divine essences he originally possessed, those of earth energy had been handed to earth elite zombie before he departed while those of death and destruction energies, Han Shuo had used up all of them on himself. Han Shuo also decided not to reveal the few pieces of divine essences of life energy as he was in the Darkness Dominion.

    With that, twenty-two pieces of wind divine essences and eighteen pieces of lightning divine essences wereid out in front of Andre. Han Shuo asked, ¡°That¡¯s all that I have. Are they worth three million ck crystal coins? If it¡¯s not enough I can find ways to make it up.¡± Han Shuo was aware that Akley was still in possession of some divine essence. He intended to take down the Godswamp Pharmacy by hook or by crook.

    There was always a risk in Han Shuo outing so many divine essences at once. However, Andre, as a high-ranking member in the House of Sainte, was definitely not an unsophisticated man. Han Shuo believed that he would certainly not do anything reckless even with so many divine essencesid before him. And above all, Han Shuo had confidence in Andre and believed that his presence in the City of Shadows would benefit the House of Sainte. It was for these reasons that Han Shuo dared to do so.

    ¡°In the City of Shadows, a piece of divine essence of wind is valued at around sixty thousand ck crystal coins. Lightning divine essence is slightly more expensive at around seventy thousand ck crystal coins. So, these divine essences here could sell for approximately two and half a million ck crystal coins.¡± Andre thought for a moment with his brows bunched before he proposed, ¡°How about this: I will make up for the half a million and Carmelita will have ten percent of the profits that Celestial Pearl makes in the future. Ten percent isn¡¯t too big a sum. In addition, the existence of this rtionship will grant your Celestial Pearl Pharmacy conveniences in performing most things in the City of Shadows. What¡¯s your take?¡±

    As ten percent was a negligible amount to Han Shuo, and on top of that, the beneficiary was Carmelita, Han Shuo did not hesitate at all and agreed to it.

    ¡°Wait here while I discuss this with them. I believe they will have no objection!¡± Andre let out a sigh of relief and rapidly headed to a dark and tall building near the back of the Sainte Residence.

    An hourter, Andre returned with a smile on his face and a stack of documents in his hands. He handed them to Han Shuo and said, ¡°These documents prove that you haveplete ownership of all those properties and assets previously owned by the Godswamp Pharmacy. From today onwards, all the shops and resources of the Godswamp Pharmacy located in the City of Shadows and her satellite towns are all yours! Congrattions, Bryan!¡±

    ¡°Thank you, thank you. Hehe...¡± Han Shuo had a big smile on his face and passed those divine essences to Andre. He then asked, ¡°How is Carmelita doing? Is she getting better?¡±

    Andre put away the divine essences and replied with a smile, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, she¡¯s doing fine.¡± After taking a short pause, he continued, ¡°Speaking of Carmelita, I have to thank you yet again. With these divine essences, we can exchange for more destruction divine essences for her. My family n has invested a lot of resources for this girl to recover sooner. Hopefully, she won¡¯t suffer any more injuries.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart had long flown to the heavens after he received those documents. After hearing Andre¡¯s reply, he got up and said smilingly, ¡°d she¡¯s fine. Erm, I need to hurry and settle the business with Godswamp Pharmacy. I shall stop bothering you.¡±

    ¡°You are going to be very busy for some time. Haha, go ahead.¡± Andre knew that Han Shuo was excited to start taking over the Godswamp Pharmacy. He let Han Shuo leave and did not exchange pleasantries.

    During their journey back, Andrina asked Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan, do you think that guy has any selfish motives?¡±

    ¡°Definitely!¡± Han Shuo let out a soft chuckle and exined, ¡°Given how enormous the assets and resources of the Godswamp Pharmacy were, considering the outstanding reputation and strength of our Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, it is without a doubt that in the future, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy will supersede and surpass the Godswamp Pharmacy before its copse. I reckon that Andre wants to gain some benefits for his House of Sainte by getting a portion of the profits. Otherwise, given the power and statuses Wace and Andre have in the Sainte Family, although difficult, they could keep their parental cousins silent, if they really wanted to. But Andre sure did not expect that I was in possession so many divine essences. Hehe.¡±

    ¡°Is he going to find ways to hinder you?¡± Andrina bunched her brows and asked.

    Han Shuo shook his head and replied smilingly, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, he is a smart man. Besides, I have given him so much divine essence. For the House of Sainte, my presence is beneficial to the City of Shadows. Their House of Sainte is in possession of all resources of the city and definitely wouldn¡¯t make life difficult for me over this bit of interest. There will be plenty of things they need to rely on me for!¡±

    ***After Han Shuo left, Andre fiddled with the divine essences in his hand while he remarked to himself smilingly, ¡°I really can¡¯t wrap my head around this youngster. Divine essence deposit? Just how recent has he been on Elysium? Sigh. Miscalction, a miscalction indeed. How would the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy in the future be valued at merely three million ck crystal coins? This youngster is very cunning indeed!¡±

 Chapter 725 - Show yourself!

    GDK 725: Show yourself!

    Godswamp Pharmacy waspletely gone from the City of Shadows and was reced by Han Shuo¡¯s Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. However, it was after Han Shuo actually took over all their businesses that he realized just how much effort was needed to properly manage the big machine. Before taking over the Godswamp Pharmacy, the entire process from collecting medicinal ingredients, refining medicine, and to selling the medicines waspleted by Han Shuo himself. However, one person was far from enough to manage the enormous resources of Godswamp Pharmacy.

    There were finer details associated with collecting, storing, refining, and selling medicines and therefore the talents Celestial Pearl Pharmacy needed was more than just pharmacists. It took Han Shuo no time to realize that he needed more manpower and he started yet another round of recruitment process...

    Although Han Shuo had then spent a long time to recruit the talents he needed, he still could not get enough people to fill all the vacant posts. People who were talented in business management were particrly hard to find. Han Shuo, as someone with poor knowledge in running a big business, was troubled by this issue.

    Andre and a few from the big family ns had rmended Han Shuo a few capable candidates. However, as those people were rted to those big family ns in some ways and Han Shuo didn¡¯t want them to know all the ins and outs of his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, he had, most reluctantly, declined their rmendations.

    Han Shuo had long moved into the big campus that originally belonged to the Godswamp Pharmacy. The altogether seventeen big and small shops in and around the City of Shadows had also fallen into his power. However, even two months after taking over the assets, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy remained closed for business due to insufficient manpower.

    For theck of a better option, Han Shuo temporarily closed the sixteen shops that were outside the City of Shadow and gathered all the workers he could to the headquarters in the city. His intention was to get the business of his main pharmacy in the city on track while he slowly recruited all sorts of talents.

    While Han Shuo was working his ass off for the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, Avery, who had been away from the City of Shadows for a long time, suddenly appeared in one of the mountain ranges outside the City of Shadows.

    Avery had been away from the city for half a year with the excuse that he was hunting for his children¡¯s murderer. He did not immediately return to the City of Shadows but halted right outside the city as though waiting for something.

    Avery knew the environment around the City of Shadows all too well. On top of his extraordinary strength, he easily avoided therge numbers of divine guards who patrolled the mountains. Behind him was a small squadron of thirty divine guards from the Fifth Corps. These divine guards originated from the House of Lavers and were loyal to Avery.

    When night fell, Avery flew up and stood on the top of a tall, ancient tree. He squinted his eyes and wore a cold face as he gazed at the City of Shadows.

    Sometimeter, in the dead of the night, a shadow snuck out from the City of Shadows. The shadow seemed to be afraid that someone might be following it and altered its course multiple times before finally arriving before Avery.

    The person kneeled down on one knee. Gazing at Avery who was standing on a big tree, he uttered in a low voice, ¡°Greetings, my Lord!¡±

    ¡°Number Three, tell me about the recent situation in the City of Shadows,¡± Avery said with his eyes still gazing at the City of Shadows not far away.

    ¡°During recent days, the most talked-about topic is the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy that will open for business soon. The Celestial Pearl Pharmacy¡¯s owner, Bryan, has gained the full support of the House of Sainte and took over the Godswamp Pharmacy¡¯s assets. In addition, the House of Sainte has never loosened up in monitoring our Fifth Corps. Andre has personallye to the Fifth Corps multiple times to ask about your Lordship¡¯s whereabouts. It appears that they are suspecting us,¡± Number Three said in a deep voice.

    ¡°Bryan... He meddled with my business and actually managed to save that bitch¡¯s life. I¡¯m not going to let him get away with it!¡± Avery scowled. After keeping silent for a while, he finally lowered his head to look at Number Three crouching on the ground, and asked, ¡°How many from the Fifth Corps are willing to leave the City of Shadows with me?¡±

    ¡°Myself included, there are nine people. I have carefully sounded out everyone but the rest of them did not reveal much motivation of leaving with your Lordship,¡± Number Three hesitated for a moment before he answered in a deep voice.

    ¡°Just nine people, that¡¯s so...¡± Avery softly sighed before he smiled grimly and instructed, ¡°Nine people it is. Number Three, I want to enter the City of Shadows tonight without being discovered. Use whatever influence you have left to arrange it for me!¡±

    ¡°Understood,¡± Number Three softly replied. He added after thinking for a moment, ¡°My Lord, those few people can only be used once. We must leave the City of Shadows after that.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, we will leave the city after tonight!¡± Avery said and nodded. He took a short pause and added, ¡°If you serve under me, no matter if it¡¯s the City of Shadows or any other city, you will still be able to enjoy the same privilege you have always enjoyed. But if you stay in the City of Shadows, because you have worked for me, you will never be treated highly.¡±

    ¡°Your Lordship has always treated us well. Wherever your Lordship goes, we will follow!¡± Number Three hastily replied.

    ¡°Good. Go ahead andplete the task I have instructed. There are a few I must kill tonight!¡± Avery said as he gestured with his hand.

    Number Three retreated and carefully returned to the City of Shadows. Right after that, he got into contact with certain important characters from the Fifth Corps. Two of these people oversaw the eastern-side city gate. With the two deliberately looking the other way, Avery, with a few elite divine guards from his Fifth Corps, sneaked into the City of Shadows without alerting anyone.

    After finally returning to the City of Shadows, Avery first went to the top of a building near the Lavers Residence. He gazed at the Lavers Residence while softly mumbling, ¡°Elder Brother, I believe you should have some clue about what is happening by now. I won¡¯t be returning home, lest I bring you trouble.¡±

    ¡°My Lord, we don¡¯t have too much time. What should we do now?¡± someone who was behind Avery softly asked.

    ¡°There are some in the City of Shadows that I have wanted to kill since long ago. We will finish them all tonight. We will get them done quickly and quietly. We must not alert the House of Sainte by any means. Otherwise, none of us will be leaving the City of Shadows,¡± Avery coldly instructed. He gave onest reluctant look at the Lavers Residence before he silently left with his men.

    It was a moonless night, a perfect night to murder and kill.

    By relying on his familiarity with the City of Shadows, Avery, leading several elites from his Fifth Corps, evaded the detection of multiple patrolling divine guards. He managed to assassinate several characters who had average strength but some influence in the City of Shadows. For example, Tuyas from the Buller Family. Although his strength was nothing remarkable, his business skills were outstanding. This Tuyas had always aligned himself against the House of Lavers but Avery dared not to do a thing to him on any average day. But that night was no average day. Avery boldly butchered him in thergest crystal stone shop of the House of Buller.

    Other than Tuyas, a few others were ughtered by Avery noiselessly. As Avery¡¯s strength was great and most of his targets were merely midgods, all the assassinations were sessful and he did not catch anyone¡¯s attention.

    ¡°My Lord, it¡¯s about time. We should leave!¡± Number Three who had been following alongside Avery softly reminded.

    Avery kept silent for a moment before he said in a deep voice, ¡°There is onest person. We will leave right after getting rid of him.¡±

    ¡°Who is it?¡± Number Three asked softly.

    ¡°Bryan of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. This kiddo has livedfortably during recent times, but it will end tonight! If it wasn¡¯t for him, Cage and Eve wouldn¡¯t have died to Carmelita. I might not be able to get Carmelita for now, but this fe must die!¡± Avery said in a chilling voice.

    ¡°My Lord, I heard that the little girl that follows around him is very powerful. I heard from the House of Kisa that the little girl used to fight with Rugersey and she was only slightly behind in strength,¡± Number Three hastily reminded when he heard Han Shuo was Avery¡¯s next target.

    Although it was clear that Andrina had the upper hand over Rugersey during their battle in the Kisa Residence, the House of Kisa did not like losing face. No one in the House of Kisa dared say that Rugersey was on the back foot in the battle and they altered they story, telling the outsiders it was Andrina who was on the back foot. Besides, as those directly involved had kept silent about the true story and as Andrina was just a little girl, no one doubted the validity of what they heard.

    ¡°She¡¯s just a little girl, how powerful can she be?!¡± Avery said disdainfully, ¡°Besides, Rugersey isn¡¯t as powerful as me. If he could defeat that little girl, then I can do the same easily. What is there to worry about?¡±

    After hearing those words, Number Three knew that Avery had made his decision and he no longer gave any advice.

    ***

    On the top of one of the tallest buildings in the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, Han Shuo was cultivating with his eyes closed.

    Although Han Shuo was incredibly exhausted from dealing with the mountains of work of his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, he never cked in his cultivation. His two avatars were not affected at all as they could stay within the Cauldron of Myriad Demon to cultivate all the time.

    His avatar of death had reached early-stage midgod realm and it had been slowly familiarizing itself with this new realm while trying to learn several new methods of using the energy of death. His avatar of destruction was still studying and experimenting with the Orb of Destruction. It was growing more and more proficient at it.

    All of a sudden, Han Shuo¡¯s heart pounded. His consciousness detected the arrival of great danger.

    After having been severely injured thest time, Han Shuo¡¯s ability in sensing danger became more acute. Immediately, he deployed the Indestructible Body Omen which gave his body tremendous defensive power. Han Shuo did not move a muscle but carefully sensed the threat. He was shocked by what he discovered and immediately transmitted to Cauldron Spirit, ¡°The attacker is very powerful. Lend me the energy of the demon generals!¡±

    Cauldron Spirit too sensed that aura that was secretly locked on Han Shuo. After hearing his instruction, Cauldron Spirit reminded, ¡°Take note, you will have to endure tremendous pain when the energy of demon generals fills your body. Moreover, your body will be damaged as the energy flows throughout your body. This cannotst for too long. You must return the energy to me once you feel that you can¡¯t take it anymore!¡±

    ¡°Hurry up! There¡¯s no time for caution!¡± Han Shuo shouted to Cauldron Spirit.

    At the next instant, a terrifying amount of energy gushed out from the Cauldron of Myriad Demon in Han Shuo¡¯s body. His body was filled with immense pain in an instant. It was as though every inch of his flesh was being stabbed with a knife. But other than immense pain, his body was also filled with a seemingly infinite amount of energy. He wanted to scream.

    The energy from tens of demon generals formed using lowgods and midgods was tremendous beyond Han Shuo¡¯s imagination. The feeling of having so much energy was invigorating but Han Shuo had to release them as soon as possible. Otherwise, the energy would just be damaging Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body.

    ¡°You mustunch the energy away quickly. If you let all the energy gather in your body, it won¡¯t be long before your demonic infant gets injured!¡± Cauldron Spirit hastily reminded.

    ¡°I know. Why isn¡¯t that piece of shit making a move yet! Fucking hell!¡± Han Shuo cursed in his mind as he endured the pain.

    Avery was indeed right around him, hiding in the dark. However, after his failed assassination attempt thest time, Avery now didn¡¯t dare to strike recklessly. He observed Han Shuo and carefully approached him, looking for the best opportunity to strike. He was unintentionally harming Han Shuo by waiting.

    ¡°Hurry and use the energy or your body will sumb very soon!¡± Cauldron Spirit hastened yet again.

    Tremendous pain filled every cell in Han Shuo¡¯s body. Seeing that his enemy was still not attacking even after so long, Han Shuo finally lost his patience. He raised his head towards the sky and, like a blood-thirsty beast, he roared, ¡°Get out!¡±

    The terrifying sound waves traveled straight towards where Avery had been hiding and caused tremendous undtion in the region of darkness. Avery, who was about to strike, was shocked. He couldn¡¯t understand how Han Shuo managed to discover him.

    <i>ROAR!</i> Han Shuo let out a wild bellow and charged like an animal at Avery. His eyes were bloodshot while the muscles and veins all over his body were puffed out.

    ¡°Impossible!¡± Avery was shocked and he cried out in surprise. He hastily assembled the divine energy of darkness in his body and formedyers uponyers of shields around him. The element of darkness in his domain of divinity was sucked clean in an instant.

    <i>Boom!</i> Demonic des erupted from his two hands as he charged into the region of darkness like a blood-crazed demon. Terrifying energy traveled through the Demonic des andnded on the shields Avery deployed using the energy of darkness. They were destroyed in no time.

    A burst of ruthless and mighty energy gushed into Avery, immediately injuring his divine body. He was thrown flying.

    Han Shuo felt much better after throwing the punch and delivering some of the violent energy out from his body.

    Han Shuo was overjoyed to see Avery flying due to his first strike. He hastily charged at Avery and continued with ¡®greeting¡¯ Avery with his chilling Demonic des.

    However,pared to that powerful strike just then, his follow-up attacks were much weaker. Although Avery still had to defend himself in a flurry, Han Shuo¡¯s attacks could not take Avery¡¯s life.

    But even so, Avery was scared witless. He did not anticipate that Han Shuo would suddenly seem to have turned into another person. The ruthless power filled with bloodthirst and madness Han Shuo suddenly disyed was nothing like Avery had ever seen.

    <i>So cunning! This fe has been hiding his power all along. He is even more sinister than Andre!</i>Avery thought as he defended himself from Han Shuo¡¯s attacks. He was looking for opportunities to escape.

    ¡°Bryan, return the energy to me, you cannot continue this any longer or your demonic infant will be injured!¡± Cauldron Spirit transmitted anxiously while Han Shuo was enjoying himself beating back Avery further and further.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart skipped a beat. He immediately detected the anomaly with the demonic infant in his body. When the demon general energy flooded his body, the blood essence that nourished Han Shuo¡¯s demonic infant would be rapidly consumed. The blood essences were used up on Han Shuo¡¯s body, allowing his bones and meridians to support the flow of demon general energy.

    However, the demonic infant also requires blood essence. When there was not enough blood essence to support the demonic infant, the demonic infant would be harmed and weakened. This was thest thing Han Shuo wished to happen.

    ¡°You got lucky this time!¡± Han Shuo cursed in a low voice before he suddenly retreated. He hastily returned the demon general energy to Cauldron Spirit.

    Avery, who had been constantly bombarded by Han Shuo¡¯s attacks, finally had a chance to regain hisposure. He stared at Han Shuo in astonishment with wide eyes before he immediately turned on his heels and returned to darkness. He fell back on his divine guards and rapidly escaped.

    ¡°How did you be so powerful so suddenly?¡± asked Andrina. She had arrived long ago and had been gaping at Han Shuo with disbelief.

    Han Shuo only dared to suddenly let go because he knew that Andrina was there. He did not immediately reply to her question. He first returned the demon general energy to Cauldron Spirit and pointed in the direction Avery left, ¡°Andrina, kill that guy for me and I will give you a hundred thousand ck crystal coins!¡±

    Andrina shook her head and replied, ¡°I¡¯m your bodyguard, not your assassin!¡±

    ¡°Well forget about it then. Avery has escaped this time. But if hees back I will be out of luck!¡± Han Shuo said with a bitter smile. After having fought the attacker for a dozen or more seconds, Han Shuo managed to recognize that it was Avery.

    ¡°It is he who should feel afraid! From the strength you disyed just now, there¡¯s no way he can kill you!¡± Andrina then looked deep into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, put on a faint smirk, and asked, ¡°Bryan, can you please tell me what energy you use? And how did you suddenly be so strong?¡±

    ¡°Tell me about yourself first. After that, I will consider telling you about it,¡± Han Shuo said with a mischievous smile.

    ¡°Hmph! If you are not telling me then forget about it!¡± Andrina said angrily and pouted.

    ¡°Ay, what¡¯s happening?¡± Akley arrived excitedly and asked, ¡°Was there a fight here just now? Where¡¯s the enemy?¡±

    The battle between Han Shuo and Averysted only a dozen or so seconds. As Akley was cultivating in a gymnasium further away and his strength wasn¡¯t nearly on the level of Andrina¡¯s, he did not make it on time. By the time he arrived, the enemy had long escaped and was nowhere to be seen.

    ¡°You arete!¡± Andrina shot a re at Akley impolitely and after a short pause, she said disdainfully, ¡°But even if you came on time, you wouldn¡¯t be able to do a thing!¡±

    Akley knew that Andrina¡¯s strength was powerful beyond fathom. He became more excited to hear that and asked ¡°A midgod?¡±

    ¡°Highgod!¡± answered Andrina.

    ¡°What...¡± Akley became dejected. He took a quick look at Andrina with revering eyes while murmuring, ¡°Bloody hell, she¡¯s a highgod...¡± It was clear from Akley¡¯s gazes that he thought it was Andrina who repelled the enemy.

    ¡°It wasn¡¯t me!¡± Andrina knew what Akley thought with just one look. She pointed at Han Shuo and said, ¡°It was he who beat back the highgod!¡±

    ¡°Save it! Alright, since nothing is here, I¡¯ll be leaving.¡± Akley waved his hand, turned around, and leftzily. He obviously did not believe that Han Shuo could beat back a highgod.

    ¡°Such an idiot!¡± Andrina wasn¡¯t in a good mood and cursed.

 Chapter 726 - I admit defeat

    GDK 726: I admit defeat

    News of the deeds that Averymitted on that night spread through the City of Shadows after the sun rose.

    Including Tuyas from the House of Buller, five had fallen to him. Although these five were mere midgods, they were prestigious and renowned characters in the City of Shadows. Their sudden deaths immediately attracted the public¡¯s attention.

    The Celestial Pearl Pharmacy didn¡¯t have their own divine guards but Erebus had assigned Anito and a small squadron from the Third Corps to patrol around the campus. Anito was quickly alerted about Avery¡¯s intrusion into the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy that night. However, he arrived on the scene eventer than Akley and had absolutely no clue what happened.

    At dawn, the Chief of the Third Corps, Erebus, personally came to visit Han Shuo.

    ¡°You sure it was him?¡± Erebus immediately asked after Han Shuo led him into a secret chamber.

    ¡°I¡¯m certain. It is Avery! If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that Andrina was just beside me, I¡¯m afraid that I would have fallen to the same fate as Tuyas and the others,¡± Han Shuo said as though he was still frightened by the event. He imed that Andrina had defeated Avery lest he attracts unwanted attention from the Sainte Family.

    Even if Han Shuo hadn¡¯t provided any detailed exnation, Erebus would logically assume that it was Andrina who beat back Avery. Back at the Kisa Residence, Erebus had witnessed Andrina¡¯s power with his own eyes. He thought that in the whole of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, only Andrina would possess that kind of strength.

    Erebus nodded and coldly groaned, ¡°How outrageous! It seems that Avery has no intention of staying in the city any longer!¡±

    Han Shuo remained silent. He knew that Avery would have left the City of Shadows that night. Given how familiar Avery was to the City of Shadows, with the help of his confidants, even the House of Sainte would have trouble stopping him escaping from the City of Shadows.

    After all, he used to be the Chief of the Fifth Corps!

    Erebus did not stay in the Celestial Pearl for too long. After asking Han Shuo about the incidents of thest night, he hastily departed.

    For the next few days, Han Shuo learned from Anito that the House of Sainte had been searching for Avery with all their strength. However, Avery¡¯s foresighted nning proved him an exceptional escape artist, and their search yielded no results.

    All of Avery¡¯s confidants left with him on that night. As for those divine guards of the Fifth Corps who remained in the City of Shadows, after being thoroughly interrogated, they were released and put under heavy surveince.

    Soon enough, the House of Sainte publicly denounced Avery and listed all the atrocities he performed in the City of Shadows, including the fact that he had attempted to assassinate Carmelita. Avery¡¯s actions were widely discussed by the citizens of the City of Shadows.

    Just as expected, the Fifth Corps was shut down. Members of the House of Lavers were subjected to heavy interrogation. The patriarch of the House of Lavers, Felder, decisively disowned Avery. To ensure the safety of his House of Lavers, Felder pushed all the responsibility on Avery and even publicly announced that Avery was banished from his family n effective immediately. Avery would no longer be a member of the House of Lavers.

    Felder¡¯s decisive action may have saved the lives of his family n members, but those reckless deeds of Avery¡¯s had nheless severely affected the strength of the House of Lavers. Not only had they lost control to this powerful institution called the Fifth Corps, with the House of Sainte¡¯s deliberate and constant oppression, the House of Lavers suddenly became the weakest of the five major family ns.

    All those disturbances in the City of Shadows did not have much of an effect on Han Shuo. After a period of preparation, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy managed to recruit a significant number of talents in various aspects. They finally gathered enough manpower to open for business in the City of Shadows.

    It was also at this point in time that Han Shuo ran into yet another thorny problem. The group of pharmacists led by Gu Li constantly hastened and urged Han Shuo to teach them the principles behind the refinement of his Pill of Rejuvenation, Pill of Tranquillity, and Rebirth Pill!

    Gu Li and the union of pharmacists had traveled thousands of miles ande to the City of Shadows because they were admiring of Han Shuo¡¯s skills in medicine refinement and wanted to learn from him. When they first started working in the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, as they were upied with mountains of work, they did not bother Han Shuo with such requests but buried their heads and worked to get Celestial Pearl Pharmacy on the right track.

    Now that most of the work was done and everything was in motion, they had more free time and began asking Han Shuo about all kinds of abstruse problems rted to medicine refinement.

    And thus yet another round of headache began for Han Shuo. He couldn¡¯t even understand the problems that the pharmacists were asking him, much less think up answers to those questions. All that while, he found excuses to avoid answering their questions. But now that Gu Li and the rest of the pharmacists wereing to him all at once, he knew that he had to stop avoiding.

    They were in a pharmacyb filled with ss tools and containers. The cabs were lined with colorful jars in which all kinds of medicinal ingredients were arranged methodically. At the center of theb was an intricate-looking sphere made of ss. It was ced atop arge pile of glimmering energy crystals.

    The group of thirteen pharmacists headed by Gu Li stood all around theb, gazing at Han Shuo.

    These pharmacists who had pressed on with joining the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy even after having heard rumors about Han Shuo¡¯s arrogant and irascible temper were very much like Gu Li ¨C they were masters in the art of medicine refinement. Therefore, it was absolutely impossible for Han Shuo to lie to them. Facing their fiery gazes that were thirsty for knowledge, Han Shuo felt as though he had built his own demise.

    He knew he had to somehow solve this issue, or all these pharmacists would leave the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy with their apprentices. And if that happened, his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy that was just starting to be operational would copse from the inside, swiftly and spectacrly.

    ¡°To tell you the truth, the medicine refinement I know of is entirely different than what you all know!¡± Han Shuo knew he had no choice but to tell the truth. He braced himself and said, ¡°In fact, I do not know much about the art of medicine refinement you practice!¡±

    The pharmacists in the room looked at Han Shuo with puzzled gazes after hearing those words but they remained silent and continued to listen to Han Shuo. ¡°I don¡¯t think any of you would have heard or seen of the art of medicine refinement my master taught me. Erm, let me demonstrate!¡± Han Shuo knew he had to show something or that would be the end of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. With one thought, the Nine Tessetion Cauldron entered Han Shuo¡¯s palm.

    ¡°Your way of medicine refinement requires extracting and mixingpounds in ss containers by altering the temperature. Mine is different in that I mix the medical ingredients directly. Then, I then use special methods to extract thepounds in the ingredients before rapidly congealing them into solids by...¡± Han Shuo slowly exined.

    Han Shuo demonstrated by refining a pelleted medicine as he spoke. He inserted a few medical ingredients into the Nine Tessetion Cauldron revolving on his palm. Right after that, a fragrant scent of medicine permeated theb. The cauldron was spurred by the red mesing from his palm and it started to revolve rapidly. The tessetion on it would glimmer with a faint halo. It was fascinating.

    To these pharmacists, Han Shuo¡¯s actions were simply unimaginable. They stared at Han Shuo performing the demonstration like fools. They couldn¡¯t understand how Han Shuo could refine medicine by throwing all the raw ingredients into a single container. Their usual way of producing medicine would begin by individually extracting thepounds from raw ingredients. Then, they would mix those extracts in ratios ording to the effect they wished to achieve. Compared to Han Shuo¡¯s one-pan-cooks-all method, not only did their approach have a ton of additional procedures, the end results were not as good as his.

    The pharmacyb was filled with a pleasant scent. A few momentster, several dark-gold Rebirth Pills flew out from the Nine Tessetion Cauldron. Han Shuo crushed the pills and ced them in several medicine bottles. He handed them to some of the pharmacists and said smilingly, ¡°Have a taste. It¡¯s very beneficial to your body!¡±

    The pharmacists were tempted just from the scent alone. They had long heard about the miraculousness of the medicines Han Shuo personally refined and had wanted to experience it for themselves. Hence, after Han Shuo¡¯s invitation, they merely hesitated for a moment before they swallowed the medicines in their hands.

    As professional pharmacists, these people could immediately detect the effect Han Shuo¡¯s medicines had on their bodies. It was clear to them just how potent the medicine was.

    Soon enough, the pharmacists had to make urgent trips to the bathroom and defecate like they had diarrhea. However, they would all look much healthier aftering out of the bathroom. They eximed in admiration, ¡°What a miraculous drug! This medicine is unbelievable!¡±

    Even those few pharmacists who did not get to experience the Rebirth Pill became more revering of Han Shuo after seeing that their colleagues appeared to be filled with vitality.

    Gu Li appeared much healthier after a round of solid waste excrement. Upon returning from the washroom, she kowtowed towards Han Shuo and uttered, ¡°I admit defeat!¡±

    Of these people, Gu Li had the greatest reputation. No one would ever again doubt Han Shuo¡¯s capability with her acknowledging Han Shuo¡¯s prowess.

    ¡°As none of you are my apprentices, I cannot teach you my method and technique of refining medicine,¡± Han Shuo observed the expressions on the faces of his pharmacists. When they disyed looks of disappointment, Han Shuo added, ¡°But, I can talk to you about the efficacy of certain unique medical ingredients. You may not be familiar with these medical ingredients but they carry miraculous effects. If you proceed with investigating and experimenting with those ingredients, I believe you will learn new things and make great advancements.

    Han Shuo naturally wouldn¡¯t teach the pharmacists his techniques of medicine refinement as it required demonic yuan. Even if Han Shuo was to do so, as they did not cultivate in demonic arts, they wouldn¡¯t be able to produce pelleted medicine. However, Han Shuo was willing to teach them about the special effects that certain medicinal ingredients had as a way of thanking them for having worked so hard for the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    The pharmacists expressed their gratitude upon hearing those words. They were contented with that guarantee from Han Shuo, even though they would not learn Han Shuo¡¯s out-of-the-world medicine refinement technique.

    Han Shuo then took out some medical ingredients he had personally collected, ced them in ss containers, and proceeded with exining their uses. Han Shuo used all kinds of professional terminologies which left the impression on the pharmacists that his knowledge was deep and profound. Their gazes towards Han Shuo were filled with admiration and respect.

    These pharmacists listened to Han Shuo with eager ears and took notes in their booklets. They could not wait to experiment with those new medical ingredients they just learned from Han Shuo. They seemed inexplicably excited as like children with new toys.

    ¡°Alright, I have exined all the functions andpounds in these medical ingredients. Whates next is all up to your own understanding and capability. Perhaps you coulde up with new medicines using these medical ingredients, or perhaps not, but this is all I can do for you!¡± Han Shuo then left the pharmacyb. Thinking that he had evaded a crisis, he secretly heaved a sigh of relief.

    Everything went without a hitch in the following period of time. A few of Han Shuo¡¯s pharmacists, inspired by him, actually managed to invent several new types of medicines from the medical ingredients they had previously never heard of. Although the efficacy of their medicines was still far behindpared to Han Shuo¡¯s pelleted medicines, the pharmacists were very delighted and excited to have made such progress so soon.

    With everything about Celestial Pearl Pharmacy falling into ce, Han Shuo then started recruiting staff to manage storage facilities to allow the apprentices of those pharmacists to collect even more medical ingredients. He was ready to open the brand-new Celestial Pearl Pharmacy for business in the City of Shadows.

    It was at this point in time that out of the blue, Donna went to the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy to look for Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo could tell from first nce that Donna appeared much more haggard than before. Her eyes revealed an intense looming gloom as though she was facing an unsolvable problem. She only forced a smile when they met.

    ¡°Long time no see, Donna!¡± Han Shuo sighed in his mind after greeting Donna. He had heard a thing or two about the recent conditions in the House of Lavers. Avery¡¯s deeds had severely affected the House of Lavers. As the House of Sainte lost their trust in them, the Lavers Family began to decline in the City of Shadows.

    Contrary to the miserable state of the House of Lavers, Han Shuo¡¯s Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was rapidly growing and flourishing, even showing early signs of budding into a new family n. Donna¡¯s mood sank into deeper and deeper sadness when she recalled how it was back when Han Shuo had just arrived at the City of Shadows.

    ¡°Congrattions, Bryan. It appears that the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy will be a new powerhouse in the City of Shadows!¡± Donna forced a smile.

    ¡°Thank you, Donna. Is there anything I can help you with? Haha, if you need medicines, given our rtions, I will give you the very best price!¡± Han Shuo assured and patted on his chest. He said it as though the two were still the best of friends.

    Donna shook her head smilingly and replied, ¡°I havee here to say goodbye. I¡¯m going to leave this ce for a long time. We won¡¯t have much opportunity to meet in the future.¡±

    ¡°Why so sudden? Where are you going?¡± Han Shuo was shocked.

    ¡°It¡¯s unlikely that our House of Lavers will aplish much in the City of Shadows. Rather than staying and getting harassed, we might as well leave. Bryan, I¡¯m d to have known you. I was right about you. Truly, I feel very proud of you that you could establish yourself in the City of Shadows in such a short time,¡± Donna said with a smile.

    Han Shuo sighed again after hearing those words. Given the current situation, the House of Lavers indeed had a bleak future in the City of Shadows. Han Shuo did not know how to console Donna who was wearing a saddened face. After keeping silent for a long while, he sighed and said, ¡°Bon voyage, Donna. I will never forget the kindness you have shown me!¡±

    ¡°Goodbye. I hope that the next time we meet, your Celestial Pearl Pharmacy would have reced our House of Lavers¡¯ ce in the City of Shadows to be one of the five major family ns!¡± Donna waved her hand and left.

    Han Shuo was astounded because he felt a veiled resentfulness in her words. He thought to himself, <i>Is she thinking that the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy has risen by stepping on the House of Lavers?</i>

 Chapter 727 - Open for business

    GDK 727: Open for business

    After ages of preparation, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy finally opened for business.

    On that day, representatives from the five major family ns went to congratte Han Shuo. From the House of Sainte were Andre and Erebus; from the House of Kinson, Jiya and her uncle; from the House of Kisa, none other than Rugersey; and from the House of Buller was Tuxi who took the ce of Tuyas. Even the House of Lavers that wasn¡¯t in good rtions with Han Shuo had Diwei attend the opening. He presented Han Shuo with a silk banner.

    All the gentry and elites were at the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy on that day. As to establish good rtions with Han Shuo, therge family ns spared no effort to rally around his business. Thanks to their efforts, the opening ceremony of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was a grand asion.

    Before opening to customers, the pharmacists recruited by Han Shuo had produced medicinesmonly used by Elysians and filled the empty shelves with medicine bottles.

    Han Shuo was very busy the whole day. He had to receive and wee guests from daybreak till nightfall.

    As Han Shuo had not personally refined more pelleted medicines, those that were sold that day were simply ordinary medicines. Although this proved to be somewhat of a disappointment to those representatives fromrge family ns, they had nheless purchased more than four hundred bottles of medicines to boost his sales. The Celestial Pearl Pharmacy gained more than twenty thousand ck crystal coins in profit that day.

    Given this good omen, on top of his outstanding reputation in the City of Shadows, Han Shuo believed that the Celestial Pearl would have a prosperous, profitable future and make him crystal coins by the truckload.

    With everything about the Celestial Pearl moving in perfect orbit, Han Shuo handed Gu Li full responsibility of the production of medicines. Gu Li, who had once despised Han Shuo, was wholly admiring of Han Shuo at this point in time. She was Han Shuo¡¯s most loyal and devoted employee.

    After having delegated the task, Han Shuo had more time to cultivate. He stayed inside the gymnasium and practiced borrowing and using Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy.

    Han Shuo could abruptly amplify his strength by an enormous magnitude and possess immense power by imbuing his body with Cauldron Spirit¡¯s demon general energy, so much so that it would allow him to go up against a highgod. However, as tough and robust as his body was, it couldn¡¯t withstand the energy for extended periods. He had attempted it a dozen times and the longest he couldst was only around three minutes. His demonic infant would start to fail beyond that limit.

    It didn¡¯t take long before Han Shuo realized that borrowing Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy was not the correct path of cultivation. It was only by forging his demonic body, making it even tougher, and making a breakthrough in realm state that he could truly be stronger.

    Although Han Shuo had seen no signs of any imminent breakthrough from the Omen Realm all that while, Han Shuo never cked in his cultivation. After all, he had not spent that much time on it. It was unlikely that he could advance and make progress without spending tens, if not hundreds of years in secluded cultivation.

    The Omen Realm was not the ultimate realm in demonic arts. There were three realms after it ¨C Skybreak Realm, Diablo Realm, and Exalted Demonlord. Gu Tian Xie, at this pinnacle realm called Exalted Demonlord, was able to tear through the fabric of space-time and traverse across universes. Just from some brief description from Cauldron Spirit, Han Shuo could imagine just how mighty the Exalted Demonlord must be.

    Not only did every small advancement require a lengthy amount of cultivation time, Han Shuo also had to endure tremendous risks in each attempt. In fact, when breaking from Omen realm to Skybreak realm, Han Shuo would be faced with a cmity. It was a process that he had no choice but to go through. By then, if he failed to resolve the cmity, not only would his strength never increase any further, his consciousness could be annihted. Han Shuo realized that every step along his cultivation would be apanied by great danger.

    Time flew by rapidly. Han Shuo had secluded himself in the gymnasium for ten years.

    After having gone through so many challenges and crises on Elysium, Han Shuo had made improvements in all aspects of himself to a certain degree. Ten years of meditation allowed him to digest andprehend his experiences. His mind grew calmer and his Omen realm state had be more stabilized.

    Ten years on Elysium was like a snap of the fingers. For the gods living there whose lifespans were in the order of thousands, if not tens of thousands of years, ten years¡¯ time wasn¡¯t all that long.

    After Han Shuo exited from the gymnasium, he got updated with the present-day situation from Gu Li and the others. During the ten years he was in cultivation, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy had made Han Shuo more than a million ck crystal coins. Of the sixteen chain stores he owned, five were open for business. The Celestial Pearl Pharmacy had be the biggest pharmacy business in the City of Shadows.

    During this time, the members of the House of Lavers withdrew from the City of Shadows one after another. The House of Sainte turned a blind eye to their actions. The House of Lavers had, after all, made some contribution to the City of Shadows. Even though Wace detested the Lavers Family, it was in his best interest not to be too cruel, especially when they had not rebelled against his reign.

    Felder obviously understood Wace¡¯s thoughts. He had been keeping watch at the Lavers Residence and maintaining a low-profile while arranging for Donna, Diwei and the others to leave the city with the excuse that they were assigned tasks in remote ces to gain experiences and temper themselves. After having lost the trust of the House of Sainte, the House of Lavers rapidly declined. Within ten short years, the Lavers Family lost their prestige and reputation as one of the five major family ns in the City of Shadows. Even some members of smaller family ns dared confront the House of Lavers head-on.

    However, Felder did not mind any of this. He most patiently endured all the pain and insults while sending members of his Lavers Family away using all sorts of methods.

    This action of Felder¡¯s seemed to be in line with Wace¡¯s intentions. He never stopped or obstructed these measures as though he had tacitly approved of it. The emergence of a small crack between tworge family ns could easily destroy the friendship they had taken decades of exhausting work to build. Wace simply could not forgive them for Avery had nearly taken Carmelita¡¯s life.

    After Avery went missing, the position of the Chief of Fifth Corps was left vacant. The remaining three major family ns all showed immense interest in taking that post. Even the smaller family ns, considering it as an opportunity for them to soar towards sess, had tried various means to obtain this position from the House of Sainte.

    To be fair towards all family ns, Wace named a single condition ¨C whoever wished to take that position had to exchange it with Avery¡¯s head!

    Avery had disappeared for many years. No one knew where he went. After hearing this condition set by Wace, all the family ns in the City of Shadows had taken painstaking efforts to locate Avery but none had made any progress in all those years. Therefore, the position as the Chief of the Fifth Corps, even though coveted by many, remained vacant.

    After learning of the recent happenings in the City of Shadows, seeing that his Celestial Pearl was functioning properly, with the fact that he had properly established himself in the City of Shadows, in addition to the fact that he had spent ages on Elysium, Han Shuo decided that it was time for him to return to Profound Continent and bring thosedies he could not part with to live on Elysium with him.

    For the time being, Han Shuo had no enemies in the City of Shadows. By relying on the financial power of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy and his rtions with the House of Sainte, Han Shuo was confident that the safety of his lovers would be assured. Given just how intensely the elemental energies could be found on Elysium, with all so many sources of reference about advancing to godhood, with all the resources avable on this material ne, cultivating on Elysium would be hundreds of times fasterpared to cultivating on Profound Continent.

    Emily, Phoebe, and the others were rtively powerful on Profound Continent. Han Shuo believed that after they arrived in the City of Shadows, they would be able to make rapid progress in this superior environment. Havinge to this decision, Han Shuo made preparations to head to that internar transportation facility he arrived using to return to Profound Continent.

    Before departing, Han Shuo took a trip to the Sainte Residence specifically to visit Carmelita as she hadpletely recovered from her injuries.

    Han Shuo had a shock when he met Carmelita again. After ten years¡¯ time, her skin had turned fair and she lost that sinister, ferocious appearance. There were still some speckles visible on her skin but they had almostpletely faded. Although Carmelita was still nowhere near a beauty, the word ugly was no longer fitting to describe her looks.

    Carmelita was very happy to see Han Shuo. She patted on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulder excitedly and said casually, ¡°You rascal, I have gone to the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy to look for you multiple times, but who knew that you would be cultivating all this time. Look at me, can you see any difference?¡±

    ¡°You have be prettier!¡± Han Shuo said sincerely.

    ¡°Haha, that¡¯s what everybody said! Bryan, thank you. You haven¡¯t just saved me twice, you¡¯ve fixed my damn face. I can be normal now. I don¡¯t know how I could ever repay you,¡± Carmelita saidughingly.

    ¡°That¡¯s what friends are for!¡± Han Shuo replied smilingly. After conversing for some time and catching up with each other, Han Shuo finally revealed, ¡°I¡¯m going to leave Elysium and it might be a while before I return.¡±

    ¡°Huh?¡± Carmelita cried out in surprise. ¡°Where are you going?¡±

    ¡°My homeworld, to bring some people here! Hehe, Elysium is the most suitable ce to cultivate. I have been living well here and it¡¯s not right for me to neglect my friends back in that world! I may have been powerless to defend myself on Elysium before, but now that I have finally gained a small footing, it¡¯s time to help those friends of mine!¡± Han Shuo could not restrain the longing in his heart when he recalled Emily, Phoebe, and the others.

    ¡°You are quite a sentimental person, aren¡¯t you? Well, unfortunately, my father has recently been rather pressing on me to cultivate, or else I would head there with you, just for fun. But I know that the little girl has some serious strength. You should be fine with her around you,¡± Carmelita said smilingly.

    ¡°Oh, that reminds me, why is it that the internar transportation matrices are built so far away from the city?¡± asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°For us Elysians, those in other material nes are merely ves for providing us the power of faith and on a normal day, we rarely travel to other material nes and therefore do not use internar transportation facilities often. In addition, we believe that those who arrive on Elysium should ovee some challenges toe to big cities. Therefore, internar transportation facilities tend to be located in remote and deste valleys far from the city,¡± Carmelita exined.

    Han Shuo grimaced after hearing the reasoning. He understood that to the Elysians, those from low-level material nes were only worthy of being their servants. They were born with a sense of superiority.

    Under most circumstances, those leaving the ne of Gods would be trying to conquer other material nes to acquire the power of faith. Although Elysium was vast, the Elysians were willing to waste time traveling. They considered it a part of steeling themselves and were fine with cing the internar transportation matrices far from the cities. This would also allow outsiders who first arrived on Elysium to learn not to expect the royal treatment they would get in the lower level material nes they originated from.

    After conversing with Carmelita, Han Shuo left the Sainte Residence, returned to the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, spent two days preparing for the journey, and set off with Andrina.

    Andrina¡¯s strength was overwhelmingly powerful. Han Shuo believed that most problems he would face throughout the journey could be resolved with Andrina alone. Even if he were toe across godhunters the level of Brovst, Andrina could easily take Han Shuo to safety.

    In addition, Han Shuo would be returning to Elysium with his friends and girlfriends. With Andrina¡¯s protection, their journey to the City of Shadows would be much safer.

    Han Shuo and Andrina exited the City of Shadows and headed towards the valley where that internar transportation facility was located. Andrina was very curious about Profound Continent and all throughout the journey, she had been asking Han Shuo everything about that material ne. It was rather annoying to Han Shuo.

    They came across several godhunters scattered across the mountain ranges. Under Andrina¡¯s unforgiving hands, not a single one of those godhunters managed to escape. They all died to Andrina.

    ¡°You seem unsympathetic when attacking godhunters. Do you have animosity with them?¡± Han Shuo asked Andrina puzzlingly after they traversed across a mountain range.

    For all that time that Han Shuo had been in contact with Andrina, he had never seen her kill anyone so viciously. She declined to kill even when Han Shuo tempted her with crystal coins. However, when Han Shuo first met Andrina in the Greenfire Swamp, he had seen her hunt and kill godhunters. From the fact that Andrina was hunted by the leaders of the godhunters, Han Shuo deduced that she must be especially hated and feared by the godhunters. And from Andrina¡¯s performance, Han Shuo could tell that Andrina felt a deeply ingrained resentment towards the godhunters.

    ¡°They deserve death!¡± Andrina¡¯s face immediately turned ice-cold after hearing Han Shuo mention godhunters.

    ¡°You have grudges with them?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    Andrina nodded. But when she saw that Han Shuo was going to ask more questions, she hastily said, ¡°This has nothing to do with you, so don¡¯t ask so many questions!¡± She took a short pause before she continued softly, ¡°Besides, I have not asked you much about your secrets!¡±

    Han Shuo forced a smile, nodded, and kept his mouth shut.

    They hastened on with their journey. As the two could travel at extraordinary speeds, they had spent just a little more than two months to arrive at that internar transportation facility Han Shuo had previously used.

    In order to use the internar transportation facility, he had to pay sufficient crystal coins.

    After arriving in the valley, Han Shuo soon met Jeff who had helped him with obtaining a divine tablet. However,pared to his cordial attitude before, Jeff now had obviously be much colder.

    When Jeff heard Han Shuo say that he wanted to use the internar transportation facility, he replied in a snide manner, ¡°I hear you have been doing very well in the City of Shadows recently. But you seem to have forgotten who it was that helped you with everything when you first arrived on Elysium. This ce may be far from the city, but we still hear most of the news from there. We pay a lot of attention to the ingratitude of a certain person...¡± After a short pause, Jeff put on a derisive smile and said, ¡°My apologies, for now, the transportation matrix only epts arrivals and doesn¡¯t take departures. You will have to wait.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s face turned cold and he asked, ¡°When is it going to take departures?¡±

    ¡°Can¡¯t say for sure. That¡¯s up to Lord Dolores,¡± Jeff saidzily.

    Dolores was Doloxes¡¯ older brother. Han Shuo had nearly killed Doloxes on the first day he arrived at the Lavers Residence. Obviously, people in the valley were aware of the events that urred in the City of Shadows. Unfortunately for Han Shuo, the story they knew of was one-sided. They had no idea about Doloxes¡¯ despicable actions and had no idea that Avery had tried to assassinate him twice.

    From these people¡¯s point of view, the House of Lavers had been very considerate and had organized things for him before he arrived on Elysium. But who knew that after Han Shuo arrived in the City of Shadows, not only would he not make any contribution to the House of Lavers, he stood against them. Therefore, they considered Han Shuo as an ungrateful little parasite who kicked his benefactor in the teeth.

    ¡°Take me to Dolores. I want to talk to him!¡± Han Shuo shouted coldly while forcefully repressing the fury in his heart.

    ¡°Hehe, Lord Dolores is busy and hasn¡¯t got time for you. Besides, I have better things to do than to chauffeur you around. Beat it,¡± Jeff was obviously trying to make things difficult for Han Shuo and said mockingly.

    Jeff used to make things difficult for Han Shuo when he first arrived on Elysium and Han Shuo had put up with him. But unexpectedly, he had yet again posed an obstacle when Han Shuo tried to return to Profound Continent. This made Han Shuo furious.

    <i>Pa!</i> Han Shuo gave Jeff a big smack in the face. A trail of blood flowed from the corner of Jeff¡¯s mouth after the loud p. He stumbled and fell to the floor.

    ¡°How, how dare you strike me!¡± Jeff immediately ran and shrieked, ¡°Help! Someone is trying to kill me!¡±

    Han Shuo sneered and went after him. <i>Pow!</i> Han Shuo threw a kick at the shouting Jeff and sent him flying. He broke multiple bones when he finally crashed on the ground.

    Soon enough, a group of divine guards, with Dolores taking the lead, rushed to the scene. He wore a chilling and murderous face when he said, ¡°No matter how influential you are in the City of Shadows, if you attack my people at my ce, I have the right to arrest you!¡±

    Han Shuo knew that after the incident at the Lavers Residence, Dolores would not be kind towards Han Shuo like he was before. Han Shuo also knew that Jeff would only be so daring and obnoxious to him because of Dolores.

    ¡°I want to use the internar transportation matrix but he impeded me on purpose. He was asking for it,¡± with a grin on his face, Han Shuo took out the emblem of the House of Sainte from his space ring and shed it at the divine guards. He said, ¡°I believe you all should recognize that this is the emblem of the House of Sainte. Please switch on the internar transportation matrix and let me leave. Otherwise, you will be going against the House of Sainte. You should know the consequences of doing so.¡±

    Given that it was no longer possible to befriend Dolores and that Jeff had fired the first shot, Han Shuo decided not to be polite.

    Dolores red at Han Shuo intensely for a moment before taking a deep breath. He raised a hand, and shouted in a deep voice, ¡°Let him pass!¡±

    Under the gazes of the divine guards, Han Shuo swaggeringly left using the internar transportation matrix. After Han Shuo disappeared, Dolores cracked a grin and instructed, ¡°Jeff, grab a few of those prisoners on death row and transmit them to that coordinate.¡±

    ¡°Wise move, my Lord!¡± Jeff was ted and he eagerly went with a few men to execute Dolores¡¯ instructions.

 Chapter 728 - Returning home with honor

    GDK 728: Returning home with honor

    **Profound Continent.

    There were no obvious changes in the environment. The ocean around the Cemetery of Death was still as blue as the sky. Ocean breezes gently blew across his face. The air was refreshing. However, as the elemental energies found on this material ne were just too sparsepared to on Elysium, Han Shuo needed a while to adapt to it.

    ¡°The elemental energies are really thin,¡± Andrina creased her eyebrows and remarked after walking out from the Cemetery of Death, carefully analyzing the surroundings with her eyes closed.

    ¡°This ce is no Elysium. If the elemental energies here weren¡¯t as low as it is now, there would be a lot more gods in this material ne,¡± said Han Shuo. He expanded his consciousness and immediately gained a clear glimpse of his surrounding conditions. He suddenlyughed out cheerfully and said, ¡°Come, let¡¯s head to my city!¡±

    The two took to the air and flew towards Brettel City of Lancelot Empire.

    Half a dayter, Han Shuo and Andrina appeared on the streets of Brettel City. A live, miniaturized scene of the entire Brettel City was projected into Han Shuo¡¯s mind as soon as he was in the vicinity of the city.

    Brettel City seemed to have grown even more prosperous and busy. Every street was packed with horses, carriages, people, and activities. There were a plethora of goods being sold.

    A sense of familiarity and homing rose from his heart when he again walked the streets of Brettel City. Han Shuo headed towards the City Lord¡¯s Mansion with Andrina.

    Brettel City had undergone an enormous transformation during the several dozen years Han Shuo had been away. The City Lord¡¯s mansion was built right at the center of the city. There were squadrons of knights in dark armor proudly standing guard around all sides of the mansion.

    Han Shuo¡¯s return had caused a mor in the City Lord¡¯s mansion. All his acquaintances gathered at the mansion upon receiving news of his return. They would express to Han Shuo their excitement in their own unique ways.

    Jack and Dorcas had obviously aged somewhat. As they did not spend time cultivating in edictal forces or elemental energies, they had grown to be middle-aged men. Jack¡¯s kid was even old enough to serve in the military and he was now serving as a knight under Brettel City.

    Helen, however, remained as beautiful as always. She had consumed a Rebirth Pill which had preserved her youthfulness. She had advanced to be a Fire Sacred Magus. There was a dazzling halo around her head.

    Soon enough, all those characters Han Shuo had been most familiar with arrived. With Dick delivering the news, it did not take long before Emily, Phoebe, Fanny, Jasper, and a long list of females rushed to the mansion via transportation facilities in various big cities.

    Thedies wept emotionally when they finally reunited with Han Shuo after all those years. They would call Han Shuo an unfeeling person.

    After spending some time consoling them, thesedies who possessed extraordinary statuses in Lancelot Empire finally regained control over their minds that were thrown into chaos. They then started conversing with Han Shuo.

    Just as expected, the Lancelot Empire became the mightiest nation on Profound Continent. The Oden Empire, Brut Merchant Alliance, and Kasi Empire had all been annexed. Lawrence¡¯s dream of uniting Profound Continent under his rule was now a reality.

    Following the ords, what remained of the Church of Light and Shrine of Ice retreated to remote and destends. They no longer recruited for more disciples and no longer conducted any religious activities on Profound Continent. During the several dozen years, they exited the stage that was Profound Continent.

    Nowadays, in the Lancelot Empire, there were only followers of the Druidic Order, Cmity Church, and a great majority who worshiped and prayed to Han Shuo. The new situation on Profound Continent was ideal in every way.

    Gilbert, Stratholme the old monster, the Emperor of mes, Elizabeth, Sanguis, Bonds, Trunks, and others had also rushed to the mansion after receiving the news.

    Han Shuo gathered with these people he was familiar with at thergest hall of the City Lord¡¯s Mansion.

    ¡°My friends, I¡¯m really happy that we could all meet again and gather here after so many years. Today, we shall drink till we pass out!¡± Han Shuo gave a toast.

    The party went on for three days. After the crowd sobered up from the hangover, Han Shuo finally began talking business. He slowly exined the differences between Profound Continent and Elysium to everyone, ¡°The elemental energy on Profound Continent is too thin and scant in all kinds of resources. Its inhabitants are primitive in the cultivation of elemental energies.¡±

    The crowd carefully listened to Han Shuo¡¯s words. It was the very first time most of these people were learning that there were other worlds out there in this vast universe. Many were astounded to learn that the elemental energies on Elysium were intense and gods weremon.

    ¡°I have returned to Profound Continent not to stay and will be leaving again soon. This time after I leave, I probably won¡¯t being back. Elysium is the most suitable ce in the universe for cultivation. I currently own a considerable business in that world and can ensure your safety. If anyone of you wishes to pursue greater strength, tell me and I will take you along to Elysium,¡± Han Shuo said in a deep voice.

    Several dozen years were just too long for an average mortal, and especially so for those who did not spend time and effort on cultivating. These people had put most of their efforts on procreation and raising their young. There were just too many friends and families on Profound Continent that they could not part with. Han Shuo reasoned that some might not be willing to move to the other side of the universe with him.

    ¡°Master, wherever you go, I¡¯ll follow!¡± Gilbert immediately dered his stance. He did not hesitate for a moment.

    Right after Gilbert, Stratholme the old monster, the Emperor of mes, Elizabeth, Bonds, Sanguis, and the others whose minds were fixed on obtaining greater strengths excitedly dered that they were willing to leave to the alien world with Han Shuo.

    These characters did not have too many things they were unwilling to part with on Profound Continent. Their minds were staunchly fixed on bing stronger and they had made up their minds as soon as they heard that Elysium was the most suitable ce for cultivation.

    Although Fanny, Emily, Phoebe, Helen, Lisa, and a few other women of Han Shuo¡¯s had families on Profound Continent that they were unwilling to part with, thesedies were more unwilling to be away from Han Shuo. Therefore, after a moment of hesitation, they too agreed to go with Han Shuo but with the condition that they will be given time to say goodbyes to their families.

    Characters like Dorcas and Jack, however, as their goals differed from Han Shuo¡¯s, in addition to the fact that they have wives and children in Brettel City, after spending some time in contemtion, they decided to stay. Trunks who had gotten his vengeance was currently in possession of enormous resources and influence in the Sunshine Valley and the Dark Forest. He had a daughter with J the bandit. He too could not part with his possessions and families in this world and therefore decided to stay.

    After getting a headcount, Han Shuo gave everyone three months to make all the preparations necessary to depart. They were to gather at Brettel City after three months. If they were absent at that time, they would be considered as having decided to stay.

    Knowing that there wouldn¡¯t be much opportunity to meet with Han Shuo in the future, those friends of Han Shuo¡¯s who had decided to stay on Profound Continent did not leave Brettel City but spent as much time and imbibed in as much booze as they could with Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo handed the cultivation items he bought on Elysium to his friends who would remain on Profound Continent. These items included the Origin Crystals as well as other keys to bing gods. These items that were priceless on Profound Continent were given away most charitably.

    Although Han Shuo had originally intended to hand them to Emily and the others, he thought that his friends staying on Profound Continent would have more use for them as these items could easily be purchased on Elysium.

    There will always be some sorrow in goodbyes and many decided to get drunk to numb the pain. For more than two months, the City Lord¡¯s Mansion of Brettel City was filled with the stinging scent of alcohol. The fragrance of fine wine could be sniffed from several miles away. Drunken bigwigs could be seen going in and out from the mansion, causing the civilians to raise an eyebrow.

    Han Shuo then found time to visit Ossen City to say farewell to King Lawrence of Lancelot Empire. Lawrence was saddened by Han Shuo¡¯s impending departure. However, as the entire Profound Continent was now under his grasp, having Han Shuo around or not didn¡¯t make that much of a difference to his reign. Lawrence, unable to persuade Han Shuo to stay, said his goodbye to Han Shuo most unwillingly.

    Candice, Emma, Graeae, Pegasus, and Ayermike Cotton, upon hearing about Elysium, asked Han Shuo to bring them along. Although they were already at the pinnacle on Profound Continent, as people who pursued greater strength tirelessly, they obviously wouldn¡¯t let this opportunity go. They hastily made their preparations and rushed to Brettel City.

    ***Three monthster.

    Gilbert, Stratholme the old monster, the Emperor of mes, Elizabeth, Bonds, Sanguis, Emily, Fanny, Candide, Emma, Graeae, Pegasus, Ayermike Cotton, and the others gathered at Brettel City. With Jack, Trunks, and the others waving them goodbye, they followed behind Han Shuo in flying towards the Cemetery of Death at the Boundless Sea.

    As all these people who were going with Han Shuo were people seeking for strength, they all had the ability to fly, which was very convenient. After seven days, the party finally arrived at the ind where the Cemetery of Death was located.

    ¡°We have visitors!¡± Andrina gasped before softly warning Han Shuo when they were about to descend on the ind.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart jolted and he immediately expanded his consciousness. Right away, he detected that there were five midgods inside the Cemetery of Death. Han Shuo was rather surprised.

    ¡°You bunch be careful and stick together!¡± Han Shuo turned around and softly instructed the party. None of these people heading to Elysium with Han Shuo had even reached lowgod realm. They would bepletely helpless in a battle against existences of such level.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡± asked Stratholme.

    ¡°There could be enemies. Their strengths are way beyond yours. But you don¡¯t have to worry for Andrina and I are here. If they show the slightest trace of evil intention, they will be dead without a doubt!¡± Han Shuo exined. He asked Andrina to protect the others before he gradually descended on the ind alone.

    ¡°Haha... We have waited for you for three months. You have finally returned!¡± a boorish voice came from the center of the Cemetery of Death.

    Shortly after, a group of five flew out and revealed themselves. It was obvious from their looks that they had no good intentions in their minds. There were unconcealed intentions to brutally murder showing in their eyes as they stared at Han Shuo and smiled sinisterly.

    Han Shuo¡¯s face turned cold. He shouted, ¡°Who are you?¡±

    ¡°Youngster, I don¡¯t know who you are, nor do I care. We were destined to die but for whatever reason, someone transmitted us to this low-level material ne. Hehe, that special someone told us that there is only one lowgod on this low-level material ne. We would be hunted and be killed if we return to Elysium but on this material ne, nobody could touch us. We could do whatever we want, that is, of course, after we finish you,¡± the leader of the party of five said while looking at Han Shuo with a malevolent smile. When he then noticed Emily, Fanny and thedies standing behind Han Shuo, heughed excitedly and remarked, ¡°Not bad, although the people on this material ne are weak, thedies look very tasty. It¡¯s been a long time since my brothers and I had contact with females. This is wonderful!¡±

    ¡°Dolores sent you here, didn¡¯t he?¡± Han Shuo wore a dark face as he sized up the gang with a sharp gaze. He quickly managed to deduce the course of events.

    ¡°Hehe, it doesn¡¯t matter. From this day forth, we will be the rulers of this material ne. Youngster, consider yourself unlucky!¡± that man said as heughed. Those midgods standing behind him were leering at Emily and thedies with sinister eyes.

    ¡°You keep them safe, let me y this trash!¡± before Han Shuo could say a word, Andrina, who resented characters of this sort, had charged forward.

    ¡°Hehe, it¡¯s a little girl. I like, I like! Brothers, she is mine!¡± an old man in ragged clothes who cultivated in the energy of darkness rubbed his hands excitedly when he saw Andrina fly towards them.

    As the energy Andrina cultivated in did not belong to any of the twelve fundamental forces and she was skilled at concealing her aura, the gang of five had no idea just how lethal Andrina was.

    ¡°Leave one alive!¡± Han Shuo hastily reminded Andrina charging forward with a chilling face.

    ¡°I know!¡± Andrina replied in an annoyed manner and proceeded with charging at the gang. Though it may have appeared that Andrina was a powerless sheep running towards a group of savage tigers, the reality was very much on the contrary. A burst of splendid radiance flew out from her petite body and transformed into five small vortexes which abruptly affected each of the five of them.

    With no surprise, they were all minced into fine chunks of flesh that rained down with their blood, except for the boorish leader of the gang who was only skinned. Every inch of his body was covered with blood as he gazed at Andrina with frightened eyes and shrieked, ¡°Spare me, spare my life!¡±

    ¡°Is it Dolores?¡± Han Shuo, who was standing a distance away, asked calmly after taking the four divine souls into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know who Dolores is, but it was an old man called Jeff who sent me here!¡± that man replied and begged, ¡°Please spare me, we have no quarrels with each other!¡±

    ¡°Alright, he can go now,¡± Han Shuo said without a trace of mercy in his voice as he gestured with his hand. Han Shuo now knew who was behind the havoc.

    <i>St!</i> The person exploded. His flesh and blood sttered everywhere.

    Those mortals like Ayermike Cotton and Stratholme watching behind Han Shuo were stupefied. As the gang of five did not conceal any of their terrifying auras, Ayermike Cotton and the others had trouble breathing in their presence. And yet, Andrina, who looked like a normal little girl, finished them off with seemingly no effort. They were greatly astounded.

    ¡°Oh no, the internar transportation matrix has been wrecked!¡± Andrina suddenly cried out in surprise.

    ¡°What?!¡± Han Shuo jolted and shrieked.

 Chapter 729 - A forgotten person

    GDK 729: A forgotten person

    The Cemetery of Death was in aplete mess. The internar transportation matrix was wrecked and most definitely unable to conduct internar transmission.

    It appeared that the gang of five was afraid that those from Elysium might pursue them and therefore, for good measure, destroyed the internar transportation matrix as soon as they arrived on Profound Continent. Without an internar transportation matrix, it would be extremely difficult to get to Profound Continent from Elysium. Perhaps even their worst enemies would give up on pursuing them.

    Without anyone who could keep them in check, after getting rid of Han Shuo, the gang of five would be able to do anything they wanted on Profound Continent and nobody could stop them. Destroying the internar transportation matrix was an excellent choice for the gang.

    This, however, was a nightmare for Han Shuo. Without an internar transportation matrix, how would Han Shuo be able to bring his friends and women who had not even attained lowgod status to Elysium?

    Having extraordinary strength was the minimum requirement for one to conduct internar trekking. Not only would one run into all kinds of dangers during the journey, but one could also very easily lose their way and end up lost in the infinitely vast universe. Even Han Shuo did not have the confidence to conduct internar trekking, much less to carry a group of weak mortals with him.

    Han Shuo was pained by the scene before him. Making a grimace, he asked Andrina, ¡°Do you happen to know how to build an internar transportation matrix?¡±

    Andrina shook her head before she gnashed her teeth and remarked coldly, ¡°That Dolores is such a horrible person. He was obviously trying to get you killed and even if that failed, you still wouldn¡¯t be able to return to Elysium. Such a malicious person!¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s the point of saying this? Great. Without an internar transportation matrix, returning to Elysium will be nearly impossible,¡± Han Shuo said dejectedly.

    Stratholme and the others were all in despair. They had gotten very excited after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s description of Elysium and were eager to head to that world. But after hearing those words, all their hopes and dreams were pounded into disappointment and grief. They couldn¡¯t help but sigh dispiritedly.

    ¡°Is there any other way?¡± Ayermike asked softly.

    ¡°Internar trekking is just too dangerous. Even I have no certainty of surviving it, let alone when I¡¯m bringing you lot. I guess only Andrina has the confidence to perform internar trekking. We are in real big trouble!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, how about this, the two of us will leave Profound Continent and try our luck with finding other material nes nearby. They might have an internar transportation matrix that we could use to return to Elysium. We can then take a trip to the Space Dominion and invite a god cultivating in the edict of space to refine an internar transportation matrix. After that, we will find a way to return to Profound Continent and take them to Elysium. What do you think?¡± Andrina proposed after thinking for a moment. She believed that this was the only option.

    ¡°That¡¯s too difficult. Not only is it risky and challenging, but it¡¯s also going to take a whole lot of time,¡± Han Shuo bunched his brows and replied.

    ¡°Then, do you have a better idea?¡± asked Andrina.

    Han Shuo shook his head, put on a grimace and said, ¡°It seems that this is indeed the only way. Well, I will have to look for those in the Druidic Order. There was a guy who once came to Profound Continent by internar trekking. They might know the pathway.¡±

    ¡°Knowing that will definitely help,¡± Andrina nodded before shemented, ¡°What a pity that there is no expert cultivating in the edict of space in this material ne. Otherwise, there could be a way to fix the internar transportation matrix.¡±

    Han Shuo who was about to head to the Druidic Order stared nkly for a moment after hearing those words. His eyes suddenly lit up and heughed out loud, saying, ¡°There could be a way!¡±

    ¡°What?¡± asked the puzzled Andrina.

    Back then when Han Shuo had fought the Light Pope, he had snatched a Holy Grail from him. McKinley, whose soul was trapped in the Holy Grail, was an expert in the edict of space. As Han Shuo had been rather busy all the while, he had neglected and even forgotten about McKinley. It was after listening to Andrina¡¯s words that he recalled the space edict cultivator.

    From his space ring, Han Shuo took out the Holy Grail he snatched from the Light Pope andmunicated with McKinley using his consciousness, ¡°Good day, McKinley, how are you?¡±

    ¡°You rascal! It¡¯s been such a long time since youst looked for me!¡± McKinley immediately started scolding Han Shuo. He then asked, ¡°Why have you finally thought of me?¡±

    Han Shuo listened to McKinley¡¯s grumbling before replying him in a flustered manner, ¡°Erm, well, I need your help!¡±

    If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that Han Shuo needed an expert cultivating in the edict of space, McKinley might still be far off from Han Shuo¡¯s mind even till now. Han Shuo had obviously failed to honor his promise to relieve McKinley of boredom every once in a while.

    ¡°I knew it, you wouldn¡¯t have thought of me if you didn¡¯t need me! Hmph!¡± McKinley expressed his dissatisfaction. It was after a while that he asked, ¡°Speak, what¡¯s the matter?¡±

    ¡°Someone destroyed the only internar transportation matrix in this material ne. As a cultivator of the edict of space, can you fix it?¡± Han Shuo hastily replied.

    McKinley obviously grew excited after hearing this. He did not immediately answer Han Shuo¡¯s question but asked pressingly, ¡°Why? Are you leaving the Profound Continent for Elysium? Haha, if you really are going to Elysium, you must bring me to the Space Dominion to meet a person. At that time, there might be a way to locate my divine body!¡±

    ¡°Ee... Yes, I am!¡± Han Shuo dared not tell McKinley that he had actually been to the Elysium and back lest he frustrated McKinley. Back then, McKinley had entreated Han Shuo piteously to bring him to the Space Dominion if Han Shuo were to travel to Elysium. Although Han Shuo had promised to do so, he had forgotten about McKinley¡¯s existence after arriving at Elysium and therefore did not fulfill the promise.

    ¡°You really are going to Elysium?¡± McKinley was incredibly excited as it was only on Elysium that something could be done about his current predicament.

    ¡°Yes I¡¯m going there. Can you fix the internar transportation matrix?¡± Han Shuo asked rather impatiently.

    ¡°That depends on how badly it has been damaged. But even if it¡¯s shattered, as long as you can find me sufficient materials, I can still build a new one for you!¡± McKinley said confidently. ¡°I¡¯m a highgod of space. Back in the Space Dominion, I was a prolific character. Making an internar transportation matrix for a small little material ne is an absolute piece of cake!¡±

    Han Shuo was ted to hear those words. He asked, ¡°The remains of the matrix are right ahead. How do we proceed?¡±

    ¡°ce the grail in the matrix. I can sense its condition through the remnants of space edicts on the transportation matrix,¡± replied McKinley.

    Without hesitation, Han Shuo, sping the Holy Grail, carefully ced it on the destroyed internar transportation matrix.

    ¡°Bryan, who is the divine soul inside the grail?¡± Andrina asked with a grave expression and said softly, ¡°This person has a powerful divine soul and should have reachedte-stage highgodhood. When did youe to know such a terrifying person?¡±

    Given Andrina¡¯s extraordinary strength, it was normal that she could sense McKinley¡¯s existence from the energy fluctuations produced when Han Shuo and McKinleymunicated with their souls.

    ¡°He is a most unlucky space edict cultivator whose divine soul was separated from his divine body soon after he reachedte-stage highgod realm. Not only did they imprison his soul in the grail, but they even cast him from Elysium to this material ne. I only obtained this grail by chance,¡± Han Shuo exined smilingly.

    ¡°How could someone ofte-stage highgod strength be turned to this? Who did he offend?¡± Andrina was astonished. Experts ofte-stage highgod strength were all outstanding and well-known characters on Elysium.

    ¡°I remember he said he had offended one of the Keepers of the Light, Gy¨¢l,¡± Han Shuo replied after taking a second to recall.

    ¡°Gy¨¢l!¡± Andrina froze and her gaze towards the Holy Grail was filled with shock. She exined to Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan, Gy¨¢l is one of the most formidable experts in the Light Dominion. The Keepers of the Light are all iparably mighty. If Gy¨¢l had personally sealed him in the grail, then this person can¡¯t just be an insignificant character. What is his name?¡±

    ¡°McKinley,¡± replied Han Shuo.

    ¡°It¡¯s him!¡± Andrina received yet another shock. Under Han Shuo¡¯s puzzled gazes, Andrina exined, ¡°This person was a very renowned character in the Space Dominion. He is incredibly powerful and queer in temper. He had been missing for tens of thousands of years. So, Gy¨¢l imprisoned him here. No wonder.¡±

    ¡°How is it that you are so familiar with everything about Elysium?¡± Han Shuo asked while staring at Andrina foolishly.

    ¡°Erm, I have been alive much longer than you have. Of course I know more things than you do. Besides, many on Elysium know about these things. There¡¯s nothing strange about this!¡±

    ¡°Then why is it that I have heard nothing about this?¡± Han Shuo squinted his eyes and asked, ¡°How many more secrets are you hiding from me?¡±

    ¡°Little boy, just how long have you been living on Elysium? It¡¯d be a wonder if you knew, hehe!¡± teased Andrina.

    ¡°I¡¯m gonna straighten this out with you sooner orter!¡± Han Shuo was annoyed.

    ¡°Sister Fanny, Bryan is bullying me!¡± Andrina cried out in a frail voice.

    Upon hearing those words, Fanny¡¯s angry eyes instantly came ring at Han Shuo. ¡°Bryan, why do you have to mess with a child? Andrina is so adorable and everybody likes her but you always bully her!¡±

    Andrina had been getting along rather well with Han Shuo¡¯s women during her time on Profound Continent. This was especially the case for Fanny, who waspassionate, kind and naive. She had been closest with Andrina among thedies. In thest three months, Fanny had even taken Andrina to visit the entire Profound Continent once. Whenever she saw Han Shuo chide Andrina, she would be the first to step up for Andrina and give Han Shuo a talking-to.

    <i>A child? Her age is probably more than a hundred times yours! </i> Han Shuo forced a smile, discreetly shot a re at Andrina, and kept silent. He knew that as long as Fanny considered her to be a child, any amount of exnation would be futile. How adorably naive of her.

    ¡°Look!¡± Stratholme cried out and attracted the crowd¡¯s attention to the internar transportation matrix.

    The Holy Grail that contained McKinley suddenly produced an intense energy fluctuation. The space started pulsing like ripples propagating on water. Under the effect of a type of bizarre energy, the pieces of internar transportation matrix that was destroyed started to reassemble and reconnect most magically. Soon after, a small-sized internar transportation matrix appeared before the party.

    The party was dumbstruck. They did not expect that McKinley that had been motionless could fix the internar transportation matrix all so suddenly.

    ¡°Most parts of the internar transportation matrix was destroyed. I could only make do with the intact parts. I have fixed the internar transportation matrix but it is now smaller and can only transmit two to three people at once. However, with enough energy stones, you could still safely get to Elysium,¡± McKinley transmitted to Han Shuo from within the Holy Grail.

    ¡°Thank you!¡± Han Shuo said sincerely. Without McKinley¡¯s help, the party would have had to go through so many more twists and turns to reach Elysium.

    ¡°You¡¯re wee. Remember, when you are on Elysium, bring my divine soul to the Space Dominion. Do me this favor and, after I locate my divine body, I will repay you well,¡± McKinley exhorted Han Shuo.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I will remember it this time. After I have settled some matters on Elysium, the first thing I¡¯ll do is head to the Space Dominion and help you with that!¡± Han Shuo immediately pledged. This time, it was truly from the bottom of his heart.

    Han Shuo had more than enough energy stones in his space rings for internar transmissions. As Han Shuo was having a feud with those few in charge of the internar transportation facility in the Darkness Dominion, to ensure everyone¡¯s safety, Han Shuo had Andrina, Fanny, and Emily be the first to go while he operated the shrunken internar transportation matrix.

    The party disappeared before Han Shuo in batches of two to three people after shes of bright light.

    After multiple rounds of transmissions, only Han Shuo and Ayermike were left on Profound Continent. They were thest batch to step into the internar transportation matrix. With a bright sh of light, Han Shuo had finally returned to Elysium.

    ¡°Such intense elemental energy! Oh my, this ce is so suitable for cultivation!¡±

    ¡°Oh, the gravity is so strong, I can¡¯t fly now.¡±

    ¡°This is great! One day of cultivation here is equivalent to one year of cultivation on Profound Continent! Such a magical ce. No wonder there are gods everywhere!¡±

    The mortals from Profound Continent eximed in admiration and surprise as soon as they arrived on Elysium. They had immediately felt how different this world was from Profound Continent.

    Andrina had been talking with Fanny while giggling and exined to her the differences between Elysium and Profound Continent. Fanny was Andrina¡¯s host on Profound Continent but she became rather ufortable after arriving at this unfamiliar world called Elysium. It was now Andrina¡¯s turn to be Fanny¡¯s host.

    ¡°What the hell, a whole bunch of mortals? We are so jinxed!¡± the divine guards on the tform started gossiping when they saw a group of people with meager strengths arrive on Elysium.

    ¡°Head this way, get moving!¡± one of the divine guards loudly instructed. He said foul-mouthed, ¡°Do you bunch think that Elysium is a tourist site? With the strength you have now, instead ofing to Elysium, you might as well go kill yourselves. I truly can¡¯t figure out what the hell is going on in your heads. Are you tired of liv-¡±

    <i>Pow!</i> Before the man could finish his speech, Andrina raised her small hand and pushed it against his chest. He was immediately sent flying into the distance.

    ¡°Cut the crap. One more word and I will kill you!¡± Andrina said with glowering eyes. An immensely mighty aura emanated from her petite figure.

    Andrina had been in a bad mood because she nearly couldn¡¯t return to Elysium. Then, when she heard this noisy bunch of divine guards as soon as she returned, she flipped out.

    ¡°How dare you!¡± The divine guards in the surrounding immediately stepped forward. They surrounded Andrina and her party while pointing their divine weapons at them.

    It was at this moment that Han Shuo walked out from his party with a sneer on his face. He asked, ¡°Where is Dolores? Releasing convicts on death row without permission is punishable by death. Are you tired of living?¡±

    The divine guards recognized Han Shuo and were aware of the dispute between Han Shuo and Dolores. Their expressions changed slightly when Han Shuo suddenly emerged as though they did not anticipate that Han Shuo could safely return to Elysium.

    ¡°Lord Dolores is not around. We do not know where he is,¡± one of the divine guards replied after giving a slight groan. He obviously disliked Han Shuo but as he knew that Han Shuo held some influence in the City of Shadows and had good rtions with the House of Sainte, the divine guard dared not be outrightly rude.

    ¡°Dolores is done for. You guys better fend for yourselves,¡± Han Shuo advised smilingly. Not wanting to bicker with them any further, Han Shuo nodded at Andrina and took the party to the office to apply for a divine tablet.

    ¡°Hello, Jeff. Didn¡¯t expect me to return all well and dandy, did ya? Hehe!¡± Han Shuo grabbed Jeff and immediately dealt him multiple ps on the face, causing him to see stars.

    ¡°What, what are you hitting me for?¡± After finally regaining his senses, Jeff started to shriek loudly. However, even after a round of screaming and shouting, Dolores still didn¡¯t show himself. It appeared that he really was away.

    ¡°Stop talking. Get every one of them a divine tablet. I will deal with you againter,¡± Han Shuo instructed after throwing him a ck crystal coin.

    ¡°No divine tablet for those below basegod strength!¡± Jeff loudly dered while raising his head up high.

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression turned ice cold. He grabbed Jeff by his cor, pulled their faces right next to each other, stared fixedly at his eyes and asked, ¡°Are you sure?¡±

    A shiver traveled down Jeff¡¯s spine and every hair on his body stood on end as he understood that Han Shuo would end his life right then and there. The expression on Jeff¡¯s face immediately humbled and he hastily exined, ¡°It¡¯s not me trying to make things difficult but a divine tablet can¡¯t verify a person¡¯s identity if they do not have at least basegod strength. I¡¯m just a small servant and a nonentity. Please spare me!¡±

 Chapter 730 - Any questions?

    GDK 730: Any questions?

    A divine tablet cannot be made without at least basegod strength? Han Shuo was stunned. From the frightened performance of Jeff, it seemed that he was telling the truth. With that, only a few of them could get a divine tablet made.

    ¡°Then get one for those who can,¡± Han Shuo swung his arm and threw Jeff to his table. Jeff repeatedly nodded in a frightened manner as though afraid that Han Shuo would finish him right away.

    Jeff knew that given Han Shuo¡¯s rtionship with the House of Sainte, with his current position in the City of Shadows, it wouldn¡¯t be much of an issue for Han Shuo to kill a small character like him. Although Jeff was Dolores¡¯ minion, he knew how to adapt to the situation when his life was at threat.

    Stratholme, Ayermike, the Emperor of mes, and a few others very quickly obtained their own divine tablets from Jeff. As for Fanny and the others who had yet to reach basegod strength, Han Shuo decided that it had to be put off until the future.

    Afterpleting the procedures, Jeff carefully handed Han Shuo the exact change. He dared not to utter a word lest he provoked Han Shuo¡¯s anger.

    ¡°Tell me where Dolores is and I will spare your life,¡± instead of receiving the crystal coins, Han Shuo threatened Jeff in a chilling voice.

    ¡°Please spare me, sir. I really have no idea where Dolores is!¡± Jeff cried out in a terrified manner.

    ¡°Bryan, that¡¯s enough,¡± Fanny advised softly.

    Han Shuo lightly groaned and said, ¡°Fine. I¡¯ll let you off for today. But you better be careful for Dolores is finished. I heard that it was you who sent the prisoners to Profound Continent. This is no small crime. Prepare to be punished.¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Han Shuo starting leaving the facility with Andrina and the party in the direction of the City of Shadows.

    After returning to the city, Han Shuo need only speak to Erebus, Andre, or Carmelita about the matter and Dolores and Jeff would pay the price for their deeds. It was only a matter of time before they would get busted and Han Shuo did not mind waiting a little longer to exact their vengeance.

    As the gravity on Elysium was much stronger, most of the people from Profound Continent had lost their ability to fly. Therefore, the party had to travel on foot. This set them back significantly.

    It was also at this point in time that Han Shuo realized he had not been thoughtful enough. In hindsight, he should have bought an airship before bringing them to Elysium. With an airship, they wouldn¡¯t need to spend as much time traveling. It was toote to buy an airship now and they were only sold in big towns. Given the remote cement of the internar transportation facility, they were still a long way from the nearest town.

    But Stratholme and the others were not in a hurry. Having just arrived on Elysium, they were in awe of this new world around them. They eximed in admiration time and time again how vast the Elysium was and its abundance in elemental energies. Even the nts and sceneries fascinated them. Thedies, especially, had taken the journey as a sightseeing trip. They were chattering andughing with each other.

    Three days after Han Shuo left the valley, Dolores returned.

    He was informed of the situation by Jeff. His face turned grave as he remarked hatefully, ¡°This kid is really quite hard to kill. He actually managed to return to Elysium in one piece.¡±

    ¡°My Lord, what should we do? He knows that we have sent prisoners to his material ne. Given his rtionship with the House of Sainte, he just needs to speak and the two of us will be finished!¡± Jeff was panicking. He was truly afraid.

    ¡°What are you losing your head for!¡± Dolores chided. After thinking for a moment with his brows bunched, he asked, ¡°You said that he brought a group of weaklings?¡±

    ¡°Yes, not one of them was a lowgod and only some of them have reached demigod and basegod realm. With strength like that, they wouldn¡¯t even be able to defeat a child,¡± Jeff replied.

    ¡°I see,¡± Dolores sneered, ¡°With this group of burdens weighing him down, he won¡¯t move very fast. All we have to do is figure out a way to prevent him from ever returning to the City of Shadows and we will be fine.¡±

    ¡°My Lord, you mean?¡± Jeff stared nkly for a moment before he asked. Having failed to kill Han Shuo thest time, he knew that Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t be that easy to take care of. After carefully thinking about it, he thought that there wasn¡¯t any unresolvable hatred between him and Han Shuo. He was also afraid of the influence Han Shuo held in the City of Shadows and had actually be rather reluctant to provoke Han Shuo any further.

    ¡°This you can ignore. I will arrange the matter myself,¡± Dolores¡¯ eyes glistened with malicious and chilling rays. He instructed Jeff, ¡°You take care of any troubles in the valley. I will be leaving again.¡± Dolores departed soon after returning to the valley.

    ***Hushveil City: Godswamp Pharmacy headquarters.

    Inside an underground, pitch-dark secret chamber, Avery was meditating. All of a sudden, he was roused. He turned his head and saw that a magical device beside him was shing. Dolores¡¯ figure gradually grew from blurry to clear inside the device.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± Avery asked in a deep voice.

    ¡°Uncle, that fe came back alive,¡± replied Dolores.

    ¡°How is that possible?¡± Avery was shocked. ¡°Even if those prisoners couldn¡¯t kill them, they would have immediately destroyed the internar transportation matrix in that low-level material ne. Without an internar transportation matrix, they should have had great difficulty returning to Elysium. Have you checked the status of the transportation matrix on that material ne?¡±

    ¡°It is sealed. Only those who know the seal could teleport to that transportation matrix,¡± answered Dolores.

    ¡°Huh?!¡± Avery cried out in surprise. ¡°Could it be that they have an expert cultivating in the edict of space? Otherwise, how could they seal an internar transportation matrix?¡±

    ¡°I have no idea,¡± Dolores shook his head.

    ¡°Tell me everything in detail,¡± Avery¡¯s face turned cold and he instructed in a deep voice.

    After Dolores exined everything, Avery sneered, ¡°It¡¯s quite surprising that the youngster would be carrying so much baggage with him. Alright, I know what to do. They would be dead before they could take a step into the City of Shadows.¡± Upon finishing those words, Avery disconnected the call with Dolores. He reconfigured the magical device and a momentter, another person appeared inside the magical device ¨C the master of Godswamp Pharmacy.

    ¡°Hello, Avery. Are you used to staying at my ce?¡± the elderly man who had a head full of white hair asked smilingly.

    ¡°It¡¯s wonderful, thank you for the hospitality, Mister Hassling,¡± Avery first smiled and thanked the elderly man before he put on a solemn expression and said, ¡°I have received intel that Bryan of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy has just returned from a low-level material ne. He had taken over your properties in the City of Shadows. I believe Mister Hassling would be interested in teaching him a lesson?¡±

    ¡°Is that so? Well, go on,¡± Hassling said smilingly.

    After Avery exined to him the situation, he nodded with a slight grin and said, ¡°I see. You may continue resting. Leave this matter to me.¡±

    Hassling disconnected the call with Avery and phoned another person with his magical device. When a blurry figure appeared in the magical mirror, Hassling said, ¡°Brovst, I have something interesting for you. That little girl you are looking for has just left the internar transportation facility of the City of Shadows. Also, if you bring me the head of that youngster Bryan who is traveling with her, I will give you an extra hundred bottles of poison.¡±

    ¡°Consider it done,¡± a deep voice sounded from the magical device and Hassling was disconnected before the person¡¯s appearance was clearly disyed.

    ¡°Meddle in my business? Young man, it¡¯s not cheap to take away things that belong to me and you shall pay for it ¨C with your life!¡± Hassling said to himself, wearing a grin.

    ***

    ¡°Elysium is really big. We have taken more than seven days just to cross a valley,¡± remarked Phoebe. The crowd from Profound Continent agreed to those words as they all came to recognize just how immense Elysium was. They had gradually adapted to the new environment as they traveled.

    However, some of them remained very self-restrained. People like Graeae, Pegasus, and a few others could be considered the cr¨¨me de cr¨¨me of experts back on Profound Continent with basically no rivals. But after arriving on Elysium, all those they met along the way were all at least lowgods. The aura emanating from the lowgods made them instinctively terrified and intimidated. They stuck closely behind Han Shuo like glue.

    ¡°Yes. This material ne is incredibly vast. Even a small valley is bigger than the territories held by the Lancelot Empire. We need to hurry to the nearest town to buy an airship. Otherwise, at the rate we are going, we won¡¯t reach the City of Shadows for another year or two,¡± said Han Shuo.

    ¡°Bryan, are godhunters really that awful?¡± asked Fanny. She had heard Han Shuo briefly describe godhunters and she felt frightened when she thought of those gods who specifically hunted for other gods.

    ¡°The godhunters are a special bunch of jerks on Elysium. They raise their own strengths by hunting and killing others and are the most abominable of all. I¡¯m going to kill everyst one I find!¡± Andrina said hatefully.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, godhunters wouldn¡¯t be interested in you people. As none of you have reached lowgod realm, without divine energy in your body, they wouldn¡¯t think about attacking you,¡± Han Shuo consoled Fanny.

    ¡°Well, doesn¡¯t that mean that we aren¡¯t even qualified to be hunted?¡± Stratholme sighed with a grimace. He shook his head and sighed, ¡°We¡¯ve been living under a rock all this time. I know that this world is filled with powerful experts, but still, that¡¯s such a huge blow to my psyche!¡±

    ¡°Calm down. Every one of you here has amply demonstrated yourself to be astonishingly talented in cultivation to have worked towards this stage even in an environment as poor as Profound Continent. Now that you are here on Elysium, with me providing crystal coins, resources and shelter, given the intense elements in this world, your powers will improve very rapidly. I know it won¡¯t be long before every one of you is a lowgod,¡± Han Shuo assured Stratholme.

    This was also the reason behind Han Shuo sparing no effort in bringing them to Elysium. Given their aptitude, aftering to this environment more suitable for cultivation, they would strive even harder to be stronger. With Han Shuo¡¯s backing, they would surely make rapid improvement in their strengths. Perhaps in the future, they might be the main powers behind Han Shuo¡¯s future family n.

    After a month, the party finally crossed the valley. Weekster, they entered a mountain range which was much bigger than the valley they previously exited. However, the good news was that after crossing this mountain range, they would find a decently sized town where they likely could purchase an airship.

    After a few days of traveling into the mountain range, Han Shuo, using his demon generals, suddenly discovered that there were many more people than usual around them. These people had disguised themselves as normal gods but were secretly observing Han Shuo and his party.

    ¡°Something isn¡¯t quite right,¡± Han Shuo said to Andrina.

    Although Andrina¡¯s divine soul was very sensitive, it was limited in coverage area and couldn¡¯t observe scenes extremely far away like Han Shuo could using his demon generals.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± Andrina asked, puzzled.

    ¡°There is arge group of people covertly gathering towards us. They were all extraordinarily powerful. They have been very careful in concealing their auras and keeping an eye on us. I think they are godhunters ¨C not the scattered and independent type, but the organized type,¡± Han Shuo said in a deep voice.

    ¡°You mean the Godhunter Alliance?¡± Andrina was astonished but shortly after, she remarked furiously, ¡°Good, they havee to die. I have been wondering where to find them!¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head. Wearing a grave expression, he rified, ¡°They seem to know that you are here and therefore don¡¯t dare to get close to us. I think we are in big trouble.¡±

    ¡°Huh? What do you mean?¡± Andrina stared nkly for a moment before a thought crossed her mind and she cried out in surprise, ¡°It can¡¯t be...?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and said in a deep voice, ¡°The situation could be simr to the one we faced at Greenfire Swamp before. They seem to be waiting for the few leaders to arrive before attacking us.¡±

    Andrina was stunned. She said, ¡°If that¡¯s the case, even I have no way of safely bringing them to the City of Shadows.¡±

    ¡°I know.¡± Han Shuo took a deep breath and continued, ¡°That¡¯s why I now propose that we separate. You will stay with them, conceal everyone¡¯s presences using boundaries, and hide in this mountain range for a little while. Meanwhile, I will go alone and find a way to draw those godhunters away. After the godhunters have left, you will bring them to the nearest town, purchase an airship, and send them to the City of Shadows.¡±

    ¡°How are you going to draw them away? I¡¯m their target. If they don¡¯t see me, they won¡¯t follow you,¡± Andrina said anxiously.

    A demon general flew out from the Cauldron Spirit and gradually congealed into material form right beside Han Shuo. It became a clone of Andrina. After that, a few more demon generals flew out and transformed into the images of Stratholme, Fanny, and the others. They were carbon copies with no visible distinctions from the real versions of themselves.

    ¡°What, what the.¡± Every one of the party was shell shocked by the scene.

    ¡°This is how I will draw them away. Any more questions?¡± Han Shuo smiled and asked Andrina.

    ¡°Dude, how in the world did you do that?¡± Andrina shook her head and said in a wry smile, ¡°Thest time, you told me that this lifeform could only be used for spying and scouting. And all of a sudden now, it turns out that they can also shapeshift. How many more secrets are you hiding?¡±

    Hey folks, I think it¡¯s obvious that I¡¯m struggling to keep up with the release rate. I thought I could handle the extra workload but I¡¯m wrong. Therefore, I¡¯d like to lower the release rate to 3.5 chapters per week (Alternating between 3 & 4 chapters per week) until I could hire a trantor to bridge the gap. What do you think? -Hedonist

 Chapter 731 - You are the first!

    GDK 731: You are the first!

    ¡°These dummies aren¡¯t perfect ¨C you could tell that these are false images just by probing it with your soul from a short distance. Nevertheless, it does the job. Those godhunters are afraid ofing near me. They won¡¯t be able to discover that something is amiss from a distance. Drawing those godhunters away won¡¯t be an issue for me. You just have to stay behind and conceal their auras. Then, after hiding here for a little while, take them to escape in another direction. Problem solved!¡± Han Shuo said with a smile.

    ¡°What about yourself? Once those godhunter leaders arrive and surround you, wouldn¡¯t you be a dead man?¡± Andrina asked concernedly after thinking for a moment.

    Upon hearing those words, Fanny and the otherdies started to disagree with Han Shuo¡¯s n out of concern for his safety.

    Thesedies may have had confidence in Han Shuo but it was no longer absolute and unquestionable, especially after they arrived on Elysium and witnessed first-hand just how powerful the experts in this world were. They were worried for him.

    ¡°I¡¯ll be fine! I know I¡¯m no match against them, but no one can stop me from leaving if I want to go!¡± Han Shuo said smilingly, ¡°You should know that I¡¯m among the best of the best when ites to the art of escaping!¡±

    ¡°Are you certain that you can escape from the encirclement of those people?¡± Andrina was still rather skeptical as she had the experience of nearly getting killed by those leaders.

    Han Shuo nodded and said withplete confidence, ¡°Absolutely!¡±

    After hesitating for a moment, Andrina agreed to Han Shuo¡¯s proposal. ¡°Alright then. As long as you can draw those godhunters away, I guarantee that they will arrive at the City of Shadows safe and sound.¡± After all, she couldn¡¯te up with any better ideas.

    But above all, it was because she felt that the mysterious Han Shuo was hiding many more secrets that could ensure his own survival. After having known Han Shuo for so long, she knew that Han Shuo most definitely wasn¡¯t one who would boast or lie. He definitely wouldn¡¯t have made such assurance without having absolute confidence.

    ¡°Bryan, we are sorry to be burdening you,¡± Ayermike said in an embarrassed, dejected manner. Back on Profound Continent, he was a character who could bring about the rise and fall of empires. He never expected that there woulde a day that he would be so helpless and reduced to dead weight.

    ¡°It¡¯s alright. Ladies, gentlemen, don¡¯t feel dejected. Given your talent and skills, it is only a matter of time before you achieve great things in this expansive world. In the near future, you will all reach godhood and you won¡¯t be in such constant fear anymore!¡± Han Shuo said smilingly.

    ¡°We are really lucky to have you. Had wee to this ne of Gods by ourselves, I¡¯m afraid that none of us would live long enough to reach godhood!¡± Stratholme shook his head andmented. He had fullye to recognize just how important it was to have powerful friends.

    ¡°Alright, that¡¯s enough. Save those words for the future!¡± Han Shuo took out a bag of ck crystal coins and handed it to Andrina. He reminded, ¡°These are for you to buy an airship. Don¡¯t eat them!¡±

    ¡°You are such a punchable person,¡± Andrina put away the crystal coins and groaned resentfully.

    ¡°Farewell, everyone! See you all at the City of Shadows!¡± Han Shuo waved his hands and unswervingly left with the group of dummies made from his demon generals.

    Without Ayermike and the others dragging him down, Han Shuo was able to travel at a much faster speed even though he continued the journey on foot.

    A portion of Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals took the appearances of Andrina and the rest of the party while some of the demon generals remained in immaterial state and dispersed all around him. These demon generals were monitoring every single activity within a hundred mile radius. Even the slightest sway of the grass caused by the gentlest breeze couldn¡¯t escape Han Shuo¡¯s detection.

    The godhunters dispersed and surrounded Han Shuo from every direction while keeping a distance from him. These godhunters were assorted in strengths with a majority being early and mid-stage midgods. There were no highgods present yet.

    They were all very careful in keeping a distance from Han Shuo and avoiding detection, likely being cautious of Andrina.

    By using the visions of his demon generals, Han Shuo determined where the godhunters were the weakest and most sparse and traveled in that direction. He would also disrupt their steps, forcing them to change their approach and courses.

    This continued for five days. Han Shuo along with his dummy figures made using demon generals had traveled close to the center of the mountain range. It was at this time that a demon general discovered a godhunter with highgod strength had arrived to join the party.

    He was an ugly young man with unkempt, golden long hair and wearing ragged clothing. His face was bumpy and scarred as though he had been severely burned. He cultivated in the energy of darkness. Upon arrival, many of the godhunters in his surroundings approached to greet and fawn over him and respectfully inform him of thetest developments.

    As highgods possessed extremely acute senses, lest that he would discover the presence of the demon generals, Han Shuomanded the demon generals in the region to distance themselves from the highgod. With that, Han Shuo could only vaguely see their figures but couldn¡¯t hear the contents of their conversation.

    It was obvious that they were afraid of Andrina. Even after the highgod arrived, the godhunters did not immediatelyunch an attack but continued to encircle and stalk Han Shuo.

    For the purpose of drawing the godhunters further from Andrina and her party, Han Shuo headed towards remote and uninhabited regions. Those godhunters would move and maintain a good distance from Han Shuo if he got too close.

    Three more days passed. Several more godhunters had arrived at the mountain range. Among the new arrivals were two highgods ¨C one was a muscr man cultivating in the edict of destruction while the other was an old woman with gray hair cultivating in the element of death. From his limited understanding of the Godhunter Alliance, Han Shuo surmised that the muscr man cultivating in the edict of destruction was Brovst, who he had previously met in the valley.

    After the highgods of death, darkness, and destruction arrived at the mountain range, another batch of mid tote-stage midgods, around a dozen or so in numbers, joined the hunting party. The force currently gathered around Han Shuo could rival anyrge family n in the City of Shadows. They finally felt ready to strike and started to contract the circle around Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo immediately got into high alert upon realizing that the godhunters were closing in. He had been moving towards the most vulnerable and weakest part of their encirclement all this while. Han Shuo suddenly had those demon generals that were disguised as Andrina and the others dematerialize and hide among the lush leaves and branches of big trees.

    After they vanished from sight, Han Shuo immediately concealed his own aura and hid atop a big tree.

    ¡°Lord Brovst, our targets have all suddenly disappeared!¡± a midgod cultivating in the edict of destruction rushed to the muscr man and reported in a low voice.

    ¡°Disappeared?¡± Brovst bunched his thick brows. His eyes sparkled with radiances as he nodded and said, ¡°Andrina¡¯s powers are extraordinary. It seems that she has discovered us and must have used special methods to conceal their auras. They can hide, but they cannot escape. We just have to constantly and gradually shrink our encirclement and we will find them!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. We have already confined them to a small area. There is no way they can sneak out from our encirclement. We must find Andrina even if she is hiding three feet under the ground. Her threat to us godhunters is simply too great. Our Godhunter Alliance will suffer even greater losses if she remains alive,¡± the ugly young man said ferociously.

    ¡°Everyone stay vignt and report back immediately if you discover the slightest movement. Huehue, they are carrying a group of ants that have not even reached lowgod strength. There¡¯s no way they could escape!¡± the old woman said in devilishughter.

    After having heard the words of their leaders, the godhunters rapidly left to ry theirmands. The godhunter party who had upied every geographical advantage continued shrinking the encirclement bit by bit. They were all well trained and were used to hunting people in mountain ranges. They operated with good rapport and excellent coordination.

    Unfortunately for them, Han Shuo was able to see every action and step they made. Without Stratholme and the others tying him down, in this region where towering trees and numerous ces to hide could be found everywhere, locating Han Shuo, who could see their every movement, would be beyond impossible!

    Under the shade of a tall, dried tree, Han Shuo dug himself a small hole. It was just big enough to fit his bodypletely. He held his breath, closed his eyes, and focused his mind. He opened his soul and set his consciousness empty. He became one with the environment.

    The godhunters walked past him one after another and none of them discovered Han Shuo who was hiding underground and mere steps away from them. Even that highgod of darkness did not notice a thing when he walked past the region.

    Soon enough, the circle of godhunters converged at the center.

    ¡°We discovered nothing!¡±

    ¡°Nothing on our side either!¡±

    ¡°Nothing at all!¡±

    The godhunters reported their non-discovery to each other.

    ¡°How is that possible?¡± that ugly looking young man cried out in a low voice, ¡°They were obviously within our encirclement. There¡¯s no way that a group of that size could disappear just like that!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Gas. They definitely have yet to leave this region. Andrina has probably deployed certain boundaries that conceal their auras and presences. Given her strength, it¡¯s not surprising that we would walk past where they were hiding,¡± Brovst said in a deep voice after thinking for a moment.

    ¡°Then what should we do?¡± that highgod cultivating in the element of darkness named Gas asked softly.

    ¡°It¡¯s simple ¨C we disperse andunch attacks in every direction. Any barriers or seals would produce reaction when attacked,¡± that old woman said with a sinister smile.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Everybody disperse and attack everywhere! You don¡¯t have to waste much of your divine energy ¨C even a small bone arrow will let you know if there¡¯s a barrier!¡± Brovst instructed.

    The godhunters started executing themand and spread out, traveling back along the path they had just taken. Myriads of attacks were fired in every direction, causing the entire region to be covered with dust and sand. They were attempting to locate the nonexistent boundary they assumed to be concealing Andrina and her party.

    <i>Damn, luckily I have a big brain and have left them behind. Otherwise, under such thorough search, no matter how miraculous Andrina¡¯s boundary was, there¡¯s no way we could remain hidden to these people!</i> Han Shuo inwardly remarked as he emerged from underground.

    Han Shuo had, by then, escaped their encirclement. If he were to just fly away and leave, none of the godhunters would be able to stop him or even discover him.

    However, if Han Shuo was to escape noiselessly right then, the godhunters would definitely not give up and would search the entire mountain range. Andrina and her party would be in danger as long as these godhunters were inside the mountain range.

    Therefore, Han Shuo took the best action he could and deliberately attracted attention to himself. <i>Snap!</i> A decently sized tree suddenly fell.

    This made a clear noise. The godhunter closest to Han Shuo immediately sirened, ¡°Here! Over here!¡±

    Multiple shadows streaked through the forest. Terrifying auras started gathering towards Han Shuo from all directions.

    Han Shuo ran away at lightning speed, all the while leaving deliberate tracks behind him. Every once in a while, he might break a tree branch, or perhaps leave some footprints on the ground.

    The godhunters, not suspecting anything was amiss, pursued Han Shuo relentlessly. After around half a day, Han Shuo ceased to leave behind breadcrumbs and again concealed his presence.

    When the godhunters discovered thest trail left by Han Shuo and noticed that there were no more trails to be found, they started to get anxious as their pursuit became a lot more challenging.

    ¡°What should we do?¡± one of the midgods inquired.

    ¡°They are carrying arge group of burdens so they can¡¯t be too far away. There is only one possibility for them to have stopped leaving trails!¡± Brovst smirked and said, ¡°They must have gone into hiding again. Everyone spread out and continue searching using the method we used earlier. I believe all that running and chasing has worn them more than it has worn us. They are probably too tired to go anywhere!¡±

    ¡°Search meticulously, boys. Remember, for as long as Andrina remains alive, it¡¯s your lives on the line!¡± Gas barked.

    The party of godhunters ceased discussion and got into action. The three highgods, each taking a few of their own subordinates, spread out and searched in three directions. The remaining would disperse and search on their own.

    Han Shuo knew each and every step they took by observing using his demon generals. He was quietly waiting for an opportunity.

    This time, as there wasn¡¯t any encirclement, their search expanded outwards from the center. Instead of shrinking their encirclement, the godhunters trailed further and further apart from each other.

    The godhunters thought that they were pursuing Han Shuo, Andrina, and a group burdensome mortals. It was due to this assumption that they hadmitted mistake after mistake in their judgments and decisions. Allowing the party to disperse was a grave error that made the godhunters vulnerable to Han Shuo¡¯s predation.

    One of the godhunters bombarded the area around him with the divine energy of darkness, sending clouds of dust and sand into the air. He carefully ventured forward and looked around with his eyes wide open, looking for any abnormal scenes which could indicate the presence of a boundary.

    ¡°Fucking hell, they are really good at escaping!¡± the godhunter mumbled and cursed. He had unknowingly walked some distance away from the person nearest to him. He waspletely focused on the search and had failed to notice that.

    He arrived before an ancient tree, raised his head, saw the lush growth of leaves, and casually delivered a burst of darkness divine energy. <i>Ka-chack!</i> A section of tree branches snapped off.

    He proceeded forward slowly and carefully. After he walked under that big tree he tested, he shot a burst of darkness divine energy into the small pond in front of him.

    ¡°Dang, still nothing!¡± he cursed before suddenly noticing that there were no other godhunters around him.

    <i>Have I walked too far away from the others?</i> he thought. He finally realized that he was a ways away from his gang and right away, he wisely turned on his heels and began moving towards the closest godhunter.

    It was at this very moment that a dozen or so dark, shadowy figures abruptly descended from the lush tree leaves over his head and entered his body. He became frozen still in an instant and didn¡¯t even have the chance to scream!

    <i>Swish...</i>

    Han Shuo gently glided down from the tree as the Cauldron of Myriad Demon flew out from his body and covered over the godhunter¡¯s skull. <i>Creak!</i> Han Shuo¡¯s Demonic des had pierced through his abdomen. Demonic yuan prated his body and instantly destroyed his internals. At the next instance, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon was activated and it collected his divine soul.

    The dozen or so shadowy figures abandoned the godhunter¡¯s body and flew away like bats. Han Shuo opened his palm and the Cauldron of Myriad Demon returned into his body. The lifeless body was given a gentle push and it copsed on the ground like a fallen statue.

    ¡°Congrattions, you are the first!¡± Han Shuo uttered before his figure turned fuzzy and disappeared into the shadow cast by the tree.

    Over on another side, another godhunter who had also ventured too far from the rest stepped on soft soil. Right when he noticed that something wasn¡¯t quite right with the ground, a hand suddenly popped from the earth and grabbed his feet. A burst of terrifying energy rushed into the godhunter¡¯s body and restrained his ability to scream.

    Right after that, a dozen or more shadowy figures flew to the scene and swarmed into the godhunter,pletely freezing his body.

    The Cauldron of Myriad Demon flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s palm and into the godhunter¡¯s chest. <i>Thud Thud.</i> The godhunter¡¯s divine body exploded and his divine soul was taken into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon.

    Han Shuo left noiselessly and went into hiding again, continuing the search for his next victim. He sneered in his mind, <i>You fuckers take me as prey? Let¡¯s see who will be the real prey here!</i>

    By using demon generals to observe the surroundings, Han Shuo was basically all-seeing. To add to his talent and skills in hiding, in this mountain range where locations suitable to hide in were aplenty, Han Shuo had be the godhunters¡¯ worst nightmare. He specifically preyed on those with below-average strength and whom were rtively isted from other godhunters. And once he got a kill, he would evacuate from the area and wait for the next prey. Within a very short time, he managed to ughter seven godhunters.

    ¡°Arghh...¡±

    An ear-piercing shriek sounded from the distance.

    The godhunters rushed towards the source of the sound and when they arrived on the scene, they found one of theirrades lying on the ground,pletely lifeless.

    Soon after that, the godhunters discovered even more bodies of theirrades. The godhunters who were originally hunting with confidence started to panic after finding more and more of their fellow godhunters killed while they remained nowhere closer to finding their stealthy opponent.

 Chapter 732 - Hunting

    GDK 732: Hunting

    Seven bodiesid lifelessly in front of them, but they had not even seen the shadows of their enemy. It was most disconcerting for the godhunters.

    ¡°Andrina! If we don¡¯t kill her this time, many more of our people will die!¡± Gas said while gnashing his teeth in fumes. Of the seven silently ughtered, four were his subordinates. It was only natural that he would be enraged.

    ¡°Something isn¡¯t quite right. Andrina is taking a group of encumbrances with her. How could she be so bold to strike under such conditions?¡± that sinister old woman remarked with a puzzled look on her face. She started to suspect that something was amiss.

    ¡°Taylin, I too feel that something isn¡¯t quite right. How is it possible that every one of them has escaped from right under our noses every time? She shouldn¡¯t be able to conceal all those burdens so well, so perfectly, even if that is Andrina. Isn¡¯t it strange that the trails stopped just as we were about to catch up to them?¡± Brovst too was getting suspicious. After hesitating for a moment, Brovst bunched his brows and continued, ¡°Could it be that the intel provided is not urate?¡±

    After keeping silent for a moment, that old woman named Taylin took a deep breath and proposed, ¡°Let¡¯s try probing the area again. This time, everyone goes in groups of three. Do not stray too far from other groups, lest someone gets killed again!¡±

    Gas and Brovst nodded in approval. The godhunters proceeded with their search but as they had to maintain a close distance, the effort was greatly slowed down.

    With that, it would no longer be possible for Han Shuo to take down the godhunters noiselessly. He would easily be discovered and quickly be surrounded. To avoid falling into that most detrimental situation, Han Shuo chose not to recklessly attack. Instead, he went into hiding once again and observed their movements with his demon generals.

    The godhunters had to keep on readjusting their positions and stick near each other. Therefore, not only was their pace much slower, their search couldn¡¯t cover much ground at all. They had scanned merely a dozen or more miles and of course, their search yielded nothing.

    Han Shuo watched the godhunters as he racked his brain on how to harm them further. Finally, after spending a long time pondering, the corners of his lips curled into a sinister smirk.

    With one thought from Han Shuo, those concealed demon generals materialized and took the forms of Andrina, Phoebe and the others. They appeared all around the perimeter and were running away in every direction.

    ¡°Someone¡¯s trying to escape here!¡±

    ¡°Over here too!¡±

    ¡°Andrina is over there!¡±

    Anxious cries broke out from various directions in the mountain range that had been silent for a long time. Brovst, Gas, and Taylin hurried towards the false image of Andrina after hastily instructing their minions, ¡°They are trying to escape by dispersing. Capture those mortals alive so that we can use them as hostages against Andrina. Go get them!¡±

    In the minds of these godhunters, of the hunted party, only Andrina alone was a sizeable threat. They assumed that the rest of the people, including Han Shuo, were merely nonentities who could easily be captured.

    This plot that Han Shuo came up with worked by specifically exploiting this erroneous assumption of theirs. Those truly powerful experts, including the three godhunter leaders, had all gone after Andrina while those meager ones dispersed in every direction, happily pursuing what they thought were heavy baggage to Andrina. Never had they expected that these so-called ¡®burdens¡¯ would lead them to their demise.

    These godhunters would watch their targets abruptly disappear in the middle of pursuit. Then, before they had evene to their senses, they would be hit by a sneak attack. Their divine soul would be stored into Han Shuo¡¯s Cauldron of Myriad Demon a short few seconds after.

    As the godhunters had been sessfully lured far apart from each other, this gave Han Shuo more than enough time to devour their divine energies. Three mid-stage midgods of death and one early-stage midgod of destruction died by losing all their divine energies to Han Shuo.

    ¡°I have got her!¡± Brovst loudly shouted. Gas and Taylin hastily caught up.

    A thread of light smoke suddenly floated into appearance and enveloped Andrina¡¯s figure. The trio of Brovst, Gas and Taylin quickly rushed to surround Andrina excitedly. They gestured at their minions to get closer.

    ¡°Andrina, you may have managed to escape thest time but where are you gonna run this time? I reckon you have yet to recover from the injuries sustained that day. Hehe, you should know that this fate of yours is inevitable for you have chosen to go against us godhunters!¡± Gas said with a sinister smile. He then nodded at Brovst and Taylin, and they approached the lump of smoke step by step.

    ¡°Andrina, please don¡¯t think that we are being cruel, you are just too bothersome!¡± said Taylin. All the element of death within ten miles radius wildly gathered towards her.

    A gentle breeze blew across them and the cloud of smoke at the center of three midgods dispersed with the wind.

    ¡°Wha¨C What the¨C¡± Taylin was startled and absolutely dumbfounded.

    ¡°Impossible! How could she vanish into thin air?¡± shrieked Gas.

    Brovst did not utter a word but he didn¡¯t look well. To have Andrina suddenly and somehow slip through their fingers when they thought they had her was an awful experience, to say the least.

    The trio looked at each other in silence. Their faces turned dark.

    ¡°Oh no! She¡¯s killed more of our men!¡±

    ¡°Over here too! Wait a second, all his divine energy has been sucked clean! What¡¯s going on?!¡±

    ¡°We have found the same thing too. This is obviously the work of a godhunter. Could it be that we have an enemy within our own ranks?¡±

    Piercing gasps of surprise sounded from every direction.

    Soon enough, eight additional bodies was ced before the three highgods. Among them, four of the bodies shared obvious injuries indicating that their divine energies had been devoured. This was clearly the work of a godhunter.

    When Brovst, Gas and Taylin looked at the four bodies, the expressions on each of their faces were uglier than the next. The godhunters standing around them were filled with dread. They had subconsciously spaced out from one another as if the murderer was standing among them!

    ¡°Everybody, assemble here!¡± Taylin instructed as she gestured with her hand.

    Those godhunters who were all in fear and on guard against each other, although feeling rather uneasy, nheless gathered at Taylin¡¯smand.

    ¡°The three of us will check each and every one of them. The attacker definitely wouldn¡¯t have finished digesting the divine energy within such a short time!¡± Taylin suggested in a deep voice.

    Brovst and Gas immediately nodded and went on to inspect their respective minions, checking if there was chaotic and impure divine energy present within their bodies.

    Naturally, there wasn¡¯t any.

    ¡°It wasn¡¯t one of our own!¡± Brovst softly eximed. He suddenly asked, ¡°Don¡¯t you think that the situation has been rather bizarre?¡±

    ¡°Yes. For some reason, it feels like we are the prey instead of the predator!¡± at this point in time, even Gas felt that something wasn¡¯t right. After taking a short pause, he continued, ¡°Even though Andrina¡¯s strength is remarkable, there¡¯s no way she could vanish in front of the three of us just like that. We might have been pursuing an illusion!¡±

    ¡°Someone is trying to get us!¡± Taylin said in a deep voice, ¡°And it could likely be high-level godhunters. I can¡¯t say for sure but perhaps, there are people trying to take our positions. This could be a trap!¡±

    The faces of the godhunters simultaneously jolted upon hearing those words. Brovst and Gas looked at each other in the eye. They had grim faces. Brovst said in a deep voice, ¡°We can be certain that the attacker isn¡¯t from Andrina. She bitterly detests people of our kind. She would never associate herself with any godhunter.¡±

    ¡°The opponent has obviouslyid traps in this mountain range. We have been led by our noses all along. They have obviously prepared this long ago to finish us. Brovst, could Godswamp Pharmacy be a co-conspirator?¡±

    ¡°Godswamp Pharmacy has cooperated with us for many years and logically speaking, wouldn¡¯t have stabbed us in the back, though I can¡¯t say that for sure. But what¡¯s for sure is that when the matter is over, we need to investigate this thoroughly,¡± Brovst took a moment to think before replying to Gas.

    ¡°We shall abandon our current mission of killing Andrina. Assemble everyone, stick together, and leave this mountain range at once. Otherwise, with the enemy having detailed nned everything, we might not leave this mountain range alive. Since they dared attack us, their strength likely wouldn¡¯t be too far from ours!¡± said Taylin.

    Those godhunters of midgod strengths had lost their guts long ago. An enemy that is always hidden is the most fearsome. They were afraid of bing the next victims to this invisible hunter. Therefore, all the midgods hastily nodded their heads after hearing Taylin¡¯s words.

    ¡°Alright then, we will stick close together and leave this mountain range. Everyone be extra cautious. I doubt that our enemy will let us walk away easily. If we want to leave this ce alive, we must work as a team!¡± dered Brovst.

    And so, this mighty group of godhunters started retreating in paranoia. They all behaved very cautiously and had lost the confidence they came with.

    Han Shuo, as the person behind the mischief, having seen their reactions using demon generals, couldn¡¯t help butugh. He did not expect that the godhunters would turn out to be such cowards and would immediately assume the worst scenario when the situation did not go exactly as nned. They were like ants who would be startled by the gentlest breeze. All that was in their minds was to escape from this sketchy area.

    Han Shuo did not know the fear of being a godhunter. As the public enemy of the entire material ne, these people had lots of experiences of being hunted. All kinds of danger followed them wherever they went. In every Divine Dominion, there would be constant streams of people who would seek them out in order to eliminate them.

    Living in such circumstances for ages had molded the godhunters to be overly cautious. Even the slightest abnormality would cause them to assume the worst. Discovering theirrades mysteriously died to people of their kind was especially terrifying to these godhunters. And even more frightening was that they couldn¡¯t detect a single trail of their attacker. In the end, they could no longer contain their fear and crumbled.

    <i>These so-called godhunters are but a bunch of cowards!</i> thought Han Shuo.

    The godhunters were very skilled in escaping from being followed. They would deploy all kinds of obstacles and barriers behind them. Wherever they passed, there would be confounding boundaries to be found.

    The party of godhunters had left confoundment boundaries on trees, ground, and rivers. They would also have people stay behind and hide to make sure that no one was following them.

    They were indeed used to being hunted and pursued. After all, as the public enemy of the entire Elysium, they must have a unique set of skills in escaping and avoiding being followed. Otherwise, if the location of their base was to be discovered, it could mean their own demise.

    Unfortunately for the godhunters, they were messing with the wrong person. Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals were not just invisible and incorporeal, but they could also cover an incredibly extensive area when used for surveince. As Han Shuo saw where they had ced the boundaries, he was able to avoid stepping into them easily.

    If Han Shuo was able to discover the base of the godhunters and lead to their destruction, it would be an enormous contribution. With that, he should have no trouble forming his own family n in the City of Shadows, possessing his own territory, and an emblem of his own. He decided to secretly follow the godhunters to their base as it could potentially lead to great rewards in the future.

    Han Shuo followed the godhunters for five days straight. They had walked out from the mountain range.

    They arrived at a in. As there were no trees on the t terrain where demon generals could hide, it had be much more probable for the three highgods to discover the demon generals.

    When they were still inside the mountain range, Han Shuo first had the demon generals take a detour around the three highgods, get ahead of them, hide in the trees and remainpletely motionless. This was a method of avoiding from his demon generals being detected by highgods that Han Shuo had recently discovered. As long as the demon generals were kept a great distance away and remained motionless, their presences would not be discovered, even by a highgod.

    Whenever a demon general flew around, even in incorporeal state, it would produce waves in the air. Midgods might not be able to detect those very minute waves, but highgods could often sense them. This could lead to the discovery of a demon general.

    It was extremely difficult to have the demon generals take detours and remain stationary in this t terrain they were in. This was because there was absolutely nowhere to hide. Therefore, Han Shuo only used one demon general to follow far behind the party of godhunters while he would follow even further behind the demon general.

    However, even though Han Shuo had taken precaution, three highgods had nheless noticed an anomaly.

    ¡°It feels as though something is following us!¡± Brovst softly eximed. The other two highgods nodded in agreement. It seemed that they too had noticed it.

    ¡°You two may proceed. I will stay behind to check!¡± Brovst told the two after thinking for a moment.

    At times like this, it was to be expected that Gas and Taylin would readily agree to such a proposal. They could not wish more to have someone stay behind to make sure they had a safe retreat. They told Brovst to be careful and then proceeded forward with the rest of the godhunters. Brovst stayed behind all by himself.

    Soon, the demon general discovered that a blurry figure was standing still in the distance. The demon general immediately halted in its path, not proceeding a millimeter forward.

    Han Shuo, who was far behind the demon general, also remained still. It was a battle of patience with Brovst.

    An hourter, having discovered no abnormality, Brovst finally continued along the journey. Han Shuo became even more cautious after this standoff. He waited until Brovst had traveled even further in the distance and all that the demon general could see was a faint ck dot before he continued following him.

 Chapter 733 - Returning to the city

    GDK 733: Returning to the city

    After the stand-off with Brovst, Han Shuo learned to be even more careful in tracking the godhunters. Fortunately for Han Shuo, the in wasn¡¯t particrly vast and it only took them one day to cross it. The terrain that followed was filled with rivers, hills, and bottomless cliffs ¨C ces most suitable for demon generals to hide. Therefore, Han Shuo was able to keep a close eye on the godhunters again.

    Han Shuo continued to follow them. Then, on the thirteenth day, the group of godhunters arrived at a huge valley where the air was filled with mist and the ground covered with swamps and odd-looking stone pirs.

    Before entering the valley, Han Shuo discovered that there were concealment boundaries deployed everywhere as well as several energy towers that were embedded inside towering trees. An abnormally intense energy fluctuation was filling every corner. Multiple dark silhouettes concealed in the dark were secretly observing the godhunters as they entered.

    After observing from a great distance away using his demon generals, Han Shuo suddenly discovered that even Brovst, Gas and Taylin humbled in postures after arriving at the valley. When passing through the checkpoints, even though they did not bow or bend their knees, they were cautious and solemn in attitude.

    Han Shuo was shocked by the scene he witnessed as, to his understanding, Brovst, Gas and Taylin were the leaders among them. They should have behaved like kings after returning to their base. Han Shuo did not expect to see them perform otherwise.

    After giving it a thought, Han Shuo was jolted by the conclusion he arrived at. There was only one scenario that could exin the phenomenon ¨C Brovst, Gas and Taylin were not the top bosses in the Godhunter Alliance!

    The trio were all roughly in mid-stage highgod realm. If they weren¡¯t even the actual leaders of the Godhunter Alliance, then the strength of this Alliance was just shocking.

    There were sentries located all over the valley. The energy fluctuation produced by the energy towers had covered the entire valley, enveloping it underyers uponyers of boundaries. Under such rigid security and defenses, there was no way that Han Shuo could infiltrate the base, not even his demon general could get a glimpse ¨C it would trigger the outermost barrier right away and invite godhunters to swarm the valley. If that happened, Han Shuo would have a hard time escaping.

    Besides, if Han Shuo¡¯s hypothesis was correct, there could very well be ate-stage highgod in the valley. Han Shuo would be in real deep trouble if he angered a being of that ss.

    Han Shuo took time to carefully observe the perimeters of the valley. After realizing that there was no way he could infiltrate the valley silently, out of consideration for his own safety, Han Shuo decided to temporarily give up on scouting the inside of the valley.

    This valley was no longer within the influence of the City of Shadows, but somewhere between the City of Shadows and Mirage City. As Han Shuo had memorized the precise location of this base, he figured that perhaps someday in the future, he would return here with an army and tten this base, making a significant contribution, solidifying his position in the City of Shadows.

    After havinge to the decision, Han Shuo stopped hesitating and silently returned on the path he came from.

    He traveled to a safe distance from the valley, spent a day memorizing the environment, and finally left, flying in the direction of the City of Shadows.

    It had been nearly two months since Han Shuo parted with the Andrina and the others. The godhunters had given up on searching the mountain range. If everything had gone well, they were to be on their way to the City of Shadows in an airship.

    Han Shuo did not return to that mountain range but headed for the City of Shadows. As Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a hurry, he decided to collect medicinal ingredients on the way home. He had spent nearly three months on a journey that required merely ten days.

    Nearly all the House of Sainte divine guards recognized Han Shuo. They greeted him respectfully when he appeared at the city gate of the City of Shadows.

    ¡°Goth, have you seen people from my Celestial Pearl enter the city recently? Most of them are just demigods and are very weak,¡± Han Shuo smilingly nodded at a divine guard he was acquainted with before immediately asking him about Andrina and the others.

    ¡°No, there aren¡¯t any demigods who entered the city recently. You should know that demigods aren¡¯t allowed to enter the city unless they are under the custody of certain special characters, for example, Mister Bryan, that they would be allowed to enter and live in the City of Shadows,¡± Goth took the opportunity to tter Han Shuo indirectly.

    There was indeed such a policy in the City of Shadows. Any regr outsider who had not even reached basegod strength wouldn¡¯t be qualified to enter the City of Shadows. Only the towns around it would take in this type of people. Before they reached basegod strength, they could not get their own divine tablet and would, therefore, be a hassle after entering the city. If they were killed, nobody would even know who the body belonged to.

    But, as always, there were exceptions to the rules. If the outsiders were important rtives torge family ns in the city, or under the guardianship of respected characters, they would be granted entry.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart sank after hearing the reply. He handed Goth a bottle of Rejuvenation Pills and smilingly asked, ¡°Can I bother you to check with the other city gates if any demigods have tried to enter?¡±

    Goth¡¯s eyes shone. He received the bottle excitedly and immediately replied, ¡°One moment please, I will ask around for you!¡±

    Goth left hastily upon finishing those words. A few minutester, Goth walked down from an energy tower, shook his head, and said to Han Shuo, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I¡¯ve checked but nothing like that has happened in thest six months.¡±

    ¡°Thanks...¡± Han Shuo felt rather worried but still, he decided to enter the City of Shadows.

    If everything went as nned, Andrina and her party should have arrived at the City of Shadows around two months ago. Although Andrina¡¯s power was extraordinary and they should be safe without godhunters obstructing their way, Han Shuo¡¯s heart could not be at ease.

    Han Shuo returned to the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy with a rattled mind.

    Akley and Gu Li updated Han Shuo with the recent happenings in the City of Shadows. The Celestial Pearl Pharmacy continued its upward momentum, raking in crystal coins day after day. They managed to recruit more pharmacists and various talents, allowing three more branches to open for business.

    The top position of the Fifth Corps remained vacant. Although every family n in the city drooled for this post, no one could locate Avery. It appeared that the post would remain unupied until someone chopped off Avery¡¯s head and presented it to the City Lord.

    The House of Lavers grew even more low-profile. They had avoided participating in most activities in the City of Shadows. Besides Felder, the patriarch, most members of the Lavers Family had left the City of Shadows. The House of Lavers continued its rapid decline.

    Carmelita had been to the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy twice while Han Shuo was away. She asked Akley to have Han Shuo look for her at the Sainte Residence as soon as he returned.

    The House of Sainte had been busy cracking down on godhunters within their territories. The godhunters had been rampant and causing havoc in the City of Shadows, greatly enraging Wace. He felt that the presence of the godhunters had severely threatened the business activities of his city and dispatched divine guards from the First and Second Corps to hunt down the godhunters.

    Members of the other threerge family ns had frequently visited the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, asking when Han Shuo would produce new medicines. Rugersey, who had once had a misunderstanding with Han Shuo, would purchase a ton of medicines every time he visited. Rugersey never haggled; in fact, he was in the habit of givingrge tips every time. His intention was obvious to everyone.

    ¡°Has Andrina returned? Any news from her?¡± Han Shuo bunched his brows and asked after listening to Akley narrate the recent urrences.

    ¡°Nope, no news at all!¡± Akley then looked at Han Shuo puzzlingly and asked, ¡°Didn¡¯t you leave with her? Why have you returned alone?¡±

    ¡°We came across some trouble on our way back and had to return to the city separately,¡± Han Shuo began to feel uneasy and therefore skipped the exnation to Akley.

    Akley did not ask about the details, instead consoling Han Shuo with a smile, ¡°Don¡¯t you worry. With her strength, what could possibly happen to her?¡±

    If Andrina was traveling alone, how could Han Shuo not be worried? He was worried about the group of people under her care. Those characters who used to dictate the rise and fall of empires back on Profound Continent were as powerless as babies on Elysium. Even an average youth living in an average vige had enough strength to kill them all.

    ¡°Forget about it. I¡¯ll go look for Carmelita. Perhaps she knows something,¡± Han Shuo said, promptly heading out to the Sainte Residence without further exining the situation to Akley.

    Han Shuo could be considered a regr visitor of the Sainte Family. The divine guards at the Sainte Residence would humbly bow and greet when they saw Han Shuo. They promptly led Han Shuo into the gymnasium after learning that he was looking for Carmelita.

    ¡°Haha, the City of Shadows has weed a few guests. Miss Carmelita is having a friendly match with them at the gymnasium,¡± the divine guard exined to Han Shuo as he led Han Shuo towards the gymnasium.

    ¡°Who are they? Why would Carmelita personally keep thempany?¡± asked Han Shuo. He had temporarily cast his worries aside.

    ¡°They are from the other two Divine Dominions. As you know, our Darkness, Death, and Destruction Dominions have joined hands in the form of Cmity Church. However, as our Darkness Dominion only joined the Churchter in time, these guests, members ofrge family ns from the Death and Destruction Dominions, hold a slightly higher position in the Churchpared to the House of Sainte,¡± the divine guard exined in a low voice.

    Han Shuo was a little surprised to learn that. He did not expect that members ofrge family ns in the two Divine Dominions woulde to the City of Shadows. He wondered what business they had in the city.

    The gymnasium facility in the Sainte Residence was very well-built. There was a total of eight energy towers at every corner, forming fiveyers of powerful barriers around the gymnasium, allowing the gymnasium to support tremendous shockwaves and bursts of energies from its users.

    Han Shuo saw Carmelita as soon as he stepped inside. He saw impatience written on her face as she sat and watched two people having a duel. They were a male and a female. Both of them looked young.

    The male had long, ash gray hair that would flow elegantly as he moved. He wore a grayish-green armor that had a design of three bones. It was likely the emblem of his family n. Like Carmelita, he too possessed early-stage highgod strength. But unlike Carmelita, he cultivated in the energy of death.

    The female had long brown hair tucked into a bun. She looked rather average and appeared to be married. She had a graceful and poised quality, clearly the product of an extraordinary background. She cultivated in the energy of darkness and was also an early-stage highgod. Although she had employed defensive measures all throughout the battle, she did not seem to be on the back foot and had handled the young man¡¯s attacks calmly.

    ¡°Oh please, Charlotte is obviously going easy on you. Portlem, are you done yet?¡± Carmelita who had been watching the duel finally lost her cool and reproached.

    The young man forced a chuckle and immediately ceased attacking. He bowed slightly at the woman and remarked, ¡°Elder sister Charlotte, I¡¯m truly impressed that you could stay in this condition even after marrying!¡±

    ¡°What does my marital status have to do with my strength declining?¡± Charlotte softly chuckled and praised, ¡°You have been making quite some improvements during these years, haven¡¯t you? I¡¯m starting to have trouble dealing with your attacks!¡±

    ¡°This is the result of me putting a ton of work into cultivation!¡± the young man named Portlem replied with a smirk. He shot a nce at the irritated Carmelita, shook his head, and clicked his tongue in wonder, ¡°I truly did not expect that such an enormous transformation would befall you, Carmelita. So much so that now, I¡¯m no longer as frightened when I see you. I still remember when I first met you, I thought that you were of an alien race!¡±

    ¡°Shut your pie hole, Portlem! You have no idea how hard I have to fight the urge to tear a second mouth into your face everytime I see you!¡± Carmelita cursed angrily and continued coldly, ¡°Don¡¯t think that because you are now a highgod that I cannot give you a beating!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m your guest. I don¡¯t believe you would act as impulsively as before, would you?¡± Portlem chuckled. He didn¡¯t appear at all afraid of Carmelita. Perhaps he felt that he could deal with Carmelita¡¯s attacks after advancing to highgodhood.

    ¡°Miss Carmelita, Mister Bryan is looking for you!¡± It was then that the divine guard who led Han Shuo to the gymnasium politely cried out from the doorway.

    Carmelita, who was about the strike Portlem, immediately turned her gaze towards the entrance. Upon seeing Han Shuo¡¯s figure, she waved her hand smilingly and said, ¡°Hey Bryan! Come over here, let me introduce you to two people!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded. Wearing a faint smile, he walked towards the party in an unruffled manner.

    Portlem and Charlotte ceased their conversation and ced all their attention on Han Shuo who was walking over. They were wearing amicable smiles and nodded at Han Shuo from a distance. Han Shuo responded in kind.

    ¡°This is Portlem. He is from the House of Batchelder of the Death Dominion. This is Charlotte. She is from the House of Bruckner of the Destruction Dominion. Charlotte originates from Mirage City of the Darkness Dominion but she is now married to the Bruckner Family. They are very interested in your Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. One of the goals they and their envoys havee to the City of Shadows with is to buy some of the medicines you personally refined!¡± Carmelita exined to Han Shuo smilingly.

    ¡°Greetings.¡± Han Shuo nodded at each of them cordially before he continued, ¡°You have indeed visited at the right time ¨C I happen to have acquired a new batch of medicinal ingredients and will have a new batch of medicines ready in two months. If you will still be in the City of Shadows at that time, I will make sure to save both of you a portion of it.¡±

    Although the medicines that Han Shuo personally refined were infamous in the City of Shadows for their exorbitant prices, nheless, they remained in great demand. More often than not, all those medicines would be sold out the very day they were put on sale. The two had stayed in the City of Shadows for a period of time and had learned about how highly demanded they were. They immediately thanked Han Shuo dly after hearing those words.

    Just like the House of Sainte, the House of Batchelder and the House of Bruckner from the Death and Destruction Dominions were all exceedingly ancient family ns. As they were located in the Death and Destruction Dominions, their influences in the Cmity Church were slightly above that of the House of Sainte.

    Having members of these two family ns purchase his medicines would be the most fantastic promotion for his business. After acquiring the medicines and experiencing their remarkable effects, even more family ns from the two Divine Dominions would surely travel to the City of Shadows to purchase his medicines. By then, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy would be even more reputable and perhaps, they coulde to own branches in various cities just as the Godswamp Pharmacy had.

    It was for this long-term n that Han Shuo promised them so without hesitation.

    ¡°Well thank you very much, then. We will stay in the City of Shadows for at least half a year. We will definitely be there at your pharmacy when your medicines are ready!¡± Charlotte immediately thanked Han Shuo smilingly.

    ¡°Indeed, price is no issue!¡± Portlem immediately assured. However, his gazes at Han Shuo seemed rather dodgy. It was as though he had something to hide.

    ¡°Okay, that¡¯s enough. Both of you get on with whatever you are doing. There are some things that I need to speak to Bryan about alone.¡± Carmelita dragged Han Shuo away.

    Both Portlem and Charlotte noticed how rxed and straightforward Carmelita was towards Han Shuo. The two of them were stunned for a moment before they seemed to realize something. Portlem grinned and remarked disdainfully, ¡°No wonder. I was wondering how he managed to rise so rapidly in the City of Shadows. Heh, Carmelita looked like a monster, yet this youngster soldiered on and got close to her in achieving his goals. His willpower must be quite something!¡±

    Charlotte bunched her brows and looked at Portlem with displeased eyes. ¡°What are you talking about? We should be happy for Carmelita that she managed to find apanion. Besides, this guy refines miraculous medicines. He will be very popr in any city he goes to. Not everyone is as deprived as you imagine!¡±

    ¡°The way I see it, he¡¯s the kind of guy who leeches off women!¡± ridiculed Portlem. ¡°But still, he¡¯s quite extraordinary to be able to stomach someone like Carmelita. Truly, I can admire him ¨C he really knows his priorities.¡±

    ¡°You better behave yourself. Don¡¯t think that I have no idea about what you did on the journey. Those people said that they are from the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy and yet, you attacked. Worst of all, you failed to capture them and let them escape. You are gonna get it if they return to the City of Shadows,¡± Charlotte nagged.

    ¡°How would I have known that the little girl would be such a freak!¡± Portlem reviled after being chided by Charlotte. His face reddened when reminded of the incident. It sounded as though he had been beaten by that little girl.

 Chapter 734 - A grand occasion

    GDK 734: A grand asion

    There were many small rooms built on the top of the gymnasium. Carmelita pulled Han Shuo to a secluded corner and softly asked, ¡°What took you so long toe back?¡±

    ¡°I ran into some issues along the way and was held back,¡± Han Shuo casually exined before he asked, ¡°Speaking of which, you came to the Celestial Pearl twice to look for me. Is there anything you want to tell me?¡±

    ¡°Of course there is!¡± Carmelita replied, ¡°The first time I looked for you was to tell you to save some of your medicines for those two. The second time was to tell you about Andrina. You separated from her on your way back, didn¡¯t you?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart skipped a beat when Carmelita mentioned Andrina. He nodded and replied, ¡°How did you know that?¡±

    ¡°Andrina contacted the divine guards at Fort Verka and asked them to deliver news to me. She said that after you drew the godhunters away, while taking your friends to the City of Shadows, she ran into some trouble and suffered slight injuries. She also said that you need not worry and that your friends will arrive in the city safely.¡±

    ¡°Andrina is injured!¡± Han Shuo was almost frantic. ¡°Did she say anything else? Did she mention who injured her?¡±

    ¡°She did not.¡± Carmelita continued, ¡°She just wanted you to know that you don¡¯t have to worry and that your friends are all doing fine!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s face turned dark. ¡°I had clearly drawn those godhunters away from them. How could Andrina even get injured near the City of Shadows? Who did shee across? In the city, all the members ofrge family ns would know that Andrina is a member of my Celestial Pearl Pharmacy and logically speaking, would certainly not attack her. But other than therge family ns, who in the city could possibly injure Andrina? I¡¯m baffled!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t you worry, Andrina said that everything will be fine. I reckon they will safely return to the city soon!¡± consoled Carmelita.

    Han Shuo nodded. He then said to Carmelita, ¡°Thank you. If you receive any news about Andrina, please let me know as soon as possible!¡±

    ¡°Got it,¡± promised Carmelita.

    ¡°Alright. I¡¯m going back to refine medicines. This will take some time,¡± Han Shuo replied and immediately headed back to the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    Andrina had delivered the message to Carmelita because she was aware of Carmelita¡¯s influence in the City of Shadows. In addition, she trusted Carmelita. Most of the people in the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy were merely pharmacists. The only expert there who could fight was Akley. She had delivered the message to Carmelita instead of Akley because he was too weak and he did not possess much of an influence in the city.

    On the way back to the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, Han Shuo weighed in on whether he should go searching for Andrina or not. But in the end, after much hesitation, he decided to stay in the city. The territories under the influence of the City of Shadows was vast. It was extremely difficult to locate someone among the expansive mountain ranges and valleys, especially when Han Shuo couldn¡¯t be sure specifically which region Andrina was in. The chances of him finding Andrina by mere luck was minute.

    But above all, Han Shuo had confidence in Andrina. He was certain that if Andrina imed that she could take his friends and girlfriends safely to the City, then she would. He nned on asking Andrina about what mishap she met after she returned.

    Therge family ns soon learned about Han Shuo¡¯s return to the City. They sent men to book his medicines in advance when they heard that Han Shuo would be making a new batch of medicines. The Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was therefore filled with people. This even drove up the sale of regr medicines made by regr pharmacists.

    At this point in time, Han Shuo had a private room inside his living quarters specially for him to refine medicines. Inside wererge cabs mounted to the walls, where all sort of medical ingredients could be stored. There was also a myriad of medical containers in the room, mostly for decoration purposes. Han Shuo instructed his staff that he was not to be disturbed while he was refining medicine in that room.

    The two avatars inside his Cauldron of Myriad Demon did not stay idle while his main body was upied with pellet-producing work. Both his avatars had made significant progress after absorbing divine energies from those godhunters. His avatar of destruction was on the verge of a breakthrough to midgod realm. It had enough divine energy in its body and all it needed was a sh of enlightenment.

    The avatar of death appeared to be able to reach mid-stage midgod realm very soon. Han Shuo was ted by their progress. He thought that if he ever needed more divine energy in the future, he shall use this speedy shortcut that allowed rapid improvement ¨C to venture around the vast mountain ranges, to hunt and consume the divine energies of the godhunters.

    Time flew. Two months had passed.

    After having produced a new batch of pelleted medicines, Han Shuo finally exited from the seclusion. During the two months, his avatar of death finally broke through to mid-stage midgod realm. His avatar of destruction, however, was still stuck inte-stage lowgod realm.

    Han Shuo internally remarked that if there was a pure divine soul of a midgod of destruction that he could fuse with, the process of advancing to midgodhood would be much faster.

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death used to fuse with a midgod divine soul in the Void. Therefore, making breakthroughs was rtively easy as long as he umted sufficient divine energies. It was crucial to have sufficient knowledge and understanding of the energy one cultivated in. Without having the correspondingprehension towards the energy, no amount of divine energy would allow a breakthrough.

    This also signaled the end of Han Shuo¡¯s level-up bonanza. The divine soul his avatar of death had fused with was merely a mid-stage midgod. This meant that from this point onwards, to make any improvement, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death had to rely on his own effort and ability to gain a deeper understanding into the energy of death. He had reaped all the knowledge the conscious-less divine soul had to offer.

    Soon after exiting from his private pharmaceuticalb, Han Shuo discovered that divine guards from various family ns were lingering around the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. Some would enter and walk around his pharmacy, and perhaps buy some ordinary medicines.

    Those divine guards were excited to catch Han Shuo. They ran to greet him and expressed the immense interests their respective family ns had in his medicines.

    ¡°After three days, the medicines I personally refine will be up for sale here at the Celestial Pearl. Tell them toe at that time,¡± Han Shuo loudly announced to the dozens of divine guards who suddenly surrounded him.

    The divine guards thanked him and hastily left, disappearing from the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy in no time. It appeared that they had gone to inform their masters of the news.

    After those people left, Han Shuo went to speak with Anito, asking him to announce to everyone that after three days, other than therge family ns, any gods, with enough crystal coins in hand, could purchase the medicines he had personally refined, that is, before the stocks ran out.

    Han Shuo¡¯s n was to grow his pharmacy¡¯s reputation even further and overwhelm all hispetitors in the city in one shot.

    Those foreigners and non-aligned gods who purchased Han Shuo¡¯s medicines would surely promote and spread the good name of his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy as they traveled around various Divine Dominions. This would be greatly beneficial to the sales of his pharmacy.

    Although Anito was of ordinary strength, he was a very good helper. Thanks to his hard work, promotional scrolls were put up on every region of the City of Shadows. Many of the gods in secluded cultivation learned of this news.

    The sale of Han Shuo¡¯s medicines suddenly became the most widely discussed and anticipated event in the City of Shadows. It wasn¡¯t just the inhabitants of the City who showed immense interest, even the gods from foreignnds who came to conduct trade grew excited about the sale at Celestial Pearl.

    ***Three dayster.

    A seething mass of people had gathered at the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. It was as though the entire poption of the City was packed like sardines in the small area around the building. Some came alone, some in groups of three to five, while some came as representatives of their family ns.

    Before Han Shuo¡¯s medicines were up for sale, the regr medicines in the pharmacy had raked in fifty to sixty thousand ck crystal coins. The employees of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy could not be busier. They would hastily help the customers checkout and restock the shelves with medicines.

    Han Shuo was standing on top of the highest building of the Celestial Pearl, gazing at the crowd underneath him. He internally remarked that it would be an achievement to be proud of if he could attract such a crowd every time his medicines were up for sale.

    Han Shuo did not hurry in releasing those medicines he personally refined to the public, instead patiently waiting. Finally, when it was noon, he instructed Gu Li, ¡°It¡¯s about time. Put the medicines I made for sale!¡±

    ¡°What about the members and representatives ofrge family ns? Do they have to stand and wait in line with the average joes?¡± Gu Li hesitated for a moment before she asked.

    ¡°Of course not. Arrange for them to gather at the banquet hall where that pharmaceutical conference was held. We ought to provide special treatment to these notable characters ofrge family ns. After all, not only will they be buying most of my medicines, but they will also be my long-term buyers!¡± Han Shuo replied smilingly.

    Gu Li nodded, ¡°Of course.¡±

    Gu Li then went on to carry out his instructions. The staff filled the empty shelves with Han Shuo¡¯s pelleted medicines that were long ready. The crowd, who had been waiting for this moment cheered loudly when they saw the medicines Han Shuo had personally refined were finally up for purchase.

    The crowd was notcking people with deep pockets. After having heard the rumors about how great of a pharmacist Han Shuo was, these people were all willing to pay big money to acquire his medicines. The shop was jam-packed in a second. The area selling Han Shuo¡¯s personally refined medicines was particrly chaotic.

    At the center of the banquet hall was arge, long, oval table where delicacies and fine wines were ced. Nearly all the powerful and prestigious characters of the City of Shadows had gathered in the hall. Portlem and Charlotte were among the party.

    It was at this moment that Rugersey who had been awkwardly standing at the entrance looked to Han Shuo and asked, ¡°Uhm, Mister Bryan, are you still holding grudges against me?¡±

    As ofte, to salvage his rtionship with Han Shuo, Rugersey had been throwing a ton of money at the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. He would even deliver small gifts every now and then to apologize for the blunder he made thest time.

    It had been a long time since the incident and Rugersey had been excessively humble and apologetic to Han Shuo since, so much so that even Andre decided to speak for him, ¡°Bryan, just let it go already. Rugersey has done more than enough to atone for his mistakes. On the ount that this is an auspicious day for the Celestial Pearl, and for my sake, let it pass, alright?¡±

    Han Shuo had, in fact, felt no resentment since long ago and therefore, after Andre spoke, he nodded his head. Rugersey immediately put on a big bright smile on his face. He walked into the hall, found himself a seat, grabbed a ss of wine and toasted to Han Shuo, ¡°To your good health!¡±

    Rugersey had shown more than enough of his sincerity. Han Shuo could not give him a cold-shoulder before the public and therefore, he too raised his cup and drank to the toast. After that, he announced to the crowd smilingly, ¡°Ladies and gentlemen, I hereby announce that I will personally refine medicines once every five years. Of the batch of medicines I have produced this time around, thirty percent will be sold to the public while the rest are reserved for every one of you in this room.¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Han Shuo pped his hands twice. An enormous ss container was pushed into the hall. Inside the enormous container were neatly arranged medicine bottles of all colors. The prices were clearly marked.

    The members and representatives ofrge family ns stood up excitedly and rushed to surround the container.

    A group of people arrived at the entrance of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. They were momentarily stunned by the scene of the pharmacy overflowing with customers.

    ¡°Andrina, is this the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy that Bryan operates?¡± Emily, wearing an astonished expression, asked the little girl standing beside her.

    Andrina nodded. She gently smiled and replied, ¡°It is. Terrific, isn¡¯t it?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s so crowded! It¡¯s as though everyone in the city has gathered here. How did Bryan aplish this? How could he attract so many people here?¡± Phoebe softly cried out. ¡°I don¡¯t remember Bryan ever excelling in business. But how could he be so remarkable at it on Elysium?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s the medicines he produces that are remarkable!¡± Andrina exined, ¡°In the City of Shadows, Bryan is known as a gifted pharmacist. Everyrge family n in the city scrambles to get their hands on the medicines he personally refines. From the looks of it, I reckon he is putting his medicines on sale again!¡±

    Having been around Han Shuo for some time, Andrina was able to deduce the fact after making a quick observation.

    Anito who had been guarding at the entrance immediately invited Andrina inside upon sighting her.

    ¡°Follow me, we will look for Bryan.¡± Andrina nodded and led the party into the campus. The mortals from Profound Continent gasped and eximed in astonishment at the scenes they saw along the way. They did not expect that Han Shuo would actually be in possession of such an enormous business on Elysium!

 Chapter 735 - Fall out

    GDK 735: Fall out

    Andrina could be considered half the boss of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. Everyone who worked there recognized her. Anito forcibly shoved the densely packed crowd to make a clear path straight to the center building for Andrina and her party.

    Anito sized up the group of people following behind Andrina with puzzled gazes. As a midgod, Anito could tell that these people were incredibly weak with just one nce. He had no idea why would Andrina, whose strength was immense beyond fathom, would be taking these weaklings to Celestial Pearl.

    ¡°Hey! Andrina, you are back!¡± Akley who was looking at the doorwayzily shouted upon sighting Andrina from a distance.

    Andrina gestured at the people behind her and headed towards Akley. As soon as she arrived beside him, she asked, ¡°Where is Bryan?¡±

    ¡°Bryan is in the banquet hall with the members ofrge family ns. He should be dividing the medicines among them at this moment. Do you have anything urgent for him?¡± replied Akley.

    ¡°Got it,¡± Andrina pointed at the group of people behind her as she instructed Akley, ¡°Get them a ce to live in. They are all Bryan¡¯s friends. Make sure they are treated well.¡±

    After instructing Akley in an arrogant manner, Andrina turned around and told Fanny and thedies, ¡°My sisters, be at ease and rest well. We are in the City of Shadows, you will all be very safe here.¡±

    The party was scared and on edge throughout the journey. They heaved a sigh of relief after hearing Andrina¡¯s consoling words.

    Stratholme had a face filled with revere as he gazed at the lively congregation. He whispered to Ayermike, ¡°Look at them, every one of them gives off an immensely mighty aura. They should all at least be in lowgod realm. We must increase our strength at the fastest rate here. Otherwise, even with Bryan sheltering us, without strength, it¡¯s unlikely that we could make much aplishment in this world.¡±

    Ayermike nodded in agreement. He replied, ¡°That¡¯s true. We are not like thedies and do not have deep, romantic rtionships with Bryan. If I became a burden to him, even if he doesn¡¯t chase me away, I would be too embarrassed to stay.¡±

    These characters who used to immensely powerful and influential back on the Profound Continent were thoroughly awed and motivated by the countless powerful experts they met along the way. Never before had they experienced such a scene where countless experts gathered. When they realized that everyone around them could kill them just by moving a finger, with effort no greater than pinching an ant, their hearts were filled with an intense sullen feeling.

    ¡°So it¡¯s Bryan¡¯s friends. Come, follow me, I will arrange your lodgings. Haha, our Celestial Pearl has a lot of empty rooms,¡± Akley saidughingly as he led Stratholme, Emily, and the others away.

    The demigods and basegod did not waste a moment. As soon as Akley helped them settled in their rooms, they began umting the elements, cultivating to raise their strength.

    Andrina did not go with them but headed to the banquet hall alone.

    ¡°I hope everyone is happy with your purchases?¡± Han Shuo asked smilingly after delivering the medicines allocated based on the respective strengths of the family ns they represented.

    There would be a big pile of medicines stacked before the representatives of each family n. They all had big smiles on their faces and would nod to express that they were satisfied.

    Bags after bags of crystal coins were happily tossed before Han Shuo and they piled up to the size of a small hill. After the crowd expressed that they were satisfied with the goods, Han Shuo kept away the crystal coins smilingly. He had refined a lot more pelleted medicines than the previous rounds. After a quick guesstimation, Han Shuo learned that he had obtained nearly three hundred thousand ck crystal coins. It was no small sum.

    ¡°Folks, since everyone is happy with your purchases, I would like to propose a toast ¨C to the pharmacy we keep profitable!¡± Andre raised his ss smilingly. His gentle voice spread throughout the hall.

    The crowd smilingly raised their cups at Andre and Han Shuo and drank to the toast.

    <i>Cough, cough... </i>Suddenly, an ill-timed coughing sounded in the hall. it was as though someone choked on their wine.

    The crowd who was downing their wine smilingly immediately gathered their attention on the source of the noise. They saw that a blushing Portlem was coughing repeatedly. It appeared that he had indeed been choking on his own ss of wine. He was patting his chest as he looked towards the entrance in a grimace.

    The crowd found his performance strange. Following the direction of his sight, they suddenly discovered that there was a little girl with ice-cold appearance standing at the doorway.

    ¡°Andrina!¡± Han Shuo cried out excitedly. He shouted, ¡°It¡¯s great that you are alright! I have been worrying about you. I heard from Carmelita that you ran into trouble on your way back. What happened?¡±

    Andrina did not immediately reply to Han Shuo¡¯s question but stared at Portlem coldly. She slowly stepped towards Portlem without moving her eyes. She appeared murderous. Anyone could tell what she was about to do.

    Those in the room were no fools. From the expressions on Andrina and Portlem, the crowd could immediately tell that there were grudges between the two. Han Shuo, who also realized this fact, immediately put on a dark face. He swept his chilling and sinister gazes on Portlem.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know his name, but on my way back to the City of Shadows, it is this guy who lusted over my elder sisters. He thought that we are too weak to defend ourselves and therefore tried to abduct us with his divine guards and an uncle of his. We almost fell to his vicious hands!¡± Andrina answered in a chilling voice after stopping beside Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo had a baleful look. His pair of eyes looking at Portlem was as piercing as swords. He asked in a deep voice, ¡°Young master Portlem, is that so?¡±

    ¡°Bryan, there are some misunderstandings ¨C I didn¡¯t know that they are members of your Celestial Pearl Pharmacy! Only a few of them have reached demigod and basegod strengths. There are people of young and old and a few women. How would I know that they are people of your Celestial Pearl?¡± Portlem put on a grimace and hastily exined.

    ¡°I have clearly mentioned we are from Celestial Pearl soon after we met. Don¡¯t tell me that you, as a highgod, had failed to hear it?¡± Andrina coldly shouted.

    As soon as she finished those words, Andrina suddenly attacked. A dazzling screen made of light shot out from her body and towards Portlem.

    Portlem was about to try giving more excuses when he saw that Andrina had suddenly attacked. His face jolted. The dinner suit suddenly shattered from his chest, revealing the divine armor underneath printed with three bones. Obviously, Portlem was aware just how extraordinary Andrina¡¯s strength was and he had therefore immediately deployed all his defenses with all his strength. He filled the divine armor with his divine energy of death. The divine armor glistened with bright while radiance and formed severalyers of defensive energy fields.

    Simultaneously, Portlem waved his two hands and using his divine energy, congealed a white bone shield in the space before him.

    <i>Pow!</i>

    The screen made of splendid radiances stuck on the bone shield. Andrina¡¯s strength was more than a level above that of Portlem¡¯s. <i>Creak!</i> The white bone shieldpletely broke into pieces. Andrina seized this opportunity to ce her tender small hand on Portlem¡¯s chest.

    <i>Pow!</i> Portlem was thrown staggering backward. His face started to turn pale.

    <i>Ka!</i> While Portlem was stumbling backward, Han Shuo got behind him and stabbed at Portlem¡¯s back with the wine ss in his hand. His sneak attack caused Portlem to stumble forward.

    Andrina¡¯s sudden attack and Han Shuo¡¯s sneak attack all happened in a sh. There were several highgods also in the hall but none of them had expected Andrina and Han Shuo to be so impulsive and reckless. Not only that they struck with no misgivings, but they also do not shy from doing sneak attacks.

    ¡°Cease!¡± Andrina and Han Shuo had both made their first strikes when Andre¡¯s cry sounded. Portlem took the opportunity to retreat towards Charlotte. A strand of blood was flowing from a corner of his mouth. His face was unsightly pale. The calmness he disyed a few moments ago hadpletely vanished. His eyes were filled with sinister lights.

    <i>Whoosh!</i> Andrina charged to the space between Portlem and Charlotte and continued attacking him.

    Han Shuo wore a callous face. His figure blurred and he turned into a trail of fuzzy shadow. He attacked Portlem from the side as though he had not heard Andre at all.

    ¡°Bryan, calm down. At least get the whole thing clear first!¡± Andre shouted in a deep voice and rushed towards the fight.

    Andrina and Han Shuo continued with attacking Portlem non-stop. However, Charlotte, who was standing near them, suddenly stepped forward to help Portlem in resisting Andrina¡¯s attack. The two focused on dealing with Andrina¡¯s attacks butpletely ignored Han Shuo¡¯s attacks.

    In the eyes of Charlotte and Portlem, Andrina was the character that was truly terrifying. As to Han Shuo, well, he could basically bepletely ignored. Han Shuo¡¯s sneak attack just then may have seeded but it did not leave any severe injuries on Portlem. Even the strand of blood flowing from his mouth was caused by Andrina.

    Both Charlotte and Portlem concentrated with defending against Andrina¡¯s attacks. His back was fully exposed,pletely ignoring any potential threat from Han Shuo.

    Andre, who was rushing to the fight, obviously has his sight set on Andrina. He too wasn¡¯t minding Han Shuo.

    The corners of his lips curled to make an evil grin. His big palm shot forward at lightning speed and pressed on Portlem¡¯s back. Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy flooded Han Shuo¡¯s body in an instant and a gush of terrifying energy violently erupted at Portlem¡¯s back.

    It was the same spot Han Shuo had struck thest time, but this attack has the addition of Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy.

    <i>Pow!</i> Portlem was sent flying into the air as he spurted a mouthful of fresh blood.

    Rugersey, over on the other side, hastily reached out to catch Portlem when he saw Portlem was flying to him. He was startled to sense an enormous force when he caught Portlem. He had to fall multiple steps backward before managing to stop.

    ¡°Br- Bryan?!¡± Rugersey looked at Han Shuo as though he had seen a ghost. His face was filled with disbelief.

    When he caught Portlem, he had directly experienced just how terrifying the burst of power was. It was clear to him that the energy did not originate from Portlem. When he realized that it was actually Han Shuo who had released this unfamiliar energy that severely injured Portlem, the fear that filled his heart was simply indescribable.

    To every person in the City of Shadows, Han Shuo was an extraordinarily talented pharmacist. No one had ever thought of him as an expert because all along, Han Shuo had only disyed the strength of a lowgod of death. This was also the reason that Rugersey dared attack Han Shuo back then at the Kisa Residence.

    A lowgod was just all too ordinary in the City of Shadows. No one would notice a mere lowgod!

    Therefore, when Han Shuo, who, to everyone¡¯s impression, a lowgod good at refining medicine, suddenly disyed strengthparable to that of a highgod, every person in the hall was utterly stunned and shocked.

    The hall was filled with powerful experts. Although they could not directly perceive the terrifying energy behind Han Shuo¡¯s strike as Rugersey could, it was clear to them that it wasn¡¯t Andrina who sent Portlem flying and caused him to spurt a stream of blood, but Han Shuo!

    This was because, with Andre¡¯s and Charlotte¡¯s intervention, Andrina had not been able tond any attack on Portlem!

    The hall suddenly sank into absolute silence. Everyone in the room felt as though they had been introduced to Han Shuo again. They stared foolishly at Han Shuo who was wearing a cold, callous face. He wasn¡¯t affected by the crowd¡¯s reaction at all and was still charging at Portlem.

    The Han Shuo at this momentcked the usual approachable and cordial smile. All that was on his face was an ice-cold, apathetic attitude towards life ¨C a demeanor forged through bloodsheds and massacres.

    <i>This guy sure had killed many!</i> the crowd inwardly remarked.

    It was also at this moment that they suddenly realized that the mild and friendly attitude Han Shuo always wore was just a disguise. His grim, bloodthirsty performance at this moment was his true colors!

    Rugersey wore a grimace. He secretly felt d that back then in the Kisa Residence, Erebus and Andre had arrived in his aid just in time. Otherwise, against this little monster with unfathomable strength called Andrina and a character even more treacherous and well-hidden strength, he might have ended up dead for his provocation.

    It wasn¡¯t just Rugersey, but every one in the hall consider Han Shuo as a character more formidable than Andrina!

    A person who could conceal his true strength so well that no one noticed it, who would then suddenlyunch such a deadly blow, and wouldn¡¯t cease his attacks for any person ¨C this patience, tenacity, perseverance, and sinisterness, would send shivers down the spine of anyone who thought of it!

    ¡°Bryan, for my sake, don¡¯t kill him!¡± Andre loudly shouted. He had managed to stop Andrina but wasn¡¯t able to simultaneously stop Han Shuo and therefore tried using persuasion on him.

    Han Shuo kept silent. He continued charging at Portlem who was still leaking blood from his mouth. Obviously, he wasn¡¯t going to do Andre this favor.

    <i>If worstes to worst, I will leave the City of Shadows and reestablish myself all over again. And if I can¡¯t stay in the Cmity Church any longer, I¡¯ll just head to the Space Dominion or the Destiny Dominion!</i> Han Shuo came to such resolution when he struck.

    ¡°Everyone stop him! If Portlem dies in the City of Shadows, we will have no way of exining ourselves!¡± Andre hastily shouted when he saw that Han Shuo remain determined. He truly did not expect that Han Shuo who was urbane and courteous in ordinary days would have absolutely no misgivings when he strikes, and wouldn¡¯t stop for anyone!

    <i>This guy is truly even more dangerous that Andrina. I have been in contact with him for so long and have failed to notice this for all these while. Truly terrifying! No wonder Avery had failed both times. This youngster is even more ferocious than Avery!</i> Andre thought to himself.

    Everyone in the hall was roused by Andre¡¯s cry. Portlem¡¯s family n was powerful and influential in the Death Dominion. If he was to lose his life in the City of Shadows, the House of Sainte would have a really hard time dealing with the repercussions. Therefore, the stupefied crowd in the hall, uponing to themselves, hastily obstructed Han Shuo.

    ¡°Bryan, calm down for a moment!¡±

    ¡°Bryan! Let¡¯s talk, alright? There¡¯s no need to resort to violence!¡±

    The crowd shouted and advised Han Shuo. Rugersey tossed Portlem to another person in the hall, who, in turn, tossed him to yet another person when they saw that Han Shuo charging at them murderously...

    Fresh blood gushed out from Portlem¡¯s mouth as he was tossed around the room. His head was giddy from being thrown around. When he saw that Han Shuo nheless relentlessly pursued him in a callous face, the fear in his heart grew more and more.

    <i>Fucking hell, is this fe nuts? He obviously knows my identity and yet, he keeps on attacking so relentlessly. This wretched thing is really treacherous. I wouldn¡¯t have been caught surprised if he used all his strength in the first attack. Why is Celestial Pearl filled with so many maniacs!</i> Portlem thought to himself while being tossed around.

    Han Shuo internally sighed and suddenly stopped attacking. He shouted, ¡°Andrina, stop!¡±

    ¡°Why?¡± Andrina responded while her glowering eyes remain fixed at Andre and Charlotte.

    ¡°We do not have enough strength to kill him!¡± replied Han Shuo.

    Andrina coldly groaned and retreated to Han Shuo¡¯s side. She shot her pair of ice-cold gazes towards Portlem, who had just been tossed back to Rugersey, and shouted, ¡°I will remember you!¡±

    ¡°Lord Andre, how would you like to proceed next?¡± Han Shuo took a deep breath before he turned to Andre and asked.

    ¡°You-, you are such a-, sigh. I don¡¯t know what to say about you!¡± remarked Andre. He wore an expression of indecision. Then, he instructed, ¡°Rugersey, send Portlem to the Sainte Residence immediately!¡±

    ¡°Hold on, my medicines will stay. I¡¯m not doing business with him!¡± Han Shuo casually tossed a bag of crystal coins at Rugersey who was holding Portlem.

    Rugersey looked at Andre indecisively, asking for his opinion, ¡°This.. erm...¡±

    ¡°And you too!¡± Yet another bag of crystal coins was tossed. Itnded right before Charlotte¡¯s feet.

    Charlotte wore a defeated expression as she cursed Portlem in her mind. She originally intended to persuade Han Shuo otherwise but when she recalled that Portlem¡¯s deeds were indeed very shameless, she did not utter a word but sighed. She took out her medicines and ced them on the table silently. She took the bag of crystal coins, went to Portlem, and had him take out his medicines. After that, she left with Portlem and Rugersey.

    <i>Consider yourself lucky. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that I could persist for too long, you wouldn¡¯t have left this ce alive!</i> Han Shuo coldly remarked in his mind as he watched Portlem left.

    ¡°Bryan, I believe we need to have a word!¡± Andre said in a grimace.

 Chapter 736 - Strength unveiled

    GDK 736: Strength unveiled

    The members and representatives of various family ns left the hall with their medicines. While walking out, they would discuss with each other in whispers about the incident they had just witnessed. Among them, Jiya had beautiful radiance sparkling in her eyes when she looked at Han Shuo. She felt as though she had been introduced to Han Shuo again.

    Han Shuo¡¯s sudden eruption had shocked everyone in the hall. It was after the incident that they realized that this person who seemed inconspicuous in ordinary days was actually an extremely patient and savage man. Han Shuo¡¯s status in their hearts was significantly raised. No one will again think of Han Shuo as merely a pharmacist.

    Although it was true that pharmacists were well-respected professions on Elysium, they could never strike-awe as a highgod could. The respect they have towards pharmacists originated out of necessity. The respect they have towards highgods, however, certainly originated from their hearts.

    ¡°That¡¯s truly surprising that the youngster would possess such strength at such a young age.¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s formidable is not just his current strength, but his patience in keeping low-profile all these while. Had Portlem not made such outrageous act, I¡¯m afraid that all of us would remain oblivious to his actual strength for much, much longer,¡± remarked Beth of the House of Kinson after exiting the hall. She then shot a nce at Jiya and asked in a low, teasing voice, ¡°Uh oh, has my little Jiya just fell for someone?¡±

    ¡°What? No,¡± refuted Jiya, her charming face blushing, ¡°I just thought that he seems pretty interesting. I have never met any character remotely like him in the City of Shadows. In the usual days, he would bow and fawn over Andre. But just now, when he tried to kill Portlem, he did not even bat an eye no matter how much Andre yelled. I¡¯m really amazed by that.¡±

    ¡°I heard that Bryan went ballistic because Portlem tried to abduct his women. Jiya, don¡¯t you forget that he already has women, and it¡¯s in the plural, not singr, mind you,¡± said Beth in a low voice.

    ¡°Mother, what are you talking about?¡± Jiya lightly groaned and left in hasty steps.

    Beth watched as Jiya left. She let out a soft sigh and murmured, ¡°I have never seen you show so much interest in any person for all these years I have raised you.¡±

    ***Inside a secret chamber, Han Shuo and Andre were sitting face to face. Han Shuo remained silent and he looked dark.

    Andre looked at Han Shuo in a grimace. He sighed and said, ¡°Bryan, O, Bryan, what more are you still hiding from us? Last time it was Andrina who flipped out, and now it¡¯s your turn. Who from your Celestial Pearl will be the next to erupt?¡±

    After keeping silent for a long while, Han Shuo finally said, ¡°Lord Andre, if the City of Shadows could no longer fit us, I will take my people and leave the City right away.¡±

    ¡°That is not my desire. Although you have kept us in the dark for a long time, you meant no harm to our House of Sainte. You have saved Carmelita twice and even helped us in exposing Godswamp Pharmacy¡¯s deeds. No matter from any aspect, we House of Sainte owes you a favor,¡± Andre hastily exined, ¡°But, it¡¯s just that the influences Portlem¡¯s family possessed are substantial. His uncle came to the City of Shadows to discuss certain things about the Church. If any mishap were to happen to Portlem in the City of Shadows, our House of Sainte will be deemed responsible.¡±

    ¡°Lord Andre, I understand your position,¡± replied Han Shuo. He turned to a deep voice and continued, ¡°But truly, learning that Portlem had attempted to abduct my women, despite having been informed they are from the Celestial Pearl, boiled my blood.¡±

    ¡°Sigh, let¡¯s not talk about that for now,¡± Andre said in a vexed face. After taking a short pause, he asked, ¡°Bryan, what energy is it that you used just now? Why is it that I have never seen anything like that before?¡±

    Han Shuo kept silent.

    ¡°Erm,¡± Andre seemed rather awkward and added, ¡°Both you and Andrina are very queer. The energies you two used are very unusual. I¡¯m just curious about it, that¡¯s all.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s a type of energy simr to fighting aura. I have practiced it since young,¡± Han Shuo exined after thinking for a bit, ¡°As to precisely what type of energy it is, I¡¯m not too sure either. My Master who taught me the art did not exin it in detail. All that he mentioned was that only certain people with a specific body type could cultivate in the energy. An average person cannot understand or practice it,¡± lied Han Shuo.

    ¡°That is truly strange!¡± eximed Andre.

    ¡°Master, what you did today is imprudent. If the Exalted Demonlord¡¯s enemy discovered that you are cultivating in demonic arts, it will try to kill you before you have grown strong enough to be its rival,¡± Cauldron Spirit transmitted to Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    ¡°I know. But I really want to kill Portlem,¡± Han Shuo said to Cauldron Spirit, ¡°This universe is vast. The chances of running into that person are very minute, especially when my strength now is still so meager. It is unlikely that a character of that level would notice me. I don¡¯t think this would be an issue for now.¡±

    ¡°Still, you better be careful the next time. Avoid using demonic arts unless it¡¯s necessary. If used too frequently, it will, sooner orter, attract unwanted attention,¡± Cauldron Spirit remained silent for a moment and said to Han Shuo, ¡°The Exalted Demonlord had severely injured the Enemy before his death. By my estimation, the Enemy would have yet to recover from its injuries at this point in time. But still, we had better be more cautious.¡±

    ¡°Got it,¡± answered Han Shuo.

    In their original understanding, Han Shuo should avoid using demonic arts and if he were to use it, he will make sure none who witnessed it stays alive. However, the circumstances on that day were unique. Han Shuo had momentarily failed to contain himself after hearing that Portlem nearly abducted his women and he had therefore rashly deployed demonic arts.

    Although he knew that doing so might invite some troubles, in the heat of the moment, the only thought in his mind was to kill Portlem and nothing else. Now that the event had happened, all Han Shuo could do was to draw a lesson from it and minimize the damage. Han Shuo took a slight relief from learning that the Enemy had yet to recover from its injuries.

    ¡°Forget about it. I won¡¯t force you if you are unwilling to speak about it,¡± Andre remarked and sighed when he saw that Han Shuo remained silent. He then stood up and continued, ¡°But you don¡¯t have to worry about the matter too much. As long as Portlem remains alive, things are still salvageable. In fact, it is actually beneficial for you to disy your powerful strength.¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned. In confusion, he asked, ¡°What benefit do you mean?¡±

    ¡°After this incident, my Elder Brother will regard you higher. If you did not possess this kind of strength, to resolve the matter, in consideration of the bigger picture, my Elder Brother might choose to sacrifice you. After all, to my Elder Brother. a pharmacist will never be as important as a highgod. But given the situation now, given the importance of both you and Andrina to him, even without considering the favors you did for Carmelita, my Elder Brother will defend you at all costs,¡± assured Andre, ¡°Therefore, you don¡¯t have to leave the City of Shadows. In fact, you need not worry about the repercussions ¨C our House of Sainte will handle it all for you.¡±

    After taking a short pause, Andre looked solemnly at Han Shuo and added, ¡°But, you must promise me that you will not do a thing to Portlem inside the City of Shadows. It¡¯s fortunate that Portlem¡¯s uncle isn¡¯t around today or else, it would have been messy. If you really cannot forgive Portlem, wait until he has left the City before doing anything to him.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s anger had partially subsided after having seriously injured Portlem. Seeing the serious look on Andre, Han Shuo calmed his mind and thought about it for a moment. Finally, he nodded and said sincerely, ¡°Lord Andre, I apologize for my actions. I have lost my rationality at that time.¡±

    ¡°I understand,¡± Andre said with a faint smile but in his mind, he thought, <i><i>You lookedpletely calm when trying to murder him. It didn¡¯t seem like you have lost much rationality!</i></i>

    ¡°I won¡¯t be seeing your Lordship out. Farewell, Lord Andre,¡± Han Shuo bowed.

    Andre nodded smilingly. He left a few pieces of advice at thest minute and left Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    As soon as Andre left, Andrina entered the chamber. She asked, ¡°Bryan, do we have to leave the City of Shadows?¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head and replied in a deep voice, ¡°We will stay for now and see what happens.¡±

    ¡°But if we don¡¯t leave now, it will be toote if the House of Sainte decides to capture us and deliver us to Portlem to resolve the matter,¡± Andrina creased her brows and said.

    ¡°If the House of Sainte really wants to do so, now is already toote for us to leave,¡± after taking a short pause, Han Shuo asked, ¡°What exactly happened?¡±

    ¡°Twenty days after we separated, I kept them inside a boundary and went out alone to scout out the surroundings. After making sure that you have sessfully drawn all the godhunters away, we continued with our journey to the City of Shadows. We spent twenty thousand ck crystal coins to buy an airship in the first town we entered. From that point on, we continued the journey on the airship.

    ¡°Then, when traveling through a valley, we came across that asshole on his airship, also heading for the City of Shadows. Although Fanny and my elder sisters are weak in strength, they are all outstanding in appearances. Even on Elysium, they are hard toe by beauties. That scum decided to act on his evil thoughts when he saw that our strengths are weak. Fortunately, they did not discover my actual strength. I caught them by surprise by destroying their airship. Then, after putting up a fight, we barely managed to escape.

    ¡°As I have received injuries, fearing that we might run into more trouble in the rest of the journey, I rested for a period of time before continuing with traveling on the airship. That¡¯s about it,¡± narrated Andrina.

    ¡°I¡¯ll go see how they are doing. Here, take it, use these crystal coins to heal your injuries,¡± Han Shuo tossed Andrina a bag of ck crystal coins and walked towards hisdies¡¯ room.

    Han Shuo knew which room Akley had ced his women as he had been watching using his demon general. Upon arrival, Han Shuo relieved them with his warm voice before soothing them physically. He made sure that there were fully contented before leaving.

    After resting for the night, on the second day, Han Shuo introduced thedies to Gu Li, Akley, and others. He also briefly informed them about the situation in Celestial Pearl. Phoebe had plenty of experiences with running a business back on Profound Continent. She was greatly interested in solving the issues faced by Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    Han Shuo, knowing that Phoebe was capable in this aspect, rmended her to Gu Li to take part in the business and personnel management aspects of Celestial Pearl. Although Emily wasn¡¯t as good Phoebe in management, she was skilled in recognizing and recruiting talents ¨C a skill that allowed her to climb to a high position in the Dark Mantle. She too volunteered to help with running Han Shuo¡¯s business.

    These things were not of Han Shuo¡¯s fortes. Seeing how excited the two were in helping him in the business and knowing their capabilities, Han Shuo assigned them some of the relevant duties.

    As Fanny had no experience in running a business and did not show interest in it, Han Shuo did not arrange for her to work in his pharmacy.

    Han Shuo left the excited Phoebe and Emily to learn from Gu Li about the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy and departed for one of the nearest divine weapon stores with Fanny.

    The Origin Crystals and scrolls detailing how to ascend to godhood Han Shuo purchased before the journey was given to Trunks and other friends remaining on Profound Continent. Now that Fanny, Stratholme, and the others had arrived in the City of Shadows, the most important thing they must do now is to rapidly improve their strengths. These mortals were all talented in cultivation. They will surely soar in strength in Elysium where elemental energies were most intense and resources were most abundant.

    After spending just three thousand ck crystal coins, Han Shuo bought all the materials they needed from the store. Those goods Han Shuo purchased were considered ordinary and low-level on Elysium. They were nothing precious.

    When Fanny saw that goods which would be invaluable on Profound Continent being disyed on a corner of the shop like it was nothing remarkable, and seeing that the prices were merely several dozens purple crystal coins to three ck crystal coins, her mind was yet again blown.

    ¡°Those on Elysium could make rapid progress in their cultivation because this world has all the resources. In addition to the superior environment, it¡¯s not surprising that gods aremon. Otherwise, there wouldn¡¯t be so many who would travel across the universe just to live here,¡± Han Shuo conversed with Fanny smilingly. After putting the items into his space ring, they returned to Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    Han Shuo assembled all those who came from Profound Continent, ced all the items he just purchased on a table in front of them, and smilingly instructed, ¡°Take what is most useful for yourselves.¡±

    There were Origin Crystals, green crystals for forming a Body of Element, scrolls detailing how to breakthrough from demigod to basegod, and even the methods of ascending from basegod to lowgod.

    After inquiring and learning the functions of the items, they selected and carefully put away these treasures which would be coveted by every person on Profound Continent. After thanking Han Shuo, they rushed back to their own rooms to cultivate.

    It was after arriving on Elysium that they realized just how weak they were. They were unwilling to waste a second on anything but cultivation in order to close their differences in strengths with an average person on Elysium.

 Chapter 737 - Justice

    GDK 737: Justice

    ***The Sainte Residence.

    Wace was keeping Doyalopany when Rugersey carried the bloody Portlem into the room. Doyalo was Portlem¡¯s uncle ¨C the most important character in their envoy.

    Portlem¡¯s chest was covered with his blood. A small chunk of the cracked divine armor on his back was gone. Pieces of shattered wine ss were still sticking out from his flesh, spilling fresh blood.

    Doyalo wore a dark face. As soon as he saw Portlem being carried inside, he flew to Portlem to hold him. In a deep voice, he asked, ¡°What happened? Who dared harm you in the City of Shadows?¡±

    The expression on Wace¡¯s face didn¡¯t look good either. Doyalo and Portlem were some of the most important guests in the House of Sainte. Portlem being injured so badly wouldn¡¯t look good on them.

    ¡°It¡¯s those from the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy,¡± Charlotte replied softly.

    Wace bunched his brows. He turned to Rugersey and asked, ¡°What happened?¡±

    Rugersey handed Portlem to Doyalo and put on a solemn expression before answering, ¡°There was a minor incident at the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. There seemed to be grudges between Andrina and Portlem. They started fighting in the banquet hall just like that.¡±

    ¡°So it was Andrina who injured Portlem?¡± Wace¡¯s heart sank and he immediately asked. He had learned a little about Andrina from Andre. He had been mindful of this powerful little girl who would hang around Han Shuo. Knowing how powerful the little girl was, it wasn¡¯t surprising that Wace would have thought it was Andrina who did it.

    ¡°No,¡± Rugersey shook his head with a frown. ¡°It was Bryan who severely injured Young Master Portlem!¡±

    ¡°What?¡± Wace¡¯s eyes widened. He said gravely, ¡°Are you sure about that? Bryan is only a lowgod. How could he injure Portlem so severely?¡±

    ¡°It is true!¡± Charlotte wore an astonished look as she exined, ¡°Everyone had underestimated his strength. He is even more vicious than Andrina. He did not use all his strength in his first strike when Portlem¡¯s defenses were up, which caused Portlem to lower his guard. Bryan then took advantage of the situation, catching Portlem by surprise by suddenly attacking with his full strength!¡±

    ¡°How is that possible?!¡± Wace was astonished. He turned to Rugersey and asked, ¡°Is that so?¡±

    Rugersey nodded and said, ¡°It is indeed so. I reckon Lord Andre will be back soon. He was there when it happened. Your Lordship may verify the details with him.¡±

    <i>That youngster actually possesses highgod strength!</i> Wace eximed in his mind. His eyes started to dazzle brightly.

    Andre indeed knew his elder brother well. When Wace heard that Portlem was injured in the City of Shadows, his first thought was to punish the attacker to appease his important guests. However, after learning that Han Shuo was the perpetrator and that he had disyed highgod strength, Wace started running a cost-benefit analysis in his mind.

    One of the reasons Wace couldmand the enormous power and influence he did was that he valued talents highly. Wace had been mindful about the presence of Andrina, a highgod, in the Celestial Pearl for a long time. When he learned that Han Shuo too possessed highgod strength, he knew he had to consider his potential wins and losses carefully.

    Doyalo examined Portlem¡¯s condition. After making sure that the injuries did not threaten Portlem¡¯s life, he raised his head, looked straight at Wace, and asked, ¡°I believe you will uphold justice for us, won¡¯t you?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. I will do you justice as soon as I understand the whole sequence of events!¡± Wace nodded and promised Doyalo. He then turned to Rugersey and questioned, ¡°I know a little about Bryan¡¯s character. He isn¡¯t one who would do something like this out of the blue. What actually happened?¡±

    ¡°This... Erm...¡± Rugersey¡¯s gaze turned to Portlem and Doyalo. He seemed rather hesitant.

    Wace¡¯s expression turned dark. He shouted, ¡°Rugersey, did you not hear my question?¡±

    Rugersey hastily replied, ¡°Yes, my Lord! Andrina imed that while returning to the City of Shadows, she ran into Young Master Portlem. She alleged that Young Master Portlem tried to abduct Bryan¡¯s women.¡± He added, ¡°This is all I have heard from Andrina. I do not know about the specifics!¡±

    Wace had an idea of what happened after listening to Rugersey¡¯s exnation. He had heard rumors about Portlem¡¯sscivious tendencies. It wasn¡¯t at all surprising to Wace that Portlem was used of such acts.

    ¡°Mister Doyalo, if it was your side that instigated it, then it¡¯ll be quite troublesome to deal with!¡± Wace let out a sigh and said, ¡°The rules of the City of Shadows apply to everyone in the City of Shadows. If I favor your side just because you are our guests, then I, the City Lord, will surely be criticized by all therge family ns!¡±

    Doyalo¡¯s expression turned somewhat sour as he could tell from those words that Wace was leaning towards the Celestial Pearl¡¯s side. Although the influences of Doyalo¡¯s family n was immense, they were inside the City of Shadows, outside their sphere of influence. If Wace, the City Lord, decided not to help them, there wasn¡¯t much that they could do.

    ¡°What exactly do you mean by that?¡± asked Doyalo.

    ¡°I will investigate the matter thoroughly and handle the case justly ¨C impartial and without prejudice!¡± Wace said righteously.

    Soon enough, Andre returned from the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. The first thing he did was wink at Andre.

    Wace nodded at Andre, excused himself from the party, went to a corner with Andre and started discussing in a low voice. A momentter, Wace returned with a faint smile on his face and said to Doyalo, ¡°The most important thing now is to treat and stabilize Portlem¡¯s injuries. I will do an in-depth investigation of the incident!¡±

    ¡°I only hope that you will uphold justice for us. I havee to this city in representing the Church to discuss some issues with you. If you can¡¯t even ensure the safety of my envoy, then your House of Sainte is really quite disappointing!¡± Doyalo said in a deep voice before leaving with Portlem.

    After Doyalo, Portlem and Charlotte had left, Wace sneered and remarked, ¡°Trying to pressure me with the Church? Dream on! Hehe, your House of Batchelder is just a tad stronger than my House of Sainte. And you have no power here!¡±

    ¡°Brother, Bryan the youngster is not to be looked down upon!¡± Andre said smilingly.

    ¡°Youth breeds heroism. The stronger he is, the happier I am!¡± Waceughed heartily, ¡°If he was just an ordinary pharmacist, I might actually be unwilling to offend the House of Batchelder. But as things stand now, hehe, sorry Portlem, consider yourself unlucky!¡±

    ¡°But, my Lord, Doyalo came here representing the Church!¡± reminded Rugersey.

    ¡°He merely represents the Church, it¡¯s not like his House of Batchelder is the Church. I have nothing to be afraid of with him!¡± Wace said disdainfully, ¡°Besides, he came here to seek my assistance, not the other way round. My House of Sainte serves the Overgod of Darkness. This little issue isn¡¯t nearly enough to jeopardize the position of my House!¡±

    ¡°Rugersey, you may leave,¡± Andre smiled.

    Rugersey nodded and tactfully left the Sainte Residence.

    As soon as the brothers were left to themselves, Wace asked Andre in an excited and ted manner, ¡°Are you really sure that the youngster has highgod strength?¡±

    ¡°I have seen it with my own eyes!¡± affirmed Andre, ¡°On top of that, the energy he uses is unconventional and very queer, even queerer than that of Andrina¡¯s. This chap is truly unbelievable!¡±

    ¡°Fantastic!¡± cheered Wace. He continued smilingly, ¡°I don¡¯t think that the House of Lavers has interest in staying in the City of Shadows. Eventually, someone¡¯s gotta fill the empty spot they left. If I were to let the other three major family ns share those privileges, they may grow too big, and perhaps even threaten the position of my House of Sainte someday in the future. Bryan has only arrived on Elysium recently and doesn¡¯t have many foundations here. His rtionship with Carmelita is good. I think it will be a decent choice to hand it to him instead. I did not take him as a candidate in the past because of his seemingly poor strength. But now, it appears that he is more suitable than Avery in taking this position!¡±

    ¡°Brother, you mean you want to hand him the Fifth Corps?¡± Andre cried out in surprise.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. The Fifth Corps has been left vacant for a long while. It¡¯s about time someone takes the seat!¡± Wace nodded and replied.

    ¡°But we have put out word that anyone who wants to take the seat must exchange it with Avery¡¯s head. How do we get past that?¡± Andre said with his brows bunched.

    ¡°This is a non-issue ¨C we can alter the terms. If Bryan performed a great contribution to the City of Shadows, we can use that as a reason to hand the Fifth Corps to him. But this is not final yet and we are not in a hurry. I¡¯m just saying that he could be a great candidate for the job,¡± said Wace.

    ¡°Understood!¡± Andre thenmented, ¡°This youngster could be said as having reached overnight sess if he takes over the Fifth Corps!¡±

    Half a month had passed with the snap of a finger. During this period, Han Shuo was on high alert, fearing that Portlem¡¯s uncle woulde to him to seek retribution.

    However, Doyalo did not take a step into the Celestial Pearl. Not only that, but under the coercion of the House of Sainte, Doyalo and Portlem seemed to have epted it as a loss, although they certainly still felt animosity towards Han Shuo.

    The mortals from Profound Continent were incredibly diligent in their cultivation. Other than Phoebe and Emily who needed to handle the daily business operations of the Celestial Pearl, none of them had taken a step out from their rooms.

    Phoebe had again proven herself to be an extraordinary business manager. Under her guidance, most of the work in the Celestial Pearl became smoother and more efficient. Her insights and experience rted to business operations and management were far superior to that of Gu Li¡¯s. From having zero knowledge about medicine refinement, she managed to fully understand all the operations required to run a pharmacy within a short time. The suggestions she introduced to improve those operations were very practical and effective.

    Emily had been working on recruiting certain rare talents. She managed to obtain new human resources to work at the branches of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. With the help of his two extremely capable women, Han Shuo had almost no work to do in his business. He would calcte the earnings every once in a while and left the rest of the business fully to their control.

    During the time, Wace, the City Lord of the City of Shadows, had personallye to visit the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. Although he imed that he was there to investigate the incident about Portlem, during the visit, he had made it clear to Han Shuo that he admired him. He even told Han Shuo to be at ease and not let the incident affect his mood.

    Although Han Shuo had been doing business in the City of Shadows for a long time, for all this while, if Wace had any business for Han Shuo, he would have Andre discuss with Han Shuo on his behalf. Wace had never been to the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy even on its opening day.

    However, just a few days after the havoc in the banquet hall, the esteemed Wace came to visit the Celestial Pearl in person. It was obvious that his attitude had changed.

    Soon after Wace, the patriarchs of the other three major family ns visited the pharmacy one after another. Not only did they heavily condemn Portlem for his depraved deeds, they even praised Han Shuo for his acts in the hall!

    As Wace had been pressuring Carmelita to cultivate, during the period, she had not taken a step out from her private gymnasium. Therefore, she had no clue about the recent happenings in the City of Shadows.

    Erebus, on the very day he returned from a trip, went to look for Han Shuo. He was extremely astonished to learn about the might Han Shuo disyed on that day. He would reassure Han Shuo that given his understanding of Wace, nothing would happen to him.

    After having made much observation during this time, Han Shuo had longe to be aware that Wace intended to defend him. Erebus¡¯ words had further confirmed his conclusion. Erebus had also invited Han Shuo to a friendly match, which Han Shuo had to decline as he could not use Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy for too long. If he was to ept the friendly match, it wouldn¡¯t take long before his exaggerated image as a powerful expert as believed by allrge family ns was shattered.

    Fortunately, Erebus did not insist on it. He did not press on further after seeing that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t interested in a friendly match with him. Before he left, he indirectly indicated to Han Shuo that his Celestial Pearl would have an even more solid position in the City of Shadows with him possessing mighty strength.

    Han Shuo had recognized this fact from the sudden change of attitude among the family ns.

    Compared to in the past, the members ofrge family ns who came to the Celestial Pearl to purchase medicines nowadays showed much more sincerity and respect. After learning that the Celestial Pearl had two highgods of unfathomable strengths and they were absolutely ruthless when it came to killing people, they no longer dared consider the Celestial Pearl as merely arger than average pharmacy business.

    With everything going on the perfect trajectory, Han Shuo had much more free time to spend on cultivating.

    Inside the Celestial Pearl¡¯s gymnasium, Han Shuo and Akley were fighting each other under a gravity-intensifying field. Akley, a man thirsty for battle, believed that he could build his strength at the fastest rate by constantly putting himself in fierce battles. During recent times, he had often fought with Han Shuo in the gymnasium.

    While fighting Akley, Han Shuo would utilize the energy of his avatar of destruction. He would congeal multiple Orbs of Destruction with his two hands and bombard Akley with the Orbs traveling in orbits conforming to the edicts of destruction.

    The Orb of Destruction was made by condensing destruction divine energy. They could hold an astonishing amount of power. Akley was strained in handling the attacks. He was traveling at such a high speed in the gymnasium that his figure became a blurry shadow. As soon as he escaped from being confined by the Orbs, he would immediatelyunch his powerful counterattack.

    <i>Boom! Boom! Boom!</i> Sounded the noise of fierce battles. It did not take long before Akley became utterly exhausted and was defeated.

    ¡°Dude, you really are such a freak. You cultivate in so many different energies at once but for whatever reason, you actually managed to cultivate every one of them to such an advanced level!¡± praised Akley.

    Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body was much tougher than Akley¡¯s divine body. On top of that, after absorbing the godhunters¡¯ divine energies, his avatar of destruction was on the verge of advancing to a midgod. Also, Han Shuo had more divine energy than Akley. Therefore, it wasn¡¯t all that surprising that Akley would lose in a battle against Han Shuo.

    ¡°Alright, now move aside, Akley. It¡¯s my turn!¡± Andrina immediately walked over with a giggle when she saw Akley defeated. She brandished her two little fists before Han Shuo as she asked, ¡°What¡¯s the rule for today?¡±

    ¡°The same old rule ¨C we will fight for precisely three minutes, not a second longer!¡± replied Han Shuo. He could onlyst around three minutes boosting his strength using Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy. If he exceeds this time limit, his demonic infant, the very core for his cultivation of demonic arts, would be injured.

    Han Shuo had been having friendly matches with Andrina during recent times too. He discovered that flooding his body with Cauldron Spirit¡¯s immense energy, although painful, was a good way to temper his body. He had a vague feeling that he was on the verge of making a breakthrough in his practice of Invincible Omen Body.

    At the present time, Han Shuo was able to deploy Invincible Omen Body through conscious thought. The next progression of this demonic skill was to have Invincible Omen Body automatically deployed when the body was attacked. Han Shuo had been trying to achieve this for a long time but haven¡¯t been able to.

    Every time he battled with Andrina, his body would be stressed by Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy. Although this was incredibly painful, his body would be strengthened each time. He knew this from the fact that he could endure Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy longer with each battle. Although it would extend by merely a few seconds every time, it was clear to Han Shuo that this practice was very beneficial to his cultivation.

    ¡°I really can¡¯t make sense of you. Not once have you been able tost longer than a few minutes!¡± Andrina pouted her tiny mouth. As soon as she finished those words, she started attacking Han Shuo without warning. Dazzling radiance would shoot out from her body and fly towards Han Shuo in the shape of a vortex.

    After having battled against Andrina in the gymnasium many times, Han Shuo had grown familiar to her attack methods. As soon as he saw the dazzling vortex approaching, he deployed the Demonic des in his two hands. Streams of dark, dense gasses flowed out from the gaps between his fingers. The dark gas was formed using the energy of demon generals. It looked as though dark ribbons had grown out from his hands.

    The ribbons of dark, dense gasses interwove, forming a giant before Han Shuo. The giant would creak and vaporize when the dazzling radiance fell into it.

    At this moment, Han Shuo and Andrina, separated by the glowing vortex and giant dark,unched attacks at each other. Shimmering lights would shoot out from their hands.

    <i>Pow!</i> One of Andrina¡¯s attacksnded on Han Shuo. His imposing being took a hit. Andrina, as she usually would, took this opportunity to push forward. Han Shuo had no choice but to be on the defense.

    Andrina was much stronger than Portlem, a fact which Han Shuo learned from having fought against her many times. As the energy she cultivated in was unique, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t figure out the actual strength Andrina possessed even till now. However, Han Shuo estimated it to be around mid tote stage highgod realm.

    <i>Pow!</i> Andrina gently pressed her tender, little hand on Han Shuo¡¯s chest and delivered him a blow.

    ¡°Eh?!¡± Han Shuo was sent retreating three steps backward but he appeared to be delighted by it.

 Chapter 738 - Lucrative Post

    GDK 738: Lucrative Post

    Han Shuo had not deployed Invincible Omen Body over his entire body as he knew that Andrina had practiced restraint in her attacks. Even if he was stuck, the attack wouldn¡¯t have killed him.

    Han Shuo was overjoyed because the demonic yuan in his body automatically activated to form Invincible Omen Body when Andrina¡¯s attack struck on his chest, firmly defending his body against the attack. With a big smile, he asked, ¡°Hit me again, but don¡¯t use too much power!¡±

    At this point, Han Shuo¡¯s body had been stressed to its limits and he could no longer use Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy without injuring the demonic infant. Therefore, Han Shuo asked Andrina to use less power.

    <i>Pow!</i> Yet another hitnded on Han Shuo¡¯s chest.

    An enormous force overcame him. It was as though a mountain had struck him in the chest. He was forced to take multiple steps backward. A mild salty-sweet vor filled his mouth before a line of blood flowed down from the corner of his mouth.

    ¡°Huh?!¡± Andrina was shocked. Her figure turned fuzzy and at the next instance, she was beside Han Shuo, holding him from falling further. She asked in a condemning voice, ¡°Why didn¡¯t you block the attack?¡±

    Han Shuo wiped off the blood at the corner of his mouth and exined, ¡°I¡¯m alright. I¡¯m just testing the endurance level of my body.¡± Strangely enough, this time, when Andrina¡¯s attacknded on his body, the Invincible Omen Body did not automatically deploy. That was why he suffered slight injuries.

    <i>What¡¯s going on? It worked just now. Why isn¡¯t it working now?</i> Han Shuo was dumbfounded .

    ¡°Akley,e here and hit me for a while. Don¡¯t use too much power!¡±

    Although Andrina had used merely a small fraction of her power in the attack, as her strength was immense, Han Shuo had nheless suffered a little bit from it. Akley¡¯s strength was nowhere near that of Andrina¡¯s and he couldn¡¯t do any real harm to Han Shuo. It would be much safer to have Akley do the test instead.

    ¡°Are you a masochist now?¡± asked Akley. He arrived beside Han Shuo somewhat unwillingly before suddenlyunching pitter-pattered attacks on Han Shuo. Although the attacks seemed ferocious, Akley had deliberately reduced the power and it wasn¡¯t all that damaging.

    ¡°Stop!¡± Han Shuo softly cried out. <i>Dang it, not working still!</i> He was puzzled. The Invincible Omen Body did not automatically deploy when Akley bombarded him with attacks as packed as raindrops in a rainstorm.

    ¡°What the hell is he doing... Has Bryan turned into a wacko...?¡° Akley mumbled to himself before he waved his hand unenthusiastically and said, ¡°I¡¯m leaving. You y with yourselves.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, what exactly are you doing?¡± Andrina asked Han Shuo in a baffled manner after seeing that Han Shuo was pondering about some issues. Given his bizarre performance, Andrina felt that Han Shuo hadn¡¯t been acting quite right.

    ¡°Nothing, it¡¯s just that I ran into some trouble rted to the energy I cultivate in,¡± Han Shuo casually answered before he said smilingly, ¡°Alright, Andrina, go do whatever you want and let me be alone.¡±

    ¡°Alright then, I¡¯ll go y with sister Fanny. She has now reached demigod strength with the help of an Origin Crystal. From the looks of it, she will be a basegod in just a few years!¡± Andrina remarked before leaving the gymnasium.

    Those mortals from Profound Continent were all unusually talented. Using the enormous resources provided by Han Shuo, being on this outstanding ce called Elysium, and having been extremely hard-working in their cultivation, they had been advancing their strengths at lightning speed. For example, Candide, previously a dark grand magus, took little time in advancing to a sacred magus. He was close to reaching demigod realm. Han Shuo was very proud of the effort they put into cultivation and their achievements.

    Bonds and Sanguis who cultivated in demonic arts had not stopped advancing their strength during the time Han Shuo was away from Profound Continent. This was especially the case for Sanguis. Thanks to his unique body, he managed to advance in the cultivation of Bloodgod Mantra at an astonishing rate. At this point in time, Sanguis had learned to control the blood inside his enemy¡¯s body as well as to transform his blood into bloody shadows that could attack others.

    Han Shuo had ced most of his attention on Bonds and Sanguis. He would answer and exin the difficulties they met in their cultivations and even refined several types of special medicinal pellets for them, allowing their strengths to increase substantially within a short time.

    After Andrina left the gymnasium, Han Shuo continued turning over his mind about why the Invincible Omen Body did not automatically deploy.

    After thinking for some time and practicing Invincible Omen Body for a moment, he still couldn¡¯t find where the problem lied. He then decided not to upy his mind with this issue any longer. He also decided thatter in time, he would test it again while his strength was boosted using Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy.

    ¡°Carmelita came looking for you!¡± Soon after walking out from the gymnasium, Han Shuo saw that Akley was leading Carmelita over to him.

    Carmelita had finallye out from secluded cultivation. Her eyes glistened as soon as she saw Han Shuo and she shouted excitedly, ¡°You rascal, so it turns out that you are actually a powerful expert! Come,e, let¡¯s have a friendly battle. I have heard about how you kicked Portlem¡¯s ass. Very well done! I have wanted to do so myself long ago. That asshole did a lot of sordid deeds before he was a highgod. It only got worse after he cultivated to highgodhood. Again, nice work!¡±

    ¡°I have just trained with Andrina and I¡¯m exhausted now. Maybe next time!¡± Han Shuo declined Carmelita¡¯s invitation before his face turned dark and he asked, ¡°That asshole, has he left the Sainte Residence?¡±

    ¡°No, but he will be returning to his home soon,¡± Carmelita seemed to know what Han Shuo was thinking and so she hastily advised, ¡°But you must not attempt to do anything to Portlem at my Sainte Residence. He is always around his uncle Doyalo. Charlotte would be nearby as well. You and Andrina wouldn¡¯t be able to defeat them. Besides, they are inside the House of Sainte. We cannot just sit and watch if you attack them. You better give up on this thought and find another way!¡±

    Han Shuo knew that it wasn¡¯t realistic to attack Portlem within the City of Shadows. After hearing her advice, he put on a faint smile and nodded, saying, ¡°I know your House of Sainte¡¯s stance. I will not make things any more difficult for you all.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, I havee here to deliver you a piece of very, very good news!¡± said Carmelita.

    Han Shuo raised his brows and asked, ¡°Very good news? What is it?¡±

    ¡°My father has found you rather admirable after learning that you possess highgod strength. Although it hasn¡¯t been long since you first came to live in the City, you have been most helpful to us, not to mention being close to our House of Sainte. So, my father wishes to have you assume control of the Fifth Corps!¡± Carmelita broke the news excitedly.

    ¡°Wha- What?¡± Han Shuo cried out in surprise. In disbelief, he asked, ¡°Me assume control of the Fifth Corps? Are you sure?¡±

    Carmelita gave a big nod and affirmed, ¡°It is indeed true. You should know that in the City of Shadows, following the rules, only certainrge family ns have the rights to possess their own divine guards. Other than them, only the seven Chiefs of Divine Guards could set up and assemble their troops. If you be the Chief of Fifth Corps, you wille to hold real powers in the City of Shadows. This will also be greatly beneficial for your Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. With the powers you hold as the Chief of Fifth Corps and with the wealth you amassed from the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, you could easily rece the House of Lavers and be a new family n in the City. A family n could enjoy many conveniences in the City. Patriarchs ofrge family ns would even have the qualifications to learn about certain matters of the Church!¡±

    Han Shuo did not expect that he would gain such benefits just by revealing his strength. Had he known that disying powerful strength would provide him such conveniences, Han Shuo might have acted on Avery long ago.

    Han Shuo knew just how big of a deal taking over the Fifth Corps would be for him. It was the most lucrative post that every big and small family n in the City had been craving for. Possessing the Fifth Corps would mean he could legally possess military force. Every Chief of Divine Guards in the City of Shadows possessed special privileges and was respected by all. Generally speaking, only powerful experts fromrge family ns who made a significant contribution to the City would have the qualifications to take the seat.

    Just how long had it been since Han Shuo arrived in the City of Shadows?

    ¡°But am I qualified enough? Every person covets this position. I couldn¡¯t just simply step in and take the seat, right? Besides, your father has put out word that to be the Chief of the Fifth Corps, one must turn in Avery¡¯s head. Not only do I currently have no idea where Avery is, even if I did, I would have difficulty in getting rid of him!¡± Han Shuo said with a frown.

    It¡¯s not that Han Shuo didn¡¯t want the position, it¡¯s just that as an outsider who had only arrived in the City of Shadows recently,ing to possess this enormous gift didn¡¯t seem sound.

    ¡°Some rules can be bent!¡± Carmelita replied, ¡°Although this is my father¡¯s intention, still, there is much work you must do before you can take this seat. You must prove your capabilities to everyone before my father can give you a hand!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and replied smilingly, ¡°Understood!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s the most important news I have for you. Other than that, Erebus wants you to know that you may go to the Third Corps and learn about their work. He can make relevant arrangements for you. There, you can umte sufficient contribution and prestige, significantly increasing your chances of taking the Fifth Corps!¡±

    If Han Shuo could learn about the conditions at Erebus¡¯ Third Corps by working there, all while umting contributions by joining in their operations, in addition to having Wace¡¯s assistance, then it did seem promising that Han Shuo could take the position as the Chief of the Fifth Corps, this post highly-coveted by everyone.

    ¡°What has Erebus been up totely?¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment before he suddenly asked. Erebus had not been in the City of Shadows during recent times.

    ¡°None other than hunting those godhunters. Erebus and Brovst have some private grudges. He never ceases pursuing Brovst,¡± answered Carmelita.

    ¡°Awesome!¡± Han Shuo cried out softly. ¡°Carmelita, I will have to trouble you to arrange that for me. I will go to the Third Corps to learn about their work. I do have some insights I could provide when ites to hunting the godhunters!¡±

    ¡°No problem, I will send Erebus a message when I¡¯m home. I will let you know when he haspleted the arrangement!¡± Carmelita said happily.

    <i>Indeed, it¡¯s good to have powerful friends!</i> thought the ted Han Shuo. He knew that if it wasn¡¯t for the fact that he had saved Carmelita¡¯s life twice and for building a good rtionship with the House of Sainte, there wasn¡¯t a chance that he could take that post, not even in a hundred years.

    ¡°Bryan, there¡¯s one more thing I want to tell you!¡± Carmelita seemed rather embarrassed and awkward.

    ¡°What is it?¡± asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°Sister Charlotte and I are on good terms. She wants you to know that she had helped Portlem in obstructing your attacks at the hall because she did not have another choice. She hopes that you will not hold grudges against her,¡± Carmelita hesitated for a moment before she continued, ¡°Bryan, Charlotte was originally from our Darkness Dominion. She has now married and moved to the Destruction Dominion. Although she is here in the city with Portlem, they did not travel on the same route. She had not participated in Portlem¡¯s vices!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and said, ¡°As long as Charlotte doesn¡¯t do anything to harm our Celestial Pearl, I will hold no grudges against her,¡± Han Shuo said and continued in his mind, <i>But if she harms any of my people, I¡¯m gonna make her pay!</i>

    ¡°That¡¯s great. Well, that¡¯s all I havee here to tell you. Ciao!¡± Carmelita hastily left. She felt that she did a favor for Charlotte.

    Soon after Carmelita left, Han Shuo took out the Holy Grail and transmitted to McKinley, ¡°I have returned to Elysium but there are some urgent matters I need to attend to. After some time, I will personally take you to the Space Dominion!¡±

    ¡°Where on Elysium are you located?¡± asked McKinley.

    ¡°The City of Shadows of the Darkness Dominion,¡± answered Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oh, this ce is indeed quite some distance from the Space Dominion. Well, if you have pressing matters, I shall wait. After all, I have stayed inside the Grail for so long. Waiting for a little longer won¡¯t make that much of a difference,¡± said McKinley.

    As long as Portlem and his party were in the City of Shadows, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t feel at ease about the safety of his Celestial Pearl. Although Han Shuo believed that they wouldn¡¯t do anything reckless in the city, as the saying goes, it¡¯s difficult to guard against an arrow in the dark. If they were to conduct a stealthy assassination as Avery did, without clear evidence, there wouldn¡¯t be much that the House of Sainte could do in holding them responsible.

    Other than that, there was this matter about this lucrative post which Han Shuo was after. He had learned about the location of the godhunter¡¯s base. As long as he put in some effort, he might gain name and contribution for cracking down on the godhunters. Then, with Wace assistance, he would have a clear path to bing the Chief of Fifth Corps.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, it won¡¯t take too long! Besides, even if not for you, I will still be heading to the Space Dominion after some time!¡± Han Shuo had arranged with Little Skeleton and the five elite zombies to meet at the Space Dominion every interval of fifty years. It was just a matter of time before Han Shuo would be there.

 Chapter 739 - Puzzle solved

    GDK 739: Puzzle solved

    Han Shuo and Andrina were in the gymnasium. Their figures were blurry. Their figures intersected with sharp tinkling sounds.

    <i><i>Whoosh Whoosh!</i></i> Han Shuo quickly deployed and retracted the Demonic des. Ten speckles of dark radiance shot out and swarmed at Andrina like ten little meandering serpents.

    Andrina responded by forming multiple dazzling vortexes that would orbit around her, blocking the ten dark radiances from reaching her. However, the dark radiances started maneuvering at lightning speed as though they were alive. They evaded the vortexes and continued slithering towards Andrina.

    Andrina let out a gentle cry of surprise. More vortexes appeared around her as the vortexes orbiting her moved towards her. The boundary towers around the gymnasium suddenly started glowing brightly as the energy contained in those towers rushed towards the boundaries.

    The ten dark radiances were shredded by the vortexes. They were no longer a threat to Andrina.

    Andrina¡¯s petite figure gently hovered towards Han Shuo. With her two little hands, she wove a screen of light and trapped Han Shuo in it. Han Shuo immediately felt pricking pain all over his body. He hastily tried to block her attacks.

    <i><i>Pow!</i></i> Andrina¡¯s small hand pierced through the barrier and pushed Han Shuo in the chest.

    Han Shuo stumbled. He immediately sensed that the Invincible Omen Body had automatically deployed. The strike did not cause much harm to his physical body. After saving himself from a fall, Han Shuo immediately pushed forward. His left hand became bone-chillingly cold while his right hand turned zing hot. Heunched attacks that harmoniouslybined the two extreme temperatures. They were so fierce that even Andrina was forced to take defensive measures.

    But it was such a pity that soon after that, the three-minute mark had passed. Han Shuo held on for another few seconds before he retreated. All the energy of Cauldron Spirit withdrew from his body. It took several deep breaths for Han Shuo to restore his blushing face to normal.

    From the many days of friendly matches against Andrina, Han Shuo discovered that while his strength was boosted using Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, his body would automatically deploy Invincible Omen Body when attacked. But after he returned the energy to Cauldron Spirit, his body would not deploy Invincible Omen Body when attacked.

    After conducting many tests, long contemtion, and lengthy discussion with Cauldron Spirit, Han Shuo had finally pinned down on the cause. They identified two major factors: his body strengthened by the demon generals that had entered his body and the enormous power in Andrina¡¯s attacks. Invincible Omen Body had automatically formed under the enormous external stress and his body was in a strengthened state.

    With this knowledge, Han Shuo gained a clear sense of how he should proceed in his cultivation. By further strengthening his body, not only could he use Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy for a longer duration, but he would also make progress in mastering the Invincible Omen Body.

    Han Shuo was destined to face a great Cmity while advancing to Skybreak Realm. If his physical body wasn¡¯t mighty enough, he would certainly die while facing the Cmity. Therefore, at this stage, he could not go wrong with focusing on tempering his body. It was on his body that he had to spend the most thought and effort on in order to advance in Omen realm. Now that Han Shuo knew his direction, he decided to build his body by boosting his strength with Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, fight Andrina, rest, and repeat.

    After doing so for a month, Han Shuo could hold Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy for around four minutes. Invincible Omen Body would instantly form when his body flooded with demon general energy was met with powerful attacks.

    While in that state, Han Shuo stood still and let Akley attack him. However, the Invincible Omen Body did not automatically activate. Akley¡¯s strength was sses below that of Andrina¡¯s. His attacks simply couldn¡¯t pose Han Shuo any harm.

    After having done this test, Han Shuo realized that at that state, only when there was an external force mighty enough to cause his physical body harm would the Invincible Omen Body automatically deploy. Akley¡¯s attacks, too weak to damage Han Shuo¡¯s body, were not powerful enough to trigger the demonic skill.

    Han Shuo had been assiduously cultivating in the gymnasium. He would be in intense agony while Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy flooded his body. He felt as though every cell from his head to toe was being stabbed with needles. But Han Shuo¡¯s body grew tougher the more he endure this kind of inhuman pain. He was constantly tempering his own body like a cksmith tempering a sword.

    During these times, Han Shuo did not partake in running the Celestial Pearl. Phoebe and Emily had proven themselves to be more than capable of running and managing the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. Although the pharmacists did not like that the duo knew nothing about medicine refinement, they nheless were very admiring of the duo¡¯s capabilities in business management.

    Within a short time, with the two turning the gears of the Celestial Pearl, every aspect of the business became most optimal, efficient and productive. Thanks to their efforts, the few branches of the Celestial Pearl that remained closed all that while due to insufficient talents were now open for business.

    With that, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy could now truly be the reigning pharmacy in the City of Shadows. During recent times, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy had collected several hundred thousand ck crystal coins in profit. Honoring their agreement with the House of Sainte, Phoebe delivered Carmelita¡¯s share to the Sainte Family in a timely fashion. The House of Sainte was most satisfied with her punctuality.

    Han Shuo, having been freed from the workload of running his business, spent all the extra time on cultivation. His body grew ever tougher.

    Finally, Portlem and his party concluded their visit and left the City of Shadows. Before Doyalo set on his journey, he had Anito ry words to Han Shuo, ¡°You better not leave the City of Shadows. If we find you, you¡¯ll be sorry you everid a finger on Portlem!¡±

    Han Shuo scoffed at Doyalo¡¯s threat. In fact, he did not even consider him a threat. If it wasn¡¯t for those Sainte Family bodyguards seeing Doyalo away, Han Shuo might have set up an ambush on them with Andrina. Having made rapid progress in his cultivation, Han Shuo was tempted to put his newfound power to the test!

    Then one day, Anito, a frequent face around the Celestial Pearl, came by and handed a stack of scrolls to Han Shuo. He said smilingly, ¡°From this day onwards, we will berades-in-arms!¡±

    ¡°So it has been settled?¡± Han Shuo received the scrolls with an ted heart.

    ¡°Hehe, with the Sainte Family¡¯s assistance and Lord Erebus¡¯ consent, it¡¯s no surprise that a matter of this sort would be settled so quickly. These scrolls here exin your position in our Third Corps. Right, Miss Carmelita wants you to know that Lord Erebus is currently at the Skyorchid Fort. Now that Portlem and the others have left the City of Shadows, you don¡¯t have to worry about the safety of the Celestial Pearl,¡± Anito smiled.

    ¡°Well then, I will head to Skyorchid Fort right away!¡± Han Shuo was growing rather bored in recent days and was ready to get on his feet.

    ¡°There won¡¯t be any divine guards protecting the Celestial Pearl for the moment but I will be around while you are away. But still, you can feel at ease about Celestial Pearl. Your enemies wouldn¡¯t spend any effort on those who had yet to be lowgods. They will look for you and Andrina if they want to strike.¡± consoled Anito.

    ¡°Thank you!¡± said Han Shuo smilingly.

    ¡°You are most wee!¡± replied Anito hastily. Han Shuo¡¯s performance back at the banquet hall was now widely known among the family ns of the City. Anito, after learning that Han Shuo actually possessed highgod strength, became even more respectful and solemn in his daily interaction with Han Shuo. His gazes towards Han Shuo would be filled with reverence.

    ¡°Andrina, we are going to Skyorchid Fort. Get ready!¡± instructed Han Shuo when he found Andrina.

    ¡°Wonderful! We are finally going to take care of those godhunters!¡± Andrina was ted to hear those words. She had in fact been waiting for it for a long time. She giggled as she said, ¡°There¡¯s nothing I need to prepare. But you have to bring along the ck crystal coins you made in thest month!¡±

    ¡°I have it here!¡± replied Han Shuo smilingly.

    With this money printing machine they called the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy making him ever more crystal coins, he became less stingy towards Andrina. Aware that Andrina could heal herself using crystal coins, he had prepared some for the trip.

    After training with Andrina for some time, Han Shuo had a vague idea of Andrina¡¯s source of power. He discovered that when Andrina fought him, some organs in her body would turn into a crystalline state. It seemed as though Andrina was an intricate energy tower that could use absorb and use the energy inside energy crystals.

    Han Shuo also noticed that whenever the fight got fierce, the energy towers around the gymnasium would behave abnormally, which gave Han Shuo some ideas about Andrina¡¯s energy. However, he did not ask or seek confirmation from Andrina as she had not asked anything about his secrets. Besides, he did not want to annoy or anger Andrina.

    ¡°You previously mentioned that you discovered a godhunter¡¯s base. Is that true?¡± Andrina suddenly asked Han Shuo while they were leaving the City.

    ¡°Yep. After I drew those godhunters away thest time, I followed them for quite a few days. I discovered a valley between the City of Shadows and Mirage City that was filled with boundaries. When Brovst arrived at the area, his behavior turned solemn. I believe that someone mightier than Brovst must be in there!¡± Han Shuo turned to a grave expression and continued, ¡°Brovst is already a mid-stage highgod. If there¡¯s a being even more powerful than he is, then this Godhunter Alliance is really quite frightening!¡±

    ¡°It is true. The Brovst trio is only on the second level of the hierarchy. The ce does sound like a really juicy target!¡± said Andrina.

    Andrina knew the Godhunter Alliance much better than Han Shuo did. Her words that Brovst, Gas, and Taylin were only the second highest inmand had verified Han Shuo¡¯s guess.

    *** Skyorchid Fort.

    This fort was close to Mirage City and one of the most remote forts of the City of Shadows. Around the fort were mountain ranges, swamps, and oceans ¨C ces most suitable for godhunters to hide.

    Not only were those terrains most suitable for godhunters to hide in, but gods that traversed between the City of Shadows, Mirage City, and Hushveil City would also have to cross those areas, giving the godhunters an abundance of prey. During the recent period, the godhunters had be especially active around Skyorchid Fort. The three cities would dispatch additional divine guards to search the region consisting of several dozen mountain ranges, around eight swamps, and three vast oceans. Those godhunters had severely threatened the safety of the three cities. They had no choice but to take the threat seriously.

    On top of the tallest building in Skyochid Fort, Erebus was sitting opposite to a woman with fine ck hair that could reach her knees. She had long, shapely eyebrows and eyes whose outer corners incline upwards. She appeared to be glowing with health and vigor. As she sat, her long, fine hair would gracefully dance in the breeze.

    The gentlemanly Erebus had eyes filled with passion as he looked at the woman sitting in front of him. In fact, the reason he joined the City of Shadows as one of the Chief of Divine Guards was for this woman. Otherwise, Erebus might still be wandering everywhere and concentrating on cultivation instead of settling down.

    ¡°Oh, Aobashi, do you not understand my pain and agony?¡± Erebus let out a soft sigh and said with a voice of agony.

    Aobashi smiled faintly. Her beautiful eyes squinted slightly as though she was making a crafty smile with her eyes. She replied, ¡°I do know your pain, but I have never asked you to stay in the City of Shadows for me. Don¡¯t you like wandering all about? You can leave the city anytime you like. I believe the City Lord will not stop you.¡±

    ¡°No matter how far I would wander, my heart stays here, with you. So there¡¯s no point in leaving,¡± replied Erebus.

    Aobashi shook her head and let out a gentle sigh. ¡°Erebus, we really aren¡¯t a match! I have said all that I have to say in these past years. I cannot do anything if you want to stay in the City but that will not make me ept you!¡±

    ¡°Forget about it, let¡¯s not talk about this for now,¡± Erebus hastily switched the topic. ¡°That youngster I previously mentioned will reach Skyorchid Fort very soon. We haven¡¯t been able to track the godhunters but I believe that will change after he arrives.¡±

    Aobashi took a sip of tea, shot a nce at Erebus, and said, ¡°We couldn¡¯t locate the godhunters but he could? Haha, isn¡¯t he a pharmacist? Why is it that you have suddenly arranged him into your Third Corps? Are you hiring him to make medicines for you?¡±

    ¡°Of course not!¡± Erebus said, ¡°The City Lord intends to have him take over the Fifth Corps that every family n has been fighting for. In fact, it was the City Lord¡¯s idea to let him work at my Third Corps so that he can learn our ways.¡±

    After hearing those words, Aobashi, the top-ranking Chief of Divine Guards, slightly straightened up herzily reclined body as a gleam shed across her eyes. She asked puzzlingly, ¡°Him? The Fifth Corps? Running an army is nothing simr to making medicines! How is he going to handle the job?¡±

    ¡°Nobody knows,¡± Erebus continued smilingly, ¡°But, I¡¯m rooting for him. This youngster is more difficult to handle than Avery. I have never seen anyone who is so good and patient at concealing their strength. He is no ordinary fellow! He obviously has highgod strength but from the first day he came to the City, he disguised himself as a lowgod. Not only did Andre and I fail to discover his actual strength, but even the City Lord was fooled. It was likely because of this that the City Lord was determined to hand him the Fifth Corps!¡±

    ¡°Oh?¡± Aobashi¡¯s interest was aroused. She said smilingly, ¡°He does sound interesting from your words. I shall see his talents for myself!¡±

    ¡°He should be here soon. I sent a message to Carmelita three days ago,¡± said Erebus.

    While Erebus and Aobashi were conversing, Andrina forced Han Shuo to show her the godhunter¡¯s valley.

    ¡°There it is!¡± Han Shuo pointed into the distance and whispered to Andrina. They were hiding on the top of arge tree.

    Andrina remained silent. She took a long time to observe before she replied excitedly, ¡°Bryan, you really are amazing! I haven¡¯t been able to locate any base as big as this in all these years I¡¯ve hunted for them. Who knew you would actually manage to discover such a huge base just like that. This is wonderful!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t you do anything stupid!¡± Han Shuo hastily said, ¡°No matter how much you hate the godhunters, entering the ce alone won¡¯t do you any good. The trio of Brovst could severely injure you. Besides, if there were character even more formidable in there, entering the ce will mean your certain death!¡±

    ¡°Pff, such a wordy one. Of course I know that!¡± Andrina wrinkled her nose and replied.

    ¡°Eh!¡± Han Shuo suddenly let out a soft cry of surprise.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± Andrina immediately asked.

    ¡°There is a small divine guard squadron lingering nearby. Perhaps they will discover this ce! They don¡¯t seem to be from the City of Shadows. From the design of their armor, I reckon they are from Mirage City. I wonder if they will get lucky!¡± said Han Shuo softly.

    ¡°You saw it using those special lifeforms of yours?¡± Andrina giggled and said, ¡°Bryan, those special lifeforms of yours are really useful. Can you give me a few of them? With those unique lifeforms, I would have multiple eyes watching around the mountain range!¡±

    ¡°No!¡± Han Shuo refused resolutely. When Han Shuo saw that Andrina had put on a discontented face, he forced a smile and exined, ¡°This has got to do with the energy I cultivate in. The energy that you use is totally different than mine so you won¡¯t be able tomand them.¡±

    ¡°Miser!¡± Andrina pouted and whined, ¡°That is just an excuse you made up. If you don¡¯t give me some, then you are a miser!¡±

    ¡°Say whatever you want but I¡¯m not giving you any,¡± Han Shuoughed mischievously. Then, he pulled Andrina and said, ¡°Come, let¡¯s go over to have a look. They are approaching from another direction and might attract the godhunter¡¯s attention. We might gain a clue about their strength!¡±

    Andrina groaned as though she was angry at Han Shuo. After being pulled for a moment, Andrina went with him, but not without dragging her feet.

 Chapter 740 - Believe it or not

    GDK 740: Believe it or not

    From the perimeter of the valley, a small group of loudly chattering divine guards were slowly walking towards the valley.

    ¡°His Lordship is very prudent and wouldn¡¯t leave any area unsearched. Those godhunters know that the three Cities are hunting them down. They should have escaped far away long ago. How could they still be nearby?¡± one of the divine guards grumbled.

    ¡°Stopining. There¡¯s only one more valley to go. If it checks out, we get to go home early. Besides, we aren¡¯t the only group working overtime. Everyone else is searching too,¡± responded another divine guard.

    The divine armor on these divine guards did not belong to the City of Shadows. They were dark green and had a sword and shield carved into their chest, an emblem unique to the House of Tule from Mirage City.

    The small group of ten people was fullyposed of mid-stage midgods, except for the leader, ate-stage midgod. They cultivated in the energy of death, darkness, and destruction except for one who cultivated in the energy of fire.

    These people had absolutely no clue just how treacherous the valley up ahead would be. They walked closer and closer to the valley as they loudlyined about their work.

    Through the observations of the demon generals, Han Shuo noticed several energy towers disguised asrge trees swaying very lightly. A minute pulse of energy was covertly transmitted to the center of the valley. Several blurry figures appeared in the distance and quietly approached the divine guards.

    Andrina gently tapped on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulder and whispered, ¡°Those energy towers disguised as trees have delivered messages. Those people are out of luck!¡±

    Andrina had a special sensitivity towards all things energy crystals, which might have something to do with the energy she cultivated in. Han Shuo knew that Andrina could even control and manipte certain energy towers and boundary towers within a certain range. Basically, as long as the mechanism or devices was powered using energy crystals, she could temper with them.

    Han Shuo nodded and replied thoughtfully, ¡°And so be it. They are from Mirage City, after all. None of our concern.¡±

    After hearing those words, Andrina understood that Han Shuo had no intention of warning those people. The godhunters in the valley weren¡¯t anything that those divine guards could tackle. If Han Shuo and Andrina did nothing, those who unwarily stepped into the valley would face certain death.

    Soon, a person stealthily flew out from the valley. It was Taylin, whom Han Shuo had previously seen. Taylin was a mid-stage highgod expert. Her arrival meant that their appointment with death had been booked with no cancetion.

    Taylin quietly approached the group of divine guardspletely oblivious to the dangers at hand. She gestured with her hand. Those godhunters who had been waiting in position slowly encircled them.

    <i>Ssss!</i>

    Noises of people rapidly moving suddenly sounded from the thickets. Multiple figures abruptly emerged from the shadows and pounced on the divine guards from Mirage City.

    Just as expected, with Taylin¡¯s intervention, the battle was over in no time. Miserable wails ended as soon as they began. Those unfortunate divine guards from Mirage City died with their divine energies drained.

    After all that wasplete, with Taylin¡¯s gesturing, the godhunters sprinkled some powder on those bodies. A momentter, their bodies were liquefied, seeping into the ground. Other than the thin scent of blood in the air, not a shred of evidence was left behind.

    Han Shuo suddenly opened his eyes wide. He eximed in a low voice, ¡°Those poisons that the godhunters are using seem simr to those made by toxicologists from the Godswamp Pharmacy!¡±

    Andrina¡¯s expression changed slightly. ¡°You mean?¡±

    ¡°The Godswamp Pharmacy could be associated with the godhunters. Otherwise, how would they have acquired those poisons?¡± replied Han Shuo in a deep voice.

    ¡°I see. Have they all been killed?¡± Andrina and Han Shuo were extremely far from where the action took ce. She could hardly see what was going on.

    ¡°Yep. Of course that small group of divine guards stood no chance against therge number of godhunters. Let¡¯s leave now and head to Skyorchid Fort. We will inform Erebus of the situation in the valley. We must assemble sufficient forces before assaulting the valley.¡± Han Shuo and Andrina then hastily left.

    ***Skyorchid Fort.

    ¡°Bryan, you are finally here. Come,e, let me introduce you, this is our top-ranking Chief of Divine Guards, Aobashi!¡± Erebus pulled Han Shuo to the front of Aobashi and said smilingly, ¡°This is the Bryan I have been talking about. He is now a member of my Third Corps and he will help us find the godhunters.¡±

    ¡°Greetings, Lord Aobashi!¡± Han Shuo saluted smilingly.

    Aobashi took a few nces at Han Shuo before she pulled a faint smile and said, ¡°I have heard great things about you. Wee aboard!¡±

    ¡°And you must be Andrina?¡± Aobashi gracefully hovered to Andrina¡¯s side, wanting to hold her little hands. She seemed to be much more cordial towards Andrina.

    Andrina bunched her brows and took a few steps backward. She wore an ice-cold expression and obviously did not want Aobashi to touch her.

    ¡°Ee?¡± A strange light shed in Aobashi¡¯s eyes when Andrina avoided her. She giggled and remarked, ¡°Well, it seems that Erebus hasn¡¯t been exaggerating. You are quite a shocking one, little girl.¡±

    ¡°You must be tired from the journey. Let me arrange your rooms so that you can rest,¡± said Erebus in a friendly manner.

    ¡°Nope, no need for that. Let¡¯s get straight to business!¡± said Andrina, coldly.

    ¡°Ermm,¡± Erebus got somewhat awkward seeing Andrina receive his hospitality so poorly. He exined, ¡°Well, we don¡¯t know where the godhunters are hiding. We haven¡¯t been able to discover their trails even after searching for so long, so there¡¯s no need to rush it,¡±

    ¡°Bryan knows where they are. You can start assembling an army. Once we have gathered enough forces, we will set off at once!¡± Andrina shot a nce at Aobashi and continued softly, ¡°You must gather more experts than yourself and Erebus, or we won¡¯t have the chance of defeating those godhunters!¡±

    ¡°Oh?¡± Aobashi didn¡¯t seem to buy it. She asked smilingly, ¡°Little girl, are you saying that the joined forces of both Erebus and I are not enough to take care of those godhunters?¡±

    ¡°No.¡± Andrina shook her head and, with a serious face, exined, ¡°I¡¯m saying that even with Bryan, the two of you, and myself ¨C four highgods joining forces, we would still have a hard time defeating them.¡±

    Aobashi was shocked by those words. She did not think that Andrina was talking nonsense and therefore, she put on a solemn face and asked gravely, ¡°What kind of situation are we talking about here?¡±

    ¡°You should ask him, no one knows the ce better than him, except for the godhunters. After all, he¡¯s the one who discovered the base,¡± Andrina said as she pointed at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Bryan, you discovered godhunter trails?¡± Erebus cried out in surprise.

    Han Shuo nodded and said in a deep voice, ¡°I have discovered a base of the Godhunter Alliance located in a valley between the City of Shadows, Mirage City, and Hushveil City. It is heavily guarded. As far as I know, there are three mid-stage highgods in there. They seemed to be Brovst, Taylin and Gas. These three alone will be difficult to handle. But, based on my observation, the three are not the top bosses in the valley. I reckon that there is at least e-stage highgod expert in the valley. That¡¯s why the few of us are not enough to defeat them and cleanse the valley!¡±

    ¡°What!¡± both Erebus and Aobashi simultaneously shouted.

    Han Shuo nodded his head heavily and assured, ¡°I¡¯m sure that¡¯s the case!¡±

    Aobashi took a deep breath but she still seemed rather startled by the news. She said softly, ¡°From what we have gathered, the leaders of the Godhunter Alliance are those three you mentioned. If the situation is as you exined, then we really will have trouble defeating them. This is a surprise! The godhunters are more powerful than we thought!¡±

    ¡°Aobashi, I will send messages and ask those two from the other two cities toe over. We need to n this out properly,¡± said Erebus in a deep voice.

    ¡°Yes, we should hope for the best but prepare for the worst. If what Bryan believes is true and we barge into the valley recklessly, we would have a very difficult time. We should have them join the operation,¡± Aobashi immediately agreed.

    There too were divine guards in Mirage City and Hushveil City who specialized in hunting godhunters. It seemed that they had been in touch with Erebus and Aobashi who worked under the City of Shadows. If the divine guards from the other two cities were to join the assault, they would have a much higher chance of seeding.

    Erebus immediately left the party and headed towards another building to transmit his message.

    Han Shuo, Andrina and Aobashi were left to themselves. Aobashi would ask Han Shuo about the environment and other details of that valley and Han Shuo would tell her everything that his demon generals had observed. Aobashi looked grave, a sign that she believed Han Shuo¡¯s words.

    ¡°Bryan, I find it quite odd that you should discover the valley. Why is it that Andrina doesn¡¯t know much about the situation there but you seem to have seen every part of it?¡± after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s exnation, Aobashi asked Han Shuo in astonishment as her beautiful eyes fixed intently on him.

    ¡°I have my ways!¡± Han Shuo was not willing to reveal much about his demon generals to Andrina, much less to Aobashi whom he had just be acquainted with.

    Aobashi did not press on with the question after seeing that Han Shuo had no intention of answering it. However, it seemed as though her interest in Han Shuo had suddenly grown. She would attempt to read Han Shuo from various aspects, for example, which material ne Han Shuo came from and how his friction with Avery started.

    ¡°You need to be careful of Avery. I have experience of working with him and I know that he isn¡¯t one to easily give up on anything. If he has taken you as his main enemy, he will not give up on bringing you down. Now that he has gone into hiding, he must be scheming something detailed to retaliate. You need to be wary!¡± Aobashi reminded Han Shuo gravely.

    ***

    Seven dayster, Aobashi and Erebus¡¯ counterparts from Mirage City and Hushvil City arrived at Skyorchid Fort with their troops.

    The one from Mirage City was called Blightsoar, a mid-stage highgod of destruction. The one from Hushveil City was called Eugene, a mid-stage highgod of darkness.

    The two were very interested in the intel and had been asking Aobashi the details. When Aobashi finally exined everything to them, that highgod from Hushveil City named Eugene started sizing up Han Shuo with suspicious gazes. He asked, ¡°He is that famous pharmacist from Celestial Pearl Pharmacy?¡±

    ¡°Yes. He¡¯s the man who discovered the valley,¡± answered Erebus.

    ¡°He is just a pharmacist, how could he be qualified to participate in such a major military operation? Also, we have been looking for many months but have not discovered a trail. How is it that he would know where they are hiding? Aobashi, Erebus, you should know that I trust the two of you, but this guy, I¡¯m very doubtful of his words!¡± said Eugene most impolitely in Han Shuo¡¯s presence.

    Han Shuo wore an indifferent face and shrugged, ¡°Believe it or don¡¯t.¡±

    Han Shuo could sense that this Eugene was prejudiced against him from the first moment they met. Han Shuo had never met this person before and he had no idea what sparked Eugene¡¯s prejudice.

    ¡°Youngster, are you giving me attitude?¡± Eugene bunched his brows angrily and said, ¡°Being a close friend of the master of Godswamp Pharmacy, Mister Hassling, I have heard stories about you. It is you who has appropriated the Godswamp Pharmacy¡¯s assets in this city. Youngster, a ck-hearted person you are!¡±

    <i>Ha! No wonder!</i> Han Shuo sneered in his mind.

    Han Shuo answered, ¡°Hassling? You would befriend a person who secretly refines poisons and trades with godhunters?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t you make irresponsible usations!¡± rebuked Eugene, ¡°I know Mister Hassling well. His Godswamp Pharmacy has a good name in the Darkness Dominion and he would never do such things!¡±

    Han Shuo scoffed, shook his head, and remained silent.

    ¡°Eugene, it was the House of Sainte who confiscated Godswamp Pharmacy¡¯s assets in the City of Shadows. Do you have a problem with that?¡± Erebus coldly shouted.

    ¡°Okay, that¡¯s enough. We are here for the identical goal of getting the godhunters. We should be fighting the godhunters, not each other!¡± mediated Blightsoar. ¡°The godhunters are threatening the safety of our cities. The most crucial thing we should do right now is to hit them hard. We cannot do that without working together!¡±

    ¡°If you do not believe Bryan¡¯s words, your Hushveil City can stay out of this operation. I just need to report to my City Lord and he will assign another Chief of Divine Guard to fill your ce. It¡¯s your call!¡± said Aobashi. Naturally, she would stand with Han Shuo and Erebus.

    ¡°I will go there with you. I want to see if this youngster is just making things up!¡± Eugene coldly groaned and continued, ¡°We know all about the godhunters. Never have I heard of the presence ofte-stage highgods in their alliance, and I do not believe that there is one!¡±

    ¡°Believe it or don¡¯t!¡± Han Shuo coldly groaned.

    ¡°Guys, less talk, more work. Let¡¯s assemble our troops and head to the valley. If we could purge those godhunters, then this cannot be better news for our cities,¡± said Blightsoar.

    The few ceased their quarrel.

    Erebus, Aobashi, Blightsoar, and Eugene each lead a brigade of divine guards. The majestic army of four hundred gods strong headed for the valley with Han Shuo leading the way. They had been cautious and solemn in the journey. As they were separated, Han Shuo and Eugene did not have a chance to quarrel.

    On day twelve, the army arrived at the perimeters of the valley.

 Chapter 741 - Spearing ahead

    GDK 741: Spearing ahead

    The valley was gloomy. Strange avian creatures would fly past above their heads. It was early in the morning and a dense mist had shrouded the valley. It was difficult to make out the situation in the valley.

    Although the heavy fog had made it difficult for the assaulting army to observe the valley below, it aided them in concealing their presence.

    Aobashi, Erebus, Han Shuo, and Andrina were together. Blightsoar from Mirage City and Eugene from Hushveil City, each leading their own troops, were traveling on both sides of the forces of the City of Shadows.

    Gradually, they were getting close to the valley.

    Blightsoar, aftermanding his men to maintain formation, quietly walked to Han Shuo. He asked softly, ¡°The valley below is the one we are after, right?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and replied softly, ¡°It is. Please tell your men not to get too close, lest they trigger the energy towers.¡±

    Blightsoar did not hold any prejudice towards Han Shuo. On the contrary, he was rather admiring of Han Shuo. After hearing the advice, he gestured at his troops from a distance,manding them to stay where they stood.

    There was a chain of mountains around the misty valley with peaks that were high above the clouds. The mountains surrounded the valley in the shape of an arc. Han Shuo and his band were on one of those mountains, crouching, stealthily peeking over the edge and down at the valley.

    ¡°I can¡¯t see much of what¡¯s in the valley. What¡¯s the situation there?¡± Aobashi asked Han Shuo softly.

    Han Shuo extended his index finger and started carving a crude diagram on a hard rock nearby. Using the carving, he started exining, ¡°I have carefully surveyed the area before. There are energy towers and boundary towers disguised as trees over here, here, and here. There is only one entrance, located here. There are also godhunters concealed, doing sentry duties. And there are boundaries on the top of the valley. We will be discovered as soon as wee close to the valley.¡±

    Aobashi looked at Han Shuo in astonishment and asked, ¡°How is it that you are so clear about the situation down there?¡±

    Han Shuo did not answer her question but continued, ¡°Although it is heavily guarded, it is still possible to infiltrate the valley without being detected. By quietly killing the sentries and avoiding the energy and boundary towers, we can enter without alerting the godhunters.¡±

    ¡°Where are the sentries located? Are you sure of their locations?¡± Blightsoar too was amazed and in disbelief.

    Han Shuo paused his briefing. He raised his head, looked at Aobashi and Blightsoar calmly, and said, ¡°If you have trusted me enough toe here, please continue to trust me for the rest of the mission and not question my words. Otherwise, you may charge straight down the valley with your men.¡±

    During such a critical moment, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t bother giving a damn about their statuses.

    ¡°As long as you can get me close enough to the energy towers and boundary towers, I can disable them!¡± whispered Andrina.

    Han Shuo was aware of this special ability of Andrina¡¯s and it was the main reason Han Shuo had brought her along. He thought for a moment and said, ¡°Eugene is prejudiced against me. Perhaps he and his men should stay outside. After we entered the valley and started engaging with the godhunters, they will try to break the siege and try to escape. Let¡¯s have Eugene be in charge of stopping those godhunters from escaping.¡±

    Han Shuo would always be very calm during critical moments like this. ustomed to givingmands, he was unwittingly ying the role of the leader again. Aobashi, Erebus and Blightsoar found it rather strange but they did not say a word as they saw just how much confidence Han Shuo had disyed. It was as though he knew every grass and wood in the valley.

    ¡°Okay. I will tell Eugene so that he and his men stay outside!¡± Blightsoar knew that Eugene wouldn¡¯t listen to a word of those from the City of Shadows and therefore volunteered to persuade Eugene.

    After Blightsoar left, Aobashi put on a grimace on her pretty face and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan, please, by all means, don¡¯t make a mistake! We have over four hundred divine guards from three cities. Any negligence could mean the death of many. Our lives are at stake!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, are you really sure of this?¡± asked Erebus. He looked concerned and nowhere as confident as Han Shuo appeared.

    ¡°As long as you listen to me and advance slowly, I¡¯m confident in taking all of you into the valley without being discovered,¡± assured Han Shuo solemnly. After a short pause, in a rxed manner, he continued, ¡°At least it¡¯s better than just blindly charging straight into the base, right?¡±

    ¡°Blindly charging has its merits too ¨C it would greatly boost the morale of the army.¡± Aobashi put on a faint smile and said softly, ¡°If we are discovered while in the midst of infiltrating the base, that would weaken our morale. That is to be considered too.¡±

    ¡°I understand,¡± Han Shuo nodded. After hesitating for a moment, he asked, ¡°If there is ate-stage highgod in there, how are we going to handle it?¡±

    Aobashi and Erebus remained silent. After a long while, Aobashi broke the silence, ¡°We are greater in number. We will besiege him!¡±

    Han Shuo frowned, ¡°Even you have no way of dealing with the possibility?¡±

    ¡°We had to rush so there wasn¡¯t enough time to get the City Lord¡¯s assistance. But don¡¯t worry, if there is one, I reckon that with my divine guards jointly deploying boundaries, he will be trapped! There¡¯s nothing to be afraid of!¡± Aobashi asserted. She then shot a nce at Erebus and continued, ¡°Besides, Erebus has an enchanted scroll given by the City Lord. I know the power contained in that scroll. When released, not even ate-stage highgod could withstand its power. We can use it in case of an emergency.¡±

    After hearing Aobashi¡¯s words, Han Shuo knew that she had considered the possibility of finding ate-stage highgod. With that, Han Shuo stopped asking them about how they would handle the possible threat. He thought in his mind, <i>In any case, if the situation goes south, I know I can preserve my own life.</i>

    Blightsoar returned to the party and said softly, ¡°Eugene has agreed. We can begin the operation!¡±

    Han Shuo stood up andmanded, ¡°Follow me. Tell your men to be extra cautious and do not make a sound!¡±

    He then glided straight down into the valley andnded at the front of the valley near the entrance. Aobashi, Erebus, and Blightsoar, after giving instructions to their men, followed in Han Shuo¡¯s path.

    Some boundaries covered the top of the valley. As the source of energy of those boundaries was located deep inside the valley, even Andrina couldn¡¯t temper with them. Therefore, the party¡¯s only option was to infiltrate the valley through the only entrance.

    Element of wind revolved around Aobashi as she gracefully floated down. She appeared nimble and agile and light as a feather.

    Han Shuo had long since discovered that Aobashi cultivated in the elemental energy of wind. Her fine long hair would form miniature domains of divinity as they fluttered and danced. These characteristics were unique to gods cultivating in the elemental energy of wind.

    The demon generals had been put into position long ago, concealing and watching from the dark. Having visited the valley twice before, Han Shuo knew the area very well. Although the morning fog would hinder the observation power of an average person, it was, however, a natural barrier for Han Shuo that would allow him and his demon generals to be even stealthier.

    Han Shuo beckoned and went forward in a strange and seemingly erratic path. He easily avoided the dense growth of shrubs and thickets, making not the slightest noise.

    Following behind Han Shuo was Aobashi. She gazed at Han Shuo withplex and mixed emotions, as though she was astonished by Han Shuo¡¯s miraculous performance. She felt as though this youngster who had arrived in the City of Shadows rtively recently might be carrying many more secrets!

    Behind Aobashi was Andrina, and following her were Blightsoar and Erebus. Although Andrina was most likely more powerful than Aobashi, as a god who cultivated in the energy of wind, she was better than Andrina at flying and was more agile. Therefore, Andrina travelled behind Aobashi.

    The party remainedpletely silent. They cautiously looked all around as they followed behind Han Shuo who was advancing as though it was his own backyard.

    Gradually, their confidence in Han Shuo grew. They saw that it had been almost effortless for Han Shuo to navigate through the region of shrubs and trees, venturing forward leisurely as though it was the back of his house. They finally believed that Han Shuo had surveyed and knew the area well.

    Suddenly, his nimble figure froze. He turned around and gestured at his partners to proceed very slowly.

    When they finally caught up to Han Shuo, he pointed at a big tree ahead of him and whispered, ¡°The third branch from the bottom an observer is hiding. Who will get rid of him?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll do it,¡± Aobashi said and noiselessly floated to her target like a weightless wraith.

    In just a split second, Aobashi arrived at the spot Han Shuo specified. She gave a gentle pat on the tree branch with her fair left hand. The tree creaked ever so slightly and swayed.

    Her lips curled up into a faint smile. She turned towards Han Shuo and gave him a nod, signaling that it wasplete.

    Erebus and Blightsoar had big smiles on their faces. Their gazes at Han Shuo were filled with admiration and approval. Aobashi¡¯s signal was direct confirmation that Han Shuo was not mistaken, that there was indeed a person hiding in the tree. They no longer held a doubt about Han Shuo¡¯s ability.

    ¡°Well done, young man!¡± praised Erebus softly while he stuck his thumb out at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Let¡¯s continue forward. Follow me,¡± instead of preening himself, Han Shuo proceeded forward with a calm face after beckoning Aobashi.

    The party then repeated the same action multiple times and silently assassinated seven godhunters. Those godhunters who thought that they were well-concealed died without even realizing what had happened.

    Again, Han Shuo suddenly stopped moving. He said gravely, ¡°There will be boundaries and energy towers from this point forward. We are counting on you, Andrina!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, not a single message will be transmitted from the energy towers!¡± said Andrina, proudly.

    ¡°Alright then, let¡¯s proceed,¡± Han Shuo nodded. He would point out the direction of the energy towers to Andrina as they moved along. Andrina indeed did not disappoint. She merely needed to close her eyes for a moment and the energy tower Han Shuo pointed to would be disabled.

    By employing this approach, the party managed to infiltrate the valley. Inside, they saw an enormous pond filled with a cold, dark liquid. On the walls surrounding the pond were numerous deep caves which from a distance looked like honebs. They roughly counted that there were several dozen caves on those walls.

    They could see human figures in some caves while some had been blocked from the inside, revealing just a fine fissure.

    ¡°We have arrived!¡± Han Shuo announced softly. Shortly after, he bunched his brows and said, ¡°The godhunters should be inside those caves. We would have difficulty checking the holes one by one. I have brought you this far and shall leave the rest of the mission to you all!¡±

    Having brought the highgods into the valley without alerting a single godhunter, Han Shuo hadpleted his mission to perfection.

    ¡°This godhunter¡¯s base seems a little strange and quite different from those we previously busted. It seems very likely that this bust is going to be huge, hehe!¡± Erebus licked the corner of his mouth. He seemed rather excited.

    ¡°Wait, do not attack until all our men arrive,¡± Aobashi wore a calm face as she said softly, ¡°Bryan, you have done a great contribution. After the event, I will make sure to mention your great work to the City Lord. You will surely be rewarded well!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s put this topic off untilter when we have wiped out these godhunters,¡± Han Shuo wore a tranquil and indifferent face. His mind was not affected in the slightest by Aobashi¡¯s words. He continued to observe the caves with cold eyes while moving the demon generals into the valley.

    A few minutester, those divine guards who had been trailing behind finally caught up to them. The divine guards silently concealed themselves and watched for activities around the pond from a distance.

    Andrina looked ravenous. Her little face was just as cold as the pond water as she said resentfully, ¡°I will kill all these bloody godhunters today!¡±

    ¡°There are a lot of caves. It¡¯s not feasible to check one by one. Also, we do not know if there would be forks in the caves. How should we proceed?¡± Blightsoar asked the party after thinking silently for a moment.

    ¡°It seems that the godhunters are all inside those caves. How about we get Eugene over? He toomands a hundred divine guards. I believe that the battle is unlikely to spread outside the valley so we might as well concentrate our forces,¡± Han Shuo proposed after pondering for a moment.

    The others thought for a while and nodded. Then, Blightsoar noticed that everyone else was looking at him. Right away, he knew exactly what they were thinking. He turned to a divine guard behind him and instructed, ¡°Return on the path we came from and ask Eugene and his army to join us!¡±

    The divine guard spoke not a word and hastily left. Then, around ten minutester, Eugene and his men arrived.

    Eugene needed just one look at the caves to realize that Han Shuo¡¯s words were indeed true ¨C it was indeed a base of the godhunters. Although Eugene was intrigued as to how they managed to enter the valley so silently and without being detected, he did not question it. Instead, he rubbed his hands and asked, ¡°What are we waiting for? Let¡¯s storm the ce!¡±

    ¡°There are too many caves. It seems unwise to storm in there without knowing the situation inside. How about if we force them out from their caves and fight them out here?¡± proposed Erebus.

    Evidently, most of the party felt that Erebus¡¯ suggestion was more feasible. Aobashi, Blightsoar, Han Shuo, and Andrina all nodded in agreement.

    ¡°First, let¡¯s disperse our troops and ce them around the entryway, guard all the exits. Then we force them out!¡± instructed Aobashi.

    The divine guards dispersed. Once they were in position, Aobashimanded Erebus, ¡°You can knock on their doors now!¡±

    Under the attentive gazes of the party, Erebus took out a dark pike and filled it with his divine energy. The dark pike, now glowing with dark radiance, was hurled. It flew like a streak of dark light, aiming for thergest cave!

    <i>Rumbles...</i> The pike pierced straight into the cave and sent shattered rocks everywhere. An earth-quaking explosion reverberated throughout the valley.

    ¡°We are under attack!¡±

    ¡°Fiddlesticks!¡±

    ¡°What the heck?!¡±

    Shrieks of panic sounded from within the caves. Right after that, human figures appeared at the mouths of the caves. These people had fierce and ruthless eyes. It was clear from their looks that they were evil and malicious characters. They were no doubt the godhunters the army were after!

    ¡°There they are!¡± shouted Blightsoar.

    ¡°Launch ranged attacks!¡± shouted Aobashi. Suddenly, several gusts of wind so wild and piercing they seemed to be able to split rocks and demolish mountains blew towards the caves.

    The fierce winds whistled loudly as though wanting to burst everyone¡¯s eardrums. Those ancient, hundred-meter tall trees in their paths were snapped. The shrubs looked as though they had been mowed down.

    The winds moved extremely rapidly and traveled several hundred meters within a few instances and violently gushed into the caves. Two godhunters were instantly killed. Three were forcibly pulled out from their caves and thrown down into the chilling pond underneath.

    The few godhunters shrieked in fear and panic as they fell towards the pond uncontrobly.

    <i>Ssh!</i> The godhunters fell into the chilling pond and their bodies instantly started fizzing, giving off thick smoke. Their shrieks grew even louder and more miserable as their flesh detached from their bodies and rapidly dissolved. Within a short few seconds, they were reduced to three shiny, white skeletons, sinking to the bottom of the pond.

    The assaulting party who witnessed the scene jolted. Their eyes were filled with horror as they stared at the pond. A few who originally intended to charge at the caves immediately stopped in their tracks, fearing that they would be struck by the godhunters in midair and fall into the pond.

    ¡°Be careful of the pond! Launch ranged attacks!¡± Aobashi shouted again.

    Streaks of light, piercing bone spears, and lumps of dark mist shot out from the thick shrubbery and towering trees where the divine guards hid and towards the godhunters at the cave entrances. In the blink of an eye, another dozen or so godhunters were killed. Two godhunters seemed to be trying to escape the valley when they were struck and fell into the pond. They were transformed into a pair of eerie, white skeletons in no time.

    Han Shuo paid little attention to the ferocious battle, and was instead gazing fixedly at the pond. He softly remarked, ¡°The poison inside the pond is the same as that made by the Godswamp Pharmacy in the City of Shadows. My suspicion is indeed true, the Godswamp Pharmacy is associated with the godhunters!¡±

    Erebus¡¯s face turned dark and he hastily asked, ¡°Bryan, are you sure that the pond contains poison produced by the Godswamp Pharmacy?¡±

    ¡°I have seen their poisons before and I¡¯m absolutely sure of it!¡± said Han Shuo with absolute confidence. He shot a nce at Eugene whose expression did not look well, and said gloomily, ¡°It seems that the master of the Godswamp Pharmacy is a dubious character!¡±

    ¡°nders!¡± cried Eugene, ¡°Those poisons found in the City of Shadows were concocted by Steiss. Hassling has nothing to do with it!¡±

    ¡°Does Hassling have a head full of white hair and skin as translucent as jade?¡± asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°You¡¯ve met him? Hassling has always kept a very low profile. How did you manage to meet him?¡± Eugene asked in a puzzled manner.

    <i>So it is him!</i> thought Han Shuo.

 Chapter 742 - You shall not leave

    GDK 742: You shall not leave

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t figure out the identity of that old man that his demon general had seen. Finally now, through Eugene, Han Shuo verified that the old man was indeed the owner of the Godswamp Pharmacy ¨C Hassling. It was clear to Han Shuo that the evil deeds conducted by the Godswamp Pharmacy in the City of Shadows were approved of, if notmanded by Hassling.

    From the day that Han Shuo exposed the Godswamp Pharmacy¡¯s evil deeds in the City of Shadows, an irreconcble enmity between him and Hassling was born. The feud would grow even worse now that the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy had fully superseded the Godswamp Pharmacy¡¯s ce in the City of Shadows. Even if Han Shuo didn¡¯t want to make enemies with the Godswamp, there was no way that Hassling would let him live in peace.

    Therefore, having arrived at this conclusion, Han Shuo decided that he had to do all he could to bring down the Godswamp Pharmacy and eliminate the threat that was Hassling!

    ¡°Eugene, I cannot be more certain that Hassling is associated with the godhunters. You should ask yourself if you actually know him or just the side he wishes to show you!¡± said Han Shuo sneeringly.

    Eugene let out a soft, disdained groan, obviously not taking Han Shuo¡¯s advice to heart. He still thought that Han Shuo was trying to nder Hassling. His rtionship with Hassling appeared to run deep.

    The battle continued.

    The assaulting forces led by Aobashi wildly bombarded the godhunters in those caves with ranged attacks. Another six godhunters who revealed themselves at the cave mouths perished to their attacks.

    ¡°Everyone retreat!¡± a roar sounded from one of thergest caves.

    Those godhunters who had been trying to charge from their caves withdrew upon hearing themand. They also blocked the cave entrances with rocks. With that, Aobashi and the assaulting forces no longer had any targets to attack.

    ¡°It¡¯s Brovst! He is indeed in there!¡± Erebus softly cried out. He seemed rather excited.

    ¡°The godhunters have all burrowed in their caves. What do we do?¡± Blightsoar flew to Aobashi to consult her.

    ¡°There are forks in those caves!¡± said Han Shuo with his eyes closed, probing the caves using a few of his demon generals. Suddenly, he shouted, ¡°There are other exits in there, it is very narrow. The godhunters are evacuating!¡±

    After having witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s outstanding performance in infiltrating the base, Aobashi and the others had no doubt in Han Shuo¡¯s words. Aobashi hastilymanded, ¡°Each corps takes twenty people outside the valley to find them, the rest will enter the cave and pursue them. It hasn¡¯t been easy for us to find these godhunters, we mustn¡¯t let them escape!¡±

    ¡°Agreed!¡± cried Blightsoar. He immediately turned to his men, gave instructions, and nodded at Aobashi.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Eugene too had given his men the relevant instructions and started flying towards the caves.

    Andrina¡¯s figure dazzled as she charged ahead, taking the lead with Han Shuo following closely behind her. Aobashi, Erebus, Blightsoar and Eugene charged out from four different spots. Shadows streaked above the chilling pond, zooming towards the caves behind it.

    In an instant, more than a hundred figures were flying above theke.

    ¡°Watch out, some of the godhunters are returning!¡± shouted Han Shuo.

    As soon as his voice sounded, the gravity above theke increased by a hundred times. Those flying above theke became sluggish. The godhunters again revealed themselves at the cave mouths and started attacking the party flying above theke with difficulty.

    All those levitating were greatly affected by the hundred-fold gravity. Not only did their airspeed fall significantly, they were also exhausting much more divine energy than usual to keep themselves in the air. Having been strained beyond their limits, a dozen or more divine guards failed to defend themselves against the godhunter¡¯s attacks and helplessly fell towards theke after being struck.

    Eerie, miserable shrieks sounded from the mouths of those who fell into theke. A short timeter, even more sets of white skeletons were added to theke.

    Those divine guards who were still onnd immediately responded,unching ranged attacks at those exposed godhunters. A few of them were struck. Their bodies fell from their caves and into theke.

    ¡°Stop them!¡± Brovst revealed his valiant and muscr figure from thergest cave and shouted furiously.

    Then, Gas and Taylin who cultivated in the energy of darkness and death respectively stepped forward to stand beside Brovst. The trio¡¯s gazes abruptly gathered on Andrina.

    Right away, the three of them jointly attacked Andrina, focusing all their attacks on her alone. The other highgods were ignored.

    Andrina was at the very front of the charging party and the nearest to the three godhunters. The sudden attacks from the three seemed to have caught her unprepared. Screens of light blossomed from her palms. She looked like a big, bright crystal shining in mid-air as she resisted the attacks.

    ¡°Attack those three!¡± yelled Han Shuo. Then, with his left hand, he tossed the Green Hypergolic Dust, which he had refined beforeing to Elysium, at Brovst and his gang.

    Aobashi and Erebus hastily attacked Brovst, Gas and Taylin. Aobashi, whose fine hair was wildly fluttering about in the wind, formed a rapidly revolving tornado in an instant and hurled it at the cave. Meanwhile, Erebus thrusted the dark pike in his hand. A stream of dark lightning flew out like a meandering dragon.

    The three who were trying to kill Andrina had no choice but to cease bombarding her with attacks and put up defenses against Aobashi and Erebus¡¯ attacks. They deployedyers uponyers of boundaries at the cave mouth.

    ¡°Huh?!¡± The three simultaneously cried out in surprise. They discovered that the fine specks of green dust that fell into the cave could burn anything it touched. Taylin, who had identally touched a few bits of the Green Hypergolic Dust, suddenly began tobust. The bright green mes were extremely malicious and took no time in charring her body.

    In the eyes of the highgod godhunters, an attack produced by a character as puny as Han Shuo would amount to nothing and they had therefore most imprudently allowed the Green Hypergolic Dust to enter the cave. However, soon after the dust started burning, they realized that they had been mistaken in their judgment.

    ¡°What the hell is this damned me, why can¡¯t I put it out! Argh! That wretched youngster, I¡¯m going to kill him!¡± Taylin cried out in pain. It appeared that she was gravely tormented by the Green Hypergolic Dust.

    Brovst and Gas were shocked to discover that even someone as powerful as Taylin couldn¡¯t immediately neutralize the green dust. Therefore, they decided to give up on attacking Andrina and retreat into the cave.

    The pressure on Andrina immediately lightened. She made use of the opportunity to quickly leap to a cave. She was the first to cross theke.

    As there was Green Hypergolic Dust raging at the cave Brovst and the others previously stood in, Andrina did notnd there. Instead, she entered a cave where three midgods were standing. Right away, she began her killing spree without the slightest mercy. She grabbed the three godhunters with her little hands and threw them into theke.

    The three godhunters were soon reduced to nothing but bones. Andrina quickly scanned around with her eyes and flew towards another cave. She was aiming at the cave with the most godhunters for the maximum kill. As soon as shended in the cave, her small hand started grabbing and throwing. In no time, another seven people were tossed into theke.

    Without Brovst, Taylin and Gas¡¯ impediment, Aobashi, Erebus and the others managed to cross theke. These highgod experts went for caves with the most godhunters. Miserable shrieks repeatedly sounded. A dozen or more godhunters were killed in an instant.

    With that, the pressure faced by those divine guards levitating above theke was greatly reduced. They managed to cross theke and entered the caves as well.

    ¡°Everyone disperse, search every cave!¡± shouted Aobashi. She then asked Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan, can you lead us to the trio of Brovst?¡±

    ¡°No problem. Follow me!¡± Han Shuo quickly responded. The Green Hypergolic Dust on Taylin was still burning. Han Shuo could track her by following the unique scent it produced.

    Upon hearing those words, Andrina, Aobashi and Erebus followed behind Han Shuo. Blightsoar, who had just crossed theke, decided to also join Han Shuo without hesitation. Eugene from Hushveil City let out a soft groan and did not follow. Instead, he entered another cave and went exploring by himself.

    ¡°Be careful, there could be ate-stage highgod in the cave!¡± Han Shuo reminded the party as he led them.

    The tunnel grew more and more narrow and they came across more and more forks. They met a few scattered godhunters along the way and were easily taken care of. After venturing deep inside, they suddenly found an enormous, sparkling bright cave. The walls were covered with shining energy crystals, lighting up the area like a ballroom.

    Multiple small tunnels extended in every direction. At the center of the cave was an enormous vertical shaft that went deep underground. Those panicking godhunters had been burrowing into this shaft.

    ¡°There should be an escape path in there!¡± Han Shuo pointed at the tunnel and exined.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Aobashi flew into the tunnel without thinking.

    After Aobashi, Erebus followed her down without any hesitation. However, Andrina, who had been on the front line all the while, hesitated for a moment. She only flew down after Han Shuo. Blightsoar was thest to enter.

    They fell thousands of meters into the tunnel. The shaft waspletely dark. Apart from Erebus who cultivated in the element of darkness, Han Shuo thought he was probably the only one who could see his surroundings, though barely.

    After looking around for a moment, Han Shuo noticed that Andrina¡¯s eyes were shining like energy crystals. Right away, Han Shuo understood that Andrina too could see in the dark.

    Eventually, their feet were once again standing upon solid ground ¨C they had reached the bottom.

    Han Shuo lowered his head and looked. He saw that there was an enormous pce underneath him which upied hundreds of thousands of square meters. The architectural style was simple and solemn. There were energy towers erected in every corner but they gave off not a glimmer of light. The godhunters who appeared tiny were blindly flying around the walls like flies trapped in a bottle. It appeared they found no escape route.

    Suddenly, an immense pressure filled the space. It was as though an enormous mountain was growing over them, weighing down on them so hard that it stifled their breaths. An aura which seemed to be filled with boundless energy emerged out of nowhere. It gave off a primordial, eternal feeling, as though it was as ancient as the stars and gxies, an Eternal existence!

    Inside the pitch-dark space, an enormous figure gradually floated into appearance. Its colossal body filled the valley. Its green eyes were high in the sky, almost like two crescent moons. It stared down coldly at those standing above the pce.

    ¡°You found this ce. That¡¯s surprising!¡± an aged voice sounded from the mouth of the colossal figure. It echoed throughout the space.

    ¡°Who are you?¡± Erebus asked in a deep voice.

    ¡°But since you havee here, you shall not leave!¡± the colossal figure waved his hand. World-ending power filled every corner in an instant, A great but unknown number of boundaries instantly formed around the space. The energies of death and darkness in Han Shuo¡¯s body were suddenly sealed. He couldn¡¯t use one bit of his divine energy.

    Han Shuo was rmed. When he raised his head and looked, he saw a hazy figure towering over him and a pair of green eyes at the very top looking down at him.

    Han Shuo had a strange feeling. He felt that the scene was very familiar, as though he hade across such a situation before.

    After trying hard to recall, Han Shuo was taken aback. He finally remembered when he had been in such a situation.

    Back at the Cemetery of Death of Profound Continent all those years ago, when exploring the second level of the Cemetery, an evil god tried to brand his soul. His brain felt like it was being cut by ten thousand des as he resisted it. It was this exact colossal figure that appeared in his mind, though less distinct than now. But he clearly remembered the pair of green eyes that peered down at him with disdain.

    <i>¡°Submit. There will be no pain, only eternal life!¡±</i> Back then in the Cemetery of Death, the colossal figure repeated those words in Han Shuo¡¯s mind to urge Han Shuo to surrender his soul and be his servant. As they were great lightyears apart, and having unbending willpower, Han Shuo was able to resist its power.

    However, this time around, the colossal figure he saw wasn¡¯t merely an image in his mind, and the voice heard wasn¡¯t transmitted into his mind. Now that he was physically in the presence of this iparably formidable being, he realized that his previous experience did not just pale inparison, but it wasn¡¯t even worthy of mentioning!

    ¡°Submit, or perish!¡± shouted the colossal being. His voice carried a strange, bewitching power.

    ¡°Who exactly are you?¡± Although Aobashi couldn¡¯t see in the dark, the pair ofrge green eyes of the mysterious and iparably powerful being were faintly glowing, illuminating its enormous body.

    ¡°You need not know,¡± the being replied. ¡°I will ask onest time, do you want to live or do you want to die?¡±

    ¡°Live!¡± shouted Erebus abruptly before throwing out a scroll. An iparably enormous energy fluctuation suddenly burst out from the scroll, instantly affecting the boundless darkness all around it. They gathered into a single point and shot towards the colossal being.

    ¡°Courting death!¡± The colossal figure waved its hand. The scroll that Erebus threw out disintegrated with a bang. A streak of light shot out from its right eye and fell on Erebus. He howled miserably and was sent flying far away.

    Before entering the valley, Han Shuo had repeatedly asked Aobashi and Erebus about this possible threat and he was assured that they had ways to deal with ate-stage highgod expert. However, from the looks of it now, Erebus could not even fight back!

 Chapter 743 - Profit from a misfortune

    GDK 743: Profit from a misfortune

    Erebus was struck by a beam of bright light. It wasn¡¯t clear if he was immediately killed. However, one thing was obvious ¨C the party was helpless against the colossal figure.

    In this pitch-dark space, the huge green eyes of the colossal figure looked down at the assaulting highgods and said in a deep voice, ¡°Pledge allegiance to me. Resistance is futile!¡±

    Han Shuo was shaken to hear the colossal being giving its final warning. He immediately decided to use Blood Disassembly to escape. There was nothing he could do about his partners.

    He turned to Andrina to look at her onest time, his heart aching. He wished he could shoulder Andrina along in escaping, but unfortunately, he was too weak to do so.

    However, right before Han Shuo activated the Demonic Blood Disassembly, he noticed that Andrina had started to glow brightly from head to toe. A sparkling and translucent energy crystal emerged from her chest. A blurry image was projected onto the crystal.

    When Han Shuo looked carefully, he discovered that the blurry figure in the energy crystal was a carbon copy of the colossal figure before the party. Although the pair of green eyes inside the crystal was much smaller, every movement and emotion it showed was identical to the crescent moon-like green eyes high above his head.

    ¡°Don¡¯t you dare, Andrina!¡± the colossal figure seemed to know Andrina. Its voice turned somewhat anxious after it noticed the beautiful energy crystal that flew out from her chest, as though worried or concerned.

    Andrina¡¯s eyes glowed brighter and brighter as she stared fixedly at the energy crystal in her hand. The crystal started giving off a most mysterious energy as a fine crack started to grow on its surface. <i>Ting!</i> The energy crystal suddenly shattered.

    The entire space was instantly illuminated with overwhelmingly bright light, so bright that everyone had to close their eyes. For a split second, Han Shuo could see the colossal figure before him glow as it let out an ear-piercing shriek.

    Soon, the light diminished. It took the party a moment toe to their senses. They discovered that the colossal figure had disappeared and the space was no longer in pitch darkness. Shattered rocks covered the floor as though a disaster had struck the area.

    Andrina who was standing still suddenly fell backward powerlessly. Han Shuo was shocked and hastily went to catch Andrina. He saw that her small face was pale without a trace of vitality and she had lost consciousness.

    Andrina was still sping the fractured energy crystal with her two hands. There were gashes on her palm as though someone had cut her hands along her palm lines. The cuts were so deep that her bones were visible.

    Creaking noises sounded from several energy towers around the chamber before they copsed with a rumble.

    ¡°What happened?¡± asked Blightsoar. He was still puzzled and frightened.

    ¡°I¡¯m not sure either, but Andrina must have done something that made him vanish into thin air!¡± Han Shuo, who was carrying the unconscious Andrina in his arms, suddenly recalled that a moment ago, Andrina showed hesitation before entering the shaft. Could she have known this would happen earlier?

    Han Shuo hastily fished out arge amount of crystal coins from his space ring and stuffed handfuls of them into Andrina¡¯s mouth in a flustered manner. He chanted in a low voice, ¡°You¡¯ll be alright, you will be alright!¡±

    Though Han Shuo had not known Andrina for too long, they had built a rapport and Han Shuo was very fond of this mysterious little girl. Had Han Shuo anticipated that this would happen, he surely wouldn¡¯t have brought Andrina along. His heart ached to see Andrina so severely injured.

    ¡°Bryan, what are you doing? Are you mad? Why are you stuffing crystal coins in her mouth? Are you trying to choke her to death?¡± Aobashi, who was examining Erebus¡¯ condition, yelled. She thought that Han Shuo had been shocked into a fool.

    Naturally, Aobashi had no idea that Andrina gained strength from energy crystals. Han Shuo ignored her cries and continued to stuff crystal coins into Andrina¡¯s mouth.

    However, Han Shuo soon realized that Andrina couldn¡¯t chew the crystal coins in her mouth while unconscious, therefore she could not heal.

    The anxious Han Shuo then hastily removed the crystal coins from her mouth. He paced back and forth while holding Andrina, trying toe up with a solution. Then a light bulb lit above his head. Immediately, he flew towards a damaged energy tower, filled it with crystal coins to power it up, and ced Andrina at the center of the energy tower.

    At the center of the energy tower was a magical matrix for extracting energy from energy crystals. The energy tower lit up as soon as it was filled with crystal coins. When Han Shuo ced Andrina on the matrix, a weing phenomenon happened ¨C her translucent body automatically absorbed the energy around her. The energy of hundreds of ck crystal coins was drained in no time.

    Seeing that the method was working, Han Shuo immediately took out several hundred thousand ck crystal coins from his space ring and filled them into the energy tower without thinking. The energy extracted by the energy tower from the crystal coins was absorbed by Andrina¡¯s body. A trace of vitality returned to her pale face.

    The nervous Han Shuo was slightly relieved. However, he did not dare pause with the task. He refilled the energy tower with ck crystal coins and repeated the process again and again.

    A momentter, Han Shuo had exhausted all the ck crystal coins he carried with him. Andrina was finally breathing again and had a pulse. Although still unconscious, her body was starting to repair itself using the energy it had just absorbed.

    Han Shuo had seen this situation before. Back then, after having sustained serious injuries from the Brovst trio, she consumed an obscene amount of Han Shuo¡¯s ck crystal coins and fell into a deep sleep. Her body was in a simr state at that time.

    Han Shuo could finally heave a sigh of relief. When thest remaining bit of energy was absorbed by Andrina, the energy tower stopped glowing. Afterwards, Han Shuo brought Andrina out of the energy tower and headed to the panicking Aobashi. He asked in a low voice, ¡°How is Erebus doing?¡±

    ¡°He¡¯s still alive but in a terrible condition. There is an energy destroying his body which he cannot resist. If this trend continues, he will eventually be dead!¡± replied Aobashi anxiously. Suddenly, she shrieked, ¡°Bryan, aren¡¯t you a pharmacist? I heard from Erebus that you have saved Carmelita¡¯s life twice with your unique art of healing. Can you save him?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll do my best!¡± Han Shuo replied in a deep voice. He walked to Erebus and ced one hand on his back. He discovered that there was indeed a bizarre energy inside Erebus¡¯ body. It carried a hint of the edict of destruction but was clearly different from the destruction divine energy of a lowgod, midgod, or highgod.

    This energy in Erebus¡¯ body was extremely savage and brutal. Wherever it traveled, it would leave behind a trail of destruction. It was too powerful for Erebus¡¯ divine energy to defend against. Not only would his bones crack and shatter, but every part of his body was being destroyed down to the cellr level.

    Although this energy was somewhat simr to the divine energy Avery left in Carmelita, thetter simply could notpare with its power!

    While Han Shuo pressed his hand on Erebus¡¯ back to probe his condition using demonic yuan, the energy that carried a hint of the edict of destruction, for whatever reason, charged at Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan, trying to break it down.

    Han Shuo was shocked. He hastily drew his demonic yuan from Erebus¡¯ body. However, he was a split-second toote. Through Han Shuo¡¯s palm, the energy left Erebus and flowed into Han Shuo.

    The energy was no longer wreaking havoc in Erebus¡¯ body but Han Shuo¡¯s left hand that was extended began to creak loudly. His bones and meridians were shattering under the attack of the energy.

    ¡°Bryan, what¡¯s going on?¡± Aobashi was astonished. She saw that Erebus¡¯ condition had improved but Han Shuo was aghast and perspiring as though he had seen a ghost.

    ¡°The energy has found its way into my body!¡± replied Han Shuo. He did not look well.

    ¡°What?!¡± shrieked Aobashi. She could see just how powerful the energy was. If even Erebus could not withstand the energy, then wouldn¡¯t Han Shuo be dead in a moment?

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about me. Just look after Andrina for me!¡± Han Shuo tossed Andrina into Aobashi¡¯s arms, and quickly sat cross-legged on the ground.

    The creaking noises from Han Shuo¡¯s left hand grew louder and clearer. Aobashi saw that the veins in Han Shuo¡¯s left hand were bursting one by one, spraying blood onto his arm.

    Aobashi was dumbstruck by the scene. She wanted to help Han Shuo but didn¡¯t know what she could do. After catching Andrina from Han Shuo, she stood and stared at him foolishly.

    ¡°He¡¯s not going to make it,¡± said Blightsoar who had arrived beside Aobashi wearing a dim face. He said softly, ¡°If it wasn¡¯t for Bryan and Andrina, we wouldn¡¯t still be alive right now! I have checked the area. There are a few tunnels down below. The godhunters must have escaped using the tunnels.¡±

    Aobashi¡¯s pretty face was blemishes with anxiety. She could do nothing but watch as more and more veins burst from Han Shuo¡¯s bloody left arm. Gradually, the destruction reached his left shoulder. Aobashi cried, ¡°What should we do? What should we do? Bryannded in this predicament trying to save Erebus. What should we do?¡±

    ¡°Forget it. Given that even Erebus couldn¡¯t resist the power, there isn¡¯t much hope left for Bryan.¡± Blightsoar let out a sigh and continued, ¡°I truly did not expect things to turn out this way. All these years, we have underestimated the godhunters!¡±

    ¡°Who said that I¡¯m not going to make it?!¡± shouted Han Shuo in an annoyed manner. He was strenuously fighting the invasion of the energy but the two were busy talking about how his death was certain beside his ears. Of course Han Shuo would be irritated!

    ¡°You can still talk?¡± Aobashi was pleasantly surprised. She hastily asked, ¡°Bryan, tell us, how can we help you?¡±

    ¡°Bring Andrina and Erebus out and get away from here. Get out of my sight. I won¡¯t die so easily!¡± shouted Han Shuo.

    ¡°Look at yourself, how can we leave you alone in this state?¡± Blightsoar couldn¡¯t be angry at Han Shuo for shouting at them at a moment like this. ¡°Besides, there¡¯s no telling if the godhunters will return. If they do and no one is around you, wouldn¡¯t that further cement your death?¡±

    ¡°Lady, Gentleman, please, I beg you, leave me alone, that is all I ask of you!¡± shouted Han Shuo. ¡°Aobashi, considering that I have saved Erebus and that Andrina has saved all of us, leave. Your presences will only disturb my mind!¡±

    Aobashi was startled. After staring at Han Shuo for a long while, seeing that Han Shuo was persistently hastening them to leave and his words had grown more and more impolite, she stomped her feet ruthlessly and said, ¡°Fine. I¡¯ll leave you to yourself. Hope to see you again ¨C and alive.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, I, Blightsoar, will always remember the favor!¡± Blightsoar said solemnly before he held Erebus and Aobashi and left.

    After Aobashi and Blightsoar had gonepletely out of sight, Han Shuo no longer repressed his pain. He clenched his teeth and shouted, ¡°Come at me, you fucker! Let¡¯s see if you can actually take me!¡±

    The energy in Han Shuo¡¯s left shoulder was let loose. It immediately began to travel all throughout Han Shuo¡¯s body at a tremendous rate.

    <i>Pop! Pop! Pop!</i>

    Crisp crackling noises repeatedly sounded from Han Shuo¡¯s body. The flesh and skin from his head to toes started to crack and split. He was drenched in blood. He looked hideous and gruesome.

    The Invincible Omen Body was deployed, filling every cell in Han Shuo¡¯s body with energy and making it immensely tough. The veins and tendons of his crushed arm started to reconnect at a speed visible to the naked eye. Even his bones were being rebuilt. If Aobashi and Blightsoar were around, they would surely be dumbstruck by the scene!

    Soon, his gory left arm waspletely healed, not a wound nor scar to be seen.

    Rattling noises continued to sound from his body as his veins ruptured and his bones fractured. Following that, when the Invincible Omen Body was deployed, his shattered veins and bones would reattach and reconnect at an astonishing rate.

    Gradually, the energy that was wreaking havoc in Han Shuo¡¯s body grew weaker and weaker. Its speed also grew slower.

    ¡°Master, absorb that energy, fuse it with your avatar of destruction. The energy is self-aware and will be greatly beneficial to your avatar!¡± Cauldron Spirit suddenly cried out to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was shocked. <i>The energy has a mind of its own? That exins why it¡¯s such a nightmare to deal with!</i>

    ¡°There is indeed destruction divine energy in the energy, but it is different from the divine energy possessed by my avatar. I doubt my avatar could assimte the energy. Besides, the energy desires to destroy all things. My avatar might not be able to survive it!¡± replied Han Shuo.

    ¡°Master, direct the energy to me. I will remold the self-awareness of the energy. After that, it will be perfectly safe for your avatar to fuse with!¡± Cauldron Spirit immediately responded.

    Han Shuo was ted. Cauldron Spirit couldn¡¯t just remold divine souls, it could also remold this conscious energy!

    Han Shuo, practiced in borrowing Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, deployed the Invincible Omen Body in specific areas to guide the now-weakened energy to Cauldron Spirit. Although the energy had an awareness, its mind was not sophisticated at all. It would travel along regions easiest to destroy, thus it headed along the path that Han Shuo had set for it.

    Finally, the energy flowed into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, allowing Han Shuo to rx for a moment. Following that, the Cauldron started to slowly spur inside Han Shuo¡¯s body. The demon generals in the cauldron started to flutter and dance. They orbited the energy in a strange trajectory, eating away the awareness in the energy bit by bit.

    There were now over twenty divine souls being trapped in the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. These divine souls belonged to the perished godhunters and divine guards Han Shuo collected before entering the cave. Eventually, the divine souls would be refined into demon generals by the Cauldron Spirit.

    The myriad of demons in the Cauldron danced, corroding the awareness in the energy restrained by dark radiances. A stand of green smoke suddenly floated from the wall of the Cauldron and into the energy being held by the demon generals. The energy suddenly started to violently struggle to free itself, as though knowing that its existence was near an end, and was giving its final resistance.

    The strand of green smoke swayed with it for a moment before the energy slowly stopped resisting, as though the awareness of the energy had been subdued. Gradually, the demon generals flew off from the captured energy one after another, returning to lie dormant on the wall of the Cauldron. The captured energy had turned calm and obedient. Cauldron Spirit guided it to the avatar of destruction that was sitting inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon.

    ¡°Master, I have reformatted the awareness in the energy. You can now fuse your avatar with the energy!¡± Cauldron Spirit transmitted to Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    Han Shuo was ted. He set his mind free and at ease while slowly allowing the energy into his avatar.

    Everything happened smoothly. After the energy entered his body, he started assimting it the way he would absorb a godhunter¡¯s divine energy. During the process, his avatar¡¯s mind received a constant stream of information originating from the awareness in the energy. They were all about the profound knowledge andprehension of the edict of destruction. Also, it included theplete instruction on forming and using the Orbs of Destruction.

    The Cauldron of Myriad Demon was indeed incredibly useful and miraculous. After being remolded by Cauldron Spirit, the energy gave not the slightest resistance but cooperated with Han Shuo in the assimtion process. Han Shuo could feel that the destruction divine energy in his body sharply increased with each passing second. The feeling of having energy filling and packing every inch of his body felt simr to having Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy flooding his demonic body.

    But in contrast to borrowing Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, the destruction divine energy would always be a part of him! It wasn¡¯t temporary and it didn¡¯t strain his body beyond its limits!

    Suddenly, abstruse insights and realizations starteding to the avatar¡¯s mind. The destruction divine energy in its body started to spur energetically. They were traveling in a certain trajectory and being condensed, simr to how he could condense his divine energy to form an Orb of Destruction!

    <i>A breakthrough!</i> Han Shuo could not be happier as he knew that his avatar of destruction would soon reach midgodhood!

 Chapter 744 - Breakthrough

    GDK 744: Breakthrough

    Soon, surely enough, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar that cultivated in the edict of destruction had sessfully breakthrough to midgod realm with the help of the wonderfully bizarre energy.

    But what made Han Shuo even more excited was that his avatar was only halfway through in assimting the bizarre energy!

    The energy continued to fuse with Han Shuo¡¯s avatar even after it had be an early-stage midgod of destruction. The divine energy in his body continued to soar as more and more enlightening information about the true essence of the edict of destruction fused with his avatar¡¯s soul.

    As his happened, the shattered veins and bones in Han Shuo¡¯s main body were rapidly being reconstructed. His body would rattle and crackle, as though firecrackers were set off inside his body. If anyone else was there, they will surely be shocked and unsettled.

    Han Shuo would usually lose track of the passing of time while under such a state. Series of loud crackling noises would jolt every part of his body, causing him to involuntarily jerk and move with the crunchy noise. Han Shuo at that moment appeared freakish, to say the least.

    ¡°Congrattions, Master! You body has been strengthened once more. From the looks of it, you should have mastered the second level of Invincible Omen Body!¡± Cauldron Spirit¡¯s voice sounded in Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    Han Shuo was roused from what he felt to be ages of deep sleep. He shook his head and tilted his neck from side to side.

    Gradually, no crackling noises could be heard from his body. Han Shuo cracked a grin and asked, ¡°You mean that even when I¡¯m not borrowing your energy, Invincible Omen Body will automatically deploy when I¡¯m attacked?¡±

    ¡°Correct. On top of that, as your body has be stronger, you can now use my energy for a longer duration!¡± exined Cauldron Spirit.

    ¡°Haha, wonderful. Wonderful!¡± cheered Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction was still in deep meditation inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. His main body has fully recovered from all the havoc and damages the energy made. He raised his head and looked all around. He saw that he was alone in this enormous underground pce.

    There wererge chunks of shattered rocks everywhere. They were dark purple in color, which in the dark underground, appeared as dark as coal. The energy towers all around had copsed. The pce at the center was riddled with holes after being struck by broken rocks. It had lost its dignified and solemn appearance

    Blightsoar and Aobashi must had checked and examined the area before leaving. There likely wouldn¡¯t be any important or significant item left behind. Han Shuo did not find anything valuable after circling the chamber multiple times. Other than the pce and energy towers made of stony materials, there were only scattered fragments of rocks on every surface.

    Seeing that he couldn¡¯t find anything valuable and that his injuries hadpletely healed, Han Shuo decided to fly up and exit the cave.

    After ascending through the pitch-dark vertical tunnel, Han Shuo returned to the energy crystal cave. His demon generals were still wandering about the nearby caves as Han Shuo had previously instructed. The cavework was nowpletely empty. Neither divine guards nor godhunters could be seen.

    Han Shuo exited the cave and proceeded with flying across the chillingke. The gravity above theke had returned to normal and therefore Han Shuo had no problem traversing it. After hended on the ground safely, he spent a moment in contemtion while staring at the deep and dark water. He then took out a medicine bottle and collected a sample of the water.

    ¡°Huh?!¡± Han Shuo let out a soft cry of surprise after he carefully examined the jet-ck sample he collected. His eyes were filled with astonishment.

    Originally, Han Shuo assumed that arge amount of corrosive poison was dumped into theke to make it so corrosive. But now that he thought about it carefully, he felt that his assumption didn¡¯t make much sense.

    Thiske was enormous and deep. Just how many bottles of poison would it take to turn therge volume of liquid to be so corrosive?

    From Han Shuo¡¯s observations of the Godswamp Pharmacy, he could tell that this kind of poison was very precious to them, as though it took them a lot of effort to produce these poison. Han Shuo guesstimated that they must dissolve at least a few tons of poison into theke in order to make it so corrosive.

    However, to throw tons of such costly poison into thiske just to form an ineffective defense, surely the godhunters wouldn¡¯t be that stupid?

    Puzzled, Han Shuo split up a strand of his consciousness to carefully examine the liquid he collected in the medicine bottle. Han Shuo was rather wary of this immensely corrosive dark liquid that could dissolve a midgod in no time.

    He discovered that although there were indeedponents of the poison in theke water, it wasn¡¯t as concentrated or potent as those produced by Godswamp Pharmacy. After spending some time in deep thought, Han Shuo reached a baffling conclusion ¨C the poisons produced by Godswamp Pharmacy were made using theke water!

    After a moment of hesitation, Han Shuo extended his left index finger, and carefully with his right hand, poured a single drop of the dark liquid he collected on his fingertip.

    <i>Fizzz... </i> Light wisps of smoke immediately emanated from the tip of his index finger. Intense corrosive energy immediately invaded the cells and bones on his index finger, trying to dissolve them into liquid.

    The Invincible Omen Body, sensing the terrible destructive power of the corrosive energy, automatically assembled the demonic yuan in Han Shuo¡¯s body. On the instant his skin made contact with the liquid,yers uponyers of defensive energy shields were deployed to resist the corrosion. His demonic yuan was being rapidly consumed.

    <i>Fizzzsssss.... </i>The light wisps of smoke turned intense and jet-ck.

    Under the protection of his Invincible Omen Body, the corrosive energy was neutralized, though it consumed some demonic yuan. His cells that were damaged and broken down were rapidly reconstructed. His finger was as good as new in no time.

    <i>Such intense corrosive power! This is hundreds of times more horrible that the fiercest acid!</i> thought Han Shuo, startled.

    Those divine guards and godhuntes who fell into theke, as the entire surface of their bodies were exposed to the onught of the corrosive energy, it didn¡¯t take long before the divine energy they had be exhausted. That was the main reason they would be reduced into skeletons. As Han Shuo had taken precautions, on top of the miraculousness of his Invincible Omen Body, just one drop of the liquid couldn¡¯t cause him harm.

    <i>What a perfect tool for destroying bodies!</i> remarked Han Shuo in his mind. Following that, he took out an enormous medicine container the shape of a barrel and started filling it with theke water. He intended to do some proper research with it. The corrosive power of this water was not just perfect for destroying dead bodies, if applied on some malicious demonic weapons, it would greatly increase its destructive power.

    Han Shuo felt no qualms about using such a foul poison. After all, he had been devouring other¡¯s divine energy. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that Godswamp Pharmacy had made a move against him, not only that he wouldn¡¯t bother about exposing their crimes, but he might even secretly purchase the malicious poison from Godswamp Pharmacy.

    It has always been Han Shuo¡¯s core motto that he would achieve his goal by all means necessary, by hook or by crook. He delightedly filled severalrge medicine containers with theke water. He felt happy that he could obtain the poison without buying it from Godswamp Pharmacy!

    <i>But what made theke so corrosive?</i>

    Han Shuo was at a loss. He knew that ake wouldn¡¯t turn into corrosive liquid without a cause. There must be a reason for it!

    After a moment of hesitation, Han Shuo decided to examine the condition under theke!

    Theke water had formidable corrosive power. After testing its power by cing a drop on it on his hand, Han Shuo felt that he did not have enough demonic yuan to allow his entire body be submerged under the liquid safely.

    Han Shuo then threw rocks, ssware, and even crystal coins into theke. He discovered that the corrosive power only act upon flesh and tissue. Non-living things like ssware were only slightly affected by the corrosive power of theke water.

    Han Shuo had also tried using demon generals to probe under the water However, it seemed that theke water could corrode demon generals as well. Although the corrosion wasn¡¯t as obvious as towards physical flesh, the demon generals were very terrified of touching theke water. It seemed that the corrosive power of theke water could act on all living things!

    After thinking for a while, Han Shuo took out the Cyano Demonze. With one thought, the Cyano Demonze was sent flying into theke.

    The Cyano Demonze was one of the demonic weapons Han Shuo refined. It carried no aura of life. Although it would still receive some corrosion, it wasn¡¯t enough to destroy the demonic weapon.

    Without any demon general attached to the Cyano Demonze, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t observe the condition under theke. All he could tell was that theke was extremely deep. After maneuvering the Cyano Demonze underwater in random directions for some time, seeing that he wasn¡¯t making much progress in learning anything about theke, he decided to take the demonic weapon out from the depth of theke.

    ¡°Master, let me do it,¡± suddenly, Cauldron Spirit¡¯s voice sounded in Han Shuo¡¯s mind.

    Han Shuo was startled. He replied in a worrying tone, ¡°I have tested the water. The corrosive energy in theke water seems to act on all living things. Even demon generals dare not enter. Are you sure you¡¯ll be alright?¡±

    ¡°As the ultimate demonic weapon, this puny corrosive power can do nothing to me. Also, if I have more demon generals, I wouldn¡¯t fear energy a hundred times more corrosive than thiske water.

    ¡°Alright then, you be careful. Help me find if there¡¯s any peculiar things under theke. I feel that there must be a unique reason that caused thiske water to be so corrosive. Noke would turn so corrosive just like that!¡± Han Shuo agreed after thinking for a moment.

    Then with one thought, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon slowly flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s body and it automatically went underwater.

 Chapter 745 - Seventeen Fangs

    GDK 745: Seventeen Fangs

    Han Shuo was still worrying even after the Cauldron has submerged into theke. He soon received a message from Cauldron Spirit, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Master. I¡¯m alright!¡±

    Han Shuo finally felt at ease after hearing this reassurance from Cauldron Spirit.

    Through the connection he had with Cauldron Spirit, Han Shuo was able to get a clear glimpse of the situation under the hazardous pool. The Cauldron took a moment to sink straight down to the bottom of theke.

    They discovered that a dozen or more speckles were shimmering with soft and dark radiances at the bottom of theke. After maneuvering around theke floor for a moment, Cauldron Spirit arrived at the nearest dark speckle.

    It was a long, pointed and shiny dark object more than a meter long, sitting quietly at the bottom of theke. It has a very sharp tip and appeared to be the fang of an enormous magical beast. As Cauldron Spirit approached the fang, it transmitted to Han Shuo, ¡°Master, it seems that this fang is the reason behind the intense corrosive power of theke water. The water in the immediate surrounding of the fang is much more corrosive!¡±

    ¡°Collect it!¡±manded Han Shuo.

    Cauldron Spirit immediately began executing Han Shuo¡¯smand. The Cauldron swam over and sat upside down on the fang. Following that, a bright sh of light came from the inside of the Cauldron and that fang which was more than a meter long, disappeared. After that, the Cauldron rapidly swam towards other sites glowing with faint and dark radiances, collecting even more fangs.

    After traveling around theke floor, there were no longer any dark radiances to be found. Theke water also seemed to had turned somewhat cleaner.

    ¡°I have collected ¡®em all!¡± transmitted Cauldron Spirit.

    ¡°Alright,e back to the surface,¡± instructed Han Shuo.

    Cauldron Spirit, carrying an altogether seventeen fangs, gradually ascended to the surface. The Cauldron had erged in size. It was at least ten times in volumepared to before it traveled down theke.

    <i>Cling ng... </i>

    The Cauldron flipped upside down and poured out the seventeen fangs. They gave off crisp metallic sounds when they bumped against each other.

    Seventeen sharp fangs were disyed before Han Shuo. The shortest was one meter while the longest was 1.7 meters. Han Shuo took out a regr longsword and struck at one of the fangs. <i>Ting!</i> The immediately longsword shattered. However, the strike did not even leave a scratch on the fang¡¯s surface!

    ¡°Wow!¡± Han Shuo cried out in surprise. He discovered that not only were the fangs extremely sharp, but it also gave an intense chilling aura. One would feel as though one was in an arctic atmosphere while standing beside those fangs.

    For Han Shuo, insanely good at adapting to the environment, to feel as though he was submerged in ice, meant that these fangs must be bone-chillingly cold!

    ¡°The seventeen fangs are frigid cold and carries terrifying corrosive power. They can be refined into a demonic weapon!¡± after cing the items before Han Shuo and returning into his body, Cauldron Spirit transmitted to him.

    Han Shuo nodded. He had a big, bright smile on his face as he said, ¡°Hehe, my luck is indeed pretty good. I believe a lot was interested with the peculiarity of theke but no one had ever dared to explore it. Also, the divine weapons in this universe usually cannot be remotely controlled. Even if they knew that there are treasures underneath theke, they could do nothing!¡±

    ¡°Theke is transforming!¡± said Cauldron Spirit.

    Han Shuo put all seventeen fangs into his space ring before turning his attention to theke before him.

    After losing the seventeen fangs, theke was no longer brimming with chilling aura. The dark and murky water also grew significantly clearer. It appeared that those fangs were indeed the root cause of theke water¡¯s abnormality. Han Shuo was surprised at the rapid transformation.

    After having a close brush with death, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction managed to make a breakthrough and attained midgodhood. In addition, his practice of Invincible Omen Body had finally reached the second stand. And on top of that, he obtained seventeen miraculous fangs that could be refined into a demonic weapon. Han Shuo could not be better rewarded.

    Han Shuo again used his demon generals to probe around the valley. He still wasn¡¯t able to find any godhunter or divine guards from the three cities. Seeing that there was nothing left to do in this godhunter¡¯s valley, Han Shuo decided to return to Skyorchid Fort of the City of Shadows.

    Three days after Han Shuo departed, the specialpounds in the chillingke that lost its seventeen fangs started breaking down when illuminated under fierce sunlight. They turned into light smoke and dissipated. A few dayster, theke water carried not a trace of the bone-chilling aura. It had transformed into what seemed to be ordinaryke water. The water even appeared clean.

    A group of people arrived beside theke furtively. One of them was constantly whistling like a bird, as though trying to call for something.

    That man who made high-pitched noises all day long remarked in a puzzled manner, ¡°Where are those godhunters? Howe no one responded?¡±

    ¡°Yea, what a strange day. We did not get intercepted by any godhunter at all and walked in here so easily. This is so very different from the usual times!¡± another person remarked softly.

    ¡°Ugh, whatever. Let¡¯s just grab the stuff,¡± another person took out an enormous barrel and walked towards theke.

    ¡°Ah!¡± shrieked the person. He seemed extremely astonished.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± his teammates were jolted and hastily asked.

    ¡°The water, how did the water turn into this?!¡± the man replied while pointing at the pond before him. His face was filled with appall.

    His teammates walked towards theke to take a look. They saw that the previously dark and coldke water had turned clean and clear. Theke gave the secluded valley a tranquil atmosphere.

    However, obviously, these people did not enjoy the peaceful scenery, not at all.

    They took out a small magical beast that was simr to a squirrel, tied it to the end of a pike, and put the squirrel-like creature in contact with the water. The little creature sshed around but showed no sign of being dissolved.

    ¡°Howe?!¡± the people were shocked. ¡°This is bad! How are we going to exin this to the Master?¡±

    ¡°Something happened to the godhunters. None of them is inside!¡± one of their teammates reported solemnly after returning from the caves.

    ¡°We must not stay here any longer. Let¡¯s leave before we get into trouble!¡± the man casually set the little creature free from its pike and immediately headed towards the exit. His teammates, knowing that this godhunter¡¯s base had been exposed, rushed to leave the area before they were discovered.

    ***Hushveil City. Inside one of the secret chambers in Godswamp Pharmacy.

    Hassling wore a gloomy face as he listened to the ount of a person in his magical mirror. After keeping silent for a long while, he asked, ¡°Not a single godhunter?¡±

    ¡°Yes, not one, Master!¡± replied the person in the mirror. He was one of those who went to collect theke water.

    Hassling bunched his brows deep while rubbing his temple worryingly with one hand. ¡°But even if the godhunters were all killed, what in the world could possibly turn theke water clear?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know, sir. It was already like that when we were there.¡±

    After keeping silent for a moment, Hassling raised his head and instructed solemnly, ¡°From this moment onwards, do not initiate contact with the godhunters and cut off allmunication with them. Erase all evidence that we had been in contact with them!¡±

    ¡°Understood, Master!¡±

    After terminating the video call, Hassling got up, left his pharmacy and headed straight for Eugene¡¯s residence.

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, Mister Hassling, but His Lordship has yet to return to Hushveil City,¡± the divine guard stationed at the front door said politely when he recognized Hassling.

    ¡°Please tell Eugene that I¡¯m looking for him when he returns,¡± Hassling said to the divine guards smilingly and left.

    <i>What the hell happened? Given the terrifying strength of Godhunter Alliance, how could anything happen to that valley?</i> Hassling racked his brain but couldn¡¯t guess what could have happened in the valley. He also had no idea that Han Shuo knew about his rtionship with the godhunters.

    ***Skyorchid Fort.

    As soon as Han Shuo arrived at Skyorchid Fort, he asked the divine guard at the gateway, ¡°Are Lord Aobashi and Lord Erebus in the Fort?¡±

    The divine guard who recognized Han Shuo shook his head and replied, ¡°Their Lordships have yet to return even till now. Why aren¡¯t you together with them?¡±

    Han Shuo immediately asked, ¡°How much time has passed since we left the Fort?¡±

    ¡°Nearly two months,¡± replied the divine guard. He was rather puzzled why would Han Shuo ask such a question.

    Han Shuo had taken around one month to return to Skyorchid Fort. They had spent twelve days to get to the valley and two to three days probing the valley before the assault. This meant that Han Shuo had spent around fifteen days resisting and assimting the invasive energy.

    Han Shuo knew from experience that while he had a breakthrough in his cultivation, be it demonic arts or fundamental forces, he would lose track of the passing of time. Han Shuo thought for a bit after hearing the divine guard¡¯s response. He thought it quite likely that Aobashi and the others were still hunting those escaped godhunters at this moment.

    ¡°Did Their Lordships send any news back here?¡± asked Han Shuo.

    The divine guard shook his head.

    Han Shuo sighed in his mind and entered the Fort dejectedly. He went to the interim person in charge of the Fort and requested to be notified of all news about Aobashi and Erebus as soon as possible. He then went to rest in the room Erebus allocated for him.

    ***Standing before a vast ocean, Aobashi, Erebus, Blightsoar, and Eugene were gazing into the distance.

    Aobashi shook her head andmented, ¡°Although we have killed a ton of godhunters along the way, the Three have managed to escape. Can this operation even be regarded as a sess?¡±

    ¡°I guess we can call it a sess. We have never before killed such arge number of godhunters. Besides, we managed to tten thatir of theirs,¡± said Blightsoar after he took a moment to consider.

    ¡°I wonder how Bryan is doing. Sigh, if I had known earlier, I would rather let the energy kill me,¡± said Erebus. He looked pale and obviously not as vigorous as Aobashi, Blightsoar, and Eugene. It seemed that he needed some rest to recover to full health.

    Aobashi turned to look at Andrina who was being carried by a female divine guard a few steps away before she sighed, ¡°Andrina is still in aa while Bryan, we don¡¯t know if he will make it. This is not a sess at all!¡±

    ¡°The Brovst trio have escaped into the sea. It is absolutely impossible for us to find them inside this region. I believe now is the time for us to call it a day and go home,¡± Eugene of Hushveil City turned to look deeply at Andrina, hesitated for a moment, and said, ¡°From your ounts, it does seem that the godhunter leader recognizes Andrina. She will be the key to identifying the person¡¯s identity. If she wakes up and provided relevant information, please notify our Hushveil City about it.¡±

    ¡°We shall see!¡± From the day Erebus learned that it was Han Shuo who saved his life, he became loathing of Eugene had been prejudiced of Han Shuo. Even his words became rather impolite.

    Eugene however, did not bicker about it. He nodded and said in a deep voice, ¡°Well then, farewell!¡±

    Aobashi waved her hand and said in azy voice, ¡°Farewell. Have a safe journey. ¡°

    It was at that moment that an intense energy fluctuation came from the sky above their heads. A blurry figure gradually appeared in mid-air. It appeared to be a graceful, elegant woman. Her body was covered with a pure white gown. Her face remained blurry to the party.

    The bizarre energy fluctuation shrouded the entire region in no time. All living things within hundreds of kilometers radius could sense the energy and know that they cannot resist.

    Aobashi and the others jolted. They all raised their heads and gazed at the figure emerging above the sky. Suddenly, they discovered that they had no wish of giving resistance. They still possess divine energy and could put them to use, but they do not want to. There wasn¡¯t a thought of resistance in their hearts and they would readily follow anymand, as though they would kill themselves willingly if the woman said so!

    This feeling made them feel powerless and incredibly terrified. They opened their eyes wide as they gazed at the woman with a blurry face. None of them could utter a word.

    ¡°I¡¯m Andrina¡¯s mother. Let me take her home,¡± a clear and melodious voice gently spread to their ears. Andrina¡¯s petite figure slowly floated upwards. The female divine guard who carried Andrina did absolutely nothing but stare foolishly. She watched as Andrina floated higher and higher, but thought not of stopping it.

    Under the traction of the bizarre energy, Andrina flew higher and higher. When her small body started to turn blurry, the woman high in the sky said in a gentle voice, ¡°Please tell Bryan thank you for taking good care of Andrina,¡±

    Right after she uttered those words, a strange light shed in the sky. Andrina and the woman suddenly vanished without a trace.

    In an instant, the energy which shrouded them disappeared. Every one of them regained their senses.

    ¡°Who is she? My divine energy wasn¡¯t restrained and yet, I couldn¡¯t even think about using it!¡± eximed Eugene. He never anticipated that he would be so powerless against a figure that suddenly appeared out of thin air.

    Aobashi put on a grimace and said, ¡°Somehow, I feel that the woman is more terrifying than the godhunter¡¯s leader. Though I knew I stood no chance against the godhunter¡¯s leader, I could fight him to my death. Before that woman, however, I couldn¡¯t even put up a fight. It felt as though if she asked me to, I would kill myself without the slightest hesitation. How terrifying!¡±

    ¡°She said that she¡¯s Andrina¡¯s mother, so I think Andrina will be fine. It¡¯s just that we would have trouble exining this to Bryan,¡± remarked Erebus.

    ¡°He¡¯s already a dead man. What is there to exin?¡± muttered Eugene, softly.

    ¡°Shut up!¡± Erebus glowered at Eugene. Even Aobashi and Blightsoar looked at him with unkind, cold eyes. It was as though the three would gang up to give him a beating if he said another word they didn¡¯t like. The atmosphere suddenly turned cold and stale. Some divine guards even ced one hand on their divine weapons.

    ¡°Well, I shall get moving. Goodbye!¡± Eugene, knowing that his presence was not weed, hastily left from the party. He would raise his head to look at the sky and wonder, <i>Who is that woman in white? How is she so terrifying?</i>

    Soon after Eugene left, Blightsoar said to the two highgods, ¡°Such queer things I have seen in this journey. Lady, gentleman, it¡¯s also time for me to return to my Mirage City,¡± Blightsoar had seen too many things that exceeded his knowledge or expectation. He was racking his brain hard on how to exin everything to the City Lord of Mirage City!

    ¡°See you again! Also, if you¡¯re at the City of Shadows, I will treat you to a drink!¡± said Erebus smilingly. He had a good impression of Blightsoar.

    ¡°Sure!¡± Blightsoar repliedughingly before his look quickly turned dim. He said, ¡°If you do see Bryan, please send him my regards. Also, if any of youe to visit Mirage City, you shall receive the most cordial hospitality from me!¡± Blightsoar then shook his head, let out a soft sigh, and left with his divine guards.

    ¡°Should we return to the valley? Bryan might still be there,¡± Erebus asked for Aobashi¡¯s opinion after Blightsoar left.

    ¡°If Bryan lives, he will not stay in the valley,¡± Aobashi shot a re at Erebus and said, ¡°Are you implying that Bryan wouldn¡¯t make it?¡±

    Erebus cowered his head in fear andmented, ¡°That energy is very unusual. I could do nothing when it was inside my body and wrecking everything. Bryan¡¯s chances of survival are minute!¡± Although Erebus would be furious if anyone said that Han Shuo would die, deep in his heart, he did not think that Han Shuo could survive.

    ¡°Bryan had ample confidence when he chased us away. I think he will be fine!¡± Aobashi then said angrily, ¡°Although you have known him longer than I do, I have more confidence in him than you do. He will be alright! He mustn¡¯t die before I get my revenge on him for chasing me away with his impolite words!¡±

    ¡°Alright then, we will not turn back,¡± Erebus summoned one of his divine guards and instructed, ¡°You go back and survey the valley. If you discover any godhunter, report back immediately!¡± Erebus was winking as he said those words.

    That divine guard was Erebus¡¯ confidant and easily figured out the actual instruction. He nodded and replied, ¡°Yes, my Lord, I know what I shall do!¡± <i>Find Bryan¡¯s body and bring it back? No problem.</i>

    ¡°Go on!¡± Erebus said as he gestured. He then turned to Aobashi and said, ¡°Shall we go home now?¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go,¡± Aobashi knew Erebus¡¯ intention but did not expose him. She merely sighed in her mind. Even if Erebus did nothing, she herself would instruct a group of divine guards to survey the valley. If something were to happen to Han Shuo, the least they could do was to bring his body back to the City.

    ¡°Wee back, my Lords!¡± the divine guard who guarded the gate of Skyorchid Fort saluted respectfully before he put on a grimace and said, ¡°Lord Bryan have been waiting for Your Lordships¡¯ return for more than a dozen days. Had Your Lordships not return soon, I believe he would go out to look for Your Lordships!¡±

    ¡°Wha- What?!¡± Erebus cried out in surprise. He hastily asked, ¡°What did you say? Say again!¡±

    ¡°I said wee back, my Lords!¡± the divine guard was jolted. He had never seen Erebus behave in such a manner. He felt very uneasy and asked himself, <i>did I say something wrong?</i>

    ¡°No, not this one, the next sentence!¡± Erebus again shouted. There were a few traces of happiness showing on his face.

    ¡°Lord Bryan have been waiting for Your Lordships for more than a dozen days!¡± repeated the divine guard. He felt nervous.

    ¡°Yes, these are the words I want to hear! Haha!¡± Erebusughed cheerfully. He did not look like the usual solemn-looking Chief of Third Corps. He turned to Aobashi and said in a big smile, ¡°See, I told ya, that youngster is a lucky one. What harm could happen to him!¡±

    Aobashi¡¯s mood rapidly improved after hearing that Han Shuo was doing fine. She red at Erebus and asked, ¡°I wonder who was it that asked his men to collect Bryan¡¯s body. Humph, you thought that I didn¡¯t know?¡±

    ¡°Hehe,¡± Erebus grinned. He then patted the divine guard¡¯s shoulder and said smilingly, ¡°Well done, well done!¡±

    The divine guard was astounded. He stood foolishly, not knowing what the matter was. He thought, <i>Could it be that Lord Erebus have noticed my hard work all this time? Haha! I¡¯m going to get promoted!</i>

    Han Shuo had been anxiously waiting in Skyorchid Fort for more than ten days. Just as he was considering leaving the Fort to look for them, he received news that Aobashi has returned.

    Han Shuo was ted. He immediately flew out from his room and headed towards the main entryway, shocking some gods along his path.

    After scanning the party once through, Han Shuo noticed that Andrina was missing. His heart instantly sank and his face turned dark.

    Erebus and Aobashi who were wearing cheerful looks met the gloomy Han Shuo in their path. They were shocked to see Han Shuo¡¯s dark face. Erebus rushed to him and asked concernedly, ¡°Bryan, what¡¯s the matter? Is it about your injuries?¡±

    Han Shuo did not answer Erebus but questioned Aobashi in a deep and rather fierce voice, ¡°Where is Andrina? Why is it that the two of you have returned without her? Don¡¯t you remember what you had promised me when I handed you Andrina?¡±

    Aobashi stared nkly for a moment before she came to her senses. She replied in her lovable voice, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m sure Andrina is alright. She was picked up by her mother!¡±

 Chapter 746 - Gods above gods

    GDK 746: Gods above gods

    Aobashi and Erebus narrated their journey once though. HS remained in silent contemtion for a long while.

    Finally, HS let out a soft sigh. He said softly, ¡°Perhaps that would be better for her. Her mother should be able to take care of her best.¡±

    ¡°I wonder who her mother is. To me, she feels even more formidable than the godhunter¡¯s boss. In front of her, I couldn¡¯t even raise the thought of resisting!¡± eximed Erebus. He still felt somewhat terrified when Andrina¡¯s mother was mentioned.

    ¡°We havepleted the mission and there wouldn¡¯t be any godhunter around Skyorchid Fort for some time. I will return to the City of Shadows and report to the City Lord with you,¡± said Aobashi.

    ¡°Erebus, do you know anything about the origins and strength of the godhunter¡¯s boss?¡± HS asked Erebus after thinking for a moment.

    Erebus forced a smile and replied, ¡°Absolutely no clue. But from my observations, what we met in the underground pce was merely a clone of the powerful being. Had Andrina not used some unknown method to shatter the clone, none of us would live to talk here.¡±

    <i><i>Save for me,</i></i> thought HS. He was able to utilize Blood Disassembly in escaping.

    ¡°It rather unfortunate for us that Andrina was picked up by her mother. Otherwise, we could ask her about godhunter¡¯s boss when she wakes up. She must know a thing or two about godhunter¡¯s boss!¡± Aobashi said disappointedly.

    HS shook his head and disagreed, ¡°Even if her mother did note to pick her up, I¡¯m sure she wouldn¡¯t tell us much after she awakes.¡±

    ¡°Huh? Why is that?¡± asked Erebus. He took a short pause before adding more questions, ¡°Bryan, how did you get to know Andrina?¡±

    ¡°I ran into her by chance. She was under the pursuit of godhunters when I first met her,¡± HS answered Erebus¡¯ second question before he exined, ¡°I have been asking her about the godhunters since the day we met. But for all these while, she was tight-lipped and wouldn¡¯t reveal a thing. I doubt she would tell us anything even if she is still with us.¡±

    ¡°I see... ¡°Aobashi nodded and said, ¡°Alright then, let¡¯s not waste words on discussion among ourselves but head to the City and ask the City Lord about this. Given his insight, His Lordship might know a thing or two about the godhunter¡¯s boss!¡±

    ¡°Sure!¡± agreed Erebus.

    HS, naturally, had no objection. he stayed in Skyorchid Fort for one day while Aobashi and Erebus prepared for their departure. As soon as they made all the necessary arrangements, they began the journey with HS.

    Half a monthter, the three arrived at the City of Shadows.

    HS did not have time to return to his Celestial Pearl but went straight to the Sainte Residence with Erebus and Aobashi to meet with City Lord Wace and Andre.

    They were summoned to an expansive room where Wace would discuss official business. The stone pirs around the room were carved with miraculous patterns. Sound-isting barriers formed around the room to prevent any prying ears from eavesdropping.

    Wace, sitting on his broad chair, wore a solemn expression. Andre was standing beside him as HS and the others walked towards them.

    ¡°What actually happened?¡± Wace asked in a deep voice as soon as Aobashi and the others entered, ¡°The message you transmitted wasn¡¯t clear. What actually happened in the valley?¡±

    Aobashi, an expert highly regarded by Wace, put on a bitter smile on her beautiful face. She let out a sigh and said, ¡°It¡¯splicated but it began like this... ¡°

    Aobashi slowly narrated their assault on the valley with Erebus interrupting once in a while to fill the details she missed. HS would stand on one side and said not a word as they spoke.

    When Aobashi mentioned that the godhunter boss easily destroyed the enchanted scroll deployed by Erebus, then severely injuring Erebus with one beam of light from his green eyes, the eyes on Wace and Andre¡¯s faces were wide open. It appeared that they were extremely horrified by what they heard.

    Soon, Aobashi and Erebus hadpleted giving their ount. Wace and Andre did not speak a word even long after the storytelling was over, as though they were contemting about something significant.

    ¡°That¡¯s the entire story... ¡° Aobashi cleared her throat softly when she saw that Wace and Andre seemed to have lost in thought.

    Wace and Andre exchange a solemn nce before Wace turned to Erebus, bunched his brows, and asked, ¡°Are you sure that the godhunter destroyed the Scroll of Darkness without much effort?¡±

    ¡°Yes, my Lord. I feel as though I was too weak to fight back!¡± replied Erebus before he sighed. He seemed disappointed by his powerlessness.

    ¡°Don¡¯t me yourself,¡± consoled Wace, ¡°Even if I was there, I too am no match against that godhunter¡¯s boss!¡±

    Aobashi, Erebus, and HS were all visibly astonished to hear those words from Wace. This City Lord of the City of Shadows possessedte-stage highgod strength. Those words of his meant that the godhunter¡¯s boss possessed strength above his!

    <i><i>Doesn¡¯t this mean it¡¯s an Overgod? But how could an Overgod be the leader of the godhunters?</i></i>

    ¡°My Lord, you mean...?¡± asked Aobashi.

    Wace nodded and affirmed, ¡°Yes, it¡¯s an overgod!¡±

    ¡°What!¡± HS couldn¡¯t help himself but cry out in surprise, ¡°How is that possible? There are just twelve Overgods for the twelve fundamental forces. Overgods have nock of divine energy, how could any of them be a godhunter?!¡±

    Wace did not answer HS¡¯s question but turned to Andre and instructed, ¡°Bryan is still rather new to Elysium, and doesn¡¯t know that much about the situation. Please rify it to him!¡±

    Andre nodded, put on a solemn expression, and exined, ¡°You are indeed correct, there are just twelve Overgods for twelve fundamental forces. But the Overgods you are referring to are those who possess the Quintessences, the very source of elemental energy and edictal forces. Although this universe is infinitely vast, there is only one Quintessence for each of the twelve fundamental forces.¡±

    There were twelve Quintessences, one for each fundamental force, naturally produced. HS thought that there were just twelve overgods in the universe, the Twelve with the Quintessences.

    Andre¡¯s voice turned deep as he continued, ¡°But, there are two types of overgods. The first is Overgods who possess the Quintessence. There will only ever be twelve of these Overgods, and only one Overgod for each of the twelve fundamental forces. They are the Overgods whom we living in their Divine Dominions, serves.

    ¡°The second type of overgods are those who, through millions of years, advanced fromte-stage highgod to the realm of overgod. Although they do not possess the Quintessence, their strength are iparably mightier than us highgods!¡±

    HS thought quickly in his mind after hearing Andre¡¯s exnation. Immediately, he understood what Andre meant, ¡°So you¡¯re saying that the godhunter¡¯s boss we met in the valley is an overgod without a Quintessence?¡±

    ¡°Correct!¡± Andre affirmed, ¡°I know the power of the enchanted scroll that Erebus received from my elder brother. Note-stage highgod expert could destroy the scroll so effortlessly. Therefore, there is only one possibility ¨C that person is an overgod!¡± Andre took a short pause before the continued, ¡°Just as you have said, the Overgods with the Quintessences will never need to absorb divine energy from an ordinary god. Their source of energy came from those who worship them in their Divine Dominions, and therefore will never be a godhunter. Therefore, the overgod you met in the valley must not own a Quintessence!¡±

    ¡°I really didn¡¯t expect that it would be an overgod!¡± eximed Aobashi softly. ¡°I have heard a little about the ssification of the two types of overgods, but I have never met an overgod. Meeting one in the valley was thest thing I expected!¡±

    Those words of Andre¡¯s had shocked HS. The only overgods he knew before this were the twelve Overgods. It was the very first time HS learned that there was more than one type of overgods. After thinking for a moment, HS asked, ¡°If there are only twelve Quintessences naturally produced in the universe, and they are possessed by the current twelve Overgods, doesn¡¯t that mean that an overgod without a Quintessence will never have a chance to advance in strength?¡±

    Andre seemed to be troubled by HS¡¯s question. He hesitated for a long while and took a cautious look at Wace. It was after getting a nod from Wace that Andre softly exined, ¡°There is one way for the overgods to obtain the Quintessence ¨C by force! Following the death of the Overgod, its Quintessence will return to heaven and earth. By then, any overgod cultivating in the energy who could find the Quintessence and fuse with it, the overgod will be the new master of the Divine Dominion ¨C the new Overgod!¡±

    ¡°So this means that as long as the Overgod with the Quintessence is alive, other overgods cultivating in the energy will not have the chance to obtain the Quintessence?¡± asked HS.

    ¡°Yes, exactly,¡± Andre nodded and continued, ¡°An Overgod with the Quintessence is much, much stronger than a regr overgod. The differences are much alike the gap between a midgod and a highgod. It is practically impossible for any regr overgods, even in big numbers, to kill an Overgod with the Quintessence!¡±

    ¡°Has any Overgod ever perished?¡± HS continued to question.

    Andre kept silent for a moment before he nodded and said, ¡°Yes, but not caused by an ordinary overgod.¡±

    ¡°Alright, that¡¯s enough. There are some topics that we cannot talk too deeply about. This is a taboo!¡± Wace suddenly interrupted the conversation between HS and Andre, his eyes looking at the ceiling, as though he was worried about something.

    Andre immediately shut his mouth tight and uttered not another word.

    However, Andre had said enough for HS. He had emphasized twice that the death of an Overgod with the Quintessence cannot be caused by any regr overgod. He also mentioned that there were Overgods who fell. This meant just one possibility ¨C they could be killed by other Overgods with the Quintessences, or a being of a level above them, the Creator!

    ¡°Our conversation today shall end here. I hope that none of you will speak a word of what we have discussed here. Some words, if spread to the public, could invite troubles!¡± instructed Wace solemnly. ¡°Alright, now that I have learned the story thoroughly, I must take a trip to the Head Shrine of Darkness. Andre shall be in charge of all matter in the City during my absence.¡±

    There were Shrines of Darkness in every city of the Darkness Dominion but the Head Shrine wasn¡¯t in any of the cities. No one except for those who had the Overgod¡¯s approval would know of its location.

    Evidently, Wace was one of those who were qualified to know the Head Shrine¡¯s location and enter it. It was clear to everyone Wace¡¯s intention and purpose of going to the Dark Shrine.

    Although an Overgod could initiate contact with their pious believer, it wasn¡¯t that easy for a regr god to meet with the Overgod they serve. Although everyone in the Darkness Dominion knew that the Overgod of Darkness exists, only a very few who could actuallymunicate with the Overgod of Darkness. Wace was one of those special few who enjoyed this privilege.

    Wace was indeed a straightforward man. Immediately after leaving Andre with a few words, he left the Sainte Residence alone, without thepany of any divine guard. No one would know where he would go.

    After Wace left, Andre started to ask HS every detail about Andrina. His curiosity towards Andrina seemed to have grown ten times in all of a sudden. As HS truly didn¡¯t know much about Andrina, under his inquiry, HS could only force a smile and exin, ¡°Lord Andre, I really don¡¯t know Andrina that well. There¡¯s no point in asking me all these questions!¡±

    ¡°You have spent such a long time with her and yet you knew nothing!¡± Andre¡¯s heart was filled with questions, ¡°I¡¯d imagine you knew Andrina better. But then again, with such a mysterious mother, it¡¯s not that surprising that she wouldn¡¯t tell you much.¡±

    HS stared nkly for a moment before he asked, ¡°Lord Andre, you do know the identity of Andrina¡¯s mother?¡±

    Andre shook his head but then he nodded his head strangely under HS¡¯s burning gazes. It was unlike how he would usually conduct himself. He hesitated for a moment before he forced a smile and said, ¡°I don¡¯t know the identity of Andrina¡¯s mother to be certain, but from Erebus and Aobashi¡¯s descriptions, I could vaguely connect it to a person. If she is truly that person, then, Bryan, luck ising your way!¡±

    After Andre uttered those words, Erebus and Aobashi cast attentive gazes on Andre. Although they did not speak, it cannot be more obvious that they were very interested in the subject.

    ¡°I can be sure that the godhunter is an overgod without a Quintessence. And, if your senses, Erebus and Aobashi, are correct, then Andrina¡¯s mother could very well be an actual Overgod with a Quintessence,¡± exined Andre.

    ¡°Which of the Twelve?¡± HS, Aobashi, and Erebus simultaneously shouted.

    There were just twelve Overgods with Quintessences, One for each fundamental force. There was just twelve of them in the entire universe. The scope was too small.

    <i><i>This has nothing to do with the Overgods of Darkness, Death, and Destruction. I believe Their Lordships will not take offense?</i></i> Andre hesitated for a moment before he said in a very low voice, ¡°I surmise, it should be the most mysterious one ¨C the Goddess of Destiny!¡±

 Chapter 747 - Avici Godslaying Sword Formation

    GDK 747: Avici Godying Sword Formation

    The Goddess of Destiny was the most mysterious of the twelve Overgods. Her Dominion of Destiny had always taken no sides and permanently neutral. It was said that Her words represented the wishes of the Creator. She does not usually intervene with affairs on the Elysium and would only show up to mediate peace when the fights between the Overgods grew too far.

    The Goddess of Destiny was such a unique existence that the remaining eleven Overgods would always listen to her advice.

    Knowing that even the gods who cultivated in the edict of destiny rarely had a chance to meet Her, Andre was surprised that Erebus and Aobashi were so fortunate to have the opportunity.

    After hearing Andre¡¯s exnation, Aobashi and Erebus carefully recalled the scene they witnessed back then. Suddenly, as though they had realized something, their faces jolted and were obviously overwhelmed with shock. Han Shuo, who have been secretly observing their expressions, immediately realized that Andre¡¯s words were likely true. The being who abruptly materialized before Aobashi and Erebus was very likely the most mysterious Overgod on Elysium.

    <i><i>If it is true that the Goddess of Destiny is Andrina¡¯s mother, then her status is shockingly noble! However, why would Andrina, the daughter of the Destiny Overgod, show up in the Darkness Dominion? Also, why would Andrina hate the godhunters so much?</i></i>

    Han Shuo pondered and pondered, and yet he came no closer to a usible exnation.

    Han Shuo was convinced of Andre¡¯s guess about the identity of Andrina¡¯s mother. That would exin why Andrina owned a crystal so miraculous that it could shatter the clone of the godhunter¡¯s boss. If her mother was the Goddess of Destiny, it would make sense that Andrina coulde into possession of an overgod divine weapon. Only an overgod divine weapon bestowed by an Overgod with the Quintessence could unleash a power that terrifying!

    ¡°Bryan, if I guessed it right, that Andrina is the daughter of the Goddess of Destiny, then Andrina will definitely be alright!¡± Andre consoled Han Shuo. ¡°Before the Goddess left, She asked Aobashi to pass you her gratitude. Bryan, you are such a lucky one. You actually left a good impression on the Goddess of Destiny!¡±

    Aobashi and Erebus looked at Han Shuo with admiring and envious gazes. The twelve Overgods, to most people, were existences far above reach, and especially so for the most mysterious Overgod. Han Shuo who had arrived on Elysium not too long ago, unexpected, won the favor of the Destiny Goddess and even built a friendship with Her daughter, Andrina. What a lucky one!

    ¡°As long is Andrina is fine, I¡¯m happy,¡± said Han Shuo smilingly. He did not expect that Andrina would have such a noble identity.

    ¡°All that we have discussed in this room, shall stay inside this room. Do not speak of what we have discussed to anyone else!¡± warned Andre after a moment of thinking.

    Han Shuo, Aobashi, and Erebus nodded at Andre.

    ¡°Alright, discussion of any other matter shall be put off until my elder brother returns. You are all dismissed!¡± said Andre smilingly. However, right before Han Shuo was out of his sight, he gently cried out, ¡°Bryan!¡±

    Han Shuo immediately stopped in his tracks. Aobashi and Erebus appeared as though they heard nothing and continued to leave quietly.

    ¡°Yes?¡± Han Shuo turned around and looked at Andre with puzzled gazes, ¡°Is there anything else I can help you with, Lord Andre?¡±

    Andre smiled cordially and said, ¡°Bryan, my elder brother is very happy with your performance. If nothing unexpected happens, he will appoint you as the Chief of Fifth Corps sometimeter. I¡¯m telling you this so you can get prepared mentally!¡±

    Han Shuo was ted. He said sincerely, ¡°Thank you!¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re wee. Not only that you have made an enormous contribution to the City of Shadows, but you have also amply demonstrated your strength by bearing the energy which even Erebus could not ovee,¡± praised Andre smilingly, ¡°Go back and make some preparations. You might want to start recruiting for some gods. After all, you can¡¯t run the entire Fifth Corps alone, can you?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and said no more. He bowed at Andre and left the Sainte Residence perfectly contented.

    Although Aobashi and Erebus did not consider their raid on the godhunters a sess, to Han Shuo, however, the mission ended wonderfully. Not only that he had made breakthroughs in his cultivations of demonic arts and edict of destruction, he had obtained seventeen huge venomous fangs. He also learned of the rtionship between Godswamp Pharmacy and the godhunters, not to forget having demonstrated his capability.

    Other than the fact that Andrina went home with her mother, the affair resulted in a big win for Han Shuo.

    After returning to Celestial Pearl, Han Shuo was briefed by Phoebe and Emily about the recent situation of his business. Thanks to the hard word of his twodies, all branches of Celestial Pearl thorough the territories of the City of Shadows were opened for business. The branches were just as popr as the headquarters in the City. At the current time, Celestial Pearl Pharmacy had upied a seventy-percent share of the entire pharmacy market in the City of Shadows, overshadowing all other rivaling pharmacies.

    By now, with most operations in Celestial Pearl moving on autopilot, running on established, streamlined processes, even Phoebe and Emily were freed from constant work, allowing them to spend more time on their cultivations.

    Those mortals who came from Profound Continent had basically not taken a step out from their rooms. They spent all their time of improving their own strengths using the enormous resources Han Shuo provided them. Having been able to cultivate to the pinnacle on an environment as poor as Profound Continent, these people were able to make tremendous progress on Elysium, where resources were abundant and the elements several hundred times more intense.

    Within a short time, all of them managed to raise their strengths by several sses. Stratholme the old monster, Ayermike Cotton, and a few others, had advanced to early-stage lowgod realm. Candide and Emma, whose strengths were rtively low among them, rose through multiple realms. They will soon reach basegodhood.

    Before leaving for the Third Corps, Han Shuo had provided them not just the Rebirth Pill and Pill of Tranquility he had personally refined, but he also gave them some crystal coins for them to purchase the divine weapon and divine scrolls they needed. This assisted them tremendously.

    Even Phoebe and Emily who had to spend time on running the Celestial Pearl will soon reach the realm of basegod.

    Han Shuo could not be happier with what he heard from Phoebe and Emily. Although Han Shuo knew that their strength will increase by leaps and bounds, he was nheless shocked to learn that they managed to break through one or more realms within a short few months.

    ¡°Bryan, at this trend, all of us will enter the realm of lowgod in just a few years!¡± said Emily smilingly.

    ¡°Wonderful!¡± eximed Han Shuo. ¡°Wace intends to have me take over the Fifth Corps. I was worried about where to employ trusted experts but it seems that I have nothing to worry about! Once all of you from Profound Continent gained decent strengths, you can fill the key positions in my agency. I will have a much easier time with your help!¡±

    People like Candide and Emily were once high-ranking members of the Dark Mantle back on Profound Continent. The tasks and duties of City of Shadows¡¯ Divine Guard Corps were simr to those of the Lancelot Empire¡¯s Dark Mantle. Someone like Candide, with a little time to learn and adapt, could easily do the job well, and perhaps outperform the others.

    Ayermike Cotton, Stratholme the old monster, and the others, were all experienced characters. Once they advance to lowgodhood, they will be great helpers for Han Shuo in various businesses. They will be the pir of Han Shuo¡¯s future family n!

    It was for their outstanding talents that Han Shuo would spare no effort in bringing them to this ne of Gods from the distant Profound Continent, in addition to supplying with a generous amount of ck crystal coins to raise their strengths!

    After returning to Elysium, as Han Shuo had to sort out various matters, on top of having been assiduously cultivating to raise his strength he deemedcking, he had spent a less than desired amount of time with his women.

    Phoebe and Emily, after giving Han Shuo a brief ount of the current situation in Celestial Pearl, wanted to rush back to cultivation. Having observed that Han Shuo¡¯s strength was ever-increasing and fearing the distance between them grew everrger, they put all their efforts on raising their strengths.

    ¡°Aren¡¯t you staying a little longer? It¡¯s been a while since west had... ¡° Han Shuo said with a lewd grin while holding Phoebe and Emily¡¯s hands.

    ¡°Sorry, but you will have to wait until we have reached lowgodhood before any of us will make love with you!¡± replied Phoebe.

    ¡°Wedies have made an agreement that we will not get intimate with you until we advanced to the realm of lowgod!¡± said Emily giggly, ¡°It¡¯s hard for us to bear too. But we must do so to close our gap in strength. Sigh, even a child on Elysium would have at least demigod or basegod strength. We do not want to be looked down upon any longer!¡±

    ¡°Gotta go, I have a premonition that I will break through to the realm of basegod. There¡¯s no time to waste!¡± Phoebe and Emily struggle free from Han Shuo¡¯s pulling and left, leaving just their melodious giggles.

    Not just Phoebe and Emily, but even Fanny and Helen, were staunch in honoring their pact. Fanny, fearing that she wouldn¡¯t be able to resist Han Shuo¡¯s seduction, wouldn¡¯t even open the door for him.

    <i><i>Dang, how long do I have to practice abstinence for?</i></i> Han Shuo smiled bitterly and sighed.

    Forck of a better option, Han Shuo decided to spend his time on cultivation instead.

    He decided to do something with the seventeen fangs he obtained from the godhunter¡¯s base. For seven days straight, Han Shuo went on a shopping spree, visiting various divine weapon stores in the City to purchase material there were bizarre to most ordinary people. After that, he left the City of Shadows alone and located a secluded valley nearby to stay there temporarily.

    Han Shuo, not wanting anyone to discover him refining demonic weapons, carefully deployed concealment formations around the valley. He then took out the fangs, arranged them in front of him, and stared at them as he pondered what demonic weapon he should turn them into.

    ¡°These seventeen fangs are very tough and their tips are very sharp. They can be refined into offensive weapons like flying swords! As the material itself is excellent, the process will be straightforward. You just need to do a little polishing on them before fusing your blood essences into the fangs. Before long, you will have a new, dominating demonic weapon!¡± Cauldron Spirit transmitted in Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    ¡°Then I shall turn them into seventeen flying swords!¡± after a moment of thinking, Han Shuo came to a decision.

    ¡°I will give you the instructions to modify the flying swords which will allow demon generals to adhere to the sword. The seventeen swords will then be able to form a sword formation. To add on the intense corrosive power of this material, this demonic weapon will be nastier and more destructive than all those you have previously made!¡± said Cauldron Spirit.

    ¡°That¡¯d be the best!¡± Han Shuo was ted to hear those words. To him, the deadlier the weapon, the better. And obviously, the nastiness of the weapon was none of his concern.

    With the help of Cauldron Spirit, Han Shuo deployed a unique formation in the valley using the materials he had previously collected. He ced the seventeen fangs around the formation and sat in the center. Subsequently, he released the demonic yuan in his body, connecting the fangs via the formation.

    Perhaps the demonic weapon he tried to produce will be a really powerful one, Han Shuo had to sit there for six months straight toplete the process. The seventeen fangs were immersed in a strange, jet-ck fluid that carried bits of dark red spots.

    With great difficulty and half-a-year¡¯s time, Han Shuo managed to infuse his blood essences he ced in the fluids into the seventeen fangs. The process took so long mostly because Han Shuo was hindered by the formidable corrosive power of the fangs.

    Now that the fangs were filled with Han Shuo¡¯s blood essences, Han Shuo started adding all sorts of materials into the pools of dark water the fangs were immersed in. Thick fumes were quickly produced. They do not dissipate but lingered above the pools.

    A year passed as though the blink of an eye. Han Shuo began supplying the fangs with demonic yuan to alter their internal structures. He would also follow Cauldron Spirit¡¯s instructions on carving miniature demonic formations on every fangs. When the magnificent symbols had been carved on the fangs, a transformation took ce. They became seventeen piercing and chilling flying swords.

    The flying swords not only possessed intense corrosive power, but they also carried chilling aura. It could hinder the movement of the enemy just by being near the enemy. And once the flying sword pierced into the enemy¡¯s flesh, they would be simultaneously affected by its corrosive power and chilling aura. It would be a total nightmare for the enemy.

    After the fangs transformed to take the shape of flying swords, Han Shuo spent time on connecting with the seventeen flying swords. He maneuvered them to fly and dance around him. Then, with Cauldron Spirit¡¯s being his instructor, Han Shuo practiced the ¡®Avici Godying Sword Formation¡¯.

    The Avici Godying Sword Formation was a dreadful sword formation, enabled by the unique marks, symbols, and miniature formations carved on the seventeen flying swords.

    It was very difficult to operate theplex Avici Godying Sword Formation. Even Han Shuo, with his absurdly powerful consciousness, and the guidance of Cauldron Spirit, had to take five years to fully master the formation.

    But the effort was surely worth it for the power of the sword formation was very formidable. Han Shuo needed just one thought and the seventeen flying swords flew in the valley in bizarre trajectories. Right after, several mountains copsed with loud rumbles. The hilly terrain was transformed into a t ne filled with rocks!

    ¡°Now that you have mastered the Avici Godying Sword Formation, even without using my energy, you can kill early-stage highgod experts!¡± Cauldron Spirit transmitted the day Han Shuo mastered the sword formation.

    Han Shuo was ted. He sensed that the demonic yuan in his body turning ever purer and condensed as he practiced Avici Godying Sword Formation. Seven years passed as though a few blinks of an eye. The day he finally walked out of the valley, his Omen realm state was better than ever, and his confidence was higher than ever!

    Finally, after being away for seven years, Han Shuo returned to the City of Shadows.

    Although seven years was a long time for mortals, for the gods on Elysium who could practically live to the heat death of the universe, it was merely a brief period.

    Therefore, when Han Shuo returned to the City of Shadows, he discovered that the City had not changed much. No one felt that Han Shuo had been away for too long. Everyone in the city was still very respectful towards Han Shuo.

    When he returned to the Celestial Pearl after seven years, he was greeted with a great surprise ¨C all those who came from Profound Continent had attained lowgodhood!

    Among them, Ayermike Cotton, Stratholme the old monster, and a few others, most astonishingly, reached the realm ofte-stage lowgod! Outstanding talentsbined with unlimited resources and tireless hard work had produced a miracle. He almost could not believe just how much progress his friends and girlfriends had made.

    Though the progress they made was shocking, Han Shuo was even more surprised by those Gilbert, Sanguis, and Bonds made!

    Sanguis was getting close to mastering the Bloodgod Mantra. Although there was no ssification of realms in Bloodgod Mantra, currently, Sanguis could easily defeat Ayermike Cotton and Stratholme the old monster. He had be one of the most powerful experts in Celestial Pearl.

    The Bloodgod Mantra that Sanguis practiced did not rely on the concentration of elements in the environment and he had been making good progress on the Profound Continent. The Bloodgod Mantra was most suited for a Sanguis-bodied, someone like Sanguis, to practice. Having received proper guidance from Han Shuo after arriving on Elysium, it was reasonable that he could make such rapid progress.

    Bonds, who cultivated God ying Devil Path, could release and withdrew killing intent as he wished. He had in fact been arranged to work under Erebus. During the seven years, he had viciously murdered countless opponents. His killing intent grew ever more intense. It was so overbearing that once it was unleashed, his opponents of weaker minds would tremble in fear before the battle has even started!

    After bing a lowgod of darkness, Gilbert, whose body had been rebuilt and forged by Han Shuo like a demonic weapon, had unique divine energy of darkness and divine soulpared to an average god. Not only that his body was incredibly tough, but his divine energy was also astonishingly powerful. Although Gilbert had only reached early-stage lowgod realm, in the gymnasium, he was able to defeatte-stage lowgods like Stratholme and Ayermike.

    In Celestial Pearl, Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert, had vaguely surpassed their friends who cultivated solely in the energy found in this universe. They became a most unique and astonishingbo.

    Sanguis and Bonds cultivated in branches of demonic arts. As to Gilbert, before his body was rebuilt and had merely his soul, he was forced by Han Shuo to practice a demonic skill that strengthens his soul. Those were the reasons that the trio could grow so tremendously in such a short time.

    <i><i>What an assembly of talents!</i></i> thought Han Shuo.

 Chapter 748 - House of Han

    GDK 748: House of Han

    After seven years, all those who originated from Profound Continent breakthrough to lowgod realm. But as they differed in aptitude, some like Stratholme and Ayermike managed to reachte-stage lowgod realm while some like Candide and Emma, whose strengths were lower than Stratholme and Ayermike, to begin with, had merely reached early-stage lowgod realm.

    As Fanny, Phoebe, and thedies had all reached lowgodhood, honoring their agreement, they no longer refrain from sexual activities with Han Shuo. Han Shuo therefore enjoyed pleasurable days after returning from cultivation.

    After returning to Celestial Pearl, other than indulging in sexual pleasures, Han Shuo also made sure to find time to tutor Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert. Other than to guide them on their cultivation of demonic arts, he wanted to learn the precise level of their strengths.

    Han Shuo was rather clear about Sanguis and Bonds¡¯ conditions as they cultivated solely on demonic arts. But as for Gilbert, he was a special case as his body was refined the same way a demonic weapon was forged and his soul had been enhanced through demonic arts. Even till present, Gilbert had no stopped practicing that demonic skill which strengthens his soul. After he arrived on Elysium, he started to cultivate in the energy of darkness and had currently reached the realm of lowgod.

    Gilbert¡¯s situation was unlike Han Shuo¡¯s. Although Han Shuo cultivated in demonic arts as well as the energy of death and destruction, he had three separate bodies for each of the energies. Gilbert, however, had just one body. Both of those energies werebined in that one body of his. It caused his darkness divine energy to be extremely bizarre.

    After a moment of careful observation, Han Shuo discovered that within Gilbert¡¯s darkness divine energy, there was also a small amount of demonic yuan which Han Shuo ced in his demonic weapons. His divine soul and divine energy were also much stronger than those of a lowgod of darkness of the same ss. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t figure out what precisely caused it.

    Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert currently ranked the top three in Celestial Pearl in terms of strength. They were more powerful thante-stage lowgods. Based on the trend they had been progressing, making more breakthrough did not seem too far away.

    During the seven years, in the City of Shadows, Celestial Pearl Pharmacy had not just maintained their market dominance, they managed to upy an even bigger chunk of the market, raking in two million ck crystal coins for Han Shuo. The medicines that he personally refined had be an attraction for gods visiting the City.

    This was mostly thanks to Phoebe¡¯s promotion. Before Han Shuo left to refine the flying swords, Phoebe had asked and gotten a portion of the medicines Han Shuo personally refined. During the seven years, she would put a few of those medicines for sale every once in a while throughout all branches of Celestial Pearl. The sales would attract big crowds at their stores, thus increasing the profits of Celestial Pearl.

    It was worth mentioning that Phoebe¡¯s ability in growing a business was admirable. Under her management, the business of Celestial Pearl had been rising exponentially. The talented pharmacists who were well paid produced medicines that were far superior to those of an average pharmacy.

    The regr medicines produced by pharmacists of Celestial Pearl were superior to those made by an average pharmacy. Therefore, even though Han Shuo had not been producing medicines during those years, the sales of Celestial Pearl managed to quash those of other pharmacies.

    Then, on one of those days that things were going perfectly fine, Han Shuo was invited to the Sainte Residence by Andre.

    As soon as Han Shuo arrived at the Sainte Residence, Carmelita, who had been forced by Wace to cultivate during the recent times came to wee him. Immediately, Carmelita threw a punch at Han Shuo, saying, ¡°You rascal, where have you been fooling around? Seven years you¡¯ve been gone!¡±

    There were no longer any dark pigments on her skin and her appearance was no longer frightening, but merely very average-looking. For some reason, Han Shuo felt veryfortable and rxed. He found Carmelita delighting to be around with.

    ¡°I went for secluded cultivation, away from the city,¡± exined Han Shuo smilingly. He quickly followed up with a question, ¡°Right, what is Lord Andre looking me for?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s actually my father who is looking for you. I will only tell you that it will be good for you!¡± replied Carmelita. As she led Han Shuo into the residence, she would inquire Han Shuo on what he saw in the godhunter¡¯s valley. He was very interested in what happened in that operation.

    ¡°Aobashi and Erebus were there. You should have learned everything from them by now. Why are you still asking me about it?¡±

    ¡°The two wouldn¡¯t speak about it clearly and left out a lot of details, as though they are trying to hide something from me,¡± answered Carmelita in an annoyed voice.

    After giving it a quick thought, Han Shuo understood why both Aobashi and Erebus did not narrate their ounts clearly to Carmelita.

    The raid on the godhunter¡¯s base involved two overgods, with one of them being the Goddess of Destiny. Aobashi, Erebus, and Han Shuo had been warned by Wace and Andre not to let words spread outside their circle. As Carmelita was rather naive in thinking and straightforward in talking, they deemed her as one who couldn¡¯t hold secrets. Knowing that she would likely spill the information unintentionally, they narrated the story vaguely.

    Han Shuo had some idea of how things in the Sainte Family works. If Carmelita knew nothing about the two overgods even at this point, this meant that Wace and Andre did not want her to learn of it. Therefore, after quickly weighing in his mind, Han Shuo decided he will not reveal the sensitive information to her. He lied, ¡°I received injuries during the raid and my mind wasn¡¯t functioning well. I believe only Aobashi and Erebus knows about the details. So, sorry, but I can¡¯t help you with that!¡±

    ¡°So it turns out that you knew nothing either, how strange!¡± Carmelita groaned lightly before she pointed at a room and said, ¡°There, my father is inside. I won¡¯t be joining you!¡±

    It was a different room than the one Aobashi, Erebus, Han Shuo, and Wace had a discussion thest time. The hall had a solemn and grave atmosphere to it. The four walls were decorated with dark designs, the stone pirs had shimmering magical stones on their tops, and above their heads, an enormous, zed magical chandelier, illuminating the hall with glorious radiance.

    The hall had gathered all influential figures of the City of Shadows. They were seated based on their respective statuses.

    One of those seated near the center was the patriarch of the House of Kinson, Caspar. Around him was his wife, Beth, his daughter Jiya, and his sister, Cami. Cami was the Chief of Fourth Corps. Just like Erebus, she was a mid-stage highgod of darkness.

    Also seated were those from the House of Kisa: their patriarch Kinloch, Rugersey, the Chief of Sixth Corp, and several inner family members.

    From the House of Buller, their patriarch, Laurel, Chief of Seventh Corps, Bat¨²k, and Tuyas¡¯ heir, Tuxi.

    Patriarchs and members of lesser family ns were present as well. They were seated near the corners and edges of the hall. It was clear that they had lesser standing.

    After stepping into the hall and taking a nce, Han Shuo took no time to realize that this was a very important meeting. His mind was jolted and had no idea what he was summoned for.

    ¡°Bryan, over here!¡± Andre yelled and gestured from a distance as soon as he noticed Han Shuo standing at the entrance.

    Some in the hall who heard Andre¡¯s yell gathered their attention on Han Shuo. All those who had friendly rtions with Han Shuo smiled and nodded at him. Even the patriarchs from the three major family ns nodded at Han Shuo, acknowledging his presence.

    Those of the five major family ns of the City of Shadows, except for those of the House of Lavers, were present. There were around thirty people in the hall, various lesser family ns included. Everyone present was at least somewhat influential in the City of Shadows.

    Answering Andre¡¯s call, Han Shuo walked over to him nkly. However, after arriving, Han Shuo looked around and noticed that there wasn¡¯t a seat or a chair beside Andre. He was rather puzzled. Everyone there was sitting but only Han Shuo was standing. This made Han Shuo felt rather awkward.

    Most of those present had friendly rtions with Han Shuo. Those of major family ns had empty seats around them but not a single one of them invited Han Shuo to sit with them. The situation seemed unusually formal!

    ¡°Elder brother, should Celestial Pearl be given a ce?¡± asked Andre after turning his head to look at Wace, sitting on the most esteemed seat in the hall.

    Wace shot a nce at Han Shuo and nodded. In a deep voice, he said, ¡°The Celestial Pearl shall have a ce. Get him a chair!¡±

    Everyone in the hall reacted by raising their eyebrows. All the patriarchs of therge family ns looked at Han Shuo with astonishment. Those of lesser family ns even started to gossip, ¡°How is he even qualified to sit there?¡± ¡°Back then, the Godswamp Pharmacy didn¡¯t even have a chair in this hall. This youngster sure climbs to high ces fast!¡±

    ¡°Congrattions, Bryan!¡± said Rugersey in a big smile.

    ¡°Congrattions!¡± Jiya too said smilingly.

    Those of therge family ns and acquainted with Han Shuo congratted him one after another while those from lesser family ns wore envious faces while looking at Han Shuo with strange gazes.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before he finally realized what had just happened. He turned to Wace and bowed, saying, ¡°Thank you, City Lord!¡±

    <i><i>So every family n has seats exclusively for their own people in designated ces in the hall. No wonder Rugersey did not invite me to take the empty chair beside him!</i></i>

    Han Shuo finally understood what Wace meant when he said: ¡°the Celestial Pearl shall have a ce¡±. From that moment onwards, the Celestial Pearl was no longer a mere pharmacy store, but a family n in the City of Shadows. This meant that Han Shuo had finally climbed to the noble ss in the city!

    ¡°Bryan, what is your full name? We need to know that to formalize your family n,¡± Andre asked smilingly while a few divine guards arranged a seat for Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo thought for a little and answered, ¡°Bryan Han.¡±

    ¡°Han? That¡¯s a strange surname. Haha, but that¡¯s alright. I have known stranger surnames,¡± Andre smiled and said, ¡°Bryan, from today onwards, Celestial Pearl Pharmacy will be the property of the House of Han. You can now possess divine guards under your family n as well as your own emblem!¡±

    ¡°Many thanks!¡± Han Shuo again expressed his gratitude. He had finally realized one of the many goals he wished to aplish on Elysium. From that moment onwards, those who came from the Profound Continent will be members of his House of Han.

    ¡°Take your seat,¡± gestured Wace.

    After Han Shuo took his seat, Wace began in a deep voice, ¡°The patriarch of the House of Lavers, Felder, has left the City of Shadows. All his family n members had left the City before him. From today onwards, the House of Lavers shall cease to exist in this City. Although they have left, their properties and estates remain. This includes several shops, residences, as well as several forts and satellite cities previously granted upon them.

    ¡°These resources belong to the City of Shadows. Now that the House of Lavers has gone, someone will have to take their ce in managing the estates, especially so with the forts and satellite cities which must have a ruler at all times. My House of Sainte has limited manpower and has always maintained that resources in the City should be dispersed among all family ns. The reason I have invited all of you here is to discuss how to allocate these assets among yourselves.¡±

    Han Shuo had learned about Felder¡¯s departure from the City of Shadows soon after he returned from refining the demonic weapon. There was no denying that Felder had made at least some contribution to the City of Shadows. However, because of Avery¡¯s outrageous acts, Felder¡¯s House of Lavers lost the trust of the House of Sainte. Wace, as an act of mercy, did nothing as Felder and his family n withdrew from the City of Shadows.

    The House of Lavers used to be one of the five major family ns of the City. Although there were not as powerful as the House of Sainte, the resources and assets they possessed were significant. After Felder left, those satellite cities, forts, estates, and shops they owned were naturally reimed by Wace. All those assets cannot be left unmanaged. Therefore, for the stability of the City, Wace summoned all the family ns in the city to distribute it among them.

    ¡°We shall respect all decisions made by the City Lord!¡± eximed those from lesser family ns. The patriarchs of the three major family n nodded silently.

    In the City of Shadows, the House of Sainte is king. It was clear to everyone present that Wace came with a n and naturally, no one will say anything that would displease the City Lord.

    Wace nodded and said, ¡°Well then,¡± turned to Andre and instructed, ¡°You do the announcement.¡±

    Andre stood up from his seat and dered smilingly, ¡°Of the eighteen stores previously owned by the House of Lavers, the Houses of Kinson, Kisa, and Buller will take six stores, each. In addition, other than Fort Lasberg, the three family ns will each get one satellite city or fort.¡± Following that, Andre pointed at a few lesser family ns. Those mentioned became excited while those who were not sighed.

    ¡°Fort Lasberg and the Lavers Residence in the City will be given to the House of Han,¡± announced Andre.

    Han Shuo was overjoyed at the unexpected good news but those from lesser family n shouted to protest this decision.

    This was because both Fort Lasberg and the Lavers Residence were big fortunes!

    It wasn¡¯t surprising that those people were unhappy about the big assets being handed to Han Shuo¡¯s family n that was just formed. Although those patriarchs of the three major family ns were rather shocked, they did not say a thing because they viewed the empty post of the Chief of Fifth Corps as an even bigger, more lucrative asset!

 Chapter 749 - Fight for power

    GDK 749: Fight for power

    Fort Lasberg was the biggest fort the House of Lavers previously controlled. It was one-seventh the size of the City of Shadows. The mountains surrounding the fort were abundant in natural resources with several small-scale energy ore mines located there. It was the biggest foothold the House of Lavers possessed outside the City of Shadows.

    Clearly, this Fort Lasberg was much more preciouspared to the territories Andre handed to the lesser family ns. Other than being rather far from the City of Shadows, there really was no cons about the Fort. It was no wonder that those patriarchs of lesser family ns would disagree with the decision that Fort Lasberg be handed to Han Shuo.

    As to the Lavers residence in the City of Shadows, it was the first ce Han Shuo visited when he came to the City. Every building there was tall and reaches through the clouds. It upied a massive area and had all the facilities one can think of. Energy towers and boundaries covered the whole area. It even housed more than a few gymnasiums.

    In the City of Shadows where every inch ofnd costs an absurd amount of ck crystal coins, a residence of that size would worth an even more absurd amount of crystal coins. Even the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy where Han Shuo currently resides cannot to the residence in terms of size. Normally speaking, without paying at least a few million ck crystal coins, it was impossible to acquire the residence.

    Fort Lasberg and that residence in the City were the two biggest assets the House of Lavers had left behind. Now that those two juiciest assets were handed to the House of Han for nothing, it would be a wonder if the patriarchs said nothing of it!

    Han Shuo too did not expect that Andre and Wace would be so generous towards him, showering him with great fortunes all so suddenly. He couldn¡¯t quite understand why they would hand him the Fort Lasberg and the former Lavers Residence.

    Andre and Wace did nothing as the patriarchs of the lesser family ns quarreled. But after a while, seeing that they showed no sign of settling down, Wace lightly cleared his throat and in his deep voice, said, ¡°Bryan had made a great contribution to the City of Shadows by locating the biggest godhunter¡¯s base we have ever known, allowing us to deal the godhunters a severe blow. Mirage City and Hushveil City know of this. Besides, the House of Han has just started out. It is not unreasonable to give them a head start.¡±

    Now that Wace has voiced his opinion, no matter how unwilling they were, those patriarchs of lesser family ns could do nothing but shut up. Their gazes towards Han Shuo were filled with jealousy.

    ¡°Don¡¯t be disgruntled, the House of Han will not take the residence and Fort Lasberg for nothing,¡± Andre said to the crowd before turning to Han Shuo and smilingly demanded, ¡°Bryan, you shall pay one million ck crystal coins for those assets!¡±

    ¡°No problem!¡± Han Shuo agreed straightforwardly in a big bright smile. A mere one million ck crystal coins will never be enough to purchase both Fort Lasberg and the grand residence. This was especially the case for Fort Lasberg, which was basically a city several times the size of Profound Continent. To Han Shuo, the value of the Fort was simply immeasurable.

    In addition, with the cash cow that was Celestial Pearl, Han Shuo was in nock of crystal coins. Candide, Emily, Phoebe, Ayermike Cotton, and the others, were all capable of managing and running a city. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t even start to imagine just how great of a benefit Fort Lasberg would bring him under their management.

    ¡°I will pay five million ck crystal coins if the Fort and residence are given to me!¡± a patriarch of a lesser family n uttered resentfully.

    ¡°The debate is over and the case settled. I will hear no more of it!¡± Wace creased his brows and dered in amanding voice. All those patriarchs shut their mouths tight.

    ¡°Ahem,¡± Andre lightly cleared his throat to get everyone¡¯s attention. He put on a faint smile and said, ¡°Alright, now let¡¯s move on to the next issue. My elder brother wants the vacant post of the Chief of Fifth Corps filled. All of you may nominate capable candidates for my elder brother to consider.¡±

    As soon as Andre uttered those words, the patriarchs of the three major family ns who had revealed not a trace of emotion during all these while, suddenly had bright lights glowing from their eyes. They sat upright and still, appearing to take it very seriously.

    This is because for the three, being a Chief of Divine Guards meant power. Compared to those stores, houses, and forts which could make them crystal coins, they attach greater importance to the position which could bring them privileges and military power. Their family nscked neither forts nor shop lots. All those estates Andre bestowed upon them were mere specks of gold dust to their crates of treasures.

    To be one of the Chief of Divine Guards of the City of Shadows meant they gain the rights to build and own an elite army of divine guards. To them, being inmand of divine guards meant having true power.

    Although allrge family ns in the City of Shadows had rights to recruit divine guards of their own, they were restricted to a small number. The House of Sainte had enforced this stringent quota lest that other family ns would exceed them in the quality and quantity of divine guards possessed.

    On Elysium, wealth, identity, and status were won through the strength of one¡¯s family n. The most direct measurement of a family n¡¯s strength was in their military might ¨C the quantity and quality of their divine guards. A family n with two Chiefs of Divine Guards would an untouchable powerhouse. Therefore, as soon as the patriarchs of the three major family ns heard Andre uttered ¡®Chief of Fifth Corps¡¯, their eyes lit up with desire and greed.

    The eyes of the patriarchs of lesser family ns too were zing brightly. Obviously, they too understood that with sufficient military power, obtaining all those shops and houses would just be a matter of time. The only thing that distinguished the House of Sainte, House of Kinson, House of Lavers, House of Kisa, and House of Buller from all those lesser family ns were that the formers were in control of the City¡¯s military agencies.

    The House of Sainte had managed to remain so far ahead of all other family ns because, other than the fact that divine guards in their family n were powerful, the top three Chiefs of Divine Guards were under the House of Sainte!

    To the three major family ns, the position as the Chief of Fifth Corps meant a leap forward, bing the most powerful family n second only to the House of Sainte. To the lesser family ns, the position meant they could advance to be one of the top family ns in the City!

    The crowd who all coveted for the post immediately turned excited after hearing that Wace wanted someone to fill the seat.

    ¡°Lord Andre, if I remember correctly, the condition named for the position is to exchange it with Avery¡¯s head, right?¡± a patriarch of a lesser family n asked puzzlingly.

    ¡°Avery has disappeared for too long. The Fifth Corps cannot be left unmanaged forever and someone will have to take his ce, at least until someone takes his head, ¡° answered Andre.

    These people had been drooling for Avery¡¯s position for a long time. They began whispering to one another¡¯s ear, discussing the vacant post. Even the patriarchs of the three major family ns couldn¡¯t maintain their poker faces and began whispering with their n members excitedly.

    Wace cleared his throat and announced in a deep voice, ¡°One must bear great responsibilities to be the Chief of Fifth Corps. The duty requires great strength and capacity. Fellow lords, name your candidates.¡±

    As soon as Wace finished those words, those in the crowd began naming trucks of people. It was like a flood gate had been opened.

    After a moment of observation, Han Shuo noticed that those people would only nominate members of their family n. They showed great interest and determination to win the nomination.

    The hall turned boisterous with various characters being rmended. No party would yield an inch and therefore the situation turned into a stalemate.

    Seeing that the discussion noise only grew louder and the list of candidates named grew overly long, Wace revealed impatience on his face and uttered in a deep voice, ¡°The Chief of Fifth Corps is a great duty. The candidates named must at least be a highgod!¡±

    Those words of Wace¡¯s meant that several lesser family ns were eliminated from the race. Most of them had rmended midgods as it was very rare to have highgods in small family ns, although most of their patriarchs were highgods. Those of lesser family ns began nominating their respective patriarchs for the position.

    Han Shuo quickly counted and learned that there were nine candidates named in total.

    ¡°I think Bryan could do the job well. He had demonstrated his capability and strength in raiding the godhunters thest time. He is qualified to be a candidate!¡± Andre name Han Shuo as a candidate the instance the congregation paused making noises.

    The patriarchs of the three major family ns raised an eyebrow and their eyes started to flicker while the patriarchs of the lesser family ns immediately turned silent. The hall turned noiseless in all of a sudden.

    <i><i>Andre is the second-inmand in the House of Sainte. If he said so, then doesn¡¯t that mean the House of Sainte is standing behind Bryan? Could this also be the wishes of Wace?</i></i> The crowd thought of this possibility and therefore turned silent.

    Han Shuo had long knew that Andre and Wace had the intention of handing him the Fifth Corps. However, he pretended to be astonished by Andre¡¯s words and said modestly, ¡°You¡¯re ttering me, Lord Andre!¡± He disyed neither inclination nor disinclination for the position.

    ¡°Bryan does seem suitable,¡± Wace suddenly said, breaking the long silence.

    The patriarchs of the lesser family ns felt aches at their hearts when they heard those words from Wace. However, they did not reveal their feelings on their faces and did not voice their opinion.

    Although the patriarchs of the three major family ns were not close to Han Shuo, some members of their family ns were because of his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. If it were any other ordinary posts, the three might just go with the flow and let Han Shuo have it. However, the Chief of Fifth Corps was no ordinary post. Even if they had good rtions with Celestial Pearl, there was no way they would readily yield.

    The patriarchs of the three family ns remained silent but their eyes flickered indecisively. Although they did not utter a word, they had clearly shown their disagreement.

    Wace clearly took heed to the three major patriarchs. Seeing that they wouldn¡¯t utter a word, he took the initiative to ask for their opinion, ¡°What do you think about Bryan?¡±

    The three exchanged nces. After a moment of hesitation, Kinloch of the House of Kisa answered, ¡°Bryan is rather young and isn¡¯t too familiar with the situation around the City of Shadows. He has just formed a family n and hasn¡¯t demonstrated his capability for certain. Isn¡¯t taking over the Fifth Corps too big of a leap?¡±

    After Kinloch, the other two patriarchs nodded, saying that Bryan was great but stillcked experience. There was no way that the three would easily give up a post as significant as this without a fight.

    ¡°Ah, I see,¡± muttered Wace. He then turned to the patriarchs of lesser family ns and asked, ¡°What do you think?¡±

    Naturally, they all agreed with Kinloch¡¯s view.

    Seeing that the majority in the room was opposed to the idea, Wace couldn¡¯t inly favor Han Shuo¡¯s appointment. He kept silent for a moment before he suddenly proposed, ¡°Alright, how about this, let¡¯s forget the thing about Avery. There is this thorny problem currently in my hand. I have received intel that an enormous energy crystal deposit was discovered near Fort Lasberg. The deposit isn¡¯t in the border of any city and various forces are gathering there. I too have sent some men but have received no news of them even till now, which meant they likely have perished. Whoever could locate the energy crystal deposit, establish our City¡¯s presence, and take control of the deposit for our City, will be the new Chief of Fifth Corps. Fair enough?¡±

    None of the crowd disagreed. The patriarchs of the three major family ns were the firsts to nod their heads.

    Their family ns had stood proud in the City of Shadows for countless years and held an advantage over other family ns in various aspects. This challenge was apetition of resources. They obviously considered themselves to hold an enormous advantage and therefore immediately agreed to the challenge. Those of lesser family ns, seeing that the three had agreed, knew that the matter was basically decided and their opposition would be futile. Therefore, they too nodded and agreed to it.

    ¡°Very well. Then it is decided!¡± dered Wace. ¡°I will send men to observe. I hope that you will not utilize the manpower of your family n, especially you major ones. Everypetitor may bring a maximum of ten men with them. And other than thepetitor himself, there cannot be any highgod in the party. Anyone who broke those rules will be disqualified!¡±

    The three patriarchs ttened their lips after hearing those conditions listed by Wace, but they did not speak a word. They thought that divine guards of their own family ns were the real elites. Even though they were limited to bringing a force of merely ten people, they could utilize the tremendous power of their family ns to scout out ahead before departure.

    ¡°One final reminder, killing those on our side is strictly prohibited. Should you vite this rule, you know the consequences!¡± Wace then gestured and announced, ¡°That¡¯s all for today. You are all dismissed!¡±

    The crowd stood up from their seats, saluted Wace and Andre and left the hall.

    Just as Han Shuo was getting ready to leave, Andre lightly cleared his throat and said, ¡°Bryan, we need to discuss about the payment of a million ck crystal coins!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded smilingly. He knew Andre would have something for him.

    Those patriarchs who were leaving knew that Han Shuo had deep rtions with the House of Sainte. They silently cursed and grumbled but no one dared to say a thing.

    Soon enough, the hall was evacuated. Wace got up, nodded at Han Shuo, and said in a faint smile, ¡°Although I have a mind to let you take the Fifth Corps, the resistance is just too great. Therefore, in the end, getting the position stilles down to your own capability!¡± after taking a short pause, Wace went over and patted on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulder in a very friendly manner. He continued, ¡°Work hard, the City of Shadows will reward you well!¡± Wace then nodded at Andre and left.

    After Wace was gone, Andre put on a faint smile and said, ¡°My elder brother believes that only those who survived cruelpetition should rise to top positions. Your performancest time at the raid on godhunters have earned you Fort Lasberg and the Lavers Residence. As to whether or not you could take the Fifth Corps, it will be your effort and capability that decides!¡±

    ¡°Lord Andre, you did not ask me to stay just to tell me these, right?¡± Han Shuo said smilingly.

    ¡°Haha, correct, indeed!¡± Andreughed out loud before tipping Han Shuo off, ¡°Erebus is currently at Fort Lasberg. I have asked him to pay attention to the matter long ago. Go there and have a chat with Erebus. I believe he will tell you thetest information he gathered!¡±

    Nothing is ever truly fair in the world. Andre was clearly helping Han Shuo, giving him an unfair advantage by telling him a lead to follow. Given the fact that Han Shuo had previously saved Erebus¡¯ life, he would definitely share all the information he gathered with Han Shuo without the slightest hesitation. If Han Shuo asked, he might even lend Han Shuo his elite troops at the Third Corps.

    ¡°I knew Lord Andre would have gifts for me in asking me to stay!¡± Han Shuo saidughingly.

    ¡°Alright. We House of Sainte is lucky that you havee to the City of Shadows. With the Goddess of Destiny having such a great impression of you, perhaps someday in the future, our House of Sainte would benefit from being associated with you!¡± said Andre jokingly. He then patted on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulder and said in a friendly manner, ¡°You know, that one million ck crystal coins are to stuff the mouths of some in my Sainte Family. I believe Phoebe can take care of it for you,¡± after a short pause, Andre praised, ¡°Youngster, you really are a lucky one. Your Phoebe is really good at running a business. I believe that Fort Lasberg will do fine under your family n¡¯s management!¡±

    ¡°Okay, I know what to do next!¡± Han Shuo replied smilingly and left the Sainte Residence.

    For all those years, Phoebe had always delivered Carmelita¡¯s share of the Celestial Pearl¡¯s profits on time. As Celestial Pearl grew more and more prosperous with each passing day under her management, Carmelita¡¯s dividend grew more and more. This made the House of Sainte very pleased. They even began to admire Han Shuo for his ability in recognizing talents.

    Upon returning to Celestial Pearl, Han Shuo gathered everyone and shared the great news with them.

    They were all incredibly excited to learn that the House of Han was officially formed in the City of Shadows. Phoebe, Emily, Fanny, Lisa, Jasper, and a long list ofdies were eager to move into the luxurious residentialplex.

    ¡°Go ahead,¡± Han Shuo delegated the relocation task to them. He then instructed Phoebe, ¡°Withdraw one million ck crystal coins and deliver them to the House of Sainte.¡± Then, he pointed at Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert, and said, ¡°Three of you,e with me!¡±

 Chapter 750 - Donâ€™t make it too bloody

    GDK 750: Don¡¯t make it too bloody

    Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert were currently the strongest in Celestial Pearl after Han Shuo. Of the three, Bonds had been working in the Third Cords and were therefore the most experienced. Although Sanguis was the strongest among the three, hecked real-life experiences and need to be further tempered. Gilbert and Han Shuo couldmunicate via telepathy, which could be useful in certain situations.

    Han Shuo decided that rather than bringing a ton of people for the mission, he would just take the very best few with him.

    Han Shuo had delegated all other tasks to his family n members. He believed that the Celestial Pearl will do just fine while he was away and that they would move into the former Lavers Residence soon.

    Fort Lasberg was located near the edge of the City¡¯s influence and rather close to Hushveil City and Darksoul City. If one were to head north from Fort Lasberg, after crossing vast oceans and expansive mountain ranges, one would set foot into the Destruction Dominion.

    Of the numerous forts under the City¡¯s influence, Fort Lasberg was the biggest in size and had some of the most abundant natural resources in the surrounding. Other than being a little far from the City, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t find any ws toin about.

    After half-a-month, Han Shuo, Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert arrived at Fort Lasberg. As the official documents had yet been issued, Fort Lasberg was not yet the House of Han¡¯s. Erebus¡¯ men were in charge of running the fort for the time being.

    Han Shuo did not immediately look for Erebus after arriving. Instead, he went strolling around the Fort with his three apprentices. Fort Lasberg currently housed approximately five thousand in poption, with most of them being basegods. Lowgods and midgods were also present but highgods were rarely seen.

    The Elysium was vast andrge number of gods live there and yet, they lose to mortals when ites to poption size and density. Although Fort Lasberg wasrger than the territories of Lancelot Empire, it housed merely around five thousand godspared to at least several tens of millions of mortals living on Profound Continent.

    The situation of most cities on Elysium were simr to that of Fort Lasberg. They never live as densely as the mortals on low-level material nes. Even the City of Shadows housed just tens of thousands of people. It was said that the most popted city on Elysium had two to three hundred thousand gods, a number that pales inparison to cities of mortals.

    After strolling around Fort Lasberg and learning its condition, Han Shuo and his apprentices finally headed to Erebus¡¯ temporary residence at the center of the Fort.

    The residence, as with the Fort, originally belonged to the House of Lavers. The buildings were tall and massive. It was many hectares in size and upied morend than the Lavers Residence in the City as thend price here was cheaper, not to mention the lower poption.

    Although this residence of the Lavers¡¯ upied arger tract ofnd than that in the City, it was far behind in terms of facilities and decorations. There were no energy towers and boundary towers covering every space, nor were there sophisticated boundaries that protects the gymnasiums from intense bursts of energy. The interior of the buildings were not sumptuously decorated but rather minimalistic in style.

    Erebus was abnormally delighted by Han Shuo¡¯s arrival. He led the four into the biggest room of the residence before he said smilingly, ¡°The City Lord have bestowed Fort Lasberg to your House of Han. You, Bryan, is the real host and master of this residence. I¡¯m just a visitor who is staying here for a few days.¡±

    ¡°My House of Han have yet to receive the official documents. Until then, Fort Lasberg is under yourmand!¡± replied Han Shuo smilingly.

    ¡°Bonds, now that Bryan has returned, are you really going to leave the Third Corps?¡± Erebus asked after turning to Bonds smilingly.

    Before Han Shuo left to refine his demonic weapon, he had arranged Bonds to work under Erebus. Unlike Ayermike Cotton and Stratholme the old monster, Bonds¡¯ strength would improve the more he kills. Butchering a god would cause his killing intent to condense into substance, forming an energy simr to demonic yuan and divine energy, allowing his strength to soar.

    Bonds was an infamous assassin back on the Profound Continent he originated. He was a professional in the art of murdering and had assisted Erebus in eliminating countless enemies during his service in the Third Corps. He was such a good helper that even Erebus felt somewhat reluctant about Bonds leaving the Third Corps.

    Bonds wore an emotionless expression and nodded. He said, ¡°It is my Senior who taught me every skill I know and asked me to work at Third Corps. Now that he has returned, I must leave the Third Corps and go back to him.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, why are you always so lucky?!¡± Erebus said enviously.

    ¡°You know, I have the Goddess of Destiny¡¯s blessing!¡± Legend has it that the Goddess of Destiny controls the fate of others. From Aobashi and Erebus¡¯ ount, Han Shuo had certainly won the favor of the Goddess. Therefore, these words Han Shuo said was half joking and half true.

    ¡°Alright, let¡¯s get to business. I know your objective ining here as Lord Andre has previously told me a thing or two. I have been paying attention to a mountain rtively far from Fort Lasberg and my men had went to scout it. I did get some useful information from it,¡± Erebus¡¯ face turned solemn and said in a deep voice, ¡°The mountain doesn¡¯t belong to any city. It is between Hushveil City and Darksoul City. The incident began when a few divine guards of our City hearsay that an enormous energy crystal deposit was discovered in that area. Andre then sent his men to scout out for information, but they have not returned any news even till now. They have probably met their demises.

    ¡°It was then that Andre informed me about it. As I happen to be around the area, I dispatched a small squadron for scouting. Based on the news that came back, an enormous energy crystal deposit is definitely present!¡±

    ¡°Other than that, did you find any useful information?¡± Han Shuo smiled mischievously as he said, ¡°You should know the City Lord¡¯s intention. I must take over the crystal deposit in order to take the Fifth Corps. The three major family ns must have started exercising their power and resources, which surpasses mine. If your don¡¯t have sufficient information for me, I doubt I could find it before they do!¡±

    ¡°I have confirmed the exact location. Other than forces from our City of Shadows, there are divine guards from Hushveil City and Darksoul City. I¡¯m sure that by then, conflicts are unavoidable. Be mentally prepared!¡± Erebus thought for a moment and continued, ¡°You shall learn the details of the situation from Anito. Just get in touch with him when you are there.¡±

    ¡°How do I contact him?¡± asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°That, you don¡¯t have to worry, Bonds should know how!¡± Erebus put on a smile and said, ¡°Although you too have worked at our Third Corps, you haven¡¯t spent much time with us. Bonds, however, have learned our ins and outs. He did actualbor here, rather than just tagging along for the credits like a certain rascal!¡±

    Han Shuo turned to Bonds and saw that he nodded. Bonds indeed knew how Third Corps¡¯ agentsmunicate on the field.

    ¡°Well then, I shall get moving. Hopefully I¡¯ll be the first to be there!¡± after obtaining useful information from Erebus, Han Shuo decided not to stay longer than necessary and quickly depart for his destination.

    Erebus knew that the sooner Han Shuo get there, the better. Therefore he did not ask him to stay and said smilingly, ¡°Good luck on the journey. Hope you wille back with good news!¡±

    ¡°The Fifth Corps will be mine when I return!¡± said Han Shuoughingly. His rtionship with Erebus was deep and therefore he wasn¡¯t scrupulous in speech. After mastering the Avicii Godying Sword Formation with his seventeen flying swords, Han Shuo had sufficient confidence in his strength. Han Shuo believed that he could take over the crystal deposit sessfully if they do not run into any mishap.

    ¡°Master, what are we going to do?¡± Gilbert asked after they left Fort Lasberg with Han Shuo.

    ¡°That depends on the situation there, but our end goal is to take over the crystal deposit. Energy crystals are some good stuff. They are universally in demand in very city with gods!¡± replied Han Shuo.

    After travelling around Fort Lasberg, Han Shuo discovered that although the Fort was great at producing all kinds of ores, there were plenty of room to improve in terms of defenses. He found that the number of energy towers and boundary towers avable to be deficient. In order to upgrade the defenses, Han Shuo would need arge amount of energy crystals. upying this enormous energy crystal deposit that had yet to be imed by anyone will be useful to serve the purpose.

    The party of four travelled for five days and in the evening, arrived at the mountain Erebus pointed them. Immediately, Han Shuo deployed his demon generals. He noticed that there were many gods in the mountain.

    Bonds discovered several unique symbols on a few big trees soon after arrival. He thought about it for a moment before going to Han Shuo and said respectfully, ¡°Senior,e with me!¡±

    Han Shuo knew that Bonds had discovered Anito¡¯s message and followed Bonds along with Sanguis and Gilbert.

    In one of the caves in the mountain, Han Shuo saw Anito. A small squadron of divine guards was usually ten men strong. However, Han Shuo saw just three people beside Anito who looked dispirited. His clothing was dirty and torn. There was also some blood stains on his chest. They seemed to have suffered great losses.

    Sadness disappeared from Anito¡¯s face when Bonds came into his view. Then, when he saw that Han Shuo too hade, his face lit up with delight. He even eximed, ¡°Lord Bryan hase!¡±

    The three divine guards beside Anito knew Han Shuo¡¯s name. Dispiritment lifted from their hearts and dness appeared on their faces.

    ¡°Anito, what happened? You seemed to have been severely injured!¡± Han Shuo asked puzzlingly with his brows bunched.

    ¡°It¡¯s those from Hushveil City and Darksoul City. Six of ourrades were killed!¡± Anito said angrily.

    ¡°The most abominable of them is that guy called Eugene, who partnered with our City to raid the godhunters. Unexpectedly, he wouldy such vicious blows against us just to get his hands on the deposit!¡± a divine guard named Deco said furiously. Han Shuo had seen him around Erebus when they went to assault the godhunter¡¯s base.

    ¡°Eugene?¡± Han Shuo was stunned for a moment but a cold grin soon appeared on his face. ¡°How unexpected, an acquaintance!¡± Eugene had been mocking and ridiculing Han Shuo throughout the raid of godhunters. He was prejudiced against Han Shuo because of his close friendship with the owner of Celestial Pearl, Hassling. Han Shuo did not expect that he wouldy his deadly hand on divine guards from the City of Shadows.

    City of Gorging Clouds, Darkwater City, Dark Stone City, Mirage City, Darksoul City, City of Shadows, and Hushveil City were the seven major cities of the Darkness Dominion, ranked from the most powerful to the weakest.

    Although all seven cities served the Overgod of Darkness, they were independent from one another. There existedpetition and minor frictions with each other. Although there had never been any all-out war between the cities, minor shes had never ceased between them.

    The seven cities bordered each other and therefore it wasmon that some conflicts would arise in territorial ims. It wasmon for a few divine guards to perish. The seven City Lords were all fine with such minor conflicts and insignificant casualties. After all, the shes between smaller family ns in opposing cities were much worse, where massacre of an entire family n was often the oue.

    All three Overgods of the Death, Darkness, and Destruction Dominions considered benignpetitions as helpful in promoting their servant¡¯s fighting power. As long as the conflicts doesn¡¯t jeopardize the stability of their Dominions, they would just ignore them and let them be. It was only when major conflicts that could severely impact the overall strength of the Dominion arises that the Overgod would step in.

    Conflicts due to ims of natural resources weremon urrences in the Darkness Dominion. Wace who had dispatched Han Shuo for the task wouldn¡¯t care less what Han Shuo did. All he cared was that in the end, Han Shuo wields control over the deposit.

    ¡°Tell me the whole story,¡± asked Han Shuo in a deep voice.

    ¡°Eugene and his divine guards are also here. There are many deposits on this mountain. We imed a rtively big deposit in the name of Lord Erebus. But before we could extract the ores, Eugene came and asserted that they had discovered the deposit first, demanding that we leave. When we wouldn¡¯t, they attacked us. We lost three of ourrades to them!¡± Anito said angrily.

    ¡°Eugene must still be holding grudges at Erebus for being impolite to him and therefore took advantage of the situation to vent it on us!¡± remarked Deco. He had seen the friction between Erebus and Eugene during the raid on godhunters. As Aobashi and Blightsoar were there, Eugene had no choice but to hold grudges in silence. He dared not to sh against Erebus.

    But the situation now was different. As Wace made the task of upying the deposit as apetition to decide the new Chief of Fifth Corps, Erebus did note over in person. With Erebus absent, Eugene had no qualms about attacking Erebus¡¯ divine guards.

    ¡°Which deposit is Eugene at? Show us the way!¡± Han Shuo said calmly after learning the whole story.

    ¡°Lord Bryan, Eugene have brought around fifty divine guards with him. Isn¡¯t our forces a little too small?¡± replied the startled Anito, ¡°I have reported the situation to Lord Erebus. We were instructed not to do anything rashly and to wait until otherpetitors from our City arrives before attacking Eugene.¡±

    ¡°Nope, just the few of us is enough,¡± Han Shuo said proudly. If he was to wait for otherpetitors to join him, even if they then managed to take down the deposit, disputes would arise when it came time to divide the spoils. It was in Han Shuo¡¯s best interest not to let any of hispetitorsy any im on the deposit.

    ¡°What are you being so wordy about? Just do whatever my master asked and cut the crap, ¡° yelled Gilbert bluntly.

    ¡°Anito, lead the way!¡± said Bonds in a menacing voice. He was giving off a murderous air!

    After having worked in the Third Corps for seven years, Bonds had developed friendships with many of hisrades. Eugene¡¯s deeds of killing his formerrades had enraged him. Bonds had killed many divine guards from other cities and possessed extremely intense killing intent. After practicing demonic arts, he grew more and more murderous and bloodthirsty. Other than Han Shuo, absolutely no one could keep him in control!

    Anito was well acquainted with Bonds and knew that this old fellow is cold-blooded, bloodthirsty madman. He was somewhat terrified at Bonds and replied in a trembling voice, ¡°Alright then. But you need to be careful. Eugene, our opponent, is a highgod!¡±

    ¡°Eugene is nothing against my master,¡± remarked Sanguis coldly.

    Sanguis, like Han Shuo¡¯s apprentices and women, held blind faith towards Han Shuo. They believed that there is nothing he cannot do. Although Sanguis had never met or know Eugene, he was confident that Eugene would lose against Han Shuo!

    Bonds and Gilbert both nodded their heads at Sanguis¡¯ remark, agreeing with his words.

    ¡°Well then,e with me!¡± said Anito. For whatever reason, when Sanguis shot a re at him, Anito felt an even greater pressure than from Bonds. In his eyes, Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert were all ferocious, ruthless characters. As Anito had never seen the fierce side of Han Shuo, he couldn¡¯t understand how Han Shuo, someone who always wear a smile and polite toward others, could keep the three monsters in check.

    Soon enough, with Anito leading, the party arrived at an enormous cave.

    ¡°Eh?¡± a divine guard who worked under Eugene guarding the cave entrance smiled sinisterly and asked, ¡°You still have the guts toe back? Do you think that Lord Eugene was too merciful in not killing all of you thest time?¡±

    ¡°Haha, they havee back to die!¡± another divine guard saidughingly. They obviously did not take any of thoseers as a threat.

    Anito turned to look at Han Shuo as though pleading for help as he said, ¡°Lord Bryan?¡±

    ¡°Oh no, you have brought in backup. Haha!¡± the divine guard eximed in a ridiculing manner as though he had not noticed Han Shuo until Anito spoke.

    ¡°Senior, shall I?¡± had it been before, Bonds would had charged ahead long ago. But now that Han Shuo was with him, he will ask Han Shuo for instructions. He dare being disrespectful to Erebus and even Wace the City Lord. However, he will never be rude towards Han Shuo or go against his wishes as he knew that everything he had was bestowed upon him by Han Shuo!

    Han Shuo still wore a warm and calm smile on his face as he nodded at Bonds. He said, ¡°Go ahead, but don¡¯t make it too bloody!¡±

 Chapter 751 - You are no match against us

    GDK 751: You are no match against us

    Bonds had been waiting for those words!

    As soon as Han Shuo¡¯s voice fell, Bonds charged forward murderously. Killing intent spread around his body before condensing into substances and shot towards the two divine guards standing at the cave entrance.

    The two who intend to further mock Anito and his teammates were dumbstruck. Bonds¡¯ killing intent was so terrifying that they found it difficult to breathe. Even the divine energy in their bodies was affected; they were unable to raise more than half their usual strengths.

    <i><i>Shiiiiing!</i></i> A slender and fine sword-awl shed but the two divine guards remained frozen in their terrified postures. They were still staring foolishly at Han Shuo and his party.

    But a few seconds after, thuds were heard. Their cleanly cut chunks of flesh slowly slid apart before falling on to the ground. The nose-assailing scent of blood started spreading in every direction. Their flesh, intestines, and organs decorated the floor as their blood crept everywhere. It was an inhuman scene.

    Bonds, as he looked at the severed bodies, put on a faint smile of satisfaction. It was as though he very much enjoyed murdering and the bloody scene.

    As Bonds cultivated in God ying Devil Path, the further he advanced into the demonic art, the more extreme he would be. He would gain a perverted obsession with killing people. Once he sprung into action, he cannot stop until someone dies to his hand, usually in a gory manner. It was for this reason that Han Shuo asked him ¡®not to make it too bloody¡¯.

    Anito, Deco, and two other divine guards of the Third Corps felt chills up their spines when they saw that Bonds, who usually do not disy any emotion, put on a satisfied smile when he stood in the pool of minced meat. They thought, <i><i>Lunatic, truly a lunatic! I must not offend this guy by all means!</i></i>

    Han Shuo wrinkled his brows and asked, ¡°Didn¡¯t I ask you not to make it too bloody?¡±

    The smile on Bonds¡¯ face turned bitter. He bowed at Han Shuo and exined, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, Senior, but I have tried my best!¡±

    Han Shuo waved his hand and took a few steps backward. He said, ¡°Nevermind. We will just wait for them toe out.¡±

    Given how intense the reeking of blood was at the cave entrance, those inside the cave will surely be alerted by the scent. Han Shuo nned on drawing the battlefield outside the cave as it was rather tight in the cave and therefore less suitable for fierce fights.

    The scent of blood wafted through the air. Soon enough, a few divine guards of Eugene came to scout the situation. They nearly puked when they saw the bloody scene painted using the intestines of theirrades. Upon seeing Anito and the gang who were standing outside, they shouted loudly to alert the others.

    The tips of Bonds¡¯ lips curled to make a sinister, murderous grin. He raised the longsword in his hand, ready to take more lives.

    ¡°Wait! Wait until they are all here,¡± instructed Han Shuo.

    ¡°Yes, Senior!¡± replied Bonds respectfully. He stood motionless but stared at those divine guards with ferocious eyes. He looked like a beast, wanting to kill them and eat their eyes for jujubes.

    More and more divine guards rushed out from the cave. They could tell from the blood-stained armors that those deceased were their teammates.

    Those people did not seem well after witnessing the inhuman scene at the cave entrance. A few of the divine guards turned pale and nearly puked.

    The most important character usually enters the scenest. After all his divine guards had stepped out of the cave, Eugene of Hushveil finally stepped into appearance, revealing his chilling face. His gazes turned even gloomier after he saw the chopped human meat. ¡°You must be here to die!¡±

    ¡°Dotard, it is you who will die! You must be tired of living to steal from my master. But that¡¯s okay, because we will be ending your jaded old life!¡± Gilbert shouted abusive words at Eugene without restraint. ¡°Look, fuck face, you still have any sense left, cut your own throat. Don¡¯t make me waste my precious energy to kill you!¡±

    Han Shuo was rather surprised at how fluently Gilbert had said those malicious words. It appeared that even getting killed once wasn¡¯t enough to change Gilbert¡¯s nature. In fact, Gilbert seemed to have advanced in the art of cursing. At least those words were new to Han Shuo¡¯s ears.

    Gilbert continued to bombard Eugene with curse words. When Eugene¡¯s head was flushed, Gilbert said satisfaction, ¡°Tsk tsk, look at that fuck face. Yuck. I would at least wear a mask outside if I were you ¨C no wait, I would be too ashamed to face anyone!¡°

    ¡°Kill that fuckin¡¯ clown!¡± shouted Eugene loudly. He could no longer bear it.

    Eugene had originally intended to use diplomacy before violence. But who knew that Gilbert would greet him with such harsh and malicious words without ending. The enraged Eugene simply could not proceed with any peaceful discussion until Gilbert is dead.

    A few divine guards immediately flew out from behind Eugene. They had long been wanting to end Gilbert, especially when they discovered that Gilbert was merely at early-stage lowgod realm. Such an unbridled, brassy lowgod ought to be taught a lesson.

    ¡°Hehe, what a bunch of dimwits!¡± Gilbertughed maniacally. When the first midgod got beside Gilbert, he threw a punch while howling withughter. His arm appeared pitch-dark. The veins on his arms looked as though bizarre, tiny dark snakes, causing his arm to look violently beautiful.

    <i><i>Pow!</i></i> The early-stage midgod who charged at Gilbert was sent flying backward along with the divine weapon in his hand. This divine guard who had gravely underestimated Gilbert sustained serious injuries before he could even disy his power.

    Sanguis¡¯ blood-red eyes gave a sh of bright radiance as he stared at the injured divine guard in the eyes. He felt as though some kind of energy had entered his body from Sanguis¡¯ eyes. At the next instant, he was shocked to discover that the blood in his body was out of his control. He was bleeding from his ears, eyes, nostrils, mouth, penis, and anus.

    ¡°Ah!!¡± that midgod was bleeding from every orifice of his body. The feeling of slowly inching towards death made him scream and shout in fear.

    Sanguis¡¯ red eyes started glowing bright red as he put on a faint smile.

    The other divine guards charging at Gilbert were shocked and they retreated in panic. At this moment, wearing a face full of savagery and thirst for blood, Bonds suddenly drew out his sword filled with a murderous aura. The sword he wielded was refined by Han Shuo and it glistened with chilling radiance. It flew towards those divine guards retreating in fear, piercing bloody holes on their armor-d chests.

    ¡°What is going on? What is happening? My blood is leaving my body!¡± the midgod injured by Gilbert was still shrieking in fear but his voice was growing weaker while his face was turning pale.

    With the crowd watching attentively, the midgod¡¯s body slowly shriveled. He spasmed for a few moments before all the blood and water was drained from his body. He turned into a lifeless, dried body.

    Anito and his divine guards who originally intended to assist Gilbert in resisting the enemies had been staring nkly and dumbfounded. They had a clear understanding of Bonds¡¯ strength but not Gilbert¡¯s and Sanguis¡¯ as they had never left Celestial Pearl before this. They had no idea that the two would be so shocking.

    Gilbert, an early-stage lowgod, had severely injured his opponent a ss above with just one punch. Sanguis, meanwhile, made the midgod bleed uncontrobly just by looking at him. They had never expected to see anything like that happen and were thoroughly intimidated by the two.

    <i><i>Monsters! All those from Celestial Pearl are monsters!</i></i> thought Anito and his men.

    They weren¡¯t the only ones who were astonished. All the divine guards led by Eugene were bbergasted. Eugene expression turned uglier. He did not expect Han Shuo to have such strange subordinates and had not an inkling about the energies Sanguis and Bonds cultivated in. Although he knew that GIlbert cultivated in the energy of darkness, he couldn¡¯t understand how he could severely injure his divine guard with just one punch.

    ¡°Get the fuck out of this cave. From today onwards, everything here belongs to the House of Han of the City of Shadows!¡± Gilbert started actingcent yet again. He waved his middle finger at Eugene and said disdainfully, ¡°You are no match against us!¡±

    ¡°Kill this goddamn jackanapes!¡± roared the enraged Eugene, ¡°Team two and three, attack! I will bear all the consequences!¡±

    Those divine guards behind Eugene had wanted to finish Gilbert long ago. Arge group of divine guards charged ahead at Eugene¡¯smand. They signalled each other with their eyes and decided to divide themselves into three groups of ten, each for Gilbert, Bonds, and Sanguis.

    Han Shuo gained a clear understanding of his three apprentices¡¯ strengths from the observation made just then. Of the three, Sanguis was the strongest and had approximately mid-stage midgod strength. Bonds and Gilbert were slightly weaker. They should possess early-stage midgod strengths.

    Han Shuo was confident that the three could easily defeat opponents of the same ss in a one-versus-one battle. But against ten divine guards at once, their lives would be in danger. After all, all the divine guards under Eugene were midgods!

    Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert wore solemn faces but Han Shuo cracked a grin. With one thought, the seventeen flying swords flew out from his body. The flying swords travelling at extreme speeds whizzed and made a circle. Miserable shrieks suddenly started ying.

    Bodies then started to rain from the air. When they fell to the ground, they would shatter into pieces, like balloons filled using blood and watery flesh. Shortly after, all the bodies melted into bloody water. Not a chunk of bone or flesh remained.

    The thirty elite divine guards that had gone to conquests with Eugene for countless years were reduced into nothing but a puddle of watery blood, slowly flowing into the ground.

    Anito and his men couldn¡¯t understand why Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert, these three fiends were so obedient towards Han Shuo. But after witnessing the scene, it became clear to them!

    The Han Shuo at this moment still wore a gentle smile on his face. However, to Anito and his men, this smile seemed to carry a hint of malevolence and savagery!

    ¡°Eugene, take your men and get lost! Leave behind all the energy ores you have extracted. From today onwards, everything in this mountain belongs to my House of Han!¡± said Han Shuo unruffledly as he smiled at Eugene.

    ¡°You killed thirty of my men? How, how dare you!¡± shrieked Eugene. He was shivering in rage after seeing that the elites he took great effort to nurture had been reduced into nothing.

    Han Shuo shook his head and sighed. He murmured, ¡°What an untactful person. Well, the hard way it is!¡±

    As soon as Han Shuo finished those words, the seventeen flying swords that were hovering in midair flew towards the remaining divine guards. After much whooshings and shrieks, all of Eugene¡¯s divine guards were killed and turned into puddles of watery blood!

    Cauldron Spirit suddenly flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s body. It flew in circles above the scene of massacre, collecting those divine souls before they dissipate between heaven and earth.

    ¡°You, you!¡± Eugene pointed at Han Shuo with trembling hand and shouted as though he had lost his mind, ¡°I will finish you!¡±

    The seventeen flying swords immediately flew towards Eugene. The smile on Han Shuo¡¯s face gradually turned cold as he closed his eyes. With his consciousness, he started deploying the Avici Godying Sword Formation. The seventeen flying swords formed abstruse patterns in the air. Chilling, fierce winds started blowing in their center as killing intent soared. It was as though he had been condemned to Hell.

    Eugene was a mid-stage highgod expert. Against such a powerful expert, Han Shuo had to utilize the Avici Godying Sword Formation. Han Shuo operated the formation using his consciousness, weaving sword radiances that disrupt Eugene¡¯s domain of divinity, not allowing him to utilize much of the elemental energy around him.

    Back then, Han Shuo was informed by Cauldron Spirit that he could butcher an early-stage highgod using Avici Godying Sword Formation without using Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy. After having done a live-trial of the sword formation, Han Shuo confirmed that it was indeed true.

    However, Eugene was a mid-stage highgod. Although he couldn¡¯t make a counter-attack inside the Avici Godying Sword Formation, it appeared that he could resist its power for quite a while.

    ¡°Cauldron Spirit, return!¡± Han Shuo doesn¡¯t want to waste much time or effort on Eugene. With one thought, Cauldron Spirit, that had collected all the divine souls, returned to Han Shuo¡¯s body. The energy of demon generals flooded Han Shuo¡¯s body in an instant. It was then that the first form of the sword formation, Ceaseless Pain, can be activated.

    As soon as Ceaseless Pain was activated, the crisscrossing sword radiances turned into substance, the chilling wind grew ten-times fiercer. Streaks of bizarre energies raged in the sword formation, destroying theyer of defenses Eugene put up. Then, a loud, miserable shriek sounded. Eugene shattered with his flesh sent flying in every direction.

    ¡°A highgod soul! Haha, wonderful, I can finally refine a demon general of the highest grade!¡± cheered Cauldron Spirit. It flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s body excitedly and pounced on Eugene¡¯s highgod soul!

 Chapter 752 - Sorry, you shouted late

    GDK 752: Sorry, you shoutedte

    The entire party from Hushveil City led by Eugene was butchered by Han Shuo. Not one survived.

    The air at the cave entrance was filled with the reeking scent of blood. Cauldron Spirit circled in the air, collected Eugene¡¯s mid-stage highgod soul. Not just Eugene¡¯s, even the divine souls of those perished divine guards were drawn by Cauldron Spirit and sucked into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon.

    ording to Cauldron Spirit, the highest-grade spirit demon must be made using a highgod soul. Spirit demon of that grade was more powerful than any demon generals and could provide Cauldron Spirit with more power. Ever since the Exalted Demonlord¡¯s annihtion, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon had produced not a single of this demon general of the highest ss. Now that Eugene¡¯s divine soul was captured, there will finally be a spirit demon in the Caudron again.

    Eugene and his army were reduced into puddles of blood in just a few moments. Other than watery blood, the ground was also stained with severed bodies that Bonds made. It was a horrendous scene.

    Anito, Deco, and two other divine guards from the Third Corps were overwhelmed with shock. Their brains had short-circuited.

    ¡°Anito, other than Eugene, didn¡¯t you say you ran into hostile forces from Darksoul City? What are you waiting for? Show us the way!¡± instructed Bonds.

    It was only at this moment that Anito seemed toe to his senses. He seemed frightened and rmed as he asked Han Shuo, ¡°Lord Bryan, did, did you just killed Eugene?¡±

    ¡°Is there any problem?¡± replied Han Shuo calmly after putting on a bright smile.

    ¡°Lord Bryan, although there is a constant battle between the seven cities of the Darkness Dominion, the Chiefs of Divine Guards would almost always be spared. If a Chief of Divine Guards dies, the matter will escte to a big issue. Eugene was one of the Chiefs of Divine Guards from Hushveil City. Now that he had perished here, the City Lord of Hushveil City will surely get involved!¡± replied Anito anxiously. Although the cities had never ceased their hidden battles with each other, their Chiefs of Divine Guards were highly regarded and were given immunity. It was extremely rare that a Chief of Divine Guards is killed.

    Chiefs of Divine Guards were the pirs of strength of a city and highly regarded by their City Lords. The death of a Divine Guard Chief would anger them and perhaps even escte to an all-out war between two cities. Anito was frightened because he thought of the grave consequences of Eugene¡¯s death.

    ¡°Ah, it¡¯s no bother. I will justify myself to the City Lord personally!¡± Han Shuo, however, did not view it as a big issue. He smilingly said, ¡°Let¡¯s go Anito, time to kick the asses of those from Darkspirit City!¡±

    Anito¡¯s heart trembled in fear at Han Shuo¡¯s reply. He had a shback of the time he first met Han Shuo in the City of Shadows, of the horrible attitude he shown towards Han Shuo. A shiver traveled up his spine when he thought of it. He thought, <i>Luckily I ended up bing friends with him. Otherwise, I probably wouldn¡¯t even know how I¡¯d die. He concealed his strength so well and appeared benign. But when he erupts, it would be a massacre! This guy is truly a ruthless, vicious person! </i>

    ¡°Come with me, my Lord. Those from Darksoul City also has a Chief of Divine Guards. He killed two of ourrades!¡± Deco was much bolder than Anito and showed the way for Han Shuo.

    As the traveled, Deco exined to Han Shuo that those from Darksoul City was actually the first to arrive at the mountain. There did not want anyone else to get close to the mountain. Those from Darksoul City discovered Anito¡¯s men probing around in the mountain and were killed.

    It was after that that Eugene with his men from Hushveil City arrived at the mountain. However, this time, the two forces did not sh with each other as they saw that their strengths were around the same. The forces of Darksoul City decided topromise. They upied some of thergest deposits and left the remaining deposits unguarded, allowing Eugene and his men to take those deposits.

    This force from Darksoul City was led by a Divine Guard Chief named Jirofi. He had the same strength as Eugene ¨C a mid-stage highgod. He cultivated in the energy of destruction.

    With Deco leading the way, the party soon arrived near the center of the mountain. There were caves entrances all around them. Every entrance was guarded by a few divine guards from Darksoul City.

    ¡°Lord Bryan, Jirofi of Darksoul City should be there at thergest cave!¡± upon arrival, Deco said to Han Shuo as he pointed at a cave.

    ¡°Our Darksoul City have imed these deposits for ourselves. Go to other deposits ¨C do not make us attack!¡± warned a divine guard from Darksoul City as he looked on coldly at Han Shuo and his party. He was very arrogant in attitude.

    ¡°Bonds, Sanguis, kill a few of them, show them who¡¯s boss!¡± instead of wasting words, Han Shuo instructed Bonds and Sanguis to begin killing.

    By murdering, Bonds could increase his killing intent, Sanguis could gain energy from the blood of their enemies, while Han Shuo could reap more divine souls. Killing others would only benefit the three demonic arts cultivators. After all, it was those from Darksoul City who made the first strike against those men from the Third Corps. Han Shuo saw no reason to avoid violence.

    As soon as Han Shuo finished his words, Bonds and Sanguis pounced on the two divine guards of Darksoul City at a cave entrance. Sanguis drew out a string of blood from his palm as he stared at the divine guards with his blood-red eyes. Immediately when their gazes met, the two divine guards felt that blood in their body was boiling.

    Bonds arrived beside them at this moment. The slender longsword in his hand gave off a bright sh before going criss-cross on the divine guards. <i>Chak Chak!</i> They were dismembered. Their bodies now cut into chunks fell on the ground and spurted blood in every direction.

    Before those divine guards at other cave entrances could provide aid, the tragedy had happened.

    They immediately shrieking in loud and high-pitched voices, signaling distress signals to Jirofi. They had witnessed just how terrifying Bonds and Sanguis were and noticed that Han Shuo, the duo¡¯s leader, had not made a move. They dared not to be reckless and were on high alert, cautiously watching Sanguis and Bonds as they called for their boss.

    A momentter, thirty-seven divine guards including their Chief Jirofi hastily flew out from the caves. Their clothes and armor were smeared dark. It appeared that they had been busy excavating energy crystals.

    As soon as he rushed to the scene, Jirofi yelled, ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± When he saw the warm fresh blood under his feet, his face turned dark and seemed enraged. Jirofi had a plump figure. His pair of eyes glistened with sinister and scheming light. At this moment, his fierce gazes had turned to stare fixedly at the calm and unruffled Han Shuo standing at the center.

    ¡°From today onwards, this mountain and its deposits belongs to the City of Shadows¡¯ House of Han!¡± Gilbert announced after bravely stepped forward. He cast Jirofi an arrogant nce and continued, ¡°Eugene had been killed by my master as he was not tactful. If you do not want to follow his path, drop everything and leave now!¡±

    ¡°House of Han?¡± Jirofi raised an eyebrow and replied coldly, ¡°The only family ns in the City of Shadows I know of are the House of Sainte, House of Lavers, House of Kinson, House of Kisa, and House of Buller. Since when is there a House of Han?¡±

    ¡°Cut the crap. Leave all the energy crystals you extracted behind and get your asses out of here!¡± said Gilbert in a bossy and arrogant manner, ¡°Leave now or stay here forever!¡±

    Jirofi seemed to be harder to deal withpared to Eugene. He did not seem to be angered or affected by Gilbert¡¯s rude shouting and insults. He made a smirk on his chubby face and said to Han Shuo, ¡°You want us to withdraw without even demonstrating that you have sufficient strength to challenge us? It doesn¡¯t work that way, boy.¡± Jirofi had made out that Han Shuo was the leader of his party.

    Under Jirofi¡¯s provocative gazes, Han Shuo put on a faint smile and replied, ¡°Well then, you won¡¯t be leaving!¡±

    As soon as he finished those words, the seventeen flying swords re-emerged. Chilling wind blew and whistled as the swords shot towards the divine guards glowering at Han Shuo. The seventeen swords were not just incredibly incisive, but they also carried terrifying corrosiveness, toxins, and chilling aura. Under Han Shuo¡¯s marvelous control, they streak across the space like a shadow and prated through the bodies of the divine guards. All those struck by the flying swords started melting away at a rapid speed and turned into bloody puddles before long.

    Jirofi was greatly rmed and was intimidated by Han Shuo¡¯s vicious flying swords. Anxious light came from his eyes as he immediately shouted, ¡°Stop! We will leave immediately!¡±

    Still wearing a warm smile on his face, Han Shuo replied, ¡°Sorry, you shoutedte!¡±

    The seventeen flying swords abruptly converged at Jirofi and Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy flooded Han Shuo¡¯s body. Ceaseless Pain, the first form of Avici Godying Sword Formation, was yet again deployed. The scene of Hell immediately consumed Jirofi as pain overwhelmed every nerve in his body. Operating the Sword Formation with his consciousness, Han Shuo pierced thousands of holes all over Jirofi¡¯s body.

    Outside the Ceaseless Pain, one will only see swords wildly flying in pitch-dark air. They cannot observe what was happening within the Sword Formation.

    In all of a sudden, Han Shuo¡¯s body turned blurry and he flew into the Ceaseless Pain. His avatar of destruction flew out from the Cauldron of Myriad Demon and begun consuming the divine energy left in Jirofi.

    Jirofi cultivated in the energy of destruction. Most of his divine energy had been exhausted to the Sword Formation. But because of his immense strength, and that Han Shuo had deliberately tried not to kill him immediately by urately and precisely maneuvering the flying swords, the intense corrosive power had merely torn down the defenses of his divine energy and did not spread to his entire body.

    Han Shuo rushed into sword formation to absorb the remaining divine energy in Jirofi before he dies. Although just a fraction of divine energy was left in Jirofi, as he was a mid-stage highgod, it was still very beneficial to Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction.

    Gradually, all of Jirofi¡¯s divine energy was consumed. Without any energy left to resist the corrosive power of the flying swords, Jirofi was liquefied. His space ring was conveniently picked up by Han Shuo.

    The seventeen flying swords flew back into Han Shuo¡¯s body while Cauldron Spirit flew out. It cheered like a kid gifted with toys as it put away Jirofi¡¯s highgod soul. It then fluttered all around, collected the souls of those divine guards also killed by Han Shuo. A few divine guards from Darksoul City were escaping. But with Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert hunting them, they will not survive for too long.

    Instead of personally chasing and hunting those escaping divine guards, Han Shuo had his three apprentices do the job. Unlike Bonds, Sanguis and Gilbert were inexperienced in hunting to kill. This would be a great exercise for the two and the experience could prove useful in the future.

    With demon generals observing them, on top of having Bonds, this experienced assassin, Han Shuo believed none of the divine guards from Darksoul City will survive.

    ¡°My, my Lord, you truly are shocking!¡± eximed Deco as he gazed at Han Shuo with revering eyes.

    Anito, meanwhile, seemed rather terrified. In a depressed manner, he said, ¡°Lord Bryan, Jirofi of Darksoul City was also a Divine Guard Chief. Now that two Chiefs of Divine Guards died to you, the two City Lords surely will surely pursue to get you punished.¡±

    ¡°What do their deaths got to do with me?¡± Han Shuo smiled mischievously and said, ¡°Eugene and Jirofi had clearly killed each other when fighting for control of the mountain, a mutual destruction. The tragedy had happened by the time we arrived. I did nothing at all!¡±

    ¡°Huh? Didn¡¯t you... ¡± Anito was confused at Han Shuo¡¯s lying through his teeth. Then, his face jolted. As though he realized something, he too started smiling mischievously. He said admiringly, ¡°Very wise, my Lord!¡±

    ¡°As long as none of those from Hushveil and Darksoul Cities lives, whatever we say will be the truth. It doesn¡¯t matter if the two City Lords believe us. If there is no evidence against us and we deny everything, there¡¯s nothing much that they can do to us!¡± Deco too wore a face of admiration. ¡°My Lord, what about those few who escaped?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about them. With Bonds, none of them will live to say a thing!¡± replied Han Shuo smilingly. He hesitated for a moment before telling them, ¡°I hope that all of you will keep this a secret. We must give the same story to everyone, even to Lord Erebus and the City Lord. Otherwise, if it leaks out, we would all get into trouble!¡±

    Anito, Deco, and the other divine guards patted on their chests and pledged to keep it a secret. Anito said, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, my Lord, we won¡¯t divulge it to anyone. Hehe, but I believe that given how wise the City Lord is, he would figure out a thing or two.¡±

    ¡°We can¡¯t do anything about that. But as long as we do not leak the story out and keep it consistent, we¡¯ll be fine!¡± said Deco smilingly. After the incident, they grew revering and afraid of Han Shuo. In fact, they respected Han Shuo more than Erebus who had led them for many years. They knew that they needed to cover their asses as they had personally participated in the matter.

    ¡°Find and collect their space rings, carefully. They must have extracted a ton of energy crystals by now. The crystals are ours, make sure you don¡¯t miss out any!¡± instructed Han Shuo.

    Those gods had killed had all melted into blood and seeped into the ground, leaving just their metallic divine weapons and space rings. As long as they were careful about it, their flesh will not be corroded. As to those gods killed by Bonds and Sanguis, although their bodies were in gory states, it doesn¡¯t corrode. Therefore Han Shuo was fine with their safety.

    While Anito and the other divine guards searched and collected the spoils of war for Han Shuo, Bonds returned. He bowed at Han Shuo and said, ¡°Senior, all settled!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded smilingly. He was very satisfied with the end result of this journey.

 Chapter 753 - Little Cauldrons

    GDK 753: Little Cauldrons

    Eugene, Jirofi, and their entire army were annihted by Han Shuo and his apprentices. Following that, Anito and others collected and counted their spoils of war. It took them around half-a-day toplete the task.

    There were around five thousand pieces of energy crystals of assorted sizes, around seventy divine armors and divine weapons, and two highgod divine weapons. The items worth so much that even at the most conservative valuation, they would worth at least two million ck crystal coins.

    However, the most important achievement was that Han Shuo had taken control of the deposits. Eugene and Jirofi had merely been mining for a few days and had definitely not extracted much of the energy crystals. The amount of energy crystals in the mountain was massive and would worth at least tens of millions in ck crystal coins.

    With Bonds¡¯ guidance, Anito and others carefully ¡®redecorated¡¯ the ce. They erased all the evidence that could incriminate Han Shuo and his people, moved the dead bodies, and made it looked as though the forces of Eugene and Jirofi had mutually annihted each other.

    Though these works were a walk in the park for Bonds, Sanguis and Gilbert struggled with it. But with Bonds, Anito, and others guiding them, the two very quickly learned how to nt and manufacture fake evidence. The matter waspleted cleanly.

    Han Shuo did not leave but stayed in the mountain, waiting for hispetitors to arrive.

    During this period of time, Anito, his men from the Third Corps, Bonds, Sanguis, and GIlbert went to every major deposit on the mountain. On the entrances to those energy crystal deposits, they carved a unique pattern ¨C the figure of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon!

    Han Shuo had to set up his family n on short notice and being not a creative person, he couldn¡¯te up with an original, unique emblem for his House of Han. But seeing that thepetitors will arrive soon, he must make it clear that his family n had imed the mountain and its deposits as soon as possible. Therefore, he simply decided to use the drawing of the Cauldron as his family n emblem.

    On every cave entrances, there would be a pattern of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. A few tiny words were clearly carved above the Cauldrons ¨C The City of Shadows¡¯ House of Han!

    It was five dayster that thepetitors from the three major family ns finally arrived. They managed to locate the mountain with great difficulty after exercising the enormous influences and resources of their family ns. They couldn¡¯t be more surprised to find the peculiar markings at all those cave entrances.

    All thepetitors were dumbfounded. They stared foolishly at the carving of little Cauldron and the tiny but clear words above it. They knew they werete.

    The City of Shadows has its rules. Wace the City Lord had clearly instructed that they must not fight each other.

    Knowing that Han Shuo had imed the mountain, although disappointed and unhappy, there was nothing they could do. Therefore they went to Han Shuo, forced a smile on their faces, and congratted him.

    The three were called Ji Wei, Manly, and Gascon. They were all acquainted and on good terms with Han Shuo because of the medicines he refined. Seeing that there was no way they could turn around the situation, they grudgingly admitted defeat.

    It was another three dayster thatpetitors from other family ns arrived. If those from the three major family ns had nothing to say, then naturally, thesepetitors from lesser family ns would make no protest. The fact that Han Shuo was close to the House of Sainte dissuaded them the most from aking anyint.

    Another seven dayster, Erebus, Aobashi, and their grand army arrived at the mountain. Erebus and Aobashi were astounded after learning the ¡®story¡¯ from Han Shuo. Obviously, they did not think that it was true.

    Though it was possible that Jirofi and Eugene might sh in vying for control of the deposits, it was ludicrous that they annihted each other and not a single one of them survived. Though Erebus and Aobashi kept on questioning them, they did not reveal a thing.

    Erebus then pulled Anito and his men to a corner and asked, ¡°Tell me, what actually happened?¡±

    The four divine guards were ashamed and dared not to look directly at Erebus. With their heads lowered, they gave a vague answer, ¡°Those from Darksoul City and Hushveil City killed ourrades. Lord Bryan had exacted vengeance for us!¡±

    Although the four divine guards dared to lie to Andre and City Lord Wace, they couldn¡¯t bring themselves to lie to Erebus till the end. He was, after all, their boss. Besides, Erebus had treated them well for all the years they served him. Moreover, Han Shuo himself had given a few vague hints.

    Erebus and Aobashi¡¯s headache grew worse after hearing their vague answer. The two were here to deal with the aftermath. They knew that shit was about to hit the fan.

    Naturally, the two did not think that Han Shuo had killed the two Chiefs straightforwardly. They thought that Eugene and Jirofi must have severely injured each other before Han Shuo took advantage of the situation to finish them off, along with their weakened forces.

    They had gravely underestimated Han Shuo¡¯s current strength!

    ¡°This is gonna be troublesome!¡± remarked Aobashi in a grimace. She heaved a sigh and said, ¡°The City Lord sent us here with the intention of negotiating with those two parties. Now that it has turned into such a significant issue, the two cities will give us hell!¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s nothing we could do but to report the situation back to our City Lord. His Lordship will have tomunicate with the City Lords of those cities,¡± said Erebus in an anxious and worried manner. He too felt as though his head was about to explode as he couldn¡¯t think of a proper way to resolve the matter.

    ¡°Lady, Gentleman, I shall leave the rest to you. Just let me know when the discussions with those two cities have beenpleted and I will arrange men to mine the ores. As to the allocation of produced ores, we can slowly discuss itter in time!¡± said Han Shuo smilingly. He stretched his bodyzily and murmured to himself, ¡°Ay, I really got lucky on this trip. I only got to fight a bunch of easy targets who were severely injured!¡±

    Anito, Deco, and the two other divine guards wore strange looks when they heard Han Shuo¡¯s words. They had witnessed Han Shuo getting rid of Eugene and Jirofi with brute strength and knew that luck did not contribute to him annihting the two powerful forces. They knew that Han Shuo was trying to conceal his actual strength. Having received plenty of divine weapons and other loots, the four acted in concert with Han Shuo and talked a bunch of nonsense, misleading Erebus and Aobashi from the truth.

    ¡°You rascal, how could you just walk away and leave the two of us to clean up the mess you made!¡± Erebus shook his head in a smile that was hiding his pain and remarked, ¡°Bryan, O, Bryan, two Chiefs of Divine Guards have died. This is no small matter!¡±

    ¡°Well, they killed each other. There¡¯s no one to me for their deaths but themselves. You just gotta tell the truth as it is. I believe that the City Lord, as wise as he is, will not say anything!¡± Han Shuoughed mischievously and continued, ¡°I shall stop hindering your Lordships from doing work. We will return to the City of Shadows now. After the matter has settled, I will treat you two to a drink!¡±

    ¡°It better be a barrel of the finest wine!¡± said Aobashi as she red at Han Shuo. Her gut feeling told her that Han Shuo was behind the clusterfuck but unfortunately, she couldn¡¯t find any evidence against Han Shuo. But even if she did, she would have to destroy it and cover it up for Han Shuo!

    ¡°Sanguis, Bonds, Gilbert, let¡¯s go!¡± Han Shuo called for his three apprentices, bid farewell to thepetitors from the three major family ns, and left.

    Han Shuo returned to Fort Lasberg and discovered that Candide, Emma, Graeae, Pegasus, and a few others were there. These people were experienced in various aspects of running a city. They took the initiative in familiarizing themselves with the situation in Fort Lasberg and made preparations for the House of Han to take over the Fort.

    Candide and the others knew the goal of Han Shuo¡¯s trip. Therefore, they immediately asked Han Shuo about his journey when he returned to Fort Lasberg. He avoided telling them the specifics but said, ¡°It¡¯s settled, the Fifth Corps is ours!¡±

    These people knew that having power is essential to their survival and were rejoiced by the news. Candide and the others could be considered as members of his House of Han. Being on the same ship with Han Shuo, it was only natural that they would want the House of Han to rise and soar in the City of Shadows.

    Having lived on Elysium for some time, these people recognized just how pivotal it was to be in a family n. They had taken initiative to Fort Lasberg because they wanted to help make the House of Han stronger. They understood that the stronger the House of Han bes, the better off they will be.

    Han Shuo took out a portion of the energy crystals he obtained in the mountain and handed it to Candide and co., instructing them to power up the energy towers and boundary towers around their residence in the Fort. Energy crystals were indispensable in keeping those towers functioning. With ample energy crystals, the defenses of the Han Residence in Fort Lasberg can be raised.

    Candide and Han Shuo discussed all sorts of issues rted to Fort Lasberg for the better half of a day. Running a city isn¡¯t Han Shuo¡¯s forte. Back then on Profound Continent, he had delegated most if not all the work of running his Brettel City to Jack and Dorcas. His skills in this aspect had not improved. Most of the discussion consisted of Han Shuo listening to Candide and others talking and exining. They wanted Han Shuo¡¯s approval before executing certain significant projects. Most of the time, Han Shuo would just nod and agree.

    Han Shuo knew that Candide and the others had no one to fall back on but him. Now that they have been branded as members of the House of Han, Han Shuo was sure that these people will serve him with all their hearts. Therefore, he had agreed to their proposal straightforwardly, giving them the freedom and convenience in making changes.

    It was after they no longer had a single question left that Han Shuo proceeded with returning to the City of Shadows with Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert.

    ***The Sainte Residence. Wace and Andre were facing a magical mirror.

    Inside the mirror were Aobashi and Erebus, giving an ount of the situation over at the mountain. When they reported that Eugene of Hushveil City and Jirofi of Darksoul City had perished in the mountain, Wace and Andre¡¯s faces jolted slightly. Wace hastily asked, ¡°How is Bryan? What about the others?¡±

    ¡°Bryan is fine. He has taken over the mountain by the time we arrived,¡± Erebus put on a grimace and continued, ¡°Bryan said that Eugene and Jirofi had killed each other. We couldn¡¯t find a single one of their forces who lived. All the divine guards from Darksoul and Hushveil Cities had perished but their corpses were missing. The situation is rather peculiar!¡±

    ¡°Eugene and Jirofi died in the mountain. Their City Lords will surely give you a ton of troubles, elder brother,¡± even Erebus could feel the headache. After thinking for a moment, Andre asked Erebus, ¡°Did Eugene and Jirofi actually killed each other?¡±

    ¡°They are all dead so we have no idea!¡± said Erebus in a grimace, ¡°Not a single divine guard from Hushveil and Darksoul survived. It seemed quite unlikely but when I asked Bryan, he sticks to his im that they annihted each other. We also found some signs on the scene suggesting that the two forces had a ferocious fight.¡±

    Wace was stunned. After a long while, he nodded and instructed in a deep voice, ¡°upy the mountain. Inform Hushveil and Darksoul Cities about the death of their Divine Guard Chiefs. No matter what they ask, tell them that they killed each other. If you found anything on the scene that was overlooked, you will clean it up!¡±

    ¡°Understood, my Lord!¡± replied Erebus.

    Wace disconnected the call and massaged his be. In a faint smile, he remarked, ¡°That youngster really knows how to make troubles. Eugene and Jirofi¡¯s deaths must have something to do with him. Hehe, their City Lords will surely be enraged by the news!¡±

    ¡°Elder brother, how is it possible for Bryan to get rid of both Eugene and Jirofi?¡± asked Andre in a confused manner.

    ¡°Well, how else would you exin the situation in the mountain?¡± Wace shot a nce at Andre, put on a smirk, and said, ¡°Though he might not have the strength to kill both of them, he could still seed if he strikes at a suitable timing, perhapsunching a sneak attack while the two were fighting. Hehe, he had preserved traces of the two sides fighting. This youngster is indeed a talent. It seems that he will do a better job than Avery in running the Fifth Corps!¡±

    ¡°Bryan is so bold it¡¯s almost reckless. It takes a hell of a gut to kill two Divine Guard Chiefs!¡± remarked Andre.

    ¡°Audacious, ruthless, astute ¨C these are all the qualities that a man must have in order to achieve great things. He has amply demonstrated that he is capable of acting as the Chief of Fifth Corps. Alright, get all the relevant documents ready by this afternoon. Also, let him have all those Fifth Corps divine guards that checked out,¡± Wace instructed Andre smilingly. Instead of getting angry at Han Shuo for making big trouble, Wace was pleased with Han Shuo¡¯s bold and ruthless methods.

    Andre nodded and left to get the work done.

    After Andre left, Wace re-activated the magical mirror and acquired a connection with the City Lords of Hushveil City and Darksoul City. He tly imed that Eugene and Jirofi had killed each other and asserted that the mountain belonged to the City of Shadows. As expected, the two City Lords were furious to learn the news. The three City Lords had a heated argument.

    Half a monthter, Han Shuo and his three apprentices returned to the City of Shadows.

    All those who originated from Profound Continent had moved from Celestial Pearl to their new home ¨C the Han Residence!

    Compared to Celestial Pearl, their new residence was even more expansive and grand. It housed all the necessary facilities. The buildings on Elysium were usually solemn and imposing in architectural style, which the new tenants disliked. Fanny, Phoebe, and the others had therefore spent a lot of effort in decorating their new residence with flowers, nts, hills, small streams, and other things, making the Han Residence a lot more serene and pleasing to the eye.

    As Han Shuo walked through the flowering shrubs, he gazed at the tall and towering structures ahead. He suddenly had a shback.

    He recalled that when he first arrived on Elysium, he had gone through great challenges ining to the City of Shadows. The first time he stepped into this residence, he was as clueless as a country-folk who first stepped into a city. Not far ahead of him was the gymnasium where he had an argument with Cage and Doloxes. He was insulted by the two young members of Lavers Family and left resentfully.

    But now, just decadester, everything in this ce became an asset of his House of Han!

    Han Shuo enjoyed the wonderful feeling of having things in his possession and control. As he breathed in the fresh air, he could taste the scent of triumph.

    Thedies went outside to wee Han Shuo¡¯s return and surrounded him with cheerful talks andughter.

    Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert were pulled aside by Stratholme and Ayermike. They kept on questioning the three on what happened in the mountain. When they learned that Han Shuo had sessfully taken over the mountain and that the Fifth Corps will be his, the two became very excited.

    ¡°Bryan, Candide and the others went to Fort Lasberg. Have you met them?¡± asked Emily.

    ¡°Yes, I have. They asked me about a pile of questions. What a headache!¡± replied Han Shuo in a grimace, ¡°I¡¯m no expert in managing a city. Lucky for me, I have brought them here from Profound Continent. Otherwise, I would have trouble finding suitable candidates to run Fort Lasberg on such short notice!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, those from Profound Continent can be trusted! There is no way that they could survive on Elysium outside of the House of Han. Therefore, they should know what they ought to do!¡± said Emily softly.

    Han Shuo nodded and replied smilingly, ¡°Yep, I understand. They will be the pirs of strength of the House of Han in the future. Though there isn¡¯t much that I¡¯m good at, I have sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint to keep from meddling with them while they do it. These men will find their roles to y on Elysium!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, these are the documents Andre sent you. He wants you to take office as soon as possible,¡± said Phoebe as she handed Han Shuo a pile of documents. She then said softly, ¡°Andre wants you to know that there are some in the Fifth Corps who are rather arrogant and obstinate. Although they did not revolt with Avery, they are admiring of Avery.¡±

    Han Shuo received the documents and gave it a read. He replied in an unruffled smile, ¡°I eat untamed punks like them for breakfast.¡±

 Chapter 754 - My Fifth Corps doesnâ€™t need trash like you bunch!

    GDK 754: My Fifth Corps doesn¡¯t need trash like you bunch!

    There were seven divine guard corps in the City of Shadows. Each corps was limited to one thousand divine guards.

    A squad consisted of ten divine guards. Apany was formed of ten squads led by a Captain. A Corps consisted of tenpanies, led by a Chief.

    The seven Corps of the City of Shadows was responsible for ensuring the safety of the City. They were also in charge of causing destruction to enemies of the City, projecting the City¡¯s influence, upying resources, and even plundering. In short, they were responsible for doing all the things from noble to despicable.

    Other than Avery, seven of the ten Captains also disappeared from the Fifth Corps. They likely had left with Avery. The remaining three Captains did not participate in Avery¡¯s rampage as they had their own families in the City. However, after the ruckus, two of them resigned from their posts and left the Fifth Corps.

    Many other divine guards had left as well. The only Captain that remained was called Lamont. At present, the entire Fifth Corps had less than two hundred divine guards.

    Of the one thousand Fifth Corps divine guards, around half had left with Avery and the Lavers Family. The other half left because they knew that they would aplish nothing in the Fifth Corps while some did so in protest of the actions taken by the House of Sainte. It was for these reasons that the Fifth Corps turned dysfunctional, crippled, and severely understaffed.

    Wace, being aware of the situation in Fifth Corps, divided all the duties of the Fifth Corps to the First, Second, and Third Corps. With that, the divine guards Fifth Corps had no work to do. They would kill time by drinking and chatting. There wasn¡¯t a dash left in them.

    In the work lounge of the Fifth Corps, Lamont, the only Captain who had not resigned, was drunk and intoxicated. He was teasing and flirting with several female divine guards. He seemed to be living the life!

    ¡°Captain Lamont, I hearsay that the owner of Celestial Pearl will being to the FIfth Corps soon. Our happy days areing to an end!¡± a squad leader who worked under Lamont remarked as he filled his ss with an amber-colored fine wine to the brim. His face was red and hot.

    Previously, when Avery was around, all these bottles of fine wine obtained from looting and gifted by small family ns was for Avery¡¯s taste buds alone. But after Avery¡¯s departure, therge collection of fine wine became ownerless. These divine guards conveniently took it for their own, drinking to their heart¡¯s content everyday.

    Lamont, who was also rather intoxicated, let out a groan and said, ¡°He¡¯s just a small merchant. What does he know about running our Fifth Corps? If it wasn¡¯t for his rtionship with the House of Sainte, would he have gotten the job? That kiddo knows nothing about our work!¡±

    ¡°Captain, you know, they should have chosen from among we veterans in seeding Avery¡¯s ce. And from how I see it, among us, you, Captain, is the most qualified to take over. But unfortunately, the City Lord did not even consider any of us as candidates. And against reason, he handed the position to this immature and inexperienced little merchant. Ugh... ¡± the squad leader had drunk a little too much to say words implying fault on the City Lord.

    Lamont responded with a long sigh and replied, ¡°Who would know what was in the City Lord¡¯s mind?¡±

    Lamont did not leave with Avery or resign as other Captains did because he had his eyes for the most powerful seat in Fifth Corps. In Lamont¡¯s wishful thinking, the position as the Chief should fall to the only Captain remaining ¨C him. That was why he stayed in the Fifth Corps resolutely when others bailed.

    Unfortunately for Lamont, things didn¡¯t go as he had hoped for. Not only that Wace did not even consider the old bunch as potential candidates, he temporarily stripped the FIfth Corps of all their privileges, tying Lamont¡¯s hands.

    Lamont¡¯s lofty aspiration was thwarted. Though sullen and disappointed, Lamont spent his days drinking those fine wines conveniently located in the Fifth Corps to numb his grief.

    ¡°Captain Lamont, that merchant called Bryan has absolutely no clue about the duties of our Fifth Corps, nor does he know a thing about how things work inside Fifth Corps. Hehe, after he takes office, we just gotta ce stumbling rocks in his path, not letting him manage the Fifth Corps well. Then, sooner orter, the City Lord will find that he is incapable and will remove him from the seat. When that dayes, perhaps the City Lord will remember that a veteran like Captain Lamont is suited to be the Chief!¡± the squad leader suggested in a sinister smile.

    Lamont smiled drunkenly. He happily raised his wine ss and said, ¡°Ayy let¡¯s drink!¡±

    Lamont was actually nning on doing exactly that. That was why he remained even after learning that Han Shuo will soon take office. His mood was lifted to hear that the squad leader¡¯s words resonated with his intention.

    Meanwhile, Han Shuo, Sanguis, Bonds, Gilbert, Stratholme, and Ayermike arrived at the front entrance of the Fifth Corps. Before they had even stepped inside, they could smell the intense fragrance of alcohol and hear the sound of merrymaking. There wasn¡¯t any air of august left.

    Those who didn¡¯t know might even think that they were entering a pub instead of a military base.

    Ayermike raised his head and was startled when he read the enormous sign that read ¡®Fifth Corps¡¯. He remarked, ¡°How could a military agency of the City be like this?¡±

    Stratholme too shook his head and remarked, ¡°It is obvious that the divine guards would be low in quality. Bryan, it seems that you are up for a big renovation!¡±

    Han Shuo, wearing a calm and collected face, nodded. He said, ¡°With you guys around, we can enlist and train new divine guards to rebuild the Fifth Corps. If any of those in there is not tactful, we¡¯ll kick their ass out of the Fifth Corps!¡±

    ¡°This way please, senior!¡± Bonds walked forward to the entrance and bowed at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Who¡¯s there?¡± just as Han Shuo and his party were entering, azy shout sounded from the inside. Following that, two divine guards whose arms were around each other¡¯s shoulders walked into view. Their faces were red through and through. Each of them was holding a half-emptied bottle of wine. It seemed that they were enjoying life to the fullest.

    ¡°The newly-appointed Chief of Fifth Corps has arrived. Gather all your men!¡± shouted Bonds in a stern voice.

    ¡°Oh, I seee,¡± unexpectedly, the two divine guards weren¡¯t rmed at all. On the contrary, they put on grins as they sized Han Shuo up. One of them asked drunkenly, ¡°Which of you iz da new Chieff?

    ¡°Cut your fucking nonsense and gather everyone!¡± shouted Gilbert furiously when he saw the two showing not the slightest respect.

    ¡°Who tha fack are you? Arr you da new Chieff? You don¡¯t luk like one! Don farking shout at me iff you not the new Chieef!¡± the divine guard shouted back at Gilbert drunkenly without fear or a sense of shame.

    Gilbert let out a reverberating roar of fury and charged at the divine guard, pping him.

    Although not every divine guard in the Fifth Corps were midgods, all those who could afford to stay, were. That divine guard who quarreled with Gilbert had long made it out that Gilbert only possessed lowgod strength and naturally, doesn¡¯t take Gilbert as a threat. The divine guard even revealed a mocking sneer as he let Gilbert¡¯s palm pping towards his face. Suddenly, at lightning speed, the divine guard scratched at Gilbert with his free hand.

    ¡°Pow!¡± the divine guard was sent crashing to the floor by Gilbert¡¯s p. His scratch thatnded on Gilbert, however, had no effect. It did not even scrape one bit of Gilbert¡¯s skin.

    Han Shuo wore a cold smile as he watched the two divine guards¡¯ performance. He had sent in a few of his demon generals into the Fifth Corps earlier and had heard and seen everything that Lamont and the others said and did. He was very much aware of their intentions.

    ¡°Bonds, Sanguis, break their arms and legs!¡± instructed Han Shuo.

    Bonds and Sanguis who wanted to give them a beating long ago immediately pounced on the divine guards without a word. They joined hands with Gilbert and subdued the divine guards in a split second.

    <i><i>Creak! Creak! Creak! Creak!</i></i>

    Sounds of bones breaking in two yed along with miserable shrieks. The two drunken divine guards suddenly regained their senses. They red at Han Shuo and screamed, ¡°Even if you are the Chief, you cannot punish us so severely for no reason!¡±

    ¡°Insubordination. That is severe enough,¡± Han Shuo put on a calm smile and asked, ¡°Wasn¡¯t you quite drunk just then? How is it that you have turned sober so suddenly?¡±

    ¡°I will sue you! I will go to the House of Sainte and sue you!¡± shrieked the divine guard at the top of his lungs.

    <i><i>Bam!</i></i> Gilbert threw a punch at the divine guard¡¯s mouth. His lips and gums were bleeding and messed up. It was then that Gilbert cussed, ¡°Sue my fist motherfucker! Do you think the House of Sainte will help you? What a retard!¡±

    The other divine guard who was about the shout something immediately shut his mouth when he saw his partner¡¯s bloody mouth.

    ¡°What is going on?¡± Lamont whose face was deep red walked over with several squad leaders. He feigned being angry and shouted, ¡°Who are you people? How dare youmit such violence to our divine guards of the Fifth Corps?¡±

    ¡°Look at their drunken fuck face. You call them divine guards? Pfft,¡± sneered Gilbert disdainfully before he announced proudly, ¡°We are from the House of Han. My master is here to assumemand of the Fifth Corps. Those two jokers belittled my master, so they were disciplined. Do you have a problem with that?¡±

    ¡°Before youe up with official documents showing your identity, you are all outsiders. They did nothing wrong!¡± Lamont glowered at Han Shuo and coldly groaned, ¡°Even if you are the new Chief, you must do things following the rules!¡±

    ¡°From today onwards, in the Fifth Corps, I¡¯m the rules!¡± Han Shuo put on a faint smile and said, ¡°You are called Lamont, right? Alright, Lamont, I hereby expel you from the Fifth Corps. Now get yourself and all your drinking buddies out of the Fifth Corps! My Fifth Corps don¡¯t need trash like you bunch!¡±

    ¡°Dismissing us just because we drank is unjustified!¡± shouted Lamont angrily as he stared at Han Shuo, not backing down.

    ¡°As I have said, in the Fifth Corps, I¡¯m the rules,¡± Han Shuo let out a soft sneer and suddenly, he was in front of Lamont. Han Shuo gently pressed his left palm on Lamont¡¯s chest.

    <i><i>Pow!</i></i>

    Lamont was sent flying straight to the exit. He fell down the stairs and out the Fifth Corps. Two strands of blood slowly flowed from the corners of his lips. He glowered at Han Shuo with hateful eyes as he yelled, ¡°I will sue you! I will sue you!¡±

    ¡°Go ahead,¡± Han Shuo waved his hand and said impatiently, ¡°Don¡¯t ever get close to the Fifth Corps or I¡¯ll break your fucking legs.¡±

    ¡°You, you, and you!¡± the imposing Gilbert pointed at those divine guards whose faces were red and shouted, ¡°What are you still standing here for? Get out before I kick your asses!¡±

    Those divine guards pointed by Gilbert were all aligned with Lamont. They were frightened. The squad leader who had been ingratiating Lamont even started weeping, pleading, ¡°Please forgive us, we only took a few cups of alcohol, we did not mean to offend Your Lordship. Please, we still want to stay in the Fifth Corps!¡±

    ¡°All those who drank are dismissed from the Fifth Corps. Shoo!¡± Gilbert shouted impatiently, ¡°You better stop talking crap and start walking out. Make one more noise and you¡¯ll crawl out with broken legs!¡±

    After hearing Gilbert¡¯s threat, with Sanguis and Bonds staring at them with cold, ferocious eyes, the divine guards dared not stay a second longer. They left the Third Corps unwillingly. After most of the Captains left, Lamont became the most influential figure in the Fifth Corps. He had even been buying other divine guards using the fine wine that Avery left behind.

    After theyoff, there were less than fifty divine guards left in the Fifth Corps. None of the fifty engaged in the vice of heavy drinking. They were very much self-disciplined. After a moment of observation, Han Shuo noticed that most of the remaining divine guards had grave and stern air. They were watching the farce going on at the entrance with cold eyes. Their gazes towards Han Shuo were filled with astonishment and bewildered. It seemed that they were considering their next course of action.

    Han Shuo had learned a little about those fifty beforeing to the Fifth Corps. A majority of them came from impoverished viges and had absolutely no family n to fall back on. A portion of them were ced there by the House of Sainte. Their loyalty lies with the City of Shadows instead of the person in charge.

    To Han Shuo, these are the characters worthy of his attention and care. They will be the foundation that will enable the quick turnaround of the Fifth Corps. Han Shuo considered one of his most important tasks after taking over the Fifth Corps was to win these people¡¯s trust and approval.

    After booting Lamont and hisckeys, the troublesome ones, out of the Fifth Corps, Han Shuo marched straight to the assembly hall and yelled, ¡°All of you divine guards, assemble!¡± The fifty something remaining divine guards silently gathered before Han Shuo as hemanded.

    ¡°You will keep whatever you position previously assigned to you in the Fifth Corps. Before we have enough men, all of you are in the First Company, lead by me!¡± Han Shuo did not waste words to stir up public sentiment but coldly instructed them the relevantmands.

    Han Shuo knew that there was no point in talking too much and that the only true way of subduing these untamed talents was with his charisma and ample demonstration of his capability.

 Chapter 755 - Make a name

    GDK 755: Make a name

    After Lamont and his bunch were kicked out from the Fifth Corps, there were less than a hundred divine guards remaining. There wasn¡¯t enough number to form one wholepany!

    It was impossible for the Fifth Corps to function properly with less than a hundred men. Therefore, the first thing Han Shuo did after taking over the Fifth Corps was to recruit for new divine guards.

    At first, Han Shuo assumed that he need not worry about unable to recruit suitable candidates as he could unt the name of the Fifth Corps. But soon after he started executing the n, he realized that although the City of Shadows was enormous, it was not easy to find good divine guards.

    He found out that all those who were capable had all joined or been recruited byrge family ns in the City. Meanwhile, all the powerful experts would be invited over by representatives from various family ns as soon as they entered the City. These highly sought-after talents were drawn in by representatives from various family ns before they even had the chance to look at the City or the Fifth Corps.

    Although the House of Han had gained some reputation in the City of Shadows, for most outsiders, the family n became famous only though Celestial Pearl. They believed that a family n that rose through trade andmerce will fall short of thoserge and ancient family ns in the City when ites to strength. Therefore, if offered the same deal, they would much rather work for those ancient,rge family ns rather than the young House of Han.

    Even though the Fifth Corps was severelycking in manpower, Han Shuo remained very demanding in the selection process. He would rather have no men than to have mediocrities. With Stratholeme, Bonds, and the others doing the interview of Han Shuo¡¯s behalf, most of the candidates were rejected. Only a very few managed to pass the interview.

    Time flew by rapidly. After a month, the Fifth Corps had managed to recruit less than forty new blood. Most of these new recruits were just barely passing the standard and deemed undesirable by therge family ns.

    Naturally, Han Shuo was not happy with the situation. Andre had hastened Han Shuo many times, asking him to solve the issue as soon as possible so that the Fifth Corps could fulfill its duties. Han Shuo had racked his brain on filling the nine-hundred men vacancy. He had even utilized the Celestial Pearl¡¯s resources in cing scrolls for recruitment in various forts and satellite cities.

    In an expansive meeting hall in the Fifth Corps, Gilbert angrilyined, ¡°There were around eighty people who entered the City in the past few days. Around twenty of them have midgod strength. Of them, thirteen have clean backgrounds. But as soon as they stepped into the City, they were all invited to the threerge family ns. Hell, they actually told me that they have never heard of the House of Han. They feel that it¡¯s beneath their dignity toe to our Fifth Corps. They are all so fucking haughty!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, both the House of Han and the Fifth Corps don¡¯t have much reputation as we have just started. To those capable experts who wish to rise and stand out among others, we do not look like the best choice. I¡¯m afraid that the situation will remain so for quite a while. I believe it¡¯s time to change our strategy!¡± Stratholme, who once served as the State Preceptor of the former Verdun Empire, was an insightful man. He too was concerned about the issue.

    It wasn¡¯t that the City of Shadowscked people. Lowgods cultivating in all sorts of fundamental forces could be found everywhere on the street. They were eager to squeeze into the Fifth Corps or the House of Han. But unfortunately, those weren¡¯t the people Han Shuo was looking for. He required the candidates to have at least midgod strength to be a Fifth Corps divine guard. On top of that, the candidates must pass Stratholme and Bonds¡¯ examination on temperament and moral character before they could join the Fifth Corps.

    With the majority of the suitable candidates invited by therge family ns, and the remaining ones heavily filtered by Stratholme and Bonds, it was to be expected that their progress was slow.

    ¡°What do you propose?¡± asked Han Shuo. He knew that Stratholme was an insightful person good at solving problems.

    ¡°We make a name for ourselves!¡± answered Stratholme in a bright smile.

    Ayermike then helped him with the exnation, ¡°I have discussed the problem with Stratholme. We feel that it is only by raising the prestige of our House of Han in the City of Shadows and alter people¡¯s impression of our family n that we could attract talents. For all these while, when people thought of the House of Han, they think of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. For those who want to outshine others, a shop, no matter how big, remains a shop, and it could not give them the prestige and power they desire. But if we could be famous for our strength, it would be a different story!¡±

    Both Stratholme and Ayermike were experienced and scheming characters. Now that they were working for the House of Han with their hearts and soul, they would provide Han Shuo with good suggestions on various matters, saving Han Shuo from a whole lot of trouble.

    Han Shuo thought about their words for a moment before he nodded and said, ¡°I get what you¡¯re saying and can see where the issue lies. But how are we going to make a name? We can¡¯t just go to the streets and shout ¡®We House of Han is very powerful! Come join us!¡¯, right?¡°

    ¡°Of course we can¡¯t!¡± Ayermike put on a smile and said, ¡°But we can do it through certain things and events!¡±

    ¡°Tell me about it!¡± said Han Shuo smilingly as his interest was aroused. He knew Ayermike well and understood that Ayermike must have a n.

    ¡°Every century, the Seven Corps of the City of Shadows willpete to determine their ranking. Every Corps is limited to a singlepany of divine guards in thepetition. In addition, there will be a separatepetition between the seven Chiefs to determine their ranking,¡± Stratholme the old monster exined smilingly, ¡°Thepetition is around the corner. In any case, our Fifth Corps has to put apany into thepetition. If our Fifth Corps could surpass the other Corps in thepetition, and if you could defeat the other Chiefs, then our Fifth Corps and House of Han will be famous.¡±

    Ayermike nodded smilingly and said, ¡°If the Fifth Corps and you could rank in the top few in thepetition, then the House of Han will free itself from being amerce family n, but a powerful family n with real power. By then, even if you do not actively recruit for divine guards, people will swarm to Fifth Corps and the House of Han, begging to join us!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, this is an extremely rare, perfect opportunity!¡± Stratholme persuaded, ¡°Besides, the rewards are pretty enticing. It¡¯s a waste to not take it!¡±

    Han Shuo stared distractedly for a moment and asked, ¡°What rewards?¡±

    Stratholme raised a tight fist and answered, ¡°More power!¡±

    Han Shuo was tempted and began asking for the details, ¡°I have heard a little about thepetition but did not take it seriously. Tell me what¡¯s in it in detail. We still have time to prepare!¡±

    Immediately, Ayermike and Stratholme took out the documents they had prepared for Han Shuo and exined thepetition between the Seven Corps in detail.

    To improve the fighting power of the City of Shadows divine guards and promote friendlypetition, every one hundred years, Wace the City Lord would host a battle between the Seven Corps. Thepetition was divided into two categories ¨C battle between the Chiefs of Divine Guards and battle betweenpanies. Thepetition betweenpanies was deemed more important.

    In all previouspetitions, the House of Sainte had firmly secured the top three ces in overall and individual strengths. In individual strengthpetitions, Aobashi had always ranked first. In second ce would be the rather mysterious Chief Ralph of the Second Corps who were rarely seen in the City of Shadows. Erebus would be the third. Thest four ces would frequently change as the strengths of the fourrge family ns were simr.

    However, when it came to overall strengths, the Second Corps would usually rank first. They were famous in the City for their overallbat power. The divine guards of the Second Corps were valiant, courageous, and outstanding.

    The Second Corps was also called the shadow army of the City as they were in charge of killing some special targets. Those hidden enemies plotting against the City of Shadows would usually be silently murdered by assassins of the Second Corps. This made the Second Corps rather revered in the City of Shadows. Even the patriarchs of the three major family ns felt vignt towards the Second Corps.

    Han Shuo read the information in his hand while listening to Ayermike and Stratholme¡¯s exnation. He soon understood the situation well.

    After the centennialpetition, the duties of the Seven Corps would be readjusted corresponding to their ranking. Those whose overall strength ranked first would even receive a special privilege ¨C act first, reportte.

    This means that if the Chief who possessed the special privilege considered that a person was a threat to the City of Shadows, he could kill the person on the spot ¨C even if the person was a member of the House of Sainte. The Chief just has to submit sufficient evidence to Wace after the event. This special privilege can easily be abused. The Chief with that power could kill anyone he disliked and then fabricate evidence against the murdered to justify himself to Wace!

    For many years, the special privilegended in the hands of Ralph, the Chief of the Second Corps. Ralph had always been loyal to Wace. Although he had this privilege, he had not truly put it to use. His actions and conduct were worthy of praise and had almost never made any mistakes during his many years of service.

    ¡°Kill first, reportter? Hehe, sounds wonderful!¡± said Han Shuo in a mischievous smirk. He then announced, ¡°Very well then, get ready, we must win thepetition. For the Fifth Corps and for the House of Han, it is time to shine!¡±

    Ayermike and Stratholme had been waiting to hear those words. They replied excitedly, even if we can¡¯t get the first, we must surpass the divine guards of the other three family ns. If we can do that, those gods who enter the City consider our Fifth Corps as an option and we can easily get suitable candidates!¡±

    ¡°How many men do we have right now?¡± asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°Including us, there are altogether ny-one people. Just barely enough to form apany,¡± answered Stratholme in a wry smile.

    ¡°High quality is better than high quantity. Ny-one is enough. I seems that I must train these men personally so that we can triumph!¡± a sh of bright light shone in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes. He said, ¡°As the Fifth Corps currently has no official duties and that there is still time until thepetition, instructed every divine guard of the Fifth Corps to head to Fort Lasberg!¡±

    Han Shuo, Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert arrived at Fort Lasberg in advance. They located a valley nearby and started getting busy. They redecorated the entire valley, erecting numerous towering dark pirs made of stone. The pirs were carved with all kinds ofplicated and indecipherable patterns.

    Han Shuo then sent the seventeen flying swords whooshing all around, cutting the stone walls of the valley into t surfaces. Chunks ofrge stones were ced on certain positions. The Cauldron of Myriad then fluttered around the valley. Abstruse-looking symbols would fly out from the Cauldron and adhere to the stones. The four also carved gulches on the ground and threw in materials with unique functions.

    After buzzing around for around ten days, Han Shuo threw in some souls of ferocious beasts into it, activating the Eight Destion and Torment Formation that will temper the divine guards physically and mentally. He also took out the most powerful demon general in the Cauldron made using Eugene¡¯s divine soul to act as the formation crux.

    A few days after the formation was set up, those divine guards of the Fifth Corps arrived at Fort Lasberg and were led to the valley by Candide. Han Shuo wasted no words. He swept his cold eyes across the divine guards and announced, ¡°Thepetition between the Seven Corps is just around the corner. Although our Fifth Corps do not have enough number, we must participate in it. I have summoned all of you from the City to this Fort in order to temper and steel you, lest you humiliate me in thepetition!¡±

    ¡°My Lord, how do you intend to temper us over at this ce?¡± asked a divine guard name Barnard wearing an emotionless face.

    Han Shuo pointed at the Eight Destion and Torment Formation filled with sinister atmosphere and replied smilingly, ¡°There, you will all step into it. Inside, you will face your worst nightmares and various kinds of dangers. I will gradually raise the difficulty. You must learn to work with your teammates. Otherwise, if you suffer any kind of injuries, don¡¯t me me!¡±

    Barnard came from amoner background and was the leader of a ten-men squad. He nodded at Han Shuo and without hesitation, instructed, ¡°Third Squad, follow me!¡±

    As soon as he finished those words, Barnard took the lead and entered the formation. His Third Squad did not hesitate and followed behind him. The other squads also marched into the formation one after another.

    These men had absolutely no idea about how demonic formation works and did not think that it could do them harm. Other than various strange materials and Han Shuo¡¯s unique energy, many demon generals of the Cauldron were inside. It would be a wonder if they came out unscathed. Just a moment after they entered the formation, bloodcurdling screeches came from within. It seemed that they had witnessed some extremely horrifying scenes and were scared witless.

    The Eight Destion and Torment Formation consisted of hallucination-inducing formations, maze, and mind-attacking demonic formations. Those who step inside must face not just their worst fears, they must face the attacks of demon generals in material form. The power of the demon generals was greatly amplified once within the formation. Taking the Cauldron Spirit and Han Shuo¡¯s energy, they could bring tremendous destruction to the divine guards.

    Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbertughed mischievously when they heard the terrifying shrieks. When the formation waspleted, the three were the first batch sent inside by Han Shuo. The trio had experienced all sorts of unimaginable and freakish scenes that still give them shivers when they thought of it. The three, however, could not help but took joy in the horrifying experiences of those making miserable shrieks.

    ¡°Master, these bastards ought to be tempered hard! They may follow your orders but in their minds, they do not ept you as their leader. Their gazes towards master are filled with doubts ¨C as though they are sure that you can¡¯t do the job well. I have been very unhappy with them for a long time!¡± said Gilbert.

    ¡°Senior, is it a little too cruel inside? We do not have enough in the Fifth Corps. If these guys couldn¡¯t bear it and lost their life inside, how are we going to find new recruits?¡± reminded Bonds after a moment of hesitation.

    Bonds was a murderous person. It was clear that he said thesepassionate words because he gave thought to Han Shuo. He feared that Han Shuo will push too hard and kill all those divine guards, making the Fifth Corps empty!

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, they will be alright!¡± assured Han Shuo. He exined smilingly, ¡°What they experience is not as intense as you three have experienced. I will gradually raise the formation¡¯s power so that they have time to adapt. These men will be the pirs of strength of our House of Han and Fifth Corps. I wouldn¡¯t let them lose their life like that!¡±

    ¡°Master, I think that in the future, we should ce all the new recruits of the Fifth Corps for a round of beating in the formation. The cruel environment will allow them to grow at the fastest rate and be the talents that our Fifth Corps need!¡± suggested Sanguis.

    ¡°That¡¯s what I thought as well. We could spend a little more time to make this ce a gymnasium specially to train divine guards. This ce is rather far from the City and so there shouldn¡¯t be much of an issue. These divine guards had no clue about how demonic formation works. They wouldn¡¯t even know what is happening when inside. We just have to ce a few energy towers and boundary towers around it as a disguise!¡± said Han Shuo smilingly.

    As the four happily chit-chatted outside the formation, inside, the divine guards of the Fifth Corps were facing perilous situations. Facing the attacks of several hundred demon generals in material state, the divine guards automatically formed defensive rings. Their coordination and rapport gradually improved. After all, it was when faced with life-threatening crises that a person will be propelled to their fullest potential.

 Chapter 756 - Remember me?

    GDK 756: Remember me?

    The Eight Destion and Torment Formation was personally operated by Han Shuo in the beginning. The task was taken over by Cauldron Spirit afterward, freeing Han Shuo from all work.

    The divine guards cried and screamed like babies as they were ruthlessly drilled in the chamber of torment. But with the passage of time, they learned to work with their teammates better. Rounds after rounds, they would be pushed to the edge of death and learn to diffuse the danger with their courage.

    Whenever they felt that their coordination and rapport had grown and the danger had been defused, they would discover how wrong they were. Cauldron Spirit kept on increasing the power of the Formation to keep on pushing the divine guards beyond their limits.

    Then,ter in time, when Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert saw that the power of the Formation had been substantially raised, they asked Han Shuo for permission to enter the Formation to temper themselves. Naturally, Han Shuo agreed. He also asked Cauldron Spirit to set up a separate region in the Formation specially for the three.

    Time flew by rapidly. A month had passed.

    Although the Eight Destion and Torment Formation were fully operated by Cauldron Spirit, Han Shuo did not leave the ce. Through the connection he had with Cauldron Spirit, Han Shuo observed his divine guards making rapid improvement inside the Formation.

    As to allow the divine guards to make even more rapid progress, after some discussion with Cauldron Spirit, Han Shuo decided to teach them some basic demonicbat formations. Thebat formations were easy to learn and master. They were essentially methods and techniques that will allow three to seven people to fight most effectively in a team.

    Following Han Shuo¡¯s instructions, Cauldron Spirit turned a demon general into Han Shuo¡¯s figure and used it to exin the principles of demonicbat formations to the divine guards inside the Formation. Thebat formations were based on the people themselves and were therefore easy to understand. After a couple of rounds of lectures, most of the divine guards figured out its principles.

    Cauldron Spirit continued with drilling the diving guards using Eight Destion and Torment Formation. When they applied the demonicbat formation they learned, they immediately noticed how effective they be at neutralizing threats as a team. With that, their enthusiasm soared. They began making more effort into mastering the uniquebat formation.

    The divine guards were unknowingly making progress inside the Formation. Under constant, immense pressure, some of them even managed to break through to a new realm. This made raised the spirits of all the divine guards. They ced all their energy on the Formation.

    Yet another month had passed. One day, a messenger delivered by Candide arrived at the valley, informing Han Shuo that Erebus and Aobashi hade to Fort Lasberg to meet him.

    Han Shuo did not want anyone to learn about the instation in the valley. Candide, knowing Han Shuo¡¯s intention, did not reveal anything about the valley to Erebus and Aobashi. After all, Erebus and Aobashi would be Han Shuo¡¯spetitors in the uingpetition. Besides, Han Shuo wanted it to be a huge surprise on the day of thepetition.

    Han Shuo was confident that with Cauldron Spirit operating the Formation, no issue would arise in the valley. Therefore, he left the valley as soon as he received the news and returned to Fort Lasberg.

    After having received the plenty amount of energy crystals from Han Shuo, Candide revamped the Han Residence in Fort Lasberg. Han Shuo saw energy towers and boundary towers covering every corner as he stepped into this tallest building in Fort Lasberg.

    Erebus and Aobashi who had been waiting in the reception lounge, as soon as they saw Han Shuo, stood up and congratted Han Shuo on bing the new Chief of Fifth Corps.

    Currently, Han Shuo¡¯s status was equally as esteemed as those of Erebus and Aobashi¡¯s. As Chiefs of Divine Guards in the City of Shadows, the three interact with each other as people of the same social ss.

    Naturally, given the friendly rtionships between the three, they would forgo most of the formalities. The two were very happy that Han Shuo had managed to secure the position. They would much rather work with Han Shuo than someone they don¡¯t like.

    ¡°What can I help you with?¡± asked Han Shuo smilingly, ¡°Oh, right, about that energy crystal deposit has the issue been settled? Did the City Lords of Hushveil City and Darksoul City give you two troubles?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t mention it. The two City Lords were mad after learning about their Chiefs¡¯ death. Not just Aobashi and I, but even the City Lord were pestered and pestered by the two,¡± Erebus shook his head, sighed, and put on a grimace, ¡°A mess as big as this cannot be resolved easily. During these past few days, the City Lord has been calling us over and over again, hastening us to resolve the issue as soon as possible. The battle of the Seven Corps is just around the corner. We are so damn upied!¡±

    ¡°If the two of you are so busy, howe you¡¯d have time to visit me?¡± asked Han Shuo puzzlingly.

    ¡°For the energy crystal mountain, of course!¡± Aobashi shot a re at Han Shuo and said, ¡°You rascal left behind a clusterfuck and walked away just like that. Do you know how sick and tired we have been in cleaning up your mess?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, the hardest work should be left to the most capable person!¡± said Han Shuo in a forced smile. He then put on a serious face and asked, ¡°Those energy crystals in the mountain are worth at least ten million ck crystal coins. How does the City Lord intend to divide it?¡±

    ¡°The City Lord¡¯s original intention was to keep all the mined crystal coins for ourselves. But the other two City Lords were incredibly furious about the deaths of the Divine Guard Chiefs and therefore unwilling to yield. Our City Lord had no choice but topromise. The three cities will share all energy crystals on the mountain equally. Of our City¡¯s share, half will go to your House of Han and the other half will go to the House of Sainte,¡± said Aobashi.

    ¡°Doesn¡¯t that mean more than half of the money goes to Hushveil and Darksoul Cities?¡± said Han Shuo in a regretful face. ¡°We had worked so hard to take down the mountain, but in the end, we have to give away arge chunk of the money just like that. Sigh.¡±

    ¡°Nobody told you to kill two Chiefs of theirs,¡± remarked Aobashi. She looked fixedly at Han Shuo with glistening eyes as though wanting to see his reaction clearly.

    ¡°They killed each other, it ain¡¯t got nothing to do with me!¡± said Han Shuo as he shrugged. ¡°Don¡¯t you nder a good man!¡±

    ¡°Hehe!¡± Aobashi giggled. She replied in a faint smile, ¡°Well, other than to inform you about the energy crystal mountain, we bring you an important intel!¡±

    ¡°Oh? What is it?¡± asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°I have received news from Chief Ralph of Second Corps that Avery is currently in Hushveil City. He seemed to be associated with Hassling, the owner of Godswamp Pharmacy. Both Avery or Hassling are your enemies. Now that the two have allied, they wille after you sooner orter. Ralph said that they seemed to be scheming against you right now. You need to be careful!¡± Aobashi¡¯s expression turned solemn. She continued, ¡°Compared to Avery, that owner of Godswamp Pharmacy will be harder to deal with. Although Godswamp Pharmacy isn¡¯t as powerful as a major family n, their stores reach every region of the Darkness Dominion. They might even be more resourceful than arge family n in gathering intel. Now that the two are actively plotting against you, you really gotta be careful!¡±

    ¡°So it turns out that Avery has joined forces with Hassling. No wonder!¡± said Han Shuo in a deep voice as he nodded.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t too worried about the threat. Hassling and Avery were both enemies of the City of Shadows. They two no longer held much of an influence in the City. As long as Han Shuo does not take a step outside of the City, there wasn¡¯t much that the two could do to him.

    Besides, even if the two came to the City for Han Shuo, he could use the Avici Godying Sword Formation against them.

    ¡°Also, the official documents have been issued. Fort Lasberg is officially your House of Han¡¯s. Make sure to put some effort into the Fort. It will be essential to your family nter on, ¡° reminded Aobashi.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I know what I ought to do!¡± said Han Shuo smilingly.

    ¡°That¡¯s all that we have to say... Oh, I almost forgot ¨C your Fifth Corps won¡¯t be joining the centennialpetition of the Seven Corps, right?¡±

    ¡°What? We will take part in it! How could we not!¡± Han Shuo said smilingly, ¡°Every Corps will be there. There¡¯s no reason for us to be absent!¡±

    Aobashi looked at Han Shuo with doubtful eyes, giggled, and said teasingly, ¡°Bryan, I have heard a thing or two about your Fifth Corps¡¯ situation. Do you have enough men to form apany? Besides, given the quality of those divine guards you have recently recruited, it¡¯s clear that your Corps will rank in the very bottom of the list!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s alright, just focus on the participation part,¡± Erebus patted on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulderughingly and said, ¡°But don¡¯t feel too upset about the results. It¡¯s only recently that your Fifth Corps has been reestablished. It¡¯s quite normal if you don¡¯t get a good ranking. When your Corps is up against our First and Third Corps, we will try to make sure that you won¡¯t lose in an embarrassing manner!¡±

    ¡°Although there¡¯s no way that we would throw a game, given how close we are, we will try to save you some face!¡± giggled Aobashi in a lovable voice. The two seemed certain that Han Shuo¡¯s Fifth Corps that was recently reestablished will lose badly in thepetition.

    <i><i>Hehe, don¡¯t be so sure! Who knew if you would end up losing instead!</i></i> sneered Han Shuo in his mind. His face, however, wore the same big cordial smile. ¡°Well then, I shall thank you both in advance!¡±

    Aobashi and Erebus did not drag the conversation any longer and said their goodbyes. Han Shuo knew that the two were very busy with work and therefore did not urge them to stay.

    ¡°Avery, Hassling, if you dare step into this City, I don¡¯t mind getting rid of the two of you!¡± Han Shuo mumbled to himself after Aobashi and Erebus left.

    Han Shuo first thought was to return to the valley and drill the divine guards. But when he recalled that Cauldron Spirit was there looking after them, there was no rush for him to return. Therefore, he spent time with Candide and others discussing matters about Fort Lasberg.

    During a discussion of the territory of Fort Lasberg, by chance, Han Shuo noticed the name ¡®Demon Mountain¡¯. The Mountain was located between Fort Lasberg and Skyorchid Fort. It was within the influence of the City of Shadows. When Han Shuo first arrived on Elysium, he and Akley obtained their first pot of gold on Demon Mountain.

    Inside the Demon Mountain, Han Shuo stumbled upon Spider Goddess Rose ¨C the evil goddess who had a conflict with Han Shuo back on Profound Continent. A series of shbacks came to his mind ¨C he remembered when Rose had nearly killed Han Shuo though Adell, when he discovered that Rose had been spreading her religion in his Brettel City via Adell, and when he spoke with Rose on the altar...

    After a moment of consideration, Han Shuo felt that he should make a trip to the Demon Mountain.

    Even if Han Shuo had no ess to Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, using the Avici Godying Sword Formation, he could fight a mid-stage highgod. Based on what he felt back then, Han Shuo guesstimate that Rose had mid-stage highgod strength. As Han Shuo was confident that he could deal with the situation and that Cauldron Spirit needed to drill those divine guards, he decided to head to the mountain alone without Cauldron Spirit.

    The Demon Mountain appeared as though a malevolent demon that stood taller than the clouds. Han Shuo expanded his consciousness as soon as he arrived. Immediately, he discovered that at the center of the mountain was a powerful life force. It was indeed the Spider Goddess Rose.

    Elysium was a material ne with many races. The non-human races could cultivate the twelve fundamental forces as humans could. They too served the twelve Overgods and had rights to live inside various Divine Dominions. There wasn¡¯t much of a difference from an average human.

    Some of the City Lords on Elysium were of non-human races. ording to the legend, a few of the twelve Overgods were non-human races. Racism was basically non-existent on Elysium. Some of the non-human races had living habits that were different from humans. Some don¡¯t like living in a dense poption. Spider Goddess Rose was one ¨C she preferred living in the remote mountain alone, unwilling to live in the City in her human form.

    If someone as powerful as Spider Goddess Rose went to the City, all four major family ns will surely scramble to hire her.

    Han Shuo felt no fear as he sensed Rose¡¯s powerful aura. He walked into the Mountain carefreely. This time around, Spider Goddess Rose was not in deep sleep. Han Shuo was discovered as soon as he set foot on the Demon Mountain.

    ¡°This is my territory. Please leave!¡± Spider Goddess Rose¡¯s voice sounded from the center of the Mountain.

    Normally speaking, before a non-human character with power like Rose settled down in the territory of the City of Shadows, they would seek the City Lord¡¯s permission. This meant that City Lord Wace should be aware of her existence. In exchange for being allowed to live on the Mountain, Rose must abide by the City¡¯s rules and not kill nearby gods as she wished.

    If Han Shuo and Akley had not stolen Rose¡¯s divine essences, Rose wouldn¡¯t have tried to kill them in fury.

    ¡°Do you still remember me, Rose?¡± Han Shuo walked into the Demon Mountain smilingly. His consciousness began transforming, changing it to match the soul signature he had back when he was still on Profound Continent!

 Chapter 757 - Surrender

    GDK 757: Surrender

    With every breakthrough in demonic arts, Han Shuo¡¯s soul characteristic would transform. When Han Shuo was still on Profound Continent, Han Shuo was nowhere as powerful as he was today. Therefore, the current ¡®appearance¡¯ of his consciousness was very much unlike that in the past.

    However, it was not at all difficult for Han Shuo to modify his soul characteristics given how miraculous his consciousness was. As he walked into the Demon Mountain, his consciousness had started to transform to imitate its previous state back when Han Shuo fought Rose on the Profound Continent.

    When Spider Goddess Rose saw that Han Shuo was still proceeding onwards even after hearing her warning, she felt annoyed and was ready to end Han Shuo¡¯s life.

    Although Rose must abide by the rules of the City of Shadows and she must not make unprovoked attacks on others, she was allowed to kill those who intrude into her territory and do not immediately leave after being warned.

    Rose was about to fill the mountain with her darkness divine energy when she suddenly heard Han Shuo asked, ¡°Remember me, Rose?¡± She immediately ceased her actions and sized up Han Shuo puzzlingly. Rose grew more and more suspicious as Han Shuo¡¯s soul characteristic transformed. Then, when the transformation wasplete, from within the cave, Rose¡¯s chilling voice sounded, ¡°So it is you!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. We have spoken with each other back on Profound Continent! What an honor that you still remember me. Very good, very good!¡± replied Han Shuo as he walked into the mountain unhurriedly, going deeper and deeper into the cave withplete disregard to the menacing danger within. Han Shuo added, ¡°Oh, right, those divine essences here that you lost here, they were taken by me. You should remember that too, right?¡±

    Rose was enraged. She sneered, ¡°So you havee here offer your soul? I¡¯d dly take it!¡±

    Multiple small spiders crawled out from the depths of the cave, went around Han Shuo and to the cave entrance behind him. The little spiders began spewing silks and sealed the opening in no time. The silk carried intense darkness divine energy.

    Han Shuo could see everything that was happening behind his back. He knew that Rose intended to kill him. However, Han Shuo did not mind her action at all as he had no need to escape.

    His stepping into the mountain was ample demonstration of his confidence!

    While the small spiders were weaving webs to seal the entrance, Han Shuo flew through the winding tunnels at rapid speed and arrived at therge cavern that metal elite zombie previously visited. At the center of the cavern covered with spider web sat Rose¡¯s enormous body. The pair of cold, ruthless eyes on her beautiful, alluring face was staring straight at Han Shuo ahead.

    Any ordinary person would find the Spider Goddess attractive for her beautiful face if one could look past her enormous body. Her face was fair and seductive looking. She had eyes that glistened like dim moonlight and full lips as red as rose. No matter from any aspect, she had the face of beauty.

    ¡°Hey Rose, just curious; Why do you, a highgod, so insisting on staying in this cave out of the reach of sunlight?¡± asked Han Shuo nonchntly after he walked into appearance with a smile and looked around the cavern.

    Rose¡¯s chilling gazes stared fixedly on Han Shuo but she did not answer Han Shuo¡¯s question. From what Rose saw, Han Shuo was just a midgod. She couldn¡¯t understand why a midgod woulde to seek death.

    Rose¡¯s heart was filled with doubts and suspicion, especially when Han Shuo had revealed not a trace of fear. Having noticed this, although she hated Han Shuo to the bones, she dared not attack recklessly.

    ¡°I havee here with the intention of settling old debts!¡± Han Shuo continued when he saw that Rose was not answering his question. He gazed at Rose smilingly and said, ¡°Back then on Profound Continent, you have nearly killed me using your ve called Adell. After that, you even had Adell defile my territory. Tell me, how do you want to settle that?¡±

    ¡°Me? Settle what?¡± Rose sneered, ¡°You had repeatedly meddled with and wrecked my ns on that low-level material n. You had even raped my follower to death! Then, aftering to this material ne, you stole my divine essences. And now you are asking me how I want to settle it? How dare you! I¡¯ll tell you how I will settle this ¨C I¡¯ll take your life!¡±

    ¡°It seems that there is no divine essence left in your cave. Sigh, guess I won¡¯t be getting much spoils of war this time,¡± said Han Shuo in a somewhat disappointed manner after he looked around the cave.

    Those words were obviously very effective in provoking Rose. She could no longer repress her fury when she recalled about the divine essences Han Shuo stole from her. At once, she let out an ear-piercing shriek that reverberated through the Mountain.

    Simultaneously, her big and sharp ws, as though enormous scimitars, came hacking at Han Shuo.

    Her darkness divine energy flowed into her sharp, glistening ws like a fluid. Simultaneously, her darkness domain of divinity was deployed. The already murky dark cavern instantly fell into absolute darkness. The element of darkness gathered towards Rose¡¯s domain of divinity from all directions. Every ray of light was consumed by darkness as the element of darkness gathered more and more.

    Seeing the bizarre performance of Han Shuo¡¯s and that fearless demeanor of his, Rose dared not take Han Shuo lightly. She put her full strength behind her first attack and had considered Han Shuo as an opponent of the same ss!

    Han Shuo stood still as he gazed straight at Rose with a calm face. It was when Rose¡¯s ws was about to reach him that he finally unfurled the seventeen flying swords.

    Following his thought, the seventeen flying swords dispersed from his back as though a peacock spreading its tail. All of Rose¡¯s hacking ws were intercepted. Not only that the flying swords were sharper than her ws, but it also carried terrifying corrosive power and chilling aura. After a burst of nking noises, Rose withdrew her ws at lightning speed.

    When the flying swords made contact with her ws, immense corrosive power and chilling aura infiltrated her body through her ws. The darkness divine energy in the w that was meant for killing Han Shuo was all used for resisting the corrosive power and chilling aura. The attack was ineffective.

    Rose was fortunate to have used all her power in the first attack instead of underestimating Han Shuo for the misleading midgod strength he presented. Otherwise, Rose would have suffered a great setback in the very first blow.

    ¡°Youngster, what energy is it that you use? Why is your vision not affected? Also, why is your divine weapon so malicious?¡± shouted Rose after withdrawing her ws.

    As soon as her ws made contact with the flying swords, she noticed the demonic yuan in them, a type of energy unfamiliar to her. She was also shocked by the malicious corrosive power and chilling aura on the flying swords. Now, after exchanging blows with Han Shuo, the more she looked at Han Shuo, the more he seemed unfathomably powerful!

    ¡°None of your business!¡± Han Shuo smiled mischievously. The seventeen flying swords hovering behind him suddenlyunched forward and went straight for Spider Goddess Rose.

    The seventeen flying swords whistled across the space,pletely unaffected by the region of absolute darkness around Rose. They began revolving around Rose in the trajectory of Avici Godying Sword Formation. As Rose possessed mid-stage highgod strength, without ess to Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, Han Shuo had to put all his strength behind the attack.

    The whistling noise made by the flying swords were ear-piercing. It was rather simr to the shrieks that Rose made. But clearly, the whistling noise made by the seventeen flying swords were much louder andsted longerpared to Rose¡¯s shriek.

    The whistling noises made Rose felt uneasy. Rose did not hesitate. Her white hair that looked like spider silks started fluttering about. Little spiders glided across her white hair and flew out. After theynded, they would crawl rapidly towards Han Shuo. There were hundreds and thousands of those little spiders. The scene would give any observer a scalp-numbing sensation.

    The little spiders held Rose¡¯s darkness divine energy. It goes without saying that getting swarmed by the spiders will not be a delightful experience!

    Afterunching the little spiders away with her long hair, her glistening ws begun waving about, forming ayer of barrier made of dark radiance around herself, firmly resisting Han Shuo¡¯s seventeen flying swords.

    Rose was afraid of the terrifying corrosiveness of Han Shuo¡¯s seventeen flying swords. She did not forget to defend against the flying swords while using the little spiders to attack Han Shuo.

    Although Han Shuo currently could not deploy ¡®Ceaseless Pain¡¯ as he could not borrow Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, defending against the most basic form of Avici Godying Sword Formation would still be very challenging, especially when the seventeen flying swords carried immense corrosive power and chilling aura.

    <i><i>Cling! ng!</i></i> The seventeen flying swords struck on the barrier Rose formed by waving her ws. The corrosive power and chilling aura of the seventeen flying swords were consuming Rose¡¯s darkness divine energy at an astonishing rate. It caused Rose to be in tremendous pain!

    Rose wailed in her heart. She repeatedlymanded the hundreds and thousands of little spiders, asking them to quickly nibble Han Shuo to death.

    Han Shuo sneered when he saw the chirping little spiders rushing towards him, ¡°Rushing to seek death? Okay!¡±

    Han Shuo casually grabbed a handful of Green Hypergolic Dust and threw it at the little spiders. As soon as the Dust made contact, the little spiders started burning with bright green mes. The Green Hypergolic Dust could set anything on fire. The hundreds and thousands of little spiders that were closely gathered were all set on fire when sprinkled by the Dust.

    The Green Hypergolic Dust was also a malicious demonic weapon. Against those little spiders with mediocre vitality, the Green Hypergolic Dust was like an atomic bomb. As the green mes ttered their bodies, the little spiders would chirp and squeal in pain. The air was filled with the smell of something charring.

    Spider Goddess Rose had her hope ced on the swarm of little spiders. When she saw that they were set on fire, her face jolted and her heart ached.

    ¡°I will kill you!¡± Rose let out yet another shriek as the little spiders were reduced into tiny dark chars in the sea of green mes. Suddenly, the enormous spider web that enveloped the entire cavern started swaying and covered down at Han Shuo. As the spider web covered a big area and it covered down at high speed too suddenly, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t react in time.

    Han Shuo was shrouded by the enormous spider web. The spider silks were alive and nimble. They would tighten and constrict around Han Shuo. A momentter, Han Shuo was tightly wrapped in spider web.

    Rose, whose divine energy was being rapidly drained in defending against the seventeen flying swords, immediately sneered in a loud voice when she saw that Han Shuo was firmly trapped in her spider web. ¡°Youngster, you are so dead!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Rose injected her darkness divine energy into the cavern. With the help of her darkness domain of divinity that enveloped the entire cavern, her darkness divine energy flowed into the spider silks wrapping around Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body. They became even tougher and durable after being reinforced with the darkness divine energy.

    While a portion of the spider silk trapped Han Shuo firmly, a small portion of it loosened up before shooting towards Han Shuo like sharp needles.

    The Omen Invincible Body automatically deployed. The demonic art which Han Shuo had mastered to the second level was astonishing in its defensive power. The needle-like spider silks that went stabbing on Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body seemed to have met an indestructible object. Sharp and clear ringing noises were heard but the spider silks couldn¡¯t even pierce Han Shuo¡¯s skin.

    ¡°Impossible!¡± shrieked Rose. She did not expect Han Shuo¡¯s body to be so tough and her mind was thrown into small chaos.

    <i><i>Ting! Ting! Ting!... </i></i> Unwilling to admin failure so quickly, Rose continued sending more spider silks to stab Han Shuo. However, Han Shuo remainedpletely unharmed.

    Although Han Shuo couldn¡¯t escape from the spider silks, he remained calm and continue to attack Rose by maneuvering the seventeen flying swords. He even remarked in a contemptuous tone, ¡°Stop wasting your energy. These spider silks can¡¯t hold nearly enough divine energy to do me harm!¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t believe that every inch of your body is impregnable!¡± yelled Rose. The spider silks began crawling towards Han Shuo¡¯s ears, nose, eyes, and every other orifice!

    ¡°Then I will convince you!¡± Han Shuo put on a faint smile. Then, using the insane control he had over his physical body, he started modifying his ears, nostrils, and other parts of his body. Small lumps of flesh suddenly sealed his orifices shut. The spider silks could do nothing to him.

    If this attack of Rose¡¯snded on other gods, even Erebus and Aobashi, experts of the same strength as Rose, they would suffer injuries from head to toe, and very likely lose their life.

    But unfortunately for Rose, her opponent was Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo¡¯s main body was incredibly tough in the first ce. On top of that, after having reached the second level in his cultivation of Invincible Omen Body, the defensive power of his body had grown substantially. In addition, as the spider silks couldn¡¯t hold too much darkness divine energy, Rose was not able to injure Han Shuo.

    Rose felt as though she had met a monster after discovering that not only was Han Shuo invulnerable from head to toe, but he could even control his nostrils and ear canals with his mind. Naturally, she had never met a demonic art cultivator before. She never imagined that a person could possess such absolute control over their body.

    Seeing that her attacks were ineffective, having exhausted arge amount of her divine energy to defend against the flying swords, the thought of retreating crept into her mind.

    With the seventeen flying swords going around, Rose could not get close to Han Shuo to injure him. Seeing that Han Shuo was firmly restrained by her spider silks, she thought that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t do much to stop her from leaving. Now would be the perfect opportunity to escape!

    ¡°Youngster, I will remember you. Not going to keep youpany any longer. But I will look for you to get my revenge sooner orter!¡± said Rose after she shot a re at Han Shuo with her chilling, sinister eyes.

    Seeing that Rose wanted to leave, Han Shuo started to struggle free of the spider silks wrapping him. However, Han Shuo could not exert his full strength as the seventeen flying swords needed the support of his demonic yuan. As the spider silks were reinforced with Rose¡¯s darkness divine energy and there wereyers wrapped around him, he could not immediately free himself.

    ¡°Our battle today is only a draw. I have spent too much divine energy and there are a few attacks that I couldn¡¯t deploy. Next time, next time I¡¯ll get you!¡± said Rose as she tried to leave.

    Although Rose said that it was a draw, she knew in her heart that she had lost. If she does not leave, not only that she had no way of injuring Han Shuo, but her divine energy would be exhausted by the seventeen flying swords sooner orter. When that happens, she will be dead without a doubt.

    ¡°You cannot escape, Rose!¡± After wriggling a few times and unable to free himself, Han Shuo sent one of the flying swords attacking Rose back to himself to cut away the spider silks rapidly.

    The spider silks were indeed quite tough. Each sh of the sword could only cut a few threads. It would take some time to cut away all the spider silks with just one flying sword.

    However, Rose clearly won¡¯t wait for Han Shuo. After one of the flying swords flew off, the pressure on Rose decreased substantially. Not wasting any words with Han Shuo, she ran for the exit while defending herself against the sixteen flying swords. She would strike on the cave wall with her ws and causerge rocks to fall and block the flying swords.

    With his thought, Han Shuo had all remaining sixteen flying swords fly back to him. The seventeen flying swords then rapidly revolved around him to cut off the spider threads.

    Soon enough, Han Shuo was free. He expanded his consciousness and instantly sensed the direction Rose was escaping towards. He immediately activate the Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens and went after her. Rose had consumed an enormous amount of her divine energy. It was the best time to eliminate her. If Han Shuo was to missout on the opportunity, it wouldn¡¯t be easy to find her again.

    Although Rose was fast, Han Shuo was even faster. When she was just a few hundred kilometers away from the Mountain, Han Shuo was standing in her path. Without a word, he deployed the seventeen flying swords. The moment that Rose was trapped by the flying swords, he charged towards Rose with the Demonyer Edge in his hand.

    ¡°Wait! Actually, there is no hostility between us that cannot be resolved. I don¡¯t want those divine essences anymore!¡± Rose had truly lost her head when she saw Han Shuo charging towards her ferociously but she couldn¡¯t win and couldn¡¯t run. Her tone began to soften up.

    Han Shuo did not budge. His eyes continue to stare fixedly at Rose and his face remained callous. It was clear that Han Shuo was not letting her off.

    ¡°I surrender. I will be your servant!¡± Rose cried out in panic when she saw Han Shuo remained staunch on killing her.

 Chapter 758 - Threats and promises

    GDK 758: Threats and promises

    The seventeen flying swords revolving around Rose stopped moving abruptly. The swords overflowing with bone-chilling aura were all pointing straight at her. Rose felt numb from head to toe. Her mind was in a big mess.

    Han Shuo, wielding the Demonyer Edge in his hand and wearing a callous expression on his face, slowly stepped towards Rose. With his eyes staring fixedly at Rose, Han Shuo asked in a calm voice, ¡°Why should I trust you?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s Fifth Corps was currently on a shortage of manpower and he had no assistant of highgod strength. An expert of Rose¡¯s ss would be highly sought after by any powerhouse. At present, in the House of Han, Han Shuo was the only expert of highgod strength. If Rose would surrender and serve him, the strength of his House of Han would raise tremendously.

    Although it was true that he had a feud with Rose, when Han Shuo thought of it carefully, he realized that Rose had not inflicted harm to those around him. He had been winning every conflict they had.

    Facing the seventeen flying swords spewing chilling aura and under Han Shuo¡¯s menacing gazes, Rose appeared rather anxious. She hastily replied, ¡°There isn¡¯t much animosity between us ¨C nothing irreconcble. There is no need to kill for some minor friction over in a low-level material ne!¡±

    ¡°I am asking, why should I trust that you would be my servant and serve me sincerely?¡± asked Han Shuo in cold voice. He raised the Demonyer Edge and pointed it at Rose as though hinting that he will butcher away if he doesn¡¯t hear what he wanted to hear.

    Rose knew that she must give Han Shuo a satisfying answer or she will surely die!

    shes of lights came from her eyes as she rapidly turned over in her mind for an answer. After a moment of hesitation, she replied, ¡°I will give my oath in the name of the Darkness Overgod!¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t believe in oaths!¡± shouted Han Shuo coldly. ¡°Give me something more tangible!¡±

    Rose put on an astringent expression on her beautiful human face. She said in a disheartened manner, ¡°Do you have a better idea?¡±

    Han Shuo kept silent for a moment before he answered, ¡°Open up your soul. We will form a master-ve contract!¡±

    Rose was shocked. For the master-ve contract to form, one party mustpletely surrender their soul to the other party. After the master-ve contract isplete, the master could end the ve¡¯s life with just one though. Once bound by the contract, there would be no trick that Rose could y.

    ¡°You will either die, or you will surrender your divine soul and form a master-ve contract with me!¡± Han Shuo knew that Rose wasn¡¯t sincere in surrendering. He put on an impatient face. The Demonyer Edge in his hand and the flying swords started glistening brightly as they gradually pressed on towards Rose.

    As the swords inched closer and closer towards Rose, the fear showing on her face became more and more pronounced. Rose even felt as though the space around her had been frozen still. The seventeen flying swords were releasing some kind of bizarre energy that was slowly cutting away her escape route.

    A highgod usually had their own unique method of escaping during an emergency. Naturally, it woulde at a cost. Using the lifeline might severely injure their body or perhaps consume an outstanding, invaluable highgod weapon. Han Shuo believed that Rose too had an emergency escape method.

    Rose being so hesitant in deploying the escape method could only mean that using it will cause her tremendous harm. As Han Shuo approached step by step, he secretly controlled the seventeen flying swords to release imprisoning energy. The region surrounded by the seventeen flying swords was filled with chaotic energy, cutting Rose away from any possibility of escaping.

    When Rose sensed the bizarre fluctuation of the space around her, she felt as though she had hoisted her own petard. Her n was to pretend to surrender and find an opportunity to escape. However, she had failed to anticipate that Han Shuo would be so treacherous to cut away all her hope of escaping.

    ¡°Rose, don¡¯t waste time anymore. No matter what tricks you had up your sleeves, they are now all useless!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s cold and indifferent voice sounded, ¡°While you were hesitating and trying to buy time, I have cut off all your means of escaping. Now, you have just two choices: You can perish, or you can surrender me your soul and ept a master-ve contract!¡±

    Rose listened to Han Shuo¡¯s words with tearless grief. Her mind was thrown into a great panic when she sensed chilling killing intenting from Han Shuo.

    She was unwilling to be any person¡¯s ve. She knew that once the master-ve contract was formed, she will lose her freedom for the rest of her life and be reduced to a tool of Han Shuo¡¯s. However, if she does not surrender, she will lose her life altogether. Rose was torn between the equally difficult choices given to her.

    Han Shuo, staring coldly at Rose, slowly moved the Demonyer Edge towards Rose in a threatening manner as he shouted, ¡°Do you really want to die?¡±

    This shout of his was extremely ear-piercing. Han Shuo had in fact utilized Demonic Siren, a unique demonic technique. His voice, carrying miraculous energy that could hypnotize a person, surged into Rose¡¯s mind and soul.

    Had it been used at any other moment, the Demonic Siren would not be effective on Rose. However, as Rose was current in a rattled and flustered state of mind, the Demonic Siren worked like a charm.

    The indecisive Rose was immediately affected by the hypnotic power of Demonic Siren. At once, she shrieked, ¡°I surrender!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Rose surrendered her divine soul, giving up all control to Han Shuo. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness entered deep into her soul without the slightest resistance and tied the two into the most unfair contract in the world.

    Glistening dark radiances shed in Rose¡¯s eyes as the two stared at each other in the eye. A momentter, the process waspleted. An imprint was formed within Rose¡¯s divine soul. It was connected to Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. Han Shuo now had the ability to end her life with just a thought.

    ¡°I, I... ¡° Rose sensed that something was wrong as soon as the master-ve contract was formed. She looked at Han Shuo in a frightened face and shrieked, ¡°What, what have you done to me?!¡±

    Han Shuo shrugged. With a big smile on his face, he answered, ¡°Form a master-ve contract with you, of course!¡± He withdrew the Demonyer Edge and the seventeen flying swords to show that he was no longer hostile towards Rose.

    ¡°Ahhhh!!!¡± Rose screamed in pain. Her sharp ws started fluttering about violently. It seemed that she was having trouble epting the fact.

    Han Shuo watched as Rose, who was in deranged mode, chopped off all the towering trees in the mountain range with her wild ws. Sands and rocks were sent flying. A wide area was ttened and deforested.

    Han Shuo had merely been watching at her violent act smilingly all along. After the master-ve contract was formed, there was nothing Rose could do to reverse it. From that point onwards, she will be a loyal servant of the House of Han. It would be a wonder if Han Shuo doesn¡¯t feel happy about getting a highgod servant.

    After going crazy for some time, Rose gradually calmed down. Under Han Shuo¡¯s smiling gazes, her enormous spider body gradually shrunk while her sharp ws slowly disappeared into her body. Her head and face, however, remained the same.

    A brief momentter, Spider Goddess Rose had transformed into a young woman who had a pair of long and slender legs. Her monstrous spider body had turned into a curvaceous female human body which,bined with her beautiful face and the exotic, seductive aura she gave off, made her incredibly attractive.

    She wore a dark, skin-tight gown with mysterious patterns, highlighting the wless curves on her body. As if she was not eye-catching enough, she had a head full of long and white hair that had the luster of spider silks.

    Han Shuo had trouble associating the beauty standing proudly before him with the enormous human-faced spider he saw just a moment ago.

    ¡°What, what did you do to me?¡± Rose asked while ring at Han Shuo resentfully. Her eyes were still as chilling and cold as before.

    ¡°Er... I bound you under a master-ve contract,¡± Han Shuo was in a daze. After quickly shaking his head to wake himself up, he remarked, ¡°Wow, I almost couldn¡¯t recognize you after you transform to your human form!¡±

    ¡°No, before forming the master-ve contract!¡± Rose looked at Han Shuo with resentful eyes and said in a cold voice, ¡°You must have done something to me! Otherwise, there¡¯s no way I will ept a master-ve contract so easily. I get an intense feeling that something isn¡¯t right after the contract was formed!¡±

    Highgods were, after all, highgods. Even in a flustered state of mind, their minds would remain extremely vignt. Had her mind not been in that spiritless state, the Demonic Siren wouldn¡¯t have worked on Rose. Aftering to her senses, she immediately realized that something was amiss. She might have sensed that Han Shuo had used some dirty tricks on her.

    ¡°First of all, call me master!¡± reminded Han Shuo coldly. He added, ¡°Now that the master-ve contract has formed, you are my ve and I¡¯m your master. So you better start addressing me properly!¡±

    A master-ve contract doesn¡¯t just allow the master to kill the ve at will, it also forms a bizarre connection between the two parties. Rose stared at Han Shuo in an aggrieved manner and Han Shuo stared back at her with cold eyes. As Han Shuo was now her master, Rose soon admitted defeat. Although unwilling, in the end, she called in a low voice, ¡°Master.¡±

    ¡°Good!¡± Han Shuo nodded and said, ¡°A ve should not question their master. Let¡¯s go, we will leave the Demon Mountain. From today onwards, you, Rose, is no longer a Spider Goddess, but a humble servant of my House of Han. You better forget your original identity as soon as possible.¡±

    Rose stared at Han Shuo with her bright and cold eyes while her sexy, full lips pursed up lightly. It appeared that she had note to terms with her new identity. As someone who was arrogant in character, she instinctively loathed her new lowly appetion.

    Throughout the endless years she had been alive, she had been proud and tall. Even when she faced highgods stronger than she was, she had never suffered such humiliation. But now, she was cast from her high throne and became a ve to a puny god from a low-level material ne she previously deemed insignificant. She couldn¡¯t feel more sullen when she thought of it.

    Han Shuo had clearly observed the emotions showing on Rose¡¯s face. He knew that it was impossible to make the highgod serve him sincerely within a short time. But fortunately for Han Shuo, the master-ve contract had been formed and Han Shuo had plenty of time. Therefore, he did not mind it too much.

    ¡°Right, I¡¯m very curious about your escape technique. If I did not imprison the space, how will you escape?¡± Han Shuo turned to Rose following closely behind him and asked while they were heading to Fort Lasberg.

    Rose suddenly seemed rather coy. She avoided Han Shuo¡¯s eyes and asked in a low voice, ¡°Can I not answer that?¡±

    ¡°Nope!¡± replied Han Shuo.

    She red at Han Shuo angrily before she exined, ¡°I can use my hair to escape. But doing that will cause my divine energy to fall back and all my hair to fall off. I will be bald!¡±

    ¡°Are you more afraid of losing your divine energy or your hair?¡±

    ¡°My hair, of course!¡± replied Rose immediately. She looked at Han Shuo coldly and added, ¡°If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that I will look ugly without hair, how would I be restrained by you and be reduced to this state!¡±

    <i><i>Indeed, women will be women. Even alien females are bound by the same, universal tendencies.</i></i> thought Han Shuo as he shook his head. He was left betweenughter and tears. It turned out that Rose was afraid of losing her hair that she spent too much time hesitation and lost the chance of escaping. How baffling!

    However, it was worth noting that other than her pair of slender and long legs, her snowy-white long hair was most pleasant to the eyes. Her smooth and lustrous white hairbined with her coquettish face and beautiful legs made her look incredibly seductive.

    ¡°Where are you bringing me?¡± asked Rose as she followed behind Han Shuo.

    ¡°Fort Lasberg,¡± replied Han Shuo calmly.

    ¡°Can I not go?¡± Rose hesitated and said in a soft voice, ¡°I don¡¯t like ces with lots of people.¡±

    ¡°You muste with me,¡± Han Shuo out on a faint smile and said, ¡°Preference can be changed. From now on, you must try to get used to it. Just follow me, do whatever I ask you to do, and don¡¯t give me nonsense. If I¡¯m happy with your performance, I will nullify our master-ve contract after one hundred years.¡±

    Rose had been wearing a reluctant and unwilling face all along. But when she heard that Han Shuo will nullify the contract after one hundred years, her eyes lit up. In a somewhat excited tone, she asked, ¡°Is that for real? You will nullify our master-ve after one hundred years?¡±

    For gods like Rose, one hundred years was a very short duration. She became excited when she heard that regaining freedom was not far away.

    Han Shuo nodded and said smilingly, ¡°That depends on your performance. If your performance is up to my satisfaction in theing one hundred years, I will surely honor the promise.¡±

    ¡°Alright then, I will follow you to ces with lots of people. I only hope that you will honor your words!¡± Rose agreed straightforwardly.

    ¡°Good, that¡¯s the spirit. Don¡¯t worry, I will give you freedom after a hundred years!¡± assured Han Shuo solemnly. Though one hundred years was a short time for Rose, it was plenty enough to achieve many things for Han Shuo. Besides, Rose might decide to stay in the House of Han after regaining her freedom.

 Chapter 759 - Off to kill

    GDK 759: Off to kill

    ***Fort Lasberg, House of Han.

    Han Shuo had not been away for too long. After returning to Fort Lasberg, he discovered that not many changes had happened.

    Evidently, Rose did not like being around others. She had been following behind Han Shuo in silence all along. She did not reveal a tad of interest in the scenery or the people there. She was as quiet as a stone.

    Candide and others had been working hard for Fort Lasberg. These people who had the experiences of managing a city showed great enthusiasm in fulfilling their great responsibilities. Using the energy stones that Han Shuo provided, they had powered up several additional energy towers and boundary towers near the city gates, improving the defenses of Fort Lasberg.

    Han Shuo only stayed in his Han Residence for a short time. Seeing that everything was operating smoothly, he left for the valley where his Fifth Corps divine guards were being drilled.

    The Eight Destion and Torment Formation was currently being operated by Cauldron Spirit. Chilling wind was blowing and killing intent was raging. Colorful streaks of lights crisscrossed within the formation. Miserable howls could be hearding from within. The divine guards were being ruthlessly tempered by Cauldron Spirit. They had not cked for even a moment.

    There were several dozens of divine guards sitting cross-legged outside the Formation. The seemed to be concentrating on something. Strange radiances would sh across their bodies every once in a while. Their domains of divinity were deployed but were kept separated from each other.

    Han Shuo knew from the first nce that those divine guards must have gained substantial improvement in their willpower and acquired new insights into the energies they cultivated in after being tormented and tempered in the Formation. As to allow these people to further improve in strength, Cauldron Spirit had kicked them out from the Formation, allowing them to carefully and calmly digest andprehend the new understandings they acquired.

    Gilbert was among those people. He was sitting cross-legged on a boulder. The usual day cheekiness on his face was reced with serenity and solemness. Gilbert had not been on Elysium for long and was only in early-stage lowgod realm. At this stage, it was very easy for him to make breakthroughs in his cultivation of the element of darkness. Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t be surprised if Gilbert managed to make a breakthrough after being sharpened inside the Formation.

    Spider Goddess Rose who had been following behind Han Shuo without a word appeared rather astonished after arriving at the valley. Before she stepped into it, she noticed that there wereyers of boundaries concealing it. An average person with mediocre strength wouldn¡¯t be able to learn the situation inside easily. And after entering the valley, Rose became even more astonished. She was very curious about the bizarre energy inside the Eight Destion and Torment Formation. After carefully releasing a strand of her darkness divine energy to probe it, she discovered that the aura inside the Formation was somewhat simr to that of Han Shuo¡¯s.

    Han Shuo turned to shot a nce at Rose. He put on a faint smile and asked, ¡°What is it?¡±

    ¡°Not- nothing!¡± Rose replied in a flurry. But after looking at the surroundings, she hesitantly asked, ¡°What is that thing for? I can sense your aura in there!¡±

    ¡°For training,¡± Han Shuo pointed at the Formation and exined, ¡°Inside is my Fifth Corps divine guards. Their strengths need to be improved. I want them to adapt to the most hostile environment at the fastest rate. Therefore, I have ced them inside to face dangers.¡±

    ¡°This structure can temper your men?¡± Rose was rather surprised. Although she could sense there were dangers inside, she knew nothing about the wonderful uses of demonic formations.

    Han Shuo smiled but did not reply. He beganmunicating with Cauldron Spirit.

    ¡°Master, these fes are pretty good materials. Most of them have mastered tactical formations for fighting alongside each other. A portion of them made a series of breakthroughs after facing life-threatening dangers. It seems that all of them have great potential. Your three apprentices, especially, had been advancing at lightning speed. They are indeed worthy of being called demonic arts cultivators!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart was filled with delight after hearing Cauldron Spirit¡¯s report. He was immensely proud of Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert. The three will be Han Shuo¡¯s most heavily relied upon henchmen in the future. The stronger they be, the happier Han Shuo would be.

    The Fifth Corps bing mighty would mean that the House of Han willpletely free itself from being known as merely a feeble merchant family n. However, that cannot be aplished no matter how powerful Han Shuo¡¯s strength was. His House of Han must have more than just one highgod. He must fill his family n with numerous powerful experts, just like the House of Sainte.

    ¡°Keep on drilling them!¡± Han Shuo instructed Cauldron Spirit. After thinking for a bit, Han Shuo asked, ¡°Instead of either one of us controlling and managing the Formation, can we use the demon general made using highgod soul to do the job?¡±

    The Eight Destion and Torment Formation was incredibly beneficial to the lowgods and midgods. After having discovered the efficacy of the Formation, Han Shuo thought that Stratholme, Phobe, Emily, and the others should all step into it for a round of tempering. He believed that it would be greatly beneficial for them.

    Han Shuo asked the question because he and Cauldron Spirit cannot stay and oversee the Formation all the time.

    ¡°Yes, it will work, but the efficacy of the Formation will be greatly reduced,¡± replied Cauldron Spirit. After a short pause, it added, ¡°But even a low-quality Formation is more than enough to temper low-level gods. If master¡¯s intention is to train those who came from Profound Continent, the Formation will be powerful enough!¡±

    Han Shuo became at ease after hearing Cauldron Spirit¡¯s words. He intended to have members of his House of Han to enter the Formation after his divine guards were done with it.

    However, this valley was more than a dozen days away from the City of Shadows. It would be rather inconvenient to go back and forth. Han Shuo began considering if he should dismantle the Formation and rebuild it in one of the gymnasiums in the Han Residence at the City.

    Time flew by rapidly. Half a year had passed.

    Seeing that thepetition between the Seven Corps was right around the corner, Han Shuo finallymanded Cauldron Spirit to power down the Eight Destion and Torment Formation and had all the divine guards to exit.

    During that short span of half-a-year, a few more divine guards managed to gain new profound insight into the energies they cultivated in. The close to one hundred divine guards had been staying in the Formation for more than a year. During that time, they were presented with all kinds of dangers at every moment. When they exited the Formation, their faces looked grave, stern, and they carried an air of calmness. It was as though they had braved through countless wars and battles.

    The divine guards had gained a brand new demeanor after just one year. Not only that their strengths had greatly improved, but their hearts and minds had also grown very tenacious. They had learned not to easily give up no matter how grave the challenges they face. They would not tremble in fear even when they stand before a highgod.

    After exiting the Formation, the gazes of these divine guards when they looked at Han Shuo hadpletely changed. The former vignce and doubtful lights were reced with sincere admiration and reverence.

    Before this, the divine guards did not think that Han Shuo could lead them. But with the Eight Destion and Torment Formation, they realized just how miraculous Han Shuo was. Even till now, these people had no clue how the terrifying scenes they experienced were made, although they were very sure that Han Shuo was responsible for it.

    It was more than enough to make the divine guards have faith and confidence in Han Shuo and for Han Shuo to earn their respect.

    Particrly, those divine guards who managed to make breakthroughs after the training felt sincere gratefulness towards Han Shuo. These gods living on Elysium usually needed endless years and ages to make a small advancement in their cultivation. They knew very well just how much they had gained from the fierce training.

    Gilbert, after waking up from his meditation, looked puzzlingly at Rose who was standing beside Han Shuo. He asked, ¡°Master, who is this white-haireddy? Is she you new woman?¡±

    Chilling radiance shed in Rose¡¯s eyes. A strand of her hair flew out at lightning speed towards Gilbert. Before Gilbert could react, the strand of hair that could seemingly stretch out to infinite length had tightly wrapped him. He was lifted into the air and mmed to the ground.

    Gilbert cried out in pain and shouted, ¡°Ouch! White-haireddy, what are you doing?!¡±

    Radiances shone in Sanguis and Bonds¡¯ eyes. They looked at Rose wearing an apathetic expression with great astonishment. Their minds automatically became cautious to thisdy who was outstanding in both looks and strength.

    Both Sanguis and Bonds knew Gilbert¡¯s strength. After seeing that Rose could subdue Gilbert with just one strand of her hair, they knew they stood no chance against Rose. They were puzzled why an expert with such power was with Han Shuo.

    ¡°My hair is silver, not white!¡± Rose looked at Gilbert coldly and said, ¡°And I¡¯m not his new woman!¡±

    Gilbert regained his feet grumpily. He knew he wasn¡¯t Rose¡¯s match. He grumbled, ¡°If you are not my master¡¯s woman, then who are you?¡±

    Rose hesitated for a moment. After taking a quick peep at the smiling Han Shuo out of the corner of her eyes, she replied in a reluctant manner, ¡°Same as you, his servant,¡±

    ¡°Oh?¡± cried Gilbert. ¡°A servant, I see. Hehe, with such a beautiful servant, I¡¯m sure my master will have a really good time!¡± said Gilbert loudly as he put on a suggestive smirk. The divine guards around Gilbert also smirked after hearing those words.

    ¡°You!¡± Rose had obviously made it out what Gilbert¡¯s words actually meant and she could tell what were on the divine guards¡¯ minds from their vile expressions. Her face turned cold and was about to flip out again.

    ¡°Enough!¡± yelled Han Shuo lightly. He instructed the divine guards, ¡°You will all return to the City of Shadows.¡±

    ¡°My Lord, are you not returning with us?¡± asked Barnard immediately. After a year of training in the Formation and experiencing a lot of hardships, his strength had substantially improved. He began to feel a deep sense of respect for Han Shuo.

    ¡°There are some matters I must deal with. I will be returning soon after. Right, you will lead the Company while I¡¯m away,¡± answered Han Shuo.

    ¡°As you bid, my Lord!¡± Barnard saluted Han Shuo and led thepany of divine guards back to the City. They were reluctant to leave the Eight Destion and Torment Formation. For the divine guards, the year they spent inside the Formation filled with dangers was one of the most memorable experiences in their lives.

    After the divine guards left, Han Shuo said to Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert, ¡°Dismantle the Formation with me. Make sure not to leave anything behind as we will be reinstalling the Formation back in the Han Residence.¡±

    Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert were Han Shuo¡¯s very core trusted aides. The three had some understanding of the demonic art Han Shuo cultivated in. Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t trust anyone else with the task.

    After hearing Han Shuo¡¯s instruction, the three immediately got to work. Every st and rock were picked up and put away. The unique and special materials were picked out and removed most carefully, lest the materials be damaged.

    After removing the Formation, Han Shuo and his apprentices proceeded with removing all trace and evidence of what had taken ce in the valley. Han Shuo made certain that not the tiniest hint could be found in the valley before he instructed his three apprentices, ¡°Return to the City without me. I will be back before thepetition begins.¡±

    ¡°Master, where are you going?¡±

    ¡°Master, bring your dark dragon along!¡± Sanguis and Gilbert said simultaneously. Bonds did not say a word but it was clear from his eyes that he too wanted to go with Han Shuo.

    ¡°I¡¯m going to take care of a hidden threat. The situation will not allow me to bring you along. It is only when you have the strength to kill highgods that I could be at ease with bringing you in and out of dragon¡¯s dens.¡± refused Han Shuo smilingly.

    After hearing Han Shuo¡¯s rejection, the three seemed somewhat disheartened. However, there was nothing they could do about the harsh reality and so they headed back to the City.

    Han Shuo, however, did not return to the City of Shadows. He headed in the direction of Hushveil City with Rose.

    ¡°What are you up to?¡± Rose asked as soon as she realized that Han Shuo was not heading towards the City of Shadows. Doubts could be seen in her cold and clear eyes.

    ¡°We are going to assassinate people!¡± Han Shuo turned around, grinned, and said, ¡°We will go to Hushveil City to kill several characters who poses a threat to my family n.¡±

    Han Shuo was determined to eliminate Avery after Aobashi and Erebus informed Han Shuo of his whereabouts. He was even further motivated to do so after learning that Avery had ganged up with Hassling.

    Just as Aobashi had warned, Avery and Hassling will never make peace with the House of Han. The two possessed outstanding strengths and Hassling was even the master of the enormous Godswamp Pharmacy. For as long as these great potential threats remained alive, Han Shuo would feel as if he had a pin in his throat. Although Han Shuo wasn¡¯t afraid of attacks from Avery and Hassling, he was worried about the members of his family n. There was no way he could ensure the safety of all his family n members from a sudden strike in the dark by the two.

    Therefore, given the circumstances, Han Shuo¡¯s most optimal course of action was to eliminate the threats before they could strike!

    After all, Han Shuo currently had the strength to do so!

    Both Hassling and Avery were in Hushveil City. Hassling was a VIP in Hushveil City highly regarded by their City Lord. Han Shuo knew that assassinating the two in Hushveil City wouldn¡¯t be easy. Although Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert had been rapidly advancing in strength, they had yet to reach highgod realm. Without highgod strengths, not only that they won¡¯t be able to assist Han Shuo in Hushveil City, they might burden him. Therefore, Han Shuo was resolute in not bringing the three.

    Rose, however, was unlike them. She possessed mid-stage highgod strength. Even if theynd in a predicament in Hushveil City, Rose could easily escape and keep up with Han Shuo. Besides, being about the observe his surroundings using demon generals, Han Shuo believed that Hushveil City couldn¡¯t stop him.

    ¡°Who?¡± Rose wasn¡¯t a kindhearted person as well. She did not reveal a trace of shock to hear Han Shuo¡¯s words. In fact, she seemed perfectly indifferent to it.

    ¡°You¡¯ll know when the timees!¡± replied Han Shuo smilingly.

    Fort Lasberg was on the outermost perimeter of the City of Shadows¡¯ influence and was rtively close to Hushveil City. The two did not converse during the journey but travelled in silence. After a few days, the two crossed the vast border between the two cities and stepped into soil under Hushveil City¡¯s influence.

    Like the City of Shadow, Hushveil City had big and small forts and settlements surrounding the City itself. After stepping into the City¡¯s sphere of influence, Han Shuo started acting more prudently. The two deliberately avoided crowds and divine guards from Hushveil City as to avoid unnecessary troubles.

    As a highgod, the terrifying aura Rose gave off was all too menacing. It was under Han Shuo¡¯s strong demand that Rose withdrew her forbidding aura so that the lowgods and midgods wouldn¡¯t be so terrified and on the alert around her.

    Han Shuo¡¯s ability in concealing aura far surpassed Rose¡¯s. He could easily disguise his strength just by not using the demonic yuan in his body and allow the aura of his midgod strength avatars to escape. If not even Rose could discover his actual strength, then an average lowgod and midgods would have no chance of discovering just how terrifying Han Shuo really was.

    After travelling for eighteen days in the territories of Hushveil City, Han Shuo and Rose finally arrived at the city gate of the City.

    The name on Han Shuo¡¯s divine tablet was Bryan. As there were many gods on Elysium, it was not umon to find gods with the same name. The divine guards at Hushveil City had not even expect that this Bryan was in fact the master of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy that had been all the rage in the Darkness Dominion. They let Han Shuo into the just like that.

    Although Rose did not like crowded ces, like every other gods, she too had her own divine tablet. Moreover, her divine tablet was different from Han Shuo¡¯s ¨C much more simple and unadorned. The Hushveil City divine guards seemed somewhat respectful when receiving and handling Rose¡¯s divine tablet. Even his words sounded much more courteous ¨C entirely different from the arrogant treatment that Han Shuo received.

    Rose stepped into the City proudly with her head held high and tall. ¡°My divine tablet is of the most ancient variant. Gods with this kind of divine tablet who are alive even till now usually have great strengths! No matter on any location on Elysium, the divine guards would give the most respectful treatment to those with powerful strength!¡± Rose seemed rather proud when she said those words. It was as though she was secretly delighted and had regained some dignity when she had received better treatment than her master.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t mind it at all. He nodded with a faint smile and said, ¡°Then you should be very clear about the situation on Elysium. Very good. When there¡¯s time, tell me all about the ancient stories about Elysium. I¡¯m interested in them.¡±

    ¡°No problem!¡± agreed Rose. She was rather astonished that Han Shuo would seek for her knowledge.

    <i><i>Hmm, so he does have one thing that is worthy of praise, after all.</i></i>

 Chapter 760 - Approached by a beauty

    GDK 760: Approached by a beauty

    *** At Hushveil City, one of the seven major cities of the Darkness Dominion.

    Han Shuo and Rose walked shoulder to shoulder across the streets of Hushveil City. The situation in Hushveil City wasn¡¯t all too different from that of the City of Shadows. Every god there were focused on improving their strengths. Divine weapon shops, divine scroll shops, energy crystals shops, and gymnasiums lined most of the streets.

    The Godswamp Pharmacy was popr in Hushveil City, almost as popr as Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was in the City of Shadows. They were thergest pharmacy chains in their cities. Han Shuo learned the location of Godswamp Pharmacy headquarters after asking some random god walking down the street for direction.

    Hushveil City was just as enormous as the City of Shadows. The journey from the city gate to Godswamp Pharmacy Headquarters took Han Shuo three hours. Upon arrival, the view of an enormous campus filled with towering buildings entered his sight. It was only then that Han Shuo realized just how much more grandiose Godswamp Pharmacy waspared to his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    Pharmacists wearing distinctive clothing as white as snow could be seen walking in and out of pharmacybs. There were also divine guards pushing trolleys filled with various ss containers to an area parked with airships. They would load the airships with bottles and bottles of medicines and ship them all across the Darkness Dominion.

    Godswamp Pharmacy¡¯s businesses were operating on a whole different scale than that of Celestial Pearl¡¯s. Other than Hushveil City, they had branches in all major cities of the Darkness Dominion. They would produce the medicines in their headquarters and ship it out to those cities using airships.

    Godswamp Pharmacy not only had good rtionships with all major family ns ofrge cities, but they also cooperated with the godhunters in secrecy. Therefore, there rarely ever were any mishaps that happened to their long-rangemerce. The Godswamp Pharmacy had been reapingrge amounts of ck crystal coins from various family ns in the Darkness Dominion.

    However, due to the recent uprising of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, most if not all family ns in the City of Shadows had stopped purchasing medicines from Godswamp Pharmacy. As Celestial Pearl¡¯s reputation rises, the impact on Godswamp Pharmacy¡¯s bottom line became more and more noticeable.

    As Godswamp Pharmacy had been established in the Darkness Dominion for many years, given their scale of operation, Celestial Pearl couldn¡¯t trump them within a short time. Celestial Pearl was operating on a far smaller scale.

    Han Shuo, standing at the entrance of Godswamp Pharmacy, did not hurry in entering or to look for Hassling. Instead, he released his demon generals to travel all around Godswamp Pharmacy, allowing him to observe the entire Godswamp Pharmacy campus.

    The Godswamp Pharmacy Headquarters was basically an enormous shop. As they must open their doors for business, the security wasn¡¯t all that tight. Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals did not meet many obstacles on the campus. They fed Han Shuo with every single activity happening in Godswamp Pharmacy.

    ¡°What are you here for?¡± Rose was puzzled to see Han Shuo stood still at the entrance, not leaving or entering.

    Han Shuo smiled, turned to Rose, and replied, ¡°To probe the situation. Right, standing right at the entrance is too eye-catching. Come, let¡¯s go stroll around inside!¡±

    Naturally, Rose wouldn¡¯t raise any objection to Han Shuo¡¯smand. Seeing that Han Shuo had stepped into Godswamp Pharmacy, she did not hesitate and followed Han Shuo into the shop.

    As the master of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, it was only natural that Han Shuo would be interested in the business model and operations of Godswamp Pharmacy. After entering the shop, he would continue to probe every corner of the campus using demon generals while strolling about the shop with Rose, pretending to be an ordinary customer.

    Rose followed closely behind Han Shuo. She had been observing Han Shuo curiously and could sense the killing intent hidden under his tranquil and calm appearance. It didn¡¯t take Rose long to realize that Han Shuo¡¯s target was someone inside the pharmacy shop. She started being mindful of Han Shuo¡¯s actions, fearing that he might suddenly attack someone in broad daylight andnd them in danger.

    ¡°Eh? Isn¡¯t this Mister Bryan?¡± a tender cry sounded and entered Han Shuo¡¯s ears. Then, a graceful and poised figure in the distance started approaching him.

    Han Shuo was stunned. His goal ining to Godswamp Pharmacy was to assassinate Avery and Hassling. As not a soul in Hushveil City had ever seen Han Shuo¡¯s face before, including Hassling, Han Shuo did not disguise his appearance.

    He was shocked when someone cried out his name. Immediately, he turned to the source of the sound. He saw Charlotte¡¯s bright gazes looking up and down at him. She seemed very surprised.

    Charlotte originated from the Braque Family of the Destruction Dominion. When she was in the City of Shadows, she assisted Portlem in resisting Han Shuo¡¯s attack. After the event, she apologized to Han Shuo through Carmelita, stating that she was not involved in Portlem¡¯s crimes.

    Han Shuo did not hold any prejudice towards Charlotte. It was because of Portlem that Han Shuo¡¯s anger had spread to Charlotte. But as Carmelita had asked Han Shuo for forgiveness on Charlotte¡¯s behalf, Han Shuo decided not to take revenge on her.

    However, the ill-feeling towards Charlotte does not simply disappear from Han Shuo¡¯s heart overnight. Although Han Shuo had no intention of taking revenge against her or her family n, Han Shuo still held a bad impression towards Charlotte. He wasn¡¯t going to sell the medicines he had personally refined to her or her family n.

    Charlotte approached Han Shuo smilingly and was very friendly in attitude. She began by apologizing, ¡°I¡¯m really sorry about the incidentst time. I had no intention of offending you. I was just doing what I had to do given the situation. Please forgive me, Mister Bryan.¡±

    Han Shuo did not expect to meet Charlotte at this ce. He only nodded indifferently in response to her apology and showed no interest to interact with her.

    Charlotte was a highgod and was excellent in sensing other¡¯s actual strength. After she smiled at Han Shuo, she soon turned to look at Rose with astonishment. She detected the menacing power in Rose who was a level stronger than her. She was rather shocked and couldn¡¯t understand why Han Shuo would always be seen apanied by powerful gods.

    Charlotte saw that the taciturn Han Shuo was leaving and so she stepped forward and smilingly invited, ¡°Mister Bryan, it must be fate that has led to us meeting here. If you would, Mister Bryan, let¡¯s go somewhere else and chat over a cup of tea. I must show you that I¡¯m sincere in my apology!¡±

    Previously, Charlotte wasn¡¯t able to purchase Han Shuo¡¯s miraculous medicines because she had stepped in to keep Portlem alive. Therefore, for theck of a better option, she decided to purchase somemon medicines from Godswamp Pharmacy instead.

    Now that she ran into Han Shuo, with Portlem the degenerate not around her, Charlotte thought that this was the perfect opportunity for her to make peace with Han Shuo. Therefore, she was not going to let Han Shuo leave easily.

    Han Shuo, however, was not at all interested in talking with Charlotte. He shook his head, raised one hand, and replied in an uninterested face, ¡°There is no need for that. Carmelita has talked to me about it. I will not take offense at you for the matter.¡±

    The coldness on Han Shuo¡¯s face cannot be more obvious, a clear indication that he still held some ill feelings towards her. His response deviated from Charlotte¡¯s expectations. She seemed a little disappointed to hear those words.

    As Han Shuo had shown his cold and detached attitude, if Charlotte was tackless and continue to nag him, she would risk irritating Han Shuo. Charlotte put on a bitter smile on her fair face and was ready to let Han Shuo leave.

    ¡°Elder sister Charlotte, have you chosen what you want?¡± a sweet and fine voice suddenly sounded from a distance. Ady with a delicate and pretty face wearing a simple but clean green dress came to Charlotte¡¯s side. She was tall, had fair skin, and carried an air of mour. She had long, shapely eyebrows and a pair of cold but appealing eyes.

    ¡°No, not yet. I came across an acquaintance,¡± Charlotte replied to the beauty smilingly and said, ¡°Let¡¯s continue shopping and negotiate a deal with Godswamp Pharmacy.¡±

    Suddenly, the lovely-looking beauty stared at Han Shuo with a pair of astonished green eyes. She cried out in surprise, ¡°It¡¯s you! Howe you¡¯re here?!¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned. He sized up the beauty, raised an eyebrow and asked puzzlingly, ¡°Excuse me? Who are you? Have we met before?¡± Han Shuo thought that the lovely-lookingdy felt somewhat familiar, especially her sweet-sounding and fine voice. He felt as though he had heard it before somewhere. However, no matter how hard Han Shuo racked his brain, he couldn¡¯t find the beautiful, charming face in his memory.

    The beauty seemed very pleasantly surprised. She walked past Charlotte and got beside Han Shuo, asking excitedly, ¡°Since when are you here? Why didn¡¯t you look for me?¡±

    Han Shuo was confused. He stared nkly at the lovely-looking beauty who seemed somewhat excited and said, ¡°Sorry, you must have mistaken me for someone else.¡±

    The beauty pulled an amused smile and carefully looked at Han Shuo. A momentter, she said, ¡°I¡¯m not mistaken. It is indeed you! Humph, so it turns out that you have forgotten about me!¡±

    The sense of familiarity grew stronger and stronger in Han Shuo¡¯s heart as they talked. However, Han Shuo was certain that he had never seen that sweet, charming face before. Otherwise, given his astonishing power in remembering beauties, there was absolutely no way Han Shuo would forget someone as attractive as her.

    However, he could feel an indescribable sense of familiarity about this beauty. This made Han Shuo more and more puzzled. He put on a bitter smile and asked, ¡°Sorry, but I really can¡¯t remember who you are. Erm, can you give me a hint?¡±

    ¡°No!¡± the beauty shook her head, shot a re at Han Shuo, and grumbled, ¡°So you really have forgotten about me. How outrageous!¡±

    After listening to them for half a day, Charlotte finally couldn¡¯t help it but asked puzzlingly, ¡°Bechymos, you know Bryan?¡±

    When the name ¡®Bechymos¡¯ was uttered, Han Shuo was immediately lifted from the confusion. His memories in the Abyss Realm rushed back into his mind like water gushing from a burst dam. He gradually came to associate Bechymos, previously the most powerful Demon King in the Abyss Realm, with this sweet and beautifuldy standing before him.

    Back then in the Abyss Realm, Bechymos had always worn a fierce-looking mask and faked her voice. It was only when she became too emotional that she would forget to speak in the rasping, male-like voice and use her original, sweet and melodious voice.

    Right before Bechymos left the Abyss Realm, she had answered Han Shuo¡¯s question with her original voice and revealed that she was indeed a female. However, Han Shuo had never seen her face. That was the reason Han Shuo felt a sense of familiarity towards her but couldn¡¯t remember where they had met.

    The forbidding air and taciturn behavior she disyed in the Abyss Realm was nowhere to be seen now that she was on Elysium. After removing her ferocious-looking mask, Bechymos was revealed to be a sweet and beautifuldy. She even seemed very approachable.

    ¡°Bechymos! How unexpected!¡± Han Shuo too was pleasantly surprised after learning her identity. Heughed heartily and said, ¡°I really did not expect to bump into you here! Haha, how are you doing?¡±

    ¡°Didn¡¯t I told you how to locate me before I left? Why didn¡¯t you look for me after arriving in Elysium?¡± Bechymos was looking at Han Shuo smilingly but she talked to Han Shuo in a berating tone.

    Han Shuo recalled that she had indeed given him the methods of locating and contacting her. However, after returning to Profound Continent, he encountered a series of events, meeting Donna, Carmelita, establishing the Celestial Pearl, and et cetera. Han Shuo was too busy to have time to think about Bechymos or to look for her.

    ¡°Erm... Sorry, I have forgotten about it,¡± said Han Shuo in a somewhat embarrassed manner.

    ¡°Judging by your clothing, you seem to be doing pretty alright on Elysium!¡± Bechymos sized up Han Shuo judgmentally before she grumpily dered, ¡°Then as punishment, you must treat me a meal at the most expensive restaurant in Hushveil City. Otherwise, I¡¯m not going to forgive you! Let me warn you that I¡¯m very good at remembering grudges!¡±

    Charlotte was very surprised that Bechymos and Han Shuo knew each other. After listening to their conversation, Charlotte gradually realized where the two had met. Bechymos had told Charlotte about her experience in the Abyss Realm in detail. She knew that Bechymos had met a magical person in the Abyss Realm and his miraculous deeds.

    Charlotte wasughing in her mind when she heard Bechymos said that Han Shuo was ¡®doing pretty alright¡¯.

    Han Shuo¡¯s House of Han had recently been founded in the City of Shadows, his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy had established presences all over the City of Shadows, while he himself had recently be a Chief of Divine Guards. Even Charlotte¡¯s House of Bruckner was begging to get their hands on Han Shuo¡¯s miraculous medicines.

    Han Shuo only took several dozens years to aplish all that. If that was called ¡®pretty alright¡¯, then all those who came from low-level material nes would be beggars!

    ¡°No problem!¡± Han Shuo agreed to the demand straightforwardly. ¡°Let¡¯s go! Everything¡¯s on me!¡±

    Charlotte was rejoiced to see that Han Shuo was so friendly towards Bechymos. She immediately gave up her n of purchasing medicines from Godswamp Pharmacy and went with them smilingly. She was determined to improve her current rtionship with Han Shuo.

 Chapter 761 - Finish what you started

    GDK 761: Finish what you started

    ¡°Let¡¯s go to the Divine Blessing Restaurant. I¡¯ve heard that their food is pretty good,¡± said Han Shuo smilingly at the hesitant Bechymos.

    Bechymos was rather surprised that Han Shuo would agree to her demand so readily. Divine Blessing was not called the expensive restaurant in Hushveil City for no reason. Every dish and bottle of wine would cost at least a hundred ck crystal coins. It was beyond what some members of small family ns could afford.

    After thinking for a moment, not knowing Han Shuo¡¯s financial capability, Bechymos suggested, ¡°Let¡¯s just go to another restaurant. I don¡¯t want you to sell your house just for a meal.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t you worry about that, Bechymos. He can afford it!¡± said Charlotte smilingly. She knew just how prosperous Han Shuo¡¯s Celestial Pearl had be in the City of Shadows and as a sessful entrepreneur, spending at the restaurant would be mere trifles.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, My treat,¡± Han Shuo turned to Rose and beckoned at her.

    Rose had been silent all along. She was like an outsider beside Han Shuo. She did not show any interest in Charlotte or Bechymos. She silently followed along with her eyes looking on the ground.

    With Charlotte and Bechymos showing the way, the four arrived at Divine Blessing Restaurant of Hushveil City. Charlotte and Bechymos seemed to be a frequent patron of the restaurant. They got themselves a table located at an excellent spot where they could see an endless stream of people below them. Not far away were several energy towers glowing with colorful lights.

    A waitress, wearing very tidy and professional clothing, approached them smilingly and said most politely, ¡°Wee to Divine Blessing. Can I have your orders?¡±

    Having cultivated to this realm in demonic arts, Han Shuo doesn¡¯t even need to eat. He pointed at Bechymos smilingly and said, ¡°Ask her!¡±

    ¡°You really seem to be making some good money, huh?¡± Bechymos softly chuckled before she casually ordered a few dishes and a bottle of wine called ¡®Blueberry Fantasy¡¯. After the waitress left, Bechymos asked, ¡°When did you arrive on Elysium? What have you been up to?¡±

    ¡°Around twenty years ago. Elysium is pretty great. I have found things worth fighting for in this world,¡± Han Shuo did not answer all of Bechymos¡¯ questions. He bunched his brows and asked, ¡°Right, are you a member of the Bruckner Family?¡±

    ¡°Yes, I¡¯m. What¡¯s the matter?¡± Bechymos seemed puzzled when Han Shuo asked her about her family n. She couldn¡¯t understand why Han Shuo was asking her about it.

    Suddenly, Charlotte stood up, bowed at Han Shuo, and solemnly apologized, ¡°Mister Bryan, I¡¯m really sorry about the incidentst time. Please forgive me!¡±

    Bechymos grew even more puzzled. She stared nkly at Charlotte for a moment and asked, ¡°Charlotte, what are you doing?¡± She then turned to Han Shuo and gave him a puzzled look, ¡°Since when are you called Bryan?¡±

    Back then in the Abyss Realm where no one knew him, Han Shuo had introduced himself with his original name, Bechymos included. Therefore, Bechymos was puzzled when Charlotte called him Bryan.

    ¡°New material ne, new name. Here I¡¯m called Bryan. But, of course, you can still call me Han Shuo. Both names work,¡± exined Han Shuo as he shrugged. He then turned to Charlotte and replied, ¡°Alright. For Bechymos¡¯ sake, I will forget about what happened thest time. If you are still interested in purchasing medicines from my Celestial Pearl, we can discuss the termster.¡±

    After hearing those words, Charlotte knew that Han Shuo had finally forgiven her for saving Portlem¡¯s life in the City of Shadows. She was delighted. She thanked Han Shuo smilingly, got back to her seat before she informed Bechymos, ¡°This is the Mister Bryan of the City of Shadows I told you about. He is the friend you met in the Abyss Realm!¡±

    Bechymos¡¯ pretty face was filled with overwhelming shock after hearing the exnation. She cried out in disbelief, ¡°How is that possible?!¡±

    Charlotte had told Bechymos about the miraculousness of Han Shuo¡¯s medicines as well as the incident in Celestial Pearl¡¯s banquet hall. She had given great emphasis on how relentless Han Shuo was when he attempted to kill Portlem. However, back in the Abyss Realm where Bechymos first met Han Shuo, Bechymos only knew Han Shuo for his miraculousness, not his powerful strength. Therefore, Bechymos had not associated the powerful expert who beat up Portlem¡¯s ass with that magical person she met.

    It was in fact in Charlotte¡¯s expectation that Bechymos would be greatly astonished to hear that because she herself was in disbelief when she realized that Han Shuo was the magical person Bechymos had met in the Abyss Realm.

    Based on Bechymos¡¯ words, when they met in the Abyss Realm, Han Shuo¡¯s strength was weaker than her¡¯s. But within just a couple decades, Han Shuo had enough strength to severely injure Portlem ¨C which meant that Han Shuo managed to transcend from lowgod realm to highgod realm within the short span of a couple of decades. This rate of progress was simply unimaginable!

    Under Bechymos¡¯ doubtful gazes, Charlotte forced a smile and said, ¡°You should know that I wouldn¡¯t make this kind of joke with you. It is true. He is the master of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy of the City of Shadows.¡±

    Bechymos grew even more astonished. She looked at Han Shuo with bewildered eyes and asked, ¡°Have you started concealing your actual strength since arriving on the Abyss Realm?¡±

    Han Shuo forced a smile. He did not know how to respond to Bechymos¡¯ question. He had not concealed his actual strength back on the Abyss Realm. But if Han Shuo were to tell her the truth, she might not believe him. Therefore, after a moment of hesitation, Han Shuo reluctantly nodded.

    ¡°You scoundrel, always so on the guard against everyone!¡± Bechymos red at Han Shuo angrily and remarked, ¡°How foolish of me to worry that you might have trouble surviving on Elysium. I was even nning to give you a referral to join my family n! So it turns out that I had been worrying about nothing!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Bechymos suddenly cried out for the waitress and instructed, ¡°Cancel our order. Serve us the most expensive course instead!¡± Bechymos was angered. She was out to get Han Shuo¡¯s blood!

    ¡°Yes, right away!¡± the waitress was delighted and she immediately answered Bechymos.

    Soon enough, dishes after dishes that Han Shuo had never seen before were continuously served. Their table was crammed with food. Bechymos vigorously chewed the finely-cooked meat slices as she stared hatefully at Han Shuo. She seemed to be imagining herself chewing on Han Shuo¡¯s flesh.

    Charlotte was somewhat astonished at Bechymos¡¯ behavior. She did not expect Bechymos would act so unmannerly in front of a male acquaintance.

    Rose had been silent all along. But when the delicious food was served, she helped herself without anyone telling her. She would grab the beautiful dishes and engrossed herself in eating the food on the table. It was as though Rose and Bechymos were having an eatingpetition.

    Han Shuo merely tasted a little bit of every dish on the table. He did not even drink much wine. Although he wasn¡¯t a foodie, he felt that the food and alcohol were excellent. He had an ominous feeling that they will be pricey.

    When it came time to pay, Han Shuo only took a slight shock when the waitress reported that the dishes cost nine thousand six hundred ck crystal coins. Han Shuo had now be a filthy rich man and wouldn¡¯t renege on his promise because the bill was a little high. Under Bechymos¡¯ attentive gazes, Han Shuo straightforwardly tossed out a sack containing ten thousand ck crystal coins.

    Bechymos, Charlotte, and Rose had all drank some alcohol which gave their cheeks a tinge of alluring red. They appeared significantly more entrancing with rosy cheeks on their pretty faces, especially Bechymos and Rose who were incredibly attractive to begin with. Even Han Shuo felt as though his breath was taken away for a moment.

    Bechymos observed Han Shuo as he settled the bill calmly. She softly remarked, ¡°You really have struck a fortune! Didn¡¯t even wince when paying ten thousand ck crystal coins. You are even more extravagant than my dad!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Han Shuo said and got up from his seat. As he left, his majestic figure visibly overshadowed many other gods in Divine Blessing. Given his ostentatiousness and the three charming beauties beside him, many in the establishment secretly peeked at him admiringly, thinking, <i><i>Who is this blessedd? Since when Hushveil City has a man with such luck around women?</i></i>

    Most of those who could afford spending in Divine Blessing was rather influential in Hushveil City. The circle was small and they knew each other well. As Han Shuo was not a familiar face around here, they started wondering who he could be.

    The threedies also stood up from their seats and followed behind Han Shuo, heading outside. When they were about to exit Divine Blessing, Bechymos softly cussed at a youngster sitting near the entrance, ¡°What a disgusting piece of shit!¡±

    From start to finish, the youngster had been leering at the threedies with unconcealed depravity in his eyes. Bechymos¡¯ cuss was fair and just.

    However, as everyone in Divine Blessing was watching and admiring Han Shuo, the restaurant was very quiet. Bechymos¡¯ soft cuss was loud and clear to everyone. All those dining in the restaurant turned to the youngster who seemed to be rather influential with amused eyes as though the youngster had made a joke of himself.

    The youngster stared nkly for a moment before he discovered that the gazes of his acquaintances had gathered on him. Not wanting to lose face, he looked at Bechymos sinisterly and sneered, ¡°Hey bitch, who are you talking about?¡±

    Bechymos¡¯ face turned dark. She seemed even more disgusted and replied, ¡°About a revolting and uncultured piece of shit!¡± Thereafter, not wanting to waste any more words, Bechymos hastened Han Shuo, ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± and leave hurriedly as though trying to stay clear of a stinking pile of shit.

    ¡°Three drunken women following behind a man. One wonders what they could possibly be up to. How sluttish!¡± the youngster said in a lewd smirk. Upon hearing those words, those dining in Divine Blessing put on faces implying sexual innuendo. Their gazes towards Han Shuo were filled with admiration.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment. The scene of him eating Charlotte, Bechymos, and Rose for dessert all at once involuntarily floated into his mind. A strange smile appeared on his face. Han Shuo shook his head and thought, <i><i>I¡¯m indeed not a virtuous man to fantasize something so lewd in this situation.</i></i>

    <i><i>p!</i></i> A loud p resounded through Divine Blessing. Charlotte stared at the youngster coldly and said, ¡°I don¡¯t care which family n you¡¯re from, you better mind yournguage!¡±

    ¡°Slut, how dare you strike me!¡± shrieked the youngster. The few divine guards dining with him put on chilling faces, stood up from their seats and surrounded the four in an instant. It appeared that the matter won¡¯t be easily resolved.

    As that youngster only had midgod strength, he couldn¡¯t avoid Charlotte¡¯s p. When Han Shuo finally came to his senses, the youngster¡¯s divine guards had surrounded them.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t afraid of troubles. However, his objective in Hushveil City was to assassinate Hassling and Avery. If his identity was exposed before that happens, it will severely jeopardize his mission. Seeing that the situation had escted to this stage, Han Shuo started weighing in his mind on how to rapidly resolve the matter.

    The youngster only had midgod strength. Those divine guards that came with him had simr strengths. None in his party was a highgod. Most of those dining in Divine Blessing possessed midgod strengths. Other than Bechymos who had recently made a breakthrough to midgod realm, all those in Han Shuo¡¯s party had highgod strengths and could finish off the youngster and his divine guards effortlessly.

    However, they were in an esteemed establishment. Doing so will surely attract certain forces¡¯ attention and they would have trouble getting away. If the matter esctes, it would likely expose Han Shuo¡¯s identity. If Avery and Hassling were to know that he was in Hushveil City, they would surely try to hunt and kill him.

    <i><i>This might get messy,</i></i> thought Han Shuo as he bunched his brows.

    ¡°This is Hushveil City. You outsiders are digging your own grave by instigating troubles here!¡± shouted the youngster. He then instructed, ¡°Arrest them. Bring them back to the Sixth Corps for interrogation!¡±

    Like the City of Shadows, Hushveil City had Divine Guards Corps. But unlike the City of Shadows, Hushveil City only had six Divine Guards Corps. It appeared that the youngster was indeed rather powerful in Hushveil City. Those divine guards following him had grave and stern air. It was obvious that they were experienced and well-trained.

    ¡°Ladies, Gentlemen, please take any disputes you may have outside!¡± It was at this time that a plump old man with grizzled hair approached them in a professional smile. It was as though he was used to seeing situations like this.

    As one of the most upscale establishments in Hushveil City, Divine Blessing was more than just a restaurant. The youngster knew the forces backing the seemingly innocent Divine Blessing. He nodded at the plump old man, beckoned at his divine guards, and said, ¡°We will wait outside!¡± The youngster gave Han Shuo and the threedies a cold look before leaving Divine Blessing.

    Those dining in Divine Blessing showed great interest in the quarrel. Some would ask for the bill and go outside to watch while some would look down from the windows.

    ¡°He is from the House of Granro, the weakest of the four major Hushveil City family ns,¡± Charlotte said to Bechymos in a faint smile. She then turned to Han Shuo and said, ¡°It¡¯s no biggie.¡±

    Han Shuo felt rather surprised by those words of Charlotte. But after thinking about it carefully, it made sense to him. The House of Bruckner had around the same strength as the House of Sainte. They were both ancient family ns. Clearly, a family n that ranked near the bottom in Hushveil City wasn¡¯t enough to pose them any threat.

    Han Shuo was relieved to hear those words. He nodded smilingly and said, ¡°I don¡¯t want people to know that I¡¯m in Hushveil City.¡±

    Charlotte looked nkly for a moment, wondering why Han Shuo would say so. She nodded and replied, ¡°Alright. Leave it to me.¡±

    Rose had been silent all these while but she seemed irritated. Clearly, she too was angered by the youngster¡¯s offensive words.

    ¡°Sister Charlotte, give that asshole a round of beating!¡± said Bechymos in a chilling voice.

    ¡°Forget about it, we are in Hushveil City and we better avoid unnecessary trouble. In any case, I have already pped him. If he knew our identities, I doubt he will continue to pressure us with his Sixth Corps,¡± consoled Charlotte. She also seemed disinclined to escte the matter.

    ¡°Sister Charlotte, how can we just let him off like that?!¡± grumbled Bechymos.

    As they spoke, the four had exited Divine Blessing. Charlotte gazed at the youngster with cold eyes and was about to state her identity.

    But before she could speak, the youngster rushed to sneer at Han Shuo, ¡°Hey man, going down on three at once must be wonderful, isn¡¯t it? Hehe,ter at the Sixth Corps, I will give you an even more wonderful experience!¡±

    The youngster seemed greatly interested in Rose. He looked up and down Rose¡¯s body withscivious eyes and said, ¡°Damn, white-haireddy, you are totally my type. I¡¯m so going to interrogate you with my baton!¡± Of the threedies, Rose had been silent and did not speak up against him. Thinking that Rose was meek, the youngster assailed her with obscenities.

    But little did he know, quiet and introverted people like Rose were usually the most murderous. The youngster hadmitted a grave mistake in offending Rose. He could not have offended Rose more by calling her a <i><i>white-haired</i></i>dy.

    Han Shuo saw the chilling radiance in Rose¡¯s eyes and knew that shit will soon hit the fan. Before he could say a thing, several strands of her silver hair violently shot out. The distance between the youngster and Rose was very short. This youngster couldn¡¯t even dodge Charlotte¡¯s p. Against Rose who was even more powerful than Charlotte, the youngster was even more powerless.

    Several strands of hair shot out like beams of lights and pierced across the youngster¡¯s chest in an instant. Rose flung with her long hair and tossed the youngster whose chest was squirting blood far into the distance. He was already dead by the time hended.

    Han Shuo¡¯s face jolted. Seeing that Rose had attacked, he knew it was no longer possible to resolve the matter peacefully. Before Charlotte and Bechymos hade to their senses, Han Shuo instructed, ¡°Don¡¯t do things halfway, finish what you started!¡±

    Rose¡¯s long hair started to flutter wildly and she coldly sent her long hair at those frightened divine guards. Their torsos were pierced and all of them died on the spot.

    ¡°What are you waiting for? Fly!¡± shouted Han Shuo at Bechymos and Charlotte. He then grabbed Bechymos¡¯ little hand and flew towards a rather deste part of the City.

    Those bystanders and observers all shrieked in fear and panic!

    They did not expect that Han Shuo and his party would actually kill in open daylight, and so ruthlessly at that! Perhaps because Rose was too brutal, all of the bystanders merely watched as Han Shuo and thedies escape aftermitting murder. They did not think about obstructing them because no one had the guts to be up against them!

 Chapter 762 - Leave none alive

    GDK 762: Leave none alive

    Divine Blessing Restaurant was located in a bustling street in the city center. Many had witnessed Rose ughter the few. Fearing that divine guards of Hushveil City will be there soon, Han Shuo decided to escape and hide.

    By using his demon generals to scout ahead of him, Han Shuo took the threedies in traversing across numerous streets, heading towards rtively secluded regions. After traveling for some time, they stopped at what seemed to be a residential area formoners.

    Divine guards usually do not pay much attention to such areas and members ofrge family ns rarely venture there. They would be safe there temporarily.

    Charlotte used her divine tablet and spent a few purple crystal coins in renting a simple and crude gymnasium.

    Charlotte and Bechymos still felt rather astounded and appalled at this moment. They looked at Rose with strange gazes. They did not at all expect that Rose would be so brazen to kill someone in the crowded city center in front of all the nobilities.

    Naturally, Charlotte and Bechymos had heard Han Shuo asking Rose to ¡®finish what she started¡¯, which also very much astonished them. They couldn¡¯t understand what the heck were they thinking.

    The very most that Charlotte and Bechymos would do was to give the youngster a beating and humiliate him. They would never murder the youngster and his divine guards so straightforwardly and recklessly.

    ¡°Han Shuo, you and your friend are truly brazen!¡± eximed Bechymos in an astonished face. She continued, ¡°The youngster seemed to be rather influential in Hushveil City. Now that you have killed him, his family n surely will not let us off!¡±

    Rose at this moment appeared unruffled. She did not feel that anything was wrong about her actions. She remained as silent as always.

    Han Shuo had seen too many outrageous acts and met countless perilous situations. Although he felt that that action of Rose¡¯s was rather impulsive, he did not feel that it was too big of an issue. He put on a reassuring smile and replied, ¡°He¡¯s just a good-for-nothing jerk from a wealthy family. Killing him wasn¡¯t all that big of a deal!¡± After taking a short pause, Han Shuo looked at Charlotte and Bechymos and said, ¡°Hushveil City will surely try to track us down. It is risky for the two of you to stay in Hushveil City so you should leave the City as soon as possible. Otherwise, given the gravity of the issue, the two of you might get into great trouble.¡±

    ¡°Are you noting with us?¡± asked Bechymos puzzlingly.

    ¡°There are still certain matters that I must finish in this City. I will leave right afterpleting them,¡± Han Shuo then turned to Charlotte and said, ¡°I don¡¯t have any medicines left. You can send men to the City of Shadows to purchase my medicines after I produced a new batch. As long as the representative can prove that he is from your House of Brucker, I will make sure that he returns home my medicines.¡±

    Charlotte was delighted by Han Shuo¡¯s guarantee. She thanked Han Shuo before saying to Bechymos, ¡°Come, we should be going home. Bryan and his friend have extraordinary strengths. I believe that even if they ran into troubles in Hushveil City, it wouldn¡¯t be too hard for them to escape. The two of us, however, if trapped, wouldn¡¯t be able to free ourselves easily.¡±

    Charlotte could see the situation clearly. Han Shuo not leaving Hushveil City under such circumstances meant that he had something extremely important to aplish here. The strength that Rose disyed made Charlotte¡¯s heart quiver. Han Shuo, meanwhile, was mysterious and unfathomable. She felt that given the situation, it was not advisable for them to stay with the duo any longer.

    Bechymos bunched her brows and frowned. She rebutted, ¡°Sister Charlotte, can¡¯t we stay to help him?¡±

    ¡°If we stay, not only that we cannot help Bryan, we might even be a burden to him!¡± replied the quick-witted Charlotte.

    After hearing Charlotte¡¯s words, Bechymos turned to look at Han Shuo, as though she was asking for Han Shuo¡¯s opinion with her eyes. Han Shuo nodded and said, ¡°I cannot take too many people with me in my operation. I need to be very mobile!¡± After a short pause, Han Shuo added, ¡°Also, you better not participate in what I¡¯m going to do. Otherwise, if people learned about your involvement, it will negatively impact your family n. Therefore, even if not for yourself, in the interest of your family n, you must not join me.¡±

    Although it was true that a member of arge family n enjoys numerous privileges, they were bound by even more taboos and they must put the interest of their family n in the first ce in everything they do. Bechymos, as a member of the House of Bruckner, was bound by this obligation. She put on a grimace after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s advise and nodded grudgingly.

    Given that Han Shuo and Rose had murdered without any scruple, the thing they will try to do in Hushveil City must be something terrible, to say the least. Bechymos did not want to invite unnecessary troubles for her family n and therefore she agreed to Han Shuo¡¯s advice.

    Bechymos and Charlotte then had a brief talk with Han Shuo about potential corporations in the future. When the sky started to get dark, the two left the gymnasium to leave Hushveil City.

    Soon after the twodies left, Han Shuo turned to Rose and instructed, ¡°Come, we should get moving!¡±

    As the gymnasium rented was registered using Charlotte¡¯s divine tablet, Han Shuo felt uneasy with staying there for too long. Seeing that the sky was getting dark, he considered expediting his mission and settle the matter with Godswamp Pharmacy as soon as possible.

    Rose murdering the youngster in broad daylight would surely attract the attention of certain forces. Han Shuo needed to kill both Hassling and Avery before his identity and whereabouts were discovered. He must act fast as the longer it was dragged on, the less favorable the situation would be for him.

    Rose, like usual, remained silent and followed along.

    The veil of night gradually fell. Hushveil City had obviously tightened in security. Squads after squads of divine guards patrolled the dark streets. They scanned all around with vignt eyes, looking out for any suspicious activities.

    Han Shuo knew that the divine guards were likely looking for him and Rose. By using the visions of his demon generals, Han Shuo managed to evade all the patrolling divine guards with ease. Late in the night, the duo was once again at the front door of Godswamp Pharmacy.

    Godswamp Pharmacy was dead silent at night. The gods would usually cultivate indoors during nighttime. The pharmacists, who had worked busily during the day, were mostly resting. Only a few rooms in Godswamp Pharmacy still had their lights on.

    Han Shuo had explored around 80% of Godswamp Pharmacy using his demon generals during the daytime and so he knew theyout of the campus pretty well. There were only a few restricted areas and secret chambers he had not probed as they were guarded by unique boundaries and seals which Han Shuo fear his demon general could set off.

    Han Shuomanded demon generals refined using midgod and lowgod souls to station and monitor all around Godswamp Pharmacy while directing the demon generals made using Eugene and Jirofi¡¯s highgod souls to probe those regions protected with boundaries and seals. The demon generals refined using highgod souls were the highest grade of spirit demon. Demon general of this ss possessed even more power than the average and could better conceal themselves. They were even better at going past boundaries without being noticed.

    As Rose was right beside Han Shuo, she could sense multiple unique lifeforms flying out from within Han Shuo. They were like invisible flying insects that flew in every direction. Like Andrina, Rose showed great curiosity towards Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals. In astonishment, she softly asked, ¡°Those things that fly out from your body, what are they?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s something simr to those small spiders that you use for scouting,¡± lied Han Shuo casually. He showed no interest in exining it in detail.

    ¡°It¡¯s not. My spiders were made by metabolizing my own cells using unique energy. They cannot fly or cloak.¡± Rose then closed her eyes and took a moment to sense before she said, ¡°Moreover, my spiders aren¡¯t nearly as powerful as your lifeforms. How is it that you, a human, be able to do that?¡±

    ¡°You are just a ve. Don¡¯t ask so many questions!¡± Han Shuo did not want to answer her question and gave her cold treatment.

    Rose¡¯s eyes turned a little sad after being reminded of her identity. She also felt rather annoyed at the same time. She pouted her lips and disdainfully said, ¡°Big deal!¡±

    Han Shuo ignored her. He proceeded with directing two of his highest grade demon generals towards a secret chamber guarded by boundaries in the dead of the night. He could sense from a great distance away that the boundary was not particrly powerful. His two demon generals of the highest grade silently broke through the boundary effortlessly and proceeded inward.

    It was a secret tunnel that led underground. The walls were covered with energy crystals, brightly illuminating the tunnel. It did not seem dark at all.

    They headed further and further into the tunnel that went deeper and deeper into the earth. There were seven or eight small boundaries in their path. The two demon generals passed through them safely without causing any reaction from the boundaries.

    When they went around five or six hundred meters underground, the demon generals were obstructed by a dark iron door. The dark iron door carried extremely intense boundary energy. The notches on them were filled with ultra-high purity energy crystals which meant that the boundary energy must be extremely strong. It was no longer possible for the demon general to probe any further.

    Han Shuo knew that there must be some great secrets behind the dark iron door. However, Han Shuo dared not to let the demon general charge into it. Otherwise, if someone were inside and they were alerted, it would make his mission much more difficult.

    Han Shuomanded his demon generals to hold still before the iron door. He waited and waited outside as he weighed in his mind whether he should take the risk.

    While Han Shuo was thinking, a demon general he ced outside the tunnel discovered that a person wearing Godswamp Pharmacy¡¯s pharmacist coat was entering the tunnel. Alerted, Han Shuo cast away all thoughts and quietly waited for the person to descend through the tunnel.

    Indeed, the person did not fail Han Shuo¡¯s expectations. He carefully traveled down the tunnel and when he arrived at the dark iron door, he turned a knob-like crystal mechanism on the door. A soft voice sounded from behind the door, ¡°Who is it?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s me, Kraft!¡± replied the pharmacist after cing his face near the ck iron door. He seemed to be a frequent visitor.

    The power of the boundary gradually diminished and therge door opened slowly. A man smilingly invited Kraft inside and said, ¡°What have you brought us today?¡±

    With just one look, Han Shuo recognized that the doorkeeper was one of Avery¡¯s henchmen previously working in the Fifth Corps. Han Shuo had carefully read through the profiles of Avery¡¯s subordinates and knew Avery¡¯s most loyal servants.

    ¡°Is Lord Avery still cultivating?¡± asked Kraft smilingly.

    ¡°He is. Let me take you to him,¡± the former Fifth Corps divine guard replied smilingly. It was at this moment that the dark iron door closed and the boundary re-energized. Their conversation grew softer and softer.

    Outside the Godswamp Pharmacy, Han Shuo¡¯s face jolted. He smilingly remarked, ¡°Very good. The information provided by Ralph of the Second Corps is indeed very urate. Avery really is muddling with Hassling. No wonder it took so long to find him!¡±

    Han Shuo then nodded at Rose and walked out from his hiding ce, instructing, ¡°Follow me!¡± before flying straight into Godswamp Pharmacy. With demon generals providing him vision in every area, Han Shuo easily evaded the divine guards patrolling Godswamp Pharmacy. He went towards the tunnel that had a boundary at the entrance.

    The boundary at the entrance only acted as an intruder rm and to conceal the presence of the secret tunnel. Given Han Shuo and Rose¡¯s strengths, it wasn¡¯t that hard for them to pass through it without triggering it. The two concealed their auras and Rose disrupted the boundary using her darkness divine energy. The two sneaked past the boundary noiselessly.

    With his demon generals having scouted everything in the tunnel beforehand, Han Shuo and Rose descended through the tunnel smoothly. After getting rid of multiple small boundaries along the way, they finally arrived at the location of the two demon generals.

    When Rose arrived before the iron door, she received a shock when as she sensed the auras of two very well concealed bizarre lifeforms. She looked at Han Shuo in astonishment and whispered, ¡°That¡¯s miraculous!¡±

    If even a highgod like her needed to be in such close proximity to detect the presence of the demon generals, then an average person will never be able to figure out that there was an extra pair of eyes right beside them. No matter when it came to escaping or hunting, with this all-seeing ability, Han Shuo would have an unfair advantage, much like ying a game with cheat codes. Han Shuo could out-maneuver his opponents at every turn!

    Han Shuo pointed at the iron door with intense boundary energy and whispered, ¡°Can you disable the boundary noiselessly?¡±

    Rose leaned forward and sensed for a moment before she shook her head and replied, ¡°I cannot. The person who deployed the boundary is no weaker than I am. As soon as we touch it, those insides will be alerted.¡±

    Han Shuo bunched his brows and pondered for a moment before he calmly said, ¡°Since that is the case, we will charge into it!¡±

    As soon as he finished those words, the seventeen flying swords flew out from his body in an instant. With one thought, the seventeen flying sworded started rapidly bombarding the iron door in unique trajectories. An earth-shaking explosion sounded. Theyers uponyers of boundaries were shredded by the terrifying power of the flying swords and the iron door was cut into pieces.

    As stone and dust spread in every direction, Han Shuo marched forward inrge, proud strides. He instructed Rose, ¡°Kill everyone. Leave none alive!¡±

    ¡°Who is it?¡± someone inside shouted in panic when the dark iron door was shattered.

    Han Shuo did not reply. His flying swords flew towards the origin of the voice. Panic shouts quickly turned into miserable shrieks. Rose was not idling either. Her long hair started to dance wildly. Multiple figures were pierced by her long hair and raised from the ground. Their bodies spurted out streams of blood as they were flung away. They were dead before they touched the ground again.

 Chapter 763 - She didnâ€™t kill your children, I did!

    GDK 763: She didn¡¯t kill your children, I did!

    The two charge forwards Avery¡¯s location as though an unstoppable force. All those divine guards of Avery¡¯s they met along the way were butchered by the two.

    Miserable shrieks filled the spacious underground chamber. All those divine guards died to Han Shuo¡¯s flying swords melted into nothing but watery blood. The bodies of those divine guards killed by Rose would also rapidly melt away when they made contact with the bloody liquid.

    They were in Godswamp Pharmacy of Hushveil City. Han Shuo knew that they mustplete the objective and escape from this ce as soon as possible. Otherwise, if they take too long, the divine guards of Hushveil City would be at the scene and surround them inrge numbers. Even with his and Rose¡¯s extraordinary strengths, they might not be able to escape from being encircled.

    Therefore, Han Shuo did not show the slightest mercy. The streams of gods were transformed into streams of blood. Han Shuo and Rose forced their way into the deepest part of the underground chamber.

    While Han Shuo was conducting his killing spree, his demon generals had gone to probe ahead. He had already figured out exactly where Avery was. Therefore, Han Shuo didn¡¯t have to waste any more time to search for him. He arrived at the tightly sealed chamber where Avery was hiding.

    The Godswamp pharmacist called Kraft suddenly came running out from the room screaming. Two flying swords streaked through his neck like a beam of light. His head was severed from his body and sent spinning away, all before his voice fell. The severed end on his neck was still squirting blood when his body copsed with a thud.

    Divine energy of darkness suddenly gushed from the space behind Kraft and a darkness domain of divinity took shape in an instant. The already dim underground chamber abruptly turned intoplete darkness. A shadowy figure started moving rapidly in the darkness. Its divine energy blew the bloody liquid on the ground and sprayed it towards Han Shuo and Rose.

    As Rose cultivated in the energy of darkness and Han Shuo doesn¡¯t get affected by changes in the environment in any way, nothing had escaped from their visions, including the corrosive liquids sshing towards them. Han Shuo had a calm face and uttered not a word. The seventeen flying swords shot precisely at the moving shadowy figure at lightning speed with ferocious power.

    The flying swords made loud whistles that could pierce ears and souls, disrupting the mind of all those in the room. All flying swords arrived beside the shadowy figure in an instant and surrounded it, not giving it an opportunity in escaping.

    While the seventeen flying swords were doing their jobs, Han Shuo moved like a shadow, evading the bloody liquid raining down at him. He shouted, ¡°Today will be thest day of your life, Avery!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy flooded into his body. A most terrifying energy emanated from Han Shuo in an instant. The whistling noises grew even louder and piercing as the seventeen flying swords that trapped Avery formed Ceaseless Pain around him. A most ruthless, brutal and sinister aura was emanated.

    Rose originally intended to assist Han Shuo in killing Avery but the instant that Han Shuo utilized Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, she was dumbfounded. The ferocious and fear-inducing aura given off by the seventeen flying swords caused her to be overwhelmed with shock.

    <i><i>So it turns out that he had not even used his full strength against me. I thought I could get my revenge after he nullifies the master-ve contract. Ha,ughable, howughable of me,</i></i> thought Rose.

    Even though Rose was outside the Ceaseless Pain, she was nheless intimidated by the terrifying energy field produced by the sword formation. She stood foolishly behind Han Shuo, not having the courage to get close to the sword formation to help attack Avery. It was also at this moment that Rosepletely gave up on making retribution against Han Shuo. She even felt a mixed feeling of dread and reverence towards him.

    Rose actually knew Han Shuo better than most gods on Elysium. Back then on the Profound Continent, through her believer Adele, Rose had sensed Han Shuo and knew his strength. She never expected that Han Shuo woulde to possess such terrifying strength in such a short amount of time. The rate at which his strength soars was unimaginable to Rose.

    Given that Avery¡¯s strength was below that of Rose¡¯s and Han Shuo had boosted his strength by borrowing Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, Avery was on the back foot and couldn¡¯t even make a counterattack. The darkness divine energy in his body was assailed by the chilling aura and corrosive power of the seventeen flying swords that were trapping it in Hell. Just a short few seconds after Ceaseless Pain was formed, his heart was swarmed with the feeling of despair.

    Han Shuo suddenly flew to Avery. In a callous face, he said, ¡°By the way, Carmelita did not kill your children. I did.¡±

    The radiance of extreme hatred and rage burst from his eyes. He seemed to be unwilling to die this way. He clenched his teeth and tried to injure Han Shuo with his death.

    For unfortunately for Avery, Han Shuo would not give him the chance to do so. The seventeen flying swords flew around his chest and took away everyst bit of vitality left in him. Before the poisonpletely liquefied Avery, the seventeen flying swords abruptly flew aside.

    Han Shuo quickly moved towards his body. He opened his left hand, deployed the Demonic des, and cut across Avery¡¯s neck. As Han Shuo had deployed frigid aura, not a drop of blood left Avery¡¯s neck.

    Han Shuo then quickly took out the ss container he had long prepared, ced Avery¡¯s head in it, and left a bit of frigid aura in the container before sealing it. Meanwhile, Cauldron Spirit flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s body to collect Avery¡¯s divine soul at the fastest speed possible.

    Han Shuo looked all around the bloody scene. Seeing that not a soul was left alive, he promptly instructed, ¡°TIme to leave.¡±

    Rose was staring at Han Shuo foolishly. After hearing those whose, she softly answered an ¡°O¡± and followed behind Han Shuo in silence. Amazement and fear could be seen in her bright eyes looking at Han Shuo¡¯s back.

    The whole duration of breaking into the secret chamber and murdering everyone inside did not exceed two minutes. Those who had detected abnormality under the ground of Godswamp Pharmacy had yet to make it to the tunnel entrance.

    Han Shuo and Rose streaked across the tunnel and traveled on the path the came from. Soon enough, they were back at the surface. It was then that they saw the Godswamp Pharmacy divine guards who were rushing over.

    Han Shuo had probed all around Godswamp Pharmacy with his demon generals before the matter and he had discovered no sign of Hassling. Currently, there wasn¡¯t a single person in the entire Godswamp Pharmacy that could actually cause them harm.

    All those divine guards who charged at the duo were simply giving away their lives. Han Shuo and Rose did not show the slightest mercy. Multiple divine guards would die horribly in an instant. After killing a few more divine guards foolish enough to block their paths, Han Shuo and Rose immediately flew away from Godswamp Pharmacy before the divine guards of Hushveil City could arrive and surround them.

    The assassination waspleted cleanly and smoothly. Han Shuo and Rose escaped into the darkness of the night effortlessly.

    Two bloody murders happened in Hushveil City in less than 24 hours and the crimes weremitted by the same gang. This rmed the experts of all major family ns in Hushveil City, especially the Chief of Sixth Corps who were wildly hunting for his son¡¯s murderers. He put about threats that once he found the murderers, he would skin them alive.

    ***In the Hofley Residence.

    The House of Hofley was the most powerful family n in Hushveil City. Hofs, the patriarch of the family n, was wearing a gloomy face and in a fit of rage. The Divine Guard Chiefs of Hushveil City were all standing before him quiet still and in fear.

    ¡°Get me the murderers in three days, dead or alive!¡± Although the thin and tall Hofs may appear cultured and refined, all those who were acquainted with him knew that he was extremely irascible in temper. This time around, Hofs had reached the point of criticality. It had not been long since the death of one of his Divine Guard Chiefs, Eugene, before such outrageous murders urred in his city. His anger was fanned before it could subside. He was clearly at the limits of his tolerance.

    The Chiefs dared not utter a word but the Chief of Sixth Corps, Salouhi, loudly answered, ¡°Rest assured, my Lord. All divine guards of my Sixth Corps have been activated and all city gates have been notified not to allow any white-haired woman to leave the City. The Godswamp Pharmacy murder took ce after the City lockdown and therefore, we can be certain that the murderers are still in Hushveil City. As long as we keep on searching, we will eventually find the two murderers.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t care whatever method you use. But in three days, I want to see them, dead or alive!¡± shouted Hofs. ¡°Where is Hassling?¡±

    ¡°My Lord, Mister Hassling is at Firesand Town. A message has been delivered. Given the short distance of Firesand Town and the City, I believe Mister Hassling will arrive soon,¡± said Lordaeron, the Chief of the First Corps.

    Hofs suddenly mmed on his table shattered it into pieces. He shouted, ¡°Why must they go to Godswamp Pharmacy to kill? The secret chamber was filled with dead bodies but there wasn¡¯t one with a whole body. Who are those murdered?¡±

    Lordaeron¡¯s face turned astringent. He answered, ¡°We have examined the crime scene but couldn¡¯t learn anything useful. We will have to wait for Hassling to tell us that.¡±

    ¡°City Lord, the master of Godswamp Pharmacy asks for permission to enter,¡± it was at this moment that the voice of a divine guard sounded from outside the room.

    All those in the room were waiting for Hassling. Hofs¡¯ eyes turned cold and he shouted, ¡°Let him in!¡±

    Soon enough, Hassling, whose hair looked old but face looked young, walked into the room respectfully. As soon as he arrived, he gave Hofs a bow and said in a griefing voice, ¡°Please uphold justice for me, City Lord!¡±

    Hofs wore an irritated face. He coldly groaned, ¡°Those died in your secret chamber, who are they?¡±

    ¡°Avery and his divine guards who were previously in the Fifth Corps of the City of Shadows. Avery contacted me after he had a fallout with the House of Sainte as he knew that I have disagreements with the House of Sainte. He asked me to provide them a ce of shelter. As I saw how unreasonable the House of Sainte have been, seeing that Avery was sincere, and having the thought of recruit talents for Hushveil City, I agreed to help him and ced him in the secret chamber of my Godswamp Pharmacy. The House of Sainte is outrageously daring. Last time, they killed Eugene. And now, they be even more unbridled tomit murder in Hushveil City. They clearly are challenging the sovereignty of our Hushveil City. My Lord, Hushveil CIty must not bow to them any longer!¡± cried Hassling tearfully.

    Hassling knew that there was no way he could conceal the secret any longer, given how significant the matter was. However, in the crisis, he saw an opportunity to frame the House of Sainte that he so hates. If Hushveil City and the City of Shadows go to war ¨C that would be wonderful. If not, at the very least, Hofs would be enraged and he would give the House of Sainte troubles.

    ¡°Avery. Turns out to be him!¡± Hofs furiously shouted, ¡°Why am I not aware of this until now?¡±

    ¡°I do not wish to disturb Your Lordship as I know that Your Lordship is a busy man. Also, I know that the House of Sainte has been trying to track down Avery aggressively. Therefore I n on waiting a few more days before reporting to Your Lordship. I did not expect that such a thing would happen before that. Please forgive me, my Lord. I, Hassling, have always been faithful and true to Your Lordship. Please know that I mean well, my Lord,¡± replied Hassling hastily.

    ¡°My Lord, as the murdered was Avery of the City of Shadows and not a member of our Hushveil City, we are somewhat in the wrong. After all, we had made a pact with Wace that none of us in the Darkness Dominion will shelter Avery. Now that Avery was found inside the secret chamber of Godswamp Pharmacy and if the House of Sainte knows about it, we are not entirely in the right,¡± the Chief of Second Corps reminded softly.

    ¡°So what? Does that mean it¡¯s justifiable for the House of Sainte to not talk about it with City Lord for His Lordship to do something about it but to intrude andmit murder in our City? Even if we don¡¯t talk about Avery, what about my son? They openly murdered him on the street just because my son had a quarrel with them. Should we just forgive them for the matter as well? It is clear from their actions that they don¡¯t think Hushveil City is a force to be reckoned with. If wepromise now, they will only be more and more unbridled in our soil!¡± shouted Salouhi.

    Hofs nced at his quarreling Divine Guard Chiefs and then looked at Hassling. In a gloomy face, he instructed, ¡°No matter who or what, I will not allow anyone whomitted multiple murders in my City to walk free. Send all your men to search and investigate. Once you find them, arrest them. If they resist, kill them on the spot. The City of Shadows have killed Eugene and now they are pissing all around in my Hushveil City. No matter what Wace will say, I¡¯m not tolerating him any longer!¡±

    Hofs did not change his opinion even after learning about the identity of the victims and instructed to capture the murderers dead or alive. These Chiefs of Divine Guards knew that Hofs won¡¯t be changing his opinion. They exited the room with cold faces and started assembling all the divine guards in the City for a major manhunt.

    At this moment, Han Shuo and Rose who had thrown Hushveil City into utter chaos were at the most deste part of the City. They found a new gymnasium to stay.

    Before looking for a gymnasium, Rose hadpletely covered her long hair with a dark headscarf to conceal the most eye-catching feature on her.

    Han Shuo used his divine tablet to rent the gymnasium. He sat down peacefully in the gymnasium and did not appear worried at all.

    However, Han Shuo discovered that after the murder at Godswamp Pharmacy, Rose¡¯s gazes towards him had changed somewhat. From time to time, she would look at him with bunched brows as though there was something she wanted to ask but didn¡¯t have the courage to.

    After seeing that again and again, Han Shuo got somewhat irritated. He turned to gaze at Rose a distance away and asked, ¡°Speak. What is it?¡±

    Rose hesitated for a moment before she asked, ¡°Back at Demon Mountain, why is it that you did not try to kill me right from the start? From the strength you disyedst night, if you had used your full strength against me, I would be dead without a doubt.¡±

    Han Shuo had in fact attacked with his full strength. It was just that Cauldron Spirit wasn¡¯t on him and therefore he couldn¡¯t boost his strength to kill her straightforwardly. Cauldron Spirit was Han Shuo¡¯s biggest secret. There was no way that he would tell Rose about the presence of the Cauldron Spirit. Han Shuo stared nkly at the curious and inquisitive Rose. After half the day, unable toe up with a reasonable excuse, he decided to just be condescending, ¡°Remember your identity. Don¡¯t ask so many questions that are irrelevant to you.¡±

    Han Shuo then shut his eyes and mouth, not paying any more attention to Rose.

    Rose turned angry. The more time she spent with Han Shuo, the more punchable Han Shuo was to her. Not only that he wouldn¡¯t tell her a single truth about the mysteries on him, but he would also alwaysmand her around. This filled Rose¡¯s heart with discontent with nowhere to vent.

    ¡°When are we going to leave the City?¡± Rose looked at Han Shuo with hateful eyes and said, ¡°After the one day and night of killing spree, I reckon that the entire Hushveil City is in turmoil. As you have asked me to cover my hair, you should also know that Hushveil City isn¡¯t going to let us off. Under such circumstances, if we are found, all the experts in Hushveil City will gather and surround us. By then, even though our strengths are decent, I fear we will not be able to escape.¡±

    Although Rose was confident in her power, she knew that there was no way she could escape from heavy encirclement. After all, just the City Lord of Hushveil City alone was enough to defeat her. If all the experts of Hushveil City were to encircle them, she believed that even Han Shuo won¡¯t be able to escape unscathed.

    ¡°Hushveil City is currently in high alert mode. There are more divine guards on the streets than there aremoners. The city gates must have all been sealed. Now is not the time to leave as it is very likely that we will be caught,¡± with his eyes still shut, Han Shuozily said, ¡°Besides, the matter has not beenpleted cleanly.¡±

    ¡°Aren¡¯t they all dead already? What more do you want?¡± asked Rose in astonishment.

    ¡°No, there is one left. This person is even harder to deal withpared to Avery. He is the master of Godswamp Pharmacy, Hassling,¡± Han Shuo opened his eyes and turned to Rose, exining, ¡°Even if not for my grudges with Hassling, in order for Celestial Pearl to dominate the market in the Darkness Dominion, I must get rid of him.¡±

    ¡°You still have the guts to attack even at this moment?¡± Rose was astounded by how outrageously bold Han Shuo was. She cried out in surprise, ¡°You should know that every spot in the City is filled with divine guards. They are all looking for the two of us. Isn¡¯t it too reckless to strike again at this time?¡±

    Han Shuo revealed a calm smile, shrugged, and consoled, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I have confidence in bringing you out the City alive. Rest well for we shall head to Godswamp Pharmacy again tonight. I reckon that after such a major incident in Godswamp Pharmacy, Hassling would have returned.¡±

    Rose wore a cold face but her mind was far from being at ease. She thought, <i><i>Didin¡¯t expect that I would end up following a lunatic. Am I really going to make it out of Hushveil City alive?</i></i>

    Although Rose had been alive for countless years, she had never met anyone who was as daring as Han Shuo was. Somehow, she felt a slight excitement in her heart. She was both worried and excited about their assassinationter that night. She was not able to calm her heart for a long time.

 Chapter 764 - Eliminating Competition

    GDK 764: Eliminating Competition

    Night fell. The streets of Hushveil City were filled with divine guards. They wore gloomy faces and looked grave. They would look in every direction with their eyes wide open.

    Many small family ns and gymnasiums were visited by the divine guards and were asked about ¡®white-haired beauty¡¯. Most of those minor family ns and average gods cultivating in gymnasiums knew nothing about the murders in Hushveil City that happened just the night before. However, from the presence of arge number of divine guards all over the streets, they inferred that something major must have happened in Hushveil City.

    Hushveil City was in an unprecedented state of emergency. The most bustling streets were searched by the divine guards. Slowly, they moved the search area to poorer and rather remote regions. It was clear that they were not going to leave a stone in Hushveil City unturned.

    But at this point in time, Han Shuo and Rose had silently left the remote gymnasium. They went back to the lively and bustling street where Godswamp Pharmacy was located.

    As soon as they left the remote region, Han Shuo immediately released his demon generals to probe all around him. Han Shuo was much more reliant on the visions of his demon generalspared to thest night as the number of patrolling divine guards had dramatically increased. They were greatly restricted and slow in movement and had to be extra careful in avoiding the endless streams of divine guards.

    Rose appeared rather uneasy while they were heading towards Godswamp Pharmacy. As a mid-stage highgod expert, Rose¡¯s hearing power was extraordinary. She heard ¡®white-haired beauty¡¯ being uttered from the divine guards located not far from her. It infuriated and terrified her at the same time.

    There were multiple times that Rose wanted to persuade Han Shuo to give up on going to Godswamp Pharmacy. She was greatly intimidated by the number of divine guards she met along the way. The further they head, the more divine guards and security checkpoints they found. Charging into the area was basically courting death.

    However, before Rose could persuade Han Shuo to give up, when she saw the staunch, confident expression on his face, for whatever reason, Rose would feel as though the mission was not particrly dangerous. It was as though with Han Shuo beside her, everything will be just fine.

    Gradually, Rose even felt a vague feeling of excitement and looked forward to the danger they will soon face.

    The closer they get to Godswamp Pharmacy, the more divine guards there were on the streets. As Godswamp Pharmacy was the most important crime scene, it was most heavily guarded. The Chief of Sixth Corps, as well as numerous divine guards, were patrolling around the area rigorously. The former was like a beast that had gone berserk. He would shout and swear as he worked.

    After having probed the Godswamp Pharmacy for at least two times, Han Shuo knew the campus like his very own backyard. He was able to locate objects suitable to hide as soon as he got close to the area. Both him and Rose were extraordinary in strength. As long as there were objects that could block their figures, divine guards whose strengths were below theirs won¡¯t be able to detect their presence.

    Rose would release faint dark mists to assist Han Shuo in camouging with the darkness while they traveled between concealment spots. After making tremendous efforts, the two finally arrived in the vicinity of Godswamp Pharmacy.

    Unlike yesterday, the hiding spot they found was some distance away from Godswamp Pharmacy. As there were too many divine guards patrolling around Godswamp Pharmacy and there weren¡¯t many objects that could conceal them located in between, the two couldn¡¯t get any closer without being discovered. They had, therefore, hid further away.

    After killing Avery and his party, several dozen demon generals were added to Cauldron Spirit¡¯s collection. The highest grade of demon general required a rtively long time to refine and therefore Avery¡¯s highgod soul was not yet avable for use. Han Shuo ced the weaker demon generals far and around Godswamp Pharmacy while using the two spirit demons to infiltrate the campus.

    Han Shuo was even more cautious this time around because he knew that Hassling was likely inside Godswamp Pharmacy. Hassling was extraordinary in strength. If the two demon generals made using the highgod souls of Eugene and Jirofi got near Hassling, it was likely that they would be detected. Han Shuo did not want anything to go wrong with the mission.

    The two demon generals carefully avoided the Chief of Six Corps and made it past the divine guards looking all around vigntly. They entered the campus to search for their target.

    The surveying mission went even better than thest. Soon after the demon generals stepped into Godswamp Pharmacy, they saw Hassling who was at the top of a building. His brows were bunched as though deep in thought.

    Given that such a significant incident happened in Hushveil City and Godswamp Pharmacy was the main location of the crime scene, Hassling, as the owner of Godswamp Pharmacy and having secretly sheltered Avery, must share part of the me, one way or the other. To show to the City Lord of Hushveil City that he was loyal to the City and would fully cooperate, Hassling removed all the boundaries and seals inside Godswamp Pharmacy. He even stayed at the most visible spot in Godswamp Pharmacy as though to show that he had nothing to hide.

    As there were divine guards at every corner of Hushveil City and not being aware that Han Shuo was targeting him, Hassling was not concerned about his safety at all. Although he looked worried and bothered on the outside, in his heart, however, he could not be happier. Everything that he had been doing for all these years was to damage and harm the House of Sainte. How could Hassling not be happy to learn that the City Lord of Hushveil City will likely dere war on his archenemy?

    The demon generals discovered Hassling standing at the highest spot in Godswamp Pharmacy. His hair was like that of an old man¡¯s but his face was like that of a child¡¯s. These features of him were very obvious and distinctive. Han Shuo was immediately sure that it was Hassling. He said to Rose who was beside him, ¡°Found him!¡±

    ¡°Where is he?¡± Rose was a little stunned. She did not expect that Han Shuo would have located his target so quickly.

    Han Shuo pointed at the tallest structure in Godswamp Pharmacy and smilingly said, ¡°There, at the top of the building. We are too far from there so you can¡¯t see him. Now we should think about how to get to that building without being detected. Then we can butcher Hassling,¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s such arge space from here to Godswamp Pharmacy without anything that could conceal us. It is practically impossible to avoid all the divine guards. I think we should wait and see,¡± said Rose after looking all around and considering their options. She was sure that there was no way to get to the building without being detected.

    <i><i>How I wish Little Earth is here,</i></i> thought Han Shuo as he gazed at the building in the distance. He started missing the times when the five elite zombies were around him.

    Given the situation, they will be detected by the divine guards if they travel through the air ornd. It was only by traveling underground that they could get to the area without alerting anyone. But as Earth Elite Zombie and his brothers were away from Han Shuo to raise their strengths, Han Shuo could only wish they were there.

    ¡°I don¡¯t want to sit and wait. We don¡¯t have time for that,¡± replied Han Shuo calmly as he stared fixedly at Hassling with his demon generals.

    ¡°Then tell me, how can we get there without being detected?¡± Rose was a little admiring of Han Shuo¡¯s persistence but thought that the mission was impossible.

    Han Shuo stayed silent as he racked his brain. Strange lights would sh from his eyes as he considered his options.

    After a long while, the corners of Han Shuo¡¯s lips curled to make a confident smile. He asked, ¡°Everyone is looking for you. If you appeared nearby, how would they react?¡±

    Rose¡¯s face turned sad and she lowered her head in sorrow. She looked at the ground as she replied, ¡°You mean to have me draw them away? If I suddenly show myself in this situation, without you around, I don¡¯t think I can escape from the pursuit of the entire Hushveil City. Master, are you nning to sacrifice me?¡±

    Ever since the day Han Shuo subdued Rose, she had never called Han Shuo as ¡®Master¡¯ without being asked. But this time, perhaps to garner pity, or maybe out of sorrow, Rose actually called him ¡®Master¡¯.

    Han Shuo immediate knew that Rose had misunderstood him. For some reason, Han Shuo felt slightly disconcerted in his heart when he saw the downcast look on Rose¡¯s face. He shook his head, flung the strange feeling aside, and replied, ¡°I have never thought of sending my people to death!¡±

    The disheartened look lifted from Rose¡¯s face. She raised her head pleasantly surprised and asked, ¡°Then what is your n?¡±

    Han Shuo started gazing at Rose with glistening eyes. He instructed, ¡°Remove your headscarf.¡±

    Rose felt ufortable being looked at so intensely. She avoided Han Shuo¡¯s attentive gaze while removing her headscarf. Her smooth silvery hair dropped down gently to her waist.

    Han Shuo stared fixedly at Rose. She had no idea what Han Shuo was up to in looking at her so intensely.

    Suddenly, Rose covered her sexy lips in astonishment as though trying to hold herself back from shrieking. Her other hand was pointing at a demon general. Rose was in disbelief and her mind was in jumbles.

    ¡°That is not you. It is just a false image I made. What do you think? Lifelike, isn¡¯t it?¡± Through the maniption of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, the demon general transformed into Rose¡¯s appearance. It appeared just as attractive as the real Rose.

    Rose nodded at Han Shuo. She was so shocked that she forgot how to speak for a moment. Those who suddenly saw a replica of themselves would usually be at a loss temporarily.

    ¡°It will draw away the divine guards for you. As long as they are kept some distance away, the divine guards won¡¯t be able to tell if it is actually you. By the time they discovered that something was wrong, we would have eliminated Hassling!¡± said Han Shuo smilingly.

    Rose was dazed for quite some time before she finally came to her senses. She eximed, ¡°So miraculous!¡±

    ¡°Any issues now?¡± asked Han Shuo who couldn¡¯t wait to get rid of Hassling.

    ¡°None at all!¡± Rose suddenly felt somewhat embarrassed for misunderstanding Han Shuo¡¯s intention.

    ¡°Very well. I will start moving the image. As soon as the divine guards have been drawn away, we will go over to ughter!¡± said Han Shuo. Then, the demon general who took Rose¡¯s appearance slowly moved out from their concealment spot and flew in Godswamp Pharmacy¡¯s direction.

    Demon generals were weightless even in material state. The demon general gently flew towards Godswamp Pharmacy. As countless divine guards were patrolling all around, the demon general taking Rose¡¯s appearance was very quickly discovered. They immediately shouted to alert theirrades.

    ¡°A white-haireddy? It must be her! How daring of her!¡±

    ¡°The City Lord hasmanded to get them alive or dead. Show no mercy!¡±

    ¡°Everyone move! Do not let her get away or we won¡¯t be able to exin ourselves!¡±

    The shouts of the divine guards suddenly filled the silent night. Those who did not saw Rose¡¯s false image were alerted as well. They hastily rushed to the source of the sound and pursued after the demon general.

    The demon general in Rose¡¯s appearance appeared as though she noticed that something wasn¡¯t right and immediately turned around to leave. It moved away from Godswamp Pharmacy at extreme speed.

    All the divine guards turned excited and went after her. Even the divine guards guarding at the front door of Godswamp Pharmacy flew out while shouting.

    City Lord Hofs of Hushveil City gave them a deadline of just three days. They all knew just how hot-tempered Hofs was. If they couldn¡¯t find and get rid of the murderers after three days, there¡¯s no telling how Hofs might punish his Divine Guard Chiefs. If their bosses were punished, they as subordinates won¡¯t be able to escape punishment either. Their Chiefs will surely scold and curse them like hell!

    Therefore, to avoid the nasty consequences, they went after her like crazy.

    The divine guards around Godswamp Pharmacy dispersed in an instant. They all went after the demon general taking Rose¡¯s appearance. Hassling who was at the very top of the tallest building had discovered abnormality. He hesitated for a moment but in the end, he decided not to pursue the false image but remain where he stood.

    Chasing and arresting murderers were the duties of divine guards. As an ordinary citizen, although he was greatly curious, it was not appropriate for him to pursue the murderer. He thought, <i><i>Is that woman crazy? Why would she be so daring to return to Godswamp Pharmacy when there will surely be arge number of divine guards around here?</i></i>

    As soon as the divine guards at the front entrance of Godswamp Pharmacy went away, Han Shuo softly instructed, ¡°Move!¡±

    Without as many divine guards watching in every corner, Han Shuo and Rose could now infiltrate the Godswamp Pharmacy without being detected. Although Hassling was standing on the highest building, he was not able to observe every single detail down below. Besides, as Han Shuo and Rose went in through his blind spot, Hassling did not notice them at all.

    The two sessfully sneaked into Godswamp Pharmacy. Once inside, there were many more ces for them to conceal themselves. With demon generals scouting out in advance, Han Shuo had selected his entry path before he had even stepped into the campus. He took Rose and traveled under the shade of the walls and stones, evaded a few divine guards inside the campus, and finally arrived underneath the building Hassling was at.

    The two did not fly straight up from the outside of the building but rushed to the top of the building one level at a time. He ascended the building very rapidly.

    It was only when Han Shuo arrived at a level below Hassling that he detected the mighty aura rushing towards him from below. He loudly shouted, ¡°Who is it?!¡± andunched an attack towards theer without thinking. It was a no brainer to Hassling that whoever that was rushing towards him out of nowhere at this moment cannot be a friend!

    The stone bs on the top of the building suddenly burst outwards and the rock fragment violently shot towards Hassling. The seventeen flying swords suddenly emerged and surrounded Hassling. Han Shuo immediately proceeded to close his eyes, absorb Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy into his body at the fastest speed, and activated Ceaseless Pain, making an all-out effort to kill Hassling.

    The enormous disturbance on the top of the building attracted the attention of the Godswamp Pharmacy divine guards underneath. A dozen or more divine guards shouted at theirrades and rushed to the scene. As they did not have to travel level by level, they reached the top of the building in the blink of an eye. They startingunching attacks as soon as they saw Rose who was wearing a cold, chilling face.

    The reason that Han Shuo brought Rose along for the assassination was to have her deal with the pesky underlings so he could focus on getting the boss. Rose knew that for Han Shuo to get rid of Hassling in the shortest time possible, he must not be distracted. Rose did not disappoint. Her long hair started wildly fluttering. The dozen or more divine guards who reached the top of the building were all caught by Rose¡¯s fluttering long hair and sent flying away with new holes on their chests.

    Han Shuo closed his eyes and ignored the surrounding. He ced his full andplete attention on activating Ceaseless Pain of the Avici Godying Sword Formation. The ear-piercing whistle of the seventeen flying swords pierced the silent night and spread far and wide.

    Many of the divine guards closeby heard the soul-piercing whistleing from Godswamp Pharmacy. Sensing that something wasn¡¯t quite right, they hurried back to Godswamp Pharmacy.

    Hassling was a level higher in realmpared to Avery. He possessed mid-stage highgod strength and could withstand Ceaseless Pain for a much longer duration. As he resisted the intense corrosive power and chilling aura of the seventeen flying swords, he shouted, ¡°I recognize you. You are the master of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy!¡±

    ¡°I recognize you as well. You had set me up and nearly caused my Celestial Pearl to wind up. You have a great rtionship with the godhunters, and your Godswamp Pharmacy is thergest pharmacy in the Darkness Dominion. You must die!¡± Han Shuo suddenly shouted and opened his eyes wide. The seventeen flying swords that shrouded Hassling suddenly turned into streaks of blurry shadows that wrapped Hassling tightly as though a giant.

    Han Shuo suddenly got up close with Hassling. He took out the Demonyer Edge, gather all the energy in his main body and avatars, and sh at Hassling. Some sort of bizarre transformation seemed to have urred in an instant. Hassling¡¯s head was sent flying away from his body.

    Cauldron Spirit suddenly flew out to quickly collect Hassling¡¯s divine soul. Han Shuo, who saw through his demon generals that divine guards nearby were approaching them, casually collected Hassling¡¯s space ring and instructed Rose, ¡°Leave!¡± and immediately flew away from the crime scene. Rose quickly followed behind.

 Chapter 765 - Killing Spree

    GDK 765: Killing Spree

    The divine guards that went away from Godswamp Pharmacy turned back around. When they saw Han Shuo and Rose¡¯s figures that were flying away from the tallest structure on Godswamp Pharmacy, they immediately chased after the two.

    At the same time, a furious roar sounded from behind them, ¡°The fuck, it¡¯s a false image!¡±

    It was the voice of Salouhi, the Chief of Sixth Corps. He had been pursuing the demon general with a group of divine guards for a long time. But when he finally caught up to the demon general taking Rose¡¯s appearance, he sensed that something wasn¡¯t quite right with the aura on the demon general. Shortly after the discovery, the demon general vanished into nothingness. It became clear to Salouhi that they had been going after a false image all this time.

    Salouhi could sense where the now invisible demon general was flying. But at this time, he heard shoutsing from behind him. He knew he must have fallen for a distraction ploy. Therefore, he decided to ignore the escaping demon general and rushed back to Godswamp Pharmacy, pursuing Han Shuo and Rose with a group of divine guards.

    ¡°Hassling is dead! Hassling is dead!¡±

    ¡°Master is dead! Master has been murdered!¡±

    Loud, panicked shouts came from the divine guards and workers in Godswamp Pharmacy. The news of Hassling¡¯s death spread all around in no time. All the divine guards nearby quickly received the information.

    The divine guards were all shocked by the news. Under heavy fortification and defense, not only that the murderers tried to return to Godswamp Pharmacy, but they also tried tomit murder. Their bold actions were simply a great insult to every divine guard of Hushveil City. It was as though the murderers were trying to make a point that the divine guards were all useless.

    And the worst and most unbearable of all, the murderers had seeded!

    To the divine guards, this was the greatest humiliation and provocation!

    ¡°What?!¡± Salouhi seemed to had been hit hard and erupted like a volcano. He panted like a berserk wild beast as he roared, ¡°Get those motherfuckers!. If they do not die, all of you will!¡±

    All the divine guards in Hushveil City seemed to had gone wild. They swarmed towards Han Shuo and Rose from every corner of the streets. Divine guards from other Corps also rushed in their direction after hearing the news. The street became flooded with divine guards. There would be at least one divine guard every ten meters.

    There were divine guards of Hushveil City in every direction, staring fixedly at the two of them. Unless they could turn invisible like his Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals, there was no way they could cut off all visual contact from their pursuers.

    Han Shuo and Rose who were traveling closely together showed no intention to fight. They charged towards gaps between the divine guards. Even when they ran into a blockade formed byrge groups of divine guards, they would simply go around them and keep on moving.

    Several hundred divine guards were converging toward the duo. If Han Shuo and Rose were to stop moving even for a moment, the divine guards would be able to quickly surround them and an endless stream of reinforcement will be able to keep them trapped until all the experts of Hushveil City could reach them. By then, no matter how extraordinary Han Shuo and Rose¡¯s strengths were, they would have no chance of survival.

    Han Shuo¡¯s figure streak through countless buildings in the dark. Although he had tried his best to avoid the divine guards, he and Rose would still be discovered. They couldn¡¯t free themselves from their tracking.

    The demon generals dispersed all around him constantly moved around, rying Han Shuo the locations and movements of the divine guards all over the streets. Han Shuo wore a calm face. His heart, mind, and consciousness were in absolute tranquility. He rapidly processed the information and scenes ryed by the demon generals and calcted their most optimal path.

    The Divine Guard Chiefs of Hushveil City had unique means ofmunication through the energy towers and boundary towers that were found all over the City. The Chiefs who were searching for Han Shuo and Rose in other regions soon received news about Hassling¡¯s death and that the murderers were on the run.

    All the Divine Guard Chiefs were enraged by Han Shuo¡¯s outrageous act. Feeling insulted, the Chiefs gathered their elite divine guards and rushed in the direction of Godswamp Pharmacy. Hushveil City was filled with ear-piercing whistles as they streaked across the air.

    The quiet midnight was broken by the whooshing noises of divine guards streaking across the air. They would yell and shout to pass onmands and ry information. They seemed to be filled with anger.

    It didn¡¯t take long before the small family ns andmoners realized that a major incident was taking ce in Hushveil City that night. Frightened, they activated the boundaries and seals to secure their homes. The energy towers that supplied energy to the entire Hushveil City, as well as boundary towers, began bursting with radiance.

    In all of a sudden, the dark night turned into a bright day. It was as though the sun was up in Hushveil City.

    With that, Han Shuo and Rose¡¯s situation turned even worse. They could no longer utilize the darkness of the night and they became much more visible to the divine guards.

    Rose felt rather anxious. The energy towers all over Hushveil City glowing brightly meant that the two had alerted every major family ns in the City of their activity. It was an undesirable situation.

    Han Shuo, however, only bunched his brows. He seemed to loathe the gaudy light that glowed fiercely from the energy towers. He even let out a cold groan and revealed a feeling of disdain on his lips.

    As the environment became brightly illuminated and divine guards from other Corps were approaching, Han Shuo and Rose started having difficulties moving forward. There wasn¡¯t much gap left between the divine guards surrounding them that they could break through.

    A callous thought swarmed Han Shuo¡¯s mind. He had originally nned not tomit a massacre in Hushveil City. However, from the looks of it, Hushveil City seemed determined to slice him and Rose into a million pieces. With things having developed to this stage, Han Shuo decided to abandon his original n. The seventeen flying swords, glistening gloriously, whooshed across the sky.

    The divine guards blocking in Han Shuo¡¯s path had just moved into a formation when the seventeen flying swords reached them. All those divine guards struck by the incisive and terrifying flying swords would start melting away. They were quickly reduced into puddles of bloody liquid.

    Han Shuo remained silent. He continued flying forward and probing the situation around him with demon generals. The seventeen flying swords flying ahead of him would destroy anything and everything in their path. He was brutal, savage, and decisive!

    The seventeen flying swords were like a glistening juicing machine, extracting the lives of those divine guards blocking Han Shuo¡¯s way. Within a short few moments, around thirty divine guards with lowgod and midgod strengths were liquefied. Naturally, Cauldron Spirit would take advantage of the opportunity to improve its strength. It flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s body to absorb the divine souls.

    Han Shuo wore a calm face. Strange lights shed across his eyes where the reflection of the seventeen flying swords could be seen.

    With the seventeen flying swords paving the way, the divine guards in Han Shuo¡¯s way would be dead before they could reach Han Shuo. This made it impossible for the divine guards to encircle the two. Han Shuo and Rose easily broke through the blockades formed by the divine guards. They were not tarried by the divine guards even for a moment.

    Han Shuo and Rose would leave behind a trail of melting bodies wherever they passed. The divine guards around the duo who watched Han Shuo ruthlessly murder anyone and everyone who was in their path started to feel hesitation. A group of divine guards who were in Han Shuo¡¯s way, intimidated and frightened, made way for him.

    The seventeen flying swords would not waste time on butchering those divine guards who gave way and streak past them as though seventeen beams of light. Right after the seventeen flying swords passed, Han Shuo and Rose¡¯s figures would whoosh past them, breaking out from the group¡¯s encirclement.

    With the first batch of divine guards setting an example, others followed. More and more divine guards, especially those who witnessed how brutally theirrades died, moved out from Han Shuo¡¯s way and let them escape from theyers of encirclement.

    Cauldron Spirit turned into a murky shadow that travels right behind the seventeen flying swords, fully focused on collecting the divine souls perished under the flying swords. It would also release a few demon generals from time to time to help out. As there wasn¡¯t a single highgod in their path, they were able to move without impediment. They managed to leave the Godswamp Pharmacy block.

    But soon after, they left the block, the Chief of Second Corps hurried over. As soon as he saw the murderous Han Shuo, he charged towards him and shouted in a chilling voice, ¡°Let¡¯s see where you could run now!¡±

    Seeing that a mid-stage highgod with apany of divine guards were charging at him while more divine guards were converging towards him from many directions, Han Shuo abruptly changed his path and moved in another direction to avoid the Chief of Second Corps.

    Even if Han Shuo activated Ceaseless Pain to the maximum, it was still not possible for Han Shuo to kill a mid-stage highgod in a split second. Han Shuo was in a situation where every second mattered. If Han Shuo was to waste a few seconds on them, the Chief of Sixth Corps would be able to reach him and the other Chiefs will be moments from catching up. In that case, Han Shuo will be surrounded by a crowd of powerful experts and escape will be tremendously difficult.

    Therefore, Han Shuo decided not to be tarried by the Chief. He straightforwardly avoided him and charged at a weaker wing of the encirclement.

    Several divine guards, unable to react in time, were pierced by the loudly whistling seventeen flying swords. Their bodies that will soon liquefy were flung high into the air in every direction.

    The divine guards in Han Shuo¡¯s path instinctively moved aside after witnessing the terrifying lethality of the flying swords. The Chief of Second Corps who noticed their reaction immediately shouted, ¡°You are not allowed to retreat! Stand in their way even in your death!¡±

    Those divine guards who originally wanted to move aside, after hearing themand, decided to activate all the divine energy in their bodies. Through the divine weapons in their hands, theyunched a wave of ranged attacks ¨C not at the seventeen flying swords, but Han Shuo and Rose charging towards them.

    Ever since Han Shuo and Rose started escaping from Godswamp Pharmacy, as they had been moving at extreme speed and they had not stopped moving for even a moment, the divine guards pulled behind by the two had notunched any ranged attack at the two. Even if they did, it would be ineffective.

    After Han Shuo took out the seventeen flying swords, those divine guards standing in Han Shuo¡¯s path would have a chance in attacking Han Shuo but they were so intimidated by the destructive power of the flying swords that the only thought that crossed their minds was to save themselves. They forgot to attack Han Shuo who was controlling the flying swords.

    However, after hearing the Second Corps Chief¡¯s shout, those divine guards from the Second Corps cast away their fear of death and decided to sacrifice their lives. They released all the divine energy they had though their divine weapons. The ranged attacks went around the seventeen flying swords and shot at Han Shuo and Rose.

    Just as expected, the seventeen flying swordsnded on the divine guards. They stood no chance against the flying swords and were totally shredded. But at the same time, the attacks they made before their deaths were just as unavoidable for Han Shuo and Rose. They two had no choice but to slow down for a moment to defend against the attacks.

    Although the few divine guards only had midgod strengths, their all-out attacks were substantial and powerful. Although Han Shuo and Rose were able to neutralize all their attacks, the two were dyed for a few seconds. During that brief moment, several hundred divine guards surrounded Han Shuo and Rose.

    Once Han Shuo and Rose stopped moving, the divine guards were able to lock their ranged attacks on the two. In an instant, several hundred bursts of brilliant lights and oddly-shaped divine weapons bombarded at Han Shuo and Rose. The seventeen flying swords that were meant for killing had to return to Han Shuo¡¯s side to defend him from all sorts of attacks.

    Rose¡¯s hair danced wildly. She rapidly released her darkness divine energy to put upyers uponyers of boundaries to defend against the divine guards¡¯ attacks.

    This was the situation that Han Shuo feared most. No matter how powerful he and Rose were, it would be extremely difficult to face against the attacks of several hundred divine guards, especially when one of them was the Chief of Second Corps. Meanwhile, the Chiefs from other Corps and more divine guards were on their way there. If the trend continued, it was only a matter of time before they are both dead.

    Han Shuo immediately realized that if they do not break from the encirclement soon, once the other Divine Guard Chiefs arrive, their fate of meeting death would be sealed.

    However, even in the worst situation possible, Han Shuo remainedposed and calm. He wore an undisturbed face as he maneuvered the seventeen flying swords, neutralizing all the attacksing at him using Ceaseless Pain. His rapidly turned over in his mind for a way to break free from the encirclement.

    Rose who was beside him seemed more and more strained. Gradually, a feeling of despair rose in her heart. Being surrounded by so many divine guards and seeing that many more were on their way, Rose thought that she will lose her life in Hushveil City.

    <i><i>Bang!</i></i> The barrier of darkness deployed by Rose was destroyed by the Chief of Second Corps. Several bursts of midgod divine energies managed tond on Rose and caused her to sway slightly. The Chief of Second Corps, upon seeing that Rose was weaker than Han Shuo, smirked and focused his attacks on Rose.

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression transformed. He calmly instructed Cauldron Spirit, ¡°Release all the demon generals. I want the entire Hushveil City to burn!¡±

 Chapter 766 - Havoc in Hushveil City

    <b>GDK 766: Havoc in Hushveil City</b>

    Han Shuo and Rose were heavily surrounded and under siege. If they do not do something radical and escape from the encirclement soon, their situation will be even direr when other divine guards and their Chiefs reach them. Therefore, Han Shuo knew he had no choice but to use all the aces up his sleeves.

    Ever since he arrived on Elysium, Han Shuo had been constantly filling the Cauldron of Myriad Demons with divine souls. After several decades, he had umted around six hundred souls in the Cauldron. In the usual day, Han Shuo would only utilize a very small fraction of the demon generals he had to probe for information. Never before had he released all the demon generals in the Cauldron to attack.

    Cauldron Spirit and Han Shuo had connected minds and it also knew how critical the situation was. The instant that Han Shuo gave it themand, it started releasing the demon generals. Rose who was fighting beside Han Shuo suddenly sensed that countless lifeforms were gushing out from Han Shuo¡¯s body. The divine guards who wereunching ranged attacks at the two, however, could not detect the demon generals as they were in immaterial form.

    In a split second, hundreds and hundreds of near-invisible immaterial lifeforms spread in every direction and ced themselves among the divine guards attacking Han Shuo and Rose. Then, when they are in position, Cauldron Spiritmanded the demon generals to attack. Grayish shadows appeared in an instant and pounced on the divine guards without warning.

    Some of the demon generals that were used for scouting also transformed into material state and joined the attack. Hundreds of malevolent and terrifying shapes violently charged at them. They hissed and wailed as they tore and scratched at the divine guards.

    The more than two hundred divine guards that surrounded Han Shuo and Rose were all loudly shrieking in fear. Many had their bodies intruded by the demon generals and their divine energy was being rapidly drained. Their divine souls were being corroded away and their awareness was being erased bit by bit.

    Demon generals in material form could cause tremendous damage to divine bodies and divine souls. The divine guards could not free themselves from the attacks of the demon generals and their power was slowly dwindling. Once their divine energy and life force were vacuumed away from the demon generals, their divine souls would lose self-awareness, bing an excellent material for nourishing the Cauldron of Myriad Demon and for making new demon generals.

    Grayish shadows whizzed and streaked all around. Many of the divine guards screamed in misery as their life forces were being rapidly drained away. Many were lying still on the ground with their eyes rolled back even though there wasn¡¯t a sign of injury on their bodies. But when theirrades went closer to examine them, they would discover that these divine guards had lost their lives.

    The scene was chaotic. Around six hundred demon generals were charging in every direction and attacking everything with a soul. There were more demon generals than there were divine guards present. The demon generals would fly in groups of tens and wildly assault a divine guard as a group. After entering a person¡¯s body, the demon generals could nibble away the person¡¯s life force within a short time.

    ¡°What is this! What in the world are these?! Ah! Locke is dead!¡±

    ¡°What the fuck are these cursed things? How can they be invulnerable to attacks from divine weapons? Ah! Ahh! They are inside me!¡±

    ¡°It doesn¡¯t die, it can¡¯t be killed!¡±

    ¡°Is the City being invaded? We should retreat... ¡°

    ¡°Shit, I¡¯m, I¡¯m dying... ¡°

    These divine guards of Hushveil City were losing their heads. They had never seen a lifeform as strange as the demon general. Normal physical attacks could pose no threat to demon generals. Before they find the right method of attacking the demon generals, the divine guards could not make any counterattacks and were hence vulnerable. In just a few moments, several dozen divine guards had lost their lives to the demon generals.

    The Cauldron Spirit gently hovered around in its immaterial form, collecting the divine souls of the deceased whilemanding the demon generals to attack the weakest divine guards in swarms.

    The Chief of Second Corps was loudly shouting all these while, asking his divine guards to form effective defenses. However, as everyone was in a panic and the demon generals were making loud, goosebump-inducing whistles, not many could hear him.

    Cauldron Spirit knew that the Chief of Second Corps had excellent strength and thereforemanded the demon generals to avoid him and focus on attacking the weaker divine guards instead. The demon generals refined from highgod souls were especially deadly, and even deadlier in a swarm. These demon generals of the highest grade could consume the vitality of an average divine guard in just a split second.

    With each passing moment, a few of the divine guards would perish. Under such circumstances, no one would have the energy to deal with Han Shuo and Rose. Han Shuo and Rose did not let go of the opportunity to strike them while they were weakened. The seventeen flying swords whistled across a dense crowd of divine guards and dismembered them. Their heads and limbs were sent flying while blood sttered everywhere.

    While calmly maneuvering his seventeen flying swords tomit a massacre, Han Shuo did not forget to station a few of his demon generals far in the perimeter to look out for any approaching enemy. He killed as many divine guards as he can with Rose so that Cauldron Spirit would have more demon generals to y with in its Cauldron.

    Rose mercilessly butchering the divine guards behind Han Shuo seemed excited for some reason. Perhaps the sudden emergence of a chance of survival when she thought all hope was lost had lifted her spirit to fight.

    Within a short few minutes, Han Shuo and Rose managed to kill more than a hundred divine guards that previously surrounded the two. The shouts of the Chief of Second Corps werepletely ineffective. He watched helplessly as more and more of his divine guards lose their lives.

    The divine guards were shouting in fear and they were panicking. The more flustered they were, the more vulnerable they will be. The wails of their dyingrades and the sight of their dead teammates only made matters worse.

    The Chief of Second Corps that had been shouting in vain suddenly discovered that Han Shuo and Rose were charging towards him murderously.

    With the seventeen flying swords paving the way, all the divine guards between them were shredded. Han Shuo moved with several dozens of demon generals as though a dark, menacing cloud in his wake. It greatly intimidated the Chief of Second Corps.

    Rose¡¯s silver hair were dancing wildly. Filled with darkness divine energy, her long hair was as cold and incisive as needles. Her long hair would pierce through the bodies of the divine guards around her, killing them in an instant.

    The Chief of Second Corps wore a dark face as he watched Han Shuo and Rose approaching him. He racked his brain for a solution. About ten secondster, he gave up on the idea of fighting against the duo by himself and retreated.

    ¡°Physical attacks are useless. Attack using fire. They are afraid of cold and heat. They are also afraid of warped divine energy!¡± suddenly shouted a divine guard who had stumbled upon the weaknesses of the demon generals.

    The spirits of all those divine guards who had been helpless against the demon generals were lifted. They followed the divine guard¡¯s instructions on attacking the demon general. Immediately, the demon generals retreated in fear. A few of demon generals that were burned by mes would even make devilish squeaks as though they had been injured.

    With that, the divine guards were no longer paralyzed. They readjusted their approach in attacking the demon generals. The rate of death sharply reduced when the divine guards discovered the correct method of attacking the demon generals. The divine guards learned to force the demon generals out from their bodies by setting themselves on fire. The demon generals would have fled before the fire could injure their divine bodies.

    When Han Shuo saw that the divine guards discovered the demon generals¡¯ weaknesses and seeing through his demon generals far in the distance that more divine guards were converging towards the region, Han Shuo let out a cold groan and said to Rose, ¡°Move!¡±

    Han Shuo proceeded with flying away. Rose did not hesitate and immediately followed behind Han Shuo.

    Several hundreds of demon generals gathered together and covered the seventeen flying swords like arge clump of dark cloud. They paved the way for Han Shuo and Rose. Several divine guards in their paths were crushed by the demon generals and minced by the flying swords, allowing the duo to move unimpededly.

    Every living thing has its weaknesses and demon general was no exception. However, even though the demon generals were afraid of fire and extreme cold, they nheless could instantly crush a person as a swarm. This was simr to man-eating ants. Anyone could easily pinch a single ant to death. Alone, it poses no threat. But against a swarm made up of millions of ants, one must get out of its way or be reduced into a skeleton.

    None of those divine guards in Han Shuo and Rose¡¯s path stood a chance against the cloud of several hundred demon generals and the seventeen flying swords concealed within. They posed as much resistance in stopping Han Shuo and Rose as dried leaves had in stopping a bullet.

    Utilizing the visions of several dozen invisible demon generals, Han Shuo led Rose in charging towards weaker wings of the soon-to-form encirclement and managed to massacre their way out. Immediately, they traveled in the direction of the nearest city gate.

    Han Shuo knew just how wild and outrageous his actions had been. He believed that if he doesn¡¯t leave the City that very night, all the well-known patriarchs of all major family ns and perhaps even the City Lord of Hushveil City himself will personally join the hunt. Han Shuo did not feel that he could go up against the entire City by himself. Thus, he concluded that he must escape Hushveil City before they are activated.

    Right outside the gate of Hushveil City was a vast mountain range. Han Shuo was confident that once they reached that terrain, even if hunted by every expert of Hushveil City, he could exit the territories under Hushveil City¡¯s sphere of influence with ease.

    After charging out from region housing the Godswamp Pharmacy, Han Shuo and Rose continued with rushing towards the city gate at the fastest speed, showing no intention of hiding their tracks. They intended to force their way out.

    It was at this moment that the City Lord of Hushveil City, Hofs, received news of Han Shuo and Rose wreaking havoc in his City.

    If one was to describe Hofs as enraged thest time, then this time, Hofs had gone totally insane!

    ¡°Inform the patriarchs of all family ns to activate their family n divine guards. Whichever family n that managed to ughter the two will inherit Eugene¡¯s position!¡± Hofs must have truly gone insane. His family n had control over three Divine Guard Chiefs. If any other family n possesses two Chiefs, they could possibly threaten the position of his family n. Hofs had issued thatmand even though he was aware of this possibility.

    ¡°Patriarch, you should reconsider this!¡± an elder of the Hofley Family immediately voiced his disagreement.

    ¡°Shut up and pass down mymand right away!¡± roared Hofs furiously and left the Hofley Residence. He led the most elite divine guards of the House of Hofley in rushing towards the city gate. He had received intel from his Divine Guard Chiefs and knew where Han Shuo and Rose were heading.

    Like Wace, Hofs was ate-stage highgod of darkness. For many years, Hofs had not personally been on the field. But this time, Hofs had gone supercritical and he was determined to cut Han Shuo and Rose into a million pieces.

    Among the seven major cities in the Darkness Dominion, although Hushveil City ranked in the bottom of the list, no one had ever dared pissed on his head like Han Shuo and Rose did. It seethed Hofs with rage that the two had been massacring in his territory but none of his Divine Guard Chiefs had managed to kill the two even till now.

    Hushveil City was poor in terms of strength whenpared to the other six major cities. And now, thanks to the rounds of massacresmitted by Han Shuo and Rose, the City¡¯s strength would be reduced even further. If Hushveil City was to let Han Shuo and Rose escape on top of all the losses it mounted, the City will never be able to turn the situation around. Worst of all, the Darkness Overgod might even deem him ipetent and execute him.

    The Overgods of Death, Destruction, and Darkness, were warlike andbative. They demand nothingplicated from their servants ¨C they must be faithful and more importantly, be powerful!

    Wace, Hofs, and the others could be the masters of the seven major cities of the Darkness Dominion because they themselves and their family ns possessed extraordinary strengths. If they could not prove themselves useful to the Darkness Overgod and maintain that image, they will likely be abandoned by the Overgod!

    While Hofs was leaving the Hofley Residence with his most elite divine guards, patriarchs of other family ns in Hushveil City received the message from the House of Hofley. Their eyes burst with lights of greed and excitement when they heard that they were given an opportunity to fight for the vacant post left by Eugene. All they had to do was to kill Han Shuo and Rose.

    These patriarchs abandoned their original ns, whatever it may be, and summoned the most elite divine guards of their family n. For the interest of their family ns in the next tens of thousands of years, all of them personally joined the hunt.

    In no time, arge number of family ns all over Hushveil City, big and small, activated their forces.

    The activation of the most elite troops of all major family ns exacerbated the unrest in Hushveil City. It had shocked themoners. Some of them even thought that forces from the Life and Light Dominions have sent an army to invade the City.

    Hushveil City turned into havoc. Rumors were spreading like wildfire. Different stories about why the military forces were activated were told. Some of the divine guards who knew the actual event exaggerate Han Shuo and Rose¡¯s strengths in their ounts, adding a veil of mysteriousness to the two.

 Chapter 767 - Killing a way out

    GDK 767: Killing a way out

    Han Shuo and Rose did not know that the gods in Hushveil City were panicking because of them. They had ced all their focus on leaving Hushveil City and did not pay attention to anything else.

    The two hastened on with their journey, heading towards the city gate that they used to enter the City.

    As most of the Hushveil CIty divine guards had gone to Godswamp Pharmacy, Han Shuo and Rose did not meet much resistance in their journey after breaking themselves free from the encirclement. The few and scattered divine guards they met along the way dared not pose them obstruction and automatically moved aside for the duo. It was after Han Shuo and Rose disappeared from their view that they hastily transmitted messages to their Chiefs.

    Therefore, the divine guards of Hushveil City had neverpletely lost track of Han Shuo and Rose even till now. The patriarchs of all major family ns and City Lord Hofs were informed of the two murderers¡¯ heading. They were all rushing to the city gate.

    Rose was following closely behind Han Shuo. Over the multiple bloody massacres shemitted with Han Shuo, Rose gained new confidence in Han Shuo. Han Shuo¡¯s having managed to free themselves from theyers of heavy encirclement and diffusing the dire situation so calmly had won Rose¡¯s conviction. Her trust in Han Shuo was almost as blind and absolute as those possessed by Phoebe, Fanny, and the others.

    Instead of feeling frightened and afraid, Rose felt a vague sense of excitement. She could not wait to continue killing and butchering, challenging the real experts of Hushveil City!

    Han Shuo¡¯s brows were deeply bunched as he knew that by now, all the experts of Hushveil City must have been activated. Some might already be waiting for them at the city gate. He knew that forcing a way out from the City will not be that easy. He was considering possible scenarios and what he could do as countermeasures.

    Before he was close to the city gate, he noticed changes to the energy towers all around him. The energy towers and boundary towers in the City, powered by energy crystals, were bursting with gaudy radiances. The enormous boundary that enveloped the entire Hushveil City had suddenly increased in power and grown much more secure and tough.

    Like the City of Shadows, the boundary around Hushveil City had no holes expect at the city gates. As it was impossible for Han Shuo to destroy the defensive boundary made using hundreds of thousands of energy towers, his only path of escape was through the city gates.

    The city gates were heavily defended in usual times. And now, given the major incidents they did, it was to be expected that the city gates would be even more heavily guarded. Han Shuo knew it was very likely that there would be great dangers and bloodshed waiting for them at the city gate.

    It was only by charging out from Hushveil City that his mission could be considered aplete sess because his only other alternative was to deploy Demonic Blood Disassembly. In that scenario, not only that he would be greatly injured, he will have to leave Rose behind where she will likely be interrogated and die a painful death.

    Han Shuo was quiet and wore a gloomy face after having considered every possibility. While rushing to the destination, he couldn¡¯t help but turned around to take a look at Rose.

    Unexpectedly, Rose who had been cold towards Han Shuo all along actually reacted to Han Shuo with a lovable smile. She even said energetically, ¡°I know we can make it out the City!¡±

    Han Shuo was astounded by her change in attitude and her unquestioning faith in him, vastly different from the cold treatment she would usually give.

    Rose¡¯s extraordinarily beautiful face appeared even more attractive when she put on a smile, so much so that it took away Han Shuo¡¯s breath for a second. For some reason, even Han Shuo started to share Rose¡¯s seemingly unfounded confidence that they will be just fine.

    That charming smile of Rose¡¯s had thawed the formless and invisibleyer of ice between the two. Han Shuo, who might soon be encircled by every powerful expert in Hushveil City, even started to view the dangerous mission as interesting and fun.

    The City Lord and all therge family ns in Hushveil City learned of Han Shuo and Rose travel path through various channels. From that, they projected that Han Shuo wanted to force his way out through a city gate. All the patriarchs rushed to the city gate with the most elite divine guards in their family ns.

    The city gate in question was under the protection of the House of Simon, one of the four major family ns in Hushveil City. Their forces were also located conveniently close to the city gate. Their patriarch, Westin, was the first to arrive at the city gate with the finest men of his family n.

    There were one thousand three hundred divine guards stationed at the city gate, including Westin¡¯s reinforcement of the five hundred finest divine guards that the House of Simon has. Every elite divine guard possessedte-stage midgod strengths.

    All four highgod experts in the House of Simon, except for the Chief of Fourth Corps, were there. As soon as Westin arrived, in a solemn and steady voice, hemanded, ¡°Don¡¯t gather in one ce. Disperse the forces on two sides of the city gate and allow a free path in the center. Once the two stepped into the path, we attack from both sides and surround them.¡±

    Those who could be a patriarch of a major family n would be no simpleton. Westin had heard how powerful Han Shuo and Rose were from the Chief of Fourth Corps. He understood that Han Shuo and Rose at this moment were two highgod beasts on the loose and they must not be taken lightly!

    Following Westin¡¯smand, the divine guards split into two groups and moved into position, clearing a big, free path that leads straight to the city gate. The divine guards were dispersed on both sides of the path, gazing ahead coldly, waiting for Han Shuo and Rose to walk right into the trap.

    ¡°Brother-inw, our family n could finally have two Chiefs of Divine Guards! I shall fill that vacant post left by Eugene!¡± said Anker, a cultivator of the energy of death. He had ascended to early-stage highgodhood less than a hundred years ago. He had returned to Hushveil City because he yearned for the vacant post left by Eugene.

    Originally, Hofs had explicitly told Westin that there was no way his family n will have more than one Chief of Divine Guards, which greatly disappointed Anker. But unexpectedly, an incident as significant as this happened in Hushveil City which pushed Hofs over the edge to offer such a lucrative bounty. Anker was excited by the offer and had some trouble containing his emotions.

    Westin shot a nce at Anker and said in a deep voice, ¡°That will only happen if we kill the two. Don¡¯t you assume that this is in the bag. Who knows if something unexpected happens!¡±

    Anker chuckled and disagreed, ¡°What could possibly go wrong? Even if the two of them possessed the strength of the City Lord, there is no way that they could escape from the encirclement of more than a thousand men. Besides, the most elite troops of our House of Simon are all here!¡±

    Westin felt that there was truth to Anker¡¯s justification. He was confident in the elite troops of his family n and thought that with more than a thousand men blocking the city gate, there was no way the two could escape.

    ¡°I¡¯m not worried that they might break the encirclement,¡± Westin put on a faint smile and said, ¡°I¡¯m worried that the two might immediately turn around when they see our army. If that happens, another family n will have the bounty.¡±

    Anker stared nkly for a moment before he nodded and said, ¡°You are right. We have more than a thousand men over here. As long as they are no fools, they will surely turn around before they step into the trap. Brother-inw, perhaps we should give them some hope. Otherwise, our bounty might run to other family ns!¡±

    Westin agreed. After thinking for a moment, he instructed, ¡°Team Four, Six, and Seven, go further away. Look for suitable structures to hide yourselves. Team One and Two will stay in the City Gate. Do not scare them away!¡±

    Following Westin¡¯smand, the elite troops of the House of Simon grew even more dispersed. They would also try to hide themselves as much as possible as Westinmanded.

    Soon enough, the forces of the House of Westin grew far apart from each other. Many divine guards disappeared in the dark.

    After having done that, Westin became somewhat relieved. He beckoned, ¡°Come, we will hide at the energy towers. They must not know that we are waiting for them at the city gate lest they retreat without giving a fight!¡±

    Anker and another highgod named Chandler nodded and agreed to Westin¡¯s words. They went to the energy towers that were all around them to hide themselves, lest their presences rm Han Shuo and Rose.

    While those from the House of Westin were moving into position, Han Shuo and Rose arrived at the city gate.

    Han Shuo was smirking in his mind as the demon generals he ced at the city gate long ago had clearly heard every word of the conversation between Westin and Anker. Han Shuo knew just what these scheming foxes were up to.

    But little did Westin know, his reducing the forces ced at the city gate was what Han Shuo wished for. If all the divine guards of the House of Simon was blocking at the city gate, then it would be nearly impossible for Han Shuo and Rose to get through. Westin dispersing his forces far apart increased Han Shuo¡¯s chances of sess.

    And to tilt the odds further to his side, Han Shuo decided to use a ruse that had been proved effective.

    Han Shuo transmitted amand to Cauldron Spirit with his thought. Two demon generals transformed into his and Rose¡¯s appearances. The false Han Shuo and Rose rushed towards the city gate but as soon as they arrived at the region, they suddenly stopped. They looked towards the ces where the House of Simon divine guards were hiding with rmed eyes.

    Han Shuo¡¯s and Rose¡¯s faces jolted. They exchanged nces and without a word, simultaneously turned around and left. Every emotion and expression on their faces were lifelike and indistinguishable from real, even from up close.

    <i>They truly are powerful experts! They managed to discover the concealed divine guards as soon as they arrive. This is bad!</i> thought Westin and Anker and their hearts jolted when they saw Han Shuo and Rose turned on their heels and ran!

    ¡°Fucking hell, chase them down!¡± before Westin could react, Anker, who could not wait to take Eugene¡¯s post, rushed out from the energy tower he was hiding. Some of the divine guards followed Anker¡¯s lead and chased after the two demon generals.

    Rose was ted. She softly eximed, ¡°They took the bait!¡±

    Han Shuo, however, remained as calm as ever. Using the two most powerful demon generals of his, he saw that Westin remained in his energy tower and did not pursue the false Han Shuo and Rose. It was clear that this patriarch of the House of Simon was not a rash person. For whatever reason, not only that Westin did not follow Anker, he even instructed from his energy tower, ¡°Team One, Two, and Five, stay here. This gate is their only path. They will not give up so easily!¡±

    If Han Shuo and Rose don¡¯t leave that night, the city gates around Hushveil City will only be even more fortified and the City will be even tighter in security. Westin felt that Han Shuo and Rose definitely will try to escape that very night. Therefore, he did not go after the false images with Anker.

    The two demon generals were far from where Westin was hiding. There was no way he could know that they were false images. He decided to stay based on his gut feeling.

    Westin had been through countless hardships and trials to be where he was. The experiences he umted from the numberless battles fought were perhaps more valuable than the wealth he gained. In some situations, having such rich experiences could be more useful than having extraordinary strength.

    Although Westin¡¯s judgment was correct, it doesn¡¯t necessarily mean the oue would favor him!

    Following Westin¡¯s orders, a portion of the House of Simon¡¯s forces remained behind.

    Chandler, another highgod under the House of Simon, also stayed behind. He was obedient to Westin. He continued to hide in his energy tower and observe.

    ¡°Some of them have not taken the bait!¡± Rose could see the danger waiting for them at the city gate. She continued softly, ¡°I sense that there are more divine guards that we could see. This is not good!¡±

    ¡°There are two highgods each hiding in those energy towers,¡± said Han Shuo as he pointed at two energy towers. He continued softly, ¡°We do not have time for a battle of patience with them. Experts from other major family ns in the City must be converging here. We need to break out from the City before Anker returns. Be careful of the two highgods in the energy towers, they mightunch a sneak attack. Make sure you do not get caught by surprise.¡±

    ¡°We are going to strike soon?¡± said Rose excitedly. She seemed a little restless.

    Han Shuo nodded unfeelingly. The invisible demon generals that were one with darkness floated to the House of Simon divine guards. They carefully avoided Westin and Chandler. No divine guard had noticed them.

    ¡°Move!¡± shouted Han Shuo softly. In an ice-cold face, he whooshed out from his hiding ce and charged towards the city gate at the fastest speed.

    <i>They indeed havee!</i> Westin¡¯s irises constricted. He ced his full attention on Han Shuo and Rose who had appeared without warning. He was prepared to make a surprise attack.

    Those divine guards hiding in the dark be excited. They grew even more admiring of their patriarch¡¯s sharp judgment. Facing Han Shuo and Rose who were charging at them murderously, these divine guards from the House of Simon showed no fear. It was as though with the leadership of Westin, Han Shuo¡¯s and Rose¡¯s deaths were certain.

    Following Westin¡¯smand, the path to the city gate was deliberately left empty, waiting for Han Shuo and Rose to step inside.

    Although Han Shuo knew of Westin¡¯s n, he had no choice but to cross the path Westin prepared for him as it was the only path to the city gate!

    The terrifying whistling noises of the seventeen flying swords pierced through the air. Han Shuo and Rose flew across the space with the seventeen flying swords.

    Han Shuo knew that many divine guards were hiding around the path, waiting to make an ambush. The seventeen flying swords started flying around and ughter the divine guards who thought they had concealed themselves very well.

    Simultaneously, the demon generals that had been lying in wait transformed to material state and pounced on the divine guards. Caught off guard, many of the divine guards lost their lives to the grayish shadows almost instantly.

    And yet again, the scene of miserable shrieks and wails reappeared. Although the divine guards knew the weaknesses of the demon generals, the ambush was just too sudden, causing the divine guards to fail to react in time. Also, as demon generals strike inrge swarms, the divine guards would lose their lives very quickly. They were given no opportunity to make counter-attacks.

    Han Shuo¡¯s attacks struck on those elite divine guards concealed in the dark as though everything between them was transparent. The demon generals that appeared out of nowhere were even better concealed than they were. The divine guards shrieked in pain as they were struck.

    Westin, who was observing from the energy tower high above, wore an appalled face. He did not expect Han Shuo to be so miraculous as though he could foresee the future. Seeing that his ambushing divine guards were ambushed, Westin immediatelymanded his men, ¡°Stop hiding ande out to the open! They are determined to charge out from this gate. Stop them!¡±

    Han Shuo and Rose moved forward at extreme speed as they defended themselves from the ranged attacks of the divine guards around them. Suddenly Han Shuo deployed the Cyano Demonze, Toxic Dragon Net, Banner of Hallucination, and Green Hypergolic Dust. They flew towards the divine guards all around them.

    Cyano Demonze whooshed around. The Toxic Dragon Net covered down, emitting mists as corrosive as the seventeen flying swords. The Green Hypergolic Dust burned everything it touched. The Banner of Hallucination produced countless duplicates of Han Shuo and Rose. No one could tell which were the real Han Shuo and Rose.

    Many of the divine guards were killed or neutralized by the vicious demonic weapons Han Shuo refined. The divine guards were thrown into havoc and confusion. Many were set on fire, some were prated by Cyano Demonze, while some were turned into skeletons after being trapped by the Toxic Dragon Net.

    As the Banner of Hallucination had produced countless false images, the divine guards could not distinguish which of the attacksing from every direction were real. The pressure on Han Shuo and Rose reduced significantly. They continued charging forward.

    Under the support of the numerous demonic weapons, the two crossed the path and arrived at the city gate in no time. There were even more divine guards waiting for them at the city gate. The gate itself was locked from the outside. It was the final barrier standing between Han Shuo and his freedom.

    Han Shuo took out a handful of the Pearls of Annihtion and hurled it at the city gate without looking. Ever since using the Pearls of Annihtion, Han Shuo¡¯s interest in high-power explosive demonic weapons increased dramatically. He had obtained a new form from Cauldron Spirit that increased the power of the Pearls of Annihtion by several orders of magnitude.

    When the handful of Pearls of Annihtion detonated, a series of world-shaking explosions sounded from the city gate. It was as though the entire Hushveil City was going to copse. Many of the divine guards were turned into pieces. Their iplete body parts flew in every direction. It was a scene of utter devastation.

    After the dust subsides, the city gate was revealed to be destroyed!

 Chapter 768 - The stage is now ours

    GDK 768: The stage is now ours

    The intense explosion at the city gate instantly killed several dozen divine guards and sent pieces of their bodies flying all around. The rumbling noise as though a mountain was copsing had alerted everyone in the city. The city gate of Hushveil City failed to withstand the fierce st and was shattered.

    ¡°Hurry!¡± cried Han Shuo softly. He raised the power of his demonic weapons to their maximum, attacking all the House of Simon divine guards swarming at them.

    At this moment, Westin and Chandler who had been hiding in energy towers all along, simultaneously descended. They jointly attacked Han Shuo and Rose.

    The seventeen flying swords suddenly appeared before Han Shuo and weaved a screen made of light,pletely shielding Han Shuo from the space in front of him. They also blocked Westin and Chandler¡¯s attacks.

    Rose knew that this move of Han Shuo¡¯s was mainly to buy her time. As long as Westin and Chandler were both blocked, the average divine guards who were being held up by the numerous demonic weapons cannot obstruct her from leaving.

    Seeing Han Shuo risking his life at such a perilous moment to buy time for her to escape, a most bizarre feeling arose in her heart. She turned to take a quick, grateful look at Han Shuo who was obstructing Westin and Chandler in a callous and handsome face before leaving.

    With the two powerful highgods held up by Han Shuo and most of the divine guards being violently attacked by demon generals and demon weapons, Rose did not face much pressure when leaving. She defended herself from the attacks of normal highgod and sessfully crossed the hole in the city gate. She had finally escaped from Hushveil City.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo¡¯s face jolted. He immediately flew towards the opening to leave Hushveil City.

    ¡°DIE!!!¡± a violent roar filled with rage came from the distance. A dark spear streaked across the sky like a dark bolt of thunder rapidly moving towards Han Shuo. It carried an astonishing amount of darkness divine energy.

    Westin and Chandler, hearing the roar, exerted even more pressure at Han Shuo. They were determined to capture Han Shuo.

    Westin was a mid-stage highgod while Chandler was an early-stage highgod. Although defending against their attacks was not easy, it wasn¡¯t too difficult. The seventeen flying swords could disintegrate their attacks just by weaving streaks of light.

    The dark spear that came like lightning, however, was far more powerful. In addition, as many divine guards were moving to the city gate to seal the hole, if Han Shuo was to focus all his strength on defending against the spear, he might lose the chance of leaving the city.

    The dark spear arrived like a shadow before the seventeen flying swords fighting Westin and Chandler could move to Han Shuo¡¯s back. Han Shuo promptly came to a difficult decision. With all his strength, he charged at the city gate that will soon be fully blocked by divine guards.

    His two hands constantly moved about, blocking off the constant streams of ranged attacks. The Invincible Omen Body would also automatically deploy. The attacks of midgods could not inflict any damage even when they scored a direct hit on Han Shuo.

    <i><i>Pow!</i></i> When the spear was instants from making contact, the Demonyer Edge pierced through the cloth on Han Shuo¡¯s back and appeared to catch the attack.

    A burst of ferocious and wild darkness divine energy surged into Han Shuo through the Demonyer Edge. The Invincible Omen Body instantly deployed to resist the onught of the darkness divine energy. This all-out attack from Hushveil City¡¯s City Lord Hofs was overwhelming. Even the Invincible Omen Body could not neutralize all of its destructive power.

    An area on Han Shuo¡¯s back suddenly caved in as though a t piece of metal deformed after being struck by a bullet. Han Shuo felt pain rising from his chest and a metallic taste in his mouth. Blood flowed out from his mouth, forming two trails of blood from the tips of his lips.

    Immediately, Han Shuo realized that he had suffered injuries after taking the all-out attack of thiste-stage highgod.

    Han Shuo was fortunate that the Invincible Omen Body had dissolved most of the power in the attack. Otherwise, the powerful strike would surely pierce a hole through Han Shuo¡¯s chest and severely reduce his fighting power.

    Han Shuo did a quick inspection of his body¡¯s condition and immediately understood that the injuries sustained were not critical. Using the momentum of Hofs¡¯ dark spear, Han Shuo boosted his speed and traveled towards the city gate at an even faster rate. Simultaneously, the seventeen flying swords flew away from Westin and Chandler to help Han Shuo defend against the attacks of the divine guards all around him.

    Han Shuo¡¯s figure streaked through the hole in the city gate as though a lightning bolt. He went through in a sh. Outside the gate was Rose, waiting for him anxiously.

    ¡°Hushveil City Lord is here. Fly!¡± shouted Han Shuo as he grabbed Rose¡¯s hand. He then activated the Art of Demonic Ninth Heaven, boosted his airspeed using Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, and turned into a trail of hardly visible shadow that rapidly vanished into the distance.

    Hofs, the City Lord of Hushveil City, possessedte-stage highgod strength. Han Shuo believed that in a one-to-one battle, with ess to the seventeen flying swords and Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, he will not lose to Hofs.

    But currently, other than Hofs, Westin and Chandler were also present. Also, more highgods of Hushveil City were quickly rushing to their aid. It was clear to Han Shuo that having a duel with Hofs at the city gate was anything but sensible.

    If Han Shuo was surrounded by thatrge number of highgods, it will be impossible for Han Shuo to escape without using Demonic Blood Disassemble which would cause tremendous damages to his body. Han Shuo would try to avoid using the harmful demonic technique especially now when his progress in the cultivation of demonic arts was slow.

    Rose possessed mid-stage highgod strength and could fly faster than most people. However,pared to Hofs behind her who also cultivated in the energy of darkness but possessedte-stage highgod strength, Han Shuo believed that Hofs would be able to catch up to Rose. As he could fly even faster by borrowing Cauldron Spirit¡¯s strength, Han Shuo decided to pull Rose with him.

    In an instant, the two ghostly shadows outside Hushveil City vanished among the dense growth of ancient trees and shrubs.

    Hofs, Westin, and a few experts of their family ns hastily went after Han Shuo and Rose. Hofs wore a malevolent face. As he shot through the air, he angrilymanded, ¡°Find them! I¡¯ve hit that youngster with my spear. They won¡¯t be able to run far! Whoever managed to kill them will take Eugene¡¯s seat!¡±

    The patriarchs two other family ns finally arrived at the city gate and heard Hofs¡¯ scream by coincidence. It woke them up from staring foolishly at the scene of devastation at the city wall. As soon as they came to their senses, the led their divine guards and joined the hunt.

    Hofs was at the front of the party. Westin, Chandler, and a few other highgods were shooting in the direction Han Shuo and Rose escaped at extreme speed.

    Countless divine guards were lost during the havoc in Hushveil City. The attackers had not only managed to eliminate their targets, they even managed to escape from the City. If the news of this were to spread, Hofs would lose all his face and prestige in the Darkness Dominion. The status of his House of Hofley in Hushveil City would also be jeopardized. It would be a most undesirable situation for Hofs.

    Westin, the patriarch of the House of Simon, was also enraged. His family n was responsible for securing the city gate Han Shuo and Rose broke through. The fact that the duo had managed to break free from the heavy fortification and encirclement was simply a great insult to his family n. He also knew that after the event, given Hofs¡¯ temperament, Hofs will surely punish his family n for failing to secure the city gate.

    But none of those things couldpare to the pain in losing the elite divine guards that his House of Simon spend tens of thousands of years to recruit, nurture, and assemble. The enormous explosion at the city gate alone had taken more than a hundred lives of his divine guards. With more than two hundred of their extremely valuable elite divine guards losing their lives, the strength of his House of Simon significantly reduced. How could Westin not feel angry about it?

    Numerous experts of Hushveil City left the City and entered the mountain range right beside it.

    Without energy towers and boundary towers covering every inch of thend, with the presence of countless ancient, towering trees, hills, and mountains where Han Shuo and Rose could hide, finding the two became a hundred times more difficult for those experts of Hushveil City.

    Rose was being pulled away by Han Shuo who was flying like a missile. At first, she felt very nervous as she saw that Hofs and other highgods of Hushveil City were chasing after them. But gradually, she noticed that the highgods of Hushveil City were dragged further and further behind. She also noticed that not only Han Shuo did not slow down, but he was still picking up speed. It seemed as though Han Shuo knew the mountain range well. He would constantly change his travel direction and cause their pursuers tog further and further behind.

    Rose was finally at ease.

    With that, Rose could finally start thinking about other things. She soon noticed the tight grip of Han Shuo¡¯s big and rough hand. It was strong and warm. She could feel every pulse of his that was filled with power. She suddenly noticed the sweat on her palm and realized that she had been too nervous.

    Rose turned to look at Han Shuo who was just inches away. She noticed the unswerving determination on Han Shuo¡¯s steady face. She saw the calmness and confidence on Han Shuo¡¯s lips stained with his own blood, the well-defined shapes on his handsome face, and the kick-ass, callous demeanor of a real man.

    At this moment, even the trails of blood on the corners of Han Shuo¡¯s lips seemed so charming. Although Rose wanted to help him wipe off the blood, she did not. She merely stared foolishly at Han Shuo as imagination ran wild in her mind.

    <i><i>Perhaps only a man like him could stand tall above the world!</i></i>

    After having gone through so many deadly situations with Han Shuo, not only that Rose no longer feel any prejudice against him, she even felt very admiring of his tenacious and unyielding attitude. He was firm, decisive, always steady, unscrupulous in achieving his goals, and had many other excellent qualities. To add to the boundless potential and terrifying strength he disyed, how could a person like him not be sessful?

    Han Shuo did not notice Rose¡¯s gaze at all. He was focused on flying, escaping, and thinking about his next course of action. He knew that given how astonishing their deeds had been, they would be enemies with Hushveil City. Even if they changed their appearances and gone into hiding, Hofs will eventually discover their identities.

    Having suffered such humiliation, there was no way that Hushveil City would be willing to let him and Rose off. Han Shuo knew they were bound to be his enemy. Therefore, he started considering how to weaken Hushveil City as much as possible, cutting the strength of Hofs and his family n so that they would have no time or energy to seek vengeance.

    Suddenly, Han Shuo turned around to look at Rose and said, ¡°In the mountain range, we are the hunters. Those chasing after us have dispersed. The stage is now ours!¡±

 Chapter 769 - Fusion

    GDK 769: Fusion

    The two were no longer in danger the moment they stepped outside Hushveil City as there were countless natural concealment spots in the vast mountain range with no boundary covering the entire sky. Han Shuo was as though a fish in a bowl that was released into the sea. Falling into heavy encirclement was no longer a concern.

    Han Shuo and Rose stopped running. They descended into a thick forest and looked for a temporary hiding ce with the help of Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals.

    A cliff wall shrouded by fog became their temporary hiding ce. Han Shuo and Rosended on the cliff wall. He gently exhaled and smilingly said, ¡°This region is filled with thick fog. An average expert won¡¯t be able to find us. It will take an expert of Hofs¡¯ ss to detect our presence. Take a rest for now. We will wait for our pursuers to catch up.¡±

    Han Shuo had managed to cast their pursuers from Hushveil City far behind and they will need some time to reach this ce. Han Shuo and Rose could use this opportunity to recharge.

    ¡°Erm, you can let go of my hand now,¡± said Rose softly with her head lowered.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment. It was only then that he realized he was still holding Rose¡¯s hand. He gave an embarrassedugh and immediately let go. He then sat cross-legged and closed his eyes to recover some strength.

    ¡°How are your injuries? Is it critical?¡± asked Rose in a soft voice after a moment of hesitation.

    Han Shuo opened his eyes, turned to Rose and smiled. He replied, ¡°I¡¯m fine. No worries.¡±

    ¡°Thanks for holding them back and letting me escape first,¡± said Rose.

    Han Shuo could sense that Rose¡¯s attitude had changed. Han Shuo was ustomed to Rose being quiet, cold, and even mean in words. He couldn¡¯t get used to Rose being so kind to him all so suddenly. After being startled for a moment, Han Shuo calmly replied, ¡°It is not my practice to let people who work for me die. Besides, I knew I could escape from them. It¡¯s no big deal.¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Han Shuo again closed his eyes and put on a focused and upied face.

    Rose, who was about to say more things, seeing that Han Shuo has started recovering his energy, decided not to disrupt him. She merely looked at Han Shuo quietly from beside him. For whatever reason, Rose felt at ease to be alone with Han Shuo at this fog-filled cliff wall. She even felt a strange sense of joy.

    A faint smile appeared on Rose¡¯s lips. With a calm and contented heart, she quietly sat down beside Han Shuo and started recovering the divine energy she used up in Hushveil City.

    ***

    ¡°Find them! I don¡¯t care if you have to dig three feet underground, do whatever it takes and find them!¡± shouted Hofs who was wearing a dark face in a voice filled with pure rage and wrath.

    Hofs and his party had been searching for ages but found not a single trace of Han Shuo and Rose. The experts from the three major family ns in the search party started to doubt if Hofs had actually struck the attacker.

    Hofs imed that he had managed to strike one of the attackers. Given that Hofs was ate-stage highgod and he had used his full strength in the attack, as long as the attacker was not an overgod, there was no way that this attacker would show no sign of being affected as even ate-stage highgod like Hofs would suffer serious injuries.

    An injured highgod would surely show signs of exhaustion after being pursued by the party for such a long time. By now, the pursuing party should have caught up to the injured attacker and in him.

    However, the reality was entirely different from their expectations. Not only that they couldn¡¯t close the distance to the attackers, but they were also left far behind in the lengthy pursue, so much so that they lost track of the two attackers. This was in contradiction to Hofs¡¯ ount.

    If Hofs wasn¡¯t the City Lord of Hushveil City and the patriarch of the House of Hofley, these people would have long called out Hofs, use him of giving misleading information without having full knowledge of the situation, and perhaps even call him a liar.

    ¡°City Lord, this mountain range is vast and we have lost track of our targets. Instead of searching in onerge group, I suggest that we split up by family ns to cover more area. Although the two are extraordinary in strengths, I¡¯m certain that one whole family n can defeat them. If they can¡¯t, they could always signal for help. What do you think, my Lord?¡± proposed the House of Granro patriarch.

    Rage must have consumed Hofs¡¯ rationality for he felt that the suggestion was proper for the situation. Hofs, in a dark face, nodded and instructed, ¡°Ok. We split up by family ns and continue the search. Signal and call for help as you discover their tracks.¡±

    Westin, who had lost more than two hundred elite divine guards to Han Shuo and Rose, had been waiting for those words. Immediately and without a word, Westin signalled at the divine guards under his family n with his eyes and left the search party. Shortly after, two other family ns also separated from the party and continued searching in different directions.

    With that, the four major family ns of Hushveil City, Hofs¡¯ included, split up into four search parties. The forces of each party would slowly grow more dispersed the further out they searched. The situation was somewhat simr to the time when the godhunters tried to hunt Han Shuo down.

    Gradually, night was reced by day. By the time the scorching sun was hanging at the tallest point in the sky, the four family n search parties had be very far apart.

    The gaudy sunlight pierced throughyers of dense fog and sprinkled on Han Shuo who was sitting on a cliff wall. Suddenly, Han Shuo opened his eyes wide. He softly cried, ¡°Someone¡¯s approaching!¡±

    Rose was resting and cultivating. Her long eyshes trembled a few times before she opened her beautiful eyes. She looked at Han Shuo for a moment for she said, ¡°I¡¯ll follow your n.¡±

    After having fought alongside Han Shuo in Hushveil City, Rose had be admiring and fully convinced of Han Shuo¡¯s decision-making.

    ¡°Members of the House of Simon. Hehe, this family n is really unlucky to run into us time and time again!¡± said Han Shuo in a mischievous grin. He then stood up and continued, ¡°This time we will kill this highgod called Anker!¡±

    ¡°Okay!¡± eximed Rose excitedly and stood up. She asked, ¡°How do we proceed?¡±

    ¡°Follow me!¡± Han Shuo flew into the dense fog and slowly descended into the thick forest below. He led Rose in sneaking to Anker while avoiding the detection of several divine guards nearby.

    Han Shuo had chosen to attack Anker because he cultivated in the energy of death. His death divine energy would be useful for Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death.

    A few of Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals had been following Anker, watching his every move. Anker had shown too much desire and greed to be a Divine Guard Chief in Hushveil City. Han Shuo saw his desperation before he escaped from Hushveil City. It was the reason why Anker took Han Shuo¡¯s bait and pursued his false images.

    After entering the mountain range, Anker seemed even more impatient and desperate. He kept on asking his subordinates to spread further and further apart as to cover a bigger area.

    These divine guards were mediocre in strength. Even a dozen of them weren¡¯t enough to resist Han Shuo and Rose for a moment. Anker had clearly shown no thoughts for the lives of his divine guards. Perhaps he was wishing that Han Shuo and Rose would ughter his men so that he could learn of their whereabouts.

    Anker had repeatedly missed out on witnessing Han Shuo and Rosemitting massacres and did not yet understand the true depth of their terrifying might. At this moment, he could not wish more for Han Shuo and Rose to show themselves so that he would have a shot at bing a Divine Guard Chief.

    Perhaps the Creator was touched by his sincerity, the figures Han Shuo and Rose gradually appeared in the distance. They were even marching towards him step by step.

    Anker was overjoyed. He praised the Creator in his mind before immediately shouted, ¡°Kill them!¡±

    These divine guards around Anker had also taken Han Shuo¡¯s bait back at the Hushveil city gate. They too had no idea just how deadly Han Shuo and Rose really were. Following Anker¡¯smand, the divine guards charged at Han Shuo and Rose without the slightest fear. Their hearts were filled with excitement.

    Han Shuo nodded at Rose and he immediately flew towards Anker. Before the excited smile vanished from Anker¡¯s face, the seventeen flying swords had flown out from Han Shuo¡¯s body andpletely enveloped Anker. Han Shuo wanted to finish things before other House of Simon divine guards reaches the area.

    Before he could evenunch an attack, Anker abruptly discovered that he seemed to have fallen into another dimension made of pure evil. Sinister energy that he had never seen or heard before violently gushed towards him from all directions. He was like a small boat out at sea caught in a heavy thunderstorm being beaten by violent, choppy waves. He could feel Death calling for him.

    It was only at this moment that Anker knew that he made a mistake, a terribly grave mistake!

    But unfortunately for Anker, his regret came a little toote. Anker, who had be a highgod only recently, quickly fell apart against the wild corrosion of the Han Shuo¡¯s seventeen flying swords. His life force grew weaker as the divine energy in his body were being rapidly exhausted.

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death suddenly flew out from his body towards Anker who was in the center of the seventeen flying swords. Simultaneously, his avatar of destruction flew towards a midgod of destruction heavily injured by Rose. The avatar restrained the person from behind.

    A momentter, the two avatars started sucking away divine energies from their victims.

    At the same time, Han Shuo put his mind to a tranquil and calm state. He deployed the Demonic des using his main body to help Rose in butchering the divine guards. As Han Shuo had started devouring divine energy, then not a single divine guard who witnessed his act must be allowed to live. Otherwise, if others were to learn of it, Han Shuo couldnd in a terrible situation.

    The instant that Han Shuo¡¯s mind and consciousness entered a state of tranquility, it seemed to somehow affect his avatars that were devouring divine energies. In an instant, the divine souls of his avatars and the consciousness of his main body formed a most harmonious connection. The three souls seemed to have fused together.

    The domains of divinity of death and destruction suddenly formed around Han Shuo¡¯s avatars. They ovepped with each other and started fusing together in a miraculous manner that no one could understand.

    Suddenly, a whole new type of domain of divinity bizarrely emerged. The edict of destruction was raging in the domain of divinity while the element of death was gushing into the domain at ten-times the normal rate. All elements, except for the element of death, abruptly disappeared from around Han Shuo.

    The bizarre transformations did not end there...

 Chapter 770 - Come out and fight me, you coward!

    GDK 770: Come out and fight me, you coward!

    Tiny and fine strings suddenly appeared in the amalgamated domain of divinity. Although not visible through the naked eye, Han Shuo could clearly perceive the fine strings through his soul. After taking a moment to carefully sense them, Han Shuo discovered that these fine strings seem to be the power of faith originating from the Profound Continent and the Abyss Realm.

    The power of faith could increase the power of a god¡¯s domain of divinity as well as providing a minute but constant stream of divine energy. Divine energy from the power of faith may be minute but if umted over many years, it would be a considerable amount of divine energy.

    For all these while, Han Shuo could sense the constant stream of minuscule divine energy that came from the power of faith his believers offered. He had never observed the power of faith causing any effects on his domain of divinity. But now, for the first time, Han Shuo clearly sensed it.

    The string-like power of faith emerged within the amalgamated domains of divinity and traveled in trajectories conforming to the edict of destruction. The fine strings constantly twisted, vibrated, and revolved around Han Shuo. The strings would interact and twist together to form thicker strings.

    This was perceivable only through Han Shuo¡¯s divine soul and cannot be observed visually.

    The element of death converged towards the domain of divinity even more wildly. Suddenly, the Boundaries of Aging, Fear, and Weakness spontaneously formed in the domain of divinity even though Han Shuo made no effort of doing so. The Boundaries were filled with fine strings. It appeared as though the fine strings could absorb the constant stream of the element of death gushing to the domain and use them to alter the structure of the three Boundaries.

    Suddenly, the power of the three Boundaries began rising exponentially. The area of effect rapidly expanded and ovepped with the entire domain of divinity in no time.

    The power of faith strings bound with the element of death gushing into the domain while twisting and warping around Han Shuo in a manner conforming to the edict of destruction. They constantly modified and altered the Boundaries and caused their power to grow stronger and stronger.

    ¡°Huh?!¡± eximed Rose. She suddenly discovered an abnormal flux of energy from Han Shuo¡¯s location and softly cried, ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡±

    Han Shuo was suddenly awoken from the trance. He immediately realized that now was not the time to slowly savor his new domain of divinity. By now, Anker and the midgod of destruction were dead and their divine energies had beenpletely devoured. Han Shuo maneuvered his flying swords to stab at their bodies, causing them to melt away.

    Rose¡¯s long silvery hair was stained with blood. As she stood coldly on thend covered with bodies, she stared at Han Shuo with her bright eyes that were filled with astonishment and puzzlement.

    The group of several dozen divine guards led by Anker was all butchered by Rose and Han Shuo. There were no survivors. Through his demon generals, Han Shuo sensed that numerous House of Simon experts were rapidly converging towards the area. He instructed, ¡°Move!¡± and retreated with Rose.

    Shortly after the duo left, Westin and Chandler, along with a few hundred elite divine guards of their family n arrived at the scene.

    It was a devastating and dreadful scene with iplete bodies covering every inch of the ground. Anker¡¯s partially melted body was quickly liquifying.

    It was in and obvious from Anker¡¯s melting body to tell who was responsible for the horrendous crime. Westin had never felt so enraged. The strength of his House of Simon had steeply declined. And now, as though it could not get worse, his family n lost another highgod. On top of all that, Anker was a sibling of his wife. Westin started wondering how to justify the losses to his wife and his family n.

    ¡°Patriarch, what should we do?¡± asked Chandler, ¡°The two not only possess terrifying strength, but they are also very stealthy. What can we do to find and kill them?¡±

    Unlike Anker, Chandler had personally witnessed how deadly Han Shuo and Rose were. As a member of the House of Simon, Chandler hated Han Shuo and Rose to the bones. However, other than hatred, Chandler also felt fear. He knew that in a one-on-one battle, even he was no match against that callous-looking and handsome youngster. He had been very careful and kept his divine guards close to him as he was afraid of losing his life.

    It was precisely because of his cautiousness that Han Shuo did not look for him but went for the naive Anker instead. Anker¡¯s death was greatly disturbing for Chandler. He was worried that he would be Han Shuo¡¯s next target.

    Westin suddenly shouted after keeping silent in a dark face, ¡°Release signals and tell them that the murderers are near this area!¡± Then, after taking a short pause, he continued, ¡°We must all stick close together, no one will split from the group. Our understanding of the attacker was wrong; he was not severely injured. Otherwise, they surely will not take such risk in making an assault.¡±

    Chandler was stunned. He quickly scanned around before asking in a low voice, ¡°Patriarch, are you implying that the City Lord lied?¡±

    Westin shook his head, let out a soft sigh, and exined, ¡°The City Lord wouldn¡¯t make that kind of joke during moments like this. Besides, from my understanding of his character, he wasn¡¯t one who would tell lies.¡± Westin turned to Chandler, looked at him with his deep eyes, and continued, ¡°The City Lord¡¯s ount is not false. The fact that the injured murderer did not try to escape but is preying on us could only mean one thing ¨C he is stronger than the City Lord!¡±

    Chandler¡¯s face jolted. After taking a moment to carefully consider Westin¡¯s words, his expression turned even more appalled. Somehow, Chandler started thinking about overgods without the Quintessence. The fear in his heart grew even stronger. In a slightly flustered manner, he asked, ¡°Then what should we do?¡±

    ¡°We have to give up on trying to kill them. Our family n has taken too many casualties. What we must do now is to take our men safely out from the mountain range,¡± said Westin in a helpless and humiliated face. He paused for a moment before he continued, ¡°If other family ns want to try to get them, let them try. It is time they suffer some losses as well. Otherwise, after the ordeal is over, our House of Simon¡¯s ce in Hushveil City would likely be threatened,¡±

    As the patriarch of the House of Simon, Westin sometimes had to make unpopr and difficult decisions for the benefit of his family n. The great insight and wisdom Westin gained from his countless years spent in battle allowed him to correctly judged that Han Shuo will reappear at the city gate. And now, it allowed him to make the right decision ¨C to give up.

    Thanks to the Omen Invincible Body, Westin had overestimated Han Shuo¡¯s strength. Although Westin and his forces had given up on hunting him, Han Shuo now had a new problem.

    During the assault on Anker and his forces, although Rose did not see Han Shuo devoured Anker¡¯s divine energy as they were covered inside the seventeen flying swords, Rose saw him devour the divine energy of a midgod of destruction. She could not be more astonished by Han Shuo¡¯s actions.

    On Elysium, the godhunters were universally hated characters. Her heart was filled with horror when she saw Han Shuo devour the divine energy of the midgod who cultivated in the edict of destruction. Han Shuo being an abominable godhunter was thest thing that Rose had expected.

    Ever since they sessfully escaped from the crime scene, Rose gazed at him with questioning and judgemental eyes non-stop, which made Han Shuo ufortable. Han Shuo finally stopped moving after arriving on a tree and hiding among its lush leaves. He summoned his courage and asked, ¡°Why are you looking at me like that?¡±

    ¡°Are you a godhunter?¡± asked Rose as she looked deeply at Han Shuo.

    ¡°I¡¯m not!¡± denied Han Shuo resolutely. He then exined to Rose in a poker face, ¡°Godhunters are those who could not control the cravings in their hearts. Their minds have been corroded by greed. Their only wish and desire are to devour other people¡¯s divine energy to improve their own strength. They have an alliance made of people of their kind. As long as they are alive, they will always attempt to hunt and kill others for divine energy!¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t need you to tell me this. I have been living on Elysium longer than you have and I know plenty of things about the godhunters,¡± after a short pause, Rose calmly continued, ¡°Don¡¯t tell me that you are different from them?¡±

    ¡°Of course I¡¯m different!¡± Han Shuo put on a faint smile and exined, ¡°I have ovee that greed. My mind is free from the insatiable desire to devour divine energy. Even if you put a helpless man before me, I can choose not to devour his divine energy. The godhunters cannot act against their insatiable greed. I¡¯m different in that I¡¯m in full control of my mind and rationality. My mind is not corrupted.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t believe that. I have never known or heard of anyone who could ovee that addiction. Once you started, you will never stop!¡± Rose¡¯s slender brows bunched tightly. She let out a soft sigh and said, ¡°Why are you that kind of people?¡±

    Han Shuo put on a faint smile and answered, ¡°I¡¯m not. You should know that best! If I¡¯m a godhunter, all that I do would be to consume other people¡¯s divine energy. For all this time you are with me, is my only goal and purpose to devour other¡¯s divine energy?¡±

    Rose stared nkly for a moment after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s answer. She carefully thought about it for a moment and realized that his words did make sense. Rose had been following Han Shuo around for quite some time. She knew that a godhunter would feel uneasy if they had not devoured divine energy for a while and will always seek for a chance to strike.

    It¡¯s been a while since Rose became Han Shuo¡¯s servant and she was always around Han Shuo. During the time she spent with Han Shuo, she did not observe any signs of divine energy addiction from Han Shuo. Not only that he seemed perfectly normal, he even appeared to possess an extremely tenacious mind and strong willpower, a man who has full control of his mind and body.

    It was clear from his performance and behavior that he was different from godhunters. After spending a long time thinking, Rose asked skeptically, ¡°No one had ever ovee that addiction, but you can?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sure that there are others who also managed to ovee the addiction, it¡¯s just that most people do not know them,¡± Han Shuo then smiled and said, ¡°You will see the truth in time, for we will be spending a lot more time together.¡±

    ¡°I will trust your words for now!¡± replied Rose. Suddenly, as though having recalled something, she eximed, ¡°Right, I remember that when you were devouring the midgod¡¯s divine energy, you were also fighting divine guards somewhere else. Did you use that strange lifeform to devour divine energy for you? If that¡¯s the case, you won¡¯t be affected by addiction!¡±

    Han Shuo knew that as they will spend at least the next hundred years together, Rose will learn about the existence of his avatars sooner orter. But Han Shuo did not want to exin too much now as it was ratherplicated. After a moment of hesitation, Han Shuo answered, ¡°Something like that.¡±

    Rose could tell that Han Shuo had no interest in exining it in detail. Although she was very curious about Han Shuo, she did not question him any further.

    After escaping from the crime scene, Han Shuo spent time surveilling his prey using his demon generals. He saw that the House of Simon divine guards were all gathered in one group. He knew that Westin was now on guard and it would not be easy to strike his forces again.

    Other family ns of Hushveil City, having received Westin¡¯s signal, were hurrying towards the area. Seeing that more and more divine guards will be there, Han Shuo and Rose quickly evacuated from the area.

    By the time Hofs the City Lord and others reached there, Han Shuo and Rose were long gone. They again searched around thoroughly. Naturally, the search yielded no result.

    Soon enough, the search party again split up by family ns to continue searching the mountain range. The Divine Guard Chiefs from Hushveil City also joined the manhunt. Some would be in a team with their family n members while some went searching with their men.

    For the next half a month, whenever Han Shuo had a chance, he would strike at the forces of Hushveil City and quickly withdraw before reinforcement could arrive. Nearly a hundred divine guards and two highgods from the Hofley Family and Granro Family lost their lives during that time.

    No matter how cautious Hofs and the others were, inevitably, some of their men would perish to Han Shuo and Rose. As soon as the search party had dispersed to a certain degree, horrific deaths will befall to some of them. And no matter how fast they rushed to the scene and how much they searched, they would always fail to locate Han Shuo and Rose. In this vast mountain range, Han Shuo and Rose were as though two invisible predators, butchering the helpless Hushveil City divine guards left and right.

    All the average divine guards were shrouded by fear. Even some of the highgods felt frightened. The search party no longer dared to spread out and would always be in close proximity to each other. They dared not belittle the dangers of the two stealthy assassins.

    ¡°Stop hiding and running like a coward! Come out and fight me alone if you have the guts! I will not bring a single divine guard with me! Come at me!!¡± roared Hofs. His voice traveled far and wide.

    Hofs was out of character and seemed to have been driven mad. His behavior at this moment was unbefitting of a City Lord. All his calmness andposure had been exhausted during the draining and frustrating half a month.

    As he loudly shouted, he would fly away from his party by himself. When any divine guards tried following Hofs, he would immediately glower and yell at them, ¡°Back the fuck off! Stay away from me!¡±

    He was serious about dueling with Han Shuo!

    The divine guards were very afraid of Hofs at this moment. They were more than willing toply with his orders and stay far away from him. The experts from the House of Hofley originally wanted to go with Hofs. But after thinking for a bit, recalling the strength that Hofs possessed, they felt that there was no need to be concerned for his safety.

    Hofs in this extremely irascible state was a torment to everyone around him. The divine guards of the House of Hofley even secretly rejoiced in his departure.

    ¡°Show yourself, fucker! Come at me!¡± screamed Hofs as he moved further and further from the search party.

    Hofs¡¯ scream in fury was extremely loud. Han Shuo and Rose who were several hundred miles from him could clearly hear his words. Rose giggled lovably before she softly said to Han Shuo, ¡°Listen to that guy, you have almost driven him insane!¡±

    During the half a month time, Han Shuo had amply demonstrated to Rose that he had full control over his own mind, untainted by an uncontrolled desire for divine energy. If Rose said no, Han Shuo could always cease devouring the divine energy of those divine guards. After having repeatedly shown that he had no trouble controlling his actions, Rose was finally convinced that Han Shuo was different from the godhunters.

    Rose was astonished by the fact. She no longer stopped Han Shuo from devouring divine energy. Rose understood that although Han Shuo was doing the same thing as the godhunters, he was not a godhunter, but rather something above their caste.

    ¡°He has gone insane!¡± Han Shuo nodded and agreed. After half a month of devouring divine energies, both his avatars had umted a critical amount of them and must spend time digesting the energies. Afterpleting the digestion, breakthroughs would all be up to the avatars¡¯ own ability toprehend the energies they cultivated in.

    ¡°I think it¡¯s about time we leave. The divine guards are all sticking together and wouldn¡¯t give us an opportunity to strike,¡± suggested Rose.

    Han Shuo put on a smile and shook his head. He replied, ¡°That¡¯s not entirely true.¡± When Rose put on a puzzled expression, Han Shuo continued, ¡°The divine guards are definitely all sticking close together. But didn¡¯t a guy just left the group all by himself?¡±

    Rose stared nkly for a moment before she eximed, ¡°You want to fight the City Lord of Hushveil City? He is ate-stage highgod! He has lost his mind. Don¡¯t tell me that you have lost your mind too?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and smilingly replied, ¡°He has amply demonstrated his sincerity. How could I disappoint him?¡±

 Chapter 771 - Illusions

    GDK 771: Illusions

    Han Shuo knew that reconciliation was impossible. Even if Han Shuo and Rose escape from Hushveil City, Hofs will not be leaving the matter at that and will continue to hunt for them. But if Han Shuo could kill Hofs, the power structure in Hushveil City would likely reshuffle and the House of Hofley might lose their dominance over the city.

    To eliminate the threat that Hushveil City might pose him, Han Shuo intended to kill Hofs here in this mountain range. Besides, Han Shuo wanted to test the full might of his Avici Godying Sword Formation against ate-stage highgod. Therefore, this was not an opportunity and challenge that Han Shuo was willing to miss out on.

    Rose was clearly shocked by Han Shuo¡¯s decision. From her point of view, fighting Hofs was anything but wise. Even if Han Shuo could defeat Hofs, the noise produced from their battle will surely draw the experts of Hushveil City to him. If Han Shuo was too upied to fight Hofs when the forces of Hushveil City arrives, Han Shuo would be in a very terrible situation.

    But Rose knew that she cannot change Han Shuo¡¯s mind. She could only sigh helplessly while grumbling about Han Shuo¡¯s daring behavior in her mind. ¡°Alright then, I will help you hold back the others.¡±

    Rose, as a mid-stage highgod cultivating in the energy of darkness, was aware that she was no match against Hofs. The only thing she could help with was to eliminate as many lesser threats around Han Shuo as possible.

    ¡°You just need to wait for me nearby. I would know about approaching enemies better than you do. You have nothing to worry about ¨C Hofs won¡¯t be able to stop me,¡± Han Shuo was very confident. Hofs¡¯ mind at this moment had been consumed by rage. Han Shuo, in contrast, was incredibly calm and collected. It was this clear advantage he had against Hofs that gave him this confidence.

    Rose forced a smile after hearing those words. She suddenly felt as though there wasn¡¯t much that she could do for Han Shuo during critical moments. As a highgod, Rose had rarely been in a situation where she could not be of help. This filled her heart with a strange, indescribable feeling.

    Han Shuo did not exin himself any further and started traveling towards Hofs. The several dozens of demon generals around him had gone ahead in advance and ced themselves around Hofs, studying the area down to the finest detail.

    Every rock, tree, and leaves in the region entered Han Shuo¡¯s mind. Before he was even close to the region, he had mastered the terrain there like it was his own backyard. Han Shuo could utilize this information to masterfully evade attacks orunch an assault.

    Unlike all those highgods who had died to Han Shuo¡¯s Avici Godying Sword Formation, Hofs was ate-stage highgod. On top of that, he had rich experiences in battle. From the ferocious darkness divine energy contained in that dark spear, Han Shuo recognized that Hofs was a formidable opponent. He knew that he must take and utilize every advantage he could get over Hofs in order to defeat him.

    Gradually, Han Shuo arrived at the region Hofs was at. Hofs at this moment was still wildly screaming in rage. His voice carried ferocious energy of darkness and it caused the atmosphere to undte as though water ripples. The shrubs located near him shattered as though sharp des had cut through them.

    ¡°Stay here and go no further,¡± Han Shuo said to Rose after he suddenly stopped moving forward. He gently inhaled and adjusted his mind to the most optimal state.

    Rose who was following closely behind him nodded. She knew that her strength was below Hofs and if she got too close, her presence would be detected. If that happens, Han Shuo¡¯s arrival would also be known to Hofs and Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t be able to make a surprise entry.

    Rose appeared worried. After stammering for a bit, she softly said, ¡°Be careful!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, everything will be just fine,¡± replied Han Shuo in a calm smile. Then, his eyes gradually turned harsh and cold while his face turned callous and apathetic as though he cannot feel any emotions. His mind had entered a state of absolute calmness that was most suitable forbat.

    In the next instance, Han Shuo¡¯s figure turned blurry. Rose watched as Han Shuo went further and further into the distance until his figurepletely disappeared. His aurapletely vanished. It was as though he was not there. She couldn¡¯t detect a trace of Han Shuo¡¯s aura with her divine soul.

    Rose was yet again bbergasted. She put on a grimace and shook her head, mumbling to herself, ¡°Just how many secrets do you have?¡±

    *** Hofs wandered further and further from his search party. He had not ceased yelling for a moment.

    But suddenly, Hofs turnedpletely silent. His eyes that were filled with insanity gazed all around while his brows pursed slightly. He had a feeling that something was amiss. He felt as though a savage beast was stalking him from somewhere he could not see.

    This feeling came very abruptly and Hofs automatically grew cautious. <i><i>Could it be that the two havee?</i></i> thought Hofs, his mind bing even more alert. He, in fact, felt that Han Shuo and Rose would likely had ignored him instead of answering his crazed scream.

    However, that sensation of being stalked felt all so real. Hofs knew from his countless years of past experiences that it was no misperception. Before he went screaming about like a lunatic, he had ordered all his men and experts under his family n to stay away from him. Therefore, whoever that was secretly observing him cannot be from Hushveil City.

    It was this ufortable feeling that made Hofs suddenly so quiet. His eyes were still filled with madness as he scanned all around. He also tried to sense for abnormality in his surroundings using his divine soul. Strands of thin dark smoke flew out from his body and wandered through the bushes and ancient tall trees around him.

    A few momentster, Hofs turned rather puzzled. The darkness divine energy that he sent out to probe his surroundings had detected no signs of any living being. However, that ufortable feeling had never left him. This made Hofs more and more restless and uneasy.

    Hofs yet again release his darkness divine energy. He leaped high into the air and started surveying thend from above. Although he had tried as hard as he could, he still could not locate the stalker!

    ¡°Stop being such a weenie, show yourself!¡± shouted Hofs. He seemed rather impatient.

    A figure suddenly appeared beside an ancient tree. He raised his head to look at Hofs smilingly and said, ¡°You injured me. Hehe, I havee to return the favor!¡±

    ¡°It sure enough is you!¡± Hofsughed maniacally before he suddenly plunged from the air. Darkness domain of divinity instantly formed around him. The element of darkness and darkness divine energy filled his dark spear in an instant as he shot at Han Shuo from above Han Shuo¡¯s head. Strange buzzing noises sounded from the spear that appeared as though a dark lightning bolt. The spear was elerated to such an extreme speed that its shape could not be clearly seen.

    Boundless darkness came covering down at Han Shuo from the sky. The region abruptly sank into absolute darkness as though everything was consumed by the Void. Immense darkness divine energy wrapped on the spear and caused it to melt into the absolute darkness.

    <i><i>Rumbles... </i></i>

    A world-shaking explosion sounded. Following that, an enormous and deep crater was revealed. All the trees, vegetations, and rocks were swept away.

    Han Shuo¡¯s figure, however, was nowhere to be seen!

    Inside the absolute darkness, Hofs descended. Hended in the enormous crater and stood proudly in a ferocious face. The dark spear returned to his hand. His eyes glistened brightly as he looked all around for the figure that had vanished into thin air.

    Needless to say, Hofs¡¯ vision wasn¡¯t affected by this absolute darkness he created. He realized that hisst strike was ineffective. He grew even more cautious and truly took Han Shuo as an evenly matched opponent.

    ¡°My turn!¡± a sneer suddenly reverberated throughout the absolute darkness. Seven fuzzy figures appeared out of nowhere and shot towards Hofs from every direction. The figures all took Han Shuo¡¯s appearance and they all gave off extraordinary auras.

    Hofs suspected that they were merely illusions and so he used his divine soul to carefully probe the figures. However, to his surprise, each and every figure seemed real and alive, with everyone of them possessing highgod aura. This immediately threw Hofs into confusion.

    Hofs, not understanding the situation, did not gamble in attacking any of the figures. Instead, he took defensive measures. With one wave of the spear in his hand,yers uponyers of defensive barriers rapidly formed. Intense aura of darkness gushed towards Hofs and shrouded him.

    Every figure Hofs saw was made using the highest grade demon generals. These demon generals refined from highgod souls were extraordinary in strength. His senses were correct ¨C the figures were alive and could pose him threat. Hofs¡¯ decision of taking defensive measures was also correct.

    However, Hofs¡¯ taking defensive measures yed right into Han Shuo¡¯s hand!

    Only when Hofs was in defensive position that Han Shuo could fully focus on maneuvering the seventeen flying swords and envelop Hofs in Avici Godying Sword Formation. Once that happens, Han Shuo could fully focus on boldly attacking. He need not to worry about anything else.

    The seventeen flying swords whooshed out but Han Shuo¡¯s figures transformed from demon generals vanished. Only the real Han Shuo remained, standing proudly before Hofs.

    <i><i>They are illusions!</i></i> Hofs was stunned. After seeing the Han Shuos transformed from demon generals disappear, Hofs started doubting his senses as he was misled into thinking that the demon generals were nothing but illusions.

    The seventeen flying swords maneuvered by Han Shuo went whooshing at Hofs shrouded by intense aura of darkness. The flying swords seemed to had struck on the toughest cotton ball. The seventeen flying swords failed to pierce through Hofs¡¯ defenses made using darkness divine energy.

    <i><i>Ate-stage highgod is indeed formidable!</i></i> eximed Han Shuo in his mind. Then, in his consciousness, Han Shuo said to Cauldron Spirit, ¡°Assemble your energy. It seems that I must borrow your energy in order to defeat him!¡±

    Cauldron Spirit wasted no words and immediately injected demon general energies into Han Shuo¡¯s body.

 Chapter 772 - Clash of domains

    GDK 772: sh of domains

    Immense pain instantly swarmed Han Shuo¡¯s entire body. Every time Han Shuo borrows Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, he would have to endure immense pain. But this time, the pain was so much more unbearable. Han Shuo felt as though he was in a meat-grinding machine with every nerve cell dipped in acid. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but cry, ¡°Ouch! Why is this hurting much more than usual?!¡±

    As Han Shuo cried out in pain, he could feel the energy contained in his body was soaring, giving him an urge to wildly release the energy from his body.

    ¡°Master, I have collected a lot of divine souls in recent times, with a few of them being highgod souls. My power has therefore increased. I have filled your body with more energy than usual, that¡¯s why the pain has increased. But the good news is, you will have more strength!¡± transmitted Cauldron Spirit in Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness.

    Han Shuo was started. He used his senses to carefully feel. Immediately, he found out that just as Cauldron Spirit exined, his body was filled with more power than usual. With one though, he diverted the energy in his body to the seventeen flying swords. The whistling sounds of the flying swords turned extremely ear-piercing.

    The seventeen flying swords that were suddenly supplied with even more energy tore through the dark lump of cotton ball in no time. They broke through multipleyers of defensive barriers in one shot and removed everything between the flying swords and Hofs.

    Hofs was surprised by the terrific power Han Shuo disyed after theyers of darkness boundaries he wrapped himself in were destructed. Aura of boundless darkness gushed out from his body while all the element of darkness within the darkness domain of divinity abruptly converged into the dark spear in his hand.

    Hofs hurled the dark spear. The aura of darkness coiled around the spear as it made its way towards Han Shuo rapidly. It looked like an enormous dark pir.

    The seventeen flying swords violently shot towards the dark spear and intercepted it in a sh. Crackle and rattle sounded from the spear as the aura of darkness coiled around it rapidly dispersed in the violent collisions. The intense divine energy of darkness on the spear was cleansed off by the seventeen flying swords in no time, revealing the true appearance of the dark spear.

    Hofs let out a cold groan. He had somehow made his way around the seventeen flying swords at an unknown time and emerged beside Han Shuo. The element of darkness found in his domain of divinity gathered to form a ck hole. Fierce suction power came from the ck hole, forcibly pulling every object into it.

    Han Shuo who was fully focused on maneuvering the seventeen flying swords suddenly felt as though hundreds and thousands of strings tied to his body and pulling him towards the ck hole. The ck hole was filled with chaotic energy that seemed to be able to warp and twist all things. This greatly shocked Han Shuo. The ck hole was made using darkness divine energy that rapidly revolved in unique trajectories. Han Shuo knew that he would be in great trouble if he fell into it.

    The piercing pain all over his body caused by Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy straining his body grew even more painful. Han Shuo deployed the Invincible Omen Body under the support of Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy. Once the demonic skill was deployed, Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body became as still and unmoving as a mountain.

    Even though the ck hole had astonishing suction power, Han Shuo managed to ovee it and held his ground. He continued with maneuvering the seventeen flying swords and sent them back to his side.

    As soon as Hofs realized that the ck hole he deployed could not grip onto Han Shuo, he concealed himself inside the ck hole. Then, using his divine body, he propelled the ck hole and maneuvered it towards Han Shuo. The ck hole began covering down at Han Shuo from above his head.

    The trees, rocks, shrubs, and even the river streams in the area were affected by the pull of the ck hole and fell towards it. Even a few demon generals nearby in immaterial forms could feel its terrifying gravity. But luckily, the force acting on the immaterial demon generals was not much and they could easily resist being drawn into the ck hole with the slightest effort.

    After the darkness divine energy on the dark spear waspletely exhausted by the seventeen flying swords, the dark spear fell into a ck hole like a beam of light. It likely had returned to Hofs¡¯ grasp.

    The flying swords shot towards Hofs. The speed of the already fast-moving flying swords was boosted by the immense pull from the ck hole. The seventeen flying swords, carrying ferocious power, arrived in front of the ck hole in an instant. The Avici Godying Sword Formation immediately formed and trapped the ck hole with Hofs in it.

    The demonic yuan in Han Shuo¡¯s body gushed into the seventeen flying swords as he activated Ceaseless Pain. Chilling wind flew and killing intent raged. The seventeen flying swords whistled as though banshees wailing, striking fear to all who hear their cries. The instant that Ceaseless Pain was formed, the seventeen flying swords became immune to the pull of the ck hole. The chilling sword radiances weaved a web made of light thatunches at the ck hole.

    The corrosive power and frigid aura of the flying swords were rapidly exhausting the thick and dark gaseous mass that shrouded the ck hole. The darkness divine energy that constructed the ck hole was being defeated bit by bit. Hofs had an ominous feeling when he discovered that he was the one being contained instead of the other way round.

    With the corrosive power and frigid energy from the seventeen flying swords acting together, Hofs could feel the aura of darkness was diminishing bit by bit while the ck hole was gradually shrinking.

    Han Shuo at this moment was fully focused on maneuvering the flying swords to assault Hofs. Hofs possessed tremendous strength and a ridiculous amount of divine energy. As powerful as the seventeen flying swords were, at the current trend, Han Shuo would need at least a few hours topletely exhaust the darkness divine energy in Hofs¡¯s body.

    Under the effect of Hofs¡¯ domain of divinity, the element of darkness within several hundred miles radius were rapidly converging towards him. He used the element of darkness collected to help resist the corrosive power of the flying swords. This made Han Shuo¡¯s goal ofpletely exhausting Hofs¡¯ darkness divine energy significantly more difficult to aplish.

    Inside the ck hole, Hofs had nothing to be afraid of. As he defended himself, he used the terrifying suction power of the ck hole to drain the demonic yuan energy on the seventeen flying swords. It was Han Shuo¡¯s supply of demonic yuan that kept the seventeen flying swords immune to the immense gravity of the ck hole.

    Suddenly, the fight evolved into an attrition battle. If it was any other situation, Han Shuo would happily continue to the endurance fight against Hofs.

    With Cauldron Spirit, this ultimate demonic treasure providing him with a seemingly endless supply of energy, Han Shuo believed that no more than a few people in the universe could defeat him in a battle of endurance. Hofs was not one of them.

    Han Shuo was very confident that if they were to continue fighting in the same manner and with every other factor remaining the same, he would eventually emerge as the victor.

    But unfortunately for Han Shuo, he currently does not have the luxury of time. Although they had escaped from Hushveil City, they were still in a territory under the influence of the City. More importantly, there were divine guards from Hushveil City all around the mountain range where the forces of all three major family ns were all hunting for them. Given how fierce the battle was, some of them had noticed the loud noise and intense disturbance and were rushing to the area.

    Once the experts of Hushveil City reach the area, Han Shuo and Rose who had exhausted a lot of their divine energy would be at a disadvantage. And when that happens, if Hofs were to stake it all to hold back Han Shuo as the experts of Hushveil City surrounds him, both he and Rose would be in a perilous situation.

    Han Shuo rapidly considered his options. Suddenly, an idea struck him. He recalled the miraculousness and power of the domain of divinity formed by amalgamating those of his two avatars.

    With one thought, the two avatars slowly flew out from the Cauldron of Myriad Demon in Han Shuo¡¯s body. The domains of divinity of death and destruction were simultaneously deployed.

    However, they were not fusing!

    Han Shuo was confused by it and it caused him to lose focus on the seventeen flying swords for a fraction of a fraction of a second, nearly allowing Hofs to make aeback. Han Shuo immediately gathered all his focus back on maneuvering the seventeen flying swords while letting the divine souls of his avatars figure out the method of fusing their domains of divinity. They failed even after making multiple attempts,

    Not giving up, Han Shuo then carefully recalled the situation when the two domains of divinity first started fusing. He suddenly felt as though he realized something and started adjusting the divine souls of his avatars. The divine souls of his avatars became as calm as the consciousness of his main body. Then, abruptly, a bizarre link between the three souls took shape.

    Han Shuo managed to reproduce the strange phenomenon. The two domains of divinity yet again started to amalgamate. Strings not visible to the naked eye filled the new domain densely while the element of death all around the environment flowed towards the domain. As the domain of divinity expands, it unavoidably made contact with Hofs¡¯ domain.

    The novel domain of divinity showed greatbativeness. The instant that Han Shuo¡¯s domain of divinity made contact with Hofs¡¯, the former started aggressively repelling and discing thetter. It tried to cut off Hofs¡¯ domain of divinity from the element of darkness in the environment and stopped the element of darkness from approaching the area.

    At the same time, the amalgamated domains of divinity continued expanding into Hofs¡¯ domain of divinity. The unseeable strings rapidly flew in trajectories conforming to the edict of destruction while wildly soaking up the element of deathing from every direction. Han Shuo¡¯s domain grew bigger and bigger as though an enormous balloon being rapidly inted.

    Hofs¡¯ domain of divinity started warping and distorting under the stress of external forces. The aura of darkness taking the form of dark clouds started moving away and dispersing. Hofs tried to counteract Han Shuo¡¯s domain by sending the darkness aura forward and deploying darkness boundaries.

    Han Shuo and Hofs deliberately controlled their domains of divinity to sh and repel against each other, not backing up an inch for the other. Logically speaking, the domain of divinity formed by the avatars of midgod strengths should stand no chance against Hofs¡¯ highgod domain of divinity as their strengths were of different sses.

    But unexpectedly, the amalgamated domain of divinity produced by Han Shuo¡¯s midgod avatars could go head to head against Hofs¡¯ domain of divinity instead of crumbling down as a usual midgod domain would.

    With that, Hofs was forced to divert some of his focus on manipting his domain of divinity. His energy was being exhausted at a faster rate. Under the corrosive assault of the seventeen flying swords, Hofs started showing signs of fatigue.

 Chapter 773 - Deicide Slash

    GDK 773: Deicide sh

    Unlike Han Shuo, Hofs doesn¡¯t have two avatars. He also had no ess to Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy. He could not simultaneously put his attention on maintaining both his ck hole and his domain of divinity. Gradually, Hofs¡¯ domain of divinity was forced to shrink to a small size. The element of darkness found in the environment no longer gushes into his domain.

    The feeling of regret suddenly rose in Hofs¡¯ heart. He started to feel that separating from his party and challenging Han Shuo all by himself was a big mistake.

    Unfortunately for Hofs, no amount of regret could help him turn the situation around. All he could do was to persevere and resist Han Shuo¡¯s attack for as long as he can.

    Gradually, Hofs felt more and more exhausted. After the element of darkness in the environment stopped flowing into his domain of divinity, he could no longer replenish his darkness divine energy on the fly. With Han Shuo¡¯s miraculous domain of divinity and seventeen flying swords exerting greater and greater pressure, Hofs was forced to burn through his darkness divine energy reserves faster and faster.

    <i><i>How I wish those fes would ignore my orders ande to my aid!</i></i> thought Hofs. Perhaps luck was on Hofs¡¯ side that day. At the moment, the experts of Hushveil CIty were actually rushing to the region as though they have heard the crying from Hofs¡¯ mind.

    Hofs who waspletely upied on handling Han Shuo¡¯s terrifying attacks naturally had no idea about the situation in his surroundings. Han Shuo, however, through the uninterrupted vision of his demon generals, was fully aware of every activity around him. Those approaching were experts from several major family ns of Hushveil City. They likely had heard the noises produced from Han Shuo and Hofs¡¯ ferocious battle.

    Knowing how formidable Han Shuo was, these experts came withrge groups of divine guards from their family ns. They were approaching the region in a U-shaped formation. It was clear that they intend to surround and trap Han Shuo.

    Rose was oblivious to the situation in the distance. She was still waiting for Han Shuo nearby as Han Shuo had instructed. Although Rose would have no trouble holding back and killing some of the midgod divine guards, she would stand no chance when the highgods arrive. Han Shuo knew that he must end the battle with Hofs as soon as possible or else Rose could be the first to perish.

    Although it was clear that Hofs was on the back foot, as Hofs possessedte-stage highgod strength and their gap in strength wasn¡¯t too big, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t able to take Hofs¡¯ life within a short time.

    Han Shuo rapidly turned over in his mind for a method to butcher Hofs right away. Suddenly, in his consciousness, Han Shuo instructed Cauldron Spirit, ¡°Lend me more energy. I want to deploy the second form of the Avici Godying Sword Formation ¨C the Deicide sh¡°

    ¡°No!¡± Cauldron Spirit seemed rather appalled. It hastily exined to Han Shuo, ¡°Deicide sh requires more energy to activate. Although I could supply you that amount of energy, your body definitely cannot bear that amount of energy. You will very likely injure your demonic infant if you deploy Deicide sh!¡±

    ¡°I am well aware of it. Just give me more energy. I will immediately cease Deicide sh when the demonic infant reaches its limit. Hurry up! There¡¯s no time!¡± said Han Shuo hastily.

    As Han Shuo was Cauldron Spirit¡¯s master, Cauldron Spirit had to obey hismand. Although Cauldron Spirit disagreed with the decision, he had no choice but to fill Han Shuo¡¯s body with even more energy.

    In an instant, Han Shuo¡¯s eyes turned blood red. The veins on his face and neck popped up. His skin and flesh swelled and started to crack. It was as though Han Shuo would burst apart at any moment.

    An energy five times the amount that was already in Han Shuo¡¯s body gushed from the Cauldron. The pain assailing every cell from his head to toe grew by five folds. It was near the limits of Han Shuo¡¯s tolerance of pain. Han Shuo, grinding his teeth as blood slowly flowed from his mouth, suddenly raised his head and let out a thunderous roar as though a savage beast. The deafening bellow spread far and wide.

    Demonic yuan energy and demon general energy wildly gushed into the seventeen flying swords. The flying swords that formed the Ceaseless Pain by rapidly revolving in unique trajectories suddenly burst out dark radiances. It was as though seventeen enormous and enraged dragons grew out from the flying swords. The dark radiances connected to the flying swords shot towards Hofs from seventeen different directions.

    One after another, the unholy dark radiances struck at the center point of the seventeen flying swords. The dark radiances would fuse and merge. Each time they merged, the killing intent overflowing from the seventeen flying swords would grow more intense. When the seventeen dark radiances that grew out from the flying swords merged into one giant column, the seventeen flying swords finally shot towards the ck hole from every direction.

    A frightening amount of killing intent spread from the region. Following that, an aura of utter power and destruction burst forth. The seventeen flying swords seemed to have fused into one. The thick column made of dark radiances rammed into the ck hole. An earth-shaking explosion sounded.

    Following the explosion, a miserable shriek sounded from Hofs.

    The aura of darkness on the ck hole waspletely destroyed by the Deicide sh. This had neutralized just a small fraction of the power of the seventeen flying swords. The seventeen flying swords, carrying unstoppable power continued crashing forward. It shoved Hofs along with the dark spear in his hand deep into the ground. The dark spear along with Hofs¡¯ right arm that wielded the weapon, shattered.

    Hofs¡¯ right arm had burst apart and he was buried deep underground. The dark spear, made using some kind of wonderful material, unexpectedly deployed a powerful boundary of darkness after it exploded into dark metallic pieces. The boundary managed to stop the remainder of the energy on Deicide sh that would have ended Hofs¡¯ life otherwise.

    The demon general energy left Han Shuo¡¯s body and rapidly returned to the Cauldron. Han Shuo spurted out a mouthful of blood. He immediately realized that he had just injured his demonic infant by deploying the Deicide sh. Cauldron Spirit took the initiative to withdraw demon general energy from Han Shuo instead of waiting for Han Shuo to do so because it knew that Han Shuo¡¯s demonic infant was injured.

    The boundary of darkness shattered after blocking the Deicide sh. Hofs¡¯ injuries were much more severe than Han Shuo¡¯s. Han Shuo had no doubt that if he borrowed Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy once more, he could end Hofs¡¯ life right there.

    However, his body had just endured an excessive amount of energy. His meridians and cells were strained beyond their limits and could bear no more of Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy before they fully recover. More importantly, the experts of Hushveil City were arriving in the region. Han Shuo knew that if he doesn¡¯t leave at once, not only that he won¡¯t be able to kill Hofs, he might lose his life.

    Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body suffered severe injuries after he forcibly deployed the Deicide sh. Even his demonic infant, the essence of his demonic art cultivation, received slight injuries. If Han Shuo were to deploy Demonic Blood Disassembly at this time, his condition will surely get much worse. He might need at least a hundred years to heal from that kind of injury.

    Therefore, for theck of a better option, Han Shuo decisively gave up on attacking Hofs, turned on his heels and flew towards Rose!

    The enormous disturbance created from their duel had shocked everyone nearby. When the terrifying aura of the Deicide sh spread out from the area, Rose could not help herself but traveled closer to the fight. She was curious and wanted to see what was actually happening.

    But Han Shuo had returned to her before she reaches the area. As Han Shuo cannot boost his strength using Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, he could only fly at the same speed as Rose. He, therefore, did not pull Rose along. Rose felt worried when she again saw blood flowing out from Han Shuo¡¯s mouth. However, at this moment, she did not say a word but focused on escaping with Han Shuo.

    Soon after the two left, numerous experts of Hushveil City arrived from every direction. The earth-shaking explosion and Han Shuo¡¯s wild beast-like roar attracted their attention. Other than feeling rmed, they were extremely curious.

    When they finally reached the area, they discovered a scene of destion. The forest was in ruin. At the center of it was an enormous crater still filled with dust and flying rocks. The intense killing intent had yet to fully dissipate and was still raging at the center of the crater.

    A shout sounded. Rocks and dirt were sent flying. Hofs bore his way out to the surface, revealing his dirt-stained face. He was panting as he red all around.

    ¡°Patriarch, your right arm!¡± an expert of the House of Hofley couldn¡¯t help but cry out in shock.

    Hofley¡¯s right arm was wrecked along with his dark spear. As Hofley did not have the insane rejuvenation ability of Han Shuo¡¯s, he was destined to lose his right arm forever. Without his right arm, Hofley¡¯s strength would be greatly affected. He would end up worse the next time he came across Han Shuo.

    The experts from the House of Hofley were astonished and frightened to see that Hofs had lost his right arm. The patriarch of the other major family ns of Hushveil City bunched their brows tightly. In their minds, they had considered the youngster who had disappeared as a most terrifying character. They inwardly came to decide that they must avoid this deadly murderer at all costs, even if it meant disobeying Hofs¡¯mand.

    Hofs was the City Lord of Hushveil City and possessedte-stage highgod strength. He was the strongest expert in Hushveil City. If he lost his right arm to the youngster, then who else could defeat the person in a duel?

    While feeling afraid of Han Shuo, the three patriarchs were also secretly delighted. They knew that the House of Hofley could firmly hold the position as the top family n in Hushveil City wasrgely because of Hofs¡¯ valiant strength.

    But now that Hofs had lost an arm, his strength would be greatly reduced. With that, the influence his Hofley Family had over Hushveil City would also diminish. The House of Hofley¡¯s loss was theirs to gain.

    ¡°City Lord, what should we do?¡± Although delighted, Westin wore a solemn and grieved face as he said, ¡°City Lord, treating your arm is the most urgent matter. Your Lordship should return to rest and treat your injuries. Leave the rest to us three family ns. We will do everything we can and we will find the murderers!¡±

    These experts had been searching everywhere for ages but they couldn¡¯t even find a trail of Han Shuo. In addition, he had lost more than a hundred divine guards of his family n. It was obvious that Westin was only giving empty promises. Even he himself doubted that he could capture Han Shuo.

    ¡°I will return to the City. I¡¯ll leave the rest to you bunch!¡± said Hofs in a ferocious face. He looked as though a wolf that had not eaten for ages. He turned his eyes to gaze at the faces of the three patriarchs one after another before instructing, ¡°You three family ns will remain in the mountain range and do everything you can to find that guy!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Hofs assembled the divine guards of his Hofley Family and began the journey back to Hushveil City.

    Hofs had lost an arm and suffered serious injuries to his body. Returning to Hushveil City immediately was a must for Hofs. On one hand, he must recover from his injuries as quickly as possible while on the other hand, he must make certain arrangements to secure the position of his family n in the City.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go. We will return to the City of Shadows!¡± Han Shuo said to Rose.

 Chapter 774 - Infamous

    GDK 774: Infamous

    The news of Hofs losing his right arm spread to the entire Darkness Dominion in no time. Every family n of every city would discuss the incident that took ce in Hushveil City. Han Shuo and Rose had suddenly be the center of attention of the Darkness Dominion.

    Although it¡¯s been some time since Han Shuo and Rose thrown Hushveil City into chaos, as none of the popce of Hushveil City had met them before, Hushveil City had no clue about the identity of the murderers even till now. However, most people suspected that the murderers originated from the House of Sainte.

    Wace and Andre, who knew that their House of Sainte had no participation in the matter, were forced to answer and respond to the widespread rumors and usations, distancing themselves from the Hushveil City incident. With that, the identity of the mysterious assassins became more mysterious.

    After losing an arm, Hofs turned unusually low profile. He paid no heeds to things happening in Hushveil City but went into seclusion to focus on healing his injuries. Without Hofs being avable to exin what actually happened, the rumors became more and more distorted from the truth. Unknowingly, the public¡¯s depiction of Han Shuo and Rose became more and more malevolent and monstrous.

    *** The City of Shadows, the Sainte Residence.

    Wace and Andre had just handled yet another wave of questions from City Lords of other cities in the Dominion. They wanted to learn from Wace if those two attackers who had made an enormous mess in Hushveil City originated from the House of Sainte.

    ¡°Who could it be?¡± mumbled Wace in a thoughtful face. He continued, ¡°Although Hofs is the weakest of the Seven City Lords, he is nheless ate-stage highgod expert. But unexpectedly, he would lose an arm to an attacker in the territory of his Hushveil City. How unimaginable!¡±

    ¡°Why? Why Avery and Hassling? What grudges would the attackers have with the two?¡± asked Andre. He too was puzzled and confused.

    ¡°Well, in any case, we have everything to gain and nothing to lose in Avery and Hassling being dead. Haha, no wonder everyone would suspect that the attackers came from our family n!¡± Waceughed and eximed, ¡°Although I can easily defeat Hofs in a duel, I doubt I could easily escape from the encirclement of so many Hushveil City experts and even kill so many of their divine guards. That fe is truly miraculous!¡±

    ¡°Brother, could it be Bryan?¡± A strong suspicion rose from Andre¡¯s heart. With his brows bunched, he said, ¡°In the City of Shadows, other than our family n, only Bryan held grudges with both Avery and Hassling. In addition, Bryan is an expert in concealing himself and his skills in escaping are extraordinary. On top of all that, Bryan has recently disappeared without any exnation. I doubt it is just a coincidence!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s impossible,¡± Wace shook his head smilingly. He turned to look an Ande and exined, ¡°Although that chap possessed decent strength, he is not that strong, is he? I know Hofs¡¯ strength. There¡¯s no way Bryan can cut off his arm. It¡¯s impossible. Definitely impossible.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t be so sure!¡± Andre put on a solemn face and refuted, ¡°We do not know of Bryan¡¯s actual strength for sure. We could detect Andrina, the daughter of the Goddess of Destiny, was concealing her actual strength from the start. But as to Bryan, if he had not struck Portlem back at the banquet hall, how would we have known that he actually possesses such great strength?¡±

    Andre took a deep breath before asking Wace in a deep voice, ¡°Brother, if it¡¯s actually Bryan who did it, what should we do?¡±

    Wace kept silent for a moment before he replied, ¡°If it really is Bryan, that¡¯d be even more wonderful!¡±

    ¡°But what about Hushveil City?¡± asked Andre.

    ¡°Hofs have been injured. Hushveil City has greatly diminished in strength. I have no fear of him!¡± Wace coldly groaned and continued, ¡°His Hushveil City had secretly sheltered Avery. I have yet to settle scores with him on that matter. He is in no position to pressure us on anything.¡± Then after a short pause, Waceughed and said, ¡°If it really was Bryan, it wouldn¡¯t be too big of an issue. Thest time that I met the Overgod of Darkness, I have mentioned about Bryan. The Lord instructed that our family n must give Bryan the best treatment hearing that the Goddess of Destiny has expressed Her goodwill to Bryan. Tell me, would that chap be in any sort of trouble?¡±

    ¡°The Goddess of Destiny is truly influential!¡± After thinking for a moment, Andre softly eximed in admiration, ¡°This chap is really a lucky one!¡±

    ¡°He is.¡± Wace said in a faint smile, ¡°But we must be overthinking. That chap likely does not have that much strength yet... ¡±

    ***

    The rumors had naturally also found their way to the ears of the House of Han. Sanguis, Bonds, Gilbert, and others knew that Han Shuo and Rose were the mysterious attackers without needing to think.

    Before Han Shuo traveled to Hushveil City, he had met with the three and introduced them to Rose. He had also revealed that he was up to something big. The three offered to help Han Shuo in his mission but Han Shuo rejected them with the excuse that they might be a burden to him.

    After listening to the details about the incident at Hushveil City, they became absolutely certain that the two daring perpetrators whomitted outrageous crimes in Hushveil City must be Han Shuo and Rose. Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert were surprised by the realization. They could not be more admiring of Han Shuo¡¯s strength.

    Soon enough, other core members of the Han Family such as Emily, Phoebe, Strathole, and Ayermike learned about the truth from the three. Knowing that they must keep the insider information to themselves, the core members of the Han Family agreed to keep it a secret and to only discuss it in private.

    The divine guards from the Fifth Corps had also previously met Rose. However, as there was plenty of white-haireddy in the Darkness Dominion and as most people did not know Han Shuo well, other than those of the Han Family, no one suspected that Han Shuo and Rose were the perpetrators.

    One monthter, Han Shuo and Rose returned to the City of Shadows.

    Along the journey home, Han Shuo collected all sorts of precious and rare medicinal ingredients found on Elysium. He used the ingredients to produce many pelleted medicines that nourish his demonic infant. After one month of nursing, his demonic infant was slowly starting to recover. However,plete recovery would take a longer time.

    Unlike the demonic body, the demonic infant doesn¡¯t heal from injuries easily. This was why Cauldron Spirit spontaneously withdrew its energy from Han Shuo¡¯s body as soon as it detected that Han Shuo¡¯s demonic infant was injured.

    While using natural herbs and ingredients to nourish his demonic infant, Han Shuo assiduously practiced fusing his domains of divinity. He had discovered the knack of forming the miraculous domain and understood that the domains would amalgamate once the divine souls of his avatars be in synchrony with his consciousness.

    Han Shuo had yet to figure out all the miraculous powers of the amalgamated domain of divinity. However, he knew that this new and amazing domain of divinity was powerful enough to contend against that of Hofs¡¯. From thest battle, Han Shuo discovered a novel cultivation path ¨C the fusion of the energy of death and destruction!

    After one month of fumbling about, Han Shuo discovered that boundaries deployed within the amalgamated domain of divinity would be multiple times stronger than any released by his avatars alone. The new domain would also allow faster than usual absorption of elements from the environment. It also possessed hostile and aggressive characteristics. Learning all these had filled Han Shuo with great excitement.

    Before Han Shuo had time to fully familiarize with his new domain of divinity, he had arrived at the City of Shadows with Rose. To avoid unwanted attention, Han Shuo asked Rose to cover her long hair with a green headscarf, concealing her most eye-catching and distinctive feature.

    Han Shuo had heard a little about the widespread rumors about himself. He did not expect that he would be so infamous for his deeds in Hushveil City. He felt a little odd to be the center of attention of the entire Darkness Dominion while those around him had no idea that he was the person they were discussing.

    Soon, they returned to the Han Residence. Seeing the refreshing decorations in his home covered with flowers and nts, Han Shuo¡¯s heart became at ease.

    Rose seemed very interested in thendscaping of the Han Residence. The Profound Continent-style of decoration happened to fit Rose¡¯s likings. She suddenly felt that perhaps a bustling and crowded city isn¡¯t all that dull.

    But what made Rose felt even more at ease was being beside Han Shuo. After having spent much time with Han Shuo, Rose gradually understood him better. Although she was technically his ve, Han Shuo had never treated her like a ve.

    This was especially true when they faced great dangers. Instead of having his ve bear the brunt, Han Shuo risked getting injured to keep her alive. Because of this, Rose no longer feel too worried about being bound by Han Shuo as his ve. She even felt that it wasn¡¯t all that bad.

    As soon as Han Shuo stepped into his Han Residence, his apprentices, harem, and other members came to wee his return. They soon went into a secret chamber for discussion.

    Han Shuo was informed that no major event had taken ce during his absence. The only major event that will take ce soon was thepetition between the Seven Corps. The members of the House of Han were very curious about Han Shuo¡¯s deeds in Hushveil City and kept on asking for his ount.

    Han Shuo had expected that the members of his family n would figure out that he was responsible for the chaos in Hushveil City. He did not deny it but narrated the story once through without too many details. Emily and the others would secretly take a peek at Rose while Han Shuo told the story. They were shocked and amazed by the terrifying might of this silver-haired beauty.

    ¡°From today onwards, she is a member of our House of Han!¡± dered Han Shuo as he pointed at Rose.

    ¡°Master, we have transported the materials for the Eight Destion and Torment Formation to the Residence. Should we set it up in thergest gymnasium?¡± asked Gilbert.

    The members of the House of Han, especially Stratholme and the others, were greatly interested in the Formation. The divine guards of the Fifth Corps, Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert had told the Han Family members a thing or two about the Formation. They could not wait to temper themselves using the Formation.

    A great majority of the divine guards who entered the Formation had obtained some improvement in strength. Inferring from his divine guards¡¯ achievements, Han Shuo was sure that his talented nsmen and nswomen would obtain a deeper understanding of the energy they cultivated after a round of tempering inside the Formation. Their strengths too would increase.

    ¡°Very well. We will reassemble the Eight Destion and Torment Formation in the House of Han. Hehe, this time, I can increase the power of the Formation to an even greater level. Sanguis, Bonds, Gilbert, if you are interested, I can let you have a taste of being attacked by highgod sous!¡± said Han Shuo in an evil smile. He had obtained arge number of divine souls from Hushveil City. He had even reaped several highgod divine souls in the journey. This will allow the power of the Formation to be pushed to a higher level and make the tempering process more effective.

 Chapter 775 - Two Heads

    GDK 775: Two Heads

    Han Shuo took five days to reassemble the Eight Destion and Torment Formation. It was installed underneath thergest gymnasium in the Han Residence. He had also installed six energy towers that power the nineyers of boundaries he deployed around the Formation to conceal the intense murderous aura emanating from the Formation.

    The Formation was ced underground and very well concealed. Only the members of the Han Family who knew of the secret could find their way there. Even outsiders who were permitted to travel freely in the Han Residence will never be able to locate the secret entrance.

    After Han Shuo finished setting up the Formation, his family n members entered it impatiently. Even Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert went inside to further temper themselves after being encouraged by Han Shuo. The new Formation was controlled by Cauldron Spirit. It split the Formation into multiple segments of different power levels to personalize their training.

    As Han Shuo wasn¡¯t concerned about his safety in the City of Shadows, he temporarily left the Cauldron of Myriad Demon in the Formation, allowing the Cauldron to temper his family n members.

    After Rose arrived at the Han Residence, she was allocated a remote and secluded building. Rose was quiet and stayed in her building all the time. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t worried that someone might recognize her.

    Messengers from the House of Sainte hade by every day since his return to the City, asking for Han Shuo. After having reconstructed the Eight Destion and Torment Formation, Han Shuo went to the Sainte Residence. As thepetition between the Seven Corps was right around the corner, Wace did not force Carmelita to cultivate. The first thing Han Shuo did after arriving at the Sainte Residence was to look for Carmelita and listen to her grumbling about being bored.

    When Han Shuo was asked about what he had been up to in recent times, Han Shuo lied and said that he had been manning Fort Lasberg. He mentioned nothing about Hushveil City to Carmelita.

    Naturally, Carmelita had heard all about the major incident at Hushveil City. She clearly did not suspect that Han Shuo had anything to do with it. She even discussed the incident with Han Shuo excitedly and dered her admiration of the mysterious attackers who wreaked havoc in Hushveil City.

    Han Shuo felt a little odd to have Carmelita singing praises of himself right before him. After some chit-chatting with Carmelita, Han Shuo finally went to Andre.

    ¡°Thepetition between the Seven Corps ising soon. Since you are participating, make sure to do the proper preparations,¡± said Andre straightforwardly after having Han Shuo take a seat. His eyes, however, were looking deeply at Han Shuo. He tried probing, ¡°Where have you been recently?¡±

    ¡°I have been overseeing the daily operations at Fort Lasberg. Haha, now that Fort Lasberg is under the control of my House of Han, it is my duty to manage it well,¡± replied Han Shuo calmly. Han Shuo knew from Andre¡¯s inquisitive gaze that he was suspicious of him. His and Rose¡¯s actions in Hushveil City had been too conspicuous and he knew he wouldn¡¯t be able to hide it for too long. Han Shuo was still hesitating if he should reveal his deeds to Andre.

    ¡°Bryan, have you heard about what recently happened in Hushveil City?¡± Andre looked at Han Shuo attentively. He suddenly put on a warm smile and said, ¡°For some reason, I always feel that the incident in Hushveil City has something to do with you. Others, including my elder brother, do not think that you are capable of such things. But I feel that you can.¡±

    Han Shuo was shocked. However, the expression on his face remained as calm as always. He replied, ¡°Lord Andre, you sure think highly of me.¡±

    Andre¡¯s irises constricted. He nodded and replied, ¡°Yes, I definitely do! For all these years, my assessment of people has always been very urate. However, even after having interacted with you for such a long time, I have failed to discover that you had been hiding your strength. If it wasn¡¯t for your assault on Portlem back in the banquet hall, perhaps I would remain clueless to the fact that you actually possess highgod strength even till now!¡±

    After a short pause, while Han Shuo bunched his brows in thought, Andre continued, ¡°In all my life, you are the only person who managed to fool my senses. Therefore, yes, I indeed think very highly of you!¡± Andre then kept silent for a few seconds. He looked deeply at Han Shuo and softly asked, ¡°Bryan, can you please tell me honestly, are you the one behind the Hushveil City incident? If it is you, there are certain measures that our City must take to guard against the repercussions!¡±

    Han Shuo looked at Andre in a daze. He could feel that Andre was sincere and could tell that he had no malice intension. The interests of Andre¡¯s House of Sainte and Han Shuo¡¯s House of Han were consistent and aligned. Avery and Hassling that he murdered were both enemies of the House of Sainte. Han Shuo could not see why the House of Sainte would not defend him for his actions. On top of that, Han Shuo knew that it was only a matter of time before someone will figure out that he was behind the havoc in Hushveil City.

    Han Shuo realized that there was no reason to conceal the truth from Andre. He cracked a smile but did not say a word. Then, he took out two ss containers from his space ring.

    They contained Avery and Hassling¡¯s heads!

    With just one look at the content of the ss containers, without needing Han Shuo to speak a word, Andre was certain that Han Shuo was behind the terrible attack on Hushveil City. Although Andre had tried preparing himself mentally, when he saw the heads of Avery and Hassling took out by Han Shuo, he was nheless astonished.

    Andre took a deep breath. His voice was a little different than usual. He said, ¡°It¡¯s you! It actually is you! Good gracious, how unbelievable!¡±

    Han Shuo was actually surprised by Andre¡¯s reaction. He thought that Andre had given him that solemn speech because he had obtained evidence of his crime. But after seeing that astonished look on Andre, Han Shuo immediately realized that Andre had no proof but merely his gut feeling.

    Andre stared at Han Shuo with wide-open eyes and remained shocked for a long time. But finally, after taking a deep breath, Andre managed to calm down. He hastily said, ¡°Come, follow me. The incident at Hushveil City has be a serious issue. We must discuss this with my elder brother!¡±

    Soon enough, Andre, walking in brisk footsteps with Han Shuo following, found Wace, the City Lord of the City of Shadows.

    Without a word, Andre ced Avery and Hassling¡¯s heads on Wace¡¯s table. He then put on a strange smile and pointed at Han Shuo.

    Wace was stunned for a moment when the heads were ced before him. Shortly after, with his eyes glowing brightly, he turned to look at Han Shuo with shock. He seemed even more surprised than Andre was. He even cried out in surprise, ¡°It was you?¡±

    Han Shuo calmly admitted by nodding his head.

    Wace was struck dumb. He stared foolishly at Han Shuo for ages before he finally forced a smile and nodded. He mumbled to himself, ¡°Unbelievable, how unbelievable! Even I have not anticipated it. Turns out to be you!¡± After a short pause, Wace asked in amazement, ¡°How did you do it?¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before he shrugged and replied, ¡°Just like that.¡±

    ¡°Brother, we need to proceed carefully. That Hofs of Hushveil City is a lunatic. He will not give up on Bryan easily. We need to be prepared!¡± said Andre in a deep voice.

    ¡°Be at ease. No one would know that Bryan was behind the Hushveil City incident within a short period of time!¡± Wace smiled and said, ¡°During the past few days, multiple family ns from various cities that have grudges with the House of Hofley publicly imed that they were responsible for the attacks. At least three major family ns were willing to suffer Hofs¡¯ wrath!¡±

    After Wace uttered those words, it became Han Shuo¡¯s turn to be astonished. He put on a grimace and asked, ¡°What? Why would they do that?¡±

    ¡°For the infamy!¡± Wace exined, ¡°To sever Hofs¡¯ right arm, murder so many people in Hushveil City and still escape in one piece, that is no ordinary feat. It¡¯s not something that anyone can do. For those family ns, iming responsibility for the attacks meant that they will instantly be well-known in the Darkness Dominion. This would attract experts who seek reputation to join them, thereby improving their family n¡¯s strength rapidly.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, you might not know it, but your deeds in Hushveil City have given rise to a craze in the Darkness Dominion!¡± Andre smiled and continued, ¡°Some women in the Darkness Dominion even deliberately dyed their hair silver-white and imitate the appearance of that woman who went with you. Isn¡¯t it interesting?¡±

    Han Shuo was at a loss of words. He did not expect that their atrocious deeds back in Hushveil City would create such a trend in the entire Darkness Dominion.

    ¡°That¡¯s why I say, you can be at ease for now. Those few family ns have diverted too much attention. As long as you do not go out on the streets with Avery¡¯s head and yell that you did it, no one would suspect that it was you!¡± Wace consoled Han Shuo. He then smilingly said, ¡°It seems that a huge change ising to the rankings of the seven Divine Guard Chiefs!¡±

    Andre nodded and said, ¡°For all this time, Aobashi ranks first. But this time around, she will likely be moving down to the second ce!¡±

    Han Shuo could cut off Hofs¡¯ right arm and bath Hushveil City with blood. Aobashi, however, did not have the strength to do so. It was to be expected that Andre and Wace would have thought so.

    ¡°Andre and I will not divulge a word of what you did in Hushveil City. Ask those close to you to keep quiet about it. With that, you would be free of troubles ¨C for the time being.¡± Wace took a short pause before he continued, ¡°You have killed Avery. This means that you have firmly secured your position as the Chief of Fifth Corps. Do your best in the battle of the Seven Chiefs. Defeating Aobashi will be greatly beneficial to your House of Han. As to the battle between divine guards, don¡¯t worry about the results too much. After all, your Fifth Corps have beencking people.¡±

    Wace and Andre thought that the Fifth Corps divine guards will take thest ce in thepetition. Erebus and Aobashi thought the same.

    ¡°Got it!¡± replied Han Shuo as he nodded. After a brief discussion about certain things with Andre and Wace, Han Shuo left the Sainte Residence. Han Shuo was thinking about his Fifth Corps divine guards who had been tempered by the Eight Destion and Torment Formation. He was considering how to deliver everyone a surprise!

    The divine guards of the Fifth Corps had obtained great improvement in every aspect after being tempered by the Formation. They had built a strong rapport with each other. In a battle between groups, these men would form the most terrifying team. Han Shuo believed that they will not disappoint him in thepetition.

 Chapter 776 - A New Direction

    GDK 776: A New Direction

    ***In a gymnasium in the Han Residence.

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatars of death and destruction deployed their domains of divinity. His three souls became synchronized and the two domains of divinity slowly started to fuse. Bizarre transformations gradually took ce in the gymnasium...

    The gymnasium was shrouded by powerful boundaries supported by energy towers. The elements in the environment were kept isted outside the gymnasium. Elemental energies could barely flow into the gymnasium through the boundaries. However, after Han Shuo¡¯s domains of divinity fused, loud popping noises starteding from the boundaries around him. It was as though the element of death outside the gymnasium felt an intense attraction and were trying to force their way into the gymnasium.

    The three Han Shuos stood shoulder to shoulder in the gymnasium. His avatars of death and destruction were using their divine souls to feel the changes taking ce in their domain of divinity. Power of faith strings filled the Domain and was rapidly revolving in trajectories conforming to the edict of destruction.

    With one thought, Han Shuo condensed the destruction divine energy in his body to form an Orb of Destruction. Inside the amalgamated domain of divinity, the rate at which the Orb materialize had increased by multiple folds. As soon as the Orb was formed, it automatically traveled in special trajectories inside the Domain, simr to the power of faith strings around it.

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction started condensing more Orbs of Destruction. The Orbs glistened with a dark luster. The destruction divine energy made buzzing noises like electrical sparks inside the Orbs. They were rapidly moving around in the same trajectory as the power of faith strings.

    The Orbs of Destruction automatically traveled around the hybrid domain of divinity following unique trajectories and Han Shuo had no direct control over their movements. It was as though his hybrid domain of divinity was doing the task for him. Han Shuo could not be more amazed.

    The Orbs of Destruction fluttered all around in the domain of divinity. They were the size of a clenched fist when they were first produced. But gradually, they increased in size. The destruction divine energy they contained also grew more and more, making the Orbs more and more potent in power.

    The Orbs of Destruction that had left Han Shuo¡¯s control grew much more powerful under the effect of the hybrid Domain. They rapidly revolved in trajectories of the edict of destruction and caused Han Shuo¡¯s Domain to be more and more chaotic.

    At this moment, a slender and curvy figure entered the gymnasium.

    When the person entered the gymnasium, it was as though the energy that had been building up in the amalgamated Domain had found a vent and swarmed towards the person. The Orbs of Destruction that had been fluttering about charged towards the person in trajectories of destruction edict.

    A series of crackle and rattle sounded from the area. The beautiful figure hastily put up defenses against the spontaneous attack from Han Shuo¡¯s domain of divinity and quickly retreated.

    With one thought, the synchrony between the three souls was broken. With that, the hybrid domain of divinity vanished. The instant that the Domain disappeared, Han Shuo regained full control over the Orbs of Destruction. They flew back towards Han Shuo and vanished into his palm.

    After the domain of divinity disappeared, Rose, the beautiful figure, cautiously stepped back into the gymnasium. She gazed at Han Shuo with astonished eyes and asked puzzlingly, ¡°What was that about?¡±

    ¡°Nothing,¡± replied Han Shuo as he bunched his brows as though in deep thought.

    Thepetition between the Seven Divine Guard Corps of the City of Shadows was right around the corner and therefore Han Shuo had been staying in his Han Residence. After the Eight Destion and Torment Formation was built, Han Shuo¡¯s friends and girlfriends had gone inside to cultivate. Han Shuo, meanwhile, had been nursing the injuries of his demonic infant while studying the wonderful amalgamated domain of divinity.

    Han Shuo was very surprised by how wonderfully the fused domains of divinity performed in the duel with Hofs. Since that battle, he started repeatedly deploy the hybrid domain to understand what other miraculous functions it had. As he had nothing to do for the moment, he asked Rose to be his sparring partner.

    Rose was extremely astonished by the existence of his two avatars and was even more surprised that their domains of divinity could fuse to form something new. Rose had never heard of such a thing. She showed great interest in it and had been very helpful to Han Shuo in unraveling the mysteries of the hybrid domain.

    ¡°Your domain of divinity is very hostile towards others. Other than yourself, all those who approach your Domain would be attacked by it. Can you control it?¡± asked Rose after thinking for a moment. She seemed somewhat worried.

    This was indeed a major challenge for Han Shuo. After much experimentation, Han Shuo discovered that for the time being, he could not fully control the amalgamated domain of divinity. Once the two domains fused, any person near it, other than himself, would be attacked by the domain. Even his closest friend was no exception.

    This was a big headache for Han Shuo because it meant that once he deploys the hybrid domain, he must fight against his enemies alone and no ally can fight alongside him or else, his ally would suffer the indifferent attacks from his Domain. His allies such as Emily and Lisa whose strengths were rtively weak could suffer serious or even fatal injuries to his hybrid domain of divinity. It was needless to say that Han Shuo was unwilling to see that happen.

    Han Shuo who was in a pensive look forced a smile and shook his head. He replied, ¡°Sigh, I don¡¯t know what¡¯s going on either. I¡¯m still trying to find a way of controlling it. That wille soon, I hope.¡± After a short pause, Han Shuo put on a delighted look and said, ¡°Anyhow, the Orbs of Destruction could amplify in power just by traveling in special trajectories conforming to the edict of destruction inside the new Domain. It appeared that the new domain of divinity could not only amplify the power of boundaries deployed, but it also has the same effect on regr attacks!¡±

    ¡°Really? That¡¯s wonderful!¡± cried Rose in delighted surprise. She then eximed in admiration, ¡°Your two avatars are currently just midgods but the new domain they form is already so terrifying. Once your avatars managed to make breakthroughs, and when you fully master your new domain, I reckon your strength will yet again rise significantly. This is so mind-blowing!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded with a faint smile and said, ¡°That¡¯s why I must learn to fully control my hybrid domain of divinity as soon as possible!¡±

    Han Shuo further discussed the characteristics of the hybrid domain with Rose a little longer before leaving the gymnasium. Rose did not leave with Han Shuo. Instead, she stayed in the gymnasium and cultivated alone. The gymnasium was specially for her and Han Shuo to use. She was very happy with the arrangement.

    Soon after Han Shuo sat down in his home office, Sanguis, who learned that Han Shuo hade out from the gymnasium, went in and announced, ¡°Master, your friends havee to visit you!¡±

    ¡°Who are they?¡± Han Shuo had many friends in the City of Shadows. Currently, every major family ns would throw olive branches at Han Shuo and would always try to improve their rtionships with Han Shuo. They woulde to visit Han Shuo from time to time. Han Shuo had no idea which among them Sanguis was referring to.

    ¡°They are not locals and are rather young.¡± Sanguis tried recalling for a moment and said, ¡°I think they are called Bolten and Li Wei.¡±

    ¡°Oh!¡± Han Shuo softly eximed before he put on a faint smile and said, ¡°It¡¯s them! How unexpected! Where are they?¡±

    ¡°They arrived seven days ago and were ced in the eastern guest house,¡± replied Sanguis.

    Han Shuo nodded and without another word, he headed straight for the eastern guest house. Before Han Shuo had reached the area, Han Shuo had located Bolten and Li Wei though his demon generals.

    ¡°What a joy to be visited by friends from afar! Haha, wee to the Han Residence!¡± said Han Shuoughingly as he stepped into the guest house.

    The visitors were Bolten, Bowen, Li Wei, and most surprisingly ¨C Dagassi the Ancient Lizard King!

    Back then in the Profound Continent, Dagassi the Ancient Lizard King had provided Han Shuo assistance and valuable guidance. Dagassi left the Profound Continent soon after and Han Shuo had not seen him again since then. Han Shuoter learned from Li Wei that Dagassi was with her family n.

    Dagassi had now be a mid-stage lowgod of darkness. His aged appearance remained pretty much the same. Dagassi seemed very shocked to see Han Shuo again as though he could not believe the man before him was the Han Shuo he knew. ¡°Bryan? Is it really you?¡±

    Han Shuoughed out loud and stepped forward to hug the Ancient Lizard King. He cordially replied, ¡°Of course it is me! How unexpected, we meet again!¡±

    ¡°I was told that Lady Li Wei met you in Profound Continent, but never had I expected that the Bryan of the City of Shadows would be the same person. Who would have thought that you could gain a foothold in the City of Shadows in such a short time? Youngster, you truly are unbelievably amazing!¡± eximed Dagassi in amazement.

    ¡°Meh, there¡¯s nothing to it. He rose to heights by stepping on Sister Donna¡¯s House of Lavers and fawning on the House of Sainte. He even seized Sister Donna¡¯s house. What a shame, Sister Donna treated him well when he had nothing and yet, he would cross Donna!¡± said Li Wei after she shot a cold nce at Han Shuo.

    Bolten who was standing beside them seemed rather awkward and forced augh to break the tense atmosphere. He interjected, ¡°Bryan, we havee here on behalf of our family n to discuss business cooperation with your Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. Haha, although we are located in the Dominions of Death and Darkness, we have heard much about your Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. Our elders knew that we are friends and therefore sent us here for negotiation¡±

    Han Shuo did not respond to Bolten but looked at Li Wei in a bitter smile. After quite a while, he let out a soft sigh and said, ¡°I can¡¯t me you for misunderstanding the situation. But I must say that I have never forgotten about Donna and the kindness she showed me. I have no grudges with her House of Lavers, but Avery had tried to kill me again and again, leaving me with no option but to fight. I only have grudges with Avery, not Donna.¡±

    ¡°You now own the Lavers Residence while Sister Donna is homeless. What¡¯s the point of saying these words now?¡± replied Li Wei after she snorted.

    Although Han Shuo did it because he had no other choice, he was, after all, victorious in the conflict. People usually sympathize with the defeated and Han Shuo could understand that Li Wei would have difficulties changing her opinion within a short time. Han Shuo shook his head helplessly and did not exin himself any further. He asked Bolten, ¡°Your family n wishes to buy the medicines I personally refined, right?

    ¡°Nope!¡± Bolten shook his head and smilingly said, ¡°Our elders wish to open a Celestial Pearl Pharmacy franchise in the Destruction Dominion. Will you be interested?¡±

    Han Shuo was ted by the proposal. He immediately nodded smilingly and replied, ¡°Of course I am!¡±

 Chapter 777 - I am now his slave

    GDK 777: I am now his ve

    Crystal coins are indispensable for a family n that wishes to rapidly expand and grow. As the House of Han grows bigger and their members grow stronger, their consumption rate of crystal coins would increase. The Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was generating enough ie from the City of Shadows to sustain all expenditures of the House of Han, for the present.

    However, the House of Han will only increase in size. Recruiting divine guards would require arge amount of crystal coins. If the ie does not grow in tandem with the growing expenses, the House of Han might one day find themselves in a situation where they were strapped for cash. In recent times, Phoebe and Emily had been discussing how they should expand Celestial Pearl to other cities of the Darkness Dominion. Han Shuo had risked his life and went through great effort to kill Hassling of Godswamp Pharmacy because he had this grand vision in mind.

    And now, out of nowhere, two family ns from the Death and Destruction Dominions tossed him olive branches, offering him a chance to expand the Celestial Pearl to those Dominions. This could mean a substantial increase to the House of Han¡¯s ie. It was needless to say that Han Shuo would not decline any opportunity for great profits.

    ¡°Our family elders see the tremendous growth potential in your Pharmacy. They wish to cooperate with you and help Celestial Pearl increase its reach by establishing a presence in the Destruction Dominion. You will supply the medicines and pharmacists while our family n will be responsible for setting up the stores through the connections we have in the Destruction Dominion. We propose that the profits be evenly split,¡± said Bolten straightforwardly after seeing that Han Shuo was weing of the idea.

    ¡°Haha, I¡¯m sure that this will be a fruitful joint business venture!¡± Han Shuo said smilingly, ¡°But as to the specifics of the deal, you should discuss it with my executives. Unlike me, they are up-to-date to Celestial Pearl¡¯s situation and are more suited to make such negotiations.¡±

    Han Shuo was no longer involved in the daily operations of Celestial Pearl and was not good at negotiating terms for business cooperation. However, Phoebe and Emily were skilled at it. Han Shuo believed that they could strike a great deal for his Celestial Pearl and House of Han.

    ¡°Sure, absolutely!¡± Bolten dly agreed and smilingly replied, ¡°I¡¯m here just to ry the wishes of my family n and to get your approval. I will inform my elders in a moment and they will send others here to discuss the specifics.¡±

    Bolten and Bowen were sent there by their family n because the two had befriended Han Shuo back in Profound Continent. Their family n knew of the miraculousness of Han Shuo¡¯s medicines and believe that they will make loads of crystal coins by forming a joint venture with Han Shuo¡¯s Pharmacy. Bolten and Bowen were there to sell Han Shuo the idea and get him interested. Once Han Shuo agreed to it, the two brothers¡¯ would leave the rest to professionals from their family n to handle the intricacies.

    ¡°Very well, I will inform my executives about itter,¡± replied Han Shuo as he nodded. He could not be more delighted. Once Celestial Pearl expanded its reach to the Destruction Dominion, the House of Han would have even greater financial power, allowing it to rapidly grow in strength and influence.

    ¡°Lady Li Wei, I believe it¡¯s now our turn to dere our position?¡± Ancient Lizard King Daggasi softly reminded Li Wei after seeing that Bolten had reached an agreement with Han Shuo.

    Dagassi felt no animosity towards Han Shuo. On the contrary, he could not be more admiring of Han Shuo. Li Wei went to the City of Shadows with the same objective as Bolten and Bowen. Although she was discontented at Han Shuo, she will not abandon the task her family n assigned her.

    Li Wei pouted and seemed unwilling. She let out a soft groan before she said, ¡°Our House of Kiaran has the same intent!¡±

    Han Shuo knew that Li Wei was still pissed at him but he wasn¡¯t going to bicker with her for it. He smilingly replied, ¡°Sure, no problem. Like Bolten¡¯s family n, my executives will discuss the specifics with professionals of your family n when they are here.¡± After pausing for a moment, Han Shuo smilingly invited, ¡°Now that you guys are at the City of Shadows, why not tour around the City and have some fun? Haha, if you want to, I can apany you guys.¡±

    ¡°No thanks. I¡¯ve been here before and know where all the entertaining ces are,¡± Li Wei coldly declined right away. She continued, ¡°Besides, a noble as high ranking as you are must be very busy. How would we dare inconvenient you to personally keep uspany!¡±

    Bolten who originally wanted to say yes forced augh and said nothing.

    ¡°Lady Li Wei, I have not met Bryan for ages. If Your Ladyship doesn¡¯t mind, I wish to talk with Bryan,¡± asked Ancient Lizard King Dagassi and he bowed at Li Wei.

    ¡°Whatever!¡± replied Li Wei in a sulky face.

    Han Shuo sighed in his mind. He knew that Li Wei had misunderstood him because of his shing with the House of Lavers. He was currently living on the former Lavers Residence and even Fort Lasberg now became a territory of his House of Han. It wasn¡¯t all false that Han Shuo had risen to his height by stepping on the House of Lavers.

    Li Wei then bitterly left. Bolten shrugged and smiled at Han Shuo before saying, ¡°We have heard a thing or two about the friction between you and the House of Lavers. Li Wei is very close to Donna. It¡¯s normal that she couldn¡¯t see through it in such a short time. Don¡¯t take offense.¡± Bolten took a short pause before he added, ¡°There will always bepetition between family ns. No one knew when a family n would rise or fall. The House of Lavers left the City of Shadows, but that doesn¡¯t mean they will continue to decline. Don¡¯t brood over it!¡±

    Contrary to expectations, Han Shuo was admiring of Li Wei for standing up to him and disapproved of Bolten¡¯s unsympatheticment. Donna had been caring toward Bolten and Bowen back on Profound Continent. It was clear to Han Shuo that Bolten disyed not the slightest anger towards him because his House of Han would be a valuable partner to Bolten¡¯s family n. Li Wei, however, was a much more genuine person and it showed that she was loyal to her friends.

    Han Shuo nodded. The faint smile on his face did not diminish. He replied, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I have taken no offense at all. But I still feel guilty about Donna¡¯s situation. I will make sure to exin everything to her when I see her again.¡±

    The joint venture would very profitable to both sides. Han Shuo, as the patriarch of his family n, will never risk alienating thisrge goldmine. He yed along and made light chat with Bolten in a seemingly cordial smile.

    Shortly after, Bolten and Bowen also left, leaving Dagassi with Han Shuo. Dagassi immediately started asking Han Shuo things rted to Profound Continent, especially about the Lizardmen who live in the Underground World.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, your people are doing well in the Underground World. Come with me, there¡¯s someone I want you to meet,¡± said Han Shuo smilingly.

    ¡°Who?¡± asked Dagassi puzzlingly.

    ¡°You¡¯ll see!¡± replied Han Shuo smilingly. He led Dagassi to the gymnasium where Rose was.

    Rose was still cultivating in the gymnasium. Her eyes glistened with astonished rays when Dagassi entered. She looked up and down at Dagassi a few times before she nodded her head coldly and said, ¡°So you are the big lizard!¡±

    Dagassi stared nkly for a moment. He looked at Rose in confusion as he asked, ¡°Who are you? Do I know you?¡±

    A giant false image appeared behind Rose. It bore her seductive and beautiful face but had the body of a giant spider. It looked down at Dagassi from midair and sternly shouted, ¡°Big lizard, you better not mess with my followers!¡±

    Instantly, a shiver traveled from Dagassi¡¯s head to his toe. He shrieked in horror, ¡°Spider Goddess Rose!¡±

    The image abruptly vanished. Rose nodded and said, ¡°Yes, it is me! So you do remember me telling you those words, huh?¡±

    Dagassi became even more frightened. He cried in rm, ¡°Why are you here? Why are you with Bryan?¡± After a short pause, Dagassi suddenly turned to Han Shuo and asked, ¡°Bryan, did you sell out our race of Lizardmen to her?!¡±

    Dagassi¡¯s people and the Dark Elves who dwelled in the Underground World had always been in conflict. He wrongly assumed the worst when he saw that Rose was with Han Shuo.

    Rose remained silent but Han Shuo smilingly exined, ¡°Of course not. I would never let the Dark Elves persecute your Lizardmen. Rose is now a member of my House of Han and your people are living in harmony with the Dark Elves.¡±

    Han Shuo then turned to Rose and smilingly said, ¡°Don¡¯t you think you owe him an apology after having locked him up for so long?¡±

    It was Spider Goddess Rose who had imprisoned Ancient Lizard King Dagassi. Back then, she temporarily descended upon Profound Continent by sacrificing several hundred Dark Elves. Once there, she easily defeated Dagassi. But as Dagassi¡¯s former master was a member of the Kiaran Family of the Death Dominion, Rose did not kill him but imprisoned him.

    Then one day, Han Shuo discovered the magical crystal ore mountain Dagassi was locked in and freed Dagassi from the seal. As Dagassi knew that the Dark Elves worshipped Rose, he did not massacre the Dark Elves after he was freed.

    Rose seemed rather unwilling to apologize. Dagassi had massacred arge number of her Dark Elves before he was imprisoned. Rose had merely imprisoned him and did not kill him. From her point of view, she had done nothing wrong. But as Rose cannot go against Han Shuo¡¯smand, after much hesitation, she softly said, ¡°Sorry for imprisoning you for so many years.¡±

    Dagassi put on a startled face. He looked back and forth at Rose and Han Shuo before he puzzlingly asked, ¡°You two, what is the rtionship between the two of you?¡±

    Rose seemed embarrassed to hear Dagassi¡¯s question. After taking a quick peek at the smiling Han Shuo, Rose softly replied, ¡°I... I¡¯m now his ve.¡±

    ¡°What?!¡± Dagassi put on a bbergasted face as he cried out in rm, ¡°You are his ve? But you are a highgod! I learned of it after I arrive on Elysium. It was because of this that I dared not seek revenge against you. How in the world did you be his ve?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s hard to exin.¡± Han Shuo smilingly said to Dagassi, ¡°Look, the grudges took ce long ago and Rose has apologized. You should now bury the hatchet.¡±

    Dagassi had yet to wake up from the shock and continue looking at the two with astonishment. A long, long timeter, he forced a smile and sighed. He said, ¡°Oh, Bryan, you really are an inconceivably amazing youngster. You have ced her into such a lowly position and even got back at her for me. Is there any room left for me to say no? Besides, I¡¯m absolutely no match against her!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s good. Hehe, I will make sure to punish her on your behalf!¡± said Han Shuo in a mischievous smile while looking at the seductive and beautiful Rose.

 Chapter 778 - Ludicrous Promise

    GDK 778: Ludicrous Promise

    Han Shuo spent the next couple of days with Dagassi. They talked and recalled about old tales in the Profound Continent.

    Out of Han Shuo¡¯s expectation, Fire Elite Zombie¡¯s godmother, the Emperor of mes, was acquainted with Ancient Lizard King Dagassi. She seemed very excited to unexpectedly meet Dagassi again.

    The Emperor of mes who had named herself Yan Yan cultivated in the elemental energy of fire. She currently possessed mid-stage lowgod strength. Back then in the Dark Forest, she and Dagassi could be considered neighbors. Before Dagassi was sealed by Spider Goddess Rose, he had been to the ce of Extreme Fire where she lived and started conflicts with her.

    In the ce of Extreme Fire, the Emperor of mes possessed absolute superiority and Dagassi could not touch her. There were no able to injure each other and somehow ended up bing friends. They did not expect to meet each other again on Elysium. They were therefore very excited and kept on talking about interesting past events.

    Dagassi used to provide Han Shuo assistance back then on the Profound Continent. Now that Dagassi hase to his Han Residence in the City of Shadows, Han Shuo naturally would gift Dagassi something as a courtesy. Han Shuo knew that the House of Kiaran had treated Dagassi decently and he was notcking in divine weapons or divine armors. After some consideration, Han Shuo decided to gift Dagassi with some pelleted medicines he had personally refined.

    Han Shuo¡¯s medicines were famous for their value. Dagassi, being very close to Han Shuo, spared him the courteous decline and dly epted the valuable gift. Seeing that Dagassi and Yan Yan had a lot to talk about, Han Shuo tactfully left the two to themselves.

    Han Shuo continued to study the hybrid domain of divinity with Rose for the next few days. But unfortunately, no matter how much he tried, he could not bring the hybrid domain of divinity under his control.

    The members of the House of Han assiduously tempered themselves in the Eight Destion and Torment Formation where they had to fight through countless perils. With Cauldron Spirit controlling the Formation, they were pushed to their limits and their hidden potentials were aroused. They would get shes of realizations from time to time. Their strengths were rapidly improving.

    The Han Residence currently housed a library filled with divine scrolls. The collection was acquired by men sent by Han Shuo from various major divine scroll stores. There were scrolls for every realm of every type of fundamental energy. As the members of the Han Family were very close and harmonious, they would share their cultivation experiences with each other without any reservation. This saved those who were trying to catch up a lot of time and vain effort.

    Gradually and unknowingly, every member of the Han Family gained substantial improvement in strength.

    Seeing that thepetition between the Seven Corps will soon begin, Han Shuo stopped exploring his hybrid domain of divinity with Rose and headed to the Fifth Corps with Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert.

    After having been restructured, the Fifth Corps became much more orderly and quiet than before. The divine guards stationed at the entrance stood straight and tall. They wore steady and stern faces. No merrymaking noises could be heard near or in the Fifth Corps. One could sense the solemn atmosphere before even stepping into thepound. As soon as the divine guards saw Han Shuo, they saluted, ¡°Hail Lord Bryan!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded in response before instructing, ¡°Assemble everyone. I want to see if my troops are ready for thepetition.¡±

    ¡°Yes, my Lord. We cannot wait for thepetition!¡± replied a divine guard.

    When Han Shuo first took over the Fifth Corps, the divine guards had neither the will nor intention to join thepetition of Seven Corps. They had no fighting spirit in them and were satisfied with just getting their days by. However, after a round of tempering inside the Eight Destion and Torment Formation, having experienced horrific scenes and dangers in the demonic formation, their demeanors and mentality transformed. Not only that they were no longer afraid of such a challenge, but they also looked forward to it. They wished to have thepetition and fight elite troops of other Corps right then and right there.

    With several men passing themand, the onlypany of divine guards of the Fifth Corps assembled before Han Shuo in no time. The almost one hundred men strong divine guards wore stern faces and stood as steady as a boulder. An invisible but strong austere aura spread from the Company.

    Every divine guard gave off an air of indifference towards life and the courage to stare death in the face. Their eyes were filled with unswerving determination and valor. These were qualities that cannot be gained other than living through extensive massacre and bloodshed.

    After scanning each and every one of their faces, Han Shuo nodded like a proud father. He was very satisfied with the demeanor they disyed. He thought, <i>The Eight Destion and Torment Formation have indeed toughened up and transformed them. Even their bearings havepletely changed. They definitely will shock everyone in the Competition!</i>

    ¡°As all of you should know, thepetition between the Seven Corps will take ce very soon. I have made a great deal of effort to improve your strengths as much as possible in the shortest time. This is the chance for our Fifth Corps to prove ourselves and regain respect in the City of Shadows. I hope I will not be disappointed!¡± said Han Shuo in a deep voice as his gaze traveled across the divine guards.

    ¡°Rest assured, my Lord! We are no longer the Fifth Corps that drinks alcohol and sleeps all day. I believe that our Fifth Corps will rank among the top in the Competition!¡± eximed Barnard confidently.

    The corners of Han Shuo¡¯s lips curved to make a satisfied smile. He proudly dered, ¡°If we are to join the Competition, then we should only strive for one goal ¨C to win the first ce!¡±

    Under the astonished gazes of the divine guards, Han Shuo continued smilingly, ¡°Don¡¯t be surprised. I have faith in all of you. You can take the first ce without a doubt! We are going to shake up the rankings of the Seven Corps of the City of Shadows. You will take the first ce in the teampetition while I will defeat Aobashi and be the top-ranking Divine Guard Chief in the City. Our Fifth Corps shall be the strongest army in the City of Shadows!¡±

    Although Han Shuo¡¯s words might be ludicrous to some, to these divine guards standing before him, they sounded bold and filled with sureness. These men worshiped true experts. For some reason, when Han Shuo made the daring im that he will defeat Aobashi, the current top-ranking Divine Guard Chief, a fire in their heart was ignited. They could not be more enthusiastic and energized.

    ¡°Rest assured, my Lord. We will defeat the Second Corps!¡±

    ¡°If Your Lordship has the confidence to defeat Lord Aobashi, then we have the confidence to take the first ce in the teampetition!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, my Lord. Our Fifth Corps will emerge victorious in the Competition!¡±

    The divine guards expressed their burning excitement and confidence to Han Shuo. They could not be more ready for the uingpetition!

    ¡°Excellent!¡± Han Shuo shouted, ¡°We will tread on top all of them and prove that we are the strongest!¡±

    ¡°We are the strongest! We are the strongest! We are the strongest!¡± chanted the divine guards loudly. They were brimming with energy and desire for glory.

    Han Shuo did not leave the Fifth Corps after that but spent all his time with the divine guards in a gymnasium in the Fifth Corps.

    Inside the gymnasium, Han Shuo coldly observed as the divine guards sparred with each other. He did not participate in the sparring but he sent Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert to the field, allowing them to ept any challenges from the divine guards.

    Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert were rtively powerful to begin with. And after they were tempered in the Eight Destion and Torment Formation, they obtained substantial improvement to their strengths. Of all those divine guards who challenged the three to a spar, none could defeat the three.

    Although the divine guards had never witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s true might with their own eyes, from the fact that none of them could defeat Han Shuo¡¯s three apprentices, they knew that Han Shuo must be quite something. The divine guards found Han Shuo to be a person filled with mysteries and revered Han Shuo from their hearts.

    Time flew by. An official notice from the House of Sainte was delivered to the Fifth Corps, informing that the Competition will be held at Soaring Cloud Mountain Range. After receiving the notice, Han Shuo went through his checklist onest time and led the only Company in his Fifth Corps away from the City and towards the mountain range.

    Soaring Cloud Mountain Range was north to the City of Shadows. Han Shuo had been to be mountain range multiple times to collect medicinal ingredients. He was very familiar with the terrain over there. Thepany of divine guards from the Fifth Corps marched behind Han Shuo majestically, naturally emanating their kick-ass valor. The civilians and members of lesser family ns they met along the way automatically evaded them.

    After therge godhunter¡¯s base Han Shuo discovered was sacked, the godhunters seemed to had abruptly vanished from the City of Shadows¡¯ territories. It had been a long time since the gods that dwelled and traveled in the region met any godhunter. The mountain ranges around the City of Shadows became very safe.

    Han Shuo originally nned on tempering his divine guards by having them hunt and kill godhunters. However, after searching all-around using his demon general, Han Shuo discovered not a single trail of the godhunters. He had no choice but to give up on that n. The Company traveled towards Soaring Cloud Mountain Range unhurriedly.

    Han Shuo asked Bonds to teach the less experienced divine guards the techniques of tracking, moving stealthily, and assassination. Although Gilbert and Sanguis had been rapidly improving in strength, they were still far behind Bonds when it came to the mastery of certain special skills. Following Han Shuo¡¯smand, they humbly asked Bonds for guidance rted to the subject and studied it along with the divine guards.

    Mastering the technique of tracking and stealthily stalk someone cannote without practical training. As godhunters had not appeared in the territory of the City of Shadows for a long time, Han Shuo allowed his divine guards to scatter around so that they can hide from and hunt for each other using the techniques they just learned from Bonds.

    On one day, while Han Shuo was deeply pondering about how to bring his hybrid domain of divinity under his control, he suddenly saw that Barnard was walking towards him in hasty footsteps. After saluting Han Shuo, Barnard reported, ¡°My Lord, it¡¯s been five days but the two still have not returned.¡±

    Before allowing his divine guards to practice tracking and stalking each other, Han Shuo had explicitly stipted that no matter the circumstances, they must return to the Company once every four days. The two divine guards Barnard mentioned had not returned to the Company for five days. This indicated that the two were either in deep trouble or had been in deep trouble.

    ¡°Understood,¡± replied Han Shuo as he stood up.

 Chapter 779 - Enemy in the dark

    GDK 779: Enemy in the dark

    Losing two divine guards had sent Han Shuo into high alert mode. He immediatelymanded his divine guards to stay close and to always be within a hundred miles to the Company. Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals could only reach the maximum of a hundred miles from him. As long as his divine guards were within a hundred miles, Han Shuo could use his demon generals to quickly assist them if they ran into any troubles.

    The divine guards also turned cautious and alerted. Han Shuo used his demon generals to probe the terrain around him while searching for the two divine guards who had abruptly disappeared. However, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t find a trace of them.

    The Company kept on its course towards the Soaring Cloud Mountain Range but started traveling even slower. Under Bonds¡¯ guidance, the divine guards had improved in their tracking and stalking skills. They too had been searching for the lost divine guards but they also found nothing.

    Using the far-reaching visions of his demon generals, Han Shuo saw many merchant caravans passing by as well as members of small family ns who went into the mountain range to temper themselves. He observed them for a long time but discovered that there was nothing suspicious about them.

    Han Shuo was at a loss. He kept on racking his head on what could possibly happen to his two divine guards that went missing. He wondered if an unknown force was trying to get him or if the two divine guards had provoked someone they shouldn¡¯t.

    Another five days had passed. The two missing divine guards still had not returned. This meant that they most likely had perished.

    With that, Han Shuo started considering who among his enemies could possibly kill them. Han Shuo had been on the Elysium for a long time and had made a whole lot of enemies. Among them, the most likely should be Hofs that he had recently offended. However, with Hushveil City still in disorder, Hofs, who had yet to fully recover from his injuries, should bepletely upied on suppressing rebelling voices and his political enemies in the City. Even if he had found out that Han Shuo was behind the attack on Hushveil CIty, he wouldn¡¯t have the time nor energy to travel all the way to the City of Shadows and mess with Han Shuo.

    After Hofs, the godhunters would be another powerful enemy of Han Shuo¡¯s. However, Han Shuo had not made himself conspicuous to the godhunters during the attack on the godhunter¡¯s base. Even if the godhunters were to retaliate, they should be putting their crosshair on the House of Sainte first rather than Han Shuo.

    After much pondering, Han Shuo could not think of any enemy who had the capacity or motive to attack him at present. As Han Shuo could not find any clues for the moment, he had no choice but to leave the matter unresolved. The Company continued traveling towards Soaring Cloud Mountain Range.

    Three hundred miles from Han Shuo was an enormous waterfall. Its swift water sparkled as it sshed into an enormous, bottomless pond on its feet.

    Ahead of the bottomless pond were several enormous boulders that had been polished glossy and smooth by water. Several gods wearing dark faces were standing on them.

    The patriarch of the House of Lavers, Felder, wore a dark face as he red at the apprehensive Doloxis. He berated, ¡°Why did you strike without my permission?¡±

    When the House of Lavers withdrew from the City of Shadows, Doloxis too withdrew away from the City with his family n. However, he never forgot about his grudges with Han Shuo and had carved it in his heart and bones.

    ¡°Patriarch, I was just trying to reduce their strength bit by bit,¡± replied Doloxis with his head lowered. He seemed rather nervous.

    ¡°Fool! Doing so will only put that cunning youngster into alert!¡± Felder loudly chided, ¡°I have told you many times before not to act rashly. What you did wasn¡¯t just self-defeating, you have jeopardized our mission of avenging your uncle¡¯s death!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, patriarch!¡± Doloxis hastily admitted his mistake after he was angrily berated by Felder. But after a short pause, Doloxis hesitantly asked, ¡°Patriarch, is he really the guy who attacked Hushveil City? I have met him multiple times before but he didn¡¯t seem that terrifying.¡±

    ¡°If he can¡¯t even manage to fool you, how would he have the capacity to rece our House of Lavers in the City of Shadows?¡± Felder coldly groaned and said, ¡°Donna knew him much better than you do. She immediately knew that it was Bryan after learning of the specifics of the incident. Back then in that low-level material ne, Donna had seen that unique lifeform that appeared in Hushveil City. It definitely was him!¡±

    ¡°Patriarch, why isn¡¯t elder sister Donna joining us? Given how much she knew that guy, this mission of ours would have a greater chance of sess!¡± asked Doloxis after hearing Felder¡¯s exnation.

    Felder let out a soft sigh before he replied, ¡°I don¡¯t know why but Donna just wouldn¡¯t agree to harm that youngster. In fact, I have to hide what we are doing right now from her.¡±

    It appeared that Doloxis held grievances towards Donna. He thought that Donna was the main reason the House of Lavers declined. If Donna had not rmended Bryan to the City of Shadows, their House of Lavers wouldn¡¯t have experienced so many ordeals. If Donna wasn¡¯t Felder¡¯s daughter, Doloxis might have proposed to oust Donna long ago.

    ¡°Patriarch Felder, with your House of Lavers joining our City of Gorging Clouds, as per our agreement, we shall do all we can to eliminate that fe for you!¡± said a short and small middle-aged man with dark skin and thick sideburns. The short man had been listening to Felder and Doloxis¡¯ conversation. He took a short pause before he continued, ¡°But you too should know about certain unwritten rules in the Darkness Dominion. Although the City of Shadows is far below our City of Gorging Clouds in terms of strength, we do not wish to alert the House of Sainte. We can only assist with this matter of yours in the dark.¡±

    ¡°Lord Lakrisen, our House of Felder has lived in the Darkness Dominion for many years and knows all the unwritten rules in this Dominion.¡± Felder was rather respectful towards the short man with sideburns. ¡°I know that Your Lordship must not go against the House of Sainte openly and risk the wrath of the Overgod. All I ask for is that youngster¡¯s life. If it wasn¡¯t for that incident in Hushveil City, I wouldn¡¯t have inconvenienced Lord Lakrisen to aid us in this matter!¡±

    Lakrisen nodded and smilingly replied, ¡°Thank you for understanding. And don¡¯t worry, Hofs of Hushveil City is the weakest City Lord in the Dominion. We have more than a single expert with strength greater than Hofs¡¯ in the City of Gorging Clouds. Even if it is true that the youngster was behind the Hushveil City incident, we would still have more than enough to finish him!¡±

    Although the House of Lavers had left the City of Shadows, they had managed to preserve most of their strength. The House of Lavers possessed not just elite divine guards but also a vast reserve of wealth. They were highly sought after by every other city in the Darkness Dominion. Before the Lavers Family had withdrawn from the City of Shadows, Felder was secretly reached out by the representatives of City Lords of many other cities.

    After considering the strengths of those City Lords, Felder finally decided to lean on the strongest city in the Darkness Dominion ¨C the City of Gorging Clouds. Felder naturally discussed some terms with the City before joining it. His family n joining the City will make the City even stronger while the CIty will safeguard the House of Lavers¡¯ interest.

    Asking the City of Gorging Clouds to assist him in killing Han Shuo was an afterthought of Felder¡¯s. To the City of Gorging Clouds, gaining the House of Lavers far outweighs the possible repercussions of assassinating a promising young expert who recently made a debut. Therefore, they agreed to Felder¡¯s request without the slightest hesitation.

    Felder had lived in the City of Shadows for many years and he understood the situation in the City very well. He knew that it was extremely difficult to kill Han Shuo in the City. Even if he somehow seeded, he would face great difficulty in escaping. He knew he must wait for an opportunity to assassinate Han Shuo outside the City.

    Thepetition between the Seven Corps would create the right set of circumstances for Felder. After learning that the Fifth Corps of the City of Shadows will participate in thepetition, Felder realized that it was the chance he had been waiting for. He utilized the remaining connection he had in the City to learn that thepetition will be held on Soaring Cloud Mountain Range. Therefore, he was able to n and prepare ahead.

    ¡°Thank you, Lord Lakrisen. As long as the youngster is dead, I will convince my daughter to willingly marry your esteemed son!¡± pledged Felder in a deep voice.

    Lakrisenughed heartily. He was very delighted. In a friendly voice, he replied, ¡°We will soon be a family. Be at ease, for I will do everything I can to aid you!¡±

    ¡°That youngster has nearly a hundred divine guards around him. It would make killing him difficult. What do you think, Lord Lakrisen?¡± After a short pause, Felder added, ¡°Based on my daughter¡¯s words, the strange lifeform possessed by that youngster is extremely miraculous. It seemed as though they could cloak and be his eyes and ears. His performance in Hushveil City had matched the description of my daughter. This will not be easy!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s no bother. We came in a small number. I can lead you in avoiding the detection of those lifeforms. The divine guards will not be beside him all the time. We just have to wait for a suitable opportunity to present itself before ganging up on him. There is no way he can escape as he did in Hushveil City!¡± said Lakrisen confidently as though he had a full grasp of the future.

    ¡°Well, if Lord Lakrisen says so, I¡¯m at ease!¡± said Felder noddingly. He seemed to haveplete faith in Lakrisen.

    No matter how much Han Shuo racked his brain, he wouldn¡¯t have expected that it would be the House of Lavers that left the City of Shadows long ago that was trying to get him. He continued to slowly travel towards Soaring Cloud Mountain Range with his divine guards.

    As Han Shuo wanted to further temper his divine guards along the journey, he had set off for the Mountain Range ahead of other Divine Guard Corps. Therefore, they had not met any other divine guards during their journey. They were getting closer and closer to the Mountain Range unknowingly.

    On one day, Han Shuo and his divine guards arrived at the waterfall where Felder and the others had their meeting. The Fifth Corps divine guards were not all male. The female divine guards were excited to see a clean pool and asked for permission to bathe in the water.

    Rose who had been following behind Han Shuo quietly all along also asked to stay there for a while. As Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a hurry with the journey, he agreed to their request. Naturally, the male divine guards, including Han Shuo, must keep away from the pond where thedies will bath. They have therefore dispersed around.

    For some reason, a feeling of distress suddenly rose in Han Shuo¡¯s heart. Han Shuo had full confidence in his senses. On top of that, with two of his divine guards having inexplicably disappeared, Han Shuo immediately put on his guard.

 Chapter 780 - Trapped

    GDK 780: Trapped

    Han Shuo always has a few demon generals that patrol around him at all times. As soon as Han Shuo get that very ufortable sensation, his demon generals fluttered around him and probed everywhere.

    Although his demon generals discovered nothing, the ufortable feeling had not left Han Shuo for a moment. This made Han Shuo even more rmed. He had the seventeen flying swords on standby, ready to handle any sudden assault.

    At present, Sanguis, Gilbert, and some Fifth Corps divine guards were listening to Bonds¡¯ lecture on the techniques of assassination some distance away. The nearest divine guard to Han Shuo was three hundred meters away.

    Everything looked perfectly fine but everything felt totally wrong. The inexplicable feeling of great danger continued to threaten him even as his demon generals found no abnormality in the surrounding. Han Shuo did not take it as a sign that he should rx, but rather to be more careful. His heart may be as turbulent as the sea in a thunderstorm but he nheless wore the same old calm and unruffled expression on his face. He sat silently on a boulder with his head hung as though he was pondering something.

    All of a sudden, the space before Han Shuo seemed to have been torn as a dazzling light warped the region. The space-time started fluctuating violently.

    In the next instance, Han Shuo found that the space seemed to have frozen. The wind, the grass, and everything instantly turned still as though time has been stopped.

    Several humanoid figures made of light and shadow suddenly appeared out of the region with intense space-time fluctuation. They assembled a potent binding power in no time and sent it towards Han Shuo. The power came swiftly and suddenly. Before Han Shuo could react, he found that his body had been solidly restrained as though incorporeal chains had firmly tied his arms and legs.

    The figures that emerged from bright light then charged towards Han Shuo. Every one of them wore a thin mask of pale-white shade. There were no openings on the mask save for two slender gaps that revealed their eyes. It made the attackers appear eerily terrifying.

    The attackers were made up of five highgods. The one in the front cultivated in the edict of destruction. He was rather low in height. He wore a dark glove made using an unknown but precious material. It was pierced with bizarre speckles and carried an astonishing aura of destruction around it.

    The four behind the short person were also highgods but they were slightly weaker in strength. They all wore the same clothing as the short person leading the charge but differed in height. They each wielded different weapons and it was obvious that the weapons were all very precious and outstanding.

    The five had the same ice-cold eyes. The killing intent emanating from their bodies were swarming towards Han Shuo. It cannot be more obvious that they intend to take Han Shuo¡¯s life right on the spot.

    The energy binding Han Shuo¡¯s body was tremendous. His arms and legs were securely locked in ce by five different energies. Han Shuo immediately detected that the energies originated from the five attacking charging at him. In an instant, Han Shuo abruptly calmed his mind.

    All five assassins possessed highgod strength. The short man leading the charge was atte-stage highgod realm. Just handling him alone would be as demanding as fighting Hofs which Han Shuo recently had the experience of. He knew that breaking free from the shackles channeled by the five highgods would be extremely difficult.

    Seeing that the five will soon reach him, with one thought, the divine souls of Han Shuo¡¯s avatars in his body turned perfectly synchronized with his consciousness. With his avatars still inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, his two domains of divinity fused. The hybrid domain of divinity was deployed around Han Shuo¡¯s main body in an instant.

    The element of death all around the environment suddenly gushed and wildly converged towards Han Shuo while the power of faith strings invisible to the naked eye rapidly revolved in destruction edict trajectories. The hybrid domain of divinity rapidly expanded from Han Shuo and aggressively purged every other element from around him.

    The five assassins who tried to kill him were immediately enveloped by Han Shuo¡¯s hybrid domain of divinity. The power of faith strings was as though countless tiny invisible hands grasping at the five. The five who had been charging at Han Shuo at high speed abruptly turned sluggish in movement. It was as though they have fallen into a pool of honey.

    The eyes underneath the masks revealed the emotion of shock. The five exchanged nces before immediately deploying their own domain of divinity. Three divinity domain of darkness energy, one of death energy, and one of destruction energy quickly spread out from the attackers.

    The little space was suddenly crammed with six domains of divinity. Five domains of divinity were rapidly expanding within Han Shuo¡¯s Domain, exerting a crushing and overbearing amount of pressure on Han Shuo.

    Unlike Han Shuo, the five assassins had full control over their own domains of divinity. Not only that they could make their Domains not conflict with each other, but they could also make their Domains work with each other and focus the pressure on Han Shuo. Han Shuo immediately felt the enormous pressure on his hybrid domain of divinity through his body. He felt as though he was being squeezed by five enormous, inting balloons. It was tormenting!

    Although his hybrid domain of divinity was aggressive, his Domain could only retreat in defeat when pressured by five highgod divinity domains at once. After all, this hybrid domain of divinity was created by two midgods and Han Shuo had yet to fully master all the miraculousness of his hybrid Domain.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s hybrid divinity domain gradually shrunk, the five attackers moved closer and closer to Han Shuo. They wereughing cruelly with their eyes as though they were certain that Han Shuo will be ughtered in just a moment.

    Han Shuo¡¯s hands and legs were fettered by the five. Not only that he couldn¡¯t use divine weapons to defend himself, but he also had no way of evading their attacks. Even his domain of divinity was being pushed back. From their point of view, Han Shuo had lost every possible way of defending himself and was as vulnerable as a chained sheep. That was why they were looking at Han Shuo like he was already a dead man!

    But very wrong they were. Even if Han Shuo couldn¡¯t move any of his limbs or make a sound, it doesn¡¯t make him a sitting duck!

    Han Shuo¡¯s formless and incorporeal consciousness remained unaffected by the binding energy projected by the five. He was able to stay calm and think of a solution to free himself from the danger even as the five attackers stared fixedly at him with their chilling and merciless eyes.

    Suddenly, an arm crawled out from Han Shuo¡¯s back. It was an arm of one of his avatars. It was holding a handful of the Pearls of Annihtion!

    The binding energy channeled by the five were aimed only at Han Shuo¡¯s main body. It did not affect Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars. Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars currently possessed just midgod strength and the two would be ughtered in no time if they were to rashly appear before the highgod assassins. Han Shuo dared not fully reveal his avatars to the highgod attackers and so he exposed just one arm of his avatar from his back, out of the assassins¡¯ sight.

    The avatar threw hard and sent the Pearls of Annihtion flying from Han Shuo¡¯s back. Simultaneously, the seventeen flying swords burst out from his body and made Han Shuo look like a giant hedgehog. The piercing flying swords started chopping the incorporeal energy links that connected him to the five attackers.

    Han Shuo possessed miraculous connections with his demonic weapons. Even with his main bodypletely restrained, as long as Han Shuo could still think and his consciousness functions, he could use and control his demon weapons as usual.

    The Pearls of Annihtion flew outward. Han Shuo calmly maneuvered the Pearls with his consciousness. When the Pearls arrived behind the five attackers, Han Shuo ignited each and every drop of blood essences contained in those Pearls.

    Each of the Pearl of Annihtion was injected with one drop of Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence when they were produced. It was the key that enabled Han Shuo to remotely control and maneuver the Pearls. The blood essences boiled and sttered while the Pearls of Annihtion that flew undetected to the back of the assassins detonated.

    The Pearls of Annihtion made using an improved form erupted with an astonishing amount of explosive force. With the five assassins located near to each other, the force of the explosions managed to impact every one of their domains of divinity. The Soulpiercers inside the Pearls were sent shooting towards the five attackers in densely packed swarms. The five were pricked from head to toe.

    Simultaneously, under the control of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, the seventeen flying swords severed off the formless chains that bound him to the five. Once the energy channels were broken, using Omen Invincible Body, Han Shuo instantly overcame the remaining binding energy around his body. He was finally free.

    <i>Rumbles... </i> The Pearls of Annihtion produced deafening explosions. The tremendous blunt force of the explosionspressed and stressed the attackers¡¯ domains of divinity, which caused them to lose their bnce. The five attackers along with their domain of divinity were swept by the shock wave of the explosions. They were sent smashing into Han Shuo¡¯s domain of divinity which in turn caused Han Shuo who had just freed himself to stumble along.

    But luckily for Han Shuo, he had expected this to happen. As soon as the Pearls exploded, he withdrew his domain of divinity and was therefore able to get back to his feet faster than the attackers could. The seventeen flying swords suddenly whistled loudly and went towards the shortest attacker.

    Han Shuo had also been assembling the demon generals made using highgod souls located in the distance and transformed them into material state the very moment he started attacking. The demon generals fiercely pounced at the other four highgods, keeping them busy at all costs. The four assassins were overwhelmed by attacks from the demon generals and had no time to bother with Han Shuo.

    The rumbling explosion had alerted everyone nearby. Rose who was bathing in the pool under the waterfall quickly exited the water and put on an oversized robe without drying her drenched voluptuous body. She immediately rushed to Han Shuo.

    Bonds and other divine guards who were nearby were also rushing to Han Shuo. These divine guards who had been tempered by the Eight Destion and Torment Formation had no fear of danger. Wearing grave and stern faces, they boldly and rapidly flew to Han Shuo¡¯s aid.

    As soon as Han Shuo freed himself from the invisible shackles, he attacked the assassins with everything he had. While maneuvering the seventeen flying swords against the shortest but most powerful assassin, he summoned every demon general to attack the rest of the assassins. Those demon generals refined from highgod souls he reaped in Hushveil City were incredibly terrifying. The four assassins werepletely upied with defending themselves and couldn¡¯t assist their short leader.

    When Rose and the divine guards arrived at the scene, they saw Han Shuo¡¯s prowess in all its glory, handling five masked highgod assassins all by himself.

    The highgod auras emanated by the assassins were very obvious, especially so with the shortie. He had the energy of destruction wildly overflowing from his body ¨C a clear sign that he had reached the pinnacle realm in the cultivation of the edict of destruction. Han Shuo, however, was able to keep him and his four associates in check with just his own power. On top of that, he wasn¡¯t showing any sign of being on the back foot. The divine guards who witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s power were all dumbfounded.

    The divine guards had been secretly guessing Han Shuo¡¯s strength among themselves. They reckoned that Han Shuo was slightly stronger than Avery, the former Chief of Fifth Corps. But now, having witnessed the scene of Han Shuo fighting against five highgods at once, they realized that Avery wasn¡¯t even on the same level as Han Shuo!

 Chapter 781 - Have fun with these highgods

    GDK 781: Have fun with these highgods

    The divine guards that rushed to the scene were awed by the valiant strength Han Shuo disyed. They were so dumbfounded that they momentarily forget to aid Han Shuo. Only Rose charged forward at the assassins after taking one look at the situation. She fought one of the assassins with the demon generals.

    ¡°Stop watching and kill these despicable attackers!¡± shouted Bonds coldly. The longsword that Han Shuo refined for Bonds shot out in a shifting and unpredictable trajectory.

    The bbergasted divine guards were roused from their dazes by Bonds¡¯ loud shout. In the next instance, all kinds of energies wereunched towards the remaining three assassins. The region started bursting with bright, glorious rays. Divine weapons and divine energies filled the sky and bombarded the attackers who were already upied with attacks from demon generals.

    The divine guards were aware that the masked assassins were all of highgod strengths. They dared not fight the assassins hand-to-hand but kept a distance from them andunched ranged attacks. Individually, the divine guards were no match against the assassins. But when several dozens of them jointly attacked an assassin, theirbined power was more than enough to keep the assassin at bay.

    Things had not developed as the assassins had nned. By now, the assassins had not only failed to ughter Han Shuo, but they also found themselves surrounded by enemies. Instead of Han Shuo, it was they who were in grave danger. With Han Shuo, Rose, nearly a hundred divine guards, and the dark swarm of demon generals fighting the assassins together, even though they were five highgods, they were starting to copse.

    The divine energy that came from the divine guards was limited in might. It was not enough to severely injure the highgod assassins rapidly. However, the concentrated attacks were enough to make them more and more panic. Whenever they revealed an opening in their defense, the dense mass of demon generals would pour into it and harass them. The bizarre energy of the demon generals was incredibly tormenting to the assassins.

    ¡°Hehe, wanna kill me? It ain¡¯t gonna be that easy!¡± with his divine guards and Rose intervening, the pressure on Han Shuo was greatly reduced. While he maneuvered the seventeen flying swords to attack the short assassin with the greatest strength, he watched the five with cold eyes and mocked them.

    The five were wearing masks and Han Shuo had no idea who they were. Han Shuo was trying to make them talk in the hope that they will reveal something about their identities.

    The five assassins seemed to be aware of Han Shuo¡¯s intention and none of them answered him. Besides, all five of them were rather flustered and upied with defending themselves. They had no time to talk nonsense with Han Shuo. Needless to say, the five assassins must be racking their heads on how to escape the encirclement.

    In all of a sudden, the seventeen flying swords moved away from the shortest and strongest assassin and arrived at the back of the weakest assassin in an instant. Before the weakest assassin could react, he had been surrounded by the seventeen flying swords. Ceaseless Pain, the first form of Avici Godying Formation, was activated.

    The assassin was immediately shrouded by dense and sinister killing intent. The seventeen flying swords whistled with ear-piercing loud noise as they flew through the dense killing intent. The intense corrosive energy and frigid aura on the flying swords were rapidly consuming the assassin¡¯s divine energy.

    The short assassin was just too difficult to handle. Even though Han Shuo could keep him upied using Ceaseless Pain, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t kill him within a short time. Therefore, Han Shuo changed his strategy and went after the weakest assassin instead.

    The assassin who cultivated in the energy of darkness rammed left and right but no matter how hard he tried, he could not escape the bizarre space formed by Ceaseless Pain. It only made him exhaust his divine energy at an even faster rate. This assassin was just an early-stage highgod. Prior to being trapped in the Avici Godying Sword Formation, he had used a great amount of his divine energy on resisting the attacks from the divine guards and the demon generals. He quickly became fatigued by Han Shuo¡¯s sudden assault.

    The seventeen flying swords seemed to be weaving a mesh-shaped object using the corrosive energy and frigid aura as they moved crisscrossed in the Sword Formation. Dark electrical sparks flickered from the object and sprinkled on the assassin like bizarre, tiny rain droplets. Frigid aura slowly filled his body and caused his divine body to turn more and more sluggish.

    Suddenly, the seventeen flying swords changed their trajectories and shot towards his chest from seventeen different directions. Sounds of bone being broken and flesh being torn were heard. Blood wildly sprayed from the assassin¡¯s chest like water from a fire hydrant. His eyes were filled with fear. His vitality dwindled as his blood drained from his body.

    After piercing seventeen holes on the assassin, the seventeen flying swords changed their target again. It turned back to that short assassin.

    The shortie hesitated about something for a moment when the seventeen flying swords flew away from him and to hisrade. But before he could decide, he was greeted by a barrage of ranged attacks from the surrounding divine guards. It left him with no choice but to put up defenses against the divine guards.

    He was also swarmed by the dark cloud demon generals overhead, among which were the most powerful type of demon general produced using highgod divine soul. These demon generals pose a great threat to him. They stopped him from leaving the battlefield.

    The power of the seventeen flying swords turned somewhat weaker as the Cauldron of Myriad Demon had quietly flown out from Han Shuo¡¯s body. It hid among the fluttering swarm of demon generals, stealthily collecting the divine soul of the recently perished highgod.

    After killing a god, Han Shuo must collect their divine soul as quickly as possible or it would likely dissipate and vanish, bing a part of the fundamental energy that they cultivated in. Han Shuo must be even hastier in collecting divine souls with highgod strengths as they likely could escape using the fundamental energies found everywhere in the world.

    While controlling his seventeen flying swords against the short assassin, Han Shuo quietly observed the overall situation. Rose who had mid-stage highgod strength was fighting an assassin of the same strength. The demon generals were also assisting her, assaulting the assassin from every direction. The assassin revealed great anxiety in his eyes. He saw no escape in sight.

    However, the rest of the assassins seemed to be able to withstand the pressure from the divine guards and demon generals. It appeared that they knew they could escape but dared not to. They kept on looking at the shortie trapped by Han Shuo¡¯s seventeen flying swords as though their means of escape lied on him.

    After a moment of observation, Han Shuo understood that the shortie was the leader of the assassins. Han Shuo deduced that the two assassins who could escape dared not without their leader¡¯smand. They kept looking at the shortie to wait for hismand.

    From his observation, Han Shuo concluded that the situation was fully under his control. The assassins had not justpletely failed in their objective, they evennded themselves in a dire situation where retreat seemed impossible. However, Han Shuo dared not rx even by one bit. He continued using all his strength against that short but powerful assassin that cultivated in the edict of destruction.

    Han Shuo knew that he must not let go of an enemy with such powerful strength as they eventually will bring him trouble if left alive. In addition, after killing that highgod of darkness using Ceaseless Pain and removing his mask, Han Shuo realized that he did not know who the person was. This made him even more determined to find out the identities of these assassins.

    After all, an anonymous enemy is the most terrifying enemy. As long as they remain anonymous to Han Shuo, he would have no way of anticipating where or when they will strike. Han Shuo actually wasn¡¯t too concerned about an attack on himself. He was concerned for his family n members in the City of Shadows who had deep bonds with him. Han Shuo will never allow any of them to be harmed or assassinated.

    The most direct way of preventing tragedy befalling his family n members was to kill every single one of his enemies. Only then can he ensure that those close to him will be safe!

    After collecting the highgod divine soul, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon returned to Han Shuo¡¯s body. With that, Han Shuo¡¯s strength was significantly boosted. The shortie who was securely trapped by the seventeen flying swords immediately felt the increase in pressure. It was also at that moment that he stopped wavering and made up his mind.

    The speckles on the gloves he wore suddenly glistened with faint lights. The space around him was warped. Waves undted through the air and spread outward as though water ripples. Countless chaotic energies suddenly emanated from the region as though he had opened up a pathway to another dimension.

    The shortie moved through the distorted field like a fish and miraculously arrived beside the assassin fighting Rose. A magnificent screen of light abruptly enveloped the region. Han Shuo suddenly shrieked, ¡°Rose, retreat!¡±

    Rose was shocked and immediately flew away from the screen of light as though running away from a great danger.

    The screen made of light quickly diminished and vanished. The two assassins inside the screen of light had also miraculously disappeared. Then, another intense undtion came from the region. A bizarre scroll appeared out of nowhere. Right when Han Shuo caught sight of the scroll, it violently exploded.

    ¡°Nooo!¡± shouted the two remaining assassins in a terrified and despaired voice. It was at that moment that the two assassins who had spoken not a single word all along realized that they had been abandoned by their short leader.

    Against Han Shuo, Rose, and nearly a hundred divine guards, these two assassins knew that the odds were heavily stacked against them. They realized that they will soon perish and they couldn¡¯t help themselves but yell. They could not be more despaired and agonized.

    Han Shuo gestured with his hand, signaling his divine guards to pause their attacks. As he stepped towards the two assassins, he put on a gentle smile and said, ¡°Identify yourselves and state your motive. Then I might consider letting you live,¡±

    The two assassins turned to look at each other. Their eyes under the masks were filled with despair. After exchanging nces, the two suddenly sprang forward, attempting to break the encirclement. It appeared that they were either not convinced with Han Shuo¡¯s words or had no intention ofpromising.

    Han Shuo again gestured and smilingly said, ¡°Kill them. They are two highgods. Have fun!¡±

    The divine guards suddenly became excited again. With Han Shuo and Rose around them, the divine guards were not worried about their safety and knew that the assassins had no means of escaping. Killing highgods would significantly increase the divine guards¡¯ confidence and morale. The divine guards were excited to do so. They put on sinister grins as they started bombarding the two highgods with ranged attacks.

 Chapter 782 - Nobody will speak a word of it

    GDK 782: Nobody will speak a word of it

    Han Shuo and Rose coldly observed the battle while standing in their escape routes. Han Shuo also ced several demon generals in concealed spots. If the two were to utilize special methods to escape, the demon generals would swarm at them and cease their actions. Han Shuo and Rose also deployed multiple barriers as they observed the battle.

    The two highgod assassins revealed desperation in their eyes. They knew that they will not escape death and so they tried to cause the greatest harm with their deaths. They used all the remaining energy in their bodies to push forward and get close to the divine guards as though they were nning to severely injure the divine guards.

    The divine guards, knowing that the two assassins were highgods, dared not be in close proximity to them. The divine guards would immediatelyunch ranged attacks at the two to push them back when they tried to close the distance. The assassins¡¯ patience and divine energy were being worn down. Over time, under the bombardment of almost a hundred divine guards, the two highgods were close to exhausting their divine energy.

    Other than Han Shuo and Rose, Bonds too did not participate in the fight. He was guiding the divine guards on how to most effectively besiege a powerful expert as a team. The divine guards who had practiced the art of fighting as a team in the Eight Destion and Torment Formationunched densely gathered attacks that does not miss a single spot of the highgods¡¯ defenses, exerting the maximum amount of pressure on the two highgods.

    For the two highgods, that was the most humiliating moment they had ever experienced in their whole lives. They had tried to assemble their energy to escape at the cost of severely injuring themselves or causing their realms to regress. But every time they attempted so, it would be disrupted and ceased by the demon generals. After repeating the process several times, the two finally realized that their deaths were certain.

    With Han Shuo and Rose deploying barriers, the two assassins could not even get close enough to the divine guards and injure them through self-implosion. Two proud highgods were reduced into puny living targets for Han Shuo¡¯s littlebat training exercise. With all hope for survival lost, the two assassins finally could not bear the humiliation any longer.

    The two assassins dropped every defense and allowed the divine energy and divine weapons of the divine guards tond on their bodies. The energies and weapons wrecked their bodies that were nearly exhausted of divine energies without much resistance. They copsed into a pool of blood and perished.

    Cauldron Spirit quickly flew out and happily collected the two divine souls. As the number of demon generals in the Cauldron of Myriad Demon increased, as more high-quality souls were added to the collection, the Cauldron became more powerful. Han Shuo could sense it clearly every time he borrowed Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy.

    To Han Shuo, the Cauldron bing stronger is tantamount to him getting more powerful. Therefore, Han Shuo would always do his best to help Cauldron Spirit collect as many divine souls as possible.

    ¡°What? They died just like that!¡± shouted Barnard in an annoyed voice. It seemed that the fun ended too soon for him.

    Barnard¡¯srades also felt the same. They did not expect that the two assassins would just give up their lives right when they were enjoying it the most. They thought the fun wouldst much longer.

    After the Cauldron of Myriad Demon collected the two highgod souls, Bonds stepped forward and went to the bodies. He lifted their masks and carefully looked at their faces. A momentter, Bonds got up, turned to Han Shuo and shook his head gravely. ¡°Senior, I do not know these faces!¡±

    Bonds had served in Erebus¡¯ Third Corps for many years and was very familiar with members of allrge family ns in the City of Shadows. Through various covert and non-covert methods, Bonds had met and seen characters that even Han Shuo had not met. Highgods were the rarest and smallest ss of people in every City. If the two assassins originated from the City of Shadows, it would be impossible for Bonds to not recognize them.

    Therefore, hearing Bonds¡¯ words, Han Shuo was certain that the assassins originated from another city. Han Shuo carefully thought about it. Other than Hushveil City, Han Shuo had offended Portlem who was outside of the Darkness Dominion. He wondered if either one of them could be behind the attack.

    Han Shuo bunched his brows as he thought about it deeply After a while, he looked all around and instructed his divine guards, ¡°Speak of this incident to no one until I get to the bottom of it.¡± After a short pause, Han Shuo added, ¡°This includes those from the House of Sainte!¡±

    Five highgods hade to assassinate him and could afford three deaths. This likely meant that Han Shuo had offended a very formidable powerhouse.

    Han Shuo was currently a high-ranking official in the City of Shadows. If Wace and Andre were to learn of the incident, the two will surely start their own investigation which meant that he would be asked about all the details. They might inadvertently reveal Han Shuo¡¯s astonishing strength to others. Other concerns aside, Han Shuo did not want the public to learn of his true strength until thepetition between the Divine Guard Chiefs begins.

    After fighting off the highgod assassins, all the divine guards in the Fifth Corps became fully convinced of Han Shuo. Not a single one of them had any doubt about Han Shuo¡¯s capability. Their gazes towards Han Shuo were filled only with reverence and respect.

    Therefore, after Han Shuo finished those words, the less than one hundred divine guards respectfully replied affirmatively in unison. None of them had another opinion.

    On Elysium, cultivation and strength were all that mattered. A great majority of its inhabitants made improving their strength their top priority. This was also why everyone on Elysium worshipped the strong. They had nothing but admiration for true experts. After Han Shuo demonstrated his formidable might by killing a highgod effortlessly, these unbridled divine guards of the Fifth Corps turned extremelypliant to Han Shuo. They genuinely approved of Han Shuo as their new Divine Guard Chief.

    ¡°Rest assured, my Lord! Nobody will speak a word of it!¡± pledged Barnard with veneration that came from the bottom of his heart and admiration shining in his eyes.

    Han Shuo nodded and said, ¡°Excellent. As long as you do exactly as Imanded, none of us willnd in trouble.¡± Han Shuo then looked around and smilingly said, ¡°Alright. I reckon that those two who escaped won¡¯t be returning. We will continue our march towards Soaring Cloud Mountain Range.¡±

    ¡°Senior, I think we are no longer in any danger. Can they resume practicing stalking and tracking?¡± asked Bonds respectfully after bowing at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Yep, go ahead,¡± Han Shuo too did not think that the two escaped assassins will threaten them anymore and therefore straightforwardly agreed.

    After Bonds led the divine guards away to continue with all sorts of training and exercises, Han Shuo turned to Rose and instructed, ¡°Let no one disturb me.¡±

    Rose was puzzled. She had no idea why would Han Shuo give her such amand in all of a sudden. However, Rose did not ask any questions but nodded. Although the rtionship between Han Shuo and Rose had long improved, Rose was still as quiet as always. She normally does not speak unless Han Shuo asked her a question. She rarely starts a conversation with Han Shuo.

    After giving the instruction, Han Shuo sat cross-legged on the spot and closed his eyes. With one thought of his consciousness, a demon general refined from highgod soul flew away from Han Shuo at extreme speed. It headed north.

    Han Shuo had applied some demonic yuan on the demon general of the highest grade. Therefore, when Han Shuo concentrated his attention andmanded it to fly, the demon general in immaterial state flew much faster than usual. In fact, it was traveling at a speed faster than Han Shuo¡¯s Art of the Demonic Ninth Heavens boosted with Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy.

    Demon generals were immaterial and gravity has no effect on them and they could therefore travel ridiculously fast. This demon general, having received a boost of Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan, could travel at an even higher speed.

    Moments ago, when fighting off the assassins, Han Shuo had left a drop of his blood essence on the shortie¡¯s armor. Han Shuo had a miraculous connection with his blood essences. Even though the shortie had managed rip a tunnel to another dimension using a miraculous space edict divine weapon and escaped, as the shortie carried a drop of Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence with him, Han Shuo could get a rough approximation of his location when hepletely focused his mind to sense it.

    Han Shuo could sense that the two escaped assassins were extremely far away and were still moving away at high speed. Han Shuo did not pursue them because he reckoned that he might not be able to overtake the two even if he went after them with all his strength. But more importantly, he had a responsibility to keep hispany of divine guards safe. He was worried that the divine guards might run into another danger and couldn¡¯t handle it by themselves.

    Therefore, Han Shuo stayed with his divine guards and sent the most demon general he had, a spirit demon, to probe the situation for him. He wasn¡¯t hoping that the spirit demon could harm the two assassins but he wanted the spirit demon to reveal the identities of this anonymous enemy of his. Once Han Shuo knew who he was up against, he would have a general idea of how to get ready for them or even eliminate the threat when the opportunityes.

    To the spirit demon that had pushed its speed to the maximum, time seemed to have slowed down. Its immaterial body made minute and faint waves in the atmosphere as it streaked through the sky and towards the region Han Shuo instructed.

    About half an hourter, Han Shuo gave amand with his consciousness and the ultra-fast moving spirit demon slowed down. It started approaching the region ahead cautiously.

    Han Shuo saw two figures that were flying at high speed. One of the figures was short and small and wore gloves dotted with starlight speckles. Without thinking, Han Shuo knew that they were the two assassins who escaped. The two were rushing ahead and had absolutely no clue that an invisible pair of eyes was following and watching them from some distance behind.

    The spirit demon followed them for around ten minutes before the two assassins suddenly slowed down. They suddenly swerved and stopped before a cave mouth covered with crushed stones and branches of leaves. The shortie made a light cough.

    Several dark figures slowed appeared from the cave. As they walked out of the cave, their faces grew clearer. One of them was Dolores who had disappeared for a long time. He put on an ted expression after exiting the cave and asked, ¡°Patriarch, is it a sess?¡±

    The assassins finally removed their masks. The taller one was revealed to the Felder, the patriarch of the House of Lavers. He wore a gloomy face as he replied, ¡°We failed. We are the only survivors.¡± Felder then turned to Lakrisen who had also removed his mask and said in a heavy voice, ¡°Lord Lakrisen, I¡¯m sorry for losing three capable helpers of yours.¡±

    Lakrisen was wearing a bitter and resentful face. He coldly said, ¡°Three highgods have perished. How am I going to justify the losses to my elder brother?!¡±

    Lakrisen at this moment was as though a volcano on the brink of eruption. Felder did not know how to answer him. He merely let out a helpless sigh and kept silent.

    Lakrisen gave a nce at Felder with cold eyes before he let out a cold groan and said, ¡°We will return to the City of Gorging Clouds and settle things there!¡± and immediately departed. Felder let out another soft sigh before taking Dolores and the others to follow behind Lakrisen.

 Chapter 783 - Preparing for a rainy day

    GDK 783: Preparing for a rainy day

    Of the seven major cities in the Darkness Dominion, the City of Gorging Clouds was without a doubt the strongest.

    The City Lord of the City of Gorging Clouds was Yarus. Lakrisen was a younger sibling of Yarus¡¯. Lakrisen cultivated in the edict of destruction and was ate-stage highgod.

    Of the seven Darkness Dominion cities, the City of Gorging Clouds had the highest number of highgods. Yarus¡¯ House of Broadhurst was also the most ancient and the most powerful family n in the Darkness Dominion. They were regarded highly by the Overgod of Darkness.

    The City of Shadows was only stronger than Hushveil City which ranked bottom in strength. The City of Shadows paled inparison to the City of Gorging Clouds.

    The strongest person in the City of Shadows was Wace who possessedte-stage highgod strength. Wace was the onlyte-stage highgod expert in the entire City. The situation in the City of Gorging Clouds, however, was very different. Practically every patriarch in the City possessedte-stage highgod strength. It was said that City Lord Yarus had transcended beyond the realm of highgod and reached the realm of overgod ¨C an overgod without the Quintessence.

    Han Shuo was utterly overwhelmed with shock when he discovered the origins of the assassins who tried to kill him. Other than Felder from the House of Lavers, all the assassins originated from the most powerful family n in the City of Gorging Clouds ¨C the House of Broadhurst.

    Having lived in the City of Shadows for so long, Han Shuo had learned a thing or two about the general situation in the Darkness Dominion. Naturally, the most conspicuous City of Gorging Clouds and the House of Broadhurst had found their ways to Han Shuo¡¯s ears. Han Shuo had a rough idea of the identities of the three highgods he killed right after Felder called that short man by his name.

    Without much thinking required, Han Shuo understood that the House of Lavers must have found their way to the City of Gorging Clouds after departing the City of Shadows. Felder must have made some kind of agreement with Lakrisen so that the House of Broadhurst would shelter his House of Lavers.

    The House of Lavers joining the City of Gorging Clouds would enhance the City¡¯s already tip-top strength that always overshadowed the other six cities of Darkness Dominion. Under the shelter of the City of Gorging Clouds, even if Felder or his House of Lavers did something harmful to the City of Shadows, Wace would have to think twice before retaliating. The City of Gorging Clouds was unlike Hushveil City. No matter in any aspect: the Cities¡¯ overall strength or the City Lords¡¯ rtionship with the Darkness Overgod, the City of Shadows and Wace was no match.

    Wace dared offend Hofs of Hushveil City for Han Shuo. But as to whether Wace dared do the same when it came to the House of Broadhurst of the City of Gorging Clouds, that was hard to say.

    Han Shuo wore a dark face as he stood up from sitting cross-legged. The demon general that had uncovered the bombshell was on its way back as Han Shuomanded.

    Demon generals, even those refined from highgod souls, were limited in reach. The further away they were from Han Shuo, the weaker their connection to Han Shuo will be. If a demon general loses connection to Han Shuo, without a master, the demon general will try to kill every living being it sees and will continue to do so until it was killed or regained a connection to Han Shuo. For this reason, Han Shuo did notmand the demon general to follow the assassins any further.

    Rose saw that Han Shuo seemed bothered. After a moment of hesitation, Rose softly asked, ¡°What¡¯s the matter? Did you run into a hurdle in your cultivation?¡±

    Rose did not know that Han Shuo had left a drop of blood essence on Lakrisen or that Han Shuo had already discovered the identities of the assassins. She assumed that Han Shuo was just resting and recovering the energy he used in thest battle. She thought that Han Shuo most likely had met a great challenge in his cultivation.

    A warm feeling rose in Han Shuo¡¯s heart when Rose showed concern for him. Han Shuo temporarily cast his worries aside, turned to Rose, put on a faint smile and replied, ¡°It¡¯s nothing. I¡¯m just a little tired.¡±

    Worrying about possible threats from the House of Broadhurst was a great burden, so much so that even Han Shuo was stressed by it. Revealing the matter to Rose will make her feel worried but not improve the situation. The stress might even affect Rose in her cultivation. Therefore, Han Shuo decided not to share the findings with anyone and to bear the burden alone.

    As the patriarch of his family n, Han Shuo had a responsibility to take care of his family n members. Having tempered his body and mind for ages, Han Shuo was not afraid of any amount of stress. He believed that the stress from having the House of Broadhurst looming over him cannot crush him. In fact, the stress might even be a motivation that propels him forward!

    ¡°Oh, okay. Don¡¯t think about the assault too much. Three of the five assassins are dead. The two that escaped did not and will not have enough power to injure you. You have nothing to worry about!¡± Rose was observant. She could tell that from Han Shuo¡¯s expression that he did not run into a hurdle in his cultivation but was bothered by something else.

    Han Shuo put on a bright smile and nodded. He used the demon generals nearby to observe his surroundings. He noticed that none of his Fifth Corps divine guards left one hundred miles radius, which made him feel a little more at ease. Before finding out who the anonymous enemy was, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t worried that the enemy might try to strike again. After learning that the anonymous enemy was the House of Broadhurst from the City of Gorging Clouds, he was no longer that certain.

    The City of Gorging Clouds was just too powerful. If the House of Broadhurst intends to go all-out against him, Han Shuo reckoned that his House of Han will be crushed like a thin dried leaf.

    ¡°Oh, right. Rose, do you know any experts with formidable strength? I mean highgods that have yet to join any family n. It doesn¡¯t matter if they are human or non-human,¡± asked Han Shuo suddenly.

    Rose looked at Han Shuo with baffled gazes. She asked puzzlingly, ¡°Why are you suddenly asking me this?¡±

    The House of Han current possessed plenty of crystal coins while Han Shuo¡¯s influence in the City of Shadows was rapidly expanding. Once the Fifth Corps obtained victory in thepetition between the Seven Corps, Han Shuo believed that arge number of midgods will swarm to his House of Han and Fifth Corps, begging to be his divine guards. Han Shuo will not becking gods of that ss.

    In the House of Han, other than Han Shuo and Rose, there wasn¡¯t another highgod. The most significant factor that determined the strength of a family n was in the number of highgods in the family n. As to raise the strength of his House of Han as quickly as possible, he must attempt to recruit highgods.

    Before that day, Han Shuo had no n to improve the strength of his House of Han so hurriedly because he knew that once his family n bes too powerful, they could possibly conflict with the interests of the House of Sainte. The current ruler of the City of Shadows was the House of Sainte. Once the House of Han grew to have enough power to threaten the House of Sainte, Han Shuo was certain that his rtionship with the House of Sainte will not be as harmonious as it was now.

    However, the threat from the House of Broadhurst was just too great. Han Shuo must try to decrease the gap of strength between his family n and the House of Broadhurst as rapidly as possible. He had no time to care about the House of Sainte¡¯s feelings.

    ¡°You have lived on Elysium for many years. Surely, you would know plenty of highgods that live in solitude as you did, right? Tell me everyone you know, both friends and foes. I want tomunicate with them!¡±

    ¡°What exactly are you nning to do?¡± Rose became even more puzzled. She couldn¡¯t tell Han Shuo¡¯s intention.

    ¡°The House of Han is too weak. I want to raise its strength as rapidly as possible!¡± replied Han Shuo.

    After hesitating for a moment, Rose replied, ¡°I know a ce where there are many experts. It is very chaotic. There are highgod and even overgod experts. If you are looking for highgods who have yet to join any family n, that will be the best ce. However, it is very dangerous!¡±

    ¡°Where is it?¡± asked Han Shuo hastily. He was ted.

    ¡°It¡¯s the Fringe ¨C the Land of Chaos!¡± Rose answered and exined, ¡°It is situated between the Space Dominion and the Destiny Dominion. It doesn¡¯t belong to any of the Twelve Dominions and it is not governed by any of the Twelve Overgods. The Space and Destiny Dominions prohibits their gods from entering the Fringe. It is without a doubt the most chaotic and the mostwless ce on Elysium. In that Land, the one with the biggest fist makes the rules. I used to live in the Fringe for a period of time and was nearly killed multiple times. After brushing with death multiple times, I decided to leave that ce. I came to live in the Darkness Dominion as I¡¯m cultivating in the energy of darkness.¡±

    ¡°Land of Chaos?¡± Han Shuo put on a faint smile and said, ¡°I can tell just from the name that it is an interesting ce!¡± After a short pause, he asked, ¡°You said you nearly got killed in that Land? Even with your strength?¡±

    ¡°I still vividly remember all those who had tried to kill me. Once I have the confidence to kill them, I will return to that ce to seek vengeance!¡± exined Rose. She put on an angered face when she recalled of her enemies.

    ¡°It will not be long. After thepetition is over and after I arranged things in the House of Han, we will head to the Land of Chaos and I will help you get your revenge!¡± Han Shuo pledged to Rose.

    When Rose heard that Han Shuo wanted to help her take revenge, her expression turned rather strange. She took a good look at Han Shuo before lowering her head and softly said, ¡°Thank you!¡±

    ¡°Hehe, we have gone through trials and tribtions together and you are mine. It is what I ought to do!¡± replied Han Shuo smilingly.

    When Han Shuo said so, the expression on Rose¡¯s face turned even weirder. Her beautiful and lovable face flushed. She softly cried, ¡°I¡¯m not yours!¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before the smile on his face turned bigger. She looked at the seductively beautiful Rose and said teasingly, ¡°I mean you¡¯re my servant, okay? Did you think I meant it any other way?¡±

    Rose¡¯s face turned even redder. She cast an annoyed re at Han Shuo and lowered her head without replying.

    Han Shuo suddenly felt that his mood had be much better. He did not expect Rose would so interesting. But Han Shuo did not continue to tease her as it appeared that she was about to get angry. He chuckled and said, ¡°Alright. alright, let¡¯s hurry to the mountain range. I¡¯m starting to get impatient!¡±

    After experiencing the attack from the five assassins, Han Shuo and his party no longer met any troubles in the remainder of their journey. After six days, Han Shuo and his Fifth Corps divine guards finally arrived at Soaring Clouds Mountain Range.

 Chapter 784 - Soaring Cloud Mountain Range

    GDK 784: Soaring Cloud Mountain Range

    The sky of the Soaring Cloud Mountain Range was constantly covered with thick, low-hanging clouds ¨C so low that one could seemingly touch the clouds just by leaping.

    It was early in the morning. Glistening dew were hanging on the leaves of the green shrubs as though they had been sprinkled with crystal dust. A thin fog filled ancient forests and mountain range. It was as though the fog was connected to the clouds low in the sky. It was a beautiful scenery to behold.

    Han Shuo and his party, as expected, was the firstpeting party to arrive at Soaring Cloud Mountain Range. Han Shuo had used his demon generals to scan all around the Mountain Range and found that no other divine guards from other Corps had arrived yet.

    After thinking for a while, Han Shuo asked Bonds to disperse the divine guards. Hemanded the divine guards to split into nine squadrons so that they can familiarize themselves with the terrain and situation in the Mountain Range, especially the hidden caves and rivers.

    Most of those in the Fifth Corps were newly recruited. They were not familiar with the terrain around the City of Shadows. Being the first to arrive at Soaring Cloud Mountain Range, Han Shuo thought that his divine guards should use the time to learn and familiarize with the terrain there so that they could be more prepared for thepetition.

    The divine guards in the other Corps were mostly veterans. They had frequently carried out missions all around the City of Shadows and they will not be unfamiliar with Soaring Cloud Mountain Range. Perhaps that was the reason why they did not rush to the Mountain Range.

    Following Bonds¡¯mand, the divine guards split into nine squadrons and dispersed around Han Shuo. They slowly explored the misty Mountain Range and memorized the terrain to the best of their ability.

    Wherever the divine guards went, the demon generals would follow. Han Shuo could observe the situation in the entire mountain range without needing to move a step. The demon generals stealthily followed the nine squadrons as they thoroughly explored and familiarize themselves with the mountain range.

    The Soaring Clouds Mountain Range was very vast in size. It was evenrger than Fort Lasberg that currently belonged to the House of Han. The demon generals had explored merely half of the mountain range after two days of exploration. The mountain range also has all kinds of magical beasts and nts. But as this ce was located near the City of Shadows, the magical beasts were not all that strong. They did not pose Han Shuo and his divine guards any threat.

    Han Shuo was greatly interested in the strange nts that grew in the mountain range. As Han Shuo¡¯s divine guards had nothing urgent to do but to explore the terrain, Han Shuomanded them to collect some bizarre nts for him while exploring. The divine guards were no pharmacists and they could not tell which nt would interest Han Shuo. Therefore, Han Shuo asked them to collect nts with peculiar shapes and any nts that looked rare and unusual.

    Han Shuo¡¯s instructions had proved useful. nts that looked different from ordinary nts were usually extremely poisonous or possessed unique properties. The divine guards that dispersed far and wide scanned their surroundings carefully and managed to collect many unique nts useful for Han Shuo.

    One of the divine guards collected a dozen or more shoots of scarlet grasses. Its leaves were as incisive as des and its stalk was blood red in color. It was as though blood was flowing in the grass.

    ¡°Where did you find these?¡± asked Han Shuo. His eyes shone brightly as soon as he saw the scarlet grasses.

    It was Bloodessence Grass, a very rare nt that could be used for improving blood cirction and vitality. An ordinary person who recklessly consumes the Grass will find themselves bleeding profusely from every orifice. But if someone like Han Shuo who understood its properties well, he could dissolve the power in the Grass and fuse it with his demonic yuan to form blood essences.

    Blood essence was the fuel that powered the demonic infant. They were also fundamental to the refining of some demonic weapons and utilization of some demonic techniques. The dozen or more Bloodessence Grasses could let Han Shuo form a few hundred drops of blood essences in his demonic infant without needing him to spend much demonic yuan.

    ¡°Eh?!¡± Sanguis let out a cry in surprise and went to Han Shuo excitedly. His eyes gradually grew redder as he stared at the Bloodessence Grass. He said in a pleasantly surprised manner, ¡°Master, I can sense that this nt contains a very miraculous energy. I think it will be very beneficial to me!¡±

    Han Shuo turned to Sanguis and stared nkly for a moment. When he saw the redness in Sanguis¡¯ eyes, he finally came to his senses. He smilingly said, ¡°I almost forget that you cultivate in Bloodgod Mantra!¡±

    Han Shuo put away nine of the Bloodessence Grass and handed the rest to Sanguis. He said, ¡°Consume it directly and absorb the energy within. It is more beneficial to you than it is to me!¡±

    Sanguis hastily shook his head and replied, ¡°Master, if it is useful to you, you should have all of them.¡±

    Sanguis was very loyal to Han Shuo. Ever since leaving the Abyss Realm, Sanguis had taken Han Shuo as his only family as it was Han Shuo who had given him a new life. Therefore, when Sanguis heard that the Bloodessence Grass was also useful for Han Shuo, he immediately refused the Grass so that Han Shuo can have all of it.

    Han Shuo shook his head and exined, ¡°This is called Bloodessence Grass. The energy that you sense in these Grasses can help me condense more blood essences. While for you, this energy can directly raise your strength. That¡¯s why I say, it is more useful to you than it is to me.¡± When Han Shuo saw that Sanguis was going to decline again, he interrupted, ¡°You are my apprentice. The stronger you are, the more it¡¯d look good on me. I¡¯mmanding you as your Master to stop declining!¡±

    Sanguis hesitated for a moment after hearing words. He finally nodded and epted the Bloodessence Grass. He ate the Grass raw right before Han Shuo.

    Sanguis chewed and swallowed the dozen or more Bloodessence Grasses. Its thick and scarlet juice, which looked very much like fresh blood, left a trail from a corner of Sanguis¡¯ lips as he munched on with great satisfaction.

    Suddenly, Sanguis¡¯ eyes turn scarlet as though they had been filled with blood and his face turned dark red as though it was smeared with blood. A thin mist made of blood slowly emanated from Sanguis. The mist does not dissipate but curled around him. A faint but sharp scent of blood came from him.

    Then, Sanguis¡¯ blooded eyes started to twinkle as the energy in the Bloodessence Grass slowly fused with the blood in his body. After a while, Sanguis took in a deep breath. The mist of blood that lingered around him disappeared into his nostrils.

    Sanguis let out a burp as though he had just finished a big and delicious meal. He joyously said, ¡°Thank you, Master! This Bloodessence Grass is really useful to me. I can feel that my blood has be purer than ever!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s great!¡± said Han Shuo in a faint smile as he nodded. He then turned to the divine guard and asked, ¡°These grasses, where did you find them?¡±

    The divine guard who had been staring at Sanguis in astonished for half-a-day was suddenly snapped out of his daze. He hastily replied, ¡°I do not know how to describe the location but I can lead Your Lordship to the ce!¡±

    The divine guard had lived on Elysium for many years but he had never seen any being like Sanguis who could put the blood energy in his body to use, and so skillfully at that. To the divine guard, it was novel and mind-boggling. He thought that only someone as unusual of Han Shuo could have such an unusual apprentice.

    ¡°Ok. Show us the way,¡± replied Han Shuo calmly. The divine guard then led Han Shuo and Sanguis to where he discovered the Bloodessence Grass.

    The Bloodessence Grass was unique nt that grew by absorbing the energy in blood. Energy can be found in the blood of every living thing. The stronger the organism, the more energy it has in its blood. When a creature happened to perish beside the Bloodessence Grass, the blood from the creature¡¯s body would be absorbed by the nt, allowing it to mature.

    Generally speaking, even if several creatures with mighty strengths perished close together, the blood energy from those creatures could nurture just one or two shoots of Bloodessence Grass. The fact that the divine guard found more than a dozen shoots in one go was very bizarre. That was why Han Shuo was interested in examining the site in person.

    Soon enough, the three arrived at a shallow stream. The water at its deepest could barely reach their ankle. Various kinds of nts were growing on the stream, among which were several shoots of Bloodessence Grass yet to be collected.

    The divine guard pointed at the stream and said, ¡°I collected the grasses from that stream. I saw that the grass is strange in color and looked as though there was blood in them and so I collected some. Look! There are a few more shoots still standing on the water. I did not collect all of them as I did not know if the grass would be useful.¡±

    Right after the divine guard finished those words, Sanguis shot forward and plucked all the remaining Bloodessence Grass. He returned smilingly and presented the Grasses to Han Shuo, ¡°Master, I have eaten more than a dozen of the Bloodessence Grass. Master should keep these!¡±

    Han Shuo did not decline. He casually put away the few Bloodessence Grass handed over by Sanguis while his eyes were fixed on the stream. His consciousness quietly assembled at that region to probe for the stream¡¯s secrets.

    ¡°Master, what are you looking for?¡± Sanguis couldn¡¯t help but asked when Han Shuo said nothing after putting away the Bloodessence Grasses but keep on staring at the stream.

    Han Shuo did not answer. With one thought, the seventeen flying swords whistled and shot straight at the stream. Crackling and rattling noises then came from the stream. The seventeen flying swords had cut off the weeds and excavated the stream. Broken rocks, dust, and sludges were sent flying in every direction.

    The seventeen flying swords then returned to Han Shuo while he suddenly flew into the hole he excavated. He emerged from underneath the stream carrying a blood-red rock the size of a fully grown man. The rock seemed to be made from blood. The red color looked eerie and its appearance could make some feel ufortable.

    After excavating the blood red rock from under the stream, Han Shuo put on a faint smile and said to Sanguis, ¡°Youcked a decent weapon for all these while. Hehe, finally now I have the material to build you one!¡±

 Chapter 785 - Refining Weapons

    <h4>GDK 785: Refining Weapons</h4>

    Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert practiced branches of demonic arts taught by Han Shuo. Gilbert practiced demonic arts that strengthens his soul much as a supplement to his cultivation of the energy of darkness. Although the darkness divine energy that Gilbert had was altered by his practice of demonic arts and his unique demonic body, he could use the divine weapons found in this universe just fine.

    Bonds used to be a cultivator of fighting aura. Hepletely abandoned the cultivation of that energy after Han Shuo taught him the Godying Devil Path. He would ce all his mind on practicing the demonic art Han Shuo bestowed upon him. Therefore, the regr weapons in this universe were no longer suitable for him. But fortunately for Bonds, Han Shuo had made him a decent flying sword that fitted him perfectly.

    Sanguis¡¯ situation was unlike that of Gilbert and Bonds¡¯. Before meeting Han Shuo, though he tried, Sanguis could not cultivate in any energy. All along, Sanguis only cultivated Bloodgod Mantra that Han Shuo bestowed upon him. Being a Sanguis-bodied, Sanguis was able to make rapid progress in the cultivation.

    It was because of the uniqueness of Bloodgod Mantra that Sanguis cultivated that Han Shuo couldn¡¯t find or make a demonic weapon suitable for him. Han Shuo had gifted the Blood Seether to Sanguis long ago. However, as the Blood Seether was just a crude demonic weapon Han Shuo refined. Not only was Han Shuo limited by the materials essible to him at that time, but the weapon also wasn¡¯t made with Bloodgod Mantra in mind. Therefore, Sanguis always felt that the Blood Seether just isn¡¯t right for him.

    The demonic art that Sanguis cultivated was very unique. It was difficult to make a demonic weapon that suits him. Han Shuo had always wanted to refine a demonic weapon that was suitable for Sanguis but he could not find suitable materials.

    But that was not the case anymore. The blood-red rock Han Shuo found under the stream was the perfect material!

    ¡°Master, what does this rock do?¡± asked Sanguis in a puzzled face. Though the color of the rock pleased his eyes, it doesn¡¯t seem that special to him.

    Suddenly, the divine guard who led Han Shuo and Sanguis to the tiny stream started acting strangely. His face was flushed and confused. He looked at Han Shuo and Sanguis and screamed, ¡°My blood! Something¡¯s wrong with my blood!¡±

    Sanguis looked up and down at the divine guard with puzzled eyes. As though he had been wronged, he eximed, ¡°I¡¯m not doing anything to you!¡±

    A big hand grabbed the divine guard and carried him into the air in an instant. When he was several hundred meters away from the stone, his face started returning to normal and he could breathe again. Han Shuo stopped and let him off. Hemanded the divine guard, ¡°Stay away from the area,¡± and returned to Sanguis.

    ¡°It wasn¡¯t you. It¡¯s it!¡± said Han Shuo as he pointed at the blood-red stone.

    Sanguis was astonished. In disbelief, he asked, ¡°How is that possible?!¡± While staring at the rock with his eyes wide open, Sanguis asked, ¡°Why is it that I do not feel anything amiss with my blood?¡±

    ¡°You might be the only person in the world invulnerable to the stone,¡± replied Han Shuo smilingly.

    Sanguis was amazed. He looked at the stone ced on the ground before him and then at Han Shuo before he asked, ¡°But, Master, aren¡¯t you doing just alright?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m also affected by the energy but it was bearable to my body. It isn¡¯t enough to make my blood move abnormally,¡± exined Han Shuo.

    Sanguis finally knew what¡¯s so unique about the rock before him. He gazed at the rock with a beautiful blood-red color. The more he looked at it, the more he liked the rock. He felt as though the rock is just like him.

    ¡°ce your hand on it and feel it. You will sense what¡¯s so different about this rock other than its color,¡± instructed Han Shuo smilingly.

    Sanguis have wanted to do so and he pressed a palm on the blood-red rock. As soon as he contacted the rock, an expression of joy and surprise appeared on his face. He turned to Han Shuo and excitedly said, ¡°There is an energy in the rock, it is just like the energy in the Bloodessence Grass. Oh, wait, it¡¯s not exactly the same ¨C it is purer than that in the Bloodessence Grass!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and exined, ¡°This rock is called a Blood Crystal. It is thanks to this Crystal that so many Bloodessence Grasses grew here. The Blood Crystal could attract and gather the blood energy of fallen creatures nearby. If this Blood Crystal wasn¡¯t buried deep underground, any living thing with blood that wandered to the region will be affected by its energy the same way they would be affected by your Bloodgod Mantra. They will bleed profusely and could easily lose their lives to the Crystal.¡±

    Sanguis¡¯ astonishment was renewed after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s exnation. He asked, ¡°This is miraculous! But what can it do for me?¡±

    ¡°At the very least, it can amplify the power of your Bloodgod Mantra attacks and very likely increase your cultivation speed. I cannot list all of the benefits it will bring as I do not cultivate in Bloodgod Mantra. You will have to figure out the rest by yourself. But I¡¯m certain that the Blood Crystal will be tremendously beneficial to you!¡± exined Han Shuo. Shortly after, Han Shuo asked, ¡°Oh, yes, what kind of weapon do you want to make from the Crystal?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s ratherrge in size. What can it be turned into?¡± asked Sanguis excitedly.

    To Sanguis, a demonic weapon that could raise his attack power and cultivation speed was simply wonderful to have. He had seen Bonds bing much more powerful after obtaining a flying sword from Han Shuo and had been admiring of the terrifying destructive power of Han Shuo¡¯s seventeen flying swords. It would be a wonder if Sanguis didn¡¯t get excited to learn that he will soon possess a destructive weapon of his own.

    ¡°It may berge now, but after the outer crust and impurities are removed, it will be much smaller,¡± replied Han Shuo. ¡°Think about it for a moment and tell me what weapon you want it to be. I can then reshape the Crystal to the weapon of your choice.¡±

    ¡°A sword! I like swords!¡± replied Sanguis excitedly. He was influenced by the Han Shuo and Bonds who used flying swords.

    ¡°Very well, a sword you shall have!¡± Han Shuo then added, ¡°I can only help you with removing the impurities and molding the sword. For the demonic weapon to be yours, you will have toplete some finishing touches and further refine the sword.¡±

    ¡°Understood, Master!¡± replied Sanguis as he nodded enthusiastically. He seemed rather impatient.

    Han Shuo said nothing more and started calming his mind. Demonic yuan energy started channeling through his hands and it carried the blood-red stone off the ground. It hovered between Han Shuo¡¯s palms and started revolving rapidly.

    <i><i>Roar!</i></i> Two streams of zes gushed out from Han Shuo¡¯s palms and gathered into a sphere right under the blood-red rock. The zes were burning at a scorchingly high temperature. Sanguis who was standing beside Han Shuo immediately felt the heat and subconsciously took a few steps backward.

    As the zes licked the blood-red rock, the solid rock seemed to have softened. The center of the Blood Crystal turned redder and redder while the outer rim charred and cracked. It was as though the mes had forced andpressed the energy in the Blood Crystal to the center.

    ¡°Eh?!¡± A soft cry of surprise came from the distance. Rose, wearing an amazed face, was standing quietly and staring foolishly at Han Shuo who was refining a weapon.

    After arriving at Soaring Clouds Mountain Range, Rose managed to locate a hot spring. For the past few days, Rose and a few female divine guards had been rxing at the hot spring. Rose had justpleted her ritual bathing session for the day and came to this ce after learning from the divine guards that Han Shuo was here. She did not expect to find Han Shuo refining a weapon.

    It wasmon knowledge on Elysium that a cksmith required at least several energy towers to melt the materials needed to forge a weapon. In addition, they will need to carve numerous abstruse andplicated magical matrixes on the ground, assembling various kinds of energies just to produce one divine weapon. The process was long, toilsome, andplicated.

    It had never been heard of on the Elysium that a divine weapon could be produced with no mold or matrixes but one piece of raw material and a pair of hands as Han Shuo was performing. Rose could not understand how Han Shuo could turn the molten rock between his hands into the desired shape without using any unique magical matrixes or energy towers.

    The astonished Rose continued to watch Han Shuo who was concentrated on refining a demonic weapon. For some reason, at least for that moment, she found Han Shuo who was fully concentrated on the task to be very attractive. She also felt that the weapon Han Shuo produced will be perfect.

    With Rose and Sanguis attentively watching, pieces of dark rock cracked and fell off from the outer edge of the Blood Crystal one after another. The two-meter long Blood Crystal gradually shrunk as Han Shuo baked it with fire spitting out from his palms. The redness at the outer rim seemed to be moving towards the center as the Crystal got smaller. The scarlet light at the center of the Crystal grew more and more brilliant. It looked as though blood was flowing in the Crystal.

    Gradually, the Blood Crystal started having the rough shape of a broadsword. The fire from Han Shuo¡¯s palms grew fiercer. Little pieces of rocks continued falling off the revolving broadsword-shaped Blood Crystal.

    After a while, the meing from Han Shuo¡¯s palms started diminishing but the blood-red radianceing from the Blood Crystal only grew brighter. It shone as though a red sun and turned everything around it blood-red. A faint scent of blood started emanating from it.

    Impatience and excitement could be seen in Sanguis who had been watching beside Han Shuo. After Han Shuo removed the impurities from the Blood Crystal, the Blood Crystal, in its purest form, burst with blood-red light. Sanguis suddenly felt as though a miraculous connection was formed between him and the broadsword. Even the blood in his body grew unusually excited.

    <i><i>Thud.</i></i> The Blood Crystal, now the shape of a broadsword, fell onto the ground. Han Shuo stopped spitting fire from his palms and used a force to redirect the stream nearby. Thick water vapor fizzed from the Blood Crystal broadsword as waster doused on it.

    After rinsing the broadsword multiple times, the Blood Crystal was spotlessly clean and no longer hot to the touch. Han Shuo finally turned to Sanguis who was jumping up and down and said, ¡°Go ahead!¡±

    Sanguis was overjoyed and immediately grabbed and held up the broadsword made using Blood Crystal. He eximed, ¡°It¡¯s heavy!¡±

    Intense bloody radiance suddenly burst from the broadsword. It even made Han Shuo¡¯s blood travel abnormally for a brief moment. He could feel his blood wanting to escape his body and flew onto the broadsword.

    ¡°Haha, this is wonderful, I love it! Thank you, Master! Thank you!¡± cheered Sanguis.

 Chapter 786 - Throw a cherry on top

    GDK 786: Throw a cherry on top

    Sanguis started ying with his broadsword made from a Blood Crystal. He felt as though the broadsword had be a part of himself. Having an extension of himself in his hand felt amazing to Sanguis.

    Han Shuo had removed all impurities from the Blood Crystal and reshaped it to be a broadsword. But as Han Shuo did not know the uses of Blood Crystal detailedly, that was all that he could do. Sanguis must figure out the rest by himself.

    ¡°Though I have formed the sword, you must find a way to form a bond with the weapon. The usual technique of dripping your blood in it probably won¡¯t work in this case. You¡¯ll have to figure that out by yourself,¡± Han Shuo said to Sanguis after thinking for a moment.

    ¡°I don¡¯t have to do that; It has already be a part of me!¡± replied Sanguis excitedly. The broadsword then abruptly disappeared into Sanguis as he chuckled. Then, a momentter, the broadsword reappeared from his chest and flew into his hand.

    Being able to store a demonic weapon into his body meant that Sanguis has sessfully connected his mind with the broadsword. Although Han Shuo had absolutely no clue how Sanguis managed to aplish that, he was very happy for Sanguis.

    Han Shuo nodded and said, ¡°Very good. You have now truly be the master of the broadsword. You may give it a name. Make sure to learn and explore all its uses!¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment and continued, ¡°Every precious demonic weapon possesses an infinite potential to evolve. Once a demonic weapon improved to a certain level, a spirit will take shape. You should keep an eye on that. This broadsword is much more bizarre than Bonds¡¯ flying sword. I think it most likely will form a spirit of its own.¡±

    ¡°Yes, Master. I will do as you say!¡± Sanguis maneuvered his broadsword to squirm around his body as he explored the uses of the weapon. He tried to form an even deeper connection with the broadsword using Bloodgod Mantra.

    Sanguis tirelesslymunicated with the broadsword made using Blood Crystal. He was so engrossed in the new weapon that he seemed to have forgotten that Han Shuo was beside him.

    Standing not far away, Rose continued to stare fixedly at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo had long noticed Rose¡¯s presence. After giving Sanguis some instructions, he walked to Rose in a faint smile and asked, ¡°What¡¯s up?

    Rose did not answer but continued to stare at Han Shuo. After a long long while, Rose softly exhaled as though trying to cast away the shock in her heart. She softly asked, ¡°So you also know how to refine weapons?¡±

    Han Shuo half-shrugged and replied, ¡°Well, I¡¯m just an amateur. It¡¯s nothing to write home about.¡±

    ¡°From how I see it, it¡¯s the exact opposite!¡± Rose softly eximed and said, ¡°I have never seen or heard anyone who can refine a weapon in the manner you did just now. Your weapon-smelting skill is marvelous. I¡¯m pretty sure that you are just as skillful in refining weapons as you are in refining medicines!¡±

    Han Shuo was known to be a genius pharmacist in the Darkness Dominion. All those who were acquainted with Han Shuo knew that he was extremely talented in refining medicines but none of them knew that he was also talented at refining weapons. If Rose did not happen to catch Han Shuo in the act of refining a broadsword for Sanguis, perhaps even Rose would remain oblivious to it.

    It was only at this point in time that Rose realized that all those miraculous divine weapons she saw on Han Shuo was produced by Han Shuo himself. During their assault on Hushveil City, Rose had seen Han Shuo utilized various weapons of mass destruction against arge number of divine guards who pursued them. She observed that those unique and deadly weapons were quite different from the conventional divine weapons. She had been wondering where Han Shuo found such a strange but supreme artisan to make all those weapons for him.

    But finally, after identally witnessing what she saw that day, the question became clear to Rose.

    <i><i>Being a gifted pharmacist has made Bryan reputable in the Darkness Dominion. If people learned that Bryan is also brilliantly talented in the arts of weapon refinement, it will surely shock the entire Elysium!</i></i> thought Rose.

    ¡°It¡¯s not as miraculous as you imagined. It¡¯s just some simple and amateur techniques,¡± with just one look at Rose, Han Shuo knew what was going on in her head. Han Shuo did not want people to know too much of his secrets and therefore said so to Rose.

    Rose looked intently at Han Shuo. After a while, she put on a faint smile and demanded, ¡°Well then, I hope you will make me a weapon too. A simple and crude one will do!¡±

    Han Shuo stared puzzlingly at Rose for a moment before he replied, ¡°The energy you cultivate in is very different from mine. Even if I made you a weapon, without understanding the energy that Sanguis and I cultivate, the weapon will be next to useless to you.¡±

    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter. I still want one. Any type of weapon will do. Your weapon refining techniques are marvelous. I want to watch you do it again!¡± demanded Rose persistently. She was determined to make Han Shuo refine her a weapon despite his reluctance.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s ve, Rose had been very cooperative and had served him well. Han Shuo was poor at rejecting his allies¡¯ requests, especially those who had been helpful to him. Therefore, after thinking for a moment, Han Shuo forced a smile and nodded.

    ¡°Fine, I will make you a weapon now. Hmm, alright, here, cut a finger and fill this bottle to the middle with your blood,¡± instructed Han Shuo as he took out a ss container and handed it to Rose.

    Rose was happy that Han Shuo agreed to her demand while perplexed by his instruction. She couldn¡¯t understand why Han Shuo needed her blood to produce a weapon. However, she did not raise her doubt to Han Shuo but readilyplied with his instruction.

    A single strand of her silky silver hair pierced the skin on her tender left index finger. Drop by drop, guided by the strand of her hair, her blood fell into the ss container. Around two minutester, the container was half-filled with her red blood. She handed the container to Han Shuo.

    After taking the bottle of blood from Rose, Han Shuo began refining Pearls of Annihtion in front of her. He took out all sorts of rare and bizarre rocks before baking them into reddish-brown spheres under an intense me. The Pearls of Annihtion that were forming were around the size of an eyeball. They were glossy and were faintly shimmering.

    Rose¡¯s fresh blood was slowly ced into the Pearls drop by drop. A fiery red light came from the center of the Pearls as though a fire was ignited inside those Pearls. They looked like glossy pearls that contained burning fires. They were eye-catching and beautiful.

    Just like Sanguis, Rose seemed very excited and happy when getting their weapons. When Han Shuo ced those Pearls of Annihtion in Rose¡¯s hand, she sensed a very faint but real connection with those Pearls. This was surprising to her.

    ¡°As you cultivate in an energy different from mine and your blood has not been condensed through unique means, you will only have a weak connection with these Pearls. However, as weak as the connection is, you can still remotely detonate the Pearls just by...¡± Han Shuo started exining to Rose on the method of using the Pearls of Annihtion as well as their powers.

    Though that weak connection, Rose could effortlessly detonate her Pearls of Annihtion from several hundred meters away. If used correctly, the Pearls could even be a lifesaver during an emergency.

    However, it appeared that Rose had no intention to make practical use of the Pearls. It seemed as though she had taken the Pearls of Annihtion as a magnificent handicraft article. Under Rose¡¯s demand, Han Shuo had no choice but to make holes on the Pearls with his demonic yuan and chain the Pearls into a bracelet using the stic veins of a magical beast.

    Rose was very contended. She constantly fiddled with the bracelet made of Pearls of Annihtion and appeared very happy.

    Han Shuo was left betweenughter and tears when he saw that Rose had taken the Pearls as an ornament. He wasn¡¯t sure if Rose listened to his detailed exnation of how to use the Pearls. He thought, <i><i>Women¡¯s minds are indeed unfathomable. She is actually treating this destructive weapon as jewelry just because it looked pretty!</i></i>

    ***

    Time passed hurried. Half a month went by. One after another, the participatingpanies from the other six Corps arrived at Soaring Cloud Mountain Range.

    Naturally, those from the House of Sainte, as the ruler of the City of Shadows and the organizer of the event, will not be absent. Wace, Andre, Carmelita, and others arrived at the Mountain Range.

    Three of the Seven Divine Guard Corps belonged to the House of Kinson, House of Kisa, and House of Buller. As thepetition could affect the interests of their family ns, members of those threerge family ns also came to the Mountain Range as observers. They would usually hang around with their Fourth Corp, Sixth Corp, and Seventh Corp. The Soaring Cloud Mountain Range suddenly turned lively.

    Those from the Seven Corps would stay in seven separate regions around the Soaring Cloud Mountain Range throughout thepetition. Wace and Andre had divided and assigned those regions ahead of time. Members and representatives from therge family ns, Wace included, would stay at the center-most region of the Mountain Range. They were in charge of handling any idents throughout thepetition.

    Those newly arrived at the Mountain Range were astounded when they saw Han Shuo¡¯spany. An emotion of vignce appeared on their faces after they carefully sized up the divine guards of the Fifth Corps.

    After having been ground and tempered by the Eight Destion and Torment Formation, the divine guards of the Fifth Corps gained a distinctive stern and solemn aura. No matter from any angle, they do not look like apany made up of amateurish recruits. The crowd who originally felt that the Fifth Corps was destined to take thest ce suddenly wasn¡¯t so sure anymore.

    Andre and Wace inwardly praised in their heads. They became even more admiring of Han Shuo. His ability to train the Fifth Corps divine guards up to this level in such a short time was phenomenal. Even Wace did not have the confidence of aplishing this amazing feat.

    ¡°It seems that the Fifth Corps might not take the bottom ce!¡± said Wace after he turned to Andre who was standing abreast.

    Andre nodded smilingly. Then, in a somewhat delighted manner, he suggested, ¡°Elder brother, Carmelita is at the age of marriage. Why don¡¯t we throw a cherry on top after thepetition?¡±

    Wace stared nkly for a moment before he asked, ¡°What do you mean?¡±

    ¡°The House of Han is rapidly rising in influence and power. Bryan even can injure Hofs of Hushveil City. If things continue to develop in this trend, it is only a matter of time before their interests ovep with our House of Sainte¡¯s. In the end, the House of Han might leave the City of Shadows. However, if Carmelita is married to the youngster, everything will be easily solved! What do you think, brother?¡±

    Wace had not considered the possibility before. After hearing Andre¡¯s words, Wace sank deep in thought.

 Chapter 787 - Third place, at most

    GDK 787: Third ce, at most

    Although it was clear that Han Shuo was an excellentd filled with potential, no father would be open to the idea of bing his father inw. Han Shuo was already having a horde of femalepanions and none of them had any formal recognition of any kind. If that wasn¡¯t enough, there was no telling if Han Shuo might further expand his harem. Wace did not think that Carmelita could keep Han Shuo in check.

    From the way Wace looked at it, Carmelita will not have a happy life if she was married to Han Shuo. Therefore, he was rather resistant to that idea.

    However, the scenario that Andre mentioned was very likely to happen in the future. Given the strength that Han Shuo disyed so far, Wace felt that he wasn¡¯t one who would be satisfied with being under the authority of anyone. With Celestial Pearl Pharmacy being a money printing machine, it was only a matter of time before the House of Hanpletely rece the void left by the House of Lavers in the City of Shadows.

    With their patriarch, Han Shuo, having such valiant strength and with a constant stream of wealth generated through Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, the House of Han was certain to have a bright future. When one day, the House of Han¡¯s presence inevitably threatened the position of the House of Sainte, without any firmer bond that ties the two families together, Wace was sure that the elders in his family n will do something about it.

    After thinking about it carefully, Wace realized that the oue of him doing nothing about it would be disastrous. Andre¡¯s proposal, if carried out soon, could avoid the disastrous oue they foresaw. Although Wace was tempted to do so, he also felt that Han Shuo was just too much of a womanizer. He could note to a decision in a short time.

    ¡°Let¡¯s not be hasty. Although I am very pleased with that youngster¡¯s performance in almost every aspect, he just has too many romantic partners around him. Besides, Carmelita hasn¡¯t shown any interest in him romantically. This needs to be carefully considered,¡± replied Wace after he kept silent for a long time.

    Andre nodded and said nothing. He knew exactly what Wace was concerned about but had no advice to give.

    Thepetition between the Seven Corps had yet to begin. Most of the participants were using their free time to study the terrain of Soaring Clouds Mountain Range, except for those from the Fifth Corps. They had arrived at the Mountain Range much earlier and hadpleted their preparations long ago. Following Han Shuo¡¯smand, none of the Fifth Corps divine guards traveled around the mountain range but stayed within their camping zone to rest and save up energy.

    Han Shuo, however, did not do so. He often went to drink and chat with Erebus and Aobashi. Carmelita would usually join them as well. These Divine Guard Chiefs did not disy the tension or solemness before apetition.

    On one of those days, Han Shuo, Erebus, and Carmelita were happily chatting with Aobashi over at the campsite of her First Corps. Without any warning, a young man with dark-green skin and sharp eyes walked into appearance. He had short and neatly trimmed hair that stood firmly on his head. He appeared to be an icily arrogant and stern person.

    When he showed up to the party, he merely gave a slight nod at Erebus before walking straight to Aobashi and proceeded by staring intensely at her without speaking. A few secondster, he coldly nodded and said, ¡°Not bad, you have not declined in strength!¡± He then announced in a loud voice, ¡°Aobashi, this year, I¡¯m going to defeat you!¡±

    Aobashi seemed to have known what this man would say. She put on a disdained smirk, softly groaned, and said, ¡°It¡¯s been many centuries but you have never been able to defeat me, not even once. It won¡¯t be any different this time.¡±

    ¡°It will be different!¡± replied the man in a solemn face with brimming confidence. Those who did not know better would easily be influenced by his confidence.

    ¡°Nah. You¡¯ll lose to me again, like always,¡± rebutted Aobashi. She let out a softugh and said, ¡°Ralph, you have always managed your troops with the cruelest method. You train them in the most dangerous environment with absolutely no regard for their lives. That is the only reason your Second Corps can get first ce in the teampetition!¡± Aobashi took a short pause before she continued, ¡°I absolutely disagree with your methods. Although your Second Corps has always taken first ce in the teampetition, it doesn¡¯t justify your cruel methods!¡±

    ¡°How I manage my Second Corps is none of your concern!¡± Ralph coldly groaned and said, ¡°In short, this time around, my Second Corps will obtain total victory! And I will defeat you in the duel!¡±

    ¡°Humph, what a brassy punk!¡± Carmelita couldn¡¯t take it any longer andmented. Although Ralph was loyal to her father, he wasn¡¯t particrly friendly to other members of the House of Sainte. When Ralph walked in just then, he did not nod or greet Carmelita. This meant that Ralph was the servant of Wace alone and not the House of Sainte¡¯s.

    Ralph red at Carmelita and said in an emotionless and indifferent voice, ¡°You have been severely injured twice in just a few years and have wasted so many His Lordship¡¯s divine essences. Do you not feel ashamed? You should be cultivating instead ofing to thepetition.¡±

    Carmelita was enraged. She pointed at Ralph and said, ¡°What¡¯s so terrific about you? All that you¡¯ve ever done is make every divine guard of your Second Corps as cold-blooded and inhuman as you are. First ce in team strength? At what cost? Don¡¯t think that we are unaware of just how many have died to your ridiculously harsh training!¡±

    Although the City of Shadows was huge, very few dared unreservedly criticize Carmelita like Ralph just did. Carmelita had always despised Ralph. But as Ralph was highly trusted and regarded by Wace, there wasn¡¯t much that Carmelita could do to him. On top of that, Ralph had greater strength than Carmelita, which made her feel helpless when she had to face Ralph. It was also because of this that Ralph did not need to care about her feelings when speaking to her.

    ¡°Bryan, teach this guy a lesson for me!¡± Carmelita must be seething with rage. She sought Han Shuo, the only person in the party who was not a member of the House of Sainte, to back her up.

    Han Shuo forced a smile and replied in a helpless manner, ¡°This is a personal matter of your family n. It is not my ce to step in.¡±

    Although Han Shuo did not find Ralph likable, he was nheless a member of the House of Sainte and an important henchman of Wace¡¯s. The matter between Ralph and Carmelita could be considered as a private matter of the Sainte Family. He wasn¡¯t in a suitable position to intervene.

    Han Shuo may be disinclined to have any friction with Ralph, but Ralph doesn¡¯t seem to reciprocate that. He shot a cold nce at Han Shuo and sneered disdainfully. In an indifferent tone, he remarked, ¡°This guy? Pfft, he doesn¡¯t have the capacity to do so!¡±

    Han Shuo bunched his brows for he was now triggered. Han Shuo had long heard about Ralph¡¯s infamous temperament. He had absolutely no scruples in anything he does or speaks and doesn¡¯t even save any respect for the patriarchs of the other three major family ns. Unlike Aobashi and Erebus, Ralph doesn¡¯t know what courtesy is. After finally meeting Ralph, Han Shuo learned that the rumors were indeed true.

    <i><i>This isn¡¯t going to end up well for Ralph!</i></i> thought Aobashi and Erebus immediately. The two knew that although Han Shuo may appear innocent and friendly at all times, he doesn¡¯t take provocation lightly and once he erupts, all hell will break loose.

    And as they had expected, after Han Shuo looked at Ralph for a moment, he did not show any anger but put on an insincere smile and said, ¡°I heard that the Second Corps ranked first in teambat strength, but I just find it quite hard to believe. Hehe, my newly assembled Fifth Corps is looking forward to discovering what the Second Corps is made of on the battlefield!¡±

    After a short pause, Han Shuo put on another fake smile and remarked, ¡°Oh, by the way, I¡¯m sure that Lord Ralph isn¡¯t going to take second ce in thepetition between Divine Guard Chiefs.¡±

    ¡°And neither will he get the first ce!¡± added Aobashi.

    Han Shuo turned to Aobashi and smilingly said, ¡°That¡¯s for certain!¡± Han Shuo took a short pause to let darkness brew on Ralph¡¯s face before he confidently imed, ¡°From how I see it, he¡¯ll get third ce, at most.¡±

    Aobashi raised an eyebrow, put on an amused smile, and said, ¡°So you mean you¡¯ll be taking the second ce?¡±

    Han Shuo put on a mischievous smile and replied, ¡°I¡¯m pretty sure I can defeat him. It won¡¯t be that difficult!¡±

    Carmelita and Erebus put on astonished faces when they heard those words. After a few seconds, Erebus shook his head in a strange manner while Carmelita cheered and pped. She happily said, ¡°Very good, Bryan. I like this confidence of yours! If you defeat him in thepetition, you will have my gratitude!¡±

    ¡°Consider it done!¡± replied Han Shuo arrogantly.

    Ralph¡¯s face had been growing darker and darker as he listened to their conversation. Finally, he snapped. He suddenly shouted, ¡°No need to wait until thepetition! Let¡¯s see if you have anything to back up your bravado right here right now!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Ralph suddenly attacked. His palm filled with the divine energy of destruction shot at Han Shuo who was just a few arm¡¯s lengths away.

    The cordial smile on Han Shuo¡¯s face did not diminish as he coldly watched Ralph¡¯s big hand approaches. Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy suddenly filled his body and a tremendous amount of energy gathered on Han Shuo¡¯s right index finger. It moved at lightning speed and made contact with Ralph¡¯s palm. A bizarre radiance erupted spread from the finger to the palm.

    A violent surge of energy came from Han Shuo¡¯s finger and halted Ralph¡¯s palmpletely. Immediately following that, Han Shuo¡¯s pointed finger closed into a fist. An explosive force even more ferocious than thest smashed into Ralph¡¯s palm.

    <i><i>Thud, thud thud... </i></i> Ralph was forced to take a few steps in reverse by the tremendous power.

    When Ralph finally regained his bnce, there was no longer a trace of disdain on his face when he looked at Han Shuo and it was reced with solemness. He nodded coldly and remarked, ¡°Not bad, you have proven yourself to be having more than just a big mouth. However, with what you have, defeating me is nothing more than a pipe dream!¡± Upon finishing those words, Ralph turned on his heels, started walking away while saying, ¡°Lord Wace prohibits fighting outside of thepetition. I will crush you to the core when thepetitiones!¡±

    It was obvious that Ralph¡¯s attack only meant to test Han Shuo¡¯s power and he had not used his full strength. Ralph was not discouraged after he stumbled backward from Han Shuo¡¯s counterattack. From that little engagement, he gained a rough understanding of Han Shuo¡¯s strength.

    Ralph had not exerted his full strength, but so did Han Shuo. He had not even utilized the seventeen flying swords.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help butughed. He said to the leaving Ralph, ¡°Let me tell you this, not only that I will defeat you in the individual category, but your Second Corps will also have to step down from the first ce in the team category. Too long have you held to that title!¡±

    Ralph stopped and turned to give one look at Han Shuo. He put on a sneer and said, ¡°We shall see!¡±

    The Second Corps had always been the champion in the teampetition. Ralph had more confidence in the strength of his Corps than in his own. He suddenly felt that Han Shuo was being more arrogant than he was!

 Chapter 788 - Exceed the quota

    GDK 788: Exceed the quota

    Ralph left in a dark face. After his figure hadpletely disappeared from the party, Aobashi put on a big smile and said, ¡°Well done, Bryan!¡±

    Aobashi and Erebus did not get along well with Ralph. It was easy to see why they would be supportive of Han Shuo¡¯s actions. As soon as Ralph left, they started praising Han Shuo.

    ¡°Bryan, this Ralph has always been an arrogant one. Don¡¯t take the matter too seriously.¡± consoled Erebus. He then let out a light groan and said, ¡°His Second Corps have gotten on top of me for too long. I will make sure that it won¡¯t happen again!¡±

    ¡°Save it. Your Third Corps is no match against him. The Second Corps is formidable in teambat strength. If my First Corps have no confidence in defeating them, what hope would your Third Corps have?¡± said Aobashi in a sweet smile. She clearly did not feel that Erebus¡¯ divine guards could defeat Ralph¡¯s.

    The Divine Guard Chiefs of the City of Shadows knew each other¡¯s strengths well. Their divine guards had fought against each other in the centennialpetition many times and they knew their level of strength. It was clear to Aobashi that Erebus¡¯ divine guards were hopeless against those of Ralph¡¯s.

    ¡°Bryan, that Ralph is not easy to handle. But as we are all Divine Guard Chiefs, he wouldn¡¯t dare give you any trouble in private. Don¡¯t take what happened just now too seriously. His main goal ining here is to diminish our morale while trying to learn about our situation. When it¡¯s time to fight, I will make sure to give him a beating!¡± Aobashi said to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo nodded smilingly. He knew that both Aobashi and Erebus had taken his ims as nothing more than conceited, nonsensical words just to infuriate Ralph. The two did not feel that Han Shuo¡¯s Fifth Corps had any chance of defeating Ralph¡¯s Second Corps.

    Soon after that, Han Shuo decided he had enough chit-chat for the day and left the party.

    Carmelita followed him out cheerfully. As soon as they have left Aobashi and Erebus, she remarked, ¡°Bryan, you really are discreet about revealing your strength!¡±

    Han Shuo had never demonstrated his mighty strength to Carmelita the entire time. Although Andre and Wace had shared a few things with her and she had learned about Han Shuo giving Portlem a beating back at the banquet hall in Celestial Pearl, Carmelita had never seen Han Shuo in action and therefore never really treated Han Shuo as an expert of equal ss.

    But finally now, Carmelita had witnessed with her own eyes how Han Shuo forced Ralph to stumble backward with one little punch. It was very surprising to her considering that Ralph¡¯s strength was one realm above hers!

    Carmelita suddenly caught a cheerful mood for no apparent reason. She recalled the time they first met and thought that no wonder Han Shuo had managed to survive and even rescue her from danger when all the divine guards were killed back in that treacherous mountain range.

    It turned out that he was a formidable expert all along who had been concealing his true strength!

    Not knowing how to respond to Carmelita¡¯s pleasantly surprised gazes, Han Shuo forced a smile. He did not know how to exin it to Carmelita. Han Shuo could try to be frank and tell her that he only possessed lowgod strength back when he joined her mission in that mountain range. But if Han Shuo said so, not just Carmelita, but no one in the world would believe his words.

    This was because no one on Elysium had ever managed to transcend from lowgod realm to highgod realm in such a short time!

    ¡°Carmelita, that Ralph really has an attitude. I did not expect that he wouldn¡¯t even give you face!¡± said Han Shuo, trying to divert the topic.

    Anger could immediately be seen on Carmelita who was about to ask Han Shuo about something. She replied, ¡°That guy is totally a mad dog that my father keeps! He will bite at anyone he sees ¨C as long as the person is not my father. But no one can disagree that the fe has outstanding strength and is very capable. Even his Second Corps divine guards are astonishing in strength. He always manages to somehow solve all the difficult problems that the City faced. Therefore, even though he is as wild as a mad dog, his position in the City remain unmoved!¡±

    Han Shuo had heard plenty of rumors about Ralph. Wace the City Lord would assign some of the most dangerous, sensitive, and despicable missions critical to the City of Shadows to Ralph. And Ralph doesn¡¯t disappoint the City Lord. He would achieve all the mission objectives as demanded of him. It was also because of this that Wace trusted him more than any other Divine Guard Chiefs, so much so that Wace would even dismiss Carmelita¡¯sints against Ralph.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, after thepetition, Ralph will learn to behave himself!¡± Han Shuo put on an unruffled face and confidently said, ¡°My Fifth Corps will defeat his Second Corps in the teampetition!¡±

    Carmelita was astonished to hear that assertion from Han Shuo. She did not know where that confidence of Han Shuo¡¯s came from. Although Carmelita was skeptical of Han Shuo¡¯s im, as Han Shuo had taken a jab at Ralph for her just then, she did not express her doubts but patted on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulders smilingly and said, ¡°It¡¯s down to you!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded. Shortly after, the two separated. Han Shuo returned to the Fifth Corps campsite while Carmelita returned to the center region campsite where Wace and Andre stayed.

    *** Among a luxuriant forest in the southeast region of Soaring Cloud Mountain Range stood arge number of emerald green camps. They were the temporary shelters for the divine guards of the Second Corps.

    Ralph flew back to his camp in a gloomy dark face. Upon his return, Kiffan, the Captain for the Company that will represent the Second Corps in thepetition, stepped forward, bowed slightly, and asked, ¡°What ails you, my Lord?¡±

    Kiffan was an illegitimate child from a small family n where he suffered endless years of abuse and torture. There was only hatred in his heart and malice in his mind. As boundless as his hate was, alone, he did not have enough power to make retribution. But things changed when he met his mentor. Ralph took him into his Second Corps for he saw the rage and thirst for blood in Kiffan¡¯s eyes. He trained Kiffan and helped Kiffan exterminate the family n that afflicted him all the agony. He watched as Kiffan slowly killed his own father.

    After Ralph assisted Kiffan in getting his revenge, he fully submitted to Ralph and took Ralph as his master. He had been serving Ralph faithfully for countless years and went through fire and water for him. Kiffan was also responsible for training the new Second Corps recruits with extreme and insane methods. There was no regard given to their lives. At the cost of tremendous injuries and deaths, the Second Corps divine guards were transformed into bloodthirsty, deadly wild beasts.

    ¡°I have met that Chief of Fifth Corps ¨C the one told in the rumors,¡± replied Ralph in a sinister voice.

    A corner of Kiffan¡¯s lips curled with icy disdain. He said, ¡°That pharmacist from Celestial Pearl? What does he know? That guy should be making medicines in his room instead of managing the Fifth Corps! How foolish of him to even participate in thispetition. He needs to learn his ce! My Lord, have you taught him a lesson?¡±

    Ralph¡¯s face suddenly turned cold as though he recalled Han Shuo beating him back with one punch. Ralph replied in a cold, loud voice, ¡°He dered that he will defeat our Second Corps and the Company you lead will lose to his!¡±

    Kiffan was astounded. After a long while, he snapped out of the daze and put on a sinister smirk, ¡°What a funny youngster. Our Second Corps has stood tall in the City of Shadows unchallenged for many years. Does he think he can surpass and unseat us right after bing a Chief? How preposterous!¡±

    ¡°In everypetition, every team is bound by a quota ¨C a maximum number of casualties they can cause. Kiffan, when you are up against the Fifth Corpster in thepetition, you may exceed the quota. I will handle all the repercussions!¡±

    Kiffan was startled. He immediately knew that Ralph must truly be angered by that pharmacist from Celestial Pearl. Otherwise, Ralph would never have disobeyed Wace¡¯smand and asked him to kill more divine guards of the Fifth Guards than the rules allowed.

    Kiffan was a blind follower of Ralph¡¯s. His loyalty lied with Ralph and not with Wace. Therefore, Kiffan did not object to Ralph¡¯s instruction. He quickly recovered from the shock, nodded, and answered, ¡°Understood, my Lord. Once the Fifth Corps ran into our path, I will make them pay the price for offending Your Lordship!¡±

    ¡°Excellent!¡± replied Ralph as his mood suddenly turned better. It was as though he could already smell the scent of blood of the Fifth Corps divine guards as they were being annihted.

    At the same time, over on the other side of the mountain range, Han Shuo put on a grim smile and said to himself, ¡°So there is such a thing as a quota for casualties. Hehe, Ralph, O Ralph, let¡¯s see who will have a higher number of casualties!¡±

    Right away, Han Shuo gathered Sanguis, Gilbert, Bonds, and Barnard to give them a few secret instructions.

    Three dayster, the Seven Divine Guard Chiefs and their men assembled at the center region of the mountain range. Wace and the patriarchs of all major family ns were present. At their center, on one of the viewing tforms, an enormous oval sand table was ced. The terrain of Soaring Cloud Mountain Range was reflected on the sand table. It was also filled with numerous markers and many red and blue lines.

    Ralph had been gazing at Han Shuo with cold eyes ever since the moment Han Shuo showed up. The hostility in his eyes was not concealed at all. Wace, Andre, and others noticed it and took note of it.

    Han Shuo, meanwhile,pletely ignored Ralph¡¯s unfriendly gazes. He chatted with Aobashi and Erebus in low voices. They wouldugh loudly or exim from time to time. Clearly, Han Shuo was not in the least affected by Ralph¡¯s hostile gaze.

    Andre gazes at Han Shuo and then at Ralph from his tform distance away. His brows creased slightly.

    Wace had been talking with the other three patriarchs ofrge family ns. Finally, he went onto the stage and raised one hand to gather the crowd¡¯s attention. When everyone looked at him in silence, Wace began by giving a motivational speech before leading the crowd to kowtow and pray to the Overgod of Darkness.

    Every century, right before thepetition begins, a simple ceremony to worship the Overgod of Darkness will be held. Everyone was used to it and they followed Wace¡¯s lead in kowtowing. Han Shuo, however, wasn¡¯t too willing to do so. The Overgod of Darkness wasn¡¯t the god Han Shuo worshipped and he felt that he had no reason to be so humble. Seeing that no one was looking at him, he did not kneel on the ground but merely bowed his body slightly.

    Han Shuo thought that no one would notice his sinful act of disrespecting the Darkness Overgod. But when the ceremony was near its end and he was ready to stand straight, he suddenly noticed that Ralph distance away was watching him coldly. He was sneering as though he had caught Han Shuo red-handed.

 Chapter 789 - Conflict

    GDK 789: Conflict

    On Elysium, a citizen was expected to be humble and respectful to the Overgod of the Dominion that they lived in. Han Shuo¡¯s behavior can be considered as sphemy against the Darkness Overgod. It was a serious crime. If he was deemed guilty of the crime, it could have an immediate impact on Han Shuo¡¯s prospects in the City of Shadows.

    Therefore, when Han Shuo saw that sneer on Ralph¡¯s face, an uneasy feeling rose from his heart.

    As expected, when the religious ceremony ends and everyone lifted their heads and rose back to their feet, Ralph immediately shouted, ¡°Lord Bryan, how dare you behave with such impiety as not to kneel on the ground! As a follower of the Overgod, such an act of disrespect towards the Overgod is unforgivable!¡±

    Wace who was about to announce something seemed somewhat astonished by Ralph¡¯s im. He turned to sweep his eyes over Han Shuo, bunched his brows, and asked, ¡°Bryan, is it true?¡±

    ¡°I did not expect Lord Ralph to be such a vindictive man. I¡¯m very disappointed that Lord Ralph has decided to make such a grave nder against me over a small quarrel we had two days ago!¡± Of course Han Shuo will not admit it. If Han Shuo was buckled with the bad name of sphemy, it could easily be used against him and cause him countless troubles down the road.

    ¡°Lord Bryan, you indeed are talented in lying through your teeth. You had the audacity tomit the sin so don¡¯t be such a coward at admitting your deeds!¡± shouted Ralph coldly as he stared intently at Han Shuo with his piercing eyes. It was as though Ralph was trying to make Han Shuo feel nervous through overwhelming pressure. Wace, Andre, and others present were sharp-eyed. They can detect even the tiniest bit of uneasiness that showed on Han Shuo¡¯s face.

    But unfortunately for them, Han Shuo¡¯s mind was staunch beyond what they could imagine. Not only that Han Shuo did not reveal the slightest feeling of guilt under Ralph¡¯s prating eagle eyes, but he even managed to put on perfect acting of having been wronged. He red at Ralph angrily and rebutted, ¡°Lord Ralph, we both know which of us is actually lying. Do you not have any conscience?¡±

    ¡°You! You are lying through your teeth!¡± Ralph immediately shouted. He did not expect Han Shuo to be so good at acting.

    Han Shuo let out a sigh, shook his head, and remarked disappointedly, ¡°I have always thought that Lord Ralph is a principled and truthful man. I really did not expect that you will make such a ridiculous nder against me just because we had a small argument. Truly disappointing!¡±

    ¡°Oi, Ralph, do you really have to make such a big fuss over something so trivial?¡± said Erebus in a loud voice. Erebus soon noticed that everyone¡¯s gazes had gathered on him. So he exined, ¡°A few days earlier, Bryan and Ralph had a small argument over at Lord Aobashi¡¯s campsite!¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t think that Lord Bryan is one who would lie!¡± said Casper, the patriarch of the House of Kinson.

    The other two patriarchs immediately nodded and repeated the opinion, implying that Ralph was making a false usation against Han Shuo. Ralph was perhaps the most hated man in the City of Shadows. The three patriarchs detested Ralph and would grab on to any opportunity to m him. But instead of criticizing Ralph directly, they remarked that Han Shuo was a trustworthy person.

    Wace looked back and forth at Ralph and Han Shuo with his brows bunched. After thinking in silence for a moment, he said, ¡°Ralph may have been mistaken with what he saw. Alright, let¡¯s move forward and not raise this little misunderstanding anymore!¡±

    Although still filled with anger, Ralph silenced himself after Wace announced so. He knew that Wace was actually defending him.

    Han Shuo still had that innocent look on his face. His eyes were filled with sadness and disappointment when he looked at Ralph. Those who didn¡¯t know better might even think that Han Shuo felt pity for Ralph for how he had conducted himself!

    In his mind, however, Han Shuo wasughing his ass off. From the attitude of the three major patriarchs, Han Shuo could tell that Ralph was sure enough very unpopr. In addition, the fact that not a single member of the Sainte Family had spoken a word to defend Ralph was proof that Carmelita¡¯s words were true ¨C even the members of the Sainte Family disliked this loyal hound of Wace¡¯s!

    Han Shuo was relieved at the fact that Ralph was so unpopr. He knew that if he were toe to actual conflict with Ralph, this would be an advantage he had against Ralph.

    With that, the disturbance died down. Wacepleted the remainder of his speech and started exining the rules for thepetition.

    Other than Han Shuo who was new there, all the participants knew the rules like the back of their hands. In fact, Wace¡¯s only targeted audience was Han Shuo. But thankfully, Han Shuo had Aobashi and Erebus exin to him everything about the rules long ago. When Wace saw Han Shuo nod his head to indicate that he already understood the rules, Wace sped up and quickly finished the necessary speech.

    Each Divine Guard Corps was represented by one Company. The Company must not be more than a hundred men strong and there must be no highgod among them. Although it was forgivable to cause idental injury and death, premeditated killing was strictly prohibited. Each Company must not cause more than five deaths.

    Competition between Companies would take ce before duels between the Chiefs. The given objectives would be different every centennial. Sometimes the sevenpanies would race to a goalpost, fighting and hindering each other along the way. Sometimes they would have to hunt for magical beasts and collect the most magical cores to be the victor.

    But thepetition this time was somewhat special. Wace had hidden a number of divine essences around the eastern part of Soaring Cloud Mountain Range. The divine guards had seven days to find those divine essences. They were also allowed to plunder from other teams. However, those were no ordinary divine essences. Wace and Andre had ced spells on them such that they will emanate unique and perceptible energy fluctuation once removed from where they were hidden.

    During those seven days, the Companies may look for the divine essences, steal, or plunder from each other. After the time was up, the Company with the most divine essences will be the victor. It was also worth mentioning that the Companies were not allowed to cooperate with each other and while twopanies were engaging, no thirdpany was to intervene.

    Those two rules were actually added specially for Aobashi and Erebus. Wace and Andre knew that Erebus was overfond of Aobashi. If the First Corps and Third Corps joined hands, the victor was certain to be one of them. It was to prevent that scenario that such a specific rule was added!

    After having quickly exined all the rules and their objectives for thepetition, Wacemanded the Companies to start marching towards the easternmost part of Soaring Cloud Mountain Range.

    Before Kiffan departed, he was summoned by Ralph was whispered something beside his ears. Kiffan nodded repeatedly in response. Before hispany started marching, he cast a cold and sinister gaze at Barnard in the distance.

    The Second Corps divine guards had as much expression as a stone but they emanated intense killing intent. Their gazes towards others were extremely fierce. They were as though beasts scanning at their prey. Compared to divine guards of other Corps, those from the Second Corps were distinctly more fearsome. That imposing demeanor of theirs was simply iparable.

    The divine guards of the Fifth Corps, on the contrary, were very rxed ¨C so much so that the crowd had trouble processing what they saw. Peals ofughter never ceaseding from the Fifth Corps divine guards. They did not show the slightest nervousness before a majorpetition. Those who didn¡¯t know might even think that they were going on a sightseeing trip!

    Compared to the other participants, especially those of the Second Corps, the Fifth Corps divine guards just seemed too offbeat. Wace, Andre, the three major patriarchs, and the Divine Guard Chiefs were all bewildered. They did not expect that those divine guards who appeared very solemn and grave earlier would be the opposite when it was time to fight!

    Of the observers, only Han Shuo alone wore a satisfied smile. When the other participating teams arrived at Soaring Cloud Mountain Range, Han Shuo instructed the divine guards to cease their preparation, rx, and loosen up. He even allowed the divine guards to drink and have fun so that they wouldn¡¯t be affected by stress. These divine guards had walked through the Eight Destion and Torment Formation. Han Shuo was not worried about their capability at all. The only thing he was worried about was that he might have given them too much pressure. Seeing that his divine guards were smiling andughing as they walked to thepetition arena, Han Shuo was not worried about that anymore.

    The close to seven hundred men strong divine guards departed following Wace¡¯s instruction.

    The easternmost part of Soaring Cloud Mountain Range was only one day¡¯s journey away from where they started. After the divine guards departed, Wace and Andre started setting up the sand table ced on the center viewing tform. Wace was holding a space divine device. Threads of divine energies steadily overflowed from it and fell on the sand table portraying the eastern part of Soaring Cloud Mountain Range. It was synchronized with the energy towers located in the region in some bizarre manner.

    After running around busily for a while, Wace suddenly stuck the space divine device at the center of the sand table and caused an intense fluctuation to spacetime around the sand table. Then, a ss-like space energy barrier formed like a dome covering the sand table.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s attentive gazes, the scene portrayed on the sand table transformed. The flora and fauna on it turned intricate and lifelike. A momentter, yet another spacetime disturbance came from the sand table.

    When the disturbance ceased, Han Shuo saw that the sand table had zoomed in on the easternmost region of Soaring Cloud Mountain Range. Everything happening in the region was clearly projected onto the table. They could even see the troops moving across the table like little ants.

    ¡°This space divine device is connected to the energy towers located in that region. Using this device, we can observe everything happening over there without taking a step away. Not only that we can keep an eye on them and make sure no mishap happens, but we will also be able to tell which team has the strongest divine guards,¡± exined Wace smilingly to the crowd after everything was properly set up. He seemed very pleased with himself.

    As expected, the crowd started praising how wonderful and miraculous the divine device was and took the opportunity to fawn on Wace implicitly. Han Shuo, however, was feeling rather uneasy. Had he knew that Wace had such a device, he wouldn¡¯t have issued some despicable orders to Barnard. He wouldn¡¯t want anyone there to watch Barnard executing his orders for it couldnd him in trouble.

 Chapter 790 - Competition

    GDK 790: Competition

    In the pastpetitions, never had such an all-epassing monitoring device been used. Wace ought to have acquired the space divine device only recently.

    Everything disyed on the sand table was real and happening live. They were just shrunk by hundreds of times in order to fit on the sand table. As miniature as the figures appeared, it was the right size for the crowd to observe everything happening in the arena without missing too many details.

    The Seven Companies marched into seven different parts of the battle arena. Upon stepping into the arena, each Company would spread into one long row and beginbing through the terrain. They were like seven straight line that travels perpendicrly.

    The patriarchs of therge family ns, the Divine Guard Chiefs, and some distinguished characters of the City of Shadows watched the sand table attentively. Chief Ralph of the Second Corps had his brows very slightly bunched. Like Han Shuo to Barnard, he too had given a special order to Kiffan. He also did not know that Wace woulde up with such a device. If Kiffan tried to kill Fifth Corps divine guards with premeditation, Wace and the others will surely notice it.

    When Ralph thought so, he too felt rather uneasy. He couldn¡¯t help but turned to look at Han Shuo. It just so happened that Han Shuo who shared the same feeling met his gaze. Ralph immediately put on a cold face and lightly groaned while Han Shuo put on a faint smile and actedposedly.

    ¡°We have cast spells on the divine essences. Once they were removed from where they were hidden, it will constantly emanate energy pulses to a wide area. Those nearby could easily detect the energy pulses... ¡° exined Wace to the crowd.

    ¡°They have just entered the arena and no one has discovered any divine essences yet. Hehe, thepetition this year is much more interesting than the past¡¯. We could even watch as thepetition progresses,¡± remarked Rugersey the Chief of Sixth Corps smilingly. He was the first of many in the crowd to give his opinion following Wace¡¯s exnation.

    Time flew by hurriedly. It had been half a day since the Seven Companies entered the arena. In the thick jungles of rugged terrains, the Seven Companies gradually grew further and further apart. They searched and sensed their surroundings carefully for any divine essences.

    The Company from the Fifth Corps nominally led by Barnard was traveling unhurried in a direction. Bonds wouldter split the Company into nine squads. Sanguis and Gilbert would each lead their own squads. The nine squads traveled in a formation that kept them rtively close together. They would always be close enough to help each other of any sudden troubles.

    ¡°Bonds, Lord Bryan wants us to plunder those from the Second Corps and ignore the First and Third Corps. But the arena is very expansive and we are growing further and further apart from other Companies. What if we cannot locate those from the Second Corps?¡± Barnard asked Bonds for advice.

    Although Barnard was officially the Captain of this Fifth Corps Company, in reality, it was Bonds who had the truemand over the Company. After having served the Third Corps for many years, Bonds was well-versed in every aspect of managing a Divine Guard Corps. In addition, he had abundant experience, excellent strength, and could always keep a calm mind. Even without any explicit orders from Han Shuo, it was clear to Barnard what he ought to do.

    ¡°No worries, I know precisely where they are,¡± replied Bonds. He had left a tracer on one of the divine guards from the Second Corps before the event.

    ¡°Those punks are so fucking arrogant! Remember how they looked at us? They are so damn punchable! Let us show them who is truly the strongest in the City of Shadows!¡± remarked Gilbert fiercely. He seemed to thirst for battle.

    ¡°The Second Corps have always ranked first in teambat strength. I believe that they will be the first to try to plunder divine essences from another Company. How about if we just preserve our energy, wait until the Second Corps have plundered most of the divine essences, and then raid them?¡± proposed Sanguis.

    Several other divine guards seconded Sanguis¡¯ proposal. They thought that it was a decent strategy.

    Bonds did not immediately respond. He thought in silence for a while before he shook his head and calmly disagreed, ¡°This is not the safest strategy. If it turns out that the Second Corps doesn¡¯t possess many divine essences, even after taking theirs, we might not have enough divine essences to take the first ce.¡±

    After a short pause, Bonds suggested, ¡°To guarantee our victory, we should at least spend some time to look for divine essences before we plunder from the Second Corps near the end of thepetition.¡±

    One of the main reasons that Bonds was the de facto leader of the Company was that he could always think clearly and would never be impulsive in making a decision. His mind would always be steps ahead of the others.

    The Company thought for a moment and realized that Bonds¡¯ suggestion would give them the greatest certainty of victory. Therefore, they decided to continue searching the arena for divine essences.

    The first piece of divine essence was located neither by the Second Corps nor the Fifth Corps, but by the team from the Sixth Corps whose Chief was Rugersey. One of their divine guards identally fell into a swamp. When he was almost fully submerged in mud, abruptly, he sensed a strange energy fluctuation underneath.

    The divine guard immediately cheered, prompting the others to dive into the mud. From its depth, they found a piece of divine essence. The swamp was specially enchanted such that only those who were submerged in its mud could detect the energy pulses from the divine essence.

    But when the piece of divine essence was removed from the swamp, the energy pulses were no longer contained to the swamp but allowed to spread far and wide.

    Han Shuo and the party observing from the center of Soaring Cloud Mountain Range saw a bright red dot appear on the sand table among thepany from the Sixth Corps. Wace pointed at it and exined, ¡°This red dot means that a divine essence has been removed from where it was hidden. Every divine essence has been specially treated so that those within a certain distance from it can detect it.¡±

    The main reason the divine essences were treated so was to encourage the Companies to fight. Otherwise, without any fighting between the Companies, they wouldn¡¯t be able to tell which of them had the greatestbat strength.

    Chief Rugersey of the Sixth Corps put on a smile. He said, ¡°It seems that my Sixth Corps is lucky!¡±

    ¡°Thepetition has just started. There¡¯s no telling if their luck will roll,¡± remarked Cami, Chief of the Fourth Corps after taking a nce at Rugersey. ¡°Besides, luck isn¡¯t the most important factor in winning thepetition.¡±

    After those of the Sixth Corps found the first divine essence, the other Companies soon found more divine essences in rocks, tree trunks, rivers, and all kinds of random and unexpected locations. They were very well hidden and only those who scan their surroundings with full attention could catch a clue.

    The Sixth Corps may start out lucky but they did not enjoy a lucky streak. Cami¡¯s Fourth Corps did not take long to emerge as the leading team by finding seven pieces of divine essences. The divine essences would blossom with dazzling lights and emanate strong energy pulses like beacons once they were unearthed. In order to encourage the Companies to fight, Wace even prohibited the divine guards from concealing the divine essences they found. The divine essences must always be exposed.

    Compared to the Fourth and Sixth Corps, the Fifth Corps led by Bonds wasn¡¯t as lucky. It appeared that there were not as many divine essences distributed in the region they choose to sweep. At this point, the Fifth Corps had obtained just two pieces of divine essences. Meanwhile, thepany from the Second Corps led by Kiffan obtained five pieces of divine essences.

    The remainder of the day had passed. The Seven Companies found some more divine essences. Cami¡¯s Fourth Corps was having a long lucky streak by obtaining five additional pieces of divine essences. The Second Corps obtained two more pieces while the Fifth Corps only found one more piece. Bond¡¯s Company had the lowest count of divine essences.

    Cami was very happy that her Fourth Corps was leading by a good margin. She said to Rugersey smilingly, ¡°See that? This is what having good luck actually looks like. It just keeps oning!¡±

    Rugersey forced a smile and replied, ¡°You yourself have said that luck isn¡¯t the most important factor.¡±

    Gradually, even more time had passed. The Seven Corps no longer discovered any more divine essences as though they had found all the divine essences that were hidden.

    ¡°That¡¯s more or less it. Around ny percent of the divine essences have been found,¡± said Andre. He said to the crowd who were watching the sand table attentively, ¡°Nowes the most exciting part of thepetition!¡±

    The Seven Companies had obtained at least some divine essences. With most of the divine essences having been unearthed, the Companies with lesser divine essences must now plunder from their opponents in order to win thepetition. Thus, the Companies will start fighting each other. In those battles, Wace and the party will be able to see which Company was the mightiest.

    Knowing it has almoste to the most interesting part of thepetition, the patriarchs and Divine Guard Chiefs watched the sand table even more intently. They wondered which two Companies will be the first to engage.

    Normally speaking, at moments like this, it would be the Second Corps, who had the strongest teambat strength that makes the first strike. Sure enough, the Company of the Second Corps led by Kiffan was heading towards the region with the strongest energy pulses ¨C towards the Company of the Fourth Corps!

    The Second Corps was renowned for their mighty strength, so much so that those from the Sixth and Seventh Corpspletely ignored Kiffan¡¯s Company who walked past them. It was clear that those from the Sixth and Seventh Corps wanted to avoid fighting them. Kiffan¡¯s strategy was simr to Bonds¡¯. He nned on plundering the team with the most divine essences and add to theirs so that his team would lead with a substantial margin before going to attack Han Shuo¡¯s Fifth Corps.

    When Cami saw that those from the Second Corps was charging towards her Fourth Corps, her face turned somewhat anxious. Those divine guards of the Second Corps trained by Ralph were famous for their terrifying strength. Her Fourth Corps had never been able to defeat the Second Corps in previouspetitions. Cami knew that her divine guards would most likely lose to those of the Second Corps again.

    However, it turned out that the first two teams to engage were not the Second and Fourth Corps but the Seventh and Fifth Corps whose Chiefs were Bat¨²k and Han Shuo. The Seventh Corps assumed that those from the Fifth Corps was the weakest. After watching those of the Second Corps walk past them, they went to attack those from the Fifth Corps.

    The two Companies came into contact and started engaging. Bat¨²k of the House of Buller secretly took a nce at Han Shuo and in his mind, he praised his subordinate for being wise. He thought, <i><i>Although the Fifth Corps did not found many divine essences, they are the easiest to plunder from. Having more divine essences is always better. My Captain sure is smart.</i></i>

 Chapter 791 - Their gap in strength is just too great

    GDK 791: Their gap in strength is just too great

    Those divine guards of the Fifth Corps had appeared too rxed to the observers. It gave everyone the false impression that the team from Han Shuo¡¯s Fifth Corps would be the easiest to defeat. Bat¨²k had a d and cheerful face when he saw his Seventh Corps divine guards began their assault on Bonds¡¯ Company, inwardly praising his subordinate for being ¡®wise¡¯.

    Not just Bat¨²k, but even Rugersey thought that Bonds¡¯ Company wouldn¡¯t be able to withstand a single blow. Rugersey looked at Bat¨²k as though Bat¨²k had grabbed the only sweet on the table before he could.

    It appeared that not just Bat¨²k, but even Rugersey¡¯s team nned on plundering divine essences from Han Shuo¡¯s team. Unfortunately for Rugersey, Wace had explicitly stated that no thirdpany must intervene while twopanies were engaging. Therefore, Rugersey¡¯s divine guards had been thwarted of the opportunity to get some free divine essences, or so he thought.

    Before the divine guards of the Fourth and Second Corps had met, Bat¨²k and Han Shuo¡¯s Seventh and Fifth Corps had started engaging.

    The observing party¡¯s attention immediately gathered on the fight. Wace and Andre were especially focused. They were very intrigued at learning the true strength of the Fifth Corps. They could do exactly that using the sand table that gave them a bird¡¯s eye view.

    Unlike Bat¨²k and Rugersey, every since the Sainte Brothers learned that Han Shuo had defeated City Lord Hofs of Hushveil City, they no longer considered Han Shuo as a regr Divine Guard Chief. When Bonds and hispany walked into the arena, the two brothers could sense an air of arrogance veiled under their cheerful and rxed mood. They were skeptical that the divine guards of the Fifth Corps would be easily defeated.

    ¡°Humph, you sure are lucky, Bat¨²k!¡± said Cami. She felt angry as she watched thepany led by Kiffan closing in on her troops menacingly. She was even more annoyed to see that Bat¨²k¡¯s subordinates had allowed Kiffan¡¯spany to walk past them unchallenged and was about to get some free scores from the Fifth Corps.

    ¡°Hehe, I am lucky to have wise subordinates!¡± replied Bat¨²kcently and cheerfully.

    After finishing those words, Bat¨²k turned to look at Han Shuo apologetically and smilingly said, ¡°Lord Bryan, although I cannot ask them to spare your team, before thepetition, I have instructed them to be as mindful as possible when they strike. You can rest assured that they will not injure your men!¡±

    Those words meant that Bat¨²k likely had given his men an instruction to target Han Shuo¡¯s Fifth Corps before thepetition. It seemed that he assumed the Fifth Corps was the weakestpeting team right from the very beginning. However, as the House of Buller still wished to purchase the medicines Han Shuo refined, it was against Bat¨²k¡¯s interests to offend Han Shuo too much and therefore he instructed his subordinates to not hit Han Shuo¡¯s divine guards too hard.

    Han Shuo was betweenughter and tears. He nodded his head and in a grateful manner, he said, ¡°Then I must thank Lord Bat¨²k in advance!¡±

    Bat¨²k was about to give a few humble and consoling words to make sure there were no hard feelings between them when his eyes happened to catch something on the sand table. His face instantly jolted and he cried out in surprise.

    Through the sand table disying a live feed of the arena, the observing party saw that the miniaturized version Bonds¡¯pany moved into a conical formation aiming at the Seventh Corps divine guards. They were like an incisive and magnificent sword being unsheathed!

    The three ck dots at the very front of the formation were Bonds, Gilbert, and Sanguis. They were the sharp tip of the de that was piercing at Seventh Corps¡¯ belly. They were charging at the brightly illuminated region with unstoppable momentum. Instead of defending against the Seventh Corps, they were going on the offensive and attempting to seize the Seventh Corps¡¯ divine essences!

    An immense murderous aura suddenly erupted from the Fifth Corps divine guards behind the vanguard made of Bonds, Gilbert, and Sanguis. Having been tempered inside the Eight Destion and Torment Formation, the divine guards had a great rapport and were well coordinated. The conical formation charged forward with overwhelming impetus.

    Gilbert at this moment was wearing an angry face as he pounded the Seventh Corps divine guards in his path using his darkness divine energy. He was whining foul-mouthed, ¡°You sons of bitches tried to pick on us because we look easy, didn¡¯t you? We didn¡¯t even n on raiding you. But since you fuckers have made the first strike, I will wipe your asses out!¡±

    Originally, Gilbert and the Company only nned on raiding the team from the Second Corps. They were still searching for more divine essences unhurriedly when without any warning, Captain Tino, wearing a most punchable, viinous smile, tried to encircle them with his men from the Seventh Corps.

    To the Dark Dragon, these men of the Seventh Corps should be grateful that his Company did not try to raid them. But not only that these people did not know how to appreciate his kindness, they even dared to initiate an assault on his Company!

    ¡°Gilbert, they are not to be killed. You better be mindful when you strike!¡± reminded Bonds in a loud voice.

    Before thepetition, Han Shuo had instructed Bonds that other than the Second Corps, he must decide the toughness of his countermeasure based on the opposing team¡¯s strength and attitude.

    After observing for a moment, Bonds can tell that Tino and hispany were only aiming to snatch their divine essences. Although these Seventh Corps divine guards were deserving of a good spanking for their reckless behavior, it was clear that they did not mean to kill. Therefore, Bonds had signalled to hispany to cause minimal harm when plundering the divine essences.

    Gilbert yielded to Bonds¡¯mand. After hearing the reminder, he cursed a few angry sentences and continued to pave the way alongside Sanguis and Bonds, ramming at Tino¡¯srades.

    At this moment, Tino, the Captain of the Company from the Seventh Corps, could not feel more regretful for initiating the offense. After seeing Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert plowing and shoving through his divine guards like mowing machines, Tino realized that he was up for some real trouble.

    Uponing to his senses, Tino gathered the most powerful experts he had to stop Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert as hemanded a few squads to attack their nks. From how Tino sees it, although the trio at the front was powerful, the rest of the Fifth Corps divine guards must be weak and could easily be defeated. After all, based on the rumors, most of the Fifth Corps divine guards were newly recruited. However, he soon discovered that he was very wrong. When the squad leaders came back to him dejectedly with reports that their nks were imprable, Tino finally realized that he was in deep trouble!

    Thepany from the Seventh Corps was unable to put up any effective resistance against the indomitable de that was thepany from the Fifth Corps. The trio of Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert was leading the divine guards behind them straight for the divine essences.

    Bat¨²k¡¯s face gradually turned dark as he watched the battle unfold on the sand table. The major patriarchs and the Divine Guard Chiefs who were discussing the situation in low voices all turnedpletely mute simultaneously.

    The party surrounding the sand table had their eyes glued to their center. Their faces were grave and solemn as they watched the Company from the Fifth Corps charged forward like a hot knife through butter.

    <i>They are not even on the same level!</i> The observing party shared the same thought.

    Han Shuo¡¯s Fifth Corps divine guards were as though an indomitable sword piercing into the soft underbelly of Seventh Corps divine guards without meeting any meaningful resistance. Using the space divine device, the observers could clearly see the valiantness and power of the Company. Against such overwhelming force, there was nothing that Tino and his Seventh Corps divine guards could do other than to run! The gap in strength was just too enormous!

    In astonishment, Wace took a nce at Han Shuo. He saw that Han Shuo was wearing an indifferent faint smile on his face. He did not seem happy or disappointed, as though nothing disyed on the sand table could affect him. Wace grew even more amazed for he knew that he himself could never achieve that state of total calmness andposure as though everything in the world was in his control.

    <i>What a mind-blowing youngster he is!</i> thought Wace. His mind automatically recalled Andre¡¯s previous proposal and his gaze turned to Andre.

    The two were standing close together and Andre immediately sensed the gaze from Wace. He put on a strange smile and remarked, ¡°I knew it, the Fifth Corps wouldn¡¯t be as easy as it seemed!¡±

    Then, suddenly, Bat¨²k cried, ¡°Lord Bryan, you are cheating!¡± When he had everyone¡¯s attention, he pointed at the trio at the vanguard of the conical formation and said, ¡°Their strengths are too powerful. All of the defenders in mypany havete-stage midgod strengths and yet they couldn¡¯t stop these three from barging in. Evidently, the three are not midgods!¡±

    The crowd started exchanging their opinions with each other after they heard Bat¨²k¡¯s usation.

    Ralph, the Chief of the Second Corps, was wearing a face just as dark as Bat¨²k¡¯s. After he saw the astonishing strength disyed by the Fifth Corps, he was even angrier than Bat¨²k. It wouldn¡¯t affect him in any way if Bat¨²k¡¯s men were defeated. However, the strength possessed by the Fifth Corps was severely threatening the position of his Second Corps in the City of Shadows.

    More importantly, Ralph had ordered Kiffan to ughter the Fifth Corps divine guards before they entered the arena. But from how things have developed so far, there was no telling which team will be ughtered!

    ¡°That¡¯s right, those three divine guards are just too strong! I don¡¯t think that three midgods could break away the defenses put up by a dozen or morete-stage midgods in such a short time!¡± remarked Ralph loudly. He red at Han Shuo coldly and asked, ¡°Lord Bryan, did you arranged a highgod into the arena?¡±

    Not just Bat¨²k and Ralph, but all other Divine Guard Chiefs were suspicious. The party¡¯s gazes gathered on Han Shuo following Ralph¡¯s usation. Only Andre had his brows bunched.

    Han Shuo chuckled and shook his head. He exined, ¡°Individuals of simr strengths can unleash power greater than just stacking up the strengths of the individuals ¨C if they know how to cooperate. This is nothing to be astonished about. If people cannot unleash greater strength when they fight in a team, then what¡¯s the point of having this teambatpetition?¡±

    ¡°Fighting in a team can indeed unleash greater strength, but the firepower disyed by those three are beyond reasonable limits!¡± rebutted Bat¨²k with his brows bunched.

    Han Shuoughed and confidently said, ¡°It is not beyond reasonable limits ¨C it just that you have never seen it before!¡±

 Chapter 792 - I accept my defeat wholeheartedly

    GDK 792: I ept my defeat wholeheartedly

    ¡°I¡¯m not buying it!¡± replied Ralph in a loud voice before he said to City Lord Wace, ¡°There must be at least one highgod among those three!¡±

    After hearing Ralph¡¯s usation, Wace bunched his brows and turned to look at Han Shuo.

    ¡°My House of Han doesn¡¯t have that many highgods yet. Before stepping into the arena, all the participants must be examined by the House of Sainte. If any of them possess highgod strength, they wouldn¡¯t be allowed to step inside. I think Lord Andre can affirm this,¡± said Han Shuo smilingly as he nodded at Andre.

    ¡°Bryan is correct, I¡¯m responsible for screening the participants. They had all inserted their divine energy into a crystal that measures their strength. If the three were allowed to enter, they cannot be highgods!¡± said Andre firmly.

    The crystal that takes one¡¯s divine energy as measurement could detect a highgod using the fact that the concentration of divine energy of a highgod was different than that of a midgod. But as Bonds and Sanguis did not cultivate in the fundamental energies found in this universe, the crystal won¡¯t detect a thing even if they had highgod strengths. As for Gilbert, he was only in the lowgod realm in the cultivation of the element of darkness. They managed to pass the test without a hitch.

    With Andre¡¯s assurance, Wace no longer had any doubts. In an indifferent tone, he said, ¡°Then it is settled. I will hear nothing more of this allegation.¡±

    Ralph and Bat¨²k were stunned, their faces filled with confusion. They knew that Andre wouldn¡¯t be lying in this setting. That left them with only one possibility ¨C none of the three in question were highgods. However, wasn¡¯t it just as unthinkable that just three midgods could unleash such terrifying power?

    Having heard Andre¡¯s assurance, the party again had their gazes gathered on Han Shuo. Their eyes were filled with doubts and astonishment. They could not understand how Han Shuo¡¯s Fifth Corps divine guards could be so outstanding!

    The battle did not pause while the observers had their little argument. On the sand table, Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert had broken through nearly all the defensesid out by the Seventh Corps and arrived at the region where the brightly glowing divine essences were kept.

    To Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert, plundering the divine essences from the Seventh Corps wasn¡¯t that difficult of a challenge. In fact, to them, the Seventh Corps had lost the battle the moment they came into view.

    The Fifth Corps divine guards followed closely behind the trio at the vanguard. They handled every attack from both nks without any trouble. They too had stepped into the center region protected by the Seventh Corps divine guards.

    ¡°Circle them!¡± shouted Bonds coldly. The conical formation started transforming. The Fifth Corps divine guards behind him spread out and surrounded the Seventh Corps divine guards.

    ¡°Do not kill!¡± Bonds reminded his divine guards again. He then nodded at Sanguis and Gilbert.

    The Fifth Corps divine guards started bombarding the area with densely packed ranged attacks. With theirrades covering them, the trio charged even deeper into Seventh Corps¡¯ territory. Bonds and Sanguis were at the leading front. Intense killing intent overflowed from their bodies. Sanguis¡¯ broadsword that was made using Blood Crystal erupted with blinding blood-red radiance. All those Seventh Corps divine guards that in his vicinity could not circte their divine energies normally as their blood was moving chaotically.

    With the broadsword amplifying the power of Sanguis¡¯ Bloodgod Mantra, his skin and eyes grew as red as blood. The divine guards who came near him would automatically withdraw in fear when they noticed that their blood started moving abnormally.

    Bonds¡¯ flying sword glistened with cold radiance. Bits of starlike sword radiance twinkled as it forced the defending divine guards to retreat.

    Both Sanguis and Bonds specialized in the cultivation of demonic arts and therefore they both possessed a bizarrely terrifying aura unique to demonic art cultivators. To add on to that, they were both overflowing with raging killing intent. It was more than enough to scare the Seventh Corps divine guards witless.

    After much charging and barging, Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert finally arrived before the divine guard in charge of holding the divine essences. When they pointed their swords at the person, he most cooperatively handed the divine essences to the trio. His eyes were clearly glinting with respect.

    The Companies in the Soaring Cloud Mountain Range were only sparring with each other. As they were all divine guards of the City of Shadows, they wouldn¡¯t go all out and fight to their deaths. The divine guard had been watching how smoothly the Fifth Corps broke through theyers of defenses put up by hisrades. He knew that there was no point in giving any more resistance.

    Sanguis received the divine essences and nodded. Immediately, Sanguis courteously cupped his hands and said, ¡°Many apologies!¡±

    That divine guard seemed rather surprised. He hastily replied, ¡°No problem, no problem!¡± From his point of view, Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert had no reason to be so courteous to the opponent they defeated.

    Sanguis, after having been around Han Shuo for so long, managed to learn some of his sophistication. He learned when he should be overbearing and domineering and when to be urbane and mannered. Sanguis was doing exactly what Han Shuo would do in this situation.

    When the divine guard saw that Sanguis was leaving right after taking the divine essences, he hastily cried, ¡°I hope you guys can beat those from the Second Corps!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about that, we will make the Second Corps crawl under our feet!¡± eximed Gilbert in a savage smile.

    ¡°Cut the chit chat and move!¡± instructed Bonds as he departed. Sanguis and Gilbert quickly followed behind him.

    The Company from the Seventh Corps knew that they were no match against those of the Fifth Corps. They did not put up any futile struggle but watched as Bonds, Gilbert, and Sanguis left with their divine essences.

    ***

    Back at the center of Soaring Cloud Mountain Range, Bat¨²k sighed, shook his head, and remarked, ¡°I ept my defeat wholeheartedly!¡±

    From start to finish, the Fifth Corps had firmly held the upper hand over the Seventh Corps. Tino and his Company were on the defensive all throughout the battle. When Bat¨²k saw that the divine essences had been taken and his Seventh Corps divine guards seemed to be unharmed, although difficult, Bat¨²k finally let go of his stubbornness and conceded.

    ¡°Please don¡¯t feel upset about it, Lord Bat¨²k. It was nothing but luck!¡± consoled Han Shuo in an amiable smile.

    Any fool could see that the Fifth Corps had overwhelmed the Seventh Corps with strength and luck was not involved in determining the oue. It was clear to the crowd that Han Shuo was being humble. Bat¨²k¡¯s heart felt a little better to see that Han Shuo remained polite and modest instead of being an arrogant prick. He forced a smile and nodded but said no word.

    Erebus suddenly went forward and patted on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulder. He said, ¡°You amazing chap, you never fail to astonish us!¡± Then, after a short pause, Erebus side nced at the dark-faced Ralph and eximed, ¡°So it turns out that you weren¡¯t making baseless assertion back at Aobashi¡¯s camp!¡±

    Aobashi who had been standing near Andre abruptly appeared beside Han Shuo. She said, ¡°Bryan, defeat the Second Corps! I¡¯m rooting for you!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded with a calm smile and said with confidence, ¡°Don¡¯t worry about that, my Fifth Corps will surely emerge victorious against the Second Corps!¡±

    ¡°Humph!¡± Ralph standing nearby gave a cold, angry nce at them and groaned.

    It was clear to the observers that of all the Companies in the arena, only those of the Fifth Corps stood a real chance of contending against those of the Second Corps. The reason that Ralph could retain such a firm footing in the City of Shadows despite being so unpopr was that his Second Corps was the strongest in teambat strength. If Han Shuo¡¯s Company could defeat Ralph¡¯s in thepetition, it will be a tremendous blow to Ralph.

    Everyone in the spectator field was either very wealthy or powerful or both. But a great majority of them loathed Ralph. These people would love to watch Ralph suffer a crushing defeat more than anything. Their eyes were filled with malicious joy when they looked at Ralph.

    ¡°The Second and Fourth Corps have started fighting!¡± eximed Rugersey suddenly.

    The party¡¯s immediately turned their attention back to the sand table. Through the miniaturized arena projected on the sand table, the spectators could clearly see thepany from the Second Corps charging straight at the Fourth Corps with menacing force. The Second Corps had always been ruthless and brutal in thepetition. Even though they (usually) do not kill their opponents, causing grave injuries were anything but unusual.

    All those Second Corps divine guards led by Kiffan were among the small number of people who had been to the bloodiest of battlefields and returned ¨C the fittest who survived. They will always cause injuries when they strike. It did not take them long to give arge number of the Fourth Corps divine guards broken arms and legs.

    idental injuries were bound to happen when divine guardpanies fight each other in thepetition. As not to make fighting too restrictive while keeping things rtively benign, it was made into the rules that premeditated killing be forbidden and each team was limited in the number of idental deaths they may cause. However, it was also made permissible to cause non-fatal injuries.

    One of the main reasons that the Second Corps was so unpopr was that they would always cause unnecessary injuries to their opponents in every single centennialpetition.

    It was clear to all that the Second Corps had much greater strength than the Fourth Corps. With such a great superiority in strength, those of the Second Corps could easily seize the divine essences without injuring anyone. Any yet, it was the exact opposite of what they would do. These Second Corps divine guards were taught to disregard the lives of their ownrades in their cruel and inhuman training. In their eyes, they had been very polite to only cause some injuries.

    With the number of divine guards wounded mounting higher and higher, Cami¡¯s face grew darker and darker. The Chief of Fourth Corps had a shivering clenched fist as she held back the anger in her heart and continued to watch the battle unfold on the sand table. She hated Ralph to the bones!

    Bat¨²k¡¯s Company was in a simr situation just a few moments ago but Han Shuo¡¯s Fifth Corps divine guards had injured not a single one of Bat¨²k¡¯s divine guards. Cami grew even more angered when she recalled it while Bat¨²k was secretly d that he was not Cami.

    ¡°Every ¨C freaking ¨C time!¡± eximed Erebus softly. He remarked as though talking to himself, ¡°This guy just has to injure others even though it is clearly unnecessary. I¡¯m afraid that if there everes a day that he loses power in the City, everyone will add insult to his misfortune!¡±

    Han Shuo thought about Erebus¡¯ words and couldn¡¯t help but turned to take a look at Ralph. He thought, <i>This guy is a lunatic. I better be prepared just in case if that happens and he does something in madness.</i>

    As expected, the Fourth Corps was no match against the Second Corps. After ten minutes of wounding the Fourth Corps divine guards, the Second Corps left with all of their divine essences.

    The Second Corps then went on to continue their rampage and raided Rugersey¡¯s Sixth Corps and Erebus¡¯ Third Corps. Although the Third Corps was stronger than the Sixth and Fourth Corps, they were still no match against the Second Corps. They were also defeated by the Second Corps after dozens of their men were wounded.

    Rugersey, Cami, and Erebus had dark faces. Their eyes were glinting with wrath when they glowered at Ralph. However, Ralph remained unperturbed.

    It was at this moment that the Company from the Fifth Corps suddenly altered their heading and rapidly advanced towards those of the Second Corps.

    Wace, Andre, Rugersey, Erebus, and all the spectators immediately widened their eyes and ced their focus on the Fifth Corps. They were looking forward to the battle between the Fifth and Second Corps!

 Chapter 793 - Death

    GDK 793: Death

    All of the spectators could see that the only Company that had the potential to defeat the Second Corps was those of the Fifth Corps. That was something that even Ralph cannot deny!

    The Divine Guard Chiefs of the City of Shadows knew each other¡¯s strengths well. They all knew just how terrifying the divine guards Ralph produced were. Although Aobashi¡¯s First Corps had yet to engage the Second Corps, by extrapting on historical trends, the spectators thought it likely that the First Corps would again lose to the Second Corps.

    On that year, the only team that had outperformed their past performances was the Fifth Corps. They had cleanly and sessfully plundered divine essences from the Seventh Corps, showing their extraordinary strength.

    <i><i>The strength they disyed seemed extraordinary. Will Ralph¡¯s Second Corps finally be defeated?</i></i> some of the spectators hopes while some doubted. Their gazes were gathered on the sand table, fully concentrated on the two forces that were on the verge of making contact.

    Han Shuo still had that same old unruffled smile. His divine guards tempered in the Eight Destion and Torment Formation and trained by Cauldron Spirit had all mastered the simple but unique demonicbat techniques that would bring out their full potential.

    The divine guards produced by the Second Corps had outstanding strength but strength was not the only factor that determines the oue in a team battle. The unity of the team and overall coordination were also critical. Han Shuo was sure that his Fifth Corps team surpasses the Second Corps team in this aspect.

    In addition, the Fifth Corps team had Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert of extraordinary strengths. Sanguis and Bonds possessed attack methods unlike any others. Han Shuo was sure that the trio could make a huge, unexpected difference during critical moments!

    After plundering the divine essences from most of theirpetitors, Kiffan went to seek out the Fifth Corps as Ralph hadmanded. The distances between the two Companies were rapidly reducing. It became clear that the conflict was bound to happen.

    When the two teams were about to meet, Han Shuo felt somewhat uneasy. The spectators could clearly see everything happening in the arena through the sand table. Han Shuo was afraid that Bonds and his Company might do something very illegal right before the eyes of Wace and the spectators. Ralph was even more nervous than Han Shuo for he had ordered Kiffan to kill all the Fifth Corps divine guards he can. With so many discerning eyes watching the battle, he would immediately be caught if Kiffan tried to intentionally killed someone.

    But it was toote now for Han Shuo or Ralph to do anything!

    The inevitable battle finally broke out. Kiffan, leading his Second Corps divine guards with unstoppable momentum and overbearing force charged at the Fifth Corps divine guards. Hemanded in a loud, cold voice, ¡°Attack! No need to be polite!¡±

    The Second Corps had sessfully plundered divine essences from the Fourth, Sixth, and Third Corps. Their morale was as high as ever. Every one of them was steaming with the desire to ughter. These divine guards who had survived the cruelest trial and training had greater individual strength than that of any otherpanies. They charged ahead in a fierce and vicious face. It was frightening to stand in their path.

    Bonds gestured at his divine guards and calmlymanded, ¡°The Second Corps is nothing like the Seventh Corps. Assume defensive position!¡±

    These Fifth Corps divine guards had braved through countless deadly situations in the Eight Destion and Torment Formation. Their tempered minds were very staunch and firm, not at all affected by the imposing and murderous demeanor seething from the Second Corps divine guards. Following Bonds¡¯ instructions, the Fifth Corps divine guards immediately spread out into a U-formation facing the Second Corps divine guards.

    ¡°Let them in!¡± Bonds continued to deliver methodical orders to his divine guards. He did not charge blindly as he did against the Seventh Corps.

    All the Fifth Corps divine guards looked on coldly at the attacking Second Corps. Following Bonds¡¯mand, the formation again transformed orderly. It turned into multiple smaller U-formations that could fit five to six people. The divine guards were spaced around two to three meters apart ¨C a distance suitable for them to assist each other while not obstructing each other.

    On the sand table, the Company from the Fifth Corps was as though a beautiful andplicated origami being unfolded. They took little time to rearrange themselves into a neat and tidy formation. It was clear to the spectators that every Fifth Corps divine guard was the same distance apart. The half-ring they formed looked as though a diagram drawn after making precise measurements of angles and distances.

    A radiance of astonishment shed from the spectator¡¯s eyes. Even without looking at the Fifth Corps¡¯ strength, from their ability to get into such an orderly and well-coordinated formation in little time, the spectators knew just how much effort had been put into training the divine guards. It looked as though the divine guards knew where they should be in the formation in order to maximize their power.

    <i><i>How remarkable!</i></i> thought the spectators.

    Ralph was a knowledgeable person. It took him just one look at that incredible coordination disyed by the Fifth Corps divine guards to realize just how much effort must have been put on team training. The most terrifying divine guard Companies were usually those that could fight as a team. For some reason, Ralph suddenly felt uneasy about his divine guards charging into the formation recklessly.

    The battle finally broke out!

    The first to attack wasn¡¯t those of the Second Corps but the Fifth Corps from their defensive position!

    Right when Kiffan and his Second Corps divine guards arrived at the center of the semi-circr formation, Bonds, in a callous face, gestured with his hand. The Fifth Corps divine guards suddenlyunched a hail of ranged attacks at Kiffan and hispany, catching some by surprise.

    Sanguis and Gilbert left the formation and charged at Kiffan. Bonds did not directly participate in the battle but kept on shoutingmands from his ce, directing the Fifth Corps divine guards to attack the Second Corps divine guards from all sides. As themanding officer, Bonds did not make any rash decisions but instructed suitable adjustments to the team after careful observation. They managed to hold back the assailing Second Corps divine guards.

    If broken down into individual divine guards, the Second Corps had greater strength than the Fifth Corps. However, thetter was way superior in terms of rapport between team members. With the Fifth Corps divine guards working with each other like the lubricated gears of a well-built machine, With the attacking bombarding them so frequently, the Second Corps divine guards did not have the opportunity to make counterattacks.

    The order Han Shuo gave to Bonds was very simple ¨C to kill the Second Corps divine guards mercilessly! And Bonds had carried out the order faithfully. In just a short time, many of the Second Corps divine guards were injured.

    ¡°Beautiful! This is what real teamwork looks like!¡± eximed Cami. In an excited and cheerful face, she said to Han Shuo, ¡°This is an eye-opener. Every member of your FIfth Corps truly considers themselves a part of the team. None of them break away and abandon their teammates under such stress. They even manage to defend their position perfectly, blocking up every gap that the attackers try to reach. Truly extraordinary!¡±

    After a short pause, Cami took a quick nce at Ralph disdainfully and added, ¡°The attackers, although made up of individuals of greater strengths, they are far behind the Fifth Corps in teamwork!¡±

    Cami¡¯s Fourth Corps had suffered severe injuries from Kiffan¡¯spany. She seemed very happy to watch the assants getting a taste of their own medicine and she repeatedly made sneeringments to irritate Ralph.

    Naturally, Rugersey and Erebus whose divine guards had also suffered simr harm from Ralph¡¯s men wouldn¡¯t miss out on this opportunity. Erebus remarked, ¡°That is very true. It looks like the Second Corps have caught a Tartar! Strongest in teambat strength? Not anymore!¡±

    ¡°It seems to me that they became strongest in teambat strength merely by bunching the strongest divine guards together. From the looks of it now, they too do not know how to bring out the strength as a team!¡±mented Rugersey.

    The three turned rather happy for they felt that Han Shuo had pped Ralph in the face on their behalf. They keep on side ncing at Ralph with their gloating eyes while makingments with their jeering words. Ralph¡¯s face turned darker and darker.

    Ralph understood themon sense that one mouth is no match against three mouths. Although he was extremely annoyed and angered, he did not make a retort. In addition, he knew that if he did retort, the three major patriarchs might join the three in mocking him. He had offended way too many people!

    ¡°Are you bunch done yet?¡± Wace could not take it any longer and he scolded.

    With Wace having spoken, Erebus, Cami, and Rugersey tactfully shut their mouths. The three had big, satisfied smiles on their faces after getting a little revenge for their losses. They continued to watch the battle on the sand table.

    <i><i>Just you wait!</i></i> thought Ralph with his teeth clenched. He was considering how to give the three a lesson after thepetition was over.

    ¡°Someone got killed!¡± eximed Andre suddenly.

    The spectators were jolted and they immediately ceased their teasing. The put on solemn faces and ced their attention back on that sand table.

    A divine guard of the Second Corps fell to the barrages of ranged attacks. Although all that one could see of him was a small ck dot on the sand table, one could tell that he was dead simply from the fact that he was still and stationary. Otherwise, he would be doing something about the countless attacksnding on his body!

    Wace¡¯s expression changed. He raised his head from the sand table and looked at Han Shuo. In his eyes there was a clear intention to inquire. Han Shuo forced a smile and shrugged at Wace, indicating that he had no idea how the situation happened. Though he may appear normal, Han Shuo was feeling rather uneasy.

    ¡°He should not have perished!¡± said Andre. After taking a short pause, he exined, ¡°If any of his teammates around him had provided assistance, he would only suffer light injuries. However, during the critical moment, his teammates had coldly withdrawn and abandoned him. It is his ownrades that cause his death!¡±

    Wace¡¯s face jolted very slightly after hearing those words. The Second Corps would always assault wildly in every one of thepetition. Many of their ws were covered by their terrifying individual strengths. Once they engaged their enemy, they would usually quickly overwhelm them with brute strength. They had never been in such a passive situation before and therefore their indifference towards their fellowrades was not revealed until now.

    Andre¡¯s word had undoubtedly pushed the me to the Second Corps. Han Shuo became slighter more at ease and he looked at Andre in a faint smile. He knew that with Andre¡¯s exnation, Wace will not be putting the me on him.

    ¡°Another death!¡± eximed Bat¨²k. He raised his head to look at Ralph and said, ¡°It is the same situation again! It seems that your troops will never care to assist or give a damn about the life of theirrades. Is this what you call teamwork?¡±

 Chapter 794 - Resounding Victory

    GDK 794: Resounding Victory

    Through the sand table, the spectators could see that more and more Second Corps divine guards died to the hailstorm of ranged attacks. The Second Corps divine guards were abnormally indifferent to the lives of their fellowrades. They cared not of their fellow soldiers.

    It was because of such selfishness and absolute disregard of their teammates that those Second Corps divine guards who could have easily get away with light injuries ended up with severe injuries and death!

    None of them had any regard for theirpanion. They had nil team spirit!

    Ralph¡¯s face grew darker and darker. He had put his divine guards through extremely cruel training that developed no trusts between theirrades. There was no unity between them, much less any teamwork!

    Once their Achilles heel was revealed, the Second Corps started crumbling fast. With Bonds having received that special instruction of Han Shuo¡¯s, he calmly passed down more and more mercilessmands, sending heavier and denser attacks, greatly increasing the casualties of the Second Corps!

    ¡°Fascinating, how fascinating!¡± eximed Aobashi. She looked at Ralph with cold eyes and ridiculed, ¡°Your training has not turned them into divine guards, but a bunch of mindless beasts! Although it is true that they have outstanding strength and is fearless of death, they know nothing about teamwork or assisting each other. They have lost the battle before it begins!¡±

    Wace turned to look at Ralph with slightly bunched brows in silence. For the first time in history, he had doubts about Ralph and the training method he employed.

    The battle went on...

    The Second Corps divine guards were indeed powerful and valiant. Not a single divine guard showed any sign of wanting to give up against the barrages of fierce attacks of the Fifth Corps. They continued to charge in the direction of Fifth Corps¡¯s divine essences valiantly without fear of death. At this moment, Sanguis and Gilbert were fighting against Kiffan and five Second Corps divine guards.

    Kiffan and his five divine guards tried to harm Sanguis and Gilbert at the cost of wounding themselves. Their cold eyes were fixed on Sanguis and Gilbert as they tried to kill him. Every attack of theirs was meant to take lives. They had forgotten all the rules of engagement.

    Sanguis and Gilbert were no saints either. They had clearly heard Bonds¡¯mand and knew of Han Shuo¡¯s intention. Just like Kiffan and his men, Sanguis and Gilbert also utilize deadly power in every strike they make. The two forces were equally matched and neither side had the upper hand, for the moment.

    None of the Second Corps divine guards could break through the defensive barrier put up by Bonds and his Fifth Corps divine guards. Those who tried to storm forward would be greeted by ever fiercer and denser attacks. Those brave but foolish souls would end up injured or killed.

    The Fifth Corps divine guards remain very well coordinated even as the battle progressed. They continued tounch attacked methodically as Bonds instructed to inflict maximum harm. The Second Corps was unable to ovee the Fifth Corps¡¯s defense. The longer the battle went on, the more disadvantageous it became for the Second Corps. Severy injuries and casualties started to pile up.

    Given the circumstances, it was clear to any fool that the best thing Second Corps could do is to retreat and abandon their divine essences for resistance would be futile.

    However, that thought never came to their mind. Even though it was clear that thepany from the Second Corps would lose, none of the divine guards retreated. They continued to push forward recklessly and with no regard for their own lives.

    Therefore even more Second Corps divine guards were injured. The casualties had far exceeded every quota there is!

    ¡°Ralph, you should order your men to retreat,¡± said Andre in a clear and stern voice. As he looked at Ralph with a solemn face, he added, ¡°If you let them go on, you are going to lose all your elite divine guards!¡±

    ¡°No! They have not lost yet!¡± replied Ralph loudly, wearing a stubborn and exasperated face.

    By now, everyone could tell that the Second Corps was on the back foot. Theirbat strength was diminishing as the casualties were mounting.

    On the contrary, the Fifth Corps was still going strong and brimming with energy. It seemed as though the oue has been preordained!

    Perhaps Ralph had never considered losing being an option. He was still unwilling to give up or admit that he had been defeated even though the situation was clear.

    ¡°You deserved it!¡± remarked Carmelita. She then raised her head and smiled at Han Shuo. She seemed very delighted.

    Wace could not bear to watch the ughter longer andmanded in a deep and loud voice, ¡°Ralph, order your men to withdraw.¡±

    Ralph was Wace¡¯s most loyal hound. He listens to absolutely no one but followed every word of Wace¡¯s. Although it was clear from his face that he was unwilling, Ralph nheless took out a magical messaging crystal and connected to Kiffan. Under the gazes of the crowd, hemanded Kiffan to cease the futile attacks.

    ¡°What a bunch of mad beasts!¡± Bonds heaved a sigh of relief in his mind when he saw the wild Second Corps stopped their assault. If the battle were to let continue, they could end up wiping out the entirepany of the Second Corps divine guards which Bonds guessed could bring Han Shuo big troubles.

    ¡°Fuckers, why cower so suddenly? Keep on fighting me if you have balls!¡± Gilbert cursed and shouted when he saw the Second Corps had suddenly given up. He wasn¡¯t happy that he had not scored any kills yet.

    Of the one hundred men strongpany from the Second Corps, less than thirty werepletely unharmed. Twenty of them were killed. The rest had sustained at least some injuries. In contrast, only ten of the Fifth Corps divine guards sustained light injuries. None were severely injured or killed. Theirbat strength remained basically the same as before the battle started.

    It was obvious which team was stronger!

    After examining the losses on both sides, the crowd again stared at Han Shuo in astonishment. They had never imagined the Fifth Corps to possess such terrifying teambat strength!

    ¡°I think there is no need to continue thepetition any longer,¡± Aobashi forced a smile and said to Wace, ¡°The First Corps is obviously no match against Bryan¡¯s divine guards.¡±

    After having spectated thepetition for some time, Aobashi had a rough idea of the Fifth Corps¡¯ true strength. Against the Fifth Corps¡¯s perfect team coordination, the Second Corps was like an egg smashed at a rock. Aobashi did not think that her divine guards were better than the Second Corps in teambat strength. She thought that as the oue was obvious, she might as well save time and surrender.

    The only team in the arena that had not battled with any team was the First Corps. All the other sixpanies had shown their strength inbat and it was clear to the spectators how they ranked. With Aobashi now giving up, it meant that the Fifth Corps has won thepetition!

    The crowd could not deny the overwhelming strength that the Fifth Corps disyed. With no objections, Wace nodded and agreed to Aobashi¡¯s surrender. In a loud and deep voice, he announced, ¡°I hereby dere that the teampetition has now concluded. The Fifth Corps wins!¡±

    ¡°Thank you, thank you!¡± Han Shuo nodded at each and every person of the crowd in a big smile as a gesture of politeness. When it was Ralph¡¯s turn, Han Shuo¡¯s smile turned even bigger and more cheerful. Heughed heartily and said, ¡°My apologies, Lord Ralph. It seems that my subordinates are slightly stronger than yours!¡±

    Ralph¡¯s face seemed twisted as though someone had stomped on his face. With many mocking eyes of his rivals ridiculing him, Ralph could not wish more to dash forward and fight Han Shuo right there. But with great difficulty, he managed to suppress his impulse. He nodded slowly at Han Shuo and said, ¡°I will make you regret this in thepetition between Chiefs!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes turned even more cheerful. He calmly replied, ¡°Excellent, I too look forward to having a real fight with you!¡±

    ¡°Bryan!¡± Wace suddenly cried out. In a rather displeased face, he red at Han Shuo and asked, ¡°So many of the Second Corps divine guards have died. How are you going to justify that?¡±

    ¡°They are idents!¡± replied Han Shuo immediately. In an innocent face, he exined, ¡°Lord Andre has said it just then. It is the Second Corps divine guards who let their ownrades die. It has nothing to do with us!¡±

    ¡°The first few may be idents, but after the first few, not only did your divine guards not exercise restraint, they started attacking even more ferociously at their weakness. Are those idents as well?¡± rebutted Wace loudly in a dark face.

    ¡°Erm... This... That... ¡° Han Shuo was at a loss for words and did not know what to answer.

    ¡°Elder Brother, you cannot fully fault Bryan on this. The Second Corps has always been very savage and brutal to their opponents. They are unafraid of death and willing to sacrifice their lives for victory. If Bryan¡¯s subordinates were to lower their guard, the Second Corps could likely break through their defense. And once that happens, they will be merciless towards those men of Bryan¡¯s. Therefore, the Fifth Corps divine guards had no choice but to keep fighting as fierce as they could!¡± Andre pleaded for Han Shuo. He had always been very thoughtful of Han Shuo and he too disliked Ralph.

    After hearing Andre¡¯s words, Rugersey, Cami, Erebus, Aobashi, Bat¨²k, and even the three major patriarchs stated their opinions. Their general message was that the Fifth Corps may have been a little rash but they did nothing wrong. Not a single one of them sided with Ralph¡¯s divine guards. Ralph constantly swept his sinister and cold gaze across the crowd as he stood alone in the corner.

    Han Shuo may be wearing a forced smile but in his mind, he wasughing madly. He thought, <i>Served you right, Ralph! That¡¯s what you get for being such a dick to everyone!</i>

    With so many people pleading for Han Shuo, considering that the Goddess of Destiny had a good impression on Han Shuo, Wace decided not to hand any punishment. In the end, Wace only chided Han Shuo a few words. He asked Han Shuo to be more cautious next time and not be so savage to the fellow divine guards of the City.

    Han Shuo was a tactful person. He repeatedly nodded and said yes, iming that he will scold his subordinates heavily for it.

    And so the matter was concluded.

    Under Wace¡¯s instruction, Andre sent messengers to the arena and announced that thepetition was over. As to reward the divine guards, Wace did not retake the divine essences but dered that the finders can keep them.

    Soon enough, all thepanies in the battle arena received the news. With the spectators watching, they gathered into lines and left the arena, heading back to their respective campsites.

    Although the teampetition had concluded in advance, Wace did not move thepetition between Chiefs ahead. Hemanded that the crowd disperse and that thepetition between Divine Guard Chiefs will take ce in three days as scheduled.

    The crowd dispersed and went in their own ways. Some were happy while some were disappointed. While the Divine Guard Chiefs were leaving, Wace suddenly shot a nce at Ralph and nodded lightly.

    Ralph did not leave and stayed there silently. He knew that Wace had words for him.

 Chapter 795 - She is interested in you!

    <strong>GDK 795: She is interested in you!</strong>

    Ralph may be unfriendly to everyone, but his loyalty to Wace was unquestionable. Despite the fact that no one liked Ralph, Wace trusted him all the same.

    One by one the Divine Guard Chiefs and family n patriarchs dispersed. Andre understood that his brother Wace wanted to have a word with Ralph so he turned to Carmelita smilingly as said, ¡°Let¡¯s go, Carmelita!¡± Carmelita nodded knowingly and followed, leaving Wace and Ralph alone in the viewing stand.

    ¡°About what happened today, well, don¡¯t take it to heart,¡± after looking around and seeing that no one else was around, Wace took a deep look at Ralph and consoled him.

    ¡°My Lord, I refuse to concede!¡± said Ralph with his head lowered. A stifled growl came from his throat. He then raised his head and said to Wace, ¡°I have always trained the Second Corps divine guards in the manner which Your Lordship hasmanded. It is always the Second Corps that handled and solved the most dangerous and challenging missions. We did not obtain the strength, power, and privilege we have through mere luck but exchanging it with the lives of our divine guards. It did note without great sacrifices.¡±

    ¡°I understand,¡± Wace nodded calmly and said, ¡°It is the Second Corps that have resolved countless challenging issues that gued the City. Rest assured, the Second Corps¡¯ position will not be affected by today¡¯s oue.¡± After taking a short pause, Wace added, ¡°No matter what happens, the Second Corps belongs to the House of Sainte. And no matter how strong the Fifth Corps bes, it belongs to Bryan; it belongs to the House of Han. Can you get what I¡¯m saying?¡±

    Ralph stared nkly and thought in silence for a moment before he replied, ¡°Yes, understood!¡±

    Ralph and his Second Corps were powers wielded by Wace which he used for securing his own position and privilege. Wace needed someone to intimidate the other major family ns for him; someone who will be unpopr; someone like Ralph.

    As the City Lord of the City of Shadows, Wace must not act in a certain manner that would tarnish his image and public reputation. But fortunately for Wace, he had Ralph. Wace did not have to sully his hands for Ralph will make the lives of those Wace disliked very miserable. Ralph would take the me and be the hated viin while Wace remained a just ruler. Due to the unique nature of Ralph¡¯s role, he was destined to be hated by almost everyone, even some from the House of Sainte.

    All this was of Wace¡¯s design. It was all because of Wace that Ralph would be as unpopr as he was.

    After hearing Wace¡¯s words, Ralph understood that even if the entire City of Shadows despised him, Wace the City Lord will still have his back because he and the Second Corps existed for Wace. Just as they relied upon Wace, Wace relied upon them.

    ¡°Excellent,¡± Wace put on a faint smile and said, ¡°So, in summary, regardless of whether you have won or lost thepetition, yours and the Second Corps¡¯ position in the City will not be affected whatsoever.¡±

    ¡°Understood, my Lord!¡± Ralph was finally at ease. Shortly after, he sneered grimly and said, ¡°In thepetition between Divine Guard Chiefs happening in three days, I will be sure to humiliate him!¡±

    Wace shook his head and looked at Ralph somewhat pitifully. He let out a soft sigh and said, ¡°Forget about it. You don¡¯t stand much of a chance defeating him in a duel.¡± Wace knew that Han Shuo had managed to amputate Hofs, the City Lord of Hushveil City and ate-stage highgod who was much stronger than Ralph. If Han Shuo could defeat Hofs, then Han Shuo could easily defeat Ralph.

    ¡°That¡¯s impossible! I¡¯m sure I can defeat him!¡± asserted Ralph confidently. He solemnly vowed, ¡°Rest assured, my Lord, I will crush him!¡±

    Needless to say, Wace wouldn¡¯t reveal to Ralph about the fact Han Shuo had defeated Hofs. Although Wace knew with absolute certainty that Ralph was no match against Han Shuo, there wasn¡¯t much that he could say to convince Ralph so. Therefore, he only told Ralph to be careful in the duel.

    Ralph¡¯s mind was eased after having received the consoling words of Wace¡¯s. He left the viewing stage and returned to his campsite to punish his divine guards who had failed him and to prepare to avenge his defeat in three days.

    ***

    Aobashi and Erebus went to the Fifth Corps campsite cheerfully with bottles of fine wine in their hands. They came to celebrate Han Shuo¡¯s victory. Erebus looked especially delighted as though it was his own Third Corps divine guards who had won thepetition.

    ¡°Oh? Who are you?¡± Soon after stepping into the campsite, Erebus noticed Spider Goddess Rose who was standing beside Han Shuo. As they were both cultivators of the energy of darkness, Erebus was able to perceive the terrifying power Rose possessed in no time.

    As Han Shuo was worried that someone might recognize Rose, he rarely took Rose to ces crowded with strangers. Therefore, it was only now that Erebus and Aobashi have met Rose for the first time.

    Aobashi too was stunned for after secretly sensing for a moment, she discovered that this beauty wearing a dark headscarf had the same strength as herself.

    <i>Since when does this chap have such a powerful expert by his side?</i> thought the astonished Erebus and Aobashi.

    ¡°She is Rose, a guard of my House of Han,¡± Han Shuo introduced Rose to the two smilingly.

    Rose was always cold to everyone. She nodded at Erebus and Aobashi and left without a word.

    The campsite was enormous and there were Fifth Corps divine guards scattered everywhere. Rose disappeared from their sights in no time.

    ¡°You sure are remarkable, Bryan. Your House of Han has only just started out but you have managed to recruit an expert of this grade!¡± praised Erebus as he casually tossed a bottle of fine wine to Han Shuo. He smilingly added, ¡°You really are inconceivably amazing. I thought that Ralph¡¯s Second Corps will always take the monopoly of the first ce. But unexpectedly, you have managed to defeat him!¡±

    ¡°And just how long has it been since you took over the Fifth Corps? A bright future awaits you, Bryan!¡± praised Aobashi smilingly.

    ¡°Oh? Isn¡¯t this Lord Aobashi and Lord Erebus? I have arrived at the Mountain Range just today and heard that Lord Bryan has defeated the Second Corps and avenged my Aunt. I havee to express our gratitude to Lord Bryan!¡± an elegant voice came from the distance. Jiya of the Kinson Family was seen walking to the party gracefully in a lovely smile.

    Han Shuo fell into a daze. He did not expect that this beauty of the House of Kinson woulde to thank him personally. Kiffan and his team had injured many of Cami¡¯s Fourth Corps divine guards. During the conflict with Ralph, Cami had defended and sided with Han Shuo. She was grateful to Han Shuo for his Fifth Corps¡¯ teaching Kiffan and hispany a bloody lesson.

    ¡°Do Lord Bryan find me unweing?¡± asked Jiya softly in a somewhat uneasy voice when he saw Han Shuo stand nkly.

    ¡°How would I find a beauty like you unweing? Haha, I¡¯m just worried that Miss Jiya will find a crude army camp like mine unpleasant,¡± replied Han Shuoughingly.

    ¡°Thank you for the polite words, Lord Bryan,¡± replied Jiya smilingly. Then, with her bright eyes, she nced through the divine guards standing behind Han Shuo. Her gaze lingered a little longer at Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert than the others. She then praised, ¡°Lord Bryan is truly extraordinary for being able to train the Fifth Corps divine guards to such a level in such a short time!¡±

    ¡°They are talented. I did not do much at all,¡± replied Han Shuo very modestly. The two continued to exchange pleasantries for a while.

    Jiya was outstandingly beautiful. Her charming appearance had gathered the gazes of all the divine guards in the area. These divine guards were wearing Lenny faces. It seemed to them that this Jiya who was renowned for her beauty in the City of Shadows was throwing herself to Han Shuo. They secretly admired their Chief¡¯s ability to charm beautifuldies.

    Although Rose was also a beauty, she would always be ice-cold towards everyone. In addition, Han Shuo¡¯s divine guards had all witnessed Rose¡¯s inhuman strength. They were all afraid of Rose and revering of her. They dared not to look at Rose with unbridled gazes for they were afraid that Rose might give them a beating.

    However, the beautiful and powerful Rose was very submissive to Han Shuo. She wouldply with any of Han Shuo¡¯s orders obediently!

    In Han Shuo¡¯s House of Han there were many more nubile maidens. Each and every one of them was heavenly beautiful and drop-dead gorgeous. Not only was Han Shuo able to make hisdies live together harmoniously, but somehow, even more beauties were throwing themselves at Han Shuo. That was way beyond what an ordinary man could do!

    These divine guards were admiring of Han Shuo¡¯s valiant strength but they were even more admiring of Han Shuo¡¯s ability to subdue stunning beauties. They thought that Han Shuo had reached perfection in the art of wooing females.

    The divine guards watched and listened attentively to their conversation. They had never been so focused. They memorized every word, movement, and expression on Han Shuo¡¯s smiling and rxed face. They intend to do a detailed analysister in the hope of improving their own skills in this aspect.

    With Jiya present, the three Divine Guard Chiefs couldn¡¯t talk as freely as they usually do. After more gentleughter and talking to each other politely about unimportant things, Jiya took leave on her own ord. But before she left, she repeatedly emphasized that she was most admiring of a character like Han Shuo. Her gaze towards Han Shuo even contained a tiny hint of something unspoken.

    ¡°That girl is interested in you!¡± soon after Jiya left, Erebus whose face had turned blushed from alcohol immediately said in a suggestive smirk.

    ¡°That¡¯s nonsense. Her main purpose here is to express her goodwill so that her family n will get a bigger chunk of the medicines I will refine,¡± said Han Shuo smilingly.

    ¡°Look at you, you clearly know it to be otherwise! What a jerk!¡± said Aobashi as she red at Han Shuo. She then added, ¡°But you sure have the chips to be proud of yourself. That girl is known in the City for her very high standards. We have never heard of her trying to approach any young man. The fact that she hase here alone to thank you is more than enough to conclude that she is interested in you. I¡¯ll be damned if she¡¯s not!¡±

    Han Shuo shrugged and said, ¡°It doesn¡¯t concern me. I already have plenty ofdies in my home and I¡¯ll get a headache whenever I see a beauty. If anything, I hope that she wouldn¡¯t bother me!¡±

    Suddenly, Aobashi stared angrily at Han Shuo and put her hands on her hips. ¡°Do you get a headache when you see me?¡±

    ¡°N- No! I don¡¯t!¡± replied Han Shuo hastily. But for some reason, Aobashi seemed even angrier after hearing the answer. Han Shuo immediate realized he had answered poorly.

    Aobashi asked in a loud and angry voice, ¡°Are you saying that I¡¯m not a beauty?!¡±

 Chapter 796 - Winning hearts and minds

    <strong>GDK 796: Winning hearts and minds</strong>

    ¡°Of course not!¡± Han Shuo hastily replied, ¡°In my heart, I have always considered you and Erebus as a pair... Hehe... ¡°

    After hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, Aobashi couldn¡¯t help but turned to take a nce at Erebus who was gazing at her with eyes burning with passion. However, Aobashi felt that Erebus was missing some sort of quality that attracted her. She felt that no chemistry could happen between her and Erebus. ¡°I have no feeling for him!¡± cried Aobashi right in front of Erebus.

    Erebus who has numbed himself to Aobashi¡¯s rejection did not seem to mind being shunned. Even his affection-filled gaze towards Aobashi did not falter by the slightest. He was behaving like a worthless creature. Han Shuo felt contempt for this behavior of Erebus¡¯. He thought, <i>Erebus is a powerful and influential man in the City of Shadows. How could he turn into such a spineless fool before Aobashi?</i>

    ¡°You be careful of Ralph. He¡¯s a vindictive person and he undoubtedly has the strength to be so. You must not be incautious in thepetition between Chiefs. You need to be prepared for Ralph¡¯s revenge!¡± Aobashi advised Han Shuo to be cautious while ignoring Erebus¡¯ gazes.

    If Aobashi knew that it was Han Shuo who had injured Hofs, the City Lord of Hushveil City, as Wace knew, she wouldn¡¯t have given Han Shuo such a length cautionary advice. She might instead be worrying about her own safety.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it, I will be ready!¡± said Han Shuo as he nodded smilingly. He genuinely found Aobashi and Erebus to be likable. When they first met Han Shuo, the two were not prejudiced against Han Shuo for theirrge gap in status and identity. On the contrary, the two had been very helpful to him on various matters. He found this trait to be hard toe by.

    Aobashi and Erebus did not stay for long. After a few more moments of chatting with Han Shuo, both of them took their leaves. The battle between Divine Guard Chiefs happening in three days was so significant that even Aobashi and Erebus dared not ck lest they meet with unexpected failure.

    As soon as the two Chiefs left, Gilbert, Sanguis, Bonds, and Barnard came to Han Shuo. Barnard presented and handed the prizes they won from thepetition to Han Shuo as he said, ¡°My Lord, these are our spoils of war.¡±

    As a great majority of the participants were cultivators of the energy of death, destruction, and darkness, the divine essences that Wace nted in the arena were of those energies. These divine essences were very useful to the Fifth Corps divine guards but none of them tempered with any piece before they handed it to Han Shuo. This was a testament to the discipline of the Fifth Corps divine guards.

    To Han Shuo, these divine essences which could increase the divine energy he had were not that useful. He had assimted the divine energy of multiple powerful gods back at Hushveil City and his two avatars were currently saturated with divine energies. What he required now was deeper insight andprehension, not more divine energies.

    ¡°I won¡¯t have them. You guys will keep them and distribute it among yourselves,¡± Han Shuo shook his head and declined instead of receiving the divine essences from Barnard¡¯s hands.

    Barnard¡¯s heart skipped a beat. In awe, he asked, ¡°But, my Lord, these are divine essences. Why would Your Lordship not want them?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t need them,¡± Han Shuo put on a faint smile and candidly replied, ¡°I do not need to increase my divine energy for now. You and the Company did an exceptional job in thepetition. You guys fought for these divine essences and obtained them with your own hands ¨C you have earned the divine essences. Therefore, it is only reasonable that these divine essences be distributed among yourselves.¡±

    When Han Shuo saw that Barnard still hesitated to ept the divine essences, Han Shuo said somewhat impatiently, ¡°Alright, I don¡¯t want to hear anymore refusal. Go and distribute it now! You are the Captain. You will decide how it should be divided!¡±

    ¡°Erm... Mister Bonds?¡± Barnard still could not believe that Han Shuo would give them the divine essences. He stared nkly for a moment before he turned to look at Bonds somewhat awkwardly. He remembered that Bonds yed a key role in the earlier battles and knew that Bonds was close to Han Shuo. Therefore, he asked Bonds for his opinion.

    ¡°Do exactly as my Senior says,¡± said Bonds proudly after he nced at Barnard with cold eyes.

    ¡°Dude, since when have you be such a wordy person? My Master has spoken. Hurry up and distribute them and get it over with!¡± said Gilbert impatiently.

    ¡°Ay, ay... ¡° Barnard was overjoyed. He excitedly rushed to the nearest cluster of divine guards with divine essences sped in his hand while crying, ¡°Lord Bryan is giving us the divine essences! Lord Bryan is giving us the divine essences!¡±

    Cheers sounded from the divine guards. They surrounded Barnard in no time and gathered their greedy gazes on the divine essences. They would cast grateful nces towards Han Shuo from time to time.

    ¡°When Avery was on the helm, any valuables obtained by the Fifth Corps must be handed to him. The divine guards would never get a thing, except those which he had absolutely no use for,¡± Bonds was familiar with the temperament of every Divine Guard Chiefs in the City of Shadows. He exined, ¡°Senior, your action is simply unimaginable to them. Everyone knows that divine essences are precious. Even if Senior doesn¡¯t use them, you could easily sell them for arge number of ck crystal coins. But to hand all of it to your subordinates without a thought, I doubt that there is another Divine Guard Chief who would do that!¡±

    After hearing Bonds¡¯ exnation, Han Shuo immediately realized that he had been overly generous. With the Celestial Pearl making him an obscene amount of crystal coins every day, crystal coins had lost most of its value in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes. Also, Han Shuo did not need divine essences to rapidly raise his divine energy for he could simply devour those of other experts. Those were the reasons Han Shuo behaved so generously.

    But unexpectedly, this act of great generosity had won the heartfelt gratefulness and support of his divine guards. With just one nce, Han Shuo could tell that the divine guards had be more revering and worshiping towards him. At this rate, it wouldn¡¯t be long before they would be private guards of the House of Han ¨C something Han Shuo wished to see.

    After thinking for a moment, Han Shuo came to a sudden realization that these divine guards were pretty easy to tame. He just needed to demonstrate his overwhelming strength to win their hearts and disy his charisma to win their minds, along with some tangible rewards. Afterpleting those simple steps, they will be obedient and submissive to Han Shuo and ready to serve him faithfully.

    ¡°Senior, they are all very talented. If given time, they will grow into powerful experts without a doubt!¡± remarked Bonds. After having interacted with Han Shuo for so long and being skilled in guessing others¡¯ thoughts, Bonds made out what was in Han Shuo¡¯s mind with just one look.

    Han Shuo put on a faint smile and nodded. He turned to look at Bonds intensely and instructed, ¡°Put some effort on them. These divine guards, the first batch to have received training in the Eight Destion and Torment Formation, will be the firm foundation of strength for our House of Han!¡±

    ¡°Understood, Senior. Soon enough, they will not think of themselves as Fifth Corp divine guards, but members of the House of Han!¡± replied Bonds in a solemn and grave face.

    Han Shuo had full confidence in Bonds¡¯ capability. He had a short discussion with Bonds in low voices, telling Bonds that if they needed crystal coins or medicines, he may look for him or Phoebe directly. He thought that it was worth investing some amount of crystal coins and medicines to win the batch of talents.

    Bonds indicated that he understood the instructions. The divine guards were also very respectful of him. He reckoned that the n will seed without a hitch.

    After Bonds left, Sanguis started narrating to Han Shuo about the amazing power of his broadsword over and over again. He mentioned just how easy and smooth it was to use the blood-red broadsword and how mighty the Bloodgod Mantra was after its power was amplified. He could not be more satisfied with the broadsword.

    The broadsword made using Blood Crystal was tailored for Sanguis. It would be a wonder if Sanguis did not find it useful!

    After listening to Sanguis¡¯ excitement, Han Shuo gave a few bits of advice, asking him to explore the broadsword even deeper. After that, he left his camp and went to Rose.

    The misty region filled with natural hot springs was upied by the female divine guards. They had dered it to be their territory. Several drenched female divine guards were guarding at the entrance lest that some of the male divine guards ¡®unknowingly¡¯ enter the hot spring. They were particrly vignt of someone like Gilbert.

    ¡°Hail, Lord Bryan!¡± the few divine guards at the entrance immediately turned solemn and saluted Han Shuo respectfully.

    Han Shuo nced at the divine guards and said, ¡°I¡¯m looking for Rose.¡±

    Although these female divine guards were not that pretty in appearance, they all have fit and toned physique with firm skin thanks to their constant training. They looked alluring, exuberant, and a little wild.

    ¡°Lord Rose is inside,¡± replied one of the divine guards in a sweet smile. Then, as though she sensed something, her gazes turned amorous. This divine guard was rather tall. When she stands straight, her eyes were at the level of Han Shuo¡¯s lips. Although she was not outstanding in appearance, her breasts were humongous. It looked as though her immense twin peaks will soon rip out of her soft, thin robe.

    This female divine guard suddenly straightened her body, causing her two massive boobs to jiggle seductively. The oscition was hypnotical to any man. As she looked at Han Shuo with her fiery eyes, she smiled charmingly and said, ¡°My Lord, I¡¯m called Roxie.¡±

    <i>Dammnnn! They are hugeeeeee!</i> cried Han Shuo internally. However, Han Shuo did not lose his poker face. He nodded and said, ¡°Roxie. Mmm, I will remember your name.¡±

    As divine guards, they were aware of the great possibility of losing their lives in a mission. Their safety was not assured! It was for this reason that these female divine guards would be so bold and flirty. Once they identified someone they find attractive, instead of waiting around like ordinary females, they would take the initiative and strike.

    To Roxie, the incredibly mysterious and unfathomably powerful Han Shuo was as outstanding as a lofty mountain. She found men as extraordinary and powerful as Han Shuo to be irresistible. She did not mind having a one-time thing with Han Shuo

    Therefore, when she noticed that Han Shuo¡¯s eyes seemed to be lingering around her towering breasts that she was most proud of, instead of reacting bashfully or angrily, she took the initiative to stick out her racks. She tried to seduce Han Shuo, hoping that Han Shuo would be so kind to have a round of the most pleasurable exercise with her!

    The other divine guards beside Roxie noticed that Han Shuo¡¯s eyes travelled a few more circles around her twin peaks. They resented themselves for not having such protruding breasts but tried to present the most alluring parts on their bodies, also hoping to attract Han Shuo¡¯s attention and arouse him.

    In the hearts of these female divine guards, Han Shuo was their god! He was the kind of man that they dreamed and yearned for. All Han Shuo had to do is beckon with his finger and they would voluntarily undress themselves, lie naked on his bed and wait for Han Shuo to bang them!

    To these women who worshipped the strong, Han Shuo was simply irresistible!

 Chapter 797 - Peeping Tom

    <b>GDK 797: Peeping Tom</b>

    After looking into Roxie¡¯s zing and limpid eyes for a few seconds, Han Shuo knew exactly what was on her mind. After all, Han Shuo could not have more experience when it came to women. After having broken through Carnal Realm, he had gained full control of his mind and could live without satisfying his lustful desires. As a Divine Guard Chief, he had to maintain a respectable image and set an example to others. Therefore, there was no way he would fool around with his subordinates.

    Han Shuo nodded indifferently and stepped inside the region, ignoring Roxie¡¯s coquettish behavior.

    After seeing that Han Shuo has moved along without batting her an eye, Roxie¡¯s face turned somewhat sad. She lowered her head to look at her massive boobs and sighed in her mind, <i>Are these not big enough to attract Lord Bryan? Why did the Chief show no response whatsoever? Sigh.</i>

    Herrades standing beside her were happy and disheartened at the same time. They were happy that Han Shuo did not ept Roxie¡¯s solicitation, and disheartened for realizing that they stood no chance in seducing Han Shuo either, for Han Shuo could easily disregard Roxie¡¯s body which was much more alluring than theirs.

    ¡°We are after all not Lord Rose. Perhaps only Lord Rose has the beauty and strength to deserve the Chief,¡±mented one of the female divine guards with slender long legs, achingly.

    The divine guards, having seen how docile Rose was to Han Shuo, had long assumed that Rose was one of his women.

    When they recalled of Rose¡¯s divine beauty and immense strength, the female divine guards suddenly let out long sighs. They felt disappointed at themselves for not being as high-caliber as she was.

    ¡°If I could have just one night with a man like Chief, I would die with no regrets,¡± remarked one of the lustful divine guards.

    ¡°Haven¡¯t Kibo been wooing you persistently? You have always shunned him but it turns out that you are one of those who would whore yourself to get a man. What exactly is going on in your head? You could make Kibo crawl on the ground and lick your toes simply with a gesture of your hand. It¡¯s not like youcked male attention!¡± remarked one of the least attractive looking divine guards angrily. She desired Kibo, but unfortunately, Kibo did not reciprocate the feeling for her.

    ¡°How can Kibo evenpare to His Lordship the Chief?¡± The lustful divine guard smirked and replied, ¡°I would rather prostrate myself before the Chief and lick his toes than to have that impotent guy fawn all over me!¡±

    The lustful divine guard¡¯srades thought about her reply for a moment before agreeing to it.

    Han Shuo did not waste any of his demon generals to listen in on those divine guards¡¯ discussing their sexual fantasies towards him. He walked across the misty region unruffled. This natural hot spring was several thousand square meters in surface area. The hot spring was not one giant pool but made of countless separate springs which allowed each individual to have a pool all to themselves. Given Rose¡¯s overwhelming strength, it was only natural that she would have a pool of her own. Han Shuo headed straight towards Rose¡¯s location.

    When Han Shuo walked past several hot springs where several divine guards were happily bathing, thedies started screaming in panic for they saw a man. And when they saw that the man was Han Shuo, they started screaming even louder.

    However, the screams did not sound fearful or afraid; Han Shuo heard only thirst and excitement!

    Whichever hot spring that Han Shuo walked past, the bathingdies would ¡®panic¡¯ and cover the sensitive areas on their bodies. However, perhaps the region they tried to conceal was too big, or perhaps they couldn¡¯t close their fingers together, some tasty things would always manage to slip from between their hands.

    Han Shuo could see round peaks surrounded by pink, bumpy, and circr fields and mellow gashes thinly veiled under scanty and dark bushes.

    Han Shuo suddenly felt as though a horde of hyenas that had not eaten for ages was stalking him. Their gazes were burning with great thirst. It seemed as though they could not wait for Han Shuo to devour them and might ravish him at any moment. Han Shuo took a shock at that discovery.

    Han Shuo massaged his temple as though he was distressed. He kept his eyes and his face straight, keeping his path towards Rose while he silently released a demon general, taking in the magnificent view...

    <i>Holy fuck! They sure are horny!</i> Han Shuo thought that since none of them could discover the presence of his demon general, he might as well use it to record all the mesmerizing and delightful things thedies tried to show him into his mind.

    ¡°Pretentious prick!¡±mented Rose loudly and disdainfully when Han Shuo finally reached the hot spring Rose was at. She had put on a loose and silky robe and was wringing her hair dry.

    The female divine guards might not be able to sense Han Shuo¡¯s demon general but Rose could. For some reason, when Rose discovered that a demon general was surveying those naked flirtatious nubile divine guards, she had a sudden urge to charge at the invisible thing and kill it and give those shameless divine guards a beating.

    She knew that the demon general had ryed every single detail of the relishing scene to Han Shuo who was looking straight ahead like a righteous man of great self-restraint. She was somehow angered by it.

    ¡°Erm... ¡± Han Shuo immediately knew that Rose must have discovered his depraved action. Although he felt a little embarrassed, he did not withdraw the demon general. He thickened up his skin and pretend as though he knew nothing. In a straight face, he said to Rose, ¡°Hey, I want to know more about the Land of Chaos. So, are you free to talk now?¡±

    ¡°If you don¡¯t withdraw that strange life form of yours, I will speak nothing of that Land!¡± replied Rose without turning to Han Shuo. She was wringing her hair forcefully as though imagining it to be a certain debauched voyeur.

    Han Shuo pulled an awkward smile and withdrew the demon general. Then, he showed his palms and asked, ¡°Ok, done. It everything fine now?¡±

    ¡°Haven¡¯t I told you about the ce before? Why are you asking about it again?¡± Rose immediately loosen her grip on her hair. She suddenly remembered wringing with such force was bad for her hair and her heart ached greatly.

    ¡°Nothing much, it¡¯s just that I¡¯m really curious about the Land. I want to know everything about it!¡± answered Han Shuo smilingly.

    Han Shuo did not know that Andre wanted to marry Carmelita off to the House of Han but had heard the conversation between Ralph and Wace. Han Shuo had been keeping an eye on Ralph for he feared that Ralph might conspire something against him. Therefore, he used the most powerful demon general he owned to monitor Ralph. When Han Shuo left the center of Soaring Cloud Mountain Range, the demon general did not leave with him.

    Han Shuo had heard every word Wace said to Ralph. It was still ying in his mind vividly. Han Shuo sensed a great threat looming over him ever since he heard those words. Just as Wace said, no matter what happened to Ralph, he will always be a servant of the House of Sainte; or, to be precise, Wace¡¯s henchman.

    While Han Shuo, no matter how strong he bes, he will always be the master of the House of Han.

    At present, there was no indication that any conflict may arise between the House of Han and the House of Sainte because the former simply did not have the power to threaten thetter¡¯s position in the City of Shadows.

    But will that remain the same case in the future?

    Everyone could see the astonishing potential possessed by the House of Han ¨C especially now that they have witnessed the surprising performance of the Fifth Corps divine guards. It was also clear that Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert were extraordinary talents who will ascend to highgodhood within a short time. On top of that, the Celestial Pearl now possessed great influence in the City of Shadows and was rapidly growing all over the Darkness Dominion. Sooner orter, the House of Han will grow to the size where the House of Sainte would feel threatened.

    When that day arrives, his rtionship with Wace and Andre surely wouldn¡¯t be as harmonious as it was now. There might even be friction between them!

    The downfall of the House of Lavers was a history to be learned. As the patriarch of the House of Han, Han Shuo must be vignt of danger in times of safety. He was no longer a lone wolf. He no longer had the option of just leaving everything behind and escape when danger strikes. If he does not think ahead and make relevant preparation, those who he cared about mightnd in a predicament.

    The Land of Chaos was, in Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, thend of hope!

    ¡°The Land of Chaos, or the Fringe, is a ce filled with powerful experts. The Fringe is not under the control of any of the Twelve Dominions. None of the Overgods ruled the region. In there, you can do whatever you want, as long as you have the strength to survive. There are no divine guards to enforce thew, if there is even such a thing asw in thatnd. It is a haven for felons. The fiercest and the worst criminals from all over the Elysium are concentrated there because, in that Land, no forces could bind them... ¡° Rose did not know why Han Shuo had such a sudden renewed interest towards the Fringe. Nheless, she exined everything she knew about the Fringe to Han Shuo again.

    ¡°Not under the control of any of the Twelve Dominions... Hmm... ¡° mumbled Han Shuo. Then, suddenly, Han Shuo raised his head and asked with his brows bunched, ¡°Why wouldn¡¯t any of the Overgods try to govern the region?¡±

    ¡°The Fringe is located right between the Space Dominion and Destiny Dominion. Neither the Space Overgod nor the Destiny Overgod would govern the region. They even forbid their forces from entering the Fringe. They have always been rather detached from affairs on Elysium.¡± After taking a short pause, Rose continued, ¡°The other Overgods wouldn¡¯t attempt to possess the region because the Fringe sits between the Space and Destiny Dominions. None of them would take the risk of offending the two permanently neutral Overgods, especially the Destiny Overgod who speaks for the Creator!¡±

    After hearing Rose¡¯s analysis, Han Shuo nodded and smilingly remarked, ¡°Wonderful, what a wonderful ce!¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s so wonderful about it?¡± Rose rolled her eyes and said, ¡°It is the most chaotic ce on Elysium. Godhunters walks openly on that Land. Those who are weak would be killed by godhunters roaming around the border before they could step into the Fringe!¡±

    Rose had nearly lost her life in the Fringe. Her opinion of that ce was anything but favorable. If it wasn¡¯t for Han Shuo¡¯s constant nagging, Rose wouldn¡¯t return to that hellhole in a thousand, or even a hundred thousand years.

    The more Rose dreaded the Fringe, the more interested and excited Han Shuo became. He had never feared to face daunting challenges. Being a demonic art cultivator with an innate desire to conquer the impossible, Han Shuo had now made visiting the Fringe his main goal. Not only that he wanted to visit the Fringe, he wished to im a piece of the Land for himself!

 Chapter 798 - GDK 798: She canâ€™t be into me, right?

    <strong>GDK 798: She can¡¯t be into me, right?</strong>

    After much listening, Han Shuo learned all the information Rose knew about the Fringe. The made visiting the Land of Chaos his highest priority.

    The divine guards began yet another round of unting when Han Shuo was on his way out of the hot spring. They were hoping that Han Shuo would do something to them. However, Han Shuo¡¯s mind was fully concerned about the future of his House of Han as well as his future rtionship with the House of Sainte. He did not use his demon general to peep at thedies but straightforwardly departed.

    The female divine guards were very disappointed. They sighed and griefed after Han Shuo left them untouched.

    Barnard had distributed the divine essences the divine guards won based on each individual¡¯s performance. With Bonds standing beside him and observing the process, none of the divine guards raised any objection. Those who received a divine essence were excited while those who did not were only slightly disappointed instead of feeling dissatisfied.

    Both Bonds and Sanguis cultivated only in demonic arts. Divine essences wouldn¡¯t increase their strengths in any way. Gilbert, however, was a dual-cultivator. He had the divine energy of darkness flowing in his body and therefore divine essences could raise his strength. As one of the main fighters in thepetition, Gilbert obtained thergest piece of darkness divine essence.

    With the teampetition between Divine Guard Corpspleted, the Fifth Corps divine guards werepletely idle temporarily and could properly rx. However, Bonds did not allow these divine guards to rx for extended periods. On the second day, he gathered all the divine guards for an borate debriefing. He wanted to make sure that the Company will learn everything there is to learn from the experience.

    In the eyes of the major patriarchs and other spectators, the cooperation showed by the Fifth Corps divine guards were miraculous. But to Bonds whomanded the battles, he thought that the divine guards still had much room to improve. He viewed that the divine guards were not cooperative enough during an actual fight. He wanted to unleash the full potential of the divine guards while slowly altering their thoughts, making them consider themselves as a member of the House of Han.

    Bonds did not waste time in instilling new ideas into their minds, telling them that the reason they could defeat the Second Corps was all because of their training in the Eight Destion and Torment Formation and therefore, Han Shuo, being the person who made the Formation, was the true reason behind their sess.

    Bonds repeatedly and subtly promoted the idea that everything they have and achieved was all bestowed upon by Han Shuo. Under the constant and subtle influence, the divine guards subconsciously epted the propaganda. Their opinion and view of Han Shuo slowly began to change.

    Han Shuo who had observed all this felt d. He believed that with his capable henchman named Bonds managing the Fifth Corps, he would have nothing to worry about.

    Han Shuo will head to the Fringe. No matter the Fringe or the City of Shadows, it was only by possessing sufficient strength that he could gain a solid foothold. If his Celestial Pearl were to continue its expansion in the Darkness Dominion, they would also need protection from divine guards. It was for these reasons that Han Shuo would try to increase the strength of his family n at all costs.

    Three days went by like the blink of an eye. The patriarchs of major family ns, the seven Divine Guard Chiefs, and other important figures yet again gathered at the center of Soaring Cloud Mountain Range.

    For some reason, the patriarchs and experts of allrge family ns became extremely cordial towards Han Shuo. As soon as Han Shuo arrived, a wave of people stepped forward to greet him and send him their regards. Han Shuo had trouble adapting to their sudden change in politeness.

    Before that, the patriarchs of Kinson, Buller, and Kisa families would only nod at Han Shuo as greetings. They did not take Han Shuo as a character of the same ss as them. In their minds, the House of Han ascended by relying on the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy instead of having powerful experts. This ss of merchant family n was far beneath an ancient and powerful family n like theirs.

    Although Han Shuo had taken over the Fifth Corps, they thought that the Fifth Corps which bare had enough men for a singlepany was nothing more than an empty shell. Too insignificant in their eyes.

    But it all changed three days ago when the Fifth Corps divine guards demonstrated their terrifyingbat ability. The three major patriarchs finally recognized the House of Han as a force to be reckoned with and took Han Shuo as a character worthy of being treated as their equals.

    <i>No matter anywhere in the universe, one will only be respected if one has sufficient strength!</i> thought Han Shuo after witnessing the change in the three major patriarchs¡¯ attitude.

    Ralph, the Chief of the Second Corps wore a dark face,pletely ipatible with the joyous atmosphere around Han Shuo. He openly gazed at Han Shuo with his ice-cold eyes filled with resentment as he stood alone in a secluded corner. He was like a hissing viper that tried to make Han Shuo his prey.

    Han Shuo greeted and socialized with the major three patriarchs greeted and other Divine Guard Chiefs as though they had been in the same social circle all along. He did not seem nervous or reserved as an upstart should have. With a warm cordial smile, Han Shuo greeted everyone in a friendly manner, talked about the fine wine they were tasting, and discussed managing a Divine Guard Corps...

    The patriarchs and Divine Guard Chiefs who feigned civility with Han Shuo praised him in their minds. Such an outstanding ability to socialize cannot be gained without at least several hundred years of cultivation. They became even more admiring of Han Shuo after seeing that Han Shuo managed to handle the situation soposedly.

    Ralph had outstanding strength, inmand of the Second Corps ¨C a group of cold-blooded killing machines, and the backing of the City Lord. The three major patriarchs, however, did not consider him as a worthy match for a simple reason ¨C he did not know how to conduct himself!

    A fool, no matter how powerful, remains a fool! A person who does not know patience and worldly wisdom wouldn¡¯t be able to achieve much in the City of Shadow, or would they be able to survive for too long!

    But Han Shuo was very different from Ralph. Not only that Han Shuo has seeded in developing the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy into the House of Han, but he also gained control over the Fifth Corps, and even trained the Fifth Corps divine guards so well, all done in rtively little time. That was very terrifying to the three patriarchs! When Han Shuo had now managed to blend into their social circle like salt dissolving into hot water, socializing with these influential figures like it was a walk in the park, they became even more vignt towards Han Shuo.

    <i>A Wolf!</i> thought the three major patriarchs.

    Although the influences over the City of Shadows were tangled andplicated, there was no doubt that the few major family ns were the strongest powerhouses. The City of Shadows was limited in size, resources, and territory. A great majority of the resources were possessed by those few family ns. As the House of Han rises and grows, conflicts might arise between them because the House of Han must seize the resources from their hands to grow even bigger.

    Having thought of such a possibility, the patriarchs of the major family ns who were chatting happily and politely with Han Shuo had considered Han Shuo as a possible rival!

    The major patriarchs finally realized that Han Shuo was a well-matched adversary. There was no longer the slightest trace of contempt in their eyes when they looked at Han Shuo.

    ¡°This year, we will match the participants by drawing lots. And, of course, like all previouspetitions, any of thepetitors may issue a challenge to anotherpetitor. If the person epts the challenge, the two may skip the first round of drawing and fight!¡± said Wace in a loud voice after he scanned the party with his eyes.

    The reason that such a rule existed was to give the participants a chance to make retribution for any resentment they may have. The divine guard Chiefs of the City of Shadows were not allowed to fight each other in usual times. This was the only chance they could legally battle with each other. As long as both sides agreed to it, with a third-party bearing witness, the duel may proceed as part of thepetition.

    As soon as Wace finished those words, Ralph, who had been as silent and still as a stone, stepped forward from his corner. He cast a cold nce at Han Shuo before he said to Wace, ¡°I, Ralph, hereby challenge the Chief Bryan of the Fifth Corps!¡± Upon finishing those words, Ralph turned to look at Han Shuo in a provocative smirk and said, ¡°Lord Bryan, do you have the courage to ept my challenge?¡±

    Han Shuo had long anticipated this move from Ralph. He was a vindictive man. As he had lost in the teampetition, he surely will not let go of this opportunity to get even.

    ¡°Of course!¡± Han Shuo put on a faint smile, bowed at Wace and said, ¡°I ept his challenge!¡±

    ¡°Alright. The two of you will wait while the other five draw lots. Those who received the unmarked pieces will wait for the next round,¡± announced Wace after he nodded lightly. He then looked at Ralph pitifully. How would Ralph even stand a chance against someone who managed to injure City Lord Hofs?

    Ralph naturally had no idea about Wace¡¯s concern. As soon as he heard Han Shuo agreed to his challenge, he sneered, ¡°Good! I shall see if you have the strength to be worthy of the position as a Divine Guard Chief!¡±

    Han Shuo seemed much more unruffled than Ralph. He shrugged and ignored the fact that Ralph existed. He turned to Aobashi and Erebus standing beside him and poked fun at them, ¡°The two of you better not be selected to duel!¡±

    ¡°If my opponent is her, I will immediately surrender,¡± said Erebus smilingly. He thought that there was nothing wrong with being so amenable to Aobashi and it was what he ought to do.

    ¡°Erebus, it is this behavior of yours that I find very ufortable! Why do you have to let me have my way in every matter? You will do whatever I told you to. Why can¡¯t you man up a little?¡± instead of feeling touched, Aobashi rained a round of scolding.

    Erebus forced a smile like a miserable wretch and said, ¡°Because I like it.¡±

    Han Shuo was speechless. He thought that no wonder Aobashi had no interest in Erebus for all these while. Han Shuo knew that a strong woman like Aobashi can only be conquered by a stronger man. To Aobashi, a man like Erebus who ced her high on the pedestal was anything but attractive. That was why Erebus had failed to capture Aobashi¡¯s heart even after many years of wooing.

    ¡°If you are like Bryan, perhaps I would have epted you!¡± said Aobashi angrily as she red at Erebus.

    Upon hearing those words, Erebus¡¯ face turned astounded. He instantly turned his head towards Han Shuo. Han Shuo too was rather surprised. He raised and waved his hands and immediately dered, ¡°There is absolutely nothing between Aobashi and me!¡±

    ¡°Hehe!¡± Aobashi chuckled and then berated Erebus, ¡°What were you thinking? I was just trying to tell you that you need to man up and be more unyielding. I don¡¯t like a man who does everything I say!¡±

    Erebus let out a sigh of relief after hearing those words. He forced a smile and mumbled to himself, ¡°Is it wrong to treat you well? Duh... Women...¡±

    Han Shuo turned to look at Aobashi. He suddenly felt that Aobashi¡¯s gazes towards him seemed rather strange. His heart jolted. <i>She can¡¯t be into me, right?</i> When Han Shuo thought so, he took yet another look at Aobashi. Even his gazes turned somewhat strange.

 Chapter 799 - Man-made

    GDK 799: Man-made

    Aobashi was famous in the City of Shadows not just for her outstanding strength and powerful position, but also for her good looks. Other than a man in the same ss she was, like Erebus, an average person wouldn¡¯t even dare to dream of having her.

    Aobashi who usually dressed in green had a graceful and attractive-looking appearance. She had all the characteristics of great beauty. But unfortunately, because of her very high status and qualifications, very few men had the courage to pursue a romantic rtionship with her.

    <i>Oi! This is the woman that Erebus has a crush on!</i> Han Shuo reminded himself. He then smilingly said, ¡°I have way too many women already. Besides, a dictatorialdy like Aobashi isn¡¯t my cup of tea. You have nothing to worry about, Erebus.¡±

    When Aobashi heard Han Shuo¡¯s words, she stared at him with her bright eyes strangely before she suddenly giggled and said, ¡°What are you so afraid of? You really thought that Erebus will believe that there¡¯s something between us?¡±

    Han Shuoughed and said, ¡°I just don¡¯t want Erebus to misunderstand and feel jealous.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not worried. Even if she wants someone else, she will notpromise her standards ¨C I¡¯m sure. Haha, what do I have to worry?¡± after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s exnation, Erebus recalled that there were plenty of good-looking women in his House of Han and he became unworried.

    ¡°But, are you really sure?¡± said Aobashi in a mischievous smile as though she was determined to crush Erebus¡¯ will.

    ¡°Erm... ¡° Erebus put on a troubled smile and was speechless.

    While Han Shuo, Aobashi, and Erebus were cheerfully chatting, Cami, Rugersey, and Bat¨²k had drawn their lots. Wace swept his gaze at the trio and immediately loudly said, ¡°Aobashi, Erebus, it¡¯s your turn!¡±

    When Wace saw that Han Shuo was getting along well with those two Divine Guard Chiefs under hismand, not only that Wace did not feel d, but he even felt a vague sense of worry. Unknowingly, Han Shuo had influenced many of those close to him. Carmelita, Andre, Erebus, and Aobashi, were all characters core to the House of Sainte. All of them had close friendships with Han Shuo.

    To Wace, this was not at all a good omen!

    ¡°Coming!¡± replied Aobashi. She gave Han Shuo a death stare and a snort before going to draw lots with Erebus.

    Wace, who had been carefully observing the trio, couldn¡¯t help but bunched his brows. He suddenly felt as though he had lost all his loyal subordinates, except Ralph, who will forever be his loyal hound. He couldn¡¯t help but turned to gaze at Ralph standing in the distance. When he recalled that Ralph will lose terrifically, for some reason, he felt deeply ufortable.

    The results of the drawing were obtained soon. Erebus will fight Cami, and Bat¨²k will fight Rugersey. Aobashi had the unmarked lot.

    Aobashi seemed d to obtain the unmarked lot. She said, ¡°I¡¯m quite lucky today, no need to waste much energy!¡± To Aobashi, other than Ralph, no other Divine Guard Chief had nearly enough strength to harm her. As Aobashi was not aware of Han Shuo¡¯s true strength, she included Han Shuo as one of those too weak to harm her.

    To Aobashi, although Han Shuo¡¯s strength was extraordinary, there was no telling if he was even Ralph¡¯s match. Having fought Ralph for many years, Aobashi knew exactly where Ralph stood in strength. That was the reason why Aobashi had repeatedly reminded Han Shuo to be careful of Ralph.

    Aobashi had never had an actual duel with Han Shuo but was aware that Han Shuo managed to injure Portlem back in Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. To Aobashi, someone like Portlem who had only recently stepped into highgodhood simply couldn¡¯t pose her any threat.

    Based on the limited information, Aobashi deduced that Han Shuo was, at most, someone who had recently be a mid-stage highgod. She did not think that an expert in this realm could defeat her.

    ¡°Well then, instead of selecting another location, let¡¯s just use the same arena for the match,¡± said Wace. He then turned to look at Han Shuo and Ralph and said, ¡°If you two are ready, Andre will show lead you to the arena,¡± Wace then whistled loudly.

    Andre who was not with the party heard Wace¡¯s whistle. He instructed the House of Sainte divine guards stationed around the area to signal at Wace from a distance, indicating that everything was ready.

    Han Shuo said no word but traveled towards Andre straightforwardly. Ralph followed behind Han Shuo while staring hatefully at his back.

    The divine guards needed several days to travel from this region to the battle arena. Han Shuo and Ralph who possessed highgod strengths didn¡¯t need to take that long. Traveling at their maximum airspeed, these highgods guided by Andre took just a few hours to reach the arena.

    The few hours spent in the journey was absolutely nothing to these highgods who had spent centuries in cultivation. Andrepletely ignored Ralph all throughout the journey but cheerfully chatted with Han Shuo. To Andre, the results had been preordained with no room for a different oue. It had been very polite of him not to mock Ralph at all in the journey.

    There were energy towers around the battle arena that formed intense protective barriers. Those who battle in the arena need not worry about shockwaves and stray energies from their battles injuring the uninvolved or damaging the environment. Most importantly, Wace and the VVIPs could observe the battle from a safe distance using the sand table. They would gain a clear understanding of the strengths of the Divine Guard Chiefs.

    After Andre took Han Shuo and Ralph to right outside the arena, he indicated to the two that they may enter the arena. Han Shuo took the lead in entering the arena. Andre suddenly cried out to remind Han Shuo, ¡°Light injuries are fine, but by all means, do not cause serious injuries or death! My Elder Brother does not wish to have a Chief no longer capable of serving the City of Shadows!¡±

    Ralph who was about to enter the arena suddenly put on a cold face and shouted, ¡°Lord Andre, what exactly do you mean by that?¡±

    Andre looked at Ralph, smiled, shook his head, and said nothing. But before he left, he again reminded Han Shuo, ¡°Have mercy!¡±

    He then shouted to the divine guards protecting the perimeter, ¡°Arena cleaners, evacuate the area and let no one step inside!¡±

    After the divine guards dispersed, Andre too retreated to a distance. He was watching the arena smilingly.

    Ralph¡¯s mind was filled with fury. He coldly groaned and loudly warned Han Shuo standing before him, ¡°Lord Bryan, I will show you no mercy!¡±

    Han Shuo put on a puzzled look. He then dug an ear with his pinkie, as though he thought there was a blockage in his ear canal. Only then he replied, ¡°Is there something wrong with your ears? Do you have impeded hearings? Lord Andre asked me to have mercy ¨C not you. Hehe, for your own sake, you better not be merciful ¨C you are weak enough already. I¡¯m really afraid that I will identally kill you in a snap!¡±

    ¡°Let us begin!¡± When Ralph discovered that he was no match against Han Shuo in a battle of throwing insults, he stopped the nonsense and charged into the arena.

    As soon as the duo was near the arena, Wace, the three major patriarchs, and the other Divine Guard Chiefs ced all their attention on the sand table they gathered around. Wace did something and caused the sand table projection to zoom in on the two ck dots. Han Shuo and Ralph¡¯s figured were vividly and clearly disyed.

    ¡°If Ralph is also defeated in this battle, that will be so fantastic!¡± remarked Cami softly.

    ¡°I really wonder if Bryan will win. Haha, he is always full of surprises!¡± remarked Jiya who was beside Cami smilingly. She was wearing a faint smile and seemed hopeful to learn the oue.

    The patriarch of the House of Kinson, Caspar, looked at his daughter Jiya in astonishment. He was already quite surprised that two days earlier she had gone to visit the Fifth Corps. Being an expert in reading bodynguage, Caspar noticed that something was unusual about his girl. Now, after hearing Jiya¡¯sment, a suspicion suddenly crossed his mind.

    ¡°Jiya, are you interested in that youngster?¡± asked Caspar softly. Being her father, Casper was very straightforward with Jiya.

    Jiya was obviously startled. She raised her head and took a quick nce at Caspar and flusteredly replied, ¡°What? I don¡¯t know what you¡¯re talking about, father!¡±

    <i>She sure enough is!</i> Caspar knew his daughter very well. She would always be calm and have the same poker face in any situation. Her flustered reaction to the question means that the answer could not be more obvious!

    ¡°It is said that the youngster is a promiscuous one. Be mindful of that!¡± said Caspar before he softly continued, ¡°But, if he is who you want, and if you have decided, your father will not stop you.¡±

    Jiya was stunned and she looked at Caspar in disbelief. Her father had never been an open-minded person. For so many years, he had managed to chase away countless promising young men who adored her. She was surprised that Caspar had basically asked her to go for it, even when he was aware that Han Shuo already had many partners.

    While Jiya was puzzled and pondered about her father¡¯s decision, Cami suddenly cried out in surprise, ¡°Why can¡¯t we see anything anymore?!¡±

    Jiya was surprised and was worried about Han Shuo for no apparent reason. She turned her mind to the sand table and stopped thinking about anything else.

    The sand table seemed to be operating normally. However, a massive cloud of white mist had floated into the arena out of nowhere and it just so happened to obstruct the region where Han Shuo and Ralph were. The spectating party who was excited about the battle could not be more anxious and frustrated.

    Through the sand table, they could see dust flying and stones shooting from the mist. It was clear that an earth-shaking battle was happening in there but they had absolutely no clue who was winning or losing.

    ¡°City Lord, why is there suddenly a mist?¡± asked Caspar hastily.

    Wace too was baffled by it. He took out a magical mirror and inquired Andre, ¡°What¡¯s going on? Haven¡¯t the arena been properly cleaned? Howe a mist covered the area in the most critical time? Where did the miste from?¡±

    Andre in the magical mirror forced a smile and answered, ¡°We have cleaned the arena properly. Such a thing can¡¯t happen. I¡¯m sure that this phenomenon is man-made!¡±

    <i>Man-made!</i> Wace bunched his brows. In everypetition, Ralph would only focus on wildly attacking and wouldn¡¯t spend any time to learn or change the environment. Therefore, if the mist was man-made, the only person who would do so must be Han Shuo. Wace was absolutely certain of it!

    <i>But why? Why didn¡¯t he wants people to see his attacks?</i> pondered Wace with his brows bunched.

 Chapter 800 - Beating up a child

    <strong>GDK 800: Beating up a child</strong>

    Han Shuo had a good reason to obstruct the spectators¡¯ view. The main weapon he will use to beat Ralph was the seventeen flying swords. If he were to reveal this trump card to the spectators which wereprised of the very observant patriarchs of the three major family ns and the other Divine Guard Chiefs, it wouldn¡¯t be long before one of them will realize that the weapon Han Shuo used matched the description of those used against Hushveil City.

    There was no telling if these people will keep their mouths shut. If just one of them spread the news out to the public, once Hofs had stabilized his control over Hushveil City, he will hunt down Han Shuo and his House of Han at all costs.

    This was not an oue Han Shuo wished to see happen.

    Therefore, he had deployed the Banner of Hallucination. It sent out chunks and chunks of mists which formed a vast, white, vision-obstructor. This prevented Wace and the crowd from seeing what was happening in the battle.

    Ralph, who was at the center of the Banner, was on the back foot against Han Shuo. He could not even make a counterattack!

    It was only now that Ralph realized just how terribly mistaken he had been! Before entering the arena, Ralph even had a short fantasy of Han Shuo¡¯s defeat. But after the fight actually started, he was trapped by streaks of brilliant radiance before he knew what in the world just happened. Thanks to the Banner of Hallucination, Ralph couldn¡¯t even tell that the magnificent streaks were Han Shuo¡¯s flying swords.

    Ralph¡¯s domain of divinity was also firmly suppressed. Every ruse he had seemed all so vain and futile against the wild, unstoppable power bombarding him. Trapped in Ceaseless Pain, Ralph felt as though he was a small boat in a tumultuous sea; as though he would be drowned at any moment.

    <i>How despicable!</i> When Ralph recalled of Han Shuo¡¯s performance back in the City of Shadows andpared it to the terrifying strength that he disyed right now, Ralph couldn¡¯t help himself but cursed Han Shuo in his mind.

    He thought that it was utterly despicable for an expert with strength superior to his opponent tounch a sneak attack from the start of the battle. It was as though a well-built adult beating up a child, starting by throwing an unexpected kick to the back of the child. That was what Ralph felt.

    The brilliant rays streaked around him as though they were weaving a giant invisible. A most domineering energy which Ralph had never before experienced swarmed towards him from every direction while intense corrosive power and chilling aura gushed towards him. It whittled away his divine energy and made his resistance weaker and weaker.

    Ralph could not be more depressed and frustrated. Inside the Ceaseless Pain, he could not see where Han Shuo was. Neither could he break out from the dimension that the seventeen swords trapped him in. He could only exert himself to resist the attack by rapidly consuming the divine energy in his body.

    It seemed as though the oue had been decided from the beginning! Ralph knew that he had been defeated and that it was a crushing defeat!

    ***

    At the center of Soaring Cloud Mountain Range, around the sand table, Wace and the spectators no longer had their eyes fixed on the image-rying divine device. They were whispering with each other, discussing what might be happening behind the mist.

    A vast expanse of mist-shrouded the region that they were most interested in right from the start of the battle. There was no sign that it was going to float elsewhere soon. By now, it was clear to all the spectators that the mist wasn¡¯t there by coincidence, but man-made. Mists don¡¯t just float into the battle ce of two highgods.

    Aobashi and Erebus exchanged nces when they realized that. They were both somewhat worried.

    ¡°City Lord, this action of Ralph¡¯s is uneptable! He must have produced the mist to do something despicable to Bryan!¡± Rugersey was somewhat angry.

    Wace shot a nce at Rugersey and said in an indifferent voice, ¡°Why must it be Ralph?¡±

    ¡°If it wasn¡¯t Ralph, then it had to be Bryan. It had to be the one with the greater strength who would have the energy to produce the mists. Given Ralph¡¯s great strength, he is the most likely culprit.¡°

    All the spectators, except Wace, held the same assumption as Rugersey. To them, it was only reasonable that the vision-obstruction mist would originate from Ralph.

    Aobashi and Erebus had their brows bunched. These two had a very close friendship with Han Shuo and they do not wish to see bad things happen to Han Shuo. After a moment of hesitation, Aobashi asked, ¡°The duel between Chiefs should only be heavy-sparring instead of fighting to the death. Could it be that Ralph did so in an attempt to retaliate Bryan¡¯s victory three days ago?¡°

    ¡°Just watch till the end!¡± said Wace coldly as he felt rather annoyed by the questions.

    The party was astounded as they heard the annoyance in Wace¡¯s words. After staring nkly for a moment, the party said not another word. They were rather confused and kept on thinking about what was really going on.

    <i>The rules for the dual of Divine Guard Chiefs are set by Wace himself. Ralph of the Second Corps is absolutely loyal to him and wouldn¡¯t disobey a word of his orders. By that reasoning, Ralph wouldn¡¯t attempt to break the rules set by Wace. So everything should be alright?</i> thought the party.

    While the spectators were confused, Han Shuo wasughing grimly in his mind for he knew that Ralph¡¯s divine energy had mostly been exhausted. It was then that he suddenly shot forward, flew into the Ceaseless Pain and dealt Ralph the final blow. With the fiercest attack, Han Shuo destroyed all remaining defense Ralph had put up.

    The seventeen flying swords suddenly stopped attacking. Han Shuo who had broken throughyers of defensive barriers in one blow injected several shots of demonic yuan through Ralph¡¯s chest,pletely incapacitating him.

    With one thought, the Banner of Hallucination flew back to Han Shuo while the Demonyer Edge flew out from his arm. He pressed the tip of the de on Ralph¡¯s throat.

    ¡°The mist is scattering!¡± cried Cami suddenly. The party¡¯s gazes were again gathered on the sand table.

    The noise of people chatting in low voices abruptly disappeared and was reced with pin-drop silence. The major patriarchs and the divine guard chiefs were all stupefied. They stared at the sand table with their jaws dropped on the ground. They could not believe what they were seeing through the projection.

    On the sand table, Ralph looked pale and weak. He had copsed andy on the ground as though a cripple and seemed to be devoid of energy. His eyes were wide open and filled with fear, staring at the dark, incisive, and chilling longsword pointing at him. The spectators had no doubt that if Han Shuo were to lightly thrust the longsword with oddly-shaped hilt forward, Ralph would lose his life on the spot.

    Han Shuo was still wearing that same old faint smile on his face. However, to the spectators, that usually warm smile appeared rather chilling at this moment. The major patriarchs suddenly felt a shiver running through their hearts. They felt as though the Han Shuo who they had cheerful talks with just recently was a demon under a mask.

    ¡°Ralph has lost!¡± announced Wace in an expressionless face. He turned his eyes to Rugersey and said, ¡°The mist must be made by the one with the upper hand. Now you should know where the mistes from, don¡¯t you?¡±

    Under Wace¡¯s gaze, Rugersey put on an awkward and embarrassed face. He forced a smile and said, ¡°I really did not expect that Bryan would turn out to be such a terrifying expert, that he could defeat Ralph.¡±

    ¡°Not just any defeat, but a crushing defeat. Ralph seemed to be too weak to even move. But Bryan looked pretty much the same as when he first stepped into the arena. It was as though he had not spent any energy at all!¡± Aobashi had a solemn face as she remarked, ¡°This is an overwhelming victory. Even when I fought Ralph, it never was as effortless as Bryan had done. Perhaps even I will have to hand over my title as the most powerful Divine Guard Chief.

    Upon hearing those words, the spectators again focused their attention on the sand table and looked carefully. They immediately realized that Aobashi¡¯s words were true.

    One seemedpletely unharmed, while the other was utterly crushed. It was a battle between experts with an overwhelming disparity in strengths!

    After a moment of silence, the party turned boisterous. Some would discuss the battle by whispering to each other¡¯s ears, some were still in shock, while some cheered and praised Han Shuo for his achievement.

    The patriarch of the House of Kinson, Caspar, couldn¡¯t help but turned to look at his daughter Jiya who was in high spirits. He thought, <i>If I can get such a powerful a son-inw in exchange for Jiya, that will be the most profitable trade ever!</i>

    Caspar had sensed the overwhelming might of Han Shuo¡¯s. It was only by taking action now that Caspar could avoid some unnecessary disputes in the future. If things went really well, the House of Kinson might even get a firmer position in the City of Shadows. By then, perhaps even the House of Sainte must pay greater heed to the House of Kinson.

    In Caspar¡¯s grand scheme, the happiness of his daughter, Jiya, was not at all a concern. He decided that after the event, he must discuss this n with his wife so that she will persuade their daughter to ¡®take action¡¯.

    Caspar wasn¡¯t the only person with this thought. While he was scheming, Wace suddenly recalled of Andre¡¯s proposal. He realized just how important this proposal of Andre¡¯s could be to the future of the House of Sainte. Wace too couldn¡¯t help but turned to look at his daughter Carmelita. He saw that Carmelita wasughing and cheering with Erebus, chanting, ¡°Bryan!¡±

    Wace suddenly recalled how close Carmelita, Aobashi, and Erebus were to Han Shuo and bunched his brows. He wanted to do as Andre proposed a moment ago. But now, Wace was unsure. He thought, <i>they are growing too close. This isn¡¯t good.</i>

    ***

    Han Shuo stared straight into Ralph¡¯s eyes as he slowly pulled the Demonyer Edge. He coldly announced, ¡°You have lost!¡±

    Ralph stared fixedly at Han Shuo, heavily panting but without a word.

    ¡°I will not kill you today,¡± said Han Shuo. He turned away and continued in an indifferent voice, ¡°But if you dare y any kind of dirty tricks against me in secret, I promise, you will die very horribly!¡± Han Shuo started leaving the arena upon finishing those words.

    Ralph stared at Han Shuo¡¯s back. All sorts of emotions were welling up in his heart. He would think about seeking revenge while the other half of his brain was advising himself endure the humiliation. He seemed to be at a loss.

    ¡°Bryan, why were there mist in the arena just then?¡± asked Andre. He already knew how the battle would end.

    With no one else around, Han Shuo exined, ¡°There are too many spectators. As I had to use my full strength, they might recognize that the weapons and martial arts I used were simr to those used in the Hushveil City incident. There are just too many mouths and I don¡¯t want to risk any of them spreading the news. Otherwise, it will be bad both for me and for the City of Shadows.¡±

    Andre thought in silence for a moment and nodded understandably. He said, ¡°I see. My elder brother has asked about it just then. I will exin it to himter.¡±

    ¡°Thanks!¡± said Han Shuo and he departed the arena.

    A momentter, Ralph too hade out from the arena. The usually bold and tough face was now pale and colorless. He was as though a terminally ill patient. Even walking seemed strenuous. After watching for a while, Andre finally couldn¡¯t help but ask, ¡°Ralph, do you want me to carry you instead?¡±

 Chapter 801 - The moment he appeared, I lost

    GDK 801: The moment he appeared, I lost

    Han Shuo¡¯s victory was out of most people¡¯s expectations. He was greeted with gazes of respect after he returned to the center of the mountain range. The three major patriarchs, five Divine Guard Chiefs, and other influential characters of the City had their gazes gathered on Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo had expected this reaction from them. He believed that it won¡¯t be long before the news of his triumphant against Ralph and his Second Corps spreads throughout the City of Shadows. By then, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t have to worry about the recruitment issue. People would beg to be a divine guard of the House of Han and the Fifth Corps.

    ¡°Bryan, did you actually just defeated Ralph?¡± Carmelita was still in disbelief even till now. Ralph, the Chief of the Second Corps had just lost everything he could be proud of to Han Shuo who had made an official debut only recently.

    This was a significant change to the general situation in the City of Shadows which had not urred for many years!

    After that day, Ralph no longer had anything that could back his arrogance! The City of Shadows would no longer be a ce that Ralph could throw his weight about because he had just lost all his pride to Han Shuo!

    Han Shuo calmly smiled, pointed at the sand table, and responded, ¡°Didn¡¯t you see it?¡±

    Carmelita stared nkly for a second before she turned annoyed and said, ¡°See what? We didn¡¯t see one bit of the process! Why did you produce that mist and conceal the whole fight?¡±

    ¡°Process isn¡¯t the important part ¨C what matters is the results!¡± said Han Shuo as he wore the most punchable mischievous smile. ¡°In short, I have won the battle. That is all that matters!¡±

    ¡°Indeed. It¡¯s not the process that counts but the oue! Every one of us here has witnessed Bryan pressing his sword on Ralph¡¯s throat. All of us here are eyewitnesses. Bryan has won, and Ralph has lost. It¡¯s that simple!¡± remarked Caspar before he looked at Wace smilingly.

    For all these while, the House of Sainte had control over the First, Second, and Third Corps. No matter in teambat strength or in the capabilities of the Chiefs, the House of Sainte had overshadowed those of the other three major family ns. In all of thepetitions, the top three Corps and Chiefs would always be those from the House of Sainte. Their supremacy had never been challenged.

    That was until this day when Bryan shook up everything!

    Wace nodded indifferently and asked in a deep voice, ¡°Alright. Bryan is victorious in this match. Any objections?¡±

    Who would have any objection? The fact was in for all to see!

    Caspar and the other two major patriarchs exchanged meaningful nces with each other. Although they were rivals, the three patriarchs shared a mutual understanding. They knew exactly what each other were thinking right then.

    Before the departure of the House of Lavers, there were five major family ns in the City of Shadows. Although they were called the five major family ns, it wasmon knowledge that the House of Sainte was much more powerful and had always kept the other four family ns contained. The House of Sainte had the City of Shadows firmly in its grasp and no one coulde close to loosening its grip.

    But were the other family ns satisfied with what they have?

    The answer was obvious ¨C absolutely not! No matter if it was the House of Kinson, House of Kisa, House of Buller, or even the lesser family ns, all of them yearned for the position of the City Lord.

    The City of Shadows had limited territory and resources which had mostly been split among big and small family ns. A new family n needed territory and all kinds of resources to grow. Without any unexplorednd and unexploited resources, this new family n must obtain what they needed from another family n in order to fuel their growth.

    The rise of a major family n often means the downfall of another ¨C a fact that had not changed since times immemorial. The abrupt rise of the House of Han was a great example. How was it that the House of Han could grow so rapidly and be one of the most influential powers in the City? It was because they had taken over the territory of the House of Lavers and their tremendous manor!

    When the House of Sainte first started out, simr to the Houses of Kinson, Buller, and Kisa, they were all just small family ns in the City of Shadows. Eons ago, the former ruler of the City of Shadows, the House of Tianluo, suffered disastrous losses in a war against the Life and Light Dominions. The weakened House of Tianluo was annihted by the joint forces of the Sainte, Kinson, Buller, and Kisa families. That was how they came to possess what they had this day.

    And, if there ever came a day that the House of Sainte declined, then the current House of Kinson, Buller, and Kisa could fill their ce and be the new ruler of the City of Shadows. They could possess what the House of Sainte had, or even more!

    Who could resist this temptation?

    The reason that the Kinson, Buller, and Kisa Families never dared rebel was that the Sainte Family had managed to firmly inhibit them in every aspect. They were also intimidated by Wace¡¯s terrifying strength. But on that day, when Han Shuo managed to defeat Ralph with ease, the colossal House of Sainte which had been untouchable in the City of Shadows seemed to have quivered very lightly.

    But even the slightest quiver was more than enough to reignite their greed!

    The three major patriarchs understood each other even though they did not speak a word.

    Wace was just too strong. The three patriarchs understood that if they were to go on an all-out fight with the House of Sainte, they must have someone on their side who could fight Wace. The three patriarchs of mid-stage highgods strengths knew that they had around the same strength as Ralph. They were certain that even if they could defeat Ralph in a battle, it would never be as effortless as Han Shuo had done.

    <i>Can Bryan defeat Wace?</i>

    The three major patriarchs simultaneously asked themselves the same question. Their heads which were lowered in contemtion were raised and their gazes yet again gathered on Han Shuo. The three astute and circumspect foxes thought, <i>I shall wait and observe. If he could also defeat Aobashi just as effortlessly, then it can be certain that he has the strength to fight Wace.</i>

    ¡°Next battle, Erebus versus Cami!¡± announced Wace.

    ¡°Here Ie!¡± Erebus who was chatting happily with Han Shuo left impatiently after he heard the call-out from Wace.

    Based on Han Shuo¡¯s understanding of Erebus, Han Shuo reckoned that it wouldn¡¯t be difficult for Erebus to win this battle.

    And the results were as Han Shuo had expected. After half a day¡¯s time, Erebus sessfully defeated Cami. Next in line was Bat¨²k and Rugersey. The results of this match were rather unexpected. Bat¨²k, who was thest ce in the ranking, with great difficulty, managed to defeat Rugersey who had previously defeated him. With that, the ranking of Divine Guard Chiefs changed slightly.

    The victors continued to fight for higher ranking while the defeated strived to stay as high up as they could. Han Shuo, Erebus, Bat¨²k, and Aobashi went for another round of lot drawing.

    ¡°Bat¨²k, if you got the lot against Bryan, just surrender,¡± the Buller Family patriarch, Laurel, advised Bat¨²k softly before he would draw lots.

    Bat¨²k forced a smiled and replied, ¡°Lord Patriarch, can¡¯t you have a little more confidence in me?¡±

    Laurel smiled and replied, ¡°Well, Bat¨²k, do you have confidence in defeating Bryan?¡± Bat¨²k was a member of the House of Buller. As the patriarch of the Buller Family, Laurel knew Bat¨²k¡¯s strength well. He did not think that Bat¨²k coulde close to defeating Han Shuo.

    ¡°Nope, not the slightest shred of confidence,¡± said Bat¨²k as he shook his head. ¡°But I have not seen how Bryan attacked just then. Even if I were to be defeated, I should at least try to gauge his true strength, right?¡±

    Laurel stared nkly for a bit and thought for a moment. He nodded smilingly as he replied, ¡°You¡¯re right. Might as well make use of the defeat. A little bit of fighting wouldn¡¯t hurt.¡±

    The results of the lot drawing were obtained in no time: Erebus was matched against Aobashi and Bat¨²k matched against Han Shuo.

    ¡°I surrender!¡± Erebus dered loudly and shamelessly before Wace could announce anything. Under the astonished gazes of the crowd, Erebus shrugged and exined, ¡°I have fought Aobashi many times in private and I know for a fact that I am no match against her. I don¡¯t want to waste everyone¡¯s time.¡±

    The crowd unknowingly smirked after hearing Erebus¡¯ words. It was known to everyone that Erebus had been pursuing Aobashi and that he was no match against Aobashi in strength. However, the crowd couldn¡¯t help but suspect that perhaps something else was going on, given how straightforward Erebus was in giving up. They couldn¡¯t help but look at Erebus and Aobashi suspiciously.

    ¡°Who asked you to surrender? Why can¡¯t you fight?¡± scolded Aobashi in a fierce scowl. She didn¡¯t expect that Erebus would actually straightforwardly give up as he said he will. He showed not the slightest courageous spirit.

    ¡°We all know that I cannot defeat you. There¡¯s no point in wasting everybody¡¯s time,¡± replied Erebus smilingly.

    ¡°Alright. Erebus has voluntarily surrendered. Aobashi will make it to the next round,¡± announced Wace.

    As Aobashi and Erebus will not be fighting, Han Shuo and Bat¨²k proceeded to the arena. Right when the battle between the two started, the mist yet again appeared out of nowhere,pletely blocking the spectator¡¯s view of the entire fight. It tickled the annoyance of the crowd who wished to have a clear view of Han Shuo¡¯s true strength.

    When the mist finally dissipated, the arena was again visible to the spectators and Han Shuo was pointing his sword at an exhausted Bat¨²k. It was simr to the fight between Han Shuo and Ralph but the battle took an even shorter time. Unlike Ralph, Bat¨²k did not even have the energy to get up.

    Bat¨²k, whose head was spinning, was helped to his feet by Han Shuo. ¡°Much apologies, Lord Bat¨²k!¡± said Han Shuo sincerely after giving Bat¨²k a hand. He knew that those surrounding the sand table saw the scene of his victory.

    ¡°It is apetition. There is nothing to apologize for,¡± Bat¨²k, who knew that he will be defeated, couldn¡¯t pull a smile as though nothing had happened as Han Shuo could. He nodded indifferent at Han Shuo and left the arena in a gloomy face.

    As Han Shuo will fight Aobashi next, he did not leave the arena. He sincerely apologized to the leaving Bat¨²k a few more times and stayed in the arena, waiting for Aobashi¡¯s arrival.

    As soon as Bat¨²k returned from the arena, Laurel hastily went to him and asked in a low voice, ¡°So, did you get anything?¡±

    ¡°It felt as though I was pulled into another dimension. I did not see Bryan even once from start to finish. By the time he appeared, I was already defeated. It¡¯s basically the same as what you would see through the sand table,¡± said Bat¨²k resentfully. He did not feel angry about the results. There was no shame in losing, but he couldn¡¯t ept not knowing how he was defeated!

    Bat¨²k turned more sullen the more he thought about it. He remarked, ¡°Had I known this earlier, I would have just surrendered. What¡¯s the point of wasting all the energy!¡±

    Laurel was astounded. The other two major patriarchs who hade to them at an unknown time also put on astounded faces.

    <i>Just how powerful is this Bryan?</i>

 Chapter 802 - Han Shuo V Aobashi

    GDK 802: Han Shuo V Aobashi

    None of them were surprised that Han Shuo defeated Bat¨²k. After all, Bat¨²k¡¯s strength wasn¡¯t even on Ralph¡¯s level. It was reasonable that Bat¨²k would lose.

    However, they could not believe Bat¨²k when he said that he did not even saw Han Shuo attacking. It didn¡¯t sound logical!

    Under Laurel¡¯s suspicious gaze, Bat¨²k said annoyingly, ¡°I¡¯m reporting the fact as it is. I did not see how he attacked at all!¡±

    ¡°Then how exactly were you defeated?¡± asked Laurel.

    ¡°Right from the start of the battle, I feel as though I was trapped in a prison cell. A very corrosive energy and a frigid energy simultaneously attacked me. I had no choice but to deploy defensive barriers. When I have nearly exhausted my divine energy, I finally feel that I was no longer imprisoned. It was right then that Bryan appeared and restrained me!¡± exined Bat¨²k in a depressed manner.

    Laurel was astonished. He exchanged nces with the other two major patriarchs listening to their conversation and they turned silent.

    While the few were discussing, Aobashi had arrived at the arena.

    Han Shuo who was resting suddenly opened his eyes and stood up. ¡°Hullo!¡± greeted Han Shuo smilingly. He seemed less at ease than usual.

    Han Shuo had previously witnessed Aobashi¡¯s strength just once. He also knew that in the City of Shadows, her strength was second only to Wace. Although Han Shuo was confident in defeating Aobashi, he had a very good friendship with her. It was because of this that Han Shuo did not know if he should attack Aobashi with his full strength.

    Unlike Han Shuo, Aobashi was untroubled. She walked towards Han Shuo with a big grin on her face. After giving Han Shuo a nce with her bright eyes, in her lovable voice, she said, ¡°I have not made it out until this day. You have concealed your secret well. Turns out you are so powerful that you can defeat Ralph and Bat¨²k without much effort. It appeared that I must go all-out in this duel!¡±

    ¡°Mercy, big sister Aobashi! Please don¡¯t be too harsh to me!¡± replied Han Shuo modestly.

    ¡°Sorry, but I can¡¯t afford to do so, or I might end up losing very horribly! Hehe, Bryan, just use your full strength and show me your true power! Don¡¯t be a chicken like Erebus!¡± said Aobashi loudly. She suddenly started elerating towards Han Shuo like a spirit.

    A violent gust abruptly appeared in the arena, kicking up sand and stones. Multiple strong and rapidly revolving winds converged around Aobashi before wrapping her tightly in the center. The element of wind from far and near started wildly converging to the center of the superstorm and formed an impregnable barrier around her.

    Once a cultivator of the energy of wind learned to form a domain of divinity, they could direct the element of wind to wrap around themselves to form a shield. They could also use it to increase their movement speed. Aobashi had just shown great mastery of her domain of divinity. While cramming the space around her with the element of wind, she formed a colossal tornado around herself.

    The apocalyptic tornado uprooted every towering tree that she flew past. An entire forest of massive trees became a part of the tornado. Nothing remained on the ground, save for the earth, and several tottering trees that had energy towers concealed within.

    The tornado whistled ever louder and grew ever more powerful. After sucking in countless trees, stones, sand, and anything on the ground, the tornado turned greyish and seemed to have strengthened by an order of magnitude. The gargantuan whirling wreckerid waste to everything in its path as it moved towards Han Shuo.

    With the presence of such a terrifying and devastating mega-tornado, Han Shuo did not need deploying the Banner of Hallucination in this battle. The massive tornado had kicked up more than enough sand and dust around the arena. Those gathered around the sand table could not see through the turbulent atmosphere filled with dust.

    Han Shuo remained motionless and stood as still as a mountain. He was waiting for Aobashi to umte her wind energy to the peak before he would attack so that she will be more epting of her defeat.

    When the tornado had stored up energy to its peak and started engulfing him, Han Shuo finally made a move. Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy gushed into his body. In an instant, a tremendous amount of energy filled every one of his organs and bones. Han Shuo felt not just immense pain, but also immense power.

    Instead of taking out the seventeen flying swords, Han Shuo used the Demonyer Edge. It shot out from his body like a dark thunderbolt. The bright-dark Demonyer Edge glowed with bewitching red radiance as demonic yuan poured into it. Shafts of red radiance started unfolding as though the blooming of a flower.

    The blood-red radiance started spinning rapidly and turned into an enormous sphere of light. It shot towards the tornado-like a wrecking ball.

    The Blood Radiance of Ten Thousand Cuts spread apart as soon as it touched the tornado. They shot through the barriers made of crushed rock and wood as though nothing was there and pierced deep inside, straight for Aobashi at the center of the tornado.

    Aobashi clearly took a shock when she saw that the barrier made of objects aggregated by the tornado had no effect. She hastily slowed down the speed of the tornado so that she can divert more elements of wind to her shield. The wind energy shield that formed a sphericalyer of absolute nothingness around Aobashi protected her from the red swarm of destructive sword radiances.

    Han Shuo observed that the speed of the tornado was abruptly reduced and he made use of the very brief window to attack. As though a crystal cannon that had been energized, heunched himself into the tornado.

    The enormous tornado of several hundred meters tall and several dozens meters thick, assembled using Aobashi¡¯s divine energy and her domain of divinity, instantly engulfed Han Shuo. The fierce winds carrying rocks shards and splinted wood ruthlessly ground him. It even forced Han Shuo to whirl around uncontrobly.

    Han Shuo¡¯s Omen Invincible Body did not automatically deploy when he faced the attack as the base defensive power of his demonic body was enough to handle it. Han Shuo was unharmed by the harsh abrasion and blunt force. He even allowed his body to spin with the wind and carefully maneuvered himself closer and closer to Aobashi who was at the center of the mega-storm.

    Although the crushed rocks and splintered wood were not as incisive as swords or spears, they nheless carried an astonishing amount of power after being elerated by the tornado to extreme speeds. Even if one could handle the attack, the person would at least suffer some cuts and bruises. Han Shuo, however, waspletely unharmed. Aobashi¡¯s astonishment was renewed after she discovered that through the element of wind found all around her.

    While Aobashi was baffled and confused, Han Shuo got closer to her by flying with the wind. Then, at some point, the barrier of wind made using wind divine energy and wind element stopped Han Shuo¡¯s path. Han Shuo was yet again obstructed from getting closer.

    With one thought, the seventeen flying swords whistled out from his body. The indestructible seventeen flying swords carried intense corrosive and frigid energies, making it an excellent weapon against any kind of shield or barrier. Under the control of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, the seventeen flying swords focused their attacks on a single point on the shield.

    The wind energy shield was spinning rapidly with the tornado. However, Han Shuo was able to keep track of that single point with insane precision and uracy. No matter how or where the shield spun, the seventeen flying swords would always manage to hit the same point again and again. That single point on the shield was bombarded with ferocious impacting force, terrifying corrosiveness, and frigid energy.

    Thanks to his absurdly good sight, the seventeen flying swords took just three waves of attacks to make a hole on Aobashi¡¯s shield of wind energy. Han Shuo abruptly got beside Aobashi the instant that the wind shield broke. He grinned and said, ¡°Gotcha!¡±

    Aobashi was stunned for a nanosecond. Before she could react, she discovered that she was confined to a bizarre space that abruptly formed within her shield of wind. She also discovered that the instant she fell into the strange space, she lost connection to the element of wind in the environment and could no longer operate her wind shield that had a tiny crack.

    Once a god with a strength lower than Han Shuo¡¯s fell into the Ceaseless Pain formed from his seventeen flying swords, the only thing they could do is to have a fight of endurance with Han Shuo. However, Han Shuo would have a great advantage in the fight as the seventeen flying swords had corrosive and frigid properties. In addition, Han Shuo had Cauldron Spirit who could provide him with an endless stream of energy. Therefore, they had practically no chance of winning in an endurance fight against Han Shuo!

    And Aobashi was no exception!

    At the center of Soaring Cloud Mountain Range, the spectators gathered around the sand table did not see that hated mist. But the spectators soon discovered that the vision they received was even worse than before. Just the tornado made by Aobashi upied around one-tenth of the arena. And when the dust, sand, and soil were driven everywhere by the tornado, the entire arena was shrouded by a brown-gray atmosphere. They couldn¡¯t see shit.

    ¡°I wonder what¡¯s really happening in the arena,¡± Erebus seemed anxious. He did not know who he was hoping to win the duel. One was his best friend while the other was the woman he loved. He was torn between supporting either one of them.

    ¡°This battle is longer than the previous ones. It seems that Bryan is having some trouble in defeating Aobashi!¡± remarked Rugersey who was feeling very upset. ¡°Though we can tell that the ongoing battle is very fierce, it¡¯s such a pity that we can¡¯t see what is happening in the arena. Sigh, even till now, we have no idea which elemental or edictal energy Bryan is using.¡±

    ¡°I believe that Bryan will win this duel and Aobashi will have to hand over the title as the strongest Chief of Divine Guards to him,¡± remarked Bat¨²k. Although he felt very sullen, he had no choice but to admit that Han Shuo was unfathomably powerful. He was most wary of enemies with strengths he could not gauge. Although Aobashi was mighty, Bat¨²k could see Aobashi when fighting her and he had a rough idea of her strength. Against Han Shuo, however, Bat¨²k felt as though he was fighting against an incorporeal monster. To him, it was much more terrifying to fight something that he could not see.

    ¡°Carmelita, who are you rooting for?¡± asked Wace suddenly.

    Carmelita stared nkly for a moment and started thinking about it seriously. She replied, ¡°I¡¯m not sure. Sister Aobashi has been very good to me, but so has Bryan. Hmm, Sister Aobashi has sat on that position for many years. Perhaps it¡¯s time for a change. If that happens, it will make the City of Shadows more refreshing!¡±

    Wace¡¯s mind was betweenughter and tears after he heard Carmelita¡¯s response. He thought, <i>This foolish girl, if only she knew all the troubles and disputes that the youngster¡¯s rise will stir up. Sigh, being a City Lord is not easy at all... </i>

    Soon, the tornado started slowing down. The crushed rocks and trees started returning to the earth. Dust gradually settled and the arena slowly became visible again. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t pointing his Demonyer Edge at Aobashi but the unruffled smile on his face could clearly be seen through the sand table. Aobashi, meanwhile, looked dejected.

    It was clear to all the spectators that Han Shuo was yet again victorious!

 Chapter 803 - Distrust

    GDK 803: Distrust

    Han Shuo, Aobashi, and Andre returned to the center area together. The crowd had their eyes gathered on Han Shuo. A constant stream of congrattions andpliments came from members of the three major family ns. Han Shuo handled the wave of praises calmly and modestly.

    The three major patriarchs who started having a certain idea did not disy too much excitement to Han Shuo on his victory. But Carmelita, Jiya, and Erebus who were friends to Han Shuo were rather open about it. They celebrated Han Shuo¡¯s victory as though it was something unimaginable. Carmelita and Erebus would also console Aobashi who lost the battle.

    Aobashi who had carefully considered this oue as a real possibility before the fight had managed to find sce after Han Shuo and Andre consoled her during their return journey. She wasn¡¯t upset or dejected as the crowd expected. On the contrary, it seemed as though the defeat had only ignited her fighting spirit. She made it known that she will get Han Shuo in the next centennialpetition.

    Wace grew more concerned as he observed just how close Aobashi, Erebus, Carmelita, and Andre were bing with Han Shuo. As the patriarch of the House of Sainte, he must think much further ahead than everyone else and therefore had much more to worry about than all those around him. Unknowingly, Wace had started to take Han Shuo¡¯s influence in the City very seriously.

    After the first ce was determined, it was time to determine the rest of the ranking. After rounds of battles, the new ranking of the strengths of the Divine Guard Chiefs was finally determined. From strongest to weakest: Han Shuo, Aobashi, Erebus, Ralph, Cami, Bat¨²k, Rugersey. In the duel between Erebus and Ralph, Ralph was defeated as he had exhausted most of his energy when battling Han Shuo. His defeat was rather surprising to the crowd.

    Ralph was much more silent than usual after the new ranking was set. He had not spoken a single word but sweep his eyes up and down Han Shuo from time to time. No one knew what he was thinking.

    Han Shuo had given Ralph a strong warning not to try anything silly and he was on guard against him. If Ralph wasn¡¯t a henchman directly under Wace, Han Shuo might even have eliminated this potential source of danger long ago. But Han Shuo knew that once he does so, his rtionship with the House of Sainte will instantly sink below the abyss, beyond the point of no return. This was not an oue Han Shuo wished to see at present and therefore he did not act on his thought.

    ¡°Thepetition has concluded. All those who ranked in the top three in either of the two categories will be rewarded. Bryan, the Chief of the Fifth Corps, takes the first ce in both categories. He is given the power to apprehend any member of any family n directly, without having to first seek for any approval. Also, the taxes levied on shops and forts owned by the House of Han is reduced by half... ¡° Wace announced the prizes after getting the crowd¡¯s attention.

    However, for some reason, Andre seemed rather astonished when Wacepleted his announcement. It was as though what Wace had just announced was different than what he knew beforehand. He stared at Wace in a puzzled face and seemed as though he wanted to say something to him.

    The three major patriarchs and the Divine Guard Chiefs, all of them raised an eyebrow. In all pastpetitions, the Divine Guard Chief who takes the first ce will be rewarded with a piece of territory. Thisnd was usually obtained from lesser family ns that had declined or banished, or one of the many territories owned by the House of Sainte. In thispetition, however, Wace did not award Han Shuo a single inch of soil.

    Han Shuo was rewarded with a bunch of titles, such as ¡®The most powerful Divine Guard Chief¡¯, and five hundred thousand ck crystal coins. The tax levied on his House of Han was also reduced by half. These rewards were the same as those given to past winners.

    Given how prosperous the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was nowadays, five hundred thousand ck crystal coins wasn¡¯t a significant amount of money. It was nowhere as valuable as a fort or a fief.

    ¡°Nond is rewarded as the City of Shadows currently has no surplus fiefdom and the House of Han has received Fort Lasberg just recently. But aspensation, I will bestow another five hundred thousand ck crystal coins,¡± exined Wace after he noticed the crowds¡¯ puzzlement.

    For a moment, Andre wanted to say something but he hesitated. In the end, he said nothing and lowered his head.

    ¡°Thank you, Lord Wace!¡± said Han Shuo as he bowed. He seemed happy and did not show the tiniest bit of dissatisfaction.

    The three major patriarchs originally intended to say something. But seeing that Han Shuo had expressed thanks and epted it dly, they stammered for a moment and said nothing. They only lightly shook their heads as though they disagreed with Wace¡¯s decision.

    Aobashi, Erebus, and Ralph were awarded divine weapons by Wace. As no one from other family ns was among the top three in either category, they did not receive anything. They had expected this and none of them had anyints about it.

    The rewards were finalized. Although the crowd had their disagreements, no one made a singleint to Wace.

    Thepetition for the centennial was officially over. The party performed yet another round of worshipping ceremony before Wace finally allowed them to disperse.

    The patriarchs of the three major family ns, the Divine Guard Chiefs, and other VVIPs went on their own ways. Han Shuo too returned to his Fifth Corps in a cheerful appearance.

    When only Wace and Andre were left in the area, Andre gestured with his hand and dismissed the Sainte Family divine guards in the area. After they left, Andre puzzlingly asked, ¡°The rewards given aren¡¯t the same as what I remember. There¡¯s supposed to be a piece ofnd! Elder Brother, why is there a sudden change of n?¡±

    Andre would never question Wace for his decisions in front of outsiders. Instead, he waited until they were alone. Wace and Andre were siblings and there was nothing that they wouldn¡¯t talk about. Andre always thought that his elder brother wasn¡¯t an illiberal man. This abrupt decision of Wace¡¯s was a total surprise to Andre.

    ¡°Andre, I know that you and Bryan have a great friendship going. But as the patriarch, I must always keep the interest of our Sainte Family in mind, both present and future!¡± Wace looked deeply at Andre and asked in a deep voice, ¡°Don¡¯t you think that the House of Han is growing too rapidly?¡±

    ¡°Elder Brother, I know exactly what you are worrying about. However, the first-ced Chiefs had always been rewarded with a piece ofnd in every single one of the centennialpetitions! With this sudden move of yours, everyone will know that you are worried about Bryan. And Bryan ¨C he might look unsuspecting but he is more cunning than anyone. He knew exactly what your thoughts are. By doing so, you have achieved nothing but alerting him!¡± replied Andre. He thought that his elder brother had made a mistake.

    ¡°Yes, that is precisely the message I want to send to Bryan and the three patriarchs. Andre, the only reason that our Sainte Family could keep the three family ns in check is that they are intimidated by the strength of our family n. They have been willing to submit to our rule because we are so much more powerful than any of them. But Bryan is threatening the status quo. Not only that he possessed a strength that rivals mine, but his family n is also rapidly improving in power. We have no choice but to take precautionary measures!¡± Wearing a solemn face, Wace continued, ¡°No matter when or what happens, our House of Sainte will always be the ruler of the City of Shadows. I¡¯m reminding those people of this fact. If Bryan is indeed loyal to us, then he should have no objection!¡±

    Andre shook his head in disagreement and responded, ¡°Elder Brother, I think that this time, you are wrong. With Bryan, with the House of Han, our City of Shadows will increase in overall strength. If the momentum continues, our City of Shadows will no longer be sitting near the bottom in the Darkness Dominion, but climb and rise in ranking. There might evene a day that we couldpete with the City of Gorging Clouds! But if you keep on beating down all other family ns, the City of Shadows will always remain just slightly better than Hushveil City but below all other cities!¡°

    ¡°If things continue to develop at this trend, yes, there mighte a day when the City of Shadows couldpete with the City of Gorging Clouds. But at that time, the City of Shadows might belong to another family n, not the House of Sainte!¡± Wace coldly groaned and said, ¡°I¡¯m the patriarch of the House of Sainte and I know what I am doing. I don¡¯t need any more of your advice on this matter!¡±

    Andre was astounded when Wace coerced him with his identity as the patriarch of the House of Sainte. Never before had Wace spoke in that manner to Andre. He was at a loss for a moment, not knowing how to react to those words of Wace¡¯s.

    When Andre finally came to his senses, he put on a smile that screamed sadness and disappointment and said, ¡°Alright then, I won¡¯t give you any more advice on it. I hope against hope that the decision you made is the right one.¡± Andre was downhearted. He turned around and started leaving with his head drooping.

    ¡°You should start keeping some distance from him. Lest you feel troubled if we had to fight him someday,¡± instructed Wace in a deep voice as he looked at Andre¡¯s back.

    Andre halted. Without turning around, he answered, ¡°Yes, I know, Patriarch,¡± and continued flying away.

    ***

    Over at the Fifth Corps¡¯ campsite, the divine guards had been waiting expectantly for Han Shuo. As soon as Han Shuo returned, they excitedly asked, ¡°My Lord, what are the results?¡±

    ¡°You guys have held true to your promise and taken the first ce, so have I!¡± said Han Shuo in a faint smile.

    Upon hearing those words, the Fifth Corps divine guards started cheering excitedly, especially the female divine guards who had their fiery eyes firmly fixed on Han Shuo. They were so passionate that Han Shuo dared not meet their gazes for more than a split second.

    ¡°Told ya. My master defeated everyone easily. There is no doubt about this!¡± remarked Gilbertcently.

    Bonds who had always been emotionless revealed a faint smile ¨C an expression very rarely seen Bonds¡¯s face. Having worked under Erebus¡¯ Third Corps for ages, Bonds was very familiar with the rules of the centennialpetition. Out of curiosity, he asked, ¡°Senior, which fief did we receive?¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s been a slight change to the rules. We did not receive any territory but an extra five hundred thousand ck crystal coins,¡± said Han Shuo. He still had a faint smile on his face.

    Bonds was astounded. He stared nkly for a moment and said, ¡°But... ¡°

    Han Shuo raised a palm and held back Bonds¡¯ words. But instead of exining, he smilingly said, ¡°Get ready, we will return to the City.¡±

    Bonds still wanted to say something but was stopped by Han Shuo¡¯s gaze.

    Bonds realized that there must be a reason that Han Shuo did not want to discuss it openly. Although puzzled and confused, Bonds did not ask anything but nodded. He began instructing the divine guards to get make preparations for returning to the City of Shadows.

    A few of the divine guards who knew thepetition rules well turned silent. Others who were oblivious to it continued cheering excitedly. Following Bonds¡¯ instructions, theypleted the necessary preparations in no time and started their return trip in a grandiose manner.

 Chapter 804 - On the crest of a wave

    GDK 804: On the crest of a wave

    Dayster, Han Shuo and his Fifth Corps divine guards returned to the City of Shadows. In one of the secret chambers in the Han Residence, Han Shuo, Stratholme, Ayermike, Bonds, Emily, and all the core members of the House of Han gathered to discuss thepetition that was held in Soaring Cloud Mountain Range.

    After everyone was seated, Han Shuo immediately began the meeting. He said, ¡°Wace feels threatened by our family n. It is clear that he is on the guard against us!¡± They had been informed of the results and Wace¡¯s actions.

    Strathole nodded and said, ¡°It seems that Wace just couldn¡¯t tolerate any kind of potentialpetition. After the House of Lavers¡¯ departure, the City of Shadows has reduced in overall strength. It¡¯s only recently that our House of Han has started to make up for the dent. But instead of throwing us all his support, he started suppressing us prematurely. Doing so won¡¯t do the City of Shadows any good!¡±

    ¡°Perhaps the strength Bryan disyed was just too overwhelming and it scared Wace,¡± Emily bunched her brows and said, ¡°I¡¯m afraid that our House of Han won¡¯t continue to enjoy such a smooth growth in the City of Shadows!¡±

    Han Shuo who took in everyone¡¯s expressions and opinions put on a faint smile and said, ¡°Well, we have reaped plenty of benefits in the City of Shadows already. Although Wace intend to suppress us, he won¡¯t do anything too excessive for now. You don¡¯t have to be too worried about it, at least for now.¡±

    After taking a short pause, Han Shuo continued, ¡°From today onwards, we House of Han will no longer focus our expansion efforts on the City of Shadows. Instead, we will focus on expanding the Celestial Pearl¡¯s influence on all other Dominions. As to Fort Lasberg, this territory of ours, as it is located at the edge of the City, we should tighten our grasp over it. We must put in as much thought and effort as we can on Fort Lasberg.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. If we House of Han managed to spread our influence to every Dominion, even if we fell out with the City of Shadows, we could just pack and leave for somewhere else. If this City doesn¡¯t wee us, another will. There is no ce we cannot thrive!¡± said Phoebe angrily.

    These members of the House of Han were very annoyed that the growth of their family n was being hindered when the growth was at its highest. No one in the Han Family, including Han Shuo, coveted the City of Shadows or nned to take over it. Wace¡¯s actions had alienated them and forced them to make necessary changes to their ns for the future.

    ¡°From thepetition between Divine Guard Chiefs, we indeed did not obtain all the rewards expected. Wace has gifted us nothing but some fame and titles.¡± Han Shuo said calmly, ¡°However, all those titles that seemed useless to him are the things we currently needed the most! Hehe, in just a short few days, more than several hundred gods have asked to join the House of Han and the Fifth Corps. These people will be the future pirs of strength for our House of Han!¡±

    The House of Han had plenty of money andnd. Theycked nothing but people!

    Before Han Shuo had revealed his outstanding strength in thepetition, only a few people would consider joining the Fifth Corps and his family n as divine guards. But after Han Shuo defeated Ralph and Aobashi and obtained the title as the most powerful Divine Guard Chief; after the Fifth Corps crushed the Second Corps and became the strongest Divine Guard Corps, the number of enlistment surged by more than ten folds!

    Moreover, the enlistees were of much greater quality in terms of aptitude and strength. They were the talents Han Shuo needed!

    With that, the divine guards that the House of Han and Fifth Corpscked were quickly filled. The House of Han was no longer a small family n protected by just a few people. It was as though the House of Han became tougher overnight.

    ¡°Yes, we needed men. The number of divine guards we have now is far too little. If the Fifth Corps can assemble a thousand divine guards, we will put all of them through a round of training in the Eight Destion and Torment Formation to make their strength and power rise to a whole new level. And if they became just half as loyal and united as the First Company, even if we were to fall out with the House of Sainte in the future, we would have some real bargaining chips!¡± said Bonds after he nodded.

    ¡°Yes, we need to do all we can to recruit new divine guards. But that doesn¡¯t mean we willpromise on quality. Be sure to check the background of every applicant thoroughly. I do not want any of them to be double-agent inserted by other family ns who might turn around and bite us during the critical moment. You must keep this in mind. Interrogate every one of the applicants thoroughly!¡± Han Shuo repeatedly emphasized the point. Han Shuo did not want a single potential spy even if that means the recruitment process will be slow.

    ¡°Rest assured, Senior. I will make certain that every single recruit is clean!¡± assured Bonds solemnly.

    As the days passed, all other divine guards and members ofrge family ns also returned to the City from Soaring Cloud Mountain Range. The oue of thepetition at Soaring Cloud Mountain Range was spread to the entire City by word of mouth. There were even certain forces intentionally spreading the news.

    Genius pharmacist defeated Aobashi and Ralph. The divine guards he trained became the most coordinated team and the most powerful in teambat strength, defeating even the Second Corps...

    All kinds of positive information about Han Shuo was spread far and wide through various channels. Gods living in every fort and town under the City of Shadows would discuss the matter enthusiastically.

    ...

    ¡°Carter, let¡¯s not go to the House of Kisa. We should go to the House of Han instead!¡±

    ¡°The House of Han is currently on the crest of a wave. They even possessed medicine that could raise one¡¯s strength. This is indeed the smartest choice!¡±

    ¡°We should go to the Fifth Corps. It is said that the Fifth Corps is currently open for recruiting divine guards. This is a once in a blue moon opportunity! Aren¡¯t you going?¡±

    ¡°Me? Forget about it. I¡¯m only a mid-stage midgod. They will probably reject me at their doorstep!¡±

    ....

    Conversations of simr content were repeated by different people in every corner of the City of Shadows. Experts with great ambitions from every region gathered in the City of Shadows. Their destination: the Fifth Corps and the House of Han. They were willing to do anything to be enlisted. A series of extensive tests were nothing to them.

    The City of Shadows turned rather crowded all of a sudden as many traveled thousands of miles to the City. Some of them had even traveled from other Dominions. They flocked to the City intending to apply to the House of Han or the Fifth Corps as a divine guard.

    The House of Han and the Fifth Corps suddenly turned very busy with extremely long queues lining up from their entrances. Bonds, Stratholme, and Ayermike Cotton who were in charge of examining the applicants were busy day in and day out. They carefully reviewed every applicant and held them to the most stringent requirements.

    The three major patriarchs quietly observed the activity in the City. They did nothing as they watched Han Shuo slowly raise an army.

    After thepetition was over, Aobashi and Erebus were reassigned to distant borders of the City. They did not go to Han Shuo and celebrate his victory.

    Since thepetition, for some reason, Andre and Carmelita had stopped visiting Han Shuo. Members of other family ns who had good friendships with the House of Han also stopped visiting Han Shuo, as though they were afraid of something.

    As the current situation in the City of Shadows wasn¡¯t exactly stable, Han Shuo did not depart for the Fringe with Rose but sat in his Han Residence. During this sensitive period, if any kind of chaos were to happen in the City, the House of Han might not make it through without a highgod. Han Shuo never take chances when ites to ensuring the safety of his family n. He will not leave the House of Han without the absolute certainty of their security.

    Time passed rapidly. One year went by. During that time, the House of Han and the Fifth Corps managed to recruit more than five hundred divine guards. The reason they were so slow in recruitment was that the requirement set by Han Shuo was just too stringent. He will only ept extraordinarily talented experts with a clean background. All those who had no tenacity or born with certain issues were rejected, no matter how powerful their strengths were.

    Once it was made certain that the new recruits will be unswervingly faithful and loyal to Han Shuo, they would be sent into the Eight Destion and Torment Formation to be tempered. Their strengths and vigor would substantially increase with every round of training in the Formation. Those who were still on the fence about devoting their lives to serve the House of Han wouldpromise after they saw those who had pledged their devotion bing stronger and receiving much better treatment. The temptation was just too great for them.

    And during this period, Jiya of the House of Kinson would often step into the Han Residence to look for Han Shuo with the excuse of seeking his cultivation advice, purchasing medicine, and et cetera. She would ignore the murderous gazes from Phoebe, Emily, and the otherdies, and shamelessly pull Han Shuo away to talk about anything and everything.

    As Jiya became more frequent in her visit, even those newly recruited divine guards managed to make out that Jiya was interested in Han Shuo.

    There was arge poption of youngsters in the City who fawned over Jiya. When they noticed that Jiya was frequently visiting the Han Residence alone and actively looked for Han Shuo, they could not be more angry and frustrated. However, the House of Han and Han Shuo nowadays were untouchable to most. Although those hot-blooded youngsters held resentment at the House of Han, they dared not cause any troubles. All they could do was to pester their family n to boycott Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. Needless to say, their actions had absolutely no effect on the House of Han or Celestial Pearl.

    ¡°I hate that little sly fox!¡± said Phoebe for the thousandth time. Emily, Fanny, Jasper, Lisa, Sylph, Helen, and Hemanna all shared the same opinion about Jiya. Every time Jiya came over to the Residence, they would be anything but nice to her. There had even been a few conflicts between them.

    ¡°Bryan, we really don¡¯t like that woman. Tell us honestly, do you fancy her or do you not?¡± asked Emily softly. Her exhausted body wasying bare on Han Shuo as she drew circles on his chest with her tender hand.

    Phoebe,ying tiredly on another side, raised her head with what little energy she had left to look at Han Shuo and softly pinched his lower leg when she heard Emily¡¯s question. She asked, ¡°That woman is too pretentious. I don¡¯t like her either. Bryan, will you please skip her?¡±

    Han Shuo, whose every cell was rxed, nodded contentedly. He answered, ¡°Okay. I am already more than happy to have you all.¡±

    Phoebe and Emily could not be happier to get that promise from Han Shuo. They lied on Han Shuofortably and fell deep asleep.

    *** Three dayster, Han Shuo received a hand-written letter from the patriarch Caspar of the Kinson Family, proposing that his daughter, Jiya, be betrothed to Han Shuo. He even asked Han Shuo to hold a most pompous and grand ceremony in the City of Shadows to officially wed Jiya.

    When Emily and the others received the news, they hastily gathered around Han Shuo and looked at him nervously. None of them had obtained any sort of official recognition even though they had been with Han Shuo for such a long time. If Han Shuo were to marry Jiya before them and even held a splendid ceremony, none of them were going to ept it.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I won¡¯t marry her!¡± said Han Shuo in a faint smile. He proceeded to write a letter, politely declining Caspar¡¯s proposal right in front of thedies. He then had Bonds deliver the letter to the Kinson Family.

    When Han Shuo wrote the letter, he had absolutely no idea that it will eventually lead to a major dispute in the City of Shadows.

 Chapter 805 - GDK 805: Countermeasure

    <strong>GDK 805: Countermeasure</strong>

    *** The City of Shadows. Kinson Residence.

    As soon as Bonds left, Caspar tore the letter in his hand to shreds. ¡°Unbelievable. He actually declined the proposal!¡±

    Beth and Cami who were beside him were astonished. It was as though they did not think that Han Shuo would even consider that an option. From how they see it, once the House of Han and House of Kinson were united, even the House of Sainte would have to think twice before going all out against them. The alliance of the two family ns would be tremendously beneficial to both sides with seemingly no downside.

    Moreover, Jiya was famous in the City for her beauty. Caspar did not expect that Han Shuo would reject having this beauty delivered to his doorstep!

    ¡°What the hell is going on in his head?!¡± Beth was rather pissed. She remarked hatefully, ¡°Don¡¯t tell me that our House of Kinson isn¡¯t prestigious enough for him? Yes, it is true that the House of Han has been all the buzztely. But just how long have they lived in the City? Do they that they are capable of going head to head with the House of Sainte all by themselves?¡±

    ¡°Cami, inform those two patriarchs of the news. Tell them that the youngster has failed to appreciate our kindness. There¡¯s nothing I can do about it and it¡¯s their turn to try something,¡± Caspar instructed his sister Cami in a gloomy face.

    Cami nodded and quietly left.

    Soon enough, the patriarchs of the other two major family ns were informed of the news. The three patriarchs had beenmunicating in secret for some time. All three held the identical view that they could take advantage of the friction between the House of Han and the House of Sainte. They nned on sounding out the House of Sainte through Han Shuo. What Caspar did was just the first step of a grand scheme. But unexpected, it failed.

    Kinloch of the House of Kisa and Laurel of the House of Buller replied that they will not do anything rashly. They intend to wait and observe what Wace will do about the Fifth Corps.

    The previous Fifth Corps had basically copsed with Avery¡¯s departure. All their responsibilities were reassigned to other Diving Guard Corps. But currently, the Fifth Corps had recruited three hundred new divine guards. To add to thepany who obtained victory in thepetition, the Fifth Corps now had four Companies in total. They had regained functionality and the capacity to fulfill their previous responsibilities.

    Logically speaking, Wace should have returned the power and duties back to the Fifth Corps by now. However, Wace had been silent on the matter and showed no intention of returning their powers anytime soon. The two patriarchs wanted to continue to observe and see if there will be any conflict between the House of Sainte and the House of Han.

    *** Back at the Kinson Residence.

    ¡°What?!¡± cried Jiya who had just been informed of the news by her mother, Beth. She furiously shouted, ¡°Who told you to do so? Why didn¡¯t you consult me first?¡±

    Caspar did not ask for Jiya¡¯s opinion before sending the letter of proposal to Han Shuo. When Jiya learned of the fact, she felt as though she had been deceived, especially when the cruel oue wasn¡¯t what she desired. Jiya was extremely incensed.

    ¡°Half the City knows that you liked that youngster. Your father did that for your own good!¡± Beth sighed and continued, ¡°But we did not expect that the youngster would be so blind and foolish. To decline marrying my beautiful darling for those women he brought from a low-level material ne, he won¡¯t be achieving anything great with that little mind of his!¡±

    ¡°Enough! You will not make any more decisions for me!¡± shouted Jiya angrily. She mmed the door and left.

    *** The Han Residence.

    Emily, Phoebe, and the otherdies were no longer nervous or unhappy. When they watched Han Shuo wrote a letter that diplomatically rejects Caspar¡¯s proposal, they feel as though they were drinking ice-cold water on a hot summer day. Their minds were rxed and at ease.

    Yet another batch of divine guards emerged from the Eight Destion and Torment Formation. Each and every one of those energized divine guards was tested by Bonds. After conducting tests, Bonds was confident that the divine guards were fully capable ofpleting any kind of missions the City could throw at them. But what a pity that even till now, the House of Sainte had been silent and had not assigned them with any task.

    Bonds went to Han Shuo and reported the situation, ¡°All fourpanies of divine guards have been staying the Fifth Corps, doing nothing but training and training because we have not received a single task all this while. The districts the Fifth Corps were previously in charge of were still split among the jurisdictions of the First, Second, and Third Corps. There is no way for them to gain any real-life experiences. With no assignment and no real scope of authority, we can¡¯t even leave the City for training. We can¡¯t keep doing so any longer!¡±

    After having received rounds of brainwashing from Bonds, those divine guards who joined the Fifth Corps had truly considered themselves as a part of the House of Han. They ced the interest of the House of Han above everything. But unfortunately, the Fifth Corps had nothing to do but practice in the same area in the City. They felt bored long ago.

    ¡°I¡¯ll look for Andre and hopefully he can do something about it. Andre hadn¡¯te over all these while. Wace must have put a lot of pressure on him,¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment and decided to visit the Sainte Residence. He knew that even if Wace was wary of him, he cannot drag the issue any longer.

    ¡°Senior, even if we can¡¯t get any privileges, please find a way for us to leave the City. If thepanies can go to Fort Lasberg, I have ways to further temper and sharpen them!¡± said Bonds. He was aware that the House of Han and the House of Sainte wasn¡¯t exactly on good terms.

    ¡°Got it!¡± nodded Han Shuo and he headed to the Sainte Residence right away.

    Even though Han Shuo had not stepped into the Sainte Residence for a year, the guards at the main entrance still recognized Han Shuo and they greeted him politely. But when they heard that he was looking for Andre, they seemed a little troubled. One of them replied, ¡°My apologies. Lord Andre has been in cultivation ever since returning from Soaring Cloud Mountain Range and he wouldn¡¯t meet anyone. He remained in seclusion even when the City Lord looked for him. It seems that Lord Andre is on the verge of a significant breakthrough!¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment after hearing those words. He realized that Andre must have disagreed with Wace¡¯s actions or he wouldn¡¯t have refused to meet Wace using this method. Han Shuo understood that it must be a difficult situation for Andre who was stuck between his family n and his friend.

    ¡°Oh, I see. If Lord Andre has been using the time to cultivate, then I assume Carmelita has also been doing the same?¡± asked Han Shuo in a faint smile.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. The City Lord has pushed Lady Carmelita to cultivate ever since she returned from the Mountain Range. Like Lord Andre, she had not taken a step out of her gymnasium since then,¡± replied the divine guard hastily.

    ¡°Oh. Okay. Nevermind then,¡± Han Shuo had no intention of speaking with Wace. He did not step into the Sainte Residence but turned around and left.

    Han Shuo carefully thought about the situation during his way home. He thought that perhaps him leaving the City of Shadows for some time could be a good idea as Wace¡¯s target was him alone.

    Han Shuo thought that what truly concerned Wace was not his House of Han but he himself. To really suppress the House of Han, Wace must first keep Han Shuo under control. Other members of the House of Han should be too weak right now to be on his radar. In other words, the members of his House of Han would be safer once he left and Wace wouldn¡¯t do anything to them.

    Upon returning to the Han Residence, Han Shuo assembled Bonds, Sanguis, Gilbert, Stratholme, Ayermike, and others, and instructed, ¡°Move all of our family n¡¯s development to Fort Lasberg. Bonds, just ignore those rules. Make some kind of excuses and move all the Fifth Corps divine guards to Fort Lasberg. Leave just the Celestial Pearl in the City. Every member of our family n will move to the Fort.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, are we leaving the City of Shadows?¡± asked Stratholme.

    Han Shuo nodded and smilingly replied, ¡°That¡¯s what I¡¯m thinking, but I haven¡¯t decided yet. You all will stay in Fort Lasberg for now. Focus our growth on other Cities or Dominions. Make sure not to have any conflict with any members of the major family ns.¡±

    Following that, Han Shuo wrote three letters ¨C one for Wace, one for Erebus, and one for Aobashi. He had his divine guards deliver the letters. The letters exined that he will be away from the City for some time.

    The letter he wrote to Wace was tactful in wording. It hinted that he had no intention of taking over the City of Shadows, although Han Shuo was certain that Wace wouldn¡¯t believe it. However, Han Shuo believed that if he was not in the City, even if Wace were to actively suppress the House of Han, he wouldn¡¯t do anything too excessive.

    In the letters he wrote to Erebus and Aobashi, he asked the two to look after the House of Han when possible. Given how close they were, Han Shuo was certain that the two will do him the favor. Besides, with Andre and Carmelita around, Han Shuo doubted that any family ns would harm the House of Han while he was away.

    <i>Always be careful wherever you venture. I will ensure the safety of the House of Han while you are away from the City.</i> Han Shuo received the letter from Wace after three days. He thought that the letter had verified his suspicions, that Wace was interested only in him.

    Han Shuo was finally at ease. After arranging certain things properly in the City of Shadows, he traveled to Fort Lasberg with Rose without resting.

    Upon arriving in Fort Lasberg, Han Shuo reconstructed the Eight Destion and Torment Formation in the Fort. He then used countless materials to construct four demonic formations in his mansion house, namely, Shura Illusion Formation, Heavenly Thunder Formation, Omen Soul Gathering Formation, and Five Toxin Mystical Yin Formation. They were arranged around the Eight Destion and Torment Formation at the center of the mansion house.

    The materials required to build the four new demonic formations were purchased using the five hundred thousand ck crystal coins granted by Wace. With the help of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, Han Shuo took half-a-year to build the formations. Han Shuo was truly at ease after he tested the power of the formations and exined the method of using them to Bonds, Sanguis, Gilbert, and others.

    With the four formations, even if the House of Han were attacked, they will be able to withstand the attack for a long time. Any enemy who dared intruded will pay a hefty price for their recklessness. Even a highgod who weren¡¯t careful could lose their lives to the formations.

    With everything properly arranged, with Phoebe and the other moved to Fort Lasberg from the City, with Wace showing no intention of stopping them, Han Shuo finally left with Rose.

    Their destination ¨C the Fringe!

 Chapter 806 - GDK 806: Come, hit me!

    <strong>GDK 806: Come, hit me!</strong>

    Setting out for the Fringe from the Darkness Dominion, Han Shuo must cross the Death and Lightning Dominions. There were no transportation matrixes avable.

    It was a long journey even for Han Shuo. After three months of traveling, they passed through Mirage City and Darkwater City. They were stepping into the territory of the City of Gorging Clouds.

    Throughout the three months of traveling, Han Shuo and Rose had been avoiding the city centers as much as possible. When they crossed Mirage City and Darkwater City, they had not entered the main Cities but would only stay in the outer towns and forts. Then, one day, they finally stepped into the territory of the most powerful city in the Darkness Dominion ¨C the City of Gorging Clouds.

    But unlike previously, Han Shuo did not lead Rose through roads far from the City but headed straight for it.

    ¡°Huh? Why aren¡¯t you avoiding the City?¡± Rose was a little surprised when she noticed the decision of Han Shuo¡¯s. She asked, ¡°Are you nning to enter the City of Gorging Clouds?¡±

    Han Shuo and Rose had been traveling alone for the past three months. Rose seemed to be in a better mood during the journey. She was no longer cold and silent to Han Shuo. Han Shuo even noticed that she became more talkative when they were in the City of Shadows. Perhaps that had something to do with her innate dislike of being in a popted area.

    Although Felder was the person who organized a sneak attack against Han Shuo on his journey to Soaring Cloud Mountain Range, the person who sponsored the most to the attack was Lakrisen of the Broadhurst Family. The House of Broadhurst was the most powerful family n in the City of Gorging Clouds. Their patriarch, Yarus, was the City Lord of the City. Not only that Lakrisen had failed in assassinating Han Shuo, but three of his experts were killed by Han Shuo instead.

    Han Shuo doubted that Lakrisen will simply forget about this grudge!

    Han Shuo wanted to enter the City of Gorging Clouds and learn its situation. And if the opportunity presents itself, Han Shuo would take risks and eliminate Lakrisen, removing this great danger looming over his House of Han.

    ¡°Yep, I want to check out the City of Gorging Clouds and see just how strong they are,¡± replied Han Shuo after he nodded.

    Rose was still unaware of the assassins¡¯ identities and therefore she was rather perplexed by Han Shuo¡¯s decision. She replied, ¡°As the most powerful city in the Darkness Dominion, the City of Gorging Clouds is way beyond the City of Shadows in overall strength. The House of Broadhurst is also the most ancient family n in the Darkness Dominion. Not only that they have countless powerful experts, but they are even very united!¡±

    ¡°After the House of Lavers departed from the City of Shadows, they have all relocated to the City of Gorging Clouds. Hehe, we have taken over their resources and estates in the City of Shadows and I¡¯m sure that hevers Family will harbor a grudge at us for that. I wonder how they are doing in the City of Gorging Clouds,¡± said Han Shuo in a faint smile. ¡°Come, let¡¯s go and take a look!¡±

    Rose was always submissive to Han Shuo¡¯s orders. She followed Han Shuo towards the City withoutint.

    After traveling for half a month, Han Shuo and Rose arrived before the City of Gorging Clouds¡¯ city gates. The great gates were made dark bright, stony material. Tall and ominous they stood upon either side of the gateway guarded by numerous solemn and austere divine guards.

    Above the imposing gates were several oversized crystal cannons, pointing threateningly at the horizon. They were glistening as though a million starlight were packed into them. Awe and dread would fell upon all who gazed at them.

    ¡°Those crystal cannons are powered by the arrays of energy towers located behind them. They are so powerful that even an average highgod would have trouble resisting a st while lowgods ¨C they would instantly be vaporized!¡± Rose softly exined when she noticed that Han Shuo¡¯s eyes had been lingering around the crystal cannons.

    ¡°This is indeed no ordinary city. Come, let¡¯s get moving. ¡° After taking a moment to observe the City from its outside, Han Shuo and Rose paid the entrance fees and entered the City of Gorging Clouds.

    After entering the City, Han Shuo and Rose spent some time walking around. Han Shuo noticed that the City of Gorging Clouds¡¯ defenses were indeed much stronger than the City of Shadows¡¯. There were countless crystal cannons and defense towers that relied upon energy crystals erected. Squads of steady and calm divine guards patrolled the streets constantly.

    Rose concealed her silvery hair and Han Shuo had slightly altered his appearance. He believed that no one in the City of Gorging Clouds would recognize them. Han Shuo then went to a squad of divine guards passing by them and asked, ¡°Excuse me, do you know where the Lavers Family is located?¡±

    ¡°Lavers Family?¡± the divine guard of the City of Gorging Clouds stared nkly at the few pieces of ck crystal coins Han Shuo put in his hand for a moment. He then turned to hisrade and asked, ¡°Is there any family in the City called Lavers?¡±

    ¡°Yea, there is. Just recently a family n called Lavers from the City of Shadows has moved here. I hearsay that a woman in that family named Donna will be married to Lord Lakrisen¡¯s son in a few days. Hehe, this means that the House of Broadhurst will soon gain yet another vassal family n!¡± another divine guard interrupted. He then said to Han Shuo, ¡°That Lavers Family is living at the south side of the City!¡±

    ¡°Many thanks!¡± replied Han Shuo before he left the squad with Rose.

    Han Shuo did not expect that something like this would happen to Donna. Although Han Shuo had a bad history with the House of Lavers, he always remained grateful to Donna. Han Shuo believed that Donna had nothing to do with Felder¡¯s attempt to assassinate him.

    Now when Han Shuo heard that Donna will be married to Lakrisen¡¯s son, for some reason, Han Shuo just doesn¡¯t feelfortable with that thought.

    Having obtained the information he needed, Han Shuo and Rose quietly traveled to the southern region of the City. As Han Shuo did not want to reveal his identity and strength in this foreignnd, with divine guards patrolling every corner of the streets, he could not travel too fast. It took him one day and half a night to arrive at the southern region and locate the Lavers Residence.

    Compared to their previous residence in the City of Shadows, the current Lavers Residence was of much poorer quality. The southern region wasn¡¯t a prosperous district of the City of Gorging Clouds. Their manor had just a few structures that seemed badly maintained. Han Shuo felt somewhat apologetic when he saw the scene.

    Without any particrly tough defenses, Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals sessfully trespassed into the residence. Under the cover of the night, the demon generals refined from highgod souls were able to conceal themselves better. They managed to explore the entire Lavers Residence without alerting a single soul.

    Soon enough, one of the demon generals located Donna in a gymnasium. She had deployed a barrier of darkness but it couldn¡¯t block Han Shuo¡¯s demon general as she wasn¡¯t a highgod.

    Donna was dressed in an emerald greenbat suit and wearing crannied brows. She seemed rather miserable andcked the tion of a bride-to-be. Dolores was with her. He was acting as her living punchbag and was bombarded with attacks powerful enough to cause pain but not enough to cause serious injuries. Every inch of his body had been repeatedly pounded by Donna¡¯s fists. He was beaten ck and blue and in immense agony.

    <i>Bam!</i> Dolores was sent flying backward and he mmed his back onto the wall of the gymnasium.

    ¡°Stop!¡± Dolores raised his hands and begged for mercy, ¡°Please, that¡¯s enough. It¡¯s veryte already and I need to rest. No more fights!¡±

    ¡°Again!¡± replied Donna. She started walking towards Dolores ferociously.

    ¡°Elder Sister, I know that you are not in a good mood but you can¡¯t just vent all your anger at me like this every day!¡± Dolores shouted, ¡°Thatst incident has nothing to do with me. Lord Patriarch brought me there because I¡¯m familiar with the region! Besides, the youngster killed our uncle and took over everything we had in the City of Shadows. Is it wrong for us to take revenge at him? Sister Donna, you are also a member of the Lavers Family. Can¡¯t you understand the situation?¡±

    ¡°If it wasn¡¯t for your brother Doloxis, Bryan wouldn¡¯t have be hostile towards our family right from the beginning and none of this shitstorm would have happened!¡± Donna angrily shouted, ¡°Now our House of Lavers have plunged to this shithole and I¡¯m forced to marry that imbecile. Why? Why do I have to suffer this?¡±

    As Donna shouted, she charged at Dolores and began yet another round of punching and kicking.

    Dolores dared not fight back and he allowed Donna to assault him. When Donna finally stopped punching as though she got tired, Dolores shouted, ¡°Don¡¯t ask me. You should ask Lord Patriarch instead. I¡¯m not qualified to answer that!¡± As soon as he finished those words, Dolores quickly limped his way out of the gymnasium.

    Donna turned exhausted right after Dolores left as though tiredness had suddenly ovee her.

    ¡°What¡¯s the point? The interest of the family is above everything else. I have been taught that since young. Am I going to watch the Lavers Family walk down the path of destruction?¡± mumbled Donna helplessly. She was physically and mentally exhausted.

    ¡°Come, hit me!¡± a voice suddenly sounded from the main entrance of the gymnasium. Shortly after that, all the doors and windows automatically shut themselves. Severalyers of bizarre boundaries formed within the gymnasium. Not a sound made in the gymnasium could travel past the boundaries.

    Donna seemed confused for a moment before she startedughing. She stared at the person who appeared before her without warning and mumbled to herself, ¡°I must have been too stressed, so much so that I¡¯m now hallucinating!¡±

    ¡°Elder sister Donna, you aren¡¯t hallucinating. It¡¯s really me!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s heart ached when he saw Donna in this state now. He wondered, <i>is this the same Donna who could remain calm and collected no matter what happens?</i>

    The poised and regal demeanor that Donna carried when she arrived on Profound Continent was nowhere to be seen. The disheartened and dispirited Donna standing before Han Shuo right then looked like another person to him.

    ¡°Though it¡¯s just a hallucination, I can make do with it!¡± shouted Donna suddenly and she charged at Han Shuo. She started punching and kicking Han Shuo wildly while shouting, ¡°Why? Why fight my family out of all people? Why did you kill my uncle? Why did you have to destroy everything my Lavers Family had? Have I ever did you any wrong? Tell me! Why? Why... ¡°

    Donna repeatedly struck Han Shuo as she shouted maniacally.

    After a while, Donna who was beside herself with grief suddenly noticed that every punch she threw hit something that felt solid and very real. She suddenly stopped attacking and looked at Han Shuo bewilderedly. Her eyes slowly turned bright and clear. After a long while, Donna cried out in surprise, ¡°It¡¯s, it¡¯s really you? How is this possible?! Howe you are here?¡±

    ¡°I happen to be traveling past this ce and I thought I might as well pay you a visit!¡± replied Han Shuo as he forced a smile.

    Donna stared deeply at Han Shuo for a dozen seconds and she suddenly threw herself into Han Shuo¡¯s chest. She started weeping as she embraced Han Shuo.

 Chapter 807 - Iâ€™ve been waiting for you!

    <h4>Chapter 807: I¡¯ve been waiting for you!</h4>

    Han Shuo could feel herrge and soft bosom pressed against his chest. He felt every shiver as she cried. Han Shuo¡¯s mind started wandering to the past, recalling the moments he spent with Donna back on Profound Continent.

    After crying for a long time, Donna suddenly pushed Han Shuo away. She red at Han Shuo and asked, ¡°What are you here for?¡±

    Han Shuo did not know what to answer. After hesitating for a while, he finally said, ¡°I heard that you are getting married, so I came to see how you are doing,¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s none of your concern!¡± Donna seemed to had gotten much angrier when Han Shuo spoke of the marriage. She hatefully said, ¡°Are you happy now? Or do you think that my family could do worse? What more do you want?¡±

    Han Shuo was tongue-tied for a moment. He felt ashamed when he looked at the teary Donna standing before him. He let out a sigh and replied, ¡°This isn¡¯t what I wanted. I did not make enemies with the Lavers, it¡¯s they who made an enemy with me. I have been passive all along. If your Uncle Avery had not tried to kill me twice, I wouldn¡¯t have killed him!¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s the point of saying these? You have won! You have obtained everything that my House of Lavers had! You killed my uncle! You won!¡± Donna shouted, ¡°Now we have to live by relying on the City of Gorging Clouds¡¯ charity. And I¡¯m to be sacrificed like a bargaining chip. What more do you want?¡±

    ¡°Donna, leave with me!¡± Han Shuo said, ¡°I know that you do not like the arrangement made by your family n. You are not responsible for the mistakes your Lavers Family made and should not bear all the consequences yourself. Why not leave this ce and start a new life elsewhere?¡±

    ¡°Do you really think I would do that? Have you thought about what will happen to the Lavers Family once I leave the City of Gorging Clouds? They are going to get exterminated! Do you think I will be so selfish to abandon my family n and let the hundreds of them perish?¡±

    Han Shuo lowered his head and looked at the ground in silence. He knew that Donna would never do that.

    ¡°Leave. I don¡¯t want to see you. Just pretend that we have never known each other!¡± said Donna tearfully.

    ¡°On ount of you, I¡¯ll forget about your father¡¯s attempt to assassinate me and won¡¯t retaliate against the House of Lavers.¡± Han Shuo looked intensely at Donna and said, ¡°No matter what happens, I will not forget your kindness. We will meet again, Donna!¡± Han Shuo turned around and left after saying those words.

    ¡°You heartless monster, how could you leave just like that!¡± after Han Shuo left, Donna seemed to have lost all energy. She copsed on the floor and cried uncontrobly.

    Back then on the Profound Continent, Donna and Han Shuo had been through hardships and challenges together. She was attracted by Han Shuo¡¯s mysteriousness. As they learned more about each other, Donna became more and more admiring of Han Shuo. And after she returned to Elysium, she discovered that she had an unusual longing for Han Shuo that grew with each day passed. She had, therefore, made plenty of arrangements in preparation for his arrival.

    After having waited impatiently for many years, Donna slowly realized that she felt more than simple admiration towards Han Shuo. On the day that Han Shuo finally showed up at the Lavers Residence, Donna was over the moon!

    But shortly after Donna realized that she had fallen for Han Shuo, the rtionship between him and the Lavers Family rapidly deteriorated. A series of events then further escted the hostility. And then everything went irreparable thanks to Avery.

    The more terrible the rtionship between Han Shuo and the House of Lavers bes, the more agonizing Donna felt. One was the family and rtives she grew up with while another was the man she loved. Donna was stuck between two sides.

    When the House of Lavers was forced to leave the City of Shadows and when Han Shuo killed Avery who hid in Hushveil City, the pain that dwelled in her heart grew by a thousand folds. She did not know how to live with it.

    Then, shortly after, she learned that Han Shuo¡¯s influence had been swelling in the City of Shadows. His House of Han had not onlypletely superseded the House of Lavers¡¯ ce in the City, but Han Shuo had even defeated Aobashi and became the most powerful Chief of Divine Guards. The Fifth Corps under his leadership also took first ce in teambat strength.

    It was clear to Donna from the strength that Han Shuo disyed that he was at least a mid-stage highgod. Meanwhile, Donna was still in midgodhood. No matter in terms of Han Shuo¡¯s position in the City or his strength, Han Shuo had far surpassed her. In all of a sudden, Donna found that the distance between them had be insurmountably great!

    It was also around this time that the House of Lavers was pressured by Lakrisen, who is probably the second most powerful man in the City of Gorging Clouds. Donna¡¯s father begged her to ept Lakrisen¡¯s demand, to marry his infamous good-for-nothing son. As Donna felt that there was no longer any hope of getting together with Han Shuo and she couldn¡¯t leave her family n to perish, in the end, she agreed to Felder¡¯s demand.

    Donna who had given up all home tried to forget everything about the past. It was at this that Han Shuo appeared out of the blue. And yet, unfortunately, there was nothing that she could do to change anything. A gloomy future seemed anything but uncertain.

    ...

    Han Shuo left the gymnasium and returned to Rose in a gloomy face. Obviously, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a good mood.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± Rose bunched her brows and asked, ¡°The House of Lavers have reaped what they sowed. Shouldn¡¯t you be happy that they have fallen to this situation?¡°

    After having stayed with the House of Han for so long, Rose knew a thing or two about the conflict between Han Shuo and the House of Lavers. Rose had even assisted Han Shuo in murdering Avery in Hushveil City. She thought that Han Shuo hade here to kill everyst one of the Lavers. She did not expect that Han Shuo would return with this reaction.

    ¡°I don¡¯t give a damn what happens to the House of Lavers. But there is a person in there who had helped me many times. I¡¯m not going to forget the favor given to me easily!¡± Han Shuo turned around to take another look at the Lavers Residence before he said, ¡°We won¡¯t leave the City just yet, there¡¯s someone that I want to kill.¡±

    Naturally, Rose had no objection and she nodded indifferently.

    ...

    After staying in the City of Gorging Clouds for two days, Han Shuo managed to learn everything about Lakrisen¡¯s son, Rashid.

    Like most offspring of the rich and powerful, Rashid was weak in strength and spent most of his time drinking and being a punter. Thanks to the lofty position of the House of Broadhurst, few in the City dared caused him any trouble. He frequently visits the most luxurious shops all around the City and spends extravagantly. An entourage of divine guards would apany him at all times.

    There was basically nothing good about this guy. Donna¡¯s life would be wrecked if she was married to him.

    After having figured out the ces that Rashid frequently visits, Han Shuo finally made a move.

    On that night, Rashid was in thergest auction house in the City of Gorging Clouds called Dreamy Milky Way. He was bidding on a ve with other kids with rich parents.

    Other than on Profound Continent, the Elves were also found on Elysium. They were also famous in this world for their beauty. Rashid was currently bidding on a young female elf. She was small and petite. She seemed to be only at the age of a pre-puberty human girl.

    The few kids with rich parents raised the bidding price excitedly. Their eyes were zing when they looked that young female elf. It seemed as though all of them had some sort of perverted psychiatric disorder.

    The price for the little elf girl was quickly raised to thirty thousand ck crystal coins from the base price of five thousand ck crystal coins. At this price level, only a few could afford to continue bidding. Rashid was wearing acent face and a big smile as though the elf was within his grasp.

    ¡°Rashid, you are going to get married soon. Wouldn¡¯t your fiance be angry if she found out that you are buying this ve?¡± a bidder contending against Rashid asked smilingly from a distance.

    ¡°Pfft, so what if she found out?¡± Rashid smirked and replied, ¡°That woman¡¯s family n has declined. She has nothing me! I¡¯m only marrying her because my father asked me to. He wants to firmly control her family n using the marriage. She should be aware of this as well and she wouldn¡¯t dare to even try to control me. Hehe, but that woman has pretty good looks. I¡¯ll very much enjoy doing her!¡±

    ¡°So that means you are determined to win this?¡± that person stared nkly for a moment before asking smilingly.

    ¡°Of course!¡± Rashid put on a big smile and called, ¡°Forty thousand! So, Dirk, are you going to fight me on this one?¡±

    That youngster called Dirk shrugged and replied, ¡°Forty thousand ck crystal coins for a ve isn¡¯t worth it. I¡¯m out!¡±

    ¡°Haha, then thank you!¡± replied Rashid contently. He enjoyed the feeling of being superior to others.

    ¡°Fifty thousand!¡± a call suddenly came from Han Shuo who had slightly altered his appearance.

    Rashid who was getting ready to collect the ve immediately bunched his brows when he heard that someone put up a higher bid. His face turned dark and he asked, ¡°Hey, who are you? I have never seen your face before. Are you new to the City? How dare you vie against me!¡±

    ¡°Cut the fucking crap. Are you going to bid or not? Just give up and yield if you don¡¯t have money!¡± replied Han Shuo unmannerly in a stubborn face.

    All those who knew Rashid were astounded. They simultaneously turned to look at Han Shuo mournfully, thinking that the outsider was going to die out on the streets that night.

    ¡°Well, well. Life wouldn¡¯t be interesting without a little bit of a challenge,¡± Rashid¡¯s expression transformed and he yelled, ¡°Sixty thousand!¡±

    ¡°Seventy thousand!¡± called Han Shuo calmly.

    Rashid emboldened himself and bid, ¡°Eighty thousand!¡±

    ¡°One hundred thousand!¡± Han Shuo side-nced Rashid and mockingly said, ¡°If you don¡¯t have enough crystal coins, just call it quits. This isn¡¯t a game you can afford to y.¡±

    Rashid was exasperated. Out of anger, he yelled, ¡°One hundred ten thousand!¡±

    ¡°What a tool. A ve like her is worth fifty thousand at most! Your brain must be the size of a pea!¡± Han Shuo chuckled mischievously and dered, ¡°I¡¯m out! Bai!¡± Han Shuo turned on his heels and left.

    Rashid was incensed. He had never tasted such humiliation in his life. He turned to one of his henchmen and instructed, ¡°You, stay and bring her home,¡± then his gaze turned to the others and he said, ¡°The rest of you,e with me!¡±

    ¡°Someone is gonna get killed tonight!¡±

    ¡°That guy is out of luck to have offended Rashid!¡±mented the crowd.

    Han Shuo took a sharp turn down a dark alley soon after he exited the auction ce. As expected, Rashid and his men appeared and surrounded him. He put on a cold smirk and said, ¡°Where you think you are going, punk?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve been waiting for you!¡± Han Shuo grinned and suddenly the seventeen flying swords whooshed out from him. Rashid and his gang were killed in an instant. They turned into nothing but a pool of bloody liquid.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go! To the Fringe!¡± said Han Shuo to Rose who was hiding in the darkness and the duo evacuated unhurriedly. A few locals who walked out from the auction ce in search of amusement saw nothing but two figures disappearing.

 Chapter 808 - Ethereal City

    GDK 808: Ethereal City

    Han Shuo and Rose traveled through the Death and Lightning Dominions and arrived at the Space Dominion. The journey took them two years.

    Han Shuo did not rush with the journey. He had been wandering through various major cities of the Death and Lightning Dominions, visiting numerous mountains and valleys, taking his time to meditate, collecting countless precious materials and medicinal ingredients. He even forged some extraordinary demonic weapons.

    Han Shuo was at ease and had no burden during those two years. His heart and soul had been in a tranquil state. His demonic yuan had been raising very rapidly thanks to the nourishment of the miraculous pelleted medicines he made for himself. He had a vague feeling that breaking through the Omen Realm could be near.

    Both his avatars of death and destruction had attainedte-stage midgodhood during those two years. If they evercked the divine energy of death or destruction, Han Shuo would just strike at the godhunters that gued the remote mountains and valleys. His two avatars were yet again on the verge of a breakthrough. They will soon ascend to highgodhood.

    Han Shuo became more and more adept with the use of his hybrid domain of divinity. While sparring with Rose, the hybrid domain of divinity made by his two midgod avatars managed to surpass Rose¡¯s. It could even keep her domain of divinity firmly contained.

    Han Shuo had ced his focus on cultivation throughout the journey. Although it had only been two years, Han Shuo had made tremendous progress in his realm state. It caused his demeanor to change. Even Rose, who had been with him all these while, found Han Shuo to be more and more enigmatic.

    During the period, Rose had also obtained plenty of benefit from Han Shuo. He would generously share the invaluable medicines he made from the precious natural ingredients he collected along the journey with Rose. The medicines had transformed and improved her body. When she cultivated using the Pill of Tranquility, it would set her mind at ease and she would often gain new profound insights into the energy of darkness. With the nourishment of all kinds of pelleted medicines, Rose¡¯s strength had also been soaring and she was also on the verge of a breakthrough.

    Rose who had been together with Han Shuo 24 hours a day realized that Han Shuo had never treated her like a ve. On the contrary, she would surely get a share of any good stuff that Han Shuo found. During the two years, Rose had unknowingly be dependant towards Han Shuo. There would even be a faint smile on her face when she talked to Han Shuo. Rose had subconsciously epted her new identity and Han Shuo.

    As soon as Han Shuo and Rose stepped into the Space Dominion, they noticed that it was unlike any other Divine Dominions.

    In the Dominions of Death, Darkness, and Destruction, the mostmonly found gods were those who cultivated in those energies. It was umon to find cultivators of the energy of wind, fire, earth, and lightning. It¡¯s needless to say that cultivators of life, light, and water energy will never be seen there.

    But things were very different in the Space Dominion. One could easily find gods who cultivated in any type of energy. Cultivators of the energy of death, darkness, and destruction do not spontaneously try to kill every cultivator of the energy of life, light, and water they saw, and vice versa.

    The Fringe was located between the Space and Destiny Dominions. If Han Shuo plots a straight path for it, it will take him at most three months to get there. However, Han Shuo had another n.

    Han Shuo, the Five Elite Zombies, and the Little Skeleton had made an appointment to meet at the Ethereal City of the Space Dominion, and the time for the appointment was approaching. Therefore, Han Shuo nned to stay in the Space Dominion for some time. He thought he might visit the Fringe after the reunion.

    Han Shuo had not seen them for a long time and he missed them very much. When the Elite Zombies and Little Skeleton left Han Shuo, their strengths were nothing outstanding. Like an ordinary father concerned about their kids traveling afar, there had not been a day that Han Shuo did not worry about their safety.

    The Five Elite Zombies were refined from the five elemental yuan energy. They were born with a superb understanding of their respective yuan energy and Han Shuo was certain that they will have no troubleprehending the energy they cultivated in. Han Shuo reckoned that if they could raise sufficient divine energy, the Five Elite Zombies could be improving in strength at a rate greater than that of Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert.

    After being apart from the Elite Zombies for nearly fifty years, Han Shuo could not be more excited to see them again. He thought, <i>I wonder what realm have they cultivated to. At least midgodhood, I guess?</i>

    Other than the Elite Zombies, Han Shuo had also promised McKinley, the space edict cultivator trapped in the Holy Grail, to visit the Space Dominion. Therefore, it was necessary for Han Shuo to stay in the Space Dominion for at least some time.

    After Han Shuo scouted his surroundings with his demon generals, making sure that the mountain range was safe, Han Shuo took out the Holy Grail and using his consciousness, he transmitted, ¡°McKinley, I have arrived at the Space Dominion. What should I do next?¡±

    ¡°We are there?¡± McKinley was excited to receive the transmission. He cried, ¡°Are we really at the Space Dominion?¡±

    Han Shuo had not talked to McKinley for a long time but fulfilled his promise to bring McKinley to the Space Dominion. McKinley was trapped in the Grail for many millennia. His soul became very ecstatic when regaining his freedom seemed within grasp.

    ¡°I must say, this Dominion is really an interesting ce. Haha, I¡¯m stepping on the territory of the Space Dominion. Tell me, what should I do next?¡± transmitted Han Shuo.

    ¡°Head to Ethereal City. That¡¯s where I used to live!¡± replied McKinley¡¯s divine soul excitedly.

    Although thend held by Space Dominion was no smaller than that of the Darkness Dominion, there were only three major cities, namely, Ethereal City, Sanctus City, and Phantasia City. The three cities upied two-thirds of the entire Space Dominion. There were no restrictions on who could enter. All gods, no matter the energy they cultivated in, were allowed to enter and live in those cities.

    The divine guards of those cities normally wouldn¡¯t interfere with the day-to-day activities of the inhabitants. Small fights and brawls weremon in the Space Dominion, which the divine guards wouldn¡¯t care to interrupt. They would only step in on somerge-scale fights and on matters that would affect the normal operation of the cities.

    Not all the Space Dominion divine guards were cultivators of space edict. Most of them were volunteers made up of foreign experts who went there to avoid conflicts between other Divine Dominions. Their only duty was to keep their cities functioning normally. They loved the freedom they enjoyed and they wished to preserve their unfettered way of life that only the Space Dominion could provide.

    The Overgod of Space frequently travels between various material nes and rarely stayed in the Space Dominion. His approach to managing his Dominion was to bepletely hands-free and to leave it all to his followers. Most of the powers and all of the tasks were delegated to the administrators. It made the Space Dominion a very unique region.

    When Han Shuo heard that McKinley¡¯s destination was Ethereal City, he smiled and replied, ¡°That¡¯s great! I¡¯m also heading to Ethereal City. We both have the same destination and I don¡¯t have to take a detour!¡±

    ¡°What are you going to Ethereal City for?¡± McKinley was puzzled. He knew that Han Shuo had never been to the Space Dominion and couldn¡¯t understand why he would be going to the City.

    ¡°Oh, I have an appointment with someone,¡± replied Han Shuo. After thinking for a bit, Han Shuo asked, ¡°Where should I go after entering the City? Who do I look for and how?¡±

    McKinley hesitated for a moment before he transmitted back to Han Shuo, ¡°Head to the City first and learn about the current situation. I haven¡¯t decided just yet.¡±

    Han Shuo understood that as McKinley was only left with his divine soul, he did not have much power in defending himself. If the person he wanted to meet tried to harm him, there wouldn¡¯t be much that he could do. Therefore, he must consider his n very carefully.

    ¡°Alright then, I¡¯ll head to Ethereal City. You still have time to decide!¡± without saying much, Han Shuo put away the Grail imprisoning McKinley.

    ¡°The divine soul in the Grail is very powerful. Who is the person?¡± asked Rose. She was around when Han Shuo and McKinley chatted and she could sense the fluctuation from McKinley¡¯s divine soul.

    ¡°A very unlucky highgod. He¡¯s one of the reasons I came to the Space Dominion,¡° Han Shuo casually exined.

    Rose seemed astonished. After staring nkly for a moment, she asked, ¡°What realm is he at?¡±

    ¡°Late-stage highgod. But without his divine body, he could only stay inside the pitiful little Grail. Haha,¡± replied Han Shuo. After taking a deep breath, Han Shuo smilingly instructed, ¡°Come, let¡¯s head to Ethereal City!¡±

    Half a monthter, Han Shuo and Rose stepped into Ethereal City. The divine guards there weren¡¯t strict about restricting entry to the City. They didn¡¯t even demand any payment of crystal coins from Han Shuo or Rose. After taking a nce at their divine tablets, the duo was allowed to enter.

    Those living in the Space Dominion wouldn¡¯t need to worry about attacks from other Divine Dominions. There normally wouldn¡¯t be anyrge-scale fight happening in the cities. These divine guards basically need only to maintain the most basic order. Their presence was close to dispensable to the existence of Ethereal City.

    The Ethereal City, other than the gods cultivated in a wide variety of energies, Han Shuo noticed that it was much more bustling than the other cities he visited. It might be because the Space Dominion had just three main Cities. Shops selling divine weapons, divine scrolls, energy crystals, medicines, and many other things covered every corner.

    The City was so enormous that it would take around one week to visit the entire City by flying. An average lowgod and highgod would need even more time.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t too interested in the bustling activities in Ethereal City. As soon as he stepped inside, he unfolded his consciousness and started wandering around the City with Rose.

    The Five Elite Zombies and Little Skeleton were made using Han Shuo¡¯s blood essence. Han Shuo could sense their presence if they were within a certain range. If anyone of them were in Ethereal City, Han Shuo will be able to locate them after circling the City once through.

    Han Shuo flew across the streets with his consciousness fully unfolded. However, after flying for a full day, he still did not discover the presence of any of the Elite Zombies or Little Skeleton. He thought, <i>Perhaps none of them havee yet? Or did they ran into troubles?</i>

    Just as Han Shuo started to feel worried, he suddenly sensed Earth Elite Zombie¡¯s presence.

    Han Shuo was overjoyed. He immediately sped up and flew towards Earth Elite Zombie with Rose.

 Chapter 809 - Han Tu

    <strong>GDK 809: Han Tu</strong>

    Near the West of Ethereal City, a rather peculiar fight was happening. Three midgods that cultivated in the energy of earth stood with their backs sticking closely with each other. Their brows were bunched and they were looking all around vigntly, ready to handle any sudden attacks.

    Then, the ground between the three slowly sunk without them noticing. A pair of hands stealthily came out from the hole and tickled one of those feet.

    The person who got tickled was startled. He immediately swung the huge hammer in his hand at the ground. His other two partners only stared nkly for a moment before they reacted. They immediately shouted, ¡°Kill him!¡± and sent a burst of earth energy towards those sneaky hands.

    The pair of hands that appeared from the ground suddenly crystallized while the element of earth wildly converged in its palms and formed a thickyer of armor. One of those hands swept forward and blocked the enormous hammer while the other swatted on one of the attackers¡¯ soles.

    ¡°Arghh!!¡± A miserable shriek sounded. The person felt as though all of the earth¡¯s energy were concentrated on his foot. His bones made a few cracks before that foot of his shattered and started spurting blood.

    ¡°Don¡¯t step on the ground!¡± One of them shouted. Their earth divine energy had shot into the ground. However, when their attacksnded, the earth that they knew so well suddenly seemed all so unfamiliar to them. It was as thoughyers of barriers had deflected their divine energy. They realized that their attacks were, yet again, ineffective.

    A shiny broadsword filled with divine energy was suddenly thrust at the region where the two hands appeared. Ting! The broadsword which should have pierced into the ground like a hot knife through butter bounced off as a burst of sparks came out from its tip.

    Evidently, this attack had also caused no harm to the sneaky attacker.

    The gods living in Ethereal City surrounded the area and watched the fight from a distance. They seemed very curious and would discuss the fight in low voices.

    Although all of those in the fight were cultivators of the earth element, the expert who was hiding underground had shown extreme mastery on the utilization of earth element, as though he was one with the earth. Although the expert had never shown his face, from the power contained in the divine energy on his two hands, the onlookers could tell that he was around the same strength as those three above the ground. They were all in around mid-stage midgodhood.

    Although they were all in the same realm, the expert hiding underground had stayed on the front foot all along. Although he had not been an inch off the ground, he could somehow move anywhere he wanted to. He could quickly throw a sneak attack at his opponents, immediately retreat underground, and move elsewhere. Evidently, this expert was on a whole nother level in his mastery and understanding of the earth element.

    ¡°Who could this fe be? He is only a midgod, and yet, hemands such spectacr mastery over earth energy. Absolutely unbelievable!¡± eximed a bystander who cultivated in the energy of wind.

    ¡°I have met a few highgods of earth before, but never have I seen anyone who could conceal themselves underground so fluidly and effortlessly! Not only that, but this expert could even form Crystal Fortification on his hands! Could he be concealing his actual strength? Otherwise, how could a midgod have such profound knowledge into the element of earth?¡± another bystander eximed in disbelief.

    ¡°This mysterious expert has stayed in Ethereal City for some days but he had nevere out from the ground even till now. I wonder how he or she looked!¡± remarked a bystander.

    While the crowd was talking, the underground guy again miraculously disappeared himself, as though he had never appeared. The midgod who lost a foot diverted divine energy to the injured leg. A vein on his leg burst from the skin.

    The trio of midgods no longer dared stand on the ground but hovered in midair cautiously. They looked incredibly distressed.

    Cultivators of the element of earth could unleash their fullest potential only when they had their feet on the ground. They need to be touching the ground to utilize the energy found in the ground and it will allow them to gather the element of earth faster than they could while hovering in midair. The sight of three gods of earth not being able to step on the ground seemed very bizarre and ironic to the onlookers.

    Those who didn¡¯t know might even think that the three were cultivators of the wind element fighting an invisible earth element expert!

    ¡°Han Tu, show yourself if you have balls. Don¡¯t hide underground like an ostrich!¡± shouted that midgod whose leg was bleeding. He was looking at the ground below him and gnashing his teeth.

    His two partners were standing on his two sides. They seemed to be in great headaches.

    ¡°Han Tu? Wow, so it¡¯s him! Why is this person in the Space Dominion?¡± a midgod of fire cried out in surprise. He seemed to know the background of the expert hiding underground.

    ¡°Excuse me mate, do you know who that mysterious earth energy cultivator is?¡± those standing beside him turned to the midgod of fire and asked. They were dying to know the mysterious person¡¯s identity.

    ¡°Han Tu is an earth energy expert who¡¯s recently been rising in fame in the Earth Dominion. It is said that when he first arrived at the Earth Dominion, he had just mid-stage lowgod strength. But somehow, he managed to rapidly soar in strength and attained mid-stage midgod realm in just a short few decades! He had made a lot of enemies in the Dominion but no one could catch him!¡± exined the midgod of fire. He was pleased to receive such attention.

    After taking a short pause, when he saw that the onlookers were still staring at him, he put on a faint smile and continued, ¡°He is very skilled at the use of earth energy. Some even said that his understanding of the earth element has surpassed those of a highgod. He is a very mysterious character. No one seemed to know where he came from or his goals. He attracted the attention of many highgods soon after entering the Earth Dominion. I have even heard rumors from the Earth Shrine that the Overgod of Earth had summoned him for a meeting, but he refused. He¡¯s been a loner and an entric in the Earth Dominion. Although he had offended many, no highgods could capture him!¡±

    ¡°So it turns out to be him! I have heard rumors about this person thest time I visited the Earth Dominion,¡± said a god as he walked to the crowd from a distance. He then added, ¡°Strange things have been happening these days. Many young but outstanding experts have started appearing in every Dominion. I hearsay of this fe named Han Mu who has been making news in the Life Dominion. He too attracted the attention of the Overgod of Life. From the Fire Dominion is a guy called Han Huo. They all have strange names, but they all have the word ¡®Han¡¯!¡±

    ¡°There is a youngster from the Darkness Dominion called Bryan who¡¯s also been rising in fame. Rumor says that he came to Elysium from a low-level material ne just recently. But somehow, despite his origin, he has supreme skills in refining medicines and possessed terrifying strength. I heard that he even defeated a highgod! It seems that a wave of miraculous experts is popping out from all the Dominions!¡± remarked a lowgod of death.

    ¡°That youngster called Bryan is really awesome. I have heard a thing or two about him when I was in the Destruction Dominion. They say that he founded a pharmacy named Celestial Pearl ¨C if I remember correctly. The business has been flourishing in the Darkness Dominion!¡±

    ¡°Yada yada yada.... ¡° the onlookers started discussing the phenomenon. For a moment, that had forgotten about the three midgods that were still hovering in midair and Han Tu under the ground.

    Then, suddenly, a group of earth energy cultivators wearing matching divine armor as the trio arrived at the area in a haste. The squad made of ten gods seemed to be a detachment of divine guards from some family n. It wasposed of an early-stage highgod, threete-stage midgods, and six mid-stage midgods.

    The highgod that led the squad was short and brawny. He had dry, yellowish skin. As soon as he arrived, he glowered at the three hovering in midair and shouted, ¡°Get back on the ground!¡±

    The three midgods cowered. Following the angry shout, they immediatelynded on the ground. The midgod who lost a leg sullenly reported, ¡°Lord Ver¨®n, Han Tu should be right underground!¡±

    ¡°Do you really need to remind me that?¡± replied the highgod named Ver¨®n in an annoyed manner. He looked all around with his eyes that were glinted ferocious rays and coldly shouted, ¡°Have you folks seen enough yet? Get lost!¡±

    Ver¨®n had highgod strength while the onlooking gods were mostly of lowgod and midgod strengths. After hearing Ver¨®n¡¯s shout, the crowd started dispersing. Although they wished to see more actions, they were too intimidated to stay and watch.

    ¡°Han Tu, I know you are underground. Don¡¯t think that you can escape us just because you havee to the Space Dominion! I¡¯ll tell you this ¨C we will get to you no matter where you run!¡± after the crowd dispersed, Ver¨®n lowered his head and coldly shouted at the ground.

    Suddenly,rge spikes shot out from the ground. That midgod who lost a leg was hit. Arge spike struck right his crotch. A miserable loud shriek sounded as the pain swarm to his brain.

    The divine guards did not expect to be attacked in Ver¨®n¡¯s presence. Having been caught off guard, three of the divine guards were struck. Some had their foot pierced while some received injuries on their legs. They hastily flew back to the sky before cursing at the ground while grimacing in pain.

    Ver¨®n was enraged. He sent a burst of divine energy towards the earth and cried, ¡°Han Tu, show yourself if you have the guts!¡±

    A deafening explosion sounded from trembling ground. As Ver¨®n was a highgod, the power contained in his attack was nothing ordinary.

    Several hundred meters from the gang, earth elite zombie emerged from the ground. He said to Ver¨®n, ¡°Fucker, stay here if you have the guts! My father will be here soon and he will beat the shit out of you!¡± Earth Elite Zombie had not changed in appearance even after decades and he still had that naive look. But one thing had changed ¨C his eyes were glinting with energy and intelligence. He had even learned to use vulgarities and behave arrogantly. It was almost half as good as Han Shuo could do.

    Ver¨®n stared nkly for a moment, as though he did not expect that Earth Elite Zombie would have a father. He took a quick nce at his crying and screaming divine guards before he replied, ¡°Your father? I¡¯m not going anywhere even if your grandpaes. Let¡¯s see if he can even touch me!¡±

 Chapter 810 - 810: Come and kill me!

    GDK<strong> 810: Come and kill me!</strong>

    Han Shuo who was rushing to Han Tu had sensed the excitement from his soul just as Han Tu could. Earth Elite Zombie could also detect Han Shuo¡¯s presence from within a certain range.

    Rose who had been following Han Shuo in wandering about the Ethereal City was surprised when Han Shuo had suddenly elerated and flown towards a direction at full speed. She had no idea what was going on in Han Shuo¡¯s head.

    Rose did not question but followed behind Han Shuo silently while making guesses.

    ¡°Father!¡± an excited cry from the depth of Earth Elite Zombie¡¯s soul entered Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness even though they were many blocks apart.

    ¡°I will be there soon!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals had arrived there long ago. He had seen Earth Elite Zombie fighting the three midgods as well as hearing the conversation between Ver¨®n and Earth Elite Zombie.

    Han Shuo did not expect that Earth Elite Zombie would have attained mid-stage midgod realm in just a short few decades. He had even made a name for himself in the Earth Dominion. To him, the stronger the Five Elite Zombie grows, the safer they will be. Han Shuo was even more astonished to learn that even the Overgod of Earth wished to meet Earth Elite Zombie.

    Han Shuo knew nothing about the disputes between Earth Elite Zombie and Ver¨®n, and he did not care. Even if it was Earth Elite Zombie that was in the wrong, Han Shuo will not let go of Ver¨®n for attacking his son.

    Siding with one¡¯s children regardless if they were at fault or not is a universal trait that every father would have. Han Shuo was no exception!

    ¡°Just you wait. When my father is here, all of you will die!¡± said Earth Elite Zombie arrogantly to the angered Ver¨®n.

    ¡°Good. I want to see who your father is. If I can¡¯t catch you, I don¡¯t mind getting him instead!¡± shouted Ver¨®n as he red at Earth Elite Zombie in the distance. Ver¨®n knew that if he were to make any move, Earth Elite Zombie, whose lower body was still submerged underground, will immediately disappear underground.

    Ver¨®n was exasperated by the fact that he, a highgod of earth, could do nothing to a midgod of earth. Sometimes, he even wondered if Earth Elite Zombie had been deceiving him about his true strength all along, for it seemed unreasonable that a mere midgod would have such an insanely profound understanding of the element of earth.

    ¡°Good! Stay right there if you have the guts!¡± Earth Elite Zombie fully exited the ground and continued to provoke Ver¨®n.

    Earth Elite Zombie could sense that Han Shuo will arrive in no time and it emboldened him to be even more condescending. Although he was still naive in appearance, to Ver¨®n, he looked like the most abdominal person on Elysium.

    ¡°Stay, I will! No matter whoes to your rescue, you will not get away from us!¡± replied Ver¨®n.

    While Earth Elite Zombie and Ver¨®n were shouting at each other, a bizarre radiance appeared from the horizon and streak across the sky before abruptly halting beside Earth Elite Zombie.

    ¡°Father! You¡¯re here! It¡¯s great to see you!¡± cheered Earth Elite Zombie and he smiled foolishly at Han Shuo.

    ¡°Are you alright?¡± Han Shuo only became at ease after taking a couple of careful looks at Earth Elite Zombie and discovered that he was not injured. Right after that, he red at Ver¨®n, bunched his brows, and asked, ¡°So this is the guy?¡±

    ¡°He is. He has been hunting me all the way from the Earth Dominion. He just won¡¯t let go! How annoying!¡± said Earth Elite Zombie in an annoyed manner. ¡°All I did was kill a few people in their city. Besides, it was they who offended me first!¡±

    ¡°Those you killed were members of prestigious family ns. If I don¡¯t bring you back, I cannot answer myself to those family ns!¡± Ver¨®n was enraged by Earth Elite Zombie¡¯s justification and immediately shouted in response.

    ¡°There will be no need to answer anything. Since we have met, I¡¯m not going to let you leave!¡± Han Shuo stared at Ver¨®n with his cold eyes while asking Earth Elite Zombie, ¡°Tell me, how do you want him dead?¡±

    Ver¨®n finally knew where Earth Elite Zombie learned to be so haughty and arrogant ¨C from his father who was even more so. This guy of unknown origin was reading Ver¨®n¡¯s death sentence in a straight face, as though killing a highgod was nothing but a piece of cake.

    Instead of getting angrier, Ver¨®nughed, ¡°Hahaha, what a duo! One only knows how to hide, and another only knows how to bluff. Oi, I¡¯m standing right here. Come and kill me if you can!¡±

    ¡°Rose, kill them all!¡± Han Shuo bunched his brows and instructed Rose who had just caught up to Han Shuo.

    Rose who had just arrived beside Han Shuo stared puzzlingly at Earth Elite Zombie and asked, ¡°He, he¡¯s your son?¡±

    ¡°Yes,¡± Han Shuo nodded and asked, ¡°Why? Is there a problem?¡±

    Rose shook her head and replied, ¡°No, it¡¯s just that I find it rather puzzling.¡± Back then at the Demon Mountain, Spider Goddess Rose had met Earth Elite Zombie and Metal Elite Zombie. It never crossed her mind that the two Elite Zombie would have such a close rtionship with Han Shuo.

    ¡°Father, who is she?¡± asked Earth Elite Zombie.

    ¡°Sense her aura carefully!¡± replied Han Shuo in a faint smile.

    Although Earth Elite Zombie¡¯s sensing ability wasn¡¯t as absurdly good as that of Han Shuo, it was much better than most people on Elysium. Earth Elite Zombie stared at Rose for a moment and he suddenly jolted. He cried, ¡°That thing in Demon Mountain!¡±

    ¡°Humph!¡± Rose red at Earth Elite Zombie. She was still a little angry, ¡°I remember you, you petty thief!¡±

    ¡°Hehe, yes, it¡¯s me that stole your things. What are you gonna do?¡± Earth Elite Zombie may appear simple-minded on the outside, but he had learned plenty after surviving in the brutal world for so many years. As soon as he saw Han Shuo giving Rosemand, he knew that Rose currently have some kind of a rtionship with Han Shuo, and therefore he was not afraid of Rose.

    ¡°Goddammit, they think us invisible!¡± one of Ver¨®n¡¯s divine guards could no longer hold his anger and he loudly cursed.

    Ver¨®n was infuriated. He finally could no longer hold back his anger and charged at Han Shuo in a loud roar.

    ¡°Alright, that¡¯s enough!¡± shouted Han Shuo softly. He turned to Rose and said, ¡°That can¡¯t wait to die. Go and fulfill their death wish!¡±

    Rose shot yet another re at Earth Elite Zombie before she finally charged at Ver¨®n. Absolute darkness abruptly shrouded the region, consuming every photon. Rose managed to kill several midgod divine guards in an instant.

    Rose was a mid-stage highgod while Ver¨®n was just an early-stage highgod. Although the two were just one level apart, it was nheless an enormous gap in strength.

    To make it worse for Ver¨®n, Rose had taken the upper hand of making the first strike, shrouding the region with her darkness domain of divinity. Ver¨®n had not just caught a tartar, but he had also sealed his destiny to meet Death.

    ¡°Father, how did she end up with you?¡± asked Earth Elite Zombie. He was very curious about their rtionship after seeing how obedient Rose was.

    ¡°Erm, after you fes left, I have managed to improve in strength. I took a trip to the Demon Mountain intending to take revenge for you and Metal Elite Zombie. After I defeated her, she pleaded to be my ve. I needed helpers so I took her in,¡± Han Shuo was a little embarrassed when talking about the matter. He was worried that Earth Elite Zombie would be unhappy that he did not kill Rose.

    ¡°Hehe, I see! Back then she was so aggressive and dead sworn on killing us, And yet, she ends up serving us! Haha!¡± replied Earth Elite Zombie contently. He did not seem to be unhappy about Han Shuo not killing Rose.

    After having been together with Han Shuo for such a long time, Rose had learned a few tricks from Han Shuo. Instead of attacking Ver¨®n right from the start, Rose attacked his midgod subordinated and tricked Ver¨®n who was disoriented in her darkness divinity domain into killing his own divine guards.

    The midgods stood no chance against Rose. All those midgod divine guards who had been pursuing Earth Elite Zombie from the Earth Dominion all the way to the Space Dominion were killed by Rose in no time. It was after they were dead that Rose put all her focus on attacking Ver¨®n.

    Ver¨®n could only barely defend himself against Rose attacks¡¯ and couldn¡¯t make any counterattacks. He felt himself getting weaker and weaker.

    Ver¨®n had assumed Han Shuo as a midgod right from the start. As no one could sense Han Shuo¡¯s strength in demonic arts and Han Shuo had been revealing the aura of his avatar of death, Ver¨®n thought that Han Shuo was just an average midgod.

    Naturally, a midgod was no menace in Ver¨®n¡¯s eyes. He did not even take Rose as a threat.

    Although Ver¨®n could not determine Rose¡¯s strength, he saw Han Shuo giving Rose an order. He thought that an expert under themand of a midgod wouldn¡¯t be any stronger.

    It was only when Rose deployed her highgod domain of divinity that Ver¨®n realized just how terribly mistaken he was. If he knew that Rose had mid-stage highgod strength, he wouldn¡¯t have stayed but make a run for it.

    Ver¨®n could not feel more regretful. He strained himself in defending against Rose¡¯s merciless attacks. It was only a matter of time before he would exhaust all his energy and be defeated.

    Just when Ver¨®n thought that all hope was lost, an aged voice sounded from a distance, ¡°Lady, Gentlemen, Please stop!¡±

    An old man with long white hair, clutching to a staff made of a dried yellowish wood ripped apart spacetime and appeared out of nowhere. With a wave of his hand, Rose and Ver¨®n were frozen inbat as though someone had paused the flow of time.

 Chapter 811 - GDK 811: If I say youâ€™ll die, youâ€™ll die!

    <strong>GDK 811: If I say you¡¯ll die, you¡¯ll die!</strong>

    The bizarre binding energy emitted from the yellowish staff held by that old man had paused time for Ver¨®n and Rose.

    The bizarre energy had also affected Han Shuo. It took two seconds before Han Shuo came to his senses and he saw that Rose and Ver¨®n who were in the middle of a fight had abruptly been separated. Rose¡¯s domain of divinity had also disappeared.

    Han Shuo immediately realized that he had also been affected by the time pause. He was astonished. He turned to look at the old man gravely and shouted, ¡°Identify yourself!¡±

    It took Rose and Ver¨®n a few more seconds before they too realized what had just happened. Rose would have been able to kill Ver¨®n in just another moment if she was not interrupted. She was rather annoyed that she was inexplicably frozen in time for a few seconds and that she was prevented from killing her prey.

    On the pr opposite to Rose, Ver¨®n, whose life was saved just inches from death, was overjoyed. He exhaled a sigh of relief, turned to the old man wielding the staff, and hastily said, ¡°Thank you, Lord Baum!¡±

    The old man named Baum kept a calm and unperturbed face. He nodded his head slightly and indifferently said, ¡°Ver¨®n, perhaps it¡¯s time for you to return. I don¡¯t think you are capable of arresting that person called Han Tu anymore.¡±

    Ver¨®n forced a smile and replied, ¡°I understand. I shall return and inform my superior of matter. Lord Baum, sorry for the trouble.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s Ok,¡± replied Baum.

    ¡°Han Tu, and you, youngster, this is not over yet. Akaji City will not stop pursuing the matter! Just you wait!¡± Ver¨®n tried to appear tough although his heart was still trembling in fear. ¡°And you, woman, what is your name? I will remember you!¡±

    Rose couldn¡¯t be bothered to answer him. She remained silent as she stood beside Han Shuo.

    ¡°You think you can get away?¡± Han Shuo coldly groaned and shouted, ¡°If I say I want you dead, then you¡¯ll die! Nothing will stop me!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Han Shuo started marching towards Ver¨®n step by step. His eyes, however, were fixed on that old man called Baum.

    Baum bunched his brows as though he was unhappy about Han Shuo¡¯s disrespectful attitude. He looked at Han Shuo and in a soft but firm voice, he said, ¡°I¡¯m the City Lord of Ethereal City. We do not allow fighting in this City. Gentleman, no matter who you may be, you should respect and abide by the rules of this City while you are in the City¡±

    ¡°Why didn¡¯t you show up when Ver¨®n and his men tried to kill Han Tu just then, but abruptly came to interrupt when Ver¨®n is about to die? If your duty is to prevent fights, then you don¡¯t seem to be doing your job well!¡± sneered Han Shuo.

    Baum possessedte-stage highgod strength and cultivated in the mysterious space edict. In normal circumstances, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t be willing to make such an enemy. However, based on observations, Han Shuo could tell that Baum and Ver¨®n were acquainted. It seemed to Han Shuo that Baum was trying to protect Ver¨®n.

    Han Shuo was not afraid of offending Baum for Earth Elite Zombie. Although Baum could freeze time, he cannot do so for an extended period. Han Shuo was previously affected by the time-freeze because he wasn¡¯t expecting it. Han Shuo believed that by taking certain precautions and defensive measures, it wouldn¡¯t be easy for Baum to time-freeze him again.

    ¡°Fights between midgods happens on every corner of Ethereal City. I can¡¯t possibly stop every one of those fights. However, I can detect battles between highgods through the sensor towers deployed around the City,¡± exined Baum calmly while his eyes locked tight on Han Shuo.

    Baum could sense that this person was rather unusual. The demeanor he carried shouldn¡¯t be found on an ordinary midgod. A person with the guts to challenge the City Lord¡¯s authority would either be a fool or a formidable expert possessing extraordinary strength.

    Obviously, Han Shuo belonged in thetter group!

    ¡°Bull fucking shit!¡± Han Shuo scoffed disdainfully at Baum¡¯s exnation. He let out a slight groan and his footsteps towards Baum and Ver¨®n abruptly elerated. Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy was injected into his body in an instant. Omen Invincible Body was also deployed.

    Baum¡¯s heart jolted and he thought, <i>Oh crap.</i> He brandished the yellow wooden staff in his hand and a pulse of miraculous energy emanated from the staff. The energy had altered thew of spacetime. A boundary of space edictal energy enveloped Han Shuo.

    A split secondter, Han Shuo found himself unable to move as though space had frozen. Following that, a wave of energy was traveling towards his consciousness, trying to freeze his thought.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness suddenly split up into hundreds of thousands of strands and swam around his brain. They formed a vortex that devoured the wave of energy targeting his consciousness. Before that bizarre energy wave could form any resistance, it was shattered by the continuous attacks from Han Shuo¡¯s whirling consciousness.

    After the threat to his consciousness was neutralized, Han Shuo immediately sensed that every cell in his body seemed to be frozen in ice. He could also sense that his body was frozen in midair as though he had been turned into a living statue. It was a very strange feeling and Han Shuo did not like it.

    The energy of the space edict boundary filled every inch of the region but Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness managed to avoid being frozen. Immediately, he activated every cell in his body. Every one of them would explode, disintegrate, reassemble, and repeat.

    The Omen Invincible Body was as though an ignited gunpowder. An astonishing amount of defensive energy erupted. Soft but clear cracking noises sounded from all over Han Shuo¡¯s body and stopped with a final loud <i>Crack!</i> Han Shuo managed to regain full mobility.

    In the next instance, Han Shuo sensed that the spacetime boundary had shattered like ss. Fissures visible to the naked eye appeared in the space around him before they rapidly fused and disappeared.

    It was as though nothing had happened and Han Shuo was still marching towards Baum and Ver¨®n in a callous face.

    Rose, Earth Elite Zombie, and Ver¨®n shivered after the loud cracking sound. They knew that something must have happened between Han Shuo and Baum. However, as they were affected by the space energy barrier, they weren¡¯t sure of the details. They cast bewildered gazes at Han Shuo and Baum.

    Ver¨®n who originally nned on leaving immediately, was ted when he saw Han Shuo ignored Baum¡¯s advice. Instead of hastily running away from the danger zone, he stayed and watched, hoping that a cmity will befall Han Shuo and Rose.

    Ver¨®n knew just how powerful the City Lord of Ethereal City was. Although Baum usually doesn¡¯t interfere in anybody¡¯s business, his strength was unfathomably great. Ver¨®n wouldn¡¯t dare hunt Earth Elite Zombie in Ethereal City without first seeking Baum¡¯s approval and presenting his City Lord¡¯s token to Baum.

    When Ver¨®n saw that Han Shuo dared challenge the might of the City Lord, and when he saw that Baum seemed annoyed, he again saw a glimmer of hope in capturing Earth Elite Zombie.

    After destroying the space energy boundary, Han Shuo continued marching towards Baum step by step. He deliberately released the intimidating aura of the Cauldron Spirit. While staring fixedly at Baum, he shouted, ¡°This is between me and Ver¨®n. You have nothing to do with this. Are you sure you want to stop me?¡±

    Baum seemed troubled and indecisive for he knew that a person who could break free from his space edict boundary in just three seconds definitely had the strength to fight him! Baum knew that if he were to fight Han Shuo, it would most likely end badly. He might even suffer injuries!

    A cultivator of space edict usually wouldn¡¯t perish in a fight, as long as they stayed vignt. To them, it was bad enough of an oue to suffer injuries. Although Baum was wary of Han Shuo¡¯s power, he wasn¡¯t concerned about losing his life as Han Shuo did not show overwhelmingly superior strength.

    However, for an expert at the realm he was, suffering injuries would be a very painful thing. As Han Shuo got closer and closer, Baum started to seriously reconsider if he should fight Han Shuo for Ver¨®n.

    Ver¨®n seemed to have noticed Baum¡¯s hesitation and hastily advised, ¡°Lord Baum, this is the Ethereal City ¨C your City. As the City Lord, you should be tough against an outsider so bold and reckless to challenge your authority!¡± Ver¨®n did not know what was the rtionship between his City Lord and Baum, but from Baum¡¯s reaction, it became clear to him that they weren¡¯t all that close. He started to worry that Baum might just let him die because Han Shuo¡¯s strength was too mighty.

    Ver¨®n¡¯s desperate words had pushed Baum off the fence. He had finally decided. As the City Lord of Ethereal City, he must fight to maintain his prestige!

    ¡°If you must kill Ver¨®n, you can wait until he left Ethereal City!¡± Baum¡¯s gaze at Han Shuo slowly turned more intense as he said, ¡°As long as he is in Ethereal City, I am going to stop you!¡±

    ¡°Rose, kill that guy for me. I will hold back this old man!¡± instructed Han Shuo calmly after getting an answer from Baum. He did not want to give Ver¨®n any chance of escaping.

    Upon finishing those words, the Demonyer Edge appeared from his palm while the seventeen flying swords whooshed out. Han Shuo, with the sword in his hand and the seventeen flying swords, shot towards Baum ferociously. Han Shuo also deployed the Banner of Hallucination with his left hand to interfere with Baum¡¯s vision and to stop Ver¨®n from escaping.

    After having worked with Han Shuo for centuries and having spent lots of time sparring with him, Rose knew his attack methods well.

    As soon as Han Shuo took action, Rose flew out with rapport and filled her long hair darkness divine energy. Under the guise of the Banner of Hallucination, her long hair slithered to right beside the escaping Ver¨®n. Yet again, absolute darkness abruptly enveloped Ver¨®n and caught him by surprise.

    As the seventeen flying swords started slicing him, Baum felt a substantial increase in pressure. He was forced to rewrite the edict of space using the wooden staff in his hand. The space around him started distorting as he seemed to have fallen into a space-time discontinuum. Dazzling radiance streaked past him as fissures torn and fused across spacetime.

    The flying swords were clearly shooting at Baum but somehow, a distortion in spacetime would appear and the swords would find themselves on the edge of crossing into another dimension. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was tightly connected with his flying swords and that he was masterful in maneuvering them; if Han Shuo had not withdrawn them quickly enough, the flying swords would have been consumed by the spacetime-discontinuum and Han Shuo would have lost all the swords.

    <i>Dang, a space edict cultivator is indeed troublesome to deal with!</i> thought Han Shuo.

 Chapter 812 - Destroying the Space Barrier

    GDK 812: Destroying the Space Barrier

    There were eight elemental energies, namely ¨C Light, Darkness, Earth, Fire, Wind, Water, Lightning, Death, and four edictal forces ¨C Space, Destiny, Life, Destruction. A great majority of Elysians cultivated in those Twelve Fundamental Forces.

    Edictal forces were considered more mysterious than elemental energies, while the edicts of space and destiny were the most abstruse of edictal forces.

    For all his life, Han Shuo had rarely ever fought cultivators of those two edictal energies. He wasn¡¯t particrly familiar with their attack methods. It was when fighting Baum that Han Shuo finally discovered that fighting a cultivator of space edict would be a great pain in the arse.

    The space around Baum would constantly twist and distort. Although he appeared to be standing right before Han Shuo, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t be sure if it was an illusion as he felt as though Baum was in another material ne. This made attacking Baum very difficult as Han Shuo could not lock onto his target.

    Han Shuo¡¯s flying swords would often identally fall into the fissures in spacetime created by Baum. If Han Shuo had not reacted quickly enough and his connection to his flying swords not strong enough, he would have lost all the seventeen flying swords forever in the first few seconds of the battle.

    The distorted spacetime had also greatly obstructed the sensing power of his consciousness. In normal circumstances, as long as Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness had locked onto a person, no matter where or how the person conceals his aura, the person will not be able to escape from Han Shuo¡¯s senses. But Baum was an exception. Even if Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness managed to lock onto Baum, the constantly twisting and distorting spacetime would quickly make Han Shuo lose track of Baum.

    And sometimes, although Han Shuo saw Baum standing right in front of him, his consciousness could not detect his presence. It was as though the person standing in front of him was just an illusion.

    As Han Shuo was unable to lock onto Baum, the firepower of the seventeen flying swords were significantly diminished. Theyers of space edict barriers Baum deployed also posed great impedance to the flying swords, which means Han Shuo had to exhaust more demonic yuan than usual, even though he couldn¡¯t inflict Baum any real harm.

    It was a very frustrating situation for Han Shuo. Although he was filled with a tremendous amount of power, he could neither put it to use nor convert them into menacing attacks that wouldnd on Baum.

    The energy of Cauldron Spirit was wildly whirling in Han Shuo¡¯s body while his consciousness was spread out into countless strands, attempting to locate Boam. The whooshing seventeen flying swords were obstructed by the spacetime fissures and they were prevented from orbiting in their correct trajectories. Han Shuo and his flying swords seemed to had lost themselves in the boundlessly vast space.

    Han Shuo was feeling frustrated as hell, but City Lord Baum the Ethereal City wasn¡¯t feeling any better.

    The seventeen swords were wreaking havoc in the distorted spacetime he deployed. Everywhere it whooshed, it would spread its intense corrosive power and chilling aura. Baum had no choice but to use his own divine energy to keep the edict of space under his control. He forcibly ripped more fissures in spacetime to defend himself against the seventeen flying swords.

    Normally speaking, after Baum deployed a distorted spacetime and used his divine energy to tear fissures in spacetime, anything that fell into the fissures would forever be lost in the edge of the boundless universe. Returning to Elysium, or any material ne, will be impossible.

    However, the seventeen flying swords were not following this naturalw!

    Every time that a flying sword fell into a spacetime fissure, it would miraculously manage to find its way back. This was inconceivable to Baum. Even a mighty god that fell into the spacetime fissure wouldn¡¯t be able to escape from it easily, and a lifeless divine weapon will forever be gone.

    However, somehow, the seventeen flying swords controlled by Han Shuo could do it again and again!

    Every time the flying swords entered a spacetime fissure, they would rapidly turn around, escape the fissure, and continue to shoot at Baum no less ferociously. It forced Baum to keep on distorting and tearing spacetime using his divine energy to prevent the flying swords from getting closer.

    He wasn¡¯t having an easier time than Han Shuo!

    What made Baum even more spooked was that it seemed as though Han Shuo could detect his location in theplex and confusing spacetime-discontinuum area Baum formed. The seventeen flying swords would always manage to find him somehow. It forced Baum to travel back and forth through the cracks in spacetime to evade the attacks.

    Baum had linked ten dimensional tunnels in this spacetime-discontinuum created, allowing him to travel to various corners of the universe within a short time. Although he appeared to still be standing in the same ce, he had, in fact, traveled to ces unfathomably far away from Elysium through the spacetime fissures. He could have traveled across different material nes countless lightyears away before returning to Elysium while appearing stationary. And yet, somehow, Han Shuo could still lock onto him almost immediately. This was simply inconceivable to Baum!

    Baum was bing more and more afraid of Han Shuo!

    While Han Shuo and Baum were causing each other immense headaches, Rose, following Han Shuo¡¯s order, had gone off to finish Ver¨®n. The two had had a battle earlier and it was clear to Ver¨®n that Rose¡¯s strength was greater than his. When he saw that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t defeated by Baum in an instant, he immediately turned on his heels and tried to escape.

    But what a pity, Rose just wouldn¡¯t give him the chance. She started attacking Ver¨®n the instant Han Shuo attacked Baum.

    Ver¨®n was absent-minded for just a fraction of a second. But by the time he came to his senses, Rose had already got to him. He was again trapped in absolute darkness before he could react. Rose¡¯s ferocious attacks also started bombarding him.

    Ver¨®n could not feel more regretful at this time. He thought, <i>Why didn¡¯t I run just then instead of staying and watch? Now I¡¯m fucked! This terrifying bitch has got me again!</i>

    Ver¨®n was no match against Rose. And this time around, Rose used her full strength against Ver¨®n. She even allowed herself to suffer light injuries in exchange for causing Ver¨®n severe injuries. With that, the situation turned even grimmer for Ver¨®n. He received plenty of new wounds all over his body in no time.

    After fighting Baum for what seemed to be ages, Han Shuo, who still could not effectively destruct Baum¡¯s defenses, was feeling distressed and thwarted. Even though he had fought countless formidable experts, never before had Han Shuo feel this way ¨C to be filled with power but unable to use it. Even fighting Hofs, who was also ate-stage highgod, Han Shuo could fight unrestrainedly and use Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy to his advantage.

    Against this cultivator of space edict, however, Han Shuo could not form the Ceaseless Pain sword formation using his seventeen flying swords all throughout the fight. If he loses focus for even the slightest time, he would immediately lose track of Baum and his presence will no longer be detectable. This made Han Shuo feel very helpless and annoyed.

    When Han Shuo was so annoyed that he was about to start cursing, he received a message from Cauldron Spirit, ¡°Master, let me help you!¡±

    ¡°You can destroy this annoying spacetime barrier?¡±

    ¡°He has merged ten small dimensional tunnels in that area. Through the dimensional tunnels, he could repeatedly travel to locations light-years away from Elysium and return in no time. That¡¯s why your consciousness would suddenly lose track of him.¡±

    Cauldron Spirit continued to exin, ¡°Master, don¡¯t you forget that the inside of the Cauldron is made of an independent dimension. I have even made many smaller dimensions for my demon generals in it. My understanding of the edict of space cannot be poorer than his! Also, back then when the Exalted Demonlord created a tunnel between the two universes, He had relied upon my understanding of spacetime. Breaking this spacetime barrier will be no problem!¡±

    ¡°Alright then, you go ahead and try!¡± hastily transmitted the ted Han Shuo.

    ¡°I need to take back the energy from you, or I might not have sufficient energy to do it,¡± exined Cauldron Spirit before Han Shuo immediately felt the energy in his body rapidly returning to Cauldron Spirit.

    Just as Han Shuo felt power draining away from his body, Cauldron Spirit abruptly flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s body and turned into a dark radiance that shot straight for the space edict barrier made by Baum.

    In all of a sudden, hundreds of bright dark shadows shot out from the Cauldron of Myriad Demon and spread in every direction towards the spacetime barrier. Even the seventeen flying swords were maneuvered by Cauldron Spirit. They were whooshing towards seventeen different directions.

    Baum, who was feeling just as horrible as Han Shuo, immediately felt that an intense fluctuation traveling across the spacetime discontinuum he created. The waves miraculously concentrated at the dimensional tunnels he made using his divine energy and induced resonances at the weak points of his dimensional tunnels.

    Baum who was in the middle of traversing through one of those tunnels was greatly rmed. He knew that only a cultivator of space edict with simr or greater strength than his could locate the weak points of his dimensional tunnels. However, Han Shuo clearly did not cultivate in the edict of space. <i>How is this even possible?!</i> thought the appalled Baum.

    It was at this point that Baum really started to panic. A person who could precisely locate the weak points of his dimensional tunnels could also easily do the same thing if he were to attempt escaping by ripping apart spacetime. In other words, Baum could be stopped from escaping.

    That is to say, if Han Shuo were to gain the upper hand in this battle, Baum might not end up with just slight injuries ¨C he could lose his life!

    Baum started to regret it. He regrettednding himself in such a terrible situation for such a minor matter!

    Shortly after, Baum detected that all the weak points of his dimensional tunnels were struck by a burst of energy. Before he came to his senses, a violent rumble sounded from every direction. His dimensional tunnels were rapidly copsing. Baum was panic-stricken and he hastily evacuated from the dimensional tunnel, lest he is pulled to the edge of the universe. After all, he wasn¡¯t the Overgod of Space who could travel to any dimension with just a thought!

    Just as his spacetime-discontinuumpletely crumbled, a miserable shriek fell into Baum¡¯s ears. In a flurry, Baum lowered his head to look. He saw that Ver¨®n has been in!

    Seeing the ughtered Ver¨®n copse on the ground lifelessly, Baum knew that all his struggles had been in vain. However, he secretly felt d about Ver¨®n¡¯s demise because Han Shuo will no longer have a reason to continue fighting him.

 Chapter 813 - Foes to Friends

    <strong>GDK 813: Foes to Friends</strong>

    The instant that the space edict barrier shattered, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness detected Baum clearly and locked onto him. However, as the Cauldron of Myriad Demon was outside his body, Han Shuo could not borrow Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy and therefore he did not immediately strike Baum.

    It was at this time that Han Shuo heard thest dying shriek of Ver¨®n¡¯s. He stared nkly for a moment and started to consider if he should continue to fight Baum.

    Han Shuo felt no grudges or grievances towards Baum and there was no reason to fight him to death. Besides, Han Shuo felt some apprehension towards this expert. Even though the space edict barrier had been destroyed, Han Shuo still did not have full certainty of killing Baum.

    It was at this moment that the Cauldron had whooshed back into Han Shuo¡¯s body. Cauldron Spirit then transmitted, ¡°Master, the spacetime barrier has been removed. This guy possessed a decent strength. He might have other tricks up his sleeves. Do you still want to attack him?¡±

    After killing Ver¨®n, Rose returned to stand beside Han Shuo and stared cautiously at Baum. If Han Shuo gave her themand, she would instantly charge forward and attack Baum.

    ¡°Ver¨®n is dead. I think there is no longer a cause for us to keep on fighting each other, don¡¯t we?¡± Out of Han Shuo¡¯s expectation, while he was still on the fence, Baum took initiative in throwing an olive branch. His attitude was much more polite than before. There was even a forced, awkward smile on Baum¡¯s face.

    It was apparent that this person called Baum was poor at feigning civility. It looked as though someone was pulling on his face muscles to make that awkward fake smile.

    Han Shuo continued to stare a Baum without speaking for a moment. His eyes were glittering with indecision.

    Baum¡¯s heart jolted. He thought, <i>Don¡¯t tell me that this guy is going to fight me to the death?</i>

    The moment that the spacetime barrier was destroyed, Baum knew that Han Shuo will be able to have a real battle with him. He also knew that Han Shuo must have some other deadly tricks up his sleeves. Baum was very wary of Han Shuo. He did not want to be Han Shuo¡¯s mortal enemy for Ver¨®n.

    While Baum let his imagination ran wild, he secretly took certain defensive precautious, fearing that Han Shuo mightunch a sudden attack.

    ¡°You are right. There are no grievances between us. There¡¯s no point in making such a big fuss over that minor little character,¡± while Baum¡¯s mind was worried and anxious, Han Shuo suddenly put on a faint smile and dered his stance. He withdrew the seventeen flying swords floating in midair, indicating that he will not continue to fight.

    Han Shuo was in Ethereal City and he still needed to wait for his other five children in this city. If Han Shuo was to continue to fight Baum, the City Lord of Ethereal City, even if Han Shuo won the fight, he most likely won¡¯t be able to stay in Ethereal City any longer. In addition, it was very unlikely for Han Shuo to win without suffering any injuries.

    If the two were to continue fighting, the most likely oue would be grave injuries to both sides. And if Han Shuo were to suffer injuries at this time, his n of visiting the Fringe will have to be postponed indefinitely. That will be inconsistent with Han Shuo¡¯s original intention. Therefore, Han Shuo did not recklessly attack.

    Once Baum saw Han Shuo withdrew his miraculous weapons, he heaved a sigh of relief in his mind and dismantled his remaining defenses as well. He carefully looked at Han Shuo up and down a few times before he exined, ¡°I had the opportunity of meeting the Akaji City Lord once and we could be considered acquaintances. Indeed, my intention was to protect Ver¨®n. However, I did not expect that you would have such strength. My friendship with the Akaji City Lord isn¡¯t deep enough for me to risk my life. With Ver¨®n now dead, well, I guess I will just let it pass,¡±

    <i>And now he¡¯s being honest, ha,</i> thought Han Shuo. Although Han Shuo did not have a good impression of Baum, he did not hold any animosity either. Han Shuo calmly nodded and cordially said, ¡°Yes, there may have been some misunderstandings between us. I hope that Your Lordship will not take offense.¡±

    Suddenly, apany of divine guards arrived from the distance. Among them were three highgods. Two at early-stage and one at mid-stage.

    After the divine guards arrived, mid-stage highgod that led thepany hastily asked, ¡°City Lord, what happened here?¡±

    The battle between Han Shuo and Baum had created intense shockwaves. Experts who had reached certain realms would be able to tell that a fight was happening nearby just from the unusual spacetime fluctuations. Thepany of divine guards happened to be patrolling the area and they rushed to the scene to see what was wrong.

    Upon arrival, they surrounded Han Shuo, Rose, and Earth Elite Zombie. Every one of them was wearing grave and unfriendly faces. They automatically assumed the trio as enemies trying to cause disorder in Ethereal City. If Baum gave themand, they would immediately charge forward and attack the three.

    The situation that had just started to ease up suddenly reverted to high tension.

    With demon generals dispersed all around, Han Shuo knew that thepany of divine guards will be there beforehand. He also knew that with their strengths, he could easily escape with Rose and Earth Elite Zombie, and therefore Han Shuo was not worried about the divine guards. He looked at Baum calmly in a faint smile as though waiting for him to respond.

    Baum who just had a great battle with Han Shuo knew better than anyone of just how terrifying Han Shuo is. When thepany of divine guards showed up at such an inappropriate time and even surrounded the three as though they were enemies, Baum panicked a little and hastily said, ¡°Do not attack. I only had a small misunderstanding with this friend here. We have resolved the misunderstanding.¡±

    The divine guards seemed puzzled when they heard Baum¡¯s words. They had all sensed intense spacetime fluctuationing from this ce. And being veterans, they could tell from the spacetime fluctuations that Baum had attacked with all his strength. Besides, Ver¨®n, a guest who had been staying in City Lord¡¯s mansion, was still lying lifelessly on the ground for all to see. It seemed very illogical that Baum would say that everything had just been a misunderstanding.

    After hearing Baum asking the divine guards to be at ease, Han Shuo realized that Baum wasn¡¯t nning on fighting him any longer. Han Shuo put on a faint smile and said, ¡°City Lord Baum, if there¡¯s nothing else, are we allowed to leave now?¡±

    ¡°Of course, of course,¡± said Baum while he repeatedly nodded his head. Then, as though something struck him, he cried, ¡°Wait!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s put on a solemn face and slightly bunched his brows before he turned back to Baum.

    ¡°Please don¡¯t misunderstand, I just want to ask you a question!¡± Baum hastily exined when Han Shuo seemed displeased, ¡°Can I know who are you? An expert as young and formidable as you cannot be an obscure character in any Dominion. I just want to know the identity of the person who had sparred with me. Can I have that honor?¡±

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help himself butugh. He answered, ¡°Haha, I¡¯m called Bryan. I hail from the City of Shadows, the Darkness Dominion.¡±

    ¡°Bryan... Bryan... ¡° Baum mumbled to himself while scratching his head as though trying to recall something. After a long while, Baum let out a cry in surprise and asked, ¡°Are you the master of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy?¡±

    This time it was Han Shuo¡¯s turn to be shocked. The City of Shadows was very far away from Ethereal City. Han Shuo did not expect that the City Lord of Ethereal City would know him.

    ¡°Erm... Yes, I¡¯m the master of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy,¡± admitted Han Shuo. He saw no point in concealing that fact.

    The Ethereal City divine guards around him were all astonished to hear Han Shuo¡¯s admission. It seemed that they had all heard of Han Shuo¡¯s name. Their gaze towards Han Shuo became much more different. It was as though they were excited about something.

    ¡°I really did not expect the rumors to be true. Youth indeed breeds heroism!¡± Baum was greatly astonished. He had never believed the rumors that came from the City of Shadows of the Darkness Dominion. He thought that the hearsays had exaggerated Han Shuo¡¯s strength. But after the battle, Baum realized that the rumors were definitely erroneous ¨C they had not exaggerated Han Shuo¡¯s strength, but underrated his strength!

    The startled Baum quickly racked his brain before he suddenly proposed, ¡°Bryan, will you be interested in opening a branch of your Celestial Pearl Pharmacy in Ethereal City? If you are willing, we can discuss this in detail. There have been a lot of people from the Darkness Dominion that highly praised your expertise in refining medicine. I believe that no matter in which city, as long as there are gods, your medicines would be sold out in no time!¡±

    The Ethereal City divine guards who red ferociously at Han Shuo just a moment ago started looking at Han Shuo with eyes glinting with fervent lights while wearing expressions of astonishment.

    They had heard too much about the miraculousness of Han Shuo¡¯s medicines from gods that came from the Darkness Dominion. But unfortunately for them, the City of Shadows was millions of miles from Ethereal City. Even if they wanted to purchase Han Shuo¡¯s medicines, it was not feasible for most of them to spend so much time traversing multiple Dominions just to get to the City of Shadows.

    In addition, it was impossible for gods that cultivated in the energy of life, light, and water to step into the Death, Darkness, and Destruction Dominions. No matter how many crystal coins they may have, there was no way they could purchase Han Shuo¡¯s medicines. Meanwhile, those who got their hands on Han Shuo¡¯s medicine would treat it like treasures and would never resell it. Therefore, although many had heard of the miraculousness of his medicines, only a very small portion of those people could obtain them.

    How could the divine guards not be excited after learning that the person standing in front of them was the master of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy?

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment. He did not expect that Baum who had a fight with him just a moment ago would take initiative and invite him to set up a Celestial Pearl branch in Ethereal City. The proposal caught him by surprise.

    After he carefully thought about it for a while, Han Shuo felt that Baum¡¯s proposal was all but harmful to him. If he were to open a branch of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy in Ethereal City, not only that he could make even more crystal coins, but he could possibly utilize the unique situation of Ethereal City to spread the influence of Celestial Pearl to every Dominion there was on Elysium!

    The temptation was too much to be refused. Han Shuo hesitated for only a short moment before he nodded and agreed, ¡°Sure, definitely. I thank City Lord in advance!¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re wee. My Ethereal City is greatly honored to have the privilege!¡± Baum promptly replied with polite words. He seemed rather pleasantly surprised. ¡°If you have nothing at hand, shall we head somewhere else to discuss this? I will make sure to select a suitable location for your pharmacy. And if you need it, I can also help you with the hiring of manpower. The Space Dominion is very different from the Death, Destruction, and Darkness Dominions. We are much freer in economy and movement. The environment we have is much more suitable for doing business.¡±

    ¡°Very well, let¡¯s discuss it!¡± Han Shuo dly agreed. He did not expect that picking up a fight wouldnd him with such a great profit.

 Chapter 814 - VIP Treatment

    GDK 814: VIP Treatment

    ***Ethereal City, the City Lord¡¯s manor house.

    Baum weed Han Shuo¡¯s arrival with the most pompous ceremony and was treating him as a distinguished guest. Most of the people in the mansion were surprised and confused. They did not know why their City Lord would treat a youngster with such great respect.

    But after they learned of Han Shuo¡¯s identity, they too started looking at Han Shuo with great excitement. It appeared that Han Shuo¡¯s customers from the City of Shadows had been eagerly promoting the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy everywhere, even in distantnds.

    Although Baum was the City Lord of Ethereal City and a very mighty expert, he did not establish any family n of his own. It was a very different situation from the City of Shadows where ancient family ns wielded great political powers. Baum did not even have a rtive living with him. His manor house appeared simple and crude, and yet, it carried a solemn atmosphere.

    It was apparent that the divine guards loved and respected their City Lord very much. Although he did not have a family n, he had several divine armies under hismand, allowing him to firmly secure Ethereal City under his rule.

    Han Shuo and Baum decided on the location for the new Celestial Pearl Pharmacy branch shortly after entering the manor house. Baum straightforwardly ceded a shop lot in the most bustling region in Ethereal City and even offered to help Han Shuo with everything else.

    Han Shuo found it somewhat difficult to adapt to Baum¡¯s abrupt change in attitude. After hearing Baum¡¯s ns, Han Shuo asked, ¡°Many thanks for your generosity, City Lord. Erm, I will give you thirty percent of all the profits generated from this branch. Is that alright with you?¡±

    Back then, Bolten, Bowen, and Li Wei traveled thousands of miles to the City of Shadows and asked Han Shuo to set up branches of Celestial Pearl in the Dominions of Death and Destruction where they came from. They proposed the coboration with the intention of getting rich together. From how Han Shuo sees it, Baum must also be having simr thoughts in being so helpful and enthusiastic.

    But out of Han Shuo¡¯s expectation, Baum immediately shook his head when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s generous proposal. He replied, ¡°No, you don¡¯t need to do that. You just need to follow the rules of the Ethereal City and pay ten percent in taxes to the City. Such are the customs of Ethereal City. I, personally, will not have any crystal coins from you.¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment and was rather confused. The shop lot Baum ceded to him was a sizable area in a pricey estate. Baum was even willing to help Han Shuo with recruiting and settle all the miring procedures. Han Shuo basically needed to do nothing but refine medicines. He found it very baffling that Baum did not want any financialpensation for helping him with all those works.

    While Han Shuo stared at him with astonished gazes, Baum exined, ¡°Don¡¯t be surprised. I have told you just then that the Space and Destiny Dominions are unlike any other Dominions. Not only that we allow any person to live here, we administrators are here only to maintain the most basic order in the City. This ce is basically as free as it gets. In normal circumstances, we will not interfere with your business. I just need ten percent of the profits generated by the businesses to maintain the divine guard armies of the City.¡±

    Han Shuo was even more amazed when he realized that Baum was not joking. He also started to like Ethereal City much more. Seeing that Baum had no intention of taking part of his profits, Han Shuo didn¡¯t insist on giving his money away. He put on a faint smile, nodded, and said, ¡°The Ethereal City is truly a wonderful ce. Haha, I¡¯m liking this city already!¡±

    ¡°The presence of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy will benefit the gods of Ethereal City. That is why I¡¯m doing everything I can to help you with opening a branch here!¡± Baum continued, ¡°I will settle everything with your shop within five days. You may write a statement for recruiting shop assistants and pharmacists, I will have the divine guards post the announcement. Ethereal City is filled with all sorts of talents and there is nock of excellent pharmacists. In this city, you can find anything that you want!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s great!¡± Han Shuo was d. He did not expect to receive such treatment from Baum even though they fought. Han Shuo got rather curious about this City Lord that has no family n.

    ¡°If you have no lodging yet, please stay in my manor house. I have many empty rooms and gymnasiums. You may stay here for as long as you like, as long as you do not mind that the ce is rather crude,¡± invited Baum.

    ¡°Well, I shall trouble you then,¡± Han Shuo bluntly and smilingly agreed.

    Han Shuo and Baum did not continue to exchange pleasantries. Baum provided Han Shuo, Rose, and Earth Elite Zombie with a rather quiet, seven-story tall building. The ground floor was a gymnasium and the rest of the building were rooms, living spaces, and somemonly found living facilities.

    Rose, who was a clean freak, immediately went to take a bath. Han Shuo and Earth Elite Zombie, meanwhile, went to a spacious lounge on the third floor. Earth Elite Zombie started narrating what he experienced in the past fifty years, including his encounter with Ver¨®n.

    Fifty years ago, after leaving Han Shuo, Earth Elite Zombie headed straight for the Earth Dominion. As the Earth Dominion had the most cultivators of the energy of earth on Elysium, it was the most abundant with knowledge and divine weapons of that energy. After arriving in the Earth Dominion, Earth Elite Zombie began attempting tomunicate and interact with people.

    It was after he left Han Shuo and tried to survive in this world that Earth Elite Zombie realized just how wonderful, treacherous, andplicated the world really was. He came into contact with all sorts of characters.

    With that, Earth Elite Zombie started to grow up rapidly. He had met a fair share of kind-hearted people, devious people, and all those in between.

    In those few decades, Earth Elite Zombie experienced many friendships and betrayals. He had found himself in dire straits multiple times but in the end, he would always manage to survive by using his capability and understanding of the earth energy. Through this process, Earth Elite Zombie rapidly increased in strength.

    Earth Elite Zombie was born from the ce of Extreme Earth and made of the yuan energy of earth. Because of that, he can grasp and understand profound concepts about the energy of earth faster and better than anyone. Having repeatedly faced and defused life-threatening situations, Earth Elite Zombie repeatedly made breakthroughs and rose in strength at an astonishing rate, attaining mid-stage midgodhood in the short time of a few decades.

    Earth Elite Zombie quickly became a famous character in the Earth Dominion for his ability to freely and stealthily roam underground. After that, he went through a series of ordeals and incidents, offending several young broods ofrge family ns in Akaji City. Having grown bolder and more audacious than ever, by using the special talent he had, Earth Elite Zombie recklessly murdered those younglings.

    His deeds were exposed in no time. The big-wigs of Akaji City who lost their sons were infuriated and they sent men to hunt Earth Elite Zombie all around the City. Earth Elite Zombie calcted that it was near the time of his appointment with Han Shuo and so he started traveling towards Ethereal City. During his journey, he asionally surfaced from underground and was spotted by people. Therefore, Ver¨®n managed to pursue him all the way to Ethereal City.

    In those short few decades, Earth Elite Zombie experienced and encountered an untold number of trials and tribtions, enabling him to grow up rapidly. No matter in terms of intelligence or social skills, Earth Elite Zombie had be much more mature than before. After hearing a detailed recount of his experience, Han Shuo realized that Earth Elite Zombie had truly turned into a high-intelligence lifeform. He was no longer that unsophisticated and naive zombie that only knows to carry out his order like a robot.

    ¡°I did not expect that you would experience and learn so much after leaving me. It seems that your decision back then was the right choice,¡±mented Han Shuo.

    Back then, the Elite Zombies and Little Skeleton were all fully reliant on him and only does things as hemanded. The lifeforms they met in the Netherworld were all of low-intelligence and therefore their growth was slow. But after arriving on Elysium, all those they met were sinister, scheming, and powerful characters. In such an environment, they could either grow or die.

    ¡°Yes, this world is wonderful and much more interesting than the Netherworld. Everyone here is strong and mighty. Some were even crafty. It is only natural that I would grow after living with these people. Hehe, Father, you seem to have be much stronger than before. So much so that you manage to tame that woman!¡± said Earth Elite Zombie smilingly in his eternally naive and innocent look.

    ¡°You and your brothers are all growing strong. I mustn¡¯t stop improving either. Otherwise, someday in the future, I might be a burden to you little fes!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s heart was at peace and he felt contented. Talking to Earth Elite Zombie was like talking to an old friend. It made Han Shuo felt veryfortable.

    The two chatted and chatted about the past without realizing how quickly time was passing. Midnight came without them knowing.

    It was at this time that Rose had finally done bathing. She had changed to a dark purple robe. Her long, silvery-white hair, still slightly damp, was uncovered and fully revealed while a faint fragrance emanated from her body. After casually sitting down beside Han Shuo, she softly reminded, ¡°You have promised that soul in the Holy Grail to talk to him after arriving in Ethereal City.¡±

    Han Shuo raised his eyebrows and opened his eyes wide,ughed, and replied, ¡°Thanks, luckily you reminded me of it. Otherwise, it¡¯s gonna take me a while before I would remember him,¡± Han Shuo had been worrying about the safety of his Elite Zombies and started searching for them as soon as he entered the City. After finding Earth Elite Zombie, killing Ver¨®n and fighting Baum, Han Shuo almost forgot about McKinley.

    Han Shuo took out the Holy Grail and startedmunicating with McKinley¡¯s divine soul, ¡°I have arrived at Ethereal City. What can I do for you next?¡±

    ¡°Here... I¡¯m finally here... ¡°McKinley was very excited. After taking a while to calm down, he said to Han Shuo, ¡°Look for a person called Baum. If he is still in Ethereal City, it shouldn¡¯t be hard for you to find him. He was my best friend long ago. He should also be atte-stage highgod realm.¡±

    ¡°Baum?¡± Han Shuo immediately replied, ¡°Haha, so the person turns out to be City Lord of Ethereal City. Haha, what a coincidence, I¡¯m inside Baum¡¯s manor house right now!¡±

    ¡°What?! He became the City Lord?!¡± McKinley was very astonished.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. The current City Lord of Ethereal City is Baum. He possessedte-stage highgod strength and cultivates in the edict of space. That¡¯s the guy, right?¡±

    ¡°Yes, fuck yes he is. It definitely is him! That god-damned son of a bitch, it must be him who betrayed me! That¡¯s how he takes that seat! The City Lord of Ethereal City should have been me!¡± out of Han Shuo¡¯s expectation, McKinley¡¯s divine soul turned furious after hearing the news.

 Chapter 815 - Stirling up troubles

    GDK 815: Stirling up troubles

    Han Shuo learned of the full story from McKinley.

    Back then, the City Lord of Ethereal City was someone else. After reaching a certain realm, cultivators of the edict of space need to constantly wander all around the universe to sense the energy of space. The City Lord of Ethereal City at that time also possessedte-stage highgod strength. As to pursue greater strength, he had no choice but to leave Elysium and travel to various material nes to increase his divine energy.

    But before he left the Ethereal City, he must elect his sessor. McKinley and Baum were one of those candidates. But of all the candidates, McKinley was the closest to the original City Lord and therefore, he had the highest chance of bing the next City Lord of Ethereal City.

    However, it was at that time that McKinley became enemies with one of the three Keepers of the Light, Gy¨¢l. McKinley had no choice but to hide for some time. He told Baum, his former best friend, where he was hiding. And somehow, soon after he went into hiding, Gy¨¢l managed to find him.

    Although Gy¨¢l¡¯s strength was greater than McKinley¡¯s, as a cultivator of the edict of space, McKinley should have been able to tear apart spacetime and easily escape in one piece. However, while escaping, the spacetime tunnel McKinley constructed was destroyed. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t had been captured by Gy¨¢l and had his divine soul separated from his divine body.

    The person who had destroyed his spacetime tunnel must have also cultivated in the edict of space and possessed simr strengths. As McKinley had told just one person where he was hiding, it didn¡¯t take McKinley much thinking to figure out who had betrayed him.

    It was only with him gone that Baum could be the new City Lord of Ethereal City!

    ¡°Then why are you still looking for him?¡± Han Shuo was puzzled after hearing the whole story from McKinley.

    ¡°I have no way of finding my body without him! Back then it was him who sold me out, so he must know where Gy¨¢l is hiding my body. I don¡¯t have much of a choice, you see,¡± replied McKinley.

    ¡°If Baum finds out that you are in this Grail, he definitely will destroy your soul to prevent any potential troubles. Aren¡¯t you killing yourself by looking for him?¡± asked the confused Han Shuo.

    ¡°Baum wouldn¡¯t dare kill me because there is a divine brand bestowed by the Overgod in my soul. If my soul is destroyed, the Overgod of Space will sense it, even from the edge of the universe. Then, with His ability to reverse time, he will be able to find out my murderer. I have been a tireless and faithful servant of the Lord and His Lordship will investigate my death. This is why Gy¨¢l had only sealed me in here instead of killing me!¡± with things having developed to this stage, McKinley did not conceal any more facts but truthfully exined everything to Han Shuo.

    ¡°The only reason that I couldn¡¯t make up my mind is that I¡¯m afraid Baum will seal the Grail shut and send me to a distant low-level material ne again,¡± continued McKinley.

    Han Shuo was somewhat astonished by McKinley¡¯s words. He did not expect that McKinley¡¯s soul would have a brand left by the Overgod of Space. It appeared that back then, McKinley must had been a trusted aide of the Overgod.

    After having lived on Elysium for so long, Han Shuo naturally caught some hearsays about the Overgods. After leaving a brand in their follower¡¯s soul, an Overgod could sense the position of their follower through some unique methods. They could also perceive the death of said follower. The Overgod of Space, being the lord of the Space Quintessence, should have even greater sensing power in this aspect.

    Han Shuo also knew that only the most pious followers and those most highly regarded by their Overgods could receive a divine brand because the brand was a part of the Overgod. Applying a brand would also consume some of the Overgod¡¯s divine energy. Those bestowed with a divine brand from their Overgod would make faster progress in their cultivationpared to an average person.

    <i>So McKinley was a real influential character in the Space Dominion!</i> thought the rather surprised Han Shuo. After thinking for a while, Han Shuo replied, ¡°If I¡¯m Baum, I definitely won¡¯t help you find your body and make myself a huge trouble. But what are you nning exactly?¡±

    ¡°I have thought of some conditions. I¡¯m going to make him an offer that is hopefully too tempting for him to refuse,¡± McKinley was angry but helpless. He continued, ¡°I don¡¯t have full confidence in the n either. But given the circumstances, I really have no better option but to try. I had enough of living in this Grail. I can¡¯t stand being trapped in here any longer.¡±

    ¡°I think you better stay in the Grail just for a little longer. I will figure out something for you. After all, I will be around Ethereal City and staying with Baum for a while. I mighte out a way to make Baum talk,¡± Han Shuo replied to McKinley after he spent some time thinking with his brows bunched.

    ¡°You? What could you possibly do about it?¡± transmitted McKinley before he went silent for a moment. Then, as though he recalled something, he asked, ¡°Right, how did you end up in Baum¡¯s manor house? How did you know him? Logically speaking, you shouldn¡¯t havee into contact with a character at the level of Baum, right?¡±

    Han Shuo smirked and replied, ¡°I had a fight with Baum and after that, he made me his honored guest.¡±

    ¡°You... You what?¡± the transmission from McKinley was disjointed, a telltale sign that he was very astonished. After taking a while to calm himself down, McKinley hastily asked, ¡°How could you possibly fight Baum with what strength you have? Bryan, you are joking with me, aren¡¯t you?¡±

    It was not surprising that McKinley would be so astounded. Back then, when they first met on the Profound Continent, McKinley had indirectly fought with Han Shuo and knew his strength. As a cultivator of the edict of space, McKinley remained sensitive to the passing of time even when he was trapped in the Holy Grail. He knew that not even a century had passed since their first encounter.

    A hundred years may be a long time for an average human being. But for highgods like McKinley who was almost ageless, it wasn¡¯t all that long. In all his life, McKinley had never heard of any being who had ascended from lowgodhood to highgodhood in less than a hundred years. To him, such a rate of progress was simply unimaginable!

    ¡°I really fought Baum. The results... erm... you can say that we are evenly matched,¡± hearing that the messageing from McKinley was fragmented, Han Shuo dared not drop any more bombshells and therefore did not mention that Baum had initiated peace talking out of fear.

    After keeping silent for a long long while, McKinley again asked, ¡°Bryan, are you really not joking?¡±

    ¡°Not joking at all.¡± Han Shuo then started giving McKinley a simplified depiction of his fight against Baum. He made sure to mention the unique features of Baum¡¯s space edict shields and barriers.

    And again, McKinley stayed silent for a long while. When he was transmitting again, his tone turned much more excited, ¡°I believe you. If you have not fought Baum, there is no way you could describe his spacetime barriers so urately. But how? How did you turn so strong? Gosh, this is unbelievable!¡±

    After talking incoherently for a while, McKinley said, ¡°Bryan, it seems that my greatest chance of regaining freedom is through you. Please, if you can locate my body, you will have my eternal gratitude!¡±

    ¡°Alright, I will try. But for now, you should just stay in the Grail with your mind at ease!¡± Han Shuo knew that McKinley needed time to calm down from the bombshell he just dropped and so he took the initiative to cut offmunication.

    Although Han Shuo learned of the conflict between McKinley and Baum, it doesn¡¯t affect the current cooperation he had with Baum. Han Shuo was a man who knows when to take freebies and when not to. At the same time, Han Shuo started weighing the risk of locating McKinley¡¯s body and helping him overthrow Baum, against the potential rewards.

    With one thought, a high-level demon general flew out from his body. Han Shuo decided to keep Baum under his surveince for some time before doing anything. Han Shuo had be vignt of Baum after hearing McKinley¡¯s story and thought of Baum to be a treacherous wolf in sheep¡¯s clothing. He also started suspecting that Baum must be having some other intentions behind helping him establish his business in this city and offering him such great treatment.

    ***

    Five days went by like the blink of an eye. The demon general that had been constantly surveilling Baum from a safe distance did not discover any unusual activity. For all five days, Baum had been busy helping Han Shuo with his new Celestial Pearl branch. Not only that he had ordered men to clean the shop thoroughly, he published an announcement stating that Celestial Pearl Pharmacy will set up a branch in Ethereal City and that those who were interested to work as shop assistants and pharmacists may look for Han Shuo at the City Lord¡¯s manor house.

    Although it appeared as though Baum was sincerely helping Han Shuo, Han Shuo remained wary of Baum. In fact, the more helpful and charitable Baum was, the more that Han Shuo felt something was fishy. He made sure that Baum was always under the surveince of his demon general.

    The spirit demon made using highgod soul was extraordinary in their stealth capabilities. Having had a spar with Baum, Han Shuo knew just how formidable his strength was. The demon general would always be at a safe distance of more than several hundred meters away. And when Baum steps into regions with space edict boundaries, the demon general would stay even further away, lest Baum discover it.

    Ethereal City was indeed filled with talents. Soon after Baum sent out the announcement, arge crowd showed up at the City Lord¡¯s manor house. It surprised Han Shuo just how many people turned up and that many of them were true masters of their field.

    Han Shuo personally selected the workers for his new branch and he interviewed them in the manor house. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness and observation skills were so mighty and outstanding that average lowgods and midgods cannot lie to him. He could immediately tell if someone was lying just by sensing their mind with his consciousness. Only those with no ulterior motives and has real talent could get through the interview.

    One day, while Han Shuo was in the middle of one of those interviews, an Ethereal City divine guard hastily went to Han Shuo and said, ¡°Mister Bryan, someone who imed to be your son is having a serious quarrel in the west of the city. He called himself Han Huo. Would you like to go there and have a look?¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before he immediately came to his senses. Heughed and replied, ¡°What¡¯s the matter with these kids, just can¡¯t stop stirling up troubles wherever they go! Alright, I¡¯ll go take a look!¡±

 Chapter 816 - GDK 816: Scam?

    <strong>GDK 816: Scam?</strong>

    Han Shuo rushed to the west of the Ethereal City and he found Fire Elite Zombie, or Han Huo. As soon as Han Shuo saw him, he could tell that Han Huo¡¯s intelligence and strength had also advanced to a whole new level.

    After entering Ethereal City, Han Huo noticed that there were all kinds of shops all around. As he was in no hurry to look for Han Shuo, he started shopping around the city. Han Huo was fighting with the shop assistants of an energy crystal shop because they disagreed on the price of a certain ore.

    Fire Elite Zombie who cultivated in the energy of fire, also possessed miraculous skills in utilizing the energy of fire. The shop did not possess any outstandingly powerful experts. Five or six shop assistants ganged up on Han Huo but in the end, they were still beaten ck and blue. If the Ethereal City divine guards had not shown up in time, Han Huo might have burned down the shop.

    The Ethereal City divine guards then learned of Han Huo¡¯s identity and that he was also Han Shuo¡¯s son. After discovering that fact, the divine guards dared not do anything to Han Huo, lest they risk making Han Shuo unhappy. They frantically sent a runner to the City Lord¡¯s manor house to inform Han Shuo of the incident while struggling to keep both sides calm.

    All those divine guards had heard rumors about Han Shuo. And from their City Lord¡¯s attitude towards Han Shuo, they could tell that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t a character they could risk offending. On top of that, Han Shuo was known to be a genius pharmacist and his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy will soon be open for business in Ethereal City. If they wished to purchase Han Shuo¡¯s highly sought after medicines, they must try to maintain at least a neutral rtionship with Han Shuo. Therefore, the divine guards dared not do anything that might offend Han Shuo.

    When Han Shuo and Han Tu arrived outside the shop, they discovered that its front entrance had been smoked. Han Huo and the shop assistants were ring at each other right outside the shop.

    ¡°Father! Little Earth!¡± Han Huo immediately cheered when the father and son showed up. He excitedly went to have a hug with Han Tu before looking at Han Shuo cheerfully.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡± Han Shuo was very happy to meet Fire Elite Zombie again. However, he noticed that the Ethereal City divine guards were wearing troubled faces and the shop assistants were wearing angry faces. He knew he should try to figure out the whole situation before taking sides.

    ¡°Erm... Mister Bryan, your son is shoplifting... ¡° the chief divine guard at the scene reported to Han Shuo awkwardly.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before he turned to Han Huo, raised an eyebrow, and asked, ¡°Is that true?¡±

    ¡°They are talking nonsense. They are asking me fifty ck crystal coins just for a piece of Firespark Stone! Back then, Little Gold told me that a Firespark Stone is nothing valuable and he can find as many as he wanted. I have been very generous to pay them five ck crystal coins for that cheap stone!¡± said Han Huo. He even pointed at the shop assistants and angrily said, ¡°You bunch of bastards, how dare you try to scam me in broad daylight! Don¡¯t think that I can¡¯t wreck your scam shop!¡±

    ¡°You despicable bully! I will kill you, you colossal scumbag!¡± shouted one of the female shop assistants with an elegant appearance. Her face was flushed red and her body was trembling in anger.

    The other shop assistants were also enraged by his words. If it wasn¡¯t for the Ethereal City divine guards, they might have charged forward and try to beat up Han Huo again.

    ¡°If you don¡¯t have enough crystal coins, then don¡¯t buy it! No one is forcing you to buy the rock. Trying to leave with the item after paying just five ck crystal coins is daylight robbery! How dare you try to make excuses to justify your outrageous act!¡± scouted the female shop assistant furiously while baring her teeth.

    ¡°Crazy woman, if you can open a scam shop, then why can¡¯t I buy from you?¡± Han Huo put on a disdainful face and said with contempt, ¡°And you better stop shouting, or I¡¯ll burn you to death!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll kill you!!¡± shrieked the female shop assistant. She struggled free from an Ethereal City divine guard and charged at Han Huo.

    ¡°Please behave yourself!¡± shouted the divine guard in charge as he hastily formed a barrier of wind energy to block the female shop assistant from approaching. He then turned to Han Shuo in a wry smile and exined, ¡°No matter anywhere on Elysium, Firespark Stone will never cost less than forty-five ck crystal coins. The price set by this shop is reasonable. Please understand, Mister Bryan.¡±

    ¡°Little Gold had told me that it¡¯s not valuable! So don¡¯t try to lie to me!¡± Han Huo shot a re at the divine guard, rolled his eyes, and said, ¡°You must be siding with them because they bribed you, isn¡¯t it?¡±

    ¡°Stupid, Little Gold never needed to spend much effort in finding precious rocks. You are such a fool to take his words at face value!¡± said Han Tu as heughed.

    Metal Elite Zombie possessed extraordinary power in sensing metal ores and minerals. He could find rare and precious rocks with ease. Those ores might be worthless to Metal Elite Zombie, but to ordinary beings, they could be great treasures.

    ¡°Ohh.... ¡° Han Huo immediately came to his senses after hearing Han Tu¡¯s words. He patted his head and softly cried, ¡°So that means I¡¯ve got it wrong?¡±

    ¡°Erm, woman, here, I¡¯m giving the stupid stone back to you. Now go away. Don¡¯t bother me anymore!¡± A piece of Firespark Stone was thrown and itnded right before the female shop assistant¡¯s feet. The Firespark Stone that should be shimmering with red light, for some reason, was dull and dark. It looked grey-white like any other ordinary stone and seemed to be nothing special.

    ¡°This is not a Firespark Stone! Who are you trying to fool?!¡± shouted the shop assistants furiously after they looked at the stone. They red at Han Huo with even angrier eyes as though they had been insulted. Even a blind could see that the stone Han Huo returned waspletely different than the one he took.

    ¡°It is a Firespark Stone, it¡¯s just that its energy has been drained!¡± an old man who looked all skin and bones abruptly came out from the shop. He went to pick up that ordinary-looking rock before looking at Han Huo in an amazed face. He curiously asked, ¡°How did you do that? Even an alchemist master needed magical matrixes to extract the energy within a Firespark Stone, and they had to spend at least a few days. You have held the stone for not even ten minutes, and yet, you managed to extract all the energy in it. How is that possible?¡±

    ¡°Grandpa Myles!¡± All the shop assistants were surprised by the abrupt appearance of that old man. They all became respectful in attitude. Even that shop assistant who threatened to kill Han Huo turned calm.

    Myles gestured with his hand, asking the shop assistants to be silent. His gazes never moved from Han Huo, as though he was keen to obtain an exnation from him.

    ¡°It¡¯s just a piece of Firespark Stone. Extracting the fire energy within is too simple. It¡¯s nothing to write home about!¡± replied Han Huo in a disdainful face as though he was disinclined to talk to the old man.

    After a moment of observation, Han Shuo discovered that Myles, although senile in appearance, actually possessed highgod strength. However, Han Shuo could not determine which of the Twelve Fundamental Forces he cultivated.

    ¡°I will give you another Firespark Store, free of charge. Can you do it again for me?¡± Myles put on a faint smile, took out an even bigger Firespark Stone from his space ring and handed it to Han Huo.

    ¡°You are a pretty interesting guy, old man. Hehe, watch carefully,¡± Han Huo held the Firespark stone glowing red in his palm. Under the gazes of the crowd, the Firespark Stone slowly turned dimmer. In less than one minute, the Firespark Stone stopped glowingpletely and turned into a dull and ordinary looking gray-white rock.

    ¡°This is miraculous!¡± cried Myles under his breath. He looked at Han Huo in disbelief as he said, ¡°That¡¯s unbelievable! I know many cultivators of the fire element, but I have never known anyone who could extract the energy from a Firespark Stone, much less so rapidly!¡±

    Firespark Stones could be considered as an energy crystal and it was very different from fire divine essences. An average cultivator of the element of fire could never extract the fire energy in a Firespark Stone. Not just Myles, but even the shop assistants and the Ethereal City divine guards were greatly astonished by the ability Han Huo demonstrated.

    An average cultivator of the fire energy might not be able to do it, but Han Huo was not an average cultivator. His body was forged using the yuan energy of fire in the ce of Extreme Fire. To him, absorbing the fire energy in a Firespark Stone was as easy as pie.

    ¡°Speechless now aren¡¯t you?¡± said Han Huocently. With his head raised high, he smugly said, ¡°Is there anything else? If not, ciao,¡±

    ¡°You brat, where did you learn to be so cocky?¡± Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but smilingly rebuked when he saw Han Huo being so arrogant.

    ¡°Hehe, nowhere, father. We have not seen each other for a long time. Let¡¯s not waste time with them. Let¡¯s leave this scam shop and celebrate our reunion!¡± Han Huo immediately cowered.

    Han Shuo tossed out a sack of ck crystal coins and itnded right at the front of the shop. In a faint smile, he said, ¡°That is one thousand ck crystal coins. Consider itpensation for your shop¡¯s losses. Please don¡¯t take any offense!¡±

    ¡°Whaa.... wait!!¡± Out of Han Shuo¡¯s expectation, Han Tu and Han Huo simultaneously started to scream. And before Han Shuo could react, the two had darted to the front of the shop and picked up the sack of ck crystal coins Han Shuo tossed. While holding the bag tightly, Han Tu took out one hundred ck crystal coins from the bag, ced it on the ground, and said, ¡°My father must have taken out the wrong bag. One hundred ck crystal coins are more than enough topensate for your shop¡¯s losses!¡±

    At those at the scene clearly heard Han Shuo said ¡®one thousand ck crystal coins¡¯. Han Tu tried to retract his father¡¯s words shamelessly.

    Han Huo frantically nodded and said, ¡°Yes! It¡¯s enough! It¡¯s more than enough! We have been very magnanimous to give your scam shop a hundred ck crystal coins! Don¡¯t ask for more!¡±

    ¡°Erm... ¡° The divine guard in charge put on a grimace and was speechless.

    Han Shuo felt very embarrassed. He did not expect these two kids to be so stingy.

    ¡°Father, how could you be so wasteful! ck crystal coins are good stuff. With enough of them, there¡¯s nothing that you can¡¯t buy! How could you squander them like that!¡± Han Huo sighed andmented, ¡°If I have enough ck crystal coins, I wouldn¡¯t have wasted so much time with these people. How could you toss out one thousand ck crystal coins just like that!¡±

    ¡°You bunch of bums!¡± Han Shuo was betweenughter and tears after seeing Han Tu and Han Huo being so mean over money matters. Several thousand ck crystal coins were next to nothing to him. It appeared that although these two kids of his had made tremendous progress in strength and intelligence, they still weren¡¯t good at making money.

 Chapter 817 - Goldstone Energy Crystal Trading Enterprise

    <strong>GDK 817: Goldstone Energy Crystal Trading Enterprise</strong>

    ¡°Father, you may not know it, but during all these years, the thing Icked most are ck crystal coins! It was after leaving you that I discovered that doing anything in this world takes ck crystal coins... ¡° said Han Huo as though he was grieving. He kept on grumbling about being limited by the number of crystal coins he had.

    Han Tu nodded in agreement as Han Huo spoke. He was hugging the sack of ck crystal coins tightly as though afraid that someone might snatch it from him.

    ¡°That... erm... ¡° Myles had a wry smile. He did not understand how a father as rich as Han Shuo could have two ridiculously stingy kids. He opened his mouth but no words came out for he did not know what to say. He was confused and curious about the three¡¯s rtionship.

    Han Shuo fiercely red at Han Tu and Han Huo and said in an annoyed voice, ¡°What a disgrace! It¡¯s just crystal coins. In the future, I will give you any amount you want!¡± Han Shuo then turned Myles, put on a smile, and said in embarrassingly, ¡°My apologies. My two sons are still a bit wet behind the ears.¡±

    Han Tu and Han Huo suddenly turned to look at each other and exchanged nces. Their eyes were filled with lights of excitement. They then simultaneously turned to look at Han Shuo in foolish smiles and asked, ¡°Father, you have gotten rich? Haha, wonderful, wonderful!¡±

    ¡°I was never poor!¡± Han Shuo let out a groan and said, ¡°Let¡¯s leave. You brats have brought enough shame on me already. I will give you any amount of crystal coins you wantter!¡±

    ¡°Yay! Fantastic!¡± cheered Han Huo. He then turned to Myles in a disdainful face and proudly said, ¡°Old man, you hear that? My father has plenty of crystal coins. Next time, don¡¯t act like a snob!¡±

    ¡°I did not... ¡° replied Myles as he forced a smile. He thought, <i>It was you who tried to take my item like a robber. When did it be me who is in the wrong?</i>

    ¡°Young master Han Huo, Young master Han Tu, I beg you, please, for our sake, please don¡¯t be so reckless around the City,¡± pleaded the most senior Ethereal City divine guard on the scene. He was afraid that the two might cause even more and even bigger troubles around Ethereal City soon.

    ¡°Not your goddamn business!¡± replied Han Huo. He offhandedly said, ¡°I know you are a gang with them! Don¡¯t think I can¡¯t see that!¡±

    ¡°You, you... ¡° the divine guard was absolutely speechless. He didn¡¯t know what to do so he turned to look helplessly at Han Shuo.

    But before Han Shuo could speak, the old man called Myles suddenly jolted as though he recalled something. He looked at Earth and Fire Elite Zombies in astonishment and asked, ¡°You, you two, what are you called again?¡±

    ¡°My name is Han Huo. Is there any problem?¡± Fire Elite Zombie turned fierce again. He said, ¡°Old man, you should know to appreciate our kindness. We have given you one hundred ck crystal coins. What more do you want? You better not make me angry, or I¡¯ll burn down your shop!¡±

    Myles suddenly burst intoughter and seemed rather happy. He looked at Han Huo in an amused manner. And as though he was not afraid of him at all, he replied, ¡°Go ahead. But if you burn down the shop, someone is gonna get you!¡±

    ¡°Old man, you are asking for trouble!¡± Han Huo then turned to Han Shuo, pointed at Myles, and said, ¡°Father, you heard him. He is insisting on messing with us!¡±

    ¡°Hahaha, if you burn down the shop, you are shooting yourself in your foot! By then, when my shop owneres for you, I doubt you¡¯ll darein even if he whacks you!¡± said Myles. He didn¡¯t seem to be afraid at all.

    ¡°Grandpa Myles, are you alright?¡± the shop assistants were astonished. They felt that Myles had been behaving rather abnormally.

    Han Huo seemed to have been infuriated by Myles¡¯ words and he imed in a fearless face, ¡°Who is that person? Other than my father, whoever tries to beat me, I will pay it back to the person by ten folds!¡±

    Myles ignored the astonished shop assistants. Under the wrathful eyes of Han Huo, Myles pointed at the signboard as he smilingly said, ¡°I¡¯m not the owner of this shop. I¡¯m only managing the shop on behalf of the actual owner. Look, do you see what¡¯s the name of this shop?¡±

    ¡°Goldstone. So what with it?¡± groaned Han Huo.

    ¡°Goldstone Energy Crystal Trading, they have branches not just in Ethereal City, but also in the Destiny, Fire, Life, Wind, Earth, and Lightning Dominions. It is an enormous energy crystal enterprise!¡± exined the Ethereal City divine guard who had just been insulted by Han Huo.

    ¡°Then? So what?¡± Han Huo was fearless. He did not turn to look at that divine guard but had his eyes fixed on Myles.

    ¡°Nothing much! Haha, but my master¡¯s name also carried the word ¡®Han¡¯!¡± Myles still wore a big smile on his face. His gazes suddenly turned to Han Shuo as though he was even more curious about him.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyebrows rose in surprise. He quickly asked, ¡°What is his name?¡±

    ¡°My master¡¯s name is Han Jin!¡± replied Myles before he startedughing heartily. Then, after taking a short pause, Myles curbed his smile and asked in a low voice, ¡°Only a few in this world have this name. But I¡¯m sure you are familiar with this person, right?¡±

    Han Huo and Han Tu turned to look at each other in great astonishment. After a long while, Han Huo suddenly shouted, ¡°Little Gold! Turns out to be him!¡±

    The hostility instantly vanished from Han Huo. He even went forward to pat on Myles¡¯ shoulder in a friendly manner and said in a big smile, ¡°I have been wondering why I find you so pleasing to the eye. So it turns out that we are all on the same side!¡±

    ¡°Haha... ¡° Myles forced a smile as he thought, <i>Huh? Since when did you find me pleasing? I thought you wanted to burn down the shop just a moment ago?</i>

    ¡°Damn... Little Gold is indeed doing real well, so much so that he has his own shop. Huhu, if I knew that he is the master of Goldstone, I would have asked him for some crystal coins!¡±mented Han Tu with his palm on his head. There were branches of Goldstone Energy Crystal Trading Enterprise in the Earth Dominion but Han Tu had never imagined that his brother, Metal Elite Zombie, was the shop owner.

    ¡°My master has instructed that those whose name starts with the name ¡®Han¡¯, specifically Han Shuo, Han Tu, Han Mu, Han Huo, Han Shui, and Han Hao, may take anything they want from the shop, free of charge, and we are to give them any amount of crystal coins they want!¡± exined Myles smilingly before he invited them, ¡°Shall we head inside and have a chat?¡±

    Han Shuo was also shocked by the news. He did not expect that the owner of this shop would be Metal Elite Zombie. And from the words of that divine guard, Goldstone had been very prosperous, with many branches established in numerous Divine Dominions. It appeared that Han Jin had been much more financially sessful than his brothers.

    But after spending a moment thinking about it, Han Shuo felt that it was only reasonable for Han Jin to get filthy rich. Given his extraordinary sensitivity towards ores, as long as he spent some time on it, he will surely find ore deposits of any kind. An average being needed to excavate for years or even decades before they could locate the ore veins in arge mountain or creek. Han Jin, however, could tell what ores were located in the region and point to the exact spots of those ore deposits just by walking around the area.

    With this wonderful ability, Metal Elite Zombie could find and extract rare energy crystals at a lower cost and in less time, allowing him to sell them at apetitive price without cutting on his profit margins. Blessed with this advantage, it would be a wonder if his business doesn¡¯t get huge and prosperous!

    Han Shuo was very proud of what he had achieved with the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy in the City of Shadows. However, the Celestial Pearl paled inparison to Metal Elite Zombie¡¯s Goldstone Energy Crystal Trading enterprise located in various divine dominions. Han Shuo felt that his son had outshined him.

    ¡°Yes, let¡¯s have a chat!¡± replied Han Shuo as he nodded and smiled. They then walked into the Goldstone shop.

    ***

    Simultaneously, in a thin jungle outside Ethereal City, a battle was happening...

    A group of sinister gods brimming with the aura of death were assaulting a small family n. It was clear from their looks that they were godhunters cultivating in the energy of death. All of them were fierce and formidable looking. They were well-coordinated and worked wonderfully as a team. It seemed as though they knew a certain fighting formation.

    Members of the small family n traveling to Ethereal City were being ughtered one after another with every valuable item they carried looted. Those who cultivated in the energy of death had their divine energy slowly sucked dry.

    ¡°Many times before your family n had tried to annihte us. Didn¡¯t expect yourself to have such an ending, did ya?¡± a one-eyed godhunter whose face was filled with scars remarked grimly while staring coldly at thest remaining survivor withte-stage midgod strength.

    ¡°I did not expect any of you to grow this strong. But that doesn¡¯t matter, for sooner orter, all of you will die to my patriarch! He will hunt down each and every one of you!¡± The midgod was a tough character and felt no fear even in the face of death. He suddenly cried, ¡°Let¡¯s rot in Hell!¡± He was prepared to severely injure or kill the godhunters with his death!

    A three-meter long bone spear abruptly streaked across the sky. It sucked away all the elements of death in the space it passed. And before that midgod could self-destruct himself, the bone spear had pinned on him. He died instantly!

    Thiste-stage midgod had shown no capacity to resist or even react to the bone spear that came out of nowhere. Evidently, the attacker¡¯s strength was way above his!

    A teenager wearing a calm face walked into the scene unhurriedly. His gaze was chilling, sinister, nefarious. He had seven long and white bone spears attached to his back. His body overflowed with a mightily intimidating austere aura. Upon arrival, he held out a hand and moved his fingers. The three-meter long bone spear immediately flew back into his spotlessly white palm.

    The brows of the teenager slightly wrinkled before he said in a deep voice, ¡°Next time, cut the crap and just kill.¡±

    All the godhunters in the area respectfully bowed when the teenager appeared. The one-eyed godhunter whose face was filled with scars looked at the teenager with revering eyes before he lowered his head and said, ¡°Yes, Chief!¡±

    The teenager nodded andmanded, ¡°Stay around this region. You may carry out attacks on your own. I need to make a trip to Ethereal City. None of you will step into the City without my explicit instruction.¡±

    The one-eyed and scar-faced godhunter stared nkly for a bit before he respectfully asked, ¡°Chief, when will you return?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know. But while I¡¯m away, be more careful with your actions. Do not attack any group that has a highgod.¡± The teenager then straightforwardly left the gang of sinister gods and headed for Ethereal City by himself.

 Chapter 818 - Gifts from Metal Elite Zombie

    <strong>GDK 818: Gifts from Metal Elite Zombie</strong>

    Myles led Han Shuo, Han Tu, and Han Huo into the energy crystal store.

    It was after stepping into the Goldstone branch that Han Shuo realized the scale of the business operation. There were racks after racks of rare and strange ores put on disy. Many of the ores could glow. The shop was brightly lit even though there were only a few magicalmps.

    After instructing the shop assistants to get back to their stations, Myles led Han Shuo and his two kids to a secret warehouse deep inside the shop.

    This decently sized depot was filled with dazzling Firespark Stones and Heavenlyfire Stones, mud-yellow Rentocite and Terratomite, and translucent Watersoul Stones and Aquacrystal. Every ore and item inside were extremely precious and especially useful for Earth, Fire, Water, and Wood Elite Zombies.

    ¡°Over the past ten years, through various channels, my master has been delivering all sorts of unique, precious ores collected by every branch to this shop in Ethereal City. He also assigned me to this branch so that I can keep watch and secure these ores. Haha, Master said that these ores are all prepared for you!¡± exined Myles smilingly to the astonished Han Huo and Han Tu.

    The wide variety of ores stored in the warehouse were very useful for the Elite Zombies. There were also a considerable amount of divine essences. Most of the divine essences belonged to the energy of fire, life, water, earth, and death. It was obvious that Metal Elite Zombie had gathered the items for them.

    The depot was filled with a spectacr amount of valuable ores and crystals. Just the pile of divine essences alone would value at several million ck crystal coins. Other ores and energy crystals located there were also fantastic materials that were no less beneficial for the Elite Zombies.

    ¡°Damn, he¡¯s real awesome!¡± said Han Huo, whose eyes were glistening with greedy lights. He threw himself into a pile of fire energy rocks and started absorbing the fire energy contained within.

    ¡°Little Gold is really generous to have gotten us so much good stuff!¡± said Han Tu in a foolish smile while he grabbed onto a handful of Terratomite and started absorbing the earth energy contained within.

    ¡°It seems that he really has been thoughtful of us all these years,¡± remarked the touched Han Shuo.

    Even without Myles¡¯ exnation, it was obvious to Han Shuo that the reason Metal Elite Zombie had been sending and umting items in this store was so that Han Shuo and the others could have all these wonderful treasures when they meet again there in Ethereal City.

    ¡°Master had instructed that after you have arrived in Ethereal City, we are to follow your orders,¡± said Myles as he bowed at Han Shuo, ¡°However, the name given by Master was Han Shuo. As you were using another name in Ethereal City, we did not know that you had arrived.¡±

    ¡°You know who I am?¡± asked Han Shuo with a brow raised.

    Myles nodded smilingly and replied, ¡°You are the father to my master. Haha, of course I know who you are.¡±

    After hearing those words from Myles, Han Shuo became certain that he was a trusted aide of Metal Elite Zombie. Otherwise, Myles wouldn¡¯t have known so much and he wouldn¡¯t have been trusted with all these treasures.

    ¡°Where is he currently at?¡± asked Han Shuo. He reasoned that if Metal Elite Zombie had arranged all these in this shop, he should know that it was almost time for their scheduled reunion and he should at least be on his way to Ethereal City.

    ¡°Master should be on his way here. He will arrive in Ethereal City soon,¡± replied Myles smilingly. Then, after taking a short pause, Myles somewhat nervously asked, ¡°Do you have any instructions for me? You may take anything and everything in the store. If you need crystal coins, I can get you a few million.¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head smilingly and replied, ¡°Things seem to be doing just fine here and I don¡¯t see the need to make any changes. For the time being, I don¡¯t need you to do anything for me. I¡¯m notcking crystal coins either.¡±

    ¡°Understood,¡± After finding out that Han Shuo was the owner of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, Myles knew that it was very unlikely for Han Shuo to becking crystal coins.

    ¡°Right, I will be taking some of the ores in this shop,¡± said Han Shuo smilingly after he thought for a bit. The Goldstone Shop had more variety of ores than any of their rivals. When walking into the shop, several extremely rare materials most excellent for making weapons had caught his eyes.

    ¡°Go ahead! As I¡¯ve said, you may take anything you see in the shop!¡± replied Myles straightforwardly.

    As everything in the shop belonged to Metal Elite Zombie and Myles was instructed to give Han Shuo anything he wanted, Han Shuo had no qualms about taking the items. He began by taking some ores and divine essences in the secret depot before proceeding to the outer sections of the shop with Myles. There, he took a dozen more odd and bizarre rocks and crystals.

    After Han Shuo was done, they waited for a moment for Han Huo and Han Tu to exit from the secret depot. The two kids appeared very content and delighted. They constantly fondled the space rings they wore on their fingers. They must have kept away all those ores meant for them that were in the secret depot.

    ¡°Alright, we shall leave now. Please tell him about what happened today when he returned,¡± Han Shuo smilingly said goodbye to Myles after Han Huo and Han Tu came out from the shop.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I will make sure to tell Master everything that happened today,¡± Myles bowed as Han Shuo and his kids left.

    ¡°Grandpa Myles, who are they? They have taken many items off our shop but they haven¡¯t paid a single crystal coin. Who in the world are they?¡± asked the female shop assistant who almost fought Han Huo after the father and sons left.

    Not just her, but all other shop assistants of Goldstone were puzzled and wanted an answer. They saw Han Shuo clearing items off the shelves, throwing all sorts of mineral rocks into his space ring straightforwardly. And after that, not only that he did not pay a single piece of crystal coins, he acted as though the shop belonged to him. Even Myles was humble and constantly bowed at him. They could not quite understand what was happening.

    These minor little workers did not know about the existence of Metal Elite Zombie. Only some of the most core members of Goldstone Trading were aware that Metal Elite Zombie was the real owner of the enterprise. Even fewer people knew about Metal Elite Zombie¡¯s rtionship with Han Shuo and others. It was normal that these workers were clueless.

    Myles¡¯ face turned stern. In a deep voice, he said to the shop workers, ¡°I want you all to keep this in mind: Tell no one about what happened today and don¡¯t try to find out what you should not know. Perhaps someday in the future, when you have obtained the trust of the Owner and be a dominion-al manager of Goldstone Enterprise, you will be qualified to learn these secrets.¡±

    Myles scanned the young shop assistants with his eyes once through, lightly groaned, and said, ¡°If I find out any of you leaked this, I won¡¯t go easy on you! Alright. That will be all. Now get back to your work.¡±

    The shop workers jolted and were frightened. They had very rarely seen Myles being so stern towards them and they realized that those three people must be very important characters. They promised to keep quiet about the matter and silently walked back to their stations.

    *** In the City Lord¡¯s manor.

    City Lord Baum was wearing a bewildered expression while listening to the report given by the divine guard who was at Goldstone Trading just then.

    ¡°Did you say that the guy named Han Huo is also his son?¡± asked Baum halfway into the briefing.

    Just like Han Tu in the Earth Dominion, Han Huo was also a pretty famous person in the Fire Dominion, or, rather, infamous. He often got into fights with others over minor quarrels and had offended many in the Fire Dominion. As he possessed supreme mastery in using the energy of fire and wielded the Fire Lotus, the most outstanding weapon of fire attribute, Han Huo was not afraid of challenging experts at a more advanced realm. He was most widely known among the young people in the Fire Dominion.

    Baum was already rather surprised that Han Tu was Han Shuo¡¯s son. He grew even more astonished now he learned that Han Huo of the Fire Dominion was also his son. Baum became more and more curious towards Han Shuo, wondering why he came to Ethereal City and what he was nning.

    The divine guard nodded and respectfully replied, ¡°Moreover, it appeared that the owner of Goldstone Enterprise has a close rtionship with him. Goldstone is one of thergest energy crystal stores in our City. They have branches in almost every Dominion and possessed greater influence than the Celestial Pearl. However, when the manager of the Goldstone branch heard their names, he immediately turned friendly in attitude... ¡°

    ¡°What?!!!¡± Baum was gobsmacked.

    Although Earth and Fire Elite Zombies possessed decent strengths and had some miraculous abilities, they were just two individuals who weren¡¯t even highgods. Baum had deemed them too weak to be reckoned with. But things were very different when ites to Goldstone Enterprise. With shops located in almost every Divine Dominion, Goldstone possessed not just tremendous financial resources but also connections. To learn that the mysterious business owner might have a close rtionship with Han Shuo, Baum felt threatened.

    <i>Was inviting this person to stay in Ethereal City a bad move?</i> pondered the intimidated Baum. After thinking for a moment, he instructed the divine guard, ¡°Pay extra attention to that Goldstone store. Also, try talking to those shop workers. Try to learn what they have discussed inside the shop.¡±

    ¡°My Lord, should I also keep a close watch over Bryan and those few with him?¡± asked the divine guard after bowing in acknowledgment.

    Baum shook his head. He seemed rather grave as he replied, ¡°You should not get close to them. Don¡¯t send anyone to monitor them and just leave them alone. I will handle them.¡±

    ¡°Yes, my Lord!¡± The divine guard immediately dismissed himself and went on to carry out the task Baum assigned him with.

    ¡°Bryan, O, Bryan, what exactly are you up to in Ethereal City?¡± soliloquized Baum with his brows bunched after the divine guard left. He did not know that on the top of a big tree several hundred meters away there was a demon general, observing his every move day and night.

 Chapter 819 - Establishing a presence

    GDK 819: Establishing a presence

    A few more days went by like the blink of an eye. During this time, Han Shuo had recruited a sufficient number of workers and pharmacists for his new shop. Baum had alsopleted the renovation for the new Celestial Pearl branch. Therefore, Han Shuo no longer stayed in the City Lord¡¯s manor house and moved into the new shop.

    After having heard the conversation that Baum had with his divine guard through a demon general, Han Shuo became even more certain that Baum had a hidden agenda and did not help him purely out of generosity. This was consistent with McKinley¡¯s story that Baum was a scheming person. Han Shuo knew he needed to be extra careful when dealing with Baum.

    But after making that discovery, the demon general that had been constantly surveilling Baum no longer discovered any other unusual activities. Baum had been cultivating in his manor house for those dozen or so days. He had only met a few people and did not do anything suspicious.

    Han Shuo had also released several demon generals to roam all around the City Lord¡¯s manor house, trying to find McKinley¡¯s divine body. However, after searching every corner, not only did they find no suspicious items, but they also did not discover any storage room in the manor house. Han Shuo knew that recovering McKinley¡¯s body wouldn¡¯t be a straightforward and easy task.

    Being a cautious man, Han Shuo had also assigned a demon general to follow the divine guard that Baum sent for sounding out the Goldstone¡¯s employees. He noticed that the workers were all tight-lipped, as though they had been warned by Myles. The Ethereal City divine guards had learned nothing useful from them.

    Han Shuo felt that of all his kids, Metal Elite Zombie was the most talented in managing business and human resources. Although he would likely be the weakest in strengthpared to his brothers due to theck of Elysians cultivating in the energy of metal, he had directly benefited Han Shuo the greatest by using his innate ability.

    The Goldstone Enterprise has branches in all Dominions. Han Shuo could learn the situation in any corner of the Elysium by using the connections Goldstone had. Right now, Han Shuo was most longing to meet Metal Elite Zombie again. He wanted to ask him about the Goldstone Enterprise and to hopefully learn management skills from him, which would be greatly beneficial to the future development of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    With Baum doing the promotion, every god in every corner of Ethereal City learned that a Celestial Pearl branch will soon be open for business in the city. Before the pharmacy store was even open for business, many gods had started queuing outside, wanting to buy Han Shuo¡¯s medicines.

    During his journey from the City of Shadows to Ethereal City, Han Shuo had traversed countless mountains and rivers where he had collected enough medicinal ingredients to fill one space ring. He had also refined arge number of pelleted medicines during that time.

    Han Shuo was working on full throttle. Following his instructions, the pharmacists he recruited started producing somemon medicines while the shop workers were making relevant preparations. It did not take long before the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy officially opened for business in Ethereal City.

    On the first day of business, Han Shuo took out a thousand bottles of his miraculous pelleted medicines and put them for sale on a special rack. They were sold out to therge crowd in no time. Han Shuo earned around seventy thousand ck crystal coins by the end of the first day.

    Those who had managed to get their hands on the medicines Han Shuo personally refined felt the promised benefits right after consuming it. Naturally, these gods started promoting the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy for Han Shuo, free of charge. For a period of time, the entire Ethereal City was talking about the miraculousness of the medicines from Celestial Pearl.

    Everything went very smoothly. After the initial sess, Han Shuo took out yet another portion of his medicines for sale. The Celestial Pearl store was crammed as gods from every block and street swarmed to the shop. They would spare no ck crystal coins to get their hands on Han Shuo¡¯s medicines.

    All those who had managed to buy the medicines would conscientiously be a promoter of the pharmacy. The Celestial Pearl Pharmacy and its owner, Han Shuo, rapidly rose to fame in Ethereal City and became well-known to the gods living in the city.

    While the shop was open for business, there were a few uncultured cunts who cut queues and forced their way into the shop to buy Han Shuo¡¯s wonderful medicine. When that happened, Han Shuo would give Rose a meaningful nce and she would immediately kick their asses off the shop. There were also some who tried sneaking into the pharmacy at night. Han Shuo and Rose would kill all those intruders on the spot with no warning. Those certain forces came to recognize that Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was not merely a simple pharmacy chain when all those experts they sent in never returned.

    After all those who intruded the Celestial Pearl failed to return time and time again, there was no longer any powerhouse who dared take their strength lightly. Everyone stopped trying to get the medicine through illegal means. Then, when the business got into a stable orbit, Han Shuo announced that he will only sell his special medicines once every few years, just as he did back in the City of Shadows. Although everyone was saddened by that announcement, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy had sessfully made a name for itself. Even without Han Shuo¡¯s personally refined medicines, its business will be doing much better than other pharmacies in the city.

    Time flies. More than half-a-month passed in the blink of an eye. The Celestial Pearl Pharmacy had slowly rooted itself in Ethereal City. However, Han Shuo was feeling rather worried as Little Skeleton, Wood, Water, and Metal Elite Zombies had yet to appear. Han Shuo had even gone to the Goldstone store twice to ask about Han Jin. But the only answer he got from Myles was that Metal Elite Zombie was temporarily out of contact and he should be on the way.

    Han Shuo looked at the calendar and saw that there was just half-a-year left before their agreed meeting date, which wasn¡¯t all that long. Han Shuo started to get somewhat anxious, worried that they might have run into trouble.

    It was at this time that Han Shuo came to understand how it felt to be a father and realized that it was not easy at all. He felt restless and uneasy waiting for them and wanted to go search for them, but he did not know where to start looking.

    <i>Are they alright? Perhaps they have been injured? Or maybe... </i> wondered Han Shuo for the thousandth time with his brows tightly bunched.

    ¡°Father, you don¡¯t have to worry, they will be just fine,¡± consoled Han Tu after noticing that Han Shuo had been rather edgy recently. Being telepathically connected, they could sense the source of Han Shuo¡¯s anxiousness.

    ¡°Yea, don¡¯t worry. Little Gold, Little Wood, and Little Water should all be on their way here. As to our Eldest Brother, he most definitely isn¡¯t in any trouble, because he is the most powerful!¡± said Han Huo cheerfully. The ¡®Eldest Brother¡¯ he mentioned was none other than Little Skeleton. As Han Shuo had made Little Skeleton before the five Elite Zombies, they naturally considered him as their eldest brother.

    ¡°Hopefully so,¡± sighed Han Shuo. He then instructed Han Tu, Han Huo, and Rose, ¡°Be extra careful tonight. I will be visiting the City Lord¡¯s manor house. I wonder what he invited me there for.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, there haven¡¯t been any thievestely. They are now too afraid of us to try to intrude!¡± said Han Huo in a fearless andcent face. It was as though he could defeat any intruders with his eyes closed.

    When Rose noticed that Han Shuo was staring at her, she nodded and replied, ¡°With me here, there shouldn¡¯t be an issue.¡±

    Han Shuo became slightly more at ease. He instructed Han Tu, ¡°If you meet an enemy that you cannot fight off, you will bring Rose and Little Fire and flee. As to those shop workers and pharmacists, bring them along if you can. But if you can¡¯t, just leave them.¡±

    ¡°Yes, I know, father. Please stop nagging!¡± replied Han Tu smilingly. He clearly also did not take Han Shuo¡¯s words seriously, thinking that no one would dare intrude the pharmacy or stupid enough to throw away their life.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help butugh at himself after hearing those words. He too felt that he was bing more and more annoyingly wordy in recent days. He would always tell Han Tu and Han Huo some cautionary tales. He had also been constantly nagging Han Huo to be more prudent in the future, lest he offends experts that he cannot defeat.

    When Han Shuo saw that those two brats of his not taking his words seriously, he forced a smile and sighed. However, after thinking for a moment, he realized it was true that there haven¡¯t been any trespasserstely. Therefore, Han Shuo did not nag them any longer and traveled to Baum¡¯s manor house.

    Soon after Han Shuo left, night came and veiled the sky. The workers and pharmacists of Celestial Pearl went into their dormitories to rest.

    The Celestial Pearl branch was refurbished from a small manor. At the front was the actual shop where all kinds of medicines were sold. Behind that were pharmacybs and buildings for the workers to rest. The main warehouse was in a separate building, protected by boundaries that Han Shuo and Rose deployed.

    The Celestial Pearl workers and pharmacists had gotten used to the strange noises after the first few nights. They no longer feel worried about their safety when they realized none of their coworkers were harmed and those miserable shrieks came from strangers. They also gradually came to realize that Celestial Pearl was no average pharmacy.

    That night, they went on and carried out their usual routine. Some went to their rooms to rest while some continued to refine medicines. None of them were concerned about intruders or attackers.

    Rose who was in the gymnasium suddenly bunched her brows and abruptly got up from her meditation. Right when she exited the door to look for Han Tu and Han Huo, she saw the two approaching her surreptitiously.

    ¡°There are enemies. It seems quite different this time. There seems to be a highgod!¡± said Han Tu softly after they got beside Rose.

    ¡°It must have something to do with that fucking Baum! Not a single intrusion happened during all those days Father was in the shop. But right on the night that he is away, the enemyes! Coincidence? I think not!¡± cursed Han Huo in a low voice.

    ¡°You two be careful. If there¡¯s any real danger, just escape without me,¡± Rose knew that Han Tu had the ability to escape by tunneling underground. She knew that Han Shuo loved the two kids very much and definitely cannot ept anything to happen to the two.

    ¡°Woman, what are you worrying about? Don¡¯t you remember what my father said before he left? I¡¯m more than capable of bringing all three of us to escape if there¡¯s any danger we can¡¯t handle,¡± replied Han Tu smugly.

    ¡°Yea, that¡¯s right. You are my father¡¯s woman, how can we allow anything to happen to you? If you are not around, who is going to sleep with my father?¡± said Han Huo in a mischievous smile.

    Rose turned red-faced after being teased by the two buffoons. Her slight nervousness was reced with an urge to beat up the brothers. Han Tu and Han Huo started smirking mischievously after seeing Rose¡¯s reaction. They continued to mock Rose, as though this ancient and mighty highgod was nothing to be afraid of.

 Chapter 820 - Come and hit me!

    <strong>GDK 820: Come and hit me!</strong>

    The pharmacy workers and pharmacists were clueless about the situation. Rose, Han Huo, and Han Tu were on high alert. They were silently observing the entire shop from the top floor of the depot.

    Rose suddenly felt something strange. While Han Shuo was with her, she had never felt worried about any enemy. It was as though with Han Shuo in the shop, the shop is invulnerable to any attacks. But on that night, when Han Shuo was away and she needed to assume the responsibility alone, Rose felt somewhat anxious.

    Suddenly, Rose was astonished for she realized that she had unwittingly be reliant on Han Shuo. When Han Shuo was around her, she would feel that there was nothing that could harm her. But when Han Shuo was not around and she had to fill the role as the leader, she felt exposed and unsheltered.

    Knowing that it was no time to lose focus, Rose temporarily cast aside all irrelevant thoughts and ced all her attention on the shadows of the buildings outside the shop, sensing the strength and number of the attackers.

    During recent times, Rose had gotten used to taking care of criminals attempting to loot the shop in the middle of the night. The strength and number of the intruders had been steadily increasing ever since the first intrusion. But ever since a highgod intruder was killed, they abruptly stopped trying to sneak into the shop. It had been a while since anyone tried to loot the shop.

    Rose thought that the raiders had finally learned to be afraid and won¡¯t be sending themselves to death anymore. She did not foresee that the raiders would again attempt to loot the pharmacy on that night. She was also surprised that the raiders were led by a mid-stage highgod. She knew that a fierce battle would be unavoidable.

    ¡°The leader is a mid-stage highgod. I can vaguely sense that he is a cultivator of the lightning energy. I will be keeping his hand tight and you two will have to take care of the rest of them. Be extra careful. He is not around and we can¡¯t afford to make any mistakes,¡± stressed Rose with her brows slightly bunched.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it. We will fight if we can. And if we can¡¯t, we will just run away. It¡¯s no big deal,¡± said Han Tuughingly as though the raiders were nothing to be afraid of.

    Han Huo nodded in agreement and had acent face. He believed that with Han Tu, they can easily escape from any danger, anytime they wanted.

    When Rose saw the two kids being socent, she wanted to rebuke them but kept to her own counsel. She did not give any more advice and continued to sense the enemies silently.

    The dimly lit streets were shrouded by a gray fog. The intruders who had been concealing themselves in dark for some time began approaching the shop. Shadows after shadows nimbly made a beeline for the Celestial Pearl warehouse.

    The warehouse was used for storing all kinds of medicines. The raiders thought that all of Han Shuo¡¯s personally refined medicines must be kept in there. The raiders had also sensed the presence of Rose, Han Tu, and Han Huo. They knew that they must get through the three before they could obtain the special medicines of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    ¡°Identify yourselves!¡± cried Rose before the moving shadows got near. At the same instant, sheunched her attack. The divine energy of darkness spread out from her body. The element of darkness were gathered and turned into ink-ck clouds. Threads of darkness overflowed from the dense dark clouds and silently grew and spread like inks in water.

    The sky above the warehouse seemed to have been dyed with ck ink. The already faint amount of light at night time waspletely consumed. The region plunged into absolute darkness within a few seconds. Threads of darkness divine energy gradually spread in every direction like thousands of tiny water streams.

    Those few raiders at the front-most of their group suddenly felt that their arms and legs were incredibly heavy as though they had been filled with lead. Although the threads of darkness divine energy could not kill those raiders, it had severely disrupted the normal cirction of energy in their divine bodies.

    Not only that their movement was severely impacted, but those who did not cultivate in the energy of darkness had also bepletely blind. Although the raiders were unable to see anything around them and terribly afraid of being assaulted, they continued to march forward cautiously.

    Unfortunately for the raiders, their worst fears were realized. There was no way the Han Huo and Han Tu would not make use of this perfect circumstance to strike them.

    While Rose was using her darkness divine energy to slow down and blind the raiders, Han Tu and Han Huo had been silently approaching them. Just like their maker, Han Huo and Han Tu could see in the dark, and therefore immune to absolute darkness. As the two were conceived through unique means, they could precisely locate their targets just by sensing the life auras of the raiders and they did not even need to rely on their visions.

    Painful cries started ying from within the absolute darkness. Those who were struck by Han Huo and Han Tu¡¯s sneak attacks dared not scream too loud and hastily retreated after suffering great injuries. Two of the raiders who couldn¡¯t react to their sneak attacks in time died on the spot.

    The raiders who intend on sneaking into the shop under the cover of darkness, ironically, were being assaulted by Han Huo and Han Tu concealing under Rose¡¯s field of absolute darkness.

    ¡°Return!¡± Just when Han Huo and Han Tu were starting to have fun, the voice of a middle-aged man suddenlymanded the raiders to fall back. The raiders immediatelyplied and retreated from the region of absolute darkness that Rose formed.

    A man with a tall, big build and broad shoulders came into appearance. His face was hidden under a crude, gray-white mask that had two holes just wide enough to reveal his glistening eyes. He seemed surprised that the Celestial Pearl had another expert at the level of Rose other than Han Shuo. Aftermanding his mob who were also wearing strange-looking masks to retreat, his eyes turned to Rose who was in the center of the dissipating dark clouds.

    Rose needed to spend divine energy to maintain the absolute darkness. Seeing that the raiders had retreated, she did not waste her divine energy on maintaining the field of absolute darkness. She looked at the raiders apathetically and shouted in an ice-cold voice, ¡°No matter who you are, leave! You won¡¯t get anything from here!¡±

    ¡°This is more than just looting. You have killed my younger brother. I¡¯vee to kill all of you!¡± replied the raider wearing a grey-white mask in an angry voice.

    Rose¡¯s heart sank after hearing those words because she realized that the threat cannot be easily resolved. If their only intention was to loot the pharmacy, they would most likely retreat out of fear of her mighty strength. But as this raider was here for vengeance, he was highly motivated to have an all-out fight!

    With Han Shuo not around, against such arge group of powerful experts led by a ferocious mid-stage highgod, Rose was uncertain if she could defend the pharmacy. If this mid-stage highgod was to retreat, Rose would let him leave. Otherwise, Rose would have no choice but to fight.

    ¡°Who¡¯s your brother? Many have died in our shop recently. We have no clue which is which!¡± Han Huo still wore boldface even when confronting this highgod expert. He even taunted the raider.

    ¡°He came here ten days ago. The one with early-stage highgod strength. He¡¯s my younger brother!¡± The man gestured,manding his gang to spread apart as he marched towards Rose step by step.

    ¡°Oh! That dumdum! I remember him! He kept on fighting instead of escaping after we broke his legs. Haha! What a fucking idiot!¡± said Han Huoughingly and condescendingly.

    ¡°Kill!¡± shouted the grey masked raider and he charged straight at Han Huo. A thick column of thunderbolt made using pure energy of lightning grew from his palm. Simultaneously, his domain of divinity was deployed. Tiny little lightning bolts meandered around his domain like millions of fry.

    ¡°What the fuck, don¡¯t look for me!¡± cursed Han Huo loudly as he hastily flew towards Rose. Although Han Huo was aggressive and arrogant in character, he was not a fool. He was prepared to scuttle before he ridiculed the highgod raider.

    Rose no longer hesitated and she flew down from the top of the building like a dark spirit. A lump of the aura of darkness rapidly came covering down at the highgod of thunder.

    As both of them were mid-stage highgods, they had to use their full strength when fighting. A ferocious battle instantly started. The two highgod were so upied with each other that they had no time to mind anything else.

    Han Huo and Han Tu dodged the two battling highgod and went to fight with the other raiders.

    Although the two were just mid-stage midgods, theirprehension of the energy of fire and earth exceeded those of highgods. Even when pitted against a dozen or more experts who were around the same realm they were at, the duo did not show any sign of being on the back foot.

    Han Huo took out his Fire Lotus and it covered him with its petals. He was glowing bright red from head to toe like heated steel. An enormous amount of heat was emanating from his body.

    The raiders fighting Han Huo felt rather helpless. As he was covered with fire, they couldn¡¯t make any melee attacks or even get close to him. They could onlyunch ineffective ranged attacks at him.

    Those fighting Han Tu felt even more helpless and unbearable. They lost track of him right from the start of the battle.

    A hand or an earth spike might suddenly emerge from underground, which could amputate them if they were not careful enough. As they could not locate Han Tu, they could only take defensive measures.

    Fighting against Han Huo and Han Tu who employed extraordinary tricks were tormenting. One can¡¯t be touched, and another can¡¯t be even be seen. How do they even fight against that?

    ¡°Haha! Come and hit me, stupid!¡± Han Huo wasughing and mocking the raiders while weaving crisscrossed through them. He would throw the raging balls of mes from his palms left and right, or perhaps spit fire at them, reducing the raiders¡¯ hair and clothes to dust. He had also been greeting their female rtives with foulnguage.

    <i>Chut!</i> An iced arrow that came out of nowhere suddenlynded on Han Huo¡¯s back. The arrow clearly came from a highgod. Thecent and arrogant Han Huo suddenly stumbled. The ice-cold aura invading his body made him shiver. His mouth was too busy chattering to continue greeting the raiders with vulgarities.

 Chapter 821 - From bad to worse

    <strong>GDK 821: From bad to worse</strong>

    It was after the iced arrow struck Han Huo that the shooter gradually revealed himself from a dark corner. He was thin and tall. He stood silently as he gazed at the injured Han Huo with his ice-cold and merciless eyes.

    The attacker¡¯s face was as t a nk, where the outlines of his mouth and nose could not be seen. He was either incredibly ugly or he had disguised his facial features, as it did not appear normal.

    ¡°Fuck!¡± It took a while before Han Huo recovered from the attack. Han Tu had stopped attacking the other enemies and started pulling Han Huo down under to the safety of the underground.

    The water energy cultivator that abruptly showed up possessed early-stage highgod strength. Han Tu knew the gap in strength between midgods and highgods and therefore did not fight him. He immediately knew that it was time to flee.

    ¡°That woman is still up there!¡± If it was any other midgods who suffered the attack, their divine body would have been shut down. Even if it doesn¡¯t kill them, they would be frozen still. But Han Huo was rather unique. As the Fire Lotus that covered his body was a treasure naturally formed in the ce of Extreme Fire over hundreds of thousands of years, over half of the assaulting frigid divine energy was counteracted. Han Huo only needed to rest for a moment before his body resumed to normal.

    ¡°We will wait for her,¡± replied Han Tu as hepletely pulled Han Huo into the earth. The two vanished from the raiders¡¯ sight.

    Then, while the raiders were loudly cursing as they looked for Han Tu and Han Huo, the duo stealthily popped their heads out in another region and shouted at Rose who was battling in midair, ¡°Oi, woman, let¡¯s go! Stop dawdling with them!¡±

    Rose was distracted by their shouts. The bnce was tipped and the highgod of lightning gained the upper hand. Several snake-like thunderbolts crawled to Rose and bit her. It made her long-hair stand up straight.

    The energy of thunder cultivator was in the same realm as Rose and slightly stronger than her. He had taken not just the high ground, but he also filled the space underneath Rose with meandering electric-dragons, making it impossible for Rose to descend to the ground.

    At this moment, the other highgod that recently joined the fight gave up on attacking Han Tu and Han Huo and shot towards Rose.

    This highgod of water knew that it was unrealistic to kill Han Tu and Han Huo who were hiding deep underground in a short time. Therefore, he decided to attack Rose who could not fly to the ground.

    ¡°What should we do?¡± Han Huo asked Han Tu anxiously when he saw that Rose was about to be surrounded by two highgods.

    ¡°I also don¡¯t know. Should we save her?¡± Han Tu was much calmer than Han Huo but just as indecisive. He knew that he and Han Huo could not defeat a highgod. Although they could form a partial Penta-Elemental Undead Formation, Han Tu wasn¡¯t sure if they would have enough power to fight the highgod and was worried that they wouldnd themselves in greater danger.

    ¡°Just run, leave me behind!¡± shrieked Rose while Han Tu and Han Huo were being indecisive. A burst of white, icy-gas suddenly shot towards Rose. As she was using all her strength and attention fighting that highgod of thunder, she could not evade the attack. The icy-gasnded directly on her back.

    ¡°Fucking hell, I¡¯ll do it!¡± Han Huo came to a decision immediately after hearing Rose¡¯s cry. Without asking for Han Tu¡¯s advice, he started screaming profanities and charged out from the hole, ¡°You despicable asshole, is back-stabbing all that you know? Fucking coward! Come and fight me directly if you have the guts! Oi fucker... ¡±

    When Han Tu saw Han Huo flying out from the ground while cursing, he let out a sigh, emerged from the ground, and pursued Han Huo. It was the first time in the battle that he was not underground.

    Han Tu could flee without Rose, but he could not leave his brother behind. Therefore, when Han Huo decided to stay, Han Tu also stayed.

    Multiple mounds grew from the earth as Han Tu flew out from the ground. As he flew towards Han Huo, he shouted, ¡°Little Fire, get into formation!¡±

    Han Huo stared distractedly for a split second before he started smirking evilly, as though he had just recalled that he could fuse his energy with Han Tu¡¯s. As the mounds lifted skywards,rge mes flew towards them and miraculously entered them. The yellowish-brown mounds then suddenly started glowing and burning like a sphere of heated steel. The burning mounds flew to the water element cultivator ragingly.

    Only certain unique lifeforms nurtured with the Five Elemental Yuan Energy couldbine their energies as Han Huo and Han Tu were doing. The yuan energy of earth and the yuan energy of fire fused together perfectly in the mounds. Not only that the mounds had be much tougher, they were constantly emanating an astonishing amount of heat. There was no way that the highgod of water would be unscathed if he was struck by one of those mounds.

    ¡°You are courting death!¡± groaned the person coldly before he blew a stream of icy-gas with his mouth. The icy-gas assembled the element of water in the air and instantly formed a sparkling and translucent iced-spear. The iced-spear, emanating a great amount of frigid aura, shot towards the fiery mounds rapidly.

    <i>Ting Ting Ting!</i> The sound of metals shing reverberated from mid-air. The iced-spear did not shatter the mounds but only pushed them aside before continuing to shoot towards Han Huo and Han Tu.

    ¡°Huh!¡± softly cried the water element cultivator. His eyes were glistening with the lights of puzzlement and surprise as though he did not expect that his iced-spear did not shatter the mounds. From his point of view, although the two midgods had strange divine energy, it should be impossible for them to evene close to blocking his attacks.

    He seemed to have be interested in Han Huo and Han Tu. Instead of targeting Rose, he turned to two brothers, gazed at them with his ice-cold eyes as he slowly marched towards the duo. As he stepped on empty air, he congealed multiple water dragons using the element of water in the air and sent them flying menacingly towards Han Huo and Han Tu.

    Han Tu utilized the energy of earth to form an earth-wall and Han Huo added his energy of fire into the wall to defend against the highgod¡¯s attacks. They intended to distract the highgod from Rose.

    Although this expert had just early-stage highgod strength, he was, afterall, a highgod. Even when Han Tu and Han Huo joined their energies, it was still very strenuous and difficult to defend against his attacks. As though it couldn¡¯t get worse, the midgod raiders made use of the opportunity to throw their divine weapons and other ranged attacks at their scorching earth-wall.

    Han Tu and Han Huo were feeling strained and helpless. While they suffered the bombardment from all directions, the thought of escaping without Rose echoed louder in their minds. Unlike a few moments ago, the duo were nowpletely passive and were showing signs of weariness.

    The highgod of water flew into a rage out of humiliation when his attacks had repeatedly failed to destroy the earth wall made by two midgods. He congealed several water dragons and iced-spears, umted the power to its peak and sted everything at the earth wall.

    <i>Boom!</i>

    An enormous explosion sounded. The earth-wall remained intact but Han Tu and Han Huo were sent flying away.

    The earth-wall was sustained by both of them and the counteracting force of the earth-wall was directly connected to the duo. The all-out attack of the highgod proved to be too much for the two. The enormous force that entered their bodies sent them flying out from the back of the earth-wall.

    ¡°Run!¡± Rose knew that Han Tu and Han Huo stayed there for her. She couldn¡¯t help herself but shouted when she saw that the two were in great danger.

    By now, the shop workers and pharmacist realized that something wasn¡¯t right. They came out from their rooms and gazed at the warehouse anxiously.

    Although it wasn¡¯t unusual to hear battling noises at night, it would always end within a short time. The screams and shouts would being from strangers. But on that night, they noticed that the battling noises were unusually long and loud. They even heard Rose scream twice. Knowing that things were going south, they stopped what they were doing and gazed at the battlefield.

    These shop workers and pharmacists had mediocre strengths. Besides, seeing that highgods were involved, they knew that there was nothing they could do to help. All that they could do was watch the battle anxiously.

    Han Tu and Han Huo tumbled and rolled uncontrobly. They were sent flying quite some distance apart. This meant that after touching the ground, Han Tu could not immediately get Han Huo under the earth¡¯s protection. The highgod of water seemed to realize this and therefore, instead of attacking Han Tu who could disappear underground in an instant, he went after Han Huo.

    The force that entered Han Huo sent him into a daze and he had yet toe to his senses. He was still falling dizzily from the air. As soon as Han Tu touched the ground, he became conscious and immediately realized what was happening. He shouted, ¡°Little Fire! Run! Run!¡±

    <i>Thud Thud</i> Han Huo too hadnded. He too had regained consciousness upon crashing onto the ground. He saw that the highgod of water was a short distance away and Han Tu was very far away. As Han Huo could not submerge underground like Han Tu could, there was no way for him to avoid the highgod¡¯s attack.

    Han Huo realized that he was in a terribly dire situation!

    ¡°Run! Run!!¡± shouted Han Tu as he ran towards Han Huo as fast as he could. Although he knew that Han Huo won¡¯t make it, he kept screaming at Han Huo to run because he was overwhelmed with fear!

    ¡°Darn it! I¡¯ll get you! Even if I die my father will avenge me!¡± When Han Huo saw that he could not run, he decided he might as well put up a fight. He gathered all his anger and rage and valiantly charged at the highgod.

    ¡°Well then, die!¡± shouted the highgod raider in a disdained smirk.

 Chapter 822 - You need to be stronger!

    <strong>GDK 822: You need to be stronger!</strong>

    It was at this moment that an ear-piercing whistle sounded from the horizon. A three-meter long bone spear glowing with dazzling white light, carrying an overwhelming amount of the aura of death, streaked across the vast space and drew a spectacr arc in the sky. It was shooting towards that highgod of water!

    The highgod raider had just reached Han Huo. The disdain in his eyes had disappeared without a trace and reced with great gravity. His pupils contracted as he fixed all his attention on the rapidly approaching bone spear. He also assembled all his water divine energy in his hands.

    As the bone spear was targeting him, he could sense better than anyone just how formidable the amount of the energy of death contained in the bone spear was. Other than the energy of death, the bone spear also contained an even more dreadful sinister energy reeking with killing intent. It was no weaker than the energy of death!

    The highgod of water had no choice but to use all his strength to defend against this dazzling white bone spear that suddenly appeared. He had no time to deal with Han Huo.

    His eyes staring fixedly at the bone spear as all the water divine energy in his body was condensing on his two hands while the element of water converged towards his palms. His white and long arms turned as sparking and translucent as crystal while emanating white, frigid mists. It was as though his arms had turned into ice in an instant.

    If one was to look from up close, one would see that in the center of his crystalized arms there were liquid slowly flowing. After attaining highgodhood in the cultivation of the water element, one would have perfect mastery in using both the fluidness of water and the toughness of ice. The bizarreness of the raider¡¯s hands was proof that his understanding of the water energy was in the realm of highgod.

    Streams of frigid air started bursting out from the tips of his crystalized fingers. The frigid cold air streams converged and formed an ice-shield in a fraction of a second.

    The fact that this highgod raider had immediately used defensive measures against this bone spear showed that he was afraid of it!

    Immediately after the ice-shield formed, the bone spear arrived!

    <i>ng!</i> The bone spear made contact with the ice-shield. A burst of splendid white light erupted from the point of contact. Countless small radiances crawled out towards every direction while making strange sparking noises.

    The highgod raider seemed to have been hit hard. His arms that were maintaining the ice-shield were making loud cracking noises. He felt two forces wreaking havoc on his ice-shield, shing with his water divine energy hundreds of times in an instant. One of those forces was a death divine energy, which had broken down his water divine energy to bits. The other force was an unknown energy with intense killing intent, which prated his ice-shield and into his hands as though it was self-aware. It was trying to prate further into his divine body.

    The highgod of water took a shock and immediately withdrew. He diverted his divine energy from his arms back to his body in an attempt to stop the assault of that vicious energy at all costs.

    In the split second of negligence, the sinister energy managed to cause tremendous damage to his divine body. By the time he diverted the water divine energy from his palm, the sinister energy had wrecked at least thirty percent of his organs. Had he hesitated for a few seconds, his body and soul would have been destroyed.

    <i>Who is this neer?</i>

    Wondered the highgod had been just inches from death. His forehead was covered with cold sweat. He dared not do anything to Han Huo who was within his reach but turned his frightened eyes on the bone spear that had just shattered his ice-shield.

    He was terrified!

    A youngster wearing an indifferent face walked out from a dark street silently. With one of his eyes light purple in colour, he appeared very sinister. There were seven slightly shorter bone spurs connected to his back. They were all glowing with soft white light.

    The teenager took just a few seconds to get to the center of the Celestial Pearl store from the dark street. He extended his arm forward and the bone spear instantly flew back into his grasp. Without wasting a single word, he flew towards that highgod raider who tried to kill Han Huo.

    His purple eyes suddenly started to glow. The element of death gathered under the rider¡¯s feet and formed an enormous bewitching flower made of bone spikes. Its petals closed and trapped the raider firmly from the waist down. His bright red blood squirted out from his body and tainted the spotlessly white bone spikes.

    The three-meter long bone spur was hurled. It drew another beautiful curve from the sky to the top of the raider¡¯s head. The bone spur punctured his skull, through his spine, and out from the bottom, pinning him straight to the enormous bone flower.

    He could not fight back from start to finish!

    The cold and emotionless teenager closed his fingers and the bone flower immediately flew to him. He stepped forward, grasped tightly on the three-meter long bone spear, and pulled it out from the raider¡¯s cap. His brain matter mixed with blood and mushy organs sprayed out from the hole on his skull.

    A grayish gas also emerged from the body at the same time, trying hard to fly away. However, the teenager grabbed it with his left hand and threw it to one of the seven bone spurs on his back. That bone spur seemed to have some kind of suction power and it vacuumed the grayish glob of gas. The bone spur glow with a gentle htion for a moment before the light faded.

    The bewitching and enormous bone flower started falling apart and miraculously vanished into thin air. That lifeless body whose soul had been captured fell spinelessly to the ground.

    All of that happened in just a short few seconds. That domineering highgod raider died before the shop workers and pharmacists of puny strengths came to their senses.

    The highgod of thunder who was battling Rose showed shock and horror in his eyes. His movement speed had substantially reduced and was no longer attacking Rose as fiercely. It seemed as though he was deciding if he should escape.

    The enormous pressure on Rose was reduced. She found the time to take a quick nce at the emotionless teenager and she too was greatly astonished. <i>Who is this person? Is he a friend or a foe? What should I do if he¡¯s a foe?</i>

    To be able to kill that early-stage highgod raider in such a short time, the teenager should possess at least mid-stage highgod strength. Rose had great difficulty dealing with the highgod of thunder and knew that she would stand no chance if this sinister-looking teenager was to also fight her.

    The onlooking shop workers and pharmacists were also wearing astonished faces, wondering if this highgod that just joined the fight was a friend or another raider of a different faction. If it was thetter, they knew that they would all die in that shop that night!

    When everybody had their gazes on the teenager, Han Huo suddenly cried out in a pleasantly surprised manner, ¡°Eldest brother! You havee!¡±

    ¡°Elder brother, when have youe?¡± Han Tu, who had finally reached Han Huo, asked the teenager excitedly in a foolish smile.

    ¡°Just now!¡± The teenager who had been ice-cold and emotionless all along put on a very faint but sincere smile. He looked at Han Huo and Han Tu and berated in a neutral tone, ¡°You fes have not been working hard. You are too weak!¡±

    ¡°We have been working very hard, erm, it¡¯s just that elder brother ended up being much stronger,¡± said Han Huo while he scratched his head embarrassingly. Then, in a fawning tone, he said, ¡°Brother, it¡¯s so fortunate that you havee just in time. Otherwise, I¡¯ll definitely have been done for!¡±

    ¡°That is why you need to be stronger!¡± replied Han Hao before he nced at the midgod raiders around him who were thinking about escaping. The bone spurs on his back abruptly whooshed out. The bone spurs made noises that sounded as though thousands of tormented spirits were wailing as they shot all around. Bone-chilling winds suddenly blew in the shop and miserable shrieks were heard. All those masked midgods were shredded into pieces.

    When the seven bone spurs killed all midgod raiders, the highgod of thunder that fought Rose no longer hesitated and decisively left. While flying away, for some reason, he would repeatedly turn his head to look at Han Hao.

    As soon as Rose saw the raider escape, she went after him. Han Hao, with the bone spear in his hand, also went after the highgod raider. When he was overtaking Rose, he said to her, ¡°You stay, I chase!¡±

    Rose stared nkly for a moment and her first thought was to ignore Han Hao¡¯s words. But when she took a careful look and noticed that Han Hao looked rather simr to that someone, she immediatelyplied. Although her mouth was half-open and ready to defy him, she had subconsciously slowed down. She gazed in the direction they left for a moment before returning to Han Tu and Han Huo.

    ¡°Go back to your rooms and rest. There won¡¯t be any more fights to watch tonight. Also, you all better keep your mouth shut about what you saw,¡± instructed Rose after her cold eyes scanned the crowd. The shop workers and pharmacists, whose minds had been blown, tactfully dispersed.

    All along, the workers thought that only the master of Celestial Pearl, Han Shuo, had very formidable strength. But after that night, they realized that the Celestial Pearl had been concealing their true strength, as though they had the backing of an extremely powerful powerhouse. They were pleasantly surprised by that and discussed the incident in low voices in their rooms.

    ¡°Erm, woman, you did pretty well!¡± As soon as the threat was neutralized, Han Huo returned to being a loud and conceited jerk. ¡°You did not abandon us and escape by yourself. You demonstrated a spirit of loyalty. Alright, in the future, I will no longer say any bad things about you behind your back!¡±

    The first half of Han Huo¡¯s words were pleasant to Rose¡¯s ears, but thetter half angered her and made her red at Han Huo. Then, she recalled something and looked in the direction Han Hao left. She asked, ¡°Who is that teenager?¡±

    ¡°He¡¯s our eldest brother, Han Hao. Didn¡¯t you hear us?¡± replied Han Huo straightforwardly as Rose had gained his trust.

    ¡°He is, he¡¯s also his son?¡± Rose was astounded. She was very astonished about Han Tu and Han Huo¡¯s existence. She found it unbelievable that there were more.

    ¡°Of course!¡± replied Han Tu. While smiling innocently at Rose, he asked, ¡°Do you fancy my father? If you do, just say it. We brothers are all open-minded people. Hehe, besides, we are very happy with your performance today. You will have our approval!¡±

    ¡°Shut up!¡± Rose turned embarrassed and hastily left.

    ¡°You stupid, you can¡¯t just spell it out like that! Hell, you may look innocent on the outside, but you sure are dirty inside!¡± chided Han Huo smilingly.

 Chapter 823 - Han Hao aka Little Skeleton

    <strong>GDK 823: Han Hao aka Little Skeleton</strong>

    Han Shuo was currently unaware of what happened in Celestial Pearl. He was at the City Lord¡¯s manor house as Baum had invited him over.

    Han Shuo had been surveilling Baum day and night using his demon generals. But other than hearing Baum instructing his divine guard to investigate Goldstone Enterprise, Han Shuo did not discover anything else that was suspicious. But that alone was enough evidence for Han Shuo not to trust Baum and to know that Baum had an ulterior motive in eagerly and generously helping him set up the Celestial Pearl branch.

    Baum had been waiting for Han Shuo in the drawing-room. As soon as Han Shuo stepped inside, Baum came forward cordially to wee him. He asked if Han Shuo was happy with the Celestial Pearl branch.

    Han Shuo too had big smiles across his faces and exchanged a round of pleasantries with Baum. After that, he went straight to the subject, ¡°May I know what you have invited me here for?¡±

    ¡°Erm, it¡¯s like this: I have a friend who wants to purchase some rather unique medicines from Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. Is it possible for Celestial Pearl to develop and manufacture it?¡± Baum hesitated for a moment before he answered.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment. The demon general that had been constantly following and watching Baum from a hundred meters away did not see Baum receive any friends. Therefore, Han Shuo was rather surprised by those words of Baum¡¯s.

    Han Shuo thought about it for a moment and recalled that Baum was a cultivator of the edict of space. Space mirrors, a divine device that uses energy crystals as the power source, should be very easy for Baum to manufacture. As the demon general must remain some distance away from Baum and sometimes they would be separated by walls and barriers, it was possible that Baum hadmunicated with his friends using a magical space mirror without the demon general seeing it.

    ¡°May I know which kind of unique medicine your friend required?¡± Han Shuo bunched his brows and asked smilingly.

    ¡°My friend deals with buying and selling magical beasts. Some of them have very tough skin and are very difficult to deal with. Having some poisonous medicine would be useful. Erm, although it is very illegal to make poisonous medicines in other Dominions, it¡¯s not that big of a deal in the Destiny and Space Dominions. We can work together if you are interested. If not, we¡¯ll just forget about it. I¡¯m not one who would force others to do something they don¡¯t want,¡± exined Baum in a natural and ordinary tone.

    Poisons were strictly prohibited in the Dominions of Life and Light. Even an average pharmacy in the Death, Darkness, and Destruction Dominions dared not sell poisons openly. The chemists and pharmacists that tested poisons on people were also hunted down like godhunters in most Dominions.

    As with most things, the riskier the business, the greater the profit. Although the pharmacies will not openly disy the poisons on the rack, they would secretly sell them in the ck market. There were plenty of pharmacies that participated in this business. As long as they have the proper channels and political connections sorted out, they wouldn¡¯t get into trouble.

    However, the poison makers, especially those who experimented on human beings, were hated by everyone. Although they were not as infamous as the godhunters, once their deeds were discovered, their businesses would be ransacked by divine guards. Therefore, those who conduct this business would never do it openly. Back then in the City of Shadows, Han Shuo had exposed Godswamp Pharmacy¡¯s deeds. Their assets were seized by the House of Sainte and a few of the core members were executed.

    Han Shuo¡¯s bunched his brows closer. He thought, <i>There are many pharmacies out there that specialize in producing poisons. Why is Baum specifically looking for me to do it?</i>

    Baum was the City Lord of Ethereal City. With the most powerful man in the City arranging the business for him, there shouldn¡¯t be an issue. But what exactly was he up to?

    A bunch of thoughts and ideas rapidly went through his mind. After remaining silent for a moment, Han Shuo suddenly put on a faint smile and said, ¡°This trade is risky. First, I need to meet that friend of yours. I will only consider doing that business if I feel that he is a trustable person.¡± Han Shuo originally nned on tly refusing the proposal. But he recalled that this might be the reason behind Baum¡¯s generous aid. Han Shuo intended to slowly and carefully investigate the truth.

    ¡°Just as you said, this trade is risky. I need to ask him for his opinion and see if he¡¯s willing to meet you,¡± Baum replied after thinking for a moment.

    ¡°Well then, let me know when there¡¯s an update,¡± Han Shuo smiled and said, ¡°If there¡¯s no other business, I shall return.¡±

    ¡°There aren¡¯t any other businesses, but I personally would like to ask you some questions. May I?¡± said Baum hastily when he saw that Han Shuo was wanting to leave.

    ¡°You are being overly polite, City Lord. Please, fire away any questions you have. I will tell you everything, as long as I know the answer!¡± Han Shuo sat back on his seat politely and did not leave right away.

    ¡°I was very fortunate to have a gloriousbat with you, Sir, and I¡¯m very admiring of your strength. But when I recalled the battle, I noticed that the energy you used was very unique. It is an energy that I have never seen over my many years spent on Elysium. I¡¯m very curious about it. Could you clear up my confusion?¡± asked Baum very sincerely. He was very interested in the energy that Han Shuo used.

    Han Shuo, naturally, will not tell Baum the truth. But instead of straightforwardly refusing to answer, Han Shuo made up lies on the fly, describing demonic arts as another form of the fighting aura. He also included some terminology of demonic arts that no one in the universe knew to confuse Baum.

    Baum had turned muddle-headed after listening to the first few sentences. As Baum had no understanding of demonic arts and Han Shuo¡¯s words contained both truth and lies, Baum could not tell if Han Shuo was talking gibberish.

    After giving a long exnation, Han Shuo pretended to be tired and said, ¡°I have said everything there is to say. This kind of energy is rather hard to understand. Even I don¡¯t fullyprehend it. It¡¯s quite normal if you don¡¯t understand. Erm, it¡¯s quitete already, I should go home,¡± Han Shuo bowed and took his leave.

    ***

    It waste at night. That highgod of lightning who tried to raid Celestial Pearl Pharmacy had been weaving back and forth through remote alleys. However, he always felt as though someone was following him.

    He flew left and right, stopped midway to scan his surroundings, carefully checked and made sure that no one was following him. However, that feeling of being followed never left him.

    He was overwhelmed with shock. He had paid a considerable price in his attempt to raid the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy and take revenge for his brother. Even with his meticulous nning, he did not expect that a terrifying teenager would suddenly show up and wreck his ns.

    He had seen just how easily Han Hao killed his early-stage highgod friend and it terrified him. As he had no confidence in defeating Han Hao and much less against the joined forces of Han Hao and Rose, he retreated from the Pharmacy.

    That feeling of being followed made him afraid of going home, lest he exposes his real identity and causes his family n troubles. He wandered in the most remote and deste region in Ethereal City and tried his best to throw off the follower.

    But after trying again and again, no matter how hard or which method he tried, someone or something seems to be following him.

    Out of helplessness, he stopped in a remote forest of stones in Ethereal City and no longer tried to shake off the follower. He looked all around and yelled, ¡°I won¡¯t be running anymore. Come out!¡±

    A momentter, from a group of stone pirs a thousand meters away, Han Hao walked out emotionlessly.

    Han Hao was different from the five elite zombies. Although he did not obtain the Five Elemental Yuan Energy or the Five Elemental Treasures, he received something much better ¨C a portion of Han Shuo¡¯s memories rted to demonic arts! In this universe, other than Han Shuo, the only person who could truly put demonic art to use was neither Bonds, Sangais, nor Gilbert ¨C It was Little Skeleton, or Han Hao!

    Bonds and Sanguis cultivated in non-mainstream forms of demonic arts. God ying Devil Path and Bloodgod Mantra were not the proper, traditional, and supreme practice of demonic arts. In this universe, other than Han Shuo, only Little Skeleton who obtained part of his memory cultivated in the proper form of demonic art. But as he was not an identical lifeform as Han Shuo, there were deviations in his cultivation. He does not make progress realm by realm as Han Shuo does and his cultivation was intertwined with the energy of death. His realm was also very vague and indistinct.

    However, not only that the deviations had not harmed him, it made his strength even more strange and unfathomable. Mixing cultivations in the energy of death and demonic arts had been making him stronger and stronger. Back then when he separated with Han Shuo, they had around the same strength. During those fifty years that Han Shuo had been rapidly advancing in strength, Han Hao had also been advancing his strength at the same rate.

    The reason that Hao Hao could follow this highgod of thunder and not lose track no matter the trick he tried was, Han Hao had also been refining demon generals using divine souls just as Han Shuo had. Although his demon generals were not as great as those of Han Shuo, they nheless possessed the basic stealth capability.

    Therefore, no matter how hard the raider tried, he could not escape from Han Hao¡¯s tracking!

    ¡°It¡¯s you?¡± the masked raider¡¯s heart sank when he saw that ice-cold teenager. Having fought Rose and knowing her strength, the raider wouldn¡¯t be too worried if it was Rose who went after him. However, if it was Han Hao, he had no confidence in winning.

    Han Hao did not waste a single word with him. Upon emerging from the forest, he charged forward with his bone spear. When he deployed his domain of divinity, all the elements of death nearby wildly gushed into it while a surge of killing intent erupted. The killing intent aura carried the element of death as it circted. It formed a violent stream of air blowing towards the masked raider.

    ¡°You think I¡¯m afraid of you?¡± He was very annoyed to have been pursued so long. Although he was unwilling to get entangled with Han Hao, as Han Hao had attacked, he had no choice but to fight.

    Han Hao continued to remain silent. He flew behind the violent stream of air while wielding the bone spear. The seven bone spurs on his back were swaying as though they could fly out to kill at any moment.

    The highgod raider formed multiple stationary thunderbolts and arranged them before him. He made a shield of thunderbolts to defend himself from Han Hao¡¯s attack.

    A loud and violent explosion erupted in the stone forest. Thunderbolts flew everywhere. Killing intent dispersed before rapidly re-converging. Arge area of ste was shattered and it caused the entire region to be filled with dust, stones, and gaudy lights.

    The two energies that were miraculously intertwined struck the shield of static thunderbolts. They repeatedly gathered and dispersed. After many pulsations, another airstream would form and bombard the raider. A three-meter long bone spear had also been flying around in the airstream, boosting the energy and power of the airstream.

    Upon taking the first blow, the raider knew that Han Hao¡¯s strength was above his. He also noticed that the energy Han Hao used was very evil. He felt very helpless when he saw the violent stream made of the aura of death and killing intent was bombarding yet again. He had been exhausting his divine energy rapidly as he used all his strength to defend himself. One of his hands was umting electricity and another hand was forming thunder.

    Simr to cultivators of the water energy, cultivators of the thunder energy could attack in two forms using their divine energy. The energy of thunder in their body needed to be sent out in a certain manner to form thunderbolt and lightning attacks. A god of the thunder energy using both electricity and thunderbolt meant that he was attacking with all his strength.

    Terrifying sounds of explosions continuously sounded. Several dozen thunderbolts revolved around him before they gradually merged into one. After that, all the electrical power he had umted charged the thunderbolt, making its diameter as great as an ancient tree.

    When the raider went all out, the seven bone spurs behind Han Hao finally detached and flew out. In an abstruse trajectory, they flew into the airstream congealed using the auras of death and killing intent. When the seven bone spurs entered the airstream, it seemed as though the airstream had turned alive. As it flew by violently, it would sweep up and devour everything nearby. Several dozen thick and strong ste were sucked into the airstream.

    When the airstream finally came, the several dozen ste that had been spun up were the first to strike. That alone ate away more than half of his thunder energy. After that, an even more powerful airstream came whacking. When the ste shattered, the bone spurs that had been hiding in the airstream abruptly and sneakily shot at the raider. Having been caught by surprise, the raider had no choice but to spend some energy on dealing with the bone spurs. He was unable to deploy the power of the enormous thunderbolt to its fullest potential.

    A world-shaking explosion erupted. The tremendous blow produced a disturbance that spread far and wide. The raider, somehow, became covered with blood.

    Han Hao walked out from therge cloud of dust. His eyes were fixed on the raider. Seven bone spurs were miraculously hovering behind him. The three-meter long bone spear in his hand was aimed right at the raider.

    It was at this moment that a strange spacetime fluctuation abruptly appeared in midair. Han Hao who was ready to deal the finishing blow creased his brows and raised his head to sense the spacetime fluctuation. Then, without saying a word, he turned on his heels and flew away. He was far away by the time that the spacetime was torn.

    Right after Han Hao disappeared, a fissure was torn in spacetime and Baum the City Lord arrived.

    He shot a nce at the bloody highgod and bunched his brows. He did not speak or ask the raider anything but gestured impatiently at him with his hand before rapidly flying in the direction Han Hao that disappeared.

 Chapter 824 - I made these

    GDK 824: I made these

    Han Hao had run away because he did not want to meet Baum at this moment. Although Baum was a cultivator of the space edict, without knowing the precise location, it was difficult for him to locate a person.

    As soon as Han Hao left the region, he turned himself into a shadow and concealed the terrifying aura of his body. He deliberately moved towards popted and crowded regions, mixing his aura with gods who were cultivating in gymnasiums. This would confuse Baum¡¯s senses and make it very difficult to lock onto Han Hao¡¯s precise location.

    Baum carefully sensed for Han Hao¡¯s aura and when he found something, he would instantly teleport to the location through hismand over the energy of space. However, he would always fail to get Han Hao.

    After doing so several times, Baum noticed that he was getting closer and closer to the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. To avoid Han Shuo¡¯s suspicion, Baum decisively gave up on pursuing Han Hao and retreated.

    *** At the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy in Ethereal City.

    Upon returning, Han Shuo noticed that there were bodies lying all around the shop and Han Huo and Han Tu were examining the bodies while muttering something. He was shocked when he saw the body of that highgod whose cranium had been punctured. Han Shuo moved like a shadow and appeared beside Han Huo and Han Tu.

    ¡°What happened? Was there a highgod?¡± asked Han Shuo as he leaned over to examine the body.

    ¡°Two highgods. One early-stage and one mid-stage. Even Rose can¡¯t stop them!¡± exined Han Tu.

    Han Shuo¡¯s face jolted and he looked at Han Huo and Han Tu with astonished eyes. He asked in a confused tone, ¡°How did this one die? The mid-stage one should be busy fighting Rose. And the early-stage one, he shouldn¡¯t be one that you two can fight, right?¡± No one understood Han Tu and Han Huo¡¯s strengths better than Han Shuo. Although the two had a great understanding of the energy of earth and fire, the realm they were at limited their firepower. Therefore, logically speaking, they should not be able to fight a highgod.

    ¡°Our eldest brother killed him!¡± Han Huo said excitedly, ¡°After such a long time, our eldest brother has be so powerful that he killed this early-stage highgod in just a moment! This cunt couldn¡¯t even fight back! Haha! Father, elder brother is now pursuing the other highgod. I reckon he will be back soon!¡±

    ¡°What? He killed this highgod in a moment?¡± cried Han Shuo in surprise.

    In Han Shuo¡¯s mind, Little Skeleton was still that small and thin little kid. He did not expect Little Skeleton to grow so powerful in just several decades. The fact that Little Skeleton could kill an early-stage highgod in a moment meant that he was at least one realm above the raider.

    Back then when Han Shuo separated with Little Skeleton, they possessed only lowgod strengths. To be more powerful than an early-stage highgod meant that his strength had been improving at around the same rate as Han Shuo¡¯s.

    For all these while, Han Shuo had assumed that the Five Elite Zombies would grow faster than Little Skeleton as the Five were born from the ces of Extreme Yuan and they had obtained the Five Elemental Yuan Treasures. Having all those innate advantages, it was only reasonable that the Five Elite Zombies would be stronger than Little Skeleton.

    But unexpectedly, not only that Little Skeleton wasn¡¯t weaker than the Five Elite Zombies, he had been leading far ahead in strength. Moreover, this gap in strength seemed to be growing wider.

    ¡°Father, these raiders came soon after you left. I think that fe who asked to meet you is involved!¡± said Han Tu. He wanted to inform Han Shuo of his suspicions as soon as possible.

    ¡°Tell me what happened in detail,¡± Han Shuo took a deep breath to temporarily cast aside his excitement about Han Hao and started focusing on the matter at hand.

    After Han Tu and Han Huo narrated the entire incident once through, Han Shuo¡¯s suspicions over Baum grew even greater. It was also at this moment that the demon general that had been surveilling Baum detected an intense spacetime fluctuation from the gymnasium Baum used for meditation.

    Han Shuo was astonished. He immediatelymanded the demon general to get closer to the gymnasium and sensed for a moment. Through the demon general, Han Shuo discovered that Baum had disappeared from the manor house. As the demon general could not tear apart spacetime to pursue Baum, Han Shuo could not know where Baum went and who he met.

    Han Shuo reyed Han Tu and Han Huo¡¯s narration in his head and connected it with Baum¡¯s unusual movement right now. His suspicion over Baum grew ever stronger. But as he had temporarily lost track of Baum, Han Shuo knew only half of the picture.

    At this moment, Rose who heard Han Shuo¡¯s voice came out from the gymnasium she lived in. She walked to Han Shuo and gave him some more details of the story. She then remarked, ¡°That kid of yours is very powerful. He is now pursuing the raider. I think he might be able to discover something. I do not know any of the faces of those who have died here. I wonder which forces they were from.¡±

    ¡°Thank you for protecting my children!¡± Han Shuo said to Rose sincerely. He was touched that Rose put her life on the line to give Han Tu and Han Huo an opportunity to escape.

    ¡°You are my master. It is my duty to obey your orders!¡± Although Rose still wore the same emotionless face on the outside, she was secretly delighted to hear that from Han Shuo.

    ¡°Father, this woman has pretty decent strength and is much more powerful than your other women. Not only that, she is even very docile to you. Hehe, why don¡¯t you... ¡° Han Huo took a nce at Rose before he softly suggested to Han Shuo in a mischievous smirk.

    Although Han Huo had lowered his voice as much as possible, Rose was standing just a few steps away. As a highgod, there was no way that she did not hear those words of Han Huo¡¯s.

    A light glistened from her eyes when she heard Han Huo¡¯s suggestion. Although she looked as though she didn¡¯t care what Han Huo said, her hands, however, were grasping each other very tightly out of nervousness.

    ¡°Don¡¯t say that!¡± Han Shuo frowned at Han Huo and chided in a low voice, ¡°Our rtionship isn¡¯t what you imagined. We are just friends. After a hundred years, she will be free to go. You better cut saying this kind of nonsense from now on!¡±

    The serious response from Han Shuo did not frighten Han Huo. Instead, Han Huo continued to smirk mischievously as his gazes went back and forth between Han Shuo and Rose.

    Rose felt a mixed array of emotions when he heard Han Shuo¡¯s response. She felt both d and disappointed to hear that Han Shuo considered her a friend ¨C d that Han Shuo did not consider her as a ve but a friend, and disappointed that Han Shuo had thought of her as just a friend instead of something more than friends. She did not know if she should be happy or sad about it.

    Han Tu, Han Huo, Rose, and Han Shuo discussed the incident for a while. Then, at the first light of dawn, Han Shuo suddenly turned delighted and looked towards a misty and dark street.

    A teenager wearing an emotionless face silently appeared. When he saw the pleasantly surprised Han Shuo, happiness, a rare sight, was seen on his face.

    ¡°Father,¡± greeted Han Hao cordially after he came to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Haha, great to see you again, Son!¡± Of all his kids, Little Skeleton was the closest to Han Shuo. Back then in the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force, when Han Shuo was a nobody, it was Little Skeleton who had been doing the menial cleaning work for him. Seeing Little Skeleton again at dawn reminded Han Shuo of those times. He could still vividly recall the scene of a tiny little skeleton stealthily hauling two bags of trash to the dumping site.

    This bond between them might be even deeper than any of the rtionships Han Shuo had with his women. Han Shuo could not be more proud to see that Little Skeleton has grown into a handsome youngster that looked somewhat like himself.

    ¡°I couldn¡¯t kill that fe. Baum the City Lord suddenly appeared and I had to leave. Otherwise, if he caught up to me, it would be very troublesome,¡± said Han Hao in a very gentle tone, as though he was somewhat embarrassed and afraid that Han Shuo might reprimand him for not havingpleted the task well. Perhaps Han Shuo was the only person in the world that could make him reveal that emotion.

    ¡°Let¡¯s talk inside,¡± said Han Shuo smilingly as a flying sword flew out and tipped on all of the bodies. While the bodies were liquifying, Han Shuo and the others walked into one of the buildings in Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    With Han Tu around to help, many underground secret chambers were built in this Celestial Pearl branch. That building they entered had a secret entrance to the secret chambers. They descended several hundred meters underground to a clean and neat secret chamber.

    After hearing from Little Skeleton, or Han Hao, Han Shuo finally knew where Baum had gone. As the City Lord of Ethereal City, Baum could detect battles between powerful highgods within the City through the energy towers strategically located all around the City. With hismand over the edict of space, Baum could get himself to the battlefield in an instant.

    Baum did not go to interrupt the battle in Celestial Pearl Pharmacy but had instantly rushed to the forest of stones where Han Hao fought the raider. Having known that, it became impossible for Han Shuo not to find Baum suspicious.

    ¡°Father, Baum actually has connections with our kind of people and have been supplying us with all kinds of goods. In fact, he is one of the leading figures among us!¡± Han Hao said to Han Shuo immediately after they entered the secret chamber.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment and asked puzzlingly, ¡°Your kind of people? What do you mean?¡±

    ¡°Godhunters, that¡¯s what we aremonly called,¡± exined Han Hao. After taking a short, while looking at Han Shuo, he exined, ¡°After our separation, I went to the Death Dominion. Soon after stepping into the Death Dominion, I was hunted by a godhunter who was slightly stronger than I was. It took me a great deal of nning and effort to defeat him. From him, I learned everything about godhunters and the methods of consuming another person¡¯s divine energy. And so I devoured his divine energy. I immediately sensed the growth in my divine energy... ¡°

    From Han Hao¡¯s narration, Han Shuo learned that soon after they separated, he came across a godhunter. That unlucky godhunter had led to Han Hao bing a leading figure in the field of godhunting. After taking the divine energy from the godhunter, Han Hao had been venturing everywhere, looking for other cultivators of the energy of death to improve his strength.

    More than a few hundred experts died to Little Skeleton within a short few decades and his fame soared among the godhuntingmunity. Many fierce and ruthless godhunters volunteered to be his henchmen. Having been used to raising an army in the Netherworld, Little Skeleton knew exactly how to control the bunch of ruthless and fierce gods.

    With that, the godhunter faction led by Little Skeleton gradually grew stronger and stronger. The cruel and savage Han Hao with formidable strength had obtained the trust of his followers. Not only that Little Skeleton had managed to raise his strength to highgodhood within a short time, his followers who originally had puny strength also rapidly improved along. They became a faction of godhunters that everyone in the Death Dominion feared.

    Then,ter in time, some of the leaders of the Godhunter Alliance went to him and invited him to join the Alliance. As to better expand his power and influence, Little Skeleton epted the invitation. He had be an important leadership figure in the Alliance and his influence in the party was still continuing to grow.

    Being one of the leading figures of the Godhunter Alliance, Little Skeleton had the qualifications to know some of their inner secrets. Little Skeleton had made relevant inquiries beforeing to the Space Dominion and learned about Baum¡¯s cooperation with several leadership figures of the godhunters. He had never met Baum before and he did not want Baum to learn about his presence in the City. Therefore, Little Skeleton ran and avoided him as soon as Baum came.

    ¡°You little joker, I didn¡¯t expect that you have actually be a godhunter!¡± After listening to Little Skeleton narrating the whole sequence of events, Han Shuo finally understood why his strength was so much greater than the Elite Zombies. As Han Shuo himself was half a godhunter and as Little Skeleton was a living being that he had brought into existence, he definitely wouldn¡¯t have any ideas just because Little Skeleton became a godhunter. After taking a short pause, Han Shuo asked, ¡°Oh ya, godhunters have an almost uncontroble craving to devour divine energy. Did you manage to ovee the corruption?¡±

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s attentive gazes, Han Hao nodded his head in a natural manner. However he seemed rather confused, ¡°Actually, I have wanted to ask Father about it. Why is it that my followers would get ufortable head to toe if they have not devoured divine energy every once in a while, but I have never felt this way?¡±

    ¡°You have never felt the corruption?¡± Han Shuo was bbergasted. Back then, after the first time Han Shuo devoured another person¡¯s divine energy, he had to take a period of time and a great deal of willpower to ovee the addiction. But Han Hao had never felt it. How was that possible?

    ¡°Yea, ever since the start, I¡¯ve not felt anything different. To me, it¡¯s just about improving my strength. I can immediately withdraw if I feel that an opponent is too strong and could cause me harm. I don¡¯t feel any urges even if I don¡¯t devour any divine energy for years,¡± exined Han Hao.

    Han Shuo was amazed. He thought about it for a moment as he looked at Han Hao up and down before replying, ¡°Perhaps it had something to do with the unique circumstances surrounding your creation. Oh, right, are you cultivating in demonic arts? I sense demon generals in the bone spurs at your back. You refined them?¡±

    ¡°I have started cultivating demonic arts ever since I obtained the memories from Father. Other than demon generals, I also know how to refine demonic weapons! Look at this bone spear, it¡¯s one of the things I¡¯ve refined. Yeah, and my new body ¨C the skin, flesh, and veins ¨C I¡¯ve made them myself!¡± Little Skeleton nodded and excitedly showed off his aplishments to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was stunned. He finally knew why Little Skeleton would be stronger than the Five Elite Zombies, Gilbert, and Bonds ¨C it¡¯s thanks to the cultivation knowledge he had identally passed to Little Skeleton!

 Chapter 825 - Could it be him?

    <strong>GDK 825: Could it be him?</strong>

    ***Ethereal City. Inside a luxurious vi in the southeast region.

    The wounded highgod of thunder, after taking plenty of detours, finally returned to his home. Upon arrival, he scuttled to his secret chamber and used thunder divine essences to heal himself.

    The highgod had suffered quite some injuries in the battle against Little Skeleton. He needed a period before he could regain his full health.

    The divine essences glistened and sparked in his palm as the lightning divine energy slowly filled the damaged areas around his divine body. He could finally start to rx.

    The highgod of thunder¡¯s mind was shrouded with fear after having fought Han Hao. The fusion of the energy of death and demonic arts had produced an extremely strange but wicked energy. Although his strength was not in the least inferior to Little Skeleton, in a battle, the highgod of thunder waspletely on the back foot.

    It was the few bone spurs that caught him by surprise that had caused him the greatest injuries. He could not avoid the bone spurs and his divine body was pierced. This had prevented him from unleashing his full strength in the remainder of the battle.

    While he was resting and recuperating, he suddenly sensed an unusual spacetime fluctuation in his vi. With one thought, a big crystal ball appeared in his hand and he used it to observe around his house. He saw that Baum the City Lord had noiselessly arrived at a secluded spot in his house.

    He kept away the divine essences in his hands and using the crystal ball, he instructed, ¡°Bring the City Lord here!¡±

    Two divine guards immediately moved out from the shadows and respectfully led Baum to the secret chamber. After the two divine guards dismissed themselves, Baum immediately bunched his brows and asked, ¡°Leon, what actually happened?¡±

    ¡°That Celestial Pearl Pharmacy is really, really terrifying! I was upied with that woman and then a teenager abruptly appeared. That teenager had pursued me from the Pharmacy all the way to the stone forest. I just couldn¡¯t shake him off. After battling him, I discovered that I am no match against him!¡± exined the person called Leon in a fearful manner and a frightened face. ¡°If that woman and that teenager were to join forces, I¡¯d have been killed. I finally now believe what you have told me previously ¨C that Bryan ought to have simr strength as yours!¡±

    Leon had suffered a crushing defeat in his attempt to raid the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. His soldiers were all killed and he nearly suffered the same fate. It was a huge blow to him, both physically and mentally. It appeared that he might even just forget about avenging the death of his younger brother.

    Baum coldly groaned after hearing those words. He said, ¡°Leon, have you forgotten who killed your brother? Are you going to tell me that you won¡¯t be taking revenge for your brother?¡±

    Leon forced a smile and then let out a sigh. He replied, ¡°I want to avenge his death. But, if I were to persist, I¡¯m afraid that my entire family n will be joining him! City Lord, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy is too strong for me to handle. If you do not haveplete certainty, please, do not drag my family n into the mess!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t you worry about it. I understand the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy much better than you do. Tonight, at the very least, you have managed to figure out their true strength. The next time that we strike, it will not end up like this. Rest assured, I will only look for you when I¡¯m certain that we can utterly crush them!¡± consoled Baum. After taking a short pause, he asked, ¡°Tell me about that teenager ¨C how he looked, his strength, energy, temperament ¨C I want to know everything.¡±

    ¡°He looked at fifteen or sixteen years old. He has a rather bewitchingly handsome face. He cultivates in the energy of death but his divine energy is rather peculiar. It was not pure but its power was very frightening! He¡¯s umunicative and doesn¡¯t talk at all. From his looks, he should have killed plenty of people before. Ah yes, his attacks were incredibly ruthless. Every strikes his make was to kill. Truly a frightening teenager!¡± fear could be seen on Leon¡¯s face when he talked about Little Skeleton.

    Baum started to share Leon¡¯s uneasiness as he listened to the exnation. But for some reason, the more he heard, the more he felt that he hade across the description of this person before. Then, suddenly, someone came across his mind. His face jolted and he softly cried out, ¡°Could it be him?¡±

    ¡°Who?¡± Leon was stunned and he immediately asked, ¡°City Lord, do you know who he is? What¡¯s his origin? For all the ages I have lived on Elysium, I have never heard of anyone who possessed such terrifying strength at such a young age. Does Your Lordship know?¡±

    ¡°Nothing. You focus on healing your injuries and get to full health. For now, you should avoid going outside as much as possible. I will look for you when I have a surefire n in ce!¡± Upon finishing those words, before Leon could ask any more questions, Baum hurriedly left the vi. He vanished in the blink of an eye.

    ***

    Han Shuo was very happy about Han Hao or Little Skeleton¡¯s arrival. For several days in a row, he had been staying with Han Hao, Han Tu, and Han Huo, discussing all kinds of random things. Han Shuo had also told Han Hao about his understanding and recent discoveries in demonic arts.

    Although Han Tu and Han Huo were there, for some reason, the two understood nothing about the demonic arts that Han Shuo taught. They also did not show any interest in cultivating demonic arts. Han Shuo thought that there was no point in forcing the two to cultivate demonic arts if they did not want to. Therefore he spent most of the effort on Han Hao.

    When Han Shuo started talking about the true essences of demonic arts with Han Hao, he was shocked to discover that Little Skeleton already had an in-depth understanding of it. He was already very skilled at refining weapons, demon generals, and rted fields. He was also adept at deploying demonic formations and using demonic weapons that were driven by the soul. Han Shuo could not help himself but gasp in amazement.

    Han Shuo was also very amazed at the dual-energy in Little Skeleton¡¯s body. He did not expect that just with the portion of memories from his soul, without any guidance from anyone, Little Skeleton could attain such great heights in his cultivation. It was simply miraculous.

    Han Shuo also discovered that Little Skeleton was astonishingly good at understanding profound demonic art concepts. He needed only a moment of thinking to understand even the mostplicated methods of manipting energy. He did not reveal any expression of being confounded from start to finish and had been absorbing demonic arts knowledge from Han Shuo like a sponge.

    Half a month went by like the blink of an eye.

    During that time, Han Shuo and Little Skeleton had been conversing at the secret underground chamber at Celestial Pearl. Although they did not use intimate words that a normal father and son would in their conversation, the two, whose minds were connected, knew that they were closer than any other parent and children in the world. They were so close that they did not need to adorn their rtionship with any extra superfluous words.

    Han Mu, Han Shui, and Han Jin had yet to arrive at Ethereal City and Han Shuo was getting worried yet again. Through Rose, he asked the Ethereal City divine guards to pay attention to those entering the city and to lead anyone called Han Mu, Han Shui, and Han Jin immediately to Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    One day, Han Shuo started talking about Baum the Ethereal City City Lord. He told him about McKinley¡¯s presence and the reason he remained friendly to Baum for now. Little Skeleton thought in silence for a moment before he suddenly said to Han Shuo, ¡°Father, I have an idea. I might be able to find out from Baum where the divine body is hidden!¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s your n?¡± Han Shuo was rather astonished. He said, ¡°The highgod of thunder has managed to escape. Baum might have learned of your identity from that guy. I don¡¯t think that Baum would trust you if you look for him now.¡±

    ¡°I can get other godhunter leaders to ask him. As long as the price is right, they will surely help me with it!¡± Little Skeleton waggled his eyebrows and exined, ¡°In the world of godhunters, there are no friends and no rtionships. There are only profits! With enough money, they would do anything and everything for you!¡±

    ¡°Crystal coins are no issue. If you think it¡¯ll work, there¡¯s no harm in trying!¡± said Han Shuo in a faint smile after he thought about it for a moment.

    ¡°Then I need to take a trip outside Ethereal City. Father, in the future, we should avoid meeting in public ces. My reputation isn¡¯t so good in other Dominions. If others were to learn about our rtionship, it will not be good for your Celestial Pearl Pharmacy,¡± said Little Skeleton after hesitating for a moment.

    ¡°We will talk about it in the future. You be careful out there,¡± Han Shuo was worried about the same thing. He had learned from Little Skeleton that his godhunter followers in several other dominions were notorious for their misdeeds. If the public were to learn of their rtionship, it will severely impact the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. But for the moment, Han Shuo did not have a good solution for this potential issue.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, father. There are only a few in the world who could stop me from escaping, and Baum is not one of them!¡± said Little Skeleton confidently. As a cultivator of demonic arts, Little Skeleton also knew many bizarre but miraculous methods of escaping. Therefore, it was not an oundish im.

    Han Shuo nodded smilingly. Ever since he learned that Little Skeleton had the strength to injure a mid-stage highgod expert and was cultivating multiple types of demonic arts, Han Shuo became truly at ease about Little Skeleton¡¯s safety.

    Although the Elysium was enormous and it housed arge number of powerful experts, Han Shuo reckoned that only a very small number of gods were capable of killing Little Skeleton. Therefore, after hearing that Little Skeleton wanted to leave for some time, Han Shuo agreed to it straightforwardly.

    Five days after Little Skeleton left, Han Shuo, who had been anxiously waiting for Han Mu, Han Shui, and Han Jin, finally received the news.

    The news came from Myles, the local manager for Goldstone Enterprise. Myles wasn¡¯t looking happy when he showed up. He informed Han Shuo that Han Jin had arrived at the Goldstone branch at Ethereal City, but he was severely injured!

    Han Shuo¡¯s face immediately turned cold. Without saying a word, he left Celestial Pearl Pharmacy with Myles and rushed to the Goldstone store.

    When Han Shuo entered the secret chamber in the Goldstone store, he saw Han Jin who was in poor health. Han Jin, a cultivator of the metal energy, looked very frail and weak at this moment. As soon as he saw Han Shuo, with great difficulty, he forced a smile and struggled to sit up.

    Han Shuo hastily stepped forward and held him before channeling his demonic yuan to Han Jin¡¯s body. ¡°Don¡¯t speak. Your injuries are severe. We need to stabilize your condition first!¡± Han Shuo carefully took out a golden and shining pelleted medicine and stuffed it into Han Jin¡¯s mouth. He chewed the medicine and swallowed it.

    Han Jin¡¯s face immediately started to look healthier after taking the gold-nugget like medicine and could be seen slowly improving.

 Chapter 826 - Rising Star

    GDK 826: Rising Star

    Although Han Jin possessed Goldstone Enterprise, as the wealthiest of the Five Elite Zombies, Han Jin was not particrly great in strength. Goldstone Enterprise, as an energy crystal tradingpany, also did not possess a particrly powerful military unit. On thest trip to Ethereal City, Han Jin had carried many rare and precious rocks from another Dominion.

    The information about their journey was somehow leaked. While his caravan was crossing the outskirts of the Fringe, they were attacked by a group of raiders. Not only that Han Jin had lost all the precious rocks he carried, but all of the shop workers that traveled with him were also killed.

    If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that there was a mountainous region nearby and his shop workers sacrificed their lives to hold back the raiders for him to escape, Han Jin might have perished.

    Using his magical innate power, Han Jin paved a tunnel through the mountains and lost himself from the raiders. He then managed to return to Ethereal City by himself. The rare minerals which he gathered from other Dominions were gone. He was the only survivor of the attack.

    After the gold-nugget like pelleted medicine entered Han Jin¡¯s stomach, a miraculous yuan energy gently spread around his body. Strands of yuan energies filled his limbs and bones, slowly healing his damaged organs and veins...

    While traveling to Ethereal City, Han Shuo had been collecting all kinds of rare, magical medicinal ingredients and used them to refine certain medicines useful for the Five Elite Zombies to replenish the yuan energies they exhausted.

    While the yuan energy was dissolving in Han Jin¡¯s body and slowly nourishing his body, Han Shuo, using his demonic yuan, carefully nursed his injuries. Han Jin¡¯s pale white face finally had a shade of redness.

    Half an hour into the treatment, Han Jin started coughing violently and puked out a puddle of filthy, foul-smelling blood. He suddenly seemed to have gotten much better. Then, he forced a smile and said to the worried Han Shuo, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Father. I¡¯m alright now!¡±

    Han Shuo did not reply but continued to probe Han Jin¡¯s body condition using his consciousness. Then, after a long while, Han Shuo heaved a light breath and seemed a little tired as he said, ¡°Your injuries are severe. Luckily I have been carrying medicines of the five elemental yuans and some rejuvenation pills. Otherwise, the injuries will surely leave a permanent effect!¡±

    ¡°Hehe, I knew that Father will be here, therefore I rushed to the City at all costs,¡± said Han Jin weakly in a smile. He took a lot of effort to sit up against the wall and refused Han Shuo¡¯s assistance.

    ¡°Do you know who did it?¡± asked Han Shuo as his eyes suddenly turned chillingly cold.

    ¡°I remember their faces and I can recognize them when I see them. But I¡¯m not familiar with the Fringe and I do not know their identities,¡± said Han Jin. He then closed his eyes to recall the battle and described the faces of every attacker to Han Shuo.

    Like Han Jin, Han Shuo did not have much understanding about characters living in the Fringe and he also could not identify the attackers. ¡°Here is a hundred Metal Yuan Revitalizing Pills. Take five of it every day without interruption until you have finished the whole bottle. Focus on healing your injuries, we will talk after you have recovered,¡± Han Shuo instructed Metal Elite Zombie after he took out arge bottle of golden and shiny pelleted medicines.

    ¡°Thank you, Father. I knew I would be alright,¡± replied Han Jin smilingly as he kept away the bottle of medicine.

    Han Shuo then went forward to carry Han Jin and said, ¡°Come to Celestial Pearl Pharmacy with me, it¡¯s safer there. Also, you should meet Little Earth and Little Fire.¡±

    ¡°Wait, I need to leave some instructions,¡± said Han Jin before he called for Myles who had been waiting right outside the door. He gave Myles a bunch of instructions, including not to let other branches know that he was injured and to pay some attention to the situation over in the Fringe to see if, by any chance, that any of his workers survived.

    ***

    In a remote valley near the northwest of the Fringe, a boorish and burly looking man was fiercely conquering a coquettish woman on top of a tree trunk. There was a group of godhunters sitting near them but they turned a blind eye to the activity as though nothing was happening. They were either concentrated on cultivating, studying scrolls in their hands, or wiping clean their divine weapons.

    Then, moments after a rapid increase in the rhythm¡¯s amplitude and frequency, the burly chap let out a long, loud howl of great satisfaction. He then casually pushed the half-conscious woman aside, wrapped his lower body in a piece of hide, and liedfortably on an enormous stone chair. He gazed at the quiet and cool moon hanging at the zenith with his sleepy, half-open eyes as though he was waiting for something.

    Half-an-hourter, an ice-cold looking teenager noiselessly appeared at the valley. He was slowly stepping towards that burly chap at the center of the valley.

    Fierce lights erupted from the eyes of all the godhunters in the valley as soon as they sensed an outsider was approaching. The divine weapons in their hands started to glow as brightly as the ferociousness in their eyes. They were ready to pounce on theer and shred him into pieces.

    However, when they discovered that the person was a teenager, one of his eyes was light-purple, and had seven strange bone spurs sticking from his back, the hostility on their faces immediately vanished and was reced with respect. They automatically part away, clearing a path for the teenager into the valley.

    ¡°Hi, my friend. I heard that you have recently annihted the Leo Family! What a great contribution you have made for us godhunters. So, what¡¯s up? Are you here for business?¡± said the burly guy as he looked at Han Hao in a polite face. He was eating fruits while sitting rxingly on therge chair at the center of the valley.

    ¡°Polo, I havee to ask you for a favor,¡± said Han Hao in a cold voice before he threw a big bag of ck crystal coins under Polo¡¯s feet. ¡°That¡¯s three hundred thousand ck crystal coins. I need you to ask Baum, the Ethereal City City Lord, the location of a space highgod divine body that belonged to someone called McKinley. If you figured out its location, I will give you another two hundred thousand ck crystal coins. And if you can somehow get me the soulless divine body, I will give you another five hundred thousand ck crystal coins on top of everything.¡±

    Polo, who had been lyingzily, suddenly opened his eyes wide and sat up straight. He looked up and down at Han Hao several times before he asked, ¡°Do you know who McKinley is? And his rtionship with Baum?¡±

    ¡°I do,¡± replied Han Hao as he nodded. His purple eye gave off a sh as he said, ¡°I heard that you have lived in the Space Dominion for a while. Surely, you¡¯d know about the story between Baum and McKinley. I also know that you have business dealings with Baum all these while. Those are the reasons I came to you,¡±

    ¡°If you are looking for McKinley¡¯s divine body, it must mean you that have his divine soul. I don¡¯t know how you got his soul, but if McKinley gets his body back, it will definitely cause Baum a lot of trouble. Baum is an important trading partner for me. To damage the trade rtionship for a mere one million ck crystal coins, that doesn¡¯t sound like a profitable deal!¡± said Polo in a peal of gentleughter. Then, he squinted his eyes slightly as he said to Han Hao, ¡°Two million ck crystal coins. I will get you McKinley¡¯s body, even if it means offending Baum! What say you?¡±

    Han Hao nodded and replied, ¡°Very well. I will hand you the rest of the money when you have the divine body.¡±

    ¡°No problem! I know that you are a trustable person!¡± said Polo before he startedughing heartily. He added cordially, ¡°That Baum cannot be considered a true godhunter. That sanctimonious hypocrite with his Ethereal City will never be as close as we are!¡±

    ¡°Keep me updated. I¡¯ll be in Ethereal City,¡± replied Han Hao sinctly. He did not waste words with Polo but indifferently turned on his heels and left the valley.

    Soon after Han Hao left, a godhunter with early-stage highgod strength went to Polo with his brows bunched. He asked in a puzzled manner, ¡°Chief, is it worth offending Baum for a mere two million ck crystal coins? I have heard a little about the feud between McKinley and Baum. Once he gets his body back, he will most certainly go for Baum. Then, when Baum dies, our businesses with Ethereal City would be over. The gains just won¡¯t make up for the losses!¡±

    ¡°Did you see just how young Han Hao is? It took him just fifty years to be one of the leading figures in the Alliance. The troop he leads had annihted many family ns that sought to destroy us godhunters. His poprity and influence are still strongly trending upwards in the Alliance. This youngster has a great future ahead of him! During these years, Han Hao has never failed in any of his endeavors. Now that he wants to get Baum, Baum most likely will not make it. We might as well make some profits off his downfall!¡± exined Polo like a master schemer.

    ¡°But, can he defeat Baum?¡± asked the godhunter.

    ¡°Hehe, recently I¡¯ve received some interesting news, saying that Baum was nearly defeated by a youngster named Bryan. That youngster named Bryan has two sons named Han Huo and Han Tu. Think about it ¨C Han Huo, Han Tu, Han Hao ¨C doesn¡¯t that sound a little more than coincidence?¡± replied Polo in a grave face as he sat upright.

    ¡°My Lord, you mean, Han Hao is rted to that Bryan?!¡±

    ¡°Not sure, but it seems very likely! If this is true, there is no way that Baum won¡¯t be dead! Hehe, before he dies, I might as well trade Han Hao a favor. And in doing so, I might even get two million ck crystal coins. I say there cannot be a more wonderful trade than this!¡± said Polo as heughed heartily. Then, he instructed the godhunter, ¡°Take the three hundred thousand ck crystal coins to Baum, tell him I need to borrow McKinley¡¯s divine body for a few days. Given our rtionship and the number of crystal coins, Baum will definitely hand over the soulless body willingly. Hehe, McKinley has disappeared for so long. Who would have thought that he would return?¡±

    ¡°Understood, my Lord!¡± the godhunter immediately got up to execute the task given to him. But he suddenly paused as a thought came to his mind, ¡°My Lord, Han Hao is in Ethereal City. After I got McKinley¡¯s divine body, should I contact him and directly pass it to him?¡±

    ¡°No, you must not. Ethereal City is filled with energy towers that Baum deployed. He must have ced a tracer in McKinley¡¯s divine body. Do not take that risk. Just leave a message for Han Hao to do the trade here. And remember to carry that divine body carefully. It¡¯s worth two million ck crystal coins!¡± instructed Polo.

    ¡°Yes. Rest assured, my Lord. It will be executed cleanly!¡± pledged the person solemnly.

 Chapter 827 - Itâ€™s a casual thing

    <strong>GDK 827: It¡¯s a casual thing</strong>

    *** Outside the Ethereal City, in the depth of a dense jungle.

    A young couple was engaging in a very exciting and vigorous exercise. Although they had been trying to keep their noises low, it nheless spread far and wide. Thirty meters away, a very handsome teenager who looked like a sixteen or seventeen years old mortal was making water bubbles out of boredom. One after another, water bubbles floated out from his palms. They gently revolved in mid-air like crystal balls.

    Half-an-hourter, the moaning from the depth of the jungle became louder and louder. The young man bunched his brows, frowned, shook his head, and sighed. After another ten minutes, the moaning sound hadpletely stopped and yet, the activity in that region only seemed to be getting more and more vigorous. There was no sign that it was going to stop soon.

    ¡°Little Wood, are you done yet?¡± the handsome teenager could not be more bored. He shouted, ¡°Father must be anxious that we aren¡¯t there yet. Can you hurry up and finish it?¡±

    ¡°Right away! Right away!¡± replied the exercising youngster and he increased the frequency of his action. He turned the beauty who had passed out long ago around, pressed her against the tree and then carried on with his expedition.

    After a long long while, a thin, tall, muscr, and just as handsome teenager slowly walked out from the jungle in a satisfied face while holding up his pants. He looked at Han Shui who was condensing water vapor bubbles and smilingly asked, ¡°Creating life is such a pleasurable recreation. Why is it that you have no interest at all towards this exercise of love?¡±

    ¡°You have been ¡®creating life¡¯ all along the journey, but have you actually created any life?¡± Han Shui rolled his eyes. The spinning water bubbles suddenly flew towards Han Mu and they turned arge pool of water. It poured down on Han Mu and washed off all the scent on his body.

    ¡°No. I¡¯ve been wondering about this actually. I really need to ask Father about this. Why is it that a good kid like me who is filled with life has failed to create any life for all these while?¡± Han Mu then put on a mischievous smile and said, ¡°But perhaps you can. Why don¡¯t you give it a try? That woman is pretty fine and she is still unconscious. Carpe diem!¡±

    Han Shui immediately put on a disgusted face and replied, ¡°Eww filthy!¡±

    ¡°Hahaha. Alright, let¡¯s carry on with our journey. I have not seen Father for a long time and I¡¯m really missing him!¡± said Han Muughingly. He knew that Han Shui has disgust for such activities. He flung his dripping wet hair and with a grin on his face, he started walking in the direction of Ethereal City.

    ¡°Wait, what about thatdy?¡± Han Shui bunched his brows and said, ¡°You have done this to nine differentdies, and I¡¯m only counting those you met on our way here. You always leave them to themselves after making them pass out. Do you not have the slightest sense of responsibility?¡±

    ¡°This is called a hookup, casual sex. You are not expected to make anymitment. What responsibility do you mean?¡± Han Mu shrugged and said, ¡°We were together only to pleasure each other physically, no strings attached! There are no fussy norms or rules that we are expected to follow. Don¡¯t be so outdated and pedantic!¡±

    ¡°Fine. Let¡¯s move on,¡± replied Han Shui. He was having a headache and was afraid that thedy would bother them and not let go when she woke up. ¡°Little Wood, this is going to be thest time I¡¯ll do you a sentry duty. The noises you make were horrendous!¡±

    ¡°What a prude!¡± Han Mu rebutted, ¡°Why is it that you have not inherited this excellent and admirable trait of our father? Look at him, he would have fun wherever he goes. What a wonderful and unrestrained life he¡¯s living! I learned it all from our father. Why are you so slow at learning this?¡±

    Han Shui forced a smile and shook his head. He did not try to dispute it as although Han Mu might be exaggerating, there was some truth to it.

    ........

    Half a dayter, Han Mu and Han Shui had walked out from the jungle and entered a small fort near the Ethereal City.

    Soon after stepping into the fort, a youngdy standing outside a gymnasium suddenly shrieked crazily, ¡°Han Mu! You bastard! I have finally found you!¡±

    Two more youngdies located not far away were alerted by that shout. Right away, they red at Han Mu and shouted, ¡°Han Mu! Don¡¯t you run now! Didn¡¯t you promise to always be at my side? You scoundrel, how could you disappear while I was asleep! You didn¡¯t even leave me a note!¡±

    The threedies came from three different forces. One was in a small family n, one operated a small business, and another was a divine guard squad leader from some city. After the shouting, the three noticed each other and they suddenly realized that they weren¡¯t the only person Han Mu had fornicated.

    The anger that had been brewing in them for all these while, erupted. The three young and beautifuldies became abnormally enraged and they charged at Han Mu like tigresses. They wanted to vent their anger on Han Mu.

    Han Mu made a grimace and hastily said to Han Shui, ¡°Little Water, hurry and run! This ce is dangerous!¡±

    Han Mu turned on his heels and started running as though he was very afraid of getting caught by thedies. As he ran, he shouted, ¡°Cici, Mimi, Annie, do you have to be so serious? We are all just fooling around. Being so clingy isn¡¯t part of the game! Mimi, didn¡¯t you say that I¡¯m your only love just a few days ago? How could you be so fierce to me now?¡±

    ¡°Han Mu! I¡¯ll kill you!¡± that beauty called Mimi charged at threateningly. She sent out unprecise radiation sts, causing coteral injuries to the innocent gods who had just entered the fort.

    ¡°Little Water! Run! Don¡¯t get caught!¡± shouted Han Mu as he fled by weaving through the crowd. He seemed very practiced at that and managed to vanish in no time.

    The handsome face of Han Shui was filled with helplessness. He discovered that he couldn¡¯t run nearly as fast as Han Mu. Moments after trying to frantically flee, he found himself surrounded by the threedies. Han Shui was feeling quite annoyed that he had to suffer such an ordeal every once in a while. He thought, <i>When I see Father, I must tell him about this. This fe is getting out of hand!</i>

    ¡°Ladies, I have nothing to do with him. Why are you surrounding me?¡± said Han Shui in a forced smile as he tried to distance himself from Han Mu.

    ¡°Why would he ask you to run if you have nothing to do with him? Also, you wouldn¡¯t be running from us!¡± shouted the beauty called Mimi. ¡°You won¡¯t be going anywhere until Han Mu shows himself!¡±

    ¡°It has nothing to do with me!¡± Han Shuo hastily exined, ¡°I only got acquainted with him while I¡¯m traveling here. I¡¯m not close to him at all. There¡¯s no point in catching me just because you couldn¡¯t get him!¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t care! Han Mu has promised to marry me! If you get him back to me, I will set you free. Otherwise, you won¡¯t be going anywhere!¡± said thedy called Annie. She gestured andmanded, ¡°Surround him!¡± A squad of divine guards immediately started to approach Han Shui menacingly.

    ¡°Bitch, who are you? Why would Han Mu marry you? Know your ce!¡°

    ¡°He said I¡¯m the only one he loved. You all get lost! Don¡¯t be so shameless to steal my man!¡±

    ¡°Shameless? You are the shameless one! He is mine!¡±

    Before Han Shui could make any more exnation, the threedies started a fierce mouth fight in the middle of the street. It appeared likely that it will escte to a battle to the death over Han Mu.

    ¡°Ahem... Stop fighting! Listen to me!¡± shouted Han Shui as he cursed Han Mu in his mind. Then, when the threedies simultaneously gathered their gazes on Han Shui, he put on a straight face and said, ¡°He had said those words not just to the three of you, but many, many moredies. Stop being foolish. He doesn¡¯t care about any of you!¡±

    ¡°Friend, I don¡¯t care if you have anything to do with him or not, but you are going nowhere!¡± a well-built middle-aged man with a face filled with knife scars joined the party. He stood beside the beauty called Mimi and said, ¡°Since he had deflowered my daughter, then he must betroth my daughter! I don¡¯t care who he is, but he must take responsibility for his actions! Otherwise, not just him, but even you will be out of luck!¡±

    The scar-faced middle-aged man possessed early-stage highgod strength. He cultivated in the energy of fire. He seemed to be repressing his anger and he had considered himself kind for not immediately killing Han Shui!

    <i>Goddammit you wretched Han Mu, what do you want me to do now?!</i> Han Shui could not be more vexed. He was trapped by three different powerful forces. He racked his brain on how to escape.

    ¡°Apprehend him!¡± the middle-aged man gestured and instructed his men to capture Han Shui.

    ¡°Don¡¯t you touch him, this guy is mine!¡± shouted thedy called Annie.

    Then, suddenly, a three-way fight started. They were fighting openly on the street for Han Shui. The threedies fought each other while loudly cursing each other as shameless bitches. The entrance to the fort suddenly turned into an upheaval scene. All the gods nearby were stunned by what they saw.

    ¡°Who is this Han Mu guy? To have three beauties openly fighting in the public over him ¨C What a legend! Damn, I¡¯d die to have half the luck he has with women!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve heard of him. He¡¯s from the Life Dominion. It is said that he would screw around anywhere he goes. He is an infamous womanizer. Countless beauties had been ruined by him.¡±

    ¡°Fucking hell, why is this person in Ethereal City? Everyone better keep an eye on your girlfriend and don¡¯t let her be stolen by that bastard!¡±

    ¡°How could the Life Dominion produce such a scum? Sigh, the world is really getting more and more degenerate. I¡¯m surprised that he had yet to be murdered by any woman.¡±

    ¡°That fe has his sight set on every beauty in the world, iming he does so with the sacred goal of creating life. Hell, against reason, there are whores out there who willingly let themselves be deceived by him. I really wonder how that youngster did it!¡±

    ¡°You fat fuck, who did you call whore?! I¡¯ll whore you!¡± Mimi who was in the middle of a battle suddenly turned her crosshair to that by-standing fatty and bombarded him with fierce radiant attacks.

    .....

    ¡°Little Water! Little Water! Run!¡± when things were at its most chaotic, the sneaky Han Mu softly cried from a corner of a gymnasium. All the trees in the region seemed to have turned alive. The tree branches started waving among the crowd like a big broom, causing the scene to be even more chaotic.

    Han Shui immediately reacted. While no one was noticing him, he hastily flew into the by-standing crowd and fled under the cover of the big trees. After Han Shui and Han Mu reunited, the two no longer dared stay in the fort a second longer. They immediately left the fort and rushed for Ethereal City.

 Chapter 828 - Stand down!

    <strong>GDK 828: Stand down!</strong>

    ¡°This is all your fault!¡±ined Han Shui as soon as the two escaped from the fort. If the threedies had not started fighting each other, Han Shui might have been captured. This was not the first time he found himself in such a situation.

    ¡°Hell, how would I know that those women will be so damn clingy? I think from now on, I will only target those who are married. They are the most straightforward and would always part smoothly and cleanly after the act,¡± said Han Mu.

    ¡°Where you think you are going, Han Mu?¡± a roar sounded the distance. Then, the brawny middle-aged man could be seen rapidly closing the vast distances between them. His midgod henchmen were also flying behind him at high speed.

    Han Mu and Han Shui turned to look at each other. They did not expect to be caught up soon after escaping from the fort with great effort. They felt somewhat helpless.

    That middle-aged man whose face was covered with scars was an early-stage highgod of fire. Heunched an attack while flying towards the two. A raging stream of fire shot towards the sky, flew over the heads of Han Mu and Han Shui, and formed an enormous fire-wall in their path. The me traveled much faster than the two and it overtook the two in no time.

    Although Han Mu and Han Shui had a profound understanding of the energy they cultivated, the energy contained in their body, however, wasgging far behind. When the fire produced by a highgod raged in their path, they had no choice but to stop flying.

    ¡°Why don¡¯t we try to break through this fire-wall by merging our energy using the Formation? As long as we make it through this in and enter the dense forest ahead, they wouldn¡¯t be able to catch us!¡± Han Mu proposed to Han Shui. He was confident that with his mastery over the energy of life, once they entered a dense forest, no one will be able to locate them.

    ¡°Toote, it seems!¡± said Han Shui in a grimace. The pursuing party arrived as they spoke. It was indeed toote to try anything.

    ¡°Ah fuck! Godamnit!¡± cursed Han Mu softly. After looking all around him, for the first time ever, he felt a sense of remorse. He thought that he shouldn¡¯t have pulled Han Shui into the mess.

    ¡°Han Mu, ept your fate,¡± said the brawny middle-aged man as he approached them step by step. ¡°As long as you marry my daughter, I will let bygones be bygones. Or else, I will give both of you hell!¡±

    ¡°I have absolutely no feelings at all for your daughter. What¡¯s the point in forcing me to marry her?¡± said Han Mu in a wry smile. His eyes had been constantly scanning the surroundings.

    ¡°Capture them!¡± The brawny man seemed to know that Han Mu was excellent in the art of fleeing. He stopped wasting words with them and instructed his men to capture the two before they could try anything.

    The midgods had wanted to give the two a good whacking long ago. They charged at the two upon hearing themand.

    It was at this time that an ear-piercing whistle abruptly sounded in the night sky. Multiple shadows that were as incisive as knives pieces into those midgods who tried to capture Han Shui and Han Mu. Then came an explosion. A burst of sinister energy pounded the midgods and threw them off bnce. None of them could touch Han Mu and Han Shui.

    ¡°Big brother!¡± cried Han Mu and Han Shui simultaneously in surprise. They could not be happier.

    Little Skeleton, or Han Hao, swept his cold eyes across all the midgods that had been paralyzed before slowly turning to that highgod of fire. He raised his three-meter long bone spear at the middle-aged brawny man and in an emotionless face, he warned, ¡°You step forward, you die!¡±

    The middle-aged brawny man was enraged when he was that his henchmen were paralyzed after being struck by a strange energy. When he was about to make an attack himself, he suddenly noticed that the space all around him was filled with terrifyingly wicked energy that came out of nowhere. After creasing his brows and carefully sensing the energy, the man turned pale with fright. He cried, ¡°Who are you? What¡¯s your rtionship with Han Mu?¡±

    Han Hao did not answer but stared at him indifferently for a moment. Then, Han Hao turned to the inexplicably excited Han Mu and Han Shui and said, ¡°Let¡¯s go,¡± before walking in the direction of the Ethereal City as though the highgod of fire wasn¡¯t there.

    Han Mu and Han Shui giggled mischievously while making an insulting hand gesture at that highgod of fire. Then, they too turned their backs at the highgod and left with Little Skeleton happily.

    The few midgods who had finally got back to their feet felt so insulted by the trio that they nearly lost their minds. As soon as they got up, they started cursing and charged at the three, wanting to chop them into pieces.

    ¡°Stand down!¡±manded the middle-aged brawny man. When his henchmen looked at him with puzzled gazes, he again shouted, ¡°Do not pursue!¡±

    ¡°But, my Lord... ¡°

    The middle-aged brawny man raised one hand to stop his henchman fromining and gazed at Han Hao who was slowly leaving. He said, ¡°Don¡¯t speak. We will go home.¡±

    Although the group of midgods was puzzled, they did not dare to ask orin. They hung their heads down dejectedly and followed their master home.

    ¡°Father? Did you catch him? Where is he?¡± shouted the beauty called Mimi excitedly.

    ¡°From now on, you will not mention that Han Mu guy anymore!¡± The brawny man suddenly put on a stern face and instructed in a deep voice, ¡°He is not a person that we could touch. For the sake of our family n, you better forget about him, the sooner the better!¡±

    ¡°Why, father? How could you do this to me?¡± Mimi¡¯s father had never been so stern to her before. Tears had started rolling in the rims of her eyes.

    ¡°I cannot let the entire family n be annihted just because of you! Mimi, bear this in mind ¨C you will never ever again look for Han Mu! Or else, I will just lock you up!¡± warned the brawny man coldly without sparing Mimi¡¯s feelings.

    ¡°My Lord, those two youngsters, do they have that kind of strength?¡± asked one of the confused midgod henchmen.

    ¡°Han Mu and Han Shui do not have that strength. But as to that youngster who showed up after, he¡¯s definitely not one that I can defeat!¡± The brawny man turned to his henchman and said, ¡°That youngster carried a strong killing intent. He is definitely not a merciful person. Had we recklessly attacked just then, all of us would have died, myself included.¡±

    The midgods were dumbstruck after hearing those words. Even Mimi turned silent and she no longer med her father for being so harsh.

    ***

    ¡°What was that about?¡± Han Hao asked his younger brothers soon after they stepped into an expansive mountain range just outside Ethereal City.

    ¡°Ask that fucker!¡± said Han Shui as he red at Han Mu.

    Han Mu felt a guilty conscience when Han Hao also started stared at him. He told Han Hao a summary of his deeds.

    Han Hao was a great listener. It was after Han Mu gave the whole story that he creased his brows slightly and reprimanded, ¡°Be more careful next time. And put more energy on cultivation instead!¡±

    ¡°Yes, brother,¡± replied Han Mu with his heads low. He was a little afraid of Han Hao and didn¡¯t dare to make rebuttals.

    ¡°All that left is the two of you. Father has been very anxious. He is going to leave the city to look for you if you don¡¯t get there soon.¡±

    Han Mu and Han Shui were excited when Han Shuo was mentioned. They simultaneously asked, ¡°How is Father doing?¡±

    Han Hao thought for a moment and replied, ¡°Very good.¡±

    .....

    ***Ethereal City, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    Baum personally came to visit Han Shuo¡¯s pharmacy. After walking around the shop, he followed Han Shuo into the guest¡¯s lounge. He casually asked, ¡°Right, I heard that there have been thieves who tried to raid the shop. How are you dealing with it?¡±

    ¡°We get clowns who try to sneak inside every once in a while. Don¡¯t worry, City Lord, they can¡¯t do us any harm,¡± replied Han Shuo smilingly. Then, he gestured at Rose, Han Huo, and Han Tu to retreat before he asked, ¡°City Lord, have youe here with an update?¡±

    Baum nodded. He withdrew a magical mirror and it began hovering in mid-air. He exined, ¡°That friend of mine does not live in Ethereal City. I usuallymunicate with him with a magical mirror. Instead of meeting face-to-face, is it alright if you talk to him through the device?¡±

    Han Shuo bunched his brows and thought for a moment before he replied, ¡°Fine.¡±

    Baum then proceeded with inserting a strand of his divine energy into the magical mirror. The energy crystals embedded around the mirror started shining. A blurry figure appeared in the mirror and gradually turned clear.

    ¡°I¡¯ve long looked forward to meeting you. I¡¯m very honored to do business with Celestial Pearl Pharmacy!¡± a hoarse voice sounded from the mirror as a middle-aged man with messy red hair appeared.

    ¡°You are?¡± Han Shuo immediately put all his attention on the person. He could not detect the aura of this person through the magical mirror and therefore could not determine his strength.

    ¡°I¡¯m Lehi. I¡¯m currently in the Light Dominion,¡± the red-haired middle-aged man briefly introduced himself before he put on a big smile and said, ¡°I have full confidence that Celestial Pearl Pharmacy will produce quality products. As long as you agree, we can begin our cooperation right away. Baum can hand you the first batch of payment immediately.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, if you agree, I can deliver you Lehi¡¯s five hundred thousand ck crystal coins right now. Here, this list. All that you need to do is deliver me the medicines written here!¡± interrupted Baum as he handed Han Shuo a long list of medicines.

    Han Shuo took just one nce at the little piece of paper and took no time to notice that most of the medicines listed were illegal substances. If Baum, the City Lord of Ethereal City cooperated with him on the transaction, there shouldn¡¯t be any problem for Han Shuo in Ethereal City. It seemed as though no harm coulde out of the deal.

    However, Han Shuo did not immediately ept the business proposal. Instead, after smilingly receiving the list from Baum, he replied, ¡°I will not take the crystal coins for now. I need to ask my pharmacists if they could get me the medicines on the list. We will talk again if they think they could do it.¡±

    Lehi seemed rather surprised as though he did not expect Han Shuo to be such an overly careful person ¨C to be so cautious even when there seemed to be nothing for Han Shuo to lose and everything to gain. As he looked at Han Shuo in a somewhat baffled manner, he asked, ¡°Given the ability of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, you are definitely capable of producing the medicines on the list. Baum is the City Lord of Ethereal City. Do you have any other worries?¡±

    ¡°Well, not really. It¡¯s just that I have too few pharmacists over here. I¡¯m not sure if I can produce the medicines on time, even with five hundred thousand ck crystal coins. That¡¯s why I need tomunicate with them first,¡± replied Han Shuo politely as he provided a fair excuse.

    Lehi thought for a moment before he nodded and smilingly said, ¡°Very well, I like your approach at doing business ¨C you have a sense of responsibility to your customer. Alright, I look forward to hearing good news from you!¡±

    Lehi then cut off the telemeeting. Baum did not say any other things regarding the transaction but talked about some random, irrelevant things with Han Shuo before he took his leave.

 Chapter 829 - Dirty thoughts

    <strong>GDK 829: Dirty thoughts</strong>

    Han Shuo was finally reunited with Han Mu and Han Shui. He was betweenughter and tears he learned about Han Mu¡¯s misdeeds from Han Shui, and especially when Han Mu rebutted by saying that he had inherited the ¡®excellent trait¡¯ of his.

    Han Shuo thought that he was excellent at sex. But after hearing about Han Mu¡¯s ¡®aplishments¡¯, he immediately felt that he paled inparison. Han Shuo did not know if he should be d or angry about it.

    ¡°From now on, you better exercise more self-control so you don¡¯t create even many troubles! Also, don¡¯t touchdies that you should not, those young ones especially ¨C they usually don¡¯t have a rational mind. And ... ¡° Han Shuo lectured Han Mu on and on.

    Han Mu was sitting upright and still with his head slightly lowered as though he was ashamed of his misdeeds. In his mind, however, hepletely disagreed with Han Shuo¡¯s lecture. He secretly peeked at Rose as he thought, <i>You ask me to exercise self-control while you bring a beauty by your side to satisfy your urges. How hypocritical!</i>

    The body of the Five Elite Zombies contained Han Shuo¡¯s Blood Essences. They were all produced by him and he knew exactly what they were thinking. When Han Shuo noticed that Han Mu was having dirty thoughts about him and Rose and that it was getting more and more explicit, Han Shuo suddenly turned angry. He shouted, ¡°You perverted bastard, what the hell are you thinking? I do not have that kind of rtionship with Rose!¡±

    Rose was there for amusement and she found it very interesting that Han Shuo would be lecturing his son. She was shocked by that sudden furious shout of Han Shuo¡¯s and she was no longer amused. Her face immediately turned dark and she started ring at Han Mu.

    ¡°Erm... I forgot that Father can read what I¡¯m thinking... ¡° Han Mu scratched his head embarrassingly. He hastily apologized to Rose, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, so sorry. Although I know my Father well enough that he would have done something, I shouldn¡¯t have imagined the two of you getting it on. Sorry! Please don¡¯t be angry!¡±

    ¡°You have a filthy mind!¡± Rose turned even more furious, stood up from her seat, and shouted. ¡°I have been beside him for so many years but he had never done anything inappropriate to me. You need to get your disgusting brain cleansed!¡°

    ¡°How is that possible?!¡± Han Mu was astonished. He looked at Han Shuo and mumbled for a moment before he asked in a low voice, ¡°Father, have your ability in that aspect waned because you have too many women?¡± Han Mu then scratched his head puzzlingly and thought aloud, ¡°But that shouldn¡¯t be possible. Father is fantastic at that. He should be able to handle more.¡±

    Rose was embarrassed and livid. She cursed under her breath and left with a red face.

    ¡°Young fe, getting more and more unruly aren¡¯t you?!¡± Han Shuo grew furious after hearing Han Mu¡¯s offensive words. He angrily shouted, ¡°You are grounded! From now on, you are not allowed to leave a step from Celestial Pearl until you¡¯ve learned your lesson!¡±

    ¡°What? Noooo! There aren¡¯t any decent-looking beauties in the Pharmacy. Even the only good-looking one belonged to Father. How am I going to live?!¡± When Han Mu heard that he was going to be grounded, he immediately started to plead pitifully. He repeatedly imed that he will listen to Han Shuo¡¯s words and will not mess around anymore.

    ¡°Han Hao, you will watch over him!¡± Han Shuo instructed Little Skeleton. He knew that he must not be lenient to the stubborn little womanizer.

    Han Hao nodded coldly and cast his emotionless eyes at Han Mu before saying, ¡°You better behave yourself!¡±

    Han Mu knew that Han Shuo was very loving and merciful to him and his brother, and therefore wasn¡¯t particrly afraid of Han Shuo. Little Skeleton, however, had been leading and disciplining them since they started out in the Netherworld and Little Skeleton had been strict towards them. Therefore, he was more afraid of Little Skeleton than Han Shuo. Han Mu immediately turned silent after reprimanded by Han Hao. He turned to Han Shui, Han Tu, and the others with pity-looking eyes, hoping that they will plead for him.

    Han Mu¡¯s brothers, especially Han Shui, however, were all wearing schadenfreude smiles.

    After lecturing Han Mu, Han Shuo took a deep breath and calmed his mind. He politely asked Little Skeleton, ¡°How did your trip go?¡±

    ¡°I went to the leader of a godhunter faction living in the Fringe who has good rtions with Baum. He has promised me to get McKinley¡¯s divine body from Baum. Rest assured, Father. Although that person is greedy and puts personal profit before everything, he is very capable. Given that he dared to ept my money, he must have certainty in delivering his promise.¡± replied Han Hao.

    ¡°That¡¯s great! If we can get our hands on McKinley¡¯s divine body, hehe, the Ethereal City is gonna have a new City Lord! I originally nned to leave for the Fringe as soon as all of you are present. But now, I think we¡¯ll wait and see,¡± said Han Shuo smilingly.

    ¡°Father, what are you going to the Fringe for?¡± asked the surprised Little Skeleton. It was then that he first learned of Han Shuo¡¯s destination.

    As there were no outsiders with them, Han Shuo openly informed them of his ns. He also told them that his family n was being ousted in the City of Shadows and they needed to evacuate the City eventually.

    After listening to the whole story from Han Shuo, Little Skeleton pondered silently for a moment before he suggested, ¡°Father, if you¡¯d like to stay in the City of Shadow, we can go there with you and help you kill those people. Given Father¡¯s strength and with our assistant, taking down the entire City of Shadows should be no problem!¡±

    ¡°Hell yeah, City of Shadows or Hushveil, we ain¡¯t afraid of them!¡± Han Huo immediately agreed. He shouted, ¡°That dotard called Wa-ss is courting death. We might as well go there and kill them all, then Father will be the City Lord of the City of Shadows!¡±

    After hearing Han Hao and Han Huo¡¯s words, the other little fes immediately voiced their agreement. It appeared that after all these years on Elysium, they have be more and morebative.

    Han Shuo forced a smile and shook his head. He exined, ¡°That won¡¯t work. Although Wace is wary of me, I¡¯m still good friends with other members of the Sainte Family. I cannot betray them. Also, Little Water and Little Wood won¡¯t be able to live in the Darkness Dominion because of the energy they cultivate.¡± After taking a short pause, Han Shuo put on a faint smile and continued, ¡°But most importantly, I feel that the City of Shadows is just a little too small. Our House of Han needs a much bigger space to grow. Hehe, the Fringe is much bigger than the City of Shadows and Ethereal City. It is also filled with powerful experts. That is the ce where the House of Han should be!¡±

    The Five Elite Zombies smiled and nodded after listening to Han Shuo¡¯s exnation while Han Hao remained silent but his eyes started glinting.

    ¡°Okay!¡± Han Hao nodded.

    ¡°Alright, now that the five of you are finally reunited, go underground and practice the Penta-Elemental Undead Formation!¡± Han Shuo instructed the Five Elite Zombies. The Penta-Elemental Undead Formation could exponentially increase the firepower of the Five Elite Zombies. The power unleashed by the Formation will also get stronger as their strengths improved. The Five had obtained a significant improvement in strengths during thest fifty years. Han Shuo believed that the current Penta-Elemental Undead Formation should have no problem killing a highgod.

    .....

    Ten days went by. While Han Shuo was cultivating, through his demon general, he suddenly discovered that Baum was receiving a highgod.

    With one thought, Han Shuo summoned Little Skeleton who was training the Five Elite Zombies deep underground. When Han Hao surfaced and entered the gymnasium, Han Shuo immediately started describing to him the appearance of the highgod.

    ¡°He is a henchman of Polo. He must be there for McKinley¡¯s divine body!¡± said Little Skeleton confidently after hearing a description of the person.

    Han Shuo was ted. He smilingly eximed, ¡°Finally!¡± before he gathered all his attention and carefully monitored the activities in the City Lord¡¯s manor.

    As soon as the person stepped into the manor, he was summoned to meet in Baum¡¯s secret chamber. The secret chamber hadyers uponyers of defensive boundaries, among which was space edict boundaries that were beyond miraculous. It would be impossible to sneak inside without being detected even with a demon general refined from a highgod soul.

    However, it doesn¡¯t worry Han Shuo for he knew that the highgod will be carrying McKinley¡¯s divine body. The highgod will eventually exit the secret chamber and leave the manor house. If he carried McKinley¡¯s divine body, he could follow the highgod using the demon general.

    After observing for a moment, through the demon general, Han Shuo sensed an intense space-time fluctuationing from the secret chamber. Evidently, Baum had ripped apart space-time in the secret chamber, perhaps withdrawing McKinley¡¯s divine body from a space-time fissure.

    Han Shuo had searched the manor house using his demon generals many times before but had discovered no sign of McKinley¡¯s divine body. After thinking about it, Han Shuo guessed that Baum might have hidden the divine body in a space-time fissure in another dimension. As a cultivator of the edict of space, this would be the most secure way of storing things.

    And the fact proved that Han Shuo¡¯s guess was spot on. A momentter, the space-time fluctuation gradually died down. And around ten minutester, that highgod henchman of Polo¡¯s came out with a massive bag. He quietly left the house through the backdoor.

    Baum, behind the windows of the highest floor of the highest building, stood silently as he watched the person leave his manor. From his face, it appeared as though he was somewhat worried.

    ¡°He will exit the City right away. There are energy towers of Baum¡¯s everywhere. We cannot take the body directly. Let¡¯s exit the City as well,¡± Han Shuo said to Little Skeleton.

    ¡°Father, we cannot kill that person. If he is dead, Polo will know that I did it. Also, there is honour among godhunters. Besides, when we join the Fringe in the future, Polo will be a useful asset to have,¡± said Little Skeleton as he looked at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was amazed. He chuckled and said, ¡°Haha, look at you, so mature in thinking. Of all my kids, you are the only one that can let me sleep peacefully at night!¡±

    Those words of Han Hao proved that he was a prudent person. It seemed that it wasn¡¯t by luck that Little Skeleton became so sessful in the world of godhunting over in the Death Dominion. It was a son like him that could make Han Shuo feel at ease. He thought that in the future, he should delegate some important tasks to Little Skeleton.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Father, I will make sure to teach them well!¡± Little Skeleton seemed somewhat embarrassed after receiving praise from Han Shuo. He made a somewhat awkward faint smile. It was much like the smile that Han Shuo wore in the usual days.

 Chapter 830 - The Wrath of an Overgod

    <h4>GDK 830: The Wrath of an Overgod</h4>

    That henchman of Polo seemed very uneasy. And as soon as he exited Ethereal City, he put on a stern face and whistled.

    Then, a dozen or more shadows flew out from the dense forest around him and surrounded him in no time.

    The henchman of Polo¡¯s then solemnly handed the enormous bag to one of those who appeared. He said in a heavy voice, ¡°For some reason, I feel that something isn¡¯t quite right.¡±

    ¡°Lord Kodiak, you are being overly cautious, ¡° one of the godhunters ttered. He said smilingly, ¡°Should we return to base right away?¡±

    Kodiak nodded and replied, ¡°I have left a message in the City. Han Hao shoulde to us after he received it. Everyone be extra careful, this body is worth two million ck crystal coins. It took me a great deal of persuasion to get the body from Baum. We cannot afford to make any mistakes.¡±

    The godhunter smilingly said, ¡°I doubt anyone is going to try to rob this soulless body from us.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t be so sure!¡± Kodiak furrowed his brows and suddenly turned to gaze behind him.

    Little Skeleton, or Han Hao, did not conceal his form and aura. He had deliberately done so so that Kodiak could sense his presence. Han Hao slowly walked to the party and threw arge sack of ck crystal coins in front of Kodiak. He said, ¡°That¡¯s the rest of the ck crystal coins. Now give me the divine body.¡±

    Kodiak heaved a breath of relief when he saw that theer was Han Hao. He saluted Han Hao in the etiquette of godhunters and smilingly said, ¡°Hello, you must have received my message.¡± He then turned his eyes to the bag of ck crystal coins under his feet and put on a troubled smile. He said, ¡°It is true that the divine body is for you, but my chief had instructed us to bring the body back to base. Erm, do you mind making a trip with us?¡±

    Han Hao shook his head, walked straight towards the godhunter who was carrying McKinley¡¯s divine body and took it from him. Then, in an indifferent voice, he said to Kodiak, ¡°Go back. Tell Polo that I have the body and you have received all the crystal coins. The transaction has been concluded, right here, right now.¡±

    Upon finishing those words, without even giving them another look, Han Hao started leaving with McKinley¡¯s divine body.

    ¡°Errmmmm... ¡° the godhunter who had been ttering Kodiak put on a grimace and asked, ¡°Is this going to be a problem?¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s check if there are enough ck crystal coins,¡± Kodiak immediately crouched and opened the bag under his feet after Han Hao left. After counting for a moment, he put on a faint smile and remarked, ¡°All the crystal coins, indeed. This Han Hao guy is really straightforward and efficient at doing things. Let¡¯s go, we will return to base and inform Lord Polo of it. I think His Lordship won¡¯t be angry at us as we are already outside of Ethereal City.¡±

    ***

    Inside a rocky valley outside of Ethereal City, Han Hao put down the enormous bag and started unraveling it. After tearing awayyers of animal skin, a crystal coffin was revealed. It contained a person that seemed to be deep asleep. The body, however, has no soul.

    ¡°This special coffin has been preserving McKinley¡¯s body and kept it in an active and functional state. How considerate of Baum,¡± said Han Shuo smilingly as he put his hand on the crystal coffin. After putting all his focus and sensing for a moment, he continued, ¡°Baum has ced a unique tracer on it. Fortunately for us, we are not in Ethereal City. Otherwise, he will be able to sense it when we ce a finger on the coffin.¡±

    As Han Shuo spoke, he inserted a stream of demonic yuan into the crystal coffin. A dark string started moving around McKinley¡¯s divine body, slowly eating away the tracer that Baum left on McKinley.

    After a while, Han Shuo withdrew his hand. He took out the Holy Grail that housed McKinley¡¯s divine soul.

    ¡°I... I can... I can sense it... After thousands and thousands of years, finally... I finally sense myself again... ¡° an intense fluctuation came from the Grail before Han Shuo could even speak. McKinley at this moment could not be more emotional. The Holy Grail that housed his soul started to glisten brilliantly.

    The divine body in the crystal coffin was his. It was only natural that McKinley could instantly sense his own body from such a short distance. He was so excited that he was talking incoherently. It was easy to see why McKinley would be so excited to have his body back after living in the day-less prison for tens of thousands of years.

    Then, a faint, blurry shadow started to slowly float out from the Holy Grail. Han Shuo had removed the energy in the Grail that imprisoned McKinley¡¯s soul prior to this. McKinley could fly out from the Grail without any obstruction.

    After McKinley¡¯s soul flew out from the Holy Grail, he slowly floated towards the crystal coffin. He fused into the coffin smoothly like a drop of water falling into the sea.

    Then, a violent space-time fluctuation came from the crystal coffin. Soft cracking noise sounded as hairline cracks started growing on the coffin. A tinge of healthy red gradually appeared on McKinley¡¯s old and pale body as an aura of life started emanating from the body.

    The crystal coffin contained an elderly man with grey-white hair. He had a pair of long white brows that touched his cheeks. Although the man was old, his skin and flesh were not at all loose. It even seemed as firm and powerful as that of a young man. When the aura of life reappeared on the divine body, Han Shuo noticed that the body started to rapidly transform.

    Gradually, his cheeks turned redder and his muscles firmed up as the cracks on the coffin grewrger and denser. His eyes started rolling around underneath his shaking eyelids.

    Then, suddenly, McKinley opened his bright and deep eye. The crystal coffin shattered with a loud bang.

    McKinley stretched his body and moved his arms, legs, and head all around excitedly. He was involuntarily screaming, ¡°Ohhhh yeahhh! I¡¯m back! I¡¯m finally back! Baum, Gy¨¢l, you better watch out, I¡¯ming for you! Wahahaha!¡±

    Han Shuo and Little Skeleton stood together as they watched McKinley celebrate his revival by screaming and dancing. It wasn¡¯t surprising that McKinley would be so ecstatic to regain freedom after being trapped for so long. Now that McKinley¡¯s divine soul and divine body were reunited, he had regained his full strength. He was no longer just a powerless soul that can be kicked around but a proud, mighty highgod.

    A long long whileter, McKinley finally calmed down ¨C somewhat. Heughed heartily as he went to give Han Shuo a big hug. He jumped up and down as he said, ¡°Thank you, thank you so much, Bryan! I still cannot believe that you have actually got me my body back. How am I ever going to repay you for your help!¡±

    Han Shuo felt ufortable from head to toe being hugged so tightly by a gay old man. He struggled free from McKinley and smilingly said, ¡°Now that you have regained your body, tell me, how do you n on getting your revenge? If you want to, I can help you with killing Baum. We can go to the City right away!¡±

    The position of the City Lord of Ethereal City rightfully belonged to McKinley. After Baum is dead, McKinley should retake his rightful role. Han Shuo¡¯s friendship with McKinley went much deeper than with Baum. If McKinley became the City Lord of Ethereal City, it would be tremendously helpful to his future development.

    ¡°I can make space divine devices for you. You know, I¡¯m very good at this. Internar transportation matrixes, magical mirrors ¨C any divine devices you need, I can make them for you!¡± pledged McKinley in a big smile.

    Space divine devices were very rare on Elysium. They cannot be forged by any average alchemist. For this reason, divine devices of the space edict were invaluable. It was not unusual for a person with an insane amount of ck crystal coins to be unable to find a suitable space edict expert who would produce them the divine device they wanted.

    McKinley was near the pinnacle in the cultivation of the space edict energy. He must be a true expert at producing space divine devices or he wouldn¡¯t have made that promise to Han Shuo. And coincidentally, Han Shuo could really use those divine devices. Han Shuo could not be happier to hear those words and he smilingly replied, ¡°That¡¯d be wonderful!¡±

    ¡°I need to make a trip to the Space Shrine and inform the Overgod of my ordeal. As for killing Baum, I can¡¯t do that just yet. Baum is the current City Lord of Ethereal City. No matter what he did, I must consult with the Overgod before doing anything to him. But once I have His Lordship¡¯s permission, I can immediatelye back to kill Baum,¡± said McKinley.

    Han Shuo understood McKinley¡¯s concerns. He nodded and replied, ¡°No problem. I¡¯ll be at the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy in Ethereal City. You can find me there after you have consulted with the Overgod.¡± The Shrine of the Overgod of Space must be located in some secret location somewhere in the Space Dominion. It was needless to say that McKinley, a receiver of the Divine Seal from the Space Overgod, should know where it was hidden.

    Before leaving, McKinley repeatedly thanked Han Shuo and promised to look for him after he gave the Overgod of Space an ount of his ordeal and to reward him by making somemonly used space divine devices. He seemed rather embarrassed that he had to leave so soon. After being repeatedly hastened by Han Shuo, McKinley finally said goodbye. He ripped a fissure in space-time, walked into it, and disappeared.

    ¡°Father, do you think that he will seed?¡± Little Skeleton seemed a little skeptical. ¡°Baum has served as the City Lord of Ethereal City for such a long time and he would have be closer with the Overgod. Would the Overgod believe McKinley¡¯s words?¡±

    ¡°Who knows? But McKinley seemed very confident. Perhaps he has some hidden aces under his sleeves!¡± replied Han Shuo after thinking for a moment.

    ***Two dayster.

    Han Shuo and Han Hao had returned to Ethereal City. Han Shuo was examining Metal Elite Zombie¡¯s condition when he was suddenly jolted ¨C he noticed that the entire Ethereal City seemed to be shaking!

    Momentster, Han Shuo received yet another shock. Through the demon general he used for surveilling Baum, he saw that the entire City Lord¡¯s manor had suddenly been shrouded in a violent space-time fluctuation. The space-time fluctuation carried an unparalleled amount of power. It pulverized the entire manor house in a moment.

    ¡°Noooo!!! Spare me! My Overlord!!!¡± Baum¡¯s could be heard shrieking miserably from the center of the manor.

    Several hundred Spatial Edge appeared out of thin air and sliced at Baum. He was obliterated in a snap. Not a cry was heard and not one bit of Baum remained.

    A great stab of pain spread in Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. In the next instance, Han Shuo discovered that the demon general he ced in the manor had also been annihted. The final scene that the demon general transmitted was a manor that had been razed to the ground. Not a single soul survived in the vast City Lord¡¯s manor!

 Chapter 831 - McKinley

    <h4>GDK 831: McKinley</h4>

    The destruction of the City Lord¡¯s manor came as a big surprise to everyone. Not only that all the divine guards were killed, even Baum the City Lord was obliterated along with his house. All of that took ce in just a few moments.

    That demon general Han Shuo ced in the manor for surveilling Baum was also destroyed by the violent space-time fluctuation. If an immaterial being like the demon general could not survive the attack, needless to say, a normal living being won¡¯t stand a better chance.

    The people of Ethereal City sank into great fear after the manor house and all its upants were reduced to waste. They wondered if they should continue to live in the City.

    The few small family ns that lived nearby the manor house also observed the manor house¡¯s razing almost as clearly as Han Shuo¡¯s demon general did. Thest words that Baum screamed before his obliteration were spread widely throughout the Ethereal City. All of the City popce knew that it was the Overgod Himself who hadid waste to the house. They wondered what Baum did so wrong that the Space Overgod would unleash his wrath on him.

    The popce of Ethereal City was horror-stricken and worried about their own safety. Many shops and businesses were temporarily closed. Those who recently came from the other dominions dared not stay in Ethereal City and hastily evacuated from the City.

    The Overgod had scared the living shit of every god in Ethereal City with a single gesture of his wrath!

    The fewpanies of divine guards who were not killed in the incident remained in the City and continued to perform their duty as order-keepers. Although every one of them was deeply frightened, fearing that the Overgod¡¯s wrath mightnd on them at any moment, they did not try to leave. They knew that the might of an Overgod was too great to run from, and especially when it¡¯s from the Overgod of Space!

    All of them knew that if the Space Overgod wanted them dead, there was no way that they¡¯d live, no matter where they run or hide. They thought that their best option was to stay in Ethereal City and wait for the Space Overgod¡¯s judgment.

    No one in the City had any idea what caused that to happen, other than Han Shuo, who had some vague ideas. He knew that McKinley must have been to the Space Shrine and reported his ordeal to the Space Overgod. However, even Han Shuo did not know what McKinley actually said to the Space Overgod or how McKinley persuaded Him that He would kill Baum so decisively.

    And, of course, Han Shuo did not leave the Ethereal City out of concern for his safety. His Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was the only few shops that opened for business as usual, as though nothing significant had happened. Han Shuo asked his pharmacist to continue to produce themonly used medicines, especially those that had been sold out recently.

    Han Shuo believed that McKinley, who was meeting the Overgod of Space, will return to Ethereal City soon.

    And as Han Shuo had expected, five dayster, without any notice, McKinley stepped into the Ethereal City most pompously.

    McKinley was a famous character in Ethereal City before he went missing. He had returned to the City at a time where everyone was on tenterhooks. Not only that, he came representing the Space Overgod, carrying a Divine Decree bestowed by the Space Overgod.

    The popce of Ethereal City, and even in other parts of the Space Dominion, were frightened, for they did not know who¡¯s the next person that the Space Overgod will take his anger on. Although many were surprised by McKinley¡¯s return, many more were calmed. The leaders of the fewpanies of divine guards that survived, after seeing the Divine Decree which proved that the Space Overgod had assigned McKinley as the new City Lord, unanimously epted him as their City Lord with no objection.

    McKinley¡¯s arrival was like a tranquilizer being injected into the Ethereal City that was starting to show disorder. Holding the Divine Decree from the Space Overgod, McKinley publicly announced that Baum had colluded with godhunters and of other crimes. He also stated that Baum, and all those divine guards who died in the manor house, had betrayed the principles of Ethereal City and they received the punishment they deserved. He went on great length to justify Baum¡¯s execution.

    And finally, McKinley, on behalf of the Space Overgod, announced that Ethereal City shall function as it previously was, that the Overgod had no intention of meddling with trifle matters about the City and He will not look into the crimes previouslymitted by any other person.

    Without the slightest bit of obstruction, with the Space Overgod¡¯s Divine Decree, McKinley became the new Ethereal City City Lord. All the divine guards of Ethereal City pledged their allegiance to McKinley. They even publicly condemned Baum for his heinous crimes.

    As McKinley was very busy with the affairs of running Ethereal City, he did not immediately look for Han Shuo. After making the public announcement and obtaining the allegiance from the divine guards, McKinley designated a private manor previously owned by Baum as the new City Lord¡¯s manor. He then met with the patriarchs of all major family ns and the leaders of all major businesses in the City. It was after Ethereal City had finally stabilized that he came to Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    Han Shuo was somewhat surprised by McKinley ¨C he seemed to have improved in his realm during the short period they were apart. Not only that McKinley seemed to be in much greater spirits, but he was also brimming with an unusual sort of vitality.

    After observing for a moment, Han Shuo discovered that the McKinley now had be even more powerful than Baum. It appeared that McKinley must have been bestowed with something by the Overgod during his time in the Space Shrine. Otherwise, there was no way that his strength would improve by such a huge margin in such little time.

    ¡°McKinley, did you receive something wonderful in the Shrine?¡± asked Han Shuo smilingly after he sized up McKinley.

    McKinley put on a big smile but did not reply.

    Instead, he started walking and looking around the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy as pleased as Punch. After a while, he remarked, ¡°Damn, that Baum is really willing to part with his capital. I originally nned on finding you a new shop lot. But now, that doesn¡¯t seem necessary. This is an excellent location and it¡¯s well renovated. I doubt I could do better than this.¡±

    Then, after they were further in the shop, McKinley said to Han Shuo apologetically, ¡°About things that took ce in the Shrine, I¡¯m not at liberty to talk about it. You have learned about what happened at the previous City Lord¡¯s manor, right?¡±

    ¡°Yea, everyone in the City has been talking about the ttened manor. Of course I would have heard of it. You are pretty resourceful, aren¡¯t you? You managed to get Baum killed without lifting a finger!¡± said Han Shuo smilingly.

    McKinley who had recently enjoyed a string of fortuitous events seemed as though he could not be happier. He replied, ¡°That was only because he deserved it, and the position of the City Lord rightfully belonged to me. I¡¯m just taking back what is mine, hehe! Bryan, I have promised you to make you some space divine devices. Have you thought about it? Which kind do you need?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t need offensive ones. I just need tools that will allow long-distance meetings ¨C devices like magical mirrors. Oh, and if it¡¯s possible, please make me a transportation matrix. I could really use them,¡± replied Han Shuo after thinking for a moment. Han Shuo also knew how to refine devices, especially those with deadly firepower. However, he had no idea how to make transportation matrices and long-rangemunication devices.

    ¡°Sure, absolutely no problem!¡± replied McKinley immediately. He then earnestly asked Han Shuo to live in Ethereal City.

    Han Shuo was wary of agreeing to such requests after the friction with Wace at the City of Shadows. Although he seemed to have a great rtionship with McKinley and Han Shuo had saved McKinley¡¯s life, there was no telling if McKinley would still be so kind if therees a day that their interests conflicted.

    But most importantly, just like the Darkness Dominion, the Space Dominion was a territory of an Overgod. Even though McKinley was the City Lord of Ethereal City, he must still obey themands of the Space Overgod. As Han Shuo was not a cultivator of the space edict, it was impossible for him to be the City Lord of Ethereal City. And if the Space Overgod, for whatever reason, wanted to kill him, there wouldn¡¯t be much that Han Shuo could do.

    After having witnessed Baum¡¯s annihtion through his demon general, Han Shuo became very wary towards an Overgod. He knew that at this point in time, before amassing sufficient strength, he better not risk offending any of the Overgods.

    ¡°You really don¡¯t want to live in Ethereal City?¡± McKinely seemed very disappointed. He continued to persuade, ¡°The Ethereal City could really use talents at this time. And if you would live in the City, given your strength, Ethereal City will be the strongest city in the Space Dominion. In fact, I¡¯m willing to govern the City with you. I can assure you that what happened to you in the City of Shadows will not happen here. After all, I wouldn¡¯t be living if it wasn¡¯t for you!¡±

    McKinley seemed sincere as he said those words. It seemed that he really wanted Han Shuo to stay.

    However, Han Shuo knew that the real City Lord of Ethereal City is the Space Overgod. Besides, Han Shuo had other ns for his future. Therefore, he politely refused McKinley¡¯s invitation. He said, ¡°I really don¡¯t n on living in Ethereal City. But don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll make sure toe by often. Haha. Right, please keep an eye on my Celestial Pearl Pharmacy while I¡¯m away.¡±

    ¡°Rest assured, nothing will go wrong with your Celestial Pearl branch in Ethereal City,¡± pledged McKinley immediately.

    ¡°What are the special materials you need for producing the space edict devices? Tell me and I¡¯ll help you collect them,¡± With the presence of Goldstone Trading, it was possible to get hold of most unique materials for refining divine devices.

    ¡°This you don¡¯t have to worry. I have plenty of materials stored in my own storage area in the City. I have also discovered a small dimensional storage space Baum set up in his manor containing precious materials. I have more than enough material. Give me a year, and I¡¯ll make you all the most miraculous space edict divine devices,¡± McKinley put on a faint smile and continued, ¡°However, for the transportation matrix, you¡¯ll need to select a special region. I don¡¯t think that you have found a good ce for it yet so we¡¯ll wait.¡±

    ¡°Well then, many thanks! I¡¯lle to look for you in Ethereal City after one year,¡± replied Han Shuo.

    ¡°Bryan, why so hurry in leaving? Can¡¯t you stay just a while longer?¡± McKinley seemed sad when it seemed from Han Shuo¡¯s tone that he will leave right away.

    ¡°My son was injured, I need to settle the debt with the person who did it!¡± said Han Shuo as his face turned cold. When he recalled that Metal Elite Zombie was nearly killed, he felt an urge to skin the attackers alive. Now that the Five Elite Zombies were reunited and McKinley¡¯s matter had been resolved, Han Shuo did not want to tarry any longer. He was ready to head into the Fringe!

 Chapter 832 - An unexpected pleasant surprise

    <h4>GDK 832: An unexpected pleasant surprise</h4>

    Han Shuo had hired a capable and trustable manager to manage his Celestial Pearl branch in Ethereal City. Han Shuo believed that McKinley, new City Lord of Ethereal City, will look after his pharmacy in the City while he was away. He also doubted that there will be an issue with Metal Elite Zombie¡¯s Goldstone Trading Enterprise.

    With everything prepared, Han Shuo, with Han Hao, Rose, and the Five Elite Zombies, left Ethereal City and headed for the Fringe ¨C the Land of Chaos.

    After Han Hao learned about Metal Elite Zombie getting injured, he asked him for a detailed recount of the raid. However, Han Hao also had no idea who the attacker was.

    It turned out that although Han Hao knew the leaders of godhunter factions in the Fringe, just like Han Shuo, he didn¡¯t know much about the Fringe either. After all, godhunters weren¡¯t the only power that dwelled in the Fringe. The most powerful and wicked experts that the Elysium could offer were living there.

    Han Shuo and his party possessed decent strength. Han Shuo, Han Hao, and Rose were highgod while the Five Elite Zombies all possessed miraculous abilities. With that, they were able to travel fast. It took them just a few days to make some significant distance from Ethereal City.

    Few days after they began their journey, Han Shuo and the party arrived at the fort where Han Mu and Han Shui were previously surrounded. The gods in the fort seemed shocked by Han Mu¡¯s reappearance. Their gazes towards Han Mu were filled with caution and wariness, as though afraid that Han Mu might do something malicious to them or their loved ones.

    ¡°The fuck you look at me for? You wouldn¡¯t have to worry about me if you¡¯d spend as much attention on your girlfriends!¡± Han Mu couldn¡¯t help but curse when he saw that all those on the streets were looking at him nervously.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help himself butugh. He previously thought that Han Mu wasn¡¯t that influential of a person. But Han Shuo now realized he was wrong. He was very amazed that all those gods who had girlfriends or wives seemed so afraid of Han Mu. He softly asked, ¡°You little brat, it seems that you have made yourself a lot of enemies, haven¡¯t you?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, they are just being overly cautious,¡± said Han Mu in a smirk. Then, he turned to Han Shui and said, ¡°Little Water, what are you worrying about? With Father and Elder Brother here, no one will be stupid enough to try to catch me. They wouldn¡¯t throw their lives away!¡±

    ¡°All thosedies you slept with are nutcases. If they decided toe after you without any regard for their lives, are you really going to kill them?¡± rebuked Han Shui impolitely after he red at Han Mu.

    Han Mu stared nkly for a moment after hearing those words. He thought for a moment and immediately came to his senses. Han Mu put on a grimace and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Father, I think we should rush. What Little Water said made sense. Those crazy bitches might reallye after me without regard for their own lives and I don¡¯t think I would kill them. We should avoid them or it¡¯ll get really troublesome!¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned. He thought that this little scoundrel of his really knew how to make trouble for himself. But in any case, with almost every god in the fort looking at them strangely, Han Shuo did not want to stay in the fort for long either. He agreed to Han Mu and they hastily left the fort.

    Soon after Han Shuo and his party left the fort, fourdies arrived at the area where Han Mu traveled through. They were of different ages but all of them looked extraordinarily beautiful. They looked all around while loudly crying for Han Mu. And, of course, they cursed him for being cruel and heartless.

    Shortly after, the fourdies noticed each other. They started a four-way mouth fight shamelessly in the public, insulting and swearing at each other. But when they learned that Han Mu had just left the fort, they immediately stopped humiliating themselves and flew in the direction that Han Shuo and Han Mu left.

    ¡°What the fuck, kid, just how many loose ends do you have?!¡± Han Shuo put on a grimace after hearing the high-pitch criesing from the fort. He then said to the party, ¡°Let¡¯s move a little faster lest they catch up!¡±

    ¡°Hurry up, hurry up!¡± hastened Han Mu. He flew at the front of the party as though he was very afraid of getting caught.

    ....

    After they were some distance from the fort, Han Hao went to the front to lead the party. They flew through many vast forests rapidly. After two days, Han Hao suddenly stopped at an enormous waterfall. A constant torrent of water poured over a rocky ledge and roared straight down into a deep pool far below. The water was then led away through many small meandering streams.

    Han Shui let out a soft cry upon seeing the waterfall. He turned into a blurry white shadow and shot into the waterfall as though a fish that was jumping into the sea.

    As a cultivator of the water energy, Han Shui would feel ufortable from head to toe if he doesn¡¯t surround himself with water every once in a while. As it wasn¡¯t easy toe across such a clean and refreshing waterfall, there was no way that he won¡¯t jump in for a rxing bath.

    Han Tu and Han Huo didn¡¯t like water. They stood on a tree near the waterfall and gazed down at them. Rose, Han Mu, and Han Jin went to the smooth walls of the waterfall, reached out with their hands to get some water and cleaned their faces.

    After leading the party to this waterfall, Han Hao said to Han Shuo, ¡°Father, my gang is over here. I¡¯ll go talk to them.¡±

    ¡°Ok,¡± replied Han Shuo as he nodded.

    Han Hao turned into a trail of light, flew through the falling water, andnded in the dark cave behind the waterfall. The few godhunters who had been gazing at Han Mu, Han Shui, and the others like a tiger stalking its prey immediately came forward. That fierce-looking scar-faced man asked, ¡°Is it you, Chief?¡±

    Han Hao did not reply but released the sinister aura from his body to state his identity. As soon as the godhunter sensed the sinister energy that filled the caves, he bowed and delightedly said, ¡°Chief! It is you!¡± Then, a group of sinister-looking godhunters started exiting from the winding caves and gathered before Han Hao.

    ¡°Chief, did you purposely lead those people to this waterfall? Do you want to kill them?¡± As they did not know Han Hao¡¯s rtionship with Han Shuo and the others, and as Han Hao had previously used simr strategies to kill his pursuers and enemies, his henchmen assumed that Han Hao had the same intention as before.

    Ever since they started serving Han Hao, they had never seen Han Hao met with any friends or families nor had they ever seen Han Hao being friendly to any person. In their minds, Han Hao was a totally callous and emotionless machine ¨C a true heartless viin. Therefore, it was only natural that they would assume that Han Shuo and the others were Han Hao¡¯s prey.

    ¡°They are not prey! They are friends!¡± replied Han Hao, surprising his followers. He pointed at Han Shuo and the others and instructed, ¡°Remember their faces. You will not attack them no matter in any circumstances. Understood?¡±

    These godhunters had never before received any instructions remotely simr to this, or with such gravity. They were all startled and it took them a while toe to their senses. They repeatedly nodded and indicated that they will obey themand while wondering Han Shuo¡¯s and other¡¯s identities.

    ¡°You bunch are no match against them anyway,¡± Han Hao coldly groaned and said, ¡°If someday you bumped into them and they wanted to kill you, just tell them that you work for me.¡± After taking a short pause, Han Hao instructed, ¡°Now, you will all return to the Death Dominion and bring the others to the Fringe. We won¡¯t haunt the Death Dominion anymore. We are going to the Land of Chaos.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s wonderful, Chief! Haha, a ce like the Fringe is where we truly belong, and we have long wanted to go there! In that Land, we can walk around openly. No one is going to scoff at us just because we are godhunters. Chief, are we going to stay there for the long term?¡± the malevolent and bulky man seemed overjoyed.

    Godhunters were specifically targeted and hunted by almost every power living in the Twelve Dominions. The Fringe, however, due to its unique geographical location, was not within the jurisdiction of any Overgods. Besides, as most who live in the Fringe were the most depraved of criminals from all over the Elysium, godhunters weren¡¯t that big of a deal for the society there. No one would bother eradicating them just because they were godhunters.

    In fact, they could live pretty much like a normal person in the Fringe and can engage in various businesses openly. For most godhunters and criminals who found it too troublesome to get by in the Divine Dominions, the Land of Chaos was a five-star resort that could refuge them. They can live therefortably without worrying about getting hunted down by divine guards.

    But, there was one prerequisite ¨C they need to be strong enough to survive in the Fringe!

    As the Fringe was not ruled by any of the Twelve Overgods, no divine guards would be there to enforce anyws. It was filled with so many fierce and powerful experts that without sufficient strength, one might lose their life right after stepping into the Fringe!

    ¡°That¡¯s right. We will be living in the Fringe,¡± replied Han Hao noddingly before he said, ¡°Get going already and don¡¯t get tarried along your journey. Go back to the Death Dominion and bring the rest of our people over. When you have reached the Fringe, just look for Polo to get hold of me.¡±

    ¡°We will do as you bid, Chief,¡± the bulky scar-faced man bowed, led the group of godhunters back into the cave, and left through an exit away from the waterfall. Before they left, they would each take a good look at Han Shuo and the others to firmly remember their faces.

    After having done instructing his followers, Han Hao walked out from the waterfall and back to Han Shuo¡¯s side. Han Shuo smilingly remarked, ¡°Not bad at all. They all seemed callous, calm, and experienced. They even know how to cooperate when traveling around the caves. It seems that they have been very well trained!¡± Han Shuo had observed everything that happened behind the waterfall through his demon generals.

    ¡°Inside the memory that Father left me are some demonic battle formation for team coordination. I have used it on them. With that, they are more united than an average godhunter group and can fight better as a team,¡± replied Little Skeleton.

    Han Shuo nodded with a smile on his face and he praised, ¡°Very well done!¡± The fact that Han Hao could aplish this merely with his memory of demonic arts was yet another evidence that he had truly inherited Han Shuo¡¯s understanding of demonic arts. After taking a short pause, Han Shuo asked, ¡°You said that you have more followers in the Death Dominion. How many do you have, altogether?¡± Han Shuo was very interested to know just how many godhunters Little Skeleton had managed to recruit in the past fifty years.

    ¡°Three Companies, which is around three hundred people. They were all personally trained by me and know how to fight cooperatively. They are much stronger than the divine guards of an average city!¡± replied Little Skeleton proudly.

    Han Shuo was ted by that information. He thought, <i>Little Skeleton is such a bringer of pleasant surprises!</i>

    Every one of the godhunters possessed extraordinary strength and was cruel in character. In addition, they know how to fight effectively using demonicbat formations. These troops might even be slightly stronger those divine guards Han Shuo trained using the Eight Destion and Torment Formation. And on top of that, they were three-hundred gods strong! Han Shuo thought that there could not be a better surprise than this.

 Chapter 833 - End him

    <strong>GDK 833: End him</strong>

    Living in the Northwest region of the Fringe, Polo, the leader of a godhunter faction, had received the payment of two million ck crystal coins from Little Skeleton. Polo did not show any anger or annoyance about Han Hao forcing the trade right outside of the City as he had received all the money he asked for.

    One day, as he was tormenting one of the beauties under his captivity, one of his followers returned to him with breaking news from Ethereal City.

    ¡°My Lord, Baum is dead. ording to the hearsays, the Space Overgod had razed the entire City Lord¡¯s manor to the ground!¡± Kodiak, the godhunter who exchanged McKinley¡¯s divine body from Baum, bowed and reported to Polo.

    Polo was bbergasted and he cried out in surprise, ¡°He what?!¡±

    ¡°The Overgod unleashed his wrath upon Baum. The former Ethereal City City Lord was annihted along with his manor house!¡± repeated Kodiak.

    Polo was so rmed that he stopped humping the beauty underneath him. He said, ¡°I anticipated Baum¡¯s death, but I did not expect the killer to be the Space Overgod Himself! This is so unimaginable! What¡¯s the situation now in Ethereal City?¡± Polo thought that McKinley would join forces with Han Hao to kill Baum instead of something so unexpected.

    ¡°McKinley returned to Ethereal City with a Divine Decree of the Space Overgod and became the new City Lord. My Lord, I don¡¯t think that McKinley is the kind of person who would do business with us. Him assuming the position of the City Lord doesn¡¯t seem to benefit us!¡± said Kodiak.

    Polo threw the beauty underneath him away and said in a deep voice, ¡°Don¡¯t care about McKinley. What¡¯s most important now is Han Hao. Since he had rescued McKinley, and Han Hao is one of the leaders of our Godhunter Alliance, doing business with him is not entirely out of the picture. Right, any news about Han Hao? I¡¯m more interested in him!¡±

    ¡°He delivered us a message through one of his men, asking us about that incident where a caravan of Goldstone Enterprise was raided. We have been asking around but we have not discovered anything,¡± replied Kodiak.

    ¡°Hmm, it seems that Han Hao and the master of Goldstone Enterprise have a close rtionship. Goldstone Enterprise has branches in every Dominion. It is said that they possessed mineral ores that theirpetitors could never find. If we can build a connection with Goldstone Enterprise, it will be very beneficial to us! Investigate it with all of our resources, find out everything you can about the raid. Report back as soon as you learn a new piece of information!¡± instructed Polo.

    ¡°Understood, my Lord!¡± Kodiak bowed and retreated. He immediately left the base with a gang of godhunters.

    ***

    Half a monthter, Han Shuo and the party had finally left the territory of the Space Dominion and had officially stepped into the Fringe.

    The very first thing Han Shuo noticed was just how chaotic the Land of Chaos really was. There were bloody bodies discarded and left to rot everywhere. Deadly battles weremon. There were even godhunters openly devouring other experts as though no one was watching. It was utterlywless.

    And this was just the outermost area of the Fringe!

    As Han Shuo and his party traveled deeper into the Fringe, the scene of battling and murdering became more frequent. There was no order in the Land of Chaos and no divine guard to maintain peace. People could get into fights for the slightest reason. Not only that no one will interrupt the fight, but most would also watch from the sidelines excitedly. They might even join the fight if they felt that they could steal a kill.

    For one without sufficient strength, traveling in the Fringe would be the same as walking towards death. This was especially true if one was carrying valuable divine weapons or has attractive looks. One would also likely run into a stronger godhunter cultivating in the same energy and be preyed upon. In the Fringe, there can be countless possible motives for one to be murdered.

    Han Shuo and the party had finally gained first-hand knowledge of just how chaotic the Fringe was. As they traveled, they gradually adapted their minds to the wretched sight of dead bodies covering every inch of the Land.

    Of the party, only Rose was giving off the distinct aura of a highgod. Han Hao wore his callous face while fierce lights dazzled from his eyes. The Five Elite Zombies, after having survived on Elysium for many years, no longer looked like weak and puny characters that can be bullied. Therefore, the party did not meet anyone foolish enough to pick on a fight with them.

    ¡°Do not lower your guard. This is just the outskirts of the Fringe!¡± Rose knew the Land of Chaos pretty well. She constantly reminded throughout the journey, ¡°The deeper we travel into the Fringe, the stronger the gods we will meet. As you have seen, all those that we met in the outskirts were merely midgods. Those godhunters with midgod strength dared not roam deeper into the Fringe, or they themselves might be prey to stronger godhunters.¡±

    ¡°Given our strength, no one should be stupid enough to start a fight with us, right?¡± asked Han Huo. He looked like he was itching to get into battle. He would shout and cheer when he saw a fierce battle along the journey.

    ¡°Not for now. But it¡¯s hard to say when we are further inside,¡± Rose wasn¡¯t as calm and unruffled as Han Shuo and the others. The Land seemed to cause her a lot of anxiety.

    Three dayster, Han Shuo and the party crossed into the inner part of the Land of Chaos. They started to find that those having fights were of highgod strengths. All those highgods had cold and cruel looks. It was as though they might immediately attack a random stranger if they looked at them the wrong way.

    ¡°Han Jin, is this the region where your caravan was raided?¡± asked Han Shuo after they came to a region filled with hills and mountains.

    Thest time that Metal Elite Zombie was at this ce, there were a dozen or more divine guards with him. Every one of the divine guards possessedte-stage midgod strength. Metal Elite Zombie had chosen to travel through this region for it was hilly and they were unlikely toe across powerful experts. But despite his careful nning, his caravan was intercepted and the tragedy fell upon them.

    ¡°Yes, Father, right in the center of these mountains,¡± Han Jin seemed somewhat sorrowful when he recalled the scene of his workers being brutally murdered. He pointed at a few ces as he exined to Han Shuo, ¡°Over there, and there, I watched my workers being savagely killed. None of them survived. I would have joined them if there weren¡¯t any mountains nearby.¡±

    As Han Shuo traveled into the Fringe, he came to realize that in this chaotd, the strong rules while the weak get murdered.

    Those who had lived in the Fringe for a long time were mostly depraved or sadistic. When theymit murder, they would do so in various peculiar manner and procedures, some included torturing the victim, inflicting as much pain as possible while keeping them alive for as long as possible. They treated killing as a hobby or entertainment.

    Han Shuo became very furious when he recalled that Metal Elite Zombie was nearly killed. He released several demon generals and said, ¡°Let¡¯s not travel deeper into the Fringe for now. We will stay nearby and ask around. Perhaps we could learn some clues.¡±

    Rose and the rest of the party nodded and raised no objection.

    Han Shuo stood straight and as still as a rock. He transformed the few demon generals he deployed into solo travelers of various appearances. As soon as he discovered people traveling in a pair or more, the demon generals would show up and start to provoke them, luring them towards where Han Shuo and the others were staying.

    After a while, one of the demon generals taking human appearance managed to enrage a party of seven. They charged and followed the demon general without thinking.

    Then, when the demon general arrived before Han Shuo, it abruptly vanished.

    ¡°Where did that asshole go?¡± shouted the highgod leading the party coldly. ¡°Are you bunch a gang with that joker?¡±

    Han Shuo put on a faint smile and said, ¡°Hello, messieurs. I¡¯m looking for a few people. Will you be of help?¡±

    ¡°What the fuck? Hand that guy over now or I¡¯ll wreck you fucking pantywaist!¡±

    Rose, who knew the proper manners of the Fringe well, charged forward without any warning and straightforwardly killed the few weak henchmen that came with the highgod. That highgod had only recently be a mid-stage highgod. He immediately understood Rose¡¯s true strength when she attacked. A shiver traveled down his spine.

    The Fringe, however, was filled with violent, ballsy characters who were not afraid of taking great risks. Although the highgod was not sure if he could defeat Rose, he nheless angrily shouted, ¡°You bitch, you are so dead!¡± and charged at Rose.

    <i>Whoosh!</i> The bone spear in Little Skeleton¡¯s hand suddenly shot out. A terrifying sinister energy instantly filled the region. It was shooting at the highgod with the might of a doomsday asteroid.

    The highgod was horrified and he immediately made defensive maneuvers. He had a frightened look after the short but perilous exchange. After gazing at Han Hao and Rose for a moment, he asked in a low voice, ¡°Who are you looking for?¡± The highgod knew that he stood no chance against both Rose and Han Hao and that he would be dead unless he starts being cooperative.

    ¡°Just recently, a caravan was raided and their ores plunder when they traveled through here. Do you know who did it?¡± Han Shuo then asked Han Jin to describe the appearances of those attackers once through.

    The highgod knitted his brows and thought for a moment before he shook his head and replied, ¡°I don¡¯t know. I¡¯ve never heard of anything rted to it.¡±

    ¡°End him,¡± instructed Han Shuo. He was still wearing a faint smile.

    Han Hao and Rose immediately started to wildly attack him. The Five Elite Zombies also swarmed at him. They opted not to use the Penta-Elemental Undead Formation.

    From how Han Shuo saw it, as Rose had already killed all of the highgod¡¯s followers, they were destined to be enemies. Therefore, he might as well finish off the highgod now, lest he returns someday in the future and potentially causes him troubles. After all, there weren¡¯t anyws to follow in the Fringe and there won¡¯t be any consequences formitting murder. But most importantly, this person was a highgod and his divine soul was the best fuel source that the Cauldron of Myriad Demon could have. He saw no reason not to kill the highgod.

    After having traveled in the Fringe for a few days, Han Shuo discovered not a single person worthy of the slightest sympathy. All those in the Fringe were the vilest criminals originating from every corner of the Elysium. They were devoid of conscience and hadmitted an untold number of heinous crimes. Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t feel the slightest thing even if all of these creatures were dead.

    Rose could easily defeat the highgod by herself. And with Han Hao and the Five Elite Zombies working with her, the highgod couldn¡¯t even try to escape. It took just a few moments before Little Skeleton¡¯s seven bone spurs impaled him.

    The Cauldron of Myriad Demon hastily flew out and collected the highgod¡¯s divine soul along with those of his minions. This divine soul could make up for that demon general which was identally killed by the Space Overgod back in Ethereal City.

    After killing the highgod and his gang, Han Shuo did not leave the area but repeated the same modus operandi. He would question all those who fell for his bait before murdering them and collecting their divine souls. But unfortunately, although Han Shuo had asked many, he did not obtain the information he wanted.

    Just when Han Shuo was going to give up and start traveling deeper into the Fringe, Kodiak, the henchman of Polo, came looking for them after hearing the whistling noises of Little Skeleton¡¯s bone spurs.

 Chapter 834 - We found the culprit

    <h4>GDK 834: We found the culprit</h4>

    When Kodiak arrived, he was shocked to see so many unfamiliar faces around Han Hao. After a moment of careful observation, Kodiak noticed that Han Shuo, Rose, and the Five Elite Zombies did not look like godhunters. This had rather confused Kodiak. He wondered what their rtionships were with Han Hao.

    Although his mind was filled with questions, Kodiak said nothing but respectfully greeted Han Hao at first contact. After showing the proper etiquette, Kodiak exined, ¡°Our Chief has been paying a great deal of attention to your troubles. He assigned the few of us to investigate around here. It took us a while but we have found the culprit.¡±

    Han Hao immediately asked, ¡°Who did it?¡±

    Kodiak seemed hesitant and did not immediately answer. Instead, he looked at Han Shuo and the others cautiously and asked, ¡°Erm, may I know who you are... ?¡± Kodiak wasn¡¯t sure if he could divulge the sensitive information in the presence of Han Shuo and the others.

    Han Hao knew Kodiak¡¯s concerns. He lightly groaned and said, ¡°They are my friends, you have nothing to worry about. Don¡¯t hesitate. Speak!¡±

    Kodiak was stunned and he looked at Han Shuo and the other with astonished gazes. He could not understand how they became friends with Han Hao. Kodiak had heard plenty about LS¡¯s reputation and achievements in the Death Dominion. He was a youngster on the up and up in the field of godhunting and one of the most revered characters among godhunters. None of the godhunters had ever known that Han Hao had friends. Therefore, Kodiak was very surprised to hear those words from Han Hao.

    After hesitating for a moment, under Han Hao¡¯s attentive and cold gazes, Kodiak said in a deep voice, ¡°As I said, after staying and investigating in a nearby region for some time, we have determined who the attacker was. He is called Kage. He cultivates in the energy of darkness and possesses mid-stage highgod strength. Right, just a few days ago, I heard that he was nning to sell those ores he plundered at a low price.¡±

    ¡°Where is he at?¡± asked Han Shuo. He had a faint smile on his face but his eyes were as cold as ice.

    After Kodiak arrived, he had ced most of his attention on Rose because he could sense a very distinct aura of highgod emanating from Rose. Moreover, he had a vague feeling that Rose was a level stronger than he was. This made him ufortable from head to toe and therefore he had been very mindful of Rose.

    As to Han Shuo, Kodiak paid no attention to him after the first nce. The demonic art energy on Han Shuo was undetectable when Han Shuo was not utilizing his demonic powers. Those without having a significant level of strength will never be able to detect the terrifying power Han Shuo was hiding. Therefore, Kodiak was unable to sense any threat from Han Shuo and only considered him as an average midgod.

    Kodiak was rather astonished when Han Shuo interrupted for he felt that a mere midgod was not qualified to interrupt a conversation between two highgods. He put on a trace of annoyance and disdain on his face andpletely ignored Han Shuo. He continued to exin to Han Hao, ¡°After raiding the Goldstone Enterprise caravan, Kage and his gang became inactive for a period and stayed inside their underground base. It was only recently that they starteding out to sell off those ores.¡±

    Han Shuo did not take offense at Kodiak¡¯s reaction. He knew that in the end, Kodiak would be telling Han Hao everything.

    ¡°Where is Kage¡¯s underground hideout located? How many experts do they have? Do they usually stay inside?¡± asked Han Hao with a calm face.

    ¡°Over on the east side of Buckthorn Valley. They have around fifty or sixty men. Other than Kage, there are three early-stage highgods. Kage would usually stay in his underground base but in recent days, he might travel deeper into the Fringe to sell the ores. I cannot say for sure,¡± said Kodiak.

    ¡°What else do you know about Kage?¡± asked Han Hao.

    ¡°Kage is a follower of Sovereign Ss. He would pay tribute to Ss every so often. If you want to kill Kage, you better not let anyone find out. Otherwise, if Ss catches wind of it, you will be in a hell of trouble!¡± Kodiak exined to Han Shuo after hesitating for a moment.

    ¡°Ss!¡± Before Han Hao replied, Rose let out a soft cry of surprise. He exined to Han Shuo softly, ¡°I have mentioned Ss to you. He is one of the five Sovereigns of the Fringe. He possesses overgod strength!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart grew a little heavier and he nodded at Rose in response.

    There were five Sovereigns in the Fringe, namely, Tyre, Rogers, Ossora, Ss, and Wasir. All five of them possessed overgod strength but they do not possess the Quintessence.

    It was needless to say that given their strength, the Five wouldmand great power no matter where they settle on Elysium. The cruel and merciless Sovereigns were the essence of disorders in the Land of Chaos. Their constant fighting for more power was one of the main reasons that the Fringe was so chaotic.

    The five were the most terrifying existences in the Fringe and they always live in the center of the Chaotic Land. Although Polo was also a powerful figure thatmanded a significant number of godhunters, he paled inparison to any of the Five Sovereigns.

    Many of the gods who lived in the Fringe would submit themselves to one of the Five Sovereigns just so that they can survive. But ites at a cost ¨C they must offer arge number of valuable goods every year in exchange for their protection. If they do not offer enough, they could risk displeasing their Sovereign and be annihted.

    Although Kage was a highgod, his strength was far, far below that of the Sovereigns. He would offer tribute to his Sovereign every year. In exchange, if Kage was killed, Ss would avenge his death. And if Kage was killed by a servant of another Sovereign, then a bloody war in the Fringe would be inevitable.

    ¡°In short, be cautious. If you are to strike, by all means, leave no survivor!¡± Kodiak spoke in a much lower voice when Ss was mentioned. He added, ¡°If Kage wasn¡¯t rted to Ss, my Chief would have finished off that guy for you. But unfortunately, my Chief dared not offend Ss. Sorry about that!¡±

    Han Hao nodded and replied, ¡°Got it. Tell Polo that I will remember his favor.¡±

    ¡°I shall take my leave,¡± replied Kodiak as he nodded. Before he left, he looked at Han Shuo with strange gazes for he noticed that Rose was very polite towards Han Shuo as though he was her master. It made him wonder about Han Shuo¡¯s true identity.

    After Kodiak left, Rose put on a rather serious face and remarked, ¡°This Ss is an unforgiving and vengeful person. For all the years he ruled the Fringe, he had not let anyone get away even for the smallest grievance. We are no match against him.¡±

    Han Shuo turned to Rose, put on an unruffled smile, and said, ¡°Don¡¯t fret about it. When we strike Kage, neither he nor his gang will take a step out from their underground base.¡±

    Han Hao suddenly looked intensely at Han Shuo. After hesitating for a moment, he asked, ¡°Father, do you have any confidence in winning if you had to fight Ss?¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly, bunched his brows, and thought for quite a while. He then shook his head and replied, ¡°No confidence. I have never tried it so I can¡¯t tell for sure.¡±

    Back then when Han Shuo went to bust a godhunter¡¯s base with Erebus and others, they came across an enemy with overgod strength. The terrifying aura that the overgod emanated had haunted Han Shuo even till now. Although Han Shuo had greatly improved in strength since then, he had never fought with an existence of that level and therefore he didn¡¯t know if he could handle it.

    <i>What a pity that I have yet to enter Skybreak Realm. Once I break through Omen Realm and reach Skybreak Realm, I will have the confidence to fight any overgod!</i> thought Han Shuo. As he attained greater and greater realms in demonic arts, every bit of progress became slower and slower. Han Shuo had always felt that he was on the verge of a breakthrough and yet, after such a long time, he had made no progress.

    ¡°Then we need to be extra careful. We cannot afford to make any mistakes once we strike,¡± said LS after thinking for a moment.

    ¡°Come, let¡¯s go and take a look at the rabbit hole!¡± Although Han Shuo felt that it was regrettable he could not right an overgod, he wasn¡¯t all too worried about it. He had prepared himself mentally long beforeing to the Fringe, since learning from Rose that the Fringe was filled with powerful experts.

    Han Shuo thought that making further breakthroughs in demonic arts could only be realized while in the Fringe because almost every previous breakthrough was made under enormous pressure and when facing enemies much stronger than himself. The Land of Chaos was filled with such existences. That was one of the reasons that Han Shuo went through all the trouble to visit the Fringe.

    ¡°With Father around, there¡¯s no way we will miss out any!¡± said Han Huo. He became very excited when he heard that they are going to murder and plunder.

    Han Shuo released demon generals to scout around him as they traveled towards Buckthorn Valley which Kodiak pointed them to. Along the way, if Han Shuo discovered any gods that he hadplete certainty of defeating, he would strike without any hesitation to fill the Cauldron with more divine souls.

    There was arge number of experts in the Fringe, far above any cities on Elysium. During Han Shuo¡¯s journey to Buckthorn Valley, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon had gained three highgod souls and thirty-eight midgod souls. And that took Han Shuo just half-a-day.

    After arriving in Buckthorn Valley, Han Shuo first used his demon generals to scout the environment. After discovering nothing concerning, he nodded to Han Tu and instructed, ¡°Open up a tunnel to the underground.¡±

    ¡°Right away!¡± There could not be any easier task for Han Tu than that. Upon finishing those words, he fused with the ground and sank deep under. The ground before the party¡¯s feet soon opened up to form a tunnel. They did not even have to spend time looking for the entrance to Kage¡¯s underground hideout.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, Father,¡± Han Tu hadpleted the task in just a few minutes. He was waving at Han Shuo and the party smilingly.

 Chapter 835 - Murder and plunder

    GDK 835: Murder and plunder

    The underground base was made up of many square-shaped rooms stacked uniformly. Some of them were for storing items and some were for cultivation and dwelling. They were yellowish crystals embedded on the walls glowing with faint and warm evening lights. It was just bright enough to see things.

    There were various unique defensive boundaries, powered by energy crystals, deployed around the base. Kage and his gang survived mainly by raiding the merchant caravans that traveled through the Fringe. They stored the goods they plundered in the warehouse section of their underground base to keep the items safe with them while looking for buyers.

    The underground base was well defended. There were two highgod each securing each wing of the underground base. Most of the inhabitants of the Fringe dare not raid Kage¡¯s base or even mess with his gang. Not all of them were afraid of Kage, but they were all certainly afraid of Ss.

    Kage and his gang had grown bossy and unbridled because they had this enormous figure called Ss to lean on. They were not afraid of any gods living in the Fringe, save the followers of other Sovereigns. Most gods dared not mess with Kage because of Ss.

    One after another, demon generals noiselessly flew out from Han Shuo and spread to the entire underground base. They covered every region and every chamber in the base, giving Han Shuo aplete vision of the entire base. It was better than using wallhacks in a video game.

    After a while, Han Shuo put on a smile and instructed Han Tu, ¡°Seal every path to the surface.¡±

    Han Tu smiled mischievously before he stepped backward, leaned against the wall, and fused with the soil.

    After carefully sensing for a moment, Han Shuo said to Han Hao and Rose, ¡°Kage isn¡¯t in the base, but that doesn¡¯t matter. We will kill everyone inside and take everything they have.¡± He then turned to Han Jin and said, ¡°The ores they stole from you aren¡¯t in here. It¡¯s most likely that they are with Kage.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s no big deal,¡± Han Jin put on a smile and said, ¡°Let¡¯s get these bastards.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and calmly instructed, ¡°Fire at will. Leave none alive.¡±

    Han Hao and Rose charged into the base as soon as Han Shuo finished those words. They started murdering in two different paths. Miserable shrieks would y wherever they went.

    Han Jin, Han Mu, Han Shui, and Han Huo also started raiding the base together. They could kill any midgod in split seconds just by using the bizarre energies on them and their telepathic teamwork. They did not even need to fuse their energies.

    Han Shuo, however, stood where he was like a rock. Hemanded the demon generals he positioned in every corner of the base to transform to their material form of sinister dark shadows and started wreaking havoc. At this time, there were close to a thousand demon generals in the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. He even had a few dozen demon generals of the highest grade refined using highgod souls. Han Shuo could easily cleanse the underground base with just his swarm of demon generals.

    Even if there were twice the number of gods defending the underground base; even if Kage was home, they would still stand no chance against Han Shuo and his party. One after another, these followers of Kage shrieked miserably and copsed.

    In usual days, they were the aggressors, plundering and murdering the merchant caravans. But now that they were getting a taste of their own medicine; when they saw their aplices rapidly fall to the enemy, they were terrified. They hastily ran to the tunnel that connected to the surface, trying to flee for their lives.

    But unfortunately for those people, their only way out had been tightly sealed by Han Tu. Soon after entering the tunnel, they found that it was a dead-end and that earth-spikes were suddenly growing from the walls around them and the tunnel was copsing. Most of them were impaled and crushed to death in a moment.

    When under the ground, Han Tu¡¯s strength would be amplified by several folds!

    In this situation, even when pitted against a highgod, Han Tu would have the confidence to kill the expert by utilizing his environment, making attacks and defenses using the energy of earth all around him. No one could use the energy of earth better than he could.

    Han Tu utilized earth energy excitedly and made the underground chambers shrink and copse. Many of Kage¡¯s henchmen could not react in time and were squashed alive. Those few who managed to escape from their rooms would find earth walls blocking their paths and trapping them.

    Before they could escape from the earth-walls, an earth-dragon appeared out of nowhere and rammed the few midgods to death. Han Tuughed heartily as he maneuvered the earth-dragon around. It slithered around the base and massacred Kage¡¯s followers who were trapped in their own base.

    It took Han Shuo and his party just minutes to kill the fifty or so gods in the underground base. Han Shuo had also released his Cauldron of Myriad Demon to collect the divine souls from the dead bodies.

    ¡°We are followers of Lord Kage. His Lordship is under the hegemony of Sovereign Ss. What you are doing now is the same as challenging the sovereignty of Lord Ss. You are courting death!¡± an expert with highgod strength yelled fiercely when Han Hao pointed his bone spear at him. His heart, however, was quivering in fear.

    ¡°Where is Kage?¡± asked Han Hao as he looked at the highgod calmly. He did not kill him immediately.

    ¡°Who are you bunch? Why are you attacking us?¡± the highgod continued to shout.

    Han Hao bunched his brows and he abruptly stabbed at the highgod. It easily overcame all his defenses, pierced through his stomach, and pinned him on the wall. Then, Han Hao repeated the question, ¡±Where is Kage?¡±

    When the bone spear pierced into his stomach, a sinister energy started gnawing on his divine body like thousands of ants. He was overwhelmed with dread and could no longer hide it. He became even more frightened when he saw that Han Hao¡¯s eyes were devoid of emotions. He hastily asked, ¡°Are you going to spare me if I answer your question?¡±

    Han Hao did not reply. Instead, he gave the bone spear in his hand a little twist. The sinister energy that had been wreaking havoc in the highgod¡¯s body suddenly swarmed into his brain and filled his mind with inhuman pain. He immediately started shrieking in pain and had forgotten to bargain with Han Hao. He answered tearfully, ¡°He went to Lord Ss with a batch of ores!¡±

    The bone spear was pulled out from his body and then thrust at his stomach at a steep angle. It went through his lungs, throat, and exited from the back of his skull. Blood gushed out from all the holes on his body.

    The bright-dark Cauldron of Myriad Demon floated towards them like a spirit and quickly covered the person¡¯s head, devoured his divine soul that had yet to dissipate, and continued flying all around the base. The Cauldron would arrive very promptly right after someone is killed to collect their souls.

    Ten minutester, the entire underground base was cleansed with blood. All of Kage¡¯s followers were murdered.

    The demon generals located in every corner of the base gradually flew back into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. Han Hao, Rose, and the Five Elite Zombies started sifting through the goods in every storeroom.

    The underground base of Kage was piled with all kinds of goods which included some divine weapons of ordinary value. Most of those things were not useful for Han Shuo or too cheap for him. He only selected some rare medicinal ingredients, precious stones, and certain special hides and skeletons of magical beasts useful for making divine armor.

    After some time, the party reassembled before Han Shuo. They all had contented smiles on their faces.

    Han Hao, the Five Elite Zombies and Rose were all closely rted to Han Shuo and therefore he would let them take anything they needed instead of keeping it all to himself. In fact, Han Shuo wanted nothing but a shortlist of items that Han Shuo asked them to collect for him.

    ¡°Oh? Why have you collected so many items?¡± Han Shuo noticed that the Five Elite Zombies and Rose only took several items for themselves but Little Skeleton had filled himself two space rings. Most of the items were not that valuable to Han Shuo. Han Shuo was rather surprised that Little Skeleton would want those items.

    ¡°Father, although I don¡¯t need these, my followers could really use them,¡± exined Little Skeleton.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment. It was only then he recalled that Little Skeleton had his group of godhunters. It turned out that Little Skeleton had gone through all the effort of collecting all those divine armors and divine weapons to enhance the strength of his godhunters. No wonder he would bother collecting those ¡®cheap¡¯ stuff.

    ¡°Oh, I see,¡± Han Shuo nodded before instructing Han Tu, ¡°Use your earth energy to move the rest of the items deeper under the ground so that if we want to, we can get them out in the future. Hehe, you might be the only person in the world who could unearth them without much effort.¡±

    Han Shuo noticed that Han Tu¡¯s strength under the ground was much greater than when above ground. After Han Shuo, the person who scored the most kill in the underground base wasn¡¯t Han Hao nor Rose, but Han Tu.

    Han Shuo suddenly realized that the Five Elite Zombies could assist him more than with just their strengths. Their special ability to use the Five Yuan Energies would benefit him more than he could ever imagine.

    ¡°Right away!¡± said Han Tu in an innocent smile. Then, without him making any special movement, the entire underground base, save for the region Han Shuo and the party was located, started sinking. To the party, it looked as though they were floating upwards. It didn¡¯t take long before all the goods were buried much deeper underground and out of their sight.

    ¡°If Kage returned, he would have to dig a new hole to get back to his underground base. He¡¯d probably think that he got the wrong ce!¡± remarked Han Shuiughingly.

    If Kage returned to Buckthorn Valley, he would surely be very confused when he could not locate the entrance to his underground base. And if he were to take the effort of re-digging the tunnel to his base, he would discover that it was empty. It seemed likely he would think that he was mistaken with the location.

    ¡°Haha, I wish I could see the expression on Kage¡¯s face when he returns. Now, let¡¯s go visit the Omphalos!¡± said Han Shuo smilingly. They left the underground after Han Tu opened a tunnel to the surface.

 Chapter 836 - The Omphalos

    GDK 836: The Omphalos

    On Elysium, the Land of Chaos was oftenpared to a hurricane for all its violence and chaos. However, just like a hurricane, it was calm at the center.

    The gods in the Land of Chaos also needed to trademodities and conduct businesses. But most of the Fringe was just too chaotic or unsafe to do so. Even the simplest of trading could hardly be performed.

    Thus the Omphalos was born ¨C a city located at the center of the Fringe. It was jointly managed by the most powerful powerhouses in the Fringe ¨C the Five Sovereigns. Every god inside the Omphalos would obey the Five Sovereign¡¯s orders not to fight, kill, or steal.

    The gods who could not live on any of the Twelve Dominions for whatever reason can live a veryfortable and worry-free life in the Omphalos provided that they had arge amount of ck crystal coins and could make it through the godhunters and criminals in the Fringe. No matter how chaotic and disastrous it gets outside, the Omphalos would staypletely calm and unaffected. All friction and conflict between the Five Sovereigns would be left outside the Omphalos.

    Many of the raiders and bandits would bring the goods they looted to the Omphalos to sell them off for in the entire Land of Chaos, that might be the only ce where people won¡¯t try to rob and murder each other. After all, no one dared offend the Five Sovereigns. However, that would only be true while they were in the Omphalos. They would be on their own as soon as they stepped outside the Omphalos.

    In other words, even if one manages to sell off their valuable goods in the Omphalos, they would still be vulnerable to getting robbed or murdered as soon as they take a step outside.

    Inside, only money mattered. Outside, only strength mattered!

    The Omphalos was a very unique ce in the Chaotic Land for anyone and everyone¡¯s safety was guaranteed. But the temporary safety came at a hefty price ¨C anyone who wished to enter the Omphalos must pay arge sum of ck crystal coins in entrance fees. The longer they wished to stay, the more they must pay.

    The Five Sovereigns had established this safe zone in the Fringe not just because there was a need for such a ce, but also because it would supply them with a constant and tremendous stream of ck crystal coins.

    Han Shuo and his party traveled straight for the Omphalos. They finally arrived at their destination eight dayster.

    During those eight days, Han Shuo ran into a dozen or more battles of various scales. Some had just two to three participants while some involved several hundred experts. There were five or six groups who attacked Han Shuo and his party but they were easily butchered by Han Hao and Rose.

    Han Shuo understood the Fringe even better during those eight days. In this region where the most heinous criminals from the Twelve Dominions gathered, morality and ethics were basically nonexistent. The strong prey on the weak and life had little to no value.

    Many criminals would travel across Elysium just to live in the Fringe. But before they could go any deeper, most of them would be murdered by gods who had been living in the Fringe. After entering the Fringe, gods with rtively weak strength must either submit themselves to a powerhouse or spend vast amounts of ck crystal coins living in the Omphalos to keep themselves alive.

    Han Shuo felt as though he was a tiger freed from confinement and released to the wild forests. He would annihte every party he discovered along his journey to the Omphalos. During those eight days, more than two hundred gods perished to Han Shuo and his party. Among those perished were ten highgods!

    The Fringe might be a nightmarishnd for most people. But to Han Shuo, it is the most wonderful ce on Elysium where he could rapidly improve his strength. Han Shuo¡¯s base strength was growing in parallel with the number of demon generals within the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. He could sense a minute but significant transformation to the Cauldron with each highgod soul collected.

    While waiting before one of the gates to the Omphalos, Han Shuo noticed that it was just slightly smaller than the Ethereal City. Its vast territory was covered by a light mist. From a distance, he could see that the buildings were rather scattered and high traffic of gods moving around. Most of those gods had cold and savage looks.

    There were five checkpoints into the Omphalos, one for each of the Sovereigns. Han Shuo and his party were entering through the checkpoint controlled by Wasir¡¯s men. Those gods had cold and sinister eyes. Their gazes towards those entering were filled with greed, as though they wished to strip everyone of their money.

    They did not check the divine tablet of those entering or ask about their purpose of travel ¨C all that they asked was one hundred ck crystal coins from each person. And if Han Shuo and his party wanted to stay longer than one day, they must pay one hundred ck crystal coins for every extra day. After paying eight hundred ck crystal coins, Han Shuo and his party officially stepped into the Omphalos.

    In most cities of the Twelve Dominions, one would only need to pay no more than a few purple crystal coins per entry. The price that the Omphalos charged was hundreds or thousands of times greater than an average city for the stay duration of just one day.

    Even if there were less than five thousand gods present in the Omphalos each day, that would mean an ie of five hundred thousand ck crystal coins in a day. Now imagine collecting that amount every day over the course of decades.

    <i><i>What an astronomical number! No wonder the Sovereigns would bother working together and manage the Omphalos!</i></i> thought Han Shuo. Even though his Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was generating him a sizable amount of ck crystal coins, Han Shuo was astonished when he made an estimation of the amount of ck crystal coins that the Omphalos was generating.

    Death and murder exist in every corner of the Fringe. Those gods with puny strength but possessed arge amount of ck crystal coins would live in the Omphalos to survive. They did not mind burning ck crystal coins to preserve their lives. With that, the Omphalos became one of the greatest ie generators on Elysium.

    ¡°Father, if we could control the Omphalos, we will never have to worry about ck crystal coins anymore!¡± Han Hao said softly to Han Shuo soon after they stepped into the city.

    The city was not all that well defended but it was filled with frequently patrolling troops of the Five Sovereigns. They were in charge of maintaining order in the Omphalos and as tax-collectors. Those who had paid the necessary fees would receive a small glowing badge that they must always wear on their chests while inside the Omphalos. After one day¡¯s time, the badge will stop glowing, signaling that the person¡¯s stay in the Omphalos is over. It must be refilled with a special energy to keep it glowing.

    When the troops of the Five Sovereigns found any person whose badge was not glowing, they would immediately demand ck crystal coins from the person to relight it. And if the person would not or could not pay sufficient ck crystal coins, they will be kicked out from the Omphalos mercilessly, and will only be allowed to enter the Omphalos again once they pay the necessary amount of crystal coins.

    Han Shuo touched the small little badge on his chest and released a strand of his consciousness to stealthily probe the energy within. However, the energy contained in the badge seemed to be self-aware. Before Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness had touched the badge, he sensed wariness from the strand of energy.

    Han Shuo took a shock. He immediately knew that the little badge must have contained a strand of an overgod¡¯s awareness. It was simr to that bizarre, self-aware energy of destruction that previously wreaked havoc in Erebus and Han Shuo¡¯s body. Although Han Shuo could easily annihte that strand of self-aware energy, doing so will immediately alert its creator. By then, Han Shuo and his party might face a disgruntled Sovereign and might even risk starting a war.

    For the moment, Han Shuo had no intention of dering war upon any of the Five Sovereigns, at least not when he didn¡¯t know much about the Fringe. He withdrew the strand of consciousness and softly instructed Han Hao and the others, ¡°Do not touch the energy in the badge.¡±

    After a moment of observation, Han Shuo discovered thatpared to most cities in the Twelve Dominions, the Omphalos wasn¡¯t all that different. There were streets, blocks, shops, and gymnasiums like every other city ¨C but they were much, much more expensive. Stalls were verymonly seen. They could be found almost everywhere. Most of them were selling goods plundered from others. They can be purchased with ck crystal coins or barter traded. Pawnshops were also popr among powerful bandits in the Fringe like Kage.

    Other than that, there was a special upation found in the Omphalos ¨C security contractors. It was simr to being a bodyguard or a mercenary. Everyone knew that the Land of Chaos was chaotic. The chances of one without mighty strength getting killed while traveling in the Fringe was just too great.

    And for this reason, security contractors naturally appeared, promising to protect the contractee¡¯s life in exchange for ck crystal coins. most of the security contractors were henchmen closely rted to either one of the Five Sovereigns. They provide protection to the contractee by flexing their rtive security for being closely associated with a Sovereign. A second, lessmon type of contactor were those with very mighty strengths. It was only under the protection of such forces that one with poor strength and no connection would dare step out from the Omphalos.

    And, of course, the asking prices for their services were often absurdly high, going for at least tens of thousands of ck crystal coins. However, there were plenty of people who were willing to pay those prices to stay alive. Otherwise, they might be murdered as soon as they stepped outside the Omphalos.

    After strolling around for some time, Han Shuo came to understand the Omphalos better. He arrived at a conclusion: in order to livefortably in the Fringe, one must have great strength or arge amount of ck crystal coins. Otherwise, only death awaits.

    ¡°I like this ce!¡± remarked Han Hao softly in a smirk after they toured around the city.

    Rose, who was walking beside him, was taken aback. She looked at Han Hao and thought, <i><i>This guy sure is like his father ¨C entric and unfathomable! </i></i>

    ¡°Hey! Isn¡¯t that Rose? Haha, how dare you show your face here!¡± a peal of very unpleasantughter suddenly sounded from a distance. An ugly, bald, old woman who was all skin and bones flew towards them.

 Chapter 837 - Wanna work for me?

    <strong>GDK 837:Wanna work for me? </strong>

    The old woman was all skin and bones. Her skin color seemed to be a mix of zinc and iron rust. The wrinkles on her face were as deep as ravines. When sheughs, the wrinkles were squeezed together, making a tremendous visual impact on anyone who sees it.

    <i>So ugly!</i> Anyone who saw her will automatically think so as goosebumps flood their skin.

    A very distinct aura of death could be sensed from the old woman who was gently flying toward Han Shuo and his party. She was in mid-stage highgod realm. It was rare for one to possess such strength in the Omphalos. She had seven escorts following behind her. Three of them possessed early-stage highgod strength. They all had sinister and ugly appearances.

    Most people will definitely not openly speak what they thought of her looks because of her formidable strength. No one would risk enraging such a powerful entity.

    However, as with most things in the universe, there would always be a few exceptions. Before that old woman arrived, Han Huo shouted as though he was horrified, ¡°Holy fuck! What monster!¡±

    ¡°Yuck, I¡¯ve never seen anything as hideous as that! I need to wash my eyes!¡± cried Han Mu as he put on a disgusted face and put up both hands to block himself from seeing that old ugly woman.

    The two were notplete jerks. They had mocked her because they sensed hostility from that old and ugly woman.

    ¡°Bertha! It¡¯s you!¡± Rose¡¯s face jolted as a murderous light shone from her eyes.

    The extremely ugly old woman chuckled in a strange manner. Upon arriving before the party, she greeted Rose in a sinister smile before immediately turning to Han Huo and Han Mu and said, ¡°You two youngsters aren¡¯t afraid of death, aren¡¯t you? You may be safe here, but you better not take a single step outside of the Omphalos because I will make certain of your death!¡±

    ¡°Ugly witch, it¡¯s not our fault that you are born ugly. But I must say that I admire your courage and self-confidence ¨C I¡¯ve never seen anyone as ugly as you walk in the public without a mask, or even step outside!¡± replied Han Huo who was not intimidated by Bertha¡¯s threatening words. He then pretended as though he smelled something and remarked, ¡°Yuck, what¡¯s that disgusting, stinking smell? Oh! It¡¯s from your rotting face!¡±

    Han Huo then pretended as though he was going to puke.

    Bertha knew that she was hideous in appearance, but no one would tell that straight to her. That was the very first time that anyone had deliberately mocked her in her face. Bertha was enraged and she stared at Han Huo like a viper. It seemed as though she was ready to kill.

    ¡°Bertha, don¡¯t you start a fight here!¡± a warning suddenly sounded from a distance. A group of Omphalos guards was gazing at Han Shuo and Bertha¡¯s party with cold eyes.

    Bertha, with all her willpower, suppressed the rage in her heart. She looked coldly at Rose and threatened, ¡°I¡¯ve been looking for you for a long time. I thought that you would keep hiding from me until your death. I did not expect that you have the courage to return to this Land. Hehe, good, very good. The moment that you and your people step outside the Omphalos is the moment that you will all die!¡±

    Then, with a twitching, malevolent grin, Bertha looked at Han Huo and Han Mu and said, ¡°And, the two of you, when that timees, I will make you two suffer a lifetime for that moment of delight.¡±

    Bertha then gestured at her escorts and instructed, ¡°Move!¡± Before they left, they would look intensely at Han Shuo and his party for a moment as though to remember their faces.

    ¡°Who is she? What¡¯s the story with the two of you?¡± Han Shuo asked Rose after Bertha left.

    Rose kept gazing at Bertha as she left. It was until her figure hadpletely vanished that she exined, ¡°Back then when I was living in the Fringe, we used to be on good terms. But one day, his son tried to drug me and I killed him after discovering his plot. Ever since then, Bertha had been trying to kill me and never stopped making me troubles until I left the Fringe.¡±

    ¡°What? With her looks, how is it possible that any guy could do her?!¡± remarked Han Mu as though he was very surprised.

    ¡°She only looked like this because of a severe injury. Before Bertha was disfigured, she was actually quite attractive looking,¡± answered Rose after taking a nce at Han Mu.

    ¡°There¡¯s no need to be concerned about her. If we run into her outside the city, it is she who will be dead!¡± Han Shuo did not take Bertha as a threat at all. A mere mid-stage highgod expert was far from enough to do them any harm.

    ¡°We can fight off Bertha, but it won¡¯t be that easy to fight off his man ¨C Buzz,¡± Rose sighed softly and exined, ¡°Buzz possesseste-stage highgod strength. He cultivates in the energy of destruction. He is famous in the Fringe for his ferocity. Hemands arge group of deadly and powerful experts. Bertha, who knew our numbers, will surely notify Buzz. It won¡¯t be long before Buzz will reach the Omphalos. Buzz has quite a reputation in the Fringe. Most people in the Fringe would not make enemies with him. Once we leave the Omphalos, we will be tracked and hunted by Buzz and Bertha.¡±

    Rose seemed dejected. She looked at Han Shuo and said, ¡°I¡¯m so sorry. I have caused you big trouble.¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head with a smile and replied, ¡°Although the Fringe is filled with countless fierce and powerful experts, I¡¯m not afraid of any of them. The only experts who could threaten me are the Five Sovereigns! No matter how powerful Buzz is, he is just a highgod. So don¡¯t you worry. If they do show up, I will show them the consequences of messing with us!¡±

    ¡°Yeah! They are just bitches who had spoiled their son. We ain¡¯t afraid of them!¡± consoled Han Huo.

    Ever since the incident at Ethereal City Celestial Pearl where Rose held back a group of raiders to allow him and Han Tu to escape, Han Huo¡¯s opinion of Rose dramatically improved. Besides, to Han Huo, Han Shuo was the most powerful in the world. He had blind faith in Han Shuo and did not think that anyone could defeat Han Shuo.

    This blind faith came from his past experiences. He had never seen Han Shuo defeated over the many years he was with him and therefore would only grow more and more confident in Han Shuo¡¯s power.

    ¡°Father, as long as you can handle that Buzz, we will not lose!¡± Little Skeleton was not as irrational as Han Huo. As his strength and intelligence improved, he learned to dissect a problem with clear and sound reasoning.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it, we will be just fine!¡± Han Shuo put on a confident smile and said, ¡°Come, let¡¯s keep strolling around and see if we can get information about Kage.¡±

    There were people in the Omphalos who specialized in selling information. They were called ¡®stringers¡¯. If anyone in the Fringe wanted to raid or attack any of the merchant caravans who traveled across the Fringe, one could learn all the detailed information and ns from stringers.

    The stringers started out by selling information on that aspect. But over time, they expanded in the intelligence that they would sell. With enough ck crystal coins, one could learn just about anything from stringers.

    After spending one thousand ck crystal coins, Han Shuo got hold of Kage¡¯s whereabouts from a stringer. He was told that Kage was here in the Omphalos five days ago before going to Ss to offer his tribute. At present, Kage should be on Empyrean Peak.

    Although the Omphalos was jointly managed by Tyre, Rogers, Ossora, Ss, and Wasir, they normally won¡¯t be in the city. The vast territory of the Fringe contained countless mountain ranges, rivers, oceans, and valleys. The Five Sovereigns lived in the most mysterious and treacherous regions found in the Fringe.

    Ss lived on the Empyrean Peak which was one hundred thousand meters at its tallest point. It was like a broadsword piercing into the blue dome of heavens. The Empyrean Peak represented Ss¡¯ exaltedness. His tributaries would travel to the Empyrean Peak annually to pay formal tribute. In normal circumstances, Ss will not leave the Empyrean Peak. He would only step outside of his mountain when there were situations that none of his subordinates could resolve.

    When Han Shuo learned that Kage was at Empyrean Peak, he knew that it was highly improbable to kill Kage soon. Not only that Ss was at the Empyrean Peak, but his core and strongest members were also always stationed on the mountain. On top of that, the Mountain was covered with a dense array of defensive boundaries. Han Shuo knew that it would be irrational to attack the Empyrean Peak with just Little Skeleton, Rose, and the Five Elite Zombies.

    Han Shuo had no n of wrecking the Empyrean Peak and fighting Ss, for now. He decided to wait for Kage to leave the Empyrean Peak before doing anything to him.

    Han Shuo and his party continued to roam around the Omphalos. Soon after, a gang walked into their path. Their leader has a cold and arrogant face. He was ate-stage highgod of darkness.

    ¡°Lady, gentlemen, I heard that you have offended Bertha and Buzz?¡± the leader of the gang asked with his head held high after arriving before Han Shuo and his party.

    ¡°Not your goddamn business!¡± Han Huo found his snobbish look annoying and replied to him dismissively.

    ¡°Fool, don¡¯t you know that you are on the eve of death?¡± The man coldly groaned and scanned every one of Han Shuo¡¯s party with his eyes. Perhaps he thought that Rose was the strongest among them, he looked at Rose and said, ¡°Let me remind you ¨C there are only a few in the Fringe who dare offend Buzz and Bertha. The duo is now waiting right outside the Omphalos. As soon as you leave the city, you will be tracked and killed by the duo. So, if you want to live, pay me one million ck crystal coins. I and my men will protect you and your party as you leave from the Omphalos. How about that?¡±

    Rose did not reply but turned to look at Han Shuo.

    The security contractor was stunned. Being good at reading bodynguage, he immediately realized that he had misidentified the party¡¯s leader. He took a moment to carefully observe Han Shuo but discovered no significant energy fluctuation on Han Shuo. He found the situation rather strange and confusing.

    ¡°Nope,¡± Han Shuo declined the proposal sinctly.

    That guy did not continue to try selling his service. He nodded in a cold grin and turned on his heels with his gang. He thought that Han Shuo and his party would be dead without a doubt.

    ¡°Hold on!¡± spoke Han Shuo suddenly. When the person turned around puzzlingly, Han Shuo smilingly asked, ¡°May I know what¡¯s your name?¡±

    ¡°Haruli is my name. So, how? Changed your mind?¡± Haruli arrogantly said, ¡°The price is now 1.5 million ck crystal coins. No bargaining!¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head smilingly and replied, ¡°You don¡¯t seem to be serving any of the Five Sovereigns. Ay, you and your followers have decent strengths. How about you work for me?¡°

    Haruli was stunned and stared at Han Shuo like a fool. Aftering to his senses, heughed condescendingly and said, ¡°Go and ask around the Fringe. All of the Five Sovereigns had tried to recruit me, but I have declined them all. What makes you think that I will work for a nobody like you?¡± Haruli then gestured at his gang and said, ¡°Let¡¯s leave. This guy must be a nutjob!¡±

 Chapter 838 - GDK 838: Make it big!

    <strong>GDK 838: Make it big!</strong>

    ¡°My Lord, that guy must be mentally ill! Howughable, that puny little fe wants Your Lordship to submit to him! We should finish him off!¡± Haruli¡¯s gang members started angrily cursing after they were away from Han Shuo and his party. From their point of view, what Han Shuo did was a great insult to their leader and he should be killed for it.

    ¡°Lunatic! No wonder Buzz wants to finish them. What a bunch of death seekers!¡± remarked another of Haruli¡¯s followers in a scowl. He added, ¡°We don¡¯t even have to do anything to them ¨C they will automatically be dead after they leave the Omphalos!¡±

    Haruli was wearing a dark face. He did not expect to hear that proposal from someone as weak as Han Shuo and was rather offended by it.

    He was one of the top characters in the Fringe. He had never really lost any battle during his many years in the Fringe and his reputation was on par with Buzz¡¯s. That was the reason he dared to offer Han Shuo and his party protection.

    He originally thought that Han Shuo and his party will definitely ept his proposal and spend the million ck crystal coins in exchange for his protection. Although it was a hefty price, it was nothingpared to eight lives. However, not only that Han Shuo had immediately declined his offer, Han Shuo wanted Haruli to work for him. To Haruli, that was beyond what a sane mind would do.

    ¡°Lohia, go keep an eye on them. Immediately notify me when they are about to leave the city. I want to watch them die!¡± Haruli coldly groaned before he instructed one of his followers.

    A highgod of earth nodded and immediately turned to one of the tangled andplicated streets. He tracked and observed Han Shuo and his party from a distance.

    ***

    ¡°I have not heard of Haruli before. But if he has the courage to go against Buzz, then he must have extraordinary strength. Master, that was a little too blunt!¡± Rose was betweenughter and tears. She could not understand how Han Shuo could say that to Haruli just like that. Haruli was a character ranking near the top in the Fringe. Before Han Shuo proved that he possessed greater strength, those words will only seemughable to others.

    As Han Shuo looked smilingly at Rose, he said, ¡°Only a certain unconventional approach would work on someone as haughty as Haruli. He will definitely keep an eye on us out of curiosity. Hehe, once his curiosity is provoked, he will be drawn to us bit by bit.¡±

    ¡°We are not familiar with the Fringe at all. If we can subdue a local mafia boss like Haruli, it will be tremendously beneficial to our future operations. Father, Haruli will definitely be watching us. As long as we can demonstrate that we possess power greater than any average powerhouse in the Fringe, and if Father then makes him a sincere invitation, then it will have a high chance of working!¡± remarked Han Hao after thinking for a moment.

    To subdue someone like Haruli whose chin was above his head, one must first make asting impression on the person. Then, one must demonstrate to possess far greater strength and power and be superior in every aspect. And if that was followed with a sincere invitation, the chances of sessfully recruiting the person will be high. It appeared that Little Skeleton understood Han Shuo¡¯s n.

    ¡°Rose, you said that you have some friends in the Fringe. Do you know any who could join us?¡± asked Han Shuo after he thought in silence for a moment.

    Rose thought for a moment before she nodded and replied, ¡°I do have some friends, but they don¡¯t live in the Omphalos. They do not have that kind of money to squander. We need to leave the Omphalos to find them. However, with Buzz blocking our way, it¡¯s not going to be easy,¡±

    ¡°Then we will leave the Omphalos. It¡¯s too peaceful here for us anyway.¡± Han Shuo casually looked around before he said to the party while winking, ¡°Hehe, so there are people carefully observing our every moment. It seems that we are getting popr in the Fringe!¡±

    ¡°Really? You want to leave the city?¡± Perhaps Rose was too intimidated by Buzz and Bertha, she was acting less straightforward than she usually does.

    ¡°Yes, Let¡¯s go!¡± replied Han Shuo. He then started slowly traveling in the direction of a city gate. He could sense that there were several people secretly watching them. They ought to be Buzz and Haruli¡¯s subordinates.

    The streets of the Omphalos were covered with stalls selling all sorts of items. While traveling towards the exit, Han Shuo would leisurely examine some of the goods being sold. And when he saw an item that he liked, he would buy them straightforwardly.

    A lot of the merchants in the Fringe did not have a clean background. Some of them did not make money by selling goods but through a devious scheme that only exists in the Fringe. The scheme began with the ¡®seller¡¯ determining if their purchaser was rich. Then, as soon as the purchaser leaves the Omphalos, they will be robbed and murdered. Not only that the goods would be repossessed, but the purchaser would also lose all his ck crystal coins along with his life.

    There was a strange phenomenon in the Omphalos. A ¡®merchant¡¯ who sold a valuable item at a very low price would have the same item back on sale at the same ce and same price after one or two days ¨C again and again.

    Rose was aware of such a scheme. When Han Shuo was purchasing several high-grade Souljade Crystals and Frigidbone Agates, Rose softly reminded Han Shuo, warning him about the scheme of the seller.

    But not only was Han Shuo not worried about it, he excitedly asked Rose, ¡°Help me look around and let me know if you see anyone doing this trade. Hehe, it¡¯d be stupid not to take advantage of this!¡±

    ¡°But as soon as we leave the city, they will swarm at us like locusts! We already have Buzz and Bertha waiting for us. That Haruli might attack us as well. If we offend other forces now, wouldn¡¯t we bepletely surrounded by powerful enemies?¡± Rose was used to being a lone wolf and while she lived in the Fringe, all she had sought was her own safety. She would normally avoid making enemies with powerful forces. Therefore, she could not understand Han Shuo¡¯s actions.

    ¡°That is exactly what I want!¡± said Han Shuo in a mischievous smile. He instructed, ¡°You don¡¯t have to worry. Just point it to me when you see that kind of shop. If we are to make a scene, we ought to make it big. Otherwise, we won¡¯t be famous in the Fringe within a short time!¡±

    Rose sighed in her mind after hearing those words. She thought, <i><i>Have I made a mistake bringing him to the Fringe? If Master does so, he will surely offend most of the forces in the Chaotic Land. If hundreds or thousands of experts of the Fringe ganged up against us, how do we even escape from that?</i></i>

    Han Shuo made out what was on Rose¡¯s mind with just one look on her face. Heughed and said, ¡°You have been with me for quite a long time. Tell me, have you ever seen me start a fight that I cannot win? Besides, with these little fes around, even if the Five Sovereigns came, we will have no trouble leaving the Fringe. You have nothing to worry about!¡±

    Although the Five Elite Zombies were not all that great in strength, their talents and special abilities were beyond miraculous. With Earth Elite Zombie, they could bore underground in no time and escape from a legion of pursuing armies. With Metal Elite Zombie, they could traverse across mountains with little effort. With Wood Elite Zombie, they could conceal their auras when traveling through forests. Who will be able to catch them?

    ¡°Well, alright then. Let me show you,¡± Rose did not take much effort or time in finding stalls that conducted that scheme. She covertly indicated to Han Shuo when she found that type of stalls.

    After taking a moment to observe, Han Shuo noticed that the shop owners indeed had extraordinarily sinister gazes. Their eyes were very attentive to everything that their potential buyer wears. They would observe one¡¯s strength, clothing, the capacity of space rings, and expression when withdrawing and paying ck crystal coins.

    Through detailed observation, they could estimate a person¡¯s strength and-worth. After making the assessment, they will contact their aplices outside the city, assemble a team of greater strength to intercept and rob the person.

    After buying from a few more stalls, Han Shuo no longer needed Rose¡¯s guidance. He too could tell which of the sellers were actually raiders. While walking towards the gate of the Omphalos, Han Shuo happily purchased many valuable items that were selling at a greatly discounted price while wearing an amiable smile. He was scheming against the schemers.

    Gradually, more and more people were following behind Han Shuo. Other than Buzz and Haruli¡¯s subordinates, those who had sold their goods to Han Shuo would also secretly follow behind him.

    Outside the Omphalos, various forces were busy assembling outside the gate that Han Shuo will use. They were hiding in various locations.

    ¡°There is a fat sheep to be ughtered! Brothers, pay extra attention to this one! That fe has at least a few million ck crystal coins. When he was buying things from Fengi, he was seen tossing out a fewrge sacks of ck crystal coins. If we get him, we can take a very long break!¡±

    ¡°Eh? Isn¡¯t that Buzz¡¯s man? Dafuq, how did he receive news as well? It seems that this is going to be troublesome.¡±

    ¡°Hey, Haruli¡¯s man is also following him. How did that fe offend so many people?! We better keep some distance and not be rash. Let¡¯s see how things go first.¡±

    ....

    Gradually, more and more forces were assembled outside the checkpoint. They were quite familiar with each other. They were wearing dark faces as they were secretly waiting for Han Shuo and the parties to exit the Omphalos.

    ¡°Lord Haruli, twenty or thirty forces are gathering from every direction. They seem to be targeting the same group of people!¡± informed a person who was hiding outside the city gate.

    Haruli cursed, ¡°Lunatic, that fe is indeed a lunatic! He has drawn most of the fierce characters around here. What the fuck is that guy thinking? Is he trying to get himself killed spectacrly?¡±

 Chapter 839 - I want you dead

    GDK 839: I want you dead

    And finally, Han Shuo, the prima donna, slowly arrived at the checkpoint for exiting the Omphalos. When he raised his head and looked around, he saw that arge crowd was hiding outside the gate, patiently waiting for his appearance.

    ¡°Friend, it seems very dangerous out there. Why don¡¯t you stay another night in the Omphalos? It¡¯s only eight hundred ck crystal coins. Otherwise, I¡¯m afraid that you will lose your life as soon as you step outside!¡± a guard manning the checkpoint kindly reminded Han Shuo who was walking at the front of his party with a sympathizing look.

    The guard had been rather observant and could tell that massive forces were gathering outside the gate. He was very curious about who could have offended so many powerful forces at once and he managed to learn who was their target through his connections in the Omphalos.

    Ever since those forces gathered outside the city gate, those who had previously nned on leaving through the gate would either turn around and leave through another gate or just stay in the Omphalos. Han Shuo and his party were the only people who proceeded with leaving through the gate. In addition, as soon as Han Shuo appeared at the checkpoint, he could hear a burst of excited breathinging from outside.

    It was clear to him that Han Shuo was the person that those savage gods were after!

    ¡°Thanks for the reminder, but we will leave the city,¡± replied Han Shuo smilingly. He did not take the guard¡¯s warning to heart.

    The guard nodded and said nothing more. He made a gesture and the gate opened wide, allowing Han Shuo and his party to leave.

    ¡°What a reckless fool!¡± remarked another guard and he looked disdainfully at Han Shuo and his party. He had been looking forward to seeing a formidable expert making an entrance but was greatly disappointed when in the end, it was just a puny gang.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go, don¡¯t let them wait for too long!¡± said Han Shuo and he took the lead on exiting the city. Han Hao, Rose, and the Five Elite Zombies followed behind him in order. Other than Rose, no one in the party was nervous. However, they weren¡¯t as talkative and cheerful as usual.

    The yellowish evening light was unusually stifling. When Han Shuo gazed around, he could see groups of gray air emanating from the dense forest and shrubs all around him. Under every ball of the gray air were a group of vicious criminals lying in ambush. It was clear from the faint killing intent exuding from them that they were up to no good.

    After Han Shuo and his party officially stepped out from the Omphalos, the guard who had given Han Shuo a warning gave him another advice, ¡°If you changed your mind, you may return into the Omphalos at any time. It is always safe inside. I must say that I greatly admire your courage to offend so many forces at once, regardless of your actual strength. I wish you good luck!¡±

    Han Shuo startled for a moment. He couldn¡¯t help but turned around to give the guard another look. He smilingly nodded at him and said, ¡°Thanks!¡±

    ¡°Try not to get too far from the gate or else, you won¡¯t be able to retreat,¡± the guard gave yet another advise smilingly.

    Han Shuo did not even n to turn around. He smiled and started confidently walking further and further from the gate with his party to show that he had no fear.

    Haruli who had been watching Han Shuo from a concealed spot was astonished. He softly cried out in surprise, ¡°What card does he have up his sleeves? It¡¯s clear that he is aware of all these people wanting to take his life, and yet, he is stepping forward boldly. Is he really nning to throw away his life?¡±

    ¡°My Lord, they will be dead without a doubt. Of the eight of them, only two are highgods and they are not even in thete-stage realm. They can¡¯t resist a single wave of attack from any of the forces. I¡¯m sure that Buzz and his men will annihte them in just moments,¡± one of Haruli¡¯s henchmen calmly assessed the situation.

    As Han Shuo stepped forward, he unfolded his consciousness to observe the forces hiding all around him. As they were just a short distance away, Han Shuo could detect the enemies¡¯ auras and strengths without even using his demon generals. He could even sense the feelings of excitement and anxiety of certain people.

    Twenty-six forces had assembled there. Nearly every one of the forces had at least one highgod. The stronger ones would have more than a few highgods. Each highgod would have a dozen or more midgod subordinates.

    After Han Shuo and his party were a short distance away from the checkpoint, five or six forces hiding nearby the area immediately stepped outside to block Han Shuo¡¯s road back, denying Han Shuo any chances of retreating to the Omphalos if things went south.

    That guard manning the checkpoint had been gazing at Han Shuo with his brows bunched. He inwardly sighed when he saw that Han Shuo¡¯s retreat path was blocked. He thought, <i>Sigh, now there is no way out for them. Well, I have said all that there is to say. What a shame that they are just so rash.</i>

    Then, suddenly, all those who had been lying in wait for them came into appearance. Arge crowd of ferocious gods surrounded Han Shuo and his party while gazing at them with covetous eyes.

    At this point, it had be impossible for Han Shuo and his party to turn back. If Han Shuo did not possess formidable strength, there will only be one possible oue for them ¨C death!

    It was at this moment that Bertha and a malevolent-looking, purple-skinned bulky man stepped into appearance. Those eyes on his ferocious face seemed to be filled with an infinite amount of hatred as he stared fixedly at Rose. It was as though he wanted to skin Rose alive. Needless to say, that person was Buzz.

    Buzz suddenly stepped forward from the ring formed around Han Shuo. He raised one hand, looked around, and said in a deep voice, ¡°My fellow friends, I know what you are all here for. I, Buzz, hereby ask you to do a favor -let me settle my business with them first. There is a debt of blood that I must collect from them. Let me assure you that I¡¯m here only to take their lives, not their ck crystal coins. Whatever valuable goods that they had and how it is distributed will be decided among yourselves.¡±

    After hearing those words, those smaller forces surrounding Han Shuo spent a moment to consider the proposal. They stood still and gazed at Buzz and his party without saying a word.

    Their goal was different from Buzz¡¯s. Thetter was here to take lives while the former was here to take valuables. There was no conflict of interest between them. In fact, they were quite happy to hear those words as Buzz will do all the hard work and they will get all the rewards with no effort. They stood still to indicate their stance and allowed Buzz¡¯s followers to surround Han Shuo and his party.

    Buzz slowly looked left and right with menacing light burning in his eyes. When he saw that those forces gave him arge space, Buzz made a hand gesture as a sign of gratitude and loudly said, ¡°Thanks. I promise I won¡¯t take a single piece of crystal coin from their dead bodies!¡±

    The atmosphere was incredibly stifling. With such arge crowd of ferocious gods gazing at them, even the uninhibited and talkative Han Huo and Han Mu were being unusually quiet.

    Little Skeleton was tightly gripping his bone spear in one hand. His Purple Demon Eye was glistening brightly. He will immediately begin his massacre as soon as he receives an order from Han Shuo.

    ¡°Rose, so you have returned to the Fringe. Did you think that we would have forgotten about you?¡± Buzz looked up and down at Rose with his sinister eyes and said, ¡°It was your blessing that my son had fancied you. But not only that you had refused my son¡¯s advancement, you had also killed him! He may have not seeded, but I will. Today, I¡¯m going to slowly rape you in front of everyone here. Even if youmit suicide, I will still defile your dead body!¡±

    Those perverted barbarians that surrounded them started to chuckle evilly. Their faces were filled with excitement as though they very much looked forward to the act.

    In the Land of Chaos where there was no moral but only strength, such an atrocity happened all too often. In fact, many of the onlookers were more than happy to watch the process, especially as Rose was extraordinarily beautiful.

    When hundreds of malicious gazes suddenly gather on her, adding to the terrifying threat that Buzz made at her, a feeling of dread swarmed her mind and her blood ran cold. She couldn¡¯t help herself but started quivering in fear!

    Then, suddenly, Rose felt a reassuring warmth on her hand. When she turned to look, she saw that Han Shuo had reached out to hold her hand. Somehow, the warmth quickly spread around her body and chased away the chills. Her body was no longer trembling and her frightened mind became at ease. It was as though with Han Shuo holding her hand, none of the powerful enemies around them could harm her.

    ¡°Buzz, izzit?¡± Han Shuo put on a smile and said, ¡°I will say this just once. Rose is with me. If you try to touch her, I will take your life.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t care who you are but I will kill you along with that whore!¡± Buzz did not heed Han Shuo¡¯s warning at all. He gestured at his followers and coldly instructed, ¡°Kill everyst one of them!¡±

    Buzz and Bertha brought thirty-seven followers, of which were four highgods. The remaining of their followers had midte-stage midgod strengths. They were fierce and ruthless characters who hadmitted countless massacres. Following Buzz¡¯smands, the four highgods, each bringing eight to ten followers, charged at Han Shuo and his party from all directions.

    Of the four highgods, two were early-stage highgods of death, one was an early-stage highgod of fighting aura, and thest was a mid-stage highgod of darkness. The highgod of darkness was charging at Rose.

    <i>Whoosh!</i>

    The three-meter long bone spear shot out from Little Skeleton¡¯s hand and streaked across the sky. It was carrying a terrifying amount of the aura of death as it pierced towards the highgod of darkness. Quickly following that, a sh burst from Han Hao¡¯s Purple Demon Eye and he charged at the highgod. His arms became as shiny as the tip of a de while a surge of killing intent overflowed from his body.

    The highgod of darkness who was nning to kill Rose only saw a streak of light before a bone spear came out from nowhere. The terrifying aura of death hit him like a tsunami, crushing the aura of darkness he released. Then, an even more powerful wave of the aura of death burst out from the bone spear.

    <i>Kaboom!... </i> The dark cloud made of concentrated aura of death started dissipating after it was hit by the bone spear. It was as though thousands of des were shredding arge ball of ck cotton.

    Streaks of misty green lights suddenly erupted from the three-meter long bone spear. The green lights were bizarre and vicious. It had some kind of adverse effect on the soul. Immediately after they shined on the highgod of darkness, he turned dizzy and felt weak head to toe. He could not release more than half of his power.

    Han Shuo was amazed. After carefully observing the bone spear for a few seconds, he sensed the presence of Necrotoxin within. He was surprised and delighted at that discovery.

 Chapter 840 - I want you dead(2)

    <h4>GDK 840: I want you dead(2)</h4>

    Necrotoxin affects both the soul and body. Once the toxins enter one¡¯s body, it would be difficult to use even eighty percent of one¡¯s strength. It was very difficult to extract and refine Necrotoxin, and even more so to fuse it into a demonic weapon. Little Skeleton had demonstrated his mastery in the arts of weapon refinement by sessfully fusing Necrotoxin into his bone spear.

    The Necrotoxin had stealthily entered the highgod of darkness by disguising under the murky green lights. It affected his divine body and divine soul, not allowing him to unleash his full strength.

    When the bone spear burst with green light, Little Skeleton had arrived before the highgod. He grabbed his bone spear with his hand that was glistening like crystal and thrust it at the highgod whileunching yet another wave of attacks.

    Bone Arrows, Bone Prison, Corpse Explosion spells were also used against the highgod of darkness, forcing him to put all his energy on defending himself.

    It was clear that Han Hao¡¯s strength was above his and that he was losing the battle right from the start. Using the bone spear, Han Hao tore and more wounds on his divine body while Necrotoxin continued to ravage his divine body and dismantle his willpower.

    Over on the other side, the three highgod and the remaining of Buzz¡¯s followers charged towards Rose and the Five Elite Zombies. However, with Han Shuo standing beside them, they did not feel worried at all. They did not put up defenses but stood there calmly.

    Those non-participating forces watching the fight were surprised. They did not expect Han Shuo and his party would stay and fight instead of trying to break the encirclement.

    Haruli¡¯s eyes opened wide and ced all his attention on Han Hao. He was dumbfounded. Haruli did not expect the average-looking Han Hao to possess such formidable strength, or that Han Hao would have taken the high-ground right from the start. That highgod of darkness was overpowered and could not even make a single counterattack.

    The other followers of Buzz had finally closed their distance to Han Shuo. They charged at Han Shuo and his party from several directions, nning to engage all of them at once.

    It was at this moment that the cordial smile on Han Shuo¡¯s face turned even bigger.

    Suddenly, hundreds of demon generals flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s body in an instant. The ferocious swarm of demon generals moved as fast as lightning. They spread in every direction and swept at those followers of Buzz.

    The tragedy that took ce in Hushveil City was reenacted. The hundreds or thousands of demon generals in their gruesome form bared their bloody fangs and pounced at their victims while making eerie, ear-piercing screeches.

    Demon generals could change between material and immaterial forms, making it extremely difficult to fight them off. Once the demon generals managed to fly into their divine bodies, it would begin gnawing and consuming them.

    The victims would immediately feel pain and fear that they will not forget for the rest of their lives. The noise of demon generals eating away their bodies would terrorize their minds as they suffer the hellish torment.

    Miserable shrieks started ying from the mouths of those people. The hundreds of demon generals annihted Buzz¡¯s army in just moments. Their divine souls were absorbed into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, leaving behind their rotted divine bodies that had been excavated from the inside.

    All of the dead bodies lying on the ground were shriveled and looked as though they had been mummified thousands of years ago. There was no blood flowing out from their gaping wounds nor could it be seen in their flesh. They looked just like Old Fey Zombies that Han Shuo used to summon from the Netherworld. They all died wearing expressions of extreme fear and agony and remained frozen in contorted positions.

    Those forces on the outer perimeter had been happily discussing how they should divide the spoils of war among themselves after Buzz was done. However, when Buzz¡¯s followers were turned into shriveled bodies in just moments, they suddenly turned utterly quiet. They were thunderstruck.

    Haruli, Buzz, Bertha, and all of the observers were wearing the same expression of shock on their faces. Their gazes were gathered on Han Shuo who was wearing an amiable smile.

    During Han Shuo¡¯s stay in the Fringe, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon had absorbed so much more divine souls that there were finally more than a thousand demon generals in the Cauldron, among which were several dozens of spirit demons ¨C the highest grade of demon general produced from highgod souls. Those thirty-something followers of Buzz¡¯s stood no chance against the swarm of demon generals that was more than a thousand strong.

    Other than that highgod of darkness who was still struggling to defend against Han Hao, all of Buzz¡¯s followers, including the three highgods, had been killed by Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals.

    Still wearing a big smile, Han Shuo looked around and saw the faces of all the observers. He gently cleared his throat and therge swarm of demon generals rapidly flew back into his body. The enormous and deadly dark cloudpletely vanished in a moment.

    ¡°Han Hao, finish him!¡± instructed Han Shuo smilingly.

    Upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s instruction, the seven bone spurs behind Han Hao¡¯s back suddenlyunched away. The energy released by Little Skeleton was once again amplified. The dark cloud around the highgod of darkness was rapidly shredded away by the seven bone spurs.

    The highgod of darkness was strained to his limit defending against Han Hao¡¯s attacks since the start of the battle. His defenses were immediately overwhelmed by the bone spurs and were pierced by one of the rather short ones.

    A bizarre transformation suddenly took ce!

    When the bone spur prated his divine body, it started to bore deeper as though a living, meandering snake. Quickly following that, the highgod¡¯s hair could be seen turning white, his skin losing sticity, and his muscle wasting away ¨C all in just a few seconds.

    But that was not all!

    His eyes sank deeper into his eye sockets and shriveled. Vitality vanished from his body that was starting to rot. A momentter, the bulky middle-aged man died of elerated aging!

    The Boundary of Aging, one of the trump card boundaries of the death energy, had been released from the short bone spur.

    Whoosh!

    The bone spur returned to Little Skeleton. Noises of bone cracking and shattering were heard when the darkness highgod¡¯s divine body copsed to the ground. It was clear to see that his vitality had beenpletely drained!

    It was also at this point that the observers realized that Little Skeleton had not been using his full strength!

    A person¡¯s ns and expectations usually do not match reality. In this case, Buzz had failed spectacrly. Not only that all of his followers were dead, but they had also died horrifically. Their bodies were all in gut-wrenching states!

    The battle was over even though Han Shuo, Rose, and the Five Elite Zombies had not moved a single muscle. The demon generals that bizarrely appeared had vanished without a trace. If it wasn¡¯t for the dead bodies lying everywhere, the crowd watching from the sidelines might even think that the terrifying scene they saw was just an illusion.

    ¡°Just... Just like that... ¡° remarked Haruli who had been observing the fight. His gaze towards Han Shuo was filled with aplex mix of emotions.

    ¡°My Lord, I think, I now know why they had rejected our proposal,¡± that follower of Haruli who thought that Han Shuo and his party would die horrifically said in a bitter smile. He thought, I must be blind to have considered that group of deadly devils as a bunch of feeblembs

    Suddenly, the other twenty-something forces that surrounded Han Shuo simultaneously walked backward with great rapport, giving Han Shuo, Buzz, Bertha, and the others an even bigger space. The few groups that had blocked Han Shuo¡¯s retreat path exchanged nces and moved away without saying a word, as though trying to indicate that they did not want to make enemies with Han Shuo.

    That Omphalos guard at the checkpoint who had been giving Han Shuo warnings and reminders shook his head andughed. He remarked, ¡°So they did not need my advice after all. It turns out that they are formidable experts. No wonder they have the courage to offend so many powerful forces at once!¡±

    The crowd who had different ns had different reactions. But without a doubt, the Buzz and Bertha couple were the most remorseful of all. The army they wielded and gave them a niche in the Fringe for a long time was annihted in moments. The duo who was now without a single servant suddenly found themselves in a precarious situation.

    Buzz gritted his teeth. He was ready to go forward for an all-out fight but Bertha had managed to quickly halt him with her eyes. Bertha put on an ¡®amiable¡¯ smile on her ugly face and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Friend, I believe we must have some misunderstandings!¡±

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but himselfughed at Bertha. ¡°Huh? Misunderstandings? Do we? That doesn¡¯t seem to be the case at all!¡± Han Shuo could not be more amazed at just how shameless Bertha was to say those words in front of so many people.

    ¡°We only hold grudges against Rose but absolutely nothing against you!¡± replied Bertha hastily. She proposed, ¡°We have a well-established presence in the Fringe. Friend, as long as you promise to leave Rose behind, we are willing to pay you five million ck crystal coins. Will you do us this favor?¡±

    Buzz¡¯s face turned dark when he heard those words from Bertha. He seemed to disagree with her decision but did nothing after he was red at by Bertha. He groaned to indicate that he did not agree.

    Arge number of their experts had been butchered. Not only did Bertha not want to take revenge, but she also offered five million ck crystal coins for Han Shuo to step away. To Buzz, this was simply a great humiliation. If it wasn¡¯t for Han Shuo having demonstrated his astonishing strength just then, Buzz would have ignored Bertha and charged forward to fight Han Shuo.

    Under Bertha¡¯s gazes that were filled with high hopes, Han Shuo smilingly shook his heads and replied, ¡°My apologies. I don¡¯t want your money, I want your lives!¡±

 Chapter 841 - ou fight me!

    GDK 841: You fight me!

    Those words of Han Shuo¡¯s meant that there was nothing left to be discussed. It¡¯s a battle to the death!

    It was at this moment that Han Shuo felt his hand being tightly held by Rose¡¯s. Han Shuo turned to her and saw her eyes that were filled with gratitude as well as a few other rarely seen emotions. Perhaps the enormous pressure and stress had caused those emotions to surface.

    Han Shuo smiled and in a soothing voice, he said, ¡°It¡¯s what I ought to do. You are mine, after all.¡±

    ¡°Thank you!¡± said Rose in a low voice and a rarely seen smile was seen on her wless face.

    Bertha, seeing that there was no room left for negotiation, startedughing maniacally. She said, ¡°Outsider, do you really think that we are afraid of you? Even the Fringe has its rules. Do you really think that you can just step in here and mess with all of us? We won¡¯t let you leave this ce alive!¡±

    Han Shuo did not feel like talking to Bertha. In an impatient face, he instructed Han Hao, ¡°Little Hao, kill her for me!¡±

    Without saying a word, Han Hao immediately charged at Bertha with his bone spear ahead of him and made an onught on her. Bertha had just mid-stage highgod strength and she didn¡¯t stand much of a chance against Little Skeleton. She was overpowered by Little Skeleton and was on the back foot right after they started engaging.

    Buzz was enraged. He was not the sort of character who would easily admit defeat. Seeing that Han Shuo had failed to appreciate their kindness of five million ck crystal coins, he finally couldn¡¯t hold back and roared, ¡°You think you can defeat us all by yourself? Ha, let¡¯s see who will be thest one standing!¡±

    After finishing those words, Buzz charged forward, not at Han Shuo, but at Han Hao.

    After having witnessed Han Hao murder his mid-stage highgod follower without much effort, Buzz knew that his wife Bertha, who was also a mid-stage highgod, was no match against Han Hao. Buzz had no choice but to fight Han Hao with Bertha. Otherwise, if Han Shuo started attacking him, he knew he would be too upied to be able to assist Bertha and she would likely be killed.

    Han Shuo swiftly reacted and flew to the space between Bertha and Buzz in no time. Having intercepted Buzz, Han Shuo raised an index finger and moved it side to side. He said in a smirk, ¡°No no no, you fight me!¡±

    This time, Han Shuo did not use his swarm of demon generals. Instead, with one thought, the seventeen flying swords flew out from his body. They flew criss-cross while making eerie, terrifying, and ear-piercing whistles. They released strands of dreadful and vicious demonic energy and corroded everything around Buzz. Now he truly had no time to assist Bertha.

    When Rose saw Han Shuo and Han Hao fighting her enemy, she wanted to go forward and assist them. However, she was worried about leaving the Five Elite Zombies to themselves. Therefore, in the end, she only stood at the same ground and watched the father and son with burning gazes.

    Han Shuo and Han Hao wouldn¡¯t have too much trouble defeating Buzz and Bertha one to one. Both the father and son possessed strength greater than the husband and wife. It was to be expected that they would win in a duel no matter which of the couple they were matched against.

    The Five Elite Zombies becamepletely at ease. The five fes smilingly watched Han Shuo and Han Hao fight while makingments about it. They were unruffled and were behaving like a non-participant.

    Using his miraculous bone spear, Han Hao had enveloped Bertha inyers of grayish clouds of death. The seven bone spur on his back was wiggling as though they would shoot out at any moment for the killing strike.

    Bertha was appalled. It was only then that she truly realized just how terrifying the teenager was. She sensed the bizarreness of Little Skeleton¡¯s energy of death that was mixed with an even more terrifying and sinister energy. As green lights continued to shoot out from his bone spear, Bertha felt her divine body growing weaker and weaker.

    Bertha knew that if she doesn¡¯t do something to change the situation, she will be murdered by the emotionless teenager very soon. Although Han Shuo did not know Han Shuo¡¯s true strength, from the strained look on Buzz¡¯s face, she could tell that Buzz was in a simr situation as herself.

    <i>No! At this trend, both of us will get killed! Rose you fucking whore, how did you manage to seduce such a terrifying fe!</i> cursed Bertha as she used all her strength defending and racking her brain for a solution.

    Suddenly, Bertha exerted all her strength and managed to temporarily free herself from Han Hao¡¯s constant bombardment. She took the little time she had to shout, ¡°My friends out there, we are in this together! We need to work together and kill these outsiders ¨C these disruptors, or they will erode our footing in the Fringe!¡±

    Those forces who had been observing seemed tempted but they turned indecisive when they recalled Han Shuo¡¯s miraculous and terrible powers. They were weighing if they should risk their own lives for a chance to repossess their valuables.

    ¡°I only want them dead! As long as you kill them, I will pay you five million ck crystal coins! Five million ck crystal coins on top of the valuables and crystal coins they have are more than enough to be shared among all of you! My fellow Fringedwellers, don¡¯t hesitate anymore! If they don¡¯t die, our future in the Fringe won¡¯t be secure!¡± Bertha hastily offered the bounty when he saw that the observers were still hesitant.

    Five million ck crystal coins was a sky-high amount of money for most of those people. It was an amount that had taken Buzz and Bertha decades to save up. Those cold and detached observers were tempted by Bertha¡¯s very generous offer.

    Suddenly, their eyes lit up and they cast their hungry gazes on Han Shuo and his party. The temptation of five million ck crystal coins had made many of them forgotten about the horrifying power Han Shuo demonstrated a moment ago. They were ready to gamble with their lives.

    Some of the forces, meanwhile, realized that what Bertha said was true. If they did not take the opportunity to murder Han Shuo and his gang, it will be much harder to do so in the future. Besides, it was not in their interest to let a disruptor like Han Shuo who messed with their businesses get away with it.

    Those forces who had retreated far into the distance once again tightly surrounded Han Shuo and his party. It seemed that they were determined to ughter Han Shuo and his gang by means of their greater number.

    There were also a few forces who remained where they stood. They weren¡¯t one of those scammers but only there purely out of curiosity. Haruli was one of them. He was tempted for a second when he heard the five million ck crystal coins offered by Bertha but in the end, he decided to stay as he was more interested to see if Han Shuo could do anything against such overwhelming odds.

    ¡°Now he¡¯s in big trouble. Even though he¡¯s very formidable in strength, it¡¯s unlikely he would stand a chance against so many experts,¡± remarked the Omphalos guard who had been giving Han Shuo warnings repeatedly.

    ¡°Brother, let¡¯s kill these disruptors!¡± shouted the leader of one of the bigger forces. As though a rock on a hill that had been given a nudge, the twenty-something gangs made up of a thousand or more notoriously vicious criminals of the Fringe simultaneously started fiercely charging at Han Shuo, Little Skeleton, Rose, and the Five Elite Zombies.

    In the usual days, these bandits and criminals were confrontational towards each other and it would be impossible to see them unite against a single party. The whole region sank into a deadly atmosphere as they murderously stormed toward amon enemy.

    Buzz was under great pressure when fighting against Han Shuo and he felt as though he could lose his life to the seventeen flying swords at any moment. But when the situation suddenly changed, when those by-standing forces made of thousand or more ferocious gods decided to aid him, his confidence swelled. He couldn¡¯t help himself butughed maniacally and cheered, ¡°Hahaha! You are so dead!¡±

    Han Shuo decisively retreated from Buzz when those forces started advancing. As he flew back towards Rose and the Five Elite Zombies, he released the thousands of demon generals from his body. The demon generals flew out in their immaterial form and spread in every direction.

    Han Hao and Han Shuo had interconnected minds and they simultaneously retreated back to the Five Elite Zombies. Although Han Hao needed just a dozen more seconds to kill Bertha, he gave up on attacking Bertha without any hesitation.

    The Five Elite Zombies had surrounded Rose in their middle upon seeing that the tides had turned against them. They stood in a pentagonal formation and quietly waited for Han Shuo and Han Hao to return.

    Sudden, the invisible demon generals that had spread all around transformed to their material form andunched a surprise and wild attack at those Fringedwellers. Those demon generals made using highgod souls, meanwhile, were able to attack while remaining invisible. They did not produce even a trace of shadow when attacking the divine bodies of those Fringedwellers.

    Miserable shrieks and wails started ying as soon as the swarm attacked. With multiple demon generals attacking each Fringedweller at once, those below highgod strength would quickly die of having their divine bodies devoured. Demon generals that had tasted flesh will turn wilder and thirst for even more blood. Their energy would also be temporarily boosted, making them deadlier against their next victim.

    In an instant, fifty to sixty gods perished to the sky of demon generals before they were even close to the Five Elite Zombies. Their bodies were also shriveled and frozen in appalling states.

    The twenty-something forces were made up of experts cultivating in all sorts of energies. Those gods who cultivated in the elements of water and fire soon discovered that extreme cold and heat were effective at chasing the demon generals away from their divine body. Those gods who were good with utilizing the energy of the soul also realized that soul-attacks were effective against the bizarre lifeform.

    It took them a while but the Fringedwellers eventually discovered the weaknesses of demon generals and learned to defend against them effectively. With that, the demon generals could no longer remain divided to maximize their kills. They had to formrge groups and attack individually. With that, their deadliness dropped.

    It was at this time that Han Shuo and Han Hao had finally flown back to Rose and the Five Elite Zombies. As soon as they entered the circle, the Five Elite Zombies, who had long got into position, immediately activated the Penta-elemental Undead Formation.

 Chapter 842 - Massacre

    GDK 842: Massacre

    The Five Elite Zombies had not had a chance to use the Penta-Elemental Undead Formation in a real battle ever since they were reunited. Han Shuo held high expectations and was looking forward to witnessing the might of the Formation.

    The Five Elite Zombies looked excited. It appeared that they were very confident with the Penta-Elemental Undead Formation they had been practicing. Han Shuo, Han Hao, and Rose stood in the pentagonal space at the center of the Five Elite Zombies.

    As soon as the three were inside the safe space, the Five Elite Zombies activated the Penta-elemental Undead Formation. Earth Elite Zombie vanished underground. Wood Elite Zombie fused into a great tree beside him. Metal Elite Zombie took out his Golden Cudgel and merged with it. The Golden Cudgel grewrger andrger until it became a hill of gold. Fire Elite Zombie transformed into a raging inferno, engulfing everything in me. Water Elite Zombie was covered under a thickyer of ice colder than absolute zero and sat as still as a mountain.

    Suddenly, the Five Elemental Yuan Energies started flooding the region. A bizarre transformation started happening to the environment.

    None of the Five Elite Zombies could be seen but their work could not be more visible. Deep gulches started tearing the earth that had be frigid cold, the air turned into raging fires while hundreds of thousands of vines were meandering like vipers.

    Streams of rainbow-colored energies came out of nowhere and they shot all around the Penta-Elemental Undead Formation. The Formation which covered just several hundred square meters started to rapidly expand. It was as though the Kraken had been awoken. It was stretching its tentacles, ready to start destroying the world.

    A frightening burst of energy erupted from the center of the Formation and spread outwards. It was like a tsunami of pure energy that will engulf and annihte anything and everything in its path.

    Those Fringedwellers charging at the very front were the firsts to be enveloped by the Penta-Elemental Undead Formation. They instantly felt an unstoppable, violent power assaulting them, as though thousands of great mountains had crushed on their bodies. All those experts below highgod were severely injured in no time and they started spurting blood. Some of those who had not reacted in time were ttened into bloody meat pies by the enormous power.

    Chilling winds as piercing as des whirled around the Formation, taking the Fringedwellers into the air. Raging mes carrying tremendous heat then swallowed them, cooking them thoroughly in an instant.

    A constant thunderous rumble came from underneath the ground that had been rent while a powerful pulling force emitted from those chasms. Huge rocks would appear out of nowhere and crash down on those Fringedwellers who had flown into the air, smashing them into the abyss.

    Miserable shrieks of people suffering inhuman pain yed from deep underground. It was as though there was a giant meat-grinding machine down there, mincing all those who fell into it into atoms.

    Of those Fringe-dwelling forces who had been engulfed by the Penta-elemental Undead Formation, other than the leaders of those forces who were struggling to defend themselves, there was no sign of any survivor. Nearly a hundred experts were massacred by all sorts of bizarre energies in an instant. Most of them perished with their bodiespletely destroyed.

    The Penta-elemental Undead Formation¡¯s area of effect was still expanding and in the blink of an eye, a few hundred more Fringedwellers crossed into the Formation. Just like thest batch, they ended up dying tragically. The Five Elite Zombies released a constant stream of their energies, fused them, and transformed it into all kinds of bizarre attacks against the ferocious Fringedwellers.

    Although none of the Five Elite Zombies had attained highgod realm, all five of them possessed the Supreme Treasure of their respective Elemental Yuan energies, which enhanced their power beyond what they possessed. And when they fused their Elemental Yuan energies using the Penta-elemental Undead Formation, they would unleash a power that was many orders of magnitude greater than theirbined strength.

    Miserable shrieks kept on ying in the Formation. Those few faction leaders managed to resist the onught only for a few moments longer than their followers could. One after another, they sumbed to the chaotic and bizarre energies.

    As though the Formation alone wasn¡¯t deadly enough, the swarm of demon generals joined in on the ughter-fest. They would attack in groups of tens, making those Fringedwellers sumb to the overwhelming power of the Formation in an even shorter time.

    In less than a short few minutes, nearly four hundred of the Fringedwellers fell to the Penta-elemental Undead Formation and the thousands of demon generals. Currently, some two hundred Fringedwellers were still inside the Formation, doing everything they could to resist its power.

    At the very center of the Penta-elemental Undead Formation, the dumbfounded Han Shuo, Han Hao, and Rose were watching the Armageddon with their jaws dropped to the ground. The apocalyptic power that the Five Elite Zombies unleashed upon the Fringedwellers had blown their minds.

    Although Han Shuo had long known that the Penta-elemental Undead Formation was very powerful, he did not know just how powerful for precise ¨C until now. He witnessed just how easily the Formation took care of those formidable Fringe-dwelling experts. He finally understood why the Five Elite Zombies had so much confidence even when up against the horde of Fringedwellers.

    When divided, the Elite Zombies might not be able to defeat even the weakest faction. But when theybined their energies using the Penta-elemental Undead Formation, their power surpassed even that of a highgod; they would be a weapon of mass destruction that would annihte any and every living thing around them.

    As Han Shuo gaped at the scene of utter devastation created by the Five Elite Zombies, he thought, <i>This Penta-elemental Undead Formation is so fucking overpowered!</i> The Formation had perfectlybined the Elemental Yuan Energies of the Five Elite Zombies, amplifying their power exponentially and giving Han Shuo a surprise he could not imagine.

    The Formation also had an entangling power. This means that all those ferocious Fringedwellers who crossed into the Formation would have a very hard time escaping from it. They could only passively defend themselves against the bizarre, colourful energies that were attacking them in all sorts of strange andplex methods, draining their divine energy and willpower until they eventually perish.

    ¡°Retreat!¡± Suddenly, a resounding roar was heard from one of the leaders of those forces just as his followers were about to cross into the Formation.

    This lucky, observant chief could not tell what was happening inside the Formation. All he saw was a wildly revolving mass of grayish air wrapping the region. However, he was rmed when he saw that none of his fellow Fringedwellers had walked out from the grayish thing.

    When he shouted, even the other dozen-something remaining factions stopped charging into the Formation. They too unanimously turned on their heels and retreated to a distance. There was no longer anyone who dared charge inside recklessly.

    As the Five Elite Zombies did not have unlimited energy, the Penta-elemental Undead Formation could only spread to cover a limited area and they could only sustain the Formation for a limited period. Gradually, the ferociously spinning air slowed down, the ming sky stopped burning, the stones fell back to the ground, and the dust settled.

    The Fringedwellers outside the Formation anxiously waited for a while. Finally, the Penta-elemental Undead Formationpletely dissipated.

    When the area was no longer shrouded, they saw an unrecognizablend that had been utterly devastated, covered with iplete bodies and severed limbs. There were also severed heads rolling on the ground...

    Of those five or six hundred experts who charged into the Formation, less than thirty were still alive. All those survivors werepletely exhausted and had a frightened look as though they had just experienced the most miserable moments in their lives.

    There were bodies, limbs covering every inch of the scorched ground that was filled with bottomless chasms. Enormous rocks of unknown origins were everywhere. Some of them were standing above mushed flesh and organs. There were a few Fringedwellers crushed underneath those rocks who were still barely alive. Blood flowed out from their gaping mouth. Their eyes were filled with helplessness and despair as they slowly faded away...

    Those lucky Fringedwellers who did not step into the Formation were utterly silent as they observed the clusterfuck before them. They felt weak-kneed as shivers traveled up their spines. None of the Fringedwellers cried out in pain or shock. Not a sound came out from their mouths.

    <i>Thud, Thud... </i> Heavy footsteps as reverberating as drums sounded, trembling their hearts. Han Shuo, Han Hao, and Rose were seen marching forward step by step.

    Han Shuo¡¯s resonating footsteps broke the pin-drop silence and brought the remaining Fringedwellers to their senses. It was then that they recalled an important fact ¨C they were not out of danger yet!

    Buzz and Bertha who had been badly injured looked at Han Shuo and Rose with frightened eyes. Their minds were in jumbles. There was no longer a trace of arrogance or ferociousness on their faces but only regrets and despair.

    ¡°I did not want to fight you people, but you bunch were just too unreasonable. If you are so keen to seek death, I will grant it to you!¡± Han Shuo said to the shivering Fringedwellers. Then, he put on an amiable smile and said, ¡°Buzz, Bertha, do you need me to end you myself?¡±

    The thirty-something people who managed to survive the Penta-elemental Undead Formation had crawled behind Buzz and Bertha. The crowd gathered their gaze on Buzz and Bertha upon hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words.

    Then, suddenly, without any warning, all those Fringedwellers behind Buzz and Bertha simultaneouslyunched a surprise attack at the couple. They couldn¡¯t react in time and were struck by those violent energies. They died on the spot!

    One of the Fringedwellers stepped forward, severed Buzz and Bertha¡¯s heads, and tossed it to Han Shuo who was walking towards them. He said, ¡°They are dead. Please do not hold a grudge at us. I promise that I¡¯ll never make an enemy with you. Please forgive our offense and spare us!¡±

    That Fringedweller was an astute person. Although he had survived the Penta-elemental Undead Formation, his body was nheless severely injured. He knew that given the circumstances, it was impossible to leave the region alive without Han Shuo¡¯s approval. Therefore, he had decisively killed Buzz and Bertha in an attempt to get Han Shuo¡¯s forgiveness.

    Han Shuo looked at Buzz and Bertha¡¯s heads rolling to his feet before turning to the person in an amiable smile and said, ¡°It took me a great deal of nning to gather you bunch here. Do you think letting you leave just like that would be part of my n?¡±

 Chapter 843 - Demonic Blood

    GDK 843: Demonic Blood

    Those survivors were heart-stricken after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s response. They realized that they were in deep trouble.

    At this moment, Han Hao and Rose stepped up beside Han Shuo. They gazed at those exhausted Fringedwellers with murderous eyes, ready to start ughtering away.

    The Five Elite Zombies had vanished out of sight. Other than Han Shuo whose mind was connected with theirs, no one would know where the five little fes were hiding. A hidden danger was always much more terrifying than one that can be seen. Those frightened Fringedwellers thought to themselves, <i><i>Damnit, how could I be so blind to offend such a deadly bunch!</i></i>

    Han Shuo then deliberately unleashed his aura, causing those survivors to stumble a step backward in fear. With a trembling heart, one of the Fringedwellers asked, ¡°What do you want?¡±

    ¡°Submit to me, or be perished!¡± shouted Han Shuo using Demonic Siren boosted by Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy.

    A bizarre energy hardly visible to the naked eye started undting like water ripples. The terrifying energy undtion originating from Han Shuo seemed to be telling those standing before Han Shuo what will happen to them if they resist.

    The small group of survivors was still afraid of entering the Penta-elemental Undead Formation again. It seemed that the Formation had made asting impression in their minds. However, they remained indecisive.

    ¡°Retreat!¡± The dozen or so remaining Fringe-dwelling forces started dispersing frantically after waking up from their daze.

    The Penta-elemental Undead Formation had not just intimidated the thirty-something survivors, but also those Fringedwellers who were lucky enough not to experience the Formation first-hand. From the ravines torn on the ground and the horrifying states of the dead bodies everywhere, they knew just how brutally those not-so-lucky Fringedwellers had been massacred even without seeing it themselves.

    At this moment, none of the Fringedwellers had any thought of fighting Han Shuo. After seeing the small number of injured and exhausted survivors, there was no longer one bit of hesitation in their minds. The dozen something groups of ferocious Fringedwellers scuttled and vanished in no time.

    The only forces who did not leave were those who had resisted Bertha¡¯s tempting offer of five million ck crystal coins to participate in the attack. They were the true observers. Haruli and his gang were one of them.

    Haruli¡¯s mind at this moment was tumultuous as the sea. He could not believe his eyes when he saw the devastation Han Shuo made.

    Haruli suddenly felt that he had been foolish and ridiculous to offer to protect Han Shuo and his party. There was no way that such a mighty bunch who could butcher five to six hundred Fringedwellers in minutes would need his protection.

    ¡°My Lord, should we also leave this ce?¡± asked a follower of Haruli.

    Haruli shook his head and replied, ¡°We don¡¯t. I don¡¯t feel any hostility from them. We will stay and watch a little longer. This guy is so good at concealing his strength. He clearly possessed strength beyond that of highgod but he gave everyone the illusion that he was just a midgod. His arrival could possibly alter the status quo of the Fringe!¡±

    Inside the Fringe, the Five Sovereigns were the most powerful of all beings. The five seemed to have some kind of tacit understanding. They would fight each other while ignoring small forces like that of Haruli¡¯s.

    It was clear to them that Han Shuo possessed strength above that of a highgod. Even his followers were incredibly powerful. If such a powerhouse were to enter the Fringe, war and carnage were bound to happen.

    With wares opportunity. If Haruli could join the winning powerhouse before the war, he will gain the most rewards when it¡¯s time to divide the loot and give medals. His power and influence in the Fringe will substantially rise and he willmand a bigger force.

    To Haruli, this was a once in a lifetime opportunity!

    Han Shuo coldly watched as the Fringedwellers fled in disarray. He did not go after them because he wasn¡¯t done with the thirty people in front of him yet and he did not have the energy to do so. The Five Elite Zombies had spent arge amount of their Elemental Yuan energies to power the Penta-elemental Undead Formation. It was not possible for them to activate the Formation again before spending a long time recuperating their energy.

    Han Hao and Rose were just two people. They could not stop the hundreds of Fringedwellers from leaving.

    Han Shuo knew that he cannot take everyone down at once and that he needed to do it one step at a time. In the future, as his strength gradually builds, even if he doesn¡¯t actively recruit, people will seek to serve him. Therefore, Han Shuo decided that right now, he needed to focus on getting those standing in front of him.

    The thirty-something Fringedwellers had exhausted their energy inside the Penta-elemental Undead Formation. Facing the enormous pressure released by Han Shuo, they started seriously considering their options.

    Of the survivors, ten possessed highgod strengths and the remaining possessed midgod strengths. Although thetter had just midgod strength, other than luck, they must have also possessed some unique abilities and talents or they wouldn¡¯t have survived the Penta-elemental Undead Formation.

    Han Shuo coldly groaned and in an intimidating voice, he threatened, ¡°You have no other option! You will submit to my rule, or you will meet your end! Hurry up and decide!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, the swarm of demon generals transformed into material state and surrounded them as though they were covered by an enormous dark dome. The dense swarm of demon generals was constantly flying about, dancing menacingly. It seemed as though they would descend on them at any moment.

    ¡°I, I will serve you!¡± Under the tremendous pressure, a heavily injured midgod¡¯s willpower crumbled and became the first to pledge his allegiance to Han Shuo.

    Usually, after the first person submits, the others would follow. One by one, the injured Fringedwellers stopped standing their ground and gave in. They knelt on one knee with their head low.

    All those who dwelled in the Fringe were the worst of criminals from all over Elysium. They had nil morality or conscience. Those survivors understood that Han Shuo would do something to them to keep them under his control. They lowered their heads and waited for Han Shuo¡¯s next action.

    Drops after drops of Blood Essences flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s palm. They looked as though spherical rubies as they spun and hovered in midair. They then flew to the thirty people and vanished into their napes.

    Those survivors suddenly sensed that something seemed to have inserted itself into their divine souls. Then, at the next moment, their gazes towards Han Shuo started to turn friendly and respectful. The hatred buried deep under their heats started vanishing bit by bit...

    ¡°Master!¡± The survivor standing at the very front respectfully kowtowed at Han Shuo. He seemed very sincere.

    ¡°Master!... Master!... ... ¡° One after another, the Fringedwellers cried and kowtowed before Han Shuo. All of their hatred and resentment towards Han Shuo vanished under the effect of his Demonic Blood.

    Han Shuo nodded. He put on a satisfied smile and said, ¡°You may rise. From now onwards, you are all my Demon Guards! Goron, you will lead them for now!¡±

    ¡°Thank you, Master!¡± respectfully replied the highgod of thunder who had severed Buzz and Bertha¡¯s heads. Of all of Han Shuo¡¯s newest followers, Goron was the only expert withte-stage highgod strength. Not only that he was formidable in strength, but he was also a vicious person with great acumen. From the fact that he switched sides at thest moment and backstabbed Buzz and Bertha, Han Shuo could tell that he was a person who knows how to adapt to circumstances and therefore most suited for the position.

    The thirty drops of Blood Essences that entered their minds would gradually influence their divine soul and make their loyalty to Han Shuo grow stronger with each passing day. The Demonic Blood will not affect their strength, their intellect, or their ability to make decisions. It will make those people think that Han Shuo was their Master without any side effects.

    ¡°Hmm, some of you have more followers. Alright, I will give you all some time. Return to your bases and gather up all of your followers. I¡¯ll give you further instructionster on. You midgods who don¡¯t have your own base will follow Goron,¡± Han Shuo, standing high and proud, calmly instructed the brand new batch of Demon Guards kneeling before him.

    The Demon Guards stood up, respectfully bowed at Han Shuo before going their own ways, dispersing in all directions. Those midgods followed Golon as Han Shuo had instructed. All those standing before Han Shuo vanished in a moment.

    It was at this time that Han Shuo cast his eyes to the distance. He turned to Haruli who had been watching him with shining eyes. Han Shuo put on a calm smile and asked, ¡°Haruli, are you interested to work for me?¡±

    Thest time that Han Shuo made the invitation, Haruli had not just disdainfully rejected him, but he also mocked Han Shuo, calling him a lunatic.

    This time, however, Haruli did not immediately respond to the question and he can¡¯t seem to make a decision. In the end, he put on a bitter smile and replied, ¡°I need to think about it carefully. I¡¯m having trouble epting that I will be treated like how you treat Golon just now.¡±

    The same day, the same question, butpletely different responses!

    ¡°They tried to fight me. That is what they deserved!¡± Han Shuo put on a faint smile and continued, ¡°If you willingly submit, you will not get this kind of treatment. You will maintain your full intellect, and ¨C our rtionship will be very different from that!¡±

    Haruli was somewhat tempted by Han Shuo¡¯s proposal but he did not immediately agree. He contemted it for a moment before he replied, ¡°Give me some time. I need to think about it carefully.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and replied, ¡°Sure. But keep in mind that the longer you wait, the poorer the treatment you will get from me. Don¡¯t take too long!¡±

    Han Shuo then looked at the few other remaining forces and smiled. He asked, ¡°What about you bunch? You have been watching for a while now. Any thoughts of joining my n?¡±

 Chapter 844 - Leave it to me

    GDK 844: Leave it to me

    Most of those gathered around Han Shuo was involved in the scam and were tempted by Bertha¡¯s offer. They had been killed or fled.

    But there were several forces who decided to stay even after Han Shuo disyed his intimidating strength. Most of them had some kind of aces up their sleeves.

    For example, they could be followers of the Five Sovereigns. Or perhaps they were confident that they could escape from Han Shuo.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s attentive gazes, the leaders of those forces exchanged nces. One of them broke the silence, ¡°I mean no harm. I came here only as a passive observer. Lady, Gentlemen, if you are interested, I can introduce you to Lord Logue. I believe that Lord Logue will be very interested in you.¡±

    It was evident from his words that he was a follower of Sovereign Logue. The reason that he had stayed until now was to try to recruit Han Shuo and his party for his master.

    After he made his offer to Han Shuo, the other forces also took their turn and made simr offers. They represented the other four Sovereigns ¨C Tyre, Ossora, Ss, and Wasir. They asked Han Shuo to consider their offers, promising that he will get anything he wanted in the Fringe ¨C if he agrees to their offer.

    The Five Sovereigns had been fighting each other for many years and they would spare no effort in recruiting the true top-notch experts. Just then, Han Shuo had demonstrated his extremely valiant strength. If he was to join any of the Five Sovereigns, he will definitely disrupt the status quo, making one of the Sovereigns significantly more powerful.

    Han Shuo had long expected that they would have the backing of the Five Sovereigns, or they wouldn¡¯t have stayed to watch so fearlessly. Han Shuo smilingly shook his head and straightforwardly declined, ¡°My apologies, but I have no ns of submitting to anyone. I believe that the Fringe is big enough for me to live without affiliating with anyone. Thank you for the offers.¡±

    Those representatives calmly nodded but they did not continue trying to persuade Han Shuo to join them. They had all seen Han Shuo¡¯s arrogant and unyielding temperament. They could tell that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t the kind of person who would bow before others and did not carry much hope of seeding, to begin with. After Han Shuo rejected their offers, they bid Han Shuo their farewells.

    Haruli bowed very slightly at Han Shuo and he also left with his men. Momentster, there was no longer a single living being around Han Shuo and his party. All that apanied them were the dead bodies lying everywhere.

    ¡°Rose, didn¡¯t you say that you still have some friends here? Let¡¯s go visit them. We currently don¡¯t have enough experts and must recruit as many of them as we can!¡± Han Shuo said to Rose after everyone left.

    ¡°Okay, let¡¯s go,¡± Rose nodded and was ready to show them the way.

    ¡°Wait!¡± a cry suddenly sounded from the nearest Omphalos checkpoint. In an instant, that Omphalos guard who had repeatedly reminded Han Shuo came into appearance.

    Han Shuo held a somewhat favorable impression towards that person. Han Shuo smiled at the person who arrived hurried and in a friendly manner, he asked, ¡°How can I help you?¡±

    ¡°You want to learn news about Kage, right?¡± he replied in a low voice.

    Han Shuo was stunned. He raised an eyebrow and asked, ¡°How did you know about that?¡±

    ¡°The Stringer that you asked is one of ours. He told me about it,¡± he softly exined to Han Shuo and continued, ¡°I will give you this information free of charge: Kage has just left the Empyrean Peak and should be on his way back to his base. If you want to find him, now is the time.¡±

    Upon finishing those words, the guard smiled at Han Shuo, said nothing more, and returned to the Omphalos.

    Han Shuo was at a loss for words and couldn¡¯t understand why would the fe be so nice to him. But after hearing that Kage had left the Empyrean Peak, Han Shuo immediately changed his ns. He wanted to kill Kage before doing anything else.

    ¡°Father, I don¡¯t think that that guy gave us Kage¡¯s whereabouts for nothing. He might want us to kill Kage and then leak the information to everyone,¡± said Han Hao soon after that Omphalos guard left.

    Han Shuo put on a faint smile and nodded praisingly. He thought that his firstborn was indeed not as naive as the Five Elite Zombies.

    After thinking about it carefully, he thought that Han Hao¡¯s suspicion was very likely. The Five Sovereigns of the Fringe hated each other. That guard probably wasn¡¯t working for Ss. If he were to leak the information after Han Shuo kills Kage, Han Shuo would most likely be hunted by Ss¡¯ forces.

    Based on the strength that Han Shuo disyed, if Ss¡¯ gang was to hunt and fight Han Shuo, even if Han Shuo ends up dead, Ss¡¯ forces would have to pay a significant price for it. This would be a desirable oue for them.

    ¡°It¡¯s no bother, we will still kill Kage. But when the timees, be extra careful so that no one would suspect us. Hehe, we will, eventually, have a confrontation with the Five Sovereigns, but now isn¡¯t the time yet!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s ultimate goal was to rule the Land of Chaos. However, as Han Shuo currently had yet to break through to the Skybreak Realm in demonic arts, he had no confidence in fighting the Five Sovereigns.

    ¡°Understood,¡± replied Han Hao noddingly. Then, suddenly, Han Hao suggested, ¡°Father, how about you leave the matter about Kage to me? You can carry on with your business.¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly at Little Skeleton for a moment. He thought about it, bunched his brows, and replied, ¡°You should have no trouble finishing Kage in a solo fight. But what if he is traveling with other experts?¡±

    ¡°Then I will bring Little Earth along. With Little Earth, I can mount a sneak attack anytime, anywhere. I will finish Kage in the shortest time possible and then escape with Little Earth. That¡¯d do it!¡± said Han Hao confidently.

    Han Hao was infamous in the Death Dominion for his savageness and ruthlessness. Not only that he possessed extraordinary strength, but he was also calm and decisive in his actions. Over the past five decades, he rarely ever lost any battle. Han Shuo thought about his words for a moment and nodded smilingly.

    Han Shuo knew from experience that it was by letting his kids face dangers and challenges by themselves that they would grow at the fastest rate. Besides, Kage had just mid-stage highgod strength. From the power that Little Skeleton demonstrated, it shouldn¡¯t be too difficult for him to kill Kage. And with Han Tu around, he could attack and retreat without any trouble, and therefore Han Shuo wasn¡¯t too worried about his safety.

    ¡°Little Earth,e with me!¡± said Han Hao after turning to Han Tu.

    Han Tu seemed somewhat excited. He put on his innocent smile and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Bye, Dad!¡±

    ¡°If you couldn¡¯t find me, look for me at the Omphalos in one month,¡± Han Shuo said to Han Hao.

    ¡°Yes, Father,¡± Little Skeleton nodded and left with Han Tu.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go. We will look for your friends,¡± said Han Shuo after turning to Rose.

    Rose said nothing and started leading the party, flying towards the South-west. Han Shuo, Wood Elite Zombie, Water Elite Zombie, Fire Elite Zombie, and Metal Elite Zombie followed behind her.

    After three days, Han Shuo and his party appeared at an everde covered in a poisonous mist in the southwest of the Fringe. They had been wandering about aimlessly. Air bubbles would float up to the swamps and sludge and linger on the surface for a second before popping, releasing toxic gases into the atmosphere.

    nts and animals that live in the region usually possess some kind of toxicity. All along their journey, countless rare and bizarre nts had tried pouncing on Han Shuo and his party without any warning. However, those nts would always be stopped by Han Mu.

    ¡°The fuck man, the nts in this region are damn stubborn. I have to spend more energy than usual to control these nts. I¡¯m so fortunate to possess the Viride Leaf. Otherwise, I would have exhausted more than half of my energy just dispersing them!¡±ined Han Mu. He was disgruntled that the nts found in the everde would dare question his authority.

    All nts in the universe survive on the Yuan Energy of Wood while Wood Elite Zombie was born from it. Therefore, he could use the Yuan Energy of Wood naturally found in his body to control every kind of nt. Although they were made of the same energy, those nts belonged to existences of a much lower levelpared to Wood Elite Zombie as their souls had yet to possess self-awareness.

    Normally speaking, any living thing that survived on the energy of wood will not be able to resist Wood Elite Zombie¡¯s control. When inside a forest, Han Mu could fuse his energy with every tree and nt. He could use them to make attacks or to use their energy of wood to restore the divine energy he exhausted.

    That was also why Wood Elite Zombie¡¯s strength would increase by several folds when he was inside arge forest. Even a highgod might not be able to defeat him.

    The nts living on this everde, however, perhaps corroded by the toxins, grew very stubborn and unyielding. They would refuse to simplyply with Han Mu¡¯smand and he must use more energy than usual to control them.

    ¡°Rose, where is your friend living?¡± Han Shuo had been expanding his consciousness but he did not detect any sign of life. This made him rather puzzled.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know the exact location but he should be around here. He is of a unique race and of all my friends, he has the strangest temperament and the greatest strength. It¡¯s been many years and I don¡¯t know if he is still living in this ce,¡± replied Rose. She knew that aimlessly wandering around the everde was not effective but she could not think of a better way to find his friend.

    ¡°Let¡¯s just keep looking and hope that we will discover something,¡± remarked Han Shuo.

    The party continued looking around. They had spent yet another day but it had been unfruitful. They then arrived at thergest swamp where enormous bubbles floated to its surface. Han Jin¡¯s face suddenly jolted. He pointed at the swamp below him and excitedly said to Han Shuo, ¡°Father, there is a very strange metal underneath. I have never seen it before. I¡¯ll go check it out!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Han Jin leaped to the swamp.

    But before Han Jin entered the swamp, a monstrous arm that seemed to be made of steel suddenly shot out and grabbed him. It pulled Han Jin into the swamp!

 Chapter 845 - Rock Paper Scissors

    GDK 845: Rock Paper Scissors

    It happened in less than the split of a second. Before Han Shuo could react, Metal Elite Zombie had been pulled to the bottom of the swamp. The giant arm vanished with Han Jin, leaving just a few bubbles on the surface.

    Han Shuo was rmed and he immediately flew towards the swamp. The seventeen flying swords whooshed out and shot into the mud.

    Metal Elite Zombie and Han Shuo had connected minds and they could sense each other¡¯s positions. Following Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts, the seventeen flying swords shot into the swamp in a sh. An earth-shaking rumble sounded from its depth while the mud-sttered high into the sky.

    ¡°Show yourself!¡± shouted Han Shuo coldly as he wrecked the swamp with his flying swords.

    Some of the seventeen flying swords were pinching on the humanoid creature covered with mud and they carried the creature out from the swamp. Several of the flying swords were still bombarding its body, making loud metallic ngs and sparks.

    Metal Elite Zombie was not on the creature. He re-emerged from the swamp behind the creature and shouted, ¡°What monster!¡±

    Toxic sludges overflowed from the humanoid creature¡¯s mouth as he spoke in a hoarse voice, ¡°Rose? Why are you here?¡±

    The sludges slowly fell off his body. Soon, his body that had a metallic sheen wasid bare. Although he bore the form of a human, his flesh and skin seemed to be made of steel and rock. His eyes were glittering with a greyish light that looked inexplicably bizarre.

    The seventeen flying swords that carried intense corrosive power had been making loud metallic noises and sparks when they stuck the person. However, he doesn¡¯t seem to be vulnerable to the power of the flying swords. Not only that his body wasn¡¯t corroding, but he also doesn¡¯t seem to be affected by the chilling aura.

    ¡°Romon? Is that you?¡± asked Rose.

    ¡°Yes, I am!¡± replied the strange person. He looked up and down at Han Shuo and his party with greyish eyes and asked, ¡°Why are you here? Who are they?¡±

    ¡°They are my friends. We are looking for you,¡± replied Rose. She hesitated for a bit before she asked, ¡°Romon, how did you turn into this?¡±

    ¡°Father, the surface of his body is filled with rare metals and his organs contain all kinds of toxins. He is not afraid of your flying swords,¡± shouted Han Jin after he left the swamp. Golden Cudgel, the Supreme Treasure of the Metal Attribute Energy, suddenly grew to the size of arge tree and came whacking at Romon.

    This alien called Romon seemed unruffled against Han Shuo¡¯s seventeen flying swords as though they had been nothing but tickles. But when he saw Metal Elite Zombie¡¯s Golden Cudgel, he put on a frightened face. He even forgot to answer Rose and frantically tried to flee from the Cudgel.

    ¡°Hehe, dumbass, your body is filled with metal. How are you gonna run from me?¡± said Han Jin in a smirk. The Golden Cudgel then flew off his hand and went after Romon like a guided missile.

    No matter where Romon ran or how he tried to dodge, the Golden Cudgel would always manage to smack him. It made a loud bang and painful cries which each hit. In just a short few moments, Han Jin¡¯s Golden Cudgel had managed to make five good whackings on Romon¡¯s shiny buttocks.

    The Golden Cudgel, being an extraordinary weapon of the metal energy, possessed an exceptional power at sensing and manipting all metals. As most of Ramon¡¯s body was made of metals, there was no way that he could run from the Golden Cudgel¡¯s attacks.

    Paper beats rock, rock beats scissors, and scissors beat paper. This was the situation. As Romon was made of rare metals and all sorts of toxins, even Han Shuo would have a hard time trying to defeat him. Metal Elite Zombie, however, although less powerful than Han Shuo, could give him a painful beating. Romon was immune to Han Shuo¡¯s deadly seventeen flying swords but he was helpless against Han Jin¡¯s Golden Cudgel. He had tried deploying every kind of defense he knew of but none of them worked.

    ¡°Asshole, this is for trying to assault me!¡± cursed Han Jin as he whacked Romon. ¡°Hehe, if it was any other highgod, I might not be able to win. But when ites to you, well, it cannot be easier!¡±

    After a while, the dizzy-headed Romon gave up on trying to dodge the Golden Cudgel. He hastily pleaded to Rose, ¡°I didn¡¯t know that it¡¯s you and your friends! Please stop him. We had fought alongside each other and I had even helped you escape from Buzz and Bertha. How could you just stand and watch?¡±

    ¡°Please spare him,¡± Rose pleaded while looking at Han Shuo, ¡°I owe Romon a favor. if it wasn¡¯t for him, I wouldn¡¯t have managed to escape from the Fringe. He has learned his lesson. Can you please ask him to stop?¡±

    Han Shuo did not travel so far to kill a potential follower. Seeing that Romon has been amply punished, Han Shuo smilingly said to Han Jin, ¡°Oi! You little vengeful brat, isn¡¯t that¡¯s quite more than enough?¡±

    Han Jin put on a big mischievous smile. He raised an open palm and the Golden Cudgel that had been striking Romon immediately started flying back to him while rapidly shrinking. By the time itnded in his hand, the Golden Cudgel had turned to the size of a needle.

    ¡°Father, this guy has a very unique bodyposition that even an average highgod won¡¯t be able to harm him. But his greatest strength is also his weakness. Unfortunately for him, hehe, I¡¯m his kryptonite. I can toy him like a puppet!¡± said Han Jin proudly as though he had aplished something.

    After the Golden Cudgel was kept away, Romon who had been seeing stars gradually recovered. He put on a grimace and said to Rose, ¡°It¡¯s been quite a while. Is this how you greet your old friends?¡±

    Although every surface of Romon¡¯s body was made of rare metals, not all of them were as hard as a rock. Some of them were extremely pliable. The metal of Romon¡¯s face was especially so. It was as flexible as normal skin and it doesn¡¯t lessen the rich expressions on his face.

    ¡°You have been hiding under the swamp and immediately attacked us without warning. How would I know that it¡¯s you?¡± replied Rose in an annoyed manner. But shortly after, she put on a puzzled face and asked, ¡°Romon, how did you turn into this? You didn¡¯t look like this when west met.¡±

    Not just Rose, but Han Shuo was also very curious. They wondered how in the world did that guy turn into this form.

    It was obvious to them that Romon was not born with such a body. He must have acquired it through some sort of fortuitous encounter.

    Han Shuo had been observing the surrounding and he frequently found skeletonsying around. There must be plenty of gods who died in this region. And if Han Shuo¡¯s guess was correct, all of them were killed by Romon. This indicated that Romon¡¯s strength must be quite extraordinary!

    ¡°Soon after you left, I was gang up by a group of people and suffered serious injuries. I did all I could to escape from them and I ran to this ce out of desperation. The myriad of toxins all around here started attacking my body and it was slowly rotting away. At that time, I had lost all hope, so I dived to the bottom of the swamp to bury myself and wait for my death. The metals and toxins underneath the swamp started adhering to my rotten body. I thought that it would just kill me faster. I kept waiting and waiting but after hundreds of years, not only that I did not die, my body had transformed. That¡¯s how I got this shiny new look,¡± exined Romon.

    ¡°Here? Under this swamp?¡± Rose was astounded and she did not expect Romon to experience something so miraculous.

    Romon nodded and continued, ¡°Yes, right under here. I don¡¯t even know what I have be. It¡¯s not just my body, but even my divine soul has transformed. There are even times that I felt as though I¡¯m a rock, like I have been dead for eons... ¡°

    Romon has a hazy look in his eyes. He seemed vacant and detached, as though he was there, but his mind was not present.

    ¡°I have noticed a lot of skeletons lying around the swamp. Were they killed by you?¡± asked Han Shuo smilingly.

    ¡°Yes. Many years ago, I killed a group of people who entered this ce. One of them escaped and he started spreading lies, saying that there is a treasure inside my body. Since then, I¡¯ve been hunted by a constant stream of greedy and foolish Fringedwellers. I would have been gutted if it wasn¡¯t for the transformation that happened to me.

    ¡°For all these years, I would spontaneously attack and kill everyone who stepped inside my swamp to scare those Fringedwellers away. I attacked you because I thought that you were one of them,¡± exined Romon.

    Han Shuo nodded at Rose smilingly and said, ¡°Good, very good! To have killed so many Fringedwellers, he must be quite capable! Alright, tell him what I¡¯m here for.¡±

    Following Han Shuo¡¯smand, Rose turned to Romon and said, ¡°Romon, my master would like to recruit you. Buzz and Bertha have been killed. You wouldn¡¯t want to live under a swamp forever, do you?¡±

    ¡°What?! Buzz and Bertha killed?¡± Romon was astounded. He looked at Han Shuo doubtfully and asked, ¡°You killed them?¡±

    ¡°Yep, you could say so,¡± Han Shuo put on a smile and said to Romon, ¡°I doubt that it had been fun living under a swamp. Besides, you will slowly lose yourself if you keep living here. So join me, I will enhance your body and make you stronger!¡±

    Romon¡¯s body was a wonderful material that could be refined. If Han Shuo puts his mind onto it, he could rebuild Romon¡¯s body and raise his power.

    ¡°You can run from others, but not from me. If you don¡¯t agree to it, I will whack you to death!¡± said Han Jin in a mischievous and evil smirk. The Golden Cudgel was yet again visible in his hand and he brandished it threateningly at Romon.

    Persuaded by Rose, enticed by Han Shuo, and threatened by Han Jin, Romon put on a bitter smile while scratching his head. He soon realized that he did not have much of a choice. After a moment of hesitation, he helplessly, yet feeling somewhat thrilled, nodded.

 Chapter 846 - Ahhh! Itâ€™s hot!

    GDK 846:<strong> Ahhh! It¡¯s hot!</strong>

    Han Shuo was instructing his children to pour all kinds of materials into the swamp that Romon¡¯s body was submerged in. With only his head above the swamp, In an anxious and suspicious face, Romon asked, ¡°What exactly are you going to do?¡±

    ¡°That, you shall find out soon enough. Hehe, you have nothing to worry about. It will only be good for you, no side effects whatsoever! ¡± replied Han Shuo smilingly. He asked Han Jin to toss more of the colorful stones into the swamp.

    The everde contained certain rare minerals that Metal Elite Zombie could locate and collect with minimal effort. In addition, Han Shuo and Han Jin had arge number of miraculous ores stored in their space rings. Han Shuo had more than enough materials to rebuild Romon¡¯s body.

    ¡°Master, will this work?¡± Rose seemed somewhat uneasy. She had seen Han Shuo refine a weapon and knew that he was a master at it. However, Rose did not know that Han Shuo could also refine the body of a living being. Therefore, she was worried that the procedure might injure or even kill Romon who had previously helped her out of danger.

    Although such a procedure was unimaginable to Rose, Han Shuo had been doing it for quite a while. Little Skeleton, the Five Elite Zombies, and Gilbert were rebuilt or enhanced by Han Shuo in simr manners. Han Shuo was very experienced in doing the procedure and he wasn¡¯t at all worried about Romon¡¯s safety.

    ¡°The process will be somewhat painful, but I¡¯m sure that he will be very happy with the results. Don¡¯t worry, I know what I¡¯m doing!¡± answered Han Shuo smilingly.

    Rose knew that Han Shuo was a man of his words and was relieved to hear Han Shuo¡¯s reassurance. She then shouted at Romon in the distance, ¡°Romon, you don¡¯t need to worry. It can be a little painful but rest assured that you will be just fine!¡±

    After hearing Rose¡¯s words, not only that Romon did not get less anxious, he became much more nervous. He pleaded to Han Shuo as though he was going to cry, ¡°Can I not do this? I¡¯m already quite happy with the current state of my body!¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head, put on a rather wicked smile, and replied, ¡°It¡¯s pretty good now, but I will make it much, much better! Hehe, you just need to stay where you are. It will take one month at most. I assure you, your new body will work with the metal and toxins much better and you will sense it yourself!¡±

    ¡°Little Gold, throw in those rare metals! Little Wood, pour in those poisonous materials you have collected!¡± instructed Han Shuo smilingly.

    ¡°Yes, Father!¡± replied the energetic Han Mu. He carried an enormous wooden bucket to the air, flew over the swamp, and emptied the stinking, jet-ck fluid it contained into the swamp.

    When Han Shui saw that the metals and poisons were added, he immediately gathered the water element energy and injected them into the swamp. The energy of water brought the swamp to stir at high-speed, distributing the materials contained evenly.

    When everything was ready, Han Huo got into action. Clouds of mes flew out from his Fire Lotus and into the swamp. All the water in the swamp, including those injected by Han Shui, was turned into steam. When the sludges dried up, they formed an enormous hard mold around Romon, wrapping him tightly.

    The seventeen flying swords flew out following Han Shuo¡¯s thought and helped him deploy a miniature Soul-gathering Formation. To proceed, Han Shuo started injecting his demonic yuan into the swamp. As though someone had turned up the dial on a gas stove, the mes produced by Han Huo suddenly became a thousand times stronger. The fire erupted and began sting the swamp with scorching heat. The surge of high heat caused Rose and Han Shui to take a few steps backward.

    ¡°Ahhh! It¡¯s hot! Ahhh! Help!!¡± cried Romon as he felt fire consuming his body. Although the metal on his body made him immune to sword attacks, as with every metal, it was very conductive of heat. The metals took no time at all to pass all the heat to the nerve endings on Romon¡¯s body.

    ¡°This is just the beginning! Can¡¯t you endure this bit of pain?¡± Han Shuo put on a mischievous, evil smile and said, ¡°My kids can easily take this level of pain. If they can do it, so can you. Romon, you need to have perseverance. Ignore everything happening to your body and hold to your divine soul. Only then can you make the most out of this!¡±

    Romon felt as though all of his organs were burning and mes were licking the inside of his chest. He continued to loudly cry in pain and struggled, trying to free himself from the burning mold.

    Han Shuo let out a long sigh. He turned to Han Jin and gave him a slow nod. Han Jin put on a big mischievous smirk in response.

    <i><i>Dong!</i></i> The Golden Cudgel came out of nowhere and pounded Romon¡¯s head, sending him half-conscious. He temporarily lost the energy to break free from the mold.

    Rose, who had been watching nearby, was shocked. She was afraid that the massive and heavy Golden Cudgel might kill Romon just like that. She started having doubts as she could not understand why Han Shuo would treat Romon so cruelly.

    ¡°More often than not, rapidly increasing one¡¯s strength requires one to endure extreme pain,¡± Han Shuo knew just what was on Rose¡¯s head and he smilingly said, ¡°Romon will be just fine. And after hepletes the process, he will be thankful that I did this to him!¡±

    Rose did not know what to say to Han Shuo and so she did not reply.

    For the next seven days, Han Huo continued to bake the swamp using his Fire Lotus while Han Jin would throw in certain ores from time to time. During that week, Romon felt as though he was in Hell and was being tortured by the Devil. He was under a constant, unbearable, burning pain. Whenever he tried to break free from the mold or about to pass out from the pain, Han Jin¡¯s Golden Cudgel would descend from the sky andnd on his head so that he would not be free from the inhuman pain, even for a moment.

    On the tenth day, Romon, who felt as though he had been dead many times, suddenly discovered that strands of bizarre energies were flowing into his divine body from the swamp. Those energies had some sort of bizarre connection with his body and they greatly alleviated his pain.

    Another bizarre transformation started happening. Romon noticed that there were more and more metals contained in his body and they were reassembling based on some sort of miraculous rhythm. The strands of toxins also started flowing around his body, making a just as miraculous transformation to his organs.

    Romon who had been constantly making all sorts of noises suddenly turned quiet. He started epting the burning pain and no longer tried to break free from the swamp.

    Half a month went by in the blink of an eye. Romon and the mold that covered his body were glowing like a red-hot iron. He had not made a sound and was as still as a boulder.

    ¡°Has he been cooked to death?¡± asked Rose who was wearing a distressed expression. It seemed to her that Romon had met his demise.

    ¡°Nah, everything is happening as nned. He is currently in the most optimal state. It won¡¯t be long before he reemerges,¡± consoled Han Shuo.

    Rose was a little skeptical but hoped Han Shuo¡¯s words were true. She watched Romon attentively for any sign of life.

    Yet another three days had passed. Fire Elite Zombie stopped cooking Romon with his mes. The sludge that covered his body had turned into a bizarre metal with incredible toughness. From a distance, Romon looked like a small volcano radiating light and heat.

    ¡°It¡¯s almost done. He should emerge tonight,¡± remarked Han Shuo after he carefully sensed the state of Romon¡¯s divine soul.

    ¡°I hope you are right,¡± said Rose. Her face was filled with regret, as though she felt that it was a mistake to bring Han Shuo to Romon.<i><i>If Bryan really killed Romon, what should I do? How am I going to face him?</i></i> thought Rose before she sighed.

    And soon, the bright full moon took the ce of the scorching sun. It was nighttime.

    Thick vapor suddenly began emerging from Romon¡¯s body as though he was being doused with iced-water. His temperature was also rapidly dropping as though he had been dipped into an ice-bath.

    After a while, Romon stopped giving off vapor and was no longer glowing red. He looked normal again.

    Under the attentive gazes of the crowd, Romon suddenly opened his eyes and made an ecstatic face. He wiggled slightly and his body oozed out from the mold as though it was liquid metal. Standing on the swamp, Romon stretched his arms forward and they transformed into a pair of stabbing des. Smaller des glistening with chilling lights also shot out from his shoulders and elbows. He then opened his mouth and spat out a stream of colorless but foul-smelling gas. The nts that touched it immediately withered and liquefied.

    Romon wasughing heartily for he realized that he was in absolute control of the metals inside his body. Not only could he transform arms and legs into weapons of any shapes, but he could even instantly transform his body into an enormous sword that spits poisons.

    Rose was bbergasted and she cried out in surprise, ¡°How did you do that? That is miraculous!¡±

    ¡°So, I guess now you won¡¯t me me for torturing him, will you?¡± said Han Shuo mockingly.

    ¡°Fe, you should know just how damn lucky you are. Other than my father, who could unleash the full potential of your body? And even do so in such a short time? With your new body, there are now far fewer people who could injure you. Even an average highgod wouldn¡¯t be able to cause you any harm!¡± remarked Han Jin.

    While inside the mold, inspired by the transformation, Romon had been thinking about how to use the metals to enhance his body¡¯s defensive powers. He had been discussing with Han Shuo and Han Jin about those methods. Han Jin had even given Romon some of his insights about metals.

    Romon stepped forward, kneeled with both knees, kowtowed at Han Shuo, and said with utmost sincerity, ¡°Thank you, my Master!¡±

 Chapter 847 - Heâ€™s mine

    GDK 847: <strong>He¡¯s mine</strong>

    While Han Shuo was rebuilding Romon¡¯s body, Han Hao and Han Tu managed to locate Kage.

    They were around five hundred miles south from the Empyrean Peak. Kage and his gang had just robbed a merchant caravan and they were counting their spoils. They would howl withughter from time to time.

    Han Hao and Han Tu were underground and right under Kage. Through the tiny vibrations that travel into the ground, Han Tu could determine the precise locations of people on the surface. He could even guesstimate their number and strength.

    ¡°Brother, other than Kage, there are four highgods and sixteen midgods. They are closely gathered. Are we going to attack them soon?¡± asked Han Tu.

    Han Hao¡¯s Purple Demon Eye glistened on his calm face. He shook his head and replied, ¡°No, we must not recklessly attack. We will only strike when there is an opening.¡±

    Han Tu said nothing and continued to observe the situation on the ground.

    After tracking and surveilling them for three days, Han Tu suddenly said, ¡°There seems to be another party approaching. They have great strength and theye in a big number. I¡¯m not sure if they are with Kage.¡±

    ¡°Where are they?¡± asked Han Hao.

    ¡°Fifty miles south from Kage and rapidly closing in,¡± replied Han Tu confidently after he closed his eyes and sensed for a moment.

    Han Hao released a demon general and had it fly out through a separate tunnel made by Han Tu. It avoided Kage and his party before flying in the direction Han Tu indicated.

    The demon generals refined by Han Hao was not as miraculous as that of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. Therefore, Han Hao had avoided using demon generals to track Kage lest he inadvertently alerts Kage.

    ***

    Around fifty miles from Kage, a group of experts who had concealed their auras was stealthily approaching Kage.

    ¡°Lord Polo, Kage is a follower of Ss¡¯. Wouldn¡¯t attacking Kage mean offending Ss?¡± asked Kodiak who was traveling beside Polo. He was hesitant about following his chief¡¯s order.

    Polo put on a cold, sinister smile and replied, ¡°Ss may be powerful, but our Godhunter Alliance is even more so! The forces of our Alliance spans all Twelve Dominions. Our Supreme Leader wouldn¡¯t be weaker than Ss. We need not worry too much about him.¡±

    After taking a short pause, Polo smirked and continued, ¡°Besides, no one will find out that it was us. When the timees, we just have to decorate the scene a little and nt a few scapegoats. Ss is not omniscient. He will never suspect us.¡±

    ¡°You are right, my Lord!¡± Kodiak knew that there was nothing he could say that would change Polo¡¯s mind once he had decided on something.

    ¡°After killing Kage, take his head and hand it to Han Hao. Tell him to consider it as a weing gift from me,¡± Polo wore a grave face as he remarked, ¡°I really did not expect that he would actually possess such tremendous power. Even though so many forces were ganging up on them, they managed to ughter four, five hundred people in an instant. Han Hao is a force to be reckoned with!¡±

    ¡°But from what I¡¯ve heard, it wasn¡¯t Han Hao who killed them,¡± replied Kodiak.

    What happened outside the Omphalos that deadly evening had spread to the entire Land of Chaos like wildfire. Polo, being one of the powerhouses in the Fringe, learned of the incident in no time. He had had several meetings with Han Hao and knew that Han Hao was incredibly powerful. However, never in his wildest imagination that Han Hao would possess such tremendous power.

    Polo could tell that Han Hao will be moving his forces into the Fringe sooner orter. They were both godhunters in the Godhunter Alliance and they were on good terms but Polo thought that further strengthening their friendship would greatly benefit him. He saw assassinating Kage as an opportunity to aplish that.

    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter who actually killed them. What mattered is that Han Hao must have a close rtionship with that being!¡± Poloughed mischievously and continued, ¡°Knowing that is enough. That Kage has been fucking unbridled and stole a ton of our businesses. I¡¯ve wanted to end him for a long time.¡±

    During recent times, Kage and his men had frequently trespassed upon the territories under Kodiak¡¯s sphere of influence. It had infuriated Polo but they couldn¡¯t touch Kage because he had Ss backing him.

    Kodiak stared nkly for a moment. It suddenly hit him that perhaps this was the real reason that Polo decided to assassinate Kage. Kodiak knew the temperament of his chief well. Although Polo was incredibly patient and scheming, sometimes, he would do something rtively irrational out of rage.

    It appeared that Polo had thought about killing Kage longer than one or two days. Han Hao was just thest gentle push needed for Polo to act on this n of his.

    ***Back in the underground tunnel.

    Han Hao¡¯s eyes had been rolling all around under his eyelids. He suddenly opened his eyes and softly remarked, ¡°So it is him!¡±

    Han Tu was puzzled and he asked, ¡°Brother, do you know the approaching party?¡±

    Little Skeleton nodded. He was wearing a somewhat bewildered expression as though he found it baffling that someone would try so hard to win his favor. He turned to Han Tu and gravely said, ¡°Get ready, we are going to strike soon. The approaching party is not a foe but a friend. Make sure that you do not make friendly fire.¡±

    ¡°Brother, you have friends in the Fringe?¡± Han Tu turned even more confused.

    ¡°Not exactly a friend. He is being friendly to me with an ulterior motive.¡± To Han Hao, there was no such thing as ¡®friends¡¯. Other than Han Shuo and the Elite Zombies, everyone is either his subordinate or his enemy. He needed no friend.

    ¡°Okay, understood. I¡¯ll be ready in no time!¡± replied Han Tu excitedly.

    ***

    ¡°My Lord, we will be reaching our underground base soon. Lord Ss was very pleased with those ores your Lordship presented. Hehe, the Sovereign will surely be more attentive towards us!¡± a bald man was fawning on Kage.

    The gloomy and cold looking Kage replied, ¡°We need to use this opportunity to expand our business operation. Our size is growing fast. Soon we will be doing just big businesses!¡± said the ambitious Kage. He would never have expected that all his followers in his base had been decimated by Han Shuo.

    ¡°You are very right, my Lord. Right, I hearsay that Ethereal City has a new owner. Perhaps we should re-expand our trades to the City. Back then when Baum was around, he would give us some fantastic deals every year. Maybe we could start by bribing the new City Lord with something valuable,¡± suggested the bald guy.

    ¡°Shut up and stop giving me those nonsensical ideas of yours!¡± Kage coldly groaned and reprimanded, ¡°Did you not know who made McKinley the City Lord? It was the Space Overlord who had personally paved the path of his ascension! Who the hell do you think we are? Don¡¯t mention or even think about Ethereal City!¡±

    After hearing the rebuke, the bald man immediately lowered his head and scowled. He could not make a sound.

    ¡°Enemy!¡± Kage suddenly cried out in rm and put on his alerted face. He said, ¡°Be careful, someone is approaching!¡±

    Those in Kage¡¯s party were all ferocious gods who had gone through thousands of battles. Following his warning, they started paying attention to their surroundings. They noticed that the trees around them were shaking very lightly and they heard faint rustling noises slowly moving towards them.

    ¡°Hi, Kage! Long time no see!¡± Polo¡¯s voice sounded from behind a big tree before his tall and sturdy figure slowly came into appearance.

    Kage frowned and in an annoyed voice, he said, ¡°Polo, what do you mean by this? We have never meddled with each other¡¯s businesses. What? You want to be my enemy?¡±

    ¡°Kage, O, Kage. Haven¡¯t you noticed that you have been stretching your greedy hands a little too far?¡± said Polo in a sinister, cold smirk. He was buying time for his subordinates to get into position to surround Kage and his party.

    Kage was a veteran predator himself and was aware of his trick. When he saw the flickering light in Polo¡¯s eyes, he knew that Polo did note here just to greet him. Kage did not bring many people with him and his strength wasn¡¯t as valiant as Polo¡¯s. His heart trembled because he knew that he was in deep trouble. Immediately, he shrieked, ¡°Don¡¯t you dare, Polo. If you touch me, Lord Ss will exterminate you and your men!¡±

    Polo startedughing like he just heard a joke. ¡°But how are you going to tell him that when you are fucking dead?¡± Hisughter suddenly vanished and hemanded in a cold voice, ¡°Kill them!¡±

    Polo¡¯s men who had surrounded Kage and his party suddenly started charging forward, rapidly shrinking the circle. Those fierce godhunters shrieked and made intimidating noises as theyunched their attacks. They started killing in groups of three to five men. They know how to fight as a team.

    ¡°How dare you, Polo!¡± Kage was greatly rmed. He did not expect that Polo would leave no room for discussion before killing his people.

    ¡°Why would I not?¡± Polo startedughing again. ¡°You really think that no one can touch you just because you have Ss covering your ass? Kage, you know what kind of a person I am, and yet, you dared to be active in my territory. You should know the consequences of not respecting my boundary!¡± Polo¡¯s smile turned more and more malevolent. He cried, ¡°My brothers! Kill, kill them all! Take their divine energy!¡±

    Polo¡¯s subordinates were inexplicably excited and they swarmed at Kage¡¯s party. The former had greatly outnumbered thetter by five to six times. They would strike and kill Kage¡¯s men in just moments before starting to devour their divine energy.

    Momentster, five or six of Kage¡¯s followers were dead. When the godhunters found suitable prey, they would turn strangely excited and be even more vicious in their attacks. Kage¡¯s men were rapidly being defeated.

    ¡°Polo, we might have some misunderstanding!¡± Kage¡¯s heart trembled harder. He did not expect that Polo would have no qualms about possibly offending Sovereign Ss.

    Kage only dared to intrude and conduct operations in Polo¡¯s territory because he had the backing of this enormous figure called Ss. He tested the waters by conducting a few operations in Polo¡¯s territory. When he saw that Polo took zero action, he assumed that Polo was afraid of his Sovereign and therefore started acting unscrupulously.

    He did not expect that Polo would do absolutely nothing for so long before suddenly, with no warning, attempted to annihte him and his gang in one sweep move. Kage was frightened.

    ¡°Oh? Now you are afraid? Hehe, sorry, but that¡¯s toote. I cannot let you live. If I let you walk away and youin to Ss, it¡¯s gonna be troublesome for me!¡± Poloughed grimly and started charging forward to kill Kage.

    ¡°Polo, don¡¯t you touch him. He is mine,¡± suddenly, a calm, monotonous voice sounded from the underground. Han Hao¡¯s figure bizarrely appeared on the battlefield and he pointed the bone spear in his hand at Kage.

 Chapter 848 - Just how strong is he?

    GDK 848: Just how strong is he?

    Polo did not expect that Han Hao would suddenly appear on the battlefield at this moment. He was astounded. Wearing an astonished expression, he asked, ¡°Why are you here?¡±

    There was not a shred of emotion on Han Hao¡¯s face. His eyes were staring fixedly on Kage as though he was not surrounded in a chaotic battle scene. He replied, ¡°Same as you ¨C to kill!¡±

    Polo stared nkly at Han Hao for a moment before he suddenly burst intoughter and said, ¡°Well then, by all means, please proceed ¨C he¡¯s all yours. That¡¯d save me some energy.¡±

    As if Kage wasn¡¯t already troubled enough by Polo, Han Hao had suddenly appeared to give him a bigger headache. Kage looked at Han Hao puzzlingly. He looked back in his memories and was certain that he had never met Han Hao before. ¡°Who are you? I don¡¯t remember meeting you. You are not one of my rivals.¡±

    ¡°You have recently raided a caravan carrying ores and minerals and ughtered a bunch of them, did you?¡± asked Han Hao in a cold voice instead of immediately attacking Kage.

    Polo¡¯s followers were still attacking Kage¡¯s. Soon, several more of Kage¡¯s followers died by having their divine energy sucked dry. The godhunters¡¯ made wild, loud battle cries as they flew all around, intercepting their victims who were trying to escape.

    Kage felt more and more worried and for the first time in a long time, he felt regretful. His followers were being brutally murdered but he did not know how to handle the situation. It was obvious that Polo wouldn¡¯t have attempted the assassination without bringing forces of much greater strength and quantity than that of Kage¡¯s. He knew that escape would be very difficult.

    ¡°That¡¯s right, I plundered a batch of ores not too long ago,¡± Kage did not deny the usation, ¡°But what has that got to do with you? You sure weren¡¯t there at that time. The only person that escaped wasn¡¯t as powerful as you.¡±

    Han Hao nodded and replied, ¡°The one who escaped is my friend. I¡¯m here to chop your head off and bring it to him.¡±

    ¡°Ha, boastful big talk. You really think that you can stop me?¡± shouted Kage. He nced at Polo and Han Hao with his cold eyes as he said, ¡°How foolish of you to think that you can kill me. Humph, I still have more followers at my base. Once I assembled all my followers, you will know the consequences of offending Sovereign Ss and me!¡±

    ¡°Be careful, Han Hao. He might try to escape by some special means!¡± shouted Polo.

    By now, most of Kage¡¯s followers had been killed. Against two formidable experts that were Polo and Han Hao, Kage knew that it was impossible to fight his way out and that he must abandon his followers.

    Kage knew that as long as he is alive, there is hope for recovery. Upon finishing his words, Kage took out a wind energy divine equipment that Ss had bestowed upon him ¨C Wind Lace, and tried to leave the battlefield as soon as possible.

    The seven bone spurs on Han Hao¡¯s back suddenly whooshed out following his thought. Before Kage could activate the Wind Lace, the seven bone spurs had zipped through the air and arrived before him. Meanwhile, Han Hao, wielding his three-meter long bone spear, was rapidly shooting towards Kage like a fiend.

    Right when the Wind Lace was ready to be activated, Kage discovered that seven dreadful energies had surrounded him, blocking him from escaping. An extremely bizarre boundary abruptly formed around him. Air and wind had stopped circting within the boundary.

    Kage was appalled. He realized that it was not possible to utilize the Wind Lace inside the bizarre boundary.

    With the seven bone spurs starting to attack him, Kage had no choice but to put up defenses and temporarily postponed his n to escape. He took out a dark shield and as soon as he raised it, intense element of darkness gushed out from it. They formed arge mass of dark clouds and enveloped him.

    Just like Rose, Kage possessed mid-stage highgod strength in the energy of darkness. A character of his strength was considered pretty formidable among the average Fringedwellers. However, against Han Hao who dual-cultivated in the element of death and demonic arts, Kage stood little to no chance of winning.

    Kage felt as though the oue of the battle had been decided ever since he was enveloped by the bizarre energy-field generated by the seven bone spurs. When Han Hao reached Kage, he was bombarded with an even more powerful wave of ferocious attacks.

    Including the bone spear in Han Hao¡¯s hand, the altogether eight bone spurs whooshed all around under the control of demonic arts. They flew erratically and every one of them carried the power to kill. They were rapidly dismantling the defenses Kage deployed using his darkness divine energy.

    Kage tried ramming in every direction but realized that he could not free himself from the eight bone spurs. Since the start of the battle, Kage could only take defensive measures. Although he had the Wind Lace, he was not able to use it.

    Although Polo was well acquainted with Han Hao, he did not have the chance to witness Han Hao attacking a person. Therefore, Polo at this moment had his full attention on the callous-looking Han Hao. After observing Han Hao with glistening eyes for a moment, he was yet again shocked.

    Even since Han Hao joined the Godhunter Alliance, many had been trying to guess his actual strength. At first, Han Hao was only barely able to defeat a midgod. But then, one day, Han Hao managed to kill a highgod. This caused everyone to re-evaluate their judgement.

    The main reason that the godhunters were not able to fathom Han Hao¡¯s strength was because he cultivated in demonic arts. Bybining the energies of two different universes, Han Hao often could ughter an expert of greater strength. Polo had heard from various sources that Han Hao was an early-stage highgod of death. After meeting Han Hao several times and having sensed his aura, Polo also thought it to be true.

    However, what he saw right now contradicted his belief. Han Hao had demonstrated overwhelming strength against a mid-stage highgod expert. Right from the beginning, Han Hao had been exerting so much pressure on Kage that thetter could not make a single counterattack!

    <i><i>Just how powerful this fe truly is?</i></i> Polo asked himself as he watched the battle with lights twinkling from his eyes.

    <i><i>Shhhuk!</i></i>

    Finally, the bizarre and unpredictable attacks of the eight bone spurs caught Kage off guard. One of Han Hao¡¯s bone spurs stabbed his shoulder.

    Soon after receiving the stab, Kage felt mentally exhausted while the divine energy in his body was circting uncontrobly like feral horses freed from captivity. A numbing sensation started spreading from the shoulder. Kage turned to look and he discovered that the flesh on his shoulder was slowly rotting away. It looked as though millions of tiny worms were tearing his flesh.

    <i><i>It¡¯s venomous!</i></i> Kage was greatly rmed and horrified.

    After having fought Han Hao for a while, Kage discovered that the emotionless Han Hao was simply the perfect killing machine that doesn¡¯t make any mistakes. He saw that Han Hao had disyed not a single emotion throughout the battle. He was like a chess grandmaster, calmly and systematically eliminating his opponent¡¯s pieces and pushing them closer and closer to defeat with every move.

    <i><i>Who the hell is this person? Is he even a person? How is it even possible that he doesn¡¯t have the slightest bit of emotion?</i></i> The fear in Kage¡¯s mind grew as he fought Han Hao.

    Han Hao might be slightly better than Han Shuo at understanding and using the Nine Changes realm. Perhaps it was due to the unique circumstances of his genesis, Little Skeleton would not feel the slightest emotion when he fought others. This allowed him to achieve absolute calmness of the heart and soul, entering the optimal realm state every time.

    One would be able to fight at his fullest potential if one was able to staypletely calm in a battle and not be affected by the opponent¡¯s provocativenguages. Kage came to recognize just how terrifying it was to fight someone who could do so.

    <i><i>Pow!</i></i> A burst of the aura of death erupted from a bone spur and it mmed Kage, causing him to stagger backward.

    The other bone spurs that had been lying in wait suddenly swarmed at him. Three of them broke through Kage¡¯s defenses and pierced his back.

    Han Hao suddenly stopped attacking. He looked at the dying Kage and said in an indifferent voice, ¡°Those followers of yours in your underground base ¨C I¡¯ve killed them all. The savings you had ¨C I¡¯ve taken them all!¡±

    When Han Hao finished those words, the three bone spurs stabbing on Kage suddenly turned alive and started boring into his body like worms.

    <i><i>CrackCrack... CrackCrack... </i></i> Bone-chilling noises started ying from inside Kage. Then, suddenly, blood spurted out from every one of his orifices. He was visibly losing vitality as blood escaped from his body.

    The three-meter long bone spear cut across his neck and sent his head spinning into the air. The bone spurs caught the flying severed head and carried it into the ss container that Little Skeleton had prepared.

    <i><i>St!</i></i> Kage¡¯s body that lost it¡¯s head abruptly exploded. The three bone spurs looked as though fed leeches and returned to Han Hao¡¯s spine.

    By now, all of Kage¡¯s followers had been killed. Polo and his godhunters were staring foolishly at Han Hao. They had witnessed Han Hao mercilessly murder Kage and saw absolutely no emotion on Han Hao¡¯s face. It was as though Han Hao was so used to doing it that he was numbed by it.

    <i><i>No wonder Chief would value him so highly. This teenager is truly terrifying. He is ruthless and merciless at such a young age, not to mention powerful. He is destined to achieve greatness!</i></i> thought Kodiak. He suddenly felt that Polo¡¯s judgment power was almost as extraordinary as Han Hao.

    ¡°Ermm... Han Hao, I guess I owe you a thank you,¡± Polo was betweenughter and tears. His original n was to kill Kage and bring his head to Han Hao as a gift. But out of his expectation, Han Hao appeared out of nowhere and killed Kage himself. With that, instead of Han Hao owing Polo a favor, it was Polo who owed Han Hao a favor.

    Han Hao turned to look at Polo emotionlessly. He nodded and replied, ¡°You are wee. You have taken care of Kage¡¯s followers for me. We have the same goal. We don¡¯t owe each other anything.¡±

    ¡°Well, all right then.¡± Polo thought for a moment before he asked, ¡°If Ss investigates Kage¡¯s death, what are you going to do?¡±

    ¡°Just find a few scapegoats nearby and throw their bodies here. Make it look like it was the other four Sovereigns who did it,¡± Han Hao bunched his brows slightly and continued, ¡°Kage is just an insignificant character. I doubt that Ss cared about him as much as Kage thought he would.¡±

    Polo nodded, put on a mischievous smile and said, ¡°Indeed, we shall make it so!¡±

 Chapter 849 - We donâ€™t need allies

    GDK 849: We don¡¯t need allies

    Polo had been living in the Fringe for many years and he was also a cunning and treacherous character. He immediately ordered his followers to handle the matter.

    Soon enough, the group of godhunters led by Polo returned to the crime scene with several bodies. Wearing a treacherous smile, Kodiak reported to Polo, ¡°Chief, these are the followers of the other four Sovereigns. Anyone who attempts to investigate the murder will be led on a path to nowhere.¡±

    ¡°Good. Be sure to tidy up the ce properly and leave no trail behind,¡± instructed Polo. He then turned to Han Hao, smiled, and said, ¡°I did not expect you to show up. Haha, I have heard about what you did outside the Omphalos. I¡¯m sure that the entire Land of Chaos is talking about you guys!¡±

    Han Hao raised an eyebrow at Polo and replied, ¡°What exactly do you want to tell me?¡±

    ¡°Hehe,¡± Polo put on a somewhat awkward smile and said, ¡°If you are going to expand in the Fringe, then, as members of the Alliance, as we are on good terms with each other, it is only proper that we should be assisting each other. Don¡¯t you think?¡±

    ¡°Yes, that is true,¡± replied Han Hao with an expressionless face. But after taking a short pause, he bunched his brows and asked, ¡°What exactly do you mean by ¡®assisting each other¡¯?¡±

    ¡°We godhunters and the Five Sovereign have always kept to our own businesses. If you wish to expand your influence in the Fringe, you will inevitablye into contact with the Five Sovereigns. Yes, and based on my understanding of the Sovereigns, confrontation is only a matter of time. What I¡¯m saying is, I¡¯m willing to take your side!¡± Polo was somewhat hesitant when he said those words. Having lived in the Fringe for many years, he knew just how ferocious the Sovereigns could be. It was not easy for him toe to this decision.

    Han Hao seemed to be interested. His purple demon eye glistened and he scanned Polo before he curiously asked, ¡°In what way are you going to stand by my side? As an ally?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right, an ally!¡± affirmed Polo.

    ¡°Oh.¡± Han Hao¡¯s face returned to showing no emotion. He shook his head and replied, ¡°We need no allies.¡± Then, with his eyes staring straight at Polo, he continued, ¡°Polo, if you are genuine, you should hand your followers to me and you too should serve me.¡±

    That proposal was way, way off Polo¡¯s original intention. He was stunned by the bold proposal for a long time. After finallying to his senses, Polo frowned and said, ¡°Han Hao, I admit, you are extraordinarily powerful. However, in the Godhunter Alliance, my reputation is no less than yours. Besides, I have been living in the Fringe for far longer than you have. You sure you aren¡¯t joking?¡±

    Han Hao nodded solemnly. ¡°You decide for yourself. In short, I do not need allies.¡± Han Hao sensed a minute vibration from the ground. He knew that Han Tu must be starting to get worried because he wasn¡¯t sure what was going on on the surface. Han Hao therefore did not take the time to persuade Polo but sinctly summarized, ¡°On ount that you have helped me today, I will not make an enemy of you. Go back and think about it. Don¡¯t take too long.¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Han Hao turned away and took to the sky without giving the godhunters another look.

    Polo and his godhunters stared at the leaving Han Hao foolishly. Like a shadow he vanished into the horizon in no time. Momentster, Polo woke up from his daze. Gloomily, he remarked, ¡°You sure are an arrogant brat, Han Hao!¡±

    Polo seemed to be in a bad mood. Given his position in the Godhunter Alliance, his strength, and the forces hemanded, Polo considered himself generous to be Han Hao¡¯s ally. However, not only had Han Hao declined his olive branches, but he expected Polo to bow to him. Polo felt as though his good intention was returned with a snub.

    Kodiak was angry. ¡°Chief, that youngster is an arrogant, conceited brat. We have done all this for nothing!¡±

    Polo grunted, ¡°Let¡¯s see how he will do in the Fringe. There is no need for us to decide in haste. Hmph, if he could demonstrate that level of strength, I will consider serving him.¡±

    ***

    Over on the other side, Han Shuo, Rose, and the party continued to roam all around the Fringe. Romon, Han Shuo¡¯stest follower, was among the party.

    Ever since Romon emerged from the swamp, he had willingly and fully epted Han Shuo as his master. He submitted to Han Shuo because he felt the enormous transformation to his body and the benefits that Han Shuo had brought.

    In just over ten days, the capacity of Romon¡¯s body was substantially raised. At the mere thought, he could turn his body into the toughest metal or transform into any melee weapon of any form. He could even spurt toxins. He had transformed into a very unique being, not to mention an extremely powerful one.

    ¡°Master, if any of them are not willing to serve you, leave them to me. Hehe, I will beat them until they do!¡± said Romon. He wished to prove his worth to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Romon, what the hell are you talking about?!¡± Rose whined. ¡°They are our friends and we are here to invite them. How could you do that to your friends!¡±

    ¡°It is their honor to serve Master. I¡¯m only helping them realize it!¡± Every other time Romon opened his mouth, he was sure to give praise to Han Shuo. In his mind, Han Shuo was more a miracle than any of the Five Sovereigns.

    Han Shuo smiled but he did not take Romon¡¯s words seriously. He asked Rose, ¡°We are almost there, right?¡±

    ¡°Yes, he should be on that bald mountain right ahead of us. I hope he still lives there,¡± answered Rose who was leading the party.

    Momentster, Rose was standing on a mountainpletely barren at its top. She shouted with her clear voice, ¡°Zovic!¡±

    Out of nowhere, a lightning struck across the sky. A short, thin figure appeared on the mountain. The petite old man had a vile face that looked all around before heughed out loud and said, ¡°Rose! It¡¯s you! I have heard about what happened outside the Omphalos recently and learned that Buzz and Bertha were killed. I also heard that you were there. At first, I thought that they had distorted the story. But look, here you are!¡±

    That hunched old man was no more than five feet tall. He was a mid-stage highgod of lightning. Despite his grotesque features, his eyes showed genuine kindness and a trace of gratitude when he looked at Rose.

    ¡°I¡¯m d that you are still alive,¡± said Rose in her rare smile. She then introduced him to Han Shuo, ¡°This is Zovic. I¡¯ve mentioned him before. What you see on the outside might deceive you, but I know that he is good on the inside. He is sincere to his friends.¡±

    After introducing Zovic, Rose was peculiarly bashful. He took a nce at Han Shuo as he said to Zovic, ¡°This is Bryan, the Master I now serve. He killed Buzz and Bertha.¡±

    Zovic was amazed. He carefully looked up and down at Han Shuo several times and found Han Shuo to be unbelievably young. After seeing those standing behind Han Shuo, he recalled the rumors about the incident outside Omphalos and he became even more surprised. He thought, <i><i>Could these youngsters be the ferocious experts who killed five or six hundred Fringedwellers?</i></i>

    ¡°I have heard a little about what happened at the Omphalos. Haha, I must say, I did not expect you all to be so young!¡± remarked Zovic. He then smilingly asked, ¡°Little Rose, what have youe to me for?¡±

    ¡°Zovic, don¡¯t hole up to cultivate anymore. Work for my Master!¡± invited Rose solemnly.

    Zovic was not astonished ¨C it was almost as if he had expected Rose to say so. He did not immediately agree or decline but smiled. Zovic turned to Han Shuo and asked, ¡°Of the Five Sovereigns of the Fringe, do you have the confidence to fight any one of them?¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before he calmly shook his head and answered, ¡°I have not tried it, no confidence at all.¡± After taking a short pause, Han Shuo continued, ¡°However, I¡¯m not afraid!¡±

    ¡°You are very young. When the Five Sovereigns were your age, they definitely weren¡¯t as strong as you are,¡± remarked Zovic. He was somewhat baffled by how forting Han Shuo was. He thought for a bit, bunched his brows, and asked, ¡°Do you have the confidence to escape from any of the Sovereigns?¡±

    Han Shuo thought about it for a moment and nodded assuredly. He smilingly answered, ¡°This, I¡¯m confident. Not just one, even if two or three of theme for me, I know I can escape.¡±

    ¡°Then that¡¯ll do. As long as you can preserve your life, there¡¯s a very good chance that you will surpass the Five Sovereigns!¡± Zovic seemed gratified as though it was enough for him to know that Han Shuo could escape from a Sovereign. ¡°Alright, on ount that Rose has saved my life before, I¡¯m willing to serve you. If someday in the future I¡¯m killed by the Five Sovereigns, I¡¯d be very happy to know that there¡¯s a chance that you would avenge my death.¡±

    <i><i>He sure is a strange one.</i></i> remarked Han Shuo inwardly. He thought for a moment before he solemnly pledged, ¡°I will do my best to make sure that you and my followers stay alive. But if any of you get killed, don¡¯t worry, I will take revenge for you and kill the person ¨C no matter who he is.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s enough!¡± Zovicughed happily. ¡°Please don¡¯t mind it, I¡¯m the kind of person who thinks about the escape route before anything. I know that against any of the Five Sovereigns, all escape routes would be useless. If something unfortunate were to happen to me, I would die at peace knowing that someone will avenge my death.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t you worry about it, I¡¯m certain that our Master will be triumphant! Hmph, I¡¯d like to see just how strong the Five Sovereigns are!¡± Romon¡¯s confidence had swelled after his strength soared. He had be so arrogant that no one else mattered other than Han Shuo and Han Jin.

    Han Shuo looked at Romon but said nothing. He turned to Rose and said, ¡°Let¡¯s keep going.¡±

    For the next few days, Rose led Han Shuo and the party to every corner of the Fringe. Unfortunately for them, those friends of Rose had either been killed or relocated. They made no further findings.

    However, Han Shuo was not disheartened by it. Instead of returning to Omphalos, he decided to continue wandering all around the Fringe to select a suitable site as his new base. Naturally, Han Shuo would only select an area suitable for deploying demonic formations. After wandering for a few days, he finally found a remote valley.

 Chapter 850 - Overgod?

    GDK 850: Overgod?

    The Yin aura inside the valley was spellbinding. Han Shuo felt chills as he approached the region. Clouds and mist were winding around the valley like a very slow cyclone. Coupled with the flourishing flora, the valley was dreamlike.

    Rose liked the ce at first nce. She softly eximed, ¡°I could get used to this. Fresh air and a beautifulndscape.¡±

    Romon and Zovic were too shy to give their opinions as they were still new to serving Han Shuo. After taking a good look around, they found the region to be mostly identical to most ces in the Fringe, nothing unique about it. Furthermore, this region was rather remote and the intensity of elemental energies was nothing outstanding.

    Han Mu walked into the lush forest and took a deep breath. He closed his eyes and sensed the trees, shrubs, and grass all around him. When he exhaled, he opened his eyes and grinned, ¡°Wonderful! I quite like it here!¡±

    Han Jin, Han Huo, and Han Shui also looked around the region and stated their opinions. Han Jin discovered rare ore deposits in the depths of the valley while Han Shui located waterfalls and water-bodies nearby. They too were happy with the area.

    Han Huo, however, after making a circle, seemed rather upset. ¡°The region is all wet and humid. There isn¡¯t a single dry spot. If I stay here, my energy will never thrive. It would be great if there¡¯s a volcano nearby.¡±

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help butugh. He knew that it was very difficult to locate a ce that would satisfy the needs of all five Elite Zombies, if not impossible. Han Shuo released his demon generals and had them circle around to check if anyone was inhabiting the region.

    ¡°Romon, Zovic, you two have been living in the Fringe. Tell me, do you know if anyone is upying this region?¡± Han Shuo did not want to create friction with the Five Sovereigns, for now. He wanted to avoid any unnecessary conflicts as much as possible.

    ¡°Sorry, Master, I do not know. Before serving you, I rarely ever left that swamp,¡± answered Romon.

    ¡°Well, I, however, am quite aware of the situation around here,¡± said Zovic smilingly. When Han Shuo¡¯s gaze turned to him, Zovic continued, ¡°You have nothing to worry about. This ce is considered remote in the Fringe. None of the Sovereigns¡¯ followers would upy this region. Besides, there aren¡¯t any particrly powerful forces around this region. If you wish to establish your base here, I believe that there won¡¯t be much of an issue.¡±

    Although Zovic was willing to serve Han Shuo, as he had yet to witness Han Shuo¡¯s overwhelming power, his mind was notpletely convinced. Therefore, Zovic did not address Han Shuo as ¡®Master¡¯ as Romon did.

    Han Shuo noticed that but he did not mind it nor did he demand Zovic to address him properly. In fact, he wasn¡¯t going to mention it at all. This was because Han Shuo was confident that in time, he could impress Zovic and make Zovic ept him as his master from the bottom of his heart.

    ¡°Very well then. Seclusion does have its benefits, after all,¡± remarked Han Shuo. He started considering whether he should immediately begin the mega-construction project that he had in mind.

    ¡°Sorry, Master, but I cannot understand why you would select this location.¡± Romon had hesitated but in the end, he had to voice his doubts, ¡°We are so isted here and so very far from the Omphalos. And there¡¯s nothing special about this terrain. The valley is too essible. It will be easy for our enemy to attack. But most importantly, the elemental energy around the valley is weak. We will have to invest a ton of time and effort into this ce. Will it be worth it?¡±

    Zovic was equally puzzled by Han Shuo¡¯s decision. He too was looking at Han Shuo doubtfully.

    Rose, however, having been around Han Shuo for such a long time, knew that Han Shuo was capable of all sorts of magnificent things. Instead of worrying that Han Shuo might have made a mistake, she was guessing what kind of transformation he would bring to the valley.

    ¡°An average person wouldn¡¯t know how to take advantage of the terrain and geography found here, and so they wouldn¡¯t know that this ce is a gem hiding in in sight. Oh don¡¯t you worry about it. When I¡¯m done with this ce, you will find out why I have selected this valley,¡± said Han Shuo confidently. The center of the valley was actually a naturally formed Yin-gathering Formation, but it was iplete. Once Han Shuo made the necessary adjustments and the Formation was whole, the elemental energies would automatically converge towards the valley.

    Han Shuo could harness the Yin-gathering Formation at its core as a power source. With enough materials and using the powers of the Five Elite Zombies, he could build arge number of demonic formations in and around the valley.

    Given sufficient time, energy, and resources, Han Shuo could turn the valley into an imprable fortress. It would be even deadlier and formidable than Ss¡¯ Empyrean Peak!

    Although Romon was still puzzled, after seeing the confidence shown by Han Shuo, he did not question any further. Zovic also did not say a thing but it was clear from his eyes that he was still skeptical. He thought, <i><i>This is a wastnd. I¡¯d be impressed if you could turn it into anything but that.</i></i>

    ¡°Little Gold, go to the mountain ranges nearby and get some basic ores for building. Bring the two along. Rose, there¡¯s a waterfall and pond right behind there. You may bathe there if you want to.¡± Romon, Rose, and Zovic couldn¡¯t help Han Shuo with deploying demonic formations, therefore he asked them to help with the menial tasks or to rest.

    ¡°Romon,e with me. You are most suited for moving things!¡± Han Jin knew that Romon¡¯s body was filled with rare metals. Not only was he incredibly strong, but he was also able to differentiate many rare ores. In Han Jin¡¯s mind, Romon was now one of his Goldstone Enterprise¡¯s workers.

    Zovic was very curious and wanted to watch Han Shuo make the transformation. However, he knew that it was usually a taboo to do so, thus, he followed Han Jin and Romon along with no further objections.

    ¡°I shall go look around,¡± said Rose before she flew in the direction of the pond as indicated by Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo had ced at least one demon general for each mile across the region, allowing him to immediately detect if Rose, Zovic, or the others were in distress. Han Shuo hardly had to worry about their safety.

    ¡°What a shame that Little Earth isn¡¯t here. Well, I guess most of the underground projects will have to be postponed until Little Earth returns,¡± Han Shuomented after the others took off. He then started instructing Han Mu and Han Huo to help him with the initial construction.

    Han Shuo wanted to focus his future growth on the Fringe because this Land was not bound to any of the Twelve Overgods¡¯ dominions. Although thepetition was incredibly fierce, he got to enjoy absolute freedom. Knowing that he would be in the game for the long run, Han Shuo wanted to make sure that hisir would be well thought out and built to the highest standards.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s strength increased, he became more skilled in using demonic formations while his understanding of them improved. With the assistance of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, Han Shuo could deploy all sorts ofplex and cryptic formations, provided that he could source the necessary materials for it.

    In the following days and nights, Han Shuo continuously flew back and forth around the valley. With the assistance of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon and the four Elite Zombies, Han Shuo started to architect his demonic dungeon and reconstruct the valley.

    The lush trees and vegetation covering the valley started to rapidly grow and became abnormally oversized as though they had been injected with steroids. The trees became as tall as mountains and the dense foliage shielded from the sun like massive dark clouds.

    The trees had not just grown taller but their positions had changed. They were repositioned to form an abstruse but harmonic design.

    Meanwhile, the shrubs growing on the ground thickened and toughened and bestowed with brand new shredding capabilities. If one was to fall into the shrubs, they would be swarmed and effectively pulverized.

    Monumental stones of various qualities were ced all around the valley. Carved into them were wicked shapes or hieroglyphic runes. In addition, they were all colorful and glowed with diabolical radiances.

    The Yin aura in the valley grew even thicker and chilling winds blew from nowhere. Any ordinary person who stepped into the valley would feel ufortable and inexplicably frightened.

    The valley had taken on a new life!

    Romon, Zovic, and Rose saw the changes to the valley. However, it only made them more puzzled as they had no idea what purpose those transformations would serve.

    Then, one day, Han Shuo asked Metal, Wood, Fire, and Water Elite Zombies to put down their work with the demonic formations and gathered up everyone, including Rose, Romon, and Zovic. He dly announced, ¡°I have yet to fully put everything in order as one of my sons isn¡¯t here and we do not have enough materials. Right now, the valley is only one fifthplete.¡±

    Han Shuo took a short pause before he continued, ¡°I have gathered everyone so that you can have a look at our work so far. What you are about to see will be just one fifth of the final result, but still, the changes will be quite considerable.¡±

    Romon, Rose, and Zovic looked forward to witnessing the results. Apart from the great changes to the facade, they wondered what other miraculous transformation Han Shuo¡¯s magic would bring to the valley.

    Under their attentive gazes, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s body and immediately started zipping all around the valley. Bursts of light shot out from the Cauldron andnded on the center of demonic formations all around the valley, activating them.

    After making a ring around the valley, the Cauldron finally flew to the monolith at the center. Several streaks of brilliant rays shot out from the Cauldron and traveled along the stone¡¯s surface. Cracking noises came from the monolith that was being engraved before their eyes. Soon, an outline of the Cauldron could be seen on the monolith.

    A demon general made from highgod soul bellowed as it flew into the inscribing on the monolith. The engraved Cauldron immediately started to sparkle as though something had been awoken. Rumbles rocked from underneath the valley like some colossal machine was operating and the monolith was the starter key to the machine.

    Then, unexpectedly, the elemental energies between heaven and earth started flowing and gathering towards the valley. The elemental energies grew denser and denser...

    ¡°How, how is this possible?!¡± Zovic¡¯s face was filled with disbelief and he could not be more appalled.

    ¡°No, not even the Five Sovereigns possess the power to alter the operation of natural forces. Which, which of the Twelve Overgods are you?¡±

 Chapter 851 - Nope, too weak

    GDK 851: Nope, too weak

    Zovic was bbergasted. To his knowledge, on the entire Elysium, only the Overgods who possessed the Quintessences could alter and rewrite the operation of natural forces.

    The originally unexceptional concentration of elemental energies in the valley had suddenly spiked. This was not something that an average god could aplish. Even the Five Sovereigns weren¡¯t able to do such a thing if they did not wield the Quintessences.

    Zovic took a moment to carefully sense the environment. He was yet again shocked for he discovered that the concentration of all Eight Elemental Energies had increased. An Overgod was only able to alter the concentration of the element they cultivated. This meant that unless the eight respective Overgods joined hands, no being could aplish what Han Shuo just did.

    Zovic was stupefied and he almost could not believe his senses.

    Rose and Romon were also incredibly amazed. It was unbelievable even to Rose who knew a thing or two about Han Shuo¡¯s brilliance. She had seen Han Shuo deploy demonic formations of serious firepower but she had never seen him deploy one that could gather elemental energies.

    Any gods who cultivated in a region of higher elemental energy concentration could make progress multiple times fasterpared to their counterparts in ces of lower concentration. In other words, those who cultivated in this valley could grow stronger much faster than others. This would be a terrifying advantage to have.

    But the transformation hadn¡¯t stopped yet!

    While Zovic and the others were still in shock, the elemental energies everywhere continued to gather towards the valley. Han Shuo kept smiling but said nothing other than to ask his servants to keep watching.

    ***Half an hourter...

    The concentration of elemental energies continued to elevate before it finally stabilized ¨C at thirty times the original concentration!

    Zovic¡¯s mouth was wide open. He flew all around to survey the valley as he mumbled to himself, ¡°How? How is this possible?!¡±

    Of the party, only the four Elite Zombies were not surprised. The four little fes knew just how miraculous Han Shuo¡¯s demonic arts were. The ces of Extreme Yuan that they were born from had elemental energies even denser than was found in this region.

    After a long, long time, Zovic finally managed to slightly calm down. He asked Han Shuo, ¡°How did you do that?¡± Zovic¡¯s gaze towards Han Shuo hadpletely changed to show reverence.

    Han Shuo smiled and calmly replied, ¡°Perhaps I¡¯m no match for the Five Sovereigns for now, but the energy which I master has the potential to far exceed all the Sovereigns. What I¡¯ve done to the valley here may seem unimaginable to you, but it¡¯s a normal day¡¯s work to me.¡±

    ¡°Master, you must be more powerful than the Five Sovereigns! I doubt that the Five Sovereigns could aplish what you could!¡± Romon admired Han Shuo even more after witnessing the transformation to the valley.

    ¡°As I¡¯ve said, the transformation you see now is not the final result. When my other son returns, we will be able toplete the whole thing and the valley will be operating at a much higher capacity,¡± said Han Shuo before he walked to the monolith engraved with the outline of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. He fiddled with a few things and the intense elemental energies gradually started dissipating from the valley.

    ¡°We will leave the valley in its original state and head to the Omphalos. The next time that we are here, we willplete the stronghold.¡± Han Shuo, Han Hao, and Han Tu had an appointment at the Omphalos. In addition, Goron and the other experts that Han Shuo had recruited will also wait for him at the Omphalos. Han Shuo wished to assemble everyone at the center of the Fringe and return to this valley.

    By now, Zovic could not be more impressed by Han Shuo¡¯s marvelous abilities. He felt that Han Shuo must have the strength to contend against the Five Sovereigns.

    After thinking for a moment, Han Shuo decided to conceal the demonic formations in the valley. After the elemental energies dispersed and returned to normal levels, other than the unusually lush nts, the valley appeared quite ordinary.

    The party left the valley which Han Shuo temporarily named Pandemonium and headed to the center of the Fringe.

    *** The Empyrean Peak. The mountain that pierced through the clouds was guarded byyers uponyers of boundaries. Brightly shining energy towers stood in every corner.

    Near the mountain¡¯s summit was a majestic pce where a three-meter tall man was sitting on the throne. His thick beard was meticulously woven into many small braids dangling over his chest. His eyes as deep as the sea were looking straight ahead. He exuded a terrifying demeanor even though he was in a calm mood.

    In the hall, below his throne, severalte-stage highgod experts were crouching before him. They were all characters of great power and influence in the Fringe but they were incredibly humble while in the pce. One of them was an expert who had tried to recruit Han Shuo outside the Omphalos.

    ¡°Culver, are you sure about what you¡¯ve just said?¡± asked the godly and muscr man sitting on the throne curiously as he looked at those crouching under his feet.

    Culver raised his head and revealed his revering eyes. He respectfully replied, ¡°Lord Ss, I¡¯ve witnessed it with my own eyes. Although that youngster appears to have ordinary strength, his true strength is very formidable,¡± Culver took a short pause before he continued, ¡°I suspect that his true strength exceeds that of a highgod.¡±

    Tiny electrical sparks suddenly started meandering in Ss¡¯ pupils as though he was thinking. A momentter, Ss nodded. He spoke in a very calm voice, ¡°From your recount, that youngster should possess strength above the highgod realm. But you said that you couldn¡¯t tell which energy he cultivated in. Strange... Very strange...¡±

    After a short pause, Ss instructed, ¡°Culver, drop all the work you have for now and investigate everything about this youngster. His emergence could potentially upset the status quo. The five of us have been recouping our energy for some time now and will enter a great battle soon. This youngster could be a game-changer. If he will not stand on my side, I shall finish him myself.¡±

    ¡°Yes, My Lord! Your humble servant will investigate this person thoroughly!¡± pledged Culver hastily.

    Ss nodded, gestured with his hand and said, ¡°You are dismissed.¡± Ss then suddenly remembered something. He bunched his brows and instructed, ¡°The trace I left on Kage has vanished. He¡¯s been killed. Find out who did it.¡±

    ¡°Yes, My Lord!¡± replied Culver respectfully.

    ¡°Now go,¡± said Ss after he nodded. An enormous lightning bolt suddenly appeared on the throne and shot straight up as Ss vanished. Densely packed lightning bolts suddenly appeared everywhere around the Empyrean Peak.

    ***

    ¡°Brother, why hasn¡¯t father returned yet?¡± the bored stiff Han Tu asked Han Hao. The two had been waiting for Han Shuo and the others in the Omphalos for several days.

    ¡°They have probably been held up by something,¡± replied Han Hao casually. He was sitting cross-legged with his eyes closed in a secluded spot of the Omphalos. He was as still as a statue.

    ¡°Do you think Father has run into some kind of trouble? The Fringe has Five Sovereigns who are more powerful than highgods. Are they capable of capturing Father?¡± asked Han Tu again out of boredom.

    ¡°Nope,¡± replied Han Hao even more sinctly.

    Seeing that Han Hao was not interested in conversing, Han Tu sighed and stopped asking.

    ¡°Excuse me, erm, are you Han Hao?¡± A weak, hesitant voice suddenly sounded. Several midgod teenagers were looking at the two nervously from a distance. It seemed as though they wanted to talk to Han Hao but were too shy.

    Han Hao opened his sinister eyes slightly and took a nce at the teenagers before closing his eyes again. He replied indifferently, ¡°Yes.¡± The teenagers had just midgod strengths and Han Hao deemed them too weak to hurt him or Han Tu.

    The teenagers seemed somewhat excited after hearing Han Hao acknowledge his identity. They exchanged nces and enthusiastically approached Han Hao. One of them hastily said, ¡°We have heard of your deeds and admire you greatly. We have all been banished from our family ns and we have nothing but ck crystal coins. We do not want to live the rest of our lives trapped in the Omphalos. Will you please take us as your followers?¡±

    The other teenagers also voiced their willingness and excitement.

    But Han Hao did not even give them another look before he replied, ¡°Nope, you bunch are too weak.¡±

    The teenagers seemed embarrassed and dispirited after hearing the answer. They looked at each other and they were temporarily at a loss.

    ¡°You know, the Fringe has Five Sovereigns. Why don¡¯t you look for them?¡± asked Han Tu, grinning. Unlike Han Hao, he was bored and was interested in making conversations.

    ¡°They don¡¯t give a damn about the lives of their followers. We are afraid that we will be sent on a suicidal mission or be killed just because they don¡¯t like us,¡± replied a pretty and innocent lookingdy timidly. She did not look evil and the Fringe did not look like the ce for her.

    The Fringe was a ce where the strong were honored and the Five Sovereigns practiced thew faithfully. For characters of their strengths, serving a Sovereign would not guarantee their safety at all. Even if they did not die to their opponents in constant fierce battles, they could lose their lives to their own superiors for identally offending them.

    There was arge number of ferocious gods from all around Elysium traveling into the Fringe every day. These gods would try to be servants of the Sovereigns to survive in the Fringe. Therefore, the Sovereigns would always have plenty of experts to spare.

    ¡°How much ck crystal coins do you have?¡± Han Hao who had been sitting cross-legged suddenly opened his eyes and asked the youngsters.

 Chapter 852 - You must also obey him

    GDK 852: You must also obey him

    One of the teenagers stared nkly for a moment. They did not understand why Han Hao would ask such a thing. ¡°Well, we carried quite a lot of ck crystal coins when we entered the Fringe. We wouldn¡¯t have been able to live in the Omphalos till now if not,¡± one of them half-answered after hesitating for a moment.

    These teenagers originated from various Dominions. They were either degenerates, or they must have done something reprehensible. Otherwise, they wouldn¡¯t have been emunicated by their families and banished to the Fringe. The fact that they could afford to live in the Omphalos for years, spending at least one hundred ck crystal coins per day, meant that they had plenty on hand.

    Han Hao carefully looked at the youngsters, bunched his brows, and started thinking. He remained silent for a while before he announced, ¡°I will take you as my followers, but each of you will have to pay five hundred thousand ck crystal coins as fees. I will not guarantee your safety ¨C in fact, you will be in constant danger. However, I will guarantee that no one will be treated as cannon footers.¡±

    ¡°What! Five hundred thousand?!¡± the timid-looking girl cried out in surprise.

    The teenagers looked at each other and found the decision difficult. Five hundred ck crystal coins was no small fortune for the teenagers. It was more than enough for them to live safely in the Omphalos for at least a decade. To pay that amount of ck crystal coins in exchange for exposing themselves to constant danger didn¡¯t seem rational to them.

    ¡°You all came from family ns from all twelve Dominions. I promise that if you follow me, when you gain sufficient strength, I will assist you in retaking what is rightfully yours from your family ns. And, of course, I will help you take care of the people who have forced you to flee your home,¡± said Han Hao calmly after he noticed their hesitation.

    Han Hao then gestured at them to leave as he said, ¡°Go back and think about it carefully. If you do not have sufficient strength, even if I were to hand you your family n, would you be able to secure it?¡±

    The teenagers seemed somewhat tempted by Han Hao¡¯s words. They again looked at each other and thought about Han Hao¡¯s proposal. Then, one of them said, ¡°Your words do make sense. We shall go back to discuss it. It¡¯s not easy for all of us to take out five hundred ck crystal coins, after all.¡±

    Han Hao again closed his eyes and returned to being still and silent like a statue.

    The teenagers bowed at Han Hao before they left with their brows bunched.

    Right after they left, Han Tu hastily asked, ¡°Brother, why would you want them?¡±

    ¡°They hail from family ns of influence from various Dominions. If we can groom these fes under our doctrine, with their blood rtions and our assistance, we could install them as the patriarchs of their family ns. We would, in turn, have control over those family ns.

    ¡°I asked for five hundred thousand ck crystal coins only to cripple their way out. It is only when they are penniless that they won¡¯t think of escaping to the Omphalos whenever they run into danger. Only then could they bring out their fullest potential.

    ¡°These people have been taking all sorts of divine essences since they were young, therefore they should have decent aptitude and potential. All that theyck is realbat experience and baptism through blood. I will give them those,¡± exined Han Hao after he opened his eyes to look at Han Tu. Then, he lectured, ¡°Little Earth, besides improving your strength, you should also better your understanding of the ways of the world. Try to understand what and how people think. It is only with a greater worldly wisdom that you can be more helpful to Father.¡±

    Han Tu put on a contemtive look after hearing Han Hao¡¯s words. He thought that Han Hao was without any reservations fully deserving of being their big brother. He didn¡¯t just possess greater strength, but also greater wisdom and intelligence.

    ¡°Got it, brother!¡± Han Tu could not be more in awe of his eldest brother. He thought, <i><i>Eldest brother is so farsighted that he could think a hundred steps ahead of others. No wonder he has risen so high so fast in the Death Dominion.</i></i>

    ***

    Han Shuo, Romon, Zovic, Rose, and the Elite Zombies were nearing the Omphalos. As soon as they arrived at the entry checkpoint, that Omphalos guard who had previously given Han Shuo kind warningsughed out loud and greeted, ¡°Hello, friend! Wee back!¡±

    It was also this person who divulged Kage¡¯s whereabouts to Han Shuo. Although he had not shown any evil intent so far, as he was a servant to one of the Sovereigns, Han Shuo remained cautious towards him. Han Shuo smilingly said, ¡°Hey! It¡¯s you again. What a coincidence. Are you always manning this checkpoint?¡±

    ¡°No, but it will be so for the foreseeable future,¡± replied the person before he put on a serious face and said, ¡°I have not properly introduced myselfst time. They call me Luolong, a servant of Sovereign Ossora. May I know your name, sir?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m Bryan. I¡¯m new to the Fringe and would appreciate any kind advice you may have,¡± replied Han Shuo calmly. He handed some crystal coins to Luolong, received several small badges, and distributed them to Romon and the others.

    ¡°Hehe, I heard that Kage is dead! Ss¡¯ people are looking for the killer,¡± said Luolong in a soft voice after he suddenly put on a smirk. He looked intensely at Han Shuo to observe the emotions on his face.

    Han Shuo had experienced all kinds of situations and all kinds of people. It was clear to Han Shuo what Luolong was attempting. He acted as though he was surprised and replied, ¡°What? Darnn it! I heard that he managed to plunder some very rare ores and I have been looking to buy some off him. But who would have thought that he¡¯d be murdered so soon! How unfortunate!¡± After a short pause, Han Shuo curiously asked, ¡°Do you know who killed him and where the ores are?¡±

    Luolong had been observing Han Shuo¡¯s expressions attentively but noticed nothing unusual. <i><i>Huh? He has nothing to do with Kage¡¯s death? That¡¯s strange,</i></i> thought Luolong before he shook his head and replied, ¡°I only know that his head had been cut off. There were bodies of Sovereign Tyre and Logue¡¯s followers around him. Nobody knew who did it. However, I do know about those ores. Kage had submitted them to Sovereign Ss as a tribute.¡±

    Han Shuo pretended to stare nkly for a moment before he grimaced, shook his head, and said, ¡°Since it¡¯s with Sovereign Ss, I guess it¡¯s not possible to get those ores. He definitely won¡¯t be in any shortage of ck crystal coins. Sigh, I guess I will just give up on that.¡±

    Han Shuo was secretly rejoicing when he heard that Kage had been murdered and that no damning evidence had been left behind. It left no shroud of doubt in his mind about Han Hao¡¯s capabilities. Meanwhile, Metal Elite Zombie who was standing not far behind Han Shuo was grinning ear to ear. He knew that Han Hao must have had something to do with Kage¡¯s death and he grew to admire his eldest brother even more.

    ¡°It¡¯s good that you¡¯d think so. That Ss is a lunatic. Few in the Fringe would even try to do business with him,¡± remarked Luolong very softly. Then, Luolong suddenly leaned closer to Han Shuo and invited in a low voice, ¡°Mister Bryan, the Master to whom I answer, Sovereign Ossora would like to meet you. Would you be interested?¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned. He raised an eyebrow and said, ¡°Sovereign Ossora? Like to meet me?¡± Han Shuo paused briefly before he put on a faint smile and replied, ¡°You should know that I¡¯m not interested in working for anyone, not even the Five Sovereigns.¡±

    ¡°You have misunderstood me!¡± Luolong hastily rified, ¡°Sovereign Ossora definitely has no such intention. I will guarantee you that! Actually, His Sovereignty is seeking opportunities for cooperation with Mister Bryan in the Fringe. Sir, Bryan, even if you do not wish to kowtow to any powerhouse; even with your extraordinary strength, it is still necessary to have friends in this tangled andplicated ce called the Fringe.¡±

    Those words of Luolong had managed to invoke Han Shuo¡¯s interest. Although it was true that Han Shuo would not yield and bow to any of the powerhouses, he was more than willing to work with a Sovereign to defeat other Sovereigns.

    After thinking about it, Han Shuo smiled. ¡°Very well then, you may go set up the meeting. I will stay in the Omphalos for a few days. Just notify me after it has been arranged.¡±

    ¡°Alright, I will do just that. I shall not bother Mister Bryan any longer,¡± Luolong seemed very happy after hearing Han Shuo agreed to meet his master. He shouted at his guards, ¡°I want you all to remember their faces. They are guests of Lord Ossora. Make sure that they have a pleasant stay. Kick anyone who tries to give them trouble out of the Omphalos!¡±

    Han Shuo nodded smilingly before he stepped into the Omphalos with Rose and the others.

    With one thought of his consciousness, Han Shuo immediately located Han Hao and Han Tu¡¯s positions. He immediately led his party towards their location.

    Han Shuo grew even more reassured of Han Hao¡¯s safety after hearing about Kage¡¯s death. It wasn¡¯t just because of Han Hao¡¯s strength, but also for his ability to execute a mission to such perfection that even Luolong had not suspected him. This showed that his intelligence had far exceeded an average being on Elysium.

    As Han Shuo was relishing in the amazement, he arrived at a secluded region of the Omphalos.

    As he got closer, he saw the cold looking Han Hao sitting cross-legged upon a boulder. Several teenagers wearing luxurious, expensive clothing were kowtowing before him, solemnly vowing their devotion to Han Hao. They also took outrge amounts of ck crystal coins and respectfully presented them to Han Hao.

    When the crystal coins were presented, Han Tu put on a big smile and stepped forward to receive the crystal coins on behalf of Han Hao. He even patted on their shoulders in a friendly manner and said, ¡°Good, good... From now on, we are all on the same boat... Hehehe... ¡°

    Han Hao raised his head and nced at Han Shuo and his party who were approaching in the distance. He solemnly instructed the teenagers, ¡°Remember this ¨C in addition to me, you must also obey him!¡± and he pointed at Han Shuo.

 Chapter 853 - Han Hao, my son!

    <h4>GDK 853: Han Hao, my son!</h4>

    Han Shuo was rather surprised. He did not know how or why Han Hao had taken in these good-for-nothing teenagers. Han Shuo stared nkly for a bit before he nodded and asked, ¡°Has it been settled?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s settled,¡± replied Han Hao. After taking a short pause, Han Hao instructed those teenagers who had just pledged their undying devotion to him, ¡°Go and get prepared. Remember the signals I taught you. I will bring you guys along when I leave the Omphalos. That¡¯s all. Dismissed!¡±

    The teenagers looked at Han Shuo to remember his face. Some seemed puzzled but no one asked a question. They left submissively as Han Hao had instructed.

    After they left, Han Hao started exining to Han Shuo his ns with the teenagers and gave a simplified recount of Kage¡¯s assassination.

    After hearing everything, Han Shuo smiled as he said, ¡°Very good. Well done. I knew you would handle the task well.¡± Han Shuo was surprised to find that Han Hao had thought of controlling those family ns by nurturing the teenagers. He did not expect Han Hao to develop such sophisticated thinking.

    ¡°Let me introduce you. This is Romon, and this is Zovic. Our new members,¡± Han Shuo said to Han Hao. He then turned to the two, pointed at the grave teenager, and proudly said, ¡±This is Han Hao, my son!¡±

    Romon had rarely ever left his swamp and did not have much contact with the outside world. Zovic, however, had heard of Han Hao¡¯s name. He stared for a moment before asking with a shaky voice, ¡°The godhunter leader from the Death Dominion?¡±

    Much to Han Shuo¡¯s bewilderment, his son was famous. He looked at Zovic and asked, ¡°How did you know that?¡±

    Zovic learned from Han Shuo¡¯s response that his suspicion was indeed true. Astonished, Zovic gasped, ¡°So it¡¯s him! Arge number of ferocious criminals from all Twelve Dominions enter the Fringe every day, so we are more or less aware of things happening all around Elysium. Besides, the Death Dominion isn¡¯t particrly far from the Fringe. We get hold of information around there rtively easily. Han Hao is highly reputable in the Death Dominion. There is hardly a soul, dead or alive, in the Death Dominion that doesn¡¯t know his name!¡±

    Han Hao had on the same indifferent face as though his emotions were not at all affected by Zovic¡¯s words. He seemed to have little interest in Zovic. He took out a ss container and tossed it at Han Jin as he said, ¡°Little Gold, this is for you.¡±

    ¡°Huh?! Kage¡¯s head?!¡± Zovic promptly wrapped his mouth with his hands realizing that he shouldn¡¯t have shouted.

    Just like Kage, Zovic also possessed mid-stage highgod strength. But unlike the former, Zovic did notmand arge group of ferocious gods. It was recently that news about Kage¡¯s death started spreading. Everyone had been guessing who the murderer was. Zovic did not expect to see Kage¡¯s severed head being tossed out by Han Hao.

    ¡°Thank you, big brother!¡± Han Jin caught the ss container. Then, he suddenly eximed as though he found something pleasantly surprising, ¡°Brother, is Kage¡¯s soul still inside?¡±

    Han Hao nodded and exined, ¡°He is still conscious. I have trapped his soul in a corner of his skull. He has no divine energy left so you can torture him as much as you like. Right, after you are done toying with him, just hand his soul to Father.¡±

    ¡°Haha, wonderful!¡± said Han Jin delightedly. He startedughing mischievously at the ss container and injected golden light into it.

    The party was in a rather deste part of the Omphalos and Han Hao had deployed a boundary before he took out Kage¡¯s head. The boundary blocked the senses of all outsiders and could prevent all those outside the boundary from snooping into what was happening within.

    Zovic stared at Han Hao with astonishment for it seemed to him that Han Hao should not possess the strength to kill Kage. But there was Kage¡¯s severed head right before him!

    ¡°Romon, you will help Han Jin and the others stroll around the Omphalos to purchase some materials. Zovic, you know thisnd best. Go and scout around, check for thetest news about the Fringe. Look out for unusual activities,¡±manded Han Shuo.

    ¡°Understood.¡± Zovic, Romon, and the others went straight to work.

    Many of the demonic formations in the Pandemoniumcked their main ingredients. Although Han Jin and Han Mu could obtain some of the ores and wooden materials, the resources exploitable in that area were limited. Therefore, Han Shuo had toe to the Omphalos to purchase the materials he needed.

    As the only trading center found at the heart of the Fringe, all kinds of peculiar items were for sale. Many of the openly traded items would never be found in any of the Twelve Dominions. For example, some extremely potent poisons, vicious divine weapons made from the skulls of gods, magical devices powered by the soul energies of imprisoned divine souls and the like.

    Everything that was illegal in the Twelve Dominions could be openly practiced here. Godhunting, organ trafficking, experimenting with poisons on living gods ¨C no one would give a damn about it.

    All kinds of perverted, wicked, and deranged alchemists and poison makers were found in abundance in the Fringe. These professions usually thrived in the Omphalos. They regrly exchanged the results of their evil research forrge sums of ck crystal coins, allowing them to continue living safely in the Omphalos. They would then have more funds to conduct even more research and to better themselves in their fields.

    To Han Shuo, this had to be the most wonderful marketce in the universe. Many of the special materials needed for his demonic formations and sinister concoctions that only the most wicked alchemist could produce could be purchased only in the Omphalos and nowhere else on Elysium.

    As there were just too many materials needed for his Pandemonium, Han Shuo had his children go on their own ways to purchase the materials. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t worried about their safety. He knew that the Omphalos might just be the safest ce in the world.

    After Rose, Romon, Zovic, and the Five Elite Zombies went on to carry out their businesses, Han Shuo and Han Hao, the father and son, were left to themselves.

    ¡°Father, I don¡¯t think that I should spend too much time with you. I¡¯m a godhunter from the Death Dominion. Although the Fringedwellers don¡¯t care, the rest of the world does. Getting associated with me won¡¯t be good for Father,¡± said Han Hao as he looked at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo knew that this could be an issue. He thought for a moment before he asked, ¡°You can alter your looks, right?¡±

    Han Hao nodded and replied, ¡°Of course. If I want to, I can even turn into another person.¡±

    ¡°Then just be more cautious in the future and change your appearance frequently. That way we won¡¯t be associated. I trust that you know what to do.¡±

    ¡°Got it. I will try to avoid getting Father into unnecessary trouble.¡± Han Hao kept silent for a moment before he continued, ¡°However, the best solution is still to avoid staying with Father as much as possible. I have been counting the days and my troops should arrive at the Fringe soon. They will need their leader. I should stay away from Father for at least a little while. After all, my troops can¡¯t alter their looks.¡±

    Han Shuo knew that it was by letting Han Hao take on the world on his own that he could gain experience and strength. Besides, Han Shuo doubted that an average powerhouse in the Fringe could harm Han Hao. Han Shuo therefore nodded and agreed to it and reminded Han Hao to always watch out for danger.

    The father and son then talked about their futuremunication methods. Han Shuo informed Han Hao of the Pandemonium¡¯s location before they said goodbye. Han Hao then left by himself, perhaps to gather up those new followers of his.

    After Han Hao left, Han Shuo ced most of his time and energy into acquiring all the most exotic materials he needed. Han Shuo would spare no crystal coins to make his Pandemonium the most fortified bastion on Elysium.

    It must be said that the Omphalos was a wonderful ce. Many of the unique materials he needed for his demonic formations could be found here. However, after the incident outside the Omphalos checkpoint, some of those sellers, or rather scammers, dared not to do business with Han Shuo no matter how much he offered for they feared that Han Shuo mighty his deadly, treacherous hands on them.

    In the Land of Chaos, information spread faster than contagion. It hardly took a blink of an eye before all the forces that dwelled in the Fringe recognized Han Shuo. Wherever he went, people whispered to each other while pointing and peeking at him. There were some who would look at him with angry eyes but no one dared make any provocation.

    After going around the Omphalos for a few days, Romon, Zovic, Rose, and the Five Elite Zombies had spent more than five million ck crystal coins and filled up more than ten space rings with the materials that Han Shuo had instructed them to acquire.

    Han Shuo was nearly out of ck crystal coins but luckily, Han Jin had made plenty of them from his Goldstone Enterprise. They may not have gotten by otherwise.

    One day, Han Shuo felt a ping in his consciousness. He suddenly sensed that his demonic bloods were approaching the Omphalos. Han Shuo expanded his consciousness and gradually spread it outwards. Soon, he sensed the presence of Goron and the others.

    <i>Enter the Omphalos and look for me!</i> Han Shuo couldmand his minions from hundreds of miles away via the demonic blood imnted in them.

    The gang headed by Goron entered the Omphalos one after another and assembled around Han Shuo. Within a month, all those Fringedwellers that hosted Han Shuo¡¯s demonic blood had returned to Han Shuo. However, unlike thest time, there weren¡¯t just thirty-something experts ¨C there were now more than two hundred experts gathered around him!

    Some of those thirty-something Fringedwellers who had survived the Penta-elemental Undead Formation were leaders of their own factions. They had brought their followers to the Omphalos as Han Shuo hadmanded.

    The impressive number of Fringedwellers gathered around Han Shuo had to pay a great amount of ck crystal coins each day they spent in the Omphalos. But fortunately, they had deep pockets and the expenditure wasn¡¯t too much for them.

    However, the Omphalos guards had been keeping a close eye on them during their stay lest they cause trouble in the demilitarized zone.

    One day, Luolong came to Han Shuo and asked, ¡°Bryan, are you free to meet Lord Ossora now?¡±

    ¡°Of course, I¡¯ve been waiting for him!¡± replied Han Shuo cheerfully. <i>Finally!</i> he thought.

 Chapter 854 - Show of goodwill

    GDK 854: Show of goodwill

    Of the Five Sovereigns, Ossora was rtively low-profile and friendly. In their countless struggles for control over the Omphalos, Ossora was usually on the defensive. He didn¡¯t fight unless he had to.

    Han Shuo was led to a rtively secluded, peaceful pavilion in the Omphalos. When he met Ossora, it struck Han Shuo how ordinary he looked with his amiable smile on his face all the time. He looked like your typical middle-aged neighbor, not at all fearsome or forceful as the rumors described.

    Although Ossora was an overgod of earth energy, Han Shuo did not sense any particrly intense energy auraing from him. In fact, Han Shuo did not get the impression that this guy was at all a mighty god. The aura he emanated was mild and calm. It felt as magnanimous as the ground he was stepping on instead of overwhelming and piercing.

    If it wasn¡¯t for the fewte-stage highgod experts standing behind him respectfully, Han Shuo might even have overlooked this stranger in the pavilion, for he seemed too ordinary.

    Han Shuo walked up to Ossora alone. With a natural and rxed smile, he said, ¡°Hello, I¡¯m Bryan.¡±

    An expert who couldpletely conceal his aura to the point that even Han Shuo could not notice it must have possessed extraordinary strength. Needless to say, Han Shuo was no ignoramus. He wouldn¡¯t have been disrespectful to Ossora just because he seemed ordinary.

    Ossora turned to look at Han Shuo who was walking in. Heughed lightly and gestured at Han Shuo in a friendly manner, saying, ¡°Come,e! Over here. Haha, no need to be too polite. It¡¯s an honor to meet the famous Bryan atst. Your reputation as a genius pharmacist in the Death, Darkness, and Destruction Dominions precedes you!¡±

    Han Shuo knew that from the moment he informed Luolong of his name, the information would have spread all over the Fringe though thework of stringers. And before long, they would figure out his identity and origins. Therefore, Han Shuo was not surprised that Ossora knew about his identity as a pharmacist. He calmly replied, ¡°You tter me, Lord Ossora. I may be well known in three Dominions, but Your Lordship cannot be more famous in all Twelve Dominions!¡±

    Ossora put on a bitter smile after hearing Han Shuo¡¯spliment. He replied, ¡°More infamous than famous, no?¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a bit before heughed and said, ¡°Aren¡¯t they pretty much the same?¡±

    ¡°They are,¡± Ossora smiled and said, ¡°However, we Fringedwellers will always be discriminated against by those in the Twelve Dominions. They may step into the Fringe and even assimte with the society as long as they have sufficient strength. We Fringedwellers, however, will never be able to blend into their society. It¡¯s such a shame!¡±

    Ossora spoke the truth. Those who could not live in the Twelve Dominions coulde to the Fringe for shelter. However, the Fringedwellers would have to face countless hurdles to live in any city of the Twelve Dominions. Most of the cities would bar Fringedwellers from entering.

    In their eyes, all those who lived in the Fringe were thugs, murderers and godhunters. They did not want any Fringedwellers to step into their cities and disrupt their stability.

    ¡°It¡¯s the same living anywhere. But there wouldn¡¯t be a problem if a character of your level wishes to travel around the Twelve Dominions, would there?¡± asked Han Shuo smilingly.

    Ossora shook his head and lightly sighed as though he was holding onto hidden sorrows. However, he did not exin it to Han Shuo.

    After taking a short pause, Ossora looked at Han Shuo smilingly and asked, ¡°You¡¯ve been doing well in the Darkness Dominion¡¯s City of Shadows. Why would youe to the Fringe?¡±

    ¡°Well, nothing much. I just feel that a ce filled with conflict would be better for cultivation,¡± Han Shuo, naturally, would not tell Ossora his real reason foring to the Fringe, which was to grasp it under his rule.

    Ossora took a few intense looks at Han Shuo as though he knew that Han Shuo did not speak his true purpose. However, Ossora did not ask any more questions about it. He thought for a moment and said, ¡°Well, now, let¡¯s talk business! I¡¯m aware that you could refine some pretty miraculous medicines. There are battles constantly breaking out in the Fringe and there is great demand for your medicines. The Omphalos has its rules. If you wish to set up your pharmacy in the Omphalos and do business here, you will have to ovee a number of hurdles and meet a hefty few requirements. But I can help you skip through all that. All I ask in return is the preemptive right to purchase every batch of medicines that you produce.¡±

    Han Shuo had stayed in the Omphalos for some time and he knew the cost to set up a business in the Omphalos. On top of having to pay arge amount of ck crystal coins as registration fees, they also needed the approval of at least three Sovereigns. And if they were approved, the businesses would be taxed half of its ie. The conditions were so prohibitive that Han Shuo could not imagine the effort it would take to set up a Celestial Pearl branch in the Omphalos.

    However, there was another type of shop in the Omphalos that wasn¡¯t required to pay any registration fees or taxes. This unique type of shop was called a Sovereign¡¯s Shop. As the name implies, they were assets of the Sovereigns themselves. As administrators of the Omphalos, each Sovereign possessed ten Sovereign shops. There may have been thousands upon thousands of big and small shops in the Omphalos but there could only ever be fifty Sovereign Shops.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment after hearing Ossora¡¯s proposal. He asked in an uncertain voice, ¡°You mean...?¡±

    Ossora nodded and answered, ¡°Yes, I will make one of my Sovereign Shops avable for you. You should know the benefits of a Sovereign Shop. Their masters and workers have residential rights and do not need to pay any fees for staying in the Omphalos.¡±

    Han Shuo did not immediately agree. He raised one brow, looked at Ossora, and asked, ¡°The only condition is the preemptive right to purchase the medicines I personally made?¡±

    ¡°Yes, it¡¯s that simple,¡± affirmed Ossora.

    Han Shuo smiled respectfully and replied, ¡°The offer sounds too good to be true. I dare not ept it rashly. Lord Ossora, let¡¯s not mince words. Why would you offer me such a great gift?¡±

    Ossora kept silent for a moment before he suddenly chuckled and said, ¡°To me, it¡¯s much more interesting to be friends with a character like you than to be enemies. You are not the kind of person who would bow to anyone. I¡¯m not as naive as certain people who think it¡¯s possible to make you a servant. And in order not to make an enemy of you, I should express goodwill in advance. This would also make cooperation in the future a possibility. Haha, I have no intentions of malice. It¡¯s alright if you are not willing to take my Sovereign Shop. I won¡¯t force it on you.¡±

    ¡°Why would I not take it?¡± Han Shuo smiled and replied, ¡°To refuse such a gift would be impolite. Thanks for the gift!¡±

    ¡°Luolong, you will be in charge of this matter,¡± instructed Ossora. Then, he turned to Han Shuo and smilingly said, ¡°You are a decentd. But still, be cautious in the Fringe. I hope that I will get a good return on investment on my Sovereign Shop.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded smilingly but said nothing. He knew that Ossora did that so that they wouldn¡¯t be enemies for a while. Given how Han Shuo had been acting, it was only a matter of time before conflicts arose between Han Shuo and the four Sovereigns. Ossora, meanwhile, would be able to avoid the conflicts. He could even use them to gauge Han Shuo¡¯s actual strength. If Han Shuo could diminish the strengths of the other four Sovereigns, that would be great news to Ossora who would remain unharmed.

    Even if it emerged that Han Shuo was actually weak enough to be killed by the other Four Sovereigns, Ossora could simply retake the Sovereign Shop he gifted to Han Shuo. No matter the oue, Ossora would lose nothing. There could not be a better investment for Ossora to make.

    Ossora and Han Shuo chatted for a while. Ossora gave relevant instructions to his followers before he nodded at Han Shuo smilingly and left.

    After Ossora left, Luolong came forward to congratte Han Shuo for receiving a Sovereign Shop tens of thousands of square meters in size. He would take care of the chores of setting up the Celestial Pharmacy branch on Han Shuo¡¯s behalf. The previous tenant of the shop was evicted in one day.

    Every inch of soil in the Omphalos was worth a shit ton of crystal coins. There were just fifty Sovereign Shops in the entire city and Han Shuo was gifted one soon after arriving in the Fringe. Many envied the treatment he received but no one dared cause him trouble.

    Han Shuo had thought about cing the headquarters of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy in the Omphalos beforeing to the Fringe. The most lunatic and top-notch pharmacists were all in the Fringe. In addition, poisons, crystal cores, and ingredients banned in the Twelve Dominions were sold here in abundance. The Fringe was a paradise for Han Shuo who cultivated in the sinister demonic arts.

    Han Shuo had no ns of starting business soon. After securing the shop, Han Shuo continued to instruct his servants and the Five Elite Zombies to purchase the materials needed for reconstructing the Pandemonium. They spent nearly three months and an untold fortune to purchase the materials. Han Jin had also dug out some more materials from the mountains and valleys nearby.

    Finally, the party started returning to the Pandemonium. Han Shuo re-activated the Yin-gathering Formation and the elemental energies started assembling in the valley. Goron and the others were amazed by the intensity of elemental energies.

    After creating rooms for his followers in the Pandemonium and settling them down, Han Shuo and the Five Elite Zombies started building their future home. Earth Elite Zombie hid deep underground. He spent a year excavating an enormous underground pce. Metal Elite Zombie carved out stone chambers in the mountains surrounding the valley. The Five Elite Zombies had also erected numerous sturdy structures in the valley.

    For two years, Han Shuo and the Five Elite Zombies worked on the Pandemonium without rest before they finallypleted the mega-construction. The valley had been turned into a treacherous ce where every step could mean certain death. The Yin-gathering Formation at the center had be surrounded by several dozen big and small demonic formations. Colorful miasmic gas shrouded the valley, limiting visibility.

    During those two years, some Fringedwellers had wandered there or tried to explore the area, but all of them would miraculously disappear without a trace. Over time, nobody dared step into the region.

    With everything in ce, Han Shuo gathered all his men and to give the first of the manymands he would give in his conquest for the Fringe.

 Chapter 855 - Expansion

    GDK 855: Expansion

    The elemental energies in the Pandemonium intensified after the formations wereplete. All those who lived in the valley could sense the benefits the formations brought.

    At the center of the Pandemonium was an enormous Yin-gathering formation and surrounding it was a variety of demonic formations. Those who did not know the intricacies of demonic formations would be greeted with catastrophic attacks as soon as they stepped into one. Even a highgod would easily perish.

    Other than the buildings located near the center, the underground pce dug by Earth Elite Zombie was also one of extreme grandiosity. Most of those who lived in the underground pce were those closest to Han Shuo, for example, the Five Elite Zombies and Rose. Meanwhile, Han Shuo¡¯s demon guards went on to live in those mountain chambers carved by Metal Elite Zombie. Those buildings in the center of the valley were prepared for members of the House of Han in the City of Shadows.

    During those two years, Han Shuo and the Five Elite Zombies had turned the Pandemonium into an impregnable fortress. It was filled with such great dangers that even Luolong and his men dared not wander around the valley.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind entered a state of total calmness when he ced all his attention on constructing the demonic formation. Unwittingly, his demonic yuan reserves had greatly increased. Han Shuo had a vague feeling that he was on the very brink of a breakthrough, as though he was just one step away from the next realm.

    His two avatars had also unexpectedly advanced to the early-stage highgod realm during that time. One one of those days that Han Shuo was totally absorbed in working on the demonic formations, his avatars had a sudden enlightenment and gained a deeper level of insight into the energies of death and destruction. Instantly, the divine energies of death and destruction in his body started transforming.

    In the span of just three days, Han Shuo¡¯s avatars had gone from barelyprehending the nature of the energies deeper to advancing to highgodhood!

    And when the avatars fused their domains of divinity, the extremely intense element of death swarmed towards Han Shuo and started to swirl into a hurricane that would engulf anything and everything in its path.

    Han Shuo was not keen on exploring his novel domain of divinity inside the Pandemonium yet for he did not want to risk damaging the iplete formations. Instead, he continued to direct all his effort at constructing the Pandemonium.

    Then, one day, the mega-construction was finally done! His grand vision of the Pandemonium had been actualized.

    Han Shuo gathered up the Five Elite Zombies, Rose, Romon, Zovic, Goron, and all the demon guards, and started exining the correct method to enter and exit the Pandemonium. He also warned them against wandering around the valley lest they run into the deadly traps.

    The two hundred something demon guards led by Goron hade to recognize the mysteriousness and treacherousness of the Pandemonium. A few of them had identally stepped into a vicious demonic formation and nearly lost their lives there. They did not need Han Shuo¡¯s reminder to always sit tight in their chambers.

    ¡°The Pandemonium has beenpleted. From today onwards, start expanding our territory around the valley. Conquer all the regions and forces, big and small. If they are not willing to submit, kill them.¡± After having been quiet for two years, Han Shuo was ready to raise some hell. He wanted to mow down the many forces located around the Pandemonium.

    The Pandemonium was located in a rather remote part of the Land of Chaos. Those who upied thends around the Pandemonium were scattered forces of the Fringe and none were followers of the Five Sovereigns. To Han Shuo, they were tiny ants that were of no threat to him.

    The several dozen big and small demonic formations in the Pandemonium were arranged in a unique,plicated pattern that allowed them to work together to form the ¡®Demonnihtion Supercluster Formation¡¯. When Han Shuo was inside the Pandemonium, he could significantly amplify his strength using the cluster of demonic formations. Therefore, Han Shuo was confident that even if the Five Sovereigns joined hands in attacking him at the Pandemonium, he could fight them off.

    With such a defensible haven, there was no way that Han Shuo would not start his conquest. His first step was to conquer the scattered forces around the Pandemonium. He could then consider further expanding his territory after those around him had been captured.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Master. I will bring them to their knees!¡± said Romon with a mischievous smirk. He had discovered a spike in the number of scouts lurking nearby the Pandemonium in recent times. Those scattered forces nearby were worried about the unexined changes in Pandemonium. Perhaps even if Han Shuo remained unaggressive, it would only be a matter of time before they came knocking on Han Shuo¡¯s door.

    ¡°Good. Show no mercy to those who do not obey!¡±manded Han Shuo. The Fringe was a ce where the strong were honored. It was only by shedding the blood of their enemies that they could gain the respect of others.

    Following Han Shuo¡¯s instructions, Romon, Zovic and Goron led the army of demon guards, two hundred-strong, away from the Pandemonium and started their conquest.

    Han Shuo, meanwhile, would stay in the Pandemonium. The first phase of the conquest should be easy enough that he wouldn¡¯t need to fight on the frontline himself. He started meditating, cultivating, and preparing for the impending demonic cmity. Han Shuo wished to advance to the next realm as to better face the threat of the Five Sovereigns.

    One day, while Han Shuo was meditating in the underground pce of the Pandemonium, Rose went to him and reported, ¡°Master, I have received news from Luolong that Han Hao has annihted yet another faction. The faction was led by a cultivator of the energy of light who possessedte-stage highgod strength.¡±

    ¡°Fantastic, he has managed to make a breakthrough yet again!¡± Han Shuo was ted by the news. ¡°Two years ago, he was killing mostly mid-stage highgods. But things have now changed. Haha, I bet he¡¯s giving a lot of those Fringedwellers a damn fine headache!¡±

    Han Hao had never visited the Pandemonium once during those two years. Ever since his followers in the Death Dominion hade to the Fringe, Han Hao started striking fear in the hearts of the Fringedwellers. In the short time of just two years, a dozen or more big and small forces had perished at his hands.

    Han Hao¡¯s reputation had also been soaring and he became known as one of the most feared forces in the Fringe. Many of the scattered godhunters in the Fringe submitted to his rule. Both his strength and the power hemanded had been rapidly growing.

    Ever since Han Shuo established good rtions with Luolong¡¯s master, Luolong never neglected to deliver news of major events in the Fringe, giving Han Shuo a good grasp of what had been happening around there.

    ¡°Master, it is said that the force annihted by Han Hao was a close follower of Ss¡¯!¡± Rose wore a grave expression and seemed concerned as she said, ¡°He had never previously attacked any followers of the Five Sovereigns. Why would he be so rash this time? The Five Sovereigns are unlike any other forces. Will he be alright?¡±

    Han Shuo also started to feel worried after hearing those words. Almost no one would challenge the authority of the Five Sovereigns in the Fringe. Han Hao had killed a follower of Sovereign Ss and even left it to be exposed. This could potentially invite the retribution from the Sovereign! No matter how greatly Han Hao¡¯s strength had been improving, he would still be no match against any of the Sovereigns. Therefore, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but feel worried.

    ¡°Where was Han Haost seen?¡± asked Han Shuo solemnly after muttering to himself for a moment.

    ¡°Venomfang Mountain,¡± answered Rose.

    ¡°I¡¯ll be away from the valley for a while. You and my five kids will look after the Pandemonium. And don¡¯t worry about getting attacked. My kids know how to operate the formations. Even if the Five Sovereignse here themselves, they cannot easily break through our defenses,¡± instructed Han Shuo. He then went to the Five Elite Zombies, gave some instructions, and left the Pandemonium alone.

    ***

    ¡°Chief, what should we do? That guy turned out to be a follower of Ss¡¯. Ss will surely seek retribution by annihting us!¡± Arthurs, an early-stage highgod of destruction, said gravely to the indifferent Han Hao who sat cross-legged on a boulder.

    There were nearly five hundred godhunters gathered before Han Hao. The gang of ferocious gods had obliterated countless forces in the Fringe. All of them wore respectful attitudes as they looked upon Han Hao for guidance. Among them were those teenagers who had each paid five hundred thousand ck crystal coins to Han Hao in the Omphalos.

    ¡°It¡¯s no bother. We just need to stay hidden for a while,¡± replied Han Hao. It was no stretch to assume that even if a person stuck a knife in his chest, Han Hao wouldn¡¯t make the slightest reaction. His followers found that demeanor of his admirable.

    ¡°But, Chief, we are talking about Ss!¡± Arthurs stressed, ¡°Ss is extremely influential in the Fringe andmands an extensivework of scouts. Our numbers are great. It doesn¡¯t seem feasible to hide all of us.¡±

    ¡°Everyone will scatter around the Fringe. Do not gather without my orders. If Ss were to strike, he woulde after me. He won¡¯t take the time to hunt you down one by one if you are dispersed. And remember this, do not ever step into the Omphalos,¡±manded Han Hao after thinking for a moment.

    ¡°Why? Isn¡¯t Omphalos the safest ce?¡± asked Arthurs after staring nkly for a bit.

    ¡°It¡¯s tantamount to throwing your life away. If any of Ss¡¯ followers discover you in the Omphalos, they can make up an excuse to throw you out. By then, you will be dead without a doubt,¡± exined Han Hao before he calmly instructed, ¡°Disperse using the method I have taught. Do not attack anyone without mymand. Now go.¡±

    As Han Haomanded, the godhunters divided themselves into many small squads and rapidly left in all directions.

    After all of his followers disappeared, Han Hao stood up. He looked in the direction of the Pandemonium for a while as though considering something before departing in the opposite direction.

    Three dayster, a terrifying bolt of lightning struck through the sky out of nowhere. Sovereign Ss abruptly materialized on the exact boulder that Han Hao previously sat on. Electrical sparks shone from his eyes as he observed his surroundings. A momentter, he bolted off once more in the direction Han Hao left three days ago.

 Chapter 856 - Piss off

    GDK 856: Piss off

    At the Northwest ocean of Venomfang Mountain, Han Hao was lying quietly on the seabed.

    During the past two years, Han Hao, with his group of godhunters, had been very active all around the Fringe. After consuming the divine energies of several highgods, he finally advanced to the mid-stage highgod realm in his cultivation of the energy of death. Simultaneously, he had also made great progress in his cultivation of demonic arts.

    As Han Hao was not a regr human being, it was hard to determine the exact demonic arts realm he was in. Just like Dark Dragon Gilbert, the divine energy in his body had demonic properties. But unlike Gilbert, he had a greater and moreplete understanding of demonic arts. With his great intelligence, Han Hao was able to pave his own unique cultivation pathway.

    A few days prior, by fighting that follower of Ss¡¯, Han Hao gained a rough idea of his true strength. He knew that even if pitted against ate-stage highgod, he was certain toe out victorious using his energy of death and demonic energy.

    Han Hao did not gather the element of death to cultivate. Instead, he set his mindpletely empty and sank into a state of ultimate tranquility.

    Inside his body, the mixture of death divine energy and demonic yuan energy was slowly circting. Han Hao noticed that when he had fully rxed, counterintuitively, his cultivation would speed up.

    After lying under the ocean for five days, Han Hao had lost track of the passing of time. His mind was drifting in his own thoughts...

    The fish, shrimp, and other odd creatures that lived under the sea swam past him as though he wasn¡¯t there; as though he had fused and be one with the seabed.

    Then, one day, Han Hao¡¯s soul was startled and he was roused from the deep meditation. He looked all around with his glowing eyes. He furrowed his brows, opened up his soul, and started carefully sensing the changes in the environment.

    For some reason, every living thing under the sea was trying to leave the region. They became extremely frightened and seemed to be trying to run away from something.

    A bizarre energy fluctuation came from the surface of the ocean and prated deep down. They were like thousands upon thousands of invisible tentacles spread across vast regions, feeling, searching for something. The low-level lifeforms in the sea did not know what it was but they instinctively felt threatened and tried to leave the region. Han Hao¡¯s soul, of which sensitivity had been enhanced by his cultivations of demonic arts, sensed the minute amount of the element of lightning in the formless and shapeless undtion.

    Han Hao took no time toe to his senses. Several demon generals flew out from the seven bone spurs on his back and slowly spread in every direction. He then grabbed his bone spear, concealed all his aura, and started shooting across the seafloor.

    Above the ocean, Ss, who was standing high and proud, suddenly smirked and said to himself, ¡°There you are!¡±

    But when Ss was about to strike, he suddenly discovered that his divine soul was losing track of his enemy. Even the strands of soul energy he injected into the ocean were rapidly losing their grip.

    Ss let out a cold groan. His majestic figure suddenly shot to the bottom of the ocean and he started pursuing his target which his senses were rapidly losing track of.

    Being deep under the sea had no effect on Ss¡¯ flight speed at all. He streaked across the seafloor like a rocket.

    The feeling of danger followed Han Hao relentlessly. Han Hao, being aware of the pursuer¡¯s identity, activated the unique divine energy in his body and ran with all his strength.

    Under the sea, one was fleeing for his life, the other was pursuing vigorously...

    Half a dayter, Han Hao flew out from the ocean and came to a mountain range lined with lush forestry. He did not continue to escape but stood under an enormous tree with the bone spear in his hand. It was as though he was waiting for something.

    A few minutester, frightening thunderbolts appeared out of thin air before they gradually transformed into Ss¡¯ massive figure. His cold bright eyes stared down at the motionless Han Hao as he shouted, ¡°Youth breeds heroism, indeed. But it also breeds imprudence! Turns out that the person who killed Ansike is you! Han Hao, you have grown more and more unbridled in the Fringe over the past two years. How dare you touch my man!¡±

    Han Hao did not reply. His head was slightly dropped while his hand was tightly clutching his bone spear.

    ¡°Han Hao, I¡¯ll give you a choice. As long as you are willing to serve me, I will spare you from death!¡± shouted Ss coldly. Han Hao had made plenty of news in the Fringe. Some of them made their way to Ss¡¯ ears. Han Hao had proved himself to be a formidable expert by murdering Ansike who possessedte-stage highgod strength. Han Hao was exactly the kind of talent Ss had been looking for, and therefore he made Han Hao the offer.

    Wearing an emotionless face, Han Hao raised his head and looked at Ss. He said in just as emotionless a voice, ¡°Piss off, bitch.¡±

    Other than Han Shuo, the person who created him, Han Hao was not going to serve anyone. Even in the Godhunter Alliance, Han Hao would do as he wished and would not ept the binding of any other being!

    ¡°What a shame,¡± Ss let out a soft sigh. Enormous spherical lightning abruptly struck above Han Hao.

    The dazzling, spherical lightning was the size of a hill. Fments and sparks could be seen meandering on its surface. As it descended towards Han Hao, thousands upon thousands of thunderbolts spread out from the ball, forming a giant made of electricity. Han Hao had beenpletely enveloped.

    Although Ss did not possess the Quintessence, he was nheless an overgod. It took him a gesture of his finger to gather all the elements of lightning in the several hundred mile radius into his ball lightning. The made of electricity carried an astonishing amount of joules. All the creatures living nearby were charred by its energy.

    The electrical was dense and expansive and hadpletely trapped Han Hao. Even thews of spacetime were distorted by Ss¡¯ mighty electrical power. A space scroll would be useless. As soon as the enormous connected to the ground, the gigantic ball of lightning started crashing down on Han Hao ferociously. It seemed as though this would be his end.

    The terrifying ball of thunder touched down and a world-shaking explosion was heard. All the trees, rocks, and even sand were reduced to dust. A mountain was ttened by the overwhelming power.

    Ss had made just one attack. After throwing his lightning ball, he just stood there, did absolutely nothing, and waited for Han Hao to die. However, after everything died down and the dust settled, his face jolted and he started looking all around with his eyes that were sparking with electricity. He discovered that Han Hao had disappeared without leaving the slightest trace.

    It should have been impossible for a highgod to escape his attack, not even one who cultivated in the edict of space. Ss thought that Han Hao would be dead without a doubt. He was shocked to discover that Han Hao had inexplicably vanished into thin air.

    Ss¡¯ face turned dark. His divine soul gathered the element of lightning and started extending outwards, attempting to locate Han Hao. However, for some reason, Ss could no longer sense Han Hao¡¯s soul. Ss was puzzled as to his knowledge, this would only be possible if Han Hao was extremely far from him or he was under the protection of a very powerful barrier.

    But unbeknownst to Ss, Han Hao was not under a barrier and he was just a thousand miles from him. The reason that Ss could not sense his position was that Han Hao had mastered the method of transforming his soul.

    Han Hao realized that Ss must have somehow learned his soul signature ever since he noticed that Ss could always manage to find him. After thinking for a moment, Han Hao became certain that Ss must have left something in Ansike¡¯s divine soul which allowed Ss to sense his soul signature after he killed Ansike.

    The only feasible way for Han Hao to escape from Ss¡¯ pursuit was to alter his soul signature. His soul had to fundamentally transform or Ss would always find him wherever he hid.

    This was an impossible task for the gods in this universe. The signature of one¡¯s divine soul was invariable unless they made a breakthrough in their cultivation which would alter the signature slightly. To them, it was impossible to actively change their soul signature using any method or energy. Ss was aware of this fact and therefore he had left a unique trace in Ansike that would allow him to sense the soul signature of Ansike¡¯s murderer.

    It may have been an impossible task for most people, but Han Hao was a unique lifeform and a cultivator of the demonic arts. There was a special technique in demonic arts specifically for altering one¡¯s soul. Han Hao had started learning and understanding its theory and rapidly practiced it while being pursued by Ss.

    Then, finally, when Ss¡¯ lightning ball came crashing down, Han Hao sessfully learned the technique and his soul signature transformed! But Han Hao knew that even though he had sessfully altered his soul signature, he was still no match against Ss. Therefore, he had decisively activated Demonic Blood Disassembly and escaped.

    Inside a cave that was a thousand miles away, Han Hao was sitting motionlessly. His body was drenched with blood.

    After changing his soul signature, Han Hao no longer felt as though he was being stalked by invisible eyes. However, his body was severely injured after having activated Demonic Blood Disassembly. Other than his jade-white skeleton that waspletely intact, his skin, flesh, and meridians had all shattered. He had also exhausted most of his divine energy.

    Han Hao at this moment was wearing a calm face as though he waspletely numb to any amount of pain. He was slowly redirecting the divine energy in his body to circte and repair his shattered flesh. This body of his that had been produced using a unique method possessed healing power just as miraculous as Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body. By now, blood had stopped leaking from his wounds. His veins and meridians were also reconnected under the effect of his divine energy...

    The recovery process took Han Hao half a month, which was much longer than what Han Shuo would have needed. After he regained the ability to move, he took out several medicinal pills Han Shuo had specially refined for him, swallowed them, and spent a period of time to recuperate. He then left the cave and started hunting for other gods ravenously, consuming their divine energy to replenish the energy used on activating Demonic Blood Disassembly.

    While Han Hao was regaining his strength by hunting others, Han Shuo, who had failed to locate the former, came to Empyrean Peak alone.

    He halted at the foot of the mountain, raised his head, and gazed at the looming summit with a staunch face.

 Chapter 857 - Barging in

    GDK 857: Barging in

    Han Shuo traveled to Venomfang Mountain and searched around but he too could not locate Han Hao. His senses picked up nothing and he discovered no trails of him. From the information Rose had ryed to him, if anything were to happen to Han Hao, it was safe to assume that was Sovereign Ss the person responsible! Han Shuo therefore made his way to Empyrean Peak.

    Many of Ss¡¯ direct disciples were on the mountain. The Empyrean Peak was akin to a broadsword that had pierced through the blue dome of heaven. It was protected by all sorts of defensive boundaries. It was impossible to sneak into the Peak noiselessly, even for Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo, while gazing at the Empyrean Peak with his head raised high, gradually expanded his consciousness. Divine souls were registered by his consciousness one after another.

    After a while, Han Shuo let out a gentle cry of surprise. Based on the surveince of his consciousness, he sensed more than a thousand divine souls on the Empyrean Peak. There were tens of highgod Fringedwellers, among which were seventeente-stage highgod experts.

    Even though Ss wasn¡¯t on the Empyrean Peak, the forces gathered on the mountain top could not be defeated by an average power. Han Shuo threaded carefully after sensing from the mountain¡¯s foot. He continued to try to locate Ss.

    Momentster, Han Shuo¡¯s brows bunched deeper. He could not sense Ss¡¯ presence on the Empyrean Peak at all. As long as Ss, an expert who had exceeded highgod strength, was on the Mountain, Han Shuo would have been able to at least sense something.

    Han Shuo had in fact employed the Soul-searching Technique. It was so powerful that even Sovereign Ossora, who was excellent at concealing his aura, could not hide from Han Shuo¡¯s senses if he used the Technique. However, at this moment, Han Shuo sensed not a trace of Ss¡¯ aura.

    <i><i>Could it be that Ss just so happened to be away?</i></i> Han Shuo weighed in his mind if he should go visit the mountain top.

    Although Han Shuo had killed plenty since he stepped into the Fringe, he had avoided offending any of the Sovereigns. Han Shuo had been trying to avoid conflict with them for as long as possible because he did not have the certainty of defeating any of them.

    If Han Shuo were to intrude the Empyrean Peak that day, it would be tantamount to dering war against Ss. Ss would wage war upon him and try to annihte him and his followers. Han Shuo had to consider his next action prudently.

    After hesitating and debating with himself for ages, Han Shuo finally made up his mind.

    ¡°Who is it?¡± Han Shuo heard a cry as soon as he stepped into the Mountain. A squadron of Empyrean Peak guards came out from their posts vigntly. They pointed their weapons at Han Shuo.

    ¡°I want to see Ss. Go pass the message,¡±manded Han Shuo calmly after he nced at those guards.

    ¡°How dare you address His Lordship so disrespectfully!¡± The Empyrean Peak guards that were used to being contemptuousmanded without thinking, ¡°Capture him!¡±

    The squadron of ten midgods attacked Han Shuo together. But unfortunately for them, they were nowhere close to being able to harm Han Shuo with what little power they had. They stood absolutely no chance against him.

    Han Shuo could not imagine just how much worse the others would be if even these tiny, weak followers of Ss¡¯ were so arrogant and condescending. He started to understand why Han Hao would kill that follower of Ss¡¯.

    Knowing that he had stepped past the point of no return, Han Shuo showed them no mercy. Before the guards even got near him, they were trapped by an enormous bone flower. The Cauldron of Myriad Demon left Han Shuo¡¯s body and gave off a dazzling light. The divine souls of those ten guards flew into the Cauldron just like that.

    The power of Cauldron Spirit grew as the number of demon generals in the Cauldron increased. By that point, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon could suck away the divine soul of a midgod straight out of his divine body with a sh. Han Shuo did not even have to raise a finger.

    Ten wisps of greyish smoke floated into the Cauldron. The little Cauldron made a circle around Han Shuo and hovered over his shoulder instead of returning into his body. It climbed up the Empyrean Peak with Han Shuo.

    Brilliant blue lights simultaneously erupted from the pointy top of three energy towers and formed an azure barrier in Han Shuo¡¯s path. But before Han Shuo had reached the barrier, arge swarm of shadows whooshed out from the Cauldron and tore holes in the barrier.

    The Cauldron of Myriad went behind the barrier and suddenly grew to the size of a person. It whacked somewhere between the three energy towers and they instantly shattered with a rumble. Clouds of dust and debris were sent flying.

    ¡°Who dares seek trouble at the Empyrean Peak?!¡± a loud, angry roar was heard from the waist of the mountain as several silhouettes rapidly descended. However, Han Shuo and his Cauldronpletely ignored them and continued their journey upwards.

    None of the barriers and energy towers Han Shuo met on his way up could withstand the power of Cauldron Spirit. The Cauldron took care of all the obstacles for Han Shuo, paving the way for him and giving him an unimpeded path to the top.

    It was only now that Han Shuo truly realized just how much the Cauldron¡¯s strength had increased after devouring hundreds upon thousands of divine souls. The Cauldron of Myriad Demon was the ultimate weapon in demonic arts. Not only did it know all sorts of demonic formations, but it also clearly understood the barriers and shields of this universe. It seemed as though destroying the barriers was a piece of cake for the Cauldron.

    At first, Han Shuo was rather worried that the barriers and energy towers all over Empyrean Peak might greatly interfere with his ascent up the mountain. However, after seeing the Cauldron¡¯s performance, not only were Han Shuo¡¯s worries alleviated, he felt the desire to shed blood.

    It was only a matter of time before he would sh with the Five Sovereigns. Besides, as Han Hao had killed one of Ss¡¯ followers, given Ss¡¯ vindictive temperament, Han Hao and Ss were destined to be enemies, hence, so was Han Shuo. With things having developed until this stage, the key to future victory was to obliterate the forces Ssmanded to the greatest extent possible. He knew that once he made the first move, he could not stop and had to deal as much damage as possible.

    One after another, the barriers and energy towers were destroyed by the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. Han Shuo was soon a quarter way up the mountain.

    By now, those experts of Ss¡¯ing from the waist of the mountain had reached Han Shuo. Some of them were highgods at the early and middle stages. They were filled with rage and it was obvious that they wished to shred Han Shuo into pieces.

    Although the Five Sovereigns would constantly battle each other, never before had any of them personally barged in to their rivals¡¯ base. The Five Sovereigns would only have their followers battle each other. It was extremely rare that any of the Sovereigns would attack the followers of another Sovereign.

    So, although the Five Sovereigns were constantly in conflict, the Empyrean Peak had never been attacked. An average Fringedweller would avoid a ce like Empyrean Peak, much less try to intrude the Mountain and throw away their lives.

    After all, the Empyrean Peak was the home of Sovereign Ss. Other than the other four Sovereigns, who would dare trespass upon his property?

    An extreme feeling of rage spontaneously swarmed the minds of those followers of Ss when they noticed the enormous disturbancesing from the mountain foot. When they saw the energy towers and barriers shattered, they felt as though someone had pissed on their heads.

    As they flew down the mountain, they felt a little worried as they saw that there was just one attacker. But when they got closer and saw that the reckless intruder wasn¡¯t any of the other four Sovereigns, they immediately forgot their worries and boldly attacked Han Shuo.

    ¡°Good! Just in time!¡± eximed Han Shuo in a malevolent smile. With one thought of his consciousness, the seventeen flying swords darted out from his body. Those charging at the front towards Han Shuo were immediately prated by the seventeen flying swords and turned into bloody liquid in a split second.

    At the same time, Han Shuo spread his fingers and the Demonic des erupted. Han Shuo flew into the wave of defenders and started dancing with those des whileughing loudly. The Demonic des cut through the divine bodies of his enemies without the slightest resistance. Severed limbs, flesh, organs, and blood were sent flying.

    The Han Shuo had now reached the pinnacle of the Omen Realm. With the power of Cauldron Spirit aiding him, no highgod could stop him. Han Shuo suddenly had an enlightenment ¨C given his current circumstances, the only way to make a breakthrough was to fight an expert of equal or greater strength to the death!

    And Ss was the opponent that Han Shuo needed!

    Han Shuo made up his mind. There was no longer the slightest shred of fear or hesitation. In fact, Han Shuo started to desperately hope that Ss would appear and fight him. Even if he could not defeat Ss, as long as he could escape from the Empyrean Peak, Han Shuo stood a great chance of making a breakthrough. And if Han Shuo could step into the next realm in his cultivation of demonic arts, he would have the power to rewrite the rules of the Fringe!

    Han Shuo was determined to take this risky gamble!

    ¡°Ss! Where are you?! Show yourself right now, coward!¡± shouted Han Shuo as he grew madder and madder. The chilling Demonic des mercilessly shredded divine bodies as he ascended the Mountain.

    Under the insanely powerful defensive power of Omen Invincible Body, the attacks that came from every direction had no effect on Han Shuo whatsoever. Those incredibly sharp divine weapons would bounce off Han Shuo¡¯s body and left him without a single wound.

    Han Shuo charged around violently as heughed like a maniac. He ughtered every living being who stood in his path.

    Grayish wisps of smoke continuously flew into the Cauldron. It gained an additional of several dozen divine souls in just moments. The man and cauldron fought alongside each other with great rapport. They were ascending the mountain with unstoppable force.

    There was a constant stream of ferocious experts who came forward and stood in Han Shuo¡¯s path. However, no amount of them could stop Han Shuo from advancing. They all perished to Han Shuo¡¯s attacks. The Cauldron of Myriad Demon hovered all around. Although it seemed harmless, it had been most useful to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Watch out, Master! That barrier is very powerful!¡± transmitted Cauldron Spirit suddenly.

    Han Shuo concentrated his attention on thest barrier to the top of the Mountain. He discovered that the enormous sphere that surrounded the Peak was filled with terrifying lightning energy. Those leaping electrical sparks seemed as though they were alive.

    Undoubtedly, thisst barrier on the Empyrean Peak was personally deployed by Ss himself!

 Chapter 858 - Emanations of the Soul

    GDK 858: Emanations of the Soul

    Those followers of Ss¡¯ on the peak of the mountain looked at Han Shuo with cold gazes. They were around three hundred strong and many of them werete-stage highgods. They were the most elite troops Ssmanded!

    However, instead of exiting the barrier and attacking Han Shuo, these experts sat calmly where they were and watched Han Shuo coldly.

    These experts did not recklessly attack Han Shuo because they had seen the mad power Han Shuo demonstrated as he ascended the Mountain. They were greatly intimidated after seeing Han Shuo butcher mid-stage highgod experts in just moments and that barrages of divine energiesnding on his body had caused him no harm.

    It was clear to them that Han Shuo¡¯s strength had exceeded the realm of highgod. No one was about to chance with his own life when it came to facing an expert of great, unfathomable strength, not even these powerful and influential characters!

    They thought themselves fortunate that Ss had deployed a powerful lighting energy barrier around the Empyrean Peak. They watched Han Shuo attentively and quietly to see if Han Shuo was strong enough to break this lighting energy barrier personally deployed by Ss!

    Han Shuo stood coldly and motionlessly as he expanded his consciousness and carefully sensed the fierce energy contained on the barrier. He could even sense elements of lightning actively leaping about the dazzling electrical barrier.

    The dense elements of lightning were moving around the massive barrier in a trajectory that Han Shuo could notprehend. The elements seemed as though they were alive as they happily fluttered about, not allowing a single molecule to move across the barrier.

    ¡°Master, this lightning barrier is extremely harmful to demon generals. I cannot tear this barrier apart,¡± transmitted Cauldron Spirit.

    Although demon generals were invulnerable to physical attacks and immune to most divine energies, the energy of lightning, however, was very destructive to demon generals. This barrier of lightning energy was simply the Achilles¡¯ Heel of demon generals. Cauldron Spirit was, therefore, unable to destroy the barrier using its demon generals like before.

    Han Shuo thought for a moment and withdrew the Cauldron of Myriad Demon back into his body. Then, he deployed the domains of divinity of his avatars of death and destruction. The two highgod domains of divinity gradually started fusing as the three souls started to link up.

    A destructive energy started emanating and expanding from Han Shuo. The elements of death within the several hundred mile radius suddenly began to converge towards Han Shuo. The energy towers and rocks on Empyrean Peak were carried into the air.

    The massive amount of the element of death was circting in an orbit conforming to the edict of destruction. The destruction divine energy in Han Shuo¡¯s avatar condensed into Orbs of Destruction. No sooner than they appeared inside the hybrid domain of divinity were they sucking in elements of death like blue whales engulfing krill patches.

    As logic would have it, the energy of destruction and the energy of death should not have been able to fuse together, and the Orbs of Destruction should not have been able to absorb the element of death. However, inside Han Shuo¡¯s hybrid domain of divinity, those rapidly revolving Orbs moving in the trajectory of destruction edict were doing just that.

    After filling themselves with the elements of death, the Orbs of Destruction expanded in volume and grew to the size of a human head. The Orbs gave off a faint emerald-green glow as greyish liquid circted within.

    Han Shuo realized that that greyish fluid flowing inside the Orbs of Destruction was, in fact, the element of death condensed to several thousand times its natural concentration! The Orbs of Destruction revolved around him and elerated. They seemed to be gradually hypnotizing Han Shuo as he let his mind get carried away.

    Then, a strange sensation leapt into Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. He suddenly felt as though thousands of avatars had manifested in those Orbs of Destruction, as though he and the Orbs were one...

    The strange but wonderful sensationsted for just a moment before Han Shuo came to his senses. He suddenly discovered that the Orbs of Destruction orbiting around him were just like extensions of his body and soul. The Orbs seemed to carry a piece of his soul energy, or perhaps a drop of his blood essence...

    More surprisingly, he sensed something simr to self-awareness from those Orbs. He could instruct the Orbs using simple, dailynguage with his mind and they would carry out his orders like sentient beings. It felt very peculiar and unreal.

    While the Orbs continued to revolve in Han Shuo¡¯s hybrid domain of divinity, he turned his attention back to the barrier of lightning energy ahead of him and thought about how to get rid of the barrier. Those bizarre Orbs of Destruction seemed to have read Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts. They started talking to each other like thousands of little Han Shuos having a discussion in squeaky voices. Then, all the Orbs swarmed towards Ss¡¯ lightning energy barrier.

    ¡°Enemy spotted.¡±

    ¡°Ouch! That¡¯s some powerful lightning!¡±

    ¡°We need backup! We need backup!¡±

    ¡°Fuck those lightning bolts! Kill them!¡±

    ....

    Thousands of strange thoughts swarmed into Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness in an instant. They came from the souls on the Orbs, narrating their glorious battle against Ss¡¯ energy of lightning...

    ¡°Dead, they are all dead!¡±

    ¡°We win!¡±

    The souls on the Orbs transmitted millions of messages in less than a second. The battle between the awarenesses of different energies took just one second. And when Han Shuo heard the message ¡°victory is ours¡± through his consciousness, his ears heard a deafening explosion.

    Han Shuo was abruptly roused. The jumbled awarenesses suddenly vanished as though all that happened earlier was just part of his imagination.

    Han Shuo calmed his mind and gathered his attention. He saw that the lightning energy barrier that enveloped the entire Empyrean Peak had vanished without a trace. Tiny thunderbolts were shooting away and scattering. When Han Shuo carefully sensed them, he discovered that those dispersing lightning bolts no longer contained that strange self-awareness, as though they had been ¡®killed¡¯ moments earlier.

    Threads of greyish and greenish lights fell from the Mountain following the energy of lightning. Those threads of light seemed to contain the fusion of destruction and death energy. Han Shuo put on a bewildered face as he sensed something from those fading lights.

    ¡°Congrattions on another advancement, Master! That state of energy you formed is called ¡®Emanations of the Soul¡¯ in the universe wee from. In this universe it is called ¡®Souls arising from Elements¡¯. The names may be different, but they are basically the same thing. This will advance your cultivation of demonic arts as well as your avatars¡¯ cultivation of Fundamental Forces! But you must now be wary. Comprehending the ¡®Emanations of the Soul¡¯ means that the Cmity is near. It could descend at any moment now!¡° transmitted Cauldron Spirit to a puzzled Han Shuo.

    Emanations of the Soul and Souls arising from Elements were one of the most profound methods of energy maniption. It bestowed the attacking energies with self-awareness. Those Orbs of Destruction made of destruction divine energy and the element of death were given lives by Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. Even Han Shuo wasn¡¯t sure if that was considered ¡®Emanations of the Soul¡¯ and ¡®Souls arising from Elements¡¯.

    However, the firepower achieved was terrorizing. Even the barrier personally deployed by Ss, an overgod, was destroyed in one blow!

    ¡°Who, who are you?¡± Those followers of Ss¡¯ on the mountain peak were greatly intimidated.

    They knew better than anyone what level of expert Ss was. One who could destroy the barrier deployed by Ss must possess roughly identical strength as him. It would be a wonder if they weren¡¯t afraid of such a mighty existence!

    ¡°Lord... Lord Ss is not around... Can I take your message... ?¡± asked another terrified highgod as he watched Han Shuo march up the Empyrean Peak step by step. Although he was a powerful and influential figure in the Fringe, he was still afraid of Han Shuo who had wrecked Ss¡¯ barrier.

    Han Shuo knew the fact that Ss hadn¡¯t showed up yet meant that he wasn¡¯t on Empyrean Peak.

    ¡°Ss personally deployed that barrier. He will know it when the barrier is destroyed, and he will rush back here as quickly as possible!¡± said Han Shuo smilingly before he gazed at those elite troops with cold eyes and threatened, ¡°But I wonder if you lot will live to see him!¡±

    ¡°Brothers, let¡¯s get him!¡± one of Ss¡¯ followers shouted. The three hundred something experts on the Empyrean Peak immediately surrounded Han Shuo.

    Some other guards at the foot and waist of the Mountain sensed the enormous disturbance at the Peak and rushed to Han Shuo. The mountain was enormous and had a huge circumference. Han Shuo had made his way up the Mountain though one of the many paths and therefore a lot of the guards did not even notice Han Shuo. All five or six hundred of them swarmed to the Peak. It was a glorious sight.

    *** Over at the cial Peak, home to Sovereign Wasir who cultivated the elemental energy of water. The wintry cial Peak wasyered thick with ice throughout the year. Above an icicle-shaped building on the Peak, Ss and Wasir were conversing.

    Although the Five Sovereigns were in constant battle against each other, they would frequently meet in private to talk about the general situation of the Fringe. Ss hade to Wasir to resolve the dispute over a new ore deposit.

    In the middle of their discussion, Ss¡¯ divine soul trembled and he suddenly turned furious. Without saying a word, he took out a shuttle-shaped space edict divine device, tore a fissure in spacetime, and left Wasir confused and puzzled.

 Chapter 859 - Blood bathing the Empyrean Peak

    GDK 859: Blood bathing the Empyrean Peak

    Back on the Empyrean Peak, Han Shuo wasmitting a massacre against the followers of Ss¡¯. Han Shuo had simultaneously deployed the Pearls of Annihtion, Cyano Demonze, Toxic Dragon Net, Green Hypergolic Dust, Banner of Hallucination, and other deadly demonic weapons. The thousands of screaming and wailing demon generals whooshed around the mountain peak and targeted the midgod experts. Chilling winds started blowing heavily on the Empyrean Peak as dark clouds formed.

    The seventeen flying swords were also put to use against those true experts. Inside the hybrid domain of divinity, the Orbs of Destruction saturated with the elements of death were brought to life by Han Shuo. They traveled to areas where experts were most densely gathered before detonating, sting those followers of Ss off the Empyrean Peak.

    When Han Shuo started attacking with all his strength and putting all his demonic weapons to use, he finally realized just how deadly he truly was. The Pearls of Annihtion and other sinister demonic weapons that Han Shuo made were incredibly effective againstrge groups of experts.

    It was only moments ago that Han Shuo had mastered ¡®Souls arising from Elements¡¯ but he had been putting the newfound skill to use. The terrifying explosions of the Orbs of Destruction sounded all around Han Shuo like a catchy beat. Limbs, organs, and heads from bodies that had been mutted, shredded and charred were scattered all over the Mountain.

    The Empyrean Peak was turned into a scene of carnage with more than two hundred gods butchered in no time. The killing intent, undying resentment, and negative energies of those perished souls were collected by the seventeen flying swords. The killing intent aura emanating from the flying swords grew so intense that their targets¡¯ minds would freeze in fear before the flying swords had even reached them. They would forget to put up defenses and be directly prated by the flying swords, losing their lives instantly.

    Inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, Cauldron Spirit was cheering excitedly as it collected divine souls. It was incredibly ted to have gained more than two hundred divine souls in just moments. Cauldron Spirit also did his best at controlling the demon generals and attacked the followers of Ss¡¯ in swarms.

    Although the followers eventually found a viable method to defend against demon generals, it was still no use against hundreds of demon generals attacking at the same time. Even the gods who cultivated in the energy of fire and lightning were devoured by the demon generals in an instant.

    The Empyrean Peak had simply be an extermination camp. Miserable shrieks and wails yed on loudly like a soundtrack. Ss had seventeen direct disciples, all of whom possessedte-stage highgod strength and yet, these highgods were powerless against the multitude of attacksing from Han Shuo. They could not even join hands against Han Shuo for he was as elusive as the wind.

    Han Shuo wasughing maniacally as he ughtered away. His eyes gradually turned dark red, reflecting his mind that was growing wild and uncontrolled. A thickyer of killing intent and a sinister aura slowly umted around Han Shuo and lingered around him like a mist. All the negative energies formed by his victims the moment they were killed had somehow congealed around him!

    By now, there were no longer any thoughts left in Han Shuo¡¯s mind other than to kill. He would kill any and every living thing that appeared before him indiscriminately. He had fallen into a demonic trance!

    Although Han Shuo should have full control over his mind after advancing to Omen Realm, he had somehow lost control of his consciousness soon after he began the killing spree. It happened very naturally and subconsciously.

    Although the Han Shuo at this moment had lost all his self-restraint and gone berserk, he still knew when and how to deploy every demonic technique. Han Shuo had turned into a killing machine programmed with one goal ¨C to terminate all things living!

    Han Shuo only grew wilder as time went by. His eyes shone with the dark red light that yearned for destruction. He no longer tried to avoid attacks but allowed them tond on his body. The Omen of Invincible Body automatically defended against the attacks, preventing his demonic body from receiving any harm.

    Han Shuo at this moment was undoubtedly menacing. He showed not the slightest hint of pity or hesitation. From his malevolent appearance, it seemed as though he would not stop until every living thing had been ughtered.

    One after another, he savagely shredded the godly experts with his hands before annihting their divine souls by shooting a faint glow from his hands. Although the barrages of attacks had not left a scratch on Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body, his clothes, however, had been almostpletely vaporized. Almost every inch of his body wasid bare with his magnificent muscles on full disy. Those thick green veins wriggling under his skin were also clearly visible.

    Han Shuo was like a demon god-sent to carry out Armageddon. Every strike that he made had been unstoppable and no one had managed to survive a blow from him. Threete-stage highgods cultivating in the energy of earth joined forces to defend themselves against Han Shuo. Cultivators of the energy of earth were known to have the greatest defensive power. And yet, the threete-stage highgods of earth were flipped into pancakes with one punch from Han Shuo.

    On the Empyrean Peak, at least for now, Han Shuo was invincible!

    ¡°Why isn¡¯t Lord Ss here yet? We can¡¯t hold off this lunatic!¡± shouted one of Ss¡¯ followers as he retreated in fear.

    ¡°Perhaps we should evacuate from the Empyrean Peak temporarily. Otherwise, I¡¯m afraid that we really won¡¯t live to see Lord Ss again,¡± said another person in an agonized and helpless manner.

    ¡°Who is this guy? Since when did the Fringe have such a crazy frightening fe?¡±

    ....

    It was clear from the voices of those experts that they were truly frightened!

    Then, most abruptly, a rapid beat of explosions sounded in the sky. A lightning bolt several times brighter than the sun struck Han Shuo who had been invincible, until now.

    The magnificent naked body of Han Shuo started violently quaking and his hair went stiff and stood upright. That, with his dark red eyes and sinister expressions, only made him appear even more terrifying.

    Han Shuo no longer aimlessly pursued those puny characters fleeing in disarray but raised his head to gaze at the three-meter tall, bulky Ss who had just arrived. Although his eyes were still dark red, Han Shuo had regained his sanity the moment he was struck by the lightning.

    Han Shuo immediately realized that he had inexplicably gone total berserk. When in a demonic trance, not only could hend himself in great danger, he would kill even his own friends if they were present!

    However, there was another state of demonic trance where Han Shuo could still possess some self-control. Although he would not be as calm as he usually would, he could at least stop himself from killing his own people. This was thest technique of the Nine Changes Realm ¨C Omen Change ¨C which he had mastered. Han Shuo was currently in this state.

    Han Shuo managed to readjust his mind very rapidly. While suppressing the explosive urge to massacre, he stared fixedly at Ss with his murderous eyes and viciously asked, ¡°Ss?¡±

    The muscles on Ss¡¯ face were twitching in rage. It was clear from the bodies and shattered energy towers what Han Shuo had done. Throughout the many years he ruled as one of the Five Sovereigns of the Fringe, no one had evermitted such an outrageous act on his Empyrean Peak.

    Even Sovereign Tyre, the Sovereign with the greatest strength, had never attacked the average gods of Empyrean Peak. Such was the tacit agreement between the Five Sovereigns!

    But today, the Empyrean Peak that represented the might and sovereignty of Ss was nearly wrecked with more than three hundred of his followers butchered. This was an insult that Ss had never suffered in the tens of thousands of years he had lived!

    Ss¡¯ blood was so seethed that it almost fried his brain. He breathed heavily for three seconds as he looked around his devastated Empyrean Peak. The scene of carnage made him even more determined to incinerate Han Shuo.

    Ss did not waste a word. He did not even ask Han Shuo for his origins. After keeping silent for three seconds, he transformed. Thick electrical dragons wound around him from head to toe before he threw himself at Han Shuo from the sky.

    The moment that Ss moved, the whole sky became filled with the sounds of thunder. The deafening thunderps carried bizarre energy fluctuations that targeted Han Shuo alone. Immediately after, the space around him violently exploded. It was as though the thunderbolts were always around him but they were only detonated after the soundwaves arrived.

    The explosive roar of the thunderbolts targeted his ears and soul while its explosive power targeted his body. Once struck, a thunder attack of such power could instantly kill any highgod on the spot. In fact, the thunderp alone would directly break apart the divine soul of a highgod.

    However, Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body could not bepared to the divine body of an average highgod. The ear-splitting thunderp that shot into Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness through his ears had only caused him to feel dizzy for a moment. The violent explosions that bombarded Han Shuo had automatically and instantly activated the Omen Invincible Body.

    After the thunder passed, Han Shuo had a new skin color and his body was smoking. However, he was still standing tall on the ground.

    The enormous explosive force of the lightning bombardment had been stopped by his Omen Invincible Body. However, the attacks of an overgod wouldn¡¯t be that simple. Minute threads of lightning energy managed to intrude Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body in that instant. Those lightning energies also possessed self-awareness. After entering Han Shuo¡¯s body, they discussed and decided to charge towards Han Shuo¡¯s brain to blow up his soul.

    The threads of lightning energy also possessed explosive powers. They nned on exploding after they reached Han Shuo¡¯s soul.

    Han Shuo understood that the divine souls of gods in this universe were not as miraculous as the consciousness of a demonic art cultivator. If the slightest energy managed to prate the expert¡¯s skin and make their way to the expert¡¯s brain area, just one tiny explosion could shatter their awareness or even annihte their divine soul.

    Had it been any highgod who suffered such an attack from Ss, it would have meant instant death.

    However, to a master of demonic arts like Han Shuo, this insignificant trick could do him no harm. With one thought of his consciousness, demonic yuan rapidly circted in his body. Those lighting energies that intruded into his body were located and intercepted. Han Shuo annihted them before they could reach his brain area.

    Han Shuo raised his head and saw that Ss who was covered with thunderbolts had just arrived before him.

    He cracked a fanatical, diabolical grin and shot to the sky, straight at Ss. He spread his arms, clenched his fists, and hurled them forward. The extremely potent killing intent that lingered around him transformed into two long and dark dragons that ferociously charged at Ss.

 Chapter 860 - Extinctions

    GDK 860: Extinctions

    To Han Shuo, Ss was not just a powerful opponent, but also the key to making a breakthrough in his cultivation. Han Shuo was determined to fight with all his strength until the end, for no matter how it ended, Han Shuo would have something to gain. Even if Han Shuo lost the battle, he would gain first-hand experience of the strength of an overgod, potentially make gains in demonic arts, and even be famous in the Fringe. Soon, every Fringedweller would learn that another existence in the Fringe could contend against Ss.

    There was nothing for an underdog to lose in challenging the top dog, as long as the former survived!

    With both hands, Han Shuo grabbed onto the air around him and transformed the killing intent that shrouded him into two dragons. They charged ferociously at Ss who was descending from the sky. With one thought of his consciousness, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon and the seventeen flying swords stopped attacking the fleeing weak gods and flew back to him. Han Shuo was cing all his firepower on Ss.

    Ss became enveloped with brilliant and dazzling lightning bolts that contained a terrifying amount of energy. Bright shes shot downwards at the dark dragons Han Shuo made using killing intent. The frightening rumbles produced caused the Empyrean Peak to rumble.

    Those surviving followers of Ss ran to the mountain foot to avoid getting injured or killed by the stray energies produced in the duel between the two experts of extraordinary strengths. They gazed up at the Empyrean Peak which had now be Han Shuo and Ss¡¯ battle arena.

    Now that Han Shuo had finally exchanged blows with Ss, he was awed by the terrifying power possessed by an overgod. Even though he had borrowed all of Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, aided by the deadly seventeen flying swords, and used all his power, he was still nowhere close to being on top.

    Ss¡¯ understanding and mastery of the element of lightning had reached an inexplicably profound realm. His divine body was covered with the element of lightning and every attack he made would carry a boundless amount of lightning energy. The dark dragons that Han Shuo made by congealing killing intent immediately dissipated after they were struck by several hundred thunderbolts simultaneously.

    The Empyrean Peak, being the ce where Ss spent most of his time, had a higher concentration of the element of lightning than any other ce in the Fringe. As there were more elements of lightning in the environment that Ss could utilize, when on the Mountain, his strength would be much greater than when he was elsewhere.

    If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body was so resilient; if Han Shuo wasn¡¯t supported by Cauldron Spirit¡¯s energy, there was no way that Han Shuo couldst so long against the constant bombardment of thunder and lightning. Han Shuo had been trying to surround Ss with his seventeen flying swords. However, the Ss¡¯ lightning energy would always manage to strike on the flying swords with great precision and disrupt their trajectory. Han Shuo was thus unable to form the Avici Godying Sword Formation.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes remained dark red. Threads of faint, dark demonic aura were emanating from his majestic and muscr naked body. His avatar of destruction had transformed into Demonyer Edge and was being held in his right hand to fight Ss.

    Ss unfolded his domain of divinity. Tens of thousands of tiny lightning bolts started to drizzle from the sky as the Empyrean Peak became filled with meshes made of electricity. Every now and then, Han Shuo would inevitably bump into one of those meshes and the lightning energy would make its way into his body.

    Luckily for Han Shuo, his hybrid domain of divinity was also pretty powerful. It was rapidly gathering the element of death nearby and used the element of death and edict of destruction to counteract Ss¡¯ domain of divinity. It gave Han Shuo some breathing room.

    As the battle progressed, Han Shuo realized that he would have a very difficult time even if he used his full strength. Moreover, Han Shuo had a vague feeling that Ss had yet to use his full power. This kept Han Shuo wary. He tried to be prepared for an even heavier assault from Ss.

    The battle went on. Soon, Ss got impatient.

    Ss suddenly let out a roar. Somehow, the tiny lightning bolts drizzling in his domain of divinity became several times thicker. World-shaking rumbles sounded in his domain of divinity.

    Even Ss himself seemed to have gained ess to unfathomable energy in a split second. Before Ss had used his full strength, Han Shuo was only barely able to defend himself. But now, Han Shuo found himself in grave peril.

    ***

    Many light-years away from Elysium were several mid-level material nes. Every sentient lifeform on those material nes worshipped Ss as their one and only God. Ss would receive a constant supply of the power of faith from his followers every second of every day.

    These mid-level material nes were erected with countless statues of Ss and shrines where his believers would worship him ceaselessly. Some of those pious believers possessed demigod or even basegod strengths. They would make pilgrimages to many other material nes to spread Ss¡¯ gospel and recruit even more followers for Him.

    But at this moment, without any warning, every living being on those mid-level material nes had blood squirting from their orifices as their souls disintegrated. The power of faith that was juiced out from their souls traversed across material nes and entered Ss¡¯ body on Elysium.

    In just moments, several thriving material nes were transformed into lifeless worlds. Billions of lives on those material nes used to piously worshipped Ss as their only God but all that they got in return was to be exterminated ¨C by the one they so worshipped.

    ***

    Back on Elysium, Ss¡¯ strength was temporarily boosted. His Domain of Divinity had squeezed and overpowered Han Shuo¡¯s. World-shaking lightning bolts with the volume of hills struck Han Shuo. The power was so great that even Han Shuo¡¯s Omen Invincible Body could not fully bear it. His skin and flesh started to split and he started bleeding.

    Omen Invincible Body could only bear a limited amount of energy. When the attacking energy exceeded its limit, Omen Invincible Body would fail to stop all damages from reaching Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    In just a fraction of a second, Han Shuo suffered serious injuries and he was knocked out!

    ¡°Master! Wake up! Wake up!¡± shouted Cauldron Spirit loudly in Han Shuo¡¯s mind that was half-conscious.

    The muddleheaded Han Shuo rapidly regained consciousness. In the next instance, he sensed the immense pain screaming from all over his body. Ever since he mastered Omen Invincible Body, Han Shuo had not felt pain of such intensity. Somehow, Han Shuo got a kick out of it.

    Han Shuo raised his head and saw that the entire sky of Empyrean Peak was filled with lightning bolts. They seemed to have filled the space between heaven and earth, pouring down like heavy rain.

    Ss was gazing coldly at the heavily injured Han Shuo below him. From the look on his face, it seemed that he would not allow Han Shuo any chance of surviving past this day.

    Thunder continued to sound and lightning continued to strike. Somehow, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was being pulled towards a dazzled state. He had a strange and vague feeling something major was going to happen.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind suddenly became absolutely calm and he was inexplicably enlightened. He felt as though his eyes could see beyond the flow of space and time. In the timeless transic state, he seemed to see Elysium during its creation...

    As Han Shuo calmly observed the empty world, all kinds of brilliant ideas and understanding materialized in his mind. All kinds of cryptic and abstruse chants turned into light and engraved themselves into his consciousness. He saw the Beginning when there was nothingness, when the universe was an infinitesimally small point...

    Ss, hovering high in the sky, saw that Han Shuo was severely injured. He was ready to give Han Shuo the final blow.

    It was at this moment that Ss discovered he had abruptly lost connection with the elements of lightning all around him. That thunder and lightning rumbling in the sky was no longer under his control and they started wreaking havoc to the Empyrean Peak and the rest of the Mountain.

    Ss¡¯ followers who were watching the battle from the mountain foot were caught off guard. Many of them were struck by the uncontrolled lightning strikes. Without the awesome defensive power of Han Shuo¡¯s demonic body, they instantly perished.

    Suddenly, the Eight Elemental Energies ¨C Light, Darkness, Earth, Fire, Wind, Water, Lightning, Death from the entire world started converging towards the Mountain. Even killing intent, energy of perished souls, energy of fear, and all kinds of energies from all over the world was gushing towards the Empyrean Peak as though drawn by something.

    It seemed as though the energy was not being controlled by any being, but was naturally drawn there by the most fundamental forces of the universe. Upon assembling on the Empyrean Peak, that energy started attacking every living thing and destroying every structure on the Mountain.

    Those boundaries and energy towers that Han Shuo did not destroy suddenly shattered and exploded. Ss¡¯ followers at the mountain foot were screaming and wailing as the Eight Elemental Energies and other bizarre energies bombarded them. A hundred or more experts perished in an instant, while many more were severely injured.

    ¡°Master, the Omen Cmity hase! Ignore Ss. Focus all you¡¯ve got in resisting the Cmity!¡± shouted Cauldron Spirit. However, Han Shuo could not hear a thing at this moment. He was still in a trance, receiving the profound wisdom flowing into his consciousness.

    Without warning, an asteroid came out of nowhere and mmed Han Shuo into the solid rock of Empyrean Peak. It was then that Han Shuo suddenly came to himself. He immediately noticed the enormous transformation around Empyrean Peak. All kinds of energies gathered and were devastating the Mountain. Those energies were still rapidly umting to form an apocalyptic attack.

    And he was the target of this final attack!

    Han Shuo could clearly sense that these energies, drawn by the most fundamentalws of the universe, had locked onto him. When the channeling wasplete, it would crash down with insurmountable power to annihte him along with the Empyrean Peak.

    Han Shuo also got the feeling that he could not run from these energies, that they would find him no matter how far he ran. His only choice was to face it head-on.

    If he didn¡¯t survive the Cmity, his consciousness would be annihted and Han Shuo or Bryan would cease to exist in this world.

    If he survived, he would break through Omen Realm and reach Skybreak Realm. His strength would soar and the Fringe would be his for the taking!

 Chapter 861 - Omen Calamity

    <h4>GDK 861: Omen Cmity</h4>

    Ss saw the changes being done to the Empyrean Peak but was powerless to stop it. His experts at the mountain foot were being injured and killed but he could not stop or block the attacks. He roared from the mountain peak, ¡°Get out of the way! Get the fuck out of the way!¡±

    Those gods at the mountain foot were struck by pirs of light. The space above Empyrean Peak seemed as though it had been ripped. Enormous asteroids were constantly crashing down. Even the energy of lightning that Ss assembled at this ce was going out of control and it indiscriminately bombarded the region.

    Ss was going to make the final attack and end Han Shuo once and for all. However, he suddenly discovered that his connection with the element of lightning all around him seemed to have been severed. He could then only use the divine energy in his body and not the energy around him.

    The chaotic elemental energies had converged and formed a thick natural barrier around Han Shuo who was lying not far from him. As he approached Han Shuo, he discovered the previously undetectable barrier squeezing and shoving him, forcing him to retreat.

    After carefully sensing for a moment, Ss discovered that the abrupt transformation to Empyrean Peak indeed originated from Han Shuo. The energies that gathered above the mountain seemed to carry tremendous firepower. But perplexingly, they were aimed at Han Shuo.

    Ss was astonished for he could not understand how Han Shuo could assemble such a wide range of elemental energies together. When he discovered that those energies were trying to attack Han Shuo, he no longer tried in vain to break through theyers of obstructing barriers to attack Han Shuo. He pulled back to observe.

    Han Shuo¡¯s majestic body was glowing with dark radiance under the atmosphere flooded with every elemental energy. Demonic yuan filled every cell in his body. He was calmly preparing himself to face the impending Omen Cmity.

    The energies umted and brewed for a long time before it finally struck. The first attack was formed using the lightning energy that Ss assembled. Thunder rocked the mountain as a lightning bolt of extreme diameter shot at Han Shuo. It was no less mighty than Ss¡¯ attacks.

    Han Shuo sent out his seventeen flying swords to face the attack. The flying swords formed a shield and a world-shaking explosion was heard when it connected with the tremendous lightning bolt. Han Shuo felt numbness on his scalp and stiffness in his limbs. His body was smoking. Although Han Shuo had tenaciously withstood the attack, it added even more injuries to his body that had just been wounded by Ss.

    Several more waves of powerful attacks were still brewing in the sky. An asteroid the size of a small mountain glowing red-hot gradually appeared out of the spacetime rift. Han Shuo could tell straight from its ominous demeanor that the asteroid must contain a mind-bogglingly tremendous amount of power.

    ¡°Master, I¡¯m not sure why but the Demonic Cmity in this universe is much stronger!¡± Cauldron Spirit suddenly transmitted, ¡°From the looks of it, Master won¡¯t be able to withstand its power. We need to find another way!¡±

    The asteroid was still umting power. Smaller asteroid fragments were being pulled to therge glowing asteroid like a giant ma. Han Shuo could sense that the giant, menacing asteroid had locked firmly on him as though he was the bullseye to a cannonball.

    ¡°What other way is there?¡± Han Shuo was at a loss for words and could not think creatively at this moment.

    ¡°Master, I can sacrifice my demon generals and take a few waves of attacks for you. That will increase your chances,¡± proposed Cauldron Spirit.

    ¡°Right, the Demonic Cmity targets my soul, but I have three souls. Will it split into three different forces?¡± asked Han Shuo hastily when he suddenly thought of it.

    ¡°No. The Cmity only targets your consciousness ¨C the soul of your main body that cultivates demonic arts. Your other two souls don¡¯t cultivate demonic arts and so the Cmity will not allocate any energy for them.¡±

    Han Shuo was alerted as it was at this moment that the fiery asteroid hadpleted its channeling. It started shooting at Han Shuo like a burning meteor. All the elements of fire in the vicinity poured into the asteroid and caused it to burn fiercely. It was much like Fire Elite Zombie and Metal Elite Zombie fusing their energies.

    Demonyer Edge, the very first demonic weapon that Han Shuo forged, was once again flooded with his demonic yuan. He temporarily cast away all his worries and with the Demonyer Edge in his hand, he forged ahead to meet the asteroid. Simultaneously, the seventeen flying swords soared to the sky. They bombarded the asteroid using the Avici Godying Sword Formation along with the Demonyer Edge.

    Yet another world-shaking explosion sounded from the Empyrean Peak. The shockwave trembled Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. As his mind was connected with the Demonyer Edge and the seventeen flying swords, he could feel his weapons. He felt as though he was being repeatedly thumped by a rock that was billions of tonnes in weight. He heard ringing in his ears and felt numbness throughout his body.

    The Demonyer Edge and the seventeen flying swords were both unparalleled divine weapons. Even the powerful asteroid formed by the Demonic Cmity started to crack under the exceptional weapons. Han Shuo endured the agonizing pain and directed his weapons to strike at the fissure.

    <i>TingTingTingTing...</i>

    The giant asteroid finally gave way under the constant bombardment. It suddenly shattered into multiple fiery pirs that continued to crash at Han Shuo. But with that, Han Shuo could eliminate the fiery pirs one after another and win by defeat in detail.

    Once those burning columns went past Han Shuo, they would be ¡®deactivated¡¯. It was as though Han Shuo was their goal post. Even if they could notnd on Han Shuo, they would havepleted their mission once they reached Han Shuo¡¯s location.

    After using up a whole lot of energy and withstanding excruciating pain, Han Shuo had strenuously survived this wave of attack.

    Han Shuo immediately took out a big handful of Rejuvenation Pills from his space ring and gorged them down his stomach. His two avatars, the Demonyer Edge and the Skeletal Staff, transformed into their bodily forms, deployed their domains of divinity and fused them.

    Perhaps affected by the unique environment, the hybrid domain of divinity produced yet another novel and wonderful feature. The elemental energies in the vicinity had immediately stopped flowing towards the sky!

    The Demonic Cmity was still brewing stronger and stronger. But as soon as the hybrid domain of divinity was deployed, the elemental energies in the environment seemed to have been disrupted and they stopped adding to the Cmity¡¯s power.

    But that was not all. The element of death, energy of fear, energy of hatred, and other negative energies became drawn by the hybrid domain of divinity. They naturally formed a thickyer of cloud-like shield above Han Shuo.

    ¡°That is truly a miracle! Master, now we really stand a chance!¡± cried Cauldron Spirit excitedly as it sensed the changes to the environment.

    Soon, a sky full of Wind Edges and Iced Swords started shelling Han Shuo. Radiance of Doom sted down from the sky...

    A new wave of uninterrupted bombardment descended upon Han Shuo. The hybrid domain of divinity sumbed after holding against the attack for a dozen or more seconds. But that had taken a great deal of burden off Han Shuo. After the domain gave way, Han Shuo formed a thin but powerful shield around himself and unleashed all the demonic yuan in his body to resist the Cmity.

    When his demonic yuan reserves were nearing exhaustion, Han Shuo began using the demon general energy in the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. Demon generals were beingbusted one after another. They were sacrificed so that Han Shuo would stand a chance at survival.

    Time passed inconspicuously...

    Han Shuo was fully absorbed in using the remaining demonic yuan in his body to form the sturdiest body shield, up until the final moment when his shield cracked and shattered. The full might of the Cmity sted on his body and caused it to slowly burst and spray blood...

    And at this moment, his greatest nightmare gripped over his mind. He suddenly reverted back to that frail and feeble otaku he was back on Earth. He had no strength, no power, and no life...

    The thousands upon thousands of lives that he had taken suddenly materialized as fierce spirits. With no ability to defend himself, his body was torn and his flesh gnawed. An unbearable pain surged into his mind. He even felt as though his soul was being consumed by the fire of Hell.

    He could not feel more despaired to lose his power. He felt helpless against the swarm of malicious spirits. It was what he had feared most.

    ¡°NO! I¡¯m no longer that useless dork. I¡¯m the reborn Han Shuo. Even if I have no power left, I will not let go. Never again. NEVER!¡± shouted Han Shuo in his mind.

    He started fiercely punching and tearing those spirits with his bare, muscle-less hands. He rammed them with his head, bit them with his teeth, and fought the spirits with the most primitive, barbarous methods. He became fiercer and more savage than any of the spirits.

    Gradually, those spirits that had been assailing him started to fear him. The energy he lost was slowlying back to him...

    After an undetermined length of time, Han Shuo who had sunk into a bizarre state suddenly woke up. He immediately felt gaudy rays bathing his body. However, these rays were unlike those destructive ones he had faced earlier but were warm and reinvigorating.

    Han Shuo looked around. There were no frightening energies brewing, no stifling dark clouds, nor any lighting bolts. There was only a fine, clear sky. Calm and quiet.

    Han Shuo then realized that he was on the Empyrean Peak, which was now barely a mound. Not too far from him was Ss, gazing at him with a mix of emotions. He seemed to be weighing if he should try to attack Han Shuo.

    ¡°Ss, we will be meeting again!¡± said the naked Han Shuo in a gay smile. Then, a cloud of blood mist wrapped him and gave off a bright sh. He vanished.

 Chapter 862 - Soaring Reputation

    <h4>GDK 862: Soaring Reputation</h4>

    Ss felt as though he had once again been spat in the face. While hesitating if he should continue to attack, Han Shuo vanished from right in front of him in an instant just as Han Hao did. Ss was consumed with rage.

    Ss had exterminated several material nes that worshipped him. He forcibly extracted the power of faith from his worshippers¡¯ souls to temporarily boost his strength. With Han Shuo having now escaped, Ss had killed his goose thatid golden eggs for nothing.

    Although Ss was angry when Han Hao escaped from him, it was nothing whenpared to Han Shuo¡¯s escape. Ss knew that given Han Hao¡¯s strength, even though he managed to escape, he could not have done much damage. But Han Shuo was different. Not only had Han Shuo massacred arge number of his experts, but even the glorious Empyrean Peak had also been ttened.

    But most importantly, Ss felt gravely threatened by Han Shuo¡¯s power!

    Ss had a feeling that if Han Shuo didn¡¯t die soon, he might not be able to defeat Han Shuo the next time they meet. A character that could disrupt the entire Land of Chaos must not be let alive for too long!

    Ss observed the scene of destion around him. The foot of his devastated mountain was scattered with the corpses of his most trusted followers. Many of the survivors suffered severe injuries.

    After the unfortunate incident, Ss¡¯ power in the Fringe had steeply declined. He was now far behindpared to the other four Sovereigns in terms of the power they wielded.

    With his eyes glistening with ferocious lights, Ss nned his next steps. He gathered his followers who were fortunate enough to survive the attack and in a dark face, hemanded, ¡°Find out everything about that guy. Locate him at all costs. He must die!¡±

    After instructing his followers, Ss hesitated for a while before he decided to discuss the issue with the other Sovereigns. He thought that the other Sovereigns would agree that a person who could threaten the status quo must not be allowed to live in the Fringe. Although they had not been concerned about Han Shuo when he could not threaten their interests, it would be a different game when he could.

    After making up his mind, Ss took yet another look at the ravaged Empyrean Peak before transforming into a lightning bolt and disappearing into the distance.

    ***

    Thousands of miles away from the Empyrean Peak, Han Shuo was lying under thickyers of mud and weeds.

    He had exhausted his energy to defend against the Demonic Cmity. His demonic body, which had been injured when his defenses failed against Ss, became even more damaged after suffering the attacks of the Demonic Cmity and the activation of Demonic Blood Disassembly. Han Shuo not only felt weak, but also tired and lethargic.

    With the wee bit of energy he had left, he strenuously pulled himself deeper into the swamp bit by bit. Then, he concealed his consciousness and became indistinguishable from the swamp...

    New knowledge and concepts flowed into his mind like a steady stream of water. Abstruse and marvelous runes engraved themselves in his mind. Han Shuo realized that he had made a breakthrough in his mental realm.

    Although Han Shuo had just an incredibly small amount of demonic yuan left in his body, the demonic yuan remained extremely tenacious. It also seemed to have transformed in quality. With each strenuous cirction through his body, it would grow slightly thicker while his wounds closed up little by little...

    Han Shuo opened up his mind and fell into a deep meditation state. He discarded all thoughts from his consciousness and allowed his body to repair itself in this wonderful state...

    ***

    ¡°Wha- What?!¡± In an underground pce was Sovereign Ossora who wore an astonished expression.

    ¡°My Lord, the Empyrean Peak has been destroyed and is currently being reconstructed. Ss has suffered great damages. Five to six hundred of his experts have been killed. Among the casualties were several dozen highgods,¡± reported Luolong respectfully as he kneeled before Ossora.

    The pce was located deep under a mountain range not far from the Omphalos. It belonged to Ossora who cultivated the elemental energy of earth. Many of his most trusted experts lived there with him. Luolong, upon receiving the information, rushed to the underground pce to inform his Sovereign of the shocking incident on Empyrean Peak.

    ¡°Are you sure it was Bryan?¡± Ossora was in disbelief. ¡°Thest time I met him, I sensed him very carefully. There¡¯s no was he has that kind of strength!¡±

    Luolong put on a bitter smile and answered, ¡°It must be him. Ss¡¯ followers are looking for him everywhere. I also heard that Ss has gone to Wasir and Logue, asking those Sovereigns to help him look for Bryan. It appears that he is determined to make Bryan disappear from the Fringe!¡±

    Ossora stroked his chin and bunched his brows. After thinking for a while, he instructed, ¡°You try to locate Bryan as well. Also, pay attention to his followers for their activities. But do not take sides yet. We will maintain neutrality.¡±

    ¡°Understood, my Lord,¡± Luolong bowed and respectfully dismissed himself.

    After Luolong left, Ossora soliloquized, ¡°Bryan, O, Bryan. If you are so capable, what should I do about you? Should I aid you, or should I end you?¡±

    ***

    The shocking news that Empyrean Peak had been intruded and razed to the ground spread all over the Fringe in no time. The stringers of the Omphalos became extremely busy as the leaders of various powers sought their service in swarms. They would spare no crystal coins to learn the truth.

    However, for some reason, a lot of these stringers, who would usually even sell the most humiliating information about themselves for crystal coins, were acting rather abnormal. They would immediately shut their mouths to anyone asking anything rted to the incident, as though they were afraid to speak about the Empyrean Peak.

    The more silent they were, the more curious the Fringedwellers became. The deste scene of the Empyrean Peak was visible even from great distances. It was impossible to hide such a matter. The Fringedwellers secretly exchanged information about the attack that took ce on the Mountain. The name ¡®Bryan¡¯ became the most uttered word in the Fringe.

    ***

    Inside a rocky valley, Polo had also learned about the massacre on Empyrean Peak from his follower, Kodiak. He also reacted to the news with great shock. Kodiak knew from various sources that Han Shuo and Han Hao were very close. With that, he started to take Han Shuo and Han Hao¡¯s presence in the Fringe very seriously.

    ¡°Who is it?!¡± cried Kodiak suddenly as he gazed at the valley¡¯s entrance warily.

    An indifferent face gradually revealed itself from the shadows. Han Hao¡¯s cold eyes nced around the valley before they turned to Polo and became affixed to him. He continued marching forward without uttering a word.

    Kodiak¡¯s eyes widened when he saw that theer was Han Hao. He recalled all those amazing and notable deeds Han Hao achieved in the Fringe before he respectfully saluted Han Hao, bowing and weing him into the valley. Polo¡¯s followers who were scattered around the valley also gazed at Han Hao with admiration.

    During the past two years, Han Hao and his group of godhunters had been wreaking havoc all around the Fringe. They were the fastest-growing power in the Chaotic Land. The open act of murdering thatte-stage highgod follower of Ss a few months ago had instantly made Han Hao¡¯s the most powerful godhunter faction in the entire Fringe.

    Compared to Polo, Han Hao now possessed greater prestige and power. As they were all godhunters, it was only reasonable that these followers of Polo would treat him with respect.

    Ever since escaping from Ss, Han Hao had started a rampage against all cultivators of the death element in the Fringe, devouring the energy in their body to recover the energy he exhausted when deploying the Demonic Blood Disassembly. By now, Han Hao had not justpletely recuperated, but his strength had again improved.

    Through his followers scattered all around the Fringe, Han Hao had also learned about Han Shuo¡¯s storming of the Empyrean Peak. However, Han Hao was not in the least worried about Han Shuo¡¯s safety. It didn¡¯t bother him at all.

    This was because Han Hao had the experience of escaping from Ss¡¯ pursuit using Demonic Blood Disassembly. Given that Han Shuo had a much more profound understanding of demonic arts, it should be even easier for him to escape from Ss.

    Through the detailed information delivered by his followers, Han Hao had some idea of what was currently happening to his father. He knew that Han Shuo was at a critical stage where he must stabilize his mental realm. When Han Shuo finally re-emerged, he was certain to upset the status quo of the Fringe!

    Han Hao, therefore, nned to pave the way for Han Shuo in advance. Among the godhunter factions in the Fringe, the one led by Polo was sizable. And so Han Hao came to visit Polo.

    Polo was also astonished to see that Han Hao hade to visit him. He put on a big friendly smile and asked, ¡°Hello! What brings you here?¡±

    Looking calmly at Polo, Han Hao gently raised the six foot bone spear in his hand and asked, ¡°Polo, that proposal of mine, have you given it a thought?¡±

    Polo stared for a moment and immediately recalled that years ago Han Hao had asked him to bow to his rule. Polo had not given an answer to the invitation in all that time and he did not expect Han Hao to mention it so abruptly.

    ¡°I¡¯m still considering. I don¡¯t have an answer yet,¡± Polo smiled.

    Han Hao¡¯s bewitching purple demon eyes glinted as he threatened sternly, ¡°Polo, I¡¯m going to unite every godhunter in the Fringe under my rule ¨C and you will be the first. If you do not submit, I will have to kill you!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Han Hao roared at the sky. A great number of shadows swooped and surrounded the valley in an instant. They were followers of Han Hao who were much greater in number and better atrge-scalebatpared to those of Polo. They wore ghoulish faces and eyes thirsting for blood as they stood in position, ready to massacre at Han Hao¡¯smand.

    It appeared that Han Hao would not be giving Polo any more time for consideration!

    ¡°Han Hao, you want my allegiance, but do you have the strength to keep me under your control?¡± Polo, unexpectedly, did not get angry, but was rather amused. He sneered, ¡°In the Fringe or in the Alliance, I, Polo, am more senior than you are. Tell me, on what basis should I obey you?¡±

    ¡°You were right. I did not have the strength to tame you. But that was two years ago,¡± said Han Hao calmly before he thrust his bone spear and attacked without engaging in further prattle.

 Chapter 863 - A gathering storm

    GDK 863: <strong>A gathering storm</strong>

    Polo was ate-stage highgod of destruction. He was a well-known, prestigious character in the Fringe and in the Godhunter Alliance. His reputation wasparable to Han Hao¡¯s.

    Given his great strength and status, it was only to be expected that Polo wouldn¡¯t easily bow to another expert¡¯smand, especially when he did not know if Han Hao had the strength to defeat him.

    After exhausting his energy when escaping from Ss¡¯ pursuit, Han Hao had been feasting on the energy of other experts. That which did not kill him only made him stronger. Han Hao¡¯s overall strength had now advanced to a new realm and he was certain that he could kill Polo.

    Han Hao was never one to waste words. He knew that in order to make Polo yield, he had to demonstrate that he couldpletely overwhelm him in power. No words could be more convincing than an actual battle.

    When Han Hao thrust his bone spear, insurmountable energy made of intertwined aura of death and killing intent exploded from it. Polo was taken aback. He seemed wary and hesitant.

    Polo could sense that Han Hao hadpletely transformed after two years. Both his demeanor and his gaze had be even more sharp and menacing. At that moment, he looked ready to destroy anything in his path.

    Both the followers of Han Hao and Polo remained still while watching their leaders. They wouldn¡¯t do a thing without their leader¡¯smand.

    After the intertwined aura of death and the killing intent, circr undtions were emitted from the tip of the bone spear. Each of the undtions formed its own Boundary of Death in a split second. Before Polo could even react, Han Hao had directed all the divine energy in his body into one point and was thrusting towards Polo with his bone spear.

    With one thought of his mind, the seven bone spurs detached from his spine and shot towards Polo in graceful and captivating arcs.

    The boundaries deployed by Han Hao would not obstruct his bone spurs. On the contrary, they would enhance the firepower and stealth of his bone spurs. Polo, having been caught off guard, exerted all his energy to defend himself.

    An intense sh suddenly burst out around Polo. Following that, all the boundaries Han Hao deployed abruptly vanished. The bone spurs hovered a few meters around Polo as though they had formed an invisible cage around him.

    The godhunters around them knew that Han Hao and Polo had exchanged blows during that intense sh of light, but they could not tell what the results were. They watched the two leaders attentively while staying vignt towards their opponents, ready to fight at any moment.

    Those followers of Polo were rather nervous because Han Hao¡¯s godhunters had greatly outnumbered them and had caught wind of the savagery of Han Hao¡¯s godhunters. They knew that if Polo was to fall out with Han Hao, they would suffer the same fate as those who were once their victims. The divine energy in their bodies would be used for advancing another person¡¯s strength.

    Han Hao wore a tranquil expression while staring intensely at Polo. He said to Polo, ¡°Let me tell you this: soon, the status quo in the Fringe will be set anew. If you do not bow to mymand, even if I spare your life today, someone might take it away tomorrow. Your happy days in the Fringe are over!¡±

    Polo showed a mixed array of emotions on his face, including a few traces of dejection. He looked deeply into Han Hao¡¯s eyes for long before hesitantly asking, ¡°That expert, Bryan, the one who destroyed the Empyrean Peak but still managed to escape from Ss, who is he to you?¡±

    Han Hao stared nkly and hesitated for a moment. He waved his hand and formed a boundary enveloping them before he answered, ¡°He is my father.¡±

    Polo was astounded. It took him a while but he finally made up his mind. Wearing a bitter smile, he nodded, ¡°Well then, I must oblige.¡±

    Han Hao nodded. He removed the barrier and announced to everyone, ¡°From now on, Polo and all his followers are mine!¡±

    ¡°Put away your weapons,¡± instructed Polo to his followers with a dispirited face.

    No further exnation was needed. Everyone knew that Polo had submitted. From that day on, Han Hao and the godhunters hemanded became a powerhouse in the Fringe that no one dared belittle.

    ***

    Over at the Pandemonium, Rose, Romon, Zovic, the Five Elite Zombies, and others gathered in a meeting room. The news about Han Shuo intruding the Empyrean Peak and massacring Ss¡¯ followers had spread to every corner of the Fringe. Luolong and Han Hao had delivered the news to the Pandemonium, asking their inhabitants to exercise extreme caution.

    During the recent time, Romon, Zovic, Goron, and the others had been sweeping away ten or so forces that were located around the Pandemonium. Some surrendered, some were butchered.

    But just as they were most motivated to expand their territories even further, they were informed that Han Shuo had intruded the Empyrean Peak. Rose immediatelymanded that they cease all expeditions and stay in the Pandemonium.

    All of Han Shuo¡¯s experts in the Fringe had gathered in the underground pce. Rose, Romon, Zovic, and Goron were wearing grave faces in these uncertain times. Ss was a Sovereign that every Fringedweller was afraid of and Han Shuo¡¯s whereabouts were currently unknown. They did not know if the Pandemonium could survive until Han Shuo¡¯s return, or if he would be returning at all.

    ¡°Ss¡¯ followers have been searching for Master very actively. His scouts have reached even the borders of our Pandemonium. As we have recently wiped out many of the nearby forces, this ce won¡¯t stay hidden for long,¡± remarked the vexed Zovic.

    ¡°Agreed. Given the manpower and connections Ss possessed in the Fringe, it won¡¯t be long before he sieges our base. Sigh, should we disperse for the moment and reassemble after we have news about Master?¡± suggested Luolong.

    ¡°We won¡¯t leave. It¡¯s not easy building the Pandemonium. We will never allow this ce to be damaged!¡± Metal Elite Zombie seemed full of mettle as he said, ¡°Besides, the bunch of you are underestimating the power of the Pandemonium. We and our father have put a ton of effort into building this ce. Its defensive power is nothing you can imagine! Hmph, even if Ss himself tries to break into the base, he will have to pay a great price for it!¡±

    Han Shuo and the Five Elite Zombies had spent a great deal of effort and energy on building the Pandemonium. As the architects and builders, they knew just how brutal the Pandemonium could be. They were not the least bit afraid even if it was one of the Sovereigns who would be attacking them.

    ¡°I believe in Master¡¯s power. Ss¡¯ Empyrean Peak has been wrecked and his experts have been massacred by Master. I reckon Ss can¡¯t muster much force against us!¡± remarked Romon.

    ¡°Given the extent of Ss¡¯ influence in the Fringe, we cannot avoid capture even if we evacuate from the Pandemonium. We might as well take a shot and stay. I believe that Master will rush back to the Pandemonium as soon as he recovers. We just have to hang in here until Master returns,¡± said Zovic.

    ¡°No one will leave the valley,¡±manded Rose calmly who had been silent all along.

    Everyone in the meeting room knew that among them, Rose was the person most trusted by Han Shuo. Therefore, the party stopped debating and epted Rose¡¯s decision.

    ***

    Back at Ossora¡¯s underground pce, Luolong went to his Sovereign and reported, ¡°My Lord, I have just received news that Ss has learned about the presence of Pandemonium and its location. He is gathering his troops and marching towards the Valley!¡±

    Ossora thought for a moment before he asked, ¡°Any information that points to Bryan being in the Pandemonium?¡±

    Luolong shook his head and replied, ¡°None whatsoever. Ever since he mysteriously disappeared from the Empyrean Peak, there has not been even a word of news about him. The followers of Ss and the other Sovereigns have searched the entire Fringe and yet, they found not the tiniest trace of Bryan.¡±

    ¡°This Bryan ¨C what a guy!¡± eximed Ossora who seemed rather impressed. Then, after thinking for a while, Ossora said, ¡°Alright, I shall visit the Pandemonium and check out the situation. I¡¯m going solo.¡±

    Luolong was astounded as he did not expect that his mighty and all-important Sovereign should handle the matter Himself. After hesitating a bit, he asked, ¡°But, my Lord, wouldn¡¯t that be a waste of your time?¡±

    Ossora shook his head smilingly and replied, ¡°This Bryan guy is definitely worth my time. I will go check out the situation at the Pandemonium and see if his followers are worthy of my help.¡±

    Luolong only became more puzzled and confused. However, he did not ask any more questions and respectfully dismissed himself.

    ***

    On a mountain peak near the northwest of the Pandemonium, Ss¡¯ followers were gathering and rapidly growing in number.

    Those experts that perished or were injured on the Empyrean Peak were just a portion of Ss¡¯ followers. The rest of them were scattered in every corner of the Fringe. Although Ss has suffered great losses, his army has not beenpletely wiped out. And indeed, he was able to muster a great number in little time.

    Within a short few days, five or six hundred gods had gathered on the mountain. These ferocious experts who dwelled in every part of the Fringe had heard of the tragic attack on Empyrean Peak. As followers of Ss, they had been riding roughshod over other Fringedwellers in the name of their Sovereign. It was needless to say just how angry they were about the Empyrean Peak getting ttened.

    During recent times, the scene of devastation at the Empyrean Peak was widely narrated among the Fringedwellers. These followers of Ss saw the schadenfreude in the gazes of other Fringedwellers. People who used to take detours to avoid them now seemed as though they were not afraid of them anymore. This made them deeply realize the impact Ss¡¯ downfall would have on them.

    Even if not for Ss, they must destroy the Pandemonium and Han Shuo for their own sake. They knew that that was the only way they could preserve the special privileges they enjoy in the Fringe.

    The Fringedweller were very realistic. Although Ss was not defeated in battle, Empyrean Peak having been destroyed and Han Shuo remaining alive made everyone think that Ss wasn¡¯t as mighty as they imagined. This has far-reaching consequences.

    Half a monthter, a thunderbolt streak across the sky. Ss finally appeared on the mountain.

 Chapter 864 - The power of the Pandemonium

    GDK 864: The power of the Pandemonium

    ¡°Hail Sovereign Ss!¡± a group of experts kowtowed before Ss. Even though the Empyrean Peak had been destroyed and Han Shuo had escaped from him, to these people, Ss was still the most formidable being in the Fringe.

    These experts who were used to bullying other Fringedwellers in the name of Ss knew that their interests were tightly intertwined with Ss¡¯. As long as their Sovereign stood tall, their ce in the Fringe remained unchallengeable. But once they stepped out of Ss¡¯ shadow, they would no doubt be hunted and murdered by their former enemies. And now, that veil behind Ss was rapidly shrinking.

    ¡°What information have you gathered so far?¡± asked Ss with a dark face. His meetings with Wasir and Logie had not been as fruitful as he had hoped. The two Sovereigns just could not, or perhaps did not, conceal their great dness when they heard that Ss¡¯ Empyrean Peak was destroyed. Although they had verbally agreed to Ss¡¯ request, it was up to anyone¡¯s guess if they would actually honor their promises.

    Sovereign Ss had be theughing stock of the Fringe for he could not even defend his base from a naked madd. He knew that the only way to wash away the humiliation was to annihte Han Shuo and all his people.

    ¡°That valley ahead known as the Pandemonium is enveloped in colorful miasmic gases. We have been observing it for a long time but have not seen a single person exit from the valley, ¡° answered one of Ss¡¯ followers respectfully.

    ¡°So they are all inside the Valley. Excellent. We can kill all of them in one go!¡± Ss gazed at his nearly one thousand followers with his eyes that were sparking with electricity. He gave a short speech, ¡°The might of the Empyrean Peak has been challenged. Today, we will show everyone the consequences of such recklessness!¡±

    Ss then gestured as hemanded, ¡°Charge into the valley. Kill everyone you find. Show no mercy!¡±

    Immediately after, those kneeling before Ss went to their troops and started yelling theirmands. Arge swarm of shadows took to the air and shot in the direction of the Pandemonium.

    As a mighty Sovereign, Ss naturally would not be at the forefront of the battle. In his point of view, his only job was to finish Han Shuo. Everything else could be handled by his followers. Therefore, instead of leading his army to the battlefield, he merely observed from his vantage point.

    ***

    In the Pandemonium, Rose, Romon, Zovic, Goron, the Five Elite Zombies, and the others were attentively observing the situation outside through an enormous spatial refraction mirror.

    During the past few years, McKinley of Ethereal City had been delivering all kinds of marvelous space divine devices to the Pandemonium. The enormous spatial refraction mirror was one of them. It was connected with the space edict matrices deployed on the mountains surrounding the Pandemonium. Instead of showing a reflection of the users, the mirror would show them anything and everything in the Valley.

    With the gigantic mirroring device, those in the underground pce of the Pandemonium could observe nearly everything that was happening on the surface.

    Through the spatial refraction mirror, the party saw a dark storm rapidly approaching from the horizon. It was made up of ferocious gods flying in a tight formation. They were led by several infamous generals of Ss, most of themte-stage highgods.

    Following and watching them from above was an enormous figure covered with lightning bolts. He was none other than Sovereign Ss.

    Without the miraculous demonic formations in the Pandemonium, Ss could easily ughter everyone in the Valley with just a portion of his experts. Other than the other four Sovereigns, perhaps no other powerhouse in the Fringe could evene close to matching the power Ssmanded.

    Everyone watching from the spatial magical mirror looked especially grave, except for the Five Elite Zombies. They wondered how long the Pandemonium could defend against the invaders.

    ¡°Calm down. Not even Ss can break into the Valley without effort,¡± said Han Huo in a prideful smirk before he smilingly asked Han Mu, ¡°Little Wood, make a guess. How many formations can the first wave break through?¡±

    The Han Mu at this moment had his eyes glued to the spatial mirror, zoomed in on those sultry femalebatants of Ss. He had a lewd smile on his face and was likely imagining something dirty. Han Mu was annoyed to be disrupted from his fantasy and replied, ¡°Who cares about those small fries?¡±

    Rose, Zovic, and the others were rather astounded. They couldn¡¯t understand why the Five Elite Zombies would be so calm and confident. To them, no matter how amazing the Pandemonium was, it could not possibly be able to resist the onught of more than a thousand gods. Once those attackers pushed through the defenses, none of them would likely be left alive.

    ¡°Oh don¡¯t worry. Even if they break through the defenses, I can easily evacuate everyone with underground tunnels. Ss cultivates the energy of lightning and cannot go hundreds of meters underground to pursue us. Seriously, I don¡¯t get what the bunch of you are so worried for!¡± said Han Tu after he nced at those experts who seemed nervous.

    All five of the Elite Zombies had unruffled looks. None of them seemed stressed out about being sieged by the formidable force. They would also frequently mock and joke around with each other as though there weren¡¯t a thousand ferocious Fringedwellers out there wanting to butcher them.

    Slowly but surely, even Rose and the others were affected by their spirit and they were no longer as worried. The reassurance that Han Tu gave had also calmed them somewhat. However, their eyes remained glued to the magical mirror as they watched the invading forces.

    The first wave of enemies soon arrived. Those generals of Ss who had been throwing their weights around the Fringe for decades weren¡¯tplete idiots. They knew to test the waters before stepping into unknown dangers themselves.

    Therefore, the first who attacked the Pandemonium were not Ss¡¯ most powerful subordinates, but weak, mediocre, nameless characters. More often than not, these experts were simply sacrificed to determine the situation ahead so that the truly powerful experts wouldn¡¯t be harmed.

    Back then in the Omphalos, a group of wealthy but good for nothing teenagers had surrendered all their fortunes to Han Hao and bowed to hismand. Those teenagers had not enrolled themselves as the troops of the Sovereigns because they knew they would be treated as cannon fodders during critical moments, just as Ss was doing now.

    There was a price for everything, even for submitting to Ss. Those cannon fodders in the junior ranks who did not possess extraordinary strength knew that their time hade. Following the instructions of their leaders, the dozen or so men descended from the sky and charged into the Pandemonium without defiance or hesitation.

    Thick, vibrant miasmic gases were hovering above the Pandemonium and every one of the gases possessed extreme toxicity. Those cannon fodders had applied expensive medical lotions for neutralizing toxins and had covered themselves with all kinds of defensive divine armors. They knew that the colorful miasmic gases wouldn¡¯t be as pleasant as they may have seemed.

    However, the miasmic gases brewed by Han Shuo and the Five Elite Zombies were nothing that an average god could defend against. With the help of Wood Elite Zombie, Han Shuo was able to procure all kinds of extremely potent corrosive poisons from exotic nts and introduce them into the miasmic gases. The miasmic gases were not just able to block others peeping into the Valley, but they were also the first line of defense against intruders.

    Those cannon fodders did all they could to protect themselves against the miasmic gases and yet, they could not elude their destiny.

    Soon after they fell into the miasmic gases, they noticed that the toxins they were facing were on a whole nother level. Even the most toxic gases they hade across deep in the mountains were nothingpared to this. Those medicines and armors they wore seemedpletely ineffective. They immediately felt numb, dizzy, and weak.

    It did not take long before their bodies started rotting and melting. Some of them had dark liquid oozing from their orifices as they died.

    Miserable shrieks sounded for a few seconds before they wentpletely silent. The first batch of cannon fodders had vanished without a trace.

    ¡°Nothing simple, indeed!¡± remarked a burly expert. He showed not the slightest grief or anger at the loss of his subordinates. It appeared that he did not even attach any value to the lives of those men.

    ¡°I want every expert of wind energy to join forces and blow the miasmic gas away!¡±manded an old man with messy long hair.

    Immediately after, all those gods who cultivated in wind energy started using the divine energy in their bodies to assemble the element of wind. Fierce winds started wheezing and numerous great tornadoes were formed. They started wreaking havoc over the colorful miasmic gases.

    There were several dozen experts under Ss who cultivated in the element of wind, among which were five or six highgods. By working together, they managed to envelop the entire Pandemonium in wild winds, tornadoes, hurricanes, and twisters.

    However, much of the thick miasmic gases shrouding over the Pandemonium somehow managed to stay in ce. Even though they moved around with the wind, they would always end up above the Valley, as though they were held by some sort of ma.

    Some of the miasmic gases were dispersed by the hurricanes and tornadoes. However, after the winds were gone, the miasmic gases would simply reassemble above the Valley like liquid flowing down a slope.

    ¡°Father spent two months gathering the miasmic gases from various regions and meticulously deployed them using ¡®Variable Anchor¡¯. If their measly little wind can disperse the Demonic Miasma Cloud, I¡¯ll eat my hat!¡± said Han Huocently.

    ¡°Hehe, perhaps it¡¯s time we show them what we¡¯ve got. Don¡¯t you think, Little Wood?¡± Han Tu said to Han Mu with a nasty smirk.

    ¡°Of course! It¡¯s time!¡±

    Suddenly, the enormous trees in the Pandemonium started trembling. Momentster, the miasmic gases gathered above the Valley started to violently spread outwards in all directions.

    Not only could Ss¡¯ followers who cultivated in wind energy not control the movement or direction of the miasmic gases, but their hurricanes and tornadoes had somehow elerated their flow and made matters worse.

    ¡°Shit. Everyone retreat. Retreat!¡± shouted that old man with long messy hair hastily. But the miasmic gases were just too fast. As soon as he finished those words, many of Ss¡¯ followers were engulfed by the roaring gases.

 Chapter 865 - Bait

    GDK 865: Bait

    The toxins contained in the Demonic Miasma Cloud were extremely deadly. A portion of the invading forces started oozing blood from their orifices. Those experts who stood closest to the Pandemonium had their skin and flesh liquefied and were reduced to skeletons.

    The colorful miasmic gasses were concocted with all kinds of extremely noxious substances. Han Shuo, as a cultivator of demonic arts, was very knowledgeable in the use of such sinister substances. With the help of Wood Elite Zombie and the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, Han Shuo managed to brew the extremely deadly toxic cloud. Never had anything so toxic been created in this universe.

    Those who possessed highgod strengths managed to resist the onught of the miasmic cloud. They had resilient divine bodies and had reacted quickly enough, extending their divine energies to every part of their bodies and moving out of the way at highgod speeds. The rest, however, weren¡¯t so lucky. All the midgods that were engulfed by the miasmic cloud perished.

    In the blink of an eye, the toxic miasmic cloud had killed fifty or sixty of Ss¡¯ midgods. The invading forces frantically retreated to a great distance. The few highgods who flew out from the miasmic cloud, although unscathed, had their minds filled with dread for the toxic clouds had exhausted plenty of their divine energy in such little time.

    Under the Pandemonium, the Five Elite Zombies wereughing mischievously.

    ¡°Nice one, Little Wood! Haha, had those idiots not used their stupid wind energy, the toxic miasma cloud couldn¡¯t have engulfed them at such great speed,¡± said theughing Han Huo. He seemed very excited.

    ¡°Hehe, father had long anticipated that the enemy would try to disperse the toxic miasma cloud with wind energy. That¡¯s why he built this special function that I can activate and use the enemy¡¯s wind energy against them,¡± said Han Mu. Instead of iming credit for himself, he pointed out that this malicious strategy was Han Shuo¡¯s idea.

    The Five Elite Zombies casually discussed the wonderful uses of the Demonic Miasma Cloud. Their confidence grew after emerging victorious in the first engagement of the battle.

    Rose, Zovic, and the others were astonished to see that a great number of the invaders were killed and injured although they had not even defeated the Pandemonium¡¯s firstyer of defense.

    It was only now that they started to feel some trust in the defensive power of the array of formations inside the Pandemonium. They got a vague feeling that the invaders would pay an unimaginable price.

    Rose suddenly grew rxed. She came to admire Han Shuo even more. His contraptions had managed to stop a thousand or more formidable experts outside the Valley even in his absence. Such an extraordinary feat could not be achieved by an ordinary man. It was at that moment that Rose knew Han Shuo would rise to be a legend in the Fringe!

    ***

    Over a steep mountain wall outside the Valley stood a man. He had been keeping a close eye on the Pandemonium, attentively overseeing the situation. He was none other than Sovereign Ossora who had rushed here from his underground pce.

    Ossora at this moment was wearing a startled expression. With a wave of his hand, a whiff of the toxic miasma floated to him and hovered over his palm.

    Ossora became even more astounded after he carefully analyzed the miasma cloud. He discovered new toxins that he had never previously seen. Every toxin in the colorful miasma had its own unique function. All kinds of rare, bizarre yet noxious toxins were mixed in an unfathomable way to form this extraordinary cloud.

    He also sensed just how formidable and deadly the miasma cloud was. Even with his overgod realm energy, he could notpletely iste himself from the toxins and had to consume a small amount of his divine energy to neutralize the toxins.

    Ossora gazed at the Pandemonium. His eyes were filled with aplex array of emotions as he muttered to himself, ¡°Bryan, Bryan, what in the world are you?¡±

    ***

    After retreating from the Pandemonium, that old man with long messy hair went to Ss and asked, pathetic and helpless, ¡°My Sovereign, what should we do?¡±

    Ss had witnessed their generals¡¯ failure. The miasma clouds were not just extremely toxic, but they also couldn¡¯t be blown away with wind energy. Ss¡¯ generals had no idea what they could do to break into the Pandemonium.

    ¡°Pile of trash!¡± Ss was furious. He thought that the enormous group of experts should have easily captured the Pandemonium and killed everyone in it. Who knew that many dozens of them would have died before they could even break through the outermostyer of defense.

    If the outside world were to learn of this humiliating news, Ss¡¯ reputation would fall below the abyss and he would beughed at by every Fringedweller in existence.

    That old man and the other generals shrank their necks and put on helpless faces, trying to look pitiful. They knew that Ss would kill even his own people when he was in a bad mood. Therefore, when Ss was enraged, their wisest choice was to keep their mouths shut as much as possible.

    Ss snarled and swept his chilling eyes on his subordinates. In the usual days, Ss would have killed a few of them to vent his anger. But this time, Ss swallowed it. He knew that things had changed. His reputation in the Fringe had hit rock bottom and, at least temporarily, there wouldn¡¯t be new experts begging to serve his Sovereignty.

    To have a footing in the Fringe, one had to be inmand of adequately strong power. Ss was falling short of followers and he could no longer just throw their lives away.

    ¡°Back off! I will destroy this toxic cloud barrier!¡± Ss had just then decided to handle things himself.

    He unfurled his domain of divinity. The element of lightning surged into the domain from everywhere. Ss was quickly surrounded by blinding lightning and deafening thunder.

    ¡°Ss¡¯ strength has not retrograded at all. Bryan sure has some skills to be able to escape from Ss!¡± Ossora¡¯s face turned grave after he carefully sensed the element of lightning that flooded the area. Rumors had it that Ss suffered a setback in his cultivation and his strength diminished, thereby giving Han Shuo the opportunity to escape. But from the element of lightning in the environment, Ossora was able to estimate Ss¡¯ strength and he realized the rumors were incorrect.

    After making the discovery, Ossora regarded Han Shuo even more highly.

    Ossora knew that if Han Shuo could easily escape from Ss, that meant Han Shuo could also escape from him or another Sovereign during a battle. That, in turn, meant that if any of them became enemies with Han Shuo, they would be unable to eliminate him and the threat of Han Shuo would always be there.

    Ossora then recalled the information that originated in the City of Shadows about Han Shuo. After a moment of consideration, he came to a wise decision ¨C that he must never make an enemy of Han Shuo!

    While Ossora made a decision for which he would be eternally grateful in the future, Ss, who had gathered and filled the sky with the energy of lightning, started bombarding the Pandemonium with his doomsday thunderbolts.

    Ss¡¯ n was very straightforward ¨C blindly bombard whatever matrices or boundaries in the Pandemonium with his most ferocious thunderbolts, hitting them with overwhelming brute power. Although the approach was simple, it was the most effective. The sky became brighter than the sun as it was lit up by countless thunderbolts. World-shaking explosions rumbled all around the Valley at every second.

    As a Sovereign of the Fringe, Ss was very annoyed that he needed to step in right from the start of an invasion. If it wasn¡¯t for the toxic miasma cloud covering the Valley, Ss wouldn¡¯t have gotten into action so soon. The presence of the toxic miasma cloud had frightened his troops. As long as the toxic cloud was present, they would be too afraid to proceed with the invasion.

    ¡°The fuck, that¡¯s too soon! I haven¡¯t had enough fun yet! There are still tons of demonic formations that they haven¡¯t touched. What is he so excited for?!¡± cursed Han Huo. He felt as though Ss wasn¡¯t ying by the rules.

    Zovic had a bitter smile as he exined, ¡°The toxic miasma cloud is just too strong. They couldn¡¯t ovee it and are not willing to just throw their lives away.¡±

    ¡°Old man, you should have told us earlier!¡± said Han Mu impolitely. ¡°This won¡¯t do. We need to kill more of his followers... Yes! We will make it look like the Pandemonium has been partially destroyed and bait them into the demonic formations!¡±

    ¡°Hahaha, fantastic idea! You sure are a sinister one, Han Mu!¡± cackled Han Huo.

    Han Mu put on an evil smirk as he connected his soul with the ancient trees that acted as the cruxes of demonic formations. The ancient trees started twisting their branches and shaking their lush leaves as though they were dancing.

    Ss¡¯ thunderbolts had been bombarding the Pandemonium for a while. They had made countless world-shaking explosions but the toxic miasma cloud remained above the Pandemonium. Ss grew more angered as time passed. He gathered even more lightning energy with even more power.

    Suddenly, the toxic miasma cloud that flooded the space above the Pandemonium seemed as though it was somehow being pulled by enormous suction power. They disappeared into the countless tiny holes all around the Valley.

    Ss stared nkly for a second before heughed nastily and shouted, ¡°Whatever energy tower or boundary that powered the toxic clouds have been destroyed by my lightning energy. Charge into the valley and ughter everyone! This time, that kid called Bryan will have nowhere to run!¡±

    Ss had absolute confidence in his strength. From his point of view, the defensive power of the Pandemonium was very limited. He assumed that no boundary or barrier could withstand the full st of his overgod power. Thinking that the defenses were down, he hadmanded his troops to go all-in right away.

    Ss¡¯ followers trusted him as much as he trusted himself. Ss had gone on rampages all around the Fringe for many years. No Fringedwellers nor barriers could withstand his lightning. The sudden disappearance of the toxic miasma cloud seemed to prove that Ss¡¯ judgment was correct.

    Those highgods who had suffered in the toxic miasma cloud had been waiting for this moment. Without any hesitation, theymanded all their subordinates to charge into the Pandemonium behind their lead. The entirety of Ss¡¯ troops descended into the Valley from every direction.

 Chapter 866 - My time to shine

    GDK 866: My time to shine

    Besides the Demonic Miasma Cloud that shrouded the Pandemonium, there were all kinds of even deadlier demonic formations deployed all around. If Ss intruded the Pandemonium, he would have hell to pay. As for his followers, well, they stood no fucking chance.

    ¡°Good, good! Hahaha, they are alling! This is wonderful!¡± eximed Han Mu.

    ¡°Hehe, Ss trusts his strength too much. He seems to believe that there are no defenses that he cannot destroy!¡± remarked Han Tu as he watched the stationary Ss through the spatial refraction mirror.

    Ss immediately stopped bombarding the Pandemonium when the toxic miasma cloud that shrouded the Valley disappeared. He hovered high in the sky and watched coldly as his followers assaulted the Pandemonium.

    After the veil of miasma lifted, the tranquil and heavenly Pandemonium wasid bare before their eyes. They saw the magnificent buildings erected with green, towering trees covering every inch of the Valley.

    Without the miasma cloud, Ss was able to clearly see the exposed Valley. He found neitherplicated boundaries norrge arrays of energy towers. Without those things, the Valley shouldn¡¯t have much defensive power left. The Pandemonium should have crumbled like a piece of paper against his overwhelming troops.

    All the signs seemed to show that the toxic miasma cloud was the onlyyer of protection. Without it, the Pandemonium was like a naked beauty tied to a tree, defenseless and powerless against her attackers.

    Ss had not joined his troops in advancing into the Pandemonium because he was somewhat wary about Han Shuo. He had witnessed Han Shuo surviving the Demonic Cmity on his Empyrean Peak and the scene had left asting impression in his mind. Ss intended to preserve as much energy as possible to handle Han Shuo who might be hiding in the Valley.

    Those followers of Ss descended upon the Pandemonium. But as they went down, they noticed that the clear and unobstructed view had suddenly transformed into a hazy atmosphere and the visibility drastically fell.

    The sumptuous structures and beautiful scenery they saw from a distance was actually created by an illusion formation. They had been fooled. And now that they were inside, it would be toote to do anything, even if they realized it.

    It did not take long before Ss¡¯ troops lost their bearings. They found themselves surrounded by chilling winds and blood-curdling shrieks. Suddenly, they noticed that they seemed to have stepped into another dimension and theirrades were missing...

    Some of them managed tond on the valley floor but the shrubs that grew on it caught them by surprise and entangled them like thousands of snakes. Their leaves cut like des and had a jade-green luster as though they carried noxious toxins...

    Others found themselves in the center of a wild thunderstorm. Then, out of nowhere, clones of themselves attacked them with sheer savagery. Those whocked strong minds and willpower immediately fell apart. The enormous pressure would make them lose their minds and sink into madness...

    Countless miraculous demonic formations were activated. Ss¡¯ troops were trapped in those formations. Many of them could not react to the bizarre attack methods that originated from another universe and quickly lost their lives.

    Extremely miserable shrieks echoed from the Pandemonium. Any listener would feel their blood run cold.

    ¡°Wahahahah...¡± Under the Pandemonium, the Five Elite Zombies were rolling on the floorughing. They were extremely delighted to watch those people fall into their traps and be ughtered.

    Rose, Romon, Zovic, and others, through the spatial mirror before them, saw the intruders massacred by all kinds of bizarre energies inside the demonic formations. They were pleasantly surprised.

    ¡°Indeed, the power Master possesses is beyond the limits of our imagination!¡± said Romon admiringly.

    ¡°So, after all, we have been worrying for nothing! Hehe, in the future, if we are to run into any danger, we have just got to make it back to the Pandemonium and we will have nothing to be afraid of. No one can touch us while we are inside this sanctuary!¡° said Goron. Any signs of anxiety he expressed earlier were now gone.

    ¡°After this carnage, the experts under Ss¡¯mand will diminish even further. Even if he ends up conquering our base, he will be the weakest of the Sovereigns. Haha, serves him right for offending our Master!¡± said the crafty-looking Zovic, beaming ear to ear.

    Through the spatial mirror before them, they could clearly see everything happening in every corner of the Pandemonium, including Ss¡¯ followers who were being butchered one after another. Even those highgod Fringedwellers could not resist the bizarre attacks from numerous demonic formations.

    ¡°There, what are they doing?¡± asked Rose as she pointed to a group of Fringedwellers who were trapped in and of fantasy. They were attacking empty spaces like rabid dogs.

    ¡°Wait, are they killing each other? What¡¯s going on over there?¡± Goron was also puzzled by what he saw in another demonic formation. Those Fringedwellers who were supposed to berades were fighting and killing each other as though they were mortal enemies. Twenty-something Fringedwellers entered the demonic formation but only six remained. Most of those who perished in the hallucination formations were killed by their best friends or even their own rtives.

    ¡°Hehe, those formations have energy that messes with the mind. You will never understand their actions without being there yourself,¡± exined Han Mu before he smilingly suggested, ¡°You guys may step inside for a ride after this is over. Then you will see why they are acting like that.¡±

    ¡°You know what, I think I¡¯d rather not know. I get goosebumps all over just watching from the spatial mirror. I don¡¯t want to risk killing all my subordinates,¡± replied Goron as he waved his hands side to side. He dared not court death after witnessing the strange, diabolic nature of the Pandemonium.

    ¡°Haha, you sure are a sensible one, Goron!¡± mocked Zovic.

    ¡°I just don¡¯t want to die horribly,¡± replied Goron with a bitter smile.

    ***

    Although those under the Pandemonium were rxed, Ossora, who had been secretly observing the Valley could not feel more astonished. Although he was some distance away, Ossora could roughly make out the situation in the Valley. Those troops were being ughtered by all kinds of mysterious energies in the Pandemonium.

    Although Ossora was one of the Five Sovereigns, he knew nothing about the miraculous demonic arts that originated from this other universe. Everything he saw in the Pandemonium was unfathomable to him. No matter how carefully he observed the Valley or how hard he tried to decipher it, he was still nowhere close to understanding the enigma.

    The only thing he could make out from the Pandemonium was that souls were being reaped at every moment. It was a symphony of miserable shrieks being yed in prestissimo.

    The longer Ossora observed the Pandemonium, the more impressed he was by Han Shuo. He knew that even his own underground pce which he had spent thousands of years setting up did not possess such miraculous defensive power. Han Shuo had only been in the Fringe for just a few years yet he was able to transform the valley into a deadly meat grinder that could shred a thousand Fringedwellers. That was more than enough proof of Han Shuo¡¯s power.

    Ossora became even more determined not to get on Han Shuo¡¯s bad side. He thought that he should make use of this crisis to gain Han Shuo¡¯s favor.

    If Ossora could see what was happening in the Valley, then Ss, who was standing much closer to it, surely could. Ss had been taking a breath after ¡®destroying¡¯ the toxic miasma cloud. Soon aftermencing the invasion, he heard miserable shrieks that came from his men but he wasn¡¯t bothered by it as it was quite normal to lose a few lives.

    But when the miserable shrieks started getting louder and more frequent and popping up from every part of the Valley, Ss raised an eyebrow. Only then did he realize that something wasn¡¯t right. He scanned and examined the Valley and was surprised to find that it was filled with all kinds of unknown energies. Those bizarre energies were arranging and moving in strange orders, forming all kinds of miraculous attacks, rapidly ughtering his troops who were in the Valley.

    Ss was greatly rmed. By now, most of his troops had entered the Pandemonium and he could not indiscriminately bombard the Valley with his thunderbolts as he previously did. Rage filled his mind as he roared from above the Pandemonium, ¡°Everyone retreat!¡±

    But unfortunately for Ss and his followers, though it was easy to enter the Pandemonium, it was extremely difficult to get out. Ss¡¯ troops were currently trapped inside various demonic formations that they could not leave, other than through their own deaths. They were busy dealing with attacksing from ¡®themselves¡¯ and they couldn¡¯t even hear Ss¡¯ cry.

    Therefore, no matter how hard or how much Ss yelled from the sky, none of his troops left the demonic formations. In fact, they were dying at an increasing rate. The Pandemonium was covered with dead bodies!

    With things havinge to this, for theck of a better option, Ss descended into the Valley.

    Ss was an expert with overgod strength. Those demonic formations that relied on the energy of demon generals were unable to defeat the lightning energy that emzoned his divine body. They could not cause Ss any meaningful harm.

    The hallucination-inducing demonic formations, however, worked the same on Ss. They took Ss into thend of fantasy in a split second. But having ascended to the overgod realm, Ss¡¯ mind and willpower were extremely resilient, far surpassing those of his followers, not to mention that his overgod soul was nothing like a highgod soul.

    For these reasons, Ss was able to ovee the demonic formations in little time. He destroyed the formations one after another. Three demonic formations were soon demolished.

    ¡°Well, time for me to shine!¡± said Ossora. He put on a faint smile and stealthily flew closer to the Pandemonium.

 Chapter 867 - Re-emergence

    <h4>GDK 867: Re-emergence</h4>

    As one of the Sovereigns, Ss indeed was extremely valiant in strength. Only a few demonic formations could truly cause him harm. Ss was able to quickly ovee and destroy three demonic formations by means of his brute strength.

    But not all demonic formations in the Pandemonium were built the same. After destroying three small formations, Ss stepped into a great formation powered using the Five Yuan Elemental Energies with a formation crux made of five highgod demon generals.

    The elemental energies in the Pandemonium were much more concentrated than any other region. Ss noticed it as soon as he stepped into the Valley. He was able to ess more elements of lightning which increased his power. But right now, Ss was disconnected from the elements of lightning in the environment.

    A bizarre undtion spread around instantly after he stepped into the formation. Five energies surrounded him before quickly dispelling all the elements of lightning in the vicinity. Immediately, Ss knew he was in trouble.

    Unable to ess the energy of lightning in the Valley, Ss had no choice but to use the divine energy in his body to defend against every attack. He felt as though he had stepped into a foreign world. All kinds of attack methods he had never seen before bombarded him as though thousands of tsunamis.

    Inside this space that waspletely isted from the outside world, Ss could neither sense the auras of his followers nor see a thing through the barrier. He could only passively defend himself against the constant bombardment of the Five Yuan Elemental Energies, consuming the divine energy in his body to protect his divine body and soul from harm.

    Ossora who was about to step into the battle had his astonishment renewed as he discovered that Ss was not invincible to the Pandemonium. Gazing from high above the sky, he saw Ss suddenly sat cross-legged inside a region filled with brilliant lights. He was wearing a grave expression as though he was in deep trouble.

    Ossora did not expect that the Pandemonium could pose a real threat to Ss. After seeing the sudden change in the situation, Ossora halted on his path and decided to not rush to be the hero. He again concealed himself and continued to observe the battle.

    ¡°Ss has fallen into a formation designed to exhaust the enemy¡¯s energy. He is being sted by the Yuan Energies that the Pandemonium has been gathering. Inside the great formation, he cannot use the lightning energy in the environment and is forced to utilize his divine energy to defend himself,¡± exined Han Mu to the party.

    ¡°I¡¯m sure that before Ss could escape from the formation, more than half of his troops would have died. That is the price for trying to invade the Pandemonium!¡± said Han Huo.

    Han Jin sighed and instructed Rose and the party, ¡°Please get ready, it seems that we will have to evacuate the Pandemonium, after all. Sigh, I wonder how Father is doing and why he hasn¡¯t returned yet.¡±

    ¡°Huh? Isn¡¯t Ss still trapped in the formation? Why do we have to evacuate?¡± asked the confused Rose.

    ¡°Yea, look at Ss¡¯ grave expression. It¡¯s clear that he¡¯s in great pressure. It might be able to trap him indefinitely!¡± Romon also did not understand why they were asked to evacuate.

    ¡°If the Pandemonium has existed for hundreds, or maybe thousands of years, the formation could keep Ss trapped until he exhausted all his energy. But, s, the Pandemonium was built just two years ago and it had only managed to umte a tiny amount of Yuan Energies. The energy umted so far could only hold Ss for half an hour, at most,¡± exined Han Jin disappointedly.

    ¡°There¡¯s nothing more that we can do. In half an hour, the Yuan Energies in the Pandemonium would be exhausted and most of the formations would stop functioning. But as long as we are alive, there is hope. We will take revenge when Father re-emerges!¡± said Han Tu before he turned to Goron and instructed, ¡°I will open a tunnel that goes a hundred meters deeper into the ground. Ask your men to get ready to evacuate.¡±

    Following Han Jin and Han Tu¡¯s exnations, Romon, Rose, and the others no longer had any doubts. The Five Elite Zombies, as the co-architects and builders of the Pandemonium, knew the demonic formations inside out. Rose realized the gravity of the situation after hearing their exnation.

    ¡°Ok, right away!¡± replied Goron before he hastily left themand center.

    ¡°Sigh, it¡¯s been many months. Why hasn¡¯t there been any news about father yet?¡± sighed Han Shui. He knew that if Han Shuo was at the Pandemonium, using the Yuan Energy avable and the thousands of demon generals in the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, Ss would likely never step out of the great formation.

    ¡°Father will return! And when the timees, humph, it will be the death of Ss!¡± said Han Huo gnashing his teeth. The Five of them had taken a ton of effort and energy to build the Pandemonium. They felt very reluctant to abandon the Valley, knowing that it will soon be destroyed by Ss.

    ¡°Everyone, get ready, we are leaving soon,¡± said Han Mu as he gestured around. Then, suddenly, his mind jolted. He closed his eyes and carefully sensed for a moment before he opened his eyes in rm. He shouted, ¡°Evacuate immediately! There is a very powerful life aura hiding nearby and he is no weaker than Ss!¡±

    Not just Rose, Romon, and Zovic, but even the other four Elite Zombies were terrified to hear that news. Facing one Sovereign was bad enough. Two Sovereigns would be disastrous.

    There had been many rumors about Ss spreading around the Fringe. One of the hearsays told that Ss had gone to Logue and Wasir, and the Sovereigns had reached a certain agreement. Rose and the others, who had heard of this rumor, automatically assumed that the mighty being in hiding was one of the two Sovereigns.

    ¡°Evacuate immediately, or we will suffer great casualties!¡± shouted Han Tu as he pointed to a deep dark tunnel under his feet.

    ¡°Wait!¡± Han Mu shouted again with one hand raised, gesturing the party to halt. Han Mu turned still and closed his eyes. Everyone in the room froze and stared at him in pin-drop silence.

    After a while, Han Mu opened his eyes again and said to the party in a puzzled face, ¡°It is Ossora. He just cast his soul energy towards the Valley, wanting to know if Father is here. I have acquired a connection with him and he said he will help us fight Ss. Do you think he can be trusted?¡±

    Han Mu cultivated the energy of life and possessed a wonderful connection with all trees and nts in the Pandemonium. His soul was also vastly different from that of an ordinary life energy cultivator. Therefore, Han Mu could sense Ossora¡¯s soul andmunicate with soul transmission.

    Outside the Pandemonium, Ossora was again surprised. When he first received a reply of soul transmission, he thought that Han Shuo was hiding in the Pandemonium. The soul energy he cast towards the Valley was very faint. No one should be able to detect the very minute energy undtion, save for another expert of his ss.

    But when Ossora received the soul message asking ¡®Who are you¡¯, he instantly realized that the being he detected wasn¡¯t Han Shuo. He had met Han Shuo once and knew that Han Shuo¡¯s soul felt much more sinister and dark, vastly different from Han Mu¡¯s energetic and jolly soul.

    The twomunicated using their souls and Ossora revealed his intention. He did not expect that Han Shuo would have an expert with such great soul-sensing ability. This made him even more determined to help those in the Pandemonium.

    ¡°Ossora?¡± Zovic raised one brow and exined, ¡°Master once had a meeting with him in the Omphalos. He also gifted Master one of his Sovereign Shops. He seemed determined to befriend us. If this Sovereign would step up for us, we might not need to evacuate.¡±

    ¡°But, can he be trusted?¡± Han Mu seemed skeptical. He asked, ¡°What¡¯s his reputation like in the Fringe?¡±

    ¡°Hmm... He¡¯s rtively low-profile and of the Five Sovereigns, Ossora is the most polite. I think he is sincere in helping us, ¡° replied Zovic.

    ¡°We cannot take this risk. Proceed with the evacuation,¡± said Han Jin after he thought for a moment, ¡°Little Wood, tell Ossora that we are evacuating. If he really wants to help us, stop Ss from destroying the Pandemonium.¡±

    ¡°Got it!¡± Han Mu closed his eyes andmunicated with Ossora. A dozen secondster, Han Mu opened his eyes and smilingly said, ¡°Ossora agreed. Let¡¯s go!¡±

    The party was rather perplexed. They did not understand why Ossora would take so much effort to help them. However, as they were in a hurry, they did not discuss the topic. The Pandemonians began flying into the underground tunnel that Han Tu made.

    ***

    Inside a mountain range, several thousand miles from the Empyrean Peak was a piece of ky drynd.

    Just months ago, thend was saturated with water and sludgy. Any beasts or humans that identally stepped on it would sink into the mud. But now, thend was as dry as bone.

    Under the cold night sky, strange cracking noises started ying from under the ground. Momentster, there was an explosion. As though a stick of dynamite was nted under the ground and ignited, dirt was sent flying in every direction and a crater was formed.

    A majestic, masculine naked figure was revealed as the dust settled. He had a pair of chilling, sinister gazes but had a faint, amiable smile on his face. He carried a demonic yet bewitching demeanor.

    He raised his head and gazed at the clear cold sky and said to himself, ¡°Although the realm state is not stable and I have yet to fullyprehend my new power, it is enough to take care of Ss!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Han Shuo shot into the sky and flew towards the Empyrean Peak at an unfathomable speed.

    The Empyrean Peak was thousands of miles away but Han Shuo took just moments toplete the journey.

    However, Han Shuo discovered that there wasn¡¯t a soul on the Mountain. He stood on the Mountain and thought for a moment. Suddenly, his face jolted and he immediately rushed towards the Pandemonium.

 Chapter 868 - Rushing to the Pandemonium

    GDK 868: Rushing to the Pandemonium

    Han Shuo realized that Ss would do everything within his means to find him and while doing so, Ss would locate the Pandemonium. It would just be a matter of time.

    Han Shuo had a good understanding of Ss¡¯ strength and the defensive power of the Pandemonium. The demonic formations in the Pandemonium could stall Ss for a while but it definitely could not kill him. Han Shuo was worried that Rose and the Five Elite Zombies who lived in the Valley might lose their lives.

    Therefore, Han Shuo rushed to the Pandemonium with all his strength, hoping that he wouldn¡¯t be toote to the scene.

    But Han Shuo had underestimated the intelligence and treacherousness of his five kiddos. He also did not expect that Ossora would defend the Pandemonium for him.

    While Han Shuo was rushing towards the Pandemonium at the speed of light, Ss¡¯ troops were being massacred in the Valley. It was like a scene from Hell.

    At the center of the Pandemonium was a monolith carved with the Cauldron¡¯s outline. Mysterious lights flowed through the etching like blood through a living organism. When Ss¡¯ experts perished, their divine souls would float into the monolith in the form of thin smoke.

    A soul-gathering formation and a storage formation were deployed on the monolith. It was made so that Cauldron Spirit could collect the divine souls of Pandemonium intruders even while he was away. Then, when Han Shuoter returned to the Valley, he could collect the souls and process them. With that, those perished souls wouldn¡¯t just dissipate and go to waste.

    Ss was at that moment wearing a grave expression, still trapped in a demonic formation. The divine energy in his body was being rapidly consumed to defend against the energies bombarding him from every direction.

    The Yuan Energies which powered most of the demonic formations in the Pandemonium was directed to the formation that trapped Ss. This caused the lesser demonic formations to fall in their destructiveness and the pressure faced by those trapped in them was likewise reduced. With that, some of Ss¡¯ troops managed to escape death.

    Under the Pandemonium, Goron and his subordinates had left using the emergency escape tunnel that Earth Elite Zombie made. Only the Five Elite Zombies, Rose, Romon, and Zovic had yet to leave.

    ¡°That¡¯s almost everyone. It¡¯s our turn to evacuate,¡± remarked Romon.

    Han Mu, Han Huo, Han Shui, Han Tu, Han Jin, and Rose were reluctant to leave the Valley which they had fallen in love with. This was especially true for the Five Elite Zombies who helped in constructing the ce. They had truly considered the Valley their home. Their hearts ached when they considered the likely scenario that it would soon be destroyed by Ss.

    ¡°I think Ossora will stop Ss as he promised. Don¡¯t grieve about it, the base will be fine,¡± Zovic consoled the party.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go,¡± sighed Han Tu somewhat mncholically, ¡°If worstes to worst, we¡¯ll just take another two years to rebuild it. It¡¯s no big deal!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s move. I hope Ossora will keep the ce mostly intact,¡± said Han Jin before he stepped into the evacuation tunnel.

    With nothing else they could do, the remaining Pandemonians escaped into the tunnel. The tunnel was sealed and no one else was present in the Pandemonium but Ss and his troops.

    *** Ten minutester.

    Ss heaved a long sigh of relief, for the bizarre energies had suddenly stopped bombarding him. He felt the brief joy of escaping death.

    Ss did not know that the Pandemonium had only collected a limited amount of Yuan Energies and the formation could not trap him indefinitely. Still, it had used up plenty of Ss¡¯ divine energy. At that trend, he would bepletely depleted of his divine energy within five days.

    Ss got on his feet and gazed around. He was surprised to find that most of the demonic formations had stopped operating. He also saw and filled with the bodies of his troops.

    Before the assault, the invading force gathered by Ss was nearly a thousand gods strong. But after the carnage, less than three hundred experts were left alive, most of whom were wounded and exhausted.

    Ss had waged countless wars and battles in the Fringe for eons but never had he suffered a defeat as crushing as he did this day. More than half his troops were killed but he had not even seen the silhouette of Han Shuo, his main objective.

    He had already lost a great number of his troops to the Empyrean Peak attack several months ago. Coupled with the losses he suffered today, he had almost no army left. To a Sovereign like him, nothing could be more humiliating.

    ¡°Search the Valley! Kill anyone you find! Do not leave an ant alive!¡±manded Ss with a dark face, determined to exterminate Han Shuo and his people.

    Those troops of Ss who were fortunate enough to survive dragged their weary arms and legs and wandered all around the Valley warily, attempting to find their enemies and finish them, hoping that it would mollify Ss.

    This bizarre Valley had annihted more than half of them. But throughout the invasion, they had not even met a single person of the defenders. The experience had shaken them to the core.

    Those exhausted survivors took great pains to search every chamber and tunnel there was but they could not find Rose, the Five Elite Zombies, or the other Pandemonians who had evacuated the Valley. After half an hour of pointless searching, the followers of Ss returned to their Sovereign with their heads drooped.

    ¡°My Lord, there is not a single person!¡±

    ¡°... it¡¯s empty, nothing valuable is left!¡±

    ¡°My Lord, what should we do?¡±

    ¡°...¡±

    Ss became so livid that the blood vessels in his brain nearly burst. He took great effort in gathering his followers from all over the Fringe to invade the Valley. Although he had sessfully captured it, his enemy had managed to escape. All those men he sent to death had been for naught. If the outside world were to learn of this, it would be a fatal blow to Ss¡¯ reputation. He could start nning his retirement already.

    ¡°Destroy it, destroy everything. Raze it to nothingness,¡±manded Ss as he gritted his teeth. By now, even Ss wondered how he should face the world after suffering such humiliation.

    At this moment, those troops of Ss had flickering lights in their eyes as they gazed at him. They started to suspect that the Sovereign that they so trusted might not be as terrifying as they had imagined. He judged the situation poorly and had given erroneousmands that directly contributed to the deaths of theirrades.

    ¡°I said, destroy everything!¡± bellowed an enraged Ss as though he had read his followers¡¯ thoughts.

    Ss¡¯ followers were shocked and they hastily went back into the Pandemonium to execute his orders.

    ¡°Long time no see, Ss!¡± It was then that Ossora slowly walked out from the darkness with an almost mocking smile on his face.

    Ss squinted and coldly asked, ¡°Ossora, why are you here?¡±

    ¡°To persuade you,¡± Ossora exined. ¡°The owner of this ce has spent a considerable amount of resources to build it. He wishes that you will not destroy this amazing Valley.¡±

    Ss¡¯ voice grew deeper and he impolitely replied, ¡±Has your brain been clogged with dirt? Bryan¡¯s presence in the Fringe will only upset the current order we have established for countless years. How could you side with him? Don¡¯t tell me that you want to cut out some of your possessions of the Fringe and share it with Bryan?¡±

    Ossora shook his head smilingly and replied, ¡°Of course not. But it seems to me that Bryan isn¡¯t interested in us. It¡¯s just you who got unlucky.¡±

    Ss was not in a good mood and couldn¡¯t take Ossora¡¯s sneering. He angrily shouted, ¡°Ossora, what exactly do you want? You want to defend that outsider?!¡±

    ¡°Well, not really. If you had killed Bryan, I couldn¡¯t care less if you destroy this ce. But now, I¡¯ve promised someone to look after this Valley. So please do me the honor and kindly leave without destroying the ce,¡± replied Ossora in a polite manner.

    ¡°You short-sighted fool!¡± Ss angrily shouted, ¡°Fine, let¡¯s see if you can stop me!¡± Ss rolled up his sleeves, ready to fight.

    The smile on Ossora¡¯s face did not fade. He chuckled as he said, ¡°Ss, oh Ss. Can¡¯t you see that it is very unwise to fight me now? You have spent plenty of your divine energy in the Pandemonium and what little followers you have left can¡¯t assist you. You should reconsider your choice.¡±

    ¡°Cut the crap. I¡¯m going toy this valley to waste. No one can stop me!¡± shouted Ss angrily before he attacked Ossora.

    Ss¡¯ troops were incredibly exhausted after barely surviving the demonic formations. Many of them were injured and far from top form. If they were to stand nearby while two overgods fought, they were bound to be severely wounded, if not killed, by the overwhelming stray energies and shockwaves produced. Therefore, those troops of Ss who were prepared to destroy the Pandemonium hastily withdrew to a safe distance.

    Ossora saw that a fight was inevitable. Lest the shockwaves destroy the Pandemonium as they fought, Ossora decided to take it elsewhere.

    Ss at this moment was nearly deranged out of rage. He charged after Ossora without thinking.

    Lightning bolts expanded and filled the sky in an instant before converging towards Ossora who was standing on the ground. In response, Ossora congealed two enormous monsters using clouds of dust and intercepted the lightning bolts.

    Two overgods started fighting near the Pandemonium. Deafening explosions shook both the sky and ground constantly. The terrifying lightning and earth energies shed and destroyed two mountains near the Valley in the process.

    The battle between two overgods would usually take a long time. The two Sovereigns were about evenly matched and would take at least one or two days before a winner might emerge.

    The other three Sovereigns simultaneously felt a major energy undtion. Following their senses, Tyre, Logue, and Wasir rushed towards the Pandemonium without the slightest hesitation.

 Chapter 869 - A gathering of experts

    GDK 869: A gathering of experts

    Ss¡¯ followers were fleeing from the Pandemonium, trying to get as far as possible.

    The battle between Ossosa and Ss had produced tremendous energy fluctuations. As they were overgods with simr strengths, it would take a while before a victor emerged.

    The terrifying undtion of elemental energies had alerted many of the experts around the Fringe. They followed their senses and flew towards the Pandemonium, hoping to find out what was happening.

    The tremendous shockwave shook the earth and prated deep underground. Han Tu, who was paving a tunnel for the Pandemonians to escape, suddenly stopped moving and closed his eyes to sense. It took him no time to understand what was happening above the Pandemonium.

    Han Tu and the others had begun their evacuation before Ossora and Ss started their battle. They were currently under a in that was hundreds of miles from the Pandemonium.

    ¡°It looks like we might not have to flee after all!¡± Han Tu seemed pleasantly surprised by something. He said to Goron, ¡°I¡¯m turning back to take a look. You and your men will stay here for now. Don¡¯t worry, I believe Ss is now too upied to deal with us!¡±

    ¡°Why? What¡¯s happening?¡± Goron was confused. Although his strength was greater than Han Tu¡¯s, his sensitivity to the earth element wasn¡¯t as great and he couldn¡¯t sense the minute undtion of the earth element.

    ¡°Ss and Ossora are fighting! WIth Ossora¡¯s help, Ss will be too busy to trample the Pandemonium!¡± exined Han Tu with a big smile before he started flying to the other end of the underground tunnel.

    Han Tu took no time to reach Han Mu, Han Huo, Rose, and the others who were at the other end. He immediately informed them that Ossora and Ss were in a great battle.

    As they were deep underground and a good distance away from the Pandemonium, they were clueless about what was happening above the Valley. Not even Han Mu could sense the soul undtion of Ossora. They were pleasantly surprised to hear the news from Han Tu and asked synchronously, ¡°Really?!¡±

    Han Tu nodded affirmatively and exined, ¡°Only an expert at Ossora¡¯s realm could produce such an intense earth energy undtion when utilizing earth energy. He must be helping us!¡±

    ¡°Then what are we waiting for? Let¡¯s turn back and take a look!¡± said Han Huo cheerfully. He too turned around and flew back towards the Pandemonium.

    The battle near the Pandemonium produced an extreme amount of shockwaves and explosions. Experts in the vicinity with strength above a certain realm could detect the energy fluctuation. In the entire Land of Chaos, there were only a few experts who could detect the disturbance from a great distance.

    Every super-powerful expert who detected the battle between two overgods through the abnormality of elemental energies in the environment put down whatever that they were doing and rushed to the Pandemonium.

    *** Near a volcanic crater, Han Hao was wearing a calm face while hiding in ambush against a powerful force.

    The powermanded by Han Hao had substantially increased after he subdued Polo. It had grown to be greater than the majority of powerhouses in the Fringe. Only a few in the Fringe were inmand of forcesrger than Han Hao¡¯s.

    ¡°What should we do?¡± Polo, crouching beside Han Hao, asked very softly.

    Before them was a group of experts who served Sovereign Logue. It was led by ate-stage highgod of light. They were rather rxed and not vignt to their surroundings as no Fringedweller dared mess with them, until today.

    Logue was known for his treacherousness in the Fringe. He was no less frightening than the vengeful Ss. Normally speaking, his followers could do whatever they wanted in the Fringe and no one would even think about attacking them. Even Polo who had lived in the Fringe for many years had never thought about attacking a follower of Sovereign Logue. Han Hao, however, decided to ambush one right after he agglomerated Polo¡¯s faction into his.

    ¡°Kill,¡±manded Han Hao without any hesitation.

    Polo hardened his heart, turned around, and gestured. The godhunters received hismand and descended from the volcanic crater. Those followers of Sovereign Logue were surrounded and immediately attacked without the chance to engage in inconsequential talks.

    ¡°We will join hands in killing that guy. This will be a smooth ride once he¡¯s dead,¡± eximed Han Hao as he pointed at the arrogant-looking highgod of light.

    ¡°Understood,¡± replied Polo. He had learned to follow Han Hao¡¯smand without question.

    Han Hao and Polo emerged and, without uttering a word, they started attacking their target with their full strengths. The highgod of light, as expected, tried threatening them with Logue. However, Han Hao and Polo ignored his words and finished him in less than half a minute. All his troops were defeated by the godhunters and their divine energy was devoured.

    While the godhunters relished in the joy of consuming divine energy, Han Hao suddenly bunched his brows. He raised his head towards the sky and closed his eyes. Momentster, he abruptly opened his eyelids and revealed a pair of sinister glowing eyes. Hemanded, ¡°I will give you all ten minutes before we start moving.¡±

    ¡°But, Chief, that¡¯s not enough time for us to devour all their energy,¡± said the confused Polo.

    ¡°Ten minutes!¡± said Han Hao assertively. He seemed rather impatient.

    Polo had been in contact with Han Hao for some time but he had never seen him being so impatient. He understood that something major must have happened. With that, he raised no further objection butmanded his subordinates to make the most of the time.

    Precisely ten minutester, without uttering a word, Han Hao started flying towards the Pandemonium. His troops followed closely behind him.

    ***

    Back at the Pandemonium, the great battle was still ongoing. Ossora and Ss did not expect so many experts would gather around them.

    By now, Ossora¡¯s purpose in fighting Ss had changed slightly. His goal was no longer just to help Han Shuo defend the Pandemonium.

    Although all Five Sovereigns were overgods, most people would still try to guess which among them was the strongest.

    To most Fringedwellers, Tyre was known to be the strongest Sovereign while the other four were of about the same strength. It was thanks to this preconception that the super-experts from all over Elysium would tend to enlist themselves in Tyre¡¯s army instead of the other Sovereigns. This caused Tyre¡¯s power to grow stronger and stronger.

    If Ossora could defeat Ss, then he would have proven to the world that he was stronger than Ss, Logue, and Wasir. Then he might be known to the Fringedwellers as possessing strength rivaling that of Tyre.

    The real reason the Five Sovereigns had been constantly fighting was for reputation. In the Land of Chaos where might makes right, having a fearsome reputation was very beneficial as it would sway the to-be-Fringedwellers to submit to their rule, growing their power.

    Ss had squandered the power of faith from billions of his worshippers during the battle against Han Shuo a few months back and he had just used up a good amount of divine energy on the Pandemonium. To Ossora, this was the perfect opportunity to defeat Ss and gain greater infamy. Of course he would not let go of the opportunity.

    Ss was rather impetuous. If it was Logue who was in such a situation, he wouldn¡¯t have fought Ossora for it was clear to this treacherous Sovereign who knew how to restrain himself that the odds were stacked against him.

    But Ss cared nothing about these things. His mind was affixed with making retribution. All those who infringed upon his Sovereignty must pay back tenfold in blood.

    For these reasons, it was unlikely that the two Sovereigns would stop fighting anytime soon.

    The great disturbance over the Pandemonium had attracted various experts located nearby. However, they dared not get too close to the battlefield but gazed from a great distance. They could not see the battle clearly and could only determine the battle progress through the fluctuation of elemental energies.

    Battles between overgods were extremely rare. Most ordinary divine beings would never have the opportunity to witness one in their lifetime. To a highgod who wished to further advance to the next realm, this was a once in a blue moon opportunity. By observing the battle between two overgods, they could possiblye to enlightenment and gain a more profound knowledge of those energies, and potentially unravel a few mysteries of the overgod realm.

    Everyte-stage highgod expert wanted to break through this nearly insurmountable cultivation hurdle. If they were to reach the overgod realm, they would possess even greater strength, enjoy even greater perks, and gain an even greater following. The temptations were much too strong to resist.

    Therefore, gods from every region of the Fringe had gathered around the Pandemonium to witness the world-shaking battle of two overgods.

    Some stringers had boldly ventured into the Pandemonium and discovered that it was covered with bodies. They sold the news to those gods who gathered near the Pandemonium and made a handsome profit. The Fringedwellers were surprised by what they learned and started discussing it with those around them.

    All those dead bodies were Ss¡¯ followers. Not a single of the perished came from the Pandemonium. Even one without a brain could deduce what the information meant.

    Those observers suddenly became very curious and on guard towards the Pandemonium. They reminded themselves that they should not offend the Pandemonians unless they wanted trouble too great for them to afford.

    A day passed and the battle grew only fiercer. The sky was filled with lightning bolts that slithered all around while thend was as tumultuous as the sea during a storm. Deafening explosions and powerful shockwaves repeatedly came from the region as lightning and earth energies in different forms would sh at every second.

    On that day, a fat guy with a faint harmonious smile appeared above the Pandemonium. His small eyes glittered with astonished lights as he gazed at Ossora and Ss who were fighting in the distance.

    A highgod of death sensed the changes in the energy of death in the environment. Upon raising his head and looking, he cried out in rm, ¡°It is Sovereign Logue! He¡¯s here!¡±

    The crowd simultaneously raised their heads to look in the same direction and they saw the beaming fatty. Their faces jolted and they left the area without making a noise, as though afraid of waking a sleeping monster.

 Chapter 870 - Nobody leaves!

    GDK 870: Nobody leaves!

    Logue¡¯s arrival had terrified many of the observers. They scurried away to keep a distance from the Sovereign.

    As Logue did nothing to deliberately hide the mighty aura on his body, the two battling overgods sensed his presence as soon as he reached the Pandemonium. Both Ss and Ossora were shocked and grew wary when attacking each other. They were afraid that the treacherous Logue mightunch a sneak attack on them.

    Sovereign Wasir arrived a few hours after Logue. His arrival caused chilling winds to blow over the Pandemonium and the surrounding temperature to drop.

    When Logue and Wasir showed up at the Pandemonium, many of the bystanders felt threatened and made a distance from them. While some decided to leave, some hid behind narrow slits on mountain walls and other ces to watch the fight.

    ¡°Haha, I couldn¡¯t have imagined this ¨C Ss and Ossora fighting over a nobody! It seems the Fringe has been peaceful for far too long. Everyone¡¯s looking for a little excitement,¡± remarked Logue with a faint smile as he gazed at the battle.

    Wasir turned his frigid gaze at Logue who was hovering nearby and calmly remarked, ¡°Ossora failed to see the bigger picture. How foolish of him to help an outsider.¡±

    Logue turned to Wasir and beamed. He said, ¡°The way I see it, helping that youngster is just an excuse. I reckon his real intention is to show everyone that he¡¯s stronger.¡±

    Upon hearing those words, Wasir groaned and disdainfully said, ¡°That¡¯s very sneaky of Ossora. But if he defeats Ss, are you going to seize the opportunity to fight him?¡±

    Logue seemed stunned. He shook his head and answered, ¡°I¡¯m too busy to do that, but it sure sounds like you are interested in doing so. You should go ahead with it!¡±

    ¡°Too busy? Then what do youe all the way here for?¡± Wasir smirked and said, ¡°If I were to attack Ossora, you will just sit there and watch until we are both injured before jumping in and attacking both of us. Hehe, nice try, Logue!¡±

    ¡°Oh Wasir, you¡¯re being paranoid!¡± replied Logue as though wrongfully used ¨C as though he did not harbor the malicious scheme.

    Wasir scoffed and said nothing more. The Five Sovereigns knew each other well, not just in their strengths but also their personalities. Logue was the kind of person who may appear polite and friendly on the surface as he wove his treacherous schemes. But when the time came, when the perfect opportunity presented itself, he would ruthlessly murder without the slightest hesitation.

    If Logue wasn¡¯t there, after Ss and Ossora were done fighting, Wasir might attack the victor. But with Logue there, Wasir dared not rush into action for he was afraid of ending up bing Logue¡¯s victim.

    While Logue and Wasir were chatting, Ss and Ossora continued to fight. Ss and Ossora were evenly matched in strength. But things changed after Ss had effectively destroyed several of his power of faith supply streams during the battle with Han Shuo and after Ss exhausted a good amount of his divine energy to the Pandemonium.

    Therefore, at this stage of the battle, Ss had started to show signs of tiring. Ossora had been employing defensive measures from the beginning of the battle. He used the tremendous defensive power of the earth energy to neutralize Ss¡¯ lightning bolts, wearing down Ss¡¯ energy. Then, as the battle went on, when Ss started showing signs that he was getting low in his divine energy reserves, Ossora finally turned from defensive to offensive.

    One was energetic while the other was exhausted. After many hours into the battle of attrition, Ss finally realized the bad situation he was in. Ossora¡¯s attacks had be fiercer and fiercer and Ss started having trouble dealing with it. Slowly but surely, Ss was losing the battle.

    Most of the bystanders were unable to observe the fight visually. However, they could determine which side had the upper hand by inferring the intensity of elemental energies around them.

    When the battle started, the environment was flooded with the energy of lightning. Bright shes of lightning bolts had set the sky aze while the earth energy seemed rather weak. However, as time went by, the spectators noticed that the tide was slowly turning. The lightning energy was growing weaker while the earth energy was growing thicker.

    From that, the spectators understood that Ss was losing the battle. They did not know that Ossora started the battle with an advantage over Ss and came to the conclusion that Ossora was stronger than Ss.

    That little observation alone was enough to have a great impact on the Sovereigns¡¯ careers. From this moment onwards, the unaffiliated ferocious gods from all Twelve Dominions who stepped into the Fringe would choose to serve Ossora over Ss, simply because the former seemed slightly stronger.

    Four of the Five Sovereigns had gathered above the Pandemonium. Only Tyre, the supposedly strongest Sovereign, had yet to show up.

    The battle continued and soon it was midnight. Ss showed obvious signs of wear and trouble resisting Ossora¡¯s attacks. However, it seemed as though Ss wasn¡¯t going to resign. It seemed as though he had gone nuts and was determined to drag Ossora to Hell even if it meant his death.

    Ossora, meanwhile, although winning the battle, wasn¡¯t feeling the slightest sense of joy. He knew Ss¡¯ unreasonable temper and that Ss was the kind of person who would fight his enemy till the death. If Logue and Wasir were not there, Ossora might be willing to fight Ss till one of them was dead.

    However, Ossora knew that neither Logue nor Wasir were honorable characters. If he were to fight Ss till the end and even if he ended up winning, he might have to face attacks from Logue and Wasir when he was at his weakest. Ossora didn¡¯t know if he could even escape from the two of them when he would have little energy left.

    And even if Ossora could escape from Logue and Wasir, the two of them would know that he was injured and would attack his underground pce without hesitation. They would do all they could to destroy Ossora¡¯s forces while he hid to recover. This was not an oue that Ossora desired.

    Therefore, Ossora who was winning the battle started to grow hesitant. He was feeling even more worried than Ss was.

    ¡°I don¡¯t think we should keep fighting!¡± Ossora suddenly retreated to a distance and said to the gasping Ss with a bitter frown, ¡°Wasir and Logue are here. If we are to fight to the end, it won¡¯t end well for either of us.¡±

    ¡°Ossora, I won¡¯t let you off for kicking me while I¡¯m wounded!¡± shouted Ss furiously. Ossora jolted for he thought that Ss was going to stake his life and fight till the end. ¡°But I will let you off for now. I will look for you at your underground pce when I have recovered!¡± Ss coldly groaned after taking a cold nce at the spectating Logue and Wasir.

    Although Ss was impetuous in personality, he was sane enough to tell that he was not in a good position. Logue and Wasir still possessed full strength. If he was to keep fighting Ossora, in the end, both of them would end up badly injured or dead.

    ¡°Huh? Why have you two stopped fighting?¡± cried Logue, making a fuss about nothing. ¡°The battle isn¡¯t over yet! Ss, this isn¡¯t how you usually behave!¡±

    ¡°Wasir, and you, Logue, have the two of you forgotten what you¡¯ve promised?¡± shouted Ss as he nced angrily at the two Sovereigns who had been passively watching the fight. He stared ferociously at Logue as he said, ¡°Didn¡¯t we have an agreement? Why didn¡¯t you assist me?¡±

    Logue chuckled and replied, ¡°Oh yes, we have agreed to help you, but keep in mind that we only said to help you against the outsider called Bryan. We have never promised to help you fight Ossora. Hehe. Besides, I have been friends with Ossora for as many years as I have been with you. How could I do something so unfaithful to my friend?¡±

    Ossora put on a fake smile as he listened to Logue¡¯s false words. After Logue finished talking, Ossora smilingly said, ¡°Alright, I think it¡¯s time we all go home.¡±

    By now, even Ss felt so ashamed of his failures that he no longer wished to destroy the Pandemonium but to leave the scene as soon as possible.

    ¡°Just you wait, Ossora, I will find you at your underground pce very soon!¡± threatened Ss coldly before he gestured andmanded his troops, ¡°Return to the Empyrean Peak!¡±

    Those followers of Ss hung their heads dispiritedly. As followers of Ss, their interests were directly impacted by their Sovereign¡¯s downfall. Those recent months had been absolute shit to them. With so many of theirrades having perished and their Sovereign Ss having appeared weaker than Ossora, they wondered if they could still live prosperously in the Fringe.

    ¡°Nobody leaves without my permission!¡± a roar suddenly sounded from a distance. Then, a majestic figure appeared in the blink of an eye, hovering proudly above the Pandemonium.

    ¡°It¡¯s you! You have finally shown up!¡± Ss who was just about to leave suddenly turned angry. He stared at Han Shuo with great hostility, as though ready to pounce on him.

    ¡°I said, nobody leaves!¡± shouted Han Shuo coldly before his seventeen flying swords whooshed out. Some of those innocent bystanders who had gathered from all over the Fringe to watch the fight were trying to flee. A dozen of them were instantly killed by the flying swords, among which were three highgods.

    The other spectators who nned on ignoring Han Shuo and fled this dangerous area were terror-stricken. No one dared move a muscle after seeing a dozen something experts liquified in an instant.

    Han Shuo¡¯s eyes glistened with chilling lights as he hovered loftily above the Pandemonium. He expanded his consciousness, looked all around, and carefully surveyed the environment. He inwardly heaved a sigh of relief after discovering that the Pandemonium was mostly intact and that the Pandemonians were safely hiding deep underground.

    ¡°Logue, Wasir, you have promised to help me kill this outsider!¡± shrieked Ss.

    Logue and Wasir wore astonished expressions while staring and sensing the wild, sinister energy on the young, handsome expert who had been in the limelight. The two Sovereigns seemed hesitant.

 Chapter 871 - A demonstration of might

    GDK 871: A demonstration of might

    Han Shuo had ughtered a bunch of experts as soon as he showed up. Those he killed were not Ss¡¯ followers but innocent bystanders who wanted to leave the dangerous area.

    The seventeen flying swords whistled and took a dozen or more lives just like that. Before the crowd could react, those innocent bystanders were turned into bloody liquid. Nothing of them was left.

    This was the first time that Logue and Wasir had met Han Shuo. When they discovered that Han Shuo¡¯s strength was unfathomably great, they grew hesitant. Instead of immediately joining hands with Ss to attack Han Shuo, they merely stood there and gaped.

    ¡°Hi, Bryan, long time no see. I have been tirelessly fighting Ss to keep your Pandemonium safe,¡± said Ossora with a faint smile.

    Han Shuo, who had been wearing a chilling face since his appearance, finally determined that the Pandemonium had suffered only minimal damage and his consciousness sensed the life aura of the Five Elite Zombies. Han Shuo curled the corners of his lips and said to Ossora, ¡°Thank you. I will remember this favor in my heart.¡±

    ¡°You are wee, it¡¯s no big deal,¡± replied Ossora courteously. In his mind, however, Ossora could not be happier. He thought that he had made Han Shuo¡¯s presence in the Fringe beneficial to him.

    After Han Shuo killed over a dozen of the spectators as a warning, not a single person dared move an inch. They gazed at Han Shuo¡¯s majestic figure nervously.

    Logue and Wasir were unable to determine Han Shuo¡¯s true strength. They did not know if they should risk suffering injuries to assist Ss in fighting Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oi! Logue! Wasir! What is the meaning of this!¡± Ss cursed when he saw Logue and Wasir not honoring their promises, ¡±Where are your balls, you sons of bitches?! Fine, you don¡¯t have to fight him. Just stop him from escaping while I kill him!¡±

    Ss thought that with Logue and Wasir blocking Han Shuo from escaping, he would be able to ughter Han Shuo. With Han Shuo dead, Ossora would have no reason to defend the Pandemonium, and Ss could proceed with his demolition, saving what little was left of his reputation. Then, if given some time to recover his strength, he could rebuild his Sovereignty and eventually return it to its former glory.

    Han Shuo suddenly burst outughing and said, ¡°Cut the nonsense, Ss! I won¡¯t try to leave today. Hehe, but I wonder if you could do the same!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Han Shuo seemed to have transformed into a Demon from Hell in an instant. A terrifying sinister energy widely erupted from him. It was filled with ruthlessness, savagery, and the desire to end all of existence.

    The faces of Logue, Wasir, and Ossora simultaneously transformed. They stared at Han Shuo with great astonishment as though they couldn¡¯t believe that this was the Bryan they heard of.

    All the gods in the vicinity were affected by the burst of sinister energy, especially those with just midgod strengths. Their minds were overwhelmed by fear and they trembled. They were so frightened that they almost subconsciously kowtowed at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo at this moment seemedpletely unstoppable, as though he was the Master of the Universe who could vaporize any being that displeased him with a snap of his fingers. All those Fringedwellers who came to watch suddenly had a strange suspicion ¨C that Ss might lose to this outsider!

    Logue and Wasir, after snapping out from their daze, turned to stare at Ss puzzlingly. They couldn¡¯t understand how Ss managed to force Han Shuo to flee from the Empyrean Peak. Based on the terrifying demeanor disyed by Han Shuo right now, they reckoned that Ss would unlikely win in an all-out fight against Han Shuo.

    <i>What in the world is going on?!</i> shouted Logue and Wasir in their minds, but they couldn¡¯t get any answer.

    Of all the Sovereigns, Ossora was perhaps the happiest at the moment for he realized that he had made the right bet. Although he did not know how Han Shuo could be such a terror all of a sudden, he knew that he had established himself as Han Shuo¡¯s friend. As long as he could remain united with Han Shuo, he would have no fear even if pitted against Tyre, the strongest Sovereign.

    And of the four, Ss had the most difficult time epting the new situation. He sensed the terrifying sister energy emanating from Han Shuo and determined that this was no longer the same Han Shuo that hest met on the Empyrean Peak. Back then on the Empyrean Peak, Ss sensed a power on Han Shuo that could threaten him. This time, however, Ss sensed a power that could kill him!

    ¡°Tell me, Ss, who is going to die here?¡± Han Shuo raised his head to the sky andughed in a mad, savage voice. He sensed that his body was filled with an energy that could seemingly annihte all. Having this unstoppable power coursing through his veins felt awesome.

    As Han Shuo had only recently entered the Skybreak Realm, he had yet toprehend most of the new techniques and profound ideas. And yet, the aura Han Shuo emanated was so catastrophic that all those around him were terrified.

    Ss¡¯ gloomy face seemed rather hesitant after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s provocation. Instead of rushing to attack like he usually would, he was acting much more cautiously.

    <i>He¡¯s bluffing, he must be bluffing! If he is as strong as he appears now, he wouldn¡¯t have escaped from the Empyrean Peak! This is not real!</i> Ss repeated to himself in his mind, trying to make up for hisck of confidence. He red at Han Shuo hatefully but did not attack.

    ¡°Hehe, Ss, are you feeling afraid?¡± mocked Han Shuo with a nasty grin before he said, ¡°It¡¯s alright. If you are too afraid to make the first move, I¡¯ll help you!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, the seventeen flying swords, carrying immense killing intent, spiralled towards Ss. The seventeen swords transformed into seventeen beams of lights as they flew before miraculously fusing together. The seventeen energies were concentrated into one.

    Han Shuo had deployed the ¡®Deicide sh¡¯, the second form of Avici Godying Sword Formation, with ease. An immense radiance carrying unstoppable power had locked onto Ss. Every defensive boundary which he formed in haste had been vanquished. His lightning energy was easily scattered by that radiance.

    Ss could sense that his soul had been firmly locked on, that he could not hide from the great pir of light no matter where he ran. And the further he retreated, the further the radiance would grow in power. He would eventually be struck.

    There were still several material nes filled with mortals that worshipped Ss. And at this moment, everyst one of Ss¡¯ worshippers bled from every orifice as the power of faith was juiced out from their souls. All sentient lifeforms on those material nes went extinct in just moments.

    The power of faith that Ss had juiced out from the billions of souls instantly traversed across lightyears and converged on him. Ss used the energy to gather the element of lightning and formed a lightning shield above his head, intercepting that radiance in thest possible moment.

    An explosion of never-before-seen magnitude erupted. The earth cracked and two hills were instantly ttened. There was a burst of blinding light followed by an iparably loud boom. It was as though the Apocalypse had arrived.

    Other than Logue, Wasir, and Ossora who possessed overgod strengths, none of the spectators could see what happened. The blinding light and deafening rumble had caused everyone to temporarily lose both sight and hearing. They could only sense their surroundings through their souls.

    A long whileter, the light finally diminished and the dust settled.

    Ss was heavily panting as he red at the indifferent-demeanored Han Shuo. He said, ¡°This will be all for today! But I¡¯m not going to let you off! If I had not just fought Ossora, you would be dead already!¡±

    Then, before Han Shuo could say a word, Ss turned into a lightning bolt and darted. He vanished in an instant, leaving his followers around the Pandemonium.

    However, Han Shuo continued to stand his ground for he knew just how difficult it was to pursue an overgod expert fleeing with all his strength. Moreover. Rose, the Five Elite Zombies, and others happened to emerge from underground at this time. With Sovereign Logue and Wasir present, Han Shuo had to stay to ensure the safety of the Pandemonium and his people.

    Aftering to their senses, the spectators still couldn¡¯t understand what happened during that immense burst of light. However, they saw Ss hastily leaving the area. There was only one conclusion they arrived at ¨C Ss was afraid of Han Shuo!

    Logue suddenly forced an awkward smile and said to Han Shuo, ¡°Erm... I¡¯m just going where the crowds are. I have no intention of making enemies!¡± Upon finishing those words, without waiting for a reply, he too hurried out of the Pandemonium.

    Wasir did not say a word. He nodded at Han Shuo and left after Logue. They vanished in the blink of an eye.

    ¡°You may all leave now. I don¡¯t like having unfamiliar faces around my Valley,¡± said Han Shuo as he gestured at the spectators, indicating for them to leave without dy.

    ¡°Erm, can, can we go as well?¡± asked one of Ss¡¯ followers. They were still spooked.

    ¡°Leave. I don¡¯t think that you will have a future under Ss. A Sovereign who would abandon his followers and leave them to fend for themselves is not worthy of followers. Just leave. I have no grudges with you,¡± said Han Shuo magnanimously. Han Shuo spared their lives simply because they were more useful alive than dead. After all, who could spread the story about his magnificence better than the survivors themselves?

    All those followers of Ss bowed and thanked Han Shuo gratefully before they hastily left the Pandemonium.

    ***On a bald mountain a good distance from the Pandemonium stood a person. He said to himself, ¡°Interesting, interesting. The Fringe has been peaceful for too long. It¡¯s about time to get chaotic!¡± upon finishing those words, he vanished in a burst of destruction energy.

 Chapter 872 - Repairing the Pandemonium

    GDK 872: Repairing the Pandemonium

    Those Fringedwellers gathered around the Pandemonium vanished in just moments. They had witnessed the battle between Ss and Ossora and saw Han Shuo drive Ss away using his sinister energy.

    Soon, except for Ossora and Han Shuo, there weren¡¯t any other beings in the Pandemonium.

    Han Shuo smiled and again thanked Ossora, ¡°I really appreciate your assistance. Without your help, the Pandemonium wouldn¡¯t have survived until now.¡±

    ¡°Haha, you¡¯re wee. We are friends, and friends should help each other!¡± shrugged Ossora courteously.

    Back in the Omphalos when Ossora first met Han Shuo, although Ossora had been polite, he was nowhere near as friendly as he was now.

    The Fringe was a ce where the strong were honored. Thest time that they met, Ossora did not consider Han Shuo as his equal and, therefore, unavoidably, his arrogance as a mighty Sovereign would appear directly or indirectly when interacting with Han Shuo. But this time, Ossora did not show even the slightest pride when speaking to Han Shuo. By chasing Ss away, Han Shuo had demonstrated that he possessed the strength to challenge any of the Sovereigns, therefore Ossora started treating Han Shuo as an equal.

    ¡°In any case, I owe you one!¡± insisted Han Shuo before suddenly turning his eyes to the center of the Pandemonium and flying over.

    Simultaneously, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, in the form of greyish smoke, flew out from Han Shuo¡¯s body and towards the monolith at the center of the Valley.

    Tens of thousands of wisps of thin grey smoke emerged from the monolith and flew into the Cauldron that was suspended in the air. They were the divine souls of Ss¡¯ followers. After they lost their lives to the powerful demonic formations in the Pandemonium, they were sucked into the monolith and temporarily stored there so that the Cauldron Spirit could collect itter.

    Ossora instantly sensed the cirction of those bizarre energies. He stared at the hovering Cauldron in astonishment while secretly guessing the miraculous uses and energy of the strange-looking divine weapon.

    In Ossora¡¯s eyes, every bit about Han Shuo was filled with mystery. Even now, Ossora still couldn¡¯t figure out what the energy was that Han Shuo cultivated. He was also very curious to know how Han Shuo had the ability to force Ss to flee in disarray. Ossora wished to unravel the secrets of the unfathomable Han Shuo.

    As the strands of soul energy flowed into the Cauldron, Han Shuo appeared calm and chatted with Ossora, ¡°So, after today, do you think that Ss can still stand tall in the Fringe like before?¡±

    Ossora stared nkly for a moment before he softly chuckled and replied, ¡°Unless Ss can somehow prove that he can defeat both of us, his reputation in the Fringe will take yet another nosedive. And most importantly, he fled from the battlefield all by himself, leaving his followers behind. I believe most people will think twice before enlisting themselves to serve a Sovereign like him.¡±

    Han Shuoughed out loud. He seemed to be in a savory mood as he said, ¡°It ain¡¯t gonna be easy for Ss to recover. I¡¯m starting to doubt if he¡¯ll evene back for me!¡± Han Shuo knew that he could defeat Ss even at his full strength. Ss likely also knew this. Therefore, Han Shuo doubted if Ss would be so reckless as to dig his own grave.

    ¡°Ss will have trouble maintaining his grasp on the Fringe. Bryan, the Omphalos has always been under the joint management of us Five Sovereigns. If Ss were to fall, would you be interested in filling the void?¡± asked the beaming Ossora.

    Thanks to the unique partnership between the Five Sovereigns, the Omphalos had remained a very unique ce in the chaotic Fringe. As the trading hub of the Fringe, almost every business and transaction was taxed, earning their managers a hefty revenue.

    It was clear from those words of Ossora¡¯s that he wanted Han Shuo to overthrow Ss¡¯ position and take his share of the Omphalos.

    ¡°Of course!¡± Han Shuo would never let such a great treasure slip through his hands. He put on a mischievous smile and said, ¡°I¡¯ll be visiting the Omphalos soon. I wonder if anyone will try to charge me an entrance fee.¡±

    ¡°Very well. I shall take my leave,¡± said Ossora. He was going to handle things rted to Ss.

    ¡°Alright. Thanks a lot, Ossora! I will remember your favor,¡± assured Han Shuo smilingly and he watched Ossora leave.

    Then, after Ossora¡¯s figure vanished, Han Shuo put on a scheming smile and mumbled to himself, ¡°Ossora, Ossora, how considerate of you!¡±

    Several minutes after Ossora left, the Five Elite Zombies, Rose, Romon, and Zovic emerged from the Pandemonium¡¯s underground pce. They were d and relieved to find that the Pandemonium had suffered only minimal damages.

    ¡°Father, you are finally back!¡± eximed Han Jin excitedly.

    ¡°Where is Ss? Father, where did he go?¡± asked Han Huo immediately after he came out of the underground pce.

    ¡°He scuttled! I believe that even after he recovers fully, he will think twice before trying to attack us again,¡± Han Shuo put on an unruffled smile and said to the party, ¡°From today onwards, you will be afraid of no one in the Fringe!¡±

    Even without Han Shuo¡¯s exnation, the Five Elite Zombies, Rose, and the others could sense that something was different about Han Shuo, although they couldn¡¯t name it specifically. The new Han Shuo seemed as intimidating as a great mountain and as enigmatic as the sea.

    Although they could not point out exactly what had happened to Han Shuo, they knew that Han Shuo must have made yet another breakthrough in his cultivation and his strength must have taken yet another giant leap.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t one to give empty words or exaggerate. When he said that they had nobody in the Fringe to be afraid of, it meant that he was no longer afraid of the Five Sovereigns.

    ¡°Father, you mean you now have enough power to fight the Sovereigns?¡± asked Han Mu excitedly.

    Han Shuo smiled and replied, ¡°That¡¯s right.¡±

    ¡°Wonderful!¡± Han Huo burst into a wildugher and said, ¡°Then soon, we can stay in the Omphalos for as long as we want. No one is going to collect fees from us!¡±

    ¡°Alright, let¡¯s not talk about that now. Where are Goron and the others?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Father, they are just fine, hiding in the evacuation tunnel I made. I think they will soon realize the situation here ande back,¡± exined Han Tu.

    ¡°Excellent.¡± Han Shuo looked around before he said, ¡°The Pandemonium is not destroyed, but still, it is damaged to some extent. Alright, let the six of us work together and repair our Lair!¡±

    Han Shuo took a short pause before he grinned and said, ¡°I suppose I should further enhance the Pandemonium¡¯s power. Then, if therees another day that Ss or another Sovereignes to destroy the Pandemonium, hehe, he must first peel his skin off!¡±

    When Han Shuo built the Pandemonium¡¯s demonic formations, he was still in the Omen Realm. And now that Han Shuo had entered the Skybreak Realm, he possessed greater power and a more profound understanding of demonic formations. This meant that the Pandemonium would be even deadlier than it was now.

    ¡°Wonderful!¡± cheered the Five Elite Zombies in one voice. They were in high spirits.

    The father and sons then spent another period repairing and revamping the Pandemonium. They worked together tirelessly to make the Pandemonium more and more terrifying...

    ***

    ¡°Say what?¡± asked Han Hao as he stared at a stringer beside ake.

    ¡°Ss was defeated. That outsider called Bryan defeated Ss. They all left the Pandemonium!¡± replied the unlucky stringer in a terrified voice. He was shivering as he was surrounded by arge group of ferocious godhunters.

    After sensing the disturbance over at the Pandemonium, Han Hao dropped all his tasks and started rushing to the Valley. And when he was a third of the way into his journey, he came across this stringer who was selling thetest news about the Pandemonium. Han Hao¡¯s subordinates easily captured the stringer and brought him back to Han Hao.

    ¡°Tell me everything in detail and I will not kill you,¡± Han Hao was pleasantly surprised by the news. Hearing that Han Shuo had defeated Ss, Han Hao knew that his father had made a monumental breakthrough. He was more excited than anyone.

    ¡°Ss tried to invade the Pandemonium and his forces suffered heavy casualties before they could capture it. They found no one inside the...¡± The shaking stringer knew that this was hisst hope for survival. He tried to calm himself down and exined everything he knew to Han Hao.

    Han Hao patiently listened until the stringer was finished talking. He nodded and instructed his subordinates, ¡°Let him go.¡±

    ¡°Chief, this guy cultivates the energy of darkness. May I...?¡± one of the godhunters asked Han Hao while staring at the stringer, drooling.

    ¡°Spare me! Spare me, Sir! I¡¯ve told you everything I know! Please!¡± the frightened stringer wailed tearfully as he knelt before Han Hao.

    Han Hao gestured at the stringer and said, ¡°You may leave,¡± before ring at the darkness energy subordinate and reprimanding, ¡°One must do as one says!¡±

    ¡°Understood, Chief,¡± replied the godhunter as he lowered his head.

    ¡°Turn around. We will be visiting Ss¡¯ warehouses!¡±manded Han Hao. He was no longer heading for the Pandemonium. He set his eyes on wiping out the remainder of Ss¡¯ forces and plundering the wealth Ss umted through his countless years of reign over the Fringe.

 Chapter 873 - Not qualified

    GDK 873: Not qualified

    Han Shuo stayed in the Pandemonium for a whole straight year, which passed in the blink of an eye. Besides repairing and revamping the demonic formations with the Five Elite Zombies, Han Shuo had also been meditating and exploring his newfound powers.

    Han Shuo noticed that after entering the Skybreak Realm, every strand of demonic yuan in his body had grown much stronger than before. Han Shuo found that having seemingly unstoppable power coursing through his veins felt very pleasurable and awesome.

    Han Shuo had learned the basics of Omen Invincible Body. When Han Shuo¡¯s body was attacked, the demonic technique would automatically activate and defend his body from harm even if he was unconscious. And when there was no danger, it would deactivate and not drain Han Shuo¡¯s demonic yuan. After ascending to the new demonic realm, Han Shuo had finally mastered the Omen Invincible Body.

    Han Shuo was very d to know that the Omen Invincible Body could not only automatically defend him but also automatically make a counterattack.

    ¡°,¡± reminded Hedonist the trantor.

    Curious of the power of this demonic technique he had just mastered, Han Shuo decided to conduct an experiment using Romon who had a rtively resilient body. He sat cross-legged, set his consciousness still, and entered a deep meditation.

    Following the instructions of his master, Romon suddenly charged at Han Shuo and threw a punch at him. When his fist of tremendous power made contact with Han Shuo who waspletely unaware of his surroundings, a great force abruptly sted from Han Shuo¡¯s body. Romon was flung backward. He saw stars and heard ringing for a long while.

    As Han Shuo wasn¡¯t sure just how powerful the automatic counterattack would be, he did not let Romon assault him with all his might. From the fact that Romon had be too terrified to help Han Shuo conduct another experiment, Han Shuo reckoned that the counterattack was quite formidable.

    After having broken through the Omen Realm and reaching the Skybreak Realm, both his realm state and strength had substantially increased. He had even mastered the Omen Invincible Body.

    With that, even if Han Shuo wasn¡¯t constantly alert, he would still have no fear of sneak attacks. Those who tried to harm him would be hoisting their own petard.

    During that one year, Han Shuo and the Five Elite Zombies had devoted their time to revamping the Pandemonium, adding many more deadly demonic formations. Perhaps due to Han Shuo¡¯s influence, or his newfound realizations while deploying the demonic formations, the Five Elite Zombies made breakthroughs and were now just one leap away from the realm of highgod.

    The Five Elite Zombies could fuse their energies and form powerful attacks through the Penta-elemental Undead Formation. The power of the Penta-elemental Undead Formation increased exponentially rtive to the strength of the Five Elite Zombies. A cultivation breakthrough made by one of the Five Elite Zombies could mean a multiple fold increase in the Formation¡¯s power.

    After that year, the Five Elite Zombies stayed in the Pandemonium and focused on stabilizing their realm state. They had recently reachedte-stage midgodhood and were excited to further advance in power and to gain even greater strength.

    The concentration of elemental energies in the Pandemonium was greater than anywhere else on Elysium which had greatly benefited Rose and the others. These gods who cultivated in the Pandemonium gained an even more profound understanding of the energy they cultivated and had made cultivation breakthroughs.

    The higher concentration of elemental energies not only allowed them to gather elemental energy faster, but it also inspired them with new insights into those energies. The experts could sense the great benefits after staying there for a short while. Even Rose was now on the brink of another breakthrough. She had been staying in the gymnasium for months.

    Apart from the Five Elite Zombies, Rose had been serving Han Shuo the longest and had experienced countlessrge and small battles. With each time that she stared death in the face, she would gain a better understanding of herself. After ages, Rose had finally heard the beckoning of the next realm and she was now preparing herself to step intote-stage highgodhood.

    Hearsay about Han Shuo had been circting the Fringe like wildfire. Any Fringedweller who spoke of Han Shuo would do so in a revering tone. They had considered Han Shuo as an existence of the same ss as the Five Sovereigns. People started to worship Han Shuo and experts of decent strengths hade forward to the Pandemonium, throwing themselves to servitude under Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo delegated matters of this aspect to Zovic and Goron. Those experts born with extraordinary talents and who passed a background check were allowed to join. After all, it was part of Han Shuo¡¯s grand scheme to rule the Fringe. Having sufficient manpower was a necessaryponent in executing the grand scheme.

    Other than Han Shuo, there was another expert whose reputation had been soaring in the Fringe ¨C he was none other than Han Hao.

    Ever since Ss fled from the Pandemonium, there had been no news about him, as though he had suddenly gone missing. Not a single person in the Fringe had seen him during the year. Even his most loyal followers knew nothing of his whereabouts or his current conditions.

    There had been many rumors about Ss¡¯ disappearance. Some said that he was hiding in an unknown region to quietly recover, others imed that he was afraid of Han Shuo and had left the Fringe for good. However, not one of the rumors was verifiable.

    After Ss went missing, his followers could no longer ride roughshod over others. Without the threat of Ss¡¯ retaliation, their enemies no longer held back,unching a campaign to massacre Ss¡¯ followers, forcing them to go into hiding.

    And Han Hao was one of the predators they feared most!

    But Han Hao did not hunt them out of spite. He was merely trying to take the enormous wealth that Ss could not carry with him when he ran. With the group of godhunters he led, Han Hao wreaked havoc all over the Fringe. Many of Ss¡¯ followers were killed and most of his riches fell into Han Hao¡¯s hands.

    The remaining four Sovereigns, naturally, were likewise very interested in taking over Ss¡¯ treasures and had specificallymanded their troops to do so. However, the followers of the Four Sovereigns somehow seemed to be far less capable than Han Shuo. Theirbined harvests were less than those obtained by Han Hao.

    Although those followers of the Four Sovereigns were all vicious, ruthless in character, none of them picked a fight with Han Hao, as if they had been specifically instructed so. Instead of eliminating theirpetition, they allowed Han Hao topete with them for Ss¡¯ riches and even avoided conflicts with him.

    The Four Sovereigns were no fools. Though they did not know the true rtionship between Han Shuo and Han Hao, after conducting some investigations, they understood that the two had to be closely rted as the energy they cultivated was rather simr.

    Therefore, all Four of the Sovereigns gave the same instruction to their followers, that they must not create any friction with Han Hao when dealing with Ss¡¯ matter. The Four weren¡¯t worried about offending Han Hao, they were worried about offending Han Shuo who had forced Ss into hiding.

    Han Hao seemed to know what the Four Sovereigns were doing and he too avoided conflict with their followers. And if he ran into Ossora¡¯s men, he would be extremely friendly, and sometimes, he would even share a portion of his loots.

    Although Han Hao had never been to the Pandemonium, he had considered the Pandemonium as his home. As Ossora had assisted in keeping the Pandemonium safe, Han Hao considered Ossora as having done him a favor. That was why he was so generous in sharing with Ossora¡¯s followers.

    ***One year after Ss went missing, Han Shuo returned to the Omphalos. He approached one of the entry checkpoints with a carefree smile.

    The checkpoint was manned by Logue¡¯s followers. When it was Han Shuo¡¯s turn to enter, they coldly demanded, ¡°One hundred ck crystal coins.¡± It was obvious that they did not know Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo nced at the Omphalos guard who demanded crystal coins from him with a funny look. Without changing the cordial smile on his face, Han Shuo said arrogantly, ¡°My apologies, but from now on, I¡¯m not going to pay a single crystal coin.¡±

    The Omphalos guard who possessed mid-stage highgod strength in the energy of water suddenly put on a dark face. With a beckoning of his hand, a group of Omphalos guards quickly surrounded Han Shuo. ¡°Entering the Omphalos without paying? Tired of living, are you?¡±

    ¡°The bunch of you don¡¯t have the qualifications to demand crystal coins from me, though Logue would. I tell you what, if Logue is here to collect the entrance fee from me, I will pay up,¡± replied Han Shuo smilingly.

    ¡°Heresy! How dare you address His Lordship so disrespectfully!¡± the Omphalos guard frowned and shouted to hisrades, ¡°I don¡¯t care who he is, I want him dead! He hasn¡¯t entered the Omphalos. Killing him here won¡¯t vite any rules!¡±

    These followers of Logue obviously did not have the slightest idea who Han Shuo was, not treating him like the significant character he was. To them, any being who entered the Omphalos was to pay the entrance fee, except for the Five Sovereigns. Everyone was quite familiar with the faces of the Five Sovereigns but few knew of Han Shuo.

    ¡°I say it¡¯s you who are tired of living. The Fringe today is no longer the same as it was. Other than the Five Sovereigns, haven¡¯t you forgotten that there is one more person that you must not offend? Haha, I believe that even if Sovereign Logue was here, he would wee Bryan into the Omphalos!¡± It was at this moment that a gentle peal ofughter suddenly sounded from the Omphalos. Haruli slowly walked into appearance.

    Although these followers of Logue did not recognize Han Shuo, they knew Haruli who had established himself in the Fringe long ago. The Omphalos guard stared nkly for a moment before a sudden recollection. He froze and began to stare at Han Shuo with some respect. With uncertainty in his voice, he asked, ¡°Are you Mister Bryan?¡±

    Han Shuo smiled and replied, ¡°So, now that you know who I am, do you still want crystal coins from me?¡±

    ¡°No!¡± replied the Omphalos guard with a frightened face. He hastily exined, ¡°Our Sovereign has instructed us that we are to allow Mister Bryan to do as he wishes!¡±

    Han Shuo chuckled. He nodded and replied, ¡°Very well then!¡± Upon finishing those words, Han Shuo walked into the Omphalos unruffled without giving those people another look.

    Those followers of Logue immediately stepped aside and showed Han Shuo the way in. They were very respectful in their gestures.

 Chapter 874 - Celestial Pearl in the Omphalos

    <h4>GDK 874: Celestial Pearl in the Omphalos</h4>

    Had it been someone else who refused to pay the entrance fees, those followers of Logue¡¯s would have killed the person mercilessly.

    But when they learned that the man they surrounded was Han Shuo, they made a full 180 on their stance, immediately lowering their bearings and respectfully allowing entry to Han Shuo. A force so powerful as to defeat Ss was not one to reckon with. Even if their master, Sovereign Logue, was there, he would have allowed Han Shuo into the Omphalos rather than making an enemy of him for a mere one hundred ck crystal coins.

    Han Shuo obviously had long known that might makes right in the Fringe. He wasn¡¯t worried that those Omphalos guards might do something behind his back, so he walked into the Omphalos like no one was watching.

    Haruli immediately followed behind Han Shuo. He seemed indecisive, as though he had something to say but did not know how to begin. While Haruli¡¯s followers looked at Han Shuo with reverence, they were also watching Haruli, hoping that their Chief would lead them to a brighter future.

    Hurry and say it, you fool! You have missed the opportunity once. Don¡¯t miss it again now! Haruli¡¯s followers were hastening their Chief with meaningful nces.

    Haruli seemed to find it a difficult thing to do. But after hesitating for a long time, he finally garnered enough courage to make a voice, ¡°Ex.. excuse me... Mis- mister Bryan...¡±

    Han Shuo stopped and turned to Haruli with a brow raised. ¡°Can I help you?¡± he asked with a smirk.

    ¡°That, uh, one year ago, you asked me if I was willing to serve you. Erm, do you still remember that?¡± asked Haruli awkwardly, shifting his nces to and fro. He seemed a little nervous or embarrassed.

    Han Shuo put on a stunned expression as though he had no idea what Haruli was talking about. ¡°Really? Did I?¡±

    ¡°Yes, you did, Sir. Over at Luolong¡¯s checkpoint and right after you killed Buzz and Bertha. Do you remember?¡± said Haruli. He felt as though he had been doused in an ice bath.

    Given Han Shuo¡¯s unfaltering memory, it was impossible that he would forget something like that. Han Shuo had asked Haruli to serve him the first time he stepped into the Omphalos. But Haruli immediately declined and even ridiculed Han Shuo.

    Soon after that, outside the Omphalos entry point guarded by Luolong, the Five Elite Zombies formed the Penta-elemental Undead Formation and annihted dozens of forces within minutes. Goron and a group of Fringedwellers betrayed Buzz and Bertha before being forced to submit themselves for servitude under Han Shuo. After the event, having demonstrated his immense power, Han Shuo yet again invited Haruli to serve him, but Haruli gave no formal answer, citing that he needed time to decide.

    And now, after the entire Land of Chaos came to know of Han Shuo¡¯s reign over Ss and the supreme strength that led him there, Haruli, who had willfully taken his sweet time to consider, finally came forward to ept the offer.

    ¡°My apologies, I can¡¯t recall having made such an offer,¡± replied Han Shuo before he continued walking. Given Han Shuo¡¯s position and reputation in the Fringe then, tons of powerful experts were throwing themselves at Han Shuo. He could do just fine with or without Haruli.

    Haruli looked dispirited as he watched Han Shuo leave. He knew that Han Shuo did not forget the offer he¡¯d made just the year prior. It was also painfully clear to Haruli that Han Shuo no longer considered him a worthy associate and that his coldness was a show of displeasure for the fact that Haruli only epted the offer after his meteoric rise in reputation.

    ¡°Chief, what should we do now? Sigh, we should have agreed back then. There are too many experts who want to serve him now. Given that our group isn¡¯t even the most powerful in the Fringe, our odds of getting recruited is low,¡± one of Haruli¡¯s followers sighed remorsefully.

    ¡°Hmph, what¡¯s so terrific about him?¡± Haruli put on an angry face and barked, ¡°He merely managed to take advantage of Ss who had exhausted too much divine energy fighting Ossora. With my position and reputation in the Fringe, I can do just fine without him, as I always have!¡±

    If he¡¯s not so terrific, then were you pandering at his feet just now? Those followers of Haruli¡¯s scoffed as they secretlyughed at Haruli¡¯s angry remark. It was clear to them now that Haruli had zero foresight. Otherwise, Haruli would have decisively epted Han Shuo¡¯s offer when he had the chance and they would be more prosperous than they were at that moment.

    Not only could he not admit his shorings, but he even tried to downy Han Shuo¡¯s abilities. Haruli¡¯s followers found his mindsetughable.

    But Han Shuo didn¡¯t care about a forgettable character like Haruli. He simply shrugged it off and went on with his business.

    ¡°Excuse me, where are the Sovereign Shops under Sovereign Ss?¡± Han Shuo stopped a random stranger in the Omphalos and asked smilingly.

    ¡°Ss? Hehe, ever since he disappeared, the remaining Four Sovereigns have taken over his Sovereign Shops. Sovereign Tyre took four while the other three Sovereigns took two each. You might not know this but even Ss¡¯ right-hand men must now pay the fees to enter the Omphalos!¡± snickered the random stranger.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment. He thought, Damn, they do act fast, don¡¯t they?

    Han Shuo hesitated and weighed in his mind on whether he should seize those Sovereign Shops with brute force. But after seriously considering his options, Han Shuo decided not to do so, at least for now.

    Having recently stepped into the Skybreak Realm, Han Shuo was confident that he could defeat any one of the Sovereigns. However, if all the Sovereigns joined hands against him, Han Shuo did not think that he could handle it for long. Most concerningly, Han Shuo had not met the strongest Sovereign, Tyre, who was described as possessing unfathomable power if the legends were to be believed. Han Shuo thought that the risks outweighed the rewards.

    After spending some time pondering, Han Shuo decided to not be hasty and to take down the Sovereigns one by one. Han Shuo then went to the Sovereign Shop that Ossora ceded to him. Ever since Han Shuo took over the shop, he had set it up as yet another branch of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    Han Shuo had managed to move some pharmacists from his Ethereal City branch to the Omphalos. They easily made more than enough medicines to fill the racks. But as Han Shuo had been busy with the Pandemonium, he did not produce and sell his pelleted medicines in this Celestial Pearl branch. Therefore, the business wasn¡¯t doing that well.

    The Celestial Pearl was very popr in other cities because they sold the special, miraculous medicines that Han Shuo refined. But every medicine sold in this branch could be bought in other pharmacies. They were average and nothing exciting. It was only to be expected that those in the Omphalos weren¡¯t spending much there.

    Besides, there were all kinds of pharmacists and toxin-makers all over the Omphalos. They were mad chemists and pharmacists from every corner of Elysium with the same but strange fascination towards producing toxic substances. These poison makers were extremely good at what they did. The medicines they refined were much more useful to the Fringedwellers than thosemon medicines sold by the Celestial Pearl.

    Though it was ouwed in the Divine Dominions, the use, production, and research of poisons werepletely unrestricted in the Fringe. Thosemon medicines sold by the Celestial Pearl were nothingpared to the medicines that could be found in the Omphalos. If not for the fact that the workers of a Sovereign Shop were exempted from paying the costly fees and taxes, the business might not have survived.

    The first thing Han Shuo noticed after his arrival at the Sovereign Shop was how massive it was. The shelves were filled with a dazzling lineup of medicines but there were very few patrons. It was in to see that the items sold here were not that interesting to the Fringedwellers.

    To maintain a strong footing in the Fringe, one must have wealth, power, and reputation. It was necessary for Han Shuo to have all three of them.

    Han Shuo¡¯s arrival made the Celestial Pearl pharmacists extremely excited. They had heard about Han Shuo defeating Ss. They were very proud that their boss was such a mighty existence.

    Han Shuo did not talk much with the pharmacists. Soon after his arrival, he went to the medicinal material storehouse, collected the rare materials he needed, notified the pharmacists, and closed himself in a secluded gymnasium.

    All kinds of medicinal materials and herbs were thrown into the Nine Tessetion Cauldron. Strands of demonic yuan then started circting along the channels on the surface as zes gently licked the Cauldron. Soon, the sweet fragrance of the medicines started emanating...

    Han Shuo vested his full attention on producing pelleted medicines. Using his demonic yuan energy, he broke down the medicinal ingredients before reforming the energies contained within. Suddenly, he realized that not only had his strength and realm state improved, but his efficiency at producing medicines had also improved.

    The pelleted medicines that Han Shuo previously needed one or two months to produce now took him just a few days. Furthermore, the quality of the medicines had not reduced, but were in fact even more potent than before.

    Additionally, when Han Shuo stopped worrying about everyday matters and focused on producing medicines, his demonic yuan could circte very smoothly and slowly increase. Han Shuo realized that if he could clear his mind and cultivate, the growth of his demonic yuan would be quite a bit faster than usual.

    Ten dayster, Han Shuo sessfully produced more than two thousand pelleted medicines. They were as round, as smooth, and as lustrous as pearls. The heavy fragrance they emanated would cause anyone to salivate.

    ¡°Master, there is arge group of people lining outside. They noticed the fragrance and they want to buy your medicines. Also, many Fringe-pharmacists have gathered outside to watch!¡± a pharmacist hastily reported as soon as Han Shuo emerged from the gymnasium.

    ¡°Just in time!¡± said Han Shuo with a big smile.

 Chapter 875 - Making a move

    GDK 875: Making a move

    After reaching the Skybreak Realm in his cultivation of demonic arts, Han Shuo could not only refine medicines faster, but the medicines had be even more potent than before.

    Many of the gods nearby noticed the salivating fragrance emanating from the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. After making some inquiries, they learned that it was Han Shuo who had been refining medicines.

    These Fringedwellers had learned from those living in the Divine Dominions about the miraculousness of Han Shuo¡¯s medicines. Once they found out that it was Han Shuo who was making the medicines, they swarmed to the Celestial Pearl like bees, lining up to buy Han Shuo¡¯s medicines.

    In the Fringe, there were all kinds of sinister pharmacists who delved into wicked research. Nearly all the drugs they produced were for harming others. There were no medicines for improving one¡¯s cultivation speed.

    Based on the information the Fringedwellers obtained, they knew that the medicines Han Shuo produced were incredibly useful for improving oneself in various aspects. This was very different from the kind of medicines abundantly found in the Omphalos. Some could increase the body¡¯s healing speed, some could stabilize the mind when one was cultivating, increasing one¡¯s cultivation speed.

    To many, this was the type of medicine that they needed most. Therefore, when the Fringedwellers heard that Han Shuo was producing medicine in the Celestial Pearl, they immediately rushed to the Pharmacy from every region. They broughtrge amounts of ck crystal coins with them with the intention of purchasing as many of Han Shuo¡¯s medicines as possible.

    Although those gathered in the Celestial Pearl were ferocious and savage gods from all over the Fringe, they were well-mannered and even voluntarily formed a tidy queue. No one of them dared make a scene.

    This was because they knew that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t just a talented pharmacist but also one of the most formidable experts in the Fringe. Inside the territory of such a mighty being, they tried to behave themselves as best as possible lest they displease Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo looked around and saw therge crowd gathered inside his Celestial Pearl. As soon as they saw Han Shuo, they went to him respectfully and politely greeted him, telling him their obvious intention.

    Han Shuo did not expect that a crowd would gather here just because of the scent. But he did not mind it as it was a good thing for him. Han Shuo announced to the crowd, ¡°My medicines will be sold for a fixed price but only a small portion will be sold each day. They will be sold on a firste, first serve basis...¡±

    Han Shuo had been running the Celestial Pearl for a long time and had learned some techniques on raising the Pharmacy¡¯s reputation and profits from Phoebe and Emily.

    Given his current reputation, not one in the crowd dared object his decision. He gave his pharmacists the medicines he made, gave them some instructions, and retreated to a private lounge.

    Many of the toxin makers who were standing among the crowd were wearing strange expressions. It seemed as though they had something to say but couldn¡¯t speak. But after Han Shuo went out of sight, they grumbled in low voices, ¡°What¡¯s so terrific about those medicines? I¡¯ll eat my hat if they are as miraculous as he ims!¡±

    ¡°As will I! If he possesses the strength to defeat Ss, then it¡¯s impossible for him to have a high level of mastery in the field of drug-making too. Hmph, if it isn¡¯t for him possessing tremendous strength, I would have challenged him to a duel in drug-making already!¡±

    As soon as Han Shuo started refining medicines, many of the Fringedwellers had rushed to the Celestial Pearl to wait. This had affected the sales of the toxin makers. It was only natural that they would be unhappy about it.

    However, they were too intimidated by Han Shuo¡¯s tremendous strength to voice their grudges in front of Han Shuo, nor did they have the courage to cause trouble at the Celestial Pearl.

    ¡°We will buy some of his medicines to test if it¡¯s as wonderful as he ims. Hmph, if it turns out that he¡¯s making false ims, even though he¡¯s very powerful, we will speak the truth as it is!¡± suggested one of the toxin makers. His colleagues agreed.

    These pharmacists who specialized in producing toxic substances were very queer and condescending in temperament. If it wasn¡¯t for their fear of Han Shuo¡¯s tremendous strength, they would have made a scene already.

    Although Han Shuo had gone out of sight, his senses covered the entire Celestial Pearl and he clearly heard every word the toxin makers uttered. Wearing a big smile, he called for one of his shop workers and instructed, ¡°If those toxin makers want to buy my medicines, let them skip the queue. Make sure that they get their hands on my medicines.¡±

    ¡°Sorry, my Lord, but I don¡¯t understand! Those bastards are here to stir up trouble! My Lord, you might not know this but when Your Lordship is not in the Celestial Pearl, they often try to defame us and im that our medicines are useless!¡± replied the shop worker. He seemed very irritated by those poison makers.

    Before Han Shuo came to the Celestial Pearl; before he had defeated Ss, these poison makers were unafraid of Han Shuo and were secretly spreading nders about the Celestial Pearl, adversely affecting the pharmacy¡¯s business.

    Although Han Shuo was previously unaware of this, he figured out the poison makers¡¯ intentions in no time. Han Shuo smiled but did not exin it to the worker. He instructed, ¡°I understand, but just do as I say. Hehe, although they are queer in temperament, they are nheless very talented in their fields. I want to see if they can find faults in my medicines!¡±

    After hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words, the shop worker dismissed himself puzzlingly and went on to carry out Han Shuo¡¯s orders.

    Han Shuo nned on making all those poison makers his pharmacists by hook or by crook. He was going to move the Celestial Pearl Headquarters to Omphalos and dominate the pharmacy market of the Fringe. His rivals would either get crushed or join him.

    ***

    ¡°Hello Mister Bryan, it¡¯s been a while!¡± a familiar voice sounded before Luolong stepped into the private lounge with a grin.

    Han Shuo had in fact been waiting for Luolong. He had sensed Luolong¡¯s presence after he was done refining medicine. Han Shuo knew that Luolong was very loyal to Ossora and he must havee to the Celestial Pearl to ry a message from Ossora.

    ¡°Oh, it¡¯s you! How can I help you, Luolong?¡± replied Han Shuo in a friendly manner.

    Luolong seemed rather surprised because he did not expect Han Shuo would still treat him in as friendly a manner as before.

    From Luolong¡¯s point of view, from the moment that Han Shuo defeated Ss, he had risen to being an existence at the same level as the Five Sovereigns. Luolong thought that Han Shuo would have handled himself differently before others and wouldn¡¯t treat him as politely as before.

    Therefore, Luolong was going to behave the same with Han Shuo as he often did to Ossora. However, before he could do so, he was surprised to discover that Han Shuo did not care about and was still as friendly as before. He found this very peculiar.

    ¡°I havee with a message from Lord Ossora,¡± replied Luolong smilingly in a very respectful tone. He continued, ¡°Ss has gone missing and the Sovereign Shops he possessed have been divided amongst the remaining Sovereigns. As Mister Bryan wasn¡¯t at the Omphalos at that time, you did not get any. However, Lord Ossora believes that Mister Bryan has the strength to control a piece of the Omphalos. His Lordship has been in talks with the other Sovereigns, asking them to relinquish the Sovereign Shops they took from Ss and let Mister Bryan rece Ss¡¯ ce in the Omphalos. However, it seemed as though it¡¯s not an easy task to aplish. There hasn¡¯t been much progress so far...¡±

    Han Shuo looked at Luolong smilingly, nodded, and said, ¡°Erm, Luolong, please thank Lord Ossora for me. I really don¡¯t know how I could ever repay His Lordship for doing so much to help me.¡± Han Shuo had always felt that those Sovereign Shops that previously belonged to Ss were rightfully his.

    ¡°Mister Bryan, the most important message I need to pass you is that Lord Ossora intends to relinquish the two Sovereign Shops he obtained to you. Lord Ossora believes that in order for Mister Bryan to take Ss¡¯ ce in the Omphalos, Mister Bryan should inherit those assets previously possessed by Ss,¡± said Luolong smilingly.

    Han Shuo was astounded. He did not expect that Ossora would be willing to surrender such great capitals just to improve their rtionship. Han Shuo was ted and replied, ¡°That¡¯s wonderful! Please tell Lord Ossora that I really appreciate it and thank you so much!¡±

    <i>What is this Ossora after? Is he trying to use me as a tool?</i> thought Han Shuo secretly while wearing a grateful, cheery face.

    ¡°There is one more thing I¡¯m instructed to inform Mister Bryan. There are hundreds upon thousands of shops in the Omphalos. If Mister Bryan wishes to have a share of the Omphalos, besides the consent of all the Sovereigns, you will also need the approval of at least half of the shop owners. These are the two requirements that Mister Bryan must fulfill in order to be one of the owners of the Omphalos,¡± said Luolong.

    Han Shuo nodded smilingly and replied, ¡°Thank you, now I know what I must do. Hehe, I doubt that those shop owners would have any objection. It should be a done deal as long as I can persuade the other three Sovereigns!¡±

    As those shop owners in the Omphalos did not possess formidable power, it would be a wonder if they would resist Han Shuo, a most terrifying expert. But Han Shuo immediately knew that there had to be caveats. Perhaps the other three Sovereigns might instruct the shop owners to oppose him.

    With that, the three Sovereigns could avoid friction with Han Shuo for the moment while preventing Han Shuo from getting a piece of the Omphalos. Most of the shop owners lived inside the Omphalos. If Han Shuo were to kill any of the dissenting shop owners, the action would be tantamount to dering war on the Four Sovereigns. With that, Tyre, Logue, and Wasir would have an excuse to join forces and kill him.

    After thinking through all kinds of possibilities, Han Shuo had a rough idea of those Sovereigns¡¯ intentions. He sneered in his mind and started thinking about his countermeasures.

 Chapter 876 - Crisis at the House of Han

    GDK 876: Crisis at the House of Han

    While Han Shuo was achieving his great ambitions in the Fringe, the House of Han ran into a major crisis in the City of Shadows.

    Ever since Han Shuo left the City of Shadows, the members of the House of Han had retreated to Fort Lasberg. They had been quietly expanding their influence and business in the Fort, not meddling with any business rted to the City of Shadows.

    Wace, the City Lord of the City of Shadows, had tacitly approved the members of the House of Han leaving the city center. He had not notified the House of Han to participate in all big and small affairs rted to the City. He had excluded the House of Han from taking any part in running the City.

    As the Fringe was just too far away from the City of Shadows, it was very difficult for news to reach the City of Shadows from the Fringe. This was worsened by the unique migration pattern.

    The criminals and ouws from all Twelve Dominions would usually head to the Fringe out of desperation. They would bring thetest tidings from every corner of Elysium with them to the Fringe.

    However, very few of those ferocious gods who had stepped into the Fringe would ever get the chance to return to their respective Dominions. This created a phenomenon where there were countless experts migrating into the Fringe while few migrated out. Therefore, it was also slow for news in the Fringe to make it to the rest of the Elysium.

    The most recent news about Han Shuo that Phoebe, Emily, and the others learned was he had left Ethereal City for the Fringe. They had no idea what happened in the Fringe or how he was doing.

    Even City Lord Wace had no clue about how well Han Shuo was doing in the Fringe. Han Shuo had ceased all contact and seemed to have disappeared forever. Nobody knew when or if he¡¯d ever return to the City of Shadows.

    Having seen the countless miraculous deeds Han Shuo aplished while he was in the city, for the future of the House of Sainte in the City of Shadows, Wace had started to quell the strength of the House of Han. But as Wace knew that the House of Han was close friends with Andre, Carmelita, Aobashi, Erebus, and others, he did not do anything too excessive.

    Wace seemed to have tacitly approved of Han Shuo¡¯s decision to relocate all of the House of Han¡¯s manpower and resources to Fort Lasberg. He even showed absolutely no interest or reaction when the divine guards of the Fifth Corps left the city and moved to Fort Lasberg.

    Fort Lasberg was located at the border of the city¡¯s sphere of influence. From Wace¡¯s point of view, the House of Han could not cause him trouble from that region. As long as the House of Han didn¡¯t expand their influence inside the city, Wace would be happy and leave the family n to themselves.

    However, back when Han Shuo lived in the City of Shadows, he had offended just too many people, for instance Hofs of Hushveil City who was located ufortably close to Fort Lasberg. After a few years of extensive investigation, Hofs learned the perpetrators who attacked Hushveil City were Han Shuo and Rose.

    And after further investigation, he found Wace seemingly deliberately alienating the House of Han. Hofs had been searching for Han Shuo to take revenge. But after failing to do so, he turned his eyes to the House of Han at Fort Lasberg.

    Besides Hofs, there was a second person eying Fort Lasberg vengefully. He came from the most powerful family n in the Darkness Dominion, the House of Broadhurst. Not only had he lost a good number of his highgods to Han Shuo, but his son was murdered before his arranged marriage with Donna.

    After many years of thorough investigation, Larikson managed to determine that Han Shuo was the person who had murdered his son. It was easy to see why he would want to kill Han Shuo and every member of his family n. The House of Broadhurst had control over the City of Gorging Clouds, the most powerful city in the Darkness Dominion. Larikson posed a greater threat to Fort Lasberg than Hofs.

    Larikson and Hofs had an identical objective and they reached a pact soon after their first meeting. They intended to join forces and destroy Fort Lasberg¡¯s House of Han. The two were confident that they could wreck Fort Lasberg using the formidable experts at their behest.

    ***Inside Hushveil City, Hofs and Larikson were having a conversation in the City Lord¡¯s mansion.

    Hofs and Larikson had been scheming an assault on Fort Lasberg for a long time. The two were confident of ttening Fort Lasberg with the forces theymanded. But there was still one thing keeping them from taking vengeance.

    ¡°Lord Larikson, I have no doubt that by working together, we would be sessful in reaching our objective. My only concern is Wace. When all is said and done, Fort Lasberg is a territory of the City of Shadows. If we are to invade the fort, Wace might retaliate and we could start a civil war.¡±

    Fort Lasberg was a territory of the City of Shadows. Trespassing on the Fort to attack the House of Han would be a provocation against the City of Shadows. This could potentially lead to a war between the cities of the Darkness Dominion. That was definitely not something that the Overgod of Darkness wished to see.

    Larikson, whose mind was filled with a thirst for revenge, replied, ¡°Don¡¯t worry about this, Wace will not make an enemy of us for a small little House of Han. He will turn a blind eye to us sieging Fort Lasberg.¡±

    Hofs seemed pleasantly surprised and he eximed, ¡°You mean to say Wace has...?¡±

    Larikson nodded affirmatively and exined, ¡°I havemunicated with Wace. He will pretend as though we caught him off guard. And after the event, the most he will do is publicly denounce us. He won¡¯t go to war against us for a small family n. Hehe, the House of Han is threatening the House of Sainte¡¯s position in the City of Shadows. The way I see it, Wace wouldn¡¯t be happier to see the House of Han destroyed!¡±

    ¡°Then there is nothing that I¡¯m worried about,¡± Hofs exhaled before he put on an evil grin and said, ¡°Let us begin our operation!¡±

    ¡°Yes. Assemble your troops. We will start marching towards Fort Lasberg soon. Those in the House of Han are incapable of putting up a fight against us. We will massacre everyst one of the family n!¡± said Larikson ferociously.

    ¡°And I believe that after the House of Han is destroyed, Bryan will rush back home no matter where he is. And when he returns, we will get rid of him!¡± Hofsughed heartily. It took him years and a great deal of effort to quell the family ns in Hushveil City in his sphere of influence. He could not be happier to think that he would soon get his revenge.

    *** Inside the Han Residence in Fort Lasberg. The members of the House of Han had be aware of Hofs and Larikson¡¯s n.

    During the past few years, the House of Han had stopped expanding in the City of Shadows. They had added not even one new Celestial Pearl branch in the city and had distanced themselves from matters rted to the city. They had gone silent. However, secretly, the House of Han was growing.

    Although the House of Han had stopped expanding in the City of Shadows, they were working with many big family ns in the Death and Destruction Dominions, expanding the influence and business of Celestial Pearl to those Dominions. With even greater revenue streams, the House of Han was able to recruit even more experts.

    Before Han Shuo departed from the City of Shadows, he had builtyers uponyers of defensive formations as well as the Eight Destion and Torment Formation in Fort Lasberg. The members of the House of Han had been training inside the Formation and their overall strength was starkly improving.

    The House of Han had built a decent informationwork in the Dominions of Death, Darkness, and Destruction. Using thework, they became aware of Larikson visiting Hofs in Hushveil City. From the unusual activities Larikson and Hofs showed, the House of Han came to the conclusion that the two were going to attack Fort Lasberg.

    Although the House of Han had been rapidly strengthening, they were still no match against the forcesmanded by Hofs and Larikson. Hofs was the City Lord of Hushveil City while Larikson was the brother of the House of Broadhurst¡¯s patriarch. If the two of them joined forces to attack Fort Lasberg, the House of Han would inevitably be defeated.

    Phoebe, Emily, Ayermike, Stratholme, Sanguis, Bonds, Gilbert, and all other core members of the House of Han gathered in the meeting room of the Han Residence. They were discussing how to defend themselves against Hofs and Larikson¡¯s invasion.

    ¡°We have received intel that Larikson, ate-stage highgod himself, brought three highgods with him to Hushveil City. Hofs, the City Lord of Hushveil City, will surely bring arge number of his City¡¯s divine guards to the invasion. We are outnumbered and outgunned,¡± briefed Emily worryingly to those in the meeting room.

    The party felt helpless against the two tremendous forces. It was impossible for the House of Han to resist the might of a city in just a few years.

    ¡°Unfortunately for us, Master is not with us, or else those two fes would certainly regret ever having been born!¡± remarked Gilbert. To him, Han Shuo had always been an invincible force. Although both Larikson and Hofs were formidable in their own rights, they had suffered defeats to Han Shuo and they obviously were no match for him.

    ¡°Hmph, if Master is in Fort Lasberg, I doubt that the two would even have the courage to attack us!¡± remarked Sanguis coldly. He was angered and his pupils immediately turned blood-red as a visible mist of blood emanated from his body. From the aura he emanated, it was obvious that his strength had yet again soared during those few years.

    ¡°But Bryan is not around and we must rely on ourselves,¡± Stratholme bunched his brows tightly and said, ¡°We must not leave Fort for we have defenses set up. We would be even more powerless against our enemies outside the Fort.¡± Stratholme took a short pause and calmly continued, ¡°Send a message to Erebus, Aobashi, Carmelita, and Andre and inform them of our situation. if they can get to Fort Lasberg in time, our chances could substantially increase.¡±

    ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll get it done!¡± said Phoebe before immediately dispatching messengers. Fort Lasberg was suddenly busy. Multiple shadows dashed out the Fort as fast as they could for the survival of the House of Han.

 Chapter 877 - Prepare for battle

    GDK 877: Prepare for battle

    A few dayster, the core members of the House of Han reassembled in the same meeting room. They seemed even more stressed and gloomy than before.

    The messengers they sent had returned to the Han Residence, but none of them came back with good tidings. Carmelita was in secluded cultivation and could not be reached. Andre had departed for Darkwater City ten days before and had yet to return.

    Aobashi and Erebus were executing a covert mission at a secret location. Nobody knew if they were still within the borders of the City of Shadows or not. None of the messengers even caught sight of the recipients.

    Andre, Carmelita, Aobashi and Erebus, the four experts closest to the House of Han, had gone unreachable as though they had nned it ahead of time. Phoebe and the others felt desperate and disappointed that the four would go missing when the House of Han needed their help.

    ¡°This cannot be a mere coincidence! It¡¯s impossible that all four of them are somehow out of reach just as Larikson entered Hushveil City!¡± Phoebe gnashed her teeth and angrily remarked, ¡°They were very close with Bryan when he was still in the City of Shadows. Especially Carmelita and Erebus, who wouldn¡¯t be living today if it wasn¡¯t for Bryan. But it turns out they¡¯re all heartless scum who would turn a blind eye at us when we need their assistance the most!¡±

    ¡°Perhaps it¡¯s not them...¡± Stratholme wore a dark face as he slowly said, ¡°There is a person who can send all four of them away and prevent our messages from reaching them...¡±

    ¡°Wace!¡± eximed Ayermike.

    Stratholme nodded and said, ¡°He is the most powerful man in the city. He alone can send Aobashi, Erebus, and Andre away from the city at the same time. Carmelita is his daughter. He can force her to go on a period of secluded cultivation.¡±

    ¡°Yes. Given their rtionship with Bryan, they would definitelye to our aid if they knew that we were in danger. Wace must have architected this situation! He wouldn¡¯t kill us himself, he wouldn¡¯t sully his hands but he would no doubt use Larikson and Hofs to do his dirty work!¡± said Ayermike angrily.

    ¡°Despicable! I cannot stand him any longer!¡± Gilbert yelled out of anger, ¡°We should march into the city and kill that fucking Wall-ass!¡±

    ¡°No,¡± Stratholme shook his head and said, ¡°Even if we know that it¡¯s Wace who has been pulling the strings, we must noty a finger on him. We are already having trouble dealing with Larikson and Hofs. Now is not the time to make another powerful enemy.¡±

    ¡°Then what should we do?¡± Gilbert sighed and asked in a dispirited manner.

    ¡°Let¡¯s just try to hang in here for as long as we can. I have contacted the family ns in the Death and Destruction Dominions. Wace may want us dead, but our business partners sure don¡¯t. They are sending men to Fort Lasberg to help us evacuate. We just need to stay alive until they are here,¡± Emily forced a smile and consoled the party.

    During the past few years, the Celestial Pearl had been cooperating with some family ns in the Death and Destruction Dominions, opening arge number of pharmacy branches in those Dominions. Every party involved in the partnership maderge amounts of crystal coins. It was important for those family ns that the House of Han stayed alive so that the crystal coins would keep rolling in.

    Therefore, immediately after those family ns received the messages from Emily about the House of Han¡¯s situation, they replied saying that they would dispatch men to the City of Shadows and help the House of Han escape and even offered them refuge.

    ¡°This is great news!¡± Stratholme said, ¡°Then we should all get packed up. Wace wants to kill us through the hands of our enemies. We cannot live in the City of Shadows any longer. Right, we should begin transferring a portion of our assets out the Fort and begin the work necessary for our departure.¡±

    ¡°Before our allies are here, we will stay in the Fort and resist our enemies. But don¡¯t worry, our Patriarch put a lot of thought and effort into the defenses of the Fort. They cannot be easily defeated,¡± said Bonds.

    ¡°Then let us get ready for a glorious battle!¡± said Sanguis.

    Fort Lasberg became buzzing with construction and defense-rted activities. Under the House of Han¡¯s management, every corner of Fort Lasberg was now covered with energy towers, cannon towers, deadly boundaries, and seals. The previously poor town was now an impressive fortress.

    Using therge amounts of ck crystal coins the House of Han umted, the weak segments of the Fort had been fortified with energy-crystal-based boundaries and weapons. The Fifth Corps divine guards, the strongest divine guards in the City of Shadows, were also equipped with the highest quality divine weapons there were, further increasing their deadliness. Sanguis and Bonds, the most elite troops in the Fifth Corps, had been soaring in strength during the past few years.

    The troops and workers of the House of Han followed the orders they received and started working around the clock. Dazzling energy towers and cannons were moved and relocated. The energy crystal cannons were aimed outwards at the expansive field, silently waiting and ready to greet the enemies with warm hugs of destructive energy at any moment.

    *** In a dense jungle a thousand miles from Fort Lasberg stood Ralph, the Chief of the Second Corps. Gathered around him were the Second Corps divine guards. They were stone-cold as they listened to Ralph¡¯s mission briefing.

    ¡°You should all know what we are here for. Though we won¡¯t initiate the attack, we need to take care of those who managed to escape. The House of Han has severely threatened the interests of the House of Sainte. Aobashi and Erebus have been brainwashed by Bryan and they will not get rid of the House of Han. We are the only people left who can do what¡¯s necessary.¡±

    Ralph and his Second Corps divine guards were going to hide at a possible escape route to intercept and take down every member of the House of Han who escaped from Fort Lasberg after Larikson and Hofs invaded the Fort.

    Ralph who was wearing a chilling face nced at his equally ferocious divine guards before he continued, ¡°Although the House of Han may have seemed benign for the past few years, they have in fact been secretly working with family ns in the Death and Destruction Dominions and growing stronger and stronger. If we do not exterminate them now, we might be the ones who will be exterminated in the near future!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, my Lord. The presence of the Fifth Corps has threatened the position of our Second Corps. We will wipe the Fifth Corps and the House of Han out of the City of Shadows!¡± said one of the divine guards ruthlessly. He took a short pause and hesitated a bit before he continued, ¡°However, there is not a hint of that Bryan guy¡¯s whereabouts. He is a formidable expert. If someday in the future he discovers what we will do, what will happen to us?¡±

    Many of them were stunned at the mention of Bryan¡¯s name. Although Han Shuo had been away from the City of Shadows for many years, the citizens and the divine guards had not forgotten his deeds and aplishments. In their minds, Han Shuo was an expert second only to City Lord Wace. Han Shuo would remain a threat to them for as long as he was alive.

    Ralph frowned slightly and he rebutted in a cold voice, ¡°What is there to be afraid of? Our City Lord is the most powerful being in the City of Shadows. Even if Bryan finds out what we will do soon, the City Lord will protect us! Don¡¯t worry, no matter what happens, the City Lord will be shielding us!¡±

    Although these divine guards were still feeling somewhat nervous even after Ralph¡¯s reaffirmation, they did not voice their concerns any further. They knew Ralph¡¯s temper very well and were aware of the friction between him and Han Shuo. They dared not question Ralph¡¯s words.

    *** From the opposite of Ralph¡¯s location, an army led by Larikson and Hofs was moving with stealth towards Fort Lasberg. Although the House of Hofley had lost a great number of experts a few years ago, Hofs remained a respected figure in Hushveil City. There remained a good number of experts who would serve under him. After a few years of recruiting, the number of divine guards at hismand was now much closer to the pre-incident level.

    Larikson, who was flying at the front of the army, wore a dark, gloomy face. His mind was constantly filled with thoughts of revenge. It seemed as though the horrific scene of his son¡¯s dead body had been haunting and tormenting him every second of every day.

    <i><i>Bryan, House of Han, House of Lavers, Donna, I¡¯m going to kill all of you!</i></i> thought Larikson as he flew towards Fort Lasberg.

    When the news broke that Larikson¡¯s son had been murdered, Donna immediately knew that it was Han Shuo who did it. Fearing that Larikson might me her and thus her family n upon finding out the truth, she went to her father and told him everything. Felder decisivelymanded his family n to escape from the City of Gorging Clouds while Larikson was madly hunting for the murderer.

    After discovering the truth, Larikson activated his forces to locate and annihte the House of Lavers. But as Felder was quick in escaping, Larikson had failed to do so. The House of Lavers seemed to have vanished from the Death, Darkness, and Destruction Dominions. He couldn¡¯t locate the members of the Lavers Family no matter where he looked.

    Larikson deemed the House of Lavers, Donna, Han Shuo, and the House of Han responsible for his son¡¯s death and sought to destroy them. Having been unable to locate the House of Lavers and Han Shuo, he turned his crosshair to the House of Han in Fort Lasberg.

    Half a monthter, a group of avengers led by Larikson and Hofs arrived before Fort Lasberg. They wasted not a single word and started bombarding the Fort as soon as they arrived. They nned on ttening Fort Lasberg using their overwhelming power!

 Chapter 878 - Welcome to Fort Lasberg

    GDK 878: Wee to Fort Lasberg

    Larikson and Hofs assumed that in the House of Han, Han Shuo was the only powerful expert while the remaining members were as harmless as kittens. With Han Shuo not in Fort Lasberg, they assumed that the fort would be as fragile as a dried leaf. Therefore, as soon as they were outside the fort, Hofsmanded his divine guards to attack.

    The assaulting army they formed were made of the most elite divine guards in Hushveil City and highgods from the House of Broadhurst while both themanders, Larikson and Hofs, werete-stage highgods.

    Against such a powerful army, not just the House of Han, but perhaps even the House of Kinson and House of Kisa which had stood tall in the City of Shadows for countless years wouldn¡¯t be able to survive.

    Outside Fort Lasberg, Larikson and Hofs wore gloomy faces and watched coldly as their troops transformed into streaks of shadows and charged at the fort recklessly as though nothing in the fort could harm them. They felt that the House of Han should be honored that they would be present to watch them get exterminated. The two wouldn¡¯t go to the frontlines of the battle unless there emerged an enemy of their ss.

    The army ferociously charged at Fort Lasberg while making loud battle cries. The divine weapons in their hands emanated an astonishing amount of divine auras. They seemed as though they were certain of their victory.

    Then, suddenly, thunderp-like rumbles sounded from Fort Lasberg. Shortly after, dazzling pirs made of light carrying astonishing powers shot out from the fort like arrows.

    The magnificent, pir-shaped radiances had the same width as a human adult¡¯s waist. More than a dozen of those energetic beams shot out from the fort at once. Many of Hofs¡¯s divine guards from Hushveil City were caught off guard and were struck. The energetic beams vaporized everything in its path and maderge holes through the divine bodies of midgods. Many of the invaders were severely injured if not instantly killed.

    Ever since taking over Fort Lasberg, the House of Han had invested tons of ck crystal coins on the fort¡¯s defenses. The energy crystals from the numerous mining pits nearby were delivered to Fort Lasberg so that they can be used as batteries for the energy crystal cannons. The energy crystal cannons would deliver beams of extreme destructiveness. With enough energy crystals, a st from the cannon could be as deadly as a highgod¡¯s attack.

    The dozen something energy crystal cannons were usually proudly disyed on the defensive wall around the fort to intimidate its enemies. But when Phoebe and the others learned that Hofs and Larikson were going to attack the fort, the energy crystal canons were relocated and hidden in the energy towers so that they could give their enemies a big surprise.

    But their n wouldn¡¯t have worked so well had Hofs and Larikson not been so arrogant to take the House of Han so lightly. Had they been just a little more cautious, the energy crystal cannons wouldn¡¯t have caused them such great casualties.

    The energy crystal cannons, powered by energy crystals in energy towers, shot out resplendent beams at the followers of Hofs. In the blink of an eye, a dozen or more divine guards from Hushveil City were struck by the energy crystal cannon. They instantly perished.

    Below the energy towers, the members of the House of Han were busily refilling the towers with fresh energy crystals. When the energy towers were refilled and energized, the energy crystal cannon began to glow. Its luminosity rapidly increased before a loud rumble was heard the moment it shot out towards the horizon as a blinding beam of light.

    ¡°Wee to Fort Lasberg, motherfuckers!¡± shouted Gilbert as he unloaded energetic beams on Hofs¡¯ divine guards, shooting them down from the sky.

    ¡°Watch out! Get scattered!¡± shouted Hofs at the top of his lungs. He did not expect that the small little Fort Lasberg would possess such arge number of high-yield energy crystal cannons along with the piles of energy crystals needed to power them.

    The energy crystal cannons were not just costly to acquire, but they were also extremely expensive to operate. Many considered firing such high-yield energy crystal cannons as burning money for each st would consume energy crystals worth tens of thousands of ck crystal coins. Therefore, most of the family ns that possessed energy crystal cannons would only use it sparingly.

    Unfortunately for Hofs and Larikson, they did not know that the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy under the House of Han had countless branches in the Death, Destruction, and Darkness Dominions that generated them a magnanimous wealth of ck crystal coins. The House of Han was filthy rich and could easily afford to consume that tremendous amount of energy crystals.

    Due to Hofs¡¯ underestimating andck of scouting his enemy¡¯s strength, nearly a hundred of the Hushveil City divine guards had perished.

    Hofs¡¯ cries were submerged under the deafening rumbles of the energy crystal cannons. His divine guards continued charging at Fort Lasberg recklessly as the energy crystal cannons continued to greet them with hellfire, but they had gotten smarter. They flew in a more dispersed formation and maderge distances from theirrades.

    With that, the energy crystal cannons were no longer as effective. Although they had been sting the invaders as frequently as before, only twenty-something additional experts were struck.

    The Hushveil City divine guards, although under constant bombardment of energy crystal cannons, managed to reach Fort Lasberg. They flew over the defensive wall and started descending into the fort.

    The first divine guard who descended towards Fort Lasberg suddenly jolted and halted. He discovered that he had mmed into an invisible barrier and he could not fly any closer into the fort. But when he tried to move away, the invisible barrier suddenly formed an intense binding energy and stopped him from leaving. He started spinning and rolling uncontrobly as he tried in vain to free himself from the barrier.

    Then, abruptly, an energy beam from an energy crystal cannon shot into the sky and scored a direct hit on the divine guard. Most of his body was instantly vaporized while the remaining bits sttered.

    Within the next few moments, another fifteen of the invaders were annihted in the same manner. They were all trapped on the invisible barrier powered by the energy towers all over Fort Lasberg before they were sted from the sky by energy crystal cannons.

    As the energy crystal cannons and the barrier were powered by the same energy, the barrier didn¡¯t obstruct the destructive beams that came from the energy crystal cannons, nor would those beams affect the barrier. For this reason, it may have appeared to an outsider that Fort Lasberg was not protected by a barrier. Those Hushveil City divine guards certainly thought so, which was why they had descended into the fort so confidently.

    The energy crystal cannons and the barrier were a match made in heaven. In another few moments, yet another dozen or so of the divine guards were vaporized as they tried to trespass upon Fort Lasberg. They died horrifically.

    ¡°Damn it, retreat!¡± shouted Hofs angrily.

    But thatmand of Hofs was ratherte. Most of those who charged at Fort Lasberg had been killed. The remaining divine guards could already tell that it was foolish to try to descend into the fort and dared not proceed recklessly.

    Before he had even breached Fort Lasberg, Hofs had lost more than a hundred and fifty divine guards!

    The forces under Hofs¡¯mand had been greatly diminished during the Hushveil City incident a few years ago. It was only recently that Hofs had managed to keep the rivaling family ns in the City of Shadows in check. He started to worry if those family ns would resume with their scheme to overthrow him after learning that his troops had further diminished.

    ¡°City Lord, Fort Lasberg is protected by energy crystal cannons and an energy barrier at the same time. This is going to be troublesome! We have been too impulsive. It appears that the House of Han is indeed very rich. They are willing to burn their crystal coins to resist us!¡± Hofs¡¯ Chief of the First Corps Divine Guards reported to him.

    ¡°Destroy the energy barrier. As soon as it is destroyed, we can breach the fort.¡± Although Hofs felt extremely angry, he had not lost his mind. He continued, ¡°Once we breach the fort, they won¡¯t stand a chance against our overwhelming forces!¡±

    ¡°Everyone, attack the energy barrier. It seems that the House of Han is very wealthy. We have struck gold!¡± Lariksonmanded his experts with a sinister smile.

    Larikson brought the most elite experts from his House of Broadhurst. These experts did not participate in the first assault on Fort Lasberg. Although Hofs had lost more than a hundred divine guards, Larikson¡¯s experts did not even suffer a scratch. As Hofs yelled all sorts of profanities, Larikson remained unruffled, fantasizing about the piles of ck crystal coins in the Han Residence.

    Hofs¡¯ eyes suddenly lit up when he heard those words. He gazed at Fort Lasberg lustfully and remarked, ¡°That¡¯s right. If the House of Han has such a great stockpile of energy crystals, then the wealth they have stored in their mansion must be very substantial as well! If I can take that wealth, it would somewhatpensate for the losses I have suffered.¡±

    Larikson took a nce at Hofs and said nothing. Nobody knew what he had in his mind.

    ¡°I want everyone tounch ranged attacks at Fort Lasberg. They will have to spend several tens of thousands of ck crystal coins just to block a single wave of our attack! Let¡¯s see just how many waves of our attacks those energy crystal towers can resist!¡± snickered Hofs.

    The divine guards of Hushveil City started using their divine energy and divine weapons tounch ranged attacks at Fortsberg. The colorful divine energies shot towards the fort like meteor showers.

    ¡°Refill those crystals! When those bastards get inside, they are going to loot all the energy crystals in the energy towers. Do not leave a single piece of the crystals for them!¡± shouted Gilbert as he moved the sparkling energy crystals into the energy towers with the divine guards of the House of Han.

 Chapter 879 - Burning crystal coins

    <h4>Chapter 879: Burning crystal coins</h4>

    As Gilbert shouted andmanded, he joined the divine guards in flushing crystal coins down the toilet ¨C refilling the energy crystals in those energy towers. He said to himself, ¡°Fucking hell, each piece of these is worth three thousand ck crystal coins. How fucking extravagant!¡±

    The House of Han was using energy crystals of the highest concentration and purity. These energy crystals could provide a tremendous amount of power for the Energy Crystal Cannons and energy barrier.

    Although the defenders had managed to kill more than a hundred of the invaders in just minutes, the former had spent energy crystals worth at least a million ck crystal coins. To most small family ns, a million ck crystal coins was an astronomical amount of wealth. Their revenues umted over a decade might not evene close to that number.

    Gilbert had been shouting and cursing, motivating the divine guards of the House of Han to continue replenishing the towers with fresh energy crystals. With that, the energy towers may continue to shine while powering the barrier that protected Fort Lasberg as well as the Energy Crystal Cannons that had not stopped bombarding the invaders.

    All these divine guards of the House of Han had gone through thorough interviews and interrogations before they were admitted. They had all passed background checks and were unusually talented. Most of them possessed midgod strengths before they were recruited.

    On the first day they joined the House of Han, they were given the best divine weapons and divine armors that ck crystal coins could buy. Then, they would be sent into the Eight Destion and Torment Formation for a round of tempering. After emerging from the Formation, they would be personally trained by Bonds and the others.

    These divine guards who had been trained and tempered possessed staunch minds and could remain calm under pressure, never dropping the ball during critical times. These people were much more efficient in refilling the energy crystals and operating the Energy Crystal Cannons than the average divine guards in the City of Shadows.

    Those Energy Crystal Cannons in Fort Lasberg did not just boast extreme firepower, but they also had a great firing range. Facing the bombardment of the Energy Crystal Cannons, those divine guards of Hofs were thrown into chaos. Many more were struck by the destructive beams and killed.

    Every stunched from an Energy Crystal Cannon would destroy a good fortune. Although there were just around thirty people in the Fort refilling the energy crystals in the energy towers, they had managed to keep the hundreds of invaders led by Hofs and Larikson from breaching the Fort.

    ¡°Scatter! Godamnit! Don¡¯t you idiots know that those Energy Crystal Cannons have great projectile range?¡± Hofs couldn¡¯t help but swear when more of his divine guards died. He instructed them to disperse even more.

    Larikson and his highgods from the House of Broadhurst, meanwhile, used their divine energies to form barriers to protect themselves.

    Larikson and his highgods were all ¡®prestigious¡¯ characters in the City of Gorging Clouds and they wouldn¡¯t evade from the annihtive beams like Hofs and his followers. They deemed themselves too ¡®reputable¡¯ and ¡®distinguished¡¯ to do so. This left them with the only option of using the divine energy in their body to resist the energetic beams.

    The situation had entered a temporary stalemate. One party had lots of divine energies while the other had tons of ck crystal coins. But the former proved to be more enduring. The fierce attacks and strong defense meant that Fort Lasberg had to consume energy crystal rapidly. Despite having piled up a great number of energy crystals, in the end, they still ran out.

    ¡°Lord Gilbert, we are almost out of energy crystals. What should we do?¡± asked one of the divine guards who was almost as irascible as Gilbert.

    ¡°What can we do but retreat? Don¡¯t tell me what you want to charge at them and throw your lives away?¡± replied Gilbert before he shouted at everyone, ¡°Brothers, it¡¯s time. Let¡¯s leave this ce while there is still some energy left in the energy towers!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s retreat to the Han Residence!¡± the divine guards said to each other. They filled the remaining energy crystals into the energy towers and rapidly withdrew to the Han Residence. It was done smoothly and perfectly as though they had practiced it before.

    With all the energy crystals stuffed into the energy towers, it appeared like there was nothing valuable left on the Fort. Gilbert and the divine guards vanished in an instant.

    Although they had left the energy towers, there was still energy left in the towers. The Energy Crystal Cannons continued to shoot out destructive beams at those invaders.

    During that time, Hofs lost yet another couple dozens of divine guards while Larikson and his experts exhausted a good amount of divine energy as they formed barriers to resist the destructive beams head-on instead of evading them.

    Gradually, the energy in those energy towers was depleted and the Energy Crystal Cannons stopped firing. The invaders carefully listened and discovered that Fort Lasberg was pin-drop silent.

    ¡°Go inside. There isn¡¯t a single soul in there,¡± Larikson calmly informed Hofs after sensing for a moment.

    Hofs too was able to detect the abnormality in the Fort. But this time, he was much more cautious. He randomly pointed at one of his followers and instructed, ¡°Head inside and report back the situation.¡±

    That divine guard secretly felt reluctant but did not reveal it at all. He nodded and flew towards Fort Lasberg. And when he got close, he flew over the defensive wall and cautiously descended into the Fort. When he noticed that the invisible barrier had gone, he loudly cried, ¡°The barrier has been depleted of energy. The energy towers are not shining and nobody is here!¡±

    ¡°Move!¡± Hofsmanded his divine guards fiercely for he knew that there wouldn¡¯t be any more danger temporarily.

    The invaders transformed into streaks of shadows and descended on Fort Lasberg. Uponnding, Hofs and Larikson immediately looked all around with glistening eyes as though they were looking for something valuable.

    After scanning all around, Hofs cursed, ¡°What in the world?! There¡¯s nothing left! That fucking House of Han couldn¡¯t leave a single crystal for us!¡±

    Larikson too wore a dark face as he wasn¡¯t happy to have breached the Fort. He groaned. ¡°We have entered the Fort. Nowes the easy part. Hehe, don¡¯t you worry, Hofs. I¡¯m certain that the Han Residence at the center of the Fort will have what you want!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s get on with it. I can wait no longer,¡± Hofs coldlymanded his troops. ¡°Move to the center of the Fort and destroy the House of Han!¡±

    Meanwhile, in the Han Residence at the center of Fort Lasberg, a thick dark cloud came out of nowhere and lingered above the Han Residence. The entire Fort Lasberg saw clear blue skies but not the Han Residence.

    After the dark cloud nketed the Han Residence, chilling winds started blowing while a mist slowly filled the Residence and shrouded it from the view of outsiders.

    ¡°Bonds, Sanguis, have the demonic formations been activated?¡± asked Phoebe in a grave face. The Han Family had gathered in arge meeting room on the highest floor of thergest building in the Han Residence.

    ¡°Yes, we have just double-checked it. They have all been activated,¡± said Sanguis after nodding. His red eyes suddenly turned away and he took a deep breath. ¡°Gilbert has returned. They should havepleted their mission. It seems that Hofs and his troops will be here soon!¡±

    ¡°Mister Stratholme, are there any civilians left in the Fort?¡± Emily asked Stratholme beside her, who had his brows bunched.

    Stratholme replied with a smile, ¡°They left long ago. There is no one in the Fort other than the members of our family n. I hope Wace doesn¡¯t do anything to those civilians.¡±

    ¡°They are going to spread the truth to the public. Wace will soon be condemned by everyone!¡± interrupted Ayermike. ¡°I finally understand why the City of Shadows ranks just a ce above Hushveil City. Hofs doesn¡¯t know how to hold his temper and Wace can¡¯t tolerate having apetitor. They may be extraordinarily strong, but they aren¡¯t going to achieve shit with that attitude!¡±

    ¡°Who cares about Wace? As long as we survive this, we will leave the City of Shadows and look for Bryan. I¡¯m sure that Bryan can lead our House of Han to a bright future!¡± said Stratholme with a rxed smile. ¡°Although I do not know Bryan that much, I do know that he possesses infinite potential. In the near future, our House of Han will surely be stronger than the House of Sainte. By then, we cane back here for revenge!¡±

    Stratholme had still underestimated Han Shuo¡¯s capability. By now, Han Shuo did not even need to get into action himself. Just the forcesmanded by Han Hao would have easily crushed the House of Sainte.

    ¡°I¡¯m back. Huhu, we have burned so many energy crystals. How my heart aches!¡± it was at this moment that Gilbert returned with an expression of agony as though something tragic happened.

    ¡°It¡¯s alright. As long as we can get the results that we want, we are not afraid of using up some crystal coins.¡± Emily put on a faint smile and asked, ¡°So how did it go, Dark Dragon?¡±

    ¡°We have sted down more than two hundreds of their divine guards!¡± reported Gilbert with a sinister smile. ¡°Many of those alive are wounded. Even Larikson and his gang must have exhausted a good amount of divine energy!¡±

    ¡°Hahaha, brilliant job, Dark Dragon!¡± said Sanguis. His eyes lit up with a red light as he imed, ¡°But I¡¯m going to score even higher! Just wait and watch me ughter the shit out of them!¡±

 Chapter 880 - Bait

    GDK 880: Bait

    Larikson, Hofs, and the experts they brought assembled before the Han Residence. Although they had been stalwart and zealous while marching to the Residence, they were worried and hesitant when they were at their destination.

    A bizarre and eerie dark cloud loomed over the Han Residence that was shrouded under a thick dark fog. None of the experts gathered outside could peer through the fog to see what danger may lie ahead. Having eaten tons of destructive sts of Energy Crystal Cannons, the divine guards of the Hushveil City had learned to fear the House of Han. They dared not charge ahead recklessly.

    Even Hofs and Larikson immediately raised their hands, signaling their experts to halt upon seeing the peculiar situation ahead. They wore dark faces as they used their divine souls to probe the Han Residence.

    After a long while, Hofs softly eximed, ¡°Something¡¯s wrong. My soul seems to be blocked by the thick fog. I cannot sense any life aura at all. This is impossible, I¡¯m sure that they are inside. They must have blocked the sensing power of my soul somehow!¡±

    Larikson nodded and said, ¡°Indeed. I too cannot sense any life aura. But I¡¯m certain that those of the House of Han had never left Fort Lasberg. From my intel, they have been defending the Fort all along. Those who left the Fort were all civilians.¡±

    Hofs knew exactly where Larikson¡¯s ¡®intel¡¯ came from. He smirked as he said, ¡°Wace really is intolerant ofpetition. But this is a good thing, hehe. After eradicating the House of Han, I¡¯m going to spread the truth to the public. If Bryan is not dead already, he will know the role that Wace yed. By then, no matter if he was willing or not, he would have to fight alongside us!¡±

    ¡°Indeed. Wace may scheme, but so could we! Hehe, we may be the ones doing the dirty work, but Wace¡¯s hands are no less bloody than ours!¡± Larikson obviously didn¡¯t n on letting Wace y the role of an innocent bystander. He too had nned on dragging Wace into the mud.

    ¡°I did not expect that the House of Han would take so much trouble. Perhaps we need to be more cautious,¡± said Hofs gravely as he stared at the Han Residence right ahead of him that was hidden under the thick dark fog.

    ¡°Let¡¯s try ranged attacks on it, the same way we treated the energy barrier earlier,¡± proposed Larikson.

    Hofs nodded andmanded his troops, ¡°Make some distance from the Han Residence and start bombarding it! Let¡¯s see if they can hold up to even a single wave of our joint attack!¡±

    Those divine guards of Hushveil City did not hesitate. As their City Lordmanded, they sent out a dazzling swarm of divine energies into the Han Residence, hoping that it would reveal the situation under the fog.

    Hofs and Larikson had been observing attentively as the divine energy attacks fell into the dense fog. It was like a stone being thrown into the bottomless ocean. They did not hear any shrieks from any beings, nor did they hear the intense explosions that should have sounded.

    <i>Something¡¯s not right!</i>

    It was in to all those gathered before the Han Residence that the thick fog was nothing as simple as it seemed. They were startled and started thinking about how they should preserve their own lives.

    ¡°You, you, and you, step inside and find the way in. It might just be a deceitful trick of the House of Han to keep us outside,¡± instructed Hofs as he randomly selected a few of his divine guards.

    Those Hushveil City divine guards who were selected as cannon fodders felt terrified and wretched but they carried out their City Lord¡¯smand. Very slowly and cautiously, they stepped into the fog. They immediately noticed that their senses were greatly affected with their eyes seeing no more than ten meters. Stepping on the t ground felt like stepping on air. Everything around them seemed unreal.

    Using their divine souls, Larikson and Hofs attentively observed the cannon fodders¡¯ movements. They were somewhat d to find that the cannon fodders did not suffer ferocious attacks as they anticipated. However, they did not lose their guard and continued to observe the two¡¯s movements.

    The few cannon fodders gradually made their way deeper into the Han Residence. They kept walking and walking but did not see a single structure nor sense any life signs. They could find neither their way in, nor their way out.

    Larikson and Hofs put on puzzled looks. They had been observing those cannon fodders move around through the aura of their divine souls, estimating their location and movement. The two discovered that those cannon fodders had been going around and around a small region. And no matter how many circles they walked, they ventured no further into the Residence.

    Hofs, given his temper, had long been screaming and cursing. However, it seemed as though those cannon fodders he sent couldn¡¯t hear him at all. They continued to go around and around the same area. They could go no deeper, nor could they find their way back.

    Soon enough, Hofs got impatient. He selected a few more of his divine guards and instructed, ¡°You lot, enter from another side. There might be a space-folding type of barrier so be mindful. Don¡¯t be as useless as those boobies who can¡¯t even find their way back.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, my Lord. I cultivate the energy of space. If there is any space-edict barrier deployed in there, I can identify them and ovee them easily,¡± assured one of the selected divine guards before taking the lead to step into the fog.

    Yet another bunch of cannon fodders attempted to intrude the Han Residence. Once they crossed a certain distance, somehow, they would all start walking in circles as though they had lost their sense of direction. It was the same urrence as the first batch of cannon fodders.

    Hofs knew that it was futile to send more cannon fodders into the Han Residence. He turned to Larikson and asked, ¡°What do you think?¡±

    ¡°They must have some sort of space-edict defensive barrier in there, and the expert who deployed it must have a profound level of mastery over the energy of space. Otherwise, your men wouldn¡¯t have been so clueless and be trapped,¡± said Larikson after thinking for a moment.

    ¡°And?¡± Hofs nced at the experts Larikson brought before he said in a deep, slightly annoyed voice, ¡°Don¡¯t you think that it¡¯s about time you bunch make yourselves useful?¡±

    Although Larikson and Hofs came sieging the Fort together, only Hofs¡¯ divine guards had been put to the frontline. Larikson and his experts had mostly been just supervising. It was easy to see why Hofs wasn¡¯t so happy about it.

    Lariksonughed mischievously, nodded, and said, ¡°Very well.¡± He turned and shot a nce at a highgod of thunder standing behind him before instructing, ¡°Kinu, go give it a try. The energy of lightning can disrupt the edict of space. I believe that with enough bombardment of the lightning energy, those space energy barriers will be destroyed!¡±

    The highgod of thunder named Kinu bowed at Larikson. Without saying a word, he transformed into a bolt of thunder and shot into the fog. As he moved, thunder started to rumble while tiny electric sparks slithered among the dark cloud as the energy of lightning umted.

    *** In the Han Residence, Bonds, wearing a scheming, cold face,manded, ¡°Activate the Illusionary Scene Projector and bait them in!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll handle it! Hehe, let¡¯s withdraw the mist for now and save that fe with the lightning energy some embarrassment,¡± said Gilbert excitedly before he went on to flip the switches.

    Of all those in the meeting room, Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert were the only people familiar with the big and small demonic formations around the Han Residence. Before Han Shuo departed from the Fort, he had described to them the powers of the demonic formations and how to use them. As all three of them cultivated demonic arts with some of their knowledge ovepping with demonic formations, they were able to learn how to control the demonic formations.

    Sanguis, Gilbert, and Bonds went on with temporarily disabling some demonic formations and activating the Illusionary Scene Projector.

    ¡°Ladies, Gentlemen, in just a moment, the mist will dissipate and the Illusionary Scene Projector will clearly project our appearances before the attackers. At that time, please act as though you are so terrified that you shat your pants,¡± instructed Sanguis as he set up the mechanisms.

    ¡°We got it,¡± replied Emily with a faint smile.

    ***After shooting into the mist, Kinu activated the energy of lightning that he had been umting above him. Lightning bolts fell from the sky and bombarded every corner of the Han Residence.

    Then, as though someone had flipped a switch, the thick fog that shrouded the Han Residence suddenly started to dissipate. Even the dark cloud above the Residence began to sway as though it might dissipate at any moment.

    Like a veil being lifted, the buildings in the Han Residence were slowly revealed to the attackers. They saw the members of the House of Han looking terrified, helpless, and full of despair. Some gazed at the attackers foolishly while others were frantically trying to flee. It was utter chaos.

    The lifelike scene and perfect acting had deceived all the attackers, especially Hofs who had been waiting for the moment. They assumed that the highgod of thunder had managed to destroy all of the defensive boundaries in the Han Residence and they did not smell a rat.

    Hofs put on a savage smile and howled, ¡°Charge! Kill them all!¡±

 Chapter 881 - Slaughterhouse

    GDK 881: ughterhouse

    Hofs and Larikson thought that there was nothing in the Han Residence that could harm them. They assumed that Kinu¡¯s highgod thunderbolts had destroyed all the defenses after seeing that the Residence was revealed.

    As the mist dissipated, the members of the House of Han were revealed. They seemed anxious and terrified. This was all the more evidence to Hofs and Larikson that the House of Han had run out of tricks. If both Hofs and Larikson, the strongest and most experienced experts in the army could be fooled, then the rest of the army would be even more clueless.

    Therefore, on Hofs¡¯ mark, all of Hushveil City¡¯s divine guards and Larikson¡¯s elite experts charged towards the Han Residence that was unveiling from the mist.

    But this time, those on the frontlines were not the divine guards from Hushveil City, but they were Hofs, Larikson, and those highgods that Larikson brought. Unlike the previous battles, the strongest were at the very front. Perhaps the glistening wealth that the House of Han had umted all these years had blinded them.

    These experts had remained passive throughout the assault. But when the Han Residence appeared defenseless, propelled by greed, they charged to the fore, wanting to loot all the wealth and resources that the House of Han had.

    The gang led by Hofs and Larikson went into the Han Residence in just an instant. Having the same objective, they flew towards the tallest and most magnificent building where Phoebe and the others were.

    ¡°Hahaha! Wee to the ughterhouse!¡± Gilbertughed maniacally before he shouted, ¡°Reactivate the formations!¡±

    Everywhere in the Residence, beams of sinister purple-red lights suddenly lit up from the ground and shot towards the sky. It seemed as though a giant whirlpool of tremendous suction power was being generated. The mist that had dissipated re-converged in an instant. The Han Residence was yet again shrouded by a thick mist.

    Simultaneously, chilling winds started blowing fiercely as ear-piercing shrieks spiked throughout the air. The Han Residence was flooded with all sorts of sinister energies in an instant. The energies engulfed every living thing within range and allowed none to leave the giant meat grinder.

    Hofs instantly sensed that something was horribly wrong. ¡°Oh shit! Everyone retreat at once!¡±

    Hismand, however, came toote. Most of the remaining Hushveil City divine guards he brought had entered the Han Residence. There were merely a dozen or so who were still outside the Residence. They were the weakest of the army and therefore were pulled far behind by theirrades.

    Larikson was stunned. The ferocious energies that were flooding the area made him feel threatened. He also realized that he had yet again fallen into his enemy¡¯s trap as though he was their puppet. It was a terrible feeling.

    Strange, eerie noises started ying in every region before bizarre energies suddenly started manifesting. The demonic formations had begun to operate. The hallucinating, corrosive, and soul-attacking effects erupted from those formations and firmly enveloped the trespassers.

    It was as though a giant meat grinder had been switched on. Bizarre columns of lights started flying all around, covering the formation like a giant spider web that could cut its attackers into chunks. At the center of the formations was the Han Residence where the members of the House of Han were watching. From the top of the tallest structure, they could see the horrifying situation all around them. They were pleased to see the trespassers being shredded to pieces.

    The members of the House of Han were gathered in a meeting room where they could observe the deadliness of those demonic formations safely without being affected. Torn bodies, limbs and organs could be seen sttering everywhere. They also saw the attackers make their final struggle and heard them shriek miserably as they perished.

    At this moment, all those valiant-looking divine guards of Hushveil City seemed as weak as newborn infants. They were helpless against the myriad of attacks and energies they had never seen before. Resistance was futile.

    ¡°Brilliant! Just brilliant! That¡¯s what they deserve for intruding our Han Residence!¡±ughed Gilbert as he watched the bloodbath. He also exined the miraculous features of certain demonic formations to Stratholme, Candide, and the others.

    Other than Bonds, Gilbert, and Sanguis, no one else in the room had any real understanding of the demonic formations deployed around the Han Residence. Even Phoebe, Emily, and the others had no clue how to operate them. Before the demonic formations were activated, the members of the House of Han were feeling somewhat concerned even though they had confidence in the defenses Han Shuo deployed.

    But now, after having witnessed its destructiveness with their own eyes, they finally understood why Gilbert and Sanguis would be so optimistic.

    By then, Stratholme, Ayermike, Phobe, and the others were so astonished that they were at a loss for words. They had yet again witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s magic and had considered Han Shuo as a supernatural being who would always make miracles. They became even more convinced of Han Shuo¡¯s invincibility.

    ¡°Hehe, although it¡¯s gratifying to watch them die, it¡¯s even more so to kill them with my own hands!¡± said Sanguis with a malevolent grin before he suddenly leaped into one of the demonic formations and butchered the visitors with his broadsword glowing with blood-red radiance.

    After Sanguis, Bond flew into the demonic formation without saying a word. Killing intent erupted from his body. A long, slender flying sword shed and sliced one of the hallucinating divine guards into two.

    Stratholme, Ayermike, and the others were excited and they too wanted to join Sanguis and Bonds. But thankfully, Gilbert stopped them in time, ¡°Don¡¯t go in there! The demonic formations can¡¯t tell friend from foe. It could kill you!¡±

    ¡°Huh? Then why is it that Sanguis and Bonds are doing just fine there?¡± asked Phoebe with a brow raised.

    ¡°Before Master left, he taught the three of us how to traverse the demonic formations without being affected. It¡¯s veryplicated and one must not take a single wrong step. The two of them had memorized everything by heart. That¡¯s why they could walk around the formations without being affected.¡± Then, Gilbert put on an embarrassed smile and said, ¡°As for me, well, I couldn¡¯t remember all those steps and directions. That¡¯s why I¡¯m not going down there. And neither should you all.¡±

    Stratholme, Emily, and the others stared nkly for a moment. After hearing the exnation, they looked at each other and gave up on entering the demonic formations.

    They had seen the horrifying conditions of their attackers. Even Larikson and Hofs were unable to escape from the demonic formations¡¯ effects. They realized that they should not take unnecessary risks.

    ¡°Bryan is truly amazing. Hundreds have died in the demonic formations. I guess we have nothing to worry about!¡± remarked Phoebe smilingly. She finally seemed somewhat at ease.

    The party nodded and smiled after hearing her words as though the formidable threat had already been neutralized.

    ¡°Do not lower your guard! The demonic formations are supported by Yuan Energies and the demon general energy that Master ced before he left. Master had said that the demonic formations can¡¯t run indefinitely. After Sanguis and Bonds have enough fun, before the formations run out of energy, we will still have to evacuate!¡± warned Gilbert.

    The party that was momentarily rxed immediately returned to the tense mood. They understood the dire situation they were in.

    ¡°Gilbert, how long can the formationst?¡± asked Stratholme with his brows bunched.

    ¡°That¡¯s hard to say. It depends on how rapidly the Yuan Energy is being consumed. But anyway, the demonic formation has a limited amount of energy and will stop running once it¡¯s exhausted. We need to leave before it runs out of juice, while Hofs and Larikson are still trapped. The sooner we leave the better.¡±

    Gilbert suddenly sighed and mumbled, ¡°Hell, how I wish Master was here. Then all of those motherfuckers would be fucking dead! Sigh...¡±

    ¡°Then we have no time to waste. Gilbert, inform Sanguis and Bonds that once we have gathered everyone, we will immediately activate the airship and leave Fort Lasberg,¡±manded Emily gravely.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Sanguis and Bonds know that we need to leave,¡± said Gilbert as he nodded.

    Emily, Phobe, Stratholme, and the others then hastily issuedmands, gathering everyone at a secret underground chamber beneath the building.

    Multiple shadows shot around the building and entered every room, assembling every divine guard of the House of Han at the secret chamber which was connected to an evacuation tunnel.

    Meanwhile, Sanguis and Bonds traversed across various regions of the demonic formation. They avoided Larikson, Hofs, and the other highgods and ughtered those attackers who possessed merely midgod strengths.

    Sanguis and Bonds looked ferocious as they were drenched in their enemies¡¯ blood. They were enjoying the killing spree.

    When the two were about to lose themselves, Gilbert shouted at them from the building, ¡°Sanguis, old guy, it¡¯s time to leave!¡± The two soon regained their rationality and flew back into the building. They then went to the underground tunnel with Gilbert.

 Chapter 882 - Coincidence?

    <h4>GDK 882: Coincidence?</h4>

    Even though the members of the House of Han had all evacuated the Han Residence, the demonic formations surrounding the Residence remained operational. Every once in a while, dying shrieks of agony and helplessness would y from the demonic formations.

    Larikson and Hofs were both trapped in a formation that attacked them psychologically. When their worst fears struck their minds, they would have to use every bit of their willpower to resist. In such a situation where their divine souls were under constant attack, Larikson and Hofs had no extra time to even find out what was happening to their underlings. They put all their focus on resisting their worst nightmares.

    Having reached thete-stage highgod realm in their cultivations, both Hofs and Larikson had minds much more tenacious than that of an average god. They had been able to resist the onught of their worst nightmares, albeit barely. Meanwhile, those midgods around them with weak minds were driven to insanity. They were unable to resist the psychological attacks and ended up killing themselves.

    Time flew. A few days passed without a moment¡¯s notice. The yuan energies in the Han Residence were nearing exhaustion and the demonic formations weakened before shutting down one after another. A number of fatigued Hushveil City divine guards re-emerged from the formations. They were just inches from death but survived by mere luck.

    Gradually, the yuan energies werepletely exhausted. The power source for those demonic formations around the Han Residence was finally all used up.

    The thick mist that shrouded the Han Residence had vanished long before that. Every region and structure in the Han Residence wasid bare under the bright sun.

    Those buildings were surrounded by towering ste and nts which were covered with people who had died under horrifying circumstances. They were Hofs¡¯ divine guards from Hushveil City. Some were without limbs or heads, or were deformed or twisted beyond their natural range of motion. Some bled from every orifice and their bodies looked as though they had been freeze-dried.

    There were a thousand Hushveil City divine guards that came to assault Fort Lasberg but by now, less than three hundred were left. Moreover, those three hundred who luckily survived were all tired and drained of energy.

    Hofs took a moment to process the scene of utter devastation around him. A mixed feeling of sadness and rage swelled from his heart. This was definitely not the oue that Hofs desired. Feelingpletely lost and helpless, his mind was vacant and he did not think of pursuing his targets.

    Those divine guards from Hushveil City who were incredibly lucky to survive seemed as though they were bordering on insanity. Their eyes were hollow with fear and horror. At the moment, they were all huddled closely together and trying their best to recover some divine energy.

    Larikson was very astonished. He did not expect that those bizarre energies would kill so many of Hofs¡¯ men. However, Larikson did not feel the least bit of sadness because none of his highgods had been killed.

    ¡°Kinu, go with your men and search around. See if those from the House of Han are still inside,¡± Larikson kept silent for a moment before hemanded in a cold voice while winking at Kinu.

    Kinu had served Larikson for a long time and could decipher Larikson¡¯s actual instruction. He nodded knowingly and immediately began executing themand. They started flying towards the tall andrge buildings and began a thorough search.

    With the strength that Larikon possessed, after the demonic formations stopped functioning, he could instantly sense that there was no one in the Han Residence except themselves. His real goal wasn¡¯t to look for any remaining members of the Han Family but for any remaining treasures.

    Hofs, still drowning in grief and pain, came to his senses upon hearing Larikson¡¯smand to his underlings. He knew what Larikson was up to. Suppressing the anger in his heart, he shouted, ¡°Search the Residence! Kill anyone you see and bring everything valuable back here!¡±

    Those exhausted Hushveil City divine guards immediately got up to execute Hofs¡¯mand with frowns. They flew all around the Han Residence at high speed like a swarm of bees around their nest.

    Ten minutester, Kinu and those Hushveil City divine guards returned with disheartened faces. It was obvious that they hade back empty-handed.

    ¡°My Lord, not a single person, energy crystal, nor ck crystal coin was left. Those damn members of the Han Family took everything with them!¡± reported Kinu upon returning to Larikson.

    Phoebe and the others had started moving their assets since receiving intel that Larikson and Hofs were going to attack them. It was obvious that they wouldn¡¯t leave the two with a single valuable item. By now, the only valuable item left in the Han Residence was the demonic formation that had run out of energy. Unfortunately for Larikson and Hofs, they did not know how to utilize demonic formations. Even if they relocated everything in the Han Residence, they would never be able to use it as a defense.

    One man¡¯s treasure could be another man¡¯s trash. To Han Shuo, Sanguis, and Bonds, who were well-versed in demonic arts, the materials in those demonic formations were very useful. But to Hofs and Larikson, those items werepletely useless.

    ¡°They couldn¡¯t have gone far. Hmph, I¡¯m sure that Wace must have deployed his forces as well. Those fuckers won¡¯t be able to leave the City of Shadows that easily!¡± Larikson coldly groaned and continued, ¡°They must be running for the Death Dominion. After them!¡±

    With so many of his troops now dead, giving up was no longer an option for Hofs. Even if not for himself, he had to murder everyst one of the House of Han as justification for the remainder of his divine guards. Besides, those of the House of Han could be escaping with a mountain of ck crystal coins. Hofs would never let Larikson enjoy the wealth alone.

    Although many of his troops had perished, Hofs was still confident that he could defeat the House of Han. There were still many highgods on his team while there wasn¡¯t a single highgod expert in the House of Han. Hofs was certain that if he could force the House of Han to fight square on, he could im victory with just those few highgod in his team.

    ¡°Pursue them!¡± Hofsmanded his troops. The attackers who had suffered great losses in Fort Lasberg went on another march, rushing in the direction of the Death Dominion.

    *** Inside a bottomless valley a great distance from Fort Lasberg, Ralph was wearing a dark face as he waited for thetest scouting information.

    A shadow shot across the sky before it stopped in front of Ralph. He knelt on one knee and respectfully reported, ¡°My Lord, I have received intel. Those of the House of Han are indeed heading for us!¡±

    Ralph was ted. He put on a cold grin and said, ¡°Excellent. Our waiting here has not been in vain.¡± After taking a short pause, Larikson asked, ¡°Right, what¡¯s the situation like over in Fort Lasberg? With Larikson and Hofs attacking the Fort, even if the Han Family has managed to escape, they should have suffered great casualties, right?¡±

    The man shook his head and replied, ¡°We do not know the exact situation in Fort Lasberg. Before Larikson and Hofs came, all the civilians were forced to leave the Fort. We have tried inserting some scouts but they could not enter the Fort. They only heard the tremendous rumbles from those energy crystal cannons.¡±

    ¡°Hehe, that is wonderful. The House of Han seems to have gone all out to resist!¡± Ralph put on an evil grin and continued, ¡°But against a thousand Hushveil City divine guards and arge number of highgods, even if the House of Han wasn¡¯t exterminated, I reckon there would only be a few who have managed to escape!¡±

    ¡°Your Lordship is indeed the wisest. I believe that those riches the House of Han has gathered all these years must be on those escaping few!¡± ttered the divine guard.

    ¡°It is the City Lord who is wise!¡± Ralph praised Wace respectfully before he instructed in a cold, evil voice, ¡°Get ready, block in the path of their airship, intercept them, exterminate the remainder of them! Hehe, we are going to shift all the me onto Hofs and Larikson. By then, even if Bryan returns, he will only go after the two while we will stay clean!¡±

    Larikson understood that his troops were still shocked by Han Shuo from thestpetition between the Seven Divine Guard Corps. Even though Han Shuo had disappeared for a few years, they were still afraid of Han Shuo. Ralph had said so to puff up his divine guards¡¯ confidence so that they wouldn¡¯t be constantly worrying about the consequences when butchering the members of the House of Han.

    And it seemed that Ralph¡¯s method was very effective. His divine guards seemed energized and motivated after hearing that they wouldn¡¯t have to suffer any consequences or worry about Han Shuo seeking them for revenge.

    *** While Ralph and his divine guards were getting into position for an ambush, Phoebe and the others on the airship were on high alert, constantly monitoring their environment as they travelled. While leaving the City of Shadows, they tried their best to avoid the civilians and other beings. They were worried about running into bandits.

    ¡°There are people gathered in the valley ahead!¡± eximed Sanguis suddenly before he exined, ¡°I can sense the flow of their blood. They are all very excited. It seems that they are targeting us!¡±

    ¡°Go around them,¡±manded Emily decisively. She said, ¡°We need to leave the city as soon as possible. We don¡¯t have time to engage them.¡±

    ¡°But they wouldn¡¯t let us,¡± Sanguis frowned. ¡°They are approaching us already. It must be us that they are after. I wonder which side they are affiliated with.¡±

    ¡°Although the airship saves us energy, it has limited speed. Running from them is not an option,¡± said Stratholmerather gravely. ¡°Get ready for battle!¡±

    ¡°Disembark from the airship, and get into battle position!¡±manded Phoebe and Emily simultaneously.

    A swarm of figures flew down from the titanic airship. The seven hundred or so troops arranged themselves methodically. Divine weapons were drawn as they waited for the arrival of their enemy.

    All seven hundred of the divine guards had been very carefully filtered before admission. Having been tempered in the hellish Eight Destion and Torment Formation and trained by Bonds in the mountain ranges nearby Fort Lasberg, these divine guards were not just deadly but also mentally tenacious. They did not feel the slightest fear as they waited for the unknown enemy.

    Phoebe, Emily, Bonds, Sanguis, GIlbert, and Stratholme were at the front for the troops. They felt a sense of pride when they turned around and saw how dauntless these elite guards of the House of Han were. They also held great confidence in the capabilities of their troops.

    A few minutester, the Second Corps divine guards led by Ralph gradually revealed themselves from the front of the Han Family.

    Ralph had brought the majority of his Second Corps divine guards. Six or seven hundred of them marched into appearance in a tight, dense, formation. Ralph wore a cold face and red at Phoebe and the others with hostile eyes. He asked in a strange manner, ¡°Ladies, gentlemen, where are you all going? What are you up to, bringing such a grand party?¡±

    ¡°You!¡± shouted Phoebe usingly. She did not anticipate that it would be Ralph blocking them from leaving. It appeared that Wace had not just tacitly approved of Larikson and Hofs¡¯ attacking Fort Lasberg, but he had also sent Ralph to make sure that they seeded.

    ¡°This is the territory of the City of Shadows, and your House of Han are citizens of our City. I wonder what you all could be up to, bringing every member of the House of Han towards the Death Dominion.¡± Ralph seemed to have thought of some excuses ahead of time. He sneered, ¡°Hmm, could it be that your people are going to betray the City of Shadows? It must be so. But fortunately, I happened to run into you. Otherwise, I wonder how greatly you would have harmed the City of Shadows!¡±

    ¡°Happened to run into us? Hahaha, what a joke!¡± Stratholme said mockingly, ¡°So it¡¯s mere coincidence that you havee to this remote, deste mountain area thousands of miles away with most of your Second Corps divine guards at the right time and ce to block our way. You call that a coincidence? Haha, yeah right.¡±

    Ralph knew the excuse was lousy but he did not care. He coldly groaned and continued with his speech, ¡°However, I will give you the benefit of the doubt and won¡¯t make things difficult for you. Turn around now and return to Fort Lasberg. I will immediately inform Lord Wace of the incident. His Lordship will investigate the matter thoroughly and hand you a fair judgment.¡±

    Ralph took a short pause before he continued in a cold, threatening voice, ¡°But if you insist on leaving the City of Shadows, hehe, don¡¯t me me for doing my job!¡±

    ¡°Wace? Is there even any integrity left in him?¡± Phoebe was usually an outspoken person and she did not have the patience to continue the charade with Ralph, ¡°Don¡¯t fucking act righteous and noble in front of me. I know that Wace has sent you here to kill us. But let me tell you, we are not returning to the Fort to die.¡°

    ¡°How dare you speak so rudely of the City Lord! It only shows how determined you are to betray the City of Shadows!¡± Ralph gestured andmanded his troops, ¡°Leave none of these traitors alive! Kill them all!¡±

    Phoebe and the others knew Ralph¡¯s purpose the moment that he appeared. He had no intention of letting those of the House of Han live right from the start.

    ¡°You think you can defeat us, Ralph?¡± Sanguis could no longer hold back his anger. His eyes glowed red as he said, ¡°My Master may not be here, but I can defeat you just as simply!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Sanguis charged at Ralph. A mist of blood spread out from Sanguis¡¯ body while the broadsword made of Bloodcrystal glowed in his hand. His momentum soared as he flew towards Ralph like a blood-red meteor.

    Ralph, who hade here with confidence, suddenly froze. He had long scouted out the strength of the House of Han. The only true experts were Han Shuo and Rose and both of them had disappeared a few years before. Without them, there wasn¡¯t a single highgod in the House of Han. It was for this reason that Ralph was so confident that he could intercept the House of Han with his troops.

    However, when Sanguis started flying towards Ralph, he was shocked. He suddenly detected that the intense blood aura on Sanguis contained an extreme amount of energy. Ralph felt a sense of threat from this sinister, bloodthirsty aura. It was obvious to him that this energy was greater than that of a midgod!

    Although Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert could only defeat midgods a few years ago, the three had made breakthroughs since then and they now possessed the strength to fight the highgods in this universe.

    Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert had to abandon Fort Lasberg because both Larikson and Hofs possessedte-stage highgod strengths and Larikson had a few highgods with him. This force was much greater than the three. There was no way that they could defeat so many highgods with their current strengths.

    Ralph, however, was just a mid-stage highgod. Sanguis could put up a fight against an expert on that level.

    ¡°Locke, Walter, I will handle this kid. You guys will handle the rest!¡± shouted Ralph before he charged at Sanguis who was emanating a formidable aura.

    Lest Ralph fail in the covert mission, Wace had temporarily ced two early-stage highgods under Ralph¡¯smand. The two were Wace¡¯s trusted aides that he kept secret from the public for missions like this. He wanted to make it absolutely certain that the House of Han was exterminated and nobody would suspect him.

    Following Ralph¡¯smand, two experts emerged from those Second Corps divine guards. One cultivated the energy of darkness while the other cultivated the energy of earth. They were both early-stage highgods.

    Bonds and Gilbert exchanged nces and shot forward simultaneously to intercept the two trusted aides of Wace. Although Bonds and Gilbert were not improving as rapidly as Sanguis was, they still made breakthroughs at a much faster rate than Phoebe and the others. Against two experts who had just entered early-stage highgod realms, Bonds and Gilbert were able to put up a fight, albeit with difficulty.

    ¡°Defenders of the House of Han, march forth! Show them who are the strongest guards!¡±manded Phoebe.

    The number of divine guards Ralph brought was around the same number as that possessed by the House of Han. But this didn¡¯t mean that they were evenly matched. The House of Han had demonstrated in thestpetition between the Seven Divine Guard Corps that they were the strongest in teambat strength.

    Those divine guards had been trained for just one year when they defeated the elite troops of the Second Corps. The House of Han divine guards now had been trained for many more years in the Eight Destion and Torment Formation. The Second Corps had no chance then, and even less now.

 Chapter 883 - An unstoppable army

    <h4>Chapter 883 An unstoppable army</h4>

    Trantor: Hedonist

    Editor:Emily

    The guards of the House of Han charged at Ralph¡¯s Second Corps divine guards like an unstoppable spear. But as they charged, they maintained formation, perfectly organized, moving in perfect unison.

    While charging at Ralph¡¯s army, these divine guards of the House of Han looked after one another with great rapport. The demonicbat formation they used when marching at their enemy maximized their firepower potential and allowed them to break apart their enemy in the most effective way.

    The divine guards of the House of Han wore emotionless faces as they calmly coordinated themselves with their teammates. Every step they made was of millimeter precision.

    If one was to observe from above, one would see that every guard in a squadron was at an equal distance from each other. The squadrons were also well-coordinated with each other as though each squadron was an individual in a bigger group. Those guards with great strength and the ability to make formidable attacks stood up front, acting at the edge of the spear. Meanwhile, those with more ordinary abilities but cultivated the energy of water or earth ¨C energies with great defensive power ¨C would stand in the middle. Their job was to deployyers of boundaries to defend against their enemies¡¯ attacks.

    The individual strengths of these House of Han guards weren¡¯t substantially greater than those of the Second Corps divine guards. However, when they worked together as a team, when every individual¡¯s potential was utilized to the fullest, they could unleash an exponentially greater amount of power and be far more formidable than the Second Corps divine guards.

    Seeing the House of Han guards charging at them, those Second Corps divine guards immediately employed defensive measures. Their leaders, Ralph, Locke, and Walter, were upied with Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert. Without the three highgods to take the brunt for them, intimidated by the House of Han guards, they employed defensive measures without thinking.

    Though they had made the right choice, it was still not enough!

    As soon as the conical-shaped formation made contact, the defensive wall that the Second Corps divine guards formed in haste immediately crumbled as though made of paper!

    Right after that, the House of Han guards shot into the gap between those Second Corps divine guards. The squadrons andpanies spread out like inting balloons before quickly reaping the lives of those divine guards nearest to them.

    When the Second Corps divine guardsunched attacks on the House of Han guards, they would be handled by those guards who specialized in neutralizing iing threats. Meanwhile, those guards in charge of attacking couldpletely ignore their enemies¡¯ counterattacks, allowing them to focus on what they did best.

    With that, even though the two shing forces had around the same number of troops, the two sides were not being ground down at an equal rate. The attacks that the Second Corps divine guards made were mostly ineffective, which would cause only some light injuries at most. Meanwhile, the attacks that the House of Han guards made would often cause severe injuries if not death.

    The fatal w of those Second Corps divine guards was immediately exposed. It was obvious that theycked rapport and did not know to cooperate. When facing an attack, they were typically only focused on preserving their own lives, which would lower the frequency and deadliness of their attacks. Those divine guards were also very selfish. Not only did they not give a shit about the lives of theirrades, but they would also sacrifice their injured teammates just to keep themselves unharmed.

    The gap of strength between the two forces was revealed as soon as they shed and it only grewrger as time went by. Most of the miserable shrieks came from the Second Corps divine guards. More than a hundred died from the bombardment from the House of Han guards in just moments, during which the House of Han suffered just two casualties and a dozen or so injuries.

    Having been taught to fight in demonicbat formations, the House of Han guards knew how to work together to maximize their firepower and defensive power. They had way surpassed the Second Corps divine guards in cooperativeness and team cohesion. Inrge-scalebat like this, the House of Han had an absolute upper hand as they mowed down those Second Corps divine guards.

    Ralph had been rather passive since the start of his battle with Sanguis and he found himself rather helpless against the ferocious bombardment of bloody radiances. He did not expect Sanguis to possess such formidable strength and to be so damn ferocious.

    Ralph could not feel more remorseful as the miserable shrieks of his troops yed over and over in his ears. He had not just underestimated Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert¡¯s strengths; he had severely misjudged the situation. He did not expect to find that not only had those refugees escaping from Fort Lasberg not suffered any casualties, but they were still bursting with energy and at the top of their game.

    <i>Fucking hell, did Hofs and Larikson even invade the Fort? How is it that twote-stage highgod experts with so many highgods and divine guards have not been able to leave the slightest scratch on the House of Han? What the fuck happened?!</i> cursed Ralph internally as he watched his divine guards being ughtered.

    Before Ralph was Sanguis, staring fixedly at him with his blood-red eyes. A broadsword giving off the reeking of blood whooshed past him and caused the blood in his body to rush chaotically.

    Ralph was confident that he could eventually defeat Sanguis. He realized that Sanguis was only barely able to stay on top by relying on the bizarreness of the energy he cultivated. Based on Ralph¡¯s assessment, Sanguis was overdrawing his energy and he wouldn¡¯t be able to keep it up for too long. Sanguis would soon be exhausted and he only needed to defend himself until that moment.

    But Ralph also knew that if he kept on waiting, more and more of his divine guards would perish. The only other option was to risk his life and go on an all-out fight against Sanguis, which he himself would suffer greatly for, even if he could defeat Sanguis.

    Ralph had been passively waiting because he would rather let his subordinates die than risk injuring himself.

    As Ralph silently defended against Sanguis¡¯ ferocious attacks, he found the time to observe Locke and Walter. He had high hopes for the two experts sent by Wace.

    But he soon realized that his hope was misced.

    Locke and Walter, the two trusted aides of Wace were also being passively bombarded by their opponents. In fact, Locke and Walter were in a worrying situation. Against the ferocious attacks of Bonds and Gilbert, the two highgod experts were candlelights in a storm ¨C they could be extinguished at any moment.

    <i>What the fuck! No wonder the House of Han won thest time! No highgod my ass! What a liar!</i> cursed Ralph in his mind. He had no idea that Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert in fact were not highgods during thepetition and that they had simply soared in the little time since. He thought that the Fifth Corps defeated his Second Corps because Sanguis, Gilbert, and Bonds were too powerful.

    <i>We can¡¯t keep going on this path. Otherwise, we would all be finished!</i> After re-evaluating the situation, Ralph finally stopped being so passive in the battle. He finally put his life on the line and went on an all-out fight against Sanguis.

    When Ralph stopped being overly cautious and stopped being so reserved, his strength substantially improved. While spending divine energy to stabilize his blood, he fought Sanguis without a care about getting hurt.

    With that, Sanguis no longer had the upper hand. Against a mid-stage highgod going all-in, Sanguis had no choice but to strive even harder. He had gained many more fresh wounds in just moments.

    But somehow, when his blood escaped from those wounds, Sanguis felt that the blood in his body had be even more energetic while his broadsword glowed even brighter.

    His firepower was increasing!

    In just a matter of minutes, more than three hundred Second Corps divine guards were ughtered by the House of Han guards, with thetter suffering just three additional casualties and around twenty injuries.

    ¡°Kill them all! Stop at nothing!¡±manded Phoebe coldly from behind the House of Han guards. She could tell that Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert were overdrawing their energies and they wouldn¡¯tst long. She realized that the House of Han guards had to destroy the Second Corps divine guards as quickly as possible and assist the three.

    The House of Han guards promptly changed theirbat formation. From a conical shaped formation, they turned into daggers stacked like a flower. The seven hundred of them divided into seven groups and shot out like seven daggers, ughtering those panic-stricken Second Corps divine guards.

    It was soon evident that this formation was even deadlier than the previous. When the seven daggers dispersed, they turned the Second Corps divine guards into seven rivers of blood.

    Ralph was frightened!

    Ralph suddenly realized that at this rate, even if he managed to kill Sanguis, he wouldn¡¯t have any troops left by then. He calmly re-evaluated the situation for a moment before he suddenly shrieked, ¡°Mission failed! Everyone retreat!¡±

    Ralph stopped attacking Sanguis and flew away.

    Locke and Walter too immediately broke off from Bonds and Gilbert and flew towards the valley nearby.

    The Second Corps divine guards who had received themand to retreat started fleeing frantically. Their hearts were filled with dread. They did not expect to fare so poorly against an army of simr size, that they would be so fragile from start to finish.

    When Ralph and his Second Corps divine guards started fleeing, the House of Han guards very calmly pursued them. They wished to cause even greater casualties and maximize the damage to Ralph¡¯s Second Corps.

    ¡°Do not pursue!¡± shouted Stratholme hastily.

    ¡°Get back here, we cannot afford to waste any more time on them!¡±manded Phoebe calmly.

    Both Stratholme and Phoebe understood that Larikson and Hofs wouldn¡¯t have given up so easily. They might have started pursuing them by now. If Hofs, Larikson, and his experts caught up to them, this time, there wouldn¡¯t be any demonic formation that they could hide behind.

    It was crucial for them to make full use of every second of every minute. They simply had no time to waste on Ralph and his gang. Besides, it wouldn¡¯t be toote to kill Ralph along with Waceter in the future when they had the capacity to return to the City of Shadows.

    They knew that Ralph was no longer a threat to them, and they could always take his life in the future.

    Upon hearing Stratholme and Phoebe¡¯smand, the House of Han guards rapidly flew back to them. They re-assumed a defensive formation around Phoebe and Stratholme.

    ¡°Sanguis, Gilbert, are you alright?¡± cried Emily suddenly.

    The crowd immediately turned their gazes towards Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert. After the great battle, all three of them were panting heavily and drenched in sweat. It was obvious that they had exhausted a great amount of energy.

    This was especially the case with Sanguis. Although he seemed as though he was supported by the inexhaustible willpower of a warrior, the moment that Ralph left, he turned pale and his blood-stained body copsed. It was after Sanguis had the time to rx that he realized he had exhausted too much energy in the battle.

    ¡°Sanguis, you okay?¡± asked Gilbert concernedly. Although he too was sweating profusely, he still looked quite healthy, unlike Sanguis.

    ¡°I will be fine in a moment,¡± said Sanguis after he forced a smile. The broadsword in his hand suddenly flew up, hovered in the sky, and started spinning at high speed.

    Strands of bizarre energy emanated from Sanguis¡¯ broadsword. Suddenly, the blood spilled by the perished Second Corps divine guards seemed as though it was drawn by some sort of energy. They transformed into mist, flew into the air, and gathered around the broadswords. The mist slowly condensed into streams of blood and spun on the surface of the sword.

    Gradually, every drop of blood on the ground had condensed on the broadsword and the reeking scent faded. The broadsword returned to Sanguis¡¯ hand before streams of red radiances flowed from the broadsword into Sanguis¡¯ body.

    Momentster, Sanguis was no longer pale and his eyes no longer tired. He seemed recharged and as energetic as usual. Sanguis took a deep breath and smilingly announced, ¡°Alright, I¡¯m good. Come, let¡¯s hurry on!¡±

    Stratholme, Ayermike, Phoebe, and the House of Han guards were all dumbstruck by what they saw. They did not expect that Sanguis, who couldn¡¯t even stand just a moment ago, could regain his energy just like that. It was simply unimaginable to them.

    ¡°Pff, that¡¯s nothing to be shocked about. Our Master¡¯s energy is nothing that you can understand. Sanguis is my Master¡¯s disciple. it¡¯s quite normal that he can recover so quickly.¡± When Gilbert saw that everyone was in a daze, he hastened, ¡°Get a move on already! Don¡¯t tell me that you want those guys to catch up?¡±

    The crowd came to their senses after hearing those words. They hastily re-embarked on the airship and continued their journey to the Death Dominion.

 Chapter 884 - Do you know Him?

    <strong>Chapter 884</strong>

    <strong>Do you know Him?</strong>

    Trantor: Hedonist

    Editor:Emily

    GDK 884: Do you know Him?

    ***Over at the shared border or the Darkness and Death Dominions ¨C the Ronson Canyon.

    The Ronson Canyon was a massive canyon that all those who wished to travel between the Death and Darkness Dominions must traverse. The canyon was gued by godhunters. It was said that the most powerful godhunter ns in the Death and Darkness Dominions had their base camps set up in the Ronson Canyon. Merchant caravans would only step into the Canyon with arge group of divine guards.

    But the Ronson Canyon had recently be much safer than usual. It was said that one of the most powerful godhunter factions had left the Canyon for some reason. And after they vanished from the Canyon, the remaining godhunter factions turned quiet and stopped wreaking havoc over thends.

    On that day, a massive airship transporting a great army flew into the vast territory of the Ronson Canyon. It was like arge cloud overshadowing thend. Human silhouettes could be seen on the airship. They were divine guards vigntly scanning their surroundings, watching out for any enemy who might suddenly emerge from the thick jungle.

    ¡°We have finally reached the Ronson Canyon. After crossing the Canyon, we will be in the territory of the Death Dominion. Hofs and Larikson will never step into the Death Dominion with their army uninvited. Our allies from the Death Dominion will be there to wee us,¡± said Stratholme after he heaved a sigh of relief. He had been feeling nervous and uneasy throughout the journey, worrying that Larikson and Hofs could catch up at any moment.

    ¡°We cannot rx just yet. This is the intersection point of the Darkness and Death Dominions. Godhunters run wild here.¡± Bonds had worked in Erebus¡¯ Third Corps for a few years and he had heard a thing or two about the Ronson Canyon. He knew that the Canyon housed a good number of formidable godhunter factions.

    ¡°Godhunters?¡± GIlbert put on a disdained smirk and remarked, ¡°Pfft, with the force that our House of Han now possesses, they should be afraid of us instead of the other way round. They¡¯d better not provoke us, otherwise, we will fulfill their death wish!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t you boast,¡± Bonds red at Gilbert and rebutted, ¡°If we run into just one of those factions, then sure, we have nothing to worry about. But if we run into a so-called ¡®alliance¡¯ of multiple godhunter factions, we will be in deep trouble.¡±

    After taking a short pause, Bonds continued gravely, ¡°There is one godhunter faction in the Ronson Canyon that is particrly savage. They are the most infamous godhunter faction in the Canyon but few know the identity of their leader. They would attack every caravan that travels through the Canyon, even one that is protected by arge number of divine guards. The cities of the Darkness Dominion had tried to annihte them but they had always failed. They have been unrivaled in the Ronson Canyon for decades. No average family n could contend against them.¡±

    Gilbert frowned, ceasing his cheeky behavior. ¡°Who is their leader? That¡¯s frightening!¡±

    Bonds answered, ¡°As I¡¯ve said, only a few know the identity of their leader. Perhaps only those in the business of godhunting. But ording to hearsay, the person is very young. He might just be a teenager. He cultivates in the energy of death and uses a bone spear.¡±

    ¡°What a terrifying youngster. I wonder if he or Sanguis is stronger...¡± muttered Gilbert as he took a nce at the teenager beside him.

    ¡°Even if Sanguis has his strength, he doesn¡¯t have his leadership skills,¡± said Bonds.

    ¡°How could you be sure about that? Hehe, now you¡¯ve made me curious, I feel like meeting that guy.¡± Sanguis¡¯ strength had recently been soaring and he had grown more arrogant. He did not think that there could be another teenager that could match himself.

    ¡°We better pray that we don¡¯t run into him. Otherwise, we might not even be able to leave the Ronson Canyon,¡± said Bonds.

    ¡°Everyone be watchful. Larikson and Hofs won¡¯t give up on us so easily. The Ronson Canyon may be vast, but we cannot linger in this area. We ought to leave as quickly as possible,¡± said Emily. The only thing in her mind was to bring the members of the House of Han to safety.

    *** Behind an awe-inspiring waterfall in the Ronson Canyon were dozens of big and small caves where figures could be seen moving about. Thergest chamber was well-lit and supported by three miniature energy towers. Dozens of savage-looking godhunter leaders were having a discussion in the chamber.

    ¡°I havepleted my investigation. They are the City of Shadows¡¯ House of Han. The Celestial Pearl Pharmacy found all over the Death, Destruction, and Darkness Dominions is owned by this family n,¡± exined Quincy, a leader of a godhunter faction, beaming with joy. He tempted the other godhunter leaders, ¡°The Celestial Pearl is filthy rich ¨C they are a big, fat cash cow! Plus, those guards of the House of Han cultivate all sorts of elements and edicts. We will get not just arge amount of ck crystal coins, but also arge amount of their divine energy. So, who¡¯s in?¡±

    The power that the House of Han disyed was nothing feeble. None of the godhunter factions could take down the family n by themselves. All the godhunter leaders in the Ronson Canyon had assembled in the cave to discuss if they should join forces to raid the House of Han.

    ¡°Sounds like a great deal!¡± Chrison, another godhunter leader said with a savage smile, ¡°The House of Han was in a dire situation when they left the City of Shadows. If we join forces, we can easily overpower them. Hehe, I¡¯m in!¡±

    ¡°Me too!¡±

    ¡°Count me in as well!

    ¡°We want some too!¡±

    Those godhunter leaders gathered in the chamber intended to join forces to defeat the House of Han. Under Quincy¡¯s instigation, the strongest godhunter factions in the Ronson Canyon agreed to join forces, marking the House of Han as their prey!

    ¡°You boys seem to have forgotten someone,¡± a dissenting voice suddenly sounded. Scarlett, one of the godhunter leaders knitted her brows as she said, ¡°His surname, Han, it¡¯s a rare family name. Don¡¯t you think it¡¯s possible that he is rted to the House of Han?¡±

    Scarlett was the only female in the chamber. She had a voluptuous, sultry figure and a beautiful look. But no man would be interested in her. In fact, most were afraid of her because of the tworge, frightening scars that blotted her face.

    Scarlett cultivated the energy of death and possessed early-stage highgod strength. Among those in the chamber, she was neither the weakest nor the strongest. And yet, the godhunter faction she led had been doing well thanks to her outstandings wits.

    Upon hearing Scarlett¡¯s words, those leaders who had dly agreed to the n bunched their brows. Even Chrison seemed somewhat hesitant to proceed. In a deep voice, he said, ¡°What are the odds? I¡¯ve never known him to have any family or friends. But if he¡¯s associated with the House of Han, we need to reconsider our n!¡±

    Quincy¡¯s face turned cold and in an annoyed manner, he said, ¡°Indeed. That guy used to be the strongest in Ronson Canyon, but he is not in the canyon anymore. Besides, his followers have clearly indicated that they will no longer interfere with any business in the canyon. Furthermore, he never said that he came from the House of Han and he is not even in the canyon. What is there to be afraid of?¡±

    ¡°Hmm, yeah. We must be overthinking. There¡¯s no way he¡¯s rted to the House of Han.¡± Chrison put on an embarrassed smile and said, ¡°We must be scaring ourselves for nothing. The n stays on course. I¡¯m still in!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s my man!¡± said Quincy as he chuckled. Shortly after, he looked at Scarlett with impatient eyes and said, ¡°Women are always so fainthearted. Hmph, if you are not joining us then you can leave. That¡¯s one less piece of the pie to share. We can do just fine without you!¡±

    Scarlett¡¯s face turned dark. She lifted her chin and replied, ¡°Well then, carry on as you wish, but I wouldn¡¯t take the risk of offending that guy.¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Scarlett transformed into a trail of shadow, shot through the waterfall, and left.

    ¡°Looks like that bitch is in love with him. She should look at herself in the mirror,¡± he snickered. ¡°How could any guy want her!¡± mocked Quincy disdainfully as Scarlett left.

    ¡°That guy has no emotions, has never shown any interest in any woman, and he most certainly wouldn¡¯t be reluctant to kill a woman. What a fool of Scarlett to fall in love with such a man. But speaking of that whore, hehe, her face may be repulsive, but her body... Mmm-mmm... I¡¯d like to take her somewhere that¡¯s pitch ck!¡± said Chrison as he moved his pelvis suggestively. The godhunter leaders joined him in cackling nastily.

    *** ¡°How was the meeting, Chief?¡± Shortly after Scarlett left the cave, a crafty-looking godhunter weed her smilingly.

    Scarlett was enraged. As a highgod, her hearing was impable. And given that those in the cave had not lowered their voices, she heard every word of their obscenements about her. However, Scarlett dared not return to the cave to beat them up because her strength was limited. She had no choice but to repress her anger.

    <i>He is possibly the only man who isn¡¯t so debased...</i> a thought emerged in Scarlett¡¯s mind out of nowhere. But she thenughed at herself, thinking, <i>Oh Scarlett. What the hell are you thinking? How could he fancy you given the way you look? He only saved you because it was aligned with his interest. He didn¡¯t mean anything at all, stop indulging in flights of fancy already...</i>

    ¡°Chief, what happened?¡± Scarlett showed a mix of emotions on her face. She would grit her teeth in rage one moment, but try to hold backughter in the next. That follower of Scarlett¡¯s couldn¡¯t help but ask in a slightly higher voice. Scarlett was abruptly roused from the daze. She shook her head hard, as though trying to shake off the unrealistic fantasy off her mind.

    ¡°It¡¯s nothing. Right, you¡¯ve mentioned that that guy still has a few followers who have yet to leave the Canyon. Can you contact them?¡± asked Scarlett after calming her mind.

    ¡°They are sorting out a few remaining businesses and they will all leave soon. I know where they are. I shall contact them right away.¡±

    ¡°Wait, let me write a scroll. Make sure it reaches them as quickly as possible!¡± said Scarlett. She immediately took out a scroll, wrote a few sentences, handed it to her follower, and hastily left.

    *** Somewhere in the Ronson Canyon, where the unbroken mountains looked no different from the surface of the sea, whererge, white cotton-like clouds floated gently in the sky.

    Those traveling in the airship had just left a swamp with a foul atmosphere and were moving towards a ravine piled with rocks. Before anyone could see the situation in the ravine, Sanguis suddenly said, ¡°Someone is approaching us.¡±

    The House of Han guards on the airship were jolted. They looked around vigntly and quickly formed abat formation on the airship.

    Emily, Phoebe, and the others were rmed. They looked everywhere as they shouted, ¡°Everyone be careful! Get ready for battle!¡±

    ¡°That is not necessary. She came alone,¡± Sanguis seemed somewhat amused that everyone on the airship was frightened. ¡°Don¡¯t worry, that woman isn¡¯t particrly strong. I can handle her myself.¡±

    After hearing Sanguis¡¯ words, the party let out a sigh of relief. But they were all rather puzzled, not understanding why a woman would approach them all by herself. They did not have any contacts in the Ronson Canyon and it was not possible for one expert to cause them any harm. What would her intention be?

    A momentter, Scarlett gradually appeared above a stone forest in the distance. Fanny, Lisa, and the otherdies lightly cried out in shock when they saw the fierce-looking criss-cross scar on her face.

    ¡°Come no further!¡± shouted Bonds coldly as his killing intent locked on Scarlett.

    Scarlett was stunned. She did not expect that Bonds could deliver such an intense killing intent at her with just one look. Her heart trembled and she thought, <i>The House of Han doesn¡¯t seem as weak as Quincy said and they have at least one highgod. Could they have even stronger experts?</i>

    Just as Scarlett was about to speak, her long, shapely brows darted and her bewitching eyes widened. She sensed a very strange energy on Bonds which she had only detected on another man who possessed an even greater strength.

    <i>They must be rted!</i>

    Scarlett became even more certain of her spection. She first halted mid-air, raised her hands to indicate that she came in peace, and hastily asked, ¡°Do any of you know Han Hao?¡±

    ¡°Han Hao? Who¡¯s Han Hao? No clue!¡±

    ¡°Who are you? And who is Hao Hao?¡±

    The members of the House of Han were astounded and they looked at Scarlett bewildered. <i>What¡¯s the matter with this woman? Why would shee to us so excitedly to ask us this ridiculous question?</i>

    Scarlett was startled by their response. She thought, <i>Have I been overthinking? But the energy on that old guy is very simr to Han Hao¡¯s. How do you exin that?</i>

    ¡°We do not know the person you mentioned. Please do not get in our way!¡± said Stratholme politely, but almost condescendingly. However, he nced at Bonds several times with a look on his face that hinted, <i>Don¡¯t me us for being impolite if you don¡¯t leave.</i>

    ¡°My apologies. I shall leave right away,¡± having been a godhunter of countless years, Scarlett was excellent at reading bodynguage and understood what they were hinting. She thought, <i>If you aren¡¯t rted to Han Hao, well, it¡¯s none of my business that you are all about to die.</i>

    ¡°Hold on!¡± it was at this moment that Gilbert started scratching his head as though he was trying hard to recall a memory tossed long ago, ¡°I think I¡¯ve heard that name before... Let me think...¡±

    The members of the House of Han stared at Gilbert with puzzled looks. Even Scarlett looked at Gilbert suspiciously. With Bonds not attacking her immediately, she reminded him, ¡°Han Hao cultivates the energy of death. He uses a three-meter bone spear. He has seven...¡±

    Gilbert¡¯s eyes lit up and he finally recalled the long lost memory. He eximed, ¡°It¡¯s him!¡±

    Emily, Phoebe, Fanny, Lisa, and others had seen Little Skeleton before. Although they did not know that he had named himself Han Hao, they immediately knew that Han Hao was Little Skeleton when Scarlett exined that he had seven bone spurs on his back.

    ¡°I believe we know the person you are talking about,¡± eximed Emily. ¡°Is there something we can help you with?¡±

    ¡°Is Han Hao a member of your House of Han?¡± asked Scarlett again.

    Emily thought about it for a moment as she wasn¡¯t sure how to answer the question. However, she knew that Han Shuo and Little Skeleton were very close, so she replied, ¡°I guess you can say he is...¡±

    ¡°Then that¡¯ll do!¡± Scarlett hastily added, ¡°All the godhunters in the Ronson Canyon have joined forces with the intention to take down your House of Han. I don¡¯t think that you can handle so many of them at once. You guys should turn around immediately and leave the Ronson Canyon. Otherwise, if they intercept you, it¡¯ll be bad!¡±

    Emily, Stratholme, and the others were taken aback upon hearing those words. Stratholme asked, ¡°How would you know that?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m a leader of the godhunters myself, but I came to warn you because I know Han Hao,¡± Scarlett said hastily. ¡°I have sent a messenger to notify Han Hao¡¯s followers, but I do not know if they can stop the attack in time. Those guys have eyes everywhere in the Ronson Canyon and they are very familiar with the terrain here. It¡¯s impossible to hide from them as long as you are inside the Ronson Canyon. You need to turn back right away!¡±

    ¡°We cannot retreat,¡± said Phoebe bitterly. If they were to turn around, they would likely run into Hofs, Larikson, and their troops, and they could not end up worse running into the godhunters.

    ¡°Thank you for your reminder, but we must cross the Ronson Canyon by hook or by crook. I just hope we can outrun those godhunters.¡± Then, without wasting another word, without even asking Scarlett¡¯s rtionship with Han Hao, they hastily continued with their journey.

 Chapter 885 - Ronson Canyon

    GDK 885: Ronson Canyon

    Crossing the Ronson Canyon from the Darkness Dominion to the Death Dominion would take ten days. Given that retreating was not an option, the House of Han could only fly through the Ronson Canyon as quickly as possible.

    Gilbert, Emily, and the others were rather puzzled. They couldn¡¯t figure out why that scar-faceddy would know Little Skeleton. They thought that a necromancy creature should always stay in the Netherworld instead of appearing on Elysium.

    But as they were in a hurry, they couldn¡¯t take the time to ask Scarlett about Little Skeleton, or Han Hao. In their minds, Little Skeleton remained a small skeletal warrior as they had not seen him for ages. They could never imagine just how influential and powerful Han Hao was now.

    Scarlett understood their concerns and did not stop them from leaving. After the airship carrying the House of Han swept past her, she hesitated for a moment before she started following the airship secretly.

    As the leader of one of the major godhunter factions in the Ronson Canyon, she understood the techniques and strength of the other yers in the Canyon. As long as the House of Han was within the Ronson Canyon, Quincy and his gang would be able to locate and track them without much trouble.

    Quincy and the others had been active in the Ronson Canyon for countless years and knew the geography and terrain like the back of their hands. Naturally, they would use the knowledge to their advantage and prevent the House of Han from escaping.

    ***Three dayster, when the airship carrying House of Han was flying towards a towering mountain, they discovered that the mountain peak was densely packed with many dark, sinister-looking gods whose eyes were glittering ominously.

    Those on the mountain peak gathered in multiple groups and those groups would keep some distance from one another. It was clear that they were of different factions.

    Those who led those factions put on cruel smiles with greedy lights glinting from their eyes as they stared at the approaching House of Han airship. Some were so excited that they were salivating profusely. It was obvious from their demeanors that they were godhunters.

    Before the airship was near, the godhunters who had been waiting on the mountain for some time took into the air. Their leaders unfolded their domains of divinity, formingyers of barriers to obstruct the airship. The House of Han was forced to stop their airship in front of theyers of barriers.

    ¡°Oi! You pieces of shit! Get the fuck off our way!¡± cursed Gilbert most impolitely.

    Ten or so godhunter factions were blocking in the House of Han¡¯s path. Each faction had at least a dozen or so godhunters. Thergest faction present belonged to Quincy, numbering at approximately three hundred godhunters. Altogether, there were around a thousand three hundred godhunters. Practically all of the faction leaders possessed highgod strengths. Against such a powerful alliance of savage gods, the path ahead of the House of Han seemed grim.

    Quincy seemed as though he had not heard Gilbert¡¯s curses. Along with the other faction leaders, Quincy would leer and point at Phoebe, Emily, Fanny, Jasper, Lisa, and otherdies as they madements about their appearances. They would also make strange, delightedughter every once in a while.

    Phoebe, Emily, Jasper, and the others were all outstanding beauties. Han Shuo¡¯s Rebirth Pills had not just made their skins even more sparkling and translucent, but it had also preserved their beauty, keeping their appearances at the most appealing state. All men and women would find them breathtaking.

    As godhunters who lived by looting and killing others, these savages loved seeking thrills and excitements. Females were particrly irresistible to these ogres. They found outstanding beauties like Phoebe, Emily, and the others to be so alluring that they had momentarily forgotten their main objective.

    To Quincy and the other faction leaders, the House of Han guards were nothing to be afraid of. They had discovered no highgod expert among the House of Han guards. Therefore, even though the size was considerable, they did not consider the army a threat.

    ¡°Woohoohoo! That one is mine! The ripest melon is the tastiest. Take any others but that one is reserved for me!¡± said Chrison excitedly as he pointed Emily in a lecherous smile. It was as though everything in the House of Han was up for grab.

    ¡°I¡¯m taking that petite one. My favorite type!¡± said Quincy as he pointed at the terrified Lisa. ¡°Brothers, look carefully and choose your woman. We are dividing the spoils now!¡±

    ¡°Yum... These are way superior to that Scarlett bitch! They not only have perfect bodies, smooth skins, but even their looks are so salivating! Yes, we should divide thosedies first and talk about the other spoilster. Hehe, today is going to be an exciting day!¡± remarked another faction leader.

    Ever since relocating to the Elysium, the members of the House of Han had never suffered any insult remotely close to such level. Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert¡¯s blood seethed to see their matriarchs being insulted. Thedies also wished to slice those faction leaders into a million pieces.

    However, they understood that they stood no chance against the ten of so savage highgods and more than a thousand godhunters. Gilbert and Sanguis who were rash in temperament would have charged ahead if Emily had not stopped them with her gazes.

    Phoebe wore a dark face and said in a cold voice, ¡°We are the City of Shadows¡¯ House of Han. We have great rtions with various major family ns in the Death Dominion. If anything is to happen to us, you will be exterminated by the divine guards from the Darkness and Death Dominions. But that doesn¡¯t need to happen. If you let us pass safely, we will pay you five million ck crystal coins.¡±

    ¡°Hahaha, who do you think you are trying to intimidate?¡± said Quincy afterughing out loud. ¡°Take a good look at us, pretty. We are godhunters. If we are afraid of divine guards, we wouldn¡¯t be doing this business already!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s not waste time talking. Thesedies got me itching real hard down there. I can¡¯t wait!¡± eximed Chrison as he rubbed his hands together excitedly.

    ¡°Stop!¡± It was at this moment that Scarlett appeared from the direction that the airship traveled from. She nced at the aroused godhunters and hastily said, ¡°I have asked, they know Han Hao. You better not touch them!¡±

    Those faction leaders were stunned by those words. Some of those who were especially afraid of Han Hao immediately showed hesitation as though they wished to retreat.

    Even Quincy and Chrison¡¯s faces jolted. It appeared that even though Han Hao had left the Ronson Canyon, those in the Canyon still feared him.

    ¡°Cut your scaremongering, Scarlett!¡± shouted Quincy angrily. ¡°Who in the right mind would trust their words? Humph, during all the years Han Hao lived in Ronson Canyon, I¡¯ve never seen him with any family or friends. You can¡¯t prove that they are rted to Han Hao just because their family name is Han!¡±

    ¡°I have asked. They said that Han Hao is definitely a member of the House of Han!¡± Scarlett warned, ¡°You should know what will happen when Han Hao finds out that someone touched his people ¨C you know what he will do to you. But if any of you have forgotten, let me give you a quick reminder ¨C all those family ns in the Death Dominion that had killed Han Hao¡¯s followers have all been exterminated. Everyst one of them.¡±

    Lights flickered from the eyes of those faction leaders after they heard Scarlett¡¯s words. It seemed as though Han Hao was so terrifying that Scarlett¡¯s words had frightened these faction leaders.

    ¡°Bitch shut the fuck up!¡± When Han Hao was still in Ronson Canyon, Quincy and his faction had always been pressed down under Han Hao¡¯s power. Now that his strongest rival had left the Canyon, Quincy thought that he no longer had his hands tied in the Ronson Canton. By now, he would get annoyed just from hearing Han Hao¡¯s name. ¡°It¡¯s a trick! They are trying to scare us using Han Hao¡¯s name. Don¡¯t be fooled! We all know that Han Hao does not have any rtives. Let¡¯s get it done already!¡±

    Quincy continued to tempt the faction leaders, ¡°Look at it, look at all these pussies and treasures right in front of us. They are ours to take and we just have to grab it... ¡°

    Perhaps Quincy¡¯s exnation worked or perhaps those godhunters were tempted by the House of Han¡¯s beauties and treasures, the faction leaders decided to go on with it. Theymanded their followers to surround the airship.

    With things havinge to this, Scarlett knew that no amount of her words could change anything. She let out a helpless sigh and silently withdrew, lest she is killed needlessly.

    The tension was high and it seemed that a battle could erupt at any moment.

    ¡°Heyyoo people, is someone having a party without me?¡± a piercing sneer suddenly sounded from the distance. A bulky man whose body was covered with scars came into appearance. He was a cultivator of the energy of destruction. As ate-stage midgod, his strength was poorer than almost every of the faction leaders.

    But somehow, all those faction leaders turned grave at the presence of this midgod.

    ¡°Hi, Khitan. I thought you have all left the Canyon?¡± said one of the faction leaders after forcing a smile.

    Quincy and Chrison seemed unhappy. They bunched their brows while staring at Khitan who was not supposed to be there. In a dark face, Quincy asked, ¡°Khitan, why aren¡¯t you in the Fringe with your chief but still here in the Ronson Canyon?

    Khitan howled withughter before he impolitely replied, ¡°Since when did you get to have a say in our business?¡±

    After taking a short pause to nce at the House of Han on the airship, Khitan said to the faction leaders, ¡°On the first day I joined my Chief, the first thing he instructed us is that we must not attack the members of the House of Han. And the second instruction ¨C we must not allow the House of Han toe under attack. Although I don¡¯t understand why my Chief would hand us such a strangemand, it is not my job to understand it. My duty is to execute my Chief¡¯smand, and execute I will.¡±

    ¡°Khitan, the rest of your gang have left the Ronson Canyon. Why bother meddling with our business?¡± Chrison put on a cold smirk and said, ¡°Besides, Han Hao is no longer here and you no longer have any power here. Hehe, do you wanna try to stop all of us all by yourself, Khitan?¡±

    A savage light glinted from Khitan¡¯s eyes before he said with a fearless smirk, ¡°I have been doing this business for ages. Do you think I wouldn¡¯t have expected that? Hehe, I have informed my brothers about the situation beforeing here. They should be on their way to the Fringe as we speak. You may kill me and proceed as you wish, but you should know how my Chief would react to that.¡±

    Upon hearing those words, all the faces of these faction leaders jolted. It seemed as though they did not expect that Khitan would have taken this measure. They felt troubled, for they knew that even if they killed Khitan and all of the House of Han, Han Hao would still learn of their doings.

    After a long silence, one of the faction leaders forced augh and said, ¡°Since Han Hao has spoken, I¡¯m not participating in this!¡± He turned to Khitan and said, ¡°When you meet Han Hao, please send him my regards, and tell him that I, Anlo, will never stand against him!¡±

    ¡°Hehe, will do, will do,¡± replied Khitan.

    ¡°That, erm, I cannot deny Han Hao of this honor. My apologies, Quincy, I¡¯m out!¡± another faction leader pulled back from the deal.

    ¡°Erm... Han Hao had been generous to me while he was in Ronson Canyon. I will never attack his people!¡±

    ....

    One after another, the leaders of the godhunter factions announced their withdrawal at thest possible moment. Afraid of retribution from Han Hao, they reluctantly turned and left with their followers.

    Momentster, only Quincy and Chrison and their gang were still blocking in the House of Han¡¯s path. There was nothing that they could do as they watched their former partners left. They had cursed Han Hao countless times in their minds.

    Gilbert, Emily, Fanny, and the other Han Family members looked at each other in puzzlement. They had no idea what was happening and why these ferocious gods would be so afraid of Little Skeleton.

    A thought suddenly crossed Bonds¡¯ mind and he softly eximed, ¡°So their leader is him!¡±

    ¡°Who?¡± asked Sanguis and Gilbert simultaneously.

    Bonds exined, ¡°Remember that mysterious teenager I¡¯ve mentioned just then? He leads the most powerful godhunter faction in Ronson Canyon but nobody knows of his origin. Unexpectedly, it turns out that it¡¯s one of ours!¡±

    ¡°Yea, I think you¡¯re right,¡± Gilbert remarked, ¡°I¡¯ve known that little guy to be pretty tough long ago. But truly, I did not expect that he wouldmand such influence in Ronson Canyon.¡±

    ¡°Quincy, Chrison, do you wish to fight my Chief?¡± Khitan sneered, ¡°You guys better give up now and I will overlook this incident. Otherwise, you know the consequences!¡±

    ¡°Fucking hell, I will take this shit no more!¡± Quincy seemed to have been infuriated by Khitan¡¯s words and he shouted, ¡°If Han Hao is here I might actually do him this favor. But how dare you puny little fucking midgod try to intimidate me! Outrageous! Fuck this shit. If Han Hao returns to the Ronson Canyon, I will just move elsewhere! Everyone, attack! And kill that bluffing Khitan the first!¡±

    Chrison too was going to retreat. But after taking yet another look at thosedies on the airship, lust got the better of him. He too gestured andmanded his troops, ¡°Attack!¡±

 Chapter 886 - Fighting Quincy and Chrison

    GDK 886: Fighting Quincy and Chrison

    Before Khitan came, around ten godhunter factions had formed an alliance to exterminate the House of Han and take all their valuables. Against ten or so highgods and more than a thousand midgods, the House of Han wouldn¡¯t stand a chance.

    But thanks to Han Hao¡¯s fearsome reputation in the Ronson Canyon, most of those godhunters were frightened and chickened out from the robbery. With that, the House of Han guards needs only fight Quincy and Chrison¡¯s forces.

    Quincy and Chrison had brought around five hundred godhunters in total with the two being mid-stage highgods. They were one of the biggest powerhouses in Ronson Canyon.

    However, the House of Han was not afraid of them. Gilbert and Sanguis could no longer hold their rage. The moment after Quincy and Chrisonmanded their godhunters to attack, they suddenly noticed that the House of Han guards were changing at them valiantly.

    Quincy and Chrison jolted. As masters of skirmishes, they could immediately tell that these House of Han guards were very unlike the typical divine guards. With that, they hastily yelled, ¡°Y¡¯all better be fucking careful!¡±

    The House of Han guards marched at their enemy in a tidy formation. They would move uniformly as though they were a single entity. By keeping a fixed, optimal distance from their fellowrades, the House of Han guards were not only able to attack effectively, but they could also look out for one another.

    Quincy and Chrison could tell from the staunch faces and ice-cold gazes of those House of Han guards were experienced and well-trained. They were not novices that had not seenbat like most of the guards possessed by young family ns.

    Although Quincy and Chrison recognized that their enemy was nothing ordinary, they had still underestimated the true power of those House of Han guards. All those years of training in the Eight Destion and Torment Formation were not for naught. Having been repeatedly baptized with blood, these House of Han guards were even fiercer and more ruthless than the godhunters. The House of Han guards were as though an unstoppable sword and they stabbed straight into the godhunters¡¯ chest!

    A scene simr to the battle between the House of Han guards and Ralph¡¯s Second Corps divine guards was reenacted. The House of Han not only had the upper hand in size but also in team-cooperation. As soon as the two sides shed, the overwhelming teambat strength of the House of Han guards possessed became obvious. Those godhunters who had been devastating the Ronson Canyon were being rapidly decimated!

    The House of Han guards advanced through the godhunters like a glowing hot knife cutting through butter. The godhunters¡¯ defenses were as though a thin sheet of paper that would immediately fall apart to the House of Han guards¡¯ attacks. The godhunters were heard shrieking in pain and despair before dying. Their chopped-up bodies would fall from the sky andnd all around the mountain peak below.

    Scarlett and Khitan were dumbfounded. When they saw Quincy and Chrisonmanded their troops to attack, they thought that the House of Han was done for. While Khitan was reflecting and ming himself for being overly arrogant, he suddenly discovered that the House of Han guards were already charging and attacking those godhunters.

    It was when the two forces shed that Khitan came to his senses. He was shocked by that mind-blowing teambat strength demonstrated by those House of Han guards and finally had some ideas why Han Hao wouldmand his followers to never attack the House of Han.

    An average person would never be able to learn anything from theplexbat formations practiced by the House of Han guards. But Khitan, as a follower of Han Hao, had also been taught demonicbat formations. With just one look, Khitan recognized that thebat formation used by these House of Han guards were simr to those he and his godhunters were taught.

    When Khitan received the note from Scarlett, he was rather skeptical that Han Hao would be rted to the House of Han in any way. But after witnessing the attack formation employed by the House of Han guards, he was certain that Scarlett was right.

    The tremendous teambat strength of the House of Han had shocked Scarlett more than it had shocked Khitan. As she watched the House of Han wrecking Quincy and Chrison¡¯s forces like a giant, efficient meat-grinder, she mumbled, ¡°House of Han... Han Hao... they are indeed unfathomable...¡±

    At this moment, Quincy and Chrison felt as though they would go insane!

    Not in their wildest dreams would they have anticipated that these House of Han guards would be so terrifying, that they could so easily reap the lives of their followers using an incrediblyplexbat formation. They wished to assist their followers but were too busy defending themselves from Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert.

    By now, even Quincy and Chrison believed that Han Hao was rted to the House of Han for they sensed the energy used by Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert was vaguely simr to that used by Han Hao.

    Before the battle broke out, Quincy and Chrison had discovered no highgod in the House of Han, but they received three great surprises as soon as the battle began. Three experts with strengths not even worthy of mentioning had suddenly transformed into formidable demons!

    Quincy and Chrison felt remorseful. They were mad at themselves for messing with Han Hao¡¯s family when they knew that Han Hao was crafty and full of surprises.

    ¡°Why aren¡¯t you shouting anymore? Keep shouting! You were talking lots of shits just then! Old fuck, let me tell you, I¡¯m going to skin you and chop your littleid tiny dick off! Fucker, how dare... ¡± Unlike Sanguis and Bonds who werepletely quiet, Gilbert had not shut his malicious mouth for even a second and he just kept spurting abusive words. They were just as fierce as his attacks.

    Quincy was held up by Sanguis while Chrison was jointly attacked by Gilbert and Bonds. Bonds would attack Chrison with his flying sword flooded with killing intent, forcing thetter to spend all his attention and energy to defend against Bonds. Meanwhile, Gilbert would fly around Chrison like a ghost and attack him when opportunities presented itself. He would also greet multiple generations of Chrison¡¯s female ancestors once through.

    This psychological torment was no less painful than the injuries on his body. Under the constant cursing and mocking by Gilbert, Chrison felt as though he might copse at any moment. Unable to concentrate his mind on fighting, Chrison¡¯s firepower was greatly reduced. Soon, Bonds found yet another opportunity and his flying sword opened up a few more gashes on Chrison¡¯s skin.

    ¡°Kill them all!¡±manded Phoebe coldly upon seeing that the House of Han guards had overpowered their enemy.

    Quincy and Chrison had not only looked at Phoebe, Emily, Lisa, and the others with obscene gazes, but they had also verbally abused them. Phoebe had been silently repressing her rage all along. Now that the House of Han¡¯s situation had turned from dire to favorable, her attitude immediately changed.

    Phoebe, Emily, Stratholme, Ayermike, and the others had been making tremendous cultivation progress on Elysium where elemental energies were the most intense. In the House of Han, they had ess to vast financial resources, scrolls containing profound knowledge of various energies, the pelleted medicines Han Shuo made, and divine essences acquired from various regions. Those resources would keep on appearing in the Han Residence¡¯s warehouse before they were distributed among these core members of the House of Han.

    They were the cream of the crop back on the Profound Continent, a resource-poor material ne. Upon arriving on Elysium, they had been provided with everything that could assist with their cultivation. Combined with their outstanding aptitude, they had been making tremendous progress.

    Phoebe, Emily, and most others had reached midgodhood while gifted experts like Stratholme and Ayermike had entered thete-stage midgod realm. They had been progressing much, much faster than those who were born and raised on Elysium.

    These people were able to be top-notch experts in a world where elemental energies were thin and little was known about those the Fundamental Forces. It was only natural that they would make extraordinary progress after moving to Elysium and gaining ess to vast resources.

    Phoebe, Emily, Ayermike, Stratholme, and the others had not been idle. They too were well-practiced in Han Shuo¡¯s demonicbat formation and had been massacring Chrison and Quincy¡¯s godhunters.

    The first highgod to fall was Chrison. He had finally lost his mind after being subjected to Gilbert¡¯s persistent chanting of malicious words. He was so focused on getting Gilbert that he had forgotten that Bonds was still a threat. When Chrison had finally managed tond an attack on Gilbert, Bonds¡¯ flying sword entered from the back of his neck and emerged from his forehead. It was an instant kill.

    ¡°Haha! Gotcha, fucker! I may not have the firepower of Bonds or Gilbert, but my body is fucking tough. How foolish of you to think that I can be killed in one hit!¡± Gilbert stumbled backward, coughed a few times, and quickly returned normal. He went on to trample Chrison¡¯s dead body on the mountain peak.

    Gilbert¡¯s body had been smelted by Han Shuo the same way he smelt demonic weapons. Although Gilbert¡¯s body wasn¡¯t as ridiculously tough as Han Shuo¡¯s, it was still orders of magnitude stronger than that of an average god. If it was another expert who suffered that attack of Chrison, they would be severely injured if not killed. Gilbert, however, could handle it without much trouble.

    ¡°Alright, that¡¯s enough, Gilbert. We need to hurry. Let¡¯s join forces with Sanguis to kill the other one!¡± Bonds gave the flying sword in his hand a gentle wipe before charging at Quincy.

    Gilbert spitted arge mouthful of saliva onto Chrison¡¯s ttened body. ¡°Fucker, you¡¯ve got off easy!¡± cursed Gilbert before he turned and also charged at Quincy.

    Quincy had been rather passive against Sanguis¡¯ wild attacks. He was also surrounded by the House of Han guards. Whenever he tried to escape, he would be greeted with the ferocious attacks from those guards.

    Although Quincy possessed formidable strength, the attack simultaneously made by hundreds of midgods was equally powerful. And with Sanguis constantly bombarding him with insane attacks, he was unable to escape.

    The moment that Christen died, a shiver traveled through Quincy¡¯s heart for he knew that it would be him soon.

    And as expected, Bonds and Gilbert went at him with chilling gazes. It was clear that they were going to gang up on him. Quincy became even more despaired.

    <i>Hell, I may die, but I¡¯m not going down alone!</i> thought Quincy hatefully. As a godhunter, Quincy knew that his life was always at risk. It was clear from his daring attack on the House of Han despite offending Han Hao that he was not afraid of death.

    The instance that Bonds and Gilbert came to attack him, Quincy knew that this will be his end. Hoping to make his death a little more significant, he decided tomit an equivalent of a kamikaze attack.

    ¡°Everyone get spread out! He wants to kill as many of us with his death! Keep a distance from him and bombard him to death!¡± Having had centuries of experience fighting all kinds of experts on the Profound Continent, Stratholme had learned to be astute. With just one look at those bloodthirsty eyes, Stratholme was able to make out Quincy¡¯s intention.

    Having heard the warning, Bonds, Gilbert, and even Sanguis immediately flew backward to keep a distance from Quincy.

    ¡°Motherfucker, wanna make your death a little less pitiful, huh? Ain¡¯t gonna happen!¡± Gilbert started opening his mouth again and began spitting his auditory poison. Gilbert greeted Quincy¡¯s female ancestors going as far back as when they were still amoeba with sort of curses bundled with insults. Meanwhile, Sanguis, Bonds, and the House of Han guards would keep bombarding Quincy with all sorts of ranged attacks.

    Quincy could not be more despaired. When he realized that his chance of making a kamikaze attack had been taken, he was left with no choice but to defend himself against the bombardment in anguish.

    The bombardment led by Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert eventually exhausted Quincy¡¯s divine energy. He was killed by a myriad of energies and weapons.

    It was an incredibly miserable death. There were all sorts of divine weapons stuck on every inch of Quincy¡¯s body and it was hung on midair. After Sanguis made sure that there was no longer a drop of blood left in his body, a group of guards went forward and chopped him up before tossing his body parts everywhere.

    With Quincy and Chrison both dead, those few remaining godhunters that had yet to be ughtered frantically escaped in every direction. They would try to fly towards hills and thick jungles and use every ounce of strength in them to run.

    Watching Quincy and Chrison killed had left Khitan and Scarlett utterly shocked. They were startled by the House of Han¡¯s performance.

 Chapter 887 - A list

    GDK 887: A list

    Quincy and Chrison, the two strongest godhunter factions in the Ronson Canyon, had been destroyed. Their deaths meant that those remaining in their faction would soon disband. Those faction leaders who had left earlier would certainly try to recruit them.

    After this battle, no godhunter in the Ronson Canyon would ever pick a fight with the House of Han!

    The mountain peak that has pierced through the clouds was covered with bodies. The House of Han guards, wearing cold faces, re-embarked the airship and stood still, ready to bemanded.

    It was at this moment that Phoebe and Emily turned their attention to Khitan and Scarlett. Emily went to them smilingly and said, ¡°Thank you for your kind assistance. If it wasn¡¯t for your reminder and warning, we would have perished on this mountain!¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re wee. I¡¯m just doing what I ought to do,¡± replied Scarlett courteously.

    ¡°It¡¯s my duty. I¡¯m just following my Chief¡¯smand,¡± replied Khitan very humbly. It was very unlike how he had talked to Quincy and the others. He even seemed somewhat overcautious.

    ¡°Is it true that Han Hao has be your Chief?¡± asked Emily with one brow raised.

    Khitan was rather puzzled for he couldn¡¯t understand why Emily would ask such a question. He stared nkly for a moment before telling her the truth as it was, ¡°Yes, ever since Chief arrived in the Ronson Canyon decades ago, he had led us on countless expeditions around thisnd. After a few decades, under His leadership, we became the most powerful faction in Ronson Canyon. All those who blocked your way had lost to our Chief. If Chief were still in the canyon, Quincy and Chrison wouldn¡¯t have even tried attacking you.¡±

    Emily put on an astonished face. She understood that a being that was feared by so many godhunter factions must be an extraordinarily powerful expert. She did not expect that the peculiar little skeleton warrior that she used to know could and had evolved to such a level.

    ¡°That¡¯s unbelievable!¡± remarked Lisa. Back when she was still studying in the Babylon Academy of Magic and Force of Profound Continent, she had been assaulted by Little Skeleton. She remembered the bizarre necromancy creature better than anyone.

    ¡°There¡¯s nothing surprising about it. That fe grew very strong long ago, it¡¯s just that you people weren¡¯t aware of it,¡± said Gilbert proudly. He then grinned mischievously and said, ¡°You weren¡¯t together with Master often and therefore didn¡¯t know just how treacherous that little guy is. Back in the Dark Forest, he looted and plundered with Master every day!¡°

    Gilbert had served Han Shuo for a very long time. Han Shuo did not shy away from the fact that Gilbert was bound to him under a ve contract. Therefore, he understood Han Hao¡¯s actual strength and intelligence better than anyone.

    ¡°Erm, then, where is he right now?¡± asked Phoebe who wished to learn more about Han Hao.

    ¡°My Chief is currently at the Fringe,¡± replied Khitan immediately.

    ¡°If that little guy is at the Fringe, then Master must also be there,¡± said Gilbert smilingly.

    ¡°We need to leave Ronson Canyon now. Other things can wait,¡± interjected Stratholme suddenly. He knew that the House of Han was still in danger and he was constantly worried that Hofs and Larikson could catch up to them.

    With Stratholme¡¯s reminder, Phoebe and Emily immediately realized that they did not have the time for conversation. They nodded at Stratholme and Phoebe thanked Khitan and Scarlett again. ¡°The House of Han will always remember the favor you did us today. We are in a hurry and cannot stop in the Ronson Canyon. Till we meet again.¡±

    ¡°Till we meet again!¡± replied Scarlett with a faint smile. She nodded at Khitan and left.

    Khitan too said farewell and wished them good luck. He left after Scarlett to handle certain matters which would arise following Quincy and Chrison¡¯s death.

    After destroying the two major godhunter factions and with Han Hao¡¯s fearsome reputation, the House of Han did not meet any obstructions in the remainder of their journey. After ten days, they had finally passed through the Ronson Canyon and stepped into the territory of the Death Dominion.

    Soon after the airship carrying the House of Han entered the Death Dominion, their pursuers finally caught up.

    However, Hofs and Larikson could only stand and watch because the divine guards from multiple major family ns in the Death Dominion were present to escort the House of Han.

    Hofs and Larikson were so angry that they were seething with blood. It did not matter if they had the strength to defeat those divine guards escorting them or not. Should they attempt to injure a citizen of the Death Dominion, they would be directly going against the rule set by the Overgod of Darkness and offending two Overgods.

    Even though Hofs was the City Lord of Hushveil City, even though Larikson was the second most powerful man in the City of Gorging Clouds, they dared not disobey the directives set by the Overgods. They could only stare angrily as the House of Han left with the Death Dominion divine guards.

    After entering the Death Dominion and being received by their harborers, the House of Han was finally out of danger and could heave a sigh of relief.

    *** The City of Shadows, the Sainte Residence.

    Wace the City Lord¡¯s face turned darker and darker as he listened to Ralph¡¯s mission report. When Ralph hadpleted his recount, Wace shouted, ¡°Rubbish! What a useless load of rubbish!¡±

    ¡°Forgive me, City Lord. We have tried our best!¡± Ralph crouched in fear and tried to look for an excuse, ¡°I did not expect Hofs and Larikson to have caused the House of Han no casualties. Also, I did not know that their experts, Sanguis and Bonds, were highgods...¡±

    ¡°Shut up!¡±manded Wace. He took a deep breath and gradually calmed himself. Then, he said, ¡°It seems the House of Han knows the role I yed in this attack. With all of them now in the Death Dominion, there is nothing that I can do to them.¡±

    ¡°My, my Lord, that Bryan... he has disappeared for many years now... Perhaps he is already dead... And perhaps we have nothing to worry about...¡± said Ralph haltingly as he took a few quick nces at Wace.

    ¡°You think I¡¯m worried about Bryan?¡± Wace sneered and said, ¡°Bryan is indeed a talented young man. Extraordinary for his young age. But I¡¯ve seen many young men like him. This kind of person, the brighter they shine, the sooner they die. Even if he returns to the City of Shadows, so what? What can he even do to me?¡±

    ¡°Then...?¡± asked Ralph cautiously in a confused expression.

    Wace let out a soft sigh and rubbed his head as though he was having a headache. ¡°Although I¡¯m not worried about the youngster himself, he is close to the daughter of the Goddess of Destiny. Back then, the Dark Lord had instructed me to treat Bryan well. It is these two significant characters that I¡¯m worried about...¡±

    Ralph was taken aback. To him, the Goddess of Destiny and the Overgod of Darkness were beings way beyond his reach. He had been unaware of the rtionship between Han Shuo and the daughter of the Goddess of Destiny and learning this had shocked him deeply.

    ¡°Schedule an appointment with Larikson and Hofs for me. It¡¯s time for us to have a good conversation,¡± instructed Wace after thinking for a moment.

    Ralph respectfully dismissed himself to immediately schedule the secret meeting for Wace.

    A few dayster, Larikson, Hofs, and Wace gathered in Fort Lasberg. They had a meeting at the former Han Residence.

    When Larikson and Hofs heard the revtion from Wace, they had a tremendous headache. They cursed Wace in their minds, <i>How could you keep such an important detail from us until now?! Fuck you!</i>

    It was at the former Han Residence that they started scheming against Han Shuo. But unfortunately for them, as none of the three were aware of Han Shuo¡¯s current condition, the discussion did not result in anything meaningful. The three agreed that they would join forces to kill Han Shuo and the House of Han if they ever returned to the Darkness Dominion.

    After the discussion was over, Larikson and Hofs left Fort Lasberg. Wace, however, did not immediately leave. After hearing Larikson and Hofs¡¯ recount of their attack on the Han Residence, Wace became greatly interested in those bizarre but deadly demonic formations in the Han Residence.

    Wace stayed in Fort Lasberg for more than a month in an attempt to study how those seemingly ordinary trees and stone pirs would have such miraculous uses. But unfortunately for Wace, he had absolutely no grasp of the profound demonic arts. It wasparable to a caveman trying to decipher the workings of a rocket engine without any understanding of thermodynamics. Needless to say, his attempt was totally fruitless.

    After more than a month, Wace had no choice but to give up on trying to study the demonic formations. He had his men destroy every bit of the Han Residence and the demonic formations. He had also retaken control over Fort Lasberg and it no longer belonged to the House of Han.

    Wace told the public that Hushveil City was fully responsible for the attack on Fort Lasberg. He publicly announced that he strongly condemned their actions and would hold those attackers ountable. However, it seemed as though it was just empty talks and Wace had not taken any action against Hushveil City.

    Some of the City of Shadows citizens who knew the truth denounced Wace and the House of Sainte for their actions. They made it known to everyone that Wace conspired to force the House of Han out of the City of Shadows, decreasing the overall strength of the city.

    After returning to the City of Shadows, Aobashi and Erebus were disheartened to learn what happened to the House of Han. It was clear to the two that Wace had a hand in it. However, as subordinates of Wace, there wasn¡¯t much that they could do. They would onlyin about their exasperation to each other.

    Andre and Carmelita, however, did not react so calmly after finding out the truth. They had a lengthy quarrel with Wace in the Sainte Residence thatsted for days.

    Even to his own family members, Wace denied having any role in the attack and shifted all responsibility on Hofs and Larikson, iming his own innocence. But Andre and Carmelita were no fools. As core members of the House of Sainte, it was easy for them to deduce Wace¡¯s role in the attack by pulling a few strings.

    But no matter how significant an event, as time went by, it would eventually fade out of memory. Gradually, the citizens of the City of Shadows stopped discussing it. Other than the Celestial Pearl disappearing from the city, everything seemed to have returned to business as usual.

    But Wace knew clearly that there was now another invisible barrier between him and Andre, Carmelita, Aobashi, and Erebus because of Han Shuo and the House of Han. He knew that this barrier would not fade with the passing of time.

    *** At the center of the Land of Chaos, the Omphalos.

    Han Shuo had no idea what happened in the City of Shadows billions of miles away. He was focused on solving a big challenge put up by Sovereign Tyre, Logue, and Wasir.

    Tyre, Logue, and Wasir stated that they would ept Han Shuo to join their ranks as one of the managers of the Omphalos. However, the three Sovereigns also stated that they must take the view of the hundreds of thousands of merchants into consideration. As long as most of the merchants would ept having Han Shuo as one of the Omphalos¡¯ owners, they would immediately hand those Sovereign Shops that formerly belonged to Ss to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo knew what those Sovereigns were up to. The three Sovereigns were infamous in the Fringe. Few, if any, Omphalos merchants would dare offend the three. With the three pulling the strings behind the scene, most of the merchants bowed to their orders and voted against installing Han Shuo as one of the Omphalos¡¯ owners.

    Han Shuo had his men conduct a survey. He discovered that just twenty percent of the merchants agreed to him joining the management board, and all these people were swayed by Ossora. A twenty percent approval rating was far below Tyre, Logue, and Wasir¡¯s standards and Ossora could only do so much. Han Shuo must still solve the problem himself.

    Han Shuo then realized that Tyre, Logue, and Wasir were not called Sovereigns in the Fringe for nothing. A great majority of the merchants feared Tyre, Logue, and Wasir more than they did Han Shuo, and they dared not disobey the secret orders of the three Sovereigns to stand against Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo spent a few days thinking for a solution inside the Omphalos. Then, he went to a cliff wall outside the Omphalos and left some messages.

    A dayter, a callous looking man came to the same spot where Han Shuo was. After noting down the message left by Han Shuo, he silently went on his way.

    Seven dayster, inside an enormous cave thousands of miles from the Omphalos, Han Hao received the message from that man.

    After reading the message, Han Hao thought silently for a moment before calmly instructing one of his followers, ¡°Assemble all my Captains.¡±

    ¡°As you bid, Chief.¡± The follower respectfully dismissed himself and brought thepany leaders from every region to Han Hao.

    A few dayster, all of Han Hao¡¯s captains were assembled in the cave. Han Hao took out a scroll and pinned it on a wall before instructing, ¡°This is a list of Omphalos merchants. Intercept all the goods of those in this list before they can send their supplies into the Omphalos. But remember, you are not to kill them. If you have to, kill one or two people to intimidate them.¡±

    Polo put on an astounded expression and asked, ¡°Just looting? Why not kill them?¡±

    Han Hao nced at Polo and replied in an indifferent voice, ¡°If they are all dead, things won¡¯t end well.¡± Han Hao did not exin much at all before he impatiently gestured at his captains and said, ¡°Go ahead and do as I say.¡±

    Polo did not ask any more questions. He nodded and left with his group. The other godhunter captains also noted down the names from the list and left.

    Following that, the godhunters that used to spread out in various regions of the Fringe suddenly gathered near the Omphalos and secretly surrounded it.

    As the Omphalos was just a valley, many of the goods sold there needed to be imported. Even poisons needed sufficient magical beast organs and other raw materials to be produced. There were tons and tons of supplies delivered to the Omphalos every day.

    Outside the Omphalos, the merchants had their own ways to protect their goods. They would spend an exorbitant amount of resources to hire arge number of guards, or perhaps sought the experts close to the Sovereigns to protect their caravans.

    Even with all these security measures, their caravans were still not a hundred percent safe and looting still happened from time to time. However, the looting was usually not too rampant as the Fringedwellers also needed to purchase goods from those merchants in the Omphalos. They knew that if they crossed the line and caused ack of supplies in the Omphalos, the Sovereigns might intervene.

    But things seemed to have changed!

    For an entire month, arge number of merchant caravans delivering goods to the Omphalos were looted by an unknown powerhouse. Almost no merchant could get their goods into the Omphalos. In addition, the looters seemed extremely determined. No matter how many guards they hired or if they were protected by the Sovereigns¡¯ experts, they would still loot the caravans the same!

    The bandits were neither rude nor ravaging. As long as the victims didn¡¯t try to fight, the bandits wouldn¡¯t be too violent. But if they tried to resist, the bandits would not show the slightest mercy.

    After two merchant caravans were annihted, the merchants had all learned to behave. When they ran into those ferocious bandits, they would consider themselves unlucky and hand over all their goods without resistance.

    The merchants thought that the unknown power must have gone mad because they were too poor, and the rampant looting wouldn¡¯tst for too long. Without sufficient resupplies to the Omphalos, it would simply be disastrous to the Fringe.

    But they soon discovered that they were wrong!

    One month passed, then two months, then three months... Yet, the unknown power was still present in every region that the merchant caravans had to take to enter the Omphalos, disrupting the order in the Fringe.

    After a while, they noticed amonality ¨C none of those merchants that supported Han Shuo¡¯s installment in the Omphalos had their caravans raided!

 Chapter 888 - Fight me if you dare

    GDK 888: Fight me if you dare

    The Omphalos merchants were no fools. Although they had no idea who those bandits were, they could tell that Han Shuo must have something to do with it.

    The merchants had been waiting for the three Sovereigns to take action. But even after waiting for a long time, the three Sovereigns still seemed to have done nothing. With all their goods stuck outside the Omphalos and their sales taking a nosedive, they had no choice but to gather and initiate contact with the Three Sovereigns.

    Tyre, Logue, and Wasir knew that it was Han Hao who had been rampantly looting those merchant caravans outside the Omphalos. The three Sovereignsmanded great forces with influence over every region of the Fringe. They were informed about this significant activity of Han Hao¡¯s soon after he started looting.

    However, the three Sovereigns also knew that Han Hao and Han Shuo were closely rted. Not wishing to fall out with Han Shuo so soon, they remained silent to see just how long Han Hao could keep it up. But even after such a long time, with Han Hao still showing no sign of stopping anytime soon and with the daily operations in the Omphalos grinding to a halt, the three Sovereigns finally ran out of patience.

    With nearly all the merchants of the Omphalos issuing a joint statement to the three Sovereigns, they had no choice but to take action. They responded by telling the merchants not to be anxious and that they will resolve the issue soon.

    ***Inside the Celestial Pearl of the Omphalos, Han Shuo was meditating inside a secluded gymnasium. He felt as though he had fused with the Omphalos, as though he had wrapped the entire space with his mind.

    Ever since stepping into the Skybreak Realm, whenever Han Shuo had free time, he would use it for meditation. Back then, the moment he broke into the Skybreak Realm, he was enlightened with all kinds of profound information, including the true essence of demonic arts and various demonic techniques. By carefully understanding this information, Han Shuo could unleash his energy to their greatest potential.

    The further one progressed in demonic arts, the harder it would be to make further progress. It would take a long time to umte and condense demonic yuan for progressing to the next level. One who did not possess sufficient talent might even never be able to break through to the next level. Even an extraordinarily gifted cultivator would take hundreds if not thousands of years.

    Han Shuo had no idea how long his journey to the next realm will be, or if he will ever reach there. But he knew that he could only reach there one step at a time. All that Han Shuo could do now was to stabilize the new realm state as much as possible and familiarize himself with the new demonic concepts and techniques.

    With everything that needed to be instructed, instructed, with his scheme set in motion, all that Han Shuo needed to do now was wait. But Han Shuo wasn¡¯t going to do nothing during that time. He used the free time to cultivate as he always does.

    One day, while calmly deciphering a profound demonic idea of the Skybreak Realm, Han Shuo suddenly sensed that an extremely strong life-force was slowly moving towards the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    After Han Shuo reached the Skybreak Realm, no living thing could escape from the frighteningly sensitive senses of his consciousness, except for an existence of much greater strength than Han Shuo¡¯s.

    With just a pulsation of his consciousness, Han Shuo figured out that the mighty existence approaching was Sovereign Ossora. Back then when they first met in a pavilion at the Omphalos, as Han Shuo had yet to attain Skybreak Realm, he could not clearly detect the energy Ossora concealed. But now, Han Shuo could sense Ossora¡¯s presence from miles away.

    Han Shuo opened his eyes and walked out from his secluded gymnasium unhurriedly. He flew to the highest clock tower in the Celestial Pearl and waited for Ossora.

    Momentster, Ossora, who also sensed Han Shuo¡¯s aura, appeared before Han Shuo smilingly.

    ¡°Tyre, Logue, and Wasir are inviting you to a meeting. Haha, it seems that they are finally going to discuss what¡¯s happening outside the Omphalos,¡± said Ossora most straightforwardly. It was obvious that Ossora had figured out that Han Shuo was behind the rampant looting outside the Omphalos.

    Han Shuo nodded and replied, ¡°Hehe, the three of them are really quite patient to have waited so long before looking for me.¡±

    ¡°You need to be careful, Bryan. It¡¯s possible that Tyre, Logue, and Wasir intend to join hands and attack you,¡± warned Ossora with his brows creased, ¡°They are not known for ying by the rules. If they were to join hands and attack you, you will be in great danger.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it, I can handle it,¡± replied Han Shuo smilingly. He did not take Ossora¡¯s warning seriously.

    Han Shuo was able to easily escape from Ss before he had advanced to the Skybreak Realm. With his strength now, Han Shuo was confident that he could escape from the three Sovereigns with ease. Therefore, he wasn¡¯t worried about it at all.

    ¡°Well then, I will show you the way,¡± said Ossora before leading Han Shuo to the meeting ce.

    The meeting location that Tyre, Logue, and Wasir selected were not the Omphalos. fighting was strictly prohibited in the Omphalos as it was the trading center of the Fringe. The three Sovereigns would not vite that rule as they were the people who were supposed to enforce it. That was why they had selected an extinguished volcano in the Northwest as the meeting ce.

    It was because of the meeting location the three had selected that Ossora warned Han Shuo to be careful. If Tyre, Logue, and Wasir wished to speak peacefully with Han Shuo, they would have set up the meeting somewhere in the Omphalos. But them having selected a secluded and uninhabited extinct volcano meant that they intend to do more than talking.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t afraid of the three Sovereigns ganging up on him. As Han Shuo and Ossora head for the extinct volcano, they chatted about recent happenings rxedly.

    The extinct volcano made of dark red rocks soon entered their sight. It was barren. There were neither nts nor animals.

    Han Shuo sensed the life forces of Tyre, Logue, and Wasir before he was even near the volcano. The three did not conceal their auras and Han Shuo sensed the three¡¯s location with just one pulse of his consciousness.

    Han Shuo received a slight shock after taking a moment to carefully sense their auras. He sensed that the life-force gave off by Tyre was much stronger than that of Logue and Wasir. It seemed that the hearsay of Tyre being the strongest Sovereign in the Fringe was indeed true. His strength was without a doubt greater than Logue and Wasir¡¯s.

    ¡°Haha, wee, wee! It¡¯s great to finally meet the talented young man who has defeated Ss!¡± A burst of cordialughter sounded from a bulky and masculine man standing on top of the extinct volcano. His voice was loud, clear, and rather pleasing to the ear.

    Tyre did not look as treacherous and sinister as Han Shuo had imagined. In fact, he looked like a frank, guileless, gentleman. Han Shuo had not expected that.

    Logue and Wasir, however, were nothing like Tyre. Logue nodded at Han Shuo as greeting while Wasir wore an unconcerned face and did not even acknowledge Han Shuo¡¯s arrival.

    After Han Shuo and Ossoranded on the extinct volcano, Tyre yet againughed before saying, ¡°The Fringe has been peaceful for a long time and I¡¯ve gotten rather bored. Haha, but luckily you havee to make things interesting again! That Ss bastard is indeed an idiot to find you trouble. Served him right he got kicked in the butt!¡±

    Tyre talked to Han Shuo like they had been friends for a long time. Those who didn¡¯t know better might even be fooled.

    ¡°Haha, you¡¯re wee,¡± replied Han Shuo in a friendly smile as he secretly sized up Tyre. Although Tyre seemed like an honest man on the outside, his eyes, however, brightly glistened with lights of wisdom.

    After a moment of careful observation, Han Shuo could tell that Tyre was a formidable character. He felt that it would be much harder to defeat Tyre than all other Sovereigns. He knew from experience than a person who looked honest on the outside was usually more treacherous than those who were sinister looking. Han Shuo had already taken Tyre as his most formidable opponent in the Fringe.

    While Han Shuo was sizing up Tyre, Tyre was also secretly sizing up Han Shuo.

    The more he observed Han Shuo, the more puzzled he became. As the energy Han Shuo cultivated was unlike the Fundamental Forces practiced in this universe, Tyre could not determine Han Shuo¡¯s true strength. And when Han Shuo stood still, it felt as though he had fused with the environment. When Tyre closed his eyes, he would feel as though Han Shuo wasn¡¯t even there, that he was just one of those rocks around him.

    The less he understood Han Shuo, the more cautious he became. He secretly gave Logue and Wasir meaningful nces, hinting at them to use a softer approach.

    ¡°Ahem... So, gentlemen, how may I assist you?¡± asked Han Shuo after sizing up the three Sovereigns.

    Logue put on a faint smile and cordially said to Han Shuo, ¡°We know that those godhunters outside the Omphalos are rted to you. Haha, that¡¯s why we have been doing nothing all these while even though they had been causing so much trouble.¡±

    Logue forced a smile and seemed embarrassed as he said, ¡°We know it¡¯s proper for it to be chaotic outside the Omphalos. However, if this keeps going, without any supplies entering Omphalos, the businesses in the trading center won¡¯t be able to sustain themselves. No Fringedweller would wish to see the Omphalos gone. That¡¯s why we are suggesting that... ¡°

    Han Shuo patiently listened to Logue¡¯s exnation with a faint smile. And after Logue was done, he put on an equally embarrassed face and said, ¡°Well, I can see that they are in a tough situation. Without sufficient supplies, it would be difficult to sustain their businesses. Sigh, what a shame that they couldn¡¯t just charge people for entering the Omphalos. Then they could just rock their feet as ck crystal coins came rolling in...¡±

    Wasir coldly groaned and said in a cold voice, ¡°Bryan, the Fringe has its rules, and your actions have broken those rules!¡±

    Han Shuo acted as though he was astounded. He looked at Wasir with astonished gazes and said, ¡°The rules of the Fringe are set by you gentlemen. If you can make those rules, why can¡¯t I? Hehe, do you think that I¡¯m not qualified to do so?¡±

    ¡°Just how long has it been since you stepped into the Fringe? You think you can just walk in here and take a piece of the pie?¡± Wasir sneered and disdainfully said, ¡°Don¡¯t tell me that you really consider yourself stronger than Ss. You¡¯ve only managed to beat him because he had exhausted his divine energy after fighting Ossora!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s face turned dark and he stared intensely at Wasir. After a few seconds, Han Shuo grinned and challenged, ¡°I wonder if you dare fight me in a duel, Wasir?¡±

 Chapter 889 - Han Shuo vs Wasir

    GDK 889: Han Shuo vs Wasir

    Han Shuo could not defeat Tyre, Logue, and Wasir all at once. But if he only had to fight Wasir, Han Shuo was confident that he could win.

    The Fringe had always been a ce where the person with the biggest fist made the rule. Sometimes, instead of a lengthy futile argument, it was better to let the fists do the talking. From how Han Shuo saw it, Wasir was not just the weakest of the three, but also the most annoying. By fighting Wasir, Han Shuo could demonstrate that he possessed the strength to take Ss¡¯ ce in the Omphalos and also kick Wasir¡¯s ass.

    Wasir did not expect that Han Shuo would challenge him to a fight. Under the threatening gaze of Han Shuo, Wasir turned from arrogant to hesitant.

    Fighting Han Shuo one on one was nowhere in Wasir¡¯s n. Before the meeting, Wasir, Tyre, and Logue had reached an agreement to gang up against Han Shuo. They thought that Han Shuo would never be able to escape from them if they joined forces. That was why Wasir had spoken to Han Shuo with such contempt.

    Tyre, Logue, and Wasir weren¡¯t all that close. In fact, they had always been fighting each other for a bigger share of the Fringe. Tyre seemed very astonished to hear Han Shuo challenge Wasir to a duel without thinking. He stared deeply at Han Shuo for a second before heughed, ¡°Brother, you are truly filled with heroic spirit. No wonder you have stood out in the Fringe in such little time!¡±

    Tyre did notment on the challenge Han Shuo issued at Wasir and he showed no intention to de-escte the situation.

    A thought crossed Logue¡¯s mind. He turned to the hesitant Wasir and mocked, ¡°Wasir, you ain¡¯t afraid of him, are ya?¡±

    Wasir was enraged for he understood what Tyre and Logue¡¯s intentions were.

    Tyre and Logue did not have a clear idea of Han Shuo¡¯s true strength. Although all the Sovereigns were present when Han Shuo fought Ss, the battle was just too brief to tell anything for sure. Besides, as Ss had been fighting Ossora prior to that, they could not determine Han Shuo¡¯s strength without a wide margin of error.

    It was because of this substantial room of uncertainty that back then, Logue and Wasir had not taken any rash action, and instead left the Pandemonium right away. This was also the reason that the Three Sovereigns had taken no action against Han Hao¡¯s rampant looting of those Omphalos merchants for such a long time.

    The three Sovereigns were patient characters. They took no uncertainty to chance, especially not with Han Shuo¡¯s strength. The three Sovereigns had only invited Han Shuo to the meeting after they reached an agreement where the three of them would join forces and end Han Shuo¡¯s life on the extinct volcano if Han Shuo proved too stubborn to be reasoned with.

    But after suddenly hearing Han Shuo challenge Wasir to a fight, Tyre and Logue realized that being able to determine Han Shuo¡¯s true strength without risking injuries themselves would be an even more fantastic deal.

    If Han Shuo then demonstrated supreme strength, where the three of them could not keep Han Shuo trapped, Tyre and Logue could maintain their current rtionship with Han Shuo and not make a powerful enemy for now. But if Han Shuo wasn¡¯t as powerful as they thought, they could step into the battle without notice and join hands with Wasir to kill Han Shuo.

    It took Tyre and Logue no time to realize that having Wasir and Han Shuo fight would be more beneficial for them than all three of them joining forces to attack Han Shuo. Therefore Tyre had not tried to de-escte the tension while Logue tried to provoke Wasir.

    In his mind, Wasir chided himself for being too impulsive while cursing Tyre and Logue for their deviousness. With Han Shuo sneering at him, Wasir did not know which

    <i>If I ept the challenge, I¡¯ll fall right into Tyre and Logue¡¯s ruse. If I decline, others might think that I¡¯m afraid of that kid and boost his morale. Grr!</i> Wasir did not know which choice to make, especially with Han Shuo sneering at him.

    The sneering Han Shuo knew exactly what was on Wasir, Tyre, and Logue¡¯s minds. Seeing that Wasir was still hesitant, Han Shuo added, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, we have no quarrels with each other, so we ain¡¯t going to fight till the death. Hehe, consider it a friendly match, if you may. That shouldn¡¯t be a problem for you, should it?¡±

    Han Shuo did not want Wasir to decline the challenge and with Tyre and Logue around, he did not want to fight Wasir until one of them was dead. All Han Shuo wanted was to kick Wasir¡¯s ass to demonstrate his strength and go home.

    ¡°Wasir, what¡¯s wrong with you today? You are acting much more timid than usual! Haven¡¯t you heard what Bryan said? What are you still worrying about? Could it be that you are afraid of fighting him? Hehe...¡± said Logue in jest.

    With things havinge to this, Wasir knew that he could not avoid a battle with Han Shuo. He silently cursed Tyre and Logue and all their ancestors before he coldly nodded and said, ¡°A fight you will have. I don¡¯t believe that you possess the power to defeat Ss. You only won because you were lucky!¡±

    Han Shuo was delighted to hear Wasir rise to the challenge. Compared to Tyre and Logue, Wasir¡¯s strength and realm state were slightly poorer. Of the three Sovereigns, Wasir¡¯s butt was the easiest to kick.

    Then, without any warning, Han Shuo spread his hands and the Demonic des shot out from the tips of his fingers. The sharp des glistened with chilling radiances.

    After advancing to the Skybreak Realm, all of the demonic techniques that Han Shuo mastered had strengthened in tandem. Powered by the new form of demonic yuan, the Demonic des formed were even more damaging than the average demonic weapon. As the Demonic des were connected to his fingertips, he could extend and retract those des freely, giving him a unique advantage in close-quarterbat.

    Wasir cultivated the energy of water. After staying on his cial Peak for a long time, Wasir deciphered and mastered the other form of the water energy. The energy of water manifested as the energy of ice had outstanding defensive and offensive power. It was most suitable for use in close-quarterbat.

    It was obvious from his Demonic des that Han Shuo wanted to fight Wasir in close-quarterbat. He was not afraid of Wasir¡¯s strong suit.

    However, instead of appreciating it, Wasir considered that an insult. Han Shuo choosing to fight him in close-quarterbat had angered Wasir. He shouted, ¡°Kid, you are asking for it!¡±

    As Wasir spoke, a thickyer of ice grew around him. Under the illumination of the bright sun, Wasir seemed to have transformed into an enormous, sparkling, beautiful diamond. Although Wasir was inside a thickyer of ice, somehow, it did not affect Wasir¡¯s movement. His two hands could still move around as though they were still in empty air.

    Although Wasir¡¯s body was protected under tough, solid ice, his limbs were not frozen but as fluid as water. Wasir was indeed worthy of being called an overgod of water. His understanding of the two different but equally profound sides of the element of water had reached a profound level.

    When Han Shuo saw that Wasir was ready for battle, he knew that he had aplished his goal. He wasted no words with Wasir. Han Shuo knew all kinds ofplicated and gaudy ranged attacks, but he forsook them for close-quarterbat. He charged at Wasir at his highest speed.

    The chilling Demonic des constructed with fingernails as its base were terrifyingly lethal once they were filled with demonic yuan.

    <i>Ting!</i> a sharp, clear ringing sound sounded when the Demonic de on Han Shuo¡¯s left middle finger made contact with the ice on Wasir¡¯s chest.

    Wasir did not expect that Han Shuo could move so fast. He only saw a dazzling sh before Han Shuo was right in front of him. While he was moving to intercept the attack, his chest was struck.

    <i>He¡¯s faster than I am!</i> concluded Wasir.

    Wasir¡¯s mastery of the energy of ice was indeed profound. Although Han Shuo managed to take the first hit, the incredibly incisive de did not manage to destroy that thickyer of ice defending Wasir. It had only managed to scrape off a few inches of ice.

    Although Wasir was a little slow, he had still managed tond attacks on Han Shuo. He thrust the two swords he made from ice at Han Shuo¡¯s chest.

    <i>Ting Ting!</i> An enormous force suddenly erupted from Han Shuo¡¯s chest and Wasir was flung backward.

    Sovereign Tyre, Logue, and Ossora who were watching from the sidelines suddenly opened their eyes wide and gasped in disbelief!

    They could very clearly see that Han Shuo did not form any defensive barrier around his body and he wasn¡¯t wearing any divine armor. There was just a thin, dark warrior¡¯s gown over his skin.

    This meant that Wasir¡¯s strike on Han Shuo¡¯s chest was a direct hit. There was nothing to absorb or dissipate the formidable force, other than Han Shuo¡¯s skin and flesh.

    There were all kinds of gods who cultivated in all kinds of Fundamental Forces all over Elysium. Some of them possessed extremely tough divine bodies. However, they had never seen any being who could resist an attack without boundary, divine armor, or any defensive measures, but with just the most basic toughness of their body.

    Tyre and Logue were astounded!

    They were certain that if it was they themselves who had taken this strike of Wasir¡¯s without any defensive measures alongside their bare bodies, they would have been severely injured!

    They were not aware of any being on Elysium who possessed a body of such toughness that could directly sustain such a mighty blow without suffering any injury. Perhaps even an Overgod with the Quintessence could not do so.

    Tyre and Logue showed mixed emotions in their eyes. They became more and more amazed by Han Shuo.

 Chapter 890 - Splitting

    GDK 890: Splitting

    While Tyre and Logue let their imagination run wild, Han Shuo and Wasir continued to fight ferociously. They had turned into two blurry figures that repeatedly shed and produced loud ngs.

    Wasir had wrapped himself in a thickyer of protective ice from head to toe. He formed a sword using the energy of ice and stabbed Han Shuo with it. However, it would always be recoiled by Han Shuo¡¯s Omen Invincible Body and couldn¡¯t cause him any harm.

    Han Shuo too was unable to cause Wasir any harm. His Demonic des could only prate a few inches of the protective ice, not nearly enough to reach Wasir who was under the thick ice. His attacks would only leave white trails on the surface of the ice.

    Both Han Shuo and Wasir understood that there was no such thing as an impregnable defense. Han Shuo¡¯s Omen Invincible Body and Wasir¡¯s protective ice required demonic yuan and divine energy. Every time they suffered an attack, they would exhaust some amount of demonic yuan or divine energy to neutralize the attacking power.

    And once any of them runs out of energy, their defense will naturally copse. By then, their seemingly impregnable defense will crumble like a dried leaf.

    The duel had turned into a battle of attrition. The one with more energy will eventually win.

    But Han Shuo was not willing to spend too much energy on Wasir. If he were to exhaust too much energy on fighting Wasir, Tyre and Logue who was watching nearby might jump into the battle and join forces with Wasir to kill him.

    Although Ossora was also watching, Han Shuo would not depend his life on him. He did not think that Ossora would help him against Tyre and Logue. Therefore, Han Shuo had to look for another approach in order to break the stalemate.

    While wearing down his energy with Wasir, an idea suddenly crossed Han Shuo¡¯s mind. He began attacking Wasir with a different method. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness suddenly produced an undtion barely visible to the naked eye. It had locked on Wasir¡¯s divine soul and pounced on it.

    Wasir who was busy defending against Han Shuo¡¯s melee attacks suddenly felt an intense pricking pain in his mind. He sensed that an incisive soul energy had intruded his mind and started a ferocious attack against his divine soul.

    The sudden soul attack had thrown Wasir into a panic. Fear was visible in his eyes.

    Of the Twelve Fundamental Forces, cultivators of the energies of life, death, and destiny had the greatest mastery over the soul. Cultivators of the energy of water were rtively poor in this aspect. But Han Shuo¡¯s mastery of the soul was so immensely profound that it was beyond what can be achieved by the cultivators of the three energies.

    After Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness intruded into Wasir¡¯s mind, it spread and transformed into arge, covering Wasir¡¯s divine soul. The incorporeal formed using hundreds of thousands of strands of the consciousness were contracting bit by bit, producing the unbearable pricking pain in Wasir¡¯s divine soul.

    As a cultivator of demonic arts, Han Shuo had not only forged his body to be incredibly tough, he had even formed an incredibly powerful consciousness that possessed abilities beyond the imagination of an ordinary being. Although Wasir¡¯s physical defensive power was indeed extraordinary, he wasn¡¯t nearly as good when ites to his divine soul. By attacking Wasir¡¯s divine soul with his consciousness, Han Shuo had gained a strong upper hand.

    The body¡¯s defensive and offensive capabilities were strongly tied to the soul. The moment that Han Shuo started attacking with his consciousness, Wasir¡¯s body movement started turning awkward and sluggish. Even his eyes were no longer radiating confidence but seemed somewhat frightened.

    The face of the observant Logue suddenly jolted. As a cultivator of the energy of death, he had a profound level of mastery in the soul. He was the first to detect Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness attacking Wasir¡¯s mind.

    After carefully sensing using his divine soul, Logue discovered that he had absolutely no idea which energy Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness belong to. He was also startled to observe that Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness energy had transformed into thousands of strands to make a spider-like web. It was unlike anything he had seen before, or anything close to his imagination. His gaze towards Han Shuo turned greatly cautious.

    ¡°It¡¯s a soul attack,¡± Under Tyre¡¯s inquisitive gazes, Logue softly exined, ¡°He has an extremely profound level of mastery over the soul. It¡¯s beyond miraculous. That soul attack of his is directly impacting Wasir¡¯s strength.¡±

    Tyre too put on an astonished face and his eyes glimmered with indecisive light.

    With the consciousness attack, Han Shuo was gaining a stronger and stronger position over Wasir. The thickyer of ice that protected Wasir started to crack and fissure lines were rapidly spreading. It seemed as though the ice would shatter at any moment. At this trend, it won¡¯t be long before Wasir would crumble to Han Shuo¡¯s wild bombardment.

    But it was at this moment that Han Shuo had suddenly withdrawn. He had not only stopped the physical attack on Wasir, even the consciousness energy that intruded Wasir¡¯s mind was withdrawn.

    Wasir found it extremely difficult to defend against the attacks on his body and soul and he became more and more terrified. He thought that he would be severely injured by Han Shuo but suddenly, the intense pain vanished from his divine soul and he felt as though he was set free.

    After pulling a distance from Wasir, Han Shuo put on a faint smile and calmly said, ¡°I believe that there¡¯s no need to continue the duel. Wasir¡¯s strength is indeed outstanding.¡±

    Before the battle, Han Shuo was not polite in attitude. But after winning the duel, he turned modest and courteous.

    Wasir first examined his divine body and divine soul. After making sure that Han Shuo did not do anything despicable to him in secret, he looked at Han Shuo with eyes showing aplex mix of emotions and said, ¡°I don¡¯t need you to save me face. I admit I¡¯m not as strong as you are!¡±

    Han Shuo was astounded. He thought that perhaps of all the Sovereigns, Wasir was the easiest to get along with. Wasir¡¯s openness and willingness to admin defeat had left a good impression on Han Shuo. And perhaps Wasir wasn¡¯t as annoying as he thought.

    ¡°Without a battle to the death, it is very difficult to tell who would actually win or lose. There are just too many variables in a battle. Even the tiniest change to the tiniest thing could alter the oue. Therefore, this duel can only be considered as a tie. You have not lost,¡± said Han Shuo in a calm smile.

    Wasir was puzzled and he couldn¡¯t understand why Han Shuo would say so or behave so politely. He looked at Han Shuo with suspicious eyes, as though trying to determine what exactly was Han Shuo nning.

    In the Fringe, every Sovereign would try to prove that he is the strongest at all costs. Only then would those ferocious gods migrating from every corner of the Elysium prefer to submit to their Sovereignty, growing the power under theirmand.

    Back then in the Pandemonium, when Ossora saw that Ss had exhausted a good amount of divine energy to the demonic formations, he had immediately provoked Ss to a battle. He wanted to use the opportunity to prove to everyone that he was stronger than Ss. Logue and Wasir went to the Pandemonium with simr intentions.

    However, after overpowering Wasir in every aspect, not only did Han Shuo not mock him arrogantly, he had even modestly imed that the battle was a tie. Wasir could not understand Han Shuo¡¯s intention.

    After looking carefully into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes for a moment, Wasir found not a trace of disdain or mockery. This made him even more puzzled.

    ¡°Eh? It¡¯s over? That¡¯s too soon!¡± Logue smilingly said, ¡°We haven¡¯t had a winner yet!¡±

    Wasir was angered. He cast his cold eyes on Logue and remarked, ¡°I believe that Bryan is fully capable of substituting Ss¡¯ ce in the Omphalos. If you disagree, you may test his strength yourself.¡±

    Logue stared nkly for a moment, not expecting Wasir to side with Han Shuo. After looking at Wasir with puzzled eyes, he realized that Wasir must be angry with Tyre and him for their actions earlier. He lightly chuckled and said, ¡°I don¡¯t think that¡¯s appropriate. Bryan has just fought you. It¡¯s not fair to duel with him now. Perhaps we might do that sometime in the future.¡±

    ¡°Hehe, since when have you started caring what¡¯s appropriate?¡± sneered Wasir. He knew that taking advantage of others was Logue¡¯s favorite activity. The fact that Logue did not immediately attack Han Shuo could only mean one thing ¨C he did not have the confidence to defeat Han Shuo!

    Logue wasn¡¯t embarrassed by thement at all and he still wore the same faint smile. He turned to Tyre and asked, ¡°So, what do you think?¡±

    With things havinge to this, Tyre was uncertain of Wasir¡¯s intention. Without Wasir¡¯s assistance, Tyre and Logue did not have absolute confidence in killing Han Shuo. He was also worried about the scheming Ossora who was standing nearby.

    Tyre understood that Han Shuo must have seen through their scheme. That was the reason he had withdrawn after gaining an upper hand in the duel. Leveraging on the fact that Wasir was angry at Tyre and Logue, Han Shuo took initiative to show goodwill to Wasir to make him hesitate, erging the rift between the three Sovereigns and breaking their fragile alliance.

    <i>This youngster is anything but easy to deal with!</i> thought Tyre. With Wasir now possibly not going to honor their original agreement, Tyre knew that the original n was no longer feasible. He thought about it for a moment and immediately came up with another n. Heughed out loud before saying, ¡°Well done, brother! Youth indeed breeds heroism! You have demonstrated your strength through that battle just now. We have no doubt of your capability, but... ¡°

    Han Shuo creased a brow and in a slightly deeper tone, he asked, ¡°Oh, is there something else?¡±

    Tyre put on a bitter smile and nodded. He continued, ¡°But Ss is not yet dead. He is only in hiding to recover his strength. If we are to let you take his ce in the Omphalos, things could get troublesome for us when he returns.¡± Tyre took a short pause before he said, ¡°But if you can get rid of Ss and eliminate this possibility, we would dly ept you as one of Omphalos¡¯ managers.¡±

    ¡°This you have nothing to worry about. If Ss ever returns to the Fringe, the first person he will look for is me. By then, I will end him myself. If I then lose to Ss, everything will just be returned to Ss. You guys have nothing to do with this. So I don¡¯t get what ¡®trouble¡¯ it is that you mean,¡± replied Han Shuo immediately. He had thought of this question long ago and wouldn¡¯t be fooled by that flimsy excuse of Tyre.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. The person that Ss hates the most is Bryan. If he even returns, the first thing he will do is look for Bryan to get his revenge. By then, the person who wins will take over the ten Sovereign Shops and continue to manage the Omphalos. We do not know when or if Ss will ever return to the Fringe. I can¡¯t see why it¡¯d be inappropriate to have Bryan substitute Ss¡¯ ce when he is not in the Fringe.¡±

    Tyre knew that Ossora was on Han Shuo¡¯s side. He nodded at Ossora and did notment about it. Then, Tyre turned to Wasir and asked, ¡°What do you think?¡±

    Tyre wasn¡¯t sure of Wasir¡¯s position. He wanted to determine Wasir position through the question to decide if he should take the riskier option.

    Wasir hesitated. He looked at Han Shuo while weighing his options. He knew that Tyre and Logue definitely did not want Han Shuo to join them as one of Omphalos¡¯ managers and the final decision nowes down to him. If Wasir disagreed, it would be three against two.

    But Wasir was still angry at Tyre and Logue for their petty plots earlier. He had been thinking about how to get even at the two. While looking at the smiling Han Shuo, Wasir somehow got the feeling that Han Shuo was much more mannered than Tyre and Logue. With that, he came to a decision. Wasir nodded and said, ¡°I think Ossora¡¯s words make sense.¡±

    Tyre¡¯s face jolted very slightly after hearing Wasir¡¯s answer. He nodded at Wasir, forced a smile, and said, ¡°Since Wasir and Ossora approve of the motion, then it is decided. Alright, Bryan, I will talk to those merchants and straighten things out.¡±

    ¡°Oh! Thanks a lot!¡± said Han Shuo smilingly. He nodded at Wasir and indicated his appreciation with his eyes.

    ¡°But before you move into the Omphalos, I hope that you will do the Fringe a favor. This involves all of us,¡± It seemed as though Tyre wouldn¡¯t let Han Shuo move into the Omphalos smoothly. He threw yet another problem at Han Shuo.

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s attentive gaze, Tyre angrily said, ¡°The Godhunter Alliance has always wanted to invade the Fringe and make it their base. And in recent times, those of the Alliance are bing more and more out of control. Many of the experts moving into the Fringe have been recruited by the Alliance before they could step in here. The number of true experts migrating into the Fringe has recently been declining.

    ¡°Bryan, I know that Han Hao is closely rted to you. I also know that Han Hao is associated with the Godhunter Alliance. I hope you understand that if the Godhunter Alliance managed to take control of the Fringe and make it their base, it will only destroy the Fringe.

    ¡°For eons, although we have been chaotic in the Fringe, we would never go out and attack those in the Twelve Dominions. But the Godhunter Alliance is different. They have been causing havoc in every Dominion and everyone wants to exterminate them. If they seed in making the Fringe their base, the Fringe will be destroyed!¡±

    ¡°And what can I do about that?¡± Han Shuo started getting a headache. This problem raised by Tyre was not unfounded. If the Fringe became the headquarters of the Godhunter Alliance, the Twelve Dominions would unite and send their divine guards to raze the Fringe to dust.

    ¡°Han Haomands the biggest godhunter faction in the Fringe. Make Han Hao split from the Godhunter Alliance or have him leave the Fringe with his godhunters. Otherwise, it will only be a matter of time before he brings cmity to the Fringe!¡± said Tyre.

 Chapter 891 - Beware

    GDK 891: Beware

    The rtionship between Han Shuo and Han Hao was more profound than any person could understand. They had lived far apart for decades. After enduring those years and finally being able to live in the same region, Han Shuo would not allow Han Hao to leave him.

    However, the issue raised by Tyre was a serious issue. The Godhunter Alliance was notorious in all Twelve Dominions for their misdeeds. Countless family ns dedicated their lives to eradicating the Alliance. If they knew that the Godhunter Alliance had moved their headquarters to the Fringe, Han Shuo could not be more certain that the top experts from all Twelve Dominions would join forces to tten the Land.

    ¡°Bryan, this is a very real issue. For all these years, there have been countless criminals who migrated into the Fringe and submitted to our Sovereignties. They had and are causing a lot of chaos, but it is always limited to the Fringe. Under our Sovereignty, they would never return to the Dominions and cause havoc.¡± Ossora bunched his brows gravely and exined, ¡°The Twelve Overgods have allowed the Fringe to exist because all the outrageous things that happen here don¡¯t spread to their Dominions. In fact, they could not be happier to see us kill each other in this Land. The Godhunter Alliance, however, is different. They do not limit themselves to the Fringe. I hope you will take this seriously.¡±

    Han Shuo knew the seriousness of this problem. After hearing the Sovereigns¡¯ words, Han Shuo nodded and responded, ¡°I will take care of it.¡±

    ¡°Alright. As long as you can settle this issue, you can have a piece of the Omphalos!¡± said Tyre in a big smile. ¡°The Godhunter Alliance has always wanted to make the Fringe their territory. The only reason they haven¡¯t made any real attempt is that they are afraid of the five of us. We maypete and fight against each other in the Fringe, but we will and we must always stand united against the Godhunter Alliance!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. The Godhunter Alliance is the public enemy of the entire Elysium. We Fringedwellers need to be united against them for the survival of our Land,¡± said Logue gravely. It appeared that the Sovereigns had a consensus on this issue.

    ¡°That¡¯s enough. I¡¯ve said that I¡¯ll take care of it,¡± Han Shuo bunched his brows and said in a rather annoyed manner.

    ¡°Alright, then the meeting is adjourned. We will let you have the Sovereign Shops previously owned by Ss. Just send your people to take over those shops.¡± Tyre nodded, transformed into a dark trail, and vanished.

    ¡°Haha, wee aboard!¡± Logue congratted Han Shuo smilingly before leaving the extinct volcano.

    Then it was Wasir¡¯s turn. He cast a few cold nces at Han Shuo, lightly groaned, and said, ¡°I only helped you because Tyre and Logue have set me up earlier. Don¡¯t get any ideas.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded smilingly and replied, ¡°Regardless of that, I owe you a thank you.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t need your thanks,¡± Wasir departed coldly.

    Han Shuo gazed at the rapidly diminishing Wasir as he left. He found Wasir to be rather decent in character, or at least he wasn¡¯t as scheming as the other Sovereigns. Han Shuo took a quick nce at Ossora who was standing beside him and his thought turned to the Sovereign. Although Ossora had been very generous to him since he stepped into the Fringe, Han Shuo was still constantly on the guard against Ossora.

    Han Shuo felt that Ossora was perhaps even more cunning than Tyre. He knew how to subtly manipte a person into fighting his enemy and had the boldness to gamble with one of his Sovereign Shops, a sizable chunk of his asset. This Sovereign had been using him from the start. He would even increase his investment as Han Shuo¡¯s strength grew so that Han Shuo would unwittingly ept him as an ally.

    Han Shuo dared not ce his trust in such a person. He had been on the guard against Ossora since day one.

    If Han Shuo had to select one of the Sovereigns as an ally, he would most likely choose Wasir. Wasir wasn¡¯t a scheming character. And when he was given respect and favor, he would return them to the person appropriately. Han Shuo thought that such a person would be rtively reliable.

    ¡°Bryan, have you figured out a solution to the issue?¡± After the other three Sovereigns left, Ossora looked at Han Shuo smilingly and asked.

    Han Shuo was jolted from the deep contemtion. He put on a faint smile and replied, ¡°No, I have not. But don¡¯t worry about it, I will settle it well.¡±

    ¡°Of course you will. I have faith in you.¡± Ossora said cordially, ¡°I shall return to my underground pce. You may now return to the Omphalos and take over those Sovereign Shops. I think that after this day, those three wouldn¡¯t try anything so brazen again, at least temporarily.¡±

    ¡°Thank you for your assistance,¡± said Han Shuo courteously.

    Ossora nodded and left, leaving Han Shuo alone on the extinct volcano.

    Han Shuo did not immediately return to the Omphalos. He stood on the volcano and muttered to himself for a while. When he was thinking about leaving, his consciousness sensed something. He turned and stared in a direction puzzlingly. A faint silhouette appeared from the horizon and slowly approached Han Shuo. When the figure got close to the extinct volcano, the puzzled Han Shuo asked, ¡°Why have you returned?¡±

    Sovereign Wasir looked around. After making sure that Tyre, Logue, and Ossora were not there, he stepped out from the shadow, came to Han Shuo, and coldly said, ¡°Tyre and Logue have ryed your rtionship with Han Hao to the Godhunter Alliance through some secret channels. The Leadership in Godhunter Alliance might try to get Han Hao. Tell him to be careful.¡±

    Wasir paused and hesitated for a moment before he looked intensely at Han Shuo and said, ¡°And beware of Ossora.¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Wasir turned on his heels and started leaving. It was obvious why Wasir chose to return after Ossora left to tell Han Shuo those words instead of before Ossora left.

    ¡°Wait!¡± Han Shuo immediately let out a soft cry when he saw that Wasir was going to leave right away.

    Wasir stopped. Without turning around, he said in an indifferent voice, ¡°I tell you these because you have spared me just then. But that doesn¡¯t mean I want to get associated with you. The Godhunter Alliance is a formidable enemy and you better pray you don¡¯t get killed.¡±

    Han Shuo put on a smile and said, ¡°Thank you for the warning. I will remember this favor. Right, if therees a day that I have to fight Tyre and Logue, I will appreciate it if you would just stand aside and watch.¡±

    ¡°If I were you, I¡¯d put off that thought until I¡¯ve figured out this problem,¡± Wasir coldly groaned and left in an instant.

    ¡°A worthy friend, indeed!¡± muttered Han Shuo softly after Wasir left.

    <i>Beware of Ossora... Hmm... </i> thought Han Shuo as a corner of his lips curved to make a scheming smirk.

    ***Three dayster, above a cliff in the northwest of the Fringe.

    Han Hao dismissed his godhunters and waited for Han Shuo¡¯s arrival alone. Ten minutester, an otherworldly radiance streaked through the sky and appeared before Han Hao.

    ¡°Congrattions, Father! You have made yet another breakthrough!¡± said Han Hao in a faint smile. It was vastly different from his usual callous and emotionless demeanor, as though there was a shred of humanity in him.

    Han Shuo smiled. He sat across Han Hao on arge piece of rock and said, ¡°It¡¯s settled. The ten Omphalos Sovereign Shops are ours!¡±

    ¡°I knew that Father must have handled it like a walk in the park!¡± Han Hao put on an expression as though he knew it all along. After taking a short pause, he asked, ¡°Oh ya, do we have to return the supplies we looted to those merchants?¡±

    ¡°Nope, they did not even mention it. They don¡¯t give a damn about those merchants,¡± After staring at the ground silently for a moment, Han Shuo said, ¡°Do not leave the Fringe temporarily. I have just received intel that Tyre and Logue have revealed our rtionship to the Godhunter Alliance though a certain channel. They might try to do something to you.¡±

    Upon hearing those words, Han Hao¡¯s purple demon eye glistened. He eximed, ¡°No wonder!¡±

    Under Han Shuo¡¯s puzzled gaze, Han Hao exined, ¡°A few days ago, I received a message from the Godhunter Alliance, asking me to visit the Death Dominion to talk about the Fringe. I find it peculiar that they would suddenly be interested in the Fringe. It turns out that they are having other ideas!¡±

    ¡°How exactly is the Alliance organized? Who is above you?¡± asked Han Shuo immediately. His curiosity was aroused.

    ¡°Above the Chiefs are Hegemons. Each of the Twelve Dominions has a Hegemon. They are the truemanders of the Godhunter Alliance. Every one of them is in the realm of overgod, just like Ss. I only know the Hegemon who manages the Alliances¡¯ operation in the Death Dominion. The rest of them, I have no clue,¡± Han Hao exined everything he knew about the structure ofmand and strength of the Godhunter Alliance.

    Back then, when Han Shuo lived in the Darkness Dominion, he had personally met one of the overgods who led the Alliance. From the fact that they hadmitted countless atrocities in every Dominion but had yet to be exterminated, Han Shuo expected the Alliance to have a number of overgods.

    But when Han Hao revealed that there were twelve of such existences in the Godhunter Alliance, Han Shuo was astounded!

    Han Shuo thought that no wonder Tyre, Logue, Wasir, and Ossora were so wary of the Godhunter Alliance. When Ss was still around, there were just the five overgods in the Fringe. They were outnumbered by the Godhunter Alliance who had twelve overgods.

    ¡°So it was that overgod from the Death Dominion who has asked you to travel there?¡± asked Han Shuo after thinking for a moment.

    ¡°Yes, only he has the qualifications to mobilize me,¡± replied Han Hao as he nodded.

    ¡°Don¡¯t go. Leave the Godhunter Alliance as soon as possible. That must be nning to do something to you,¡± advised Han Shuo, fearing that something bad might happen to Little Skeleton.

    ¡°Well, I¡¯m not nning on going back.¡± Han Hao wore a calm face as he said, ¡°The Godhunter Alliance has no strings on me. I have no intention of following theirmands aftering to the Fringe. To me, only Father and my brothers are important. I answer to no one but to Father!¡±

    ¡°Then I¡¯m at ease,¡± said Han Shuo in a gentleugh. He thought, <i>Indeed, Han Hao is not bound by anyone and would only listen to mymand. It turns out that this seemingly challenging problem has never been a problem!</i>

 Chapter 892 - House arrest

    GDK 892: House arrest

    Han Shuo went to the Sovereigns and informed them in no uncertain terms that Han Hao would split from the Godhunter Alliance and that if there ever came a day that the Fringe was at war with the Alliance, Han Hao and his faction would stand against the Godhunter Alliance.

    With that pledge of Han Shuo¡¯s, the Sovereigns had no more excuses and they gave Han Shuo what he wanted.

    Han Shuo had finally gotten control over a piece of the Omphalos. The Sovereigns surrendered the Sovereign Shops previously owned by Ss to Han Shuo. And as one of the managers of the Omphalos, each year, Han Shuo would get one-fifth of all tax ie collected in the Omphalos. It was an astronomical amount of ck crystal coins.

    Back when Han Shuo first stepped into the Omphalos, Ossora had gifted Han Shuo one of his Sovereign Shops, which was converted into a Celestial Pharmacy branch. After taking over Ss¡¯ Sovereign Shops, Han Shuo gave one of those Shops to Ossora. Han Shuo no longer owed Ossora anything of mary value.

    Han Shuo was on his toes towards Ossora since the beginning. And after having heard Wasir¡¯s warning, Han Shuo was even more vignt towards Ossora. Han Shuo tried to not be too closely associated with Ossora so that if he ever had to kill Ossora in the future, he wouldn¡¯t have any apprehensions or be criticized by the public.

    Once Han Shuo took control of the ten Sovereign Shops, he asked Zovic and Metal Elite Zombie to move into the Omphalos. Metal Elite Zombie had established his Goldstone Enterprise in every Dominion and had amply demonstrated his talent in managing and growing businesses. Therefore, Han Shuo gave Metal Elite Zombie one of his Sovereign Shops so that he could set up a Goldstone branch in the Omphalos.

    Zovic was an intelligent person and he knew the ins and outs of the Fringe. Han Shuo had brought Zovic to the Omphalos to help Metal Elite Zombie in setting up his Goldstone branch. But most importantly, Zovic knew some of the stringers in the Omphalos. Han Shuo gave him a sizable amount of ck crystal coins to build his own intelligencework in the Fringe.

    After the meeting on the extinct volcano, the three Sovereigns hadmunicated with those Omphalos merchants, instructing them to stop making things difficult for Han Shuo. After having their supplies looted by Han Hao for many months, those Omphalos merchants agreed to the instruction almost immediately. After this ordeal, they all understood just how treacherous Han Shuo was.

    In addition, those merchants also understood that the Sovereigns must have reached some sort of agreement with Han Shuo. They became even more afraid of this mighty character who was rapidly rising in the Fringe.

    Having an infamous reputation was very useful in the Fringe. When it came to setting up the Goldstone branch or getting information, things went much smoother when Han Shuo¡¯s name was mentioned.

    Three months went by in a heartbeat. During that time, Metal Elite Zombie had sessfully established a Goldstone branch in the Omphalos. With a seemingly endless budget of ck crystal coins and Han Shuo¡¯s fearsome reputation, Zovic managed to hire a number of stringers to work for Han Shuo. Although this newly set up intelligencework wasn¡¯t as expansive and all-epassing as those of the other Sovereigns, it was better than having nothing.

    During those months, Han Hao did not continue wreaking havoc all around the Fringe. He had been focused on training the godhunters he had recently recruited.

    Although Han Hao and Han Shuo rarely ever met up, they knew each other¡¯s situation well as they had been frequentlymunicating through their secret channel.

    One day, while refining new pelleted medicines and scheming to swoop every pharmacist and poison maker of the Omphalos under his Sovereignty, he was interrupted by the anxious Zovic rushing into his gymnasium.

    Han Shuo had instructed Zovic not to disturb him when he was producing medicines or cultivating, unless there was an emergency. Zovic wasn¡¯t an incautious person and he definitely knew how to follow orders. He had never interrupted Han Shuo in his cultivation before. And from that anxious look on his face, Han Shuo knew instantly that there was an urgent situation.

    ¡°What¡¯s happening?¡± Han Shuo¡¯s face turned grave. He had a feeling that something really bad happened.

    The rather anxious Zovic immediately replied, ¡°I just received news from Han Hao. His follower has just arrived from the Death Dominion with news about the House of Han.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s face froze and he felt even more uneasy. Immediately he asked, ¡°What happened?¡±

    ¡°Every major godhunter faction in the Ronson Canyon had joined forces to attack the House of Han. They...¡± Zovic hastily reported everything he knew.

    From the moment Han Shuo assigned Zovic the task of building an intelligencework, he had instructed Zovic to pay attention to the House of Han in the Darkness Dominion. Having served Han Shuo for some time and being an intelligent man, it was clear to Zovic how much the House of Han meant to Han Shuo.

    The messenger who had just reported to Han Hao was sent by Khitan before he went to stop the godhunter factions from attacking the House of Han. This messenger had no clue of their fate. What was told to Han Shuo was just as dire as what the messenger had heard at that time.

    That follower of Han Hao¡¯s took four months to travel non-stop from the Death Dominion to the Fringe. This meant that by the time Han Shuo received the information, it had been four months since the House of Han was attacked.

    Han Shuo¡¯s face turned dark. From the information, he deduced that the House of Han must have met some sort of cmity in the Darkness Dominion. Otherwise, they wouldn¡¯t have tried moving to the Death Dominion. Just like the marathoner, Han Shuo had no idea what the House of Han¡¯s current situation was like or if they had managed to pass through the Ronson Canyon.

    Based on the information currently at hand, Zovic felt that it was likely the House of Han had perished in the Ronson Canyon. However, he remained silent and kept that prediction to himself.

    After thinking for a moment, Han Shuo took a deep breath and said to Zovic, ¡°I need to leave the Fringe for a while. Keep it a secret. If anyone asks, just tell them that I¡¯m cultivating in the Pandemonium. It won¡¯t be long before I return. You will be in charge while I¡¯m away.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, my Lord. No one would know that you have left the Fringe,¡± replied Zovic as he nodded.

    Han Shuo then said, ¡°I¡¯m leaving right now. Keep an eye on those little guys and make sure that they are not stirring up trouble. I will return as soon as possible.¡±

    After leaving some instructions to Zovic, Han Shuo openly walked out of the Celestial Pearl like everything was normal. But as soon as he was outside the Omphalos, he concealed his aura and contacted Han Hao. After secretly meeting Han Hao to have a short discussion, Han Shuo left the Fringe.

    ***The Death Dominion, Witherbone City.

    Of all the cities in the Death Dominion, and perhaps on Elysium, the structures in Witherbone City were the most peculiar. The city wall was made using the bones of an unknown magical beast. The bones were of various colors and were incredibly tough. It gave the city a terrifying, sinister appearance.

    The members of the House of Han were gathered inside a structure in the Kiaran Residence made of white bones. The sanitary conditions and amenities of this building were far poorer than what they had in the City of Shadows. But the most unbearable thing was that the building was located beside a stinking, revolting bone refinery.

    A bone refinery was a facility where bones were processed using unique minerals and metals. By subjecting the bones to certain processes, they could be transformed into a material even tougher than rocks. The processed bones could be used for building durable structures and some could even be used as the foundational material of divine weapons.

    Most of the bones were those of magical beasts and some belonged to perished gods. They came to the refinery raw with rotting flesh still loosely attached. It left an unbearable stench on the ce.

    The House of Han was ced in a house located nearby the bone refinery.

    They had lived in the Witherbone City of the Death Dominion for a while. The days of living by relying on someone else¡¯s charity had not been pleasant. Although the members of the House of Kiaran were very cordial towards the House of Han at first, when they discovered that the House of Han wouldn¡¯tpromise on a certain issue, they became not so cordial.

    The House of Han did notck ck crystal coins. They could easily afford to rent a better residence or even buy an upscale property in the city to live in. However, Sha-t¡¯o, the patriarch of the House of Kiaran, gave all kinds of excuses to keep the Han Family from leaving the Kiaran Residence.

    Li Wei, who was a close friend of Han Shuo, had protested the treatment of the Han Family. But unfortunately, Li Wei wasn¡¯t influential in her House of Kiaran and Sha-t¡¯o turned a deaf ear to herments.

    Phoebe, Emily, and the others who were clean freaks were nearly driven mad after having to endure the rotting stench of the bone refinery for months.

    The members of the House of Han grew more and more annoyed after their requests were repeatedly rejected. However, the House of Kiaran was extremely mighty. They were one of the strongest family ns in Witherbone City. It also seemed as though they had some sort of agreement with the City Lord to prevent the House of Han from leaving the city.

    ¡°I can¡¯t believe that we escaped from one danger just to walk into another one. The House of Kiaran is not just cing us on house arrest, they are torturing us!¡± said Phoebe angrily.

    ¡°There¡¯s nothing we can do but to swallow this. Witherbone City is much stronger than the City of Shadows. There are divine guards stationed all around the Kiaran Residence at all times. It is impossible for us to force our way out the City,¡± said Stratholme after he let out a sigh. He thought that they were out of danger after stepping into the Death Dominion, but they onlynded themselves in greater danger.

    ¡°They want Bryan¡¯s medicine forms and our training methods. These are the cornerstones of our House of Han. We would have no ce on Elysium without them. I will not reveal a thing to them. I will carry them to my grave if I have to!¡± said Phoebe resolutely.

    After having stayed in the residence for so long, it was obvious to Phoebe what the House of Kiaran wanted.

 Chapter 893 - Buy time

    GDK 893: Buy time

    ***Witherbone City, the City Lord¡¯s Mansion.

    Hill, the City Lord, Sha-t¡¯o, the patriarch of the House of Kiaran, and the patriarchs of all major family ns in the city gathered in the Mansion.

    Hill sat on his throne made of white bones positioned higher than every other seat in the chamber. His brows were bunched in annoyance as he asked, ¡°Haven¡¯t you made any progress?¡±

    As the City Lord of Witherbone City, Hill cultivated in the energy of death and possessedte-stage highgod strength. A few hundred years earlier, the Death Overgod bestowed upon him a Divine Brand. Thanks to the brand left in his soul, Hill was likely going to make a breakthrough in a short time and reach the realm of overgod.

    Although he would never have the Quintessence that the Death Overgod possessed, reaching the overgod realm was still an incredible feat. There were no more than tens of overgod beings in all of Elysium. Hill had been assiduously cultivating and worked very hard to manage the Witherbone City for the Death Overgod just for a chance to earn the Divine Brand which would increase his chances of advancing to the realm of overgod.

    Hill was ambitious and greedy. The moment he heard about the miracles of the House of Han¡¯s medicines and the amazing team-coordination of their divine guards from Sha-t¡¯o, he was tempted. Just like Hill, Sha-t¡¯o was no benevolent character. The two came to an agreement in no time and their scheme was set in motion the moment the House of Han stepped into the Death Dominion.

    Sha-t¡¯o and Hill¡¯s divine guards were incredibly courteous and cordial when they escorted the House of Han to Witherbone City. But as soon as they stepped into the Kiaran Residence, Sha-t¡¯o started trying to get those secrets from the House of Han. And when he discovered that the Han Family wouldn¡¯t divulge a word, he immediately instructed divine guards to be stationed all around the Kiaran Residence, preventing them from leaving the city.

    Sha-t¡¯o shook his head as though he was out of moves. He replied, ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter what I offer. They are unwilling to sell that information. No matter the medicine forms or their training method, they won¡¯t divulge a thing.¡±

    ¡°The House of Han no longer has any footing in the City of Shadows. Although their Celestial Pearl Pharmacy has branches in many cities, they do not possess the power to protect their assets. And that Bryan, nobody knows if he is even still alive. The fuck are they being so stubborn for? They think that they still have a way out of this?¡± said Banfather disdainfully. He was a patriarch of one of the major family ns in Witherbone City.

    ¡°I have no idea what the hell they are clinging onto!¡± Sha-t¡¯o put on a sorrowful face and said, ¡°We haven¡¯t been subtle in our actions and it should be obvious to them what we are after. They should also know that we will not let them off if we don¡¯t get what we want. Why wouldn¡¯t they just yield?¡±

    ¡°Those family ns that have business rtions with the House of Han keep sending representatives over, iming that they wish to talk business with the House of Han. But the real reason they are here should be the same as ours.¡± Hill bunched his brows and instructed Sha-t¡¯o, ¡°Speed up the process. We won¡¯t be able to hide the fact for much longer. Those family ns won¡¯t be easy to deal with. They mighte to visit Witherbone City in person. It will be troublesome if they find out what we are doing.¡±

    ¡°Give me another month. If the House of Han remains so stubborn after one month, then I¡¯ll stop being so polite with them.¡± Sha-t¡¯o also knew that he could not drag the matter for too long. He had to extract the information he wanted as soon as possible lest all the thoughts and efforts they had put in be for naught.

    ¡°Yes, get it out of them as soon as possible.¡± Hill wore a cold smile as he said, ¡°If they still don¡¯tply with our demands by then, we will kill them all! We are cultivators of the energy of death. We have a greater understanding of the soul than the average person. If we can¡¯t get it from their mouths, we will extract those secrets from their souls!¡±

    ¡°That should only be done as thest resort. If we do that and it is leaked to the public, those family ns might form an alliance to crusade against us. And needless to say, our reputations and interests will be greatly affected. If it is still possible, we should make the House of Han voluntarily share those secrets with us,¡± said Banfather.

    Sha-t¡¯o nodded and replied, ¡°I will try all the softer measures first. But if those don¡¯t work, then I will use the hard one!¡± Sha-t¡¯o wore a chilling face as he said, ¡°Those two great secrets of the House of Han are worth the risk!¡±

    ¡°Alright, then it is decided. You will have another month. After that, if you don¡¯t kill them, I will send my men to finish them. By hook or by crook, those two secrets will belong to our Witherbone City!¡± Hill then gestured and said, ¡°That¡¯s all for today. You are all dismissed. Sha-t¡¯o, pump up the pressure.¡±

    Sha-t¡¯o got up from his seat, bowed at the City Lord, and returned to his Kiaran Residence.

    *** Dagassi walked to the structure beside the stinking bone refinery. The Ancient Lizard King wore a helpless, miserable face and sighed as he walked. When he reached the structure, he did not know how to begin a conversation with those inside.

    Just like the members of the House of Han, Dagassi originated from Profound Continent. Needless to say, he was disturbed and saddened by how the Han Family was treated by the House of Kiaran. However, as Dagassi was just a tiny little divine guard, he had no influence on any matter at all. Sha-t¡¯o made Daggasi the mediator because he knew many members of the Han Family.

    Stratholme and Ayermike were acquainted with Dagassi back when they were still on Profound Continent. During their time in the Kiaran Residence, they had heard bad news innumerable from Dagassi. Although the two were angry at the House of Kiaran, they held no grudges against Dagassi.

    Stratholme forced a smile when he saw the despondent Dagassi. He faked augh and asked snidely, ¡°I suppose you have more news for us today?¡± Stratholme understood that Dagassi must be bringing bad news once more. He behaved that way so that Dagassi wouldn¡¯t be so miserable.

    ¡°Sigh... I really do not wish to see you here... at least not this way...¡± Dagassimented, ¡°Back in the City of Shadows, you guys and Bryan had treated me very well in the Han Residence. But now that you guys are in the Kiaran Residence, not only have I been unable to give you the same treatment, but I have to let you suffer such humiliation... Sigh... If I were stronger, perhaps they would listen to me...¡±

    ¡°It has nothing to do with you. Li Wei can be considered a little princess in the House of Kiaran. And yet, her words are ignored just the same. Sha-t¡¯o has been blinded by greed and he will not listen to anyone¡¯s advice. You have nothing to me yourself for.¡± After taking a short pause, Ayermike asked, ¡°So, what is it that you want to tell us?¡±

    ¡°Certain people deliberately allow me to overhear their conversation... Hill and my patriarch had a meeting today and he is giving my patriarch a deadline. If he still cannot get the information from you after a month, Hill will kill you and extract the information from your soul,¡± revealed Dagassi.

    ¡°We will fight them!¡± Gilbert angrily shouted, ¡°What a bunch of despicable twats! I have never met anyone more shameless than them! When we cooperated before to build a Celestial Pearl branch in Witherbone City, they treated us so cordially. And after making a shit ton of crystal coins from our Celestial Pearl, this is how they are treating us! They are even more disgusting than Wace!¡±

    ¡°If they won¡¯t let us live, then we will attack them!¡± said Sanguis with his eyes glowing red. During those months of staying in the Kiaran Residence, Sanguis had been bottling his anger and hatred. He was getting the impulse to recklessly destroy everything.

    Sanguis was also aware that once they struck, the House of Han would be dead. Although the House of Han guards were powerful, they were heavily outnumbered by the divine guards of Witherbone City.

    The House of Han was facing an even greater threat here in Witherbone City than before. In the City of Shadows, Wace would only get someone else to do his dirty work but not openly attack the House of Han himself because he was somewhat scared of Han Shuo, or more specifically, his connection with the Goddess of Destiny.

    But here in Witherbone City, Hill and Sha-t¡¯o did not consider the young Han Shuo as any threat. In their minds, Han Shuo was nothing more than a genius pharmacist. They were clueless about Han Shuo¡¯s association with the Goddess of Destiny¡¯s daughter. Therefore, they had no qualms about exterminating the House of Han.

    ¡°If we sneak up on them, we can kill at least a few hundred of the House of Kiaran¡¯s divine guards. But, of course, we will end up dead. We should start discussing how to kill as many of the Kiaran Family as possible. Even if we are to die, we shall make our death worthwhile,¡± said Bonds calmly.

    Bonds knew the situation they were in and that there was no hope of escaping from the Kiaran Residence. The way he saw it, causing the greatest damage to the House of Kiaran was the only thing they could do.

    ¡°No!¡± cried Emily. She exined, ¡°Bryan will definitely not want anything to happen to us. We cannot be so rash!¡±

    ¡°Then what should we do?¡± Gilbert grumbled, ¡°We have no way out and we are dead no matter what we do. The least we could do is make them suffer some losses!¡±

    ¡°Bonds, Sanguis, Gilbert, you three know Bryan¡¯s demonicbat formation the best. Produce a set of instructions of one of the formations,¡± instructed Emily reluctantly.

    ¡°Why? What¡¯s the point?!¡± Sanguis shouted, ¡°They will never let us off! Even if we give them everything, they will still lock us up here!¡±

    ¡°Dagassi, did you help us deliver the information?¡± Emily asked Dagassi without replying to Sanguis¡¯int.

    ¡°I have used up all of the one million ck crystal coins you handed me. If he is still alive, he will receive the information sooner orter.¡± Dagassi forced a smile and said, ¡°Hill and Sha-t¡¯o did not consider Bryan as a threat. They did not limit my activity at all.¡±

    Emily nodded and let out a short sigh of relief. She proposed to the party, ¡°Let¡¯s try to buy as much time as we can. I only hope that Bryan will find us before it¡¯s toote.¡±

 Chapter 894 - The City of Wraiths

    GDK 894: The City of Wraiths

    Han Shuo rushed towards the Death Dominion at his maximum speed. After entering the Skybreak Realm, it seemed as though his body no longer felt any effects of Elysium¡¯s gravity. He could travel more than a million miles per day. He was flying faster than what an average being could even imagine.

    That godhunter of Han Hao¡¯s took almost four months to reach the Fringe from the Death Dominion. But Han Shuo, by pushing himself to his limit, took just seven days to reach the Death Dominion.

    After seven days of marathoning at his top speed, Han Shuo had exhausted plenty of his energy. He decided to enter the nearest city ¨C the City of Wraiths. Other than to rest and recharge some of the energy consumed, he wanted to find out the House of Han¡¯s current situation.

    Han Shuo knew that the House of Han had traveled hundreds of thousands of miles from Fort Lasberg to seek refuge in the Death Dominion. The Ronson Canyon bordered the Death Dominion. If the House of Han escaped from the godhunters of the Ronson Canyon, they should be somewhere in the territory of the Death Dominion.

    Han Shuo did not know if his family n members managed to escape from Ronson Canyon but he held some hope. He knew that the first thing he had to do was to find out if they had stepped into the Death Dominion.

    Han Shuo took half a day to pass through the outer viges and towns. He was standing before the City of Wraiths¡¯ city gate by nightfall.

    As one of the six main cities of the Death Dominion, the City of Wraiths had its own distinguishing architectural style and characteristics. The most notable feature was the wraiths that filled the city.

    The City Lord of the City of Wraiths, Talbot, was a master at controlling wraiths. His hobby was to collect the souls of every living being and imprisoning them inside energy towers. He would twist those souls using a mysterious energy or seal them in the city wall directly. Although those wraiths were weak, they could monitor every corner of the city for him.

    Talbot the City Lord would very quickly be informed by his wraiths if there were any disturbances in his city. He would also be instantly notified if enemies tried to invade the city, allowing him to respond to the threats very quickly.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but bunch his brows disdainfully after sensing those weak lifeforms poorly concealed in the city wall and energy towers of the City of Wraiths.

    The wraiths may have seemed to be parallels of Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals. However, Han Shuo knew that even the strongest of these wraiths were nothingpared to his weakest demon general. They were just ¡®eyes¡¯ that Talbot ced in every corner of the City which could be easily detected by anyone.

    The offensive capability of a wraith was so minute that it couldn¡¯t even threaten a basegod. Even if Han Shuo were to stand still and allow thousands upon thousands of wraiths to swarm at him, he still wouldn¡¯t sustain the slightest injury.

    Those wraiths had near non-existent offensive capabilities, immobile as they were sealed inside walls, and most certainly could not continually evolve stronger. No matter the aspect, this life form was light years inferior to Han Shuo¡¯s demon generals. That was why Han Shuo scorned after sensing the life form attached to the walls.

    In every city, there were merchants who traded not goods but information. The City of Wraiths was no exception. Where there were consumers, there would be sellers.

    Read more chapter on

    .

    *** In the western region of the City of Wraiths.

    Many non-local gods stayed in this area. There were all kinds of goods for sale. And naturally, information was up for sale as well.

    An Information Brokerage Firm was a store that collected and sold information. With enough ck crystal coins, one could obtain nearly any information that one desired. Even if they did not have the information that one sought, one would need only pay a reasonable amount of ck crystal coins as deposit and the firm would send their investigators to obtain the information desired.

    Information Brokerage Firms were typically quiet and empty on usual days. But if something major happened in any of the Dominions, these Firms would be crowded with customers. Many of the major family ns who did not have reliable intelligenceworks in other Dominions would patronize such a Firm.

    Han Shuo entered one of the Information Brokerage Firms. Immediately, he saw an old woman with drooping eye bags sitting in a dark corner. Her eyes were closed but she was not asleep. With just one nce, Han Shuo determined that she was a mid-stage lowgod of death.

    Han Shuo surveyed the Brokerage Firm with his consciousness and discovered that no one was on the premises other than the old woman. After calming his mind, Han Shuo made a beeline for the old woman. He tossed out a sack containing ten thousand ck crystal coins on the wooden table before her. A loud clinking noise broke the silence.

    ¡°I want to know about the City of Shadows¡¯ House of Han. If you have information about their wellbeing, this bag of ck crystal coins is yours,¡± said Han Shuo. He was feeling somewhat nervous to find out the truth, afraid that they had all been killed in the Ronson Canyon.

    The sharp sound of crystal coins bumping against each other instantly roused the old woman who was resting in her seat. She opened her eerie green eyes like a hungry beast that scented its feast. Without saying a word, she ced a hand on the sack of ck crystal coins, grasping, feeling it with her greedy hand.

    She nodded, as though having confirmed that the ck crystal coins were not counterfeits. Then, she started sizing up Han Shuo with squinted eyes.

    The light in her eerie green eyes glowed brighter and brighter. She had a strange expression on her wrinkled face. She seemed puzzled, but at the same time, unperplexed. After staring at Han Shuo for a long, long while, she took a light breath and in a slow, deep voice, asked, ¡°Why would you be interested in the House of Han? Hehe... there are quite a lot who are interested in them recently...¡±

    Han Shuo was a little stunned. He replied in an annoyed manner, ¡°Cut the crap. I gave you my money, now give me my information.¡± Normally, an Information Broker would ask nothing about the buyer¡¯s identity and origins. It was taboo. In her line of work, the old woman¡¯s actions could be deemed unprofessional.

    ¡°Do you know how many variations there are in the Eight Destion and Torment Formation?¡± the old woman suddenly asked as she looked at Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo¡¯s face instantly jolted and his eyes opened wide. His right hand moved forward, clutched at the old woman¡¯s neck, and raised her to the air in one fell swoop. Han Shuo¡¯s face went dark and chilling as he shouted, ¡°WHO ARE YOU? HOW DID YOU KNOW ABOUT THIS?¡±

    Simultaneously, the wide-open doors and all the windows shut themselves in a loud ¡®bam!¡¯ A bizarre, obstructive energy instantly filled the Information Brokerage Firm, preventing those outside from knowing what was happening inside the building.

    The old woman¡¯s face quickly turned purple. She tried kicking and punching Han Shuo to free herself but that only made things worse for her as the Omen Invincible Body automatically rebutted. Soon, she had no strength left. Her green eyes started rolling up and it seemed as though she would die at any moment.

    Han Shuo then flung the old woman away. She was pressed against the wall by an invisible energy. Although she could breathe heavily, she could not move.

    ¡°Speak! How do you know about the Eight Destion and Torment Formation?!¡± asked Han Shuo who was standing five meters from the old woman. With one thought, a Demonic de glistening with chilling lights shot out from his right index finger. Han Shuo could not appear more threatening.

    The old woman heavily gasped and coughed for a while before she could speak. Looking at the murderous Han Shuo and knowing just how helpless she was, the old woman couldn¡¯t help herself but shrieked in panic, ¡°I have no idea what the Eight Torment Formations is! Someone came to our agency and gave us arge amount of ck crystal coins and asked us to ry some words!¡±

    ¡°Speak clearly or I will skin you alive!¡± threatened Han Shuo.

    ¡°Every Information Broker is instructed so: if anyonees asking about the City of Shadows¡¯ House of Han, we will ask the person if they know how many variations there are in the Eight Destion and Torment Formation. If the person could answer it correctly, we would give the person some information!¡± replied the terrified old woman hastily. ¡°There are many who asked about the House of Han¡¯s situation. I have asked all of them that question but none of them knew what it was. You are the only person who reacted so violently. It seems that you are the person we have been waiting for.¡±

    <i>Bam!</i> The energy that restrained her body abruptly vanished and she fell to the ground. Immediately, she knew that her life was no longer in danger.

    ¡°There are eighteen variations!¡± Han Shuo opened his palm and the old woman was pulled back to her seat. Han Shuo wore a dark face as he instructed, ¡°Speak, tell me everything I should know!¡±

    ¡°So it is you!¡± The old woman nodded as she massaged her neck that was nearly snapped. She forced a smile and said, ¡°Someone gave our agency arge sum of money, they want you to know the House of Han is currently at Witherbone City and they are in a bad situation. They ask that you look for them at the Kiaran Residence with haste.¡±

    ¡°Anything else?¡± Han Shuo inwardly heaved a sigh of relief after hearing that the House of Han was not exterminated in the Ronson Canyon. His face calmed and his voice grew less threatening.

    ¡°No, that is all. They want you to look for them at the Kiaran Residence in Witherbone City as soon as possible,¡± replied the old woman as she looked at Han Shuo. She pushed the sack of ck crystal coins towards Han Shuo and said, ¡°This information is free. You may take your crystal coins back.¡±

    ¡°I apologize for my actions. You can keep the crystal coins. Consider it aspensation,¡± said Han Shuo after forcing a smile. Han Shuo no longer felt so restless after knowing that the House of Han was fine. He immediately left the Firm and went in the direction of Witherbone City.

    ¡°Goddamnit! He almost killed me!¡± said the old woman after Han Shuo vanished. She put on a dark face and thought for a moment. Then, as though she had recalled something, she hastily went to a room in the back of the building and fiddled with a magical mirror that every Information Brokerage Firm was entrusted with.

    After punching a string of integers into the magical mirror, the impatient face of a young man gradually appeared on the smooth and t device. The young man took a nce at the old woman before he arrogantly asked, ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡±

    ¡°Young Master Portlem, I hear that you have been looking for Bryan of the House of Han. Are you still interested in his whereabouts?¡± asked the old woman humbly in a ttering smile.

    The House of Batchelder was one of the top family ns in the City of Wraiths. Portlem, as a young master of the house, was famous in the city for having reached highgodhood at his young age.

    After having been injured by Han Shuo, Portlem thought of revenge every minute of his life. But unfortunately for Portlem, Han Shuo had always stayed in the Darkness Dominion¡¯s City of Shadows, out of Portlem¡¯s reach.

    And after news got out that Han Shuo had left the City of Shadows, Portlem had contacted his local Information Brokerage Firms, asking for Han Shuo¡¯s whereabouts. However, after leaving the City of Shadows, Han Shuo had avoided popted areas and remained rather stealthy. Therefore, the firms were unable to get Han Shuo¡¯s precise location.

    Back then, this old woman had reported to Portlem when Han Shuo was sighted in Ethereal City. However, as Ethereal City was just too far from the City of Wraiths, Portlem had no choice but to further postpone his quest for vengeance. And after Han Shuo stepped into the Fringe, these Information Brokerage Firms lost track of Han Shuo as their intelligencework did not cover the Fringe.

    Although it had been many years, Portlem¡¯s hatred for Han Shuo did not subside with time. He was still interested in Han Shuo¡¯s whereabouts and he hastily asked, ¡°Where was that guyst seen? If he is not too far from the City of Wraiths, I will make him pay the price for injuring me, the mighty Portlem!¡±

    ¡°Not far, not far at all!¡± The old woman smiled and said, ¡°He just left from my ce and he should still be inside the city. Hehe, your Batchelder Residence is near the city gate he will leave from. If you get ready right now, you should be able to intercept him before he leaves the city!¡±

    Portlet cackled sinisterly. Through the magical mirror, he replied, ¡°If your information proves reliable, I will pay you a hundred thousand ck crystal coins. Alright, I will get ready right away!¡± Portlem disconnected the call upon finishing those words.

    Portlem¡¯s image faded and the magical mirror gradually returned to normal. The old woman let out an evilugh and said to herself, ¡°Youngster, I have told you the information that you should know, as I¡¯m obliged to. As for revealing your whereabouts to Portlem, that¡¯s my business with Portlem. This is in line with my profession¡¯s rules of conduct!¡±

    ***Han Shuo¡¯s mind was finally rxed after knowing that his family n had not perished in the Ronson Canyon. For the time being, he did not know the humiliation and treatment his family n members received in Witherbone City. To him, all that mattered was that they were still alive.

    Although Han Shuo was at ease, he did not slow down his pace. Soon after entering the City of Wraiths, he nned to leave the city through another city gate.

    Han Shuo dared not fly at his shockingly great top speed inside the City of Wraiths. There were wraiths in every inch of the city and countless divine guards patrolling. If Han Shuo was to recklessly zoom across the streets at his insane speed, he could invite unwanted attention, especially from the patrolling divine guards.

    Therefore, Han Shuo had only been flying at a speed slightly greater than the crowd as he approached the city gate in the direction of Witherbone City. When he almost arrived at the gate, his consciousness suddenly detected that for some reason, many experts and divine guards were gathering in that region.

    Han Shuo did not release demon generals to probe ahead. He thought that no matter what was happening there, it shouldn¡¯t have anything to do with him. As the city gate was the closest to Witherbone City, Han Shuo did not change his course. He reached the city gate after ten minutes.

    The great city wall entered his sight. He sawrge groups of divine guards carrying a unique emblem of a family n. And barring the city gate was a young, arrogant-looking man. To Han Shuo¡¯s surprise, it was Portlem!

    Upon seeing the expressions on those divine guards and that there were two highgods from the House of Batchelder, Han Shuo took no time to realize that he was their target. And without thinking, Han Shuo figured out that it must be that old woman from that Information Brokerage Firm who had revealed his whereabouts.

    While inside the Firm, Han Shuo had shut every door and window and even released an energy that obstructed prying ears. Even Talbot the City Lord who had wraiths all around the city wouldn¡¯t be able to find out what happened in the Firm.

    Moreover, Talbot should not know of Han Shuo¡¯s identity or that he had grudges with Portlem. That old woman must have made out his identity from his reaction and the question he asked.

    <i>Duh, if I had known earlier, I would have finished that bitch...</i> thought Han Shuo a little regretfully. However, he did not evade Portlem but continued flying towards the city gate.

    Given Han Shuo¡¯s current strength, no expert in the City of Wraiths had the power to stop him. That feeble little Portlem would pose Han Shuo as much obstruction as a piece of paper. Even if Talbot and the patriarch of the Batchelder family were there, Han Shuo was confident that he could ughter them without much trouble.

    ¡°Hey, Bryan, long time no see! I heard that your House of Han got kicked out of the City of Shadows? Back then, I couldn¡¯t touch you because Wace was there to protect you. But what a surprise ¨C you would step into the City of Wraiths, to your doom! Too tired of living, I suppose?¡± Portlem had been waiting for this moment for decades. He remembered being chased around by Han Shuo in the Celestial Pearl¡¯s banquet hall. If Charlotte had not stepped in, he might have died to Han Shuo in the City of Shadows.

    Han Shuo was in a hurry and had no time to prattle with Portlem. He impatiently shouted, ¡°Portlem, to be honest, I have forgotten about you long ago. But since you insist on seeking death, death you will get!¡±

 Chapter 895 - Leaving the City of Wraiths

    Chapter 895: Leaving the City of Wraiths

    ¡°Hahaha.... ¡° Portlemughed out loud, obviously not taking Han Shuo¡¯s threat seriously. ¡°You seem to have forgotten that you are in the City of Wraiths, my territory. No one is going to step up for you!¡± said Portlem arrogantly.

    The House of Batchelder was very influential in the City of Wraiths and Portlem was the favored young master in the House. Given that the House of Han had recently lost their footing in the City of Shadows, Portlem thought that he was invincible. He knew that no one would make a sound if he murdered Han Shuo right there.

    ¡°Young Master, let us handle this brassy guy!¡± said one of the highgods standing beside Portlem after he took a step forward. He cultivated the energy of earth and possessed early-stage highgod strength. He had a Herculean physique and appeared strong.

    ¡°Young Master, we can take care of him for you. He wouldn¡¯t be able to escape!¡± said another highgod who cultivated the energy of wind. The two highgods stood readily on both sides of Portlem. They were ready to charge at Han Shuo at Portlem¡¯smand.

    As the most promising young blood of the House of Batchelder, Portlem had a bright future ahead of him. Some of those House of Batchelder highgods had long been treating Portlem as their future patriarch. They would seize every opportunity to win Portlem¡¯s favor.

    Han Shuo was betweenughter and tears when he saw there were just two early-stage highgods approaching him.

    At the time Han Shuo dealt a blow on Portlem, they indeed possessed simr strengths. But now, after so many years had passed, Han Shuo¡¯s strength had soared to the point that he could defeat overgod existences without too much trouble. Two early-stage highgods were no threat at all.

    ¡°Portlem, O, Portlem... It seems that you have stayed inside the Death Dominion for too long... So much so that you have lost touch with reality... ¡° said Han Shuo with a ridiculing smile. Han Shuo had fought Ralph and Aobashi in the City of Shadows and defeated them. Han Shuo thought that Portlem probably had not been paying too much attention to news about him. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have brought just two highgods.

    But Han Shuo was wrong. Portlem had heard of that news from the City of Shadows, he just didn¡¯t believe them.

    ¡°Hehe, you are talking about defeating Aobashi, right? Bryan, only those who have never fought you would believe that you could defeat Aobashi! I have left the City of Shadows for just a few decades. Your strength couldn¡¯t have improved so rapidly. Haha, I know that you and Wace had been ying an act so that you can take the position as the Chief of Fifth Corps. You think I couldn¡¯t figure out something as in as that?¡± Obviously, Portlem did not believe these so-called ¡®news¡¯ originating in the City of Shadows.

    It wasn¡¯tpletely unreasonable for Portlem to think so. On Elysium, even the most talented expert would need a few hundred years to reach mid-stage highgodhood from early-stage highgodhood. He thought that Wace and Han Shuo had conspired and faked that news.

    Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help himself butughed while shaking his head. Then, without saying another word, he started walking towards the city gate calmly. Han Shuo had not batted the two threatening highgods an eye. He acted as though they weren¡¯t even there.

    The arrogant and cocky attitude of Han Shuo had infuriated the two early-stage highgods. They did not wait for Portlem to give themand but simultaneously charged at Han Shuo with great rapport. It took them just an instant to deploy their domains of divinity, gather the elements of earth and wind, andunch their attacks.

    They thrust an earth spear and a wind scimitar filled with the divine energies of earth and wind towards Han Shuo¡¯s chest.

    <i>ng!</i>

    When the earth spear and wind scimitar made contact with Han Shuo¡¯s chest, they did not melt through his flesh and bones like the two expected. Instead, it seemed as though their divine weapons had struck on extremely hard rock. Loud metallic ngs were heard and they were stopped.

    In the next instance, two bursts of violent power flowed through the divine weapons, shattering it before entering the two highgods. The violent counter-attacking power had caught them off guard. They had been stunned and were sent flying backward.

    Then, with a quick gesture, an invisible energy was injected into the shattered pieces of earth spear and wind scimitar. The broken pieces of weapons seemed as though they had be alive. They shot towards the two highgods at an even greater speed.

    <i>Shhh-uckkk!</i>

    All of the shards entered the bodies of the two highgods. However, they did not immediately die and not a drop of blood had left their body.

    Those shards, maneuvered by an incorporeal energy, were as though hundreds of small scissors, making crunching noises from within their bodies. It was as though the two highgods were being blended from the inside. They shrieked and cried with absolute horror and misery.

    <i>St!</i>

    Finally, they exploded. Their minced internal organs sttered all around and loud, wild shrieks suddenly turned into silence.

    Then, Han Shuo exhaled a puff of grey air. The greyish ball of air hovered to their skulls and gently brought their divine souls to Han Shuo.

    After advancing to the Skybreak Realm, Han Shuo had be profoundly masterful in the maniption of energy, so much so that he could even perform surgical operations to the cellr level using demonic yuan. Manipting soul energy could not be easier for Han Shuo.

    In just moments, two highgods filled with energy were transformed into puddles of blood in the most horrifying and agonizing way possible. Their shrieks of helplessness and misery continued to echo in the ears of the remaining House of Batchelder divine guards.

    Suddenly, a divine guard on the city gate took a step backward and announced, ¡°This is a quarrel between the two of you. We have nothing to do with it!¡± Then, he immediately turned to his subordinates and instructed, ¡°Open the gates!¡±

    The divine guard worked for Talbot the City Lord. As he was not aware of Han Shuo¡¯s strength, he epted Portlem¡¯s request to seal the city gate to prevent Han Shuo from escaping. But after seeing just how easily Han Shuo ughtered two highgods, he immediately realized just how foolish he had been. He immediately switched sides to avoid conflict with Han Shuo.

    But Han Shuo did not even pay any attention to the divine guard. He was just too insignificant to him.

    Han Shuo put on a faintly mocking smile as he looked at the bbergasted Portlem. He shook his head and sighed, ¡°Huhu, how pitiful of you, Portlem. You¡¯d rather believe in a conspiracy and make such a feeble attempt to kill me. Pathetic.¡±

    Portlem had been totally stupefied. He saw two mighty highgod experts ughtered by Han Shuo just like that. There wasn¡¯t even an actual fight. From start to finish, Han Shuo seemed as though he had barely exerted any strength, as though killing two highgods was as easy as killing two ants. It was evident to Portlem that Han Shuo¡¯s strength was more than a level greater than those highgods. Perhaps only ate-stage highgod expert like his father could do so without breaking a sweat.

    ¡°So.. it wasn¡¯t a hoax... ¡° muttered the ashen Portlem. This so-called ¡®prodigy¡¯ of the House of Batchelder suddenly realized just how insignificant he waspared to Han Shuo.

    ¡°You know, sometimes in life, you just gotta ept your fate!¡± The smiling Han Shuo walked to Portlem rxedly and whacked him with his bare palm.

    A tremendous force as though a mountain with the density of a neutron star crushed on Portlem. His neck, spine, and legs went bent to unnatural forms before his body exploded with a bang.

    Han Shuo had never been merciful to his enemies. Portlem had sealed his destiny ever since he tried toy his finger on Phoebe, Emily, and the others. Even if Portlem had not shown up on that day, Han Shuo would have sent someone to get rid of him when Portlem came back to his mind.

    Han Shuo understood that if a character like Portlem was to be spared his life, it will only be a matter of time before they harm the House of Han. Although Han Shuo was not afraid of being attacked himself, he did not want any possibility of his family n membersing under threat.

    After collecting Portlem¡¯s divine soul, Han Shuo scanned those House of Batchelder divine guards with his eyes and calmly said, ¡°You should all know who I am. Hehe, tell your patriarch that I¡¯m going to Witherbone City. He can find me there if he wants revenge!¡±

    Those House of Batchelder divine guards immediately pulled a distance from Han Shuo, as though afraid that Han Shuo might kill them.

    The city gate ahead of Han Shuo was being hastily opened by the divine guards in charge. They tactfully cleared the path and watched as Han Shuo walked out of the city swaggeringly.

 Chapter 896 - Composure

    <h4>Chapter 896: Composure</h4>

    ***In Witherbone City, the Kiaran Residence.

    Inside a grandiose andvishly decorated meeting room, the patriarch of the House of Kiaran was wearing a faint smile as he read a scroll handed to him by Emily.

    Standing beside Emily was Bonds and Stratholme. Others, especially Sanguis, Bonds, and Phoebe who tended to be impulsive, were not allowed to join the meeting lest they bring cmity to the House of Han.

    On that day, Emily handed the scroll describing one of the demonicbat formations that Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert had documented to Sha-t¡¯o.

    After hearing those words ryed by Dagassi, Emily and the others knew that if they continued to keep their lips tightly shut, Sha-t¡¯o and those treacherous leaders of Witherbone City might run out of patience and exterminate their family n, extracting the secrets they wanted from their souls.

    Hoping to stay alive for as long as possible, Emily agreed to their demand but handed them just one of the demonicbat formation training methods.

    After having waited for so long and pressuring the House of Han with all kinds of methods, Sha-t¡¯o finally got the scroll he wanted. Needless to say, he felt pretty delighted.

    However, as Sha-t¡¯o carefully read the scroll, that smile on his face gradually turned dark. And when he finished it, he angrily flung the scroll. <i>Pa!</i> It was propelled by a forceful energy and pped loudly on Bonds¡¯ cheek.

    ¡°You trying to make a fool out of me with these stupid scribblings? How in the world can they be better at teambat just by dancing around in those nonsensical steps? Ridiculous!¡± Sha-t¡¯o wore a dark face as he red at the three members of the House of Han. He took a deep breath and coldly groaned, ¡°My House of Kiaran has demonstrated our good faith. Not only are we housing your Han Family in our Residence, but we are also giving you millions of ck crystal coins. But all we get in return is this bullshit?¡±

    It was obvious that Sha-t¡¯o had deliberately pped Bonds with the scroll to humiliate Bonds and the House of Han.

    Sha-t¡¯o was annoyed at Bonds from the moment they met, especially by the faint killing intent Bonds released. Unlike Emily and Stratholme, Bonds was not respectful to Sha-t¡¯o but was rather rude and indifferent. All he could do in his rage was try to get a reaction out of Bonds.

    Any ordinary person who had been insulted by Sha-t¡¯o in that manner would most likely have lost theirposure and started an all-out brawl.

    But Bonds did not react as Sha-t¡¯o had expected. In fact, he did not react at all!

    There wasn¡¯t a trace of anger, sadness, or humiliation on his face. He stayed calm and indifferent as though Sha-t¡¯o had not pped him. He was like a monk who felt absolutely nothing.

    Bonds reached for the scroll, then, in a calm, indifferent voice, he exined, ¡°The set of steps and positions recorded on this scroll is genuine. It is the method we use for training our House of Han guards. To prove that this is not a fake, you can simply ask three of your House of Kiaran guards to practice the technique and test them against three others.¡±

    Emily and Stratholme inwardly let out a sigh of relief. They knew that Bonds was a monster who could be even more savage than Sanguis and Gilbert when he was killing. They were really afraid that after being insulted by Sha-t¡¯o, Bonds might lose hisposure and go all-out against Sha-t¡¯o.

    They also knew that perhaps it was Sha-to¡¯s intention ¨C to provoke Bonds into attacking him and end up dead.

    Inside the meeting room, other than Sha-t¡¯o the Kiaran Family patriarch, there were also five highgods of the Kiaran Family. They stood in a row and were all staring at Bonds, ready to kill the instant he snapped.

    Sha-t¡¯o appeared as though he did not expect Bonds could keep hisposure so well. He hesitated for a moment before he beckoned and impatiently said, ¡°You three are dismissed. Leave the scroll here. I will put the technique to the test with a few of my divine guards. If I find out that they have no effect on teambat strength, you guys are gonna get it!¡±

    Stratholme and Emily exchanged nces, respectfully said goodbye to Sha-t¡¯o, and left the meeting room with Bonds.

    ¡°My Patriarch, the self-restraint possessed by that fe is truly frightening! I have been carefully observing ¨C he showed not even the slightest anger from start to finish. A person who possesses such great control over their own emotions will eventually be a formidable character. He will be a tremendous threat to us!¡± remarked one of the highgods after those of the Han Family left.

    ¡°A character like him who can remain so calm to such an insult is either a fool or a most formidable enemy. Patriarch, he must not be allowed to live!¡± advised another highgod.

    Those highgods of the Kiaran Family felt greatly threatened by Bonds. They were not afraid of Bonds¡¯ current strength but were afraid of the patience he demonstrated as they themselves were unable to remain so calm and indifferent to such humiliation and insult. They felt that allowing Bonds to live would be no different from sleeping in a bed with a viper underneath it.

    Sha-t¡¯o was no fool and he too could tell how much of a threat Bonds could be. He growled, ¡°Of course I know that. But he stayedposed no matter what I threw at him. I need no excuse to kill him now! We need to check if the scroll they gave us is actually useful. But in any case, they are firmly trapped in our Kiaran Residence. We will just kill them after they give us all their secrets!¡±

    ¡°Patriarch, why bother asking them for the secrets? Isn¡¯t it easier to just kill them all and extract the memories from their souls?¡± asked one of the puzzled highgods.

    Sha-t¡¯o exined, ¡°It¡¯s easier said than done. Memory extraction not only consumes a great amount of the reader¡¯s divine energy, but there is also no guarantee that the victim¡¯s memories will be fully extracted. The reader will also have to act quickly as the moment that a person dies, his memories will start dissipating with his soul. The reader could end up getting just random pieces of information that can¡¯t be used. After all, the soul is the mostplex and mysterious thing in the world. No one has evere close to fully understanding it.¡±

    Then, Sha-t¡¯o gestured and instructed, ¡°Take the scroll, get a few of the guards to practice the technique. I want to know the results as soon as possible.¡±

    ¡°Understood, Patriarch!¡± the highgods replied in one voice, bowed, and left.

    *** Stratholme, Emily, and Bonds returned to their temporary residence beside the Bone Refinery. Stratholme and Emily heaved a sigh of relief as they looked at Bonds. Emily remarked, ¡°You handled it really well, Bonds. I¡¯m proud of you.¡±

    ¡°I think Sha-t¡¯o did it on purpose. He wanted to provoke you into attacking him. For a moment, I was so worried that you would fall into his trap,¡± said Stratholme with admiration. But soon, he put on an angry face and remarked, ¡°If we have the chance, we will skin Sha-t¡¯o alive!¡±

    ¡°What happened?¡± asked Sanguis and Gilbert simultaneously. Among the Han Family, Sanguis and Gilbert were the closest to Bonds. They could tell from Emily and Stratholme¡¯s reactions that something must have happened to Bonds. ¡°Old guy, what happened?¡±

    ¡°Sha-t¡¯o was...¡± Stratholme recounted what took ce in the meeting room with a cold face.

    After hearing the recount, without saying a word, Sanguis started marching out the building angrily. It appeared that he was going to draw blood!

    Gilbert roared and shouted as though he had gone mad, ¡°Outrageous, outrageous! I¡¯ve had enough of those fuckers! I¡¯ll kill them all!¡±

    ¡°The two of you, get back here!¡± Stratholme, Emily, Ayermike, and the others hastily shouted. They knew that if Sanguis and Gilbert walked out of the building and started killing those of the House of Kiaran, a war would erupt and the House of Han might all perish with them in the Kiaran Residence.

    ¡°You can continue to cower, but I won¡¯t do that any longer! I decide what I do with my life!¡± shouted Gilbert angrily as though it was him who had been insulted instead of Bonds.

    Gilbert and Sanguis possessed outstanding strengths. Stratholme, Phoebe, and the others were unable to stop them from leaving. They were rmed after seeing that the two wouldn¡¯t listen to their advice and continued marching out the building to draw blood despite knowing that they would end up killing themselves.

    ¡°Get back here!¡± Bonds bunched his brows and coldlymanded, ¡°Senior Brother had said that the two of you must listen to my instructions while he is away!¡±

    Bonds felt some warmth in his cold heart. The three usually hung out together and frequently had friendly duels with each other. As time passed, they had gradually formed a very strong bond.

    ¡°But... but...¡± murmured Sanguis and Gilbert as they looked at Bonds.

    ¡°We will have our revenge!¡± Bonds looked at the two and calmly said, ¡°But not today! Now is not the time yet! Do not jeopardize the entire House of Han with your recklessness!¡±

    Sanguis and Gilbert stared at the icy Bonds. After a long while, they sighed and gave up on the idea.

 Chapter 897 - More formidable than we thought

    Chapter 897: More formidable than we thought

    Inside a gymnasium in the Kiaran Residence, three divine guards of the House of Kiaran were doing footwork practices in ordance with the scroll they received from the House of Han. The three nimbly moved all around the gymnasium in a tight formation but they do not bump into each other.

    Sha-t¡¯o was sitting on a throne made of bones as he observed the three guards. He summoned the highgod in charge of training the three to his side and asked, ¡°So, they have learned thebat formation?¡±

    ¡°I have been training them for the past three days in ordance with the footsteps and movements recorded on the scroll. Although they aren¡¯t the fastest learners and they have not fulfilled the requirement stated, we should see some effects by now.¡±

    Sha-t¡¯o nodded andmanded, ¡°Well then, let¡¯s find out if they would bring any effect.¡± He randomly pointed at three of his family n divine guards and sent them down to the battle arena.

    The selected three walked to the arena smilingly. They, along with many of the Kiaran Family thought that those three practicing thebat formation had been wasting time, that the training method provided by the House of Han would be useless.

    Those divine guards who practiced the House of Han¡¯s demonicbat formation and those who did not were allte-stage midgods. Both sides had identical individual strengths.

    ¡°Finally, we will get to see if the training method is actually useful. If it¡¯s not, the House of Han is gonna get it! Let the fight begin!¡± shouted Sha-t¡¯o after those divine guards were at ready positions.

    The divine guards were fighting in close-quarters. The three who had briefly practiced the demonicbat formation stood in a triangle with their backs facing inward. They would move around the arena as a unit without breaking from the formation. From above, they appeared as though a spinning triangle.

    Their opponents who were wearing jolly and rxed smiles spread out. They simultaneouslyunched their first attack at those divine guards constantly wandering around in a triangr formation.

    A miracle happened!

    Although the three had simultaneously attacked, two of the attacks missed their targets and only one of the wanderers. And immediately after, the three wanderersunched their counterattacks. They focused fire on one of their opponents and sted him. He was sent flying backward.

    As everyone in the arena was divine guards of the Kiaran Family and they were merely having a friendly match, they only attacked with a small portion of their power. The divine guard who sent flying backward immediately got back to his feet and quickly returned into the arena.

    He thought that it was just a lucky hit and he had taken it too lightly. He rejoined hisrades and they took a more cautious approach.

    The threeunched their attack for the second time. Yet again, two attacks missed and one of them got sted off!

    They went forward again and again, and the three attackers were sted out of the arena again and again. The three divine guards employing a demonicbat formation, however, had always stayed within the arena and were never taken down.

    In the beginning, those Kiaran Family spectators were all in a jolly mood. But gradually, they became silent and their expressions turned grave. All of them watched the battle with their full attention.

    Sha-t¡¯o who had been sittingzily was currently sitting with his back straightened and leaning slightly forward. His eyes opened wide and glistened with lights of excitement as he attentively watched his divine guards battle each other.

    After staring for a long while, he took a deep breath and instructed, ¡°Stop, that is enough.¡±

    Then, he turned to the high-ranking members of his House and asked, ¡°What do you think?¡±

    ¡°Miraculous! Absolutely miraculous!¡± One of them took a deep breath and his eyes were glowing with excitement as he eximed, ¡°The House of Han is indeed quite something. They have practiced the technique for just three days and yet, they could already unleash such formidable teambat power. Once they have mastered the technique, they would be even more powerful!¡±

    ¡°Patriarch, it seems that we must obtain every secret of the House of Han. If we seed, not just our House of Kiaran, but even the overall strength of our Witherbone City will increase by folds!¡±mented another senior member.

    Sha-t¡¯o nodded. In a determined face, he said, ¡°Indeed. We must acquire all their secrets by all means necessary, no matter the price!¡±

    *** ¡°One of our guards mysteriously disappeared yesterday night!¡± Stratholme wore a grave face as he said to Emily, ¡°On the very first day we were here, we instructed them to never leave thepound without ourmand. They will never disobey ourmands. Something¡¯s very wrong about this!¡±

    Emily knew that none of the House of Han guards dared disobey theirmands. From the day they entered the House of Han, they were trained to be loyal, to obey their masters¡¯mand to the letter. And given the current situation they found themselves in, it was even more improbable that any of those guards would leave without permission.

    ¡°Try to search all our activity areas and ask around for this person,¡± suggested Emily. She had a feeling that someone sinister happened to the guard.

    ¡°I have searched everywhere beforeing to see you. I¡¯m certain that he is not here.¡± Stratholme hesitated for a moment before he said, ¡°Could it be... ?¡±

    Emily knew when Stratholme meant to say. They were inside the Kiaran Residence. The activity area of the Han Family was very limited. With it being impossible that a member of the House of Han would attack one of their own, this meant that the divine guard¡¯s disappearance was most likely of the House of Kiaran¡¯s doing.

    ¡°Cover it up for as long as possible.¡± Emily wore a grave face as she said, ¡°I do not want the House of Han guards to panic. But most importantly, I don¡¯t want Sanguis and Gilbert to do anything reckless. They have only started calming down about Bonds being pped. If they learn of this, all hell will break loose.¡±

    Given their current circumstances, Stratholme knew that their only option was to continue to silently endure it and do nothing. Being heavily outnumbered, any kind of struggle will only end badly for them.

    ¡°I understand... ¡° Stratholme¡¯s heart ached but he nodded and epted the difficult decision.

    ¡°Sigh... This is all my fault. We should have headed for the Space Dominion instead of the Death Dominion. Had we went there instead, none of these would have happened... ¡° remarked Emily after letting out a sigh.

    ¡°Don¡¯t me yourself, we all made that decision. At least we are still alive,¡± replied Stratholme. He let out a sigh and left with his head drooping.

    ***Under the Kiaran Residence, in an underground prison shrouded underyers of defensive barriers.

    In a prison cell sat a House of Han guard. There were bruises, wounds, and holes all over his body with some made to expose his bones. Some of his fingers and toes were missing, his chest had been badly charred and there were bizarre worms chirping as they happily munched on his rotting flesh. This House of Han guard had been tortured for an entire night and was barely recognizable. He had a numbed expression on his disfigured face and his weary eyes were staring into emptiness. There was not an ounce of energy left in him.

    <i>Click-dong!</i> The prison gate was unlocked and mmed open. Sha-t¡¯o walked down the stairs with his brows bunched. He nced at the dying House of Han guard with disgusted eyes before asking in an annoyed voice, ¡°I have given you one night. Have you gotten anything yet?¡±

    The eerie-looking torturer put on a helpless expression and shook his head. Putting on a bitter smile, he answered, ¡°Patriarch, I have seen many tough cases. However, this is the first time I have met someone who wouldn¡¯t budge to any kind of torture. I have used more than twenty different tools but he wouldn¡¯t say a word.¡±

    ¡°What a useless bunch of rubbish!¡± groaned Sha-t¡¯o coldly before he reprimanded in a deep voice, ¡°I had spent so many ck crystal coins every year on maintaining you but you can¡¯t even do your job right! Not only are you wasting my crystal coins and time, but I also have to spend my divine energy to finish the job myself! Absolute trash!¡±

    ¡°Bro- Brother-inw... I really have tried my best... Not only that he wouldn¡¯t say a word, he had bit his tongue off. There really is nothing more that I could do... ¡° When the torturer saw that Sha-t¡¯o was angered, he immediately changed the appetion from ¡®Patriarch¡¯ to ¡®Brother-inw¡¯. It seemed that they were rtives.

    ¡°He what?!¡± Sha-t¡¯o was shocked by what he had heard. It wasn¡¯t that Sha-t¡¯o had never seen someone do it before, but for a random, average guard to do such a savage thing to himself ¨C that was the first time he had seen it and it terrified him.

    The prisoner they abducted was just a very ordinary guard of the House of Han, possessing merely mid-stage midgod strength. He was pretty much a cannon fodder type of existence. And yet, this ordinary character was stauncher than even the toughest criminal god. If such a group of experts one day came to possess adequate strength, they would bepletely unstoppable!

    <i>It seems that I have to change my n. No matter if the House of Han hand over those secrets, they will have to die. I cannot allow such a formidable threat to exist.</i> thought Sha-t¡¯o inwardly. He impatiently gestured to the torturer to be dismissed. After everyone exited the cell and he was alone with the House of Han guard, Sha-t¡¯o went forward and pressed his hand on the dying guard.

    A hazy mist glowing with eerie green light enveloped the guard¡¯s skull. It rummaged through his mind and extracted memories from the depths of his divine soul.

    Momentster, Sha-t¡¯o withdrew. The House of Han guards had bled out from his seven orifices and no longer had any signs of life.

    Sha-t¡¯o walked out from the cell in a grave face. When he was in front of his highgods, he instructed, ¡°Tell the House of Han to hand over every training method of their demonicbat formations within three days. Three days are all they have.¡±

    ¡°Patriarch, did you obtain useful memories? What did you find out?¡± asked one of the highgods.

    ¡°The House of Han is more formidable than we thought!¡± eximed Sha-t¡¯o. From the memories of the guard, he learned that Han Shuo had killed Larikson¡¯s highgods on their way to Soaring Cloud Mountain Range, attacked Hushveil City, defeating City Lord Hofs, and other things. Sha-t¡¯o started getting worried.

    ¡°Understood!¡± replied the highgods immediately. Then quickly went to Dagassi and gave the House of Han the ultimatum.

    On that night, Han Shuo who had been speeding his entire journey finally entered the domain of Witherbone City. At his current speed, he would reach the City within half a day.

 Chapter 898 - Cornered

    <h4>GDK 898: Cornered</h4>

    Dagassi had ryed Sha-t¡¯o words clearly. The House of Han must surrender everyst bit of their secrets to the House of Kiaran within just three days. Otherwise, they will be exterminated.

    Emily, Phoebe, Stratholme, Bonds, Sanguis, Gilbert, and other core members of the Han Family gathered to discuss how to respond to the ultimatum. They were all wearing gloomy and grave faces.

    By now, it was obvious to Stratholme that the missing House of Han guard must have been abducted by the House of Kiaran. Otherwise, Sha-t¡¯o wouldn¡¯t have known about the existence of those remaining demonicbat formations.

    Emily and Stratholme exchanged nces. They both knew that it was no longer necessary to conceal the matter. Stratholme revealed to the party about the disappearance of one of their guards before he solemnly said, ¡°It seems that Sha-t¡¯o must have learned some secrets of our family n from the guard. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have suddenly demanded us to surrender all our secrets in just three days.¡±

    ¡°I have personally trained every one of our guards and I¡¯m absolutely confident that they wouldn¡¯t say a word,¡± remarked Bonds confidently after thinking for a moment.

    Before they were recruited into the House of Han, the guards had to pass thorough background checks and all sorts of personality tests. They would then be trained and tempered mentally and physically through various methods. These guards would ce the interests of the House of Han above their own lives.

    And as a matter of fact, the House of Han guard who was abducted spoke not a word despite having been tortured. He had even bit his tongue off. Such was the faithfulness of a House of Han guard.

    ¡°Sha-t¡¯o cultivates the energy of death. As ate-stage highgod, his mastery and understanding of the soul would be beyond our imagination.¡± Fanny who cultivated the energy of death, exined, ¡°I believe in the loyalty of our House of Han guards. But after a person dies, their memory and soul don¡¯t immediately vanish. Given Sha-to¡¯s strength, it wouldn¡¯t be too hard for him to extract some information from his soul.¡±

    The party immediately understood what must have happened after hearing Fanny¡¯s exnation.

    ¡°It seems that this is as much time as we could buy. If Sha-t¡¯o learned the secrets of our House of Han from the divine guard¡¯s soul, then he will never ever let us off. No matter what we do, our only way out is death,¡± said Emily after she sighed in despair. With things havinge to this, even the optimistic Emily saw no hope of survival.

    Bonds who still wore the same calmness and indifference on his face, in a firm, decisive voice, proposed, ¡°Then we shall wait no more. We will strike this very night and take as many kills as we can!¡±

    Bonds had been very calm all along. It was him who had been keeping Sanguis and Gilbert from doing anything rash. He had followed Emily and Startholme¡¯s strategy to buy as much time as they could. He even endured an insult from Sha-t¡¯o. But surprisingly, he was also the first in proposing a kamikaze attack.

    Sanguis and Gilbert who were prepared to do so a long time ago had ferocious lights bursting from their eyes. They seem strangely excited after hearing Bonds¡¯ words.

    Emily nodded firmly. In a resolute voice, she said, ¡°Tonight it is! We will give our lives to cause the greatest casualties to the House of Kiaran. The House of Han may be annihted, but we won¡¯t go down without a fight!¡° It seemed as though she would wee death with open arms.

    Emily looked at the faces of all those gathered before she suddenly smiled and said, ¡°But know that we will not die in vain! Bryan will avenge our deaths ¨C it will only be a matter of time. He will kill all those who have directly or indirectly participated in this!¡±

    ¡°Let us disperse and take a quick rest. We will assemble before dawn and we will strike as one,¡± said Bonds. As the instructor who had trained every House of Han guards, he was most capable of coordinating an assault, such as the one the House of Han was about to do.

    Those core members of the House of Han silently dispersed to take their possiblyst recharge. Bonds then immediately assembled the House of Han Captains, informing them about their uing n and strategy.

    *** While the House of Han was quietly getting prepared, Sha-t¡¯o, the patriarch of the Kiaran Family went to the City Lord of Witherbone City at his Mansion. He revealed the information he extracted from the soul of the House of Han guard to City Lord Hill.

    Hill was rather annoyed at first, thinking that it was not necessary for him to be briefed with every nitty-gritty detail. But after hearing that Han Shuo had killed many of Larikson¡¯s highgods and even forced Larikson and Felder to flee, his annoyance turned into shock. He put on a grave face and said to Sha-t¡¯o, ¡°Tell me everything you know about this guy in detail!¡±

    There had been many rumors about the City of Shadows¡¯ House of Han which had gotten their way to Sha-t¡¯o and Hill¡¯s ears. However, the two weren¡¯t people who would trust unverified news and they were unaware of many of Han Shuo¡¯s secrets. Therefore, Sha-t¡¯o and Hill had not taken Han Shuo as a potential threat from the beginning.

    They may not believe in rumors, but they had absolute confidence in the memories of that guard¡¯s soul. Sha-t¡¯o exined all the previously unknown secrets about Han Shuo to Hill. Both of them noticed the profound graveness in each other¡¯s eyes.

    Hill took a deep breath as he fiddled uneasily with his armrest made of bones. In a deep voice, he said, ¡°The House of Han must not be allowed to live. Not only must we make sure that they are all dead, but we also need to find a way to shift the me on someone else. Fucking hell, it turns out that the guy is more terrifying than the rumors about him. If hees to Witherbone City and finds out the truth, our City will surely be weakened!¡±

    ¡°I have handed the House of Han a three-day deadline and I will use this time to get things set-up. Those from the other Dominions are on their way here. As long as we carefully n everything out, it¡¯s possible to make a scapegoat of them,¡± Sha-t¡¯o revealed his treacherous n.

    ¡°Good, you have done well. When it is all over, you will be rewarded well!¡± said Hill dfully. He was pleased with Sha-to¡¯s performance so far.

    But suddenly, Hill bunched his brows. He turned to the divine guard who had just rushed into the room and in an annoyed voice, he asked, ¡°What are you so flustered about?¡±

    ¡°City Lord, the Kiaran Residence is on fire! They seem to be under attack!¡± replied the divine guard hastily.

    Sha-t¡¯o had put on a humble smile on his face after being praised by Hill. But after hearing the emergency report, his face froze for a moment before it instantly transformed into anger. He shouted, ¡°How dare, how dare they attack! I will tear everyst one of them into pieces!¡±

    Then, without even saying farewell to Hill, Sha-t¡¯o left and rushed for his Kiaran Residence.

    Hill knew that Sha-t¡¯o was anxious and therefore was not offended by hisck of manners. He too immediately got up from his white throne and followed behind Sha-t¡¯o.

    Those divine guards of Hill¡¯s inside his Mansion were not aware of the attack at Kiaran Residence. When they saw Sha-t¡¯o hastily dashing across the corridors with Hill following behind him, they thought that Sha-t¡¯o was escaping from Hill. Having misunderstood the situation, some of them aimed their divine weapons at Sha-t¡¯o, wanting to intercept him.

    ¡°Don¡¯t fire! Let him pass!¡± shouted Hill as soon as he saw his divine guards raising their weapons. His voice resounded through the entire mansion.

    *** At the same time, an extravagant outsider had just entered Witherbone City through one of its city gates.

    ¡°Hey! Stop righ-... Nevermind!¡±

    Han Shuo did not bother letting those divine guards check his divine tablet. He just whooshed through the checkpoint in a sh. Those divine guards manning the city gate were about to chase after Han Shuo but they suddenly saw therge amount of ck crystal coins scattered on the ground. They pretended they saw no intruder and hastily helped themselves.

    After entering Witherbone City, Han Shuo grabbed a random midgod on the street and shoved a sack of ck crystal coins into his hands. He hastily asked, ¡°Where is the Kiaran Residence?¡±

    The midgod was disgruntled that Han Shuo had pulled him out of the blue. He was about to start cursing when he felt something hard and heavy in his hands. When he lowered his head and looked, his face turned from frowning to beaming ear to ear. Immediately, he pointed in a direction and happily answered, ¡°Eastward all the way!¡±

    As soon as he finished those words, Han Shuo vanished as though he had just popped out of existence. If it wasn¡¯t for the sack of ck crystal coins in his hands, the midgod would have thought that he had been hallucinating because Han Shuo moved so fast that he didn¡¯t even catch him leaving.

    *** In the Kiaran Residence.

    Taking full advantage of the element of surprise, the House of Han managed to tten more than half of the structures in Residence in just a short time. Many of the Kiaran Family guards who were cultivating were killed before they could react.

    With many of the highgods and divine guards not ready and out of position, the House of Han had been unstoppable. They divided themselves into many small groups taking ring-shaped formations to destroy and kill everything and anything they saw. Those flurried and disarrayed House of Kiaran guards were ruthlessly ughtered.

    In less than fifteen minutes, a hundred or more of the House of Kiaran were butchered. Meanwhile, the House of Han guards had only suffered several injuries.

    However, the tide soon turned against them. After the great number of House of Kiaran highgods were assembled, when those divine guards of Hill¡¯s stationed around the Residence began their counterattacks, the House of Han was pushed back.

    As the City Lord¡¯s Mansion House was rtively nearby the Kiaran Residence, Sha-t¡¯o, the Kiaran Family patriarch, soon returned to his Residence. The City Lord of Witherbone City also had shown up after Sha-t¡¯o. Upon seeing the twote-stage highgods, every member of the House of Han understood that their end was nigh.

 Chapter 899 - The Demon Arrives

    <h4>Chapter 899: The Demon Arrives</h4>

    The moment that Hill and Sha-t¡¯o appeared, the House of Han¡¯s struggle was basically over.

    Both Hill and Sha-to possessedte-stage highgod strength. Other than the two, there were also five highgods of different stages of the Kiaran Family. In addition, the two divine guard Chiefs stationed outside the Kiaran Residence also possessed highgod strength. Thousands of divine guards were also rushing to the Residence from every part of the City. This great disadvantage that the House of Han was in cannot be negated merely withbat formations.

    Sha-t¡¯o was fuming when he returned to his Kiaran Residence and saw all the buildings that the House of Han had copsed and the bodies of those they killed. He was so angered that he wished to skin every member of the House of Han.

    Hill had arrived at the Kiaran Residence at the same time with Sha-t¡¯o. He too saw the tremendous losses suffered by the House of Kiaran and that the House of Han guards were gradually retreating and defending themselves in a bizarrebat formation. However, not only did Hill not feel sad for the Kiaran Family¡¯s losses, but he was secretly delighted.

    In Witherbone City, the House of Kiaran was the only family n that could pose a real threat to his position as the City Lord. But as Sha-t¡¯o had always been loyal and devoted to him, Hill couldn¡¯t find any excuse to diminish the House of Kiaran¡¯s strength. He could not be happier to see the Kiaran Residence be covered with fire and blood. It was also a proof of the great teambat strength of the House of Han.

    By now, the House of Han had beenpletely encircled by thousands of divine guards of Witherbone City. Hill was excited to think that the Witherbone City would soon obtain the secret forms to their miraculous medicines and their extremely deadly demonicbat formations.

    ¡°How dare you attack us! You are asking for death!¡± shouted Sha-t¡¯o. He was giving Bonds, Stratholme, Emily, and the others a death stare. It was as though he wanted to tear their flesh and devour them alive.

    ¡°We had enough of your intimidation and bullying!¡± Emily angrily replied, ¡°You will have us killed no matter what we do. If you won¡¯t let us live, the least we could do is make you bleed!¡±

    ¡°Well, very well then.¡± Sha-t¡¯o put on a ruthless face, gestured, andmanded, ¡°Kill them all! Show no mercy!¡±

    Arge number of divine guards and highgods had surrounded the House of Han. They temporarily ceased fire when Sha-t¡¯o and Hill arrived. But upon hearing Sha-to¡¯smand, they no longer hesitated and charged forward.

    Knowing that the House of Han¡¯s demonicbat formation was incredibly miraculous and deadly, Sha-t¡¯o was not counting on therge number of his Kiaran Family divine guards. Instead, he was relying on his high number of highgods. He instructed the highgods to take the brunt while his Kiaran Family divine guards would beunching ranged energy-projectiles from a safe distance.

    Five highgods under Sha-t¡¯o and two highgods under Hill surrounded the House of Han from seven directions. The thousands of Witherbone City divine guards aimed their divine weapons at the House of Han.

    The House of Han had no choice but to clump up and hold their ground. They knew that the Kiaran Residence must have been heavily surrounded by divine guards from all over the City. If they were to try to escape from the encirclement, they would be rather vulnerable and easily crushed by those Witherbone divine guards who had greatly outnumbered them. They thought that it was better to stay on their ground and kill those whoe to them, inflicting the maximum harm at the cost of their own lives.

    The House of Han understood that they had an advantage over their enemy in teambat strength. If they were to spread out, they would lose the only advantage they have. Not only would the House of Han hasten their doom, but they would also fail in causing significant harm to their enemies.

    Every member of the House of Han wore calm faces despite facing certain doom. They were ready to put up what would likely be their final fight.

    Seven highgods begin charging at them from seven directions. A dark, cloud-like canopy formed using the energy of death shrouded the Kiaran Residence while dazzling radiances burst from the remaining energy towers. The massive, ominous dark cloud slowly hovered to where those of the House of Han gathered.

    The seven highgods unfurled their domains of divinity. Various elemental energies in the environment were assembled to form bizarre energy streams. When the seven energy streams made by the seven highgods shot towards the House of Han, it set a chain of deadly events into motion.

    Thousands and thousands of colorful energy sts rose into the sky and whistled towards the House of Han. There were also bone spears thrown. They were the top quality products manufactured from renowned Bone Refineries using the highest quality of materials. Not only were they polished to a mirror-smooth finish, but they were also filled with a great amount of the aura of death.

    Every member of the House of Han wore calm faces. Despite having thousands of attacks swarming at them, not a single guard panicked and their breathing rate remained steady. They remain collected and organized as though those bright projectiles flying at them were just normal raindrops.

    Despite being enemies, those Witherbone divine guards were astonished by the fearless demeanor of the House of Han. City Lord Hill, who was experienced in training divine guards, was especially marveled. After seeing the valor disyed by the House of Han guards, Hill was filled with awe and he became even more determined to obtain their secret training method.

    The House of Han stayed motionless to the thousands of attacks flying towards them. But moments before those attacks wouldnd, theirbat formation suddenly transformed!

    The House of Han guards who were clumped up suddenly moved outward. They have originally spaced themselves just three steps from each other but had suddenly expanded to around ten steps apart.

    The instance that they assumed the newbat formation, the House of Han guards got into action with great rapport. Some of them would deploy all sorts of boundaries and defenses to resist the bombardment while the rest wouldunch counterattacks without paying any attention to those energy fluxes and divine weapons shooting at them.

    The instant that the House of Han assumed a new formation to defend themselves while counterattacking, those Witherbone divine guards could no longer stay calm. Some would deploy defenses while some would try to flee and evade frantically.

    The two armies bombarded each other with swarms of bone spears, divine weapons, and energy fluxes. Moments after they exchanged blows, it became obvious that the House of Han had the lower hand primarily because of their low count of top-notch experts.

    If there were just three highgods, Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert would be able to handle the attacks, albeit rather strenuously. However, they were facing seven highgods, with five of them being mid-stage highgods, with twote-stage highgods observing at the side. Due to the great differences in strength, the House of Han was no longer as unstoppable as they were before. One after another, the House of Han guards perished to the overwhelming energies shot at them.

    But despite that, it would be obvious to any observer that the teambat strength of the House of Han was much greater than that of the Witherbone divine guards. If it wasn¡¯t for the seven highgod experts, the House of Han might have a chance at crushing the thousands of Witherbone divine guards!

    Many of those Witherbone divine guards wailed and scuttled when they were attacked. Many were killed when they collided with theirrades who were also trying to evade an iing attack.

    Meanwhile, every guard of the House of Han remained cool and silent despite facing attacks that filled the sky. They worked together methodically. Those in charge of defenses would put all their energy on defending while those in charge of attacking would be fully focused on attacking.

    From start to finish, every guard of the House of Han had remained in their position. No one panicked despite seeing theirrades perish in the battle.

    ¡°Sha-t¡¯o, ask your men to be careful. Make sure that they do not kill their leaders yet!¡± said Hill. He was observing the House of Han with admiration and he felt great reverence towards the person who trained those guards.

    Hill knew that the moment a person dies, their soul will start vanishing and the memories contained within would disappear along with it. When a soul hadpletely dissipated into the environment, their memories would also bepletely gone. No amount of the divine energy of death could restore it.

    The reason Hill wanted to keep those core members of the Han Family alive was so that he could extract as much of their precious memories and secrets as possible.

    ¡°Understood,¡± replied Sha-t¡¯o as he nodded. After seeing the great losses his House of Kiaran suffered to the House of Han, he was consumed by rage and had nearly forgotten their main objective. But he came to his senses after being reminded by Hill.

    Sha-t¡¯o first took a deep breath before he roared at the sky. Then, having gathered the attention of his highgods, he made a hand gesture.

    As veterans of the House of Kiaran, those highgods immediately understood Sha-to¡¯s wordlessmand. They became much more selective in their bombardment. Most of the attacksnded on those non-important House of Han guards.

    It was those seven highgod experts who had caused the House of Han the greatest casualties. The seven would only attack and kill those guards on the outer perimeter but not harm those core Han Family members who were grouped together.

    The Han Family looked at each other and they saw the despair in each others¡¯ eyes. Stratholme and Emily were sharp-witted characters. They could instantly tell what their enemies were nning.

    Bonds took a nce at Stratholme and Emily and instantly read their thoughts. He shouted, ¡°Don¡¯t do anything stupid. With the three of us here, there is no need for suicide. They won¡¯t be able to extract any information from your souls even if you are thest one of us to fall.¡±

    Bonds could tell that Stratholme and Emily were nning to kill themselves so that their souls would have dissipated before Sha-t¡¯o and the others could extract anything from their memories.

    Emily softly sighed and mumbled to herself, ¡°Goodbye Bryan... I guess I will never see you again... ¡°

    It was at this moment that suddenly, as though Emily¡¯s prayer was heard, a world-shaking roar sounded from the horizon. A ferocious aura carrying the desire to annihte all things suddenly enveloped the whole Witherbone City!

 Chapter 900 - Overwhelming power

    GDK 900: Overwhelming power

    When the members of the House of Han heard the thunderous roar, cheerfulness suddenly blossomed on their despair faces as though they saw the light at the end of the tunnel.

    ¡°It¡¯s Master! It¡¯s our Master!¡± eximed Gilbert emotionally. Every member of the House of Han was hoping that Han Shuo would find them and save them from the peril although they knew that it was very improbable. But perhaps the Creator had heard their prayers, Han Shuo came to their rescue at thest possible moment.

    Not just Gilbert, but every member of the House of Han could immediately tell that it was Han Shuo. They could recognize Han Shuo¡¯s voice and his ruthless aura that have now shrouded the entire Witherbone City.

    ¡°Master has be even stronger!¡± eximed Sanguis excitedly after he closed his eyes and carefully sensed the apocalyptic aura rapidly moving towards them.

    ¡°Defend! We just need to hold on until Bryan arrives and we will have nothing to worry about!¡± shouted Emily. Her cheeks and neck were flushed out of excitement.

    To every member of the House of Han, Han Shuo, their patriarch, was an invincible existence. The House of Han guards who had been trained in the Eight Destion and Torment Formation were also familiar with Han Shuo¡¯s voice and aura.

    Every member of the House of Han who was prepared to fight to their death became very emotional. Some even couldn¡¯t help themselves but cheer out of excitement.

    Every expert in Witherbone City felt a sense of danger from the tremendous aura. Hill and Sha-t¡¯o, the two mightiest existences in Witherbone City, were dumbstruck as they stared at the direction that the aura originated.

    Not just Hill and Sha-t¡¯o, but even the divine guards of Hill and the House of Kiaran were so startled by the terrifying aura that they temporarily stopped attacking the House of Han. All of them turned to gaze at the menacing dark cloud rapidly approaching them.

    With that, the two sides temporarily ceased their battle and silently waited for the demon to arrive.

    Ferocious roars continued to sound from the distance, resonating and shaking the entire Witherbone City. Every god, no matter sleeping or cultivating, was roused by it. They put on appalled faces and looked towards a direction.

    Through the violent roars and aura, every person could deeply feel the wrath of the unparalleled existence. Most citizens of Witherbone City were unaware of what the House of Han had suffered in the past few months. Following the source of the sound, they curiously went in the direction of the Kiaran Residence, wanting to see what was happening in their city.

    ¡°Who? Who in the world is he?¡± Hill, the City Lord of Witherbone City, felt frightened when he discovered that even with all the divine guards around him, he would still be easily crushed by the approaching demon.

    ¡°No... No idea... ¡° replied Sha-t¡¯o who was also feeling flustered. Just like Hill, his attention was also fully taken by that frightening powerful aura and therefore did not notice the expressions on the faces of the Han Family.

    The environment was filled with a ruthless, savage, sister energy that thirsts for blood. The frightening aura containing seeming infinite power broadcasted omnidirectionally to cover the entire Witherbone City. It struck fear into the heart of every expert in the City.

    Although the City was flooded with an intense killing intent, the density differed at different spots. Hill and Sha-t¡¯o sensed that the pressure was focused on them, as though the approaching expert was targeting them!

    When the Hill and Sha-t¡¯o realized the fact, a shiver traveled down their spines. Somehow, they saw the scene of themselves murdered. They also understood from the terrifying pressure that they stood no chance against the powerful existence.

    As the person got closer, the ferocious roar gradually faded. However, Hill and Sha-t¡¯o did not feel more at ease as they continued to get the unsettling feeling that a monster had its eyes on them and they could be devoured at any moment. The two strongest experts in Witherbone City were panicking.

    Finally, a majestic figure materialized on the dark sky. Han Shuo wore a chilling face and his eyes glowing with sinister lights were sweeping across the Witherbone divine guards surrounding the House of Han.

    Given Han Shuo¡¯s outstanding strength, he was able to remotely sense the House of Han when within a certain range. He recognized the auras of those House of Han guards who he had put through the Eight Destion and Torment Formation. He realized that the House of Han guards were being ughtered when he noticed that those auras were disappearing.

    This was definitely not something Han Shuo wanted.

    With the intention of stopping his House of Han guards from getting killed before he reaches the Kiaran Residence, he unleashed his aura to the fullest and even boosted it with all his rage. He wanted to intimidate the Witherbone divine guards and make them ceasefire temporarily.

    Releasing his aura unrestrainedly had indeed worked as he anticipated. Intimidated by his terrifying energy, Hill and Sha-t¡¯o turned all their attention to Han Shuo and temporarily forgot about the House of Han. The Witherbone divine guards were also thrown into a daze and stopped attacking.

    ¡°Master!¡± ¡°Bryan!¡± ¡°Patriarch!¡± ¡°My Lord!¡±

    Han Shuo was greeted by his family members. When he arrived, Gilbert, Sanguis, and others cheered excitedly. Emily, Fanny, Lisa, and many others cried tears of joy.

    Moments ago, all of them had lost all hope. Every member of the House of Han knew that they stood no chance of survival against the entire Witherbone City.

    But momentster, when Han Shuo suddenly showed up, their hopes were rekindled. They realized that not only could they survive the cmity, but they could also have their revenge.

    Upon hearing the cheering from the Han Family, those Witherbone divine guards immediately realize who theer was.

    Hill and Sha-to¡¯s hearts sank. They suddenly found the weather to be exceptionally chilling and they were getting cold feet and goosebumps all over. Their terrified gazes gathered on Han Shuo and they simultaneously opened their mouths. However, as though something had stuck in their throats, not a sound came out.

    Hill and Sha-t¡¯o, as the strongest highgods present, could tell better than everyone else of just how formidable Han Shuo¡¯s strength was. They were terrified because they knew they stand absolutely no chance against Han Shuo.

    ¡°There... there¡¯s been a misunderstanding... ¡° stuttered Sha-t¡¯o in a forced smile. His body was slightly bowing. He seemed even more humble to Han Shuo than to Hill.

    Han Shuo swept his deadly eyes across Sha-t¡¯o before he turned to Emily, Stratholme, and the others and asked, ¡°What happened?¡±

    ¡°Certain people want the medicine form of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy and the secrets to training our guards. They gave us three days to hand over everything, failing which, we would all be killed. But I doubt that they would let us live even if we surrender those secrets,¡± answered Stratholme loudly in a smirk as he looked at Hill and Sha-t¡¯o.

    ¡°They have also abducted one of our House of Han guards and extracted his memories using the energy of death! And that Sha-t¡¯o had once insulted Bonds... ¡° Emily stepped forward and loudly reported the suffering they received.

    ¡°Master, that is not all. They forced us to live in that shitty building, right behind that stinking Bone Refinery. Our matriarchs had often been puking because of it! Fucking hell, they have made so much ck crystal coins with our Celestial Pearl¡¯s name but as soon as we entered their City, they put us in house arrest and demand all our secrets! Fucking outrageous!¡± Gilbert startedining and cursing at Hill and Sha-t¡¯o.

    As Han Shuo listened to Stratholme, Emily, Gilbert, and others¡¯ recount, his face turned darker and darker. Han Shuo had learned from the Information Broker that the House of Han was in a bad situation, but it turned out that the reality was far worse than he had imagined. If he had not been rushing to Witherbone City at his top speed, he would have been toote and his family n would have been annihted.

    ¡°Mis... Misunderstanding... It¡¯s a misunderstanding... ¡° Sha-t¡¯o keep on repeating the word. He felt the stifling air around him bing colder and colder.

 Chapter 901 - Flaying Alive

    GDK 901: ying Alive

    At this moment, Sha-t¡¯o could not be more regretful of what he did to the House of Han. Facing Han Shuo, an opponent that he had no chance of winning, other than trying to make up excuses and hope that Han Shuo would somehow believe that it was all a giant misunderstanding, there was nothing else that Sha-t¡¯o could do.

    Hill, the Witherbone City City Lord felt dryness in his mouth as he gulped down his saliva. His heart was beating at an unusually high rate ¨C something that had not happened to him for thousands of years. He knew from the involuntary reactions of his body that this fear came from the bottom of his heart. He was afraid that this demon from the House of Han would tten his Witherbone City and himself.

    Hill was previously informed by Sha-t¡¯o of Han Shuo¡¯s terrifying strength. Based on Sha-to¡¯s description, Hill guesstimated that Han Shuo should possesste-stage highgod strength. Hill thought that even if he could not defeat Han Shuo by himself, with Sha-to¡¯s assistance and perhaps other highgods in Witherbone City, they could take care of Han Shuo without expending too much energy.

    But never in a million years did he expect that Han Shuo had made yet another breakthrough. Having ascended to the Skybreak Realm, Han Shuo¡¯s strength was now far, far greater than that of ate-stage highgod.

    Even Ss and Wasir, Sovereigns who had ruled parts of the Fringe for countless years, were no match against Han Shuo. He could squish an expert the level of Sha-t¡¯o like an ant.

    ¡°A misunderstanding, you say?¡± Han Shuo had unexpectedly put on a smile. However, Hill and Sha-t¡¯o did not feel better after seeing the smile, it only made their hair stand on end.

    ¡°It really is just a misunderstanding. We genuinely want to work with the House of Han. We definitely did not have any other ideas!¡± Hill was rather nervous as he said in a shaky voice, ¡°Perhaps the House of Kiaran had beencking in certain aspects, but this is definitely not our Witherbone City¡¯s intention. We are sincere in cooperating with your family n. Even this battle was started by your House of Han. I came here only to resolve the dispute. I didn¡¯t mean anything by it!¡±

    Every Witherbone divine guard present could see the nervousness and humbleness shown by Hill. It was as though their City Lord had been turned into a respectful servant.

    ¡°That is correct. Not only have we rescued the House of Han from Larikson and Hofs, but we have also housed them in our Witherbone City and given them the most cordial hospitality. They have inexplicably killed so many of my family n guards but we came here only to find out what¡¯s going on. Everything is a misunderstanding!¡± added Sha-t¡¯o.

    With things havinge to this, Sha-t¡¯o and Hill understood that if they were to fight, as the leaders of the army surrounding the House of Han, they would be the first that Han Shuo kills. Sensing the overwhelming strength of Han Shuo¡¯s, the two highgods racked their brain toe up with something to avoid having to fight Han Shuo.

    ¡°Despicable!¡± shouted Emily furiously. She then said to Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan, don¡¯t listen to the nonsense spewed by these vicious and greedy bastards. They are here to exterminate the House of Han! If you had note in time, all of us would have been annihted!¡±

    ¡°Shifu, there is nothing to be argued. Let¡¯s kill them!¡± Sanguis bloodthirst eyes turned to Sha-t¡¯o before he pointed his broadsword glowing with blood-red radiance at him and said, ¡°He had insulted Bonds and every one of our House of Han. We shall y him alive!¡±

    ¡°As you wish,¡± replied Han Shuo.

    Then, with a movement of his hand, the dark cloud which he condensed from his killing intent suddenly fell towards the ground and wrapped Sha-t¡¯o straightforwardly. Han Shuo made another gesture and Sha-t¡¯o was sent flying. Hended in front of Sanguis, Gilbert, and Bonds.

    The dark cloud had turned into strands of smoke, bored into Sha-to¡¯s body like countless little worms, and restrained the divine energy in his body. Sha-t¡¯o noticed that his senses had been enhanced and were unable to make a budge.

    Hill and Sha-t¡¯o, these so-called experts, werepletely helpless against Han Shuo. He had immobilized Sha-t¡¯o without breaking a sweat.

    The paralyzed and toothless Sha-t¡¯o nowid helplessly between Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert. Bonds, who was once insulted and humiliated by Sha-t¡¯o, coldly withdrew a slender and long sword and stepped forward.

    Gilbert and Sanguis were going to participate in the killing but when they saw the cold look on Bonds¡¯ face as he approached Sha-t¡¯o, they put on sinister smirks and sat back to enjoy the show.

    Bonds was calmer than everyone. He could endure Sha-to¡¯s insult but it did not mean that Bonds hold no grudges. Among the Han Family, Bonds was known for his patience, ruthlessness, and vengefulness. Bonds might have not shown it on the surface, but he had never forgotten Sha-to¡¯s insult. He had only been waiting for the opportunity to get his revenge.

    Sha-t¡¯o watched silently as Bonds approached him with his sword. He no longer tried iming that it was all a big misunderstanding for he knew that no amount of words could alter his fate. As the patriarch of the House of Kiaran, Sha-t¡¯o wasn¡¯t one who feared death. He sighed and stared into the sky with despaired eyes, given in to the inevitable.

    ¡°Hey, hey! What are you trying to do?!¡± shouted the highgods of the House of Kiaran when they saw Bonds walking to their patriarch who had been captured alive just like that.

    These highgods of the House of Kiaran also sensed the terrifying aura emanated by Han Shuo and knew that they stood no chance. However, after having been brainwashed under the House of Kiaran for ages, they would put the prestige of their family n above everything else. They thought of giving a fight before Sha-t¡¯o would be yed.

    The five highgods looked at each other in the eye. They suddenly shrieked in one voice and recklessly charged at Han Shuo.

    By now, there were thousands of Witherbone City¡¯s citizens all around the House of Han. Other than divine guards of the House of Kiaran and Hill, there were also experts from all major family ns who noticed the great disturbance.

    All of them could tell just how terrifying Han Shuo was just from his aura. Upon arrival, they merely stood as a silent observer instead of trying to be helpful citizens. No one daredunch an attack at Han Shuo who was standing tall above his House of Han.

    Of the thousands of gods present, only the five highgods of the Kiaran Family attacked Han Shuo. They were fighting for the prestige that their House of Kiaran had built and grown for the past tens of thousands of years.

    Han Shuo turned his chilling eyes at the five. With one thought, five of his flying swords whooshed out from his nape. They streak across the sky in a sh and appear in the chests of the five highgods.

    Han Shuo had very precise control over his flying swords. Instead of flying through their bodies and liquifying them, he made the flying swords stop halfway through their chests. The five dead highgods were dangling in midair.

    <i>Drip... Drop... </i>

    Blood slowly dripped down from the five bodies hung in midair. The crowd was so silent that the sound of the blood dripping could be clearly heard.

    ¡°AAAAHHHH!!¡±

    While everyone had their attention on the five dead highgods suspended in the sky, a blood-curdling scream jolted the crowd and many of them trembled. Immediately, the crowd turned their attention to the source of the sound.

    The person making the screech was the patriarch of the House of Kiaran ¨C Sha-t¡¯o.

    Bonds hadpletely ignored the five Kiaran Family highgods andpletely absorbed in his task. Using the sword that Han Shuo had made for him, he cut open the skin on Sha-to¡¯s chest with surgical precision ¨C not deep enough to kill him immediately but just enough to get the job done. Still wearing aposed, indifferent face, with his bare hands, Bonds calmly proceeded to tear the skin off Sha-to¡¯s chest.

    Having one¡¯s skin torn from one¡¯s flesh was, needless to say, an extremely painful experience. Other than immobilizing Sha-t¡¯o, in order for Sha-t¡¯o to savor the process as much as possible, Han Shuo had also enhanced Sha-to¡¯s senses, boosting sensory inputs by more than ten timespared to normal.

    In other words, the pain that Sha-t¡¯o was suffering was ten folds of what he would normally feel.

    Therefore, even the gritty patriarch of the House of Kiaran crumbled to the torture. He helplessly shrieked in absolute pain and agony.

    Sha-t¡¯o was among the strongest experts in Witherbone City. But there he was, totally helpless and being inhumanly tortured before the crowd, making miserable and despaired shrieks that made everyone¡¯s blood run cold.

    Thousands of Witherbone City experts were watching. Some found it a sight too horrific to behold and lowered their heads. Some gritted their teeth and red at Han Shuo with bloodshot eyes.

    However, no one dared step forward!

    After all, the five House of Kiaran highgods who had charged at Han Shuo together were still hanging in mid-air. Their blood was still dripping off their dead bodies.

    This kind of intimidation was more convincing than any words!

    Many of the House of Kiaran members who had an urge to stop Han Shuo and save Sha-t¡¯o would immediately give up on the idea when they looked up and saw the five highgod bodies dangling in the sky. They would swallow their anger and restrain themselves.

    ¡°Bryan, please, let him go, I beg you!¡± a loud tearful voice sounded. Li Wei, whose hair was rumpled, came to the front after wildly shoving through the crowd.

    Li Wei had once visited the Han Residence and many of the Han Family recognized her. They knew that Han Shuo and Li Wei were close friends. During the House of Han¡¯s stay in the Kiaran Residence, Li Wei had always tried persuading Sha-t¡¯o to stop mistreating the Han Family and maintain their friendly rtions.

    However, blinded by greed, Sha-t¡¯o did not bother listening to her opinion. In the end, when he got sick of being pestered, he got someone to lock Li Wei up. It was until now, after Sha-t¡¯o was captured by Han Shuo, one of the House of Kiaran divine guards recalled of Li Wei¡¯s existence. Thinking that she could alleviate the situation, he hastily released Li Wei from confinement.

    Bonds halted his execution the moment that Li Wei appeared. He turned to Han Shuo and looked at him with an inquisitive gaze, waiting for hismand.

    Han Shuo took one look at Li Wei. He thought about the things that his family had suffered in the Kiaran Residence and he coldly said to Bonds, ¡°Carry on!¡±

    Bonds nodded and continued.

    Sha-t¡¯o yet again started shrieking in absolute misery. When Li Wei heard his terrible cry again, her eyes rolled up and she passed out.

 Chapter 902 - Who else?

    GDK 902<strong>: Who else?</strong>

    Inside the Kiaran Residence of Witherbone City, Sha-t¡¯o, one of the top characters in the city in terms of strength and influence, was being skinned alive by the callous Bonds. After a long long while, Sha-t¡¯o stopped making his miserable shrieks. His body spasmed for some time before it turned motionless.

    No one in the crowd dared step forward to stop Han Shuo after sensing the terrifying aura he was emanating. Those who had participated in attacking the House of Han were palpitating and dread could be seen in their eyes.

    The House of Han who had been oppressed for a long time became visibly excited after Sha-t¡¯o was dead. Despite havingplete trust in Han Shuo¡¯s strength, they did not expect that Han Shuo would have made such giant leaps. Even the top-notch experts of Witherbone City and the City Lord dared not mess with Han Shuo.

    ¡°Who else?¡± Han Shuo asked Emily.

    Emily scanned the surrounding crowd with murderous eyes before it stopped on Hill the City Lord. She pointed at him and said, ¡°This guy! He is the City Lord of Witherbone City. Without his backing, Sha-t¡¯o wouldn¡¯t have the courage to do something so brazen and outrageous!¡± Emily had heard a thing or two from Dagassi and knew that Hill yed an important role in their persecution.

    In fact, back then when the House of Han¡¯s appeal for help reached Witherbone City, it wasn¡¯t Sha-t¡¯o who came up with the sinister n to trap and force the House of Han to give up their secrets ¨C it was the ambitious and greedy Hill. He was the real mastermind.

    ¡°What? I got nothing to do with this!¡± When Hill saw that the members of the Han Family seemed to be pacified after Sha-t¡¯o was dead, he thought that the matter was over and he wouldn¡¯t be implicated. But who knew that Emily would point him out out of the blue.

    As the City Lord, Hill was not supposed to be so flustered. However, as he had sensed the unstoppable power on Han Shuo and having witnessed Sha-t¡¯o being yed alive right in front of him, he lost his usual bearing. Sha-to¡¯s inhuman, miserable shrieks still echoed in his ears.

    Han Shuo cracked an incredibly chilling grin as he sized up Hill. He said, ¡°Do you think I would trust yours or my people¡¯s words?¡±

    A shiver traveled down Hill¡¯s spine. He knew that by now, no amount of excuses would save him from the monster. From how Han Shuo had exacted vengeance of Sha-t¡¯o, Hill knew that Han Shuo was anything but kind. With that, Hill immediately abandoned his unrealistic thoughts and started rethinking his approach.

    ¡°Bryan, this is Witherbone City and I¡¯m the City Lord. You dare kill me?¡± Hill kept silent for a moment before he suddenly transformed into a lofty man with a tough, unshakable demeanor. It was as though he had swept every trace of fear from his mind and turned into another person.

    Hill was indeed worthy of being the Lord of a City. Facing an unbeatable opponent, Hill was able to quickly readjust his mind and strategy to find a way out. With all his focus and energy, he first purged his fear of Han Shuo off his mind.

    Han Shuo was startled for a fraction of a second. He did not expect that Hill would dare give him that attitude given the situation he was in. It appeared that although Hill was just slightly stronger than Sha-t¡¯o in terms of strength, he was much tougher than Sha-t¡¯o by virtue of being a City Lord.

    However, even though Hill was the City Lord of Witherbone City and his divine guards hadpletely surrounded them, Han Shuo could still kill Hill and his gang with a lift of his finger. Han Shuo could not understand where Hill¡¯s confidence came from.

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo raised an eyebrow and disdainfully asked, ¡°And what about that? You think those divine guards around you could protect your ass?¡±

    Hill inwardly heaved a slight breath of relief after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s reply. He was afraid that Han Shuo would kill him straightforwardly without giving him a chance to speak. Otherwise, he would be dead no matter how good his reasoning would be.

    ¡°Sha-t¡¯o is just a family n patriarch. He was not qualified to meet the Overgod. His Lordship wouldn¡¯t care if he is alive or dead. But I¡¯m very different. I¡¯m the City Lord of Witherbone City and the most humble servant of the Overgod of Death. His Lordship has imnted a Divine Brand in my soul. If I¡¯m killed, His Lordship will avenge me!¡± exined Hill hastily.

    Upon hearing those words, the faces of those House of Han members jolted while those trembling Witherbone divine guards seemed to be injected with a shot of courage. They thought that their City Lord¡¯s words made sense. The City Lord was personally appointed by the Overgod of Death. If the outsider was to kill the City Lord, he will surely suffer the wrath of the Overgod.

    And absolutely no one on Elysium would want to get an Overgod angry!

    ¡°Bryan, I think... we should let it go... ¡° the apprehensive looking Emily advised Han Shuo in a low voice.

    It was Emily who pointed out Hill to Han Shuo but she was also the first to advise Han Shuo against killing Hill. She knew that the might of an Overgod was frightening beyond her imagination. She would rather swallow the humiliation than to have Han Shuo risk his life against an Overgod.

    ¡°Bryan, don¡¯t do anything impulsive. In any case, Sha-t¡¯o is already dead... Perhaps it¡¯s time to let it slide...¡° advised Stratholme. He too knew that an Overgod was extraordinarily powerful. It wasn¡¯t easy for the House of Han to be finally out of danger and he did not want Han Shuo to be killed by an Overgod.

    On the entire Elysium, if not the entire universe, no existence would ever risk offending an Overgod who possessed a Quintessence and ruled a Divine Dominion. Every member of the House of Han understood that and they advised Han Shuo to let Hill off.

    ¡°It seems that your family n members are sensible people. Bryan, I admit that you are extremely strong and we Witherbone City are no match against you. However, you should still think before you act. If you kill me, not a single person in your House of Han will live to step out of the Death Dominion,¡± said Hill after the House of Han members conceded to his reasoning, hoping that Han Shuo would give up on killing him.

    Han Shuo wore a dark face as he gave thecent looking Hill a death stare. He knew that Hill wasn¡¯t bluffing. If Hill was killed, the Overgod of Death would instantly know about it and would most likely seek revenge.

    A quick series of thoughts shed across Han Shuo¡¯s mind as he reasoned with himself. After weighing the costs and benefits, Han Shuo took a deep breath and coldly nodded. He then turned to his House of Han and said, ¡°Come, let¡¯s leave the city.¡±

    Everyone heaved a sighed of relief. The House of Han, the Witherbone divine guards, and Hill felt that they were just inches away from Hell. They understood that if Han Shuo were to be so reckless as to kill Hill, the Divine Brand in Hill¡¯s soul would be destroyed and the Overgod of Death might show up. If that happened, the consequences would be unimaginable.

    ¡°I¡¯m really sorry about what happened to the House of Han in Witherbone City. It really wasn¡¯t my intention,¡± said Hill courteously. He felt rxed when he saw that Han Shuo was leaving. He dared not provoke Han Shuo lest he changes his mind.

    Hill gestured, ordering those divine guards who had jammed packed the ce to immediately make way for the House of Han, allowing them to leave unimpededly.

    Han Shuo wore a dark face as he silently led his family n to the nearest city gate. Wherever he went, the divine guard would automatically withdraw a few steps backward. It was obvious that they were very afraid of Han Shuo.

    Every member of the House of Han followed closely behind Han Shuo. They spoke not a word as they marched through the streets. By the morning of the second day, they arrived at the nearest city gate.

    It seemed as though those Witherbone divine guards had been notified in advance. Long before the House of Han was near the city gate, they had swung those gates wide open for the House of Han to exit the city.

    Without meeting the slightest impedance, the House of Han led by Han Shuo finally stepped out of the Witherbone City.

    After traveling for another half-a-day, when the House of Han had made quite some distance from Witherbone City, Sanguis finally couldn¡¯t hold his curiosity. He hesitated for a moment before he asked Han Shuo, ¡°Shifu, are you really going to let Hill off the hook?¡±

    ¡°I will escort you all away from the Death Dominion. You all will be safe once you are outside the Dominion,¡± Han Shuo took a deep breath before he turned to Emily and Stratholme and instructed, ¡°After leaving the Death Dominion, head to the Ethereal City of the Space Dominion. Look for McKinley the City Lord. He will get you all settled.¡±

    ¡°Bryan, don¡¯t do it, please!¡± Emily was worried about Han Shuo¡¯s safety. She begged, ¡°Please just let it pass. After all, it was Sha-t¡¯o who had done those things to us and he is dead. I don¡¯t want to take any more revenge... ¡°

    ¡°Bryan, if you kill Hill, you could anger the Overgod!¡± Stratholme was astonished after realizing Han Shuo¡¯s n.

    ¡°Yes, I know I might offend the Overgod, that is why I¡¯m bringing you all out of the Death Dominion now. If I had killed him just then and the Overgod appears, I might be able to escape but you bunch might be exterminated by the divine guards. As long as your safeties are assured, I don¡¯t mind fucking up Witherbone City. Humph, to think that I¡¯m afraid of the Overgod of Death, how foolish of Hill!¡± coldly groaned Han Shuo.

    When Han Shuo saw that his family n members were still going to persuade him against doing it, he raised one palm and said, ¡°That¡¯s enough, I have made my decision.¡±

    ¡°Senior brother, do you have the confidence?¡± asked Bonds calmly.

    ¡°I have the confidence of not losing my life, not even to an Overgod with the Quintessence,¡± replied Han Shuo after he put on a faint smile.

    Bonds nodded and said nothing more. Under Han Shuo¡¯s escort, the House of Han made detours around various major cities of the Death Dominion as they traveled in the direction of the Space Dominion.

    Lest they invite even more troubles, the House of Han hastened on with their journey. After two months, they officially stepped out of the territories of the Death Dominion. They continued traveling towards the Space Dominion.

    Meanwhile, Han Shuo quietly left the group and returned to the Death Dominion all alone.

    He was nning to murder not just City Lord Hill of Witherbone City, but even City Lord Wace of the City of Shadows. He was nning to offend not just one of the Overgods but two in one go.

 Chapter 903 - Back to Witherbone City

    GDK 903: Back to Witherbone City

    After the House of Han left, the Witherbone City turned busy for a while. They weren¡¯t busy with upgrading their defenses or repairing the damages but were busy expropriating the wealth and assets of the House of Kiaran.

    Cruel, unforgiving is the world. The House of Kiaran used to be one of the top family ns in Witherbone City. However, after their patriarch, Sha-t¡¯o, and five highgods were murdered by Han Shuo and hundreds of their divine guards killed by the House of Han, their strength and influence took a nosedive. They tanked to the bottom just like that.

    With all their top-notch experts now dead, the House of Kiaran was unable to protect their tremendous assets. The other powerhouses of Witherbone City who had been coveting for the Kiaran Family¡¯s wealth began their plundering the moment the House of Han left the city.

    Sha-t¡¯o and the House of Kiaran had been faithful and diligent in working for Hill the City Lord. Morally speaking, Hill should at least step in and prevent those predators from robbing the House of Kiaran.

    But in reality, Hill was one of the firsts to rob from the Kiaran Family!

    Using his position as the City Lord, Hill took over most of the estates and businesses of the House of Kiaran, iming that those were their punishment for making the City such a powerful enemy. Large amounts of assets of the Kiaran Family were confiscated by Hill in just one night.

    But to keep the other family ns contented, Hill did not take all the bounties for himself. The remaining interests of the Kiaran Family were expropriated by those big and small family ns of Witherbone City.

    While Sha-t¡¯o was still alive, the rivals and enemies of the House of Kiaran would never dare touch his family n members. But immediately after his death, those people started hunting down the Kiaran Family members to have their revenge. It seemed as though they wanted to exterminate the House of Kiaran.

    Having witnessed their patriarch, Sha-t¡¯o, being humiliated to death, the House of Kiaran divine guards felt that the family n was branded with shame and disgrace. Many of them left the House of Kiaran and joined other family ns.

    This major family n that had thrived in Witherbone City for tens of thousands of years was destroyed practically overnight.

    Everyone with the surname ¡®Kiaran¡¯, no matter young or old were hunted by their enemies. Within a short few days, this ancient bloodline was nearly exterminated. There were only a few of them who were still in Witherbone City.

    Ny percent of the Kiaran Family was killed in the manhunt. But there was one person that no one dared to even touch.

    *** At the Northern District of Witherbone City was a dpidated shine. Li Wei sat huddled on the ground, gazing intently at nothingness. She was embracing a box of ashes as she mumbled incoherent words.

    Beside her was Dagassi. He wore a pitiful face and repeatedly sighed whilebing Li Wei¡¯s messy hair.

    The past three months had been absolute hell to Li Wei. She watched her father Sha-t¡¯o yed to death, her brothers, sisters, and cousins mercilessly murdered, raped, and enved. She watched her big and lovely family destroyed.

    After having witnessed the countless tragedies and overwhelmed by grief, her mind gave way under the strain. The proud, cheerful heiress of the Kiaran Family turned into a girl with a psychotic breakdown who would mumble to herself all day.

    Although Li Wei was a member of the Kiaran Family and was one of the easiest targets for her enemies, she was spared because many were aware of her friendship with Bryan. Although her brother and sister were murdered in front of her, no one dared to cause her harm.

    All those who had met Han Shuo would gravely warn their family n to never harm Li Wei. They were afraid that Han Shuo might seek revenge on them. They knew that if Han Shuo wanted to, he could exterminate them with a snap of his fingers.

    ¡°Sigh... I wish I could shoulder some of the pain for you... ¡° Dagassi couldn¡¯t help himself but sigh yet again.

    A shadow stealthily approached andnded in the abandoned shrine. He looked at Li Wei for a moment before he let out a long sigh and remorsefully said, ¡°In seeking justice, I have done an injustice to Li Wei... ¡°

    Dagassi¡¯s face jolted and he was rmed. He immediately stood up and put himself between theer and Li Wei. But after identifying who theer was, he rxed, forced a smile, and said, ¡°Why are you here?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s original n was to immediately begin his ughter upon returning to Witherbone City but then he suddenly thought of Dagassi and Li Wei. Han Shuo still remembered the soul signatures of Dagassi and Li Wei. Given his extraordinary strength, it could not be easier to locate them by sensing their souls. He hesitated for a moment before he decided to look for them first.

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart ached when he saw the Li Wei now who had been driven to madness. Although the House of Kiaran and Sha-t¡¯o had betrayed the House of Han, Li Wei was innocent. She had even tried to help the House of Han. Although her effort had been futile, Han Shuo still considered it as a favor.

    ¡°What happened to her?¡± asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°The world had not been kind to her. After having seen too much horror and suffered too much agony, her spirit crumbled,¡± Dagassi sighed before he continued, ¡°When I returned to the House of Kiaran, I discovered that my original master had perished. No one in the House of Kiaran would bat me an eye. Li Wei, however, had been kind to me. Bryan, can you please find a way to treat her?¡±

    Han Shuo thought for a moment before he replied, ¡°I can erase some of her memories and make her forget everything about the House of Kiaran,¡± he took a short pause before he continued, ¡°A fresh restart, that¡¯s the only solution I could think of, it¡¯s all that I could do for her.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯d work, as long as she could be happy again. She wouldn¡¯t be gued with so much pain after forgetting about the House of Kiaran,¡± agreed Dagassi after he nodded.

    Han Shuo stepped forward and pressed a hand on the back of Li Wei¡¯s head. His consciousness swam into her mind and gently wrapped her soul. Then, it started flowing through the webs made of glimmering, incorporeal strands and searched for every memory rted to the House of Kiaran. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness would then wrap around those strands and extinguish them.

    If Sha-t¡¯o, ater-stage highgod of death could extract memories from another person¡¯s soul, then Han Shuo who had attained Skybreak Realm in demonic arts could do it without breaking a sweat. He had a far greater understanding of the soul and his consciousness was far more suitable for the job. This memory deleting procedure surgically done by Han Shuo would leave no side effect.

    Several minutester, Han Shuo took a deep, gentle breath and withdrew his hand from Li Wei who seemed to have fallen deep asleep. He turned to Dagassi and said, ¡°When she wakes up, she will remember nothing about the House of Kiaran. Don¡¯t stay here any longer. Go to the Ethereal City of the Space Dominion with her. You may seek shelter at the Celestial Pearl in the City.¡±

    Dagassi nodded and replied, ¡°Yes, I have been thinking about leaving this ce with her. Ethereal City is indeed a decent ce.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sorry. It is me who caused her all these suffering,¡± Han Shuo suddenly lowered his head and sighed again. He felt responsible for destroying Li Wei¡¯s life.

    Dagassi patted on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulder and said, ¡°Don¡¯t be too hard on yourself. If anyone is to be med, it should be Sha-t¡¯o and the others. I¡¯ve seen how they treated your House of Han. You weren¡¯t wrong for serving them justice.¡±

    Han Shuo felt a little better after hearing Dagassi¡¯s words. He thought for a bit before he asked, ¡°Right, tell me everything you know about it and the names of those who had participated in oppressing my House of Han.¡±

    Dagassi stared nkly for a moment. He suddenly realized something and his face jolted. ¡°Bryan, you didn¡¯te back to the City to look for us, but to kill Hill?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and said, ¡°Correct. Hill is the mastermind and I¡¯m not going to let him off!¡±

    ¡°But Hill is the City Lord of Witherbone City and his soul has a Brand bestowed by the Overgod of Death! If you do that, you could bring the wrath of the Overgod upon you and... ¡° Daggasi got worried and wanted to dissuade Han Shuo on the idea.

    ¡°I know. Don¡¯t worry, I will be fine,¡± Han Shuo was touched. He was grateful to have made friends on the Profound Continent who genuinely cared about him.

    Seeing that Han Shuo was adamant, Dagassi stopped trying to dissuade Han Shuo. He forced a smile, shook his head, and remarked, ¡°Back then, when I first met you in the Underground World of Profound Continent, you were just a tiny little necromancer. Who would have thought that in just a few centuries, you would rise to such prominence on Elysium? What¡¯s more, you would soon be provoking an Overgod... It¡¯s true what they say ¨C you would never know what the future has in store for you.¡±

    When Han Shuo heard Dagassi¡¯s words, his mind automatically recalled the time he ventured to the Underground World. Back then, he was merely a weak necromancer who was no match against Dagassi. But in just a short few hundred years, he had now ascended to be an overgod and even established a rapidly growing powerhouse on Elysium.

    ¡°Alright, as far as I¡¯m aware of, other than Hill and Sha-t¡¯o, there are... ¡° Dagassi started informing Han Shuo the names of those who had participated in oppressing the House of Han.

    ¡°You should leave for the Space Dominion with Li Wei quickly. Witherbone City is about to get messy,¡± said Han Shuo whose eyes were glowing with ice-cold lights. He was ready tomit a ughter feast.

    ¡°Be careful,¡± said Dagassi when he saw that Han Shuo was leaving.

    Han Shuo did not reply and vanished from Dagassi¡¯s sight in an instant. It was much faster and stealthier than leaving by tearing space-time.

    *** In the City Lord¡¯s Mansion of Witherbone City, Hill had summoned the patriarchs of all major family ns. They were discussing who should seed the Chief of the Third Corps divine guards that previously belonged to the House of Kiaran.

    Suddenly, a frigid sinister energy shrouded the City Lord¡¯s mansion. All those patriarchs in the middle of a discussion were jolted off their seats and they looked all around in fear.

    They had sensed the energy before and they immediately realized a frightening fact ¨C the Demon has returned!

 Chapter 904 - How would it be over when youâ€™re still alive?

    Chapter 904: How would it be over when you¡¯re still alive?

    Hill and the family ns patriarchs stood up from their seats in fright. They panically looked all around as though anticipating something to show up.

    A chilling wind blew and the thinyer of barrier protecting the meeting room shattered while the energy towers that powered it exploded. The glistening energy crystals scattered everywhere.

    Every defense protecting the meeting room crumbled in an instant. Immediately following that, a sinister, ruthless energy flooded the chamber and disced every elemental energy. Those in the meeting room who were the most influential and powerful characters in Witherbone City felt shivers traveling down their spines. They were unable to assemble elemental energies to effectively defend and attack.

    Then, finally, Han Shuo made an appearance. He calmly walked towards those people belonging to the highest echelon of their society as though he was talking a walk in his own backyard.

    ¡°What?¡± Hill¡¯s heart sank. In a rather anxious voice, he asked, ¡°Haven¡¯t you left Witherbone City? What have youe back for?¡±

    Hill knew that Han Shuo¡¯s strength far surpassed his and everyone else in the roombined. He was afraid for anyone who made an appearance by immediately destroying every defense surely wasn¡¯t there to make friends.

    ¡°Good, excellent, everybody¡¯s here. That¡¯d save me from taking a few extra trips,¡± Han Shuoughed grimly after he looked at the faces of those gathered in the meeting room and saw that all those who had been named by Dagassi as conspirators against the House of Han were all present.

    ¡°Bryan, what the hell do you want? Wasn¡¯t the matter already settled? What more do you want?¡± Hill¡¯s eyes were wavering. He had an ominous feeling that he wouldn¡¯t be so lucky this time.

    ¡°How would it be settled when you are still alive?¡± remarked Han Shuo in chillingughter. Then, when Hill¡¯s face jolted, Han Shuo calmlyunched his attacks. The upgraded Cyano Demonze whooshed out and the fierce, ghostly mes began engulfing Hill¡¯s chest.

    With one thought of his consciousness, hundreds of demon generals emerged and swarmed at those family n patriarchs. Those ferocious incorporeal creatures invaded their bodies and started tearing and devouring their flesh and bone.

    Those demon generals that had been unleashed from the Cauldron of Myriad Demon were made from midgod or highgod souls. Fifty to sixty of them would simultaneously attack a person, gnawing that flesh, bones, and brain matter. They overcame their targets in no time.

    A single demon general might not be able to do these patriarchs any harm. But if there were dozens of them attacking at the same time, especially if there were demon generals made using highgod souls, those patriarchs would stand no chance. In just moments, all those patriarchs of major family ns in Witherbone City turned into shriveled, lifeless bodies.

    Demon generals had the ability to evolve. They could improve their strength by devouring flesh, brain matter, and bone marrows. If a spirit demon was evolved beyond a certain level, it could be refined into an avatar.

    Compared to the flesh, brain matter, and bone marrow, the divine soul was the most nutritious food for demon generals. But as the divine souls could be turned into new demon generals, the Cauldron Spirit restrained the demon generals and stopped them from devouring those highgod souls.

    Under the Cauldron Spirit¡¯s control, several greyish lumps flew into Han Shuo¡¯s body. Following that, the demon generals flew back into the Cauldron.

    By now, in the meeting room, the only victim that Han Shuo had yet to kill was Hill who was howling and wailing in pain. The upgraded Cyano Demonze now possessed even greater destructive power. Hill¡¯s skin, flesh, and even his soul were slowly cooked by the ghostly green mes. Green zes could be seen raging inside his eyes.

    While Hill shrieked and cried, Han Shuo extended his right hand, made a w, and put it above Hill¡¯s head. Five des then abruptly shot out from Han Shuo¡¯s fingertips.

    The five des went through Hill¡¯s cranium like a hot knife cutting through butter. After prating deep into his brain, five strands of energies wrapped Hill¡¯s burning divine soul. Not only could Hill not escape, but he also lost all ability to transmit messages.

    Strands of consciousness flowed through the five des and invaded Hill¡¯s soul. Han Shuo soon located a Brand in a corner of Hill¡¯s soul, emanating a strong aura of death. It was ipatible with Hill¡¯s soul and was constantly releasing minute strands of energies that stimted his soul.

    Immediately, Han Shuo realized that this was the Divine Brand that the Overgod of Death had ced in Hill¡¯s soul. After carefully sensing it for a moment, Han Shuo could feel a deste, ancient, and powerful presence.

    It was obvious to Han Shuo the function of this Divine Brand. Han Shuo also knew that once Hill was killed, the Overgod of Death will immediately be alerted and learn about everything that had transpired.

    Han Shuo carefully avoided the Overgod¡¯s Brand and bore deep into Hill¡¯s soul using the consciousness in the form of millions of strands. Then, simr to how he had treated Li Wei, he started deleting the memories from Hill¡¯s soul. But instead of selectively deleting some of the memories, Han Shuo was going for a full, thorough wipe. After the divine soul was formatted, it no longer had any self-awareness or any thoughts. Han Shuo then extracted the soul from Hill¡¯s body and stored it in a special container.

    Having cultivated to such a high level in demonic arts, Han Shuo¡¯s understanding of the soul had far surpassed that of every god on Elysium, even those who cultivated the energies of life, death, and destiny. Perhaps even an Overgod could not perform such an intricate operation to the soul.

    Han Shuo had killed Hill¡¯s self-awareness but kept his soul alive to avoid receiving the wrath of the Death Overgod. He came up with the idea as he traveled back to Witherbone City.

    With his self-awareness wiped out, Hill could notmunicate with the Overgod of Death through the Divine Brand. And as his soul was technically still alive, the Overgod wouldn¡¯t know that Hill was as good as dead.

    But Han Shuo knew that this was just a temporary solution. Sooner orter, news about Hill¡¯s death will get out and by then, the other City Lords in the Death Dominion will report to the Death Overgod about what had happened. It was only a matter of time before the Overgod would learn of the matter.

    And the brief dy was all the time that Han Shuo needed. He would head to the Darkness Dominion, get rid of Wace, Hofs, and Larikson, and leave. By then, even if the Overgods of Death and Darkness wanted to kill Han Shuo for murdering his enemies, he would have been long gone from their territories.

    As Han Shuo observed Hill¡¯s divine soul stored inside a special container, a light bulb suddenly lit above his head. He had an idea on how to rapidly raise the strength of his House of Han members.

    He could kill highgods, extract their divine souls, destroy their self-awareness, and wipe away every bit of their memories irrelevant to cultivation. After that, Emily and the others could fuse with these divine souls without self-awareness and possess the highgod insight and knowledge into their energy, saving hundreds if not thousands of years otherwise needed.

    One may increase their divine energy, and thus their strength, through the power of faith, divine essences, or by devouring another cultivator¡¯s divine energy as the godhunters do. But more often than not, the cultivation realm state was the true obstacle to making breakthroughs. Without gaining sufficient insights and understanding, no amount of divine energy would allow one to ascend to the next realm and gain greater strength.

    But if one possessed sufficient understanding and knowledge, making breakthroughs was basically guaranteed as divine energy can be slowly umted with time.

    Han Shuo thought about the idea carefully, examining its feasibility and risks. Momentster, Han Shuo became ted as he was certain that the idea was absolutely viable. He raised his head,ughed cheerfully, and started fantasizing the future. He could almost see every member of his Han Family standing proud and tall as highgods!

    Han Shuo was perhaps the only person in the universe with such profound understanding and mastery towards the soul that would allow him to perform such an unnatural thing.

    The patriarchs of every major family n in Witherbone City were around Han Shuo as lifeless bodies. Hill the City Lord had his self-awareness wiped clean and his mindless soul was kept in a special container by Han Shuo like a living specimen.

    Han Shuo did not stay in the City Lord¡¯s Mansion for too long. Aftermitting the murders, Han Shuo calmly and stealthily left the crime scene.

    After quietly leaving Witherbone City, Han Shuo started traveling towards the Darkness Dominion at his top speed. Seven dayster, Han Shuo appeared at the most powerful city of the Darkness Dominion ¨C the City of Gorging Clouds.

    Han Shuo¡¯s target was Larikson of the House of Broadhurst. He was ate-stage highgod of destruction and he had once mounted a sneak attack on Han Shuo with Felder.

    Han Shuo knew that Larikson would never let his House of Han off for Han Shuo had killed his son. This was evident in Larikson¡¯s attempt to exterminate the House of Han by besieging Fort Lasberg. To spare his House of Han from potential troubles in the future, Han Shuo was determined to eliminate Larikson.

    At first, Han Shuo thought that with his strength, getting rid of Larikson would be a piece of cake. But when he got to the Broadhurst Residence, he realized that it wouldn¡¯t be anything as easy as what he did in Witherbone City.

    The defensive boundary around the Broadhurst Residence was incrediblyplex and strong. An eternal darkness made of intense element of darkness would float above the Residence like a giant canopy at all times.

    With just one look, Han Shuo could tell that the Shield of Darkness protecting the Broadhurst Residence cannot be deployed by a highgod. He also vaguely sensed the presence of an extremely powerful darkness energy inside the Residence.

    ¡°So the hearsays are correct. Yarus, the City Lord of the City of Gorging Clouds has indeed entered the realm of overgod,¡± Han Shuo murmured to himself as he gazed at the Broadhurst Residence shrouded by darkness.

 Chapter 905 - Yarus

    <strong>Chapter 905: Yarus</strong>

    Of all the cities of the Darkness Dominion, the City of Gorging Clouds was without a doubt the strongest. The city had arge number of powerful experts and a great number of highgods.

    The City of Gorging Clouds was substantially stronger than Hushveil City and the City of Shadows,bined. Ifpared to the family ns in the City of Gorging Clouds, Wace¡¯s House of Sainte would rank in the top few in strength but it would pale inparison to Yarus¡¯ House of Broadhurst.

    There had been hearsays circting around Elysium that Yarus, the City Lord of the City of Gorging Clouds, had ascended beyond highgodhood. Yarus was a rather low-key character. As he had delegated many of his work to his family members, it was rare for people toe into contact with him. Additionally, those few who had the opportunity to meet him could not tell the difference between a highgod and an overgod from his aura. For these reasons, the hearsays always remained as nothing more than hearsays.

    But that might change soon. Han Shuo, standing near the Broadhurst Residence, immediately realized that Yarus had indeed reached the realm of overgod from the power of the boundless darkness shrouding the Residence.

    The elements of darkness that were lingering above the Broadhurst Residence were of Yarus¡¯ doing. There were energy towers erected all over the Residence that functioned as darkness element collectors. Yarus and other cultivators of the darkness energy would benefit from the higher concentration of the darkness element.

    Han Shuo¡¯s original n was to immediately sneak into the Broadhurst Residence and kill Larikson. But after sensing the powerful aura of darkness, he halted in his track and lightly bunched his brows.

    If there wasn¡¯t this overgod expert called Yarus, Han Shuo could intrude the Broadhurst Residence withplete stealth, assassinate Larikson, and retreat with ease. But Yarus turned out to be stronger than Han Shuo had expected. With the overgod barrier deployed around the Residence, it was practically impossible for Han Shuo to get inside noiselessly.

    If he was found intruding on the Broadhurst Residence, he will most likely face the attack of Yarus. It wasn¡¯t that Han Shuo was afraid of Yarus, but alerting Yarus couldpletely ruin Han Shuo¡¯s n. With Yarus, an overgod, and many other Broadhurst highgods, not to mention the environmental advantage, Han Shuo¡¯s chances of killing Larikson was minute.

    But worst of all, his trail would be exposed and everyone would know that he had returned to the Darkness Dominion. Wace and Hofs might go into hiding. In summary, it will really mess up Han Shuo¡¯s n.

    Therefore, after thinking for a moment, Han Shuo decided not to intrude on the Broadhurst Residence but to wait for Larikson to leave his house before striking.

    Although Yarus was the City Lord, he was very much focused on his cultivation. He had given almost all of his duties to his family members to handle. Larikson, as Yarus¡¯ younger brother, was delegated a good portion of his work. It was unavoidable and it will only be a matter of time before he leaves the Residence.

    Han Shuo withdrew and went to a local Information Broker to purchase the news about Larikson. He learned that Larikson was indeed inside the Broadhurst Residence and he had been inside the City for a while now.

    After obtaining the information, Han Shuo returned to the outside of the Broadhurst Residence and patiently waited for his prey toe out from its rabbit hole.

    Three dayster, in the evening, Larikson and a few divine guards of the House of Broadhurst finally left the house. They were heading straight for the nearest city gate as though they had some sort of mission.

    Midway into their journey, Larikson suddenly felt a sense of danger.

    ¡°Ello, Larikson! Hehe, great to see you again!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s voice sounded as he abruptly appeared before Larikson.

    ¡°Ah shit,¡± eximed Larikson. Before his voice had even faded, one of his space rings let out a strong burst of light and tore the spacetime in front of him. Larikson shot into the spacetime fissure instantly.

    Han Shuo did not expect Larikson to be such a coward, that he would immediately escape by tearing spacetime before they had even exchanged a sentence.

    Han Shuo knew that it was toote to attack now. He let out a cold groan and shot into the space-time fissure after Larikson.

    He entered a strange dimension filled with dazzling lights. And when Han Shuo warped out to the other side, he found himself underyers uponyers of barriers. He saw arge number of gods wearing sneering faces ¨C Larikson, Hofs, and Wace were among the crowd!

    His consciousness pulsated and he sensed the boundless darkness above him. Immediately, he realized that he had fallen into a meticulous trap of his enemy.

    ¡°Bryan of Han, wee to the Broadhurst Residence. We have been expecting you,¡± greeted a thin man with a staunch look in a calm, faint smile. This man who had a darkness aura surrounding him was none other than Yarus.

    As the City Lord and the most powerful existence in the City of Gorging Clouds, Yarus naturally exuded a noble, kingly demeanor. As an expert in the overgod realm, he also carried a unique, inexplicable quality.

    Outside theyers of barriers that trapped Han Shuo were dozens of highgods. Five of them, including Wace and Larikson, werete-stage highgods while the rest were mid-stage highgods. Most of them cultivated the energy of darkness. They looked at Han Shuo withughing eyes, as though he was a turtle in a jar.

    ¡°Well yed, what an impressive ruse. Well yed indeed,¡± Han Shuo took a deep breath, looked at Yarus, and praised, ¡°You are indeed a brilliant man. You not only possess outstanding strength, but you¡¯re also excellent at scheming. No wonder Wace and Hofs are no match against you, and no wonder your family n would be more powerful than an entire city!¡±

    ¡°Shut up!¡± shouted Hofs who felt insulted. ¡°You haughty piece of shit. With Lord Yarus here, you will not get away this time!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, I did not want to be your enemy, but you have been giving me no choice,¡± Wace let out a disappointed sigh and confessed.

    ¡°HAHAHA YOU WOT M8???¡± Han Shuoughed his ass off. After a long while, he finally replied, ¡°I leave you no choice? You mean the two times I have saved Carmelita and the countless times I helped your House of Sainte? Fuck, you have started suppressing my House of Han as soon as it was founded. I was going to move my family n out from the City of Shadows but you colluded with Hofs and Larikson to exterminate my family n. And now you are telling me that I leave you no choice? You must be fucking kidding me!¡±

    ¡°The City of Shadows will always belong to the House of Sainte. As the patriarch, I must eliminate all those who could threaten the House of Sainte!¡± Wace tried to bend logic.

    ¡°What a ridiculous guy,¡± remarked Han Shuo in a disdained face while shaking his head. He did not say much for he knew that it was impossible to reason with an unreasonable person.

    ¡°Well, well. Larikson, Wace, Hofs, Ralph, all present!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s eyes went through each of them before it finally stopped on Yarus and smilingly asked, ¡°You must have meticulously nned and prepared for this moment for a long time ¨C here I am. So, what are you waiting for?¡±

    Yarus put on a charming smile before he said to Han Shuo, ¡°I have heard a lot about you, Bryan, and I must say, you are more impressive than your outstanding reputation. Let me be frank ¨C Wace may have no tolerance forpetition, but I¡¯m quite the opposite. In fact, I¡¯m now formally inviting your House of Han to be a part of my City of Gorging Clouds, with the condition that you will set aside your grudges with Larikson. Not only that your presence will be most weed in my City, I, Yarus, hereby pledge that what Wace did to your House of Han in the City of Shadows will never happen in my City of Gorging Clouds!¡±

    The offer came as a total surprise to Han Shuo. He could also tell that Yarus was sincere when he made the invitation.

    ¡°Brother! How will that do! He had killed your nephew and many of our experts! How could you let him into the City?!¡± protested Larikson hastily before Han Shuo could even respond.

    ¡°Silence!¡±manded Yarus. The arrogant Larikson immediately shut his mouth tight. It appeared as though Larikson was afraid of him.

    Yarus, with his brows bunched, turned to Larikson and chided, ¡°It was you and Felder who started the whole thing. Bryan did not kill your highgods unprovoked. And as for your son, he¡¯s nothingpared to an overgod expert. In any case, your dick is still working fine and you can always make more kids!¡±

    ¡°Bro- brother... ¡° Larikson was rather startled.

    Yarus¡¯ face turned cold. He gestured and said, ¡°I have decided, so shut up.¡±

    Although filled with grumbles, Larikson dared not make a voice and lowered his head. He continued to re at Han Shuo.

    Wace and Hofs standing nearby seem astonished. It was obvious that Yarus had not revealed this intention of his to the two. They looked at Yarus with eyes that seemed to be shouting, <i>Dude, what the hell? That was nowhere in what we have discussed!</i>

    Yarus¡¯ attention turned back to Han Shuo. He put on a faint smile and offered, ¡°Bryan, if you will join my City of Gorging Clouds, all grievances are forgiven. Not only that, but I can also provide you much better treatment than what you had from the City of Shadows. Land, manpower, wealth, connections ¨C anything that you need, you will have it. What say you?¡±

 Chapter 906 - Do your worst!

    GDK 906: Do your worst!

    Han Shuo became even more admiring of Yarus after hearing the invitation. However, Han Shuo shook his head resolutely. He smilingly replied, ¡°Thank you, I appreciate the kind offer, but my House of Han will not live under the shadows of anyone, not anymore.¡±

    Back then, when Han Shuo left the City of Shadows, he was determined to never again survive by someone else¡¯s mercy. Although Yarus was nothing like Wace, Han Shuo still would not ce the safety of his House of Han to the City of Gorging Clouds.

    Besides, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t all that impressed by Yarus¡¯ strength. How would Han Shuo be willing to serve Yarus?

    After Han Shuo rejected the offer, Yarus sighed, lowered and shook his head disappointedly. Meanwhile, Larikson, Hofs, and Wace, heaved a sigh of relief.

    ¡°Indeed, this fool doesn¡¯t know how to appreciate kindness. Brother, let¡¯s not waste words with him. Idiots like him deserve death!¡± said Larikson.

    ess

    Yarus looked at Han Shuo in a sorry manner. He said, ¡°I was sincere in my invitation. You should know that I will have to end your life here if you decline the offer.¡±

    ¡°I understand. Go ahead and do your worst,¡± said Han Shuo with great heroic spirit. He wasn¡¯t taking the danger around him seriously.

    Theyers uponyers of barriers trapping him had isted every elemental energy and made the spacetime inessible. Even an expert that cultivated the edict of space cannot escape by tearing the spacetime. Yarus and others had made certain that Han Shuo cannot escape from their trap.

    ¡°There is no way that you are getting out of this, Bryan! Unless you can somehow break through the one hundred twentyyers of barriers between us, you will have to passively suffer our attacks until you die!¡± said Wace as he looked at Han Shuo with chilling eyes.

    ¡°I suppose you haven¡¯t told Andre and Carmelita that you and Ralph are in the City of Gorging Clouds? Hehe, I wonder how they would feel if they know what you are doing to me now,¡± said Han Shuo smilingly. He seemed very rxed.

    Wace¡¯s expression changed when Han Shuo mentioned Andre and Carmelita. It seemed as though someone had pinched him on where it hurts.

    ¡°The matter of our House of Sainte is none of your business! Humph, Carmelita and Andre are short-sighted and had been led astray by your trickery. But it will only be a matter of time before theye to senses and understand that I¡¯m doing all this for the good of our family n!¡± replied Wace. He seemed to be soothing himself with those words rather than arguing with Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo nodded and did not reply. He did not mention Carmelita and Andre with the hope that Wace might let him off, but to find out from Wace if the two were aware of their patriarch¡¯s actions at all.

    Back then, he had learned from Emily and Phoebe that Andre, Carmelita, Aobashi, and Erebus had not responded to the House of Han¡¯s requests for assistance. There was verified news that Aobashi and Erebus had been sent away from the City before Fort Lasberg came under attack. After hearing these words of Wace, Han Shuo was certain that Wace must have somehow prevented them from receiving those messages. Han Shuo was d to find out that his friends had not betrayed him.

    Seeing that Han Shuo was determined, Yarus understood that no amount of words could change Han Shuo¡¯s mind. He turned to his assistance and instructed, ¡°Get Darkwater and Darkstone over.¡±

    Soon, two trails of shadows moved towards Yarus from two directions before appearing beside him. The two wore full-dark clothes and dark faces. Not only that they both possesste-stage highgod strengths, but they both look the same.

    Darkwater and Darkstone were identical twins and they were the City Lords of Darkwater City and Darkstone City respectively. In the Darkness Dominion, only Yarus had a greater reputation than the twins. Legend has it that the Darkness Overgod had left a pair of identical Divine Brands on the identical twins which would grant them special abilities.

    When Darkwater and Darkstone appeared, Han Shuo creased his brows slightly and his expression turned graver.

    Han Shuo had been aware of the presence of the twins standing in the dark and far apart from each other. Han Shuo thought that they were just any other highgods and did not consider them a serious threat.

    But after they moved from their hiding spots, as they got closer to each other, Han Shuo was shocked to discover that the divine energy in their bodies was exponentially growing in power and the darkness aura rapidly assembled around them. By the time they were standing together beside Yarus, Han Shuo discovered that the power of their divine energy and darkness aura had far surpassed that of Hofs, Wace, and other highgods. Although their aura wasn¡¯t as intense as that of Yarus, its power was obviously beyond that of a highgod.

    The identical twins whose spirits were connected in mysterious ways were both cultivators of the darkness energy in thete-stage highgod realm. After the Overgod of Darkness bestowed them with an identical Divine Brand, their joint power became orders of magnitude greater than their individual strengths.

    Having Yarus as an opponent was already rather challenging. And now, with the equivalent of another overgod opponent appearing, Han Shuo immediately realized that freeing himself from the hundred and twentyyers of barriers will be about to get substantially more difficult.

    ¡°Bryan, I will give you onest chance. Do you insist on bing my enemy?¡± asked Yarus gravely. He had revealed his trump card with the hope that Han Shuo would reconsider his decision.

    Han Shuo smirked and replied, ¡°You think you can keep me trapped here just because you have the two of them?¡±

    ¡°No, we are not going to hold you, we are going to kill you,¡± replied Yarus.

    ¡°Hahaha!¡± Han Shuoughed out loud. He raised his head and took a look at the tremendous aura of darkness high over his head before he boldly challenged, ¡°You think that my strength would be substantially reduced if you iste me from all elemental energies? Haha, go ahead and kill me. I¡¯d love to see you try!¡±

    The region around Han Shuo had beenpletely isted from the outside world and other than the darkness element, no elemental energy could flow through the barriers. Had it been any other gods who cultivated elemental energies in Han Shuo¡¯s ce, their strength would be substantially affected and they would be forced to consume the divine energy in their body to fight or resist.

    Without ess to elemental energies, they cannot replenish their divine energy. Any expert, no matter how powerful, would be as feeble as a mortal once their divine energy had been exhausted.

    ¡°What a dauntless man you are, and what a shame you have to die here!¡± praised Yarus before he turned to Darkwater, Darkstone, Hofs, Wace, and other experts who cultivated the energy of darkness and said, ¡°I will deploy a spinning ck hole. You just have to pour your darkness divine energy into it to amplify its power. When the ck holends on him, he will be shredded into millions of pieces.¡±

    All the darkness energy experts nodded their heads. They were very aware of Yarus¡¯ might and just how deadly his trademark technique was.

    Yarus wasted no time and immediately sat cross-legged on the ground and closed his eyes. Strands of darkness auras emerged from his body and connected with the boundless darkness above the Broadhurst Residence. The massive amount of darkness aura seemed to be propelled by countless invisible forces and started revolving.

    Darkwater, Darkstone, Wace, Hofs, started sending out streams of darkness energy from their bodies and towards the vortex forming above Han Shuo¡¯s head.

    The strands of darkness energy that flew out from Darkwater and Darkstone would resonate and intertwine in a miraculous manner to form new strands that were significantly more powerful. Their rbined power was more than ten folds greater than that of Hofs and Wace.

    As the streams of darkness energy were injected, the slowly revolving vortex high over Han Shuo¡¯s head spun faster and faster. It was as though a ck hole had appeared in the sky and was growing in power and would not stop until the world was engulfed.

    Yarus was an overgod expert. Darkwater and Darkstone hadbined strength equivalent to an overgod. In addition, there were mighty highgods of darkness such as Hofs, Wace, and others. The joint power of all those experts had surpassed Han Shuo¡¯s expectations. The threat was much graver than Wasir or Ss.

    They were gathering all their energy and nning on crushing Han Shuo in one powerful hit. The energy umted in the ck hole grew more and more terrifying and Han Shuo¡¯s heart grew heavier.

    For a moment, Han Shuo was rather clueless. He did not know what he could do against such tremendous power. His seventeen flying swords had left his body long ago and started bombarding the more than a hundredyers of barriers. Although the flying swords were making progress, it was rather slow as those barriers were very tough.

    ¡°It¡¯s do or die!¡± Han Shuo made up his mind in a split second and decided to perform a risky maneuver.

    The seventeen flying swords had stopped bombarding the barriers and returned into Han Shuo. He sat cross-legged on the ground and closed his eyes. His consciousness transformed into dark radiances and flew into his demonic infant. Following that, the demonic infant slowly floated out from the top of Han Shuo¡¯s head and grew bigger and bigger. It was like a ghostly copy of Han Shuo.

    Simultaneously, the hundreds of thousands of demon generals whooshed out from the Cauldron of Myriad Demon and vanished into the demonic infant. The demonic infant that was originally the size of a human infant rapidly inted as it was being filled with demon general energy. In just moments, the demonic infant had transformed into a demonic giant more than a few dozen meters tall that hovers in mid-air.

    A chilling, sinister, ruthless, bloodthirst energy suddenly flooded the City of Gorging Clouds. It was as though the hundredyers of barriers could not obstruct the apocalyptic energy of the demonic infant.

    ¡°ROARR!!!...¡± When all of the demon general energy has entered the demonic infant, it suddenly bellows.

    The tremendously powerful soul-attacking sound wave went through theyers of barriers. Many of the gods inside the Broadhurst Residence suddenly bled from every orifice and died on the spot!

 Chapter 907 - Myriad Demon Transformation

    Chapter 907: Myriad Demon Transformation

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness and all of his energy were transferred into the demonic infant. His physical body that was sitting cross-legged on the ground seemed to have aged by decades in just a few seconds. It turned limp and lost their color.

    Injecting the demonic infant with the demon general energy was simr to boosting the strength of his demonic body using the energy. But as the demonic infant and demon generals were rather simr lifeforms, the demonic infant could utilize and unleash the demon general¡¯s energy much better than his demonic body could.

    The ¡®Myriad Demon Transformation¡¯ that Han Shuo deployed was a very risky demonic technique. Before reaching the Skybreak Realm, the demonic infant will be injured if it was forced to absorb demonic general energy. And even if one has reached the Skybreak Realm but does not possess a stable realm state, there is a chance that one could fail to purge the demon generals from the demonic infant which would lead to severe damages to the demonic infant.

    Additionally, when the technique was deployed, the consciousness, vitality, and everyst bit of his energy will be separated from his physical body, leaving itpletely vulnerable.

    If Han Shuo wasn¡¯t trapped under the more than a hundredyers of barriers and with a terrifying dark vortex being dropped onto him, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t have deployed this powerful but risky demonic technique.

    ¡°ROAR!!!....¡± Han Shuo¡¯s deafening roar pulsed through the entire City of Gorging Clouds. Many of the gods living in the Broadhurst Residence with below-average strengths were instantly killed. Even those living nearby the Residence suffered ruptured ear-drums, internal bleeding, or soul injuries.

    Yarus, Wace, and the others who were just outside the barriers were the first to be hit. But as most of them were of highgod strengths, Han Shuo¡¯s destructive roar did not injure them. However, it did greatly jolt their souls.

    ¡°What the hell was that?¡± cried Hofs after his face jolted. His attention was taken away.

    Ralph, Wace, Darkwater, Darkstone, and the others were also taken by surprise. They felt the terrifying aura of the hovering immaterial demon under the barriers.

    Of the party, only Yarus had remained calm. He remarked, ¡°Whatever it is, we need not care. Just focus on injecting your energy into the ck hole and that thing will be destroyed.¡±

    Yarus¡¯ calmness seemed to be infectious. After hearing his words, the party stopped their futile discussion in panic and continued to inject their darkness energy into the vortex of darkness.

    As the party injected the ck hole with their darkness divine energy, the retion disk around the ck hole grew even more massive and they spun faster and faster. The ck hole also started to slowly descend.

    After letting out the long and destructive roar, the massive, hovering Han Shuo that was somewhere between material and immaterial state,nded on the ground behind where his physical body sat. It made a rumble and shuddered the entire Broadhurst Residence.

    Yarus thought that the massive Han Shuo was just a hallucination that Han Shuo produced and it would pose no threat. However, when he sensed the tremor, he realized that the colossal Han Shuo was very real and he grew a little worried.

    Afternding on the ground, Han Shuo crouched slightly before he forcefully leaped towards the sky with a fist stretched upwards.

    An aura of pure berserk power erupted. The punch was so powerful that Yarus and the party felt frightened despite being separated by more than a hundred boundaries from Han Shuo.

    <i>Booom!... </i>

    Of the one hundred and twenty boundaries and seals jointly deployed by Yarus, Darkwater, Darkstone, and the others, more than several dozens were destroyed by that punch containing power that could topple the mountains.

    More than one-third of the boundaries trapping Han Shuo was undone in just one punch. Han Shuo, who hadnded on the ground again, smiled nastily before he threw another punch.

    <i>Booom!... </i>

    More barriers were destroyed!

    ¡°This is bad! Inject all the energy you can. I must bring the ck hole down immediately!¡± said Yarus whose face jolted. He knew that if Han Shuo was given the chance to throw another punch, all of the remaining barriers trapping him will crumble. If Han Shuo does not stay trapped in the region, the ck hole might notnd precisely on him to inflict the maximum damage.

    Darkwater, Darkstone, Wace, and the others were shocked. After hearing Yarus¡¯ cry, they immediately went all-out and sent all the darkness energy they could towards the ck hole. Then, suddenly, the ck hole that was slowly descending came crashing down on Han Shuo as though the sky was copsing.

    The Han Shuo now was more than several dozen meters tall and massive, but ck hole jointly powered by Yarus and the others were even more massive. Its size was greater than the inside of the boundaries and there was no way for Han Shuo to evade it.

    The one hundred and twentyyers of boundaries were made using the darkness divine energy of Yarus, Darkwater, Darkstone, and the others ¨C the same type of energy that formed the ck hole. Therefore, when the ck hole made contact with the boundaries, not only did they not impede the ck hole, but the darkness energy on the boundaries flowed into the ck hole and boosted its power, making it even more destructive.

    Before Han Shuo could throw his third punch, the gargantuan ck hole came crashing down on him and enveloped Han Shuo who was in his demonic infant form. The revolving vortex containing Yarus and the others¡¯ darkness divine energy immediately started grinding Han Shuo.

    The massive amount of darkness energy swarmed into Han Shuo¡¯s immaterial demonic infant and filled every demon general in his colossal body. In just an instant, Han Shuo¡¯s massive body had been shredded into a million pieces and became part of the retion disk of the ck hole.

    Under tremendous force, even the space-time copsed. Strange iridescent radiances started shooting around the region. One could even see the cold infinity of stars.

    The ck hole that was deployed by Yarus could damage not just physical objects but also incorporeal things like souls. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness and demonic infant had been shredded into pieces before torn again into even smaller pieces.

    The ck hole went away just as fast as it came. An instant after the immaterial Han Shuo was shattered and his consciousness pulverized, the ck hole gave off a sh and disappeared in the iridescent space-time fissure.

    All the barriers disappeared and the colorful radiances faded. There was no longer anything in the region.

    All that remained was Han Shuo¡¯s physical body, sitting on the ground motionlessly. Without the demonic infant, consciousness, and energy, the lifeless body was pale and wrinkled.

    All of the ck hole¡¯s energy had been used on pulverizing Han Shuo¡¯s immaterial demonic infant and therefore his physical body was unharmed.

    Yarus heaved a sigh of relief. He put on a rxed smile and said, ¡°That was close. This guy is truly formidable. Had he broken through the barriers, our ck hole attack would be ineffective. And had he managed to escape, he would cause no end of troubles for us.¡±

    ¡°Brother, what about his body? It is still intact,¡± asked Larikson as he pointed at Han Shuo¡¯s physical body.

    ¡°It is devoid of energy and soulless. It is as good as destroyed,¡± replied Yarus before he shook his head regretfully andmented, ¡°What a shame. If this powerful youngster would serve me, our Darkness Dominion would take a great leap in strength. Sigh... ¡°

    ¡°I will destroy his body for good measure,¡± said Wace after wiping the cold sweat on his forehead with his sleeves. He then started approaching Han Shuo¡¯s physical body cautiously. It appeared that of everyone in the party, Wace wanted Han Shuo dead the most. He wouldn¡¯t even leave his dead body unharmed.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it, that guy ispletely destroyed. The ck hole shreds everything, both material and immaterial objects. His divine soul has been turned into a million bits,¡± said Yarus afterughing at Wace. He found Wace¡¯s taking precaution against a soulless dead body to be rather absurd.

    Wace forced an embarrassed smile and replied, ¡°It¡¯s always better to be cautious when dealing with this youngster.¡±

    With the party watching, Wace walked towards Han Shuo¡¯s body step by step. When he was less than a hundred meters away and considering if he shouldunch ranged attacks, a wild, chilling wind blew out of nowhere.

    In all of a sudden, hundreds of thousands of grey, ghostly strands rapidly regathered. The demon general energy that had scattered everywhere gushed back to where it was in an instant. The immaterial Han Shuo that had vanished without a trace reappeared in just a moment.

    ¡°Surprise, motherfucker!¡± the incorporeal Han Shuoughed out loud. His massive hand that was as fast as lightning shot out and grabbed the startled Wace. <i>Squish!</i> Han Shuo clenched his hand, crushing every bone and organ in Wace¡¯s body and squeezed his blood out.

    Against Yarus¡¯ ck hole attack, even Ss and Wasir who possessed overgod divine souls would stand no chance and they would be shredded into pieces. Han Shuo¡¯s miraculous consciousness, however, can be split into hundreds of thousands of strands. Even if it was shredded into a million pieces, it can still reassemble ande out unharmed.

    Not just Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, but even the thousands of demon generals were unharmed. The instant that he was enveloped by the ck hole, Han Shuo split his consciousness into thousands of strands and mixed them in the souls of the demon generals before immediately scattering them, thus escaping the ck hole¡¯s attack.

    The Myriad Demon Transformation was basically formed by hundreds upon thousands of strands of the consciousness and a great number of demon generals. Therefore, using the ck hole to shred his soul was like punching at water. It waspletely ineffective and a futile effort.

 Chapter 908 - Skynet

    <h4> 908: Sk</h4>

    If Han Shuo did not have absolute confidence, he wouldn¡¯t have taken the demonic infant out of the safety of his physical body and used it to withstand Yarus¡¯ ck hole. After all, the demonic infant and consciousness were the basis of his existence. If anything bad happens to those two things, Han Shuo would be in deep shit.

    His consciousness and demon generals that had scattered all around suddenly converged and reassembled. He then grabbed Wace before he could destroy his physical body and squeezed him to death.

    Han Shuo then quickly inhaled with his mouth, sucking Wace¡¯s divine soul into his stomach. He will store Wace in there until he is done wreaking havoc here and let the Cauldron of Myriad Demon turn his soul into one of his demon generals.

    All that happened in just seconds. Before Yarus, Darkwater, Darkstone, and the others could react, Han Shuo had taken Wace¡¯s life.

    ¡°How is this possible?!¡± Yarus had never shown any expression of panic, until now. From his understanding of the divine soul, a person would be absolutely dead once their soul was shredded. It should have been impossible for any soul to recover from that.

    But Yarus did not know that Han Shuo cultivated in demonic arts that originated from another universe which made Han Shuo¡¯s soul anything but ordinary. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness could split into hundreds upon thousands of strands and still be just fine. It was to be expected that the gods of Elysium wouldn¡¯t understand the miraculousness of Han Shuo¡¯s otherworldly consciousness.

    ¡°Haha! All of your barriers are gone. How are you gonna stop me now?¡± Han Shuo howled withughter before kicking on the ground with his massive foot tounch himself up. The Broadhurst Residence trembled again.

    Following his thought, the seventeen flying swords flew out from his physical body and went after Hofs, Ralph, and Larikson. Meanwhile, the massive Han Shuo made of the demonic infant and demon generals let out deafening roars as he ran ferociously at Yarus.

    His tremendous footsteps had shaken many of the buildings in and around the Broadhurst Residence into copsing. Even more gods spat blood and died to the destructive roar he made.

    Yarus was greatly rmed. Seeing that the massive Han Shuo wasing for him, he hastily assembled the energy of darkness. The clear sky above the Broadhurst Residence was quickly shrouded by intense darkness aura before it came crashing down on Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oh c¡¯mon, the same trick again? Is that all that you¡¯ve got?¡± Han Shuo raised his head and bellowed at the sky. His deafening voice that carried a bizarre power spread out as pulses. The soundwaves stopped the gathering of darkness energy and forcibly dispelled the darkness aura, allowing the sunlight to pierce through the sky and fall on the Broadhurst Residence.

    ¡°Aarrgghh... ¡° a miserable shriek suddenly sounded. Three flying swords had pierced through Ralph¡¯s torso.

    Ralph possessed just mid-stage highgod strength. He was no match against Han Shuo before Han Shuo left the Darkness Dominion. And now, after Han Shuo had advanced to Skybreak Realm, he stood even less of a chance. As one of the weakest of the party, it shouldn¡¯te as a surprise that he would be the first to perish.

    After Ralph was killed, the seventeen flying swords interweaved and formed a massive, deadly. Hofs, Larikson, Darkwater, and Darkstone were trapped inside the where the frigid aura and corrosive power were activated to the fullest. They exerted all their strength and yet, they could not break free from it.

    When ¡®Sk¡¯, a form of the Avici Godying Sword Formation, was deployed, it immediately sent Hofs and the others down a hole of despair. The ¡®Sk¡¯ would slowly shrink and those trapped in it would find their movable space bing smaller and smaller.

    The interweaving seventeen flying swords flew faster and faster as those trapped were forced into a smaller and smaller space. When the channeling wasplete, the flying swords would converge into a point and all those trapped in the Sk will have their body and soul destroyed.

    ¡°Aarrgghh... Aarrgghh...¡± Two shrieks came in quick sessions. They originated from Hofs and Larikson¡¯s mouths.

    ¡°Darkwater, Darkstone, how could you!¡± cried the pale-looking Hofs as he defended himself from Darkwater and Darkstone. They were squeezed into the space of an average room.

    ¡°Sorry guys, but there just won¡¯t be enough space for all four of us, ¡° replied Darkwater and Darkstone in a unison, chilling voice while attacking Hofs and Larikson.

    With each cycle that the seventeen flying swordspleted, the Sk will shrink by a certain amount. Eventually, the Sk will shrink to the point where there won¡¯t be enough space to fit four people.

    To allow themselves to survive for slightly longer, Darkwater and Darkstoneunched sneak attacks at Larikson and Hofs. Hofs and Larikson were on the back foot as they had suffered the twins¡¯ sneak attacks and they were weaker than the twins, to begin with. It appeared that they would soon be defeated.

    ¡°Hahaha, interesting, interesting!¡± Han Shuo who was beating Yarus backughed out loud. He did not expect that they would kill each other in such a situation

    ¡°Darkwater, Darkstone, don¡¯t you dare! Or I will kill you!¡± shouted Yarus when he saw that Larikson was severely injured and close to death.

    ¡°Don¡¯t even get me started, Yarus. If it wasn¡¯t for you, we wouldn¡¯t be in this situation!¡± scoffed Darkwater coldly. He then mercilessly impaled Larikson¡¯s head with a dark pick.

    Meanwhile, his twin, Darkstone, threw a punch on the badly injured Hofs and sent him into Han Shuo¡¯s Sk. As soon as Hofs made contact with the, his body immediately started melting and gave off thick smoke.

    ¡°Brother!!!¡± Yarus was furious. An intense darkness energy overflowed from his body and shrouded him. He unfurled his domain of divinity and every darkness element in the Broadhurst Residence flowed into him.

    It appeared that Yarus had lost his rationality after his brother¡¯s death. He no longer concealed his overgod aura, unleashed all his energy, and wildly charged towards Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was surprised that Yarus would be going all-in. He did not expect Yarus would be so close to Larikson. While watching Yarus ferociously charging at him, a thought struck Han Shuo and he suddenly moved aside.

    As Han Shuo suspected, Yarus did not pursue him but shot past him and continued on his path towards Darkwater and Darkstone who were still trapped inside the Sk.

    Han Shuo smirked mischievously. With one thought, the Sk was dissolved and the seventeen flying swords returned into his physical body. Han Shuo nned on grabbing his popcorn, watch Yarus fight Darkwater and Darkstone, then kill all of them with a sneak attack when he saw the opportunity.

    But all of a sudden, the element of darkness in the environment started behaving abnormally.

    In an instant, the element of darkness inside the Broadhurst Residence that had just been sucked dry by Yarus was replenished by more than a hundred, if not a thousand folds. The darkness elements were rapidly converging on the empty sky and an awareness that envelopes the entire City of Gorging Clouds were gradually forming.

    Han Shuo¡¯s face jolted and he immediately gave up on attacking Yarus, Darkwater, and Darkstone. The immaterial Han Shuo transformed into a twisted, ghostly shadow and immediately slithered into his main body that was sitting cross-legged motionlessly.

    Simultaneously, the darkness elements abruptly vanished from Yarus, Darkwater, and Darkstone. Even their divine energies werepletely restrained. Their world-shaking battle suddenly turned into aughable scuffle.

    Without the darkness element and divine energy, the three City Lords were no stronger than a puny basegod. Theirical kicks and punchesnded on their opponents but would do no damages.

    The three soon realized what was happening and their faces jolted. They simultaneously stopped fighting and looked towards the sky.

    Boundless darkness had enveloped the entire city as though light had forever vanished. There was an immensely heavy, stifling pressure in the atmosphere. Every citizen of the City of Gorging Clouds could not help themselves but automatically kowtowed, including Yarus, Darkwater, and Darkstone.

    After the consciousness and demonic infant returned to his physical body, Han Shuo immediately stood up. Upon sensing the darkness that had suddenly shrouded the City of Gorging Clouds, Han Shuo¡¯s face jolted. He realized that this existence that caused the environmental change was at least a hundred times stronger than overgods like Wasir or Ss. Han Shuo knew he had absolutely no chance against an existence of this level.

    Without thinking, Han Shuo activated the Demonic Blood Disassembly. A bloody radiance shed and Han Shuo was gone from the city.

    Hofs and Wace, two of the City Lords of the Darkness Dominion, must have the Divine Brands of the Overgod of Darkness in their divine souls. The Darkness Overgod must have been alerted by their deaths through those Divine Brands and therefore descended upon the City of Gorging Clouds.

    Overgods with the Quintessence were the source of energy. They could create and destroy energy and possessed aplete understanding of their element or edict. An Overgod with a Quintessence was simply iparable to one without.

    In the infinity vast universe, there will always and forever be one holder of the Quintessence of Darkness. Knowing that he was no match against such an existence, Han Shuo promptly decided to activate Demonic Blood Disassembly. He would injure himself just to quickly get far out of the city.

 Chapter 909 - Mysterious God

    GDK 909: Mysterious God

    Yarus, Darkwater, and Darkstone had long stopped fighting. They kowtowed on the ground as a familiar aura of divinity emanating from the sky filled their humbled hearts.

    A death-like trance seized upon every living being in the City of Gorging Clouds. Every god in the city stopped whatever they were doing and instinctively kowtowed with respect and fear.

    The city had sunken into absolute darkness and silence as though all the world was dead and cold; as though there was no night or day, but only darkness. The concentration of the darkness element in the environment became a few hundred times more intense than usual and all other elements had been disced.

    The elements of darkness had been converging above the Broadhurst Residence and grew more and more intense at a frightful velocity. And soon, a massive figure with an indistinct outline was formed. A divine aura of pure austerity, dignity, and magnificence erupted and it caused many to awe and tremble.

    ¡°Yarus, Darkwater, Darkstone. Let go of your grievances. You are all City Lords of My Dominion. Do not fight among yourselves over a matter so small, ¡° a deep, reprimanding voice sounded from the sky. It was not advice but amand that was to be obeyed.

    The three who were fighting each other to death immediately replied affirmatively in respectful manners.

    Yarus then raised his head and gazed at the colossal figure made of pure darkness energy. He respectfully requested, ¡°My Overlord, Hofs and Wace have just been killed. The one they call Bryan is a great menace to Your Dominion. Even I could not defeat him. My Overgod, please put an end to his existence!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m aware. He will not return to My Dominion. But if he does, I will end him,¡± replied the colossal figure in the sky. Then, It instructed Yarus, ¡°Ry Mymands: Andre of the Sainte House will be the City Lord of the City of Shadows; Felder of the Lavers House will be the City Lord of Hushveil City.¡±

    Yarus was stunned and puzzled. He did not understand why the Darkness Overgod did not kill Han Shuo. From Yarus¡¯ point of view, even though Han Shuo had disappeared from the city using a miraculous method, if the Darkness Overgod wanted to, Han Shuo would have no chance of leaving the Darkness Dominion alive.

    ¡°Is there a problem?¡± the imposing voice sounded when Yarus did not immediately reply to Hismand. Although His voice was just very slightly lower in pitch, all those who heard it would feel an overwhelming dread.

    Yarus was frightened and he hastily answered, ¡°My Overlord, I will do as You bid. But, My Lord, I do not know where Felder or his Lavers Family is.¡±

    It was true that Yarus had no clue where Felder was. The Lavers Family used to live in the City of Gorging Clouds. But after Larikson¡¯s son was murdered by Han Shuo, Felder had evacuated the city with his family n. Larikson had been hunting for the Lavers Family but he could find nothing.

    ¡°That, you need not know. Just disseminate Mymands and Felder and his Lavers House wille to Hushveil City,¡± replied the Darkness Overgod.

    Yarus immediately knew that the Darkness Overgod must have His ns. Felder and his House of Lavers had been driven away from the City of Shadows by Wace to the City of Gorging Clouds for refuge, and forced to flee and hide after the murder of Larikson¡¯s son. Yarus could see that although the Lavers House was still alive, they were as good as dead. But thismand of the Darkness Overgod would soon turn everything around for the Lavers.

    Although Yarus could not understand why the Overgod would do so, he respectfully nodded and acknowledged His instructions.

    ¡°Good,¡± the Overgod was pleased. Then, suddenly, the boundless darkness that flooded the city started vanishing like a receding tide. An arrow of sunlight struck thend as the darkness melted into the returning brilliance. The city came back to life again.

    Yarus got back to his feet and heaved a sigh of relief. He turned to Darkwater and Darkstone, put on a hateful face, and said, ¡°If it wasn¡¯t for the Overgod, know that I would never have spared your lives!¡±

    Darkwater rolled his eyes and replied, ¡°Pfft. Yarus, we answered your call and traveled thousands of miles just to help you. And now you want to me us for what happened? Your brother¡¯s death is ultimately caused by Bryan. Even if we had done nothing, your brother would still have ended up dead. You should have gone for him, not us.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Had the Dark Lord not shown up on time, we might have died here. Yarus, it¡¯s you who owes us a favor, not the other way around!¡± said Darkstone disdainfully.

    ¡°Hmph, if Wace and Hofs had not offered you two a fresh crystal mine, would you havee?¡± scoffed Yarus before he said, ¡°But let¡¯s forget about it. They are dead and we get nothing. Sigh, I don¡¯t understand why didn¡¯t the Dark Lord kill him. If His Lordship wanted, there is no way that Bryan could escape.¡±

    Darkwater and Darkstone put on puzzled looks. Darkwater hesitated for a moment and looked around the sky before he quietly suggested, ¡°Wace has mentioned that the kid is close to the daughter of the Destiny Goddess. Could this be the reason?¡±

    Yarus¡¯ eyes twinkled after hearing those words and he nodded slowly and lightly. He replied, ¡°Maybe, but I suspect there¡¯s more to it. But well, it¡¯s none of our business. You guys should ry The Lord¡¯smands as well. How unexpected and how fortunate of Felder to join our ranks.¡±

    Darkwater and Darkstone scratched their heads as they could not understand the reasoning behind the Darkness Overgod¡¯s decisions. They then started leaving the City of Gorging Clouds.

    *** Atop a bald mountain Northwest of the City of Gorging Clouds, Han Shuo was drenched with blood and was heavily gasping for breath.

    The Omen Invincible Body was automatically activated and the demonic yuan rapidly circted around his body. A few secondster, the blood stopped flowing out from his body and started flowing backward instead. His torn flesh, bones, blood vessels, and meridians wriggled back into their normal positions. The wounds on his body started healing at an unnaturally fast rate.

    After attaining the Skybreak Realm in demonic arts, Han Shuo¡¯s body repairing speed had grown to the point where the damages that Demonic Blood Disassembly would cause to his body was no longer all that troubling. He sent demonic yuan around his body and easily repaired the damages.

    Han Shuo needed a rtively brief time topletely heal himself from injuries of such severity. But he had no time to waste. After stabilizing his condition, Han Shuo started leaving the Darkness Dominion. Han Shuo felt a great sense of threat when the Darkness Overgod suddenly made an appearance. He knew that he was no match against the Overgod for now and therefore he needed to leave the Darkness Dominion as soon as possible.

    The power of the Darkness Overgod was just too frightening. There wasn¡¯t a moment when he felt safe inside the Darkness Dominion!

    Han Shuo activated his energy to the fullest and tried to leave the Dominion as quickly as he could. After seven days of marathoning, Han Shuo heaved a breath of relief for he had finally stepped out of the Darkness Dominion and came to the shared border with the Death Dominion.

    In his trip to the Darkness Dominion, Han Shuo had aplished his objectives by killing Wace, Hofs, Larikson, and Ralph. However, by murdering those people, Han Shuo had offended Yarus, Darkwater, and Darkstone. He might have even provoked the Darkness Overgod. But Han Shuo believed that once he returned to the Fringe and settled the House of Han in the Pandemonium, they would have no fear of these threats.

    <i><i>I have killed two of his City Lords. Why didn¡¯t he attack me?</i></i> thought Han Shuo.

    The only matter that still rather bothered Han Shuo was the Darkness Overgod. He did not understand why the Overgod had not tried to kill him when he had caused such a great disturbance in the Darkness Dominion. Based on the strength that the Darkness Overgod revealed in the City of Gorging Clouds, Han Shuo knew that he wouldn¡¯t have been able to escape so easily if the Overgod had tried to stop him in any manner.

    Han Shuo had been stuck on the question for a long time. But even after he entered the Ronson Canyon, he was still nowhere close to unraveling the puzzle.

    Han Shuo decided to ease his mind of the thought momentarily and go about with his business. He expanded his consciousness and quickly found a godhunter who had concealed himself.

    Han Shuo¡¯s body vanished and reappeared before the godhunter in a snap. Before the godhunter could react, Han Shuo buckled his neck, immobilized him, and asked, ¡°Where is Scarlett?¡±

    ¡°Who are you? What do you look for our Chief for?!¡± shouted the panicking godhunter.

    ¡°Oops.¡± Han Shuo put on a smile, let go of the godhunter, and replied, ¡°I¡¯m from the House of Han. Scarlett has assisted us and I want to personally thank her for her help.¡±

    The godhunter heaved a sigh of relief after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s reply but he remained very cautious. He asked, ¡°But, how can I know if you are actually from the House of Han?¡±

    Han Shuo bunched his brows slightly and asked, ¡°Han Hao used to be in charge of everything here, right?¡±

    The godhunter showed revering emotions when he heard the name ¡®Han Hao¡¯. He asked, ¡°Yes, back when he was still in Ronson Canyon, every godhunter here had to obey his words. Do you know Han Hao?¡±

    Han Shuo smiled and replied, ¡°Take a good look at me. Don¡¯t you think that I look a lot like Han Hao?¡±

    It seemed as though the godhunter was only aware of it after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s words. He squinted and looked carefully at Han Shuo before his eyes widened and he immediately replied, ¡°Alright, I shall lead you to my Chief!¡±

    Han Shuo traveled deeper into the Ronson Canyon with the godhunter leading him the way. Along his journey, Han Shuo discovered many well-concealed godhunters as though they were on a major operation. Out of curiosity, Han Shuo asked, ¡°What are you all hiding all around for?¡±

    ¡°We are scouting for movements and activities. There have recently been quite a number of people traveling from the Death Dominion to the Destruction Dominion. They originated from various family ns of the Destruction Dominion. We Ronson Canyon godhunters are nning and preparing to attack the smaller ones, ¡± answered the godhunter truthfully.

    With one thought, Han Shuo realized why there were suddenly so many family ns leaving the Death Dominion.

    These people from the Destruction Dominion had probably traveled to Witherbone City for matters rting to the House of Han. They must have realized that the Witherbone City was now Deadbone City and therefore left the Death Dominion.

 Chapter 910 - Reciprocating

    GDK 910:<strong> Reciprocating</strong>

    The godhunter led Han Shuo all the way to a pond below a tall and steep waterfall. But before they got close, a squadron of godhunters intercepted them. They were led by a man who had a deep red nose. He unmannerly shouted, ¡°Lamb, what are you here for? Your chief is busy discussing business and you should be out there patrolling!¡±

    Although the guy with a red nose was shouting at Lamb, his eyes would repeatedly shift towards Han Shuo. As godhunters of the Ronson Canyon, despite having different Chiefs and in different factions, the godhunters were acquainted with each other. The godhunter with a red nose could tell that Han Shuo was not one of them and was therefore rather cautious towards him.

    Lamb bowed his body slightly and took a humble posture. He smilingly replied, ¡°Please notify my Chief that an important guest would like to meet her.¡±

    The red nose furrowed his brows and said in an annoyed manner, ¡°Did you not hear what I say? Your Chief is in the middle of an important meeting. All matter can wait until the meeting is over. Do you not understand the rules?¡±

    Lamb stared nkly for a moment before he turned to Han Shuo and helplessly said, ¡°I¡¯m sorry, but we will have to wait. I believe the meeting will be over soon.¡±

    Han Shuo bunched his brows. With one thought, a demon general of his stealthily flew into the waterfall and entered the expansive cave underneath it.

    Han Shuo saw that Scarlett and a number of faction leaders were having a heated discussion. They seem to disagree on when they should strike their prey. They were flushed with anger and their voices were growing fiercer.

    After the demon general went around the cave system and surveyed the situation, Han Shuo calmly announced, ¡°I¡¯m going in.¡±

    ¡°But... ¡° Lamb was surprised that Han Shuo wanted to intrude the cave. He anxiously tried to persuade Han Shuo to wait but was interrupted.

    ¡°You are a bit deaf aren¡¯t you, friendo? Imma kill you if you take another fucking step,¡± warned the red nose in an unfriendly voice after immediately stepping into Han Shuo¡¯s path.

    Han Shuo gently lifted his left hand and patted the shoulder of the red nose. <i><i>Crack!</i></i> The loud noise of bones shattering sounded from every inch of his body. He spasmed as blood gushed out from his orifices.

    Then suddenly, <i><i>St!</i></i> His head exploded and his brain matter painted the t gray rock nearby like abstract art.

    ¡°Enemy! Enemy!¡± those godhunters standing behind the red nose shouted at the top of their lungs after their leader was murdered.

    ¡°How, how could you?!¡± Lamb was frightened and rmed. He did not understand why Han Shuo would do something so reckless.

    Han Shuo cracked a grin and said to Lamb, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, you will be alright!¡± Then, Han Shuo transformed into a trail of shadow and weaved among the squadron of godhunters, butchering them in an instance. He continued walking leisurely towards the waterfall.

    ¡°Enemy! We have an intruder!¡±

    ¡°Enemy outside the cave! Everyone gather!¡±

    The panic cries of godhunters sounded everywhere and those who had been hiding around the waterfall immediately rushed to the crime scene. They were all effortlessly killed by Han Shuo and their divine souls were collected into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon.

    Lamb was terrified. He kept a safe distance from Han Shuo, fearing that Han Shuo might suddenly turn to attack him.

    Despite being extremely loud in their discussions, those faction leaders noticed the disturbance outside the cave. They stopped their meeting and went outside to check out what was happening.

    When they exited the waterfall, they saw that the ground was fully covered with dead bodies. Their skeleton and organs had beenpletely crushed and shattered by brute power and their divine souls were gone.

    And standing calmly on the bodies of his victims was Han Shuo, the murderer.

    ¡°Who are you? What do you want?¡± shouted one of the faction leaders in a stern voice.

    ¡°I¡¯m the Patriarch of the House of Han. I¡¯vee to reap your souls!¡± said Han Shuo casually and smilingly.

    ¡°Why, why would you do that? We did not attack the House of Han when they passed through the Ronson Canyon. We have no quarrel with each other!¡± The faction leader was shocked and terrified upon learning Han Shuo¡¯s identity. He had heard a thing or two about Han Shuo¡¯s tremendous power from hearsays originating from Witherbone City.

    ¡°You did not attack not because you did not want to, but only out of fear for Han Hao. Otherwise, the House of Han might already be dead,¡± exined Han Shuo casually. Before they could refute, a swarm of demon generals appeared and pounced at the faction leaders like a massive dark wave.

    Han Shuo had attacked these faction leaders not just to supply more soul energy to the Cauldron of Myriad Demon. He wanted to take their highgod souls, erase their memories and self-awareness, and turn them into spirits that would help his House of Han members advance in their cultivation.

    Those faction leaders were rapidly immobilized by therge swarm of demon generals. No one could put up a resistance or even escape. Their flesh and blood were rapidly devoured by the demon generals. Even those godhunters who had been lingering some distance from them were hunted down and attacked.

    In less than five minutes, every godhunters in and around the cave had been murdered by the demon generals. Han Shuo captured their divine souls and stored them in the Cauldron. The memories and self-awareness of those faction leaders had been erased. Those tab rasa souls contained nothing but insights and understanding of the fundamental forces.

    Other than Han Shuo, only Scarlett and Lamb were still standing.

    When Scarlett saw the sky of demon general swarming at her, she felt despair, thinking she was about to die tragically to Han Shuo. But when the menacing dark cloud reached her, they gently flew past her as though she was not there. Not a single demon general attacked her. She was pleasantly surprised and immediately realized that she was spared for her going out of her way to assist the House of Han.

    A feeling of respect rose in her heart as she sensed the terrifying power of those demon generals all around her. She suddenly understood why Hao Han would possess such a mysterious and terrifying power.

    Momentster, Han Shuo was done with his ughtering and all the demon generals returned into the Cauldron. There was no longer any threat around them.

    It was now that Han Shuo turned to Scarlett and smilingly asked, ¡°You must be Scarlett?¡±

    Scarlett was somewhat surprised to hear Han Shuo speak her name. She respectfully bowed at Han Shuo and humbly replied, ¡°Yes, Sir, I¡¯m. How may I help you?¡±

    ¡°Haha, my son has told me about you, that you have helped my House of Han. I happen to pass through Ronson Canyon so I thought I should pay you a visit and purge the Canyon of certain filths,¡± said Han Shuo in a cordial manner.

    Scarlett seemed somewhat surprised that Han Shuo, who had just effortlessly ughtered every godhunter faction leader in Ronson Canyon, would speak to her so politely. She respectfully asked, ¡°This son of yours, who spoke of me, is he...?¡±

    ¡°He¡¯s Han Hao! You do know him, right?¡± replied Han Shuo smilingly.

    Scarlett seemed strangely emotional when she heard Han Hao¡¯s name. She flusteredly nodded and replied, ¡°I do, I do...¡± She took a short pause before she mumbled, ¡°I should have expected that... Not only do you have simr looks, but even your auras and demeanors are also simr... ¡°

    ¡°Han Hao has separated from the Godhunter Alliance. It will only be a matter of time before he bes an enemy with the Death Hegemon. I heard that you have a pretty good rtionship with Han Hao. You wouldn¡¯t want to be his enemy, would you? Why don¡¯t you move to the Fringe? You know, Han Hao is there as well!¡± said Han Shuo. He realized something from her bodynguage.

    Scarlett became even more flustered and her face a little redder. Mixed emotions of doubt, touched, and pleasantly surprised could be seen on her face. After shifting her gaze between Han Shuo and the ground for a while, she nervously and gently asked, ¡°Is this invitation from you or from Han Hao?¡±

    ¡°Erm... ¡° Han Shuo stared nkly for a bit before he smilingly replied, ¡°You could say that it¡¯s an invitation from the both of us. If it wasn¡¯t for your assistance, our House of Han might have all perished in this Canyon. Han Hao and I are very grateful for your help. If you stay in Ronson Canyon, there mighte a day that you will be Han Hao¡¯s enemy. That is why we hope that you will separate from the Godhunter Alliance and move to the Fringe.¡±

    ¡°If Han Hao wants me at the Fringe, then I will get ready right away!¡± said Scarlett without any hesitation as soon as she heard that it was Han Hao¡¯s intention, as though she had decided on the matter long ago.

    Han Shuo felt happy and rather surprised. He did not expect that Han Hao could make Scarlett fall so madly in love with him to be willing to abandon everything she had built in Ronson Canyon and relocate to the Fringe.

    After all other godhunter faction leaders of Ronson Canyon were murdered, if Scarlett was to stay in the Canyon, she could easily take over those leaderless factions and be the most powerful person in Ronson Canyon. But Scarlett was willing to give up all that for Han Hao without thinking. Han Shuo was rather surprised by that.

    Han Shuo then noticed that although Scarlett had a voluptuous body, she had two repulsive scars on her face. Han Shuo immediately had an idea.

    ¡°Scarlett,e over. Let me get rid of those scars!¡± said Han Shuo.

    Scarlett seemed as though she could not believe she had heard. She stared at Han Shuo and stammered, ¡°You... you mean... you can get rid... the scars on my face...?¡±

    ¡°Of course. It¡¯s quite easy,¡± replied Han Shuo confidently as though he could treat her problems without any difficulty.

    Scarlett was ted. If it was someone else who said those words, she might not believe it. Shepletely believed in Han Shuo¡¯s ability because he was well-known on every corner of Elysium for his miraculous art of healing as the master of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. She happily walked to Han Shuo.

 Chapter 911 - Enemies joining forces

    GDK 911: Enemies joining forces

    The scar on Scarlett¡¯s face was so fierce and terrifying that it wouldpletely stop every ordinary man from having fancying thoughts of her.

    But she had a curvaceous body and a translucent, silky-smooth skin. She would be a wless, extremely attractive-looking woman if not for those scars.

    Han Shuo inwardly approved of Scarlett, feeling that she will be a suitable partner for Han Hao. He was especially impressed that she would give up being the ruler of Ronson Canyon just for Han Hao. Han Shuo thought that it would be wonderful to have Scarlett as his daughter-inw.

    Scarlett walked to Han Shuo with her head lowered and she seemed rather fidgety and shy. She was a little worried about how Han Shuo would think of her as he was the father of the man he fancied.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, the procedure is quite simple,¡± consoled Han Shuo smilingly after seeing that Scarlett was nervous.

    As he spoke, he raised his left hand and ced it a few millimeters above her face. A warm grey gas emerged and gently flowed into her face. An energy guided by his consciousness started operating at the cellr level, removing unwanted cells and reconstructing some.

    ¡°You might feel some heat as I remove the scar tissues. It¡¯s nothing to be worried about,¡± said Han Shuo rxedly as he guided the energy emanating from his palm around Scarlett¡¯s cheeks.

    Han Shuo had extremely precise and urate control over demonic yuan energy and he could effortlessly alter the properties and metabolic rate of the cells on her face. Others might take centuries to treat such a scar but Han Shuo could fix it in just minutes.

    Momentster, Han Shuo withdrew his hand, and smilingly said to Scarlett, ¡°Alright, it¡¯s done. Take a look in your mirror!¡±

    Scarlett opened her eyes and gazed at Han Shuo for a moment before she rather embarrassedly replied, ¡°I don¡¯t have a mirror... ¡°

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before immediatelying to his senses. <i>Of course! I¡¯m such an idiot, I should have thought of that!</i>

    Han Shuo smiled, took out a mirror from his space ring, and handed it to Scarlett. ¡°Have this. You should use it more often!¡±

    After taking a short pause, Han Shuo took out a bottle of medicine and handed it to Scarlett as he instructed, ¡°This is one of the medicines that I made for Carmelita of the City of Shadows back then. It is suitable for you as well. Apply it on the scars twice a day. In one month, they will vanish without a trace.¡±

    After taking the medicine bottle from Han Shuo, Scarlett took a deep breath and mustered the courage to look in the mirror. She eximed when she saw that the two,rge horrifying scars were now two barely visible red lines. Scarlett could not be happier and she emotionally said to Han Shuo, ¡°Thank you, thank you so much!¡±

    Han Shuo replied, ¡°No, it is me who should thank you. Without your help, my House of Han would have been exterminated in this Canyon.¡±

    Scarlett kept away the bottle of medicine and a brilliant smile blossomed on her face. She said to Han Shuo, ¡°I will do the necessary arrangements in Ronson Canyon and head to the Fringe as soon as possible.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and smilingly said, ¡°That¡¯d be great. I believe that Han Hao will be shocked to see you again, haha.¡±

    After the scar was almostpletely gone from her face, Scarlett became more confident than ever before, especially when facing the man she loved. She was excited to meet Han Hao in her confident, wless self.

    ¡°Right, how did you get those scars? I can tell that they were made by a sharp tool. Who did it to you?¡± seeing that Scarlett was in a good mood, Han Shuo finally asked the question.

    Scarlett hesitated for a bit before she answered, ¡°I did it to myself,¡± giving Han Shuo a shock.

    Before Han Shuo could ask the reason, Scarlett exined, ¡°Back then, my family n was attacked and we suffered a crushing defeat. Every male member was killed or forced into very while female members were raped and then sold as sex ves. To avoid being defiled, I cut my face.¡±

    After learning of Scarlett¡¯s tragic past, Han Shuo¡¯s face turned dark and he asked, ¡°Are your enemies still alive?¡±

    ¡°After I be a godhunter, I have been doing everything within my means to raise my strength. I got my revenge many years ago. But thank you for asking.¡± Scarlett immediately knew that Han Shuo intended to help her exact vengeance. She appreciated the kindness. She felt that although Han Shuo and Han Hao were ruthless to their enemies, they cannot be more loyal to their friends.

    Han Shuo nodded and said, ¡°Well then, I should get going. Right, if you run into any trouble in the Fringe, just speak my name. No one should be foolish enough to harm you.¡±

    In Ronson Canyon, Scarlett was among the strongest experts. But in the Fringe, an early-stage highgod like her was pretty ordinary. Even a small faction in the Fringe would be a highgod. As those new to the Fringe would be bullied or targeted, it was likely that she would face troubles in the Chaotic Land.

    ¡°I will be careful,¡± replied Scarlett cheerfully in a beautiful smile.

    Han Shuo said farewell to Scarlett and left.

    Han Shuo had always been a person who reciprocates both kindness and malice. He took his revenge against Hofs, Wace, and the others, but he did not forget repaying Scarlett¡¯s kindness. Seeing that he had aplished his objectives, Han Shuo decided to return to the Fringe.

    *** On a murky, gloomy, and deste graveyard where bones were littered all over the ground. Faint, ghostly green lights would randomly sh in the thick mist.

    A tomb that was buried deep under the ground suddenly erupted with bright lightning shes. A majestic figure emerged from the tomb and he took a deep breath.

    A peal of sinisterughter then sounded from an even bigger grave. It asked, ¡°Hehe, Ss, you have fully recovered from your injuries, right?¡±

    The bright electrical sparks on his body forced the mist to dissipate. He stomped on a massive skeletal frame and it was wrapped with lightning bolts before immediately pulverized. Ss¡¯ sparking eyes turned to the grave and replied, ¡°Thanks a lot. Without the assistance of your Godhunter Alliance, I wouldn¡¯t have recovered so soon.¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re wee, you¡¯re most wee! Hehe, but don¡¯t forget about the things you promise you¡¯d do for us in return!¡± The person inside that grave sounded extremely cunning. He said, ¡°Tyre, Logue, and the others have ruled the Fringe for too long. It¡¯s about time someone else takes their ces. We Godhunter Alliance have drooled over that wonderful ce for a long time!¡±

    ¡°Tyre, Logue, and the others sharing a piece of the Omphalos with the kid meant that they have recognized his position. Humph, in any case, I no longer have a ce in the Fringe and I can¡¯t return. Whatever you do to them or that ce, I no longer care!¡± remarked Ss angrily. He seemed very discontented with the Sovereigns¡¯ actions.

    ¡°Good, good. Ey Ss, I heard that the nemesis of your has left the Fringe. He¡¯s been in the limelight around the Darkness and Death Dominions. How about we join forces and stop him from returning to the Fringe?¡± suggested the person in the grave in a smiling voice.

    Ss stared nkly for a moment before he sneered and said, ¡°That kid is as elusive as a ghost, but you somehow know his whereabouts?¡±

    ¡°I received intel three days ago that the Ronson Canyon had been purged of godhunters. That guy is currently heading back to the Fringe from the Death Dominion. Hehe, this is my territory. I have the most extensive intelligencework after the Death Overgod. As long as he¡¯s in the Death Dominion, it¡¯s not that hard to locate him,¡± replied the person in the grave in a confident voice.

    It was obvious from Ss¡¯ expression that he was interested in the idea. After hesitating for a moment, Ss said, ¡°I had fought that guy twice. He is extremely vicious and treacherous. It¡¯s easier to defeat old foxes like Tyre and Logue than to defeat him. Not to mention, that kid is extremely good at escaping. He¡¯s extremely vengeful and his strength improves at lightning speed. If we do not have overwhelming power against him, then just forget about assaulting him.¡±

    ¡°Ss, don¡¯t tell me that you are afraid of that kid?¡± the person in the graveughed out loud before he said, ¡°You have been dominating the Fringe for countless years. Even we Hegemons of the Godhunter Alliance are very admiring of you, so much so that we dare not invade the Fringe. It is obvious that the kid took advantage of you while you were weak. Why would you be afraid of him? Are you still the Ss that we know?¡±

    Others may think that Han Shuo managed to defeat Ss because thetter was in a disadvantaged situation, but Ss knew that his defeat was not out of bad circumstances, and he knew better than anyone else just how terrifying Han Shuo¡¯s power was. Therefore, no matter how the person in the grave instigated him, Ss rejected the offer. He coldly replied, ¡°Unless you can somehow guarantee that we have no chance of failure, I will not step up and fight him!¡±

    The person in the grave went silent for a while as though he could not understand why Ss would be so wary of that kid. Momentster, after thinking about it carefully, heughed mischievously and said, ¡°Me, the Hegemons of Destruction and Darkness, and you ¨C four overgods altogether. Are you in?¡±

    Ss jolted. He stared at the grave puzzlingly and asked, ¡°What grudges does the Godhunter Alliance have with him that the three of you would join forces to kill him?¡±

    ¡°One of my chiefs that I¡¯m most impressed with called Han Hao, betrayed me for this guy after he moved to the Fringe. And back then, when he was in the Darkness Dominion, he led people into destroying one of our branches. And just days ago, he had wiped out our people in Ronson Canyon. His existence is severely threatening the interests of our Godhunter Alliance. As you say, his strength improves rapidly. We need to get rid of him as soon as possible,¡± replied the person in the grave in a sinister voice.

    He took a short pause before he continued, ¡°With the four of us, even Tyre will be dead without a doubt. So, are you in or not?¡±

    Ss hesitated for a moment. He recalled the destruction of his Empyrean Peak and hardened his heart. He shouted, ¡°Fuck it! Fine, I¡¯ll do it!¡±

 Chapter 912 - Misty Sea

    <h4>GDK 912: Misty Sea</h4>

    One was certain to step into the Misty Sea while traveling to the Fringe from the Death Dominion. After traversing the Misty Sea and crossing two towering mountains, one would officially step out of the Death Dominion.

    The sea was called the Misty Sea because every inch of it was constantly shrouded by a thick mist connecting the surface of the sea to the sky. The mist was so thick and dense that even the most intense sunlight could not reach the sea.

    The vast ocean was home to innumerable bizarre and odd sea creatures. There were a number of non-human races that lived at the depths of the sea all year. They would never step ashore or interact with beings that lived onnd.

    It was very easy to lose one¡¯s way in the Misty Sea. There was no monument orndmark for reference, but endless stretches of confusing whiteness. Gods traveling alone in the sea, without adequate strength, would most likely be prey to the godhunters and lose their lives in the Misty Sea.

    One day, while journeying home from the Death Dominion, Han Shuo finally came to the Misty Sea. He gazed at the endless whiteness that veiled the sea and noticed that the mist was much more intense than thest time he was there.

    In addition, he noticed that the elements of death and darkness were somewhat more intense than in the past. He was also surprised to discover that no godhunters were wandering aimlessly around the sea looking for prey.

    Months ago, while entering the Death Dominion, Han Shuo discovered many godhunters lurking in the Misty Sea. A few of them were even foolish enough to provoke him. After Han Shuo ughtered those fools, he simply cast their bodies into the sea and gave the massive sea creatures a feast.

    Many godhunters would patrol the Misty Sea in groups. Thanks to the natural visual obstacle, no one could see theming or avoid them. And once they run into a prey, they would attack in a group. If their prey turned out to be stronger, they could easily use the mist to escape.

    It was as though the ocean was made for godhunters!

    Soon after entering the Misty Sea, Han Shuo started going around and scanned the sea with his consciousness. He detected no life forms other than sea creatures. He thought that it was rather regrettable and he found it a little strange.

    Along his journey home, Han Shuo had wiped out dozens of big and small godhunter factions. Following the information provided by Scarlett, he went to the regions that godhunters usually gathered and used his extraordinarily powerful soul sensing power to find and hunt them.

    From Ronson Canyon to the Misty Sea, Han Shuo had killed more than five hundred godhunters. With their divine souls, Cauldron of Myriad Demon had gained more than five hundred demon generals.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t rmed by the strange changes to the Misty Sea and continued his journey. As there were no godhunter to hunt, Han Shuo decided not to stay too long in the Misty Sea for there was nothing for him to gain. He flew across the ocean at high speed.

    When he had traveled halfway into the ocean, his consciousness suddenly jolted. A sense of danger suddenly filled his heart.

    Han Shuo bunched his brows and suddenly halted. He first cleared his mind of random thoughts and focused his consciousness on the sensation that suddenly swarmed into his heart.

    After attaining the Skybreak Realm in demonic arts, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness had be extremely sensitive to impending dangers. Whenever that was a real danger looming, he could always sense it in advance and take the necessary actions to avert a disaster.

    When the sense of danger came to his heart and after taking a moment to think, he immediately connected the dots. He realized that it wasn¡¯t a coincidence that brought so many usual changes to the Misty Sea.

    Han Shuo transformed his consciousness into hundreds of thousands of strands and spread them all around him while sending several dozens of demon generals from his body. They spread everywhere to look for the source of danger.

    ¡°Who is it?¡± shouted Han Shuo, but there was no reply.

    After thetest advancement in his strength, Han Shuo possessed absolute confidence against any opponent, save for an Overgod with the Quintessence. Han Shuo ruled out the possibility that it was an Overgod as they were proud characters and their pride wouldn¡¯t allow them to mount a sneak attack against anyone.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness and demon general had extended to every corner of the Misty Sea but had discovered nothing. However, not only was the sense of danger not disappearing, it was growing more and more intense. Han Shuo understood that his enemy must be somewhere in the Misty Sea.

    With one thought, Han Shuo withdrew his consciousness and demon generals back into his body. He let out a cold groan and continued flying away from the Misty Sea at an even greater speed.

    Han Shuo reasoned that if his enemy was hiding in the Misty Sea, then they must be nning to use the special features of the Sea against him. They wouldn¡¯t want Han Shuo to leave the Sea and will do everything they can to intercept him, thus they will be forced toe out from hiding, revealing themself.

    And Han Shuo was correct.

    When he tried leaving the Misty Sea at an even greater speed, the elements of death and darkness in the Misty Sea bizarrely started gathering. In an instant, the white mist transformed into ck smoke.

    The aura of death started ravaging on the surface of the sea. It was mixed with the chilling sea breeze and spread to the entire sea within a short time.

    In an instant, Han Shuo detected that manyyers of barriers were deployed around the Misty Sea and they were converging towards him.

    After carefully sensing the gathering rate of the elements of death and darkness, Han Shuo¡¯s face jolted and he was rather surprised.

    With his acute senses, judging from the gathering rate of the elements of death and darkness, Han Shuo was able to determine the number and strengths of his enemy. He knew that there were at least two overgods who cultivated the energy of death and darkness. Although they do not possess the Quintessence, two overgods were still a very formidable power.

    When Han Shuo was about to say something, he suddenly discovered that the seawater below him was boiling. The dark seawater was filled with the energy of destruction. They were turning the seawater into solid, growing columns. It was an overgod of destruction!

    Han Shuo was astonished. He did not expect that there would be three overgods hiding in ambush.

    In the next instance, a stream of lightning bolts shot through the mists. It then split up into thousands of lightning bolts and weaved a giant on the sky.

    Han Shuo was not familiar with the death, destruction, or the darkness auras. But Han Shuo was familiar with the aura on the lightning bolts and immediately figured out who deployed the lighting energy barrier. He raised his head, looked at the sky, and shouted, ¡°So it turns out to be you, Ss! I must admit, I¡¯m quite surprised that you could recover so quickly and even find three powerful assistants to assault me. You must have schemed long and hard for this.¡±

    The majestic figure of Ss gradually appeared in the mist. He stared down at Han Shuo from high in the sky and put on a smirk, ¡°Well, you got it wrong, kid. It¡¯s not me who nned the assault ¨C it¡¯s the other three. I¡¯m just tagging along!¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment and with one thought, he immediately understood the situation. He suddenly burst intoughter and said, ¡°I see! It seems that my butchering of the godhunters has finally provoked a counterattack from the high-ups. Haha, it¡¯s just that I did not expect the counterattack to be so fierce!¡±

    Soon, a colossal figure gradually appeared from the dark. He had a pair of cold green eyes that looked as though two green crescent moons, staring down at Han Shuo. His terrifying aura of destruction seemed to be stirring the seawater, causing them to move around erratically.

    Next, the boundless darkness grew more and more intense. A massive dark figure enveloped by the most intense element of darkness gradually appeared. Only his vague outline could be seen.

    Shortly after, a throne made of bones appeared out of nowhere. A figure wearing a white mask whose body was wrapped by an intense aura of death sat on it. The aura of death was constantly moving around, giving the person an indefinite outline.

    The three overgods showed up one after another. They would wear a mask or hide under the darkness, not revealing their true appearances. It seemed the Hegemons were very cautious about revealing their identities.

    After the three Hegemon showed up, Han Shuo turned to the colossal figure and smilingly shouted, ¡°Hey, it¡¯s you! I¡¯ve seen you before!¡±

    Back then when Han Shuo lived in the City of Shadows, Han Shuo discovered a Godhunter Alliance base and he brought Erebus, Aobashi, and the others to tten it. The colossal figure showed up in the underground pce in the base and it nearly killed them all.

    And when Han Shuo was still a mortal, when he was still on the Profound Continent, this massive figure had also appeared in the Cemetery of Death. It tried to make Han Shuo surrender his soul and be its ve.

    Han Shuo did not expect that after so many years, he would meet this overgod of destruction face to face in the Misty Sea.

    By now, Han Shuo could tell that the colossal figure was just a hallucination created to mask his real appearance. But as his strength was extremely terrifying, most experts cannot tell that it was a hallucination and thought that he was actually that massive.

    When facing such a colossal figure with such mighty energy, those who had weak minds would easily be intimidated and surrender their souls to serve him. Even Han Shuo back then was terrified of the colossal figure that seemed to wield infinite power.

    ¡°Indeed, we have met before. How unexpected, a character as insignificant as an ant could soar in strength in such little time, even to the point of threatening our Alliance,¡± a slow, aged voice sounded from the colossal figure. He sounded rather impressed.

 Chapter 913 - Kabooom

    Chapter 913: Kabooom

    Had any of the four overgods attacked Han Shuo just decades earlier, he would have died without a doubt. But the Han Shuo now was a force to be reckoned with. The Hegemons of the Death, Darkness, and Destruction Dominions as well as a former Sovereign, Ss, must join forces just to get a shot at killing him.

    ¡°There¡¯s no escape this time, Bryan!¡± shouted Ss.

    As Han Shuo had deployed Demonic Blood Disassembly to escape from the City of Gorging Clouds just weeks earlier, he was not at his tip-top condition and cannot fight at peak performance. While sensing the mighty auras the four overgods emanated, Han Shuo epted that he would have to fight a battle lopsided against him.

    Although Han Shuo could activate Demonic Blood Disassembly and escape from the Misty Sea, using this escape technique again when such little time had passed woulde with serious repercussions.

    If Han Shuo were to use the Demonic Blood Disassembly to escape from this ambush, his demonic body will suffer injuries that he must take a much, much longer time to recover. This will mean that he won¡¯t be at his peak condition after returning to the Fringe, putting himself under a risk he cannot ept given how treacherous Sovereigns like Tyre and Logue were.

    Han Shuo wore a dark face as he sensed the four menacing auras while racking his brain for an escape n.

    ¡°The four of us had prepared for this moment for a long time. Now that you are inside our trap, you can forget about leaving!¡± said the colossal figure as he stared down at Han Shuo with his green eyes. Using the energy of destruction, he formed an enormous energy field around him and used it to alter the properties of the seawater, preventing Han Shuo from escaping by diving into the ocean.

    ¡°What a shame, he could have been an excellent servant,¡± remarked the masked overgod sitting on a white bone throne. He started approaching Han Shuo slowly and the white bones that made his throne started glowing with a milky white halo. The grayish aura of death from the environment started gathering towards him. The other three overgods immediately started moving with great rapport.

    The four overgods slowly closed in on Han Shuo. The energies of death, darkness, destruction, and lightning slowly umted and flooded the Misty Sea. They unfolded their domains of divinity, causing the region to be devoid of all other elements. Four violent energies beganpressing Han Shuo from the zenith, nadir, forward, and aft.

    The four must have detailedly discussed how they should trap and kill Han Shuo. They might have even practiced it beforehand. The four energies were perfectly joined up on their intersections and had sealed off every inch of space that Han Shuo could leave from while slowly converging, shrinking the area that Han Shuo could move.

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind jolted and he immediately knew that he must not allow himself to be so passive in the battle. If he was to allow that four energies to converge, there will be no way that he could resist it. Though his consciousness may escape by splitting into millions of strands, his demonic body and the demonic infant would be destroyed.

    Immediately after, Han Shuo realized that he needed to stake his all or he won¡¯t be leaving the Misty Sea in one piece.

    Han Shuo cursed in his mind and he no longer hesitated. The energies from thousands and thousands of demon generals suddenly gushed into his demonic body, boosting the already immense power his body possessed. He was determined to give an all-out fight.

    But this time, Han Shuo did not utilize the Myriad Demon Transformation and fought using the demonic infant even though it would grant him ess to vast amounts of power. Although the situations were equally dire, what he was facing in the Misty Sea was different from what he had to face in the Broadhurst Residence. Not only must he leave the Misty Sea as soon as possible, but he must also bring his physical body along.

    Back then in the City of Gorging Clouds, Han Shuo needed to face only two overgods forces. He knew that the ck hole attack deployed by Yarus cannot injure his demonic infant.

    But now, in the Misty Sea, not only must Han Shuo face four overgod experts, but most significantly, he will be fighting Ss, a cultivator of lightning energy. The energy of lightning was greatly damaging to lifeforms like demon generals and the demonic infant.

    The energy of lightning had always been the bane of incorporeal lifeforms. Although Han Shuo was not afraid of the lightning energy from an ordinary god, Ss was no ordinary god. Han Shuo was worried that his demonic infant would be injured once struck by Ss¡¯ overgod lightning energy.

    Therefore, Han Shuo did not use the Myriad Demon Transformation but transferred the demon general energy to his physical body and temporarily boosted his strength.

    When the seemingly infinite amount of power gushed into every cell of Han Shuo¡¯s body, his demeanor and even his attitude transformed. He suddenly raised his head at the sky andughed like an unstoppable maniac. Meanwhile, the seventeen flying swords emerged from his body and orbited him in bizarre trajectories. A chilling, sinister, wicked aura surged as radiances burst from those swords that were dragging long trails of lights.

    An instantter, the seventeen flying swords suddenly ovepped into one, transforming into an enormous sword five meters wide and a hundred meters long made of pure sword radiance.

    Deicide sh, the second form of the Avici Godying Sword Formation took shape in an instant. Immediately, it went shing at Ss who was hovering high in the sky.

    The enormous sword made of pure power seemed unstoppable. It tore a hole in the field of lightning energy and viciously went after Ss.

    Ss cursed in his mind, <i>There are four of us here, why must you fucking aim it at me?!</i>

    Ss had be afraid of Han Shuo after having fought him at the Pandemonium. The fact that Ss did not immediately look for Han Shuo after he had recovered from his injuries was a clear sign that Ss had no confidence fighting Han Shuo one on one. Therefore, when he saw the enormous swording at him, he instinctively withdrew.

    Ss dared not withstand the ferocious Deicide sh. He pulled back and tried to dodge the attack. With that, one of the four powerspressing at Han Shuo was immediately weakened.

    ¡°Ss! The fuck you doing?! Take the attack!¡± shouted the person on the white bone throne angrily when he saw Ss retreating.

    From his point of view, Han Shuo¡¯s power was not enough to severely injure Ss in a single blow. He thought that as long as Ss would withstand Han Shuo¡¯s attack for just a moment, the three of the Hegemons could then divert some of their power to help Ss counteract the power of the Deicide sh, and Han Shuo will still be on course forplete annihtion.

    But Ss obviously did not think the same. He let out a cold groan and continued to dodge the Deicide sh.

    When Ss retreated, Han Shuo started moving. The Demonic des burst out from his fingers and he flew upwards at the hole in Ss¡¯ barrier.

    ¡°Oh no!¡± cried the hovering dark figure as colossal as a mountain. Orbs of Destruction suddenly emerged from him and shot at Han Shuo. It was as though pearly droplets were raining down on Han Shuo. They came inrge numbers and in dense swarms, not allowing Han Shuo to dodge them.

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction also knew how to create Orbs of Destruction and he understood that it was made by coagting the divine energy of destruction. Those small Orbs, despite their size, were extremely powerful and deadly. Han Shuo¡¯s face slightly jolted when he saw those Orbs of Destruction pouring down on him like raindrops.

    With one thought, he sent out the Pearls of Annihtion he produced and sent them colliding into those Orbs of Destruction. A strand of his consciousness then activated the blood essences within those Pearls, which caused the Orbs of Destruction to violently explode.

    The first wave of explosions seemed to have triggered a chain reaction and the remaining Orbs of Destruction exploded. A series of long, world-shaking, eardrum-rupturing explosions sounded from the sky.

    While producing the Pearls of Annihtion, Han Shuo had a novel idea and added a strand of his destruction divine energy into those Pearls. The idea was to simultaneously ignite his Pearls of Annihtion with his Orbs of Destruction to create the maximum firepower.

    Han Shuo had been wanting to test out the firepower but he did not expect that instead of doing so with his own Orbs of Destruction, he would first do so on the Godhunter Alliance Hegemon¡¯s.

    As the remaining Orbs exploded, it seemed to have destabilized the lightning energy barrier that Ss deployed. With that, the lightning energies also started exploding. The noise grew from eardrum-rupturing to lung-copsing.

    The explosionssted for a long, long while. When it finally stopped, the thick, dense mist above the Misty Sea was dissipating and the garish sunlight managed to pierce through the atmosphere for the first time in eons.

    ¡°Ss¡¯ barrier got destroyed! Dhaka, what the hell is wrong with you?!¡± shouted the person on the white bone throne furiously.

    ¡°The fuck would I know!¡± cried the colossal figure.

    ¡°Dhaka, so your name is Dhaka!¡± said Han Shuo before he suddenlyughed out loud. After the mist dissipated, the blinding sunlight was allowed to fall onto the enormous hallucination, causing it to vanish and reveal an old man.

    The old man had winter-white hair and a wizened, heavily lined face but his eyes were piercing and gleaming with life.

    After having a goodugh, under the gaudy sun, Han Shuo¡¯s figure blurred and suddenly fissioned into a dozen Han Shuos. They simultaneously escaped in twelve directions.

    After Ss¡¯ barrier was destroyed, Han Shuo was no longer trapped. He quickly flew out and made an escape without hesitation.

    The four overgods were confused when they discovered that the dozen of Han Shuos were all indistinguishable from the real Han Shuo. As they could not tell which of the Han Shuos were hallucinations, they had no choice but to split up and randomly went after one of the escaping Han Shuos.

    And after they pursued and killed the ¡®Han Shuos¡¯, they found all remaining Han Shuos had disappeared without a trace. He had vanished from the senses of their divine souls.

 Chapter 914

    <h4>GDK 914: Running into an old friend</h4>

    Ss and the three Hegemons reassembled at the center of the Misty Sea. They all wore dark faces. The four overgods had been setting up their traps and barriers all around the Misty Sea for days. They had even been practicing joining forces against Han Shuo.

    But despite their long, careful nning and preparations, despite having Han Shuo right in their palms, Han Shuo still managed to slip through their fingers. If the outside world was to learn of their failure that day, they would have no reputation left.

    In the end, Ss had managed to dodge the Deicide sh and not squander the slightest energy to resist it. When the Orbs of Destructions destroyed the barriers in the sky, Han Shuo had the seventeen flying swords return into his body so that he could escape with it.

    ¡°This is all your fault, Ss! If you did not retreat, there is no way he could have escaped!¡± As soon as the four overgod reassembled, the masked man on the white bone throne angrily started the me game.

    Ss was not in a good mood either. He rebuked, ¡°That¡¯s easy for you to say when you had not even fought him once. Had I taken that strike directly, I would have to spend at least hundreds of years to recover from the injuries!¡±

    The Hegemon of Destruction named Dhaka looked at Ss before he turned to his fellow Hegemons, nodded, and gravely said, ¡°Dagmar, Asser, that youngster is definitely not easy to kill. Now is not the time to point fingers. What we should do now is to think of a way to finish him as soon as possible!¡±

    After listening to those words, Dagmar, the Hegemon of Death, seemed to recall that they still needed Ss¡¯ knowledge of the Fringe for their invasion n and therefore did not further berate Ss. After thinking for a moment, Dagmar bunched his brows and said, ¡°This youngster is indeed as sly as a fox. The four of us having failed to kill him today meant that it will be much harder to kill him in the future. But I still cannot understand ¨C when he was escaping, he made a dozen hallucinations. All the hallucinations are indistinguishable from an actual god and they even gave off divine auras, as though they all possessed souls. I cannot understand how he had managed to fool us.¡±

    Dagmar, Asser, and Dhaka turned to Ss. Of the four, Ss knew Han Shuo the best and naturally, they would look at Ss for answers.

    ¡°He cultivates a bizarre energy that seems to allow him to manipte souls. I don¡¯t know how, but I¡¯m sure he could transform the souls he controls to take his appearance and aura,¡± Ss pondered deeply for a moment before he continued, ¡°Compared to thest time I met him, his strength has improved. Even until now, I have no clue what energy he cultivates. If we do not kill him soon, I¡¯m afraid that there mighte a day that it will take all Twelve of your Hegemons just to get a shot at killing him.¡±

    ¡°Given his temperament, I doubt that he would let you off easily, especially after what you¡¯ve tried on him today. Have you thought of a countermeasure, Ss?¡± asked Dhaka in a grave face. He felt that Ss was not exaggerating and he vaguely felt that Han Shuo was bing the greatest threat to the Godhunter Alliance.

    ¡°He may run and hide, but not those he cared deeply about. All of them live in a ce in the Fringe called Pandemonium. If we siege that ce, he will have no choice but to show up and fight,¡± answered Ss after thinking for a while.

    ¡°Wonderful. As long as he has people that he cares about, then he is vulnerable!¡± Dagmar put on a sinister smirk and said, ¡°Well, we are going to invade the Fringe anyway. We could end him along the way. Ss, you still remember what you¡¯ve promised us, right?¡±

    ¡°If I cannot have it, then no one will. Go ahead and destroy it. I care not.¡± replied Ss. As a former Sovereign, Ss had a good understanding of the terrain and forces distribution of the Fringe. With his assistance, the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s invasion of the Fringe will be buttery smooth.

    ¡°Very well. I will contact the other Hegemons and discuss how we should take down the Fringe,¡± said Asser, the Hegemon of Darkness.

    The four overgods had a brief discussion and left the Misty Sea that was no longer misty.

    *** Han Shuo heaved a sigh of relief after having freed himself from the trapid by four overgod.

    Had Ss not dodged his ¡®Deicide sh¡¯ and taken the blow directly, Han Shuo would have a very hard time escaping from their barriers. Once the four barriers werepressed to a certain degree, with the energy in his body bound by four overgod energies, Han Shuo might not even be able to deploy Demonic Blood Disassembly to escape.

    Of the four overgods, Han Shuo could sense that Ss was the weakest. The three Godhunter Alliance Hegemons possessed extremely formidable strengths. This was especially true with Hegemon Dhaka. His true strength might not be weaker than Sovereign Tyre of the Fringe.

    Had Han Shuo not made use of psychology, exploiting Ss¡¯ fear of him, quick-witted use the Pearls of Annihtion to trigger Dhaka¡¯s Orbs of Destruction, and sacrificing a few spirit demons, his life might have ended on the Misty Sea that day.

    ¡°The Godhunter Alliance is indeed a force to be reckoned with. If Ss is associating with them, they will surely try to invade the Fringe. It appears that the peaceful days of the Fringe will soon be over,¡± muttered Han Shuo under his breath after thinking about Ss¡¯ appearance with the Hegemons. He thought that he should return to the Fringe as soon as possible to prepare for the impending war.

    ¡°Oh?!¡± eximed Han Shuo in surprise. He suddenly sensed a familiar life aura in the distance.

    Han Shuo had now stepped out of the Death Dominion and was heading for the Space Dominion through a remote region. He was currently on a vast mountain range between the Space and Death Dominions. When Han Shuo detected the pulse of life aura, he calmly sensed it for a moment. Joy suddenly appeared on his face.

    The Han Shuo now could remember the soul signature of those he had met and he could detect the energy wave naturally emanated by a soul within a certain range. That was one of the countless abilities of the consciousness.

    Han Shuo was delighted because the soul signature he detected belonged to Donna!

    Han Shuo also detected many life auras around her but he couldn¡¯t care less. Without thinking, Han Shuo immediately flew in her direction. Donna seemed to be entering the Death Dominion from the Space Dominion and was traveling in the exact opposite direction that Han Shuo was going. Therefore, Han Shuo reached them in no time.

    ¡°Ahem... ¡° Han Shuo suddenly appeared standing before Donna. He looked around at Felder, Dolores, and other members of the Lavers Family. He seemed rather awkward.

    The House of Lavers had been declining since the day Han Shuo stepped into the City of Shadows. Not only were they ousted from the City of Shadows, but they also had to flee from Larikson soon after they found refuge in the City of Gorging Clouds because of Han Shuo.

    It was as though Han Shuo was the Lavers Family¡¯s bane.

    It was obvious that the members of the Lavers Family did not have an easy time. Not just Donna, but every member of the family n seemed tired and exhausted. Their eyes, however, were still glistening with ambitious lights. It was as though their body were driven by an unknown willpower.

    But the Lavers turned despaired when Han Shuo suddenly appeared. Felder who was leading his family n was jolted and stepped backward in fright. In a bitter smile, ¡°Truly, I did not expect that you could locate us on such a remote path. It seems that this will be the end of us Lavers.¡±

    Unlike Hofs and Wace, the House of Lavers who had been hiding in the Phantasia City of the Space Dominion, due to its close proximity to the Fringe, they managed to learn a thing or two about Han Shuo¡¯s achievements in the Fringe. In addition, they were aware of the shocking news that came from the Death and Darkness Dominions recently. They knew just how terrifying Han Shuo¡¯s current strength was.

    Felder was on his journey back to the Darkness Dominion to take the ce of Hofs as the new City Lord of Hushveil City. He was filled with hope and thought that his Lavers Family would finally have a new beginning. But now, Han Shuo found them and everything is over. He felt utterly defeated.

    Other than Donna, every member of the Lavers Family looked at Han Shuo with frightened faces. Some of those with weaker minds even shat their pants and begged, ¡°Please, please spare us! Look at us, we haven¡¯t lived a day without misery. Have you not punished us enough? Please let us live!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t beg him, even if we die, we will die with honor!¡± reprimanded Felder. With a staunch look on his face, he said to Han Shuo, ¡°It is indeed me who assaulted you with Larikson at Soaring Cloud Mountain Range. I know you¡¯ve figured it out. Come, carry on and exterminate us. I won¡¯t make a flinch!¡±

    Han Shuo lightly sighed and replied, ¡°Let bygones be bygones. I won¡¯t do any harm to your House of Lavers. I did not deliberately look for you guys. I just happened to pass through this area and sensed Donna¡¯s aura, I wished only to talk to her. You don¡¯t have to be so nervous.¡±

    Felder was astounded and seemed baffled after hearing those words. He looked at Han Shuo puzzlingly and asked, ¡°I don¡¯t understand. With your power now, you could exterminate us with a snap. Why would you suddenly let us off now?¡±

    ¡°All along, I¡¯ve never initiated any hostility towards your House of Lavers. I merely reacted to your attacks. Had Avery not tried to kill me over and over again, I wouldn¡¯t have killed him. And I¡¯ve never asked the House of Sainte to chase you away from the City of Shadows ¨C it was Avery¡¯s attempt in killing Carmelita that led to it. I have always been fair to your family n and I say that with a clear conscience.¡± Due to all sorts of reasons and circumstances, Han Shuo did not have the chance to have a discussion with Felder. But now, he could finally justify his actions before his victims.

    ¡°Bryan, let¡¯s talk, alone,¡± proposed Donna suddenly.

    Han Shuo took a deep breath and nodded. He and Donna walked into one of the jungles in the mountain range.

 Chapter 915 - Forcing a confession

    <h4>Chapter 915: Forcing a confession</h4>

    As soon as Han Shuo and Donna were away, Dolores went to Felder and whispered, ¡°Patriarch, you should use the Divine Brand that the Overgod has bestowed upon you and inform His Lordship that Bryan is here. Perhaps the Dark Lord could descend here and finish Bryan!¡±

    Dolores kept his voice very low as though he was afraid that Han Shuo who had disappeared into a forest with Donna could hear him.

    Those members of the Laver Family who had previously begged Han Shuo to spare their lives immediately had their eyes lit up after hearing Dolores¡¯ proposal and voiced their agreement, hoping that Felder would immediately summon the Overgod of Darkness to kill Han Shuo.

    Felder bunched his brows at Dolores and angrily said, ¡°You want us Lavers exterminated?¡±

    Dolores was taken aback. He was surprised by Felder¡¯s reaction to his proposal and he hastily replied, ¡°No, Patriarch! I do not understand. Why would that be such a bad idea?¡±

    Felder looked at other members of the Lavers who were also puzzled before he groaned and answered in a deep voice, ¡°If the Dark Lord wanted Bryan dead, you think he could have walked out from the Darkness Dominion alive?¡±

    Dolores became even more astonished. ¡°Patriarch, you mean to say that the Overgod of Darkness had meant to let him escape? How is that possible? Hofs and Wace were City Lord of the Darkness Dominion. Why would the Darkness Overgod spare Bryan¡¯s life after he killed two of the most important characters in His Dominion?¡±

    Felder put on a disdained look and replied, ¡°You have never been in the presence of the Overgod and you will never understand His might. Although I do not know why the Dark Lord did not kill him, I¡¯m certain that if His Lordship wanted, Bryan would already be dead long before he could step out from His Dominion.¡±

    Dolores was overwhelmed with shock and was rendered speechless momentarily by that bombshell.

    Felder then let out another cold groan and said, ¡°You better give up on even touching him as soon as possible. And speaking of Bryan, we might even have to thank him for our return to the Darkness Dominion. Given our family¡¯s condition and strength, I¡¯m far from being qualified to be the City Lord of Hushveil City. I suspect that the Overgod¡¯s decision might have something to do with Bryan... ¡°

    Dolores was overwhelmed with shock and it seemed as though that was too much of a revtion for him to digest. He mumbled in disbelief, ¡°Impossible, this is impossible! Why would an Overgod, one of the most powerful beings in the universe, give thought to such a puny character?¡±

    ¡°How would we know?¡± Felder suddenly looked at the ground, shook his head, and sighed. Hemented, ¡°If I knew that Bryan possessed such great powers, I would have personally weed him the day he first stepped into the Lavers Residence. Sigh, indeed, Donna¡¯s foresight is lightyears ahead of ours. If I had listened to her advice, perhaps our Lavers Family wouldn¡¯t have declined but soared meteorically.¡±

    ¡°Pa.. patriarch, have you... gave up on... avenging Uncle Avery¡¯s death?¡± asked Dolores stammeringly after hesitating for a while.

    ¡°Avenge?¡± Felder took a nce at the thick forest that Han Shuo and Donna went before he yet again sighed. He turned back to Dolores and replied, ¡°Yarus, Darkwater, Darkstone, Hofs, and Wace ¨C almost every City Lord of the Darkness Dominion and a bunch of highgods joined forces and tried to kill him. But in the end, they failed and it cost Hofs, Wace, and Larikson their lives. So, tell me, how would we get our revenge? Who among our House of Lavers are capable of that?¡±

    ¡°But... but... ¡° Dolores had words to say but was choked by the brutal reality.

    Felder interrupted and sternly instructed, ¡°You all better give up on the idea as soon as possible. When we are at Hushveil City, focus on performing your duties. Don¡¯t even fantasize about attacking Bryan, or you will bring cmity upon our House of Lavers. Remember that by heart!¡±

    Dolores and other members of the House of Lavers found the instruction hard to ept but their patriarch was not giving them any room for rejection. They nodded and promised to obey his instruction.

    ***Inside a thick jungle with verdant and lush vegetation where the ground was covered with beautiful flowers emanating faint fragrances.

    Among those flowers stood a most outstanding, captivating, lovely beauty, wearing a light purple dress that not in the least concealed the beautiful curves of her body and her long, slender legs. There was a tinge of sorrow on her rosy white cheeks that would invite sympathy from anyone.

    When standing before Donna, Han Shuo felt as though he had a million words to say but no words coulde out of his mouth. In the end, he let out a long sigh and said, ¡°It¡¯s been a while, Donna.¡±

    Donna turned her bright eyes to Han Shuo and stared foolishly at him for a moment. This youngster who used to hide his light under a bushel and came to the Elysium with nothing had be one of the most outstanding characters in the world and possessed great influence.

    Not only was he a Sovereign on the most hazardousnd of Elysium, but he had also fought against the most powerful City Lords of the Darkness Dominion and escaped from their trap. In just a short few decades, from a nobody, he had be one of the most outstanding beings on Elysium. His strength was so valiant that many City Lords of the Divine Dominions were intimidated by his name.

    Even though Donna knew from day one that Han Shuo would eventually rise to great sess, the heights he had achieved this day was still far beyond her imagination.

    ¡°Bryan, I truly did not expect that you would aplish what you have today,¡± said Donna in a somewhat forced smile. It wasn¡¯t as bright and charming Han Shuo remembered.

    Han Shuo stared awkwardly for a moment, thinking for something to talk about before he asked, ¡°Donna, where are you all going?¡±

    ¡°We are returning to the Darkness Dominion. The Darkness Overgod has bestowed a Divine Brand upon my father andmanded him to head to Hushveil City and be the City Lord,¡± replied Donna straightforwardly.

    ¡°Oh, I see. It¡¯s great that you all are benefiting from Hofs¡¯ death, haha. Right, what about the City of Shadows? Who will be the new City Lord?¡± Han Shuo did not expect that the Darkness Overgod would bestow the position upon Felder.

    ¡°Andre of the House of Sainte,¡± replied Donna.

    ¡°That is wonderful. He is absolutely suited for the position. Although Wace was a capable City Lord, he was too intolerant ofpetition and would drive talents out from the City, hindering the City from growing. I¡¯m sure that under Andre¡¯s management, the City of Shadows will prosper!¡± remarked Han Shuo smilingly.

    Donna bunched her long, slender brows slightly and stared at Han Shuo intensely without saying a word. It made Han Shuo really ufortable.

    For some reason, Han Shuo felt rather flustered under Donna¡¯s gaze. It had nothing to do with strength. It was a mixed emotion of guilt, a shred of excitement, and anxiousness.

    After keeping silent for a while, Donna took a deep breath, lifting her buxom breasts and the tight clothing seemed as though it was going to rip up. She stared at Han Shuo with her bright eyes without blinking. As though having garnered enough courage, she finally asked, ¡°Why did you kill him?¡±

    Although Donna did not speak the name, Han Shuo instantly knew exactly who she was referring to.

    Han Shuo somehow panicked and his heart seemed to be beating uncontrobly. He rather frantically said, ¡°That guy is a degenerate and had not done a single good in his life. He is not worthy of you. As your friend, I cannot stand and watch your future be destroyed!¡±

    As he spoke, as though he found an excuse for himself, his tone turned from flustered to righteous.

    But Donna kept staring at him with her piercing eyes. She just stared intently without saying a word.

    For some reason, Han Shuo felt as though Donna could see through him. He dared not to look at Donna in the eye and avoided her gaze.

    After a long, long while, a tip of Donna¡¯s lip curved to make a half-smile and she somewhat mockingly said, ¡°How righteous of you, Bryan! Really? You did not kill him for any personal reasons? None at all?¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s mind was frozen. He suddenly recalled how he felt after killing Larikson¡¯s son. It felt liberating and satisfying, as though knowing that he had re-secured something that belonged to him, preventing it from falling into others¡¯ hands. In his subconscious mind, he had done it all for himself.

    ¡°I have read your mind, haven¡¯t I?¡± Donna sneered, ¡°Bryan, you are the most selfish person and everything you do ¨C it is for yourself. You knew the dire consequences for me and my Lavers Family if he was murdered, and yet, you carried on! You did not do it for me, but for yourself!¡±

    ¡°For... for myself...?¡± Han Shuo mumbled and asked, ¡°Why? What would I get?¡±

    ¡°Because in your heart, I¡¯m your property! Even when you¡¯re not upying it, you wouldn¡¯t let anyone have it!¡± Donna suddenly stepped forward, grabbed Han Shuo¡¯spel, and forced Han Shuo to look her in the eye. In a ferocious look, and angrily said, ¡°Speak! Are those your thoughts?¡±

    ¡°I... I don¡¯t know...¡± It was the first time that Han Shuo was treated by a woman in this way. He was somewhat at a loss and he felt as though he was caught with his pants down.

    All of a sudden, Han Shuo sensed that his demonic infant was kicking and punching erratically, his Skybreak realm state destabilizing, and even the demonic yuan in his body bing disordered.

    Han Shuo was astounded and he realized that the whole shebang with Donna had unwittingly evolved into a mental barrier for he had not been truthful to himself. A series of thoughts rapidly went through his mind before Han Shuo suddenly clenched his teeth, embraced Donna, and confessed, ¡°Yes! Those are exactly my thoughts! You are mine and I will not let anyone other than myselfy a finger on my woman! I¡¯m selfish and possessive! What are you gonna do?¡±

    Tears suddenly filled her eyes. Donna returned the embrace with all her strength, buried her face in Han Shuo¡¯s expansive chest, and started crying. She had been waiting to hear those words for ages.

 Chapter 916 - Not letting you off

    GDK 916: Not letting you off

    All along, Han Shuo had been denying his feelings for Donna, trying not to increase the size of his harem. But in the depths of his heart, just as Donna said, he had considered her as his woman and his actions reflected his subconscious mind.

    On that day, with Donna¡¯s interrogation, Han Shuo was forced to confront his true feelings. When Han Shuo observed that his realm state was destabilizing, he realized just how deeply he felt for Donna and that he must stop burying his feelings.

    Although Donna was confrontational and it seemed as though she was going to kill Han Shuo, all her anger vanished when she was in Han Shuo¡¯s embrace. Everyst bit of pain and hatred were erased off her mind.

    The weeping Donna embraced Han Shuo tightly as though she wanted to squeeze herself into Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    Han Shuo felt sympathetic. He stood silently and let Donna cry on his chest while gently caressing her soft, long hair.

    As the grief and grievances that had been umted over the past many years went away with her tears, her heart gradually calmed down. For all these years, having to constantly move around and hide with her family, there had not been a day that she felt at peace. But in Han Shuo¡¯s broad chest, she felt safe and a sense of tranquility.

    <i>How I wish I could lean on his chest for eternity... </i> thought Donna who had put on a faint, blissful smile after she stopped weeping. Happiness had disced all the sorrow in her heart.

    After a long, long while, after having vented her feelings, she moved away from Han Shuo¡¯s chest somewhat embarrassedly. With her wet eyes, she saw that Han Shuo seemed rather nervous and somewhat at a loss. She thought that the Han Shuo now was very adorable. There wasn¡¯t a hint of his usual proud and lofty demeanor showing on his foolish face.

    ¡°Hehe!¡± Donna, whose cheeks were still wet, couldn¡¯t help butughed. She reached out with her hand and gently pinched Han Shuo¡¯s face, ¡°Why would you make this silly face? You make it look like I had forced you to confess!¡±

    Han Shuo forced a smile and thought, <i>Well, but you did force me to confess, right?</i> But Han Shuo was d that the hidden knot in his heart had been untied. Han Shuo still felt somewhat embarrassed and therefore avoided Donna¡¯s eyes and lowered his head slightly.

    When his gaze moved downward, it suddenly stopped and turned affixed when it came across Donna¡¯s massive bosom.

    The front area of Donna¡¯s dress had soaked up most of her tears. When her thin garment was dampened, they became semi-transparent and stuck closely to her breasts. It looked almost as though she was not wearing anything. The mesmerizing, enchanting curves of her giant globes were exposed.

    Donna was curvaceous and busty, to begin with. After seeing her almost bare breasts, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t move his gaze away.

    Perhaps having noticed Han Shuo¡¯s gaze, Donna put on a faint smirk and stretched her body. When her arms stretched backward, her chest was raised and the tip of her soft, plump bosom gently rubbed against Han Shuo¡¯s chest for a brief moment.

    zing light instantly burst from Han Shuo¡¯s eyes and steam could be seen escaping from his ears.

    ¡°Hehe!¡± Donnaughed mischievously and stood upright before she joyfully said, ¡°Bryan, I¡¯ll stop teasing you. I need to get going as soon as possible. But I¡¯ll look for you soon!¡±

    All thoughts left Han Shuo¡¯s mind when he heard that Donna was leaving. He hastily grabbed Donna with a hand and asked, ¡°You are going to Hushveil City?¡±

    ¡°Yup, the Darkness Overgod has appointed my father to manage Hushveil City. This is a once in a blue moon opportunity for my family n. We need to make good use of this opportunity to restore our former glory. Sigh, my family n is already very weak now and we arecking manpower. I cannot leave my dad at such a critical time,¡± exined Donna.

    ¡°Then, then, what about us?¡± asked Han Shuo stammeringly.

    Donna ced her hand on Han Shuo¡¯s cheek, put on a sweet smile, and tenderly said, ¡°I will look for you soon. You have destroyed my life and for that, I¡¯m not letting you off, forever!¡±

    Han Shuo heaved a sigh of relief and replied, ¡°Then I can be at ease.¡±

    ¡°Alright, go and do whatever you should be doing. I know that you are at the Fringe. As soon as my Lavers Family have established ourselves in Hushveil City, I wille for you!¡± said Donna smilingly. Then, as though having recalled something, she giggled and said, ¡°But by then, I am counting on you to pacify your other girlfriends. I¡¯m afraid that they will murder me or something... ¡°

    ¡°Alright then, take care of yourself. I will be waiting for you,¡± said Han Shuo smilingly before he suddenly went forward, grabbed Donna into his arms, and went in for a nice long kiss before she could react. ¡°Woo Hoo!¡± He then went on his way while cheering happily.

    Donna stomped her feet while blushing and pouting. ¡°You cheeky little rascal!¡± she murmured before tucking her lips inwards and licked them as though trying to savor and preserve Han Shuo¡¯s mark in her heart.

    When the members of the Lavers Family were on the brink of losing their patience, Donna finally re-emerged from the forest.

    Before entering the forest with Han Shuo, Donna¡¯s eyes were filled with hatred and anger. Even Felder was worried that Donna might try to attack Han Shuo and worried that something might happen to her.

    But unexpectedly, not only did she return safe and sound, she came back full of energy and not a trace of gloom could be seen. The difference was night and day.

    The Lavers Family were stunned and puzzled. They couldn¡¯t understand what happened to her in the forest or how the spiritless Donna could turn ¡®alive¡¯ in less than half-an-hour.

    Felder looked deeply at Donna and he seemed to make out something. He raised a brow and asked, ¡°Where is he?¡±

    ¡°He left, he¡¯s returning to the Fringe.¡± Donna had done her best to conceal the happiness on her face but she could not conceal it in her voice. Anyone could observe that her demeanor had transformed.

    ¡°Oh, ok.¡± Felder nodded before he nced at the members of his family n and instructed, ¡°Why are you all still standing? Get moving!¡±

    Dolores and the others hastily replied affirmatively and continued with the journey. But they would secretly peek at Donna and gossip about her in their minds.

    Felder and Donna were traveling at the very front of thepany. After they had pulled some distance ahead of the others, Felder softly said, ¡°Donna, I will do nothing about the matter between you and him. But, as always, try to avoid troubles for our family.¡±

    Donna stared nkly for a moment before she puzzlingly asked, ¡°Father, you, you won¡¯t make me break up with him?¡±

    Felder lightly sighed before he replied, ¡°Could I?¡±

    ¡°Father, actually I... ¡° Donna hastily tried to exin that she understood the position of her family n as Han Shuo and the Lavers could still be considered enemies.

    Felder raised a hand and interrupted Donna, ¡°There¡¯s no need for exnation, this is all my fault, I had failed you. If I had listened to you and at least met him the day he first visited our Lavers Residence, perhaps none of those things would have happened. Sigh, it was with my arrogance and stubbornness that I had pushed the House of Lavers into the abyss. I had even nearly sacrificed you to that good-for-nothing son of Larikson... ¡°

    ¡°Father, why don¡¯t you expel me from the Lavers? Then I cannot bring the family n any troubles,¡± suggested Donna.

    Felder shook his head resolutely and replied, ¡°No, it is me who is in the wrong. Why would I punish you for my mistakes? Alright, that¡¯s enough, don¡¯t overthink. Although I do not know why, I suspect that the Darkness and Death Overgods want him to live. With that, the thing between you and him shouldn¡¯t be an issue.¡±

    ¡°Father, do you mean, you approve of our rtionship?¡± Donna was so ted that her voice trembled slightly.

    Felder nodded slowly, sighed, andmented, ¡°I had not treated you fairly and had made you suffer too much for our family. Though I may have been a good patriarch, I had not been a good father. This is the least I could do to make it up for you.¡±

    ¡°Thank you, Father! Thank you!¡± Donna could not be happier. She thought that after Han Shuo killed Avery, Felder¡¯s brother, the grudges between Han Shuo and her family n will never be resolved. But unexpectedly, Felder would let go of the offense and approve of her rtionship with Han Shuo. With those words of Felder¡¯s, there were no longer any knots in her heart.

 Chapter 917 - Do me a favor

    GDK 917: Do me a favor

    Ever since Baum was executed and McKinley reced him as the City Lord of Ethereal City, the city had been rapidly improving in terms ofmerce andbat capability.

    One of McKinley¡¯s first acts as the City Lord was to reduce the taxations on all kinds of trades. He would also maintain the City¡¯s economic and political system where there is minimal government involvement in certain areas of public policy and the private sector. All those who came in peace were allowed into the Ethereal City.

    McKinley had proved to be much more capable than Baum. Not only was he great at management, but he was also great at rallying support with nearly every family ns and merchants in the City approved of his governance. Those divine guards who had previously served Baum had all realigned their allegiance to McKinley and served him well.

    With the generous support of the City Lord, the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy and Goldstone Enterprise became thergest businesses of their respective sector in Ethereal City. They had dominated the market.

    Emily, Phoebe, and the others had been living in Ethereal City for a while and they were given the best treatment by McKinley the City Lord. They truly felt as though they were VVIP guests. Unlike the City of Shadows, the regtions in Ethereal City were muchxer, and the experts living there cultivated a far more diverse type of energy. Not only was it a more livable City, but it was also far more prosperous than the City of Shadows.

    With McKinley¡¯s assistance and Emily and Phoebe¡¯s expertise in running a business, the House of Han¡¯s Celestial Pearl Pharmacy and the Goldstone Enterprise rapidly dominated the market, crushing a majority of theirpetitions and bing monopolies of medicines and energy crystals in Ethereal City.

    *** In the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, Phoebe, Emily, Sanguis, Bonds, and the others gathered for a regr meeting.

    ¡°Ethereal City is truly a wonderful ce, but Bryan has said that the Fringe is where we belong. We won¡¯t be staying here for too long so there is no need to put too much effort into improving this ce,¡± said Stratholme smilingly.

    The Han Family had been living in greatfort and security. They could feel that McKinley was treating them with utmost sincerity based on their past experiences.

    ¡°I have no words but praises for McKinley. I even feel like he is being overly kind towards us. Despite the constant pressure from those merchants and criticism of him being biased, he still refuses to tax our businesses anything. What a guy!¡± said Phoebe smilingly. She felt as though Ethereal City was her massive yground where she could do what she was best at.

    ¡°But we must not be presumptuous lest we cause McKinley troubles. In any case, Ethereal City will not be our home. As soon as Bryan returns, we will head to the Fringe,¡± remarked Emily who wished to reciprocate McKinley¡¯s kindness.

    ¡°Why haven¡¯t Master returned by now? I wonder how he is doing,¡± said Sanguis who seemed rather worried.

    Upon hearing those words, the party turned silent. They understood that Han Shuo¡¯s murder of City Lord Hill meant a great likelihood that he will have to face the wrath of the Overgod of Death. To them, the Death Overgod was an unimaginable powerful existence. The longer they lived on Elysium, the more the idea was reinforced in their minds.

    Although they were confident in Han Shuo, when they recalled that Han Shuo might have to face a practically invincible existence, they would still feel worried about his safety.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Master will be alright. Even if he cannot fight an Overgod, he should have no trouble escaping!¡± Gilbert remained blindly convinced in Han Shuo¡¯s power as he always does. He wasn¡¯t worried about Han Shuo¡¯s safety at all.

    ¡°An Overgod with the Quintessence possesses the purest of their fundamental force. In the entire universe, there are just twelve of them. Their might is certainly way beyond the limits of our imagination, thus we cannot specte anything. All we can do is hope that our Patriarch is alright,¡± remarked Bonds after letting out a sigh. He seemed somewhat worried.

    ¡°Alright, you guys can stop worrying now. Pack up your stuff cuz¡¯ we will be going to the Fringe!¡± said Han Shuo after his majestic figure abruptly materialized in the room in an instant.

    ¡°Bryan! I¡¯m d you¡¯re alright. What happened?¡± asked Emily hastily.

    ¡°Hill, Hofs, Wace, Larikson, Ralph ¨C they are all dead!¡± Han Shuo put on a smile, looked at the party before he remarked, ¡°It seems that McKinley has been treating you well.¡±

    ¡°Definitely. Compared to how we were treated in Witherbone City, this ce is simply heaven!¡± said Stratholme in a faint smile. He seemed to like the ce.

    Sanguis, Emily, Phoebe, and the others cheered when they heard that Hill and the others had been murdered. They were the mortal enemies of the House of Han and them being dead can only be good for their reputation and future. They would also have less hidden threats to worry about.

    ¡°Alright, you guys should start packing. I¡¯ll pay McKinley a visit and after that, we will begin our journey to the Fringe. No matter how great Ethereal City is, in the end, it is someone else¡¯snd. In the Fringe, however, we get to be the truendlords. I¡¯m sure that when you¡¯ve seen the Pandemonium, you will love the ce just as much,¡± said Han Shuo smilingly before abruptly vanishing.

    ***In the City Lord¡¯s Mansion of Ethereal City.

    McKinley who was meditating in his gymnasium suddenly put on a big smile. He was d to see Han Shuo who had suddenly shown up in front of him. ¡°Bryan! You¡¯d finally visit me!¡±

    McKinley¡¯s demeanor had transformed. The gloom that he had umted over millennia of being trapped had been erased and he seemed energetic and in high spirits. He was very satisfied with being the City Lord of Ethereal City.

    ¡°Hehe, you seem to be doing pretty well and your strength has improved! So, when will you breakthrough to the overgod realm?¡± asked Han Shuo jokingly.

    Han Shuo and McKinley had been keeping in touch for the past many years. Although they rarely met up, thanks to the proximity of Ethereal City with the Fringe, they had been writing to each other frequently. Han Shuo was aware of McKinley¡¯s situation in Ethereal City and McKinley knew what Han Shuo had been doing in the Fringe.

    ¡°No matter how quickly my strength is advancing, I¡¯ll still be a snail whenpared to you!¡± McKinleyughed heartily before he remarked, ¡°I still remember how weak you were back on Profound Continent. But who could have expected that you would advance to such a great realm in less than a hundred years aftering to Elysium? What a freak you are!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll be taking my family to the Fringe soon. Any progress on those devices you promise you¡¯d make for me?¡± asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°I¡¯ve got them ready for you long ago,¡± McKinley smiled and a space ring flew towards Han Shuo before he named the devices, ¡°Magical Mirror, Portal Scroll, Spatial Disruptor... ¡° He also informed Han Shuo on how to operate those devices.

    The magical mirror was amunication device that could allow people separated by vast distances tomunicate which will be very useful for Han Shuo¡¯s intelligence collection in the Fringe.

    Portal Scroll was a wonderful tool for escaping. Han Shuo may not need one, but if his family members had a Portal Scroll, they could escape from dangers by using the space-time tearing device. It would greatly increase their chances of survival.

    As the name implied, Spatial Disruptor was a device for disrupting space-time. An average space edict expert or a resourceful person with a Portal Scroll could usually escape by tearing space-time. With a Spatial Disruptor, the Han Family members could prevent their victims from escaping with that method.

    Other than the three devices, Han Shuo also received several other kinds of devices that only a space edict cultivator could produce. Some of them were even useful for Han Shuo.

    ¡°Nice, fantastic! Hehe, thanks a lot!¡± Han Shuo felt and scanned the space ring in his hand. He detected Magical Mirrors, Portal Scrolls, and other space-edict devices numbered at a few dozens each. It was more than enough for his family members.

    ¡°Right, Bryan, I heard that you have caused havoc in the City of Gorging Clouds and fought Yarus. Is that right?¡± asked McKinley suddenly. He seemed unusually interested in the matter.

    Han Shuo nodded and smilingly replied, ¡°Yep. I can confirm the rumors that Yarus has attained overgod realm is true. He is a decent, honorable guy. I¡¯d be more than happy to have him as a friend but, too bad, we can only be enemies because I killed his brother Larikson.¡±

    McKinleyughed while shaking his head as though in a loss for words. Then, after thinking for a moment, in a somewhat embarrassed manner, he asked Han Shuo, ¡°Bryan, can I ask you for a favor?¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a split second before he smilingly replied, ¡°Of course, there¡¯s no need to hesitate between us. Just tell me what it is and you can consider it done. I would even murder and plunder for you.¡°

    McKinley¡¯s glistened. He seemed touched by Han Shuo¡¯s words. He kept silent for a moment before he asked, ¡°As you should know, it was Gy¨¢l, one of the Keepers of the Light, who had separated my divine soul from my divine body. I want revenge and I hope that you can assist me.¡±

    Gy¨¢l was one of the three Keepers of the Light, the most pious disciple of the God of Light. He had attainedte-stage highgod strength many years ago and McKinley was no match against him. He needed at least an assistance to defeat Gy¨¢l and Han Shuo was the most suitable candidate.

    ¡°No problem. Just let me know where and when,¡± agreed Han Shuo without thinking.

    ¡°Thank you! I will let you know when I¡¯ve located Gy¨¢l,¡± McKinley thanked Han Shuo solemnly.

    ¡°Sure, I will be waiting for your message. Alright, time for me to return to the Fringe!¡± said Han Shuo smilingly and he vanished without exchanging pleasantries.

 Chapter 918 - You dare?

    GDK 918: You dare?

    Not much had changed in the Fringe during Han Shuo¡¯s absence. Murder, plundering, massacre, rape, continued to happen as always it always does in the Land of Chaos. Big and small scale battles could be easily found in the perimeter of the Fringe.

    The big and small factions took notice as soon as the House of Han stepped into the Fringe. But when they noticed that the person leading them was Han Shuo, they scuttled and ran as far as they could.

    Han Shuo was just too infamous in the Fringe and no one dared offend him.

    Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert were as though apex predators that were introduced to a flock ofmb. They would often venture away from thepany by themselves, away from Han Shuo¡¯s protection, and return with scratches and injuries.

    The three who cultivated demonic arts understood that they must temper themselves by bloodshed if they want to rapidly raise their strengths and that the Fringe was the ce most suitable for them to do so. The more they fight, the stronger they be.

    Sometimes they would strike together and sometimes they would go alone. They would only attack forces that weren¡¯t too strong and improve their strengths through the death of their victims.

    Han Shuo had allowed them to venture around by themselves for he knew that the three had decent strengths and were very treacherous. The injuries that they suffered were minor and they wouldpletely recover in one or two days. He thought that it was unlikely for them to be defeated by forces in the Fringe.

    After making a few assaults by themselves, they started bringing a few squadrons of the House of Han guards with them. Those House of Han guards who had been tempered for ages were bloodthirst as well. With those guards, they were able to destroy many more forces along their way. Many of the forces would avoid them.

    ¡°The Fringe doesn¡¯t seem as frightening as what they¡¯ve told us. All those we have met aren¡¯t all that powerful,¡± remarked Sanguis who had been in high spirits for thest few days. After killing a mid-stage highgod in a duel, his confidence swelled. He had be rather overconfident.

    ¡°Haha, we are just too strong! For the Fringe is truly chaotic. Not only there arerge-scale battles everywhere, each Fringedweller is fiercer than the next. This is truly a wonderful ce most suitable for our House of Han!¡± said Gilbert. He was also feeling very delighted for he could finally unleash the energy in his body and kill to his heart¡¯s content. It was obvious that he liked the Fringe very much.

    Bonds, however, wasn¡¯t having their overconfidence. He swept his cold nce at the two and said, ¡°The Fringe is infamous on the Elysium for its perilousness. The most dangerous and treacherous criminals from all Twelve Dominions are in this Land. We have not met any truly formidable enemy because we have not stepped into the deeper parts of the Fringe and those true powerhouses knew of our origins. They are afraid of our Patriarch¡¯s power and therefore have been avoiding us. Don¡¯t be so presumptuous to think that the Fringe is nothing dangerous and drop your guard.¡±

    Bonds had considered the two as his closest friends ever since what they had gone through in Witherbone City. Otherwise, had it been somebody else, Bonds would only coldly puff in disdain instead of giving a lengthy, insightful lecture.

    Sanguis and Gilbert, being young and reckless, did not take the advice to heart. Sanguis smiled mischievously and said, ¡°What you said does somewhat makes sense. But I still think that other than the Four Sovereigns, there aren¡¯t any other particrly strong forces in the Fringe. I¡¯m sure that even without using Master¡¯s reputation, we could still establish ourselves in the Fringe!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. The leaders of most forces possess just early-stage highgod strength ¨C nothing remarkable. The three of us in addition to fifty guards could easily gain a footing. Right, why don¡¯t we head to the Omphalos first? I believe that we can easily reach the Center by ourselves,¡± suggested Gilbert excitedly.

    Sanguis¡¯ eyes lit up and he enthusiastically agreed, ¡°That¡¯s right! We should get there before the others. With Master protecting them, our Matriarchs and the others would be just fine without us.¡±

    ¡°No! If any bad thing happens, how would I exin myself to Senior Brother?¡± Bonds bunched his brows and rejected the proposal without thinking.

    ¡°Come on, old guy. Don¡¯t be so paranoid, it will be just fine. Come on, let¡¯s go. We will wait for them in the Omphalos. After all, we have figured out the general direction.¡± Sanguisughed heartily and proceeded with the n, belittling the dangers ahead of him.

    Gilbertughed mischievously, went and pulled Bonds as he said, ¡°It¡¯s alright, Master will not be angry at us for doing so. Come on, don¡¯t spoil the mood!¡±

    If Sanguis and Gilbert had not tried to risk their lives to stand up for Bonds in Witherbone City, Bonds definitely would have decisively halted them and brought them back to thepany.

    But Bonds now considered Sanguis and Gilbert as people he trusted the most after Han Shuo. Seeing their enthusiasm, Bonds felt rather reluctant to spoil the mood. After hesitating for a moment, with Gilbert dragging him, Bonds went along despite his gut feeling telling him no.

    With that, Sanguis, Gilbert, Bonds, and fifty House of Han guards, separated from the main House of Hanpany, began heading to the center of the Fringe ¨C the Omphalos.

    At first, they had run into rtively small forces that were led by early or mid-stage highgods. With Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert easily defeating those highgod leaders and the terrifying teambat strength of the House of Han guards, the party was able to easily crush their enemies and went deep into the Fringe without much resistance.

    Sanguis and Gilbert became even more excited and overconfident. They had forgotten of the fact that the deeper they venture into the Fringe, the more dangerous it would be. They would shout and cheer along their journey.

    But their streak was about toe to an end. When they got very far from the mainpany of the House of Han, some of the major and ferocious forces deep in the Fringe took notice of them. They were not aware of their association with Han Shuo due to the distance and Gilbert and the others had even avoided revealing their association with Han Shuo because they wanted to prove their power.

    Finally, a group of Fringedwellers led by ate-stage highgod expert intercepted them on a mountain.

    And there was more than e-stage highgod!

    The enemy forces were made of e-stage highgod of death, e-stage highgod of wind, a number of early and mid-stage highgods, and a bunch of midgods. They numbered in the hundreds. Their strength had far exceeded that of Bonds, Gilbert, Sanguis, and their fifty guards.

    ¡°You guys seemed to have been indulging yourselves in killing indiscriminately. Hehe, to attack Sovereign Logue¡¯s followers, how brazen!¡± thete-stage highgod of death said in a mocking smile. He looked at Sanguis, Gilbert, and the others who had been surrounded and immediately gave the ultimatum, ¡°You have two choices ¨C you can bow and pledge your allegiance to Lord Logue or you can fucking die!¡±

    It was only now that Sanguis and Gilbert realized that the Fringe was nothing like the Darkness and Death Dominions, that the Land of Chaos was indeed filled with extremely formidable experts and they were extremely brutal.

    Sanguis, the strongest of the three, was confident that he could defeat a mid-stage highgod expert. Against ate-stage highgod, however, he stood no chance at all.

    Their enemy had twote-stage highgod and six to seven highgods in early and mid-stages. It was clear that they had no chance of winning.

    Sanguis and Gilbert suddenly looked at each other with a hint of despair in their eyes. They finally regretted not heeding the advice and being too arrogant.

    ¡°Friend, we are members of the Pandemonium¡¯s House of Han!¡± Bonds suddenly stepped forward and said in a moderate attitude. Unlike Sanguis and Gilbert, he remained as calm as usual. The mind that he had tempered through oveing perils and hardships had proved useful during critical moments.

    ¡°What? Pandemonium? House of Han?¡± the face of the baldte-stage highgod that had a mocking smile suddenly jolted. He asked, ¡°Who are you to Lord Bryan?¡±

    ¡°This is his disciple,¡± said Bonds as he pointed at Sanguis.

    Bonds heaved a sigh of relief after seeing the person¡¯s reaction. He thought, <i>Senior Brother indeed has a terrifying reputation in the Fringe. I guess with his name, we would be out of danger.</i>

    The bald highgod put on a grave face and sized up Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert for a while as though weighing his options. Then, suddenly, he shouted, ¡°Kill all of them! Leave none alive! Otherwise, if Bryan finds out, we will cause the Lord a lot of unnecessary troubles. If any of you fails and they manage to escape, I will skin you!!¡±

    ¡°You dare?¡± shouted Bonds in a ferocious voice. He was rmed.

    ¡°Haha, why do we not? You think that we are afraid of you just because you are associated with Bryan? Hahaha, with all of you dead, he will have no idea who killed you. How would he find out that it¡¯s me? Let me tell you outsiders something, we Fringedwellers are all fucking nuts. There¡¯s nothing that we are afraid of doing!¡± said the bald highgod as heughed wildly. He did seem very much like a lunatic.

    After having a goodugh, he gestured andmanded, ¡°Attack!¡±

    Bonds¡¯ heart jolted. He knew that they were in deep shit.

 Chapter 919 - Pleasing to the eye

    GDK 919: Pleasing to the eye

    The bald highgod saw that Sanguis, Bonds, Gilbert, and their forces were much weaker than theirs and therefore nned to exterminate them altogether. If none of them could live to tell the tale, no one would know who had killed them and avenge their deaths.

    As soon as the bald man coldly gave themand to attack, everyone in his gang charged forward. Bonds, Sanguis, Gilbert, and their divine guards became even more tightly surrounded. They had sealed every inch of space that they could escape from.

    ¡°ughter away!¡±manded the bald highgod in a sneer. He and the otherte-stage highgod of wind, however, did not get into action. Perhaps they thought that Bonds, Sanguis, Gilbert, and the others can easily be taken care of by his minions.

    Five or six highgods and more than a hundred midgods swarmed at them. Those highgods were at early to mid-stages. Sanguis and Gilbert gritted their teeth and charged forward, each intercepting a highgod.

    Bonds quickly followed behind them and unleashed his incisive flying sword. The atmosphere was filled with killing intent so intense that they had coagted into matter. An early-stage highgod who got too close to Bonds was startled by the terrifying killing intent. Sword radiances shed. During the split moment he lost focus, he received deep wounds across his chests.

    ¡°Sanguis, Gilbert, we will look for an opportunity to escape!¡± shouted Bonds as soon as he forced his opponent to retreat.

    A chilling light shed in Sanguis and Gilbert¡¯s eyes and they started attacking their opponents more fiercely. They made powerful but risky attacks without any regard for their own lives. As their opponents were unwilling to sacrifice their own lives to kill Sanguis and Gilbert, they had no choice but to take defensive measures.

    However, Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert had to face not three but six highgod. When all six of them had gathered and began attacking together, the trio immediately lost their upper hand. They would have perished in just minutes if not for their risky defensive maneuvers.

    While the six highgods had surrounded Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert, the more than a hundred midgod Fringedwellers encircled the House of Han guards in chilling smirks. Then, suddenly, they simultaneously began their assault on the House of Han guards.

    Although the House of Han guards were outnumbered at least two times, their teambat strength was still much greater than that of the Fringedwellers. They abruptly spread out as though a giant machete. They had not only evaded most of the attacks, they had managed to cause tremendous casualties to their enemies.

    After the two forces exchanged their first blow, of the House of Han guards, five were injured and one killed. Meanwhile, of the Fringedwellers, thirty were injured and ten were killed!

    Although thebatants of both forces were all in the realm of midgod and the Fringedwellers outnumbered the House of Han guards, thetter nheless managed to gain the upper hand with just one blow. The bald highgod¡¯s face jolted when he observed the unusual phenomenon. Immediately, he instructed, ¡°Divert two highgod to kill those guards!¡±

    The six highgods who were jointly beating up Sanguis, Gilbert, and Bonds immediately realized that their minions were losing when they heard the instruction. One early-stage highgod and one mid-stage highgod dropped their attacks on the House of Han trio and charged at the guards. The two highgods had managed to immediately turn the tide of the battle. The House of Han guards went from having the upper hand to losing. Casualties were gradually mounting.

    The trio of Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert immediately felt the pressure on them reduced. Originally, if Sanguis or Bonds still could not find an opening to escape in the next few minutes, they would all be doomed. But after two of the highgods were redirected away, despite being injured, the two of them now had a chance to escape.

    But it appeared that the bald highgod who had only been watching wasn¡¯t going to let the battle drag on any longer. Seeing that his minions could not destroy these members of the House of Han straightforwardly, he sneered and said, ¡°It seems that the rumors are true. Those of the House of Han is not to be belittled! Humph, but even so, you will not escape your fate of death!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, he along with thete-stage highgod of wind gradually approached the House of Han trio who had been surrounded. He was going to make the battle end in the shortest time possible.

    ¡°Leave now, Sanguis! Or we will never be able to!¡± shouted Bonds hastily when he saw that the twote-stage highgods were going to intervene.

    ¡°But, what about them?¡± Sanguis took a quick nce at the House of Han guards. His red eyes were filled with reluctance.

    ¡°Uff!¡± The split second of distraction had allowed a bone spear to pierce Sanguis¡¯ chest. Blood immediately started flowing out from the wound.

    ¡°We need to leave in order to avenge their deaths!¡± Bonds got anxious when he saw that Sanguis was being indecisive. He knew that when the twote-stage highgods joined the battle, they might not even have the chance to deploy their demonic escape technique.

    ¡°Hehe, wanna escape? You can¡¯t!¡± said the bald highgod in a mocking smile. as he spoke, he had raised his hand andunched an attack.

    When his deadly attack was about tond on Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert, a peal of loud, machoughter suddenly sounded and a majestic figure fell between the trio. He raised a hand and the energy of destruction formed a greyish shield and intercepted the attacks of the bald highgod.

    ¡°Polo?¡± eximed the bald highgod and he immediately frowned. He coldly groaned and threatened, ¡°You better not mess with my business, or don¡¯t me me for messing you up!¡±

    ¡°Nice attempt at intimidation, Luca. But I wouldn¡¯t have shown up if I¡¯m afraid of you!¡± Polo then gestured and shouted, ¡°Brothers! Step forward!¡±

    After hearing Polo¡¯s cry, hundreds of figures wearing sinister faces revealed themselves from the shadows and surrounded the bald highgod and his forces in an instant.

    The bald highgod named Luca looked around him and saw that Polo had brought more than three hundred experts and twice as many highgods as he had!

    Luca¡¯s heart jolted. He stopped taking an offensive posture at the House of Han trio but red at Polo as he said, ¡°Polo, you should know who I serve. You dare offend Lord Logue? You should know the consequences of doing so!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t you fucking try to intimidate me using Logue. I ain¡¯t afraid of him!¡± Poloughed arrogantly before he said, ¡°Oh Luca, haven¡¯t you realized that the Fringe now is no longer the same? The Sovereigns aren¡¯t the only ones who wield true powers. You are well-informed in the Fringe. Do you not know who I now serve?¡±

    After hearing those words, the bald highgod¡¯s face yet again jolted as though he had recalled a recent intel, that every godhunter in the Fringe had been united by a powerful existence. As Logue¡¯s trusted aide, Luca was very much aware of how close that person was to Han Shuo.

    ¡°You serve Han Hao?¡± Luca¡¯s face turned grave and his attitude was no longer as arrogant.

    ¡°Haha, so you do know about it. Now you better shoo the fuck off and leave these people from the House of Han alone. I will consult my Chiefter on what to do about your transgression, but you may go free for today,¡± said Polo disdainfully in a smug smirk.

    ¡°They may im to be from the House of Han, but how would you know if it¡¯s true?¡± Lucained, ¡°There has been a shit ton of people traveling to the Omphalos iming themselves to be members from the House of Han. Hell, even a goddamn monkey would im itself to be rted to the House of Han when in trouble. If we are to let everyone off, how would we keep our businesses going?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t care, that¡¯s not my problem. Let them go or I will make you be gone!¡± threatened Polo arrogantly, not bothering to argue with Luca.

    Luca wore an angered face as he considered his options. He understood that he was in no position to fight but if he were to let Gilbert and the others free, when they returned to Han Shuo, he and his Sovereign might get into trouble. Therefore, he hesitated and did not know which choice to take.

    Gilbert suddenly went to Polo with a smirk on his face and said, ¡°Hey, you. You said you serve Han Hao?¡±

    Polo took a nce at Gilbert out from the corners of his eyes before he replied in an annoyed voice, ¡°Yes. What business is it of yours?¡±

    Gilbert was stunned. He did not expect Polo to be so arrogant towards him. Immediately, he frowned and shouted at Polo, ¡°Fucking hell, I have known Han Hao since way back in Profound Continent. You are just his servant but you dare speak to me like that? Where are your manners?¡±

    Polo jolted upon hearing those words. He then took a careful look at Gilbert, Bonds, and Sanguis, and found that the auras emanated by the trio were vaguely simr to that of Han Hao. With that, Polo asked, ¡°You really are members of the House of Han?¡±

    ¡°What the fuck? So you are deliberately messing with us, Polo?¡± Luca the bald highgod immediately realized that Polo had shown up just to look for trouble.

    Polo put on a mischievous smirk and replied, ¡°Hehe, just as you¡¯ve said, there are just too many outsiders traveling to the Omphalos iming that they are from the House of Han. I couldn¡¯t tell if they are lying either!¡±

    As Polo spoke, he took out a magical mirror. He then turned to Gilbert and asked, ¡°What¡¯s your name? I need to report to my Chief.¡±

    ¡°Tell him it¡¯s Gilbert the Dark Dragon. Although it¡¯s been a while, I¡¯m sure that he still remembers me!¡± replied Gilbert, beaming ear to ear.

    Polo nodded and went to a corner. His minions had surrounded him before he activated the magical mirror andmunicated with his master.

    Gradually, Han Hao¡¯s figure appeared in the magical mirror. After listening to Polo¡¯s narration, he gave Polo a straightforwardmand.

    Polo nodded and the call was disconnected. The smile on his face vanished and he returned to Gilbert with a dark, murderous demeanor.

    ¡°What? Don¡¯t tell me that he had forgotten about me?¡± Gilbert panicked when he saw the murderous look on Polo¡¯s face.

    ¡°Kill them all! Leave none alive!¡±manded Polo in a chilling voice.

    ¡°Kill who?¡± asked Polo¡¯s rather confused followers.

    ¡°Idiots, Luca of course! Isn¡¯t it fucking obvious? Why would I kill someone as pleasing to the eye as Gilbert?¡±

 Chapter 920 - Despicable

    <h4>Chapter 920: Despicable</h4>

    After hearing Polo¡¯s words, the godhunters marched forward with sneers on their faces. They slowly tightened the circle and surrounded Luca and his troops even more tightly.

    Luca¡¯s heart jolted. He shouted, ¡°You dare? I¡¯m the most trusted servant of Lord Logue. If you touch me, His Lordship won¡¯t let you off!¡± Luca knew that he stood no chance against Polo and his forces and once again tried to intimidate Polo using Logue¡¯s name.

    ¡°With all of you dead, he will have no idea who killed you. How would he find out that it¡¯s me?¡± Polo put on a malevolent smirk and said, ¡°Besides, so what if Logue finds out? Do you think Lord Han Hao would be afraid of him? Haha, my brothers, ughter away! Leave none alive!¡±

    Luca had said those words to mock Bonds, Gilbert, and Sanguis after surrounding them. He did not expect that in just minutester, he would have a taste of his own medicine and be mocked by Polo by the same exact words. Luca could not be more annoyed but against Polo who was just as savage as he was, there wasn¡¯t much that he could do about it.

    Polo did not give Luca the chance for more prattling and charged at him ferociously. He engaged Luca with ate-stage highgod of thunder.

    Sanguis was astounded. He looked at Gilbert puzzlingly and asked, ¡°How would this guy who you call Han Haomand such a powerful group of experts? From what you¡¯ve said, it doesn¡¯t sound like he was all that strong when back in the Profound Continent. How could he recruit so many powerful followers in just a short few decades?¡±

    ¡°Well, how would I know?¡± Gilbert giggled and said, ¡°But that guy has been a peculiar one all along. He would murder and plunder with Master and have served Master much longer than we have. Hehe, back then in the Abyss Realm, weren¡¯t you just as weak and powerless? But look at the heights you are at now. Should it reallye as a surprise to you that he, Master¡¯s first follower, could soar in strength so rapidly?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Back then, while we were in the City of Shadows building our House of Han, he was in Ronson Canyon building his godhunter faction. He was the de facto ruler of the Ronson Canyon before he left for the Fringe. It was only natural that his strength and influence have grown even greater after having stayed in the Fringe for so long,¡± exined Bonds who had heard a thing or two about Han Hao.

    ¡°I really wish to meet him!¡± muttered Sanguis.

    In the House of Han, Sanguis had always been the most powerful expert after Han Shuo. Sanguis¡¯ strength had been rapidly progressing in the past few years and his arrogance had risen in tandem. It was only natural that Sanguis, a hot-headed teenager, would like to challenge Han Hao who seemed to possess strength and prestige that surpassed his.

    Bonds and Gilbert looked at Sanguis in a funny look but they did notment about it. They both knew that although Sanguis had been rapidly progressing in strength, he would still stand no chance against Han Hao. To fight Han Hao was to smack a rock at his own feet.

    If Polo, a follower of Han Hao¡¯s, possessedte-stage highgod strength, then logically, Han Hao must possess even greater strength than Polo. Given that Sanguis could not even defeat ate-stage highgod at this point, it would be impossible for him to defeat Han Hao.

    While Bonds, Gilbert, and Sanguis were chatting, those minions of Luca were being crushed by Polo¡¯s godhunters. They suffered heavy casualties in just moments.

    ¡°Gilbert, Sanguis, look at the movement and coordination of these godhunters. Does it look familiar to you?¡± asked Bonds suddenly.

    Sanguis and Gilbert started to carefully observe the godhunters for a moment and their faces jolted slightly.

    Surprisingly, Polo¡¯s godhunters knew how to effectively fight as a team. It was obvious from their footsteps and coordination that they had been taught demonicbat formations. Although they had not been tempered for years inside the Eight Destion and Torment Formation and were not as well-trained as the House of Han guards, their effectivebat strength was nheless significantly amplified under the demonicbat formation, allowing them to crush Luca¡¯s poorly coordinated forces easily.

    ¡°That guy has indeed learned plenty from Master. Haha, no wonder he would be so aplished among the godhunters!¡± remarked Gilbert smilingly after making observations.

    ¡°He is indeed extraordinary. Sanguis has met his match, it seems,¡± remarked Bonds after taking a nce at Sanguis.

    Bonds understood that Sanguis¡¯ temperament would change for the worse as his strength soared and he was starting to look down upon others. Bonds thought that it might be good for Sanguis to eat a humble pie.

    Besides, Han Hao was also a member of the House of Han. Friendlypetition would be great for tempering Sanguis.

    ¡°Let¡¯s help them up. Haha, after all, it¡¯s not courteous to just stand and watch!¡± suggested Gilbert excitedly after doing nothing for a while.

    Before Bonds could speak, red lights burst from Sanguis¡¯ eyes and he charged at the enemies as an intense reeking of blood emanated from his body. Having Han Hao as a strongpetitor seemed to have motivated Sanguis. Somehow, he seemed to have obtained yet another breakthrough in his cultivation of Bloodgod Mantra.

    ¡°Holy fuck, that blood aura of his have intensified. Don¡¯t tell me that he has obtained yet another breakthrough? Sanguis is absolutely wild!¡± Gilbert was familiar with Sanguis¡¯ strength and they were standing close by. He eximed when he sensed that the blood aura on Sanguis had grown more intense than before.

    Bonds nodded dly and put on a prideful faint smile. He remarked, ¡°Sanguis is indeed talented. At this speed of progress, one day, he might even exceed Han Hao in strength.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯d doubt that. Haha, you have not met Han Hao before. That guy is even more terrifying and even more callous and heartless than you are. There is no way that Sanguis could progress as fast as he could in terms of realm state,¡± remarked Gilbert after thinking for a moment. He felt that Sanguiscked something that Little Skeleton had.

    ¡°I can¡¯t wait to meet him,¡± said Bonds. He too seemed very interested in Han Hao.

    ¡°Come, let¡¯s kill these bastards!¡± cried Gilbert before charging at Luca¡¯s minions.

    Polo¡¯s forces had the upper hand over Luca¡¯s forces. With Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert joining the massacre, Luca¡¯s minions perished at an even faster rate. One after another, they would let out miserable shrieks and perish after all their divine energy was drained.

    In just moments, the more than a hundred midgods that Luca brought were annihted. All that left was Luca and a few highgods who were struggling to survive. However, it was clear that they won¡¯t be able tost for much longer.

    ¡°There¡¯s no escape, Luca. What a fucking shame that you don¡¯t cultivate destruction energy. Otherwise, I could have a real feast today,¡± said Polo haughtily as he beat up Luca with five of his godhunters.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it, Polo. Though you may not be able to absorb his energy ¨C we can!¡± remarked a highgod of death as his eyes shining with ravenous, savage lights stared fixedly on Luca. Saliva overflowed from the corner of his mouth as he grinned.

    Luca grew even more desperate and despaired as he listened to the godhunters discussing how to divide the divine energy in his body among themselves. Whenever he tried to use a certain item in his space ring to escape, the firepower shot at him would increase by several folds, forcing him to defend and unable to utilize the escape tool.

    As the battle went on, the injuries on Luca¡¯s body grew more and more severe. Suddenly, he noticed that his eyelids felt incredibly heavy and the cognitive ability of his divine soul was diminishing.

    ¡°Poison? You... You haveplete upper hand, and yet, you use... poison?¡± Luca felt lethargic. He could barely lift his arms and legs as they seemed as heavy as lead. Luca stared at the sneering Polo with discontent as he strenuously yelled, ¡°Despicable, how despicable! You... You will die horribly!¡±

    ¡°Hehe, we know that given your strength, we will have to suffer some losses if we were to kill you by normal means. But luckily for us, the House of Han makes medicines. Our weapons have beenced with a colorless and odorless poison called ¡®Godfall¡¯. It is said that Lord Bryan himself had produced them. ept your fate!¡± replied Polo in a most treacherous smile.

    Polo and his godhunters had been attacking Luca but not dealt him the killing blow as to let him have hope and not make a kamikaze attack. However, they would moderately make cuts on Luca¡¯s body with their poisoned weapons and slowly poison him.

    ¡®Godfall¡¯, a poison made by Han Shuo, was not just odorless and tasteless, but it also doesn¡¯t activate in low doses so that the victim had no idea that they were being poisoned. The poison would very slowly make its way around the victim¡¯s divine body and prate every cell. When the dosage was enough; when the victim felt the effects of the poison, it would be toote.

    The poison would affect both the divine body and the divine soul. No matter what they do, they won¡¯t be able to assemble their energy. They would be incapacitated and be a sitting duck. It would be impossible to do anything, much less making a kamikaze attack.

    ¡°Wahaha... Master is indeed bing more and more despicable! This Godfall poison is wonderful stuff! Hahaha, I must ask Master for someter. It is very damn useful formitting massacre! This is like slowly pushing the enemies off the cliff without them knowing until it¡¯s toote! Hahah!¡± Gilbert called Han Shuo despicable but it seemed that he used the word not as an insult but praise. He seemed very admiring and proud of Han Shuo.

 Chapter 921 - Osteoburg

    <h4>GDK 921: Osteoburg</h4>

    Under the effects of the Godfall poison, Luca was incapacitated and unable to utilize the energy in his body. Several highgods of death swarmed at him and jointly sucked his divine energy dry. He could only watch helplessly as the godhunters kill him slowly.

    After Luca was killed, the remaining few of his minions soon suffered the same fate. Just as Polomanded, not a single one of them was spared.

    The Godfall poison had yed a significant role in Polo¡¯s swift and effortless victory in this battle. Luca and his forces did not realize that they were being poisoned before it was toote. Without any capacity to resist, they became living divine essences for the godhunters.

    After the massacre was over, it was time to clean up the crime scene. Polo¡¯s godhunters would take out bottles of azure-blue powders and apply them to the wounds of the bodies. In just moments, those bodies wouldpletely liquefy, leaving no evidence behind other than a puddle of bloody liquid.

    Polo put on a gratified smile and exined to the House of Han trio, ¡°Hehe, thanks to these extraordinary medicines provided by Celestial Pearl, we have a much easier time doing our jobs.¡±

    Bonds swept his gaze across those liquefied bodies and nodded his head indifferently. He said, ¡°We would like to meet Han Hao.¡±

    ¡°Chief is not in this area and His Lordship is in the middle of something. But if you will be staying in the Omphalos, you will have the opportunity to meet him in the near future,¡± replied Polo in a friendly manner as though he had transformed into another person.

    ¡°Alright then. Thank you for your help,¡± replied Bonds.

    ¡°Haha, you¡¯re too polite. we¡¯re all friends here, so don¡¯t need to be so cordial.¡± Polo was aware of Han Hao¡¯s rtion with the House of Han and he had considered himself a fringe member of the House. There was no way that Polo would be smug before Bonds.

    ¡°Be it as it may, we appreciate your assistance. Alright, we will continue heading towards Omphalos but we will be more careful. We probably won¡¯t run into any more troubles,¡± said Bonds after thinking for a moment. He then turned to Gilbert and Sanguis and said, ¡°Let¡¯s get moving!¡±

    Sanguis and Gilbert nodded. With the thirty-something House of Han guards that remained, they separated with Polo.

    After making some distance from Polo, Bonds turned to hispanions and remarked, ¡°Polo and the others are godhunters. We House of Han must not be seen going too close with them or it will affect our business in every dominion.

    ¡°Yes, Shifu must have thought of this issue and therefore declined to rify his rtionship with Han Hao to the public all along,¡± said Sanguis nodding.

    While Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert continued their journey to the Omphalos, Han Shuo was still traveling with the mainpany. He had a gut feeling that something was wrong when the trio had not returned for days and was starting to worry about them.

    Han Shuo could detect the general location of the trio when they were within a certain distance but Sanguis, Gilbert, and Bonds were now far from the coverage of Han Shuo¡¯s senses.

    Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert may possess decent strengths but they were in the Fringe where the strongest and most abominable criminals from the Twelve Dominion gathered. The strengths they possessed would only reduce the risk of them getting killed but not eliminate it.

    Two more days passed but the trio still had not returned to thepany. Han Shuo started to get somewhat anxious.

    When he was considering looking for them, he suddenly received a signal. With one thought, a demon general streaked across vast terrains in the northwest direction and stopped before a godhunter camouged with the ground. The demon general then materialized, taking Han Shuo¡¯s appearance, and asked, ¡°What¡¯s the matter?¡±

    The godhunter who was a trusted aide of Han Hao did not reply but took out a scroll and respectfully handed it to ¡®Han Shuo¡¯. After reading the message, Han Shuo understood what Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert had encountered and he destroyed the scroll. The demon general then returned to its invisible state and vanished.

    Han Shuo who was traveling in the middle of hispany bunched his brows and mumbled to himself, ¡°Hmm, I wonder if Luca had acted on his own or by Logue¡¯smand... ¡°

    *** The Fringe, Osteoburg. The ground was covered with white bones and wraiths could be seen wandering aimlessly. The intense element of death filled the atmosphere in the form of thin fog. Other than amplifying their strengths, experts of the death energy could progress faster while cultivating in this ce.

    At the center of Osteoburg was a castle made purely out of bones. Logue, one of the Five Sovereigns, lived in the eerie white castle.

    At this moment, Logue was sitting on an enormous bone throne and wearing a cold, dark face as he listened to a report of one of his followers.

    ¡°Luca has vanished without a trace. We could not find even single evidence of him in his activity area,¡± reported a burly expert of death energy on one knee.

    ¡°Luca is probably dead.¡± Logue coldly groaned, straightened his back in his seat, and continued, ¡°Those few kiddos are definitely no match against Luca. It must be someone else who killed him. Bryan is getting more and more out of line. It seems that I must take action sooner!¡±

    ¡°My Lord, from the first day that this person entered the Fringe, he had done nothing but mess up the system and many of the established rules! The Pandemonians are bing more and more domineering and many of the neers are enlisting themselves with the Pandemonians. They get stronger with each day passed. My Lord, we must not allow this problem to fester! The longer we wait, the harder it will be to destroy them!¡± advised the burly man gravely.

    Logue let out yet another cold groan. He gestured and instructed, ¡°I¡¯m very much aware of it. You are dismissed.¡±

    After the burly man left, Logue immediately changed his expression, putting on a cordial smile. He raised his head and said to the sky, ¡°I¡¯ve been expecting you.¡±

    A dark light suddenly cast downward. The strongest Sovereign of the Fringe, Tyre, stood before Logue and he immediately said in a grave expression, ¡°Don¡¯t be hasty about Bryan, we have a bigger problem ¨C I have received reliable intel that the Hegemons are marching for the Fringe. This is nothing like we have faced before. Currently, seven of the Hegemons have mobilized.¡±

    ¡°What?!¡± Logue¡¯s face jolted and he cried, ¡°The godhunter Hegemons have always been divided and uncooperative, or the Fringe would have fallen to them long ago. How? What could have possibly united them?¡±

    ¡°I heard that Bryan has wiped out the godhunter bases in the Darkness and Death Dominions. The two Sovereigns consider him a threat to the existence of the Godhunter Alliance and want to destroy Bryan at all costs. As his base happens to be at the Fringe, they thought that they might as well conquer the Fringe while they are at it,¡± said Tyre in a grimace.

    ¡°It¡¯s him again!¡± Logue got furious. He suddenly mmed the armrest of his throne, stood up, andined, ¡°Ever since this guy steps into the Fringe, he just keeps on making us troubles and troubles. And now, he even made the Hegemons unite! This guy is a scourge that needs to be eliminated!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about that just yet, we need to deal with the Godhunter Alliance first.¡± Without concealing his murderous intention, Tyre said, ¡°I know you want him dead ¨C so do I. But now is not the time to do so. Even if we attack Bryan and seed, the Godhunter Alliance will still carry on with the invasion. And by then, we will be too exhausted to defend ourselves.¡±

    Malicious, sinister lights glinting from Logue¡¯s little eyes. He nodded and smilingly said, ¡°I have an idea ¨C we can push him forward and let him take the brunt of the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s attack. Hehe, with that, he will be forced to go all out against the Godhunter Alliance. If he ended up getting killed ¨C that¡¯d be the best. If he won ¨C we could then get rid of him without too much effort. In short, we must not let him live!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s a great idea!¡± Tyre chucked sinisterly.¡°But can Bryan and his forces handle the Godhunter Alliance?¡±

    ¡°Isn¡¯t there Wasir and Ossora?¡± Logue put on a scheming smile and said, ¡°The two of us just need to n ahead and push the three of them to the frontline. As long as they fight the Godhunter Alliance before us, we will be in great positions. Hehe, if all three of them end up dead, the Fringe will be ours!¡±

    Tyre kept silent for a moment before he suddenlyughed heartily and said, ¡°It seems that I have made the right decision ining to meet you!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s discuss and make a thorough n. With the power and influence we have in the Fringe, we can easily make those three fight the frontline. And when this is done, Tyre, we will split the Fringe into two ¨C you¡¯ll have one side and I will take the other!¡±

    ¡°Sounds good, let¡¯s discuss... ¡° Tyre and Logue began scheming.

    One dayter, Tyre left the Osteoburg with a big smile on his face. He went to a secluded spot, deployedyers of barriers around him, and took out his magical mirror.

    The image in the magical mirror twisted and warped, gradually revealing a face that Han Shuo knew. It was one of the Hegemons of the Godhunter Alliance ¨C Dhaka!

    ¡°Elder Brother, so here¡¯s the deal... ¡° Tyre had a rxed look as he told Dhaka every detail about his negotiation with Logue.

    Dhaka nodded as he listened to Tyre. After a while, he smilingly replied, ¡°After this battle, I will be in charge of the Godhunter Alliance and you will be the ruler of the Fringe. And by then, we brothers will join forces, open the path to Aethernia, and steal the Quintessences!¡±

    ¡°Hahaha, sorry Logue, but the Fringe won¡¯t be split into two. It will be united ¨C under my rule!¡± Tyreughed out loud.

 Chapter 922 - Unnatural

    <h4>Chapter 922: Unnatural</h4>

    Han Shuo and his family n members did not rush in their journey. After half-a-month, they finally arrived at the Omphalos.

    Han Shuo now possessed ten Sovereign Shops in the Omphalos and one of the City¡¯s entrances roughly facing the Pandemonium was controlled by Han Shuo¡¯s minions. Needless to say, the House of Han members were allowed into the Omphalos without having to pay any entrance fees.

    Sanguis, Bonds, and Gilbert had reached the Omphalos long ago and they had been waiting at the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. As soon as Han Shuo and hispany arrived, Bonds stepped forth to apologize, ¡°Senior brother, the three of us had recklessly traveled far ahead of thepany and ran into the underlings of Sovereign Logue. Had Han Hao¡¯s followers note to our rescue in time, I¡¯m afraid we wouldn¡¯t have reached the Omphalos. I take full responsibility for this avoidable incident. Please punish me!¡±

    Bonds tried to take full responsibility for the mistake. He did not reveal that it was Sanguis and Gilbert who had egged him into doing so.

    ¡°No, Master, it wasn¡¯t his fault. It was Sanguis and I who came up with the idea!¡± shouted Gilbert.

    Sanguis did not speak but nodded, agreeing with Gilbert.

    ¡°Alright, that¡¯s enough. I know what happened and I don¡¯t have to hear your recount,¡± said Han Shuo in an annoyed manner. He red at Bonds and said, ¡°I know you well, Bonds. It¡¯s obvious that you couldn¡¯t havee up with such an idea.¡±

    ¡°Gilbert, Sanguis, you are grounded for two years starting from this day. Your recklessness had led to the death of twenty of our House of Han guards, yourrades. Use the time to repent!¡± chided Han Shuo coldly.

    Sanguis and Gilbert lowered their heads in shame. They recognized their mistakes and epted Han Shuo¡¯s punishment.

    ¡°Emily, Phoebe, Stratholme, you will continue to manage the Celestial Pearl. We will head to the Pandemonium after I have sorted out a few things here,¡± instructed Han Shuo. After settling the House of Han in the Celestial Pearl, Han Shuo looked for Zovic and softly instructed, ¡°Contact Ossora, Tyre, Logue, and Wasir. Tell them that the Godhunter Alliance will be invading the Fringe and they better get prepared.¡±

    Zovic¡¯s face turned grave after hearing those words. He nodded and respectfully dismissed himself to carry out the order.

    After that, Han Shuo gathered every of his core family members in a secret chamber and announced in a faint smile, ¡°All of you came with me from the Profound Continent to this world many years ago, and you all have been rapidly advancing in strength. However, I still feel that you could do even better.¡±

    As Han Shuo spoke, he started taking out crystal balls around the size of a fist. Each of the crystal balls contained a greyish, gas-like object that constantly changes its shape in an unpredictable manner. Using their divine souls, the party sensed weak soul energy emanating from the crystal balls.

    ¡°You have probably sensed the weak soul signatures emanating from these crystal balls. They contain divine souls of highgods who cultivated in various energies. However, I have erased their awareness and everything in their souls, save for their cultivation experiences and knowledge,¡± exined Han Shuo smilingly as he nced through the party.

    The party stared nkly after listening to Han Shuo for they weren¡¯t sure what Han Shuo wanted them to do with it. But unlike the others, Fanny, who cultivated the energy of death, seemed pleasantly surprised. She cried out excitedly, ¡°Bryan, you mean to have us assimte these souls? I know that souls without self-awareness are equivalent to pure memories and they can be absorbed by our divine souls. If these souls used to be highgods, that means their memories contain... ¡°

    Everyone in the chamber also put on the same pleasantly surprised faces before Fanny had finished her words. Their eyes lit up as they realized what treasure wasid before them.

    When they took their first step on Elysium, these people who came from the Profound Continent realized just how weak they were and they had been doing all they could to increase their strength. Using the tremendous financial resources of the House of Han, they had been making rapid progress. However, money could only get them this far.

    Although they could gain divine energy by purchasingrge amounts of divine essences, no amount of ck crystal coins could buy them the knowledge and understanding they needed to advance to their next realm. This was simr to how an Earthling would need decades to learn and master advanced mathematics or physics: the individual must make constant effort to understand the subject. Mastery could only be achieved through the individual¡¯s grit and talent.

    Therefore, despite having ess to tremendous financial resources, most of the House of Han members stagnated in the midgod realm. A few of the less talented ones were still in the lowgod realm. They would need decades, if not centuries, to reach where they want to be.

    But those crystal balls Han Shuo presented will allow them to skip all that time and effort!

    Not just Han Shuo¡¯s harem, but even old fes like Stratholme and Ayermike were in raptures. Ayermike looked at Han Shuo in disbelief and emotionally asked, ¡°Bryan, how did you do that? We have lived on Elysium for a while now but never had we heard that it is possible to artificially erase the self-awareness of a soul without damaging it. That is miraculous! I think even those Quintessence Overgods cannot do so!¡±

    Aykermike¡¯s words had reminded the party just how difficult it was to erase the self-awareness of a highgod soul and to somehow prevent it from naturally degrading and vanishing into the world.

    During the many years they lived on Elysium, they learned that it was only in a certain extremely unique environment and under unique circumstances that a divine soul without self-awareness could form. But this was an extremely rare natural phenomenon.

    They had never heard it be achieved artificially!

    Naturally, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t exin his ability granted by demonic arts to alter souls. He smiled and replied, ¡°Don¡¯t bother asking how I did it, just focus on fusing with these highgod souls and assimte their knowledge. After obtaining the understanding andprehension they had umted over the centuries, you will all obtain breakthroughs very easily. With sufficient divine energy, you will reach highgodhood in just a few years!¡±

    The party was overjoyed. Next, they each received a crystal ball of their energy following Han Shuo¡¯s assignment.

    ¡°Most of the souls are in the mid-stage highgod realm and a few of them are in thete-stage highgod realm. The information contained in their souls would be extremely enormous. Take caution when assimting their souls. Do not try to take in everything in one shot, lest your soul crumbles!

    The special container you are holding stops their soul from degrading and dissipating. So take your time and absorb their knowledge bit by bit in intervals. Again, do not more than what you can handle!¡± warned Han Shuo when he saw the ecstatic faces of the party.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Bryan. We¡¯ve got it!¡± said Emily cheerfully. No one could be happier than her and Phoebe. During the past many years, they had ced most of their energy on Celestial Pearl and did not have as much time to cultivate as the others did.

    Therefore, in the House of Han, Phoebe and Emily had been making rtively slow progress, especially in their realm state. Despite having the privilege to enjoy more divine essences than the others, they stagnated in their cultivation as they were bottlenecked by their realm states which needed time that they did not have. They had been feeling rather worried about falling too far behind the others.

    But now, with these crystal balls, that will no longer be an issue.

    ¡°This act is against the natural order. We need to keep this a top-secret, no outsider must know anything about this! Godhunters are Elysium¡¯s public enemy for consuming another person¡¯s divine energy. What we are doing is the same as consuming another person¡¯s soul. This would be more outrageous than what the godhunters are doing. We must never, ever reveal a thing about this. Otherwise, the House of Han will be Elysium¡¯s public enemy!¡± warned Ayermike gravely.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. This is why I had dismissed the House of Han guards earlier. Only we who came from the Profound Continent can know about this. Keep this knowledge within this circle. And if you want to exchange your findings, only do so in a secret chamber!¡± warned Han Shuo gravely.

    After hearing the warnings, everyone in the room understood the importance of keeping it a secret as what Han Shuo did was a hundred times more appalling than what the godhunters did. They withdrew their smiles and solemnly swore not to divulge a thing to outsiders.

    ¡°Good, I believe everyone understands how important this is,¡± Han Shuo smiled and continued, ¡°Alright, you all be careful. We will be moving to the Pandemonium after I¡¯ve met Ossora. Over there, you won¡¯t have to worry about anyone finding out. Withyers of demonic formations around it, even the Sovereign cannot glimpse into the Pandemonium!¡±

    Other than Sanguis and Bonds, every House of Han members received a crystal ball. Even Gilbert received the soul of a mid-stage highgod of darkness.

    With those divine souls and the tremendous financial power of the House of Han, Han Shuo believed that it wouldn¡¯t be long before these people would soon possess powerful strengths and he could spend less time worrying for their safety.

    After the meeting was over and when everyone had left, Han Shuo took out two crystal balls. It was time to advance his two avatars!

 Chapter 923 - Feigning Civility

    <h4>GDK 923: Feigning Civility</h4>

    Of the two crystal balls, one contained the divine soul of Hill, the former City Lord of Witherbone City, while the other contained the divine soul of a godhunter Chief who cultivated destruction energy. Both of them were inte-stage highgod realms. Their self-awareness was erased and contained nothing but their knowledge and understanding of the energy they cultivated.

    After entering the Space Dominion, Han Shuo had proceeded with erasing the Divine Brand that the God of Death ced in Hill¡¯s divine soul. He knew that the Death Overgod must have sensed his action but he wasn¡¯t worried about it as he was outside the Death Dominion.

    And it appeared that Han Shuo¡¯s spection was right. So far, the Overgod of Death had yet to take any action despite knowing that Hill was murdered. It seemed as though He wasn¡¯t going to do anything about it.

    Han Shuo held one crystal ball in each hand. His two avatars gradually emerged from the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, sat on the sides of his main body, and received the crystal balls.

    After having ascended to Skybreak Realm in demonic arts, Han Shuo¡¯s strength substantially increased, far surpassing that of his avatars that cultivated in the energies of death and destruction. It had been a while since hest used his avatars against an enemy and he had been cking on their cultivations.

    Han Shuo understood that no matter how rapidly his avatars would improve in strength, they most likely cannot catch up to the strength of his main body. But Han Shuo thought that those avatars were still worth keeping. He knew that the avatars could fuse their domains of divinities and unleash tremendous power. He thought that his avatars should take on a cultivation path that focuses on fusing their energies.

    Under the maniption of the two avatars, the two crystal balls gently floated up and hovered before their faces. They began opening their divine souls and acquiring connections with the information and memories contained in those formatted souls. When their divine souls came into contact with the crystal balls, they instantly sensed that a tremendous amount of messages were contained within.

    Following their thoughts, the life forms in the crystal balls suddenly begin shing and moving erratically. Segments of memories were fusing with their divine souls.

    Meanwhile, the consciousness of Han Shuo¡¯s main body had split into two, each entering a crystal ball. His consciousness would sort and arrange the memories in those crystal balls as they flowed into the divine souls of his avatars.

    If it was Phoebe, Emily, or the others, they would have to spend tremendous efforts to assimte the divine souls in those crystal balls. The memories and understanding of those souls were disordered and they must spend a long time to defragment the memories. Otherwise, not only will their realm state not rapidly progress, but their realm state might even go retrograde.

    But with the assistance of his main body¡¯s consciousness, Han Shuo¡¯s avatars would only take a fraction of the time needed to assimte those souls. He could absorb the libraries of knowledge and memories in those crystal balls once-through rather than having to do it bit by bits like Stratholme and the others had to.

    In just three days, Han Shuo¡¯s avatars hadpleted the assimtion. The vast sea of information and insight into the energies of death and destruction were now in the minds of his avatars, readily essible. With that, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness returned to his main body.

    ¡°Come in!¡± said Han Shuo after his avatars returned into the Cauldron in his body.

    Zovic who had been waiting outside for a long time hastily entered the chamber. He respectfully bowed before he said, ¡°Ossora has a message for Your Lordship. He is inviting you to Tyre¡¯s Sovereign Shop where he, Tyre, Logue, and Wasir have been waiting.¡±

    ¡°That was fast,¡± Han Shuo nodded and got on his feet before he instructed Zovic, ¡°Enhance the security of the Celestial Pearl for now and make sure that no outsider could step into the restricted areas.¡± HS knew that his family members would be assimting those divine souls given to them in the secret chambers and he wanted to take extra precautions to prevent anyone from discovering their acts.

    ¡°Understood. No unauthorized person could step into the Celestial Pearl, save for the retail sections,¡± pledged Zovic confidently.

    ¡°Good.¡± Without wasting any more words, Han Shuo left his gymnasium and headed for Tyre¡¯s sovereign shop unhurriedly.

    Ten minutester, Han Shuo arrived at his destination. This Sovereign Shop of Tyre¡¯s does not conduct any business. It was a gathering ce for Tyre¡¯s minions and the operation center for his stringers, used for collecting all sorts of information in the Fringe and the Twelve Dominions. It was thanks to the intelligence agency in this building that among the Sovereigns, Tyre would always be the first to learn about the most recent events in the Fringe with the greatest uracy.

    ¡°Wee, Lord Bryan. The Sovereigns are all inside. Let me lead the way, ¡° one of Tyre¡¯s followers stationed at the front door respectfully greeted Han Shuo without dy and invited him into the building.

    Han Shuo was led to a luxurious and expansive lounge. The floor was covered with a soft carpet and the walls were filled with decorative lightings. Tyre, Wasir, Logue, and Ossora, all wearing dark faces, sat far apart in the room, sitting in opposing directions. When Han Shuo appeared, they nodded at him as a greeting.

    ¡°Hey, Bryan. We have been waiting for a while,¡± Ossora gestured, indicating Han Shuo to sit anywhere he liked.

    ¡°You are dismissed,¡± instructed Tyre at his follower who led Han Shuo to the lounge. The person bowed at the Five and respectfully left. The five mightiest existences in the Fringe were now gathered in the chamber.

    ¡°Bryan, the situation seems really bad. After receiving your message, we have sent our men for scouting. Those godhunters in many of the Dominion are indeed gathering towards the Fringe. Unlike the past, the godhunters seem to have been united and are moving out together,¡± After Han Shuo took his seat, Ossora let out a soft sigh and began describing the current situation in a grave face.

    ¡°If the Godhunter Alliance are united against us, the Fringe would stand no chance against them,¡± stated Wasir with his brows furrowed worriedly.

    ¡°Indeed. The reason that the Fringe had not fallen to their hands was that the Godhunter Alliance had always fought internally and could not unite against us. But things are quite different this time. From the intel I have collected, it appears that every faction of the Alliance has temporarily ceased their internal strife and is determined to destroy the Fringe!¡± said Logue after he nodded.

    ¡°I have met the Hegemons of Death, Destruction, and Darkness. Their strengths are very formidable! We definitely have a tough battle ahead of us as Ss is working with them. With Ss¡¯ familiarity with the Fringe, the Godhunter Alliance could navigate around easily, giving us defenders less of an advantage,¡± said Han Shuo after he thought for a moment, deciding to reveal that he had exchanged blows with the three Hegemons at the Misty Sea.

    ¡°No wonder the Godhunter Alliance Hegemons would be so united ¨C all thanks to your good work!¡± Logue coldly groaned and said, ¡°If you had not been massacring the godhunters, the Godhunter Alliance wouldn¡¯t be so determined to invade us. You really know how to bring troubles to the Fringe, Bryan!¡±

    Upon hearing those words, Wasir and Ossora turned to Han Shuo and looked at him with puzzled eyes. They did not expect that Han Shuo¡¯s actions in the Darkness and Death Dominions were the main driving factor of the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s unity and aggression towards the Fringe.

    Only Tyre had a calm face as though he didn¡¯t care who or what had triggered the matter. He smilingly mediated, ¡°The Godhunter Alliance has coveted for our Land for many years. Even if Bryan did not attack them, it would still be a matter of time before they would attack us. Bryan had not caused it, he only made it earlier.¡±

    ¡°I did not expect that Ss would work with those godhunters. With Ss¡¯ assistance, their invasion will be much smoother,¡± remarked Wasir suddenly, shaking his head after keeping silent for a moment. He too recognized the seriousness of the situation this time.

    ¡°Bryan, half-a-month ago, one of my followers named Luca had mysteriously disappeared. There has been no news about him even till now. Those I sent to investigate his disappearance reported that only Han Hao¡¯s followers had passed through the area where he disappeared. What the hell was that about?¡±ined Logue angrily.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before he put on an astounded face and replied, ¡°Oh, really? That¡¯s surprising. I will ask Han Hao for youter and see if he knew about it, but I believe that it had nothing to do with his followers!¡± Then, as though he thought of something, he put on an rmed look and said, ¡°Could it be that those of the Godhunter Alliance have already infiltrated the Fringe? I think that is most likely! Logue, we need to be united at this time. Don¡¯t you fall to our enemy¡¯s ruse to divide us!¡±

    Logue got furious after listening to Han Shuo¡¯s bare-faced lie. He shouted, ¡°How is possible for the Godhunter Alliance to arrive so soon? They definitely will not hastily step into the Fringe without a year of preparation and nning! Just own up to your actions!¡±

    ¡°You must have gotten it wrong!¡± Han Shuo shook his head and exined, ¡°Although I have only returned to the Fringe today and wasn¡¯t aware of it, I¡¯m sure that Han Hao¡¯s followers wouldn¡¯t touch your followers. This definitely had nothing to do with us!¡±

    Logue was going to continue arguing but was interrupted by an annoyed Tyre. ¡°That¡¯s enough. What¡¯s the point of arguing over such a petty matter? Those godhunters areing and we need to be united against them. If we are fighting among ourselves now, we might as well surrender the Fringe to them!¡±

    After Logue and Han Shuo finally ceased their arguing, Tyre took a deep breath and asked, ¡°My fellow Sovereigns, do any of you have a solution in mind?¡±

    Logue, Wasir, and Ossora shook their heads. Han Shuo, however, put on a smile, and said, ¡°Well, I do have an idea.¡±

 Chapter 924 - Scheming

    <h4>Chapter 924: Scheming</h4>

    ¡°Oh? Tyre straightened his body and smilingly said, ¡°Please, tell us about it.¡±

    Han Shuo still had an unruffled look, as though the Godhunter Alliance was no threat at all, as he slowly exined, ¡°Inform the Twelve Dominions that the Godhunter Alliance will be assembling at the Fringe. I bet they would be more than happy to take long journeys for exterminating the Godhunter Alliance that had always been scattered and in hiding.¡±

    ¡°That does sound like a n, but I¡¯m afraid that when those of the Twelve Dominions havee to the Fringe, they will not just exterminate the Godhunter Alliance but we Fringedwellers as well,¡± Tyre wore a grimace as he exined, ¡°Although we Fringedwellers are not as unpopr as the Godhunter Alliance, we aren¡¯t exactly liked. Most of us Fringedwellers used to be criminals from every Dominion. I¡¯m afraid that when their army came, they would exterminate us along with the godhunters.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Bryan, you might not know, but there are many who felt that the Fringe should not exist on Elysium. If they feel that they have a chance at eliminating the tumor, which is us, from Elysium, they will do so. We could be hoisting our own petard. Those of the Godhunter Alliance could escape everywhere but we cannot. We could be exterminated by the forces of the Twelve Dominions before the Godhunters could invade ournd,¡± exined Ossora after he sighed. He sounded rather helpless.

    ¡°Humph, don¡¯t forget that your Han Hao used to be a member of the Godhunter Alliance. Once those of the Twelve Dominions arrive at the Fringe, they will exterminate Han Hao and his godhunters before destroying the Fringe, ¡° sneered Logue.

    ¡°s, we seem to have an unsolvable challenge before us... ¡° remarked Tyre with a worried frown.

    ¡°Then we shall fight! If we can obtain early-victories, the Godhunter Alliance will hesitate!¡± said the rather quiet Wasir suddenly.

    Tyre immediately voiced his agreement as though he had nned to do so since the beginning, ¡°This is an unavoidable war. We must fight!¡± He looked at Han Shuo and Ossora before he asked, ¡°As long as the five of us could work as one, we will stand a chance against them. Gentlemens, what do you say?¡±

    Han Shuo could tell that Tyre and Logue must have nned something before the meeting but he decided not to point it out bluntly. He merely shrugged and replied, ¡°Well, I¡¯m the youngest here so I guess I¡¯ll just follow you elders¡¯ n. I will do my best to contribute as a member of the Fringe.¡±

    ¡°Excellent! What ad!¡± Tyreughed heartily as though he was very satisfied with Han Shuo¡¯s answer. He said, ¡°There¡¯s a good chance that the Godhunter Alliance won¡¯t invade as one army. So here¡¯s the n: the five of us will each guard one side of the Fringe. If any of us were attacked, we immediately start defending while informing others about it. If any of us could no longer hold the enemy, the other four will send reinforcements... ¡°

    Tyre exined his n in detail, covering every aspect and every possibility. It was clear that he had given a lot of thought into it. In short, the five will each defend one side of the Fringe and stay connected using magical mirrors. And if any of them ran into a powerful attack, the other four would send reinforcements.

    Although the Godhunter Alliance had Ss¡¯ assistance, their military intelligence capability would still be poorer than the Sovereigns who ruled thend. If any faction of the Godhunter Alliance got too far from their main army, the forces of the Five Sovereigns would immediately assemble and defeat them in detail.

    Tyre¡¯s n seemed rather sound and reasonable. Logue would frequently nod as Tyre exined. He did not ask any questions or voice any disagreement.

    Ossora opposed the n. However, as he could not offer a better alternative or find grounds to refute Tyre, in the end, he had no choice but to agree to it.

    ¡°Bryan, are you okay with the arrangement?¡± asked Tyre smilingly after turning his gaze at Han Shuo.

    ¡°No problem, none at all! I concur fully and wholeheartedly!¡± replied Han Shuo after he jolted slightly. It seemed as though he had been roused from a daydream and had not been listening to Tyre.

    But Tyre did not take offense. Seeing that his objective had been reached, heughed heartily and said, ¡°Very well, then it is decided! We shall defend the side of the Fringe that our Omphalos gate is facing. But I believe that it will be at least half-a-year to one year before the Godhunter Alliance could invade us. We should use this time to converse strength, build up energy, and keep collecting intel to prepare for the war ahead of us!¡±

    ¡°Tyre, the five of us should issue a joint statement to every faction in the Fringe and let them know what¡¯s happening. They too must contribute in defending the Fringe against the Godhunter Alliance, which can only be done with the five of usmanding them,¡± spoke Logue suddenly.

    ¡°Of course,¡± Tyre grinned and replied, ¡°Actually, I have already delivered an ultimatum to all big and small forces in the Fringe that they must surrender to either one of us and join our army within half-a-year. They may immediately separate from us once the crisis is over. Those who would not defend the Fringe will be banished.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s fantastic!¡± Han Shuo got up and with a big smile on his face, he said, ¡°I see that you have taken care of the necessary work for us. I guess there¡¯s no longer anything that I should worry about. Alright, we shall meet again when the godhunters have reached the perimeter of the Fringe.¡±

    After finishing those words, Han Shuo took a nce at Ossora and Wasir and left.

    The Sovereigns did not discuss any further after Han Shuo¡¯s departure. Wasir and Ossora took their leaves and left Tyre and Logue in the lounge.

    ¡°Humph, that kiddo is definitely growing more and more domineering!¡± Logue smiled sinisterly and said, ¡°He is the prime target of the Godhunter Alliance. If we move away from the side that he will be guarding, the godhunters will naturally go in his direction and attack him. And by then, even if the Godhunter Alliance cannot finish him, we will!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, after this war, there won¡¯t be a Pandemonium or House of Han in the Fringe!¡± Tyre put on a faint smile and continued, ¡°Alright, we should make full use of the time to rope in as many of the factions as possible. Thebined power of those forces is extremely great and this is a rare opportunity for us to tap into that power. We had been letting them do as they wished for many years and now is the time for us to reap the benefits!¡±

    ¡°Haha, Bryan is definitely still clueless that we have already subdued most of them. I bet that Wasir, Ossora, and Bryan will be pissing their pants real soon!¡± sneered Logue.

    *** At the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy of the Omphalos, Ossora and Han Shuo was having a drink. They sat facing each other with a coffee table between them.

    ¡°Bryan, how do you feel about Tyre¡¯s n?¡± asked Ossora after downing a ss of wine.

    Han Shuo gently swayed the wine ss in his hand and stared into the dark-red wine thoughtfully. After a long while, he answered in a deep voice, ¡°It¡¯s obvious that Tyre and Logue had nned it ahead of time. But I wonder if they are nning against the Godhunter Alliance or us... ¡°

    ¡°It¡¯s probably both. They likely are nning to use the Godhunter Alliance to weaken us. Humph, Tyre and Logue hadmitted all kinds of despicable and shameless acts. If they sell out information about our defenses to the Godhunter Alliance and abandon us during crucial moments, in the future, the Fringe will be theirs!¡± replied Ossora.

    ¡°I¡¯ve been thinking about what you said in the meeting ¨C that people do not want the Fringe to exist on Elysium. That may be true, but they need the Fringe to exist. Without it, the criminals would have nowhere to go and the crime rate in every dominion will soar. A moment of impulsion, greed, or even something as simple as a spat could turn a good man into a murderer. Therefore, be it now or in the future, there will be nock of criminals.

    ¡°The Dominions could hunt down the criminals to stop the crimes, but it would be much easier if the criminals would just leave and go somewhere. And Fringe is a haven for those people, a ce where they can move to and call home. In the past millions of years, although the Fringe had been purged several times, multiple Sovereigns rose and fell, and yet, even to this day, it persevered. That was not a coincidence,¡± said Han Shuo whose eyes were glistening.

    Ossora suddenly realized what Han Shuo was hinting at and he eximed, ¡°You mean?!¡±

    ¡°There is a necessity for the Fringe¡¯s existence and therefore the Twelve Dominions will not wipe it out of existence. However, they wouldn¡¯t let the Fringe grow too strong either. They will attack the Fringe every once in a while to weaken it, but never to exterminate it,¡± continued Han Shuo.

    ¡°So you intend to carry on with your idea and disclose the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s n to Twelve Dominions?¡± asked Ossora.

    ¡°Maybe. But I think that a round of cleansing is long overdue for both the Godhunter Alliance and the Fringe,¡± Han Shuo did not answer Ossora¡¯s question directly. He smiled and said, ¡°Tyre and Logue may scheme, but so can we. Ossora, by then, if you run into trouble,e to my Pandemonium.¡±

    Ossora put on a pensive look and nodded. He then took his leave.

    After Ossora left, Han Shuo summoned Zovic and instructed, ¡°Inform every House of Han members that we will leave for the Pandemonium in three days.¡±

 Chapter 925 - A mysterious visitor

    <h4>Chapter 925: A mysterious visitor</h4>

    Somewhere in the northwest of the Pandemonium was a wild mountainous region. There, Han Hao, Han Tu, Han Jin, and Han Mu were undertaking construction work under the ground.

    They had bored arge number of narrow, intertwining tunnels connecting more than a thousand big and small chambers at five hundred feet underground. Three of the mountains above them had their contents hollowed out and carved into enormous, spacious stoned chambers. However, there was no lighting, furniture, or electricity installed and none inhabited those spaces.

    ¡°Elder Brother, we are so exhausted. We have dug out one underground pce and three mountains ¨C that was a really arduous project!¡± said Earth Elite Zombie whose face had taken on a mud-yellow shade. Perhaps it had something to do with him having used up most of his energy.

    Metal Elite Zombie was in simr conditions. The originally golden armor on his body had turned dull and he looked very tired.

    In the underground pce where only his brothers were around, Han Hao¡¯s callous face went much softer than usual. He raised a brow before fishing out a rock that resembled dried mud and a shiny, jade-like rock with lights flowing within, and presented them to Han Tu and Han Jin.

    As soon as Han Tu and Han Jin saw the two items, their eyes lit up like spotlights. Simultaneously, they bluntly snatched the items from Han Hao¡¯s hands.

    The unremarkable yellowish stone began to release a great amount of the Yuan Energy of Earth as soon as Han Tu grabbed it, as though it was dissolving into his hand. Weariness gradually lifted from Han Tu¡¯s face and his eyes were once again glowing with energy.

    Han Jin, meanwhile, was rapidly munching down the jade-like stone, crushing it with his teeth and swallowing it. After eating the stone, Han Jin put on a bright smile and asked, ¡°Elder Brother, where did you find these treasures? I have traversed countless mountains and valleys but I never had the luck to find an Emperor ystone or a Goldjade Stone. They are the most nutritious essences of Earth and Metal!¡±

    ¡°I got them by robbing,¡± answered Han Hao calmly.

    ¡°Hehe, Eldest Brother is indeed the best. Being able to burn, kill, and loot every day, that must be fun!¡± remarked Han Tu in his foolish smile.

    ¡°What about me? Little Gold and Little Earth each got a treasure. Where is mine?¡± asked Han Mu.

    ¡°I have not found anything suitable for you, but I will keep an eye out,¡± replied Han Hao after taking a nce at Han Mu.

    ¡°Then thank you in advance! Hehe, other than treasures, please also keep an eye out for beauties. As Elder Brother should know, I love making life!¡± said Han Mu in a lecherous grin.

    ¡°The three of you should return to the Pandemonium, my followers and I will handle the rest here. It would take us at least a year to install all the lightings and furnishings across the entire space,¡± said Han Hao.

    ¡°Understood, brother. I think I will bore another tunnel connecting this base to the Pandemonium on my way back. With the additional tunnel, we could easily reinforce each other¡¯s bases,¡± said Han Tu smilingly.

    ¡°That¡¯d be great,¡± said Han Hao after he nodded. Then, a thought entered his mind and he suddenly ascended to the surface.

    Han Hao¡¯s face had returned to the callous and unfeeling look upon reaching the surface. He looked at a henchman of his that was kneeling on the ground and asked, ¡°What is it?¡±

    ¡°There is a message for you, my Chief,¡± the henchman bowed and handed Han Hao a scroll.

    After reading the scroll, a sinister light shed in Han Hao¡¯s eyes. He burned the scroll into ashes, turned to his kneeling henchman, and instructed, ¡°Tell every one of my Chiefs to assemble. We will be taking a trip away from the Fringe as soon as possible.¡±

    The henchman of Han Hao¡¯s was astounded. He did not understand why Han Hao would ask the godhunter chiefs scattered in every region of the Fringe to assemble and leave for seemingly no reason. However, the henchman did not ask any questions. He respectfully acknowledged Han Hao¡¯smand and left.

    Han Hao then returned to the underground and said to his brothers, ¡°Father has a task for me. I will have to be away from the Fringe temporarily.¡±

    ¡°What task, brother?¡± Han Mu giggled and said, ¡°Bring me along! I have been feeling quite bored recently.¡±

    Han Hao shook his head and resolutely declined, ¡°My godhunters and I will pretend to be those of the Godhunter Alliance. We are going to strike travelers and merchants in strategic ces to alert the Dominions of the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s gathering. We are also going to spread certain information. You are not suited for the task. Besides, Father will be returning to the Pandemonium soon and he might have tasks for you by then.¡±

    ¡°Oh, okay. Nevermind then...¡± replied Han Mu, slightly disappointed.

    Han Hao then immediately departed, leaving the enormous construction project halfway done. Han Jin, Han Tu, and Han Mu then slowly made their way to the Pandemonium with Han Tu creating another tunnel along the way.

    ***cial Peak. Wasir, a cultivator of the energy of water, was sealed inside an enormous block of ice. It looked as though he had been frozen there for tens of thousands of years and was not revealing any trace of life.

    The cial Peak was frozen all year and the average temperature was around negative seventy degrees Celsius. There were certain spots on the cial Peak where the air was especially cold and ice could form. The Frostcavern that Wasir had sealed himself in was the coldest spot on the cial Peak. It was so cold that it could even kill a highgod!

    Wasir had selected the cial Peak as his base because of the extreme environment. By burying himself in the coldest spot, Wasir¡¯s cultivation could be elerated. The chilling ice around him could also inspire a deeper understanding of the frigid nature of the water element.

    Outside the Frostcavern where Wasir was cultivating sat a row of highgods of water. They were covered in snow from head to toe and looked like snowmen. Only a minute flow of energy could be detected in their bodies.

    Unlike Wasir, these highgods were too weak to cultivate in the extremely frigid Frostcavern and could only utilize the cold air blowing outside it. Despite being only a fraction as cold as the center of the Frostcavern, those highgods still benefited greatly from it. Their cultivation speed was more than three times greater than other water element cultivators.

    The five ¡®snowmen¡¯, sitting cross-legged, had their eyes closed as they silently absorbed the cold air blowing from the Frostcavern. Suddenly, one of them opened their eyes. He saw that a shadow of indefinite shape was moving with the wind before it disappeared.

    At first, the person thought that it was just his imagination ying tricks on him. But after taking a moment to sense the environment, he was shocked to discover that there were a few breezes of air blowing towards the Frostcavern. Cracking noises sounded from his head to toe as he started thawing his frozen body. He cried, ¡°Oh no! We have an intruder in the cave! The wind should constantly blow outwards from the Frostcavern but just then, the wind moved in the opposite direction for a split second. Someone must have entered the Frostcavern at a high speed!¡±

    The faces of the other four highgods also jolted and cracking noises also started sounding from their bodies. One of them asked in panic, ¡°What should we do?¡±

    ¡°What else should we do? Inform His Lordship, of course! The Lord should still be cultivating in the ice. If he cannote out from the ice in time, he could be in danger!¡± replied the person before hastily charging into the Frostcavern.

    ¡°Stay where you are!¡± a chilling voice suddenly sounded from the Frostcavern.

    The five immediately halted their hasty footsteps when they heard themand and stared nkly at the person who discovered the intruder. The person was stunned for a moment before he returned to his spot and sat cross-legged on the ground. He said to hisrades, ¡°The Lord has spoken. He is not in danger and we have nothing to worry about.¡±

    Hisrades nodded and also returned to their seats. One of them asked, ¡°Ansett, do you have any idea who this visitor is?¡±

    Ansett, the one who noticed the intruder, shook his head before he answered, ¡°I did not sense any aura that I¡¯m familiar with. He should be an expert on the same level as His Lordship. There are only a few of them in the Fringe. Lord Ss and Logue used toe here often. Could it be one of them?¡±

    ¡°I doubt it,¡± replied Ansett¡¯srade, ¡°They had always visited our Lord openly. Besides, Ss left the Fringe long ago and there is still no news of him. As for Logue, I heard he had a disagreement with our Sovereign recently, so I don¡¯t think that it would be him.¡±

    The five of them could not hear the conversation in the Frostcavern, giving them no clue of who the mysterious visitor could be.

    Hourster, a faint shadow shot out from the Frostcavern in an instant and rapidly vanished into the horizon.

    The five of them had been waiting for the visitor to leave so they had a chance at finding out who he was. Although they had used their full observation power, they were still unable to determine the person¡¯s identity.

    ¡°It¡¯s definitely not Sovereign Logue or Ss. Otherwise, instead of absolutely nothing, they would have left at least a slight trace of the elements of death or lightning in the atmosphere,¡± remarked Ansett long after the visitor left.

    ¡°Then who could it be?¡± one of the highgods was puzzled.

    ¡°The person¡¯s silhouette seemed majestic and the air behind him stirred a trace of sinister aura. It felt rather simr to that someone who had recently thrust himself into the limelight,¡± remarked Ansett after thinking in silence for a moment.

    ¡°You mean, the one from the Pandemonium?¡± All four of Andre¡¯srades cried out simultaneously with amazement.

    ¡°Ahem!¡± a disapproving sound suddenly came from the Frostcavern.

    The five of them were jolted and terrified. They immediately shut their mouths tight, not continuing their chit-chat.

 Chapter 926 - Partying

    <h4>Chapter 926: Partying</h4>

    After half a month of traveling, the House of Han had finally arrived at the Pandemonium.

    With the nourishment of the intense elemental energies and Wood Elite Zombie¡¯s green fingers, the Pandemonium was filled with verdant green nts, beautiful, fragrant flowers, and towering trees. The air was fresh and rejuvenating.

    Other than the houses erected on ground, there was also an immense underground pce in the Pandemonium. Every hallway and chamber was fitted with magicalmps and relevant furnitures in ce. There was more than enough space to amodate every member of the House of Han.

    The House of Han members fell in love with the Pandemonium almost immediately. Phoebe, Emily, and the others cried out in awe when they saw the serene, springtimeyndscape.

    ¡°There areyers uponyers of defenses around the valley. Even a so-called overgod like Tyre would have trouble sneaking into the Pandemonium while an ordinary highgod will die if they try to intrude. This is the true foothold for our House of Han. All those who are in the Pandemonium are insiders. You can assimte those souls without worrying that the public might discover it!¡± exined Han Shuo smilingly. He felt d that his family members were now truly safe.

    ¡°I truly am impressed with this location. We can gain deeper insight into the elemental energies by cultivating here. Bryan, you are remarkable to have concentrated the elements in this area! It¡¯s extraordinary!¡± remarked Ayermike.

    ¡°Wonderful! We will definitely progress faster in our cultivation!¡± In her lovable smile, Emily turned to Han Shuo and said, ¡°After the countless hardships we have gone through, we finally have a ce we can truly call home! Gone are the days of living under another person¡¯s shadows!¡±

    ¡°This calls for a celebration ¨C to say goodbye to our arduous past and hello to a bright future for our House of Han!¡± suggested Phoebe who was in high spirits.

    Everyone became more excited after hearing Phoebe words. They voiced their agreement that they should drink and feast.

    Naturally, Han Shuo agreed. With one thought, one of his demon generals flew into a round tform at the center of the Pandemonium and fiddled with one of the matrices.

    Suddenly, the thick, menacing mist that shrouded the Pandemonium began flowing into the towering stone pirs surrounding them. In just moments, the thick mist was reduced to just a soft, thin veil of whiteness. The bright moonlight was allowed into the valley, illuminating its heavenly scenery.

    Beautiful moonlight, elegant buildings, luxuriant, colourful nts, fragrant flowers, and charming angels... At this moment, the Pandemonium had lost all trace of menace and turned into a paradise.

    Following Han Shuo¡¯smand, the crates of fine wines were taken out from the underground warehouse and served. The most delicious fruits from all over Elysium were ted on crystal dishes. Under the moonlight, thepany drank to their heart¡¯s content.

    Goron, Romon, the Five Elite Zombies, and others who happened to be in the Pandemonium exited the underground pce and joined the merrymaking. Han Shuo rxed and enjoyed himself to the fullest in this hard-toe-by peacefulness. He took turns drinking with his harem.

    Although everyone in the party possessed great strength and could easily neutralize the alcohol with their divine energy, they deliberately allowed the alcohol to mess with their systems and intoxicate them. They chugged down strong alcohol like it was water. As for Han Shuo, after drinking non-stop and actively boosting the effects of alcohol in his body for two days, he finally felt a slight tingling in his finger.

    On the second night of the party, Han Shuo carried Emily and Fanny whose faces were flushed and slightly drunk, one on each arm, into his underground pce with a great chuckle. Phoebe, Jasper, and those who were usually rather reserved had not received Han Shuo¡¯s nourishment for a long time and were craving for it. With alcohol removing their shyness, they automatically followed behind Han Shuo to his underground suite.

    Han Shuo¡¯s underground suite was more than three thousand square feet in size, containing six big and small rooms and a great living room of more than a thousand square feet. The floor was covered with the soft fur of a certain beast. This suite decorated by Rose could not be more cozy.

    Han Shuo did not bother taking them into one of his bedrooms but immediately mounted Emily and Fanny on the soft carpet in his living room. Before long, Phoebe, Jasper, and the otherdies entered his suite without being asked. Han Shuo went on one conquest after another.

    *** After a long night of attacking pink fortresses, Han Shuo smiled with dness as he gazed at the field of mesmerizing, naked bodiesid across his living room.

    Back when Han Shuo was still on earth, not even in his wildest dreams could he imagine having a girlfriend. But today, he had just been gang banged by a group of beauties, and not just any beauties ¨C every one of them had looks that would make Aphrodite jealous.

    Han Shuo reflected on his past life on Earth and how different things were now. He was proud of his achievements in this world.

    The goddesses in the living room had fallen deep asleep after being satisfied to their limits. Han Shuo the satisfier, however, did not feel the slightest wear. After scanning their bodies for a while, Han Shuo¡¯s mind suddenly jolted and he quietly walked out of his suite.

    Upon exiting, he saw a lonely figure with calm, cold eyes and long, silvery hair standing quietly. It was Rose!

    Rose seemed somewhat flustered when he saw Han Shuo suddenly appearing as though she did not expect that Han Shuo could still be awake after banging so many women consecutively. She said, ¡°I happen to walk past here, so I thought I might as well tidy up your suite.¡±

    Han Shuo smiled and replied, ¡°There¡¯s no need for that anymore. Haha, I¡¯m sure that at least one of them will help me with cleaning the ce.¡±

    Rose took a peek into the living room scattered with silky, flower-embroidered undergarments and the voluptuous bodies lying everywhere. For some reason, a sour taste suddenly flooded her heart. <i>He already has so many of them. Of course he wouldn¡¯t need my help.</i> Rose nodded quietly and turned on her heels with her head lowered.

    ¡°Wait!¡± cried Han Shuo suddenly.

    Rose immediately turned around and a hint of excitement and anticipation glistening from her eyes. She softly asked, ¡°Yes?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s time to nullify our master-ve contract,¡± Han Shuo smiled and continued, ¡°I promised you that I wouldn¡¯t bind you under very for too long and it¡¯s about time for me to fulfill my promise!¡±

    Rose¡¯s head was once again lowered and she pouted her lips slightly in disappointment. She mumbled, ¡°Of course... You now have countless powerful experts. To you, my strength is now insignificant and I¡¯m no longer useful... You would do just fine without me...¡±

    Han Shuo was startled after seeing that Rose was hurt by his words. He forced a smile and said, ¡°What are you talking about? I¡¯m nullifying the ve contract because I do not feel the need to bind you anymore; because I now trust you without any reservation. Don¡¯t overthink it!¡±

    Rose raised her head, looked deeply into Han Shuo¡¯s eyes, and asked, ¡°Do you want me to leave?¡±

    ¡°Of course not. Even with the contract nullified, there wouldn¡¯t be much changes in our rtionship! The Pandemonium will still be your home and you will still be a member of the House of Han. You have nothing to worry about,¡± reassured Han Shuo.

    ¡°A member of the House of Han...¡± Rose put on a strange look on her face and mumbled to herself for a moment before she softly asked, ¡°As what? What will I be in the House of Han? What will our rtionship be?¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before he smilingly replied, ¡°As my friend! You will be my friend and no longer my ve! I will still treat you like before. Nothing will change!¡±

    It seemed as though this was not the answer that Rose was looking for. However, she did not object, adding, ¡°I¡¯m not nullifying the contract. It¡¯s not time yet.¡±

    Han Shuoughed out of bafflement. He looked at Rose with a confused look and replied, ¡°You sure are a strange one. Back then, you urged me to emancipate you every day. But now that I¡¯m nullifying our contract, you refuse. Why?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t care! I won¡¯t nullify the contract before the agreed time!¡± Rose did not answer Han Shuo¡¯s question. She softly groaned and put on a stubborn look.

    After having lived with Rose for decades, Han Shuo knew that she could be stubborn at times and there was no way to change her mind. He shook his head smilingly and replied, ¡°Alright, fine. If you are so insistent on being my ve, there¡¯s nothing that I can do. But you cane back to me anytime to nullify the contract. I will never eat my words.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m just abiding by the agreement. Hmph, you shouldn¡¯t overthink either!¡± said Rose with a cold face. She took yet another nce at the living room and remarked, ¡°If you do not exercise any restraint, sooner orter, it will be overused and be dysfunctional!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Rose turned around and quickly left.

    Han Shuo grimaced, shook his head helplessly, and sighed.

    ¡°Dum Dum, she¡¯s attracted to you!¡± a soft cry suddenly sounded from behind Han Shuo. Emily, wrapped in soft textile, slowly walked to him.

    ¡°I know,¡± replied Han Shuo with a slight grin.

 Chapter 927 - Little Skeletonâ€™s arranged love

    GDK 927: <strong>Little Skeleton¡¯s arranged love</strong>

    ¡°You know?¡± Emily smiled and asked, ¡°Then why did you act like that?¡±

    Han Shuo pulled Emily into his arms and softly replied, ¡°Women, power, wealth ¨C I already have all that I¡¯ve ever wanted in life and more. It is about time that I start being content with what I have. Besides, I have very limited time and can barely spend enough time with you all. She would be lonely if she was with me.¡±

    Emily gently pressed a finger on Han Shuo¡¯s chest, raised a brow, and giggled, ¡°Is that so? That doesn¡¯t sound like the Bryan I know. Hehe, just look at how manydies are inside your room right now. You¡¯re telling me that you¡¯ve changed your ways? Who would believe you?¡±

    Han Shuo grimaced and awkwardly scratched his head for a moment before he exined, ¡°I used to be promiscuous because I was in a very unique realm state in my cultivation. It was necessary. I had no choice!¡±

    Emily rolled her eyes and replied, ¡°What a load of hogwash.¡±

    Han Shuo put on an innocent face as though he had been used wrongly before he suddenly put on an evil smirk and replied, ¡°Woman, you don¡¯t believe me when I tell you the truth, yet you fall for lies! This makes me angry! I shall have to punish you!¡±

    ¡°You¡¯ll have to catch me first!¡± Emily tried to slip away with her soft, smooth skin but was buckled tightly in Han Shuo¡¯s arms and failed to escape. Han Shuo took her into a bedroom and gave her a good round of pounding.

    ***

    Half a year passed in the blink of an eye.

    During that time, the Land of Chaos had only be even more chaotic. Tyre and Logue had been spreading the news that the Godhunter Alliance would soon be invading and demanded that all Fringedwellers temporarily submit to themand of the Sovereigns.

    All Fringedwellers understood just how grave the situation was and they submitted to the Sovereign of their choosing, hoping that the Fringe would endure the attack of the Godhunter Alliance.

    As criminals that came from all over the Elysium, they understood that the Fringe was the ce that they could truly call home and that if the Fringe fell into the hands of the Godhunter Alliance, not only would they lose their home, they would be prey of the godhunters and die by having their divine energy consumed.

    Those Fringedwellers were not going to surrender their home without giving it a fight. They ceased their in-fighting, assembled their forces, and contacted their Sovereigns.

    With Tyre and Logue having acted early and having a greater reputation, most of the Fringe forces had surrendered to the two. Wasir and Ossora understood that the greater the forces theymanded, the better position they would be in during the uing war. They began making promises and using their wealth to influence the faction leaders.

    Tyre, Logue, Wasir, and Ossora had activated all their resources and means to pull as many Fringedwellers into their temporarymands as possible.

    Han Shuo, however, despite being qualified to ept those Fringe forces under hismand, had not made such an effort. On the contrary, the Pandemonium had publicly dered that they would not ept any Fringedwellers or forces! Han Shuo¡¯s actions werepletely beyond reason and expectations. Several faction leaders who were inclined towards Han Shuo had even visited the Pandemonium in person, hoping to persuade Han Shuo otherwise, but they were rejected all the same.

    While all other Sovereigns were busy gathering as many forces as they could, the Pandemonium was doing absolutely nothing. Although the House of Han¡¯s Celestial Pearl continued to open for business in the Omphalos as usual, not a single core member of the House of Han had been seen in the public.

    Even Han Hao and his powerful godhunter faction had mysteriously disappeared from the Fringe. People rarely ever discover their trails.

    The Pandemonium¡¯s mystifying and seemingly unreasonable actions had made the four Sovereigns and all Fringedwellers very puzzled. But as the Pandemonium was protected by terrifying defenses and shrouded under a thick mist, no one could even get close to it to scout out any information. No one knew what the Pandemonium¡¯s n was against the great looming threat.

    Time flew and three months more had gone by. Tyre, Logue, Wasir, and Ossora had received intel ¨C godhunters had been very active around the borders of the Destiny, Death, Space, and Lightning Dominions!

    Upon receiving the news, Tyre immediately sent messengers to every Sovereign, inviting them to discuss the matter. The messenger sent to the Pandemonium, however, was declined, with Stratholme giving the excuse that Han Shuo was in secluded cultivation.

    Without Han Shuo, the Sovereigns reassembled and discussed why the godhunters would appear at the borders of the four Dominions. Tyre and Logue were especially puzzled. They couldn¡¯t understand why those godhunters would do something as foolish as attacking those gods traveling between those Dominions.

    The Godhunter Alliance who was moving to attack the Fringe should try to conceal their movement as much as possible and would never reveal their trails before reaching the Fringe. Impudently attacking travelers between the four Dominions would not only do them no good, but it might also invite counterattacks from the divine guards of the four Dominions. Therefore, those actions of the Godhunter Alliance seemedpletely unreasonable to them.

    The four Sovereigns spent a whole day discussing the intelligence but yielded no conclusion. They could only ask their followers to continue keeping an eye on those regions.

    *** Over an unregted region between Ethereal City and the Fringe, Han Hao was wearing a surprised look as he stared at someone he did not expect to meet.

    ¡°What¡¯s the matter? Is it about my face?¡± Scarlett, who had brought all her followers from Ronson Canyon to Han Hao, asked smilingly. She thought that Han Hao was surprised by theck of scars on her face.

    ¡°Why are you here?¡± Han Hao bunched his brows.

    Scarlett was stunned and looked at Han Hao puzzlingly. She asked, ¡°Didn¡¯t you ask me toe?¡±

    Han Hao shook his head and resolutely replied, ¡°No.¡±

    Bitterness filled Scarlett¡¯s heart as she suddenly realized that Han Shuo had lied to her. She stared carefully at Han Hao before she sighed and said, ¡°I thought that you wanted me toe here. Since you do not want me here, I will return.¡±

    ¡°Who told you that?¡± asked Han Hao after keeping silent for a moment.

    ¡°The House of Han Patriarch. He came to Ronson Canyon, killed every faction leader, and healed the scar on my face. He told me that you wanted me toe to the Fringe.¡± Scarlett lowered her head disappointedly and mumbled to herself, ¡°I should have known, this is not your way... You wouldn¡¯t be concerned about anyone. Why would you ask me toe to the Fringe? Indeed, yet again, I¡¯m being delusional...¡±

    Han Hao thought it was strange that Han Shuo had told her so. Suddenly, a bizarre thought came to him, <i>Is Father trying to be my matchmaker?</i> When he began exploring that awkward idea, it seemed as though something deep in his soul was touched. He started gazing at Scarlett foolishly and his mind was thrown into disorder. Something seemed to be thawing his ice-cold heart.

    ¡°I¡¯m going back to Ronson Canyon. Goodbye... take care.¡± Scarlett felt ashamed and uneasy under Han Hao¡¯s uncanny gaze and humiliated for being fooled into traveling thousands of miles for nothing. She wanted to leave the ce as soon as possible.

    ¡°Don¡¯t leave...¡± said Han Hao softly after keeping silent for a long time.

    Scarlett was stupefied. She opened her round eyes wide and stared at Han Hao as though he had be another person. ¡°What... what did you say...?¡± Scarlett spoke stammeringly as her heart palpitated.

    ¡°I said, don¡¯t leave...¡± It seemed as though Han Hao was not used to speaking so gently and he found it awkward. He did not know what was going on with him and he found his actions rather baffling.

    Scarlett gasped, ¡°You... You have never spoken to anyone in that manner!¡± Her face suddenly lit up and her eyes shone like a star. It was as though she had be a million times more gorgeous and captivating than she already was. ¡°With those words of yours, traveling thousands of miles was worth it!¡±

    A most inexplicable feeling was suddenly evoked in Han Hao. He did not understand this bizarre and unfamiliar ¡®thing¡¯ that made him somewhat flustered. He returned to that callous and cold demeanor and said, ¡°Now that you are here, you must obey me! You will do as Imand!¡±

    Deep in Han Hao¡¯s heart, he had decided not to treat Scarlett as he would to others of his followers. This feeling made Han Hao very ufortable. Therefore, he switched back to his default demeanor and attempted to be the one in control.

    Scarlett nodded happily and submissively. With a dazzling smile on her face, she replied, ¡°I will do anything for you! I would even die for you!¡±

    ¡°Very good,¡± Han Hao nodded, satisfied with the answer. Then, he callouslymanded, ¡°Come here, let me touch you!¡±

    Scarlett¡¯s face instantly turned red and in a shaky voice, she asked, ¡°Wha... What?¡±

    ¡°Let me touch you. I don¡¯t know why, but I want to touch you,¡± replied Han Hao as he scratched his head. It seemed as though he did not understand why he would want to do that.

    ¡°Okay...¡± Scarlett secretly took a peek at a few of her followers who were standing nearby, wearing puzzled faces. She felt so ashamed that she wanted to dig a hole and bury her head in it. With her head lowered, she slowly walked towards Han Hao.

 Chapter 928 - How strong he has become

    <h4>Chapter 928: How strong he has be</h4>

    Scarlett might have been the only female among the leaders of the godhunter factions in Ronson Canyon but she was just as vicious and merciless as others. She was infamous for her scheming against others. But ever since Han Hao saved her life, she started treating him uniquely. Rather than scheming against Han Hao, she would scheme to help Han Hao.

    For some reason, the inhumanly callous teenager was like a strong gravitational field that was gradually pulling her. And as time went by, she found herself deeper and deeper in his gravity.

    Had it been any other person who told her ¡®let me touch you¡¯ in front of her followers, she would have killed the person immediately. And even if she could not defeat the person, she would scheme to have the person dead at all costs.

    However, after hearing those words from Han Hao, although Scarlett was very embarrassed, she did not feel any anger. She even foolishly walked to Han Hao as he hadmanded as though she had forgotten that many of her followers were still around.

    Scarlett was blushing across her face. Her head was lowered, too shy to meet Han Hao¡¯s gaze. This ruthless godhunter faction leader who hailed from Ronson Canyon was now a shy, bashfuldy. She felt nervous and stood silently before Han Hao.

    Meanwhile, Han Hao seemed unsure and perplexed. The strange, bizarre desires that came from the depths of his heart had caused him to be somewhat at a loss. He did not understand what was going on with him or why he would have such peculiar and messy ideas in his mind.

    Han Hao stared nkly and hesitated, not knowing if he should act upon those novel ideas surfacing into his mind.

    ¡°What are you¡­ waiting for¡­ ?¡± Scarlett had been standing there and waiting for a long while. She only got more and more nervous when Han Hao stared at her without doing anything before finally breaking the silence.

    ¡°Okay,¡° replied Han Hao softly. It was as though Scarlett¡¯s words had made him stop hesitating and he finally extended his hand and very slowly but awkwardly stroked his palm against Scarlett¡¯s tender, red cheek. In that instance, a most bizarre, inexplicable sensation which Han Hao had never before perceived suddenly flooded his heart.

    Scarlett¡¯s followers who had traveled thousands of miles with her from Ronson Canyon stared at their leader, utterly bbergasted. They could not believe their own eyes when they saw that this devil who had led them tomit massacres and various atrocities, whom they had only known to be ruthless, ferocious, and invible, was willingly allowing Han Hao to caress her. It was as though the Chief they knew of had transformed into another person.

    &lt;i&gt;Don¡¯t tell me that she has brought us all the way to the Fringe just to¡­ just so that Han Hao can touch her? What in the world is going on?!&lt;/i&gt;

    The instant that Han Hao¡¯s skin made contact with Scarlett¡¯s, her body shivered lightly. She felt somewhat ufortable and wanted to move her cheeks away from Han Hao¡¯s ice-cold palms and yet, at the same time, she felt as though her face was drawn to them by an invisible force. Scarlett stood there as still as a rock and allowed Han Hao¡¯s hand to caress her lovely face. She felt embarrassed but secretly delighted.

    Gradually, it seemed as though touching her cheeks was no longer satisfying enough for Han Hao. The bewildered Han Hao followed the thought that came from his heart and slowly moved his hand downwards along her soft white neck and towards her busty bosom.

    Scarlett jolted and her face turned even redder. rmed, she thought, he¡¯s not thinking about doing that in front of all these people¡­ right? Scarlett started trembling more and more violently and she could no longer feign her calmness. She suddenly raised her head and looked at Han Hao.

    To her surprise, Han Hao was wearing a vacant face. His brows were slightly bunched as though he was deep in thought. Scarlett could not find a trace of lewdness on his face. It was as though he wasn¡¯t touching an outstanding beauty but a weapon or an armor. He meant only to explore instead of doing anything indecent.

    What¡­ What is he thinking of? Scarlett was puzzled. No matter how good one was at hiding their emotions, in such a situation, no man could possibly hide all trace of their lustful desires. Han Hao, however, seemed to be an exception.

    While Scarlett was pondering, Han Hao¡¯s hand had slowly moved downwards and gently grasped her tender, bosomy breast.

    ¡°Ek!¡± one of Scarlett¡¯s followers who had been watching from a distance could no longer contain his astonishment and involuntarily made an unpleasant cry with his throat.

    Scarlett was jolted from her pondering and she suddenly took a step backward, freeing herself from Han Hao¡¯s wicked clutch.

    She panted heavily as though she had just finished a marathon. She spoke haltingly, ¡°Han¡­ Han Hao, how¡­ how could you¡­¡±

    ¡°Strange¡­ Very strange¡­¡± Han Hao mumbled to himself as he stared at his right hand that felt Scarlett. As soon as he ced his hand on Scarlett¡¯s chest, he felt a strong urge suddenly surge from below. His heart was set racing and his mind was thrown off from the absolute calmness he had always maintained. Little Skeleton was also shocked that he seemed to have gained a new bone. But before he could carefully experience the sensation, Scarlett had hastily withdrawn herself.

    The surprised Han Hao stared nkly for a moment before he shook his head as though trying to cast away that strange sensation off his mind. He looked at the blushing and startled Scarlett and in an expressionless face, he tly said, ¡°Okay. That is all for today. We will try that again next time.¡±

    Scarlett became even more embarrassed. She secretly peeked at her distraught followers, gritted her teeth, and inwardly cursed, You scoundrel, how could you do that in front of so many people! Couldn¡¯t you have done it somewhere more secluded and private? Are you trying to humiliate me? How infuriating!

    ¡°Seen enough yet? Piss off!¡± Scarlett shouted at her followers angrily with murderous eyes, directing her resentment towards them.

    ¡°Und- Understood!¡± Those dumbstruck followers of Scarlett came to their senses and hastily scattered.

    After those godhunters left and the two were alone, Scarlett took a deep breath to try to calm herself before she asked, ¡°What exactly do you want from me?¡±

    Han Hao stared nkly for a moment and the default callousness he had just restored yet again crumbled. For some reason, Han Hao could not seem to maintain his absolute unfeelingness in front of Scarlett. After thinking for a moment, having no idea what exactly was going on with him, Han Hao bunched his brows and replied, ¡°I haven¡¯t thought it through yet.¡±

    ¡°Haven¡¯t thought it through yet?!¡± Scarlett was enraged. She screamed in her mind, You¡¯ve touched my face and even my breast in front of so many people, but you are telling me that you haven¡¯t thought it through yet?!

    ¡°Then tell me, am I your woman or not?¡± asked Scarlett while trying her best to contain her anger.

    ¡°Yes,¡± replied Han Hao straightforwardly and without the slightest hesitation. But before Scarlett could feel happy about it, Han Hao quickly added, ¡°Now that you are in the Fringe, you are mine, just like Polo and the others. You are under mymand. Right, I will need to put those thate with you through a round of training.¡±

    ¡°Just¡­ Just like Polo?¡± Scarlett had heard of Polo before. She anxiously said, ¡°How¡­ How can we be the same? Polo is a male and I¡¯m a female! Besides, you¡¯ve just¡­¡±

    ¡°All the same,¡± Han Hao put on a t face and callously said, ¡°You are both my subordinates. There¡¯s nothing different.¡±

    After hearing those words, Scarlett flew into a rage out of humiliation. She yelled, ¡°Han Hao, what exactly do you want? How could you be like this? Do you think you can just toy with my feelings? If you will only consider me as just another follower of yours like Polo, then, then we are over!¡±

    Han Hao immediately felt lost and weak when Scarlett flipped out. He felt as though he had done something wrong but he had no idea what it was. He bunched his brows and thought about it deeply. Then, he realized something - when facing Polo, he would never have those strange and passionate ideas.

    ¡°Yes, it¡¯s a bit different¡­¡± Han Hao scratched his head and mumbled, ¡°You are a woman, so you are my woman. And Polo is a man, so he is my man¡­ right?¡±

    Scarlett was betweenughter and tears listening to Han Hao mumbling nonsense to himself. ¡°Huh? How can Polo be your man? You aren¡¯t making any sense¡­¡±

    Then, suddenly, Scarlett was reminded of some words that Han Shuo once said to her, Han Hao had never been intimate with the opposite sex. He used to live and cultivate in an inhuman world and he knows absolutely nothing about that certain thing!

    Scarlettmented in that realization before she asked, ¡°Han Hao, do you know what a romantic rtionship is?¡±

    Han Hao looked at Scarlett puzzlingly, shook his head, and answered, ¡°I don¡¯t. I have never seen or heard of it before.¡±

    Suddenly, it all became clear to Scarlett.

    It turned out that Han Hao wasn¡¯t being insensitive, trying to humiliate her, or ying with her feelings - he had absolutely no idea what he was doing. It seemed that his actions moments ago were merely out of instinct.

    Scarlett felt as though she had found a treasure and she now found that clueless and puzzled look on Han Hao to be endearing. She was also rather surprised that such a handsome, callous, and incredibly powerful man had never experienced a romantic rtionship before.

    No wonder! thought Scarlett as she shook her head. Shepletely forgave Han Hao for what he had just done and decided to grab onto this rare gem and fill his empty brain with her love.

    ¡°Oh no!¡± When Scarlett was just going to start indoctrinating Han Hao with her ideals, Han Hao¡¯s face suddenly jolted and he gravely cried, ¡°Bring your followers to the Fringe. Leave this ce immediately!¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± Scarlett panicked a little. She realized that something was wrong.

    ¡°It¡¯s Dagmar! He ising. I have met him before and I recognize his aura!¡± Han Hao wore a grave face and said to Scarlett, ¡°You leave this ce immediately. I will hold him back!¡±

    ¡°Our Hegemon?¡± Scarlett was rmed and she anxiously proposed, ¡°Why don¡¯t you run and let me hold him back?¡±

    ¡°You cannot stop him, not even for a second,¡± Han Hao wore a chilling face and instructed, ¡°Listen to me and leave. Don¡¯t worry, I will be fine. He cannot kill me!¡±

    Scarlett stared at Han Hao for three seconds before she nodded resolutely and said, ¡°Okay, I will leave right away, but you must live to see me again!¡± Scarlett then immediately left and shouted, ¡°Everyonee with me, we must fly!¡±

    Scarlett¡¯s followers who were waiting nearby were oblivious to the danger. They followed Scarlett puzzlingly and hastily left.

    Han Hao held his three-meter long bone spear and stood silently, waiting for Dagmar¡¯s arrival.

    Ten minutester, the masked Dagmar sitting on a white bone throne suddenly appeared. Evidently, Dagmar¡¯s target was Han Hao alone and he took no action about Scarlett.

    ¡°We meet again, Han Hao.¡± Dagmar sat in the middle of his white throne high in the sky. He stared down at Han Hao, who was taking a hostile posture, arrogantly with a hint of amusement in his eyes. With a sinister smirk, he asked, ¡°Oh, are you thinking of fighting me?

    ¡°Hegemon,¡± greeted Han Hao indifferently.

    ¡°Han Hao, I have been generous with you. Why did you have to betray me for that Bryan guy?¡± Dagmar extended his hands that were hiding under a pair of long sleeves. They were thin, pale white, and had long sharp nails that looked like hooks. The energy of death gradually umted around his fingers and formed greyish stands of wavering smoke.

    Han Hao stared back at Dagmar with ice-cold eyes and without any of the confusion he had shown earlier. In a calm voice, he replied, ¡°My apologies, but you simply do not possess the strength that would make me bow.¡±

    Dagmar sneered and disdainfully said, ¡°But Bryan does? What can he give you? Don¡¯t you forget that you are a godhunter and he is not. No matter where or when, your identity will always be one of a godhunter. You will never be free from that shackle for the rest of your life. The Godhunter Alliance is where you belong!¡±

    Han Hao nodded and said, ¡°That¡¯s right, I cannot change my identity as a godhunter. However, I can change my status and position among the godhunters!¡± He pointed at Dagmar with his bone spear and announced coldly, ¡°Hegemon, let me tell you this: one day, sooner orter, I willmand the Godhunter Alliance and be the master of all godhunters!¡±

    ¡°How vain,¡± Dagmar snorted disdainfully. His white bone throne suddenly started crashing down, taking along an overwhelming energy of death. His hands, around which light grey smoke curled, suddenly started dancing. Rays of grey fell from the sky and buzzing sounds echoed.

    ¡°It took me tens of thousands of years to ascend and be one of the Hegemons. Who do you think you are? How conceited of you to dream of ruling all godhunters! Today, I will take back everything that I have bestowed upon you!¡± Dagmar had enough of chatting and wanted to end the conversation. His white bone throne began shooting out bone spears as he spoke.

    ¡°You have nothing to do with anything that I have! All that you¡¯ve given me is a title, as Chief of the godhunters - it¡¯s so insignificant that it¡¯s not even worth mentioning!¡± An evil light shed through Han Hao¡¯s purple demon eyes as the seven bone spurs flew out from his back at astonishing speeds. However, instead of striking Dagmar, who was airborne mid-attack, the bone spurs soared in seven directions around him.

    Seven distinct energies suddenly dispersed from each bone spur, and this was subsequently followed by the screams of an untold number of wretched souls imprisoned in those bone spurs. At this moment, the energy of death, mixed with a power that Dagmar was not familiar with, began emanating pulses of energy waves.

    At the same time, Han Hao¡¯s chest suddenly bulged outward, and the tombstone he had obtained from the Netherworld tore out of him. It instantly erected before him and expanded into an enormous monument.

    All of a sudden, the intricate and cryptic carvings on the tombstone sprung to life, separating from the tombstone. Thousands of inscriptions resembling mystical beings revolved around the stele, resonating with the miserable shrieks of those wretched souls that were imprisoned in the seven bone spurs.

    All the elements of death within a hundred-mile radius of Han Hao were absorbed by the tombstone in an instant. Even the elements of death that Dagmar, an overgod, had gathered around him were drained and taken. The death elements he had integrated into his attack had somehow turned chaotic and he felt as though he was losing control over it.

    Then, Han Hao, with the three-meter-long bone spur in hand, suddenly let out a piercing scream.

    An even more intense energy fluctuation emanated from the tombstone and it directly affected the energy of death in Dagmar. He was shocked to discover that the energy of death in his body was rapidly escaping and sucked into the tombstone underneath him.

    ¡°What the hell?!¡± Dagmar peered at the towering tombstone below in disbelief. The tombstone that was originally only several dozen meters tall had swelled and was now as tall as a mountain, perhaps caused by it having absorbed all the elements of death within the hundred-mile radius.

    After the tombstone was erged, the previously tiny and densely packed inscriptions on it became visible. Out of nowhere, various white bones appeared under the tombstone. Streams of the energy of death flowed around the stele like veins in a human body, making it seem oh-so mysterious and bizarre!

    The divine energy of death in Dagmar¡¯s body was being drawn to the tombstone. The bizarre energy fluctuations generated by the tombstone could not only affect the element of death but also cultivators of the energy!

    The terrified and rmed Dagmar immediately withdrew the attacking power heunched at Han Hao to recover the divine energy. He began pouring in every effort to stop his divine energy from being drained.

    As Dagmar was an overgod, once he gave up on attacking Han Hao and concentrated his effort on resisting the influence of the tombstone, he managed to stabilize the divine energy in his body and his divine energy stopped flying into the tombstone.

    ¡°Impossible, impossible!¡± Dagmar was panting heavily. His eyes, the only part of his face not covered by his mask, revealed his astonishment and fear. He no longer had a lofty and arrogant voice as he spoke, ¡°You have not reached the overgod realm, you can¡¯t possibly possess such terrifying power! You can¡¯t be Han Hao. Who are you?¡±

    Han Hao at this moment was standing on the top of the tombstone. Countless streams of greyish air that seeped out from the white bones had enveloped him and the trickling energy of death had submerged him. It seemed as though he had be part of the tombstone.

    Han Hao¡¯s voice sounded from the top of the tombstone, ¡°This tombstone can affect all those who cultivate the energy of death without exception. Perhaps besides the Overgod of Death, no other cultivator of the death energy can kill me, which includes you, Dagmar! Even though you are a realm above me, you cannot kill me!¡±

    ¡°What, what in the world is that thing?¡± Dagmar was appalled. He believed Han Hao¡¯s words for he had experienced the power of the tombstone first-hand.

    ¡°I do not know either!¡± Han Hao took a short pause before he continued, ¡°I have yet to fully learn its power. But when I do; when I can unleash its full power, it will be your end, Dagmar!¡±

    Upon finishing those words, an enormous vortex of death formed at the bottom of the tombstone. The mountainous tombstone started vanishing from the bottom as the vortex slowly rose into the sky. And when the tombstone waspletely engulfed, the vortex copsed into itself. A strong wind blew out of nowhere and dispersed all traces of the vortex.

    The towering tombstone, the seven bone spurs, and Han Hao had vanished.

    Dagmar gazed nkly and dejectedly at the ground that had returned to normal. After a long while, he finally came to his senses. He shook his head as he said to himself, ¡°No wonder¡­ No wonder he wouldn¡¯t bow to mymand¡­ He¡¯s be so powerful!¡±

 Chapter 929 - Quintessence Shard

    <h4>Chapter 929: Quintessence Shard</h4>

    ***At the Dominion of Death. Inside a stone chamber located in a towering mountain. The chamber was saturated with extremely concentrated elements of death. There, a mighty being was awakened and it rose from the pool it was submerged in. It looked in the direction where Han Hao was, and murmured softly, ¡°Who could it be?¡±

    Concentrated death elements in liquid state overflowed from its mouth as it spoke.

    Every cultivator of the element of death had to absorb the element from the environment to strengthen themselves. This being, however, seemed to have broken this naturalw and no longer needed the ubiquitous elemental power found all around the universe. What¡¯s more, the element of death would overflow from his mouth with each word he spoke.

    It was almost as if this being was the fountainhead of the death element, as though all death energy in every material ne had originated from it.

    ¡°It seems that I have to take a trip to the Dominion of Destiny,¡± the man murmured. Then, he seemed to dissolve into the death elements in the chamber and disappeared without a trace.

    ***

    At the Dominion of Destiny, at the massive central hall of the Destiny Goddess¡¯ Shrine, Andrina looked at the expressionless Goddess of Destiny with boredom and coquettishly begged, ¡°Mother, I want to go out to y. I want to go find Bryan. I know that he¡¯s in the Land of Chaos, it¡¯s just nearby!¡±

    The Goddess¡¯ eyes disappeared into squints as she smiled. Not a trace of her terrifying mighty aura, which Aobashi and the others had experienced in the Darkness Dominion, could be sensed. She appeared as though an ordinary mother, graceful and kind as she gently replied, ¡°No, sweetie, not now. Just wait a little longer. I will arrange for you to meet him in due time.¡±

    ¡°Why?¡± Andrina, chewing on energy stones like snacks, pouted and grumbled.

    The Goddess of Destiny stretched out her hand and caressed Andrina¡¯s soft and long hair, putting on a faint smile as she said, ¡°There are certain things that I cannot reveal to you yet, but I can tell you that Bryan is a key figure... He shouldn¡¯t be here, but his presence will alter the destiny of many.¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s so different about him? Why do you always say that Bryan shouldn¡¯t be here? I know Profound Continent is only a low-level material ne, but there are plenty of sessful people living on Elysium who originated from low-level nes!¡± Andrina was a little confused.

    The Goddess of Destiny calmly exined, ¡°He did not originate from Profound Continent, nor is Bryan his original name. You will learn of this in time. His existence is an opportunity for all of us. One day in the future, we might even need his favor.¡±

    Andrina was shocked and perplexedly said, ¡°You all? The Twelve Overgods?¡±

    Smiling as she nodded, the Goddess of Destiny answered, ¡°That is all that I can reveal to you for now. I promise you, when the time is right, I will tell you more.¡±

    Then, suddenly, the Destiny Goddess stared nkly with her pair of eyes that seemed to contain gxies. Stars seemed to be revolving in her deep eyes. She turned and gazed in the direction where Han Hao and Dagmar were fighting. She bunched her brows lightly and murmured, ¡°Why would a piece of a Quintessence Shard appear here? Mhmm, it is of the death element, he must have sensed it too. I suppose he will be visiting my Dominion...¡±

    ¡°Mother, what is it?¡± asked Andrina curiously when she saw her in a daze.

    ¡°Nothing.¡± Smiling as she stood up, the Destiny Goddess said to Andrina, ¡°I¡¯ll be leaving for a while and should be back soon. Andrina, promise me, do not be naughty while I¡¯m away and stay home. Okay?¡±

    ¡°Of course, I will not leave,¡± Andrina immediately assured her with a cute face.

    The Goddess of Destiny nodded. She bowed to gently kiss Andrina on her delicate cheek before she faded into thin air and vanished.

    ***

    Back to the battleground between Han Hao and Dagmar where only thetter remained. Dagmar stared nkly for a long while before also leaving the scene.

    Three days after the battle, Dagmar went to a volcanic crater near the Fringe. Asser and Dhaka, the Darkness and Destruction Hegemons, were waiting.

    When Dhaka, who cultivated destructive energy, saw Dagmar appearing above the crater with his bone throne, he frowned slightly and asked, ¡°Dagmar, what¡¯s the matter? I can tell that something is wrong from that look of yours. Don¡¯t tell me that you have failed to settle that little brat who¡¯s causing us trouble?¡±

    Asser was also rather baffled and he said in a deep voice, ¡°Dagmar, I know that he used to be a follower of yours, but you can¡¯t be reluctant with him. It doesn¡¯t matter if he has great potential, he is now our enemy. If you are to let him mess around in the borders of the various Dominions, the divine guards from those Dominions wille for us. By then, we will be forced to cease our invasion!¡±

    ¡°Dagmar, if you couldn¡¯t do it, let me finish him for you. We can¡¯t let a puny little joker jeopardize the mastern that we have worked on for years!¡± remarked Dhaka who seemed displeased.

    The masked Dagmar nced at his fellow Hegemons and said, ¡°I did try to kill him, but I failed. Not only that, I even lost an aching amount of divine energy to him. This kid hase to possess some sort of divine weapon that I¡¯ve never seen. Somehow, it overpowered me.¡±

    Dhaka and Asser¡¯s faces jolted when they heard the exnation. They both looked at him with disbelief and Dhaka gravely asked, ¡°Dagmar, are you sure about that? That kid is not even in the overgod realm. He couldn¡¯t match you no matter how powerful his divine weapon was. What exactly happened?¡±

    Asser was also shocked and looked at Dagmar with a puzzled and perplexed face.

    ¡°It¡¯s a gravestone with abstruse carvings on it. It emanated an extremely miraculous energy of death...¡± Dagmar recalled the scene from three days ago, and exined what he experienced in detail. He even told them his own understanding of the gravestone in as much detail as possible.

    After he finished speaking, the Hegemon of Darkness, Asser, stared nkly with an astonished look, while Dhaka stroked his long beard pensively.

    After a long silence, Dhaka suddenly realized something and raised his head, eximing, ¡°It¡¯s a Quintessence Shard!¡±

    Dagmar and Asser were shocked, their eyes were full of incredible surprise. Dagmar¡¯s voice was trembling as he murmured, ¡°Yes...yes, I should have known...! It¡¯s the only thing in the universe that could unleash such power, that would allow him to suppress me!¡±

    Suddenly, a dazzling light of greed bursted from Dagmar¡¯s eyes. Hepletely lost his cool and grabbed both Dhaka and Asser, demanding, ¡°Help me capture the Quintessence Shard! I will give you both anything in exchange! Anything you want!¡±

    Dhaka and Asser exchanged nces and they loosened the grip of Dagmar¡¯s hands which were clutching onto their clothes tightly. Dhaka said with a solemn expression, ¡°Quintessence Shards are said to only exist in Aethernia and that ce was sealed when the Creatorst disappeared. How could there be a Shard that was left out?¡±

    Asser also said with a heavy voice, ¡°Although a Quintessence Shard is not the Quintessence, as a vessel that once held the Quintessence, it is still a powerful object, containing the most profound andplete understanding of its Fundamental Force. If, for any reason, a Quintessence Overgod perished, any ordinary overgod who holds a Quintessence Shard will automatically be the new master of the Quintessence. This object is of great significance. The Quintessence Overgods will attempt to reacquire the Shards at all costs and annihte anyone who possesses one! For this reason, those possessing the Shards would never dare to reveal it and would hide themselves in material nes millions of light years away from Elysium. How the hell did that fee to possess a Shard?¡±

    Dagmar managed to calm himself down somewhat as the two Hegemons talked. He smiled bitterly and said, ¡°How would I know? If he hadn¡¯t suppressed my power with that object, he would have been dead three days ago! With such a marvelous device in hand, it¡¯s no wonder his strength has been soaring. Had I known earlier, I would¡¯ve killed him when he was in the Dominion of Death and taken the Shard from him. Sigh, but it¡¯s toote for me to do so now. He has now be so powerful that besides the Overgod of Death, no cultivator of the death energy could touch him.¡±

    After taking a short pause, Dagmar continued, ¡°Therefore, I beg you, please help me acquire the Shard. Once I possess it, I promise to find the Quintessence Shards of Darkness and Destruction for you two. How does that sound?¡±

    ¡°Of course we will help you. We are all allies here, aren¡¯t we?¡± Dhaka agreed, smiling schemingly as he said, ¡°As long as you can locate him again, Asser and I will do all we can to assist you. Right, Asser?¡±

    Asser nodded silently. No one knew if he was being sincere.

    Dagmar had lived for countless years, and he had encountered all kinds of characters. He could tell from their tone that the two wouldn¡¯t be helping him in good faith. However, the temptation of the Quintessence Shard was just too great to Dagmar, and at present, it was only with the aid of these two Hegemons that he had any chance of obtaining the Shard.

    ¡°Alright, Dagmar, we still have to discuss how exactly we will attack the Fringe. That kiddo will definitely be there. Once we conquer the Fringe, he will have nowhere to hide and be forced to fight!¡± Dhaka saw Dagmar¡¯s desperation for the Shard and knew that he could not take it off his mind. Therefore, Dhaka tried to use the line of reasoning to get Dagmar back to business.

    ¡°Understood. I will mobilize all the power in my hands. As soon as the kid appears in the Fringe, I will seize the Shard from him at all costs!¡± Dagmar took a deep breath and began considering if he could kill Han Hao using his subordinates who were not cultivators of the death energy.

    He even thought of Ss, wondering what he could offer Ss that would tempt him.

    The temptation of the Quintessence Shard had thrown Dagmar¡¯s mind into disarray. It was the only thing that he could think of. He was utterly obsessed!

 Chapter 930 - Aroused

    GDK 930: Aroused

    A few dayster, the Goddess of Destiny descended upon the location where Han Hao and Dagmar had fought. She did not wait for long before a faint shadow manifested in midair.

    The concentration of the death element in the area instantly shot up when the shadow appeared. It was more intense than what could be found in the Pandemonium. The Goddess of Destiny, wearing a neutral face, turned to the shadow and said, ¡°Hello, Nestor.¡±

    The faint shadow gradually became more and more distinct until it turned into a handsome and feminine looking gentleman. Elements of death continuously overflowed from his body in wisps of smoke. He nodded smilingly at the Goddess of Destiny before walking to her, and asked, ¡°Althea, you were much closer when it happened and you cultivate the edict of destiny. Do you know who holds the Shard and where I can find them?¡±

    Althea, the Goddess of Destiny, put on a faint smile and replied, ¡°You should know the characteristics of a Shard as much as I. As long as the bearer does not use the Shard, he would be beyond your detection. I cannot obtain more information on the Shard bearer than you can.¡±

    ¡°Shard bearers can always sense our presence but we can only sense theirs when they are using it. What a threat they are to us Quintessence Overgods!¡± remarked Nestor with his brows bunched. He seemed rather troubled.

    ¡°Such is the will of the Creator. The Shards exist to give the world hope ¨C the slim but real chance of overthrowing us. I believe that the Creator had scattered the Shards to remind us that we are not irreceable,¡± said Althea in a neutral tone and expression.

    Nestor nodded lightly and said, ¡°I will do everything I can to find this person. I will not allow any being who possesses a Quintessence Shard of Death to live.¡±

    Althea smiled but did not give any morements on the topic. She knew that she would do exactly the same as Nestor had been doing, to find and destroy the Shard bearer at all costs, if she ever discovered that someone possessed a Shard of the Destiny Edict, to make sure that she remained the Goddess of Destiny.

    After keeping silent for a moment, Althea suddenly asked, ¡°I heard that City Lord Hill of your Witherbone City has disappeared. Is it true?¡±

    Nestor let out a soft groan and answered, ¡°If it wasn¡¯t for you, I would have ended that youngster already. Even our friend from the Darkness Dominion would have done that long ago instead of letting that kid off. His Dominion lost two City Lords and it was a real mess.¡±

    After taking a short pause, Nestor asked, ¡°Althea, is that youngster really the key to unlocking Aethernia?¡±

    ¡°He is, indeed. It is impossible to unseal Aethernia without him. It is enveloped with every known energy in this universe and therefore no energy from this universe can unseal it,¡± answered Althea affirmatively. She continued, ¡°That is why I have asked you all to keep him alive. But when he has grown strong enough ¨C after he unseals Aethernia for us, you all may do whatever you want to him. You will hear no objection from me.¡±

    ¡°But, Althea, are you sure that we are not nurturing a snake in our bosom? This kid cultivates the energy left behind by that being and his strength has been soaring at an incredible rate. I¡¯m worried that one day, he will be so strong that even the twelve of us won¡¯t be able to defeat him!¡± said Nestor. Traces of fear could be seen on his face as though he was reminded of an extremely terrifying memory.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, he will never attain the height of that existence. He exists only to unseal Aethernia. Once he has fulfilled his purpose, you may do whatever you want to him, I will not care,¡± Althea reassured again. She took a short pause before she instructed, ¡°Pay attention to the Fringe, a great chaos will rage across the Land. Another ten thousand years have passed and it¡¯s about time for it to be cleansed again.¡±

    Nestor nodded. He put on a faint smile and replied, ¡°I have made the necessary arrangements. Oh, right. By then, if my forces happen to sh with those from the Light and Life Dominions, please don¡¯t mind us.¡±

    ¡°I couldn¡¯t care less about your petty conflicts. Do as you wish, as long as you do not drag the entire Elysium into war,¡± said Althea with a rather annoyed look before she said calmly, ¡°Please remind our friend over at the Darkness Dominion not to touch the kid before Aethernia is unsealed. Alright, I have said all that I should say. Goodbye.¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Althea¡¯s figure gradually diffused into the air. A gentle breeze blew away all remaining traces of her.

    Nestor did not leave the area right after. Using the element of death overflowing from his body, he reached a massive area ofnd around him and took his time to survey it. He concealed his mighty aura and became a most ordinary, inconspicuous god of death before finally going on his way.

    ***

    After several months of havoc-making at the borders of various Dominions, Han Hao finally returned to the Fringe. As soon as he escaped from Dagmar, he reassembled every one of his godhunters andmanded them to return to the Fringe with him.

    Dagmar¡¯s appearance meant that the main army of the Godhunter Alliance will be reaching soon. As Han Hao had aplished his objectives which included spreading a certain rumor, he knew that it was time to disperse and return home.

    Besides, through the gravestone that was in his body, Han Hao sensed that Nestor, the Overgod of Death, was approaching. The threat from the Godhunter Alliance army was nothingpared to Nestor.

    Han Hao could constantly sense Nestor¡¯s aura and his general location, something that even Hill and others who were bestowed with Divine Brands from Nestor could not. Back then, Han Hao had settled in the Ronson Canyon, at the border of the Death Dominion and wouldn¡¯t venture any deeper into the Dominion because he was wary of this terrifying existence who was constantly within his senses.

    Although Han Hao had no idea what the gravestone really was, or that Nestor couldn¡¯t sense his location when he wasn¡¯t using it, out of his survival instincts, Han Hao always tried to keep as far away from Nestor as possible.

    Soon after returning to the Fringe, Han Hao went to Scarlett who had been anxiously waiting for his return. Scarlett could not be more emotional and delighted when Han Hao suddenly appeared before her. If it wasn¡¯t for therge number of her followers around her, she would have thrown herself at Han Hao and embraced him.

    For some reason, Han Hao felt a sense of dness in his heart to see Scarlett filled with such joy. He felt as though he was facing Han Shuo or his five brothers.

    ¡°Come, we will return to our base and get ready for war,¡± said Han Hao.

    ¡°I¡¯m d that you¡¯re alright, Han Hao. Did you meet Dagmar?¡± asked Scarlett after calming down from her excitement.

    ¡°Yes I have,¡± answered Han Hao straightforwardly.

    ¡°You, you really met Dagmar?!¡± Scarlett was astounded. She eximed, ¡°Then how is it that you seempletely unscathed? Dagmar is the Hegemon of Death, the ruler of all godhunters in the Death Dominion. His, his power...¡±

    ¡°He cultivates the energy of death and therefore he cannot kill me,¡± replied Han Hao. He did not tell Scarlett about the gravestone as he himself didn¡¯t understand the weaponpletely.

    Scarlett seemed perplexed, unable to understand why Dagmar could not kill Han Hao just because he also cultivated the energy of death. However, she did not ask Han Hao for rification as Han Hao seemed disinclined to talk about it. Scarlett decided to resume her original n as they journeyed to their base.

    Over the next period of time, Scarlett tried her best to educate Han Hao on a certain subject. She would often send her followers far away and tirelessly lecture Han Hao on romantic rtionships, attempting to indoctrinate his naive and empty mind.

    But Scarlett soon discovered that Han Hao wasn¡¯t so good a student. Han Hao didn¡¯t learn by listening to others but through his own experience and exploration.

    All along the journey, although Han Hao had been listening to Scarlett¡¯s teachings, he did not ept them. He kept silent and shyed from giving anyments. The most he would do was bunch his brows.

    One day, the two came to a hill covered with lush green grasses and flowers that gave off faint, refreshing fragrances. The cotton white clouds slowly sailed with the gentle wind. It was a rxing and serene ce most conducive for a certain activity.

    ¡°Han Hao, have you been listening to anything that I¡¯ve said? Did you understand anything at all?¡± asked Scarlett softly.

    Han Hao shook his head and with a nk face, he replied, ¡°I have no idea what you were saying. Even if I do, I would not simply ept it just like that. I only learn by touching, feeling, and experiencing for myself. I will only take what I find true, not from the words of others.¡±

    Scarlett was at a loss for words for a moment. She asked, ¡°What exactly do you mean by touching and feeling?¡±

    ¡°Just like that day ¨C to use my hand to touch and use my heart to feel,¡± replied Han Hao with a brow raised. He seemed to think that Scarlett¡¯s question was silly.

    When Scarlett was reminded of what Han Hao did the other day, her cheeks immediately turned red and her heart palpitated. She bashfully took a peek at the serious-looking Han Hao and murmured to herself, ¡°This bastard... So that¡¯s how his brain works? Then what should I do? Should I let him freely explore my body again?¡±

    ¡°You are agitated. That is not good. This will affect your realm state and make you unable to perform your best in a battle. You should be like me and always be calm,¡± advised Han Hao.

    Those words of Han Hao had irritated Scarlett. She frowned and rebutted, ¡°I don¡¯t believe that you can always stay calm!¡± Scarlett then gathered her will and marched towards Han Hao against her nervousness.

    Han Hao was going to say that his heart was always as calm as still water but it was at that moment that his mind was jolted awake. It seemed as though something had awakened the gravestone that was in his chest and he was losing control over it.

    Scarlett was annoyed by Han Hao¡¯s attitude. She thought, I don¡¯t believe that I cannot stir up your heart! She became even more determined as she resisted her shyness and walked to Han Hao.

    Han Hao at this moment had his brows tightly bunched and his purple eyes were glistening brightly. It was as though he was pondering something and did not notice Scarlett¡¯s actions at all. He wasn¡¯t even looking at her. This exasperated Scarlett. She groaned hatefully and said, ¡°I don¡¯t believe that you have no emotions at all!¡±

    Scarlett suddenly opened her arms, stepped forward, and tightly embraced Han Hao. Her round, ample breasts turned to ote spheroids as they were firmly pressed against Han Hao¡¯s chest...

    Scarlett also moved her hands around Han Hao¡¯s back and carefully felt the attachment points of his seven bone spurs on his body. ¡°It¡¯s- it¡¯s connected to the spine!...¡± Scarlett couldn¡¯t help herself but to softly exim after realizing it.

    All along, Scarlett thought that the seven bone spurs were just another one of Han Hao¡¯s weapons with special attachment points for him to wear them on his back. But now, after feeling them with her hands, she discovered that they were connected to his flesh and bones. They were part of his body!

    The astonished Scarlett continued to explore Han Hao¡¯s back with her small hands. She gently brushed her tender skin against Han Hao¡¯s, trying to arouse him.

    I don¡¯t believe that you would have no reaction to this! thought Scarlett before she took a quick peek at Han Hao. Her face suddenly jolted and she eximed, ¡°Han Hao, are you alright?¡±

    Suddenly, the gravestone slowly started emerging from Han Hao¡¯s chest as a strange energy erupted from his body, throwing Scarlett away. The cryptically carved runes separated the gravestone as though thousands of birds were set free from their cages. They revolved and danced around Han Hao. The elements of death from far and wide were drawn to him and began gushing into his body.

    Han Hao seemed to be in a daze. He stared puzzlingly at the runes orbiting him with his brows bunched. After hesitating for a moment, Han Hao slowly reached out and grabbed at the gravestone hovering right in front of him with one hand. He gently caressed the carvings on it with his thumb.

    Then, all of a sudden, those cryptic runes revolving around him started entering his brain through his ears. Han Hao jolted and he immediately shut his eyes and stood still as though he had been fossilized.

 Chapter 931 - Abnormality of the gravestone

    GDK 931: Abnormality of the gravestone

    The gravestone inscriptions that could fill libraries suddenly gushed into Han Hao¡¯s mind, immediately stunning him. He became as still as a rock.

    Meanwhile, the gravestone that emerged from his chest kept on gathering the elements of death, as though it wouldn¡¯t stop until every element of death in the Fringe was sucked dry. But this time, the gravestone did not erge after umting the element of death but brightly radiated a ghastly white light.

    The gravestone was densely packed with inscriptions and only a portion of them had separated from the gravestone and entered Han Hao¡¯s brain. The inscriptions that remained began wriggling on the gravestone when it was illuminated by the ghastly white light, absorbing the element of death pouring from every direction.

    Scarlett, who was sted off, was horrified. Not knowing what was happening to Han Hao, she stared at him in panic for a moment before trying to approach Han Hao to get a clearer picture. But before she could get close, another burst of energy erupted from the gravestone and again sted her away.

    The burst of energy was intertwined with a strand of Han Hao¡¯s awareness. He had reduced the power that erupted from the gravestone. Otherwise, given Scarlett¡¯s strength, the energy would have instantly disintegrated her soul instead of just safely throwing her into the distance.

    After several more failed attempts, Scarlett gave up on getting closer to Han Hao. She stood in the distance and gazed at him anxiously, hoping that he would not be injured by this gravestone that appeared out of nowhere.

    The ghastly white radiances began flowing away from the gravestone and towards Han Hao like a most bizarre liquid...

    The motionless Han Hao was slowly enveloped by the liquid made of white light before every piece of clothing on him was suddenly shredded and expelled,ying his body bare before Scarlett. His pale white skin gradually turned transparent as though it had been transformed into a clear crystal. Scarlett could even see his veins, organs, and skeleton.

    Through the pores on his skin, the ghastly white light then started seeping into Han Hao¡¯s body and dispersed in his every bone and organ. He began emanating a death energy aura of extreme purity.

    Scarlett was relieved after seeing that the white light on the gravestone was not harming Han Hao but was nourishing him and transforming his body. She stared at the transformation in amazement while guessing what the divine weapon on Han Hao¡¯s chest was and pondering how something so marvelous and powerful was forged.

    After a long, long while, all the white radiances had fused with Han Hao¡¯s body and the gravestone abruptly shrank and vanished into his chest.

    Simultaneously, the element of death stopped gushing into the region and the environment immediately returned to normal.

    A momentter, Han Hao took a gentle breath and slowly opened his eyes. The volumes of scriptures rapidly faded away from his pupils and he returned to normal.

    Han Hao gently bunched his brows and mumbled to himself, ¡°So this thing is called a Quintessence Shard...¡±

    ¡°Han Hao, are you alright?¡± eximed Scarlett as she rushed to Han Hao immediately after sensing that the boundary protecting Han Hao had vanished. She reached out with a hand to touch Han Hao¡¯s chest where the gravestone had disappeared to examine him.

    Han Hao shook his head. His hazy eyes returned to their usual cold calmness. He looked at Scarlett who was still panicking a little and softly replied, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m alright. My body and soul have just transformed for the better and I¡¯ve learned a few things.¡±

    ¡°What exactly just happened?¡± Scarlett was surprised to hear that even his soul was transformed.

    ¡°Nothing...¡± Han Hao did not exin. He lowered his head and looked at his naked body before withdrawing a ck warrior¡¯s gown from his space ring and casually putting it on.

    It seemed as though it was only now that Scarlett realized that Han Hao was still unclothed. She covertly took a quick nce at Han Hao¡¯s bare body before bashfully turning away from Han Hao with her blushing cheeks.

    After putting his new clothes on, as though nothing had happened, Han Hao instructed, ¡°Come, let¡¯s get moving.¡±

    ***

    Nestor, the Overgod of Death, was still searching for trails of the Quintessence Shard near the border of the Space Dominion. Suddenly, he turned and gazed in the direction of the Fringe. From the towering mountain, he murmured to himself, ¡°It is in the Fringe... Who could it be? Is it one of those Sovereigns? With the general location known, it¡¯ll be much easier to find the bearer...¡±

    The Overgod of Death, who had concealed his almighty power, stopped wandering around in the region aimlessly and headed for the Fringe.

    ***

    Over at the Fringe, the Osteoburg.

    Logue, a cultivator of the energy of death, was receiving the leaders of various factions intending to submit to his rule. Without any warning, Logue turned aghast and he gazed in the direction of Han Hao with horror on his face.

    ¡°My Lord, what is the matter?¡± asked one of Logue¡¯s henchmen after seeing Logue suddenly pause his speech and revealing the bizarre reaction.

    Logue did not respond. He got up from his seat and stared fixedly in Han Hao¡¯s direction. There was an unconceble fear on his face. After staring for a while, he mumbled to himself, ¡°Impossible, absolutely impossible! The Overgod of Death would nevere to the Fringe. But besides the Overgod, who else could possess such formidable and pure power?¡±

    ¡°My Lord, is everything alright?¡± asked the henchman of Logue again.

    ¡°That will be all for today. The n remains the same. I must go,¡± said Logue before immediately leaving his Osteoburg and a group of confused and puzzled guests.

    ***

    Over at the Pandemonium.

    During the half year, the House of Han members had fully assimted the divine souls in the crystal balls that Han Shuo had given to them. And during that time, the Pandemonium had been consuming a ton of divine essences of various energies. Therge stockpile of divine essences that Metal Elite Zombie and the House of Han had umted over the years were almostpletely used up during the six months.

    With their realm states improved, they started raising their divine energy levels by absorbing divine essences. This allowed them to make rapid breakthroughs. But as divine essences were rare and expensive, even the filthy rich House of Han and Metal Elite Zombie were unable to acquire enough of them. With that, the Pandemonians began facing a shortage.

    To make matters worse, there was a greater demand for certain types of divine essences as most of the House of Han members cultivated the same Fundamental Forces. Divine essences of death and darkness elements had already been exhausted two months prior.

    With that, the Pandemonians found themselves in a frustrating situation. Progressing to the next realm required one to possess the relevant profound insight and divine energy. These House of Han members had the former butcked thetter. They felt stuck and gradually, they started to get somewhat desperate.

    While gaining divine energy was easier than gaining the profound understanding and insight of a Fundamental Energy, it was still a process that took time. Although the concentration of elemental energy in the Pandemonium was much greater than elsewhere and their cultivation was elerated, these House of Han members still felt that it would be too slow. They would need at least several decades to umte sufficient divine energy for each breakthrough, if they were to do so only through cultivating in the Pandemonium.

    Although several decades wasn¡¯t that long of a time given their ridiculously long lifespans, to these House of Han members, it felt unbearably long when there was a much quicker alternative.

    None of these core members of the House of Han were godhunters. However, some of their henchmen, like Goron and the others, were. The House of Han members who were thirsting for more power started inquiring them about a certain subject. It seemed as though they were tempted tomit the act.

    One day, Han Shuo, who was cultivating in his underground gymnasium in the Pandemonium, finally made a major breakthrough. By assimting twote-stage highgod souls and devouring divine energies, his two avatars reached thete-stage highgod realm.

    With the help of his miraculous and powerful consciousness, his two avatars managed to quickly digest the sea of memories contained inside thete-stage highgod souls. And as one withplete control over his mind, Han Shuo was immune to the addiction that came from devouring another person¡¯s divine energy. Therefore, asionally, he would venture outside the Pandemonium to nab unsuspecting Fringedwellers and devour their divine energy.

    With that, Han Shuo¡¯s avatars were able to reach the realm ofte-stage highgod in just six months. He was progressing at a much faster rate than his family n members.

    ¡°Stratholme, gather every core member of my House. I have something to say.¡± Han Shuo did not immediately proceed with stabilizing the new realm states nor did he experiment with the power of his hybrid divinity domain. As soon as his avatars had reached new realms, he emerged from his gymnasium and gave Stratholme the instruction.

    Soon enough, every core member of the House of Han was gathered before Han Shuo.

    ¡°I know that you all are getting impatient, and some of you are even thinking of bing godhunters,¡± said Han Shuo as he scanned the party, his ring gaze moved a little slower when it swept across Gilbert, Ayermike, and a few others. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness covered the entirety of the Pandemonium and he knew every slightest movement and sound they made.

    Han Shuo continued in a grave voice, ¡°But this is not something that you can simply stop once you start. Yes, your strength will rapidly improve, but you will also descend into madness at an even faster rate. You will lose self-control; Your minds will be corrupted, your intellect will be perverted, and you cannot stop doing it for the rest of your life! The long term costs of doing so heavily outweighs the gains. I¡¯mmanding you all right now ¨C don¡¯t even think about doing it! Never!¡±

    Han Shuo knew just how addictive devouring another person¡¯s divine energy was. Only a few in the universe could ovee the addiction. He and Han Hao had only managed to ovee it with their extraordinary circumstances and abilities.

    ¡°Master, then, then what should we do? I can immediately make breakthroughs, I just need more divine energy!¡± asked Gilbert who seemed rather desperate.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I have a n,¡± replied Han Shuo confidently.

 Chapter 932 - Sheâ€™s my woman!

    GDK 932: She¡¯s my woman!

    Although Han Shuo could not let them devour another person¡¯s divine energy, he could extract divine energy from a person and process it with special medicinal ingredients, producing an elixir that would have simr effects to divine essences.

    ¡°I will find a solution to this, just don¡¯t be a godhunter!¡± Han Shuo had always given them plenty of freedom and rarely intervened in their activities. The fact that he issued them a directmand prohibiting them from devouring divine energy showed that he was gravely concerned about the repercussions.

    Gilbert and the others had been hesitant about devouring another person¡¯s divine energy because they were also aware that bing a godhunter was a path of no return. So as soon as they heard Han Shuo promising them an alternative, they immediately cast the idea out of their minds. All of them nodded and promised that they would not even dabble with the idea.

    ¡°Good. You should continue studying the memories you obtained from the crystal balls and get a better grip over their understanding of the edicts and elements. Also, do not leave the Pandemonium for the time being. There¡¯s no need to concern yourself with the situation outside,¡± said Han Shuo.

    Following Han Shuo¡¯s order, the party dispersed one after another. Deep in their hearts, these core members of the Han family understood that everything Han Shuo did was for their own sake. They were no longer desperate to raise their divine energies and went back to calmly study the profound knowledge in those crystal balls.

    Han Shuo then exited the underground pce, summoned Zovic, and demanded a report about the recent urrences in the Fringe.

    ¡°Tyre and Logue have been meeting frequently. Together, the two of them have managed to subdue over 70 percent of all forces scattered around the Fringe. Ossora and Wasir are far behind. Most of the forces they have taken in are those who were already aligned with them. Combined, they have absorbed just 20 percent of all forces. The remaining 10 percent remain undecided...

    ¡°As ofte, godhunters have been unusually active in the borders of Space, Destiny, Death, and Lightning Dominions, which has drawn great attention from cities in those Dominions. It seems the Godhunter Alliance is just around the corner and the Fringe is on the verge of being attacked...¡±

    Zovic courteously and patiently reported the recent happenings in the Fringe to Han Shuo. When hepleted his report, Zovic put on a confused look and asked, ¡°My Lord, many faction leaders havee to us, wishing to serve the Pandemonium. Why did your Lordship decline them? Wouldn¡¯t it be better to gather as much of the forces as we can, so that we would have more chips to use when the war breaks out?¡±

    Not just Zovic, but all those who dwelled in the Fringe were perplexed by Han Shuo¡¯s actions. Tyre, Logue, Ossora, and Wasir had fought high and low and even offered all kinds of ridiculous rewards just to have temporarymand over those untamed factions. They were going all-in to assemble as big of a force as they could to give themselves the best chance of riding through the impending storm.

    Han Shuo, however, did theplete opposite. No matter who came to visit Han Shuo or which faction they represented, Han Shuo rejected them all the same. All those faction leaders who desired to submit to Han Shuo¡¯smand were flushed with embarrassment as if their burning zeals were doused by barrels of iced water.

    Han Shuo put on the smile of a master-schemer and replied, ¡°We of the House of Han do not need strength in numbers. Fret not, everything is going as I¡¯ve nned. We are not missing out on an opportunity here.¡±

    Zovic remained no less confused after hearing Han Shuo¡¯s answer but he didn¡¯t utter another word to convince Han Shuo otherwise. He understood that Han Shuo had a n and as Han Shuo¡¯s henchman, his duty was to execute Han Shuo¡¯smands and not worry about the mastern.

    ¡°Alright, you are dismissed. Keep up the good work,¡± Han Shuo waved a hand, gesturing to Zovic to go back to running his intelligence agency.

    ***

    Half a monthter, Han Hao, apanied by Scarlett and their followers, appeared inside the underground pce excavated for him by Earth Elite Zombie and Metal Elite Zombie.

    Han Hao¡¯s godhunters had returned from various regions to the Fringe some time ago. Some of them had even relocated to the underground pce and the mountains nearby.

    Upon arriving at his new base, Han Hao summoned his Chiefs to a chamber excavated from the belly of a mountain for a meeting.

    ¡°Ry mymands ¨C have everyone assemble in this base. We will no longer be scattered all over the Fringe. And cease attacking the Fringedwellers for now, exercise self-restraint. After this is over, you may resume satisfying your inner urges,¡± he began shooting orders as soon as everyone arrived.

    The Chiefs, including Polo, nodded repeatedly, pledging to restrain their men during this period. They were all cognizant of the fact that they were at a critical time when every Fringedweller had to unite against the greater enemy. If they were to continue hunting other Fringedwellers, they would undoubtedly be condemned and denounced by everyone.

    ¡°Make good use of the time left and put all your effort into constructing and enhancing this base. It¡¯s well-hidden. As long as everything is set up properly, we won¡¯t have to be too worried even if the Godhunter Alliance sieges this base. Alright, you lot should start assigning tasks to yourpany. Whatever traps or boundaries you can make, put them up. The more the better,¡± Han Hao pressed on.

    After taking a short pause, Han Hao pointed to Scarlett who was standing quietly by his side, and introduced her, ¡°This is Scarlett, one of us. She is of the same rank as the bunch of you.¡±

    Polo and the others had sensed the distinctive aura of a godhunter on Scarlett as soon as she entered the chamber. Without thinking, they knew that Scarlett must have been yet another faction leader who surrendered to Han Hao¡¯smand. They nodded but did not make anyments.

    Scarlett had been gazing at Han Hao with the eyes of a fangirl the whole time. It was only now that she realized just how much power Han Hao had umted. In the chamber, there were three Chiefs withte-stage highgod strength. The remaining Chiefs had mid-stage highgod strengths.

    Based on the number ofte-stage and mid-stage highgod experts in the chamber, Scarlett could tell that Han Hao nowmanded a significantly greater force than what he had started with when he was still in Ronson Canyon. Even thebined might of those former Ronson Canyon faction leaders would pale against Han Hao¡¯s.

    Seeing the loftily standing Han Hao giving order after order in his callous and handsome face, Scarlett found herself helplessly awestruck by his charm. She couldn¡¯t help but recall the moment they hugged a few days prior. Although it onlysted for only a moment, it left an unerasable mark in Scarlett¡¯s mind.

    As Han Hao wrapped up his orders, he nced at Scarlett and caught her with flushed cheeks and a somewhat enchanted gaze. He turned back and looked at his henchmen. He realized that Polo and the others were staring at Scarlett with fiery eyes. All of a sudden, he felt a pang of wrath for no apparent reason, as though he was being vited.

    When they were still alive, those faction leaders of Ronson Canyon had lewd and indecent ideas for Scarlett, even when there were two horrifying scars stretched across her face. Now that the hideous scars on her face were gone, she bloomed with an irresistible charm. It was no wonder characters like Polo and the likes would lust for her.

    As Han Hao had always been socially-detached and had never before shown even the slightest interest towards the opposite sex before his subordinates, Polo and the others didn¡¯t at all suspect that the rtionship between Han Hao and Scarlett was any different from theirs. They thought that Scarlett was just another subordinate of Han Hao¡¯s and therefore they had the audacity to wantonly scan her body.

    Han Hao red at his subordinates who were ogling Scarlett with immodest eyes, let out a cold groan, and sternly announced, ¡°She is my woman! Look at her that way again and I will gouge your eyes out!¡±

    The lecherous looks on their faces were immediately reced with appall and they instantly averted their gazes from Scarlett. They understood that although their leader was rather young, he was cruel, callous, and most importantly, a man of his words. He would do exactly as he said with nopromise.

    While terrified, those Chiefs were also baffled. Having served Han Hao for ages, they had never seen Han Hao express any sort of romantic interest in another living being. From their point of view, Han Hao was just an emotionless, unmoving rock. The party was greatly astonished to hear those wordse out from Han Hao¡¯s mouth. They were almost in disbelief.

    Scarlett was irritated by their indecent gazes and was just about tosh out at Polo and the others when Han Hao suddenly made the threat. Scarlett was overjoyed and she felt as though her heart was filled with the sweetest honey. She threw a seductive nce at Han Hao as she thought, Finally, he¡¯s starting to get it!

    ¡°Erm, we are sorry... We did not know that you were the Chief¡¯s woman...¡± Polo put on an awkward and embarrassed smile before bowing at Scarlett and said, ¡°We are really sorry... We have never known that Chief is interested in women and therefore thought that... Haha... Really sorry about that... ¡° Polo was Han Hao¡¯s most senior aide and therefore immediately extended an olive branch to Scarlett.

    Scarlett no longer felt any anger at them. She nodded smilingly and magnanimously replied, ¡°I will forgive you for doing so in ignorance. I won¡¯t hold grudges over such a trivial matter. We are all on the same side, after all.¡±

    Han Hao cast a cold nce at Polo and groaned yet again. In a rather annoyed tone, he said, ¡°That¡¯s enough talking, now go get busy. Those from the Alliance will be attacking very soon and you bunch better have the defenses ready before they are here. There¡¯s no time to waste!¡±

    ¡°Yes, yes...¡± Polo was yet again jolted. He stealthily took a peek at Han Hao as he thought, Come on, I¡¯m only having a few words with her and already you are separating us. Do you really have to be so possessive?

    Polo and others hastily left to carry out their orders. Han Hao then led Scarlett to his underground pce and said, ¡°Come, let¡¯s go to the Pandemonium.¡±

 Chapter 933 - Duels

    GDK 933: Duels

    At the Pandemonium, inside a massive underground gymnasium.

    Sanguis was wielding his broadsword that was bursting with blood-red radiance and fighting Bonds and Gilbert. Han Shuo was sitting on one side, quietly observing the battle.

    There was a thin mist made of blood surrounding Sanguis. His skin seemed to be stained by blood and his eyes were glowing like a pair of terrifying red mes. Gilbert and Bonds were exerting themselves, pushing with their full strengths but were only barely able to resist Sanguis¡¯ ferocious attacks.

    Sanguis was born with the ¡®Body of Sanguis¡¯, an extremely rare type of body that was most suitable for cultivating Bloodgod Mantra, a subsect of Demonic Arts. Having tirelessly trained and cultivated, Sanguis had now reached an extremely profound realm in Bloodgod Mantra. Sanguis was able to easily route Gilbert and Bonds¡¯ attacks and push them back by shooting bloody radiances from his broadsword.

    Han Shuo had been silently but closely watching the battle. When Gilbert and Bonds were pushed so far back that they had no more room to retreat, Han Shuo finally intervened. He raised a hand and an enormous palm materialized out of nowhere, blocking the two sides and ceasing their battle.

    ¡°Well done, Sanguis, you have reached the most advanced level in Bloodgod Mantra,¡± said Han Shuo as he nodded. He then turned to the rather disappointed Bonds and advised, ¡°Advancing in the Godying Devil Path requires constant bloodshed. Although you have reached the Bloodlust realm, it seems that you¡¯re stillcking in your realm state. Bonds, there are times when you have been too calm. This will make it difficult for you to go berserk in a battle and fall into a demonic trance state. If you can get into a controlled demonic trance in every battle, your strength will manifold. You need to put more effort into this aspect.¡±

    Bonds put away his flying sword, humbly bowed at Han Shuo, and asked, ¡°Senior brother, how do I make myself fall into a demonic trance state during a fight?¡±

    ¡°You need to allow yourself to lose rationality and go wild. This usually requires provocation from your enemy. However, you can still practice entering the state by yourself, or at least close to it. Try imagining things that make you mad and imagine your opponent as the person you hate the most. And try not to think too much when fighting ¨C just fill your mind with the desire to ughter,¡± replied Han Shuo after thinking for a moment about his past experience of entering demonic trance.

    ¡°Gilbert, a majorponent of your demonic arts practice is in tempering the soul. The other majorponent is your body which I had forged in the same way that I would make a demonic weapon. Other than cultivating the energy of darkness, you must also pay attention to those two aspects.¡±

    ¡°Master, I have reached the early-stage highgod realm and my darkness energy is starting to merge with my demonic energy. However, I still feel rather stuck. Is there any other way to make the darkness energy fuse better with my demonic energy?¡± asked Gilbert. He was the weakest of the three and he was most desperate to improve his strength.

    ¡°I do not have relevant experience to guide you on fusing those energies. You¡¯ll have to figure that out by yourself.¡± The Demonic Arts that Han Shuo cultivated was of the orthodox school which was not practiced by Sanguis, Bonds, or Gilbert.

    Even though Han Shuo had two avatars cultivating the death and destruction energy, he cannot fuse it with the demonic yuan of his main body as the demonic yuan would reject those Fundamental Forces. In addition, as the power of his demonic yuan was orders of magnitude greater than that of his divine energies, fusing those energies would be extremely difficult. Han Shuo only had experience fusing two energies found in this universe but not in fusing energies from different universes.

    ¡°Master, why don¡¯t you teach me one of those demonic arts? I noticed that Bonds and Sanguis are making progress much faster than I am by focusing their cultivation on one energy. Perhaps if I focus my cultivation on just one energy, I might make much greater improvements,¡± said Gilbert.

    ¡°That won¡¯t be necessary.¡± Han Shuo shook his head and replied, ¡°You are already at the early-stage highgod realm in your cultivation of the darkness energy. It would be a waste to discard that power. Besides, you are not on the wrong path, you¡¯ve just yet to get the knack of it. Han Hao cultivates in two energies just as you do and he has been improving rapidly. Right, Han Hao will be here in a moment. You should ask him for adviceter. He would have more relevant experience that would help you make breakthroughs.¡±

    From the Pandemonium, Han Shuo could sense Han Jin and Han Tu¡¯s souls while they were constructing Han Hao¡¯s new underground pce. Han Shuo and Han Hao could easily sense each other¡¯s presence from their respective bases. Therefore, Han Shuo immediately knew that Han Hao was on his way to the Pandemonium using the underground tunnel connecting their bases.

    Gilbert was delighted to hear those words. Heughed out and said, ¡°So it turns out that the little fe is also dual-cultivating! It¡¯s been a while since Ist saw him. I wonder what he is like now.¡±

    Gilbert had known Han Hao since way back. Centuries ago, Gilbert and Han Hao had been murdering and looting unsuspecting victims with Han Shuo back in the Dark Forest of Profound Continent. He had heard a lot about Han Hao¡¯s aplishments and wanted to see how much Han Hao had grown in this hostile world called Elysium.

    Lights of excitement suddenly shed across Sanguis¡¯ eyes when he heard that Han Hao would be there soon. Sanguis had long wanted to meet Han Hao and duel with him to test their strengths but he never had the opportunity. And during the recent period, Sanguis had been arduously tempering himself and made another giant leap in strength. He was in his top shape for a duel. This was the perfect opportunity that Sanguis had been waiting for. Therefore, immediately, Sanguis went to Han Shuo and requested, ¡°Shifu, I wish to challenge Han Hao to a duel!¡±

    ¡°Haha, sure, go ahead. Through battles one identifies their weaknesses better. You need not restrain your power or give him any warning ¨C just attack him right away. You can evenunch a sneak attack. With me as the referee, it will be quite harmless,¡± agreed Han Shuo immediately. Not only did he not show the slightest concern, but he also seemed very happy about it.

    ¡°Thank you, Master! This is fantastic!¡± Sanguis was ted as he thought that Han Hao wouldn¡¯t have allowed it.

    Sanguis had always felt that no one, other than Han Shuo, was stronger than himself. Being apetitive youngster, Sanguis had been eager to prove that he was stronger than Han Hao through a duel ever since he found out about Han Hao¡¯s existence and identity.

    Time and time again, Sanguis came across credible rumors that Han Hao would be an extraordinarily powerful opponent. However, instead of making Sanguis think twice, it only made Sanguis even more excited to fight Han Hao. This was the opportunity he had been looking forward to for a long time and he wasn¡¯t going to let it slip by.

    ¡°He will be here very soon. You may go all-in as soon as he steps inside,¡± said Han Shuo with a smirk to the incredibly excited Sanguis.

    ¡°Sanguis, do not hold back! If he could make someone like Polo kneel under hismand, he should be more powerful than you are. Attack with your full strength!¡± advised Bonds. He was also feeling excited as he had been looking forward to witnessing Han Hao¡¯s power.

    ¡°Sanguis, Bonds and I are no match against you, but that little guy definitely is. This is going to be interesting. Let¡¯s see which of you is stronger!¡±ughed Gilbert as he walked to Han Shuo¡¯s side with Bonds.

    As Han Hao did not conceal his footsteps or his aura, all those in the gymnasium could hear him approaching and sense the faint killing intent he emanated. They knew that Han Hao was right outside the gymnasium¡¯s entrance and they stared in his direction with anticipation and excitement.

    ***

    ¡°Master is inside,¡± said Zovic softly after leading Han Hao to the outside of the gymnasium.

    Zovic was one of the few Fringedwellers who knew about Han Shuo and Han Hao¡¯s rtionship. For many years, Zovic had been in charge of exchanging intelligence with Han Hao¡¯s followers. He was very much aware of the appalling acts the youngster standing before him hadmitted. And as a well-informed person, he knew that Han Hao undoubtedlymanded the greatest forces in the Fringe after Han Shuo, Tyre, Logue, Ossora, and Wasir. And from certain aspects, the relentless and merciless Han Hao could even be considered as a character more terrifying than the Sovereigns.

    The Fringe has always been a ce where the strong are honored. Therefore, even if Han Hao wasn¡¯t his master¡¯s son, Han Hao would still be treated with great respect.

    When Han Hao came to the gymnasium¡¯s entrance, he creased his brows, turned to Scarlett, and instructed, ¡°Scarlett, stay here for a moment.¡±

    ¡°Okay,¡± Scarlett nodded. She was feeling rather nervous and bashful as she knew that she was going to meet his ¡®father-inw¡¯ with Han Hao.

    A so-called sneak attack would bepletely ineffective against Han Hao as his soul was just too sensitive. He could sense the faint energy targeting him from inside the gymnasium before he was even close. Even though Sanguis had tried his best to conceal his aura and energy, Han Hao could still detect that Sanguis¡¯ killing intent was locked onto him.

    Han Hao also detected Han Shuo¡¯s presence in the gymnasium and he reasoned that this person nning to ambush him was probably not an enemy. He was not worried about his own safety but had asked Scarlett to wait outside lest she be affected by the aftershocks of them shing. After all, she was just an early-stage highgod.

    After hearing Scarlett¡¯s response, Han Hao took on an aggressive demeanor. A three-meter long bone spear suddenly emerged from the palm of his right hand. A chilling aura and terrible killing intent erupted from the bone spear in Han Hao¡¯s grasp. This shocked Zovic. Puzzled and panicking, he cried, ¡°Young Master Han Hao, what are you doing?¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, someone wants to duel with me. It¡¯s gonna be fine,¡± exined Han Hao before he finally stepped into the gymnasium.

    Immediately, the gymnasium was lit up by an intense burst of blood-red light like a sun made of blood had appeared out of nowhere while an intense reeking of blood flooded the gymnasium. Sanguis, carrying his blooded broadsword and the sky filled with daggers made of blood, began descending upon Han Hao.

 Chapter 934 - Han Hao vs Sanguis

    GDK 934: Han Hao vs Sanguis

    Sanguis possessed tremendous strength and needless to say, it was a terrifying sight when he unleashed his full power.

    Han Hao remained cool as a cucumber, not showing the slightest trace of fear against the blood-red radiances that shrouded the sky. He watched as the crimson-eyed young man descended from above, the murderous aura girding him ever so menacingly ¨C yet he didn¡¯t fret. He whirled the bone spear in his hand. A sinister and wicked energy suddenly shot out from the bone spear and instantly disintegrated the red radiances.

    An evil gleam shed through his purple demonic eyes before arge bone cage abruptly materialized. The hideous bone cage bore sharp spikes. It was positioned in Sanguis¡¯ path with the open side facing Sanguis, as a shark waiting for its prey to swim right into its sawtoothed mouth.

    Sanguis was astounded as a shiver traveled down his spine. He finally realized just how terrifyingly powerful the callous teenager was. Not only was he able to neutralize the blood-radiance attack that Sanguis congealed using blood essence with just a quick gesture, he even had spare energy to form a white bone cage using the energy of death.

    Sanguis had already exerted his full strength against Han Hao. For some reason, it seemed as though Sanguis gained ess to his fullest potential when pitted against the most formidable opponent he had ever encountered. The blood-red mes in his eyes burned even more vigorously with red trails overflowing from the corners of his eyes. His cheeks seemed to be overfilling with blood as his veins popped up under his skin. He looked like an angered, diabolical monster that thirsted for blood.

    Those were signs that he was pushing the Bloodgod Mantra to the very limit!

    Han Shuo, who had been standing aside and observing, took notice of the changes happening to Sanguis¡¯ face. He gravely bunched his brows as he raised his guard, ready to intervene at any moment should things go South.

    Sanguis did not try to avoid the bone cage. When he essed his full potential, the terrifying blood aura around him instantly congealed into matter. The mist of blood all around the gymnasium condensed into a red palm before it shot into Han Hao¡¯s bone cage.

    <i>Crack... Boom!</i>

    The bone cage shattered into smithereens and bone debris dispersed like snowkes in all directions.

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Hao appeared a little surprised. A strange light shed in his purple eyes as he stared intently at Sanguis whose power seemed to have surged several folds. He even seemed somewhat excited.

    He could sense that Sanguis¡¯s power was extremely unique and it was definitely not of the energies found in this universe. He also sensed the strong killing intent on Sanguis that was distinctive to cultivators of demonic arts. After Sanguis unlocked the fullest potential of his body, Han Hao would finally consider him as a worthy opponent.

    Han Hao waved the bone spear in his hand and a deafening cacophony of ghastly cries and howls echoed from within as if thousands of tormented souls were struggling to break free. In an instant, the white bone spear turned murky grey while thousands of hideous, malevolent faces appeared on its surface. They were writhing violently as though trying to escape from their eternal prison but they remained securely bound to the bone spear.

    ¡°Charge!¡± With a sudden swing of his arm, Han Hao threw the bone spear into the sky, making harrowing shrieks as it soared. Sinister dark radiances glowed from its tip as those souls trapped in the bone spear gathered into an enormous and hideous mouth lined with fangs. It charged at Sanguis ferociously.

    ¡°Gilbert, take a careful look ¨C Observe the energy that Han Hao has applied to the bone spear!¡± said Han Shuo, reminding the thrilled Gilbert to tear his eyes away from Sanguis.

    Gilbert woke up from his daze and quickly realized that it was Han Hao¡¯s cultivation that he ought to emte. He promptly gathered his concentration on Little Skeleton¡¯s bone spear and carefully sensed it with his soul.

    After making the observation, Gilbert became overwhelmed with shock. He detected the presence of thousands of ferocious souls on the bone spear. They were filled with immeasurable rage, hatred, despair, and bloodlust. Those negative energies fused with the energy of death and formed a newfound, one-of-a-kind energy of sheer terror.

    Gilbert had only been sensing the bone spear with his soul for a moment but already, he could sense a vague power drawing him into the bone spear to make him part of the collection.

    <i><i>Damn, even his weapon has be so terrifying! Sanguis is out of luck!</i></i> eximed Gilbert internally.

    Just as the thought appeared in Gilbert¡¯s mind, the gruesome bone-spear-turned-mouth swallowed Sanguis who was caught off guard.

    In an instant, Sanguis hadpletely disappeared. There was nothing but an erged bone spear hovering over the battlefield. The bone spear seemed to have transformed into an enormous earthworm. It squirmed tirelessly, the fierce souls emerged and disappeared on the surface of the bone spear, rolling around rapidly in the chilling, misty air.

    Gilbert, Bonds, and others knew that Sanguis was now inside the bone spear as bursts of blood-red shes could frequently be seen reaching the surface of the bone spear from within.

    Evidently, although trapped, Sanguis was not immobilized. The shes of red radiances indicated that he was still struggling vigorously, trying to escape from Han Hao¡¯s bone spear.

    By now, it was obvious that Han Hao¡¯s power far surpassed Sanguis¡¯. Despite his violent thrashing, his toil was to no avail. Those souls trapped in the bone spear had neither physical body nor blood and werepletely unaffected by Sanguis¡¯ blood aura. They weaved tighter and tighter around Sanguis, wearing down his power with every passing moment.

    As time passed, it seemed as though Sanguis¡¯s formidable power was nearly exhausted. The red shes that reached the surface of the monster bone spear grew weaker before they eventually stopped. Only then did Han Hao extend a hand. He curved his index finger to make a strange gesture, and made a flick.

    All of a sudden, the writhing bone spur spat Sanguis out like a cannonball. He crashed into the ground feebly and the murderous mes in his eyes vanished. It seemed that most of his stamina had been worn down while inside there and he could no longer pose a threat to Han Hao.

    From start to finish, Han Hao had not moved much at all. Instead ofunching aggressive and frenzied attacks with his body as Sanguis did, he simply maneuvered his bone spear around with his mind and effortlessly defeated Sanguis who had pushed his Bloodgod Mantra to the peak. Clearly, Han Hao had unleashed just a portion of his full might.

    At this point, the chasm in their strengths could not be more obvious.

    Ashen-faced and panting heavily, Sanguis locked his eyes and stared at Han Hao. A good whileter, he nodded and announced in a deep voice, ¡°I¡¯ve lost!¡±

    Han Hao briefly peered at him, speaking no word in response. He then turned around and called out to Scarlett who was standing by the door, ¡°You maye inside now.¡±

    Scarlett cautiously and bashfully trod into the gymnasium. Only then did Han Hao calmly exin to Sanguis, ¡°Actually, your strength is rather decent, especially with your power to affect the blood. Still, it¡¯s useless against me as the amount of blood in my body is one-one hundredth that of an ordinary being. My bodyposition is unlike others and therefore, your energy has no effect on me.¡±

    Han Hao began as just a skeleton with not a drop of blood in his body. Even though Han Shuo hadter refined and enhanced his skeleton with unique methods, still, it contained just a few drops of Han Shuo¡¯s blood essences.

    And as Han Hao grew stronger, using the blood essences that Han Shuo had left in his body as a temte, he started making himself his own blood. He used it for activating certain demonic techniques and forging demonic weapons. This type of blood was mixed with part of his soul energy and was shrouded in a mixture of demonic yuan and death energy. Hence it was invulnerable to Sanguis¡¯ Bloodgod Mantra.

    As a result, the Bloodgod Mantra that worked on thousands and thousands of beings had no measurable effect on this unique lifeform called Han Hao. Besides, Han Hao¡¯s base strength was a whopping level above Sanguis¡¯, so Sanguis¡¯s defeat was only a matter of course.

    After hearing Han Hao¡¯s exnation, Sanguis¡¯ heart felt a little less bitter. He shook his head, put on a wry smile, and said, ¡°I thought that you had somehow made your blood immune to my power ¨C it turns out that you don¡¯t have much blood to start with. No wonder I lost! Tough luck for me.¡±

    ¡°Haha, Sanguis, energy may affect most people, but unfortunately for you, this fe isn¡¯t even human to begin with! You indeed are unlucky. Haha, it¡¯s almost like Han Hao was made to defeat you!¡± Gilbert guffawed before stepping forward to Han Hao to look him up and down. After a moment, he eximed, ¡°My gosh, you have changed so much, you¡¯re nothing like before!¡±

    Han Hao turned to Gilbert and nodded. His ice-cold expression thawed a little. He replied, ¡°And you look pretty much the same as before.¡±

    ¡°Thank you for your assistance. If Polo had not intervened, the three of us wouldn¡¯t still be alive now,¡± said Bonds suddenly with a solemn face.

    Han Hao nced at Bonds and casually replied, ¡°No need to thank me. We are all on the same side.¡± It was no big deal to Han Hao.

    It was at this moment that the blushing Scarlett who had been standing behind Han Hao went to Han Shuo, bowed at him, and earnestly thanked him, ¡°Thank you for healing my scars and leading me to this ce. I really appreciate it.¡±

    Upon hearing Scarlett¡¯s words, Han Shuo knew she must have figured out his lie about Han Hao inviting her to the Fringe. However, it appeared not only was Scarlett not angry at Han Shuo, she even seemed grateful for it. After some quick thinking, Han Shuo nodded and replied, ¡°My boy, Han Hao, is nescient of a certain matter. I believe that it is necessary for him to learn and experience it in his life for him to truly grow. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t be aplete man. Scarlett, you know what I¡¯m saying, don¡¯t you?¡±

    Given Scarlett¡¯s intelligence, she effortlessly caught on to what he was referring to. A sliver of unsuppressed delight gushed into her heart. She nodded, peeking at Han Hao as she softly and bashfully answered, ¡°Yes, I know exactly...¡±

    ¡°Perfect. I trust that you will do well in helping Han Hao develop in those aspects.¡± Han Shuo chuckled with satisfaction before he turned to Little Skeleton and asked, ¡°What brings you to the Pandemonium?¡±

    ¡°Let Scarlett stay here for now. It¡¯s not quite safe at my side.¡± Han Hao paused to think for a moment before he continued, ¡°Other than that, I have obtained the Quintessence Shard of Death. I know Father has invested considerable efforts into constructing the many demonic formations in the Pandemonium. This is the only ce in the universe where I can safely investigate the secrets of the Shard without being discovered by <i>that</i> guy.¡±

    Han Shuo was rather confused as it was his first time hearing the words ¡®Quintessence Shard¡¯. He raised a brow and replied, ¡°Hold up, now what is a Quintessence Shard and how did you obtain it? Who exactly is this guy you are referring to?¡±

    Inside the gymnasium with them was no one but Bonds, Sanguis, Gilbert, and Scarlett, of whom none were outsiders. With that, Han Hao revealed everything in detail, telling them about the gravestone he obtained from the Netherworld and the nature of the Quintessence Shard.

    Han Shuo had a dumbstruck look on his face when Han Haopleted his narration. Han Shuo immediately turned to Gilbert and gravely warned, ¡°Make sure that you do not share any of what you¡¯ve learned with anyone! Absolutely nothing!¡± Han Shuo was very well aware of Gilbert¡¯s loose lips.

 Chapter 935 - Sealing the Pandemonium

    <strong>GDK 935: Sealing the Pandemonium</strong>

    Gilbert was stunned by what he heard from Han Hao. He too realized the gravity of the matter and solemnly pledged to Han Shuo, ¡°I will not say a word about this to anyone!¡±

    A Quintessence Shard was once a vessel that held an Overgod¡¯s Quintessence. They were astounded to hear that Han Hao would possess such an invaluable artifact. They were also amazed and envious of Han Hao after learning about the miraculous abilities of the Shard.

    This was the first time the party had heard about the existence of Quintessence Shards, even for Scarlett ¨C someone who was born and raised on Elysium. Of the party, she was perhaps the most astounded by the bombshell. She looked at Han Hao with dazzling lights in her eyes while wondering how many more secrets Han Hao had.

    ¡°It seems to me the reason that the Netherworld would attract soul energies from the various material nes near it and the high concentration of the element of death found in its environment has something to do with this Quintessence Shard,¡± Han Shuo put on a grave expression and remarked, ¡°And that person you sense would no doubt be the Overgod of Death. It¡¯s fortunate that he cannot sense you while you are not using the Quintessence Shard. Otherwise, he would have gotten you when you were in Ronson Canyon.¡±

    The Quintessence Shard was just too special and powerful of an object. Han Shuo knew that if the Overgod of Death discovered that Han Hao had the piece of Quintessence Shard, he would spare no effort to find and kill Han Hao. He would either repossess the Shard or destroy it. In any case, he definitely will not allow anything to threaten his position and power.

    ¡°Before I had grown to possess sufficient strength, I was unable to gather the element of death through the Shard. But still, through the inscriptions on the Shard, I had been gaining profound knowledge and understanding of the element. It was after I attained highgodhood that I started sensing the Being¡¯s presence, constantly. Other than lightly studying it, I have never used the Shard because I felt that It could threaten my life.

    ¡°But aroundst month, Dagmar suddenly showed up at a shared border of the Space Dominion and the Fringe. I had no choice but to activate the Shard, unleashing its power to defend against Dagmar. I immediately sensed the Beinging for me from the Death Dominion, and my suspicion was proved correct... ¡° With his brows bunched, Han Hao exined what he understood about the Shard in detail.

    ¡°I will go double-check and make sure that all the formations in the Pandemonium are active before modifying the gymnasium. Once everything is set up, you may focus on learning the Quintessence Shard without any worry. If you could master the full power of the Shard and fuse it with the demonic arts you cultivate, I believe that one day, you can overthrow the Overgod of Death and be the next owner of the Quintessence!¡± said Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo took a short pause before instructing Han Hao, ¡°Gilbert¡¯s cultivation path is pretty simr to yours. He is also fusing demonic arts with an energy found in this world. But obviously, he¡¯s not quite as talented as you are and he¡¯s a little stuck. You should guide him and enlighten him while I¡¯m away.¡±

    Han Hao nodded, turned to the excited Gilbert, and said, ¡°Whatever questions you have, shoot. I will answer it to the best I can.¡±

    Gilbert was overjoyed. He immediately went to Han Hao¡¯s side and started exining the obstacles he faced when fusing the darkness energy and demonic energy in his body, hoping that Han Hao could guide him to the solution.

    Han Hao was indeed way more superior than Gilbert in this aspect. The energy of death and the demonic yuan in Han Hao¡¯s body had been fused together in a harmonious way, which required extremely profound mastery and insight. Han Hao had faced hurdles simr to those that were perplexing Gilbert now. As fellow brethren of the Han Family, Han Hao unreservedly helped Gilbert and detailedly described how he solved it long ago.

    Sanguis, Bonds, and even Scarlett gathered around the two and listened to their conversation. Although their cultivations were different from Gilbert¡¯s, they hoped to learn a thing or two from Han Hao. Besides, some of Han Hao¡¯s exnations will include his understanding of demonic arts which could be relevant to Sanguis and Bonds. Therefore they listened to Han Hao¡¯s lecture just as intently as Gilbert.

    Seeing the few earnestly listening to Han Hao¡¯s lecture left a smile on Han Shuo¡¯s face. He left the gymnasium and ascended to the Pandemonium¡¯s surface in an instant.

    After standing on the round monolith that was engraved with the outline of the Cauldron of Myriad Demon, Han Shuo transmitted to the Cauldron Spirit, ¡°Given its current defensive power, is the Pandemonium capable of shielding itself from the senses of an Overgod?¡±

    ¡°Yes, of course,¡± replied Cauldron Spirit immediately and most confidently.

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment before he realized that he had not conveyed his meaning clearly. So he added, ¡°I mean, an Overgod with the Quintessence.¡±

    Cauldron Spirit kept silent for quite a while before he replied, ¡°You mean, the kind of god who possesses the purest source of a Fundamental Force?¡±

    ¡°Yea, that kind,¡± replied Han Shuo.

    Cauldron Spirit hesitated for a moment before he answered, ¡°With my power alone, I don¡¯t think I can shield it. But with both our powers, it should be doable.¡±

    ¡°Alright. Then let¡¯s start by activating all the demonic formations in the Pandemonium. Then we will reinforce those formations for blocking soul probing with our energy. I will also divert a portion of my consciousness and energy to assist you. We need to obstruct all possible soul-sensing,¡± instructed Han Shuo after thinking for a moment.

    Upon receiving Han Shuo¡¯smand, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon flew out from his body and slowly sank into the crux of the Pandemonium ¨C the monolith engraved with its outline.

    Han Shuo then sat cross-legged, diverted a portion of his consciousness to the Cauldron Spirit, and began injecting the demonic yuan in his body into the monolith underneath him.

    Simultaneously, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction flew out from his main body. He took a moment to observe the fog around the Pandemonium that was growing thicker and the energy field growing stronger. Happy with what he saw, the avatar nodded and returned to the underground pce, back to the gymnasium where Han Hao and the others were.

    Han Hao at this moment was carefully exining his experience in fusing two energies from different universes. Other than Gilbert, whose questions were being answered, Bonds, Sanguis, and Scarlett were listening to his exnation with theirplete attention. They were all wearing pensive looks, as though they had learned something from Han Hao¡¯s lecture.

    Seeing that they were learning earnestly, the avatar Han Shuo decided not to disrupt the ss. He stood at the entrance silently and listened to Little Skeleton¡¯sprehension of those energies.

    The cultivation path Little Skeleton had taken was different from Han Shuo¡¯s. As Little Skeleton had inherited only a portion of Han Shuo¡¯s memories about demonic arts and being a non-human lifeform, he cannot cultivate the orthodox school of demonic arts in the same way that Han Shuo did.

    But being a non-human lifeform has its advantages. As Little Skeleton was an undead creature of the Netherworld, he was gifted in the cultivation of the energy of death and had been improving at an extraordinary rate. At the same time, Little Skeleton did not give up on cultivating demonic arts. As his life force was different from that of a human being, even if he cultivates the same demonic arts as Han Shuo, he could only unleash a portion of the full power of demonic arts.

    If Little Skeleton were to stick to that cultivation path, it would only limit his potential. But fortunately, Little Skeleton was unusually talented and somehow managed to fuse the energy of death with demonic arts, paving his own unique cultivating path and continued to soar in strength. Currently, he was the strongest member of the House of Han after Han Shuo.

    Gilbert seemed delighted as though he had found the solutions to many of his cultivation hurdles from Han Hao. After a long while, Gilbert suddenly interrupted, ¡°Pause! Please pause.¡± Under Han Hao¡¯s puzzled gaze, Gilbert put on a rather embarrassed look and said, ¡°You have said enough to clear not just my current hurdles, but many more toe. That¡¯s plenty of information and I¡¯m afraid that my brain doesn¡¯t have enough space left for more. Besides, without reaching the higher realm state, I wouldn¡¯t understand anything you say. I might as well stop listening ande back to you for more when I¡¯m ready.¡±

    Han Hao nodded and calmly replied, ¡°Ok.¡±

    Han Shuo who had been watching at the entrance nodded proudly. Despite the temptation, Gilbert remained aware of his capacity and did not bite off more than what he can chew. It was one of those things harder to aplish than it sounded. This showed that he had grown much more mature than he was back in the Profound Continent.

    ¡°Sanguis, Bonds, Gilbert, and, erm, Miss Scarlett, please exit the gymnasium and keep out,¡± instructed Han Shuo as he summoned the Five Elite Zombies over with his consciousness. Han Shuo exined, ¡°Things might get a little out of hand when Han Hao delves into the Quintessence Shard. Having your auras and life force in this region could produce undesirable effects.¡±

    ¡°Understood.¡± Bonds nodded and was the first to leave. He knew that staying in the gymnasium could indirectly affect Han Hao.

    ¡°Good luck!¡± Sanguis and Gilbert also did not hesitate and they happily followed behind Bonds.

    Scarlett, however, was feeling rather worried. She had been feeling uneasy after being informed about what the object in Han Hao¡¯s chest really was and that the Overgod of Death could be hunting for him. It wasmon knowledge to Elysians that Overgods with the Quintessence were invincible beings. She was genuinely concerned that Han Hao would be harmed.

    Han Hao bunched his brows when he saw that Scarlett was reluctant to leave. Abruptly, a strange, indescribable feeling once again rose from his heart. He took a moment to feel and digest the emotion before he soothed Scarlett in a tender voice, ¡°My Father is here, I will be fine. Wait for me outside.¡±

    Scarlett¡¯s heart would melt whenever Han Hao speaks to her in that manner. She nodded obediently and said, ¡°Be careful,¡± and silently left.

    Soon after, the Five Elite Zombies arrived at the gymnasium and they cheerfully greeted Little Skeleton.

    ¡°Stand around the gymnasium in a pentagon. Deploy the Penta-elemental Undead Formation and iste this region!¡± instructed Han Shuo. Then, when they were in position, he said to Little Skeleton, ¡°Alright, let¡¯s begin.¡±

 Chapter 936 - Father and sons joining power

    <h4>GDK 936: Father and sons joining power</h4>

    Han Shuo and the Cauldron of Myriad Demon were overseeing the Pandemonium from the formation crux on the surface. Adding to the Penta Elemental Undead Formation deployed by the Five Elite Zombies, Han Shuo believed that Han Hao could safely activate the gravestone in the Pandemonium without alerting the Overgod of Death.

    A burst of chilling wind suddenly blew in the Pandemonium. Shadows barely visible to the naked eye whooshed across the thick mist and gathered on various demonic formations.

    Han Shuo split his consciousness into millions of strands and scattered it across the Pandemonium, forming a unique boundary made of soul energy that could obstruct every form of soul probing.

    Inside the gymnasium, red, yellow, gold, white, and green radiances began shooting everywhere. The Five Elite Zombies, who were sitting cross-legged around the gymnasium, flooded the space with their energies and expelled all elemental energies.

    Then, suddenly, the gymnasium seemed to have entered another dimension. Bonds, Sanguis, Gilbert, and Scarlett could see inside the gymnasium, it felt as though the gymnasium was millions of light-years away.

    It was as though the gymnasium was no longer a part of the Elysium; as though what they saw in front of them was an illusion. The Five Elite Zombies, Han Hao, and Han Shuo were sitting just in front of them, and yet, they could not sense the slightest hint of their auras. If they were to close their eyes and look using just their souls, they would see an empty field of nothingness.

    ¡°The energy of the Five Elite Zombies haspletely isted the gymnasium from the rest of the world. Thew of spacetime has been altered and the gymnasium has effectively be a material n of its own. It may seem as though they are right in front of us, but they are no longer a part of the Elysium. I believe that even an Overgod won¡¯t be able to detect their activity inside,¡± remarked the astounded Bonds after sensing the changes to the gymnasium.

    Sanguis and Gilbert were amazed. They did not expect that the formation formed by the Five Elite Zombie would be so miraculous. It was as though they had created a separated, independent spacetime in the gymnasium. In this universe, the Overgod of Space might be the only other existence capable of such a marvelous feat.

    Of the four, Scarlett was perhaps the most dumbstruck as she did not know much about the House of Han nor was she aware of the miraculousness of demonic arts. She was rather confused after seeing the Five Elite Zombies, none of whom cultivated the edict of space, disconnecting the gymnasium from the rest of the world. She almost thought that she was hallucinating.

    ¡°Sanguis, Gilbert, and Miss Scarlett, we should retreat a little,¡± suggested Bonds before he quickly exined, ¡°The spacetime around the gymnasium is now very unstable. The entrance before us should be one of the few remaining links still connecting the gymnasium to the Elysium. If Han Hao were to do something that destabilizes spacetime, spacetime fissures could be generated and we might get trapped in a corner of the universe.¡±

    Upon hearing Bonds¡¯ words, Scarlett hastily retreated. Even the usually bold Gilbert jolted and quickly made some distance from the gymnasium with the others, lest they be affected by the highly unstable boundary.

    Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction carefully sensed the energy that filled the gymnasium and sensed the energies of the Five Elite Zombies gradually fusing together. Thinking that everything was ready, he nodded to Han Hao and said, ¡°You may begin.¡±

    Han Hao who had sat cross-legged on the ground slowly closed his eyes. His chest started throbbing and pulsing bizarrely. Momentster, bit by bit, the Quintessence Shard emerged from Han Hao¡¯s chest and hovered a meter before him.

    When the Quintessence Shard emerged, the gymnasium which had been purged of elemental energies and isted from the environment by the Elite Zombies, was suddenly flooded with the element of death. They came pouring in through the tiny spacetime fissures around the gymnasium and gathered towards the Shard.

    ¡°Oh no! The power of the Shard is indeed extraordinary, so much so that it could absorb thement of death in dimensional fissures through the spacetime fissures!¡± cried Han Shuo in rm and he immediatelymanded the Five Elite Zombies, ¡°Deploy all your power and seal those spacetime fissures. If we are to allow the element of death from the environment to enter the Shard, the Overgod will surely sense it!¡±

    The Five Elite Zombies recognized how grave the situation was and immediately exerted all their strengths, releasing streams of colorful radiances that assembled and fused with the five-colored cloud on the top of the gymnasium. The Penta-elemental Undead Formation became even more energetic and all the spacetime-fissures were sealed.

    Simultaneously, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness that had split up and scattered across various regions sensed the unusual flow of the element of death in the Pandemonium. They were gushing into the gymnasium through those fissures at an unimaginable rate.

    Han Shuo was rmed. He sent a portion of his consciousness to the gymnasium and formed ayer of boundary around it. The thousands and thousands of demon generals aimlessly wandering around the Pandemonium suddenly shot into the boundary and adhered to it. The originally invisible barrier suddenly turned to a dark shade. It was as though a dark egg-shell had enveloped the gymnasium.

    After retreating to a safe distance, Bonds suddenly discovered that there was ayer of dark substance shrouding the gymnasium. He immediately cried, ¡°It¡¯s my Senior brother¡¯s energy!¡±

    Sanguis and Gilbert also detected Han Shuo¡¯s life aura on the dark substance. The spectators were shocked and stared at the ck shell in astonishment while guessing what was going on.

    ***

    At the same time, over at a waterfall in the border of the Fringe, a burst of light suddenly came from Nestor¡¯s eyes and he gazed at the depths of the Fringe.

    Nestor could sense a strand of energy that he was most familiar with broadcasting from the depths of the Fringe. He was certain that the Quintessence Shard bearer must have activated the Shard again. He immediately started moving towards it.

    However, just as Nestor turned his body, he suddenly discovered that the aura of death seemed to be concealed by some kind of energy and he lost track of the beacon.

    ¡°Huh? What is going on? Why did the signal suddenly vanish? This is strange... ¡° Nestor was somewhat puzzled. He knew the characteristics of the Death Element Quintessence Shard better than anyone and that there was no way to conceal the pure energy the Shard emanates when the bearer uses it.

    After bunching his brows and thinking for a moment, Nestor still had no clue what might have happened. But nheless, he started moving towards the rough direction of the Shard.

    ***

    Once a Quintessence Shard was activated, no ordinary energy could conceal it. The energies used by Han Shuo, Cauldron Spirit, and the Five Elite Zombies, however, did not originate from this universe. Using their miraculous demonic arts, they had managed to temporarily conceal the purest energy emanating from the Quintessence Shard. This was why the Shard had suddenly dropped out of Nestor¡¯s senses.

    The millions of strands of consciousness and the tens of thousands of demon general energy had gathered to form ayer of extremely tough defensive barrier around the gymnasium. On top of that, the Five Elite Zombies had isted the gymnasium from the Elysium. By working together, they managed to conceal the energy emanating from Han Hao¡¯s Quintessence Shard.

    ¡°Good. Keep going!¡± shouted Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of destruction.

    Han Hao explored the secrets of the Quintessence Shard freely and without any worry. The seven bone spurs on his back were trembling slightly as his purple eyes stared fixedly at the gravestone hovering before him. The abstruse inscriptions on the gravestone could vaguely be seen shing in his eyes.

    All these while, as Han Hao had constantly sensed the presence of the tremendously mighty existence, he never dared to delve and study the gravestone intensively. But it was different this time. With Han Shuo and the Five Elite Zombies helping him conceal the energy, Han Hao knew that he could finally study it without fear of being tracked by the Overgod of Death. He opened up his soul and tried to learn the gravestone¡¯s power and gainplete control over it.

    Lines of bizarre runes began to float out from Han Hao¡¯s eyes and slowly flowed into the gravestone. Gradually, the gravestone that was only the size of a fist started erging. And in just moments, it had grown to several dozen meters tall. There were eerily white inscriptions slowly moving about the gravestone¡¯s surface as though they were alive.

    At this moment, Han Hao seemed very tiny while sitting next to the enormous gravestone. But Han Hao did not seem to panic. The seven bone spurs on his back suddenly detached from his body and stuck on the enormous gravestone.

    Then, without any warning, blood-curdling shrieks and wails simultaneously sounded from the seven bone spurs. Desperation, fear, pain, madness, hatred, and other negative energies overflowed from the bone spurs. The energy came from the countless tormented souls which Han Hao had umted over the years.

    Densely packed runes were swimming inside Han Hao¡¯s pupils, synchronizing with the gravestone in front of him. It was as though some sort of incredibly abstruse connection was being formed.

    <i>Crack... Crack...</i>

    The gravestone that had reached the top of the gymnasium was still erging, causing a most frightening sound to y in the gymnasium. It was as though the gymnasium would burst apart at any moment!

    The Five Elite Zombies were wearing grave expressions and sweat had drenched their faces. It seemed as though they had exhausted a considerable amount of energy.

    ¡°Father, if the gravestone bursts through the gymnasium, this space will immediately copse and our remaining connection to the Elysium will be severed! What should we do?¡± transmitted Han Jin to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo was aware of the situation. If the gravestone bursts through the gymnasium, the spacetime constructed with the joint power of the Five Elite Zombies will crumble. By then, even if they weren¡¯t crushed into smithereens, they would be sent into distant corners of the universe and be trapped in the endless void of space for the rest of their lives with no hopes of ever seeing another living being again.

    Han Shuo attempted tomunicate with Han Hao but discovered that his soul had now intertwined with the gravestone. It seemed to be fusing with the gravestone. Throughout this process, Han Hao must not be distracted by the slightest or the consequences will be unimaginable!

    After hesitating for the moment, Han Shuo instructed, ¡°He has entered the most critical stage. We need to keep hanging on. Do not push against the gravestone ¨C we do not know how it would reach and it could cause dire results!¡±

    ¡°Understood!¡± the Five Elite Zombies gritted their teeth and replied. It had been arduous for them to maintain the spacetime and the expanding gravestone was only making the task harder. If it wasn¡¯t for Han Hao, they wouldn¡¯t have agreed to it without any hesitation.

    They were putting their lives on the line! If spacetime copses, their bodies and souls would be absolutely shattered!

 Chapter 937 - Fusing with the Quintessence Shard

    GDK 937: Fusing with the Quintessence Shard

    Following Han Shuo¡¯s orders, the Five Elite Zombies remained steadfast in arduously sustaining the gymnasium despite the gravestone threatening to destabilize the spacetime.

    Although the gravestone was pushing and cracking the roof of the gymnasium, the Five Elite Zombies did not apply any forces on the gravestone or stop it from expanding in any way for the fear that it would cause an adverse reaction on Han Hao. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness in the form of millions of strands, enhanced with demon general energy, continued to envelop the gymnasium and prevent the gravestone¡¯s energy from leaking into the environment.

    Both the Elite Zombies and Han Shuo were in grave danger. If the gravestone were to puncture the gymnasium roof, the energy field around the gymnasium would rapidly destabilize and the spacetime would copse. Even though Han Shuo¡¯s main body was not there, his consciousness would suffer serious injuries.

    It could be said that Han Shuo and the Five Elite Zombies¡¯ lives were now in Little Skeleton¡¯s hand!

    Little Skeleton,pletely focused and upied with fusing with the gravestone¡¯s energy, however, doesn¡¯t seem to be aware of the grave danger they were in. Currently, his soul was intertwined with the gravestone and he could not sense Han Shuo¡¯s nervousness. His eyes, shing with inscriptions, continued to stare fixedly at the gravestone giving off dazzling white light.

    Although not a trace of energy from the environment could enter the gymnasium, the gravestone just doesn¡¯t stop expanding. It continued to push at the gymnasium roof, threatening to destabilize the spacetime around it.

    Crack... Crack...

    Noises that made their hair stand on the back of their necks sounded from above their heads. Sweat poured profusely from the Elite Zombies¡¯ foreheads as they tried not to be distracted and exerted their full strength to sustain the spacetime-field.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness continued to split and rbine at the area that the gravestone was pushing. To ensure that not the slightest energy could leak from the gymnasium, Han Shuo had to fill the gaps with demon generals.

    Pszz... Pszz...

    Wisps of thin gray smoke were seening from the tip of the gravestone. Demon generals were being annihted as their energy was used up on containing the gravestone¡¯s energy.

    Han Shuo and the Five Elite Zombies watched the gravestone with their hearts palpitating, dreading a sudden surge of energy from it that would destroy the gymnasium and st them to Hell.

    Then, while everyone could not be more anxious and worried, the power emanating from the gravestone suddenly transformed. There was a clear indication of Little Skeleton¡¯s soul energy in it as if his soul and the gravestone were one.

    Simultaneously, the power exuding from the gravestone gradually started to dwindle and it even started to shrink in size.

    Han Shuo and the Five Elite Zombies all heaved a sigh of relief at the same time. From the moment the gravestone started shrinking, they understood that the most dangerous phase had passed and that the spacetime was no longer in danger of copsing.

    The inscriptions that could fill libraries revolved around Han Hao as the gravestone continued to shrink. Then, when it slimmed down to approximately his size, the gravestone suddenly shattered like ss. All of the fragments were around the size of a thumb and they flew towards Han Hao.

    The shattered fragments of the gravestone carried some miraculous energy. They prated Han Hao¡¯s skin and entered deep into his body. As if he was suddenly awakened from a deep sleep, sinister radiances shed from his eyes and he sprung to his feet. He started a peculiar, eerie, energetic dance in the gymnasium.

    Crack... Crunch... Krrrr... Tuck!...

    Crisp notes sounded from Han Hao¡¯s body as if his skeleton were being crushed into pieces. In the next few moments, his body would turn as flexible as boneless, his limbs and body twist and move beyond the natural range of motion. Gravestone inscriptions would also appear on his skin. It was a peculiar scene, to say the least.

    ¡°Father, what is happening?¡± asked Metal Elite Zombie hastily to Han Shuo.

    ¡°The energy of the Shard was scattered and those pieces fissioned to fuse with his bones. I¡¯m not sure if Han Hao is doing this voluntarily but I believe that this is beneficial to him. So, don¡¯t worry,¡± exined Han Shuo¡¯s avatar who continued to keep a close eye on Han Hao.

    Han Shuo could sense that the pure energy inside the gravestone had fused with Han Hao, the inscriptions imprinted on his skin and flesh, while the fragments were fusing with his skeleton.

    After performing the eerie dance for some time, Han Hao suddenly copsed to the ground powerlessly. He lied silent andpletely motionless.

    The inscriptions on his skin stopped meandering just as Han Hao stopped moving. However, the crisp, frightening cracking noises continued to sound from his body.

    Outside the gymnasium, Scarlett covered her lips in shock and sorrow. She gazed at Han Hao who had copsed on the ground with her wet eyes. She felt as though a part of her heart had been torn away and pain greater than any she had felt before. As she was outside the gymnasium, she was unable to sense Han Hao¡¯s aura and had no idea that the transformation was beneficial and not harmful to Han Hao.

    Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert were also isted from the gymnasium and only their vision was not obstructed. From their point of view, the gravestone had suddenly shattered and shot into Han Hao¡¯s body. Han Hao violently twitched in pain before he sumbed to the gravestone¡¯s power and copsed...

    Unable to sense that the gravestone was fusing with Han Hao¡¯s flesh and skeleton, they thought that the gravestone rejected and attacked Han Hao and that he was now on the verge of dying.

    ¡°N-no!...¡± Scarlett, who was ovee by anguish, tried barging into the gymnasium.

    Bonds was rmed and he hastily pulled Scarlett to stop her. Calmly yet sternly, he said, ¡°What we see might not be the truth, do not act rashly! Barging in not only won¡¯t help Han Hao, but you will also be injured by the barrier around the gymnasium!¡±

    Gilbert and Sanguis hastily went to block Scarlett¡¯s path, preventing Scarlett from doing anything reckless. Other than not hoping Scarlett will get injured, they were worried that she might destabilize the energy field around the gymnasium. Han Hao was in a critical phase now and even the slightest fluctuation could cause a cascade failure. They would not risk letting Scarlett indirectly injure those in the gymnasium.

    ¡°He... Is he...?¡± Scarlett pointed a trembling finger at Han Hao who was in the gymnasium, sorrow brimming from her teary eyes.

    Bonds was rather astounded and puzzled. He did not expect that Scarlett would be so deeply in love with Han Hao. He thought that a lifeform as callous and emotionless as Han Hao would have no luck in getting a romantic partner.

    Bonds shook his head and consoled, ¡°He will be fine. Our senses cannot reach into the gymnasium and we have no clue if the actual situation is as we saw. Besides, with my Senior Brother around, even if something bad happens to Han Hao, his life will not be in danger. You can be sure about that.¡±

    Bonds was not lying or boasting. He knew that Han Shuo had managed to resurrect Gilbert back then on the Profound Continent. And given that Han Shuo had now grown thousands of times stronger, it would be effortless for him to resurrect Han Hao.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. In fact, back then on the Profound Continent, I was dead but my Master resurrected me using his power. So, you have nothing to worry about. Han Hao will definitely be just fine!¡± remarked Gilbert, sharing his past experience in an attempt tofort Scarlett.

    ¡°Yes, don¡¯t worry. I have dueled that guy and I know that his soul is stronger beyond imagination. I believe that even if his body is shattered for whatever reason, his soul would remain intact. And as long as the soul remains, my Master would have ways of resurrecting him!¡± added Sanguis.

    After hearing Bonds, Gilbert, and Sanguis¡¯ consoling words, although not fully convinced, Scarlett had calmed down somewhat and was no longer desperate to barge into the gymnasium.

    It was at this moment that a finger of Han Hao¡¯s made a slight movement.

    Like a chain reaction, his hands, arms, neck, and body seemed to suddenly regain their energy. Han Hao abruptly rose to his feet before exercising his neck and flexing his arms with a curious look on his face...

    Just as he was struggling to find moreforting words to spew at Scarlett, Gilbert caught sight of the waltzing Little Skeleton, as good as new. ¡°Holy fuck, he¡¯s alive!¡± he eximed.

    ¡°I knew it, there¡¯s no way that he would die so easily,¡± remarked Sanguis before he muttered to himself, ¡°It seems that the Quintessence Shard had fused with him. His strength must have grown even greater. It appears that I have much catching up to do... ¡°

    Inside the gymnasium, the Five Elite Zombies simultaneously cheered. Although they still had to remain stationary, their lips had not stopped moving.

    ¡°Elder Brother, you alright? Haha, I know you will be alright!¡±

    ¡°Elder Brother, you really scared us good just now. We thought that the gravestone will keep on expanding. Honestly, I was really frightened. If the gravestone¡¯s energy suddenly got out of control, we will be so dead!¡±

    ¡°Haha, Elder Brother, have you got full control over that thing? Is it good to use? How awesome... ¡±

    ...

    While gradually withdrawing their energies from the gymnasium, the Five Elite Zombies babbled to Han Hao excitedly and cheerfully.

    Han Hao could tell from the genuine smiles on their faces that they sincerely cared for him. And after hearing their words, he came to realize that they had been in grave danger and his brothers had risked their lives for him. His heart was filled with warmth. He revealed a faint smile and answered, ¡°I¡¯m alright. I have fully merged with the Quintessence Shard. I can now use some of its powers without alerting that guy.¡±

    ¡°Behold, our future Overgod of Death!¡± Han Shuo guffawed before continuing, ¡°In theing war of the Fringe, you shall end Logue for me!¡±

    Han Hao thought in silence for a moment before putting on a faint smirk and replied, ¡°Okay!¡±

 Chapter 938 - Conspiracy

    <h4>GDK 938: Conspiracy</h4>

    After the energies of the Five Elite Zombies were removed from the gymnasium, Scarlett, Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert could finally sense the presence of all those in it. After the soul-boundary deployed by Han Shuo vanished, the four re-entered the gymnasium together.

    Gilbert and the others immediately congratted Han Hao. Scarlett returned to Han Hao¡¯s side and was no longer worried after seeing that he was very much alive.

    Han Shuo felt content and he could not be prouder of Han Hao¡¯s achievement. He believed that with more time, Han Hao could achieve even greater feats.

    On the surface of the Pandemonium, Han Shuo¡¯s main body slowly got to his feet. The Cauldron of Myriad Demon which had stabilized every demonic formation in the base returned into Han Shuo¡¯s body.

    Han Shuo was about to go back underground and ask Han Hao about his situation in detail. But suddenly, he turned his focus outwards, his senses pierced through theyers of mists shrouding the Pandemonium before he started scanning a mountain range nearby.

    Han Shuo sensed a spot in the mountain range where the energy of lightning was much more intense than the surroundings. After withdrawing his consciousness from the gymnasium, Han Shuo immediately sensed the distant and faint anomaly which no ordinary expert could detect.

    The Pandemonium was essentially a giant machine that gathers elemental energies from the environment, meaning that the elemental energies around the Pandemonium would always gradually flow towards the valley. But Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness sensed that somewhere deep in the mountain range, there was a spot where the element of lightning was not drawn towards the Pandemonium and somehow, it was more intense than the environment.

    With one thought, Han Shuo sent a strand of his consciousness to stealthily fly towards that anomalous region.

    Upon arrival, Han Shuo detected that a mighty being was hiding there. The being emanated an aura that Han Shuo was most familiar with ¨C it was none other than Ss!

    Han Shuo let out a cold groan. His main body disappeared in a sh, piercing through theyers of mists and boundaries surrounding the Pandemonium without a trace. Han Shuo had memorized the terrains surrounding the Pandemonium down to the position of each rock. He could get anywhere within his territory withplete stealth.

    Ss, O, Ss. How foolish of you to return here and try to probe my base! Hehe, I shall fulfill your wish and turn you into Sd! thought Han Shuo with a sneer on his face.

    Ss had not only joined the Godhunter Alliance Hegemons in ambushing Han Shuo at the Misty Seas, but he was also working with the Godhunter Alliance in their invasion of the Fringe. If Han Shuo could ughter Ss before the impending invasion, the Fringedwellers would have a strategic advantage over the invaders.

    It was obvious that Ss came to scout the Pandemonium in preparation for the uing war. It was only natural that Han Shuo, who had inadvertently found him, would not allow Ss to escape once more.

    Ss who had concealed himself in that region carefully probed the situation around the Pandemonium using his divine soul. He understood that the Pandemonium was filled with all kinds of dangers and that Han Shuo should be inside. Therefore, he had been very cautious about it.

    His divine soul was wandering and drifting around when suddenly, he felt as though a chilling wind was blowing towards his soul. Ss was jolted as his instincts told him that grave danger was up ahead. He instantly withdrew his divine soul.

    A burst of soul-tremoring energy suddenly shot at him. Ss felt as though his divine soul had been stabbed by frigid icicles, threatening to freeze and trap his soul.

    Ss¡¯ divine soul was injured in no time. Flustered, he withdrew his divine soul back into his divine body as quickly as possible. In neither loud nor soft voice, he spoke, ¡°Who is it?¡±

    ¡°Hehehe... ¡°a peal of derisive, sinisterughter sounded from the distance and quickly moved closer to Ss. The sound was strangely terrifying.

    Ss¡¯ face jolted and in a deep voice, he said, ¡°It¡¯s you, indeed.¡± For whatever reason, Ss did not immediately try to escape but stood where he was, as though waiting for Han Shuo to appear.

    ¡°I did not expect that you still dare to return to my Pandemonium!¡± said the sneering voice that was moving closer and closer. An eerie breeze blew out of nowhere and Han Shuo¡¯s figure abruptly materialized before Ss. With a mocking smile, he asked, ¡°Ss, do you really think that it was by mere luck that I¡¯ve defeated you here? Simply because you¡¯ve used up some power fighting Ossora before I fought you?¡±

    While mocking Ss, the demon generals emerged from Han Shuo¡¯s body, blocking all possible escape routes of Ss¡¯. Although Han Shuo had no idea why Ss did not immediately escape, he would not simply let go of the opportunity to trap Ss.

    The thousands and thousands of demon generals had filled the space around them as Han Shuo spoke. Individually, none of the demon generals could injure Ss who cultivated the lightning energy, a natural weakness of demon generals.

    However, Han Shuo¡¯s intention wasn¡¯t to directly block Ss using the demon generals but to affect the movement of spacetime using them, preventing Ss from using Portal Scrolls to escape. And Han Shuo knew that he could easily overpower Ss, giving him no chance to use his lightning energy against the demon generals.

    ¡°I know that luck had nothing to do with it. Even if I was in tip-top condition, I would still be no match against you,¡± Ss stared at Han Shuo with a serious look as he said, ¡°And after our encounter at the Misty Sea, I¡¯ve be even more certain that I¡¯m absolutely no match against you.¡±

    Han Shuo was rather surprised to hear that answer. He raised a brow, looked at Ss up and down with puzzled eyes, and asked, ¡°Then? What do youe here alone for?¡± Han Shuo smirked and asked, ¡°Don¡¯t tell me that you really have a death wish?¡±

    ¡°Bryan, I did note here to fight you,¡± said Ss firmly.

    ¡°Huh?¡± Han Shuo was a little amused and curious. With the space around Ss now under the influence of the demon generals, it was impossible for him to escape. Han Shuo thought that there was no harm in taking some time to listen to Ss¡¯st words. ¡°I ttened your Empyrean Peak and took your ce in the Omphalos. But you are telling me that you don¡¯t wanna fight me?¡± Han Shuoughed and shook his head as though he could not believe what he had heard before he continued, ¡°Well, now this is interesting! Tell me then, what are you here for?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m here to propose a coboration!¡± answered Ss. But after thinking for a moment, as though afraid that Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t believe his words, he quickly added, ¡°There is no way that I can genuinely befriend the godhunters as after all, I¡¯m not a godhunter. Besides, those Godhunter Hegemons are unreliable. I have no way of trusting them. I know Tyre and Logue very well. They scheme against others all the time. There is no way that I would cooperate with them.¡±

    ¡°What about Wasir and Ossora? Their reputation in the Fringe is not that bad. Why didn¡¯t you look for them?¡±

    ¡°I have dueled Wasir and Ossora. If they can¡¯t even defeat me, how can I trust them?¡± Ss had a disdained look on his face as he exined, ¡°I, Ss, have my own set of principles and conducts. Those who cannot defeat me are not worthy of my consideration. That is my way.¡±

    Han Shuo became even more interested in the topic after hearing the exnation. He put on a big smile and asked, ¡°Well then, how do you wanna cooperate? What can you give me and what can I give you?¡±

    ¡°I can give you all the information about the Godhunter Alliance and lead them into your traps. They are not familiar with the Fringe and they will listen to my advice with no doubt!¡± answered Ss immediately as though he had prepared for it.

    Then, after taking a short pause and taking a deep breath, Ss continued, ¡°I wish to return to the Fringe. After this war is over, some of the Sovereigns will die. It could be Tyre and Logue, or Wasir and Ossora. Or perhaps even all of them. By then, all you need to do is give me a hand and acknowledge my position.¡±

    ¡°That simple?¡± asked Han Shuo.

    ¡°It¡¯s that simple!¡± said Ss resolutely.

    After thinking for a moment, Han Shuo bunched his brows and looked at Ss, ¡°Why would I trust you?¡±

    If Ss was sincere in cooperating with Han Shuo, he would have a better certainty of the oue of the war. But as Ss and Han Shuo used to be enemies, there was a good chance that Ss might betray him during the critical moments. Making even the slightest mistake could mean altering the entire war. Therefore, Han Shuo dare not take Ss¡¯ words easily.

    ¡°I also can¡¯t tell you why you should. However, if you agree to my proposal, I can provide you with a few very critical pieces of information right now. It will help you understand the situation better and even give you some advantages!¡± replied Ss seemed somewhat troubled, as though he could not think of a way to prove his sincerity.

    Han Shuo hesitated for a while before he nodded and said, ¡°Alright, I will work with you. Now tell me about it.¡±

    For some reason, Ss seemed to trust Han Shuo. Not worried that Han Shuo might eat his words, he immediately said, ¡°Dagmar knows that Han Hao possesses a Quintessence Shard and he had been scheming to take it from him. He had brought all his experts from the Death Dominion over and he¡¯s going all-in.

    ¡°In addition, I discovered that Tyre and Dhaka of the Destruction Dominion could be connected. Tyre had been unusually informed about every movement of the Godhunter Alliance and Dhaka seemed to have spies in the Fringe. He knows too much about the Fringe.

    ¡°But the connection between Tyre and Dhaka is only my own spection. I do not have concrete evidence yet. I¡¯m telling you this so that you wouldn¡¯t be caught surprised if it¡¯s true. Right, don¡¯t you think that the two have rather simr appearances?¡±

    Han Shuo put on a surprised look. He recalled their faces for a moment and they did look vaguely simr to Han Shuo. He also recalled that both of them cultivated the energy of destruction. After thinking for a moment, Han Shuo said, ¡°I think we have much to discuss... ¡°

    Ss was ted. It was obvious that Han Shuo was finally convinced that he was sincere. The two deployedyers of boundaries around them and held their discussion right in that spot. After hatching a conspiracy, Ss stealthily departed from the Pandemonium.

 Chapter 939 - Not a half-assed overgod

    <h4>Chapter 939 - Not a half-assed overgod</h4>

    *** Over at the center of the Fringe, the Omphalos.

    Tyre, Logue, Ossora, and Wasir were having a meeting at Tyre¡¯s Sovereign Shop about the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s impending invasion. As time went by, the four Sovereigns managed to collect more intel about their enemies¡¯ movement. They had verified sources that all Twelve Hegemons of the Godhunter Alliance had arrived outside their border.

    The great war could erupt at any moment soon. The four Sovereigns hadpleted their preparations. They did their best subduing as many Fringedwellers under theirmand as possible. All the usually aggressive Fringedwellers were now suddenly monks and ceased ughtering each other. Stringers had been especially active, constantly scouting and collecting intel.

    ¡°Ossora, of the four of us, you are the closest to Bryan. Do you know why he is still not attending the meeting?¡± asked Tyre whose face was rather dark. He had sent messengers to the Pandemonium, inviting Han Shuo to join their meetings. However, Stratholme would always decline the invitations on Han Shuo¡¯s behalf, giving the excuse that Han Shuo was in secluded meditation. And now, Han Shuo continued to decline attending the meeting when they received intel that the Godhunter Alliance was right outside the Fringe. To Tyre, this was inexcusable.

    Ossora shook his head and replied, ¡°I too have sent people over. They¡¯ve received the same answer as yours. It seems that Bryan is at a critical juncture of his cultivation. Well, in any case, we have agreed on our responsibilities and strategy long ago. I think he would have made the necessary preparations.¡±

    ¡°I sure hope so!¡± Tyre groaned and disdainfully remarked, ¡°If his side was to crumble like a biscuit, those godhunters could march straight into the Omphalos and attack us from our backs. None of us could afford the slightest negligence. Right, Ossora, please remind him again that the godhunters could attack anytime now and that he better be ready.¡±

    ¡°Sure.¡± Given the circumstances, Ossora agreed to Tyre¡¯s request right away instead of bickering.

    ¡°I hope he can handle the pressure. He¡¯s been real domineering during recent times. He ought to have something to back that kind of attitude,¡± remarked Logue in his malicious, cunning smile.

    ¡°Hey, you! Stop right there! You are not allowed to enter!¡± a cry suddenly sounded from outside the Sovereign Shop.

    Tyre¡¯s face suddenly turned dark and he seemed displeased. The Sovereign Shop was under his name and many in the Omphalos knew that he and the other Sovereigns were gathered there. The four mightiest existences in the Fringe were gathered in that room. Who would be so reckless as to trespass on the shop and interrupt their meeting?

    Pow! A muffled thud sounded outside the Sovereign Shop before it returned to the usual silence.

    ¡°Hehe, Tyre, it seems that someone is taking a piss on your turf. Interesting, interesting!¡± teased Logue with a mischievous smirk.

    Wasir and Ossora, meanwhile, were bbergasted. They had no idea who the intruder was and they couldn¡¯t understand how someone could be so bold or foolish to trespass on the area where four Sovereigns had gathered.

    ¡°No matter who it is, it has just sent itself to death!¡± Tyre suddenly turned from angered to amused. Instead of going outside to check on the situation, he sat in his seat and waited for the intruder toe to him.

    Although Tyre did not step outside the chamber, using his mighty divine soul, he sensed that the intruder was a cultivator of the death energy and was only at the mid-stage highgod realm. Although an expert of this ss was not abundantly found in the Fringe and quite powerful, Tyre, perhaps the strongest of the Sovereigns, could not feel less threatened by that kind of strength.

    Yet, Tyre found it very strange that an expert of that ss would dare intrude his territory. Besides, the henchman he had stationed outside the shop was ate-stage highgod expert who should be capable of stopping the intruder.

    While Tyre was thinking about the peculiar situation, he was suddenly jolted. He discovered that fissures abruptly developed on the boundary he deployed, allowing a figure to enter the meeting room.

    The intruder swept his gaze across the four Sovereigns before fixing it on Logue. He unenthusiastically asked, ¡°Are you Logue?¡±

    Logue was startled. When his gaze met that of the intruder, he suddenly felt that the divine energy in his body was behaving rather strangely. They turned rather disordered and got out of his control.

    Logue was overwhelmed with shock by the abnormality. He immediately nodded and answered, ¡°Yes, I¡¯m Logue.¡±

    The intruder nodded before staring intensely at Logue. His powerful soul energy enveloped Logue in an instant. Logue¡¯s pupil disappeared and only the whites of his eyes could be seen. He seemed to have been frozen.

    ¡°Who are you? What did you do to Logue?¡± shouted Tyre as he stood up angrily. He was ring at the intruder and ready to strike at any moment.

    Wasir and Ossora got up from their seats and nked the intruder from his left and right. They assumed hostile stances towards the person in preparation for attacking him.

    ¡°You better not try to strike me or I will end you.¡± The person was slowly and thoroughly exploring Logue with his soul and yet, somehow, he could still talk. His tone was filled with utter arrogance and disdain as though Tyre, Wasir, and Ossora were puny ants that he could kill with a lift of his finger instead of mighty Sovereigns of the Fringe.

    Tyre had met plenty of haughty, conceited characters, but never someone as condescending as this unknown intruder. The usually calm-looking Tyre was infuriated by his attitude. He responded, ¡°You think that this is a ce that you can simply enter and leave alive, even if you are a Hegemon of the Godhunter Alliance? End us all? Haha, let¡¯s see it!¡± Upon finishing those words, Tyre raised in preparation tounch an attack.

    ¡°Tyre, stand down!¡± Logue¡¯s pupils returned to his eyes and a shiver traveled down his spine before he shouted those words just in time. He looked at the intruder with a frightened face and in a slightly trembling voice, he asked, ¡°Is there anything that I can help you with, Lord?¡±

    Tyre was stunned. He almost couldn¡¯t believe that the Logue at this moment was the same person who he had known for ages. This infamously treacherous and vengeful Sovereign had never used honorifics when speaking to another person or shown any fear towards any being. But the Logue now was visibly frightened and he spoke in a humble tone.

    ¡°Tyre, do not attack!¡± repeated Logue as he slowly got up. Quickly, he turned to the intruder, bowed at him, and asked, ¡°How may I serve you, Lord?¡±

    ¡°Name me every cultivator of the death element in the Fringe,¡± asked the person unhurriedly after putting on a calm, faint smile.

    ¡°Han Hao, Lung-qi, Perseus¡­¡± replied Logue respectfully after thinking for a moment.

    ¡°And where are they?¡± asked the intruder after nodding his head. He seemed satisfied with Logue¡¯s attitude.

    ¡°I don¡¯t know where Han Hao is, but the others are located at¡­¡± answered Logue hastily while his body was still bowed.

    ¡°Em-hmm. Good,¡± the man turned on his heels and walked away after getting the information he wanted. He didn¡¯t even bother to look at Tyre, Wasir, or Ossora.

    The room remained silent until long after the unknown intruder had left. Finally, Tyre looked at Logue with a grave face and asked, ¡°Who is he? Your father? Grandfather? Why would you be so respectful toward him?¡±

    After letting out a long sigh of relief, Logue slouched on his seat. After taking his time to calm his mind down, he grimaced and replied, ¡°I wouldn¡¯t be that respectful to my father and grandfather. And if I were even remotely rted to him, I wouldn¡¯t be living in the Fringe now.¡±

    ¡°Then who in the world is he?¡± Even the usually non-talkative Wasir couldn¡¯t help himself but ask.

    ¡°Overgod!¡± answered Logue stutteringly as though it took a ton of effort to utter it. After taking a short pause, to make sure that Tyre and the order understood him, he added, ¡°And obviously, not the half-assed kind of overgod that we are.¡±

    Upon hearing those words, Tyre, Wasir, and Ossora were stupefied. Shivers traveled down their spines.

    ¡°No wonder¡­ I should have guessed¡­ If wasn¡¯t him, Logue wouldn¡¯t have been so humble¡­¡± remarked Wasir whose face seemed a little pale.

    ¡°I¡¯m so d that I¡¯ve listened to you and not attacked¡­¡± Tyre grimaced and continued, ¡°Otherwise, the Fringe would have been ttened before those godhunters were even here.¡±

    ¡°Why would hee to the Fringe? What does he want?¡± Ossora seemed somewhat flustered. He mumbled to himself, ¡°Could it be that the Twelve Existences intent to wipe out the Fringe? How could this be¡­?¡±

    Logue managed to fully calm down and with a collected face, he gave his analysis, ¡°That is probably not his intention. Otherwise, the four of us would have already been dead. He should be after something else¡­¡± After thinking for a moment with his eyes closed, Logue exined, ¡°He seemed to be searching for something, or someone¡­ His soul had explored every part of my body. There was nothing on me that I could hide from him. He likely did not find the thing that he¡¯s after and therefore spared me¡­¡±

    ¡°I really hope that is the case. Otherwise, oblivion would fall upon us no matter what we do.¡± Ossora seemed somewhat pessimistic. He knew that even thebined might of the Fringe stood no chance against such a mighty being.

    ¡°I think we should call it a day. We all need some time to calm down from that,¡± said Tyre, ending the meeting decisively after seeing that the other three Sovereigns no longer had the desire to talk about defending against the Godhunter Alliance.

    Wasir, Logue, and Ossora agreed. Without Tyre saying another word, they left one after another. Even Logue went home to suck his thumb instead of staying behind to have further discussion with Tyre.

    After all three of them left, Tyre sat quietly in the chamber for a long while before stealthily leaving the Omphalos. He went to the dead volcano where Han Shuo was first introduced to the Sovereigns. He went behind a cliff, deployed a barrier, took out a magical mirror, and dialed Dhaka.

    Not far from the cliff, a ghostly figure was standing under the shadow of a tree, tracking Tyre¡­

 Chapter 940 - Brainstorming

    GDK 940: Brainstorming

    Tyre hadn¡¯t noticed that someone was spying on him when he produced the magical mirror to contact Dhaka.

    As soon as the image of Dhaka, leader of godhunters, materialized upon the magical mirror, Tyre quickly asserted, ¡°Elder brother, there¡¯s been a change of situation!¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong? We are still in the process of forming an invasion n over at my side. Why do you seem so frantic?¡± Dhaka, inside the magical mirror, raised a brow and replied in his deep voice.

    ¡°One of the Overgods just came to the Fringe! Us four Sovereigns nearly got wiped out!¡± It seemed as though Tyre had yet to recover from the shock of being visited by the Overgod of Death. A tinge of anxiousness wasced in his voice as he spoke hurriedly.

    ¡°An overgod nearly killed you? What exactly happened?¡± Although slightly taken aback, Dhaka did not seem too concerned. He had misheard or misunderstood Tyre.

    ¡°I did not say an overgod, I said, The Overgod!¡± stressed a perturbed Tyre.

    ¡°What?¡± Dhaka freaked out, finally realizing how truly pressing the problem was. He eximed, ¡°What are they doing in the Land of Chaos?¡±

    Tyre gave a wry smile and recounted to Dhaka their encounter in detail.

    Dhaka¡¯s face grew more and more solemn as he listened to the narration. After a long while, he suddenly broke out in a depraved chuckle and muttered, ¡°Hahaha, I know why he hase to the Fringe! Haha, that¡¯s too bad for you, Dagmar, but I guess now you¡¯ve got no hope of everying your hands on that thing!¡±

    Dhaka continued cackling for a moment before turning serious again. ¡°There¡¯s no need for concern at all, the Overgod of Death is not after you Sovereigns. Alright, I will get my people to postpone the invasion until the Overgod is done with His business here. His presence in the Fringe brings too many uncertainties to us both and could affect the oue of our mastern.¡±

    After saying those words to calm Tyre, Dhaka revealed to him about the Quintessence Shard on Han Hao.

    Tyre was surprised by the revtion, but he also felt envious. He grumbled, ¡°They are such lucky bastards!¡± He took a short pause before adding, ¡°Bryan alone is already a real pain in the arse; and now with that Han Hao possessing a Quintessence Shard, he¡¯s going to be an even greater scourge!¡±

    ¡°You must not reveal this information to anyone. Only me, Dagmar, and Asser know that Han Hao has a Quintessence Shard. Only, me, Dagmar, and Asser know about this. If this gets leaked, our rtionship could risk being exposed. Even as we speak, some are getting suspicious of me for being too cognizant of happenings within the Fringe. To ensure that our mastern seeds, we need to be mindful of our every move,¡± warned Dhaka in his deep voice.

    ¡°Got it,¡± Tyre nodded before he smilingly remarked, ¡°The Fringe may be vast, but I don¡¯t believe it will take the Overgod of Death long to go through the names Logue gave him. Han Hao will eventually meet his doom!¡±

    ¡°Yes, and all we gotta do is sit and wait! And keep an eye on Han Hao. Once he is dead or the Overgod of Death leaves the Fringe, notify me immediately and we will proceed with the invasion. When this is over, you willmand the Fringe while Imand the Godhunter Alliance. With our powersbined, we will have a real shot at entering Aethernia!¡± said Dhaka.

    Tyre nodded and smiled. He then casually exchanged a few more words with Dhaka about the current situation before ending the call.

    ...

    Located not too far from Tyre was a wisp of smoke that gave off not the slightest aura of life. It wafted undetected into the distance.

    After moving a hundred miles from Tyre, the wisp of smoke stopped and gradually morphed into Han Shuo. After spying and surveilling Tyre for nearly half a month, Han Shuo finally confirmed Ss¡¯s suspicion ¨C Tyre, a Sovereign, and Dhaka, a Hegemon, were in fact brothers. Han Shuo was astonished by the discovery.

    Had Han Shuo remained oblivious to this fact when the war broke out, he would be in a dire situation. Both Tyre and Dhaka cultivated the energy of destruction. Given that Tyre was the strongest Sovereign in the Fringe, Dhaka, his elder brother, should possess even greater strength. Thebined power of the two could be even more formidable than thebined might of Wasir, Ossora, Logue, and Ss.

    Han Shuo was fortunate to have been tipped off by Ss which led to his discovery this day. With that knowledge, Han Shuo could now make the necessary preparations before the treacherous brothers dealt him the blow. What¡¯s more, Han Shuo could even make use of this information when scheming against them.

    With a n in mind, Han Shuo didn¡¯t stay further and promptly returned to the Pandemonium.

    The biggest challenge before him right now was not the Tyre and Dhaka brothers but Nestor, the Overgod of Death, who hade to the Fringe. Han Shuo was aware of the reality that although his strength had been improving by leaps and bounds, he was far, far from being a match against the Overgod of Death.

    As Han Hao was among the names Logue reported to the Overgod, it meant that Han Hao¡¯s life was now in great danger. Given the mighty power of the Overgod of Death, it would only be a matter of time before he located Han Hao hiding in the Fringe. Han Shuo had to somehow find a way to keep Little Skeleton alive in the little time that was left.

    He returned to the Pandemonium at top speed and immediately summoned Han Hao. Without dy, he informed Han Hao of this dire situation, then added, ¡°We need to find a solution or he will find you eventually!¡± After taking a short pause, Han Shuo continued, ¡°You said that you¡¯ve integrated with the Quintessence Shard. If the Overgod of Death were to stand next to you, would he be able to tell that you have it?¡±

    ¡°Yes,¡± Han Hao nodded after thinking for a moment.

    Han Shuo felt a great headache. He was certain that the Overgod of Death was now searching high and low for the death energy cultivators Logue had named. Once he was done probing them, eventually, Han Hao would be thest person remaining on his list. The Fringe was limited in size but the might of the Overgod was not. It wouldn¡¯t be long before He came knocking on their door.

    Even though the Pandemonium was defended byyers uponyers of demonic formations, Han Shuo doubted that it could stop a Quintessence Overgod. With nowhere to hide and no way to fight, Han Shuo had no idea how to keep Little Skeleton alive.

    Han Hao, seeing the anxiousness on Han Shuo¡¯s face, thought for a moment before he suggested, ¡°How about I leave the Fringe and hide in other Dominions temporarily?¡±

    ¡°You can, but that will only be a temporary solution. If that guy can¡¯t find the Shard in the Fringe and realizes that you are coincidentally missing, you will be His number one suspect. And when that happens, you will be in an even more dire situation,¡± exined Han Shuo, grimacing in frustration.

    Han Hao did not reply but carefully thought about it for a while. And indeed, he could note up with a good solution to the crisis. There was no way to truly resolve it unless he and Han Shuo could suddenly raise their strengths to the level of a Quintessence Overgod. As rapidly as Han Shuo had been progressing in demonic arts, he would still need centuries if not millennia to get to that level. And although Han Hao had just fused with a Quintessence Shard, it was still impossible for him to fight the Overgod.

    Even if Han Hao mastered using the Shard¡¯s energy, there would still be no way he could fight the Overgod with the Quintessence. Han Hao racked his brain and he too could note up with a solution

    ¡°We need more brains to work on this so that we cane up with a solution as quickly as possible!¡± remarked Han Shuo before immediately summoning those who knew about the Shard¡¯s existence. When Bonds, Gilbert, Sanguis, Scarlett, and the Five Elite Zombies were gathered at the underground gymnasium, Han Shuo hastily briefed them about Han Hao¡¯s dire situation before he gravely said, ¡°Things are looking grim and we don¡¯t have much time, which is why I have called for this brainstorming session. Please try toe up with a solution.¡±

    The atmosphere turned tense after the people realized the gravity of the situation. Just like Han Shuo, they bunched their brows and racked their brains for ideas.

    In this universe, an Overgod with the Quintessence was practically invincible. Save for other Quintessence Overgods, no existence in the universe coulde close to even fighting them. And now, with this terrifying being hunting and searching for Han Hao, with the futility of fighting Him, Han Hao could only try to run or hide.

    But even if Han Hao temporarily left, after crossing everyone off his list and not finding the Shard in the Fringe, the Overgod of Death would immediately consider the missing Han Hao as the primary suspect. By then, the Overgod would focus on hunting and killing Han Hao.

    It seemed to be an impossible challenge. A day went by in the blink of an eye. Although a few seemingly workable ideas were proposed, they were all dismissed after a round of scrutiny.

    Gradually, the discussions started to die down. The impatient Gilbert was starting to get restless. He argued that they might as well stake it all and fight the Overgod.

    ¡°He can kill you with a lift of His finger. You can try but you will die without a doubt,¡± Han Shuo replied to Gilbert with a disapproving face.

    ¡°I¡¯ve already died once anyway, I don¡¯t mind dying once more!¡± rebutted Gilbert.

    ¡°His expertise is in the soul. If he kills you, he will be sure to annihte your soul. And by then, no amount of power can bring you back to life. You will be dead permanently,¡± said Han Shuo after snorting and rolling his eyes.

    ¡°That guy is adept in the energy of souls. If you die this time, you won¡¯t be able to retain your soul temporarily like you did the previous time. Once he destroys the seal of your soul, I won¡¯t be able to resurrect you anymore no matter what, and by then, you will be finished for real!¡± Han Shuo glimpsed at Gilbert and snorted coldly.

    ¡°Senior, that reminds me ¨C can Han Hao separate his soul from his body and possess another body? This body of his had fused with the Shard. But if you forge him a new divine body and let him possess it, the Overgod wouldn¡¯t find any trace of the Shard on him, right?¡± Bnds¡¯ eyes lit up as if inspired by Gilbert¡¯s words.

    Han Shuo was jolted and he opened his eyes wide. Immediately, he turned to Han Hao and asked, ¡°You¡¯ve been practicing demonic arts and your soul is different from an ordinary being. Are you able to separate your soul from your body?¡±

    Han Hao thought about it for a moment and vaguely attempted it. He nodded, ¡°I think I can.¡±

 Chapter 941 - Cheating Death

    GDK 941: Cheating Death

    Han Shuo could easily fabricate a new divine body with the exact appearance of Hao Hao. As long as Hao Hao could separate his soul from his original body, he could possess the new body and use it to fool the Overgod of Death.

    Upon hearing that Han Hao could do it, Gilbert, Bonds, and the others became ted. Among them, Scarlett was especially excited and relieved that they¡¯d found a workable solution. She asked Han Hao, ¡°Are you sure you can do it? Will it have any adverse effects?¡±

    Han Hao nodded and Scarlett confidently and replied, ¡°I will be just fine.¡±

    ¡°Perfect, then this can be done with ease!¡± eximed Han Shuo smilingly before he instructed Han Hao, ¡°Then let us get started right away, there is no time to waste. Come and select the materials with me. I will need the skeleton of a highgod and some special medicinal ingredients. With those things, I can build you a new body without much effort!¡±

    ¡°Father, there is still another problem,¡± after hesitating for a bit, Han Hao bunched his brows and said, ¡°A portion of the Shard has fused with my body and its inscriptions have interwoven with my soul. I¡¯m worried that He will be able to detect the inscriptions on my soul.¡±

    ¡°All you need to do is split up a strand of your soul. I will teach you how to solve this.¡± As Han Shuo now had a direction, it did not take him long to think of a solution to this potential issue.

    Through demonic arts, Han Shuo could split his consciousness into millions of strands. If Han Hao could separate his soul from his body, then splitting a strand of his soul should also be achievable. Han Shuo could then help him form a secondary soul simr to an avatar.

    While thinking about the solution, another new idea came to Han Shuo¡¯s mind. He smilingly said, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, this one is easy to solve. I will help you form a secondary soul and use it to possess the surrogate body. When the Overgodes, let him probe your secondary soul and surrogate body. Then, have your main body activate the Shard outside the Fringe. He wouldn¡¯t suspect a thing.¡±

    ¡°Father, what do you mean by a secondary soul?¡± asked Han Hao who seemed a little perplexed.

    ¡°Well, it¡¯s like this!¡± said Han Shuo with a big smile as his two avatars that had been sitting inside the Cauldron of Myriad Demon emerged. Two carbon copies of Han Shuo suddenly appeared beside him. They looked exactly the same in their appearances and demeanor.

    Han Hao carefully examined the two avatars for a while before he nodded and said, ¡°I understand now.¡±

    The Five Elite Zombies, Gilbert, and Sanguis knew that Han Shuo had avatars but Scarlett and Bonds were unaware of this secret. They were astonished to see two clones of Han Shuo suddenly standing before them and they could not be more curious.

    Han Shuo, however, did not exin much to them. He said to Han Hao, ¡°Let¡¯s not tarry any longer. Soon I will teach you the techniques. You can be at ease. This surrogate of you will have the same soul undtion of your main body but it will not carry the aura of the Quintessence Shard. I¡¯m sure that the Overgod won¡¯t be able to tell that it¡¯s a fake.¡±

    Han Hao seemed rather excited.

    Han Shuo had gained the two avatars mostly by luck. But now that he had attained Skybreak Realm and having obtained new memories and insights into demonic arts, Han Shuo was finally able to forge an avatarpletely from scratch, which was why he was so confident that it would work.

    Han Shuo and Han Hao went to the warehouse in the Pandemonium and they selected the materials needed for forging a surrogate body. A number of eerie white bones and sparkling, translucent rocks were taken.

    The warehouse stored all kinds of valuable and umon materials. A portion of them were leftovers from constructing the Pandemonium while most of them were spoils Han Hao looted from the Omphalos merchants. All kinds of miraculous and rare materials were piled in those rooms. He had more than enough to forge even ten more avatars for Han Hao.

    ¡°Refining an avatar would take a long time, time that we do not have. Besides, even with an avatar, it wouldn¡¯t help with anything if the Overgod decides to ughter the other you. Therefore I will just make you a puppet, but it¡¯s good enough to fool him. This will save us a ton of time and energy.¡± After gathering all the necessary materials, Han Shuo brought Han Hao to the surface of the Pandemonium and began forging a new body using one of the avable demonic formations.

    While Han Shuo¡¯s main body was busy manufacturing a new body, his avatar was teaching Han Hao how to split up a strand of his soul. As Han Hao was a demonic arts cultivator and his soul was mostly simr to that of a human, with Han Shuo¡¯s guidance, he very quickly mastered the technique.

    Han Hao tried and tried again. In just three days¡¯ time, he was able to split up a strand of his soul as Han Shuo wanted. It was way faster than Han Shuo thought.

    ¡°Excellent, excellent!¡± Han Shuo was overjoyed and was pleased by Han Hao¡¯s extraordinary talent in demonic techniques. He said, ¡°Now that you have a strand of your soul separated, the hardest step ispleted. All you have to do now is sever the strand from your main soul while keeping it entangled with your soul. Here¡¯s how you do it...¡±

    On the surface of the Pandemonium, Han Shuo¡¯s main body continued to inject demonic yuan and work with the Cauldron of Myriad Demon to build the surrogate while his avatar of destruction described the steps of forming a secondary soul to Han Hao.

    Simultaneously, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar of death was at the underground pce. He had been updating himself on thetest news in the Fringe from Zovic.

    ¡°Five were visited by the Overgod and three of them were killed. The two came out unscathed because they did not try to resist,¡± Zovic, standing respectfully before Han Shuo, reported with a solemn face.

    Han Shuo asked Zovic to keep an eye on those names Logue mentioned to the Overgod. Half of those element of death experts had the Overgod of Death knocking on their doors. Some of those Fringedwellers oblivious to the identity of their mysterious visitor, used to being arrogant and snobbish, were taken out by the Overgod.

    Meanwhile, those who sensed the terrifying might of the Overgod and who were as meekly prostrated as Logue was were spared.

    ¡°How many are left?¡± asked Han Shuo with his brows bunched gravely.

    ¡°Five more. I believe that after he visited those five, he will focus on finding Han Hao. It wouldn¡¯t be long. Should we do anything to prepare?¡± asked Zovic.

    Han Shuo thought for a while before instructing, ¡°Now is a sensitive period for these prominent energy of death experts to die. It will surely cause a ruckus. Use your resources to spread a rumor that there is a godhunter hunting for experts cultivating the death energy. Exaggerate the hunter¡¯s strength as much as possible but don¡¯t mention anything about a Quintessence Overgod. And make sure that the remaining five hear the rumor while not revealing that it originated from us.¡±

    ¡°Is this to frighten them so that they will go into hiding, thus increasing the time before they would be found?¡± Zovic immediately understood Han Shuo¡¯s n.

    Han Shuo nodded and replied, ¡°That¡¯s correct. It¡¯s to buy us a little more time. The solution I¡¯m working on will be ready soon. By then, the surrogate Han Hao will head to the Omphalos where everyone recognizes him and the Overgod can be sure of his identity.¡±

    At this most critical moment, Han Shuo needed the most urate and relevant information from him and therefore revealed the great secret to Zovic. Besides, given Zovic¡¯s history in serving his House of Han for many years with undying loyalty, Han Shuo trusted that he would keep a tight lip about the secret and perform his best.

    ¡°Understood, I will have it done right away!¡± replied Zovic nodding before quickly leaving.

    ***

    Yet another three days had passed. The Han Shuo sitting inside the gymnasium on the surface of the Pandemonium took a deep breath and slowly exhaled. He put his arm into the pool of blood before him and pulled out a body. It was a carbon copy of Han Hao.

    ¡°Are you ready?¡± Han Shuo asked Han Hao solemnly.

    ¡°I¡¯m ready!¡± answered Han Hao. He seemed calm and not the slightest bit nervous.

    Han Shuo nodded and smilingly said, ¡°Sometimes I wonder if you ever know what fear is. Alright, you may begin. Possess the body with your secondary soul. I can only help you this far and the rest is up to you.¡±

    Han Hao did not waste words. He sat cross-legged on the ground and stared fixedly at his surrogate body with his bewitching purple eyes. A trace of faintly discernible soul undtion formed above his head and slowly drifted to the lifeless clone of his.

    The strange shimmer in his eyes grew brighter and brighter before it suddenly stopped wavering as though Han Hao was in a suspended state.

    Han Shuo grew worried. He kept watching back and forth at Han Hao¡¯s main body and the surrogate. He became more and more anxious when things seemed to be taking too long.

    After a long while, the strange light shed in Han Hao¡¯s purple eyes before he slowly closed his eyes. Meanwhile, the surrogate before him opened his eyes and slowly got up. He moved his arms and legs around curiously and said, ¡°Father, it¡¯s done.¡±

    Han Shuo was relieved and ted. Heughed out loud and said, ¡°Good, very good! Nowes the fun part. You are going to cheat Death!¡±

 Chapter 942 - You hid it!

    <h4>GDK 942: You hid it!</h4>

    Han Shuo brought the two Han Haos to the underground pce. The others, including the Five Elite Zombies and Bonds, could not be more amazed. They used their souls to thoroughly examine both of the Han Haos but were shocked to discover that not only did they look exactly the same, their auras were almost indistinguishable. They could sense a unique aura of death inside the main soul of Han Hao.

    ¡°As his main soul contains the power of the Quintessence Shard, the two souls cann¡¯t have the exact same aura. But the Overgod of Death will not be able to tell that this is just a surrogate!¡± said Han Shuo confidently.

    ¡°Father, should I go now?¡± asked both Han Haos in one voice. They had the same pitch and inflection. As Han Hao was still not used to having two bodies, he still could not control them independently like Han Shuo could with his avatars.

    ¡°Yes, go now. Leave the Fringe with your main body and head to the Omphalos with your surrogate. Remember to bring your followers along. Go explore the parameters yourself until the Overgod finds you,¡± said Han Shuo smilingly.

    ¡°Understood,¡± nodded Han Hao. He said his goodbyes to Scarlett and the Five Elite Zombies before leaving through an underground tunnel of the Pandemonium,mencing the plot to cheat Death.

    Han Shuo did not leave to the Omphalos with Han Hao as he did not wish to meet the Overgod of Death at this stage. Besides, Han Shuo had killed City Lord Hill of Witherbone City, an important servant of the Overgod. A meeting with the Overgod might not end well for Han Shuo.

    If you can, please consider supporting the trantion project. You¡¯ll get advanced chapters!

    In addition, the Han Hao heading to the Omphalos was just a disposable surrogate. It wouldn¡¯t cause any adverse effect on Han Hao¡¯s main body even if the Overgod annihted the surrogate. This put Han Shuo much more at ease about letting Little Skeleton go on the mission alone.

    As soon as Han Hao left, Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert immediately went to Han Shuo excitedly to ask about avatars. They were very interested in what they saw and they too wanted surrogates of their own.

    Unfortunately, Han Shuo had to douse their enthusiasm. As Bonds and Sanguis did not cultivate the orthodox school of demonic arts, they could not branch out a stand of their souls. Gilbert, however, could do so as he was taught the demonic techniques in tempering his soul.

    However, it could be said that the current body of Gilbert was already a surrogate body which had be well-attached to his soul, not to mention the extreme robustness of the body. Therefore, it was pointless to spend time and energy forging another surrogate.

    Han Shuo denied their requests and urged them to put their effort into their cultivations instead of distracting themselves with getting a clone.

    The trio did not feel too dejected. Gilbert immediately returned to cultivating and meditating. He had learned a great deal from Han Hao and now saw the direction on how he should fuse the two energies in his body. He was confident that he would make great progress very soon.

    Meanwhile, perhaps shocked or inspired by the strength they saw in Han Hao, Sanguis and Bonds became even more focused on their cultivations than they already were. They continued to advance at an incredible rate.

    With the Godhunter Alliance now on the border of the Fringe, they were prepared to invade at any moment, Han Shuo was not at liberty to be careless. Ever since Han Hao departed, Han Shuo frequently met with Zovic to keep up to date about thetest situation and their battle n. Han Shuo would also mysteriously disappear from the Pandemonium unexined. He seemed to be setting something up in secret.

    Two weeks passed in a snap. Han Shuo had been counting the days and thought that by now, Han Hao¡¯s main body should have left the Fringe while his surrogate body would have reached the Omphalos. He started feeling somewhat worried, wondering how the situation was at the Omphalos.

    ***Over at the Omphalos.

    Han Hao with a group of his godhunters formally stepped into the Omphalos. With his most grandiose and ostentatious party, he wandered all around the major streets and shopped for unique materials.

    This surrogate body of Han Hao¡¯s was in the vicinity of the Omphalos as early as five days ago. However, as his main body had yet to reach his destination, he hid and waited. It was only today, when surrogate Han Hao sensed that the main Han Hao had entered the Destiny Dominion, that he entered the Omphalos.

    Han Hao¡¯s sudden appearance in the trading city had alerted the major powerhouses, especially Tyre who knew that he possessed the Quintessence Shard. Tyre immediately ordered his men to furtively keep Han Hao under constant surveince while disseminating his whereabouts using Stringers.

    At present, Han Hao¡¯s reputation in the Fringe was barely beneath the Five Sovereigns. Fringedwellers and the various forces were naturally curious when someone as powerful as Han Hao showed up in the Omphalos. They, too, silently observed every move he made.

    Ossora was the first toe to Han Hao.

    After bringing Han Hao to one of his Sovereign Shops and deploying multiple boundaries around themselves, Ossora bunched his brows and asked, ¡°Why have youe to the Omphalos?¡±

    Ossora knew that Han Hao and Han Shuo were very close and that he should also express his goodwill to Han Hao.

    When the Sovereigns were visited by the Overgod of Death, Ossora had heard with his own ears the names Logue reported. Through his own intelligencework, Ossora was aware that some of those in the name list had been murdered. He had also ryed that news to Zovic via secret channels. Given just how dangerous the situation was, Ossora couldn¡¯t understand why Han Hao would appear in the public now.

    ¡°I have some businesses to do here. I¡¯m not the person He¡¯s looking for. I will be fine,¡± although Han Hao¡¯s skills in interaction were primitive, especially in romantic rtionships, he knew enough to feign civility with a character like Ossora.

    ¡°Not you? Are you sure?¡± asked Ossora suspiciously after thinking for a moment. Although Ossora had no idea what really was happening, from the clues he had gathered so far, he could be certain that the Overgod of Death was looking for someone or something.

    ¡°It¡¯s not me,¡± reaffirmed Han Hao.

    ¡°Alright then...¡± Ossora nodded and suddenly changed the topic, ¡°How is Bryan doing recently? I have sent multiple messengers inviting him to the Omphalos for discussion. Why has he not replied?¡±

    ¡°He¡¯s in a critical stage of his secluded cultivation. But you don¡¯t have to worry, he has made all the necessary preparations. There wouldn¡¯t be an issue even if the Godhunter Alliance strikes now,¡± answered Han Hao immediately. He had prepared those answers in advance with Han Shuo.

    Ossora then asked a few more questions about Han Shuo which were answered almost spontaneously by Han Hao. He did not reveal any secrets rted to the Pandemonium, but did a good job of not appearing as though he was trying to hide information from Ossora.

    Ossora could not obtain the answer he wanted from Han Hao. After seeing that Han Hao seemed not in the least worried about the Overgod of Death visiting him and was determined to stay inside the Fringe, Ossora did not continue to persuade him otherwise. Not hoping to meet the Overgod of Death a second time, Ossora did not bother Han Hao for too long. He advised Han Hao to not resist if the Overgod visits him and wished him luck.

    Han Hao thanked Ossora before leaving his Sovereign Shop with an indifferent face. He continued roaming around the Omphalos, waiting for Nestor to get him.

    Around three dayster, Han Hao, followed by Polo and the gang, went shopping at a store that sold certain unique bones. One by one, he scanned all the oddly-shaped bones containing strange energies that the merchant had.

    As a cultivator of the death energy, Han Hao had a hobby of collecting all kinds of unique bones. It was a hobby of his to forge weapons out of bones. He needed just one look to determine the quality of a bone and if it was suitable to be turned into a weapon.

    Needless to say, the shop owner was aware of Han Hao¡¯s identity and he was incredibly respectful towards him. When presenting his highest quality products to Han Hao, the merchant wore the most sincere smile on his face and treated him with utmost courtesy.

    After hours of shopping, Han Hao dropped a dozen or so bones on the counter and asked the merchant, who had been running all around the shop tirelessly the entire time, ¡°I¡¯m taking these. How many crystal coins do they cost?¡±

    The merchant bared his palms, put on a ttering smile, and said, ¡°How would I dare take your crystal coins, Lord? Please, you may have them all free of charge!¡°

    Han Hao stared nkly for a moment. He raised a brow and asked, ¡°Huh? Why won¡¯t you take my crystal coins? Don¡¯t tell me you¡¯re actually running a charity?¡±

    ¡°No, Lord, it is a gift, only for you. You maye anytime and take anything in this shop. Haha, we would be extremely grateful if in return Your Lordship would spare us in the future,¡± said the merchant in an awkward and somewhat nervous smile.

    Han Hao was rather baffled and he looked at the merchant with puzzled eyes. He didn¡¯t seem to quite catch the merchant¡¯s meaning. At this moment, Polo who was standing beside Han Hao chuckled mischievously before whispering into Han Hao¡¯s ear, ¡°A few years ago, Chief instructed us to intercept all the goods flowing into the Omphalos. Hehe, this is one of the merchants we looted...¡±

    Han Hao immediately realized what was going on after hearing Polo¡¯s words. Back then, Tyre and Logue were finding excuses to prevent Han Shuo from joining their ranks and control a part of the Omphalos. Theymanded the Omphalos merchants under their influence to oppose Han Shuo¡¯s installment as one of the city¡¯s rulers. In response, Han Shuo had Han Hao loot all the merchandise going into the Omphalos, shutting down their businesses.

    ¡°Oh, thanks then,¡± said Han Hao indifferently as he nodded. He casually took away those bones and left with Polo and the gang.

    Suddenly, the moment he stepped out the front door, Han Hao jolted for he felt as though someone had locked onto him. Although this body was just a surrogate body that was nowhere as good as an avatar or his main body, Han Hao¡¯s secondary soul still possessed the acute sensing power of his main soul. He immediately knew that something was going to happen.

    And just as expected, a misty cloud of death energy enveloping a dark figure stealthily emerged from a corner of the street and shot towards him at incredible speed. As the shadow approached Han Hao, out of nowhere, the energies of lightning, destruction, and darkness appeared around him to block Han Hao¡¯s every escape path.

    You¡¯re finally here, thought Han Hao. He stood tall on his ground without moving, quietly waiting for the energy of death to get to him. He seemed prepared to allow the Overgod to probe him without giving any resistance.

    But, out of Han Hao¡¯s expectations, the figure shrouded by a cloud of mist suddenly stopped and a cold voice sounded, ¡°Trap him!¡±

    ¡°Dagmar!¡± eximed Han Hao before he hastily retreated, instantly flying back into the shop he just came out from. He instructed, ¡°Polo, disperse and shout!¡±

    Han Hao was very surprised. He did not expect that instead of Nestor the Overgod of Death, the visitor was Dagmar the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s Hegemon of Death!

    They were at the Omphalos, the center of the Fringe. Tyre, Logue, Ossora, Wasir, as well as the leaders of various major factions, were in the Omphalos at that time. It was lunacy for Dagmar toe and strike him at the Omphalos.

    Dagmar cultivated the energy of death and had a much more profound mastery of the soul than an ordinary expert. It was indeed possible for Dagmar to conceal his presence from the Sovereigns and sneak into the Omphalos.

    Han Hao was betweenughter and tears after baiting for the Overgod of Death for many days but it was Dagmar who was obsessed with the Shard that showed up. While immediately retreating into the shop, Han Hao did not forget to give Polo instructions.

    ¡°The Godhunter Alliance is here! The Godhunter Alliance is attacking!¡± Needless to say, Polo was aware of Dagmar¡¯s identity. Having worked under Han Hao for many years, he knew exactly what he had to do at this moment. He cried for help while escaping with his gang.

    ¡°There¡¯s no escape this time, Han Hao!¡± shouted Dagmar in his sinister voice. Multiple shadows appeared from all around Han Hao and surrounded him. Dagmar, however, instead of going after Han Hao, waved his hand to trap Polo and the others in bone cages.

    After his previous encounter with Han Hao, Dagmar learned to be cautious of the Shard¡¯s miraculous power. He was afraid of being affected by the gravestone again. It was for this reason that Dagmar had kept a distance from Han Hao.

    Naturally, Dagmar had no idea that this was just a surrogate body of Han Hao¡¯s that did not carry the Quintessence Shard. He would keep Han Hao¡¯s followers trapped while having his experts who don¡¯t cultivate the energy of death to encircle Han Hao.

    ¡°You still can¡¯t kill me!¡± shouted Han Hao after jumping out from the back window of the shop. He then threw a handful of the Pearls of Annihtion in every direction.

    Kaboom! Kaboom! Kaboom!

    Tremendous explosions that shook the entire city erupted. Those henchmen of Dagmar¡¯s had to temporarily stop advancing to shield themselves from the st. One of the experts who were much further ahead of the others was shredded into smithereens. It was instant death.

    Afraid that the surrogate Han Hao might get attacked while traveling to the Omphalos, Han Shuo gave him half of the Pearls of Annihtion he had. This surrogate body of Han Hao¡¯s was rather weak and it could not unleash much power as it was made in haste. However, as the secondary soul inherited the properties and memories of the main soul, it could activate the Pearls of Annihtion without any trouble.

    In an instant, the violent explosion destroyed several dozen shops in the vicinity. Rubbles, wood chips, broken crystals, and dust were sent flying everywhere. All the merchants, sales clerks, and shoppers in the area became coteral casualties.

    Dagmar emerged from the cloud of dust and yelled, ¡°Hurry! Seize him! We don¡¯t have much time!¡± He flicked his fingers and sent strands of the energy of death into the bone cages trapping Polo and the others. The spiky bone cages started shrinking and piercing through their bodies.

    Given that Dagmar was an overgod expert, it came as no surprise that Polo and the others stood no chance against him. Polo and the others would have been dead long ago if Dagmar had not been so focused on Han Hao.

    Through Dagmar¡¯s mad shouting, those devoted followers of his dauntlessly braved through the explosions and continued to charge at Han Hao. It seemed as though they were determined to kill Han Hao even at the cost of their own lives.

    The Pearls of Annihtion could not instantly kill all those experts Dagmar brought as all of them possessedte-stage highgod strengths. This half-made avatar body of Han Hao¡¯s was no match against the group of highgods. With them now charging ahead without regard for their own lives, Han Hao also could not outrun them.

    However, Han Hao wasn¡¯t all too worried. He knew that even if this surrogate body was destroyed, it would have no effect on his main body. Besides, if he was ¡®killed¡¯ in the Omphalos, the Overgod would no longer hunt for him. Although this would be different from the original n, it still aplished the original objective.

    Five shadows suddenly gathered around Han Hao and intercepted him. Immediately after, five energies bound his body, not allowing him to budge.

    ¡°Hegemon, we¡¯ve restrained him!¡± cried one of Dagmar¡¯s followers.

    Dagmar was overjoyed and he was shaking in excitement. He stopped injecting his energy of death into the bone cages that were about to pierce Polo and the others to death. Instantly, hended before Han Hao and put a hand on Han Hao¡¯s chest.

    ¡°Yes... My precious... I will finally have you...¡± mumbled Dagmar foolishly as he caressed Han Hao¡¯s chest. Then, with his sharp, white fingernails, he stabbed Han Hao in the chest.

    Chhhkkk!

    He pushed his hand deeper into the surrogate body¡¯s chest excitedly as though he wanted to rip Han Hao¡¯s chest out for the Quintessence Shard.

    But suddenly, Dagmar stopped. He turned furious. He stared at Han Hao and bawled, ¡°It¡¯s not there! Why is it not there?! You hid it! Where have you hidden it? Give it to me, give it to me!¡±

 Chapter 943 - Just kill me

    <h4>GDK 943: Just kill me</h4>

    Dagmar had recklessly intruded on the Omphalos even when four of the Sovereigns were present. His greed and obsession with the Quintessence Shard had consumed all his rationality, so much so that he was willing to sacrifice these elite experts of his and even putting himself at risk of being severely injured or killed.

    It was obvious how angry and frustrated Dagmar must have felt after staking it all to only discover that the Quintessence Shard was not on Han Hao. His face turned from excited to flushed red with anger and exasperation. He grabbed Han Hao on his cor, shook him violently, and shouted, ¡°Give it to me, give it to me!¡±

    Han Hao wore an indifferent face as he stared at the Dagmar throwing a fit. There was not a trace of happiness, sadness, shock, or fear. It was as though the person Dagmar captured wasn¡¯t Han Hao but a cold bystander.

    ¡°Hegemon, they areing, hurry!¡± reminded one of Dagmar¡¯s henchmen anxiously. From the loud screamsing from the distance, it was obvious that experts from all over the Omphalos were gathering towards them. They would be surrounded in just moments.

    ¡°Han Hao, hand it to me and I won¡¯t kill you. I promise I won¡¯t kill you!¡± Dagmar offered a bargain while grabbing Han Hao tightly. Desperation could be seen in his bloodshot eyes and heard in his voice.

    ¡°Just kill me,¡± replied Han Hao without any emotions.

    ¡°You really want to die?¡± roared Dagmar, his eyelids twitching. He was internally debating whether he should destroy Han Hao or forcing him to reveal the Shard¡¯s location.

    ¡°Hegemon, we have no time!¡± shouted Dagmar¡¯s henchman again. It almost sounded as though he was crying. They had stayed inside the Omphalos far longer than they had nned and Dagmar seemed to still bepletely unaware of how much time had passed.

    ¡°Fine! As you wish!¡± bellowed Dagmar. He gritted his teeth and assembled his divine energy to deal the killing blow.

    It was at this moment that suddenly a frigid aura flooded every inch of the region. Streams of frigid air came out of nowhere and entered Dagmar in an instant, covering him in ayer of snow-white frost. The frigid energy had immediately made Dagmar¡¯s movements extremely sluggish and prevented him from fully activating the energy in his body.

    Then, immediately after, those streams of frigid air spread from Dagmar and towards his henchmen, shattering the incorporeal chain that restrained Han Hao while leaving a trail of frozen objects.

    Those frigid air streams seemed as though they were alive. They affected Dagmar, his henchmen, and even lifeless objects in the environment. However, for some reason, those frigid energies did not affect Han Hao just inches away from Dagmar.

    Han Hao was ready to let Dagmar end the life of his surrogate. But the instant he sensed that Dagmar had been frozen and the energy restraining him removed, he escaped for his life at his top speed.

    Although Dagmar had inserted a hand into Han Hao¡¯s chest, it wasn¡¯t damaging enough to kill Han Hao. Dagmar¡¯s only objective was the Quintessence Shard. When he discovered that the Quintessence Shard was not on Han Hao, he immediately pulled out the hand instead ofpletely destroying Han Hao¡¯s body.

    But even if Dagmar were to shatter every organ in this surrogate body, the surrogate Han Hao could still survive. This unique body manufactured by Han Shuo, unlike an ordinary body, could continue to function without its organs.

    ¡°Dagmar! How dare you intrude the Omphalos! Meet your doom!¡± a chilling and cold shout sounded. Sovereign Wasir was the first to arrive at the scene and he freed Han Hao from Dagmar without dy.

    Wasir had reached Dagmar as he spoke. His massive Domain of Divinity instantly enveloped the region, causing the environment to suddenly plunge below zero kelvins. Even the ground was immediately frozen and it made eerie cracking noises.

    Wasir¡¯s frigid energy couldn¡¯t have entered Dagmar¡¯s body if he had remained alert to his surroundings instead of being engrossed with getting Han Hao to surrender the Quintessence Shard. But fortunately for Dagmar, he was also an overgod who was famous among the Godhunter Alliance for his formidable strength. Although Wasir¡¯s frigid energy had injured him, it had also woke him to the grim situation.

    After several cycles of circting the energy of death in his body, Dagmar managed to purge Wasir¡¯s frigid aura from his body. With a wave of his hand, the element of death in the Omphalos rapidly converged in the region. A thin grey mist appeared and neutralized the frigid aura, causing the temperatures to rise somewhat.

    ¡°Hegemon, run!¡± shouted one of Dagmar¡¯s henchmen at the top of his lungs.

    It was obvious that Dagmar had now woken up and understood the grave situation they were in. He could sense that Ossora was rushing to the scene. He also vaguely registered Tyre and Logue¡¯s auras, indicating that they were not far away.

    If Dagmar could not escape before the four Sovereigns assembled, he would most likely have to stay in the Omphalos for good. Dagmar gritted his teeth and took out a green crystal ball, shouting, ¡°Abandon your body! Get your soul inside!¡±

    Those followers of Dagmar were ted. Without any hesitation, they abandoned their divine bodies and flew their divine souls into the green crystal ball in Dagmar¡¯s hand. Immediately after, Dagmar waved his unupied hand and released strands of his energy of death into the now soulless bodies of his followers.

    Suddenly, those divine bodies started rapidly inting like balloons as dreadful energy brewed inside them. Their shapes slowly turned round as their faces became distorted and unrecognizable.

    Wasir, who was nning to do everything within his means to obstruct Dagmar, jolted when he saw the inting divine bodies that were rising to the sky. He suddenly retreated and shouted, ¡°Get cover!¡±

    Han Hao who was located not too far from Dagmar had immediately sought cover when he saw those bodies bizarrely rising to the sky. As a cultivator of the death energy, Han Hao could immediately recognize that Dagmar was deploying Corpse Explosion on those highgod divine bodies. He ran faster than everyone.

    And soon after Wasir¡¯s warning sounded, those divine bodies of Dagmar¡¯s followers violently exploded, releasing an immense burst of the energy of death and tore an opening on the domed barrier covering the Omphalos.

    Dagmar, with the green crystal ball in his hand, immediately flew through the small opening and escaped.

    ¡°After him!¡± shouted Wasir after raising his head and looked at the sky.

    Along with Wasir, three trails simultaneously soared to the sky. The barrier covering the Omphalos seemed to pose no obstruction to them. They flew through the barrier and vanished in a sh.

    Han Hao looked at the sky and memorized the other three Sovereigns¡¯ flight paths. After Wasir, Ossora was the closest to the crime scene at several kilometers. Tyre and Logue, meanwhile, were about fifty kilometers away. Han Haoputed in his mind for a moment and deduced that Tyre and Logue should have been the closest to him instead of Wasir and Ossora.

    Why would Wasir rush here so quickly? Why did he help me? Han Hao felt somewhat perplexed. He could tell that Wasir had gone out of his way to protect him. If Wasir had not reached there in time, froze Dagmar, and unshackled him, this surrogate body of Han Hao¡¯s would have been shattered by Dagmar.

    Wasir could have attacked Dagmar indiscriminately without giving any thought to Han Hao¡¯s presence instead of selectively freezing Dagmar without affecting Han Hao who was just inches away. Even if Han Hao was injured or killed, the fault would be on Dagmar and not Wasir. Han Hao was not aware of any friendly rtions between Wasir and the House of Han. If anything, Wasir should be antagonistic to him as Wasir was once defeated by Han Shuo at the volcanic crater.

    While Han Hao bunched his brows and pondered, Polo broke free from Dagmar¡¯s bone prison. With his own body still drenched in his own blood, he anxiously asked, ¡°Chief, are you alright?¡±

    Han Hao temporarily paused his specting and calmly replied, ¡°I¡¯m fine. What about you guys?¡±

    ¡°Dagmar was quickly distracted and had stopped applying their energy on us early in the attack. We suffered only minor injuries,¡± replied Polo in a rxed manner. He did not seem to be in pain. Having lived in the Fringe for such a long time and being a godhunter, those injuries were too artificial to bother Polo.

    ¡°Good to hear that. Let¡¯s rest,¡± said Han Hao after nodding. He then sat cross-legged right where he was even though the Sovereigns were still pursuing Dagmar.

    Polo and the gang followed the action of their leader. They too sat cross-legged as though the rubbled zone was a gymnasium, stopped their wounds from bleeding and began recovering the energy they had just exhausted. They were making the most of their time to stabilize their injuries and recover their strengths.

    This was something they had learned from Han Hao after bing his followers. It became their standard to always maintain their strengths at peak conditions no matter where or when.

    Han Hao thought that the surrogate body of his could not be of any help and therefore did not join the Sovereigns in pursuing Dagmar. And from the fact that Dagmar had decisively deployed Corpse Explosion on the divine bodies of his top-notch experts, Han Hao could tell that Dagmar must have more tricks up his sleeves.

    Tyre and Logue did not rush to the scene immediately because they wanted Han Hao to be killed by Dagmar. Therefore, the Sovereigns were unable to surround and trap Dagmar. Han Hao thought it likely that Dagmar could shake off the Sovereigns¡¯ pursuit.

    The surrogate Han Hao continued to analyze what had happened instead of healing his injuries as the body was made to be disposed of and that the injuries were not life-threatening. Besides, after the ordeal is over, Han Hao¡¯s secondary soul will abandon this surrogate body and rejoin his main soul. Therefore Han Hao wasn¡¯t going to waste his effort in repairing this body.

    Why would Wasir help me? Why is it that Ossora was slower than Wasir? A series of questions popped up in Han Hao¡¯s mind as he pondered with his brows bunched.

    Time went by quickly and quietly. After arriving at the scene, the Fringedwellers in the Omphalos discovered that Dagmar had vanished and that Han Hao was sitting on the ground with rubbles all around him. When they saw that blood seemed to be flowing out from his chest, they started having certain ideas. Some of them had sinister lights in their eyes when they looked at Han Hao.

    Having grown and expanded his forces and territories in the Fringe for such a long time, Han Hao lost count of how many Fringedwellers he had offended. On usual days, afraid of his formidable power, his enemies wouldn¡¯t dare touch him. But it was obvious that Han Hao was now severely injured. Even his henchmen were drenched in their own blood. It was a once in a blue moon opportunity to strike.

    Those leaders of big and small factions were unaware of Han Hao and Han Shuo¡¯s rtionship. They stayed around and quietly gazed at Han Hao and his follower with ferocious eyes.

    ¡°The Omphalos has its rules and I couldn¡¯t recall any Fringedwellers breaking those rules. Hehe, do you bunch want to be the first?¡± challenged Polo in a scornful smirk after sweeping his eyes at those watching them ferociously.

    Han Hao, meanwhile, spoke not a word. He shut his eyes as though they were too insignificant to pose him any threat.

    After hearing Polo¡¯s remark, the crowd started to quietly disperse. They clearly realized that attacking someone in the Omphalos wasn¡¯t a good idea. It would mean making enemies with all Five Sovereigns and it wouldn¡¯t end up well for themselves, especially during such a sensitive period.

    It did not take long before all the stalkers and onlookers dispersed, leaving Han Hao and his gang alone in the rubble field scattered with body parts of merchants.

    But at this moment, a figure gradually appeared in the settling clouds of dust, walking towards Han Hao unhurriedly.

    Polo smirked coldly and suddenly stood up. In a malevolent voice, he said, ¡°It seems that some people just aren¡¯t afraid of death!¡± Polo had only suffered minor injuries and he was ate-stage highgod. Other than the Five Sovereigns and Han Hao, there was no expert in the Omphalos he was afraid of.

    Besides, many of hisrades had suffered just minor injuries. Polo was confident in winning even if those dispersed stalkers had attacked. To Polo, this solo attacker stood no chance.

    A tall, handsome man gradually emerged. Theer looked calmly at Han Hao who had now suddenly opened his eyes. He had aplete disregard for Polo and the others ring at him as he smilingly asked, ¡°Are you Han Hao?¡±

    ¡°Who are you?¡± shouted Polo who was ready to strike.

    ¡°Polo, stand down!¡± instructed Han Hao suddenly. After making sure that Polo and the others understood hismand, he looked at theer with an emotionless face, nodded, and replied, ¡°I am Han Hao.¡±

    ¡°Well, well, it appears that you already know who I am. Excellent, I get to save some effort,¡± remarked the handsome man smilingly. Then, an immense soul undtion suddenly spread from his body and enveloped Han Hao in an instant.

 Chapter 944 - Han Hao vs Andrina

    <h4>GDK 944: Han Hao vs Andrina</h4>

    After examining Han Hao for several dozen seconds, the mysterious and handsome man shook his head disappointedly, let out a soft sigh, and murmured to himself, ¡°Not this one either...¡± He turned around and vanished in the cloud of dust.

    Soon, Tyre, Wasir, Logue, and Ossora returned to the Omphalos. Just as Han Hao expected, they failed to capture Dagmar.

    After Dagmar flew out of the Omphalos, there were no longer any boundary or energy towers stopping him from using a Portal Scroll. By the time that the four Sovereigns found Dagmar, he had already crossed the spacetime tunnel and the spacetime fissure was gradually fusing back together.

    The four were a tadte and could only watch as Dagmar escaped. But nheless, Dagmar had paid a hefty price for his reckless intrusion of the Omphalos. The divine bodies of nearly all his most elite highgods were annihted and he had suffered injuries after Wasir¡¯s frigid aura entered his body.

    After this incident, Dagmar¡¯s power and forces had sharply declined. It could even be said that Dagmar would no longer be much of a threat to the Sovereigns in theing war for the Fringe. Dagmar suffered the consequences he deserved for his irrational and foolish actions.

    By the time that the four Sovereigns returned to Han Hao, Nestor, the Overgod of Death, had left the area disappointedly. They did not know that Nestor had visited Han Hao while they were away.

    No matter the grudges between them, as the Sovereigns, it was only proper that they visit the Fringedweller victim of an attack carried out by an outsider inside the Omphalos.

    ¡°Han Hao, are you alright?¡± asked Ossora. He appeared as though he was very worried.

    ¡°I¡¯m fine. Did you guys get Dagmar?¡± Although it was obvious from the dejected looks on their faces that they had failed, Han Hao knew enough of societal norms to ask the obvious.

    Ossora shook his head in a grimace before he sighed and said, ¡°Dagmar is so ruthless that he would sacrifice the bodies of his followers. The Corpse Explosion deployed on multiple highgod divine bodies was powerful enough to cause a crack on the barrier around Omphalos, allowing him to escape. Otherwise, we would have surrounded him and he definitely wouldn¡¯t still be alive now!¡±

    ¡°Oh, what a shame. If only some of you hade to the scene sooner...¡± said Han Hao as he nced at Tyre and Logue. He then said to Ossora, ¡°But, anyway, a really strange guy came to me just now. He examined me thoroughly with his soul before leaving and shaking his head. I wonder who he is...¡±

    Tyre and Logue¡¯s face simultaneously jolted and the two exchanged looks. Logue then put on a mischievous smirk and asked Han Hao, ¡°A guy probes you with his soul but leaves without a scratch? That is very strange indeed! I¡¯m very surprised to learn that. Since when have you turned into a pacifist?¡±

    Wasir and Ossora turned their attention to Han Hao. They too were very interested in the matter.

    ¡°Well, I have no clue who that guy is, but I can be certain that hismand of the death energy surpasses even yours,¡± Han Hao looked at Logue with an emotionless face as he calmly said, ¡°I know that I have no way of resisting such a mighty existence, and thus silent cooperation is my only option. Hmm, I¡¯ve heard that Lord Logue was also visited by a very powerful stranger. I could not be sure of the merits of rumors, but it sounded as though Lord Logue was much more... cooperative than I was?¡±

    Logue¡¯s face turned rather dark after hearing Han Hao¡¯seback. He let out a cold groan but did not reply. Logue knew from Han Hao¡¯s words that the mysterious visitor was the Overgod of Death. As he had not learned from Tyre that Han Hao possessed the Quintessence Shard, he wasn¡¯t all that surprised that Han Hao survived the visit.

    Wasir and Ossora also did not suspect anything. They were just rather surprised that the Overgod of Death was so mighty that He could learn about Han Hao¡¯s appearing at the Omphalos so quickly.

    Only Tyre had a pensive look. He looked deeply at Han Hao, as though wanting to see everything in Han Hao¡¯s body and soul.

    Why? Why didn¡¯t He kill Han Hao? Could it be that Elder Brother got it wrong? How is that possible? Tyre was very shocked and confused. He thought that Han Hao would be ughtered when the Overgod of Death visited him and found the Quintessence Shard on him.

    ¡°If there¡¯s nothing else, I shall take my leave,¡± Han Hao did not continue feigning civility with the Sovereigns after obtaining the information he wanted from Tyre and Logue. He stood up and instructed Polo, ¡°Let¡¯s move.¡±

    Han Hao then left the scene. Before he left, he stealthily took a nce at the ice-cold Wasir.

    ¡°Let¡¯s disperse. If Dagmar dared intrude the Omphalos all by himself, then it must mean that the Godhunter Alliance will attack very soon. Time to go back to our bases and standby to face the invasion!¡± said Tyre before also taking his leave.

    ***

    As soon as Han Hao left the region, he went to the House of Han Sovereign Shop with his gang under the pretense that he wanted to purchase Celestial Pearl¡¯s medicines but using Han Shuo¡¯s secret chamber in actuality.

    Han Shuo and Han Hao had kept their rtionship so secretive that even ordinary House of Han servants had no clue about it. The manager of this Celestial Pearl branch, however, was aware of the secret. After politely leading Han Hao to the secret chamber, he dismissed himself and instructed their private security to watch out for intruders.

    Han Hao had selected this secret chamber where Han Shuo usually used for cultivating when in the Omphalos because it was protected by unique formations and matrices. When inside, he won¡¯t have to worry about being spied on or disturbed.

    After sitting crossed leg on the mat, Han Hao gradually opened up his soul while concealing the aura on his body.

    At this moment, his main body, located far in the Destiny Dominion, was also sitting cross-legged. His eyes suddenly opened and shone with strings of tiny inscriptions shing through his pupils. A bizarre energy began emanating from his body, affecting the element of death in the environment...

    Nestor the Overod of Death had yet to leave the Omphalos. His head was lowered as he racked his brain, wondering if he had missed something. Then, suddenly, his eyes lit up and he stared in the direction of the Destiny Dominion.

    Han Hao was thest person on his list. When Nestor discovered no Quintessence Shard on Han Hao, he was iparably disappointed. He even started doubting his investigative skills. He couldn¡¯t understand why he yielded nothing even though he had examined every energy of death experts in the Fringe.

    The sudden activation of the Quintessence Shard in the Destiny Dominion had jolted Nestor. His eyes glistened as he mumbled to himself, ¡°So it turns out that the fe had left the Fringe... Yes, of course it would... How would he have the guts to stay here when he sensed that I¡¯m nearby?¡±

    Nestor immediately started leaving. With one thought, he soared to the sky and vanished. The domed-boundary above the Omphalos had not the slightest effect on him.

    ¡°Finally!¡± Tyre and Logue looked at the sky and simultaneously let out a sigh.

    The domed boundary above the Omphalos was jointly deployed by the two Sovereigns. The ground boundary was deployed by Ossora while Wasir applied his frigid energy on the city walls. When the Overgod of Death pierced through domed-boundary, Tyre and Logue who had deployed it would sense something. They could tell that Nestor had left even without seeing it.

    To characters like Tyre and Logue who were used to controlling others¡¯ lives, it was very ufortable to have an even mightier being who could end their lives in a snap anywhere nearby. They desperately hoped that the Overgod of Death would leave the Land of Chaos and never return.

    Tyre took a deep breath and calmed himself down. He then left the Omphalos and returned to the same volcano, dialed his brother Dhaka, and informed him of what just happened.

    ¡°Got it. Dagmar has just returned. He too said that he found no aura of the Quintessence Shard on Han Hao. This is very strange. I wonder what he had done to the Shard,¡± remarked Dhaka who was also surprised and confused. He couldn¡¯t figure out what was going on as logically speaking, anyone who obtained a Quintessence Shard should keep it firmly in their hands and would never part with it.

    ¡°Forget about it, let¡¯s stop concerning ourselves about Han Hao,¡± Dhaka asked with his brows bunched, ¡°Are you sure that the Overgod has left?¡±

    ¡°He should have. He had examined every expert in the Fringe and I don¡¯t think that He had any more reasons to stay in the Fringe. And based on my senses, I can vaguely tell that He went in the direction of the Destiny Dominion. Perhaps He is going to seek the Destiny Goddess¡¯ advice,¡± replied Tyre after thinking for a moment.

    ¡°Very well,¡± Dhaka nodded before he put on a cold smirk and said, ¡°Then we can begin our operation. You should get prepared. Tomorrow shall be the day that we Godhunter Alliance officially invade the Fringe. You will be facing the Hegemons of Wind and Lightning. They are the weakest of us all, so you don¡¯t need to be too worried. As to Bryan, hehe, he will be facing me, Dagmar, Asser, and Ss. I will raze his Pandemonium to the ground!¡±

    ¡°Haha, after this war, we brother will be the most influential and powerful existences after the Twelve Overgods!¡± said Tyre in a maniacalugh.

    ***

    Over at the Destiny Dominion, Han Hao who had deliberately released the Shard¡¯s energy sensed that Nestor was rushing towards him from the Fringe. He smirked and thought, heh, so what if you¡¯re the Overgod? You still get fooled the same! From now on, I just need to stay cautious and you will never know that I have the Shard. And when I have fused the Shard¡¯s energy with demonic arts, I will take the Quintessence from you!

    After sensing that Nestor was on his way, Han Hao again concealed his aura. He slowly got up to his feet and ready to take a detour back to the Fringe.

    It was at this moment that a petite figure suddenly appeared before Han Hao. She stared at Han Hao with an astonished face and asked, ¡°Is it you who released that energy just then?¡±

    Han Hao was startled and his face quickly turned cold. He looked all around in caution before he asked, ¡°Who are you?¡±

    Han Hao had sensed a very unique soul-undtioning from the little girl. Her soul was much mightier than evente-stage highgods like Polo. Han Hao also sensed that she was no ordinary lifeform. It made Han Hao felt threatened.

    ¡°I¡¯m Andrina. This is the Destiny Dominion ¨C my home!¡± Andrina bunched her brows slightly as she sized up Han Hao. It suddenly turned to a frown and she asked in a cold voice, ¡°I sense godhunter¡¯s aura on you. You are a godhunter, aren¡¯t you?¡±

    ¡°Indeed I am. What are you gonna do about it?¡± Han Hao took out his bone spear and held it in his hand. He took an alerted stance.

    ¡°That is all that I need to know,¡± said Andrina in an ice-cold face. Her hand suddenly glowed with the splendid radiance of crystals and she punched at Han Hao.

    Han Hao was rather surprised that he couldn¡¯t sense any of the Twelve Fundamental Forces on Andrina. The gaudy radiance in her fist contained just the purest power of energy crystals, as though her fist was an energy st that came from a super-sized energy crystal cannon. It was not just terrifying but also very agile.

    Han Hao did not know who Andrina was and had no idea that she and his father were close friends. Andrina, meanwhile, didn¡¯t even know that Han Shuo had children. Han Hao immediately considered Andrina as a mighty opponent as soon as sheunched an attack.

    With a wave of his bone spear, the elements of death that were drawn to the area by the Quintessence Shard were energized. The Boundaries of Weakness, Fear, and Aging enveloping the entire region were instantly formed.

    Simultaneously, a thin, greyish film took shape at the front of Han Hao. There were tiny streams of the energy of death gently circting on it.

    ¡°Oh?¡± cried Andrina in surprise. She did not expect Han Hao¡¯s strength to be so powerful. He was much mightier than nearly all the godhunter experts she had met.

    With that, Andrina immediately unleashed her full power. The gaudy radiances on her hand transformed into matter. A big energy crystal was formed with a glowing spheroid embedded in the center. It emanated scorching rays as though it was the core of a star that contained nearly infinite energy.

    The Goddess of Destiny had been taking good care of Andrine. Her strength had soared substantially ever since she was brought home from the Darkness Dominion.

    The shield that Han Hao formed using the energy of death was defeated by Andrina¡¯s all-out attack. It made arge hole in Han Hao¡¯s shield. The energy crystal consolidated from radiances was propelled by its core. Carrying formidable power, it spun and rolled towards Han Hao.

    The Boundaries of Weakness, Fear, and Aging had not the slightest effect on a lifeform as unique as Andrina!

 Chapter 945 - On the brink of war

    GDK 945: On the brink of war

    Andrina seemed just as vigorous when inside the three Boundaries of Death. There was no sign that she was affected by Weakness, Fear, or Aging. A gaudy, zing radiance that was even brighter than the sun shone from her chest and it lit up the region.

    The oval spheroid in the center of the energy crystal resonated with the gaudy radiance on Andrina¡¯s chest. It gave off a burning radiance as it shot towards Han Hao with tremendous power.

    When Han Hao saw that Andrina was immune to the Boundaries of Death, he immediately changed his attack strategy. In an instant, he drew the element of death powering those boundaries into his bone spear and he abruptly retreated to avoid the rolling crystal ball.

    ¡°Wanna run?¡± Andrina sneered. She opened her palm and started moving her little fingers as though she was ying an invisible harp.

    The crystal ball under Andrina¡¯s control was extremely agile. It maneuvered around like a fighter jet. It turned and tracked Han Hao firmly, not giving him any chance of escaping.

    Despite the grave situation, Han Hao¡¯s heart remained as calm as still water. His bewitching eyes glistened with sinister lights. Then, suddenly, he stopped and stood his ground.

    <i>Whoosh!</i>

    The seven bone spurs behind his back violently shot out and aimed themselves at the sneering Andrina. Simultaneously, he hurled the bone spear in his hand. The shriek and wails of hundreds of thousands of tormented souls sounded while wisps of ink-dark smoke emanated from the bone spear. They spread and curled around the bone spear before turning into an enormous, malevolent, hideous face.

    A chilling, frigid wind blew out of nowhere. The bone spear which was supposed to be inanimate suddenly transformed into a terrifying, ferocious monster. It opened its enormous mouth lined with sharp teeth. A sinister killing intent condensed from hundreds of thousands of tormented souls erupted.

    The sneering Andrina was jolted and she put on a shocked expression. She didn¡¯t expect that the normal-looking bone spear would contain such a terrifying amount of sinister power!

    Before Andrina could react, the bone-spear-turned-monster swallowed the crystal ball of Andrina¡¯s with its enormous mouth and it started chewing.

    <i>Crack... Crack... </i> It sounded as though the energy crystal projectile that was harder than diamond was being broken down into pieces.

    <i>Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!</i>

    The seven bone spurs whistled and surrounded Andrina in an instant. They emanate a frigid and insidious energy.

    This made Andrina even more shocked. She immediately turned her attention to the seven bone spurs that had her surrounded and gave up on the crystal ball which was devoured.

    A most luminous light burst from Andrina¡¯s chest, quickly transforming her body into sparkling and translucent, living crystal. Quickly after that, a blinding light emanated from her. It was so luminous that even the structure of spacetime was altered by it. The seven bone spurs that had surrounded Andrina could only dither back and forth as they could not lock onto her location.

    ¡°Who are you? Why does your aura seem so familiar?¡± shouted the crystalized Andrina with the same ice-cold face while ring at Han Hao who had the bone spear back in his hand.

    Han Hao was never talkative when fighting. Without even acknowledging the question, he charged at Andrina.

    As he moved, he violently flung his erged bone spear about, causing hundreds of thumb-sized energy crystals to fall off the bone spear. Those energy crystals were devoid of all energy and they had be the most ordinary rock.

    When the crystal ball was devoured by the bone spear, it was cut off from Andrina, its power source. After the energy inside the crystal divine weapon was exhausted by Han Hao¡¯s energy, with nothing to replenish its energy, it crumbled and was destroyed.

    ¡°Identify yourself! I don¡¯t want to hurt the wrong person!¡± shouted Andrina again when she saw that Han Hao ignored her question and charged at her.

    Han Hao remained silent. He hurled the bone spear in his hand forward.

    The bone spurs that flew out of Han Hao¡¯s back were unable to lock onto Andrina and attack her. The bone spear that trapped thousands of tormented souls, however, seemed to be immune to the luminous light. It pierced through theyers of shields made of light and went straight for Andrina¡¯s chest.

    Andrina¡¯s face yet again jolted. The blinding light shield all around her suddenly vanished as she took out a beautiful astrarium that had various constetions and stars etched on it. It flew out as though it had a mind of its own.

    <i>Ting!</i>

    The astrarium shot forward to intercept the bone spear. Upon contact, a most bizarre energy surged into the bone spear. Those tormented souls located at the tip of the bone spear were annihted into puffs of faint grey smoke.

    Han Hao¡¯s eyes glistened. Without thinking, he raised a hand and took back his bone spear. He decided to activate the energy of the Quintessence Shard and demonic art. He was going all-in.

    Han Hao sensed that the astrarium contained the energy of destiny. He had rarely encountered experts cultivating in this energy. He knew that the edict of destiny was the most abstruse and mysterious of the Twelve Fundamental Forces. The energy on the astrarium was also extremely formidable, far too much for those tormented souls in his bone spear to withstand.

    After making up his mind, Han Hao took back his bone spear and charged at Andrina without hesitation.

    This main body of his was extremely tough. He had spent way more time and effort enhancing his body than on his bone spear. And recently, his body had sessfully incorporated a Quintessence Shard of Death. It could even be said that the most terrifying weapon Han Hao had was his body.

    Andrina could tell that Han Hao was going all in. All of Han Hao¡¯s previous attacks were through ranged weapons and he wore a very calm expression, almost as though she wasn¡¯t taken as a threat. But Han Hao now wore a grave expression and he was obviously much more concentrated.

    The formidable power that Han Hao had revealed so far made Andrina feel threatened and distressed. If not for the astrarium that her mother had given her, she would have been injured by the bone spear just then. Therefore, Andrina was getting worried when she saw that Han Hao was going all-in.

    ¡°Who are you to Bryan?¡± she suddenly shouted when Han Hao was just meters away from her.

    Han Hao, whose mind was concentrated on killing his enemy, was startled. He halted just a dozen-something meters before Andrina, sized her up with a rather puzzled look, and asked, ¡°Who are you? How did you know my father?¡±

    Andrina was astonished and she eximed, ¡°What?! You are his son? How is this possible?!¡±

    Han Hao slowly descended to the ground, looked at Andrina calmly, and asked, ¡°Are you his friend or his foe?¡±

    ¡°Friend, of course! I used to be his bodyguard! I happen to be looking for him. Why don¡¯t you bring me to him?¡± answered Andrina in a giggling smile.

    Han Hao did not immediately reply but stared at her attentively as though judging if Andrina was telling the truth. After a while, Han Hao replied, ¡°I¡¯m busy. My father is at the Pandemonium of the Fringe. You can go look for him yourself.¡±

    Upon finishing those words, Han Hao turned and left without even giving Andrina another look. He could sense that Nestor was rushing to this spot at full speed and he must not linger in the area any longer.

    Although Han Hao was returning to the Fringe, he must take a detour to avoid running into the Overgod of Death. Therefore he cannot travel with Andrina.

    Before Andrina could say anything, Han Hao had vanished into the distance. She pouted andined, ¡°What a jerk! I know where the Fringe is and I know how to get there myself!¡±

    Andrina continued to gaze in the direction Han Hao left with her eyes that were glistening with strange lights. She mumbled to herself, ¡°The energy that this fe deliberately released is clearly from the Quintessence Shard of Death. And he did not use his full strength just then. Hmm, I heard that Nestor has gone to the Fringe. Could it be that Nestor is after this fe?¡±

    After thinking for a moment, she grumbled, ¡°If it wasn¡¯t for Bryan, I would definitely be going to tell Uncle Nestor about you!¡±

    Andrina made a face and let out a ¡®humph¡¯ in the direction Han Hao left before she headed in the direction of the Fringe.

    ***In the Destiny Goddess¡¯ Shine.

    The Goddess of Destiny¡¯s figure gradually took shape and appeared in the shine. ¡°Andrina, I¡¯ve brought you something ¨C it¡¯s your favorite crystal!¡± a benevolent, graceful, and melodious voice sounded through the shine.

    After a long while, the Goddess shook her head andughed. She said to herself, ¡°I guess I should have known, this girl could never stay put... But I think she wouldn¡¯t venture too far this time. She would be quite safe with her new power.¡±

    The Goddess cast her gaze to the Fringe. Her eyes looked as though a pair of astrarium with constetions of stars slowly revolving. It was as though she was an extremelyplicated automaton instead of a living being with flesh and blood.

    ¡°O, Han Shuo, I hope you could unseal Aethernia with the energy He had left you...¡± murmured the Goddess as she gazed at the Land of Chaos.

    ***

    Over at the Pandemonium.

    Han Shuo who was in secluded cultivation suddenly had an uneasy feeling. He couldn¡¯t help himself but exited his gymnasium, flew above the Pandemonium and gazed in the direction of the Destiny Dominion. He mumbled, ¡°Could it be that Han Hao met an ident over there?¡±

    Han Shuo always trusted the senses of his soul. He started weighing if he should head to the Destiny Dominion to have a look.

    ¡°My Lord, I have news,¡± it was at this moment that Zovic came to him and reported to him respectfully.

    Han Shuo smiled and asked, ¡°Is it from the Omphalos?¡±

    Zovic nodded and replied, ¡°There was a small mishap, but things ended exactly as Your Lordship has predicted. The Overgod of Death did not attack Young Master Han Hao. He had left the Omphalos and most likely had left the Fringe,¡± Zovic gave Han Shuo a quick summary before he exined everything in detail.

    ¡°The temptation of the Quintessence Shard was so great that it had destroyed every bit of rationality in Dagmar, drove him to do something as foolish as intruding into the Omphalos. Humph, if it wasn¡¯t for Tyre and Logue¡¯s deliberate stalling, Dagmar would have died in there!¡± Even though Han Shuo wasn¡¯t anywhere near the Omphalos when it happened, he easily figured out the truth from Zovic¡¯s recount.

    ¡°Many of Dagmar¡¯s most powerful followers had their divine bodies destroyed. Even though Dagmar escapes with their divine souls, there is still a long way to go for them to regain their original strengths. After this incident, Dagmar is no longer a threat,¡± remarked Zovic smilingly.

    ¡°Never ever underestimate a man who has gone insane!¡± Instead of being as optimistic as Zovic, Han Shuo gravely instructed, ¡°Pay special attention to Dagmar. An overgod who has lost his rationality could do things that we cannot foresee. Tell everyone to not leave the Pandemonium for now.¡±

    ¡°Understood!¡± answered Zovic solemnly.

    ¡°Alright. You are dismissed,¡± Han Shuo nodded and sent Zovic away. After he left, Han Shuo stared in the direction of the Destiny Dominion with his brows slightly bunched. He mumbled, ¡°If Han Hao is alright, then what was that feeling about? Hmm... Andrina should be in the Destiny Dominion. Could it be that something happened to Andrina? That makes no sense. No one would dare touch her in the Destiny Dominion...¡±

    After thinking for a long while, Han Shuo still could note up with any possible scenario. He decided to stop thinking about it and go back to preparing his defenses against the Godhunter Alliance who will be invading very soon.

    With the Overgod of Death now left the Fringe, the Godhunter Alliance had no reason to stall their invasion any longer and his Pandemonium would be fiercely attacked.

    ***

    The day after, on a hazy bald mountain at the outskirts of the Fringe.

    All twelve Hegemons of the Godhunter Alliance were gathered on the top of the mountain with their armies of godhunters scattered all around them. Those ferocious-looking godhunters that numbered in the tens of thousands hadpletely upied the mountain.

    Although the Godhunter Alliance had existed for eons, this was the first time that all twelve Hegemons had gathered. It was also the first time that they attacked any forces on a united front.

    There, an old man with apassionate face, wearing the bright white gown of a Church of Light priest, smiled and asked the Hegemons for their attention.

    But he was interrupted before he could begin his speech. ¡°Judas, why are you still wearing that stupid white-priest clothing? Haha, don¡¯t tell me that you are still wishing to return to the warm embrace of the God of Light?¡± teased Dhaka as he looked at the Hegemon of Light with a mocking expression.

    ¡°If he could return to the God of Light, I would have long been summoned back to the Shrine of Ice!¡± sneered Tuckamore, the Hegemon of Water.

    Judas seemed somewhat embarrassed. He put on a grimacing smile and exined, ¡°It was the God of Light who had forsaken me. But deep in my heart, I still hope to serve Him. If He could forgive my sins, I might actually return to His side.¡±

    ¡°Hahaha, return to His side? To do what? Backstab Him again?¡± Dhakaughed without the slightest scruple. He cupped his hands towards Judas in salutation and remarked, ¡°I have nothing but absolute respect for you, Judas. Not only for the fact that you were once a Keeper of the Light, but that you are still alive despite havingmitted such an atrocious act. Truly, you are the most treacherous and strongest among us Hegemons.¡±

    ¡°You are ttering me,¡± said Judas humbly. He then turned and bowed towards an empty space and piously said, ¡°Praise be to God of Light! I will strive to live for as long as possible, till the day the Quintessence leaves Your Body!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s enough. I have no interest in listening to your prattles. Let¡¯s get moving already,¡± said Dagmar in an annoyed manner after letting out a cold groan from his white bone throne.

    ¡°O, Dagmar, Judas may be the strongest, but you are without a doubt the most heroic among us! To infiltrate and strike at the center of the Fringe all by yourself ¨C that is indeed a boost to our morale. Haha, if we win this war, you would be all thanks to this meritorious deed of yours!¡± said Regis, the Hegemon of Thunder in a mischievous smirk. He added, ¡°However, it would have been even more admirable if you had killed Tyre, Logue, and the other Sovereigns instead of running from them. Then we can just swoop in and pick up the pieces. Don¡¯t you think?¡±

    ¡°Regis, you wanna fight?¡± Dagmar¡¯s face turned dark and he challenged Regis, ¡°I have defeated you four hundred years ago, and I can do it again today!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s see about that!¡± Regis grinned and stood up. It appeared that he really wanted to duel Dagmar.

    Throughout its existence, the Godhunter Alliance had been fractured mostly because of the hostility between the Hegemons. They would mock and ridicule each other and add salt to each other¡¯s injury.

    ¡°Hold up, not now. Let¡¯s destroy those in the Fringe first. After we defeat our enemy, you may fight as much as you want,¡± said Judas smilingly. He raised his voice and said, ¡°Alright, let¡¯s all get back to business. Now, how do we split the forces?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m taking down Bryan!¡± Dagmar let out another groan and leaned back on his throne. He had suffered enormous losses in the Omphalos but had failed to obtain the Quintessence Shard from Han Hao. He was determined to force Han Hao to reveal the location of the Shard and kill him.

    Unlike the Overgod of Death, Dagmar had seen Han Hao use the Quintessence Shard with his own eyes. Therefore, even though Dagmar couldn¡¯t find the Shard on Han Hao back in the Omphalos, he still had his eyes fixed on Han Hao. He will never stop until he obtains the Shard and kills Han Hao.

    ¡°Asser and I are close to Dagmar. We will join him in attacking Bryan and the Pandemonium,¡± said Dhaka as he cast a nce at Asser.

    Asser nodded after Dhaka finished his words. They seemed to have agreed on it earlier.

    ¡°Really? Do you need three Hegemons to defeat the House of Han?¡± asked Tuckamore, the Hegemon of Water. He felt that Dhaka had the least workload and disagreed with the arrangement.

    ¡°Erm... The House of Han is very strong. I know that because I have fought Bryan before. Besides, Dagmar¡¯s strength has now reduced. So it¡¯s quite fair that the three of us take the Pandemonium together,¡± Dhaka was replying to Tuckamore¡¯s question but his eyes were on Judas.

    Judas thought for a moment before he beamed and said, ¡°I think that makes sense. Tuckamore, considering that Dagmar had suffered a misfortune, let them go together.¡±

    Although Tuckamore had made sarcasticments about Judas just then, he seemed to still have some respect for him. Tuckamore nodded and said nothing more about it.

 Chapter 946 - The war begins

    GDK 946: The war begins

    The meeting of the Hegemons steered by Judas and Dhaka slowly came to an end. Dagmar, Asser, and Dhaka, the Hegemons of Death, Darkness, and Destruction, will be attacking the House of Han¡¯s Pandemonium. Tuckamore and Judas, the Hegemons of Water and Light, will be attacking Logue. Regis, Miller, and Isaiah, the Hegemons of Thunder, Wind, and Earth, will be attacking Ossora. The remaining Hegemons would be attacking Tyre and Wasir.

    It was obvious that the power of the Godhunter Alliance was far greater than that of the Fringe. If everything goes well, the Five Sovereigns would be defeated and the Fringe would fall into the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s hand.

    After the meeting was concluded, the Twelve Hegemons gathered their troops and separated as five armies, marching into the Land of Chaos from five directions.

    The Pandemonium will be facing Dhaka, Asser, and Dagmar, three experts with overgod strengths. Although Dagmar had suffered tremendous losses in hisst failed mission, Asser and Dhaka still possessed an army of experts at the top of their shape. With Ss, a former Sovereign who knew his way around the Fringe working as their guide, it seemed as though the Pandemonium was destined to fall.

    With Ss showing the way, the three Hegemons started marching towards the Pandemonium. After a while, Ss suddenly spoke, ¡°There are all kinds of powerful boundaries protecting the Pandemonium. The valley is shrouded all-year by extremely toxic fog. It¡¯s very hard to deal with. Back then, I suffered tremendous losses when I attacked the Pandemonium, even though Bryan was not around at that time. I could not eveny waste to the valley.¡±

    The real battle will begin soon and it was important that they know as much as possible about their enemy and the ground situation. Ss informed the three Hegemons everything he knew about the Pandemonium in detail. Dhaka and Asser listened intently to his briefing.

    Dagmar, however, was absent-minded. His viper-like eyes glistened with insidious rays. Before Ss hadpleted giving his briefing, Dagmar suddenly interrupted, ¡°Ss, it¡¯s just a small little valley. Even if there are a hundred times more barriers and seals, are they enough to stop the four of us?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not sure. But back then, soon after I intruded the valley, I was trapped by a bizarre energy for a long while.¡± Ss used to be cautious of Dagmar. However, ever since Dagmar became obsessed with the Quintessence Shard, Ss started to scorn him. He thought that Dagmar was no longer a formidable expert after he lost his ability to think rationally.

    ¡°A bizarre energy?¡± sneered Dagmar. He nced at Ss from the corner of his eyes and derisively said, ¡°Ss, are you making things up to hide the fact that you were too weak? How in the world can the defenses of a valley trap an overgod expert?¡±

    Ss groaned and put on an annoyed face. He responded, ¡°I¡¯m just telling you what I¡¯ve experienced. It¡¯spletely up to you if you want to believe my words or not. But don¡¯t say that I didn¡¯t warn you if your followers got massacred.¡±

    ¡°Dagmar, you were there when we fought Bryan at the Misty Sea. You should know that his cultivation is not the same as ours. Also, you¡¯ve known Han Hao long ago and have fought him recently. Han Hao also cultivates an energy that is not known to us, is it not?¡± said Dhaka. In a grave expression, he continued, ¡°In this war, not only must we kill Bryan, Han Hao, and destroy the Pandemonium, we must also avoid taking too many casualties. As you know, that Judas guy is a cunning fox. If we lose too many of our forces to the House of Han, we will lose out when it¡¯s time to divide the spoils. Therefore, we better listen to what Ss has to say.¡±

    After hearing Dhaka¡¯s words, Dagmar put on an eerie smile and said, ¡°Hmm, that makes sense,¡± He turned to Ss and apologetically said, ¡°Please continue, I will listen carefully, hehe...¡±

    Ss nodded, thought for a moment, before he continued, ¡°The Pandemonium is extraordinarily unusual. I¡¯m telling you that lest that you get caught by surprise and suffer heavy losses. Other than that base, from my research, I discovered that there is another base near the Pandemonium. Han Hao¡¯s godhunters are stationed there. Although it is not far away from the Pandemonium, its defenses aren¡¯t as tight...¡±

    Dagmar¡¯s body jolted when he heard Han Hao¡¯s name mentioned. A sinister spark circled in his eyes before he asked Ss, ¡°What do you suggest?¡±

    ¡°Han Hao is close to the House of Han. As it is not as well defended, I think that we should head to his base first and see if we can destroy it before going to the Pandemonium. Oh, and don¡¯t underestimate Han Hao¡¯s power. He had united every godhunter in the Fringe. After the Five Sovereigns, he has thergest army!¡±

    ¡°Very well, we will head to Han Hao¡¯s base first.¡± Dagmar seemed rather impatient. His main objective wasn¡¯t to destroy the Pandemonium but to take Han Hao¡¯s Quintessence Shard. The Fringe was nothing in Dagmar¡¯s eyespared to the Quintessence Shard of Death.

    ¡°Ss, you are more familiar with the Fringe than we do. Do you think we might run into any trouble?¡± asked Dhaka with his brows bunched. Ss¡¯ proposal was a deviation from his own n. But after thinking about it carefully, Dhaka didn¡¯t feel that taking a quick detour would cause any issue.

    Never in a million years would Dhaka suspect that Ss had secretly looked for Han Shuo and even reached a deal with him. After all, it was Han Shuo who had ousted Ss from the Fringe. From Dhaka¡¯s point of view, Ss and Han Shuo had irreconcble animosity and it was impossible for them to team up. He felt that Ss was proposing that in his best effort to destroy the House of Han.

    ¡°I do not know if we might run into troubles, but I¡¯m sure that their defenses won¡¯t be as great as the Pandemonium. If we can¡¯t even defeat that base, then there is no point trying to invade the Pandemonium,¡± replied Ss in a deep voice.

    ¡°What do you think?¡± Dhaka thought for a moment before turning to Asser and asked for his opinion.

    ¡°Sure, why not. We can take down that base as a warm-up and see if we can find Dagmar his Shard in passing,¡± answered Asser unenthusiastically, shrugging.

    ¡°Wonderful! Hehe,¡± eximed Dagmar. Asser had just be much more pleasing to his eyes.

    ¡°Alright, then we shall head there first,¡± Dhaka finally agreed to the slight change of n. They started asking Ss about the situation over on that base as they altered their course.

    *** Over at the Pandemonium.

    Zovic, Romon, Rose, the five Elite Zombies, Bonds, and every core member of the House of Han were assembled. Even Stratholme, Phoebe, and the others who had been busy assimting cultivation memories from their crystal balls came out from their gymnasiums.

    ¡°Dhaka, Dagmar, and Asser are heading for us with their godhunter troops. Other than the three Hegemons, we might also have to face Ss...¡± Zovic who was standing beside Han Shuo exined the situation with a grave look.

    The atmosphere turned solemn after the House of Han members were briefed. Even the usually carefree Gilbert turned unusually quiet.

    Dhaka, Dagmar, and Asser were all overgod experts. If Ss was among them, they would be facing four overgods. The House of Han had never faced such a mighty force. Compared to the four, Hill and Sha-t¡¯o they had encountered in Witherbone City was absolutely insignificant.

    ¡°That¡¯s the situation now,¡± Han Shuo swept his eyes across the crowd and instructed, ¡°From today onwards, the Pandemonium is sealed. Nobody takes a step outside without my explicit permission!¡±

    ¡°If we do not leave the Pandemonium, wouldn¡¯t the godhunters take a detour and head straight for the Omphalos?¡± asked the puzzled Ayermike, ¡°From our agreement with Tyre and the others, is it not our responsibility to guard this side of the Fringe? If we allow Dhaka and the others to go around us and head for the Omphalos, the consequences would be dire!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Dhaka wille to the Pandemonium. His objective wasn¡¯t to take the Omphalos but to destroy us,¡± replied Han Shuo with a confident smile.

    Ayermike nodded and did not ask any more questions. He had known Han Shuo for a long time and he could tell that Han Shuo has a n in mind. He would have thought of every aspect long ago.

    ¡°Yea, so don¡¯t go out to seek them. Instead, we will wait in the Pandemonium and let theme to us!¡± Han Shuo scanned the faces of his family n members before he smilingly continued, ¡°But if they were to go around us and head for the Omphalos, let them be. In any case, our members in the Omphalos should have evacuated by now.¡±

    Stratholme stared nkly for a moment before he suddenlyughed and asked, ¡°So you have never bothered about defending the Omphalos?¡±

    Han Shuo tooughed before he answered, ¡°So what if it is destroyed? With Han Tu and Han Jin, rebuilding the Omphalos is a piece of cake. As to those in the Omphalos, well, why should I protect their lives? I couldn¡¯t care less if they die. Hehe, only those strong enough to survive the ughter are qualified to be the future servants of my House of Han!¡±

    After hearing those words, the party immediately understood Han Shuo¡¯s real n. It seemed as though Han Shuo was nning to conquer the entire Land of Chaos.

    ¡°Erm, Bryan, about the elixir you promised, how is the progress on that?¡± Stratholme¡¯s heart was itching. He had an embarrassed smile as he said, ¡°I have reached a higher realm state. I will advance to the next level once I have sufficient divine energy.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it, the raw materials for your elixir are on their way here. Hehe, with all those godhuntersing our way, I can produce an endless supply of the divine energy elixir for everyone,¡± answered Han Shuo before he calmly added a few more instructions and advised them to be extra cautious. However, Han Shuo did not reveal much about his actual n.

    ***

    Over at a valley not too far from the Pandemonium, silhouettes could be seen weaving above three mountains. They seemed to be busy with something.

    Standing on a cliff, Han Hao was closely observing the activities happening on the three mountains and those shooting across it. From time to time, he would summon a follower and give some instructions.

    Enormous sigils with strange shapes were carved onto the three mountains. Nobody knew when it was carven, who did it, or even what they were for. Even Han Hao¡¯s followers werepletely clueless about it. They merely followed Han Hao¡¯s instruction to pour barrels after barrels of a most pungent and dark liquid on those sigils.

    When the ink-like liquid made contact with the sigils, jet-ck smoke was produced. However, miraculously, the ck smoke doesn¡¯t dissipate or move with the wind but lingers around the sigils.

    The inside of the mountains was excavated to form countless cavities. When energy crystals were ced into those cavities, the energy crystals would start shining in their unique, beautiful luster and begin releasing their energy which would flow to every corner of the mountain through special circuits.

    Under the work of Han Hao and his followers, the atmosphere of the three mountains had drastically transformed. It appeared ghostly, sinister, and dangerous.

    ¡°Are you okay?¡± Han Shuo suddenly materialized beside Han Hao. He took a look at the wound on his chest and asked, ¡°Zovic told me that you ran into Dagmar in the Omphalos? Did he do anything to you?¡±

    Han Hao gestured for his followers around him to keep away temporarily before he answered, ¡°It¡¯s fine. This surrogate body is meant to be disposable, after all.¡± After taking a short pause, Han Hao said, ¡°Father, the first toe to my rescue was Wasir.¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a bit before he smiled and nodded. ¡°Excellent. It seems that Wasir is a reliable person during critical times!¡± Han Shuo thought for a moment before he bunched his brows and asked, ¡°Tyre and Logue definitely wouldn¡¯t have intervened even if they were just nearby. Hmm, what about Ossora? Did you notice anything unusual?¡±

    ¡°Ossora arrived after Wasir. He seemed to be rushing to me and I can¡¯t tell anything wrong. But still, somehow, it just feels as though he was a bitte...¡± answered Han Hao.

    ¡°Hmm, okay... ¡° Han Shuo thought in silence for a moment before he turned to those busying on the mountains and smilingly remarked, ¡°Ss should be leading them here as we speak. Hehe, they are going to love the big surprise that I¡¯ve prepared for them.¡°

    ¡°Father, do you know a girl named Andrina?¡± asked Han Hao suddenly.

    Han Shuo was stunned. He looked at Han Hao with an astounded look and replied, ¡°Yes, I know Andrina. She is a good friend. How did you know about Andrina?¡±

    ¡°I have fought her.¡± Seeing that Han Hao was still puzzled, Han Hao added, ¡°I mean, my main body fought her in the Destiny Dominion. She is formidable. She possesses a divine weapon that probably belongs to destiny edict cultivator...¡± Han Hao recounted his encounter with Andrina in detail.

    After hearing Han Hao¡¯s story, Han Shuo kept silent for a moment before he suddenlyughed and said, ¡°She ising to the Fringe to find me? Hehe, that¡¯s wonderful! If she stays in the Pandemonium, I believe that even a Quintessence Overgod would think twice before attacking us!¡±

 Chapter 947 - Payback

    GDK 947: Payback

    The Fringe was neitherrge nor small. Dhaka, Dagmar and Asser spent only around ten days searching the ce with their subordinates to reach Han Hao¡¯s abode near the Pandemonium. On the way, Dhaka and the rest didn¡¯t encounter even half a soul. It was as if the chaos of the Fringe had all subsided. It was so calm that it seemed a little imposing.

    The unnatural calm prompted them to be even more careful and wary. They were in somebody else¡¯s turf, after all. Even with their strength, they didn¡¯t dare act with abandon, especially when they knew the other side would definitely be lying in hiding and waiting for them.

    Dhaka, Dagmar and Asser each scanned different parts of their surroundings with their divine souls to ensure no hidden foe would ambush them. With Ss around, Dhaka and the rest didn¡¯t ask much. They kept their thoughts mostly to themselves.

    Finally, they reached the vicinity of the three mountains.

    In the distance, Dhaka saw a ck fog that brought a certain stench out of the valley. Suspicious, he shot Ss a nce and said, ¡°Ss, are you sure this is the ce?¡±

    ¡°It should be here,¡± Ss replied solemnly. He found it rather weird himself as his divine soul sweep didn¡¯t detect any sign of other souls. What in the world was that guy up to?

    ¡°There¡¯s nobody here at all!¡± Dagmar said. His white bone throne emanated a field of death aura to keep the ck miasma from touching his body while carrying him to the valley between the three mountains.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go take a look,¡± Dhaka said to Asser before the two of them caught up to Dagmar. There was a pungent, soury smell wherever the ck miasma wafted by. It was a clear sign of poison, but Dhaka and the rest were powerful enough that this wouldn¡¯t affect them.

    Ss didn¡¯t follow along and merely watched curiously from afar, observing the details in the surroundings.

    Having had the experience in Pandemonium, Ss was really wary of anywhere remotely rted to Han Shuo. He knew that anywhere Han Shuo had him bring people to was definitely somewhere to beware of, so he didn¡¯t dare to be too daring.

    Without Dhaka and the other two¡¯s orders, their subordinates remained where they were. These godhunter elites from the three Divine Dominions had been working loyally for the trio for many years. Not only were they strong, they were also well disciplined and wouldn¡¯t act on their own ord without explicit orders.

    The trio explored the valley and saw nothing but some weird runes on the walls of the mountains. Their senses picked up not a single sign of life.

    Soon, they returned to Ss. Dhaka said, ¡°The ce should be fine, but it seems like they¡¯re all gone. I believe they are aware that we wereing, so Han Hao probably had his forces group up with the House of Han.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s indeed possible. They are probably well aware that they can only stand a chance against us if they pool their forces,¡± Dagmar said in agreement, but with some impatience in his tone. ¡°I think we can give up on this ce and go straight to Pandemonium, right?¡±

    Given all that, Ss believed that he had done all he could. The valley was indeed deserted. If he forced the three of them to search the mountains thoroughly, it would only make him look suspicious, so he nodded his agreement without saying anything else.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go to Pandemonium then. I believe that unless they decided to give up their foothold in the Fringe entirely, the House of Han would be there,¡± remarked Dhaka as he prepared to instruct his men to leave.

    ¡°Wait!¡± eximed Dagmar as he raised a hand. There was an odd sh in his eyes.

    ¡°What is it?¡± Dhaka eximed, ¡°Did you notice anything?¡± He knew that Dagmar was a cultivator of death energy, so his soul searching skills would be much more proficient than his own. Most faint soul reverberations might escape Dhaka and Asser¡¯s senses, but it would be detected by Dagmar.

    ¡°There are a few weak soul reverberations in the valley. I felt a pulse or two just now. Let me double check onest time.¡± A soul energy slowly spread out from Dagmar. It seemed that he was deploying a special technique to detect the weak pulses in the valley.

    Dhaka and Asser knew that Dagmar was not his usual self thanks to the Quintessence Shard, but given he had cultivated death energy to the overgod level and his usual penchant for not making things up, not to mention his target was Han Hao, he wouldn¡¯t lie about it so casually.

    As expected, Dagmar used his unique sensing method and pointed at the three mountains. ¡°There¡¯s no need to leave. There are people within the three mountains, but a kind of special energy was infused in the valley to block our divine soul sweep. Bryan is formidable as expected. He almost tricked us with that barrier of his!¡±

    ¡°How do you know the one who deployed the barrier wasn¡¯t Han Hao?¡± Ss wondered.

    ¡°He isn¡¯t that capable! Back then at Omphalos, I managed to get a good feel for his strength while my subordinates held him back. He¡¯s not nearly as powerful as you say he is. Without the Quintessence Shard, he is a normal highgod. I can crush him easily like a bug!¡±

    ¡°Dagmar, are you sure they are hiding in the mountains?¡± Dhaka ascertained once more.

    ¡°I¡¯m sure. There are people in all three of them,¡± he replied confidently. He took a short pause before he continued, ¡°Dhaka, Asser, there are three mountains, so each of us will search one of them. There will definitely be many twisting paths within. I¡¯m sure the mere Han Hao wouldn¡¯t be able to escape the three of us!

    He then immediately turned to his subordinates and instructed, ¡°Come with me. The miasma in the valley isn¡¯t anything troublesome. Move!¡±

    Not caring whether the other two Hegemons would do as he said, Dagmar charged straight into the valley.

    After a moment¡¯s hesitation, Dhaka said to Asser, ¡°Let us go too. Dagmar¡¯s soul detection is rather decent, and we¡¯ve worked together many times. He is indeed pretty good on that front.¡±

    Asser agreed and zoomed towards the valley in the form of a ck beam. His subordinates followed along without a hint of hesitation.

    ¡°What about you, Ss?¡± Dhaka asked, not in a hurry to leave.

    ¡°I¡¯m fine, let¡¯s go.¡± Ss shrugged. If he didn¡¯t tag along, Dhaka would definitely be suspicious. He had to join despite knowing the risks involved.

    ¡°Alright, just tag along with me. I can look after you as well,¡± said Dhaka smilingly, no longer hesitating after hearing a satisfactory answer. He charged in with his subordinates too.

    When Dhaka and Ss arrived, Dagmar and Asser had gone quite far in. The two Hegemons picked the smaller mountains, leaving the tallest and most intimidating one for Dhaka.

    Dhaka secretly cursed the fact that the other two only wanted to cooperate in name, but wouldn¡¯t hesitate to cut corners. Everyone in the Godhunter Alliance was self-centered and that was something nobody could change.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± He still did what he should. He found a path into the valley that could let in three people side-by-side at once and entered with Ss.

    ¡°Lord, there is a barrier here as you suspected!¡± one of Dagmar¡¯s subordinates reported. His voice reverberated and echoed across thework of tunnels and made its way into Dagmar¡¯s ears.

    The moment they entered, they encountered countless branching paths. Thankfully, Dagmar knew that that would be the case and had his subordinates split up to make sure all the paths were searched.

    The way he saw it, the strongest one in the mountains was Han Hao. When he fought his avatar back at Omphalos, he thought he knew the extent of his power and no longer considered him a worthy foe. He believed that his subordinates alone were enough to take on the mid-stage highgod Han Hao.

    As such, he didn¡¯t think twice when he spread his men thin. He wasn¡¯t afraid they would be ambushed at all.

    ¡°I¡¯ming!¡± Dagmar charged in from another tunnel with utter bliss.

    There wereyers of light within the tight cavern. The firstyer was filled with the energy of death, with the following ones being water, fire and othermon energies. Thestyer, however, was special. Even Dagmar couldn¡¯t quite tell what it was.

    He gave the barriers a quick feel and without any hesitation, began destroying them.

    Contrary to his expectations, the barriers didn¡¯t seem to possess much defensive power. When his bone spear pierced into it, theyers of the barrier crumbled easily. Even thest oddyer fell apart much easily that he¡¯d thought.

    ¡°Come!¡± Dagmar shook with anticipation at the thought of Han Hao falling to his godhunters.

 Chapter 948 - Set in Stone

    GDK 948: Set in Stone

    There was an identical barrier a few hundred meters ahead. This time around, Dagmar didn¡¯t even hesitate and broke through the grand-looking but ultimately weak barrier, breaking through it to go deeper in the cavernous mountain.

    Like Dagmar, Dhaka and Asser encountered simr barriers and dealt with them the same way.

    Such barriers could be found blocking the way all across the three mountains, and they were broken through one after another by the three of them as they made their way to the center.

    ¡°Woah!¡± Outside the valley, one of Dhaka¡¯s subordinates let out a cry of shock as he studied the odd runes on the three mountains curiously.

    Those runes that represented something they didn¡¯t know lit up one after another as colored smoke wafted out of them and gathered in the dark clouds around the mountains. It caused the stench to grow stronger than ever.

    Dhaka and the rest had left a few subordinates outside the mountains just in case someone woulde charging into the mountains after them for a sneak attack.

    Upon noticing it, their subordinates¡¯ felt a sense of dread as they continued to observe the slightest change in their environment.

    ¡°I feel like something¡¯s off!¡± Asser¡¯s subordinate said, furrowing his brow. ¡°There is some kind of special energy inside the valley that seems to gather around the weird markings on the mountains. Don¡¯t tell me it¡¯s something bad...¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll go in to report to our lord!¡± said another as he charged into the cavern Asser had entered.

    At this moment, weird noises could be hearding from the mountains as the ground shook fiercely, causing countless cracks to form beneath their feet. The weird power within the mountains congregated around the top of the mountains. Instantly, the lighting from the runes grew to blinding levels.

    ¡°Something¡¯s happening!¡± Dhaka¡¯s subordinate yelled in panic. ¡°You few, inform the lord about this immediately!¡±

    Dagmar¡¯s men reacted the same. They felt some kind of odd energy being released by the mountains. Not only did it affect the terrain around the valley, but it also changed the mountains themselves.

    The changes happened so rapidly that before Dagmar¡¯s subordinates managed to enter the caverns, a loud explosion rang out from the depths of the earth. Wafts of gas came out from the cracks and blended with the ck miasma.

    At the same time, the shaking made the three mountains unstable. The one Dagmar went into nted more and more to one side like a drunk giant.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± the three Hegemons yelled from within their respective mountains.

    ¡°Danger! Retreat!¡± Asser yelled. His voice rang loud like thunder through the caverns.

    They felt the abnormality even clearer than the subordinates they left outside. It felt as though there were terrifying energy reactors within the mountains continuously filling the mountains with energies. As they continued to shake, rubble started falling from the top.

    While the godhunters, as godly beings, wouldn¡¯t be afraid of mere rocks that fell from the ceiling, that coupled with the violent shaking of the mountains and the energy the cores at their center unleashed caused quite a lot of force to be imbued in the falling rocks, making them quite the threat.

    Not only did the energies make the rocks weigh tons, they even caused them to fall at much faster speeds. With the caverns so narrow and filled with godhunters, most of them could barely avoid the rocks and were rammed by them harshly.

    Under the bombardment of the rocks that were charged up by the mysterious energy, the godhunters fared no better than mortal humans. Many of them ended up broken and bleeding, with some frantically deploying barriers above their heads in hopes of being able to prevent some damage.

    It was a shame that the supercharged rocks were so powerful that they easily destabilized the barriers they deployed before crushing them like eggshells. The rocks ricochet around in the caverns and caused huge casualties among the godhunters.

    Many of them couldn¡¯t even lift a finger against the rocks, especially when they were pushing against each other in the tight space like sardines. They only stood a chance if they smashed the rocks with joint attacks.

    But even then, destroying the rocks would cause them to explode like grenades, sending extremely prative shrapnel in every direction and causing them grave injuries.

    Their retreat paths had copsed and they were trapped. Therefore, even though they knew that they would be seriously injured, they did everything they could to destroy the rocks. It was their only chance of survival.

    ¡°Ss! You did this!¡± Dhaka roared as he destroyed the rocks that blocked his way.

    By now, he was well aware that he had fallen into a trap. Although it sounded as though he was suspicious of Ss, he didn¡¯t imagine Ss would actually betray them.

    ¡°How would I know something like this would happen? Dhaka, did you think I wanted to harm you?¡± Ss said, hiding his guilt. ¡°Do I have any reason to harm you? I have a huge grudge against Bryan! I¡¯m also here to settle debts with him, just like you!¡±

    Dhaka didn¡¯t overthink it. Seeing how agitated Ss seemed, he said, ¡°I don¡¯t know if you¡¯ve actually entrapped us, but if it wasn¡¯t for your suggestion, we wouldn¡¯t have entered this ce!¡±

    ¡°Hey, own up for your own actions for once! Dagmar himself charged in here! What does this have to do with me, damn it? Don¡¯t me others just because you fucked up! I¡¯ll quit if you keep doing this!¡±

    Ss didn¡¯t have a good temper to begin with. Though his temperament now was much more subdued than when he was at the Fringe thanks to the losses he suffered at the hands of Han Shuo and his son, his short fuse was still there. Coupled with the fact that Ss was contemptuous of Dhaka and the rest to begin with, he doubled down on his attitude.

    Seeing Ss rage, Dhaka stopped wasting time arguing with him and shut up after an unhappy humph. He knew that he still needed Ss to fight their way out of the caverns. If Ss was to ignore him now in a fit of pique, as an overgod, Dhaka could most likely survive this predicament. The majority of his subordinates, however, would perish.

    Making a mental note to revisit this matter, Dhaka shut up and focused on destroying the rocks that had filled the path they took. While the rocks were almost impervious to ordinary experts, Dhaka and Ss were powerful enough that it wasn¡¯t a problem. They eventually managed to open up a path leading outside.

    ¡°Retreat!¡± Dhaka yelled, letting his subordinates through first instead of charging out first. His men hurriedly charged towards their singr hope for survival.

    Loud explosions continued to ring out from the center of the mountains as the shaking got worse. The two of them felt that the mountain would copse sooner orter.

    ¡°Heavens, what is going on here?¡± Dhaka¡¯s subordinates eximed at the center of the valley.

    As a result of the explosions, cracks hundreds of meters deep formed at the feet of the mountain into a mess that resembled a spider¡¯s web. It was as if a mouth opened up at the feet of the three mountains, attempting to swallow all three of them up.

    ¡°Quick, run!¡± Dhaka felt the mountain sinking rapidly. He wondered who could be so powerful to force three huge mountains to fall towards the ground within such a short time.

    With things set in stone, there was no stopping the mountains from sinking into the abyss. The forces of the ground closed in on the sinking mountains with huge pressure while the energies within the mountains themselves exploded outwards.

    Once again, another tragic disaster had unfolded! As the mountains sank, the runes etched on them exploded one after another. Then, as though a chain reaction, an even greater explosion erupted inside the mountains, causing them to fracture into many more pieces. The godhunters within them were either crushed by the sheer force of those explosions or by the falling rocks.

    In but an instant, most of the three¡¯s subordinates had perished in the mountains.

 Chapter 949 - Ciao

    GDK 949: Ciao

    Dhaka, Dagmar, and Asser had never imagined this trip of theirs to end with such heavy and swift losses. It was too quick and fierce for them to react.

    The three mountains had mostly sunk into the ground before a minute had even passed as explosions rang loudly from their depths. It took only moments for thousands of lives to be imed. This was possibly the worst loss anyone had suffered in the Fringe.

    The rumbling echoed nonstop. Once the three mountains had sunk more than halfway through the ground, they cracked open in the middle. The power that had been brewing within the mountains were unleashed in an energetic burst, causing many godhunters within the mountains to howl in agony. One bloody figure after another burst out the mountains.

    It was at this moment that the thick cloud of smoke began descending from the sky while carrying a most terrifying force. Many of the figures that were sent flying from the mountains were crushed by the immense pressure before theynded with audible sts and turned into meat paste.

    It turned out that the ck smoke hovering above the valley which had gathered corrosive gases on those mountains had been waiting for this moment.

    The three mountains had turned into hell on earth. Even though the explosions had subsided, the howls of pain never stopped and grew louder and more bone-chillingly frequent.

    Gradually, the dust and explosions settled. After the smoke that descended took another thousand lives, it dispersed into nothingness.

    ......

    Ashes and dust kept falling from the sky instead of rocky shards. It seemed as if peace and quiet had returned.

    The three mountains had sunk into the groundpletely, though they hadn¡¯t been reduced toplete rubble. Gradually, figures covered in injuries walked out from the mountains with broken bones and blood at the corner of their mouths. There were only tens of them that werepletely uninjured, and all of them were powerful highgods.

    Dhaka, Dagmar, and Asser were thest three toe out of the mountains. Seeing their pitiful subordinates, their expressions darkened; they were like volcanoes that could erupt at any moment.

    Ss had also managed to leave. Once more, he experienced first hand the terror of the House of Han.

    By now, he had made his decision to never again fight the House of Han. It wasn¡¯t that he was a coward; they just far superseded his expectations based on the fact that Dhaka and the other two lost close to half of their men before even encountering their enemy directly.

    Thinking back, Ss recalled how he was just like the three of them back then, filled with the ambition of eliminating Pandemonium. Yet, that had gotten him trapped in some weird barrier with none of his subordinates even spotting half a person from the House of Han. He had suffered a loss as heavy as this too.

    Having seen that happen once again, Ss was humbled and epted his defeatpletely. He was not a match in a one-on-one fight against Han Shuo and the might of the House of Han guards were now unmatched by most. Coupled with the crazy defenses they employed, Ss wasn¡¯t sure anymore whether he could afford to fight against them.

    He decided he wouldpletely forget this notion of getting even with them. Initially, he had nned to settle debts with the House of Han once everything was over, but now he was certain that wasn¡¯t a path he wanted to go down.

    ......

    ¡°Let¡¯s assess our losses,¡± Dhaka said after a long period of silence and heavy sighing.

    His henchmen that didn¡¯t dare to speak up the whole time immediately carried out their orders. Dagmar and Asser also waved to get their subordinates to do the same.

    The subordinates called their names one after another, but only half of them answered. Dhaka and the other two Hegemons seemed even grimmer.

    Soon, the verdict was out. They had eache with more than a thousand subordinates, but only half survived. Only around two thousand godhunters in total made it out from the mountains alive with varying injuries right before they encountered even a single member from the House of Han.

    ¡°Ss!¡± Dagmar roared as he shot him a venomous re.

    ¡°We were about to leave this ce, yet you insisted on going in. What does this have to do with me?¡± Ss said dauntlessly. He red coldly back at Asser and Dhaka. ¡°So you want to push all the me on me if something goes wrong, huh? Is that how you usually conduct yourselves?¡±

    ¡°How did the House of Han know we wereing? How did they manage to set a trap for us? Ss, how can you im to know nothing about this?¡± Dagmar spat as he ran his throne rapidly close to Ss.

    ¡°I didn¡¯t know anything of course!¡± Ss pointed at Dagmar angrily and continued, ¡°You think I¡¯ll betray you? Damn it, I¡¯ve been chased out of the Fring by Bryan and the House of Han, and my mountain was razed to the ground by him! I don¡¯t even have a home to return to! And now you¡¯re saying that I¡¯d sell you out to him? Have you gone mad because of the Quintessence Shard?!¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t believe the House of Han can possibly know that much. If it wasn¡¯t for you guiding us here, we never would¡¯ve arrived in the first ce,¡± said the usually quiet Asser. It seemed he began to suspect Ss as well.

    Ss, shocked, suddenly backed off to a safe distance from the three of them. ¡°You lot have gone insane! You¡¯re ming me for the loss of your men. I guess there¡¯s nothing else to be said! I¡¯m out of here and leave you to deal with this however you like!¡±

    After that, before they could respond, Ss transformed into a lightning bolt and zoomed off to the distance.

    Dhaka, Dagmar and Asser nked out. They didn¡¯t think Ss would leave just like that.

    All three of them had pushed the responsibility of this incident to Ss because of some lingering suspicion, but they were more concerned with finding a scapegoat for their horrible losses. If they didn¡¯t me it on someone else, it would be hard to justify such ipetent leadership to their subordinates.

    In truth, they had never believed Ss would join hands with Han Shuo. Like Ss himself said, he bore seething hate for the House of Han. They had clearly researched Ss¡¯s own experiences in Pandemonium before inviting him to join them, so while they wanted to me him, they wouldn¡¯t actually act against him.

    If they really felt that he had betrayed them, they wouldn¡¯t have let him know about it. Instead, they would attack him while he was unprepared for it. They wouldn¡¯t even give him a chance to exin himself.

    Now, the three of them seemed even worse off. They didn¡¯t expect Ss to leave without any hesitation. Having lost their guide, things would be much harder for them especially with the losses they¡¯d suffered.

    ¡°Darn it, he¡¯s really gone!¡± Dagmar roared. He was still filled with pent-up rage. He had wanted to vent it on Ss, though that only caused him to leave.

    ¡°There¡¯s no helping it. Given our current strength, we should be able to deal with Pandemonium just fine if we don¡¯t fall for more traps,¡± remarked Dhaka. He knew that the three of them couldn¡¯t afford any more division. Even if he was still frustrated from what happened and wanted to vent it on Dagmar, he would have no choice but to endure it.

    Dhaka hade filled with confidence and mouthed off on how he would utterly crush the House of Han, yet now, he didn¡¯t seem so assured about dealing with Pandemonium now.

    ¡°That¡¯s right! We can definitely crush Pandemonium,¡± Dhaka emphasized, though it sounded more like self-constion more than anything. Given how bad the losses they¡¯ve suffered, nothing they said would really sound convincing.

    ¡°Let¡¯s tend to their injuries first. It¡¯s best we leave this dangerous ce immediately,¡± Asser said, feeling a little unwell at the sight of the three sunken mountains.

    The other two agreed and gave the injured godhunters some preliminary treatment before leaving.

    Soon after they left, Han Shuo and Han Hao came out of one of therge cracks underneath. Han Shuo observed the surroundings in mid-air and said a little forlornly, ¡°What a shame we didn¡¯t have more time to calibrate the formation. The implosion was asymmetrical, making the yield a fraction of what¡¯s possible. Otherwise, the three mountains wouldn¡¯t just copse ¨C they¡¯d explode instead. Had that happened, Dhaka, Dagmar, and Asser would have gotten hurt themselves, let alone their subordinates.¡±

    ¡°Father, this is already a good result. I doubt they¡¯d be able to cause Pandemonium any more trouble after their loss here!¡± Han Hao looked at the cracks and said, ¡± Would the copse of the mountains and the cracks in the ground affect my underground pce?¡±

    ¡°It will somewhat. But don¡¯t worry. After this is over, Han Jin and Han Tu will be able to restore it. I¡¯m sure the rocks that have gathered down there will make your pce even more secure,¡± Han Shuo said smilingly.

    As he spoke, he waved and gathered the godhunters¡¯ souls that had yet to dissipate into the Cauldron of Myriad Demons. ¡°Let¡¯s go. We¡¯ll see them at Pandemonium soon.¡±

    ¡°I doubt they¡¯d dare to show up again,¡± Han Hao said with a smile. He found messing with Dhaka rather interesting.

    ¡°That¡¯s fine as well. In fact, that would be ideal. Let them head to Omphalos. Logue and Tyre will be there as well, so it¡¯s best they duke it out with each other,¡± Han Shuo said with a heartyugh before he left with Little Skeleton¡¯s half-formed avatar.

 Chapter 950 - Love at first sight

    <h4>GDK 950: Love at first sight</h4>

    When Han Shuo returned to the Pandemonium, he was surprised to find Andrina there waiting for him. It was obvious from the aura emanating from her that she had now be much stronger than when they were back in the Darkness Dominion.

    Andrina was acquainted with the House of Han members, especially Fanny, since the time she traveled to the Profound Continent with Han Shuo to bring them to Elysium. She was invited into the Pandemonium when the House of Han members noticed her outside. Otherwise, even with her current strength, there was no way that she could intrude into the valley and remain unscathed.

    Han Shuo had deployed a ton of terrifying formations around the Pandemonium in anticipation of the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s invasion. She would undoubtedly be injured if she had tried intruding into the valley.

    Andrina had been waiting in the Pandemonium for a few days and she had been exploring every aspect of the valley. The defenses of the Pandemonium was primarily made up of demonic formations deployed by Han Shuo and the Five Elite Zombie and supplemented by defensive formations powered by energy crystals.

    She was most interested in the demonic formations deployed by Han Shuo and the Five Elite Zombies. The unique energies on those formations had piqued her curiosity. Although she had a ton of questions, no one could exin how those formations worked as the Five Elite Zombies were all still cultivating underground.

    Perhaps she had been too bored in the Destiny Dominion, she became hyperactive after entering the Pandemonium. It was as though there was nothing that won¡¯t make her excited. From time to time, she would even deliberately step into formations and traps to discover their power and find out how they worked. She seemed to be having lots of fun as though those dangerous traps were rides in a theme park.

    Andrina was even more excited when Han Shuo returned to the Pandemonium. She cheerfully said, ¡°Bryan! So you¡¯ve relocated here! Why didn¡¯t you look for me all these while when the Destiny Dominion is just nearby? That¡¯s outrageous! Do you not consider me as your friend anymore or have you forgotten about me?¡±

    Andrina was always cold and unfriendly towards strangers but not to her friends like Han Shuo.

    ¡°I have been very busy with work and managing my family n. How would I have time to visit you? Besides, I have absolutely no idea where the Destiny Shrine is, other than that it¡¯s somewhere in the Destiny Dominion,¡± replied Han Shuo smilingly. He had absolutely no thought of going to the Destiny Dominion to visit Andrina.

    For some reason, Han Shuo felt that he needed to be wary of the Destiny Goddess. Sometimes he even suspected that the Destiny Goddess knew about his origins. Over the past many years, as Han Shuo had to face stronger and stronger experts, he had no choice but to stop concealing the demonic energy he cultivates. If the Destiny Goddess knew about the Exalted Demonlord¡¯s appearance in this universe and discovers that Han Shuo cultivates the same energy as the Exalted Demonlord, then she could easily deduce Han Shuo¡¯s origins and secrets.

    After all, how could the Goddess who mastered Destiny be unaware of such a significant incident?

    ¡°You? Busy?¡± Andrina lightly pouted and snorted before she said, ¡°Don¡¯t think that I have been clueless about what you did in the Fringe. In fact, I knew every move you made ever since you stepped into the Fringe!¡±

    Han Shuo stared nkly for a moment and asked, ¡°Huh? You have been staying in the Destiny Shrine the whole time. How would you know my every move?¡±

    ¡°My mother told me, ¡° Andrina grinned and exined, ¡°She knew every move you made and would often tell me what you have been doing. She also told me that you carry a ton of secrets with you!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart sank a little as his suspicion seemed likely to be true. However, he did not think much further on this issue. With the same calm and collected smile, he asked Andrina, ¡°Why did note here? Did your mother know about it?¡±

    ¡°Nope. She went to meet Nestor the Overgod of Death for some business so I sneaked out while she was away. Hehe!¡± answered Andrina in a big cheeky smile as though she wasn¡¯t worried that the Goddess would punish her.

    Han Shuo grimaced and said nothing for he was speechless.

    ¡°Hehe, I heard that the Godhunter Alliance is going to invade the Fringe, so I¡¯vee to provide you aid. Don¡¯t tell me that I¡¯m not weed?¡± asked Andrina and she faked a frown.

    ¡°Of course you are weed here! How would I dare say otherwise?¡± replied Han Shuo after putting on a happy face. He continued, ¡°There happen to be some energy towers and batteries that are not quite up to my satisfaction. You could take a look at them!¡±

    The energy that Andrina cultivated was rted to energy crystals. She had extraordinary profound insights and expertise in the maniption and use of energy crystals. With her assistance, Han Shuo believed that the Pandemonium¡¯s defenses could be brought to an even greater height.

    ¡°No problem at all! In fact, I¡¯ve already inspected every one of them. I¡¯m just waiting for you to return before modifying any lest your people think that I¡¯m sabotaging the base,¡± agreed Andrina immediately. She had been strolling around the Pandemonium for a long time. She had been itching to demonstrate her skills and power.

    After a short pause, Andrina continued, ¡°However, in order to alter and enhance your energy towers, I will need at least three times the energy crystals in those towers. Do you have that much energy crystals?¡±

    ¡°No problem!¡± Han Shuoughed heartily while telepathically instructing Han Jin who was meditating in the underground gymnasium to bring over the energy crystals in his reserves.

    As the owner of Goldstone Enterprise, Han Jin always had an abundance of energy crystals. As most of the defenses of the Pandemonium wereposed of demonic formations, many of the energy crystals were not utilized. On top of that, Han Hao had previously plundered a ton of goods from the Omphalos merchants with some of those goods being energy crystals. Therefore, the number of energy crystals stored in the underground warehouse of the Pandemonium was almost immeasurable.

    Han Jin who was practicing the Penta-elemental Undead Formation in the underground gymnasium immediately paused his activity and headed to the energy crystal warehouse. He loaded up an entire space ring with energy crystals of the highest grade and went to Han Shuo.

    ¡°Wow!¡± eximed Han Jin before his jaw dropped to the floor. He gaped at Andrina as though he had been frozen. He waspletely stupefied.

    Bright, white halos radiated from Andrina as though water ripples. She stared back at Han Jin with her pupils glowing with blinding light.

    Han Jin and Andrina stared fixedly at each other as though time had stopped. Bizarre soul undtions emanated from their bodies as theymunicated in a manner that even Han Shuo could not understand.

    The two continued tomunicate without moving a muscle and stared each other in the eye for hours. Han Shuo felt as though he had been forgotten.

    At first, Han Shuo found their behavior rather baffling but he soon realized what was happening. Han Jin was made from the Yuan Energy of Metal and he possessed the Golden Cudgel, the Supreme Treasure of Metal. Not only was he born with the knowledge of all metals and stones, but he could also even manipte stones and walk through rocks.

    Andrina was also not an ordinary life form who could eat energy crystals to replenish and increase her energy. Both her soul and her energy had the characteristics of energy crystals. Even her body was filled with the purest power of energy crystals.

    She was basically the most unique energy crystal which is alive!

    The more unique a stone is, the more attractive it was to Han Jin. Meanwhile, the Metal Yuan Energy on Han Jin should also be irresistible to Andrina. Therefore, it was only natural that chemistry would happen when these two unique lifeforms with the mostplementing properties met each other.

    Han Jin and Andrinamunicated in a manner that no other beings in the universe could understand. They werepletely motionless and as still as stone. If it wasn¡¯t for the intense soul undtions emanating from them, Han Shuo might even mistake them for sculptures.

    Han Shuo continued to observe the duo curiously. He was pleasantly surprised by their chemistry and felt d. Han Shuo had always hoped that Little Skeleton and the Five Elite Zombies would not just have formidable strength, but also to develop holistically like a normal human being ¨C to actually live their lives instead of being cold and emotionless undead.

    Perhaps because of his womanizing ways, deep in his heart, Han Shuo wished that his children would also have romantic partners of their own, and maybe even their own children...

    After half-a-day, Zovic suddenly hurried over to Han Shuo to inform him of important news. Perhaps his voice was not soft enough, Andrina and Han Jin who were still staring at each other were roused.

    rity slowly returned to their eyes and the two of them smiled. They walked to each other and held hands without the slightest awkwardness.

    It was so natural and smooth as though Han Jin and Andrina had known each other for hundreds of years. Their smiles turned even brighter and they seemed like the most matching couple that was deeply in love.

    Han Shuo was bbergasted. He had considered the possibility of Han Jin and Andrina bing a couple but never imagined that they would be lovebirds just hours after meeting each other!

    ¡°Father, I finally understand how you feel towards Phoebe and the others! It feels so strange yet so wonderful!¡± said Han Jin as though he knew the answer to the ultimate question.

    ¡°Good, good!¡± Han Shuoughed heartily. He could not be more delighted.

 Chapter 951 - Accidents Happen

    <h4>Chapter 951 - idents Happen</h4>

    ¡°Just leave the rest to the two of us. I will settle Andrina¡¯s matter!¡± Han Jin confidently said. It seemed that he was quite excited after conversing mentally with her.

    ¡°That¡¯s right, we¡¯ll do it properly, rest assured!¡± Andrina said with a smile. She took frequent nces at Han Jin as she spoke.

    Han Jin was more familiar with Pandemonium¡¯syout. Back when Han Shuo created the various formations within it, Han Jin and the rest had been helping out, so apart from Han Shuo, Han Jin and the other four knew Pandemonium best.

    With him helping Andrina out, Han Shuo believed she would be able to realize her greatest potential. Seeing the two of them so confident, he let them do as they pleased. ¡°Alright, I also have some stuff to tend to.¡±

    He told Han Jin some final bits he had to pay attention to about certain special formations before leaving the alteration and enhancement of the various energy towers to the couple.

    When Zovic came about, he reported to Han Shuo that the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s forces had entered Pandemonium. Tyre, Logue, Wasir, and Ossora couldunch a joint attack at any time.

    The Hegemons of the Godhunter Alliance seemed powerful and united like never before, which didn¡¯t bode well for the Sovereigns of the Fringe. It will be an uphill battle for the Sovereigns, to say the least.

    However, Han Shuo knew they had their own trump cards. They had fortified the Fringe for years, so as long as they could properly take advantage of the terrain by setting up powerful formations at strategic locations, they could deal the invaders a catastrophic blow and still stand a chance at winning the war.

    For instance, Logue¡¯s Osteoburg contained intense elements of death, thanks to the centuries of work he had put in. Logue would definitely be far more powerful within Osteoburg and could possibly defeat Tyre there, as he had long be one with the death energy there.

    If the godhunters invaded Osteoburg, Logue could use the Osteoburg to boost the strengths of his highgod subordinates to the point where a group of them could repel an overgod on his level. And if Logue and his highgods worked together, they could possibly even annihte an overgod outright.

    The same would apply to Tyre, Wasir and Ossora. As long as they make good use of the advantages they have and create some opportunities, they would definitely fare much better in battle and stand a chance at winning.

    Upon reaching the bottom of Pandemonium, Han Shuo located Han Hao¡¯s surrogate and asked, ¡°How long will it take for your main body to return?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m already in the Fringe. I should arrive in three more days,¡± Little Skeleton replied after some thought.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°I¡¯m spying on Dagmar and the others using a demon general that has a stand of my consciousness attached. Currently, they are still recovering. I believe they won¡¯t enter Pandemonium in at least ten days to half a month. With you, your brothers, Andrina, Sanguis and the rest here, Dagmar and his pals won¡¯t be able to breach our defenses easily.¡±

    ¡°Will you be leaving for something?¡± Han Hao stared nkly for a moment before he realized something from Han Shuo¡¯s words and asked.

    ¡°Yeah. I¡¯ll be going out for a bit. Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll return immediately once the matter is settled. Given your abilities and the defensive power of the Pandemonium, Dhaka and the rest won¡¯t be able to breach Pandemonium easily. It¡¯ll be fine!¡±

    ¡°Go ahead. I¡¯ll take good care of this ce.¡±

    After informing Little Skeleton about the uses of various formations in Pandemonium and how to operate them, Han Shuo felt assured enough to leave on his errand.

    ¡­¡­

    At Frostcavern on cial Peak, Wasir was sitting cross-legged like an ice sculpture, allowing the bone-chilling cold to envelop him.

    A figure entered Frostcavern and respectfully reported, ¡°Lord, we received word that the Hegemons from the Space and Destiny Dominions are on their way!¡±

    The ice that shrouded him suddenly cracked apart and shattered into countless pieces as Wasir emerged from it. Powerful cial energy leaked from him as he was reanimated. His energy seemed to have be one with Frostcavern itself.

    ¡°Angelo, are you certain of this news?¡± he finally asked after he finished some warm up.

    Angelo, who also cultivated the water energy, took a few steps back. The cold that was radiating from Wasir was too terrifying to the point that even he couldn¡¯t take it. ¡°I am certain. They are heading for cial Peak. The two Hegemons on the way are also said to be the most mysterious ones. Nobody knows their true power. What should we do?¡±

    ¡°Space¡­ Destiny¡­¡± Wasir furrowed his brow, as if he was thinking about something very important. ¡°Hegemons that cultivate in these arcane edicts will no doubt be something to look forward to. It¡¯s said that the edict of destiny is the most mysterious among the Twelve Fundamental Forces. There are only a few destiny edict cultivators who have managed to reach the highgod stage in the world, so those that do must be really secretive and impressive. I wonder what kind of strength these Hegemons will have!¡±

    ¡°Lord, people who cultivate the space energy are also really powerful! If they reach the overgod stage, they will be able to intrude the cial Peak without anyone noticing. Should we make some preparations?¡± Angelo was quite anxious. Though Wasir was powerful, he was but one man, yet two allegedly powerful Hegemons were on the way. He didn¡¯t know whether Wasir alone could deal with them.

    ¡°Any preparation that I can possibly make has been dealt with,¡± Wasir said, knowing what Angelo implied with his question. ¡°Those like us that cultivate the energy of water should remain as cool as ice even in the face of overwhelming threat. If you want to advance to the next stage, you must remember to not have any fear or panic even if you¡¯re about to die!¡±

    ¡°Thank you for your teachings, Lord!¡± Angelo was truly grateful as he looked at Wasir with adoration.

    Among the five Sovereigns of the Fringe, the hardest to get along with was Wasir, yet he was famous for one particr trait of his. Any cultivator of the water energy would be able to make huge progress after receiving crucial tips from him.

    He would generously give cultivation advice unreservedly even to someone like Angelo at thete-stage highgod realm who has the potential to improve to Wasir¡¯s level with his teachings. It was as if he didn¡¯t fear his subordinates growing more powerful than him.

    It was also thanks to this that most of the water-energy users from the twelve Divine Dominions would join him when theye to the Fringe.

    ¡°You may leave now. Tell them they no longer have to stand guard outside cial Peak and get them to enter Frostcavern. Activate all the energy towers to gather all the cial aura around the peak. As for those that don¡¯t cultivate in water energy, have them retreat into the mountains for now,¡± Wasir ordered.

    Angelo nodded and left to spread the word. But before Wasir¡¯s men could carry out the order, arge spacetime fissure suddenly appeared above cial Peak. Countless figures emerged from the spatial tear andnded on cial Peak before they started searching for their target.

    ¡°Wasir, I can foretell your every move. There is no way that you can win this. Though your fate is sealed, your subordinates¡¯ are not. Leave your cial Peak and have a chat with us if you don¡¯t want them to perish with you,¡± said an old crone with a pentagram mark on her chest. She held a brilliant-green crystal ball. Her voice rang with a mysterious cadence that lingered in the air of cial Peak.

    As she spoke, more and more figures came out of the spatial fissure, before an old man with long eyebrows came out and pulled it close like one would close some curtains.

    ¡°Wasir, with Mascy predicting your actions and me sealing up the surrounding space, you won¡¯t stand a chance, not even at escaping,¡± said the old man smilingly. He walked up to Frostcavern and raised his arms, causing spacetime itself to twist and waves to undte through it.

    Though Angelo and the others wanted to seek refuge in the cavern, they suddenly noticed that the nature of the space there had changed. They weren¡¯t able to move at all and couldn¡¯t do what Wasir had instructed them to.

    ¡°One to predict my actions and the other to lock down space itself. You two might just have the strongestbination I¡¯ve ever seen! I must be quite lucky!¡± Wasir said from within the cavern. He was standing at the entrance and coldly staring at the two leaders.

    ¡°Wasir, not only is your destiny sealed, the Fringe¡¯s destiny has been sealed too!¡± said the old crone called Mascy solemnly and loftily with her fingersid on her crystal ball. It was as if she held the fates of all.

    ¡°You¡¯re not an overgod!¡± Wasir suddenly said after staring intently at Mascy.

    ¡°Those who cultivate in the edict of destiny¡­¡± Mascy said as she pointed towards the direction of the Destiny Dominion, ¡°¡­have never be an Overgod, nor demi-overgods for that matter, apart from that person! No exceptions! We are not like you; you can reach the overgod realm without a Quintessence, but we¡¯ll forever remain at highgod!¡±

    After a pause, Mascy chuckled. ¡°But this is more than enough¡­¡± She furrowed her brow as her crystal ball shone all of a sudden. ¡°Dennis! Act now! He seems to be waiting for someone¡­ someone my precognition isn¡¯t able to predict!¡±

 Chapter 952 - Arrival

    GDK 952: Arrival

    Dennis, the Hegemon of Space, seemed a little perplexed at Mascy¡¯s words, as if he still hadn¡¯te to understand how dire the situation was. He shot her a confused look and said, ¡°Mascy, didn¡¯t you say nothing that happens will be able to escape your detection?¡±

    The crystal ball glowed dark green in her hands, causing her to furrow her brows in terror. ¡°Enough nonsense, Dennis! Act now! I can feel Wasir¡¯s waiting for someone toe, and that someone is definitely not our friend!¡±

    ¡°Who in the world can help him?¡± Dennis still didn¡¯t seem hurried, unlike the panicked Mascy. ¡°The five Sovereigns of the Fringe don¡¯t really interfere with one another¡¯s business. Apart from an overgod, nobody should be able to break my spatial lock. What are you worried about?¡±

    ¡°Wasir thinks that once that person arrives, the two of us might not escape cial Peak alive. That¡¯s what he truly believes! My insight definitely isn¡¯t off, there¡¯s a catch! Dennis, we¡¯ve worked together for many years, yet you trust me so little?¡± Mascy red at him angrily.

    Wasir was quite taken aback. He didn¡¯t think that a highgod like Mascy would actually be able to divine his thoughts that clearly. What he didn¡¯t understand, however, was why she couldn¡¯t find out the identity of that mysterious fellow?

    Seeing Mascy angry for real, the seriousness of the situation finally sank in for Dennis. He knew how urate her predictions were, and she definitely wouldn¡¯t be messing with him in such a crucial moment. He had decided to act immediately.

    But before he could, Wasir had deployed his subzero Domain of Divinity, immediately causing a white fog to emanate from the cavern behind him. The fog of cold enveloped him; he had cultivated in Frostcavern for years and long had be one with the frost energy within it. He allowed it to circle around him before letting the snake-like fog slither towards Dennis and Mascy.

    Wherever the fog touched, space itself crackled nonstop. The region that Dennis had locked up was shattering like a mirror.

    Those subordinates of Wasir that had been frozen in ce suddenly felt that they could move again. They immediately broke free from their bindings and hastily charged into Frostcavern without their master asking. They were afraid of being captured by the spatial energy once more.

    Dennis¡¯ expression shifted as he humphed, ¡°Wasir, did you think you¡¯d be able to survive this? I alone am enough to defeat you, let alone now that I have Mascy with me. You might not know this, but those who cultivate in the edict of destiny can make you tremble even if they¡¯re just highgods!¡±

    Dennis yelled as powerful spatial waves reverberated from his body, affecting the structure of spacetime around him and morphing it into a sharp de, which he sent cutting in Wasir¡¯s direction.

    The moment that de manifested, Wasir¡¯s white fog was affected by the spatial energy around it. not only could it not continue to spread, it was also pushed back towards Wasir. It looked just like a waterfall which flowed in reverse. The fog seemed to be sucked right back into Frostcavern.

    At the same time, Mascy snickered and suddenly put all ten of her fingers into the crystal ball. A vague silhouette had formed in the ball and it seemed to resemble Wasir.

    Mascy¡¯s fingers glowed within the crystal ball. The green glow stretched out like threads and slowly enveloped the little figure within the ball.

    When the green tendrils surrounded the limbs of the figure, Mascyughed and pulled with force. All of a sudden, Wasir, who had been trying to fill the surroundings with frozen boulders, felt his limbs tense up as if hundreds of formless threads had bound them. He couldn¡¯t move at all as he watched the spatial dee his way.

    ¡°Wasir, nobody has managed to defeat Mascy and I when we work together! Haha, ept your destiny!¡± Dennis watched as the spatial de continued to gather spatial energy as it rapidly shot towards the frozen Wasir.

    At that moment, all the energy within Wasir¡¯s body was activated to their fullest potential; the fog that came back towards him didn¡¯t enter his body, but rather, freeze it. Now, he was one with the frost in the cavern and had turned into a block of unmelting ice right as the spatial de fell!

    A sharp, grating sound came from Wasir¡¯s body, though it didn¡¯t part immediately from the spatial de. Instead, the de cut in gradually inch by inch.

    Wasir¡¯s expression was nowpletely pale. Some blood leaked from the corner of his mouth and turned into a crimson icicle.

    ¡°It¡¯s a shame all I can do is stop his body¡¯s movements. I can¡¯t do anything about his soul. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have been able to form those protective ice around himself and would have been dead by now,¡± Mascy¡¯s fingers twitched and caused the green tendrils to pierce deep into the little figure in the crystal ball.

    ¡°You¡¯ll be able to advance to the realm of overgod once you find the Quintessence Shard. After which you¡¯ll be able to bind souls as well as bodies. By then, the two of us will rule the entirety of Godhunter Alliance!¡± Dennis consoled with a smile.

    As far as they were concerned, it was over for Wasir. It was only a matter of time before the spatial de cut him into two halves. On top of that, Mascy¡¯s incorporeal tendrils were damaging his body as they burrowed deep into it.

    Thisbination was truly terrifying. Mascy was able to see each and every move Wasir would take while Dennis could make extremely formidable attacks. The longer the fight went on, the lower the chances of Wasir¡¯s survival until he would be finally driven into a wall of despair.

    Dennis and Mascy chuckled and chatted without paying too much attention to cial Peak. They knew that the fortifications and barriers around the peak wouldn¡¯t be able to be used to their full potential once Wasir was dead. The highgods that would be left would have absolutely no chance against the two of them.

    ¡°Quick, Wasir is still holding onto hope for that someone toe. We¡¯ll kill him first and entrap the person he¡¯s waiting for!¡± Mascy said as she put more power into forming more tendrils to bind Wasir. The battle was soon reaching its end.

    After Angelo managed to enter the cavern with much effort, he saw Wasir helpless against the spatial de that was cutting into him. ¡°Lord!¡± he cried desperately.

    All the subordinates that managed to enter the cavern had only one thought in their minds: saving their lord. Even though Wasir didn¡¯t hold back when he punished them from time to time, his subordinates still remained loyal to him even in his time of crisis. They charged out from the cavern fearlessly and suicidally towards Dennis and Mascy.

    ¡°You¡¯vee to die?¡± Dennisughed and spatial waves spread from his body once more. All of a sudden, a few fist-sized holes of light appeared on the bodies of Wasir¡¯s subordinates. They had such powerful suction that the subordinates¡¯ bodies were seemingly liquefied as they were pulled into the center of the hole. Not one trace of their bodies remained.

    Wasir¡¯s eyes burned with anger. Even though he was captured, he could perceive his surroundings perfectly well. Only now did he find out that his subordinates were truly loyal to him despite how often he scolded them. He watched as they gave their lives for his sake in vain.

    It was too bad Mascy stopped him from movingpletely. He also had to constantly expend divine energy within his body to defend against Dennis¡¯s spatial de. There was nothing he could do to help them.

    Why aren¡¯t youing? Why aren¡¯t you here yet? Have you used me the whole time? Why? Why?!

    He red towards the distance as hate festered in his mind. He felt like he had been betrayed. He was driven so close to desperation that he wanted to cast his body away and take out the enemy with him in his soul form.

    As if someone had heard Wasir¡¯s desperate inner plea, a sharp sound could suddenly be heard from afar. It hade from countless terrifying lifeforms that sported rows and rows of razor-sharp teeth. The creatures were so dense together they looked like a thundercloud approaching at full speed.

    A terrifying and insidious energy was being radiated from the body of those creatures. When they collided with Dennis¡¯s spatial-lock barrier, it crumbled almost instantly.

    With the spatial barrier broken, the creatures flooded all over like bats as they charged towards godhunter subordinates of Dennis and Mascy. cial Peak was covered in darkness all of a sudden while the creaturesnded on every inch of the peak.

    Wasir¡¯s eyes shed with delight and joy. The moment he saw those creatures, he knew he hadn¡¯t misced his trust. His chance to take revenge was finally here!

    Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh! The Seventeen Flying Swords cut through the horizon and appeared above cial Peak. Before Mascy and Dennis could react, they had been surrounded by a that was weaved from the light trails of the flying swords. Before long, the began to close in on them!

 Chapter 953 - Turning Tides

    <h4>GDK 953: Turning Tides</h4>

    Dennis and Mascy felt like they had fallen from heaven into hell. Before they were able topletely crush Wasir, they ended up trapped for some reason beyond their knowledge. By the time they came to their senses, they had found themselves surrounded by razor-sharp swords orbiting threateningly around them, causing them to gulp in fear.

    In their panic, their control over Wasir crumbled. Dennis¡¯s spatial de no longer maintained its previous power and could no longer cut deeper into Wasir.

    Mascy was worse off; having freaked out and with her soul in a chaotic state, the mysterious edict of destiny she deployed through her crystal ball was rendered useless.

    Wasir felt the pressure on his body suddenly released as he regained control over his hands and legs. The power that bound him was no more. He was greeted with the sight of his subordinates being killed by Warp Vortexes. The moment the pressure on him lightened, the white fog gathered around him swiftly aggregate and collided against the spatial de.

    Dennis, now surrounded by the Seventeen Flying Swords, could no longer fuel the spatial de with his divine energy of space, so the de quickly disintegrated from Wasir¡¯s anger-fueled attack in a white sh.

    The icy divine power circted a few times though his body and purged the remnant traces of destiny edict divine energy within him. Then, he turned his cold gaze towards the duo who were surrounded by the swords.

    ¡°Who is it? Show yourself!¡± Dennis yelled. He could feel the danger lurking in the surroundings, yet he couldn¡¯t pinpoint the location of his enemy.

    Mascy¡¯s expression was grave. The crystal ball¡¯s green glow was rather subdued, though the light it cast on her face made her seem dark and terrifying. Strands of light were shot from her fingers into her crystal ball. By now, she hadpletely given up on applying any more pressure on Wasir and chose instead to focus all her attention on their hidden adversary.

    They both knew that their assant was a really powerful expert whomanded powers they were not familiar with. It didn¡¯t help that they couldn¡¯t detect the location of this mysterious enemy who could be more powerful than Wasir.

    For some reason, Mascy¡¯s crystal ball didn¡¯t seem to work well in pinpointing their foe¡¯s location no matter how many strands of destiny energy she cast into it. No figure appeared within the ball at all.

    ¡°Haven¡¯t you found him yet?¡± Dennis seemed a little panicked because now, the ice around Wasir hadpletely vanished. It was a sign he had almost regained all his fighting prowess.

    If one single hidden assant was enough to drive them to such dire straits, they would certainly fare much worse now that Wasir was going to join the fray.

    ¡°I can¡¯t locate him! This is baffling!¡± Mascy said with a hint of panic, unlike her previously confident self. ¡°With all my power, I should be able to locate most demi-overgods, yet I¡¯m not able to locate this person at all!¡±

    ¡°What does this mean?¡± Dennis leaned in against Mascy as the Seventeen Flying Swords was still weaving its web smaller and smaller. He felt a strong threating from the swords, so he had no choice but to retreat to the center of the web like Mascy.

    ¡°Apart from Overgods with Quintessence or Quintessence Shards, only an expert with supreme mastery of the soul could elude the binding power of the edict of destiny! It¡¯s obvious that he¡¯s not one of the Twelve Overgods, so either he has a Shard, or his mastery of the soul is advanced to the point where he can change destiny itself!¡±

    The moment he heard it, Dennis felt rather taken aback. Someone who possessed a Quintessence Shard would definitely be worried of being pursued by one of the Twelve Overgods, so they would certainly be very careful about revealing their power. In fact, they wouldn¡¯t even show up on Elysium and would usually cultivate on remote material nes. People like this numbered far and few in between and wouldn¡¯t show up in centuries or even millennia.

    On the other hand, those who had such high mastery in matters of the soul to be able to elude destiny was just as rare! In either case, their might would certainly be so powerful that even Dennis and Mascy would be really wary of it.

    ¡°We have to escape from this!¡± Dennis said, seeing the swords closing in on them.

    ¡°I¡¯m afraid I¡¯m not too proficient at matters like this...¡± Mascy was already far from a brute-force fighter, given that she cultivated in the edict of destiny in the first ce. The web of swords obviously wouldn¡¯t be affected by her edict, so she felt rather helpless.

    Dennis fell silent for a moment as he generated an intense undtion of spatial energy around him. He intended to construct a spatial fissure through which they could leave.

    However, the moment he unleashed his power, he suddenly noticed that the energying from the swords had affected the spatial makeup of the surroundings. The space he and Mascy upied suddenly felt a little foreign, so foreign that he wasn¡¯t able to form a spatial fissure to leave through!

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡± Mascy asked when she saw him move and suddenly stop.

    ¡°He¡¯s terrifying!¡± Dennis took a deep breath as if he had steeled his resolve and grabbed onto Mascy. The two of them seemingly turned into smoke and wafted into a scroll.

    The scroll fluttered around in the web of swords and let out powerful spatial pulses. A strong light shot out and the two of them suddenly vanished from within the web, only to reappear far above cial Peak.

    ¡°Dennis... Did you... just destroy the pocket dimension you spent a thousand years building?¡± Mascy cried out in shock.

    Powerful spatial cultivators like Dennis could use their power and insights into the edict of space to make their own personal pocket dimension like the Space Overgod. Within that pocket dimension, they would be omnipotent and have control over everything.

    The scroll that was just torn up was the basis Dennis used to construct the pocket dimension. There was a minor ne within that had mountains, rivers andkes, much like the real world, apart from theck of lifeforms. Dennis had spent a thousand years crafting it. The only reason he got so closely acquainted with Mascy was because he hoped she would be able to find a Quintessence Shard of Destiny so that she could imbue his pocket dimension with the power of destiny. He would then find another expert in the edict of life for the finishing touches of his ne.

    Once there was life on his ne, with the Life and Destiny routine operating, they could leave the Elysium for the pocket dimension he created. There, they would be all powerful. Even Overgods with Quintessence wouldn¡¯t be able to defeat them within it. They would truly be able to reign freely and achieve everything they could ever desire.

    Overgods with Quintessence may be invincible, but as long as they had the pocket dimension, they would be safe from the Overgods ¨C provided that they could escape into it before being instantly annihted.

    It was a shame that his half-formed pocket dimension was ruined before it was truly realized.

    Mascy, seeing the pocket dimension she had spent much effort forming with Dennis, seemed even more distraught than he was as she suddenly coughed out blood onto her crystal ball. At that moment, her soul and crystal ball seemed to fuse. Synapses and connections seemed to form in the crystal ball until they became two hemispheres of a brain.

    Gradually, a human brain was clearly revealed in the crystal ball. There was a grey smoke with an erratic form floating within it that almost resembled a soul.

    Gradually, a blurry figure formed within the ball alongside the clouds around him. He moved swiftly under the cover of the clouds.

    Dennis red closely at the figure within the crystal ball. A few secondster, he seemed to have realized something and looked up at the sky.

    A very vague shadow suddenly charged downwards from the clouds towards them. All of a sudden, they could feel strong killing intent gushing out like water from a broken dam.

    ¡°He¡¯s up there!¡± Dennis cried, before he grabbed Mascy and teleported away. He also gave her crystal ball a tap, causing her to snap out of it. Blood vessels streaked across her eyes and blood oozed out of both her nostrils.

    She had used her soul as a medium to peek into matters that should not have been visible to her, and so she would have to pay a heavy price for it.

    Beneath them, Wasir¡¯s men charged towards the invading godhunters with rabid fervor. Wasir didn¡¯t charge into the fight when he emerged from the ice after he saw Dennis and Mascy trapped by the Seventeen Flying Swords. He merely red at them and mercilessly killed the other godhunters instead.

    By the time they used the pocket dimension to escape, Wasir had already frozen up nine highgods from the Godhunter Alliance.

    ¡°Wasir, we¡¯ll kill the woman first!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s voice rang from above cial Peak.

    With but a thought, nine beams of frost shot out from Wasir onto the nine highgod ice sculptures, instantly shattering them into hundreds of pieces of frozen flesh.

    ¡°I¡¯ming!¡± Wasir smirked malevolently and no longer cared about the fight taking ce on cial Peak. He flew towards Mascy like a fierce demon.

    Back then, he couldn¡¯t do anything but watch his subordinates killed by the godhunters. He had sworn that he would definitely do everything in his power to keep Dennis and Mascy on cial Peak forever if he ever managed to escape. Wasir had experienced the most painful moments of his life and ovee it. Having managed to escape his deathly predicament, he would have the two pay their debt in blood.

    Now that Han Shuo had arrived, he no longer had to fight alone!

    ¡°I¡¯ll show you that the cial Peak doesn¡¯t take kindly to being invaded!¡± Wasir yelled as he closed in on the two from the bottom while Han Shuo did the same from the top, working together to execute a pincer maneuver.

 Chapter 954 - Complete Annihilation

    <h4>GDK 954: Complete Annihtion</h4>

    Dennis and Mascy hade with nothing but confidence. With Mascy being able to predict every action and Dennis locking down the whole of cial Peak, Wasir was essentially a shark in a jar; a toothless threat. Little did they expect things would turn out this way, however. Not only were they unable to wipe out Wasir and his subordinates, but they were also now in dire straits themselves.

    Han Shuo came swooping down from the skies and used the killing intent wrapping his body to form a gigantic hand, swatting down at Dennis and Mascy to grab them.

    Wasir stretched his hand out and took out a ten-meter-long icicle from within the cavern. It looked like a precious crystal that emanated white smoke as a result of the sheer frost energy it contained.

    The frost energy contained within thence-like icicle was so powerful that it seemed as if it was the crystallization of Frostcavern¡¯s power itself. The moment Wasir struck with it, it caused the temperature around Frostcavern to sink even lower.

    The gigantic hand came pressing down. Coupled with the terrifying frost, crackling sounds could be heard as wafts of smoke began appearing.

    Mascy had managed to force Han Shuo out after much difficulty, only to find that she was now his main target. She immediately tried to approach Dennis.

    Dennis had sacrificed much to escape Han Shuo¡¯s sword formation. He grabbed Mascy and teleported once more to the top of cial Peak.

    Mascy¡¯s fingers were moving about on the crystal ball as she seemed to be weaving something within it. One after another, the green tendrils that came out of her fingers formed a mysterious picture.

    All of a sudden, Wasir¡¯s body stiffened. The icicle in his hand seemed to lose control as it came piercing towards Han Shuo.

    The sudden change was so rapid that Wasir couldn¡¯t stop the attack in time. The icicle pierced towards Han Shuo¡¯s gigantic palm.

    ¡°Han Shuo, move!¡± he yelled.

    ¡°No worries!¡± Han Shuo said from behind his giant palm before he dematerialized it. The killing intent that the palm was formed of scattered immediately.

    At the same time, a figure suddenly flew past Dennis with blinding speed.

    With but a thought, the Seventeen Flying Swords appeared from out of nowhere once more to surround Dennis and Mascy. They were about to be trapped once again.

    However, having had previous experience dealing with the swords, Dennis had his guard up. He didn¡¯t wait for the swords to descend upon him and immediately teleported without letting the swords sessfully surround him.

    Mascy¡¯s power alone was able to cause some minor distraction to Wasir at most. Without Dennis working with her, she was far from able to kill him.

    When the icicle shot towards the sky, Wasir¡¯s divine energy raged within his body to counteract the mysterious energy that was nudging him from within. Now that he didn¡¯t have to worry about a spatial de cutting towards him like before, it only took him three breaths¡¯ time to break free.

    Mascy spat out a mouthful of blood from the blowback from having her destiny energy repelled by Wasir. The blood covered the crystal ball in her hands, making it look rather gruesome.

    ¡°Dennis, let¡¯s retreat,¡± she said helplessly with a pale look.

    Under pressure from the Seventeen Flying Swords, Dennis had no choice but to teleport short distances constantly. With Mascy not being able to hold Wasir down, they would lose sooner orter, so she had to warn him to retreat.

    Dennis knew that the situation was now disadvantageous to them. Seeing Mascy hurt and unable to pose any threat to Wasir, it suddenly dawned on him that while theirbination would work against someone on par with them, they would suffer when they were up against two foes.

    Dennis also wanted to leave immediately, but the godhunters he and Mascy had brought with them were still engaged inbat at cial Peak. His subordinates were already on the losing side to begin with, and if he left with Mascy now, none of them would survive.

    Those men were Mascy and Dennis¡¯s elite subordinates. If they were wiped out, they would definitely suffer a huge loss. Even if the Godhunter Alliance managed to defeat the Fringe in the end, the two would be hard-pressed to get any of the spoils with their subordinates all gone.

    As such, Dennis hesitated as he tried his best to find an opportunity to open up another spatial fissure through which his subordinates could retreat.

    As Dennis contemted how to do so, Han Shuo was faced with his own dilemma. Given his and Wasir¡¯s strength, he could easily wipe Dennis and Mascy out. However, Dennis, a space edict cultivator, was able to keep teleporting to avoid being surrounded by the Seventeen Flying Swords.

    cial Peak was a ratherrge ce and Dennis wouldn¡¯t remain at a fixed point for long, and short-distance teleportation didn¡¯t particrly drain his divine energy. As such, he wouldn¡¯t be able to capture him, let alone engage him in a proper fight.

    Had they been fighting in Pandemonium, Han Shuo had at least seven tricks he could use to take advantage of the demonic formations within Pandemonium to alter thew of physics in the environment. That way, Dennis wouldn¡¯t easily be able to teleport around, making it much easier for Han Shuo to take him out.

    It was too bad the battle took ce at cial Peak instead. There was simply no formation he could use. The constant frost that gathered there wasn¡¯t enough to freeze space itself, so Dennis was easily able to slip around.

    When Han Shuo noticed Dennis staring at the godhunters from time to time, he knew what he was worried about. As such, he had to continue applying pressure on Dennis with his Seventeen Flying Swords even if he couldn¡¯t trap him with it to prevent him from making a spatial fissure for his subordinates to escape.

    Han Shuo and Wasir kept the pressure high, not giving Dennis any chance to open a spatial fissure at all. One moment, he was up in the skies, and the other, he was down in the mountains, and the next, he was amongst his fightingrades. Yet, the two were unable to pin him down all the same.

    The fight between the four fell into a stalemate.

    One idea after another surfaced in Han Shuo¡¯s brain. His consciousness seemed like a vortex in the starry skies, spinning rapidly like a spiral.

    The ideas were all shot down by him. He had to sift through the countless ideas for one that could kill Dennis and Mascy for certain to ensure they wouldn¡¯t be able to escape cial Peak.

    Perhaps as a result of all his contemting, the Seventeen Flying Swords slowed down slightly, giving Dennis and Mascy some time to take a breather.

    Dennis, as a cultivator of the edict of space, noticed the subtle change. Each time he teleported, the swords seemed to slow down a second or two, so he tried to teleport faster and faster.

    After tens of times of repetition, the swords now seemed much slower than before. It no longer seemed able to keep up with him.

    This should be enough time! Dennis immediately tapped into spatial energy, causing the fabric of space around him to ripple as he tore open a spatial fissure behind his subordinates.

    ¡°Retreat now!¡± Dennis yelled to his subordinates who were constantly backing off. He teleported to where his subordinates gathered with precise calction.

    The godhunters that were being massacred by the subordinates of Wasir and HS¡¯s demon generals saw the spatial fissure behind them and leaped for the chance to escape.

    ¡°No! Bryan, stop them!¡± Wasir cried as he charged towards them without regard for anything else.

    As if he had been awakened by Wasir¡¯s cry, Han Shuo, who had been standingpletely still while chasing Mascy and Dennis with his flying swords, suddenly seemed to notice something. He charged frantically towards Dennis and Mascy.

    ¡°Bryan, Wasir, we¡¯ll return when we meet up with the other Hegemons! By then, Pandemonium and cial Peak will be obliterated! Hahahaha!¡± Dennis snickered as he grabbed Mascy and fled towards the spatial fissure.

    All of a sudden, the Seventeen Flying Swords came charging in with a few times more force than before. At the same time, the demon generals swarmed back towards the Myriad-demon Cauldron. Letting out a blinding, yet dark light, it came ramming towards Dennis and Mascy with overpowering force.

    ¡°Adios!¡± Dennis said as he sped up even more, passing through the spatial fissure. Right as the two entered it, the Seventeen Flying Swords and Myriad-demon Cauldron burst through the spatial fissure, causing it to emanate a kind of sparkling light.

    ¡°Nooo!¡± Dennis¡¯s cry of agony came from within the fissure. His hand stretched out of the fissure as if he wanted to climb out of it, yet he was dragged back inside by a strong force.

    ¡°Aaaaaaagh!¡± cried Mascy and Dennis before the spatial fissure disappeared with a sh of light. It was now gone from cial Peak, along with Dennis, Mascy, and hundreds of godhunters.

 Chapter 955 - You sure are treacherous!

    GDK 955: You sure are treacherous!

    The Seventeen Flying Swords then proceeded to weave around the mountain, mercilessly ughtering the few remaining godhunters. Soon they were all turned into chunks of flesh.

    The strands of greyish smoke which then emerged from their bodies were sucked into the Cauldron of Myriad Demon hovering high in the sky. The sinister, dark radiance on it glistened brighter and brighter.

    Then, with a wave of his hand, the Cauldron and the Seventeen Flying Swords whooshed back towards Han Shuo and vanished into his body.

    Wasir flew to Han Shuo¡¯s side and gazed at the region where iridescent radiances erupted and vanished. With a puzzled look, he asked Han Shuo, ¡°Where are Dennis and the others? What exactly had happened?¡± Wasir could tell that Han Shuo must have done something to Dennis¡¯ spatial fissure. Otherwise, Dennis wouldn¡¯t have tried to crawl out from it and make that blood-curdling screech.

    Han Shuo put on a bright smile and exined, ¡°I knew that Dennis wanted to escape with his followers using a spatial fissure and so I allowed it to happen. Then I secretly altered several key fulcrums of the spatial structure, effectively sabotaging his spacetime-tunnel.¡±

    Han Shuo had been racking his head on how to prevent Dennis from constructing a spacetime tunnel and escape while the battle was in a stalemate. He had thought hard about it but it seemed impossible. But then, it finally hit him. Rather than preventing Dennis from constructing a spatial fissure, he might as well let him deploy it and use the spatial fissure against him.

    He deliberately slowed down his flying swords by fractions of a second to make Dennis mistakenly think that he was distracted and to allow Dennis to construct his spatial fissure.

    The instant that Dennis tore the fabric of spacetime and constructed a spatial fissure, several demon generals made from highgod souls stealthily moved into it and altered several points in the spacetime structure.

    Under normal circumstances, Dennis might be able to detect the minute alterations to his spacetime tunnel. However, with the great threats of Han Shuo and Wasir hurrying towards him and especially when the Seventeen Flying Swords and Cauldron of Myriad Demon went soaring at him, Dennis wasn¡¯t in the state of mind to notice the changes. He went into the spatial fissure without thinking.

    But as soon as he entered the tunnel, he discovered that his destination wasn¡¯t where he had intended but an unstable temporal void. It was a deste space billions of light-years away without any elemental energies. Exotic matter sparkled and gave off strange radiances while consuming everything in its path like a ck hole.

    Dennis immediately realized that he had fallen for Han Shuo¡¯s malicious scheme. But unfortunately for him, before he could crawl out from the spatial fissure, the Seventeen Flying Swords and the Cauldron of Myriad Demon struck the fissure and caused it to copse, cutting away his hope of ever escaping.

    After hearing the smiling Han Shuo exin what he had done, Wasir looked at him with terror in his eyes and asked, ¡°So you have been scheming against him right from the start?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and replied, ¡°Well, he wanted to escape using a spatial tunnel, so I granted him his wish. Hehe, not only did make him dig his own grave, I¡¯ve even made him jump into it happily! Isn¡¯t this wonderful?¡±

    Wasir was astounded. It took him a moment to regain his senses and he remarked, ¡°You sure are treacherous!¡± Then, after taking a short pause, he put on a curious look as he asked, ¡°And what will happen to Dennis and the others now?¡±

    ¡°The temporal void will copse. The implosion will be powerful enough to annihte them instantly. Other than Dennis who is in the overgod realm, it should be impossible for any of them to survive that kind of power.¡± Han Shuo put on an even bigger smile and continued, ¡°But Dennis should be heavily injured by the implosion and sucked into a corner of the universe. By my estimates, he would need tens of thousands of years to return to Elysium, minimum.¡±

    A shiver traveled down Wasir¡¯s spine. He took a moment to digest it before remarking, ¡°Ruthless even!¡±

    Han Shuo dly epted Wasir¡¯s praise and said nothing about it. He turned around and took a look at Wasir¡¯s followers who were approaching them respectfully. He noticed that Wasir had suffered a considerable amount of losses with hundreds of his followers perished. Some of his most loyal and valiant highgod experts were killed with their bodiespletely destroyed.

    ¡°My apologies. I did not expect them to show up that soon,¡± said Han Shuo in a low voice.

    Wasir immediately shook his head and replied, ¡°It¡¯s not your fault. Neither did I expect that the woman who cultivates the edict of destiny would be so miraculous that she could predict my every move and even read my thoughts. But fortunately, she couldn¡¯t predict your arrival in time. Otherwise, I¡¯m afraid that the cial Peak would have fallen by now.¡±

    ¡°The edict of destiny is miraculous indeed. If Mascy was in the realm of overgod, she would be even more terrifying than she already was. It seems that of the Twelve Fundamental Forces, the Edict of Destiny isn¡¯t just the most mysterious but also the most formidable,¡± remarked Han Shuo. While he was on his way to the cial Peak, he had a vague feeling that someone was probing his soul.

    Han Shuo was surprised by that feeling and he immediately split up his consciousness into millions of strands and altered the state of his soul. With that, Mascy was unable to predict his origin and arrival. Otherwise, Mascy and Dennis would surely have tried to finish Wasir as quickly as possible and wait for him to arrive. By then, perhaps even Han Shuo would be powerless against the duo.

    ¡°Greetings, Lord Bryan!¡± respectfully greeted Angelo who was fortunate enough to survive the ughter. Many of Wasir¡¯s followers also came to Han Shuo and bowed, thanking him for saving their lives.

    Han Shuo took a good look at the faces of all these people, nodded, and said to Wasir, ¡°These men of yours are admirable ¨C they are loyal and devoted!¡±

    ¡°Speak nothing of what happened here today,¡± Perhaps touched by the loyalty of his subordinates, Wasir¡¯s expression became unusually kind after scanning Angelo and the others. He warned, ¡°And do not tell anyone that Bryan was here! The war has only just begun. You bunch better stay vignt!¡±

    ¡°Yes, my Lord!¡± answered Angelo and the gang. They were pleasantly surprised that their Sovereign had secretly made an alliance with Han Shuo. Having witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s might first-hand, they became hopeful for their future. They felt that with an ally as powerful as Han Shuo, their chances of surviving the war would be much greater.

    ¡°Wasir,e with me to the Pandemonium. I have been counting the days and Dhaka and the others should have started attacking my base by now. I¡¯m worried that my people cannot hold them off for too long. However, as long as we can get there in time, we can finish off the three Hegemons just like we got rid of Dennis and Mascy,¡± proposed Han Shuo after seeing that Wasir was done giving his troops the relevant orders.

    ¡°Sure!¡± agreed Wasir straightforwardly. He took a short pause and added, ¡°Wait one moment. I will bring my men along. The forces under Dhaka and the others are tremendous. I¡¯m worried that you won¡¯t have enough men to handle them.¡±

    Han Shuo shook his head and smilingly replied, ¡°That won¡¯t be necessary. Just the two of us is more than enough. Hehe, Dhaka and the others lost half of their army to me while on their way to the Pandemonium. My Demon Guards not only possess greaterbat strength but also outnumber their forces. If it wasn¡¯t for the presence of Dhaka, Dagmar, and Asser, I wouldn¡¯t even need to return to the Pandemonium. ¨C my House of Han guards could crush them easily.¡±

    Wasir was astounded. He cried, ¡°What?! Half of their army killed before they entered Pandemonium?!¡±

    Han Shuo had sealed off all information on his side while Dhaka and the others definitely wouldn¡¯t go around and tell everyone about their pathetic losses. Therefore, nobody knew about it even till now.

    ¡°That is unbelievable!¡± eximed Wasir before asking, ¡°How many casualties did you suffer?¡±

    ¡°Zero. Hehe, I lost just three mountains and some energy crystals. Erm, this will take a while to exin. Come, I¡¯ll tell you everything in detail as we travel,¡± after dropping an even bigger bombshell on Wasir, Han Shuo departed and left the gaping Wasir.

    ¡°My Lord, Lord Bryan had left!¡° reminded Angelo when he saw that Wasir was still staring nkly into the air.

    It was only then that Wasir was roused from the shock. Desperate to know how Han Shuo aplished it, Wasir hastily gave Angelo and the others thest few instructions before quickly flying in Han Shuo¡¯s direction to catch up to him.

    Destroying half of the opponent¡¯s army without losing a single man! Such an extraordinary loss exchange ratio was astounding even to a Sovereign like Wasir.

    ***

    While Han Shuo was busy ughtering godhunters all over the cial Peak, Dhaka, Dagmar, Asser, and their godhunter finally came to the Pandemonium. Han Hao, Stratholme, Andrina, and the others who were in an underground chamber could clearly see the godhunters stationed at the outer perimeter of the Pandemonium through an enormous spatial refraction mirror.

    After having suffered a round of crushing defeat, Dhaka and the others learned to be much more prudent in their approach. When they reached the outer perimeter of the Pandemonium, no one dared move forward recklessly. They stopped and took their time to carefully scan their environment down to every piece of rock.

    After losing half their men, Dhaka and the Hegemons were frightened and they no longer dared underestimate the House of Han¡¯s power. They truly considered the Pandemonium a most dangerous ce that it was. They would be cautious in each step they take. With that, they took an hour toplete a journey that would have been minutes otherwise.

 Chapter 956 - Far Too Fearful

    <h4>956: Far Too Fearful</h4>

    Stratholme, Gilbert, and the others snickered as they watched the godhunters halting after taking each step forward and being overly cautious. The previously tense atmosphere turned much more rxed.

    ¡°At this pace, they will need another day before they will actually step into Pandemonium. Haha, these godhunters are really funny. It¡¯s not like we have any formidable defensive measures at the outer perimeter,¡± remarked Stratholme as he chuckled.

    ¡°They are terrified!¡± Ayermike pointed at a group of godhunters in the spatial mirror and said, ¡°Look carefully at this bunch. There are still wounds visible on their body and their footsteps are rather disordered. Even their movements seemed awkward and unnatural. It is obvious that they were heavily injured from thest attack!¡±

    The House of Han members had heard a thing or two about Dhaka¡¯s misfortune in the three mountains near Han Hao¡¯s base. They couldn¡¯t help but take quick nces at Han Hao and felt a sense of awe when they thought about how half of their opponent¡¯s army perished just like that.

    The one standing in the chamber with them was Han Hao¡¯s main body. His secondary soul that possessed his surrogate body had now rejoined his main soul and body. The current Han Hao was at his peak condition and stronger than he ever was. Although he was still no match against Dhaka or Asser, he had absolute confidence in defeating Dagmar who was also a cultivator of the energy of death.

    ¡°They wouldn¡¯t attack for at least another day. We don¡¯t have to be too worried for now,¡± remarked Bonds after he calmly evaluated the godhunters¡¯ movement and distance.

    ¡°Humph, I hope they will all die! These degenerates should be cleansed from the universe!¡± shouted Andrina hatefully.

    For whatever reason, Andrina was extremely hostile towards godhunters. If there was a magical button that could somehow obliterate every godhunter in the world, she would smash it without any hesitation. She would get triggered if she heard anything remotely rted to godhunters and would proim about eradicating them.

    Han Hao took a quick nce at Andrina and made a mental note to have his followers keep as far away as possible from the peculiar little girl. She knew just how terrifying Andrina was and that none of his followers was Andrina¡¯s match.

    Besides, Andrina was the daughter of the Destiny Goddess, a close friend of Han Shuo¡¯s, and recently became Han Jin¡¯s lover. Even if Andrina murdered a couple of his followers in rage, there would be nothing that Han Hao could do. He also thought that he should talk to Han Jin to prevent his sister-inw from killing his followers.

    ¡°Let¡¯s get ready. It¡¯s time to activate all primary formations,¡± said Bonds after taking a moment to assess the situation.

    ¡°Okay!¡± answered the Five Elite Zombies. They took a look at Han Hao and left the chamber.

    There were dozens of demonic formations of varying sizes around Pandemonium. Some of them would consume Yuan energy at an astonishing rate even when idle, especially those demonic formations with extremely terrifying power. Although Pandemonium had collected a considerable amount of Yuan during the past many years, it was not unlimited. Therefore, to save on their reserves of Yuan, most of the demonic formations were deactivated until thest possible moment.

    Although the army of the Godhunter Alliance was now right outside their turf and they would be attacking soon, they could still wait a little longer before activating the energy-guzzling formations. But considering that Han Shuo was currently not around, the Pandemonians dare not take any chances.

    Han Hao left soon after the Five Elite Zombies exited the room. Andrina thought for a moment before quietly catching up to Han Jin.

    During the recent days, Andrina was always seen with Han Jin. It was as though the two were inseparable. Not only were they attracted to each other, they seemed to be able to help each other advance their cultivations, as if they knew each other better than they understood themselves.

    ¡°Everyone get ready. Order the House of Han guards to station in every region. We must utilize not only the power of the demonic formations but also the power of our army. Dhaka, Dagmar, and Asser are all experts in the overgod realm. Any of them are many times more powerful than thebined might of Hill and Sha-t¡¯o of Witherbone City. We must not let our guard down,¡± ordered Bonds in a grave face after Han Hao and the others left.

    The House of Han members understood the gravity of the situation. They stopped their giggling and went back to work.

    ***

    Outside Pandemonium, Dhaka, Dagmar, and Asser were discussing on how they should attack Pandemonium. Dagmar proposed that they would bombard Pandemonium in a burst of energy to destroy all the boundaries and defenses.

    Dhaka thought that they should be more methodical. They should survey and probe the environment as much as possible before attempting an exploratory attack. And if it failed, they would inform other godhunters and call for backup.

    Asser, meanwhile, had an entirely different approach. He suggested that the three of them should explore Pandemonium by themselves. With their overgod power, no matter the trapid, they should be able to easily escape. Theirbined might should be more than enough to handle both Han Shuo and Han Hao.

    The three each held on to their own views firmly. They were unable to reach a consensus.

    It was only until a full day of discussion that they finally agreed on testing the defenses of Pandemonium. They ordered all their remaining army to assemble right outside the thick fog that shrouded Pandemonium.

    Following the cue of the Hegemons, the three groups of godhunters simultaneouslyunched ranged attacks towards the thick fog.

    Bursts of colourful energies wereunched into the air. They followed a parabolic trail and fell into the thick fog. A deafening rumble sounded from behind the impregnable veil as brilliant radiances of all colours erupted.

    ....

    After a long while, the rumbles had subsided and the shes died down but the three Hegemons did not get the result they wanted. In fact, they did not get anything. They heard no miserable shrieks and no House of Han members scuttling to escape the bombardment. They didn¡¯t even know if their attack had caused any damage or casualties.

    ¡°Dagmar, even you cannot sense any soul undtions?¡± asked Dhaka, astonished.

    By now, the immense hatred had vanished from Dagmar eyes. He had temporarily set aside his thirst for vengeance. In a deep voice, he said, ¡°I can sense a force that¡¯s preventing my soul from sensing anything far beyond the thick fog. It¡¯s just like being blindfolded. My soul is unable to sense if there¡¯s any dead there. In fact, I can¡¯t even sense the slightest presence within.¡±

    Asser¡¯s expression changed at hearing that. He immediately recalled their experience back at the three mountains. ¡°The situation is off. I¡¯m afraid we¡¯ve fallen for a trap once more. We must be extra careful under such uncertain circumstances!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go in to look, the three of us.¡± Dagmar finally agreed to Asser¡¯s initial proposal after some hesitation.

    Dhaka had already talked to Tyre about this beforehand. He had intended to take advantage of the battle going on at the Fringe to take control over the Godhunter Alliance. He had thought that with thebined strength of the three, they would easily be able to destroy Pandemonium. Little did they know they would lose up to half of their men before they even get to engage the Pandemonians.

    It was because of that that Dhaka no longer dared to gamble with his men¡¯s lives, for they were what he was counting on to maintain any semnce of power in the alliance. He didn¡¯t want to take any more risks now, but if he didn¡¯t even enter to check, all their attacks now would be a waste of energy. That was why he had no choice but to make his decision.

    Asser agreed with Dhaka and turned to Dagmar. ¡°I¡¯m sure the three of us won¡¯t have any trouble going in.¡±

    At that moment, Dhaka suddenly felt some undtionsing from his space ring. He didn¡¯t make a sound and instead secretly used his soul to check the message left on the magical mirror.

    After a while, his face glowed with joy. ¡°Come, let us check this ce out for good. Ideally, we¡¯ll be able to destroy the defenses boundaries altogether. Hmph, I doubt Pandemonium is actually as formidable as it looks!¡±

    ¡°Why the sudden change of tone, Dhaka?¡± Dagmar asked, taken aback by the sudden change in attitude.

    ¡°I received word from a credible source that Bryan¡¯s not in Pandemonium right now. Haha, it seems that he¡¯s gone to cial Peak. There¡¯s no way he¡¯ll be able to make it back that quick! We should destroy all he has built here andy in wait for his return before wiping him out!¡±

    Dagmar and Asser suddenly turned and looked at each other before asking Dhaka suspiciously, ¡°Are you sure?¡±

    ¡°A hundred percent!¡± replied Dhaka confidently but without exining the source of his information. He put on a mischievous smirk and said, ¡°Come, let¡¯s go!¡±

    Dhaka then took the lead and stepped into the thick fog confidently and without any hesitation. Dagmar and Asser hesitated for a bit but they decided to trust Dhaka and followed behind him.

    As soon as they entered the thick fog, they noticed that their senses were greatly affected. Not only were their visions heavily obstructed, even their divine souls could not extend far.

    ¡°Everyone be careful, this is a perilous ce. But as long as we three stick together, nothing should go wrong,¡± said Dhaka after his fellow Hegemons also stepped into the fog.

    Dhaka heard no response even after waiting for a long while

    ¡°Dagmar! Asser! Where are you? Why aren¡¯t you talking?¡± shouted the startled Dhaka. He heard nothing but the echoes of his own voice that were reverberating louder and louder as though they were amplified by something. Then, as though triggered by his voice, an unknown energy suddenly swarmed towards him.

 Chapter 957 - Taking a Risk

    GDK 957: Taking a Risk

    Dhaka had never expected that something like that would happen right after they stepped into the thick fog. After calling out a few times loudly without receiving a response, he knew that something odd had happened to Dagmar and Asser. They wouldn¡¯t just vanish like that.

    He gave it some thought; the three of them weren¡¯t even that far apart. Their sudden disappearance caused Dhaka to be on even higher alert.

    He had intended to find the other two before proceeding any deeper, but before he could sweep the area with his consciousness to locate them, he noticed that he had been wrapped by a thickyer of seemingly benign smoke. It was as if he had fallen into a quagmire, constantly sinking and about to be submerged at any moment. His limbs felt thousands of times heavier than before. It took him more than ten times the force to even raise his arm.

    As the smoke enveloped him, it entered his body through his pores. Not only did he feel much heavier, he also started to numb. The smoke definitely contained some form of toxin.

    Even so, it was not able to do any proper harm to him. Dhaka smirked as he caused the energy of destruction in his body to erupt from his body, annihting the toxin that had entered it and forming a barrier over his body at the same time.

    All of a sudden, the weight of the smoke was suddenly lifted, giving him back control over his body.

    Being one of the twelve Hegemons of the overgod realm, Dhaka was famous for hisbat strength. The edict of destruction had always been one that focused on powerful attacks, and Dhaka was willing to do anything to constantly get stronger. A minor setback like this wouldn¡¯t be able to ovee him.

    After breaking from the toxic smoke, he made a sweep with his soul in an attempt to locate Dagmar and Asser. However, his mastery over this was still inferior to Dagmar¡¯s. He felt his soul sense being restricted from spreading too far by a weird body of air. He couldn¡¯t even span the hundred meters in his immediate surroundings, let alone find Dagmar and Asser across the whole of Pandemonium.

    <i>Thankfully Bryan¡¯s not in Pandemonium. Otherwise, he would¡¯ve taken the chance to sneak attack one of us already,</i> he thought as he slowly marched towards the depths of Pandemonium.

    ......

    Meanwhile near the center of Pandemonium...

    ¡°Dhaka really is impressive. He was barely affected by the fog. I guess my master was right. The outer defenses might work against normal gods, but not those at the overgod realm,¡± Gilbert said. Seeing Dhaka shake off the effects of the fog from the magical mirror and break through a few barriers within Pandemonium, he felt rather impressed.

    ¡°Every expert that reaches the overgod realm are terrifying beings. Dhaka, Dagmar and Asser, being Hegemons of the godhunters, are people who have emerged to stand atop a mountain of corpses. We can¡¯t afford to underestimate people like that!¡± Bonds said with a serious look. After a moment, he looked to Han Hao and said, ¡°With him barging in so forcefully, I worry that most of the formations won¡¯t be able to stop him. Do you think we should lead him to this spot instead?¡± He pointed at an area that looked like a small hill.

    The Five Elite Zombies, seeing Bonds point at the spot, seemed a little taken aback. However, they didn¡¯t speak a word and only turned to Han Hao.

    As the leader of the Fringe-dwelling godhunters, Han Hao was well trusted by Stratholme, Phoebe and the others of the House of Han, despite not spending much time with them.

    Han Hao looked at the spot with a contemtive gaze. After a moment of thought, he said, ¡°Alright. I¡¯ll make a trip there myself to lead him there.¡±

    Han Jin, surprised, said, ¡°Big Brother, let someone else do it. Over there is where the most terrifying formation of Pandemonium is deployed. Father had warned us that the formation doesn¡¯t differentiate friend from foe. Anyone that enters the area will be attacked indiscriminately, and the formation won¡¯t ever stop working as long as there is a sign of life in it and the energy within Pandemonium hasn¡¯t been used up!¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s fine,¡± he said. He didn¡¯t say anything else before turning to leave.

    ¡°Wait!¡± Though Scarlett didn¡¯t really seem too worried at first, she felt something was off after listening to Bonds and Han Jin.

    Han Hao turned to her and said, ¡°I will be fine!¡± He left right after without dy.

    Just as he left, through the magical mirror, everyone noticed Dhaka activating his divine energy to the fullest, forming Orbs of Destruction to be sent all over the ce indiscriminately. Some of the formations were more or less ruined by the chaotic bombardment while others could barely operate at full capacity.

    Unlike Dhaka, Dagmar and Asser had entered Pandemonium with utmost caution despite how brave sounding they were initially. They were so careful that they only took small steps, unlike Dhaka who destroyed almost everything he came across.

    ¡°These two are huge threats as well. They didn¡¯t go all out because they still didn¡¯t have a grasp of the situation before. Once they leave the fog and are no longer under its influence, they¡¯ll definitely go sting away at everything in Pandemonium like Dhaka,¡± Bonds calmly said.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. They¡¯ll soon encounter the Infernal Psychedemon Formation. The two of them will be held back there for some time at least. Once they leave it, the Skysunder Lightning Formation awaits. So, there¡¯s no need to worry about the two of them,¡± Han Jin whispered to Bonds.

    ¡°Great!¡± Bonds¡¯ voice was raised a little higher to draw the attention of the others. ¡°Everyone, let¡¯s get preparing. Once Han Hao leads Dhaka into that ce, we¡¯ll immediately leave Pandemonium through the underground tunnel. The three¡¯s subordinates are waiting outside and I want to use our household¡¯s might to deal a heavy blow to them while the three are in here.¡±

    ¡°Of course!¡± Sangius loudly said, ¡°Since those godhunters have a deathwish, we should oblige!¡±

    ¡°Sanguis, instruct the guards to get ready. However, wait for my signal. Only bring them into the fight through the underground tunnel after I say it¡¯s clear, alright?¡± Bonds warned, knowing how reckless Sanguis could be sometimes.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I know what to do!¡± Sanguis said before impatiently leaving with Gilbert.

    ......

    Within the valley, all sorts of formations were covered in fog. Han Hao flew past them like a wraith armed with his bone spear.

    A few demon generals stealthily flew out from his bone spear and snuck up to Dhaka, who was destroying everything in the distance, to monitor his every move.

    Han Hao had memorized all the formations and energy barriers Andrina had deployed along the way thanks to his impable memory. He quickly sped towards Dhaka.

    An insidious aura was present all across Pandemonium. Whenever the formations were activated, the killing intent they radiated would cause those within it to feel a chill down their spine which would also affect the energy within their bodies. However, Han Hao didn¡¯t hate this ce. Instead, he found it ratherfortable. The environment was ideal for his cultivation of demonic arts.

    His bone spear swayed about in his hand and shot out a dark beam from time to time, all the while an eerie wail emanated from it. Though, it was so soft that one wouldn¡¯t pick it up unless one really listened for it.

    Gradually, he arrived at the location Bonds had talked about; he could already feel the danger as he approached. The demon generals that he sent out made sure to avoid that area and even the countless souls contained within the bone spear seemed to want to leave the area too.

    ¡°You may go anywhere you want within Pandemonium, but you¡¯ll have to be on your utmost care at one ce. Even you shouldn¡¯t enter it! That ce will destroy anything that enters it regardless if it¡¯s friend or foe!¡± Feeling the fearing from the souls in the bone spear, Han Hao recalled Han Shuo¡¯s warning to him before he left. He stood still at the edge of the area without taking a single step in. He gave it some thought before pushing the spear into the ground by his feet as he infused some odd runes and energy into it.

    He then let go. The bone spear sank slowly into the ground until only one small part of it was exposed. It then began to let out a grey smoke.

    After some hesitation, Han Hao left empty handed and charged past the various formations back to where Dhaka was. Soon, he was there and he immediately sent a surge of soul energy rumbling towards him.

    All of a sudden, Dhaka felt his head hurt midway through his rampage and immediately noticed Han Hao¡¯s presence. The physically tough Dhaka was a little weak towards soul attacks, so the full-powered soul energy strike Han Hao used was enough to make Dhaka feel his head splitting with pain.

    He hurriedly stopped his wanton destruction and focused his attention on resisting the soul attack. Just as he was doing so, he noticed that the soul energy that permeated his consciousness had vanished the next instant. Not far from him, Han Hao looked a little panicked as he attempted to flee.

    ¡°Hmph, you¡¯vee to die, have you not?!¡± Dhaka smirked and couldn¡¯t wait to give chase. He was not a cultivator of the edict of death and therefore, even if Han Hao had mastered the Quintessence Shard¡¯s power, he¡¯d still be immune to its effects.

    That¡¯s why, while Dagmar was afraid of Han Hao, Dhaka wasn¡¯t.

 Chapter 958 - Unrestricted Access

    GDK 958: Unrestricted ess

    Every person that managed to cultivate to the overgod realm was incredibly powerful, and Dhaka was no exception. Han Hao¡¯s soul tremor attack couldn¡¯t really deal any real harm to him, for he managed to easily dispel the soul attack by focusing his attention.

    Unable to disable Pandemonium¡¯s defenses despite having wantonly destroyed many of the formations, Dhaka chose to hunt down Han Hao instead.

    His mind steeled with resolve; he was worried there wouldn¡¯t be anyone there to guide or wee him. Now that Han Hao had showed up, there was no way he would let him leave just like that. Dhaka followed behind Han Hao fearlessly and no longer attacked any stone pirs he saw. He focused on chasing down Han Hao instead.

    ¡°It¡¯ll be fine, right?¡± Stratholme said worriedly as he watched it from the magical mirror.

    Bonds seemed calm as always, as if he wouldn¡¯t panic and try to escape even if the sky was to crumble. He watched Dhaka chase down Han Hao through the mirror and said in an uncertain voice, ¡°I don¡¯t know either. But I bet Senior Brother has exined how dangerous that ce is to him. I believe he¡¯s at least confident enough to return after bringing Dhaka there!¡±

    ¡°Hope it¡¯ll work out. Otherwise, I don¡¯t know how we¡¯ll be held ountable for this...¡± Stratholme said with a bitter smile. He knew how deep the rtionship between Han Shuo and Han Hao was. If thetter really fell in Pandemonium, Han Shuo would no doubt be filled with anger and no one in the chamber would want to face his wrath.

    ¡°He¡¯ll be fine, definitely!¡± Though Bonds sounded certain, he actually felt a little ambivalent about it.

    ¡°Look!¡± Phoebe cried and pointed at the magical mirror. ¡°He¡¯s gone in!¡±

    Bonds, Stratholme and the rest ceased talking and looked at where she was pointing at, all tense with suspense and anticipation.

    After the various defenses in Pandemonium were set up, Han Shuo had informed them about it so that they didn¡¯t identally enter these dangerous formations themselves.

    The spot they were looking at was the Sky Annihtion Formation, which none of the members of the House of Han should ever approach once it was activated. Those that did would no doubt die.

    Han Shuo had made sure to repeat his warning more than a couple of times and made sure to bring up the formation¡¯s danger whenever he briefed them about Pandemonium without exception.

    ......

    Han Hao was now standing still at the outer edge of the formation. All of a sudden, nine bolts of ferocious lightning cameunching towards him like an unstoppable force of nature, as if it wouldpletely annihte Han Hao¡¯s soul. Endless amounts of hatred condensed and formed into nine towering mountains that hurtled towards him, each as powerful as a full-force strike of an overgod.

    The ground was nowhere to be seen, having been reced by an endless dark abyss. A pulling force simr to gravity could instantly be felt. It was so powerful that Han Hao seemed to be unable to resist it as it dragged him towards the depths.

    The forces of lightning, mountains and gravity all targeted him clearly. It seemed like he wouldn¡¯t be able to escape the attacks no matter how he dodged, and that was only with him stepping into the outer edges of the formation.

    Just as he was about to block the iing attacks as he continued his descent, he noticed a figure enter the abyss from the outside. ted, he immediately gave up on blocking the three attacks, choosing to unleash all the power contained within his trump card in an instant.

    Outside the Sky Annihtion Formation, the part of the bone spear that poked out of the ground shone rightly. One talon after another sprouted from the spear itself. All of a sudden, the negative energies that festered in Pandemonium seemed to be drawn towards the spikes that just appeared on the spear.

    Before long, a pir of light roughly as broad as a human zipped into the range of the formation to form a path that reached Han Hao as he fell towards the very bottom of the abyss.

    His eyes brightened before he jumped into the column of light. All of a sudden, the column quickly narrowed itself as it receded towards the surface.

    The moment Dhaka entered the Sky Annihtion Formation, he suddenly noticed that his edict of destruction was heavily affected. That area seemed to have changed thews governing destruction in an instant. The divine energy of destruction contained within his body grew more chaotic, making it impossible for him to form the Orbs of Destruction even though it used to be effortless for him.

    Not only that, the powerful lightning bolts and force from the crushing mountains as well as the gravity that tugged at him from the abyss¡¯s depths was certainly felt by him. The killing intent and hatred that were essential to the attacks greatly disturbed his peace of mind.

    At that moment, Han Hao used his bone spear to quickly leave the abyss. Dhaka finally seemed to realize he had fallen for his trap and forced his destruction energy to stabilize before desperately propelling himself upwards to escape.

    Wham! Even though he felt almost no resistance as he entered the abyss, any attempt to ascend felt like it would be met with thebined weight of tens of thousands of formless mountains pressing down on him. There wasn¡¯t a single way for him to break through that obstacle, especially with his unstable power.

    ¡°Phew...¡± Han Hao finally managed to leave the Sky Annihtion Formation. He drew his bone spear out of the ground and it returned to its usual form almost immediately, looking no different than it did before.

    ¡°He¡¯s back out!¡± Bonds cheered with relief. While he was the one who asked Stratholme to calm down, he wasn¡¯t any bit as confident as thetter that Han Hao would be able to escape.

    ¡°Wonderful!¡± Stratholme cheerfully took a swig of booze. ¡°Now that Dhaka has been trapped, our job just got much easier. Dagmar and Asser will have many other formations waiting for him. No matter how careful they are, they¡¯ll never be able to avoid them. I¡¯m guessing they¡¯ll need at least ten days to make their way out.¡±

    Bonds¡¯ gaze calmed as he said, ¡°It¡¯s about time weunched a counterattack. I¡¯ll inform Sanguis, Gilbert and the others about it. The godhunters outside are now leaderless and they¡¯re not our match.¡±

    They cheered as they prepared to face the godhunters with a light heart.

    ......

    Han Shuo and Wasir zipped towards Pandemonium at full speed. After Wasir heard about the Dhaka trio¡¯s huge loss, he felt even more respect for Han Shuo now, though he didn¡¯t make it a point to tell him about it. The way he saw it, Han Shuo was undisputedly superior to Tyre, the leading one of the Five Sovereign, both in terms of personal power and his team¡¯s might.

    On the way, one question constantly weighed on Wasir¡¯s mind: why didn¡¯t Han Shuo seem worried at all about the impending battle? Where did his confidencee from? No matter what, the Five Sovereigns of the Fringe wouldn¡¯t be enough to take on the Godhunter Alliance. After all, they were just five overgods, while the alliance had far more. Not only did the number of experts in the alliance greatly outnumber that of the Fringe, their strengths were definitely far superior too.

    No matter who one asked, the Fringe didn¡¯t seem to stand a chance against the Godhunter Alliance. Wasir had made preparations to leave the Fringe with his subordinates before the battle began. Had it not for Han Shuo¡¯s assurance that cial Peak wouldn¡¯t suffer one bit throughout the battle, he wouldn¡¯t have stubbornly remained.

    ¡°Bryan, why do you think Tyre, Logue, and Ossora stayed to fight this bloody battle?¡± He decided a direct approach at questioning would be better.

    ¡°Tyre and Logue want to use this chance to control the Fringe. The two of them definitely don¡¯t have any kind intentions, so they must have some sort of hidden trump card. As for Ossora, to be frank, I just don¡¯t really understand his motives. However, he definitely has his own agenda. Perhaps he¡¯ll do something that surprises,¡± Han Shuo replied after some thought.

    ¡°Ever since you came to the Fringe, Ossora has tried to get on your good side. Why, then, did you choose to cooperate to work with me instead of him?¡± This was something that bothered him so much, yet he wasn¡¯t able to figure out why.

    ¡°Ossora?¡± Han Shuo smiled. ¡°He¡¯s definitely been trying to butter me up. Yet, what did that end up causing? A fight with Ss, a grudge with Tyre and Logue, as well as a huge fight with you. And what exactly did he risk? Nothing but one Sovereign shop and the chance to appear stronger than Ss.¡±

    He shook his head and continued, ¡°He¡¯s far too ambitious. I don¡¯t dare to get too close to him nor let him know about my ns. I worry that he¡¯ll mess me up at the crucial moment, and I won¡¯t be able to do anything about it.¡±

    ¡°He is someone you can¡¯t easily figure out indeed,¡± Wasir agreed after some pondering.

    ......

    Meanwhile, the person they were talking about was now outside Pandemonium with a group of remnants.

    The forces of the House of Han, led by Bonds, Sanguis and Gilbert, were killing off the godhunters that invaded their territory. The enemies were mercilessly crushed before the remnants scampered off in shambles.

    Ossora looked like he had just been a part of the great battle. His men¡¯s hands were bloodstained and many had to be supported to remain upright. Ossora ordered, ¡°Help the House of Han defeat the godhunters!¡±

 Chapter 959 - Who Could You Even Kill?

    <h4>Chapter 959: Who Could You Even Kill?</h4>

    Without the support of the Dhaka trio, the godhunters werepletely not the match of the soldiers of the House of Han. Their ughter continued on without an end in sight.

    Rose, Romon, Sanguis, Zovic, and Bonds, the elites of the House of Han, took part in the chaotic battle. Even Han Hao¡¯s subordinates, be they members of the Han household guard or his personal subordinates, using demonicbat formations, worked in tandem to fight the godhunters.

    The invaders werepletely outmatched. The moment Ossora arrived with his own men, it only served to elerate the godhunters¡¯ demise. They had no choice but to escape rather than waiting for Dhaka and the rest to return to help them.

    Back then, they had already suffered a huge loss from Han Hao at the three-mountain valley, with most of them have not yet recovered from the injuries they suffered on that day. Faced with the fearsome fighters, it was as if they had forgotten that their leaders were not with them as they fled the ce.

    As they ran, the warriors of the Han household gave chase. Using their familiarity with the terrain, they were able to ambush the fleeing godhunters at many corners before dealing them another heavy blow.

    Yet, this should have been a wless victory for them, had they suffered no incident along the way. The warriors repelling the invaders had thought themselves to far outpower their enemies and charged in recklessly without regard to the risks.

    Soon, they found that the initially confused godhunters seemed to muster their courage to fight back. One after another, theyshed out like cornered mad dogs.

    Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert were fighting at the very front and were shocked to see the change. They didn¡¯t understand why the desperately fleeing godhunters would suddenly counter with a renewed fervor without regard for their own losses. They were obviously not a match for the warriors of the Han household, yet they seemed to have gotten newfound confidence to fight back. What was the source of their renewed fighting spirit?

    Bonds felt that something was off. Before the godhunters could approach, he ordered, ¡°Head back!¡±

    ¡°Why? They¡¯vee to die and we¡¯re merely granting their wishes! Haha, I worry that we won¡¯t have enough of them to kill,¡± Gilbert said as he gave Bonds a curious stare.

    ¡°Something¡¯s fishy!¡± he replied, ¡°Everyone, head back, now!¡±

    ¡°Gilbert, go!¡± Sanguis yelled the moment he saw Gilbert about to talk back. ¡°There¡¯s reinforcements. I can feel lots of killing intent approaching us!¡±

    Gilbert, now genuinely startled, no longer wasted time talking and retreated as he cried out, ¡°Everyone, head back! Stop pursuing, it¡¯s a darned trap!¡±

    The moment the fighters heard Gilbert¡¯s warning, they immediately turned back to whence they came. At that moment, many experts suddenly appeared from behind the fleeing godhunters. It was in to see from the color of their outfits that they weren¡¯t the subordinates of Dhaka, Dagmar, or Asser, though they seemed just as bloodthirsty. One thing was without question: they were also godhunters.

    ¡°They¡¯re the ones pursuing Ossora. Darn it, didn¡¯t he just say that he managed to lose them?¡± Sanguis snapped when he took a look behind him.

    Thanks to their timely reaction, their subordinates might be spared. While the leaders might¡¯ve survived the sh, the other normal warriors of the Han household would¡¯ve perished from the sudden onught that would¡¯ve happened.

    The thought of the mere possibility of that happening caused Sanguis to feel like cursing Ossora for inadvertently leading those people to Pandemonium. The least he could do was make sure he wasn¡¯t being followed beforeing to Pandemonium.

    ¡°Quick, run!¡± Bonds yelled even louder as he felt a huge presence from behind. There was definitely one Hegemon among the pursuers.

    It only took them one look for them to tell that they were no match for the new invaders. All of a sudden, a gentle breeze caused a person to manifest.

    With a gentle smile, the Hegemon Miller created a wind barrier in front of Sanguis, Gilbert, and Bonds.

    Three men ahead of Sanguis couldn¡¯t stop in time and rammed into a barrier, only to be repelled. None of them managed to barge their way through.

    All of a sudden, a ferocious tornado, made from the divine energy of an overgod, formed near them. The air itself became the sharpest of des that yed the skin and flesh of the warriors before tearing their bodies apart in an instant.

    Sanguis¡¯s eyes turned bloodshot. he drew his blood-colored sword that let out a beam five meters long, making the air smell of blood. Fresh blood seemed to flow around the sword itself, making it seem even more sinister. Sanguis¡¯s body turned into a bloody glow before fusing with his sword and piercing towards Miller¡¯s barrier at full speed.

    With the sound of tearing, arge hole was opened in the barrier that could let three people pass through at once. Sanguis was the first one to go through it, with Bonds and Gilbert following behind. Some of their subordinates were quick to notice the opening and went in after, escaping the wind barrier.

    However, some dozens of others weren¡¯t so lucky. Before they were able to escape, they noticed the hole had closed up. This time around, the barrier was reinforced with even denser wind elements,pletely sealing off their escape route.

    ¡°Hmph!¡± Miller¡¯s expression was one of surprise, having not anticipated Sanguis¡¯s piercing through his barrier. Though he had put together the barrier casually on the spot, it still wasn¡¯t something that could be easily damaged. Sanguis¡¯s ability to channel all the force of momentum into a sharp point to be unleashed with the shortest impact time for unparalleled destruction broadened Miller¡¯s horizons.

    With an even thickeryer of wind element reinforcing the barrier, Miller continued his assault using wind des on the warriors that were left within it, turning them into bloody paste. He then turned into a gust of wind to flow through the barrier he made effortlessly to catch up with Sanguis and the rest.

    ¡°What about the rest?¡± Gilbert roared the moment he left the barrier.

    Bonds didn¡¯t say a word. His expression was deathly cold. He knew that there were some warriors that couldn¡¯t make it. Fighters of their caliber definitely wouldn¡¯tst a few seconds against Miller. Gilbert¡¯s worry was unwarranted; they were sure to have died by now.

    Seeing Bonds remain silent, Gilbert could already guess what had happened to them. His eyes reddened as he decided to turn back and put up a desperate fight. All of a sudden, his body stopped in mid-air; it seemed like he was no longer going to retreat.

    ¡°Grab him!¡± Bonds told Sanguis before he immediately stretched his hand out as well. He and Sanguis each managed to grab one of his arms before they flew back towards Pandemonium, ignoring Gilbert¡¯s protests.

    ¡°Little fellow, you have a really unique power. Haha¡­ stay and let us investigate what exactly it is!¡± Miller said from behind them. All of a sudden, he surrounded the three of them with another wind barrier that couldn¡¯t even bepared with the one from before.

    The moment Sanguis saw the barrier, he immediately turned back to re at Miller. He knew that this time around, he wouldn¡¯t be able to breach the barrier, so he didn¡¯t bother to waste any effort on it. It would be more productive to fight Miller. Even if he couldn¡¯t kill him, he could at least hurt him somewhat if he fought hard enough.

    The moment Bonds and Gilbert saw Sanguis give up on trying to escape, they knew that they were in a crucial juncture. It was as if they left the panic they had from before behind as they focused their hateful res on Miller.

    The other warriors stood quietly behind the three of them. Not one of them showed the slightest hint of weakness or fear. They seemedpletely calm, as if death was nothing but a diforting inconvenience for them that they had already prepared for.

    Miller wasn¡¯t in a rush to attack. He made sure to take in the looks on their faces before he praised, ¡°As expected of elite troops like yours. It¡¯s no wonder Dhaka and the rest would crumble just like that. Well, now you have a choice to make. Either you surrender your souls immediately and swear allegiance to me or be killed by me right this instant!¡±

    ¡°Who could you even kill?¡± someone called from the depths of the area. A tear suddenly appeared beneath Bonds as a grim-looking Han Hao emerged with his bone spear. He nced at Miller before turning to Bonds and the rest. ¡°You have no business here. Go back to Pandemonium from beneath!¡±

    ¡°Haha, I¡¯ve heard much of your reputation, Han Hao. You sure do seem like you live up to it!¡± Miller said as he pped excitedly. ¡°However, do you think you¡¯ll be able to protect them?¡±

    ¡°You¡¯re free to try!¡± Han Hao focused his full attention on Miller, pointing his bone spear at him as he would a great foe. The seven bone spurs on his back also began to shake heavily.

 Chapter 960 - Were Not Leaving!

    <h4>GDK 960: We¡¯re Not Leaving!</h4>

    Han Tu was no doubting from the crack in the ground. However, Bonds, Gilbert and Sanguis merely gave it a passing nce without the slightest intention of leaving through it.

    ¡°You guys should go!¡± Bonds said, pointing at the warriors behind him. They had been trained most often by Bonds and would never hesitate to do as he ordered. Without hesitation, they jumped into the crack in the ground.

    MIller¡¯s smile receded as a gentle breeze came blowing out of his palm. A barrier formed over the crack in the ground and the warriors that had entered were sent bouncing back out.

    ¡°If I say nobody¡¯s leaving, I mean it!¡± Miller approached Han Hao menacingly, his every step causing a small twister to form, eventually covering the whole area.

    Han Hao squinted as the seven bone spurs shot out of his back towards the wind barrier over the crack. With a loud crash, a hole was torn on the barrier.

    ¡°Go, now!¡± Bonds yelled. The warriors quickly jumped into the crack, leaving not one of their own behind. This time around, there was nothing to stop them.

    ¡°You three too, go!¡± Han Hao said without even turning back. A red glow shone in his purple eyes as he red at the approaching Miller. Specters came out of the bone spear in his hand and gathered around him.

    ¡°Han Hao, we¡¯re not leaving!¡± Gilbert stubbornly said, ¡°We can¡¯t watch you die for our sake! If we¡¯re to die, let all of us do it together!¡±

    ¡°Hahaha, well said. You should all die together!¡± Miller smirked andshed out without warning. Strong gusts of wind shot out like humongous torrents out of nowhere towards the three of them,pletely enveloping them.

    With a stretch of his hand, he made a sharp, saw-toothed de with the cold winds and shed with it. The de spun at high speeds and covered the whole of Han Hao. The sudden surge of Miller¡¯s power put his abilities as an overgod of wind on full disy. Only those on the same level as he was could stand a chance against it; those weaker than him would be trapped by the strong winds without question.

    ¡°How dare small fries like you act so arrogantly?¡± Miller mocked. He didn¡¯t consider Bonds and the rest his match at all. Even Sanguis, who had breached the barrier he made, only merited the slightest bit of caution. He didn¡¯t think Sanguis could really fight him on even footing.

    Though he continued to mock them arrogantly, Miller was actually paying close attention to Han Hao, who was currently being entrapped by the saw-toothed wind de. As far as he was concerned, Han Hao was the only troublesome one among them, though even then he was someone that Miller didn¡¯t have to use his full force to fight.

    All of a sudden, Miller¡¯s expression suddenly shifted. ¡°What?!¡±

    Loud wails and cries of wraiths could be hearding from Han Hao¡¯s direction as a gigantic silhouette formed. The figure wed and bit at the surroundings, ravaging everything in its path.

    The de formed from Miller¡¯s wind energy was immediately shattered into countless fragments after the figure bit down onto it, causing the wind element thatprised it to disperse. They could never form together into the solid de again.

    At the same time, Han Hao¡¯s bone spear opened its wide, ghastly mouth, resembling a hellish dragon that had climbed out of its prison in the abyss for the first time in aeons. It emanated endless hatred and killing intent as it closed in for a bite.

    Miller¡¯s expression was grave. Now, there was no longer the slightest hint of underestimationing from him. He now knew that Han Hao was a match on his caliber.

    All of a sudden, Miller¡¯s body began to turn rapidly, causing arge tornado to form with him in the center. The tornado stretched all the way to the sky and covered a ten-kilometer area. All the flora and rocks were crushed and absorbed into the tornado.

    Miller was now at the eye of the storm, continuously supplying energy to his colossal creation that threatened to swallow all. Not only did it pull whatever it could into it, it even managed to pull Han Hao¡¯s bone spear towards it.

    Sounds of crying and howling could be heard from within the tornado. The moment the bone spear entered it, the tornado began to slow down, as if it was diverting all its power to move a mountain.

    ¡°Go, now!¡± Han Hao cried as he sent out his bone spur to disperse the wind energy that bound them. Bonds and the rest were quite shocked at the development.

    ¡°I¡¯m still not his match yet, so I can only hold him back for a bit. I can¡¯t defeat him!¡± Han Hao exined before he charged into the crack himself.

    Bonds and the rest no longer hesitated and followed behind. If Miller was someone even Han Hao admitted to not being able to defeat, the three of them wouldn¡¯t even stand a chance. There was nothing else they could do but run.

    The moment they entered the ground, the crack above them closed back up. There wasn¡¯t a single trace of it remaining.

    At the same time, the bone spear Han Hao tossed into the tornado suddenly weighed much more than before and sank into the ground. One after another, earth spikes asrge as hills filled the tornado, spreading out the force it channeled to the point the tornado could no longer sustain the spinning.

    The bone spear fell straight onto one of the hills before disappearing beneath it like a drop of water in the ocean. At the same time, the horrifying energy that had filled the tornado before was now nowhere to be felt.

    With the bone spear gone, it took away the power of the earth with it. The hills that had sprouted lost their support immediately and crumbled into soil. Miller¡¯s body could be seen once more. He looked at the ground pensively and praised, ¡°It seems that this is thanks to that fellow called Han Tu. Those from the House of Han truly dabble in some interesting cultivation techniques. Thankfully, they used some rather interesting contraptions this time. Otherwise, my trip would¡¯ve been wasted.¡±

    ......

    Back underground, Gilbert said, ¡°Han Hao, where¡¯s your weapon? Did you discard it?¡± He knew how important the bone spear was to him. Seeing how it was left above ground, he felt rather worried.

    Han Hao turned back and said, ¡°It¡¯sing.¡±

    Before Gilbert could react, the bone spear suddenly burst out of the muddy wall beside them andnded in Han Hao¡¯s hand.

    ¡°Han Hao, how many did we lose?¡± Bonds¡¯s expression was cold and grim. The ones that followed them weren¡¯t the only ones to leave Pandemonium on the offence. There were surely more of them who didn¡¯t manage to escape Miller¡¯s ughter, considering that even they only barely just made it.

    ¡°More than fifty were killed, but most of them were mine. Most of you lot¡¯s are fine, so don¡¯t worry,¡± he replied calmly after some thought.

    Bonds was shocked and wondered why most of the casualties were Han Hao¡¯s, though something seemed to ur to himter. After some hesitation, he said, ¡°Thank you!¡±

    Han Hao nodded without saying much as he sped up his pace to head towards the underground pce Pandemonium.

    After some time, they soon arrived at arge stone room within the pce. The Five Elite Zombies, Stratholme, Zovic, and Rose had gathered there. All of them seemed to be in a rather foul mood.

    When Hao Hao arrived, he asked, ¡°Where¡¯s Ossora and the others?¡±

    ¡°They are over at the guest room not far away from here,¡± Stratholme said. After some hesitation, he said, ¡°What the heck is wrong with that Ossora? Why didn¡¯t he make sure that he wasn¡¯t being followed and led the pursuers here? We lost quite a lot of people. Rose and Zovic only just barely made it back alive, thanks to all the digging Han Tu did.¡±

    ¡°Guest room, huh? It¡¯s within the underground pce, right?¡±

    ¡°Yeah.¡± Stratholme found Han Hao to be reacting a little oddly. Back then, Ossora had saved Pandemonium from being destroyed by Ss. And this time around, he hade with reinforcements to help them in a time of need. They should be weed inside, if anything.

    ¡°Who was the one who brought Ossora in here?¡± Han Hao coldly asked, ¡°Didn¡¯t I instruct them to be left above ground before I left to seek out Gilbert and the rest?¡±

    ¡°Ossora was the one who said he wanted toe in for a look. He saved Pandemonium back then and has a good rtionship with Bryan, so there isn¡¯t anything inappropriate about it, right?¡± Phoebe said with a furrowed brow. She also found Han Hao¡¯s attitude to be a little off.

    ¡°The underground pce is the home base of the House of Han! Father had said not to let outsiders inside! Let me ask you this: do you think Ossora¡¯s an outsider?¡± Han Hao said, ring at Phoebe coldly. He then turned to Zovic and instructed, ¡°Go take Ossora out. Either he stays somewhere above ground or the mountains where Goron and the rest are.¡±

    ¡°Isn¡¯t that really impolite to our guest?¡± Phoebe snapped.

    ¡°There¡¯s something fishy about Ossora! Given his power, there¡¯s no way he wouldn¡¯t have noticed the pursuers that were tailing him! The fact that he didn¡¯t bring it up when he met up with us shows that he¡¯s nning something!¡± He paused to take a deep breath. ¡°Zovic, what are you waiting for?!¡±

    Zovic sneaked Phoebe a nce. Seeing how she was seriously contemting Han Hao¡¯s allegations, he hesitated. He decided he would rather offend Phoebe than Han Hao and left immediately.

 Chapter 961 - He Doesnt Want To

    <h4>GDK 961: He Doesn¡¯t Want To</h4>

    While there were many women in the House of Han, there were few who actually had a say in matters. Phoebe and Emily were among the few. Back then during Han Shuo¡¯s absences, the two of them held quite a lot of authority. Even old Stratholme and Ayermike had to respect their opinions.

    But ever since Han Hao came about, things took a slightly different turn. Thanks to his amazing power as well as having the respect of Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert, he had quietly be another leader in the House of Han. Phoebe felt a little unhappy about her position being taken from her.

    Stratholme, Bonds, and Gilbert remained quiet and watched as Zovic left, tacitly epting Han Hao¡¯s instructions and his authority.

    Feeling a little annoyed, Phoebe nced at Han Hao and said, ¡°Ossora probably just failed to notice because he was worried for his subordinates, or because he was worn out from all the fighting. He couldn¡¯t have intentionally caused us trouble, right?¡±

    Emily and Fanny seemed to agree with the assessment. The women usually got along well with each other, so it was natural they took the same side.

    ¡°Your abilities aren¡¯t anywhere close to his level yet, so it¡¯s no surprise you aren¡¯t aware of how potent the sensing abilities of an overgod is. Even if Ossora had been greatly injured, his sense should¡¯ve been able to pick up hidden dangers. There was no way he wouldn¡¯t have a single clue,¡± Han Hao calmly said, not bothered by the woman¡¯s anger at all.

    After some consideration, he decided they shouldn¡¯t dwell on the matter. He turned to Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert. ¡°Gather the most core members of the household. We must remain together at times like this.¡±

    ¡°Okay!¡± Bonds immediately left to carry out that order.

    ¡°Han Tu, the five of you should also get ready. The moment something happens, transport everyone as quickly as possible to the control center of the formations in Pandemonium. That¡¯s where the defenses are the strongest. You will be able to utilize the yuan energy in Pandemonium to block attacks from the outside. Even overgods will be unable to breach it as long as Pandemonium¡¯s energy reserves haven¡¯t run out yet,¡± he continued without even so much as ncing at Phoebe.

    The Five Elite Zombies did as they were told without any second-guessing. It was as if nobody cared about Phoebe¡¯s anger. They saw Han Hao as their leader instead and did whatever they were told, ignoring the women¡¯s opinions.

    ¡°I worry that Zovic won¡¯t be able to handle it properly. I¡¯ll go take a look myself,¡± Han Hao said before he turned back to Phoebe. ¡°You should also make some preparations. It¡¯s best you head to the control center immediately. While Pandemonium is huge, that is the most secure location.¡± Han Hao immediately turned and left.

    ¡°I don¡¯t see the slightest hint of how he used to be back then!¡± Lisa remarked with a bitter smile.

    Back during their time at Babylon Academy on the Profound Continent, Little Skeleton had been ordered by Han Shuo to enter Lisa¡¯s room during the night and give her a harsh beating.

    A few years back, ever since Gilbert revealed Han Hao¡¯s identity as Little Skeleton, Lisa was often reminded of that night. She had always tried to identify if Han Hao was the same as he was before, but apart from the seven bone spurs on his back, she could no longer see anything resembling his previous self.

    ¡°He really transformed alright! I didn¡¯t think a necromancy creature would be able to grow to this point,¡± Fanny said with a sigh. She had known him since he was Little Skeleton, but had never imagined things woulde to pass like this.

    ¡°Hmph, he¡¯s arrogant and doesn¡¯t know his ce. I really don¡¯t understand how Bryan brought him up this way!¡± Phoebe snapped.

    ¡°Ugh...¡± Stratholme, who hadn¡¯t left, felt a little awkward. ¡°He saved us, you know, so you can trust his judgments on such matters. Phoebe, Bryan treats Han Hao like his own son. I don¡¯t think he¡¯ll like how you called him an undead creature.¡±

    ¡°Bryan really sees him as his son!¡± Ayermike added. He suddenly seemed to have recalled something. ¡°Umm... You all have been together with Bryan for such a long time... so why haven¡¯t you gotten pregnant yet?¡±

    The moment he said that, the women¡¯s faces turned dark. They seemed a little ufortable. Stratholme shot Ayermike a nce as he thought, <i>The women can¡¯t be jealous of Han Hao, right?</i>

    The more he thought about it, the more usible it sounded. They hadn¡¯t been able to give birth to an heir for the House of Han for so many years, yet Bryan adopted a weirdo like Han Hao to be his son. They were sure to find this rather weird as women.

    Stratholme suddenly awkwardlyughed when this urred to him. The women were acting like that because of their personal issues.

    ¡°Don¡¯t tell me Bryan is... having some problems...¡± Ayermike carefully asked. If the women weren¡¯t to me for not getting pregnant, then the man surely was... The question caused Phoebe and the rest to blush. They didn¡¯t know what to say.

    ¡°Ahem...¡± Stratholme said, ¡°In terms of age, I believe Ayermike and I can be your grandfathers. You can be straightforward about it. If the problem is with Bryan, perhaps we can find a way to rectify it. This is no small matter as it is paramount for the House of Han¡¯s future! We have to regard it seriously!¡±

    ¡°Where is your imagination taking you?!¡± Emily snapped. She stole a nce at Stratholme and Ayermike as she stuttered, ¡°It¡¯s... it¡¯s just... Bryan doesn¡¯t want it... He said... he said he¡¯ll only impregnate us after he deals with all the dangers and threats!¡±

    The moment she said that, the two men understood the situation. Given Han Shuo¡¯s power, he could easily control every single part of his body. It would certainly be child¡¯s y for him to not give any of the women a child.

    ¡°I see... Then I guess we¡¯ll be waiting for quite some time. When everything is over and we are safe, it should work out,¡± Stratholme said. He felt like this matter was easier to solve than he had imagined.

    ¡°We... We¡¯ve been waiting a long time. It¡¯s been near a century since we came to Elysium. I wonder how long it will take to make sure all possible threats are neutralized?¡± Phoebeined. She seemed to be rather annoyed about that matter.

    ¡°Umm... We¡¯ll talk to Bryan about this when he gets back. It might just work out, you know,¡± Ayermike said, seeing how yearningly the women looked at him.

    Surprised and delighted, the three women said, ¡°Really?¡±

    ¡°We¡¯ll do our best... Promise...¡± Stratholme hurriedly shot Ayermike a sly smile.

    ¡°Thank you so much!¡± the women said in unison. Ayermike and Stratholme were their seniors, after all. If they talked to Han Shou about it, they might really change his mind.

    Han Shuo had been fighting through thick and thin over the years while they stayed in their rooms lonesomely, desperately wanting a child of their own to put their hopes in. Yet, they couldn¡¯t bring themselves to talk to Han Shuo about it, thinking he would be aware of what they wanted. They didn¡¯t expect he would leave their wish hanging for so long.

    ¡°We¡¯ll give it our best effort!¡± Ayermike suddenly found Phoebe and the rest to be rather pitiful. They had left their families in the Profound Continent toe to Elysium, yet they weren¡¯t able to spend much time with him here.

    All of a sudden, a sharp, hissing whistle came through the holes in the walls. The women who were shyly discussing matters of procreation with the two seniors were jolted and they put on grave faces. ¡°This whistle only sounds when the strongest of foes is approaching the underground pce. We only heard it once during a drill when the pce was first built. What¡¯s going on?¡± Phoebe asked.

    ¡°Go! Head for the control center!¡± Startholme said urgently. He knew they were facing crucial times. Nobody would dare to sound the whistle as a joke. Some kind of emergency definitely urred in the pce.

    ¡°Could Han Hao have gotten it right?¡± Lisa wondered with worry.

    ¡°Now¡¯s not the time to think. Protect yourselves first!¡± Ayermike yelled. He pushed a button near the whistle, causing a stone door to open. One after another, they stepped through the door quickly.

    ......

    ¡°Zovic, retreat!¡± Han Hao said as he stood in front of a cavern entrance with his bone spear in hand. He looked at the lightning-covered Hegemon, Regis, and yelled, ¡°Ossora led you here, didn¡¯t he? Where is he?!¡±

    Regis snickered without answering his question. He shot out a bolt of lightning that filled the whole cavern, leaving no room for Han Hao to evade.

    ¡°Han Tu, take everyone away!¡± he yelled before he pierced the bone spear into the cavern walls, causing the earth to fall and block the way between him and Regis. At the same time, his bone spear let out a savage glow that formed into a white bone shield in front of him.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Han Hao said as he dragged Zovic with him.

    With Regis around, Isaiah, the Hegemon of Earth, would definitely be near if not inside the underground pce as well. Han Hao knew that a dire battle awaited them, so it wasn¡¯t the best time to be messing around with Regis.

 Chapter 962 - Underground Assault

    <h4>GDK 962: Underground Assault</h4>

    Regis wasn¡¯t surprised at Han Hao¡¯s reaction. Given the circumstances, retreating was simply the wisest action. What he didn¡¯t expect, however, was that Han Hao would be that decisive in leaving with Zovic without saying anything else.

    Almost immediately, light shone through the cracks in the blockage before it burst open, sending shrapnel flying towards the white bone shield. The beautiful shield shattered into pieces before it turned into powder.

    Regis¡¯s eyes shone with bright electricity. He locked onto Han Hao as he zoomed about and snickered. ¡°You have a decent reaction. You must be a talented one. I wonder how far you can run.¡± Right after, he leaped towards Han Hao, speeding through the dark passageway like a bolt of lightning.

    Han Hao, who was pulling Zovic with him, felt Regis gaining on him from behind. The difort he was sensing was a sign that Regis had locked firmly onto his soul.

    ¡°Zovic, leave first!¡± He loosened his hand before turning around and impaling his bone spear into the ground. As it sunk in, it let out a weird light. All of a sudden, the firm earth around the passageway rippled like a carpet being dusted and shot towards Regis. The energy of death caused countless sharp bone spikes to manifest around the tight passageway facing the iing Regis.

    ¡°Be careful!¡± Zovic said before he turned to run.

    ¡°Not bad, Han Hao!¡± Regis praised once more. He unleashed his power fully in the tight passageway, sending lightning bolts crackling throughout as they shattered the bone spikes one after another.

    With a squint, he sent two bolts of lightning out from his eyes that snaked towards the earthen ¡®carpet¡¯, sessfully neutralizing the attack.

    ¡°Huh?¡± When the dust settled, Regis suddenly realized he had lost track of Han Haopletely. ¡°He really is a fast one...¡± His mouth curved into a pensive smile as he muttered, ¡°This isn¡¯t so bad either. It¡¯d save me much effort if they can be dealt with all at once.¡±

    ......

    As long as Han Tu was in the underground pce, he could make new passageways anywhere he wanted thanks to his affinity with the earth element. It wasn¡¯t a surprise he used his abilities to his full advantage to help out the others in the House of Han.

    Right after Zovic entered a room, a new hole suddenly appeared on the wall within it. Initially, he was suspicious of its presence, but he soon figured something out and entered it without hesitation. The moment he entered, the hole in the wall closed up, leaving it no different from before without the slightest crack to be seen.

    The same was happening within the underground pce wherever there was a member of the House of Han. The moment they entered, the holes would close back up like before. Not only that, many existing holes would crumble to stop the godhunters from pursuing them. Han Tu used his power in tandem with his familiarity with theyout of the underground pce to lead the household members towards the heavily defended control center.

    With his support, the core members of the House of Han were able to escape alive from the godhunters¡¯ frantic pursuit. However, Han Tu himself had yet to enter the control center. Currently, he was hiding in a remote corner within the underground pce, doing what he could as he observed the situation through several mirrors.

    Apart from Han Jin, Han Huo, Han Mu, and Han Shui, he was also apanied by Andrina, who looked somewhat doubtful. She was holding hands with Han Jin and watching Han Tu work his wonders with her crystal-like eyes. She seemed rather shocked and puzzled at how an early-stage highgod like him would be so masterful with manipting the energy of the earth, especially with how he could open up new passageways so far away.

    As the daughter of the Goddess of Destiny, Andrina had quite a deep understanding of the Twelve Fundamental Energies, familiar with their unique properties as well as what could be achieved at any given stage. Her mother had exined much of it to her in detail.

    Putting aside highgods, even earth overgods like Isaiah or Ossora wouldn¡¯t be able to do what Han Tu did. It was remarkable.

    Clutching Han Jin¡¯s hand tightly, she whispered, ¡°Where¡¯s all his powering from? Why does it look so weird? It¡¯s as if the earth is part of his body! This is too wondrous. If I hadn¡¯t seen it with my own eyes, I wouldn¡¯t dare believe that earth cultivators could achieve feats to this degree!¡±

    Han Jin hesitated for a moment before pointing at Han Mu, Han Shui and Han Huo. ¡°It¡¯s not just Han Tu. The other three and I excel at utilizing the energies corresponding to our element. Hehe, this is something our father has gifted us.¡±

    ¡°Bryan... He... he really is...¡± Andrina shook her head with a resigned look.

    ¡°Someone¡¯s here!¡± Han Tu growled as he pointed at a wall nearby as if his nemesis was approaching. ¡°He¡¯s an earth cultivator as well! He probably detected that the source of the changes happening around the underground pce came from here! If it isn¡¯t Ossora, it has to be Isaiah!¡± He exhaled and suddenly opened his eyes.

    ¡°How is it?¡± Han Jin asked.

    ¡°It¡¯s almost done. I¡¯ve sent away those I need to. There are still some warriors left, but as there are too many, the best I could do was make an escape path for them leading towards big brother¡¯s base,¡± he answered.

    ¡°Alright. Then, let us go too,¡± Han Jin said after some quick consideration.

    Right at that moment, Han Tu and Han Mu both felt someone was near. Even Han Jin could feel an oppressive force approaching. Either Ossora or Isaiah was approaching them at full speed.

    As earth cultivators, even if they couldn¡¯t utilize earth energy in the way Han Tu did, thetter¡¯s blockages weren¡¯t able to stop them in the slightest. Not to mention, as Han Tu was using the energy of the earth nonstop, they were able to pinpoint his location.

    ¡°They really came fast! Let¡¯s go!¡± Han Mu yelled as he took a step back.

    Han Tu rose and opened a hole in the wall before jumping into it. Han Jin, Han Huo and the rest followed without hesitation before the secret chamber suddenly copsed. The hole Han Tu had opened up closed back up as well.

    The earth itself began to shake heavily, apanied by a loud rumbling from above. A figure could be seen bursting through the earth in their path till they reached the crumbling secret room.

    Isaiah sensed his surroundings and humphed. He swung his hands wide open, pulling apart the walls where Han Tu and the rest had entered, making a huge hole and revealing the backs of Han Tu, Han Jin and the rest.

    ¡°Gotcha!¡± He snickered and charged right in. As an expert of the overgod realm, Isaiah was definitely not one to be taken lightly. While his control over earth energy might not be as refined as the uniquely talented Han Tu, his attack power definitely far outssed Han Tu¡¯s owing to his cultivation.

    With his boundless power alone, he could affect theposition of the earth to reform it with his will. While he wasn¡¯t able to be one with the earth like Han Tu could, he could use his divine energy to influence the earth itself.

    He managed to crack a path wide open with brute force alone. Using his divine energy, he gathered arge amount of earth element on his body, allowing each step he took to shake the whole underground pce.

    ¡°Oh no!¡± Han Tu cried. The extremely dense and powerful earth element hadpletely altered theposition of the earth around him, filling it with Isaiah¡¯s divine energy. Han Tu had lost his control over the earth. The pathways in front of him began to shrivel up as his control over them slipped.

    ¡°Here Ie!¡± Andrina cried at that moment. Han Jin felt a terrifying powering from her hand. Only the simultaneous activation of hundreds of energy towers could cause such a powerful reaction. A blinding light shot out from Andrina¡¯s diamond-like body towards the iing Isaiah.

    Struck with the sudden burst of light, Isaiah winced and had no choice but to withdraw the divine energy he infused the earth with to defend against the move. He caused a firm wall to form in front of him.

    The sh caused a tremor so huge that everyone in the underground pce could feel it, especially from the dust and rocks that fell from above.

    ¡°Great!¡± Han Tu said with joy. He noticed that Isaiah¡¯s energy was gone from the earth around him. A pathway opened up in front of him once more, and he and the rest charged in quickly.

    Knowing that a powerful cultivator like Isaiah was right behind them, the rest didn¡¯t dally and ran as fast as they could. Before Isaiah could react, they were already quite far off.

    Soon, the Five Elite Zombies and Andrina passed through the barrier and reached the control center, which was a wide, underground secret chamber. Above them was the round monolith engraved with the Cauldron¡¯s outline. The monolith could not only gather elemental energy from the environment, it could also collect the souls of those who died in Pandemonium.

    ¡°Why did you pull me away so hurriedly? It¡¯s just Isaiah! I¡¯m not afraid of him!¡± Andrinained.

    Han Jin smiled awkwardly and said, ¡°I was just worried you would be in danger...¡±

    Hearing that caused her to smile sweetly. ¡°With this precious thing over here, even Isaiah can¡¯t take me on!¡±

    Surprised, Han Jin asked, ¡°Then can it be used to kill Isaiah? If so, let¡¯s go back and get rid of him!¡±

    ¡°I can only use it to keep myself alive. It can¡¯t kill him,¡± Andrina said, shaking her head. ¡°My mother doesn¡¯t let me kill people for no good reason. Had she given me the Mirror of Destiny, however, I would¡¯ve been able to kill him.¡±

    ¡°The Mirror of Destiny? The divine weapon of the Goddess of Destiny?¡± Stratholme eximed. He wondered what kind of chaos Andrina could usher in if she really wielded the mirror.

    ¡°Who else isn¡¯t here yet?¡± Han Hao asked Phoebe with a furrowed brow. After all they had experienced, Phoebe, Emily and the other women no longer med Han Hao for being too cautious, knowing that if not for his swift reaction, asking Han Tu to evacuate everyone, many of them would¡¯ve been dead by now.

    Phoebe looked around the control room with a thoughtful expression before she said, ¡°Everyone that came from the Profound Continent should be here.¡±

    ¡°Alright.¡± Han Hao turned to the Five Elite Zombies and said, ¡°Seal the entrance!¡±

    The five of them immediately used their elemental powers to seal the walls. Colorful energies radiated from their bodies before seeping into the walls around them. The room rumbled and creaked as they worked away, as if a huge mechanism was being activated.

    At the same time, a portion of the yuan energy from the Sky Annihtion Formation gushed towards their secret chamber as all sorts of defensive formations manifested on the walls. Dhaka, who had been trapped within the aforementioned formation, noticed the change. While the pressure on him had lightened considerably, it would still take him some time before he could emerge from it.

 Chapter 963 - Imprisonment

    <h4>Chapter 963: Imprisonment</h4>

    In the control center, the members of the House of Han banded together to resist Regis and Isaiah¡¯s persecution. The Five Elite Zombies unleashed their power to gather the energy from the Sky Annihtion Formation to where they were, using it to form the most formidable defense they could. They turned the secret chamber into an impregnable shelter that left not a seam undefended.

    Everyone knew that it was only a matter of time for Regis and Isaiah to make their way here. Even though they knew hiding wouldn¡¯t do them much good, they had little choice but to do so. At the very least, within this secret chamber, there was no way Regis and Isaiah would be able to break through the heavy defenses Han Shuo had so painstakingly set up.

    Before Han Shuo had left, he said that he would return at the soonest possible time once he dealt with his errand. As such, the rest were counting on him to return. All they had to do was to hold out until he did.

    Han Shuo had told them before that within Pandemonium, his power would be greatly boosted. No matter what kind of edict or energy the overgod cultivated, if they didn¡¯t have a Quintessence, they wouldn¡¯t be his match in his domain.

    ¡°Bryan will definitely return before they break the defenses!¡± Emily said with confidence.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. Even if Father isn¡¯t able to make it back in time, the five of us will be able to hold on for some amount of time if we give it our all to operate the Penta-elemental Undead Formation,¡± Han Jin said with a rxing smile,forting the nervous ones among them.

    ¡°If I use my treasure, I will be able to fend off one overgod at least. I can promise you that they would bepletely preupied with me,¡± Andrina said in a rxed smile while sping Han Jin¡¯s hand tightly. It seemed that her mind wasn¡¯t dwelling on the danger they were in at all.

    Hearing all that, the expressions on the others¡¯ faces rxed considerably. They no longer spoke of much dread and instead turned their discussions on when Han Shuo would return, as well as how close they had cut it moments before they reached the control center.

    Han Hao didn¡¯t say much during this time; the rest had already considered him their main pir of support. It was thanks to his judgment that Han Tu was notified in time to transport the core members of the House of Han to a safe zone under such dangerous circumstances.

    ¡°Let¡¯s not be too optimistic yet. We need to be prepared for the worst that cane,¡± Han Hao said calmly. He turned to Andrina and said, ¡°Currently, there are seven overgods in Pandemonium. While Dagmar, Asser and Dhaka are currently temporarily restrained, once Miller figures out what¡¯s going on in Pandemonium and saves them, they will number seven overgods, Ossora included. I worry that the defenses in this room won¡¯t hold out for too long.¡±

    Once he said that, the others¡¯ expressions changed once more at the realization of the number of terrifying enemies that were currently in Pandemonium.

    However, apart from Miller, Isaiah and Regis, as well as the trapped Dhaka, Dagmar and Asser, Ossora was still unounted for. Any one of the seven overgods were formidable foes. If they didn¡¯t work together, the secret chamber might yet hold out for quite some time. But if they did, their terrifyingbined force was hard to even conceive of. No matter how confident they were about Han Shuo, they didn¡¯t really think the defenses heid would be able to take thebined assault of seven overgods.

    ¡°What do we do, Big Brother?¡± Han Jin asked.

    ¡°I¡¯m still thinking.¡± Han Hao slowly sat down with his brows furrowed, thinking in silence.

    ......

    Within the underground pce, Regis, Isaiah and their subordinates wiped out the House of Han warriors whenever they came across them and continued towards the direction of the secret chamber within which Han Hao and the others hid.

    So far, only the core members of the House of Han were allowed into the underground pce, apart from a small number of guards who served as messengers. As such, Isaiah and the others didn¡¯t run into many people apart from those from the Profound Continent.

    Regis and Isaiah searched through a whole area and only managed to kill a few dozen guards. They were quite curious why the powerful House of Han only had so few guards. Little did they know, most of the guards resided within the mountains outside of Pandemonium. Thanks to the crisis they were facing, Han Hao and the rest had already sent word out to them before they retreated to the reinforced room.

    The warriors in the mountains had retreated even further through the paths opened up by Han Jin where it would be difficult for Regis and Isaiah to detect.

    Currently, the two just encountered Miller. Regis smilingly asked, ¡°Let me guess ¨C he brought you here?¡±

    MIllerughed and nodded. ¡°That¡¯s right. How are things here?¡±

    ¡°The core members should have gathered together. Hehe, that saves us trouble from having to hunt each of them down separately.¡± Isaiah pointed above him and said, ¡°They¡¯re there. The more defenses there are, the more likely they are to reside in that direction.¡±

    ¡°Dhaka, Dagmar, and Asser are all in Pandemonium as well. Ossora told me about it before he led me here. He said it was the three that told him about the news,¡± Miller praised, ¡°If I hadn¡¯t seen it myself, I wouldn¡¯t have believed there were so many traps in this ce that could even keep those three caught up. It truly is wondrous.¡±

    ¡°Yeah. Thankfully, we snuck in by pretending to be Ossora¡¯s men. Otherwise, we might¡¯ve been trapped like Dhaka and the others. This Bryan really is quite the amazing figure,¡± Regis said.

    ¡°Speaking of them ¨C what should we do about Dhaka, Dagmar, and Asser?¡± Miller said to Isaiah, who had nned the whole operation with Ossora. The rest now followed the two¡¯s lead.

    ¡°What does it have to do with us?¡± Isaiah said, ¡°They fell into the traps of their own ord. We didn¡¯t lure them there on anything. We are under no obligation to save them.¡±

    Miller and Regis locked eyes andughed, agreeing tacitly with Isaiah¡¯s decision.

    ¡°Let¡¯s go to where they¡¯re hiding. Remember. We can¡¯t kill anyone before Bryan shows up. Pandemonium is far too interesting. In the future, we will be the ones to control this ce, so we need to force Bryan to reveal all its secrets to us before we wipe him out,¡± Isaiah said.

    ¡°Naturally.¡± Miller and Regisughed heartily.

    The reason they were so careful and meticulous when dealing with Pandemonium was the various amazing defenses it had that could even entrap three powerful overgods like Dagmar, Dhaka and Asser. In their eyes, this little remote base was more valuable than the prosperous Omphalos.

    The way they saw it, the Godhunter Alliance will seed in their invasion of the Fringe. Before the battle even ended, they were already thinking about how they could split the territory.

    In the near future, the Fringe would be split among the twelve Hegemons of the alliance. The alliance was by no means tight knit, for it was but an alliance of convenience rather than mutual conviction.

    As such, the heavily defended Pandemonium was highly sought after. With it, they would be able to afford offending other factions of the alliance without any worry for retaliation, so taking Pandemonium was a top priority.

    Soon, the three of them arrived outside the secret chamber. Colorful lights seeped out of the walls. Upon closer inspection, the wall seemed to have a crystalline structure and didn¡¯t resemble earth at all. Strands of mystical energies flowed through the patterns on the wall, giving off a repulsive impression.

    The moment the three of them approached the room, they felt a gentle force pushing them away from it. Even overgods like them couldn¡¯t help but take a few steps back, which only served to fuel their excitement.

    ¡°It¡¯s mysterious alright! Ossora really wasn¡¯t lying!¡± Isaiah said with a face filled with excitement. ¡°It¡¯s no wonder he decided to sell Bryan out and work with us. I believe he¡¯s been pining after this location for quite a while now. People are greedy by nature. Anyone who has seen the wonders in here would want to have it all for themselves!¡±

    ¡°It truly is arcane,¡± Regis said as he carefully sensed the energies infused in the wall. Impatiently, he said, ¡°I can¡¯t wait! Let me give it a try.¡±

    Isaiah and Miller smiled at each other before taking a few steps back to give Regis the space to test it out. Bolts of lightning umted into a thick body of electricity before Regis sent it smashing against the colorful wall. A loud rumbling could be heard as the power of lightning dispersed without a trace.

    ¡°Amazing!¡± Regis cried. He felt that the strike which contained eighty percent of his power had only given the wall a slight dent, before it proceeded to recover without a single scratch.

    ¡°It truly is surprising,¡± Miller agreed. His eyes shed as he summoned a gigantic de of wind and sent it at the wall. With a loud click, the de he formed from the wind element and his divine power disintegrated.

    ¡°There is a mystical power in the wall that can disrupt the structure of the elements. That Bryan really is an unparalleled genius. I really don¡¯t know where he learned how to manipte such unheard of energies,¡± Miller said thoughtfully after his attempt.

    ¡°Haha, ording to the intel we received, he will be returning soon. With a hidden pawn like Ossora and the members of the House of Han still here, we can toy with him slowly. After we extract all the secrets about Pandemonium from him, Dhaka and the rest won¡¯t be able to do anything about it even if they make it out!¡± Isaiah eximed. Pandemonium was truly filled with wonders. He was ecstatic at the notion that it would all soon be his.

    ¡°Come, let the three of us give it a try. No matter what kind of defense, it has to be sustained by energy. I believe it won¡¯t hold as long as we keep attacking it!¡± Miller said with a serious look.

    It wasmon knowledge since time immemorial that any kind of barrier or seal needed to have some kind of energy source to remain operational. These coulde from energy crystals from energy towers or the divine power or elements that the deployer of the barrier infused beforehand. Any kind of energy could be used to fuel barriers.

    But no matter how powerful, each strike the barrier took would sap away at its energy reserves. The moment it was all drained, the barrier would crumble no matter how powerful it was.

    Miller and the rest naturally understood all this and made their preparations. They took turns battering the wall with strikes of lightning, earth and wind.

    Phoebe, Emily, Stratholme and the others within the barrier felt the whole room shake from the strikes. The booming was so loud that they could almost physically feel it.

    However, the secret chamber had been gathering natural energy from the environment for years. The defenses were as strong as they were rumored to be; the wall wasn¡¯t broken through even after Miller, Isaiah and Regisunched their thirtieth attack.

    The three of them looked at the crystalline wall with disbelief. They didn¡¯t think that ten strikes from each of them, all overgods, were still not enough to crush the wall.

    ¡°Stop attacking!¡± someone called out when the three were still deliberating whether they should continue. Ossora soon emerged from the earth and continued his exnation. ¡°The harder you hit, the more the energy that¡¯s keeping Dhaka and the rest trapped will be transferred over. If you go on they will be able to escape. If that happens, we won¡¯t be able to keep Pandemonium for ourselves!¡±

    ¡°How¡¯s this happening?¡± Isaiah asked, stunned.

    ¡°I felt a flow of energy clearly from aboveing towards this location. As your attacks intensified, the flow also quickened. I am certain of this!¡± Ossora pressed.

    The three immediately stopped attacking, now even more awed by Pandemonium¡¯s mysteries.

    ¡°We must prepare to put up a show. Bryan will being back here any moment now,¡± Ossora said, seeing that they¡¯ve stopped. He seemed to be filled to the brim with confidence.

 Chapter 964 - That Was a Decent Show

    GDK 964: That Was a Decent Show

    After a few days of rushing, Han Shuo and Wasir finally reached a mountain range some tens of kilometers away from Pandemonium. Han Shuo looked in Pandemonium¡¯s direction and grimaced when he got to know that something had urred there. As he had a hand in making the formations there himself, he knew their functions and effects well. He could easily feel the abnormal flow of energy from far away.

    There were strong yuan energy waves around the Sky Annihtion Formation as well as the secret control chamber. The activation of the former was a sign that a terrifying foe had entered Pandemonium, whereas thetter was a sign that the House of Han members had retreated into the secret chamber due to some extraordinary danger. There was no good reason for the demonic barrier of the secret chamber to activate otherwise. Immediately, he elerated even more towards Pandemonium.

    ¡°Bryan, is there a problem?¡± Wasir could easily tell something was off about him.

    His query caused Han Shuo to slow down slightly. After looking at the energies near Pandemonium again, he took a deep breath to regte himself, calming his panicking mind. With his mind and soul now still and calm, some thoughts shed through his mind.

    ¡°Something definitely happened at Pandemonium, but the powerful defensive formations I¡¯ve set up at the secret chamber are still operating. That means thest line of defense is yet to be breached,¡± he exined calmly, no longer in a rush back. ¡°I¡¯m sure Dhaka and the rest entered Pandemonium. However, there is no way they¡¯d be able to barge through all the defensive formations there in such a short time. There must be some other force that is forcing my people to flee to the central control chamber, so something is off.¡±

    He of all people knew the power of the defenses best. Not to mention, he had tested out Dhaka and the rest¡¯s power during the battle at Misty Sea and didn¡¯t think that they would be able to breach all the defenses in such a short time. It was because he was at least that confident about the defenses that he dared to leave for cial Peak to save Wasir.

    ¡°Perhaps some other enemy infiltrated the ce,¡± Wasir said, given that he believed what Han Shuo said about the defenses of Pandemonium.

    ¡°That shouldn¡¯t be possible! Nobody can enter Pandemonium that easily unless they¡¯re one of us!¡±

    ¡°I suppose we¡¯ll see the truth once we get there.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded and was just about to do as Wasir said. All of a sudden, he felt a slight pulseing from the distance. Immediately, he sent a weak strand of his consciousness out, emanating soul undtions from his body.

    ¡°Who are you trying to contact?¡± Wasir asked. The undtions emanating from Han Shuo¡¯s body were really subtle. He wouldn¡¯t have noticed it if he were leaning directly against Han Shuo. Being a powerful overgod, Wasir knew that it must be some kind ofmunication technique that relied on two people agreeing on what wavelengths or other features of the undtions to focus on to be able to send information through wide distances.

    ¡°You shall see in a second,¡± Han Shuo said as he motioned for Wasir toe to a corner of the mountains nearby.

    Wasir wondered why Han Shuo seemedpletely unhurried despite something going on in Pandemonium and tried to guess the person he was trying to contact. Did he set up some other pawn amongst Dhaka, Dagmar, and Asser? Why would he have anything to do with the three of them?

    Just as he let his imagination run wild, a weak light shot out from the dark clouds beforending in front of Han Shuo. It looked like the figure of a person.

    ¡°Ss!¡±

    ¡°Wasir!¡±

    The two called out to each other as if they were facing off their nemesis. Ice and lightning energy filled the surroundings, as if they would sh immediately.

    ¡°We¡¯re all allies!¡± Han Shuo said, stopping them from acting rashly by charging between them. ¡°Stay calm, we¡¯re allies!¡±

    Both Ss and Wasir weren¡¯t aware that they would be working with each other and had almost got into a fight.

    ¡°Out of everyone I could¡¯ve guessed, you weren¡¯t even on the list!¡± Wasir said, his cold expression melting into a in smile. ¡°Bryan, you even dragged Ss down. I¡¯m astonished! You truly are terrifying!¡±

    Han Shuo had defeated Ss and took his ce in the Fringe, ruining his prospects there. Their grudge should¡¯ve been irreconcble by all ounts. Yet, they had actually been working together secretly. If Wasir hadn¡¯t seen it himself, he wouldn¡¯t have believed it even if others brought him proof.

    ¡°I¡¯m also quite surprised. You¡¯re someone who wouldn¡¯t even submit to Tyre, yet why would you leave cial Peak toe here?¡± Ss looked at Wasir oddly before turning to Han Shuo. ¡°It¡¯s no wonder you were able to firm your hold in the Fringe. It¡¯s only after today that I¡¯m truly convinced of your abilities.¡±

    Now, the two Sovereigns of the Fringe expressed their admiration for Han Shuo at the same time.

    ¡°Let¡¯s not dwell on this,¡± Han Shuo said, not letting it get to him. They had to deal with Pandemonium first. ¡°Ss, you¡¯ve been monitoring Dhaka the whole time, right? What happened?¡±

    As he spoke, Han Shuo sent some demon generals into Pandemonium. However, what they saw wasn¡¯t enough to inform him about what truly happened there, so he still needed Ss¡¯s input.

    ¡°First, Dhaka, Dagmar, and Asser went into Pandemonium. The three moved as I had predicted and got trapped like you said they would. However, you might not have realized it, but after Dhaka, Dagmar and Asser arrived, Miller, Isaiah, and Regis came to Pandemonium.¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± Han Shuo was beyond shocked.

    ¡°I didn¡¯t see it with my own eyes, but I can be certain that Isaiah and the rest entered the underground pce in Pandemonium through a direct path. I bet you wouldn¡¯t be able to guess who led them into the underground pce.

    ¡°It¡¯s definitely Ossora!¡± Han Shuo snapped, ¡°Regis, Isaiah, and Miller were targeting Ossora to begin with, so Ossora definitely had a part in their appearance here. Given Pandemonium¡¯s defenses, they wouldn¡¯t be able to enter without Ossora leading the way.

    When he said that, Ss¡¯s expression turned grim. ¡°You were able to figure it out after all. I guess you have long put up your guard against Ossora.¡±

    ¡°Dagmar, Dhaka, Asser, Isaiah, Miller, Regis, and Ossora... There are seven overgods within!¡± Han Suo¡¯s expression grew grave. ¡°We shoulde up with something together. This battle will not be an easy one. Thankfully, Pandemonium is my turf, otherwise, we wouldn¡¯t even stand a chance.

    ¡°Dhaka, Dagmar, and Asser are still trapped since Isaiah and the rest didn¡¯t free them. The only ones we have to take on are Ossora, Isaiah, Miller, and Regis,¡± Ss said.

    ¡°Then it¡¯ll be much easier for us to act.¡± Han Shuo rxed and pondered. ¡°The two of you shouldn¡¯t show up yet. Let me go take a look. I believe Ossora still doesn¡¯t know that I¡¯m already aware of what¡¯s happening and will try to backstab meter. I¡¯ll let him do what he wants...¡±

    After their discussion, it was decided that Wasir and Ss would remain in hiding while Han Shuo entered Pandemonium alone.

    ......

    ¡°He¡¯s here!¡± Ossora cried.

    ¡°He finally returned!¡± Isaiah and the rest were overjoyed. They had been waiting so long just for the master of the ce to show up to hand them the secrets of everything in Pandemonium. That way, they could finally take it over for good.

    ¡°He definitely doesn¡¯t suspect me yet,¡± Ossora said, ¡°We should put up a convincing show. As long as I can catch him off guard, I¡¯ll be able to maim him. After that, the three of you will swoop in and we¡¯llpletely dominate him. Later, by ckmailing him using his wives and friends, we¡¯ll be able to make him spill all his secrets.¡±

    ¡°Then what are we waiting for?¡± Isaiah said.

    Ossora left immediately and injured himself lightly, trying to look like he was escaping something. Meanwhile, Isaiah, Miller, and Regis tagged along and appeared as if they were about to strike Ossora down.

    That¡¯s a pretty convincing show, I¡¯ll give them that. Han Shuo snickered in his mind and willed a grand formation in Pandemonium to start operating. The formation immediately moved to where Isaiah was and enveloped Ossora within it.

    ¡°Hey, Ossora!¡± The Hegemon of Darkness, Asser, called out. He had been trapped within it for a whole day and noticed someone else appeared next to him, though he didn¡¯t expect it to be one of the Five Sovereigns.

    ¡°Huh?¡± Ossora¡¯s face was one of doubt. ¡°Why are you here?¡±

    ¡°I was going to ask you the same thing!¡± Asser smirked before he turned to attack him. As far as he was aware, Ossora was there to help Han Shuo, so he had to strike first for the advantage.

 Chapter 965 - Who Calls the Shots

    GDK 965: Who Calls the Shots

    Ossora was so shocked that he couldn¡¯t find the words. Even if he were to reveal to Asser that he was joining hands with Isaiah and the others, and even if Asser believed it, there was no guarantee that Asser might cease attacking. The Godhunter Alliance wasn¡¯t a united group; Isaiah definitely didn¡¯t get along with Dhaka too.

    He was feeling a little troubled, not knowing how exactly he had identally fallen into the barrier that was keeping Asser trapped. No matter how he tried to recall it, he just couldn¡¯t figure it out.

    Asser was cornering him, so he couldn¡¯t even try to escape from the demonic formation. All around them, every once in a while, the stone towers would shoot out beams which would numb their limbs. They would fail to properly dodge each others¡¯ and suffer injuries. It only took a single false step for Ossora to fall into so much trouble.

    All of Ossora¡¯s preparations had gone to waste. By the time Isaiah, Reggis, and Miller reached this ce and noticed he was missing, there was no way they would be able to find him even with their senses.

    ¡°Let¡¯s head back!¡± Isaiah said, noticing that something was off. Regis and Miller locked eyes and nodded. Without a single word, the three of them who had nned to fight Han Shuo with Ossora hurriedly turned back to head towards the secret chamber with the colorful walls.

    They knew that as long as they could defend that location, there were no tricks Han Shuo could use to get his family out. That way, they could be sure Han Shuo would do what they wished. Given the three of their powersbined, they were confident they would be able to capture Han Shuo even without Ossora¡¯s backstabbing. Soon, they returned to the secret chamber.

    ¡°Now we won¡¯t fear even if hees!¡± Isaiah¡¯s mouth curved into a confident smirk. ¡°We don¡¯t have to fight him outside. We¡¯ve seen what kind of trouble Ossora got into just now. There must be some other hazards too. Let¡¯s just wait here instead until hees.¡±

    Regis and Miller smiled without the slightest trace of nervousness. The way they saw it, everything was still under control.

    ......

    ¡°Father is here!¡± Han Hao said agitatedly from within the secret chamber. The chamber was defended byyer afteryer of protective seals. The walls contained an odd energy that could not only deflect most attacks from gods as well as prevent any soul senses from seeping through.

    As a result, the Five Elite Zombies whose mastery over the soul was inferior to Han Hao didn¡¯t sense Han Shuo¡¯s arrival at all. They were still anxiously waiting for the moment the defenses of the chamber were all drained to execute the Penta-elemental Undead Formation to continue protecting the rest. However, hearing Han Hao say that caused everyone in the chamber to rx and unwind.

    ¡°We¡¯ll be fine now,¡± Han Hao said, standing up as he clutched the bone spear. He turned to Andrina, who was biting into a crystal shard, and said, ¡°You can keep an overgod upied for a short amount of time so he can¡¯t attack anyone, right?¡±

    The fist-sized energy crystal was already bitten into by Andrina. She chewed the chunk in her mouth thoroughly before nodding repeatedly. ¡°Of course!¡±

    ¡°Get ready. We¡¯ll go out togetherter,¡± Han Hao said as he approached Han Jin and the rest. ¡°Only with the five of you working together can you send the two of us out. Listen for my signalter and send Andrina and I out as quickly as you can. I will establish contact with Father.¡±

    ¡°Okay!¡± Han Jin said, before turning to Andrina. ¡°Be careful!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ll be fine, don¡¯t worry.¡± She rolled her eyes at Han Hao and giggled. ¡°You should be more worried about him.¡±

    Han Jin smiled and said, ¡°Big Brother will be fine!¡±

    ......

    Resoundingughter filled the skies as a majestic figure descended. Han Shuo scanned Isaiah and the other two, who looked like they were in for a fight with a mighty foe, and smiled. ¡°You all came all this way to Pandemonium to visit me. How touching. It¡¯s a shame I wasn¡¯t here to attend to you, so I hope you forgive theck of hospitality.¡±

    Isaiah saluted Han Shuo with a smile. ¡°You¡¯re too kind.¡±

    ¡°Well, I am quite ttered that the three of you think so highly of me.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t seem the least bit worried. He stood on a round tform with a diagram of the Cauldron of Myriad Demons and felt the flow of yuan energy in Pandemonium. Then, heughed. ¡°Well, what do the three of you want? As long as it¡¯s something I have here, I will dly give it to you.¡±

    ¡°Now that¡¯s more like it!¡± Isaiahughed heartily and looked around, before pointing at the eerie formations all over. ¡°As long as you tell us the secrets of Pandemonium, I promise I¡¯ll send you and your family out peacefully!¡±

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo seemed stunned and troubled. ¡°Isn¡¯t it a little too harsh to chase the lord of the house away?¡±

    ¡°Bryan, you no longer call the shots here. The Fringe will be the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s sooner orter. Given your talent and intelligence, you should¡¯ve known to leave this ce long ago. Nobody would call you a coward for it, instead, they¡¯ll praise you for knowing how to read the signs!¡± Miller said in a shaky voice, before his body swerved. The next moment, he was some distance apart from Isaiah.

    Electricity crackled in Regis¡¯s eyes as he took a few steps to the left before stopping at wherever he found appropriate. Isaiah, Miller and Regis now had Han Shuo surrounded. Though the three hadn¡¯t attacked yet, they already had him locked on. As long as Han Shuo refused, he would be bombarded to hell and back.

    Naturally, Miller and Regis¡¯s change in position didn¡¯t escape Han Shuo¡¯s notice. Unlike what the three of them were expecting, however, Han Shuo retained his smile despite being surrounded. He didn¡¯t try to move away immediately or do anything to the effect of breaking out of their encirclement.

    Miller and Regis found that a little odd. Upon deeper thought, they suddenly realized that Han Shuo¡¯s reaction was a sign that he had chosen submission instead to ensure that his family survived.

    Isaiah looked quietly at Han Shuo. Seeing that he didn¡¯t attack them and even settle down in the middle of the three, he rxed, thinking that Han Shuo had made the right choice.

    But it was right at that moment that without any warning, Han Shuo suddenly fought back. Before the smile on Isaiah¡¯s face receded, a gigantic palm appeared over the heads of the three of them. The hill-sized palm was so huge that even the lines looked like deep crevices. The killing intent the palm radiated was so terrifying that it could make some people cower and prostrate themselves from the fear it induced.

    A tearing sound over their heads could be heard as the palms came pressing down, epassing the whole area.

    ¡°Darn!¡± Regis cursed as he retreated. Isaiah and Miller also noticed that Han Shuo was definitely hostile to them. Feeling the pressureing from above, they didn¡¯t stay and stubbornly take the attack, choosing instead to evade like Regis had done. In but an instant, their encirclement of Han Shuo had broken apart.

    ¡°I¡¯ll show you who calls the shots here!¡± Han Shuo stood rooted to the ground like a mountain as heughed and watched the three frantically retreat. All of a sudden, the gigantic palm split into three, chasing after each one of the three.

    Shocked, they felt a strong dangering from Han Shuo. Despite standing there without making a single move, he was controlling the three palms like they were his own appendages. The palms homed in on each one of them no matter how hard they tried to lose them.

    If it were elsewhere, there was no way Han Shuo would be able to break out of the encirclement with a single move and drive them running into a corner. However, this was Pandemonium, a ce where Han Shuo knew all about, including every single nook and cranny. He was at least three times as powerful here than he was anywhere else.

    Soon after he reached the Skybreak Realm, he was able to force Ss into retreat. Now that he had stabilized his realm state and was fighting on home ground, his might wasn¡¯t something Isaiah and the others could even conceive of.

    ¡°Destroy it!¡± Isaiah yelled, causing Regis and Miller to zip to his side. The three of them attacked the gigantic palm above them together. A deep sound could be heard from within Pandemonium as Regis, Miller, and Isaiah gathered their power and mmed it into the palm. Powerful energy waves exploded outwards. Even those within the sealed barrier in the secret chamber could feel the shockwaves.

    One of the palms disappeared, but it caused the other two to vanish as well. The three of them breathed a sigh of relief. If they couldn¡¯t dispel the attack even when they joined forces, they would immediately give up on taking Pandemonium and run as far as they could.

    Han Shuo snickered and thought that if he didn¡¯t still need to fuel the Sky Annihtion Formation with yuan energy to keep Dhaka held up, there was no way the three would be able to break the attack so easily.

    ¡°As expected of the three Hegemons of the godhunters. Impressive! Since that¡¯s the case, I know what to do now. Alright, let us begin. Tell me what you want to know and I¡¯ll tell you all about it.¡±

 Chapter 966 - Real Submission?

    <h4>Chapter 966: Real Submission?</h4>

    Isaiah and the other two were shocked. They had nned to take out Han Shuo one go. But seeing him willing to negotiate all of a sudden, they were reeling from the whish.

    ¡°I was just testing the three of you to see if I had a chance in taking back Pandemonium. I¡¯ve seen that you three are indeed rather powerful, so my desire to fight back haspletely vanished. I¡¯ll cooperate with you properly now,¡± Han Shuo exined with a bitter look.

    The three gave each other odd looks. While they didn¡¯t immediately fight back at Han Shuo, they didn¡¯t dare to believe him entirely either. This time around, they didn¡¯t surround him, but chose to stand against him from the same side instead. After all, he was able to break out of their encirclement so easily, so they would rather not waste their energy.

    ¡°Bryan, you are stronger than we¡¯ve expected. However, I believe you were only able to break out of encirclement by making use of the advantage afforded to you by the terrain,¡± Isaiah said solemnly, ¡°Even if you escape from our grasp, you won¡¯t be able to save your family and friends within. Tell us what we want to know, or we¡¯ll do all we can to wipe out those that are inside the secret chamber!¡±

    ¡°It seems that this secret chamber shares the same power source as the trap that¡¯s keeping Dhaka and the other two held up. If we didn¡¯t want to negotiate with you, we¡¯d have broken through the chamber already. If the three of them would¡¯vee out by now. Then, there is no way the House of Han would survive!¡± Regis coldly said. He had been quite unhappy about the shocking attack he had just experienced.

    ¡°Don¡¯t force us to do that!¡± Miller snapped.

    ¡°Sure, sure.¡± Han Shuo raised both hands to show that he understood them fully. ¡°I¡¯ll do as you please. Tell me. What do you want to know? What do you want to get?¡±

    Seeing Han Shuo so cooperative, Isaiah smiled and nodded. ¡°It¡¯s simple. We want to know everything about Pandemonium, all the seals, barriers, energy toweryouts and how to use them. Also, tell us in detail about the three seals that are keeping Dhaka, Dagmar and Asser upied.¡±

    ¡°Oh, I see.¡± Han Shuo took a deep breath and said, ¡°Sure. We¡¯re leaving the Fringe in the first ce, so I have no qualms leaving Pandemonium to you.¡±

    ¡°Now that¡¯s what I¡¯m talking about!¡± Isaiah looked to Regis and Miller, signalling them to be careful of Han Shuo lest he fought back again.

    With their previous experience, they wouldn¡¯t trust him so easily now. As far as they were concerned, Han Shuo was quite a threat to them and had the power to back it up. The slightest careless mistake could result in them being gravely hurt and disrupting their ns.

    ¡°Come with me then. I¡¯ll lead you to a ce where you¡¯ll get to know everything,¡± Han Shuo said before he immediately walked out.

    ¡°Wait!¡± Isaiah called out. When Han Shuo turned back, heughed and said, ¡°You sneaky little bastard, do you think that we will just go where you tell us and get trapped like Dhaka? We¡¯ll do it here and here only! We have something that can scour your memories.¡±

    Regis and Miller stared at Han Shuo unmoving, constantly on their guard for a sudden, fatal strike.

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo smiled and nodded. ¡°Good. I wonder what you have that can scan my memories.¡±

    ¡°This is it¨Ca soulsphere!¡± Isaiah took out a fist-sized purple sphere with a smooth, jade-like surface. The sphere looked a little foggy within. Soulspheres were special items that could only be made by elite cultivators of the energy of death. Within them were strong, soul vortexes that could generate a huge force to retrieve the memories of anyone it was close to.

    While it could retrieve the memories, it wasn¡¯t safe to use at all. The slightest mistake could wound someone¡¯s soul and stupefy them.

    Han Shou¡¯s expression changed as he shook his head. ¡°That won¡¯t do. The side effects of soulspheres are too much. It¡¯s too dangerous. With you using it, I can¡¯t guarantee my safety, so I won¡¯t do it!¡±

    ¡°There¡¯s no need to waste time with him, Isaiah!¡± Regis growled as he looked at the secret chamber beneath them. ¡°Let us just break the chamber and kill them all! Who cares about Dhaka, Dagmar and Asser? By the time theye out, they¡¯ll all be dead!¡±

    Miller smiled and looked at Han Shou, whose expression shifted. ¡°What¡¯s the point of all this? When those threee out, you won¡¯t be able to protect your family no matter how strong you are. By then, there¡¯s no saying if you¡¯ll be able to escape Pandemonium alive. Isn¡¯t cooperating with us much better?¡±

    Miller and Regis were ying the standard good cop, bad cop shtick. It seemed that their words were working. Han Shuo¡¯s expression grimmed as his the veins on his forehead pulsed. In the end, he firmed his resolve and reluctantly said, ¡°Alright. I¡¯ll do as you say!¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s better.¡± Isaiah smiled and secretly signalled Regis and Miller. Smiling and careful, he held the ball and walked to Han Shou, constantly on guard and gradually handing it to him.

    After Han Shuo received the soulsphere, he seemed rather anxious and hesitant, as if there was a war going on in his mind. Momentster, he sighed deeply, as if he had let go of every shred of resistance. ¡°Here goes nothing!¡± He held the soulsphere out in front of him before two soul beams connected with the sphere.

    All of a sudden, the fog in the sphere glowed eerily. Isaiah and the restughed out loud at the same time.

    ¡°Even as powerful as you are, you have no choice but to follow suit!¡± Regis said as he zipped in front of Han Shuo, sending out lightning bolts that formed into a that bound him. Isaiah and Miller nked Han Shuo in the meantime and deployed a restrictive barrier around him,pletely sealing off the energy in his body.

    ¡°The moment the soulsphere finishes recording his memories is the moment of his death,¡± Isaiah said with relief, ¡°I¡¯ve tinkered with it beforehand. The moment he connects with it, nobody apart from an Overgod will be able to break free from the power of the soulsphere! What a shame, for such a talented youth to be ruined by us.¡±

    ¡°Spare me that fake tragedy of yours,¡± Miller said, chuckling as he looked at the waves in the sphere that represented Han Shuo¡¯s memories with satisfaction. ¡°This trip was worth it. With his memories and Pandemonium, we¡¯ll be able to find out what weird energy he cultivates and make a simr ce to Pandemonium!¡±

    Theyughed heartily from their triumph.

    But all of a sudden, a cry could be heard from the distance. Wasir came rushing out coldly from the heavy fog. When he saw the soulsphere and the bindings on Han Shuo, he snapped, ¡°What did you do to Bryan?¡±

    ¡°Wasir, was it?¡± Isaiah gleefully said, ¡°You have no business here. If you leave now, we won¡¯t bother with you. Oh, by the way, make sure to leave cial Peak with your subordinates because we will be taking over this ce soon enough.¡±

    Miller and Regis snickered, for Wasir alone wouldn¡¯t be their match. If not for the fact that they had to pay attention to Han Shuo, they might¡¯ve had Wasir stay to toy around with him first.

    ¡°Wasir, where are you going?¡± somebody yelled from the distance. Soon, that person was revealed to be Ss.

    ¡°Ss, you¡¯re also a Sovereign of the Fringe. Why did you help the Godhunter Alliance?¡±

    ¡°Since when did you take me seriously?¡± Ss said, ¡°Darn it, ever since i left the Fringe, you people look like you serve the kid now! I¡¯ve been operating in the Fringe for years, yet none of you cared about our old dealings at all. Since that¡¯s the case, why should I worry about you?¡±

    As he yelled, Ss attacked Wasir without mercy.

    ¡°Haha, Ss is here too!¡± Isaiah knew him and his dealings with Dhaka and the rest, so they weren¡¯t too shocked that he was there.

    Miller and Regis found it rather interesting and watched them fight. Miller asked, ¡°Ss, want us to give you a hand and deal with this fellow?¡±

    ¡°I couldn¡¯t have asked for more! Darn it, Dhaka and the other bastards fell for Bryan¡¯s trap, leaving everything on me! I¡¯m breaking off from them for good! If you don¡¯t mind, I am willing to join your side to fight against Dhaka!¡±

    As he said so, Ss used his full force to push Wasir towards the three of them.

 Chapter 967 - An Insidious Strike After Another

    GDK 967: An Insidious Strike After Another

    ¡°This is just wonderful!¡± Isaiah said. If Ss really was to join them, they would have a much better chance facing off against the Dhaka trio. After all, the formations in Pandemonium wouldn¡¯t keep the three trapped forever, so they had to make as many preparations as they could to face him.

    Isaiah gestured to Regis and Miller secretly to get them to help Ss wipe Wasir out. Even though Wasir alone was hard pressed to interfere with their ns, they still felt a little uneasy about letting an enemy overgod roam free. Killing him would be much more preferable.

    ¡°Haha, Wasir, oh, Wasir... I asked you to leave early, yet you didn¡¯t listen. Don¡¯t you cry foulter!¡± Regis said as he suddenly charged towards Wasir like a bolt of rainbow lightning.

    Regis and Ss both cultivated lightning energy. Being sandwiched between the two of them, Wasir was hard pressed to escape. Miller was watching carefully from the sidelines,pletely unhurried about joining in. Instead, he turned his gaze to the only way Wasir could possibly escape to. His cunning wit caused him to already be thinking about locking down Wasir¡¯s escape route.

    Wasir darted away in a panic. Being surrounded by the three, he was feeling a little anxious. The impressive frosty aura about him seemed to wane.

    Regis smiled even more as he started to look down on Wasir, an overgod who wasn¡¯t willing to give everything he had in a fight. Someone with an attitude like that couldn¡¯t be that powerful. The instant Regis held that thought, he no longer treated Wasir like someone on equal footing. He shot out a bolt of blinding lightning from his palm, forcing Wasir to flee helplessly.

    At that moment, Ss turned into a bolt of lightning and rammed into Wasir. Then, a lightning bolt wrapped around his hand pierced Wasir through the chest, causing him to spit out a torrent of blood.

    ¡°Haha, I didn¡¯t think that this would ever happen to you, Wasir,¡± Ss said, before he delivered another punch to his face, sending Wasir flying towards Regis. ¡°Regis, send him to the afterlife!¡±

    Regis figured that Wasir was already injured. The lightning sparks that crackled from his body suggested that he was injured to the point that he could no longer resist. ¡°Alright!¡± Regis heartily agreed, thinking that Wasir wasn¡¯t any bit impressive at all, for his defenses to have been breached that easily.

    Isaiah observed the whole battle and found it to be weird. He didn¡¯t think that Wasir wouldn¡¯t be able to take a single strike at all and fall almost immediately from Ss and Regis¡¯s teamwork.

    On the other hand, Miller was all smiles and had lowered his guard. Wasir no longer seemed to even be able to escape by now.

    At that moment, everything changed. Bone-chilling frost came sweeping from the supposedly incapacitated Wasir, immediately freezing the unprepared Regis, who was just about tounch a fatal attack. Now, he was nothing but a giant statue of frost.

    ¡°Not good!¡± Isaiah no longer cared about Han Shuo, who was being absorbed by the soulsphere, and charged right in.

    Miller¡¯s expression also changed as he charged towards Regis. ¡°Ss, you¡¯re so dead!¡±

    ¡°Hehe!¡± Ss snickered.

    All of a sudden, the bloody and battered Wasir turned around and moved out of Ss¡¯s way. A gigantic frost hammer appeared in his hand before he smashed it hard against the frozen Regis. Ss also sent a bolt of lightning striking down from the skies at the same time onto Regis¡¯s head.

    Crisp sounds of Regis¡¯s bones breaking rang out as blood came spurting out of his arm and leg joints. When the ice fractured and shattered, Regis¡¯s eyes were zed over. Two trails of blood came streaking out of his nose onto his chest. It only took one strike for him topletely be incapacitated.

    ¡°Ss, you¡¯re sick of life, aren¡¯t you?!¡± Isaiah roared as earth energy surged into his arms, making it tonnes heavier in the process. He seemed just like a mountain now.

    ¡°Sick of life? I think you¡¯re the one who is!¡± Ss snapped as he turned to Wasir, who was wiping the blood off his mouth. ¡°Who do we get first?¡±

    ¡°Miller!¡± Wasir said.

    Without the slightest hesitation, Wasir and Ss flew towards Miller. He was a wind cultivator, so his attack and evasion speed was far better than the two¡¯s. While he had reacted a little slower than Isaiah had, he was actually closing his distance with Regis faster than Isaiah.

    ¡°Shameless fool, you wouldn¡¯t be able to defeat anyone without relying on sneak attacks!¡± Miller said, before he slowed down. He decided he would let Isaiah take the brunt of their attacks first.

    It was in to see that Regis only lost because of the sneak attack, otherwise there was no way he would so easily be knocked out ofmission. Miller knew from there that the two were incredibly sneaky and wouldn¡¯t fall for the same trick again.

    However, something out of his expectations happened. Miller would never imagine that it was all part of a greater n. Beneath Miller, a crack appeared on the colorful wall of the secret chamber. From it, an astrarium glowing with arcane energies shot towards Miller, immediately causing him to feel like he was standing at the very center of an infinitely wide void. It was as if his soul had lost control of his limbs.

    Miller was faced with the threat of his sinking soul, on top of Wasir and Ss. Knowing how dire his situation was, he gathered all the wind divine energy he had umted over his long years of cultivation and speedily formedyer afteryer of wind barriers around him.

    A bone spear shot out from the secret chamber beneath and instantly gathered every element of death in Pandemonium. At that moment, even the weakest element of death seemed like it had been infused with life as it danced around the tip of the spear while it pierced through the barriers Miller set up like they were nothing, before finally exposing him abre to Ss.

    ¡°Get away!¡± Isaiah yelled as he charged towards Miller the fastest he could.

    Suddenly, a terrifyingly insidious force came shooting out from behind Isaiah. Shocked, he hurriedly turned back before he could save Miller.

    A red palm filled with killing intent came pressing down with explosive force that sent Isaiah flying. Blood gushed out of him and formed a light drizzle.

    ¡°How could it be?!¡± he cried in utter disbelief and terror. Han Shuo was snickering in front of him, but there was another Han Shuo down there, still petrified thanks to the soulsphere.

    ¡°Aaaagh...¡± Miller cried weakly as he plummeted from the skies like a deted balloon.

    A hole opened up once more on the wall of the secret chamber, out of which came three gigantic ws of blood that gripped Regis, Isaiah and Miller tightly. They were then stuffed into the hole in the colorful wall, mending itpletely and leaving no trace of the damage that had been done to it.

    ¡°And we¡¯re done!¡± said the Han Shuo that surprise attacked Isaiah, before he shot out a beam towards the glowing soulsphere below.

    Immediately, the soulsphere shattered, letting the weird light from within to escape. The other Han Shuo¡¯s eyes shed as he opened his mouth and sucked the lights back in. Not a single bit of his memories that had been scraped from his soul was lost. After that, this body of his smiled and assimted itself back into the main body.

    ¡°Isaiah, Miller, and Regis ¨C three elites of the Godhunter Alliance...¡± Han Shuoughed and looked at Han Hao, who was walking out of the secret chamber. ¡°Since you want to take over the Godhunter Alliance, I¡¯ll keep them alive for now. After this battle is over, we¡¯ll have more than enough ways to make them submit.¡±

    ¡°Thank you, Father!¡± Han Hao said, retrieving his bone spear.

    The three bloody hands that stuffed the three Hegemons into the wall turned back into yuan energy and returned to the Sky Annihtion Formation. Much of the yuan energy from the wide secret chamber beneath also flowed back to various parts in Pandemonium, leaving only a small portion in the cells imprisoning Isaiah, Miller, and Regis.

    ¡°Thanks, you two. I didn¡¯t think that you guys are so talented in this aspect. Even I almost fell for the show myself!¡± Han Shuo praised as he turned to Wasir and Ss.

    Wasir seemed a little embarrassed about the praise. He pointed at Ossora, who was still fighting Asser to the death, and asked, ¡°What should we do about him?¡±

    ¡°He¡¯s the one who deserves to die the most,¡± Han Shuo hissed.

    Buy Hedonist a coffee(and read the next chapter in advance)

 Chapter 968 - End it Yourself!

    GDK 968: End it Yourself!

    As Ossora dealt with Asser¡¯s desperate attacks, he carefully observed the pirs near him in fear of them emanating even more energy beams to freeze him. He was feeling utterly helpless as he wondered how in the world he fell into that area and encountered Asser in the first ce. His n to deal with Han Shuo had beenpletely ruined by now.

    The two of them were heavily restricted within this odd formation. As they fought to their deaths, the sky-piercing stone pirs next to them would send out beams of odd energy that would freeze anyone who was hit, causing them to be hit by the one not frozen.

    After a while, the evenly matched two were covered in wounds all over, half of them thanks to their opponent while the other half from the beams the pirs shot out. Ossora didn¡¯t want to continue fighting Asser. From the very beginning, he had been looking for a way out, but the attacks from the formation and Asser¡¯s incessant pursuit sapped all his attention. Hence, he was unable to leave even though he wanted to.

    ¡°Asser, I don¡¯t want to keep fighting you! Stop pestering me!¡± Ossora said as he shot out a beam into the ground, causing a gigantic earth golem to rise and block in front of him.

    Asser, who was hiding in the dark, chuckled. ¡°Ossora, you are a Sovereign of the Fringe and are on good terms with the owner of Pandemonium, Bryan. The moment you get out, you¡¯ll join up with him to fight me. Do you think I¡¯m an idiot?¡±

    Ossora smiled bitterly and wanted to exin that he no longer had ties with Han Shuo, but felt that it wasn¡¯t too appropriate to do before he had backstabbed him properly first. Not to mention, it wasn¡¯t like Asser would believe him if he told the truth anyway, hence his hesitation.

    Seeing Ossora stay silent, Asser intensified his attacks. The energy of darkness attempted to grab hold of Ossora like tentacles. He was doing everything he could to wound Ossora before leaving this darned ce.

    Meanwhile, the ghastly pictures on the dozen pirs nearby seemed toe to life and wail from the dense negative aura, letting out an ear-piercing cry. Both of them noticed the change in the pirs and immediately grimaced. Ever since the beginning of their fight, the stone pirs had interfered but didn¡¯t seem nearly as threatening, so the two of them continued to fight.

    But now, the wailing ghost pictures seemed to be letting out an incredibly cold aura of evil which caused Asser and Ossora to shudder from the threat. They looked at each other, seemingly having picked up on something, and immediately backed off from one another without continuing their fight. Soon, a long shadow emerged behind one of the pirs. The energy the pirs gave off seemed to be attracted by something and gathered on that blurry shadow.

    ¡°Great! You¡¯re finally here!¡± Ossora eximed with joy, ¡°It¡¯s great that you¡¯re fine. I was under pursuit from Isaiah and the rest and had to retreat here. Little did I know I would fall into this ce and encounter this fellow!¡±

    He knew that person was Han Shuo. Asser¡¯s expression changed from the implication. He knew he was in deep trouble for having to deal with both the master of the ce and Ossora at the same time.

    As expected the figure revealed himself to be Han Shuo. ¡°Ossora, are you alright?¡± he asked, looking worried as he did so.

    Ossora was obviously happy about Han Shuo¡¯s apparent attitude, thinking that his whole shtick hadn¡¯t been exposed yet. ¡°I¡¯m fine, you came at just the right time. Let¡¯s wipe Asser out together!¡±

    ¡°That was exactly what I was nning to do!¡± he said as he charged towards Asser, who was hiding in darkness.

    The beams of light the pirs shot out were like sharp weapons that tore through everything that stood in their way. Even Asser¡¯s Divinity Domain of darkness was torn open from the sts, exposing his body within. Ossora was growing even more ted. He looked at Han Shuo with a well-concealed malicious intent.

    ¡°Coming!¡± Ossoraughed loudly as he swerved, causing the sands on the ground to gather to him. Now, he was as heavy as a mountain as he approached Asser domineeringly.

    Asser sighed at his bad luck and predicament. If he wasn¡¯t in the darned formation, he could¡¯ve had a chance to escape. He knew how hard it was to leave given his experience and that he wouldn¡¯t be able to do it without sufficient time. He watched as Ossora and Han Shuo approached him from front and back. He then abandoned every lingering thought and turned to Han Shuo all of a sudden.

    Having fought Ossora for quite some time, he knew the rough extent of his abilities. He believed he would be able to take Ossora¡¯s strike. Han Shuo, however, was far more terrifying, and he wasn¡¯t sure he would be able to take the hit.

    ¡°Haha, Asser, you should¡¯ve known this would happen from the day you wanted to wipe Pandemonium out,¡± Han Shuo said as he suddenly disappeared.

    Asser noticed that he could no longer sense Han Shuo¡¯s presence, causing him to panic and give up on attacking, choosing instead to surround himself with darkness once more.

    A thud could be heard from behind him, followed by an ear piercing cry. ¡°Bryan... Why... Why did you attack me?!¡± Ossora was covered in blood.

    Asser was stunned. He watched as Ossora bled out and turned to the smiling Han Shuo,pletely bbergasted.

    A weird energy swam about in Ossora¡¯s body, causing countless explosions in the process. Eventually, blood seeped out of all of Ossora¡¯s orifices. He desperately avoided Han Shuo¡¯s attacks as he cursed the unfair treatment he had gotten.

    ¡°Ossora, I¡¯ve always respected you as a guide. Yet, you didn¡¯t know your ce!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s expression was one of utter coldness. ¡°You dared to bring Isaiah, Regis, and Miller into Pandemonium, so you should¡¯ve seen thising! Hehe, I just did what you wanted to do to me all along!¡±

    ¡°You... You knew?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded. ¡°You don¡¯t have to keep hoping for Isaiah and the rest to save you. They can¡¯t even save themselves.¡±

    ¡°Impossible!¡± Ossora cried in a high-pitched voice, his wounds making him far more distraughtpared to his usual calm demeanor. ¡°There¡¯s no way you¡¯ll be able to hold off the three of them!¡±

    ¡°I guess there¡¯s nothing else for us to say.¡± Han Shuo sighed. ¡°Ossora, you¡¯ve helped me before, so I don¡¯t want to kill you myself. You better end it yourself!¡±

    ¡°Hehehehehehehe.... End it myself?! Bryan! Do you really think everything is under your control?!¡±

    ¡°Oh? Is it not?¡± Han Shuo smirked and looked at Asser, who was trying to bolt away. ¡°Are you talking about him? Haha, do you think he can help you?¡±

    As he spoke, two more figures appeared from behind two pirs, namely, Wasir and Ss. The moment they appeared, Ossora¡¯s face turned ashen. ¡°Wasir and Ss... Bryan, oh Bryan... You truly are ruthless! I didn¡¯t think you¡¯d not only work with Wasir, but also that crook Ss!¡±

    Asser stared at Ss with disbelief. ¡°You! Why are you helping him?!¡±

    Even though he wasn¡¯t from the Fringe, he knew that Ss held a huge grudge against Han Shuo. Otherwise, Dhaka, Dagmar, and Asser wouldn¡¯t have allowed him to join the fight against the Fringe. Yet, now, they were standing on the same side.

    ¡°Didn¡¯t you already know?¡± Ss feigned surprise and mocked, ¡°Weren¡¯t you convinced I was the one who caused you to suffer that loss at the three mountains? Why are you acting so shocked now?¡±

    When he said that, Asser shook with anger. ¡°So it really was you!¡± Back then, although they had med Ss for the loss of their men, they didn¡¯t really think that he had betrayed them.

    ¡°Haha, of course it was me! Otherwise, you never would¡¯ve lost half your men before even entering Pandemonium!¡± Ssughed with utter joy as he watched the look on his face. Back then, the trio had wanted to make a scapegoat of him, but now, he was having thestugh.

 Chapter 969 - Death Wish

    <h4>Chapter 969: Death Wish</h4>

    Were he able to do it over, Asser would definitely pay any price to kill Ss instead of letting him into the Godhunter Alliance. It was a shame that it was but a helpless plea. The moment they appeared from the dark corner, he knew that there was no longer anything he could do about it.

    Ossora was now heavily injured; even if he could still fight, there was nothing much he could do to help. Before Han Shuo came, Asser and Ossora had spent too much energy fighting one another. Now that they were up against three people at their peak, they felt that death would be soon upon them.

    ¡°Anyst words?¡± Han Shuo looked at Ossora and decided he would not waste time talking with him anymore.

    By now, Ossora seemed to have realized his true predicament. When he saw Han Shuo about to act, he stomped to the ground and caused an earthen wall to appear. At the same time, he took out a Portal Scroll, intending to tear the spacetime to escape.

    However, Han Shuo didn¡¯t act. Instead, he watched Ossora mockingly as he attempted to use the scroll. The scroll shone brightly for a moment, but stopped right after before it could do anything.

    ¡°This...¡± Ossora truly despaired this time. His eyes now looked dead.

    ¡°Nobody can leave anytime they want within Pandemonium without my say so!¡± Han Shuo smiled and prepared to kill Ossora himself.

    Wasir and Ss exchanged nces before smiling and heading for Asser...

    ......

    Meanwhile within another formation, Dagmar couldn¡¯t move at all. The clouds around him were all dark and many colorful creaturesbined to form a gigantic monster that danced beside him.

    Dagmar could see many blurry, but bloody figures in his vision. They looked like dead people he knew that had returned from the dead and leapt at him, wing away with their rotten arms incessantly.

    All sorts of sights manifested in his mind. He seemed to remember all of them, and now, it looked utterly real to him. If he couldn¡¯t relinquish the vacant thoughts in his mind, he wouldn¡¯t be able to break free of the hallucinations.

    After who knows how long, Dagmar¡¯s mental state recovered. He had been feeling a little burdened by his years of mad ughter, but he concentrated the death energy in his body into a death scythe and cut them all apart, properly dispelling his hallucinations with physical attacks.

    All of a sudden, a familiar figure holding a bone spear came walking out of the heavy fog. Dagmar¡¯s mouth curved into a disdained smile when he determined that it was but another illusion. Using the death scythe he had formed before, he swept it towards the approaching figure.

    However, something utterly weird happened; he lost control of his scythe halfway through that swipe. The death energy that formed the scythe was so chaotic that it could no longer support the sweep. Not only that, all the death energy in the surroundings no longer seemed to be attracted to Dagmar but to that figure instead. When he realized that he had lost control of the death energy, he knew this wasn¡¯t an illusion. ¡°Han Hao, it¡¯s really you?¡±

    The one wielding the bone spear was indeed Han Hao. An odd glow shed across his eyes as one odd rune after another appeared on his irises. The irresistible force of death emanated from his bone spear. As the pure death energy that came directly from the Quintessence Shard washed over Dagmar, he couldn¡¯t help but want to prostrate himself in worship.

    ¡°Dagmar, you¡¯re no longer my match. Pledge to serve me and reveal your divine soul unprotected to me. Then, I will spare you,¡± Han Hao said.

    ¡°Hahaha... Hahahaha...¡± Dagmar wasughing so hard that tears wereing out. Pointing at Han Hao, he said, ¡°Me? Submit to you? Haha... On what grounds? Han Hao, you are my subordinate, my inferior! Always have been! You want to take over? Well let¡¯s see if you¡¯re capable of that or not!¡±

    Back in the Death Domain, Han Hao had worked under Dagmar for more than fifty years. Yet, now Han Hao wanted Dagmar to submit to him. That was not something the prideful Dagmar could ept.

    Han Hao looked Dagmar over and sighed, before nodding slightly. ¡°Let me show you then!¡±

    One odd tombstone after another came out of the bone spear and levitated to Dagmar¡¯s side, invoking his desire to fight. However, he noticed that the energy of death within him was influenced by the tombstones, causing him to be unable to let out even a single ounce of it.

    ¡°Why... Why did your body not have the Quintessence Shard back at Omphalos?!¡± he cried unyieldingly.

    He could tell that the tombstones hade from the Quintessence Shard itself. Compared to what he had experienced previously, the power of the Shard now was far more mysterious and insidious. Originally, he could still resist when facing off against Han Hao, with thetter not being able to do much to him.

    Yet, this time around, he felt totally and utterly helpless. The death eenergy he had cultivated over millennia wasn¡¯t of any use at all. He now knew that Han Hao had probably truly absorbed the Quintessence Shard, which meant that from now on, he was unparalleled when it came to controlling death energy aside from Overgod Nestor, a bearer of Quintessence.

    ¡°Dagmar, submit to me! I will not harm even one hair on you if you do!¡± Han Hao coldly said, seeing Dagmar so dejected.

    ¡°I¡¯d rather die than submit to you!¡± He yelled and willed the remaining death energy in his body to implode, immediately crushing his organs in the process. Then, some weird undtions came out of his divine soul, forming into dissipating lights of darkness.

    Dagmar knew that facing Han Hao, the bearer of a Quintessence Shard and fellow cultivator of death energy, he couldn¡¯t even take him down with a suicidal attack of his own. Before his attack evennded, the death energy contained within would be dissipated by the Shard.

    Dagmar was a prideful man. Though he knew lowering his head just this once would see him spared, he still didn¡¯t do it. As someone who used to lord over Han Hao, he couldn¡¯t bear to bring himself to yield, so death was the preferable option.

    Sensing Dagmar¡¯s soul undtions, Han Hao knew that he was about to vanish from existence for good, something which surprised him considerably. He didn¡¯t know why Dagmar would choose death instead of submitting to him.

    Looking at Dagmar¡¯s corpse, his eyes glowed. After a while, he tossed a ghostly re he summoned to the corpse and burned it to ash.

    Though the overgod Dagmar was now dead, his divine body still had lots of uses. His bones could be used to make even stronger bone spears or spurs, while his skull and brain could be used to make some impressive demonic artifacts. In fact, even his skin had its uses.

    But for some reason, he didn¡¯t harvest Dagmar¡¯s corpse and cremated him instead. He only stopped the mes when everything was reduced to ash.

    A simple white-bone ring fell to the ground. After hesitating for a bit, he stepped forwards and picked it up. When he sent some death energy into the ring, a gigantic white bone throne appeared.

    Stunned, Han Hao took a deep breath and slowly sat in it. He sent some divine energy into the throne and it moved however he willed it to. Some strange undtions came from the throne and mingled with Han Hao¡¯s soul undtions. When he sent some more death energy into it, the bone throne seemed even more terrifying than it was when Dagmar used it. It seemed to have changed after reacting to Han Hao¡¯s energy somehow.

    Han Hao felt that the throne was now part of his body, much like the seven bone spurs on his back. He then stepped off the throne and looked at it as it levitated in mid air.

    With but a thought, the throne moved and swerved in the sky like a remotely controlled drone. A smile appeared on Han Hao¡¯s face as he yed with his new toy. The throne moved through the air as he willed it, gaining more and more speed.

    After a while, he jumped into the throne and sent more death energy into it, causing it to rev up and activate the white-bone des around the throne. From a distance, he looked like a skeletal monstrosity that was able to perform many agile offensive movements in mid-air.

    Han Hao wasn¡¯t in a rush to leave this ce. He relished the sensation and had a feeling that the throne never belonged to Dagmar, for he wasn¡¯t able to use it to its full potential. However, Han Hao¡¯s own energy was able to unlock the forbidden seals on the throne and bring out even more of its mysterious functions.

 Chapter 970 - Theres No Predicting Fate

    <h4>Chapter 970: There¡¯s No Predicting Fate</h4>

    Within the Sky Annihtion Formation, Dhaka struggled to no end. By now, thirty percent of his destruction energy had been depleted thanks to the various forces that suppressed him. Though angered he was, he was helpless against the forces within the formation and unable to break free from it at all. Not to mention, he had to constantly be on guard for the sneakier attacks.

    After some time, the mysterious forces in the formation seemed to be affected by some other force as it weakened. ted, Dhaka used this chance to concentrate all his destruction energy into ance which he used to pierce across the formation¡¯s bindings and broke free.

    Outside, the smiling Judas slowly kept a cross away. Looking at Dhaka, he asked, ¡°What¡¯s wrong? Are you trapped too?¡±

    Dhaka¡¯s eyes shone when he saw the cross. ¡°Is that one of the four divine artifacts created by the God of Light back then?¡±

    Judas was quite surprised as he didn¡¯t expect Dhaka to be aware of that too. Nodding, he said, ¡°That¡¯s right. The Holy Grail, Olive Branch, Crucifix, and Angel Sculpture are indeed forged by the God of Light. The Olive Branch is in the hands of Gy¨¢l whereas I have the Crucifix. Haha, if not for having one of the divine artifacts, even I wouldn¡¯t be able to get you out of there.¡±

    Surprised, Dhaka shook his head with a bitterugh. ¡°For you to possess the Crucifix and not be eliminated by the God of Light, Judas, you really are impressive.¡±

    ¡°You tter me too much,¡± Judas said with a bow. ¡°Praise the God of Light¡¯s bright mercy that illuminates us all!¡±

    ......

    Within another formation, Han Shuo¡¯s expression changed as he pursued Ossora. He suddenly seemed tog mid-flight. Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness was connected with each and every formation in Pandemonium, and the changesing from the Sky Annihtion Formation didn¡¯t escape him. A sudden force had affected the yuan energy of the formation, allowing the trapped Dhaka to escape. At the same time, he felt another chilling aura that informed him of an approaching enemy.

    Before Han Shuo could take any action, the Hegemon of Water, Tuckamore, suddenly appeared. Scanning the surroundings, he smirked. ¡°Interesting. I didn¡¯t think Pandemonium would have the upper hand!¡±

    When Tuckamore appeared, Asser, who was being pursued heavily by Wasir and Ss, immediately broke free from their encirclement in a spurt of energy. He came to Tuckamore¡¯s side and said, ¡°Pandemonium¡¯s far harder to handle than we thought. We must join hands to be able to wipe it out!¡±

    Tuckamore nodded. ¡°I really didn¡¯t think that the toughest ce in the Fringe wouldn¡¯t be Logue or Tyre¡¯s ce, but rather Pandemonium.¡±

    When Ossora saw Tuckamore and Asser together, he also tried to join their side.

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression was grim, but he didn¡¯t stop Ossora¡¯s movements, for the tens of stone pirs that were sustaining the formation began to fracture. The energy fueling the formation suddenly vanished.

    Dhaka and Judas eventually showed up. When they set sights on Han Shuo, they made sure to keep their eyes glued to him, lest he made any sudden moves.

    ¡°I didn¡¯t think you¡¯de to Pandemonium too,¡± Han Shuo said to Tuckamore and Judas, ¡°Where is Logue? Is Osteoburg done for?¡±

    Judas was wearing an old, white and tattered robe. He had a gentle look on his face,pletely unlike a bloodthirsty Hegemon. He smiled and answered, ¡°Osteoburg is indeed done for, but that cunning Logue managed to escape.¡±

    ¡°What about Tyre?¡± Han Shuo asked after some thought.

    Logue¡¯s escape was within his predictions. Given his cunning personality, he would definitely escape without care for his subordinates if things got dangerous for him. It wasn¡¯t a huge feat for him to leave alone, given how long he had spent in Osteoburg.

    However, Han Shuo was surprised that Judas and Tuckamore hade to Pandemonium instead of going to Tyre¡¯s base which was closer. Their presence here meant that the battle against Tyre was over.

    Judas hesitated a moment before he said, ¡°Tyre has vanished along with his subordinates. When Balintan and Kauze reached the Shrine of Destruction, they didn¡¯t see a single god, nor Tyre. So, the two of them also came.¡±

    Han Shuo knew that the two of them were the fire and life Hegemons who were in charge of attacking the Shrine of Destruction, which was Tyre¡¯s base of operations in the Fringe. It seemed that the two of them returned from the shrine empty-handed.

    While the Fringe wasrge, there were only five truly powerful factions, namely, Logue¡¯s, Ossora¡¯s, Wasir¡¯s, Tyre¡¯s, and Pandemonium. With Tyre gone missing, Logue escaped, and Ossora as well as Wasir being in Pandemonium, the ce became the pivotal location the Godhunter Alliance had to wipe out. As such, the Hegemons of the Alliance came to Pandemonium by sheer coincidence rather than nning ahead to do so.

    Hearing Judas¡¯s exnation, Han Shuo¡¯s heart sank. He had thought that Tyre and Logue would either resist their attacks ore up with a n. Little did he know they would run without offering any resistance and buying him any time.

    Han Shuo had nned to take out the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s split forces one after another. For one, the two Hegemons that had gone to cial Peak had been stuffed into the spatial rift by him. They wouldn¡¯t be able to return to Elysium within thousands of years. Regis, Isaiah and Miller, on the other hand, had been sealed in the underground secret chamber, while he was about to deal with Dagmar, Dhaka, and Asser.

    If he had just a little bit more time, his divide-and-conquer strategy would have worked and Judas and the rest would havee marching to their deaths. Yet, the opposite happened. Judas and Tuckamore not only managed to save Dhaka, but they had probably also let Regis and the rest out.

    As if he had guessed what Han Shuo was thinking, Judas smiled and nodded. ¡°It¡¯s just as you thought. Balintan and Kauze have gone looking for those three. They should be able to free them soon.¡±

    When Judas said that, Han Shuo felt his heart skip a beat. He could feel the strong undtionsing from the chamber where he sealed Regis and the rest, which suggested that they were indeed about to be broken free.

    He grimaced as he slowly despaired, thinking that there was really no predicting fate at all. Even the best of ns could be knocked awry by the slightest variable. As long as Judas and Tuckamore had been one dayte, he would¡¯ve been able to deal with Ossora, Asser, and Dhaka for good while sealing Regis, Isaiah, and Miller off for good.

    Even if the rest cameter, with Wasir, Ss, Han Hao, and Andrina¡¯s powers as well as the advantage of being on home ground, he was confident he would be able to stop at least two of the four from escaping Pandemonium.

    Now, things had gone beyond his control. The true fight was about to begin and he didn¡¯t feel like he stood a single chance.

    At that moment, a white bone throne came flying towards them from a distance and stopped beside Han Shuo. Seated in the middle of the throne was Han Hao. He looked around wordlessly and hovered closer to Han Shuo. ¡°Dagmar¡¯s dead.¡±

    His words caused everyone to startle. Judas took a nce at the gloomy-looking Dhaka before looking at Asser. Shaking his head with a resigned look, hemented, ¡°I didn¡¯t think that Dagmar would be so pathetic as to be wiped out by a former subordinate. To think that I even supported him...¡±

    Han Shuo was a little relieved to hear the news. After going through all his thoughts once more, he said, ¡°Seems like a battle must happen. If I can kill one or two of you before the restes, we might be able to survive!¡±

    Dhaka smirked and said, ¡°In your dreams! Don¡¯t think I don¡¯t know how Han Hao was able to defeat Dagmar. Hmph, even if he was able to kill him, he isn¡¯t any of our match!¡±

    He nced at Wasir and Ss, thetter of which caused his eyes to burn with hatred once more. ¡°Those two, and you, stand no chance against me, Judas, Tuckamore, and Asser. There¡¯s no way you¡¯d be able to kill one or two of us!¡±

    However, Judas raised his hand to stop the mocking. He turned to Han Shuo and said, ¡°Tell us the secrets of the energy you cultivate and Pandemonium. I will allow your divine soul and your wives and children to leave, but Ss and Wasir must remain!¡±

    To Judas, this battle no longer held much of a point. He basically had full control of the situation, so he could just let Han Shuo¡¯s soul leave as a gesture of generosity. Han Shuo could always spend a thousand years cultivating to regain his current strength, not to mention his family and friends would be safe.

    ¡°Bryan, this sounds like a proposal you can ept,¡± the cold Wasir said, out of Han Shuo¡¯s expectations. He seemed neither ted nor dejected. It was as if he hadn¡¯t heard what Judas said at all. He didn¡¯t seem to pay his potential death any mind.

 Chapter 971 - Doing So Despite Knowing Otherwise

    GDK 971: Doing So Despite Knowing Otherwise

    Now, it seemed that the House of Han was hard pressed to win in any and all regards. It wasn¡¯t that the defenses of Pandemonium were insufficient, nor was Han Shuo¡¯s strength inadequate to defend them ¨C the opponent was simply just far more powerful than they had expected.

    Judas¡¯s offer sounded decent. At the very least, it was a surefire way to make sure that not all the members of the House of Han would be wiped out. At the very least, Han Shuo¡¯s divine soul would be spared.

    Wasir¡¯s sudden reaction waspletely out of Han Shuo¡¯s expectations. He looked at the brawny man without saying anything, feeling a little touched instead for Wasir¡¯s act of self-sacrifice at a moment of crisis in a surprising disy of camaraderie.

    The other Sovereign, Ss, only smiled in resignation. He didn¡¯t offer to sacrifice himself like Wasir did, but he didn¡¯t immediately beg Dhaka, Judas and the rest for mercy either, as he knew more than anyone else that the Godhunter Alliance never left debts unsettled. Ss knew that even if Judas would spare Wasir, he wouldn¡¯t let him go as he was a traitor to them.

    ¡°Bryan, think it over,¡± Judas said with a pleasant smile, ¡°I¡¯m not like Isaiah and the rest. I won¡¯t plot against you secretly right here. As long as you are truly willing to tell me the secrets of Pandemonium, I assure you that I¡¯ll let your divine soul leave in peace.¡±

    ¡°Judas!¡± Dhaka yelled, ¡°The members of the House of Han don¡¯t include Han Hao! Anyone else can leave, but not him! You¡¯ve seen how he killed Dagmar yourself. I can¡¯t let this go unpunished on the behalf of Dagmar¡¯s subordinates!¡±

    Stunned, Judas turned to look at Han Hao before nodding. He and Dhaka had taken it for granted that Han Shuo would already submit to them, so they were now going over the fine details.

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression was grim as ever as his eyes darted between the two of them, as if he found it really difficult to make a choice. Momentster, he suddenly sighed and said to his unhurried enemies, ¡°From the moment I got into the limelight, I¡¯ve never submitted to anyone before. Not back then, not now, not ever!¡±

    Dhaka¡¯s expression turned cold as heughed. ¡°Then, this will be your death wish!¡±

    ¡°Bryan, you really should reconsider. We have experts here who are well versed in the intricacies of the soul. The moment we kill you, the secrets your divine soul keeps will still fall into our hands all the same. Why bother?¡± Judas advised onest time.

    ¡°I¡¯m the kind of person that does it despite knowing otherwise!¡± Han Shuo spat.

    Judas nodded and turned to Dhaka and Tuckamore. ¡°Looks like we¡¯ll have to do it the hard way. Too bad, we have to exhaust some of our power.¡±

    ¡°This is even better. We¡¯ll get to wipe them out for good to save us troubleter. That was what I had been nning to do all along!¡± Dhaka turned to the injured Ossora and snickered. ¡°What about you, Ossora? What¡¯s your n?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, you¡¯ve seen it yourself. He suddenly turned against me without batting an eye. Naturally, I¡¯m siding with you guys.¡± Ossora¡¯s injuries had stabilized somewhat. He turned to the Han Hao seated in his bone throne and said, ¡°Let me deal with the small fry. I¡¯m still injured, after all.¡±

    ¡°So it is decided,¡± Judas said, before he signalled to Dhaka to attack Han Shuo together.

    Tuckamore and Asser didn¡¯t idle around either and attacked Wasir and Ss respectively. The temporary pause to their battle was now no more. This time around, Han Shou and the rest didn¡¯t have the upper hand.

    The cross in Judas¡¯s hand let out an iparably holy aura as it emanated rays of the most purifying sacred light to envelop Han Shuo, much to his difort.

    Dhaka, the destruction cultivator, had been slowly recovering his energy since breaking free of the Sky Annihtion Formation. He formed a spear from destruction energy that has a really terrifying tip. It gave Han Shuo the sense of helpless defeat before it was even thrust his way.

    In an instant, Han Shuo calmed himself down, externalizing his obstacles and pressures. His eyes regained their former unmoving calm. With a wave of his hands, the Cauldron of Myriad Demons began shooting at him from the formation crux and sucking in the vast yuan energy from the Sky Annihtion Formation. The energy flooded into the cauldron like a huge torrent.

    With but a thought, he willed the Seventeen Flying Swords floating out from his back. They streaked across the sky, leaving trails like meteorites, as they executed Deicide sh. A demonic light glowed in the sky as the magnificent sh descended towards Dhaka.

    Dhaka¡¯s expression changed, as if he hadn¡¯t expected Han Shuo to be nearly that terrifying. Those seventeen swords had gathered a ferocious amount of demonic energy and Dhaka had no choice but to withdraw his attack at Han Shuo. He countered it with his full power concentrated on hisnce of destruction.

    When Cauldron of Myriad Demons came whooshing over, thousands of demon generals were circling above it. Gradually, the demon generals seemed to form gigantic, monstrous tentacles that were stretching in all directions. The yuan energy that Pandemonium had gathered over the years was now inside the Cauldron, boosting its power and allowing it to disy such overwhelming power in an explosive burst. Torrents of evil energy came spiraling down with the pressure of the ocean depths.

    ¡°Amazing!¡± Judas cried in surprise. He could feel that even his evil-purifying Crucifix was being pressured by the Cauldron. The inky torrent that came spiraling down even dulled the glow of the Crucifix somewhat. It was quite apparent that even a divine artifact crafted by the God of Light wasn¡¯t as impressive as the Cauldron.

    Judas no longer paid attention to Han Shuo and infused his full power into the Crucifix, restoring it to its former brightness. However, that still wasn¡¯t enough to deal with the terrifying power the Cauldron disyed.

    The Crucifix was but one of four divine artifacts crafted for the three Keepers of the Light, not the weapon used by the God of Light himself, while the Cauldron of Myriad Demons was the lifelong treasure of the Exalted Demonlord. They could nary bepared.

    Back then, the Cauldron hadn¡¯t been able to be utilized to its full extent as most of the demon generals within had been vaporized during the Exalted Demonlord¡¯s great battle. But after so much time of collecting divine souls, the cauldron was now beginning to recover its former power. Though it wasn¡¯t as powerful as when it was serving the Exalted Demonlord, it still wasn¡¯t something a mere divine artifact could overpower.

    Thanks to the thousands of demon generals¡¯ power, the inky ck force came crashing down on Judas. The Crucifix in his hand shed on and off, its holy power being rapidly suppressed. The nigh-invincible Crucifix had finally met its natural counter. Not only could it not continue to unleash holy energy, it was even being corrupted by the evil energying from the cauldron and was beginning to destabilize.

    Judas paled with the shock. He didn¡¯t think it would end up this way even though he had such a prized artifact with him.

    ¡°Sacred Sanctuary!¡± he yelled, causing his body to shine blindingly with sacred light, turning the nearest demon generals into ash. All of a sudden, the demon generals returned to the Cauldron, causing the inky ck wave to vanis and exposing the Cauldron shrouded under it. It continued its descent with tremendous power.

    The Cauldron fell onto Judas and caused him to stumble some distance backward.

    Before anyone noticed, Judas was now d in an armor of gold from top to bottom, even his head, leaving only two slits through which his amazement-filled eyes could be seen.

    ¡°Holy Aurum Armor!¡± Han Shou mused with surprise. He didn¡¯t know that Judas was a light cultivator who could use Holy Aurum Armor. Why was he a godhunter instead?

    It was said that only the most devout believers of the God of Light would be granted a divine stigma on their soul which they could use to manifest Holy Aurum Armor by channeling the power of faithing from the hundreds of millions of believers of the God of Light. The armor was capable of resisting any and all corruption from evil. Seeing Judas use it, Han Shuo was filled with questions. He even wondered if Judas was truly a Hegemon.

    ¡°Truly amazing!¡± Judas said with praise once he found stable footing. Even after summoning Holy Aurum Armor to ovee the overpowering cauldron, he still took quite a bit of toll from it. The immense power still bewildered him endlessly; the mere sight of the Cauldron filled him with excitement.

    ¡°Dhaka, I don¡¯t care how you split up Pandemonium. All I want is that little trinket over there!¡± Judas said. It was as if he had found what he truly needed.

    ¡°You cultivate light energy! What would you need an evil divine artifact for?!¡± Dhaka had expended quite a bit of effort to counter Deicide sh, but he couldn¡¯t just let thatment stand. ¡°You can have Pandemonium! I want that cauldron!¡±

    Judas nced at Dhaka with a hint of insidiousness despite his smiling expression. ¡°Firste first serve!¡± he said, before he glowed blindingly and charged towards the Cauldron, maniacallyughing along the way.

 Chapter 972 - Uncontrolled

    <h4>Chapter 972: Uncontrolled</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    After Judas armored up, he still dared to give the cauldron another direct counter. It was a sign of his absolute confidence in his strength. The Crucifix shone even brighter now that he was d in Holy Aurum Armor. The holy power was far more intense than before.

    With the Crucifix and Holy Aurum Armor, Judas seemed like the embodiment of the God of Light himself. There was no way people would associate him with a Hegemon of the Godhunter Alliance.

    Han Shuo felt greatly pressured from the holy power that wasing from Judas. He had no choice but to send a stream of energy into the cauldron to aid it in resisting all that holy power. The whole time, he had thought that Dhaka was the strongest fighter in the Godhunter Alliance. Now that he had seen Judas¡¯s holy power, he knew that Judas, the one who betrayed the God of Light, was even more terrifying. He was the true undisputed Hegemon among the godhunters.

    The Seventeen Flying Swords took formation and used Deicide sh once more, keeping Dhaka in check, forcing him to have to retaliate with full force. On the other hand, Han Shuo sent some demonic yuan energy to the cauldron, allowing it to squeeze out even more power before it mmed into the armoured Judas. The force of the blow left him stunned.

    ¡°Haha, it¡¯s got even better!¡± Judas eximed with excitement. He was d entirely in the armor that was formed from thebined faith of 100 million God of Light believers. Even after being rammed by the cauldron twice, the armor didn¡¯t shatter. The condensed faith shone brightly with holy energy like the sun, seemingly able to resist any and all forms of corruption.

    ¡°Han Hao, you aren¡¯t my match!¡± Ossora smirked. Earth energy filled his body, making him feel like a magnificent mountain. Each strike he unleashed gave off an impressive domineering sensation.

    While Han Hao alone would be quite hard pressed to face off against such raw power, he was now seated in the middle of Dagmar¡¯s white bone throne. His whole body seemed to have fused with the throne itself; the throne had be an extension of his body. The concentrated energy of death flowed unabated throughout the throne, turning it into a gigantic yet impossibly agile monster.

    With but a thought, he could make the throne extend its fangs and talons to attack Ossora, as well as order it to shrivel up and defend him from Ossora¡¯s attacks. The throne was just as good at offense as well as defense, something which Han Hao exploited for his own benefit. From time to time, the bone spear in his hand would sh, causing Ossora to back away in fear every single time. Just because of the throne, Han Hao was able to drive Ossora away without allowing himself to be truly harmed or attacked.

    But just as Ossora was unable to deal any real damage to him, Han Hao wasn¡¯t able to kill Ossora either. Thetter wasn¡¯t a death cultivator, so the Quintessence Shard of Death wouldn¡¯t be able to do much. Earth cultivators also excelled at defense, and Ossora covered himself entirely with an armor of earth. There wasn¡¯t much Han Hao could do against it. If not for Ossora¡¯s defensive element, Han Hao would definitely be able to crush him.

    ¡°You can¡¯t kill me either!¡± Han Hao said coldly. He wouldn¡¯t let Ossora¡¯s words affect his emotional state.

    Ossora was still somewhat injured and wasn¡¯t able to utilize earth energy to his full capabilities. Coupled with such an impressive defensive artifact like the white bone throne, there wasn¡¯t much Ossora could do to harm Han Hao.

    Han Shuo, who was dealing with Judas and Dhaka alone, turned to look at Ossora and Han Hao. Much to his relief, it didn¡¯t seem like thetter would be in any trouble anytime soon. Smirking, he said, ¡°So you still think you have everything under control, huh?¡±

    Then, he whistled hard. All of a sudden, two identical Han Shuos flew out from the Cauldron of Myriad Demons, each one holding the cauldron¡¯s left and right side as death and destruction energy radiated from them before forming into a hybrid domain of divinity around them.

    These two avatars werete-stage highgods and only a hair¡¯s breath away from reaching overgod status. Apart from having absorbed the souls and divine energy of many death and destruction highgods, they had also incorporated much of the memories contained within their souls. Now, they were stronger than ever before.

    With a ping from the main body¡¯s divine consciousness, the two avatars were in sync with the main body. Suddenly, the death and destruction domains of divinity shifted into a new, never-before-seen domain of divinity with the cauldron in the very center, instantly spreading out and enveloping the whole area.

    The cauldron in the center focused the death and destruction energies together, causing thebined domain to be able to repel other types of energies. Dhaka¡¯s expression immediately changed when he realized that he was no longer able to truly grasp thews of destruction despite being an overgod of destruction.

    The death energy gushed from all directions while Orbs of Destruction hung in the skies like fruits hanging on invisible branches, rolling nonstop as they unleashed terrifying destruction energy.

    Dhaka looked up and found that the Orbs of Destruction above not only had death and destruction energy within, the orbits on which they spun also contained traces of the true essence of thews of destruction. If a minor god that cultivated destruction energy looked at the orbs, they would be able toprehend new ways to utilize destruction energy, bing even more powerful in the process.

    Inside the hybrid domain, Judas immediately noticed the lighting from his Holy Aurum Armor dimming. Even his evil-dispelling Crucifix didn¡¯t seem to be able to hold out against thebined domains.

    The two avatars that were not even at the overgod level were far greater than the sum of their parts; thebined domain of death and destruction influenced everyone within its bounds and affected their power, with but a single exception: Han Hao, who bore the death Quintessence Shard. The death element of thebined domain was actually not affected by his shard¡¯s influence, much to his shock.

    Suddenly, without any warning, Han Hao shone brightly, and it waspletely out of his control. One rune after another surfaced from his body as a gigantic image of a tombstone manifested behind him. The moment the tombstone appeared, it seemed to affect the new hybrid divinity domain. The two forces de-harmonized and shed and caused rampant energies to shoot all over the ce.

    The tombstone was not controlled by Han Hao, and the sh of the two forces was far out of his expectations. It had happened so fast that he wasn¡¯t able to respond to it.

    Han Shuo was just as surprised. He didn¡¯t think his avatars¡¯ hybrid divinity domain would sh with Han Hao¡¯s Quintessence Shard just because it contained some death energy too. Eventually, the hybrid domain began to fracture, causing the death energy within to flow towards Han Hao. The remaining destruction energy was no longer able to support the hybrid divinity domain.

    ¡°Hahaha, truly interesting! To think the father and son would turn on each other!¡± Ossora had been blown away when the new domain just formed, but now, all he could do wasugh.

    ¡°It¡¯s the Quintessence Shard! It can¡¯t be anything else!¡± Judas cried when he turned to look at Han Hao. When Tuckamore and Ossora heard that, they looked at Han Hao disbelievingly too.

    The chaotic battle hade to a halt the moment Han Shuo¡¯s hybrid divinity domain shed with Han Hao¡¯s death energy, causing the other overgods who weren¡¯t aware of the Quintessence Shard to gape at him. Even Ss and Wasir were shocked as they realized the reason Nastor had gone to Omphalos to interrogate Logue.

    It appeared that the Overgod of Death himself had indeed been looking for the Quintessence Shard. It was no wonder an exalted being like Him woulde to the Fringe all the way from the Death Dominion.

    ¡°We have to end the battle quickly. It wouldn¡¯t be long before the Overgod of Death returns. If we don¡¯t leave before he arrives, we might end up on his dinner table!¡± Dhaka said hastily.

    Everyone knew that Nestor was extremely sensitive towards the Quintessence Shard of Death. It was a separate matter if he did not activate the Shard, but Han Hao had manifested it directly, out in the open. There was no doubt that Nestor would immediately sense the Shard¡¯s power ande.

    While the Hegemons normally liked to throw their weight around normal folks, they knew that they were far from Nestor¡¯s match. The Overgod of Death could easily wipe out every overgod in the Fringe all by himself.

    ¡°Let¡¯s make haste!¡± Judas said, before heughed out loud all of a sudden. ¡°Haha, Regis, Isaiah, Miller, and the rest are here. The battle¡¯s as good as over!¡±

    As he had stated, there were indeed five figuresing from the distance.

 Chapter 973 - Unyielding

    GDK 973: Unyielding

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Regis, Isaiah, Miller, Balintan, and Kauze had finally arrived. The former three had been injured and imprisoned in the secret chamber by Han Shuo and wouldn¡¯t have been able to escape with their powers alone. It didn¡¯t help that the chamber forbade the use of all energies.

    Even so, Kauze and Balintan who came from the Divine Dominions of Life and Fire weren¡¯t hurt, so they used fire and life energy to attack the secret room nonstop. As Han Shuo drew away too much yuan energy, coupled with the odd events uring in the Sky Annihtion Formation, the secret chamber¡¯s defenses were heavily weakened, so it crumbled from their nonstop attacks.

    If the threat of Judas, Dhaka and the rest alone was enough to get Han Shuo and his gang in trouble, they would soon be pushed to the breaking point with the arrival of new foes. As Judas had said, the battle was alreadying to an end.

    Being surrounded by every remaining Hegemon, Han Shuo smiled bleakly. He said, ¡°Looks like we¡¯re forced into a corner. Wasir, Ss, I have let you two down this time around. It appears that you¡¯re going to be doomed with us.¡±

    The Hegemons were not in a rush to act. Instead, they formed their own Domains of Divinity to lock the whole area down, keeping Han Shuo and the rest confined within.

    With so much power on their side, Judas and the rest could be sure that Han Shuo and his cohort would not be able to match them. To prevent them from escaping, Regis, Balintan and the others had sealed up the surrounding routes with their respective energies before joining up with Judas.

    Layer afteryer of barriers spread outwards and enveloped Han Shuo, Wasir, Ss and Han Hao. Within them, thews of space were erratic. Even an overgod well versed in the space edict wouldn¡¯t be able to escape from the area.

    Han Shuoughed forlornly while Wasir and Ss sighed at the same time. they knew that they had failed and there was no more hope for them to leave alive.

    ¡°Father, we can still try,¡± Han Hao telepathically said to Han Shuo. As he sent the telepathic message, he also shot Han Shuo a nce. Han Shuo knew what he was intending. They still had one final move as cultivators of demonic arts they could use. As their abilities were not of this world, they were simrly not bound by this world¡¯sws. So long as Han Shuo and Han Hao ignored potential injury and utilized Demonic Blood Disassembly, there was a chance they would be able to escape.

    Even so, Han Shuo felt a little troubled about doing so. He felt that if he and Han Hao really chose to run, his whole family would still perish. He felt a little dejected about his predicament.

    Among them, Judas noticed an odd look in Han Shuo¡¯s expression. He waved to stop the other Hegemons from doing anything and smiled. ¡°Bryan, I¡¯m still willing to give you a chance. As long as you give us all the secrets of Pandemonium as well as your cultivation, we will ensure that your family is spared.¡±

    ¡°Judas!¡± Dhaka yelled, ¡°Why bother? At this point, they¡¯re going to lose to us anyway! Why waste so much time?¡±

    It wasn¡¯t just Dhaka; the other Hegemons were feeling rather annoyed about Judas making the decision without consulting them first. Regis, Isaiah, and Miller were even more pissed, considering that they had been hurt and imprisoned by Han Shuo just moments before. Isaiah smirked and said, ¡°Judas, you don¡¯t call the shots in the Godhunter Alliance. Today, the House of Han must perish!¡±

    A little stunned, Judas smiled and said, ¡°You think you three have any right to speak?¡± He pointed at Asser and Dhaka and continued, ¡°And you two. Didn¡¯t Ie with Tuckamore to save you lot? If not for us, you would¡¯ve perished at their hands already. I hope you haven¡¯t forgotten that.¡±

    The moment he said that, they looked rather awkward. Judas had spoken the truth. If not for him, Kauze and the rest helping them out, not a single one of them would be able to leave Pandemonium alive.

    Han Shuo really wondered why Judas would still give him that option despite having theplete upper hand. As long as he asked the other Hegemons to attack, there was no way Han Shuo and the others could resist.

    Seeing that the others have stopped arguing, Judas smiled. ¡°So, how will it be, Bryan?¡±

    By now, Han Shuo had to scrutinize the tempting offer, trying to find a way out of it.

    ¡°Father, we are fine. We¡¯ll be able to leave Pandemonium soon. What about you and Big Brother?¡± Han Mu telepathically said.

    Though wavering over Judas¡¯s offer, Han Shuo was ted to receive Han Mu¡¯s message. However, nothing showed on his face. He immediately reached out to Han Mu with his consciousness to ask them how they were doing. Soon, he was told that Andrina and the Five Elite Zombies easily allowed them to escape from Balintan and Kauze. Taking advantage of their familiarity with the local terrain, they managed to reach safety.

    As all the demon generals in Pandemonium were gathered in the cauldron, coupled with how he had used up too much yuan energy in Pandemonium, he wasn¡¯t able to perceive everything that happened within like usual. Not to mention, the life edict expert Kauze hid his and Balintan¡¯s life auras, making it so that there was no way Han Shuo could tell how they were doing. That was why he had been worried about his family and the Five Elite Zombies the whole time. But now, he was finally relieved after hearing that they were safe.

    ¡°There¡¯s no need to use that, I still have one trick up my sleeve!¡± Han Shuo telepathically told Han Hao, who seemed a little stunned to hear it. He didn¡¯t seem to be aware of what Han Shuo was nning to do.

    ¡°Judas, my answer is the same! I am someone who does things knowing that I might well fail!¡± he proudly proimed.

    Surprised, Judas shook his head with a resigned smile and sighed. ¡°What¡¯s the point of all this...¡± He waved and said, ¡°Since that¡¯s the case, I believe Bryan is still nning something. We better keep our guard up.¡±

    The other Hegemons were waiting for Han Shuo to say exactly that. They didn¡¯t believe that Han Shuo would really have any way he could use to turn the tables. Instead, all they saw was a dead man still walking. They smiled eerily as they closed in on him step by step, each forming a small energy field concentrating the energies they cultivated.

    ¡°Bryan, I wouldn¡¯t me you if you had epted his terms,¡± Wasir suddenly said as he turned to him.

    Han Shuoughed out loud and said, ¡°What are you talking about? Either we survive together or we perish. There¡¯s nothing more lowly than sacrificing a friend¡¯s life for your own. It¡¯s not something I would stoop to doing.¡±

    When Ss heard him say that, a hint of a sparkle could be seen in his eyes. ¡°Bryan, oh Bryan, I really didn¡¯t misce my trust in you. You¡¯repletely unlike crooks like Logue and Tyre. Today, we fight side by side till our deaths!¡±

    Wasir felt a little touched too. He nodded sincerely and said, ¡°Then let¡¯s fight! To die fighting alongside worthy friends ¨C there is no greater honor to a warrior than this!¡± He turned his fierce cold eyes to Regis and Miller who were approaching him. When the two heard Wasir say that, they felt a chill in their hearts. They slowed their footsteps and put up their guard, as if they were facing off against a mighty foe.

    Overgods who were determined to fight to their deaths were the most terrifying. If Ss and Wasir used a suicidal move to take them down together, Regis and Miller might not be able to live through it either.

    ¡°Whether we¡¯ll die is not set in stone yet!¡± Han Shuo yelled loudly and his howl seemed to break down theyers of barriers all over. Sounds of explosion could be heard in the distance as Pandemonium itself shook furiously.

    The secret chamber cracked open and many energy towers and stone pirs exploded. There was even sounding from the Sky Annihtion Formation. The ground cracked apart as dense yuan energy gushed out from them.

    Beneath their feet, arge crevice had suddenly appeared. Isaiah and Ossora, both experts of the earth element, were actually unable to detect the sudden change in energy in the ground. They looked dumbfoundedly at the cracking earth beneath them and rapidly tried to probe the crack.

    Dhaka widened his eyes and signalled to Asser before the two of them charged through one of those crevices. Balintan, Kauze, Ossora and Tuckamore also stood beside simr crevices.

    They knew that Han Shuo had a son who was an elusive master of earth energy. If Han Shuo and the rest were able to escape through those crevices, the Godhunter Alliance would be made aughingstock for losing them after basically cornering them.

    Han Shuoughed maniacally, and Pandemonium reacted with loud explosions urring all across it, as if hisughter was the taboo act that triggered it. Nobody knew what he was nning to do.

 Chapter 974 - Rampant Change

    <h4>Chapter 974: Rampant Change</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Han Shuo had expended quite a lot of effort in building Pandemonium. There were too many secrets within that outsiders were unaware of, most of which had cost Han Shuo lots of wealth and materials to make.

    For Han Shuo, whose power was at the Skybreak Realm, he had absorbed lots of experience about offensive formations from the Cauldron of Myriad Demons. Coupled with his understanding of demonic arts, his formations contained specialized knowledge that only he knew. If Han Shuo was an artist, then Pandemonium was his masterpiece made with the summation of his skills and knowledge.

    Within it, there were some special mechanisms that had never been activated before. The whole time, these ces didn¡¯t seem to have any utility or special function, so most people just thought that they were useless. Even the Five Elite Zombies were oblivious to their functions. Only Han Shuo knew what they were truly for.

    The changes came suddenly; huge crevices appeared on the ground where yuan energy gushed out uncontrobly, resulting in strong winds and flying sand and rocks. It suddenly seemed like the end of the world was descending on Pandemonium.

    Needless to say, given their strengths, Judas, Dhaka, and the other Hegemons were incredibly sensitive to changes in the environment. They knew something was off with the odd changes urring in Pandemonium. Without speaking a word, they all charged towards the crevices in an attempt to stop Han Shuo and the rest from escaping through them.

    Han Shuo did see what they were trying to do, but did nothing to stop them. His lips curved into a cold smirk as he let out another ear-piercing howl which seemed to cause Pandemonium to transform once more.

    Vast amounts of yuan energy came flooding in like a huge torrent. Rumbling could be heard from the many dark clouds that had gathered as the yuan energy came plummeting down. It was as if all the negative energies in the world had gathered together and was about to wipe out all life.

    At the same time, a shocking wave of energy emanated from Han Shuo. The cauldron floated menacingly in mid-air as it sent out thousands upon thousands of demon generals that flew into the oppressive dark clouds.

    ¡°Bryan, stop it with your tricks. As long as you tell us everything, we will agree to Judas¡¯s suggestion.¡± Perhaps because he was frightened by the rapid changes, Isaiah, who was initially for killing everyone in the House of Han, began to want topromise.

    Hearing that, Regis and Miller also agreed. Dhaka and Asser still seemed rather hesitant and didn¡¯t say anything about it. Nobody knew if they agreed with what Isaiah had said.

    Judas smiled slightly, but he felt a little displeased with what Isaiah had said. He gave him a mocking nce.

    Wasir and Ss, who had prepared themselves for the possibility of dying, were just as surprised to see what Han Shuo had done to cause all these rapid changes. Now that survival was still in the cards, their fighting spirit red up. They stood together with Han Shuo with the intent of betting all they had with him.

    Han Hao, now delighted, levitated on the throne to Han Shuo¡¯s side. The moment Han Shuo acted, he would help him out with the charge.

    While the Hegemons were rapidly trying to salvage the situation, the killing intent, hatred, resentment, and other negative energies condensed into the dark clouds, descending upon the defensive barriers and seals they had ced around the area.

    The seal Miller deployed was first to be destroyed while the other barriers were cracking and shattering. It appeared that they will soon all be removed.

    Then, without any warning, a sudden burst of yuan energy pushed everyone apart while the killing intent from the menacing dark clouds entered the cauldron in an instant, causing it to grow in size multiple times before it charged towards Judas.

    Judas¡¯ face jolted as he got the feeling that he was no match for the cauldron. Instead of taking it head-on as he did previously, he chose to evade.

    ¡°Ss, Wasir, go now!¡± Han Shuo cried as he pointed with his left hand at the crevice that was being filled with yuan energy as it suddenly became muchrger, revealing arge, seemingly endless abyss. The force was so great that Ossora, who was blocking the crevice, was forced to back away rapidly like a drunk man stumbling backward.

    ¡°What about the two of you?¡± Ss wondered. They didn¡¯t leave immediately like Han Shuo had asked him to.

    ¡°Han Hao and I will escape with our own methods, so don¡¯t worry! Quick, this is my final resort. Once the energies disperse, I will no longer be able to gather them again. I can¡¯t keep this on for long so you must leave now!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± Wasir shot Han Shuo a solemn nce before he leaped into the abyss wordlessly. Han Shuo could tell how much he trusted him based on that.

    After nking out for a moment, Ss steeled his resolve. ¡°Take care. I¡¯m still waiting on you to fulfill your promise. As long as you can escape alive, I will take you as my master!¡±

    He then jumped into the crevice after Wasir.

    ¡°Stop them!¡± Dhaka yelled. Balintan and Kauze who were closest to the crevice hastily charged at them.

    Han Shuo closed his hands and unleashed a focused beam from his palms, causing the yuan energy that was pushing Ossora away to form into an insurmountable obstacle that kept Balintan and Kauze outside, allowing Wasir and Ss to slip away.

    ¡°Kill him!¡± Dhaka yelled as he let the destruction energy in his body surge to form an Orb of Destruction the size of the dark sun. This orb was the size of a hundred fistsbined and its destructive potential could strike terror into most that saw it.

    When Regis, Miller, Isaiah, and Tuckamore noted how sinister the whole situation was, they no longer held themselves back.

    Thunder roared as bolts of lightning fell like rain. Strong winds quickly formed into many destructive tornadoes as the earth shook nonstop. Out of nowhere, a meteorite fell out of the sky. The dense energy of frost turned into a fog that froze anything it touched.

    At that moment, the Hegemons, who had unleashed their Domains of Divinity, attacked with their full power. All sorts of forces shing in Pandemonium threatened to destroy it.

    ¡°Han Hao, you leave first!¡± Han Shuo yelled. His three souls fused into a single body instantly before he unleashed his hybrid Domain of Divinity before the other Hegemons came charging. He would forcefully expand his domain outwards.

    However, Han Hao didn¡¯t retreat as Han Shuo had ordered. Instead, he widened the distance between them and used the power of the Quintessence Shard to its full extent, causing a gigantic tombstone to manifest.

    From that instant, something even weirder happened. The yuan energying from within Pandemonium seemed to be drawn to the killing intent, resentment, violent urges, and other negative energies that the countless dead had left behind. They melded into Han Shuo¡¯s hybrid domain, causing it to transform once more. Unlikest time, the domain now contained not just death and destruction energies but also the various negative energiesing from Pandemonium. It seemed to no longer be affected by Han Hao¡¯s shard; there was no longer any conflict with it.

    ¡°ARGHHH!¡± Han Shuo roared. All of a sudden, he felt that the demonic yuan in his body was no longer within his control. It shot out at a speed that the naked eye could hardly follow into his new domain, within which many demon generals danced.

    At that moment, death, destruction, demonic yuan, demon generals, and many other forces blended together in a way nobody could¡¯ve been able to imagine. It felt like it was a beast that had emerged from the fringes of the universe, the embodiment of all things evil, an all-devouring ck hole whose radiation was nothing but pure anti-life malice.

    The Hegemons felt the energy rushing at them as they were engulfed by Han Shuo¡¯s new domain. It felt like the ground had fractured and the world had been destroyed.

    Then there came a sh as bright as a thousand suns. Everything and everyone was instantly enveloped in a blinding light...

    After some time that seemed as long as a day but paradoxically as short as a moment, the depleted Han Shuo regained his consciousness and senses. He felt paining from his whole body, pain that he had not experienced for a long time.

    Slowly, he opened both his eyes and noticed that he was bloodied all over. The Invincible Omen Body he had been so proud of was seemingly not invincible after all. Some of his wounds exposed his bones and blood came flowing out of it without stopping. Still not used to the sensation, he struggled to turn around. The sight that greeted him was garish beyond description.

 Chapter 975 - Explosive Growth

    GDK 975: Explosive Growth

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Han Shuo felt a little stunned. Was this still Pandemonium? The surroundings seemedpletely destitute, with most of the buildings that should be there all gone. Pandemonium had been wholly reduced to tnd. All that could be seen wererge crevices in the ground and ash falling incessantly from the sky. There wasn¡¯t a single roof tile nor a person to be seen. The silence was deathly.

    All of a sudden, Han Shuo had an odd feeling. It was as if he had returned to the past, as if he was on the deste, lonely moon. He couldn¡¯t move his body at all as he watched the lifeless sight before him in despair, awaiting his audience with the great equalizer.

    This sight before him looked so simr to the one from back then. It was just as lifeless, filled with craters, and he was just as powerless. He was currently reliving his past.

    He looked around faintly, trying to find a single living person, trying to move a single limb, trying to inspect what state his body was in.

    ¡°Father, are you alright?¡± Han Hao sent to the depths of his soul.

    ¡°Where are you?¡± Han Shuo asked, seemingly drunk. When he heard Han Hao¡¯s voice, he seemed to have rediscovered himself. He was able to make sense of his senses once more and, as a result, began cognizant again of his worry for Han Hao.

    ¡°I am underground. I¡¯lle up right away,¡± Han Hao replied.

    A sound could be heard from the small pile of rocks next to Han Shuo. All of a sudden, the rocks were blown apart by the gigantic white bone throne. Han Hao¡¯s reemergence seemed to trigger a chain reaction of sorts. Next to Han Shuo, sounds of rock being sted away kept ringing out as one haggard figure after another emerged.

    Judas, Dhaka, Isaiah, Regis... The Hegemons emerged one after another, still alive. Their faces were pale like paper, reflecting their vulnerable state.

    ¡°Bryan... You... what did you do to us?¡± Ossora mumbled weakly. He seemed far worse off than the rest.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t understand what he was talking about. He was feeling far weaker than before himself. Furrowing his brow, he said, ¡°What do you mean?¡±

    ¡°Why does it feel as though a part of me is gone? Why is the earth divine power within my body permanently diminished by some amount?!¡± Ossora yelled.

    It wasn¡¯t just Ossora; Dhaka, Isaiah and the rest seemed to be piqued by what Ossora had said. It was as if they were suffering from the same plight. They turned to Han Shuo, expecting an exnation.

    ¡°You¡¯re saying you lost divine power?¡± the light cultivator Judas suddenly said. All the Hegemons nodded in response. It was clear to them that their divine power had decreased in a permanent capacity.

    Judas looked at Han Shuo with disbelief. One moment, he wanted to go for the kill, but another, he seemed rather hesitant. Nobody knew what was going through his mind. Han Shuo still wasn¡¯t aware of what was going on himself.

    All of a sudden, an odd sensation could be felt in Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness. He suddenly felt like he had many more eyes. When he willed it, he pinged the cauldron and his two avatars. The moment he did that, thirteen blurry figures surfaced from therge crevices in the ground.

    ¡°Huh? What¡¯s this?¡± Han Shuo himself was just as shocked to see those figures.

    The cauldron rushed back to Han Shuo, but he no longer felt the presence of demon generals within it. It was nowpletely empty.

    However, he did feel a simr sensationing from the thirteen figures. Not only that, he seemed to have a unique connection with those figures. It was as if he was the shadow of those thirteen and vice versa.

    What in the world is going on?

    ¡°Master, I don¡¯t know why, but all the demon generals experienced a change. The energies they had cultivated back when they were alive resonated and fused together, eventually causing those demon generals that cultivated the same energy to fuse into one. As a result, thirteen lifeforms with your soul imprint were formed based on the thirteen energies. They are a new type of avatar, one that¡¯s even more unique than those of Demonyer Edge or the Skeletal Staff. In fact, I¡¯m not even sure which ssification of life-form they belong to,¡± the cauldron spirit said.

    For a moment, Han Shuo was confused and couldn¡¯t understand what he meant. ¡°What about those two avatars of mine?¡±

    ¡°They exploded after the great force struck. However, their souls and power seemed to have fused into the new avatars. You can feel it yourself. The death and destruction avatars should already bepletely synchronized with you without even having to limate to you.¡±

    Han Shuo tried to sense the aura of the thirteen figures. Gradually, he noticed that they did indeed have some sort of odd connection with him. The thirteen shadows included darkness, earth, fire, water, wind, lightning, death, destiny, space, life, death, destruction, and fighting aura. The death and destruction avatars felt more distinct to him than the rest. When he willed it, he felt an odd sensation entering his mind.

    ¡°Hahaha...¡±

    ¡°Hehehe...¡±

    The two avatars that were more distinct than the rest suddenlyughed, but they sounded different. Han Shuo felt like he was controlling three bodies with a single soul. Compared to before, it didn¡¯t feel one bit different from a synchronized soul. In fact, they were even more tightly synchronized than before. The sense of unity was truly a wondrous one.

    The death and destruction clones gave off the purest aura with respect to their corresponding cultivations. Gradually, they turned into humanoid figures roughly five times the size of Han Shuo and molded themselves to look exactly like him.

    ¡°What the...¡± Judas cried. He waspletely bbergasted. It was as if he noticed the fishy part about the thirteen figures that rose into the sky. Even Dhaka and the other Hegemons merely stared nkly at them.

    ¡°The thirteen energies... What the heck is going on here?!¡± Dhaka cursed.

    ¡°Wait a second, could it be these things that took our power...?¡± Ossora could feel familiar earth energying from one of those figures.

    ¡°As long as he doesn¡¯t die, we will never be able to have peace. One day, all of us will die because of him!¡± Dhaka yelled, despite not being able to so much as control his beating heart.

    The Hegemons were now united and no longer seemed hesitant. They had firmed their resolve to kill Han Shuo for good.

    At that moment, the destruction and death avatars fused together, melding the two energies into one as they formed the hybrid divinity domain. The ovepping avatars¡¯ shadow shimmered as it absorbed the lightning figure into them, adding the power of lightning into the hybrid divinity domain and doubling its power.

    Han Shuo¡¯s face was contorted from the effort he expended in controlling the three avatars. He left his injured body unattended and focused his full attention on them instead, causing the darkness, wind, and water figures to ovey each other.

    The strain on Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness grew exponentially with each avatar fused. After having the darkness, wind, and water avatars ovey with each other, his consciousness, as powerful as it is, reached its maximum working capacity and he could no longer get the other avatars to fuse. This was the limit his consciousness could sustain.

    The new figure formed by the oveid death, destruction, lightning, darkness, wind and water avatars slowly fused into a humanoid that looked like Han Hao, but felt nothing like him. Thebined six energies all manifested within the new divinity domain.

    ¡°Die!¡± Ossora felt a primal fear towards Han Shuo¡¯s new body and was the first to charge in. The new Han Shuo gave him a casual nce and simply raised a hand. Boundless, never-seen-before energy collected and engulfed Ossora.

    Instantly, Ossora¡¯s body disintegrated and vaporized. Even the strongest earth armor he could make was useless. In the end, he fell to the ground in bloody tatters, out of which a gray soul emerged. The cauldron didn¡¯t waste any time and sucked the soul into it, sealing it for good.

    The Hegemons, having witnessed the effortless kill, now looked different than before. They exchanged nces as they retreated backwards in abject fear. They no longer had the courage to face Han Shuo.

 Chapter 976 - Lord of All Things Demonic

    GDK 976: Lord of All Things Demonic

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Currently, Han Shuo was giving off a really terrifying vibe. Even Ossora, an earth overgod, was helpless to resist and had been killed in an instant. Han Shuo now seemed to be in the league of Quintessence Overgods.

    After witnessing someone as powerful as Ossora being wiped out in basically a single moment, the others shuddered from the chill and immediately retreated. Even staying for a single second longer meant risking being taken out by Han Shuo.

    The ovep of the six avatars of death, destruction, lightning, darkness, wind and water hovered in the air like a towering titan. Its divinity domain was a huge storm of six energies blending and melding together.

    ¡°Father, they¡¯re getting away!¡± Han Hao cried. But contrary to his expectations, Han Shuo didn¡¯t give chase at all. The gigantic figure in the air didn¡¯t move at all as it looked down on the single person that remained: Judas.

    It wasn¡¯t that Han Shuo didn¡¯t want to pursue them. Instead, the six-energy avatar congregate had to be actively maneuvered by his consciousness and couldn¡¯t be willed to move around as he pleased. There were also lots of unknowns remaining about it, chief of which was why the lightning, darkness, wind and water avatars didn¡¯t have a telepathic link with him.

    After barely being able tounch a strike to wipe Ossora out, the congregate avatar was about to break apart, especially when the aforementioned four energies spiraled out of control. He knew that if Dhaka and the rest didn¡¯t leave on their own ord, he might not have been able to take them out easily once these four energiespletely de-harmonized.

    Han Shuo was still rather unfamiliar with the powers of his avatars of death and destruction. He also barely had any knowledge about other eleven avatars coalesced from tens of thousands of demon generals.

    What he had to do first was familiarize himself with the thirteen new avatars. Only after he figured out their strengths and quirks and integrated them into his consciousness could he bring out their full power. Before that, all he could do was ovey them in a brute-force manner without proper integration, which seemed to be rather dangerous.

    Han Hao didn¡¯t seem to be aware of this, however. Seeing the new avatars wipe Ossora out in a single strike, he immediately believed that Han Shuo was now untouchable, so he shouldn¡¯t have let the rest go so easily.

    ¡°Bryan, you truly are breathtaking. I really didn¡¯t think you¡¯d make another breakthrough so soon,¡± said Judas, the only Hegemon remaining. He still had an amiable smile on his face.

    Currently, Han Shuo¡¯s main body stopped bleeding. The expiring magical yuan energy seemed to have been renewed and slowly began to seep and creep through his body. As the weak magical yuan energy slowly gathered, it nourished him and slowly reconnected his severed meridians. The cells around his wounds recovered quickly while his fractured bones seemed to reform like liquid. It was a mystical transformation indeed.

    At the same time, Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness zoned out as odd sights began to surface in his mind. He saw many fleeting ancient writing with all sorts of colors. It cleansed his mind and soul, putting his whole being into a serene state.

    ¡®I am the lord of all things demonic!¡¯

    This epiphany had suddenly urred to him. Perhaps being the lord of the House of Han for so long or worrying about the Five Elite Zombies and Han Hao gradually made him responsible for leading them. Not only did he have to do everything for them, he also had to consider how to keep them safe.

    ¡®The demon reigns supreme, I reign supreme, I am the demon that reigns supreme!¡¯ These words rang out loud in his still and calm sea of consciousness, causing waves to rise within it. Instantly, the sea of consciousness seemed boundless like it would overflow and spill into the skies above with nothing being able to stop it.

    ¡®All is demonic, all is me. I am demonic, I am all...¡¯

    The arcane thoughts continued to surface in him, causing all sorts of changes in his sea of consciousness. The bright stars in the sky seemed to travel along their circr paths without ever changing. Now, his sea of consciousness seemed to have morphed into a micro universe. It was as if he had fused with the universe itself.

    Judas watched Han Shuo with shock. Nobody knew what he was thinking as he stood there unmoving, not attacking Han Shuo nor in a hurry to leave. After some time, Han Shuo gradually reawakened.

    Suddenly, he realized that his consciousness was now at the Diablo Realm. However, the power in his body still hadn¡¯t gathered enough to the point that his body would transform and achieve the Diablo Realm like his mind did.

    Looking down, he saw that his injured body had recovered mostly. While he was not at his peak, he had recovered more than half of his demonic yuan. Being able to heal up to this extent in such a short time shocked even him.

    He lifted his palm up and saw that his skin was smooth like jade and even had an eerie sheen on it. It looked even more beautiful than a woman¡¯s skin. The lines on his palm were clear and defined, but it seemed to morph as he gripped and rxed his hand. It seemed oddly beautiful in a way.

    ¡°This... this...¡± Han Shuo mumbled with awe.

    ¡°Bryan.¡± Judas was smiling at him, causing Han Shuo to put up his guard. However, all he did wasugh. ¡°Hahahaha, congrattions!¡±

    Now, Han Shuo was a little puzzled. The congregate avatar he had so desperately tried to sustain had split up. Now, all thirteen of those gigantic, ethereal figures rushed back into the hovering cauldron, which levitated back to Han Shou¡¯s chest and vanished. Slowly, Han Shuo stood up and gave Judas an odd look. ¡°Why haven¡¯t you left yet?¡±

    Han Shuo had always found Judas to be a little odd. Even though he was a Hegemon who had betrayed the God of Light, he wielded the Crucifix, a divine artifact the God of Light had personally crafted, and could even wield the fate of 100 million believers to manifest the Holy Aurum Armor. It really called into question whether he was truly a godhunter.

    As he looked at Judas, he found his sight to be a little unusual. His divine consciousness was entirely focused on Judas, but he wasn¡¯t able to get a grasp of Judas¡¯s true strength. He felt that Judas was plotting something with him involved and was hiding an even greater power.

    ¡°Huh? Why should I leave?¡± Judas chuckled.

    Not knowing what his intentions were, Han Shuo smirked and caused the Seventeen Flying Swords toe whooshing out. The Cauldron of Myriad Demons also charged out to ram towards Judas.

    Even though Han Shuo had only recovered half of his power, his Diablo Realm realm-state caused the flying swords and cauldron to strike out with even more force. Infusing his attacks with his Diablo Realm consciousness caused them to be even harder to grasp than before.

    Han Shuo believed that there was no way Judas would be able to take on those attacks based on the power he had demonstrated. He would still get badly hurt even with Holy Aurum Armor.

    However, things turned out differently from what he had expected. All of a sudden, Judas shone like a bright sun as a wave of holy energy came descending from the sky into his body. Though mediocre before, Judas¡¯s Holy Aurum armor now had a different glow. The Crucifix in his hand lurched upwards as the sacred light energy came washing down upon it.

    Both the flying swords and cauldron were unable to break through the Crucifix¡¯s defenses. Shocked, Han Shuo retrieved his weapons and asked, ¡°Who in the world are you?¡±

    ¡°Nestor and the others are almost here. Hmph, you better watch out for Han Hao,¡± Judas said smilingly as he stopped.

    Han Shuo was even more bbergasted now. There were few in the entirety of Elysium who dared to address Nestor by name. Who in the world was Judas?

    Before Han Shuo could react, the Goddess of Destiny and God of Death simultaneously appeared out of thin air. Nestor¡¯s gaze was immediately affixed on Han Hao. ¡°I didn¡¯t think that even I would be tricked!¡±

    The Goddess of Destiny¡¯s star-like eyes turned to Han Shuo, then Han Hao before they finally stopped on Judas. ¡°What in the world are you doing?¡±

    Seeing the goddess, Judas didn¡¯t prostrate himself like Han Shuo had expected. Instead, he fearlesslyughed and said, ¡°I was just applying some pressure on him to help him grow faster. Haha, you also know that we don¡¯t have much time to spare. Look- there- Thanks to me, he has gotten stronger now!¡±

 Chapter 977 - New Quintessence

    GDK 977: New Quintessence

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    ¡°God of Light! You¡¯re the God of Light!¡± Han Shuo snapped when it finally dawned on him.

    Judas nodded with a smile. ¡°That¡¯s right, indeed I am. I¡¯m only borrowing Judas¡¯s body. Bryan, oh Bryan, you truly are more amazing than anyone would¡¯ve expected.¡± Judas directly admitted to being the God of Light. Han Shuo immediately knew why he remained behind even though the other Hegemons had left after witnessing his newfound strength.

    An Overgod with a Quintessence was easily a hundred times more powerful than overgods the likes of Dhaka. Though they shared the same descriptor, it couldn¡¯t be further from the truth. An overgod with Quintessence wouldn¡¯t be afraid of being harmed by Han Shuo.

    ¡°God of Light... Why are you a Hegemon? Don¡¯t tell me you Overgods were the one who orchestrated the formation of the Godhunter Alliance to begin with?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    The Goddess of Destiny nodded listlessly. She stretched her hand out to send out an odd energy wave that covered the entire area. Nobody would be able to notice what went on within whether from above or below.

    ¡°The Godhunter Alliance has to exist, otherwise the so-called alliance here would¡¯ve long been wiped out by us,¡± the Goddess of Destiny casually said after sealing off the entire area.

    ¡°Why would that be the case?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    She smiled without answering his question, instead turning to the God of Light and Overgod of Death. ¡°Gentlemen, I believe we can now tell him about Aethernia by now.¡±

    ¡°That is fine. But before that, I must first destroy Han Hao¡¯s Quintessence Shard!¡± Nestor said with a nod. He red at Han Hao on the bone throne without any intention to negotiate.

    The moment he said that, Han Shuo¡¯s expression changed. ¡°I don¡¯t care what you n to do, but I will not allow anyone to touch Han Hao!¡±

    Nestor leered at him and mocked, ¡°You think you¡¯re powerful enough to even do that?¡± He turned back to Han Shuo and his body shuddered. The purest of death energy emanated from his body. All of a sudden, the Overgod of Death approached Han Hao, his seemingly infinite energy of death affected the environment around him simply by manifesting.

    Shocked, Han Shuo snapped, ¡°You won¡¯t stop me from trying!¡±

    Nestor had said he wanted to destroy the Quintessence Shard in Han Hao, which had already fused with Han Hao¡¯s soul. Destroying it meant wiping Han Hao from existence entirely, and Han Shuo would never tolerate that.

    His rtionship with Han Hao was far deeper than what he had with his women. Back when he had nothing, Han Hao had apanied him all the way, helping him pick up trash and clean. He was an integral part to his life, and he wouldn¡¯t allow anybody to touch him, not even Nestor!

    With a thought, the thirteen avatars came out of the cauldron. Six of them, death, destruction, lightning, darkness, wind, and water respectively, oveid with one another to unleash the new Domain of Divinity.

    This time around, Han Shuo had a much easier time controlling the six avatars with his consciousness, unlike before. Even so, he still hadn¡¯t yet stabilized his new growth and was only able to use six avatars for now.

    The new congregate force formed a barrier that enveloped Han Hao, stopping the encroachment of Nestor¡¯s energies. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t afford to hide any ounce of his power when facing off against a foe like him. The new domain that formed was unique in that six waves of energy flowed through it like water.

    ¡°Ooh!¡± The Goddess of Destiny seemed really interested in this new energy. She turned to the possessed Judas and asked, ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡±

    Judasughed and shook his head. ¡°I don¡¯t know myself. Perhaps this is what makes the energy he cultivates so special. It has to be a wondrous reaction between his energy and our universe¡¯s energy for something like this to even be possible... But worry not. His new power isn¡¯t perfect yet. Just fusing them together by force isn¡¯t going to unleash too much energy. Hahaha... It¡¯s still all under our control.¡±

    ¡°Under control, huh...¡± She wore an odd expression on her face. ¡°This is only the start. He still hasn¡¯t managed to master his powers yet. But when he does, it will surely be very different from how it is now. This Bryan is both promising and worrying...¡±

    Even though she had basically mumbled the whole thing, Judas heard it all clearly. He knew what she was implying. Now, he seemed to also have noticed something unique about Han Shuo and was in deep thought.

    By now, Nestor¡¯s death energy fell upon Han Shuo¡¯s congregate barrier. An Overgod with the power of Quintessence couldn¡¯t simply bepared to a ¡®faux¡¯ overgod. The moment the forces shed, Han Shuo felt a boundless, dense energy of death that was far more powerful than any overgod¡¯s. It was as if the death energy across countless nes had been gathered here.

    Facing such immense power when he hadn¡¯t even mastered his own yet was a gruesome and straining affair. There was always a chance that his barrier would crumble.

    Not only that Nestor could draw the purest death energy from the environment, he himself was a massive battery of densely packed energy, having had billions of years to infuse himself with power, the extent of which nobody could even begin to imagine.

    Had it not been for Han Shuo¡¯s new avatars¡¯bined six energies, there was no way he¡¯d be able to take on Nestor¡¯s attack. The energy from the consciousness manifested as very thin lines that were hard to see by the naked eye. The threads melded together with the other avatars and continuously helped channel their energies to the new barrier, but the effort took a huge toll on Han Shuo.

    ¡°Oh, not bad. Apart from Quintessence Overgods, nobody has been able to hold out against me for this long!¡± Nestor said in a surprised tone before putting even more pressure on the barrier.

    ¡°Father!¡± Han Hao cried. Being telepathically linked with Han Shuo, he knew about what was happening. He knew that Han Shuo was expending the power of his soul to save him. If demonic yuan energy was used up, it could be replenished in time, but it was a whole different story for the power of the soul, which the death-adept Han Hao was too well aware of. He couldn¡¯t help but feel a little anxious about Han Shuo for doing so.

    All of a sudden, a gigantic tombstone manifested behind Han Hao as he used all his power to infuse his bone spear with the demonic yuan energy he had cultivated over the years in a desperate bid to fight Nestor. A subtle light suddenly shot out from the tombstone as the energy of death fused with demonic yuan energy.

    Then, a clear-sounding ringing could be heard from the tombstone as it morphed into a rhombus-shaped, crystalline object that hovered and spun on an axis. It kept on unleashing death energy as it spun including all sorts of negative energies like endless hatred and resentment.

    ¡°Nestor, stop!¡± the Goddess of Destiny cried as the Mirror of Destiny leapt out of her hands to reflect the shift in the tracks of fate.

    All of a sudden, Nestor retracted his death energy and retreated to her side. Giving her a troubled look, he asked, ¡°Why? That kid has a Quintessence Shard. I will definitely not allow an existence that can threaten to rece me to live.¡±

    The goddess didn¡¯t answer him and instead focused on the crystalline object that spun near Han Hao¡¯s chest with a look of wonder.

    Judas, mouth agape, muttered, ¡°How... how could this be possible?¡±

    The Goddess of Destiny and the God of Light¡¯s reactions caused Nestor to look at Han Hao, before his expressionpletely shifted. ¡°This... this is?!¡±

    Nodding firmly, the goddess said, ¡°It¡¯s the power of the Quintessence! A... a new Quintessence formed on his body!¡±

    The moment she said that, even Han Shuo shuddered. He turned to Han Hao with a look of wonder without letting up the barrier and saw a Quintessence, not just a shard! One of the most amazing things in the universe had just manifested on Han Hao¡¯s chest!

    In Elysium, the reason the Twelve Great Overgods reigned supreme wasn¡¯t their innate talent, their impressive reputation, nor their long lifespan, but rather, their Quintessence that nobody else had. It was something that marked absolute superiority amongst even overgods, and now, Han Hao managed to form one of his own. What did that imply?

    Nestor, the goddess, Judas, Han Shuo, and even Han Hao himself were all dumbfounded. What type of Quintessence would his be?

 Chapter 978 - Ruminations

    <h4>Chapter 978: Ruminations</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Everyone was dumbfounded, including Han Hao himself. He looked down nkly at the spinning rhombus near his chest and felt like it had be his second soul. Thanks to the new Quintessence, the hatred, resentment, rage, and all sorts of negative energies all around the world were affected and came flooding in from all directions.

    This new Quintessence almost seemed like the source of all negative energies, which is channeled and gathered for Han Hao to use. The rhombus-shaped Quintessence spun around a few more times before entering Han Hao¡¯s head and was enveloped by his divine soul, bing one with it. That instant, a grand st of light seemed to emanate from the bone throne as it began to change in some way.

    Han Shuo, who stood not far away, was just as clueless about the changes as the others were. He wasn¡¯t sure what that Quintessence represented, but he secretly felt tion at the prospect of Han Hao bing an existence on the level of the Twelve Great Overgods.

    He could feel a familiar, yet paradoxically foreign auraing from Han Hao, of which nature he was still unaware. But based on the looks on the others¡¯ faces, he could be sure that the object was indeed a Quintessence.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on? How could a new Quintessencee into existence?¡± Judas mumbled. The smile on his face was now reced with nothing but utter shock.

    ¡°Wasn¡¯t it said that only twelve Quintessence hade into existence since the very beginning? Over the aeons, I haven¡¯t heard of an instance of new Quintessences forming,¡± Nestor said as he shot the Goddess of Destiny a confused look, expecting some kind of exnation from her.

    It seemed that she was just as dumbstruck as they were. After recovering from the shock, she smiled in resignation and said, ¡°Don¡¯t look at me. Even I don¡¯t know why this is happening. Han Hao¡¯s destiny is not something I can control. He is now beyond my understanding of the universe.¡±

    ¡°What do we do then?¡± Nestor said after some thought.

    She didn¡¯t answer his question immediately. Instead, she turned pensively to Han Shuo and Han Hao. After some time, she frowned and said, ¡°Nestor, the Quintessence is already born, so there¡¯s no need for you to worry that he will take your Death Quintessence. These two might be of help to us. Now, I have a feeling we should leave.¡±

    Nestor turned to Han Hao with an uncertain gaze, while Han Hao looked back at him as if he was the greatest foe he would ever face. He was worried that the Overgod of Death would stake it all and attack him.

    Even though he now had something so powerful in his divine soul, he hadn¡¯t mastered how to use it best yet. As of now, he was definitely not Nestor¡¯s match. Han Shuo was just as careful as he was. Now, his main body and avatars were carefully preparing to stop Nestor if he charged.

    ¡°Nestor, there are some things that are out of our purview,¡± Judas finally said.

    Nestor shot him a look before nodding. With a chuckle, he said, ¡°We still have one more fight before we go to Aethernia. If you dare to continue using that trashy body of yours, I will not hesitate to destroy it.¡± He then turned to Han Hao and merely humphed. He then nodded to the goddess before he left.

    When Nestor had vanished, the Goddess of Destiny furrowed her brow and said to Judas, ¡°You shouldn¡¯t meddle too much with the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s affairs nor upy Judas¡¯s body. The alliance exists for a reason, but it doesn¡¯t need you to lead it.¡±

    When the God of Light heard what she said, his expression turned serious. With some hesitation, he said, ¡°I know what I need to do, so you don¡¯t have to remind me. Once I leave, Judas will disappear for good. He will no longer show up in Elysium ever again.¡±

    The goddess smiled and nodded. ¡°Very well.¡±

    The God of Light turned to Han Shuo and Hao Hao. After some hesitation, he smiled and said, ¡°Before Aethernia opens, an unavoidable change wille to Elysium. I hereby invite you to join the battle as a representative of the Light, Life, and Water Dominions. Don¡¯t be in a hurry to join or refuse yet. You can take your time to think it over.¡±

    ¡°I want to kill one of your three guardians, Gy¨¢l!¡± Han Shuo said, remembering McKinley¡¯s pleading right before the God of Light left.

    Stopping in his tracks, he turned to Han Shuo. After some thought, he said, ¡°Gy¨¢l has been a loyal follower of mine for years and I alone will decide his fate. If Gy¨¢l is dead, I will consider it as you having refused my olive branch. Think carefully about what you decide.¡±

    He then nodded to the Goddess of Destiny before slowly walking away. When he was right at her side, he stopped and whispered, ¡°Rather than the Quintessence-bearing Han Hao, I¡¯m more concerned about his father who can fuse the twelve fundamental forces. We know the power and limits of the Quintessence, but nobody has a grasp on foreign energies. You have to be careful how you let this develop.¡±

    After saying that, he gradually left. The God of Light didn¡¯t bother to hide what he said. Han Shuo and Han Hao heard it perfectly well. Now, Han Shuo knew that the Twelve Overgods had other ns, but he wasn¡¯t sure what it entailed yet.

    Now that the other two had vanished, the goddess smiled. ¡°Looks like I don¡¯t have to worry about Andrina staying with you all. Please take care of her. I have some other matters to deal with at the moment. When the time is right, I will seek you out personally to talk about what you want to know.¡±

    Han Shuo honestly didn¡¯t know what to say to her. Even though he knew she was hiding something from him and had hopes for him, she had never gone into any of the details. However, he had a hunch it had something to do with his cultivation and the Exalted Demonlord. He couldn¡¯t imagine what other part of him would draw the goddess¡¯s attention.

    He didn¡¯t say anything as he watched the goddess vanish. Now, even she was gone, leaving only Han Shuo and Han Hao in Pandemonium¡¯s ruins.

    After the great battle, the father and son grew even stronger. Han Shuo¡¯s realm-state broke through to the Diablo Realm and he also gained avatars for thirteen different energies, all of which he could fuse into a sum greater than their parts.

    Han Hao had also developed a Quintessence, the pinnacle of divinity itself. To say that it was aplete transformation would be an understatement. The two of them, however, didn¡¯t think too much about their gains and instead felt a little dejected about the ruins. Gilbert, Sangius, Bonds, and the others were still missing, so Han Shuo was rather worried for their safety.

    ¡°Father, Pandemonium is no more...¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°Well, we¡¯ll just have to rebuild it. Each time we rebuild, it will evolve. This time around, we will give it aplete overhaul with my current abilities to deploy an ultra-sized Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester so that we¡¯ll have boundless yuan energy for Pandemonium¡¯s operation!¡±

    Back in the Profound Continent, the Exalted Demonlord had set up such a demonic formation to harvest the natural energy and used it to draw Han Shuo¡¯s soul to this universe from another.

    Compared to the Profound Continent, the yuan energy in the environment here was a hundred times denser, so setting up a formation here would allow Pandemonium to have an endless source of energy. He could also use the harvested energy to forge his Invincible Demon Body and store more and more demonic yuan energy within him so that his body could reach parity with his mind at the Diablo Realm.

    As long as his mind and body were at the Diablo Realm, he was confident he would stand a fighting chance against the aeonic Quintessence-bearing overgods. Other than that, he still had thirteen other avatars to count on. The fusion of six of them alone could already allow him to defend against Nestor¡¯s attack. The moment all thirteen of them fused, there might not be anybody in Elysium who could take him on.

 Chapter 979 - Reorganization

    GDK 979: Reorganization

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Han Shuo and Han Hao didn¡¯t remain at Pandemonium¡¯s ruins for too long. Too much had happened here and it wasn¡¯t known whether the Godhunter Alliance was still in the Fringe, nor how Wasir, Ss and the other members of the House of Han were doing.

    Their first priority was to get a clear picture of the current status quo, starting by locating Sangius, Bonds, Phoebe and the rest, thereby ensuring their safety. Additionally, they would have to head to Omphalos to scout it out as well as find out what the circumstances were behind Tyre¡¯s disappearance. Lastly, Pandemonium would have to be reconstructed to incorporate the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester. There were too many tasks to attend to, so he had no time to waste here.

    Even though Han Hao now had a Quintessence of his own, he still couldn¡¯t utilize its power to its full potential. Even so, it should be more than enough to deal with the likes of overgods like Tyre and Logue. So, Han Shuo sent Han Hao back to his base near the mountains where Dhaka, Asser, and Dagmar lost many of their men to gather some of his godhunter subordinates before going to hunt down Logue and Tyre. He was also asked to look out for the other Hegemons that just left.

    Han Hao was now filled with confidence; his acquisition of a Quintessence made him one of the most powerful existences on Elysium. He left through the underground tunnels quickly after Han Shuo gave him the order.

    Han Shuo then expanded his consciousness to get in touch with the Five Elite Zombies before heading in the other direction. Now that his realm-state was at the Diablo Realm, his consciousness could spread boundlessly like the sea, allowing him to clearly perceive anything and everything inside it¡¯s enormous coverage. By magnifying the signals between the Five Elite Zombies, he could easily locate them.

    Han Shuo suddenly noticed that his consciousness hadpletely transformed due to his elevated realm state. It was as if he could vaguely feel the souls of every single living being in the Fringe. The more powerful the lifeform was, the more obvious he could pick out their telltale life aura.

    Gradually, as he focused on his senses, he began to pick out many familiar signals, including Tyre¡¯s, Logue¡¯s, as well as Wasir, Ss and so on. He cracked a smile at this new mastery he had acquired. His new realm state still hadn¡¯t stabilizedpletely yet, but he already had a taste of how powerful the Diablo Realm was and it would only get better from there. Now, it was as if he could see through everything.

    He decided he would first consolidate his men, starting with Wasir and Ss who were nearest to him. He immediately flew towards them at a speed nearly impossible for the naked eye to detect. Soon, he reached a cold pond. ¡°Come out, Ss, Wasir,¡± he cried towards the crack in a cliff.

    The two of them were worried that Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t be able to escape the grasp of Judas and the rest. The moment they heard his voice, they immediately burrowed out of the crack with joy.

    ¡°Are you alright, Bryan?¡± Ss seemed genuinely happy to see him.

    Wasir, however, didn¡¯t say much and merely looked at him, as if he was checking if he was hurt in any way.

    Seeing these two again, Han Shuo felt a little odd. When he had firste to the Fringe, these two were the most hostile to him. He also had some unfortunate grudges with the two of them and had almost killed them.

    Yet, these two had be among his closest allies. While the two of them were proud and didn¡¯t have good tempers, they were sincere folk, unlike superficial backstabbers like Ossora, Logue, and Tyre.

    ¡°Haha, I¡¯m fine. However, the threat still looms over the Fringe. The Godhunter Alliance hasn¡¯t left yet. First, we have to find the rest of the members of my house. After we settle them down, we¡¯ll head to Omphalos together. I have a feeling that Logue and Tyre are now located around there with thest of their forces. It seems like they¡¯re up to something.¡±

    ¡°We¡¯ll go with your n then!¡± Ss casually said, ¡°After thest battle we¡¯ve faced, I am convinced. Only someone like you can inspire my trust, not Logue or Tyre.¡±

    Wasir didn¡¯t say what was on his mind like Ss did, but he still gave a tacit nod, agreeing to what Ss had said. Even though they didn¡¯t officially pledge their allegiance to Han Shuo, it was still a sign that Han Shuo would rece Logue and Tyre as the unparalleled ruler of the Fringe.

    ......

    Omphalos had lost much of the splendor it used to have. Not only did the Sovereigns leave, many of the businesses there had closed down. All that remained were people who didn¡¯t belong anywhere else.

    Everyone knew that a cruel fight was breaking out in the Fringe. Not only did the Godhunter Alliance have the advantage in sheer numbers, they also had lots of elites. Even the merchants that feared the might of the Sovereigns back then weren¡¯t too confident that the Sovereigns could resist the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s invasion.

    Back then, their safety at Omphalos was almost guaranteed, but it was wholly different now. Word from the Fringe was that the Godhunter Alliance held theplete upper hand, causing those in Omphalos to fear for themselves. If they weren¡¯t fugitives among the Divine Dominions, they would definitely have left Omphalos long ago. Most of the shops of the Sovereigns there had already closed down, with the only establishment remaining being Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    These days, Celestial Pearl Pharmacy had be an important source of information for the remnants in Omphalos for toxin brewers.

    Akley had been left in charge of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. He was the first person Han Shuo had gotten to know when he first stepped foot on Elysium. Back then, Akley¡¯s mastery of the energy of destruction was at the lowgod stage. He had grown much since thanks to the many divine essences that he, Han Shuo and the House of Han had obtained. He was now an early-stage highgod.

    Initially, Han Shuo wasn¡¯t willing to leave Akley in such a dangerous ce like Omphalos, but he himself had said that being in constant danger helped hone his realm state in the edict of destruction, what with there being a constant dread and threat of destruction that loomed over Omphalos. He had insisted to be allowed to stay back in Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    ¡°Tell all the toxin brewers to join the House of Han. We can ensure that they make it out of these troublesome times safely,¡± Akley said to an old man as he leanedzily into his beast-skin chair, popping one shiny grape into his mouth after another.

    ¡°Lord Akley, the others are all on edge. Strangers show up in Omphalos often nowadays and it seems like the Godhunter Alliance wille at any moment. It¡¯s not just them; even I¡¯m scared. Don¡¯t you think we should at leasty low first, Lord?¡± The old man wiped nervous sweat off his face.

    He was just a pharmacist Han Shuo had hired from Ethereal City, sobat was not his forte. With things being the way they are now, anyone could tell that it wasn¡¯t safe in Omphalos and those who could had already evacuated from the Omphalos. Only Akley seemed to stay there like a fool who didn¡¯t understand the true extent of the threat the Godhunter Alliance posed.

    ¡°Scared my ass!¡± Akley spat out thest grape seed and said, ¡°Tell the poison brewers that Bryan of the House of Han promised they will be kept safe as long as they work for Celestial Pearl Pharmacy!¡±

    ¡°How are we going to assure them of their safety?¡± The old man must¡¯ve thought that Akley was insane.

    Akley humphed and said, ¡°The Godhunter Alliance has suffered heavy casualties at Pandemonium, resulting in the Hegemons all fleeing hastily. I don¡¯t think they¡¯ll have much time left. The age of Logue and Tyre is long past. From now on, the whole of the Fringe belongs to the House of Han!¡±

    ¡°You can¡¯t be serious!¡± The old man couldn¡¯t believe what he heard at all. Nowadays, Akley feasted and drank himself to the high heavens nonstop as far as he was aware. It didn¡¯t help that his words sounded like the ravings of a madman.

    ¡°Fool! Don¡¯t you know that every member of the House of Han has a spatial mirror?¡± He rolled his eyes, got out of his chair, and went outside as he continued to mumble, ¡°This is a chance you can use to convince those fellows. After the danger passes, it¡¯ll be hard to get any concessions out of them...¡±

 Chapter 980 - Winning Peoples Hearts

    GDK 980: Winning People¡¯s Hearts

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Jack was the most famous toxin brewer in Omphalos. The toxins he made were famous for having nopetition among everyone else¡¯s in terms of toxicity and solubility.

    When he was young, he was a scion from a notable family in the Water Dominion. However, he had never tried hard cultivating water energy. Instead, he had been too deeply engrossed in the art of brewing. When the power bnce in hisrge family shifted, his parents took the fall and he was also hunted down. He only managed to escape after much difficulty.

    Carrying all that hate in his heart, he survived and plotted to use the acidic toxic fumes he synthesized to eliminate all six hundred plus members of his family. Within a single night, he reduced all of them into bloody fluid, leaving not a single one of them alive.

    Before he did so, he waspletely unheard of, but right after, his name sent shockwaves across the Water Dominion. From then on, the dominion¡¯s authorities spared no effort to hunt him down, dead or alive. Being quite weak himself, he had no choice but toy low and disguise himself as he left the dominion for the Fringe.

    On the way, he continued improving his toxin-brewing skills, killing many of the enforcers that came his way and bing public enemy number one. However, his carelessness caused him to douse his left hand with poison identally. Had he not reacted quickly enough to amputate himself in the nick of time, he would¡¯ve been reduced to a pile of ones.

    Being a top fugitive, he would definitely be wiped out if he dared to leave the Fringe. But in the Fringe, he could brew as much poison as he wanted. He had made quite a lot of progress in the past few years but it was not enough for self-preservation as he wasn¡¯tpetent inbat at all. If his enemy managed to get close to him, he would be killed before he even had a chance to use the toxin.

    By now, many refugees had already left the Fringe, though Jack knew that doing so would be suicide for him. All he could do was stay and hope he would survive the troubling times ahead. Dying was thest thing he wanted, and when he noticed Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was the only establishment that remained in Omphalos, it became his new safe haven. He didn¡¯t care whether they had anything to do with his poisons or not. All he did was visit them for some news about the situation at the Fringe.

    Apart from Jack, there were many other toxin brewers who couldn¡¯t hold their own in a fight but were still experts in their own field. Some of them weren¡¯t just weak; they were disabled in one way or another and the Sovereigns didn¡¯t care much for them, leaving them to their own fates instead.

    ¡°What are we going to do, Master Jack?¡± asked Kohler, a fellow toxin brewer adept at infusing weapons with poison in the courtyard of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

    Despite Jack looking like a middle-aged man with his long beard, frizzy hair and unkempt clothes, he liked being addressed as ¡®master¡¯. It made him feel far more important than his current station.

    ¡°How would I know?¡± Jack shot him a nce and turned back to the dozen others who were dressed more or less like him. ¡°The Sovereigns can¡¯t even protect themselves, so they wouldn¡¯t bother with us. This is the only ce that hasn¡¯t closed up yet, so I hope they¡¯ll be able to keep us safe one way or another. Sigh... The Godhunter Alliance is really far cruel. They kill people like it¡¯s merely a daily passtime for them. I heard they¡¯ll feel unnerved if they don¡¯t kill a few people each day. If they run Omphalos, I doubt any of us will be able to survive.

    ¡°What are we to do...¡± said another with a long sigh.

    ¡°Let¡¯s just wait it out. Hopefully, Celestial Pearl will be able to find somewhere safe for us to stay. I doubt we¡¯ll be able to stay in Omphalos any longer,¡± Jack said as he leanedzily against a pir. He was just as worried as the others, but his past experience allowed him to cope slightly better.

    As they spoke, Akley stretchedzily as he approached them. When he arrived, all those in the courtyard anxiously got closer and asked about the goings on in the Fringe. Akley loved the feeling of people anxiously flocking to him. Smiling, he waited for them to calm down before he turned to Jack. ¡°Oh, Master Jack, you¡¯re here too? Haha, I thought you were making a lot of noise about our establishment being a scam and not providing quality products.¡±

    Jack seemed a little awkward. He kept quiet and didn¡¯t say anything. When Omphalos was still at peace, heined that the concoctions Celestial Pearl Pharmacy produced were too average to justify the high asking price. It was nothing but an outright scam to him.

    Akley smirked at seeing that reaction. Turning to look at the rest, he said, ¡°Tyre has fled without a fight and has been missing since. Logue has been defeated and lost a lot of subordinates, so he had no choice but to flee from Osteoburg. Ossora has betrayed the Fringe and joined Isaiah, while Wasir has joined the House of Han to form thest defense line against the Godhunter Alliance. Even though the Fringe is arge ce, only the House of Han will be able to protect it.¡±

    His words caused many of them to drop their jaws in shock. Akley¡¯s im that the two most powerful Sovereigns, Logue and Tyre¡¯s instant defeat, was far out of their expectations. Ossora¡¯s betrayal was also a huge blow for their side. The news was nothing short of despairing.

    However, Akley proceeded to drop another bombshell, telling them about how Han Shuo and Wasir teamed up to deal a huge blow to the Godhunter Alliance. It burned all their despair away in an instant and ignited another ze of hope. Even though some of them were skeptical about it, they wanted to believe that the news was true.

    ¡°What are you implying, Akley?¡± Kohler said, noting the subtext in his words.

    Chuckling, Akley said, ¡°Even though the Sovereigns don¡¯t care about all of you, the House of Han appreciates your talent and skills in these unique fields. I, on behalf of the House of Han, have the right to ept your application to join Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. As long as you are part of us, the House of Han will ensure your safety. The Godhunter Alliance will not be allowed to touch you!¡±

    They all knew what that meant. The moment they joined, they would lose their freedom and serve the House of Han instead of being allowed to do as they liked. Even so, no price was too high if it meant they would be able to survive.

    Akley wasn¡¯t in a rush to hurry them at all. He smiled and waited for these amazing toxin brewers to make their decision, but he wouldn¡¯t have to wait for long. A few secondster, someone took the initiative and said, ¡°I¡¯m willing to join. I¡¯ve long heard that you treat your own rather well. Joining Celestial Pearl is the same as bing a member of the House of Han. I can¡¯t ask for anything more.¡±

    After the first deal was sealed, the rest followed smoothly. Even Kohler agreed to Akley¡¯s offer after some deliberation. Only Jack, the former scion, was still hesitating about the matter. The Sovereigns had long noted the potency of the toxins he brewed and had sent people to recruit him, but he refused all their offers. Perhaps his refusal had offended the Sovereigns, causing them to leave without taking him along. Someone that prideful like him would definitely find it much harder to let go of his autonomypared to the likes of Kohler.

    After everyone else agreed to join, Akley smiled and turned to Jack. ¡°Master Jack, my lord has told me that he respects your mastery of the craft and has asked me to make you a special offer. As long as you are willing to join us, you will be put in charge of all matters rting to toxins. Apart from that, my lord promised to restore your lost arm.¡±

    The moment he heard that his arm could be restored, he lost his cool and yelled, ¡°What?! Restoring an amputated limb is a thing of legend! Only the most powerful gods of the edict of life can do such a thing! Does your lord have such an ability?¡± While Jack was an expert at toxins, the art of healing was beyond him.

    ¡°Of course. Our lord¡¯s aplishments in the field of healing is far beyond what you can imagine. He said that he can easily restore your arm and he will do so ¨C as long as you join us. So, what will it be, Jack?¡± Akley knew that the deal was as good as sealed.

    As expected, Jack nodded without much thinking. ¡°Alright. I¡¯d like to see what miracles his lordship can use to restore my amputated arm!¡±

    Now that even Jack had joined them, basically all the unaffiliated talented folk in Omphalos served the House of Han. Celestial Pearl Pharmacy would be able to stand on their own in Elysium even without Han Shuo¡¯s explicit support.

 Chapter 981 - Resurgence

    GDK 981: Resurgence

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Tyre and Logue met up outside of Omphalos. Though the casualties suffered at the battle at Osteoburg were heavy, it wasn¡¯t enough to truly end someone as scheming as Logue. He used those Fringian factions who had submitted to his authority as cannon fodder to take the brunt of the blow. The ones who had perished defending his Osteoburg were mostly from those factions while most of Logue¡¯s elites had survived.

    Tyre however waspletely different. Having known Dhaka and the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s ns all along, he left the Shrine of Destruction in advance without losing a single soldier.

    After the huge blow he suffered, Logue was so dejected that he considered dropping out of the uing battle in the Fringe entirely and head to the Dominions of Space or Destiny to sit the chaos out. But before he could, he received an invitation from Tyre for ast-ditch fight in the hopes of being able to make aeback at Omphalos.

    Logue had wanted to refuse at first, thinking that they didn¡¯t stand a good chance against the Godhunter Alliance, but after hearing what Tyre had to say, he changed his mind. Instead, he regrouped his forces to join up with Tyre with the intention of putting up onest fight against the Godhunter Alliance at Omphalos.

    Tyre and Loue had their subordinates spread word that Omphalos contained the most untold riches in all of the Fringe, especially the wealth belonging to all the businesses of the Sovereigns there, especially all the ck crystal coins, in an attempt to lure the Godhunter Alliance to Omphalos.

    ¡°Tyre, are you really certain that you¡¯ll be able to wipe out all the Hegemons?¡± Logue asked pessimistically at a mountain peak far away.

    The ever-resolute Tyre seemed to be in rather good shape. Feigning an air of absolute confidence, he smiled. ¡°Logue, don¡¯t you worry. There are a million tonnes of weapon-grade energy crystals buried beneath Omphalos, my personal stash that I¡¯ve gathered over the years. As long as the Hegemons enter, I will be able to use an energy tower to detonate all those energy crystals and wipe the Hegemons and their men out in one go.¡±

    Weapon-grade energy crystals were a type of crystal containing highly concentrated energy of remarkably high purity. A million tonnes of them exploding at the same time would be able to wipe Omphalos outpletely in almost an instant. That kind of destructive power would be on-par to an all-out attack of a Quintessence Overgod and it was sure to be something even the Hegemons wouldn¡¯t be able to survive.

    After hearing Tyre¡¯s n, Logue cursed so hard that even his ancestors would roll in their graves. How he could be oblivious to such arge stash being piled up in Omphalos right under his nose was a mystery to which there was no answer. Thankfully, he was standing on the right side this time around, or he could be one of the unlucky few Tyre was trying to blow up.

    ¡°There are still some toxin brewers and merchants in Omphalos. What do you n to do about them?¡± Logue asked while he secretly cursed Tyre for his ruthlessness.

    Tyre¡¯s lips curved into a smirk. ¡°Those toxin brewers don¡¯t know their ce. It was only a matter of time before they perished at Omphalos, so we might as well let them apany the Godhunter Alliance on their final journey. Besides, we need them there to be our live bait. If there¡¯s not a single living soul in Omphalos, the godhunters wouldn¡¯t fall for this trap that easily.¡±

    ¡°Hehe, let¡¯s hope this works out!¡± Logueughed as he nodded, not the slightest bit concerned about the lives that were at stake either.

    ......

    Meanwhile, the Hegemons were all feeling rather down in the weather. After they left Pandemonium hastily, they rallied their men and began a frantic retreat from the Fringe. Not a single trace of greed remained in their distraught minds.

    The power Han Shuo had shown in Pandemonium had been far too terrifying. He had single handedly erased Ossora from existence and made it look as easy as lifting a finger. This kind of power was beyondprehension of these Hegemons from the Divine Dominions. They were frightened to their cores.

    Apart from that, they feared the God of Death Nestor¡¯s return as Han Hao had activated the Quintessence Shard of death. Having known about Nestor¡¯s exploits in the Fringe, the Hegemons immediately knew that Nestor would being to Pandemonium when the Shard¡¯s aura was released into the environment without restrain.

    To think that Hegemons like them that reigned superior to most people would be just as fearful for their deaths like their subordinates... They had a primal fear for Overgods with Quintessence, who would easily be able to wipe them out. Taking Nestor¡¯s imminent arrival and Han Shuo¡¯s power into ount, the only rational move was to flee.

    The one among them who left most unwillingly was Dhaka. He had plotted the longest with Tyre to take over the share of the Fringe that should belong to the Godhunter Alliance and made lots of preparations for their shared goal, yet now, he had to leave empty handed. He knew that he would regret this for the rest of his life.

    As such, when he received word about Tyre, he decided he would keep what he had just experienced in Pandemonium a secret. Instead, he imed that they obtained a huge victory there and managed to deal a heavy blow to the House of Han, but Han Shuo still managed to escape.

    The reason he told him that was he knew his younger brother¡¯s personality. If Tyre found out that Han Shuo¡¯s abilities had soared, he would know that he would gain nothing by attacking the Godhunter Alliance at Omphalos. That meant that there was nothing for him to gain by going against such a powerful being like Han Shuo, and he was far from the type to squander his resources with no benefit to gain for himself.

    Dhaka was the one who had most to gain from obliterating the Hegemons at Omphalos. He would be able to consolidate the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s power for himself and be its de facto ruler. Taking that into consideration, Dhaka decided to hide the truth from his younger brother, Tyre.

    After their discussion, Tyre sent his men to spread rumors of the wealth in Omphalos, which soon reached the retreating godhunters. Judas from the Dominion of Light was nowhere to be seen, so they assumed he had fallen to Han Shuo at Pandemonium. With Judas gone, Dhaka was now the most influential Hegemon. After gathering up the other Hegemons, he told them about the hidden wealth.

    The dejected Hegemons¡¯ greed were stoked by Dhaka¡¯s rumor. Seeing that was the case, Dhaka doubled down on it while the iron was still hot. Thanks to the tempting ck crystal coins, the Hegemons decided they would raid Omphalos of the Sovereigns¡¯ umted wealth before leaving the Fringe.

    Before they came to the Fringe, they had long heard that Omphalos was a mysterious ce which charged a hefty entrance fee to every god that seeked to enter it. The gods that hade to the Omphalos from the Twelve Divine Dominions were mostly from wealthy families. It went without saying that they brought a lot of ck crystal coins with them before hiding out in Omphalos.

    The rumorsbined with Dhaka¡¯s encouragement managed to lift the spirits of the dejected Hegemons to fight once more for the hidden riches of Omphalos.

    ......

    After he parted with Han Shuo, Han Hao gathered his subordinates. The godhunters that served him had an aura unique to godhunters, which sometimes allowed them to elude the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s pursuit.

    There were too many godhunters in the Fringe, but thanks to the fact that the elite godhunters from the Twelve Divine Dominions were split up through the chaotic battles, Han Hao¡¯s men managed to slip through the cracks. They scattered and spied on the Godhunter Alliance per Han Hao¡¯s instructions, secretly paying attention to Logue and Tyre¡¯s actions.

    ¡°Chief, we received word that the Godhunter Alliance is consolidating their forces for an attack on Omphalos. Rumor has it that the Sovereigns have a huge stash of wealth there, among which include lots of divine essences,¡± Polo reported as he bowed.

    Back when Polo received Han Hao¡¯s order in Pandemonium, he immediately retreated with the other godhunters through the underground tunnels to the underground pce that Han Jin and Han Tu built. He waspletely oblivious of the incident with Isaiah, Regis, and Miller. Most of the godhunter troops under him were not harmed in the slightest.

    ¡°Did you find out what Logue and Tyre are up to and where they are?¡± Han Hao asked.

    Bowing even deeper than before and revealing a trace of anxiousness, Polo replied, ¡°Not yet. We¡¯re still trying our best to gather more information. Our informants haven¡¯t sent word back yet.¡±

    Back then, Polo would smile and joke around with Han Hao as they used to have simr status. They were even friends to some extent, so he wouldn¡¯t fear Han Shuo like his subordinates.

    But now, he felt that Han Hao waspletely different than before thanks to a great power within him that he could sense from time to time. Polo felt like he would be instantly annihted by that kind of power without being able to put up the slightest resistance.

    He didn¡¯t know that Han Hao now had a Quintessence, but he could feel its fearful effects all the same, which caused him to no longer act as casually as before. Now, every word he spoke was filled with the utmost respect.

    Han Hao also knew what prompted the sudden change in attitude. It hadn¡¯t been long enough since he obtained the Quintessence, so he wasn¡¯t able to control its power perfectly yet, which manifested as a leak that Polo felt. It wasn¡¯t something he could control for now.

 Chapter 982 - The Goddess of Destinys Secret

    <h4>Chapter 982: The Goddess of Destiny¡¯s Secret</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Back at Pandemonium, Han Shuo had spent some time to locate all his family members and took them back here. When they all saw the current state of Pandemonium, they shook with rage and hatred for the godhunters.

    Pandemonium was now nothing but an area covered in rubble and debris. Even the ground was cracked all over with rocks piled up unevenly across it. The countless buildings as well as decorative and defensive pirs and energy towers were nowhere to be seen.

    To Phoebe, Stratholme and the rest, Pandemonium was the true home base of the House of Han. They were quite sentimentally attached to the ce and couldn¡¯t bear to see it in its current state. Even Han Shou felt rather taken aback, for he had invested the most time and effort into the ce out of everyone here. The defensive formations alone cost him countless ck crystal coins and ores apart from many other precious treasures. Seeing it all gone was quite a huge mental blow.

    ¡°Don¡¯t be too sad. I will rebuild the whole ce. With Han Tu, Han Mu, and Han Jin helping out, we¡¯ll be able to restore Pandemonium to its former state in a year or two. By then, it will be among the most mystical ces in all of Elysium. We shall perfect it even further and make it more suitable for the cultivation of many different types of energies,¡± Han Shuo said to console Phoebe and the other downtrodden women.

    They were all unharmed, thanks to Andrina and the Five Elite Zombies leading them away the moment the situation seemed odd. There was nobody who could stop Han Tu and Han Jin from sneaking away.

    The women¡¯s moods gradually recovered with his constion. The thought of how amazing Han Jin and Han Tu¡¯s abilities were made them confident that rebuilding Pandemonium was not too difficult a matter.

    Ss and Wasir didn¡¯te to Pandemonium with him. Now that Nestor, Judas, and the Goddess of Destiny had left the Fringe, Han Shuo believed that there wasn¡¯t anybody else out there that could harm them now. With the state of Omphalos still being unknown, he needed Wasir and Ss to go there and scout it out.

    ¡°Han Tu,e here.¡± Han Shuo waved to him, interrupting his thought about how he should rebuild the ce.

    Smiling, he quickly came to Han Shuo and asked, ¡°Father, are we going to start rebuilding right away? The underground hasn¡¯t changed much. All we need to do is to reconnect the severed tunnels. If we spend a bit of time restoring the underground pce, the underground routes will soon be back to normal.¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s leave all that for ater time. I doubt the godhunters will ever dare toe back here again, so we wouldn¡¯t need to worry about this ce too much.¡± He then took out a shining crystal ball and handed it to him. ¡°This is Ossora¡¯s divine soul. There¡¯s still a trace of the earth divine energy Ossora used within it. If you assimte it, your abilities should grow quite a bit. Where you¡¯re an overgod, given your talent, rebuilding Pandemonium will be a piece of cake for you.¡±

    Han Tu could immediately feel the powering from the crystal ball. Han Shuo had already erased all of Ossora¡¯s self-awareness from his soul, leaving behind only theprehensions he had on earth energy as well as theplexities of breaking through to his level. It was nothing short of a treasure trove for Han Tu and would definitely help him improve at an explosive rate.

    He received the ball excitedly and said, ¡°Thank you Father! Thank you!¡±

    Han Shou chuckled when he saw how startled the other four elite zombies were. ¡°Don¡¯t be too envious. I¡¯ll go kill the three Hegemons that cultivate in water, fire, and life energies with Han Hao and give you their divine souls.¡±

    Han Shui, Han Huo, and Han Mu cheered. Only Han Jin continued to sulk, but before he could say anything, Andrina put her hands on her hips and snapped, ¡°Bryan, what about Jin here?¡±

    ¡°Umm... The energy Han Jin cultivates is a little different from the others. I still don¡¯t have a candidate that can help him improve. The twelve Hegemons don¡¯t really cultivate any rare energies, after all. I don¡¯t have a choice in this matter.¡±

    ¡°Andrina, Father treats us all the same. I¡¯m sure you also know that my energy just isn¡¯t a good match,¡± Han Jin added. The metal energy was too rare in this universe, with them only encountering one or two practitioners in a long while. Even then, they were weaker than Han Jin and wouldn¡¯t be of help.

    Andrina had no choice but to ept the exnation. ¡°You¡¯re always honest to a fault. You let them get all the good stuff.¡±

    Han Jinughed dryly, as if he was a little afraid of her. Hearing their conversation, Han Shuo found it rather interesting. He didn¡¯t think that Han Jin would actually be the first among his brothers to gain a fruitful romantic rtionship. These days, Han Shuo noted that Han Jin¡¯s soul was slowly transforming after he spent so much time with her. Not to mention, the energy in him was also growing rather quickly.

    Gradually, Han Shuo observed Han Jin showing some ratherplex emotional responses when it came to Andrina. He could no longer see any idiosyncrasies of lower lifeforms within Han Jin, who had his own thoughts and feelings that were still evolving to this day.

    Based on this and Han Hao¡¯s rtionship with Scarlett, it seemed that the Five Elite Zombies were developing genuine emotions, which allowed them to continue breaking through again and again. It wasn¡¯t just a question of pure power, but rather something essential that came from within the depths of their souls. Finding that would make them a new, better lifeform.

    ¡°Are you going to take on the Hegemons?¡± Andrina asked.

    Han Shuo nodded. ¡°That¡¯s right. The Hegemons dared to stop retreating from the Fringe. They are turning their attention to Omphalos. Since that¡¯s the case, I¡¯ll make sure they never get to leave the Fringe alive.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯lle with you!¡± Andrina said resolutely.

    Han Shuo was a little taken aback. He knew that Andrina loathed godhunters, so refusing her wasn¡¯t an option. After some hesitation, he asked, ¡°Why do you hate the Godhunter Alliance so much, Andrina? You¡¯ve always kept it from me up till now. I wonder if this is the right time to ask.¡±

    Andrina paused for a while before she said, ¡°My father was killed by godhunters and I used to be captured by them. They forced me to make energy crystal cannons. My lifeforce was almost used up entirely before I even managed to grow up!¡±

    Han Shuo was shocked to hear it. ¡°How could this be possible with how powerful your mother is? Not to mention, shouldn¡¯t someone your mother fell for be able to defeat godhunters?¡±

    The Goddess of Destiny was a widely respected figure. No matter how daring the Godhunter Alliance was, there was no way they would even dare to touch her husband and daughter.

    ¡°Back then, my mother hadn¡¯t yet obtained the Mirror of Destiny. She also didn¡¯t know that she was the Goddess of Destiny and wasn¡¯t even an overgod. Before she awakened her powers, my mother was just a normal woman without the wisdom she has today. She was only a weak lowgod,¡± she said after some hesitation.

    ¡°What in the world? So your mother isn¡¯t like the other Quintessence Overgods who gained their power quickly?¡±

    Nodding, Andrina said, ¡°The God of Destiny¡¯s powery dormant in my mother¡¯s body as it was sealed. My mother¡¯s divine soul is a reincarnation. Before she awakened her true powers in the edict of destiny, she didn¡¯t know her true identity. But even back then, she could already have a vague feeling about what would happen. But her limited abilities meant that she wasn¡¯t able to avoid the fates her foresight had predicted.¡±

    That threw Han Shuo in for a loop. He didn¡¯t think the goddess had that kind of history. If Andrina had not told him this, it might be something he would never find out for the rest of his life. The Goddess of Destiny¡¯s powers werepletely unique. Yet, what kind of person could be powerful enough to seal away the powers of someone respected by the other eleven Quintessence Overgods and cause her to reincarnate? Gradually, he seemed to have gained an insight into something.

    ¡°Andrina, your mother should¡¯ve avenged you and your father already, right?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right, but she didn¡¯t kill all the godhunters even though she has the power to. Every time I asked her why she didn¡¯t do it, she wouldn¡¯t tell me anything. Doesn¡¯t she know nothing is more important to me than avenging my father?!¡± It seemed that she had run away from home because of this reason.

    ¡°Alright. We¡¯ll go to Omphalos together then,¡± Han Shuo suddenly agreed.

    ¡°Father, I will go with her, right?¡± Han Jin said longingly.

    Chuckling, Han Shuo nodded. He half expected this reaction. ¡°Alright. The two of you shalle with me.¡±

 Chapter 983 - Undercurrents

    GDK 983: Undercurrents

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    A cold breeze blew through the unexplored depths of Omphalos. However, that kind of cold wasn¡¯t the kind felt by the body, but rather the soul.

    Strange figures could be seen moving about outside Omphalos, all of whom seemed to have hostile intentions. Obviously, they were godhunters. With the Sovereigns of the Fringe having hurriedly retreated and resigning the lives of the denizens of Omphalos to fate, none of them would survive the moment the Godhunter Alliance descended upon them.

    Chaos broke out within. By now, they would die even faster if they tried to leave with the godhunters lingering outside. The denizens of Omphalos had been driven onto the brink of extinction and were helplessly awaiting their final judgment. There was nothing they could do about it, and that desperation had permeated throughout the whole ce. All of them seemed lifeless and dispirited.

    The only exception to that, however, were those in Celestial Pearl Pharmacy. The toxin brewers that Akley had recruited felt a sliver of hope thanks to the assurances for their safety. It was thanks to that tiny bit of hope that they had joined the group and handed over the recipes and knowledge they had spent much of their life researching.

    These people saw their life¡¯s work as more important than their own lives. Even though Akley had promised that they would be fine, they didn¡¯t fully believe him. That was the reason they handed over their secrets to Akley for safekeeping.

    After all, they wouldn¡¯t want their life¡¯s work to be lost from the world even if they didn¡¯t survive. In any other situation, they would never hand over their secrets to Akley, but with their deaths looming over them, each day that passed was a day risked not passing on the fruits of theirbor. At the very end, they hade to terms with their possible demise.

    Akley, naturally, was overjoyed to suddenly receive so much new knowledge. Even if those toxin brewers really ended up dead, the House of Han would be able to put their knowledge to use and propel Celestial Pearl Pharmacy to new heights. As such, he happily epted their magnum opuses and had his men guard the secrets.

    Soon, half a month passed. Gradually, the folks in Omphalos noticed that the frequency of godhunter sightings outside were increasing. They grew even more despaired as they awaited their doom.

    Finally, the main army of the Godhunter Alliance and all the remaining Hegemons arrived at Omphalos. The leader of this excursion, Dhaka, kept telling them about the wealth that was hidden within. The other Hegemons didn¡¯t seem to doubt him one bit and were all intent on taking a huge share for themselves.

    With Dhaka running everything, the godhunters soon mustered their resolve to raid Omphalos clean. That was also the day when Han Hao received word from Polo about Logue and Tyre¡¯s whereabouts. Han Hao wasn¡¯t in a rush to look for the two of them as the situation at Omphalos seemed far more urgent. He knew that there were still some members of the House of Han there, as well as many other toxin brewers, who had already joined the house ording to Akley¡¯s report.

    ¡°Sir, we shouldn¡¯t head to Omphalos now. The Hegemons are already within. Our forces might not be able to match up with theirs,¡± Polo said with a respectful bow.

    This wasn¡¯t even a fight he would consider if Han Hao had not decided to go through with it. While Polo didn¡¯t dare to doubt Han Hao, he couldn¡¯t shake the feeling that they were engaging in a futile effort.

    ¡°It¡¯s fine,¡± Han Hao said, not exining much. ¡°We¡¯re not sending everyone there. I¡¯m only taking a small team including you. We aren¡¯t going there to fight the Hegemons to the death. Instead, we¡¯re going to rescue the other members of our house.¡±

    Polo¡¯s expression turned even grimmer when he heard not all of them were going to sortie. While he mocked Han Hao for his foolishness in his mind, all he dared to do was not. ¡°Alright. We¡¯ll do as you say, Lord.¡±

    He didn¡¯t say anything else and proceeded to get his elite subordinates to coordinate with Han Hao on the n.

    ......

    Meanwhile, Logue and Tyre were jittering with excitement. Logue had never expected Tyre¡¯s n to actually work out. He didn¡¯t know that Tyre and the current de facto leader of the Godhunter Alliance, Dhaka, were brothers. So, he really thought that the alliance had chosen to gather around Omphalos, giving him this hope of overturning the battle at the Fringe.

    ¡°Get your men ready, Logue. Hehehe... Once all the Hegemons enter Omphalos, I will detonate the explosives within and wipe them all out. The two of us will take care of the small fries outside before going into Omphalos to take care of the aftermath,¡± Tyre said with a smile. He looked at Logue and thought, once the other Hegemons are dead, you¡¯re the first one my big brother and I will kill. By then, everything in the Fringe will be mine.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, they¡¯re all ready. Tyre... You really are amazing. I didn¡¯t know how you managed to sneak all those energy crystals inside. After this battle, the Godhunter Alliance will no longer pose any threat to us, and you will be the true ruler of the Fringe!¡±

    Tyre didn¡¯t seem to mind one bit. ¡°The two of us will rule the Fringe in the future. We¡¯ll split it with Omphalos as its border. Haha, without your help, I wouldn¡¯t be able to do many of the things I¡¯ve done. I will be counting on you from now on too.¡±

    ¡°Oh, you¡¯re too kind.¡± Though Logue replied with a smile, he thought, once the Godhunter Alliance is done for and the situation in the Fringe stabilizes, I¡¯ll definitely be the first one you wipe out. He kept thinking nonstop of how to conserve as much of his power as he can to deal with Tyre¡¯s potential betrayal.

    Now, it seemed that Tyre was more powerful than him, so he had to make quite a number of contingencies for that. Tyre himself was also wary of Logue doing just that. If he didn¡¯t suspect him at all, he wouldn¡¯t have asked Logue to join him. After all, he and Dhaka were enough to take out the godhunters with or without Logue.

    ......

    The Godhunter Alliance wouldn¡¯t fall for it that easily as Tyre had thought. No matter how much Dhaka tried to convince them about the wealth there and the weaknesses of Omphalos¡¯s defenses, they treaded carefully after having suffered such a huge loss at the hands of the House of Han. That was especially the case after Asser recounted their experiences at Pandemonium to the other Hegemons.

    They didn¡¯t enter Omphalos all together like Dhaka had envisioned, instead sending some of their subordinates to scout the way out. Only after they got a clear picture of Omphalos¡¯s situation at the absence of any powerful enemies would they enter.

    There was nothing Dhaka could do about this. He made sure to use the magical mirror hidden in his sleeves to inform Tyre to be more patient. Naturally, Tyre had long considered this possibility. He informed Dhaka to bring some men with him to search the Sovereign¡¯s shops. Tyre had prepared some rather huge stashes of ck crystal coins and left them within the shops to hook the Hegemons for good.

    In the past many years, Tyre had earned quite a number of such coins from Omphalos and he was willing to part with them to take over the Fringe. This way, he could ensure that the scouts the Hegemons sent in wouldn¡¯t discover that Omphalos was empty and leave before he and Dhaka could wipe them all out.

    Dhaka then confidently entered with a few others. The other Hegemons seemed to yield slightly after seeing the one who proposed the n enter so readily. However, they didn¡¯t dare to trust himpletely. But if word came that there really were riches within ready to be plundered, they would be the first to scramble in. So, Dhaka entered with some of his own men and the other Hegemons¡¯ men.

    Upon seeing the godhunters enter, the various other gods tried to hide. Dhaka naturally couldn¡¯t care less what happened to them. He ordered the godhunters to kill anyone that entered their sights. The vagabonds weren¡¯t particrly powerful in the first ce. If they stood a chance, they wouldn¡¯t have hidden themselves away in Omphalos to begin with.

    Some who knew that Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was still operating tried to escape towards the establishment, seeing it as their final safe haven. Soon, their actions attracted the attention of many godhunters, who headed in that direction all the same.

    The godhunters who were on a killing spree no longer believed that a powerful foe was waiting in ambush within. Their actions grew more daring by the moment. Before long, cries of fear and pain could be heard closer and closer to Celestial Pearl Pharmacy.

 Chapter 984 - I Have Killed Him

    <h4>Chapter 984: I Have Killed Him</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Seeing that their lives were endangered by the iing godhunters, the toxin brewers began to panic and cry out for Akley, hoping that he would keep his word.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, we won¡¯t die from that,¡± he said as he emerged from who-knows-where. His indifferent expression seemed to suggest that he waspletely oblivious to the dangers. Standing beside him was Han Hao, whose purple eyes sent chills down the fearful toxin brewers¡¯ spine, causing them to freeze up where they stood.

    Han Hao¡¯s ferocious reputation had long spread throughout the Fringe. The toxin brewers from all over feared him especially even back then. Now that he had a Quintessence and wasn¡¯t able to hide the power it seeped out, he continually gave off a terrifying aura. Even ate-stage highgod like Polo feared him, let alone the weaker toxin brewers. His eyes swept past the crowd, who were just as delighted to see him as they were fearful. His presence there represented hope for their survival.

    ¡°Take them inside,¡± Han Hao instructed after he saw that they had calmed down.

    Though Akley seemed to act rather carefreely around Han Hao, he still felt a little tense from his cold demeanor. With a no-nonsense voice, he said, ¡°All of you,e join me inside.¡±

    When Han Tu and the others were at Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, they made arge space underground to be used as a warehouse. There was also a path there that led outside Omphalos for discreet purposes, which Han Hao had used to sneak in.

    The nervous toxin brewers carefully tiptoed around Han Hao to where Akley was. Polo stepped aside to let them enter the room. But before all of them could go in, sharp cries and jeers could be heard from all directions outside the building.

    Han Hao¡¯s expression was unmoved as it has always been. But when he saw that a few toxin brewers still hadn¡¯t entered yet, he didn¡¯t intend to wait any longer and nodded to Polo, signaling him to look after the weaker toxin brewers.

    ¡°Hahaha, brothers, this is Celestial Pearl Pharmacy!¡± someone said in a grand-sounding voice. ¡°It has many branches across the cities in Elysium. I¡¯m sure all of you heard about how good their medicines are. They¡¯re sure to be much more valuable than ck crystal coins! We definitely lucked out!¡±

    ¡°Palroe, this shop belongs to the House of Han. Should we leave it alone? They are not a force to be reckoned with. Even the Hegemons suffered a huge loss at their hands,¡± said a nervous voice. That person seemed to know something about what transpired in Pandemonium, but probably not everything.

    Only the minority of godhunters participated in the battle in Pandemonium as the Hegemons had left most of their subordinates outside. Few other than the Hegemons themselves knew what was going on.

    ¡°What¡¯s there to be afraid of? The Hegemons¡¯ losses aren¡¯t that big of a deal. Putting aside whether there¡¯s someone powerful guarding this ce, even if there were, we have numbers on our side,¡± Palroe said smugly before he bust his way in through the door.

    All of a sudden, arge boney flowershed out from the doorway. Like a monster from the abyss, it swiped its powerful bone spikes at the invader, instantly eviscerating him into pieces. All the other godhunters that went inside didn¡¯t manage to escape either. The bone flower only kept getting bigger and radiated a weird energy from its core, which caused the godhunters to feel really weak and paralyzed.

    Being unable to move, they couldn¡¯t do anything to stop the bones from piercing their bodies. Blood sttered all over the ce nightmarishly.

    ¡°Go back to whence you came!¡± Han Hao said as he slowly walked out of the pharmacy. When he showed up, the bone flower spun even faster, causing its stiff bone appendages to soften and lengthen like a rope, spreading in all directions. A few other stunned godhunters that didn¡¯t manage to react in time were dragged into the flower and turned into meat paste. Even their souls seemed to be sucked into the flower by some kind of energy, causing instant death.

    ¡°It¡¯s him! That¡¯s him!¡± someone cried as he desperately tried to back away. Many godhunters had an impression of Han Hao. It was no surprise, for many of Dagmar¡¯s subordinates hade from the Dominion of Death and knew of his fearsome reputation there.

    ¡°Han Hao, you¡¯re a godhunter too. Why are you helping outsiders?¡± asked one of the godhunters angrily without immediately leaving. He was a huge and burly man, but the aura he gave off was eerie to say the least. Back at the Dominion of Death, he had worked with Han Hao by Dagmar¡¯s arrangement on a few errands and had even helped Han Hao out. Seeing him tactlessly kill fellow godhunters infuriated him.

    Han Hao was just as surprised to meet an acquaintance here. His purple eyes glowed as he gave it some thought. ¡°Dagmar and the rest aren¡¯t qualified to rule over the godhunters. The Hegemons are nothing but weaklings. I am the only one worthy of leading the godhunters!¡±

    His words rang so true that it sounded like a universal truth. It was as if he had been a Hegemon all along.

    ¡°sphemy! Lord Dagmar... Lord Dagmar definitely won¡¯t let you off!¡± he roared.

    ¡°Dagmar is dead, and I have killed him! You should leave. I won¡¯t kill you. Once all the Hegemons are dead, you¡¯ll naturallye to serve me.¡± When he finished, the white bone throne appeared behind Han Hao.

    He took a seat into the throne and looked at the godhunter like an emperor would his subject. He gave off a domineering sensation that shook them to the depths of their souls. The godhunter immediately knew that he wasn¡¯t lying when he saw Dagmar¡¯s signature throne. He must¡¯ve been dead for the throne to be in Han Hao¡¯s possession.

    If Dagmar was powerful enough to make him give up his will to fight, Han Hao was even more terrifying. He couldn¡¯t believe what he was seeing, but Han Hao didn¡¯t say too much to him. Instead, he willed the bone flower to wrap around the godhunter and fling him aside.

    ¡°Buzz of!¡± he warned once more. This time around, nobody stayed behind. They all ran without turning back. Only Han Hao¡¯s acquaintance shot him an odd nce before he nodded unwillingly. ¡°If you can really take over the whole Godhunter Alliance, I will be at your beck and call.¡±

    Han Hao nodded. ¡°You should leave. Stay as far away from Omphalos as you can!¡±

    The man didn¡¯t say much before he left.

    ¡°Lord, we should leave too. It¡¯ll get much harder to when the Hegemonseter,

    Polo advised respectfully.

    ¡°Just look after the toxin brewers. I¡¯ll stay here a bit longer,¡± he answered without turning back. He could feel that Han Shuo wasing their way and would reach Omphalos before long.

    Thanks to the Quintessence, his connection with Han Shuo was better than ever. The two of them couldmunicate from anywhere within the Fringe directly without relying on a magic mirror.

    ¡°Alright. Be careful, my Lord,¡± Polo said before he bowed and left.

    Right then, loud cheers erupted from various corners of Omphalos. They sounded like godhunters. Feeling that something was off, Han Hao used his demon generals that his bone spear unleashed and found that the godhunters did end up findingrge stashes of ck crystal coins in certain Sovereign shops, which exined their cheers.

    Outside Omphalos, the hesitant Hegemons that stayed outside seemed just as ted. They exchanged nces of greed before they decided that Dagmar¡¯s words could be trusted and charged in with their subordinates.

    By now, Han Shuo, Han Jin, and Andrina were close to Omphalos, but before they arrived, Han Jin¡¯s expression shifted. ¡°Oh no!¡±

 Chapter 985 - Condition

    <h4>GDK 985: Condition</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± Han Shuo asked when Han Jin startled him.

    Han Jin nervously said, ¡°There¡¯s a lot of energy crystals hidden beneath Omphalos. I didn¡¯t notice it thest time I was here. They are used for energy cannons and are highly explosive.¡±

    ¡°What does this mean...¡± Han Shuo began to ponder the gravity of the situation.

    ¡°If they explode, the whole of Omphalos will be vaporized instantly! Oh heavens... If all those energy crystals go off, there¡¯s no saying whether we¡¯d escape alive or not! Big Brother is still inside. I fear he¡¯ll be in danger if he stays!¡±

    ¡°Can that kind of explosion threaten an overgod?¡± Han Shuo immediately wondered if this could be someone¡¯s plot against the Hegemons.

    ¡°I think even overgods will die from the explosion!¡± Han Jin eximed.

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression immediately changed. He informed Han Hao about it telepathically and asked him to leave through the underground path immediately.

    ¡°Han Jin, is there a way to stop the explosion?¡± Han Shou asked anxiously. Omphalos wasn¡¯t like Pandemonium; it was the hub of the Fringe with all sorts of shops and many gods still there. It was important that it survived. He didn¡¯t want it to be reduced to rubble.

    ¡°Not only are there energy crystals underground, there are also stashes of ck crystal coins all around Omphalos. Those crystals, given their high purity and energy-density, will only exacerbate the explosion. All life in Omphalos will be wiped out instantly.¡± Andrina added after some thought. But the next moment, something shed across her eyes as she smiled.

    ¡°Bryan, don¡¯t you think we should just let the godhunters be vaporized in an instant? How wonderful it is for all of them to be killed right here and now!¡± She hated the godhunters with a passion thanks to her grudge. Not to mention, she couldn¡¯t really care less about whether Omphalos survived; it was but a small price to pay for the deaths of all the godhunters.

    Naturally, Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t opt for that. Not only would the Omphalos serve an important function in his future n for the Fringe, he also wanted to go after the water, fire and life Hegemons for Han Shui, Han Huo and Han Mu. He wouldn¡¯t let their precious souls be obliterated.

    Not to mention, a sizable number of the godhunters might end up serving Han Hao in the future. Killing them all would be the same as handicapping Han Hao after his eventual takeover of the Godhunter Alliance.

    ¡°There are methods,¡± Han Jin said, eyeing Andrina. ¡°We can stop it if she agrees to help us.¡±

    Andrina was a unique lifeform with a special ability to control energy crystals. She could definitely work something out, especially while working in tandem with Han Jin.

    ¡°Jin! Why are you not on my side?¡± she snapped.

    Han Jinughed nervously and rubbed his hands in fear. After some hesitation, his eyes brightened. ¡°It is a massive lot of energy crystals down there, you know. It is more than enough to raise your power to the next realm!¡±

    Andrina seemed charmed by the idea and giggled. ¡°Hehe, Bryan, if you agree to let me have all of the energy crystals, I¡¯ll agree to help.¡±

    ¡°Deal. Take it all.¡± He couldn¡¯t afford to hesitate now. Han Shuo¡¯s priorities were elsewhere. While it didn¡¯t sit too well to give her all those crystals as snacks, he didn¡¯t have much of a choice, especially when the crystals were good as gone if they were detonated.

    ¡°Alright. Jin, let¡¯s iste all the external energy waves!¡± she said as she pulled Han Jin towards Omphalos with glee.

    ......

    Outside of Omphalos, Tyre and Logue watched the whole thing sinisterly. Their preparations wereplete.

    ¡°Logue, let us move closer! Hahaha, don¡¯t worry. All it takes is for a pulse of my soul to tten the whole of Omphalos. This ce is still a little far from Omphalos, so we should get moving for the best results,¡± Tyre said. He couldn¡¯t stop himself fromughing with excitement at the thought of seeing the ruins of Omphalos. No matter how powerful he was, that didn¡¯t stop him from letting his imminent sess get to his head.

    Logue seemed even more excited than Tyre. ¡°It¡¯s ready, right? Let¡¯s go! Omphalos will be ours!¡±

    They left the barrier they were hiding in with their subordinates for Omphalos.

    ......

    Currently, chaos was breaking out in Omphalos. Apart from Dhaka who came in earlier, the other Hegemons also charged inside and killed anyone they saw as they spread out. The shops of the Sovereigns became their main targets. Each one of them went looking for their own shops to ransack.

    Most of the gods within had fallen to the cruel godhunters without being able to resist one bit, most of them were killed in their shops or hidden rooms they took refuge in.

    Seeing that all the Hegemons had fallen for it, Dhaka waited in anticipation. Nobody paid attention to what he was doing now.

    ¡°All of you, spread out and leave Omphalos from different entrances. Make sure to hurry up!¡± he said sternly.

    ¡°Why? Sir, we should be plundering as much as we can like the rest. If we¡¯re slow, they¡¯ll take it all!¡± one of his men questioned.

    Dhaka snapped coldly, ¡°It¡¯s pointless if you¡¯re dead!¡± He swept his gaze across the rest and said, ¡°Order your men to leave Omphalos right away, no questions asked!¡±

    After seeing him snap with anger, they didn¡¯t dare say any more and hurriedly left ording to his instructions. Even then, they didn¡¯t alert the rest around them who were too busy looting. They no longer cared about what was happening around them.

    Back at Celestial Pearl Pharmacy, Han Hao immediately went underground after receiving Han Shuo¡¯s message. He didn¡¯t doubt the possibility of the explosion at all and left as quickly as he could.

    He soon caught up to Polo and the rest. Seeing how rxed they were, he chided, ¡°Hurry up! As fast as you can!¡±

    The rest immediately knew something was up and dragged the toxin brewers along as quickly as they could without asking questions.

    All of a sudden, something urred to Han Hao. He quickly contacted Han Shuo. ¡°It must be Tyre and Logue¡¯s doing! Nobody other than Sovereigns are able to sneak that amount of energy crystals discreetly underground! Father, I¡¯ve detected where they are. It¡¯s¨C¡±

    ¡°I know where they are!¡± he interrupted as his senses detected a group of iing people. His broadened senses allowed him to recognize Logue and Tyre¡¯s aura from afar.

    By now, Han Jin and Andrina were heading towards Omphalos. Being unique lifeforms, they should be fine even if the explosion urred, especially considering that they were formed from crystalline structures like the energy crystals. In fact, they might benefit from the explosion of energy if anything, so Han Shuo wasn¡¯t too worried.

    He charged towards the two approaching Sovereigns as he continued to converse with Han Hao. ¡°Jin and Andrina are approaching Omphalos to stop the explosion, but you still have to leave immediately. Go as far as you can. I don¡¯t know when they¡¯ll trigger the explosion.¡±

    ¡°Father, those two are trying to take the Hegemons out. Once Andrina and Jin take care of the situation, send me a notice. I will take my men to block off the exits and make them pay for destroying Pandemonium!¡±

    ¡°Alright. I¡¯m heading to deal with Logue and Tyre.¡± In the next instant, he reached where they were, but he didn¡¯t show himself. He was worried his presence would cause them to detonate the crystals in a panic.

    After he sensed that Han Hao and the rest had left and Han Jin and Andrina reached the depths of Omphalos, he appeared before Logue, Tyre and their men.

 Chapter 986 - Only One Sovereign

    GDK 986: Only One Sovereign

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Han Shou had appeared so abruptly in the midst of Logue and Tyre¡¯s men that he shocked all of them. The ughter was still happening in Omphalos even though the sun was already beginning to set. The men, who discovered someone had popped up among them, cried in surprise, ¡°Who-who are you?¡±

    Not all of those men knew Han Shuo. These so-called elites had been left by their leaders at the Shrine of Destruction and Osteoburg. All they did was cultivate and protect those two ces without taking a step outside.

    ¡°Tyre, Logue,e meet me!¡± Han Shuo said with a heartyugh from up high.

    The two of them who were at both ends of the group immediately paled when they heard his explosive voice. They had no idea whatsoever why he would be here of all ces, right when they were about to execute their n too.

    Tyre especially had a bad feeling about the whole thing. After reflecting on their previous actions and ensuring that he hadn¡¯t made any mistakes, he exhaled heavily and smiled before he went over. As he headed there, his mind raced to find a way to wipe Han Shuo out.

    By the time Tyre saw Han Shuo, he noticed that Logue had arrived earlier than he did from behind the group. He seemed to beughing and chatting with Han Shuo, much to Tyre¡¯s relief. Han Shuo probably didn¡¯t know what was up yet.

    ¡°Bryan, I heard you suffered a huge loss at Pandemonium. The two of us can¡¯t even protect ourselves well, so we apologize for not being able toe to your aid. We¡¯re truly sorry,¡± Tyre said with a hint of grief, ¡°We underestimated the power of the Godhunter Alliance. We didn¡¯t think that they¡¯d overwhelm the whole of the Fringe so quickly. So far, we haven¡¯t received one bit of good news. I think we¡¯ll be hard pressed to defend the Fringe, Bryan.¡±

    Han Shuo found it rather weird that Tyre wouldn¡¯t be aware of their victory over the Godhunter Alliance even though he shared the secret of the energy crystals with Dhaka. There was no way he wouldn¡¯t know because the two brothers had their own means ofmunication.

    After a pause, Han Shuo¡¯s lips curved into a sly smile. It was now in that Dhaka was hiding the truth from him in order to get him to eliminate the Hegemons. Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a rush to take any action yet so he could buy more time for Han Jin and Andrina. Instead, he faked a deep sigh and said, ¡°Pandemonium¡¯s nowpletely ruined. The thousand soldiers I had there were all killed. Faced with the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s sheer might, there was nothing we could do but watch as our ownrades were killed. All I could do was protect myself!¡±

    His anger seemed to intensify at that point. He red at Tyre and continued, ¡°Why did Balintan and Kauzee to Pandemonium? Why didn¡¯t you two stop Judas and Tuckamore? Tyre, you didn¡¯t lose any men at all, while Bolten and Kauze brought plenty of them. It didn¡¯t seem you bothered to fight them at all. Why did you note to save us even though you had so many troops at your disposal? You said you would help us before the battle began, but what did you do instead?¡±

    Han Shou got more and more agitated as he doubled down on the usations, putting up a rather convincing act of being pushed to the edge. Among Tyre and Logue¡¯s troops weren¡¯t just their direct subordinates. There were many other smaller factions that had temporarily submitted to their leadership, but they were far from loyal, and Han Shuo¡¯s words were directed at precisely these people. As expected, some of the men cast doubtful nces at the two of them.

    ¡°We did in fact not engage Bolten and Kauze in battle!¡± said the leader of a rtivelyrge faction, Karp.

    ¡°Not to mention, most of those who perished in the battle at Osteoburg were one of ours, not those twos!¡± said nk, another leader. He took the chance to say what he really meant now that Han Shuo was openly chiding them. ¡°Sir Logue, you¡¯ve used our men as cannon fodder the whole time. Of all 193 brothers of mine, only 75 remain! Nearly two-thirds of them perished! Ante and Krull lost all their men too! What about you? Your loyal followers are mostly unharmed. You took advantage of us and sacrificed us! Logue! Do you remember what you said when you tried to recruit us? You said you¡¯d treat us the same as the rest and protect us the best you could, yet what did you do?!¡±

    nk¡¯s words cut much deeper than Han Shuo¡¯s and sounded even more justified. Han Shuo was just faking his anger, after all, while nk truly had a bone to pick with them. He was filled with resentment for hisrades¡¯ deaths.

    ¡°nk, the reason your men suffered heavy losses was due to their own ipetence,¡± Logue said coldly, still smiling, ¡°Each one of my men is an elite and are far more powerful than you all, so it¡¯s no surprise they die less often. Are you nning to turn against us now because of this?¡±

    He shot Tyre a hidden nce, hinting that they should deal with Han Shuo right now. At the very least, they had to chase him away so he didn¡¯t continue to ruin their ns.

    Before Han Shuo came, these two dissatisfied leaders didn¡¯t really dare to make their misgivings heard, for no overgod was going to stand up for them. They didn¡¯t even dare to resist. But now, they were all too happy to take this opportunity Han Shuo provided them to vent theirints.

    Tyre also started to grow anxious. He secretly signalled Dhaka and learned that their group was about to leave Omphalos soon, while the other Hegemons had all gone in. Yet, now, he had to make sure the various faction leaders listened to him and calm the situation down.

    While most of the Hegemons were within, they left quite a number of subordinates outside, enough in number to match up with his and Logue¡¯s men. He couldn¡¯t afford to have his own troops fracture now. While it was fine back then, Han Shuo¡¯s arrival was a catalyst to his troops¡¯ destabilization.

    After hesitating for a bit, Tyre suddenly said, ¡°Why are you trying to sow division at this juncture? The survival of Omphalos is at stake! What in the world are you nning?¡±

    Han Shuoughed loudly with a hint of anger before he pointed at Tyre. ¡°Oh, Tyre, if you can¡¯t own up to your own deeds, you can never be the ruler of the Fringe! You simply see those who joined you as cannon fodder and keep using them as your shields in battle. You can even sacrifice your friends for your own sake! Even though you knew Pandemonium was in danger, you just sat there and watched. With you in charge, the Fringe is sure to be doomed!¡±

    The other leaders were filled with even more worry and began hesitating. It seemed that they no longer intended to fight with Logue and Tyre. Han Shuo¡¯s words simply described the two of them far too well. They were leaders that didn¡¯t care for their livelihoods at all and would be happy to dump them into the abyss.

    ¡°Bryan, I know you¡¯re grieving because of Pandemonium¡¯s destruction, but if you continue to spout those baseless words to incite us, don¡¯t me me for not taking our previous friendship into ount.¡± Tyre took a deep breath and calmed his tone of voice, but it was in to see that this was his final warning.

    ¡°Friendship? Hahahah! Since when did you care about that? I lost nearly a thousandrades, and it¡¯s all your fault! If Bolten, Kauze, Tuckamore and Judas hadn¡¯t been there, we would¡¯ve been able to hold on. It¡¯s all because of your ipetence that myrades are dead!¡±

    ¡°You¡¯ve gone mad!¡± Tyre no longer hesitated and formed a long spear with destruction energy as he charged towards Han Shuo. When he struck, a tense atmosphere filled the air. The spear pierced through everything with such destructive power that it was as if it had pierced space itself, revealing the odd colorful fabric within.

    The moment he struck, Logue also acted, but his approach was different. He concentrated death energy into a giant cobra that opened its mouth wide in an attempt to swallow Han Shuo up.

    The rest just watched as the three fought, thinking that there was no way Han Shuo would stand a chance with two Sovereigns attacking him. They then turned their attention to nk and Karp. These two would suffer the same fate.

    nk, Karp as well as a few other faction leaders could feel the maliceing from the two Sovereigns¡¯ subordinates and knew that they wouldn¡¯t be spared if Han Shuo fell. Now, they hoped that Han Shuo could hold back against those two long enough despite having nothing to do with him beforehand, all in the hopes that he could buy them time to escape. The moment they saw an opportunity to leave, they wouldn¡¯t hesitate. There would be no more serving as the shields for Tyre and Logue.

    With that in mind, they hoped that this new and uing ace in the Fringe would be able to hold on. If he could help them escape, they would even serve under him, the man who dared to go against two powerful Sovereigns. At least, it would be much better than serving those Sovereigns that didn¡¯t care for their lives at all.

    ¡°Hahaha, so you got mad when I pointed out your mistakes!¡± Han Shuoughed as if he wasn¡¯t facing off against two powerful Sovereigns. Hisughter reverberated all the way to Omphalos. Right after, he suddenly struck. Thirteen avatars appeared in mid air, six of which with the energies of death, destruction, darkness, water, lightning and wind fused together. The new Domain of Divinity spread out and enveloped the space around them.

    Suddenly, Logue and Tyre¡¯s attacks were neutered. Both the spear and cobra shattered in an instant. The ovepping six avatars looked down on them like a god would mere mortals. His cold eyes were cruel and merciless. With a single push of the hand, insurmountable pressure came down against Logue and Tyre, pressing them almost instantly into the ground and half burying them in the process. Everyone was shocked silent.

    Tyre and Logue¡¯s men as well as the other faction leaders were bbergasted. They looked at the godly avatar floating in the sky in utter shock. Logue and Tyre were still partly buried in the ground, lookingpletely distraught and confused. It was as if they wereughing one moment and crying another as their mental faculties broke down.

    ¡°What five Sovereigns? There is only one Sovereign in the Fringe!¡± nk muttered when he snapped out of it. Though it wasn¡¯t loud, the words rang clearly in everyone¡¯s ears. Indeed, there was only one Sovereign.

    Those words seemed to echo nonstop as everyone there snapped out of their stupor and looked up at Han Shuo like he was the one fit to rule the Fringe. The others like Tyre, Logue, Wasir and Ossora were mere side characterspared to him.

    ¡°Impossible... How can this be?¡± Tyre, who used to be recognized as the number-one Sovereign, seemedpletely out of it. It was as if all his motivation and fighting spirit had been smothered at the sight of the gigantic avatar.

    ¡°Tyre, we still have one move! Use it!¡± Logue cried when he saw Tyre¡¯s confusion.

    Tyre snapped out of it andughed like a maniac. ¡°Yes, indeed, I do have one final resort! The situation is still salvageable!¡±

    By now, he no longer cared whether Dhaka and the rest managed to escape and telepathically triggered the detonation mechanism he nted underneath Omphalos. However, Han Shuo merely watched his panicked attempt at aeback as if everything was still under control.

    As expected, Tyre¡¯s expression immediately changed when he realized there was no response after his detonation signal. It was impossible. He jumped out of the hole and turned towards Omphalos. ¡°Why?! Why?!¡±

    Logue also grimaced at seeing Tyre¡¯s reaction and snapped his head to Han Shuo, who was smiling mockingly at them. He immediately figured that Han Shuo had done something to thwart their ns.

    ¡°Tyre, I think it¡¯s Bryan¡¯s doing. The explosion is no longer possible,¡± he said with a pained look.

    ¡°No, it can¡¯t be!¡± Tyre cried. His madness seemed to trigger something as a loud boom came from Omphalos. That instant, the whole ground shook as the sound rang so loud it felt like the world was copsing. Even though it was quite far away, everyone could feel the horrifying effects.

    Han Shuo¡¯s smile immediately vanished when his eyes widened in stupor. He saw thick smokeing from the area ahead, unaware of what was going on. In a panic, he tried to sense Han Jin, Andrina and Han Hao, the three of whom he cared the most about.

    Immediately, he rxed when he found that they were fine. He then sensed that the explosion had only ruined a fifth of the Omphalos ¨C the region ruled by Tyre. It seemed that Han Jin and Andrina¡¯s n had worked, but Tyre still had onest trick up his sleeve to make it explode in some capacity.

 Chapter 987 - Deep Camaraderie

    <h4>GDK 987: Deep Camaraderie</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    The ashen-faced Tyre and Logue beamed with excitement once more. Logue said, ¡°We wiped out the Hegemons inside Omphalos all at once! nk, Karp, the situation in the Fringe has now changed. We suffered huge losses so that we can get all the Hegemons in one ce to wipe them out. Do you know why I did what I did now?¡±

    ¡°I lost two-thirds of my men and this isn¡¯t going to bring them back,¡± nk said after recovering from the shock. He no longer trusted Logue about anything especially after he admitted to using them as cannon fodder.

    ¡°Bryan, the Hegemons are done for and you have been avenged. We should no longer be fighting with each other! The situation now is urgent and we should deal with the remnant godhunters first. What do you say?¡± Tyre asked, finally calming himself down and spinning the situation around. As expected of a powerful overgod, his attitude immediately shifted the moment he saw that Han Shuo was far more powerful than them.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t care about what Tyre¡¯s intentions were and looked towards Omphalos coldly. ¡°My Celestial Pearl Pharmacy was still operating there with many of my subordinates among the staff. You blew up the whole ce without giving me any previous notice to get my men out of there and now, they have perished in the explosion. Do you think I¡¯ll still be on your side after you just killed so many of mine?¡±

    ¡°Sacrifices are essential for the Fringe¡¯s victory! Bryan, you should be more open minded about this!¡±

    ¡°Why do you never have to sacrifice anything?¡±

    ¡°Why are we the only ones sacrificed?¡±

    The other faction leadersined without restraint, one louder than the other. They had suppressed these dissenting thoughts for quite some time and they came pouring out towards Logue and Tyre in one go after Han Shuo triggered it.

    ¡°That¡¯s right! Why did you sacrifice our men but never your own? Tyre, you¡¯ve never cared about our wellbeing!¡± Karp snapped.

    ¡°Hahaha... Sir Logue is even better. He can sacrifice his loyal subordinates with no problem. Remember how he unhesitantly grabbed one of his men, who had served him for many hundred of years, to block a blow from Kauze before sneaking away? If he doesn¡¯t care about his own men¡¯s lives, why would he care about ours?¡± nk said mockingly, having personally witnessed this at Osteoburg.

    After witnessing Han Shuo¡¯s power, Karp and nk¡¯s courage was inted. They believed that before his impressive strength, Tyre and Logue wouldn¡¯t dare to harm them. However, it wasn¡¯t just the two of them.

    Many more started to criticize Logue and Tyre for their sneaky actions, including even some of their own subordinates who were convinced. After years of working for them, they hade to notice such tendencies as well, especially after the rest highlighted it for them. Back then, there were no Sovereigns who could avenge their subordinates like Han Shuo, so people didn¡¯t really think too much about it. But now, they couldn¡¯t helpparing their masters to Han Shuo.

    ¡°What are you guys saying? Do you want to mutiny?¡± Logue said after noticing that even his loyal followers seemed to be going against them.

    The moment he snapped, the others lowered their heads. However, nk and Karp weren¡¯t his subordinates and they chewed him out even more with Han Shuo backing them.

    ¡°You have a deathwish!¡± Logue suddenlyshed out at nk as his venomous death energy gathered in the surroundings before a bone cage locked nk up. Han Shuo knew that Logue would act. Watching from above, he unleashed thebined six energies towards them.

    All of a sudden, the bone cage shattered apart. A great force pressed down on Logue, pinning him down so fast that he wasn¡¯t able to evade it. The force from the push caused him to spit out blood. With but a thought, the new domain sent down an odd power that seemed to entrap Logue like a. Han Shuo also noticed that Tyre was about to sneak away andughed. ¡°Tyre, I won¡¯t deal with you now. I would like to see what kind of chaos you can cause with Dhaka and his men.¡±

    When he said that, Tyre¡¯s jaw dropped. ¡°What... what did you say?¡±

    ¡°Isn¡¯t Dhaka your elder brother? I bet you have already conspired with him to wipe out everyone else that survived the explosion, right? Two destruction overgods working together is sure to be terrifying. You¡¯re trying to count on that to turn everything around, right?¡± Han Shuo looked at Tyre with a mocking smile.

    ¡°What? Tyre¡¯s actually conspiring with Dhaka?!¡± Karp looked at the exposed Tyre with disbelief. ¡°It¡¯s no wonder! Tyre was among those who sold the Fringe out!¡±

    This time around, everyone, not just nk and Karp, were fueled with rage. The fact that Tyre was Dhaka¡¯s blood brother was something they couldn¡¯t even have fathomed. That meant that Tyre had been a traitor the whole time at was at least at half at fault for how badly the Fringe was faring against the godhunters.

    Even Logue, trapped and as injured as he was, wore a face of disbelief. With a resignedughter, he said, ¡°I see... Tyre, oh Tyre, you were nning to wipe me out with your brother Dhaka, huh? Hahaha... That way, you¡¯d stand at the top of the Fringe with nobody being able to threaten your position.¡±

    Tyre¡¯s expression was grimmer than it could ever be. He didn¡¯t utter a single word.

    ¡°Don¡¯t bother to argue your way out of this. Dhaka will be here in a moment. The truth wille to light then. I¡¯d like to see if you¡¯ll be able to defeat me by working with Dhaka,¡± Han Shuo said with a smirk as he turned to look in the distance. Someone wasing and it couldn¡¯t be anyone but Dhaka.

    ¡°What¡¯s with that, Tyre? Why did you only destroy a fifth of Omphalos, your fifth of the ce too!¡± Dhaka roared before he even arrived. The Hegemons in Omphalos hadn¡¯t all died from the explosion. Dhaka was faring really hard trying to regain control of the situation. His anger was hardly surprising, given how all his efforts over the years had been ruined.

    That was all the proof they needed to show that he and Tyre were in fact brothers.

    ¡°What?!¡± Dhaka suddenly stopped. ¡°Bryan, why are you here?!¡±

    He immediately recoiled at the thought of how powerful he was, still traumatized by the whole incident back at Pandemonium.

    ¡°Dhaka, I gave you a chance, but it seems that you don¡¯t appreciate it. Since you still haven¡¯t left the Fringe, you will never be able to!¡± Han Shuo turned to Tyre and said, ¡°Do you have anything else to say at this point?¡±

    ¡°Brothers, we just have to wipe Bryan out and the Fringe will be ours!¡± Tyre suddenly said as heughed out of a sudden. Seeing that there were still some people who doubted him, he continued, ¡°That¡¯s right, Dhaka and I are indeed brothers. I have also made use of others. But aren¡¯t you all fine? I did this all for myself. In the future, you¡¯ll see that the Godhunter Alliance will not be a threat to us with me in charge. Isn¡¯t that what we have all been working towards?¡±

    He was still trying to salvage any loyalty he had left. The subordinates who had followed him over the years seemed conflicted, but not one of them promised that they would fight by his side immediately. They didn¡¯t seem to be refusing either, choosing instead to remain silent.

    Han Shuo immediately knew the reason they were hesitating. ¡°Who rules and who falls will be decided by this fight. Hahaha, Dhaka, Tyre, all you need to do is defeat me. Your men will still remain yours at the end!¡±

    Tyre gave it some thought and immediately knew what his men were thinking. If he and Dhaka were killed in the following battle, there was no assurance for the others¡¯ safety.

    ¡°Brother, let us kill Bryan. There is no overgod that can match up against us!¡± Tyre proudly proimed.

    Dhaka¡¯s courage seemed to be stoked by his words. ¡°Hahahahaha, not bad. No overgod without a Quintessence can fight us two brothers.¡±

    The two of them turned to Han Shuo all of a sudden. They were both destruction overgods of the same blood, which would allow them to synchronize much better with each other. They could alsobine their domains like what Han Shuo was doing. After they did so, their powers of destruction shot through the roof.

    Now, perhaps no overgod without Quintessence would be able to resist them. However,bining domains using six different energies was a hundred times harder than what Dhaka and Tyre were doing, and consequently, a hundred times more powerful. They were still far from his match.

    Even after sensing their power rise, Han Shuo still remained smiling. He waited for their power to reach their peak and said, ¡°Dhaka, Tyre, how dare the likes of you im to be unmatched by all overgods?¡±

    Destruction energy exploded from Han Shuo and spread outwards like a huge wave. The power was so terrifying that it squeezed Dhaka and Tyre¡¯sbined domain out and crushed it.

    ¡°I don¡¯t even fear the Gods of Death and Light, so why would I fear small fry like you?¡± Heughed so loud that he shook the skies as even more power came surging from the void towards the two of them.

    Nothing but their pained cries could be heard. Tyre was surrounded by a powerful light and transported to the odd space where Logue was kept captive. When Dhaka heard that, he immediately tried to escape, only to be struck by the wave of light, ending up bloodied all over. He didn¡¯t dare to turn back to so much as nce at Han Shuo nor care about his younger brother¡¯s survival. The pain he felt caused him to flee in desperation.

    The thought of Han Shuo¡¯s im about not fearing the Gods of Death and Light made him aware of something. When he was leaving Pandemonium, he knew that Nestor was on the way there. He thought that Han Shuo and Han Hao would undoubtedly be killed by him, yet he was still alive and said something like that. The implications of that were so frightening that Dhaka fled without taking Han Shuo¡¯s attack like Tyre did.

    ¡°Brother!¡± Tyre cried in the prison beside Logue. He couldn¡¯t escape nor fight, but his vision and hearing were unimpeded. He yelled desperately as he watched Dhaka flee without caring about anything else. Dhaka had obviously heard him, but he didn¡¯t stop at all.

    Han Shuo smiled and said, ¡°Now that¡¯s smart of you, but do you really think you can escape?¡±

    The reason Han Shuo didn¡¯t make a move was that he could feel Han Hao nearby. Dhaka suddenly noticed someone ahead of him. Soon, it was apparent that it was Han Hao. ¡°You want to try to stop me too?! Since your father hurt me, I¡¯ll pay him back by getting back at you!¡±

    He unleashed a gigantic Orb of Destruction using all the destruction energy gathered in his body before slinging the ¡®grey sun¡¯ towards Han Hao.

    Discontent seemed to sh across Han Hao¡¯s eyes as he stood proudly, wielding his bone spear. ¡°You really deserve death.¡±

    He raised the spear and shot a beam out from its tip. It contained all sorts of negative energies like death, despair and cruelty. The grey sun of destruction, Dhaka¡¯s all-out attack, seemed so insignificantpared to the beam.

    Then, a loud explosion could be heard. Dhaka¡¯s charge suddenly stopped and before he could react, he could already see the bone spear before him. In the next instant, it pierced between his eyes, ¡®nailing¡¯ him in mid air, before his flesh and soul were all absorbed by the spear. The despair he felt before his death was converted into a mist that Han Hao swallowed. His eyes glowed brighter as if he had just been nourished by it.

    Dhaka had just died like that. How did the father and son get so powerful in a matter of days?

    ¡°You dare attack my family? You deserve to die!¡± Han Hao said as he pulled the spear out of Dhaka¡¯s divine body before it crumbled into nothingness. Dhaka had died after everything sucked out of him.

    After killing Dhaka, Han Hao didn¡¯te over. Instead, he sent a telepathic message, ¡°Father, I already killed Dhaka. There are still a few Hegemons at Omphalos. I¡¯ll make sure they won¡¯t leave the Fringe alive.¡±

    ¡°Go ahead. I¡¯ll be there shortly.¡± Han Shuo then turned to his prisoners. ¡°Tyre, your brother left first and died first. You should know that he¡¯s gone if you canmunicate with his soul.¡±

    Tyre, who was still mired in hate for his heartless brother, now seemed bbergasted. He tried to reach out with the magic mirror beforeughing. ¡°Haha, hahaha! He deserved to die! Let¡¯s die together!¡±

    All of a sudden, a great destructive force came from his body and shook the cage before enveloping it in light. Even Logue wasn¡¯t able to escape as Tyre detonated his divine body.

    Seeing Tyremitting suicide, Han Shuo hurriedly sapped their powers away and threw the Cauldron of Myriad Demons towards the cage. Even if he couldn¡¯t collect their divine bodies or divine energies, he would be able to get their purified divine souls.

    The divine soul of an overgod was far too precious. With Tyre and Logue¡¯s, one could advance further in death and destruction energy. Once someone from the House of Han understood the intricacies of the power, they might be powerful overgods themselves one day.

    Thankfully, Han Shuo made it in time. The cauldron managed to suck the two¡¯s souls up before they were eradicated by the light. Though Tyre had said Dhaka deserved to die, he proceeded tomit suicide. Han Shuo found it rather weird. He wasn¡¯t sure if he chose to kill himself because of his close ties with Dhaka or whether he did so because he knew there was no hope of escaping Han Shuo¡¯s wrath.

 Chapter 988 - Why Wouldnt I

    GDK 988: Why Wouldn¡¯t I

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    The five Sovereigns of the Fringe used to be its protectors. With them around, the Fringe was able to maintain some degree of relevance without being threatened by the other Divine Dominions nor the Godhunter Alliance.

    But in time, Ss and Wasir chose to stand with Han Shuo, while Ossora had betrayed him and died, only to quickly be followed by Logue and Tyre. In a short decade, three of the five Sovereigns had perished with the other two having submitted.

    The Fringe had seen many years of war, but from today onwards, nobody else could threaten the House of Han any longer. The gigantic avatar formed from six types of energies returned to the Cauldron of Myriad Demons. Han Shuo looked below and looked at the remnants. ¡°Tyre and Logue have died. You guys should scatter now.¡±

    nk and Karp bowed respectfully. ¡°Since the Godhunter Alliance is still in the Fringe, we should be serving you temporarily to fight against them. Why did you ask us to leave?¡±

    It wasn¡¯t just them; even Logue and Tyre¡¯s men were hesitant about leaving. As far as they were aware, they should be subordinating themselves to Han Shuo right now as he was the biggest yer in the Fringe. Any other Sovereign in this situation would be demanding their allegiance and assimte them into his army, so they didn¡¯t understand why Han Shuo was doing the exact opposite.

    Smiling coldly, he said, ¡°Pandemonium is more than enough to deal with the Godhunter Alliance, so you don¡¯t have to waste your energy. The Godhunter Alliance is to be allowed to exist for a reason. When they leaveter, you should not stop them. Just let them pass. There are many other powerhouses watching for them outside of the Fringe, after all.¡±

    ¡°Is... is there anything we can do?¡± nk said with a look of embarrassment. He felt as tiny as an ant before someone like Han Shuo. It didn¡¯t seem like Han Shuo was the least bit worried about the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s threat against the Fringe.

    ¡°What can you do?¡± Han Shuo shook his head with a smile and said, ¡°All you need to do is to live well in the Fringe. Omphalos will stabilize in time and you may spread the word to the merchants of Omphalos that have gone into hiding that they are free to return after this passes.¡±

    The next moment, he disappeared from their sight.

    ¡°The Five Sovereigns no longer exist from today onwards...¡± nk said nkly. ¡°Lord Bryan is far more powerful than they ever were. As long as he stays in the Fringe, it will be his.¡±

    ¡°That isn¡¯t bad either. With the Fringe being controlled by a single person, there will no longer be endless war,¡± Karp said after thinking it over. ¡°No matter what, this Lord Bryan seems quite decent to his own men. It would be nice if we would be able to serve under his house one day.¡±

    ¡°Well, only if they think us worthy! There have been many who had tried to join them before the great battle, but they didn¡¯t take any in. I had thought that the House of Han was just looking down on people, but I now know that they couldn¡¯t be bothered to waste their time on the likes of us. Without Pandemonium, the Fringe would¡¯ve long fallen to the Godhunter Alliance.¡±

    ¡°We have to do our best to earn Lord Bryan¡¯s favor and be one of them!¡± Karp said. Han Shuo had them fully convinced of his position as the strongest in the Fringe after defeating Logue and Tyre.

    By now, Han Shuo had returned to Omphalos. The loud explosion had reduced Tyre¡¯s part of Omphalos to rubble. Only the godhunters there perished, with Tuckamore and Asser managing to survive but suffering heavy injuries in the process. They could barely even move.

    During the explosion, the two of them happened to be in that area and weren¡¯t able to escape in time before they were swallowed up in the st. Thankfully, only a part of Omphalos had blown up. If the zones of all five Sovereigns blew up at the same time, the explosion would be at least ten times more powerful. Asser and Tuckamore would¡¯ve probably perished instantly in that case.

    When Han Shuo arrived, he noticed that the remaining Hegemons were rapidly leaving Omphalos. The first explosion was so powerful that they didn¡¯t dare risk staying in the other parts in case there were more explosions waiting to go off.

    Tuckamore, Asser, Regis, Isaiah, Miller, Balintan and Kauze were the only seven Hegemons remaining, with the foremost two heavily injured and powerless. Regis, Isaiah and Miller also hadn¡¯t recovered fully from the fight at Pandemonium, leaving only Balintan and Kauze in peak condition.

    Han Hao raised his bone spear and blocked the seven Hegemons, coldly staring them down. An eerie mix of negative energies seeped out of his body. It wasing from the Quintessence which he couldn¡¯t yet adequately control, but it served to terrify the seven Hegemons. Han Shuo¡¯s arrival caused them to shrivel in fear. If Han Hao alone was enough to apply so much pressure on them, his father sted thest traces of their confidence into the ether.

    ¡°Father, here¡¯s all seven. They¡¯re all here,¡± Han Hao said.

    Nodding with a smile, Han Shuo turned his gaze to them. ¡°Gentlemen, we meet again. Well, the explosion in Omphalos was all part of Dhaka and Tyre¡¯s n. The two of them hid tens of thousands of tonnes of energy crystals underground and had wanted to wipe you all out. But thanks to my interference, you all survived.¡±

    The Hegemons didn¡¯t know what to do when facing him now. Their men were still all scattered. If they escaped the Fringe by themselves now, their injured men would never be able to take on with Han Shuo and Han Hao.

    ¡°What do you intend to do now?¡± Isaiah said with a glum tone. Before he came to the Fringe, he was feeling on top of the world. But now, he had lost all of his vigor and only wanted to leave this ce as far as he could. He didn¡¯t want to see the father and son ever again.

    ¡°Hmmm, I wonder...¡± Han Shuo stroked his chin with a smirk. Hebined his six avatars to show off his power, forming a huge veil in the sky that enveloped all the Hegemons within.

    ¡°I gave you a chance to leave the Fringe, yet you dared to continue to cause trouble here. Since that¡¯s the case, don¡¯t me me for not showing mercy!¡± Heughed out loud and started closing the veil in. Like an egg shell, it slowly applied the pressure to all seven Hegemons within it.

    The only ones who could put up any meaningful resistance were Balintan and Kauze. The others were either too injured from the explosion or still weak from the battle at Pandemonium, so there was no way they could take him on, especially with Han Hao still nearby. The father and son were now so powerful that they wouldn¡¯t be the match of anyone apart from overgods with Quintessence.

    ¡°You... you would dare to kill us?¡± the life Hegemon Kauze yelled, ¡°The Godhunter Alliance has existed since antiquity! Even the Twelve Quintessence Overgods acknowledge our presence and didn¡¯t touch us, so who are you to dare?¡±

    When the Goddess of Destiny came to Pandemonium, she revealed some hidden truth about the Godhunter Alliance. It seemed that they had to exist for a reason, which was why the Twelve Overgods would tolerate them. Even the Goddess of Destiny didn¡¯t wipe them out after her husband was killed by one of their kind.

    ¡°Why wouldn¡¯t I?¡± Han Shuo sped his hand and caused Kauze¡¯s bones to snap, causing him to spit out blood in pain. ¡°Hmm, it seems as though you know something. Very well, very well. Since I¡¯m not able to get the goddess of destiny to reveal anything, I guess I¡¯ll have to get them from you.¡±

    Han Shuo took out the cauldron and sucked Kauze into it. As he used it to refine Kauze¡¯s divine soul, he gathered the power from his fusion avatar to wipe out the other six Hegemons. ¡°Since the Godhunter Alliance needs to exist, I won¡¯t wipe out all the godhunters. I will only get rid of you Hegemons and use your souls to help the House of Han grow in power.¡±

    With a loud crack, the Hegemons¡¯ bodies fractured, causing their souls to be absorbed into the cauldron as it refined Kauze¡¯s soul.

 Chapter 989 - Balance

    GDK 989: Bnce

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Kauze¡¯s soul felt like it was being subjected to a strong, windy force inside the cauldron that could extinguish it at any time. The strength of his consciousness coupled with the cauldron¡¯s ability to manipte souls allowed Han Shuo to extract all of Kauze¡¯s life experience ¨C even the memories he¡¯d forgotten. As long as there was some remnant of that remaining, Han Shuo would be able to use soulscouring to reconstruct it.

    Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness spread out in Kauze¡¯s mind like a web thattched onto his soul, digging out memories from the depths of his psyche. Kauze, being a life cultivator of this level, no longer had a set lifespan. In his long life, he had experienced all sorts of defining moments, so it would take Han Shuo at least a day or two to properlyb through his memories. Kauze had lived for ten thousand years, after all, so he had an ocean of experiences to speak of.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t interested in his daily affairs, nor was he some pervert that enjoyed peeking into his most private moments, so he focused on his target as he searched. Something that pertained to the survival of the godhunters was no doubt among Kauze¡¯s most important thoughts, which usually shone brighter than the others. They quickly swept past him before the one Han Shuo wanted surfaced before him.

    His consciousness wrapped around that deep memory and used soulscouring on it to rey the memories. It was something that had urred centuries ago, rtively recent by the timescale they lived by. Back then, Kauze hadn¡¯t be an overgod nor a godhunter yet and was a mere tribal chief in the Life Dominion.

    Not only was he not a godhunter, he was someone who discriminated heavily against them. One time when he faced off against godhunters in the Life Dominion, he was betrayed by a cousin in his tribe and trapped by the godhunters in a valley.

    It didn¡¯t take long before the tribesmen that came with him were made short work of by the godhunters, including his wife and child, during the time he was held back by other godhunters. He was powerless to do anything as he watched his wife be vited and his son quartered. It was something that was burned into his memories.

    The Hegemon back then was only ate-stage highgod, but Kauze was an early-stage highgod and had no choice but to take it all without being able to do anything about it. Before this, he was someone who actively hunted down godhunters in the Life Dominion¡¯s various cities, which made him their archenemy. However, the Hegemon of the Life dominion managed to capture him, through which Kauze learned something about godhunters.

    That person had told him that godhunters were something integral to Elysium. Every single god¡¯s existence would result in there being too much energy of their respective type. If the type of energy in Elysium surpassed a threshold, the bnce of energy will shift and affect the Quintessence Overgods really negatively.

    As a result, he told Kauze that godhunters would never disappear from Elysium as their presence helped cull the number of gods in Elysium to prevent such an event from happening. They were essentially pest control for the Quintessence Overgods. He denied every justification for Kauze¡¯s actions, calling them a fool¡¯s errand. The God of Life allowed the fights between the gods and godhunters to happen. Even the deaths of his own subordinates wasn¡¯t really a bad thing.

    In the end, Kauze managed to survive. The guards from various cities of the Life Dominion managed to make it in the nick of time and saved Kauze after only a part of his divine power was absorbed. Having lost lots of it, his powers dipped greatly. When he returned home, he saw that his traitorous cousin had taken his ce to be the new tribe leader. Needless to say, Kauze was easily defeated and chased out of the tribe.

    With the betrayal and his family gone and power stripped away, he changedpletely and abandoned his faith to the God of Life. For vengeance, he became one of the craziest godhunters. he started from consuming the weaker gods and slowly recovered his own divine power. In a century, he managed to kill his cousin as well as the other tribesmen that had turned their backs on him. Even the Hegemon that once subjugated him wasn¡¯t able to escape. Kauze tortured his soul by burning it with venomre for two hundred years, slowly roasting it away to cause as much suffering as he could. He became the new Hegemon of the Life Dominion and quickly grew in power to be an overgod.

    Han Shuo exhaled as he carefully kept Kauze¡¯s soul away in a special corner of the cauldron. He used the cauldron¡¯s power to wipe out the impurities from his soul, leaving behind only the purest essence of his understanding of the arcanews of life for Han Mu.

    ¡°Sigh, he¡¯s a pitiful soul too.¡± After learning of his experiences, Han Shuo no longer felt any hate for Kauze. He was just as much a victim of circumstance and despair. There was no way he would be able to get his revenge after losing his power, after all. Having nothing else to lose after everything was taken away from him, including his years-long fate, it wasn¡¯t surprising he did what he did.

    ¡°Father, is it true that godhunters exist for a reason?¡± Han Hao asked once Han Shuo transmitted what he could to him.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°Too many gods will cause there to be too much energy. When any of the twelve types grow too much, it will result in something that the Quintessence Overgods don¡¯t like. So, godhunters exist to maintain that bnce.¡±

    Han Shuo immediately recalled the uing battle that woulde before the opening of Aethernia the Goddess of Destiny and God of Light mentioned, which would cause even more gods to die. Was the death of gods another precondition to the opening of Aethernia? A grand battle urred in Elysium at regr intervals, during which many gods fell. Many talented geniuses perished before they were able to reach their full potential that way.

    And in all those pivotal moments, the Goddess of Destiny would show up to cause things to calm down. Back then, Han Shuo didn¡¯t know why this kept happening, precisely, why the goddess waited for years of fighting to pass before stepping in to resolve the conflict. Part of the answer to that was found in Kauze¡¯s memories, which informed some of Han Shuo¡¯s own guesses.

    ¡°Bnce?¡± Han Hao suddenly said, ¡°Father, do you mean that the Twelve Great Overgods tacitly allow the godhunters to exist?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m sure you¡¯ve seen how powerful Judas and Nestor are. Either one of them will be able to wipe out all godhunters in the Twelve Divine Dominions. Not to mention, Andrina said that even the Goddess of Destiny didn¡¯t wipe out the godhunters that killed her lover. Andrina herself almost died from being sapped dry. Yet, the goddess didn¡¯t do anything about it. I believe Kauze¡¯s exnation has merit. There is no reason why the Twelve Great Overgods would tolerate the existence of the godhunters if there wasn¡¯t a good reason for them to.¡±

    ¡°So that means even if I unite the godhunters and attack the Twelve Divine Dominions, the Twelve Great Overgods won¡¯t meddle in my business?!¡± Han Hao said as his eyes glowed.

    ¡°If you operate in their interests, they naturally wouldn¡¯t do anything to you.¡± After some thought, Han Shuo continued, ¡°However, the gods that live in the Twelve Divine Dominions provide power to them through their faith. Essentially, they need that power but also can¡¯t let the number of gods grow too much, striking a fine bnce. So, there are limits to how much you can act. Otherwise, the Twelve Great Overgods will turn against you, and we are still not their match, so you have to be careful.¡±

    ¡°Understood, Father. I will do just that.¡±

    Right that instant, two high-pitched whines could be heard approaching from the distance. Soon, Ss and Wasir came to Han Shuo. Ss seemed rather agitated as he said, ¡°Bryan, the divine guards of the Twelve Divine Dominions are marching into the Fringe. It seems that they¡¯re here to deal with us and the godhunters.¡±

    Han Shuo nodded. ¡°If they want to maintain bnce, the Godhunter Alliance can¡¯t be allowed to grow too powerful. There are probably too many of them right now, so they¡¯re trying to cull some numbers.¡±

    ¡°What do we do, Father?¡±

    Han Shuo looked at the fearful godhunters that had lost their seven Hegemons and said, ¡°You¡¯re the new leader of the godhunters. You can decide what to do. I believe you should first take them under your wing.¡±

    ¡°Understood.¡±

 Chapter 990 - Hexopolis of the Fringe

    GDK 990: Hexopolis of the Fringe

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Now that not a single one of the twelve Hegemons remained, the godhunters had lost their leaders. They didn¡¯t know what would happen to them. Now, they needed someone that could bring new hope to them, and Han Hao fit the bill in terms of actual capability, power and status as a godhunter. Without wasting too much time, Han Hao unleashed the power of the Quintessence, causing the godhunters to all bow and submit to him and cementing his position in the Godhunter Alliance for good.

    ¡°Father, I might need to leave the Fringe for a period of time. I will take them away from the Fringe and consolidate my power among the godhunters of the various Divine Dominions first.¡±

    The dead Hegemons still had many subordinates scattered across the Divine Dominions who weren¡¯t aware of what had happened to their leaders. With them now gone, Han Hao had to rapidly strike down those that would doubt him and take the rest under his wing.

    Han Shuo nodded with a smile. ¡°Go your way. Take Polo and the others away too. Be careful when you leave the Fringe. Make sure you don¡¯t run let the city lords from the Divine Dominions ambush and gang up on you. There¡¯s no doubt that quite a lot of godhunters have perished in the Fringe, so I believe the Twelve Overgods will be happy with the oue. However, that doesn¡¯t mean that their followers will stop persecuting the godhunters, so you should know what to do there.¡±

    Han Hao could use demon generals and his new Quintessence. With demon generals, he could easily find out the troop distribution of the various city garrisons across the Divine Dominions and avoid direct conflict or other troublesome affairs.

    ¡°Then I¡¯ll take my leave now. It might take a while before Ie back to visit. I¡¯ll have toprehend the Quintessence¡¯s power first.¡± Without rambling too much, Han Hao immediately motioned for the godhunters to follow him. He then went to the far end of Omphalos to instruct Polo to gather the other godhunter troops at one spot before leaving the Fringe with him.

    Seeing Han Hao give out orders from afar, Han Shuo felt a little unwilling to let him leave. However, he felt more joy than mncholy about the whole affair. He was happy for Han Hao for achieving what he had. As one of the most important family members to him, Han Hao didn¡¯t only have the power to protect himself already, he also had the skills to manage others. Only with enough subordinates could he afford to prevail through the endless conflict in Elysium.

    Soon, Han Hao¡¯s presence went further and further away. Han Shuo quelled the emotions he was feeling. Soon, he felt Akley¡¯s presence approaching him.

    Akley smiled and said, ¡°Bryan, it¡¯s all done! The pesky toxin brewers and some other weirdos you wanted me to approach personally are all dealt with.¡±

    ¡°Thanks for the hard work, Akley. From now on, Celestial Pearl Pharmacy will be the greatest pharmacy in all of Elysium. However, we have to start thinking about how we can build branches in the Divine Domains. As long as we can do that, we will never run out of ck crystal coins.¡± Though their brand was well known enough, they simply didn¡¯t have enough talented brewers for their potions. There was no way Han Shuo himself could afford to spend too much time and effort on the pharmacy brewing potions, so he needed capable brewers that could man the pharmacy. With the new additions to their team, Han Shuo could rest easy in the future.

    ¡°Father,¡± Han Jin said as he emerged from the underground with Andrina. They seemed to have been involved in the st, with their clothes slightly torn and faces covered in soot.

    ¡°Are the two of you alright?¡± he snapped, surprised at how they looked. While he knew they had unique constitutions, he was still worried that they got hurt from trying to suppress the explosion.

    ¡°We¡¯re fine,¡± Han Jin replied as he shot Andrina a bright look. ¡°Not only that, we also benefited from it. The energy from the explosion didn¡¯t harm us at all and instead allowed us to store up on lots of energy in our bodies.¡±

    Han Shuo beamed with joy. He swept his consciousness through the two of them and found that the energy content within them was denser. ¡°Not bad. I knew you two would do fine. Your constitutions and bodies can only benefit from the energy crystals¡¯ explosion. Though, it still begs the question what Tyre did to make his part of Omphalos explode.¡±

    ¡°Tyre truly is sneaky. Within every district of Omphalos, he installed detonators that would receive a signal from his soul. But the detonator at his district was fitted with three redundant power sources that were really well hidden. The energy wavesing from them were also obscured, so we weren¡¯t able to find them in time before Tyre triggered the detonation,¡± Andrina said hatefully.

    ¡°We¡¯re sorry, Father. We failed to stop that explosion,¡± Han Jin said with embarrassment.

    ¡°You did well enough.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t me them and turned to Wasir. ¡°You should have your men move from cial Peak to Omphalos. I worry that the guards of the Divine Dominions aren¡¯t just targeting the Godhunter Alliance.¡±

    Wasir¡¯s expression changed as he nodded before leaving immediately and contacting his men with his magic mirror.

    ¡°Ss, Empyrean Peak will belong to you in the future. There will no doubt be many factions remaining in the Fringe after this, so take in as many under your wing as you can. I have enough people on my side, so I won¡¯t be allowing them to join the House of Han. There is also a chance the Fringe will receive more refugees from the Divine Dominions. If you manage to convince them to serve you, they can alsoe to take shelter at Pandemonium,¡± he promised.

    ted, Ss said, ¡°Now that¡¯s what friends are for!¡± He knew that if Pandemonium was willing to open its doors, then the leaders of the various factions in the Fringe wouldn¡¯t hesitate to join with them. Effectively, they would be Han Shuo¡¯s men and wouldn¡¯t consider joining Ss at all. However, Han Shuo¡¯s promise allowed him to gather his own force while also enjoying the benefits of protection in Pandemonium.

    ¡°I will spread word of the good rtionship between the three of us in the Fringe. I¡¯ll also forbid my men from shing with yours and Wasir¡¯s. Hahaha, the Fringe will be ruled by the three of us from now on,¡± Han Shuo said.

    Shaking his head, Ss said, ¡°Bryan, I appreciate the sentiment, but Wasir and I have talked it over. There is only one Sovereign of the Fringe, and that¡¯s you. The two of us shall serve the House of Han.¡±

    ¡°How can that be?¡± he said, surprised.

    By now, Wasir had finishedmuning with his subordinates and returned. ¡°Bryan, your power has far outstripped ours. Everyone in the Fringe knows that you were the one who resolved this crisis. We have no right to be your equals. Don¡¯t refuse this. In the Fringe, might is right. You are powerful enough to have earned our respect!¡±

    Ss nodded heavily in agreement as heughed. ¡°With you at the Fringe, even Quintessence Overgods have to think twice beforeing to mess with us. From now on, there is no longer a need for us to fight amongst ourselves. The Fringe shall has its owns rules of conduct like otherrge cities.¡±

    By now, Han Shuo knew that he had no choice but to go with the flow. He nodded after giving it some thought. ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll ept it. From now on, Omphalos is no more. I will rebuild it and name it Hexopolis of the Fringe! I will be its city lord and you will be its chief guardians. The three of our ns shall rule it!¡±

    ¡°Hexopolis of the Fringe... Hexopolis...¡± Ss repeated it for a few times. ¡°This name¡¯s a little weird, but it sounds impressive!¡±

    ¡°Alright! Hexopolis of the Fringe it is!¡± Wasir eximed.

    ¡°I¡¯ll stay here for now instead of returning to Pandemonium. I would like to see what the guardians from the twelve Divine Dominions can do to me when theye!¡± Han Shuo felt that there was no longer anything he had to worry about given his strength now. If even Quintessence Overgods didn¡¯t want to cause trouble for him, there were few others in Elysium that could bother him now.

    As such, he no longer had to worry about much and could just focus on gathering demonic energy. A streak of ck gas flowed into the ruins of Tyre¡¯s former territory and gathered around a few boulders before dragging them over.

    With a few loud booms, the ten-meter-tall boulders transformed into a smooth monolith and was erected outside a city gate. ck streaks shed across the monolith¡¯s surface, chipping away at smaller pieces of rock loudly. A bitter, a gust of wind blew the dust and small rocky shards away to reveal the words carved into the gate: Hexopolis of the Fringe.

 Chapter 991 - Finding the Way

    GDK 991: Finding the Way

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Apart from Han Shuo, Wasir and Ss remained at the Hexopolis to defend it. Wasir had already sent word for his subordinates to temporary hide out at Pandemonium. Meanwhile, Ss used this time to meet with the various faction leaders in the Hexopolis. Since Han Shuo had proimed that he wouldn¡¯t be taking anyone into the House of Han, the rest were up to Ss and Wasir to manage.

    Once Han Shuo¡¯s intentions were broadcast, the others who didn¡¯t treat Ss as someone worthy began to seriously consider his words. Some of them knew that their faction¡¯s might was too weak and wouldn¡¯t be able to do much within the Fringe and decided to join Ss instead.

    Han Shuo spent the next few days in Celestial Pearl Pharmacy to break down the remaining impurities in the souls of the Hegemons, leaving only the cultivation insights behind and making them into a few arcane orbs for Han Jin and Andrina to deliver to Pandemonium.

    Han Shuo had eliminated all the Hegemons in the previous sh, resulting in him gaining eleven arcane orbs in total, including those for Han Huo, Han Mu and Han Shui¡¯s use. Apart from those three, Akley could get one destruction arcane orb made from Tyre¡¯s soul. There was also the death arcane orb for Fanny while Emily would get Asser¡¯s dark arcane orb. As for the other destruction arcane orb from Dhaka, Isaiah¡¯s earth arcane orb, Regis¡¯s lightning arcane orb and Miller¡¯s wind arcane orb, Han Shuo would keep it for the others in his house.

    Having been able to operate and expand his Goldstone Enterprise to its tremendous scale this day, Han Jin had demonstrated that his intelligence wasn¡¯t any bit inferior to Han Hao¡¯s. And since he started getting along with Andrina, he began to grow even faster, allowing Han Shuo to leave quite a lot of important matters in his hands.

    Once Han Jin and Andrina left, Han Shuo remained in Hexopolis, spreading the word to those that came to the Fringe from other territories and drafting the new regtions of the city.

    With Wasir and Ss¡¯s support, Han Shuo became the undisputed ruler of the Fringe. He also took inspiration from thews of Ethereal City and the City of Shadows to draft new regtions for Hexopolis. He decided to revoke all the despoticws of Omphalos. From now on, Hexopolis would be the new capital of the Fringe and gods would no longer have to pay to stay there. They could stay for as long as they wanted.

    This sh with the godhunters had resulted in significantly lower traffic to the Fringe. Many powerful gods in the Fringe were either killed by the godhunters or had temporarily left for somewhere rural to avoid the conflict. To ensure that the Fringe quickly grew prosperous again, Han Shuo implemented quite a number of policy changes, which took him quite a number of days. When everything was back on track, Han Shuo entered seclusion to cultivate in an underground room in the pharmacy Han Tu had made.

    Since the breakthrough in Pandemonium, Han Shuo realized that the thirteen avatars inside the cauldron were incredibly powerful. Each one of those individual avatars could rival overgods without Quintessence by their own, but when two of them fused, they would easily dominate normal overgods like Tyre.

    While the fusion of six of them didn¡¯t make them more powerful than Quintessence overgods, they disyed terrifying power that was able to render Tyre and Logue helpless and unable to put up a fight. Given that, if he could fuse all thirteen of his avatars, Han Shuo believed that he might even be able to outpower Quintessence overgods.

    It was a shame that six was his limit for now. Though he had wanted to test it with the seventh, he hadn¡¯t found the chance yet. Not to mention, he had tried the other seven energies once before but wasn¡¯t able to fuse any of them together, much to his dismay.

    Sitting alone in the training room, he fused the six avatars of destruction, death, darkness, lightning, wind and water. The forces fused like six separate streams flowing into onerger one, giving him a new, more powerful energy. He took a deep breath and began testing out fusing the light avatar with the other six, only to find that it was repelled right after itbined.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a hurry, so he gave it repeated tries and attempted to figure out the problem. Gradually, he found that a trace of dark energy was repelling the light energy. It seemed that the energy grew stronger after the fusion of the six clones, representing a significant chance that could cause the fusion to copse.

    In his many tries, he found that the dark energy pushed away the light energy right after the fusion attempt was made. As he wasn¡¯t able to figure out a workaround, he tried fusing other energies instead of light, such as fire, life, space, destiny, earth and fighting aura. He found that fire was repelled by water while life was repelled by death. While space, destiny, earth and fighting aura didn¡¯t experience any repulsion, they didn¡¯t seem to meld together well either. It almost seemed as if pr opposite energies like light and dark, death and life, and fire and water couldn¡¯t be fused no matter what.

    He gave it a little more thought and figured it was hard but probably not impossible. With that in mind, he decided he should focus more of his efforts on space, earth, destiny and fighting aura. Those four energies seemed easy to manage. When he fused using the fighting aura avatar, he felt a littlefortable. While he hadn¡¯t managed to achieve sessful fusion yet, it felt like it would be rather easy.

    The total time he trained was just a short ten days, during which he didn¡¯t make any grand breakthroughs but rather found a clear direction to progress in. He decided he would focus on fusing the aforementioned four energies with extra effort on fighting aura into the sixtet-energy avatar. As for life, light and fire, he would leave it forter. Whether it was possible to fuse them was still a question he didn¡¯t have an answer for.

    That day, he left seclusion training and had Wasir and Ss summon those that had joined them to Hexopolis. With his powerful consciousness, he sensed that the guardians of the Twelve Divine Dominions had arrived in the city.

    ¡°Bryan, how many are there?¡± Ss asked with worry.

    ¡°They number more than the Godhunter Alliance. But you don¡¯t have to worry, numbers don¡¯t mean much. I¡¯d like to see how they can take me on.¡±

    As long as they were within the Fringe, Han Shuo and Han Hao¡¯s telepathic connection could be maintained. He was told that Han Hao and the godhunters didn¡¯t suffer too many casualties as they left the Fringe.

    Han Hao¡¯s message allowed Han Shuo to have a rough idea of the guardians¡¯ forces, but he didn¡¯t really take it to mind. The only one he paid attention to was the Keeper of Light, Gy¨¢l.

    Among those that came to the Fringe under pretense was McKinley, city lord of Ethereal City. He was Han Shuo¡¯s good friend and had informed him about their arrival beforehand, allowing Han Shuo to have a good grasp on their movements at all times.

    ¡°Bryan, Gy¨¢l is here. If possible, I hope you can get rid of him for me!¡± McKinley said. His expression on the magic mirror was one of pure rage. ¡°Gy¨¢l actually broke through and became an overgod. He¡¯s the one who led the campaign here to take on godhunters in the Fringe. Sigh, I¡¯m still not his match yet. I was mocked the whole time I came here, but all I could do was endure his insults the whole time.¡±

    Apart fromining, McKinley also revealed all sorts of information about Gy¨¢l. Han Shuo rather sympathized with McKinley. He finally escaped after being sealed by Gy¨¢l for so long, only to find that he was still not his match. Not to mention, he was forced to join the campaign, only to meet Gy¨¢l there and have to endure his harsh treatment without being able to exact revenge. One could only imagine how much rage he felt.

    Gy¨¢l was loyal to the God of Light, who had warned Han Shuo not to touch him back in Pandemonium. However, Han Shuo had never been on friendly terms with the God of Light since his days in the Profound Continent, and he wasn¡¯t about to begin now. He smiled coldly as he watched the guardians approach.

 Chapter 992 - Come On In

    <h4>GDK 992: Come On In</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    The experts from the Twelve Divine Dominions arrived outside the Hexopolis and temporarily settled on a mountain nearby, silently observing as they discussed what was happening. McKinley¡¯s expression was rather glum. His eyes kept darting towards the white-bearded and well dressed elder of the God of Light¡¯s shrine, Gy¨¢l, as heughed and chatted with the other guardians from the various dominions.

    As one of the three Keepers of the Light of the God of Light, Gy¨¢l was really powerful and a rather active character among the other guardians. Apart from Yarus from the Dominion of Darkness and a few other lead guardians from the Dominions of Death and Destruction, the others were rather careful around Gy¨¢l.

    The Dominions of Light, Life, and Water had always been at odds with those of Destruction, Darkness, and Death. Minor skirmishes were rathermon between them and they were absolute nemeses during the battle of the gods. Given their history of rivalry, they could never fully be on each other¡¯s side. This time, they had only convened because of the uniting threat of the Godhunter Alliance.

    Gy¨¢l and Yarus had almost gotten into a fight, but it was said that they managed to calm down. After that, their two factions stayed apart without offending each other, merely carefully observing one another.

    Given the tension between the two sides, the armies from six dominions led by Gy¨¢l and Yarus might break out into a fight on the spot once the matter in the Fringe was dealt with. They had already upied their own respective territories while McKinley stood there by himself, asionally suffering the indignity of being mocked by Gy¨¢l.

    ¡°Hexopolis of the Fringe?¡± Gy¨¢l suddenlyughed as he saw those words Han Shuo put up at the entrance. ¡°They had a name change, huh? Even though they¡¯re going to be razed to the ground soon? They¡¯re really a bunch of interesting fools.¡±

    He turned to McKinley from afar and said, ¡°McKinley, do you think that the Godhunter Alliance could have wiped out that friend of yours already? I heard you have a good rtionship with that brat called Bryan. Didn¡¯t you give extra care to the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy branch in Ethereal City? Given that you cultivate space energy, you¡¯ll definitely have something to do with it if he ends up surviving, right?¡±

    ¡°Noment!¡± McKinley humphed without even paying Gy¨¢l and heed.

    ¡°Oh, McKinley, Ethereal City is right next to the Fringe. I don¡¯t know how you can be so clueless about everything and yet became a city lord,¡± Gy¨¢l mocked.

    ¡°Bryan won¡¯t be killed that easily. If he¡¯s really in the Fringe, would you dare fight him alone?¡± Yarus called out with augh.

    Gy¨¢l seemed surprised as if he hadn¡¯t expected Yarus to say something like that. After some thought, heughed and said, ¡°I heard that Bryan had gone to the City of Gorging Clouds before. Hahaha, it seemed that you worked with Darkwater and Darkstone to fight him, but I heard you suffered quite a loss.¡±

    Gy¨¢l suddenly stopped and shook his head. ¡°Yarus, it seems that you didn¡¯t just stagnate these past few years, but in fact have deteriorated. To think that a nameless brat like that could take care of the three city lords of the Dominion of Darkness... I must¡¯ve overestimated your lot.¡±

    Yarus smiled without looking the least bit offended. ¡°Oh, really? How about we leave Bryan to youter? We¡¯ll take care of the rest.¡±

    Gy¨¢l didn¡¯t take Han Shuo seriously at all. ¡°Just him alone? Hah! I wouldn¡¯t even have to personally deal with him. I¡¯ll only y with him once he proves himself.¡±

    ¡°Haha, then I¡¯d like to see how the ying goes when he really shows up. Alright, let¡¯s go. We¡¯re already standing at their doorstep now.¡±

    ¡°Yarus, is Bryan really that powerful?¡± Talbot, the lord of the City of Wraiths asked in a whisper.

    Back then, Han Shuo had killed Portlem in his city and proimed that he didn¡¯t fear any retaliation, causing Talbot to hesitate to act against him. This time around, he took the chance toe to the Fringe personally with this expedition with payback in mind.

    Yarus said in a serious tone, ¡°As Bryan hasn¡¯t been active in the Dominion of Light, it¡¯s no surprise that Gy¨¢l doesn¡¯t understand his might. However, he¡¯s been to the Dominions of Death and Darkness many times before. I believe that back then, he shouldn¡¯t be weaker than you one bit. Yet, it didn¡¯t matter. If he were weak, I would¡¯ve been able to wipe him out with Darkwater and Darkstone back then.¡±

    ¡°Are you confident in defeating him now?¡± Talbot said, even quieter than before.

    Yarus shook his head in resignation. ¡°No! I¡¯m not confident even if everyone here fights him with me. I can¡¯t figure out that fellow at all. However, Gy¨¢l and the rest aren¡¯t aware of Bryan¡¯s power at all. If he¡¯s still in the Fringe, we¡¯ll let Gy¨¢l take the brunt of his might. Once he gets injured from this, we¡¯ll immediately retreat from the Fringe and attack Gy¨¢l.¡± Yarus had used darkness energy to form a barrier around them before this conversation started, so the rest weren¡¯t aware of what they were nning.

    ¡°Can Bryan do that?¡± Talbot asked, shocked.

    ¡°Just watch.¡± Yarus smiled mysteriously and whispered, ¡°Remember. When Bryan shows up and disys his might, we must leave without hesitation and ambush Gy¨¢l and the rest outside the Fringe. I have told our lord overgod about this. He said that since the battle of the gods is bound to happen, we should strike first.¡±

    ......

    After some time, the guardians from the Twelve Divine Dominions finally arrived at the great stone gate with the words ¡®Hexopolis¡¯ engraved on them. Gy¨¢lughed and loudly announced, ¡°All those inside this cesspool, godhunters or criminals hiding out in the Fringe ¨C they deserve annihtion. Today, the God of Light¡¯s sacred radiance shall shine upon this filthy ce, cleansing it and bringing upon a new dawn!¡±

    With a loud click, the stone gate opened up andughter could be hearding from within. ¡°Hahaha, I¡¯ve been expecting all of you. Those whoe to visit are my guests. Doe in. It¡¯s nice to see you two again, McKinley, Yarus. Don¡¯t be strangers.¡±

    ¡°Who are you?¡± Gy¨¢l asked haughtily.

    Those from the other dominions were also confused as to what was happening. Hearing a young voice like that did throw them off. Hegemons were usually middle-aged or elderly people. Nobody that young existed among their ranks.

    Yarus¡¯s expression shifted as he hesitated, before he shot Talbot a hidden nce. Feigning a smile, he said, ¡°I didn¡¯t think you of all people would be the ruler here. Since you have invited us in, I shall indulge in your hospitality for a drink. However, let me make it clear that we havee to the Fringe for the godhunters, not you, so please do not misunderstand.¡±

    ¡°Bryan? <i>You</i> are Bryan?¡± Gy¨¢l immediately figured out who he was. Now, he seemed hesitant, as if he was confused over something.

    ¡°Who was the one who proimed that he wouldn¡¯t have to personally deal with him just now? What¡¯s wrong? I see that you haven¡¯t gone in yet. Feeling scared?¡± McKinley said, venting his pent-up frustrations.

    ¡°Shut up!¡± Gy¨¢l said as he red at McKinley. ¡°You are inferior to me, so don¡¯t you dare mock me!¡±

    He humphed and red at the rest before leaving, his followers tagging behind him. Yarus smiled when he noted the fear Gy¨¢l was disying. The fact that there were no godhunters around meant that they had been defeated, ostensibly by the current ruler.

    ¡°Be careful, Talbot. We¡¯ll leave the divine guards outside and enter by ourselves. Our aim isn¡¯t the same as Gy¨¢l¡¯s. We don¡¯t have to linger here and will be leaving the moment the tables turn!¡± Yarus reminded.

    Talbot, who had sworn to seek vengeance against Han Shuo, dropped it entirely when he noted Yarus¡¯s attitude. He knew he wasn¡¯t Yarus¡¯s match, so how could he possibly defeat someone even Yarus was wary against?

    They all slowly approached the recently renamed Omphalos with their own aims and goals. The only one who didn¡¯t seem to show any fear was McKinley, who knew that Han Shuo wouldn¡¯t harm him. That was why he dared to lead the way.

    The moment they entered, McKinley saw Han Shuo with Ss and Wasir in the middle of the wide street. There was nobody else apart from the three of them, but they all smiled calmly.

    McKinley merely nodded slightly and gestured with his eyes to tell him which one was Gy¨¢l. Though, Han Shuo could already tell who it was without needing to be informed with his current power. Besides, it was easy to see which among them was the biggest arsehole.

 Chapter 993 - Even Stronger

    <h4>GDK 993: Even Stronger</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    ¡°So you are Bryan? Hahaha, you look like a young squirt for someone so bold!¡± Gy¨¢l said with a cold chuckle as he made his entrance after McKinley.

    ¡°Long time no see. I didn¡¯t think you¡¯d have be the new lord of Omphalos. I knew you were destined for greatness,¡± Yarus said with a solemn look. The whole time, he made sure to keep a good distance from Gy¨¢l and even more from Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo ignored Gy¨¢l and instead smiled at Yarus, finding it a little weird how even though he was the one who killed Yarus¡¯s brother, Lakrisen, not to mention the ughter at the City of Gorging Clouds. Yet, the first thing Yarus did after seeing him this time wasn¡¯t to seek vengeance, which was not something he expected at all. ¡°Even though I was the one who killed Lakrisen, you¡¯re saying that you¡¯re only here to deal with the godhunters? Do you really mean it?¡±

    Feeling his chest tighten, Yarus feigned a smile and nodded. ¡°Whether you believe it or not, I really don¡¯t n on taking revenge.¡± He had received instructions from the God of Darkness about this matter some time ago and wouldn¡¯t dare disobey them no matter how unwilling he felt.

    ¡°So where are the godhunters?¡± Gy¨¢l said with distaste when he saw that Han Shuo had ignored him.

    Han Shuo finally set sights on Gy¨¢l and recalled the God of Light¡¯s words. After paying attention to him for a while, he noticed that Gy¨¢l was a religious zealot. The wild air of fervor he gave off was due to his intense faith for the God of Light.

    Though he was dressed in a clean, white robe, he didn¡¯t seem the least bit tranquil. Instead, he looked like he would explode with the slightest disturbance. Like McKinley had said, Gy¨¢l wasn¡¯t born in Elysium and used to be among the most maniacal believers of the God of Light in some backwater ce. He had killed endlessly for his faith and grew it at the same time, eventually earning him the attention of the God of Light, who bestowed him a divine stigma. His powers soared greatly as a result, making him the first light cultivator in the small continent he hade from to be a midgod.

    His achievements impressed the God of Light so much that he was sent to various major expeditions across different nes. Gy¨¢l¡¯s fanaticism had never failed the God of Light¡¯s expectations as he culled the minor religions across those nes and spread his faith far and wide. In the end, Gy¨¢l was instructed toe to Elysium. Like before, he performed to the God of Light¡¯s satisfaction and spent only five centuries to be a highgod, quickly bing a rising star in the Dominion of Light.

    There were many legends about Gy¨¢l, though all of them made sure to highlight how unique he was. He had never been someone who was well versed in sneaky tactics, always relying on nothing but his intense and zealous power to crush his enemies, making him out to be the most reckless and forceful of the three Keepers of the Light.

    Han Shuo recalled everything he knew about Gy¨¢l and was just as impressed by his genius. It appeared that only those that devoted their entire being to the God of Light would draw his attention and favor. It was no surprise that Han Shuo was warned not to mess with him.

    ¡°Didn¡¯t you meet any when you came over?¡± Han Shuo said amicably, ¡°We have chased the Godhunter Alliance out of the Fringe. Now, we are godhunter free. Gentlemen, you are wee to visit at your leisure, but if you intend to wipe the Fringe out, then I¡¯m afraid I¡¯ll have to show you out.¡±

    ¡°Where is Han Hao?¡± Gy¨¢l asked, ¡°I heard he¡¯s a godhunter too. Hand him over and tell us where his men are. Only then will we consider whether we should ignore your cesspool and let you rot on your own terms.¡±

    If not for the fact that Gy¨¢l didn¡¯t have a full grasp on Han Shuo¡¯s power, he would¡¯ve had his men kill everyone within the city without even bothering to talk. But even though he knew Han Shuo wasn¡¯t someone who could be easily dealt with, he couldn¡¯t change his temper at all and said it in a way like he was giving him orders. It was as if nobody else but the God of Light and those of his faith mattered. The rest could all die for all he cared.

    Han Shuo had never intended to spare Gy¨¢l ini the least. The moment he was demanded to hand Han Hao over, his expression grimmed. Chuckling sinisterly, he said, ¡°What¡¯s the meaning of this, Gy¨¢l? Do you think you have any leverage to negotiate with me?¡±

    As far as he was concerned, he was on the same level as the God of Light, so being threatened by someone beneath him ruffled his feathers badly.

    Gy¨¢l¡¯s rage was simmering over. ¡°Hahahaha... Over these past thousand years, I have never feared anyone apart from the Quintessence Overgods. Yet, you were the first ever person to dare act so arrogantly before me. Very well! Now, even if you hand Han Hao over, I will still make sure you perish!¡±

    Unlike the crafty Yarus, Gy¨¢l was the kind of person to attack without thinking. Sacred light burst out from his body as Holy Aurum Armor formed over his body. Then, holy energy emanated from his body and the Olive Branch in his hand, putting a great pressure on everyone there. Gy¨¢l had always had a short fuse which made him unsuited to ruling a city, but a great warrior. He was famous throughout Elysium for being the strongest of all three Keepers of Light.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, you¡¯ll never ever run into anyone that dares to act arrogantly before you ever again!¡± Han Shuo said. He wasn¡¯t surprised at the level of power Gy¨¢l disyed. It was only natural for someone with such a deep faith to possess Holy Aurum Armor as well. Without waiting for the Olive Branch to fully unleash its power, Han Shuo willed his six avatars toe out of the cauldron and fuse and expand his Domain of Divinity to envelope the whole Fringe in an instant.

    The moment the ethereal, gigantic Han Shuo opened his arms, he caused bolts of lightning and countless icicles that glowed an odd grey to fall and strike Gy¨¢l. It only took one barrage for the Holy Aurum Armor to crack and shatter. The grey pir of light came crashing down after only a little holy light gathered at the tip of the Olive Branch.

    That instantly caused Gy¨¢l¡¯s body to explode, sending shards of gold all over the ce along with his flesh. With a stretch of his hand, Han Shuo tried to take his soul into the Cauldron of Myriad Demons. However, a white and holy light shone from Gy¨¢l¡¯s soul and emitted an ear-piercing sound before forming into the mostmon sword of light and shooting towards Han Shuo.

    His expression changed when he felt the power of Quintessence from the white light. The light was probably thanks to the divine stigma the God of Light left on Gy¨¢l. It was sheltering Gy¨¢l¡¯s soul and attacking Han Shuo¡¯s avatar. It dawned on him that the God of Light must have left this attack dormant within Gy¨¢l¡¯s soul after their encounter in Pandemonium. The sword of light seemed almost unavoidable, so all Han Shuo could do was try to form a grey with the power from his fusion avatar to catch it.

    He focused all his attention on catching it as if it were a fearsome foe. All of a sudden, his fighting aura avatar shook while the light avatar absorbed a part of the light that resulted from Gy¨¢l¡¯s explosion. Surprisingly, those two avatars actually fused into a single avatar for some reason. Shortly after, the life, fire, space, destiny, and earth avatarsbined with the light-fighting aura avatar. Now, the new gigantic avatar with thebined powers of light, fighting aura, life, fire, space, destiny and earth formed another to catch the sword of light.

    ¡°A genius indeed! He used the power of my Quintessence for another breakthrough! Brilliant, it seems that the day Aethernia opens is not far off.¡± The God of Light¡¯s voice could be hearding from the light as it stopped attacking Han Shuo and disappeared instantly with Gy¨¢l¡¯s soul. It had ended just as abruptly as it had started.

    Han Shuo felt a strange sensation as he gazed at the two gigantic avatars that seemed to be antithesis of each other. He had wanted to fuse all the energies together one at a time, and did not think there was a better route given the pr nature of certain energies like light and darkness, and so on.

    Yet, it didn¡¯t seem that the energies of light, life and fire repelled each other and fighting aura seemed rather simr to light as well. Coupled with the power of the Quintessence acting as a catalyst, the seven avatars whose energies didn¡¯t seem to synergize with each other actually fused into another avatar.

    On one hand, he had aposite avatar of death, destruction, darkness, water, lightning, and wind, and on the other was one of light, fighting aura, life, fire, earth, destiny, and space. Though their qualities were different, their absolute power was without question.

    ¡°Since the godhunters aren¡¯t here, we shan¡¯t be disturbing you,¡± Yarus suddenly said, disrupting Han Shuo¡¯s train of thought and signalling Talbot to leave.

 Chapter 994 - Reconstruction

    <h4>GDK 994: Reconstruction</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    They had beenpletely terrified by Han Shuo. Gy¨¢l, one of the three Keepers of the Light, had been famous in Elysium for being the top fighter of the God of Light. He had struck down many powerful experts and was feared and respected by many. Yet, Han Shuo had managed to strike down this very person without even breaking a sweat.

    And that still wasn¡¯t the worst part. Yarus, being the wise guy that he was, could immediately tell that it was the God of Light who intervened after Gy¨¢l¡¯s body was destroyed. The white light from the God of Light that came out of Gy¨¢l¡¯s soul wasn¡¯t able to harm Han Shuo at all and even praised him before leaving. If even the God of Light didn¡¯t kill Han Shuo immediately for the transgression of killing his most faithful servant, the other gods stood even less of a chance.

    The thought of the ughter Han Shuo had engaged in within the Dominions of Death and Darkness and the response of their respective Quintessence Overgods made Yarus realize something that caused him to feel a chill down his spine.

    Talbot finally knew why Yarus was so wary of Han Shuo now. After hearing his cry, he immediately retreated and no longer held the slightest trace of his desire to seek vengeance against him,pletely relegating Han Shuo¡¯s rampage at the City of Wraiths to the back of his head.

    The two of them exchanged nces before focusing their full attention on Han Shuo as they took one slow step after another out of the Hexopolis, fearing his attack. They might not be able to leave this ce alive.

    The other guardians from other dominions began to shiver in fear from seeing Gy¨¢l killed in an instant. They felt even more terrified when the God of Light¡¯s presence vanished after saying praise of Han Shuo. Eventually, some of them couldn¡¯t help but say, ¡°Since the Godhunter Alliance isn¡¯t here any more, there¡¯s no reason for us to be as well! We won¡¯t disturb you any longer.¡±

    ¡°We have onlye to deal with the godhunters, after all. We don¡¯t intend to make Pandemonium our enemy, so we shall take our leave here.¡±

    ¡°We have other matters to attend to, so no need to see us off.¡±

    They all gave their excuses to leave after Yarus did, slowly backing away towards the exit of the city. McKinley was the only one who didn¡¯t move a step, standing excitedly as he looked at Gy¨¢l¡¯s blood. ¡°He¡¯s finally dead... Just like that... It¡¯s finally over...¡±

    Han Shuo, who had been bathing in tion for his avatars¡¯ sudden breakthrough, snapped out of it when Yarus bid his farewell. However, he didn¡¯t really pay attention to them and remained standing on the spot pondering.

    The twelve chief guardians of their respective dominions were all powerful in their own right. Yarus and a few others were even overgods, not that Han Shuo would take them seriously. The reason he didn¡¯t wipe them out was that he didn¡¯t want to anger the Quintessence Overgods that backed them. Not to mention, he had heard Yarus and Talbot¡¯s conversation earlier.

    With the battle of the gods about to start, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t wait for them to leave and wouldn¡¯t cause them any trouble. He wouldn¡¯t be participating in that grand battle, feeling that it was better for him toy low for now. With that in mind, he let Yarus and the rest leave while he continued to feign deep thought.

    Yarus and the rest, seeing that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t paying attention, moved a bit faster as they left. Once they were finally out, they immediately turned tail and zipped away as fast as they could. Almost immediately, the leaders left the Fringe with the rest of the guardians faster than they came in for the fear that Han Shuo would change his mind ande after them.

    ¡°Bryan, are you just going to let them leave like that?¡± Wasir asked.

    Rxing his stiffened expression, Han Shuo smiled. ¡°They have Quintessence Overgods backing them. A few of them even have stigmas from them. It isn¡¯t wise to keep them in the Fringe at this point in time. They will eventually fight among themselves anyway, so why should I waste my energy?¡±

    ¡°You mean to say that they will go to war with each other soon?¡± Ss asked, shocked.

    ¡°Of course. Just wait and see. Once they leave the Fringe, they will begin to fight. Haha, I didn¡¯t think that we would usher in the battle of the gods.¡±

    At this moment, McKinley took a deep breath and bowed. ¡°I will maintain neutrality and not participate in that battle. Bryan, I have you to thank for resolving my centuries-long grudge!¡±

    Waving at McKinley, Han Shuo said, ¡°You don¡¯t have to go that far, given our friendship. McKinley, you should hurry back to Ethereal City soon. The battle might affect it, so you have to be prepared for it.¡±

    ¡°Understood.¡± McKinley nodded, before he thought in silence. turning back to Han Shuo with a solemn look, he continued, ¡°Bryan, Gy¨¢l¡¯s soul hasn¡¯t been eliminated yet. Was that white light that took him really the God of Light?¡±

    ¡°Of course. You shouldn¡¯t think too much about this. If the God of Light decided to protect his soul, there¡¯s little I can do about it. However, Gy¨¢l fared far worse than you did. Back then, your soul and divine body had only been separated, but Gy¨¢l¡¯s divine body was nowpletely vaporized. In a way, your grudge is now resolved.¡±

    ¡°I am more than satisfied with how things turned out. Only, I am a little worried about you. The God of Light definitely has his eyes on you now. Will you be alright?¡± He furrowed his brow as he paused. ¡°I really don¡¯t know how you cultivated to the point of being able to wipe Gy¨¢l out so easily.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s best that you don¡¯t overthink this matter. Don¡¯t worry, I can protect myself. It¡¯s best you go back soon to defend your city.¡±

    ¡°Alright, I¡¯ll take my leave now. Take care, Bryan!¡± He didn¡¯t say anything else and immediately went where Yarus and the others had gone.

    By stunning the invading guardians with his nigh-impossible feat, Han Shuo managed to resolve the threats easily.

    ¡°Haha, the Fringe won¡¯t be in any danger for the time being. We still have to rebuild the Hexopolis. I will go back to Pandemonium for now, so I¡¯ll need you guys to stay here. Just use the magic mirror to contact me if there are any issues and I¡¯lle immediately,¡± Han Shuo instructed, now that he had the luxury of getting things done without having to worry about the threats.

    ¡°Alright. We will gather the other gods in the Fringe and have them help manage the ce ording to your ns. Just rest assured, we will make sure nothing goes wrong here,¡± Ss said with augh. He seemed to be in a rather good mood.

    From that day onwards, conflict in the Fringe substantially decreased. Without the sneaky Tyre, Logue, and Ossora around, they could finally manage the Fringe properly. Once the battle of the gods began, many more people mighte to the Fringe, giving it new life. It might even grow even more powerful than before.

    ¡°Bryan, go deal with what you have to,¡± Wasir said.

    ¡°Alright. I¡¯ll leave this ce to the two of you.¡± He left without saying much else. At his consciousness¡¯s current level, he would even be able to feel the presence of enemies all the way from Pandemonium without needing Wasir or Ss to inform him, so he wasn¡¯t worried in the least.

    ......

    Soon, Han Shuo returned to Pandemonium. The Five Elite Zombies managed to restore some former semnce to the ruins, with most of the crevices in the ground now gone, causing the eternal fog to once more form within.

    Han Shuo began the reconstruction once he arrived, first having the Five Elite Zombies to change some of the mountainousyout as he imagined them before using his power to forcefully alter the naturalws. He even movedrge swathes of earth to fill in the seas and collected all sorts of material that hecked.

    With his realm state at the Diablo Realm and the power of his thirteen avatars, he was stronger than he had ever been. He began to focus his efforts on installing the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester.

    Something like that could rob so much elemental Yuan from the surroundings that it could even drag Han Shuo into this world from another universe. If it was constructed in Elysium, a ce with energy that was hundreds of times denser and countless times abundant, it was surely to be unmatched.

    It represented a tremendous undertaking. Han Shuo utilized the Five Elite Zombies¡¯ powers and his own insights from his new realm to gather resources from all over the Fringe, the areas near Ethereal City as well as the Dominion of Destiny to fill Pandemonium without regard for how many ck crystal coins he had to spend.

    Time quickly passed and Pandemonium had changed quite a lot, incorporating much of the mountains andkes next to it as it expanded to five times its former size. The climate in Pandemonium had also changed considerably, with lightning bolts and strong snow beingmon sights. It gradually turned into among the grandest ces in Elysium as the battle of the gods began.

 Chapter 995 - Ten Years

    GDK 995: Ten Years

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Ten years passed in a sh. Han Shuo, with the Five Elite Zombies¡¯ help, managed to finally construct a Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester in Elysium. The day the fruits of theirbor were ready to harvest, all the negative energies and Yuan energy gathered around the clouds above Pandemonium as if they were being sucked in by the formation.

    The Pandemonium had now grown to ten times its size before the war. One look across and one would be able to see huge mountains piercing into the skies like swords. The few pces standing in their midst seemed to be filled with traces of energy that almost seemed visible under the moonlight.

    Thanks to the energy gathered by the formation, cultivators within Pandemonium could feel how much denser the various energies were. It almost felt like they were leaning back pleasantly in a sea of various energies.

    There was an amber-colored room in the center of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester that looked like the purest of crystals that continued to give off a magnificent radiance. Within it, Han Shuo remained quietly seated and unmoving as a haze of smoke circled his body.

    When the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester began to work, it would start gathering the negative energies in the surroundings without stopping, which could be converted into demonic yuan that Han Shuo could absorb at a rate hundreds or thousands of times faster. Without the formation, Han Shuo would take thousands or tens of thousands of years to bring his body¡¯s demonic yuan to the Diablo Realm.

    But now, he could shorten that time up to a thousand times. As the continent with the densest Yuan energy, Elysium had a huge concentration of energy that could be funneled by the formation into Pandemonium. Thanks to this sudden influx of power, Han Shuo¡¯s body strengthened at a staggering rate as it converted the negative energies. Demonic yuan seep through each and every cell in his body, changing it as it flowed through his veins.

    Han Shuo¡¯s main body had been absorbing energy like that nonstop using the Cauldron of Myriad Demons as the focal point of the formation, helping him advance through leaps and bounds.

    A decade soon passed and conflict was now present all across Elysium. Ever since Yarus and Talbot attacked the guardians of the Dominions of Life and Light once they left the Fringe, the battle between the Dominions of Light, Life, Water, Destruction, Darkness and Death had begun for good andsted ten whole years.

    While that time was quite long from the point of view of a normal man, it was but a blink of an eye for the nigh-ageless gods. There had only been small skirmishes during the past decade without any real grand battles. It was as if the conflict was building up towards something even bigger.

    The other divine dominions didn¡¯t participate in the battles like before and chose instead to observe and perhaps secretly influence the situation to turn the situation to their benefit. The Fringe had changed a lot during that time. The Hexopolis had long been rebuilt, and under the House of Han, Wasir and Ss¡¯s management, it grew prosperous again. No matter what godse to the city, they wouldn¡¯t be charged a single ck crystal coin to be allowed to remain.

    Though, it still wasn¡¯t enough time for the city to recoverpletely from the previous conflict. Even so, it was still a good omen for the future toe. The battles that had been ongoing also caused a lot of rogue gods to flee to the Fringe as refugees.

    With the situation of Elysium in near constant flux, tensions were high. Han Shou ordered those in the Fringe to not interfere with external affairs and take care of their own turf. With his help, the members of the House of Han improved by leaps and bounds. Many of them managed to break through a realm. Fanny, Emily and a few others who received overgod souls improved at an even crazier pace with Han Shuo¡¯s divine elixir. Now, they were currently at the mid-stage highgod realm and at this trend, they would break through to be overgods soon.

    Nowadays, the power of the House of Han greatly outstripped that of all other great ns in Elysium. If they were to get into a fight with any capital city of any of the divine dominions, they would surely win.

    After word of Han Shuo killing Gy¨¢l a decade ago spread throughout, the various gods in Elysium were made aware that another being as powerful as a Quintessence Overgod existed. Han Shuo had been elevated to their level as a result.

    As Han Hao, who became the leader of the Godhunter Alliance, he had been nowhere to be seen in the past decade. It was as if he had vanished. Nobody knew his whereabouts at all, though godhunters in general did still pop up from time to time to gue the divine dominions.

    Apart from the three Quintessence Overgods who had met Han Hao in person, few actually knew that he had developed his own Quintessence to be the thirteenth Quintessence Overgod.

    All that coupled together showed a sign that a storm was brewing in Elysium.

    That day, a sole figure stepped into the Dominion of Death. The moment he took a step in, he felt an odd energy pulse. But instead of immediately taking defensive measures, he halted. It was as if he was standing there, waiting for something to happen.

    Momentster, a head appeared in mid air formed from the purest death energy into Nestor¡¯s visage. He looked down on the young man who had stepped into his domain emotionlessly and said, ¡°You¡¯vee, Bryan.¡±

    That was Han Shuo indeed, but not his main body, but rather the amalgamate of his thirteen avatars. There was a fine line across the middle of his head that looked like a long scar. It was as if it had been split into two; the skin on the left half was white as jade and looked saintly and benevolent, while the skin on the right was dark and venomous.

    The whole time, Han Shuo had been trying to unite the six-fusion and seven-fusion avatars together, but simply couldn¡¯t find a way. After ten years of arduous effort, the best he could do to reduce the rejection between two pr opposite avatars was to use the power of space to split them in the middle before fusing them.

    This forcefully smushed together body was still actually considered two parts. When he wasn¡¯t paying attention, bursts of energy from the mutual rejection would cause the two halves to conflict once more. However, that was exactly the way he wanted it. He hoped that he would be able to find a way to unite them by observing these rejection reactions.

    ¡°Nestor, why did you send word to get me toe here?¡± he calmly asked.

    A year ago, someone came from the Dominion of Death to Pandemonium to hand Han Shuo the seal of Nestor. Once he unsealed it, he found that it was an invitation to talk in the Dominion of Death. As his main body was still absorbing energy nonstop in the middle of the formation, he couldn¡¯te ¡®in person¡¯, so he sent his fusion avatar instead.

    ¡°This isn¡¯t your body, is it?¡± Nestor asked after some observation.

    Han Shuo furrowed his brow and chuckled. ¡°Nestor, you can¡¯t have asked me toe to do me ill, can you?¡±

    Now that he considered himself Nestor¡¯s equal, he spoke casually without caring about formalities. Back in Pandemonium, Nestor had intended to harm Han Hao. Had it not been for the fact that he grew powerful all of a sudden and Han Hao got his own Quintessence, Nestor might have really killed him. That left quite a bad taste in Han Shuo¡¯s mouth, hence theck of respect.

    ¡°If I wanted to deal with you, I wouldn¡¯t have bothered waiting till now,¡± Nestor calmly replied, ¡°Back when you captured Hill¡¯s soul, I knew you were in the Dominion of Death. I could¡¯ve killed you ten years ago instead of letting you grow for the past ten years.¡±

    Hearing that, Han Shuo could finally be certain that the Gods of Death and Darkness were definitely aware of Han Shuo¡¯s presence in their territories. The reason they didn¡¯t act against him was perhaps they needed part of his power to aid them open Aethernia or something.

    ¡°Alright. Then why did you seek me out?¡± Han Shuo said, now rxed.

    ¡°You killed Gy¨¢l, so the God of Light will no longer make an effort to make peace with you, given his personality. The battle of the gods this time around will involve every divine dominion. Even the Dominions of Space and Destiny will be enveloped in furious battle. While the Fringe is a little smaller, it can still be considered one. What are your ns?¡±

    Han Shuo found the question rather weird. ¡°Are you saying you want me to join you?¡±

    ¡°Back then, you cultivated the energies of death and destruction. That is your true nature and you don¡¯t get along well with the God of Light, so why not stand with us? But don¡¯t be in a hurry to agree or decline. Come to the Dominion of Darkness. The three of us will meet you in person soon to talk to you about it and some other matters. Worry not, you definitely stand to gain from this.¡±

    After some thought, Han Shuo said, ¡°Alright. I¡¯ll wait for the other two toe and we¡¯ll talk.¡± Naturally, they were referring to the Gods of Destruction and Darkness.

 Chapter 996 - A Sigh

    GDK 996: A Sigh

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    The God of Death Nestor didn¡¯t continue the conversation with Han Shuo and instead vanished, leaving Han Shuo feeling rather odd about the situation. Back then, after rescuing his family and escaping from the Dominion of Death, he was still a little worried if Nestor would still seek him out at the Fringe and deal with him on ount of Hill and Sha-t¡¯o. Although he had a few guesses, he couldn¡¯t be certain.

    Yet, decadester, he actually made a return to the dominion on Nestor¡¯s invitation. Not only was he not worried about Nestor digging up old grievances, he could even talk to him normally. It would have been unimaginable to him back then.

    When he thought about it, the only reason he could talk with Nestor as equals was the fact that he was now on a wholly different level, earning Nestor¡¯s acknowledgement. The reason Nestor had left him alone the whole time was because he felt that he still had some value, though he didn¡¯t take him that seriously yet, hence him having not shown up before him at that time. It appeared that it was only through gaining power that one could change one¡¯s status and fate, and having true peace of mind.

    Han Shuo smiled and shook his head, abandoning that train of thought as he made his way to the Dominion of Darkness at a leisurely pace. He had many acquaintances there, for instance, the citizens of the City of Shadows, namely, Erebus, Andre, Aobashi, Carmelita and so on. Apart from that, there was Donna from Hushveil City. The thought of Donna always sent a pang of guilt through him.

    The meeting with the Gods of Destruction, Darkness, and Death would take ce in the Dominion of Darkness, so Han Shuo intended to visit his acquaintances in the meantime before heading to Hushveil City to have a good talk with Donna. After making up his mind, he flew a little faster, all the while working to fuse the energies of his two avatars.

    ......

    Meanwhile at the Sainte household in the City of Shadows, Erebus, Andre, Carmelita, and Aobashi were discussing the battle of the gods in hushed voices. Ever since Wace had been killed at the City of Gorging Clouds, Andre took up the position of city lord of the City of Shadows. While he wasn¡¯t as powerful as Wace, he was great at managing city affairs. In the past years, the city had developed considerably under his watch. Andre¡¯s charisma and amiability allowed him to deepen his rtionships with the other great households, and unlike Wace, didn¡¯t push the other households away just because they were powerful and could be a threat to his reign.

    It was thanks to Andre¡¯s qualities that the city had developed even further. Unlike Wace, violent conflict didn¡¯t break out often in the city. However, him being rtively weaker had impeded his authority somewhat. The patriarchs of the major households in the city weren¡¯t too respectful towards him because he couldn¡¯t dominate them in brute strength. If not for the fact that Andre was personally appointed by the God of Darkness to be the city lord, they might have long attempted to work together and depose him.

    ¡°Yarus had sent word for us to gather all the guardians to prepare for a joint attack from the Dominions of Light, Life and Water. Sounds like they are nning something huge rather than a simple probing attack.¡± Andre seemed rather troubled. After some hesitation, he said, ¡°However, the Kinson, Kisa, and Buller families all have their own ns and don¡¯t intend to utilize the forces of their households so soon. They are hoping that someone else will take the brunt of the attack and are going against my orders. Things really are tough.¡±

    Carmelita humphed her displeasure. ¡°Those fellows are going more and more overboard. I think we should make it clear where the authority lies and even use force if we have to.¡±

    Andre started and hesitated. After a pause, he sighed. ¡°Carmelita, I know what you mean, but the three families are rather powerful. It isn¡¯t the right time to act against them when we¡¯re in such a critical juncture. Do you think we¡¯re powerful enough to pull them in line?¡±

    Carmelita shut up after hearing that, though she looked rather grim. No matter how reckless she was, she knew that the Sainte family could no longer overpower the three other families. Not to mention, this was the time when they needed to unite the most. If the Sainte family really did something like that, they might end up angering the God of Darkness and lose his favor entirely.

    While the heads of the three other families weren¡¯t really obedient to Andre, they at least had to maintain a semnce of respect for him and didn¡¯t dare to act against the Sainte family, all thanks to the message from the God of Darkness that Yarus had ryed. They feared the Overgod rather than the Sainte family themselves.

    ¡°Oh well, we can only endure this. Once it all passes, I will enter seclusion to cultivate. As long as I reach thete stage, those three will settle down,¡± Andre said, ¡°We have to make sure that we stay united at all costs. We can¡¯t afford otherwise.¡±

    ¡°But the unity simply won¡¯t hold! If they don¡¯t obey your directives, we will be unable to consolidate the city¡¯s strength. If Yaruses asking about itter, we will be the ones to take the fall. The God of Darkness might even fault us for it too,¡± Erebus said.

    ¡°Then what can we do?¡± Andre said with a hint of desperation.

    ¡°I heard that Bryan is doing pretty well for himself in the Fringe and even managed to get rid of someone as powerful as Gy¨¢l. If he doese to the City of Shadows, those folks won¡¯t even dare to let out a single fart,¡± Aobashi whispered after some hesitation and careful nces.

    The moment she said that, Carmelita and Andre¡¯s expressions changed. Carmelita yelled, ¡°Why did you bring him up? Didn¡¯t we say that we will never mention that name ever again?¡±

    ¡°Sigh, we can¡¯t me Bryan for that...¡± Erebus muttered, having always been rather close to Aobashi.

    ¡°No matter what, that doesn¡¯t change the fact that the Sainte family, my father especially, treated him very well. Yet, he didn¡¯t even spare my father! I don¡¯t want to hear the name of someone so sinister ever again!¡± she snapped.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. No matter what, Big Brother was killed by him. Even if we used to have a good rtionship, we can never get along ever again,¡± Andre growled uncharacteristically.

    ¡°Then why did the City of Shadows not take part in the n Yarus suggested to kill Bryan in the Fringe?¡± Aobashi asked.

    Andre and Carmelita didn¡¯t say a single word, but their expressions were terrifying. Sighing inwardly, Aobashi didn¡¯t say anything else. She knew better than anyone that the grudge between them and Han Shuo wasn¡¯t something that could be resolved with just words.

    Before Han Shuo killed Wace, he was the best of friends with Andre and Carmelita. Yet, when Wace wanted to deal with him, those two crossed family boundaries to defend him from Wace and even helped the Han family on various other asions. However, Wace had undeniably died at Han Shuo¡¯s hands.

    This was a conflict soplex that even Aobashi had no resolution to. It wasn¡¯t that she and Erebus hadn¡¯t tried to talk the other two out of it, but they had decided that Han Shuo shouldn¡¯t have killed Wace no matter what and had never forgiven him for it.

    Just then, a long sigh could be hearding from the outside. It sounded really sentimental, but seemed to slowly fade away into the distance.

    ¡°Who goes there?!¡± the guards of the Sainte family yelled. They were within a secret meeting room, ess to which was forbidden to anyone and everyone. So, the innocuous sigh provoked the strongest of reactions from the guards as they armed up to track the person down.

    Andre, Carmelita, Erebus, and Aobashi were all stunned when they heard the familiar voice. After a long moment, Erebus stood up suddenly and said, ¡°Was I hallucinating? I think I heard Bryan¡¯s voice.¡±

    ¡°It can¡¯t be. He should be in the Fringe now. There¡¯s no way he¡¯d show up here. Erebus, you¡¯re too tense these days,¡± Aobashi said, before she snapped alert too. ¡°Wait, I also heard it too, so it can¡¯t have been a hallucination. But there¡¯s no way Bryan can be here now... It must just be someone who sounds simr. Let me go out to take a look.¡±

    Just as she got up and was about to go outside, Carmelita snapped, ¡°It¡¯s him! It¡¯s definitely him!¡± She was biting her lip so hard that she almost bled.

    Andre also stood up abruptly as if he had thought of something. He turned to look at Carmelita before slowly sitting back down. ¡°Let¡¯s leave him be. Let him leave.¡±

    ¡°How could we?¡± Aobashi said, ¡°That person probably heard what we said! If it isn¡¯t Bryan, then we have to find out who he is! If he is Bryan, even if you don¡¯t want to meet him, Erebus and I do! We¡¯re still his friends! If he¡¯s in the city, we¡¯ll meet him no matter what!¡±

    Aobashi turned to Erebus, who quickly nodded and agreed. However, they didn¡¯t leave immediately and instead paid attention to how Andre and Carmelita would react.

 Chapter 997 - Old Acquaintance and Ruins

    GDK 997: Old Acquaintance and Ruins

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Carmelita and Andre both fell silent. They seemed to ignore what Erebus and Aobashi had said without expressing any disagreement or approval.

    The other two exchanged nces before Aobashi cleared her throat. ¡°Let me go out to take a look then.¡± She went out without caring if they approved of it or not.

    ¡°Sigh... We can¡¯t really me Bryan for what happened back then either. The city lord had forced his hand. Back at the City of Gorging Clouds, the city lord had intended to deal with Bryan, so he had no other choice... That¡¯s why...¡± Erebus couldn¡¯t bring himself to finish what he was saying when Carmelita red at him. No matter the circumstances, Wace was dead and as a consequence, she and Andre suffered for it.

    Shaking his head and sighing, Andre smiled in resignation. ¡°How dare hee... Even if we don¡¯t deal with him, Yarus wouldn¡¯t let this chance off. Not to mention, this is the Domain of Darkness. I wonder if the Lord Overgod will notice his presence and me us on it.¡±

    Ever since Andre became the city lord, he began considering the bigger and much moreplex picturepared to Carmelita, who was solely focused on Han Shuo¡¯s debt with their family. Based on the current tumultuous state of Elysium, it was really inappropriate for Han Shuo toe to Elysium alone.

    Carmelita clicked her tongue as she hesitated, before turning to Erebus and saying, ¡°You should go too! If it¡¯s him, chase him away!¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not powerful enough to do that,¡± Erebus said with a chuckle.

    She seemed a little agitated when she said, ¡°We don¡¯t wish to see him. There¡¯s no point for him toe to the Dominion of Darkness either, so get him to leave!¡±

    It was only then that Erebus felt that he heard a hint of what she meant. He gave her a suspicious look and turned to Andre, who secretly nodded at him. Seemingly understanding something from that, Erebus nodded back and said, ¡°I¡¯ll chase him away if I see him then.¡±

    He gave them onest look before leaving, and when he was gone, Carmelita heaved a sigh. ¡°Why is he here? Isn¡¯t he doing well in the Fringe?¡±

    ¡°It shouldn¡¯t be a big deal. Thest time, he was able to make it out of the Dominion of Darkness, so this time should be no different,¡± Andre said after some hesitation.

    ......

    On the sides of the streets of the City of Shadows were countless shops. Aobashi left the Sainte household and walked along the streets on her own without saying a single word. The guardians in the city recognized her and immediately sought her out for instruction, thinking that an incident had urred within the city. Aobashi simply waved them away. Soon, she noticed that Erebus hade out after her with a smile.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± he asked Erebus.

    ¡°Nothing much. I was able to tell that both Carmelita and Andre still see him as a friend. They just can¡¯t appear to be too close to him because of Wace¡¯s death.¡±

    Hearing that, Aobashi nodded and knew what she had to do. The two of them went to a quiet alley where the branch of Celestial Pearl Pharmacy used to be. For some reason, after the House of Han left the city, that patch ofnd was kept empty. Nobody could buy it from the Sainte family.

    It seemed rather dirty fromck of cleaning thanks to all the dust that gathered, but the two of them didn¡¯t really seem to mind it as they entered. Han Shuo¡¯s exploits within the Dominion of Darkness were hardly unknown. As a result, nobody dared to damage that area. Many powerful elites in the city held a semnce of respect for the ce and even the heads of the three major families in the city had instructed their descendants to not vandalize the area, which spoke a lot for their respect for Han Shuo as they weren¡¯t nearly as strict when it came to dealing with the Sainte family.

    Within, Aobashi and Erebus found someone standing within, smiling at them as they came.

    ¡°It¡¯s been a long time, Bryan,¡± Aobashi said.

    ¡°Haha, it was you after all! I knew my ears wouldn¡¯t fail me!¡± Erebus said with a beaming smile as he hugged Han Shuo tightly. He knocked on Han Shuo¡¯s back a few times before finally letting go. ¡°What¡¯s wrong? Did you get hurt? Why¡¯s there such a long scar on your face? You could heal all of Carmelita¡¯s wounds but not your own?¡±

    The line separating his two halves was too obvious. If he wasn¡¯t dressed, the two of them would see that the line actually extended down to his body and radiate spatial energy.

    ¡°It¡¯s only a minor wound. It¡¯s no big deal,¡± Han Shuo said, not going into detail about it. He sighed and asked, ¡°Do they still hate me?¡±

    Erebus and Aobashi didn¡¯t know how to respond to that.

    ¡°I knew it would end up like that. It¡¯s no surprise that they can¡¯t forgive me. Because of Wace, many guards of my household were killed. He even wanted to kill me. If I didn¡¯t kill him, the House of Han would be no more, so I had no choice.¡± He sighed and forced a smile. ¡°I only came to visit you all this time around. If they don¡¯t wish to see me, then forget it.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s not like what you think. Andre and Carmelita still see you as friends and are concerned about you. However, the whole city knows that you killed Wace, and if they get along well with you, the rest of the Sainte family won¡¯t let them off the hook for it. They were even worried for your safety, especially from Yarus,¡± Erebus exined, before he looked overhead, seemingly worried about something.

    Aobashi snapped, ¡°Enough with that nonsense!¡± She also knew how impressive the abilities of the God of Darkness were. Who knew if their conversation were being listened in on.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. Not many cany their hands on me in the entire of Elysium, to say nothing of anyone in the Dominions of Destruction, Death and Darkness,¡± Han Shuo said with a carefree chuckle. He really didn¡¯t have much to fear with his current power.

    ¡°Oh? You sound confident!¡± Aobashi said, ¡°I see that you¡¯ve made quite a name for yourself in the past few years. The entirety of the Fringe belongs to you, right? Do you think I can join you if I can no longer stay in the City of Shadows?¡±

    ¡°You are always wee to the Fringe,¡± Han Shuo said. Aobashi had lived in the City of Shadows for a long time in much part thanks to her benefactor, Wace. Even with Wace gone for so long, she still served the Sainte family for a long time and could be said to have repaid her debts. ¡°Then again, who can possibly match your strength in the City of Shadows, especially when you have Erebus and the Sainte family with you?¡±

    ¡°Things have changed,¡± Erebus said before exining their troubles to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo nodded and said, ¡°I see.¡± He handed them a few things and said, ¡°Take it. There¡¯s one for each of you, including Carmelita and Andre, and they¡¯re used for...¡±

    Back in the Fringe, Han Shuo had killed quite a lot of highgods, many of whom were near peak stage. He had refined their souls into arcane orbs which allowed one to absorb the insights of another directly into their soul. Apart from them, he gave them a few enhancing potions that could help Erebus and Aobashi break through.

    ¡°These... These are precious. Where did you get them?¡± Erebus asked,pletely shocked.

    ¡°They aren¡¯t particrly precious. I have lots more where that came from. Don¡¯t tell Carmelita and Andre that they came from me. I worry they won¡¯t ept them. Andre can¡¯t reign them in because he¡¯s not powerful enough, so he¡¯ll need these.¡±

    Without letting them refuse, he quicklyughed and said, ¡°Alright, let¡¯s go get some drinks. We¡¯re not going home sober!¡±

    Right after, he caused all sorts of delicacies and delicious wine to appear out of nowhere and began to feast with them.

    ......

    As Andre was managing city matters, a guardian appeared before him all of a sudden and kneeled. ¡°City Lord, the patriarchs of the Kinson, Buller, and Kisa families have sent messengers to inform us that they¡¯re willing to ept our conditions and allow us tomand their guardians.¡±

    ¡°What?!¡± Andre cried in surprise, ¡°They didn¡¯t even budge no matter how hard I tried, so why did they agree out of nowhere?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t know either.¡±

    After some thought, Andre¡¯s eyes brightened. ¡°Don¡¯t tell me...¡±

 Chapter 998 - Unseen

    GDK 998: Unseen

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    The three great families¡¯ attitudes had suddenly changed. Now, they listened to Andre without scrutinizing every single detail. The problem that had gued him for so long seemed to have been solved overnight. It didn¡¯t seem possible to him, especially after considering the years Andre had interacted with them.

    ¡°Alright, you are dismissed.¡± When he was alone in the room again, he muttered, ¡°Bryan, you truly are influential... I didn¡¯t think the three families would still be beholden to you after so many years...¡±

    ......

    Han Shuo was indeed the one who had solved Andre¡¯s conundrum. All he did was have Erebus ask to meet the three family heads to tell them Han Shuo¡¯s stance on the matter. Almost immediately, the family heads got in line.

    Putting aside Han Shuo¡¯s current strength, his exploits across the Dominion of Darkness more than a decade ago, including his rampage in the City of Gorging Clouds and killing of Wace and Hofs had spread far and wide throughout the entire dominion. The gods of the Dominion of Darkness were utterly floored when they heard that Han Shuo killed Wace and Hofs in an instant and still managed to leave the dominion alive. Nobody would dare to cross such a person.

    ¡°Aobashi, Erebus, I¡¯ve stayed in this city for the past couple of days and really enjoyed all the feats we had. However, I still have some matters to attend to, so I will be leaving for Hushveil City today,¡± he said as he was about to bid them farewell at the forest outside of the city.

    During the past two days, Han Shuo had Aobashi and Erebus go around spreading some news while also dining and chatting with them, but Carmelita and Andre didn¡¯t show up at the very end. He felt a little down about it, so he was about to leave today.

    ¡°Don¡¯t overthink it. Andre¡¯s busy tending to city matters, so he doesn¡¯t have much time. Carmelita¡¯s still cultivating in seclusion. Perhaps she doesn¡¯t even know you¡¯re here,¡± Erebus exined.

    While Han Shuo knew that it simply wasn¡¯t true, he merely smiled and didn¡¯t press the matter. Waving as he walked away, he said, ¡°Take care, you two. Come to the Fringe when you¡¯re free. You¡¯re always wee there.¡± He then zipped away to the distance before disappearing from the horizon.

    Some timeter, a rustling could be heard from the forest. Carmelita came to Erebus and Aobashi¡¯s side and looked towards the direction Han Shuo had gone in. ¡°I guess he won¡¯te back here ever again.¡±

    ¡°No, he will when he has the time.¡± Aobashi lifted her hand up and smiled. ¡°Given his strength, he must have known that you were just nearby. Even though you didn¡¯te out, he knew you were here to send him off.¡±

    ¡°I wasn¡¯t here to send him off! I just happened to be passing through!¡± Carmelita snapped.

    ¡°Sure you were. Well, let¡¯s go back. I have quite a few things I want you to hand to the city lord... It should be able to greatly increase your power,¡± she said as she walked back towards the city holding Carmelita¡¯s hand.

    In fact, Han Shuo definitely noticed her presence there long ago, but merely feigned ignorance since she didn¡¯t step out on her own ord. He still felt rather sorry towards her. No matter the circumstances, he had killed her father, Wace, under whose cruel surface was a father who doted on his precious daughter dearly. The grudge wasn¡¯t one that could be easily resolved.

    Even so, he was thankful that she showed up at all and felt that his trip hadn¡¯t been in vain. Even if he couldn¡¯t hang out with Andre and Carmelita like he did before, at least he no longer had to treat them like enemies. He now felt like a huge burden had been lifted off his chest. As he headed towards Hushveil City, the figure of Donna surfaced in his mind and it put a smile on his face. He was in a really pleasant mood.

    In a single night, he arrived at Hushveil City; the city¡¯s tight defenses might as well be nonexistent to him. After the Lavers family took control of the city by the God of Darkness¡¯s order, things had been taking a turn for the better for Felder. Not only did he manage to save the Lavers family, he managed to take control of one of the seven cities within the Dominion of Darkness. The miserable days back when he was in the City of Gorging Clouds was long beyond him. Now, he managed Hushveil City with a passion.

    Unlike Andre, Felder seemed to have made a breakthrough in his mind state thanks to the countless hardships he had ovee. Not long after he became the city lord, he became ate-stage highgod.

    With his newfound power and a stigma in his soul, his influence grew to the point he could easily suppress the patriarchs of the other influential families in the city, allowing the Lavers family to prosper under his reign. Coupled with his wit and diplomatic approach to interacting with the other families, he managed to build a rather united city.

    Nowadays, the Lavers family hadpletely taken the Hofley family¡¯s ce as the true lords of the city. Their residence located in the prosperous city center was far bigger and luxurious than the one they had back then in the City of Shadows.

    Han Shuo walked at a leisurely pace within the estate of the Lavers family with not a single energy tower being able to detect him. Smiling, he sent out his consciousness to sweep the area before making his way to a room and starting to drink as he waited. It didn¡¯t take long before Donna could be heard approaching; she had been summoned by Felder to talk about some pressing matters concerning the city.

    Felder valued Donna¡¯s opinions and had often listened to her suggestions over the years. He also made sure to seek out her thoughts when he had any dilemmas. After all, it was due to him not taking her thoughts into ount decades ago that a rift ended up forming between the Lavers family and Han Shuo, which ended up resulting in the Lavers family¡¯s exodus. They had almost ended up in a rut they couldn¡¯t recover from. That was a mistake he wouldn¡¯t make again.

    Just as Donna was about to open the door, she heard gulps from within the room. Taking a breath to ready herself, she mmed the door open and yelled, ¡°Who goes there? Ahh...¡±

    She breathed a sigh when she noticed who it was. ring at Han Shuo, she grit her teeth.

    Han Shou smiled and looked at her as he downed the rest of his wine. ¡°What¡¯s wrong? Am I not weed here?¡±

    Donna stomped her foot as she turned to close the door and deployed a few barriers outside. Then, she stepped in front of him. ¡°Why did youe?¡±

    Holding her hand, he smiled. ¡°Should I not have?¡±

    A look of joy bloomed on Donna¡¯s face as she stroked his face, muttering, ¡°I thought... You¡¯d nevere looking for me ever again... I was nning toe look for you after I finish dealing with affairs here... I didn¡¯t think you¡¯d reallye...¡±

    He helped her take a seat beside him. ¡°Well, I dide for you in the end. How¡¯s life in Hushveil City?¡±

    ¡°Pretty good. My father is now ate-stage highgod. With the God of Darkness himself appointing my father as the city lord, the other families in the city don¡¯t dare to cause trouble. Even though Hushveil City isn¡¯t reallyparable to other cities, we are sure to see quite a lot of development if things proceed as they have.¡± She smiled and locked her hands with his as she continued to tell him about the city.

    Han Shuo smiled as he listened, interjecting from time to time with questions to get a better picture of the situation. All of a sudden, she stopped and looked at his hands, seemingly unhappy about something.

    Han Shuo was surprised to see her dissatisfied re. ¡°What¡¯s wrong? I thought you said nobody was giving you trouble here.¡±

    ¡°You left me alone here while you continued to mess around with the others in the Fringe,¡± she said with a pout, ncing back at their interlocked hands with slight contempt.

    ¡°Umm... Well, you know how busy I¡¯ve been. The Fringe has been rather chaotic over the years and I was in most, if not all battles that took ce there. I didn¡¯t have time to spare for the others either, you know. The path of cultivation is fraught with ups and downs. Usually, I either find myself standing against the Hegemons or spending the rest of my free time on making a mind state breakthrough. I¡¯m busier than you are.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t care. You were with them the whole time and didn¡¯t even visit me!¡± She pulled her hand away from his in a small fiit. It was clear that she was angry, but it seemed a little too sudden. Even Han Shuo, well versed in the ways of the fairer gender, wasn¡¯t able to tell what she was thinking at the moment and merely shot her an odd nce.

    Donna made some distance between the two of them, seemingly still angry and not even wanting to meet his gaze. He smiled in resignation and pulled her into his embrace. That was the ideal solution he hade to after years of experience whenever he didn¡¯t know what they were unhappy about.

    As expected, she stopped struggling after a few attempts and leaned her head against his shoulders. ¡°Why are you such a gentleman all of a sudden? What happened to your sneaky little hands?¡±

    It only just dawned on him that Donna was unhappy that he didn¡¯t cop a feel or two when he had a chance.

 Chapter 999 - I Beg of You

    GDK 999: I Beg of You

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    The fusion of his thirteen avatars he forcefully put together was hard to control, hence his restraint with Donna. He was worried that the chaotic blend of energies might destabilize and hurt her by ident, so he hastily exined himself when she got angry at him.

    It didn¡¯t take her long to believe him, however, for she felt the darkness energy within her rumble a little out of control when she approached him. Initially, she had thought it was because she was getting a little too agitated from not seeing him for a long time. Even so, she was still willing to give him a light hug.

    Naturally, she didn¡¯t get too intimate with him, knowing that it was not his actual body. The way she saw it, the avatar was merely a puppet he was operating, a fact which unnerved her somewhat.

    Meanwhile, Han Shuo was deathly afraid that the chaotic energies within him would inadvertently harm her. He didn¡¯t even dare to move when she hugged him. Donna, feeling his nervousness, let go after a while and talked about other matters regarding the City of Shadows and Profound Continent. As he listened intently, his eyes brightened before he whispered, ¡°Your father is here.¡±

    Blushing slightly, she hastily said, ¡°Then hide!¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t get up and smiled. ¡°Why should I? It¡¯s no harm letting me meet him, right?¡±

    Blushing even more, she stomped angrily. ¡°Fine. I¡¯m not afraid.¡±

    Soon, Felder came to the door. Seeing the barrier before him, he asked, ¡°Why did you erect a barrier? I need to talk to you about something.¡±

    Donna removed the barrier and let him in. Still blushing, she said, ¡°Bryan¡¯s here.¡±

    Felder didn¡¯t seem the least bit surprised unlike what she expected. He said as he approached them, ¡°I knew he was here. I didn¡¯t think he¡¯d find you so quickly. I was nning to have a talk with you about him.¡±

    Even Han Shuo was surprised that Felder knew of his presence and sat straight warily. ¡°Did you hear about my arrival from the City of Shadows?¡±

    Felder shook his head and took a seat. ¡°The God of Darkness informed me about it directly.¡±

    All of a sudden, Donna looked outside before hastily shutting the door. She pulled on her father¡¯s arms and anxiously asked, ¡°What do we do?¡±

    Han Shuo had embarked on ughter in the Dominion of Darkness more than ten years ago, so it wasn¡¯t surprising that everyone including Donna thought he was on the god¡¯s bad side. She was both worried about Han Shuo and her family.

    Felder looked at her and inwardly sighed as he wondered how much his daughter would have to suffer in the future. As he thought so, he turned to Han Shuo; he knew that he had many other beauties by his side, all of whom were amazing in their own right. Donna, however, was someone from the Lavers family that had done Han Shuo harm in the past before, though they ended up losing out from it. It wasn¡¯t something they could just hand waive away. Even if Han Shuo could forgive them, what about the other women who were with him?

    ¡°Donna, what are you worried about?¡± Han Shuo said, ¡°The fact that I dared toe means I¡¯m confident I¡¯ll be able to leave easily. Don¡¯t worry.¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s different. Nobody is able to stand up against the God of Darkness¡¯s might. You were only able to leave thest time because the City of Gorging Clouds was at the very border of the Dominion of Darkness. But this is Hushveil City and my father even got a mental message from the God of Darkness himself. What do we do?¡± She didn¡¯t let her guard down one bit even though Han Shuo waspletely rxed.

    As her actual power was quite weak, she couldn¡¯t truly understand the might of a Quintessence Overgod. Just like how Han Shuo could detect any and everything within the Fringe, the God of Darkness could also make sure anyone weaker than him wouldn¡¯t be able to leave his dominion no matter what. Han Shuo was only able to escape thest time not because he left in the nick of time, but because the God of Darkness was going easy on him. However, Donna was too weak to truly understand the dynamics at y here.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll be fine,¡± heforted once more, before turning back to Felder. ¡°The God of Darkness didn¡¯t ask you to deal with me, right? What message does he have for me?¡± He sounded casual even though he was speaking to Donna¡¯s father. At his level of power, social norms and hierarchies no longer held a firm binding on him.

    ¡°You knew that the God of Darkness wasn¡¯t out there to get you?¡± Felder seemed a little surprised about it.

    ¡°I came to the Dominion of Darkness by invitation from the three of them, after all,¡± he said with a chuckle, ¡°Not to mention, if he wanted toe get me, he wouldn¡¯t bother informing you about it first.¡±

    While Felder was ate-stage highgod now, he posed not the slightest threat to Han Shuo at all, who could kill him with utter ease if he wanted to. The God of Darkness, having witnessed Han Shuo¡¯s power a decade ago, wouldn¡¯t bother sending Felder to take him out if that was his intention.

    Hearing that, Felder smiled in resignation, knowing that Han Shuo was speaking the truth. If he could kill Gy¨¢l so easily a decade ago, not even the whole of Hushveil Citybined would be able to do anything to him now. However, something suddenly dawned on him. ¡°Three people invited you here? Who else is there?¡±

    ¡°The Gods of Death, Destruction and Darkness invited me here. I have no idea what they are up to.¡±

    Donna and Felder watched him with utter astonishment. Those three were akin to mythical beings as far as they were concerned. They were people they worshipped in the shrines and had never seen in person before. How could these people who stood at the pinnacle of Elysium invite him over, not to mention all three of them at once? They were obviously treating him like an honored guest.

    It was so ridiculous it sounded impossible. Quintessence Overgods were hardly known for their humility and only got along with their own ilk. The only thing this could mean was that they now perceived Han Shuo as their equal.

    ¡°You aren¡¯t joking, are you?¡± Donna said when she finally snapped out of it, though a hint of shock still lingered in her voice.

    Han Shuo knew the implications, but he didn¡¯t borate on it. ¡°So, what did the God of Darkness ask you to tell me?¡±

    Felder finally recovered from his shock and drew a deep breath, before recalling the message and making sure he got it right. ¡°He wants you to head to the Shrine of Darkness in the next two days. I will tell you where it is.¡±

    Then, he turned to his doubtful daughter and said, ¡°I¡¯m afraid that what Bryan says is true. I¡¯m sure I recall the God of Darkness telling me that Bryan is to be treated as an honored guest. I didn¡¯t know the reason back then. To think that he was invited here by the three Quintessence Overgods...¡±

    Donna repeatedly looked Han Shuo down before she said, ¡°You... Did you really get that powerful?¡±

    She knew that he improved at staggering rates, but he was only a lowly lowgod at the time they met, having only arrived in Elysium for a few short centuries. Yet, now he was on the same level as a Quintessence Overgod. This was something she truly couldn¡¯tprehend.

    ¡°Haha, to be honest, even I don¡¯t know if I¡¯m truly that powerful,¡± Han Shuo said with a shrug. ¡°However, I know that they wouldn¡¯t dare kill me and even need to request me of something.¡±

    By now, Donna really had no words. Her mouth was wide agape as she stared at him nkly, struggling toprehend how he managed to reach the level he was now in such a short time.

    ¡°Ahem...¡± Felder cleared his throat and said, ¡°Donna, leave us for now. I have something I want to talk to Bryan about in private. The location of the Shrine of Darkness is not something you¡¯re allowed to be privy to.¡±

    Having no other choice, she gave him onest look before saying, ¡°Alright. I¡¯ll leave you two to talk.¡±

    When she was gone, Felder heaved a long sigh. ¡°If I had listened to what she said years ago, the Lavers family wouldn¡¯t have suffered such a heavy loss.¡±

    His regrets had only grown after seeing Han Shuo grow so powerful. It was all due to him underestimating Han Shuo back then that, through a series of events, led to the death of his brother, Avery. After that, the whole Lavers family had to leave the City of Shadows and was almost exterminated in the City of Gorging Clouds.

    ¡°Where is the shrine?¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t want to talk about things long past, so he changed the subject.

    After Felder told him the whereabouts, he looked deeply at him and said, ¡°Bryan, do treat my Donna well... Umm... I beg of you.¡±

    He knew that he shouldn¡¯t throw his weight around someone so much more powerful than him, so he humbled himself.

    Nodding, Han Shuo earnestly said, ¡°Don¡¯t worry. I will take good care of her.¡±

 Chapter 1000 - Source of Darkness

    GDK 1000: Source of Darkness

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    ¡°What did my father talk to you about?¡± Donna asked when Felder left.

    ¡°Just the Shrine of Darkness. It wasn¡¯t anything special,¡± Han Shuo said with a smile, ¡°Your father is quite lucky. The fact that the God of Darkness contacted your father directly means he values him a lot. I believe that his position in Hushveil City is secure from now on.¡±

    As long as one had the Quintessence Overgod¡¯s favor, one would definitely have a bright future within their respective dominion. While Felder¡¯s power wasn¡¯t outstanding, he had a sharp wit and was good at managing the city, so the God of Darkness valued him as a subordinate.

    ¡°You really didn¡¯t talk about anything else?¡± Donna seemed rather antsy about something as she blushed. ¡°Did you talk about us?¡±

    ¡°Hehe, your father didn¡¯t really say anything other than asking me to treasure you,¡± he said after some thought to reassure her.

    Hearing that meant her father wasn¡¯t against their rtionship. Blushing and looking straight at him, she whispered, ¡°Then, are you going to listen to what he says?¡±

    ¡°What do you think?¡± Han Shuo held her hand and smiled mischievously. Donna met his gaze for a few seconds before backing off shyly and stomping on his feet to vent the embarrassment.

    ¡°I have to leave for a bit to see those three. After I¡¯m done with the meeting, I¡¯lle back to look for you. If there isn¡¯t anything urgent you have to do here, make some preparations to go to the Fringe with me.¡±

    She was just as surprised as she was moved by the offer, but she hesitated. ¡°Let me talk to my father about it first. There are quite a lot of things in the city we have to deal with and our family is rather strapped for manpower.¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. Your father will do fine with the backing of the God of Darkness. Nobody will dare cause him trouble. Not to mention, you can¡¯t be here to help him forever, and I also need an extra pair of hands for the many issues in the Fringe.¡± He held her hands in his own and smiled sweetly. He was indeed kept rather busy in the Fringe, but thanks to Phoebe, Emily and the many other members of the House of Han, he didn¡¯t really need extra manpower. It was just a convenient excuse.

    ¡°I¡¯ll talk to Father about it,¡± she happily said. It seemed that she was serious about arranging her departure now.

    ¡°I¡¯m sure your father will let youe with me,¡± he said as he stroked her hair. ¡°Alright, I shall take my leave now. I¡¯lle to fetch you when the matter is settled.¡±

    Donna was a little unwilling to see him leave, wanting to get a little more intimate with him for a little longer. But after recalling how weird his avatar was, she discarded the notion and let him go after asking him to stay safe.

    Han Shuo then headed for Mirage City. ording to Felder, the Shrine of Darkness was located in the murky woods of Myrkvidr, which was situated between Hushveil City, City of Shadows, and Mirage City. The trees in the forest towered high into the skies, blocking off sunlight and moonlight alike, making it dark and murky even during the brightest days.

    Han Shuo had long guessed that that was where the Shrine of Darkness would be; after all, Myrkvidr was forbidden to most people. Anyone who entered without permission would never leave alive. Even though Han Shuo had a hunch about its location, he didn¡¯t dare to check it out himself. Back then, the Quintessence Overgods were practically a myth to him when he was still weak.

    While it was quite some ways away from Hushveil City, Han Shuo¡¯s speed had improved considerably and he managed to reach the entrance in half a day. He felt the dark element that permeated the surroundings, took a deep breath, and stepped into the forest. Though he put up a confident front in front of Felder and Donna, he did feel a little anxious about entering Myrkvidr. If the three Quintessence Overgods decided to wipe him out there, he wasn¡¯t confident he could leave such a unique ce that easily.

    He spread his consciousness out after entering and felt out the flow of the dark element, before heading into the depths. <i>I wonder what the Gods of Death, Destruction, and Darkness really want to see me for?</i> As much as he pondered on the notion, he couldn¡¯t figure out an answer for it.

    ording to Nestor, they didn¡¯t invite him over just to discuss a simple alliance with the Fringe. Han Shuo had never nned to join the battle of the gods in the first ce, but Nestor made it sound like it was something he couldn¡¯t avoid. Even the ever-neutral Dominions of Destiny and Space wouldn¡¯t be able to avoid the repercussions of the uing battle, so it definitely wasn¡¯t going to be an ordinary one.

    Based on the secrets he managed to extract from Kaiser¡¯s soul about how the godhunters were actually part of the machinations of the Twelve Overgods, Han Shuo began to be really wary about them. He didn¡¯t understand why they watched as he slowly grew stronger. It seemed that they were nning to use his strength to open Aethernia for some purpose. He had taken the risk toe to clear his doubts about it.

    He walked deeper and deeper into the forest at a leisurely pace, stepping on the soft fallen leaves as he did so and correcting his course by sensing the dark element to ensure he was always heading for the center. Han Shuo didn¡¯t detect any sign of life in his surroundings, which made it eerily quiet. As he went deeper, he noticed that the concentration of other elements thinned while the dark element¡¯s grew denser.

    All of a sudden, the light around him disappeared and he found himself in pitch-ck darkness. He also noticed that there was no longer any trace of other elements apart from the dark element around him. His consciousness told him that he still wasn¡¯t at the spot with the highest concentration of dark element yet, so he definitely wasn¡¯t in the Shrine of Darkness.

    He could no longer rely on his sight, so he used his consciousness to sense his way to the shrine. After some time, he found himself at a source of darkness out of which dark element poured out in all directions. The amount of dark energy seemed boundless like a sea. It was as though this was the source of all the darkness element in Elysium.

    <i>It was the power of the Quintessence!</i> He immediately knew that he had arrived at his destination. Soon, he would be able to see the God of Darkness. Only the Quintessence could possess such boundless power.

    Han Shuo cleared his throat to make his presence known. Then, he noticed that the dark element in his surroundings suddenly energized, pushing down against him like a constricting cage while pressing against every corner of his body. Feeling the terrifying power, he didn¡¯t hesitate and immediately split his avatar into two halves by undoing the forceful binding that he had done with spatial energy.

    He had never been truly able to fuse those twoposite avatars. While he looked like a single person, it was actually rather unstable due to the conflict between his avatars¡¯ energies. While he could afford to take on weaker enemies in that state, he didn¡¯t dare risk it when facing off against Quintessence Overgods.

    The two halves split far apart, unleashing the shing energies. He didn¡¯t care what the God of Darkness was nning to do and immediately erected his strongest barrier to protect himself. His avatars, which had made easy work of Gy¨¢l, were changing under the sudden huge pressure. The dense dark element that was pressing down changed into drops of pure dark essence, each one containing the power of a highgod.

    Then, those drops fused together with each other into an ocean that submerged Han Shuo whole before turning into a vortex, flinging his two avatars in circles within and threatening to swallow him entirely. With each revolution in the vortex, his avatars¡¯ defenses weakened. Soon, the barriers protecting them werepletely ground down.

    Utterly shocked, Han Shou now felt that he had been too reckless to enter someone¡¯s home turf. He had never expected to be suddenly attacked without so much as a word and even face the threat of losing his two avatars. The power of a Quintessence Overgod was truly unfathomable.

 Chapter 1001 - Qualification

    <h4>Chapter 1001: Qualification</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Han Shuo hadpletely no idea what the God of Darkness was nning. As his two avatars gradually weakened amidst the vortex of darkness, he felt a really foreboding sense of danger and focused all his attention on resisting the God of Darkness. It was only now that he realized that his imperfectly fused avatars still weren¡¯t powerful enough for him to deal with Quintessence Overgods.

    As the two different forces were ground down by the vortex, Han Shuo began to feel more and more powerless. The only thing he could try to do was attempt to fuse them together, for as long as he could do it, he definitely wouldn¡¯t have to fear the God of Darkness any longer. It was a shame that fusing all thirteen types of energies was far too hard. It would be a miracle if he really seeded in doing so within such a short time.

    As his avatar¡¯s powers were slowly ground down, he slowly began to panic. All of a sudden, an idea urred to him. If he couldn¡¯t fuse them together, perhaps he could try making the conflicting energies sh with each other to generate a powerful reaction.

    He immediately brought his two avatars close together. Now, the defensive energies he had around his bodies were converted into two distinct rampaging streams of energy which were sent shooting into each other. A huge explosion could be heard once more as the force of the repent reaction spread out in all directions.

    Han Shuo managed to utilize the shockwave generated from the explosion to propel himself out of the dark vortex. Without a second thought, he immediately made his way to anywhere with a lower concentration of the dark element.

    ¡°Oh?¡± It sounded like someone was surprised that Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars managed to escape the power of the Quintessence of Darkness. However, Han Shuo couldn¡¯t be bothered by anything else other than making his retreat in an attempt to make as much distance as he could from the Quintessence.

    Even then, he had underestimated the power of Quintessence. Countless dark tendrils came streaming out of the vortex towards Han Shuo at great speed, homing down on him no matter how many turns he made. Even though it was so dark nothing was visible, the dark tendrils still managed to seek him out. However, Han Shuo was so fast that the God of Darkness wasn¡¯t able to make another vortex to trap him within.

    Then, an odd sound could be heard descending from the sky as a wave of destruction energy came pressing down. Han Shuo found out toote and wasn¡¯t able to avoid having his two avatars pressed to the ground. At the same time, the light of death appeared in front of Han Shuo. Nestor¡¯s visage was slightly visible in that light.

    The Gods of Death, Destruction and Darkness¡¯ figures now appeared before him. When he saw them appear, he calmed down. There wasn¡¯t much else he could do now to escape now that the three of them had shown up.

    Even if his two avatars ended up destroyed here, his main body was still in Pandemonium. In a desperate bid, he forced his two avatars together and had each avatar hold the other¡¯s hand tightly. All of a sudden, unbelievable waves of pain could be felt throughout his body. The shing energies had traveled from each of the avatars to the other through the held hands that acted like a bridge rapidly and unseen, but it sent lots of torment into the souls of both his avatars. It was so painful he felt like his heart and lungs were being torn out.

    The whole time, he hadn¡¯t dared to let the two avatars actually touch one another, because he felt the pain of his soul burning when their hands identally brushed against each other once. It was the kind of pain ten times worse than what he felt when breaking through to the Skybreak Realm. If not for his insane endurance and willpower he had obtained from cultivating demonic arts, the pain in his soul would have caused them to dissipate. However, he also realized back then that the two avatars touching generated an unbelievably powerful energy field. It was ast resort.

    ¡°Whoa!¡±

    ¡°Amazing!¡±

    ¡°Not bad!¡±

    The three Quintessence Overgods expressed their amazement unanimously when they felt that energy field as Han Shuo stared at Nestor furiously before two beams shot out towards Nestor.

    Nestor¡¯s expression changed before he yelled, ¡°Not good!¡± He then immediately dodged in a panic.

    ¡°Bryan, don¡¯t be hasty! We were only testing you out and didn¡¯t mean to harm you!¡± Nestor said after evading the attack. As he said so, the boundless darkness receded and moonlight began to find its way to the ground again.

    At the same time, a cold and handsome youth and a burly man stepped out of the darkness. The two of them looked at Han Shuo, their eyes shining with the unmistakable powers of Quintessence.

    When Han Shuo heard what Nestor said and saw the two other Quintessence Overgods make an appearance, he hesitated before slowly letting go of his hands. The powerful energy field could no longer be felt all of a sudden.

    He then turned to re at them, both his palms still crackling from the contact and emanating colorful light. It was as if his body stored a boundless force of nature that was trying to force its way out of him. He didn¡¯t know whether Nestor was lying or not, so he made sure to not take his hands two far apart, leaving only a fist¡¯s distance in between.

    The pain he felt suddenly vanished. Feeling the crackling between his palms, he took a deep breath and shot a hostile look to the handsome youth bearing the Quintessence of Darkness. He looked to be really young, forlorn, but pleasant to the eyes. Han Shuo gave him a sweep with his consciousness and sensed an ancient power aside from the Quintessence of Darkness. It was as if he was an existence that had seen and experienced it all. He knew that the man was only young on the surface. There was no doubt that he had lived through aeons and had probably existed before Profound Continent did.

    The God of Darkness, Amon, returned the favor by looking Han Shuo up and down. After that, he nodded and said in a gentle voice, ¡°That was pretty decent. You now have the qualifications to talk to us... Well, that just now was just a lesson. You killed two of my city lords in my dominion, after all.¡±

    ¡°I fought to test if you were qualified to talk to us,¡± said the burly man with the Quintessence of Destruction. All three of them had the same ancient aura about them. Han Shou knew that their appearances were far from representative of their actual age. His own age couldn¡¯t evenpare.

    Even then, Han Shuo still couldn¡¯t let his guard down. He carefully observed their expressions and behavior and eventually noticed that they didn¡¯t contain the slightest hint of deceit. He felt that they really didn¡¯t ask him toe with the intention of wiping him out. Putting aside the role he would y in the opening of Aethernia, there was little he could really do about it if Nestor was serious about dealing with him.

    After this encounter, he knew that he was still not a match for the Quintessence Overgods until he could fuse all thirteen energies together. Perhaps he would only stand a chance if he could fuse the thirteen energies together or after his main body breaks through to the Diablo Realm, which would cause the demonic yuan he had to transform. He firmly believed that nobody would be able to match up to him if that day ever came.

    Han Shuo rxed himself after much pondering and pulled his two hands apart. Nestor smiled when he saw that Han Shuo truly believed them.

    ¡°I didn¡¯t think that you¡¯d really take that small matter to heart,¡± Han Shuo said with a rxed smile after he turned to Amon. Though he said that, he himself definitely wouldn¡¯t forgive such an act.

    Amon seemed a little surprised at how quickly Han Shuo had put the matter behind them and secretly approved of it. Though, his voice didn¡¯t sound the least bit different from before. ¡°Wace and Hofs have served me as city lords for a long time. Even if they weren¡¯t exemry in that regard, they still get credit for the sheer time they served me for. I can¡¯t just let their deaths go by unanswered. But from now on, I shall drop the matter for good. Let us begin our talk.¡±

    ¡°What are we here to discuss?¡± Han Shuo said, feeling his agitation bubbling up. He had traveled really far just to get some answers, and that was finally going to happen.

    Amon turned to Nestor and said, ¡°We shall talk about the battle of the gods and Aethernia.¡±

 Chapter 1002 - Sea of Faith

    <h4>GDK 1002: Sea of Faith</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    The battle of the gods and Aethernia were things that had upied Han Shuo¡¯s thoughts for the past few years. Both the Goddess of Destiny and God of Light were really cryptic about the whole thing when they revealed that Han Shuo¡¯s involvement might be necessary in those affairs. Not to mention, they also mentioned that the Fringe and the Twelve Divine Dominions were heavily intertwined with it. The two of them hadn¡¯t revealed too much about the matter to him back then, and even though Han Shuo had tried to seek out that information himself, his efforts were in vain.

    Currently, the battle of the gods had begun, with the Dominions of Life, Light, Water, Darkness, Destruction and Death already participating, sending cascading effects across Elysium. ording to Nestor, no dominion would be able to avoid the uing battle, even the weakest of them all, the Fringe.

    Yet, Han Shuo still had no idea what the whole affair was about despite that, so it was a fatal weakness for him. He had traveled far and risked himself much toe to the Dominion of Darkness so that he could finally get answers once and for all.

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo said, ¡°I still have no idea about the battle of the gods and Aethernia, so pray tell.¡±

    Amon looked at Nestor and the God of Destruction, who nodded, before he said, ¡°Let¡¯s talk inside.¡±

    Amon reentered the darkness from which they had emerged while the other two followed suit without hesitation. Han Shuo could now vaguely see a huge shrine in the clouds within the boundless darkness. It was so grand that it was ten times Pandemonium¡¯s size, seeming like it was stacked up from a few mountains. Han Shuo couldn¡¯t help but respect the sight¡¯s marvel. Seeing the three head towards the grand shrine, he also followed behind.

    Just as he was calming down, he felt that the shrine was a terrifying vortex filled with dark element with a density hundred times more than normal. A kind of weak, but mysterious force flowed towards it from all directions, slowly seeping into it. He tried to feel it out and noticed that it was the power of faith for the God of Darkness. It came in an endless stream of trillions of tiny strands.

    He turned to Amon and noticed that right after he entered the Shrine of Darkness, the power of faith began to gather towards him. When he squinted, he was surprised to find that the strands suddenly turned into colorful lights. The Shrine of Darkness almost resembled a huge beast with its mouth open, swallowing up all the power of faithing from the God of Darkness¡¯s believers.

    Some lines were thick as arms while others were thousands of times finer than hair. When he tried to sense them, he found that the thick ones had the aura of highgods while the really fine ones had auras so weak he could barely feel them. Soon, he came to the conclusion that the stronger the aura, the more powerful the source of the faith. The finest ones probably came from normal folk without cultivation.

    He noticed that the three of them were waiting for him at the center of the Shrine of Darkness ¨C a space filled with stars that looked like a portal to a whole different realm. The strands of faith were really concentrated there and slowly flowed like a wide ocean. Most of the power of faith streaming from every part of the universe was pouring into that strange region while the rest flowed into Amon.

    When Nestor saw him enter, he pointed at the starry space and said, ¡°This is the sea of faith where the Quintessence is submerged.¡±

    Han Shuo snapped alert when the discussion was finally beginning. ¡°Sea of faith? Submerging Quintessence? Does it need to be nourished by it?¡±

    ¡°If we want to use the power of Quintessence, we need to constantly refill its power by submerging it in the sea of faith at set intervals to cleanse all the impurities that form on it. Only by doing so can we continue to use its power,¡± Amon exined.

    Han Shuo hadn¡¯t been aware that Quintessences had to be cared for so deeply. He had thought that once an overgod received it, they would be able to use its power indiscriminately. When he was on the Profound Continent, he noticed that many lesser nes had lots of shrines that proselytized their faith to gain more followers for the power of faith to fuel their respective gods.

    Han Shuo had initially thought that to be a method used to bolster the power of the Domain of Divinity. It seemed it also had an important role to y for Quintessence Overgods too. If they had to constantly refill the power of their Quintessence, it was no wonder they would scramble to build shrines and gain followers even on the lesser nes.

    ¡°What happens if a Quintessence isn¡¯t refilled or regrly cleansed by the sea of faith?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    ¡°Then, the bearer of the Quintessence will die! More specifically, the Quintessence will make our divine souls perish before seeking out a different bearer and fusing with them,¡± Amon exined with a heavy look.

    ¡°In other words, if you no longer have believers in any world and use up your power of faith, you will be abandoned by the Quintessence for another recement?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right.¡± Amon hesitated, but he continued his exnation. ¡°Quintessence Shards are unique items in that regard. Once a Quintessence abandons us, it will seek out another suitable god that has fused with a Quintessence Shard and absorb the shard to convert it into power of faith. Quintessence Shards are essentially crystallized forms of faith.

    ¡°As long as the new bearer of the Quintessence manages to obtain believers before their power of faith runs out, it will be fine. The Quintessence will be able to sustain itself with the iing stream of faith.¡±

    ¡°Can overgods without shards also obtain the Quintessence after your souls are smothered out by it?¡±

    ¡°Of course!¡± the God of Destruction, Cratos, answered. ¡°But that only applies if nobody else has shards. The moment they fuse with the Quintessence, they will have to immediately garner the power of faith to feed it or end up just like the previous bearer. Usually, that hardly happens. We will not allow a demi-overgod cultivating the same energy as we do to garner the critical number of believers... That is also the reason why Nestor didn¡¯t care about powerful demi-overgods like Logue or Dagmar, but worried a great deal about Han Hao.¡±

    Nestor didn¡¯t seem mad at Cratos for using him as an example. He nodded and said, ¡°To us, even lowgods with Quintessence Shards are a hundred times more threatening than faux-overgods without one.¡± Chuckling, he continued, ¡°Had Han Hao not formed a new Quintessence himself, I would¡¯ve killed him even if the Goddess of Destiny disapproves of it.¡±

    Han Shuo humphed at hearing past matters brought up. ¡°Seems like as long as the gods with Quintessence Shards can ruin your faith and steal some of your worship, they will eventually be able to rece you. I had thought that you were eternal existences.¡±

    ¡°There is no such thing as an eternal existence,¡± Cratos said with augh. ¡°Even that powerful being who brought you from another universe was exterminated by the Allmother. The Allmother herself, which most consider eternal, had also almost perished in her solitude in Aethernia.¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression immediately changed. All this time, he had only learned about Gu Tian Xie, the Exalted Demonlord, from the Cauldron of Myriad Demons. Even though he suspected the Twelve Overgods knew his true identity, he couldn¡¯t be sure of it until now. To think that he had tried toy low aftering to Elysium in fear of being discovered.

    ¡°Does that mean you weren¡¯t tolerating my presence in the Dominion of Darkness back then solely on the Goddess of Destiny¡¯s ount?¡±

    Amon¡¯s lips curved into a disdainful smile. ¡°On her ount? Hehe, she doesn¡¯t have nearly enough clout for that!¡±

    ¡°That means I don¡¯t owe the Goddess of Destiny any favors then,¡± Han Shuo said with a chuckle.

 Chapter 1003 - Her?

    <h4>Chapter 1003: Her?</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    ¡°Why are you telling me about the rtionship between the sea of faith and Quintessence? And what does the battle of the gods have to do with Aethernia opening?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    ¡°I only want you to know that we who stand at the apex of Elysium are not irreceable, and that we are bound by the Quintessence,¡± Amon said.

    ¡°Just like how we obtain faith from our believers, someone else also draws worship from us. A huge part of the faith we receive is channeled by the Quintessence to the Allmother!¡± Nestor said with a serious look. ¡°Put a little harshly, we Overgods are merely the ves of the Allmother. Through us, she monopolizes the faith of all life and the moment we are no longer able to generate sufficient faith for her, we will be reced.¡±

    After he said that, Amon and Cratos grimaced. Han Shuo widened his eyes in realization. It seemed that being an Quintessence Overgod wasn¡¯t that amazing of a deal after all. The Allmother that created the world had a tight leash on them and used them to harvest the power of faith for herself. While the Twelve Quintessence Overgods seemed impressive and powerful, that was merely a tangential benefit. Even though they stood supreme to most others and could use the power of Quintessence, they were shackled by an obligation they didn¡¯t ask for.

    ¡°Why would you dare discuss this with me?¡± Han Shuo asked after some thought, ¡°You make it sound like you won¡¯t be able to escape the grasp of the Allmother no matter what. What happens if she finds out about it?¡±

    Cratos smiled and took a deep breath. ¡°The situation has changed. Many years ago, a really powerful being came here through a crack between two universes. We Overgods and the Allmother both felt the terrifying might of that person. You should know who I¡¯m talking about.¡±

    Han Shuo knew that they were talking about the Gu Tian Xie, the Exalted Demonlord. As Han Shuo¡¯s power grew, he came to understand how truly powerful that person actually was. Even he could be sure he wouldn¡¯t have to fear Quintessence Overgods once his ascension at the Diablo Realm isplete, so the Exalted Demonlord, who was a realm higher, was surely almost unmatched in this universe. Only the Allmother could conceivably harm him.

    ¡°I know who. Go on,¡± Han Shuo said and waved for him to continue.

    ¡°He had torn through the barricades between the two universes. Right after, the Allmother ordered us to join her and take out that person before he could recover. It would be hard for you to imagine, but that battle was so destructive that many lesser nes werepletely annihted entirely from it. The twelve of us only managed to force him back while the Allmother was the one who truly dealt the finishing blows.

    ¡°After so many years, I still remember how distressed I felt when I thought about that person. I didn¡¯t think anyone but the Allmother could possibly be so powerful to the point of being able to destroy an entire ne in one gesture. It¡¯s far too terrifying!¡± Cratos said with a forlorn sigh.

    It was the first time Han Shuo had heard someone else describe Gu Tian Xie¡¯s power. Being able to level an entire ne and making it sound so easy was no joke indeed. Back when he first received the memories containing the demonic arts, he was doubtful about whether it could actually reshape entirendscapes so easily, but now he knew that even that wasn¡¯t the full extent of the power.

    ¡°He was utterly exterminated,¡± Han Shuo said softly.

    Amon and the rest didn¡¯t think that Gu Tian Xie had lost because he was weak at all. They exchanged painful nces. Cratos continued, ¡°He didn¡¯t lose because he was weaker than the Allmother. It was probably due to the fact that he had spent too much energy tearing through the universes before the fight. Had he not done that, it would¡¯ve been hard to say who would¡¯ve won. Even then, the Allmother was injured heavily from the fight.¡±

    Amon¡¯s face grew cold when he added, ¡°At that moment, the Allmother caused our Quintessence to go out of control. Our soul and Quintessence flew towards her. During that time, we clearly felt the power of faith and divine energy we had gathered over aeons flood towards her rapidly as she recovered just as quickly.

    ¡°Had it not been for that person¡¯s divine artifact unleashing onest strike before leaving, the twelve of us would¡¯ve lost our souls and Quintessence. We would¡¯vepletely perished for the sake of her revival. It was then when we suddenly realized that she had a leash on all of us all this time. We can be ughtered by her at any moment!¡±

    ¡°Thanks to that person, we finally got to know where we truly stood!¡± Cratos said. ¡°The final strike that person unleashed injured the Allmother even more while we, initially loyal to her, began to hesitate.

    Amon said, ¡°She knew better than anyone that we were already looking to betray her, so she used thest of her power to enter Aethernia. Before sealing its entrance, she said that not even all the energy in this universebined will be able to force Aethernia open. She also said that she would recover everything she had given us when she reawakens. Naturally, she wasn¡¯t just talking about the Quintessence, but also our lives.

    ¡°She was absolutely certain that the otherworldly being wouldn¡¯t survive even after his escape due to the lingering energies in his body,¡± Cratos said. ¡°And that was in fact true. That person ended up falling in the end. What she didn¡¯t predict, however, was how he used onest resort before perishing to drag your soul here from another universe! We learned about you from the Goddess of Destiny after the fact. We were only able to ascertain you cultivate that person¡¯s energy after you came to Elysium. As the Quintessence had fused into our souls, we are unable to cultivate any other energy than our own, so we ce our hopes in you. We want you to open Aethernia once more!¡±

    This was rather shocking for Han Shuo to hear. He had only just learned about what truly happened back then and why Gu Tian Xie had a grudge against the Allmother. The Allmother had been recovering in her private retreat the whole time and woulde out from Aethernia once she felt her power had recovered enough. Then, she would go on to take care of the Twelve Overgods, who surely weren¡¯t able to sleep well at night knowing that fate would eventually catch up to them.

    ¡°So you¡¯re saying that we should break into Aethernia and kill her together before she recovers?¡± Han Shuo said after some thought.

    Cratos nodded without any intention to hide it. ¡°That¡¯s right. We don¡¯t have a choice. Once she recovers to some extent, she¡¯ll reim our Quintessence along with our souls. We have been her puppets for untold aeons and gave most of the power of faith we received to her, yet she still wants to kill us. There¡¯s no way we would go down without a fight.¡±

    ¡°Had that person not shown up, we wouldn¡¯t be able to do anything to her even if we found out that she had been raising us like pigs to be ughtered. Her power far exceeds ours and even the twelve of us working together won¡¯t be able to harm her. Fortunately, that person has left us with one final hope, and her heavy injuries allowed us to take some initiative for ourselves,¡± Amon said.

    Han Shuo looked closely at the three of them and said, ¡°It sounds like you don¡¯t just want to kill her. Is there something that you desire within Aethernia?¡±

    Amon, Cratos, and Nestor¡¯s eyes glowed but they didn¡¯t answer, but that was enough for Han Shuo to confirm the existence of such a thing. The fact that Quintessence Overgods like them showed emotion unintentionally upon mention of that thing meant that it was so impressive that it even shook their mind state for a second.

    Since they didn¡¯t seem like they intended to reveal that, Han Shuo didn¡¯t press them on it. That matter was still a little far off and he could just ask them about it before they actually departed for Aethernia.

    ¡°Even after knowing a bit more about Aethernia, I still don¡¯t know why you all held the battle of the gods so soon,¡± Han Shuo said.

    ¡°We feel that the Quintessence has been demanding more and more faithtely and is growing out of control. Even though we are unable to feel her presence, it seems like her control of our Quintessence has only increased with time. There¡¯s not much we can do about it even if we try, so that can only mean the Allmother might emerge from Aethernia soon,¡± Amon said with a grim look. ¡°The battle of the gods is also a key to open Aethernia, so if she¡¯s going to emerge, we have to rush to hold it to get the edge on her.¡±

    Han Shuo felt a little pity for them. They feared the Allmother far too much. He was also a little shocked to hear about her eventual re-emergence. As he posed a huge threat to her, it might be the case that he was the first one she would deal with instead of the Twelve Quintessence Overgods.

 Chapter 1004 - Cooperation

    <h4>GDK 1004: Cooperation</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    ¡°As for why we absolutely have to start the battle of the gods, it¡¯s that she¡¯s still able to exert influence on our Quintessence even though she secluded herself within Aethernia. We can feel the tug Aethernia has on our souls and the Quintessence,¡± Amon exined, ¡°It has been about fifty thousand years since she went into seclusion. We don¡¯t know if the tug started growing because she has recovered some of her power.

    ¡°Thanks to the influence of the tug, our Quintessence slowly stray out of our control as if it wants to leave us and head to Aethernia. The Goddess of Destiny has also realized that by nourishing her Mirror of Destiny with a certain number of divine souls, she will be able to influence the pulling from Aethernia.¡±

    Han Shuo said, ¡°So divine souls are necessary to stop it... Then the battle of the gods was intentionally waged by you all to sacrifice as many gods as you can so that enough divine souls can fill the Mirror of Destiny to help you resist the pull.¡±

    ¡°Bingo!¡± Amon admitted, ¡°Naturally, we will take the battle of the gods seriously. It will be even better if we can sacrifice each other¡¯s men than our own to nourish the Mirror of Destiny.¡±

    ¡°Wait, so does that mean that every time the Goddess of Destinyes to mediate, the Mirror of Destiny has been nourished enough?¡±

    Amon nodded once more. Han Shuo took a deep breath in shock. He had never expected the battle of the gods to contain such secrets. It was no wonder it couldn¡¯t be avoided. All of a sudden, he suddenly recalled the memories of Hegemon Kaiser. ¡°Since you want to preserve as many of your own as you can, why do you let the godhunters roam free? I also heard that if the gods of a certain energy grow too much in number, the Quintessence would be affected as well.¡±

    Amon seemed a little surprised. ¡°How do you even know that? That is indeed the case, but it¡¯s different from what you imagine. Apart from needing the power of faith and cleansing from the sea of faith, Quintessence also require gods that cultivate the same energy as them to die. That is how they are primarily sustained.¡±

    It all clicked into ce. Quintessence did indeed sound really mystical. They basically consider gods that use the same energy they do as food. While they need to be constantly nourished, they couldn¡¯t consume too much at once either. Now, Han Shuo finally knew everything about the battle of the gods, Gu Tian Xie and the Allmother. Yet, he still had no idea why Amon, Cratos and Nestor had asked to talk to him.

    ¡°Alright, so can we finally talk about why you asked me toe here?¡± Han Shuo said after he quelled his excitement and curiosity. However, the three of them quieted down for some reason in contrast to their previous patient exnations. ¡°Oh? Is there anything inappropriate about that?¡±

    ¡°That isn¡¯t really the case,¡± Nestor said before he turned to Amon and Cratos and asked, ¡°Do you two think that he is worthy to stand on our side?¡±

    Amon and Cratos gave Han Shuo a close look down once more, hesitated, before they nodded.

    ¡°Very well,¡± Nestor said, ¡°We hope that you will work with us and keep our losses in the battle of the gods to a minimum. Additionally, we hope you will fight together with us at Aethernia.¡±

    ¡°What¡¯s in it for me?¡± Han Shuo asked after a pause.

    ¡°Originally, you would¡¯ve outlived your usefulness after Aethernia opened. We were nning to deal with you after since your terrifying potential means you¡¯ll be a threat to us in the future,¡± Nestor said solemnly, ¡°But if you agree to fight by our side, we will agree to do our best to ensure your survival. As for what happens after, we will make our decision until after Aethernia is dealt with.¡±

    Han Shuo had known as much. It wouldn¡¯t be surprising if the Twelve Overgods turn on him once Aethernia was unsealed. The Exalted Demonlord Gu Tian Xie had terrified them too much. Even after he was eliminated by them and the Allmother, he managed to leave a legacy in the form of Han Shuo. It only made sense that they¡¯d try to kill him too.

    ¡°In other words, you¡¯re saying that you¡¯ll help protect me from being killed by the others once Aethernia opens? And after Aethernia, we will go our separate ways?¡± Han Shuo carefully asked.

    ¡°That¡¯s right.¡±

    ¡°What in the world is inside Aethernia anyway?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    The three¡¯s expressions changed. Nestor whispered, ¡°It¡¯s something that can make a new Creator, if the Goddess of Destiny¡¯s guess is to be believed. Regardless, we will definitely strive to fight for it.¡±

    So it turned out that they weren¡¯t only rebelling for their lives. That was their true goal after all. He seriously considered their offer and said, ¡°Where does the Goddess of Destiny stand on killing me after Aethernia opens?¡±

    Cratos made an odd smile. ¡°Hahaha... She was the one who suggested it!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart sank as his expression grimmed. After a while, he nodded and said, ¡°Alright, I will work with you.¡± He didn¡¯t expect that she would be the one to suggest it. Based on his observations on the auras and expressions of the three, they were telling the truth.

    ¡°Haha, you really agreed so easily?¡± Cratos said.

    ¡°If I can¡¯t even take on Amon alone, I won¡¯t have a chance against all twelve of you,¡± he said with a shrug. He knew that no matter who obtained that item that would make them the new supreme god, their first target would be him anyway. But if he could avoid being killed right after Aethernia¡¯s opening and manage to enter it, he might yet stand a chance.

    ¡°Alright. Let¡¯s discuss the details then,¡± Amon said. They proceeded to refine the agreement including the fact that the Fringe would be joining the battle of the gods and how they would deal with the others when Aethernia opened up.

    ......

    Meanwhile at the center of the Shrine of Destiny, the goddess stood in front of a starry mirror. She shot a white beam into its center, causing the stars within to explode and turn into nebs. The debris gathered and formed a new ne containing various energies. When some light from the depths of the universe touched the ne, life was born.

    The destruction and rebirth of a ne along with life and death could be seen through the mirror. All of a sudden, thin white lines began to connect the various lifeforms that could be seen through the mirror, allowing their souls to resonate.

    With tug on a string, she caused a foreign lifeform to emerge. His birth, growth, sickness and death could all be seen unraveling at a speed visible to the naked eye. Nothing could elude the Goddess of Destiny.

    As if she was handling fine artwork, she carefully tightened the thread around her fingers and gave it a tug, breaking it. The lifeform connected to the thread died suddenly before a white light exploded from the goddess¡¯s hands and enveloped all the threads. The threads had vanished, leaving behind a blurry scene within the mirror.

    It showed the Shrine of Darkness and Han Shuo, Cratos, Amon and Nestor discussing something. The four of them werepletely unaware of this scrying ability of hers. They were currently discussing the battle of the gods, opening Aethernia and how they would work together.

    Something shed across her eyes as she watched. All of a sudden, she wiped the scene in the mirror away.

 Chapter 1005 - Distance

    <h4>GDK 1005: Distance</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Deep underground within Pandemonium was the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester, at the center of which was a room to which all the energy the formation gathered was channeled. Han Shuo¡¯s main body sat in the room, covered in electric sparks.

    These past few years, he had left the Fringe and Pandemonium to the rest in the house to manage. As for more pressing matters, he dealt with it using his avatars, leaving his main body inside the mystical yin energy-filled room, slowly using it to reforge his body.

    His consciousness had been entirely focused on processing the insights of the Diablo Realm as well as some knowledge from the Cauldron of Myriad Demons. The mystical yin energy gathered by the harvester formation was indeed dense as the formation could draw from all the mystical yin energy from the whole of Elysium. They came in a huge nonstop torrent into the room at the center of the formation to fuel Han Shuo¡¯s bodily transformation.

    Suddenly, his consciousness trembled slightly as a bizarre and obscured energy wave moved past him. His body that had been in a hibernative state for years suddenly opened its eyes as if it was staring across space itself at the Dominion of Destiny. Han Shou had felt a weak energy wave from there just a while ago and it seemed to have something to do with him. His consciousness felt like it was being spied on.

    His eyes glowed with an eerie chill as he gathered the mystical yin energy in the room together. All of a sudden, his eyes closed suddenly and cut off the glow entirely. His consciousness began to furiously spread throughout the entire area from the room and it rapidly spanned mountains,kes, forests, cities, and the lifeforms that inhibited them. Han Shuo continued the outward expansion until he reached the entirety of the Fringe. Now, he was truly an omniscient god within the Fringe.

    Within a few short seconds, he had taken the whole of the Fringe into his consciousness, but the expansion continued on towards the Dominions of Space and Destiny. Even more sights entered his mind; he felt a mysticalfort at having everything under his control.

    All of a sudden, his consciousness¡¯s expansion stopped. He sensed that he was at the border of the Dominion of Destiny. One more step and he would reach inside. Instead, he chose to sense the waves that were being radiated from the Dominion of Destiny and eventually noticed one that avoided the Fringe as it spread towards the Dominions of Death and Destruction. He immediately retracted his consciousness, taking only a few short seconds to do so.

    Within the Shrine of Destiny, the Goddess of Destiny abruptly turned to look in the direction of the Fringe. It was as if she was looking at the journey of life and death unfold from her Mirror of Destiny. After a few moments, the glow in her eyes subsided as she breathed a sigh of relief. ¡°His vignce is terrifying. The power that isn¡¯t from this universe was actually able to sense the waves of destiny from my end. I really have no idea what he managed to find out...¡±

    Shaking her head, she looked towards the Fringe again, seemingly staring past the space between them and muttered, ¡°Andrina¡¯s still there. I hope she¡¯s doing well...¡±

    ......

    Within the Shrine of Darkness, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar¡¯s expression suddenly changed and he halted his speech. Nestor and the rest were rather surprised. He had been speaking just fine, so what made him shut up all of a sudden? Was there something that displeased him? Nestor asked, ¡°Is there a problem?¡±

    Without answering, Han Shuo suddenly stood up and looked outside to the starry sky. Taking a deep breath, he said with his back facing them, ¡°The Goddess of Destiny might have learned about our ns.¡±

    His words caused the three¡¯s expressions to shift as well.

    ¡°What do you mean?¡± Amon said as he slowly approached him. As he spoke, a ck-crystal-like Quintessence emerged from the back of his head and entered the sea of faith before it rapidly began absorbing faith, depleting the sea at a visible rate.

    ¡°You should be aware that this body isn¡¯t my main one. I¡¯m actually within a secret room in the Fringe now. As we were speaking, my main body felt an odd wave being emanated from the Dominion of Destiny. Though they were weak, they must¡¯vee from the Shrine of Destiny!¡± When he turned back and saw that they were paying attention, he emphasized, ¡°And the wave was being transmitted in our direction!¡±

    Nestor and Cratos immediately turned to look at the ck Quintessence in the sea of faith at the same time. Amon also red at his ck Quintessence and nodded. ¡°I felt it as well. It was faint, but it was definitely her!¡±

    Though Han Shuo didn¡¯t know what method Amon used to detect it, it matched his own observations of the situation.

    ¡°That sly vixen!¡± Cratos eximed, ¡°Did she really think she could control everything? So what if she knows? We can just ignore her!¡±

    Han Shuo gave Cratos an odd look, not understanding where that animus came from; it seemed that he had some personal misgivings against the goddess.

    Cratos didn¡¯t exin it, however. After a cold humph, he said, ¡°Let us continue! She doesn¡¯t matter!¡±

    Nestor and Amon furrowed their brows without saying anything. Since the three of them didn¡¯t stay too long on the matter, Han Shuo didn¡¯t press it either and continued their discussion.

    Three dayster, Han Shuo left Myrkvidr and returned to Hushveil City. He immediately went looking for Donna and found her to be waiting for his return.

    Her face beamed with joy when she saw him. ¡°You¡¯re back!¡±

    He stepped forwards to take her hand and sat down. ¡°So? Did your father agree to let you leave with me?¡±

    ¡°Yes. Ever since he found out that you were invited here by the Gods of Death, Destruction, and Darkness, he no longer holds anything against you. I told him I would be going to the Fringe with you and he didn¡¯t even hold me back. All he did was ask me to maintain a low profile and stay out of trouble, but don¡¯t let myself get bullied either.¡±

    ¡°What do you mean? How would you get bullied there?¡± He pulled her along and said, ¡°Since your father doesn¡¯t have anything else to say, let¡¯s go.¡±

    ¡°Did you really talk to those three?¡± she asked when she suddenly recalled his meeting with the three Quintessence Overgods. She felt a little bad for not being able to help him out with anything.

    Back when Han Shuo just came to Elysium from the Profound Continent, Donna was still powerful enough to aid him, but now he was someone even she had to look up to. It was as if they were now separated by a huge distance and she didn¡¯t know what she could do about it. Apart from that, she was worried that Phoebe, Emily, Fanny and the rest would hold it against her for the old grudges between the House of Han and her family. Though she had wished to be with him at the Fringe for quite some time, she felt nervous now that she could finally do so.

    ¡°We¡¯re not going straight to the Fringe. There¡¯s somewhere else I want to visit,¡± Han Shuo said once they left Hushveil City.

    ¡°Where would that be?¡± she asked, surprised.

    ¡°The Dominion of Wind.¡±

    ......

    The winds were so strong at Windhowl Valley within the Dominion of Wind to the point that it was able to lift a giant boulder. The flying sand and debris in the valley made traversing thendscape a very daunting prospect. Windhowl Valley was the main base of operations of the godhunters in the Dominion of the Wind which few people knew about. Ever since Miller left without returning, the godhunters there split into a few factions. Without a dominating force like Miller, they all vied to rule over the others.

    ¡°Apparently, the Hegemon died in the Fringe. Nowadays, a fellow called Han Hao is gathering the godhunters into his own force and has taken over the godhunters in the Dominions of Earth, Water and Fire. He¡¯s said to be here already!¡± said one of the godhunters in the valley.

    ¡°Hmph, the Godhunter Alliance¡¯s rule is that no Hegemon shall be allowed to interfere in another¡¯s territory. Since Han Hao took over as the Hegemon of the Dominion of Death, how dare he stick his nose into the business of other dominions? If he really dares toe to fight for the position of Hegemon, I, Naga, won¡¯t let him off scot-free!¡± said anky middle-aged man with a wrinkled up face.

    ¡°Han Hao¡¯s quite powerful, you know. Even the godhunters of the other three dominions weren¡¯t his match and anyone that resisted was killed. We probably won¡¯t be able to do anything about it either!¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s gather all our forces at Windhowl Valley and put down our differences for now until we get rid of this outsider. The Dominion of the Wind needs a Hegemon and that can only be chosen from those of us that cultivate the power of the wind. That outsider shall never triumph over us!¡± Naga said.

    The others nodded with agreement.

 Chapter 1006 - The Power Between Life and Death

    GDK 1006: The Power Between Life and Death

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    A figure descended into Windhowl Valley and unleashed his sinister aura, shocking the godhunters of the Dominion of the Wind. The next moment, a rustling sound could be heard as more and more figures swarmed into the valley. Amidst the blowing sand and dust emerged Han Hao. He scanned the group and said, ¡°Are you the leaders of the godhunters in the Dominion of Wind?¡±

    His gigantic bone throne floated in the air, allowing him to emanate a terrifying power. All of a sudden, the whole valley seemed to be subject to a mystical force that somehow stopped the winds within from blowing.

    The godhunter leaders had just been talking about him. Taking a deep breath, Naga asked, ¡°Are you Han Hao?¡±

    Han Hao nodded slightly. ¡°You said you wouldn¡¯t let me off scot-free if I came here, did you?¡±

    Naga felt a chill down his spine and didn¡¯t dare to meet Han Hao¡¯s terrifying gaze. However, he stubbornly said, ¡°The Hegemon of Wind can only be chosen from among us cultivators of the wind energy! Outsiders shan¡¯t be allowed to interfere!¡± Even as he said so, he didn¡¯t feel confident about being able to deal with the terrifying energying from Han Hao.

    Furrowing his brow, Han Hao suddenly struck from his bone throne, sending a bone spike descending from the sky towards Naga, who wasn¡¯t able to resist at all and had his life force sucked out entirely by the bone spike.

    The most arrogant Naga had been killed in an instant. The bone spike returned to the throne and disappeared among the many other spikes on it. The other godhunters that had wanted to work together to deal with Han Hao and his godhunters were all dumbstruck and didn¡¯t know what they should do.

    ¡°I didn¡¯te here nning to be your Hegemon,¡± Han Hao said, ¡°But I will appoint one for you. From now on, the Hegemon of the Dominion of the Wind has to do my bidding!¡±

    He casually pointed at someone and said, ¡°You shall be the new Hegemon. Your first task is to reassemble every godhunters in the Dominion. Are there any questions?¡±

    Everyone kept silent.

    ¡°Go ahead and do your work!¡± Han Hao said with annoyance.

    The godhunters there didn¡¯t dare to defy him. They silently watched as Han Hao left with his godhutners, feeling a chill down their spine.

    Han Hao turned to Polo and said, ¡°Watch them close, Polo.¡±

    ¡°I will. I¡¯ll make sure they work obediently,¡± Polo said with a bow before leaving.

    Within a short half month, Han Hao managed to unite the godhunters in the whole Dominion of Wind under his banner. The whole time, he only had to rely on his subordinates for everything without needing to lift a finger. Anyone that didn¡¯t abide by his orders would be wiped out by Polo.

    He spent most of his time in a cave within Windhowl Valley toprehend the power of his Quintessence. Just as he was about to head towards his next destination, Han Shuo and Donna easily found him and came to him.

    ¡°Father, why did youe?¡± He seemed really happy to see Han Shuo.

    ¡°How¡¯sprehending the Quintessence going?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    ¡°I¡¯ve been spending the past few years using it, but I¡¯m still not that familiar with it. I am definitely not as proficient as Nestor and the others when ites to it.¡±

    ¡°I¡¯vee here to talk to you about the Quintessence. Before I came, I met Nestor, Cratos and Amon at the Dominion of Darkness and learned something out about it.¡±

    After briefing Han Hao on the conversation, he said, ¡°I¡¯m worried that your Quintessence will lose control once you use its energy up, so it¡¯s best you start gathering the power of faith now.¡±

    ording to Nestor and the rest, there were many other rituals that had to be conducted for the Quintessence, including cleansing it in the sea of faith. While Han Hao might not need it back when it was just a shard, his Quintessence would annihte his soul and seek a new master once it ran out of faith to draw from.

    Han Shuo had immediately set out after hearing about it so that he could exin it to Han Hao. Even though Han Hao wasn¡¯t at the Fringe, he would send Han Shuo a message from time to time about his whereabouts. Even so, Han Shuo chose to contact him in person to make sure his words wouldn¡¯t be intercepted by anybody else.

    ¡°Father, I don¡¯t really think that applies to my situation,¡± Han Hao said after a long pause of thought.

    ¡°Doesn¡¯t apply? How so?¡±

    ¡°My Quintessence is formed from the death Quintessence Shard and my own demonic arts. Now that the shard is gone, I still don¡¯t feel any need for power of faith. Not only that, the Quintessence is still infusing energy into my body and soul. I feel like I¡¯m growing stronger and stronger as time passes.¡±

    ¡°What?¡± Han Shuo gave Han Hao a good look. After a good moment, he said, ¡°Then I really have no idea what¡¯s going on. This is weird. Don¡¯t tell me that your Quintessence is different from the others¡¯ and doesn¡¯t require faith?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯m not sure myself. I don¡¯t feel any pull or obligation from it. Instead, it seems to be helping to strengthen me even further. Even if I encountered Nestor now, he wouldn¡¯t be able to kill me even if I can¡¯t defeat him yet.¡±

    Han Shuo was still a little at loss after hearing it, but he knew Han Hao wouldn¡¯t lie to him. Han Hao was confident enough to face off against Nestor now and survive, yet Han Shuo couldn¡¯t even deal with Amon. Was Han Hao stronger than him now?

    ¡°Show me how powerful you are,¡± he finally said with a smile. Turning to Donna, he gently said, ¡°Go take a rest over there. You might get caught up here.¡±

    She nodded and gave them some space. From that conversation alone, she knew that the father-and-son were now far from average in Elysium and their powers were on the level of the Twelve Overgods. She was aware that even the smallest shockwaves from a battle between two Quintessence Overgods could easily shatter her body and annihte her soul.

    After she left, the two sealed off the cave. Han Hao then struck with exceeding care, infusing his bone spear with negative energies like violence, despair, death and endless hate. A slight wave of the spear seemed to cause space itself to sparkle and tear.

    Han Shou could feel the powering from the spear and closed his eyes. After a long time, he nodded and said, ¡°Your energy is really unique. It¡¯s a fusion with your understanding of the edict of death as a base coupled with your insight into the soul from demonic arts. You are able to use the negative energies unleashed at the instant life is extinguished to explosive effect.¡±

    Han Hao had alwayscked a fundamental understanding of his own energy. ¡°Father,, do you mean that this power stems from thest burst of a life on itsst embers? The power between life and death?¡±

    Nodding, Han Shuo opened his eyes. ¡°It is an energy without an element. Before all life vanishes, they will leave some remnants of energy in the surrounding environment. For those who died from old age or sickness, the deaths are usually peaceful because they can see their fatesing and won¡¯t generate much energy like that. However, your energyes from the people who died under exceptional circumstances. All the hate, despair, violence, killing intent and savagery and perhaps even evil itself is the essence of your true power. You were really lucky to use those energies to form a Quintessence.¡±

    After some hesitation, he continued, ¡°Only you would¡¯ve been able to perform such a feat. Perhaps it was thanks to your unique lifeform that you could incorporate all that negative energy into your soul. Had it been any other god, their soul would have crumbled long ago.¡±

    ¡°Father, what should I do?¡± Han Hao asked. He seemed a little stunned.

    ¡°I¡¯m not sure. I have a feeling that your Quintessence formed almost too easily.¡± ording to Nestor and the rest, the Allmother only left twelve types of Quintessence behind, yet Han Hao had formed his own. Even Nestor and the rest had never seen something like that ur in their aeons of life. He wondered if it had something to do with demonic arts.

 Chapter 1007 - He Asked to See Me

    <h4>GDK 1007: He Asked to See Me</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Editor: Emily

    Han Shuo and Donna didn¡¯t stay in Windhowl Valley for too long. After having a talk with Han Hao and realizing how different his Quintessence was from the Twelve Great Overgods¡¯, he was no longer worried and let Han Hao explore its power as much as he wanted.

    He and Donna didn¡¯t return to the Fringe immediately. Instead, they took their time and traveled leisurely ording to her whim. Apart from not being able to fully blend the energies together, he didn¡¯t have much else to worry about. As long as he couldn¡¯t find a way to unite the thirteen energies, there was no progress to be made. Since his main body was making rapid progress in the Fringe, he didn¡¯t mind spending time with Donna using his avatar.

    While they couldn¡¯t get too intimate thanks to his avatar¡¯s unique constitution, Donna felt rather fortunate for the chance to be by his side at all. Being able to take casual walks with his hand in hers was a blessing denied to her for far too long already.

    In the many years Han Shuo had spent in Elysium, he had only visited the Dominions of Darkness, Death and Space apart from the Fringe. As for the rest of the dominions, he had never so much as set foot there. While he did get information briefs about them, he had never truly experienced anything there.

    Now, he had ample time and the battle of the gods not being as devastating as previously imagined, involving only the Dominions of Death, Destruction, Life, Light and Water. The remaining half hadn¡¯t started to fight yet, and those that did hadn¡¯t gone all out yet.

    It was still hard to say when the battle would end and when Aethernia would open. Not to mention, even if it did end early, it would be impossible for Han Shuo to open the doors of Aethernia so long as his main body hadn¡¯t reached the Diablo Realm yet.

    With his newfound free time, he decided he would travel through all twelve of the dominions with Donna. Meanwhile, his main body continued to use the power generated by the formation to metamorphose into a new form.

    Within the silent courtyard of the Pandemonium, Rose sat quietly on a stone bench, letting her long, silver hair hang from her head like a waterfall. She quietly observed the various nts and decorations in the courtyard. All of a sudden, someone entered the courtyard, destroying the serenity that had been there before.

    Rose turned and saw Romon rush towards her. Looking at his unique metallic body, she furrowed her brow. ¡°Romon, why did youe? Your body seems to have changed somehow.¡±

    He chuckled and said, ¡°When I went to visit Han Jin, Andrina was there as well. I wanted to ask them about it, but I didn¡¯t think they would beat me up for no reason. Then again, my body felt incredible after the fight. It¡¯s as if I¡¯ve entered a new realm! I want them to hit me every day!¡±

    Rose was taken aback until she recalled that Han Jin and Andrina used unique energies that Romon could somehow benefit from. ¡°Your realm is a little odd. Do you know what stage of power you are currently at?¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t really know the separate stages of my cultivation, but, hehe, I did try to test it out ¨C by pulling a jumpscare on Ss. He didn¡¯t know that it was me and went pretty hard on me. After taking his lightning strike, I noticed that I wasn¡¯t really that badly hurt. In fact, Ipletely recovered after a few days,¡± he gleefully said.

    Tossing her hair, Rose replied, ¡°Ss is an overgod! If his full-power strike couldn¡¯t harm you, you must be really powerful now!¡±

    ¡°Hahaha! You think that was impressive? After that, I fought him again and his lightning wasn¡¯t that effective against me either. They only made my soul a little numb. Even he was dumbfounded by it. I really don¡¯t know how Bryan was able to tweak my body to make this happen.¡±

    After some hesitation, Romon gratefully said, ¡°Thank goodness you asked Lord Bryan to seek me out back then. Otherwise, I would still be miring in that swamp, not reaching where I am now even after a thousand years.¡±

    Upon hearing mention of Han Shuo, Rose seemed a little downcast. ¡°Even I haven¡¯t seen him for years ever since he went underground. Even though I¡¯m ate-stage highgod now, he is no doubt far more powerful than me now than he used to be.¡±

    She sounded a little sour about it. Back when he first came to Demon Mountain, he couldn¡¯t resist her at all and had to flee. Ten yearster, he finally managed to defeat her and made her his servant. And now, he was on the level of the Quintessence Overgods. They were drawing further and further apart.

    Back when they were in the Dominion of Darkness, she often spent time with Rose, as she was the only highgod around him. Thinking back to the time when they stormed Hushveil City and made hell for Hofs, as well as their journey to the Fringe, she felt rather nostalgic.

    Nowadays, Han Shuo had long wiped out Rose¡¯s enemies and even managed to rule over the chaotic Fringe. His bold promises to her back then were now a reality. But when she recalled how distant they were from each other now, she would regret evering to the Fringe with him. Perhaps the rift between them wouldn¡¯t be so wide if he wasn¡¯t so powerful. She couldn¡¯t help finding herself looking at the ground, wondering what he was up to down there.

    ¡°Rose,e here,¡± said a voice in the depths of her mind. Shocked, she recognized that it was Han Shuo and didn¡¯t know what to do.

    ¡°What¡¯s wrong?¡± Romon asked when he saw her nk out.

    ¡°He asked to see me! He just did!¡± She couldn¡¯t contain her feelings as she rushed towards the path leading to the underground, leaving Romon standing there stunned and confused.

 Chapter 1008 - Summons

    <h4>GDK 1008: Summons</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    To say that Rose was excited would be a severe understatement. Completely unaware of how different she was acting, she ran off, leaving Romon to stare at her dumbfoundedly. After a good while, something urred to him as he looked towards the way underground. ¡°I guess he¡¯s the only one in the Pandemonium who¡¯s able to send direct messages with his soul...¡±

    He was hardly new in the Pandemonium and more or less knew how powerful Han Shuo was. Ever since Han Shuo had killed Gy¨¢l more than a decade ago, everyone in the Pandemonium knew his true strength. Throughout the years, Romon had seen the Five Elite Zombies seemingly telepathicallymunicating, so he wasn¡¯t too surprised at seeing Rose talking to herself all of a sudden before she ran off.

    All of a sudden, he heard something in his mind too. ¡°You shoulde with us to the centre of the underground pce.¡± Startled, he looked around for a while before he understood what was happening.

    ¡°Ummm... Do you need me for something?¡± he asked after fumbling a little to learn how to respond telepathically.

    ¡°We have to talk about the battle of the gods.¡±

    Romon didn¡¯t ask much else and followed in her tracks, wondering how Han Shuo could speak to him through his mind like that, transmitting messages directly to his soul.

    Then it suddenly urred to him ¨C had it been a hostile attack instead of a benign message to the center of his soul, wouldn¡¯t that mean an instant death? Would he even have time to react? Those thoughts made him grow a little fearful. He suddenly understood that Han Shuo could kill him even without directly attacking. Anybody within the range of his senses wouldn¡¯t be able to escape either unless they had some way to defend against his formless soul attack.

    Romon felt that most people in the Pandemonium wouldn¡¯t be able to pull off something like that, let alone himself. Han Shuo¡¯s recent progress towards the Diablo Realm had given him even more mystical powers, such as being able to invade the mind of anyone in the Fringe and delivering a fatal blow to the soul of any lifeform remotely. Anyone that he could sense wouldn¡¯t be able to avoid his attack, so he could easily end the life of anyone there that he pleased without even lifting a finger.

    Rose¡¯s excitement dampened significantly when she saw Sanguis, the Five Elite Zombies, Phoebe, and Emily there. She had thought he was asking her to spend time alone with him, but it was clear that wouldn¡¯t be the case. Soon, even more important people in the Pandemonium joined them, including Stratholme, Ayermike and other core members of the House of Han. All of them were making rapid progress in their cultivation these days.

    For the past few years, they had been training hard in the Pandemonium, which had tens of times more elemental energypared to most other ces. With the aid of the arcane orbs Han Shuo had provided them as well as incredible growth-aiding potions, even the lowliest ofmoners could experience rapid growth, let alone the elite members of the House of Han.

    They began to wonder why they had been called to assemble without much of an exnation from Han Shuo as they caught up with each other on recent events, having been cultivating on their own for quite some time. Though, they had a feeling Han Shuo definitely had something important to announce. As their anticipation simmered to a peak, the space in the wide hall seemed to bend for a moment before Han Shuo appeared in a sh of light.

    He smiled and cleared his throat to beckon for silence. Everyone immediately quieted down and stared at him nkly for a moment before they went to greet him. Sanguis, the Five Elite Zombies, Phoebe and Emily evenined that they hadn¡¯t seen him for far too long.

    Gesturing for them to quiet down, he smiled and said, ¡°Let¡¯s sit down and have a talk.¡±

    There were many stone chairs of varying sizes in the hall. Once everyone was seated, he began, ¡°I asked you all toe to tell you this: even though I said we won¡¯t be participating in the battle of the gods back then, I¡¯m afraid we won¡¯t have a choice in that matter. Since we can¡¯t prevent it, we must start preparing ourselves for it.¡±

    Everyone¡¯s expression turned solemn when they heard the news. They all quietly listened without daring to interrupt. While the current battle only involved small skirmishes between six dominions, it was only bound to grow in scale with time. The recurrent battle of the gods always ended with huge casualties, so the prospect of fighting in it was a worrying one for sure.

    ¡°The battle this time might be even bloodier than thest few. Apart from the Dominions of Death, Destruction, Life, Light, Darkness, and Water, the other dominions will have to join as well. There will be casualties.¡±

    ¡°Even the Dominions of Space and Destiny won¡¯t be exempt?¡± Goron asked with shock. As a native of Elysium, he had heard about the battles all too often. As far as he knew, the Dominions of Space and Destiny had always been neutral parties in the battle of the gods. While the Dominion of Space would nudge things in certain directions from the shadows, he had never heard about the Dominion of Destiny involving themselves in any other capacity than mediation.

    Nodding, Han Shuo said, ¡°That¡¯s right, nobody will be able to escape from it! This battle will be far bloodier than any that had ever transpired!¡±

 Chapter 1009 - Asking to Leave

    <h4>GDK 1009: Asking to Leave</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    ¡°What should we do?¡± Goron said with a grim expression. The other members of the house also turned solemn.

    ¡°Since we can¡¯t avoid it, we have to prepare ourselves as best we can.¡± Han Shuo smiled in a rxed manner. ¡°I¡¯ve already talked to the Gods of Darkness, Death, and Destruction. The Fringe will be allying up with them.¡±

    Those words sent a wave of confusion through the rest, who didn¡¯t know how in the world he managed to reach out to the three Quintessence overgods.

    ¡°And they agreed?¡± Stratholme said with a look of shock.

    Han Shuo nodded. ¡°I went to the Dominion of Darkness personally to meet with Amon, Cratos, and Nestor. The moment the battle of the gods spreads throughout Elysium, our forces will join up with theirs against the alliance on the God of Light¡¯s side.¡±

    They had no idea how and when he had gone to the dominion. The news about the agreement with the other three Quintessence overgods was shocking enough for them. Most of them didn¡¯t even know their real names, but they believed in Han Shuo¡¯s power and were excited that he managed to form an alliance with them.

    To them, Quintessence overgods were ultimate beings that stood at the top of the pedestal. Nothing else in this universe could possibly go against them. Everyone else was nothing but lowly servants before the twelve great ones.

    Apart from a few elites or city lords of the Twelve Divine Dominions, few had truly seen the Quintessence overgods, not to mention being aware of the true extent of their power, which was why they were bbergasted that Han Shuo had reached an agreement with the three of them.

    Romon and Goron were pumped for the uing battle; they were hardly pacifists. After living in peace in the Fringe for so long, they began to feel a little weighed down by theck of action.

    ¡°Before thates to pass, we have to gather all our forces across the Fringe.¡± He turned to Stratholme, Ayermike and a few others who were keen on strategy. ¡°I¡¯ve told Ss and Wasir to gather their forces as well. They will join up with us. As for the rest of you, go to the Hexopolis to coordinate the steps we take moving forward.¡±

    Given Han Shuo¡¯s powerful consciousness and Wasir and Ss¡¯s powerful souls, they were able tomunicate rather easily through telepathy. Now that he had briefed them on the situation, he said, ¡°This battle has the potential tounch us into prominence. We must start stocking up on goods from Goldstone Enterprise and the Celestial Pearl for our own forces.¡±

    Currently, Han Shuo was the de facto ruler of the Fringe, with Ss and Wasir operating on his advice. However, he treated them like his allies rather than as cannon fodder. He would gather anything that could give his allies an advantage to make sure they were fully armed and prepared.

    The folks in the Pandemonium moved quickly to carry out his orders. The Five Elite Zombies all went to Hexopolis to start fortifying it. With Andrina and Han Jin there, they should be able to increase the city¡¯s defensive capabilities substantially.

    As for what strategy they would adopt during the battle of the gods, there were many suggestions. After they decided on a general framework, Han Shuo asked for all of them to leave, but Sanguis, Gilbert, Bonds, Phoebe, Emily, Fanny and Jasper stayed back. The former three asked Han Shuo about aspects of the demonic arts that still confounded them, while the women wanted to have a private conversation with him.

    Rose, seeing them flock around Han Shuo, felt a little downcast. She had wanted to talk to him, but she felt a little hesitant due to how far apart they had grown now. All of a sudden, she took a step forward and said, ¡°Bryan, I would like to leave the Fringe for some time.¡±

    Han Shuo was in the midst of exining the demonic arts to Bonds when he snapped and turned to Rose. ¡°What¡¯s wrong? Are you not happy living here?¡±

    The other women beside him seemed to notice something amiss and turned to look at her, before turning back to Han Shuo and exchanging nces with themselves.

    ¡°These days, the Pandemonium is filled with powerful people. Not to mention, you¡¯re here, so nobody would dare mess with you anymore. I no longer have much use here and I¡¯ve reached a cultivation bottleneck, so I n to travel the Twelve Divine Dominions for new experiences.¡± Even though she gave her reasons naturally, she avoided the gaze of the women.

    ¡°The density of elements here is much higher than elsewhere, and there are more advanced cultivators here from whom you can seek guidance. I feel like you¡¯ll improve here more quickly,¡± Han Shuo said. ¡°Not to mention, these are dangerous times. Why are you in a hurry to leave now?¡±

    Emily smiled and suddenly grabbed Rose¡¯s arm tightly and said, ¡°That¡¯s right, why are you in a hurry to leave? We¡¯re really thankful for what you did for us in the Dominion of Darkness. We would¡¯ve been in lots of trouble if not for you. Lately, we¡¯ve been rather busy with cultivation, so we haven¡¯t really had time to spend together. We can always make up for lost timeter.¡±

    Rose felt a little uneasy about Emily getting so intimate with her, however. She didn¡¯t know how to react as she felt a little overwhelmed.

    As for Phoebe, Fanny and Jasper, they were initially taken aback by her actions, though they quickly reacted and came to convince Rose to stay with beaming smiles on their faces. Whether it was their convincing reasons or their sudden disy of camaraderie, Rose agreed to stay in the end without bringing the matter up any longer. Han Shuo smiled subtly as he listened in on the conversation.

 Chapter 1010 - A Good Woman

    GDK 1010: A Good Woman

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    It was worth noting that Emily was the most empathetic one among them. She was always the one who mediated any discord within the House of Han and ensured a good oue came of it.

    While Phoebe had been the one chiefly in charge of the Celestial Pearl Pharmacy and growing the businessrger andrger, Emily had been paying close attention to the internal situation of the House of Han and putting a stop to any potential conflict before they had a chance to fester, allowing Han Shuo to cultivate for long periods of time without being disturbed.

    Now that she had noted Rose¡¯s odd behavior, she immediately stepped in to resolve the situation, not letting it affect Han Shuo¡¯s cultivation at all. Rose felt a little surprised by the sudden warmth and agreed with Emily to stay without giving it too much thought.

    After all, there simply wasn¡¯t a good reason to, given the dense dark element in the Pandemonium and the resources of the House of Han she was free to use. Not to mention, the man she loved was living there. She couldn¡¯t bear to leave them had she not been feeling a little down about being neglected.

    The whole time, Emily, Phoebe, and the rest of the harem maintained a certain distance from other females in the Pandemonium. It wasn¡¯t like they intentionally avoided them, but they didn¡¯t really make an effort to socialize either. The way Rose saw it, Phoebe, Fanny, and Emily were the women that hade to Elysium with Han Shuo from Profound Continent, so he naturally cared about them the most.

    That made them a unit that outsiders couldn¡¯t easily butt into. In the long time Rose had been in the Pandemonium, the three of them had never taken the initiative to talk to her before, which further cemented Rose suspicion that they were wary of her.

    Back then, when they were in the Dominion of Darkness, she didn¡¯t really mind it because she was much stronger than they were and was confident that she would be far more useful to Han Shuo. But after they came to the Fringe, Phoebe and Emily managed to improve quite a lot with the orbs of arcana and many other concoctions to the point that they were catching up on Rose.

    Not only that, the orbs of arcana made from the divine souls of Logue and Asser rocketed Phoebe and Fanny¡¯s abilities far beyond Rose¡¯s imagination. It would only be a matter of time before they became demi-overgods, ending up more powerful than her old self.

    She couldn¡¯t even contribute by helping out with the management aspects. Gradually, she began to lose her self-esteem and gave up onpeting with them, deciding in the end to avoid them and Han Shuo. However, their sudden warmth gave her a little more hope, prompting her to stay.

    She turned to nce at Han Shuo and couldn¡¯t help but blush when she saw the odd smile on his face.

    ¡°Haha, we¡¯ve never seen you blush like that,¡± Emily said as she pulled her along. ¡°Come, we need to talk in private.¡±

    Phoebe and Fanny red at Han Shuo before following along. Almost instantly, the women were gone from the room leaving only Han Shuo, Sanguis, Bonds and Gilbert standing there nkly.

    ¡°Wow, that was pretty generous of Emily. Even though she knew that cold-blooded, white-haired woman had feelings for you, she still asked her to stay. Tsk tsk... Master, I think you are far more proficient with women than with demonic arts!¡± Gilbert said with admiration.

    Sanguis nodded eagerly in agreement. Shooting Han Shuo a worshipful look, he sighed. ¡°It seems that there is much that Master has yet to teach me. My path ahead is a long one indeed.¡±

    Han Shuo snapped out of his stupor and gave Sanguis a whack. ¡°I knew leaving the two of you together was a bad idea! What in the world are you guys learning from each other?¡± He then turned to re at Bonds. ¡°Make sure to keep a closer eye on these two and not let them waste their time on anything other than cultivation.¡±

    Bonds red at the duo like Han Shuo did before he sighed. ¡°Senior Brother, Emily is indeed a good woman in many respects.¡±

    Given the power of Han Shuo¡¯s consciousness, he could unconsciously pick up the gist of the others¡¯ thoughts even if he didn¡¯t want to. Before he came, he linked his mind with Rose¡¯s and felt the reverberations of her soul. After some thought, he came to understand what she felt.

    While he hadn¡¯t spent much time with hertely, they were quite close before they came to the Fringe. He already knew how she felt about him back then, and how much more so now.

    Hearing Bonds¡¯s off-handment, Han Shuo smiled and didn¡¯t say a word before continuing to expound on the demonic arts to them. When he was done clearing their doubts, he smiled and said, ¡°While I can help you out if your realm isn¡¯t high enough, I can¡¯t make up for the energy difference. The energies you are cultivating are unique, so enhancement potions or concoctions won¡¯t do much for you. If you want to grow stronger quickly, you¡¯ll have to use the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester like I do. But as you are still too weak now, you might be crushed from the sheer pressure if you train in that formation. After some consideration, I¡¯ve decided to make another room into which I can siphon a part of the distilled energy from the main room for you three. You should be able to make rapid progress that way.¡±

    That small portion of output from the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester was more than enough for the three of them and it was a negligible difference for Han Shuo anyway. After all, the sheer amount of yuan energy that had gathered in Elysium over the Aeons was far more than one could imagine. Even the amount that formed in the recent years alone was far more than what Profound Continent had gathered for many years.

    ¡°Master, can that really be done for us too?!¡± Sanguis was so excited he didn¡¯t know how to react.

    ¡°Yes, and you three deserve it. Prior to this, your realms were still too low and the formation wasn¡¯t stable enough yet. The fact that you asked me those questions just now means you must be ready for it.¡±

 Chapter 1011 - A Drop of Blood

    <h4>Chapter 1011: A Drop of Blood</h4>

    Sanguis, Bonds and Gilbert started off pretty well to begin with, with the former two proficient enough in the demonic arts to be able to use Mystical Yin to increase their power. Gilbert was more unique in that the basis of his cultivation was on his soul while his body still contained the energy of darkness.

    Han Shuo decided he would start working on Gilbert¡¯s body first. Back then when Gilbert¡¯s body was dead, Han Shuo had used many precious materials to make a new one for him. It had been crafted the same way a demonic artifact was. So, Han Shuo decided he would infuse the demonic body with Mystical Yin generated from the harvester this time around.

    However, all three of them couldn¡¯tpare to him as he had the proper legacy of demonic arts that passed on to him from thete Exalted Demonlord through Cauldron of Myriad Demons. The best they could aspire to be was an offshoot of the legitimate school of demonic arts.

    Since the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester generated so much Mystical Yin that siphoning a little out for them wouldn¡¯t affect him much, he decided to go for it. The uing battle wouldn¡¯t be won by him alone, after all. It was just as important for him to strengthen those around him.

    The three followed behind him as he entered the depths of the underground pce, asking him one question after another in sheer excitement. Even as his right-hand men, they still didn¡¯t know the full extent of how proficient he was. They were all too surprised when he contacted the rest of them throughout the whole Fringe with telepathy without even having to leave the underground. Even though they cultivated demonic arts like he did, they weren¡¯t aware of what realm he was at now for him to be able to pull off such a feat. Perhaps even Quintessence overgods wouldn¡¯t be able to do something like that.

    The best the Twelve Great Overgods could do wasmunicate telepathically with other powerful gods that cultivated the same energy they did, like how Amon could contact the city lords Felder and Wace. A huge part of that was due to their deep faith in Amon and the stigma left in their souls. Even then, Amon wouldn¡¯t be able to sense all that was happening within the Dominion of Darkness nor could he find out what other non-darkness gods were up to. On the other hand, Han Shuo could sense anyone and everyone regardless of cultivation type as long as they were in the Fringe and he could evenmunicate with them.

    Their excitement only grew the closer they got to their destination. Even though they hadn¡¯t actually been there before, they knew from the Mystical Yin that radiated from it that it was sure to be an astonishing ce.

    Han Shuo said, ¡°Your powers still aren¡¯t enough for you to absorb much Mystical Yin, so I will have to channel it to you.¡±

    As he said so, he willed the cauldron to appear before it turned into a doorway to another space. As the artifact that was used as the cornerstone of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester, it could perform certain tasks better than Han Shuo could.

    Han Shuo pointed towards the tear in space, causing a drop of fresh blood to ooze out of the tip of his right thumb. It glowed with demonic energy and flowed into the opening in space like it had a life of its own. All of a sudden, a constant dripping sound could be hearding from within it as bloody light shone out of the opening.

    Sanguis started with shock as he watched the weird doorway in the wall. He sensed that a powerful force was helping the Cauldron of Myriad Demons form a space within, carving it straight out from the thick underground walls and inscribing countlessplicated patterns all across it. The patterns seemed like the most intricate of carvings that somehow split the dense Mystical Yin energy around the space within into many neat little pockets. The three werepletely dumbfounded at seeing a single drop of blood like that possess so much power.

    Han Shuo turned to them and smiled. ¡°I¡¯ve read the Bloodgod Mantra. It is indeed a rather unique technique. Even though I didn¡¯t cultivate it directly, I have no problems applying its theories to make it perform little tricks like these. A drop of life is akin to a new life and a pocket dimension. As long as you are powerful enough, anything is possible.¡±

    With Han Shuo¡¯s mind in the Diablo Realm, he had a renewed understanding of the core essence of the demonic arts. If his body was fully realized at that realm as well, he could use any part of it to create a whole new space, even a single strand of his hair, a chip from his nail, or even his spit. All of it would contain unthinkable power.

    During the process of absorbing the vast amounts of Mystical Yin into his body, it was as if each and every cell of his body was being reconstructed and filled with pure, unimaginable power. Once both his body and mind reached parity, every part of his body would be a powerful treasure.

    Sanguis wore a worshipful expression as he said, ¡°Master, does Blooddrop Invincibility refer to something like this?¡±

    Shaking his head, Han Shuo said, ¡°Blooddrop Invincibility refers to the ability to form a new life, a new you, with a single drop of blood. As long as that remains, you will be able to constantly regenerate. So long as you don¡¯t run out of blood, you¡¯re ¡®invincible¡¯. That¡¯s the Bloodfiend Realm¡¯s defining characteristic. However, I didn¡¯t cultivate the Bloodgod Mantra, so I can only do what I did using brute force with help from the cauldron. It¡¯s not asplicated as you think it is.¡±

    ¡°Then, will you be able toe back to life from a single drop of blood?¡± Sanguis asked.

    ¡°Haha, I do not rely on my blood. Instead, I rely on my consciousness.¡± As long as a strand of his consciousness still existed, he would continue to revive. The formless strands of consciousness were even harder to grasp than blood. Han Shuo believed that the only person who could possibly eradicate consciousness would be the Mother of All Creation herself. In other words, Han Shuo was now as good as immortal even before his body had been fully perfected.

 Chapter 1012 - Vast Ocean

    GDK 1012: Vast Ocean

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Editor: Emily

    As they spoke, the drop of blood had carved out a small subspace. The power of blood essence filled the Cauldron of Myriad Demons as it seemed to attract the Mystical Yin in the surroundings like a ma. It only took a few moments for the area within the wall to be saturated with it.

    The power in that drop of blood eventually wore out. Han Shuo turned to the three and said, ¡°You can start cultivating now. The energy will gather much faster than you¡¯re used to. Gilbert, you¡¯re a little different so you need to absorb the energy with your soul before assembling them in your body.¡±

    Sanguis and Gilbert were rather impatient after hearing about all the benefits and immediately went into the space. But almost immediately, they closed their eyes as they took a deep breath and began adapting to the Mystical Yin within.

    ¡°You should go in and cultivate too. It will be good for you,¡± Han Shuo said as he motioned him to enter.

    ¡°Thank you, Senior Brother!¡± The usually calm Bonds couldn¡¯t really contain an tion.

    Bonds bowed before stepping in. After giving the other two a quick nce, his expression turned stern as he quickly sat down and closed his eyes, letting the Mystical Yin wash over him.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a hurry to leave, so he observed them from outside and used his consciousness to monitor the energy waves on their body. After some time, those three began to calm down and try to use Mystical Yin to aid their cultivation. Only then could Han Shuo nod with satisfaction as he went deeper underground.

    Soon, a few more years passed. Elysium was in even more chaos than before. The conflicts between the Dominions of Light, Life, Water, Darkness, Death, and Destruction had been escting. Some cities were even in fullbat readiness.

    As for the Dominions of Wind, Fire, Lightning, Earth, Space, and Destiny, they had been fortifying their cities the whole time. Even though they hadn¡¯t officially joined the grand battle, they were secretly making ns and preparations for what was toe. Those who had the faintest familiarity with Elysian politics could easily sniff out the intention of those dominions, for even the ever-neutral Dominion of Destiny was assembling an army.

    That was a strong sign which many Elysians took as an omen of unrest. While they didn¡¯t know the true purpose of the battle, the gods knew that there was something different about the battle of the gods this time around. They suspected that even the Goddess of Destiny wouldn¡¯t be able to maintain control over the situation any longer, which made the rtionship between the various factions even moreplicated. The dominions that hadn¡¯t been in the battle up till now knew that there was no avoiding it and were not only gathering their forces, but also restricting the activity of outsiders in their territory, fearing that they would be used for malicious ends. Travel across the whole of Elysium was being strictly regted in an unprecedented manner.

    During those few years, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar had traveled the dominions with Donna. He couldn¡¯t do anything about fusing his avatars even if he returned to the Pandemonium anyway, not to mention he had to scout the situation across Elysium for intel.

    After their long journey, they left the Dominion of Earth and headed for Phantasia City. The cities of Phantasia, Sanctus, and Ethereal were located within the Dominion of Space. Phantasia happened to be a stop on the way to the Pandemonium.

    During the past few years, Han Shuo had gained a much better informationwork than most on Elysium. His main body in the Fringe could regrlymunicate with Amon, Cratos, and Nestor, while his avatar was directly connected to his main body. Right now, he could maintain the connection between the two bodies even if one was on the Profound Continent that was many light-years away. At the Diablo Realm, it was as if his main body and avatar weren¡¯t separated by any space at all. It didn¡¯t matter where those two were as long as they were in the same universe.

    Thanks to his three Quintessence overgod allies, he more or less had an idea of what most notable figures in Elysium were doing. He knew that the Goddess of Destiny had beenmunicating with the God of Light and the others, and that the currently neutral ones had private conversations with each other. The only one that had zero activity was the God of Space.

    It wasn¡¯t just Nestor and the others; it was said that the God of Space wasn¡¯t too much into the Goddess of Destiny¡¯s n since she brought it up. The fact that he hadn¡¯t returned to Elysium during such a sensitive time was one such sign. His current whereabouts were also unknown. Back in the Fringe, Han Shuo had long been in touch with McKinley about it. McKinley said he didn¡¯t receive any instructions from the God of Space. It was as if he had vanished.

    In the battle of the gods that took ce many years back, the God of Space once worked with Nestor, Amon, and, Cratos. This time around, those three also intended to ally with him, which Han Shuo was more than happy to agree to. However, they seemed a little anxious about not being able to reach out to him at this point in time, so they asked Han Shuo to go to the Dominion of Space to see if there was a way he could get in touch with him. It just so happened that the Shrine of Space was located within Phantasia City.

    This time, he couldn¡¯t afford to tour the city at his own pace. He was in a hurry to get in touch with the God of Space. Not long after his arrival there, he had Donna travel the rest of the way to the Fringe alone. Back when the other three gods asked him to look for the God of Space, Han Shuo had used his consciousness to search the Dominion of Space, but wasn¡¯t able to do so as his consciousness was prevented from entering the Shrine of Space by a spatial barrier. Since his main body had to cultivate as much as it could and his avatar was passing through, he decided to visit the dominion with his avatar.

    Quintessence overgods were proud beings who wouldn¡¯t deign to meet anyone beneath them, so Han Shuo had no choice but to have Donna leave. He wasn¡¯t too worried for her safety since he could watch over her with his vast consciousness the whole time.

    When he reached the vast ocean where the Shrine of Space was, he didn¡¯t hesitate and dive in. The moment he did, he noticed that he was drawn away by a mysterious force into another space entirely.

    ¡°You¡¯re finally here... ¡± said an old voice directly into his two souls. The space energy that forced the two halves of his avatar together dissipated, splitting him back into two.

 Chapter 1013 - I Want to Go to Your Universe

    GDK 1013: I Want to Go to Your Universe

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    The bottom of the vast ocean was radiant blue. Countless creatures swam about all over the cradle of life. Soon after he submerged, an old voice rang in his soul and before he could react, a blue light shone from the water ahead of him before it expanded rapidly, consuming his two avatars.

    He found himself looking at a bleak sky with dense, grey smoke obscuring everything. The horizon was nowhere to be seen. No elements nor edicts could be felt around this foreign space. As his two souls spread out to sense his surroundings, he found that he wasn¡¯t bound by anything. It spread out far and wide seemingly without restriction, though he found nothing. It was as if he was trapped in an infinite expanse of nothingness.

    ¡°You¡¯re finally here,¡± said the old voice that filled the entire space once more. All of a sudden, vibrant multicolor lights gave life to the deste, monochromatdscape as mountains rose from the ground. The smoke around them began to dissipate, revealing the countlesskes, trees, beasts, and other aspects of nature all at once. It was as though he was witnessing Genesis.

    His two souls that had stretched out towards the unlimited bounds retracted back into his bodies. Now, he looked around in confusion. It was as if the world had been popted with life and nature in a single instant. It was a world of unbelievable realism.

    ¡°God of Space!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s two avatars called out at the same time, with one looking towards the sky and the other towards the ground.

    Gradually, a vague apparition formed from the grey fog. The ground cracked open as magma rose into the skies before causing a rain of fire to fall, igniting fires on the ground that lit up the lively world even further. The apparition¡¯s shape grew more and more defined until it resembled an old, wrinkled face without a body ¨C just empty, dark eyes that didn¡¯t have a hint of life.

    This world was his, a world he had forged with the edict of space. Within it, he was <i>the</i> God almighty. Anyone within <i>His </i>domain waspelled to y by <i>His</i> rules.

    Back then in the Fringe, the Hegemon of Space also had his own realm, albeit an imperfect one that hadn¡¯t the slightest sign of life within, which was why he fell prey to Han Shuo¡¯s ns in the end. Yet, Han Shuo could see life within this world. Everything that could be found outside it was here as well. With a sweep of his consciousness, he was instantly able to tell that the world the God of Space had crafted was a resplendent oneplete with all forms of life, giving him the shocking realization that in here, even the other Quintessence overgods would be powerless before him.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. As you have imagined, here, even the Goddess of Destiny is bound by my rules. That¡¯s why none of the other overgods have dared toe to my ocean directly to talk to me. They always choose other ces,¡± the hovering face said with an eerie smile. ¡°Nestor and the other two asked you to be the one to contact me because they knew that I wouldn¡¯t do you any harm. Even if they knew that I was here, they wouldn¡¯t daree here themselves.¡±

    ¡°You can read my thoughts?¡± Han Shuo said, both his avatars wearing expressions of surprise.

    ¡°I already said that I am the sole god in this world. Any other lifeform that enters my realm will be bound by my rules. I can even read the Goddess of Destiny¡¯s mind in here; yours is no different. Here, I am omnipotent,¡± he proudly dered.

    It was no wonder the other three didn¡¯t dare toe despite knowing its whereabouts. Han Shuo smiled and said, ¡°What about the one who slumbers in Aethernia? Will you still be omnipotent if she enters your realm?¡±

    The face¡¯s expression turned sour upon mention of the Allmother. Sighing, he said, ¡°This world is sustained with the Quintessence¡¯s power. If she reims it, my world will be no more. That¡¯s why I am suffering from the same plight as Nestor and everyone else. If she ever emerges, you and all twelve of us will not live to see another day.¡±

    There was no way the Allmother would give up on the Quintessence nor let a practitioner of the demonic arts roam free. Han Shuo nodded and said, ¡°So I assume you have been expecting me for long?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right, far longer than you imagine.¡± The God of Space smiled as his eyes glowed. They projected various scenes. The first one depicted a tear in an endless sea of stars before switching to a young man at a grave. Then, the scenes showed his experiences at Profound Continent from the moment Han Shuo¡¯s soul took over Bryan¡¯s body, speeding through his magic academy years until his mind broke through to the Diablo Realm at the Fringe before stopping.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t think that someone had been monitoring him since the moment he arrived in this universe. His every move had been within the purview of the God of Space, a notion that sent chills down his spine. ¡°Are you a pervert? You¡¯ve been spying on me this whole time?¡±

    The scenes vanished from the God of Space¡¯s eyes as heughed in resignation. ¡°You are our only hope, so I had to make sure to pay close attention to you and make sure that no real harm would evere to you. I alone can watch your every move across time and space. However, it¡¯s not like I monitor you constantly. I don¡¯t watch when your life isn¡¯t in danger.¡±

    Han Shuo took a moment to recall the projections. He didn¡¯t see any scenes of him frolicking with Phoebe and his other women, much to his relief. Clearing his throat, he said, ¡°Alright, I¡¯m here. What do you want of me? Opening Aethernia is also to my benefit, so I¡¯ll do it even without you telling me. As for the battle of the gods, it isn¡¯t something I can avoid participating in. So, there must be something else you want from me.¡±

    The God of Space stared at him in silence for a long time. Then, he whispered, ¡°I want to go to your universe!¡±

    Stunned, Han Shuo stammered, ¡°You... w-what?¡±

    ¡°I want to go to your universe!¡± he repeated, ¡°All these years, I¡¯ve been trying my best to escape this one, to no avail. I¡¯m bound here. I can¡¯t free myself from the chains linking me to this universe like that person can. I can¡¯t escape it.¡±

    He sighed and continued in a dejected voice, ¡°Even I am unable to leave this universe. You are my only hope.¡±

    As the God of Space, nobody else knew more about the nature of the universe than he did. If even he couldn¡¯t use his powers to leave the universe, Gu Tian Xie really must¡¯ve been quite powerful to be able to pull off this feat. So, the God of Space also hoped that Han Shuo would be capable of something simr as the sessor of the Exalted Demonlord.

    ¡°Why would you want that?¡±

    ¡°Although I am unable to leave this universe, I can go to any ne I wish with a single thought. In my long life, I¡¯ve seen, touched, and experienced everything this universe has to offer. With nothing left to be explored, every day is boring and dull. It feels as though I¡¯m trapped in a prison ¨C it may be a big prison, but a prison nheless. It is not a feeling you canprehend,¡± he said in a forlorn manner.

    To Han Shuo, this universe was endlessly vast. There were still many nes he had yet to visit. However, the vast distances of space meant nothing to the God of Space. He had seen it all, and could create everything he wanted in his own domain with a single thought. It didn¡¯t take long for Han Shuo to understand the God of Space¡¯s desperation to leave, but he couldn¡¯t agree just yet.

    ¡°Given my power, I¡¯m unable to help you leave this universe. Back then, that person was able toe here because he was at the peak of his cultivation. I am still quite far off, not to mention, the one that slumbers in Aethernia will awaken soon. I worry that I won¡¯t survive that ordeal, let alone grow strong enough to help you escape.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s why we have to make sure she slumbers once and for all!¡± the God of Space said mercilessly. After a pause, he turned back to Han Shuo and said, ¡°As long as you promise to help send me off when you grow powerful enough, I will aid you with everything I have. I won¡¯t let anyone harm you and I¡¯ll always stand by your side!¡±

    ¡°Will you trust me if I promise you that?¡± Han Shuo felt that it was an excellent proposal, but by the time Han Shuo grew powerful enough to fulfill the promise, there would be nothing that the God of Space could do to him if he then decides to not do it.

    Surprisingly, the God of Space nodded. ¡°I do! After spending so many years observing you, I know you better than anyone else. You are a man of your word who keeps your promises no matter what. So, yes, I will take your word for it!¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t think the God of Space would know him to this extent. He pondered it for a moment: the offer seemed toe at literally no cost to him, so he swiftly agreed. ¡°Alright, we have a deal.¡±

 Chapter 1014 - Time is Running Out

    <h4>Chapter 1014: Time is Running Out</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Seeing Han Shuo agree, the God of Space smiled. The world suddenly quieted down as a colorful pathway manifested in the sky, stretching out and stopping before Han Shuo. He noticed that there were different bright lights in it that collided with each other, seemingly able to tear apart anything within. Soon, an old aura seeped out of the pathway.

    ¡°Come with me. I have something to show you,¡± the God of Space said, the projection of his face suddenly vanishing as he slowly emerged from the pathway. However, the sound felt like it hade from behind him.

    Han Shuo¡¯s two souls immediately sensed that the ancient aura hade from the figure emerging from the pathway. After some hesitation, he smiled and stepped into it with his two avatars. The odd energies of space contorted his two bodies and before he was ready, a bright point appeared in mid air, into which both his bodies were sucked within.

    Now, he found himself on a fluffy bed of clouds. In front of him was a shambling old man who smiled and said, ¡°Thank you.¡±

    Han Shuo immediately knew that this was the God of Space from the same aura that came from his body, which distinctly marked him as a possessor of a Quintessence like Amon and the rest.

    ¡°You¡¯re wee. If I am truly capable of reaching that level of power, I will dly lend you a hand.¡± His split avatars were united again with the power of space.

    ¡°This is no longer the world you created, right?¡± Han Shuo could feel the elements again and the odd sensation of space was no longer there.

    ¡°Of course not.¡± The God of Space pointed ahead and asked, ¡°Look. What do you see?¡±

    There was an ancient city beyond the thick mist, surrounded by thunderclouds that rained chaotic energies of death, destruction, light, and other elements that shed with each other. It formed a barrier that closed up the entire city.

    Han Shuo felt like the city had a life of its own. Wherever it moved, the thunderclouds followed close behind, forming a beautiful colored trail of various elements. ¡°This is Aethernia!¡± he gasped.

    ¡°That is correct,¡± the God of Space said with a solemn nod, ¡°This is a fortress that moves constantly of her making. It absorbs all elemental energies this universe has to offer. Aethernia destroys anything that stands in its path. Since the beginning of her slumber, 65 nes have been crushed in its wake.¡±

    ¡°Why would she do something like that?¡± What power must the city have to be able to crush entire world nes so easily? If the Allmother couldmand such power in her slumbering state, how truly powerful was she in her prime?

    ¡°I believe Nestor and the rest have told you that Quintessence bearers need the power of faith. That poweres from sentient life from all across the myriad nes. Once a ne disappears, all life within it is gone and faith can no longer be produced. Without being able to generate faith, the Quintessence will escape our control and return to Aethernia,¡± the old manmented, ¡°Even in her slumber, she holds the initiative. We will be slowly forced into the corner and forever live under her shadow.¡±

    ¡°Is there nothing you can do to stop it?¡± Han Shuo felt a little sympathetic to the Quintessence overgods when he looked at the barrier of myriad energies encircling the city.

    ¡°The barrier that protects Aetherniaprises all types of energies in this universe. They endlessly collide in a manner that supercedes allplexity. Our Quintessence¡¯s power isn¡¯t able to help break the barrier. All we can do is watch it destroy one ne after another. The best we can do is to evacuate life from those nes the best we can. But many of them often aren¡¯t willing to leave and doubt their nes will get destroyed. Even if we pledge to them with the power of our shrines, many of them start to doubt their faith and end up perishing with their nes. Countless lives were lost over the past aeons and we are gradually getting less and less faith. With enough time, she could end us Twelve even without leaving Aethernia.¡±

    ¡°How savage!¡± He finally understood how desperate the twelve were. It was no wonder the fight for faithful believers was so strong.

    ¡°You might not be aware of this, but each ne contains a huge amount of energy which will be unleashed upon its destruction only to be absorbed by Aethernia. That will hasten her recovery. Every time a ne is destroyed, she will recover a portion of her power. Now, she has recovered a third of what she has lost. That¡¯s why she¡¯s confident she will be able to take care of us soon.¡±

    ¡°Why is that so?¡±

    ¡°It¡¯s obvious from Aethernia¡¯s trajectory. It is on a collision course with Elysium!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s expression immediately changed. Elysium was the cornerstone of the Twelve Overgods¡¯ survival. That was the area with the densest amount of energy in the entire universe. If it gets destroyed and Aethernia absorbs all that energy, the Overgods would have no hope of ever prevailing.

    ¡°It¡¯s just as dire as you imagine. The Elysium alone contains more energy than all the nes¡¯ she has destroyedbined. She will recover another third of her energy if she seeds and nobody in this universe will be able to match up to her,¡± the God of Space said with despair.

    ¡°How much time do we have left?¡± Han Shuo asked, understanding the gravity of the situation.

    ¡°Around 230 years at the rate Aethernia is moving. We must make the necessary preparations and break the barrier during this time. The battle of the gods also has to conclude before that happens. Otherwise, nobody will be able to escape her!¡±

    ¡°It really is a rather pressing matter...¡± said a red-skinned man that appeared from a burst of fire. He seemed to be covered in burning mes thanks to the dense fire element that surrounded him and was even hotter than the sun.

    ¡°Chartrice, you came too,¡± the God of Space said.

    ¡°Fernando, I thought you went into hiding. Looks like you are worried about Aethernia after all.¡± The God of Fire smiled warmly and turned to Han Shuo. ¡°You¡¯re Han Shuo, right? I¡¯ve long been wanting to meet you. I didn¡¯t think this would be how the first meeting went, though. Any thoughts of Aethernia¡¯s imminent approach?¡±

    Chartrice approached him without reservation as he talked, bringing his heat wave with him. His two avatars almost buckled from the burning sensation. Backing off a little, he turned to Aethernia and smiled. ¡°What else is there to think about but a way to stop it?¡±

    ¡°Assuming there is a way at all,¡± Chartrice said with a mocking smile. He looked at Han Shuoh, seemingly a little disappointed, and turned back to Fernando. ¡°Are we helpless even after so many years? If we could somehow lead Aethernia to another universe, we wouldn¡¯t have to wait here like sitting ducks.¡±

    ¡°If I had that power, I would¡¯ve left this universe long ago without caring if the rest of you would survive,¡± Fernando mocked inly. He didn¡¯t seem too happy to see Chartrice.

    A giant drop of crystal-clear water then appeared before Han Shuo and surrounded him before he could react. No matter how much he struggled, he wasn¡¯t able to break out of it.

    A beautiful woman slowly stepped out from the void. Her skin was so clear it was almost see through and a frosty aura came radiating from her. She gave Han Shuo a disdained look as he continued to try breaking out. ¡°Isn¡¯t it a little reckless of us to ce all of our hopes in someone like this? There¡¯s no way he¡¯ll be able to break the barrier even if given two millennia!¡±

    ¡°If you had any other ideas, Monroe, by all means give it a try. I will follow your lead if you can break the barrier,¡± Nestor said as he manifested with Cratos and Amon, staring mockingly at the Goddess of Water.

    Monroe humphed and withdrew the water that had Han Shuo trapped.

 Chapter 1015 - Gathering of Overgods

    <h4>GDK 1015: Gathering of Overgods</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    The water drop left Han Shuo¡¯s body, allowing him to move again. He took a deep breath and looked at the Goddess of Water, Monroe, with a dark face, but without snapping at her. Back then, from fighting Amon, Nestor, and Cratos, he had learned that his avatars weren¡¯t a match for Quintessence Overgods, not before he had perfectly fused all the avatars. It wasn¡¯t surprising to him that he wasn¡¯t able to deal with her surprise attack.

    It was in to him that she didn¡¯t like him. She had definitely intended to humiliate him by imprisoning him with her power the moment she arrived. Though, he knew it wasn¡¯t the time tosh out. He made a mental note of how she treated him here today so that his main body may one day pay her back for it once it was done metamorphing.

    It was obvious to Han Shuo that Nestor, Amon, Cratos, and the others did not show up by mere coincidence. He soon noticed that the God of Space, Fernando, was constantly giving off spatial energy to create multiple rainbow-colored paths into this space. The Overgods hade at Fernando¡¯s invitation.

    One spatial tear appeared after another, during which the Goddess of Destiny, Althea, God of Light, Azdins, Goddess of Life, Lyna, Goddess of Wind, Balyr, God of Lightning, Ranzlorde, and God of Earth, Bergson, appeared in this unique space. Currently, all twelve Quintessence Overgods had assembled.

    When Azdins arrived, he saw Han Shuo and nodded with a smile. ¡°Very well. You are standing with the other side after all.¡±

    Han Shuo knew what he was referring to. Back then, the God of Light had warned him to not touch Gy¨¢l or he would consider him an enemy. Yet, he killed Gy¨¢l off anyway at the Hexopolis. If not for the stigma, even his soul wouldn¡¯t be spared.

    ¡°Azdins, even if Han Shuo hadn¡¯t killed him, he would¡¯ve died all the same,¡± Fernando said with a furrowed brow. ¡°Gy¨¢l had imprisoned McKinley for so many years, so this ending is fitting for him.¡±

    ¡°Haha, Fernando, are you suggesting you would have killed him yourself? Naturally, you¡¯d have no problem killing him with your power, but isn¡¯t it going a little overboard?¡±

    ¡°Who said I would kill him myself? Karey has traveled far and wide and has long be a demi-overgod. Even if Han Shuo hadn¡¯t killed Gy¨¢l, Karey would¡¯ve eventually dealt with him. Your servants aren¡¯t the only ones capable of bing demi-overgods!¡±

    Karey was the city lord of Phantasia. It was said that he had be a peak-stage highgod quite a number of years ago and embarked on a long journey, only to return to Phantasia five years ago as a demi-overgod.

    ¡°Oh, Karey, huh? I¡¯ve heard about him. Haha, you think he could¡¯ve killed Gy¨¢l? I¡¯ve already rebuilt his divine body. Since you¡¯re now standing with Han Shuo, you definitely n on being my enemy as well. Just you wait. I¡¯ll make sure you witness the sight of Gy¨¢l killing Karey! Don¡¯t me me for not warning you. He¡¯s now as powerful as he was before.¡±

    ¡°I sure am looking forward to it,¡± Fernando said, smirking. He then turned to Althea, seemingly waiting for her to speak.

    ¡°Our time is running out; Fernando already said much,¡± she said as she turned to look at everyone, making sure she had their attention. ¡°We only have around two hundred years, but my Mirror of Destiny still doesn¡¯t have enough soul power. I¡¯m sure that you have been feeling the pull from Aethernia for quite some time now. Without enough souls to nourish the mirror, our Quintessence would return to Aethernia before she even awakens.¡±

    Their expressions turned grim at the mention of that. Even Fernando and Azdins had stopped bickering.

    ¡°Han Shuo, I know your main body has been gathering a kind of energy we aren¡¯t able to use in Pandemonium. Do you think you can make a breakthrough in two hundred years?¡± Althea asked as she turned to him.

    ¡°Althea, can he really break the barrier around Aethernia?¡± Lyna interjected.

    Everyone turned to the Goddess of Destiny concernedly, then back to Han Shuo, implicitly asking the same question.

    ¡°I doubt we can hope for anybody else but him! Back then, that person managed to break through the great divide between two universes toe here. If that was possible, Han Shuo will definitely be able to open the barrier of Aethernia. He¡¯s our only chance.¡±

    ¡°Even I myself am not confident about it,¡± Han Shuo said with a shrug. ¡°I can, however, definitely make another breakthrough within that time. The question that even I don¡¯t have an answer to is whether that¡¯s enough for me to break Aethernia¡¯s barrier.¡±

    ¡°You definitely can!¡± Althea said, ¡°The Allmother was injured when she erected that barrier, so it¡¯s imperfect. I¡¯ve been watching you since you came to Elysium, and every breakthrough you had brought with it an immense growth in power. If I¡¯m not mistaken, your power will even rival ours after your next breakthrough. Your energy is not of this universe, so it can definitely bore a hole through Aethernia¡¯s barrier!¡±

    ¡°Will we be able to defeat Her, though?¡± Balyr asked pessimistically.

    ¡°Some of us will perish, but at least we can hope.¡± Althea met their gazes with a heavy one of her own. ¡°If we stood no chance at all even if we all worked together, she would¡¯ve no doubt emerged far earlier. There wouldn¡¯t be a need for her to slumber for so long.¡±

    The others nodded at the sound argument.

    ¡°Let¡¯s wee a new ally while we¡¯re at it.¡± Althea turned to Fernando and said, ¡°I need you to bring Han Hao here too.¡±

 Chapter 1016 - Joint Target of Attack

    <h4>Chapter 1016: Joint Target of Attack</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Fernando nodded and caused yet another rainbow pathway to appear without looking like he used any spatial energy at all, out of which Han Hao stepped through.

    ¡°Father, why are you here?¡± he asked as he gawked at the others. He quietly walked towards him and assumed a position beside him.

    Han Hao¡¯s appearance caused the other overgods¡¯ expressions to visibly shift. They likely knew that Han Hao had formed a new Quintessence in the Fringe, but as they hadn¡¯t met him in person before, they kept their guard up while sizing him up.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t answer his query and turned to Althea disapprovingly. ¡°Why did you rope Han Hao in? What does this have to do with him?¡±

    Opening Aethernia was a really dangerous affair and Han Shuo wanted to bear the risk alone. He wouldn¡¯t let Han Hao join him on this perilous journey.

    ¡°He has a new Quintessence. Any Quintessence overgod is obligated to fight Her,¡± Althea said inly, ¡°Not to mention, She would definitely go after Han Hao after re-emerging from Aethernia. I¡¯m involving him for his own good.¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Those of us with Quintessence should work together. We need all the power that we can get,¡± Azdins, the God of Light, said approvingly.

    After a cold humph, Han Shuo didn¡¯t say anything else and brooded on his own.

    ¡°The battle of the gods cannot continue to drag on. Now that we have gathered together, let us go through the rules of the battle for our two neers,¡± Althea said. ¡°I¡¯m sure you all understand that we won¡¯t be allowed to personally participate in the battle and can only guide the participants on the big picture, right?¡±

    Althea furrowed her brow and turned to Han Shuo and Han Hao. ¡°These are the rules for those who bear the Quintessence, all for the sake of our own good. It wouldn¡¯t do all of us any good if there is too much chaos from rule breaking. Do you two have any issue with it?¡±

    ¡°No,¡± Han Shuo said with a shrug. Han Hao didn¡¯t initially say anything, but begrudgingly nodded after hearing the answer.

    The battle of the gods had something fundamental to do with the power of Quintessence overgods, who could easily dominate normal gods. The moment they joined the fray, the entire battle could be overturned in an instant, having the potential to disrupt the natural flow of the battle.

    Just as the gods guided the many lifeforms of this universe, the Quintessence overgods could guide their subordinates for their own benefit. But if they involved themselves in a massacre of normal gods, the chain reaction could cause the entirety of Elysium to end up as a deste wastnd. For instance, if Nestor, Amon, and Cratos personally fought, they could wipe out all the gods of the Dominions of Water, Light and Life, and the same could be said if those dominions¡¯ Quintessence overgods did the same in revenge. Nobody would benefit from such an oue where no gods remain in Elysium, causing the generation of faith to no longer be possible and ending with them losing control of their Quintessence.

    Seeing the two of them assent to the condition, Althea pondered for a moment before she continued. ¡°I don¡¯t care how you choose to start joining the fight, nor can I stop you from doing so. But one thing must be stressed: we are running out of time, so it must begin soon and end quickly.¡±

    ¡°Althea, how did that brat form a Quintessence? Ours were granted to us by her. Is it really possible to form our own?¡± Monroe asked while shooting Han Hao an odd look. The other gods turned to him as well, all filled with questioning looks.

    Shaking her head, Althea said, ¡°Even I don¡¯t know how. His Quintessence is indeed unique, much like how unconventional of a lifeform he is. It is not something I could¡¯ve predicted.¡±

    ¡°Time is running short, so I shall be sending you all back,¡± Fernando said when he noticed Han Shuo¡¯s expression turning sour by the moment. He immediately opened the pathways once more to urge the others to leave.

    The first one to leave was the Goddess of Destiny, Althea, followed by the God of Light, Goddess of Life, and the rest, leaving only Fernando, Nestor, Amon, Cratos, Han Shuo, and Han Hao.

    ¡°I believe we should have our own discussion here,¡± Nestor said as he turned to Fernando.

    ¡°I will instruct my subordinates to construct spatial transference matrixes to link up the Dominions of Death, Darkness, Destruction, Space and the Fringe. The three cities in my dominion are also ready. Once the matrix isplete, they will be able to join your armies against the Dominions of Light, Life, and Water at any moment.¡±

    ¡°Very well. With this advantage, we¡¯ll be able to assault and retreat as we please.¡± Nestor then raised an eyebrow and said, ¡°However, we don¡¯t intend to start with the Dominion of Light.¡±

    ¡°Then, who will you be attacking first?¡± Han Shuo wondered.

    ¡°The Dominion of Destiny!¡± Cratos said. ¡°All these years, she has watched coldly as our dominions fought among ourselves. Since she has said that even her dominion wouldn¡¯t be able to escape this fate, we should let her have a taste of what it¡¯s like!¡±

    Han Shuo¡¯s heart skipped a beat as he turned to gawk at Nestor, Amon, and Cratos. Fernando and Han Hao were just as surprised, however, it didn¡¯t sound like they had been joking.

    ¡°Very well. I was about to suggest that from the start,¡± Fernando said, taking a deep breath as some light seemed to return to his empty eyes. ¡°The only dominion to escape the damage wrought by the battle of the gods is hers every single time. Who knows how much power they have managed to amass over the aeons... Since we have a chance to strike back, we should make them pay!¡±

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t think Fernando would be for the suggestion either. The Goddess of Destiny¡¯s favoritism for her own dominion had gotten on their nerves.

    The other three looked each other in the eye and startedughing abruptly. Nestor said, ¡°Since we all want to go there, we should start discussing the details. Bryan, oh, I mean Han Shuo, we will need the Fringe¡¯s full support. Afterall, the number of elites you have has suddenly shot up.¡±

    The concept of the passage of time doesn¡¯t seem to apply to this space. Only after they had chatted for who-knows-how-long and finalized their ns did Fernando personally send each of them off.

    When he stopped through the spatial pathway, Han Shuo emerged right above the Hexopolis, the sole city in the Fringe. Han Hao didn¡¯te with him and instead asked Fernando to send him to the Dominion of Destruction with Cratos. As godhunters were special gods who had betrayed their respective Quintessence overgods, they couldn¡¯t generate faith for them, but they were still necessary. Han Hao still needed them.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t in a rush to return to Pandemonium. Instead, his avatar went looking for Ss and Wasir at the Hexopolis to ask them to prepare for the arrival of those from the Dominion of Space. Karey had acted much faster than he had imagined; right after he asked for Ss and Wasir in the Hexopolis, Karey appeared outside the city in a bright sh. After announcing his identity, he entered and started discussing the matter of the transference matrix with Ss and Wasir.

    ¡°Ss, Wasir, work with Karey to get the transference formation ready in short order.¡± Han Shuo didn¡¯t say anything else, leaving everything to Karey before heading to Pandemonium.

    Ten years swiftly passed, during which many transference matrixes had been set up all over the Fringe and the Dominions of Death, Destruction and Darkness. They were now fully prepared for war.

    Han Shuo¡¯s main body could now use a super spatial refraction mirror tomunicate with the other three Quintessence overgods in their respective dominions. These days, they were reorganizing their forces into one before their imminent attack on the Dominion of Destiny.

    But during such a crucial time, Han Shuo received word from Han Hao through his magic mirror that the Dominions of Light, Life and Water had started attacking the Dominion of Destiny before they did! It was apletely unexpected turn of events for everyone involved.

    At the same time, the Dominions of Earth, Wind, Lightning, and Fire announced the formation of an alliance to attack the Life-Water-Light alliance¡¯s dominions while they were away. That was how the unprecedented battle of the gods started.

 Chapter 1017 - Taking a Slice of the Pie

    <h4>GDK 1017: Taking a Slice of the Pie</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Han Shuo¡¯s body was still absorbing Mystical Yin using the harvester while his avatar continued to strategize for the battles with the other elites in Pandemonium. The sudden attack from the Dominions of Light, Water and Life against the Dominion of Destiny was something he hadn¡¯t expected, so he had to gather the forces of the Fringe immediately so that he would be able to react in time.

    Before Han Shuo had finished the briefing, an odd twist in the spacetime fabric manifested above Pandemonium where then Fernando emerged. He took a nce at Han Shuo and the others before smiling at him and invited, ¡°I believe we should travel to the skies of the Dominion of Destiny to take a look since you might not know how the Mirror of Destiny channels its power. Let me take you there.¡±

    Bonds, Stratholme and the rest stared wide-eyed at Fernando when he appeared, their faces filled with doubt that morphed into terror and shock when Han Shuo told them who he was. One of the most mysterious existences on Elysium, the ancient God of Space, had personallye to Pandemonium of all ces. That immediately implied that Han Shuo was now more or less on the same standing as the Quintessence overgods!

    ¡°Can you wait for a bit?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    Fernando nodded with a warm smile. ¡°There¡¯s no rush. I¡¯ll wait.¡±

    After hearing the conversation, most of those in the room stared at Han Shuo with worshipful expressions while some had their jaws dropped to the ground. Phoebe, Emily, and the other women looked at him hungrily as if they wanted to devour him. It was unimaginable to them that a Quintessence Overgod would wait for anyone. Han Shuo merely smiled and rushed through the rest of the matters before following Fernando into his spatial tunnel.

    ......

    In the airspace of the Dominion of Destiny, Han Shuo and Fernando stood above the clouds as they looked down on the vast area. There were many ant-like dots far below them, all of whom were gods of Elysium. They didn¡¯t just look like ants, they might as well be, given how easily Han Shuo and Fernando could crush them.

    ¡°Look there. The Mirror of Destiny is at the top of the shrine and the many fine lines connecting to the people below are their marks of fate.¡± Fernando exined the various aspects of the mirror that normal gods weren¡¯t able to perceive.

    From Han Shuo and Fernando¡¯s point of view, they did see arge mirror in the sky that let out really fine threads. There were easily billions of them, many intersecting with one another, and a particr bunch pulsed with a strong life force. The gigantic mirror seemed to be reflecting the fates of most people on Elysium and absorbing some trace of energy from the gods below.

    Every time a god fighting down there perished, the corresponding thread of fate would grow longer and thicker, causing the already dense mirror surface to look more and more like a tight. Colorful fist-sized lights could be seen moving about the strings. The lights seem to draw the other strings in.

    ¡°The moving clumps of light represent Aethernia. Althea used them to mark the moving city. The closer Aethernia is, the more threads would be enveloped in the clump of light, resonating under the effect of Aethernia.¡± Fernando sighed and continued. ¡°However, that is not Aethernia¡¯s purpose. The gods below can¡¯t even feel its influence on them. Only the twelve of us are able to feel its pull as our Quintessence grow more and more out of our control.¡±

    ¡°What does the mirror do to weaken the pull?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    ¡°Just watch. With each god down there that perished, the Mirror of Destiny will cause the energy in their divine soul to be unleashed. That way, their threads will grow thicker and the will be tighter and denser. Althea can then move the threads of the dead gods to make a that can mitigate the pull from Aethernia. The denser andrger the, the better it works to stop the pull.¡±

    Han Shuo started to make sense of what he was seeing. The did indeed grow with the deaths of the gods below. ¡°I didn¡¯t think the mirror could be used this way. It¡¯s no wonder why everyone says that the most mystical of energies is that of destiny.¡±

    After some hesitation, he asked, ¡°Since the is woven by Althea, will it boost her power?¡±

    He couldn¡¯t be faulted for having those doubts. If Althea could really make use of the energy from the souls of normal gods to weave a like this, the must be of truly mystical sort. If it could be used to block Aethernia¡¯s pull, what other abilities did it have?

    Fernando paused at the question, before shaking his head with an odd expression. ¡°I¡¯m not too sure about that, but it isn¡¯t hard to imagine there being another use case for it. All these years, the power of destiny has been growing in Althea. Nestor and the others also suspect that apart from mitigating the pull from Aethernia, the mirror is also helping Althea. They believe that she is hiding something from us, but mitigating the pull is not something we can do without, so nobody actually confronted her about the matter.¡±

    Hearing Fernando say that, Han Shuo had a thought. He nodded as he figured that the other eleven Quintessence overgods probably had their grievances with that too, but as long as they needed her power to resist Aethernia¡¯s pull, they couldn¡¯t really bring the matter up.

    ¡°I believe that must be part of the reason Azdins targeted the Dominion of Destiny. Lyna and Monroe must¡¯ve been unhappy with this for quite a while now too. After all, the Dominion of Destiny hasn¡¯t participated in every other battle of the gods and benefited much over it. Since Althea herself said that even her people wouldn¡¯t be able to evade the war this time, the others finally got a good reason to vent their frustrations.¡± Fernando relished in the schadenfreude. He definitely had some pent-up frustration as well.

    ¡°I think it must be because some destiny divine souls have to be sacrificed this time around. There¡¯s no way she would sacrifice her own subordinates otherwise,¡± Han Shuo said.

    ¡°Well, who knows? Either way, even if Althea again chooses to watch from the sidelines and let us battle it out, I believe neither Azdins nor Nestor would let her have it her way. After all that sacrifice, their subordinates couldn¡¯t really grow or improve, so they ended up having much fewer elite fighters to count on.¡±

    ¡°Still, the Dominion of Destiny is really amazing. They actually managed to hold the three armies of the other dominions back!¡± Han Shuo eximed.

    At that moment, seven astrarium-wieding old crones were sent out to fight. All of them were peak-level highgods. They used their astrariums to form a heptagonal star and used it to guide astral debris toe crashing down into the ranks of the enemy, iming many lives of light, water, and life gods.

    ¡°The power of destiny has something to do with the movement of celestial bodies. Those seven have been with Althea for a long time. Even if they weren¡¯t able to be demi-overgods, theirbined power enhanced by their astrariums make them about as powerful as an overgod. If they work together, even Quintessence overgods like us would have trouble dealing with them. Althea must¡¯ve been intentionally hiding the power she had gathered, making people think that the Dominion of Light is the strongest one in Elysium. Azdins really suffered a humiliating p by her this time around!¡±

    Most people did indeed believe that the Dominion of Light was the strongest of them all. When the Keepers of the Light showed up, many dominions had to be wary of them and evade them. The three keepers came to be synonymous as the strongest demi-overgods, but even then, they hadn¡¯t made their way to the Dominion of Destiny before. People thought that was because Azdins had a deal with Althea to not cause trouble for her, but now that seemed to be far from the truth.

    It now appeared that Azdins was long aware of the power of the Dominion of Destiny. Had he sent his keepers there to cause trouble back then, they probably wouldn¡¯t be able to escape alive from the seven old crones.

    Marveling at the might of the Dominion of Destiny as he watched many gods perish at the hands of the crones, Han Shuo saw the energy of their divine souls vanish before he suddenly had a thought. Could he use his cauldron to take a slice of the mirror¡¯s pie?

 Chapter 1018 - Sneaky

    GDK 1018: Sneaky

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Han Shuo almost fell on his face from the sudden epiphany. Ever since the demon generals his cauldron had collected mysteriously morphed into his thirteen avatars, he no longer had any demon generals he could utilize. To use the cauldron to its maximum potential, the number of demon generals yed a pivotal role.

    Seeing the gods die one after another as the threads got denser and denser, he was tempted to take some divine souls from the Goddess of Destiny. However, the she was weaving was necessary to block Aethernia¡¯s influence. He could risk decreasing its power output and thereby allowing Aethernia to have a greater effect on the twelve Quintessence overgods. That might earn him their ire and cause them to wipe him out. That was the reason he didn¡¯t dare to act nor tell Fernando about his desire.

    Even though he tried to be wary, that notion was irresistible to him. He was tempted by the sheer number of souls down below and fantasized at being able to use some for himself. As the gears of his mind spun, he suddenly came up with an excuse to do so.

    At that moment, a light came zipping out from the underground of Pandemonium towards the Dominion of Destiny, which wasn¡¯t that far off from the Fringe. The Cauldron of Myriad Demons elerated at maximum speed until it reached the warzone. Then, it stealthily weaved across the war zone to absorb the freshly dead divine souls, managing to collect hundreds of them in no time. Secretly ted, Han Shuo kept his cool and continued to chat with Fernando while sneakily looking at the soft, ck light the cauldron emanated as it collected the souls.

    ¡°Those old crones are a little too powerful. The Dominions of Light, Water, and Life might not be able to do much damage at all. The ones who are dying now are mostly from their dominions while the Dominion of Destiny isn¡¯t suffering much losses,¡± Han Shuo said, trying to distract Fernando from seeing what he was doing.

    Fernando chuckled and said, ¡°That might not necessarily be the case. Azdins definitely knows what the Dominion of Destiny is capable of, so he didn¡¯te unprepared. There¡¯s no way someone as ambitious as him would do anything he wasn¡¯t confident in. Not to mention, the other two dominions aren¡¯t easy pickings either. They won¡¯t lose too badly against the Dominion of Destiny.¡±

    Fernando¡¯s ¡®prophecy¡¯ seemed toe true immediately as the tide of battle turned. A few demi-overgods appeared behind the troops of the three dominions. Back then, they seemed to be discussing how to deal with the seven old crones, but now, they were charging at them. One of them was Gy¨¢l, who the God of Light had revived. He was donning his Holy Aurum Armor in his impressive charge.

    Apart from the Dominion of Light, the other two also had their own demi-overgods joining in. The one from the Dominion of Water was a gentle and beautiful woman who swirled into the fray as if she didn¡¯t have a single bone in her body. Nobody saw how she attacked, but a floating pool of water suddenly appeared beside the old crones and submerged them.

    The demi-overgod from the Dominion of Life was a man who loudly sang praises to the Goddess of Life as he emanated waves of life energy across the battlefield. Anybatant on their side who was still alive would be restored to fullbat capacity regardless of how severe their wounds.

    Apart from those three, two other demi-overgods nked the seven crones on both sides despite the barrage of the astrariums, slowly closing the distance between them and the crones. With every step the seven crones took backwards, many gods of the Dominion of Destiny would be killed. They no longer had an absolute advantage.

    The Dominion of Destiny¡¯s army seemed to be wavering against the sudden intense onught. Now, it seemed the other three dominions were holding a slight edge. Han Shuo was overjoyed at how chaotic the battle was turning. He wanted nothing more than for the ughter to speed up even more. The gods didn¡¯t notice the soft ck light above them that was absorbing divine souls from both sides.

    Another three hundred souls were snuck into the cauldron without anyone noticing. It was at that time that suddenly, the cauldron decided to stop being sneaky and it began absorbing souls at a ravenous rate. Anywhere the dark light appeared, souls would disappear. Damn, I¡¯ll be discovered at this rate! Slow down!

    At that moment, an odd sound could be heard from the Shrine of Destiny, before the mirror shed and disyed an image of the cauldron. Han Shuo knew the goddess must¡¯ve caught on.

    ¡°Both of you, pleasee to the shrine,¡± she said by sending a strong spirit wave.

    Fernando, still unaware of the situation, descended towards the shrine. Han Shuo hesitated for a bit before following him.

    ¡°Althea, why did you ask me toe down? Can¡¯t I watch the fight from above? It isn¡¯t against our agreement, right?¡±

    The shrine was made of an unknown material that somehow made the interior look like the gxy with countless moving stars. Han Shuo felt a little off when he stood upon it.

    Althea didn¡¯t answer Fernando¡¯s question and instead calmly looked at Han Shuo. ¡°Han Shuo, are you trying to cause trouble for me?¡±

    Fernando looked to Han Shuo oddly and asked, ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡±

    ¡°Take a look yourself!¡± Althea waved and showed a projection of what the cauldron was doing. It was all too clear that Han Shuo was collecting souls, so he couldn¡¯t talk his way out of it.

    Awkwardly, Han Shuoughed. ¡°Well, there¡¯s so many souls going around, so I reckoned it shouldn¡¯t affect you much. My demonic artifact can absorb souls like your mirror after all, and I¡¯m only going after the leftovers. Not to mention, this will strengthen it and have a huge effect on the growth of my cultivation. I¡¯ll be able to reach the level you expect much quicker. I thought you wouldn¡¯t mind that to be honest.¡±

    ¡°Han Shuo, that wouldn¡¯t be too appropriate, would it?¡± Fernando said after pondering it over.

    ¡°The souls are used by the mirror to stop the pull of Aethernia. It¡¯s for everyone¡¯s sake. Only then can the Quintessence overgods rest assured. Even though you don¡¯t have a Quintessence, Han Hao has one. Would you really let your greed take priority over your son¡¯s life?¡± she said, obviously displeased.

    Do you think Han Hao is just like you? It doesn¡¯t affect his Quintessence! Naturally, he wouldn¡¯t say that out loud. ¡°I was nning to only collect a little, but my demonic artifact is a little hard to control. I will keep it in check, don¡¯t worry.¡±

    ¡°If your artifact could help resist Aethernia¡¯s pull, I wouldn¡¯t mind letting you im some souls. But if it¡¯s not going to do anything for now, I hope you stop doing something so sneaky for everyone¡¯s sake!¡± she sternly said.

    Han Shuo talked to the Cauldron Spirit telepathically. ¡°Idiot, why are you making it so obvious? Stop now! We can only carry this out secretly. Are you trying to embarrass me? They already said that we can¡¯t absorb souls if we can¡¯t mitigate the pull.¡±

    ¡°Who said I couldn¡¯t?¡± the cauldron spirit snapped back. ¡°As long as I have enough souls in my body, let¡¯s say the power of ten thousand souls, I can mitigate part of the pull. If I have a hundred thousand souls to convert into demon generals, I can take on all of it! There¡¯s no need for that stupid Mirror of Destiny at all!¡±

    ¡°Are you sure?¡±

    ¡°Master, if I have 200 thousand souls, I can even smash Aethernia¡¯s barrier directly!¡±

    ¡°Han Shuo, what do you mean by this?¡± Althea said coldly. Nobody had dared to ignore her like that, and that was what Han Shuo appeared to be doing when he wasmuning with his cauldron. It displeased her greatly.

    ¡°I think I¡¯ll have a slice of that pie after all!¡± Han Shuo said with a smile after taking a deep breath.

 Chapter 1019 - Intensifying Battle

    GDK 1019: Intensifying Battle

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Earlier, Althea was only just mildly annoyed. But after hearing what Han Shou just said, her expression turned into a scowl and she no longer hid the anger she felt towards him. ¡°Do you think my Mirror of Destiny is collecting souls for fun? Without them, Aethernia¡¯s pull will grow stronger and stronger. We¡¯ll perish before you are able to smash the barrier around Aethernia!¡±

    Fernando also furrowed his brow, thinking that Han Shuo was going overboard. However, he didn¡¯t chew him up directly like Althea did. ¡°Han Shuo, doing so will only cause trouble for us. Even if I allow it, the others will not. By then, let alone Azdins, even Nestor, Amon, and Cratos will get mad at you about it.¡±

    While Althea might be collecting souls for her own ends as well, it was at least still justifiable. Without the mirror holding back Aethernia¡¯s pull, their Quintessence would¡¯ve long disappeared. So, even if Azdins, Nestor and the rest were unhappy about what she might be up to, they still had to do what she said and only dared to cause the smallest of troubles for her they think they could get away with.

    Han Shuo wasn¡¯t surprised at their responses. Smiling rxedly, he said, ¡°Don¡¯t get so angry and hear me out first.¡± Seeing that the two were calming down, he continued, ¡°Didn¡¯t you say that as long as I can mitigate the pull on the Quintessence, you¡¯ll allow me to collect souls?¡±

    Althea seemed a little weirded out and scrutinized him as she said, ¡°Are you saying you can do it?¡±

    Fernando was just as surprised. He looked at him with uncertainty and said, ¡°Han Shuo, you shouldn¡¯t say things like this lightly. The slightest mistake can ruin all of us.¡±

    ¡°Do I look like the kind of person who jokes about matters like these?¡± he put away the smile on his face and solemnly said, ¡°I can promise that once my demonic artifact absorbs enough souls, it could counteract Aethernia¡¯s pull the same. Not only that, with enough souls, it can even break Aethernia¡¯s barrier with ease.¡±

    Something shed across Althea¡¯s eyes. She seemed rather shaken as she stared at Han Shuo hard, before deliberating for a moment. ¡°Are you certain your artifact can break the barrier of Aethernia once it gathers enough souls?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded. ¡°I am sure. As long as there is enough, opening Aethernia up would be only a matter of course.¡±

    ¡°Very well!¡± she said, breathing so hard that her chest rose and fell. ¡°I will allow you to collect those souls. But you should know the consequence if you aren¡¯t able to break Aethernia¡¯s barrier by then.¡± She turned to Fernando and said, ¡°Fernando, please summon the other. This affects all of us and we have to make a new arrangement.¡±

    Fernando nodded and opened a few spatial pathways to invite the rest to the Shrine of Destiny.

    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± Azdins said with a beaming smile, as if the murderous gods that were just fighting nearby weren¡¯t his men.

    Nestor looked at Fernando doubtfully before turning back to Han Shuo. ¡°Is there anything up? Looks like you have something huge to discuss.¡±

    Althea, seeing Monroe, Lyna, and Azdins appeared, furrowed her brow ever so slightly as if she was unhappy about them attacking her dominion. She proceeded to brief the rest on the situation. When all of them heard it, they turned to Han Shuo with a doubtful look. Monroe was the most direct. ¡°Are you sure this kid isn¡¯t just making things up? This isn¡¯t something you should joke about. If he isn¡¯t certain, doesn¡¯t that mean we¡¯ll all die if he fails? Althea, don¡¯t you think it¡¯s pretty reckless of you to ce our survival on the brat?¡±

    Many others thought the same. They didn¡¯t believe Han Shuo actually had the ability to do that. Nestor, Amon, and Cratos didn¡¯t express their opinions on the matter, but they didn¡¯t stand up for Han Shuo either.

    ¡°I¡¯m not sure if what he says is true, but I believe we should gamble on it. We don¡¯t have much time left, so we can¡¯t give up on any chance.

    ¡°But I have an idea for a fail-safe measure. I hope you will all agree to doubling the casualties in this war. With that, even if Han Shuo¡¯s method doesn¡¯t work, my mirror will still have enough souls to mitigate the pull. What do you think?¡±

    ¡°This is a good idea. It can¡¯t hurt to be doubly prepared,¡± Nestor said, having not participated in battle up till now. Amon, Cratos, and Fernando also seemed to approve of the idea. Only Monroe, Lyna, and Azdins hadn¡¯t said anything yet. They were the ones who had suffered the most so far in the battle, so having more casualties might not necessarily be a good thing.

    ¡°What is your personal opinion, Althea?¡± Azdins asked, his smile having faded long ago.

    ¡°I believe it¡¯s worth trying. If he can open Aethernia up, sacrificing more souls is worth it. At the very least, it might give us a chance to kill her before she emerges from Aethernia on her own ord.¡±

    ¡°Haha, Azdins, Althea herself isn¡¯t against it while your side has the upper hand. So what are you worried about? Don¡¯t tell me you¡¯re chickening out?¡± Nestor egged on.

    ¡°Fine!¡± Azdinsughed heartily and said, ¡°Since Althea isn¡¯t afraid, why should I be? Monroe, Lyna, we can¡¯t shirk away when the others are stepping up.¡± He turned back to look at Althea, as if saying he was epting her challenge. The other two goddesses begrudgingly agreed, having always gone with Azdins¡¯s ns.

    ¡°Kid, if you can¡¯t open Aethernia when the timees, I¡¯ll sentence you to a fate worse than death!¡± She red threateningly at him.

    Han Shuo merely shrugged and smiled. ¡°Don¡¯t worry. I¡¯ll definitely not disappoint you.¡± Hmph, when my main body reaches the Diablo Realm, you¡¯re gonna get it!.

    ¡°Since that¡¯s the case, let us continue the war. There¡¯s no longer a need to hold back. Attack with all you got. I¡¯ll tell you all when enough souls are harvested. Until then, go wild!¡± Althea said impartially. ¡°You may return from whence you came. The spatial pathways are still there, so be on your way.¡±

    Azdins and the others left gloomily while Nestor, Amon, and Cratos shot Han Shuo an odd smile before leaving. Right as Han Shuo was about to leave with Fernando, Althea suddenly said, ¡°Let me im the souls on this side. You can im the ones on the other front near the Dominions of Light.¡±

    Having two people iming souls at the same location would cause quite a conflict, so Han Shuo found it to be rather reasonable. ¡°Very well. I¡¯ll head to the Dominion of Light then. Fernando, I¡¯ll have to trouble you to send me there.¡±

    ¡°No problem.¡± Fernando smiled and opened up a new pathway before going in himself first.

    Han Shuo gave Althea onest look before following Fernando through. The next moment, he noticed that he was now at the Dominion of Light¡¯s Kilomountain Range. This was the ce anyone would have to pass when entering the Dominion of Light. There were a thousand mountains of varying sizes, hence the name. Currently, there were countless gods battling each other. Those from the Dominions of Wind, Fire, Lightning, and Earth chased down the ones from the Dominions of Light, Water, and, Life and forced them further into the Dominion of Light.

    It was apparent from the countless enemy guardians they ughtered that the alliance of four dominions had the upper hand. But fortunately, the Dominion of Light had erected countless energy towers on the mountains that all emanated sacred light, which helped them stave off the harsh pursuit somewhat.

    The dense energy towers consumed an unimaginable number of energy crystals. The Dominion of Light must have prepared them for the Dominions of Death, Darkness and Destruction, but they had no choice but to use it to weather this unexpected assault from an alliance they did not expect. Han Shuo saw countless souls floating in the sky and began tough with excitement. Without hesitating, he brought the Cauldron of Myriad Demons and began to im them.

 Chapter 1020 - Giving You Hope

    GDK 1020: Giving You Hope

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Han Shuo loved to meet people who were about to die sooner orter, so each one of those souls he saw were like the most precious medicinal material to him. If anyone were to be more enthusiastic about this than he was, it would no doubt be the Cauldron of Myriad Demons. It turned into a beam of ck light and zipped around the mountains nonstop.

    As Han Shuo¡¯s demonic artifact, it became stronger and stronger as Han Shuo¡¯s mental realm rose, and the more it started to act on its own ord. Even though Han Shuo¡¯s main body was still controlling the cauldron all the way from Pandemonium, the Cauldron Spirit didn¡¯t need him to steer it and was able to unleash devastating power by itself. Anywhere the cauldron flew, the souls in the area would be sucked into it. In a single round around the mountain range, it got more than six hundred divine souls.

    Althea did keep her promise to not take the souls in this area, letting Han Shuo absorb them with his cauldron without issues. The more the battle intensified, the more excited he became.

    Soon, it became clear that the gods from the Dominions of Light, Life and Water could no longer resist the onught, not to mention the energy crystals powering their energy towers were running out. Continuing to fend off the assault of the Fire, Lightning, Wind, and Earth gods at the mountain range was no longer sensible, so they began to retreat.

    The intensity of battle died down slightly as a result. Only a few of the retreating gods were killed as they retreated in an orderly manner towards the closest fortress, Luminus.

    ¡°Han Shuo, Nestor and the others sent word that they want to start attacking the Dominion of Earth and asked to have your forces meet up with theirs at the Dominion of Destruction,¡± Fernando said right as Han Shuo was watching the cauldron im souls with a smile on his face.

    Fernando had made spatial mirrors for Amon, Nestor, and Cratos. They could use it tomunicate with each other at any time, so Fernando had a clear picture on everything that was happening on their ends.

    ¡°Oh?¡± Han Shuo stopped smiling and said, ¡°Nestor and the rest really know how to pick a time. I happened to notice that the Wind, Fire, Lightning, and Earth dominions have the highest poption and are the closest to the Dominion of Destruction. I guess earth might be the weakest of them all, and it would take quite some time before Wind, Fire, and Lightning would be able to send their reinforcements. That should be more than enough for the dominion to be ravaged heavily.¡±

    ¡°Perhaps they thought that Nestor and the others would sit and watch, so they picked this time to attack the Dominion of Light. Nestor and the others are sneakier than they make themselves up to be,¡± Fernando said.

    Han Shuo nodded in agreement with that assessment. ¡°I¡¯ll stay here to continue collecting souls, while my main body in Pandemonium will instruct my subordinates to go to the Dominion of Destruction using the spatial formation you set up. What will you be doing? Are you heading back to the Dominion of Space first?¡±

    ¡°I will. I¡¯ll get things in order first before checking in on Nestor and the rest at the Dominion of Destruction. If you need anything, feel free to contact me using the spatial mirror. I wille to you in an instant.¡± Then, Fernando left through a spatial tear.

    Having Fernando as an ally really is lucky, Han Shuo thought. Being able to stay connected with allies during such arge-scale battle was not just a great convenience, but also a great strategic advantage. With Fernando in their team, Han Shuo and the rest could remain a cohesive unit as well as be able toe up with solutions for urgent situations even when they were far apart.

    It was for this reason that Nestor and the others didn¡¯t leap into battle until they were certain Fernando was going to join them. In the past few battles of the gods, they had lost more often than they won. But the one time when they worked with Fernando, they got a really huge advantage and won. As such, the three considered Fernando to be of exceptional strategic value to them. For all crucial matters, they would always seek his opinion and only act once he agreed with what they were going to do.

    Seeing Fernando leave, Han Shuo stealthily made his way to the mountains to continue using the cauldron to harvest souls. Even though his main body wasn¡¯t here, his avatar wasn¡¯t someone just anybody could take on. In fact, they couldn¡¯t even detect his presence on the battlefield.

    Meanwhile, his main body used his powerful consciousness to inform Ss, Wasir, Stratholme, Bonds and other elites in the Fringe to gather their forces before heading to the Dominion of Destruction. Even though his body was underground, he was still able to easily tell what was happening all over the Fringe.

    ¡°Going back to the Dominion of Destruction? Gosh, we won¡¯t be hunted down the moment we set foot there, will we?¡± some of them wondered.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Back then, we were chased out of there for we had offended far too many people in that dominion. They even swore to never let us in ever again and would kill us if we do! Wouldn¡¯t we just be killed in an instant?¡± said another.

    They were those who had fled from the dominion toe to the Fringe. For all sorts of reasons, they were dered public enemies of the dominion and exiled by the city lords and guardians there, forbidden from ever returning. And now, after having finally settled down in the Fringe, they were told to return to the dominion, which bbergasted many of them.

    When they were exiled, they had given up on all hope of returning to the dominion. Even though they were its natives and still had family members there that they wanted to see, they didn¡¯t dare to risk it, especially after the arduous trip they took toe to the Fringe.

    ¡°What¡¯s all themotion about?¡± someone asked from afar. Ss descended around the fearful gods and said, ¡°Why are you afraid at a time like this?!¡±

    ¡°Lord Ss, it¡¯s not that we don¡¯t dare to return to the Dominion of Destruction. We¡¯re just worried we will cause trouble for everyone. After all, our reputation there is far too bad. The moment we arrive, they mighte to cause trouble for all of you on our ount. Do you think we should stay back instead?¡± said the leader of the worried fellows.

    Hearing that, Ss was reminded of their sensitive identities. Furrowing his brow, he wanted to reach out to Han Shuo, but before he even used his spatial mirror to contact him, Han Shuo sent a strand of his consciousness with a message. ¡°It¡¯s fine, they can go. Cratos has given the order. Nobody would dare to attack anyone from the Hexopolis, even if they have been exiled from the Dominions of Death, Destruction, and Darkness. If there¡¯s any problem, I will bear all responsibility.¡±

    Ss smiled and announced, ¡°I just got a message from Pandemonium that anyone from the Dominions of Death, Destruction, and Darkness will be able to return without any problem! He has negotiated with the three Overgods to make sure there will be no issue!¡±

    The gods, upon hearing that, were filled with excitement and hugged one another at the center of the Hexopolis, dancing with joy nonstop. They had been forbidden from returning to see their family and friends for so long that nobody could easily understand the pain they felt. Never had they imagined that the chance to return woulde to them. They were all too overjoyed when they heard Han Shuo¡¯s promise to them and couldn¡¯t praise him more than they already have.

    ¡°Alright you damned fools, shut up, all of you! Now get in line and head to the transference matrix!¡± Ss yelled, though he couldn¡¯t help but smile. He wanted to return to the Dominion of Lightning badly as well.

    Ss used to be quite the hero there back in the days and there were quite a few people there that he couldn¡¯t just bring himself to let go and cut tiespletely with. These past many years after he became a demi-overgod, he often snuck back there secretly, though he was always afraid he would be discovered by the guardians or attacked by the God of Lightning.

    But now, Ss saw hope in being able to return to the dominion one day and even get revenge against his sworn foe without worrying about the God of Lightning. That thought caused happiness to bubble uncontrobly in him, so he could empathize with these gods as well.

 Chapter 1021 - A Thousand Demon Guards

    GDK 1021: A Thousand Demon Guards

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Han Shuo was unaware of Ss¡¯s past, nor did he know what he was thinking now. However, he could feel how agitated Ss felt with a simple sweep of his consciousness. He didn¡¯t say too much and continued to absorb Mystical Yin after he gave his instructions.

    To him, while the battle of Elysium was important, his own cultivation was even more crucial. Aethernia would open one day and that was when all his debts were due. Monroe, Lyna, and Azdins had tolerated his requests so far. But once he was no longer of use to them, there was little doubt that they would act out against him.

    Given what Amon, Nestor, and Cratos had said, Han Shuo long had a rough idea what the others intended. They would wait for him to open Aethernia and attack him before he even got to enter. After all, the inheritor of the Exalted Demonlord Gu Tian Xie¡¯s legacy was just as much of a threat to them as the Allmother was.

    While Amon and the other two had said that they would help him when the time came, he couldn¡¯t be sure he could trust them yet, so he wouldn¡¯t leave his fate in their hands. As a result, the only thing he could do was to continuously increase his strength at any cost, no matter what methods he used. That was the reason he was willing to risk angering the other Quintessence overgods to absorb some of the souls meant for the Mirror of Destiny for his own use.

    A trail of electricity that was barely visible to the eye entered his demon body, causing his flesh, bones and innards to pulse nonstop. His body was like a ck hole that sucked in all the Mystical Yin he could.

    Mystical Yin had gathered on Elysium,pletely untouched and unused, for aeons, so the amount avable was unimaginable. But by using the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester, he would be able to absorb all of that within two centuries. Momentster, his body hardened like stone once more as he continued to absorb the abundant energy.

    His main body basically never left Pandemonium while his clone was lingering around the Dominions of Light, Life, and Water. Anywhere battles ured, his avatar appeared with the Cauldron of Myriad Demons to absorb the souls of dead gods. Each time, he was just as ted to witness his growing harvest.

    Meanwhile, the attacking armies of those dominions had to return from the Dominion of Destiny as their own home turf was being attacked. Their champion, Gy¨¢l, led them back before managing to destroy the Dominion of Destiny. As Gy¨¢l didn¡¯t have the advantage of a spatial transference formation, he found the Dominion of Light heavily damaged by the time he returned.

    The forces of Darkness, Death, Destruction and the Fringe led by Yarus, Bonds and the rest began their onught at the Dominion of Earth, ravaging a few cities in one go and making their way all the way up to the Shrine of Earth. As Han Hao¡¯s godhunter subordinates had rather sensitive identities, they didn¡¯t participate in the main battles and instead turned to the stragglers, taking advantage of the chaos at the hotbeds of battle all across the Dominion of Earth.

    When the attackers from the Dominions of Wind, Fire, Lightning, and Earth got wind of Gy¨¢l returning to the Dominion of Light as well as Bonds and Yarus ravaging their own homes, they immediately sent out forces to upy some areas to facilitate a safe and smooth retreat from the Dominion of Light and back to the Dominion of Earth.

    Across all those battles, an elite group stood out with great ir among the rest: the Han Demon Guards! The demon guards who had emerged from the Eight Destion and Torment Formation numbered around a thousand, but each one of them possessed immensebat prowess. They were an incredibly sharp bread that cut through enemy ranks like butter straight into the heart of the Dominion of Earth. Any guardians of the dominion that ran into the Han Demon Guards had only one fate: decimation!

    The thousand demon guards worked with great synchronization, and thanks to the many demon formations, they performed at their utmost potential. It was thanks to them that Yarus and the rest were able to continue their ughter all across the Dominion of Earth. Almost overnight, the Han Demon Guards¡¯ fame spread all across Elysium and everybatant in the battle from the elite guardians of the Dominions of Wind, Fire, and Lightning shivered at the thought of meeting them on the battlefield. They quickly sent scouts to monitor the Han Demon Guards to try to find a way they could deal with them.

    The whole of Elysium now knew of the Han Demon Guards and were trying toe up with countermeasures for them to close the distance between them. As the battle went on, about ten thousand lives had been lost across Elysium, around seven thousand of which were harvested by the Goddess of Destiny. While Han Shuo had Fernando¡¯s help iming souls, he was a littlete and only got about three thousand of them.

    Even so, he did feel the cauldron grow stronger. After most of the souls were refined by the cauldron into demon generals, Han Shuo¡¯s main body could now remain connected to the cauldron without interruption no matter where on Elysium they were.

    While his main body was deep underground, he had aplete knowledge of the battle situation thanks to the connection. With a single thought, he could control the cauldron to start collecting even more souls.

    At this stage, his avatar didn¡¯t serve much of a purpose anymore. Even now, he still wasn¡¯t able to properly fuse the two halves together. As both the souls of the two halves hade from the cauldron¡¯s demon generals, he couldn¡¯t use his avatar to properly control the cauldron, so his main body had to do most of the work.

    Today, his avatar had nothing better to do and returned to Pandemonium. Just as he arrived, Rose came up to wee him. ¡°Bryan, I have something to say to you.¡±

 Chapter 1022 - Let Them Come

    GDK 1022: Let Them Come

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Han Shuo felt his scalp tingle as he followed Rose to a small hill near Pandemonium. That hill was one of the cornerstones of the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester Formation, so it was located in a rather rural area where people did not usually visit. Han Shuo didn¡¯t know what to say when he saw Rose fidgeting around hesitantly.

    ¡°Bryan, our master-servant contract still isn¡¯t nullified, right?¡± she said when she finally turned to him.

    He felt a little relieved that this was what it was about. ¡°It can be nullified at any time. Do you want me to do it now?¡± he said with a smile.

    ¡°Sure.¡± She nodded.

    His main body willed it, immediately severing their linked souls. The contract was no longer worth anything nowadays to him anyway. A soul contract was a unique application of the power of destiny. Whenever one was made, the Goddess of Destiny would draw some energy from the power between their souls and use the Mirror of Destiny to link their threads together. But the moment Han Shuo reached the Diablo Realm, his fate was no longer something Althea could be privy to. The contract that remained was only something Han Shou intentionally left active, so he could nullify it at any time.

    ¡°Well, we¡¯re finally talking to each other as equals then.¡± She mustered her courage and looked straight into his eyes. ¡°I don¡¯t want to be your servant. I want to be like Emily and Phoebe! Bryan, you know what I mean!¡±

    Han Shuo tensed up right after he rxed himself. There was no way he wouldn¡¯t know what she intended at his level, but he still said with an awkward smile, ¡°What do you mean, Rose?¡±

    ¡°You know it. Stop pretending!¡± she snapped, ¡°You had a link directly with my soul, so you know what I was thinking the whole time!¡±

    Han Shuo was stunned at hearing those words. After some silence, he shook his head and said, ¡°Why do you want that? You¡¯ve been here in Pandemonium the whole time. Surely you¡¯ve seen that I haven¡¯t been spending much time with Emily and the others either. I¡¯ve been using all that time on my cultivation. Being with me will only bring more pain to you.¡±

    ¡°I don¡¯t care! Even if it brings me pain, it¡¯s what I chose!¡± She took a deep breath to calm her heavy breathing. ¡°Are you saying we can¡¯t be like that?¡± she asked, a little fearful to hear the answer.

    Back when they were in the Dominion of Darkness, Rose had been tagging along with him the whole time throughout the City of Shadows and the battle at Hushveil City. She had stood strong beside him all the way. Aftering to the Fringe, she had also helped him recruit Romon, Zovic and many others.

    Han Shuo was a sentimental person and he had always found it hard to refuse a woman¡¯s advances. Since Rose liked him so much, what else could he say now that he was confronted with it?

    ¡°Fine... Since I already have so many, there¡¯s no harm in getting one more. However, I will have less and less time in the future and can¡¯t spend much of it with you. This is the choice you made!¡±

    Rose, who didn¡¯t really dare to look at him, suddenly shot him a bright smile. She didn¡¯t need him to promise to stay by her side for the rest of her life, that was the only answer she needed.

    ......

    Right now, Han Shuo didn¡¯t have the luxury of indulging in his many lovers as they didn¡¯t like getting intimate with his avatar. While he was mentally speaking the same person, physically, something seemed to becking.

    He kept himself busy the whole time at Pandemonium, receiving word from Nestor, Amon, and Cratos daily about the war effort. Bonds, Sanguis, and the rest were also not afraid to disturb him with the regr detailed battle reports they sent through spatial mirrors.

    The allied army of Death, Destruction, and Darkness ughtered many gods during their plundering of the Dominion of Earth. As thebatants of Wind, Fire, Lightning, and Earth began their retreat from the Dominion of Light, Han Shuo moved his cauldron to the Dominion of Earth.

    Right now, the battle at the Dominion of Destiny hade to a pause, so Althea had been focusing on iming the souls at the Dominion of Earth as well, which resulted in some conflict between her and Han Shuo. Fortunately, the two of them were reasonable and tried not to encroach upon areas where the other was already iming souls.

    In the end, the invading forces of Death, Destruction, and Darkness entering started to sh with the defending forces of Wind, Fire, Lightning, and Earth. That finally marked the start of these two factions¡¯ battles.

    At the city of Redmud in the Dominion of Earth, the gods of Wind, Fire, Lightning, and Earth gathered on the city walls, releasing barrage after barrage of fire from energy crystal cannons. Outside of the city were the forces led by Yarus, Bonds, Sanguis and the rest. The gods on their side charged towards the city walls without regard for their safety with the intent on wiping all the gods within it out.

    The Han Demon Guards stood out particrly among them. Their orderly formations and ster coordination with Bonds, Sanguis, and Gilbert leading them allowed them to carve a path straight towards the city. Despite the constant cannon barrage, their forces advanced at a steady pace.

    ¡°I guess there was a reason Bryan managed to be the ruler of the Fringe and obtain the Overgods¡¯ acknowledgement so quickly,¡± Yarus said as he watched the Han Demon Guards from afar during his own charge.

    ¡°I worry that we won¡¯t be able to call his name directly in the future anymore,¡± the lord of Darkwater City said. ¡°It was no wonder that we lost to him back then.¡±

    ¡°Now, I look at that loss like a badge of honor!¡± the lord of Darkstone City said.

    ¡°Not bad. Losing in a fight to someone like that can hardly be called humiliating. It¡¯s an eternal honor to have faced off against someone like him!¡± Yarus said. ¡°Quick, the folks from the Fringe are showing us up! If we don¡¯t try harder, our Lord will be displeased!¡±

    Hearing that, the fighters from the Dominion of Darkness charged more fervently towards Redmud.

    ¡°We¡¯ve breached it! Hahaha!¡± Sanguis said, a strong, bloody air wafting all over him. With a wave of the bloody greatsword in his hand, the gods on the defensive walls died from their blood going out of control, bleeding out of all their orifices. Using that chance, Sanguis, Gilbert and Bonds were the first to step onto the walls. They proceeded to kill off all the other gods that were operating the energy crystal cannons.

    With the barrage now halted, the only defense that the city had was its barrier. City barriers only had limited defense capacity, so the one of Redmud was overloaded soon after the other charging gods attacked it. It shattered audibly, exposing the entirety of the city to the invaders.

    ¡°Kill!¡± The forces of Darkness, Death, Destruction, and the Fringeughed maniacally as they charged in, killing not just the guardians of the city but also anyone they set their sights on. The entire city was leveled from the earthquakes, lightning storms, howling gale, and glowing embers.

    ......

    ¡°Lord, Redmud¡¯s gate has been breached! Even if we couldn¡¯t obtain aplete victory, we can at least cause the four dominions heavy casualties!¡± Zovic reported to Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo, who was expounding the mysteries of various kinds of energies amidst a group of women, nodded. ¡°I¡¯m not surprised that Redmud was breached. Is there anything else that¡¯s noteworthy?¡±

    ¡°The fighters of Light, Life and Water only returned to Luminus for a short while before leaving,¡± Zovic said after some hesitation.

    ¡°Where are they heading?¡± Han Shuo asked.

    ¡°Umm... They¡¯re actuallying towards us. If I¡¯m not mistaken, they¡¯re targeting the Fringe.¡±

    ¡°Ah! Hehe, I guess Azdins thinks we¡¯re easy pickings!¡±

    ¡°They¡¯re probably having a hard time with our thousand demon guards, so they want to wipe us out before they return!¡± Zovic said. He seemed to understand the reason behind the troop movements of the Dominion of Light.

    ¡°Taking the initiative isn¡¯t a bad move for him,¡± Han Shuo said with a smile. ¡°By now, a chaotic battle is breaking out at the Dominion of Earth. Even with a spatial transference formation, there¡¯s no way we can focus on both battlefronts at the same time, as I¡¯m sure Azdins is aware.¡±

    ¡°What do we do, Lord?¡± Zovic asked worriedly. ¡°We really don¡¯t have many fighters who remained in Pandemonium. The moment their forces reach Hexopolis, we won¡¯t be able to hold out!¡±

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. We¡¯ll do what we have to.¡± He smirked coldly and continued, ¡°Let theme. As long as Han Jin and the other four are at Hexopolis, we¡¯ll even wee their arrival!¡±

 Chapter 1023 - They Came, They Saw, They Left

    <h4>Chapter 1023: They Came, They Saw, They Left</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Zovic didn¡¯t inform the rest in the Fringe about the iing danger and instead notified only the Five Elite Zombies at Hexopolis about it. Like Han Shuo, Han Jin seemed really casual about the whole affair. ¡°Just let theme.¡± Like crazy father like crazy son.

    The battle at the Dominion of Earth continued intensely. Fighters from all seven dominions shed in a huge mess, but the Han Demon Guards yed the most important role in that battle. Ss, Wasir and the other fugitive gods also performed really well, which wasn¡¯t surprising for gods who had survived the chaotic Fringe. They were ruthless and fearless, showing Yarus what real savagery looked like.

    Fernando¡¯s subordinates from the Dominion of Space had yet to participate in the battle so far to ensure that their allies would be able to rapidly respond to any situation that needed them. After all, if the Dominions of Light, Life and Water could surprise attack the Dominion of Destiny and the Dominions of Earth, Wind, Lightning, and Fire couldunch a surprise attack on the former alliance in their absence, there was also a good chance the Dominion of Darkness, Death, and Destruction as well as the Fringe to be attacked at any time.

    To prevent themselves from being taken by surprise, they decided to leave the elite fighters from the Dominion of Space to take on a supporting role. Being practitioners of the energy of space and having spatial transference matrixes, they were able to rapidly respond if either of those territories were attacked.

    Not to mention, the gods of the Dominion of Space were also in charge of transmitting news among their allies. The one who brought Zovic the news of the iing attackers was none other than McKinley himself. Once McKinley sent word there, he immediately contacted two other city lords to gather reinforcements to be sent to Hexopolis immediately.

    At the highest point of the battle at the Dominion of Earth, the invaders from the Dominions of Light, Life, and Water finally reached the Fringe. Within a swift seven days, they made their way to Hexopolis.

    On the walls of Hexopolis stood Han Jin, Han Shui, Han Mu, Han Huo and Han Tu in a pentagonal formation, each one taking care of one side of the defensive wall. One figure after another also appeared from the spatial transference matrix within the city: they were gods from the Dominion of Space. Immediately, they teleported to any ce where there was a gap in defense.

    ¡°Oh, why are you all here?¡± Han Jin asked McKinley, who had suddenly teleported next to him.

    ¡°Haha, supporting the dominions of our allies is our responsibility. Now that the other three dominions are fine while you are being attacked, we naturally have toe. Though, if any of the other three dominions are also under attack, I¡¯d stille to the Fringe to help out!¡±

    McKinley had an interesting history with the House of Han. Han Shuo had even offended Azdins on his behalf by destroying Gy¨¢l, one of the three Keepers of the Light. Since then, he was really close to the House of Han.

    ¡°Han Jin, let me introduce you to Karey. He¡¯s here specifically to handle Gy¨¢l. Naturally, I will also fight Gy¨¢l, but I worry I¡¯m not his match,¡± McKinley said as he introduced Han Jin to a white-haired old man with a long beard. He was a space cultivator who had traveled throughrge distances of space on Fernando¡¯s orders to fight Gy¨¢l.

    ¡°Ah, nice to meet you!¡± Han Jin greeted warmly. ¡°Looks like Gy¨¢l is going to die for sure this time then.¡±

    McKinley and Karey bothughed as they turned to watch the enemy forces approach from the distance. ¡°How should we deal with them?¡±

    ¡°Just watch. It¡¯s about to begin,¡± Han Jin said with a chuckle. All of a sudden, he yelled loudly. From four other directions in Hexopolis, Han Shui, Han Mu, Han Huo and Han Tu responded. Then, Han Jin jumped forwards into a hole that opened up in the earth before he was wrapped inside it.

    The moment he fell into the earth, the entirety of Hexopolis shook and seemed to groan. Subsequently, the ground cracked open in the midst of the forces of Light, Life, and Water, letting out countless sharp spikes that skewered many gods. Hotva immediately came flooding out and set fires all over the ce. There were many explosions among the enemy ranks which resulted inrge columns of smoke rising into the sky and obscuring any and all light. Amidst the cloudy darkness, hints of light shed as icicles came falling from the sky, skewering even more enemy gods. It was as if the world was ending!

    The Five Elite Zombies utilized their Penta-elemental Undead Formation to the utmost, operating it like a machine of ughter. They didn¡¯t spare anyone they could kill, sending soul after soul rising up into the sky. Even though McKinley and the other space cultivators had a n to repel the enemy they wanted to ry to Han Jin before the fight, they didn¡¯t expect Han Jin to just leap into the fray immediately. Not only that, they didn¡¯t see anyone in Hexopolisunching those attacks.

    ¡°Holy fuck! What in the world is happening?!¡± The usually well-mannered Karey couldn¡¯t help but curse at what he saw.

    McKinley shook his head in resignation and sighed. ¡°I told you that the House of Han is scarily powerful. You¡¯ll finally believe me now, right?¡±

    Karey snapped out of his stupor. ¡°But this is a little too insane, isn¡¯t it? I didn¡¯t even get to see who made the attack! Isn¡¯t this kind of power in the league of Quintessence overgods? Am Igging behind the times because I¡¯ve left Elysium for far too long?¡± After hesitating for some time, Karey turned to McKinley with a solemn look. ¡°Are they breaking any rules? Will the Quintessence overgods join the battle directly?¡±

    ¡°How would I know?¡±

    Ever since thest battle at Hexopolis, Han Jin got a huge boost in power from the exploding energy crystals. The other four also obtained arcane orbs refined from demi-overgod souls. Not to mention, after the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester Formation wasplete, they also got some benefits from it. Thanks to the huge amount of Mystical Yin in Pandemonium and their arcane orbs, they managed to break through. Nowadays, the five of them weren¡¯t weaker than average demi-overgods, and them working together using their Penta-elemental Undead Formation only served to boost their power many times over.

    Being unique lifeforms, the Five Elite Zombies were able to fuse the elemental yuan energy they cultivated with the fundamental forces of this world, allowing their power to soar to such heights, which was why Han Shuo wasn¡¯t too concerned about the approaching invaders. It wasn¡¯t just McKinley and Karey; the other gods in Hexopolis couldn¡¯t believe their eyes. While those five rarely walked about in public, many people knew who they really were. Even so, they weren¡¯t expecting them to be powerful to that extent.

    ¡°Lord McKinley, the elites from the Dominion of Destiny haveunched an attack! They¡¯re actually invading the Fringe!¡± someone reported to McKinley through his magic mirror. He immediately asked for more details and found that many elite destiny cultivators had managed to evade the eyes of the space cultivator scouts to arrive at the Fringe, which was located between the Dominions of Space and Destiny. They weren¡¯t a long distance away, so the destiny cultivators were able to swiftly begin their attack.

    ¡°Hey, it looks like the Dominion of Destiny is going to use this chance to take on the Fringe,¡± McKinley told Karey.

    ¡°There¡¯s a chance they¡¯re going after the forces of Light, Life and Water too. They were the ones whounched an attack on the Dominion of Destiny first,¡± Karey said, ¡°But given how they do things, they¡¯re most likely trying to take advantage of the whole situation and deal a blow on both the Fringe and the alliance.¡±

    McKinley smirked. ¡°Hmph! They think they can swoop right in to take advantage of us? Let¡¯s see if they can fight their way past us then!¡±

    ¡°McKinley, don¡¯t be reckless! The united forces of Light, Life, and Water weren¡¯t able to gain an edge on the Dominion of Destiny even though they attacked first! We might not be their match. Why don¡¯t we send the elites of the Dominions of Death, Destruction, and Darkness who are on standby here as reinforcements instead?¡±

    McKinley calmed down at the reminder, gave it some thought, and agreed. ¡°This is the safest move to make. Let¡¯s do it then!¡±

    ¡°Lord, Lord, the destiny cultivators are turning back,¡± reported someone through the magic mirror once more.

    ¡°What?!¡± cried McKinley and Karey. They turned to look at the chaotic battlefront and instantly understood why. If they were in their shoes, they would definitely turn tail and run at the sight of such devastation too.

    Note: the final chapter is now avable on patreon!

 Chapter 1024 - Penalized

    <h4>GDK 1024: Penalized</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    The gods from the Dominion of Destiny came suddenly and left just as abruptly. McKinley and Karey had prepared themselves for a harsh battle. After all, they couldn¡¯t afford to ignore the invaders from the Dominions of Light, Life and Water, let alone a powerhouse that had managed to fend them off.

    Putting the magic mirror in his hand away, McKinley smiled and turned to look at the powerful formation continuing to shave down the ranks of the allied invaders without knowing what to do. He had known that Han Shuo¡¯s subordinates would be powerful, but not nearly to that extent. Most of the fighting force came from Han Jin, Han Shui, Han Mu, Han Huo and Han Tu, all demi-overgods operating a huge formation within Hexopolis.

    It was at this moment that two uninvited visitors came to Pandemonium. The moment Azdins and Monroe, the Gods of Light and Water respectively, entered, Han Shuo¡¯s main body felt their presence and used his avatar to wee them.

    ¡°Wow, I wasn¡¯t expecting honored guests like you today.¡±

    ¡°Han Shuo, you didn¡¯t follow the rules!¡± Azdins used in a deep voice without a slightest hint of a smile on his face. At the same time, Han Shuo¡¯s main body underground also noticed the Goddess of Life arriving at Hexopolis and letting out arge storm of life force to heal the gods on their side before using another life storm to disrupt the souls of the Five Elite Zombies to interrupt them from using their Penta-elemental Undead Formation.

    His expression turning grim, Han Shuo snapped, ¡°Azdins, Monroe, what is the meaning of this?!¡±

    At the same time, spatial pathways opened up in Pandemonium, out of which Fernando, Amon, Nestor and Cratos emerged. They all red at Azdins and Monroe angrily.

    ¡°What did those five do outside Hexopolis?!¡± Monroe shrieked, ¡°Half of our army died by their hands! How could this happen if not for rules being broken?!¡±

    The four who just arrived were stunned when they heard it, though they didn¡¯t have a full grasp on the situation. Fernando turned to Han Shuo and said, ¡°Is that really true?¡±

    Han Shuo nodded. ¡°Those five are demi-overgods. Not a single one of them have the power of Quintessence! There are also demi-overgods among those invading the Fringe! How in the world was any rule broken?!¡±

    ¡°Those five may individually be demi-overgods, but they are half as powerful as a Quintessence overgodbined!¡± Azdins raged,pletely losing any trace of his former calm. ¡°If this goes on, there¡¯s no point in continuing the battle! They can sweep the entire Elysium clean if we allow them to continue, so what¡¯s the point?¡±

    ¡°That¡¯s right!¡± Althea said as she descended into Pandemonium without using a spatial pathway. ¡°Those fivebined do indeed have the power of half a Quintessence overgod, not just five demi-overgods. Han Shuo, the battle will be pointless if this continues. The Fringe will just wipe everything out.¡±

    Azdins and Monroe immediately began discussing how to penalize Han Shuo, while Fernando, Nestor, Amon, and Cratos supported Han Shuo and began arguing with the other side. Pandemonium got really noisy from their nonstop argument and no side prevailed.

    ¡°As usual, let¡¯s go with a majority vote.¡± Althea suggested to Fernando since their stalemate wasn¡¯t about to break. The twelve Quintessence overgods had always resorted to a vote whenever they had disagreements. Even though Fernando knew the numbers weren¡¯t in their favor, he had no choice. The old rules couldn¡¯t be broken, so he opened up more spatial pathways to bring the other Quintessence overgods to Pandemonium.

    As expected, apart from Han Shuo, Han Hao, Fernando, Nestor, Amon and Cratos, the others voted to penalize Han Shuo. It was eight against six, so it couldn¡¯t be helped.

    ¡°Fine, from now onwards I won¡¯t let them work together, lest you use me of bullying you,¡± Han Shuo said, shrugging.

    ¡°No, those five can¡¯t fight at all! I noticed that any two of them working together will more than double their power!¡± Lyna said, ¡°I don¡¯t know how they do it, but as long as they¡¯re together, they can muster some kind of destructive power, and each additional person causes their power to rise ten times or more! Those five can definitely not join the fight!¡±

    Hearing that, those that opposed Han Shou¡¯s side looked even grimmer. They weren¡¯t worried about the Five Elite Zombies themselves. Instead, they were concerned about Han Shuo, who had made them with his demonic arts. If Han Hao, a practitioner of demonic arts and a unique lifeform, could gain a Quintessence, how powerful would Han Shuo be since he had been cultivating demonic arts the whole time?

    The thought of Gu Tian Xie breaking through the universes and heavily wounding the Allmother was terrifying enough. If Han Shuo had even a part of his power, even if they got rid of the Allmother, they wouldn¡¯t be able to deal with Han Shuo. That was why many of them had secretly decided they would wipe him out after he broke the barrier of Aethernia no matter the cost.

    ¡°Fine. It¡¯s not like I have the numbers to oppose your side anyway. Why not make a few more unfair rules while you¡¯re at it?¡± He noticed that apart from Fernando, who seemed to have his side no matter what, even Amon, Nestor, and Cratos seemed cautious of him. The Five Elite Zombies had indeed shocked them too much with their power. If this went on, even his three allies might consider what would happen after the Allmother was taken care of. He knew that this wasn¡¯t the time to agitate them, lest his side lost even more before they even broke the barrier of Aethernia.

    ¡°This will be it. Those five will not be allowed to join the fight. The battle shall continue,¡± Althea decided.

    ¡°Althea, how many more are needed?¡± Azdins asked, wincing at the thought of all that lost life. The side of Light, Life, and Water had suffered immense casualties at the hands of the Five Elite Zombies right after a losing skirmish at the Dominion of Destiny. Later, the side of Wind, Fire, Lightning, and Earthunched a surprise attack on the Dominion of Light and caused them even more losses. Now, his dominion was the weakest of the three. He was beginning to feel like the fighting should stop.

    ¡°I¡¯ll be done soon. I don¡¯t know about him,¡± Althea said, trying to divert their rage on him.

    ¡°How many more?¡± Azdins, Monroe, and Lyna asked with an angry look.

    ¡°I¡¯ll be done soon too,¡± he answered awkwardly, knowing that they were in a terrible mood. The Gods of Earth, Wind, Fire, and Lightning who had suffered heavy losses too didn¡¯t seem to fare any better. If he really told them that the more dead the better, they might just lose it right then and turn against him.

    ¡°If my dominion no longer has any gods to fight, don¡¯t me me for breaking the rules and wiping out every one of yours!¡± Azdins snapped before angrily leaving. Monroe and Lyna shot him another angry look before leaving too.

    The other gods humphed awkwardly before leaving through their spatial pathways, while Althea shot him an odd look and left by flight instead of using a spatial pathway.

    ¡°Alright, we need to go about this moderately. Better start holding back!¡± Cratos said with a pat on Han Shuo¡¯s shoulder. ¡°If this goes on, those fellows will lose control of themselves. What do you think?¡±

    ¡°I¡¯ve never been an instigator. I¡¯m always a pacifist. If anyone doesn¡¯te to offend me, I would never offend them!¡± He shrugged and put up his most innocent look.

    ¡°We¡¯re talking about him,¡± Nestor said as he pointed to the silent Han Hao. ¡°As the fight goes on, the godhunters in all the dominions have caused heavy damage. We can¡¯t let that go on.¡±

    ¡°I see.¡± Han Shuo nodded and gave Han Hao a look. ¡°It¡¯s fine, you guys should head back too. The battle at the Dominion of Earth is still ongoing.¡±

    ¡°Alright.¡± Nestor and the others nodded before leaving through the spatial pathways.

    ¡°I, for one, support you,¡± Fernando said when he was the only one remaining before vanishing.

    ¡°I¡¯ll make sure to leave your dominion alone intact in the future,¡± Han Shuo said with a sinister smile.

 Chapter 1025 - Im Ready

    <strong>GDK 1025: I¡¯m Ready</strong>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    The Five Elite Zombies no longer participated in the battle. But the damage they had wrought was already enough to cause the remnant forces of Light, Life, and Water to no longer threaten the space cultivators stationed at the Fringe. In the end, they had no choice but to retreat, lest the army bepletely annihted.

    Later, the battle at the Dominion of Earth saw the sides from Earth, Wind, Lightning, Fire, Darkness, Destruction, Death, and the Fringe suffer rtively heavy casualties. Even quite a few of Wasir and Ss¡¯s men perished.

    Azdins had said quite a threat before he left the Fringe. Among all the factions, the Light, Life, and Water side suffered the greatest casualties and stopped making any provocations. The other dominions also didn¡¯t test their bottom line and left them alone. As for the Dominion of Destiny, nothing really happened there. Ever since they had retreated from the Fringe, they seemed to have quieted down and didn¡¯t attack anywhere else either, choosing instead to hole up in their own dominion.

    Gradually, the only battlefront that remained was the one at the Dominion of Earth. With the forces of Earth, Wind, Lightning, and Wind all deployed there, Nestor and the rest no longer had the upper hand and the tide quickly turned against them. When the three started racking up casualties, they pleaded with Han Shuo to cease the fighting as soon as possible. After all, Althea did announce that her mirror had sufficient souls. Although Han Shuo had wanted more souls, he had no choice but topromise and also announced that he had enough. With that, the battle of the gods came to an end.

    The battle hadsted a whole fifty years, with the side of Light, Life, and Water suffering the heaviest casualties. Two-thirds of the gods in their dominions were gone with many cities burning to ruins and uninhabited.

    The Dominions of Earth, Wind, Lightning and Fire were next, Earth especially as the battle fought there was the most intense. They had already suffered a huge loss from the very beginning fighting against Darkness, Death, and Destruction, and the attack on their home ground caused them to lose too many gods.

    During that battle, Nestor and the rest didn¡¯t fare too well either, with many of Ss and Wasir¡¯s men perishing from the fight. As for the Dominion of Destiny, they managed to preserve much of their forces as they were only attacked once by the allied forces of Light, Life, and Water, and didn¡¯t engage in the other battles.

    Needless to say, the Dominion of Space lost the least number of gods, being mainly put in charge of transport andmunication. They only joined the final battle at the Dominion of Earth to help their allies, but it didn¡¯tst long before Han Shuo announced that the cauldron now had enough souls.

    The Han Demon Guards led by Bonds, Sanguis and Gilbert, however, didn¡¯t suffer many losses. They stood out the most among all the fighters and performed the best. Using expert coordination, they shocked the entirety of Elysium with their prowess, now hailed as the strongest unit of fighters across all of Elysium.

    As for Han Hao¡¯s Godhunter Alliance, they didn¡¯t join any of therge factions but they did show up where the battles were the most intense. However, they didn¡¯t fight in open battle and instead went after the stragglers and deserters or the gods who were going to reinforce others. Like a venomous snake in the bushes, they struck when their foes let their guard down before swiftly retreating. The godhunters had a huge effect on how the battles turned out, attacking almost any side they encountered. However, the city lords absolutely loathed them for all the damage they¡¯ve caused.

    Now that the battle of the gods was officially over, the dominions began gathering their forces and training new guardians to make up for those who perished in battle. Meanwhile, the Quintessence overgods went to Han Shuo to ask him if he could already break the barrier of Aethernia as the city¡¯s threat began to loom closer and closer to them. However, Han Shuo kept turning down the excursion to Aethernia with the excuse that his main body¡¯s power wasn¡¯t enough to allow him to control the Cauldron of Myriad Demons freely yet. His main body and avatar remained in seclusion within Pandemonium as he quietly made his preparations.

    ......

    Eventually, another hundred and fifty years passed. A powerful wave of energy came sweeping out from Pandemonium, sending chills down everyone across Elysium. The Quintessence overgods also seemed to feel the massive radiation of energy from the Fringe. Right above Pandemonium was a vortex of Mystical Yin. It was so dense that traces of white-colored Mystical Yin could be seen with the naked eye, swirling as it descended into Pandemonium.

    Now, the ce was a sea of white. The Quintessence overgods could feel a power they couldn¡¯tprehending from within, causing them to gather there. The whole ce was filled with all the Mystical Yin that had gathered on Elysium across aeons, which had been absorbed fully in the past two centuries and converted into stored energy.

    ......

    ¡°This energy might just be enough to break Aethernia¡¯s barrier!¡± Althea said when she felt the oppressive and ethereal forceing from the depths of Pandemonium. After beingpressed heavily, the Mystical Yin now took on a mercurial form.

    ¡°Althea, did we make the wrong choice after all?¡± Azdins said with a sigh. ¡°I can be sure now that he¡¯s already more powerful than us. Even if the Allmother is eradicated, he¡¯s not someone that we can defeat.¡±

    After some pondering, she said, ¡°Azdins, I know what you¡¯re worrying about, but you don¡¯t have to worry. The moment Aethernia is destroyed, we won¡¯t be the first ones to take the fall.¡±

    Monroe¡¯s eyes glowed as she smiled and nodded. ¡°That¡¯s right. To the Allmother, he¡¯s definitely the biggest threat. He uses an energy that doesn¡¯t belong in this universe ¨C the same energy that the Being used to injure Her. He should be the Allmother¡¯s top priority.¡±

    The others nodded and smiled. Nestor, Amon, and Cratos also seemed rather unsure, having been startled by the staggering force emanating from Pandemonium. They were also doubting whether siding with Han Shuo was the right choice to make. The only one who seemed happy about it was Fernando. Now that Han Shuo¡¯s power seemed to not belong in this universe, he finally had hope of being able to leave this universe. To Fernando, the stronger Han Shuo was, the better.

    A long roar could be heard from underground. All of a sudden, the Mystical Yin that gathered there swirled into the depths at lightning speed, concentrating to a single point in a few minutes¡¯ time, causing another wave of powerful energy to sweep out.

    Then, arge crevice opened up at Pandemonium. A figure shrouded in white mist emerged from it, the mercurial Mystical Yin flowing nonstop around his body as it got more and morepressed as the power from the figure grew stronger. All of a sudden, the figure sucked all the mist into its pores including all the mercurial Mystical Yin. Gradually, he returned to ¡®normal¡¯ human form as the other gods watched.

    At the same time, a spatial pathway opened and a gigantic bone throne emerged from it. Negative energies like evil, cruelty, hate, wrath and violence emerged from Han Hao, who was seated in the throne. He kept his eyes on Han Shuo as he muttered, ¡°Father, you¡¯re finally at the Diablo Realm. You¡¯re the Lord of All Demons!¡±

    Then, an intense light shone from his body. When it slowly receded, Han Shuo walked towards them with a smile, dressed in his signature ck clothes.

    ¡°I¡¯m ready,¡± he said, ¡°If possible, let¡¯s head out now.¡±

    The Twelve who had been waiting for this day for tens of thousands of years nodded. Fernando didn¡¯t say anything else either, knowing that the rest were anxious to get the whole thing over with. He immediately made spatial pathways, into which the Quintessence overgods entered.

    ¡°Fernando, after this battle, I will break through the bindings of this universe to fulfill your wish,¡± Han Shuo said.

    ¡°You have my eternal gratitude!¡± Fernando smiled, rarely for once, and motioned for Han Shuo to enter. Han Shuo looked at Han Hao gently before entering. Naturally, Han Hao also tagged along.

 Chapter 1026 - Allmother

    <h4>GDK 1026: Allmother</h4>

    Trantor: Ryogawa

    TLC: Hedonist

    Aethernia continued to creep along the cosmic aether, slowly nearing the center of this universe and Elysium. Countless lights were being released around the city, weaving together into a protective around the mysterious castle-like city.

    ¡°We couldn¡¯t havee a moment too soon,¡± Althea remarked. Given the rate Aethernia was moving, it would collide with the continent of Elysium in a few more decades. Everyone there would no doubt perish, with even the gods unable to escape the disaster. Without the power of faith, the Quintessence overgods would lose control of their Quintessence and be swiftly dispatched by the Allmother.

    ¡°Han Shuo, break the barrier, quick!¡± Monroe said, staring at him hatefully. ¡°If you can¡¯t break it, we¡¯ll wipe you out first! Our dominions have paid a huge price in order to make this happen!¡±

    ¡°Monroe, since when did you have the right to bark at me like that?¡± Han Shuo snapped coldly.

    ¡°You!¡± She angrily tossed a body of crystalline water towards him. Two centuries ago, Monroe had suddenly appeared and did the same thing to his avatar to humiliate him. Back then, his main body still didn¡¯t have enough energy to rival her, so it was all he could do to endure it.

    But now, he merely humphed coldly and sent the Cauldron of Myriad Demons out. Before that gigantic water drop approached, the cauldron sent a wave of water sshing outwards that pushed Monroe¡¯s attack aside and washed over her, sending her flying off uncontrobly. Her body turned into fluid before it reformed sometimeter. Now, all she did was grit her teeth and re at him without daring to threaten him any longer.

    ¡°This is for that day two centuries ago. If you continue to talk to me like that, don¡¯t me me for being not as gentle next time.¡± He smirked and held on to the cauldron.

    ¡°You!¡± Monroe was filled with anger, but she knew now that Han Shuo wasn¡¯t someone she could afford to mess with.

    ¡°Seriously, Monroe, don¡¯t you have something more important to worry about right now?¡± Han Shuo snapped, before he smiled and turned to Azdins, Lyna, as well as the Goddess of Wind and Gods of Fire, Lightning, and Earth. ¡°I know many of you will want to attack me after I break open the barrier. I¡¯ll be waiting, so make sure to give it your best shot.¡±

    He didn¡¯t say anything else and looked into a cauldron; beams came out of his eyes into the cauldron, filling it up and causing it to glow with a dark light. Cries of tormented souls could be hearding from within, as if there were demons within it about to be let out at any moment. As that urred, the Cauldron grew in size until it was a ck sphere adorned with many ancient and arcane characters alongside many ghastly faces.

    An ancient, mysterious and evil energy began to slowly leak from the cauldron. Then, the formation of the stars and moon could be seen on the ck spheroid, followed by the appearance of mountains,kes and all sorts of scenes of nature.

    Gradually, it began firing one dark beam after another, each one of them having a life of its own and shrieking as they left the cauldron. The beams gradually grew in size as they struggled to devour one another before growing into an unimaginablyrge blood of dark light. Then, an odd sound could be hearding from Aethernia. The barrier that was formed from the strongest energies of this universe actually began to crack.

    ¡°What a terrifying power! Aethernia¡¯s barrier is really cracking!¡± eximed the Goddess of Wind, Balyr. The other gods seemed to have mixed feelings about the matter as they watched the barrier slowly crumbling. On one hand, they had been waiting for this day for who knows how long. It was a miracle unfolding before their eyes. On the other hand, the energying out from the cauldron was so terrifying that they couldn¡¯t help but feel hostile towards it. They were worried that Han Shuo would be a blight to them before the barrier even fully copsed.

    Then, a clear, crackling sound could be heard from the colorful barrier. It had protected Aethernia for aeons, but now, it was slowlying apart, revealing holes through which people could see.

    ¡°We can enter now!¡± Fernando cried as he immediately opened up a spatial pathway to that crack. At that moment, the Quintessence overgods that stood at the pinnacle of Elysium began to turn to one another, hesitating. They didn¡¯t dare to be the first to step through the pathway. To them, the Allmother was the most terrifying existence in the entire universe. In their long lives, the trauma they had suffered from their fear of her was so much that they were hesitating at this crucial moment.

    ¡°If she doesn¡¯t die, you will anyway! What¡¯s there to hesitate about?¡± Han Shuo said, his eyes glowing paradoxically dark. He continued to pour in more power into the cauldron to make the crack bigger and bigger.

    Perhaps because his words had struck a chord in Althea, she hesitated for a moment and said, ¡°That¡¯s right. If she doesn¡¯t die, all of us will. Everyone, we¡¯ve been waiting for this for far too long, and I believe we should be ready for whatever¡¯s toe. Any of us alone is unable to threaten her one bit, so we must fight as one.¡±

    ¡°We should leave the matter of Han Shuo forter. Right now, the one that is the most threat to everyone is no doubt the Allmother. Perhaps we should work together to defeat Her first before we talk about anything else,¡± Nestor said as he turned to him.

    If Han Shuo didn¡¯t demonstrate his power just now, they might have already started attacking him. But after he schooled the Goddess of Water, Monroe, they began to take Han Shuo¡¯s power seriously.

    ¡°That¡¯s right. Dealing with Han Shuo as we have nned is no longer feasible,¡± Azdins said, never having denied the hostility he held for Han Shuo. ¡°Given his power, we won¡¯t be able to defeat him without suffering losses, and we can¡¯t afford to waste any of our energy on fighting amongst ourselves. Han Shuo, you should be aware that she won¡¯t let you off either, so I believe you should help us deal with her too!¡±

    ¡°Oh, that was my intention all along. Once she¡¯s dead, we¡¯ll settle our debts. We¡¯ll find out who the ruler of this universe is when we fightter.¡±

    ¡°Let¡¯s go in together,¡± Althea said. The others nodded, being able to push their petty squabbles aside to focus on the bigger picture.

    ¡°Alright!¡± Fernando said, being the first one to lead the way. The others followed and walked in line with him into the pathway.

    When Han Shuo entered, his eyes shed before the cauldron began to howl really loudly. Then, loud explosions could be heard as the colorful barrier was torn through like wet paper by the cauldron.

    ¡°It¡¯s gone now!¡± Fernando said as he and Althea hurried up to enter Aethernia. Han Hao and Han Shuo tagged closely behind. When he stepped onto Aethernia, he almost forgot to hold onto the cauldron.

    They all stood on the ground of Aethernia that was made from an unknown rocky material. There wasn¡¯t the slightest sign of life there, only incredibly dense elemental energies that were not one bit weaker than the power of the Quintessence. Han Shuo spread his consciousness throughout the entire ce and didn¡¯t feel any signs of life. It¡¯s as if the whole ce was dead.

    ¡°There¡¯s no sign of life here at all! What¡¯s going on?¡± Han Shuo said, before he turned to Lyna, the Goddess of Life, ¡°Do you feel her presence here?¡±

    ¡°My poweres from her, so even if she is right next to me, I won¡¯t be able to detect her presence,¡± she said with a resigned shrug.

    ¡°We have to find her first!¡± Fernando said, looking rather troubled. Ever since he came, he had been teleporting all over the ce but didn¡¯t find a single trace of the Allmother. He was running out of ideas.

    ¡°You¡¯re finally here, my dear children. I¡¯ve been waiting for you for a long time,¡± said a gentle voice all of a sudden that seemed to havee from the top of Aethernia. ¡°You¡¯re all standing on me right now, my dears. Why are you still looking?¡±

 Chapter 1027_END - Finale

    <h4>GDK 1027: Finale</h4>

    Trantor: Hedonist, Ryogawa

    Before the echo faded, Aethernia began to transform. The barrier that Han Shuo destroyed instantly repaired itself, enveloping Aethernia in iridescent lights and trapping all the intruders within.

    Then came a series of terrifying explosions, all so powerful that they caused the entirety of Aethernia to rumble. An enormous egg erupted from the center of Aethernia amidst the explosions.

    Immediately, the elemental energies from all over the universe began gushing towards the egg, covering its surface with colourful, moving stripes. Before long, the enormous egg cracked.

    A dazzling woman emerged with a faint smile on her face, sporting a pair of enchanting eyes that seemed so deep that it contained gxies within. Her lustrous hair shimmered with all colours, and her skin was a radiant translucent tone, stretched across her voluptuous, naked body. Surely, the concept of beauty itself was derived to describe her visage.

    Then, with a wave of her hand, the shattered egg shell glowed and transformed intoplex linear patterns that wrapped tightly around her body, forming strange yet beautiful patterns. The halo around her grew more distinct as she gradually exuded an austere, intimidating aura that kept growing stronger with time. The Twelve Overgods immediately locked their gazes at her, perceiving her as a hostile threat as their faces turned grave and pale.

    ¡°Allmother,¡± greeted Althea in a respectful voice before turning to her fellow Overgods and sternly yelled, ¡°What are you waiting for?¡±

    Immediately, the Overgods cast everyst bit of hesitation out of their minds and activated their Quintessences. Some held them in hand, others wore it on their chest, and some manifested them in their eyes.

    If they were ever to stand any chance against the Allmother, it would only be possible if they attacked with all they had. Channelling their force through the Quintessences which they came to dominate with the power of faith, they unleashed their full, apocalyptic might, pushing the power of their Quintessences to their very limits right from the get-go in hopes that it would annihte the Allmother. Raging fire, frigid ice, wrathful lightning, roaring wind, blinding light, all-consuming darkness, and other energies went sting towards her, but she did not seem the least bit concerned.

    ¡°O, my adorable children, it was Me who had bestowed power upon you. How could you hurt Me with what I gave you in the first ce?¡± the Allmother remarked with a benevolent smile, as if she was nagging at naughty little children. Dazzling, iridescent rays of light suddenly shot forth from her body before interweaving to form a barrier simr to the one enveloping Aethernia.

    The all-out strike of the Overgods shed with the barrier she willed into existence, but not a single explosion or sound could be heard. Their attack was like water that was being poured into the ocean, not causing the slightest stir nor ssh. Needless to say, it did not damage the Allmother in the slightest, much to their abject horror. Some were even visibly frightened.

    ¡°You are all born of this universe, and everything that you have was granted by Me. I raised all of you, granted you power, and gave youmand over My nes. Yet, you wish to betray Me. Is this how you repay Your Mother?!¡± said the Allmother with the same smile.

    Then, the strange patterns stered on her perfect body began to glow and move as the iridescent barrier disintegrated into countless lights that flowed into her body, further infusing her already terrifying aura with even more dread and august ir while also making the colorful halo around her take a more corporeal form. Even her skin seemed brighter and more magnificent.

    The looks on the Overgods¡¯ faces turned even more sour, having beenpletely blindsided by the Allmother¡¯s ability to render their attack useless and convert it into Her nourishment.

    ¡°We don¡¯t deny you gave us everything we have, but it wasn¡¯t out of good intention on your part. You only wanted to make us servants with which to maintain your grip on the universe. Despite possessing the Quintessences, we could only borrow its power but never truly possess it. You¡¯ve never treated us as your own children, but as ves,¡± said Althea calmly, shooting the Allmother a grim look.

    ¡°So? What¡¯s wrong with that?¡± The smile on Allmother remained warm and kind ¡°You are all My children. It is only right that you take part in My work and grand design. And you, Althea, are my favourite for being the most impressive of My children. But do you really think that you can harm Me just by joining hands with them?¡±

    ¡°Of course not. I knew that we would never be able to harm you. You could easily destroy all twelve of us without breaking a sweat even when you were severely injured with only a fraction of your power. Had you done that, however, you wouldn¡¯t be getting a constant supply of the power of faith, so you chose to control us through the Twelve Quintessences like you always have.¡±

    ¡°That is correct,¡± the Allmother seemed pleased. ¡°You are indeed the smartest of My children. I did indeed deliberately spare your lives. If I had killed you all, I wouldn¡¯t have obtained such enormous streams of faith power as choosing new Quintessence Overgods involves time and trouble. That is the sole reason why you all still exist.¡±

    All the Overgods except Althea were stunned; even Han Shuo and Han Hao were shocked to learn that.

    ¡°Althea, what do you mean?¡± Monroe was appalled and horrified. ¡°Are you saying that we should have died long ago? That she left us alive not because she couldn¡¯t kill us? Then all the work that we had done for all these years had all been in vain? Was our fate ordained from the start? You bitch! You knew everything and kept it to yourself! Fuck you, Althea, you fucking trecherous bitch!¡± Monroe, the Goddess of Water, could no longer hold it together after learning the truth.

    ¡°Isn¡¯t that better? If I had told you the truth back then, your life would have been filled with dread, and you definitely wouldn¡¯t have done my bidding. At least I gave you a purpose in life,¡± replied Althea indifferently.

    ¡°How could you do this to us?!¡± cried Lyna.

    ¡°Our power came from Allmother. No matter how weak She is, we cannot kill Her. This is a fact that nobody can change!¡±

    Althea turned to look calmly at Allmother and asked, ¡°You left us alive for so long till now so that you can retake our power on this day, right? And once you absorb our energy, you will recover your power fully and release the Quintessences once more to raise another cycle of Overgods, correct?¡±

    ¡°It seems that I have overlooked some things after I was hurt. Have you removed the seal, Althea?¡± the Allmother gently raised an eyebrow as though something was out of Her expectation.

    ¡°Yes, I have. Every few billion years, you would gather all the Quintessence Overgods, assimte their energy, annihte their body and soul, and select a fresh batch of Quintessence bearers ¨C but I will always be spared. In every cycle, you would just seal off my memories and some of my powers before making me reincarnate to be the Destiny Goddess again and again. If my count is right, there have been nine cycles, and all 99 of the Overgods had their energy taken and their souls destroyed. If it wasn¡¯t for that person hurting you so badly, I would still be blinded from the true essence of Destiny and remain your helpless puppet!¡±

    ¡°Oh, so you have found out about your past. Big deal. But so what? What else can you do about it? Soon, I will rid you all of your power. And you, Althea, will have your memories sealed once more. You will be reincarnated again and again, managing the trajectory of the universe¡¯s destiny for me and supplying me with destiny energy from every part of the universe. This is your destiny as it has always been, as it currently is, and as it ever will be!¡±

    The Allmother put Her hands together, causing Her eyes to glow like a pair of zing suns. All of a sudden, twelve glowing vessels of different colors emerged from every corner of Aethernia, each of them emanating a distinct aura corresponding to each of the Twelve Fundamental Forces as immense energy waves.

    ¡°Quintessence Vessels!¡± cried Azdins in terror. The Quintessence on his chest was going berserk and dragging him towards one of the Quintessence Vessels.

    It wasn¡¯t just Azdins; all the Quintessence Oversgods, except Han Hao, started losing control over their Quintessences and themselves. Struggle as they might, they couldn¡¯t stop themselves from being drawn towards their respective vessels.

    ¡°I cannot resist you, but I can kill them!¡± Althea suddenly let out a wild shriek and the Mirror of Destiny in her hand glowed with strange, colorful lights. Fine threads, representing the orbits of life surfaced from the mirror and entangled with one another. Soon enough, the billions of threads intertwined to form eleven bright and thick threads. As soon as those eleven threads took shape, all the Overgods felt a pull on their divine souls, causing them to jolt once more.

    ¡°Althea, what the hell are you doing?!¡± Nestor shouted, absolutely horrified.

    ¡°You can never escape from Her, but at the very least, I can make sure your death isn¡¯t in vain!¡± Althea gritted her teeth and started to pull the eleven thick strands with all her strength.

    ¡°Damn you, Althea!¡± the Allmother, who appeared calm and unhurried the whole time, finally showed a hint of true emotion: wrath. She pointed at Althea and shot a stream of colorful beams at her.

    Knowing that she cannot resist the power, Althea immediately turned to Han Shuo and shouted in a panicked voice, ¡°Help me, Han Shuo! All these souls I had gathered from all those wars are for this moment! Once the threads in my mirror are broken, their divine souls will shatter with their Quintessences and the Allmother will be weakened! Only then will you stand a chance at killing Her!¡±

    ¡°Han Hao, attack!¡± Han Shuo ordered after making his decision in a split second before he charged towards Althea. He hurled the Cauldron of Myriad Demon towards her as a clump of ck light emerged from it and enveloped Althea in a barrier.

    Even though this meant that Fernando, the Overgod of Space would perish, it was Han Shuo¡¯s one and only real chance at killing the Allmother. It was a fight for his and the world¡¯s survival, something that he had to do even if it meant sacrificing a good friend.

    The two energies representing the pinnacle of power from their respective universes shed, creating a blinding burst of light that lit up every inch of Aethernia. Han Shuo¡¯s body trembled as he barely managed to resist the Allmother¡¯s strike.

    ¡°You think you can fight me, Han Shuo? Your power isn¡¯t even close to what He had!¡± remarked the Allmother before she gestured, sending eleven halos to envelope the eleven Overgods.

    ¡°Oh no! With those barriers, their Quintessence will remain intact even if I shatter their souls. Han Shuo, you must destroy those barriers or I won¡¯t be able to destroy their Quintessence!¡± Althea eximed.

    ¡°Understood!¡±

    Out of nowhere, a majestic figure utilizing a bizarre energy tore through in Aethernia¡¯s barrier andnded before the Allmother. It was Han Shuo¡¯s avatar, now no longer half-baked and forciblybined using the edict of space like it had been two centuries ago. Now, his face was symmetrical and wless.

    Back then, as Han Shuo¡¯s main body remained inside the Mystical Yin Harvester to be reforged, he did not have time at all to get intimate with any of his women. Eventually, Rose threw herself on his avatar. Having practiced this involuntary abstinence for ages, Han Shuo could no longer hold it and went on to consummate the delicious fruits of their rtionship.

    While using his usual demonic coption technique of Yin-Yang enhancement, he discovered that the two parts of his avatars began to show signs of harmonizing. From that point on, Han Shuo began his journey of pleasurable cultivation with his women in Pandemonium. Thanks to the sheer size of his harem, he could engage in cultivation non-stop and make rapid progress. Eventually, the two parts of his avatarpletely reconciled and fused into one three decades ago.

    ¡°Oh?!¡± The Allmother¡¯s face jolted slightly as she sized up the other Han Shuo. She eximed, ¡°Not bad, not bad at all, you have managed to fuse all Twelve Fundamental Forces in that body. It isparable to mine in my youth. Excellent! I can directly assimte this body of yours and grow my power to a new peak!¡±

    ¡°Han Hao, attack!¡± shouted Han Shuo. His main body and his avatar then charged at the Allmother. Meanwhile, Han Hao, who was on his White Bone Throne, activated the seven bone spurs on his back, releasing a burst of aura filled with extreme dread, desperation, and hatred. His seven bone spurs assailed the radiant barriers enveloping the Overgods while he charged towards the Allmother alongside Han Shuo.

    Han Shuo sent forth a hundred thousand demon generals from the cauldron while his avatar charged up the Twelve Fundamental Forces into a giant beam. Han Hao concentrated his negative energy on his bone spear. All three of them attacked with their full power. Had it been any of the Quintessence Overgod, they would have no chance of surviving this attack.

    The Allmother put on a grave look. Suddenly, a strange light shed in her eyes and she shrunk into a sphere, once more enveloped in a giant eggshell. The attacksnded on the mercurial shell produced loud explosions, but didn¡¯t seem to shatter it at all. It appeared as though the energy of Han Shuo¡¯s avatar did not have much of an effect on the eggshell. Only his demonic energy and Han Hao¡¯s negative energy caused the eggshell to shake.

    ¡°Keep it going!¡± shouted Han Shuo. The hundreds of thousands of demon generals emerged from the cauldron and attached themselves to Han Shuo¡¯s arm, forming an enormous, terrifying fist. He punched on the eggshell with all his power.

    The strike contained the full power of Han Shuo¡¯s main body and every demon general in the cauldron. It was Han Shuo¡¯s ultimate attack. When itnded, a high-pitch ringing could be heard as cracks finally formed on the eggshell.

    Before Han Shuo could throw a second punch, the Allmother re-emerged with bits of eggshell sticking to Her skin, forming colorful lines. Her bright, translucent skin seemed to have turned a hint dimmer. She hastily retreated a great distance away before she snapped, ¡°How dare you?! I am the Creator! Worship Me!¡±

    Then, she performed a bizarre gesture with her two hands, causing a new Quintessence Vessel to appear out of thin air. This vessel glowed with a dark radiance and seemed much bigger than the others. It shimmered with an even more ancient and mystical power, echoing not just the Allmother¡¯s aura, but also the sinister aura of Han Shuo. As soon as the Quintessence Vessel appeared, it streaked across the sky almost instantly and buckled on the top of Han Hao¡¯s head.

    Immediately, Han Hao began to stare nkly at the Allmother. His seven bone spurs that were shooting towards other Quintessence Overgods suddenly froze in mid-air.

    ¡°Han Hao, you are my son. My only son!¡± said the Allmother with a warm and kind voice as she shot him a loving gaze. She smiled and asked, ¡°Your father wants to kill me, he wants to kill Mother. Son, are you going to let your father kill Mother?¡±

    ¡°No,¡± replied Han Hao in a monotonous voice. After staring for a while, he pointed the bone spear in his hand towards Han Shuo.

    ¡°Wha¨C what the fuck is going on?!¡± Han Shuo waspletely bbergasted. He looked to Han Hao, and then back to the Allmother, with a feeling that everything was about toe copsing down.

    The Allmother was still all smiles. ¡°Good boy, Han Hao. Now, Han Shuo, did you think your bloodline alone and your imperfect demonic arts was enough for him to grow nearly as he is now? Oh, Han Shuo, ever since this child got the gravestone, a trace of my blood and stigma manifested within him. You werepletely oblivious to it.

    ¡°There¡¯s no way he would¡¯ve been able to mature so quickly without my blood and stigma to the point he could rival you in power. Do you really think that a new Quintessence would just form out of the blue? Let me tell you, Han Shuo, he is the child of both of us, and it¡¯s only natural for a good son to defend his mother from a father that¡¯s trying to kill her.¡±

    Those words exined everything. Han Shuo finally understood how Han Hao was able to improve so quickly and even form a brand new Quintessence which didn¡¯t need the sustenance of faith, unlike Nestor¡¯s or the others¡¯. The Allmother had nted a seed within him long ago, a seed that kept on festering the whole time!

    ¡°What did you do to him?! He¡¯s definitely not himself!¡± Han Shuo bellowed. His heart clenched at the sight of Han Hao pointing the bone spear at him.

    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. You will die, but he will outlive you! He is the only true child I¡¯ve ever had in my aeons of life ¨C my Firstborn! Althea was right; I have always considered the Overgods mere ves. They are not fit to be my children. They don¡¯t have my blood nor stigma. Hahahaha.... Han Shuo, I really owe you my gratitude. Without your blood and the knowledge of demonic arts that was transferred to him, my child wouldn¡¯t have grown so powerful. Rest in peace knowing that our son will be the sole ruler of this universe! After I retake Althea and the others¡¯ powers, I wille to your universe to conquer it!¡± The Allmother began cackling in an uncharacteristic fashion, breaking her saintly image. ¡°Han Hao, kill your father and this universe will be yours!¡±

    Han Hao seemed to no longer be able to recognize Han Shuo after hearing that order. He charged towards Han Shuo, mercilessly aiming his spear at him. At the same time, the Allmother tried to hold back Han Shuo¡¯s main body as she began collecting the twelve Quintessence Vessels. Even with her power not at its prime, she was not someone Han Shuo could easily take on. She was easily able to push Han Shuo back with such force he couldn¡¯t afford to not evade her attacks.

    ¡°Han Hao, snap out of it! I am your father! Your only parent!¡± Han Shuo¡¯s main body and his avatar both yelled in an attempt to snap Han Hao out of it. He couldn¡¯t bear to hurt him and kept on evading instead. His avatar tore into the surrounding space while his main body continued to retreat from the Allmother¡¯s attacks and slowly suffered damage from her Twelve Fundamental Forces. His arms, chest, abdomen, and waist were all hurt. Even with his Invincible Omen Body, he wasn¡¯t impervious to Allmother¡¯s attacks, as was apparent from the blood all over him. He had no choice but to continue sacrificing divine souls within the Cauldron of Myriad Demon to mitigate the damage he suffered.

    ¡°ept your fate. I have found out about you long ago and you are but a pawn in my grand scheme. The only reason you managed to live till now wasn¡¯t thanks to Fernando or Althea. I needed you to grow strong enough so my son could continue to improve. Not to mention, I will be partaking in the energy you have amassed.

    ¡°Hahaha... Once I collect the energy from your two bodies, I will use your techniques to ovee the great divide between the universes and head to your universe and do as I please. Know that your destiny has been written and you¡¯ll never be able to change it!¡± The Allmother was all too happy at Han Shuo¡¯s increasingly battered state.

    Althea, who was watching from the sidelines, couldn¡¯t do anything to help. Her power had originated from the Allmother herself, so even if she joined in, she wouldn¡¯t be able to do any damage to her. In fact, she would be essentially returning her energy to the Allmother.

    If this went on, everyone who came to Aethernia would be wiped out in one fell swoop by the Allmother. There was no way she would allow anyone to leave alive. Han Hao¡¯s sudden changepletely threw Althea and Han Shuo¡¯s n out of whack, leaving them at a huge disadvantage. Meanwhile, Han Shuo¡¯s avatar got stabbed through his chest by the bone spear. Han Hao pulled the spear out and immediately aimed for the head.

    ¡°Wake up, Han Hao! Did you forget the time we fought together in the academy on the Profound Continent? You did all sorts of things for me, helped me teach Lisa a lesson, helped me...¡± Han Shuo looked panicked for the first time. He wasn¡¯t able to bring himself to kill Han Hao and things were growing worse by the second.

    However, his desperate plea seemed to be working. Han Hao¡¯s face suddenly turned nk before he broke into tears, as if there were thousands of sharp des being drawn through his head at that moment. His eyes turned clear and then blurry again, alternating between the two states.

    When the Allmother noticed the change, she seemed slightly taken aback, as if she hadn¡¯t expected Han Hao to even be able to resist her stigma. As she was nning to reassert control over him, Han Shuo¡¯s main body intensified his attacks like a madman, summoning all hundred thousand demon generals from the cauldron and fusing them with his main body regardless of the cost! He kept the Allmother upied with an unrelenting effort.

    ¡°Aaaagh!¡± Han Hao yelled louder and louder. ¡°I only have a father, I don¡¯t have a mother!¡±

    When he said that, he pierced the bone spear towards the Quintessence Vessel on his head, causing it to shatter. The seven bone spikes that had been hovering in the air previously continued their trajectory towards the barriers around the other Overgods¡¯ heads.

    ¡°Nooooo!¡± shrieked the Allmother in full desperation.

    Althea, who had been waiting for a chance, finally got it and immediately snapped the thick strands extending from the Mirror of Destiny. Then, the mirror shattered. Apart from Fernando, whose Quintessence Vessel had been broken by Han Hao moments before, the bodies of the other ten Overgods were instantly reduced to dust in a clear, audible explosion, which was quickly followed by ten explosions within the Allmother¡¯s body. With each boom, color drained from her face. After the final one, she staggered weakly from the power leaving her.

    ¡°Han Hao, let¡¯s kill this Bitch together!¡± Han Shuo cried.

    With Han Hao¡¯s reason now restored, they worked in tandem and unleashed an endless barrage on the weakened Allmother, debilitating her current state even further. Meanwhile, Fernando stood with Althea as they watched the father and son ravage the Allmother, poking thousands of holes through her out of which her life force seeped and waned.

    Suddenly, the Cauldron of Myriad Demon in Han Shuo¡¯s hand sucked the Allmother entirely into it. Using the energy from the souls of the dead Overgods that had yet to dissipate, the cauldron managed to keep the Allmother sealed within. Han Shuo held the cauldron tightly and said, ¡°Fernando, open a spatial pathway to Pandemonium. I¡¯m going to use it to slowly grind her down to nonexistence!¡±

    Shocked, Fernando immediately made a pathway and let the father and son leave, before going through the pathway himself with Althea. Aethernia, now no longer supported by the Allmother¡¯s power, crumbled and imploded into space debris.

    Back in Pandemonium, the Ninth Realm Mystical Yin Harvester was reactivated, but this time, it wasn¡¯t infusing Mystical Yin into Han Shuo¡¯s body. Instead, it was using the remnant pieces of soul of the dead Overgods and the demon generals from the cauldron as well as the Mystical Yin that had been gathered over the years to transmute and refine the Allmother.

    Soon, a century passed. With Fernando, Althea, and Han Hao keeping guard, Han Shuo finally managed to grind away at thest remnants of the Allmother¡¯s will and awareness. As he did so, his avatar began to absorb the energy refined from the cauldron gradually. Now that the Allmother was gone for good, his avatar was magnitudes more powerful than before.

    Han Shuo finally emerged from Pandemonium and looked at Fernando, Althea, Gilbert, Emily, the Five Elite Zombies, Andrina, Phoebe, Wasir and the others. Smiling, he said, ¡°She¡¯s gone for good. From now on, this overlord of the universe is no more.¡±

    ¡°You are the new overlord of the universe,¡± Althea said with a smile.

    ¡°Sorry, I misunderstood you. I thought you stood with the other ten,¡± Han Shuo apologized sincerely.

    Smiling and shaking her head, Althea said, ¡°You don¡¯t need to be. I had been waiting for this chance the whole time. For the sake of achieving my goals, I have done more unspeakable things than I would have liked. Thankfully, you managed to seed and didn¡¯t disappoint me. Not to mention, you¡¯re not just another Allmother. You wouldn¡¯t do something as cruel and unjust as she would.¡±

    ¡°Han Shuo, when will you finally open a pathway to another universe for me? I am itching to go out for a walk,¡± Fernando said with a warm smile.

    ¡°Maybe a centuryter. I¡¯ll let my main body absorb some more energy from this universe and break through to the realm of the Exalted Demonlord. Then, I will be able to establish a pathway to other universes for you.¡±

    ¡°I would like to leave and take a look outside as well,¡± Althea said. Turning to Fernando, she said, ¡°Let¡¯s go. We shouldn¡¯t disturb him any longer.¡±

    ¡°Father, you¡¯re finally done,¡± Han Hao said. Now, he was smiling in a most natural fashion, something previously thought impossible for an artificial lifeform like him.

    Han Shuo didn¡¯t say anything else and merely ruffled his hair. The father and son could already understand one another without words.

    Then, Han Shuo turned to look lecherously Emily, Phoebe, Fanny, Helen, Lisa, Sophie, Jasper, Sylph, Hemanna, Donna, and Rose. ¡°I know, you all have been wanting to bear my children for a long time now. And you won¡¯t have to wait any longer; From now on, we will be making babies, and I will give you as many children as you want!¡±

    Thedies blushed, smiling with contentment and excitement.

    ¡ª- The End ¡ª-

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